Sitting in the Dark for my favourite planet

8:40pm 29th of 2008 and my neighbourhood looks different, not a single light is on in any house. Its EARTH HOUR. I'm sitting in my room in the dark with my laptop running on its battery and the radio on its. Earth hour, an event that was started last year in sydney where residents and businesses turned their lights off for an hour to focus on our attention global warming and the environment. It has grown this year to include 200 cities across the globe. In the next few hours other cities will have their earth hour where they will turn their lights off.

Some critics may claim that an hour of turning our lights off will make no difference to the planet. I say its very important, if nothing it brings our attention to the important issues of global warming, to an ever increasing energy crisis and to our planets health in general. All too often we take energy for granted, especially in the developed world. Events like these turn our focus on the task at hand. The need for alternative sources of energy, the need for conservation of energy and most importantly the need for sustainable development.

Another less known advantage of such an hour is it gives the romantics amongst us the chance to have a nice candle lit dinner ;)

Don't forget to turn your lights off from 8-9pm tonite :)

meals i'm going to miss

Well, before i write about all the other things that i am going to miss about home I have to at least talk about all the good Sydney food that I'm going to miss terribly. Being a incurable foodie i have been spoilt growing up in Sydney. Without being biast i have to say the variety of food and fresh produce that is available in the city is amongst the best i have come across. This is mostly thanks to the many migrants from around the world that have made this place home. I remember in my kindergarten class I had kids from 25 different countries, so each lunch box had something quite exotic in it.

There are various areas in Sydney that serve authentic food from particular nations, the upside of ethnic ghetto living. So if i want to have authentic Turkish i head to the Turkish quarter, or yummy Vietnamese i head to a suburb where you feel like you are in Vietnam (well as far as the food is concerned). Here are some of my favorites...

• Malaysian : Laksa at 'Laksa King' - Laksa is a favourite noodle soup for sydney siders and is available at every food court. It is a spicy coconut milk based noodle soup with fragrant spices, can be quite hot.
  
• Turkish: 'Sofra' at Auburn. Makes the nicest Adana Kebabs - lamb kebabs marinated in spices, slow cooked over charcoal, served with turkish bread (close to the Indian Naan), onion and tomato salad with sumac(a middle eastern spice). Drink Ayran (Yogurt drink like lassi )with it.
• Vietnamese: Pho or Chicken noodle soup at Flemington or Cabramatta. A healthy option , and makes you feel better with warm clear chicken soup with noodles, mint, basil, fresh chillis and sprouts.
  
• Lebansese: Doner Kebab or Shewarma at every corner. Perfect for a late night meal, slow roasted chicken wrapped in lebanese bread with Toubouli salad (my favourite) and homous.
  
• Thai :Curries (red/green/yellow). Thai food has become pub food in Sydney. Being the most popular food here. Great option for vegetarians as they do veggie food well.
  
• Greek : Dolamades - marinated rice wraped in wine leaves, kalmatta olives, slow cooked lamb souvlaki.
• Italian : Wood fired pizzas and lasagna and Cappocino anywhere in Leichhardt or Five Dock..
• Chinese : Sydney's Chinatown .. some things i'm still too afraid to try but the sizzling plates are nice.
• Other : Crepes, meat pies, baked potatoes, nachos ..

Hmm.. all this food talk has made me quite hungry.

Although i'm going to miss all this food i am quite excited about exploring Hyderabad and its food secrets. Have got myself the Times Food Guide to Hyderabad and will surely be checking out some places .. will post my thoughts on these.

Last few days here will be spent eating up all the stuff I'm going to miss ;)

To do or not to do .....

Only 10 days to go now before I head to India and my to-do list just seems to be growing by the second. I'm sure everyone making there way back to school must be going through a similar phenomenon. This morning i got up after the extra-long easter weekend and thought i should get through some items on my to-do list..Left my house this morning at 8:20 am..

1. Go to doctor to get eyes checked .. ended up waiting one hour even though i had an appointment. Almost got a parking ticket cause i had only paid for an hour.
2. Go to library to return books
3. Ring Airlines to change flight date (on hold for 35mins, cordless battery ran out,done)
4. Ring Gym to cancel membership (have to send them some signed letter etc)
5. Collect Laptop battery from courier (arrived with free gift)
6. Confirm dentist appointment (confirmed)
7. Check what the markets are doing today .. (looking green today, thank god)
8. Arrange and Make booking for Friday party .. (done)
9. Ring tax office to find out about this years early lodgement..
10. Ring to arrange a gardener ..
11. Put insurance on hold ..
12. Renew car on road support membership ...
13....
14...

The to-do list just seems to grow faster as you work on it more .. reminds me of the trees that i prune in my garden.

As a wise man once said .. you can never get rid of your to-do list but you can learn to live it ;)

Change rooms need to change

I went shopping today for some clothes. I had to visit the dreaded change rooms which is the least fun bit about the whole shopping trip. Seems like when they design shops they pay very little attention to creating good change/fitting rooms.

To start of with there is usually a long line, then there is someone standing there who wants to know exactly how many pieces of clothing you have. When you finally get entry into the change room you find you have to learn the art of curtain closing, you spend 10 minutes getting it right (well almost right, who cares you think in the end). You then realise that you have 10 things and only one hook wah lah! so you end up putting half the stuff on the ground .. we all know what happens next so i won't go into the details ;)

If you think about it, the change rooms are a part of the shop where the largest bit of investment should be made since this is where the most critical decision is made , "should i buy this or shouldn't I". I presume the better the experience the more things a customer tries on, the greater potential to make that sale. What would make the change room experience better for you?

3 weeks to go.

I sit in my bedroom tonight and I hear ..

the gumtrees make rustling noises in the strong wind outside,
the possom knocking on my roof as he/she does every so often in the night,
faint gun shots from my brother's room from some crazy computer game he is playing,
the murmur of my small table fan which is about to die after years of service,
and the sheer silence of the night.

It still seems a bit unreal that in three weeks time, on a similar monday evening my ears will be privy to a new set of sounds .. not sure what they will be .. will let you know :)

History ... whats the point?

History to many brings back memories of a much dreaded subject at school. How they had to learn an endless number of dates, names of people and event gone by.. What's the point?

Last night i was watching the movie 'Gandhi' an historial account of the great man and his works. It reminded me of how we sometimes are so engrossed in getting to the future that we forget the all important past, a treasure of insights. So why is the past so important?

What makes history interesting (and very important) is not 'when' it happened (1800 or 1850 makes no a difference when we are in 2008) but 'WHY' it happened. 'Who' was the actual doer is far less significant then 'HOW' it was done. Take for example the partition in 1947 the most important parts of this event is not when or who but how it was excuted, how so many lifes were lost and most importantly why it ended up being one of the bloodiest mass migrations in history. Similary if we ask these questions of the great wars we come to gain many insights into human behaviour.If we don't acknowledge the mess that was created how will we work towards ensuring that the mess is never recreated. Looking at the good and the bad leaders in history we better understand what sort of leadership is effective and what type of leadership needs caution. If we don't understand how Hitler came to be, how can we recognise another one in the making.

Just as from our personal life we have successes and mistakes and we learn many lessons from these. Similarly we have many lessons to learn from humanity's successes and failures. For the more scientifically inclined, history is like the results of a great many experiments carried out over time, results which should not be ignored.

Although we all have the previledge of shaping the future we also have the responsibility of learning from the past because they say 'History has a way of repeating itself'.

Downunder had a hot Indian Summer

This Summer here in Australia was what could be termed as a 'hot Indian Summer' and not because of the mercury. In fact it was one of the coolest summers if we are to trust our thermometers, however we all know differently.. yes folks I'm talking about the cricket season that has just gone past.

Thought I would share with you a what living in Australia as an Indian cricket supporter is like. Being part of the 'Swamy army' here in Australia is not an easy task, its like being on the front line. Each Indian supporter feels the pain when India looses matches. In india they analyse and whinge and re-analyse.. But those of us who live downunder can't get up and forget it the next day.

A typical Day after an India Loss: As soon as i walk into work i have a few emails waiting for me reminding me how India lost the match..then i walk into the coffee room and someone asks me (with a cheeky smile on their face ) if i have read the sports section this morning.. finally when i make it to my desk i have a few visitors who want to discuss how good the Australian cricket team played how they are the world champions .. on my way home i pick up the evening news paper and it talks about how the India lost.. as you can imagine I never look forward to the mornings after India has lost a big game to Australia. But its not all doom and gloom, for everything i get i give back with interest :) ..waiting for that elusive win, making sure i forward a few headlines to people and make my visits to various desks and bring up the topic of cricket :)..

Might I add that its all in the right spirit. We all have a good laugh about it. Growing up in Aussieland we take our sport seriously, and that's about all we take seriously.

This summer well it was no different except hotter and spicier just like a good madras curry or as we would say in Aussie slang 'the indians gave the aussies a bit of curry'. The controversies and the monkey business added fuel to aftermarth of a serving of curry and made for endless banter at friday drinks.
Some personal highlights for me from this summer include :-
- Watching India Vs Australia at the SCG in a sea of Blue with the constant beats of the Dhol.
- Being the only Indian supporter on a bus full of Sri Lankan supporters on way back from the Canberra game where India Lost to Srilanka. I was brave enough to keep my India T-shirt on. I think after surviving that ordeal i have come out a stronger person ;)
- Watching India collapse in the T20 with 5 other Indian families over Dinner, watching everyone loose their appetite and recieving 20 SMSs from my Aussie buddies.
- Reading the million and one articles the Aussie press wrote on Bhaji, its a love hate relationship.
- Last but not least Walking into work with the biggest smile on my face after India won the One-Day series.

Cricket they say was a dying sport here in Australia but thanks to a hot indian summer its alive and kicking!

Ah first times ...

They say there is a first time for everything .. so here it goes .. my first blog post in my first blog... are you the first reader ???

Here's to some of those first times ... difficult yet full of possibilities

• First day at school ... Thought: ' how beautiful is my new school bag and my cool new pencil case with all these new pencils '
• First crush ... Thought: 'oh how cute is he'
  
• First day at work ... Thought: 'I'm going to work my hardest and consequently do really well here'
• First heart break.. Thought:'The world is going to end. Its going to stop spinning'
• First sip of alcohol ... Thought:'Yuk, how can anyone pay for this stuff'
  
• First day of unemployment... Thought: 'yipee! i can sleep in'
  
• First blog entry ... Thought:'Geez just what have i signed up for'
  

Luckily there is always a second time :)