Desi-Plight

I often used to hear the word desi from one of my friends living in America from many years now. He told me that it was a synonym for the word ‘Indian’ in US. While in Hindi the word ‘Desi’ (derived from Desh- meaning country) is used as an adjective to describe ‘of one’s own country, I thought maybe it was a Punjabi thing.  When I came here in US, I noticed that the term Desi was ubiquitous here. I observed ‘Desi’ is especially mentioned as an additional information on the banners of beauty parlors and even some people named their stores as ‘Desi Mart’ or ‘Desi Indian Bazar’. My plight had no end when on the packet of ‘Kala Chana’ the translation read as ‘Desi Chickpea’ instead of 'Black Chickpea' or ‘Indian Chickpea’. So here, this word from Hindi Language became a noun from an adjective. 

I wonder how do they write it in India now, I never noticed before. 

Common name: Indian Chickpea/Black Chickpea
Proper name: Desi Chickpea

P.S. Rather than being a Pardesi (a foreigner) here I am a Desi now (of this land Indian).

D is for Desi on April 5

Care to Cook...

GK and ME:

Prior to our wedding my husband had no idea that I can cook. He decided to take up the responsibility of cooking all by himself expecting very little from me i.e. to be his helper when he is cooking, to which I readily agreed.  After getting a taste of my culinary skills, he is always found wanting more.  There was no sign of complaints. Keeping expectations low is a success strategy. (*Grin)

 On my last birthday (which was in March) I baked my first ever cake which surprisingly turned out good:

My first ever self made mini-cake on March 4

C is for Care to cook on April 4.

The Bollywood Fan

“Welcome to US and many congratulations on your wedding.” One of the agents (a native European) at Honda Showroom, welcomed me after knowing I was a week old here. 

“Thankyou so much.” I smiled. 

“Oh Weddings in India are so vibrant and enormous.”, he exclaimed with an excitement, 

I had known this exhilaration in people about weddings in India. 

“You bet, they are an extravagant affair, filled with high energy and lot of enthusiasm.” I added. 

“Do you really dance in weddings as shown in Indian movies?” He asked with curiosity.

“Haha absolutely! She danced a lot in her wedding.” said GK, smiling and looking at me.

“Really!” He chuckled, “You look like a Bollywood actress.”
GK and I looked at each other.

“Really which one?”, came from the curious husband.

He tried to recall the name, “I don’t remember her name, I can tell you the movie she starred in. She played twin sister…Sita….”

“Seeta Geeta” GK was amused.

“Hema Malini”, by now my eyes popped out a little in a disbelief. “That came for the first time to me.” Though I thanked him, manage to hide the shudder I felt.

“Have you seen any other movie”, we had become a curious couple trying to know more from him.

“Yeah, many. But I do not remember all the names. There was a movie where second husband of a lady pushes her in a lake of crocodile and she gets plastic surgery and comes back for a revenge…”

“Khoon Bhari Mang.” I guessed a few seconds before GK. 

He continued, “and I have seen a movie of that man who lost his memory. It had this song…Jimmy Jimmy Jimmy, Aaja Aaja Aaja…” He sang the words in his foreign accent, moving his hands imitating the dance steps.

 I was gazing at him in disbelief, while GK amusingly answered “Mithun!”

“That is impressive. You look so young how do you know about the classic Bollywood Era?” I was inquisitive. 

“We used to watch a lot of Bollywood movies with Russian subtitles, when I was a kid.” He told us. He had some Russian connection while he was from Europe as per my hazy memory from our conversation. “I haven’t seen any lately; life is busy now.”

Today, in the era of globalization, it is common for people to know Shah Rukh Khan or Madhuri Dixit in other countries, but we gathered Bollywood had its mark on international audience two decades back as well. This man didn’t know anything about movies today though. 

P.S. I came across a few more Bollywood fans after that, with a playlist any Indian would love to have any day…

B is for Bollywood Fan, on April 2 .

Image Courtesy: Buzzfeed

America - a whole new opposite world…

I have been wed for four months now, first time away from my parents, siblings and home and yet at home. Two months back I moved to the city of Sacramento in California. During my first initial adjustment weeks, I was in my observatory phase. "We have bigger malls and taller buildings back in Delhi. This place doesn’t inhabit many people either. It looks so vacant." I mumbled to GK (my husband, as I fondly call him) comparing the place with my previous den. Traveling to new places and relocating to a new place both have different responses on our mind. I was struggling with similar dilemma. Rather than enjoying this new place, for the first time I was judging it. During first three weeks America confused me a lot. I found everything got reversed here. Entering inside the lift at airport was my first awakening, there was no ground or zero floor in it. Here they call it first floor. The time zones, the driving rules and the simplest things like units of measurement everything upturned. Weights in pounds, distance in miles, volume in ounces/gallons, temperature in Fahrenheit seemed like learning a whole new language. Automobile fuel (petrol) is called gas here even when it is in the liquid state. Live wire also changed its color from red to black (as GK told me).

While going out, I always ended up opening the left door of our car to be on the passenger side. All the traffic rules are opposite to what I have been following back at home. Driving on the right side with driver’s seat on left, free turns on right and so many different signs drawn on the roads each meaning something different. For one month GK patiently directed me to the passenger’s seat. One day I opened the car’s door to sit, he already on the driver’s seat said, let us both share this seat today and drive together. At home whenever my attention shifted to switches, with an intent to switch off the lights I ended up switching them on. I thought I have adjusted to everything around, when one day I was absent-minded, trying to plug my charger into the socket and unable to insert the pins, I found another inversion:

A is for America on April 1 

Announcing my participation in April A to Z Challenge(2016)

April A to Z Challenge for bloggers is starting from April 1 where all the participant bloggers would be posting blogs on each day of April except on Sundays. So the 26 days of April will be dedicated to 26 alphabets, starting with any topic from letter A on April 1, B on April 2 and so on till Z on the last day of the month. This is 7^th Annual A to Z Challenge this year and my second one.

Last time I participated in it in 2014- you can check my posts here: AZ Challenge, 2014 

I haven’t updated my blog from many months, I apologize to the readers who expected regular posts and showed their disappointment offline about the dormant site my blog had become. Since I was super busy with my pre-wedding, wedding and post wedding life, it became a daunting task to snatch away that time and inspiration from my new routine and sit before the laptop and write with all my heart and soul. Not being able to update my blog and follow my eight year old routine, this challenge is going to be a good break for me.

I would be needing a lot of support and love to go through this tiring yet super fun April Challenge. I wish all the best to all my blogger mates and to the readers of this blog (you would be reading a lot this month). 

The sign-up link is still available to the bloggers who are interested and haven’t signed up for it yet:

Sign up here for A to Z Challenge, 2016

So let us all gear up with our respective keyboards and glasses and lot of enthusiasm for this April.