Before school started, we had a four day window to visit my sister and family in Boston. We are spread all over the place. My parents with my brother in Chennai, India.. my sisters family on the east coast and us in the west coast. It is similar story on my wife's side. Her sisters family is in Melbourne and her brother is in Seattle. So reunions and face to face meetings with family are rare. Entire family get togethers on any one side of the family are rarer.
The best part of the trip for me was to see my sister and her hubby in their natural habitat, happy and smiling and watching the kids play together with their cousins. For the most part I was always roaming around, camera in hand..
It was a quick trip but we got some sightseeing done. Will do a separate blog post for some of the visits.
Day 1: we visited Harvard. Tried to walk around ourselves. Got tired of waiting behind this Chinese group (the girls were all dressed like supermodels and there were cameramen with lighting , reflectors etc. taking pictures of them at every statue). Someone in the crowd told us they were "prospective students".
San asked the cameramen nicely if they will move on so we could take a picture. He said 2 minutes and it went on for 15. So we decided to take the "official tour" with a student tour guide. Having wandered through Harvard multiple times many many moons ago and having danced in two of their ballrooms.. thought we could just wander around.. the paid tour was not bad. The student who gave the tour managed to keep it entertaining.
Plus, we got our turn at taking pictures..
Initially the kids were all eager to touch this statue. Later they learned that this was the most "pissed on" statue in the universe and were running to find water and hand sanitizer!
Then we went to MIT and their science museum.
Day2 was completely spent on a "duck tour" around downtown Boston and a trip on the Charles river followed by the Museum of Science. This was one great museum for the kids. Some highlights were the guy inside a cage getting struck repeatedly by lightning from a Van de Graff generator and a bed of nails..
Naturally, the Yogi had to volunteer for the bed of nails.
Day 3 was spent celebrating my nephews birthday.. we also managed to go to Cape Cod and visit the Plimoth plantation museum. This reminded us of Ballarat in Australia. There were scenes that transported us to the 1600's like the one below..
Did I already say the best part was seeing my sister after a long time? I see her in my daughters face every day to the point where sometimes I call Jr. by my sisters name because she looks like a replica of my sis when she was the same age. When she is sitting on the ground and looks up with her iris on the top without raising her head up.. it is like watching my sister!
Jr. is a bridge between the genes of the two women on either side of her. Given they are all November borns.. it gets interesting from a tempramental stand point when they are talking to each other.
Moving on to other things..
We thoroughly enjoyed the trip to the many lighthouses in Cape Cod area.. and the best pic that stood out on the quick scroll through the downloaded pictures was this one..
We were smiling throughout this trip. No fights. No daddy getting lost on freeways in a new place. Found restrooms when we wanted them to appear while on the road. A peaceful trip after a long time.
When I get a chance, will edit more pictures and post a travelog on Harvard, MIT, Cape Cod, the Museum of science and the Plimoth plantation.
