Teeth, Spring, Nana, Papa come to Boston

Despite the valiant efforts of relatives to make Rohan into a Pennsylvania boy (with progressively larger Steelers outfits and Nittany Lion shirts), his formative years are sure to mark him as a Beantown native. Most recently, he took his Nana and Papa candlepin bowling (kudos to Mom for her bowling victory) at Sacco's Bowlhaven, a relic of the early 1900s.

Like most of New England's sons and daughters, Rohan will grow up with little wooden balls with no finger holes, no pin resets within frames. He will call this "real" bowling, and he will consider big balls and "duck pins" to be his parents' pastime and therefore démodé.

Nana and Papa brought Rohan a tree swing for our backyard, to mark his first spring. Of course, again, Rohan will grow up thinking that spring starts (in earnest) sometime in May or June. But that doesn't stop his parents from celebrating the end of winter with some old-fashioned swinging and tree-climbing. Forget that the tree does not actually have leaves yet, and that the ground is still pretty bare.

After all, spring technically started at the end of March, in fact, just a few days after Rohan's first teeth appeared. "Now you can eat all kinds of food, going kutush kutush, like a mousie," wrote Rohan's Dimoni, with killing onomatopoeia.

A toothy mouse, and also a mighty mouse -- sitting up by himself now, and rolling all over the place, Rohan today accomplished the Great Escape from his Bumbo seat in order to reach a plastic egg. "Look out, Easter Bunny! Your teeth are nothing compared to mine!"

Greetings from Paradise

Rohan's first vacation in the sunny Florida Keys. We planned our escape from the cold winter of Boston and were on our way. We actually had some trouble finding a spot for our car in the economy lot at Logan airport that wasn't full of snow. Just one more reason to get out of town for a week. We made it through security fine in this direction and Rohan made an uneventful first flight. He slept through most of it and then we relaxed for a day in Fort Lauderdale, taking in the sun and walking along the beach. The drive down to the Keys couldn't have been nicer and this was just a foreshadowing of the week to come (70F nights/80F days the whole week with no rain). Rohan loved the sun and more importantly what that meant for him, fewer clothes.

We tried him out on a swing and slide and he liked those, but he absolutely loved being in the pool. Rohan was kicking away furiously to try and propel himself around the pool. It's a good thing he has been practicing kicking for the past 15 months or so. He loved watching the showboat kids doing funny jumps into the pool for whatever audience would watch them. I guess their parents tired of this long ago. Rohan was also a hit with the major demographic in the area where we stayed: grandmothers. He suffered the cheek pinching and lavish praise well.

Most of our time in Florida was spent doing the normal touristy things like walking along the beach, swimming, visiting the dolphin research center, and just plain relaxing and enjoying the warmth. But for as long as I have known Chandreyee, she has had a penchant for the unusual. One of the scheduled activities was a trip to Key West to go to a pirate museum, an aquarium, and something a bit off the usual track. Chandreyee entered (and won) a conch shell blowing contest. Contestants were judged on length of the note, purity of tone, loudness, and novelty of the blow. Not having a conch of her own, she borrowed one from a guy dressed up as a pirate and this "good conch" was a key to her victory. The winning man blew a song from Frank Sinatra on his conch and the winning group ("the Conchestra" from Boca Chica FL) dressed up as flappers and other wild costumes and performed a rendition of Jimmy Buffet's classic "I don't know where I'm a gonna go when the hurricane blows". It has really been a while since I have seen something so odd. You can see Chandreyee's TV interview on the web if you are so inclined ( fast forward to about minute 20-21 or so to see Chandreyee, the entire conch blowing spot starts at 17'15" if you want more background).


As if that wasn't odd enough, we walked to the Key Colony Beach fair and looked at the baubles that people were selling and they also had a few games of chance including barracuda races where you bet on the winning fish. We were most excited about the funnel cake however. We split one and some arepas and a gyro for lunch. We definitely enjoyed the food while we were on vacation, especially dessert. In our week in Florida, the two of us were able to eat half a chocolate cake, half a pecan pie, 2 pints of Ben and Jerry's ice cream, the funnel cake and two cones of frozen custard. I really need to start biking again to work off all the yummy food.

Another fun this that we did was to rent a fishing pole and try to catch dinner one night. Chandreyee caught her first fish on this trip and he was yummy. Chandreyee used the web browser on my phone to learn how to clean a fresh fish and then she fried up this little guy for an appetizer one night. Eventually we had to return to Boston and leave all the warmth and fun of south Florida behind. The last interesting thing that happened to us was when we went though security on the way back. We were prepared to have to answer questions about the big metal object in our carry on luggage (conch trophy), so it was with little surprise that when Chandreyee's bag went through the scanner, the lady shouted that she needed a "CIC". After waiting about 10 minutes, and holding up the entire security line for that time with a row of increasingly nervous and grouchy looking fliers, the bag was inspected and the offending article was not the huge trophy, but a bag of corn meal that we decided to take back with us. I guess CIC stands for "Corn meal Inspection Crew". Another good flight for Rohan and I was pleasantly surprised to find that our car was not covered with snow or ice when we got back to Boston.

Anyway, we had a wonderful time and next vacation we are thinking of expanding it to include other members of our family and renting a bigger place. Thanks for reading my long-winded tale of our Florida adventure.

Mike, Chandreyee, and Rohan

Little moments

Rohan has been "hoovering" oatmeal for a couple months now, but on February 15, he had his annaprashan, or rice-eating ceremony, at which he had his first taste of rice pudding, lentils, and even a little fish. Dimoni, Dadan, and Tinkumashi arrived days in advance to help prepare the feast for 30 people.

After the ceremonial spoonful of payesh (rice pudding) from his uncle Kaushik, Rohan chose the symbolic book (from among the coins, gold, crystal, earth, iPod, and pen). All the serious deliberation made Rohan hungry, and he proceeded to "hoover" the entire bowl of payesh, while friends and family showered him with countless and diverse blessings.

Rohan was lucky enough to receive the gift of "great knowledge of physics" (thanks, Will), and the gift of musical talent from future Broadway star, Amy. One memorable gift was from our friend, Li, who hoped Rohan would enjoy many "little moments."

After all, we'll never forget big days like Rohan's annaprashan, but here in this blog, we should take care to record Little Moments, such as

1. Rohan's first Rude Noise (see video),
2. Rohan's first fun bath (see photo), and
3. The Time Rohan Sneezed Yams All Over Daddy (yesterday).

"Nothing like a faceful of yams," sputtered Mike, as Rohan cracked a huge, orange, goopy, yammy grin. I know you're hoping there's a picture of that; however, we are currently trying to keep our camera Yam-Free.

Rohan discovers his funny bone (and his foot.)

It started just before the holidays. The occasional, Pillsbury-dough-boy type of giggle, brought on usually by nuzzling his belly during a diaper change. But Rohan's first all-out, body-shaking guffaw came on December 21st, at Nana and Papa's house after the Gage kids opened presents. Cousin Madeline was bouncing on her new "jumpoline," a request from my sister-in-law in hopes of saving her furniture at home with an outlet for Madeline's Tigger-like bounciness.

Rohan kept staring at Madeline, so I propped him up next to her and bounced him a little along with her, accompanied by "Boingyboingyboingy" noises. Suddenly Rohan began to laugh, and the laughs just kept pealing out, a stream after the first snowmelt of spring.

Since then, eliciting those laughs has become my purpose in life. A day is not complete without one. Luckily, we've discovered many things that tickle Rohan's funny bone.
1. Watching people bounce up and down, not necessarily Madeline, and not necessarily on a trampoline.
2. His Ma squealing "meepmeepmeep" in a high pitched voice. No, Daddy does not work.
3. Daddy making funny faces, especially the dog face.
4. Me yawning while saying, "Haiyamung!" (don't ask.)

Here is one example of #1 captured on video. I am the bouncer in this case.

Holidays 2008-2009

We drove down to Pennsylvania for the holidays and Rohan continues to show us that he is patient with driving and generally a happy little fellow. We had a great time visiting relatives, hanging out and wandering around Philadelphia. We also enjoyed taking over Caroline's parents' house with a giant sleepover.

Here Rohan is enjoying the annual Christmas Party at Chris and Eileen's house. It didn't look like they were going to move to a new house in a month. Rohan got some new Steelers ware a cool wagon and toys. And I was the lucky "pickle finder", a game where a pickle ornament is hidden in the tree and the finder gets a prize. In this case a neat ceramic candle holder. My winning tactic was to just look in the places that Chandreyee had already looked in and soon enough I found it.


I am going to have to keep an eye on this guy. He can't eat solid food and already he has designs on my pretzel. Good thing his aunt and uncle and grandparents live near Philly so we should get good ones often.

As I said, Rohan was mostly chipper, but at one point he needed well, ...... let's just say prune juice was required. In fact, as we were going in the door of Caroline's parents' house, before we could properly greet everyone Chandreyee shouted "Rohan needs prune juice now!". The expected happened sometime after midnight and he was back to his usual self. Then in the morning Eric casually said "So did everyone hear the big event?". I thought, well it was a pretty big event, but I'm not sure that everyone heard it or needs to know about it. It turns out that there was a small earthquake in Lancaster that shook the house (~3.3 magnitude acording to a Digg article). I guess that living in San Francisco for 6 years made me able to sleep right through it. And Chandreyee was awake and didn't feel anything. I guess we need at least a 4.5 or it is just a little tumbler.

After we got back home, we went sledding and Rohan liked it a lot (sorry no pictures of that). And he was very happy to host a Penn State vs. USC football party. Unfortunately Penn State didn't win, but we had a great time and Rohan even sang along with his mom's Christmas gift ABBA sing-star for the Playstation. Ocassionally I am able to think of a good gift for Chandreyee and I'm glad she likes it. It was pretty easy this year as Chandreyee loves ABBA and karaoke. As bad as my voice is, I even sang along to some of the songs on the other disc which had '90s music on it.

We also went to two playoff NFL parties and I guess that Rohan helped the Eagles to win and hopefully there will be an all Pennsylvania Super Bowl. I learned a funny thing today on the NY Times. At one point, during WW II, there was a shortage of players and teams were combined to keep the games going. So for one season, 1943, there was a team named the Steagles. Pretty Weird. Maybe that will help someone out with a trivia question someday.

We also found out one thing that absolutely captivates Rohan and will hold his attention despite hunger, cold, and anything else... ceiling fans. I guess it is like a giant mobile that spins really fast. He can't get enough of them. He sat watching Ami's fan for like 30 minutes until we had to turn it off so he would eat and again sat transfixed watching the one at Mike Springer's house.

We had a wonderful holiday season and hope you did as well. Thanks to every one who helped us celebrate the new year.

Mike G

December with Rohan

This week's installment is being written by guest author Nana Gage.
The last two weeks have sped by too quickly, and I fear the last week will be as brief.
Rohan has been on this earth such a short time but already has enriched our lives immeasurably. He provides smiles, squeals, and laughter endlessly. His most recent goal involves turning from a supine to prone position. He exerts a tremendous amount of energy and concentration in his attempts. I fear he will become very frustrated when he accomplishes his goal, only to discover that he has inflicted "tummy time" on himself.
He greets each day with a smile, knowing he is loved and cherished by those who surround him. Every day brings the promise of experiencing a new and wonderous adventure.
He has mastered grasping the rings on his activity mat, has licked them (see picture), and found them much to his liking.
On last Saturday, Chandreyee's friend Kay visited, and we all trekked to downtown Boston. Rohan enjoyed strolling through Boston Commons, where we were treated to beautifully decorated trees, and ice skaters enjoying the outdoor rink. From there we ventured to Chinatown where we enjoyed a delicious dinner. Rohan sat placidly in his stroller entertaining us, fellow diners, and wait staff alike.
We have had such fun during these short days, but I know there will be much more to come......

An open-air market of Moons

Over the river and through the woods we drove last weekend, to Wellsboro, Pennsylvania, where Rohan met his cousins Madeline and Olivia for the first time. Though attacked by Madeline's zealous displays of affection (see video at end) and baby Olivia's pokes of curiosity, Rohan parried only with smiles and squeals.

Rohan's Dadan (my father) described this picture as "jeno chander hat boshechhe." Literally, "as if there's an open-air market of Moons."

In Bengali, children, as pure as moonlight, are often referred to as "chand" (Moons). Certainly, Rohan's beaming face, Olivia's round eyed stare, and Madeline's impish grins haunt me daily with their moon-like simplicity.

In one short day at Uncle Nathan/Aunt Susan's house, we even managed to go sledding, which Rohan loved, despite having to wear Olivia's dunce-cap snowsuit.


After 9 months of pregnancy, childbirth, and newborn-baby-boot-camp, I hadn't been ready to think about a brother or sister for Rohan baby, but after Thanksgiving with the Wellsboro Gage cousins, I can't imagine a greater gift for our son.