Joys of gardening

Summer is here finally! I long for the sunny days all though chilly, windy winters. This time is definitely fun, all the more so because I have a backyard now in our new house where I can connect to the earth, doing work planting, nurturing plants, watching them grow-this is the stuff I love to do. I can just sit and savor with my eyes the blooms around me. I can say nature is therapeautic.

I have sowed some seeds for vegetables, hoping I can grow them organically. There are some bright pink roses erupting with all their color in our backyard. The purple colored osteospermums in the front yard have already did their turn this season in flowering; it took me a while to notice them, as they were already planted when we moved into the house and I was then too busy to notice the beauty! I have planted some pink Mexican primroses, which I had borrowed from someone; they have already died but are supposed to revive aplenty from the ground.

I have just begun, and I am so looking forward to a full summer of garden love:)

Decodaquote

I am addicted to solving the daily newspaper puzzles. The decodaquote is my favorite. In this puzzle you have to solve a jumble of letters to reveal words that make the quote. Some quotes are really great. I remember a few of these notable ones:

I saw an angel in the marble and carved until I set him free. Michelangelo

Some people have money and some people are rich. Coco Chanel

Vegetarian is an old Indian word for a lousy hunter!

No politician in India has the courage to say that cows can be eaten. Indira Gandhi

A thousand splendid suns

A thousand splendid suns is the second novel by Khaled Hosseni who has earlier written the Kite Runner (I liked the movie better than the novel). It is the story of how ordinary lives have been torn apart by the turbulent state of affairs in Afghanistan and this novel tells us that it is the woman who ultimately suffers the most. A mother losing her children to war, a single woman left all alone to fend off for herself, atrocities on women in pro male society, illetracy among women. But then this is the same woman who carries on living with a hope in her heart that she clings on to and weathers through her difficulties. It is the simple things in life that brings her cheer like the birth of a child or like the longing for a child.

Its a great book that I could not put down. It is a heartbreaking story mostly but carries a lot of hope. So much hope and faith in God that the family who suffered so much and left the country, came back to Afghanistan when the Taliban were ousted. I have to mention that the descriptions of the cooking of the kebabs , shorwa and tandoori roti made my mouth water all the time as I read along! That writers have an eye for details and describe so attentively the mundane things is very endearing.

To bee or not to bee

"The power of mind is to perceive differences and the power of heart is to perceive similarities."

The above line is from the book- To bee or not to bee, an inspirational book by John Penberthy that I read today. It is a small book with lots of drawings and quick to read in just under an hour. It tells the story of a young bee whose mind is full of questions and is looking for answer to the biggest mystery of life-the why of it all and why he has to "bee". It is this quest that takes him to a journey towards understanding of life as it is. Things may not seem perfect as they are but as the quote from the book says- perfection is a state of mind and not a state of affairs. The book tells beautifully how to look at life from a spiritual perspective and how everything is connected by a Universal Force. A beautiful read to refresh your moods!

5 people you meet in Heaven

5 people you meet in heaven by Mitch Albom.

I had heard a lot about this book when it came around and there was a movie also made on this (Ain't Hollywood quick on making movies, killing desire to read?). I was quite reluctant to read it as I am not too much into fiction these days and I thought it would be preachy.
I bought this book in library book sale for real cheap, I buy books from the sale on the spur for a chance at reading them. This one got the chance as it is pretty thin book ( there are a lot of unread books on my bookshelf, their volume is too daunting) and I finished it real fast. I began reading book on low expectation and quickly developed interest as I read along. The story is pretty simple, but it is made interesting by the suspense created by how the story enfolds and when the facts are presented. And along with the story, there are some beautiful thoughts about life-about sacrifice, love, forgiveness, emotions.

Since this was a used book, the book came to me with thoughtful lines already marked! Here is a beautiful prose from it about love and that it is forever:

Lost love is still love. It takes a different form. You cant see their smile or bring them food or tousle their hair or move them around a dance floor. But when those senses weaken, another heightens. Memory. Memory becomes your partner. You nurture it. You hold it. You dance with it. Life has to end, love doesn't.

The take home message of this book is: life that anyone lives is not unimportant. Each human is part of a whole, and gives something to that whole through his/her life. A very effective book.

Summer reads

I was in back home in India this summer for a couple of months and here was my opportunity to catch up on my much longed for reading activity. So I did read a few books. My first read was the autobiography of the Mahatma. It was very interesting to read about the "Mahatma" as an ordinary human being, who was struggling with his own fears and trying to find the answers to life's questions. Hence the tiltle of his book is "My experiments with truth". It is amazing to note that he describes his innate fear of speaking, but eventually he overcame it to accomplish great deeds of courage. This one was a pretty big book of about 500 pages. This translation by Navjivan trust (Gandhi's autobiograpy was originally written in Gujarati) seems hard to read as the language is too wordy.

Next I read the two bestsellers by Malcom Gladwell-Blink and The tipping point. Both are very interesting books. Both talk about how seemingly insignificant/small things in life matter so much. In blink, he talks about the first instinct and in The Tipping Point he talks about small ideas that can be big. And it is not just real examples that he talks about and theorizes, he supports them with evidence from researches. Both books are good food for thought.

My last read was Superstar India by Shobha De. I am amazed that I finished this book for all it kitschy and gossipy qualities. On the other hand I found myself laboring to move from one page to another of The Argumentative Indian by Amartya Sen, for all its intellectuality. Against the title, Superstar India actually is a trash talk on India, with just one point in support of India-family values. I would'nt want to read such content in a book titled "Superstar" India. Shobha De fooled me with the title.

Currently I am reading "Wild Swans" by Jung Chang. Since I am back in US and my reading is on a halt, I wonder if my summer reads would be all that I read this year!

Coming into world of video games.

I am writing this blog while someone is playing Call of Duty on the PS3:) After going between yes and no for long, finally husband bought the PS3. And on top of that, he also bought a Nintendo DS and that too within a span of 2 days! And with them came some days of argument over the use of such time and money squandering devices. I was furious.

As the heat cooled off, I was cajoled into giving it a try, and started playing the New Super Mario on the DS. Now, after completing the game, I must admit that I was hooked. After all it is like a virtual adventure -finding your way towards a goal with thrills of becoming victorious over mean enemies along the way. Wish life was like that.....you knew your goal and enjoyed the journey towards reaching the goal.