Her hands in many pies

Wrote my first story for the main paper a few days ago! So exciting!

It was a feature on this 77-year-old guy who bikes 10-17 miles a day, despite having had both his knees replaced, a hip replaced, peripheral neuropathy of one foot and some pins in his back. Was truly inspirational. Will be writing a story a week for the paper from here on out.

As you can see i'm a regular busy bee these days! :)

Earthquake

Our windows and doorknobs rattled and shook for a bit around 4:30 a.m. this morning. Nanu wondered why the road crews - who have been re-laying roads in our neighborhood the past few days - were already at work so early in the a.m. I never heard it, because I was sound asleep.
Imagine our surprise then to wake up two hours later and find Southern Illinois had experienced an earthquake that registered a 5.2 with the U.S. Geological Survey. Luckily no one was hurt.
But I found it interesting that our dogs woke my husband up sometime before the earthquake and he figured they needed to go potty at this unearthly hour. So he let them out in our back-yard and got them back in and came back to bed.
And that was the only reason he was awake when he felt our windows rattle…

Goodbye Bombay Tatha

After spending 10 days in a coma, my grandfather’s heart finally gave up on him. He died five minutes to midnight on April 13. If he’d hung on five minutes more, it would have been my grandmother’s birthday. He was 86.

I had no idea he was so well known and respected, until I was at a friend’s house some years back and her grandfather totally perked up when I mentioned my grandfather’s name. “

You’re Mr. K. Ramachandran’s granddaughter?” he asked me.

“Yes,” I confirmed.

“Oh he is the Steel Man of India!” he said admiringly.

Steel Man of India or not, he was simply Bombay Tatha to us, because he was the much-loved grandfather who lived in Bombay (now Mumbai). Summer holidays during my childhood meant heading to Bombay, to my grandparents’ house, with my sister and mom. Dad, a chartered accountant by profession, would never come since April-May-June was invariably his busiest time work-wise.

We’d spend two whole months playing with my cousins and assorted building kids our age, while mom would catch up with old college friends, shop and relax in her parents’ home.

I remember my Bombay Tatha then as a powerful, authoritative figure, who enjoyed clipping interesting or relevant articles from the newspaper every morning and filing it away or sending it to someone who needed to read it. He would get very upset if any of the neighborhood cats - Chellam Paati (my grandmother) loved to rescue - so much as got on the couch!

Many years later, when I was all grown up and working in Bombay as a writer, living on my own in a small apartment in Four Bungalows, Andheri, a suburb of Bombay, Bombay Tatha took the time and effort to visit me one day. Due to the traffic it took him two whole hours to get there. I was on the third floor with no elevator. Bombay Tatha was too weak even then to negotiate all those stairs. So we sat in the backseat of his car and spoke at length. I brought down some snacks and drinks and we had a nice time talking. He seemed proud of the fact I was making it on my own.

In August 2003, a few days before I was all set to head to the US for graduate school, Paati died. Bombay Tatha was heartbroken. He’d been married to her for a lifetime. Now he would have to learn to live without her.

At my wedding, he helped arrange a whole lot of things, including the venue and the caterers and at the ceremony itself he was the person in charge of all the change. He sat on the stage with us and the priests, dutifully handing all the coins and notes whenever asked, as part of the ceremonial rituals.

He approved of my husband and said I had made a good choice. That meant a lot to me.

Since then, Bombay Tatha has seen his first born die due to cancer, and his youngest (my mother) lose her husband. The deaths affected him profoundly and weakened his already frail heart.

Living with my mother the past year, he’s been in and out of hospitals a lot for a while now. The doctor’s called it, “Living on borrowed time.”

His failing health frustrated him, because his mind was as sharp as ever. “My body is refusing to keep up with my mind,” he said to me on the phone one day. And that was the problem.

I will miss my Bombay Tatha. I’m sorry I wasn’t around in India to participate in his last rites. I hope he’s reached a happy, serene place, wherever he is now.

Goodbye Appa

My father passed away at 1:35 a.m. on the 29th of October, 2007. He was only 63. The doctor's labelled the cause of death as multi-function failure.

I find it hard to believe that my father, the man who brought me to life, is now dead. I find it hard to believe that an important chapter in my life is now closed.

It saddens me that my future children will never get a chance to meet or know my father.

I feel scared when I think of my mother living on her own for the first time in her life, in a house full of memories. My mother is strong and brave and insists she will be fine on her own.

As the death ceremonies were being conducted according to Vedic rites, I kept thinking my father was going to wake up and say, "What the hell is going on?"

As I went through some of my father's closets, the day after his cremation, I found objects from my youth, preserved and taking up pride of place in my father's room. I found gifts I had given him a long time ago, still kept, unused.

I flipped through his address book and found names and numbers of everything from friends to funeral services to freezer boxes for the dead. It seems my father, a meticulous man, had planned ahead in case of his death.

Since we are Hindu Brahmin Iyers our death ceremonies will continue for 13 days. My mother leaves for Varanasi, the holiest of cities, on Sunday, to perform my father's 9th to 13th day ceremonies there.

According to Hindu philosophy the body is just the outer garment of the individual. The real self never dies, but is reborn in a different body in due course. I wish my father good health, happiness and all the love in the world, in his next birth.

Update on Dad

Its been a little more than two weeks now since my father went into a diabetic coma and had a stroke. The doctors label it a Cerebrovascular Accident (CVA) coupled with a multi function failure.

A few days ago, he was shifted from the IMCU to the ICCU. This means he is less critical then what he was before, because the Intensive Critical Care Unit is apparently a step down from the Intensive Medical Care Unit.

But he continues to be hooked up to machines and monitors and the doctors continue to tell us it could swing either way. They refuse to give us any hope.

They say every day is different and right now they are focusing on stabilizing my father. Also, they are yet to ascertain how much damage has occurred to the brain, when it was deprived of oxygen and if the damage will be temporary or permanent.

Meanwhile, my father drifted into semi-consciousness two days ago and mumbled a few words no one understood, before drifting back into unconsciousness. It looks like his speech function has been affected.

I have postponed my ticket back to the US by a few more days, on the advice of my father's primary physician, who is fast becoming a friend.

Not Dead

The doctors informed a lady sitting next to us that her husband was dead. Very soon some 300 Muslims showed up at the hospital. It seemed like the dead person was an important Islamic leader of some sort.

An ambulance was deployed to bring the dead body home. Relatives wept outside the IMCU.

Suddenly a nurse comes out of the IMCU and informs the people that the man is not dead. Apparently they managed to resuscitate the dying man.

How can any responsible hospital do this? How can they claim someone is dead and then say the opposite. It really is appalling behavior.

Shouldn't they first make sure their patient really is dead before informing his family? Its simply bizarre.

Given a choice we wouldn't have placed my father here. But this is where he insisted he wanted to go to, if there was ever a medical emergency. My father truly believed he would get cured if he came to St. Isabel's, since this is where he has always been hospitalized in the past and this is also where my grandfather came to when he was unwell.

Call it superstition, faith or just a place he was comfortable to go to, but we will respect my father's wishes to the end.

Hospital Hoarding

Durga Puja Pandal

In India, Navaratri just ended and Diwali is fast approaching*. Its one of the most festive and auspicious times of the year.

I walked out of Apollo hospital a few days ago, and saw a Durga Puja pandal erected right outside the hospital. Normally this is something you would see in the State of Bengal. Not in the South of India.*

Apparently a lot of Bengalis come to Chennai to avail of the excellent medical care available here. And since their most important festival is Durga Puja - of course there is going to be a celebration.

I found myself appreciating the artistic interpretation of Durga, the Supreme Goddess and wished I had more time to attend one of the several pujas organized for this festival.

* Navaratri literally means nine divine nights, where we worship the divine Goddess and Diwali is the festival of lights.

* While its true we South Indians have a Kolu, which is essentially a decorated, stepped platform filled with small images of Gods, animals, birds,and other beings, its nothing like the pomp and splendour of the Durga Puja pandals.

St. Isabel

Outside the IMCU is a little shrine of sorts to St. Isabel. A life-sized figure, carved out of stone, she stands on a pedestal, wearing a nun’s habit. Her arms are outstretched, her eyes compassionate.

Since this is India, where religions often merge, especially in times of desperation, people of all faiths light candles to St. Isabel, praying for their loved ones in the IMCU and the ICU.

Truth be told, the Hindus treat St. Isabel, a catholic saint, much like they would a Hindu God.

Every day they place an offering, often a saree or a garland, sometimes both, in front of her. A hospital worker then drapes the offerings on St. Isabel. Candles are lit. Prayers are said. Hopefully loved ones are cured by her Grace.

So far, I have seen St. Isabel wear as many as four new sarees in a single day. It seems she has such an extensive wardrobe; she needs a change of clothing every few hours.

Don’t ask me what happens to the old sarees. I do not know. But I’m guessing (and hoping) they are donated to the needy at the month’s end.

My mother’s cook bought two candles the other day and gave it to her. “Please light these in front of St. Isabel,” she said to my mother. “Your husband will get cured.”

And so we lit a candle each this evening to St. Isabel. We prayed silently and asked her to heal my father.

Stories from the IMCU

The doctors each have different opinions. There’s my father’s primary care physician, his diabetologist, his neurologist, and the duty doctors at the IMCU. They are yet to reach a consensus on whether he will make it.

Meanwhile we wait outside, in case my father were to wake up or we are needed to pay bills or procure a drug unavailable at the hospital pharmacy.

Waiting outside the IMCU, is exhausting on many levels.

Yesterday someone really young died inside. The relatives outside cried and one of them went into loud, screaming, hysterical fits that went on for a while, until a nurse came by and sedated her.

Someone else was rushed inside last evening after a suicide attempt. The man apparently objected to his son marrying outside his religion and in true Bollywood style, tried to kill himself, by eating the fruit of a poisonous tree. When he vomited after the first attempt, he went back to the tree and ate two more fruit.
His son’s upcoming out-of-caste marriage is now on hold. It looks like the blackmail attempt worked. The relatives outside blame the son, for making the mistake of falling in love with someone outside his religious sect. I feel sorry for the son.

A 68-year-old woman waits with us. She holds a rosary and looks as if she is near-collapse herself. Her husband has advanced COPD. Pneumonia has complicated his case and he is struggling for every breath. She has no children and no relatives or friends to support her. All she has is her husband and she is afraid she will lose him.
And so she waits endless hours outside, muttering prayers, hoping her husband will be all right. I tell her she needs to sleep some, in order to conserve her energy.

Another elderly lady sits next to us. She has four sons and two daughters. But none of them are here with her. She tells me her husband has had a massive stroke and heart failure. He is struggling for survival. He has no insurance.
Most hospitals in this country require an advance payment at the pharmacy and at the IMCU every single day. She managed to pay for his care for the first three days. After that she ran out of money.
“Every day I have to beg my children to give me some money,” she wept. “We sacrificed so much to bring them up and educate them. What is the point? They are not here in our time of need.” Her grown children are still fighting amongst themselves about who should pay and how much, apparently.

Sea baths, Pune visits and broken hands

As I sit outside the IMCU, waiting for my father to wake up, I think a lot about the past.

I think of the good times. I think of the happy times.

I think of the time when we went “seabathing” as he put it. I was about 10 years old then. My father held me on one arm and my sister on the other and sat in the waters of the Indian Ocean. He let the waves wash over us. My sister and I squealed in delight each time the waves hit us. My father laughed and held onto us tight.

He was handsome and healthy then.

I think of the time my father visited me in Pune. He came by train, just to see me, all the way from Chennai . It was a journey of nearly 28 hours. I was doing my Master’s degree then and was at my irresponsible best. I overslept that morning and awoke to the phone ringing around 10 a.m. It was my father. “You didn’t come to pick me up,” he said. He sounded so disappointed and hurt.

He was still strong and vital then.

I think of the time my father fractured his right hand, just before my wedding. His osteoporosis had made his bones so brittle; he was like the proverbial glass man. Despite the pain, he insisted on playing his role as father of the bride. He actively participated in all the numerous Hindu wedding rituals, wincing each time he had to feed the Holy fire with his broken right arm.

Appa

My father lies in the Intensive Medical Care Unit at St. Isabel’s hospital in Chennai. He’s been unconscious for four days now. Every breath is a small miracle.

My mother realized something was wrong when he didn’t wake up one morning, She called the ambulance right away. And called me a few hours later from the hospital. Less than five hours later, I found myself in a car heading to St. Louis and then on a plane later that night heading back home to India to be with my family.

Appa looks fragile and shrunken. A mass of tubes snake their way around his bed and into his body through intravenous drips and ports: A glucose drip entering his neck, an oxygen mask covering his face, a nasal feeding tube winding its way across his face, a medication drip entering his arm on either side, a urinary catheter, a pulse meter attached to his finger. Machines surround him. Quietly humming and beeping in turn.

His hands are covered in purple bruises. The blood thinner meds they gave him to remove any possible blood clots in his brain, ended up bursting the clots on his arms. His arms bled for a while and were bandaged at regular intervals.

His face is bloated. The skin is dry and scaly. His eyes are shut tight. He looks nothing like my father.

His sugar levels dipped to 15 a few days ago and he’s been in a diabetic coma ever since. The doctors now say he’s also had a stroke. His entire left side has been affected. Breathing is torturous. He is an advanced COPD patient. No one knows if he will survive.

Visitor’s keep stopping by to say their goodbyes. I’m not ready to let go as yet. I don’t want him to suffer.

I sit outside the IMCU, with a bunch of others who all have relatives who are critically ill. Visiting hours are only between 5 and 5:30 p.m. everyday. That’s a measly half an hour, to be shared with a hundred other relatives and friends who want to see my father.

So I tip the security guard and sneak into the IMCU when it’s not visiting hours.

I whisper into my father’s ear, “Appa, it’s me, your first born. You can make it if you want to. Please come back.”

At other times, I pray he dies. He's suffered enough. And I don't want him to anymore.

Weekend in Bloomington

“Bring your favorite cookbooks,” Sunitha instructed us before we left for B-Town last weekend.

Her request may have seemed strange to anyone, but us. For in the old days, we used to have a lot of fun with communal cooking - the concept of catching up with each others lives, while cutting a bunch of onions and potatoes.

So we drove the five hours and hooked up with Abby, Koichi and Sunitha. And then proceeded to stuff our faces with Blarney Puffballs, Saturday Night at the Irish Lion.

Over a late breakfast at the Runcible Spoon on Sunday, we discussed each others lives and then, what we’d like to cook together!
And then the real fun began. We shopped for ingredients and spent the rest of the day holed up in Sunitha’s rather quaint and charming rental, cooking!

The five of us had a pretty good time chatting non-stop, watching football, surfing the net, prepping the veggies, cooking, washing dishes and drying them.

Koichi plucks mint leaves, while Nanu watches football.

There’s no doubt about it. It’s the people that make a place special.

B-Town here we come!

In a few hours we will be in Bloomington, Indiana! Should be fun catching up with old friends and soaking in the "atmosphere!"

This picture is from August 2004.

Cant wait to see Sunita and Abby! Sunita's back in B-Town to finish her thesis and Abby is in town to attend a wedding. Koichi and Giri (who are still studying!) will be there too.

The icing on the cake? The Lotus World Music & Art Festival is on this weekend in B-Town. Fun fun fun!

Cascade of Colors

Saturday evening, we took both the dogs to Cascade of Colors - Southern Illinois' hot air balloon festival.

The parking area at Southern Illinois airport was jam packed with cars, when we got there.

Hundreds of families and their kids filled the venue, staring up at the balloons as they rose into the sky.

It was lovely watching the colorful balloons rising up into the air, as the wind ruffled my hair.

Since we had our dogs, we didn't go inside, but watched the balloons from outside the fenced in area.

A lot of people came by and petted Mina. "Oh she's such a cutie!" was the common refrain.

I felt bad for Pico. No one petted him. Poor boy!

Visiting New Born Baby

Just visited our friends who have recently become brand new parents of the cutest baby boy ever!

The baby had just been fed and was sleeping soundly in Papa Jack's arms.

We admired his tiny feet and hands and wondered how on earth Jack and Angela cut their baby's nails!

Jack was a sight to behold. There he sat on his recliner, with a drink on one hand and the baby curled up in the other, watching the Sox on TV.

I asked him how his cats (he has two kitties) are reacting to the new baby.

And this is what he said, "At first they were like 'When's he leaving?' And when they realized he's staying on, they just look at us in the middle of the night, whenever he cries as if to ask us, 'Are you going to take care of that or what?'"

Hilarious. :)

Du Quoin State Fair

Went to the Du Quoin State Fair yesterday.

Cant believe its been a year already. My sis was here the last time and we had such a blast...

This time Nanu and I exercised incredible restraint, avoiding the funnel cakes and the blooming onions and the fried twinkies!

Instead we shared an assortment of salted nuts and dug into a bowl of low fat dipping dots.

Mina joins our family!

Big news people! We have a new baby at home!

She is of the four-legged kind. And her name is Mina.

My family thinks we're nuts. What? We want to add one more dog to our home-zoo of two cats and a dog? We must be crazy or just plain masochistic.

Against all advice from the wise, we went ahead and adopted Mina, a happy and beautiful terrier mix, this Saturday.

I first saw her on Petfinder and something about her seemed to call out to me. I called Nanu over to my computer and asked him what he thought. He liked her too. And so the wheels were set in motion.

PAWS, the shelter where we adopted Mina from, stands for Pets Are Worth Saving and is located in Anna, Illinois. We adopted Pico from them almost two years ago and it was sweet to be able to go back to them for Mina.

Apparently Mina's former owner - an old lady - gave her up to the shelter saying she was unable to take care of her any longer.

At the shelter, she was microchipped and spayed and then put up for adoption. The folks at PAWS, think she is about a year old.

The PAWS ladies called her "Angel," but since she doesn't seem to respond to "Angel" we figured we'd change her name to something nicer; and Mina seems to fit the bill.

So far, Mina and Pico get along like a house on fire. But the cats are mad as hell about having their space invaded. So they are still sulking.

The past two days have been crazy-fun. The dogs go for their potty breaks together, eat together and chew each other's bones.

We took them on a 2 mile walk this morning and both doggies did fine. There's a Discovery Channel documentary on animal behavior unfolding in my home and its fascinating and often funny to watch the craziness as it happens.

So congratulate us on our new baby and send a friendly bark across Mina's way! :)

Heat Wave in Southern Illinois

The temperature has been boiling hot the past few days. You cant step outside your house without feeling like you're entering a sauna.

I dread sitting inside cars these days. The first few minutes, until the a/c starts blasting cool air into your face is agony. Cars with leather seats are especially vicious, if your bare skin happens to touch a heated seat. They burn! I know from first hand experience.

Southern Illinois is going through a major heatwave. With the temperatures continuing to soar 10-12 degrees above their averages, just five minutes outside is enough to sap you completely.

A heat advisory is in effect until Thursday, since the heat and humidity may create a situation in which heat illnesses are possible.

Weekend Warriors

Yellow Moon and Radiant Red.

Those were the colors I chose on a whim.

And those were the colors we painted our family room this Sunday.

Our very first paint job ever.

It was backbreaking work.

Took us a full day almost.

One thick coat of primer, followed by one thick coat of paint.
The painting was the easy part, however.

The prep work prior to painting was time consuming.

Moving furniture, removing wall paintings, getting the drop cloths in place, patching the wall, masking off the
moldings, scraping old clotted paint, wiping the walls down with a vinegar-water solution...you get the picture.

And then the cleanup of the floors, our brushes and tools, and rearranging things back in place after the painting was over – took ages!

The guys on HGTV could have fooled us.

They make it look so easy!

At first I was scared we had gone too bold.

I mean, the colors looked so much more muted when we saw the samples in the store!

However once they dried, they looked really nice - very vibrant and interesting.

And truth be told, we are kinda enjoying our
new “bold” colors, for the reason we wanted bright colors in the first place, was because its a dark room, with no windows and not the greatest of lighting.

We still have to paint the moldings white (they used to be a brick red before!), but we’ve decided to keep that for another weekend.

Now if only my body wouldn’t ache so much...

Who knew that painting could be such good exercise? :)