A day at San Jose Tech Museum

'The Tech' in San Jose downtown is a sophisticated building that houses hours of scientific exploration for kids and adults alike. Shweta and her husband Nikhil persuaded us into going there. The ticket costed us $10 a person which included a documentary movie in the IMAX theater (IMAX tickets cost $5, if bought separately). Our kids, who were less than 5 years got in free. The museum is pretty small, spread across 2 floors and can be browsed through in about 3 hours. We went there around 2.00 PM and were done by 5.00 PM. If you spend time in building any of the projects, you would end up staying longer. They have some cool projects and games like 'Build your own turbine', 'Build your own tracks and coasters', 'Craft session', 'Shoot the target in moon', 'Virtual hand wrestling', 'Virtual race on a wheel chair', 'Grow your own glowing bacteria by inserting jellyfish DNA' etc. Shweta and I did grow our own 'glowing' bacteria :) and it was fun...

Our kids were too young to actually have fun here. Kids above 5th or 6th grade would have loads of fun and you could easily spend a whole day. For us, the highlight was the IMAX movie. The theater has a huge dome shaped screen which gives a 3D kind of experience. This has been the best IMAX experience till now. We watched the 45 - minute movie 'Under the sea' and I found it very interesting. The best part was my 17 month old son enjoyed it so much. He pointed at the screen and called out aloud 'Fishy', exclaimed 'WOW!!!' and clapped his hands in glee many times... At the end, when the title was displayed with a background song, he started stomping and dancing until the song was over. Seeing our son having so much fun, made our day!!

Rangoli - A colourful Indian art

Rangoli is a traditional Indian art used to decorate the entrance of homes and worship areas. It is believed that Goddess Lakshmi (the Goddess of prosperity) would visit your home and bring prosperity when decorated with rangoli. It is either made with plain rice flour or with colours. Intricate patterns are drawn and coloured brightly especially on festival and celebration days. The logic behind using rice flour is that, it will serve as food for the ants, birds and other small forms of life.

Back home, group for 3-4 ladies and kids would get together and make huge colourful rangoli at the entrance of our home on festival days and everyday during the whole month of Margazhi (Tamil month from mid December to mid January). We would either start making it late night (around 12.00 AM) or wake up early morning (around 5.00 AM) and decorate the floor in the dark with mere not so bright street lamp (sometimes just torches or porch light). First, we would sprinkle water on the ground (tar or mud) and sweep it. Sweeping will remove stones and other large particles of sand. Water will help the pattern to stick to the ground and not be blown away easily. Then, the 'expert' lady would draw the pattern outline with Kolam flour (coarse powder of a particular kind of limestone) or coarse rice flour. Drawing patterns with a powder using fingers is an art by itself and takes a lot of practice to master. Then we would mix rangoli colours (very fine colour powder) with the kolam powder in coconut shells to make it coarse and be able to fill the pattern with fingers. Once the filling is done, the 'expert' would again take charge and border the pattern with white kolam powder to make the design stand out.

This is how I learnt to make rangoli as a kid, but never got to become the 'expert'. I participated in few rangoli competitions during college days, which helped me learn a few techniques like using a tea filter, using masks, shading, gradient etc. Still, never got to become the expert. Even though, I did not win anything (except the 3rd place in our college inter-department competition) worth mentioning, I thoroughly enjoyed each and every experience.

We made this rangoli (in picture) at our apartment entrance on Diwali day. This is the first time we made rangoli here in the US. I bought coloured craft sand instead of rongoli powder as it did not involve any kind of mixing and is easier to handle. First I decided on the design and practiced it a few times on paper with pencil and crayons to get the right colour combination. On Diwali day, I sweeped the floor and wiped it with a wet towel. I drew the outline of my design with white chalk and then filled it with the craft sand. Then I placed a small lit bronze oil lamp in the center. I was pretty happy with the outcome and clicked a few pictures as usual. After a few hours, I remembered what a good exercise making rangoli is from my aching thigh, glute and calf muscles.

A trip to the Indian Consulate in San Francisco with my son - An interesting experience

My friend, Rose, had to go to San Francisco to get a visitor visa for Singapore and she told me that she was going to take her 16 month old son along with her in public transport. Since I had to get my passport renewed, I thought, why not go with her and submit my passport for renewal. I would take my 18 month old son along and anyways the kids are friends too. Rose and I had to be in our respective consulates by 12.00 noon. We carefully planned our trip and we had close transfers to make to get there on time. The plan was to take Caltrain from Sunnyvale to Milbrae, then transfer to BART and go up to Montgomery station. Her destination was there, but I had to take the local bus and go 3 more miles (which takes about 20 - 25 minutes). I had once taken Caltrain with my husband (long before my son was born) to San Francisco. Other than that, I have never traveled in public transport in bay area leave alone with a kid.

We met at the Caltrain station at 9.15 AM, bought the tickets, got to the platform and in few minutes our train was there. We did not realize that Caltrain has steps to get into the train (while BART does not), until the train arrived at the station and the doors opened. We had to quickly get the kids out of the stroller, close the stroller, carry the kids, stroller and bag and board the train all in the matter of few seconds. We did pull the feat together successfully. Kids loved the train ride and we moms got to talk a bit. We got out at Milbrae and the first BART connection was in the next 2 minutes (according to our plan). Before we could get out, strap the kids in the stroller and buy the tickets, the train was gone. We took the next train which put us about 20 minutes behind schedule. We could keep the kids in the stroller in this train and both of them dozed off. We got off at Montgomery and Market and Rose helped me get onto my bus and my son woke up when I took him out of the stroller. I took the normal bus at 11.20 AM. Limited bus would have been faster as did not stop at every stop which is almost at every block in the downtown. Three wheel chairs got in and 2 got out on the way and I was getting delayed. I was counting every second and was hoping that I would make it on time. I got out of the bus at 11.57 and it was about a couple of minutes walk to get to the Indian Consulate. I was there at 11.59 and saw that the 'Closed' board was already up.

I walked up to the security lady and asked her if she would let me in as I arrived there just before 12.00. She first said no, but then she said I can go but the baby can't go. Like a crazy mad woman, I asked the ladies waiting outside if anyone would watch my kid when I go in. I was in such a hurry that I don't know what I was thinking and was willing to leave my kid with strangers. I thought it would be a 5 -10 minutes work and did not expect it to take 1 1/2 hours. Then she let me take my kid in, but did not let me take the bag nor the stroller and she strictly said "No baby bottles or food". I left the stroller and bag outside without anyone to take care of them, took my purse and my papers and went in. When I got in she said, if the baby cries or screams, I should go out with him. I was the last one in line. I got all my documents and somehow managed to keep my kid from shouting and crying without any entertainment, food or water for the next 1 1/2 hours. I had to change my son's diaper in the ladies room as he had done potty(poo poo). The payment line was longer than the counselor line. I waited for more than half an hour to make payment

Finally, I got out, walked to the bus stop, got into a crowded bus with stroller hanging from one shoulder, bag on the other and kid in the arms. Someone was generous enough to lend me a seat and I met Rose at the BART station. The return was pretty un-eventful and we were discussing our experiences of the day and entertaining the kids by singing nursery rhymes and reading books to them. We did have little difficulty in stations since there were stairs and escalators, but no elevators and our kids were strapped to the stroller. Then we walked back home from Sunnyvale station and it was almost 5.00 PM when I reached home. One whole eventful crazy day spent on submitting passport for renewal!!!