Amsterdam

 

I was invited to the World Congress of families in August, 2009 to Amsterdam. I had earlier been to Amsterdam and had spent three days here with the Kids when Somu was in Zambia and I was going to meet him. At that time  I had travelled all around this place with the kids and went visiting the various canals in the boats. We also visited the Rijks Museum . But the best place which I liked was the Vincent Van Gogh Museum and Ann Franks House. I had become a great fan of Van Gough after I read Irwin Stone’s Lust for Life. Amsterdam derives its name from Amstel and Dam meaning a dam in the river Amstel. Earlier this was a fishing village. What I really liked about the place was that many people used the bicycle as a common means of transport. The airport at Schipol was also amazing with the vast multitude of people from different nationalities who were going around and the vastness of the structure.  Hence this time I did not  go for any sight seeing but spent my time in the Conference. On the first day Prof. Theo and Nicole came to meet me and we had a lovely round of the city and sat down to have coffee. The world Congress was amazing that for the first time family was the focus and most of the speakers were pro- family. In India every one has to be pro- family as we have no choice. In the absence of the State structure support family is the only alternative and one has to rely on the family. My paper on Families in South Asia – Challenges for the New Millennium was very well received and many people came to meet me after my presentation and we exchanged a lot of cards. The highlight of this Conference was that we saw some lovely films such as Firewall, The Demographic Bomb which talk about the issue of population explosion.

 

In Bulgaria

 

The Balkan Peninsula had always been a very important topic in our European History text books and it was with great interest that I had followed the war in the Balkans during the world war. Balkan may be defined as an area of southeastern Europe. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains, which run through the centre of Bulgaria into eastern Serbia. I was really thrilled when I got a chance to attend an Indology Conference In Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria. This was the first time that I was traveling to Eastern Europe and I looked forward to the trip with a lot of excitement. It was a group of five of us from India who landed in Sofia on 23^rd September, 2009. Sofia has a long history and was born 7,000 years ago and is at the foothills of Mount Vitosha. The topography of the place almost looked like Haldwani with all the mountains surrounding it. Some of the important rivers of this region are Vladaiska, Perlovska and Iskar. Sofia was earlier known by the Bulgarian name Sredets. During World War II, Sofia was bombed by Allied aircraft in late 1943 and early 1944. As a result of the invasion of the Soviet red army the Bulgarian country came under the Communist rule. It was only in 1989 that communism was over thrown and now slowly the country is limping back to a capitalist country.

I had gone to attend the Indology Conference and it was for the first time that I met many scholars from Poland, Budapest, Croatia, Latvia, Czechoslovakia, who are well versed in Sanskrit and Hindi. We met many students who are very much in love with Indian culture and its history. I made some very good friends and what really impressed me was that unlike Western Europe people are very hospitable and they welcome you and you get the same kind of hospitality which we Indian give to the outsiders. I met Nicolai and Elena who were very much in love with the Indian culture and planned to go back to India for a second time. It was fun to listen to the students talk in very chaste Hindi. The Conference kept us very busy and we really did not get time to go to the Museums which i would have liked but we spent time in a Church and attended the Mass. It was a beautiful experience of a Christian Orthodox church. The music was beautiful and after this we saw an Museum and art gallery of Christian icons. Walking around the streets in the lovely weather was beautiful and we saw lots of shops on the way selling laces, embroidery and rose perfumes. We bought a lot of kinky stuff which tourists buy and as I left Bulgaria I kept thinking I must come back to see more of this lovely country.and its beautiful and hospitable people.

 

In Zurich, Switzerland

 

I had gone to Amsterdam to attend the World Congress of Families. On my way back I went to Zurich where Mini was studying. I had a lovely time and we spend some beautiful evenings around the water bodies which surround the whole city. This city is Switzerland's main commercial and cultural centre and sometimes called the Cultural Capital of Switzerland. Zürich was named the city with the best quality of life in the world as well as the wealthiest city in Europe. In 2008, Zürich was ranked ninth as the most expensive city in the world. Zürich was accidentally bombed during World War II. But today there is no trace of this and the whole city has been reconstructed and one can also see some old buildings. We also visited the Rhine falls, Europe’s largest waterfall. They are truly magnificent, not so much for their height (a mere 23m) as for their impressive breadth (150m) and the  spray rise in  a cloud of rainbows above the forested banks.The falls are located on the High Rhine between the municipalities of Neuhausen am Rheinfall and Laufen-Uhwiesen, near the town of Schaffhausen in northern Switzerland. One has to walk around the town and it was fun to see a lot of people out in the streets on the weekend and enjoying themselves with music and songs. The whole street seemed to filled with a lot of life on Friday and Saturday and every one out there seemed to be out enjoying the weather and sitting out doors.

Somu and his garden

 

When we purchased our house it was surrounded by a huge grass land around it. Today also towards the side there is just an empty expanse of grass. But Somu spent a lot of time trying to develop a garden. We had to first plan the design and earmark the place. Though we do not have much space but only a small one something which one can afford in the city, Somu has been able to have two small lawns, few flower beds and a small kitchen garden.Somu loves to do gardening and he will not trust even a gardener to touch his plants. He just gets help from Kistayya who is like a man Friday and he drops in when ever he feels like. Hence most of the garden work is done by Somu himself. He stats planning what flowers to put in the beginning of the season. We are also able to get some vegetables from the Kitchen garden. In the beginning we would get a large number of pumpkins, brinjals. Now also I manage to get a large amount of leafy vegetables, green beans, Radish, Coriander and Chili's. It is nice to know that one can just walk outside and get coriander and Chili's. The garden is filled with roses of every hue and color . In winter the small patch of land which is our garden is a riot of colours. We have Crossandra,roses, Eranthemum,Petunia, Amaryllis Lily besides the seasonal flowers. We have immortalized our first roses  that cam up in our garden by digitising them and they hang in a frame in our Veranda. Somu takes care of his flowers like his children.  Every morning before going to his Office he has to spend some time going around his garden. When ever he comes back from tour he first goes round his plants and tells us you have killed this plant and you have killed this one. I have also now started enjoying the garden.