Rishav Annaprasan

Rishav

Last to last week my friend Diptam and Soumi invited for Annaprasan of thier son Rishav. Rishav was around 6 months and we didn't got chance to meet him after his birth so couldn't resist the offer.

On 21st June around 5:45 AM we headed for Boston in my Nissan Sentra car. You are lucky if you are not struck in traffic jam at NY. We were not so fortunate, there were road works about 20-30 miles after George Washington Bridge and the car moved at snail pace for 45 min. I saw my watch and I knew there is no way we can reach before 11 AM at Diptam place. I saw Nimisha face and she was bit disappointed as she wanted to wear saree after reaching Diptam's apartment. Frustration can be gauged from the fact that she was insisting to drive fast even when I was driving at 65 miles/hr. Well, I didn't wanted to take lot of risk when Aryan was at the back seat so we decided that we will directly go to Shree Lakshmi Mandir.

We did reached the address at 10:45 AM but it was a factory and business area and there was no sign of mandir. There was an extra 'e' in Waverley street which GPS was not able to recognize. We roamed for around 30 min when we saw an Indian guy on the road who helped us in locating the right direction.

Nimisha hurriedly rushed to change room to get herself ready and I got Aryan dressed up in the car. My kurta pyjama was left as it is and I wore what I have been wearing on the travel. After few minutes of wait Diptam and his family arrived and then Biswajit and Richa also joined the group. I met Rishav inside the mandir and I can see resemblance of Soumi in his face. He has chubby cheeks and a perfect gentleman who plays quietly on his own.

While, I was having chit chat with Biswajit, pundit jee arrived and then started Annaprasan ritual which lasted for around 45 min. After puja we rushed to Diptam apartment for the lunch and I must admit that Soumi can be an excellent interior designer, the house was well decorated and she has put lot of efforts to make the home a sweet home.

Then started sumptous lunch with puri, pulao, chicken, fish cutlet, chutney and soft gulab jamun. I filled myself with neck and buffered myself for next 2-3 days. Now it was time to chit chat through out the night and make fun.

The day was well spent and trip was worth 11 hrs journey back and forth.

Bade Miya Chote Miya

Bronx Zoo

It's said that people go to zoo three times in their life. First time when one is kid, second time when they are parents and third time when they are grand parents. I have entered into 2nd phase of my life and wanted to show Aryan all the real life animals which he used to watch in Baby Einstein "Animal Neighbourhood" CD.

Bronx zoo was in NYC and was around 1 hr from my place so started early in the morning. You can be an excellent driver if you can move around in NY city without missing an exit. Well, I missed one of the exit and we were lost on the way. Finally took help from people in residential suburbs and reached Bronx zoo. This is the only green area I have found in NYC and my lungs got an opportunity to breath fresh air.

We got parking in Gate C and we realized that we have missed Aryan stroller. I knew Aryan is going to give me tough time today and he did. He was not very willing to walk and would catch my feet to lift him up. At the end of the day, my hands got pain and neck got stiff after holding him for 8 hrs. But he enjoyed every seconds, got to see few rare animals, smiled and clapped all the way which made my day.

Zoo entrance was greeted with clowns, few handshake and then snap. One of the clown offered Aryan to ride bicycle but he got scared and started crying. Finally, I lifted him up and moved towards "Sea Lion pool". It was a big pool where sea lion was having sun bath, diving deep into the pool and barking occasionally. Moving few steps there was "World of Birds" and got view of some of the rare and colourful birds.

Nimisha at the entrance

At the entrance

Clown

Clown

Aryan crying and clown holding him on bicycle



Sea Lion

Have you thought why you never find cows, goats, sheep, buffalo and horses in Indian zoos? When you can find them on middle of road why would kids go to zoo to see domestic animal. In US, these animals are rare to see and are found in zoo. Aryan got chance to touch few of them. Though there were people and kids feeding these domestic animals but I was not sure whether Aryan should also feed these animals. What if they bite or chew his tiny fingers?

Goat

Now it was time to rest and have lunch. Aryan is going through teething stage and gave us hard time in eating food. He just ate one small packet of baby yogurt in last 9 hours. We tried hard but since he was crying after every spoon we left after some try.

Aryan having lunch

Now it was time to fly in air with "Skysafari", a cable car ride giving bird's eye view of zoo and gave a wonderful view of NYC. We travelled from zoo center to "Wild Asia" to get flavour of Asian animals. There was queue for camel ride so we left and went for other attraction, monorail ride to get glimpse of deer, rhinos, elephant, lions, tigers, Giraffes and wild horses.

Wild horse


Elephant


View from monorail


Which is the tallest animal?


Skysafari


Peacock


Deer


Camel ride


Monorail ride


Aryan relaxing after hard work


Aryan in desert




Skysafari

Last time I saw monkey was in our honeymoon trip at shimla and "Monkey house" reminded me to one of those old day.It was fun watching them hanging from trees, jumping from one branch to another.

Now it was time to see small bugs and butterflies in Butterfly garden. The garden was well maintained and had number of colourful, rare butterflies.

Peek a booe

Butterfly Garden

Aryan waiting for bug ride


Butterfly Garden


If I had wings, I would have been butterfly

Besides this we also visited Congo Gorilla Forest,Mouse House, World of Darkness, World of Reptiles, Big Bears and it was one of the best zoo I have ever visited.

Gorilla

Moneky doing exercise


Aryan sitting on bird nest
Rabbit
Was a small tunnel, next is Holland tunnel
Swan

Chucky E Cheese

After doing puja at durga mandir, we headed towards Lawrenceville to catch my old buddy (Abhay Saxena) from college days. After having long chit chat we planned to go to Chucky Cheese, hot favourite for kids. It has number of rides, offers full entertainment for small kids, great food and a nice place to celebrate birthday parties.
Both Anisha and Aryan had a wonderful time together and it was tough to get out of the place.

Seema, Nimisha and myself holding Anisha

Car pool

Driving cool bike

Riding train with alien

Driving train

Riding a horse

Nissan Sentra

On 30th June 2007, I bought 2004 Nissan Sentra from Nissan World, Denville. Luckily, I got my favourite colour black, the car looks new and runs great.

Nimisha wanted to perform puja so we went to Durga Mandir next day at Princeton.

Aryan watching his reflection

Kya style hai bhai?

Nimisha and Aryan outside Durga mandir

Boy or Gal

This is one of the casual photograph taken while Aryan was playing with Nimisha hairband. After seeing the snap, I believe visitors on this site may get confused whether the kid in the snap is a boy or a gal.

Keep guessing?

Point Pleasant Beach

24th June

It was bright sunny sunday and we had rented a compact Mazda car. Nimisha was desperately searching for used cars in Sulekha and Craiglist but unfortunately good used cars goes before you have your sunday brunch.

By noon car business was over and gradually thought process moved towards having sunbath on a wonderful beach. With New Jersey on the coastal area, one need to have number of weekends to have your footprints on each of the beaches. I googled couple of beaches and finally zeroed in for Point Plesant Beach. Nimisha took google map and was my navigator.

We took Garden State Parkway North, a long stretch on the highway. Journey would have been boring without the audio CD of romantic movies. We were sceptical whether Aryan will sit on the back car seat quietly but he enjoyed watching sceneries, listening songs and racing cars. I was having trouble in getting directions so Nimisha joined on the front chair but the good boy Aryan remained a perfect gentleman through out the trip. One exit crossed and then another and it's said journey doesn't completes in NY/NJ if you don't pay tolls. We already had bunch of coins to be disposed for the toll. Paying toll in Newyork/New Jersey also has big stories which I will blog some other time.

Finally after an hour we reached Point Pleasant Beach. The weather was good and it seemed everyone has made it their favourite destination. We struggled but got the parking at one of the roadside, few blocks away from the beach. The ambience at the beach was very lively with children playing on the sand, ladies having sun bath - good I had goggles :-) and guys playing on the beach. I took Aryan for the bath at the shore but it seems he was scared with the waves of water rushing towards him. The water was cold and he got frightened with the first few splashes from the waves. I lifted him and tried encouraging him but it didn't worked so we finally changed his clothes and took him for a walk on the beach. On the way there were lovely birds and Aryan was eager to catch them. He ran after birds and the birds flew away and then he ran after other birds and this continued till he was tired.

Now it was time to make sand castles. I removed sand and made a burrow and we finally sat there with sand covered till waist and he thoroughly enjoyed playing in the sand. Now it was time to go but it was extremely difficult to pull him out from the sand and bring him in the mood of going back. He was crying and not at all willing to leave the beach so I took him on my shoulder and gave him a ride on the beach.

Finally, everyone was tired, a day well spent and a time to go back home. We took Garden State Parkway South highway and we were talking, listening songs, eating chips and Aryan was having wonderful nap on the back seat when I realized the car is not accelerating and in seconds it came to grinding halt. I got confused and bit worried, What happened all of a sudden and after seeing indicators, I realized the gas is over. The cars were speeding in the right lane and there were queue of cars behind my car in our lane. With some effort, I managed to park the car on the right shoulder. Now it was time for brainstorming as what to do now?

After some discussion, we thought to call my school friend Sidhart. He was relaxing on sunday evening and I spoiled his day. He is real gentleman and has also helped me in the past. I explained him where I am? Though, I wasn't fully sure where I am struck on the highway. Garden State parkway is a long drive with no shops or landmarks on the roadside and I didn't remembered which exit I have crossed just now. I gave him an approximate location and
he immediately agreed to come and bring gas in some container.

I knew it's going to take another 1.5 hr for him to come so meanwhile we were discussing and exploring other alternatives. Aryan was getting cranky sitting strapped in the car seat. We fed him with the food which we were carrying and tried entertaining him but he was now running out of patience. Then we heard police siren getting loud and saw a police car coming towards our car. The cop asked what's the problem and I explained him our situation. I had a smile on my face when he told he is going to inform towing company which will bring the gas. Within 10 min a towing vehicle arrived and filled our car with 5 gallon gas. It was a big relief and I said tons of Thanks and also Thanked and informed Sidhart who was already on the way.

The car started and we zoomed back to home. It was a day well spent on the beach with adventure on the highway.

What's that daddy?

Aryan watching waves touching his feet

Small plane flying advertisement banner

Aryan playing with sand

Going for bath

Aryan crying, scared of waves

Birds on the beach

Aryan strolling on the beach

Lovely day on the beach

Ready to go back