Monday, December 31, 2007

A Thank You note from a blogging beginner!

I want to take this last day of the year 2007 to thank you all for accepting me into the blogging world and giving me a warm welcome. I really appreciate you reading my posts and taking time to comment. Each and every one of you made me popular. It is rewarding to know that there is some body out there who likes to read and comment on my work. I started blogging here and had a great start.

As of today I have 20 posts, a few page hits and some very good comments. I want to take a moment to thank each one of you for all the motivation. I would say the last few months of 2007 have been quite rewarding for me as a writer as I never imagined that I could possibly write anything. There is a joke on S/W engineers that if they become writers the story will be filled with keywords like if/else and do/while! So coming from that background and lacking writing skills and being accepted by the blogging world seems like a privilege.

While I agree that blogging is a very different ball game for me I am learning a lot by looking at what others are doing here. As I read the posts by some of the top bloggers I am getting some ideas. I am having a great time reading others blogs and the innumerable comments helps me step away from my own blog for a little while and get some fresh ideas and perspectives. I should mention that my friends are getting lazy in not posting their comments on the site but giving me feedback via email or chat.

I feel that my blogging experience here can bring about rich and wonderful conversations and lead to lasting friendships. I am aware of the fact that it can take a long time to build up a readership. In the mean time I am planning to enjoy the writing process. I started blogging to serve as a writing exercise. After seeing my words up on the internet, I now have the urge for people to read, comment, and relate to them… A natural inclination, I guess. Thank you for making my year a beautiful one!

Tuesday, December 25, 2007

Having fun while waiting to be served in a restaurant

We dine out a lot. Some restaurants are very quick in serving the food and some are not. In a busy restaurant you might need to wait some time for a free table then some time for a waiter to attend you and some more time for the food to be prepared. So what do you do while waiting for the food to be served especially when you are starving? I came up with a nice game that my husband and I usually play at restaurants to make the wait time interesting.

I am an Indian living in Silicon Valley. Needless to say we dine most of the time in Indian restaurants. And the people who come to dine mostly fall into the following categories: couples, who are newly married, married for few years, with kids, visiting parents, and singles that come for some onsite assignments. The age group of Indians dining out more or less ranges from 22-40. So it is fun watching them eat. Each category has its own trait.

A little about the game I invented, one of us have to pick a table and guess the category the people of that table belong to. We do not have judges in this game. Usually I observe some one and ask my husband his opinion. We defend each of our answers and discuss the possibilities. It is lot of fun doing that. It works out very well for us because the categories are limited and you see a definite pattern among each category.

My process of categorizing people goes like this. Let me start with newly weds, the most interesting category of all. They can be sub divided into couples who had love marriage or arranged marriage. We often see the later versions. With the arranged marriage couples, most of the time it is the guy who has been living here and for the wife it is the first time in US. So the guy has a predominant role here. He tries to explain her with great enthusiasm that you get all these cool authentic Indian cuisine to start with. Then he helps her in choosing some thing to eat. They keep looking at each other, the girl blushing, the guy admiring his wife when she is struggling to decide some thing on the menu. It is like watching a romantic movie. And they both sacrifice so much when it comes to ordering food trying to order the other person’s choice even if they don’t like it. So sweet!

Some times you miss the opening credits but do not worry as every thing going on between them tells you they are newly wed as if love is in the air. They never get frustrated of waiting for the food to be served and chat very lovingly about every possible topic on earth. You can tell some thing by looking at the way they sit. The guy is more relaxed and the girl is a little conservative trying to be conscious of her surroundings. Of course some times if the guy is too conservative the scene can be other way too! Once the food arrives, they do not dig in like others. They take time to talk about each of their choice, first taste the food on other’s plate and then slowly eat sharing every small bite. They don’t have time to look at other tables like we do!

The next category is couples who had known each other for a few years and got married. They already know each other, their likes and dislike what to order and all that. So they do not waste much time in ordering food. Once the order is placed they start chatting on some topic enjoying the conversation, playfully touching each other, laughing etc. They both look very relaxed and comfortable and have fun while waiting. In this category usually the girl’s role is predominant as the guy is still trying to please her and do whatever she likes! Once the food comes they share but sparingly and then go and finish their food. They do look at other tables and wave happily at the kids sitting around them. They are happy people.

Moving to the couples married for few years with kids, if the kid is an infant it is still OK. They try to give the baby milk or some Gerber food before their order arrives so that they can eat in peace. They give a rattler to the baby and eat happily discussing only about the baby or about their friends with babies. They do not have time to look around to see who else are in the restaurant, if they do they envy the couples who do not have kids and feel sad for the couples with older kids. We can actually guess what they are talking by just looking at them. Most of them have their parents visiting them to help them with the baby. So they try to help their parents with the menu and how to eat with a fork and a knife etc. I enjoy watching other’s parents especially when the guy marries a Chinese girl or an American.

Now with parents with kids, toddlers to say six years old, the first thing they do once they get a table is to impatiently wait for the waiter to come and take the order. They decide what to eat on their way to the restaurant. They hate waiting and expect the food to arrive in record time. They start complaining about the waiter. They struggle to stop the kid from pulling others hair, hitting other babies, running away from the table, and pouring water all over themselves. The kids become very imaginative at restaurants and come up with highly unpredictable pranks. Father expects the mother to take care of the kid and vice versa and they both decide never to come to a restaurant again and order the food to go. Once the food arrives, both of them try to make sure that the kid likes it and eats it. Meanwhile they forget to even look at what is on the other’s plate and just gulp in and swallow their food. The kid ends up playing with the food and not eating anything leaving the parents more frustrated and the waiter poor guy never gets good tip as the parents think that it is his entire fault for not getting the food in time!

I am a mother of 3 year old. We went through all the phases mentioned above and came up with great tricks to make our life peaceful and enjoy our trip to a restaurant. We take one of my son’s favorite toys so that he can be busy playing with it till the food comes. We try to ask for a table which is away from the trouble making zone. We let him play with the sugar packets and make some nice sugary water so that he does not pour the water on the table or some where else. We play our game of guessing the age of the marriage of the couples sitting around our table and have some fun till the food arrives. We also try to look at what others have ordered and if it looks good so that we can try it out by ourselves. Once the food arrives, we share our food, have fun, and make sure he eats some thing to fill himself. I prefer going to restaurants where I can play this game!

Monday, December 10, 2007

Love is actually blind

“Love is blind” is a widely used phrase but I never believed in it. I never understood how two people fail to see the flaws in the other person when they are so obvious to the world. I am not saying to search for a perfect person and then fall in love but I know about myself, my family and I should be able to see if the other person suits me and fits into my family or not. I always thought that people often mistake crush and infatuation to love and ignore the incompatibilities which may potentially affect them in their future life.

I have seen a few of my friends falling in “love” with a wrong guy, according to me of course. I used to question how a person can irresistibly be drawn to another in love. I do agree that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. But my point was to see the reality and practicality beyond that beauty. Some people do not hesitate to go against their parents in pursuing their love. How can you even overlook a more than two decade relationship with your family who defined your life for a person you hardly know?

For me blind love where you see a person and feel the spark the first time you meet and then lose yourself completely in his or her love to the extent that your brains dumb down and rule your hearts is a highly over rated concept and was better in movies. Real time love stories always remained a mystery to me. By the way this is all about the feelings till you get engaged or married. Love after engagement or marriage is different. It makes so much sense than the other one. It is life made simple with a little ground work.

Well, I was suggested to write on this topic by one of my friends. In an attempt to understand the most profound and powerful human emotion I did some research and here are my findings. To start with the origin of the phrase is from a Shakespearean sonnet from “The Merchant of Venice”. Jessica says:

“Here, catch this casket; it is worth the pains.
I am glad 'tis night, you do not look on me,
For I am much ashamed of my exchange:
But love is blind and lovers cannot see
The pretty follies that themselves commit;
For if they could, Cupid himself would blush
To see me thus transformed to a boy.”


It is quite touching and very well said but it is still fiction. I was quite surprised to know love really is blind and there is a biological basis for the blindness. Research says that certain brain areas are stimulated when you see some one attractive and they produce a feeling of intense happiness. At the same time it is found that the feeling suppresses neural activity associated with critical social assessment and negative judgment. Now it makes sense why we see strange couples who say they had love at first sight or fell in love and then got married.

That said my next question is how long are the brain areas of negative judgment deactivated? Certainly not forever as they say “Marriage is an eye opener”. In this case I would say that people who get married and then fall in love are at an advantage as they have their brain cells deactivated for a longer time! After the deactivation process I guess one should be wise enough to accept the person for what they are and be happy!

Friday, December 7, 2007

Wouldn’t it be cool if our life worked the way it does in cartoons?

I enjoyed watching cartoons as a kid. Now I have a 3 year old and I am watching lots of them and reruns of every episode more than a thousand times each. But surprisingly I enjoy them even today. Now when I watch them I cannot help but realize that physics works differently in cartoons.

Characters can walk on air, as long as they are not reminded of the situation. If they fall, they make their body impression in the ground or if it is water they go into the depths and float back with a smile on their face. Even if they are injured it is okay because they recover in a second. The characters pass through otherwise impenetrable barriers and hot peppers really do make smoke come out of their ears. Wouldn't it be cool if our world worked that way too?

I am a big fan of Pixar. It takes a lot of creative thinking and fresh perspective to come up with such great stories. I wish I remembered my dreams on the cartoon characters, I could have proudly read my son the stories authored by me. Watching so many cartoons these days I think I can come up with a few of my own!

I started wondering how it would be if the laws of Newton and Einstein changed to those of Hanna and Barbara (Producers of the Tom and Jerry show). Just imagine the laws of gravity working in coherence with emotions and intuition and negated by fear. One can run and almost fly without their feet touching to the ground when in a hurry, flight does not depend on mass of the body, can perforate solid walls at will. I would happily become a James Bond successor and work in some special rescue missions with super natural (or should I say cartoon) powers without getting hurt.

Life would be more exaggerated and funny so that the fantasy while still illogical makes sense. People would not look dull but idiotic. The innumerable and utterly complex emotions like happiness, sadness, anger, surprise, and disgust can be clearly expressed with different faces. Life would be less painful or mostly painless; you would get solutions to the problems in a blink, resolve differences with people around you in a moment. I could use all the emoticons shown in cartoons in my real life to express what I feel in different situations with out having to say a word!

Wednesday, December 5, 2007

The content analysis of my dreams

I dream a lot. The theme and content keep changing but I have been dreaming since I was a kid. I usually share my dreams with one of my family member or a friend the day after and then I forget. With three decades of dreaming experience concerning various topics I guess I am very well qualified to be a case study for some kind of “Dream Analysis” project! Well, till some one selects me for such research I thought I can explore the mysterious and fascinating world of my dreams and do a content analysis.

Dreams, they are unique as every individual is. It is said that every dream is connected with our personal life and experiences. It is also said that for the most part dreams are a reasonable simulation of waking life in terms of characters, social interactions, activities, and settings. I don’t think I can completely agree to that statement because my dreams are practically impossible in any real life.

When I was a kid I used to dream the whole Tom and Jerry show. Not the ones I watched but a whole new episode. I wish I jotted them down soon after I woke up, I could have sent the scripts to the directors! I used to dream of being a part of army or military personnel (influenced by a character in a TV series). I used to read science fiction by “Arthur C Clarke”. I dreamt of alien life in a very different way nothing as shown in movies. Recently I had a dream of a full length action movie shot in the streets of Paris featuring me in the lead role of course. How about that?

So what do they mean? What should I interpret from them? Some times I am aware that I am dreaming. When I wake up in between a dream, I go back to sleep and try to search for the part where it was paused and continue from there. This is scientifically possible and it is termed as “Lucid Dreaming” or “Dreaming consciousness”. But one thing I do not understand is how come I am having such heroic fantasies with my conscious mind! I think sub consciously I like experiencing such things but it is terrifying in real life and safe to explore in a dream state.

Recently my dreams have become more realistic. I did a considerable amount of gardening this summer and I had dreams of my garden in a house we lived when I was a kid. I also dreamt of signing books for my New York best seller! I wish it comes true. To dive into this analysis, I think I should have a journal to keep track of what I dream. If I am not able to conclude anything out of it, I can at least use them for my writing purposes. I am positive they make good stories.

I usually wish my friends on their birthdays “I wish all your dreams and aspirations may come true very soon”. But now, I don’t think I will say that any more. Some dreams are better off in sleep than in real life. I guess I will edit the line and remove the word “all” and make it “The dreams of your choice”!