Visiting American students have watched recently-released movies like 'Lage Raho Munna Bhai', 'Dhoom 2' and 'Don' to sharpen their knowledge of Hindi.

Nearly 20 students, who arrived here from the United States on an educational tour as part of New York State Independent College Consortium for six weeks, will be learning to speak some Hindi, enjoying Rajasthani cuisine, watching Indian movies and celebrating festivals.

Amanda, a master's student from New York, has come for the third time to the Pink City. While twice earlier she came as a student, this time she has come as a teacher.

Talking to press today, she said that "we were into this course at University of Rajasthan and enjoyed the course to enrich our knowledge".

Asked about exercises they were asked to do to enhance their knowledge of Hindi, Amanda said that the students were asked to watch more and more Hindi movies.

"We have stayed as paying guests with a typical Indian family. With our landlords and landladies, we are asked to speak only in Hindi. Apart from watching movies, we also had on and off interactions with the locals in Hindi which includes everyone from rickshaw puller to a tea vendor", she said.

"Bahut kuch seekh gaye hain (we have learnt a lot)", she replied in Hindi.

Asked about the girl sitting next to her, Ananda said "yeh meri bahen hai (she is my sister)".

Maintaining that Jaipur has changed a lot in the last six years, Amanda said earlier a few shopping malls were there, but now they were located at every nook and corner. "The last time I came to Pink City were in 1997 and 2000. Compared to then, Jaipur has visually changed a lot", she said.

These groups of students go and watch Hindi movies almost every Friday.

Her sister Rebecca, who is also the student in the group, said that though initially they did not understand Hindi movies, the drama, emotions, music and whistles of Indian audience were enough to give the meaning.

While they have watched 'Don', 'Lage raho munna bhai", 'Dhoom 2' and 'Kabul Express, majority of the students liked 'Dhoom 2'.

Amanda said she has become a fan of Hritik Roshan, who has starred in 'Dhoom 2', and asked if he was in Jaipur and was shooting for 'Akbar Jodha'. "I like his acting and style".

She is planning to study Jainism and also thinking on doing some research work on it.

"I found Jainism and its beliefs quite interesting," she said, adding that she was aware of the ritual of 'Santhara', a fast unto death practised in the Jain community.

Asked if she found it good practice, she said, "I am no one to comment on beliefs of any community".

Apart from learning Hindi, their course included studies on Indian history, Indian music and environment.

Some of the girls have even learned to cook Indian cuisine like 'matar paneer' and 'gobi ka parantha'."In our landlord's house, our landlady sometime took us in the kitchen and gave the tips on cooking some of the dishes," they said.