A Generation passed Away!

Jan 27th 2013 - 4:15 am- We got the much dreaded early morning call.
G' grandfather(dad's dad), Ritvik's great grand pa expired.
He was a dynamic personality, well-built (though his legs were getting weak), had to use a walking stick. He did all of his work by himself , never one to depend on anyone for his needs.
His wife expired many years ago and even at that time when he was asked to marry again, he refused.
He would love to recount his boyhood journeys, how things were in those times to any ardent listener.
He would even wash his own clothes, never being dependant on anyone for anything.
After my wedding we came to Mumbai and he even came there after a month to stay with us for a week.
May his soul rest in peace.

Wishlist Wednesdays 6

This is the 6th installment to the Wishlist Wednesdays. The details can be found

The prompt for this week is I wish I could touch...........

I wish I could touch the silence between us
Wrap it all in a box
And store it never to come out.

I wish I could touch the clouds
Make a fluffy bed of them
And rest myself there.

I wish I could touch the rainbow
Gather all the colors
To wrap myself in them.

I wish I could touch my son's laugh
Gulp it down
And laugh unashamedly like him.

Some more R'isms

20th Jan (sunday) : We hosted SIL's baby shower. The previous day I kept telling Ritvik how we have to go for the Baby shower on Sunday.
Sun as I was rushing to get ready and during my peeing session in the bathroom, he walks up to me with a questioning look, "eddak amma, baby mele shower podriya" (looking at the bathroom shower). translation - ("why are we putting shower on baby").
I was dumbfounded and could only burst out laughing.
I should google to find why it is called Baby Shower.

He's already named the baby girl "Seshna"(no idea what it means nor have I heard anyone with this name)

I looked gorgeous in my new saree(send from India)--sample pic here.

When Harry met Sally errr ME

I love Harry Potter books. I have read all 7 of them.  Couple of years back I could even doll out the different spells. You must be wondering why I am writing this here as there are tens and thousands of even bigger Harry Potter fans than me.
But it was not love at first sight for us. I remember the "Harry Potter" craze was sometime when I had just started working. I used to travel to and fro by train and one day I saw this girl reading a huge novel and then later on praising the main protagonist in this case Harry himself. I, consider myself to be a huge reader and so took the book and started reading(I guess it was the 2nd series). Even before I went to the 3rd page I was bored. I felt it was very kiddish and did not bother to read it again.

Few years later a friend and his fiancee came to stay at my place, he is an avid reader himself and it so happened that he was reading Harry Potter(4th series). As they both left for office in the morning and i had to leave only a noon, I happened to see the book lying on the sofa and once again picked to browse through it. immediately I was transferred to a magical world, a world of witches and wizards. I could not put the book down until I had completed reading it. Thankfully he had the 5th series too. I finished reading that and then went in search of the initial 3 books. After having completed them I had to wait for the 6th and 7th books and the wait was worth it..and that is how I fell in love with Harry and met him finally.

Wishlist Wednesdays 5

Here is the 5th installment of Wishlist Wednesdays. For more details go here

Topic today is
I wish I had one more chance to ...................

I am a person who basically does not like to look in the past. I firmly believe that whatever has to happen will happen to you and it happens for the best.
Having said this and the post forced me to look back at life and here is my say:-

I wish I had one more chance to ...................
1) Give a tight slap to the guy who groped my butt on a bus in Kerala. This was in my 10th std. we had gone to kerala for vacations and was boarding a bus. In kerala women/girls always climb from the front but me being a city girl did not feel the need to adhere to this and got in from behind. (The bus was at the bus depo, so it was empty with us being the first ones to get in). This guy got in behind me and cheekily grabbed my butt. I was shocked and turned round and glared at him. That did not stop him, he just removed his hand when he wanted to after a minute or two.
Given the chance now , I would have definitely turned round and given him a hard slap across his face.

2) After completing my Graduation, I wanted to do my Master's in Computers(only reason being, I knew a job in IT would lead me to US(onsite)). Dad wanted me to do M.A. I did get admission from a well known institute for Mass Communication. I would have loved to do the course in M.C. (the course curriculum sounded interesting )  and it would have taken me into the world of Journalism/Advertising creativity. If I had one more chance I would have definitely chosen to do Mass Communication.

3) The ability to say 'No' and not put up with things ever.
 I never wanted to get into a committed relationship till I got married. I did have my flings and crushes. One thing I realized is that I care a lot about other's feelings, even more than mine. Even though I hurt I did not want others to hurt.
 For two months of my life I befriended a guy. We were not in love nor were we having an affair. Initially it was good when we were getting to know  each other but after that he became this whiny, demanding sort of guy, being nice at one moment, fighting at the other. After 2 months I completely stopped talking to him but I do wish , I never met the guy at all. I just pacify myself with
 "Bad guys have to happen to realize who a good one is"

Diwali Dhamaka 2012

Diwali Dhamaka 2012 the annual Diwali function that is celeberated by us Broadmoor residents concluded on 18th Nov 2012. It was a marvellous display of talent, decoration, food and great team-work.

Preparations for the event had begun one month prior, there were regular practices for kids dance, skit, adult dance, registration and planning for food and all other activities.
We had a chart decoration competition on Nov 3rd and a kids drawing/coloring programme on Nov9th.

Nov 17th saw up putting up the decorations, the lamps created by us residents.
Nov18th morning saw other decorations and arrangements being made. I was in charge of stage seating/audio/video/photo and due to this responsibility I set up the seating arrangement.
The programme was to start at 5 pm, we had everyone come by 5:30pm and we started the pooja, this was followed by all the awesome cultural programmes that we had put up.

Finally we ended up with awesome food. After clean-up we returned home ending a fun-filled night.

Yipeeeeee--the new sofa is here

Sunday - We got a new couch, a massive 6 seater. I have yet to get a picture of it in our home hence this one here

We have definitely upgraded a lot from the past 4 yrs. The 1st time we came we had a couch which one of our friends going back to India had given us. We used that for a year and then we were shiftng to a 2 BHk  so we got another one (2nd hand again) that we used for a year.
We again shifted to a 1 BHK and due to bed bugs issue threw out all our furniture.
Last year when Ritvik was coming from India we got a sofa for $50(again second -hand, 1st time spend money)  and now this year we got a new one ($800), so see we have come along way from where we began.

Wishlist Wednesdays 4

This is part of a series of prompts happening at Preeti's blog < a href="http://justamotheroftwo.blogspot.com/2013/01/wish-list-wednesday-no4.html">here

Today's prompt is
I wish everyone loved.........the child within themselves. Each of us had a child residing within ourselves and it is important for us at times to bring out those child like qualities.
I am not saying we should give up our responsiblilites but at times it is good to incorporate these child-like qualities in our day to day life style. Few points are:-

1) Living in the moment. Forget about past fights, abandon egos,forget about meetings and deadlines and just be what you want to be.

2)Don't care about what others will think. Go ahead and do what you want to do. Break all restraints, for ex: if you wanted to swing on the kids slide but were holding back go ahead and indulge yourselves.

3)Be curious like a child: There is no limits to their imagination. Look at things with a child's eye and ask endless questions.

4) See the world with new eyes: Like is a miracle and there is always something fascinating happening all the time. It is for us to see and enjoy the sun's rays or the buds blooming and to realize that we ourselves are a miracle and every moment we have is a gift to be cherished forever.

5) Laugh out loud: Laugh out loud on anything you find silly and believe me it's a great feeling.

Happy New Year -2013

WISHING EVERYONE A VERY HAPPY NEW YEAR.....................................................................