Recylced Rasam and Spicy Burritos

Some of memorable days have been my days at WVU. Every time I think about those days, they bring an involuntary smile over my face especially certain events. Here are some of the events that I experienced first hand and some heard on hearsay.

Recycled Rasam - If you are from South India, you must know what rasam means. It is a common practice among student roommates to share the chores especially cooking. So there was this guy who would recycle the rasam. How is that possible? He would take the rasam made by his room mate the previous day, add some water, salt and rasam powder, reheat it and would say Rasam Ready.

Spicy Burritos - This is an anecdote from personal experience. This guy was from Bombay and had a Peurto Rican and a Brazilian friend. He would hang out with them quite often. So one day he comes and it was his turn to cook food. He asks if we would like to try a Mexican item named Burrito. To me it was exotic. Sounded good Why Not. So he makes spicy scrambled eggs, takes out a tortilla, spreads some Maggi TomChi sauce (which was staple on everything at our home those days) on the tortilla, rolls the tortilla stuffed with Scrambled eggs and say here you go. I think I did like it that one time. But he would make it every time it was his turn.

Fountain - This was my first day at school and I was waiting at the Chairmans office to report my arrival and talk about registering for classes. At the desk was a Student Assistant who was filling in for the secretary. This was the graduate student assistant with whom I took a class later on. After a short wait, I ask this dude where I can find drinking water with my thumb pointing to my mouth. After repeating what I needed, he says there is a fountain outside. To this I felt slighted, why does he want me to go out of the building and drink water from a fountain. I did not want to miss the Chair in search of a fountain as I could see one on my way in. After a short time, I repeat to which he says there is a fountain just outside. What I later found was that there was a water fountain just outside the office door. All this while I was imagining a dirty fountain in the park, that this graduate student was asking to find drinking water.

Cleaning with Tissues - This is from my brothers school at EMU. His roommate takes his bath, dries himself with tissues papers and clogs the flush. He somehow manages to clear the clog that day. It so happened that the clog went a little out and stayed causing the water to fill up and seep through the roof underneath. Imagine the stench for the guys staying below and from the backup. The landlord slaps him with a bill of $2.5 K. At least the clog is cleared.

Togo and For Here - This must be the perennial. Anyone used to Plate or Parcel can sympathize with this guy. This one guy goes to a BK and orders something for lunch. the lady at the counter TOGO or For Here. Having heard it for the first time, he cries neither. He blurbs out, I WANT HERE AND NOW FOR MYSELF TO EAT HERE.

Then there are these cliches like this newcomer sitting on the commode, cleaning in the shower tub etc. No details necessary there.

Happy Sankranthi

It is that time of the year which is the most auspicious for the Andhra Community. It's in essence a harvest festival when the farmers celebrate for the harvest abundance.

It is a four day festival that begins with Bhogi. On Bhogi a bonfire is the major activity of the day. As kids we were anxious to create the bon fire. We would gather woods, leaves whatever that was waste in and around the house from weeks ahead of time. I am not sure if this is still a custom among the youth in present urban India.

The second day is the most important day and is known as Sankranthi or Pongal. The delicious Pongali or Paramannam is made with rice from the harvest. Also a special only on Sankranthi vegetable dish named 'Kalagoora' is made at our home. This vegetable curry is made of pumpkin, beans, red potato and other vegetables that are available in the season. Uttarayana Punnyakalam period begins with Sankranthi and the next six months are considered highly auspicious.


The third day of the festival is Kanuma and is considered the main festival in our Alla Family. On this day my mom would make boorelu, areselu and pongadalu - all traditional uttrandhra sweet items. Also today all the family gathers. The daughters and the son-in-laws visit the family with their kids. It's a tradition to give the daughter and son-in-law monetary and jewellry gifts.

The fourth and final day is referred as Mukkanuma. This marks the end of the festivities. I am not sure of any other significance of this day. I am sure there is one but cannot recollect it now.

Wish you all a Happy Sankranthi and wish you the abundance that life has to offer.

New Year Resolution

It is not my normal practice to have New Year Resolutions and talk about them. To me they are just plain cheesy. But then, being a Libran, I am cheesy sometimes. So I decided to have a resolution. Not many just one. I am afraid I am not going to stick to them, and I said before have resolutions is just cheesy.

The resolution was to create a trilogy of blog that encompass the different facets of me. This is the first in the trilogy - something like The Matrix - the first in the matrix trilogy. This will be my personal blog where I scribble something about the happenings in my life.

As this was about New Year Resolutions, I will say a few things about how I spent my New Year. I was outside my car in the chilly weather watching the sky filled fireworks with tall buildings as the foreground. I had just dropped my parents and brother at the riverfront where the view would have been spectacular. But then since there was no good place to park, as it always is on an event like this, I had to drive back and wait in my car to go back to pick them up to my brothers place.

The fireworks were great, made a quick call to my better half who was at work on the stroke of midnight. The next was the great mummers parade. I watched it for about 4 hours and could not take the cold anymore.

The thought to have these blogs came to me on the weekend before the New Year while I was on a long drive to my home. I had all the content and layout planned, all during the drive. Now I am struggling to remember what the third blog would be for. The second one is my tech blog