About Me 

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Every person has some interest or the other - hobbies - the means to pass the spare time; to indulge oneself in, once in a while, to release ones frustrations, tensions; to enjoy, and to derive pleasure from. It can range from sports to cooking to reading to dancing and of course sleep for some.

I have varied interests - ranging from cooking to travelling, hiking, trekking and camping to reading, listening to music to watching movies and going to theaters to staying at home spending time with family and friends, chatting, exchanging ideas and dreams.... I indulge into one or more of them depending on the mood and situation. My name means "A Lady", "Godess of Vedas" or "Godess of learning - Saraswati" and most of my interests compliment the same.

Reading and Writing: I used to be a good story-teller as a kid, a trait I had picked up from my parents and my tutor for Kathak dance. I could hold the audience (my class-mates) for a long time. I still remember I could start the story but never knew how/or when to end it. I took the themes from several children magazines I used to read like - Nandan, Tinkle, Champak, Amar Chitra Katha, to name a few. I no longer tell stories but write them once in a while. I plan to put some of them on my web site (of course my new ones only if and when I write them). I still read magazines, no longer the same though which I used to read as a child!! I have now moved on to Femina, Macleans, Reader's Digest, Chatelaine along with some journals related to Operations Research, Statistics, Reliability and Quality. I also enjoy reading novels and some of my favorite authors are: Jeffery Archer, Barbara Taylor Bradford, Eric Segal and Danielle Steel. I have read almost all the books by the above mentioned authors. Daniel Steel's His Bright Light, biography of her son Nick Traina, inspired me to get into more serious reading of biographies, autobiographies, history, literature and classics. Though I have not yet been able to read many book of this kind but I am hoping to do it soon. Some of the most recent books I have read are: Fundamental Concepts of Quality Improvement edited by Melissa G., Hartman, Juran’s Quality Handbook, Quality Problem Solving by Gerald F. Smith, The Team Handbook by Peter R. Scholtes, The Quality Toolbox by Nancy R. Tague, The Quality Improvement Handbook by Grace Duffy and Success Through Quality: Support Guide for the Journey to Continuous Improvement by Timothy J. Clark. in addition to the Multivariate Analysis by Muni Srivastava. I am also very fond of Urdu and Hindi poetry and ghazals. I write some once in a while when mood strikes and some of them do impress me (of course not all of them).

Travelling: I love travelling. I have been to some parts of Canada, Europe, USA, Mexico and Central America but have traveled extensively all across India - north to south and west to east. Some of my favorite places being Niagara Falls, Disney World in Florida; in India - Kanya Kumari, Srinagar; and Geneva in Europe. I have traveled mostly as a kid. As I grew up, the pressures of the school work caught up and then later on since my self and my sister went to different colleges and universities for our higher education, we could not travel much. But once I migrated to Canada, I again got a chance to travel around United States as well as Canada. I still have strong desire to go back to Europe - but that has to wait till I have explored more of the US and Canada.

Dancing and Music: As a child, I took private lessons for classical dancing - Bharatnatyam and Kathak, drawing/painting and music - both vocal and instrumental. I was quite good at all, with the exception of singing. That is one activity I feel I am handicapped even today. I still like to dance though no longer classical. I listen to music of all types though mostly ghazals and Indian movie songs and no longer play any instrument. My favorite ghazal singers are Jagjit Singh, Chitra Singh, Pankaj Udhas and Talat Aziz.

Occult and Behavioral Science: : I have interest in Palmistry, Numerology and Astrology. I can read a little bit of lines on hand, make horoscope and interpret the name (using numerology) but still have not reached the stage to predict the future - to my satisfaction. I am slowly but steadily moving towards that stage too. I also have interest in handwriting reading and body language reading though I am still in baby stage for them, have read very little so far. I do this mostly for fun sake. I do believe in it though I don't have blind faith in it. I agree with G. K. Chesterton who has very correctly said: "I do not believe in a fate that falls on men however they act; but I do believe in a fate that falls on them unless they act."

Collecting different items: I was known as the junk dealer of the house as I collected all kinds of things - bird feathers, broken bangles, news-paper articles (even though I did not understand their significance - then as a child), patterns for dresses, stamps, poems, brochures of places of tourist interests, programs for variety shows or other events, even wrappers of the sweets and chocolates I savored. I still have the wrappers, articles, patters, stamps, poems but no longer the feathers and broken bangles. I could also not part with some of my old things like clothes and diaries, which might be attributed to my being Virgo. After growing up, I still collect things - but some of the items have changed. I still collect stamps, articles and patterns, but have developed interest in collecting fridge magnets, coffee mugs, phone cards and post cards too. I have reduced collecting brochures now, because it is hard to store these in the little apartment of mine. Within last few years, I have collected around 200 magnets from different places visited by me, or my family and friends. I also collected around 100 coffee mugs from different places and of different shapes, sizes and styles. Now that you know I like to collect stamps and postcards, why not drop me one, you can get my contact info from: .