Once or twice in a week, Sai comes back a little early from his office and then we accompany him to his gym at Larkspur. He spends almost one hour doing his exercises in the Gym ,while Latha and myself go for a walk in the Larkspur Ferry Terminal area. En route we have a huge statue of a warrior standing with a flag. The entire statue is made of wrought iron & it is very huge . You can make out the size from the photograph where you can a see a tiny Latha standing underneath the statue .On 03Aug (Sun) we decided to attend the Bhajan at Central San Jose (Pronounced as San Hosey).It was quite a long drive . Took us almost one and a half hours to reach there.But the drive was worth it . We attended the Veda Patnam training first in a hall where there were almost 15 to 20 gents and about the same number of ladies . Shekhar Bodupalli , a middle aged gentleman was teaching the Rudram to them.It was fascinating and indeed rejuvenating to see that people in the States are interested in the Vedas !
After attending the Rudram class we went to attend bhajans in a huge hall nearby. The Hall was jam packed .There were probably 500 devotees or so in all.There were a lot of Indians also and the bhajans were sung typical Indian style.The enthusisam and the devotion was remarkable.Left the hall literally charged as it were.On the way back we halted at Udipi Palace a SouthIndian restaurant and finalised the menu for Sai - Steph wedding at Livermore Temple. The Manager offered us some Idlis Vadas and Rava Kesari for tasting. The food was typically South Indian in style and was very tsaty . 
Teju and Swapna invited us for Lunch at their residence in Walnut Creek another suburb of San Francisco .Quite a distance away .Took us an hour or so to reach there from Mill Valley.Both of them were extremely happy to receive us . A small but very well kept home . Swapna had made some excellent food.We had taken Taramissu ice cream to top up the menu . It was a very enjoyable afternoon that we spent with them. Both of them were very affectionate and served the food with great love and affection.
The Vedas say "Matru Devo Bhava " (Your Mother is God) ,Pitru Devo Bhava (Your Father is God),Athithi devo Bhava (your guest is God),Acharya Devo Bhava (Your Teacher is God) .As we were guests for them they treated us with the same respect love and affection as explained in the Scriptures . Of course we know Teju and his parents for a very long time - more than 15 years or so. Sai followed Teju to the same Bijapur College where Teju did his Bachelors in Engineering and later to the University of Mississippi for his MS .And now they are together in SFO.
After our lunch we went for a walk to Downtown Walnut Creek.Another beautiful ,spick and span clean city in the Bay Area.Place has a lot of Indians and Indian restaurants .We really enjoyed the walk.Did some "window shopping ". Went into "Barnes & Noble Book Store " - a large Book shop with several branches all over the States . What is interesting is that in any Book store in the States ,you can pick up Books or magazines and keep reading them for hours , replace them in the Book shelves and just walk away without buying anything and no body minds it.We did precisely that although not for too long !
The Car Parking system is so fantastic here. You have parking meters where you put your parking fee.The digital display of the Parking meter shows the time upto which you can park the car there. There are a lot of parking restrictions like 2 hr parking, 4 hr parking, no parking on Sundays and holidays and so on.The Cops are always on the prowl and they check the meters frequently. If somebody ecxceeds the time limit shown in the Parking meter, the cops leave a ticket on the Car which means a penalty going upto $100 or more depending upon the duration by which you have exceeded your parking time ,as per the meter.
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