Christmas Dinner

An inspiration from Carnival Diet’s website, here is what a traditional Catholic Indian Christmas Dinner looks like:

Tongue Curry ~that’s right, tongue from a cow is carved up and made into a delicious mouth watering curry, all I can say is don’t knock it till you try it…

Brown Basmati Rice with boiled egg and fried onions

Potato Chops: A potato concoction that is filled with mince and fried

Fuguas: a doughy bread made on feast days

Vindaloo: A red pork curry

Sorpetal: A brown pork curry in which pork pieces are mixed with liver pieces and cut into fine little bits

Dessert usually consists of Christmas sweets, and ice cream. This year we were treated to some fine rum cake, donated by a good friend.

Goodness my mouth is watering thinking about the food…….

These are a Few Of My favorite Things:
~Apple Martini’s
~Lychee Martini’s
~Candy Apple Martini’s
~Martini’s
~Cuban Bands
~Cuban men in white shirts
~Spanish men with Fresh of the boat accents, who tell you they can HIT the spot!
~Men who can dance, dip and throw you in the air, with a hold that you can rely on….(key ladies)

~Good Friends who you don't see all year, but who always show up to your parties

So needless to say last nights preemptive Birthday celebration was the BOMB….!

Btw, my real birthday is on December 28th, the Day of Holy Innocence…..

How come when I tell people that they start to laugh?

MERRY CHRISTMAS, FROM MY HOME 2 URS

WISHING YOU GUYS ALL THE GOOD STUFF TODAY,

Luv,

Cranky Putz

My life is topsy turvey,

Instead of enjoying the Christmas lull like my fellow co-workers, who are strewn around ohhhing and ahhhing at their Christmas spoils, I am stuck resentfully at my desk, churning out ‘cutesy’ charts for some judge.

The nerve!

When I GROW UP I want to be IN HR

For all You Fellow HR Professionals:

www.hr.com/grow

WHAT OPRAH WINFREY HAD TO SAY ABOUT MEN

Cuz sometimes we Gyals need a little reminder:


If a man wants you, nothing can keep him away.If he doesn't want you, nothing can make him stay.

Stop making excuses for a man and his behaviour. Allow your intuition (or spirit) to save you from heartache. Stop trying to change yourself for a relationship that's not meant to be. Slower is better. Never live your life for a man before you find what makes you truly happy.

If a relationship ends because the man was not treating you as you deserve then heck no, you can't "be friends". A friend wouldn't mistreat a friend.
Don't settle. If you feel like he is stringing you along, then he probably is.

Don't stay because you think "it will get better." You'll be mad at yourself a year later for staying when things are not better. The only person you can control in a relationship is you.

Avoid men who've got a bunch of children by a bunch of different women. He didn't marry them when he got them pregnant, why would he treat you any differently?

Always have your own set of friends separate from his. Maintain boundaries in how a guy treats you. If something bothers you, speak up. Never let a man know everything.* He will use it against you later. You cannot change a man's behaviour.* Change comes from within.

Don't EVER make him feel he is more important than you are... even if he has more education or in a better job. Do not make him into a quasi-god. He is a man, nothing more nothing less.

Never let a man define who you are.

Never borrow someone else's man. If he cheated with you, he'll cheat on you. A man will only treat you the way you ALLOW him to treat you.

All men are NOT dogs.

You should not be the one doing all the bending...compromise is two way street.

You need time to heal between relationships...there is nothing cute about baggage... deal with your issues before pursuing a new relationship

You should never look for someone to COMPLETE you...a relationship consists of two WHOLE individuals...look for someone complimentary...not supplementary.

Dating is fun...even if he doesn't turn out to be Mr. Right.

Make him miss you sometimes...when a man always know where you are, and you're always readily available to him - he takes it for granted. Never move into his mother's house. Never co-sign for a man.

Don't fully commit to a man who doesn't give you everything that you need.*

Keep him in your radar but get to know others.

Christmas Traditions

Every Christmas my mother cons us into ‘Making Sweets,’ the most pointless Indian Tradition ever. Basically each family makes oodles of sweets, to put in a Christmas plate, and give to another family, who will give you variations of the same sweets back. Often the product you get back is worse than your own, hence the POINTLESSNESS.

Yesterday once again we innocents (dad and Moi) got suckered into dedicating our ENTIRE Sunday into this pointless tradition.

At seven a.m., Aunty Z shows up at our front door, bearing huge plastic boxes, armed and ready. My mother, Aunty Z and dad spend all day forming little multi colored shells (mazipan,) white balls with cherries on the tops (Nankaties) and little fried shells (Kul Kuls)

Sample of conversation whilst making the Kul Kuls:

Dad: This is a silly tradition

CP: I think we should do a cost analysis of how much this is costing us in terms of ingredients and man hours and figure out if we need to do this again next year

Mum: Listen you two whiners this is tradition, (to my father) Your mother would beat you

CP: I think we should out source

Aunty Z: Listen here, there is joy in making these sweets, my husband loves to do this!

Dad: (Mutters about how Aunty Z’s husband is in fact taking a nap as we speak)

CP: My hands hurt, how come we get the crappy jobs, I want to stir,

Mum: Listen small fry; to learn how to do things properly you’ve got to do the dirty work

CP: (In a threatning voice) But I don’t want to learn, I will never do this when I live on my own…..the TRADITION DIES with me,

Mum and Aunty Z: (give me a knowing look) We said the same thing, and Look at us now

Dad: Yup all you crazy women turn out to be just like your mothers, CP look how big your bum is going to be one day…..just you look…

CP: It’s been five hours….do you think I could put this on my resume? I wonder what my title would be?

Dad: Director of Operations, Kul Kul Administration….(Starts to laugh so hard he falls of his chair)

(Pictures to follow shortly)

What’s your holiday tradition?

My dearest Martin Campbell,

I trust all is well. I wanted to tell you that I saw Casino Royale yesterday. I have a few choice words for you.

Let’s start off with what I liked about the movie:

~The first scene is amazing. Absolutely James Bond, unbelievable, I loved it.
~Daniel Craig is yummy. I love his blue steel eyes. And his naked torture scene, Glory, Glory, Glory!
~He can run, and run and run…..um I would test his stamina any day.
~Do ask him to email when he has a moment.
~Cathrina Murino is gorgeous. I asked Fathead if he thought I looked like her, I took his profuse laughter to mean I am a carbon copy.





However, there are some things James Bond should NEVER say:
~I love you,
~I am yours, whatever I am left, I am yours
~Lets travel the world together, one day one of us will have to get a normal job, most likely it will be you, since I have no idea what a normal job looks like
~Vesper Lynd: You're not going to let me in there. You've got your armour back on.
James Bond: I have no armour left. You've stripped it from me. Whatever is left of me - whatever I am - I'm yours.

Martin, this is a James Bond Movie, not a soap opera…..where were the nifty gadgets, (a heart machine is not enough, nor is a GPS tracking system embeded in someone’s hand, that’s so yesterday,) where were the steamy love affairs, (as a woman, I am appalled to have to point this out to you.) The story was odd at best, hardly clever and OH so predictable.
Sigh,

With disdain,

CP

The Boyz call me at 8 am. On a three way call and they say "CP, We've been thinking.
You know how last year, you loved off Horsey ( Ronaldhinio) at the world cup, and you were his biggest fan, watching all the Brazil games, and such, making horse noises everytime he came on the field, talking up all sorts of scenerios of how you would exploit his fame and fortune once ya got married and such............. and you know what happened."

And I say, “Yeah they sucked and Lost.” (And began to mutter about what a waste it was to buy that overpriced $50 Brazil shirt all cuz i was caught up in the moment)

And they say “And remember that time we were at the Indian place during lunch and India was playing, you were like woweee India rules, and then they lost. Yes?”

And I say, “Well they were losing to begin with.....”

And they say, "And remember when you started cheering for Trinidad at the World Cup, yuh wore the shirt Dracs got yuh, n u tied up tryn to be all sexy n ting? We went to Island Mix and u get all boisterous and cheering? And then they lost???"

And I say, "You said they had and I quote "Nochance in hell" I mean heck, even they were surprised they made it!"

And they say, “And you know how yuh luv off Anthony Parker of the Raptors and scream Israel everytime he comes on??”

And I say, “Yeah but he's cool, cuz he shoots like 18 points in a game”

And they say, “Well he only does that rarely, and yesterday he gave out 10 turnovers”

And I say (pretending to know what a turnover is) “Well maybe he was tired, or Sam told him to.”

And they say, “Well we were thinking today, what is the common element amongst all these people and their losing ways, and it occurred to us, IT'S YOU”

And the other one says, “Yuh curse. Yuh ever been baptized....yuh a Jumbie, Yes!” (Why do Trini people use Yes like as an exclamation mark??)

And I say (incredulously) “Let me get this straight, You think I am jinxing sports teams with my support for their players?”

And ‘all serious’ they say “YEAH, yuh the common link, the common Element, the Problem”

And I say, “But I thought we all agreed it was Sam??”

And they say, “We thought so too, until we did our analysis. IT is definitely YOU, thus we need you to stop cheering....or rather we're going to pick someone for you to cheer from and conduct an analysis to see if its true.”

Bad enough I am having hardships in the dating arena, this fools now think I am a bona fide jinx.....

THE NERVE

Glorified sweat shops:

Last night I caught “Bombay Calling” on the passionate eye, which followed the lives of various employees in a call center.

Call centers are big business in Mumbai.

In the past the best job were airline steward/stewardess's positions. It got people out of their villages, paid well and they got to see the world. It worked particularly well for women, who usually work till they get married (majority but not all.) Thus once they found their suitable partner, they happily retired to a life of domestic-city and did not have to worry about progressing in their careers.

The documentary depicts the upside down lives of these call center employees, who work twelve hour night shifts, often at the expense of their personal lives. Yet the pay is so ludicrously good for Indian standards ($5000 to $10,000 a year vs the national standard of less than $500 a year) that it is a hard opportunity to pass up. India is slowly transforming into a society of choice. The streets are now lined with cafes, bars and clothing stores. People now have the power to purchase and call center jobs are assisting them on becoming more materialistic. Also as one employee points out, this way better educated Indians are able to stay in India close to their families, as opposed to looking elsewhere for work.

The only pre-requisite to working in a call center is that you have to speak English. This is particularly attractive in a society like Indian, where not only is education expensive, it is so ridiculously hard. My cousins often take four or five subject tuitions after school and this has been the norm for as long as I remember. It should be noted though, that a lot of call center staff are highly educated college graduates, some with MBA’s. Yet with the advent of call centers, more teens are dropping out of college, seduced by the promise of easy money. Thus call centers offer a ‘lazier’ alternative.

It’s also hilarious how they fake the accents and names. Rajesh becomes Ryan, Jaswinder, Janice and Santhan, becomes Sam.

There are many costs. There is no such thing as work/life balance. Labour is abundant and cheap, thus employers do not offer even the basic incentives afforded to North American workers, like sick days or benefits. The attractive pay by Indian standards, is supposed to be the end all drawing point. The only incentive offered that I could find were free private transportation to and from work, along with air-conditioning at work.

A lot of these employees are subject to what would be deemed harassment under western standards. In the documentary employees are told that they will have to stand until someone makes a sale.

My dilemma with call centers is it makes me wonder, can I compare call centers to sweat shops, where seven year olds make Nikes and get paid next to nothing. I am probably going to get into a lot of trouble here from people who work in these places and are happy. Call centers pay well, have great working conditions for the most part, and Indians are doing jobs that we in the west touch with the greatest of disdain. Yet one could argue that the Nike factories did the same, by keeping the seven years olds and their families fed, saving them from a life of begging on the streets. (For all you moralists out there, this is a real concern, every time I visit Mumbai, I am always appalled how little babies roam wild, begging and the rest of society is completely immune to their pleas.)


I wonder, Are Indian call center jobs just glorified sweat shops?

Happy Misleading Lies

I am so bored of animated movies. Every other movie on Pay Per View is animated.

I saw Happy Feet this weekend, and while I enjoyed the great music (They had so many songs, it was like watching a Hindi movie, minus the wardrobe changes.) And I loved the four Latino Penguins. Yet the overall message of the story was so odd.

Sorry for the spoiler here.

Odd penguin who can sing to find his soul mate, saves other penguins, by getting captured, put in a zoo, does a quirky tap dance with his feet, and somehow magically re-appears in the wild with a transmitter which leads humans to the penguins. And the humans somehow kindly put a moratorium on fishing, and all is happy and well…..waddaaaaa????

Who wrote this nonsense?

First world Vs Third World Issues

Last night was super duper educational.

Here is lesson # 2.

I was flipping between the Passionate Eye, that featured “Loss of Innocence” a documentary on Cambodia and the Life Network, which featured a documentary “Sporting Kids, Mom’s and Dads” on children whose parents have them involved in every after school activity imaginable.

What struck me was the huge difference in concerns based on material wealth of two distinct regions.

In North America, our wealth affords us the luxury of taking basic needs like clothing, security, food and shelter, for granted. Instead we worry about carting our children between multiple activities, stressing about our hectic schedule, which we choose. Sure everyone needs to earn money. Yet often we choose jobs that are more stressful, because of prestige. We choose to enroll our kids in multiple activities, because society says this will make them into better people. We choose to make ourselves sick. There are ailments in certain rich countries that would be seen as preposterous in the third world. Anorexia for example. A starving child in Africa would laugh at someone who purposely didn’t eat. I do not mean to down play the seriousness of this psychological disease, but I want to point out, that it is an affliction of a rich society to be more concerned with aesthetics than survival.

The Passionate eye story was about the slave/sex trade in Cambodia. Children as young as six, sold and raped, since it the superstition is that taking a girls virginity brings a man good luck. In Cambodia, most of the people in the villages are simply trying to just survive, in a society destroyed and decimated by civil war, foreign meddling and inept governments.

I am not here to say Cambodia or the third world’s problems are more important than the concerns of people that live in richer societies. I have always been of the opinion that no matter how grounded and humble a person is, their own problems will always be more important than two million people being slaughtered a million miles away. The point is, perhaps we need to re-examine our lives. And appreciate, that since we have no worry of being sold into slavery, we should do a little more for the people who still live in fear.

Also instead of driving our kids crazy learning activities they are quiet likely to forget, why not take them on fact finding holiday to see how the other half lives.

Immigrants

Once a week for the past six months I mentor A, a new immigrant from China, recently married, extremely educated (MBA, CFA,) humble and all round great girl. A is inspiring. She and her hubby met in China, and he then immigrated to Canada two years before she arrived. They then got married, and A had to defer to immigration law, and wait for another six months till her SIN # (which allows you to work) came through. Now most people in A’s position, put their legs up and watch TV for 6 months. Instead A, took ESL classes, took the CFA test, volunteered to run a local MP’s election campaign. A inspires me. So when she asked me to dinner I jumped at the chance.

I went over to their apartment last night, which A and hubby share with another Chinese couple. A cooked a great dinner, and then we all got to chatting. I learnt that in China, there are few paid public workers. Instead the people are responsible for most of the daily chores, for instance as university students A and hubby were responsible for cleaning the snow of the roads and highways twice a day. In school all the children do the job of the local janitors. They clean floors, scrub windows. Even the itty bitty kids in Grade one are expected to perform these duties, if they can’t manage their parents lend a hand. A and Hubby talked about how when Chairman Mao took over, one of the first things he did was to make the intellectuals, white collar workers, spend time in the villages with the farmers, to learn how to feed themselves.

We then discussed the trials and tribulations people face in Canada as new immigrants. The one thing my family and I took for granted when we immigrated to Canada, was our perfect command of English. A and hubby said the main obstacles they face in a society like Canada, one based so much on the service industry and sales, is their inability to communicate in the most basic way. Thus everything becomes more frustrating, more depressing. We talked about how when people immigrate, the first thing they need to forget is their pride. No matter how rich, important or what a great job you had in your own country, Canada humbles you in an instant. You take any job you are given, just to earn the prized Canadian experience. For instance since coming to Canada, my dad has sold vacuum cleaners, worked night shifts in factories, and done telemarketing, just to help us survive. All this from a man who used to manage 65 people and hadn’t done manual labor in over twenty years. Yet there is light at the end of the tunnel. While the first generation of immigrants, no matter where they hail from, never truly feels ‘Canadian,’ it is their children that thrive. For my part I am a weird hybrid of a first generation immigrant as well as a ‘lucky’ child, who went through the system long enough to get acclimatized. I like to think I understand both sides of the track. The danger of course is that we ‘children’ quickly forget the sacrifices made on our behalf’s. Thus you see a lot of first generation parents in old age homes, abandoned, and bewildered at how soon they have been forgotten.

I am not a good Catholic or religious person. Most of the time, I question the idea of God or God's very existence. At Mass I want to debate the priest.

What I do believe in, is people. I believe good people like my dad, A and her hubby. The people who you don’t read about in the papers, who don’t invent a cure for anything, who for the most part lack any sort of major egos, are the ones who can truly save us. Through their simple every day actions, I find hope.

My challenge to you is, don’t say the world is getting worse. Do something to make it a better place.

Why a girl should never get pregnant, without first spending some very ‘long’ quality time with a man.

What I find interesting about this story is ‘Sporty Spice’ is not a poor girl. She doesn’t necessarily need Eddie to pay for the kid. So what’s his problem? So you had a fight, so you broke up, so you have your doubts about if the baby is indeed yours….can’t you talk to her one on one? Do you have to announce to the world that you question her sexual history?

Mr. Murphy thou art a fool. I hope she proves u the baby daddy and then tell you to go to hell when you offer support.

And Miss Ex Baby face, keep your eyes and ears open, and the pill by your bed side.

How can you go from “Nobody knows it but me’ to “My girl wants to party all the time” anyway???

Sporty, I hereby dedicate this song to Eddie on your behalf, yup I got ur back gurl.

The Foot woman just came into my office beaming and handed me a very nice looking box with the company logo, and said, “Here you go.”

So I said, “Thank you.”

And she says, “You’re most welcome.”

So EAGERLY I open it, what could it be?

The box is empty.

I replaced the lid, and opened it again.

Still empty.

What the???

I walk over to her desk and say, “My box is empty.”

And she says, “Yes, they were throwing them out downstairs, so I rescued them.”

It took all the self restraint I had NOT to yell,
“THAT’S BECAUSE THERE’S NOTHING IN THE BOX YOU MORON.”

Progeria

Sunday Night I was in bed, flipping through my 25 channels, on my super duper Dubai TV, (which I can not program in Canadian order for the life of me,) when I came across a program on TVO called “In Times Shadow: The Hegis Story.” The next hour and a half broke my heart.

The documentary was about a little girl named Ashley, who at sixteen months had been diagnosed with ‘Progeria.’ At the time of the documentary Ashley was six years old, going on sixty. Progeria is a rare (only about 40-45 cases world wide) terminal condition that causes children to age at an accelerated rate. It comes from the Greek work meaning ‘prematurely old.’ Ashley looks like a shrunken old lady. She is bald, with her veins showing through, wears glasses and suffers from blinding migraines. Children with Progeria rarely survive past their early teens, usually suffering from numerous heart problems and strokes. Ashley has already had four strokes.

Ashley’s mum Lori had Ashley when she was eighteen. Lori later divorced Ashley’s father, only to meet a sweet man, who took care of them for two years, before tragically drowning. My heart ached for this woman, she has literally been charged to raise a daughter who will die. A note of hope, on their website, Lori seems to have found a new man to love her.

I have gotten rather whinny over the years. I often think jeez why can’t I have this, or why can’t I make this or that happen.

Stories like this sure bring you back to reality real quick.

Saturday the Koreans stood me up, so I accidentally spent a lot of money at a strip mall….not even a real mall.

Whilst browsing at a grocery store, I meet this fellow I used to work with. We chat for a bit, exchange current job titles, catch up on dating histories, and general life goals. He tells me he is dating an Indian girl and we get into a little exchange on cultural differences. As I am about to leave he says, we should hang out sometime. I say sure, we exchange numbers. I waddle home.

I get a call at around 10, private (who calls private anymore??) and it’s him, asking where I am heading to that night…..so we have a two minute conversation. And I head out.

4 a.m. phone rings, its private again….and its buddy, checking in to see how my night went.

Excuse me. I met you again after 8 years, I do not know you well enough for you to call me at 4 a.m., you are definitely not booty call material, and you said girlfriend, which is supposed to indicate you will not be a stalker……Men are so misleading.

The Tale of Scott and Eduardo:

It started off innocently enough.

They worked together, engineers by trade, long hours that stretched well into the night bought them closer, sealing what would begin as a close friendship. Within a few weeks it was obvious to the both of them that they were ‘soul mates.’ They began to complete each others sentences, pick the same things off the menu, and laugh at the same jokes. Things were going well. Both had their day lives, families they had started before they met each other, obligations that had made them pensive at first. Their vacation in Cuba in February sealed the deal for Scott. He wanted Eduardo, He wanted him for life.

Without consulting Eduardo, Scott tells his wife. She leaves Eduardo a nasty message. He is shocked.

Eduardo calls Scott, demanding to meet him.

They have an intense conversation. They are oblivious to everything else. Scott stares hard at his tea cup, as Eduardo animatedly tells Scott in no uncertain terms that he will not leave his wife and little son Putto. Scott, sat there for two hours, stoically listening to Eduardo’s excuses…….

In the meantime, Eduardo and Scott are oblivious to the hooligans in the table across. The hooligans who coyly attempt to photograph Eduardo and Scott, who are mimicking their possible conversation, the hooligans who pretend to stand by a flower pot so as to get a better picture of the lovers………..the blogger link up peeps.

I get to Alice Fazzolis Friday night and I felt like I was on a blind date, I had no idea who I was meeting….and yet it was great. Bloggers are wonderful people. We have it all, we are funny, we are intelligent, we pen our thoughts down as if they are the most interesting in the world, and then we expect other to comment. It was really great meeting you lot, and hope we can do it again soon…….Btw, can one of you send me the pics of Scott and Eduardo….Muuuuuuuuuchas Gracias….