iamneo

Well since my good friend Binoy (aka Neo) is behind in his blogs, I thought I might help him out and write about our fantastic weekend. See this past Sunday Binoy attended his first everAmerican concert!!! He, along with myself and two of my very good friends saw Michael W. Smith in concert at the Peoria Civic Center. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Michael W. Smith, he is a contemporary Christian artist was has been singing and playing the piano for over 20 years. He is one of my absolute favorite musicians.

Anyway, back to the story ….. The concert was at 6:00 pm, so I picked up Binoy at 4:00. So after catching up on the latest news, Binoy and I headed for Peoria. Of course we could not begin the trip without coffee, so we made a quick stop at the local McDonalds for a cup of delicious black coffee. With coffee in hand, we made our way to Peoria. Before reaching Peoria, we had to stop in Morton, IL. My friend Robert offered to drive us the rest of way to Peoria, since neither Binoy nor myself knew how to get to the Civic Center. So we met Robert at the Wal-Mart in Morton and all piled into his small car. We then met up with Abby in Peoria and drove to the Civic Center.

We find our seats, which are super close to the stage and wait for the big event to begin. Before Michael performed, we got to hear music from Selah and Watermark. I thought both bands were great, but Binoy did not share those feelings. Finally, Michael W. Smith entered the stage with his band. That moment was incredible – there was so much energy in the arena!! Michael proceeded to sing about 15 songs – all of which were great. Michael even sang Binoy’s favorite song “Everywhere” and I swear I could see a tear come to Binoy’s eye. For the last few songs, both Selah and Watermark came back onto the stage to sing with Michael. Those songs were beautiful too. After that Michael and the band said goodbye and left the stage. The four of us were awestruck and were feeling amazing.

To top off the evening we decided to go get some dinner. Unfortunately, it was so late that our choices were limited – but we decided to eat at Denny’s. Good food was enjoyed by all, until later that night when I suddenly came down with intense stomach problems. Now I don’t want to blame Denny’s for the sickness, but I have a feeling something may have been in the eggs. After we got done eating, Abby got in her car to drive back up to Galesburg, and Robert, Binoy, and I drove back down to Morton to pick up my car. When we reached Morton, Binoy and I said goodbye to Robert. The rest of the ride back to Bloomington was a little difficult due to all the construction, but thankfully Binoy was able to keep me calm. When we finally made it back to Bloomington, I said my goodbye’s to Binoy and headed back to my apartment where I would spend the next two hours ‘hugging the toilet’ But although I got sick, the entire evening was so much fun. I could not have hoped for a better concert experience for Binoy. I can’t wait until him and I can go to another American concert. Until next time…..

Update 1: The ‘I’ in the post is Kelly. Thank you Kelly for writing this entry. One day she will have her own blog
Update 2: Some pictures from that day

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After reading ’s post on hair, I got inspired to write a post about my tryst with hair!

Hair age
Long time back when I was school, I had plenty of hair on my head. My hair was jet black and thick and very curly. I used to never comb my hair because it was difficult to comb through the hair and also I did not care much about my looks and hair style. I used envy my (guy) friends who had nice straight hairs that could be easily styled especially during the junior college days. We were young and fresh out of school and for first time got a real taste of freedom especially with the members of the opposite sex. Hormones were playing its sinister games with us. The girls in our group would happily run their fingers through the hair of most of my friends. But my turn never came – I guess the girls did not find my curly locks very enticing! My hate for my hair increased even more.

Losing age
Our family shifted to New Bombay sometime during my junior college. I still do not know if it was the change in water or the climate or place, I started losing my hair. In retrospect I think my hatred for my hair prompted the hair loss. I feel if you hate something too much it will go away – It is all in the mind. Well I had so much of hair that I did not notice the receding hair line till I was in my 3rd year engineering. By that time it was too late. I tried so many things to reverse the process but nothing worked. I tried strange lotions, exotic concoctions of hair oils, ayurvedic medicines, and even rabbit blood! (well not rabbit blood but I have heard it is good for hair!).

Cover-up age
By the time I was done with the four years of undergraduate, I had an almost bald head and a B.E. degree! I think there is very strong cultural pressure in our Indian society that opposes baldness – especially if you are in your youth and not married. I never met an person back home who would not offer me a remedy for hair loss. Older the person was more exotic was the remedy. My family did not like it whenever I would have an ‘army cut’ – the clean crop look. I was constantly advised to grow the hair long so I could cover up the baldness. Fortunately my old girlfriend did not seem to mind my baldnes and the fact that I had a girlfriend shut-up some skeptics who would keep harping that my baldness would make it difficult for me to get married!

Transition period
Then I came to America for my masters and I was pleasantly surprised by people’s reaction to my hair or no-hair head. People here do not care about your looks instead they care about what you can do – what skills you have! This was a welcome relief to me because I did not have strangers offering me remedies or asking me how I lost my hair or what I am doing to stop the hair-loss. In fact I can count on my fingers the number of times I had somebody comment about my hair. But guess what! When I was back home last December for Christmas vacation within 72 hours, I had at least 50-60 people comment about my hair

Age of Self-realization
Now I cut my hair real short – just short of completely shaving off the hair. I feel very good with this ‘hair-style’. I have also realized that hair does not matter in having romantic relationships (I guess some girls find bald head irresistible ). It is ironic that now the only thing that I do not like is when it is time to get a hair-cut! The reason for this because I do not think I get value for the money I pay to get a haircut. It cost around $11 + $1 tip (Yes! In America you tip the hair dresser too!). That amounts to my hard earned $12 (approx INR. 525). I spend more time waiting for my turn at the hair salon than for the time for the actual hair-cut! And this $12 is just for clipper hair cut, two rounds with the clipper and my hair cut is done, easy job for the hair dresser I guess. It hurts even more when I compare INR 525 to the INR 50 that I paid last time back home for a hair cut and a soothing head massage.

It was nice when I was staying with my old roommate, we had become pretty good at cutting hair, we used to give each other a hair cut and save $24 in total! America teaches you many things I do not trust the clipper with my current roommates. The first and for the very last time I asked my present roommate to give me hair cut ended in a near disaster. I guess having very little hair saved the day since many people did not even notice the asymmetrically hairlines. My girlfriend/sweetheart would definitely need to acquire hair cutting skills and save the household tons of money

So much for some hair! I will end my post with a little spin on Shakespeare’s famous quote – What is in the hair?!?

I better post the weekend report else the information will lose its currency!

Friday

My weekend started on Friday, 8th with a very late lunch. I had skipped my breakfast and could not have lunch at the noon so by 5:30 pm I was famished. I had fried rice, pepper chicken, egg roll and potato wedges. I had overestimated my hunger and stomach size and by the time I was finished with lunch I knew I had over eaten. After the super heavy lunch I decided to take advantage of the excellent weather and went for an hour of drive. I came back in time for a show at our university’s planetarium. The show was about star gazing. I am forever a fan of space and its heavenly bodies. After the show, I rushed out into the open to catch a glimpse of the stars and constellation but was disappointed by the glare of city lights. There is a term for this – light pollution. I then went home and picked up the movie Elektra. Half way through the movie came over to my apartment and we decided to go and have a super late dinner. The place of choice was Denny’s – another fast food chain. I had coffee, Moons Over My Hammy. By then time we finished eating and talking it was past 1:30. On reaching home I was so tiered that I end up sleeping on the couch.

Saturday

I get up late in the morning and rush to get routine things done – the usual house keeping activities – pay the rent, car maintaince etc. I also finish watching Electra. It was an okay movie nothing to write about! In the afternoon, I go over to ’s place to eat zunka bhakar. It tasted pretty good. There was also some kind of ‘prasad’ – all on the occasion of new year. Then and me go to the mall for some shopping – pretext is shopping for my sister but end up buying more stuff for myself than for her [hope she does not read this! ]. In the mall, I have coconut mocha with lots of cream and coconut chips. By the time we reach our apartment it is beyond 9:30 pm. We decide to watch a movie – Garden State. I end up watching the movie between doing my laundry, chatting with and some more eating – my version of chana chat! I thought the movie was good. After the movie it time to hit the bed couch!

Sunday

I again get up late! I brew some coffee and then call my parents. Later in the evening I go to church and then to the Indian store for my favorite – banana chips. For dinner, Sesha and me go to Chili’s where I had bacon burger and rice. After that sumptuous mean we call it a day and retire to my couch bed!

Its only Monday night and my sights are all set for the coming weekend

Sesha’s personal website
Finally Sesha too has a personal website! He is my very good friend and complete novice when it comes to ‘HTML coding’. But after seeing the results of his first attempt, I felt his efforts should be acknowledged and commended. Hence the mention of his homepage on my website. Please feel free to send your comments and suggestions to him directly at the email addressed mentioned on his website.

Note: The view expressed on Sesha’s personal website are his and are not necessarily subscribed or endorsed by me!

My very good friend and old roommate got snared by the world wide web. He did some reading and dabbled a little bit with Dreamweaver and presto – a descent website. Check out his first attempt!