[S.T.D.]

Dear Naina_Marbus,

What I posted was the dilemma of a NRI Gujjubhai who is unable to forget India and fully merge with US. It is "severe" nostalgia with no solution. Bur what you have posted is a different cup of tea. The suffering of the writer of that piece of a letter can be any where. He can be even in India somewhere in the north. To get a girl who loves you(and whom you too love) as your wife is a rare gift of God. If that girl happens to be matured enough to- understand that people are made of positive and negative qualities, that old people have an ego which has also grown proportionate to their age, that people are to be loved despite their negative qualities, that people are just to be forgiven and whatever they have done to her is to be forgotten- then such a wife is the rarest of gift from God. Those who are not blessed with such a gift have to suffer and carry the burden.

I am blessed and so I am writing this.

Cheers.

[Big A]

dear raju !
nice to hear your fine words. you should also remember that
you can not satisfy all the people all the time. there are people who are not satisfied with what they got and they will blame for things which is not obtained.life is like cricket (nowadays T 20 ) and result is viewed by others. a true player will play the game for his own satisfaction.manaivi amaivathu ellam eraivan kodutha varam
guruvayurappan

[doctorzlo]

Dear Naina_Marbus,

.... that people are to be loved despite their negative qualities, that people are just to be forgiven
.

Nice response. It was literally close to what the moderator in that magazine provided...! As you say, one really has to be blessed...

[Raj_Copi_Jin]

……We can all learn and gain (certainly I can) from reading the different experiences…

Well put! I couldn't have said it better myself! That is the crux of the issue.

[HedgeYourBets]

I never really felt like an NRI cosI have been born brought up here for generations and a natural born citizen…..

So I am happy being in Malaysia and being nearby to India.

One can take a PIO out of India, but can’t take India out of a PIO ?

[HedgeYourBets]

Dear Sri. Naina, Greetings.

I refer to post #7. It may be quite possible, his parents gave very hard time to his brother too. I have a massive doubt... what is wrong if the parents go to an aged care facility? Why should the children feel guilty about that? I can't fathom that. Before someone tells me I have to experience it when I become older, I have to say I have worked in aged care facility for few years and I know how well they are pampared in such facilities. It is hard to look after them like that at home.

Cheers!

[Lillie_Steins]

Sowbagyavathy RR, Greetings.

I refer to your poem in post # 13. That poem is very nice.

I am not living in India either. I am not so keen about filtered coffee; but I get good quality coffee powder here and can make filitered coffee with great aroma.. do it once in a while when I have the mood ( I don't crave it regularly). I don't have much taste for bagles ( gives me heart burns). If I crave ponda, I can get that from frozen section and microwave it. But I don't like anything deep fried in oil ( including appalams. I microwave them. only rarely I deep fry appalams only if it is rice appalam).

I seldom cook pasta. Often times we cook pizza at home. but not regular though. When I am very tired, there would be no cooking... I just buy pizza may be twice a month?.. or something like that. I have the wet grinder; canmake idli anytime; but my children are not idli fans though. so, I don't want to go to the extensive exercise of making sambar/chutney etcjust for myself.. but I enjoy 'puttu' and my wife makes that often though.
There is a knack to cook that large கத்தரிக்காய். It is too soft and will get cooked within minutes. So when I cook sambar/kuzhambu, I almost finish everything and then put this கத்தரிக்காய் in; about 3 to 4 minutes later I turn off the heat and take the pot away.It gets cooked in the sambar heat itself.It takes about 3 to 4 hours for it to soak the flavours. It tastes great. I cook it twice every week ( besides I also get கத்தரிக்காய் just like the ones we get in India... only even more younger.. That tasts just superb!). I get nice long vendaikkai.. very expensive though. My wife only like வெண்டைக்காய் பொரியல்... even if I cook a kilo, just get only a little. ( to clean the 'pisukku', wear a mask, wear gloves, clear all the food iems away from kitchen, spray 'degreaser' lightly, leave it for 2 to 3 minutes and wipe it it out completly. Do it one a fortnight... no more 'pisukku'! For heavy 'pisukku', use 'oven cleaning degreaser'. They are quite heavy, gloves and mask a must use. ( send the children away. after spraying, leave the area for about 30 minutes. don't want that fumes in your lungs).

As you can see I don't miss much at all. ( I am going to cook கத்தரிக்காய் & butter beans kuzhambu and சௌ சௌ ( பெங்களூர் கத்தரிக்காய்) பொரியல் when I get off the computer!).

Cheers!

[S.T.D.]

Sri. Haridasa Siva, Greetings.

To get good thayir - use only 'full cream milk' ( or maximum cream that is available over there). The milk should be warm to touch ( if it is too hot, you will find water on top of curd; if it is too cold it takes too long to form curd if it did at all.. you can work it out by trail and error). Can use 'greek creamy yoghurt provide it contains culture; or can use sour cream ( don't use lite version though) with culture.. mix them liberally .( I use up to 3 table spoon s per liter of milk). Then cover milk in an airtigt container, close the lid. Wrap the whole cotainer in a blanket (multi layer) and put it away in a cupboard. Next day usually nice thick curd would be formed. If like it sour, use it after two days.. but I don't like it sour though!

Cheers!

[S.T.D.]

With reference to post #21.

I am blessed and so I am writing this. I am not blessed so, I can appreciate the value! Nice to know aout fortunate persons. Personally recently I gave up.

Cheers!

[doctorzlo]

..........Then cover milk in an airtigt container, close the lid. Wrap the whole container in a blanket (multi layer) and put it away in a cupboard. ........

Dear Raghy Sir,

My daughter-in-law makes curd even with regular milk. Boils milk for about 5 mts in a milk cooker (I hate the shrieking whistle, even

when kept in low flame - so will remove it!!) 'oRaguththufy' while warm and keep the vessel inside the oven - of course, NOT ON!!

Yummy curd will be ready next morning!

Note: She has taken the 'culture' from India!!

Regards.......

[softy54534]

Sowbagyavathy RR,

I refer to post #30. If the house or apartment is heated, keeping inside the oven may work. We don't even use heaters; houses here are not even meant for low temperatures. so, in winter, the whole place will be low in temperature, including inside the oven. That's why covering the vessel works. Regular milk is fine; but those 'lite milks' don't give good curd; where as 'extra cream milk' gives very nice creamy curd. Culture from India won't pass the customs in Australia.

Cheers!

[NeroASERCH]

........ Culture from India won't pass the customs in Australia.

Dear Raghy Sir,

You forgot your nice greetings!! (Just kidding!) I should ask my dear d i l, how she managed to take the 'culture' to Boston!

FYI, I took a small bundle of neem leaves to Boston, since one of our friends suggested to keep some leaves under the pillow
of the baby girl - my grand daughter. 'Packing technique' NOT to be written in a public forum!!

[Lillie_Steins]

Commercial yoghurt like amul or brittania (or any standard natural yoghurt, not the fruit variety) will work to start the first batch of home made thayir. This process worked abroad as well for me. Even now in india, after return from a fifteen day plus trip, the first home made thayir is made with purchased yoghurt. Even in cold climates, if the vessel with hot milk (40 deg c) with added yoghurt is kept inside an insulated jar, curd will be ready in 4 to 5 hours. Richness of the curd will depend on the milk grade.

We are now reduced to or forced to using low fat(e) (

[Fegasderty]

Dear Sri. Naina, Greetings.

I refer to post #7. It may be quite possible, his parents gave very hard time to his brother too. I have a massive doubt... what is wrong if the parents go to an aged care facility? Why should the children feel guilty about that? I can't fathom that. Before someone tells me I have to experience it when I become older, I have to say I have worked in aged care facility for few years and I know how well they are pampared in such facilities. It is hard to look after them like that at home.

Cheers!

Raghy Sir:

I agree that there are cases where parents had given hardtime. But largely I would suspect that it is on matters of discipline (as defined generally by the surrounding society, and particularised by the parents based on their own financial standing). And, of course, most children will rebel against it. But if the parents have enabled their children to get a good education, especially when it involves wholesale sacrifice of their own personal needs and comforts, filial bonding and piety should trump all else.

You were wondering:“what is wrong if the parents go to an aged care facility?” Nothing wrong, except when the parents feel that they had sacrificed their comforts and spent all the money raising the kids and giving them a good education only to be kicked out to an empty life in an old-age home?

They could have stopped their children’s education at the high school level and kicked them out, much like how they do in the West, telling them to take up a job. The scenario mostly among clerks, archakas, purohits, school teachers, cooks and hotel-servers in the TB community, is that they don’t want their children to go through the kind of wretched existence that they were going through, so tend to adopt a strict disciplinary code, inorder that the children can get a good education, with the expectation that the children will get a good job and give the parents a meaningful life. If the children don’t feel guilty for not reciprocating, no doubt it becomes a tragedy.

Of course, if the parents are well off, there is generally likely to be compromises between the generations.

As a professor, I have personally observed this kind situation among a number of poor students(especially TBs) in colleges and universities, and I am fully cognisant of the sad social dynamic tearing away at the very fabric of many tradition-minded families. A poor boy/girl does well, gets his/her degree, gets a job and goes abroad, and once abroad, he/she is no longer under parental control, gets to socialise with all kinds of compatriots some of whom may be from a different social strata back home, and with a different approach to tradition. Well, the rest of the story can read like what has been posted earlier.

I have to say I have worked in aged care facilityfor few years and I know how well they are pampered in such facilities. It ishard to look after them like that at home.
Amazing! I would suspect that they also charge heftily. In some of the less expensive ones, the kind of stories I hear would make your blood boil. Itis therefore nice to know that there areplaces that come with high recommendation. Would you be willing to share the name of this facility for us?

[Slonopotam845]

We never know the love of the parent till we become parents ourselves. When we first bend over the cradle of our own child, God throws back the temple door, and reveals to us the sacredness and mystery of a father's and a mother's love to ourselves.—And in later years, when these have gone from us, there is always a certain sorrow, that we cannot tell them we have found it out.—One of the deepest experiences of a noble nature in reference to the loved ones that have passed beyond this world, is the thought of what he might have been to them, and done for them, if he had known, while they were living, what he has learned since they died.
Henry Ward Beecher

Honor thy parents, those that gave thee birth, and watched in tenderness thine earliest days, and trained thee up in youth, and loved in all. Honor, obey, and love them; it shall fill their souls with holy joy, and shall bring down God's richest blessing on thee; and in days to come, thy children, if they're given, shall honor thee, and fill thy life with peace.
Tryon Edwards

Whoever makes his father's heart to bleed,
Shall have a child that will revenge the deed.
James F Randolph

[Slonopotam845]

Dear Raghy,

I am not blessed so, I can appreciate the value! Nice to know aout fortunate persons. Personally recently I gave up .

Don't give up man. Read post # 23. Just kidding.

Cheers.

[brraverishhh]

Ref.: Post 17 from guruvayurappan and post 28 from Raghy

My poem was just on the lines of Gujju. It was not my personal experience. I have mentioned time and again in the Literature section where I write poems that my poems are different from me. We get everything here and I don't miss India. We get idli, sambar, coffee powder, thayir, groceries, veggies like bitter guard and vendakkai and also Indian snacks. I am more than happy with what I get. We also have temple and have an Indian (local) community.

[Peptobismol]

Dear Raghy,
As you can see I don't miss much at all. ( I am going to cook கத்தரிக்காய் & butter beans kuzhambu and சௌ சௌ ( பெங்களூர் கத்தரிக்காய்) பொரியல் when I get off the computer!).

You can try making vazhakkai curry. In our home when vazhakkai karamuthu(this is vaishnava paribhashai-karry becomes kariyamuthu and finally karamuthu because karry when offered to Srimannarayana becomes karry amudhu. similarly every item offered to God becomes a sort of amudhu) comes to the dining table we all enjoy it immensely. My daughter exclaims oh it is D.S. kattampotta karamuthu today and gives a bear hug to her mother. D.S. stands for Dhaya Satakam the stotram (by Swami Desikan) which my wife keeps chanting while cooking the karamuthu and "kattam potta" because each piece of the vegetable is a perfect cube as if carved out by a master craftsman. With other ingradients like coconut shreds, uluntham paruppu, karappodi, kaduku and salt to taste it becomes a gourmet's delight. To make the experience complete I think you would need to chant D.S. while cooking it without fail. In our home, come Markazhi every day, the vegetable on the table comes with the extra flavor of a Thiruppavai. Thus one day if it is markazhy koththavarangai karamuthu another day it is maley manivannaa aviyal. Life is really enjoyable man. Live it fully. Cheers.

[softy54534]

In our home when vazhakkai karamuthu(this is vaishnava paribhashai-karry becomes kariyamuthu and finally karamuthu because karry when offered to Srimannarayana becomes karry amudhu. I understand karry amudhu. But why rasam is called 'sAththamudhu'?

[softy54534]

This thread now deals with lots of yummy recipes!