Miles to go before I sleep….

Rajee Athai,

This is your favorite Surya scribbling my first letter to you. It has been more than a year ever since I announced my grand arrival as a wonderful son to my intellectual mother and my lazy father. Since then, I have been thinking about penning a letter to you. However, my busy schedule of eating, sleeping, dreaming and above all playing did not allow me to do so. Today, as I was showing off the beautiful dress you got me, I realized that there cannot be a better occasion to write this letter.

Let me start by revealing a small secret about Appa. Whenever I address you as Athai, he is not quite comfortable about that. It took me a while to find out the reason. By calling you Athai, am implying that you are his sister and he does not like that at all. Poor AppaJ.

Am sure you are wondering as why I am writing this letter to you. Isn’t it? Well let me start it this way. There have been multiple occasions where Appa has been very lucky. The best example is that of him getting married to Mom.  I can’t imagine the disaster if he had married anyone else. Can you?

Another instance where he has been quiet lucky is his friendship with you. And this letter is not to discuss about how much he treasures that. It is more about the profound impact you have upon me. Ever since I was born, hardly has a day passed without my parents thinking about you. I even started wondering if I need to compete with you to gain their attentionJ.

My father to a very great extent had the privilege of having a very inspiring person as his friend, I had the pleasure of hearing about your mental strength and your amazing attitude towards life every day. Thanks Athai to be my father’s friend. We truly enjoy and relish your company.

While I wish to write a novel about your accomplishments and how you have inspire me, my busy schedule of eat, play and sleep would not let me do that. So, I decided to put it simple. What Jessica Ennis is for Great Britain, Rajee Athai is for us. We love you for what you are, what you have accomplished and all the great things you are going to do in the future.

Few things are etched too deep in one’s mind .I have scribbled down one such verse. The best thing about this verse is it reminds me about you every time I read …

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Signing off with Loads of Luv,

Surya Mohana Vivek

Happy Birthday Mom...

Amma,

 Of late, I have been watching a quite a few Bloopers. They, apparently, are more entertaining than the actual show. What I have scribbled below is a hilarious, but true rendition of sequence of events and goof ups Appa did while planning your birthday. The only difference though, is you are reading the blooper first and then seeing the actual product. It goes without saying that you are the most my world. So, even a smirk on your face after reading this would only reinforce the truth behind the statement "Ek Idea Mera Dhuniya Bhadal jayangae".  So, please smile after reading this J

It all started like this.

I was anticipating a great birthday for you and was checking with Appa as what his plan is. As always, Mr. Vivek (yeah yeah, Appa only) was lazy and was looking for an avenue to escape. His physical unavailability here in India only helped his cause. I was not convinced and prodded him to come with a plan.  After lot of thought, he came out with the idea to buy a Samsung Galaxy S2 for you and then claim that he has fulfilled your wish. This is what I would classify as the dumbest idea I have ever heard. Sorry to say mom, he has such a poor his imagination. Thank lord, am like you.... J

As you have told, every challenge is an opportunity in disguise. Appa's dull plan just served that purpose if not anything else J . It quickly dawned upon me that there cannot be a better day than your Birthday to tell you as how much we love you.  And I was very sure that we could express in much better way than just getting a Android Phone (It is not even a windows phone... )

I, for once other, took responsibility and donned the hat of an event manager with the goal to make this birthday the most unforgettable one till now. Right after becoming a self-proclaimed event manage, I realized that I needed a partner to execute this plan. I, immediately, struck a secret alliance with Chittappa as I knew he was equally keen to make this moment big. (Everyone other than Appa are more keep on your birthday  J ) While Appa was busy watching the Olympic ceremony, Chittapa and I had marathon discussions and etched, what we called the "Surya's super cool plan". As always Chittappa was very generous and named the plan after me. Thanks Chittappa.

Casual Conversations can at times trigger great ideas. It is no different here. I was telling Chittappa as how much you are interested in creating a diary for me, marking all important events of my life and how disinterested Appa is about that. As I was telling this, an idea struck Chittappa's brilliant mind as why we should not capture the best moments ever since I became the cynosure of your eyes and make a personal album of it. It was this personal touch that was missing in Vivek’ s so called master plan.

With the high-level plan in place, we quickly identified that the first thing we needed to garner is a collection of your photos. Chittappa attempt to grab your photos from Appa was futile. We weren't overly surprised :). I exactly knew whom to rope in to get going. Who else other than my all-time favorite Chitti would be more interested your birthday????? So the GOT (Gang of Three) team got into act again and came out with this album which we think capture the 12 most best of your life

I have posted the poster  at http://sdrv.ms/Ndem6s . While I took the pleasure of designing the poster, Chitti and Chittappa designed the album.

I hope you liked the poster. However did you try opening the album Mom? Ah Ah .. Too early! 

Let’s have the starting ceremony before viewing the actual gift. So, here we go. Please go and collect your first gift from Chittappa and then continue reading..... Yeah, we did not want Appa to feel miserable about his hopeless plan. We decided to have it as the starter. Chittappa, being one of the 2 partners in crime, forged Appa’s signature in one of the cheque leaves to withdraw money for the mobile. Chittappa, has mastered the art so well that I would not be surprised if the bank starts rejecting those cheques which are actually signed by Appa. :)

You should have figured out the password for the album by now. Haven't you? So let’s open the album together and view what's in store.

Hope you liked what we presented to you. Just before I sign off, I wanted to tell that the master mind behind this plan is...... I know what you are thinking but you are wrong.... it is of course me J

Loads of Luv,

Surya