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Culture of eating with hands

Being South Asian I have always been eating with my hands since I guess when I started on finger foods. It is very tough for anyone to change habbits i.e. anyone who has lived all thru their life eating with silverware to start experimenting with using hands.

But I guess there is this innate satisfaction when someone eats with bare hands. Humans eat food like any other species in animal kingdom in more than one ways. Eveyone begins with Nose, Eyes and then the mouth. But using hands gives another avenue to feel the food before we actually consume it. The fingers can actually feel the food in terms of temperature, texture, etc. This allows one more dimension before the food winds up into your stomach.

When eating Indian food traditionally we tend to limit eating with only the right hand sometimes left hand is acceptable. It is considered unhealthy to eat with left hand. Licking foods off fingers for certain types of food is considered OK but in moderation. But I guess it is different in some cultures. I ate Mediterranean and I have come across where people eat with two hands. It is different type of fun to use two hands to tear on the bread, dip it in sauce with meat or veggies and then chew on it.

But one thing that is common in all cultures where eating with hands is traditional is washing hands. In Indian restaurants if anyone is to use their hands, there are designated wash places with soap and driers. But I liked it in the Mediterranean cuisine, where the person who serves the food comes with a pouring kettle and large collecting vessel. The guys there just pour the water from the kettle starting from just on top of the hands to almost 6 feet high and the customers are asked to place their hands on top of the receiving vessel.

Eating here is also a little different where the dishes are all served in a common bowl and each one gets their own bread. Every one has to tear their bread, dip into the common sauce and eat. Mind you double dipping is not allowed and this also promotes sharing of food and that all are equal when eating food. A good concept, I liked it.

Both these pictures were taken on a birthday of a friend. He took us all to this Ethiopian restaurant in San Jose on First Street. There was belly dancing by artists and we all were asked to seat on seat cushions on the floor and some on the sofas. It was a good experience.

Chocolate Factory?

The famed Ghirardelli Chocolate located right in the heart of the San Francisco downtown. Customers can walk in and watch the folks make the chocolate and other derivatives of it. Ghirardelli has one of the large collections of chocolate candy. They have on location eatery where anyone can order and eat the store made chocolate delicacies including ice creams.

My favorite over the years has been the banana split with 3 scoops ice cream, cream topped with hot chocolate and caramel, sprinkled with toasted nuts. Gosh I miss them from Ghirardelli.

This picture was taken when a friend of my wife visisted us during her vacation. We took her around the Bay Area and wound up the trip with a dessert stop here. One more addition to the list of Ghirardelli fans.

We all later went for a walk and stumbled upon the empty Famed Carriages of SFO downtown. They looked so welcoming that we all could not stop ourselves spending few minutes there. Check out the picture.

It is or is it - an impending disaster?

The kids seem not aaware of the approaching huge wave when they are playing in the sand in the beach. Well nothing big, it was a calm area around the Monteray Bay CA. The tide was starting to get high and all of the folks got away from the waters safely before the tide became really high and waters rather rough.

Sania Mirza Vs Venus Williams - US Open 2005 - in Stanford CA

It was middle of the year and one day around June 2005 a friend of mine comes over and surprises us with tickets to a tennis match between Indian Tennis Sensation Sania Mirza (well she was a craze then) and Venus Williams.

We are instantly thrilled and gladly accepted the offer. The D day was on 27th of July. We arrived at the Stanford Stadium in Palo Alto. Though we arrived relatively early we could see that the entire area was filled with folks who came to see the match. We did have a reserved parking too but it took us a while to identify the reserved parking for one and to get there was a different thing. Too many cars and since it is close to the Stanford University, lot of college crowd in the neighborhood.

We parked the car, took some refreshments and walking into the court where she was playing. It was still I guess one of the first few rounds of matches. We get to seat at one of the corners of the court and we had a pretty good view of the players and the play. Eventually the players walked in with Venus leading Sania. Both shook hands and the match started.

Match was pretty well played before Sania let it go in the end of second set even though the score suggests a rout by Venus. The overall score was a two set victory in I think just over an hour. The spectators for this match was evenly matched between Venus and Sania supporters. You all can assume I think when ever there is a good volley from Sania the reaction from the crowd. It all sunk into the crowd of the eventuality and so the intensity of the support died a slow death in the second set.

Overall it was a fun match, we got to see the players in close quarters, the way they let out a cry when volleying or serving, the stamina they posses in reaching for the hard to reach cross courts etc. Once the match ended, there was no acknowledgement at all from either players for the support they received. They both just walked back with Sania leading the way. We waited for over 10 minutes after the players walked in and then started out. It was relatively cold - not too chilly - and we knew we had a good distance to walk before reaching our cars.

Am I the only one to see it?

This is a picture I had taken when we were living in Sunnyvale, CA. Our kitchen cabinet had this unique natural design. From the first moment onwards I always felt that there is something unique in it. I always felt a person was looking at me thru it.

It was as if a woman with folded hands is welcoming you. My wife says she sees the divine linga in it. But I believe opinions differ and so do people and how they see things.

Hearst Castle

It was one of the vacations - a long weekend and we all decided just out of the blue to travel south. We all started from Sunnyvale in Bay Area to travel on Route 1 towards Montarey Bay. Close to about 90 miles south from the Bay Area there is this Hearst Castle.

We started in two cars and reached the Castle by noon. What a spectacle it was. Winding routes along route 1 and then the beaches, the seals sun bathing, quite a spectacle. Lunch time it was and with a kid as a companion we took a lunch break on a streetside restaurant. Once lunch over we resumed the ride and within next hour took another break to check out the seals. There were innumerable number of them all along the beachline.

At the foot of the Castle all tourists are supposed to park their vehicles, visit the stores, the meusium and then take a ride in the coach busses to the top of the Castle. It was magnificent from the bottom itself. All of us spent few minutes on the show on the history of the Hearst Castle before embarking to the top.

Once on the top we entered the magnificent Castle. A spectacle and a wonder by itself. It was no different than what was described in the movie. According to it the owner William Randolf Hearst built it with different architectures including Roman, Gothic, etc. Fabulous structures and design ranging from contemporary to traditional.

None of us knew how time flew by knowing the details of the castle. No wonder Mr. Hearst spent so much on it.

My trip to San Francisco

I returned to San Francisco Bay Area nearly after 2 years since leaving for Texas. It has been a kind of a home coming with old memories floating in my mind. In all I made 3 trips to Bay Area and all of them being business trips. In all 3 occassions I visited the SFO downtown and other prominent places in Bay Area. What a change this place is going thru. The Mineta San Jose International Airport is completely revamped. A new terminal building, new parking structure, the internals of the terminal also changed completely. I guess being elevated to 10 biggest city in US warrants a huge change on its airport look and feel.

I still remember the first time I landed in San Jose in 1999 and I guess the airport was then called San Jose Municipal Airport. I remember getting down the plane and walking down the winding tent to come out the airport. Everything has changed, more lanes added too and the car parking made more stream lined.

I did not get a chance to visit few of my favorite restaurants and places. Those were the times when we, for the of eating ice cream, drove from Sunnyvale to Milpitas. Drove to SFO downtown to eat the spicy Indian flavored food at Naan 'n Curry restaurant. Since eating there they have changed their location once and now located on Lavenworth. Not to mention the IMAX theater in the SFO downtown.

The last two trips I visited SFO I stayed with my long time friend. His apartment is in a sky rise. On one end it feels as if the morning is announced by the famous BoA building which seemingly peeks into my friends apartment. On the other end is the Bay Bridge and the Embarcadero and the third is the Golden gate. I had some good feel eating in a Thai, Japanese, American and Indian Restaurants. Good choices by my friend. Hopefully if I am back again, I would like to spend more time experimenting with more cuisines which I stopped for a while now such as Lebanese, Ethiopian, etc.