Home beckons...

My brother, who lives and works in Bangalore, is currently visiting my parents in Guwahati...

Yesterday papa posted some pictures of my brother's visit home ...today, this is what my brother writes from Guwahati...

"Yesterday, I lived another day as a 17 year old. Took the city bus to Guwahati club hanging by the door (unlike before paid the full fare)...took a rickshaw back home (without threatening the rickshaw driver or haggling with him)...Had a couple of plates of momo (offered my friends without spitting on any)...bought a packet of Wills Filter from the shop downstairs (paid him a few extra bucks for all the cigarettes he gave me on credit)...met an old friend and went for a drive(did not play tennis, but made plans to)...smoked the day's last cigarette in the toilet(did not bother to spray the room freshner)...finally spent a few hours sitting in my balcony,before going to bed (the way I used to)...I love this place. After all these years, I realize I am more or less the same...and I am really glad about it"...

Well as I looked at the pictures and read this, I wanted to tease my brother about smokes and cigarettes constituting a major part of his nostalgia, I wanted to tease him about having put his 'cool dude' status in extreme jeopardy by becoming so philosophical,I wanted to nudge him and remind him that the balcony he mentions as his own ,was mine for a much longer period of time before it was passed on to him
(so it actually is still mine:-))...whatever!!! )...and then I felt a tug in my heart...oh boyy...it sure has been an interesting life journey for everyone in our family, with a lot of things that have changed and a lot that haven't...and amidst all the stress of planning a trip to India (specially for people like us, who have to get 'n' number of things done in a short period of a couple of weeks of vacation, including the oh so stressful visa stamping stuff etc.)...all of a sudden I wish the holidays were closer...yes home beckons...and I wish D and I were there right now...with family...

Hopefully I will have a lot of interesting stories and perspectives to share when I get back to blogging again...

Till then, I wish you all a very safe and happy holiday season with friends, family and all your loved ones!!

Happy holidays folks !!

YAYYY...the days are shorter!!

One would think that with fall coming to an end, the days getting shorter and the trees shedding those beautiful, colored leaves, that adorned them, just a week back, I would be depressed...really, really depressed...

Well generally the passing of fall does cause a sense of gloom to set in...but this year is different... you may ask why...well, I have spent the major part of spring, summer and fall, living the life of a golf widow :-(...

Not that I mind giving D the space to pursue his hobbies...after all, I do wholeheartedly cherish my personal space when dabbling in hobbies and indulging in activities which allow me to form perspectives on issues , completely independent of D...so if that's the case...why am I really cribbing...ok, let me just put it this way, in the context of hobbies, dabbling in one and allowing one to dictate one's life are at two opposite ends of the spectrum...D's love for playing tennis has never gotten me so frustrated in all these years...may be that's because I personally love and enjoy that game as much as he does...and most importantly, I usually get to hit around a bit with him whenever he's in the mood to play with a beginner like me...ok, so does that show a tinge of contradiction of the earlier point I made about 'loving the space to indulge in activities that allow me to form a perspective on issues, completely independent of D'...I seem to be okay with D's hobbies where I have a part to play or contribute...I really am turning into a confused mess on this...don't want to introspect too much...this is not an introspective blogpost...it's more of a ranting blogpost...where I am just giving vent to pent up frustration:-) ...So here I go again..

D was posssessed by and obsessed with this game we all call 'GOLF' this entire summer and fall...weekdays, weekends...it just didn't matter which day of the week it was...we would go shopping and all that he would be in the look out for were golf accessories...how frustrating is that!!... in fact, once we cut short a weekend getaway so that he could come back and play an 18 hole game on a par 4 (or was it 3...who the hell cares anyways...the game is just so boring!!) course !!! He even tried persuading me to join him at the driving range and course a couple of times with of course, absolutely no success...better luck with that next year, honey!!

Hey...wait...don't yet point that accusing finger at me for being the quintessential unsupportive wife... I haven't really explicitly nagged him about golf till this post on the blog:-) ( I really have been trying my best to live upto the image of the 'space loving and space giving' wife I hero worship;-))...all that I have been doing is making weird faces and giving blank stares whenever he mentions anything associated with the game...after all, I did get him a golf themed cake and showered him with golf gifts on his birthday...and believe it or not his friends ended up gifting him stuff related to golf as well...so now you know, it's not just me...that definitely makes me feel a whole lot better...it's just that D and GOLF have become synonymous over this summer...and really, if you ask me, a golf themed birthday party, is the most I can do to show my support for the tee, the club, the par, the hole, Tiger Woods, Augusta and D's love for all things golf :-)

These hilarious cartoons at www.cartoonstock.com just about sum up the 'golf widowed life' I've led for the major part of this summer and fall...

Now you know why I am so happy, cheering the onset of winter...cold, short days but definitely(or should I say hopefully...in case covered driving ranges/courses are discovered in the next few weeks) more of D ;-)

Of Change and Continuance ...

Well I am turning another year older at the stroke of midnight...another year wiser?...well maybe, maybe not...can't vouch for the wiser part of it ...going over one of the first big hills, as they say...does growing another year older make that big a difference...well not really, I tell myself, I don't feel any different than what I was in my early twenties...age is just a number in the mind , isn’t it?...hmmm...well I don't think I am being completely honest here, am I :-)!

After all, I do realize that my biological clock is ticking...I keep getting feelers about that from my mom and mom-in-law every time I call home…they don’t lose a chance to enforce and reinforce on me the fact that it’s about time D and I started thinking about life beyond just the two of us…

After all, when hubby dear asked me about what I wanted to do on my birthday weekend and gave me two options...a drunken weekend away at a party destination or something more quiet at a serene destination, I did opt for the latter...I am laughing out loud, imagining a very dear friend of mine, P, pull my leg about this by saying something to the effect of ”Tu buddhi ho gayin hain" on having opted for the latter... LOL :-)

Anyways, that's that...but this post is not just really about me growing another year older or another year wiser...it's me reminiscing about the past three decades of my life...it's about how a lot of things have changed and a lot haven’t, as I have evolved as a person over the years...

It all started with a rather carefree life, growing up in the beautiful hills of Shillong, Meghalaya...friends, family, birthday parties, indo chinese dinners, long drives, chocolates, teddy bears, mickey mouse club, school concerts,great times essentially...Papa loves cars and driving and I remember in those days, if he got back late from work, to make it up to us, he would bring back loads of chocolates and would just keep honking the horn of the car on the driveway till we got out of the home...and off we would go, all four of us, for a long drive across the beautiful town and hills of Shillong, and that would invariably end in one of the most delicious Indo Chinese dinner places in the world, "ABBA"...lovely summer vacations at my paternal grandparents in Guwahati...memorable winter vacations in Jorhat with my maternal grandparents...family vacations to other parts of India...now , you would say it was vacation time for the major part of the year then...well sort of...you know how life in a hill station in the 80s was...relaxed, carefree and pristine, among affectionate, friendly and warm locals, without the added burdens of "touristyness" and “commercialization” we associate with most Indian hill stations these days...an almost fairy tale like existence...

Imagine a beautiful house on a hilltop surrounded by pine trees...a gentle chill and breeze in the air...a family of four replete with a white Alsatian, running around the grounds of the home...family time, with adorable parents and a bratty little brother, by the warm fireplace in the living room...friends and neighbors moving in and out of each others homes, all well fed with delicious home made food, happy and contented in each others’ company, completely oblivious to the vicissitudes of life...that was what life was all about in the my first ten years into this world…

Since then I’ve seen a lot of ups and downs in my own life and in the lives of near and dear ones...I have evolved from wanting to become an air hostess (inspired by none other than the Kittu Gidwani starrer by the same name that used to be aired on Doordarshan on Sunday nights)...to a cop...to an air force pilot...to an astronaut...to a doctor (the romanticized version of Erich Segal, of course )...to a teacher...to a genetic engineer( fancy huh...this was at a time when I hardly knew what genes were :-))...to a physicist...and finally ended up as the stereotypical ‘electrical and computer engineer’...it’s a different matter all together that D, the industrial engineer in the family,is a zillion times better at all the theoretical and practical electrical and technological troubleshooting than I am...Oh well...you know what, I feign ignorance(that’s a good excuse for outright incompetence, aint’t it :-))!! On a slightly different note, once an uncle of mine was advising D that he should feign ignorance and prove his incompetence in all household chores early on in the marriage...apparently once that’s done, it would make sure that the wifey (yes, I) would forever relieve D from the travails that the tedious household tasks entail...LOL...well am I glad that I overheard that conversation, otherwise D would have gleefully succeeded using that tactic on me his entire life!!

Coming back to the point, over the years I have sobered down from being a rebellious feminist to a realist...I have evolved from the feisty teenager, who thought she could take on a system single handedly and bring about much needed changes, overnight, to someone who has matured enough to realize that small , individual changes in a system, over time, eventually lead on to bigger, better ones...I have evolved from an ambitious teenager, with big dreams, to someone who has realized that there are sweeter pleasures in life than the next big career move...I have evolved from tending to be judgmental to learning to give people the benefit of the doubt..I have evolved from reading fairy tales to Enid Blyton to Carolyn Keene to Dickens to Austen and the Bronte sisters to Agatha Christie and Robin Cook to Arthur Hailey and Jeffrey Archer to P.G. Wodehouse to Aynd Rand to Sophie Kinsella to Jhumpa Lahiri and Salman Rushdie to Nasim Taleb...you get the gist...not to forget the Mills and Boon and Linda Goodman stage ;-)...and then, something I am really proud of, I have evolved from a really bad cook to a reasonably decent one...well, the list is endless and I can just go on and on about how my tastes and I have changed over the years...

But then the point is that over the past three decades, while I have evolved and grown in a lot of ways, while I have loved and hated, laughed and cried, risen and fallen, given and taken...there are certain things that haven’t really changed all that much, after all...and in that list is my love for books, music, chocolates, teddy bears, dogs, mountains, bollywood flicks (Ah...how I love being a part of the crowds for the first day, first shows :-)!! ), street food, shopping, writing and physics...my appreciation, love and admiration for humility, intelligence, open mindedness, genuineness, affection, warmth and generosity...my dislike for arrogance and hypocrisy...but I think the most important in the list of things that hasn’t changed much over the years is my ‘optimism’...my belief in fairy tales...my belief that what goes around comes around...my faith that every cloud does have a silver lining...

The other day, a friend of mine wrote to me saying something to the effect of, “You are such an optimist...it’s refreshing to see your take on life in this otherwise cynical world”...believe me, it is a compliment I shall forever hold very close to my heart...for optimism and hope keeps me sane, happy and relaxed...enables me to seek out and enjoy the simple pleasures of life...Yes, I know life will bring in changes, both good and bad, in the years to come...I will evolve for the better or ,god forbid, change for the worse in the midst of life’s vicissitudes...but I do sincerely hope I manage to remain an eternal optimist, in the midst of it all...we will see how that goes...only time will tell :-)

For now though, yes, I am yet another year older :-), hopefully another year wiser as well...and it’s Happy Birthday to me...with a fresh new year of life to right some wrongs...to love,laugh and live!

I have shared a love hate relationship with...

the Art of Cooking :-)

I LOVE food and hubby dear is an even bigger foodie than I am. But over the years, though my relationship with food has been a constant...that of pure love (and my genes make sure that the love for food shows on me in the form of extra girth and a yo yoing weight:-)), my tryst with cooking has been rather fascinating and has seen it’s fair share of ups and downs…

As a 14 year old, the spoilt brat that I was, while a lot of my peers were beginning to nurture their cooking talents, I don’t think I was even aware of where in the kitchen, the spice rack was located (Yes…I was that obnoxious !!). That was a stage in life when I was mighty happy being fed on delicious food made by mom, my adorable grand moms, aunts and all the brilliant cooks we had as household helpers…and yes, every once in a while, on a Sunday afternoon, dad would take over the kitchen to make that delicious Spanish omelette that only he could make, albeit leaving the kitchen in the state of a ‘hurricane aftermath’…

As a 17 year old, let’s just say this, while some of my peers were busy trying to woo their way into the hearts of prospective boyfriends, by cooking and feeding them home made meals, the seeds of feminism, already sown in my mind, made me glare disdainfully at anyone who dared to say anything that had the slightest hint of endorsing “the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach” paradigm …I was determined to find a guy who would love me the way I am and would be prepared to live eating canned food, for the rest of his life, if the need arose …can you believe that !!

During my undergrad years, I was happy falling in love with D, the ultimate personification of a foodie on earth :-)... but let’s just say this, cooking was the last thing on my mind during those four years…At the slightest opportunity, D and I would make our way to whatever few good restaurants we had in Trichy,and revel in the great food that they served (trust me, all food tasted great after what we had to deal with in the hostel dining halls)…

As far as my tryst with cooking, during the couple of years I was working in Bangalore, is concerned, my dear brother sums it up pretty well...he says that the 'daal', 'egg curry', 'paneer' ,essentially everything I cooked, ‘tasted the same’…and when he says ‘tasted the same’ with that smirk on his face, it means you are supposed to read ‘tasted the same’ as ‘tasted terrible’…

But then something changed...after moving in with D in the US, I realized that the person I had fallen in love with, was not just a big foodie but was a great cook as well…I reveled in the delicious food that he cooked while he barely managed to tolerate the tasteless food that I made…but the sweetheart that he is, he did that with a smile on his face …and then one fine day, he ‘officially’ asked me to marry him. Given the kind of food I was cooking and feeding him (specially given the fact that he was a foodie, a great cook himself and the very typical perfectionist Virgo), I was absolutely convinced that I had found the guy in D , who loved me for what I was and was prepared to live eating canned food, for the rest of his life, if the need arose:-)

Over the past 4-5 years, I take the liberty of patting myself on the back for evolving into a rather decent cook (my ever critical brother and perfectionist Virgo husband vouch for that,having been at the receiving end of my cooking over the years ;-))…I have developed a love for cooking dishes of different cuisines….I love to improvise on dishes, blending exotic regional spices and herbs…I have discovered and developed that skill of being able to bring out the taste of key ingredients in a dish...so now, all the dishes that I cook definitely don’t “taste the same” anymore….however I would still not claim to be extremely passionate about cooking…I do love cooking at leisure, as a hobby, and I definitely love entertaining people with home cooked food…but my dislike for cooking, on weekdays after a hard days' work, persists, and I crib about it every time it’s my turn to cook (D and I take alternate turns cooking on weekdays)…

But there is one day in the year when I cook with my heart and soul and hope to be able to do so for the rest of of my life…and that’s on my foodie hubby’s birthday….yes, yes D’s birthday…how I love that contented look and smile on his face when he’s fed a well cooked meal…I cook a variety of his favorite dishes on his birthday, just the way he loves them…

Well let’s just say this, though I didn’t woo my way into D’s heart through his stomach, his birthday dinner with friends is my way of saying thank you to my foodie hubby for loving me for what I am ,as much as he does, and for having been prepared to live off canned food, for the rest of his life , if the need arose…

Happy Birthday D !

Lost and Found...

A few months back I received an envelope, addressed to me, by snail mail...it took me about half a second to determine who it was from…it was from a dear cousin, R, who lives in London. In addition to regularly keeping in touch with her via email and phone calls, I always look forward to receiving these letters/cards (she has this way of finding these unflashy, beautiful, elegant cards, hand-painted on recycled paper for a social cause) from her with D and my names clearly etched on top of the envelope in her beautiful, cursive handwriting...

As far back as I can remember, she has never forgotten to send handwritten messages/cards on all special occasions, and postcards from places they are visiting, sharing an unknown trivia about a new place they have been exploring ... and I, for one, really look forward to receiving these...

This time around, when I opened the envelope, what I found was a note from her announcing the arrival of "The New Sheriff in Town", her second son, along with photo prints of family pictures with her two adorable kids, husband and my aunt ( her mom)....Of course, I had spoken to her 'n' number of times after the little one's birth and she had already shared these photographs with me on snapfish...but that handwritten message and the photograph prints, for some weird reason, evoked a medley of emotions...I can't explain the cause or the source of what I felt...but it evoked an urge to give her a big, warm hug...

In this perennial mad rush and rat race for the next big change in life, technology, career, advancement...as we've transitioned from reading printed books to listening to audio books…from writing letters to emails to texting to sharing what's happening in our lives through status messages on social networking sites…from bonding with pen pals through letters written in our own handwriting to being instantly gratified by new online pals with information about various cultures, through shared online photographs and messages ...from writing diaries to writing blogs...I think I know what we've found, but there is definitely something precious we've lost as well...

In audio books, I have found a good substitute to satiate my reading needs given the mad rush I am always in during the work week, while trying to deal with a long commute to work combined with the need to strike a good balance between office workload, household chores and spending quality time with D….what I’ve realized I miss, however, is the touch and feel of printed words on paper…the charm of lying down on the couch, having a cup of tea or coffee, sitting and becoming captured by the pages of a book, turning them one by one, getting more and more engrossed as the climax builds …I miss not being able to emphasize , interpret and visualize words and phrases like I would want to, and having instead to rely on the readers' discretionary emphasis on words and phrases, which I feel has a direct impact on the interpretation and visualization of sentences in a book.

In all the latest technological gadgets and electronic paraphernalia (email, texting, chatting, VOIP), that facilitate instant communication with near and dear ones, I have found solace in the knowledge that despite being physically thousands of miles away, loved ones are virtually just a click away…what I miss, however, is communication through the art of calligraphy, handwriting as an artform, which by itself has the ability to add a lot of meaning and expression to mere words…

In all the online social networking sites and blogs, I have found ways to reconnect with old pals and discover new ones….I have found ways to enrich my life with shared online travelogues, life experiences and photographs of old friends and new…I have found ways that make me revel in not having to memorize and remember the birthdays and special occasions of ‘n’ close friends, happy in the knowledge that early in the morning of the special day, I will be duly prompted by pop ups in one of the social networking sites to wish the person concerned…what I miss , however, is that postcard that someone close would send to share tid bits of travel experiences…what I miss is being one of the first ones to know about a birth in the family , about a snippet of good news in a friends life, before it is broadcasted to the whole world as a facebook status message ;-)….what I miss is that feeling of being special that comes with the knowledge that someone close was not prompted but remembered an occasion close to your heart, and put an extra effort to make you feel really special by posting a card that would reach you just in time for ‘the day’ celebrations…

Yes, yes folks…everything, in the above context, that I miss and feel I have lost, is extremely non “go green” friendly…but I miss these simple pleasures of life, nevertheless…and the funny thing is that I say all this, while I am fascinated by and revel in the kind of easy connectivity, planning ability, portable entertainment, fun, efficiency that gadgets like the iphone, blackberry etc. facilitate…hmmm…hypocrite you may say :-)…but not really I guess, it’s just that in the circle of life, whether you like it or not, you lose something to find something else…

Thank you for the music...

The last couple of weekends have been literally 'musical weekends' for us...

Last week I had written about the 'Billy Joel-Elton John' face to face concert that D and I attended and so thoroughly enjoyed.

This weekend was different but just as musical and beautiful ...it was a more informal,laid back musical evening at a lovely dinner party hosted by a very dear friend(in blogospshere and outside), RJ, ...in fact as I have grown to know her more,I wish I had a sister like her ;-).

RJ had friends and family visiting her, all musical greats and genius' in their own right, who treated us to a medley of beautiful melodies...like she mentions in her post, the party included two well known artists, 'M' and 'L', and another talented musician,'S', while the rest of us, novices, chipped in by singing along whenever those ever eluding lyrics of songs we thought we knew so well , finally came back to us, in bursts...

'M' sang some of his own eloquent and melodious compositions, in addition to other well known songs.'L', in her beautiful, effervescent voice, treated us to some lovely Assamese and Bengali songs that I had not heard in a long, long time, yet I seemed to relate to immediately. Music comes so naturally and effortlessly to both of them...it's just amazing ! I was mentioning to RJ the other day that having spent more than half our lives outside the north eastern part of India, there are times when D and I feel a sense of disconnection from our beloved land of birth. M and L's simple, melodious voices and music has kind of bridged that disconnect, that has this tendency to creep in ever so often, at least for the time being...

'S', on the other hand very deftly, strummed some all time Western favorites on his guitar, while RJ sang along in her husky, sexy voice :-)...'Starry Starry night','Boxer','Baby can I hold you tonight','Dust in the wind' and many more...aah filled D and me with nostalgia...believe me in the era of Britney Spears, Beyonce and Jonas Brothers, you don't find too many people appreciating those evergreen melodies anymore...and it was wonderful to be in likeminded company ,buzzed and tipsy with just the right amount of alcohol, enjoying this lovely, musical evening...

There was another thing different about this particular 'musical' evening...the only accompanying instruments were two acoustic guitars...and I am sure a lot of music lovers will agree with me that there is a different kind of charm associated with music that's created with just the simple strumming of a guitar and beautiful voices to render the vocals...with absolutely no exotic, electronic paraphernelia to enhance the experience !!

So that was a lovely evening for us...good food, great drinks and of course amazing, beautiful music that encompassed us with a sense of serenity and bliss...how can 'paradise on earth' be ever lost when there are people around to create magic with instruments and melodies!!

Lovely party and good times ! Thank you for the music, folks !

The Piano Men...

"It's nine o clock on a saturday
The regular crowd shuffles in
There's an old man sitting next to me
Makin love to his tonic and gin"

....these are the starting lyrics from Billy Joel's chartbuster " The Piano Man" and one of the many melodies to which D and I sang along as we spent Saturday evening watching two of the greatest "piano men" of all times, live in concert...Billy Joel and Elton John, face to face...

After watching 'Bruno' on Friday night, anything else we did on Saturday would have been more than a refreshing change. Speaking of 'Bruno', I never have and never will be a fan of the Baron Cohen kind of humor (at least it seems unlikely in this lifetime!!)...I read somewhere that the movie has invariably got just one of two kind of reviews...while some viewers have deemed it 'extremely hilarious'...others have deemed it 'immensely disgusting'...and without doubt, I definitely belong to the latter category of movie goers !!

It was all good that we had already booked tickets for the live concert on Saturday where the rock and roll legends were performing some of their greatest hits...love for all forms of music is something that D and I passionately share and both of us were really looking forward to it. We had watched 'The Eagles' last year when they were performing in DC as part of their "Long Road Out of Eden" tour and since then, we have nurtured this secret hope and dream of being able to watch at least one musical legend ,live in concert, every summer...this time around ,it turned out to be a double treat with the two "piano men" in a face to face concert :-)

Instead of driving into south east DC, we decided to take the metro to the Washington Nationals Stadium, the venue of the concert.As we got off the orange line at L'Enfant PLaza , it was almost as if we were swept by a tide of people to the platform from where the Green Line was supposed to take us to the venue of the musical event...people of all ages were lined up to get into the metro to see the piano men in action...among them, was this grey templed , cheerful man standing beside me...he scanned the crowds, smiled at me and said, "I am surprised to see so many youngsters like you around...for some reason, was just expecting middle aged people like me to be interested in this kind of music...never realized the rock and roll music of the 70s and 80s still sells among youngsters"...I couldn't think of anything more apt to say in response to this other than "That's what makes Billy Joel and Elton John legends, I guess" ...just then the train arrived and there was this huge round of applause and cheer from the crowd... the celebrations had already begun with the crowd all geared to sing along and dance to the beats of the musical greats...

And boy, the legends didn't let us down as they treated us with a taste of their evergreen hits...Billy Joel's 'River of Dreams','Moving Out','Stranger','Uptown Girl','Only the good die young','My Life','Zanzibar','She's always a woman' and Elton John's 'Rocket Man', 'Daniel','Candle in the Wind','Don't let the sun go down on me' being a few of the plethora of melodies that were performed....At the end, the two great artists traded vocals for each others compositions...and they finally concluded the show performing the surreal vocal-piano-harmonica combo...'The Piano Man'...

As I watched the fingers of the musical genius',oh so deftly, move over the pianos and create magical music , I realized that it was about time I got down to some serious business, as far as my guitar/piano learning aspirations are concerned, instead of just dreaming and building castles in the air about being able to someday strum my favorite tunes on the guitar and create melodious music on the piano...oh well, yes, they are big dreams, big dreams...no harm done though in dreaming big, I guess...after all that's what keeps the zest in life alive,doesn't it!!However my "learn it yourself" strategy having miserably flopped last summer, I better go and seek the help of dependable friends, 'google' and 'craigslist', to assist me in my search for a good music teacher if I want at least some part of the dream to turn into a semblance of reality...

Till then, I will have to just make do by thanking and admiring everyone who makes great music...

Rooting for the underdog...

For all those who know me well, I am not a sports maniac, quite unlike D...I do like watching tennis, cricket and a bit of college basketball…however my interest in these games too is limited to the more exciting part of major tournaments aka quaterfinals, semi finals, finals etc. As to with whom my loyalties lie in the games that I do watch, understand and enjoy...oh yeah, it's always with the quintessential underdog, provided , of course, he /she puts in the fight of a lifetime in an effort to grab victory from the clutch of the one deemed favorite. As to all the other games that I am compelled to watch just to give D company, I inevitably end up rooting for the team D doesn’t support (just to add some excitement to the whole game watching process) or more often than not, the team with the better looking dudes :-)

There is one exception to this support for the underdog however, and that is when India as a team or an Indian player is in the game. But more often than not, they end up playing as the underdogs and even if they do happen to be the favorites in a tournament, it's rare to see them keep up the momentum and the winning streak to reach a position where they are actually defending a title...sad but true, for whatever reasons...so, for the major part, I am saved the ordeal of feeling guilty and unpatriotic for subconsciously empathizing with a non-Indian underdog playing against an Indian favorite:-)

I very vividly remember the 1992 Wimbledon final...the thrilling five setter between Goran Ivanesevic and Andre Agassi...I was sitting at the edge of my seat in our family room in Guwahati and cheering Ivanesvic all the way till the end when Agassi hit the winning championship point...17 years since then, that aspect of me hasn't changed much...yesterday as I was watching the Roddick- Federer Wimbledon final, I was sitting at the edge of my seat hoping that Roddick would hit the winning point...I love Federer (other than his habit of weeping at the drop of a hat ) for the brand of power precision tennis he plays, but I desparately wanted Roddick to win for the long, brave fight he was putting in...

A lot of my friends echo my thoughts of involuntarily supporting the one deemed less likely to win a game ...there are, of course, quite a few others who do not resonate our thoughts and believe that a champ is a champ because he deserves to be at the top and that in sports, there is absolutely no room for empathy…skill, talent, power and killer instinct are all that matter…after all it’s records and names of winners on the mantle that are passed on as legacy from one generation to another…I hear them and all that they say makes enormous sense to me…but I still root for the underdog :-)

I wonder what is it that's so appealing about an underdog to those of us who inevitably support them!! Perhaps an underdog, putting in a brave fight against all odds, personifies the tenacity and resilience of the human spirit...perhaps we see a bit of ourselves and our imperfections in him or her... perhaps because at some point in our lives, we have all felt small and powerless and yet have wished and worked hard to change our destiny…perhaps because we believe and want to continue believing in fairy tales.. perhaps there is some message of hope in each of the stories of underdogs, rising from the ashes like the phoenix, urging us to follow our dreams, hold on to hope and overcome our personal mountains...

The Man in the mirror...

The 'Man in the mirror' has faded away...

He was a prodigy and a child singing sensation at the age of 5, a teen icon at the age of 18, a superstar at the age of 25...a singer, dancer, composer, lyricist, entertainer...he rose to the helm of superstardom in a jiffy and fell from the pedestal just as fast...he was wealthy but lived beyond his means...early on in his career, he was deemed a shrewd investor...in the last decade of his life, all his investments were deemed foolish...he was a philanthropist...he was an apparent victim of child abuse and extreme parental pressure that drove him to the limit...he never lived the childhood every human being deserves...he was a man who never seemed happy with the way he looked...he was a perfectionist...he was weird...he was complex...he was once a handsome, vivacious trendsetting youngster ...at a later stage in life, he had almost transformed to an alien...he was accused of the inexcusable crime of child molestation...and his death now is shrouded in a possible case of prescription drug abuse... understood by very few, he seemed like a very lonely soul...a man many found difficult to love,but even more difficult to hate...

Yes that's Michael Jackson ...the good and the bad...the black and the white ...the known and the unknown...and of course the very visible shades of grey...and today, "The King of Pop" is dead at an age when very few of us, lesser mortals, can claim to have achieved what he achieved in just the first 25 years of his life...

Over the past one and a half days, news channels have flashed snippets and stories about MJ's life and death ...the internet has been clogged by fanatical fans trying to make sense of his life and his sudden passing away...

In the midst of this frenzy , as I follow the various news clips and my feet involuntarily tap to the trendsetting beats of " Billy Jean" and " Beat It", a question crosses my mind...all of us , humans beings, have shades of grey in our personalities, don't we? I am sure there are instances in every persons' life, when he /she looks at the mirror , literally and figuratively, and doesn't like what he/she sees...But what is it that pushes some people to the brink of insanity, darkening the shades of grey that's inherent in human nature, almost pushing them into a bottomless pit ?

It's one of those questions, I guess, to which there can never be an unequivocal answer...

With that question lingering in my mind, as an era comes to an end with the death of Michael Jackson, I realize it's about time we gave him the benefit of the doubt...I mourne the passing away of a legend, accepting those shades of grey in his life, instead of trying to judge and classify those shades as black or white ...I seek solace in and celebrate the beautiful music that only he was capable of creating...

After all not every human being is fortunate enough to learn and understand, early on in life, that with great power,talent,wealth and success comes great responsibility...I guess MJ was not one of the fortunate ones...

But then, of course, neither is every human being capable of achieving what the 'King of Pop' achieved in his short life span...

While his legacy lives on in the form of his amazing musical creations, may his soul rest in peace !

Food for thought...

So Sunday, May 10th was Mother’s day…and my friends with kids, who had rushed to the mall to pick up last minute gifts for their wives, were of the unanimous opinion that the malls were packed to the hilt with male folk and kids on Saturday evening and Sunday morning so that preparations, for the mothers to be pampered, could be completed in good time :-) …

I hadn’t realized until that point of time, that over the years, Mother’s Day celebrations have gone on to assume such importance in the lives of families…it was cheering to see the children ,aptly prompted by their dads, do small things for their mothers in their own special ways as a token of their appreciation and love…

Noticing all these celebrations around me, my thoughts transitorily dwelled on Ms. ‘S’, a lady I have met just once and perhaps will never meet again…and just for a moment, I was overcome with this overwhelming sense of helplessness.

About a month back, I volunteered at this organization called One Brick for an event “Bowling with KEEN”. Kids Enjoy Exercise Now (KEEN) is a nonprofit, volunteer organization and in association with One Brick holds these bowling events every month for children and young adults having disabilities such as autism, cerebral palsy, down syndrome, various intellectual and developmental disabilities. So the event I signed up for was a KEEN bowling event where a participating athlete, with special needs, is paired with a volunteer coach for an afternoon of bowling.

I had been thinking of getting involved in some such volunteering activities involving children /education etc for quite some time …but it took a final push from a friend, Rush,who took the initiative to sign up for the event, to actually make me get out of bed relatively early on a Sunday morning (by early, I mean 10:00 a.m., the lazy bum that I am :-) ) and get to 'Strike Bethesda' to bowl with those wonderful youngsters. And am I glad that I managed to overcome my laziness and get to the bowling session that Sunday afternoon(despite having this last minute urge to go back on the commitment I had already made…believe me, my brain was baiting me with a lot of excuses…incomplete household chores …hectic long week at work coming up etc.etc. :-))!!

To say the least, the event was a sobering experience and filled me with an overwhelming sense of gratitude for all the good things that I have been blessed with in life…

As a volunteer coach, I was paired with ‘P’, a 20 year old adolescent in the body of a 10 year old child…a wheel chair bound youngster …a fragile shriveled being… who was almost oblivious to the world around him and not responsive to anything other than the occasional gentle touch of his mother…Ms.‘S’,the lady I mentioned before…a beautiful, dignified, single mom, whose world seemed to revolve around her son…

And on Mother’s day,as I rejoiced in the celebratory mood of my friends,I momentarily thought of Ms. S …

I wonder what she did…probably she had family around her to pamper her…I am sure ‘P’ must have made her feel special in his own little way…maybe…probably…perhaps…I really don’t know…all that I know is that it left me with a very sad feeling…

I personally love being pampered and appreciated by friends and family for big things and small on special and not so special days…I would be a hypocrite to claim that I don’t…

Nevertheless it made me feel that maybe...just maybe while all of us fortunate, privileged ones go on with our lives and have these ever growing list of special global days (Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day etc), to celebrate our relationships with the special people in our lives and also to endorse and rejoice in a sense of camaraderie with other people, who are fortunate enough to be on the same boat as us, we perhaps unknowingly exacerbate the void, pain and loneliness in the lives of those not as fortunate…

Perhaps, just perhaps…we have got into the habit of eternally looking for reasons to create hoopla and fuss about just ordinary days…

Cavetoons...

With summer just round the corner (at least historically...who knows this year we may just end up experiencing white, snowy months of June,July,August if the unpredictable weather pattern is anything to go by :-)), I have been doing some research on the theatre and standup comedy scene in the Washington DC metro area...

There are quite a few interesting shows and plays lined up for this summer...more about them in another post...I just want to post some cavetoons in this space for now...brought a huge grin to my face as I browsed through them again yesterday...

And as to what are 'cavetoons'...so we went for this show "Defending the Caveman" last summer ...essentially a stand up comedy, endorsing and accentuating the "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus" philosophy. It was a hilarious show that left both D and me as well as the friends who accompanied us with that quintessential "feel good" feeling that arises from the realization that we are not alone, as far as having to deal with some of the apparently "atypical" idiosyncracies of our partners, is concerned ...

So here are some cavetoons(courtesy www.defendingthecaveman.com)...hope it will bring a smile to anyone who drops by the blog...

Mahalo Maui !

Aloha...

We just got back from a beautiful, relaxing and refreshing Hawaiian vacation last week...

Needless to say, it was pretty difficult bringing ourselves back to work and to the world of mundane daily chores after spending five days in what seemed like paradise…

We were visiting Maui, the lovely Hawaiian island bang in the middle of the Pacific and eons away from the mainland…the land of beautiful sunsets...swaying palm trees...acres of sugarcane fields...miles of gorgeous white, black and red sand beaches...land of kula coffee and mai tais...the Haleakala volcano...hula dancing...laulau...poi...luaus...leis...beautiful beed and shell jewellery...amazing hand carved wood trinkets...adorable Polynesian people and culture...

It was an unplanned trip and was hence all the more exciting...the beach bums that D and I are, a major portion of our five day vacation on this gorgeous island was spent beach hopping, sun bathing and engaging in a variety of water sport activities. We drove up the Haleakala volcano and hiked a couple of miles down...walked above the clouds at the crater summit...drove along the unpredictable pacific coastline forming the island ... explored part of the sometimes rocky ,sometimes serene pacific landscape/terrain on car as well on foot...and of course sipped more than our fair share of 'mai tais' as we watched the sun go down everyday ...

It was a different kind of sunset each of those five days...the sun would go down, filling the sky in a splatter of soothing and daunting colors(I know for sure now that it's definitely possible for an experience to be soothing and daunting at the same time:-)).

I am an ardent nature lover...but that aside, my fascination and love for sunsets is augmented by the fact that I spend most of my pre and post twilight hours negotiating the notorious Washington DC traffic, thus rarely getting a chance to just sit down and watch the sun go down :-)...what else...we got a birds eye view of a clothing optional beach...and of course not to forget hogged on local Hawaiian food and drinks...

Here are a few pics of this piece of paradise on earth...Maui...

Us and Them...

Well for all of you Pink Floyd fans, this post is not really about their “Us and Them” classic which I so ardently love…this post is literally about “us” and “them”…the social stratifications created among humans by humans through prejudiced beliefs…

When educated, young politicians go on to make such inflammatory statements like Varun Gandhi did in Pilibhit (http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/EC-files-criminal-case-against-Varun-Gandhi/articleshow/4275065.cms), it is depressing to realize that what all of us have been clamoring for so far i.e. to have educated, progressive thinking youngsters in the Indian parliament , with hopes that they will be able to guide India to become a world power by leveraging the secularity, the democratic ideals of the nation and the intelligence/ perserverance of the common Indian man, is perhaps just a utopian dream…

I have always been proud of coming from a country which nurtures as much diversity in terms of faith, language and culture as India does…a country where at a specific point of time in recent history, the two highest official positions in the country were held by two extremely talented individuals ...a Muslim president and a Sikh prime minister …both being from what are considered minority communities in a nation which is inhabited by the largest Hindu population in the world…

Wherever there is diversity, there is of course bound to be differences of opinion about matters big and small…and it’s all good that there exist different opinions or views about matters…but when these cultural differences take a turn for the worse to become prejudices and premises for judging people and actions, that’s a lethal step towards turning the moderates among common folks into extremists…and to be very frank it doesn’t take a genius or a scholar to realize that…

I personally believe that it’s all good to be proud of a faith by choice …after all each individual derives solace and strength from different sources…choice and belief in a faith is something personal but being prejudiced by a faith and demeaning others who do not concur with one’s beliefs is really not acceptable…

That brings me to another controversial topic about prejudices… “the caste system” in India…of course a lot has been written and discussed about the evils of this system and I need not delve into it further…just the other day, we were having a discussion among friends that transitorily dwelled on the caste system in India…that discussion, though short and of no specific significance, provoked me to go back and rummage my old diaries for tid bits of some of my teenage year conversations with my grandparents and parents about religion, faith and social stratification…

Born into a family which has never encouraged discrimination based on culture, religion or any such other societal divides, for the major part of my life I have been quite oblivious to the burden/superficialities that the belief in the caste system entails. Though no one I know endorses the system in black and white, over the years I have heard a lot of people say that the origin of the system lies in/is endorsed in the Vedas…

I have always been skeptical about this myth though, because my granddad always used to say that the Vedas do not endorse a specific religion or classification of humanity…they talk about a way of life …a culture…

So I did my bit of research and am I glad that my belief about the tolerance of the thoughts articulated in the Vedas and of Hinduism as a culture was proved correct!!!

The Vedas say and I quote, “‘Janma Jaat Shudra Sarve, Karmenu Brahman Bhavati”…this means, by birth all human beings are born inferior and it’s only ones deeds or “karma” that go on to determining how great or superior a human being grows up to be…


I wouldn’t claim to have read the Vedas or the Bhagavad Gita to completion…may be some day I will…but I am sure all scriptures of faith including the Quran, Guru Granth Sahib, the Bible and all others have the same thing to say about human kind….it’s just us lesser mortals, who have a way of reading between the lines in support of some of our prejudices…

I visit temples and love the feeling and the sense of inner strength that permeates me when the chanting of Sanskrit mantras reach a crescendo, I enjoy the serenity and peace that envelopes me when I pray in a Church, I am filled with an unsurpassed feeling of hope as I light candles in a dargah…and I am sure as and when I do visit a gurudwara and other sites of worship, I will be filled with similar thoughts and feelings…

All faiths, at the core, have the same things to say…to nurture respect and tolerance for others, to be humble, to appreciate the dignity of labor, to live and let live…

Life is, after all, far too short and beautiful to burden it with notions of “Us” and “Them”…

Athos, Porthos, Aramis and the spirit of Slumdog Millionaire

This one's been long due:-)...now with the movie nominated in 10 Oscar categories and tipped to win the best picture by a lot of critics, I do have to pitch in with my two cents as well...he..he..he...specially with all the hoopla surrounding it about whether India, as a country , has been represented "appropriately" in the context of the movie...

We watched Slumdog Millionaire about two months back during the phase of its limited release in the US...

I personally loved the movie...I always do love "feel good" movies...those that make you sit at the edge of your seat at the theatre and cheer the protagonist till he/she achieves what he/she set out to achieve or just dreamt of achieving in the first place...movies that can make you choke with emotion but at the same time make you want to stand up and applaud at the end, for they symbolize and represent hope, love and the resilience of the human spirit...

When I got out of the theatre after watching Slumdog Millionaire, let's say this, I felt cheered and had a smile on my face...it was ,after all, a very well made movie...great cinematography, screenplay, dialogues and not to forget A. R. Rehman's melodious, soul stirring music...a movie that represented the spirit of humanity...frankly speaking, at that point of time, that's really all that I cared about...

Then of course, as the movie gained popularity and moved on to become a full fledged commercial release, there were these plethora of debates and blog posts by anyone even remotely associated with India about whether the country has been "appropriately" represented in the context of the movie. There were statements made by Indian celebrities tagging the movie with as creepy terms as " poverty porn"…all because a relatively mid budget movie, with relatively unknown faces in Hollywood/Bollywood in the cast, directed by a British director, based
on a book by an Indian diplomat, had gone on to capture and hold the attention of global audiences...

I had a lot of arguments with friends who were of the opinion that despite being a good movie, Slumdog Millionaire was misrepresenting India to the global audiences...after all India is not all about poverty and slums etc. etc...I differed from them as far as the point of view of “misrepresentation of India” is concerned and frankly speaking, I don't think I am any less patriotic because of that :-)

What really is the "appropriate'” representation of India...I personally don’t have an answer to that...

After all, India is as much about people still living below poverty line, about the thousands of slums like " Dharavi" spread all over the country, about religious riots, about children being forced into beggary, about young minds being drawn into crime for survival, as it is about people like you and me, who have been fortunate enough to be born into educated, middle class / upper middle class families, who are in a way driving the nation's economy and are the face of the progressive India,so to say. It's my belief that the sooner we realize and accept this fact, the more effective the inherent patriotism in each one of us will be in making a difference in the lives of those less privileged…

Who are we to question the creativity of a movie maker who chooses the poverty stricken life of the Indian slums as a backdrop to represent the resilience of the human spirit. Just as Italy and the Italian people are not all about the “mafia” just because a lot of movies have “Italian mafiadom” as a backdrop…so is India not all about poverty and slums just because the context of Slumdog Millionaire has the poor India as it’s backdrop…


Slumdog Millionaire is all about the human spirit…about resilience …about love….about friendship…about fragile human relationships…about being at the right place at the right time and witnessing one's destiny being moulded…

After all, for all fortunate Anil and Mukesh Ambanis of the world, who are born into luxury and given the baton of carrying forth a legacy, there is a Dhirubhai Ambani who had persevered, worked hard, been resilient through failures, loved and hated and been at the right place at the right time many a time, to build an empire, which many of us believe is one of the representations of the spirit of the progressive India….

So as a run up to the Oscars, let’s celebrate the spirit of Slumdog Millionaire and what Alexander Dumas’ fictitious characters of Athos, Porthos and Aramis have been teaching us about the human spirit for decades…

A life defining moment...

D and I celebrated our third wedding anniversary last month...

We met for the first time more than 13 years back in high school...

D says I was definitely not his idea of a date or mate then... apparently I was far too tomboyish and nerdy for his liking...grrrrrrr...does the feminist in me cringe at the expression of such an obnoxious thought..of course it does:-)...but then it doesn't take much for the romantic in me to quickly take over and make me smile, as in the same breath D also describes in the minutest of detail where, when, how we first met and even what conversations we had...not just that, he vividly remembers our second, third, fourth and all the other " uneventful" encounters in high school... and before I can go on a rampage complaining and giving him 'feministic fundas', he is quick to remind me that he kind of made up for all the initial “explicit” lack of attention towards me, in high school, by pursuing me relentlessly for two years during our undergrad before I finally committed to a relationship...

Jokes apart, it was one long courtship before we finally got married...but against all odds , get married we did...and surprisingly enough, the odds that we faced were not the stereotypical “Indian family opposition” kind of issues...it was more the choices we made...like deciding to live in two different countries immediately after completing our undergrad…I am sure a lot of people would agree that a three year long distance relationship is a big enough "odd" to create raucous, rifts and drifts in any romance...

I would be lying if I claimed that there were absolutely no points during that three year phase when we were beginning to drift...for there were plenty...but each time we managed to get back together, primarily because at the bottom of the relationship we shared and share to date is a friendship that enables us to communicate our fears, apprehensions, insecurities and doubts to each other…all without the nagging apprehension of being judged unfairly…and I am eternally grateful to God for that…

Anyways, I have this habit of going back and looking at old photographs every once in a while and just the day before our anniversary I was having one of these photograph viewing sessions …pictures with family and friends at different stages of life, childhood in Shillong, high school in Guwahati, undergrad in Trichy, work in Bangalore, 2002-2003 Europe, 2003 US trip to visit D, D’s grad school days in North Carolina, Richmond, my grad school days in Maryland, our wedding in Guwahati, honeymoon in Venice, our ‘n’ number of vacations together, good times with friends and family…needless to say, it made me nostalgic…those memories made me wonder if there was any specific moment, incident or day that has defined and gone a long way in determining the way the last decade of my life, in general, and my relationship with D, in specific, has shaped out…

Oddly enough, my thoughts took me back to a moment on my fourth day in the ‘Opal’ girls hostel in REC Trichy…that’s where I studied for my undergraduate degree in Engineering…

If a nice relaxing vacation is what you are looking for,Trichy is definitely not
the place to go :-)...nevertheless, the four years I spent in this small university town in Tamil Nadu has gone a long way in defining my life so far....

Those were the days of boring lectures, cycling around campus in the scorching heat, inedible mess food, three day second class train journeys back home for vacation...

I vividly remember, on the 4th day of my stay in the hostel, after a long session of getting ragged and subsequently weeping into my pillow :-((, I had packed my bags and was all set to return home to Guwahati....my hostel senior, who was supposed to escort me to the phone booth to make the fateful call to my parents, sat me down in her room and just said one thing "Suck up the stress for a couple of more weeks and you will not regret it"....

That moment there, when I made the conscious choice to stay on, and the four years thereafter have defined my life on the personal as well as professional front.....life was never the same again…. life long bonds and friendships were formed with people from all across the country as each one of us struggled to fit in ... cupid struck and turned into a blissful long term commitment …

Big dreams...uncertainty...trials...tribulations ...joys...sorrows...night outs...weekend trips...heartbreaks...love...parties...failures …accomplishments ...all contributing to an exciting journey leading to where I am today...

I strongly believe that our lives are stamped with defining moments that mark our memories, guide our futures and define us as individuals and in a weird kind of way, that simple choice I made that day to stay back and continue at REC Trichy laid the foundation of my relationship with D …as both of us struggled to fit into a new way of life, we developed a bond and connection stronger than any I have known…had I chosen to return back home to Guwahati that day, I cannot even imagine what life would have been like for both of us…

Thereafter both of us have been confronted with a lot of choices and moments which had the potential of making or marring our relationship…but none had the potential of affecting the direction of my life and my connection with D the way that nondescript moment in REC Trichy did…

D and I continue to have our fair share of tiffs, arguments, disagreements and vicious fights on big issues and small…but I know one thing for sure that my life with him in the past decade has made me grow and evolve into a better, well rounded human being…I won’t take the liberty to speak for D in this space…but if he also does feel the same, I think the past decade has been well spent by both of us 

As for what the future holds for us, it’s really not for us to speculate or for others to judge :-)…so here’s a toast to the years we’ve been together…

A teeny weeny ski adventure...

I love mountains, I love snow and I love snow clad mountains, of course...and I invariably accompany D on at least one skiing trip every year...not for the love of skiing, though :-)

One of the reasons I accompany D on his annual skiing adventures is because I really hate hearing him crib and hold me responsible for being a deterrent to the growth of his adventurous spirit by not encouraging him to ski …any discussions on this issue always end up with us engaging in arguments about him not having enough space in the relationship to get involved in activities which he enjoys whereas I don't…well, well I am sure that would sound familiar to a lot of girls who are either married or in relationships and they would definitely vouch for the fact that “ the space in a relationship” issue is the basis of many an argument in most reasonably “normal” households …

Anyways, now coming back to the point…so the other day, while I was asserting my dislike for adventure sports, specifically skiing, a friend asked me something to the effect of why I couldn't or rather wouldn't allow D to go skiing alone with his friends…that got me thinking...there is definitely no real compulsion for me to accompany him on his skiing trips …after all I do give him the “space” and let him do a lot of other things on his own without being clingy…tennis, golf and not to forget most importantly I allow him to sit on the couch and gulp down can after can of beer while watching football, basketball and all those 'n' other sports, season after season after season :-), while I sacrifice watching many of the 'oh so entertaining' episodes of the “Desperate Housewives” in the process …

As a matter of fact, we did explore the option of him going skiing alone with his friends this one time a couple of years back…the plan was that while he was away, I would catch up on some chick flicks and some reading…but you know the kind of tricks the female mind plays in such scenarios…throughout that 12-14 hour period that he was away, I was distraught with scary speculations…my mind was clogged with horrifying thoughts and “what ifs”…'what if' he fell down and seriously hurt himself with no one around him to help him…'what if' he needed to make an emergency call and there was no cell phone signal on the slopes…'what if' he decided to break the promise he had made to me and graduate to those dangerously steep and treacherous “Black diamond” slopes….what if…what if…what if…I was scared…so much so that like the proverbial 'nag' I couldn't resist the urge to keep calling him every 10 -15 minutes to just check on him…needless to say, the day didn't go off as planned or as well as we would have liked for either of us…after this episode, the consensus was that for the peace of mind of both of us, we would either venture out on skiing trips together or wouldn't go at all …

As far as I am concerned, I have never been a fan of any form of adventure sports,whatsoever…so I always knew it was highly unlikely that I would develop a real passion for skiing…however I realized that to be able to make these skiing trips with D enjoyable, in addition to my skiing gear, all that I needed to be equipped with was the ability to laugh at myself (an absolute essential if you want to survive among those toddlers whizzing past you with such dexterity while you fumble,tumble and fall all over the place ) and an ability to chit-chat with “like minded” strangers loitering around at the base of the beginners' slopes….fortunately I have developed and nurtured both these abilities over the years…when I say “like minded” , I mean people who would much rather be cuddled up on a couch in front of the tv sipping hot chocolate rather than be on the ski slopes…:-) and believe it or not, you will them aplenty at the ski resorts...

Anyways, so the first time D and I went skiing, after the above mentioned episode, was supposed to be a two night “ romantic getaway” at the Show Shoe Resort in Virginia…I went out on to the snow all geared with skis and poles but without ear warmers and a hat…and as you can imagine, after slipping, sliding, falling and getting up a number of times, I was numb with cold and ended up spending the rest of the day getting pampered at the spa :-)….the second and third times we went skiing, I was in the company of like minded girlfriends and ended up spending the day at the base without venturing out on to the slopes, choosing instead to chit chat about our lives and catching up on all the gossip that was doing the rounds :-)...

This time around however, the couple of friends who were accompanying us on the skiing trip were all revved up about mastering the “art and science” of skiing…so I really didn't have much of a choice…

As soon as we reached the base, while D set out to ski on his own in the intermediate slopes, the other three of us took beginner ski lessons…to cut a long story short, I tried skiing down the beginners' slope a couple of times with my friends with little success to boast of ...I was never able to complete the whole ride downhill without falling …I would either fall while getting off the lift at the top of the hill or while trying to stop at some point on the slope while skiing downhill…

Close to the end of the day,while D was busy negotiating and skiing down dangerous terrains, a second friend of mine had graduated from the basic beginners' to the mid level beginners' slope while the third friend had reached the conclusion that as far as skiing is concerned 'you either get it or you don't' and he very wisely decided that he was better off sitting at the resort sipping coffee and watching a football game rather than venturing out on to the slopes again...so that left me…I decided to go back to the basic beginners' slope alone this time around…needless to say, I was scared…

The first time I came down the slope, I had a bad fall while trying to stop…there was this sweet little 5 year old girl, Sarah, who had taken the beginners' skiing lesson with me, who adroitly stopped near me on her way downhill and gave me a helping hand to get back on my feet...she egged me on to accompany her to the top of the slope and skii down again…and though I was still shaken after the bad fall, I didn't really have the heart to disappoint this little toddler…so I reluctantly decided to give this whole skiing thing another try …this time when I got off the lift at the top of the hill, I was still on my feet and didn't fall…that was one winner, for sure…I let Sarah ski down the hill first and thereafter started my venture downhill…as I gained momentum on my way down, I began to panic like I had the earlier times…I desperately wanted to stop …and in an attempt to do so, in skiing lingo, I “edged”, “wedged” and “turned” and to my amazement there I was in the middle of the hill at a complete standstill and very much on my feet …whoa….another winner here :-) …with renewed confidence I was prepared to negotiate the remaining part of the terrain downhill…and I think I did pretty well this time….'cause I reached the base of the slope in one piece and most importantly ,on my feet…and there they were Sarah and two of her little friends skiing up to me and congratulating me with 'high fives' … and I sure had a ear to ear grin on my face…after all this was my first successful skiing venture in all these years…whoa…I was in fact ecstatic…

Funny, embarassing, touching, exhilarating…if any experience could be all of this at once….this was it …a teeny weeny accomplishment in the big picture of things…but an accomplishment for me, nevertheles!

Another year goes by...

2008 has whizzed past... just seems like the other day when D and I, on Jan 1 2008, were pondering over the achievements and failures of 2007 ,over cups of coffee, while nursing New Year's Eve party hangovers ...today, it’s already more than a year since then…

All said and done, by God’s grace, 2008 was a reasonably good year for both of us on the personal as well as professional fronts( touchwood)…

On the personal front, we set up our home together, had both sets of
parents and my brother visit us , reveled in the much awaited wedding of the family (D’s elder brother finally decided to take the plunge after years of self induced commitment phobia :-)), had some great times with friends and extended family…memories we’ll cherish forever…

On the professional front, both of us have progressed in our careers like we had hoped, albeit in small steps …

Not to forget, we’ve witnessed history in the making with the election of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the USA…not just that, it’s been a fun and enriching experience being gripped by phases of ‘Obamamania’ and witnessing a reinforcement of peoples’ belief in the enormity of the difference they can make with simple choices in a democratic nation…

As far as resolutions for the New Year go, on the personal front I never really make objective/measurable resolutions for myself…my resolutions are always hazy ,more in the likes of read more, sleep less, write more, weigh less, dump the piano, pick up the guitar, work hard, party harder…you get the gist …none of my personal resolutions are such that I can look back at the year gone by and objectively declare their fruition/failure…it’s great that I at least have ‘SMART’ (in managerial lingo, 'Specific Measurable Achievable Realistic Timebound') professional objectives for 2009 …that will keep my life balanced as far as resolutions are concerned, for sure…a complete dearth of objectives for a new year could potentially deem life directionless :-) whereas too many ‘SMART’ personal and professional resolutions can make a year of life end up becoming one helluva marathon with no finish line in sight …robbing life of its charm , of course, in the process … I do however hope that D manages to take his New Year resolution to fruition i.e. to quit smoking for good…we’ll see how that goes …keeping my fingers crossed…

As for what the year 2009 has in store for us…only time will tell…like D says, at the very least , all of us have a challenging year ahead ….with the uncertainties that define corporate America, the meltdown of it’s financial system and the repercussions of the same being observed in the global markets, the best we can do is hope and pray that we are able to ride out the storm and come out of the crises unscathed…or if not unscathed ,at least we have the resilience to come out of the crises stronger as individuals …we’ll see how things go…hopefully at this same time next year, I will have more good things to write about than bad ;-)

But for now…here’s a toast to the year gone by…to all the good times and beautiful memories shared with family and friends in the year 2008…no significant life events or changes, but good times nevertheless…

We ended the year 2008 vacationing in the beautiful US Virgin islands of St. Thomas and St Johns, basking in the warmth of the Caribbean sunshine…in the land of black beards ale, rum, conch fritters, rum cakes and blackened Mahi Mahi…in the land of beautiful, laid back, lively people…where lush green cliffs and hills, dotted with quaint Caribbean homes, lead on to white sands and the turquoise blue waters of the Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea…here are a few photographs , our amateurish attempts, to capture the pristine beauty of these islands…