Chez Moi

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!