Update

Well, obviously there is a long gap in my writing; if anyone lived with me they will know there has been a gap with everything! Been lazy…not cooked regularly…not been in my usual form in keeping up with friends…let me think, what can I blame it all on?

To give some benefit of doubt to myself, yes, I have had a lot on my mind….but maybe it is beyond all that. I read an article on Yahoo (?) recently and it called ‘Wedding’ as ‘one of the top five most stressful times in any person’s life” Hear hear! I totally concur! Not that I am even in the country where the wedding is to take place, not that I am running around on an everyday basis to get things organized, but oh my God, it is a bit much.

Murphy’s Law seems to be proving itself right every single minute of the day too, and here I am waiting for things to go wrong not only with respect to the main “event” but with respect to everything including appliances at home, health, and what not! The last two weeks, I have had problems with parts of my body and with everything in my house; to give you an example, one evening last week the water dispenser suddenly started leaking, just when I came for a drink after sweating it out in the gym (after a whole day at work) - I had just lifted the heavy bottle on top of it the previous evening and hence had to move the full container down again! The bathroom shower curtain decided to fall down as soon as I got into the shower and no matter what I did just refused to stand in its place again. I dropped my original plans, got into the guest bath and had a quick shower. I then considered a drive to cool me and of course I don’t mean that literally, coz it’s a boiling upper 50s degree Celsius outside at all times of the day!!! Then many more small things happened the same evening driving me very crazy…..but well, let’s move on. More recently, my DVD player is acting very strange, refusing to recognize DVDs that it bonded pretty well with in the past! Worse yet, it recognizes, starts playing, and then decides it is no longer interested in what I have decided to watch and stops! See what I mean? Drives me insane!

But on the other hand, I am slowly getting more excited about the upcoming event; booking tickets, counting number of people, food arrangements, and SHOPPING :-) No, I am not doing the actual shopping at this point but the planning and directing people is fun too…you get to do that sitting on your couch, in front of the laptop. Of course, sometimes my fiancé and I are the middlemen and it’s not so much fun when we start fighting with each other, and trust me it happens more often than anyone can imagine. Everyone gets very touchy at times, it’s like the world is having its PMS! Those are the days I rue, but have now come to anticipate. My patience level has gone up dramatically, or so I like to think ;-)

Certain good things are happening….my little bro is visiting me, and we expect to spend some quality time together and I get to be the host for the first time in this new country…everyone in Doha seems to be on vacation, which implies bosses missing at work, roads relatively empty, desperate sales at malls, trying to woo the people left in the city, etc!

Just a quick update on last few weeks…..turned out to be a rant for the most part! But hey, I am writing again and hope I become more disciplined and do it almost everyday (dare I hope?). Maybe one day I can make these pre-wedding rants as a collection and give it to my children, titled “Now you know why your mom is the way she is!”?!!!

Happy Father's day!

Happy Father’s day, to the best father in the whole world!

Just a few words about the man of few words………..

He has been and is a wonderful dad….kind, trusting, loving, generous, encouraging, devoted, and courageous. A man of principles, he led by example; our family’s role model! I hope we have caught on at least a small percentage of his qualities!

As a child, I loved being given baths by him, food tasted extra delicious when it came from his plate…..it never mattered that I already finished lunch/dinner, I would always be ready when he started eating, for few more mouthfuls from him :-)

Memories I have of him are more of the subtle kind; many many of his words have stuck with me and I like to think I always act by them. Hope he feels the same and is proud of whatever my brother and I do.

One incident very close to my heart- I had participated in my first college level elections and was a nervous wreck the whole week and more so the final days before results were announced. Finally after we had the results, I called home excitedly and told my father I had won! He, in his signature calm voice told me, “We always knew you would win da, only you were tensed. Come home soon, we have reserved tickets to go for a movie tonight, to celebrate”!!! Could I have asked for a better father with any more trust?

Thank you for being you appa, love you very very much. You are our pillar of strength!
Happy Father’s day!

www.my-mother.net

My post about my mom for Mother’s day is now on http://www.my-mother.net/ --> Featured stories! This is a great website and I think a lovely tribute to mothers. They are finally going to put all the stories/tributes together as a book...what better way to appreciate our mothers right? Do send your own articles to stories@firstcounselors.com, or submit online at the site. See below email from the webmaster for calls for the same.

Dear Sunitha
Thank you for your story about your mother. It is now available online at www.my-mother.net where you can access and read it.
Please also let your friends and relatives read your story online and perhaps they too will write and submit stories about their mothers. Together we can make this the greatest tribute to mothers. Hope you will blog about this too.
With best regards

Message to my teen-aged self? ;-)

Ammani (http://jikku.blogspot.com/) is a writer I admire so very much. She had asked her readers to write a letter to their own teenaged self for "If I knew then what I know now".

This is what I would tell my own self: You never regret the things you did, but will always regret things you did not do.

It is here in Ammani's blogspot too: http://lettersforall.blogspot.com/

:-) Thanks for the opportunity Ammani....keep rocking!

Iranian Souq

Last few weeks have been quite hectic at work, but I have had loads of fun during the weekends. I finally made it to the Iranian souq/Old souq/Souq Waqif as it is called. Apparently this souq, which is about a hundred years old, has been majorly renovated in the last few years using of course, lots and lots of money! The first thing that struck me….” Ok does not look too bad! Can still step without inhibition on the stone pavements…..quite clean in fact!” and once we entered, “wow, what an amazing smell!” It actually smells like a native medicine shop, for whoever is familiar with that kind of smell from India. There are so many small shops around and they all look so inviting, as you feel like going and discovering all the hidden goodies in these small places :-) Most of the items are not packaged goods, but rather open in boxes and they will weigh out what measure you want and pack it up. While Asians may be used to this concept from olden days, it is no longer the custom in most places, and is hence very refreshing. I felt like I was walking the streets of old Tamil Nadu, with the small shops, and wooden planks for doors…..anyone remember those types? ;-)

One can get almost anything from these small shops in the souq……henna powder in huge boxes…..so many varieties of them – black henna, red henna, coarse types, softer types, etc; Other herbal powders, dried flowers for various purposes, dry fruits, including dried pomegranate arils; this is one of the best discoveries I have made in any shop in recent times! It is so deliciously sour, goes so well with other dried delights like almonds and walnuts, or even with breakfast cereal. All kinds of spices used in cooking are also available in their original state. The huge barks of royal cinnamon are an example! Best part, you are allowed to sample anything edible before you buy ;-)There are also things like dried, whole limes, crushed and dried garlic (that looks like chips), etc, which are all apparently widely used in the native cooking here.

Once you finish this side of the souq, the alley opens into a broad area with some very nice, what I call “junk-jewellery shops”! I started using this term since my childhood because my father always thought buying gold was the best thing you can do; it is an investment and good planning. I, his daughter, always loved anything that: 1) was not made of gold or any other metal of value 2) was huge and antiquey looking (mostly) 3) usually had no resale value of any sort and 4) were usually quite expensive too! These lovely shops carried beautiful chains, bracelets and earrings made of stones, antique looking metals, beads etc. Some of them were a bit on the expensive side, but many quite reasonable. I am trying to convince fellow family members that I can actually wear some of them for my wedding, but am met with caustic glares (or rude admonitions if on phone) that often silences me after some initial mumbling :-(
I have already been to the souq twice in three weeks for, of course, what else but these shops!

Now are you imagining the souq to be made of all these kinds of shops? Just when a newly visiting person may start to write it off so, a Basking Robins/Dunkin donuts branch appears, inside the souq!!! Just as you are beginning to recover, there is a Costa coffee! And also………….wait for it…………….a Häagen-Dazs outlet! There are also other restaurants, shisha (?) cafes and some interesting eat outs. The best part about it is you can sit outside in the open stone pavements and enjoy your cup of coffee or food here. This of course is subject to temperature conditions and by that I mean “NOT NOW in summer”! It is a boiling 50° Celsius already and nobody fails to inform me that it is “just the beginning”!!!

There were also some clothes, shoes, and kitchen accessories kind of shops, which did not interest me too much. There is also a ‘pet shop’ kind of area where they sell birds, kittens, rabbits, etc. these kind of places usually only make me sad and I left that area as soon as I could!

On the whole the Souq was a wonderful experience and I am sure I will be there for some essentials and not so essentials quite often ;-) Looking forward to showing some people around soon, so people, start visiting!

Can a letter be romantic and practical at the same time?

What a beautiful letter (below) by Beethoven to his beloved! How can one write such a romantic letter that is also so practical at the same time?

My angel, my all, my very self -
Only a few words today and at that with pencil (with yours) - Not till tomorrow will my lodgings be definitely determined upon - what a useless waste of time -
Why this deep sorrow when necessity speaks - can our love endure except through sacrifices, through not demanding everything from one another; can you change the fact that you are not wholly mine, I not wholly thine -
Oh God, look out into the beauties of nature and comfort your heart with that which must be -Love demands everything and that very justly - thus it is to me with you, and to you with me.
But you forget so easily that I must live for me and for you; if we were wholly united you would feel the pain of it as little as I -
My journey was a fearful one; I did not reach here until 4 o'clock yesterday morning. Lacking horses the post-coach chose another route, but what an awful one; at the stage before the last I was warned not to travel at night; I was made fearful of a forest, but that only made me the more eager - and I was wrong.
The coach must needs break down on the wretched road, a bottomless mud road. Without such postilions as I had with me I should have remained stuck in the road. Esterhazy, traveling the usual road here, had the same fate with eight horses that I had with four - Yet I got some pleasure out of it, as I always do when I successfully overcome difficulties -
Now a quick change to things internal from things external.
We shall surely see each other soon; moreover, today I cannot share with you the thoughts I have had during these last few days touching my own life -
If our hearts were always close together, I would have none of these.
My heart is full of so many things to say to you - ah - there are moments when I feel that speech amounts to nothing at all -
Cheer up - remain my true, my only treasure, my all as I am yours.
The gods must send us the rest, what for us must and shall be...

Cruelty

In my opinion, anyone who is cruel and abusive to children and animals is not a human being; does not deserve to be treated as one. Period. It is such a horrible thing that people use religion to get away with these kinds of acts too! The article below just made me so sad…..can you imagine the number of children who have suffered for so many years in the hands of idiots and perverts disguised as fathers and nuns?!!! No one interfered too; there was nobody the poor, helpless kids could turn to! How can anyone be religious seeing such acts? Whom do you trust?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/20/AR2009052003809.html?hpid=moreheadlines
Look at this link below from yesterday’s Hindu Metro supplementary:
http://www.thehindu.com/mp/2009/05/20/stories/2009052050070600.htm
Somebody actually tied a dog using barbed wire!!! I do not understand how people can be this cruel. Same goes for killing any animal. Non-vegetarians can give hundreds of examples or references, religious and otherwise as to why they eat meat; I will never understand or accept it though. How can you eat meat knowing somebody killed that animal and in all probability it suffered horribly before its death? Don’t get me wrong, most people around me are non-vegetarians, including members of family, and many dear friends. While I am opinionated in this issue, I do not force anyone to convert; all the same I request everybody to stand up for certain issues as human beings and make sure in your own way you make some small contribution to animals in this world.
This recent post on his blog by Wayne Pacelle, President and CEO of The Humane Society of the United States is very interesting.
http://hsus.typepad.com/wayne/2009/05/michael-vick.html
I have always admired the work by this society and thank them for exposing so many issues to the public and saving so many many lives. The Michael Vick trial had me boiling for months….’how could he?’ was a question I could not get out of my head for a very long time. I wanted him to suffer more than all the dogs he killed and injured put together! This post by Mr. Pacelle made me very happy this morning though. I appreciate how the society is trying to use Vick to change the attitudes of many growing boys from similar backgrounds, thus ensuring removal of any new Michael Vicks coming up in this world. I hope and pray that Vick is really honest in his efforts and somebody is always watching him, because I am not going to be able to trust him for a very long time! This is also important, especially because no matter what he did, there are people who still worship him for the Quarterback that he was! When the six year long dog-fighting operations were finally discovered, many fans of his actually wrote in public forums “So what if he killed dogs, it’s not like he killed human beings”!!!!!!!! As you can imagine, my BP shot up so much after reading those kind of statements, that I would have gladly killed whoever wrote that myself and had no regrets.
If anyone wants to know more about Vick and repercussions he faced due to his actions etc, here is the wiki page about him:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Vick
Kindly also follow Mr. Pacelle’s blog, http://hsus.typepad.com/wayne/ if interested, and I strongly urge all my friends to do your part, however small; volunteer for animals, donating just little bits of time for them, or make financial donations, however small. Every small good act or thought counts!
As long as I am in the link-giving spree ;-), here is also Qatar Animal Welfare Society’s (QAWS): www.qaws.org