Travelogues - Verona, Italy

Yup, this is the same Verona as in Shakespeare's "Two gentlemen from Verona". It was a hot, sweltering day in Verona.  The sun was beating down on our heads as we toured through the city. One thing we really missed in Europe were water fountains. Bottled water is forbiddingly expensive - one small 0.5 L bottle costs around 5 euros. The guide warned us that locals might just pump tap water into the bottles and sell them (deja vu India!).  S & I decided to take a risk and drank water right out of a fountain in the middle of a piazza. S went a step farther and dunked his head in the fountain to escape the 105 F heat. Yup, Italy in the summer == Madurai/Trichy during agni natchathiram.

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Ancient roman ruins excavated beneath the present day Verona. It is amazing how much the ground level has increased over the centuries.

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Shakespeare's most famous heroine Juliet's hometown is Verona. The house where Juliet's supposed to have lived is in a nondescript, winding alleyway. Pictured right, her statue in the fictional home. You will be lucky in love if you place your hand over her heart and think of your loved one or some such thing. I couldn't bring myself to subscribe to this belief because look what happened to Juliet herself, eh?

©Subhashini Srinivasan

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Everyone's a sucker for love. Wall graffiti at the entrance to Juliet's house. Legend has it that if you write your name along with your lover's on this wall, your love will be successful. We found lots of couples waiting in line to scribble on this wall...

©Subhashini Srinivasan

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Juliet's window (right) from where she romanced Romeo...

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Arena di Verona, another giant coliseum, originally built in AD 30. 

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They were gearing up for an Operatic concert when we visited there. The arena was impressive in its size and conception. 

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I was walking past this statue toward the Coliseum when it suddenly lunged at me. Turns out it is a living guy after all..:) How he managed to be wrapped in this gold dress in the burning hot sun is beyond me...

©Subhashini Srinivasan

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A modern world gladiator taking a smoke break..:)

Travel Diaries: Lugano, Italy

Some years back, S & I took a vacation to Europe. We visited London, Paris, Switzerland and Italy. It was one of the most wonderful, educative trips we had ever taken. I am not sure why I didn't blog about this back then. But I did maintain copious travel notes and TONS of photographs. Here are a few memories from that trip...

The highlight of the trip was Italy. Both S & I had such an amazing time there. So I'll start from there.

Lugano is a quaint little town on the Swiss-Italian border. It is one of those towns right out of an Enid Blyton book - laid back, sleepy and very comfy like a favorite old armchair. 

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 We stopped at Lugano for a coffee break en route to Italy. After tasting insipid, watery coffee in the rest of Europe, it came as a delight to my taste buds. In fact, when we got into Italy, S & I heaved a huge sigh of relief. Here, we could get food that satisfied the salt & spice cravings of the vegetarian South Indian. The cappuccino , pictured right, at a non-descript restaurant was one of the most delicious I'd tasted! Yummm.

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Lake Lugano, pictured right. We took a stroll along the promenade next to the lake. It was a beautiful, summer morning with the crispiness of the previous night's dew. The mountain sides by the lake were full of colorful houses. 

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We found two old, retired men playing chess on this chessboard right by the lakeside. One of them said that they had been doing this regularly for the past 10 years every single day. What a beautiful, relaxed way to spend one's old age - with a cup of coffee, an old friend and a well played game of chess by the lake!

©Subhashini Srinivasan. All rights reserved

Many of you might be familiar with the legend of William Tell. It was one of the earliest stories my mom told me. I was pleasantly surprised to see his statue in Lugano!


















PS: I finally have added copyright info to this blog and the photos. I never thought my writing/photographs were worthy enough of copying. But after an idiot copied my blog posts last year, I've been forced to add copyright information. 

An Indian Summer

When I am not being a super-genius, all-cool software programmer (that's my day job), I like to pretend I am an interior designer. I have a liking for and appreciate aesthetically designed spaces but that's where my talent ends. Sure, I can put together a decent looking living room that people won't be revolted by. But I don't think I can come anywhere close to designing a chic, super-hot room that people will be awed by (like the ones they show on HGTV). Nonetheless, we all want to be something we can't be. Soooo, in my free time, I don the interior designer avatar and go hunting for home decor stuff.

I looove all the colorful little, cutesy knick-knacks that you can pepper the house with -- keepsake boxes, letter holders, scrapbook caddies etc.. Much to S's bewilderment, my latest fad is cute baskets. Honestly, not sure many girls can resist handwoven baskets with colorful linen covers inside and adorable wordings! So, every time I make a trip to Kroger or Babies R Us, S peers worriedly into the shopping bags wondering what sort of junk I've accumulated this time. And sometimes, he convinces me to return stuff.

Anyhoo, this morning, I was doing some blog hopping and landed up at The Indian Summer. Unlike me, she's a real, real interior designer sort. I was blown away by her blog and the spaces she showcases. So, if you're in the mood to shop or decorate your home, hop away to The Indian Summer and feast your eyes.

Should American Women Learn to Give Birth at Home? - TIME

I am a big believer in natural pregnancy and childbirth. Having gone through one pregnancy here in the US, I think I can safely comment that the birthing process is "overmedicalized" like the article quotes. There are innumerable tests, screenings and procedures to be undergone whether they are necessary or not. To make things interesting, doctors here never offer concrete advice regarding a lot of these screenings/tests. They only have "options" and then they leave it "upto to you", the patient, to decide. Doctors here seem more terrified of insurance companies and libel suits than they are concerned about the patient's health.

With that mistrust firmly in place, I decided to avoid a C-section at all costs. I went the natural route and even took a "natural childbirth" class. Our instructor was excellent but the class turned out to be pretty boring after a while. There's only so much anyone can tell you when you've already read a dozen books on the subject. One of the things that the class often talked about was home births. I had no plans of home birthing initially but midway through the pregnancy, I started having second thoughts. I bounced the idea around among family members just to get some perspective.

I thought the previous generation - my mom, mother-in-law (MIL hereafter) - would be supportive of home births largely because Indian parents are pro-natural. I was in for a surprise. My MIL, who had witnessed a few home births, was vehemently opposed. I explained to her how medicalized the process had become here in the US. But she had witnessed unforeseen complications and even loss of life in the home birthing environment because of lack of medical advancements. She was firmly in the hospital birthing camp. Ditto for my mom who thought that while we hear a lot of positive stories about home birthing, there are women who never live to tell the tale.

I have to admit that my fear of doctors and hospitals here in the US was not fully justified. The care that I received during labor/delivery was excellent. Doctors and nurses were very co-operative and supportive of my unmedicated birth. They did not once mention epidural (even though 95% of women here receive epidural routinely) until I asked for it myself. And all through 31 hours of labor, the nurses were so compassionate and helpful that I feel grateful to them. And my midwife didn't once mention C-section since I was doing well.

Sooo, I have revised my black-and-white impression of epidural, medical interventions and hospital births in the US. I still feel like epidural/pain medications are vastly overused. But there's a place for them (in cases like mine) as well. One of our friends, who was aghast when I said I was going epidural-free, asked me if I wished I'd taken epidural early on in labor. I stand by my decision and I don't regret it. If I had to do it all over again, I'd do it the same way. But next time around, I might give home birth more serious thought..:)