One Fleeting Moment

Here's the modern day version of a message-in-a-bottle. Its good fun if you have time to spare and nothing better to do with it. I just finished trawling through endless messages about nudges, winks and glances shared on the Metro and I am dumbstruck. All I ever encounter on the Metro are gloriously fat, half way dysfunctional families on their annual educational tour to DC, loud obnoxious teenagers, smelly homeless people or oversized, orphaned underwear! This is totally unfair cause we all know that nothing is more amusing than watching young (and not so) things go through the excutiating hoops of that sordid ritual called courting, the first part of which apparently starts with flexing some minor muscle on the Metro.

[Warning: This post is solely dedicated to those who come here looking for ways to fix their Malm bed (you know who you are). Thanks for stopping by and its nice to know that you folks make up about 40 percent of my readership that comes through via Google.]

So on my last visit (to fix my retail therapy itch) I bought a pair of nice cushion covers, a bag of their coffee, two bottles of Kristian Regale sparkling apple and peach drinks, a box of scented tealights and a candle dish. Just tried the coffee and its quite decent. Atleast its better than the bulk Maxwell House bile that is usually brewed at work. The cushion covers look pretty and scented candles smell nice. Now what?

PS: Just in case you are wondering, my retail therapy itches can be cured rather cheaply, sometimes handing over just 10 dollars of my money to some big corporation will do it for me.

Labels: Ikea

I love everything about food, from cooking to grocery shopping. I can spend hours in the produce section selecting vegetables. I also spend hours poring over food related trivia on the Internet and usually eat my weekend lunch in front of the TV while Jacques Pepin cooks lovely meals in a studio somewhere. I find cooking at the end of a tiring work day relaxing. I try to be conscientious about my food choices, picking Tilapia over other fish as it is environmentally friendly and generally refraining from purchasing/consuming red meat. I try to buy local farm produce during the few months of the year that it is available. Mc Donalds and Olive Garden are the same as far as I am concerned(read: will not eat there for a million dollars, okay might reconsider for a million, but only for a million or more) and in case I forgot to mention I love eating out and trying new places.

Now if I were to state all of the above in a social setting, the “working” women in the crowd would erupt into howls of disbelief, followed by protestations about the drudgery involved along with much rolling of the eyes, nudging of the elbows etc. etc. Here are some of the classic questions (I usually give up by question number 3 or 4 and start looking for an aspirin) with translations for the uninititated.

Working Woman: I totally hate cooking.
Subliminal Subtext: Never heard of Lean Cuisine, what a shame?

Working Woman: How do you find the time to do all this?
Subliminal Subtext: Do you have a college degree or what?

Working Woman: My husband/ boyfriend/fiancé loves cooking and feeding me.
Subliminal Subtext: Where did you find your caveman? Should have listened to your mamma.

Working Woman: Wow! This* is sooooo good, where did you learn to cook this well?
Subliminal Subtext: Oh! well, you must be one of those Cinderella type, kitchen drudges. Only Cinderella was pretty and she got that Prince to rescue her. You just got a caveman.

Working Woman: You must really love good food.
Subliminal Subtext: You love stuffing your face. You should seriously check out Lean Cuisine, it will do you a fat lot of good (oops! wrong choice of words).

Working Woman: Cooking at home is so healthy; besides you guys must be saving a lot.
Subliminal Subtext: Yep! You are cheap. THE ULTIMATE DIG

* refers to the masticated remains of my delicate fish fry, which are currently residing in her mouth.

Labels: Food

Oh man, this is the holy grail of bloggerdom, that which all bloggers yearn for but very few achieve (thank God they have better things to do!)... This is IT. Anyways I digress, the real reason for my prodigal return (so, I went a little overboard with the metaphors...big deal) is this movie. Go watch it if you can. And if you do not already have a Steve Carell shrine at home, I suggest you start watching re-runs of the The Office on NBC or head out to the nearest Blockbuster and rent either this or this. And you might just be inspired to build that shrine.
Joking aside, this is one of the nicest movies I have watched in the theatres this summer.

Nothing defines summer afternoons better than stuffing your face with a slice of watermelon over the sink. Just remember to surface every once in a while to breathe and spit out the black seeds. Other than that it’s just one endless session of slurp-ity slurp as long the fruit lasts. And if that is not disgusting enough you could lick the juices running down your elbows to some more swooshing and exclaiming. Hey! that’s why we do it in the confines of our kitchen because in company we might have to eat bite sized pieces of melon like a lady…how terribly boring!

Coming back to the point, it all starts with selecting the perfect watermelon. A ripe cantaloupe smells really ripe as does a ripe pineapple. So cantaloupe and pineapple lovers go sniff-sniff at the grocery store to select the one they will finally take home. However watermelon connoisseurs have no such luck because a ripe watermelon smells just like its unripe cousin on the next vine. This is where the thumping test comes in handy. I am not really sure it’s a great test because I am yet to meet a watermelon that does not produce a nice “thud” on being thumped. Yet I join in with the other clueless folks at the fruit stand and thump, slap, knock and even drum out a few beats on these heavy weights before settling for some random sample. The acoustically well endowed melon then sits in the refrigerator till its juicy red innards reach the right temperature. After that all you need is a knive (yes, you will need one because unlike Aamir Khan* our watermelons don’t cube themselves into perfect little packets of watermelon goodness while growing up) a couple of hacks, a lazy afternoon and on to watermelon nirvana.

* Remember that song from "Dil Hai ki Maanta Nahin" that had Aamir Khan hogging a whole melon while Pooja Bhat sulked in a corner and a ratchety song played in the background.

If you don't live in an university town, let me explain how this works. Every year around August new students start flying in from India. The local graduate student association extends the basic courtesy of an airport pick-up and temporary housing to all incoming students. Luckily for them, some students usually opt out as they have family in the area. The pick-up duties for the remaining are then distributed equitably (sometimes even non equitably) among the volunteers. Temporary housing is also similarly distributed. The Boy and I are no longer in a position to offer temporary accomodation due to our apartment size, but airport pickups are manageable. Besides one gets to meet a new person and the one hour journey back is full of questions related to accomodations, TA's, RA's cooking turns etc. etc. the answers to which we have mastered. So last week we went to Dulles and recieved a tired young man who had spent more time in queues at Heathrow than in flight(thanks to the terror alerts). It was nice. And like previous years, the new entrants into the system are the also most visible ones. The bus stops are full of men and women, all scrubbed and shiny at eight in the morning. Soon they will imibibe the wisdom of those who came before them and hopefully they will stop being so squeaky clean at that hour.

the Boy and I stood around in a cavernous room full of medical equipment, a rather calm nurse, a worried father and a very, very pregnant mom. We fiddled and ho hummed and as the going got worse we hurried out. I bawled as much as the mom in the throes of labour and the Boy got us some hot chocolate. After the bawling and chocolate were dispensed with, we welcomed little Anika in to our world, exactly one year and three days ago. Over the last one year, we have seen her grow and her Dad break all previously held speeding records on the Beltway at the merest hint of a wail (okay, it was not a hint but a mighty big wail). We have become a little more confident about holding her. The Boy and I have also become pretty good at instantly baby proofing our place. The algorithm is something like this:

1. Take everything at or within 2 feet from the floor level and place it on top of the book shelf.

2. Wait for Anika to come and if she still manages to find something (the last time around she took a sudden fancy to the beets in the kitchen) then pry that from her and place it on the bookshelf.

3. When its time to leave, go to the top of the book shelf and look around for stuff that has been accidentally placed there during the evening, like Daddy's wallet or his phone or the housekeys.

So this weekend, after a year we joined a little group of friends in celebrating her first birthday. We grilled some chicken, ate loads of samosas and later in the evening, the Boy played us some music on Anika's toy keyboard. Anika showed her appreciation by waddling over and banging a little on the keys. Now go ahead and do the "Awww...choo chweeet" routine.

And here's another little something about the red train wagon I posted sometime back. Well, its in Old Town Bowie and serves as the Town Musueum. If you want to spend a lazy weekend afternoon window shopping, then it does not get better than this. Browse through the antique stores at a leisurely pace, sip some tea at Retro Tea Room (but not for long, its slated to close down soon I am told) and generally take in the quiet surroundings. The antiques here are of the homey sort that are probably anywhere from a hundred to forty years old. Its definetely not high end, but that adds to the charm. The Old Bowie Town Grille I am told by many is a good place to relax. They have live music most evenings and have lunch on weekends but dinner every day.

So today is 15th of August and like the previous years I will do nothing about it. Yep, I am not very patriotic, at least not in the commonly understood way. I have attended only one flag hoisting ceremony in my lifetime and intend to keep it that way. My patriotism is closely linked to my idea of home and it makes me feel like boarding the next flight home whenever we drive by the Dulles International Airport. When festivals go by in the humdrum of daily existence without registering even a blip on my social calendar, I miss India. Now spare me the “Mera Bharat Mahan” e-mails and let me go about my business. And, if like me, you are sitting in the air conditioned comfort of your office in some first world country, stop for a moment and look up the word irony in the dictionary.

Unlike most other cities, DC does not have a prominent skyline. There are mounuments (and then there is "THE MONUMENT") museums and the White House etc. etc. Movies set in DC usually have the main characters walking along the Tidal Basin discussing all manners of hush, hush conspiratorial stuff or doing drugs in some seedy part of town (remember Michael Douglas driving around Southeast in "Traffic"). Most of the time its the former that gets more coverage. How come DC is never the setting for a family drama involving the girl and the guy next door, their dog, the neurotic parents just like any ordinary city?

Okay, so you just can't escape the lofty government buildings in the District. But just behind the shadows of the Capitol and beyond the grasp of the tourist-y National Mall there is a perfectly normal city















It has its churches, sometimes two within a block. It has its weird guy jogging at a weird hour.

Then there are quaint old row houses from its horse and buggy days, terribly homey and all that.

Some buildings still maintain their old facades, while some try to make themselves more visible with a bold coat of paint. These row houses define the District, from the upscale homes in Northwest to the dingy ones in its crime ridden neighborhoods. My love affair with these homes started in 2003, when I would visit A who lived in a row house in Dupont Circle. She shared the high ceilings, large windows and the winding staircase with a few students and a rather grumpy landlord. The kitchen was spacious and always cool. And there was an adorable claw foot tub in the bathroom. In some of the economically depressed sections, there has been a sudden spurt in development with ugly condo's sprouting all over. I had rather see these old homes, restored and set up as affordable housing than be converted into obnoxiously priced condo's for yuppies.

And now for a little history lesson (for me):
Address: 221-225 Pennsylvania Ave.SE
Date: 1887
"The three buildings that make up the Mayers Block were designed by John Granville Meyers in the Queen Anne style to have shops at street level and residences above. Meyers also designed the Christian Heurich Mansion near Dupont Circle."

Now, come on some one please make that average Joe, peanut butter movie about DC without resorting to lovely aerials of the Capitol or high octane chases down I-395. And no, not another cheesy movie about the cadets at Annapolis (techinically that's in Maryland) either.

What had started out as an yearly get together for five friends has slowly morphed into an annual tradition of our own. Come Thanksgiving, the five of us meet up, cook some great food, watch pirated Saif Ali Khan movies and relive our college days. The cold weekend is also very, very conducive to staying indoors and catching up on 365 days worth of gossip.

The foodies in the group start obsessing about the menu weeks in advance and responsibilities are split. Friends of the hosts are also roped in to help. Last year, the pumpkin pie was flown in, in a pureed state and assembled at the venue. This year we will fly into Chicago a day early, spend some time with our friends there and then head out for Houghton, Michigan the next day. Now Houghton, Michigan is pretty close to the far end of the world as far as we are concerned but we shall drive for more than nine hours through wintry conditions to meet a friend, because some traditions are simply worth it.

Labels: Thanksgiving

It has always been difficult to explain the intricacies of my work to family and friends back home. I usually leave it at civil engineer and if I am in a wicked mood I might tell nosy aunty from next door that I drive a big truck and supervise guys building roads. This sufficiently blue collar explanation goes down much better than the traffic engineering spiel. So what do I do? Well, I travel the length and breadth of two of Maryland's most densely populated counties for a living. Really, that's what I do...kind of. I help the agency I work for solve traffic and pedestrian issues, congestion issues etc. The work involves a lot of travel and I love the sense of freedom that being alone on the roads brings...

Sometimes in a leafy suburb a young mother might stop by to chat, or on a cold morning the guys at the community fire station might offer me a coffee.

Sometimes I find myself in neighborhoods where life has become a humiliating chore for the inhabitants, where no one smiles and I lock my self in my car, pull up my windows and keep the engine running while I try to work.

Sometimes the congested highway gives way to a rural two lane roadway that winds through farmland.

Sometimes there is no gas station for miles or even worse, a restroom.

Sometimes when I stop and look, I find beauty in strange places, like this stop on the old railroad system. The bright red engine is now a museum, a reminder of more busy times, when the trains did stop by.

Labels: Speeding Highway

The recent heatwave had us confined indoors for more than a week. We did try making a couple of trips to the mall but after a night walk around the neighbourhood left us sweating profusely, we gave up all together. This weekend however the tenperature took a turn for the better. The humid haze lifted on Sunday to reveal a cheerful day which incidentally woke us up way early than usual with its brightness. I think it also went through the bones and did something to the spirit because we were at our "DC Explorer" best throughout.Our first stop was the legendary DC eatery-Ben's Chilli Bowl for lunch. If you come out of the U Street Metro station through the 13th street exit you can't escape its cheery red, white and yellow frontage. The interior with its high ceiling and ceiling fans, peeling paint and 60's counter tops is reminiscent of much simpler times. Its only befitting that the food they serve has the same simplicity and timeless quality. Now, normal human beings would think twice about eating hots dogs and fries on a hot day but after more than a few 100 F days, the weather seemed balmy to us and we proceeded to plow our way through a Jumbo turkey dog (for the Boy), a chilli dog for me and an order of chilli fries. Those are the sorry remnants of our chilli fries. Our verdict - the food is so-so, nothing to write home about. In retrospect, we should have ordered the half smokes which Ben's is famous for and the meaty chilli. The vegetarian chilli which was generously smothered over our hots dogs and fries had no texture. However its the insitution and history that matters more than the food and we plan to recommend it to our out of town friends, nevertheless.

Our other stop was the Eastern Market in Southeast. Right outside the Eastern Market Metro station, this is one of the oldest markets to be continually used in DC. It reminded me of Crawford Market in Mumbai and the Old Amish Country Market in Burtonsville. Most of the produce was more expensive than my local farmers market, but the quaintness of it all was worth the visit. They also had an arts and crafts section were some enterprising Indian was busy ripping off people with cheap knick knacks purchased on the last trip home. They also have a weekend flea market where the Boy got a good deal on a graphite tennis racket for himself and then proceeded to buy me a pair of hand made ear rings. The sheer number of Tibetan prayer bowls on sale here was just hilarious. I am sure most people mistake them for fancy mortar pestle sets like yours truly! The Tibetan fellow selling those had the same hustle that one encounters on the streets of New Delhi. He tried to soothe our souls with his muiscal prayer bowl and if had shown any interest I am sure he would have gone the "Ma-daam, only wan phiphty, super special price for you Ma-daam" way.

Look what the recent heat wave did to my chilli pepper, it was bright green one day and the very next day it was red hot. Yikes, at this rate we should be talking about Global Boiling and not Global Warming.
Off late, I have been staying indoors (with the AC chugging away at full blast) and complaining about the 100+ temperatures, the heat index and how the planet will blow itself up anyway. All this after surviving Pilani summers for four years without any air conditioning? What have I become? And this is the part that bothers me the most, my ecological footprint was much smaller then (0.7 compared to a honking 16 now), yet I think I complain more now. I am more aware of my environment now than before. I try to do all the right things like recyling and driving a fuel efficient car, but by virtue of living in a first world society I am still utilising the resources worth 16 acres of land. The average person in US has a eco footprint of about 24 acres per person but that comparison does not please me.