Do diwaane sheher mein

Its been a month since I last posted. Finally, the speed of reality has overtaken the speed of my dreams   and so therefore, there was much more to do and much less time (or inclination) to write.

If this is how life is going to be, I’m lovin’ it! There has been an influx of friends in our life of movies, and outings, and meeting people and eating out!

Anyways let me first recount how this past month has been.

The first week for me was spent breathing in the cool B’lore breeze and revelling in the lush greens… For someone like me who loves rains and breeze, it was the place to be! H was still in Delhi so after hectic days at office, evenings were spent walking around the campus in the breeze, and in the silence of the night.

Then H arrived, and for a week we just couldn’t meet, what with his work and mine.

So we actually met in Week3 … (Week2 for him) over a weekend. And that weekend we also started looking for houses. 

To start off we had identified three areas for our house hunt… Koramangala, Indiranagar, and Outer Ring Road/Sarjapur. So to start off with.. we spoke to some brokers in Outer Ring Road… ( that is where all the new properties are)

I remember how we walked around outer ring road, and sarjapur for three hours looking at apartments and more apartments! And me being the perfectionist that I am (ahem) finding faults with every single one of them! H was irritated! I guess he kinda expected us to finalise on an apartment right away! But with Aadi maasam, we had more than enough time to look for a house,  and I was obviously in no hurry   We shifted guesthouses and moved to the city centre together too that Saturday

So we scheduled to meet the same guy to show us apartments in Koramangala the next day. And that day was such a waste of time. No keys, awesomely high rents, and bad entries to otherwise good places. But yes we did catch a movie that Sunday — > We saw the Hangover ( mad movie that!… no.. correction…crazy and mad movie) .

With that, week began again

In the middle of the week, we saw some more houses and selected one. Yup, we never saw Indiranagar at all!

The place we have selected is lovely. Spacious, new, well lit, comfortable. I am visualising lots of evenings with friends and family. Lots of dinners, and bon homie and laughter The only thing is we are going to shift only by the end of the month. So we wouldn’t be able to make any use of all the “sale”s. And swine flu too has been a reason to stay away from most places. So that, when that happens

More movies seen — > Harry Potter and Love Aaj Kal… both were entertaining.

And so now, we are through with the house hunt. Next up, Whitegoods!

 

What do I want from “home”?

I’ve been thinking of this question a lot lately. I am the sort of person, who likes to dream about things. And nowadays I have been building castles in the air about what I’d want “home” to mean for me. And then I think of what I want from my home, this is the answer.

I want a happy home.

And so the post.

I want H and I to build a friendly, welcoming, comfortable, sunshiny home. I want it to be a positive place that recharges us, instead of draining out our energies. Lately, I’ve been thinking of how to go about doing this? How do I ensure that our house radiates positivity? And when I start thinking in this direction, I automatically think of vibes.

All houses radiate emotions. Happiness, sadness, peace, anger, love. I feel that they hit you, even before you lay your eyes on the interiors, or the color scheme or the furniture. I’ve stayed in a number of house till date, and I have experienced all these vibes. My parent’s place, exudes peaceful, comforting vibes. I go home, and suddenly, all the noise in my head goes quiet. Even if there is no one at home, I still feel the stillness, the calmness around me. I think, that comes from the kind of people my parents are. Calm, at peace, and content. My place in Pune had happy vibes. It was disorganised, and chaotic, with four talkative girls in it, but still, it was a pleasant place, a place of many giggles, and stories. I’d think of home, and I’d link it to smiles, to a positive welcoming feeling.

What are these vibes? It’s difficult to explain. They are not really body language, though body language helps in our understanding of vibes, and it is not really intuition, because intuition is always futuristic. It is our “sensing” of our environment, and is linked more with thoughts. And I have realized, that it is good to go with one’s instincts about vibes.

Happy vibes make a happy home. And only a happy person makes happy vibes. So the next natural question is… What makes us happy?

Happiness.. it’s all about perspective, really. Happiness has its roots in Self Image. And that is where it gets all tricky. We are only as happy as we want to be. Some emotions are reactive emotions, and some are proactive emotions. For example, getting angry is a reactive emotion. You cannot be angry for no reason… the reasons are there, overt, or covert. But I think, one can be happy reactively… or proactively. One can be in situations that give one pleasure and joy, but at the same time… one can opt to look at normal things and find happiness in them.

I am happy that I have a laptop that I can type away on, endlessly, and take, wherever I want to. There… how difficult was that?

But like I said, you need to have a positive self image as well as positive conditions to grow happiness in your home. And this is what.. and entire day of thought has yielded. Something so simple!

So how does one improve the family’s self image?

1. Opinions get heard, and respected

2. One tries to give and take positive strokes, “I’m OK, you’re OK”.

3. Disputes are handled with fairness and communication.

4. There is support and understanding

5. There is a lot of affirmation, and confirmation of care, love, affection.

6. The truth is spoken, and there is transparency

And dear H, this is how I want us to be, with each other, and with our children.

And the second and equally important thing is: -

1. To celebrate life. To seek happiness and joy, in little things, to remind ourselves, and each other of how great, how beautiful things are.

2. To live in the present, and prepare for the future.

3. To create situations of happiness for each other

Would you like to add to the list?

 

And it rained!

Its finally raining in Delhi!

And I think we were all beginning to feel that the monsoons might really fail us this time round!

Anyways, with the shift being top most on our mind, visions of a very green, very rainy Bangalore have been swimming around in my head. And ofcourse with the rains, I feel that I’m invigorated! And the world feels like a happier place.

Nothing much happened this week, which is all too well, as I got to enjoy the rains.. And go out into the garden, sniffing around, inhaling the fresh smells of the wet earth, and the trees and the grass.

Leaving you with a some of my absolute favorite rain songs :-

Rhim Jhim Gire Saawan

Zindagi bhar nahi bhoolegi

and finally… this one..

Yeh raat bheegi bheegi

In fact, I just realised, that most of my favorite rain songs are songs which also talk about the night.

There is something magical about the pitter patter of the rain, in the quiet of the night. The mystery of the night is enhanced by the smells and sounds of the rain… the croaking crickets, the silent pitter patter, the sway of the breeze through the glistening leaves…..

… as you can see.. I’m lovin’ it!

 

The Kitchen Series – Imli and Puli Saadam

The Imli is another staple ingredient in South Indian Cooking. And that’s the only place I thought it was used, till I “Wiki”ed about it. Turns out, it is used in Latin American cuisines and is also an important ingredient in Worcestershire sauce, HP sauce; and the Jamaican-produced Pickapeppa sauce!

Puli Saadam – Literally Translates to “Tamarind Rice”, and must say, its one of my favorite South Indian dishes. So, obviously I have the recipe copied for the “Shift” and am posting it here, for the irrational fear that I might lose the recipe slip of paper in the midst of all this sorting and shifting.

Ingredients for the Puli Saadam paste

2 Lemon size balls of dried tamarind – Soak in water and get a thick paste, with no trace of the pulp.

1 tsp turmeric (haldi)

3 tsp salt

2 tbsp channa dal (uncooked, split white channa)

3 tbsp oil (preferably sesame oil)

3 tspn mustard seeds

7-8 red chillies – slightly broken

Curry leaves – 15 – 20

2 -3 tbsp peanuts

1 tablespoon channa dal

For the Dry Powder – This is to be fried in very little oil and ground.

1 tsp methi seeds

3 tsp dhaniya (whole)

10 – 12 chillies

1 cm raw hing

Instructions

Heat the oil in a pan. Add the mustard seeds, red chillies, curry leaves, peanuts and channa dal and cook till roasted (there should be no trace of water). Add the tamarind paste, haldi, salt and channa dal and cook thoroughly till the raw smell of the tamarind goes away.

Add the powdered masala and cook further.

Before removing from the gas, add a teaspoon of gur (jaggery).

Add the paste to boiled rice, along with fresh curry leaves. The paste can be prepared and kept in the fridge. It is added to the rice as per taste. Adjust the salt.

At home we serve this with a special chutney. The recipe for the same is given below

 

Ingredient for Chutney

1 quarter grated coconut

3 red chillies

1 mm of hing

1 tsp of urad dal

1 tsp of tamarind paste

Instructions

Fry the chillies and hing. Fry the urad dal seperately. Grind and add the tamarind. Add the coconut. Add salt. Grind further. Finally at the urad dal which has been seperately fried.

I plan to keep the paste ready for packed lunches. Make the paste on the weekend and add whenever to boiled rice

 

Designs and Dining Dreams

The past two weeks have literally flown away, what with planning and packing and sorting. Actually, more sorting than planning and very little packing!

Its funny how much junk one tends to accumulate over time! Really, even squeaky clean people like me I have a habit of stowing away receipts, atm slips, into my purse whenever I shop. I hate to have anyone wait in the check out queue behind me at any shop, as I fumble around with money and slips and bags, so things are hastily shoved into the big bag, and I’m off. To think of it, I should actually just throw these bits of paper away at that point itself, because I don’t really check them ever.

And then there is the whole pile of office paperwork to destroy, which again, we print and bring in ( we are hardworking, and dedicated employees, what do you say!) And of course, being company confidential, it had to be shredded. And finally clothes, sorted into, “To wear”, “To alter” and “To discard”, to be attended to later.

But despite all the sorting, the room is looking messier than ever. There is hardly any space with the advent of the bean bags, and H refuses to part with them and so we walk around falling over them all the time… And falling into them later, out of exhaustion! And so go things in the Sunshine house, and so we prepare for the “Shift”

In the midst of all this, we have found time to dream up a design for our “would be” Dining Table. We’ve surfed and we’ve clicked pics at shops in Kirti Nagar and then finally it shaped up, some of this and something of that, and all of hope and expectation! But let’s go over it all step by step, strategically.

Vision – A dining table that is timeless and adapts to our lifestyle. (yup, vision statements are that vague)

Objectives – A stylish, sturdy, yet functional piece of furniture that does not take up much space.

Goals – Should be able to grow with time, should be able to hold all the amazing dishes I plan to cook, should be able to seat our favorite people, should be able to withstand cleaning by H

So I surfed on the net a bit. I loved the look of a square piece ( we can possibly add extensions later). I wanted the chairs to fit in. I was also looking for a four seater, and not six or eight. I also wanted the trough like things in the wooden base, to personalise it with paper, or pebbles or marbles.. The works. Something like this given below.

Taken from the Internet – Source

Then we went around to Kirti Nagar and had a look at this,

Kirti Nagar Dining Table

… And this.

Clicked at a Store in Kirti Nagar

I loved the concept of the narrow back for chair, and also loved the glass top and the grooves in the table. I wasn’t too comfortable with glass extending over the sides of the wooden frame… We decided to cut it to the dimensions of the wooden base.

So finally what do we have.

1. Square shape – 40′ – 40′

2. Toughened glass on top, cut to same size as the wooden base.

3. Wooden base to have four square troughs.

4. Four Narrow back chairs, with that split wood design.

5. Nice chocolatey brown paint.

I’m looking forward to seeing how it turns out. Let’s hope its as nice as we are imagining it to be

 

The Kitchen Series – The Coconut Scraper & the Kurma

Yesterday, I used this interesting looking kitchen tool for the first time. The maid was off for the night so I was in charge of cooking ‘something – anything’. MIL and FIL wanted dosa so we decided that a Vegetable Kurma would do nicely.

Now I’ve made this gravy before, so there is a fair degree of comfort. But last time round, S, our domestic helped cut up the vegetables and grated the coconut so didn’t get any opportunity to use that coconut tool, but this time I did!

The cutter/grater we have at home looks like a upturned sickle and a rounded extension with grating teeth. You keep it on the floor to either cut vegetables by hand, or use the grater. Its totally new to me because we don’t use it much in the north. But MIL has promised to give me one for the new kitchen as well

 Live2cook has provided an awesome description of the same here

 

My Kurma recipe follows

Ingredients : -

Cloves – 2 to 3

Elaichi – 2 pods ( green cardamom)

Cinnamon stick – one ½ inch stick

Curry leaves – 7 to 10

1 Onion, Finely chopped

2 Tomatoes – Finely chopped

1 inch of Ginger

5 -6 cloves of Garlic

½ Grated coconut

1 tablespoon saunf ( fennel seeds)

1 Potato – Peeled and Cut into 2 inch cubes

1 Carrot – Peeled, cut in fat slices

1 small cauliflower – cut into florets

½ tsp haldi

Red chilly powder and salt to taste

Preparation

Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in a pan. Put in the cloves, elaichi and cinnamon. After they cook a bit, 30 seconds, put the onion in. Cook the onion till transparent and then put in the finely chopped ginger and garlic. Stir around for about 1 more minute and the introduce the tomatoes. Add the salt and the turmeric and the chilly powder. Cook till the tomatoes are tender. Then finally add the vegetables. Close and cook in the masala for 2 minutes, then add 2 cups of water, and close the lid to cook the vegetables thoroughly.

After about 15 minutes or when the vegetables are done, grind the saunf and coconut together in the grinder and add to the gravy. After another boil or two, the gravy is done.

Some Notes :-

The water can be added as per consistency required. This can be reduced.

Tastes better if some dhaniya powder is also added

 

Penning it here for posterity. Wish I had some snaps to post. Happy Cooking!

 

If bitter-sweet was a feeling, and plans!

The news came in around March. Hubby had been asked to move to B’lore.

I really don’t remember how I felt exactly. It’s like the feeling needed time to sink in. And it is only in the span of the next three – four days, that I realized, that things would start to change. How one feels at such junctures in life is always an odd mix of the happy and the sad. We were happy and excited at the thought of this new phase that would actually kick start our life, and shake up our routine. At the same time, there is this feeling that one is somehow letting one’s parents’ down.

And so thoughts have swung in both directions since then. On the one hand, I have been planning and dreaming, and Hubby’s and mine conversations have started taking the tone of “When we are in B’lore you will not do XYZ” or “When we are in Bangalore, you will have to help out with ABC”. We have been researching on “posh residential areas in Bangalore” and “rental apartments in B’lore” and making lists, categorized as, Furniture…. Electronics… or Utensils. On the other hand, I look at MIL, and try to imagine what she must be going through. I see how our parent’s who’ve pretty much built their life around us, would feel lost. I help MIL on the computer, or teach her how to boot the laptop, or insert a pendrive in the USB drive, telling her how to “safely remove hardware” and I feel bad, that we wouldn’t be around to help them with this. I feel like we are abandoning these people, who belong to a past age, leaving them in the bewildering world of electronic banking, and smses, and internet messenger chats, and emails and picasa…new ways of communication that they now have to master.

I see her trying to teach me dishes to cook for Hubby,  and I understand how difficult it must be to let go.

If bitter sweet was a feeling, this would have to be how it would feel.

But this will be my sunshine blog, and so we won’t dwell on this any further. The planning has begun, and I’ve begun to draw comparisons of how life will be then, as compared to now.

1. Household Shopping – The bad side – We will have to take time out from our nine to nine schedules, to keep our house running. The good side – We get to pick and choose what to buy, We get to be experimental… frozen prawn for a Goan Prawn Curry recipe, you got it… Hot salsa for that sprout salad, coming down in the aisle in a vegetable trolley! Also Hubby basically loves supermarket shopping, which is a blessing!

2. Cooking – The bad side – I’ll ( will hopefully some help from Hubby) have to cook. It might be a torture to make those dishes on a busy work day. The good side – I get to keep tab on Hubby’s eating. We get to cut out sweets and lose those 5 kgs that have piled on due to pampered feeding by both set of folks. And I love cooking and so I get to experiment all I want!

3. Waking up early – ( : ( groan!) – The bad side – All of it! The good side – We get to catch the rising sun! We get to exercise and get some fresh air. Plus Point No 2 totally depends on it.

4. Household chores – The maids, the laundry, the setting and dusting – The bad side – This one, I’ll have to do, or supervise…. So makes point no 3 imperative! But maybe all that running around will make me lose the remaining 5 kg too!

5. The weekend gateways –The bad – Nothing! The good – Lots more time to plan for these, more friends to go out with

6. More time to myself – The bad – Well actually none, I like being with myself, The good – I get to blog, catch up with old friends etc

7. Living la vida loca!

So as D –day approaches, we try and get more and more geared up for it. And of course, how do I forget, we got our first piece of furniture post marriage. Two bean bags! These are the biggest available, chocolate brown in color and absolutely the most comfortable things to sink into! And we need to buy lots more! A sofa, a dining table set, cupboards, TV cabinet.. these things to start of with… and then white goods.

Will share my views on furniture in the next post! Till then, have you heard this beautiful song…”Yeh Tera Ghar, Yeh Mera Ghar”… apt, don’t you think?

 

A post of many firsts

I’m starting this new blog for a new period in my life. It’s my symbolic transition into a phase in life which I hope will be as sunshiny, and bright and beautiful as I am imagining it to be

We are shifting locations. Heading out towards the south of India. It will be a major change for Hubby and me… A period of many firsts. This is the first home that we will be building together, all by ourselves..our first house hunt expedition, first brush with the brokers and maids. Then ofcourse will follow the first furniture that we’ll buy, the first appliances, first friend that we’ll invite… The works!

It’ll be a thrilling time, don’t you think? And I want to chronicle it all here. The laughs, the confusion, the anxiety, the fun, the arguments.

I hope to record things here and hope for this to be a work that I can dig into, many years later, and chuckle or grin goofily. I also want you all to please comment. Treat this like a friend’s place.. Drop in to say hi, agree with me, disagree with me, share a slice of life with me.

Looking forward to our cuppa chai and chat as soon as we can