Its a boy!!!!!!!!!!!!

Shamala gave birth to a baby boy friday, 15 days ahead of the due date! :) totally exciting! Can't believe that she is a mom! Congratulations Shiva and Shamala!

:) I never relealized it was Kachhi_Kali's Bday!! thanks to Sid

..Happy BDay kalis!

Life update: after almost 3 months!
Amazing fun when aai visited. Visited Seattle, Washinton, portland, Florida (for a conference), New York Niagara etc..
Neeraj and aai also visited Las Vegas. It was so cool to come home to a cooked dinner and to not come home to an empty house. Was a whirlwind trip. Lots happening..Daddy is quitting his job and going back, Neeraj switched jobs, I bought a car!! yippppppeee...Bought India tickets for Jan..

Now can't wait to get a license to start driving on my own. The DMV does not have appointments for the next one month in South Bay...how boring can it be!! I wish I had gotten my license in CO..I know ..my bad ;)

Also...fast approaching first wedding anniv!! 29th Dec..no plans as yet..

More detail post soon! got to get some fruit-loops...These weird hour shifts make u hungry! :)

Long Post

I am working on a weekend. Dont expect any calls but I have to be here and not move away from my desk for more than 2 minutes for the next 8 hours.

So what do I do??!!
I have loads of pending work, but I can get to that later. The last thing I want to do right now is work.
This is like a forced relaxation! :) Some of my co-workers think that is a funny phrase. Especially thats what I call some mandatory training for some stuff that we dont need to spend an entire day on..but oh well..it is such a relief!!

So well I am here in the office, it is eerily quiet. Barring a couple of people who stopped by...
Want to call friends..will do that later in the day...Maybe hours might not be enough for all the things I want to do, and once I go back home its a mad rush to get the apartment cleaned before Mom gets here..4 days to go..yippppeeee.

Thought I should get my very (in)famous group on the web!! We are a group of 8 friends from my grad school, Colorado State University, Fort Collins. To the amusement of a lot of people, our group is called Kacchi_kali. There is story behind this name.
Cannot be shared.! :)

There is Atul, Medha, Priti, Ritesh, Rohit, Sachin, Siddharth and of course..I
(This is an alphabetical list)
Atul: The "thinker" of our group. He maintains an awesome blog. Check it out in my "I read" section. He and I have spent a lot of fun times especially during courses that we took together and did projects. We will always share the trials and tribulations that we suffered in CS581. We wanted to do well in that course so badly. And both of us messed it up...we were sooo upset after that..
The only person from Kacchi_kali to attend my wedding.

Medha: Hehe..cant help but smile when I think of this nutcase..she is beyond repair..:D She and I loove shopping and we love making the other buy stuff. We have made countless trips to Walmart and Foothills fashion mall to buy clothes, shoes..Most of the times we landed up buying two of the same design. :) Miss the afternoon coffee, the gym sessions, the gossiping, the crying-ur-heart-out. We hated each other when we met for the first time..Both of us thought that the other was a bit oversmart. I guess we are..but then can;t help it..

Priti (Darling): God, what has Kacchi_kali association done to this girl, this sweet innocent girl..now she uses the language that would make a sailor blush (i love my fair lady). She taught me typical marathi phrases like "ovalele karta" :) The only person I know who used to call Neeraj "tumhi" haha..Had a major ball about it !

Siddarth: Probably the most infuriating, outright shocking, and devil-care attitude..I don't know what fuels this boy..on the second hand...I dont want to know! :p. Great writer..great at dramatics..other KK on my blog. One of the very few people to have come to US with funding in his lap. I think I have had maximum fights with him..he justs keeps on hurting me ..Remember the day you threw that ball in my face...yeah yeah..when I stormed out...:D

Ritesh: The guy from Indore..He is the only non-marathi in this group of pune-mumbai people. He is almost converted to a maharashtrian. He follows marathi quite well..I guess and speak a few sentences if he wants..:) He visited Neeraj and I for a week..It felt like Neeraj;s friend was visiting him rather than mine! He is the quiet guy...or so you would think on first impression. Great cook!!

Rohit: My best son!! hehe..he is the guni bal ..well behaved caring, sweet. The first person to meet Neeraj in person. Neeraj still finds it funny that on introducing Neeraj, Rohit blushed the most. He plans to go back to India for good. :( Will miss u...keep in touch..

Sachin! :D Last but not the least..
So many things we have shared. When he first stepped out of the shamrock shuttle, I was looking around to see this Indian guy who was supposed to be arriving. Then this fair, green eyed guy starts talking in marathi!! We have had a blast since day one! People actually thought we were going around for some time! Then all the navra thing, the diamond thing, the walk in the oval, the fight (we had one..remember ritesh?), india night, his bay area trip, his engagement..that lasted a few minutes :D...so many things...unbelievable...he is the next KK to visit CA this December.

Miss you all...

Topsy Turvy

Have you ever felt like you life went on a roller-coaster ride and you did not want to get on the ride..and never knew when you got on it..

Its strange how life takes a different course in a matter of a day..You are used to some things..and your life follows a pattern, and there is no un-predicability. And then it something shakes that and there is uncertainty. Uncertainty need not necessarily mean a bad thing..but then its new..

I am not too sure I like it....

U2..

I heard "With or Without you" after a long time..Made me want to go to a U2 concert. Always wanted to hear them live..now maybe we will. Got to watch out for their next concert in the bay area.

Been a crazy week as usual. Highlight is that mom got my papers for visa. She will be applying for her visa soon. I am so excited. I have been dreaming about aai-baba's trip almost everyday. Only thing is strangely, last nights dream, they landed in Boston, where the reached by railway and the railway station uncannyly looked like Pune railway station and it said "New York Railway station" ..it gets weirder..I walk from my office to pick them up. My office is in Sunnyvale, CA. And I have been to Boston once for a few hours.

Anyways, hopefully she will be here for the long weekend. Other nice thing was along and overdue chat with my best friend, Shamala. She is the sweetest person I have known. She makes me want to be a better person. She got married in Dec 2000. I so badly wanted to be there, but I was not funded and simply could not afford to fly back. I met her husband Shiva for the first time for my wedding. Was so thrilled to see her so happy. And she is now expecting a baby in Dec..Dec 20th to be precise (their third wedding anniversary). I am sooo happy for her. We had always planned so much to be together. we even planned to get our kids married and "dosti ko rishtedari mein badal dalenge" .

We used to do the craziest things, we used to love this particular song "WAlking in the rain". I went "I am just walking in the rain, and I missed you once again.." Please please please if you have thing song, send it to me..We both lost it. Anyways, we used to drive back from Camp singing this at full volume, chat in college all day and then call immediately after reaching home. I love her mom's cooking and she loves to cook. I had prayed that I got my Toefl center in Banglore cause Shamala had moved there a year back. I was so happy when I got to go there. In the excitement of meeting her and chatting into the wee hours of the night, I almost forgot to go for the exam..

Anyways, Shamala is going to have a baby...and I am going to pamper my little neice/nephew..YAAY!!

God!! ..some people are sooo ungrateful. Its unbelievable..But then I think its all a part of the job!..

I think I am a disgrace to all the wizard world. I am still on chapter one of the book....waaaaaah..:( But been doing a lot of things lately. Went to Yellowstone, learnt to (well tried to learn to) play basketball and almost broke my finger, clean the apartment: even pigs would refuse to stay there, been driving a bit.

I am okay as long as there is no one behind me. Then I go into a panic mode and make the silliest of mistakes. The worst one I have made till now has been not yeilding to a person but since he was kind of far away, I was okay, but the minute I saw in the rear view that it was a ford explorer, my panic returned, and in that state, my car came to a stand still. I am sure the guy was quite indignant. Since it was a single lane road, all I could do was start the car patiently and go on till he got a chance to cut me.

I have realized that I am not much of a driving fan...Maybe once I get the hang of it, I will love it just the way I loved driving my kinetic pride on the streets of Pune...

HARRY POTTER

I think the vegas post can continue later...

Right now I am totally excited about the new Harry Potter book. I want to be the one of the first ones to get my hands on it..I can't believe that thieves stole a truck full of those covetted books in UK. People!! Stop doing that...
So well..what might happen? Umm..my guesses:

1. There is going to be something about Dumbledore in this book thats more than just the one who tells Harry some unknowns and then sorts out things when they wrong. There will be more of his personal life..I think it was hinted in goblet of fire.
2. More love will be in the air ...
3. Its hinted that Ron will be the best student (something of that order/sort) in all the books. So he has to become a house prefect or something like that.

Thats all I can think of.....Can't wait!

Las Vegas.

We drove to Las Vegas last weekend. I always wanted to visit Vegas ever since I flew over it last year. In the dead of the night flying over this city of lights was quite an experience. We had been planning to go there and then one day about ten days earlier I just went and made hotel reservations. We decided not to fly and save that money and get new tires for our car. We were not too thrilled about the Marriott Suites we got on priceline. Its not on the strip. But then once its done, its done.

The day we were supposed to leave, it was a long day at work, and Neeraj picked me up at 4 pm. By the time we hit the road it was 6 pm. We knew it was a long drive and decided to take all the stuff to make bhel and just eat it on the way. (small pleasures of living in CA :P). Just stopped on the way once to make the bhel and eat it. And then got stuck in nasty traffic. By the time we got out of it, we were all set to stop at one of the bigger towns on the way. But then Vegas was waiting for us.

The interstate to Vegas that we thought would be deserted was teeming with people. It is in the middle of death valley and we thought we were the only fools to drive at that time. It was like a carnival. It just kept us going. As we neared Vegas, we got a couple of false alarms with the outlet fashion mall and Nevada Landings (another city). Finally when we reached this city of lights, We were so tired, it was 4:30 in the morning. We barely crossed the strip to reach the hotel (which in fact is in a really nice location). After seeing all the huge hotels and casinos, we were a bit skeptical about this little hotel that seemed so insignificant. As we opened the door to our room, we were pleasantly surprised. It was a beautiful suite with a european touch.

Next day we got up at 2 pm and it was HOT. We were contemplating going out, when we saw the magazine with an ad to fly over the Grand Canyon in a helicopter. It was going to drain us out of all the money we saved by driving was going to be spent on it. We decided what the heck and made the reservation to go ahead with the ride in the starry afternoon at 3 pm.

Then we stepped out in to the Mayanagari. We parked in the parking lot for one of the casinos. And stepped into the Casino. Its an unbelievable. Even at 3 pm in the afternoon, the place was full of people gambling. All we needed was food. We found a little mexican place call Margarita. Nice fajitas.

Then we walked on the strip for some time. It was hot and dry and we came back with a headache. Cesar's palace, Bellagio live up to the expectations. We spent some time walking there. Gambled 4 dollars. :) Not worth it. And we were already broke. We came back for a change and then went back to the strip. We walked around for some time and then dragged ourself back to the room.

More later......

My first 100

I am bad at bowling..its a fact. My highest score for quite some time was 36 :D. As a student in CO that was an expensive hobby, and also not worth going all the way in the snow to get a measly 36. So never really tried it much. Here in CA we go bowling often, and my performance has been slightly better..my maximum was 69. And today I rocked (not exactly :)) but well I made a 75 in the first game and 104 in the second. The second game was a combination of strikes and 8-9's but no 2s or threes. So if I had not gotten so many in the gutter I could have easily made 150 ..hehe..

I am happy!! NOW I am going to buy bowling shoes.....

Frustration.

I am at work..and I need to get the frustration out.

I have spent over 9 hours with a customer trying to get the simplest of the issues to resolve. It is so logical and simple, that I feel like an idiot because I can simply not think of any thing else to do. There is nothing to do. I have tried it here on my machine and it works and it just does not work on the customer;s side.

It is so frustrating when you know you can do it and yet you can;t. I do not want to stop trying but I could not keep the customer for so long.

AAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGH

This is for Radha.

Chicken Biryani

Chicken (cut in cubes) or drumsticks / mutton cubes
curd
ginger-garlic paste
garam masala
turmeric
chilli powder
salt

This is for the marinade. Marinate will in advance, atleast 4 hours.

For the rice,

soak rice in water and drain and keep for about 30 mins. (This will help to avoid making the rice sticky).
Heat some oil (ghee even better). add black pepper (whole), cloves, ilaichi, tej patta (optional), dalchini. To it add ginger garlic paste.
Then add onions and let them fry on low flame till they are done well. Then add tomato.
The onions have to be well done or else on adding tomato, they will no longer get fried, then tend to get soft and cooked.
Let the tomato cook till the oil starts to leave the paste. To this add some kasuri methi and some mint.
Then add garam masala. (if you can get some biryani masala, even better)
Add rice to this and let it mix well in this masala.
Add the chicken with all the curd and mix it well. Then add water and let it cook. (pressure cook if needed).

Other way of doing this.

Heat some ghee and add some pepper, dalchini, ilaichi and tej patta and then put the rice in it. Cook the rice and then add some kesar to the cooked rice.
For the curry, in the cooked onion and tomato paste, add chicken and cook it.
Then make layers of rice and curry and cook it in a pressure cooker.

Quick recipe:

Veggie Pattice

Pepperidge puff pastry sheets
Boiled potato
green peas (frozen is okay too)
ginger garlic paste
jeera (cumin)
oil
Turmeric powder

Heat some oil and add jeera to it and turmeric, then add the ginger-garlic paste. Add the peas. Then add boiled potatoes.

Cut the puff pastry sheets to make 12 equal pieces from one packet. There are two sheets in each packet make 6 from each sheet. Defrost the sheets in the microwave and then this is the trick. Using a polpat-latna (rolling pin) press the sheets and spread them out a bit. Then fill the potato mix and then in a pre-heated oven bake the pattice till they become slightly golden brown.

Always a sure hit! :)

First Day in US

Fort Collins, CO is an extremely charming place that you just fall in love with instantly. When I first came to US, I had the typical Indian student carrying 32 kg suitcases with 15 kg in the hand bag and backpack which was stuffed with things I gathered over the flight(I was in first class, which is another story altogether) MY port of entry was Atlanta. When I left Mumbai, there were people that Delta had to help the girls with their luggage. But after landing in Atlanta, I had a hard time getting the luggage out of the conveyor belt. And lugging the hand bag was no joke. I was extremely tired. The other Indian sudents were helping the girls, but then that was more because everyone was as lost and scared as I was. But then once everyone dispersed, I was the only one going to CO. So after I immigrated, then carrying the luggage and rechecking it in the domestic flight was a task of extreme strength. Once I checked that in, I took the train and reached the terminal and the departure terminal. I was so ready to collapse. I had not realized till then that te flight that seems to be an hour was actually three hours, I didnot realize the time zones. Once I found out that it was a 3 hour flight, I was about to give up. All I wanted to do was go home. "Yeh kaha aa gaye hum" kept playing in my head. To top it all, very smartly I had all the important addresses that I needed once I got to FC and US were stored in a digital diary. Somehow there was nothing in it when I got to US.

As soon as I started looking for a place to sit, someone walked upto me and asked if I was Ketaki. It was an old school friend, who was studying in GaTech. I had sent an email to him before I left India to ask about the immigration and stuff, and he actually came to meet me at the airport. I was so relieved to see Satyan. He took me to a food court where we had iced tea for 3 bucks a piece, 150 Rs I was calculating at the back of my mind. I almost had half a mind to tell Delta that I simply couldnot travel, and that I would travel the next day!! But just seeing a familiar person eased the tension so much. By the time we got back to the gate, it was extremely crowded, and I just had to sit. Satyan sat on the carpet...I was shocked. Satyan said " This is US..yaha kuch bhi chalta hain" I just couldnot bring myself to sit, (Side note, now when I wait for Neeraj to pick me up from work, I sit on the pavement, when I don't have my leather jacket and when its not raining).

I was so sad to get back on the plane. Once I got on the plane, as I struggled to get my bags into the overhead luggage compartment, some blond guy got up and helped me. I couldnot believe it. I sat in the plane and held the iced tea to my heart. I was not going to throw away 150 Rs. As we landed in Denver, it was almost 8pm. Took another train and came to the baggage terminal. I didnot have to touch a single bag. there were people who helped me.

As I waited for the shuttle to Fort Collins, I wrote down the 5 dollars I had spent to call home from Frankfurt. In the shuttle, parting with 21 dollars wrenched my heart. People were chatting like they were all friends and I dozed off. When I got up, we were in Loveland. I was so scared...I wanted to go to Fort Collins, Did I get on the wrong shuttle??!!! I looked around and saw all blond people. I had always known that this would be tha case in a place like Colorado, but I had never prepared my self to people chatting like they knew each other for life. I remembered the bus trips to Indore to meet my grandparents. You always look at your fellow passengers with suspicion. This was an entirely different experience. And even in the horror of landing in Loveland, I feel asleep. Next I woke up at about 11 pm local time and they had started dropping off people at their homes. He told me I would be the last one to be dropped off as I was going to the other side of the town. Finally it was just me and the shuttle driver in the shuttle and he was like "West Myrtle"??? There is no West Myrtle. I was shocked..He said Myrtle runs north-south. Are you sure???

I kept on thinking this was a dream, and I would wake up in my bed in Pune with my mom sitting outside sipping on her tea as she does everyday. I told him this was the address the Indian student association gave me. Thats when I actually realized that the electronic diary had been wiped off. I was in a state of utter panic. All the emergency contact numbers had been wiped off. All i remembered was the phone number of the girl who was going to be my host and room mate. I gave him that. He called her, she told the address. As we approached the apartment, there was cops all over the place. Apparently there had been a shoot out near the Seven-Eleven and all the roads were blocked. The driver tried different ways of approaching the apartment in vain. He told me he would take me back to Denver International Airport and bring me back the next day.

Next I knew we were in front of the apartment and Shefali, my roomie, was waving at us. I was in such a shock, I dont remember the next few minutes. Shefali;s mom had made hot poli and hbaji for me. As luck would have it, my friend Dhananjay who was in the same university, went to pick me up at the airport as a surprise and his car broke down and he got back at 4 am.

Till this date I remember each and every thing that happened in those few hours vividly....

On the phone!!
the action begins..having been answering a lot of phone calls..and its nice to know there are a whole lot of nice people out there..
Bloopers :

1. Instead of asking the customer if he had the "Downtime" schedule set, I asked, if he had the "Downtown" scheduled...I am sure he got that I was in a party mood. :D
2. I had been calling a lot of customers, and I go "This is Ketaki calling from ..." and when I actually picked up a call that came from a customer, instead of just saying, "This is Ketaki.." I went." This is Ketaki calling..." The customer was like what??!!!
3. I forgot the name of a customer...So I looked at Warren and Warren quickly wrote the customer;s name on the board...

Went to this really cool sale at Sears...Jamba juice is good..sipping on it now!! missed lunch because of the sudden high call volume.

Clarification
:) Had to post this soon..We didnot buy 500 dollar tix, we bought 500 dollars tix for 100 bucks...Thats why we were such outcasts. And I have to apologize for all the typos in the earlier Rahman blog, I was chatting with my mom and my mama, and typing..Should fix the typos, I realized its almost impossible to read it..

Happy Birthday to ME!!!!!

Had to get a post for my bday!! i feel like a princess..I have been pampered!!

A R Rahman
Is God. Had a chance to listen to him live in SF in the Cow Palace. We got tickets in the 22nd row in this huge indoor stadium. So we were practically in seats where not only could we see them up close and personal, but I think, they could see us too!! It was a sammelan of Hondas, Toyotas and Mercedes. Never have I seen so many leather jackets in one place. And even in my marriage i didnot wear as much gold as the women wore. Me in my perenial jeans and tee-shirt (it is cold in SF) seemed like and outcast in those 500 dollar seats. As of course, like all desi events, this one also started late. Was to start at 7:30, started at 8:30. But then it was a "be Indian" sort of an event. So I didnt see a single hassled soul because of the delay. Everyone was going about talking, mingling, showing off merrily. There was chai stall, mango lassi, samosa, even posters of bollywood kings and queens. It was like being in the theatres in India.
Rahman started with a bang with SP Balasubramium. Then Sonu Nigam crooned to Sathiya and stole each and every girl (from 16 to 60). I think I am totally mesmerised by the songs of Saathiya. So it was quite a treat to hear him alive. And I have been a fan of Sonu since Sa Re Ga Ma. It is quite short built though...
Neeraj said that last year they sang a lot of tamil-telegu songs that the non-south indian people did not know. So after interval, half the stadium was empty, this time however, they sang almost all hindi songs, and only sang a few lines from each song in tamil/telegu. In fact it was quite enjoyable for everyone.
Lagaan and Saathiya were extremely popular, though humma humma had almost everyone dancing up on their seats.
Shivamani rocked!! His antics had the crowd entertained in the interval. And..hold your breath. Zakhir Hussain was sitting in the audience. He has something about him that just melts your heart. hehe..I am sure neeraj was amused at my fickle heart. Cant help it. Small trivia, Shankar Mahadevan used to work in Oracle(just outside SF) before he decided to quit everything to becaome a musican. Oracle buildings are quite a landmark while going from San Jose to SF. Bollywood, here I come!!!
Sadhana Sargam sang Chupke se to the tee. Missed Chandralekha, since I had heard so much about it from previous shows.
When we got out, it took us some time before the euphoria died down. Absolutely fantastic experience......

BUSY
I have been terribly busy the past few days. There were whole day exams that went on from 10 am to 7:30 pm, there were meetings, presentations. Also, Neeraj's younger sister Anuja was visiting us along with Shashank, her would-be. So we took them to Gilroy, Mystery Spot. And all sorts of places to eat :) We went to Santa Cruz, to this place called Capitola which was a small beach town, which the most charming downtown and awesome seafood...but no more food posts..:D.

Anyways, saw a really good movie "Basic". John Travolta, Samuel L Jackson and a whole bunch of other people. Quite a different movie, with an intelligent plot and a gripping end. It was a movie in which you cannot afford to get distracted for a minute. You just wont be able to follow it. So I was quite irritated by the couple sitting next to us. Leave rest to imagination ;).

But definitely worth seeing once, preferably in a theater, because you have to be engrossed.
Small post, really tired.

Perfumes
I love perfumes..I donot like the sporty perfumes, neither do I like very floral perfumes. I like exotic smelling perfumes. My favorites are Paris (by YSL and my mom has been wearing it for a number of years..love it.), I like Obsession by Calvin Klein, and I simply love Joop!. Its a very different smelling perfume, and believe me, I get complements every single time I wear it. I remember I was in Carl's Jr in school, and this lady stopped to ask me what I was wearing, then as I was leaving my apartment building in CO, another girl asked me, and when I bought in Wal-mart (!!), as I carried the bottle to check out, another woman asked me if they were selling Joop!. So my first pay, I pampered myself to a bottle of Joop!. As I ran out of my earlier bottle last year. Anyways, thrilled...oooh...just smells divine....