Growing up, my neighbour was like the Indian version of Ned Flanders/Indian music teacher... I was 14 in his house recording me playing the sitar/his baby...
He has a lot of different Indian instruments, from drums to stringed and like wood box accordion thing... His sitar was like his baby/he didn't lend me that, let me play on it though as I jammed with my guitar back then... Holding a sitar is... Tricky, and involves yoga and your foot and there's a book he showed me real quick on how to hold it, and I remember playing it was great, and I remember my arm got tired since it was above my head with that thing and the sitar picks are like metal wires on your finger and your fret next to the raised fret, that was cool, sounded awesome! - He lent me a wooden cross between a guitar and piano you strummed with metal keys, and that had another plastic pick that was bigger and longer than a guitar pick, I don't know what that was called, but that was alright as far as instruments went... (I was the kid with a bulbul tarang in his bedroom thanks to his neighbour).
'I just Googled it and found out what it was called.'
The craziest thing my school had, and we had a couple of these, were steel drums.