The little one is all set to fly out of the nest

It has been some time since I blogged. That is because I spent more than a week recovering from the severe allergies and nose bleeds after that super bloom hike. Was also under a lot of pressure from family to recover before first week of June, to be at the little one's high school graduation!

We came to Cupertino when she was a 6 month old baby, chasing a school district that was "the place to be" in our local circles. Most of our close Desi and Chinese friends were all moving to Cupertino and so did we! It feels like yesterday. 

17 years later, we have graduated out of this school system. It has been an interesting experience as a parent and I am sure both Jr. and the no so little one may have a very different view of things. I for one was happy to have them study here! The elementary, middle and high schools were all within walking distance given our location, they had great friends and we got great friends through them over these years. They also got a decent well rounded learning experience be it academics (thanks to all the "subject aunties" who tutored them where the teachers could not give individual attention), sports or music.... especially music! These schools had amazing music teachers who truly inspired! This place is also beautiful. We don't realize it everyday as we go through the grind, but when sitting in the stands looking at the graduating class, the backdrop was just beautiful!

While Jr. got to go places while still in high school (be it as a exhange student in Taiwan, a trip to rural Indonesia as part of a camp, a training program in Berkeley, etc.) the little one was not so lucky as she was pretty much grounded and at home thanks to COVID. That goes for almost all her classmates who missed out. 

So she was naturally hesitant to go far away. That is always music to my ears as I would like to see the kids every now and then. Not sure if I can handle San's undivided attention. It always reminds me of the ant that gets burnt by the lens. That said, both kids will be going to school in California.  The little one for undergrad and Jr. for a masters. 

While Jr. missed out on prom and a graduation ceremony thanks to COVID, she really enjoyed the grad ceremony and lived it through her sister! She made a secret collage gift and seeing that made my day!

Taking prom and grad pics made me tear up a lot. All these kids we have seen grown up over the years are now going out to the world as adults. Still see them as noisy kids yelling and screaming excitedly in the car as I used to take the group to badminton class every alternate week. 

(that background was modified using Photoshop.. I did have some fun editing grad pics!)

The little one was so happy that grandma made a quick visit for her graduation!

Slowly reconciling myself to the fact that this is going to be a very sad empty nest. Time to play board games till 3AM with a continous flow of chai with our friends I guess. We can do that again now that there are no kids in any of the houses... (in case I lost you there, here is an old old post from this blog!). 

Life does come full circle!

The kids have done us proud so far! Hope they keep succeding at whatever they try!

Navarathri 2021

Last years Golu was a wash, because of COVID. It was also when I missed Jr. a lot as she was setting in college and getting busy. 

This years Navarathri was better. I had just landed after a hectic last minute trip to Chennai just after Navarathri started. So it was nice to be invited to a few golus in the bay area. Most of the golus this year were ladies only events and that meant, not a lot of Golu pictures.. we even went to a drive by golu this year!

This year I tried to continue a thing I started in 2019.. trying to match wife's saree color with my shirt color. It was a challenge as my wardrobe, while colorful, is no match for her variety! Once I set this trend and make it fashionable, it will only be a question of time before Nalli and Pothy's start selling matching shirts to the sarees. You will hear this soon "idhu sari with blouse ma, idhu sari with blouse and Shirt!".. you heard that here first! just remember..

There were a lot of new dolls which was impressive given people managed to get these shipped here during COVID. We also visted a few folks for the first time and saw interesting dolls, some that date back a century and were handed over for generations!

This year, I was asked to sing in a few Golus and did that. Have only been singing movie songs recently, but decided to give it a try. Wife give me a smile and said "not bad!" which is as much of a compliment I can expect to get. Next year, will learn, practice and sing a few classical songs if everything goes well!

All that said, here are the pictures of the golus and some dolls that caught my eye..

Hopefully by next year, COVID is a thing of the past and we get to visit more golus. There are many families that have lost dears ones in the last year and that also reduces the number of golus we visit. When you hear "we lost a relative, so no golu this year in our house!" over and over again, the magnitude of COVID strikes you!

All these trips got me to feel somewhat normal again after that Chennai trip. 

We did do a quick Saraswathi Poojai and Vijayadasami, given they both fell on working days and I was in meetings for the most part of those two days! 

It would be a big miss if I forget to mention the food over the last week.. sundals, vadais of different types and sizes, payasams, pooris, kuzhi appams, etc. etc. either I got to eat them directly or San got me parcels from the ones she visited. Given I had lost 5 lbs over 15 days with the trip, have almost put all the weight back in one week now. 

Wish the kids take more interest in dressing up and visiting golus in a few years once they are out of their busy high school/college life!

If I can try to learn carnatic music (again for the 4th time in my life) at this age, there is hope for them! 

Wishing you all a wonderful year of learning ahead! May the godess Saraswathi bless you with learning everything you wish to learn and may you find the right guru to teach you!!

Watching a sunrise after a long long time

As a person who is so used to watching sunsets on the west coast over the ocean, it was odd for us to go chase a sunrise. Two weeks ago, we had to drop Jr. at SFO early in the morning. It had been a day since my gum surgery and the pain was starting to show.  Also I was on a mission to get off pain killers within a day so the 60 day Yoga challenge could continue. Taking painkillers and doing yoga is like drunk driving your body.. never ends well. 

I was also sad to see Jr. go. Not that I saw her when she was home during the last month. We had maybe a 30 minute overlap of our waking hours on a daily basis. 

San got us some help and info from a couple of friends who had recently shared snaps of Golden gate sunrises and Kirby cove views. 

managed a smile with my face still looking like an "idli paanai"! Both these are iPhone selfies .. so you can see the auto color changes..

We dropped Jr. at the airport and drove in the dark to Battery Spencer. A former military installation that apparently had canons mounted during World War times and never used. You get amazing views of the bridge from here. We were the first ones there after we used a flashlight and made our way. Within 20 minutes a dozen photographers showed up out of nowhere. It was like they knew exactly when to come and set up shop, click and disappear. It was hard to tell if they were wearing masks, so we moved out of the area.  We had been standing there for a good half hour already to enjoy the gradual brightening and once we saw the horizon light up, decided to go out and down to Kirby cove. 

We were the only ones on that road and it was probably a mile and a half walk down to the beach. This time only three other folks came to join us. We had enough gaps to put our tripods and take pictures. 

Have put the photos as a slideshow..

There were a few iPhone photos that I shared on Facebook but was waiting for a laptop and Photoshop to get the pictures from the Canon downloaded. The iPhone is good, but it auto adjusts the brightness, contrast and color to be able to "see" everything. When you take a photo of the bridge where everything else is dark because is the sun is not out yet, the pictures look like broad daylight and all the hues are gone!

It was frustrating. (you can see it in the video taken with the Phone and compare to the photos from the Canon). I had to adjust the iPhone photos to make it close to what we saw.

It is a just a question of tiem before I click a picture of me and San and the iPhone shows me a picture of Shah Rukh and Kajol instead of our faces.. so much for AI !

All said and done, the sunrise was breathtaking. We really enjoyed it and it provided me a good distraction from pain physical and emotional. 

We did check the tides for that morning and saw it was okay for 7AM. The tides have washed ashore so many people in last few months and we were warned by friends to be careful. 

We will definitely visit this place again! The Cove and beach are beautiful!