C'est La Vie

And as long as it does not hit the fan, it’s all good and even if it does hit the fan, as long as it does not hit you, it’s all good and even if it does hit you as long as you can clean up good, then it’s all good, maybe it was even worth it, maybe you’ve learned something, maybe it will enrich you!

That’s 2009 for me.

Spending the first four months of the year in my hometown sparked some much needed realization, re-thinking and resolutions. In retrospect, I think the initial charm of working in Mangalore had just started wearing off. It was an almost annihilation vs acclimatization scenario at work too.

Then the assignment, having heard of the single street, desi dominated culture, I was kinda prepared for what I was getting into. However I really got off the wrong foot on the start of the trip itself with trying to postpone the trip by a week so that I could cast my vote in the Loksabha elections (missed polling day by 3 days). I think it was disappointing with my enthusiasm for administration and politics at their zenith during the time especially considering the efforts to oust ‘anti-secular’ candidates, not that it was successful in the end and not that my vote would have made a difference to the result!

I did not particularly enjoy playing the lead role that was forcefully thrust on me in the movie that was titled with a literal definition of being taking for a ride in Mumbai and then having to deal with the most arrogant staff at the ATL airport was just over the top! Thanks to them, I missed my connecting flight and was subsequently on stand-by for 3 more and then had to spend a day in Atlanta, all this after a painful 17 hr journey plus the 15 hours in transit!

From the Pacific Northwest to Northwest Arkansas, the differences are stark. Of course, it’s not the geographies of a place that make or break you, it is the people. Nothing much changes at the workplace and even if it does, I don’t want to dwell on it here. Slightly averse to workplace friendships, looking back, it’s been a good year with friendships and despite all the long distance friends I have, I can count at least one good friend here.

Where would I be without my long distance friends? Be it the innumerable travel tales or the little pieces of advice on health-care, the constant cribbing about your ex employer or ex girlfriend, the countless pictures from every single occasion back home, the process of learning to climb trees while rediscovering myself in the most surreal ways, smiling more and being a part of me while I made sure my glass is always half full (be it with wine or vodka or more recently whisky!) . You’ve stood by me through the rain and snow, you are very much appreciated. And to my sister, you are beautiful in every single way, you are loved.

If you blame me for the decisions you made in life, fine. Get on with it, move on, I still love you, there’s no two ways about it.

To my two best friends who are expecting babies on the very same day and coincidentally on my ma’s birthday, I wish you the very best and to my friend who’s facebook status can no longer say ‘single and complicated!’ you’ll be okay, you have a beautiful future ahead of you and don't forget the enlightenment you still owe us ;’). To all that’s been amiss in 2009 may it find its right path, to each of you, to all that you do in this year, may it make you happy, may you have no regrets and at the end of the day, take the time to wait for the smile that the eyes began and keep smiling.

And now this sounds like a speech! Happy New Year 2010.

Merry Christmas

Unexpectedly good Christmas day despite being all 'alone', the weather playing spoilsport on my confirmed 'plans' and my own indecision about my travel plans. Total strangers can sure make you happy!

Here's to my first white Christmas :)

Snowmageddon

Snowmageddon, Snowpocalypse was supposed to happen today in Seattle, the roads resembled those on thanksgiving, schools were shut and we were asked to work from home. I'm still waiting to see the first flake of snow, it did snow on Saturday, but today's forecast seems so totally off, I'd rather have completed the rest of my Christmas shopping! They've decided to blame the doughnut hole and Mt. Olympia, as interesting as it may sound it's not. I guess there's just one positive out of this, I can sign for the UPS package and not have to go pick it up!

December is supposedly the best month to write, somehow I think it's exactly the opposite for me and my excuse is not the usual! Work is becoming a mere whisper in my ear of late! but of course it's holiday time and farewell time all while looking forward to greener and warmer pastures.

Keep, Think, Give

It's that time of the year and unfortunately this is seeming to be more like a once a year ritual! wardrobe sorting it is and no this is not a task undertaken to clear clutter. I can guarantee you, my closet is organized, almost obsessively!

The 'Give' and 'Keep' piles are relatively simple, it's the 'Think' pile that bothers me. 'Think' has a collection of clothes, some that I feel I should no longer wear but have an attachment to, for e.g a gift from a dear friend or an absolutely low maintenance but slightly 'old' shirt and then there are those which I have not worn in months, but hope to wear 'someday'. The pile also includes some country specific/city specific clothes, I'd rather not dwell on them.

The 'Give' pile is ready to go into the Clothes Collection bin and the 'Keep' will be carefully packed, the 'Think' well, hopefully it has become the 'Thought-Keep/Give' pile when the time to pack my bags comes and then of course, it does depend on the the final weight of the suitcase, like I've said before, always constrained by what the airlines let me carry!

Band Aid Covers the Bullet Hole

The title of the previous post seems half appropriate for this post about the latest terror siege that occurred in Bombay. Scars are rampant on all who experienced this first-hand and I am not sure if any souvenirs will emerge out of this, but the hope remains, this story could qualify.

The internet is aghast at the audacity of the attack, demanding action and with a scathing attack on the governance. Facebook communities have been formed and while I will not be joining any of them or vouch for the purpose they would serve, I will be wearing white tomorrow in allegiance to the country which has suffered the maximum brunt of terrorism, be it from external elements or from the in-grown factor.

It was a Wednesday morning, the day before thanksgiving and while I was browsing through TOI, I came upon the main story of a terror attack in Mumbai, I almost dismissed the story, casting it aside as yet another attack, what's new about it? Unfortunate is the situation wherein the citizens of a country can put aside news about a terror strike! I realized the enormity of the attack and the scale when news flash tweets started pouring in through my twitterfox popup.

Ever since, I've followed first hand updates on twitter, live streaming, joined the discussion on CNN (Wednesday's AC360 telecast was 2 hours long and saw a huge presence of the Indian diaspora joining in the live conversation on the 360 blog), have commented on various blog posts and have constantly been amazed at the response of emergency personnel to the disaster. When the fire was blazing at the Taj, I was almost hoping for a chopper to appear loaded with fire suppressing materials, but I guess India does not have one.

Yesterday, here in Seattle I watched while a paramedic team arrived in response to a 911 call in aid of a pregnant woman who was feeling faintish, all in under 5 minutes. The hope is for such a response time in India from any of the essential services, be it fire, paramedics or the police. India has a strong urban presence and despite the fact that a majority of the population still lives in rural areas, a service similar to 911 has to emerge. A question at this point, are roads the only projects covered by our taxes?

A few months ago, a colleague of mine was tracked down and interviewed by the federal bureau, all because he had hired a couple of boats for a ride through Lake Washington, this was his birthday bash(I could not attend due to unavoidable circumstances :)) and it seemed like someone allegedly reported the group for clicking excessive pictures. I can't say aloud or write about the nature of the allegations, however guys in a boat, clicking pictures of an important floating bridge, a vital link between two land masses, I leave it to you to piece it together. You might call it going overboard, but that is how serious security can sometimes be in this country, not always of course.

'All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing', is a quote attributed to Edmund Burke, though I'm learning it may not really be his quote, anyway it does not matter who said it at this point! When Mangalore happened, there was a general complaint that very few good men (or women) took a stand to highlight the incident, it did happen eventually. Today, a number of good men and women have taken a stand, the attention of world media is on India (not so much on Nigeria, where more than 400 people have died) and it will take much more than band-aids to cover the gaping holes in our security, in our emergency response time. Has a lesson been learnt? Maybe, maybe not.

The title of this post is also the title of a Scarling song.

Scars and Souveniers

I've mastered the art of dodging the bullet! literally but from the over-eager, over enthusiastic kiosk employees who are constantly in your face, trying to sell you something, be it a hair extension (seriously!), a nail set to make your nails all shiny without applying nail polish, wind chime thingies, aromatherapy packs, pro-activ, crystal souvenirs for every relative you could dream of while the above mentioned over eager, over enthusiastic salesperson badgers you into submission. And if you are the kind who finds it hard to say 'No thanks', then good luck. Don't forget, these kiosk/cart stores have no return policy either.

I remember a particular incident in a Houston Mall when three of us were walking down the mall and this Seacret Sea salesgirl pops, almost out of nowhere and practically took our hands and started polishing one nail each. Thank God for small mercies that I had painted my nails so she let me get away! The remaining two, were not spared, they emerged with shiny nails (one of them male!) and were badgered into buying 100$ worth of nail products and some other stuff all allegedly made with ingredients from the dead sea!

Our local Southcenter Mall has an umpteen number of kiosks/carts and has fallen prey to the cart culture. Nothing against this culture and considering that I come from a country where the cart culture business thrives. In fact it's just possible that you find some unique item you were looking for, from halfway across the world. It is the harassment and badgering that I condone, Isn't the retail tagline 'Customer is king', they will come to you, wait for it!

Dodging the bullet is nevertheless easy, my strategy is to ignore the kiosks completely, no eye contact and I even act as if I am deaf and blind too, it may be rude, but it works.

I was in Southcenter yesterday and noticed this cart with beautiful wood carvings of nativity scenes, rosary hands, last supper scenes all intricately and exquisitely carved. The owner seemed to be of Middle Eastern descent, Israelite possibly or could be Egyptian too. He explained that the statues were all hand carved out of Olive wood from Bethlehem and considering my interest in the Nativity scenes offered a 10% discount while querying if I was buying it as a gift!

I told him I wanted to buy it for myself at which he acted pleasantly surprised and seemed almost to be searching for a telltale sign that I was a Christian and no, I was not wearing my little cross pendant. He asked if I was from India and on my affirmative answer, said he did not know Christians lived in India!

My being a Christian from India surprises many, from the Ethiopian cab driver, my Russian neighbor, the midwest programmer who even asked me if it was tough being a Christian in India to the Vietnamese parishioner and the Middle Eastern kiosk owner. I told him there are 20 million Christians in India with an evil smile to the almost shocked look on his face and then told him that we make up 2% of the population, it seemed to make him happy!

I believed the hand-carved bit but was doubtful about the Olive wood from Bethlehem part, anyway I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and ended up with a carved set of a nativity scene. The discount was nullified by the 9% sales tax! Nevertheless a pretty nativity set to start the advent season.

I'll take that hour back

It's that time of the year...again, only this time its time to turn back the clocks for that extra hour and I'll take it gladly, and no I am not glad because the bars can serve for an extra hour! Of course, I am not going to set the time before I sleep, what fun would that be? the best part is waking up at 8 AM and realizing that it's only 7 AM, how awesome is that!

If you must know, I was not pleased at all on March 9th! I wish they would turn the clocks back on a Monday, there's nothing like getting an extra hour of sleep on a working day but then I dread to think of the reverse scenario!

Is it possible to lose time? As it is traveling through time zones can be really weird and confusing. India to the US is not so bad, but consider traveling from New Zealand to the US, you will infact be arriving at your destination before you left the source. I remember a trip when I was flying from Nevada (PST) to Utah (MST) and on to my final destination Seattle (PST). I go one hour ahead and then go back one hour, the flying time did not make much sense and I didn't think about it too much then, coz I was practically running to the plane to avoid getting stuck in Utah.

Consider a case where you have traveled to a daylight saving country such as the US before they advanced their clocks (if it was 2008, before march 9th), so essentially you've lost one hour, however you don't need to fret if you would continue to stay in a daylight saving country (US or Europe) until they turn back their clocks(Nov 2nd). But what if you traveled to a non-daylight saving country such as India or a state such as Arizona say in October?, where is that all important one hour? beats me!

Glad I have my hour back, thank you!

Every leaf is a flower

Autumn is a second spring where every leaf is a flower - Albert Camus

We traveled 3 hours into the mountains of Western-Central Washington, North Cascades to be precise to catch a glimpse of the acclaimed fall foliage. This is what we saw (10/26)



The below pic is from right outside my apartment and there was more of this all along the way (10/19)



But of course, the first snow on the mountain peaks and some amazing home cooked food consumed in the near freezing conditions made the drive worthwhile.

How great thou art

An airview of Mt. Rainier (my favorite mountain :)), while flying from the San Francisco side (9/2/2008).

I can never get tired of the vista of this beautiful mountain and look for it everyday on the commute back home. He? does like to play hide and seek though, sometimes hiding completely or just a part amidst all the clouds. And No, I don't think flying saucers land there.

Majestic ain't it?, it is after all the third most active volcano in the USA.

Fact

Today is an autumnal equinox

It is one of two days in the year when the sun spends exactly the same amount of time above and below the equator. It thus signifies the start of shorter days and longer nights, I do like the sound of that, the beautiful fall colors raved about in the East, not sure what the colors will be like here in the West and the time to bring out the sweaters.

Somehow like magic, mother nature knows when to flip the switch. I almost think she has a chart which says today is the official first day of fall! and promptly changes the weather. Well of course, I know how the 'official first/last days' were deduced, but it seems nice to think of it in my terms!

Official reports confirmed that 'fALL' arrived at 8:44 AM PDT today, I believe the chill and the rain are here to stay for sometime now.

I did not know that there was a state water law that limits the amount of rain water that can be saved! Imagine such a rule in Mangalore! where is the reason?

A mouthful of what?

While on the topic of eating, Seattle downtown has some truly quaint eatouts.

One such place is the turkish delight at the end of pike place market, a few stores down from the first starbucks store. They have the best baklawa, I've eaten to date. I was quite astonished at the price of the delicacies though, a small triangular bite of a pistachio baklawa costs $3.75, and again it's a cash only transaction restricting the quantity you can buy owing to all the plastic money in our wallets! But then it was well worth the price, a Turkish coffee to go with the sweet and I was all set to be amazed by the hustle and bustle of pike market on a Saturday evening.

Zig Zag Café: Not much of a choice for eating except for the sandwich which was pretty decent, but then of course, our motive was not to eat! This place has some of the best reviews for cocktails and I must agree with all the good reviews. I had the 'drink with no name', seriously that's what their menu says!, customized to my liking. It has an almost perfect ambience for a cocktail place, it was a tough find though, almost missed it twice! Who knew we had to go down the stairs!

Zaina: Nothing quaint about this place. The whole Egyptian, middle-eastern music and ambience gives it an almost mysterious hip atmosphere. The hookah bar, light dancing, Arabian men almost reminded me of one of those places in those Arabic serials I used to watch occasionally as a kid. Not really a place to venture out alone though.

Six days

Have you ever been in a morbid state of mind? when the niggles and sniffles of life and an active imagination seem to fuel your paranoia. Did you know that the inability to sneeze when you felt the onset of one could be a manifestation of medullary neoplasm, whatever that means. Wow, that does sound morbid! Have you ever seriously considered writing a will?

The newly opened H&M, seemed to have caused the entire Seattle to descend on the South Center Mall as did I, it was a sea of people either queuing up to enter the store or seeking to heed to the call of their growling stomach or just watch the Dark Knight/X-Files. I somehow managed to do all three and that's when the thought that there could be a deranged killer in our midst crossed my mind. It's not the first time that such a thought has crossed my mind, it has probably to do with that sense of morbidity that seems to be looming over me!


Today in church, (for some unknown reason, I made it to Church in good time, which I must say has become a rarity of late!) I started to dwell on the complexities of the mind that takes the life of unknown strangers, after all, colleges, malls and churches seem to have the highest incidence of random shootings.

And amidst all the thinly veiled death threats, there's the miracle of life, of birth itself. Three babies were baptized today, with their beauty and innocence intact. It somehow served as an affirmation, that this is what fuels life, the marvel of a child. Each of babies seemed averse to the holy water being poured on their heads but not so much to the holy oil on their foreheads. It was indeed a marvel when Father lifted each baby up at the altar, presenting them to the parish and declaring them a member of the Congregation. It was a humbling experience.

The title of the post has nothing to do with the fact that it took six days for God to create the universe however it has everything to do with the fact that I believe in a higher eternal power, in a God who possibly created the universe as we know it, and despite the thoughts of morbidity, I am in awe of life, despite the roller-coaster or the see-saw that is called life, I hope to do my bit for a better world... however cliched and beauty pageantish it may sound!

The title of the post is a song title sung by DJ Shadow

A cup of coffee

The first Starbucks coffee shop is right here in Seattle, in the famous Pike Place Market.

Despite the 'you can't miss the shop' kind of comments, we almost did!. It is quite different from your regular starbucks coffee shop, a definite tourist attraction and most people seemed quite content clicking pictures and purchasing memorabilia, but not me of course, the caffeine shot had to be taken.


Notice the 'Soon' on India!

The title of this post is a song title by Johnny Cash

Raindrops keep falling on my head

I finally have proof that the smoke alarm in my apartment is functional! I had started to doubt the little thing on the ceiling, five months and not once has the alarm gone off, it could also be attributed to the fact that I have stopped cooking typical smoking dishes!...shallow frying cutlets... this is what set it off and no I didn't burn them! One of my favorite foods is beef/mutton cutlets, reminds me of one my neighbors, she makes the best cutlets and ah who can forget those awesome kheema parathas that we used to enjoy in the tiny shack beside Hangyo in Manipal.

Here's the recipe I used

1/2 lb beef (I used the ground beef version)
10 cloves of garlic (more the merrier, if you are fond of the garlic) - finely chopped
1 small ginger piece - finely chopped
8 green chillies (de-seeded & finely chopped)
2 small onions - chopped
3 small potatoes (cooked and mashed)
Turmeric, Pepper, Coriander powder, Cumin powder - according to taste
Lemon juice - 3 tbsp
Bread crumbs & 1 Egg for the coating

Heat about 1/2 a tsp of oil in a cooking pot, add the chopped garlic, ginger, chillies, onions - fry until the onions obtain a yellowish color. Add the spices and the uncooked minced meat. Cook for approximately 20 minutes without adding water. Once done add the lemon juice. Set aside and let it cool. Add the mashed potato into the meat mixture and shape into oval shaped balls. Dip each of the balls into the beaten egg mixture and then roll onto the breadcrumbs before shallow frying in oil.

I have always enjoyed the cutlets with the egg coating, however if you want to reduce the oil used while frying, simply fry the cutlets without any coating.

I chose to enjoy the cutlets with a glass of port, that's it, appetizer and a drink as my main course!

The rain doesn't seem to stop this past week, yet its so beautiful... walking out with an umbrella and once in a while letting the raindrops fall on my head.

The title of this post is a song title made famous in the 1969 movie 'Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid'

Deception Pass - 4/12/2008

80º in Seattle, it would be totally not right if one did not take advantage of such a beautiful day, the weather Gods portrayed a smiling face(a rare, reason to celebrate occasion in Seattle), it only seemed fair to have our share of the sun too! and in some of the worst traffic I've been witness to, it seemed like the entire population of Seattle had exactly the same plans!

Deception Pass which is about 80 miles from Seattle was our destination. I'll stop talking or rather writing now. A picture truly speaks a thousand words.

Let it snow!

Snow, rain and the sun not to be left out, made a late but short appearance! all within an hour... Well this is definitely not your typical day in Spring in Seattle, the snow though unable to quite sustain itself for long...despite the freezing temperatures. In all it was a beautiful day :)

It's not only about the dreamliner!

A day in the life of a Boeing employee!, a bit of insight into Rosie the Riveter concept here

Disclaimer!: A day does not refer to all days...