Olivia’s Diary

September 22, 1922
I am so excited to finally be in India! As soon as it was announced on the boat that it would only take a few more days to arrive in Bombay, my impatience started to get more and more. To be honest, it was quite boring on the boat. Sure, a lot of entertainment was offered to the passengers and the crew was very friendly. After a while however, I started longing for some change. I started to feel the need to go somewhere else; my bedroom, the dining hall, the lobby; they all started to annoy me.
But I am here now! During the trip to our house I saw a lot of the beautiful nature in this country. When driving through cities I also saw a lot of local Indian people. They were a bit different than I had imagined. Especially the clothing is different. In the streets there are bazaars and everywhere you can smell food.
When I arrived at our house this morning I was very pleasantly surprised. The house is just wonderful! The servants immediately took care of my luggage and there was nothing for me to worry about. Douglas took me to the living room where some cold drinks were waiting for me. Oh I was so happy to see him again and hold him in my arms! It has been such a while!
Unfortunately Douglas couldn’t stay very long; he had to get back to work. This disappointed me a little. I have been missing him so much all these weeks!
When he was gone I decided to start unpacking my luggage; however I found that the servants were already busy doing this. My Hindi is very bad so by waving my hand I tried to send them away.
Now I have finished unpacking and don’t know what to do anymore. I can’t wait until Douglas will be back to spend the evening with me. However, he had already warned me: it could be quite late and if I’m tired I should go to bed.

December 12, 1923
Tonight, Douglas said, some people from work are coming over to have dinner at our place.
I am very excited to meet these people. The Crawfords will be coming. Mr.