Whatever I like in this space, it's my profile.
Not many of my high schools peers are in North America. While in Montreal, I managed to find a couple of  them which I used to hang out in High School. Was great meeting people from the past and catch up on all the great times we have had (not that I am not having a great time now too... )Â
As every year is the tradition, we celebrate the Mauritius Independance day amongs all the Mauritians in the San Francisco Bay Area and this year, we had a record turnout of over 70 Mauritians.
It was a great awesome crowd with tons and tons of food as is the case with any Mauritian gathering. We had so much variety and so much food that I did not get to even try all of it. Many new Mauritians showed up this year following the successes from our previous gatherings.
This year, we also had a silent auction and raffle to benefit a non-profit organization helping the less fortunate in Mauritius and we got a decent amount collected to send to the organization.
I've posted a few pictures of the different foods we have. Just to name a few of the foods that I can remember - we had, amongst others, Briani, Napolitaine, Gato Arouille, Gato Pima, Dipain Frire, Badia, Mine Frire, Carri Poule, Wantan, Lumpia, Sipec, Farata, Salade Mangue, Salade Laitue, Chatini Cotomili, Mazavarou, Roti Poulet, Poudine Mais, Mauritian Flag Black Forrest Cake, Dahi Wada, Baguette Fromage, Poudine Dipain, Carri Zac dans Massalla, Gratin Sousou, Chatini Coco, Rougaille etc..
Yesterday night, Annie hosted her annual White Elephant Gift Exchange and End of Year Christmas Dinner party. As usual, good food, good company and some interesting gifts. The most funny gift I thought was a box of Man's underwear and suprisingly, people wanted that bad and on the second round when you can steal each other's gift, that was well sought after and as usual Joel got the sex gifts and least but not least, Annie got the Cookie Sutra book.. I can't wait to try her new cookies when she bakes them :)
Serene and Topher hosted yet another marvelous dinner party last Saturday evening with some very exotic different kind of thanksgiving food. We started off with Squash soup with ginger, then off to a Miso glazed carrots and then we had the traditional Turkey and Stuffing - but specially crafted for our international crowd. For the stuffing we had Brioche bread with chorizo, and the Turkey was cooked in Red Thai Curry all of that on top a nicely done steamed Sticky rice with peanuts and spices. Had a great time catching up with everybody and having some delicious food.. Thanks Serene and Topher !!
My apartment walls have been bare since I moved in to this place. But thanks to Christina, it's not bare anymore - it's now adorned with one of her original work of art - a huge 30x48 Acrylic on Canvas painting. The painting is called "Fantasie" and Cristina was inspired to paint that by Chopin's beautiful classical pieces. I love it. It adds so much color and mood to the room. THANK YOU SO MUCH CRISTINA !!
I also put up the my wood shelf with my Ganesha, Shiva Linga, Nandi and Buddha statues.
The studio slowly becoming more homey and cozy..
Yesterday night, went to Kan Zaman to have some food and drinks with friends before I leave for my travels. It was great and we had the best seats of the house to be able to see the Belly Dancing performance. The food was so-so, but the belly dancing, atmosphere, music played and company of good friends was wonderful !!
We celebrated the year of the Tiger at Wayne and Hiren's place with a potluck and great company and great food. I cooked pancit noodles with purple cabbage, carrots and shrimps. It came out a bit salty as I cooked too much noodles in a small pot and could not evaluate correctly amount of salt to put in and could not turn well. So, I called my new dish - Salty noodles :)
Attached a collage of all the pics from the party. I just discovered this feature in Picassa.. pretty neat feature !
After the Mauritian dinner in Sunnyvale, I went to another party in Sunnyvale too. I was getting my good dose of Sunnyvale. I had not been to Sunnyvale in months and Sunnyvale used to be my home when I first moved to the Bay Area. Good Memories ! Serene and Topher were celebrating being pregnant, and it was the same time, the occasion for Mitch's and Joel's Birthday. Was great to catch up with all the friends and have some good times. Check out the last 3 pictures.. it's from the automatic 3 shots picture :) I have no idea how i got from sitting down to being up in the air !!
As usual Caroline organized a dinner to celebrate the New Year for the Mauritian Community in the bay area. We had all voted for Indian Food in the South Bay and we picked Turmeric in Sunnyvale. It was a buffet and had great food. I loved their Goat Curry with bones, Malabar Fish Curry and all the other delicacies. They had so much food, that I did not even try it all out. We had a good turnout - about 30 Mauritians - this time though lots of kids ! It was great catching up with all the Mauritian folks !
Christmas day - I decided to invite a few friendsover for dinner at my place. While a lot of people were out or had other xmas dinner plans, there were still quite a few friends who were able to make it and we had the most wonderful time. Initially I was thinking to do a potluck, but then I decided to cook it all and feed them and rather ask each of them to bring in the drinks and deserts. We started off with chinese dumplings. Chopsticks were pretty handy to eat the communal dumplings. After dumplings, I had a freshly baked quiche with spinach. Following the appetizers, we went on the salad course - we had a nice red leaf lettuce salad made by Kendra. The main courses consisted of Roast Beef and Scalloped potatoes in parmesan and butter made by my housemate and I had cooked Basmati rice with peas and carrots, massaman thai chicken curry with dried peanuts, vegetarian thai red curry and stir fried chayotte. Then the desert course consisted of Upside down pineapple cake cooked by both Priscille and Deepti, Brownies by Brian and Chocolate bark by Deepti again,
After dinner, we had a white elephant gift exchange. It was real fun. We all had brought in a gift that were waiting under the Christmas tree. We took in numbers which determined the order which we picked an unopened gifts. We had a great nice variety of gifts, but I think the best gift though is the one Deepti brought - a yodelling pickle !!! That brought some good laughs :) Then we played lots of nice fun games - lies and truths... Had a great time in the great company of my great friends !
