Random thoughts and musings

Culture, Sanskar...?

2015-11-21T15:38:00.001-08:00

I always use to wonder what "our culture" or Sanskar meant

I have scant regard for orthodox beliefs so I never really dwelled.

It suddenly occured to me yesterday.

We light the diya in the house every morning and then again in the evening around 6:00. When we do that we put on all the lights in the house.

This is culture, how can I not do that. Not doing that would mean life is not normal at the moment.

My mom use to eat eggs or non-vegetarian food only on Wednesdays and Sundays. She regarded every other day as dedicated to a God. I was not like that but now I am more comfortable doing that.

Instinctively it limits the intake of those foods but at the same time makes sure I have some if I wanted to.

We never step on paper. We don't eat beef because rightly we consider the cow as a mother.

This and many others keep me in check and I hope my daughter also inherits the respect for these beliefs.

I like Chipotle but...

2011-04-28T10:01:00.000-07:00

I enjoyed eating at Chipotle immensely until I realised the people behind it are the same people churning out McDonalds Fast Food.
At Chipotle they make promises of "Naturally raised animals" without antibiotics, not preservatives and all that entails.Whereas in McDonalds it is all about more food at the least possible cost and they keep slashing their prices every other day. We know what that means.

How can the same company stand for two diametrically opposite things?
Catering to the rich and the not so rich with different marketing jargons, sadly it is all about the money.

Jeya and the hills(My first story)

2011-03-07T12:55:00.001-08:00

Jeya & the hills

by Aarthi G.

For,

Vinay, who never fails to light my way

Jeya loved going to Madurai. Why she loved it, she didn’t know. In fact she didn’t know that the warm feeling that engulfed her, as the train crossed the Vaigai river and the station sign reading “Madurai” in three different languages came slowly into view, was love. There were always cousins awaiting her family’s arrival at the railway station. She didn’t know how blessed she was to have people come and receive until many years later.

Jeya lived with her Amma, Appa and her brother babu in Bombay and every summer she looked forward to their visit to Madurai. Although she missed her Bombay friends and the aimless frolicking, Madurai was always like a treasure box and it thrilled her to open it every single time. The Madurai visit normally meant visiting every relative for a day or for a longer stay of about a week. But the base was always with Bamba and Baba, her appa's elder brother and wife, the two people she loved most after her parents. One of the must-dos during her stay was a week-long visit to Mama’s house on the outskirts of Madurai. Thirunagar bus stop no.5, that’s how she remembered it and everyone got down with glee at stop no.5.

Mama’s sons and their only daughter were all grown up so it was not them that made the visit so much fun but it was the joy of all cousins visiting mama’s house together. The elders would cook together and later settle down for a nap or ready themselves for a game of Ludo. Oh yes money was always involved! Meanwhile Jeya and her cousins would ready themselves for another visit to the “hills”.

Just beyond the last house on the street was the start of the gentle slopes of the hills. Every visit to the hills was a happy run among the huge rocks that made up the hills, a pit stop at a small ancient temple and finally reaching the top from where you could see the tiny villages on the other side. It was like discovering something wonderful every time. Jeya and gang would make two bottles of cold sugar sweet orange Trinka, a few pouches of oily potato chips to go along and a few other knick knacks bought at the corner shop at the bus stop which all added to the excitement. Thus went the summer holidays.

A few years went by and cousins started thinning out. A few got married, others moved to far off places for jobs and their visits didn’t often coincide with Jeya’s visit. This lessened Jeya’s visit to the hills too; alone, the hills were not as green and she started to sense the villages on the other side crouching up the hill.

Now Jeya is married and lives in a distant country. Somehow living in another country made her realize how much she belonged to the tiny town of Madurai, to Thirunagar bus stop no. 5 and to the hills. She promised herself the next time she traveled to India, she would visit the hills again.

This time Mama and Mami were alone, son’s and daughter in their respective homes and no cousins to tag along, Jeya was all set to make it alone this time. The walk to the hill was paved with concrete road and not the dirt road which had always been inviting. This somehow did not bode very well. That road cut right across the hill; the hills were gone. Civilization had taken over. Homes, grocery stores, slaughter houses were built and people of the new village walked about.

It broke her heart to see that; "Oh well", she thought “that’s what human’s do isn’t it? We take new land, build on it, live on it and then some more...”. She returned with sadness,she now only had the happy memories of it in her heart. The Hills had flattened.

To Gym or not to Gym

2011-02-27T10:20:00.000-08:00

I have been going to a gym or doing some form of workout since the last 6 years or so. Tennis, running, yoga, sometimes a spinning class or even zumba, all come under the gamut of my workout.
Sometimes I wonder why I do it, ofcourse staying healthy is part of the reason but I still wonder what this is all about.
In many ways I have become, for want of a better word, addicted to it.
If I do not visit the gym I start itching to go again.
Many days revolve around going to the gym, making time for it, not letting myself of the hook until I get there.
Unable to put in sometime in workout can get me in an unhappy state of mind and vice versa.
So yes I do have many questions but until I get the answers I guess I will keep at it :)

What's in a Name?

2010-11-25T01:58:00.000-08:00

I like my name spelt 'Aarthi'. May be because I was originally christened with those letters, not too short and neither too long. Just perfect with the 'thi' balancing the double 'Aa's.
I am from the southern part of India; the culture, art, design somehow manifest my name as an intricate 'Aarthi'. But my name makes a long journey.As it starts traveling north and then to the west, it loses its intricacy and becomes a bold 'Aarthy' and sometimes 'Aarathy'. In Bombay where I spent greater part of my childhood it loses its softness and becomes 'Aarti'. As it moves further north or if it falls into a lazy person's hand it becomes a short 'Arti'
If it so happens that such a person moves altogether to a western country the name further confounds the localite and becomes an artistic 'Artie'. Although my name has taken different hues and forms, I do seem to like the final 'Artie'. Oh well its only after my actual 'Aarthi' :)

English August- A book review

2010-10-29T02:55:00.000-07:00

English August written by Upmanyu Chatterjee, another English book by a Bengali Author. It very much lived up to the standards I have come to expect of Bengali writers.
This book gives a scoop into how villages work, how the so called government servants, IAS officers run the rural areas. Perfect for city bred,English speaking youth who have no clue of what and how of a village.
Agasthya Sen aka English August is our window into this world of bureaucracy. I cannot simply say this book is humorous which it is but because laughter comes in from unexpected quarters and sometimes it is so sudden that I was laughing out loud not just at the situation but also an the ingenuity of the author. This book is a class of its own. The author uses words plucked from remote parts of the dictionary yet the result is beautiful prose not just a jumble of words. Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of the famed "Eat Pray Love" extols the beauty of Italian language. Upon reading English August, even English seems to have a whole new dimension.
I look forward to re-reading this book in future, perhaps when life demands some spontaneity and mirth.

The Case of Dissappearing Balconies in Mumbai

2010-10-06T23:00:00.000-07:00

Image courtesy:tripadvisor.com

Balcony is a small portion in your apartment home open to the outside world.Balcony without question had been a integral part of apartments in any high rise building in Mumbai.
It started as a small trend some 15 years ago to "take-in" this balcony to add to the living room space, a sign of the upper middle class who owned the apartments and could afford the remodelling costs.
Unfortunately what started as a novel idea has now become a norm in any new construction. Builders reason that if a balcony is constructed anyway it would be taken-in in a few years so let us do it for you. There is a catch though, the room size has actually stayed the same, only now there is no balcony to take-in!
Balcony was a place to bask in the sun after a long head bath, say hi to the neighbour across the street. It also provided a secretive place to talk to your boyfriend, sometimes take a little walk; as oasis when life became stressful.
An ever burgeoning Mumbai population combined with a sharp increase in real estate prices is taking away this little comfort zone from us.

Gone With the Wind

2009-12-26T16:57:00.000-08:00

www.mediabistro.com
thanks Margaret Mitchell for such a book,a book of a lifetime.
It was not just a trip to new place but it was a trip to another era and it was not just a visit, well it was like I lived there for a while.
Having lived in the US for about 5 years now this book has integrated me more into the fabric of the country. I know now why Obama becoming the president was such a big deal.
I categorize this book as unputdownable :)

Cute Christmas Ornament

2009-12-05T14:02:00.000-08:00

Creative Anna came up with this wonderful paper house idea and she was generous enough to share one of them with all. Thanks Anna

Our world going backward

2009-11-16T17:34:00.000-08:00

Heard the news yesterday, MNS threatening the State Bank Of India to recruit only Maharashtrians for all their branches in Maharashtra.
It really doesn't make any logical sense
So according to the "Son's of the soil" should Maharashtrians be stopped from working in any other state of India? Should they be stopped from going abroad to find work. uuuuuggh the ugliness of this all. I am sure even my maharashtrian brethen also wouldn't want this.

A Happy Morning

2009-10-01T12:40:00.001-07:00

Today morning I just couldn't decide what to make for breakfast. I made an egg Omelet sandwich for V~ but I decided that will not work for me. Usually on such mornings I dilly dally long enough such that anything edible makes for a good breakfast. Anyways today was different. The weather was a perfect 60 degrees, I slipped into a comfortable pair of jeans and t-shirt and stepped out . I had to have something different today.
I was happy with my decision to go out since it coincided with the day there is a farmers market in Herndon downtown(The town which I call home).
I enjoyed shopping at the farmer's market as usual. Beetroot,cucumber,spring onions,tomato and apples went into my bag today. Oh wait I also bought "Apple Cider" today after tasting the generous amount of free sample they gave. I am still pretty new to this country so yes Apple cider is still very novel to me.
The matter of breakfast needed my attention now. Before starting today I did have a backup plan of Virginia Kitchen in case nothing else clicked but right around the corner from Farmer's market I came across Great harvest Bread Co. This is a part bakery which mostly sells their freshly baked bread.

This was my first time here and I remember my husband telling nice things about this place. The best part about it is that they give you a free "no obligation" slice of their freshly baked breads of your choice. Lucky for me I tried their Apple Scrapple and it was really delicious. Although I decided I wanted to buy it, didn't stop me from trying their High 5 Fiber as well. What she gave was not just a tidbit but a very healthy portion and with butter(which was also free :) it tasted great.

There I had my "different" breakfast and free made it even better :)

Good old Pav Bhaji

2009-09-18T11:11:00.000-07:00

There is nothing like Pav Bhaji to take you right back to the streets of Bombay.
5 years into making this once in a while, I am starting to finally get the street flavor :) Yay.

A breath of fresh air-Dining at Jacksons

2009-08-18T06:59:00.000-07:00

I enjoy dining at the Jacksons
The ambience,food,friendly waiters, perfect... well not just that, I also find these people to be responsible.
I am a person who is conscious about not being wasteful,especially when eating out, like for eg I don't like how extra ketup or mayo is served in plastic use and throw containers and why do waiters assume anyone who drinks water needs a straw? It is very easy for a person who has grown up outside of the US to notice these things.
I infact avoid takeouts for the sole reason they create so much garbage for disposal.

photo courtesy:exploreandeat.wordpress.com
At Jacksons I can eat without any of these bugging my mind. They give straws only only when one asks. They serve butter with their great tasting bread and ketchup in little steel cups and finally what really shows their conscious style is:no plastic bags served up with your togo boxes!
These little things are definitely great pluses according to me and it goes to show you don't really have to be lavish to create a nice dining experience.

Today's Harvest

2009-08-02T09:53:00.000-07:00

Mint, Tomato and green chilly from the "Backyard Farm".

The tomato plants, which are my source of primary interest mainly because of their consistent and rapid turnover, have been yielding roughly 2 ripe tomatoes(about the size of a golf ball) a day. This is clearly not enough to sustain the hearth which deals on a regular basis with tomato intensive recipes like Rasam. So I end up buying tomatoes from the market which dampens the joy and satisfaction of home-gardening. It's a stark reminder of how much goes into growing the food consumed in every single meal.

I recently saw an episode on the food channel where they mentioned that eating fried grasshoppers and other crustacean insects required about 1/1000th the amount of water as compared to growing veggies. That really threw the spanner in the works for I have always prided myself on being a sort of minimalist by virtue of my vegetarianism. Can I preach the veg-life to meat eaters if I myself am averse to the even better alternative?

Daycation to WashingtonDC

2009-07-25T19:13:00.000-07:00

Going to DC all by myself, walking around especially on a weekday topped my TODO list ever since I quit my job a few months ago. However my only destination in mind, the Botanical gardens, didn't seem reason enough. Sometime last week while sitting in the Chiropractor's office,reading the washingtonanian magazine, a photo of Hill's Kitchen, a gourmet shop for your culinary needs finally helped me take the plunge.

I started my trip to DC at about 1.00PM. Reached Hill's kitchen around 2 and drooled over their lively selection for a while. Then wandered aimlessly around for a bit and realized that there were some really quaint and beautiful houses with well decorated pathways and creeper hugging walls in that neighborhood. I came across a house which had a huge apple tree in its tiny lawn. The house didnt look occupied for the moment but the apple tree hadn't let that get in the way, it was full of apples with umpteen of them strewn all around it. Though skeptical, I tread the fine line between being a bum, or just plain crazy and picked up a couple of apples that were close to the railing (Vinay and I enjoyed them that evening). I even earned a glare or two.
By this time my stomach was growling with hunger. I had packed myself a nice meal of cooked rice, egg kurma and potato fry. I sat beneath a tree in a public garden and had my lunch :). Always wanted to do that.

Next I walked to the eastern market which is a place to buy meat and other food stuff, like in the halcyon days, before the super markets took over.
This market had been closed for a while after a fire had gutted the place down but it was always a part of the DC culture and it was finally resurrected and reopened recently.

After my visit to the market I decided to have coffee in one of the local coffee shops, unlike the urban starbucks, this shop serves coffee in actual porcelain cups instead of paper cups with plastic lids. You could actually stir the coffee with steel spoons, aah how nice. The next 1 hour was spent happily reading "The Yacoubian Building" and enjoying coffee.

The trip concluded with me visiting the Botanical garden, a nice 1 1/2 hour at the American-Indian museum and then getting stuck in the notorious DC jam on the way home. Although I have lived near washington DC for about 5 years it was my first real date with it ever and I finally got to experience its true culture!

Cut Copy Paste

2009-07-23T07:04:00.000-07:00

Since I quit my job almost 3 months ago I have been experimenting with various things to see if anything is better than coding 8 hours a day :)
Being a big fan of Calvin and Hobbes I have been drawing some of my favorite strips.

My friend said you can draw! The software programmer in me responded, 'I may not draw but I can definitely Cut Copy Paste!'

Testing my patience

2009-07-07T08:29:00.001-07:00

For the first time I am seeing any concrete results of my gardening effort and I am waiting to get my hands on them.
Its been almost 3 weeks and they refuse to turn red!

Another Calvin and Hobbes drawing

2009-07-02T04:12:00.000-07:00

A little bit of the Montana

2009-06-29T13:53:00.000-07:00

I picked up this book "Never Cry Wolf" in a small quaint town of Montana just before we were to start back from our trip to YellowStone National Park.

May be I liked the place, may be reading the first 2 pages of this book endeared me or may be I wanted to take a little bit of Montana with me

Never cry wolf was a very different book; a book in which the main characters were animals.

About 50 years ago the Author Farley Mowat travels to the Artic to study the cause of a large number of Caribou killings.

Most of the people concerned about the killings: caribou hunters and top wildlife bureaucrats blame the Artic wolves to be the culprits and that is what Mowat is sent to investigate.

Mowat's find is not just startling but by the end of the book you feel respect and love for these wolves, infact you end up feeling "small"... just a small part of the large animal kingdom.

I have to say Mowat loved his profession, the length that he went to study the wolves

from setting up a tent just a stone throw distance from a wolf family's den to subsisting on a diet of rats to study their food habits(yes Artic wolves eat rats until caribou migrate back in Summer). Beat this, he actually gives a rat recipe for the adventurous at heart :)

Now coming to the wolves themselves.Most of the things about wolves were astonishing, human like and in some cases they seem smarter!

Wolves living with their family, mating for life and just like humans wolves visit their relatives, a mom, a sister!

And here is the deal

Wolves don't kill Caribou for fun. Infact most of the times they kill only the weak or the diseased thus actually helping the caribou stay healthier.

and the real culprit--- you got it,Humans, Human hunters and not wolves.

Was he too?

2009-06-17T08:26:00.000-07:00

At the risk being called a copycat myself here is my attempt to draw a Calvin clip

I watched the much endearing movie "Taare Zameen Par". TZP
I really wonder if being dyslexic is half way to becoming a genius?
Full credit to the Amir Khan and team for venturing away from mainstream cinema and making such an eye opener of a movie.

It captured India/Mumbai so well,

right from eating a gola toIshaan's mom actually coming out of her house with a "duppata" on her night gown to see him off.
anyways I digress.
Any Calvin and Hobbes fan would notice the borrowed traits in Ishaan's character!

That page-flipper book Ishaan makes to portray the story of his separation from the family,

the imaginary "Bindaas Captain Ishaan" much like The Valiant Captain Spiff and not to mention the cute looking spaceships both ride in.
Though not mentioned anywhere in the comics Calvin always seemed to have a problem with numbers and in one strip the letters did fall of his pages just like in the movie :)
Now did the TZP team intentionally copy these ideas to make it a tad bit cute?... we may never know. (But even if they did I still like the movie, I just hope Bill Watterson knows about it)

and here's the hmmm inducer, was Calvin dyslexic too? hmmmmm....

While I wait for the Swiss Chard...

2009-06-03T17:35:00.000-07:00

I will show off my home grown Methi(fenugreek)

IndoSunGod called all gardeners to show off their green thumb so here is my bit.

This was before I made some great tasting Aloo methi :).

Thanks Indo for the encouragement!

~I grew methi following the instructions from Jugalbandi, thank you Jugalbandi

soak methi seeds in water for 24 hours, drain them and leave it for 24 hours;smallsprouts will appear, rinse and leave them again for 24 hours.

Scatter them in the ground where you plan to grow and cover with 1/2 inch of soil

Tagged

2009-05-07T08:09:00.000-07:00

My first tag ever thanks Lost On the Street.

I am super excited,lets see how this goes. It is nice tag about books!

1) What author do you own the most books by?
R.K. Narayan

2) What book do you own the most copies of?

"The English Teacher" perhaps

3) Did it bother you that both those questions ended with prepositions?

Not Really

4) What fictional character are you secretly in love with?

Jennifer in LoveStory

5) What book have you read the most times in your life?

Calvin and Hobbes

6) What was your favorite book when you were ten years old?

The Three Musketeers,Tinkle,Chandamama,Champak

7) What is the worst book you’ve read in the past year?

My Sister's keeper(This is not a bad book and worst of the lot I read :)

8) What is the best book you’ve read in the past year?

A good Indian wife

9) If you could force everyone to read one/two book, what would it be?

Predictably Irrational,The last hours of an Ancient Sunlight

10) Who deserves to win the next Nobel Prize for literature?

Can't Say

11) What book would you most like to see made into a movie?

I don't How she does it

12) What book would you least like to see made into a movie?

Tamarind Woman

13) Describe your weirdest dream involving a writer, book, or literary character.

I don't know if I ever dreamt about such and even if I did I cannot remember :(

14) What is the most lowbrow book you’ve read as an adult?

Mills and Boon.

15) What is the most difficult book you’ve ever read?

Shantaram

16) Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?

None(I am not there yet)

17) Austen or Eliot?

Neither

18) What is the biggest or most embarrassing gap in your reading?

Shakespeare, Thirrukural(tamil literature)

19) What is your favorite novel?

Eat Pray Love

20) Play?

Eka Lagnachi Goshth(Marathi Play:Story of a Marriage)

21) Short story?

Stories in UnAccustomed Earth

22) Work of non-fiction?

Waiter Rant,Maximum City

23) Who is your favorite writer?
Jhumpa Lahiri

My Addition to this Tag

24)The most inspiring book?

Leaving Microsoft to Change the World

I tag Daily Musings

Inspiring few weeks

2009-03-22T05:21:00.000-07:00

Below is a list of movies and books that I have come across in the last few weeks
Revolutionary Road(Movie):
It aptly puts forth Thoreau's words "Most men lead a life of quiet desperation"
Was also swept away by Kate Winslet's mind blowing performance.

Dead Poet's Society(Movie):
The words "Carpe Diem"- Sieze the day! is still ringing in my ears.
Sometimes you feel a movie was made just for you and this was one such.
Every scene was a book on philosophy!
Many a times before beginning my day I write these powerful words in my journal and automatically spot on I get onto something I want to achieve that day. Its been thrilling.

Leaving Microsoft To Change the World(book by John Wood):
This incredible man has lived the dream of few hundred extraordinary men. I salute you John Wood. Following the dream to provide education/books to thousands of students in the developing countries including India,Nepal,Vietnam, Cambodia, Ethiopia; you have truly changed my life.
It is incredible what one person is capable of doing driven by passion and goodwill
http://ww.roomtoread.org

Being Yourself

2009-02-18T13:55:00.000-08:00

Being yourself is a very tough job to do. You try to cheat yourself all the time and convince it that the shortest route is what you want.

But your core self is not one who easily gives in.It doesnt let you live in peace until it gets it way

Bringing in Hope

2009-02-15T05:55:00.000-08:00

I have heard many people say "growing plants is so magical", and I have felt that myself.Even more so yesterday.
I have a jasmine plant which gives some amazingly fragrant flowers in spring and fall.
It is brought back in for the winter;this happens every year; but this winter was different, its leaves started turning dry and almost looked like they would fall off, I thought it may be the heat waft coming from the vent close by. But moving it to a different location did not help either. In a few weeks it looked almost barren.
I kept my fingers crossed and I thought I will let spring work its magic.
It is not spring yet...
but one fine day I wake up and find little green shoots from its end.so magical, It feels like it has beaten all odds and is ready to begin life again with renewed vigor.