Had a very nice Christmas! Was grateful that Papa was here. Went to the Christmas Eve Service at PAC. Rev. Hannold talked about 4 prophecies of the birth of the Messiah that were made starting ~730 years before the birth of Jesus.
We had yummy biriyani for dinner & lunch on Christmas Day.
Christmas Day was our annual party for our friends around NJ. This year we had the Bhimpures, Vasireddis, Khers, Ahujas, Dharankars, Markales, Natu & Singh families here to celebrate Christmas with us. We all had a blast - catching up with each other. The kids put up an awesome magic show in the end! Catered food from Crown of India & had plenty of cookies, cake & candy. Anita made a great pomegranate & Proseco drink!
My notes on life.
Monday, December 27, 2010
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Nov 22, 2010
Rutha is 11 years old today! She is turning into such a beautiful person - inner & outer - pardon the maternal bias here. She had a blast this past weekend at the Junior's Campout in Middleville NJ. It was a very memorable experience with learning rope climbing, hiking - day & night, campfire, hot chocolate & s'mores, making their own lunches & dinners & building a whole lot of camaraderie & friendships!!
This past year Rutha has done so well in academics. Her NJASK4 scores were fantastic - a perfect 300 on Math, 296 in Language Arts and 267 in Science. Her new interest for excelling is currently social studies - finds it very interesting. Her grades are already maxed out this marking period. She handles her other interests/activities too very well. Has done well in chess - won 2 plaques for 2nd & 3rd place at PCS & SciCore. Performed in 3 items - Lavani, Raag Kedar & murali manohar in her Guru's annual function. Came up with the piece to perform an Asian Fusion dance with Roopa (Bharat Natyam) on the song Believe by Ozomatli from the album "Street Signs". Really showed initiative here - also commended by Archana for her initiative on this. Is progressing very well with violin. Did well in her swim lessons - teacher recommended that she could now do the stroke clinic but we are taking a break for a few weeks over the winter. Is also a member of the school choir. Will be taking part in the Odyssey of the Mind Contest with 6 other participants from her grade.
My prayer for her today is that she continues to grow, reflects her love for her God in all that she does, is the best among the best and brings praise & honor to her Creator as we acknowledge His blessings on her!
This past year Rutha has done so well in academics. Her NJASK4 scores were fantastic - a perfect 300 on Math, 296 in Language Arts and 267 in Science. Her new interest for excelling is currently social studies - finds it very interesting. Her grades are already maxed out this marking period. She handles her other interests/activities too very well. Has done well in chess - won 2 plaques for 2nd & 3rd place at PCS & SciCore. Performed in 3 items - Lavani, Raag Kedar & murali manohar in her Guru's annual function. Came up with the piece to perform an Asian Fusion dance with Roopa (Bharat Natyam) on the song Believe by Ozomatli from the album "Street Signs". Really showed initiative here - also commended by Archana for her initiative on this. Is progressing very well with violin. Did well in her swim lessons - teacher recommended that she could now do the stroke clinic but we are taking a break for a few weeks over the winter. Is also a member of the school choir. Will be taking part in the Odyssey of the Mind Contest with 6 other participants from her grade.
My prayer for her today is that she continues to grow, reflects her love for her God in all that she does, is the best among the best and brings praise & honor to her Creator as we acknowledge His blessings on her!
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Toronto Summer 2010
We dropped the kids for 2+ week vacation with Sunita in Toronto. Met Satish, Neetu & Roma who were visiting Savita & Sangeeta. It was really nice seeing them!
Picked up the kids on the 1st weekend in August. Went to Scarborough Bluffs on Saturday - a lovely day to hang out at the beach! Went to Frederick's for dinner - quite a disappointing experience.
Sunita had made lovely biriyani & a yummy Malabar Shrimp Curry.
Left Toronto on Sunday night - crossed the border only to realize that I left my purse in her kitchen. We stayed at the Fairfield Inn in Henrietta & Pramod - bless him left at 6 am to go back to Glendale Ave across the border to pick it up & Sunita & Savita - bless them drove from Toronto to bring it to us.
Picked up the kids on the 1st weekend in August. Went to Scarborough Bluffs on Saturday - a lovely day to hang out at the beach! Went to Frederick's for dinner - quite a disappointing experience.
Sunita had made lovely biriyani & a yummy Malabar Shrimp Curry.
Left Toronto on Sunday night - crossed the border only to realize that I left my purse in her kitchen. We stayed at the Fairfield Inn in Henrietta & Pramod - bless him left at 6 am to go back to Glendale Ave across the border to pick it up & Sunita & Savita - bless them drove from Toronto to bring it to us.
Vancouver 2010
Attended JSM 2010 at Vancouver this year - its was 10 years since I went to a JSM meeting! Vancouver was beautiful - just as I had remembered from my visit in 2003.
Met so many old friends, ex-colleagues and my old teachers and professors. The convention center was HUGE so I guess that is why it did not seem so crowded. I attended some good talks (some not so good ones), helped with my company's hiring efforts, went to the bookfair, attended a meeting of the Committee for International Relations - which I serve on. The committee had sponsored a teacher from Costa Rica and it was very interesting listening to her about the conditions for teaching Statistics in her country.
One of my friends (my senior) from Penn State Omer Ozturk was elected an ASA Fellow - a truly deserving honor for Omer. Had lunch with him one day. We were joined then by Prof M. B. Rao - a very interesting and engaging conversationalist! He is a historian - his anecdotes are so informational and entertaining! He told me of a recent article from the WSJ that talked about a 25 year follow-up study on children who were given additional motivation/stimulation and those who were not - of course no surprise - the ones who were given this stimulation did much better in life in general than those who were not! Phew - not too late to work on Rohun as he becomes a kindergartener this year!!
Prof Bruce Lindsay recd the Fisher Memorial Prize this year - he was a very good teacher & researcher. Clearly nervous while giving his lecture - it wasn't as impactful as one would have expected.
Met Susan Murphy - the same energy - the same style - even better - she is now a silver blonde with a lot of style! Jim Rosenberger & his wife - looked the same as ever - really lovely couple! Very happy to see Dr. Bill Harkness - such a devoted teacher - he has lost loads of weight - his was a Santa Claus image from 15 years ago!
Met some very nice people through Arvind Shah - Rajesh Selukar, Pandu Kulkarni and Madhuri Mulekar. Had met Rajesh at another conference in 2002! Cannot talk about Vancouver without talking about food!! We all (the above, Charu, Amy & Jessica) went to Vij's for dinner one day. Its a great Indian restaurant with a twist. Very small, on a side (residential) street, they take no reservations so the wait is considerable. After reaching there a little before 6 pm we had to wait for 1.5 hrs. But the chatting company was great & the waitresses - prettily dressed in black frocks (classy blonds) brought out platters of yummy free appetizers and cups of chai. The food was great - not your run of the mill chicken tikka masalas - but very interesting! The drinks were also great - I had a rum drink with mango, garam masala and ginger!
Met Varsha's brother Vinay & sister-in-law Rekha - they took me out to dinner at a place called Red Door - an asian fusion place with great food! Very tasty & served in style with a very good Okanagan peony wine! This was another fine evening with great company - we went for a quick stroll at a beach & a drive through Stanley Park.
I stayed at the Sutton Place - nice hotel with great breakfast included!
The flight to Vancouver was filled with 70% statisticians & the return flight had about 40% statisticians!
Another very good talk was given by Jim Goodnight from SAS - the question answer session was even better!! He talked about bringing science/computational education in schools across America & the need for a crisis that will lead this great country into another area & era of leadership & innovation! I am praying for that too!
Met Prof Anil Gore - my teacher from Poona University - got caught up with news from Poona. It was sad to learn that Prof Kunte had passed on - he died after meeting with an accident on his scooter returning from a game of bridge. His was the most riveting laugh I've ever heard - loud and so filled with laughter - if you know what I mean - was glad in a way that his end came following a game of bridge - he was a very smart statistician!
Ro & Ru were Sunita & Mom in Toronto - having a blast for 2 weeks - but one evening while I was in Vancouver Ro had a meltdown and claimed that his heart was sad because he missed his Mama and Dad :-(
Met so many old friends, ex-colleagues and my old teachers and professors. The convention center was HUGE so I guess that is why it did not seem so crowded. I attended some good talks (some not so good ones), helped with my company's hiring efforts, went to the bookfair, attended a meeting of the Committee for International Relations - which I serve on. The committee had sponsored a teacher from Costa Rica and it was very interesting listening to her about the conditions for teaching Statistics in her country.
One of my friends (my senior) from Penn State Omer Ozturk was elected an ASA Fellow - a truly deserving honor for Omer. Had lunch with him one day. We were joined then by Prof M. B. Rao - a very interesting and engaging conversationalist! He is a historian - his anecdotes are so informational and entertaining! He told me of a recent article from the WSJ that talked about a 25 year follow-up study on children who were given additional motivation/stimulation and those who were not - of course no surprise - the ones who were given this stimulation did much better in life in general than those who were not! Phew - not too late to work on Rohun as he becomes a kindergartener this year!!
Prof Bruce Lindsay recd the Fisher Memorial Prize this year - he was a very good teacher & researcher. Clearly nervous while giving his lecture - it wasn't as impactful as one would have expected.
Met Susan Murphy - the same energy - the same style - even better - she is now a silver blonde with a lot of style! Jim Rosenberger & his wife - looked the same as ever - really lovely couple! Very happy to see Dr. Bill Harkness - such a devoted teacher - he has lost loads of weight - his was a Santa Claus image from 15 years ago!
Met some very nice people through Arvind Shah - Rajesh Selukar, Pandu Kulkarni and Madhuri Mulekar. Had met Rajesh at another conference in 2002! Cannot talk about Vancouver without talking about food!! We all (the above, Charu, Amy & Jessica) went to Vij's for dinner one day. Its a great Indian restaurant with a twist. Very small, on a side (residential) street, they take no reservations so the wait is considerable. After reaching there a little before 6 pm we had to wait for 1.5 hrs. But the chatting company was great & the waitresses - prettily dressed in black frocks (classy blonds) brought out platters of yummy free appetizers and cups of chai. The food was great - not your run of the mill chicken tikka masalas - but very interesting! The drinks were also great - I had a rum drink with mango, garam masala and ginger!
Met Varsha's brother Vinay & sister-in-law Rekha - they took me out to dinner at a place called Red Door - an asian fusion place with great food! Very tasty & served in style with a very good Okanagan peony wine! This was another fine evening with great company - we went for a quick stroll at a beach & a drive through Stanley Park.
I stayed at the Sutton Place - nice hotel with great breakfast included!
The flight to Vancouver was filled with 70% statisticians & the return flight had about 40% statisticians!
Another very good talk was given by Jim Goodnight from SAS - the question answer session was even better!! He talked about bringing science/computational education in schools across America & the need for a crisis that will lead this great country into another area & era of leadership & innovation! I am praying for that too!
Met Prof Anil Gore - my teacher from Poona University - got caught up with news from Poona. It was sad to learn that Prof Kunte had passed on - he died after meeting with an accident on his scooter returning from a game of bridge. His was the most riveting laugh I've ever heard - loud and so filled with laughter - if you know what I mean - was glad in a way that his end came following a game of bridge - he was a very smart statistician!
Ro & Ru were Sunita & Mom in Toronto - having a blast for 2 weeks - but one evening while I was in Vancouver Ro had a meltdown and claimed that his heart was sad because he missed his Mama and Dad :-(
Friday, July 16, 2010
Conversations with Rohun July 2010
Scene 1: Driving home from swimming with Rutha & Rohun
Rohun: I think I can fall in love with some girls
Me: What do you mean "some girls" whom do you mean?
Ro: I mean if I see some pretty girls then I can decide if I want to fall in love with them or not.
Rutha: (the brightest bulb in the family!) Looks can be deceiving buddy!
Scene 2: Another day of driving back from swimming - Pramod, Ru & Ro. The topic was Pramod's dad
Ro: Where is your Dad?
Pramod: He passed away - is no more.
Ro: You mean he went to heaven?
Pramod: Yes I guess so.
Ro: (After a 2 min pause) How do you get to heaven?
Pramod: When you do good things you get to go there.
Ro: (An instant reply) Oh then you will never get to heaven Dad - because you don't do good things with me - you yell at me, you force me to sleep when I don't want to, you are mean to me.
Rohun: I think I can fall in love with some girls
Me: What do you mean "some girls" whom do you mean?
Ro: I mean if I see some pretty girls then I can decide if I want to fall in love with them or not.
Rutha: (the brightest bulb in the family!) Looks can be deceiving buddy!
Scene 2: Another day of driving back from swimming - Pramod, Ru & Ro. The topic was Pramod's dad
Ro: Where is your Dad?
Pramod: He passed away - is no more.
Ro: You mean he went to heaven?
Pramod: Yes I guess so.
Ro: (After a 2 min pause) How do you get to heaven?
Pramod: When you do good things you get to go there.
Ro: (An instant reply) Oh then you will never get to heaven Dad - because you don't do good things with me - you yell at me, you force me to sleep when I don't want to, you are mean to me.
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