The jazzy tunes of new york

My parents came to visit me this weekend and today I decided to show them around my neighborhood and beyond. We crossed a few avenues to get to 5th ave. To our right was central park, and to our left stood the most expensive stretch of real estate on the planet.

I love taking the walk down 5th avenue and central park to get to midtown, because it is beautiful to see the classy abodes that line the street on one side with the serene park on the other. Athletic men and women jog listening to their ipods and iphones, while older ladies in fur coats walk their small fluffy dogs with pride not paying attention to a group of wide eyed european tourists. Yellow cabs line the street with their drivers honking and frustrated; some are stuck in the busy traffic and some are stuck in their lives. When you live in these abodes, it is easy to forget the world that many people live in, including many new yorkers. A few steps down the street lie the archaic city subways. Once in a while, I can hear a jazzy tune played by a sad man, once in a while it is a chinese flute, and once in a while, it is a merry spanish song. All of these tunes can be heard in the subways and almost all of them are created by men homeless or unemployed unable to make a decent living otherwise. Many of them are quite talented. I wonder what the difference between some of them and the people of 5th avenue are? Is it luck?

The sounds of the city can be heard everywhere - you just have to listen.

No TV and No beer make Homer something something

Here is a link to a Simpsons episode from a while back:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yGJGTjV2WE

I found it hilarious because I have been watching less and less of TV for a while and I dont drink at all. According to Homer, I should've turned crazy long ago. I used to watch a lot of TV before. When I moved to New York, I made the decision that I will not subscribe to premium cable. It is one of the best decisions I made. I can still watch TV if there is something important, but at the same time, it forces me to use my life for other productive tasks. There are so many better things I could do with my day and it is beautiful feeling to end each day well.

The only downside to not watching as much TV as before is missing out on conversations about shows. I can get very lost while friends talk about LOST. I dont know what goes on in Top Chef and I dont always follow American Idol. It is still a small price to pay for the time I get to do better things.

Americans spend an average of 142 hours watching TV a month. That is 142 less hours of spending time with their family. 142 less hours of socializing. 142 less hours of reading. It could be anything. I am sure other countries are catching up to this. I have noticed my relatives in India watching a lot of TV too.

The reason I find TV annoying, to say the least, is the amount of choice and control I have over shows and commercials. With internet, I can choose to visit only websites I like to visit, and I dont have to watch commercials. To me, that is a more efficient use of time.

Food and entertainment

I realized I haven't posted anything on my blog for more than a week! NY is an excellent place to be if you are a work hard play hard person. There is so much energy and endless things to do. NY is also famous for its array of restaurants and cafes. Many of the good restaurants are packed, even during a recession. However, it is not the time to be an average restaurant or a Wall St restaurant. My coworkers and I used to frequent a place for lunch; it was a cafeteria/restaurant/cafe with different kinds of food and we were never dissapointed with the quality. It was right on wall st and frequented by the regular wall st crowd. Two weeks ago, when we went there for lunch, we were surprised to see that the restuarant had closed down. Our assumption is that the wall st meltdown must have caused it to come to its end.
Each week, I have been discovering new restaurants and I should start posting the names of all of them. This weekend, I went to a cuban restaurant for a friend's birthday called Havana Alma De Cuba. The appetizers, especially the empanadas were great. I love plaintains and people eat plaintains in our part of India too. Its always interesting to see how cuisines can be similar according to similar climates; they also stem from cultural influences brought on by historical voyages. Here is a link to the restaurant:

http://havanavillagenyc.com/media/websitehavanavillage.html

I also discovered a new cafe around my neighborhood. Its called beannocio and it was recommended by a lady I saw in another cafe. I liked the environment and it is a great place to read and study. http://beanocchios.com/

Last week, I saw the Sonicvision show in the planetarium at the american museum of natural history. Being an astronomy enthusiast and also the fact that the show was in a planetarium, I was expecting a little bit more of a science lesson. The show was fascinating, but it was more on the technical, music, and graphics side and less on the science side. It was definitely worth seeing once.

http://www.amnh.org/rose/dome/

The Secret

"The Secret" is a book and film phenomenon that launched in 2006. There was a lot of publicity and TV interviews about the ideas in the book. I took time to read it and it was definitely a worthwhile and inspiring read. The secret has a few main ideas: "Ask", "Believe", and "Receive". It says that you need to be clear about what you want in life, behave as if what you want is already with you, and be open to receiving it. The book was also marketed pretty well, which explains why so many people raved about it.

If you think about it, many of the world's major religions have ideas based on the secret. Apparently, people have known this for centuries. I agree with the basis of the book, because positive thinking does create better results for people in the long run. You are more motivated to work hard and are more likely to attract the right people into your life. Visualization of goals helps people behave as if their dreams have already come true and it somehow makes them work towards that goal more. The only time I get a little nervous about liking the idea wholeheartedly is knowing that luck does play a role in shaping people's lives. Children born into poverty are not as lucky as children born into affluence. Hungry babies in famished countries are not as lucky as healthy babies in wealthy countries. Abused women are not as lucky as others. So, do these people attract these negative events into their lives? I dont think so.

Anyways, I have tried to see how "the secret" works in my life and the lives of people I know. To a large degree, it works. The Secret and similar books teach people a lesson: you attract what you think. I have noticed that positive people are much more successful in the long run. Negative people like to complain about their lives and point out everything that is wrong with them and that in turn attracts more negative events.

I recently read "The Alchemist" by Paulo Coelho. The story is about a shepherd trying to find his personal legend. Here is a quote from the book

"And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it."

Ms.Magazine to women of today

The women of my mother's generation paved their way for the "modern" woman. They lobbied for equal righs, equal pay, and worked to stop objectification of women. They criticized and campaigned to make life easier for us. Sometimes I wonder if the womens rights and feminist movement of the 60's and 70's really helped the women of today. Western women of today are not necessarily happier. There are high rates of depression and low self esteem. Objectification of women has increased and people can see it everywhere. Women are trying to have a career and raise families at the same time. Women cannot be overly aggressive for being termed manly and they cannot be overly passive because they will be a doormat.

For years, women blamed men for their treatment and issues - and historically it has definitely been true. However, sometimes I wonder, especially nowadays, whether women are responsible for their own problems. In many cases, you choose to be insecure; you choose to have men define how you are supposed to look; you choose to dress the way you dress; you choose to be unhappy; you choose to take on more responsibility than you can handle. Can women ever win?

Michigan lakes and city intersections

I am spending this long weekend in Michigan with my parents. I find it sad that such a beautiful state with hard working people is in the economic situation it is in currently. The recession that other states are experiencing now, the state of Michigan has been expriencing for the past few years. From my parents' house, I watched the fluttering birds and snow that partially enveloped the lake; the icy part stood still and the part that melted was flowing like the river. The sun cast its last rays among the winter clouds and turned the background into different colors. I love spending time at this house, because it is quiet and away from the big city- a sharp contrast to the life that I have gotten used to. I like the warmth and friendliness of the mid-westerners; neighbors know each other and there is none of the standofish attitudes I find with people living in the east coast cities. Do people change to adapt to their environment? Probably true, because I cannot be the friendly midwesterner when I am trying to get into the subway to be on time to a 8 am meeting or while grabbing a cab quickly to get to a dinner on time or while quickly scrambling my way among the crowd to cross a busy intersection while the light is blinking with the red hand. In my heart I am still a midwestern Indian girl, but it never hurts to be the New Yorker once in a while. As the saying goes, if you can live in New York, you can live anywhere.

Slumdogs and Billionaires

The popularity of the movie Slumdog Millionaire has made me think a lot about my birth country: an enormous democracy of wealth and poverty; mountain snow and tropical waters; modern and ancient. A country of a rich and ancient past that emerged victorious despite many struggles. A country that has some of the most eminent scholars, authors, and poets in the world, but also has more than 25% of its own people living under the poverty line. The largest and most expensive house in the world is being built in Mumbai, the same city that has the largest slum in Asia. See links:

Largest and Most Expense House
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/3002586.cms

Largest Slum
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/world/06/dharavi_slum/html/dharavi_slum_intro.stm

I wonder if I would have had the same opportunities I have now, if I had grown up in India. Maybe yes, but most likely no; I would be a woman and a minority in a country that still has rigid caste, relgious, and social structures in place. In spite of this, somewhere in my heart, I have a place for India. I can't explain that feeling but I know that it feels similar to a child's love for a mother.