Sweet simple joys

This is my first blog. I've been thinking about what to write. Seeing other blogs I feel like "Ooh, I should write on something spectacular and awe striking!!" But honestly I don't have a clue of anything unusual. In fact, there has been many sweet simple joyous moments in my life( something I never noticed). And now I realize it how lucky I am to have it...

Mornings:
I love mornings. No not the part where I have to get up, but when the early rising sun streams into my bedroom, when sometimes my sweet hubby offers to get me a cup of tea. When I get to read the newspaper in my balcony with a fresh whiff of unpolluted air. And of course, when I can laze around in bed and don't have to go to work!!

I remember the constant wake up calls of my parents, literally at their nerves end, trying to get me out of bed. Especially during exams, my papa never got his 40 winks but I slept like a log. My aunt ( who stayed next door) used to bring me a cup of hot black coffee sharp at 5.00 am just before she went for her walks. Then again at 6.00 my Mom got up to make my favorite 'adrak chai'. I remember having my tea on a particular step in the back yard. I sat there enjoying the morning sky and my cat nuzzling near my leg( we had some cats who grew around the society, the last sip of my tea belonged to him). Then heavy breakfast followed after an hour( which we could not avoid under my Mom's stern gaze). Today, I skip breakfast so many times or end up eating cornflakes or oats( due to lack of time or sheer laziness of preparing it). When I look back and think of the times I used to fight with my Mom for pushing the breakfast down my throat.. Oh really miss those days!!

Kids:
I come from a large family. Though I have just one sibling, on birthdays and special occasions, our houses are full of aunties, uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews(some years back even grandparents). Distance or close relatives, there is always a huge pack of kids. And its wonderful seeing them jump around as if they have springs attached to their legs. It reminds me of the days gone by when my cousins and me used to be jumping around like them. We had are own games and secrets, no elders allowed rules, making up stories, going on 'adventure trips' around the world on a imaginary ships within the safety of our parents' scooter or staircase or front porch.

Summers meant playing in hot sun, night-outs with cousins, drinking water from our aunty's fridge (which she meticulously kept filling in bottles and kept chasing us out of the house), waiting for the 'ice-cream walla' for the then famous 'pepsicola'(sweetened, crushed ice stuffed in small pencil shaped plastic covers), 'kulfis' and 'golas'. The NextGen, however, seems to be a much composed and matured bunch compared to the notoriety of their predecessors. They are more into dance, painting classes and have busier schedules than the elders.

Baking a cake :
Whenever I pass through a bakery, I am so tempted to eat a pastry. Baking a cake is an art. No I'm not talking about those off-the-supermarket-shelf-ready-made cake mixes. I prefer the more traditional method of right-from-scratch cake bakings. Watching the chefs baking breads and cakes on the cookery shows, one feels its more simpler than making an omelet. I know the day I was proven wrong. But thankfully, I never gave it up, unlike other things.

Baking cakes with Mom meant waking up early morning during a weekend or the christmas holidays. Mom hurriedly gave us breakfast and Papa would be rushing to the store to buy all the ingredients. Kitchen would be filled with flour, egg shells, the bajaj oven heating up at a corner. Mom patiently sieving the flour and the baking soda and my sister and me stealthily putting the cherries, raisins and tutty fruitties in our mouths. Those days of Christmas , we easily baked up to 10 to 15 cakes for neighbors, relatives, friends and guests. Now-a-days, though nobody has so much time and effort to do it, what with excellent cakes available in the shops. However, after marriage, I try to bake some cakes for every Christmas(It has been only 2 Christmases). And I enjoy each time my cakes come out with a fully risen, unbroken crust. Its rewarding to see my labor of pain being cut down to pieces before it even cools. Its an achievement in itself.