A Little Here, A Little There

An Interesting Quote

I find that many people I speak with put up this front as to who they really are. I found the quote below and thought to myself how true it is. In this world it seems people always try to be who they are not and in so doing, forget who they really are.

"We become so accustomed to disguise ourselves to others, that at last we are disguised to ourselves."
                                                                              --Francois Duc de la Rochefoucauld

We Have Ourselves a Home!!!

Oh my goodness, it's been ages since I last updated. Where do I begin? The move to NC was interesting, to say the least. It did end up running smoothly in the end. Our apartment is awesome! It has such a beautiful view overlooking forest and lake. There is also a 3.5 mile paved path around the lake and into the foresty areas which is great to walk and bike on (plus, it's a bonus to help keep our bods in such sexy shape..har har har). NC is a hidden gem of the US; it's full of lush forestry and beautiful flowers. There are many lakes around the Triangle (i.e. Chapel Hill, Raleigh, Durham) area and we are close to the ocean and mountains. The Southern folk are extremely friendly and when you go driving in a neighborhood, they'll just wave and say hi even if they don't know you - fascinating! There are lots of amazingly good eats here and the weather is rockin'!

Plus, the biggest news is that WE BOUGHT OUR FIRST HOME!!!!!!!! It's so awesome. It's about 2300 sq. ft. and sits on 0.21 acres and we paid a glorious $289,900.00 for it. It's 4 bedrooms and 2.5 baths on 2 levels and it's awesome. We were looking at much larger homes on larger lots in the $350k's range but we were like "what the hell do you do with 6 bedrooms?" Right now, it's just 3 of us and within a year or 2 it will be 4 of us and I still don't know what to do with that many bedrooms. Plus, it's our first house so I don't want to start pimping out and getting the largest damn house on the block - it's just not wise. You can view all pictures of this house on my yahoo accounts: http://photos.yahoo.com/kasha.mehra

Aside from that, life is just beautiful here. We do not miss California one bit and don't regret for a milisecond of moving here. If you would come here, you would love it too!

Basketball Country

I've recently figured out that football is not a big venue here in NC. Here, people worship basketball. Of course, UNC and Duke have been ousted but wow, talk about the love of the game here. We've also noticed that there are A LOT of tall men out here. Hmmm...not sure if there is any positive correlation between the men's height here and the love of basketball. 

In other news, we've also noticed that families are quite huge here...like 3-5 kids is the norm. I'm not sure if that has anything to do with us being in the South but it's an interesting thing to point out nonetheless. We of course see families of just two children and we think those might be part of the growing number of transplants from New York, New Jersey, and Mass.

We've also noticed that people seem to love riding on your ass while driving. But, it's different than CA. In CA, people ride your ass because they are pissed that you are going 15 over the speed limit and causing them to be late to work. Here, they just seem to like tailing you - it's all friendly. I don't see those tailgaters with a look to kill or anything like that. In general though, they are much better at driving out here than in CA. At least you don't have some slow mo-fo's in the left lane blocking your ability to pass up slow drivers in the right lane. Here, left lane is for passing and driving fast, as it should be.

Hamburgers with Vinegar?

Apparently in the South (or at least this part of the South), BBQ hamburgers are done with vinegar instead of ketchup or other BBQ sauce. Actually, the original BBQ sauce dates back hundreds of years and was just vinegar and pepper. Even cooler is that this very first BBQ sauce supposedly originates in North Carolina and South Carolina.

Hollywood equals Historical Accuracy?

It's been kind of funny to see the reaction of various Iranians and other folk concerning the film '300' and the worry about how it is negatively portraying Persian history. I find it absolutely hilarious and ridiculous all at the same time.

Do movies + television shows equte to real history? NO!! It's Hollywood for god's sake. Hello?! Hollywood = not historically accurate most of the time. If I want to know about the true history of a place or people, I'll immerse myself in the history books and speak with people that have extensive knowledge on the subject (i.e. professors at universities). Even books and actual people aren't accurate about history because we did not live back then in that time period so even we can't be sure if what's written in historical books, etc is true.

I have no doubt that Persia was at one time a very powerful and amazing empire and this movie will not skew that view for me. I saw this movie purely for artistic and entertainment value and if I want historical accuracy, I'll look elsewhere outside of the movie and TV scope. It's funny how people have to find something to bitch about these days even with so much going on. I think that if Iranians and other people are bashing this movie for it's historical inaccuracy, that they should focus their energy on present-day Iran and other issues surrounding our world today.

We've Moved to North Carolina!

It's been a whirlwind of a month. From finding out Karan's transfer to the Durham, NC office got approved to actually moving out here last week Thursday (3/15). Moving in 1 month is crazy, especially when you have a little baby. We packed by ourselves (101 boxes total), picked a household goods mover (www.mooversinc.com, who we HIGHLY recommend by the way. They are an offshoot of Delancey Street Movers in SF), picked our auto shipping company (Golden Key Express), shipped our cars, figured out where to live in NC while looking for a home, figuring out when we would actually fly out and when to ship our goods and ship our cars, etc. IT was freakin' crazy. I'm too exhausted to even think about being exhausted. But, it was well worth the move.

Right now we are living in an awesome apartment place in Cary, NC (which is in what is called the Triangle area of NC - Raleigh, Chapel Hill, and Durham). It's BEAUTIFUL here. We are not missing CA whatsoever (except for friends and family that we left behind there!). This place reminds me of the North Woods of Wisconsin except everyone here is VERY well educated (think SF and the SF Bay Area), ten times nicer than anywhere I've ever been (must be the Southern Hospitality thing going), and it's also a slower pace of life here. It feels just like Silicon Valley minus the ridiculous prices for everything, not a lot of Asians around here (maybe there are at the universities like Duke, North Carolina State, or UNC-Chapel Hill, but we haven't ventured there yet) and still lots of great food options to choose from. I can't say enough great things about this place so far and we only arrived on Thursday evening! Oh, the Southern accents are killer by the way. I get a lot of "yes, ma'm" said in that oh so Southern way.

We're supposed to be in the Bible belt of the US but so far I haven't met any folks that try to praise Jesus and Christianity down my throat. It's just such a diverse place that I'll doubt I'll meet those people in less I really look hard for them. I see nothing different about this area than anywhere else.

We have yet to do some unpacking. We'll be moving in a couple of months again to our hypothetical new house that we have to buy yet, so the thought of unpacking and having to pack again is not very lovely. I've begun to hate cardboard boxes. Anyways, we've posted a couple of pics of our apartment and outside the apartment. You can find them here: http://new.photos.yahoo.com/kasha.mehra/album/576460762394160269

Anyways, that's all the updates for now. But this decision that we've made was definitely well worth it. Mind you that we have moved to NC without EVER coming here before and it turned out like a fantastic decision.

Tir Na Nog

One awesome bit of news, I've found an Irish pub in Raleigh that has "real" UK-style fish and chips and live Irish music and dancing. Tir Na Nog baby, here we come!!!

We are very excited about moving out to the Triangle area. We got a realtor out there already and she seems like the sweetest person ever. And let's not forget about the Southern accents - I love it. I get lots of "yes, ma'm," "no, ma'm" in that really cool Southern way. Pretty soon ya'll might be hearing me talk with a Southern accent.

Moving - Part 1

Moving is both exciting and traumatic, all at the same time. I've finally got the car transport squared away, the hotel in NC for the first night, our apartment in NC is set, doctors are almost all chosen, and utilities are ready for 3/16. What don't we have done? A million things. Packing, for one, is only about 1/3 done. We've chosen to pack ourselves because I feel more comfortable doing it that way and it will cost us less money. We also haven't chosen the actual moving company yet. It's a debate between Mayflower, Allied, Atlas, and United. I am so tired of estimators and researching these moving companies that frankly, I'm at the point where I wish I could just teleport everything over there. I do thank www.movingscam.com and the Better Business Bureau for helping me pick out the best of the best.

Adios California!

March 14, 2007 marks our last full day in California. We're moving to Raleigh, North Carolina and we're super excited. We'll miss California and our family and friends here that we care deeply about. North Carolina is by no means a "forever" move, meaning I don't think we are planning on staying there for a VERY long time. But for now, it's the best option to help our money go that extra mile and to buy a home. We'll actually be able to save about 30% more out there than we can out here; which equates to a lot of money.

Our plan is to rent an apartment and immediately start a house hunt. There's going to be LOADS to blog about in the coming months and I'm really going to have to stay on top of it. The best part about this whole move is that we've never been to NC before nor do we know anyone there (except our realtor, but we know her virtually for the time being).

Some initial perspectives about NC:

1. If you answer a question that requires a "yes" answer, folks in that state don't say "yes' they say "yes ma'm" in that all so Southern way.
2. They have awesome Southern accents - I love it!!
3. Last of the Mohicans was filmed in NC and from what I can see in that movie and the pictures, it looks beautiful.
4. There are 4 seasons but we shouldn't be expecting -4 degree weather.
5. It's a very slow pace of life out there
6. Very community-oriented
7. People like driving on your ass but supposedly they like tailgating there...but not in the same way they like doing it here in California.
8. They have Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, and Costco --> YES!

Okay, that's the initial scoop for now. More to come.

PS: If anyone wants to buy a 60" SOny Grand Wega LCD Rear-Projection HDTV-Ready TV or any furniture (like sofa, coffe table, dining table, etc), give me a call.

I'm Back

It's been a while since I posted and that's a result of being lazy. The weeks leading up to the Holiday's and the weeks after have been crazy. We flew to Wisconsin and spent Christmas and New Year's with my family, as always. It was great. We had traditional Polish food like Pierogi, Barscz soup (red beet soup), and kapusta (sour kraut salad). Some of the traditional food Karan, my sister, and I did not eat because it's too weird, like Goose intestines soup (YUK!). Granted, this soup is not specifically served during the Holiday but it's traditional food of Poland. I sat back and came to a realization that even Polish people have really weird food. They may not eat Bull's testicles like they do in the East Asian part of the world but there is some pretty creative food that is eaten.

The plane ride was fantastic. Alexay was so good that we got comments on how good of a baby he was. The only thing that was upsetting about the whole vacation was that we all got sick and there was no snow. Oh well.

Now, the new year is here and I can't believe that I'll be turning one year younger next month. We've also started to seriously consider moving out of California. nVIDIA has a big branch in Austin, TX. Although I said I would never move below 36 degrees Latitude in the US, it looks like a really great option for the next 6 or so years. With Karan's salary staying the same, our dollar would go a hell of a long way down in Austin. There are a lot of tech companies down there and a lot of California transplants. It's also home to a damn good college with a great Pharmacy School. We'd even be able to buy a huge home for $250K, which in California we'd be lucky to afford a trailer home in a trailer park for that amount. School systems are also much better down there. I'm not really in the mood to spend $10K + a year on private school here in Cali. The weather in Austin may get hotter than the devil's ass in summer but hey, that's what central air conditioning is for! I'll miss cold weather and snow but at least Colorado is a plane ride away! And since we all know and agree we don't want to stay there long term, it's looking like a great option to move to. Plus, I always get bored staying in one place for too long and it's been almost 4 years (plus 3 summers of internships) out here in California and that's just been way too long.

Anyways, everything is in the research and planning phase but we might be out of Cali by the end of the year.