San Antonio Trip

Not that I celebrate St.Partick's day but we were at River Walk, San Antonio during the celebrations last week. The river(not a river by any means, it is a canal system that is 3ft deep) was colored green by dumping eco-friendly coloring dye into the water. The restaurants were packed and the wait time was anywhere from 1 to 2.5 hours for dinner.

It was relaxing the following day when we leisurely lunched by the waters and bought a hand painted Mexican turtle made out of clay from one of the local vendors.

The Japanese Tea Garden transports you miles across the globe.

Ri is a true Texan by any means. She knows her Texas history and could not wait to see the Alamo. She told and retold the history and importance of Alamo numerous times that Ro can now pass the 4th grade social test.

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Me Time

Yoga is the purest form of my-time. I am not sitting there and focusing on what to cook for dinner or how to pick the kids on time with a last minute meeting scheduled at 5:30 or about that deliverable due in the next hour. When I am in the mountain pose, I am rooted to the ground and when in the warrior pose, I am focused on the orientation. Gradually, I have learned to let go of my rambling thoughts and instill a deep appreciation for the rhythmic breathing that weaves the body and soul together in every yogic pose.

In short this post should read, I went back to yoga after a while and loved every bit of it.

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Women's Day

 

Well, whether I believe in the need for a special day for women or not, this Women's day I salute my mom's  spirit of adventure and her zest for life.

I hope she has a speedy recovery and swings right back into action.

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Big Day at School

Today is Ri's Writing TAKS (or Standardized Testing) at school. She hit the bed early last night. She woke up at 6 today and was well rested. I made her favorite breakfast - Pongal/eggplant gost and packed Idlis/Onion chutney for lunch along with milk and a snack. Of course I did some prep work the previous night to make this 9 course meals early in the morning.

I like the fact that schools provide grading criteria for grading essays. We ate breakfast together and went over a few writing rules -

• Choose the points you want to write and then sequence it
• Be descriptive and provide your perspective to the essay.
• Focus on a catchy intro and a decisive conclusion.
• Finally edit it like someone else wrote it.

As usual she prayed and left for school this morning. Called up from work and found that the prompt she received was "Write about something you found". She wrote about how she found a lost library book and titled her essay "The Modern Sherlock Holmes"

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Winter Olympics, Marathon Runners and more ...

It was a pleasure to have a marathon runner as my ex-neighbor at work.  He was such a motivation to look up to. He not only runs marathons but meticulously packs/preps balanced-lunches every Sunday for the whole week, plans his workout schedule in advance, does not skip workout for the sake of meetings or other commitments at work. Just talking to him about his weekend/after work activities would drive me to the gym.

This past week, we watched the Winter Olympics almost every evening. It looked so real on our 120 inch TV screen that it felt guilty being a mere spectator.

My workout partner and I bumped our workout one notch up.

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Brussels, August 2009

 

Belgium was the third country of our visit and by now, we were literally eating desserts for breakfast, lunch and dinner. We took the train from the airport and spent an evening in the city center. Ro was moved by the little boy who ( literally ) pissed to save his country from a fire.

Chocolates, waffles and some good Belgium beer was part of our dinner that day.

Travel Tips
Most hotels have few family rooms and they get booked real fast. So book your rooms in advance. We had to stay in 2 rooms as we were a family of 4 (2 adults and 2 kids).

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Paris, August 2009

 

The "Everyday Style of Parisian Women” is impressive. It is refreshing to notice that that they leave their hair in its natural element and not fuss over perfectly straightened hair.

We took the Euro Star to Paris and commuted with in Paris via metro. After we visited Notre Dame, we went to the book store right across from it called the, “Shakespeare & Co”, which housed many writers during their early days. I bought the “Hunchback of Notre Dame” with the official seal of the store. We walked by inspector Cruso’s (Pink Panther) head quarters and tasted chocolate crepes and ice cream from Berthillion.

We spent a whole day in Louvre. Every room is a masterpiece by itself. Ri thoroughly enjoyed the paintings by Di Vinci, Monet, Van Gogh and others. We picnicked by the Eiffel tower and enjoyed a late evening cruise in River Seine. The view of the lighted monuments and bridges was spectacular.

Travel Tips

Most hotels have few family rooms and they get booked real fast. So book your rooms in advance. We had to stay in 2 rooms as we were a family of 4 (2 adults and 2 kids).

We stayed in Mercure chain of hotels in London and Paris.

The metro is well connected and we used it for our entire Paris trip.

Unlike US, there are tons of options for vegetarians.

Learn a few French words, it definitely helps.

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