Wow, I have gotten WAY too slack on this blog. Honestly, my other WordPress blog is lacking as well. I have lost my crafty, little muse. At least with my other blog I can post an obnoxious amount of pictures of Storm, this blog is a little more difficult. I have the urge to write/type today so I figured I would just start and see where I end up. NaNoWriMo is coming up and I want to really try this year. I know I have to warm up my muscles quite a bit. I have two books that I have not finished because I am stuck. I have put it off and I know that is not going to help. I have a couple of guesses of why I am having such a difficult time coming up with anything to write.

#1 – I don’t do anything and mostly sit around all day. Mind you, I read while…

Festivity filled the air as the garba and dandiya dancers in flamboyant costumes kept pace with rhythmic beat of the drums, moving gracefully around a lighted lamp in front of the picture of Durga, the divine mother or the feminine form of cosmic energy. The rings of dancers revolving in cyclic movements merged into exquisite patterns symbolising, as widely believed, the changing sequence of life surrounding the eternally constant and unchanging reality of the divine mother.

The music and dance lending vibrant colour and merriment to the evenings is the festival of Navrathri, a celebration lasting nine nights (Sanskrit nava denoting nine and rathri night). The celebrations enter the ninth night as I sit down to write a portion of this post, to culminate in Dussehra or Vijaya dashami on the tenth day, falling on the 3rd October 2014.

The concept of divine mother or feminine energy is a major…

Hey, gang. So I was thinking,

The internet is public. You’re smart. You know this. I do too. We all know it, but we don’t all remember. We don’t all understand, grok, dig, appreciate this. The internet is public.

When we are on the internet, we are on one website, looking at one page on that website. It’s like being in a room. And we are standing in that room looking at one wall in the room. The room is in an apartment. The apartment is in a building. The building is in a neighborhood. The neighborhood is in a city. The city is in a state. The state is in a country. The country is on a continent. The continent is in the world.
Image source: pixabay

The whole world is the internet. And we are standing in one room looking at one wall. It’s really easy to move…

Some books should be reread at various stages of your life, not only to view the book differently, but to view the world differently.

Anna Kareninaby LeoTolstoy is one of those books.

As a teen I thought this book wildly romantic. A tragic tale filled with noble nobles; and I didn’t fully understand why the peasants were so upset.

In my 20s I thought Anna Karenina was a narcissistic neurotic birdbrain; the nobles pompous gits; and the peasants noble.

Now, in my 40s I decided to read this again, so I borrowed the recent Oxford University Press version, an inspiring and edifying translation with notes and a wonderful introduction by Rosamund Bartlett from Netgalley.com for the low price of an honest review. As the pages flew by I realized how differently I now see the novel as well as the complicated navigation of life’s path. The message…

The goal of this blog is to educate my dear readers of Goan Cuisine as it has a very strong Portuguese influence specially in the Christian households of Goa. Using the best ingredients and styles of both worlds Goan have created their own fine cuisine.

For this week I decided, I would make Beef Roulade / Beef Rolls, I usually do my research on Google to see what has been written out there and what I know and to compare notes. In the US I haven’t been exposed to Rouladenand through my research I found out it is Polish and the only popular Polish food I have seen is the Famous Pierogies out here.

I think every European country has their own unique recipe for Beef Rouladen but the basic recipe compromises of thin slice meat stuffed with some sausages, slices of potato, carrots, onions rolled and cooked in…

Darkness abounds,
clouds and thunder shatter;
where is peace?

“I am now officially a doctor. Can you write about my doctorate?” Nawar Al Saadi wrote to me the other day, sending over a link from his graduation ceremony.

Nawar is in charge of the popular Tourism in Iraq Facebookpage that I have written about previously. His enthusiasm and love for his country touched many: the blog post has been shared over 300 times on Facebook and other Iraqis got in touch with me after reading the post.

When I first spoke with Nawar he was still a PhD student in Bucharest, Romania, specializing in tourism, hoping to be a part of the future tourism industry in Iraq. He wanted to return to Iraq despite having family living in Sweden – he had a burning desire to show the world another country than what usually features in Western media, and to be a part of it’s future. And he seems to…