Mahabalipuram for the hopelessly shallow

We are fortunate enough to live half an hour away from a UNESCO world heritage site. In Mahabalipuram you can see early examples of Dravidian architecture and a variety of sculptures from the 7th/9th century. Some of the sites are right by the sea, offering spectacular views. You will also see the work of today's sculptors, in roadside workshops and in every little shop for tourists. You can walk around and maybe have lunch in a not so great looking place consisting of only one dusty room but where they will cook for you whatever fish was caught early that morning - and you get to have fun bargaining for the price and feel like a local.

If, however, you are a local and bargaining has lost a lot of its charm for you; if you have been to the sites many many times already; if you have three kids and are too tired to remember how to spell "Dravidian"; then here is what you can do instead.

Drive to Mahabalipuram, ignore all the signs directing you to the culturally relevant sites and as soon as you pass the collection point where some people - who may or may not have a right to do so - charge a fee to enter the town, make a left turn a drive into the premises of the most ostentatious resort of the area. Check in and don't leave until it's time to go back home.

(Note: these photos were taken three weeks ago, when my mom was still visiting us. This weekend at the resort was our way to thank her for agreeing to spend all the rest of her visit in a flat in the middle of nowhere with loud children and unreliable electricity supply.)

All here now

Ho finito di trasferire qui tutte le pagine dei due blog precedenti. Sono accessibili dall'archivio, nella barra laterale a destra, o dalla nuvola di argomenti in fondo alla pagina.

I moved here all the posts from the Piccolo Rajiv blog as well, so now the whole story from 2007 is in one place. Unless you are me, you probably don't feel the need to go and look at older posts very often, but in case you do they are all accessible from the archive in the sidebar, or from the cloud of labels at the bottom of the page.

Papa'

This is not a very original shot, but I can live with that.

Viola's birth

I haven't written about Lila's birth yet and given that this blog is supposed to be first of all a way to keep memories for us, that doesn't feel right. There are many things I am not happy about and I might even talk about that at some point, but that shouldn't come in the way of the things that I am *very* happy about.

These first photos were taken about a week earlier, at achamma's house and on our way out to dinner. I thought that this was going to be our last chance to get a snap of Picu still inside, but she was not a eager to leave her bubble as we imagined.

In the end Picu was not given much choice and made her appearance at night on May 21 2012, after a day filled with small disappointments, via a cesarean section. It is a quite weird experience and I didn't really get to see my baby until a bit later. They did however tell me right away that it was a girl and I remember feeling quite shocked, because that is the last thing I expected at this point. It took more than a week for us to stop saying "he" - which annoyed the grandma to no end.

S saw his baby girl before me. I don't remember much at all until dad and baby came to to me in the post op area some time later. Weird experience, really.

And here we are:

And a few more flattering shots taken later by dad in the room alone with her.

I have a complaint, though. We have a little family tradition of dressing our babies in the same little red pajama after birth, but there isn't a single photo of Lila in her red birth day dress. I suppose we must take pride in being disorganized down to the smallest details..

The children came the next morning to meet their sister and they have been in love with er ever since. Here, however, they can be seen opening their Picu Day presents, at last. They were really beginning to fear the day would never come :)

We stayed at the hospital longer than I would have liked but the room was very comfortable - choosing a posh hospital was good, at least for morale - and the kids could visit often.

In the end we had only one good birth experience out of three, but obviously we had three out of three good baby experiences.

From the first day back at the grandparents' house:

I think they were all saying "foof".

Es geht

So how is it going? Does she sleep? Indeed she does, a lot. She sleeps quite well at night - not as well as I could, just to clarify, but well enough for being only two months. She sleeps a lot during the day too, if I hold her, not so much if I don't.

Mostly I sit in front of my laptop with Lila on my shoulder or in my arms, sometimes feeding her and sometimes just holding her, and I entertain myself by playing Sudoku and Minesweeper, or I type stuff with one hand, like I'm doing now, or I edit my photos - with one hand, or shop online.. you get the idea.

If I am feeling especially alert I also think about beginning to prepare for the quantum mechanics course I have to start teaching in August, but I haven't progressed to actually doing it, yet.

I am looking forward to resuming the German class with S at Rajiv's school though, and hence the title.

"Yay, I'm a dad! For the third time!!"

Roar!

Our sweet and wild little Rohan, in a nutshell :)