Came back from Hindustan over the weekend. I had a such a nice time for two weeks, I didn’t realize that it was time to come back. It feels good to be back with my babies. It was precious to see the happiness on their faces to see me.

The journey back home was very uneventful. Non-stop flight from Mumbai to New York was about half full and I had a whole bench of three seats to myself. I could make full use of them to lie down through most of the travel time. First class treatment in economy class fare. Who would complain about that?

Other than meeting with parents, friends and relatives to eat about 5-6 meals every day, there were just a few mentionable things I did.

  • I was invited to present a talk at the 50th Anniversary celebrations at my alma mater, The Bombay College of Pharmacy. The two-day (Jan 18-19) symposium was a great success with presentations mostly by alumni on topics ranging from genomics and drug discovery to formulations and regulatory affairs.
  • Keeping up with tradition, I had to visit at least one fort in the Sahyadris during my trip. This time, it was Lohgad near Lonavala. It is one of the best preserved forts as it was occupied and in-use till 1818 when it was transfered to the British without shedding a drop of blood or using a single bullet. Here are some photos...
    Lohgad 01-2008
    After eating a meal at one of Mumbai's fanciest hotels, The Orchid, on the night before, I was treated to simple zunaka-bhakar for lunch at Hotel Baba at the foot of Lohgad. After the arduous hike in cool weather, freshly made hot zunaka-bhakar with onions and pickles was just heavenly.
  • Met with radhika74 in person. After unsuccessfully trying to catch a couple of other LJ friends, we decided to meet at her home. I have many close cousins that I meet during every trip and meeting with Radhika seemed like seeing another of my cousins. A simple home-cooked meal with 'Naturals' ice cream to follow added to that perception. We had a good time chatting for a couple of hours. It was a lot of fun and am going to add her name to the list of my cousins to see on every trip. One thing I couldn't figure out... Why was she talking with me in english? It took her good 15-20 minutes before settling down to Marathi. She has a post on her LJ about our meeting and it reads almost like mine.