Easter in Bangalore - 2011

Bangalore has evolved over the last 10 years in leaps and bounds.  We've had to deal with a huge influx of people from other parts of the country and the world, which, by the way, we love!  Bangalore has clearly edged past Chennai and Kolkatta in terms of economic importance.

Original thoroughbred Bangaloreans like myself (hey I have papers!!) tend to reminisce about how some of our festival celebrations have changed over the years.  Today, retail is such a big word in this city, it's not funny.  There are malls EVERYWHERE!! Everyone's buying things all the time and if there's a festival around the bend, the frenzy is even more, to the delight of businesses.

While Easter is considered the MOST important festival for Christians, it is not that big on the ground as it is not commercially popular like Christmas is.  Having said that, there is some shopping to be done in terms of new clothes for the kids, Easter eggs and other eats.  Easter for me takes me back to the time when I was a kid.  We'd go to church in the morning (Easter is always on a Sunday) and then promptly stop by at Thoms in Frazer town, buy Easter eggs and some hot mutton puffs and head to my Gran's place in Cox Town.  She'd be eagerly waiting for us as her "kids" with their kids will all troop in one family behind the other until the happiness was as loud as the noise we kids would create around the house.  Biryani was pretty much a staple for festivals in my family and this was no different.  My gran and her kids would get busy in the kitchen and we'd go hunting for the Easter eggs.  My favourite was the soft ones made of chocolate, but those were expensive, so they'd run out pretty fast.  So most often, I had to settle for hard boiled fondant icing eggs that would have some surprise inside once it was broken!  Lovely memories though..

Today there are so many options to pick from.  I decided to do my part and make available yummy Easter hampers and the Lindt Bunny that is made completely of the finest and legendary Swiss Milk Chocolate and available easily at  the Roesome website.  Roesome is a creative gifting company that puts together some of the finest ingredients into tasteful cane baskets and other creative packaging.  Roesome also puts together fantastic wine baskets that go great with chocolates and some yum Washington apples.  They are reasonably priced for the quality that is offered and in most cases, free delivery is available.  That is something that I would not even have imagined 10 years ago from sleepy old Cox Town.

This Easter, I'm going to try and follow the same ritual (though I'll probably just do a take out) and land up in my gran's house.  She lives by herself in Cox Town now and I'm sure she'll be delighted to see us with our great creative gifts from Roesome.  I'll still have to go to Thom's for the Mutton Puffs though :)  Happy Easter everyone!

Kuwait is still home - by Kiran Elza Abraham

Hi folks,

A friend of mine wrote this piece.  She hails from Kerala and grew up in Kuwait.  Her studies have brought her back to India and she reminisces as she spends time in Kuwait with her family over the holidays.. I found it very interesting and have her permission to publish it on my blog.  So, read on...

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Most people come to Kuwait, the Promised Land of the Middle East claiming it is for a maximum of  two years or "to make enough money'" and go back home. Countless Falafel and Shawarma sandwich years later, they are all still here. Grayed quite a bit, but very much here.

Kuwait is like that. One starts off earnestly in a job, shares an apartment with some kind folks. Soon you begin to get comfortable with the non-iron bed sheets and Jamaiyas laden with easy to serve yogurt and long-life milk.  By then your status has risen back home because you work in this oil-rich, highest per capita income wonderland. Ma beckons from home that they have found a "nice, homely" girl for you. So you rent your own one bedroom apartment, put out few cheap "Banta" chairs, and blend in some Ikea "As Is" furniture just for it to not look so cheap. Few Friday market( second hand stuff) visits later, your house and heart are ready to receive the new bride.

If winter is here can spring be far behind? Stacks of Pampers appear in the by now crowded home. The patter of tiny feet, Cartoon Network, pushchairs(Prams) and colic occupy your waking and sleeping hours. The MBA you well intended is long forgotten with the stress of how to ask the boss for a raise, now that your child will start playschool, and you can't cope with the installments for your new place back home. The luckier ones find fresh opportunities and move up the economic ladder, but never out of Kuwait. You upgrade your car and home, and generally grow to be a part of Kuwait, or rather Kuwait like a sandy desert spirit becomes ingrained into you and fourth and fifth ring roads become your best weekend hangouts.

Just because it seems the in thing to do, you apply for migration to a western country, knowing full well in your heart that you may never be able to start a new life in another strange land. The taxation everywhere else hurts. So do the residence fees here, but can you leave Kuwait? The general view was that once the health insurance was levied; there would be an influx of expats fleeing Kuwait. No one I know has left for those reasons. Leave Kuwait, and miss the Houmos and Mutabel and all the Vaasta you built up, are you kidding? Life goes on, with bodies and souls flirting in and out of The Sultan Center, Souk Sharq, Caesar's Restaurants, all the new malls(The Avenues, Sharq mall, Geant..etc) that have sprung up like mushrooms.

Soon one Friday blends into another and next thing you know you are boarding a flight to the U.S. to drop your son or daughter to University.

Time has flown, and you and your friends of yesteryears still meet occasionally, and discuss who has grayed more, and whose cholesterol is threatening. The whole point of who "made more money" but never returned home is never brought up. Endless weekend dinners, get togethers, beach picnics, potlucks and problems, growing-up pains, career ups and downs, friends who are like family, birthdays and anniversaries, visit visas and residences later...Kuwait is still HOME!

Kiran Elza Abraham
(writing from Kuwait)
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