The Spicy Indian Blog

Your Dreams, Your Fears, Phases of Life, All the Good and Bad In Our Life, Are Really Not That Far Away...! All sorts of things hit you even before you can say 'Duck'... Taking the positive, as I said, this goes for our dreams too... We just have to try ; we are bound to end up somewhere nearby. But the most important thing is knowing where you want to go... Else you end up just being a drifter.... A 'Vision', as Dr.Amitava Datta used to say, (the person who gave Siemens Soarian such a momentum) is critical for well-directed and measurable progress. Its like a force (motivates you towards your foreseen goals), and at the same time like a rudder (guides the force in the direction of your goals). You need to see where you want to be may be a few years down the line, atleast. I.e. Imagining the context of your existence after the trees have shed leaves a few more times. May be something like this. "Living happily (this happy word can have endless elaboration) with fam...

This is getting interesting... Not that I have not seen subzeros, but not in California last winter atleast. Juxtapose and contrast this with 'The Searing Heat' post down below. Ah...The Season's of Life... :-) ...

It was our first Diwali in US, rather the first Diwali out of India... To be honest, I had expected it to pass off just like any other days here. U know, devoid of the actual spirit etc etc... But I guess, the dish of life is how YOU make it. Its after all up to you to add the spices, the flavors. This is of course apart from what life serves you. But you are always free to make your own dishes too... Nobody stops you :-), do they ? So, once this Bodhi tree effect struck, we concluded that we must make the best of this occassion. We were in US after all, what the heck... So, off I went... And bought the electric lights and the candles (as diyas). And it was fun as usual arranging the lights on the balcony. I wondered though, whether most of the people in the apartment felt the lighting was for Halloween :-) ... Each moment was enacted exactly as we would do in India...Waking up early, the abhyangasnaan with utna (as always from Bhanupadma in Dadar) and scented oil, the early morning pu...

A complete Song and dance sequence. With very much decipherable lyrics. Akshay Kumar and Govinda dancing along with Urmila and another babe whom I could not recognise. Even a romantic intertwining of their names written on the water, beside beautiful fountains... And after the song, back to some action. A rib-tickling comedy scene about policemen afraid to handle their bull-dogs. I was laughing hysterically, and not only in my dreams. That's when Mugdha nudged me awake. With some fear in her mind as to what was happening to me, and why was I laughing so much at wierd hours in the night...And then I recounted the part of the 'movie' that I had just seen. :-) ... My sense of humor was pretty active even then, to have dreamt of such a hilariously funny scene of the 'dogged' policemen... I will probably be amused by this figment or rather 'Reel' of Imagination for some time to come... But to know who was the second heroine in the sequence, I wait to dream of the...

A branch from Ranade Road cuts in into Gokhale Road. And right in front of this T Section, is Krishna Kripa. Whether coming back from a brief spell of shopping at Ranade Road (which, along with the Shivaji Park is my favorite part of Central Mumbai), or coming back from the Dadar Railway Station, or station as we call it, 'Aajikade' was where we always had a stopover before heading to our 'extension' abodes. Seeing the silhoutte of Aaji standing by the balcony railing was always comforting sight. I used to wave from across the road. Aaji would strain to see who it was, from her first floor vantage point; and a smile crossed her face inevitably when she realised it was me. She used to respond with a calm, yet happy wave back, and moments later I would be scrambling my way up the stairs of Krishna Kripa. The stairs there make a rickety-rackety noise, thanks to one or two metal plates nailed to each step. Inside the house, there would be Aatya going about some work. You co...

After a series of periodic blogticles in July, there is suddenly a lull. Nearly half of August has come to pass, without a single blogticle posted on my blog. So, for the sake of the lull, i have commanded my pen, um, er... my keyboard to head somewhere ; where, I know not. A lull on this blog, nevertheless, there was quite some activity on elsewhere. Aai-Papa attended the interview, and got the US visa. They have started planning to come to the US. Here, I too have started ramping up a bit, in preparation for their arrival. Also, the East beckons in mid-September. Travelling for pleasure too brings forth its tensions. The packing, the journey, the need and urgency to see what all there is to see, the stay away from home. Talking of Home, 'Home' has become a thing of mystery now. I do not know whether to be happy or sad in this regard. I do not really know what to call my home now. Should I be calling Mayoor (Dadar) as my home. Or is Elite (Bangalore) my new home address. Or is...

I do not know how I intended this blogticle (that's the term I have coined for a blog article) to be... When I started to write this one, I might have wanted it to describe a weekend I would consider to be ideal. Now I do not know what has been churned out. Anyway's here it is... I leave office earlier on Friday. Thus starts the weekend celebration. (Not to say if I went early to office). I come back home. Then I have a cup of tea (with milk - the Indian way), and some snacks. Doritos would be ideal here. After freshening up then, I would head down to any cafe, or say Starbucks, to start the winding down. If it was Erlangen , one would probably head down to Bogarts, or one of the streetside cafes at the sqaure front of HauptPost, and savor a Wiesenbier or two, over the next hour and half, preferably with a juicy and tasty Vegetarische Baguette. Somehow, the sandwiches, and burgers I have had, were infinitely more tastier in Germany than anywhere in the US. I don't know wha...