Travel and Souvenirs

Many years ago, when I started travelling abroad, I noticed people buying things that they didn’t really need. I was brought up in a middle class home where we only shopped for things that we needed and nothing more. Therefore I was surprised when I saw people buying dozens of assorted key-chains as if they were free.

That was the first time I was introduced to the concept of souvenirs.

I learnt that people shop for souvenirs to bring back home the memories of the places that they visited and to give away mementos to their well-wishers too.

I used to love dolls, I had decided then that I would collect dolls from every country that I visited.

But this passion did not last long, because after traveling to many places, storing the dolls was an issue. There are many souvenirs I have collected over the years but most of them I have given them away. They attract me but the thought of storing puts me off.

Walking through the narrow streets of Ghana I came across this wooden carved figure and I couldn't resist buying

 trekking through the dirt path in the interiors of Tenerife in Spain, I came across a tiny shop that sold this metal lizard with a baby

 Then I was looking for table lamp and loved this hand painted shade with a carved metal stand when I saw it in Spain

masks always amuse me and this tiny wooden mask captured my attention

Over the years I have collected many souvenirs that have included books, artifacts, coins, key-chains, fridge magnets and many more.

It becomes easy to give as souvenir to friends, specially those who appreciate it.

I have tried many airlines but I like to travel in those flights that have good inflight shopping. Most of them have duty free stuff like perfumes, jewelry and drinks. But sometimes if you are lucky you might find rare things too, for example this ‘camel-tooth-pick’ souvenir that I had purchased during my travels to Dubai.

When the inflight shopping is interesting, then it is certainly much better activity than just sleeping and eating, no?

Women’s Day Tea Party

International Women’s Day is celebrated on March 8. The idea of celebrating this day is for recognizing the importance of women’s role in the society. It is an occasion to review how far they have come in their struggle for equality, peace and development. It is also an opportunity to unite, network and mobilize for meaningful change.

And I got opportunity to unite and network with women this week end when I got an invitation from Rushina to attend her Tea party at her studio.

All I could feel was thrill, thrill, thrill!

At 4pm I arrived with my friend at APB cook studio. I am always impressed at this cook studio that has a large kitchen with 6 working stations. Plus there are shelves of products on sale that include sauces, jams and other food items, there are also food magazines and other interesting kitchen articles like apron, kitchen clocks that we may not find at other places.  

The room was filled with beautiful well-dressed ladies, all with their smart phone, ready to click the event. There was ample food and drinks to pamper the taste buds. There were bite size desserts from ‘Icing on Top’, mini cakes from ‘Piccoli Tortini’, sauces from ‘i2cook’ , wine from ‘Fratelli wines’, tea from ‘tea Trunk’. The evening was all about networking, sharing of ideas and communicating. I had an interesting conversation with Meeta who updated me on healthy eating.

The evening was packed with activities like sharing the skills and demonstration of recipes.

Akshola Honawar of ‘Runal Salon’ educated us on hair care telling us the importance of massage and spa.

This was followed by the reading of a book “Escape from Harem’ by Tanushree Poddar.

Next there was a discussion on adding prunes to our regular diet followed by demonstration of recipes with prune by Harsha Sabnani

Rushina demonstrated the recipe of stuffed mushrooms and chicken in orange juice and wine, which was tangy and sweet, an interesting combination.

The evening was lovely, made lots of new friends and yes, not to forget the gift hamper that had peanut butter, pitted prunes, a test tube bottle of tea leaves, fig jam and spicy Paan masala