Baby with no eyes

Last year when we were in India, one day my mom took me to a home where they take care of babies ignored by their families. There were many babies there. Most of them were female babies. My mom showed me a baby and said that she and her friend are sponsoring for that baby.

"There are so many babies here. Why this baby alone???? I asked."

"Because she is special. She is a needy child"

"Special!!!!!!"

"yeah. Because she has no eyes."

"No eyes!!!!!!!! why?????????"

"I don't know."

"Why she is here??? "

"Because she was ignored by her family.They left the baby here."

"Why they left her here. Why can't they take care of her?"

"There could be many reasons. Poverty or social concerns or something else. It is difficult to know or explain to you"

When we were talking I saw the baby opening her left eye. I saw just a dot moving.

I felt very sorry for her. Why should babies are born with such defects?, i thought.

I searched in the web and found that there are many babies like her.

I read about the concern of a mother one such

http://www.getipm.com/articles/benlate-eyes.htm

Silly moments

Me and Samosa

In the morning I gave a schedule to my mom about how I am going to spend the day. But, I didn't follow the schedule and played a lot. Evening my dad took us for shopping. My mom asked me to eat/drink something so that we don't need to spend time on eating out. I refused to eat saying that I am not hungry.

After we reached the shop, instead of saying that I am hungry I gave a buildup saying that I have stomach pain. Inside the shop I behaved well and helped my mom and got some sweets and cookies. The flavor that hit my nose from the chat corner near the cash counter tempted me. When I asked my mom for Samosa (a North Indian snack item) she refused to get it for me.
I spoke nonsense

My mom got irritated and she said she will never get it for me. I started to behave like a mad(crazy). I went and sat somewhere in the dark and I refused to get in the car. All these made my dad to get wild.

After getting back home my mom explained me about my mistake. The mistake list she gave was :- not being obedient, not being contented, talking nonsense for silly things, talking back and, running away.

I learnt that I don't have to get mad for silly things. If I don't get some thing now I might get it later. But if I behave silly it might turn out to be dangerous.

Earthquake... How to react?

One day at about 8pm I was playing with my brother. I felt some shake, and my mom shouted “earthquake” and rushed in and carried my brother . We ran outside the house. We noticed that there was no one except us in the apartment who came out. We have recently moved to California from India. Next day I asked my friend about it and he said his teacher has instructed not to go out but have to DROP to the ground; take COVER by getting under a study table or other piece of furniture or get into toilet or bedroom where there is double ceiling. Next day a similar announcement was made in my school too. I searched in the web and found similar information. Refer:
http://www.consrv.ca.gov/index/Earthquakes/Pages/qh_earthquakes_what.aspx
http://www.fema.gov/hazard/earthquake/eq_during.shtm

But, my awareness on this earlier was different. My Mom read out an article for me after the 2005 Tsunami in India which explained to get out of the building to an empty ground or how to stay safe in the triangle formed by the objects falling towards ground from top. The strict instruction was not to get below any table/cot to avoid crushing.

I was confused by the instruction that is totally opposite .

I asked my uncle about it and he said the building in US are earthquake proof. I know that houses are made of wood here and walls between rooms are only false partitions. I do not understand what earthquake proof means. Here apartments have multiple floors. If the ceilings in the top floor are heavy enough to hold people and their furnitures would it not cause damage if it falls?
In India houses are made of bricks , cement and iron bars .
If people who lived in US for quite sometime in US goes to places like India and follows the practice they have here when they face an earthquake, then would it not cause a serious damage to them?
I also didn't know what is double ceiling ? and how does it protect us during an earthquake?

Halloween moments

Halloween is a tradition celebrated on the night of October 31, most notably by children dressing in costumes and going door-to-door collecting sweets, fruit, and other gifts. This is called trick-or-treating. ...
My mom said this is something like our 'Golu' in India where kids goes to houses to collect 'sundal'.

In my school my friends started talking about Halloween costumes , things they bought for Halloween before a week. I bought a mask for me before Halloween. At 6pm I went trick or treat with my friends. I got three boxes of candies, three ducks,and some money too. I scared a women with my mask. It was fun to get so many varieties of candies for free. I got one more thing for free. I went in cold and caught cold and cough for free. I supplied to my family for free too.


This is my costume.

I was embarrassed

My father got transferred. So, I went to get the TC (Transfer Certificate) from my school. I met the principal to explain her that I am leaving this school and said bye. When I was talking to her she was reading a book, she stopped and looked at me with a faint smile and continued her reading. I didn't know why she was not kind enough to say good wishes to me. She embarrassed me by doing that.

I learnt to write e-mail in tamil

Over this week end I learnt to write e-mail in Tamil.

How did I do it ?

I am having a Firefox web browser. I searched Tamil font that is supported by Firefox browser.Here is the link:

Tamilkey Firefox extension is an utility to enable Tamil typing in any website or email using Firefox and Thunderbird.

The latest version of Tamilkey (0.3) has been released to the Tamil community and can be downloaded from http://tamilkey.mozdev.org/installation.html

Use a Tamil e-mail editor to type Tamil e-mail

For example:

• Go to http://QuillPad.in/tamil/
• Select Tamil
  
• Click Send as e-mail
  
  

Temple

Livermore temple

My parents planned to go to Livermore
temple. I wondered how a temple at
U.S. would be. I visited the web page of the temple to get some information about it. I found in the calendar that an abishegam for Lord Muruga was scheduled for the day at about 5 pm. I asked my mom if we could go for the abishegam. She said it might not be possible because it would get too dark in the evening and today being a rainy day it is better to get back home during the day time. I was disappointed. But by the time we started from home it was 4 pm because my Dad unexpectedly took us to Wall mart in the noon.

When we stepped int the temple I was surprised and happy to see the abishegam for Lord Muruga. At the end of abishegam the Lord was dressed beautifully with Viboodhi (ashes). It was good to hear Kandar Sashti Kavasam there.

The temple is Siva Vishnu temple and hence the main deities are Siva and Vishnu (Balaji). The decorations for Siva and Vishnu was gorgeous and I could not move away my eyes from them.

There are Praharams for Lord Ganesha, Parvathy, Lakshmi, Andal, Krishna-Radha, Rama-Sita-Lakshman-Hanuman, Navagragha, Hanuman.

We had our cousin's family and our family friend with us there. We gave the first rice food (annaprasnam) for my baby brother who is 7 months old.

There is a mandapam and a library at the back of the temple. There is also a garden where there were banana tress and flowering plants. We had prasadams which was almost like a dinner with lemon rice and sweet pongal.

I could not get a clear view of the Gopuram and around temple area because of poor lighting and rain. I would like to go back to the temple once during the day time.