What is a blog without Pongal pictures?

Was so busy with the game that the Pongal photo post never made it through!

Last year we made pongal without the Prayer part, because my aunt passed away.

This year Pongal was a relatively subdued affair, considering it made it on a weekday. When I came home early to do the prayer, there was a pleasant greeting at the doorstep..

There was a prayer, which coincided with sunset instead of sunrise,

and some really yummy Pongal and Vadai!

Note to self : Next year, take the day off and celebrate.

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Lights, Camera, Action

First the lights..

Now the camera..

May the godess Lakshmi (more specifically Sowbaghyalakshmi!) bless this house with a new lens in the coming year!

Okay, okay.. that was not the cameras fault. It was an accident! After taking pictures of the outside lights, on a tripod the extended family requested a group shot. Without realizing that it was on manual mode with 0.8 seconds at F/4.0! and on self timer, placed the tripod and this is what we get. Still does not hurt to ask the godess, right?!

That photo, came in handy! This is the first group photo with all the unrecognizable ladies published on the blog!

Now for the action...

My BIL, who is celebrating his Thalai Deepavali (first deepavali as a "hubby"), came up with this one. He was trying "night shot" mode, thereby giving this second picture, which would normally make the reject pile, find extensive use on this blog to show what was happening without having to do any photoshop to black out faces. This ensures that the folks seeking anonymity are happy and makes me happy as well (I get to post some photos!)

Happiness, is watching great looking happy women celebrate in style...

This was another candid classic from the BIL who is now trigger happy with his new Nikon D40 (Edited to chop off what remained of the recognizable faces. Ladies, my apologies! Next year will make sure all of you turn the other way so we dont have to do this).

That picture pretty much gives a brief overview of this years deepavali saree selections namely:

asattu karuppu with arakku border
mayil kazhuththu color with segappu border
deep magenta with gold border
etc. etc.. (colors which are undescribable, untranslateable and untransliterable in english)

The kids really enjoyed it!

We had a blast this year!

This Deepavali was much needed in this household which has otherwise become very gloomy in its outlook.. Time to think positive at home, at blogger, at everything!

Here's to the "lighter" side of life!

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A wedding and a Deepavali ?!

After the BIL's wedding was over, we had 4 days before we were going to be on a plane.

Just before we left for the airport, we celebrated a mini Deepavali on our terrace.

You see, my parents miss me terribly, every Deepavali, especially when they see how kids today have no enthusiasm for firecrackers. It simply devastates them to think that kids today don't obsess over crackers.

When it came to "pattasu" or firecrackers, Mandaveli Sundaram who currently goes by Sundar Narayanan or Dr. Narayanöhe, set the bar high. Very high!

Before the local "pattasu" stores would come into seasonal existence in and around the Mandaiveli, Mylapore area, more notably around St. Mary's road, RK Mutt Road and all around the temple tank, little platform vendors would start selling only cape! My parents did not save me any cape this time, but for those of you who do not know what we are talking about, they are little paper dots with a small amount of explosive chemical in the middle. You fire them with a cape gun or any other pressure spring (which would make the things look like mini spaceships)!

My brother and myself would even have cape revolvers where you would load a roll of paper tape with the "cape" dots and would fire them, mostly at the caterpillars eating the plants between our house and the neighbours and the process piss off the mami next door. The cape goes off with a sound and a little spark and we would play for almost 15 days with just the Cape, waiting for the stores to start unleashing the latest and greatest firecrackers from Sivakasi!

From Airplanes to rockets, Snakes to sparrows, sparklers to sizzlers, we would cover the spectrum over the last week. The only presents we would accept for Deepavali were things with the picture of Red Fort or goddess Lakshmi or a yellow sparrow on them.

We were probably the only kids in the street to burst crackers three days after Deepavali was over and most of that bursting would be done by me. When I was little, rumor has it that I would take all unburnt crackers and put them in a "Thulasi Madam" (a small shrine like thing in every Tambram household that grows holy Basil plant) that was empty and create a bonfire with the leftover chemicals!

When it came to firecracker bursting, let us just say that I was some legend, or at least my parents and relatives, still tell tales like that!

So, every India trip, my dad saves crackers for me to burst from the latest Deepavali. This time we kept postponing the event till the very last minute and an hour before the "call taxi" was to show up to take us to the airport, we went on the terrace and had a blast! (Well, there were none of the explosive crackers, so the blast was more figurative).

I was a kid again, and my dad had tears in his eyes watching me be a kid again. It is my sincere thought that given a choice, my parents would do some voodoo, convert me back into an eight year old and freeze me there. The grown up version of me probably has a lot less to offer them! Anyways, we are getting lost in thought, as usual.

We celebrated Deepavali, as a family for one hour and it made us soooooo happy, but we left India with a heavy heart!

Needless to say, there ARE pictures!

Belated Happy Deepavali to one and all!

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Wishing you a happy....

Indian Independence day to all Desis (In India, abroad, at heart)

Aavani Avittam for the "poonal" boys,

Varalakshmi pooja to the "saradu" girls,

and wishing all relatives(close and far, who read this blog), on the birth of Bharat, my new nephew!

Recently it has been good news in a row or bad news in a row.

I am sure the astrologers will have a nice explanation for that.

This weekend has been a good festive one!

yours truly,

Princess Daddy and Style Missy.

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To have or not to have Pongal ?

Pongal is a festival that gives us a chance to thank the Sun for shining down on us and giving us food to eat!

2006 was great!

2007 Pongal was spent in Bombay with the in-laws (We had just reached, and were starting to go out)!

2008 brings us some questions. My aunt passed away a few weeks ago in India. My dad, who is the only sibling left of what was a dozen kids, could not even go to the funeral as he is tending to my recently operated mom in a city that is alien to him! I know that he shed a silent tear or two and moved on because of his current circumstance. That said, my mum told me over the phone that this year, there is no Pongal for us!

I do not know if this is a custom restricted to Indians? south Indians? Hindus? Brahmins? a sub set of Brahmins? etc. etc.

It is possible to understand the sense in the one year mourning(yes, it is a no festival celebrations rule, till the anniversary of the death), to remember the person who passed on. It might make that person's soul happy, when they are looking down and they see their family is toning it down when the rest of the townspeople are painting the town red, but no one can actually verify this.

The thing that gets me is that this is very hard on the kids. Many a year, as a kid, when my parents would declare no Deepavali due to the death of some older relative we have hardly met, we would actually curse that relative! If kids are closer to god and we were actually cursing the dead relative, the parents were doing more harm than good by not celebrating! They could have cut down the prayer and given the kids the sweets and fire crackers.

However, I do have to add that when two of my uncles (dad's brothers) passed away within a three day period, I really did not feel like celebrating anything for a long long time... I was also not a kid anymore! That was 1993 and those two back to back events left my dad and his elder sister the only two left out of a 12 pack!

On the one hand, I am torn by what my dad is going through. None of his generation is left. He might be feeling lonely for all I know. I do feel that my aunt (who I knew) could be remembered by a toned down pongal!

Not fair to Jr. and the Little One though. They do not know my seventy year old aunt. Jr. spent 10 minutes with her three years ago, and the litte one has never seen my aunt!.

I have decided that there will be no prayer, but there WILL be Pongal for the kids to eat. Planning to make the Pongal myself, with a silent prayer for my aunts soul to rest in peace.

In the event I do not make the Pongal, we know at least two local Indian restaurants that will have free Pongal! for all who eat there...

Here is my grandmother's recipe, in case you are interested in trying...

1. Take 3/4 cup rice+ 1/4 cup moong dal + a few spoons of channa dal, roast in pan in low heat to make them dry. Then, put in pressure cooker, add two cups water, one cup milk, cook partially (let your cooker whistle once if it normally whistles thrice) and set aside.

2. roast cashewnuts, raisins, cardamom seeds in ghee (clarified butter) and set aside

3. soak some saffron in a few spoons of water and set aside

4. In a big vessel, add 1 cup jaggery (or 1 cup of molasses liquid, if you are in a place like Troy, New York and Jaggery is not available! works the same) and 1 1/2 cups of water. Stir till the consistancy of the liquid is such that when you take it on a ladle and drop the liquid back into the vessel, the liquid does not break or spatter. Remember the ad's you see on TV where the cough syrup smoothly coats the inside of your throat? That consistant!

5. At this point, add the contents from the rice cooker to the sugar syrup and start stirring. Add some more Ghee and the saffron water and keep stirring. When the ghee starts to segregate, add the roasted Cashews etc.

6. Finally, sprinkle some pachai kalpooram into the pot (literal translation is green camphor. don't know where this is available in the USA. we have a small box, which I got from India in 1998!) and give it a final whirl.

You are now ready to taste something that is downright Divine!

To all those out there celebrating, Happy Pongal!

"Iniya pongal nal-vazhthukkal!"

May your year be as sweet as the Pongal you make!

A footnote: it is spelled pachai and not pachchai!! Here is the Wiki Link to the edible camphor! Got to go find out if this tree is available in the US! and plant one in the backyard right away...
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