books and ovens

I am reading this book that I think has a lot of good ideas on making a relationship work better. The title is The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work by John Gottman - not that we are having problems, but better to learn skills while there aren't huge problems. It has very concrete things to say, not so woo woo and it is more than just actively listening.

Yesterday we bought a toaster oven! Looks like we will be here awhile longer and not having an oven was so sad. Last night we had baked potato and chicken cooked in the oven. I am thinking of trying cookies! It is nice to have a break from boiled and fried and variations on that.

Totoro and friends

If you would like to go to Studio Ghibli and you live in say San Francisco, then you should try to get tickets before you go to Tokyo. We did not, and all the wkends were completely sold out. It is closed on Tuesday, so we ended up going on a Weds. The best way to get tickets is at a convenience store called Lawsons. They have a machine that sells tickets. It is not an easy machine to figure out if you do not read Japanese, so what we did was have the hotel write a note to Lawson's saying these people would like two tickets to Studio Ghibli on Weds at 12. You have to pick a time. It takes about 4 hours to really thoroughly go through the museum. If you get there a little later than your time, it is ok. The station we went to is Mitaka and you can there from Shibuya pretty fast on the JR line, but we had tickets for the other lines so we went from Shibuya to Kudanshita on the Hanzomon line and then switched to Tozai line to Mitaka and then switched to a bus (that was covered in SG characters at bus stop number 9, down a level from the trains, 300Y or so) - that took about 90 minutes.

There is a lot of things suited for kids at the studio - a catbus to crawl in and around, small doorways to go through. And at the end we watched a 20 minute film that was just great, that we had never seen before, but with all the wonder/joy that is Studio Ghibli. There is a lot at the studio that teaches you how animation is done - very informative. The place is maze like and it feels like wonderful things are all around. We had lunch at the takeaway stand since the sit down restaurant was so crowded. We had hot dog, 3 kinds bean curry with rice, beer, apple juice, white milk ice cream and chocolate ice cream. There is also a wonderful souvenir shop, that some people said doesn't have everything, but I thought they had lots.

Back in Bangalore

All the way around the world and now back in Bangalore. Just in time for a state holiday (Nov 1).
Trying to reclaim the apartment from the dust and bugs. Looks like it has been raining a lot here - roads that looked ok when we left look a lot worse now. had dosa and filter coffee at our local kamat hotel for $2. And a great breakfast this morning at Infinitea -real pancakes and delightful tea from Assam with warmed up milk plus had a chance to read newspapers, since they haven't started arriving yet (but at least there wasn't a month's worth sitting there). Internet isn't working so well at home so contact will still be sparse til we sort that out. Paid the electricity bill - 2 months worth, paid the internet bill and vacuumed the rooms with carpets. Had pasta at home last night, which was nice.

While we were in Sydney we put our clocks forward an hour, I was surprised to see US isn't changing their clocks til this upcoming wkend. I would've thought everyone would do it at the same time. People in Sydney were so friendly. I had a fabulous time there - saw people we know, ate at Bourke St Bakery, went to Brett Whiteley's Studio: http://www.brettwhiteley.org/the_studio/introduction
I love artist's studios, and this one was especially enjoyable. Had a great lunch at Bird Cow Fish (though maybe I wish it was Pig Cow Bird). Sydney was definitely an easy city for us. Strangers were even friendly. Ate at the customs house, went to Watson's Bay.

zurich

I spent most of thursday in the art museum, wonderful contemporary collection. it was rainy in the morning and art museums have everything you need, bathrooms, espresso and snacks and ART. I really enjoyed it. there was a sculpture by Segal called Bowery that brought tears to my eyes. and lots of Giacometti since he is swiss. and a special showing of various art videos. Then we went to a little restaurant with great ambiance called Rosso, deep in west zurich. communal tables, and you can get wine by the glass where they just leave the bottle on yr table and you drink as much as you want. favorite food was the starter of beef tartar.

Haleem!

so Hyderabad is famous for Haleem which you get during Ramzan which is now and we are here - I really wanted some and due to exhaustion and colds and the convenience of staying in the hotel we didn't make it out for haleem until our last night here, but we did it. Asked the driver of the auto to take us to Hyderabad House and ended up at Paradise, but what the heck. Paradise is HUGE, you can order to go haleem, stand up and eat haleem, sit down in non-AC haleem and top floor fancy restaurant haleem. we went for the fancy restaurant (cost total: 250 rps for haleem, naan, paratha, lime soda sweet) and the haleem was delicious - omg is it filling. goat that has been cooked for 8 hrs with wheat and spices, fried onions on top. it was a mild spicy level and glutinous. that makes the second new food I have had here that has the consistency of goo.

Hyderabad

Had a great adventure today - went with cyanblue by AUTO (and they mostly used the meter) from ITC Kakatiya to Charminar and watched the parade of trucks with Ganesh on them. We were the only foreigners down there (maybe due to the recent bomb blasts?) and people were very excited to shake our hands and talk to us and wave at us. Lots of roads were blocked off so it took three autos to get there and I think two to get back. We saw the Mecca Masjid and it was beautiful - actually saw several mosques all looked amazing to me.People were throwing the powder they throw during Holi and also throwing flowers, beating drums and dancing. It was very exciting and I think it is amazing we made it there and back. I am so happy we went. We saw lots of tiny roads off the beaten path in order to avoid the road blocks.

Dentist

I went to a fantastic dentist today. He is so great, the superstar of dentist. I had tried to get this problem fixed twice in the US and once at RV dental college and none of those worked. He said, ok let's try a crown instead. His name is Dr. Jagdish Rohira.

http://www.drjagdishrohira.com/

His phone number is 91 80 2361 3286

This morning I had a dentist name and no phone number and both Just Dial and the internet failed to come up with the number. Then I had six other numbers for different dentists and all the numbers said "call failed" over and over again. I feel like I can't dial a phone here. One number said, please try at another time. It was very frustrating. But then I called Dr. Rohira - he could see me right away, he was very easy to talk to, I felt safe, everything was SUPER clean. And he can get my permanent crown on the one day I have between Andamans and Hyderabad. I was SO thankful. And a crown here is about US $200, and in the US a crown will run around $800 _after insurance_. He was so gentle, and you can just tell he has heaps of experience, great touch, great bedside manner. Plus chatted about other things. so relieved.