Petrichor

These are really very powerful. Implement whatever you can. 1. Take a 10-30 minute walk every day. And while you walk, smile. It is the ultimate anti-depressant. 2. Sit in silence for at least 10 minutes each day. Buy a lock if you have to. 3. Buy a PVR tape your late night shows and get more sleep. 4. When you wake up in the morning complete the following statement, 'My purpose is to__________ _ today.' 5. Live with the 3 E's -- Energy, Enthusiasm, and Empathy. 6. Play more games and read more books than you did in 2006. 7. Make time to practice meditation, yoga, tai chi, and prayer. They provide us with daily fuel for our busy lives. 8. Spend more time with people over the age of 70 and under the age of 6. 9. Dream more while you are awake. 10. Eat more foods that grow on trees and plants and eat less food that is manufactured in plants. 11. Drink green tea and plenty of water. Eat blueberries, wild Alaskan salmon, broccoli, almonds & walnuts. 12. Try to make at leas...

I am fairly interested in interesting recipes(read 'never cooked before marriage'). Every time I try something new, I cannot wonder at the amazing variety of Indian dishes. We are filthy spoiled. Its absolutely no wonder that wherever we go, Indian food makes me hog for. Mexican, Chinese, Thai, Italian cuisines are definitely tasty in their own way, but are there any variety? I doubt with my little knowledge. Man, I so love Indian food. Food is one of the main reasons I travel :-) Nothing can give me good digestion or sleep but rice/roti. If it is curd rice, its a dream-come-true! Indian food is no more an addiction. It is survival!!!! for me, at least.

Just managed to finish Dan Brown's Deception Point . A political thriller! I am not a big fan of US politics or NASA or the US Intelligence, but this is simply awesome. In fact, I liked it better than Da Vinci Code. I have started liking his writing & next on my rack is Digital Fortress .(I have a history of starting with New books & going backwards!!!) From the first couple of pages, I do seem intrigued! For all of you 'duh' ing me, its my second Dan Brown book. Amateur, you see. Its not always, I feel comfortable with someone's writing style.

What's up with the weather all of a sudden? Crazy chilly. Thawing in the shower every morning!!!!

I've heard so much about this temple. Somehow, I haven't been here even once in 4 yrs. Maybe, its the distance. Or maybe, it was not until late that Livermore temple became commercialized. Our 4th anniversary marked my first visit to Concord temple. It is actually a church converted into a temple. It can be a challenge to find this place, though. In no way it resembles a temple from the outside. In fact, it does not resemble a church either. G had a borrowed Magellan GPS from a friend & he proudly says that he found the temple with the GPS. ahem... It really was not that big a deal of a temple. That was my first impression. A small Vinayagar idol, A decent size praharam that was screened(6pm is marked for Shiva Murugan Abishekam) & a small Amman idol. That's about it. But when they opened the screen & I saw the way the Kurukal(pandit) performed the pooja, I was simply jumping with joy. It was all in Tamil, my mother tongue & he even performed archanai ...

Marriage is a space where two totally different people come together. They end up being together, thinking together and working together for the benefit of their family. Its been 4 yrs together with G and this thought came to me only now :-) It has been a pleasant 4 years & I sure do feel a lot more than 4. Its like I've known G for ever!!! I wouldn't want to change anything in my life, including my husband G. ;-) Love you G. Happy Anniversary!

I am one among the millions of people who have migrated from India for one of the many reasons. Until I left the country, I don't remember being away from family even for a short period. My memory of Chennai, precisely: - The best veggie foods available. -lovely school with lovely teachers & of course, memory of a great childhood -the same with college -friends & extended family whom I last met at my wedding -traditional & conservative society where I like some & hate many -my scooty that took me places I knew not -the bus & train -the pollution -Ranganathan st crowd -the name change from Madras to Chennai -geographically safe city We had a get-together 2 days ago where we were talking about how we live in the past. Chennai(or any other city/town in India) is not the same as we think it to be. We all have left Madras couple years ago & still think it to be as intact as it was when we left. Subsequent visits over the last couple years have proved to be drasti...

According to an ABCNews correspondent, Technically, child labour is illegal in India. But the government lacks will to enforce its own laws. What a shame!

I began my usual walk late in the evening. Fall is more like summer & I prefer the cool nights. I came out & what caught my attention almost instantly? The sunset colors in the horizon. I generally look the other direction. What I see? The FULL MOON. I feel blessed. An evening is made! I am all dreamy when around the turn, I see someone smoke. I kept waving my hands against my nose until I was sure the smoker saw me do it. I cross an intersection. I smell smoke. US is a huge land. If I can feel the smoke now, what will happen to the next generation? They will live in smoke. With such thoughts, I kept walking. A couple of steps ahead, I was still thinking. The moon, the sun, nature when suddenly, *BANG*. I freeze my thoughts for a minute & look up. I see sparks on the road. An accident. No one was hurt, but it was quite a scene. Bumper jumped in the air, the car was pushed to the curb. I went in a little further to check if anyone needed help. The least I had was water ...

I had a rather interesting talk with a Mexican mami(She's a mommy too!!) in Walmart. We were in the same section looking for sweat pants. I was the only other person there, so she started her talk about why she was looking for sweats in the first place. She is visiting her son in Denver in early November & is going to be there for over a month. I was a patient listener(she was not boring at all). She asked me if I was Indian. After I confirmed, she started the real story. Her DIL-to-be is also Indian. I went uh-oh! If her DIL-t-b was not liked(which is not very rare) is she going to blame the whole Indian community??? Well! She started by saying that she was such a doll. Hmm...not so bad after all. In fact, she does not find any difference between Mexicans & Indians(I hear that all the time) & she agreed almost immediately to her son's wedding. We had a chat(her talking, me nodding is more appropriate) for almost 10 min. I now know quite a bit about her husband, son...

I saw the dvd in the library & picked it up after reading the gist. It said "A Madhur Bhandarkar film". I remember a recent movie from the same director featuring Konkana Sen. G generally does not prefer Hindi movies(to be read as cannot understand comfortably...sorry G) but this movie made him stop his work to watch. The movie is in close perfection to reality, probably. It was gripping & makes you sit on the edge of your seat. It is all about dirty Indian politics. In fact the movie depicts how dirty politics can go. How an ignorant lady is brought into politics & how she manages to entangle all the political traps & set things right. An empowering movie! When Anna Sahib says, "Satta is an oppurtunity... it is an oppurtunity to bring about a change in the existing politics, an oppurtunity to do something good for the people", it kind of brings in a promising clarity. The role fits Raveena as a pro. She excels. It is totally her all through the movi...

The older generation did not ask a lot of questions. But followed whatever was told to them. The younger generation ask a million questions. Rarely follow what is told to them(by the older generation). Older generation : Our parents/grandparents, generalized New/this generation : Us/younger to us Who is more right? Let's analyze. When it comes to being versatile in their likes(I know people who listen from Yanni to Sudha Ragunathan) I doubt if anyone can beat this generation. They rarely do anything without questioning it. Which is good, rt? They pretty much know everything from Soccer to Carnatic. They read from Malgudi days to Da Vinci Code. They have views on everything, right from Sonia Gandhi not being related to the Mahatma to the current Fed rate cuts in the US. Their knowledge knows no boundary, simply because there is so much exposure in today's world. I see less of male chauvinism, ego & more of understanding & the need to be happy & satisfied. Some of the...

I've never believed in the concept of best friends. I've seen people: Best friends today, go separate ways tomorrow(family moves or whatever); people miss each other so much that it affects your studies, food habits, your daily life! If I look at it all now, I smile. I am not a heartless person to say, "you are crazy to have a true friend you can trust". I do have a lot of friends. In fact, I cannot live if there are no people around. Just that, I never really felt the necessity to trust anyone so much as I had my mom always by my side. I wanted to share a joke, she was there; I wanted to go for the movies, she was there; I wanted to go shopping, she was there; I wanted to cry, she was there; I wanted to tell: someone hurt me, she was there; I wanted someone to share the day's events(be it school, college or work), there she was!!! She was a working mom, but she was there for me every step of my life! When you grow older, you need your mom more. I am feeling thin...

Basically from Madras, I somehow cannot imagine being in a place where there isn't a beach nearby. And hey, unlike in America, a lake shore is not considered a beach!!! It is strange that I did not have to be in such a place for a very long time. I might not go to the beach that often, or wet my legs in the waters, but when I need to, it has to be nearby. As psychologists say, we all have affinity towards water. I am generally not that kind of a person who wants to BE in the water. I just need to be near it; be it a beach, or a lake, a river, a waterfall anything to do with water. I can still smell silence in the air even in a crowded beach. Pleasure, tranquility, happiness, smile, joy, loneliness when you just need it!!!

I came across this site from "Photography" mag & I am sure this will be useful for a lot others too.

What comes free and in tonnes? Advice.

Swamiji(Swami Sukhabodhananda) was here in the bay area, last weekend & what a presence he made! Honestly, I've never heard of Shiva sutras before. Swamiji beautifully unfolded the truth, of course in his own, humurous style. His famous Mulla Nazrudin jokes & the importance he lays on understanding things, rather than blindly follow them may seem unorthodox to many people. But once you get out of your barrier & start trying to see what we are all seeing, the truth is mystical. I am at loss of words to explain what he covered in his 2 day discourse. I should buy the VCD to have it all sink in what-Swamiji-calls "Uttar Pradesh". :-) If the discourses on Aug 24 & 25 amazed people, another bunch of us considered nothing short of blessed to attend his Relationship Matrix workshop on Sunday, Aug 26th. I am sure of others too, but I roared with laughter. Swamiji is so funny. For all those who missed the workshop, there's always another one. You can always a...

Madras le, Summer le RAIN!!! I am yet to recover from that shock. And now this . God! What else is going to change before I go back to India?

Being Orthodox is very personal, meaning it works to personal convenience. Some people claim to be very orthodox, but having come to US are unable to maintain all that. So, if you are a NRI, you escape, but if you are in India, consider yourself tortured, eh ! A couple days ago, I happened to meet an aged friend, who belongs to a very orthodox tamil brahmin community. OR so she said. She constantly found something from my family's practices & contradicted it as to why they don't follow that & how different (& extremely madi they were). Well, I assume that I am unorthodoxy(traditional to an extent, but unorthodox). I did not want to start an argument for the simple reason, I had no intentions of changing her or her ways. She had every reason to feel her way & I had every reason to feel mine. But sometimes, I wonder. In this "community" or "caste" race, do we drop our humane somewhere? Often in concentrating on the bug picture, do we lose the...

It is nice to see someone from your own country once in a while. When you are in California, it happens more than once. Well, here's the deal! If they don't smile at you, be happy. If they do, it means they are in for a catch. No prize for the right guess-Amway!!! I cannot believe that after so many years, we can still not evade such people. A guy(R), just walked by at Albertsons late saturday night while we were walking out. He smiled at my husband. My husband did look baffled, confused & everything in that order. R was trying all possible ways to recollect from where hubby looked familiar. Poor hubby was tired after a long day & least interested in talking. A minute later, R thrusts his v card into hubby's palm & forcefully gets our phone#. Poor hubby gave the correct #. R works for Google, so he would not use a cheap Amway trick-says hubby. Right the next day, R calls in to talk to hubby. We had visitors & dropped the call very courteously. If he calls i...