Atlanta, here we come

After spending a couple of days at Tega Cay, SC we continued our journey towards Atlanta, GA. We reached Lilburn, GA at around 2:15pm (24-DEC-2007.) I met my extended family after about 14 years and boy! it was an awesome feeling - reminded me of my childhood times.

We received a warm welcome from Akka and Bava. We had a big (late) lunch, then in the evening the "gentlmen" went out on a tour of the town.

AtlantaTrip

ThaygaKay

We reached Tega Cay, SC (read it as ThaygaKay) by 2:00pm Saturday (22-DEC-2007). Ganesh and Bindu received us and treated us with a full meals (sambar + appadum - paapad - deep fried, not microwaved + curd made out of whole milk)

This city Tega Cay, is spectacular in every way - stretching a vast 5 square miles, has a golf course, a natural lake (Wylie), about 200 houses (all upscale, half a million types), a fire dept and a "blue ribbon" (Gold Hill) elementary school. Thats all there is to that city (or a town, or a village, or a place...) Tega Cay is surrounded by satellite towns - ThayguThaa, ThaygaNoo, Thaygu.

Ganesh showed us Charlotte downtown (Bank of America and Wachovia headquarters), went shopping at the largest mall in America - concord mills mall and we spent the next day (a rainy day) at home - cooked delicious food and watched a comedy movie.

TegaCay-Ganesh Himabindu

Driving down south

We did some shopping on Thursday (20-DEC-2007), packed our bags and started driving down south at about 5:45pm. We stopped a couple of times before reaching Morrisville, NC at about 10:15pm. We had a good dinner at Gowri annayya's (my cousin) house.

On Friday (21-DEC-2007) dad and mom pretty much took rest to recover from the exhaustion of driving around a lot. Gowri annayya took us to the Venkateshwara temple in Cary, NC on Friday evening.

We met another Garimella family here in Morrisville, NC. Rohini aunty, Satish Garimella's mother happened to be friends with mom back home in Bombay. In an engaged conversation, Rohini aunty coined a word "Gharana Musthivallu" to refer to families here who have migrated from India and trying to accustom to American lifestyle. "GM" - she meant going to parties, packing the left overs, storing the food in the fridge and eating brought overs in the later days...

Raleigh-Durham Trip

We had a good breakfast and started to drive down south west towards Charlotte, NC to reach Ganesh/Hima Bindu's place in South Carolina.

Temple tour

Mom and dad (on mukkoti yekaadasi - 19-DEC-2007) were engaged in a temple tour. We had a big breakfast and started driving towards our eventual destination, Pittsburgh, PA ("feetsburr" - as mom would call it).

There were some flurries on the way to Pittsburgh, but the snow did not settle on the road to cause any trouble. We reached Pittsburgh in 4 hours (including a short break in Breezewood, PA)

We went to see Sri Venkateshwara Swami temple, Gurdwara, Hindu Jain temple and Sai Baba mandir.

Temple tour

We see DC

We went to DC darshan (sight seeing) on Tuesday (18-DEC-2007). It was a clear and sunny day, but the reality kicked in when we went to the Capitol. Mom did not wear thermals after noticing that it was a sunny day, but she realized that the weather could be very misleading this time of the year in the east coast.

Mom and dad saw Lincoln memorial, Washington memorial, Jefferson memorial, White house and the Capitol.

Raj/Shailaja and Santhosh/Sreedevi joined us for dinner on Tuesday.

We see DC

Grand Canyon tour

Sunday morning we woke up pretty early, savored Starbucks coffee, packed our bags and put them in the cloak room. Then we sat on a tour bus, 3 hr drive each way, to go see the Grand Canyon (Hoover dam on the way.)

One of the oldest, most spectacular, natural rock formations on earth, the visit is worth every penny. Grand Canyon, a part of the famous Mohave desert, native to the Hualapai (means "of tall pine tree") tribe, is laced with 5000ft deep gorges and valleys made up of sand stone and granite.

The grand tour is made up of a bus ride from Las Vegas to Grand Canyon with a stop near Hoover dam (constructed in 1931-1935) for pictures, a 5000ft decent on a helicopter down to the Colorado river, a boat ride upstream and downstream the Colorado river, an ascent on a helicopter back to the rim of the Grand Canyon, a sumptuous Hualapai-style buffet at the Guano point and a 3 hour ride back to the Las Vegas.

While at it, we learned a few words in Hualapai-lingo: "Chittha" = Mom, "Thalaa" = Dad, "Gamay Yoo" = How are you?

Grand Canyon tour

Viva Las Vegas

We packed our bags and set out for Las Vegas Friday night. My employer Axon, invited its employees for an annual dinner event in Las Vegas. We barely escaped an impending inclement weather in the east coast and reached LV by 10:30pm (14-DEC-2007), where our company sponsored valet service put us in a limo and promptly dropped us at the MGM Grand Hotel.

Dad and mom exhausted from a 5 hour flight, hit the bed while I went down to the casino to meet Pradeep and Rajesh. We had a lovely dinner, gambled a bit, hung out at the club "Tabu" and went to bed at 3:00am.

In the morning at 8:00am, all of us went to the grand breakfast. After the breakfast, myself, Pradeep and Rajesh headed to a half-day company meeting. Mom/Dad and rest of the crew spent time in the casino. After the meeting, all of us went to a lovely lunch on "the strip".

At 7:00pm me and Dad attended the "formal" dinner (4-course meal, live music and magic show.) We got back to the room and rested to get ready for a day-long trip to the famous Grand Canyon, next day.

Viva Las Vegas