The blue sky

When I hear this word ‘amba’ (Mango), it takes me to my childhood days, where my mother’s grandmother (in Maldoli village) used to open the room to me where mangoes were stored and she used to tell me, have as much as you want! We visited her mostly in summer vacations and that was the time when the whole house and everything in it smelled of mangoes. There were different types, the best one called Alphonso, which is considered the king of mangoes!! Mango itself is the king of all fruits and the king in mango kingdom means you can imagine the taste and the texture and the sweetness of it! We had mangoes for breakfast, when panji (my great grandmother) sliced the mangoes and put them in front of us. Then for lunch it was aamras (mango pulp) which was prepared by selecting the best of the ripe and fragrant mangoes and removing the pulp from it, by hands! And then the program of cleaning (licking every bit of mango) from the seed was a great event in itself. After a sumptuous lunch ...

Narendra Modi, (christened as NaMo) the messiah, the saviour, the future PM finally emerged as winner and his party, the Bhartiya Janata Party won a majority of seats in the Loksabha Elections held in different states in April and May 2014. Friday, the 16th of May was the day when the results were announced and the whole country was rejoicing and had come out in streets to celebrate this victory. The youth of India, who mostly shy away from the country's politics also was keeping a tab on the happenings over the passing day. I missed the vibrant atmosphere in India on this particular day and I am sure it was no less than celebrating a festival together. I feel very bad for not being able to vote in the Elections, though I was entitled to. As I was away from my country, on a deputation, I lost the chance of choosing the right and person in my constituency. Not only me, there are so many like me who were not able to cast their vote. There should be some system in which the NRI o...

The word home has so many synonyms -  abode, diggings, domicile, dwelling, firseide, habitation, hearth, hearthstone, house, lodging, pad, place, quarters, residence, roof in the English language and in Hindi, it is synonymous to ghar, gharonda, basera, makaan, sadan and so on..   Ye Tera Ghar Ye Mera Ghar Kisi Ko Dekhna Ho Gar To Pehle Aake Maang Le Meri Nazar Teri Nazar Ye Tera Ghar Ye Mera Ghar Ye Ghar Bahut Haseen Hai Ye Ghar Bahut Haseen Hai Ye Ghar Bahut Haseen Hai This song from the movie Saath Saath exactly depicts my mood today when my dad just called me up to tell that he has collected the property documents from the bank (after we cleared the home loan 2 months back) and the house, our dream home in Bangalore is finally ours! Oh! What a feeling! We are the proud owners now, the house is finally ours. The moments just flashed before my eyes. How we booked this particular flat in a single day and how we liked it very much and how we saw it get...

I had heard a lot about the city Venice, from my friends and also my mother-in-law who happened to visit it last year when she was in Germany. The simplest and most economical way of getting there was with a travel company called IKARUS Reisen. They took care of the bus journey till Venice and after one day of sight-seeing there, brought people back to Stuttgart. I checked out with my colleagues and after a lot of speculation, four of us decided to go to Venice on the long weekend of 2-3-4 th May. Booking was done by me and I had the tickets in my hand for all of us. We were picked up at about 9 pm from the Echterdingen railway station on 2 nd May. It was a double decker bus, very huge and we had seats on the upper deck. There were people who had come from other cities too. They were already inside and after we all settled down, we started the journey. We stopped at 2-3 places for different pick-ups and breaks and finally reached a station called Mira Mirano at about 9 am. ...