The Jammin' Professor

Final exams are coming up; I am excited because I have prepared myself ahead of time. I still want to review some stuff for algebra. My jury is on the sixth, which means I have to practice, and focus more on violin. Unfortunately, I concentrate on academics more than music these days. I need to find the right balance.

A vacation is the most exciting prospect for me this winter. I cannot decide where I would like to go, but I know India probably is not feasible. I need to get some rest as soon as possible. I might take a week off with friends just to relax a bit and enjoy myself. I cannot wait until I have something to relay back to friends and family. I have plans to use a new sewing machine I recently inherited this winter, if nothing else. I have not really done any sewing with it, but I am anxious to get to it. Among my priority sewing projects are outfits for deities. I would like to sew a set each for smaller Gaura-Nitai and larger Jagannath Baladev Subhadra deities.

Today I got a compliment back from a peer who said I was always having adventures, and had something interesting to say. I like that. I like having adventures. Adventure suits me. I get into funny, awkward, or just strange situations sometimes. While normally these things might bother me, nowadays I just roll with the punches, go with the flow, and laugh at myself when necessary. Everything is funny when you take your head out of your ass and laugh.

I had a silly dream last night involving my English professor. I was in a frenzy to speak privately with her, but it just was not a good time for her. She told me several times, "Madri, this isn't a good time for me. Can you come during office hours? Make an appointment." and so on. I would not have it though. I demanded "me" time urgently. I followed her into her next class, she sat down, and the professor (not her) started up his boom box, with a personally mixed tape of Mariachi, Banda, and Norteno music. Apparently my professor was taking a course at the college for fun, with this quirky guy at the wheel. The professor was a very tall, handsome, older black man. He was wearing a funny blazer with elbow patches that he promptly removed. He pulled out his drum pad and drumsticks, and started to jam out with the Mexican music while singing along. It was so captivating that I forgot about my urgent ordeal, and listened dumbfounded to the hysterical professor.

Much Needed R&R

I have a thesis for my topic due on Wednesday, which should be easy enough because I have read half a dozen articles. I have yet to arrange an interview with anyone. This is a cry for help. If you or anyone you know is a member of a car club, please email me. I would like to interview you/your friend/relative for my research paper. Why did I choose car clubs? Well, when I searched academic databases for scholarly articles on car clubs, I found relatively little about it. There were plenty of car culture, and car customization, but not too many scholarly articles about car clubs in particular. I have curious, also, extremely curious about the fascination with car clubs. I've seen plenty riding around East Dallas, Pleasant Grove, North Dallas, and Oak Cliff but I don't know anyone personally who is a car club member or associates with any car club organization. I have a couple neighbors who are members of a car club but they have not responded back to me. I wonder if I seem like a creeper. I would hope not. Why would anyone want to investigate car culture and car club subculture?

On another note, I have been having strange dreams again. I suppose it has something to do with my lack of sleep that whenever I can sleep my body immediately jumps into deep sleep. I am currently investigating different sleep aids: natural, therapeutic, and medicinal to help me sleep better. I have found a combination that kind of works for me, it just takes a long time to kick in, and it has to be a daily routine or it does not work well.

Sunday was the last day of Damodar month, Rasa Purnima, and Tulasi Saligram vivaha. It was also Chandaneswar prabhu’s lunar birthday. We made pizza for lunch and had a quiet family dinner for prabhu. After dinner, we got ready quickly and headed to the temple for the festivities. Mother Sudantika usually conducts Tulasi Devi’s arati ceremony, and she eagerly took leadership of Tulasi Devi’s wedding arrangements. There was an energetic and lively kirtan for Vrinda Devi, circumambulation of the greenhouse, prayers, and then dozens of bhaktas watered Tulasi Devi. After everything, I was really exhausted but happily headed home with a feeling of rejuvenation and contentment.

Spring Update

Well it has been over a month since I last blogged and that is mainly because I've been busy with school work. I have less than a month to go this semester, and I'm really proud of myself. I still have straight As and I have made a lot of new friends with different peeople.

On other news, I have moved again. Actually, I'm right back to my old place. The house has more privacy in the backyard and the foliage also protects my plants from excessive sun exposure. The best news so far? No more roommates. Next on the agenda is a spring yard sale.
:)
Right now I'm working on a group assignment on e-Portfolio but I think I still have more to add.
Today I cooked palak paneer and posted the photograph to allrecipes.com. I'm a little upset that someone posted a photograph there that is obviously not my recipe with onions for garnish. Of course, it isn't my recipe exactly, either. Feel free to visit the webpage and try the recipe, if you feel inspired. Also, if you prepare the Palak Paneer, take time to rate, comment, and upload a photo if possible.

Discoveries

I don't know what to write about really. I have a lot of homework assignments but I'm keeping up so far. I made a perfect score on my last algebra exam and I'm hoping to ace the next accuplacer, I want to test out and save myself another semester of developmental math.
I made a near perfect score on my critical thinking quiz. I could have done better if I had not rushed through it and missed the intellectual standards of assessment section.

It's okay if you only know three chords but for God's sake, play them in the right order.

I want to read Jaiva Dharma but I have a bit of reading to catch up on for a vocabulary quiz. It has been three days since I read any devotional material. The last thing I read was "Being A Guru" by  Srila Bhakti Siddhanta Saraswati Thakur. Prajapati prabhu has given me a few items to read, a packet about Sri Radhe and another astrology packet. I'm trying to avoid opening the astrology related material as I tend to get distracted and carried away. I love reading devotional literature, but, as with most reading, I lose track of time and find myself still reading several hours later.
Is it strange that enjoy working my algebra problems more than writing an essay?
I thought that I really enjoyed writing, I do enjoy writing. Lately I'm finding that I enjoy a lot of things that I did not know about before. I'm learning a lot about myself. Of course, I knew that I loved math. I did Math Olympiad in elementary school and up until middle and high school I relished solving problems and learning new concepts in class. I remember we had Dr. Tiernan come to H.S. Thompson once or twice a week to teach us college math. It was so stimulating and refreshing. I think everyone lit up whenever she came into the room. We were very young and excited about math. Summations especially. There was something invigorating about solving an equation that seemed larger than life. You felt as if you could conquer the world after solving a summation. She gave us the greek alphabet and we learned to write in a new coded language. We thought we were so smart, like we had discovered an ancient secret.

Teaching Sanskrit and Re-learning Bengali

I was reading today, Srila Prabhupada says that the woman's foremost duty is to train the children early to become first class devotees of Krishna. He says they should be diversified and learn little ABCs, take prasadam, chant and see the Deities, play etc. that way they are always engaged by some activities and will be naturally inclined towards devotional life. Right now, Krishna Chandra already knows his ABCs and 123s... but that was really not all my doing. My sister had a bigger part in that, she was sitting with Krishna Chandra and keeping him company while I looked after the house, cooking, cleaning, worshipping the Deities, caring for Tulasi etc. She managed to teach him letters and numbers and I played my small part by regularly quizzing him after his daily lessons. I would point or show random letters and ask him to identify them, usually he was successful but sometimes he would be confused. We realised that his lowercase letters had to be clarified-- Maria quickly tutored him and soon enough, he could tell his lowercase 'L' from his uppercase 'I'. Soon enough he was increasing his speech and speed, we would mention to people that he knew his ABCs and they would seem kind of skeptical. It also didn't help that Krishna Chandra didn't feel enthusiastic to show his talents on the spot, either. That was almost a year ago that we started him first vowels, then consanants, little by little he has learned it all and has it memorized backwards and forwards. Today I started Krishna Chandra on Sanskrit vowels, mainly because I thought that he would grasp Sanskrit easily, he already recites Sanskrit prayers by his own volition and that would be beneficial for him as well. He already insists on doing the evening arati and with a little supervision I let him do it, just to keep him from throwing a tantrum. Usually he likes to sing Brahma Samhita prayers, "govindam adi purusham tam aham bhajami", especially in the early morning. Sometimes he will just sing that one line all day long from morning to evening, but somewhat broken and mis-pronounced. Sometimes he likes to chant "Jaya Jagannath" and when I hear it I really enjoy his kirtan. I think to myself, "Wow, even a child can do it so why not I?" Lately, I have not been in the practice of speaking/reading/writing Bangali and so I also wanted to keep practicing my Bengali. Nowadays a lot of letters have gone unused as they're only used for transcribing Sankrit texts and some people feel its unnecessary to have so many Bengali alphabets and plus there's a whole crap-load of conjunct letters. Those letters shouldn't be forgotten and removed from the Bengali alphabet, it is a very useful part of the Bengali literature and culture. There are so many wonderful renaissance Bengali poets whose works should be studied in universities across the globe. I think there should be a Bengali Language and Literature Major in every major university in the world, that way many people can read the great literary works of Chandidas, Vidyapati, Vrindavana Das Thakur, Krishnadas Kaviraj, and Bhaktivinod Thakur and benefit greatly. It is not just my opinion but the instruction of the acharyas that everyone should learn from Vaishnava literature about topics of Krishna, especially the Bengali literatures. Bangla is such a sweet language, I only regret that I have neglected it for so long and now I have no godbrothers to speak or practice with. Purandar Acharya-dada used to always inquire from me in Bengali, everything from "What are you cooking?" to "Where is your husband and what is that rascal up to?" and usually I would earnestly try to reply him in Bangla as much as I could but slowly I was degraded and lost my touch. I hope Krishna Chandra inspires me to re-learn that beautiful language, then I can read the literatures of all the Gaudiya Vaishnava acharyas in the original text very fluently. I can read the text and pronounce correctly but I am not very adept or fluent, sometimes I see a conjunct that I've not seen in a while and it confuses the hell out of me. This usually happens with transcribed Sanskrit texts because a lot of the symbols are rare and unused in modern Bengali print-- I just have to practice or I'll completely forget. Oh well, wish me luck.