A visit by our Jangpura Neighbors

Jangpura Neighbors

Mukesh, our next door neighbor, recalls his memories of my wedding reception which was arranged in the Park in front of our houses in Jangpura Extension, New Delhi in 1972. He clearly remembers how he, as an eight years old boy, enjoyed the song which I performed on that party night.

He migrated to USA in 1998 and settled down in Houston Texas. Fortunate as he is, Mukesh is running a successful operation of couple of gas stations including a large Shell gas station near the airport.

Presently he is anxiously awaiting to bring the rest of his family to USA. Mukesh had filed the immigration petition for his wife and their four daughters at one go.


For strange reasons, his oldest daughter Pooja was luckily approved by US Government and stamped with an immigrant Visa by the US Counsulate in New Delhi about nine months ago, while the rest of the family still awaits the stamping to have a happy re-union.

So, Mukesh decided to cheer up Pooja and give her a vacation by visiting us in the Bay Area during her spring holidays.

At San Jose Gurdwara Sahib

At Monterey

At Lone Cyprus

At Beach

At Beach

At San Ramon Water Fall

At Crooked Street

At Pier 39

  At Golden gate

© preet mohan singh., all rights reserved.

One Side Of Papers

My Desk

One side Of Papers

I normally work from a desk placed in a multipurpose room attatched to my bed room. This attached office has a table, a chair, a treadmill, and walk-in-wardrobe. This arrangement fits into my kind of reqirements. A fast internet with excellent bandwidth is wirelessly available to me on my laptop. I also use extensively the I-Phone which also works as standby tool for my internet reqirements.

Shiv is a great fan of paperless office working. But I continue to tell him that at times the reqirement is essential. At the same time, as a 'green' thing I would like to make the use of paper to the minimum. Hence I have resolved to use the other side of the paper which has been already used on one side. I usually do 'doodling' and throw away the paper in the evening.

The other big use of one side used paper is to fulfill the demands of Gobind and Jania. Every now and then they would make a demand and I would oblidge them  with a crisp one side used paper. Initially, Jania refused poin blank and with little pursuation she agreed. Both of them accepted this arrangement solving my problems to avoid wastage.

Today, I got into deepest of troubles. Gobind came in a hurry and demanded three papers as he was required to take them to his Dad for some assignment. As I questioned his requirement, he was blindfolded bent upon to have papers. In mean time, I just got busy in some studies, this guy went to the other side of the desk and grabed 3-4 papers after thoroughly checking that they were used on one.

To my good luck, I happened to check those papers and to my utter surprise those papers were important real estate documents just received in the mail. When I stopped him not to touch them as they were very important papers and I needed them badly for my records. To which Gobind immediately reacted, " these are one side used papers, grandpa."

How can I expalain to him now!

© preet mohan singh., all rights reserved.

Panipat Zila Karnal

Our house Number 391, W-12, Kalandar Chowk, Panipat. This is the front of our house where we spent 25 years after partition. The house, with multi owners, has been redone by the builder who built many appartments by merging neighboring houses. The picture is courtsey my niece Simer Chhabra who joined all my four sisters in March 2010 and revisited the place where we grew.

Young and talented Simer Chhabra

                 Bhagwant, Amarjeet, Mohinder and Tripat on their recent visit to Panipat March 2010

Bhagwant in our courtyard with a Portable 'Tandoor' in the background

Panipat Zila Karnal

It was quite often when our family will meet over a get together, I being a four/five year old will be made a focal point of attraction. My dad will call me, while sitting among his group of friends and ask me to narate the same few lines on Panipat.

We were lust in the process of settling down in Panipat immediately after the partition of the country. Most of our other members of our family was settled in New Delhi. One evening we had got together for a wedding dinner and squatted on the floor on the roof of a dharamshala in Rohtak in connection with the wedding of Mr Atam Narain Singh (my mothers eldest sister's son).

I was summoned by Mr Dalip Singh( Dad's budy and his bench-mate) to bully me and asked me to sing that by now infamous naration about our new abode. As I sang, all the people around me would jump to thundrous laughter and will join me in singing alongwith while I was seriously doing the song. Obviously I was thrilled by the attention I got from all near and dear, while all others had real hearty fun.

The lyrics are given below, I do not know whether it attracts the same attention or not:

"Panipat zila Karnal,

No Koi Roti, No Koi Daal,

Bhukhe mar gae Bachche naal"

'There is a town called Panipat which falls under the district of Karnal,

There is hardly any bread or butter/dish available at that place,

How do we survive, as We and kids are dying out of hunger.'

This was just a pointer to my Dad, being a grain producer himself, till the other day owning 100s of acres of aggricultural lands, had to make his both ends meet with utmost difficulty to take care of the needs of his kids.


My Dad joined his kins without a wrinkle of worry on his face though and just laughed it away.

© preet mohan singh., all rights reserved.

When my Grand Daughter Jania Speaks

Jania is full of life and always chattering goody goody things. I am amazed if I was knowing even ten percent of the vaccubalary she knows. May be TV shows and exposure of developed nation are the factors giving rise to this level of information. I thought whynot to document her trifle titbits. She is another inspiration for me use my time in a fruitful and positive way.

Lesson of Love

Yesterday after dropping off Gobind, we straightway proceeded to Acorn Learning Center Daughtry Valley, where she is having her second year pre-school activities. While sitting in her car seat, picked up a Lolly Pop and give it to me, but she wanted to give the same to Dadi Ma too. Next what she did has touched my heart too much. While putting her right hand on my left shoulder and left hand on Dadi Ma's right shoulder, She pushed both of us towards each other saying that this candy should be shared by us both as we both love each other. 

© preet mohan singh., all rights reserved.