Jet lag is not good - vacation at home is good!

We're back from our trip to India - and what a trip it has been. With all my aunts trying to out-do each other taking care of N, Appa and I just vegetated in Guwahati. Ate huge quantities of food, and did not even have the decency to do some walking around for digestion. The heat daze also helped keep us lying flat on our beds for most of the day - venturing in the evenings to CCD ( we used to call it Cafe Coffee Day, but thats not cool I heard :-) .

The little sis was happy - she got plenty of time to spend with N. She organized the loudest Bday celebration ever for N in Ghy. My Dad of all people made the biggest commotion with the foam gun ( or whatever that thing that you shoot that lets out foam at parties is called). Ma worked so hard getting the party together. As Appa often says : "I dont know how your Mom gave birth to two lazee donkies like you and your sis" the contrast in our ability to work hard so apparent.

Goa was great too - nice resort vacation with the in-laws. FIL has turned 70 ( our splurging on a 5- star resort due to this occasion), and he looks fit and good. God keep him that way for a long time.

Bombay was hot - but worth it due to the good food. Unlimited skewers of barbecue after a 2hr drive and a 45 min wait - but still worth it. Great vada pavs - fantastic Indian food atKhyber. Awesome Gujju thalis, the best ofwhich we had in, of all places, Goa!

All in all, could not have asked for a better vacation. The jet lag is not too hot though, neither is the travel ( yucks! ). More on the travel some other time.

Memories of a time-sibling

A good blogger (like any artist) tries to capture life truthfully. In this effort, the bloggers honest memory usually serves as a poor servant:

"Memories are milestones
But the magic of life is made
In the mundane moments
'Tween the markers in our mind."

So when Notunma asked me to write about the time leading up to Noyonika being born exactly a year ago (wow, is it 1 year already?!), I was in a fix. It was too hard a task for me to perform.

I could write about my most vivid memory - sometime in Dec '06, when we did the ultrasound and my heart stuck in my throat when I saw the picture of that little baby curled up and sucking her thumb (just the way she does even today).

I could write about K leaving the US for India on Feb 17th last year, and my restlessness and melancholy afterward, till my getting to Guwahati on Apr 7th and being ridiculed for being "beefy" - I had taken to weights to beat blues; I guess I had been a bit too restless!

I could write about the morning of the 8th, when we ate poori & chhole at K's aunt's house, and K telling me that her stomach was hurting, she'd eaten too much.

I could write about the tension of having to switch Doctor's on the morning of the 8th and the 4 hours that crawled by till we heard a wail from inside the O.T.

I could write about my looking around, dull-headed and dim-witted, when the nurse stepped out with a bundle in her arms and said "Father kaun hai?" (& of dearest Shahana, being right there next to me to push me forward!)

However, none of these events seen individually communicate how I (or K) felt before Noyonika was born. Nor do they, when strung together like beads, capture accurately time leading up to Noyonika's birth.

The reason that it's so hard writing about the time leading up to Noyonika's birth is that while I may document each event as honestly as I can, my memories of before Noyonika are a falsehood - they are the memories that belong to a different person, who just happens to have the same writing style as me.

"Time-siblings
Created at birth
Of another."

There are a few events in ones life that are truly life-changing, that add a new dimension to life that you couldn't have understood before the event and can't explain with words after.

Now, whenever K runs up the stairs at 90 miles an hour at an imagined sound from a fast-asleep Noyonika, I grin to myself - this isn't the woman I married, but no worries, life's good.

Vada pav deprived

We are in Mumbai after a 26 hour journey. And was it tiring!
Anyway, I am glad to be among family.

My only crib - I have not been allowed to eat at the roadside stalls.. and I am so vada-pav deprived. Those tastee pieces of bread dripping in butter with a big fat bonda nestling inside. And a green chilly for the punch!! Oooohhh... will wait another day for the stomach to settle, and then..

Okay, actually, I have another crib. I lost my voice - yes, thats right, my voice. So am talking in whispers. People are making fun of me - but i'm not taking any chances here. Got to get my own voice back ( that was literal, not metaphorical)!

Meanwhile,we are preparing for N's first Bday party. Its exciting!!