Day 5 - The Cocktail Party and Dinner

The final event during our wedding was the cocktail party and dinner hosted by Vikram's Grandparents. I wore my favourite saree for this occasion - a deep pink saree with Kundan work. It was so simple and yet so pretty.

Vikram's Grandpa ( a retd coln ) gave a small speech and then we cut a cake. The dinner was yummy too. Everyone was finally relaxed and enjoyed the party.

A lot of planning and hard work went into the planning the wedding. I wanted a lot of things differently. Luckily for me, both my mother and mother-in-law were very supportive and let me have my way. Thanks to them, I had my dream wedding. Our clothes had co-ordinated colours. We bought all our clothes in Bangalore. I bought my jewellery after a lot of window shopping.

I realised that my mother had been planning my wedding since I was born ! I have to thank my parents for giving me such a beautiful wedding. My cousins, Shilpa and Anu helped me a lot throughout. My cousin, Andy, helped me with great ideas and suggestions. My friend, Pushpa, gave me the names of many stores for shopping. My friends, Archana and Prasanna helped me a lot during the wedding days. And ofcourse I had the wishes and support of friends and family. Thank you all !!

The 5 day wedding was finally over and my posts on the wedding series is finally complete :)

Sauna Belt

I was flipping channels when I came across TVC and saw some very funny products. One of them was ' Sauna Belt' ...

LOL !

"Want to lose weight or inches quickly that to without any pills, Lotions & creams ! Seems like a dream! Not anymore. TVC presents Sauna Belt a convenient, comfortable and personalized way of losing that unwanted fat & flab in the confines of your home. An absolutely easy and effective way of reducing body measurement, not in months weeks or days but in one hour. "
The ad was very funny....according to which you can have a flat stomach ( even a six pack) by just using the sauna belt ! The claims were ridiculous. There was free offer with the belt - something called DAANT PARI - what a tacky name ! ROFL !

Then V told me that he actually knew someone who bought this product to lose weight ! I din't know people could be so guillible !!!

Click on the TVC for some really silly products ( some are endorsed by stars of bygone eras).

That is familiar !

On my first day in Dubai, V took me to the desi grocery store in the evening. There were stores everywhere ! The city has stunning buildings and lighting. And it is undoubtedly the Shopping Capital of the World. I will write about the malls and stores in another post.

So, anyway coming back to my story. We came out of Choitram, the grocery store, and my eyes fell on a coffee shop on the opposite side of the road. It was 'Second Cup' ! Imagine my surprise. I had seen this coffee shop chain Canada just a few months ago. I had not even seen it in US and here it was ! I was very curious to see if it was the same chain. So, the next evening, V and I went to have coffee. It was the same ! But they did not have the maple latte. Instead they had more cold beverages ( made sense as it was in Dubai).

Then on subsequent trips to the grocery store, I even found many brands that I use in the US. For example, my breakfast is still Quaker oats ! Ragu pasta sauce is available here. So, are Milano chocolate cookies ! There is so much more variety here for food products. But food products are a lot more expensive compared to US.

Starbucks is a familiar sight everywhere. Here are some more stores that were familiar
( NOT including those that are european and common in India)


* Cold Stone creamery
* McDonalds
* Burger King
* Chilies
* Tony Roma's
* Cinnabon
* Haagen Daz
* Subway

* Gap
* Old Navy
* Banana Republic
* Claires
* Forever 21
* Columbia
* Timberland
* Liz Clairborne

Famous stores like Guess, Nike, DKNY, Levis, Hugo Boss, Polo, MAC, Dockers, Espirit, Diesel, Calvin Klein, Benetton, Elle, etc are there in most of the malls !

Needless to say, I was quite surprised !