Month: August 2018

Welcome back dear readers! Since our previous episode in Goa, we have been taking advantage of downtime back in Hyderabad. For me, that meant tuning up my LinkedIn profile and dropping the occasional job app🤷‍♂️. For Swathi, it was buckling down and studying doctor…things. Soren/Meera were partying non-stop with their ever expanding fan club. And of course drinking tea and napping. Lots of that. Swathi and I also played tennis regularly as the courts were conveniently located across the street from the house in India. We are terrible at tennis, and we can proudly say that after 1 month we have improved to…pretty bad.

The last two weeks haven’t all been business as usual however. Here are a few highlights:

5th Year Wedding Anniversary (Aug 15)
They say time flies when your having fun. We must be having fun, because I can’t believe I’ve been married to my wonderful and beautiful Swathi for five years! Here we are, just a couple of kids, getting married back in 2013:

 And BOOM all of a sudden it is five years later:

We celebrated by going out for shopping and a nice lunch at Manjeera Mall. August 15 is also Independence Day in India, so it was exciting to be in a celebratory mood with the whole city! We were welcomed home with a nice cake  from the family after we got back.

Riding the Hyderabad Metro (Aug 16)
While riding the metro might not initially seem like a highlight, this was definitely near the top of Soren’s India to-do list. Plus, the metro had been under construction since before our wedding (5 years ago – see above) and recently opened. It was about time we check it out. Soren was amused:

Chicken 65 😋 (as often as possible)
On the theme of anniversaries, this August was my 5 year mark for learning about Chicken 65. It is kind of like an Indian version of General Tso’s chicken and I LOVE it. Swathi’s uncle got me Chicken 65 as often as possible. Definitely a highlight.

The Trampoline Park (Sat Aug 18)
We decided to have an outing to a trampoline park for the day. Basically, this was a giant warehouse with different trampoline stations that you can bounce on. They have a free bounce area, a trick jump pit, a basketball hoop and dodgeball station.  Although I was initially worried about popping my ACL, it was very fun:

Also, Swathi decided to hulk out on me in the foam gladiator pit.

It was fine though. I got my payback on the dodgeball court 🎯🎯😎

Steel Factory Shopping (Aug 21)
Went on another outing to the steel factory outlet where they manufacture steel dishes, cups and other housewares. Swathi’s aunt led the way and found us the best items. Steel is actually the perfect medium for little children. The items are lightweight, easy to clean and nearly indestructible. If anyone wants to start an stainless steel company selling these puppies to mama groups you know where to find me:

We also went Indian jewelry shopping and Swathi bought some clothes. We did not have to go clothes shopping for the little ones as various family members and friends kept getting them new clothes.

Marvel Movie Super Marathon!! (like every night)
What started out as a casual attempt to catch up on the first Ant Man movie spiraled out of control and turned into a nightly journey through the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Our final tally of superhero movies included: Ant Man, Ant Man and the Wasp, Black Panther, Thor: Ragnarok, Captain America: Winter Soldier, Captain America: Civil War, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Avengers, and Guardians of the Galaxy. Best (or worst) part? We didn’t even make it to Avengers: Infinity War yet.

Lakshmi!! (Aug 24)
Our last day in Hyderabad was momentous indeed. It was an auspicious day as everyone celebrated Lakshmi. To make it even more exciting, Meera received a gold necklace from her “Big Ammamma” Lakshmi (Swathi’s aunt) as featured below:

That’s all for this episode. We left for an over-night trip. Join us next time for our penultimate stop on our world tour: Hong Kong🇭🇰🇭🇰!! How will we cope with the children after having constant care-giving family members for 1 whole month!?!

“A vacation within a vacation.”

As if our vacation visiting family and friends in Hyderabad wasn’t enough, we decided to indulge ourselves in…another vacation! This time we headed off to Goa, with our children, my mother, and sister in tow! We debated for awhile on whether to go to Goa or Kerala, and decided on a beach vacation due to Soren’s love for sand, water, and swimming. As it turned out, the state of Kerala has been experiencing a very severe monsoon season, the worst in a century in fact. It has been a terrible natural disaster.

The monsoon was also active in Goa, but in a much more pleasant fashion I am happy to report. It was cloudy most of the time and humid, with occasional light rains lasting 10-15minutes 2-3x a day. The beach water and the pool water felt amazing – cool and comfortable. It was off season in Goa, so the markets were not as bustling as usual and the resort was not fully occupied, which all suited us just fine. On talking to the resort staff and outside vendors, we learned that Russians are now the major international tourists that visit Goa to escape their long and cold winters. I had no idea!

The plane ride to Goa was only 1 hour long and we had no travel issues. The hotel had a bus that picked us up as soon as we stepped out of the airport. We arrived on August 7th at the Park Hyatt beach resort in the evening and settled into our rooms and had dinner at the resort.

The next few days followed a similar pattern. Breakfast, then beach time, then pool time, then pool-side lunch, followed by more swimming or time in the kids’ club, then clean-up time and dinner. I LOVE pool side lunches…only second to afternoon naps! Here are some of these moments captured.

Here we are enjoying a nice breakfast:

Due to the monsoon season, the beach was rough and windy, but somehow still pleasant. Clark is getting good at taking these panoramic pictures. The sand was very soft and lovely to walk on and play with.

On our third day in Goa, we finally ventured out of the resort. We hired a driver to take us to a spice plantation. We all enjoyed the tour and learned about where our favorite spices come from!

The farm itself was quite beautiful and tropical. We had a lovely time!

Here were are in front of Clarks’ favorite crop, the coffee tree.

On our way out, we stopped briefly to take pictures with 2 friendly elephants. Soren was brave! One of them opened his mouth widely and we were quite impressed. The elephants then retired to their lunch of tree branches and leaves.

On the drive we passed many churches and other buildings with Portuguese design. Goa was a Portuguese colony/terrority for a few hundred years prior to being rightfully annexed by India and is currently the (smallest) state in India. It was interesting to note the Iberian influences as we drove around. I had been to Goa 8 years ago with friends from medical school for vacation, but didn’t appreciate this element as much back then, but after having recently visited Portugal just over a month earlier (where has the time gone!!), it was fascinating to note the similarities and differences. We are very excited to see what Macau, another former Portuguese territory, looks like as we are planning on a trip there while in Hong Kong.

The children had a wonderful time in Goa. Meera started sitting up independently for longer periods of time, and Soren really improved his swimming abilities!

Soren loved going down the slide, and splashing into the pool below:

Meera enjoyed the children’s play room where she had plenty of space to try to learn how to crawl and chew on many toys:

She also enjoyed tasting the many different delicious dishes at the resort:

On the last day, we relaxed at the beach and pool before heading to the airport. I spent an hour walking on the beach, cooling off in the water and listening to my audio book, All the light we cannot see; this was my personal highlight of the vacation. What a trip!!

Namaste and welcome to another episode of our summer 2018 world tour! And what a great episode it is: our beloved sister (in-law) Sruthi makes a guest a appearance, we discover Meera’s true calling in life and we deliver on our previously promised crocs (plus lions, bears and tiger trains oh my).

First, we feature our guest star of the week Sruthi! Sruthi would have joined us on earlier adventures, but she had to be responsible and prep/take the bar exam (booo!). I would also like to note that she managed to stay awake through all of Mission Impossible: Fallout one day after arriving. Very impressive. Anyway, we’re all happy to have her back and she was warmly welcomed:

Another highlight of the week was doing Meera’s first rice eating ceremony. The ceremony roughly breaks down as follows: (1) family gathers to take turns feeding her rice for the first time, (2) determine her future calling in life by letting her crawl to grab various objects. Spoiler alert: she chose a book, a gold bracelet and a wad of cash in that order. Feel free to draw your own conclusions, but I think she’ll be a glamorous scientist that stumbles upon a MAJOR discovery which she then parlays into a new career as a business mogul:

Guess banana farming just wasn’t compelling enough. Also, she liked eating the rice:But we are jumping around. Let’s pick up where we left our intrepid heroes last week: facing lions and crocs and bears…oh my?

July 29: Hyderabad Zoo Park 🦁🐅🐻🐊
So let me start by saying that the Hyderabad zoo DELIVERS. Tired of lethargic bears that mope about? They have HIGHLY motivated bears. Hippos? Got one lurking. You want crocodiles? Here are like 40: The park was actually so big that we had trouble covering everything in one day. We somehow missed the tigers! Closest we came was this tiger themed train around the zoo. We wrapped up the day with a trip to a Biriyani house in old Hyderabad on our foodie cousin Balu’s recommendation.

July 30 – Aug 2: Lazy 😴
Lots of laziness going on here. Having trouble recollecting now, but days were something like this: coffee, lunch, tea, nap, dinner, bedtime. Exhausting, I know. Also this happened: Soren also spent some time figuring out how to pedal a real bike on Tejas’ bike:August 3: Sruthi!
Plz refer to top of post. Sruthi showed up. Children rejoiced. Mission Impossible was watched. Nap.

August 4: House Hunters Hyderabad
Went to view an apartment Swathi’s mom had purchased as an investment. I was expecting something nice, but this place was very nice! Don’t believe me? My video walkthrough took 3 minutes and I still might have missed some rooms! The property itself was lovely and looked like a resort.

Most important however, Soren got his first ride in an auto rickshaw after the walkthrough. Another important step in his quest to experience every mode of transport ever:

August 5: Lazy 😴
A day with no photos 😮! We spent the day visiting with Swathi’s mother’s lifelong friends from school. Meera was charming as always. Soren hid from the company, but was eventually lured out with toys/presents.

August 6: Rice eating
I know, I know! We already told you about everything the rice eating and how Meera decided against banana farming. But…we saved some good family photos for the end:

All righty, that’s it for this episode. On the next installment, the gang heads to Goa for a vacation within a vacation.