Karva Chauth

It was Karva chauth the day before yesterday. For all those who don't know, it's the annual fasting event for married north Indian women for the long life and health of their husbands.
It started on a great note the evening before with my darling husband gathering stuff for me to eat in the morning, trying to get me to put fab henna (which didn't work). It went on fine with us getting up on time- 4 a.m. with Anuj and the girls as well and hogging the delicious stuff he had bought for me.
In spite of some hiccups: my mother in law's endless bitching about me, it still went on fine till late afternoon. So what happened? I got a lesson in appropriate language by this lady on my use of 'don't you dare' to my son and she refused to do the pooja saying of all the things "I'm not fasting". It didn't occur to her that all these years she's helped me do the pooja, she's never kept the fast.

How can people be like this? Well before I had the great luck to find an amazing guy like A, I had no clue about women like his mother. I had heard stories of course, but one on one experience- no sir!!

Well I guess it's God's way of keeping an equilibrium- great guy = parents' in law like mine!!!

So easy to lie!

To mostly everyone including your own self! So what does that make my life? !!!

My New Apple!!!

An apple a day...well it's here to stay! I haven't even had a peek at it...am waiting patiently. Let's see if it lives up to its expectations. We have been toying with the idea of having a mac book for so long now that it hasn't even sunk in.

I am extremely disappointed by Apple as a company though- for making Arunachal Pradesh a part of China in their I phone map application. I do believe the U S should be stricter than this in allowing something that very easily gives the message of compliance or support of the Chinese claims.

Oh when will this stop? I am 35 and I do not want my children or anyone else's for that matter to witness wars and shit like that. Life is way more sweeter than that- made sweeter with the presence of gadgets and the like so why spoil it? On a slightly saner reason- it's just not worth it! So let's do our bit in avoiding strife and spreading love...cliched? cliches work!!!

Sunday Brunch

This morning was 'Chholey Bhature'...turned out to be magnificent. For accompaniement, there was the pickle and the spread I bought from Jiyo yesterday.

The reciepe for Chholey...

• soak chickpeas overnight- for morning prep
• boil with whole masalas- cardamom, black pepper, cinnamon
• open the cooker and add the following masala mix
• coriander powder, garam masala, amchur, black pepper powder, cumin seed powder
• mix well and simmer for about 15 minutes
• add grated ginger
• serve with crisp bhatura
• sinful amounts of calories!!!!

What My Husband Doesn't Know....

Can fill up volumes...

This is what I had in mind for a title immediately after our fight in the morning. Then we made up. And the blog went flying out of my head :-)

Akhyan and Dastkar 2010

We went yesterday- my children and I.
We went today again- my husband, niece, staff member, my children and I! Needless to say we'd had so much fun that we decided to repeat it. It was like a big party with lots of dances, folk performances, mask exhibition and a lot of shopping.
I honestly did not expect to have so much fun, and that too two days in a row. But we did, and how I shopped and then how Anuj shopped! We felt in the middle of a giant party and can't wait to go back again.

Finally a drink with my husband!!!

Sounds...what exactly?
Great actually!

After years of never going out without children, A and I managed to sneak in an hour away after the babies had slept of course, to go and have a couple of drinks at the club. It was fabulous! And I think we can do it again. Of course it's a far cry from the days we used to be there when the bar opened and stayed much after it closed. Those were the days of pure adult fun- of going to bars, getting sloshed and passing out once we were back at home.

And these are the days, extremely fatiguing albeit, of pure unadulterated fun- of being with our children, and never having a moment to ourselves. It still remains fun. Of course they are going to grow up, go out with their friends- girls and boys, and wouldn't want to be around us at all. But its fun till it lasts- may it last forever!

New design for my blog

It's pretty cool...the older template that I was using- Travel, was making navigation really heavy. This one- awesome' it's called; is pretty fast!

Fighting for nothing!

Don't we all do that? But A and I seem to be doing it all the time..we don't have the time to unwind decently...we don't have the time to eat or sleep properly; but we do have hours to waste over trivial shit that doens't matter at all...

How inelligent we really are!

Kerala!!!

Munnar in the morning from our cottage!

 On our way back to Kochi!

Wow...

Devdutt Patnaik- Myth=Mithya

Fabulously written.

I haven't finished it yet and that's also because I've taken the author's sugestion to just pick it up and read it randomly. It's a great read. We have all read or heard about the myths which populate the hindu religion. The author makes very interesting differences between the two words to start with: myth and mithya.

Read it..it's great!

20 NORTH

Another great find like flipkart- for me and for many others like me. IT's a website for people who want stuff from the U.S. etc...the website has it all and it promises to get it for you if they don't already stock it...all you have to do is to send the internatinal link. It is a bit expensive, but their prices include shipping and handling: so a bath and bodyworks body splash(my absolute fav )will cost you three times the price...but at least you get what you want without having to beg family or friends going abroad.

I lost my job :-(

Well yes, I guess it's still true of me- can't massage people's egos! Atleast that's what I think went wrong with this one, and here's the story in all its glory:-

A friend recommends me to her boss- I meet him- I like the work- he likes my background- we decide to work together. Except I have to work with this who appeared to be a sweet woman from Hyderabad! So I am new to the fashion/export industry and yet I put in days and night to achieve a herculean task- of writing a whole section without any help that was promised me t start with. To top it all, the woman in question doesn't want to talk or have any kind of verbal communication.

I go to Kerala, having accomplished a big chunk of the ebook I am writing, with the promise that she would go through it and give me specific corrections. So what happens when I get back? A note saying twenty things are wrong. But do I get a specific areas where those twnety things might be lacking? No. I just have to rewrite the whole document and send it? No reply to this either!

So I call her and try and find out what's happening. Just bunk all the separate documents into one and it should be fine comes the reply. So I wait , starting work on the following documents and believe my surprise when I get a mail so caustic, I havent ever laid eyes upon. Some supercillious bitch casting aspersions on my competence. Well, that's one thing she shouldn't have done- because the place where I start working from is not a state of super confidence but actually quite the opposite. I do not believe I know anything on the subject which makes me put all that I have in just getting my fact straight- the one thing I never want is to get caught on the wrong foot.

So of course the time I should've spent working, I waste in drafting a reply as for a communications person, I am totally lost for words. And all the time I know, it will be over in the morning. Having worked in the radio industry for just over 16 years, I have dealt with people with ginormous egos, the worst cases of bitching- it is quite terrible. But frankly, this was my first time to find someone, who I had done no harm to or even interacted with much, harbour such malice towards me. Because that's what it came across as- malice. But why would she be malicious towards me? Not because she thought I wasn't genuinely performing- which after a 3 weeks, I would seriously doubt. So far I had delieverd on time,I wanted feedback, I had the rest of the sections ready.

Well, I'm out of a job in a month- sad :-(

Thank God, I didn't have to work with such an egotistical person.

Trip Advisor is not biased :-)

Well my review got published...and the website regained my trust!

We have trusted this website for a long time now and were completely disappointed to think it was somehow being made not to publish a bad review of a place -Tea Bungalow, for which I haven't seen a single bad remark. How could it be that it went so bad for us...and we are pretty accomodating when it comes to things? Well, I guess it's always a case of the 'head' ruling the body...with the attitude and arrogance of the manager, what the hell else can you expect?

But I can go back to reviewing places and stuff on the trip advisor...and go back to travelling as soon as possible!

Trip Advisor is biased!!!

Well...Well...Well!!

Was that a break or what! As all the millions who follow me know already, I have been away to what is popularly known as 'God's Own Country'- Kerala.
After planning this trip, sometimes with great anticipation and some others with trepidation, sometimes with confidence and other times taking a pure gamble; after thinking a million times that perhaps it will all go to naught, after booking the tickets and the hotels and paying up for them- it could've been all a waste.I am going to thank God that it all went as planned- mostly better, sometimes a little disappointing; but great in all its entirety.

We started our vacation with a brief stay at the Trident on the Willingdon Island close to Kochi, went on to Kumarakom at the Taj- wow, stayed in the middle of thousands of acres of tea plantations at Munnar and finished our 10 day long journey at Tea Bungalow- the only thorn in our backside. In fact I have reviewed all the properties in Trip Advisor and found out that 'THEY ARE BIASED'...they did not let a bad review of the place go through.

But let me not get into this- just revel in the beauty of the state that is Kerala!!!