Our India trip

20/11/06

We had a short and memorable vacation of three weeks in India. It was a lovely holiday and a very special one for hubby dear especially as it was his dad's sashtiabhdapoorthy. We also celebrated Deepavali in India for the first time since our wedding. It was lovely waking up to familiar sounds and smells of lakshmi vedi and saravedis. The aroma and the scents of yummy and delicious snacks wafting from the kitchen, the fragrance of agarbathis from the pooja room, the loudspeakers blaring nathaswaram music from the nearby pillaiyar temple definitely made our deepavali memorable. It was pouring cats and dogs during our entire stay in India, though on the plus side we escaped the wrath of Sooriya Bagawan.

The short vacation had to be carefully planned as our home towns are a good 300kms away and both the set of grandparents wanted to enjoy as much time as possible with their grandson. The end result, each of us got to spend only about a week with our respective parents. The shorter the stay, the precious it becomes. There is something magical about coming home isn’t there? Craning my neck to catch the first glimpse of amma and appa while waiting for my luggage, running as quickly as I could into their open arms, saying a quick hi to our faithful driver who still calls me 'Paapa', rushing to get into the house to be welcomed by three loudly barking and whining dogs, who lick me head to foot, taking a quick tour round the house just to check if anything has changed since my last visit- now this is heaven on earth.

Amma cramped all my (and hubby's too) food requests that I had made and forgotten about since my last visit in that one week. I felt guilty of having made complicated meal requests and made a mental note of not repeating that in future. I notice amma and appa have gone frailer since the last time I met them. It sort of becomes a race against time and I realise that no number of phone calls can come even remotely close to the actual physical presence.

Each and every city that I visited seemed to have changed as well. The traffic on the road has increased dramatically, new shops, houses and shopping malls have sprung up everywhere and most places seem to be less green than they used to be a year ago. There certainly seem to be a dramatic increase in the fast food chains like Dominoes, Pizza hut and the like.

The highlight of our trip was a visit to an orphanage in the outskirts of Coimbatore. There were about 75 physically/mentally challenged children and about a dozen of elderly women and destitute. We had a meal with them. It taught me to appreciate all the little things that I took for granted, that makes our everyday lives a lot easier than these children. After a soul stirring prayer, the children sat down for their evening meal. Most of the children were able to help themselves, but there were these special few, who required an additional hand.

There was this little boy, perhaps a year or two older than Kuttan, who was crying and absolutely refusing to eat anything. All pleads and cajoling from the staff did not help, the boy was absolutely adamant and refused to eat a morsel. As Kuttan and I approached him, he came close to me and hugged me close. I slowly asked him what the problem was; he answered me in a tongue that I could not follow. It was heart wrenching to hear later from his care takers that the boy came to know that he had lost his mother two days ago.

I was amazed to see the warmth and the affection shared by the children. Almost all the little ones there tried to comfort him in their own ways. Some offered him the sweet (a small jaangiri) that was given to them - The staff there told me that they don’t get this everyday but is reserved only for those rare occasions where there has been more than one meal sponsor for the same meal, one little girl tried to sing a song, some hugged him close and the others tried to feed him. I realised that you do not need words and a common language to understand other's grief, all it takes is a heart!
We did leave with a very heavy heart.

We also visited Tirupathi. It was a very well planned trip organised by the Andhra tourism board. We had a good darshan although as always the temple was very crowded. Kuttan named it the 'Squashing temple' and any mention of the word 'Kovil' petrified him and he made sure that we were not visiting the 'Squashing temple' before getting anywhere close to the car.

Hubby had a master health check up while in India. His cholesterol levels are high. He is one of the unlucky few who seem to have inherited the faulty genes and his diet contributes to only 10% to his woes. He has been quite a sensible eater all along. We were told regular exercise would help significantly. We are determined to do all we could to keep the monster under check.

I also had the pleasure of meeting almost all of my college lecturers. The fact that none of them work in the college any longer is the highlight here. It was very nostalgic and brought back a lot of memories.

There were a few things that I would have loved to do had time not been a pressing factor like spending more time with my parents, visiting my achi who lives in Bangalore, enjoying Sambhar vadai at Annapoorna(Coimbatore), visiting my school and catching up with some of my old friends. I also missed my brother a lot, because this is the first time, since my wedding that our holidays hadn’t coincided. I missed all those long chats around the dining table until the wee hours of the morning that was customary during each of our visits.

All in all, it was a lovely trip and the three weeks flew in a jiffy. Before we knew, it was time to pack our bags to come 'Home'. With a heavy heart, we left our home to get back to the normal grind of our so called routine. Until our next trip, it is these treasured memories that hopefully will keep us going.

Lessons from a six year old

08/09/2006

The summer of 2004 was particularly difficult for us. Kuttan, a year old then had just started nursery and was coming home with all sorts of infections. He seemed to be falling ill quite frequently with a high temperature. We took him to the doctors who assured us that it was a viral infection which is pretty common with kids of that age. It did not seem normal though with Kuttan's fever returning once every three days.

On a particular windy Wednesday morning, Kuttan woke up with a high temperature. My attempts to get him to eat his idli didn't work and he seemed very tired. He had just started walking and as I was getting out his paracetamol my poor boy (who is normally very cheerful and active) slowly walked to the couch and laid on the cushion. It was heart wrenching to see him so dull and miserable. I rang work to let them know that my boy is poorly. They requested me to come to work to hand over the presentation slides and then take the rest of the day off. We then left Kuttan at nursery requesting the girls to look after him for just an hour till I get back from office.

But the journey to work that normally takes about twenty minutes, took about an hour and a half due to some major road works. Every minute seemed like an hour. I was praying fervently asking the Gods to show mercy on us and our sick child. I was determined to get the GPs at the surgery to refer him to a specialist. I may be no doctor yet this somehow didn't feel right. As I stepped into the office building Hannah our receptionist who had come downstairs to collect the post informed that the teachers from Kuttan's nursery had called asking me to come and pick him up as soon as possible as he had developed difficulties breathing. I thrust the documents and the key to my drawer and rushed back to the car park.

At the nursery, our boy was stripped and was lying on the cot with only his nappies. There were two fans on either side of him and one of the teachers was applying the cool compress. He was breathing quite loudly and was fast asleep. We decided to make a brief stop at home to gather some of his essentials before rushing off to the Children's A&E. On reaching home, the moment I laid him on his cot to change his nappy his nose started bleeding profusely. We were very scared and did not know what to do. I wrapped my boy in a towel and rushed to the car. Hubby dropped us off at the A&E's main entrance and zoomed off to find a parking space. I rushed to the reception carrying the boy in my arms. The boy was really hot and flushed and his nose bleed seemed arrested for the moment, he was breathing through his mouth. The receptionist kept pestering me for routine health information which strangely required our religion, mother tongue and ethnicity. I am not quite sure how I managed. I desperately wanted to see a doctor. At this point he was running a temperature of 102 degrees Fahrenheit. We were rushed off to the ward, where he was stripped of his nappies and the cool compress began.

A doctor quickly examined him and requested for a chest x-ray to be done immediately. He seemed to think that Kuttan might have developed an acute chest infection and that the x-ray was just to reconfirm his findings. We were in tears at that juncture and didn't know what to do as the doctor had warned us that they might need to do a lung puncture if the fluid collection was significant. By this time, Kuttan's temperature had come down thanks to the paracetamol that he had been given some twenty minutes earlier. He was quietly playing with a toy he found in the waiting room completely oblivious to the trauma that we were going through. At this point a paediatrician came looking for us and said that Kuttan need to be given antibiotics intravenously to arrest the spread of his infection. This would mean finding the best vein in the dorsum of his left hand. He warned that since Kuttan was on the chubby category then, it might require several pricks to spot the right vein. It was a very agonising moment. We were taken to a small cubicle and the curtains were drawn. The nurse entered the room carrying all the necessary equipment in a small trolley. The doctor was holding Kuttan's hand and was speaking to him gently while eyeing for the right vein. I refused to stay with Kuttan and walked away to the far corner of the block leaving Kuttan with his dad. I felt so helpless and tears filled my eyes. I was praying that the doctor finds the right vein in the first prick. I was gazing though the huge window and the distant church seemed so ethereal on that cold, foggy and drizzling afternoon. Please answer my prayers. Please give us strength and courage to get through this ordeal, I begged.

I would have stood there for about five minutes completely lost in my own thoughts, that I hadn’t noticed the little boy standing next to me. He had lovely straight golden hair and his sparkling eyes were looking at me intently. I quickly wiped my tears and smiled at him feebly. Are you one of the parents? He asked me gently. I nodded and replied that I have accompanied my son who is currently being seen by the doctor. He's not alone in there, is he? He might get scared. He said eyeing me quizzically. I smiled and replied that the boy was with his dad. Is he really poorly? He asked. I hope not, I said and looked at him. It was now my turn to interrogate. It just occurred to me that his parents might be here for him. He did seem well, so I was not sure what to ask him.

My sister is poorly. She is in one of the rooms above. I was poorly too last year, but I recovered, guess it’s her turn now. But I was able to help her, you know. He said. Ah, that’s really nice. Now how did you help her? I asked and was half expecting him to say that he shared his toys/ books or that he was kind to her. But his response shocked me. He had been a donor to transfuse blood into his little sister. His mum, who had come looking for him, briefly explained that her two children had some rare medical condition and as her son had the same condition the previous year, he had developed the antibodies for it which explained why he was involved in the blood transfusion.

I felt God's presence through this little boy, learnt what real courage is from him and his mother.

Down Memory Lane

22/08/06

Yet another mid week workday. As I hurriedly strap Kuttan in his car seat and double check the safety belt, I worry that I'm running late for the conference call that has been scheduled to happen in the next hour. I make a mental note to let people at work know that I may be running a bit late as soon as I reach Kuttan's nursery. As I set off, I notice that the usual hustle and bustle is missing and the roads are unusually quite. It took a moment for me to realise that the children are enjoying their summer vacation which means that there are far less number of 4X4s on the road.

My mind went racing back to the summer vacations that I enjoyed when I was a child. The day before the last annual exam was always exciting as that would be the day that Thatha (my maternal grandfather) would have come from Aramboly (a tiny village near Nagercoil in South India), to escort Annan and me back to the village.

We would set off on the state transport bus to Aramboly armed with biscuit packets, bananas, idlis and molagapodi packed in banana leaf and newspaper packets and three bottles of water in the morning the day after our exams were over. I'm not a big fan of idlis and yet it was such a treat to eat that meal in the bus. Thatha would have three spoons in a plastic cover wrapped neatly with a rubber band to eat our idlis with and come lunch time (the bus driver will decide to stop the bus at a particular place for food where there would be few food joints, dhaba style with latest movie songs blaring in loud speakers) the idli packets will be opened. Mum packs more idlis than what we eat normally and Thatha would insist that we place these extra idlis in his banana leaf before starting our meal. He does not like to waste food and will give it away to some poor person standing near these buses after we have finished.

After lunch, he would take us to the food joints where they also sell books and magazines. We would each get a tinkle digest and will return to the bus. The journey to our village takes a good 8-9 hours and so these books would be such a treat to kill time. I always got to sit next to Thatha in the bus and Thatha would tell us stories of the bygone days, of how they used to live or of the current happenings of the village. Now I think back, I was so like Kuttan, I would pester Thatha from the moment I alight the bus with numerous' Are we there yet?' questions. He was so patient and would say that after so many stops we will reach Aramboly.

It would get so exciting as we get close to the village in the evening, the familiar mountains, windmills, Muppandhal kovil,Kotai vassal thatha veedu, police station, Hindu Vidhyalaya school, Esakiamman kovil, sandhai, Mani kadai and finally the bus stand. I will be craning my neck outside the window and there usually will be a competition between my brother and me as to who will spot Velu(he used to work in Thatha's farm and Achi would have sent him to carry our baggage) first.

The short walk from the bus stand to home will be equally interesting with many of the village folks coming to us and asking Thatha 'Yaaru Padma pillaela, ennamo amma, appa varaliya'. I enjoyed the banter as much as the journey. We run from the bus stand with Thatha and Velu walking hurriedly to keep up with us. Usually my other cousins would have come weeks before (In B'lore, schools close weeks before ours did, in those days) and they would all be waiting at the doorstep along with Achi for us. It would be such a noisy and joyful reunion and the start of two months of heaven on earth.

Sadly, this tradition stopped the year I joined college, when Thatha fell terminally ill. We lost our Thatha ten years ago and our ancestral home has since been disposed off as there is nobody to take care of it. Now I hate to go anywhere near Aramboly as the emotions that erupt are over whelming and the pain just too unbearable. The entire family misses Thatha very much and he was our pillar of strength but I feel blessed to have known such a wonderful person for so many years and to have had so many wonderful summer vacations.

And yes, I did make it to the meeting on time.

Wedding bells

09/08/06

Please join me in wishing my good friend JA who is getting married tomorrow. I have known her only through the internet, never seen her except for a few photos and yet she is one of the very few to have impressed me. She comes across as a very warm, intelligent, responsible and caring person.

Here's to the bride, a lady who keeps her head though she loses her heart!

Hearty Congratulations. May your marriage be for both of you a lifetime filled with dreams-come-true.

Lots of love,
Raji

The apple of my eye

20/07/06

It is a sunny afternoon and from the window upstairs, I look with awe at the man mowing the garden below while happily chatting with his little boy. He wipes off the sweat from his brow and reaches for the trimmer, ready to trim the edges of the otherwise neat lawn. He catches my eye and I smile at him through the panelled window frame, wondering how incredibly lucky I am to be married to this gem of a person.

Funny, rather scary to think of it now, we met literally minutes before we got married six years ago. Our mothers were once childhood friends who lost contact with each other and thanks to the many (senior citizen) aunts and uncles who excel in the art of match making, horoscopes were exchanged and after many long phone calls to Vedhagiri uncle, (one of my mum's close friends, the Anniyan of our block who suffers a MPD :D and hence is both a doctor and an astrologer) the marriage was fixed.

He is there every step of my way, guiding me carefully, warning me of pitfalls, supporting and encouraging me when I fail and cheering and applauding when I succeed. I was this naive 22 year old, just out of college, extremely pampered and unbelievably cocooned lass, whom he readily took under his wings. I have never seen a more honest, sincere and down to earth person. He is extremely patient, so much so that he was my driving guru! When I first began to learn, I couldn't tell the brake from the accelerator. I was not a fast learner and many times wanted to give up. It was his determination that made me go and many months later we got the licence.

He was my birthing partner. I was in labour for a good 23 hours before Kuttan finally decided to show up. He was there with me right from the word go, helping me all the way. He went without food too the whole day along with me and that single toast that we shared in the wee hours of the morning as proud parents is really very special.

We are just poles apart. He loves physics, I like literature. He loves gardening, even dead plants seem to spring back to life under his tending fingers; whereas the humble grass dies, if I try to water them; he is a home bird; I love travelling. He loves thriller movies, I enjoy comedy. I love doing things spontaneously; he plans everything to the last detail, I like my dosais crisp whereas he calls oothappams as dosais.

We used to fight like cats and dogs for anything and everything. When newly married saying "Sorry" was just so easy for us, but then when there are so many things on our plates, we forgot to say "Sorry" for small things. All the displeasures and the disappointments gets bottled up, stashed away somewhere deep down in some corner of your heart and just one small fight is the trigger to bring everything up. We were both in pain and said things just to hurt each other. At those instances, we just stop thinking about the other person and just desperately want to see who gains on whom. Ego is a big thing after all! We blame everything and everybody for our fights but it takes a lot of maturity to accept reality and take responsibility and he certainly has it. He initiated (still does!) truce at the end of each of our war.

We were really never away from each other since marriage and when Kuttan was born, we decided that Kuttan and I spent some time in India. At the airport, there was this really strange knotting feeling in my tummy and my hands were cold. It was strange, I was going back to my home, the place where I spent the first 22 years of my life , to my people, whom I longed to see for the last three years and yet I was feeling home sick already.. It made me realise that the three years of togetherness had made us so dependent on each other. I understood he meant more than anyone/anything else in my life.

Our relationship has matured and we are definitely learning to be more considerate to the other person's needs. Our fights are now few and far between and we are still learning to accept the other person with a whole heart flaws and all. We may not be thinking alike but at least we are teaching ourselves to think together. We are working at what our parents have and grandparents had, the sort where one knows everything about the other's feeling without a word being exchanged. I certainly look forward to spending many more of such happy years together.

Love you Loads, Chells!!!

வணக்கம் பம்பாய்(Salaam Bombay)

11/07/06

I am deeply saddened by the bomb blasts in Mumbai. What angers me even more is the lack of sufficient media coverage of the incident in my adopted country. Is this not another chapter in the saga of so called international terrorism? Is an Indian's life simply not as worth as any other Brit or Israeli life? Should the English not understand the agony and the pain having undergone a very similar tragedy just a year ago? With all due respects to the captive Israeli soldier, how is the life of a kidnapped Israeli soldier more valuable than more than 200 innocent civilian lives tragically lost and 1000’s injured due to a bomb blast? Shouldn’t they really be ashamed of their narrow mindedness?

I am angered by the acts of the terrorists. Do they not have a conscience? How could one perform such atrocities in the name of religion? Which religion does not condemn violence? Is this only how much one would value a life? Is int the person who is killed/injured someone's mother/father, someone's daughter/son, wife/husband and friend? What have these innocent lives and their families done to meet such a tragic end? Will their lives ever be the same again? Is this some sort of a collective punishment meted out to the entire community to prove a point? Is it really worth it all? How can anyone be so selfish and unreasonable? Will the compensation from the Government bring back the loving father or the doting mother so mercilessly snatched from their precious families?

I'm frustrated that as a fellow human being as much as I hate to see what is happening around me, there is not much that I could do to stop these atrocities. Sometimes I feel that we are fighting a losing battle. There is only so much that UN or the governments can do and unless there is a radical change in the thought process of the individuals there may really no light at the end of this dark tunnel.

In spite of all this, life goes on and in Mumbai especially life goes on non-stop. Mumbaikars take things on their stride and carry on trying to help others where they can, sharing their grief and pain, donating blood and offering food and shelter to the stranded. Readers Digest has certainly got their math wrong by naming Bombay as the rudest city. The layman's vocabulary may not include please and a thankyou but certainly there is compassion and warmth, which is far more important.


I'm extremely proud of this glorious city and its people who are refusing to yield to demands and pressures of few spineless and heartless individuals and go about their business. This is not disrespect to the dead and this civility should not definitely be construed as weakness. Be it bomb blasts or a natural calamity, the city rises every time like a Phoenix and it is this aspect, which makes Mumbai a truly outstanding city.

York through a child's eye

The last few weeks have been pretty busy with Dh working late shifts. As a result he got to see kuttan only for few hours in the morning. Kuttan and I spent the evenings together with the usual play time-dinner-bath-prayer-bottle-bed routine and saturday was the first day in two weeks where appa got to spend the whole day with Kuttan.

Kuttan's latest passion is trains. He absolutely adores Thomas the tank engine series. So we decided to take him to The National Railway Museum(NRM) in York.

The NRM is the largest railway museum in the world, responsible for the conservation and interpretation of the British national collection of historically significant railway vehicles and other artefacts. The Museum contains an unrivalled collection of locomotives, rolling stock, railway equipment, documents and records.

It was a beautiful sunny day with the average temperature around 24 degrees. After a pleasant two hour journey,we reached the beautiful city of York. It was our first visit to this charming little town and boy it was like stepping into one of the pages of an old English novel. It was really fascinating to know that the city has passed through the hands of Romans, Saxons, Vikings, and Normans. Not surprising the entire historic core of York has been declared as a conservation area.

After an uneventful drive with multiple stops for wees(Kuttan is in the process of getting potty trained) and the non stop question of 'Are we there yet, appa?', we reached the car park. It was a very nominal charge of £5 for the entire day's parking.

I have to say that the entrance to NRM was far from spectacular. It was rather unappealing. There was a fairly long queue and at the counter we realised that the entry to the museum was completly free and that they only charged for the Norwich Union Yorkshire wheel. Kuttan particularly didnt enjoy these during his visit to London and so we decided to skip the wheel though at 60 meters in the sky the views of the city from inside must have been uniquely panaromic.

Kuttan was in awe seeing the innumerable display of locomotives. He was a tad bit disappointed that his favourite 'Thomas' train and the fat controller were not present there, the closest he could get was a little shop selling Thomas artefacts. He enjoys photography very much like his dad and so for his third birthday he was presented an used aim and shoot digital camera. He had a ball of a time taking pictures, some of which are included below.










More than the beautiful city, the amazing history and the lovely environment, it was the happiness in the child's face that made it a truly memorable day for us.