Harsh Mohan starts wearing Turban

Handsome Harsh looking delighted in the back drop of picture of lovely three 

"Oh! Hello my friends, here is a good news! How beautiful is the turban as by wearing this, the speech becomes sweet and the face gets glamorized." guides Shivpreet as how he is inspired by the lines of Saint Namdev in Sri Guru Granth Sahib.

The above lines were appropriately sung by the Raagis on the auspicious occasion of Dastar Bandhi of Harsh Mohan, second son of Dr Tej Mohan  Singh and Dr Simran Singh. So if you have to follow the path of Sikhism, glorify your lookism, you must speak sweet words and then your personality and character will shine out. 

Hence the first step to give out a call to the friends was announced with the beatings of the drums and singing of the spiritual renderings.

Harsh has to speak sweetly now onwards to come out successful in everyday life. The turban will not only enhance his personality outwardly but inwardly also to make him a perfect person.

Harsh full of delight and gratitude to his parents and grand parents. 

I met Dr Tej Mohan Singh in 1994 when I was introducing my recently published CD Rom on Scriptures & Heritage of Sikhs. Dr Tej Mohan was pursuing his residency in training of Vascular Surgery from the Stanford University after completing his medical degree from University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine.

Dr Tej Mohan flanked by Brij Mohan and Harsh Mohan

Dr Tej Mohan looked very smart, bubbly and    

enthusiastic young Sikh boy. I still remember him pointing out my mistake in the text of the CD very respectfully. I was just won over by his attitude, dexterity and charismatic personality.

And when I needed his help in guiding Shiv for his future career, Tej Mohan, along with his newly-wed beautiful wife Simran, travelled all the way for 30 miles to come to our place in San Jose to give his personal opinion and guidance. Harvinder and me were thankful to them for sparing their precious time in his tight schedule. Tej Mohan and Simran had to leave back quickly only after a few snacks.

Brij, Indira Singh, Tej, Harsh and Harbans Singh

Our association with Dr Tej Mohan and his family went from strength to strength over the years.  Dr Tej Mohan introduced us to his parents and we formed a good friendship. His parents Harbans Singh and Indira Singh  meet us on almost every visit to Bay Area. The family has by now bonded well with us for almost two decades. Mr Harbans Singh and Mrs  Indira Singh are enjoying golden period of their lives after successfully spending half a century in this land of opportunity by indulging in entrepreneurship in and out of Chicago. All their kids are practicing Sikhs in USA. 

Dr. Tej Singh is a vascular surgery doctor in The Bay Area California. He is affiliated with multiple hospitals in the area, including El Camino Hospital and Good Samaritan Hospital. He received his medical degree from University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine and has been in practice for 21 years. Dr Tej is one of 9 doctors at El Camino Hospital and one of 7 at Good Samaritan Hospital who specialize in Vascular Surgery.

Harbans Singh and Indira Singh are planning to travel to Alaska and I wish them a hilarious, wonderful and trouble free ensuing cruise to Alaska.

I can not escape but to mention that Dr Tej Mohan is very punctual to the dot seconds. Both Tej and Simran will reach always on time. Initially I felt so imbaraased to find them at the door while we were in the initial stages of setting up finalities of a party. He also leaves the party on time. Thereafter we always try to hurry up. We are sought of scared as Tej and Simran timely arrival may not catch us on the wrong foot one more time.

Today was a big day when their second son Harsh Mohan had a Dastar Bandhi. 15 year old Harsh proudly was tied a turban by Hazuri Raagi After Ardaas. Some of the pictures are given below:

Start of the turban tieing.

In the process of tying turban

Getting up to pay obeisance and respects for Baba Ji.

Delighted Fathers

Harsh listens to grandma instructions to bow to Baba Ji.

A part of the Sangat

Chicago family troops with older daughter-in-law Daman Jit Kaur and her daughter Jasleen join the photo shoot and the third son Anik Mohan is finally available for a nice family picture.

Shiv and Gobind

Meetpaul offers Tej the 'Kesgi' and rewinds twenty years.

A grand Panaramic view after the ceremony.

Harsh and Simran

The Proud Mom

Simran snaps me and Harvinder with handsome brothers

Harsh with Grand parents

Tej with proud parents

We missed Dr Narinder Chadha, the dad of Dr Simran Singh. Dr Chadha being trained as a teacher in the Medical College gave me exceptionally great hints on his last trip to USA.

Golgappa Party

Nilesh and Ritu, our new neighbors are very social, friendly and respectful couple. Their two little kids are equally well mannered and behaved. Being very friendly to Jania, the families are also intermingling frequently. The Golguppa Party was the result of similar initiative.

Even Shilpy was able to join the Party as she had only to cross  30ft road.

 The Mint Chuttney

Alfonso Mangoes

The soup 

The Stffings

Another stuffing 

The Chowmin

Dal Bhujia

The Golguppas

Each one of us enjoyed the party, while the kids had a gala time in their play room.

Tuesday An Ice-cream Day

I decided to take Gobind and Jania for enjoying the Icecream on a Tuesday. Baskin Robbins have a special deal for kids on as the Kid's scoop is for $1.49 against $1.99 for a regular scoop on every Tuesday. I have two intentions, one to teach them how to spend money judiciously and second to save my pocket in the process.

We also decided to take Jania's friend Neha whom I had promised for a Ice-cream treat along with Jania. I thought it will be fun if Neha's older sister Rishika also joins. 

But these guys hardly can accumodate into each other's Schedule. So Nth time, we had to cancel the Joint trip and proceed alone for the treat followed by Kumon/Music Classes. 

Finally dejected, we left alone as Neha and Rishika had to attend some different activities exactly at the same time.

G&J are trying to firm up their minds for their orders.

Jania gets her double Scoop order for Vanila only.

In comes the turn of Gobind, he had warned me to go for three Scoops unless  I refuse to pay for three at the last moment. So he went for three following Scoops with melted fudge on top:

So Gobind got melted Chocolate Fudge on his cup.

Today, they gladly offered me one spoon each as my mandotry share of whatever they eat. Gobind warned me against the sugary contents. I could easily assume that they had enjoyed the Icecream to their satisfaction.

Freshly Energised G&J give me a boxing pose.

My aim to save money on a Deal day did not work though. I rather ended up paying more. But it was fun as always.

Vege-Mania in Our Kitchen Garden

A Vegetable Garden or Patch is a garden that exists to grow vegetables and other plants useful for human consumption, in contrast to a Flower Garden that exists for Aesthetic purposes. It is a small-scale form of vegetable growing. 

With worsening economic conditions and increased interest in organic and sustainable living, many people are turning to vegetable gardening as a supplement to their family's diet. Food grown in the back yard consumes little if any fuel for shipping or maintenance, and the grower can be sure of what exactly was used to grow it. Organic Horticulture or organic gardening, has become increasingly popular for the modern home gardener.

The kitchen garden has a year-round visual appeal and can incorporate permanent perennials. The kitchen garden may serve as the central feature of an ornamental, all-season Landscape area. It is a source of herbs, vegetables and fruits but it is often also a structured garden space.

Growing kitchen vegetables has been a craze for me lately. Last year, we had so much tomatoes that we did not buy them from the market for good six months. We had only four plants. It's true what they say: The best-tasting tomato is always the one you grow yourself.

This Patch has again three Tomatoe plants and plenty of green Onions. Besides it has green Black Grams, two potato plants. Harvinder just picked a few pieces of Black Grams and sowed them. It is very exciting to see green gram plants emerging along with their fruits. All of us in the family are looking forward to enjoy eating Rice Pulao full of green grams with.

Will it not be yummy?

This Patch has also one Pea plant brought by Jania from her School. 

It is amazingly growing fast and flowering from original 2" to 2 ft. Jania is having Bio practicals at home.

This is very favorite patch for Jania as it has Strawberries. Last year, she had a full bowl of Strawberries everyday for a couple of months during harvesting season. The berries are quiet soft & sweet and just melt in your mouth. Rest of the space is occupied by Fenugreek (Methi). Harvinder used her 'Methraas' from her kitchen store and sprinkled it in this patch. They are now grown into a foot long plants full of fragranted soft leaves which are good for diabetese.

New Patch with Tomato and Bell Pepper (green & red) and Chillee Plants

This Patch has Squash, Cucumber, Basil and Corn plants

This Patch has Squash, Egg Plants, Water Melon, Cantaloupes, and Corn

Getting encouraged, We have planted nine more Tomato plants this year. We have also enhanced more cultivaiable areas shown above by adding three more Vege Patches on Eastern side. Incidentally these patches get 6-8 hours of Sun which is good for Vegetable produce. The new Patches are proving to be more productive.

Besides these Tomato plants, we have also planted 7 Corn plants, 3 Basil plants, 8 Bell Pepper plants, 4 Egg Plants, 10 Squesh Plants, three Water Melon Plants, 2 Cantaloupe Plants and three Cucumber Plants.

   Corn

   Squash

  Cucumber 

  Bell Pepper

 Squash

  Egg Plant

Tomato 

Mint

Green Black Gram

Green Onion

Strawberry

Fenugreek (Methi)

The plants are like kids and we have to take care of them really well, save them from insects, fertilize them, irrigate them very regularly on time and make sure the drainage of excess water is being effective.

Let's hope we eat our home grown organic vegetables while simultaneously educating our grand kids the art of Kitchen garden. The entire 7 Corn plants have been planted by Shiv. So inspite of his tight office schedule, Shiv does visit the Veg patches every morning when in town to watch the growth of his Corns.

OUR FRUITS

Some of the fruit tree are shown below. Our Cherry had bumper crop this year but the black fly deserted the entire crop. I would be wiser to treat it next time.

"Abb Pachhtaaye kiya hot hai, 

Jab Chiriya Chug gai Khet"

Meaning it is useless to repent now when the fruits have already been eaten away by the birds. The black birds in hundreds came and enjoyed the fruits, but that was last year, this time black flies diseased it.

Enjoy the fruits as they look today:

Appricot 

Plum

Asian Pear

Nectarine 

Mulberry 

Pomegranate 

Apple

Pear

  Peach

One of the twenty Lavender Plants

The Fruit season starts with Cherry, Mulberry, Apricot, Nectrine, Peach, Almonds, Pear, Asian Pear and parsiman

In the end.

Let's all enjoy! Our friends and readers of this blog living nearby are welcomed to pick the fruit of their choice with free compliments from Kapoor family.