Bappa Bulletin Board

आत्ताच हरतीलीकेची पूजा झाली . त्याचे फोटो लावले आहेत. सोबत आरास आणि बाप्पाच्या चांदीचं वस्तूचे पण फोटो लावले आहेत. प्रीती तू देलेला साईबाबा सर्वांच  खूप आवडतो . मी तो नियमित मांडते . 
 ह्या वर्षी मी एक पंचधातूची गणेश मूर्ती पण ठेवली आहे .तिच्या समोर एक crystal बोल मध्ये काही गुलाबांचा पाकळ्या टाकून, त्यात floating candles ठेवणार आहे .

Bappa Bulletin Board

I never thought I would come back so soon with more news, but this just happened.

Whenever I don't have late evenings at work, I try to keep those competely to myself.

In our house everybody has his or her's agenda for the evening. Aai is in her room watching some Hindi serial, Raj in his own world and Chetan is in the office room either working or watching a tiger leaping on a deer or the shark attacks on the discovery channel.

Since I don't watch TV, I get lot of time to myself. I try to get connected to my hobbies. One of the thing I have reconnected is working with the clay, - and what could be the better start than moulding a ganapati murti I made clay Ganesha, sitting in a royal pose, holding laddoo in the left hand. The idol is air drying. It is still  in "progress stage". Hopefully I finish it in a day or two.

The next picture is a Supari Ganapati I made a while ago. When Iwas  making it, I unknowingly made the trunk on the right side, so when I realized it, I decided to make two roses and a basket with 11 laddoos for him.

London 2012 Olympic Memories

Wembley Arena - Badminton Games 

Indie Wembley Arena

Crowd- After the games

Tower Bridge-London

Inside the Olympic Village

Inside the Olympic Village

Inside the Olympic Village

With Badminton player from Hong Kong China- He won one of the game we saw. 

With Russian Boxer

At Trafalgar Sqare- under the Olympic Clock

International fans

International fans

Funny station name

At Wimbledon

Peaceful- Town of Wimbledon

Kensington Palace- Official residence of Princess Diana 

Inside the Palace. Raj and I were invited here for lunch. We had royal food here. Unbelievable .

Today's Puja

Today we have Jeevti and Pithori puja together. It is very rare. In the evening we have planned some south indian menu this time. Dosa, Idlis, Tamarind rice and rice kheer. Today is also known as mother's day and  it also happens to be Ba's smrutidin.

Some New Grilling Stuff

Summer started here on June 20 th. The weather had been great for outdoor activities since May. Sometimes it rains in the morning and the evenings are pleasant and great for the outdoors. Last week it was too hot . We had heat emergency declared with temp rising to 97-99 degrees F. It was so hot. Our neighbor's dog was always belly up on their lawns trying to beat the heat. Lucky dog. Anyways. We enjoy grilling a lot and rarely cook inside in the evenings.  I bought some new grill supplies to make it more enjoyable and sharing here.

This one is for grilling the whole corn. At a time 4 corns can be grilled, Great time saver and it occupies less space.

This is a grill basket with a clasp. All types of veggies or fruits like sliced pineapple or sliced peaches can be stuffed in this . This also avoid food from falling inside the grill. 

The next one is a great help. Its great for grilled version of the stir fry. Place anything in it, in any combination. Pour some oil and get the grilled taste for the stir fry with less oil.

Here is how it is used . We tried it with Shrimps and veggies and ate with egg rice. Awesome.

Four Seasons

Here is the view from the main door of our house. I have tried to capture colors of the changing landscape from one angle. I started in January for Winter, April for Spring, July for Summer and November for the Fall season.
Our house is at the end, and there is a small island which has few mature trees on it. All the cars have to go around this island to turn back.

Notice the small black pole and white box on it. It is our mail box. The mailman puts all the mail here and we pick it up in the evening. If we have to mail something, then we empty the box, put the mail and raise the flag so the mailman knows he has the mail to pick up for delivery.

Click on the images for larger view.

Winter- December to March 

               Spring-March to June

Summer- June - September

Fall-September to December

Ganpati Celebration

Like every year, my day started at 4 am, as I had to make all the puja arrangements, adorn the idol with the jewelry and cook for the lunch. For morning I made Kala watan amti, matki usal, varan bhat and chappati. For the 5 sweets which are offered to the deity, I made kheer, puran, shrikhand, aamras and Ukadiche modak. Aai made the 21 modaks this year.

The puja started at 10:30am. Sachin, his kids and some of my friends attended the puja. Chetan performed the puja. Puja was followed by Atharvashirsh, Deve, Suktas and all the Gayatri Mantras. Raj performed the aarti and the ritual ended with mantrapushpanjali.

After the lunch, it was time for the preparation of evening dinner. We had 65 + guests this year. Everything excepts the puri is made at home. For dinner we have a set menu every year. It includes
Shrikhand-Puri, Varan-Bhat, Masoor Garam Masala, Hirwa Watana Kaju Bhaji, Batata Bhaji, Boondi Raita, Pickle and Green Coconut Chuteny.
I made about 7lbs of Kesar Pista Shrikhand. Much lesser than usual quantity.

All the people arrrived on time for mothi aarti which last for about 45 minutes. This is followed by the dinner.
As always, we had great time. Its also time for meeting and catching up with the friends and relatives.
The festivities ended next evening after the Bappa's visarjan in the nearby lake

Million thanks to Bappa who helped us in his puja. Without his grace such an event couldn't have been possible. Chetan and I was worried after the recent natural calamity which struck NJ.

I will post the pictures asap

Pithori Puja after the hurricane.

Hurricane Irene was all the nightmare one could imagine. We also had tornado warning. Chetan was asked to stay in a hotel closer to his work area so he is available. The torrential rain accompanied by circular high speed winds topping 85 mph made a very sinister, evil ominous sound. I felt as if the Titanic was breaking and making screeching sound outside our house. Raj said we should hide in the basement. The storm was so slow moving, that it seemed almost unending. Thank god we were not harmed and there was no damage to our property or to the trees. We lost the power on Sunday at 1pm, but got it back by 4pm. So, I was able to do the Pithori Puja in the evening. Its is a mother's day today and also our Ba's death anniversary.

Hurricane Irene to hit New Jersey

For last week everybody over here is following the development of tropical storm hurricane Irene developed in lower east Pacific Ocean. Its huge.. really huge. It battered the Bahamas and the Porto Rico. It is moving slowly to the North East. At present is it bashing North Corolina and Virgina. Tonight it will come to bash us. So we are getting ready to face it. We have our cars gas full, enough of food supply, water etc. There are chances that we may loose power. NY city for the first time has been evacuated. The wave surges could go 16 feet high. As the precuations all the beach resorts are closed. Residents are asked to moved in to the inner areas. It is now a category 1 storm with sustained wind of 70 mph and top winds of 90 mph. Yesterday it was cat 2 with winds over 110 mph. Hopefully it weakens a bit when it hit us. When it hits us, there will be torrential rains for near a day causing fear of flooding.
In past we have experienced few hurrincae One was hurrican Floyd in 1999 and Isabel in 2003. Isabel was really bad. Irene is worst in the History.

Earthquake on the east cost of US

This afternoon we experienced medium tremor in NJ for about 30+ seconds. I was at work and on the conference call with our business partners in NY city. When it struck, everybody on the call had the same reaction "now what was that ?". We rushed out and the I guess the whole east coast from Virgina to Massachusetts was evacuated. I called Raj to get out of the house. He said that he had to hold the fish tank to stop it from toppling . Poor fishes would have been dead by now,  and cleaning the mess would have been a completely different story.

I remember one of the earthquake I experienced in school years. I guess this must be before 1980. Our Ba, Aai and Shejarche Kaka all three were there at that time. I was sitting down in the kitchen and eating . Aai was cooking, Ba was on the chair, supervising. Kaka was at the kitchen door with newspaper. At that time the ground shook and we realized something wrong. Kaka stopped talking and asked Aai  "Soonbai , kai zhala ?"  Aai said nothing . Then he turned to Ba and asked  "Rattubai, Aho kai zhala ?" Very peacefully Ba answered " Dharnikampa, chala kamala laga" . Such a calm expression, as if nothing happened, I continued eating, then. And look what I did today..... ran out of the building.

Ganpati Prep Update1

This is our Living Room

Basic frame for the decoration is set.  The two side stand and a rod in a center, helps to put on the lights and the Toran. This way we avoid punching the wall with nails, glue etc. On the smaller table I have put my Ganesha Collection. On the left most corner, there is a water fountain.

Back From Short Vacation

We came back from Canada on Monday night. It was short vacation and our 4th visit to the falls. We had a good time. We arrived in Niagara,Canada on the Saturday afternoon.We stayed at the Marriot Gateway Hotel and our room was facing the Canadian Horse shoe fall,  The view was breathtaking. Our room was on 14th floor and surprisingly,  we still could hear the roar of the falls, especially at night or early morning. It was a  very pleasing site. I couldn't move away from the window.
Where we stayed was quite a happening place. All top hotels, restaurants, stores, casino, live band outside every restaurants. It was great fun walking on the FallsView Boulevard.
We took Maid of the Mist, boat ride which takes you inside the fall. I had pictures taken and also the video of it.
Raj alone went on the Skylon Towers. The tower has observatory deck and revolving restaurant in it. On nights there was beautiful display of the fireworks over the river and the falls.
On our way back Raj wanted to visit the city of Buffalo, NY to try out its famous Buffalo Chicken Wings. Chicken wings are marinated in the hot, spicy buffalo sauce and grilled. These wings are available in NJ too, but Raj wanted to try it in Buffalo. This has nothing to do with the real Buffalo.
I will soon post the pictures here. Raj has posted few on his FB account. If any of you have FB you can view it there.
Hope you guys are fine. In next two weeks I will keep you updated with whats going on here for the big day The Ganesh Chaturthi.

Going To Niagara Once Again

Tomorrow we are driving  to see the Niagara Falls. Just made the plan yesterday, Raj said its been long since we last visited it. Well, that was when Shweta, Sunil and Akshata had come in Oct 2003.. We had great time then.

Since we just came up with the thought to go there, we have not made any hotel reservation yet, Still don't know whether to stay in US or Canada .The view of the Niagara is beautiful from the Canadian side. It is called horse shoe falls. We also plan to take the boat ride called the Maid of the Mist. It takes you inside the fall.
We will start around 5 am. That will make the drive less tiring and we should reach by the 1pm. We plan to stay for 2 nights and return on Monday evening. On our  return journey Raj would like to spend few hours in the city of Buffalo which is in the state of New York. . I will post the pictures as soon I get back.

जिवतीची पूजा

 आज मी जिवतीची पूजा केली. दर श्रावण शुक्रवारी हि  पूजा घरी असते .

हि पूजा  घरातील लहान मुलांकरता केली जाते . मी फार काही करत नाही, फक्त जिवतीचा एक फोटो ठेवते आणि हळद कुंकू , चौसर ,  फुलं  वाहते  आणिकहीतरी स्वीट ठेवते . संध्याकाळी  आरती करते . ह्या दिवशी केळीची उंबर करतात. केळं, गूळ, गव्हाचे पीठ, हे सर्व मिक्स करून त्याची भज्जी तुपात तळायची . राज त्याला बनाना फ्रीठेर्स  असा म्हणतो . तो भाहेर खेळत असतोआणि जेव्हा तो आरतीसाठी घरी येतो, त्याच्या बरोबर त्याचे काही मित्र पण येतात आणि देवीला एन्जेल म्हणतात व नमस्कार करुं उंबर खाउनजातात. जुन्या घरी त्याचे सर्व मित्र ह्या दिवसाची वाट पाहत. गेल्यावर्षी त्यांनी मित्रांना खूप मिस केलं. हा फोटो  जो इथे लावला आहे तो जुन्या घरीपूजा केली तेव्हाचा आहे. हाच फोटो आम्ही दर वर्षी वापरतो.

This weekend was a movie weekend for us. There are few theatres over here which plays Hindi Movies. Since these movies  are watched only by Indians,  it is shown only for a week or two.

Since this is the case of the show times, we rushed to see Zindagi.... and Delhi Belly this weekend itself.

I liked both the movies. Zindagi na ... had little touch of the movie Hangover. If you have seen Hangover you will know what I mean. I felt it dragged a bit. It was definitely better than Delhi Belly as the latter had characters using only the bad words.
Though I enjoyed the movie, the language was too crude and vulgur. Wonder what the production house had in the mind. Some scene was yucky and there was overdose toilet shots. That too dirty, not funny.  I thought I was going to see beautiful Delhi. The kind the Indian channel like Sony and Zee appeals to the NRI to buy properties in Delhi or Noida. I did not find any good location except the hotel lobby. The roads, market, street vendor making the tandoori etc everything not very pleasing to the eyes. Very dirty. Some scenes were hilarious, but seriously not the movie for the kids.

Raj watched Harry Potter7 and Captian America. Thank god he was not with us for Delhi Belly.

Regarding Camping

It was fun, but yes we had to take lot of precautions. As Sangeeta mentioned in the comment her concern about the bugs,  we applied the spray and also had the citronella torces ( looks like mashaal) lit around our tents during the dusk. The tent was fully closed. Even the bottom tarp was stitched to the walls, so no bug could crawl in
.
Preeti, the fear of the animals coming over was here too. In fact bears come over to eat if garbage is left out.
We were warned not to leave even slice of bread or cheese. Once inside the tent, they don't attack. All the food items were locked in the ice box.

The funny part was at the time of changing the clothes at night. We had to switch of any type of lights in the tent, otherwise someone could see the shadow show from outside :)

If you guys plan to visit in summer we can go in the wild and enjoy the nature for couple of days. Its a great escape.

Going Camping this weekend

Summer officially starded today.

We are going camping this Friday afternoon to upstate New York, which is around 2 hours drive from Princeton. 

It is called Yogi Bear camp. There we wil join our group of 5 families.

This is the picture of our tent, our home away from home. It is 14’ X 8’ feet.  It is water proof and stays dry in rain.

We are carrying air bed for us and Raj will sleep in the sleeping bag. 

We have booked our spot for the tent. Our car will be parked next to it,  so if we need anything we can take from the car.

All the families are sharing responsibilities and it will be great fun hiking, cooking, grilling, swimming, fishing etc.

At night we plan to have camp fire. It will be 2 night 3 days at the camp.

Looking forward to this and very excited about it. More after I return from our adventure.

Old Songs

Today when I had gone to the market I heard a song long forgotten. Somewhere in the late 70's, Baba bought a cassette player/ recorder. It was small and black in color. CDs were unimaginable at that time.

We had many cassettes, but I guess there was one which was played the most.
There were some old English songs on it, but there was  no mention of the name of the song or the singer on the list..

I don't know who got that cassette, but I am sure we all loved it.

I remember 3 songs on it and am listing those here. If you know the other, then please include in the comment section. I have these songs listed below. Please cut and paste the links to the browser. The hyperlink option did not work here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1cjaheraq8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VvD0_aeAf2E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7pMI_dH8SI

Summer Time

Afer reading Nilesh's post about the monsoon, I thought of sharing our life over here in spring and summer.
Over here in New Jersey we get complete 4 seasons ie Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter. Spring starts in mid March.
Right now we are enjoying spring. But the weather is warming up and we know that the summer is just around the corner. Everybody waits for the summer time. The schools are closed in 2nd or 3rd week of June and reopens in Fall on 2nd week of September.

Last week we cleaned our backyard deck and the barbeque grill. Its the grill time. Anything and everything edible on the grill. We are going to have our first barbeque party with our friends next week.

We have visitors like Deer and Squirrel coming over in our back yard.

There are some seasonal visitors during this time. One of them is rabbit. Rabbit appears during March/April and is with us all the time till Sept. Sometime he comes and eats our flowers. But he  is very adorable.

We also see lot of colorful birds like Robin, Humming Bird, Blue Jays etc. One vistor I would especially like to mention here is the firefly or Kaajwa. I never saw one in Mumbai ( they could be found in suburbs or villages). The firefly are spotted in thousands during the twilight and it looks OMG so out of this world. They appear in Mid June and are here up to August. Few years back Raj stepped out of the house and carried a glass bottle with him. He then caught one of them and got home. We switched out the light and lo what a beautiful thing it was, giving its own light.

Well, We hope to have great summer and wish you all enjoy the monsoon.

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