A picture is worth a thousand words

A picture is worth a thousand words... it is so true and we all use this phrase very often in our lifetime. And Wikipedia puts it as "The adage A picture is worth a thousand words refers to the idea that a complex idea can be conveyed with just a single still image. It also aptly characterizes one of the main goals of visualization, namely making it possible to absorb large amounts of data quickly."

For me, it is more than just visualization and data absorption, but great piece of treasure with bundle of emotions associated with it. Gone are those days when Raja Maharajas used to get their portraits done with great artists. Thanks to cameras, we don't need to sit for hours to treasure our memories.

God gifted us with the invisible camera which stores images of people and places that we like the most or hate the most. But poor memory, it has limited capacity...can't store many pictures for long...so we need external storage as an add-on for human memory...unless we are human camera...see the video clip shared by one of my FoF (Friend on Facebook):

Digital cameras make our life even more simpler. Share your memories with family and friends with just click of a button. Today, we got a chance to browse through 2000 pictures which were on hard prints before. I've been bugging my husband to get them scanned and finally got the digital prints. The picture browsing session took us on a journey from Kurnool to Hyderabad to Trivendrum to West Bengal to US and back to Kurnool to Tamilnadu to Karnataka...great ride of beautiful memories. What a pleasant gift for the new year!!

And the most beautiful memories for any mother are the first few years of her babies. Within one year after birth, babies change so much...it is really hard to recollect how they looked each month. Honestly, if I don't have their pictures taken, I'm sure I can only recollect few important moments. Thanks to my kid's nanny Kim Markly and Shutterfly who inspired me in doing baby books for both my kids. Whenever I open those books, they bring big smile on my face and it's great fun for kids to see their life's first actions and reactions with dates imprinted. 

Harshita's first year baby book with milestones:

  

Harshita sat with support on November 14th 2002.

Harshita's first laugh on December 09  2002.

And Parinita's first year baby book with milestones:

Pari rolled over unassisted on Jan 19th 2005.

Pari sat without support on May 9th 2005.

If you think that I've so much time to capture and treasure my babies beautiful memories, what will you say for this father who captured his baby's growth for years. 

Gosh....should have got this idea before....may be time for another kid j/k ;-).

That reminds me of new year resolution. To all my friends with new resolutions, wish you all the best and a very HAPPY and PROSPEROUS NEW YEAR. Enjoy your time with family & friends and do treasure those fun times.

The Soothing sounds of water

Last year, I had send-off party by my roomies in a Thai restaurant. It is Sweet Thai Basil in Foster city, California. Thanks to Anusha for reminding me the name of the restaurant, in less than a year, I totally forgot its name ..effect of aging ;-). 

We had great time talking with each other and in the middle of our chit-chat, gossip, laughs.... something attracted my attention. I felt some soothing effect, it was the sound of water with water flowing restlessly in the fountain. That very moment, I decided to have a water fountain at home. After lots of window shopping and 60% discount during festive season last year, rewarded myself with this water fountain.

Didn't realize that it looks like Ganesha until some of my friends told the same. Feels good whenever I see Ganesha in the form of water fountain. The only problem... emptying and refilling it every other week. But the sound of water and the coolness around it is worth taking the pain... especially in summer.

Read more on the benefits of water fountain at http://www.waterfountain.in/ 

The soothing sounds of a waterfall help focus the mind, and bring the tranquility of a mountain stream into any room. As if this wasn't enough, waterfalls also produce negative ions, tiny electrically charged particles that help you feel more alert and relaxed. These also remove impurities in the air, alleviating allergies and decreasing indoor pollution.

But from last one month, I stopped this recycling process as it's bit cold here in Pune. One fine day, sound of water woke me up and when I peeked out of our balcony, it was from a sprinkler installed next to swimming pool. It dances daily for one hour...dunno the exact purpose of it. Anyways, I'm happy to wake up for the soothing sounds of water. When all I hear is the sound of water in the serene morning....feels very relaxed.

When it rains, the view from our balcony, with cup of coffee, takes me to heaven and brings back all the old memories. 

And whenever I listen to my most favorite song "Aye Dil E nadan", it reminds me of dancing droplets. Been listening to this song on tape for years. Always had the feeling that it was filmed near water fountain. But when I saw the video for the first time yesterday, I told to myself..."Aye Dil E Nadan(Oh, foolish heart!)", as it was filmed in the desert. At least happy to see water and its ripples towards the end of the clip. Lataji's sweet melodious voice combined with beautiful background music (Santoor I guess) tempts me to relax and listen to this song. And the slight pause and photography for "ye jameen chup hain, aasmaan chup hain(this earth is silent, the sky is silent)" is breathtaking. Enjoy the song on YoTube and MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Love kids in a right way

Today, one of my friend forwarded this email to me. Thought I'd share this on my blog. Here you go...

This is a powerful message in our modern society. We seemed to have lost our bearing & our sense of direction.

One young academically excellent person went to apply for a managerial position in a big company.

He passed the first interview, the director did the last interview, made the last decision.

The director discovered from the CV that the youth's academic achievements were excellent all the way, from the secondary school until the postgraduate research, never had a year when he did not score.

The director asked, "Did you obtain any scholarships in school?" the youth answered "none".

The director asked, " Was it your father who paid for your school fees?" The youth answered, "My father passed away when I was one year old, it was my mother who paid for my school fees.

The director asked, " Where did your mother work?" The youth answered, "My mother worked as clothes cleaner. The director requested the youth to show his hands. The youth showed a pair of hands that were smooth and perfect.

The director asked, " Have you ever helped your mother wash the clothes before?" The youth answered, "Never, my mother always wanted me to study and read more books. Furthermore, my mother can wash clothes faster than me.

The director said, "I have a request. When you go back today, go and clean your mother's hands, and then see me tomorrow morning.*

The youth felt that his chance of landing the job was high. When he went back, he happily requested his mother to let him clean her hands. His mother felt strange, happy but with mixed feelings, she showed her hands to the kid.

The youth cleaned his mother's hands slowly. His tear fell as he did that. It was the first time he noticed that his mother's hands were so wrinkled, and there were so many bruises in her hands. Some bruises were so painful that his mother shivered when they were cleaned with water.

This was the first time the youth realized that it was this pair of hands that washed the clothes everyday to enable him to pay the school fee. The bruises in the mother's hands were the price that the mother had to pay for his graduation, academic excellence and his future.

After finishing the cleaning of his mother hands, the youth quietly washed all the remaining clothes for his mother.

That night, mother and son talked for a very long time.

Next morning, the youth went to the director's office.

The Director noticed the tears in the youth's eyes, asked: " Can you tell me what have you done and learned yesterday in your house?"

The youth answered, " I cleaned my mother's hand, and also finished cleaning all the remaining clothes'

The Director asked, " please tell me your feelings."

The youth said, Number 1, I know now what is appreciation. Without my mother, there would not the successful me today. Number 2, by working together and helping my mother, only I now realize how difficult and tough it is to get something done. Number 3, I have come to appreciate the importance and value of family relationship.

The director said, " This is what I am looking for to be my manager. I want to recruit a person who can appreciate the help of others, a person who knows the sufferings of others to get things done, and a person who would not put money as his only goal in life. You are hired.

Later on, this young person worked very hard, and received the respect of his subordinates. Every employee worked diligently and as a team. The company's performance improved tremendously.

A child, who has been protected and habitually given whatever he wanted, would develop "entitlement mentality" and would always put himself first. He would be ignorant of his parent's efforts. When he starts work, he assumes that every person must listen to him, and when he becomes a manager, he would never know the sufferings of his employees and would always blame others. For this kind of people, who may be good academically, may be successful for a while, but eventually would not feel sense of achievement. He will grumble and be full of hatred and fight for more. If we are this kind of protective parents, are we really showing love or are we destroying the kid instead?*

You can let your kid live in a big house, eat a good meal, learn piano, watch a big screen TV. But when you are cutting grass, please let them experience it. After a meal, let them wash their plates and bowls together with their brothers and sisters. It is not because you do not have money to hire a maid, but it is because you want to love them in a right way. You want them to understand, no matter how rich their parents are, one day their hair will grow gray, same as the mother of that young person. The most important thing is your kid learns how to appreciate the effort and experience the difficulty and learns the ability to work with others to get things done.

Unique Identification Number

For friends in IT, you know what I mean. I'm not going to talk about the unique id or primary key used in relational database, but unique 16-digit identification (ID) number to be issued to all the residents of India. Yes...UID is the concept recently introduced in India and managed under the guidance of Nandan Nilekani, former Infosys CEO. After a person is allotted an UID, his/her identity linked to biometrics would be established to uniquely identify the person. This is similar to Social security number(SSN) in US. 

The project is named Adhaar meaning foundation to remove confusion over the name among the people. The Numerological Meaning of the word Adhaar seems very interesting. "They are extremely reliable and are often found taking care of others. They have a deep need to try and create harmony in their surroundings. Unfortunately, this can sometimes lead to getting taken advantage of. " So true...if the card falls in the hands of bad guys...Govinda GOvinda....

All these identity stuff is being stamped for each person to protect and identify his/her OWN identity. Why do we need this identity? God is great... he gave unique identity to each person. No two persons are same in features...even though twins look the same, there are still some differences that are unique to each person. So the first identity given by God is the FEATURE SET. <getting distracted by Abhilasha's song on SaReGaMapa...too good>. So is feature set sufficient for unique identification? Nope....each person needs to be tagged with a NAME. 

Without name, imagine how your friend will call you with God gifted feature set "hey...long hair, brown eyes, short nose..." or may be a Tarzan yell. But human raised one step further and TAGGED each person with a name for easy identification. But with so many names in the world, LAST NAME came into picture to identify certain set of people based on region, religion, profession, caste etc.etc.. Slowly ID cards and biometric measures came into picture to identify or authenticate a person's identity.

All these ID cards and identity theft seems to be part of new era. How about olden days? Did they have identity theft back then? First thing that comes to our mind is NO.. as there were no ID cards ;-). But the identify theft back then seems to be more dangerous than today. Hope you heard of ParakAya Pravesham - leaving one’s body temporarily and entering the body of another person. Shri ShankarAcharya used the ParakAya pravesha vidya and entered body of the king amaruka. Recent Hollywood hit Avatar also has the concept of Parakaya Pravesham. Read more at Avatar The Movie – Similarities with Hindu Teachings and symbols and concepts in Hinduism.

Not just Parakaya Pravesham, but Gods and demons used their powers to take different forms to disguise their identity. In Ramayana, Mareech assumed the guise of a lovely golden deer and moved about in the presence of Sita and then Ravan took the form of Rishi and kidnapped Sita to his kingdom Lanka. In Sasirekha Parinayam,  Ghatotkacha takes the form of Sasirekha to avoid her marriage with Lakshmana Kumara, while the real Sasirekha is married to Abhimanyu. Being an Andhrite, who'll forget the good old Maya Bazar song with great actress Savitri playing the role of Sasirekha.

Also Krishna replicated his identity with each Gopi during Rasa dance, that way each Gopi thinks that Krishna is with her. And in the latest movie, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, many people take the form of Harry potter to protect him from bad guys. Krishna followed one to many entity relationship whereas Harry potter followed many to one entity relationship ;-). But at the end, it is the disguise that matters.

Now coming back to Kaliyug, man has many measures for uniquely identifying a person including ID card, blood group, finger print, polygraphic test etc...etc.. Then, what will be the future identification of a person? 

My vision into future.....once a baby is born, implant a small chip inside the body...let's say inside finger and then swipe the finger under/over the scanner. I'm sure all the electronic gadgets will have in-built scanners in the future. This relieves a person from carrying a card. Oh....wait...is it safer than carrying a card? What if the thief cuts the finger and uses it to scan and steal the identity. Man....this is more dangerous than carrying a card...you'll lose your life for the chip :-(. 

So what else can be done? May be the scanner will be intelligent enough to detect if the chip is inside a living entity that sends and receives signals from the brain. Oh...well...the thief can hijack a person and use him/her as a card....too bad again. So what next? May be the scanner will be intelligent enough to figure out if the person swiping the finger is not under any pressure...the integration of Lie detector/Polygraph test. Punya....you are giving new product ideas....time to patent your invention ;-). Anyways, human identification has long way to go....

Today's Maya Darpan - Skype

When I was a kid, may be around 6 to 7 years, I watched a Telugu movie (Pathala Bhairavi?) that has this concept of Maya Darpan... where villain looks at a magical mirror to track people and fulfills his evil desires. I still vaguely remember that MAYA DARPAN...but not the plot and the story.

Today, I called my parents to ask the movie name. They laughed and asked me why I want to know. Anyways, THAT Maya Darpan concept rooted in my mind because I was fascinated by the way villain looks at the mirror and finds out what's going on on the other side. I always used to wonder, someday somewhere, if someone can invent something like that.... how good it'll be...of course, not for any evil plot ;-). 

In Hindu mythology, there are lots of stories about how people communicated with each other...including birds carrying messages and people personally traveling on horses to covey messages to other party. This followed by snail mails, phone calls and now video calls. 

When I was working at this company called Liberate that got liberated during dot com burst :-( , there were big TV screens in all the conference rooms to video chat with other team members in Utah. Meetings were seamless with the feeling that the other team is sitting next to us, but on a table setup on the wall ...virtual collocation :-).

In the same way, if you want to see and chat with your loved ones, there are so many video chat services from so many vendors. But the one we constantly use is SKYPE. The hype of Skype is so deep rooted in my kid's minds, they love using it even when mamma  is around. Especially watching mamma and daddy on the screen and typing so many stickers (other name for emoticons by Pari ;-)) is a huge fun for them. Last year, when I was away from home, Skype helped me to keep track of my kid's progress and help them in doing their home-work. My roomies used to look at me in amusement and over time, they got used to it :-).

I love Skype, regardless of how many times you call anyone, wherever in the world, the call will always be absolutely free, and it is simple to get going. You just need a computer with an internet connection and a web cam...that's all today's Maya Darpan needs...and of course, the other person has to acknowledge it....so no peeking into other's life like the good old Villain ;-).

Not only that, we used the power of Skype for Thanksgiving shopping. My poor husband...he has to return the items not approved by me and kids. But it's a great way to see and select items instead of repenting later.

So is Skype limited to chat with friends and families?  Nope...glad to know that Skype is being used for Campus placements. 

Campus placements across the seven older Indian Institutes of Technology got off to a colourful start on Wednesday. The highlight of this placement season was at the IIT Madras, where for the first time hiring went high-tech with the popular social networking site Facebook conducting interviews for short-listed students via Skype, the Internet voice protocol service.

Read more at: Facebook interviews IITians via Skype, placements - The Times of India 

So what is the next thing I wish for? I wish the person you love is in front of you the next moment you think of them. And somebody already stole that concept from my heart ;-). If you want to see for yourself, enjoy the AIRTEL ad for video calls Airtel's New AD - Endless Goodbye. 
And here is another Airtel ad with music composed by none other than A.R Rahman Dil Jo Chahe Paas Laaye.

The power of TOUCH

During one of our phone conversation, my husband was singing our favorite song Saiyyan Saiyyan… Tu jo chhoo le pyaar se, and then he asked me if I can write a blog post on that song….I know he was just joking. After a slight pause, I told him “Yes I’ll write”. In surprise, he asked me “WHAT?????” and was curious about the blog title. I told him it’s about TOUCH (based on chhoo le in the song). He started laughing and wondered what my wife is going to write on TOUCH ;-). Ok..here…it goes…

As we all know, there is bad touch and there is good touch. Well… there is only one bad touch that make others feel bad, depressed or results in fight. With so many rascals on the road, it’s better to teach our kids the difference between bad touch and good touch at an early age. I’ll leave that to the parents and move on to many good touches we encounter in our lives….

Touch of mother: Touch is a great way to bond with new born baby and it makes the baby feel secure. Infant massage is another form of touch that has so many advantages for baby’s well being.
Not only new born babies, even big babies sleep well for mother’s massage in her lap. I feel like sleeping in my mother’s lap now :-).
Here is an interesting story about mother’s touch: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/38988444

Doctor’s touch: Touch is one of the vital tool used by doctors to understand patient’s health.
A mother can almost always predict kid’s fever before it shows up on thermometer…. that’s mother’s special touch and her sixth sense. My husband always wondered how I could be so sure of an upcoming fever. I always tell him, "you got to be a mommy to understand that special touch" ;-).

Touch as a vital sense: Out of five senses in our body (sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch), touch is something that is not associated with single part, sense of touch is found all over the body.... thanks to our skin to carry signals to the brain.
I truly enjoyed watching the movie BLACK directed by Sanjay Leela Bansali and great performance by Rani Mukherjee. It depicts how a person who is blind, deaf and dumb uses touch as a means to communicate with the surroundings.

Touch to get blessings: As per Hindu customs, we touch our elder’s feet to show respect and get their blessings. Nowadays, we are too worried to bend down completely and touch the feet... sometimes we adjust by just touching the knees…. it could be our fat tummies that won’t allow us to bend 180 degrees. But there is a hidden exercise in bending our body ;-).

Touch to scare ghost: OK….I have a Ghost story to share. Sounds interesting…. isn’t it? Not sure if it was a Ghost or something else, but I had this experience when I was in my teens and it happened around 5 to 6 times. Never got a chance to experience it after that…ok… here is the story….

When I used to sleep on my back… that too after midnight (Oooooo…can you hear the wolf sound ;-)), I could feel something sitting on my chest. After that, I absolutely had no control on my body, but mind still working. Each time it happened, I tried my best to move myself…..but in vain…I couldn’t even blink my eyes. With no fear for Ghosts (of course, we are Ghosts wrapped in flesh), I was very curious, if I can ever see it or at least move myself. This is one of the out of body experience I had in my life. This happened for few months and then no more.

One thing was very interesting, it happens only after midnight and that too, when everyone is asleep. The moment my mother (who used to be in deep sleep ;-)) TOUCHES my body, I’m back to life. Not sure what TOUCH has to do with this phenomena. It is still an open question to me. Would like to know if any of my blog readers had similar experience in their life.

On Wikipedia, they call it Sleep Paralysis. They say it could be result of insomnia….but I never had sleeping problem in my teens. I wonder why it happened only in the night? If it was sleep paralysis, why it didn’t happen during the day and why it went away with touch of my mom?

Touch to express love: Who will forget the first touch by their partner. Touch is one of the beautiful way to express love. Not just direct touch, even touching an object touched by lover elevates the other person to heaven :-).

Touch for reproduction: Touch and hormones are the building blocks used by God for creature reproduction....with test tube baby being an exception.

Touch products: Nowadays everyone wants touch screen…whether it be mobile phone, laptop or TV…everything is bitten by touch concept. Electronic gadgets are competing with each other to feel the touch of human being. btw, I like the ad by Karbonn k1212 that says DO NOT TOUCH.

OK…OK Punya stop now. Looks like I can write an entire book on TOUCH. Still there are so many touches to write… touch to calm animals, stories of touch by famous gods etc…etc…Anyways, I’ll leave them to the readers now… but one last touch before I stop….

Touch to heal: Few years back, my husband broke his femur and was hospitalized for 12 days. We both tried our best to control our tears in front of kids…. one of the real ACTION taught by God. Being all by ourselves, I had to take care of kids in the morning and once they fall asleep in the night, rush to the hospital to stay with my husband by his side…holding his hands most of the time.

One day, he felt pity on me and requested me to stay home. Next day morning, when I visited him, he bursted into tears like a baby.... and requested me to stay by his side. It’s not the pain that made him cry….but the missing touch. TOUCH definitely has healing effect on our souls http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therapeutic_touch.

I would like to THANK all my friends, co-workers and neighbors who extended their enormous help during those tough times.

And to all my friends in US, HAPPY THANKSGIVING and safe BLACK FRIDAY!!

When you get time, do watch the beautiful performance by Mouni Roi for Saiyyan Saiyyan song ….the song that is an inspiration for this blog post.

Biggest challenge for today's parents

If you are parents of toddlers and school going kids, you know what I'm talking. Yes....FEEDING kids is one of the biggest challenge of today's parents.

The journey starts when the baby is inside mommy's womb. But the magical umbilical cord takes care of feeding the baby. Once the baby is out, mother gets sole responsibility of feeding the baby... it's a bliss to bond with baby close to her heart. As long as the baby is in mother's womb and mother's lap, everything seems to be ok. But the real challenge starts when the baby gets the chance to eat food.

Most of the parents wait for THE DAY for their babies to start eating food.... thinking that it is one of the easiest job. But kids will give us no time in repenting on what we thought. Whenever I used to see Gerber bottles (baby food) in the store, I used to feel happy... that my baby will eat when she turns 6 months and will continue until toddler age. Ooooh.....big mistake. The moment I put Gerber food in her mouth, I was totally disappointed by her expression.


It felt like "What the hell I'm doing to my kid?". I wished for an INVISIBLE umbilical cord that feeds my baby whenever I eat my food. Hmmm.... we are in Kaliyug... our wishes will not come true... we have to accept the fact that we have to struggle. So started preparing food at home and that helped her to come out of those expressions. But.... is that all? Nope... making them sit at one place and feeding them was another big challenge. Thanks to booster seats and high chairs.


If they are not in booster seat.... you better be ready to play hide and seek with them :-).



Once they are out of toddler age, eating good food is an untouchable thing for them. They do everything whatever they want...except touching the plate.... and they don't even bother to look into the plate.


Does that mean they don't eat anything? Then we are wrong....they have their own choices, and if they get what they want, they don't need our help at all.




Wonder why we spend so much time behind our kids. Whenever my parents come home, they always say one thing " we never spent so much time behind you and we never had any problem feeding you guys...then what is wrong with today's generation?". Truth is... today's kids are more creative and they want variety. ...if not, they'll say "again the same thing...Oh no...".

Being mother of two, I learned a lot and trying my best with some crazy cooking for the creative kids. It feels good when my kids say "Wow... I like it, can I have some more...". And I feel proud when they say "mamma, you know what... you should go to master chef" ;-). Oh..well...if they eat all the food I give them....that is the biggest compliment I can get from my kids.

When I've time and energy, this is what they get when they come from school.... strawberry milkshake, boiled corn, papaya, beetroot halwa and grapes... yummy isn't it?


With their inspiration, planning to start another blog especially for kids....of course, it's for big kids too :-). I know there are many blogs and websites dedicated for big kids...but hardly see any for little kids. Hope this will help other parents too....

Where is MY Calendar?

It is mid November and almost end of the year. Now kids have only one more sheet to turn on their Calendars, and they started reminding me almost everyday about their next year Calendar. btw, they have their OWN calendars with their pictures imprinted on each sheet.




First thing they do everyday morning is....check their Calendars. They can't ignore it as Calendars are straight in front of their eyes when they wake up.


Here is the story behind these custom Calendars. Last year, when I was away from home and enjoying my time, realized that the days are much longer than before. Overwhelmed by the EXTRA time (which just flies when kids are around) that came on my way and the pile of pictures overflowing my laptop and also external drives, felt pity and thought of putting both of them to work. So spent some good amount of time in creating these custom calendars for kids, big kids(me and my husband) and very big kids (my parents).




When I handed over these Calendars, the smile on their faces was priceless. OK...now the next challenge was... how to hang the Calendars on the walls? I really didn't want to use nails as kids will have tough time turning the sheets. After good amount of research, decided on L-Shaped Allen wrench instead of nails. Now I'm not worried when kids play with the Calendars :-).


Didn't realize that kids will love them so much that they get addicted in checking the important dates almost everyday. Using pictures instead of text to display important dates is a major click. Also it's easy to catch mommy's mistakes when she puts Childrern's day on October 14th instead of November 14th.... next time I've to be extra careful ;-).

Happy to see kids getting into the habit of checking Calendar for important dates to plan ahead. Also they never gave me a chance to turn the sheets..... it happens on the 1st of every month.

Now realize that the project which was undertaken at my free time has become mandatory. I've only seven weeks to go.... time to start Punya....

Visit to Children home

Last month, kids had a trip to an orphanage in Pune, as their school raised money from Dandiya event conducted in their school premises. Thought I'll also pay a visit to the orphanage to see how kids react when they interact with the kids there. As I could see, kids mixed well and they were busy exchanging games they play in their respective schools. And they had fun playing together.


By the time I reached there, Harshita made friendship with a girl by name Karishma. Now Harshita is pitching in to share her views...I'm typing as she is telling...

"Karishma is a 11 year old girl and she is short for her age. She has a big brother and a small sister. Her parents could not afford money for them. So they sent them to the orphanage. The orphanage has a school, library, cafeteria, bedding and clothes. They like their home, but they are forced to drink dirty water and eat the same food everyday...that too, in small quantity. I think they are very creative, good at dancing and very friendly to visitors. They also participated in a dance competition and won. When we visited them, they danced on the same song as in the competition. Their dance was on a Ganesh Sloka. But I must say, they danced pretty well. Karishma was very happy when our school served the orphanage Bournvita and notebooks to write in. There were many poor kids who were being comforted by the elder ones. Most of the people felt very sympathy and were also making them active. Karishma is a Marathi girl. She mostly talks in Marathi, but can understand little Hindi. It was a little hard communicating with the orphans. But I think they were able to understand what we were saying. So in my view, I think the orphanage field trip was the best one until now."

Here is the picture of Harshita with Karishma.


Kids were curious to know about each other....


And I saw these two kids sitting on one side and talking to each other. When I asked why they were not playing, they replied that they love to talk with each other. So cute....


Here is some art work done by the kids there..






School kids enjoyed distributing Bournvita and see them smile...

Kids there seemed to be very happy. Life has taught them a big lesson to live without parents. The person who is in charge of the orphanage was very proud to say that the kids are very responsible and very good in their studies too. I couldn't control to capture their smiles....






Here is the information about the orphanage, "The orphanage in the name of Bhatkya Vimukta Jati Shikshan Orphanage(BVJSS) is run by its founder Mr Shivlal Jadhav, a post graduate in Economics & Politics. This home has abandoned children from the streets of Pune and at present there are around 250 children between the ages of 5 to 15 who are provided with food, shelter and education in the premises itself. "


Now listening to Kunal Ganjawala's song on SaReGaMaPa "Life is good. Life is wonderful. Life is pain.... it's all part of that game...." very true.

Deepavali celebration

It's two days past Deepavali, but still we can hear the sounds of fireworks, string of lights flashing in the balconies and commercials on TV channels. It'll take another three to four days to come out of Diwali Dhamaka :-).

For us, Deepavali celebration started with Harshita bringing the lantern she made at school and then buying Diyas.


Kids hand picked their own Diyas and had great fun coloring them.


They got colored Diyas as Diwali gift from their art teacher.



String of light bulbs hanging in neighbour's house made kids bug their mommy to buy one for them. So we got lights and Lotus lantern to show off.






Also kids had fun choosing firecrackers and rangoli colors.


Finally on the day of Deepavali, kids woke up at 6.30am triggered by their mind clock. They came to their mommy who was still debating to come out of bed after short night sleep. But their enthusiasm to draw Rangoli woke me up. They directed me in filling the colors of the rangoli.... and here is the output.


As usual, our maid took off on Diwali. At least I was happy that our cook agreed to prepare sweet in the early morning at 7am. Thinking that all the puja preparations will be done soon, I took oath to do fasting. Believe me, I'm very bad at fasting... empty stomach makes me go cranky and results in bad headache... with my body taking control over my soul. So I usually don't take the pain of fasting. But somehow, thought I'll fast this time on Diwali. Unlike people who fast by drinking juice, tea and eating fruits and Saabu daana kichdi, my fasting is only with water... so bit hard on me ;-). Anyways, I tried my best.

With fasting in place, I had to do all the household chores. It was indeed a very good exercise. btw, I see some people taking exercise classes and going to gym to shed extra body weight. Dunno why they are wasting money in paying the instructor and also to maids. Doing household chores is the hardest exercise anyone can do.. it involves all sorts of bending, moving, lifting and what not ;-). Anyways, it is my personal opinion... no offense to anyone.

OK...it was around 10am...still my cook didn't turn up. Thought I'll be disturbed by rats in my tummy... but I had no time to think about it. As per my kid's request, prepared their favorite lemon rice. Harshita gave good company in taking pictures of the preparation and now she wants me to blog it....so I need to start another blog... will be coming soon...stay tuned :-). btw, here is one of the 34 pictures she took on lemon rice preparation...


At last, cook turned up at around 11am and started preparing Karanji(Kajjikayalu). Usually I prepare with Poornam (chana dal and jaggery paste). Now I learned Karanji preparation and hope I'll get it right when I prepare next time.



Then we started our puja preparations. There is nothing more than the joy of offering home grown flowers to God.



After Puja, it started drizzling outside and the smell of fresh rain was awesome.... felt as if God was happy with my fasting and was giving me blessings. btw, I didn't realize that I was fasting the whole time. Felt good at last..... now I can proudly say that I can also do fasting ;-).

Had our meals after Puja and then I had to fulfill my kid's wish of doing Mehndi on their hands. This was one of the tough job for me. Never used Mehndi cone in my life... all I used to do was to put a big round circle in the middle of my palm and small dots around it. So it was indeed a big challenge. Anyways, internet was there to rescue in finding some Mehndi patterns. So sat down and tried my best. Kids were boosting me by saying "mamma.. you are a professional..... see, how nicely you are doing the pattern with cone.... and that too.... for the first time...". I know they learned the art of praising me and getting their work done ;-). Here is the result of my hard work and there is one invisible result too...my back pain for sitting so long...



Kids started the fun with small roll caps....


And small tablets that grow into long snakes when lighted....


In the evening, we lit Diyas at the front door and kids were happy to place their Diyas in the Rangoli.

Then we armed with firecrackers and marched to the area dedicated for fireworks in our society. Kids had GREAT time playing with crackers and also watching so many people enjoying Diwali at one place. We tried our best to be sound free... but couldn't make it smoke free. Will help the "Go Green" theme by doing some planting this weekend. Finally kids got bit scared with the sounds and we had to return home when big soldiers marched into the field.

btw, today is Bhai Phota and kids had fun saying "Bhai-er Kopale Dilam Phota, Jom Dvare Porlo Kata" to their brothers three times on phone. It is one of the biggest festival in West Bengal and similar to Bhai Dooj in North India. On this day, sisters apply sandlewood tilak as Phota on their brother's forehead for long life. Planning to celebrate next Bhai Phota in West bengal. Let's see... For now, kids went to sleep and gave me sometime to blog :-).

See you next week....