Seetha can cook !!

Seetha is a cosmopolitan Indian women. Through most of her life she has been compared with others. As a child she was compared with her cousins and asked to eat like them. In her critical school years she was compared with her classmates and asked to perform better than them. When it was time for her to get married, she had to look better than the other girls and find the best guy out there. After getting married she had to be better than all her sister-in-laws in running a house and cooking etc. When Seetha had a kid there was pressure to see if she was raising the kid right. At 25 Seetha was used to being faced by challenges and meeting them, she had become a fighter. Seetha wasn't a freak and she didn't go searching for challenges but the challenges kept coming her way..

Seetha and her husband had a group of friends, there were 12 of them totally, 6 couples. On more than three occasions Seetha noticed that her friends always wanted to have a potluck when they were invited to her house or her husband would cook. Seetha didn't mind really it was extremely convenient and it gave her time to take up other interesting activities like listening to music. But in three years she realized her friends had cooked at least once a year for everyone, her husband had cooked twice and she had pot-lucked twice. An alarm went off in her head, maybe they don't like my cooking she thought. How dare they, it was time to show them she was the best. The only way to do that was by having a surprise party and having the food ready. This would rule out any chance of her friends requesting for a potluck or a chance to eat out.

Seetha took her husband into the plan and told him to stay out of the kitchen. He could clean the house while she cooked. Seetha planned everything meticulously, there would be 8 dishes, Paneer mutter, Stuffed tomatoes, Kashmiri Aloo, Peas pulao, Panchvati Dal, Dahi Vada, Raita, Custard and fruit salad. Everyone's coming was doubtful initially, but by 2pm she had confirmation that they would all come. The plan was to meet up at 7pm and head out for dinner after that. Seetha started cooking at 3pm and was done by 5:30pm. The food was perfect. Everyone came and ate well and showered Seetha with compliments on the amazing food. Seetha had proved to her friends that she could cook. She slept well that night, waiting for a new challenge.

journey across the seven seas.. for what ?

People tend to travel for different reasons, some for entertainment, some for earning a living, some for health reasons. It is difficult to determine how much travel is too much travel, when can you know that you have moved too far away.

I traveled across seven seas to get education. Perhaps that was just an excuse and the main motivation was independence. Like thousands of others I settled into a comfortable lifestyle, good job, reasonable pay, loving husband and now a child too. At the end of the day I sometimes stop and think what I must do to go back. This is an extremely tough question for me to answer. The bitter truth is I am lazy and scared. Eight years ago I had no fear, because I had no where to go but up. Now I must think of my family, will the three of us survive a transition back across the seven seas? Can I work hard enough to have a lifestyle like the one I lead here now? My own car, dishwasher, washing machine, good health care, being the boss of my house !!, eating out at least twice a week, 24 hr Internet, working for 8 hours a day on a average and getting three weeks of paid vacation, 5 days of sick time, couple of vacations a year ( last year we went on 5 vacations).

Two of my colleagues made the move back and I know half a dozen others who did it too. If they could do it, so can we I think and I give myself confidence, hide the guilt and, buy myself some more time.