love thy neighbour not!

Good, Bad or Ugly? What defines my neighbour better!? Now that is left for you to decide once I am done with narrating my tale.
I have been living in the same apartment now for over 5 months, right from the day I set foot on American soil and that, I guess gives me enough time and authority to judge people living around me.

We(my husband and I) live in a small place called Lake Hiawatha, and the apartments we stay in are the oldest(literally speaking, we have an old dilapidated box for an AC) in the place, and obviously the most reliable,considering the number of years they have housed people! They are comfortable and decent apartments with just one teeny weeny problem. Like most of the apartments around this area, the parking lots are not alloted to each individual house, anyone (obviously people belonging to the apartments) can park anywhere and so can their friends and family (I know, now I sound like a verizon wireless ad!).
Just four families share a parking area with 6 slots, not so difficult you may think, but the fact is some families own more than one car and hence the botheration!!
Having explained all that, I guess I can move on to relate the actual details. We are an outgoing lot, my husband and I, and simply love going out late in the night on long drives, just listening to the radio station with a hot cup of coffee (more like a keeping the driver, my husband, awake thingy!) in hand. So, most of the time our car is not in the parking lot nearest to our house, well, we never crib, finders keepers right?! But that is simply not the case with our neighbours, an eccentric mallu family (nothing against the community!) with two blessed cars, always watching out for parking slots nearest to their house. Nothing wrong, unless you start obsessing about it!
This is exactly how they go about their task:
The lady of the house or the man for that matter, always keep an eye on the parking lots. Most of the time, they have their cars parked next to each other, right in front of the house, like the rest of us residents are car thieves. God forbid, for some inevitable reason if they had to park elsewhere, be it at 2:30 in the morning or 7:00 in the evening, they are always watchful and ready to switch their cars into parking slots that are available in front of their house.
That is exactly where our hate relationship comes in. Every time we leave the house, and if ever we were to have a good parking spot, the "mallus" are always ready to devour it! No matter what time we leave, when we get back, the "woman" would have occupied our space. We would have probably left the house for just 5 mins, and you could still find her car in that very spot. Isn't it quite unlikely that the woman or her husband manage to get back home during the very 5 mins that we are away, every time?!
Recession is the only reason because of which we haven't moved away from their idiocracy!
Nevertheless, today happens to be a triumphant day for us. We found their cars, next to each other, this morning when we left for the beach. By the time we got back home, for some reason unknown to normalcy, lady mallu had to leave her parking slot, and so, even though there was a slot a few slots away from her husband's car, we chose to leave our car right where she had previously parked it. "Revenge is sweet" and I am enjoying every moment of it!

Art Vanda lay

People, specially the normal ones, face "spots" where they have to come up with stories of sorts! Allow me to explain:

A hypothetical situation,
You are running late for a get-together, something that is really not worth attending and yet you are compelled (due to some unspoken misfortune!) to endure the rendezvous, you tend to delay. And then, at some point, when you actually reach the scene of gather, you are to give a good reason for your absence till that moment. Now, that is when you will have to come up with the perfect cover for your hold up ("stories of sorts")!

So, technically speaking, you are about to lie, and when you are at it, it better be good.
It is at such moments that you can always count on "Art Vanda lay" !?
Now, who is he? Well, he is an anybody, a somebody and a nobody!!

I first got to know Art Vanda lay, while I was watching an episode of Seinfeld. I am an addict, if I may call myself so, of the daily sitcom and I thoroughly enjoy the "sick humor" that is prevalent in abundance! Art Vanda lay is a phony or "the perfect alibi" that George Costanza (a character in the sitcom) summons every time he is in need of a decent lie!
Let me elaborate:
Art Vanda lay works on the 17th floor of the(any building for that matter and your building may probably have just 15 floors, but that doesn't matter!!) building, is an architect of sorts, and dribbles in a potpourri of activities. He could be a latex merchant(given the scenario, specially when you are looking out for references for your resume!!) willing to hire you, or probably just a friend you went to visit, when instead you could have accompanied your mother shopping, you get the idea I guess!!
Ergo, for the normal people I was referring to, it is but natural to land in sticky situtations. So take my advice and create your very own Art Vanda lay, it pays!?!

birds of the same gender..?!

Days of abstract nothingness means loads of orkut, some amount of facebook, a little yahoo mail, some gtalk and well rejuvenation of my brain cells!
So, I sat one day(as I have been doing more often, off late) busy "orkutting" ,as many people may put it, thumbing through virtual pages for any new update I could lay my hands on, and voila, I had a new friend request!
New friends are always good to make, they don't seem to know much about you, they are all ready to explore, to build, only too eager to make it work and after all it does reflect on the how-socialable-you-are statistics! But, there is also something about new friends, after a while, you always end up finding them a little too intrusive(atleast I do! I donot take to new people that easily, I am a territorial person!), a darn little too irritating(the just not your type kinds, most of the time) and generally not interesting.
Now that I have very clearly explained my feelings towards "new friends", you may better understand how sceptical I was, of the friend request, but all the same, a little curious to know if I could reciprocate the niceties. The request read and I quote "Hi, I'd like to be your fren, can u give me ur chat id, and by the way, you look really good in that skirt(meaning my profile pic)". It sounded pretty honest, and well I was flattered by the compliment. A girl(my bad, for not mentioning the gender detail before!) complimenting another is generally a rarity, and when it does happens, it just feels good. And so, I decided to visit her profile.
The beginning seemed pretty sane, she was a single girl, living with her partner(probably a live in relationship, I thought!) and then, there were the photos that I could look at, an album named "Passions" with a couple of pics of stilettos, and a woman in a saree (a model, perhaps and yet so weird!). Then, all of a sudden, something caught my eye, interested in said "dating(women)". I was actually being hit upon by a.. er.. differently oriented person (if I may put it so!)
How did it feel? I don't know! Something like that has never happened to me, was never taught to deal with it! I can still hear mommy saying "Keep away from boys" but girls?
Probably like Katy Perry's song, it is just:

Us girls we are so magical
Soft skin, red lips so kissable
Hard to resist so touchable
Too good to deny it
Ain't no big deal, it's innocent!

If you ask me, I'd say No comments!?! I am too busy living my life to care about gender orientation or disorientation for that matter, and for the record, I simply ignored her request!

India shining!

Yesterday, we(Me and 6 other people including my husband) were in the first temple that was built in the US of A, well I am talking about Pittsburgh's very own Sri Venkateshwara temple. The temple is a beautiful one situated on top of a hill, just like it's parent(Thirumala in Thirupathi!), called the Penn Hills and like all the other temples in the US, is owned by the "stinking lo rich" (a very telugu way of saying extremely rich, but well that is just another story!!) telugu community. I must admit, the temple has beautiful architecture and landscaping, with its very South Indianish looking domes.
But, well that is not really what this is about!
I went inside the temple and found a couple of white and black men, cleaning the temple! They were sweeping, mopping, laying tiles(u get the idea, I gss!!)and what not, without their shoes!!
To find catholics(or watever!), shoeless inside a temple, actually scrubbing the floors clean was quite a sight!!
I kinda synonymize India and Hinduism, because I truely believe that if it was not for the broadmindedness(sarcasm in oodles!!) of the Hindus, other religions would have never found their way into this country, and so I say India is shining!! we rock!! :)

.. and it started all over again..!

It has been a while since I took time.. out for myself, to sit tight and write. I have grown a year older, worked in a corporate, been promoted, gone trekking and married since the last time you heard from me.
It is very satisfying when I look back.. one year and I have done it all.. Well, if you may call it, an eventful life.