Sunday, May 17, 2015

Ruchir's Chowla and Aksharaabhyasa!

April 10th, Friday, 2015


Ruchir @ 2 Years!
Ruchir turned 2 years as of 3rd April and we wanted to complete the Chowla for Ruchir at the earliest as his the summer was getting harder and was getting impossible to manage his curly hair :-)



We combined the event along with the Aksharabhyasa as well.

We booked the 'Subrahmanya Matt, 3rd Floor hall', the same place where he had conducted his Namakarana, which was next to the Mallikarjunaswamy Teample, behind APS college at Basavanagudi.

All of us arrived early by 8 AM and started with a super breakfast of Uppittu and Kesaribhat, followed by Coffee and tea. This time we hired a photographer as it would be difficult for me alone to take photos while in the middle of proceedings.

We took a whole lot of family photos, photos of Ruchir playing with his curly long hair which was soon to be missed. The Chowla function started at 10 AM and the customary hair cut was completed on-stage by cutting the 'Darbe' !!!.

The poojar then asked us to get his hair cut by the barber who was hired and his services made available downstairs, behind the Matt. We were a bit nervous as we were expecting Ruchir to make a big fuss when his hair would be snipped, but by keeping him engaged, we kept him playful and went through with the routine quite easily. No tears! He rather started playing with all the hair falling down on his little white banian :-)

Souji and I had a lot discussion, the previous night, on whether to go for the full hair cut or just keep it short and finally we decided to leave it short :-). Just couldn't see him going bald :-)

In a matter of 10 minutes, our cute little baby, suddenly started looked like a boy!. Ruchir and I were then got ourselves poured by a bucket of water by the 5 ladies (Muttaides :-)). 

After a round of Lemonade we got back on the stage for the 'Aksharabhyasa' event, where Ruchir wrote 'Shree' in Sanskrit over a Silver Plate full of Rice with a piece of Turmeric root as his pencil. Next the same was repeated on the Slate (Thanks to Latha from Adoni, who sent across such beautiful stone slates and 'balapa/chalk' which are not available and lost in history). Ruchir next graduated to write 'Shree' on a notebook with a Pencil. Ruchir managed to remain playful right through all the ceremonies. 

Ruchir received a lot of blessings and gifts from everybody who had come over for the function.

We tucked Ruchir into a little nap for him to rest and attended all the guests who had come over despite it being a working day. Frankly we worried that we may have drop-outs, but were overwhelmed to see everybody make it to the session, some even taking day off at Office to be a part of this event. Very Very glad about that and many thanks to all.

Lunch was served at 12:30 PM and we were all done by a couple of hours. The general feedback was that the food was quite tasty as well. Soujanya had asked for 'Kaai Obattu, Mysore Pak and Tarakari Bonda' as additional add-ons to the regular menu.

Overall, we thought the function went on very well, and thanks to you folks for being a part of it and blessing the little one.

Here are some snaps that were taken during the occasion. It is a mixed set of Photos (from both the Photographers and mine).