The Story telling Workshop

Saturday morning turned out to be quite unexpected for us. As we dropped our daughter  to school for a story telling session, little did we know that the workshop was actually for us and not just for the children. We had an elaborate plan of sending a courier, going to a dress boutique and generally conquering the whole world as our daughter attends the session. We were swooped in for this wonderful experience with Sowmya Srinivas, who is heading Pre Primary in Sri Chaitanya Techno school and an artist in All India Radio. She has a neat way of telling stories through sound, expressions and gestures and she also sings.

The session started with some activities for parents. For example, we had to draw our child’s favorite thing or person and then enact or tell a story on that drawing. We drew a Lotus (Daughter’s favorite flower) in a pond and Sun and my wife thoughtfully named them as Kamal and Suraj and that the story is about their deep friendship. As we went on, Sowmya enacted how a story can be told with deep, long, loud expressive voices, facial expressions and hand gestures with rhyming jingles. The story was about the Monkey and the Crocodile. It reminded me of my Hindi teacher who took us this lesson – “Magar aur Bandar” and how he pronounced Magar (crocodile) as Maagarrrrrrrr, which earned him the name Magarji. There was then a touching story of a boy who lost his mother and then considered his teacher to be his mother. She showed how flashcards might also be a good aid in telling stories, probably just like the story books filled with pictures. Lastly we had a small activity of enacting an animal without narration by 4 different teams. We did the peacock with one of us as the dancing peacock and the rest of us making the sound of rain and hand gestures of rain falling from the top.

It was a day when we loosened up a bit for our children. Adults in their late 20’s and early 30’s were turning themselves into 5 year olds and learning the art of having and spreading fun. It also helped us to see how the teachers of our children turn themselves into 5 year olds to teach our children, as they participated along with us. Lastly as we had a brief chat with Sowmya, She reminded us where we actually heard stories from, our grand parents. I heard stories from my Grandma, My daughter hears stories of MGR killing the pirates from my father and other mythological stories from my in laws. Perhaps when we become Grandparents we will have stories of Rajinikanth to tell our Grandchildren. It becomes so, that as we age, as we go through our life, we finally learn the value of Fun, the fun that we can have with our Grand children. We remain busy until then taking care of the life.

Ultimately, be it a simple story telling session or playing a video game on a phone, we fail to recognize that it is Fun that we are actually having and not the object of Fun. Objects change, but Fun remains the same. Hopefully, we will get to this inner realization as we age.

Until then, Just have Fun!

Pancake Mommy Pancake

Apparently the following song seems to be a rage among 2-3 year olds! It is like their Rock music! The boy in the song probably has a huge fan following like Bono, I mean look at the cute winking that he does!

Pancake Mommy Pancake,

Mommy fired the Pancake,

Rice flouru and Urad flouru, mixed and formed the pancake,

For the father fouru,

For the mother threeu,

For the brother twou,

for the baby onnu,

Eatu Eatu Desireu,

Turn and ask means rituals!

Which song you ask? It is the Tamil Rhyme song – Dosai amma Dosai. Thank you Youtube! What would those of us staying away from the homeland, do without Youtube!

Zen and the art of Cooking

Is Cooking an art?

Cooking is just cooking. Cooking starts of as just a process to learn and then It becomes an art in the hands of an able master. A master chef would say that the best food is not made by its ingredients, but the way it is made with it. There is a lot of philosophy associated with Cooking than just following recipes. Recipes are mere guides. The universal truth about cooking is:

“The same dish cannot be made the same way, again!”

Even master chefs would agree to this. They would make it tasty every time, but it may not look or feel or even taste the same every time.

So what has Zen got to do with Cooking? Everything!

There may be a lot of aspects to cooking, but according to me there are 4 aspects that will make a particular food, the best product of art ever.

HOSPITALITY

Hospitality is not just about how you treat the guests. It is about how you bring your guests and set them free in the confines of your environment. The guest can be anyone – a new friend, or a relative or even the family in the house.

This is an aspect of cooking that happens before the chef even enters the kitchen. We can refer this to ambiance in a restaurant to an extent. We always have some anxiety in a new place. Hospitality is about letting that go away and making them comfortable. Only a relaxed mind, a mind that is free, a mind that is sure about its environment, will be able to taste the goodness in a good food. Even Wolfgang puck would need this for his food to taste good.

I know this is abstract, but a little prior knowledge about the guest will help you make this happen. This is where the non-cooking member plays an important role in cooking (see the paradox here?). They can make the person feel comfortable by talking things of their interest or indulging in simple activities of their interest that can free their mind.

This is what they call it as – ‘BE AT HOME’

COOKING SPACE

How would you like to have your food? In a Clean Plate or In a plate that is not washed?

If you answered Clean plate, then why should you start cooking in a dirty kitchen? Space is precious. According to Zen, Space and the Material world go together. They are different entities, yet they cannot be separated and hence they are one. Would you know how to define space if there was nothing but space in this world and vice versa?

So it is very important to start cooking in a space that is clean, that is devoid of anything from your previous stint of cooking. Just like how the universe appeared from the void or singularity, your cooking should also start from nothing or Shoonya (Zero) or empty space.

A Clean space will indicate a clean mind, a clean mind with no prejudices and hence the cooking will start with no silly assumptions from before. You will be creative each time. Why do you think programmers like to write the code from Scratch? Why do you think Mothers clean the kitchen space before hitting the bed every night?

Start with a Clean Slate everyday!

SPONTANEOUS

When Arjuna was learning to shoot the arrow, he was asked what he saw through his eyes, as he aimed. He said he saw the eyes of a bird. When he shot the arrow after that, he didn’t think even for a second. He just shot it.

So if you know what to do and figured out how to do, just do it. The moment you think as you do, you will likely be derailed from the original plan. You may end up spoiling the dish. But at the same time, if you think you can add a pinch of salt more than what the recipe says, then just add it without thinking. That will be spontaneous. Your alterations to the recipe should also happen in a spontaneous way. Also, the alterations you did today, may not work the same way the next day, so don’t bother to take notes of those alterations.

Just feel the flow, and be spontaneous. Why do you think a Mother’s food tastes the best in the world. It is because she knows you more than you think she does and she cooks the food in a spontaneous way which will make you love it! That is why it is called the Mother’s touch. It is her spontaneous alterations that suits the needs of the family, makes it taste the best in the world.

COOKING MIND

What is on your mind today? Happiness or Sorrow or Jealousy or any kind of emotions? Your food that you cook will reflect what is in your mind. So what is the best emotion that should be on your mind when you cook? Is it Happiness or should we not have any emotion at all?

It is Love that you should have in your mind when you cook. When you mind is full of love for your family and yourself , your food will taste fantastic. You can’t hate yourself and still love others, only when you love yourself (which is not the same as self centered) you will be able to love others. It flows from the inside to outside.

A Mother’s food tastes the best because of the love she radiates from within herself to the whole family. We fail to see that in her most of the times, but we sure enough love the food that she cooks. What we like is not just the tasty food, but we indirectly feel that love. And when you tell her that you enjoyed the food very much, that is all the acknowledgment she needs, to know that her love has reached you.

Cook like a mother, with all the love in your mind.

Here is an Imaginary Conversation with the Wife:

Wife: “You don’t cook much or often. All you did was a silly Rasam when you were a Bachelor! How can you even write an article on the art of cooking?”

Me: “Why not! Did Vatsayana, before writing his book, ever …” (Wife Interrupts).

Wife: “Enough, I got the point. Now, Let’s keep your blog at PG!”

Worries

Everyone worries about something at some point. It is just that “the some point”, is very different for Men and Women. Men and Women worry about things at different points and believe me, that makes all the difference. Here are a few case studies:

CASE 1: THE LAUNDRY

A Woman buys a Churidhar. She starts worrying about how to wash it right from the time she buys it. The dress is beautifully worked, but the only problem is it can only be hand washed. So, she is worried that she should remember not to machine wash it.

Now, the Man of the house always likes to impress the Woman for various reasons. So he rolls up his sleeves and tries to do the laundry himself, in the pretext of providing a surprise help. But the problem is he does a machine wash. Until this point, the man is not worried.

Man: “Honey, I’ve washed all your clothes!”

Woman: “Oh, that’s so sweet! wait … what about that churidhar?”

Man: “That too Honey, and you are very welcome”

Woman: “Oh my God, you can’t machine wash it!”

Here is when the Man starts worrying and prays to every god in every religion, to save that one churidhar from the evil effects of the washing machine.

CASE 2: THE COOKING

A Woman knows how to cook, because she is worried about what to cook even before she enters the kitchen. All your trips to Grocery stores to buy vegetables and stuff is because a Woman is worried 7 days in advance, as to what needs to be cooked the whole of next week. She doesn’t write that down, but she keeps them in mind. (Why else you think you are sent to the Grocery store? To stuff the Kitchen shelves and fridge for decoration?)

So if she says she is going to cook “Venn Pongal” and “Sambar” today, it means that she has already worried about buying all of its ingredients, 7 days in advance. This is exactly why you are having that dish today. Not because of some magic.

A Man on the other hand, only thinks that he knows how to cook, but he is far from it. The problem is the Man assumes that there are house elves that take care of putting the items in Kitchen shelves and fridge. So, he sets out to surprise his wife by trying to make a simple dish – Pasta. He promptly lets the water to boil and as soon as it reaches slightly above boiling point (noted from excessive smokey water vapour from the container) he begins looking for the pasta.

This is when the Man starts worrying. Too bad, he needs to leave it to luck to find the pasta and even if he finds the pasta, it is usually the case that there is no pasta sauce in the house 99% of the time. The legend has it that this is how Man learnt to make boiling water.

CASE 3: CLEANING

A Woman is worried about disorderliness, atleast to an extent. She is worried if the house will get clumsy and look bad to the guests. So she indulges herself in keeping things clean, decorating the home and basically tries to keep everything in order, even before it gets dirty and clumsy.

A Man just lives. He starts using things, takes the remote from the table and puts it in the couch, keeps the coffee mug without the coaster on the table, eats as he roams around the house and spilling stuff, runs cables from one point to another to setup wireless connection, and much more. After doing all that, he starts worrying that the house is now in disorder and it needs to be cleaned and sorted out.

This is when the Woman of the house, hands over the Vacuum cleaner to the Man.

CASE 4: LOOKS

Woman are worried about how they look, even before they look or any one else looks at them. I have one word for you – Make up. Ok, that was 2 words, but the point is, the worry about the look starts from the beginning.

Man walks to the closet and fetches the nearest available clothing to wear for the day. It will be too much effort to reach for the good shirt in the corner of the closet. He may or may not comb standing in front of the mirror, but he is hardly worried, how the clothes look on him.

A Colleague walks by the Man and says “Hmm… Interesting shirt for the pants!”.

That’s it, the Man is completely worried now. Not because the shirt makes him look like a clown, but because it is usually difficult to pass a witty reply for such comments.

CASE 5: BLOGGING

A Woman thinks a 1000 times before she blogs about a topic. What if people think I am stupid? What if people don’t like it? What if I get flamed?

A Man publishes the post. He then worries about a 1000 things, but then he just updates the post with those 1000 things as tags for the post “I-may-be-stupid”, “People-may-not-like-it”, “Inflammable”.

Dressing with Ghaghra Choli

Consider the following statements:

1. It looks cute when a full sized adult dress is miniaturized for 1 to 2 years old and so a Ghaghra Choli for 2 years old is very cute.

2. When you dress for a party it takes the longest for the Woman in the family to get dressed.

These 2 points imply that the father in the family gets to dress his 23 months old daughter for the party. It takes longer for a Man to dress his toddler daughter than for this wife to dress herself up for the party. The challenge is not in just dressing but tackling the active toddler and then dressing at the same time. It is like trying to dress your bike in a pyjama while you are riding it with both the hands and the bike going in a random direction no matter how you hold the handle bar.

So It was a day of one of the parties at our friend’s place and I took the mission of dressing the daughter.

First, Undressing the daughter is very easy. You just have to pull the top upwards and in 3 seconds you will find the kid 3 meters away from you while you will be holding the top inside out. Same goes to the bottom, except she would have only reached 2 meters for that. After that you will need to perform 3 somersaults to change the diaper (perform 4 if you have the intentions of saving the nearby objects from being vandalised).

Now comes the tricky part. I made a few attempts at getting her dressed and here they are:

1. Is the top part called Choli? Assuming it is, I took the choli and put it on her left hand and then I put the other end on her right hand. During this time I didn’t notice that she took off her left hand from the choli. I went back and put the choli on the left hand and she cleverly undid the right side. The cycle continued for a while until I decided to go attempt 2.

2. Knowing that putting it one hand at a time is difficult, I tried to put it on both the hands from the front side at the same time. She bent down, got under me and ran away into the other room while I was sitting there with my both hands partially inserted into the choli. It took me a while to chase her down and clamp her to my lap before trying attempt 3.

3. This time I was very determined. I wasn’t budging, I wanted to be the one in control. I wanted to show her who the daddy is. So after a brief bit of wrestling with a combination of above 2 attempts, I finally got the choli on her and started to tie the knot. The knot was tied and She was dressed. There all done and neat. That’s when my wife came and looked at me with a stare.

Wife: What’s this?

Me: I dressed her, what else!

Wife: Is this how you dress Ghagra choli?

Me: I haven’t dressed myself in Ghagra choli in any way possible. So I don’t know.

Wife: Funny ha! Why is the knot on her front?

I didn’t realize as my daughter was turning and I was turning around to get into position I was off by 180 degrees. I had tied the knots that come on the back, to her front.

Me: Oh! You are right, was that supposed to be tied backwards. Let me try again.

Wife: (walking away) and Put her bottoms will you!

That must be the Ghagra I forgot and that was why I was wondering why the Ghagra looked exactly like her diaper. After a brief hunt, I found the Ghaghra barely hanging off from the ironing board.

All is well that ends well. I was finally able to dress her up for the party and we were ready to go. Just one thing was left. My wife adjusted the bottom by rotating it for 180 degrees.

Wife: “This is the correct side”

Me: How would I know? It looks the same on all sides!

Wife: Watch the label on the inside. It is the same way you wear your Banian.

Now we were definitely ready to go for the party, except I have to put the daughter’s shoes on! And there I went again!

Delicious Diwali

Diwali in US happens in a very simple way. Usually the closest weekend is taken up as Diwali and a party happens at someone’s place. The party involves some food, and more food and then a lot more food. So the Diwali party on Sunday at my friend’s place went by the same way.

There was a huge lineup of sweets – Bread Halwa, Wheat Halwa, Motichur Laddu, Jamun. Of all the sweets, the significant one was Halwa. Yes, this Diwali we were all given Halwa. The term “To give Halwa” is well known in Tamil Nadu for a different reason. Let me illustrate the second meaning of the phrase with a few examples.

1. When the gas prices shot up like the SLV rocket, the brilliant business minds put forward a deal to customers buying cars in US. You buy their car and they will give you guaranteed $3 Gas Price even if the prices go up. So the customers thinking that very soon the gas prices will go up to $10 per gallon, signed the deal for $3 gas and bought the cars. Unfortunately, gas prices have fallen down to about $2.15 now which means their $3 gas deal is worth nothing. In other terms these customers were given Halwa by the car dealers. I pity them really.

2. You go to a much promising multi starrer Bollywood movie – Hrithik, Abishek, Aish expecting it to be exactly like Dhoom. But it turns out to be a disaster and you come out with the same old comment “Sequels are not always good”. In this case, the Movie producers/directors have given Halwa to the Audience.

3. The classic case of giving Halwa is from the “Boy loving Girl, Girl loving another Boy” Love story. In fact, this is where the term Halwa is used a lot. Girl tells the Boy that she likes him very much. Boy replaces the word ‘like’ with ‘Love’ and dreams about her, makes love to her, marries her, has 10 kids and 38 grand kids all in one dream sequence. The next day the girl insists I like you very much, but I am in love with your hot hunky friend, can you help me get to him? In an audible distance, the bursting of a transformer sound is heard and the boy’s heart is broken into 1000 pieces. The Girl has successfully given Halwa to the Boy.

The following are the laws of Halwa:

1. If a person is vulnerable to be given Halwa, then he/she will definitely be given Halwa at some point of time.

2. For every Halwa given, there is no equal and opposite Halwa unfortunately. So there is no possibility of the affected, being able to give back the same Halwa to the Source. You can try a different one.

3. The system of Halwa giving and receiving is unaltered unless acted upon by an external force, which has to be another Halwa giver or receiver.

If you do not understand the above laws, then you are vulnerable to be given Halwa at some point of time, So please read carefully and mug up!

The main dish had a lot Chicken. Sorry, there were a lot chicken which had main dish in them. Chicken Biryani, Chicken Kuruma, Chicken Fry you name the dish it was there with Chicken. By the end of the party, I am sure the entire Chicken race should have been extinct. If you are still having chicken it is either the last batch or a new breed of teenage mutated ninja Chickens.

Finally, we were desserted with a new innovative way of turning you ‘over’overweight – Fried Banana Icecream. It was delicious and I couldn’t help myself having it the second time. It was basically Banana, fried with some flour and topped with a scoop of Vanilla Ice cream. Fried Banana Icecream Rocks! But it turned my (Relatively) Rock Hard (Six pack) abs into Flowery soft round Michelin tyre. Hence the following comic:

Picture of Surya – http://www.chennai365.com , Michelin Man – http://www.berrimilla.com

It will now take me a full year to go back to Six Pack Surya. But then there will be another Diwali and I will be back to Michelin Muniyandi in 1 day.

Diwali is always Delicious!

The Battle of the Bathian Sea

Captain Shorty Pie is standing short in the Bathian Sea and this time she is surrounded by a multitude of sea creatures. One by one the creatures are floating towards her. A star fish, a sea horse, an octopus, a blue whale, a sea lion, a shark and a jelly fish all of them in every single direction, lay there waiting for her to make the next step. She is completely surrounded, she has nowhere to go. Oh god! this is the first time in the history of Sea creatures attacking a short Captain, that there are so many sea creatures attacking a short captain all at once.

The star fish is all orangey and ready to feast on the prey. The sea lion makes an echoing moo noise which is extremely devastating. The sea horse does the sea horse neigh and taking quick swim steps to get ready for the attack. The octopus waves all of its arms in every direction and makes its move slowly towards the captain and getting ready to embrace her in its venomous arms. The blue whale squirts out water from the top and opens its mouth wide open with the blue whale noise. The shark makes rapid swims and jumps with its fins and coming in closer. The jelly fish emanates its vicious jelly like substance that will get anyone who comes in its path.

Such was the situation, so dangerous and nowhere to go. But our captain has conquered the 7 seas. She has been there to every corner of the world and fought every creature in her way. She is no stranger to such situation. She can handle this with ease. Captain gets ready with her crouching stand with legs wide apart. It is the strongest of the stance and only experienced adventurers adapt it.

She quickly moves to the right and grabs the star fish with her palm and squeezes the juice out of it and throws it away. The rest of the creatures pause for a moment and get cautious. They come to know she is not an easy prey. She is a fighter and they have to beware. The sea horse quickly tries to make an attack from the back, but our captain is too smart. She grabs the sea horse by its stomach and squeezes its juice out of it and puts it in a container. The rest of the creatures are now really scared, they are not going to take the next step but will wait for her.

But she doesn’t wait, She has got into her stance and there is no turning back for her. She now grabs the blue whale with her right hand and the jelly fish by her left hand and squeezes them and extracts an ocean of juice from them in just a few seconds. She growls and makes an angry face when she does that. It scares the big juices out of the Octopus and the Shark, who are the only ones left in the battle. They are not sure if they are strong enough to fight the almighty captain. Shorty pie puts one step further towards the octopus. The shark takes one step back. The octopus tries to bow down to the incredible pie but it is not forgiven. The shark tries to give an attack from the side but she is too clever and moves away. The shark now goes to her left and watches the captain squeezing the last drops of juice from the octopus.

It is now a duel between the shark and the captain. The shark makes one final attempt to jump on the captain. The captain catches the shark and squeezes the juice out of it too. The shark screams in agony but that is masked completely by the arrogant growl of the juice squeezing captain. Captain Shorty Pie of the bathian sea once again smells victory.

And this is how I see, when my daughter plays with her squirt toys in the bath tub.

Marathon Marriages

Law of Marathon Marriages:

1. When there are cousins and relatives who are in the same age range chances are they will not get married in the same year, unless you plan a Vacation to India during that time.

2. The net amount of marital force is calculated by the formula = Number of vacation days multiplied by Number of Marriages.

3. For every Marriage happening in a Marriage hall in Madurai, there will be a Balloon seller standing opposite to the hall.

Marriages are made in heaven goes the old saying. But when Marriages happen in quick succession and especially if you are supposed to attend each and every one of them right from the time you land, it becomes drastically deviated from being heaven. I wouldn’t call it hell though as I loved the experience and the food. Well Ok, mostly the food!

The last vacation to India, We had close to 25 days to spend in Madurai but most of the days were spent in attending marriages and functions. We had to attend a marriage function right on the day we were landing in Madurai and I totally wished I had the following conversation with the Air hostess of the delayed Air Deccan flight from Chennai to Madurai.

… IMAGINARY CONVERSATION BEGINS

Me: Excuse me, Artificially-looking-beautiful-due-to-heavy-makeup Air Hostess! I am getting late for my cousin’s marriage. Can you please ask the captain to drop me by the marriage hall.

Air Hostess: Sure, why not! Whatever the customer says, Customer is first.

(She moves towards the cockpit)

Me: While you are there can you ask him to not wiggle the airplane, it feels funny! and ask him to drive faster, I just saw a 90 year old passing us in his bicycle in mid air! and Please go in and change the color of your uniform, your bright red color dress is blinding me!

(She comes back from the cockpit.)

Air Hostess: The Captain said you must be crazy. There is only one runway in Madurai airport, so if we take that runway and put it near the Marriage hall, where your Cousin’s marriage is going on then there will be no runway in the airport.

… IMAGINARY CONVERSATION ENDS

After we arrived home we were immediately transported to the cousin’s marriage. We were hardly dressed for the occasion and by the time we went there the marriage was over, but we were about on time for the Photo Session and Lunch. I enjoyed the food so much that I shamelessly had extra helpings of Veg Briyani when everyone had almost reached the end of the game eating their curd rice. Such was the start of the Vacation of Marathon Marriages.

The procedure to attend a marriage function after you are married is drastically different from attending one when you are bachelor. The itinerary between your home and the marriage hall is usually intersected by a visit to the in laws, especially if the marriage is happening on your in laws side.

So, The next day we got ready and went to my in-laws house from where we were supposed to go to another marriage hall for attending another cousin’s marriage.To avoid myself explaining the relationship (which I am terrible at) I am just going use the phrase “Another Cousin” for every Cousin. My wife had to get dressed for the occasion at her place, as the materials needed were (in)conveniently at her place.

As I entered the in laws house, I couldn’t help notice my Father in Law sitting on the sofa wearing a Munda Banian and a Sangu Mark Lungi. He was sitting there silently channel surfing with the TV remote control. Here I am completely dressed and ready for the function and he was lounging in the couch. So I had to ask:

Me: “Aren’t you getting ready to go FIL? We have to be there in 30 minutes.”

FIL: “Relax, Your mother in law has just now got in to get ready. Please sit down now, why don’t you have Bovonto and watch some TV for a while”

And so I made up my mind and sat down on the couch watching TV with him. In few minutes I was involuntarily getting restless of the fact that the time was approaching, while the daughter merrily played with her toys and FIL still in his relaxed at-home costume watching TV. Just then, my Wife and MIL came out of the room in their Saree.

Me: Great, we are ready now. FIL, I think you should get ready now and we should go.

FIL: Relax, They just got dressed. They have to wear Jewels now.

Me: But, we have to be there in 5 minutes. We will be disrespecting them if we go late. ( Which I actually meant to say – “We gotta go, what if the food gets over? I want to eat the main lunch, not the Its-over-so-let’s-make-up-something-quick lunch”)

FIL goes back to his TV watching. I now wanted to beat the restlessness and so carried myself to the computer room and played a few games for a while. Apparently it seems it takes the same time for a Woman to wear Jewels as wearing the Saree and I am scientifically unable to explain this phenomenon. So we were obviously getting delayed. I finally realized it doesn’t matter how restless I am, things will happen at its own pace, I had to be patient, a self realization moment.

The Jewels were on and I finally heaved a relieving sigh and got up from the computer. But FIL is unbelievable as his relaxation didn’t end even after that. I badly needed a magic wand to wave at him and get him dressed but his reply was “There is always the last touch up!” and he was right. As they were just about to finish on their last minute touch up, the FIL man went in and came out in his dress in 1 minute. He simply put a Well disciplined McClaren Formula one Pit Crew to shame.

But I learnt something that day. I learnt to be patient, I learnt to endure under circumstances and keep myself cool. I learnt that it doesn’t matter if you get restless, you just sit down, relax and play along. When we got there we were not as late as we thought. Everything was fine and I was able to have my moment of eating a delicious meal.

20 out of 25 days of Waking up early, getting ready and going through the waiting process of the ladies getting ready, attending the function, smiling at people, laughing at jokes, cracking intelligent jokes and receiving blank stares, cracking dumb jokes and setting the entire hall in laughter and so on it went. We had a fun time and when it was all over, emptiness returned and we were back to our normal life.

When we work on things, we fail to see the bigger picture. We only see how difficult the task at hand is, we forget that we have worked tougher tasks before or there are people who have worked tougher tasks before. If you learn to see the things in that perspective, there will never be a moment of frustration. You will be able to handle and solve any problem in your life. I will leave you with a Haiku:

See not a Problem

as a Hurdle, but see it

as a task to solve!

What I mean is if you are going to be late for a Marriage don’t be so late to miss the lunch!

Professional Ducks

Ducks don’t have to be the same Quacking, swimming, eating, mating birds. If the Makers can get the Chinese workers to imagine a bit, and if the buyers are suckers for cute things, then you can make Ducks that are Tennis players or Station Masters or even Pirates. The following picture is the proof:

It is amazing to see how much creativity goes into such little things, by paying 0.5 cents to a Chinese factory worker for a toy that might cost 5 cents to manufacture and gets sold for 97 cents in the US.

PS: 0.5 and 5 cents are not actual numbers, They are mere exaggeration. 97 cents is naked truth though.

The Indian man who went to buy Chicken but came down with a lot more

I had already mentioned sometime back that doing Grocery Shopping is an Ordeal here in the US.

On a usual work day evening, I had to face the ordeal for the millionth time again albeit due to my own fault. I suddenly had a craving to eat Hyderabadi Chicken Biryani and so I wanted to hit the store to get some chicken for next day. I was all dressed up (which is wearing a T-shirt that would beg washing and a Shorts that would wish it was worn inside out) and checked with my wife if I should get 0.5 or 1 pound of Chicken, as I was the only chicken-eat-tarian in the family.

Wife: “0.5 would be too less, you won’t get much for making the 65. 1 pound will be too much, you won’t be able to eat it fully. 0.75 pounds! How about that?”

And so w(if)e decided that 0.75 pounds is the right quantity of chicken I would need, if I should minimize the wastage, never mind that the Grocery store itself wastes tons of meat every single day that could not be sold.

The Hitchhiker’s guide to Grocery states that, If you know what you are going to buy, you should never turn back and check to see if anything else is needed. Because 100% of the time, you will be asked to get more. As I am someone who hasn’t read the guide (heck, the guide doesn’t even exist!), I ended up going for the door knob and making a courteous turn around and asked the dreaded question.

Me: “Do you need anything else?”

I could have simply opened the door and walked away merrily with just 1 item to buy, but no I had to be Mr. Nice Guy and turn around and ask. Little did I realize when I asked that question, that I was in for a big list of things to buy.

Wife: “Oh sure, we certainly need milk. I forgot about that!”

It is like Dominoes. You just tip one and the rest of it follows through and falls down. Now, being in US buying milk is not as easy as going to the nearby bakery and getting a half litre Aavin milk packet. It is much more confusing than you think.

Me: “Which ones?”

Wife: “Hmm… half gallon of 1% milk, 1 gallon Fat free and 1 gallon Whole milk” (Good luck trying to understand how the word “Milk” became such a long sentence).

Me: “Ok, I will get them.” and I thought I would be spared and that’s all I might have to get, but no. We are now going full fledged.

Wife: “Let me see the fridge!”

That is when I realized I would need a paper to write down the list, because my brain cannot hold more than 2 grocery item at a time. I already had 4 (Chicken and 3 kinds of Milk). I quickly grabbed an old receipt lying on the kitchen countertop and tried to look for a pen. After fighting for 2 minutes with the daugther over the only pen I could spot, which she was using to scribble notes on from her previous experiment, I was ready to take down the rest of the list.

Wife: “We need Apples. 4 or 5.”

Me: “4 or 5? Please give me one number and no, we can’t do 4.5″

Wife: “Ok 5 it is. You and your obsession with accurate numbers. We will also need a bananas. Just get a bunch whatever number you feel like and the usual Bread that we buy”

Choosing a bread itself is a big task. There are thousands of varieties to choose from. In India, it is easy to buy a packet of bread, you just walk to the nearby bakery and ask for a bread packet. That’s it your 2 minute bread shopping is done. But here, you have to choose if you need white or wheat or honey wheat or whole grain or multi grain or thin sliced or anorexic sliced and the list goes on. Thankfully, we just like the Sara lee Honey wheat and just stick to it. So no big deal there beyond your first few attempts of trying to choose and like one from the variety. We have already attained nirvana in the kind of bread that we need.

Wife: “And finally a Cabbage. Make sure it is white in color, it shouldn’t be green”

For a moment before that I thought the list was over with the bread. One more to the list didn’t hurt and so I added cabbage to the list.

As I was ready to shop in the store, working my shopping cart through the multitude of aisles, I realized that Cellphones are necessary evils. I have a separate post on themselves that I am waiting to post. I say this because, with an already confused mindset I get a phone call from home adding 2 more items to the list.

Wife: “Can you get 1 bunch of Cilantro and a bunch of Green onion? I forgot about them”

Me: “What? wait I don’t have a pen, I can’t write it down, I can’t remember the other ones, what did I buy, what else I need to buy, my god my brain is short circuiting, I see sparks.”

Wife: “You need those for your Hyderabadi Biryani tomorrow!”

Me: “Oh ok, let me just get it then, hang on!”

Butchers can easily upsell you.

Me: “0.75 pounds of Boneless skinless chicken thighs please!”

Butcher: “Sure!” and puts it on the scale “Oh! it comes to 0.84 pounds”

Me: “Take a little bit out please!”

Butcher: “oh, it is 0.64 now! that will be too far away from 0.75, you want more or you want less?”

Me: “Got me, I want more. Let’s do 0.84 pounds”

And so my friends, an average ordinary Indian Man who was quenching to eat a Hyderabadi Chicken Biryani one day, set on a mission to buy 0.75 pounds of Chicken but came back with a big list of items – 0.84 pounds of Chicken, 3 kinds of Milk, 5 Apples, 6 Bananas, 1 Bread packet, 1 Cilantro bunch, 1 Cabbage and 1 Green Onions bunch.

This post should have really been title “The Ordeals of Grocery Shopping – Part II” but I thought it would be cool to make the title rhyme like a movie and hence I titled it “The Indian man who went to buy Chicken but came down with a lot more”. Anyone wants to guess the real movie name that sounds like this title?

Edit: And the winner for the Movie guessing contest is Nikhil. The answer is “The Englishman who went up the hill, but came down a mountain”, starring Hugh Grant.

Happiness from iPod and a Water Fountain

It was a cloudy saturday evening and we decided to go off on a mission to get some groceries done for the week. After finishing the ordeal that is called Grocery shopping, we thought we might want to check out the new Apple store in our area. This store has been opened up recently and we never got the time or need to drop in, until now. Apple has released a new iPod Nano and iPod Touch and we thought we could test drive it at the store. We drove around looking for the store for a few minutes, our eyes lying on several different things trying to locate a big Apple logo. My 1.5 year old daughter saw the big Apple logo sign first and said “Apple!” and that’s how we found the store. The store was slightly bigger than the one at Country Club Plaza in Kansas city.

How thin can an iPod be?

Apple has put iPod Nano on a strict fat free diet. It has squeezed the jelly out of it using a sugarcane juice maker. Then using a Chappati rolling stick, normally used by wives to beat the crap out of husbands, they have rolled the iPod Nano sideways to give it a thin oval look. This thing was so thin and light that if someone stood upside down in the store on his index fingers, I would have said “huh! Big deal!”.

The screen was brilliant and bright and the interface response time was quick. The colors were fantastic and I loved the Orange, Yellow and Silver of the lot. The screen is too small for playing a video, so it is probably just for occasional peeking and wouldn’t be usable for full length TV Shows or Movies.

The new iPod Nano shuffles beautifully. You just shake the iPod and it plays the next song in the shuffle line. Remember the days when you used to beat the top of your radio to get a clear reception, well this is sorta like that. This is a cool new feature, I don’t have to look at the screen and just have to shake it to listen to a random next song.

Available in 8GB for $149 and 16GB for $199.

Me: “I love it. I want it one now, honey! Can I buy this 8GB one? It is just $149″                                                                     (Picture: http://www.apple.com)

Wife: “You already have a perfectly good iPod Nano!”

Me: “But this is new. Owning this will make me the happiest man, please, pretty please! See even the daughter is loving the iPod.”

My daughter was getting all curious and attempting her minority report stunt to grab hold of the iPods lying on the table. She was very curious looking at all the colorful ipods.

For Bargain Hunters, I saw the older iPod Nanos at 4GB- $99 and 8GB – $129. Just put a word to your relative in US heading to a vacation in India, but don’t point them to this blog!

iPods are also Touchy!

(Picture – http://www.apple.com)

When you get rid of the phone component in the iPhone, you get the iPod Touch. The new iPod Touch is even more thinner than it’s predecessor. Thin is becoming a feature now, a fashionable demand. Whenever you think how much thinner can it get, Apple shows it in the next version of the iPod. iPod touch has WiFi and can do email, Web browsing, Games, Applications and YouTube. In the first version of the iPod touch it was difficult for me to type on the touch screen, but this new version seems much more easier to type and I was quite surprised by that. I wonder what changed, perhaps the software.

YouTube is the key here. It can be very addicting especially due to the simple and cool YouTube user interface on the iPod Touch. So I searched and watched this song and it came out really well on the device.

I also played this song, one of my daughter’s favourite. She always laughs whenever she sees Rajinikanth on the screen. Perhaps, she thinks that he is a comedian and he is always funny, especially due to this song.

She smiled wide as she saw Rajinikanth dance for the Style number in Sivaji.

Me: “This is a cool iPod. I think we can buy this. I don’t want the iPod Nano, I will have this one. It is just $229 and it will make me very happy.”

Wife: “You keep changing your mind!”

My daugther concurred with me as she was now all stimulated to grab hold of the iPod touch playing Rajinikanth’s song on Youtube.

We finished our window shopping and then came out of the store. It was a cool dark evening and the fountain just by the store was glittering beautifully in the halogen light coming from inside the fountain. We stood there for a while to enjoy a calm moment, a gentle breeze, sound of the water flowing in the fountain. It was a happy moment to just look at the fountain in silence.

I didn’t want to buy it and have it for myself, but it made me happy. It wasn’t a cool iPod with cool features, but it made me happy. My daugther was agreeing with me as she smiled wide looking at the water and the light and making attempts to try and catch the flowing water.

I realized two things:

1. Happiness is a temporary feeling that shifts from one thing to another that you like.

2. Happiness is not just in buying cool things but Happiness is in the way you like something around you.

It is amazing to see the wisdom that a child brings to you.

CD in the bathtub

Our daughter loves to conduct experiments. Her field of specialization is to perform a regular act of a toddler and examine the reactions of two fully grown adult species of Homo Sapiens, one from each sex – Me and my wife. She likes to improvise and hence her experiments have been more offline which means she does what she wants to do stealthily without our knowledge and then when we see it with our eyes we react and she takes down the readings, more like scribbling with a black ball pen on the Telephone directory.

In one such experiments of the toddler, I was stepping into the shower on a lazy saturday morning (No, Please don’t picturize this unless you want to suffer from Flu for the entire winter) when my feet stepped on a flat hard object. It was a CD. A CD in the bathtub. I went “arghhhh …..no……”. I then took a deep breath and said “it’s ok, it’s just a CD”. One close look at the CD and I was actually quite relieved. It was a Sony CD-R that I had used to copy some photos from my friend’s laptop. The photos were already added to my iPhoto library and hence this CD can be actually thrown away with no harm done (except occupy some square inches in the landfill and let it sit there for several decades).

Little did I know that I was going to be the subject of the toddler’s experiment and open my mind into self realization. I picked up the CD and wondered what other things it can be used for. I was feeling itchy on my back and used that CD to slowly scratch my back (Again don’t picturize). It felt great, tremendous. All of a sudden, an object whose primary use was to store some seemingly important data, was led into one of its possible other uses – Scratching my back. This CD could very well be doing it’s job of displaying photos on a  computer or a DVD Player but it perfectly worked its way comforting me from the itch. This was the moment of enlightenment.

Are we all CDs in a bathtub? Are we in the right place doing the right job we are capable of and not just the one we are qualified for? Could I have done better as a doctor saving lives rather than sitting in front of a computer all day and working through spaghetti of lines of programs? Perhaps a courageous Journalist? or a Sportsman? Or a Car Designer? Or a musician?

Was MGR a better actor than a Politician? Would Aishwarya Rai have been better off doing Modelling than acting in Bollywood? Didn’t Kumble and Srinath do great as Cricketers rather than Software Engineers? Don’t we dance to the tunes and voice of Shankar Mahadevan rather than do nothing with the Software that he might have written? Didn’t Bikerdude kick IT recently and enter Arts? Is Arnold better being a Governor than the Terminator?

Life doesn’t allow us to do everything at one time. We get to choose and when we do, we don’t know if we have chosen to be the CD on the player or a CD on the bathtub. But what we should do is we should remain truthful and good as the CD and shouldn’t mind being in a player or the tub. Who knows, being in the tub might perhaps make the CD feel better than being in the player.

I have to tell my daughter that her experiment was a success, she is a genius, after I change her diaper.

Filling Medical Questionnaire

To fill a Medical questionnaire one needs courage. Wait, not courage, you need intelligence, Super human that is, and a lot of patience. Atleast the questionnaire that I got to fill for my Annual checkup.

Name: Are you sure you need my name again? Because I just filled it 10 times on the registration form and printed my name under 15 signatures on privacy notices.

After the name, the form goes on with trivial information like DOB, Today’s date (I will gift you a calendar so you can see today’s date for yourself everyday), place of birth and Reason for visit (Duh!), all of this that was already mentioned in the previous registration/insurance forms.

Family History: Has any blood relative had the following: (Circle if yes)

Mental Illness, Cancer, Diabetes, Stroke, High Cholesterol – Nope none of these even remotely match the word “yes” or even abbreviate to “yes”, So I am not circling them.

Social History: And under this comes the occupation. Are you trying to insult me? You want me to say that of all the great things on earth like Mountaineering, Rafting, Photography, Scientists, I am a mere Software Engineer as Occupation when it comes to my Social History? I understand you are enjoying the peak of your career as a doctor but is this your way of asking your patients to fill their profession and calling it a Social History, to have a sarcastic chuckle? Why wasn’t this called Employment history?

Then comes a blunt question: Are you (circle): Single Married Divorced Widowed.

I am not Circle, I am not square, I am an irregular shaped humanoid. Now what do you want me to do with the other 4 words?

Do you smoke? Yes No. I answered No but it went on to ask How much? and I am left to wonder how to answer How much I don’t smoke!

Exercise Program: Walking around the apartment to get to important places like Bathroom, Fridge, Couch. And as a software engineer I haven’t written any “Program” for Exercise.

List all Medication allergies: I don’t like medicines. They leave a bitter taste in my tongue, unless it tastes good like Benadryl. So you can take it that I am allergic to all medicines.

Surgical History: Nope, I haven’t conducted or performed any surgery on anyone, not even as a 17 year old trying to enter Guinness record, and not even insects or frogs, I was a Computer science major.

Non Surgical History: List all hospitalization without Surgery – Let me check the yellow book and see if there are any hospitals without Surgery department and then get back to you on it.

Sometimes a seemingly trivial but a necessary questionnaire can leave you wondering “WTF”, not just a medical form but it can apply elsewhere too. At somepoint we must all have been Vogons, why on earth otherwise we have to fill form after forms for every single thing that needs to be done.

Like Munnabhai said, “Aadmi martha hai, thab form bharna jaroori hai kya?” (When a man is dying, is it necessary for him to fill the form?).

Barrel Train Express 2.0

Remember the Barrel Train Express post I made a while back. Well, the train has been neatly developed into a Version 2.0. The new version has a steam engine looking Mod on the lawn mover equipment and it looks pretty cool. It also makes sounds like a steam engine. Pretty nice development over the first one. Here are the pictures, (I didn’t carry a camera that day so I could only get a cellphone shot)

The Toy Music Story

Last year we bought a Rocker for our Infant daughter. It had a nice little bar toy which when pulled, plays a sweet soft tune for the baby. Our daughter got so fond of that toy she used that to develop her motor skills by pulling it. As days went by she started pulling it so hard that we just decided to unhook it from the bar and give it in her hand.

This toy went through a lot during its life. It plays on a Lithium ion CR style battery and it has been playing on and on. We used to lug this toy around everywhere we go. It became a standard accessory for my daughter and a favourite play toy in her car seat. After she started crawling and moving around she would carry this and drop it somewhere in the apartment. No one can find where it went and only she can crawl around and find it. She does this with other things and we have been unsuccessful to find things like her Sippy Cup, my Watch, an iPod Shuffle and the list of tiny things goes on. She finds it herself when she likes and returns them to us and that is if she wishes.

This music toy went through the same game of hide and seek throughout the apartment and must have visited every room and every corner that my daughter did. We also took this toy with us when we were on our vacation to India and again this toy visited several places there – Our home, in-laws home, Uncle’s etc. Among these places, there was one important place that caused a turn around in the usage of this toy – The Bath tub. Yes, One fine day she took it with her to the bath tub and before I could snatch it off from her, it slipped and fell into the water filled tub. When an electronic item gets immersed in Water, well you can forget the water. We had no hope that this toy would come back alive and replay its soft tunes. We let it dry and tried to pull the handle and No, It didn’t play the music.

We thought it was end of life for the toy and put it aside somewhere. One night, when we were watching the TV, we heard the same familiar soft tune. Was it coming from the TV? Nope. Was it the old music toy? It sounded like, but we couldn’t find where it was coming from. Our daughter was giggling and playing in a corner and no she wasn’t holding it either. It was a mystery. It then started to go off randomly once a few minutes and it was kind of like the toy asking us to find it and recover it. We did try hard and finally found it inside the closet, somewhere in the corner. We pulled the handle but it still wouldn’t play the music. So it was still broken, but now it works randomly. The battery for the toy was not replaceable either.

The Toy went on and on for several weeks playing the music randomly at odd times, scaring the guests, scaring us at night and it finally gave away its last music. The music reminded us of our great times with our daughter as an infant. But the music has now stopped, perhaps it is its way of indicating that our daughter has grown up and she no longer needs that toy. Perhaps, it was the love from the toy towards my daughter that made it play randomly even though it was broken. Perhaps it wanted to and tried to stay back in music with my daughter. Time had its last say.

Everything in life keeps moving, but we don’t want to. We like our old things and we stick on to it as much as we can and as long as it can go. It is hard for our human mind to know that for everything there is an end, there is finality. We don’t get over things as fast as we should. This toy has taught us a lesson. We love and have to love the things that we have in the present, but should also know that it cannot go on forever. When it stops, we shouldn’t. We should expect new things and move on with life. That toy played nothing but the same music over and over again, but it brought me this wisdom.

So long Music Toy and thanks for all the music.