The other night I went to the engagement party of my research assistant's brother. I had no idea what to expect or what to wear. I have only been to one Indian engagement party and I was pretty underdressed for it. My RA sent me a text message that said no special clothing required, everyone's wearing western clothing. That is actually quite difficult because I brought very few clothes from home with me. I wore some nice pants and a fun dress that I bought in London. I was picked up from IIM campus about 830pm by several girls in short short fancy dresses and tons of make up talking on their phones and smoking cigarettes - it does not take much to make me feel old and out of place. We drove for a while out of town, picking up others and switching cars along the way. My RA's family is in the navy, so they had the party at the local naval base. We arrived late, but it did not seem to matter much. There were chairs all around a nice lawn with a bar on one side and a DJ and dance floor on the other. Everyone was really nice and interested to meet me. There were a few older men with huge white mustaches - which mark them as from the Rajput caste, many young people gathered in groups by age, and family members here and there. Everyone except the children was taking advantage of the bar and I wondered whether the rules must be different for alcohol in the navy (Gujarat is a dry state). The family is mostly Roman Catholic and my RA refers to herself as Anglo-Indian. Her mother seems very young and spunky and her father seems extremely gentle, I could see it in his eyes right away. Before I knew it everyone - and I mean everyone - was dancing together in front of the DJ. Grandparents, parents, teens and children were kicking up their heels to Bollywood, Elvis and hip hop. All kinds of tasty appetizers were circling around and it was quite fun. It took me a little while to get on the dance floor, but how could I not, even my RA's grandmother was up there?