Jabaaz Onam 2007 Charlotte IV

Part III
Sunday Sept 2, 2007 Eve : A Sweet Celebration

Sweety Sumesh couple was completing one year of their marriage on Sep 8th. Since we have accepted sumesh into our joint family, we couldnt let this event go past without any celebration. We bought a cake and a card and surprised the couple.

Once everyone was capable of walking after the heavy lunch, we went out to charlotte downtown and roamed around for 2 hours. Even though people were from big downtowns like chicago, seattle, NY we gave them a tour of of small and beautiful city.

We retired to our home around 10.30PM and it was time for the real fun. Guys were drinking beer, playing cards and the entertainment committee was entertaining them with songs. Devu's performance of "Kalabham Tharam" displaced Ashwin's spot as the group's official singer. Also Jabaaz placed their protection hand over her head and asked her to report any small incident of Mootta against her and he will be punished. Mootta remembering his eethams readily agreed to love her forever without raising his voice.

Everybody who didn't know Sweety well began to wonder whether all these stories which we were telling was true or not. Because she didn't do anything stupid till then. Note the words TILL THEN. Once she got into talking mode, it started coming one by one. Highlights being (remember my earlier disclaimer. can't write all) - YezDi (SD) card. Somebody from the group asked a question what is the diff between SD card and other memory card. Sweety started her technical explanation "Well, You See.... SD card is small in size from other card." After displaying her technical skills so much we thought, it was over. No, next came the command over Malayalam language. She was explainging to Kshema the difference between "nammal" (us) and "njankal" (we).

"Well, You See Kshema, njankal means you and ashwin, nammal means rest of us... No NO.. nammal means njankal means..." Within seconds the whole room was rolling over on their stomachs laughing. So it was concluded that all konkinis including sweety dont know this difference. And now you know why this blog is in english. Poor sweety let her also read this.

Monday Sept 3, 2007 : Normality Returns

It was bye bye day. Groups started packing their bags and leaving. First to go was Sweety, Sumesh and Kuriappa. Not before Sweety did one last job for pachakam committe. Bread and bulls eye for all the hungry souls. Rest of the girls left early morning to a near by mall. Main agenda to get rewarded for their hard work by shopping with their husband's money. By the time they were gone, the rest of guys cleaned the house, heated the left overs for lunch. After lunch Mootta, Devu and Koshy also said good bye. By six, the rest of the gang, Ashwin, Kshema, Ratheesh and then the chicago gang was also gone. And the house was back to normal, with the couch, rugs, chairs coming back to the original position. But something was not right, we were already missing the gang.

Thank a ton for all the Jabaaz who made this Onam a really special one. With friends like this, even in this foreign soil, i don't feel like an outsider. Because my family is here with me, to celebrate every onam together.

Jabaaz Onam 2007 Charlotte III

Part II
Sunday Sept 2, 2007 : Main Event OnaSadhya

The good thing about onam day is that, if you are not a host or not in pachakam committee, the activities for the day are very simple - wake up, take bath, get ready (preferably into Mundu aka Dhoti), eat a lavish feast and take rest. But for the other group, its a very hectic day. I was ready in my Onam dress by around 9 and i roamed around the kitchen when i got an order from Sweety and Vini "We need shredded coconut, fast!!! All our remaining dishes need that." It was a fun ride, going into all american stores in mundu, looking for shredded coconuts. No desi store opens before 12 on Sunday in charlotte. So after a lot of curious looks, i finally found coconut in a chineese shop (our brothers... remember India China bhai bhai). With that in kitchen, the ladies started their work and i got into host mode.

A major success for the sadhya was to keep the non food committee members away from kitchen till food is ready. For that i took the help of Bread Machine Mr.Kuriappa. He was woken up from bed and given 2 full packets of bread and jam. Adimakkanu Kuri did a perfect job from bed itself. Also we prepared tea for everyone. So who ever got up was given bread and tea which kept them away from kitchen. Another mission successful. Some work was offshored (in the house families were staying) by the food committee. To make rice for 17 ppl in batches and prepare 100 pappadams. So we took 4 guys and started that work. Why 4!! to play cards in between ofcourse!. Another set of guys were in charge of cutting Vazha Ila for the sadhya.

Once food was ready and when everyone was in their Onam dresses, it was time for the much awaited Onam Sadhya. Don't you want to hear the items. Upperi, Pappadam, Pazham, Choru, Parippu, Neyy, Manga Achar, Puli Inchi, Olan, Kalan, Pachadi, Kitchadi, Koottukari, Cabbage Thoran, Erisseri, Aviyal, Sambhar, Rasam, Pacha Moru, Parippu Payasam, Ada Pradhaman. Except Upperi everything prepared by our Pachakam committee and their adimakanns. Kudos girls! Believe me, it was awesome.

Highlights during Onam Sadhya (if i write every incident that happened during the feast, this will like ramayanam... divided in so many parts.. malayalathil paranjaal kaandam kaandam aaye ezhuthanam).

• First Man Sitting Award : Vini, host or not, food committee or not, my wife is always the first.
  
• Aakrantham (Can't control) Award : Kshema, Sorry couldn't control, by the time one round of parippu was served and everybody looking at each other, lets start? she is already finished. Can't blame you! blame to pachakam committee.
  
  
• Cleanest Ila Award : Ratheesh as usual. Except for the one small banana skin, there was nothing left in his ila. Anto, Mathew, Priyan, Koshy everyone tried, but couldn't compete with Ratheesh. He was perfect.



• Last Man Sitting Award : The most prestigious of the awards goes to Mathew Thomas. Kuriappa and Priyan were fighting with Mathai till the end. When audience started cheering and pressure became too much, Kuriappa retired. Priyan was almost ready to give up, then Mathew being a good sport, shared his secret. "Eda, even if your stomach is full, it takes 5 minutes for the signal from stomach to reach brain. So before that fill your stomach with more food." Priyan tried, but failed. Mathai was declared the winner and it toom some effort from all of us for him to get up from his seat.

After this huge task, people retired to their resting positions. Punjabi house DVD playing in TV and everyone in front of it sleeping was a good enough declaration of how good the feast was. Ratheesh's friend Vinayan also dropped in around 4pm.

Part IV

Jabaaz Onam 2007 Charlotte II

Part I
Saturday Sept 1, 2007 : The Preparation Begins...

Its no joke to prepare lunch for 17 people. Especially an Onasadhya (Onam feast) to 17 hungry mallus who are away from home in a foreign land. So to get the raw materials for this Herculean task, we started shopping at Saturday morning. Mootta, Devu and us went to farmers market in charlotte. Since it was a long weekend, the crowd was much less. I guess all desi crowd was out of charlotte visiting the must see spots in US. Well, hands down, charlotte is not one of them. But for the 17 mallus who are in town, we plan to make this trip a memorable one.

Next stop was Asian Groceries run by a mallu. We had ordered Vazha Ila (Banana leaves) for Onasadhya -- can't have sadhya without it. While shopping we were constantly mentioning Sweety's name, who is coming from Jackson, Mississippi. She is in pachakam (cooking) head committe and had decided on the menu with strict instructions to purchase from the list given. So the owner of the shop got curious and asked who is coming. Is she like an authentic brahmin girl who is so strict in cooking Onasadhya according to the standards. Sweety's stories started spreading in charlotte hours before she is even in town. Well this onam is going to be fun. We all agreed on that.

After a heavy lunch and enough rest, the girls - Devu, Shimna and Vini started the preparations for the sadhya. In original plan, saturday's dinner was supposed to be outside, since we didn't want to disturb the girls and take up the kitchen from them. But Mootta had a great idea. He said we will just have a little rice and little cherupayaru thoran (moong dal curry). Its so easy, we can prepare this in minutes. This seemed like a good idea at first for many and Koshy took up the initiative. But like any other meals, the menu increased in minutes and he found himself cooking rice, chicken curry and thoran. And you would have guessed, Mootta was no where to be seen near the kitchen.

No act like this goes unpunished in Jabaaz. Once mootta was back after picking up Ratheesh and Priyan, he was punished. Because of presence of his wife Devu, his sentenced was reduced from kicks to 101 eethams (situps with both hands on ear). This was a warning for all such future ideas. The next lucky one was priyan. He was guilty of not attending to chicken curry, even though he was specifically instructed. Nobody else did, but that is out of the scope of discussion. He was sentenced to do the task of Adimakannu (slave -- a term awarded to Renjimon in 2005 Onam).

All night Priyan was washing dishes thrown at him by the pachakam committee. And to top it all, vini was examining the dishes he washed for the "squeak" sound by rubbing her finger. But since Jabaaz were happy with his performance, he was given "In memories of Renji mon -- Adimakannu Award". We called Renjimon at night 12 to wish Happy Onam. Since he didnt come for this Onam and ran away from the responsibility of hosting it, it was decided he shouldnt sleep either.

The next batch to arrive was Sweety, Sumesh and Kuriaparampil. Kuriaparampil had taken a bus from Dallas to Jackson and from there all 3 of them drove to charlotte. Sorry one correction, Sumesh and Kuri drove and Sweety provided the entertainment, by speaking. Sumesh was meeting all of us for the first time and like JAKKI he too had such a wonderful experience. He was like the new groom who married a girl from a big joint family. The relatives are always too much to handle and poor Sumesh inherited so many Jabaaz by marrying Sweety. Even though he was initially surprised, i think ( hope!!! ) by the end he learned to live with us.

Last to arrive was Kshema and Ashwin from Seattle. With the whole gang in place, the party was rocking. The kitchen was in full swing, with all 5 girls busy in cooking. There was always a group of 4 or 6 playing cards. And since we had so many artists among us, there was always music in the air. Ashwin, Koshy, Priyan and Devu being the stars. Pachakam committee decided to call it a day (or night or early morning) around 2AM. Families settled into their house but bachelors stayed for another hour playing cards and also watching my college cd which had many of the guest list members in their old unrecognisable shape.

Part III

Jabaaz Onam 2007 Charlotte I

Friday Aug 31, 2007 : Guests are arriving........

"This silence is killing me. I didn't even want to go inside, its so empty." Vini was sitting outside of our apartment. I was returning after dropping the last batch of our guests to Charlotte airport. The 3 day Onam celebration at our house was officially over.



Onam celebrations have become Jabaaz's tradition now. Even though Jabaaz gang which initially consisted of us 6 roomies in Chennai, now is more of a huge mallu gang with six of us , our family and our friends and their family and their friends and so on. The lucky ones to host this event were us in 2005 and Jeggu Mon in 2006. Onam 2007 was all set for Minneapolis at Renji's house when he and Juny decided to escape to India rather than face this torture (they say the reason is visa, but we don't believe it). So we got to host it again. So Jabaaz Onam 2007 stage was finalised as The Queen City Charlotte.


The Onam list was ever increasing and finally settled at count 17 including us. The first guests to arrive was Mootta (means bed bug.. his nick name is Renjith) and wife Devu on Friday eve. Since we had more guest coming that night, we decided to prepare a mallu dinner with beef fry. Guest no3 Koshy was arriving from Atlanta to his friend Jeejesh's place at night and promised to pick Chicago gang from airport comprising of Mathai, Anto and Renjith John.


I need to side track for a moment to tell about Jeejesh. On thursday, Mathai called me. "Good news, 2 more people are joining us for Onam lunch,Jeejesh and his wife Shimna. No problem with you right?" "Do i have a choice? Thanks for letting me know this early." "Its okay, no need for thanks. Anyway note his mail id. Let me spell it out (in mallu accent) JAKKI ELEFANT ELEFANT JAKKI ELEFANT SAAMM HARRRRY @gmail.com" Did not imagine at that moment that this name would be one of the highlights of Onam. Poor Jeejesh who was meeting 14 of the 17 people at our house for the first time was hence forth called only as "JAKKI ELEFANT ELEFANT JAKKI ELEFANT SAAMM HARRRRY" or sometimes in short as "JAKKI ELEFANT".





Koshy and JAKKI picked up Chicago gang whose flight was delayed by 2 hours and dropped at our house at night 2.30AM. At night Mathai had called specifically and said no need to prepare dinner. But i don't think he remembered that at night, he was in "Must eat dinner, Must eat dinner" mode. So after attacking beef fry at night, we settled into bed at early morning around 4AM. All bachelors were staying at my house and families at our friend's house who were out of town.

Part II

Life in a box : Funda Ek : Planning & Prioritization

Disclaimer : All characters in "Life in a box" are fictional. But any resemblance to actual places, incidents, situations, persons may be intentional :-).

"I hate my work", Vini said while throwing her purse at the sofa. "Such a bad day, i didn't get a chance to take a break for even 5 minutes today. I am telling you, they are killing us."

I smiled. Its fun to imagine the role reversal that has happened in our life. My new box is cool and Vini's really hectic. I come back everyday at five, make tea for both of us and relax in front of TV watching "Everybody loves Raymond" while she struggles to come back by seven and prepare dinner for us. Atleast that is the story since i left my old box... where we never stopped working for them.

"You know what happened today", She started her day's story by sipping the tea. This is the daily routine now and i love it. Three months of life apart was really horrible. Nobody to talk once at home and she wants to give me up to date news, everyday as soon as it happens.

"I am being swamped at work. My plate is always full. There is always so much to do and worst there is no shortage of new work. I hate it, how you used to manage da, I am sick of it. I think i will quit."

I smiled. I can sense a session of fundas by Aneeshji coming up. The very ones which have helped me live my life peacefully, at least to an extend, in my old box. But let me better be sure that she needs it before i start lecturing it on her. She after all is not just another men-tee, she is my wife. The difference i have learned the hard way. None of the other men-tee's shout back when i go overboard with my fundas.

"Today i was in three production issues. And i am given more work. If i go to my manager saying i am loaded, he will say plan and prioritize. All the work doesn't have to be done now itself. Arrey, after all i have to do all the work right? I am tired, you tell me how should i handle that. How should i say NO to work? I don't want to work like this. Will i get a job in your company, I also want to relax like you do."

Well, is she meaning i have no work? Grrrrrrrrrrr... In my words i have "less" work. How less, well, i don't need to tell you folks. We are not discussing about me remember. She is in for a session today, i don't think, i can avoid it today. Vini, this is your lucky (or unlucky!!!) day. I am gonna open the doors to one of the most important lessons to survive in the box, especially when there is no shortage of work. Funda Number Ek (one) : Planning & Prioritizing.

"Vini, relax di, the situation is nothing bad, what he told is right. You just need to plan and prioritize properly. You should be able to get control of the situation which you are in."

"Oh, you also criticize me. Its all my fault right. Not that people giving us work are wrong, its all our fault." I told you right, wife is different from a regular men-tee, i am yet to fully learn that. I get carried away all the time. But sorry dear, you are gonna get the full session, i have already started. May be a lighter language might help, my brain told me.

"No i am not saying that dear, look at me. When you go to your manager, forget him, suppose i am the lead, if you come to me saying you are loaded with work, you can't take up something i have assigned you, i will ask you one question. -- WHY? "

"I know, he does the same. I just can't take it up ok. Why i should be killed with work or what? Don't smile as if i don't know anything."

"Don't get emotional da, there is no need or use for that in our profession. If you know the question WHY will be asked, don't get upset. Just have the answer to it with you. Have the data to back up WHY you can't do. Very important to bring data to the table while discussing anything. Without data, its just argument. You provide the same arguments with DATA to back it, you can see how much more of an impact it has."

"But how can i show that i can't take this work. All the other work are in different phases. I can never prove i can or cannot do this work. It is not so simple as you say."

"Well, before we close ourself saying we cannot take this work, lets analyse for a moment what are the work you have and whether you can take this work or not."

"Anhaaaaaaaa, now u r going to convince me to do it, rather than supporting me."

Did i mention about the wife factor yet??? "Not like that dear, hear me first. Have you heard about Stephen R. Covey and his book The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People."

"Nope". "In that book he describes a habit called Put First Things First. In that he describes a framework in concentrating on the long term important goals instead of doing things which appear to be urgent but are really less important. He explains it using a 2x2 matrix - using a cartesian co-ordinate system with urgent non-urgent in one axis and important non-important in another. Learn this dear, this is your holy bible for Time Management."
"QI - we don't have a choice. It has to be done. QII is the part i love. Here the tasks are not urgent yet, but they are slowing on the path to move to QI. Finishing them before reaching QI is the challenge and the trick. The success of our planning depends on it. QIII - not important not urgent. We shouldn't be doing this one unless 2 conditions - No other work :-) or you feel it is gonna be QIV pretty soon. QIV - the more no of tasks there ,the higher the level of failure in your planning. Never let a task migrate from QIII to QIV. Never be forced to do less important stuff just because it is urgent, when ideally you should spend that time focussing on long term important tasks in QII."

"This stuff looks interesting, but you didn't tell me how it will help in reducing my work. I need a magic for that. DATA as you say to back my decision to say NO."

"Patience my dear Vinikutty, Every day morning, you fill this matrix with your tasks. Ideally it should have more in QII and QIII and less in QI and QIV. Attack the tasks so that you will reach a position where your goals are long term. When every new work comes, religiously put it in this matrix. When you new task comes, you will be in a position to say, what impact it will have when you accept it. Whether it will cause some tasks to move from QII to QI or QIII to QIV or whether it will affect any QI or QIV tasks which would be deadly. That my lady love is the DATA you are looking for."

Finally i could see a small reflection of smile in her face. I could sense that she has suppressed her wife feelings to throw it at my face because she can and has accepted it as a good learning to implement it in her work.

I think this is the right time to say it, i have been waiting to say this from the time she came, let me say it before it is too late. "Honey, i am hungry :-) Can you make dinner now." Yeah fundas are over and husband aneesh is back. I watch her with a smile as she rolls her eyes in "oh my god, this guy!!!!!" expression and walks to the kitchen. I switched on the TV and Sanjaya Malakar was singing his guts out. Back to the normal life, outside the box........!!!!!!!!!

A Journey to the Smokies : On our Second Anniversary

April 10... Second anniversary is coming, need to plan something special for Vini. This thought was in my mind for some days. "The idea for a perfect gift : Give something which he/she wants to do for a long time, but wont do it them self". I don't know remember from where i heard this, but it sure is a great way to arrive at a good gift.

A romantic get away :-) Yep i liked that one best from my list. She always wanted to get away for a weekend, to stay in a resort and be pampered. So this anniversary is gonna be that weekend. Just needed to decide the place and resort. Eight Gables Inn, Gatlinburg in Smoky Mountains was the place to be.. where we are gonna celebrate our second anniversary.

We were really surprised to realise that this was the first trip in US where it is going to be just the two of us. Let me make it more interesting, I gave her one more gift. I promised her i will be less of a control freak, less of a hyper active person for the whole weekend. No maps with spots which we need to visit, no yelling at her to get ready at the exact time, no intention of doing every single thing i have planned for the trip - when nothing is planned :-) that risk is avoided.

So with just the map of the way to Eight Gables Inn, we started at around 11am Friday, April 6. It was a beautiful drive. Driving through Carolina and Tennessee. On the drive through I-40 W the spring was too beautiful and tempting. "Lets stop and take some photos". "What" the control freak inside me yelled. We never stop till we reach our destination, thats me :-). But not today. We stopped at 3-4 times on our way, we were taking photos in front of someone's home, back yard, being barked at by their dogs. It was real fun. It sure made Vini happy. "I can't even believe this is my husband".

In between Google maps confused us. We roamed around 30 min trying to find the way to Gatlinburg as soon as we entered Tennessee. After finding out the right way by calling the resort, we thought we will have lunch. We had decided we are going to have lunch from some American restaurant only, no fast food or desi hotel. And we got one too. "The Bean Trees", on Tennessee border in I-40W was just the place. It was started by 4 women and now 2 of the founding ladies continued to run it. The sign board inside the restaurant said "Bad Food, Slow Service, Great Place". I don't agree to the first, but the next 2 statements were right :-). We played Dominoes and had great food. It was really refreshing.

Eight Gables Inn, Bread & Breakfast was all that we were hoping for and more. Amazing room with fireplace, feathertop beds and a bathroom equipped with whirlpool tubs. Our suite was called "The Morning Glory". After checking in, we went to Gatlinburg downtown and shopped for sometime. While walking through the town, we couldn't skip the "Old Times Photo" stores. We checked it out and this was an experience which was hard to resist. We had a blast shooting those photos. Vini just loved holding those guns and of course the fact that she was aiming at me. Even the photographer commented "Look at how happy she is to shoot at you!!". "Its just two years, i can't imagine what she will do after some more". This sure was the highlight of our trip.

We retired to our room at night where our desserts where waiting. After slipping on our robes we spent some time relaxing in the whirlpool tub. This sure was turning out to be worth the money we spent.

We went to see the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in spring, to see all the trees blossoming. But it had other plans. It snowed so heavily on Friday night and Saturday, we could hardly get to Dining room for Saturday, April 8, morning breakfast. We were greeted with a hot cup of coffee/tea and then by a hearty breakfast. It sure cleared Vini's impression that Americans eat only cornflakes for breakfast.

After that it was massage time. It was our first experience but surely will not be the last. It was really relaxing and an amazing experience. Eric and Marcel, of course lady for me and guy for Vini, had magic in their hands. The board in which we could write comments were filled with one like "Eric, will you marry me","You guys are awesome" :-).

Saturday night, we had our candle light romantic dinner. We don't know whether we had a "romantic" dinner or not. We were our usual self :-) chatting away of all the stupid things like we do when we are alone. We hope were not a disturbance for the other couple, on their honeymoon, having a "romantic" dinner :-). After the four course dinner, we ordered our champagne to the room. Yeah!!! I know the people who know us are raising their eye brows. Champagne and us :-). Well it was in the package, and we sure didn't want to miss it. I opened it and spraying it all over. I always wanted to do that!!! We tasted it and as i expected hated it :-). Sorry champagne lovers, i don't think we are not fit for the champagne rather than otherwise.

Sunday morning, we went to Clingman's dome in Smoky Mountain National Park. It was an amazing drive, with mountains fully covered with snow. We stopped in between for a trail down to the river, for playing in the snow and ice. Once we reached the Clingman's dome after a tiring 2 mile hike in the cold, we called it a day for our trip :-). It was time for start our journey back.

On our way back, relaxed me was making all the mistakes i usually don't. Not driving carefully, forgetting wallet in the car while going out, forgetting to take the credit card after paying. "What is happening to You?" "Well, you wanted me relaxed, non hyper. This is that Aneesh". "Enough of that gift, please come back to your normal behavior". Yeah, at that moment we realised vacation is over :-) and its time to get back to our normal life.

Before we checked out of the Inn, we were writing our memories into the guest book in our room. I browsed through it and a couple of entries were hard to forget. One was written by a couple who had just lost their young son. "It is the first time we are alone after our great loss. This place has given us an atmosphere where we can grieve our son without any disturbance. Thanks for all the help in getting us back to normal." Another one was "We are celebrating our 55th wedding anniversary. Thanks for making it really special."......
55 years :-) well 2 over, 53 to go.... we can sure give it a try...

Some more fotos....