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Winning the Inter-house Quiz

“And the winner, of the Inter-House quiz competition is……”  Headmistress ma’am announced into the mike. Our fingers were rapping by themselves on the table. We were getting goose bumps. We could almost hear the drum roll in the distance. “….Tabuk house!”  ma’am finished. We all cheered loudly. So did the audience. They clapped like they had been expecting us to be the winners the entire time. Actually, we did know they were guessing that the winners would be us because when ma’am had asked the audience who they thought would win they had all announced “Tabuk!” I had been chosen for the quiz competition by Rejula ma’am. There were 4 people in each of the four houses, that were, Hijaz, Jizan, Madinah and Tabuk. I was in the house Tabuk along with 3 others for the quiz. We were really excited and as we got off stage and our friends congratulated us. We had gotten off to a good start. We got points in all the questions of the MCQ round, the Category round, and the “Wha

Losing Archie Andrews ...

I took a deep breath and entered my new class. All my classmates looked at me. ‘Hi!’ ‘Enjoyed vacations?’ ‘Congrats, you have been promoted to 8 th grade!’ I was so happy to see my friends again. 2 weeks break after 7 th grade final exams, it felt so good to see them all, everyone chatting loudly, joking and laughing. My best friend Chandana was sitting on my left and my other best friend Anne was on my right. The 3 of us could hardly wait to tell all that had happened during vacation. All words came spilling out. Our new class teacher, Maria ma’am, came in and announced ‘Hello class, I will be your new class teacher. I will teach you chemistry…..………….’ she went on, telling us the rules and everything. She had taught us chemistry in 6 th and 7 th grades too, so we know her really well. Yesterday, when I came home from school, my mom sad ‘I want to show you this news article’. Alas!  It said that Archie Andrews of Archie comics is being killed off! I s

Freaky Friday

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Since today is the weekend, we have a couple of restaurants to try out in our mind and one of them is the ‘Red Lobster’. I don’t know if it’s good or not but my father had his heart set on eating big, fat lobsters so he seems very enthusiastic on going there. You see, Dad would be non- vegetarian the first 6 months and be vegetarian the other 6 months. Which is also one of the reasons I call him an omnivore. He loves eating salads a lot. But, in the very rare times we would buy ice-cream or if I would be having any fruit, he would request for a ‘small bite’, but by the time the ‘small bite’ would be taken, the fruit would not be seen. I saw the movie ‘Frozen’ a few days back and I really liked it. My favorite character was definitely Anna, and she looked very cute when she was young. There is a metro coming in Kochi, so according to the video, it is fun, you can save 20 to 50 per cent of your normal travelling time and more. The metro's starting point is at Pet

Lunch at Back Yard Grill

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I can’t believe this! Only 9 days left for my vacation to end. I am so angry! I don’t know why the days of vacation have to whiz by and the school days go so, so slowly. My family loves trying out various restaurants, so just yesterday, we went to Backyard Grill because whenever we passed it, we would say ‘Hey! Why haven’t we tried that out yet?!’ When we entered the restaurant, we felt the ambiance was not as good as compared with Apple Bees and Steak House. It seemed a little dull. There weren’t many options in desserts either. But the food was just great. I had a Silverado burger, and I could not stop eating the minute I took the first bite. I would have chewed my fingers too if I hadn’t got a grip on myself. My Mom was going to order chicken teriyaki, but it hit her that whenever we would order the chicken teriyaki, it would always be sweet. We aren’t exactly fans of sweet chicken so she skipped it and ordered a sizzling fajita combo meal. We checked

Dirab Trip

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Just one day after the vacation started, we went to Dirab. It is a place in Riyadh which is really worth seeing and is a 30 minute drive. We can see many valleys in Dirab. It was mid-morning when we went there and then we wished we had thought of the time more clearly because Dirab looks best in the evening. When the sun’s rays shine through the mountains in the colorful evening sky during sun set, it looks just great. The sun’s rays on touching the clouds reflect the clouds with a bright golden colour. The blue sky is transformed into pink, purple and golden. There are farmlands and a horse stable  at Dirab. From a distance the valleys look beautiful. My Mom loves Dirab a lot. She always insists on going there since it is such a relaxing destination. Since the valleys are low, every time we go on the  hairpin  road downwards, my ears pop. Thankfully it goes just as quickly. My ears pop in flights and they begin to hurt a lot. The foggy hearing that I get only goes after a

Thank God, It's Friday!

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SLURP! SLURP! These were the noises my Mom’s straw was making as she drank the ‘Ultimate Gold Medalist’ that my Dad had ordered for himself. The cocktail had looked very nice and my Mom just did not seem able to tear her eyes from it, even though I waved my hand in front of her eyes. She saw right through it as if it was invisible. Apparently, my mother had fallen in love with that special cocktail.    I did not see anything too special about it since it looked like a regular cocktail. But when I had a sip, my heart melted for it, and I was drinking just as merrily. We were at the restaurant T.G.I. Friday’s . When we went to London, we had tried out this restaurant with uncle Sujesh and we had instantly liked it. We got the main course we had ordered and wow, were it delicious. My Garlic chicken pasta magically disappeared after a few minutes. As the cocktail was originally for Dad, me and Mom ordered a ‘Friday’s Sundae.’ The name was kind of funny, because it ca

Farewell, Class 7

Just yesterday we had our class party. Officially we have completed 7 th grade and on our way to 8 th . The results were distributed. You could judge everyone’s marks by their faces. Some were looking at the ceiling predicting their situation when they got home.  So to stop thinking about the sadness and suffering we were going to endure, we tried to focus on the food. But there were a few problems as well. When Anne opened the lids of the ice-cream cans, we found out that the ice-cream had nearly become soup. I was like “Uh-Oh”. But the taste remained so it was okay. On the other hand, Alaina had forgotten to bring the knife to cut the cake she had bought so she had to make do with a plastic spoon, which was not exactly the best option but we didn’t have any other choice. She had a hard time cutting the cake but it turned out all right at the end. Cutting the cake was as hard as cutting a tree. There were samosas, cookies, pedas, cake, ice-creams, marshmallows, cheetos, c

Back to blogging...

­­Sorry, I  haven't  blogged in a while. I got stuck with so much of work and studies. We had our FA-4 in January and our SA-2 finished just yesterday. A small calculation: (FA-1 + FA-2+FA-3+ FA-4) + (SA-1+SA-2) =  Promotion to next grade, good results & FREEDOM!!! Tons of studying Anyway, I feel like a lot of pressure has just been removed from my shoulders. It’s kind of like the feeling a donkey has when 4 tons of load are removed from its back.    This morning, to celebrate my independence, we went to McDonalds and had breakfast from there. We ordered pancakes, an Egg Mcmuffin meal and two Sausage McMuffins. Then we went to LuLu, did some shopping and came home. We have a class party tomorrow and instead of uniform we are allowed to wear colour dress. Our results of our SA-2 will also be shown. My cousin Savithri’s cat gave birth to 2 more kittens when the previous 2 died a few months back. The mother cat’s name

IKEA Breakfast

There was deep rumbling from somewhere. Unfortunately that was not thunder, but my stomach growling. We were on our way from the badminton class. I was getting hungrier by the minute. I was given 2 options - Asraya Turkish restaurant or some other Arabic place. I did not have any interest in either of them but I saved when Dad pointed at DQ Grill & Chill , which we hadn’t tried till now, we could have our food from there. We loved trying out new restaurants. This place was called Dairy Queen (DQ) though I had no idea why it was called that. As long as I was concerned, it seemed to have burgers and the usual stuff and I didn’t think it to have any dairy items. We ordered onion rings, quesadillas, 2 grilled chicken burgers, large grilled chicken salad for my Dad and 2 sandwiches.  The place was a bit crowded, but still there was not much noise and we found a table. The onion rings were delicious and the quesadillas were to die for. Everything was yummy and the growli

OK Google!

This week was very busy. I bought 3 books from Jarir bookstore- “Diary of a Wimpy Kid- Hard Luck” by Jeff Kinney, “Dork Diaries- Tales from a Not-So-Happy heart breaker.’’ by Rachel Renee Russell, and “Gangsta Granny” by David Walliams. We  weren't  actually planning to go to Jarir bookstore. We just decided to go somewhere since we were bored and we thought of it. I jumped on the books the minute I saw them and Dad regretted of even thinking of going to the bookstore. He was also surprised when I finished all 3 books in one day. Go figure. A Nexus 5 Kit Kat is on its way from America and its destination will be the waiting hands of my father, or, more truthfully, my hands. It is a new version and not yet available in Saudi Arabia.  I said I could always help get rid of his old phone by accepting it as a hand-me-down.     If you come to my home, don’t be surprised if you hear someone always shouting “ Ok Google !” in front of the computer. This is because now there

Chennai Express

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“Don’t underestimate the power of a common man” was a quote said by Shah Rukh Khan at least 5 times in the movie ‘ Chennai Express ’, a comedy movie. Three-fourth of the girls in my class watched that movie, and everyone liked it. Now at school we all imitate him and say “Don’t underestimate the power of a common girl” all the time. I really loved it too. It was really funny.  But Mom did not feel about it the same way I did, because she had seen many movies before similar to this. Also, when the fight between Tangabali and Rahul started, she had got up and walked around the house for some time since she did not like fight scenes. And I got that very gift too. So I was mostly looking down at my feet and admiring my toes during the fight. But I watched the rest of the movie with Dad and Mom. The three of us were sitting on two comfy huge armchairs. For some time I sat next to Dad on his armchair but his tummy got in the way so I sat next to Mom in hers. Both of us fit per

Oh Zeus!

When I got out of the car, the wind had become stronger. It tugged at my shawl, but I held on to it. Now we can say winter has officially started, for the temperature has dropped. After reading Percy Jackson books (again), I was ready to blame the Greek god Zeus , lord of the skies. We did not have to wear our uniform tomorrow, instead, we could wear color dress, and the teachers said we did not have to bring any books. It would be really fun. But the sky is now all moody and grumpy and it is making me all grumpy too. There is lightning, thunder and rain. Mom says that maybe I may not be able to go to school tomorrow. Great. Just great. There are only a few days when we look forward on going to school and tomorrow is going to be one of those days. And then BOOM! Now we can’t. I wonder how many classmates of mine are coming to school tomorrow.   Have mercy on us, Zeus. 

Bahrain Diary (Part 2) - Tree of Life

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A group of women wearing short dresses got out of their car. The car’s tire had sunk in the sand, and refused to move.  Some men surrounded them, giving them smiles and offering their help to the girls. Their own car had got sunk in the sand, but they hardly paid any attention to it or the “ Tree of Life ”, now that they had something else better to look at …… . I gazed at the tree from a distance. This ancient tree was called the “ Tree of life ” as it had survived in the desert for 400 years without any known water source. When we were just about to reach, I had seen a tree next to the roadside but it was only my size and I had felt disgusted, since I thought that was the great ‘Tree of life’. But when the real tree appeared in sight, bigger than its imposter, my disgust turned into wonder and amazement. Many people, the newborn, the middle-aged and the old, were sitting on the tree happily and trying to climb it. Some branches of the tree touched the ground while the ot

l'OLIMPO - The Italian dinner

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I picked up a slice of yummy pepperoni pizza, cheese trailing after it. It looked and smelled delicious. In less than 4 seconds my slice was gone. Dad was looking at me, astonished. “Nobody is going to steal your slice.” I gave him a suspicious look. If Dad requested for a small bite of anything I was having, from guavas to ice creams, pretty much half of it would be gone. Go figure. We were at l’OLIMPO , an Italian restaurant. For me, dessert is more important when we go to restaurants like these, and I would always go to dessert section first, whether we bought any or not. For Mom, the place looked like a ‘wonderland’, for me it looked a little like ‘ Steak House ’, only little more stylish. I like Steak House, but now whenever I think of it I always remember the ‘great zucchini’ incident . We had chicken Caesar salad first. Dad love salad a lot, which is why I called him a ‘herbivore’. I poked my fork and attacked the lettuce since I found it difficult to stab it.

Bahrain Diary - 1

I groaned while I lay on the back seat, feeling bored and tired. The traffic crawled, moving 3 inches in every 10 minutes. My Mom had adjusted her seat so that it leaned back. Her eyes were closed and had her hands folded on her lap. My Dad rested his hands on the steering wheel. We were on our way to Bahrain. We had started out early in the morning and had been going for 4 hours. We left Khobar and reached the middle island though King Fahd causeway. Finally, when we got past all the traffic and visa checks after 2 hours and reached Bahrain, I became more relieved. We reached Hotel Ramada . It was a really grand hotel, with a swimming pool and breakfast every day. We would stay there for 4 days. Mom was tired and asked me and Dad to have lunch and get a take-out for her. But that was where the trouble started. I and Dad went out, ready to go to ‘ Saravana Bhavan ’. Ajay Valyachan lives in Bahrain, so he had told us about this restaurant. He gave us directions. We

His Highness Sheikh Mohammed and Dubai 1

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After watching fairy tales, we always expect Kings and Queens, Princesses and Princes to have long gowns that sweep the ground, glittering tiaras, crowns studded with jewels, and excessive amount of jewelry. Right? It may seem like I am lying, but believe me, I am telling the truth. I ACTUALLY HAD A CHANCE TO SEE THE KING OF DUBAI, HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS MOHAMMED BIN RASHID AL MAKTOUM !!!!! A King or Queen is a normal person like us, except they are born famous; they rule a country and everyone knows them. They wear normal clothes just like us, according to their traditions. My parents, Kunjunni (also known as Rockstar Nara , Detective Nara etc..) Kunji chechi, and Valyamma were also there when we saw him. We were at Dubai Mall. Dad and Mom were sipping a cappuccino at the coffee shop while the rest of us went at the top of Burj Khalifa . The view was spectacular. We were “Aaah”ing and “Ooh”ing the whole time -while we waited in our group, in the fastest elev

A tasty class project

Terrin was flapping her hands like annoying birds were flying around her head.  “What’s wrong?” I asked. A lunch box was open. It was Nada’s lunchbox. Nadha was standing nearby, looking amused. Terrin finished eating and exhaled. Her breath smelled like uniyappam. “Gross!” I said, wrinkling my nose. “Is it just me or is your breath so strong I can smell uniyappams even while standing 5 feet away?” “So good! But I ate only one.” Terrin said. “Can’t you wait until it’s time for the party?” “It’s hard to resist” came the reply. Terrin, me, Anne and Chandana are best friends. We could hardly wait for the party which was during the 4 th period and recess. There were many sweets, veg and non-veg food. When it was the 4 th period, we all immediately started arranging the tables and chairs. We had planned to make it like a buffet, and girls would stand behind the tables serving the food. I and Anne waited at the door to greet the teachers. We all had divi

Trip to Star City

“Behave like humans” was the first instruction given to us by Sandhya ma’am as she laid out the rules before we went to Star City, an amusement park, next day. Sandhya ma’am gave us a small glare and continued. “You have to wear your uniform ...” Sandhya ma’am went on. After she explained the instructions she said ‘’Don’t go anywhere alone, always be with your partner. The shops in Star City will be open for you.” My partner was Chandana, and Anne’s partner was Terrin. We had decided to try and stay together, but in either case that was tough. Everyone was so excited today when we were going to Star City. I, Terrin and Anne sang the song we had made in class yesterday, with the lyrics as the blood circulation. It started like this- (Sung to the tune of the hit Malayalam song ‘Appangal Embaddam’) “Pulmonary vein Left auricle, left ventricle Aorta, arteries All the body parts except luuungs..” Everyone laughed. We looked out of the window as we reached

Riyadh Aviation Museum

School is  reopening  after 2 days! Aaarghh! We bought a new bag, a new water bottle and a new lunch box. Sadly, the lunch box has a Disney princess on it and it is very, very pink in colour. But I anyway figured it couldn’t go worse than that and (besides, most of the lunch boxes either had a Mickey or Minnie mouse on it) therefore I decided to live with it. I have successfully completed my holiday homework and almost misplaced them in my happiness. Anyway, teachers won’t fall for the old trick, the my-dog-ate-my-homework one. Not that I have ever tried it. Now, I can look forward to projects, homework, table tennis classes, and Math’s tuition when school reopens. We went to the Royal Saudi Air Force Museum yesterday, and I have to admit, it was super. Old-fashioned planes of all shapes and sizes were there. There were fighter planes, planes for transporting cars and stuff, unmanned aircrafts, jets, bombs, missiles etc.

Alappuzha Trip

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“Mew!” A kitten mewed when I stroked it. The other one brushed against my legs as it walked past. Their mother sat on the ground lazily, and watched the kittens lie, lick and run.  I started to stroke the other kitten and it ran between my legs. We laughed. The mother cat was named Mickey as Savithri and her family thought Mickey was a male cat and Savithri and her younger brother Shanku, ended up naming it Mickey. It was only after she gave birth to 2 kittens that they realized they Mickey wasn’t a ‘he’, but a ‘she’. Sadly, one of the kittens (Chakki) died later.   And when I visited them a second time, I saw a crow lying on one of the electric post. It had got electrocuted.  A murdered crow was surrounded by a ‘ murder of crows ’ ! Even though, that would be sad news for the crow, I was so excited. I had never seen a dead crow. Especially not one that had been electrocuted.      Two people from Mathrubumi came to interview Savithri’s Achachan (Grandfather).