Wanderberry Tales

I have always had a hateful relationship with the summers. I wished for summer vacation to fall during winters! As a kid I was prone to heat boils in summer that would irritate me day and night until my aunt found a solution through it through MEDIMIX soap - now, all Indians especially a malayalee will would relate to this brand of soap:) Moving to Bangalore, made summers a tad bit bearable. When my groom hunt was on, one thing I was very particular of was - No wedding in April and May. Weddings are supposed to be happy moments not disgusting and sweat drenched. This is my third summer in Dubai and you can imagine the plight of a summer hating creature like me surviving in this part of the world. Coupled with humidity, the weather makes it impossible to step out even for a few fleeting moments. Even if you do all you can think of is getting back under the shower which is not much of a solace because you have hot water running in the taps. I look forward to the summers bidding ...

We explored the architectural extravaganza that is Rome and Vatican and then had headed to the beautiful countryside of Tuscany and Umbria . Our last destination would be La Spezia to explore the coastal villages of Cinque Terre. We briefly stopped by Pisa to catch a glimpse of one among the many wonders of the world ( just because I think that there are more than 7 wonders) - The Leaning Tower of Pisa. We took the train to Pisa and had our luggage checked into the baggage area before an approximately 2.5 km walk to the Leaning Tower. We loved the fact that the trains in Italy were well maintained, be it regional, intercity, or the high speed Freccia trains. It was lunch time and we stopped by a restaurant where we fed ourselves on ravioli (yum!!), pasta and finished it off with a panacotta. If you have visited the Leaning tower, you sure should have a souvenir to substantiate it - you have endless souvenir shopping choices along the road. Magnets,...

I have lived in Karnataka most of my life exempting the last 3 years in Dubai. Back in the days most of Kerala delicacies never crossed the Kerala borders. I lived close to Mangalore and Mangalore is only an arms distance away from Kerala (not literally:P) Despite this, it was a rarity to find any of the Kerala treats in Mangalore region or any neighboring areas. May be if you hunted down, you would find it in some corner of Mangalore unlike today when Kerala food is as popular in these regions. My parents say that after every vacation, when we come back from Kerala we had to lug across cartons filled with fish pickle, mango pickle, ari unda, achappam, ethekka upperi, chakka upperi, aluva, jelebi, puttu podi anything and everything. Now almost all of these are available in Mangalore sparing them the trouble of carrying cartons. My mother even ranted on once about how we managed to put everything into the bus at Mangalore station including me and my dad but before she and my sis...