I am Back!!!

Hello to everyone in the Blog world and out of it!!! ;-)
I am back after almost 10 days of vacation and you guessed right - I am bored and sleepy!
Trying to get some work done and I checked my mails - 200 and odd of them!
Well, sadly, none of the "weird" relatives turned up and the ceremonies went on well without any hiccups except the food turned up an hour late and everyone were hungry and me hungrier than the rest since I had no breakfast!!!! ;-)
I did look kind of pretty in the silk sarees and jewellery! (that's what my friends said and friends usually say nice things and I'm such a sucker for nice things!! heh!)
Well, after everything was done and good-byes were waved to my favorite aunts and uncles and in-laws, we were just the 5 of us - me, hubby, sis, parents...
(My parents stayed for almost a week to help us settle in and look out for an apartment for my sis as her office is in the opposite direction to where we live!)
We shifted the next day and that was again chaotic which ended with my sweet-tempered and usually patient husband blowing his top on the movers-and-packers!! They arrived 4.5 hrs late and demanded extra payment!!!
Chaos has set in - I fear permanently!!!
** I am still not able to find things... everything had a designated place at our previous home, here, my toothbrush is lying on the dining table and the paste is in the bathroom!!!!
** Bathroom fixtures are yet to be put up and all our bathroom taps leak!
** It's funny really and very irritating - the plumber did come and he did replace a lot of things, so now instead of just the tap leaking, water is leaking out of the wall behind the tap since he hasn't screwed the tap on tightly!!!
** The geyser had stopped working on Saturday! We waited for the damn electrician the whole day - he didn't turn up and the next day, we re-plugged it in and now its working fine!
(Weird really!!!)
** Our front-doorbell doesn't work - it seems that the connection hasn't been given, so who ever is turning up at our door step gets a chance to beat the hell out of the door in various tunes!!
** The best part is the wind howls like crazy and the weather in Bangalore has gone all weird and cold, so with all the doors and windows closed - one can actually hear the wind howling and that's scary at night!!!!!
** Our neighbours have a weird habit of playing with their lights at the middle of the night, so with the wind howling, lights blinking - I had the scare of my life more than once!!!!
** And still NO internet at home!
**AND I fell sick!!! (Change of weather, lots of stress, etc etc)
All said and done - I love our new place! Enjoying it and still chaos reigns.
A very experienced friend of mine said that it will take a month or more to get into an established routine and I am already waiting for that day to arrive
Will post some pics once my friend sends me some of the pics, its all there in her camera and she hasn't found the time to transfer it to her PC and send them to me! :)
I still have to read all my favorite blogs and I'm lagging behind on all my work! (Which is bound to happen if I'm blogging and surfing the Internet on my first day back in the office!!)

Edited to add: Rayshma reminded me that I had forgotten to add THE most important part - the Gifts!! So, here's the list:
** A maroon 3 ft tall Flower Vase from my best friend because I love having flowers in all the rooms in the house!
** A pair of silver lamps for the God's room
** Lord Ganesha and Goddess Saraswathi in Silver
** Cash from my favorite aunts, grandma
** Tulsi plant, Lord Krishna's idol from my parents
** 2 wall clocks
** A dinner set in glass (you know the kind which is actually glass and not crystal)
** A set of dessert bowls in crystal
** Cash from various other relatives
** A tray and 2 bronze horses (I am confused about this gift and we are yet to figure out what it is...)
** Lord Ganesha Idols... (I think we received 3 of them! I have so many now!! I love it!
Laughing Buddha and Lord Ganesha Idols fill my home! :) )
** Various other trinkets for the kitchen like tea, coffee, sugar holders, salt and pepper holders...

That's the list! I think I have remembered to mention everything!
That felt good too!!! :)
Thanks Rayshma!

On Vacation!

Hey people!!!

I'm off for a week - vacation which includes the house-warming ceremony for our new apartment and shifting to our new place and settling in...
I don't think we will be having Internet access at home, since we need to get our present connection removed and we need to apply for a new one... So, it's a week without Internet...
(*sob* - life can be so difficult at times!! *sob*)
The weekend is going to be filled with various poojas, other religious ceremonies to ward off all sorts of evil and bad omens! :)
It will also mean - no breakfast before the actual ceremony, since its going to be performed by me and hubby (and the priest), wearing huge, heavy silk Sarees, lots of sweating because of that!
The difficulty will be the - no breakfast part!
(I'm already feeling faint and whenever I am told I have to forgo a meal, I get more hungry!)
It will also mean - a weekend with weird and obnoxious relatives...
Irritable and know-it-all types...
The list is endless!!!
It will also mean - gifts, friends coming over! (I'm shameless about the gifts part!! hehe)
The best part is my parents might be staying on for about a week, since my sister also starts working in the next couple of weeks :)
So, bye for a couple of days... God Bless you all and hope you are all in Good spirits, health and are happy!!!
I will be back with weird stories next week - around Friday! Till then, cheerios! :)

Eating habits!

This is not a post in which I am speaking against non-vegetarians!
No, it's not a post which is not giving due credit to meat...
If you think its so, then its your fault.
This is a rant post about the food habits of certain people, who think that they are beyond all sorts of social norms - especially the "eating properly" norm.
I have lunch in the office cafeteria everyday... There are a couple of good ones and one or two which are terrible.
The place I like to eat, also serves meat.
So, you get all sorts of people who like to come there and eat since the food is usually not too spicy and oily.
But, my grouse here is about the people who eat meat - maybe chicken, fish for lunch.
They forget that they are sitting in close quarters with others and most of them don't have any manners.
They rip the meat off the bones, make weird noises while eating and worst of all use their hands to eat the meat - even though spoons, forks, knives are provided in plenty!
Eating by hand is part of our culture and most of eat using hands, but even with hands, one can be neat right?
The persons sitting next to or in front of such people are usually in for a hard time!
It's usually like watching Discovery or the National Geographic Channel in which they show Lions, Tigers, and other carnivorous animals pounce on their prey, rip the meat off and eat it!!! Why can't meat be eaten properly?
I have friends, who eat so neatly and the bones are kept aside very neatly, so that no one else feels icky just by looking at their plates!
I mean, when the food is wasted, it looks like some sort of animal went thru the meat and left the remaining for the crows and rats to feast on...
The talk and the chew is always loud!!! Maybe, they are trying to connect to their prehistoric ancestors!!!
I'm not saying all vegetarians eat very neatly, no they don't. You will find plenty of people stuffing food in their mouth, using their hands and spilling rice everywhere!
But, it looks much more gross when meat, rice and the gravy is seen spilt, stuffed into faces and are completely oblivious of the distraction they are creating!!!
Being educated and working in corporate companies means you need to maintain and follow certain norms - one of them being - eat properly - use spoons and fork and what-not!
So, that your face doesn't go green or purple with all that stuffing!!!
We need to be sensitive to others in such a huge culturally and geographically different environment.
Strict vegetarians usually don't even sit with people eating meat, they don't visit restaurants where meat is served.
One can't complain about it or say its wrong - that's how different we are as Indians...
It's difficult to eat when such people are around and it certainly makes me lose my appetite...
My solution? - go early before the predators attack the canteen and finish fast with my head bowed down and me not looking into other people's faces or plates!!
But, its still yucky!
Its a sensitive area - eating habits... But, when it comes down to table manners, I'm sure its right to expect some sort of etiquette especially from an educated human being - irrespective of whether he is a vegetarian or a non-vegetarian...