Lift Off

I am not bound by anything... no one is. Where we may be limited in the physical world, we are absolutely free in our mental world. We do choose, for the most part, how we live. This being said, I have found a new form of freedom: flying. I started flying lessons about two months ago. And I feel there is no freedom like flying. There is a moment right before take off, when I'm sitting on the runway, waiting to go. It's the calm before the storm. My plane sits at one end the runway, the engine is going, but my feet are pressing down on the brakes, so I'm not moving. I push the throttle in the whole way, and I listen to the engine roar. The propeller moves so fast I can no longer see the motion. The plane jolts forward as I release the brakes. The wheels are still touching the ground for half the length of the runway as I gather enough speed to take off. About three quarters of the way down the runway I lift the nose of the plane and I'm airborne. I slowly go from touching the ground to 3000 feet in air.

From 3000 feet in the air, the world is a very different place. The world is much more beautiful. The details that I focus on on the ground, are no longer visible 3000 feet in the air. Large becomes small, and small becomes non-existent. There is a whole new set of details, that were previously unseen. Flying has given me a new perspective on how to look at the world. Sometimes we focus so greatly on very small details, we miss the whole picture. It's much easier to see everything if you step away and look at things from a different point of view...

All the philosophy aside I really enjoy flying. I enjoy the lift off the most. There's an element of magic mixed in with all of the engineering/science. I think I'm in disbelief each and every time I pilot the plane to take off. I usually sit an airplane about once a month, it's definitely not the same. There's something about piloting the plane yourself...

On Butterflies and Significance

In most Indian films you know something life altering is going to happen if there is lightning. There's a lot of lightning and thunderstorms today and if this was an Indian film, something life shattering would definitely be happening right now. Of course life doesn't work that way. We have ups and downs, rights and lefts, usually very few "point of no returns." Most real significant moments in life accumulate over time. They take years to develop and sometimes a moment to realize. We tend to focus on these moments and give them great importance. They are realizations, wake up calls, signs from God, whatever you would like to call them. I don't believe there are switches that change you for good, I think changes accumulate and build up over time. This accumulation tips you to a point of no return... Without the accumulation there would be no tip... so is the tip significant, or is it the slow buildup. Why do we focus on that one moment?

I think we all want to be "better." Better people, better siblings, better spouses, better employees... whatever it may be, just better. There's a myth or a hope that makes us want to believe there will be some random point in time, when we'll be struck, not by lightning, but by a higher power to give us the strength or inspiration to be better. We've all heard the stories of people that had their awakening call one day while doing some seemingly mundane task, and their life is changed thereafter. I think we wait for a moment like this to give us a reason to change, give us hope to be significant. Significance, like most things, is a relative term. We want to change the world, but we feel we can't make an impact from our small house in our small city. The truth is we don't know how far our actions reach. You can just smile at someone at your local coffee shop and change the course of their day, maybe even their life. Smiling at someone doesn't seem very significant to me :)

What do they say about butterflies and hurricanes again?

A Fast Year

I can't believe it's August. I don't even remember when this year started and now it's more than half over. This year has been full of good changes for me and most of the world. I think deep down the conscious of the world we knew we couldn't keep up the way we were going. Our checks and balances system was off. Our economy collapsed. Our environment is changing due to global warming. I'm happy to see the President pushing the world to change. President Obama initiated a program for Americans to switch in there old cars for money to put toward hybrid cars. The program sold out their billion dollar budget in days. The world is ready. We need this change.

Thinking back to the months that have gone by, I think so much has happened that it seems time has been in fast forward. Every morning something new is happening. I recently read that the recession has started showing signs of slowing down. I'm a little surprised to see that. Maybe my life is still hasn't found the balance that economy is finding. I can see the signs of the recession a little more clearly in Tennessee. There is a much larger divide between the wealthy and the poor here. Signs of the recession are everywhere. Empty restaurants, vacant parking lots, stores closing down, foreclosed/auctioned homes.

Aiya, you might find it amusing that in the US the poor are usually quite overweight. The wealthy are usually slim. It seems like an oxymoron, until you see the most of the people below the poverty line eat food from McDonald's, BurgerKing and other fast food restaurants. The commercials on TV advertise fast easy and very cheap meals. Most of these families can't afford better than this. They are left without a choice. These restaurants have disproportionally changed the amount of diabetes and heart disease in the poor communities.

I'm excited to see the world after this new balance has been found. I'm hoping for a better place. I have been reading a great book: The Next Hundred Years. I recommend it. This book has really made me think about the world as we know it, the future that seems so sure, and the impossible being possible.

Blood, Sweat, and Tears

They say money is the root to all evil. I think money is one of the few material things that all people collectively around the world understand. They understand what it can buy, how it can redefine comfort, establish a sense of security and mostly the need for it. We all need a certain amount of money to survive, we all want more than we need.

My father worked really hard for his money. I remember growing up, watching him work. He never missed a day of work, was always willing to travel, and switched jobs any chance he had for a salary increase. He had seven children, and he understood the responsibility that went along with feeding and housing his family. Over the years he invested and bought property and made sure his family was safe with assets. Towards the end of his mental breakdown we noticed his homes had many backed up payments. We've recently been forced to sell his first home he had ever bought. The home is in New Jersey and too far away to upkeep.

In the selling process I was reminded of the book, "The Good Earth." I felt we weren't just selling a property, we were selling a part of my father's life. This house was the first house he bought in the states, four of his children were born in this house. My mother didn't approve of us selling the property, she thought we should keep it for it's sentimental value. We had to sell the house to preserve his other investments. I will never understand the "amount" of work my father did to make it to America.

His village Kamalpur has haunted my dreams since going there this past year. I can't imagine the will power it must have taken to decide to go against his parents and get an education. My father always told us stories of how hard he worked. In Calcutta he worked as a coolie at Howrah station, a tutor to highschool students, any odd job he could find, but he never forgot his final goal to get a college education. His life spiraled in directions that I'm not sure he had planned. As his children we are just trying to make sure both of my parents are well taken care of and not lose his legacy... it's a delicate balance.

On Bright Lights & Fairies

Aiya, I'm currently in Tennessee spending sometime with my sister and her family. I've taken a long generous break for the past couple of months. I had no idea how much time I spent at work, until I stopped working. You spend time getting up to go to work, then the eight to nine hours at work, then going home from work, then more time just thinking about work. I think the average American spends twelve hours a day "at work." And just like that, all that work is done, and the lights go out. All the work that was put into your job is used by others, and you are very quickly forgotten. I'm ready to move on. This break has helped...

Much of my time in Tennessee has been spent with my newborn niece. Children are the brightest of lights. There is such wonder in their eyes, I love to look at familiar things through the eyes of a child. Everything is amazing from that vantage point. The most common place things are mind blowing to my niece. She just learned how to sit on her own, and her current fascinations include ceiling fans, the buttons on my shirt, my hair, and books.

There's a lot more open space in Tennessee compared to California. So much of the land is undeveloped. The area around my sister's home is a forest full of large beautiful trees. The summer out here is closer to India's summers: hot and humid. I don't get a chance to go out much in the day, but in the evenings I try to go for walks through the forest. The whole forest bursts with life in the evenings: birds chirping, crickets singing, the rhythmic humming of the wind through the trees.

This past week as I walked through the forest I noticed little bursts of bright light. They are lightening bugs... little flying insects that light up for brief moments in flight. Pure magic. I'd always read about them growing up, but I had never seen them before last week. My first instinct was to run and catch one, and I attempted many times, each time before I could close my hands around the little fairies, their light would go out, and they would disappear. Escaping from my grasp, and on to a new flight. I'm not sure how many "lights" a lightening bug has, but for their brief moment they are very bright... and they light up the area and the things that surround them.

The Similarities in Our Differences

Hi Aiya,

I'm so sorry I haven't blogged in a long time. I can't say I have been busy this entire time, but what I can say is my mind has been occupied. That is not an excuse, but a reason for my lack of blogging. I have been missing your responses... That being said:

When meeting a new person, usually we try to align our similarities. How am I like you? How are you like me? This is usually how people make friends. People with many commonalities tend be "better" friends. I've met people from a different race/religion/culture as me, and we're able to find similarities. I always wonder about these similarities. How can two people that come from opposite ends of the world, that are raised in two completely different cultures have similarities on such granular levels? It make me wonder about the human fabric and lines that divide us. These lines are imaginary yet very real. There are borders between all countries, that have little to do with the people. People are usually similar. We have dreams, imaginations, loves, hates, desires, safety, peace.  A lot of the time people want the same things. It doesn't really matter if you're from a big city in the United States or a small village in Bihar, India. A small boy of Kenyan descent apparently has just as much chance to rule one of the world's most powerful countries, as a privileged Caucasian.

As you know the world changed on Tuesday, November 4th, 2008. America voted an African American as the next President of the country.  The world is going to pushed into the future by this great leader/visionary. I'm so excited!  All my thoughts are leading me back the pure excitement that this great man is President of the United States. How is India reacting to this moment?

The "Right" of Passage

There is an entire concept in the US called a rite of passage. A rite of passage is about experiencing the world and discovering yourself in order to become a man. The concept, I feel, applies more to men than to women. For many Americans this rite of passage is living in New York City. Every year hundreds of thousands of young college graduates move to this beautiful city to discover who they are. I'm back in this amazing city for a couple of days... work conference. I find it so easy to get "lost" in this massive city. It's ironic that most people come here to find themselves. My perspective leans me towards small towns as better place to figure out who you are. It's much harder to hide your true nature in a place where people know you. I've been walking up and down the streets of this city forgetting who I am and what my goals are... No one knows me here, I can be anyone I want to be.

The Sound of God

I'm in Huntsville again, which means my days are full of meetings listening to people talk, and my evenings are very quiet. Every evening I make plans to do something new, just to keep myself busy. Last night I drove for hours in my boredom. The roads in Huntsville are very different from the ones in California. They remind me of the open roads to Gangauli; two lane roads with fields of wheat surrounding you on both sides. The weather this week has been unusually pleasant... hot but not humid. More like California's summers. I was driving down these empty quiet roads with my window rolled down. After awhile I heard a very loud sound, I thought it was my engine, so I pulled over and turned off my car. The sound got louder when I turned my car off. It was the sound of thousands of crickets singing in the brush that surrounded me. Aiya, the music of the crickets was so loud it was deafening. I was moved by the shear beauty of it. I thought for a moment this is what God sounds like. As a scientist you understand more about the world around you than most people. What most people consider miracles can easily be explained with simple science. I know in the science community religion is very prominent. That element of the unknown always leads us to believe in a higher power. The sound of the millions of crickets singing could easily be explained as a typical summer night in Alabama... It was the force of the sound that moved me. I felt like I was standing in the center of of an orchestra. I could actually feel the music in my heart.
I know in my past blogs I have spoken about the virtue of silence... today I'm thinking the power of noise.

Home Is Where the Heart Is

Aiya, 

I'm sorry I haven't written in a long time. I have spent a large part of the past month traveling for work. Some of it was very exciting, I got to stand inside the space shuttle! A lot of my travels were pure work. I do not get sent to glamorous locations, unless you consider Huntsville, Alabama glamorous. Huntsville is a small town, with a lot of engineers and scientists. There is something very nice about small town America. People are much simpler and the world is much quieter. I long for this, I've noticed: simple and quiet.

I don't think it's possible to go to new places and not meet new people. I don't think it's possible to meet new people and not fall in love with the new places. People are the souls of their town. I leave a little piece of my heart in every place I go. I've left a little piece of my heart in Nand Nagar in Varanasi as well.

I have been going to Huntsville about every other week. I've noticed when I'm there, I want to be in California, when I'm in California I want to be there. I don't have any friends there. In fact I eat all my meals alone when I'm there. I am just in love with the serenity of Alabama. I realize that any place where your heart is is your home. Most of the time your heart resides with people, every now and then it resides with a place...

A Tribute to My Mothers

As you know, I am not mother. I'm still single and looking :)

My two closest friends are mother's of two children, and one of my sisters is the mother of an almost one year old. I have watched all three of these amazing women raise their children, each in their own way. My sister quit her engineering job and after three months of working. She couldn't bare to be away from her daughter. She hated the separation and missing the new achievements her daughters was getting through daily. She now works on her photography business from home, and spends every minute with her daughter. She recently brought her daughter in for a routine checkup, her pediatrician was amazed at her daughters advancements in speech and interactions. She doesn't speak in words yet, but she sure does try to communicate with you. She can say book, duck, button, eye, and if you say nose she'll point to her nose :) 

One of my friends has two sons. She chose to continue working after having her first son. She lives in a very fortunate arrangement, with her parents. While she works part time her parents take care of her children. Her children are also far advanced. I can have full conversations with her five year old son. In fact I recently had a thought that in a few years he will surpass me in intelligence. His mind is quick and detail oriented. At four years old he pointed out to me that I laughed at him about something, and it hurt his feelings. He constantly reminds me that children are intelligent thoughtful beings, never to be underestimated.

My other friend also has two children and her first is a girl. My friend quit her job and became a full time mom when her daughter was born. She had a very particular way she wanted to raise her children and she has accomplished this. Her daughter, age four, speaks english and telugu. She loves to dance, and dress up like a girl. She refuses to leave the house without a bindhi and some bangles.  I'm hoping to give her her first bharatnatyam lessons.

These are all mothers and children I am close to. They are each raising their children in different manners, yet all their children are above average in most categories. The only commonality I have seen in all homes is a safe loving environment for children. Princess Diana once said, "All children need is a little tender loving care." I truly believe this statement. This is why babysitters fail in most cases. They may look after the children, and provide them with everything they need, but in most cases they do not love the child. A mother's love is irreplaceable.

Aiya, I was initially going to post about my great adventures last week, until I read your comment. I agree most children that do well have amazing parents in their life, that guide them along. Mothers are truly unsung heroes. My post is a tribute to the great mothers I know. Thank you for reminding me!

Aiya,
I'm currently on work travel. This past week I was at Kennedy Space Center for the launch. I'm on the structural stress analysis team for the shuttle, so I had a chance to view the launch, and go inside the shuttles. I will be sending you pictures when I get back to California. I'll be on travel for another week!
I'm missing your comments!
Anita

On Fables and Myths

I've always admired my father. There have definitely been points in my life when I have hated him, every child goes through this. You feel your parents have wronged you for various reasons... but my father has this one quality which I have never been able to de-fable. He's fearless. He's truly fearless. He's conquered the most ridiculous odds purely on his ability to face anything that has come up against him, and not backdown. 

Growing up I never looked up to superheroes, because my father was one in my eyes.  When I was 10 I went for a walk with my father. This was 1987 and California didn't have any rules against walking your dog without a leash. As we passed by this house three or four dogs came charging at us. I was terrified of dogs, especially the ones that bark and charge at you. I was frozen in fear, I could not move. I was watching those dogs, baring their teeth, come closer and closer. From the corner of my eye, I noticed my father running towards the dogs. Between us and the dogs there was a stick lying on the ground... he was amazingly running towards the stick. He picked it up and started warding the dogs away from us. At one point there were 4 dogs jumping all over him.  I will never forget his face, he wasn't scared. Superheroes were nothing compared to him.

I think about that moment from time to time. The fact that he saw the stick in this situation is what puzzled me the most, but there were other factors that I think about. See the odds that he would get to the stick before the dogs was slim... too slim. Even if he got the stick, did he really think he could fight off four huge dogs with one stick? There is a "fight or flight" mechanism built into each of us. In that situation I know for me it was flight... no question. For my father it was fight. It is always fight with him. He has never once backed down from a challenge. I notice it even today in his Alzheimers. I go for a walk with my father once a week. I try to jog his memory and make him laugh as much as I can. I will always try to get him to sing his favorite Dev Anand songs. Today I challenged him with "I bet I know more songs than you do." He took on the challenge. He doesn't remember any of the songs from the movies, so he made up songs. He made up a new song for every film song I sang. At the end I had to let him win, because I just memorized some songs, he made up about 20 songs in 30 minutes. It was brilliant.

I'm not sure if my future children will ever know my father, but they will definitely know the fables and myths that surround his existence.

The Color Brown

As an artist I love colors. I love everything about them.  All of God's beauty can be found in a simple rainbow. I have taken on an internship with my sister as an assistant photographer for weddings. Most of my sister's clients are Indian, therefore most of the weddings are Indian weddings.  As you already know Aiya, Indian weddings are the most beautiful spectacle of colors. Red lehnghas, orange marigolds, blue saris, white dhothis, saffron colored sweets, it's just amazing.  Interlaced in all the brilliance is the color that God chose for the Indian race... the color brown. I think the color brown could possibly be the most hated color in India. I recently read an article about how the Indian population spends billions of dollars a year on complexion lightening creams. I wonder about this phenomenon. 

In my household my father focused so hard on education with his children we never heard about our skin color. The first time I realized I had dark skin was when someone pointed it out (Gujarati guy in college). It was never a point of concern for me. As a mature adult I see how thoroughly skin color matters in the Indian community. Matrimonial ads list education, profession, height, and skin color. Why does it matter so much?

I wonder if the whole issue began with the British rule in India. It is being propagated by Bollywood. The fair skinned, light eyed actresses are role models for beauty in a country where 100's of million of people are dark skinned, brown eyed.  I'm just confused by the whole topic.

In retrospect Americans spend billions of dollars a year on tanning creams, so maybe it's just about not being satisfied with what you have... 

Love, Betrayal, and Karma

I had a friend once that fearlessly loved.  She loved a man of a different race, religion, creed. Their differences brought them together. She enjoyed his views on life, he enjoyed her Indian ways. I remember the first time I saw her "in love." Her face had changed, the sun seemed to be inside her eyes. Every ounce of her being was glowing with this love. I had not met this boy that had brought such happiness to my friend, but I wondered if his face glowed too. 

Over the next three years I watched my friend through this love. Their love affair was tumultuous to say the least. Their differences that had once brought them together, now tore them apart, he knew he couldn't marry someone of a different religion. She was willing to sacrifice all she had for one lifetime with him. I did eventually meet this boy, deep into the relationship. I met him after watching my friend drown in love for three years. Her face no longer glowed with love, it was now desperate. She lived in a constant fear that he would leave her. Leave her all by herself. His face did not glow. He could not meet my eyes, during that dinner. His entire energy was ashamed and embarrassed of the betrayal he was sure to commit. 

They say that all great love stories end in tragedy. This one ended in marriage and a broken heart. He eventually chose his family and his religion over his love. He married a girl that his parents had arranged for him. My friend and her broken heart lost hope.

Over the years I watched her spiral out of control into her misery. I tried to help, but I just couldn't. The weight of her grief was too heavy for me to carry. After three years of consoling her, and standing by her side, I had to cut her off.  She was taking me down with her. 

It's been two years since I talked to my friend, and I always wonder what has become of her. Yesterday as I was waiting to cross the street I noticed the man in the car at the stoplight staring at me. Our eyes met, there was recognition... and there he was: married, with his wife, and his newborn child. He had the look of quiet desperation in his eyes.  I realized something that I had never thought of before. Maybe his life was the more tragic. My friend has a chance to find her new love, to move on. He was sitting in that car staring at me remembering her. And I saw it in his eyes. 

Gandhi once said, "A coward is incapable of exhibiting love; it is the prerogative of the brave." My friend was very brave...

Alzheimer's = Age - Time

Every Sunday my family meets up at my parent's house; three generations of Prasad's eating, laughing, and enjoying life. As I watch our family interact, I can't help but notice how similar my aging father acts to my nine month old niece. His condition is Alzheimer's, hers is youth. Anyone that has been around Alzheimer's knows about the degeneration of the inflicted' mind, and childlike behavior that ensues. I go for walks with my father, and I answer the same question 20 times during the 30 minute walk. "Anita when are you getting married?" Soon Dad. I babysit Rekha, and I tell her not to put the remote control in her mouth 20 times. The same amount of patience, attention, and love is required in both settings. 

In my parent's home, I'm constantly reminded of time.  In this world, time is the only constant, everything else is changing. Time continues to move forward into the infinite, there is no stopping or rewinding it. We all age in the same increments, one year at a time. Though I think age has the ability to come full circle. A 65 year old, can behave like a nine month old.  I'm beginning to understand that the only place that time has the ability to fast forward into the future, or rewind into the past is in our heads. I'm watching my Father revert to his village Hindi, a language he hasn't spoken in over 50 years, and I can see that he has gone back in time, to live in a different point in his life. I have heard of cases in Alzheimer's where the patient thinks he/she is 18 again, and decides to behave in that manner. Maybe there such a thing as time travel.

Though scientifically there is no method of physically going back in time, or jumping into the future, I have learned that you can make time stand still. When you are living in the moment, time will stand still...

The Virtue of Silence

Silence has always been the most honest sound to me. I grew up in a household of nine people. There was always lots of excitement, laughter, voices, noise, music... silence was almost impossible to find.  But I would always find it, right before I went to sleep... fifteen to twenty minutes of utter silence. In those precious minutes before I went to sleep I would really know who was. It's very easy to lose yourself in the sounds the surround you. Your family's chatter can easily be mistaken as your own. When there is no sound, the only chatter that you hear is what's inside your head and your heart. You can be very true to yourself. Your honesty can get lost in your social obligations. 

I remember in kindergarten my teacher taught me to be kind to others, always say nice things, and never lie. As I get older I realize that the lies that we tell people are colorless compared to the lies we tell ourselves. It's very important to be honest to yourself.  I don't believe being honest is always right. Most of the time people do not want to hear your truths. They are more comfortable with your neutral white lies. Therefore it's most important to be honest with yourself in your moments of silence. These moments of truth will define who you are and what you stand for... 

The Dreams of our Fathers

A Father is an integral part of any family. In my family, my Father was my hero and the authoritative force in the household. He had rules and regulations that were never broken, in fears of punishment. His rule was with an iron fist. When I was young I was so enamored by his stories of India and over coming poverty, I remember thinking there was no one as great as him. He really pushed education very strongly on all of his children. "Without a good education you will be now where" was his daily lecture to us. There was always room to be "better." My father never told me he was proud of me, or good job Anu... just a lot of "Why didn't you do better?" I was always scared of him, and I never felt any love.

When I was a young adult, I didn't understand, how or why he expected so much out of me. Nothing was ever good enough. He would always tell me, how he would be concerned of where his next meal was coming from, where he would sleep that night, and he still got top marks... why couldn't I? I always thought it was an unfair comparison. I remember when I graduated from engineering my Father stood up and cheered. Through all the thousands of people standing in the crowd, I could see my Father standing and screaming. It was on the greatest moments in my life. 

I'm thirty now, my Father has Alzheimers. His mental illness has him on a medication that allows him to lower his inhibitions.  He never talks about us achieving more, just how much he loves us.  I finally see that all the punishment was love, all the expectations was love, all "do better" was love. I am very grateful to have had him as a figure in my life. I can see that by standing on my own two feet and becoming an engineer, I am fulfilling his dream for his children. 

My youngest brother is twelve years younger than me. My Father's mental degeneration had started after his birth. My brother has had no father figure in his life. No direction, no punishment, no "do better", but lots of love... from him and all of us. I can see that the tough love that my Father gave me growing up kept me in line. The lack of it has allowed my brother to stray. We constantly have told him how much we loved him, but it has come to my attention, by not punishing him, or pushing him to do better, he feels we don't care. I want him to realize the dreams of our Father. He will, but it'll take him a little longer than it took us. He never knew the man that we knew...

Random Acts of Kindness

On my flight home from Huntsville, Alabama last week the man sitting next to me asked me, "Do you practice random acts of kindness? Have you ever bought the person behind you at Starbucks their coffee? Do you ever pay the next car's toll on the bridge? Etc." I was taken aback. That night when I went to laid down for sleep it occurred to me that I really don't practice random acts of kindness. I have been doing some humanitarian work in India, but as far as little things here in the US, I have done very little to none. 

I made a decision the next day I would be randomly kind to people around me. Now random acts of kindness can run the entire spectrum of kindness, from smiling at strangers to feeding people at homeless shelters. I've always wanted to get myself up at a very early hour on a Sunday morning, and head over to the homeless shelter and help out, but Sundays are my day off.  So I decided to start at the smaller end of the spectrum: smiling. I would smile at every person that I encountered.  

As I began my day, I smiled at the man that held the door open for me at my local Starbucks... and he smiled back and said, "Hello. How are you?" Then I smiled at the lady behind the counter. And the person that held the door open for me as I left the coffee shop. I smiled at the guards at the front gate at work. My coworkers, the man that I ran across during my jog, etc. I spent the entire day smiling. I noticed even when I was alone I was smiling.  I just felt generally happier. My general mood was elevated, and it is quite possible that I elevated someone else's mood by smiling at them. I had no idea a smile could be so enlightening.

I am a quiet person, that keeps to myself. I don't usually make an effort to talk to people I don't know. After my little experiment I have noticed I am more open to smiling at strangers. I think if all the people could just practice these small free acts on a daily basis our communities would be a happier safer place for everyone. 

Hello Aiya,

Vineeta tells me you still read my blog. I will keep updating this site for you. My stories will now be of life here in the US! Looking forward to your comments.

Anita

Another Article!!!

Aiya I made another newspaper!!!!!

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1080204/jsp/nation/story_8858481.jsp