February 11, 2010

Phir bhi dil hai Hindustani...

So many things in life we take it for granted, like
Mom's kaituthu (cant translate it really! :-),
Granny's pickle,
Occasional meal on Plantain Leaf (especially on festivals),
On a rainy evening, Dad coming back home with hot bajji bonda from the nearby shop,
Roadside Panipuri,
Standing on the terrace and gazing the stars with radio in your cell or talking to dear friends,
Standing on the terrace and watching the colorful sky on the Deepavali night... (it was so boring here this time :( Deepavali without crackers... naaah!),
Deciding at the nth moment and still making it to meet a friend for a coffee just-like-that,
To kick start the weekend by going to Forum and doing mindless window shopping :),
Having hot joLa (maize) on roadside with spicy green chutney on it, especially when it is raining,
Not having to check weather.com each time you want to step out of your home,
BDA complex panipuri and Jalebi,
the noise, the traffic, the pollution... sighh!

One might ask, if you miss home so much, why at all come out? Financial commitments, Financial Planning, Exploring a new place, Private space, reasons could be many, whatever it is, when we come out of our country and start living in a different place for a while, thats when we realize the value of what we've lost... The moment we start thinking about going back (even for a short while), the joy we get can never be equated to the n number of world tours we make.... I cant stop grinning, i'm going home for 3 weeks :D... I know its too less, but its good enough to rejuvenate me :)
PS: Title is a bit cliche? I know!! but thats the closest I could get...

February 08, 2010

Happy Birthday to me..

From the time I remember, my typical birthdays have been, buying a new Dress, Early morning going to temple with Baba... Going go School/College in my new Birthday Dress, evening few close friends would come home and give me gifts (the best part of the day :D), Amma would serve them Puliogare, Gulab Jamoon and a few other delicacies....Year by Year the same routine continued with a few additions like the craze of receiving calls at 12am, taking friends out for Treats etc etc... but the main skeleton of the day's plan used to remain the same...
This was the first time in all these years, I could not go to temple with Baba in the morning, that one set of friends who used to meet me at least on my birtyday every year werent around, Baba did not buy me a new dress nor Amma made any sweets for me... it was very different...and I was a little sad about that :(

On Sunday with the subtle hints by My dear Pati and a dear friend Kaur, though I knew there was some plan going around behind my back, when I got home in the evening, the plan of celebrating my birthday at IST surprised me... the house was decorated with balloons and festoons all over... there was newspapers, "London Paper" and "Bakar Times" stuck on the wall.... it was a super cool idea, though I dint like the headlines which were shouting out I was getting old ;)
After the joyful evening, when everyone left, I read a letter by Kaur and my eyes were full... it was very sweet of her... (I didnt have a clue then that, the whole gang was a part of it :))
By then, I was pretty tired and I hit the bed early.... Around 12, Hero woke me up and brought me to the hall..he said your dad has come... In my half sleep, I actually stated looking around... then he showed me in skype... my parents were online... it was their early morning 5.30 :) I met parents and in-laws online, it was really overwhelming :) Then I opened my birthday gift by Ms Rao which, with full difficulty I had stopped myself from opening last 3 days... It was a jewellery box with both our picture on top of it :d... For a technologically challenged person, it was tooo much to expect her to go online and order something like this!!! Bravo my girl!


Later, hero showed a Video which had scanned copies of hand written messages from many of my dear ones, it had me in tears :) It was such a sweet gift for a senti creature like me :)... With Hero being him, I'm sure how much he would've annoyed everyone to get that done...




When you are 5000 miles away from home, realizing that you've built a small world for yourself where you have a bunch of folks who care to take their time out to make your day special, acknowledging the fact that they are happy with your presence in their lives, what more can you ask for in Life... I'm thankful to God for this little world I've created.... Thank you guys.... you Rock!