21 posts tagged “india”

தீபாவளி நல்வாழ்த்துக்கள்.  வாழ்வில் ஒளி பெருகட்டும்.
Wish you a happy and safe Deepavali.

Right after a deadline got out of the way at noon, I packed my bag and set out on my sojourn to the homes of all the people who had invited me to their Navarathri kolu.  Finished four so far. Impressive for three hours, with each house in opposite ends of town, what ?

Here is the catch.  I have harped many times here and elsewhere that I am, what is called, a "sweets" person.  But perhaps I over-stated my palatal preference. The moment people saw my head on the horizon, they loaded their plates with sweets of all colours, flavours and kind.Ghee-dropping fruit halwa, chocolate burfi, milk Kowa, rosogolla, coconut bufi.  Each, on its own, would have made me drool from now to eternity, but one after the other within three hours, most of which spent within the closed confines of a car, especially on a day after a rather sleepless night working on a deadline, is NOT good news.  And topping the whole corunucopia of sucrose overload with a cup of instant coffee is pretty much the icing on the cake, so to speak.

Now the stomach is on a hyperdrive, somersaulting and threatening to spill its unpleasant content one way or the other. 

I have four more houses to visit this evening.  I sincerely hope, for their own good, that none of them dares even mention the "S" word within my earshot.

You are invited.

Kolu 2009

3 comments

Vasundaras kolu

Farm and jungle

Garden

I have a question for all ye people out there who wear saree casually, i.e. not for occasions alone, but just-like-that.  When you have worn a saree and are at home attending to the million chores around, do you or do you not pull up the pallu around you and tuck it into your waist (see picture below, of course, minus the "oomph")? 

Tucked in

3 comments

I do, and I just realised I don't know why I do it.  Like dude says, it looks untidy, and doesn't serve any purpose.  Yet I do it ever single time.
Any ideas?

Happy pongal

This thanksgiving, here are a few things our family is grateful for:

A whole lot of totally unrelated strangers who toil in their field to get the food on our table.
A country whose weather is conducive to growing the food, that gets to our table.
The innumerable animals and plants that sustain our life through the food on our table.
Good health that makes it possible to eat a healthy meal with no restrictions.
A family that makes it possible to have a peaceful meal at the table with no worries that catch the throat.
Jobs that pay sufficiently to get wholesome daily meals.
Parents who helped us get the skills used in the job that pay for the food on our table.
Guests that drop by and partake of our meals, making it more wholesome by their company.
Friends that add just that little sparkle that adds to the peace of enjoying a meal.

It is so easy in the humdrum of daily existence to overlook little things that make life worth living.

Thank you.

If I find a Caucasian singing Carnatic impressive, this one just blew me away

Confeti

For the first time in my entire life in this country (which, incidentally I love), some program started on time.  ON TIME.  A magic show was arranged for the kids that live in campus to celebrate children's day today and I could not believe that the program started at the dot of 5.30 PM that was announced.  I almost cried with joy.  I wish I could have met the magician and fallen at his feet in joy.  And what is more?  It concluded exactly at 6.30 PM as promised.  Before the kids got cranky, before the moms got crazy and the night got darker. 

The show was great. I mean, it was a fairly run-of-the-mill magic show with most of the tricks already seen many times, but the ambiance was quite good (except for, sigh, the loud music).  The kids had fun.  Moms generally were relieved that everything went smoothly (except for the fire alarm that went off when the magician set fire to paper to "transform" it into a bouquet).  The magician made a very courageous attempt at English, I wondered why though.. he could have conveyed stuff better in his own language.  And as usual I almost choked up when he waved the Indian tricolour to the music of ARR's Vande Mataram (have I mentioned that I am a hopeless romantic?).

BUT, what makes me gape in wonder was the perfect adherence to time. Hail magician (what is his name?).  May your tribe increase.