Happy Birthday!!!

Joyce turns ONE tomorrow. I wanted to do her birth story to coincide with her first birthday but I am not sure I will have the time.

This is just a stick note to my little one. I haven't seen your father more enthusiastic about shopping and spending than on this one occasion in the last 2 years that I have been married to him. He is all pepped up and in high spirits and has also been driving me nuts. He shopped for your dress all alone because I wouldn't let him pick what he liked(Thatz true). He fixed up the venue and just informed me because he thought I would have tossed it out (I would have). He has personally invited all. He has taken suggestions to accommodate for specials. All this JUST FOR YOU. This is not the P I knew. This is the P who is your father.

There are a few who wouldn't be able to make it tomorrow for your birthday and might not appear in the album when you flip thru them in a few years from now for all kinds of reasons, but nevertheless, they all love you A LOT.

Note to Dad: Your first grand daughter turns 1 tomorrow. Sometimes, I just can't make up my mind if we are missing you the most or are you missing out on the most.

To Read & Being Read To

I saw this contest hosted by CHBM and Kane/Miller Publishing Company through Orchid's Blog. The idea is to blog about a favorite memory of being read to as a child or a favorite memory of reading to your child.

I really do not have many memories of being read to during my childhood except for the famous Molly & Bobban cartoons by V.T.Thomas, the cartoonist, from malayalam magazines. My father & mother were both avid readers and probably that is how I was bit by the reading bug. Though I haven't been read to, my mother was a great story teller and she used to tell us stories of appupan & ammumas (old man & lady), about animals, mostly all folk tales. The one I loved was of that of the old couple who lived in the forest. Since I have no pics and links here goes the story...

Long long ago there was a appupan & ammuma who lived in the forest. One day the appupan wanted to have dosas(what else do you expect a mallu to think of) and he expressed his desire to ammuma. Ammuma was all game and asked appupan to go collect firewood from the forest while ammuma prepared the batter. Appupan returned from the forest with the firewoods and ammuma was ready with the batter. Both were pretty excited about having dosas after a long time. Ammuma started preparing dosas. When the batter was done, they had 11 dosas. Appupan insisted on having six but ammuma wouldn't give in. So they came up with a plan to choose the lucky one who can have 6 dosas. They decided to sit quietly. The one who spoke first would get just 5 dosas and the other 6. So both of them sat in the house waiting for the other to speak. Meanwhile a wild cat entered the kitchen and ate the dosas. Ammuma saw the cat and ran behind it shouting "puch pucha" (cat cat) .... and appupan ran behind happily, you get only 5 and I get 6.

For some very strange reason, the house the old couple has in the jungle, in my imagination, was the house where my granny lived. Its funny when I think of it now, but it just seemed the right kind of house for the story since the kitchen had a wood burner, had a place for firewoods and also probably because my granny was forever scared the cat might eat everything she cooks for us.

About reading to my daughter, I haven't yet started seriously by all means. I got her a board book, so that she keeps away from all my books :)...crafty mom ... he he .... I read it to her, she seems to enjoy, but its just a daily activity book than a story book. I am hunting for board books and am yet to find something suitable for story telling. If genes are anything to go by, reading is in there and I need not worry. My grandfather had a library in our ancestral house in chenitala. Dad used to tell me that people from the church have begged him to donate the books and he wouldn't. It was only after he passed away couple of years back that the church was given away his collection. He did authored a lot of books too. Our whole family(both sides) reads, some crazy, some relaxed and in the family we have readers of travelogues to gospel weekly mags to malayalam mags to fiction, science, economics, geography etc etc. I didn't mean to boast but I am proud to be amidst all.

AdSense makes sense & money

AdSense is the coolest thing in blogosphere and I wonder if all of you have checked her out.

I have seen a lot of bloggers who write pretty regularly and passionately about many stuff. All these bloggers also have quite a good number of visitors everyday on their blog. If this is you, you will surely benefit by putting in a little time to check Adsense out. A little extra money is always welcome, isn't it??

When I re-joined work after having Joyce, I had couple of weeks in hand to catch up while the appropriate project was being sort. As I have mentioned earlier, I was roaming the lanes of blogospheres, one blog to an another, trying to catch up with my favorite blogs and discovering new ones. While I was at it, I came across AdSense. It said, you can earn money while you blog. Though I wasn't absolutely thrilled at the idea right away, (because there have been many instances in the past where you are lured to believe so and there are tons of *conditions apply, the ones that imply you cannot earn.) but I realized people did make money out of their blogs. Since I had all the time in the world then, I digged & digged (like a burrowing animal) and realized even I can do it. But here are a few ground facts to get you thinking & help you earn your first cheque in 4-8 months.

AdSense is a program run by Google to display contextual advertisements using banners or links or images in different sizes that are provided by Google. Google decides what advertisement needs to be shown. Google generally tries to match the adv with your content so that relevant advertisements can be displayed.

Now for making money through adsense, the single most important & difficult thing is regular blogging. Even though you might not blog everyday, even if you update your blog once or twice a week you still have a good chance of earning a few dollars.

What do you need to do:
o Sign-up for Adsense.
o Login into your blogger account
o Go to your page layout and click on 'Add Page element'.
o Select AdSense, make your choice of banners or link units.

You don't need tons of ugly text advs. The limit imposed is 3 advs on a page. You can choose to have less.Once you have got the basics right, you can experiment with asthetics & the best size of adv unit for you and the best position to attract maximum attention.

If you are interested you can check out Digital Inspiration by Amit. He has a lot of information and is an expert on the subject. You can also visit the AdSense blog for more details.

Piyush - Update 5

Here is a piece in Pune Newsline. The family has managed to collect a whooping 1 crore so far and that to me is amazing. Its amazing because, its people like you and me, from all walks of life who have joined hands to build that amount. I was really really happy to see this piece of news. Piyush is flying to S'pore on the 17th for his treatment. He is scheduled for an operation on the 19th. Do Pray for Piyush's recovery and for courage to the Kolur family, while they go through this with their son.

Here is what Maltesh Kolur has to say

Lot of things to be done and now I am seriously thinking, 24hrs a day is not suffecient at all. Piyush is keeping good health. Once again our heartfelt thanks to all the people who have showered so much of blessings, prayers and well wishes! Please keep your blessings on till we come back from the transplant. Piyush really needs your prayers. Please do visit www.aidmyson.com in which we are giving timely updates about the progress.

They still need an additional 25K. For donations please check out http://www.aidmyson.com. Do spread the word, by writing mails or by providing a link to the above site from your site in an attempt to reach out to as many as possible.

You can write to Piyush and his family at maltesh@rediffmail.com.

Previous posts on Piyush, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

The Other Extreme

Inspired by Anjali's post, here is a story to tell you the other extreme,

A neighbor of mine got married couple of months back. He is a simple nice guy. The bride was a pretty girl. She had to resign her job she had in her city and move in with this guy. The guy lives with his parents but the parents were planning to stay separately after 6 months. After 2 months of their marriage, and after traveling to-fro on weekends, she finally came down to join the family. She started her job hunt. I met her couple of times. She almost looked like a college-goer to me. When I say college goer, I mean that kind of enthusiasm, that kind of language and subjects. In 2 weeks time she went back home. A few days latter we heard, the neighbors were arrested by the local police for women harassment & for demanding dowry. From what I hear, the neighbors (excluding the guy) had an altercation with the bride and she packed off. The parents came in and they had a spat, they came in with a recorder, recorded everything the guys parents said, and that was presented as proof. Smart you might say. Sleazy is what I thought it was.

.My problem with this whole issue is, the way this was handled by the girls' parents. I can only guess what would have happened. My neighbors aren't particularly very great with their  communication skills. The parents would have taunted about dowry or about what did her father pack her off with. She met it head along. A hot tempered father heard his daughters woes and just came in to teach them a lesson.The case is in family court and if proved is 5 yrs of imprisonment. We haven't met the neighbors eye to eye after that.

Every married girl has faced taut comments from in-laws about herself, her worth or her family, some directly, some indirectly. Every girl deals with it. Some spat back, some ignore it & some  might brood over it in private or bitch to friends about it but surely put it past you to put your life in perspective. Whatever be the deal, you are looking forward to a life with the man you chose to marry for whatever reasons. If a girl & her family were to retort to such ways of getting back, its going to prove disastrous. This kind of a treatment is surely not deserved.

Too little or too much tolerance, both can prove dangerous.

What do you think?

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Why I haven't been replying to mails.

Since I have joined this new organization, I haven't been checking any of my personal accounts regularly. Couple of days back I got broadband at home and was checking all the thousands of important mails I missed in the past so many months. There were mails from Dr Blessy George, who sends mails with the subject "Dear Beloved" ... so despite of the strong urge to hit the delete button I have to open and check what he has to say to the beloved me, then there is Roger Ivan, who has "Lovely myname" in the subject line, now though I think its junk because I can't relate the 'Lovely and my name togather, but you see how you want to hear good things, so I open it to confirm. It is junk indeed. Then I also have the whole of Netherland Christians writing to me in the name of Christ and telling me how they are suffering from lung cancer and so want to donate the millions of money to me and before that they want me to send them airtickets to India - So nice...how wealthy. I did take some precious time off Joyce to reply back saying, Dear sister, airlines are really cheap here and I have bid your tickets at Rs 1.50/- and I am sure we will win. Alternatively, you can buy a chartered plane & an island with all that money.

Sorting, Reading and replying to all that important mails from long lost boyfriends and sisters and believers, I miss mails addressed to me. I just uncovered one such mail today, written to me in December. Though I am sad I missed it earlier, there indeed is twosome joy here, one is, it is indeed addressed to the beloved and lovely me and second is ....the news that my friend is expecting is incredible ... Take Care ...Hurray!!!!

But I still don't understand,

1) Why do Netherland Christians address me as 'Dear Sister'. I have 2 and they are hands full. Don't need any more sistering me.

2) Why are all of them suffering from lung cancer.

3) And where they hell did they inherit all these millions of dollars from? And how did they reach the US of A.

Piyush - Update 4

Magic Sea Shells - By Unknown


Pink shells, white shells, and
shells coloured blue;
Smooth shells, crinkled shells,
old shells and new;
Striped shells, and plain
shells lift by the tide;
My shell is magic - the sea sings inside.

Dear friends, I wrote to Mr. Maltesh Kolur(Piyush's father) today to just check on how Piyush is doing and enquired if he is looking forward to his trip to Singapore. Here is his reply

Nice to hear from you. Piyush is really excited about Singapore. He is aware that Singapore is covered by sea and he is looking forward to collect Shells. He is fond of collecting shells.

The above poem is dedicated to Piyush. I hope Piyush has a rocking time in Singapore collecting sea shells & recovering.

Readers who have been following Piyush here will be happy to know a good samaritan from Delhi contacted the family and has offered to sponsor the flight & stay at Singapore. May God Bless You!!! They have managed to collect 82 lacs so far. There is an additional 40-45 lacs to go. Please make your contributions at the Cancer patient's Aid Association. Alternatively, you can also transfer your donation to Maltesh Kolur's ICICI or Citi bank accounts. The details are available at www.aidmyson.com. If possible, please link your sites to the CPAA or the AIDMYSON sites, to help the family reach out to as many as possible.

You can write to Piyush and his family at maltesh@rediffmail.com.

Previous posts on Piyush, 1, 2, 3, 4

SAHM v/s Working Mothers - My Take

Jumping right into the SAHM(Stay At Home Mothers) v/s Working Mothers discussion. I am a working mother and my mom looks after my daughter. MM's post about SAHM and working Mother did get into quite an interesting discussion and made me re-think. Here is Rohini's take on it. Here is mine.

In my opinion, a Mother needs to be happy & content to raise happy kids. Whatever makes a mother happy should be done, be it stay-at-home or working. Never try either if you are not convinced.

To narrate my personal experience, I & P had taken 2 weeks leave for Christmas to be at home with Joyce. We did not plan to go out anywhere, just at home, her granny had gone visiting her daughter meanwhile. I went through the daily routines, cooking, cleaning, washing, folding & the 100 jobs that come along. After 2 days, I called my sister and told her it was so much fun. I baked cakes for my daughter's first Christmas, not 1 or 2, but 6 cakes in all. That tells you about my excitement. But after a week, I was bored. I was bored with the household chores. Cleaning, cooking, washing .. the never ending ordeal. It could have been the extra enthu of cooking 3-course meals too but I knew then, I couldn't be a stay-at-home mom. My Hats off to SAHMs. My work keeps me happy. I go home all eager to see my baby. The moment we ring the bell, we hear her bangles on the floor as she crawls towards the door, these days its the tinklets. It refreshes & re-energizes us to live the second part of the day. So far have managed with no commitments beyond 6.

From the time when she was 4 months, when I joined work uptill 7months(then it got cold in the mornings), I used to bathe her in the morning. Not to discipline her or sort but because it was very special ritual between me and my baby. I would massage her, sing to her, bathe her on my legs, wipe her dry, apply the moisturizer, the powder, she would smell like morning dew(actually Johnson's dew:) ) and then would feed her and put her to sleep. It was important to me. In all probably 45-50 mins. then in the next 15 mins I would rush thru my chores and leave. I love to see her sleep after her bath, all clean and happy.

Any amount of time that we spend with our baby, if we are happy, I think the baby is happy. That is quality time to me. When I & P start arguing, she would start crying. Its just the tone and the vibes probably, the moment we shift gears from normal chit-chats to arguing, she gets affected. The point I am trying to make is, our mood, our spirits affect the child more than anybody else's. So its us, who needs to be happy with the choices we make.

MM raised the point about Grandparents being done with their parenting, I completely agree. But I want to believe I am not taxing my mom with my daughter. The days I feel mom isn't well or my baby isn't, or if my mom needs to go out, I make sure I am there. I do not want my mom or in-laws to feel constrained because of my daughter. The truth is I did rather leave my daughter with them than in anyone else's care. I am willing to go that extra mile to accommodate their plans. My mother once told me, as grand parents its very easy to love & take care of your grand children because you see your child grow up once again but this time you have no responsibility and do not have to worry about savings, the job, studies or the future. Also I do not deny that I cannot totally get-away with parenting my style. I live with the ones I can handle and I try my best to explain and reason the ones I cannot totally handle.

And finally, I am very clear I am doing all this for my own happiness. I hope never in the future I will loose my reasoning to tell my daughter, oh I slogged away for you.

Piyush - Update 3

Little Piyush will be going for his operation most likely on the 10th of March. They are currently going ahead with the initial down payment with the hospital. Remaining money has to be paid over 3 months. So far they have managed to collect 70 Lacs.
Today, they have been approached by the Indian express editor and have promised to help. Probably it will be published tomorrow or day after.

Please make your contribution here. Do mention "For Piyush" in the description.

Thank You!!

Pens, Papers, Books, Reading & Writing

Last week I read an archived article of ITPeople. I cannot seem to find it now. The writer was of the opinion that the current generation of kids do not read or write sufficiently, they browse, skim & scribble. They do not read a prose or article and enjoy the beauty of the written language. The love for books is all lost in browsing and hoping from one link to the other getting distracted often. An another view I came across, which again I cant seem to find was exactly the contrary. It said, the kids these days are exposed to so much, they can read stuff that interests them, to their heart's content. They have access to all kinds of literature at the tip of their fingers. Children at the age of 10 are dealing with sms texting, mails, essays, atleast 2 different chat softwares, all requiring a different style of writing & understanding and they do it with ease moving from one mode to the other effortlessly.

The first letter I ever wrote, was probably when I was 9-10 yrs, to Dad, when mom and us were vacationing in Kerala and Dad could not join us. Then latter I remember writing a couple of letters to my cousins, grandmom(s), a couple of letters for change of address to different utility departments under the supervision of dad, to my best friend in class V, who moved to a different city, letters to mom & dad when I stayed away at my aunt's place for college (I used to post them without a stamp because I did not have the patience to wait and buy the stamps and stick it on and so my parents always had to pay the fine to pick them) and then to an another friend, when I moved to a different city (with the stamp). In all, approximately around 50 letters in the past 30 years of my life. How many e-mails have I written. Countless. To friends, parents, cousins, strangers, colleagues, different utility departments, banks, agents the list is endless.

About Reading, it was limited to the school library (which had 100s of copies of "King Midas' Touch", I still don't understand why) and the weekly, monthly subscriptions of local children's book & a few walt disney story books from generous friends. During the teens, Nancy drews, hardy boys, Dad's subscription of magazines like Indian Auto, India Today, Competitive Review etc held interest. So coming back to my point, the access to number of books, kind of books was all pretty limited and so reading was all limited by resources. And so I have enough reason to believe, kids today will surely read, write & know much more than we did.

If they will mess with something, that will be 'Handwriting'. If handwriting of people of a few progressive countries are anything to go by, then we will have cursive writings long forgotten. I miss writing so much. All I write these days are MOMs, to-do-list, notes that only I can understand if read the same day else even I can't decipher it, grocery list .... all in all ...scribbles. I miss my ink pen & the ink bottle. I miss my Parker pen. I miss writing while the ink flows continuously onto the fresh white lined book.

So Naughty!!

Picking the mischief tag


Wouldn't let Ammachy sit & pray but she will sit and clap religiously for the last few lines of the prayer.

"Sthothram sthothram karthave
sthothramadh aayiram aayiramai
anavadhi aayi sthothram nadha
krupa venam njazhalil ennum"

(Manglish can be horrible, but it means, Thank you lord a million times, Do bless us always)

Me, myself & mine

I picked up this tag from ArtNavy. I enjoyed doing it.
Here is my DNA

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

I tag Risha & Biju. Anyone else interested can pick it up and let me know.

Piyush - Update 2

I did not photograph Piyush when I visited him. He has lost weight compared to the time he was clicked for IBN. Here is a link forwarded by Piyush's father about the IBN coverage. There is a video available too.

Please donate, link to your own blogs and let as many people know as you can. Your contribution might be small but it will make a huge difference to Piyush's life.

I will try to provide updates on Piyush here in my space as and when I hear from Piyush's father.

Previous posts on Piyush, 1, 2