Happy Ganesha Chathurthi

Today is a celebration for the elephant headed god Ganesha, the remover of obstacles. Was able to take a few hours this morning to finish the pooja. San was busy in meetings as well, but still managed to make some yummy kozhukkattais, Vadai and Payasam. 

She even recorded me this time doing the archanai for Pullaiyaar!

One kid is eating a qdoba sandwitch for lunch after attending college and standing in a long lunch line while the other kid is in school, still fighting a stomach issue after a month.

Celebrating between the two of us is still okay and we are getting used to making do with what we can, when we can.

My pulliyaar for this poojai has not changed in decades. 

Looking at this one always makes me smile and be positive. Maybe it is just a habit I have developed over the decades! Think of this as one of my Horcruxes.. 

San clicked this while she was talking to me about how I had a deadline to finish the neivedhiyam(food offering to Ganesha prior to it being distribution worthy) before her next meeting and I look up annoyed and she clicks.... apparently this is what passes for candid photography by wifes standards.

I am not this grumpy by default. Just didn't like to be rushed for the pooja!

Then there was a kozhukkattai (dumpling) exchange with our neighbor. I got called out to the front to take a picture. My legs were numb from sitting in same place for an hour. So got up and literally wobbled out of the house as the blood returned to my feet.  In my rush didn't realize that my dhoti had come undone slightly on one side! My neighbor points this out  just before clicking and I make a joke on top of her joke and voila..

As long as we have great friends and San keeps laughing at my jokes, think we will be okay! 

that is more like the normal me!

and a video that San took during the poojai...

Was thinking of my grandpa a lot today and my dad. They are both big on getting saamandhi poo for the poojai. Usually we have yellow crysanthemums at this time which I use. This year they are late to bloom and the plant is full of buds that have yet to open! A thousand memories ran past my eyes as I finished the poojai. Some of my happiest memories of celebrating in India are from the Pulliayaar chathurthis. Compared to that, this is a very simple celebration.

My grandpa is a memory and my dad is not in a position to do pooja anymore. All I can do is show him these photos and videos to cheer him up.

We make to with what we can, but celebrate we still do!

Ganesh Chathurthi in 2020

Ganesha, vinayaka, the remover of obstacles has the big celebration today. Ganesha's blessings are needed more than ever this year. There are fires all around us.. (I am not philosophical.. literally fires all around us) and the air quality is see-sawing on an hourly basis.

Mostly we make all of the favorite foods for this pooja (which obviously are also our favorites) but this year we kept things simple. 

Missing someone, no marks for guessing.. 

Ganesha will keep her safe wherever she is, or that is the hope and prayer! 

You will find plenty of old posts on this blog for this event! 

It is the same day sheet calendar Pillayar that is still the mainstay for our prayers on this day.. but with the iPhone in portrait mode, he really shines.

San is getting good at taking pictures with the iPhone.

and the little one did a good job taking this photo for us.. this year given we are stuck at home all the time, have decided to wear a new T-shirt for every festival. Why not?!

2020 has been and continues to be surreal. There are always some positives from everything. I have not boarded a plane this year and that is a good thing. Have been reasonably healthy this year with the body. There is a nagging gum infection and I was told earlier this week that unless there is a gum surgery in two or three weeks, will lose two more tooth much sooner. Apparently they are gone in a few years anyways. This is the second time in 8 years this is happening. 

Not sure if there is any yoga for tooth. They seem to be the motorcyles of the body, when it comes to risk and insurance. Have been told that my dental insurance covers practically nothing and the bill for this will be in the many 1000's. Trying to figure out a way right now. If the virus wasn't doing its thing, would have gone to India to our family dentist and got the surgery done, but that is not an option now. Even with a flight ticket included it would have cost less than half of what it costs here. 

Praying to the "remover of obstacles" to make sure this will be the last time I go through this. 

To everyone who is celebrating Ganesh Chathurthi, may Ganesha give you everything you ask for! 

Want some kozhukattai(dumplings) now and will go help myself to some..

A day sheet calendar and a long time tradition

It was 1989.. and my parents were helping me pack to go to Varanasi to study. In the last minute my dad decided to get me this day sheet calendar that showed the Tamil month and date information.. It was a beautiful calendar with a golden Ganesha stuck on the top of cardboard. 

We had just left Chennai the day of Vinayaka Chaturthi to go to Varanasi. It has been 30 years and almost the same date. 

That year went by and the day sheets were all used, but that golden Ganesha was separated from the calendar and kept in the room. As a teenager, I did not have to do a pooja for Ganesha by myself given by father was performing it in Chennai. I used to go to the local temples in Varanasi to celebrate. That did not mean I would not do a Ganapathi pooja by myself. Would do that every now and then, thanks to the training I got from my high school. We had a Vidhya Ganapathi at the school entrance and I got to do the daily pooja for him including abhishegams. If you want to learn deference and get a grip on faith, doing an abhishegham to an idol that the entire school will come to worship in a few hours is one way to start!

Then I ended up in the US. Again, I would call my parents and enquire how the pooja went and dream of kozhukattais and if lucky some married senior grad student or local professor would indulge us with some kozhukattais (modhaks, dumplings). 

Once I got married, things changed. It was time to perform the pooja as head of my own household. San tried her hand at making kozhukattais and her first experience had her almost in tears. Then she slowly improved and once her mom started coming to visit when the kids were born, things took an interesting turn. She turned pro..

Also over the last 10 years, my MIL has been here for many Ganesh chaturthis and made the usual kozhukkattais as well as my favorite "ammani" kozhukkattis.. which I would come home and roast with some grated coconut and eat. Some years were good and some were bad.. that we almost had no celebration. 

This year we are fortunate to have Ganesh Chathurthi as a national holiday in the US for Labor day. Got to do yoga early in the morning, come home and do the pooja.. to the same day sheet calendar Ganapathy! If it has been your "go to Ganesha" for 30 years, it is now the gold standard!

The photograph makes it look big.. it is only 5 inches tall.. but to me it means something. Was thinking about my dad this morning. As a teen, the one thing I wanted to be after growing up was "not him". He has a lot of good things about him as well as some lousy stuff. The lousy stuff is now long gone.. Once he crossed 55, he was a different person.. maybe because he realized the kids were grown up or he wisened up or realized that no matter what he did, society is going to do what it does. 

For all his faults, I do have him to thank for many things in my life that provide me an anchor of sorts.. be it in a good way or a what not to do in my life way. Was thinking of him in a good way today. 

Was also missing my MIL today. San was at it the entire morning and was complaining of her hands hurting while making the kozhukkattais. Having cut my finger deeply while helping with Veggie cutting, my utility in the kitchen reduced.. San is an Obi-Wan at this.. but MIL is Yoda. Getting visuals of my MIL in a yoda costume saying "kalari it, you must", "hurt, it will".. 

Now it is time to round up the tummy with some good eats... 

This year, we also managed to pack and carry a nice small decorative table during the recent India trip. We got a large Ganesha as part of Jr.'s arangetram decor and were looking for  a nice place to put the idol. This table makes a perfect stand for the Ganesha. Everyone in the house is now placing flowers on it when they get a chance. 

Ganesha is my favorite of all the Indian gods, so it is no surprise that we celebrate this festival the way we do! 

There was a time when the kids used to get involved.

These days, given high school and growing up in a different place different time, they look forward to the kozhukkattai and they come when the pooja is almost done. 

Sooner or later they will realize that unless they learn to make the Kozhukattai's themselves, they will be missing out!

Time to start a Kozhukkattai making class next Ganesh Chaturthi... 

Happy Ganesha or Pillaiyar Chathurthi to everyone who is celebrating!

A different August

This blog is a good screenshot of our life over the last ten years. Every August has been marked by sickness of some kind for me. 

For the first time, this August went without me being sick. To that we have to thank god, and that we did yesterday morning..

We have celebrated Ganesh Chathurthi (aka Pillayar Ummachi's birthday in our house) every year and sometimes it has been a full blown out weekend thing with every type of Kozhukkattai (dumplings) and other times a quiet prayer where we just sang "Happy birthday to you" in front of the god and went to bed. 

This year it being a school day, we got up early and finished the pooja and the food ready before it was time to get the kids to the breakfast table. 

The little one took that picture. She is getting better every day at taking pictures.

This Ganesha idol was given to me by my dad 24 years ago. It was actually glued on to a "day sheet calendar". It became the pooja Ganapathy during my college days as this was the only 3D version. It makes me think of my dad everytime I set this idol down on the floor and start the prayer. 

We had a huge health scare in the family in August, but fortunately things turned out okay. We all thanked Pillayar Ummachi for helping us through this tough time.  

We are now into a long weekend with no travel plans. That means, it is time to go work on the other 1000 pictures left from the Jaipur trip!

Trying to impress grandmas and getting carried away..

Jr. and the little one both get a "ragam quiz" every night at bedtime. They can guess ~20 ragams from either a song I hum, the aarohanam-avarohanam or phrases or swarams I hum or sing.

Sometimes just play from iPhone for the quiz(usually GNB, MS, MLV, TN Seshagopalan, Ariyakudi from the music collection or the latest Sudha Raghunathan, Sanjay Subrahmanyam, Priya Sisters, Ranjani-Gayathri straight from Youtube favorites).

They guess reasonably well, considering they have been at this for two three months already.

Every now and then, they pick a favorite and listen to the whole song till they memorize it and imitate it. While San thinks this is border line blasphemy, I encourage it. After all every kid is not going to be a super singer and the whole idea is to imitate and learn and this is my way of spending some quality time with them and having some fun.

The most important thing in learning, is learning how to learn! (if that has not been copyrighted, I am doing it right now)

So, here are the little Narayanan girls, doing their version of Vinayaka. They thought this was a rehearsal and did not know that the camcorder was on.

Don't know if the paati's will be pleased, what with the little one's novel concept of "variable thAlam" where she suddenly goes into a vigorous hand slapping to give herself some more energy to sing and Jr.'s attempts to sustain notes to try and get some semblance of a steady timing.

If they do improve over the years with lots of practice and training, they might look back at this and go "god, we have come a long way".. and if their interest in music dies out after some time, they might still look at this and go "we did try, didn't we"..

Getting these two to sit next to each other and sing in unison was in itself a workout for Daddy Narayanan. If they happen to sing this in tune and tempo eventually, will post that video as well...

For now the girls are a "work in progress"!

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