New wall additions

After the return from India, we finally got a chance to add some new decor.

This one from a small shop in Monterey. These characters were created by the parents for their kid! Now it has gotten to Disney..or so we heard at the store. The drawings were amazing. So we bought this one, and thanks to IKEA have framed it. Dancing mice! That covers the adults and the children.

Another Ganesha added to the zillion already blessing us from every wall. This one though, was made for this location.

A Ravi Varma redone (oil on canvas), successfully framed in Mylapore with Plexiglass instead of glass (our previous attempts at bringing things with a frame were all failures no matter how good our packing inside the suitcase). It has been a long time dream to have one of these paintings in our bedroom and finally we have one!

Have never done any posts on wall decor before. This one was inspired by Dipali.

.

Should non Americans be able to critique Bailout?

A good buddy PK starts questioning himself on his right to critique the USA on the current economic situation, bailout etc.

Having been on the other side of the coin as an NRI whose right to question desi politics and happenings, here is my take.

People all across the globe have every right to criticize the current situation, irrespective of their nationality.

Why?

The President of the United States has conferred upon himself the title:

"Leader of the free world"!

Now, what are the implications of that statement?

After a lot of soul searching, it is my belief, that this is purely a pretext, to drive a catch-22 situation which implies one of two things:

a. If you are part of the free world, then the US President is your leader
b. If he is not your leader, then you are possibly not free and he will feel obligated to send his army to free you. Plain and simple!

Having said that, one should feel free.. at least to criticize the happenings here!

That is possibly the only thing this freedom buys you! Nothing more. Not cheap gas, Not more fuel efficient cars, not your tax dollars spent on things that matter like education, energy, healthcare, border security, etc.

So, please, feel "free**" to put in your two cents on what is going on. Don't let your local government hold you down!

**Disclaimer : All freedoms subject to change. You are being watched. Anything you say may be used against you. We know where your retirement money is!!! We also control your tax rate...

.

Immigrant Diaries

The secret shoebox that distracted me with all those invalubles, held one item that actually triggered the "Chuck Norris for President" post.

It was my little account notebook where every cent was balanced,over my first eight nine months of living in America. This was done till debts were closed in India.

Except for my roomate from those old days, nobody has seen this notebook.

Here are the first three pages..

Lot of "fresh off the plane" memories. Note, how I spelt Pizza (Pietza?!?) two days after landing here. Was rolling on the floor laughing after seeing this and some other entries. Also note, how I learnt to return things in a store (a concept that was really new to me after entering the USA). Still remember asking a college senior, "What do you mean, return the phone? I already bought it! How will the store take it back after I already paid for it and there is nothing wrong with it?" and he said "Tell the store, that your friend gave you a hand me down phone!" and the store will take it back. And "take it back" they did, with an understanding smile and I just could not believe it!

Will never forget having a sleeping bag instead of a bed for nine months and using Kellogs cornflakes boxes as a shelf of sorts to keep all my stuff. We used to watch a hand me down four inch black and white TV, with the two extended antennas which had to be tweaked very precisely to the 0.01 th of a degree, to get NBC, ABC, CBS and PBS. The funniest thing was that someone actually stole that TV, when we were moving from one apartment to another a year later.

Things have changed quite a bit now. There is a 52 inch LCD TV at home, which suggests that the growth is 13 times in 15 years, if of course, one measures oneself by the ratio of the diagonal TV size!

Somewhere, somehow, the lessons in those early days on growing up, taking care of oneself, dealing with debt, having the drive to get over a barrier, have all made me what I am today.

Life goes on, without the precious notebook!

.