Eating out ....

Here's the comment I read in one site… "I have been eating like its going out of fashion for the past week.”
Thought it to be funny… sharing it :)

Today at office we had been to a collegues send off lunch today... Lunch was a buffet at new place called Red Bean near office...

The way I was piling up stuff on my plate, I was thinking how correct the above statement seems from my perspective... Dunno what my collegues thought but they too were piling up the same way.. :D

For more survival tips on how to eat in a buffet check out here. :)

Wats a Carrier ?

What does the word “carrier” indicate ?
I used to think that I had a fairly good idea of English Language. But nothing prepared me for the different meanings a simple word can construe.
A colleague and me were walking from an evening dose of ‘chai’.
That was a time period when people of another company were leaving from their morning shift.
As we were walking, my colleague mentioned “ So many carriers in this building?”
For a split second I did not really get it as to what was the main subject.
For me, carrier implied a vessel or more like the ‘dabba’ you get as your lunch box.
Or somebody sitting on the pillion carrier of a two wheeler. But as far as I could see there were just lots of people walking down to the gate.
I know that wiki has lots of meanings for carrier.
But I was seriously stumped that what could possibly be this ‘carrier’.
Then realization dawned and what she was referring was that there are lots of pregnant ladies or rather expectant mothers among the lot who had left for the day.
Too much I say …
Ciao,
Tina :)

Pongal Holiday :)

From: Tina

Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2009 4:02 PM

Subject: Pongal Holiday :)

Hey Guys,
Happy Pongal , Makar Sankrant and Lodhi to all… Hope you all had a good time.

Yesterday was a holiday, so we made a late plan to go for lunch at a resort type place little bit off city limits.
So me being the person supposedly being staying in HYD for a long time was asked to give some directions :) (I know …not a good suggestion)
Somehow we got to the main road and then I knew it was straight down..
As we neared the destination, friend asked “Is it real far cause we do not have much petrol and we might need to fill the tank”
I was like not sure , I know it is straight down this road but not sure how far. Thinking to myself what if we had to turn at the previous junction.
Then as we crossed the junction I slowly mentioned that maybe it would be a good idea to stop and ask as I am not sure how far or till where we should go.
Then I proceeded to call and ask my colleague who had been to this place.
V got down to ask the auto waala. “Bhaiyya ____ yeh jagah kaha hai, kitnee door hai pata hai”
Auto waala looking as if he has come from Mars… “ Just do about turn and look at the other side of the road..Thats the place.”
Eureka. We were right in front of the place and looking for it :)


When I called my colleague for the directions to this place.
The phone rang for quite a while and then finally when I had almost thought he is not going to pick up, my colleague picked up..
Then very softly, “ Hi Tina, aaj office hai kya”
Me very exuberantly replied, “ Happy Pongal, You thought I called to come for office” ( Generally I am the one to pass on any sad news like that to my team.)
“Nahi… You know this place _____ . I just wanted to know where this particular place is?”
Then he replied in his normal voice with a gusto explained to me where the place. Fortunately we were right in front of it on the other side of the road.


After a holiday we all came to work today with quick wishes to everyone and went ahead to check emails and continue with project work.
For some reason I guess there are very less people around and time slowly dragged till it was time for lunch.
At Lunch, we were discussing how everyone spend the single holiday as out station candidates could not go home.
One by one every one mentioning that ‘I did this’ and ‘I went there’ etc.
That had C(guy) going with friends for a get together.
Su(guy) going through the after effects of a hospital visit but had his mom here for festivities.
Su1(second guy) njoiiing hostel special foods with a movie in theatre.
Sr(another guy) say that he too went for a movie but spend quite a while in the morning flying kites. Also noting that this time quite a few kites doting the SECUNDERABAD skyline till late evening.
That’s when S(Gal) bragged that ‘Yea we too went to the terrace and flew some kites with roomies. It was nice. We were able to even cut a couple of kites”
Sr replied “Cut with what..Blade kya”
The whole table erupted with laughter :)
With S(Gal) replying “ Nahi with another kite ”
Hope you all had a good time and yea ‘Til gud ghya gog god bola’
Cya,

Tina.

Domestic Musings

Dear wife
I have forgotten my mobile at home :).
Please pay electricity bill, the amount is Rs.XXX/-
Take care,
========================================

From a wife who eventually figured out :)

Dear Husband,
Thought so.. :) Good luck with being cell less :)
The electricity bill is not reflecting online. Will pay the same next week.
Regards,

Thinking about tiffins

From: Tina

Sent: Friday, August 22, 2008 5:04 PM

Subject: Thinking about tiffins

My latest past time is to read blogs (as you must have come to know by the mails I sent)… and notable among them being Food blogs :)

It generally helps to whip up an appetite for the cafeteria lunch..:)

Of course the downside is that it makes me feel the dishes shown there are easy to whip up.
So in order to surprise V, plan some different stuff to cook so that at least it is different from my usual routine khana.

Unfortunately, V ends up being shocked.

So after a few days of disasters, I mentioned that maybe over the weekend , I lost my special cooking skills.
As a result we were having disasters for the past week.

I knew the level of my skills, when V replied “Oh is it, were they not disasters before last weekend” :)

Just today when one of my colleagues was miffed about his mom not packing his lunch right, we all ended up discussing about Moms/Dads packing out tiffins.
I was thinking our moms(could be parents too ) were generally a class apart.

Dunno when they found time to whip up all the good stuff.
Not just breakfast but include a lunch and snack also for the evening apart from morning milk/tea.

Generally all I have time to whip up a safe breakfast of bread and omelets in the mornings.

But when we were in school, our mums used to send us to school with a tiffin bag. Tiffin bag containing a water bottle, short break tiffin , lunch break tiffin and Napkin.

And we people had enough nakharas like…

Short break tiffin will have something different from long break tiffin.
Short break tiffin will have something exceptional so that friends in the group share and say “WoW”.
Lunch break tiffin should have roti’s, Rice in rare scenarios permissible.
If Rice present then spoon also should be present.
If Rice present , curry should not drip out.
If Papad there then that should be in separate polythene.

Dunno how my mom found the time to give us such tiffin bags for all siblings, with rules directly proportional to number of siblings.

But I guess it is true that you start appreciating all this when you are trying to achieve one-tenth of what they used to do..:)

So long see ya.
Tina :)

Everyday Hurdles !!!!

From: Tina_Thomas
Sent: Friday, July 11, 2008 5:42 PM
Subject: Everyday Hurdles !!!!

It seems like Mr Murphy law is coming true for us the past few days… It is not that my bread is falling on the buttered side but still it is holding true for me.

Murphy's law is an adage in Western culture that broadly states "if anything can go wrong, it will." It is also cited as: "If there's more than one possible outcome of a job or task, and one of those outcomes will result in disaster or an undesirable consequence, then somebody will do it that way"; "Whatever can go wrong, will go wrong"; or, "Whatever can go wrong will go wrong, and at the worst possible time, in the worst possible way".

Why is it that whenever one is late from office that all things go wrong.. I mean not wrong or a disaster in the strict sense of the word.
Instead of beating round the bush let me get straight to the point or rather Murphy point :)

For the past few days, we never the train on time :) . I mean we leave office in order to catch the right train but somehow in order to send some update or mail back, we generally leave at the last minute.

That’s when generally all things do not work out as per general scheme of things.

For starters till we reach the bus stop or the junction (chowk) there will be no sign of “share auto”

“Share Auto” will put our Chennai auto rides to shame. It is the same three-seater rickshaw but in front at least 4(inclusive of driver) male members somehow squeeze in…
And behind at least three to four females. I guess diesel prices are having their effect.


If it is the bigger variant of the three seater(mind you not the six seater). i.e same as the pix above but the back side is not enclosed. So in the back also has open space to carry luggage etc, if the hatch is opened. So the more enterprising sit behind with legs dangling..
For some reasons I have not garnered enough courage and hence I have never sat that way.
But I have seen people enjoying that kind of seating, of course with the company id card in prominent display :)
So if it is that kind of rickshaw then at least three people are expected there too.


For some reason when I used to say “rickshaw” friends here used to wonder what am I speaking about as that was what we used back in Pune.
So here if I am referring to the three seater above , I have to say “auto” :) . So much for trivia.

So let me come back to my story…

In case if at all we do get the “Share auto” , either it will be too empty or too filled. Murphy’s Law starting to work..

Drawbacks of

· Too empty means only 2-3 ppl, so the driver will look and turn the auto at every individual remotely waiting.. maybe for bus, friend or just standing.
In the effort to get the desired no of candidates, there will frequent slowing asking them to enter the auto to go to destination.
· Too full means he will have his auto full but driver will drive slow and frequent stops.

Yesterday’s fellow for some reason was going so slow that I felt if we get down and push the auto probably we would reach faster.

By the time we come to the chowk, there will be 10 mins till train timing.
And then in his own sweet time with multiple stops he will drive to the station.

Luckily he will reach the station, roughly 2 mins before the train timing. Yesterday was better as he at least left us near the station entrance as opposed to the road entrance.
If dropped at road entrance it would mean another minute gone sprinting down till station entrance.

So if all is fine then we will reach the station entrance which opens to Platform 1 at the nick of time and train will be coming at luckily Platform 1.

But Mr Murphy has been having few different ideas since past few days, hence as soon as we reach Platform No 1 there will be an announcement if we are lucky or we see the local come to Platform No 6.

So with absolutely no time to spare and the next local being there after an hour, we have nothing best to do but sprint towards the train at the other end of the station at Platform 6.
Now don’t get me wrong, sprint not towards the over bridge… No time for that…
That’s what I mean by hurdles J Run across directly from Platform 1 to Platform 6. Fortunately the platforms are not barred and separated.

But the height of the platform is amazing… So down – jump – climb – run scenario goes on till we reach the 6th platform ….and finally run towards the train.
By the time we manage to get into the same, we are totally out of breath and heave a huge sigh of relief that at least we have not missed the train.
Seriously should get a bit fit as portly me looks real funny with this hurdles race.

But if you feel that I should in fact, try to go early then Bhaiyoon aur beheno have tried that too….
Then it is opposite.. Few days back we reached the station early with 10 mins to spare but guess what the train was about 40 mins late…

That’s why I said Mr Murphy having some problem with me :)

Njoiiiing everyday hurdles…

Cya,

Tina :)

Disasters with cooking :)

From: Tina
Sent: Friday, March 07, 2008 7:36 PM
Subject: Disasters with cooking :)

They say ‘The way to a man’s heart goes through his stomach’ but if that’s the case then I guess I will never reach my hubby’s heart…
The type and edibility of the food I prepare is something which is highly debatable.

And ‘Amche Aaho’ comments that I cook in auto pilot…
Yea which is true I guess when Television is on but otherwise I do not think so...

Well missing putting sugar in coffee or putting too much sugar in tea is by default I guess…
But some curries turn out in such a way that he is forced to ask…exactly what this was before you demolished it.

Once it happened that I went ahead to cook cabbage by the time I turned on the gas and went ahead with putting all ingredients I realized I had missed out something and that ingredient was not available at home too. So went ahead with cooking just put some pepper. Got distracted while cooking and ended up with semi burnt sabji. :) That day at dinner convinced ‘Amche Aaho’ that I put extra pepper and that’s the reason for cabbage looking black…

Another day thought of making some dessert so tried Gulab Jamun. The ad in the ready to mix pack and the actual product were two different stuff.
If you know how rock is then you should have some idea as to how the Gulab Jamun was ….
Though putting it in sugar syrup did have some what better effect at least you could break the small rocks :)

Of course how difficult will making rice be…
Well I can make a mess of that too..
With putting in more water that I guess we had rice soup one day :)

The icing on all this cake is Cake itself.
Thought of whipping up a cake as a surprise.
Got all ingredients, mixed it and put it to bake …
Set the timer and went ahead to kitchen to cook sum other stuff.
After a while thought will check it out , but could not make out how the cake baking dish size reduced so much.
Quickly opened the oven and cake is crisp and burnt and cake dish is partially melted…
I by mistake se set it on conventional bake time instead of normal bake time.
That month our electricity bill was also a packet: D

Of course ‘Aamche aaho’ had a good time clicking photos of the cake in Top view, Side view, on plate, with white background (to emphasize on the burnt color and texture ) etc.
He just wanted that ppl back home should not miss the wonderful top part like vanilla(i.e white) and bottom part like chocolate (i.e burnt black)

For the life of him, he cannot understand what I do so much in the kitchen with the final product sometimes questionable.
So best and healthy suggestion is just cut all veggies and brings it to the table so we can have a healthy non –burnt food…
Yea got to try that too :D

Well these are some of the disasters I could remember while penning this …will update more if I remember..

Till then will inflict such a pain to ‘Amche Aaho’ only
In case any one wants to try at your own risk, you are always welcome :D

Warm Regards,
Tina :)

Kismis.. :)

From: Tina
Sent: Monday, December 17, 2007 7:37 PM
Subject: Kismis.. :)
Bleary eyed was eying at the tasks to be done before leaving for wrk....
Maid had just made an entry and told something in telegu....
Normal conversation with maid goes something like this...

Maid : Telegu ...telegu ........bhabhi .....telegu....
Me : Ok ...Telegu radu (dunnot know telegu )
Maid : Phenyl telegu...telegu
Me : Phenyl khatam ho gaya ? Will be able to get only on weekend...Saturday....chalega
Maid : nods.
So after such attempts at communicating generally i am quiet thinking why to unnecessarily trouble her and myself....

Another day her conversation went...
Maid : Bhabhi ...hindi...
Me : Haan Hindi aatee
Maid : Telegu ?
Me : Little little..Koncham Koncham .(Actually know only Telegu Radu..)
Maid : Bhaiya telegu...
Me : Bhaiya telegu radu...(Now how to tell i knw atleast telegu radu , bhaiya does not know that too )
Maid : Kya bhabhi telegu telegu ( in a gist i guess...god knows how we will communicate)
So after a week of such conversation or rather no conversation

I braved and just attempted some more small talk...
Me : So baachee kaise? (thoda actions ke saath)
Maid : Telegu baache school etc etc telegu telegu
Me : Ohh Ok... (smiled sweetly)

Me gave up on small talk and went about with something in kitchen.

Maid : Bhabhi kismis hai ...
Me : (thinking - Gas connection bhi nahi hai ....She want to cook or what...No dry fruits also...Then dry fruits mein kismis se some cleaning. ohh maybe for kids) Kismis....Kismis kyun chahiye?
Maid : Nahi bhabhi....kismis telegu .telegu
Me : Kismis khane waala ...Pakane ke liye chahiye ?
Maid : Radu bhabhi ..kismis kismis....telegu telegu telegu..
Me : (Totally clueless)....kismis par weekend ko hii laa payenge ,....
Maid : radu bhabhi..

Both of us are looking at each other for communication gap...Almost at verge of giving up then realization dawned upon me...
Ekdum cartoon character zaise bulb jala siir ke uppar :)
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
Me : CHRISTMAS .......Ohh ...Aap Christmas ke baarein mein pooch rahein ho ...
Maid : (thousand watt smile) haaa bhabhi
Poor thing was trying some conversation at her level too...
Me : Haa hain naa....(gave a brief description of x'mas)

Then we slipped back to oblivion ..i.e back to silence....
I guess we will take some more time to discuss abt "new year" or for that matter any other festival....but that will be another story...
Till then see ya and keep mailing

Take care
Tina :)

Being Engaged ;)

From: Tina

Sent: 10/11/07 02:48 PM

Subject: Being Engaged ;)

One of my friends asked that so do you feel engaged? I said yes ..Now slowly slowly i do feel engaged or committed.

On asking what exactly prompted the feeling ....i thought little bit abt it and then thought will better frame the answer in a mail.

Here are the reasons which include a bit on the wackier side :D

-- Of course phone bills increase and if you have pre paid then monthly bank statement seems like only prepaid recharges.

-- Guessing game starts whether whose SMS it is.

-- Everyone starts asking you are you all set for the 'D' Day.

-- ' What ur still doing in office ? ' or ' When are you going ?' As if ppl have nothing better than getting rid of me .

-- People are wondering whether you changed Orkut profile so as not to mislead others and if you have not changed then they want to know when you would.

-- All friends stop communication like as though you are hot potato... Like as though you are continuously on phone with ur would be better half. Thanks for the consideration :)

-- Casually ppl mention now you are going away from group or ur have already stopped communicating to the group. This esp after u have written a huge mail. And to top it all the explanation is 'It is expected that you would now that you are engaged.'

This was a mail which i almost did not send. but hope it makes out esp inspite of the mail sending restrictions ;)

Take care

Regards,
Tina :)

P.S : Ppl in cc will not get this mail ... If it can be reforwarded by some one that would be gr8 ..Thanks.

Aasman se uttare khajuuur pe atke....

From: Tina
Sent: Tuesday, July 10, 2007 12:46 PM
Subject: Aasman se uttare khajuuur pe atke....

(Rough recollections of my trip back from US to India.... Njoiiii broken Hindi /English Combo and yes Read at Leisure )

Aasman se uttare khajuuur pe atke....
thats what sums up my return trip back to India....
It is not that all these experiences can be termed as adventures but yea it does bring out the adventurous streak in me :)
Well it did not start with my getting to knw I am going back.... Well that will make the story more long .....
Let me start with the part when I came to knw abt booking my tkts....
As you know the policies which at that time pretty much i did not know ....
I thought if you send one mail summing up all your details then i guessed pretty much you can get the tkts....
But that was not the case instead I got templates of a couple of more documents saying that please fill up these then you will get the tkts....
So after all woh sab toh process hiii hai
Filled up a pile of documentation and send some mails then fielded some mails ...And after an all round performance at the mailing front finally travel desk came close to giving tkts....
I had asked for tkts from Newark to Mumbai....Instead after a couple of mails came to know that traveldesk is booking tickets for Newark to Delhi.....

After really being on the mail trail for the whole of morning when finally they came up with this option , 'had no option but to laugh' .....And patiently garner enough will to write a mail back saying 'Bhaiyon mujhe tickets mumbai tak kii chahiye Delhi tak kii nahi '
Sure enuf they rectified the mistake and gave me tkts from
New York to London to Mumbai....for the day after tmrw morning
Fair enuf ...only problem is that in London just hav one hour to transfer from American Airline s to Jet Airlines.....
And in I will have to catch the flight from New york , JFK which is kinda around 1.15 hrs frm where i stay and to top it all the flight timing is early morning 8.30a.m.
So counting that three hours earlier i have to be in the airport to catch international flight
and the time to reach the airport i would have to leave by 4.15 a.m.
Wow and then there were not many other options so had to go with this....as fortunately there was a flight from Mumbai to Pune .....though in mumbai i would have to wait for 6 hours.....
So monday all i was doing was fielding certain other sets of official mails running to my room and dumping my clothes and books (kaafi saare ikata ho gayein theey)
After all this and a quick lunch where some of my collegues had come down for a quick bye bye ....
then began the process of getting my bags to weigh 50 pounds...kuuch bhi karo jitna bhi books nikalo phir bhi it is showing more weight....

kapde nikal diye aur bas essentail stuff rakha phior bhi itna heavy .....
chocolates bhi nahi liye iss baar phir bhi itna weight.....
phir realise hua mera bag ka weight hii around 10 pounds hai ....
no time to change the bag.... after trying entire evening socha forget it ....clothes will buy new in india baaki ka reheno do and if over weight will pay that ,much ...tired of utak patak.....

My roomie was wrking late that day and was at a far office ...Toh by the time she came and one of my other friends came down it was close to 8.30 p.m
Phir socha jaake dinner karenge last waala kahi bahar...last time sakes....
As my roomie had to get a rental car for the next day ...she had to go to the Other state for project work....We went to get rental car.. All the places rental car agency was closed toh isliye we went till the airport.....
After going to a couple of rentals we got one at the airport....
Wapas aate waqt got stuck in traffic and then finally jab restaurant tak pahuche tab tak it was 11 and closing time....
Phir socha kahi toh khayenge....as all of us were really behosh with hunger.....
Then suddenly it started raining ...sudden thundershower kii hii kamiii thee
Bhaag bhaag ke phir wohi pe TGI mein chalein gayein and fast fwd mein order kiya but by the time we finished it was close to 12....
Wapas ghar pahuche and by the time I was close to going to bed it was 12.30 a.m.
Still worried abt the overweight bag ..went off to try to sleep for 3 hours as had to get up by 3.30....Roomie also had to go early . Both of us were not at all sure whether we will get up...
As I was worried kii i will miss the flight mere ko need hii nahi aa rahee theee...
Ghar pe bhi bolke rakha kii please mujhe utta dena aur mobile ko loud mei set karke sone kii koshish kii ....1.30 neend hhiiiii nahi aa rahee ...arrey yaaar ab toh so jao otherwise how will you catch flight.....
phir bhi no use....then finally around 2.15 aankh just lag rahee theee....tab ghar se call aaya at 2.30 uttane ke liye ....
arrey yaar 3.30 ko uttana tha ......
somehow i sent a msg and tried to get some of the remaining sleep.....
hazy hazy sleep mein finally 3.30 ko alarm ring hua....
neend kii toh watt lagee thee ...Got up ...woke my rommie ......checked for etkt....and finally took a couple of printouts and got ready.....
Final mein bhi weight check kiya toh overweight....
Fit of irritation mein khola ...jo samne dikha nikal diya and closed the bag....
Reached Airport....checkin kii toh bhayanak line chal rahee theee as they were giving first priority to a flight which was going in an hr....
after almost dozing dozing in the line finally checked in the luggage....hurrah overweight utna nahi tha....cool
somehow finished the security check inspite of the bag reached the final stage by 7.00 a.m.
Then begins the long wait for catching the flight....ek coffeee piii rahee huun uske baad doosre and almost trying not to fall asleep....uss beech mein jitne bhi log jagein theey sab ko call maara to say final good bye.....final US good bye :)

Finally got into the flight and got the middle seat with hatte katte ppl next to me all sleeping .....
and me for some reason no sleep at all.....
Took of and don't remember seeing final stages of US.....Just remember waiting for some one to get something to eat is as I was dying of hunger.....

Finally khane peene ke baad squeezed to sleep toh need hii nahi aa rahee hai
It was a 6 hours flight and managed to get an hr worth of broken sleep...

There was an American lady beside me and she was also on her way to Scotland....
We were discussing abt the next stage of our trip ..She abt her missing the flight and re-booking ,hence she would have to stay at the airport till next morning ...Me telling her I have a flight in an hour after we land in London .......she was like Pray that you get the flight....

Thats when it sank in kii agar flight nahi mila toh ....
We landed at Heathrow 20 mins late at 8.50 p.m local time and my flight was at 9.30....p.m.

Finally just ran out of the flight when everyone started disembarking .....
Actually had planned to explore Heathrow before going on to catch the flight.....
I barely saw Heathrow....Just ran with my backpack on me ....

International connections dikh gaya .....i was like wow this will be quick....
Door se Jet ke bhi flight nazar aa rahee thee.......Ran with the backpack....which of course seemed to weigh like a ton....

It was close to 9.00 p.m.....Ran around a flight of stairs ...managed to keep up in the line ....
Ran Ran par rasta khatam hii nahi ho raha hai ....
Reached ground floor and then again ascended up the flight of steps...
All I can see is International connections....Finally from far of I saw Air India..Jet Airways and Some more....
Cool ab toh pahuch jaayega....
Finally cleared the security check ....Door se hiii ready ok ....relay race kiii tarah bhaag rahee thee....Removed shoes dumped belt..removed cell phone and put the bag aside....
Poora check ke baad ....bhagtein bhagtein dumped all the cell phone , belt into the bag and just squeezed into the shoe and ran towards the Jet counter...

I guess there was a Indian /Paki lady there ... I asked her...'Please can you tell me the boarding gate for Jet flight to Mumbai."

Then she replied in the amazing Brit accent.... " Can I see ur boarding pass"
Showed it to her and then she was like ..."I think it is too late for Checkin"...
I was like ...."Checkin...who asked for checkin....It is through checked in "

Still she was saying the same thing ..."It is too late for checkin ..."
Me : " I have to catch a connecting flight after this ...If I miss this then wht"
She : Checking with someone on walkie talkie who was not responding to her at all "Ground _ to Flight Boarding "
No response...
Me:" I have to catch this flight and I am not responsible for My American Airlines flight being late..."
She : "Ground _ to Flight Boarding ".
Still no response ...after wasting 3-4 crucial minutes...finally someone replied.....
She : " I have got a passenger who is trying to checkin for the flight..her Name is _"
From there : "She is through checked in..She can come directly"

She :" Ok thanks" and to me " You can go ahead"
Me : " Same question I am asking which gate number ?"
She : "Ohh Gate number is 42..But you gotta hurry.....it is just 15 mins for the flight to take off.."
Me : "Thanks" ...(Of course no thanks for wasting my 10 mins)

Ran from there towards gate 42....
Just glanced through a bustling HEathrow with lots of restaurants and shops...And me could not explore a single one :(

In airports just like our Central escalators there are horizontal escalators....
Just so that it enables you to cover more ground in the airport....
Unfortunately for me those things were also not working ....

Wishing that I had the backpack with wheels ...Ran....
1-10 here... 10-20 there...
But no sign of 42.....
All the escalators were not working .....

In US there were a new type of shoes for kids which was intorduced I guess last year ..
It was a high point of all the kids dream...
Sport shoes with one wheel at the end....in such a way that you can walk normally and if you tilt you leg at the heal then you can slide too.....
So in a way you can skate away :)
Wish I had a shoe like that :D

Finally after running and dragging my backpack along with me ....i reached the other end of the airport ..
ab toh 42 dikha .....par woh board hii tha....couple of flights climbed karke finally saw 42 and saw that I had 4-5 mins to spare....
Finally saw the flight and I was ready to drop...
Met a couple of flight karamchari who fast fast mein ushered me to the flight....

Just found my seat and dropped into it with my backpack....
And was in a situation kii mujhe paani do....

Got water and adjusted to sitting on my seat ...Finally was getting my equilibrium back .....
But the flight left after good 15-20 mins later .......

That was a close call......

Itna adrenaline pumping ho gaya kii neend toh sab bhaag gayee...
Finally after take off ....
Saw back to back couple of movies and also one of my fav serials re run...thinking kii ab india jaake yeh dekhne ko nahi milega..... :P

Barely made up with another hour and a half of sleep in between the movies food and announcements....

Finally landed in Mumbai....after the landing immigration went to claim the baggage ....
After waiting for almost hf an hour and searching all the bags which were coming ....finally a lot of the JET folks came to knw that our baggage had not arrived with us....

The whole multitude who caught this flight as a connection with British and Lufthansa and of course me with American did not have their luggage....
Finally after standing in a long line with other passengers got a form filled it with the description of what all could be there in the bag.

After another half an hour came close to submitting the form .....
I was worried that I would not be making the Pune connection waala flight....
as it was close to 14.45...
Some how submitted the form and finished security check and got out to go to the domestic terminal.. By then the mumbai heat was catching up....Finally after standing in an amazing big line to go to domestic terminal, got a seat in the airport bus to go to domestic terminal with the lady issuing a new boarding pass for me...
Reached the Domestic terminal with an hour to go to 16.30
In that hour met up with a UK groom going to Bangalore whose entire wedding trousseau was in the missing baggage
It is when your waiting or getting bored that you do feel amazingly sleepy....
That was what was happening to me too....
After having a extraordinarily priced coffee, finally it became 16.30 and still no boarding call....
Ohh did I doze off during the boarding call .....
Went and checked with the Flight attendent and she was like the call will be made for the flight at 16.30... I showed her my watch and said it is 16.30 p.m.
She is like no ma'm it is 14:00 .... It took me a while to click that still my watch was at the US time zone....
Feeling really sheepish , thanked her and was wondering how to complete the next 2 and 1/2 hrs without sleeping .....
Another amazingly pricey coffee and after that another amazing pricey sandwich and walking around the domestic waiting area and reading a couple of news papers somehow provided relief...
Offcourse a couple of times did almost doze off... but the scare of missing the flight woke me up....
Finally mushkil se woh 2 and 1/2hrs katein and there was a boarding call for Pune flight....
Somehow got my window seat in a practically empty flight....
Started dozing almost immediately....
Remember seeing cloud laden mumbai from up above and then remember getting up at Pune .....
Somehow in the hazy recollection got out of Pune airport ....Thanks to no luggage did not have to wait in the line .....Met my family ...Nice to get rid of the backpack....
Albeit they were more worried abt my luggage than me.....
As long as woh backpack nikal gaya I was no more worried....
Remember seeing the last of Pune Airport and slight showers in Pune welcoming me i guess....and then I dozed off till home.......zzzzzzzzzzzzz........

P.S : Got my luggage...Not that much of Jet Lag bas climate change ke wajah se Viral Fever ho gaya ...

A flashback weekend .................BOWLING

From: Tina
Date: Aug 22, 2006 1:31 AM
Subject: A flashback weekend .................BOWLING

RING RING ..................It was around 10.30ishhh --- 10.45 p.m.... I was just wrapping up the code change to move it to different environment...
One phase had already gone to production and the next was abt to go by next week....
"Hungry kya ..." wala feeling was just starting to develop.....
This was the time when we were in throes of work and so were working late in Hyd...apna golden office re ;)
So rather than tolerate the food at 9.30 ...my team mates would go for bread omlette or maggi which was available after 12.00
(it was a different issue even the non kitchen compliant nut could also make better maggi than what was being dished out at cafeteria)
To get that we would walk down to the dorms cafeteria....discussing abt the problems in general and problems in particular esp late night working which we all had unknowingly got habituated.....

wow woh bhi kya dinn thee :)

toh back to where I started ... RING RING......
my cell was ringing ...

For the first 2-3 rings i did not pick it up thinking some of my friends giving free miss calls for saying good night when their free smses were over...
but the call was continuing...
I saw kii my manager was calling....
mentally in span of 2 secs i reviewed kii was there any escalation or sumthing ...as itnee raat ko without reason toh my manager would never call
nothing i could think of.....

I picked up the cell with worst expectations though i started with all niceties....

"Toh tina jee where is bowling in hyd ....."

I was like 'yeh poochne ke liye call kiya ? '

There are lots of places in hyd , some of friends have gone to this place ...that place....i continued....trying to think at night where did bowling come into picture....

"Where did u guys go? "

I was like yeh kya hua ...we toh went a couple of weeks back ...that too when we had a get together of friends tab....
just to do something different with weekend rather than watching movie......

but how did that come into picture today....

sirjee we went to so and so place in ameerpet....

"yes madam I can see you , vijay, sonia , manoj and smita bowling on TV...."

I almost fell off the chair......
I was like wow ..kya connection ....

I was like speechless for sometime and then manage to croak..... kaunse channel mein yeh aa raha hai ?

"This is coming in Etv telegu ...was watching with my wife...saw u guys toh introduced all of u to her via TV hehehhe
Tell me kab khelne gayein thee..bahut video footage hai ..koi competition tha kya ?"

I was like battti gulll .... .I don't remember coming when they were talking the views toh i guess am not there in footage

No No i said ...we all went with friends to the new place....and they were shooting the way the ball is thrown toh i guess we were just seen in passing reference i think ....

"Well you guys are all seen in full reference and you all seem like pros :) good to see you all in extra currilar activities .hehehe
chalo then njoiii ...just thought would like to tell you that atleast some one saw the prog "

I was just in rewind mode thinking kiii uss dinn meine kya kapde pehene theey (typical girl thought ) and where was that camera.....

Kept the phone aside....

Took the landline to ring up my friends most of whom were there that day....

Now there are three classes of friends...

1) Like me and my roomies who stay together but do not have TV though cable connection ka jugad hai ;)
2) Friends who stay together but definately have TV and who are generally there to see TV
3) Friends who stay in hostel or with someone and TV is accessible but they are generally in office or no where near it.....

I called up my roomate...told her... arrey jaldee se kahi TV hai kya dekh apna footage aa raha hai :)
she was like itnee raat ko all neighbours sleeping

call our 2nd category friends....
Called up 2nd category of friends....took 2 sec to explain them ( i was breathless by then)
they asked very basic question telegu ke toh bahut se channel hai kaunsa waala
i told etv ...ok they said they will try to find out if they hav that....
1 saal se cable tha par kabhi telegu channel nahi dekhiii
toh ek maharashtrian, marwardi, mallu aur gujju milke dhoond rahein they usss channel ko
jab kii waha ka ek lauta teleguite was in office.....

then called up third category and kinda blurted out .....
toh bhai saheb is like pretty cool way mein
behen shannnti se bolo mujhe kuuch samaj nahi aa raha hai ...
i was like jaldee jao apne hostel ka TV on karo apna bowling ka footage aa raha hai telegu channel ETV mein
ur the only one who knws telegu....
search it and see it man.....

behen i am out on the road going to my friends place and far away from my hostel....
are u telling me that it is that day ka footage.....

by then i was kinda parched ...toh bol diya yup....
will get back with more details

the ek lauta teleguite and another of the 3rd category were there in another office ....via official chat unko bhi update kar diya tha

then before I could drink water... the 2nd category friends called up....
Tina everything is written in telegu yaar
can you get more details of the channel ...
I was like ab tak toh manager soo gayein honge

well in 2 channels we can see some documentary ..hope so there will be repeat telecast sumtime tomorrow or today later news broadcast....

Yea....i said...mujhe bhi dekhna thaa,,,,, :(
Will update once I get more details.....
chalo then keep surfing and take care ....
Good night... I said...
the excitement it generated lasted for quite a while and I remembered that it was abt two weeks back that we all had gone bowling....

Some of our batchmates had come down from chennai and pune....
Toh after a typical dhaba lunch what to do....
Koi movie toh release nahi hue
kya karein
then some one suggested that we could go bowling....as most of the public had not gone to the new bowling alley....
chalo decide kiya
and went ahead.....
the strong 15-16 strong contingent went to the place
keeping the fingers crossed kii it should not be crowded.....
two rinks were empty and we divided ourselves into two grps...
and got ready to bowl ahead.....

Some of our friends had just been to bangalore toh it reminded them of the bowling they did at Forum....
Of course yeh toh bowling alley was no where as compared to that.....

Each of us were honing our skillls plus playing as two teams.... with many inputs abt how to improve the play....
thats when we noticed tht there were a video shooting of all the bowling balls which crashed all the pins....

wow said public chalo pose maarke kartein hain ....
we continued with the game thinking the bowling alley waala shopkeeper was getting footage because of us....
then some friends of ours went and asked ....

those guys were like they were from ETV for a documentary on Youth and their pastimes....
we were like kyun chunna laga rahein ho...
lagta toh nahi hai and we continued and almost forgot abt them

once the game was finished each of us calculating who was first and with how many points each of us were far from the person who came first...
tht we decided bas ho gaya kahi aur jaate hai.....
when we were putting back our shoes .. removing the bowling shoes thats when the footage waala came back for some comments abt the youth .....

I was at the farthest corner and the last one getting up...so i was kinda blissfully missed out...
but the remaining of us gave one or two comments in chaste english...
then they were like if some one knows telegu it will be real good...
Hunted for the ek lauta person in our grp who knew decent telegu and woh bola no ways....
mere relatives hai yehan.....will really feel weird .....

Neways most of us thought kiii shayad yeh chunna laga raha hoga Reporter.....he had a mike though.....

And conveniently we forgot abt it....
So it came as a pleasant surprise that it actually did come up on TV
though it was a tradegy of sorts kii none of us saw the footage....
Neways kabhi toh TV pe aaye :))

All the above thought procedure did not take much long but to write it definately took longer....

For those of who ...who remember the weekend.......Hope this is one more way to remind you of that....
:)

Tak care and warm regards,

Tina........

P.S : Revamping the mailing list....mostlywill be stopping this junk mail service..much to the relief of many.... thanks for reading till now and haa bahut aatyachar sahien ho baba..ab aaram kar lo :)