Last Day of the Year

A wonderful year is coming to an end. It's been full of interesting and fun things.
The last month too has been quite good. It started off with annual day preparations in our school. I was actually one of the performers in the annual day program. Mine was the opening song, welcoming everyone. So i practiced hard and on the d-day, dressed up like a princess and went to school. I was in the opening song. I was a little upset because someone had spilled color on my new dress but i think i managed okay. All credit goes to maa who worked more than me in getting me prepared.


After that, winter holidays started with Christmas. We had a great time meeting Santa at different places. Santa even came home and left nice gifts (a barbie doll that i'd wanted for a long time and some chocos.) Thank you Santa, next time please visit when i'm awake.
I went to my maternal grandma's place for winter holidays. Happy holidays. Have a wonderful new year and a new decade to everyone.

Trip to Nainital and Happy Diwali

It has been a hectic month. First, we went on a vacation to Nainital. It was an amazing trip. The views were breathtaking, hills were cool and the lake was beautiful. We trekked, did boating, walked around and had a good time. I and Maa also got our photos taken in so called traditional dresses.









After we came back, papa started his new job and all of us were busy setting up his home office. Soon Diwali arrived and with it were Lights, Lamps, Candles, colorful dresses, sweets, fireworks and great food. Till last year, i was mighty scared of fireworks and crackers but this time i thoroughly enjoyed them. I know fireworks create noise and air pollution (I am not sure I understand what it means though) and so i made sure we did it in moderation.










Just as the celebrations ended, dadaji met with an accident. He has a couple of bones broken and is in hospital. I made a drawing for him yesterday and hopefully, he should be back home soon.

Happy Days are back

Okay so the festival season is back. First it was Eid, followed by Durga Puja, and Vijaya Dashmi. It was as good as it was last year but i think i enjoyed more this year.

They also celebrated Ramlila in school and I played Lakshman, Lord Ram's younger brother. It was fun.












I also got my first report. I need to improve my number writing skills and my teacher says i'm a chatterbox. Otherwise, I think i did quite okay as I got quite a few golden stars.










We go to Nainital next week. papa is between jobs and hopefully he will not be on emails and calls on this vacation :). After that, it'll be Diwali. So lot's still to come :)

Happy Independence Day

This was an interesting week.

First, it was Janmashtami - the birth day of Lord Krishna. There is a celebration all around and most temples are decked up. Incidentally, I like watching stories of little Krishna on the TV and love the way he manages to get Maakhan (butter).

On Saturday, India celebrated her Independence from Britishers. In our school, they asked us to come dressed up as freedom fighters. So I dressed up as Rani Lakshmibai, the queen of Jhansi. I also got a sword and all and I am sure no one would have seen the queen with a school identity card :). My mom did all the hard work in getting the dress and accessories as well as making sure I memorized the famous slogan "Khoob ladi ....". There were many freedom fighters that day in my class and I think my favorite was Subhash Chandra Bose.

First Summer Vacations

Finally after the initial not so good days in my new school, much awaited summer vacations started and i absolutely loved them. This was my first real and official summer vacation. They
started off with quick visits to my grandparents' place in paschim vihar and sudha nani's place.
After a few days, i then went to Kanpur and Fatehgarh. I was looking forward to meet my little cousin Bulbul. I had a great time at her place playing around with her toys. More than that i liked being treated like a big sister by her. She would follow me endlessly and try to imitate me all the time. I learned new games and dance from my friends gauri, ojas, tejas, and amber bhaiya (who were there to spend their summer vacations like me).


Finally, one leg of my vacation came to an end and i was back in Delhi to prepare for himani bua's marriage.
I had a long list of things to buy for her wedding...oh! not for her but for myself. Garima bua and ma spent hours together to put together ensembles for me. i got one suit stitched to perfection and a violet party frock with matching accessories. I enjoyed the mehendi ceremony and danced









all night. On the wedding day everybody told me that i looked like a fairy. What i enjoyed most during the ceremony was collecting flowers..which i guess embarrassed my parents.

I also went to the famous historical place called Kurukshetra. It has a wonderful history and famous wars have been fought there.

Final leg of the vacation was spent in paschim vihar. My main attaraction here was to pick up things from grandma's and garima bua's pandora's box.
I have developed a special liking for stationery items - pencils, sharpeners and erasers. I developed such a fascination for them that i went berserk collecting them. This led me to explore the area and i stumbled upon chaddha uncle's stationary shop. I would religiously go to his shop everyday with dadiji to buy erasers and i collected some special erasers like santa, joker, slippers etc.

WOW! my collection today stand at 30 pencils, 8 erasers and 9 sharpners!

Like all good things in life, summer vacations are over and I started school again. I hope it will be better than what it was before the vacation and i will hopefully soon start enjoying it.

Goodbye GAIA Hello Amity

8th April was my first day at the new school. It is called Amity International School. I think ma and papa were more nervous than I was. They were probably worried that i might cry or indulge in tantrums but i think i was reasonably well behaved. Even though i was feeling a little sad, i managed it quite well.

This school is a little different - it is very very big, and everyone wears the same clothes. They call it school uniform. Along with a new uniform, I also got new shoes, new school bag, new water bottle and new lunch box :)

I liked my old school GAIA a lot but i hope Amity is equally fun and i will make some good friends here.























On a side note, papa has taught me how to react when ma scolds me. I have become an expert now and can always manage the situation :)

Driving Trip to Rajasthan

I, Shums and Munchy decided to take a break from our hectic lives and go off to a driving trip to Jaipur, Ajmer and Pushkar. We also decided to take our parents and parents' friends along.It was an amazing trip. We all took off on friday and combined the weekend to get 3 days for the trip. We started at 5 AM on friday morning and after taking susu breaks at a couple of roadside dhabas reached the famous Amer fort at around 11 AM.

The Amer, whose actual name is Amber was built some 500 years back and has an amazing history. It is huge and majestic. The elephant ride from the base of the hill to the fort is royal. The bedrooms still have an amazing art all over the roof and walls. And queen's saree wieghed 9 kgs and jewellery weighed 40 kgs! They had rain water harvesting in 1592. And we had coffee in Raja's dining area.

After that we went to the famous LMB restaurant in Jaipur and had some traditional rajasthani lunch. We then drove to Ajmer and checked in after a long tiring day. Us kids were okay but our old folks (parents) got tired.

Next day, we went to the famous Ajmer sharif.

It is one of the holiest places of worship in India. We travelled in a Tonga on the journey back to the hotel. The horse's name was Johnny and Shums' horse was named Raja.

We then went to the Ana Sagar Lake in Ajmer and tried our hands (rather legs) on pedal boats. But it was too hot and we came back.

After taking lunch and a nap for some time we headed to Pushkar. It is a very famous Holy place, has many temples, a lake and a very long road where one can spend any amount of time. We bought some interesting stuff, had dinner and headed back to the guest house. These old folks get tired rather easily.

Happy Holi

Happy Holi it was! Sadly, papa was not here as he had gone to Bangalore to attend a training. I missed him but still enjoyed it. Ma and I went to dadaji’s home to celebrate holi. It was his b’day as well. Sudha naani had made delicious dishes (gujhiyaa, matthi & namakpaara) and sent them over. On choti Holi (a day before Holi), we played with flowers and chandan (sandal). I got 2 pichkarees (water canons) – one small boy (named pichhu by dadi), who used to pee on pressing his belly button and the other, a mouse (given by gaurav chachu).
I liked the pichhu so much that bua got me three more (in different colors). Dadaji also bought me blue gulal & water bombs (balloons in which you fill water and throw at others). We then went downstairs with bua and ma to play holi with other children. I was the youngest of the lot, but enjoyed myself thoroughly (unlike last year, when I used to fear water & water bombs). The children were all bigger than me but I forced them to spray water all over me. I also threw water bombs at others but
my aim was too bad and all my water bombs went waste. I cried whenever anybody else shot a water bomb on me ?. I also applied gulal (color) on myself each time it came off due to water splashed by others. In the end, I threw all my water bombs (about 100 of them) one by one, on the road from the balcony.

Finally after cleaning myself, I dressed in my favorite lehnga chunni and went for holi lunch downstairs (poori aaloo, idli, vada & icecream). What a day!

Graduation Day

That's what they called the day i "graduated" from play school (GAIA) to a big school. It was actually my school's annual day and I was performing. Our sweet little play was about going green, the fact that trees are our friends and we should conserve forests. I was one of the Trees :) and had fun dancing with other trees. I think i did well, much better than papa (who is known for being a poor performer in annual days during his school days). The credit goes to Maa though - she had volunteered to work with the teachers and make sure all kids were ready and decked up.

Another good thing happened on the same day. It was also Garima Bua's convocation on the same day. She also graduated with me :). Okay maybe graduated is not the right word as she got her post graduation and she's a big doctor now.

However, like all good things, my stay at GAIA is also coming to an end. I will go to Amity from April and i don't think i like that. I am not sure if it will be as good as this but we'll soon find out.

BTW, we went to a flower show last weekend. It had an amazing display of flowers and lot of fun games.