You know when someone you have known practically all their lives is suddenly taking an interest in a totally new ‘hobby’, there has got to be a Reason. Right? Usually it is a girl. I mean, there’s a girl at the bottom of most things in life, where guys are concerned and vice versa, I agree.

But this time, I was astonished, astounded, amazed and a couple of other fancy words starting with a. Why? Said person is none other than my lazy ass brother. So what’s he done now, you ask. Well, he has gone and decided to take part in the Silicon Valley Marathon! And, here’s the big, he is doing it to raise money for charity.

Strike me down with a feather! My baby bwother is all growed up!

Okay enough silly-billyisms (to quote my son). When I first heard of this latest endeavour of the brother’s, I was skeptical to say the least. 26 frigging miles is no joke! And to get trained fit and ready in 6-ish months before the Event struck me as something maha difficult - def not for the likes of me. Which is why you wouldn’t find me doing it. But what I am doing is something equally good - am feeling all saintly about it now cos I am sponsoring some of hubby’s hard earned dosh towards this good cause.

His aim is to raise $2300 towards ASHA, the charity that tries to “bring hope through education” in India. The money is tax deductible in the US of A. But if you live elsewhere in the world, I hope you will not let that pesky detail stop you from giving anyway. It is for a good cause - some poor child in India is going to learn to read and write thanks to the change we can spare. So please do dig deep and donate. If you have any questions about anything concerning this, do drop him a line at teamasha AT arvindashok DOT com and am sure he’ll be more than happy to answer your queries.

Edited to add: That noob in the piccie is the sibling. If you are as puzzled as me why he runs barefoot, the explanation is here!

I reached that monumental mark yesterday - chalked up three decades of living. So I can no longer call myself a “girl”, no matter how inappropriate it was till now. But, as certain laydees, who are certainly rocking in their 30’s and 50’s attest, life begins NOW. So am hopeful of things to come. 

But not as far as my son is concerned. Left to him, I might as well go on the national OAP register. 

Anyhoo, the budday yesterday ROCKED. Totally! Hubby started things off with a bang on Friday, the “star” budday by giving me this amazing pearl set - gorgeous chain coupled with drop earrings. Celebration started properly by mid-Saturday, with a trip to the cinema to see Jaane Tu ya Jaane Na. We both had been real keen to see this flick, ever since the music charmed us. Plus, with the early birds who had been humming away since catching it on the first week egging us on, we simply could not put it off anymore. 

Happily, the movie did not disappoint. I actually want to see it again. The only part I did not like was the character of that Sushant character. Why did they have to make him so easy for everyone to dislike and get rid of? Wouldn’t it have been better had he been a regular, decent soul and despite that, Aditi loved Jai best cos that’s the way it should be? (Any of the Bollywood director types looking for a consultant - well, your search stops here!)

Sunday dawned bright and sunny - a marvellous day in London, which is a glorious thing in itself. For once, we left home quiet early so we could have a sensible day out. Started off with a spin on the London Eye. As P had only seen it from far, he was pretty excited. He enjoyed the Eye thoroughly. We had fantastic views of the city, spreading as far as the eye could see. A loud American was pointing out various landmarks (quite wrongly!) to his awestruck family. I wished he’d either shut up or pipe down. Of course he did neither! 

After that, we let P loose on the park where he proceeded to try all sorts of balancing tricks on the rope bridge and climbed up the rope column - thrice - before deciding enough’s enough. 

Next stop - BFI IMAX. 

As IMAX were showing P’s current favourite flick, Kung Fu Panda, there was no escaping this. After the miniscule multiplex screens of today, the 20 m X 26 m IMAX screen seemed MEGA! We were all astounded at the size of it and the sound quality was literally mind blowing. So much so I thought one member of the family would have big problems with it. The Bun proceeded to rock and roll through out the movie, making for some exceedingly uncomfortable moments. 

Once that part of the day was finished, we went in search of Ping Pong, a Chinese dim sum restaurant. The review said grub was good while the same cannot be said for the service. They were spot on. The location was brilliant. We got outside seats as it stank too much of fish inside and I couldn’t bear it. But flagging down the wait staff was an art we sucked at and most of the time was spent in waving furiously. I was reminded of Bill Bryson’s pithy remark: “… you cannot make a waiter see you unless he is good and ready..” 

Reared as we are on the Saravana Bhavan School of Hospitality, the service didn’t bother us much. Especially when the food they brought in was like pure morsels of heaven! The dim sums are served in individual wooden steamer baskets and each one contains three dumplings. Though our waitress suggested we order about three baskets each, we displayed rare (and in this case, misplaced!) caution and ordered one each. 

Presently, the farcical part of the routine started. There we were, with some amazing smelling, glistening morsels of food waiting for us and we were armed with two fiddly sticks. It didn’t help matters any when the brat mastered eating with chopsticks like he had been doing it all his life and polished off his dumplings with “YUM YUM” noises. Sighing, we stabbed, poked, prodded and generally mutilated our dumplings into submission. But man, was it worth it or what? 

The next couple of hours were spent in trying to attract the wait staff’s attention, ordering more portions and slowly coming to grips with the chop sticks. By the time we downed tools, we were absolutely sated. Three portions of dumplings, followed by a miniscule portion of yummy mango pudding, watered down by a strawberry and lemon cordial (for me- while hubby had jasmine tea and the brat OJ) constituted my budday meal. I was one happy bunny!! 

Needless to say, that was the best budday ever - if this is a taste of things to come, then bring ‘em on! 

Image courtesy: FoxNews.com

What would be your reaction on coming across a headline like this:

Woman gives birth to twins at 70

Mine was the usual “WTF?” I clicked on the link and was amazed, astounded and finally, resigned when I read the full article. Why, you ask. Well, this has happened in apna India.

Now you can guess the rest of the story. No male heir. Couple desperate for someone to carry on their name. So keeps trying. Dad 77, mum 70.

But the prize for the best quote ever has to go to the proud dad: “t is a matter of great joy, that in my old age God has blessed me with two kids to support me in my old age.”

Need one say more?

Blogosphere had never seen the likes of the big-ass virtual baby shower thrown in honour of us six (7? 8?) MTBs (mother-to-be) on April 25, 2008, by a fantastic group of bloggers who would be better suited to running giant corporations and small countries. If what happened that day wasn’t special enough, what ensued since was even better. The whole lot of us, the ‘Doula Gang’ as they called themselves and us MTBs, all bonded in a unique and special way to become the best of blog friends. We have all since met up - virtually every day and in real life, once or twice and have come back feeling much better about ourselves.

But what has made us all feel like part of this big, jolly group, more than anything is the babies - their impending arrival, the birth, the fight for the photos, the inevitable cooing over the little ones and of course, the labour room war stories. So far, we have reached mid-point.

Kodi’s mom gave birth to a bonny boy, “Plane Paapa” on June 4.

Lavs gave birth to her firstborn son on June 10th. His blog name is L’Buddha.

Maggie’s son Munch decided enough’s enough and decided to put in an appearance on June 26, 2008, a mere 5 days after he was due.

The first girl of the season put in an appearance the next day - Boo’s younger daughter, Antu joined the party six days before she was expected, delighting everyone.

All the babies and mums are now home, being pampered silly.

We now will enjoy a brief hiatus (touchwood) before the double date of RV’s first and Poppy’s second on August 17th. After that, it is Laks’ turn on September 2, followed by Yours Truly on September 15.

Since the big day, a few more expectant mums joined the merry gang and our group has now swelled to include two more MTBs and a Doula herself, who got a third bun in the often, blaming a faulty product. (Or so she claims!)

Here’s to us and our lovely babies.

Couple of weekends back, hubby and I decided to go on the hospital’s birthing unit tour. We did this the last time around too and though it scared the pants off us, it was useful to get a mental picture of where we (er, I) might end up. Dropping P off at a friend’s place, on we went, to join a crowd of expectant parents waiting in the Maternity Unit’s lounge for the tour to begin. It was unnerving, to say the least, to be amongst a gazillion women in different stages of pregnancy. Brought it home to you, the whole deal and what lay in store.

Soon enough, a pretty midwife named Laura joined us and led us around. Unbeknown, the phrase “lambs to slaughter” entered my feeble brain and as I turned to catch the eye of one of the other mums-to-be, I could see a similar expression of panic writ large on her face. Somehow that calmed me and I followed Laura in a steadier frame of mind. First we visited the midwife-led unit. As I am keen to deliver here, I asked hubby to concentrate. The midwives run the show here, in the “low risk ward”, and there are only gas & air (Entonox - laughing gas) and pethidine injections available here for pain relief. Anything stronger, you’ll be taken to the higher risk zone.

We walked around the ward - the brightly lit lounge with a flat screen telly and lots of comfortable chairs and the odd birthing ball or two. Even here the walls had the protruding gas & air nozzles, which made all of us breathe a big sigh of relief though none could envision us sat here in this calm area on D-Day.

Next came the labour room - it was tiny, to say the least. We all peeked in as there wasn’t enough space for the whole lot of us to troop in. For the first time, I realised what it means to say “no space to swing a cat in”. Well, cat swinging aside, the room had a reclining heavy-duty bed, gas & air nozzle, monitoring equipment, bassinet, a telly and a spare armchair, for the birth partner to pass out in. That was it.

As we were standing outside, peering in, Laura chirpily asked us if we had any questions. Deciding to test SilentOne’s claim that she was home six hours after giving birth, I asked L if that was so. L went “no no…”, and before I could finish thinking “gotcha, SilentO…”, the midwife continued, “… you could leave in four hours if you want. As long as there are no complications with you or the baby and you are happy, you could just go after four hours.” It was time for me to test another of famous english phrases - slack jawed. ‘Cos that is exactly how I felt. Go home a mere four hours after giving birth*?! Wow!

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Next we went down the stairs to the regular labour ward. All the wards follow the same layout, we were told. Good thing too as by the time we had finished wandering around the place, hubby was well and truly lost. As we were following L, he whispered, “maybe we should leave a breadcrumb trail or something.” Knowing his penchant for going around in circles (especially around the roundabouts), I sincerely wish he was joking!

The high risk ward was pretty much the same - the labour rooms had more high tech gizmos to monitor mum and baby and other nameless machines. As the rooms were larger, we could all troop in to one. As we all formed a ring around a bed, every face registered mild to severe panic. I am sure everyone’s thought bubble read the same as mine: “next time we are here, we’ll be on the bed - screaming!” Only Hubby seemed unconcerned and quite chilled out. Well why wouldn’t he be?

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Once we got home, I went online to update my friends on what I had been upto that morning. When I mentioned the back-home-in-4 deal to my friends, I got a whole wide spectrum of feedback. Boo, Mags, (I stand corrected!) however, took the cake for the best quip:

“Imagine, DG, you could drop P at school, go to the hospital, give birth and be back at the school gates by home time!” Jokers, every single one of them.