tragedy tragedy :(

What do we call a cook who while trying out various spice jars and putting the basic salt-turmeric-chilli-coriander etc into the recipe, manages to make the entire spice dabba (box) fall upside down on the kitchen floor?

Good cook or bad cook, I dunno but this cook definitely needs to be patient enough coz it must have meant cleaning the whole mess, especially the mustard-cumin seeds jumping to reach every possible corner there.

:D or :( such things dont happen everyday.. after a!!

I googled this pic but most traditional Indian kitchens have this mandatorily & the one being discussed above was a pinkish translucent plastic one.

Indianized version of Chicken Soup

I must have done some good for sure to be born in this era of internet. How else would I be able to meet this girl from Germany who is in love with Indian culture and language. She has not been to India ever, we are what is called 'online friends' for almost 3 years mostly via chats and mails, few phone calls and a postcard letter once. She is 4 yrs younger to me but that has hardly mattered. Hey girl, I still have the sweet teddy u sent for me thru someone coming to India :) , I hope you dont mind me mentioning you on my blog. I basically want to record the chicken soup recipe that you gave me this wkend since I got all praises for it and the credit goes to you. 

Chicken soup sounds simple but I never had tried that before. A relatively new friend, when I said I can survive on soups n salads, said, she too can provided they are non veg. she is "strictly non-veg" in her own words. Since that day I hv been thinking of making non veg soup/salad. 

So this is what I tried with the stuff available in my fridge.

--3 Chicken franks - grated (I dint buy any other chiken as my freezer was full of this wkend offer). If one uses chicken pieces, de-skin it else the soup will taste oily however the bones give a nice taste to the soup so let them be.... (the tip from Lydia)

--1 carrot - finely chopped

--1 bowl frozen corn

--1 boiled potato  - cut into small thin pieces

--1 tomato and 1 onion - finely chopped, mixed with dried crushed mint leaves, fresh cylantro(coriander) and sprinkled with pepper powder.

bullion chicken cube was part of original recipe but that would mean going to supermarket so I tried something wierd-sounding stuff that tasted great. And here is the replacement.

--black eye bean (lobiya). I had some boiled leftover from the earlier day meal which I made into a paste in mixer with some salt and pepper.

--& olive oil

Now lets turn on, the cooking stove..

--) In a large pan heat 2 spoons olive oil and put carrot- cook and stir, add corns- cook and stir, add the grated chicken- cook and stir

--) Then add the lobiya paste, mix the ingredients well- cook and stir. This would give the thickness to the soup and also add to the nutritive value.

--) Put water depending on the quantity and consistency of soup u want to make. I think most of my cooking is done by "andazan" philosophy.. not good when u are recording recipes but anyways.

--) After 2 min you can add the boiled potato, and the onion-tomato mixture that was kept aside in beginning & which kept tempting me to use it in a Haldiram's Bhel snack instead :p

--) Since we are done with adding everything , additional salt and pepper can be put to taste.

--) Bring it to a boil and cook for 2 minutes before you are done. 

I made this at dinner time and it turned out to be almost the main meal, so filling and satisfying. Ask Amit.

Pets being impacted too...

...with recession. With more than 1500 visas getting cancelled everyday and people going back to their home countries, Dubai is emptying out. While its easing out the traffic on roads which is pleasant on the face of it, the dark side of it is disheartening.

"Be prepared for long hours of traffic jam, rents as high as the tallest bldg out there and hot sand storms", this was the image we recieved for living in Dubai when we disclosed our decision of moving out of India. It however failed to deter our nomadic spirits. We came here all prepared and with least expectations in the immediate time, we were pleasantly surprised by quite a few things about this land when we landed here. TOUCH WOOD, must I. Times are not v good. Holding on to one's chair is the latest addition to the JO's for those who have work while I had already given up whatever I had, in India so I have nothing to loose u see!

Before I loose track of what I mean to say, I will pull myself back from my random thoughts. While browsing through dubizzle(a website offering local classifieds & forums for job, housing etc) I came across this particular category "Pets" that I was hooked onto for the next one hour, last weekend. Cats, dogs, parrots, fish, turtles & even pet cobra/snakes (?) being offered for adoption as the owners either cant afford them or are moving out and cant take their pets along. I was surprised at one ad where this fellow is seeking a temporary home for his persian cat because the paper work for cat's travel will take around 6 months & he is ready to bear the cost of living of the cat for that period.. How painful can this recession get!!!

I being lucky with lotsa time these days, have offered to take home some of these pets.. lets see what works out..especially considering the expression on husband's face which was worth a notice :P, but then my heart goes to these pets who currently have the fear of being homeless.

Holi '09 & '08

This was the making of it in reverse order!

Sabudana papad (made all by myself!!) and a pinch of turmeric powder for rang! That regular n  umm yum omlette for breakfast (lucky me to have Amit). That was our holi before he left for work.. That was also how we made up after yet another war(this was a mine one though) last night :p, about he being sleepy and me being busy with the net and the light disturbing him etc... why do so many blogs get updated just when u just want to hit the bed??? 

--*--

Last holi at this time, we had already climbed the Vaishno Devi Shrine and what a holy trip it was! We had prior bus bookings from Delhi to Katra but when we reached the bus stop there was some goofup between main bus operator and the agent doing the bookings. We were made to wait and compelled to grumble to get the seats we had booked in the sleeper bus, for an overnite journey which anyways can get tiresome. We reached there at around noon, checked into a simple lodge basically to keep our stuff n freshen up. Had planned that we will take the resigtration slip for darshan, have lunch, relax and start climbing in the evening. It was good only till we saw the miles long queue and a 3 hours waiting at the 'Yatra registration counter' and we were supposed to start our trek within 6 hours else the resistration would be rendered invalid. That left us with no time to relax (which is much recommended before a 13 km trek for darshan, having already done a 12 hrs bus ride on the hills); food wasnt good either, maybe coz we had the lunch at 5pm. With 'Jor se bolo - Jai mata di' enthusiasm we started walking, getting equipped with our walking sticks on the way. I tell you, the trek upill was filled with so much of energy & zest. 

Its advisable to keep ur belongings in cloak rooms behind and take only minimal stuff with you uphill. We were adviced by a friend to carry new pair of clothes and take bath before doing the darshan in those new clothes. So we did that.. From what I remember, at 1 km from katra is 'Banganga', where the goddess is believed to hv stopped to drink water, she actually shot an arrow into the ground and water gushed out in form of a spring from where she quenched her thirst; then there is 'charan paduka' at another 1.5 km where matarani rested before going ahead. 4 and a half km further is 'Ardhkuwari' where she meditated for 9 months inside a cave. This is halfway point in the yatra. & you find another long queue to get a group no. and then a long wait to be called to go inside the cave when your group's turn comes. Its a narrow cave so only one person can pass thru at a time n hence all this arrangement. We were told that our group will hv to wait for some 3-4 hours so we thought of covering the bhawan in the meantime. Who knew that the onward journey will be tougher owing to aching legs, another long queue and wait to enter the main shrine or 'bhawan' as it is called. 

This is the point where our patience gave up. There was chaos, flood of people wandering almost aimlessly, no information boards, no place to stand or sit, utter madness with people pushing, jumping the queue and even cheating to get in without queue or appearing in the middle from nowhere into the queue. Sumit and Amit tried to control the crowd at one point but for how long could the army of 2 people take this battle and some unheard curses on? I cant believe that all these people actually come here for peace of mind and solace. Rab to yaar ghar mein rakhi bhagwan ki murti mein bhi basta hai. We stood in the queue in turns thus getting some time away from all this. Anyone going there for the first time without prior booking or VIP tag or 'jaan pehchaan' would feel totally lost I promise you. It was getting difficult to keep up our holy spirits. The chilling cold winds only drained us some more. Now just as we were to see a ray of hope, reaching the entry gate, they declared that the gates will be closed for pilgrims for next two hours. Being the aarti time. & later I heard from the same friend of ours that they were escorted in, for darshan in the proper aarti time(?!!?!!). This is what I mean by VIP TAG or 'jaan pehchaan'.. Cruel.. but then it exists at all religeous places is what she tells me. Disgusting..

Some more of madenning rush n push! Guess, it must have come as a shocking surprise for many like it did to us. & whynot? Try n imagine holi leading to a long weekend, in north India and a crowd of thousands of shraddhalus and equal no of trekkers coming here as a wkend getaway from nearby places. So the in-flow of ppl continues 24X7 and there is no adequate arrangement at bhawan or any other point for such huge number. The thoughts of a slide or some mass mishap started haunting me and it was suffocating to see people all around. 

We tried to sit near one of rare booth meant for assistance at a point just near the main shrine and what we heard were stories of ppl missing. Its bound to happen when you go in groups and members have different speeds or the elder ones take a pony or palki and reach here before the rest. So the help this booth was providing is by doing announcements about lost and found kids/young/elderly.. I also got into consoling an old lady who had this strange worry that her son and DIL must have planned the trip to get rid of her here and she asked us money and means to go back to her village somewhere in bihar. Her cries and the cold made me feel sick and irritated Amit enough to call it quits. We said our prayers and apologies to mata rani peacefully and somehow made our way out of that flood of ppl sitting all over & waiting for the gates to reopen for darshan. There is 'Bhairo temple', which is to be visited after completing the darshan here. Not sure of whether this qualifies as our darshan, we still booked our ponies to go back via Bhairo temple. There was long queue there again..sigh! But with sunrise, there was warmth in air and with visibility on the top of that hill I felt less choked. We spent some time there and headed straight back to Katra. Downhill ride on the backs of these ponies who are trained to run like in marathons, was painfull and we crashed as soon as we entered our room at Katra. Not a single bone was intact, all screaming aloud for what we did to them. I think we managed to take hot water bath before crashing there as I remember that had helped. That was 'holi' day, our very first holi as a couple and I dont even remember if we had lunch that day or not.

My dreams of playing a full fledged holi with Amit is still a dream only..

The buzzing alarm woke us up in the evening. We gathered ouselves somehow, collected our stuff and checked out. Did some shopping on our way to the bus stop and took one to reach the railway station. Now that is where we had a nice dinner and a walk in spite of the aching bodies before we bid good bye to this beautifull hill station.

Its a BIG NO-NO going there during the holiday, wkend and summer seasons. With little bit of prior planning it could have been better but having said that, I was completely disappointed. Most of my friends have been there and had good experiences but they all had gone with someone having influence over there or with prior bookings.

We have told Mata Vaishno Devi to invite us again OR next time we gonna come & see you in off season!!

This is the scene when we had come back from the yatra, look at the crows still coming in and seeking registration slips when the officials have already closed the counter for the no of pilgrims had exceeded the manageable limits. If we call our darshan incomplete what would they call theirs??

I was going down this way on the pony back :-(, when i saw this monkey that seem to be enjoying his drink...

Much celebrated 'blogging'

I think there are certain waves flowing in abundance at particular times. Similarly there are phases in life when certain activities enjoy more of your time than others. Like I would play a carrom game every possible evening with dad, bro n sis some time back. Being a winning team used to matter so much. There are lot of things we pick up while we grow, if we enjoy we continue with some of them and it reaches its peak before it gradually starting to fade down. A rare few stay with us as a part of life for ever though in addition to the experiences and memory ofcourse. 

Of late it has been the blogworld for me.. Blogging to me is an extension of my diary with some modifications obviously. While I didnt want me to be read by many I was curious to know others via their blogs. I know the blogs might not be about the the real people but I enjoy the different way of writing and expressing mundane stuff, so initially I tried clicking 'next blog' which is the 3rd button on the blogger page and just read them randomly if I could read them that is. Not all bloggers write in english for that matter. If I like a particular writing style or content somewhere, I quickly put some sort of bookmark so i revisit those blogs. wait i think its called blogrolling them and there is even a feature to let such blogowners know that we follow n like their blogs. I this its cool.. Now thats the fun of computers and internet. I recently learnt that writing about blogging in the blog is called metablogging (if i remember correctly) so I see its a big world with some fancy terms involved already. 

The want of being heard or the feeling of just venting out for the sake of it, thinking aloud-recording it at the same time and along the way learning of some interesting add on's from people who happen to find and bother to read and thankfully add their thoughts to ours. It has its own pull. Writing does act as a therapy to so many!

I am more of a memory person than one who can visualize myself in future. Maybe because I cant articulate what i want, not even to myself in my mind. I generalize it as 'good time', yes, this is what I always keep wanting my future to be.. my boss often reiterated to me the importance of looking into future I cant be but myself. Right now I feel like trying to remember few of the waves I encountered and then conclude how boring has my life been or NOT.

-I loved collecting empty matchbox. Googled to find some matchbox names right now and I find a blogpost on them done already, the pics brought back the memory..While the object of interest keep changing, the craze of collection has remained always with me.

-Skipping a rope was like the daily soap but it was done all 7 days a week. Again, there are interesting articles about rope skipping on the net that I read through just now as I write(thanks to the time I have, to kill right now) & yes, we used to do double-tripple(2-3 ppl skipping with one rope, the middle one holding and moving the rope carefully and all three jumping in sync) & rope jumping tricks like crossover. Now skipping might have become like once in a year activity but we do have an adult's skipping rope at home & I am capable of doing 100 n more skips at one go. I will be breathless by the end of it but I still can!

oh! as I think back, I go more n more into those times and its leading to nostalgia so I drop the idea to continue.. I think I will not go on with this even for the sake of killing the time..coz i just realise i am killing myself of hunger now. So before I fix something for lunch I will just mention one more. That's 'orkutting'. I can hear my bro and hubz giggling at me on this one(I was such an addict) but I am happy I got into it for I got back in touch with so many of my old friends which was some strong old wish of mine coming true.

I conclude here with kudos to blogging for the time being. Its good for me right now. I see myself fumbling less for words. I am not here to follow any rules by the way.

hit by insomnia

There is no pending job to be attended to, 32% battery life of the laptop is left, I am sitting in the balcony to avoid the light or keypad noise disturb the sleeping husband. While the breeze is cool, I am not enjoying it much. I guess there are somethings going on in the mind. Is it because of oversleeping during the day(I started watching the movie 'chandi chowk to china' at noon as I had nothing else to do and felt asleep for the movie couldnt hold me up enough)? or is it sign of having enjoyed enough of the break from work now? or is it out of the anxiety of this testing time (recession) and our rent being higher than what others are paying for a house twice as big as ours? or there is something else altogethre?

I should be feeling nice after having met two nice friends i hv made in the last one month in this new land. I have already felt nice for that but sleep isnt coming still. Tried tossing in the bed for half an hour and got up to read something on the net; some further study options, some blog reading, some comments not making much sense on other's blogs, read few news articles and some applications on the job sites. All done n I am still not sleepy. 28% battery life left.. Dont want to plug in the adapter coz then i know i will keep sitting here till the morning with my eyes almost popping out n me at the same pt where i started from..

I will go, try sleeping again now.. for record, its 3:20 am India time :( my laptop still shows India time :( hope i get up feeling nice n fresh!