This post is all about ‘Self Bragging’,please bear with me :-)

This saturday saw me hosting a lovely couple from Jammu and their absoulutely charming 1.5 year old son.
Friday evening hubby informed me that we are having guests tomorrow for lunch.
Now I come from a place where our love is shown over the food.We sincerly believe ‘athiti devo bhava”
For us feeding people is one of the nobel act.Now the definiton of good food in our dictionary is rich and ghee laden food 🙂

/*Infact I guess entire north India is like that.Weather you are invited for breakfast/lunch/evening snacks/dinner we make sure we serve you the best food
and feed you so much that you will be forced to skip your next meal 😉

Last month when we (me and hubby) had visited this couple for lunch they welcomed us wholeheartedly and served the most yummy food.Every one hour the lady (lets call her R)
would serve something to eat.I was reminded of my mom who would keep serving dishes to the guest till they were ready to run away 🙂
But yeah in my place we believe in “khatirdari”.We do treat guests as our God .Incase we fail to serve good food the guests may take it as their insult and would probably
never visit our house again.

Anyways so the list of all the food that she served is :

1.Welcome drink and store brought snacks.

2.Lunch:
rajma (the special quailty which it seems we get only in Jammu)
palak paneer..with a tadka of desi ghee and garlic….yummy
paneerbhurji
rice
roti
salad
boondi raita
pickles
anaar dana ki chutney (again this is a dish from Jammu)

3.Dessert:
Custard with banana

4.Evening:
Kava (a drink similar to tea from Jammu Kashmir)

We were so full we could hardly move 🙂 R is a damn good cook and the love with which she  served made us feel so good.*/

Ok now back to last friday when I came to know that R and N (her husband,N is actually my hubby’s friend) are coming I quickly decided on the menu to be cooked.
But since I have never hosted guests and never cooked that party type ka food ,I was bit scared of how the dishes would turn out.

Friday evening reached home ,took bath and did Ganpati pooja.As the fate would decide hubby got late in office.By the time he came and we left for Reliance Fresh for
shopping the shop was about to close.Bought some stuffs and left the other syuffs to shop next morning.

Called mom to re-confirm the recepies except for the paneer dish that I learnt from somewhere on the internet (no idea of the exact source)

So this was my menu:

1.Welcome drink with home made moong daal ke mangode with green chutney and tomato sauce

2.Lunch:
Shahi paneer
Shahi phool gobhi
Pakode wali Kadhi
Mixed sprouts salad
Veg salad
roti
rice

3.Dessert:
Fruit cream topped with almonds

4.Evening:
Tea for me and hubby and coffee for R and N

Later  both N and R were full of praises,even hubby was happy.I was glad that I was able to serve  some tasty food and please my guest.
I called up mom and told her “mummy meine aapki naak nahi cutvawi,meine tasty khana banaya :-)).I felt good that I have inherited the genes from my mum to
serve food to the guest without doing any kanjoosi as truly “Guests are like God”.

 

Note:The quantity of food was so much that same food we had for lunch on  Sunday 🙂

Gur(d) mat do per gur(d) jaisi baat karo..

The above title is a hindi proverb which can be loosely translated as “If you cant give jaggery, atleast speak like jaggery ie.talk sweetly”
Which means if you cant do good to anyone atleast speak to them in such a way that they feel good.

My mom and mil often ask me to practice the above said proverb,which I am completely against.
I beleive if you cant do good to others and there is no point to give them false assurance that you are with them and would help them when they need.
We might give them a temporary happiness but in long run when they actually need help and expect us to help them we back out.

Let me share some instances where just sweet talks does not do good.

1.Ask your mil what needs to be cooked and how much:
My mom is of the opinion that always ask your mil what has to be cooked,this will her happiness that her dil atleast asks her for her opinion.
I disagree to this,I know what is to be cooked as I plan my cooking 2 days in advance.Lets say if I ask her in the morning what has to be cooked
and she says bhindi but I dont have bhindi chopped ,my maid has chopped gobhi and I plan to cook the same.
Ofcourse I will have to refuse which may make her feel sad and would think “jab apne man ka karna tha,to poocha hi kyun?”

2.You son/daughter needs a job,dont worry I know XYZ people they will refer your child:
People please unless you really have contacts or know some people who can really help in finding job or could atleast arrange for interview please dont assure people of job.
Its about someone’s career.

a)”Bhabhiji aap to bas apne bacche ka resume bhej do,I know ABC manager/teamlead/HR in my company/friend’s comapany/friend’s friend’s company.
App bas resume bhej do..samjho aapka kaam ho gaya”
And once the resume is mailed to them ,the mail is unread for ages or is being deleted then and there.

b)”Bhai saahab aapne bataya nahi apne billu (replace any other nick name) ne engineering kar li.Aap to bas usko bhej do Mumbai
(again replace it ,with any other big Indian city) (s)he can stay with us and look for job”.And once you land up in their city,
forget about coming to pick you on the railway station when you reach their house,they would give you such weired looks that you would be embarrased
or worst when you reach you may find their house closed and neighbours inform you that they have gone on a month’s vacation.

3.You have to get your kid married,dont worry I know many people in our community,I will get an alliance fixed.
“Bhabhiji aap to chinta karo hi mat beti ki shadi ki,wo to meri khud ki beti jaisi hai.I will find the best groom for her.Bas samajh lo shadi fix ho gayi,aap
to bas shaadi ki taiyaari shuru kar do”

There are many such similar instances where people would give assurances and give you hope.But when reality strikes you realize the same people who made all
promises have disappeared and you find yourself alone.

My point is give assurance only if you really can help or atleast you have inclination to help.Dont ever give false hope.People might assure you that they would help,
and when you ask them/remind them they get bugged up and start telling others of how you have made their life hell and try to sympathies from them.
Such people love to play double game.

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All said and done,people I would really love to know your thoughts on this.No matter if your thoughts are not inline with mine,i would still love to what do you people think.
Please post in your honest coments here or mail me.Suggestions are welcome 🙂

Another blog meet that I attended….

I was on an office outing when I checked my mail on my smart phone and saw RM’s mail saying that she was coming to Bangalore,I got so excited and decided to mail her immediately and hence composed a mail but my not_so_smart_phone just dint send the mail through 😦

Next day in office I replied to her mail.Following week was a tough one for me in office and I was so looking forward for the meet.

Called my helpline(read mom) to suggest some idea to take as gifts for kids and some homemade dish.She told me to get some colorful clips and kids books.I liked the idea and pestered hubby to come with me to the market.Luckily got the required stuff,a great achievement for me as I have no idea for kids gifts .

Next task was the dish.I decided to make moong daal ke mangode.I called hubby to get moong daal.When I reached home I saw he had got the yellow one 😦 I wanted the green one..Got upset but then thought to get something ready made.Finally took  a bag of potato chips.

I must have bugged up LLT big time as to guide me with the route.I was really feeling bad calling her again and again and disturbing her when she was attending to the bloggers who had reached ON TIME (yes I reached late :-()

Next 2 hours just passed away quickly.I dint even realized it,I had promised my hubby to be back in 1 hr as he was just doing TP in Bangalore Central.But it was so much fun with the ladies and I had a blast playing with kids that I dint notice that it was way past 1 hour.

One important thing,when I reached LLT’s place we were looking around to confirm if we have reached the right place.Her parents immediately looked at us and waved at us and informed LLT that we have reached and this girl came out at super fast speed even before I could get out of the car.It was such a cordial gesture.I bow my head for great parents and great daughter 🙂

I was speaking to tammu and asked her about bullu,kaalu and the birdies.Wrong question that I asked her,poor girl got all senti and narrated me the entire story of the demised baby bird 😦

I tickled chutku on his tummy and he let out a loud laugh..we continued it for some time and we both enjoyed a lot 🙂

So i thought how clever I am to  know the trick in making friends with kids.So same trick I applied and tickled Uma’s R  on his head.He looked at me and gave me an angry look 🙂 Hahhaa I realized I am not that smart.But that look of “angry young man” was to die for 🙂

RM’s R started crying and *hold your breath* people I actually succeeded in stopping her from crying *proud look* 🙂

Mannu and Poohi were silent and absolutely adorable.They silently played and hardly made any noise.

Nithvin’s sanju was also silent and  was very soft spoken.She is the epitome of being good at sharing things,she askd her mom to give her the bag that had goodies for the kids and gave each kid a goodie 🙂

All that we did was to eat and make hell lot of noise 🙂 Each one of us enjoyed completely and ended the evening with a huge smile on our face.Thinking of that evening makes me smile even now 🙂

Thanks RM for coming all the way to Bangalore and getting us gifts  and Rashmi for inviting us and nithin’s Vin for taking the photos for us 🙂

And finally all you people who made the evening memorable….Hope to have many more blog meet 🙂

ETA:While leaving LLT gave all the kids a packet of dry fruits and chocolate and guess what SS and myself also got a packet each 🙂