Go Cats!

I remember writing before about how I felt about Manhattan, Kansas when I moved there. It is a real small university town and at that time no one there knew how to spell Vegetarian. Anyways, during orientation I signed up for a host family and completely forgot all about it...until one day I got a phone call. It was from JH. JH introduced herself and asked me if we could go out for dinner. She asked me of my dietary requirements (vegetarian at the time) and decided that I would enjoy salads (which I do not). So off we went to Applebees on a Friday evening. She picked me up, treated me for dinner and dropped me back. She was nearing 50 and a widow of the erstwhile assistant coach of K-States prestigious football team, the Wildcats...Bob Hope. She did this once every month. Offered to take me shopping or just to hang out. She was always courteous and polite and very nice giving me ample advice.

During the college football season, she offered to take me and G to a game. I had no idea that we would get prime seats, and an amazing view but unfortunately neither of us followed the game and sat through the ordeal grudgingly in cold. That was the only football game I had been to till 2012. Later on JH got re-married and moved away to Florida to start a new life and I have not heard from her since...that was 10 years ago...

This past Friday a friend and also a K-State alumni, MR called to ask if we would like to go our school game at TCU and he had free tickets...hell yeah! Babs baby sitter was arranged and off we went together...giggling and full of excitement sporting school gear! Because we went late, the only place we found was among the TCU crowd...but we got there and cheered as loud as we could. We rooted for our team with our mascot Willie the Wildcat, and stood on our feet the whole three hours filled with excitement. For once I did not need coke or anything else to boost my energy. The crowd was electric, both K-state supporters and the home team.

We started to win and the home supporters started to leave slowly...and eventually by the end of third quarter we were standing in the first row...we screamed for Willie to hi-fi with us and could not stop cheering as Wildcats finished the game. We were all so proud and inspired to see our 73 year old coach Bill Snyder do his thing and pull our team once ranked the "most hapless team" to be the #1 team in the country...

Then another amazing thing happened, the team ran close to us giving us hi-fi and fist pumps, I got to shake hands with our Heisman trophy contending QB, Collin Klein and then we took tons of pics with Willie who very nicely posed with all of us...and the rest of the walk back to our car we could not stop talking about the fun we had had...the excitement...

This had been better than the Cowboy's game we had gone to earlier this year...we not only lost but got booed by the guest team in our very own arena...how sad could that be...we left half hour before the game ended and so did most Cowboy's fans...

Anyways, the icing on the cake was when Babs asked me and G when we picked her up, "So did you guys have fun? Tell me about it."

I thought she will get sad if I told her we had fun without her but then decided to tell her everything to build the trust, and to our surprise she was not sad or mad but wanted to see the pics and pestered us to tell her everything about the game. She always keeps surprising us...

So Anyways...I will update with some pics soon...until then have a fun fun fun Deepavali/Diwali.

Love
ART

Falsetto!

I am really not a musician. I think can hold a tune and I believe I can sing but nothing that anyone other than me, and my daughter can tolerate. And as my daughter grows up I am slowly loosing my only fan...how sad is life for me. Anyways...when Babs was a baby we seriously indulged in Bollywood night and day but as she got closer to turning 5 she shifted focus to English songs. She knows all the new Pop singers and is in love with singing the songs.

Anyhoo...as we both listen to the songs on the radio I am becoming more aware of the distinction between western and Indian songs. At least for me...

• In Indian songs the women have to sound as squeaky as possible. I remember when the Usalampatti (Gentleman movie) song released everyone criticised the lady voice saying she sounded like a guy, which she definitely did. But that is accepted in the West, the women's voice can range from Adele to the Usalampatti singer and it is fine...as long as you have dinchak beats.
• Men in Indian songs have to sound male. They cannot get away from high pitches by switching over to falsetto, they have to keep it going base...but god does the west like the male falsetto? Have you heard Maroon 5? Beiber? MJ? Anyone and everyone like to sound like a lady at least for 30 seconds...
• This one is digressing...In Indian music videos women love to wear the tight clothes....
  

Random thoughts while driving my 100miles per day...and just wanted to throw it out there...

Thanks

ART

Son of a !@#ch

Driving on the roads of Chennai can make even a saint cuss...I really think that it applies to Driving, period!

The other day while I was stuck in a fashionable traffic jam my mind started to wander. I realized there were three types of people driving on the road at any given time. Most people vary between the two types and never adhere to any one type but the third category is a specialty one. Here is how my classification goes:


The Dreamer: I am sure that every driver has had the moment where he suddenly wakes up from a staring-into-oblivion gaze to realize that he has driven a few miles without actually paying attention to anything. He is really surprised and shocked at any small change to the driving monotony and is the one who will typically screech to a halt when awoken from a slumber.

The Driver: The driver who is honestly awake and is aware of his surroundings. This driver can be dangerous when they get on the cell phone because they feel they are aware. They are so aware of their surroundings that they drive 40 mph on a 70 mph road on the left lane while multitasking because they are confident. They are also the ones who might have their turn lights on because they forgot to turn it off, they are following the rules, at least parts of it. They also sometimes confidently apply make up while at a signal and spend a few extra seconds after the green light. They definitely get annoyed when you honk them awake or overtake them because according to them they are driving perfectly normal.

The Danger!: He/she is your maverick. The one with an amazing car with amazing brakes, amazing power, and the car with the looks...typically black or red sports car and can sometimes be the annoying pimped up pick-up truck. You have to watch for these guys, they are always doing 20 over speed limit, slipping and sliding in and out of the lanes, cutting everyone and waking up the dreamers. They tailgate the ones on their cellphones, honk when you slowdown and sometimes they even drive on the shoulder...and the best part is when there is a traffic jam, you sometimes tend to over take them and I always make it a point to try and make eye contact and smirk...most of the time they are so self absorbed that they are not watching you but their own reflection :) These guys can make your evening ride back home dangerous (I never see them in the morning drive, maybe they tend to sleep late).


And like everything else in life, if not for the different personalities on the road how boring the driving experience would be? And the only thing holding me back from saint hood is the few curses I throw around while driving home morphing anywhere between a dreamer and a driver.

And for that...I thank all the drivers...

ART

You Guessed it Right!

October stumps me. Every year it ends up being the most busiest of months for me. I have to schedule two parties and attend various other fun events that have been planned months ahead. There are a minimum of three birthday's to celebrate among celebrating Diwali, Navrathri, Halloween and other stuff. Unfortunately there are only four weekends and only so much time to get everything done.

Each year I tell myself that I am going to get organized but it turns up like my new year resolution, only heard  of and never to happen. This year after so many plans and ideas we scheduled Babs birthday at a Gymnastics place four days before her birthday not because we wanted it then but because that was the only day available. Unfortunately that only gave me two weeks to prepare...and you might think two weeks is a lot of time but it is not if you are driving 100miles per day for work and crash at 8.30 every night to wake up early the next day. I barely spend time at home or with family. Life has changed...

To make things interesting I push things to the end. I waited till the last minute and thank God my parents surprised me with a visit and helped me take care of things. The big day came, Babs had a blast and so did most of her friends. She was pretend Simba for a few minutes and that made her day. She also got tons of clothes from us that morning, a surprise, and she was excited beyond words. Phew!

That is the beauty of these things. Somehow these things workout...you wonder how but it always does. I ran around so much that day that I barely remember sitting down but the look on Babs face made it all worthwhile.

A friend of mine remarked..."now we can say our kids are grown up, there is no running around or screaming and yelling at pizza time." That was the only time I stopped by to check and see what was happening around me, during the rest of the party, I was a headless chicken.

On the day of the party...she dressed up in her Indian dress, wore bangles and helped me carry her photo board to her school. Mom accompanied us and she had a blast showing off her new clothes, jewelry, and her photo board. It was a quick effort because I had completely forgotten about doing it but it worked out well as it was one of those, "less work more pretty" efforts.

Phew! daughter is 5, and her teacher warned me that soon they will turn 16. I freaked out...I already feel that Babs is 5 going on 16...and boy I do not know what I would do with her if she was really 16...

Loving, Tired 

Amma :)

Almost 5?! Chincha? Really?!

I cannot believe that I have spent my last five years being a mother first and foremost. I had started at the job with practically no experience and now I can say that with five years under the belt that I still think I am a novice. I am not the typical mom you would come to with advice...be it potty training or feeding, it all just happened while I was at work...I really say that. Things all happened and fell into place and I was there to catch it. With amazing baby sitters and friends I managed through somewhat decently.

Now that she is older and needs more time and more influence I am stuck. She will turn five in two weeks and then her life will change...yes dramatically so and over night. She will realize that she is big now because I have been harrassing her with it and then I will have to teach her big girl stuff...you may ask, like what? and I will tell you because I don't want you think something else up...you see there are so many things a parent has to teach her ward(s) like biking, running without falling, swimming, tennis, ice skating, singing, dancing, and of course the omnipresent Indian guide on "How to become an Engineer/Doctor/or something really cool."

This is too much pressure on us...the parents...I thought I had left the pressure system back in India when I moved out but apparently a whole bunch of others also relocated with me to make my life hell and keep the pressure on...how nice of you competitive Desi Tiger Mom's...so now there are decisions...schools...private vs public vs charter. The charter schools are filled with Desi moms who are ready to train their children into spelling bee champs or geography bee smart Alec's. I am even being stereotyped by people around me...Seriously, I might look like it but I am not that...I hate to force her to study. I even took her out of Ballet class because she visibly sucked...and then had to re-enroll because she so desperately wanted to give it a try...not my call...see...I hate to force...

But I realize that I am in the education race that I do not want to be a part of. I am being forced and so I will force her and then we will be in the rat race once again...the race that I wanted to leave behind in India. I wanted her to have a childhood free of feeling pressured...with five comes a whole new realm of life and responsibilities for the parents as well as the child(ren) and as excited as I am that she is older now, a side of me misses the carefree parenting days, when going to the park or lying on the bed was fun and I did not have to worry if she knew her sounds of her numbers. I miss holding her while sat still on me because now she is ready to bound away. I miss the days of me singing and her enjoying as against her telling me to keep quiet while she sang...life has changed.

Here is to my little monkey who is going to be 5 soon. You are the best 4 year old ever (and 3 and 2 and 1 and 0). You never bothered me with morning sickness or learning how to pee in pot or drink from a glass. You were quick to learn and easy to raise. Thanks for making mommyhood easy for me and your Papa. We love you the most and when we are not with you we are talking and thinking about you. You fill the voids and everything around us. You make us feel full and in your words...when you are a good girl, you fill my bucket (heart) and when you are bad...you still keep it full...

Love
Amma.

PS: You can sing almost all the songs on 106.1 Kiss FM. Your favorite is Maroon5 (Payphone). I have strictly prohibited you from singing Whistle (Flo-Rida) though you beg me to hear it. You also like (love) One Direction (Beautiful) and love Katy Perry.

Keep singing and keep us all happy.