— पांच हजार तीन सौ सैंतीस —

Shivi's visit is now over: she had an insanely early flight out of SeaTac this morning at 7:15, which evidently took off on time; she and Shobhit both woke up around 4 a.m. and Shobhit drove her to the airport. As I write this, I can confirm she got off the plane in Chicago (further from Purdue than Indianapolis but both cheaper and the only airport between the two with direct flights), as she responded to the text I sent her early this morning, with a link to the 15-minute edit of the video I made of Shobhit's and my wedding in 2013, as I had promised last night I would.

I received this incredibly sweet text from her at 10:57 a.m.:

Thanks a lot!
Also I had a great time in Seattle, I'm glad to see chachu very happy. I'm glad he has u 😊

Side note: chachu is Hindi for "uncle"—but one of more than one such words, as the language can have different words for relatives depending on whether they are on your mother's or your father's side of the family. Chachu basically means "paternal uncle": Shobhit is Shivi's dad's brother. If Shobhit were her mom's brother, the term would have been ma ma. Confusing for English speakers who would expect that to be informal for "mother," I know. Further complicating things is the fact that Shivi calls Shobhit's mother amma (this is subtle but it places slight emphasis on the double M's: like um-ma), which actually means "mother" in Hindi. "Grandma" is actually daadee (more specifically, again, "paternal grandma"; maternal grandma would be naanee), but, for some reason, I guess Puneet—Shivi's dad—didn't want his mom's eldest grandchild to call her that, and to call her amma instead. Even though Shashi Ji was already plenty old enough to be a grandmother when Shivi was born in 2000, the year Shashi Ji turned 55.

Anyway, Shivi never called Shobhit "Shobhit" or even "Uncle Shobhit," always using the Hindi word even though they otherwise spoke exclusively English to each other—with rare exceptions, only ever speaking Hindi when they were on the phone with Shobhit's mom, or on rarer occasions, with Shivi's dad, Puneet. Either way, Shivi always called him chachu, and thus that was how she referred to him even in a text to me.

I'm 46 years old and will be 47 in April, so you would think I would be used to this stuff by now, but never having had children of my own really makes these experiences different. It feels like an oddly unique experience, even though it's nearly universal, to spend time with and relate to family who are still very young, barely not still children, but technically an adult and someone with solidly independent thinking. Shivi is very much her own person, and I have to give her parents credit, maybe more than Shobhit would necessarily be inclined to: I asked Shivi what she thinks about arranged marriages, and not only was she immediately like "no way, not ever," but she made clear that her parents have been telling her since she was ten years old that she should only marry for love. (Specifically, they refer to it as "love marriage," a distinguishing term that remains common among South Asians. I'll never forget the first time I heard Shobhit use it, it was so odd to me: aren't all marriages supposed to be "love marriages"? Well, not for everyone.)

Anyway, the point is, it was really sweet to get a text like that from her.

— पांच हजार तीन सौ सैंतीस —

We had one final engagement to drag Shivi to last night before she headed back home: dinner with Karen and Dave, at Saffron Grill.

This had been Karen's idea, from a few weeks back, when she hoped they could also bring their now-grown daughter Anita (she turns 26 this month, which is like: holy fuck), since she was originally from India, and she and Shivi could meet. In the end, with yesterday being the only day that worked for all the rest of us—they had gone to visit Karen's parents on Cape Cod last week, and we had other plans Saturday, Sunday and Monday—Anita could not make it after all. There remains the hope that one day Shivi can visit again and we can try this again with Anita, but as it was, we only met up with Karen and Dave.

In fact, a day after I texted Karen to confirm we were still on for dinner Tuesday—I had originally thought tonight would be another option, then I found out Shivi was to fly out early this morning—Karen texted me back yesterday, in part, Dave and I are available if Shivi doesn't mind old white people, LOL. Literally dictating what Shivi told me verbatim, I replied, Shivi says she loves old white people!

I have to say, Shivi doesn't seem to have a cynical bone in her body. She's constantly wide-eyed, open hearted, and laughs regularly, all while still never being above giving her chachu shit, clearly one of her favorite pastimes. As my dad had noted on Sunday, she isn't the least bit shy, she is totally at ease and comfortable around all different kinds of people and meets new people quite comfortably. In virtually every respect, she's like the diametrical opposite of what I was at the age of 22. I rather wish in hindsight that I could have been more like her when I was that age. I mean, shit. She's already got a job lined up and is set to move to central Maryland this summer after she graduates.

Her family is coming to the U.S. for her graduation, by the way. Maybe even Shashi Ji, although I remain somewhat skeptical. Shobhit may be right when he says Shivi might more successfully convince her to come and visit than he can, but also she is 77 years old and that is a real factor no matter what. There has been no discussion or suggestion of Shobhit and me coming to Shivi's graduation (unfortunately, it would likely be too awkward with both Shivi's parents, and certainly if Shashi Ji were there; her visiting us by herself is one thing, but with a bunch of her family around is quite another), but Shobhit is clearly hoping to leverage this graduation into finally getting his mom to visit us in Seattle once more. I realized just yesterday that, her second and last time visiting us was in 2008, which as of 2023, was fifteen years ago.

Anyway, yet again I digress. Even without Anita, the five of us had plenty to talk about at dinner last night, at Saffron Grill, the restaurant that had catered Shobhit's and my wedding in 2013—a big reason we wanted to share it with Shivi. As far as I could find in my calendar and Flickr records, this was the third time we've ever eaten there with Karen and Dave: first time was in late December 2012, along with Danielle as well, all of us there to sample their food and decide whether or not to make them our wedding caterers; the second—and the last, with them—was in December 2014, two years later, a sort of reunion dinner with the same group. This time, we kind of swapped out Danielle for Shivi, and this time, as already noted, Anita couldn't make it. (She was still a teenager in 2012 and 2014, having been 15 and 17, respectively, albeit in both cases less than a month from turning 16 and 18.)

Although Anita herself apparently feels little connection with India, having been raised pretty definitively American, Karen still has many different ties to India, linked to both adoption and disability advocacy, and has many friends from India, or who have moved back to India. They haven't visited India since 2007, but, between those things, they had a fair number of conversational bridges to cross with Shivi, as well as talking about other pretty typical things like where Shivi goes to college (Purdue) and what she's studying (computer hardware engineering).

I made the smart decision to skip lunch yesterday, which proved surprisingly easy to do—I did have three or four snack bites at work, but it was very little—in anticipation of this large dinner, and thankfully my weight was still down this morning. I'm hoping to make that a trend, an shed at least some of my pounds before we leave for Australia next month. Karen and Dave were totally good with having Shobhit order for our family-style eating at the table, getting two orders of shahi paneer; two other dishes I can't remember the name of except one was dominated by sauteed vegetables and the other had sort of vegetable balls in a sauce; an order of pakoras; a "family" order of rice; then at the end, two orders of gulab jamun for dessert, along with an order of kulfi on the house, Mohammed Jr. apparently continuing his father's tradition. Karen and I both ordered chai, which as expected was both delicious and resulted in a very poor night's sleep. It was worth it. I'll probably zonk out early tonight, but not before I finish my "New Year's" photo digest email, which normally I would have sent on the first, but I decided I will combine it with photos of activities with Shivi, hence my waiting until today to write it up.

Oh, I guess I haven't mentioned this yet; my brain was stuck because I already wrote it in the caption for last night's dinner photo: Shobhit, Shivi and I all arrived a good ten minutes before Dave and Anita did, and were seated first as well. When we walked in, as he always does, Shobhit asked after Mohammed, the sweet old man who had been running Saffron Grill for ages, and with whom we had first met about having them cater the wedding. Every time we came back thereafter, and most times Mohammed was there, Mohammed would shake our hands warmly and often even hug us both. He never forgot us, and almost always gave us either an appetizer or a dessert on the house. We were informed that Mohammed had retired! Shobhit asked who is running the restaurant now, and the hostess pointed to a much younger man she identified as Mohammed's son. This guy already owns and manages multiple other Seattle restaurants, most in the U District, and I guess now Saffron Grill has also passed on to him.

Later, after Karen and Dave arrived, Dave asked the younger man what his name was. He replied, "I'm Mohammed Junior!"

Shobhit had hoped to see Prospero at least, after he learned Mohammed wasn't there (and we may never see him again, which makes me sad), as Prospero had been the guy who managed the catering in person at our wedding—Mohammed himself had not come. Prospero evidently still works there, but was off yesterday. Perhaps we can cultivate a lasting relationship with Mohammed Jr. going forward, and hopefully stay abreast of any pertinent news of his father, as we were always so fond of him.

I think Shobhit immediately switched over in his head to thinking the food wasn't quite as good as it used to be, but I would disagree with that. The shahi paneer was as delicious as ever as far as I was concerned, and Karen was especially impressed with it: "I missed this!" she said. Earlier she had noted they hadn't been back there since before the pandemic (and we got take-out from them more than once during stay-home orders in 2020 and 2021; it was what we had both my birthday dinner and our anniversary dinner in 2020). Shobhit and I have eaten there truly countless times, and although we surely will continue to, it won't be the same without Mohammed Sr.

Once dinner was done, Dave actually gave Shivi his card. There was hope expressed all around that she can visit again one day and Anita can join us. We'll see if we can make that happen.

Shobhit drove Shivi and me back home, and that was when, as I had promised, I showed Shivi several of the wedding photos from Shobhit's and my wedding in 2013. I used the Apple TV box to screencast my iPad to the TV, and showed her a bunch of photos, from the henna party the night before (Shivi declared the henna was badly done) to the best of the professional photos to the album dedicated to the cake Stephanie had baked for us, and then even our 1st/10th Anniversary Party back at Golden Gardens Park.

I hadn't looked at a lot of these photos in a very long time, and it was really fun to go through them again, especially with Shivi, who was super interested and had never seen them. She even got a little teary-eyed.

The day before, she had pointed out that this year is the 10th anniversary of our wedding, and we should do something special. We usually take a trip every year, but the feasibility of that will have to be determined after we are back from Australia, as with anything else we might plan this year—including what will be Shobhit's 50th birthday in October, also a milestone that should probably be properly commemorated somehow. Shivi had been particularly emphatic about that one, but Shobhit's mood about his birthday varies widely from year to year, never in any way tied to the age he's reaching. All plans after March in 2023 remain pretty nebulous at this point, but I do have my hopes.

— पांच हजार तीन सौ सैंतीस —

[posted 12:33 pm]