Children from HATS School celebrate Holi with an invocation on March 18. (From left) Viashnavi, Bailey, Sunaina, Mahi, Nicole, Risha, Seyash, Zaysha, Diva, Reyansh, Atharva, Neeva, and Sharva. Photo by Nitin Nagpal Despite the snow piling up in the parking lot and temperatures remaining in the teens, the Central Middle School Performing Arts Center in Eden Prairie managed to capture the full spirit of spring on Saturday, March 18. This was thanks to the Hindu Society of Minnesota (HSMN). It celebrated Satrangi Holi (Seven Colors of Holi), a Hindu festival honoring the arrival of spring, there on Saturday. Six hours…
Author: Vijay B. Dixit
Vijay B. Dixit
Vijay Dixit Vijay Dixit left his professional career to champion distraction-free driving after a distracted driver killed his 19-year-old daughter, Shreya, on Nov. 1, 2007. Vijay and his wife Rekha, with their surviving daughter Nayha, established the Shreya R. Dixit Memorial Foundation www.shreyadixit.org with the mission to transform the driving culture. The charity works with individuals, businesses, and communities in making distraction-free driving part of a healthy lifestyle. Vijay has been recognized by the Minnesota Department of Public Safety for his work in education and has also authored “One Split Second,” a book about the epidemic of distracted driving – how it kills and how we can fix it. He has written many commentaries on the subject of distracted driving.
(From left) Kishori Mohan, Deepika Jain, Vaibhav Agrawal, Aparna Agrawal, Ravindra Nagraj, Adhrit Ravindra, and Bharti Gupta recently celebrated Holi in Eden Prairie with joy and colorful “gulal” powder. Photo by Kapil Jain India is the land of festivals and commemorations. No month passes without an observance. That’s not surprising. The country has documented historical markers of its traditions preserved in its vast literature, ancient monuments, and stone carvings scattered across the country. In addition, India also has a unique oral tradition of songs, dances, and festivals with stories. It helped to permeate its cultural values through the millennia for…
Six months ago, a dozen students from Eden Prairie High School’s (EPHS) Distraction-free Life Club (DLC) got together to confront the epidemic of distracted driving. They designed and demonstrated EyeDA-1; an artificial intelligence (AI) – based device for tackling distracted driving. Their invention was widely reported in local media and even became the topic of a Sunday sermon by Pastor Gail Bach at Eden Prairie’s St. Andrew’s Lutheran Church. Yash Dagade, a 17-year-old junior at EPHS, the EyeDa’s lead developer, and his team are now working on a refined EyeDA-2 design. EyeDA-1 device developed by the Distraction-free Life Club at…
The Eden Prairie Local News (EPLN) holiday kiosk continues to greet shoppers on the second-level walkway between AMC Theatres and the food court at Eden Prairie Center mall through Friday, Dec. 23. Three banner displays on the holiday kiosk provide information about Eden Prairie’s volunteer-run, non-profit online community news service, which covers sports, education, schools, city government, and entertainment. EPLN hopes the banners will draw community news enthusiasts, business owners and potential volunteers to the kiosk. The kiosk has EPLN brochures available that provide information about opportunities to volunteer, advertise, donate, or subscribe. The kiosk itself personifies the strength of…
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Alisha and Isha Shah have been preparing for this moment for over half of their lives. After years of rigorous training, beginning at age 7, the 15-year-old twins’ hard work will reach a crescendo Saturday, July 30, when they perform India’s 2,000-year-old classical dance Bharatanatyam in a ceremony called Arangetram. Alisha (left) and Isha Shah. Photo provided The Eden Prairie High School sophomores are ready for their public performance debut. To make the occasion even more memorable, they will perform in the presence of their guru, Smt. Padmaja Dharnipragada, who owns Nrityalaya Dance Academy in the Twin Cities. She has…
A celebration is underway at the newly expanded AAA Minneapolis branch in Eden Prairie, located across from the Hennepin County Library. What used to be just a small travel office is now three times bigger. It offers a majority of AAA services Eden Prairie residents found before only at its St. Louis Park headquarters. The re-opened facility at 561 Prairie Center Drive now has a larger retail area with more travel and insurance people. In addition, there is an area designated for hosting events associated with travel and other activities. The site offers senior driving and novice driver-ed classes. It can…
It was June 29, 2007. Spring had paved the way for summer, prompting nature enthusiasts to rush to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum in Chaska. After hibernating for months during the Minnesota winter, buds sprouted across the arboretum’s expansive 1,200 acres. Vibrant tulip blooms under the bright sun greeted the excited visitors. Two time zones to the west, on June 29, 2007, the first-generation iPhone sprouted on the arboretum of technology. It seeded hundreds of new businesses and products that owe their existence to Apple. The revolution Steve Jobs envisioned continues to evolve. He saw in the iPhone not a device to…
National Distracted Driving Awareness month observances took place in April. In its crash facts, the Office of Traffic Safety (OTS) noted the fatality count in 2021 to be the highest since 2007, when we lost 510 in Minnesota. As of May 10, the state has already counted 94 traffic deaths. In 2009, Ray LaHood, then U.S. secretary of transportation, likened distracted driving behavior to “an epidemic.” This epidemic is not confined to the U.S. This problem is not confined to Minnesota. Distracted and unsafe driving behaviors are prevalent the world over. Advocacy groups are struggling to combat this epidemic in many…
Megan Maynor’s passion for writing books for children has been with her since childhood. Maynor graduated from Eden Prairie High School in 1992, earned a degree in communications and journalism from the University of St. Thomas, and started to work full-time in advertising. Book writing continued, but only as a side project. Her priorities shifted right after her first two children entered her life. That worked very well for her — to be at home with little children and write picture books. What followed was a long journey. It took 10 years to get Maynor’s first book, “Ella and Penguin…
The Thinking Spot in Wayzata is a science-themed book store and learning center. Rima Parikh is passionate about science. Over the Thanksgiving holiday, the Eden Prairie resident opened The Thinking Spot, a community bookstore in Wayzata with the mission to promote STEM learning in the broader society. The acronym STEM represents Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math as a single building block for delivering quality education in schools.Her bookstore maintains an extensive collection of 5,000 STEM-focused books for all ages. Born amid COVID headwindsOpening a bookstore was always at the very top in Parikh’s post-retirement bucket list. When COVID hit, she…