PLENTY OF FISH IN THE SEA

It was one of those dreary rainy mornings in San Diego, rainy and cold, with gusts of wind making sure the rain penetrated right through clothes. I hate rain in the mornings, especially if I have to go to work. Now, to be fair, it can rain as much as it likes as long as I am tucked under a nice warm quilt, a cup of hot tea in hand, reading a good book. I love to watch the rain pitter patter down windowpanes or drum on roofs but to have to trudge to work in this kind of weather, now that totally puts me off.

In order to fortify myself against the day ahead, I decided to eat a good American breakfast. Err, now let me modify that. A good American breakfast for people with very little time on their hands and a modicum of respect for their stomachs. So cornflakes it had to be. I was forced to eat “Honeybunches” since our pantry is filled to overflowing with the stuff. D, in a misguided move to impress upon his wife that her every wish was his command, had gone down to Vons and come back with a whole crate of the stuff.

Breakfast done, it was time to think of lunch. 11:30 am and a bunch of like-minded foodies decided to go out for a Japanese lunch. Now let me get this straight. I love fish, specially the fried variety, how could I not? It is an integral part of being a mallu. But raw fish? Now that is enough to make even the bravest soul cringe. So I spent the next hour trying to find something at least half-cooked if not completely cooked. I settled for dumplings with different fillings, a miso soup and a salad.

That was when my lunch companions decided that I had to be properly introduced to true Japanese cuisine. They begged me to try the California rolls. It boggles the mind why a Japanese dish should be called that. It consists of a roll with small pieces of fish (please god, let it have been cooked) surrounded by rice and various other condiments all wrapped in a thin sheet of I have no idea what. (Was it sea weed of some kind?). It was then cut into bite-sized chunks. I was informed that the true-blue sushi eaters do not consider the California rolls sushi, but that it was perfect for a novice like me making a brave foray into the world of sushi eaters. Suffice to say that I dipped it into every sauce that was on the table and put it into my mouth and swallowed. That was my first experience with sushi, and since I am still alive to write this, it doesn’t seem to have done me any harm.

Cold rainy evening and what could be better than a hot cup of coffee? Off we went, to a Vietnamese restaurant, to sample some of their wares. I had heard lots of people wax eloquent over Vietnamese coffee and wanted to try it to see if it was as good as it was made out to be. My enthusiasm levels were high since I knew for sure that it was not likely to contain anything raw, except of course, if the Vietnamese got it into their heads to make their coffee with raw milk. The coffee was strong and sweet, with condensed milk, and served in little individual filters rather like the typical south Indian filter coffee.

Come to think of it, my day, in spite of the rain, was pretty international, so I guess rainy days have their good points too.

SHE IS DISGUSTINGLY BEAUTIFUL

The lovely couple I live with are very interested in all things Indian. So in the interests of their continuing education in Indian culture, I asked if they would like to go see a Hindi flick. C was game, but D chickened out at the last minute.

I would have loved to take them to a good old Bollywood masala movie, but the only one playing right then was “Guru”. So off we went, with a couple of other friends. Friends who were quite upset at what they called “chicklogic.” They opined that only the truly deranged would insist on watching a Hindi movie when there was an exciting football match on TV.

First shock, when I realized that there were no seat numbers and that one can practically sit anywhere. Only in this case, anywhere happened to be in the second row near the screen. C had a shock when she realized that Hindi movies were looooooooooong and actually had intermissions in the middle. I wonder what she would say if I made her sit through Hum Apke Hain Kaun.

C loved the dancing and the costumes and was actually trying out some of the dance moves during the intermission. Some of those moves were actually quite risqué and I bet the men in the rows near us got quite an eyeful. Poor C also got stared quite a bit since she is light-skinned and beautiful to boot. She did have the look of a deer caught in headlights when people would actually stop talking to look at her.

Movie over and back home, I asked C what she thought of Aishwarya Rai. C retorted, “She is disgustingly beautiful.” “How do people even manage to talk when she is looking at them through those eyes.?” Good question C, any answers anyone?

ORDER!! ORDER!! ORDER IN THE COURT!!

“Do you think I could use tofu instead of buffalo wings to make this Mexican dish?” One pyt (pretty young thing, for the uninitiated) asked another. A weighty decision that needed to be made in a Court Room with the presiding Judge in attendance. An animated discussion followed, where the pros and cons of such an action were discussed. The discussion came to an abrupt end when the judge banged her gavel so she could make herself heard. The judge herself was a crusty old woman, full of vinegar and piss. She called herself a bitch and berated one of the insurance companies since they had made an appointment and were nowhere to be seen.

My first visit to the Worker’s Compensation Appeals Board and more illusions came crashing down. Where were the hallowed portals and the hustle and bustle of the courtroom as portrayed in movies? Where were the attorneys rushing about looking hassled, striving to save the innocent? All I got to see was a room full of rather sad-looking people resigned to their fate and hoping some good would come out of their trip to the board.

The lady judge, in the course of our tour, allowed us to peek in her office. We noticed a dark, pod-shaped object with what looked like short brown wires and hair sticking out at odd angles. This, she explained, was the prize winning artifact made by her 37-year-old daughter in her free-throw ceramics class. One of her secretaries later confided to us that they all had a nick name for it: “the hairy dick”.

We walked past rows and rows of files and came to a stop in front of what looked like a first aid box. Only, this first aid box had an emergency defibrillator. I can only imagine how many heart attacks must have taken place in the building to have necessitated the installation of such a machine.

The tour ended with lunch at P.F.Chang’s where everyone ate like there was no tomorrow. Out in the warm sunshine, after that enormous lunch, I did try out a feeble excuses my comatose brain had come up with to not go to work. None seemed really plausible, hence back I went to the salt mines.

HEAVEN IS A LITTLE CLOSER IN A COTTAGE BY THE SEA

Nestled in the hills surrounding a pristine beach is a little cottage with gray walls and a blue roof. Little wind chimes tinkle sweet melodies as the wind plays hide and seek. Huge glass windows capture all the sunshine and a warm wood floor holds all that warmth inside. A wonderful fireplace for chilly evenings and knickknacks that hold memories from all over the world.

Best of all is the woman who lives here. One who gave up a life of gain to give something back. To underprivileged women struggling with abuse and poverty in some of the poorest countries in the world.

She was so impressed with the warmth shown to her by complete strangers that she is going to spread it around. She welcomes people into her home and heart and hopes that the recipient passes it around. A wonderful way to make the world a better place.

Does the beautiful piece of earth she lives in play a role in the warmth she exudes? Weatherworn wooden steps lead from her home to the wide expanse of the beach. Trees line both sides of the path leading to the ocean and the green canopy overhead makes it a dark and mysterious tunnel. The path ends suddenly and there is a sudden burst of sunshine. Vistas of blue and white stun the eye after the cool and soothing colors of the path. The water is every shade of blue and more and the white sands provide a startling contrast: a true feast for the eyes.

Heaven on earth. Only the truly lucky get a taste of it and only the luckiest get to live in it.

LUNCH WITH LORNA DOONE

A long time ago, when I was a young girl, I happened to read a novelette titled Lorna Doone. The thrill of reading the said novel was doubly compounded since I had sneaked the book off of my cousin’s study table.

The story was that of a young man who falls in love with the daughter of a gangster who hid in the hills and the young couple would secretly meet in a green grassy bower. The word bower brought up visions of a saucer-shaped depression with sloping green, grassy sides interspersed with flowers.

This describes, to a T, the little park outside where I work. It is a little depression, with sloping grassy sides and hundreds of tiny flowers interspersed in the grass. I always wonder how the flowers bloom equidistant to one another. Is it the skill of a consummate gardener or the wonders of genetic engineering?

I tend to eat my lunch here most days sitting on the steps, book in hand. I love to hear the bees and feel the sun warm on my shoulders while I am lost in the story. I once had a humming bird grant me the rare privilege of watching him while he ate (or was it sipped?) his lunch. He was so close I stopped breathing for fear of scaring him away. Another first, being able to watch a humming bird right under my nose.

My bower has had its share of romantic couples too, only these are ones trying to snatch a shared moment together in the middle of a busy day. I guess their bosses would do very well for Lorna’s tyrannical father. I do sometimes berate myself for intruding, but then, I was there first and that should count for something.

Today was one of those days when I simply had to get out of the office, so I collected sandwiches, book, a bottle of water and off I went. I made myself comfortable on one of the lower steps and was soon lost in the story of charging horses, princes and beautiful princesses just waiting to be rescued.

I had just gotten to the part where the princess was about to swoon into the prince’s arms, when something went whoooooooooooosh overhead and then landed with a thump. I nearly fell off of the step in fright. Had one of the horses in my book come to life? I looked up fearfully to see a cyclist, helmeted and padded to within an inch of his life, standing there with a foolish grin. I am still trying to make up my mind what made me madder, the loss of the romance, or the foolhardiness of some people.

SALAD DAYS

Salads: just the word is enough to send shivers down the spine of any self respecting meat-eater . Who wants to eat boring old veggies, bland and practically tasteless, when there is meat? Now I can see frowns of disapproval from the die-hard veggies. But then, if you want to be kind to animals, why are you eating their food?

But living in the US, that too with an American family has caused me to dramatically change my opinion. There has been so much meat in my diet that I have now come to love salads with a passion.

Salads have saved my skin a number of times, especially in restaurants. I hate having to choose what to eat. Yeah I am variety-phobic. I generally beg someone else to choose what I should eat. But this does not always work, especially in restaurants where the menu has exotic dishes and no one has any idea what goes into any of them. Along comes a salad in shining armor to my rescue.

And the sheer variety in salads, now this is one area that I love variety. It would be sheer sacrilege to call the salads here boring. They come in all shapes and sizes with the most obscure ingredients, like beans, pieces of meat, fish, garbanzo beans (the lowly channa) and exotic stuff like artichoke hearts.

Salads are also a godsend for people on a diet. Though I fail to understand how you can diet with salads when all the dressings are so calorie-intensive!!

And the best part about salads? The snob value. The sheer superiority complex that differentiates the salad eaters from lesser human beings. Have you ever noticed people in a restaurant who are smug and walk with their noses in the air and what seems suspiciously like a halo around their heads? These are the self-righteous ones who have just chosen salad for their meal.

GALLIVANT ON THE GREEN

Another first for me. I got to go to go golfing. Of course, stating that I went golfing is stretching imagination quite a bit, since I didn’t know and still do not know a putter from a 9-iron. This was another of those lazy afternoons; the kind I like best.

The people who went with me deserve the Nobel price for patience. Specially, since I had the habit of wandering off with somebody’s clubs, to go look at some bush or twisted tree that caught my fancy. “A” was actually patient enough to explain all the nuances of the game. Like I have told him before, he would have made a great teacher. So thanks to him, I know what a green is, why people sit on their haunches before they take a shot, and that it requires quite a bit of skill to play a sport that looks relatively easy to an onlooker.

To the consternation of all involved, I decided to play a shot too. I was told to bend my knees, grip the iron with both my thumbs facing downwards, and to try and get the ball in the general direction of the hole. Then everyone moved to a safe distance. I swung, missed the ball completely and instead, a chunk of the turf went flying, leaving behind a divot. At least it went flying in the general direction of the hole, and I am convinced it took along a piece of my right toe too.

In the interest of the rest of mankind, specially the ones within hurting distance of me, I decided to stop with that one try and went back to my meanderings. I am not sure if my ears deceived me or if I did hear a collective sigh of relief.

COFFEE AT CORONADO

Anyone up for a nice, restful afternoon after all the stresses of the week? Then the place to head for is Coronado Island. The way to it is over a huge bridge that spans across the bay affording spectacular views. Views that remind you that San Diego is truly what all the travel brochures call ‘picturesque’.

Quaint, old fashioned neighborhoods, sidewalks just meant for ambling along, stores just perfect for browsing. That about describes picture-perfect Coronado. Oh, I forgot to mention the lovely old hotel. It boasts of having had various Presidents stay in its romantic old rooms. The hotel is all white with a red roof, right out of a story book. I was convinced that if I looked hard enough, I would find a piece that I could break off and eat. The white walls are sure to be made of white chocolate and the roof of marzipan; colored red.

Outside the hotel, there are vast vistas of white sand that just beg you to take off your shoes and bury your feet in its warmth. And the icing on the cake: beautiful views of the ocean that bring out the poet in your soul.

Let me hasten to add that for the afternoon to be truly perfect, you have to bring along a friend. One who you can sit around shooting the breeze with, one who doesn’t think you’re weird just because you talk about the colors of the sea, one who is willing to listen when you want to bitch about your mother-in-law.

So there you have it, the recipe for a perfect, lazy afternoon: A sunny day, Coronado Island and a good friend. Life is sometimes so simple.

JEWEL IN THE DESERT

Las Vegas. A sea of lights twinkling in the surrounding gloom, enticing all and sundry to come and be caught up in the magic. A gentler description? Little lamps lit and set afloat on a dark river, a river of dreams.

Vegas on New Year’s Eve was all it promised to be. Brash, loud, noisy and in your face. The glitz and the glamour, all the ugliness hidden under the bright lights. So much like the ladies of the night, collecting all that is dark and ugly and holding it in, so the rest of world can breathe easy.

Caught in a mad crush of people, busy filming everything, and to have friends who made sure I was safe. People waving at my camera, and yelling Happy New Year. Being horrified when things went crrrrrrrrrrrrrrrruuuuuuuunch under my feet and finding out I was walking on a sea of glass.

Sympathizing with guys whose girl friends were so drunk they could hardly stand up let alone walk. And marveling that the bunch I was with, not a single one was. Talk about weird things!!!

A lovely new year’s eve, one that will stay special!!!