ShanSense.com

What I learnt from Jon Stewart about show-biz

2012-01-26T22:44:00.000-05:00

Thanks to Andy who got the tix, we went to a live taping of the Jon Stewart show. I learnt a LOT of things from the show, here are some of my observations.

Waiting makes you appreciate the main act more. They kinda have an online ticketing system. They could have used it to give away confirmed tickets (anyway all tickets are free). But they still want you to come early and wait in line hours before the show. The whole waiting game is there so that you value the experience much more.
Scarcity creates value. Same deal as above. They have only a limited audience. You feel like one of the chosen few who managed to score something awesome.
They don't really need the live audience (or do they?) If you look at it one way, the whole 'live audience' story seems like a sham. The real audience for Jon is the millions who watch him on TV. So why does he need the live audience? My theory is that he feeds on the energy of the live audience. Remember, he is not trying to create one perfect show, he's trying to create a great show, every single day. If he doesn't get the feedback, he can't carry on, as simple as that.
The 'priming' of the audience (1). A not-so-popular comedian came up first and warmed up the audience. This is to be expected, but I found two things to be very striking. One, his jokes were mildly offensive to the participants. Sure, this is the nature of stand-up comedy, but I think this is necessary because this is the nature of the show (one man's tragedy is other's comedy).
The 'priming' of the audience (2). Two (and I think this is more crucial), he made us cheer Jon as if Jon was a huge celebrity. Ordinarily, if we were to pay for this show, this priming might not be needed, but we were about 200 of us picked off the street (so to say) and paid nothing for it. There is no guarantee that we really liked Jon, no guarantee that we wanted to see him in particular. He made sure that we would become his fans for the rest of the show.
Jon likes to connect to his audience and take care of them. I noticed this as a recurring theme. He mentioned that he saw us standing outside in the rain, took personal questions and so on. I think this is a great selling tactic. Jon is trying to please two sets of audience at once (an admittedly difficult task) but really he's making sure the act remains spontaneous and true to stand-up comedy roots.
Jon is always super-excited, even when the cameras are off. This is necessary to keep the momentum going. He always seems to be hyper-caffeinated and busy as a bee. He's always fidgeting with his fingers, rocking his chair, or continuously scribbling something. Having run the show successfully for 13 years, I bet he isn't nervous. No, I think it's because he has to maintain the momentum even if there's a break. He has to keep the tempo up which reflects in his show.

Overall, I think Jon is awesome, he has a gift and a charisma. But it's also obvious that he has worked very very hard and takes care of a lot of minute things to make the show a success. Everything is the way he wants it and he is under control.

I have never seen Steve Jobs live on stage, but I have no doubt that he was a master of this kind of show-business too.

Here are some clips of the Daily Show by Jon Stewart: http://www.thedailyshow.com/ (I'll post a link to the Jan 26 episode once it's up)

Many thousand miles of travel - V

2012-01-06T13:27:00.000-05:00

(See previous editions 2010, 2009, 2008 and 2007.)

By far the least amount of travel as compared to the previous 4 years.

Feb: India! Delhi, Aurangabad, Pune, Mumbai. Caught up with friends, including school friends who I had not met in like 10 or 15 years! Also spent some really good time with family.

I did not feel like coming back after the trip!

Jul: Providence, Rhode Island and Mystic. Continuing my Northeastern US explorations from the last year. Saw the water fire show in Providence, the mansions in Newport and sailing in the mystic harbor.

Sep: Paris! Definitely the highlight of the year. We had an absolutely fantastic time. We were hosted by a lively Parisian lady (spoke only French, no English), and that was truly the highlight of the trip. French food, French coffee, the baguettes, ah, I miss Paris. It definitely deserves the reputation it has. A great place to roam around

2 books that influenced me the most in 2011

2012-01-04T08:31:00.001-05:00

Here are two books that I really loved reading in 2011

Reality is Broken by Jane McGonigal. Wonderful take on why games are so engaging as compared to reality. Why is it that people can spend hours playing games and even do monotonous actions in a game, but when asked them to do such repetitive actions in real life they hate it? What makes games so engaging that people are willing to help others who they don't know in a collaborative game but are not typically generous? And so on. I thought the author's approach is very fresh, though sometimes impractical.

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson. Remember the time when, straight out of college you were out there to change the world and not make money. And then somewhere along the road you lost your way and the small bonus and the one promotion is all that you wanted? Yeah, me too. But this book - and Jobs - inspired me so much that I am back to my energetic younger self, out there to change the world, or die trying. On a professional level, Steve Jobs way of Product Management, when applied to myself is inspiring on so many levels.

Here's a must-watch video. The "Think Different" commercial in Jobs' voice:

The moment I miss the most

2011-11-15T00:13:00.001-05:00

It's late evening and the sun is setting with fiery red and orange color. These are some of the longest days of the year. The wind is blowing, sometimes turning into a gust. Loose papers and plastic bags fly across. On hot roofs, tin cans rattle and make a distinctive clang. The wind causes swirls of dust to rise up from the parched ground. The weather is changing and it seems it's in a hurry. There is a moistness in the air and a sweet smell. It has rained somewhere nearby, it seems.

Late into the evening, children play cricket, fly kites or play marbles. And they won't stop till it's late into the dusk and difficult to see the ball or the kite or take aim. School has just started, or is about to start, but that's the least of their concern. An occasional airplane flies by in the skies, stirring in the young minds a hope and a yearning.

Evenings are spent eating ice creams and slushies and watermelons. The laughter continues on the roofs late into the night. Faint melodies of Bollywood music fill the night. It's impossible to say where the music is coming from, but it is pleasant. You sleep under the stars, spotting an occasional planet and trying to find the constellations.

Late summer, just before the monsoons, India is a magical place to be. And that evening sunset is the moment I miss the most. I'm waiting to experience the magic again, since 2004.

2011-10-18T20:15:00.001-04:00

Me with my meditation teacher John Osborne at the International Art of Living center in Quebec, Canada.

I'm truly blessed to have a teacher like John in my life. Words fail to express the gratitude I have for John and the knowledge and love I have received from him. I treasure every moment spent with him.

Many thousand miles of travel - IV

2011-06-18T01:03:00.000-04:00

I just realized that I never posted a 2010 edition. 6 months late, but here we go! (See previous 2009, 2008 and 2007.)

Oregon/California Coast: I had done the Pacific coast highway going south from SF, this time, I did Seattle to SF. The coastal redwoods are like nothing else on the planet and I feel truly grateful to have had a chance to experience the majesty of these humble giants. Trying to capture the beauty in a photograph is nearly impossible, but here's a sample (click thru goes to flickr to view a bigger version)

Montreal and Thousand Islands: Fun roadtrip. Absolutely loved the Montreal bagels!! The Mont Royal park was lovely and Old Montreal has a certain charm to it. Thousand Islands is a touristy detour.

Switzerland: By far the highlight of the year. As I like to say, if Steve Jobs were to design a country, it'd be Switzerland. The country is engineered to perfection! We did - Zurich (during the Zurich Fest!), Lucern, Geneva, Jungfrau and a ton of other small towns. Great trip. Unforgettable on so many counts. Cannot imagine the astounding beauty everywhere in this country, be it the lakes or the mountains. I also did the Canyon Jump - definitely the most brave act of my life yet! ;) Here's a picture of the enchanting Swiss Alps

Cape Cod / Martha's Vineyard: Continuing our explorations of the New England. We had a great time on the island and the pretty beaches. Rented a moped for a day which was tremendous fun!

Boston: You get the idea .. New England! Boston is a lovely city. Lots of variety packed in a small city. Boston reminds me of San Francisco a lot. There's a lot of culture in this city, from history and food to just places to hang out and be with people. A lot of old-world charm.

Fall trip - Vermont and upstate New York (Thacher state park): Can't blame us this time! New England is best for fall colors. Vermont is pretty of course, but the highlight was the Thacher state park and the Indian ladder trail. Breathtaking fall colors and a delightful weather. Overall, I'd say Thacher is a hidden gem. If you're around, definitely worth going.

Atlanta and Great Smoky Mountains National Park: Seeing off Aniket and Moush. Tons of fun with the gang at the German themed village of Helen and around. Did a Halloween night super-scary maze. People dress up really scary and you're in a maze with no way to get out. Not for the faint of heart. Also did the magical underground Ruby Falls (pictured left)

Los Angeles: Thanksgiving. The highlight was the Getty. Great architecture! (Didn't bother much with the art though). Also hit the charming gardens at the Huntington Library and the ever so pretty Malibu and Santa Monica beach.

The online/offline connection (ecommerce)

2010-11-03T23:22:00.000-04:00

A couple of weeks back, I went shoe shopping and found something I liked. Just before buying the shoes, I checked the price online and was shocked to discover that it was cheaper by about 20%. Of course I did not buy the shoes at the store, I bought them online instead.

The curious thing is, I'd have never bought them online without checking them out in a store first, and on the other hand, I'd never pay 20% more for instant gratification.

So what is the future of commerce in this scenario? In the short term, I think online players will win big as people go to buy things in-store, but smartphones make it easy to check the price online. But if enough people start doing that (and I guess they will), the stores will close and then what? Will people be forced to buy things online without trying them out first? I don't think I'd do that.

Another scenario is that a whole new breed of 'lean stores' will crop up which will be run with very little manpower (salesmen) and will serve the sole purpose of giving a real feel of the product to the consumer. You can't buy anything there, any order will go through the online store. Still, if the product is not distributed via a single distribution channel, there will always be a cheaper option online.

I don't know how this will pan out, but the future is certainly going to be interesting!

Paycheck player

2010-09-09T00:56:00.001-04:00

Two quotes, saying essentially the same thing, inspired me last week:

. Here's why you don't have your ten million dollars yet. You are a paycheck player. You play with your head. Not your heart. In your personal life? Heart. But when you get on the field -- you're a businessman. - from the movie Jerry Maguire

By the early '80s, the Greater Boston Track Club had half a dozen guys who could run a 2:12 marathon. ... Twenty years later, you couldn't ﬁnd a single 2:12 marathoner anywhere in the country. The United States couldn't even get one runner to meet the 2:14 qualifying standard for the 2000 Olympics...

What happened? How did we go from leader of the pack to lost and left behind? ... the answer is best summed up as follows: $.

... the fact is, American distance running went into a death spiral precisely when cash entered the equation. - Christopher McDougall (Born to run)

What's true for sports is true for every single profession. The good news is, the realization sets you free.

The story behind the act

2010-08-08T11:35:00.000-04:00

All our wants are either related to money, relationships or health. Assume, for a moment that regardless of what you do now, you will have enough money for the rest of your life and you'll have good health for the rest of your life and your relationships will all be as desired for the rest of your life.

What now? What will you choose to do now? (note again, in this scenario, whatever you do now will not affect the outcome) How does it compare with what you're actually doing now?

Now assume for a moment that regardless of your current actions, none of your monetary, health or relationship desires would be fulfilled.

What now? What will you choose to do now? (note again, in this scenario, whatever you do now will not affect the outcome) How does it compare with what you're actually doing now?

Are you aware of your actions and what makes you act that way?

Back to blogging

2010-08-03T00:15:00.001-04:00

Been a while since I wrote my last post. I've been missing writing and I've also been told to write.Good idea. I guess the better idea is to implement the good idea.

Everyday, so much passed by - so many emails, status updates, buzzes, tweets, oh my. But what strikes you? What makes an impact on you? What makes a change in your life?

Here's one thing that struck me today: http://nathanmarz.com/blog/you-should-blog-even-if-you-have-no-readers.html

Many thousand miles of travel - III

2010-03-13T14:23:00.000-05:00

Continuing the 2008 and 2007 tradition, here's the 2009 edition:

Jan: Hawai'i - probably my best vacation ever! Went to Oahu and Big Island. The beaches, the ocean, the volcano. Amazing. Hawai'i feels so spiritually uplifting. The people are so nice. There's peace in the air. There's nothing like it.

Mar/Jun: Washington DC. First to meet Guruji, next to do TTC! :-) I'm a YES!+ teacher now.

Sep: Univ of Virginia at Charlotesville and Shenandoah National Park. Was cold, rainy, foggy, but we ended up having a good time anyway! Shenandoah drive is awesome.

Oct: Fingerlakes region. Obligatory fall trip to see fall colors! This was a quick one though and we never ended up staying in Ithaca. Brilliant fall colors though.

Nov: Las Vegas. What a riot. Great trip, very memorable. Had so much fun, I don't want to go back again, coz it'll be hard to beat this trip! ;-)

Nov/Dec: India (Mumbai, Pune, Aurangabad): 3 weddings. What fun. Met everyone I know and honestly, didn't feel like coming back. Explored South Mumbai and loved it!

Dec: Walt Disney World, Orlando. My first visit to a theme park! Was a lot of fun. New Year's is a great time to be there and enjoy the festivities!

Other trips: Bear Mountain, New York

Celebrating Ideas!

2009-03-06T20:17:00.000-05:00

This blog post is inspired by an article from one of my favorite blogs.

And I would like to post something really interesting today: motivation and ability.

Motivation comes naturally in 2 cases: when you are new or when you see a huge gain. When you are new in a field, new in an organization, new in a team, you are highly motivated. It's obvious if you look at it the other way: you are trying out something new because you are motivated. You are full of expectations and have a strong desire to perform and succeed.

You are also motivated if you see a huge gain. Maybe at the end of the task, or maybe as a result of the task. But somewhere you know that you will get more than what you put in.

Ability also comprises of two parts: one is your knowledge and two your experience. The funny part is that when you are new to some task, you have motivation but almost no ability. You probably have prior experience or prior education which has convinced the leader that you will perform well in this task but you have yet to demonstrate the ability.

Now look back at a time when you quit a long running project (or a hobby/task). You clearly had a lot of ability. The only reason to quit is lack of motivation.

So to sum up:
In the beginning: high motivation + low ability.
In the end: low motivation + high ability.

Successful people understand and realize this fully. When they lose motivation, they try to develop it back, or they quit quickly. The trick is to quit quickly. Only you know yourself. Make the decision now. Do something new which motivates you. Don't fear the jump into the unknown. You have the ability already or you'll develop it along the way anyway.

Thoughts about The City

2009-01-29T15:04:00.022-05:00

I ♥ NY. But adjusting to NY and enjoying it is not easy. Not natural at all.

Here's a great article on NYTimes.com (where else ;): Newcomers Adjust, Eventually, to New York

I think the City has a mind of it's own. You can't have it on your terms. Exactly when you think that you are in control and have it all figured out, things can go wrong. If the City does not feel like amusing you, it won't! And no matter how much you fight, it won't budge. Money Quote from the article:

There also usually comes a time, early on, when newcomers must accept that the city is a power greater than they are.

And yet, this is the only city where while lazing at my friend's at 11:30PM my friend says: Let's get something to eat - I'm hungry. We walk down and there's a great place open right around the corner. (No, not a McDonald or some other chain, this is a proper good restaurant). We go, sit there for a while thinking what to order when Rita says: Don't they have fries? It was a classy Italian place, so the answer was unfortunately, no, they didn't.

We three look at each other and say, hmmm - so let's go get good fries! We hop into a cab, takes us 5 mins to get to Lucien which has some of the best fries in NYC (we always ask them to be made well done) and hang out there till 1AM. And when we come out, we still have options to go places, to have fun. The avenue looks like it's daytime. So many people on the street at 1AM!

Tell me any other city where you can do this. Not SF, nor London, nor Mumbai. The reason to love New York is that although it's a whimsical city with a mind of it's own, it has everything to offer and much more. If you play by it's rules, you'll have the most fun of anywhere else.

Another quote from the article:

Every day you encounter situations where you have to step out of your safety zone, and it’s really kind of a self-discovery experience

Many thousands miles of travel - II

2008-12-29T15:29:00.001-05:00

Just like 2007 (see this post), I'm posting my 2008 travels:

January 08: India. And not just that, got married in India. :) If you ever have an option to get married anywhere in the world, choose India. It's amazing to be in the middle of a couple of thousand people when you get married.

February 08: St-Mathieu-du-Parc, Canada (near Montreal). The cold. The snow. The Guru. What else can I say? :)

May 08: Rocky Mountains & Arches National Park. Amazing trip with Smitha. Arches is so lovely. Rocky was cold. This is probably the only place I went to twice in two years! Yes, it's _that_ lovely.

July 08: St-Mathieu-du-Parc, Canada (near Montreal). The beauty. The Lake. The Meditations. The Guru. What else can I say? :)

August / September 08: Upstate New York. The ever-lovely Cornell, the ever-enchanting Ithaca Falls, the ever-beautiful wineries. The blue Seneca Lake and the intriguing Watkins Glen. The Corning glass factory and museum. We did it all. Also went to Vraj, PA Srinathji temple.

September 08: Las Vegas / Bryce Canyon / Zion. Amazing. Bryce Canyon is so delightful, and IMHO way better than Grand Canyon. The sunrise and sunset at Bryce is breathtaking. Zion was also beautiful. Las Vegas was exciting!! The Gondola ride at Venetian and Eiffel Tower at Paris are must do!

October 08: Vermont Fall Trip. The fall colors here are so unbelievable. It's like a painter has splashed some color here and there. The bouquets of yellow, red, orange and all shades in between are guaranteed to enchant.

November: LA - to meet our dear friend Viraj. Had coffee at Intelligentsia! I liked this trip to LA. Of course Santa Monica is impossible to dislike anyway! We also went to Encinitas to pay a visit to Paramhansa Yogananda's ashram (or whatever they call it). It is one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. The California coast is a natural wonder in itself, and the spiritual energy at this place is guaranteed to stir your inner spirit. You feel the energy and the presence of an enlightened being there.

November: India Home food, rest and relaxation. Relaxing and nice trip to home, filled with love! (unfortunately, this was the same week as Mumbai attacks)

Stay tuned for more adventures in 2009!

List of good friends who've left NY grows longer

2008-10-24T18:43:00.001-04:00

Is NY meant to be the city where good friends leave? :(

1. Aakash
2. Viraj
and now 3. Tom ...

Sigh. All good things in life must come to an end, I guess.

You will be missed Tom, you'll be missed a lot.
Guitar Hero,
coffee (especially Grumpy),
bridge (Mongolian Flannery is unforgettable),
go,
pumpkins,
Indian food (remember the bulk orders in 1440?)
and most importantly Faulkner ... the list is endless.

Life, probably, will never be the same.

Now this is commitment

2008-09-05T15:41:00.000-04:00

Excellent article: http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2006/05/grafter200605?currentPage=all

This is what the guy does: http://www.flickr.com/photos/edyson/46106499/

Fascinating, isn't it?

Met Paul Auster today!

2008-08-20T19:05:00.002-04:00

Wow! I got a copy of Paul Auster's latest book "Man In The Dark" when he came to talk here at Google. Later, he signed it for me. Now that's cool, isn't it? List of Paul Auster's books is here.

I spent two days learning and _living_ this ...

2008-06-26T21:51:00.002-04:00

This article sums everything up perfectly:

http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/66/mylife.html?page=0%2C0

(Hint: go to print version if you don't want to click on next page every now and then)

I just did a 2 day course where I learnt and lived this ... in a classroom with like minded people, this changes your life - visibly and forever.

My NY restaurant map

2008-04-04T18:13:00.005-04:00

Alright, a lot of people have asked for it, and here it is: My personal restaurant map of NYC. These are the restaurants I want to check out. The ones I have checked out, I mark as green (like it) or yellow (OK) or red (avoid). The ones in blue are the ones I plan to check out sometime.

Of course, this omits a ton of restaurants I already like and I plan regularly. I will add them as I remember them. I will keep updating the map over time so keep checking often.

The good thing: ALL of them are veggie friendly, of course!

Feel free to suggest more in comments.

Click here to see my map

Other links on this blog related to food, etc:
Pizza like no other
China, Ghana and SoBro
Chaat at Gujju Restaurant

Two videos

2008-01-03T03:53:00.000-05:00

OK, you guys know that I don't really post videos on this blog, but I gotta make an exception for this hilarious one (_please_ watch it till the end for the punch line):

and this foot-tapping 'Gotta digg' song:

which is a symbol of the world we live in:

A video song
Regarding a website
Posted online on a video sharing site
Linked on a blog
Listened to and watched on a (i)phone (or computer if you are old school!)

... exactly what part of 'revolution' don't you understand?

The geek goes midnight shopping

2008-01-02T21:24:00.000-05:00

I must say, my attitude towards shopping, clothes and fashion in general changed after I saw The Devil Wears Prada. Ever the geek uninterested in clothes and what I wear, I suddenly realized that there is actually something to it and is kinda an art form! The conversion was complete with a rite of passage a few days before Christmas ...

A couple of days before Christmas Eve was quite memorable. Me, Cathod and Rita did the unthinkable (well, at least for me): We shopped for the whole night. We entered Macy's at around 10 PM and came out at 8AM the next day. Can't believe it, but yes, we did it! So what did we really shop? Clothes for me, accessories for a bunch of people, sweaters for moms, Jeans, shoes ... :)

Now I'm not saying that I have completely changed or anything, but yes, my approach has definitely changed. Gone are the rags of yesterdays which I would happily wear out of the dryer. No more clothes which are 'ok fit' - now I will buy something which is a really good fit only. The credit goes in large part to my Rita as well. In fact, I think it would go wholly to Rita.

Here's to New York City and midnight shopping!

The tale of two subways

2007-12-15T16:13:00.002-05:00

New York and London - two cities which would die without their subways (tubes!). Here are some differences I noticed:

Frequency: Hands down London wins. A train every 90 seconds in rush hour. Wow!
Crowd: London is more crowded.
Cleanliness: London tubes are unbelievably clean! The tracks seem to be made yesterday. New York subways are notoriously dirty. Even the mice in New York subway are bigger than in London. I guess they are just Americanized!
Hours: London is a massive disappointment. The subways stop around 12:30 AM or so. That effectively puts an end to night life. Sigh! NY subways of course never sleep.
Fare: The tube is really expensive. At $2 per ride, NY is a bargain!
Express Trains: They are a boon in New York. There's no such thing in London, which means you have to visit every station along the route.
Ease of use: The tube has a slight advantage here. The touchless entry makes a lot of sense. I've seen many a frustrated card-swiper at NY unable to figure out what the exact speed of swiping should be. Also, your oyster card for the Tube can be recharged online. Nice.

The bottomline being, although the Tube is a better experience, you have to shell out more but even worse, the fact that it doesn't run round the clock dampens the fun.

Many thousand miles of travel

2007-11-07T23:05:00.001-05:00

Back to blogging after a long time. Let's see how long I can keep up ...

Can't help but look back at all the nature travel I did in 2007:

January '07: PCH 1, California : Call it by any name, it's the best road trip ever. PCH 1 is all you can ask for in a road trip - cute li'l towns (think Carmel-By-The-Sea), beautiful towns (Santa Barbara), and the fantastic road which winds through steep mountains on one side and oh-so-blue sea on the other. The Big Sur coast line is breath taking. Bixby bridge is awesome! An unexpected highlight: Seals! Ending in LA is another experience though. I can't wait to do this again!

March '07: Death Valley, California : Hottest, Driest, Lowest. This was so much fun ... terrible heat, but I will never forget Zabriskie Point, Devil's Golf Course, Badwater, Artist's drive ... it's another world. The best point hands down though is Mesquite Flat Sand Dunes.

June '07: Rocky Mountains, Colorado: about 8 hours before boarding the plane, me to my friend (who I was gonna join there) - "I should be flying to Denver, right?" That might give you an idea of how stressed out I was and how badly I needed this trip. And I had never thought Colorado would be so much fun! Did whitewater rafting for the first time ... thrilling! The rockies are so beautiful. Highlight: Pike's peak (both by cog railway and road)

July '07: Yellowstone, Wyoming (and Idaho and Montana): They don't say "This is the first and the best national park" for nothin'! Wild bison < 10 ft away from you? Check. Breathtaking lakes? Check. Hot springs of various colors and shapes and sizes? Check - everything from a notorious 2 ft spring to 150 ft high. Fabulous camping? Check. Highlights: I saw wild wolf, bear, elk, bison and numerous birds. The Grand Teton National Park is great bonus too.

August/September '07: Las Vegas/Grand Canyon/Yosemite: I can write reams about this. From the Sin City to the torrid Grand Canyon, it's a journey of showy flashy Vegas with fantastic fountains at Bellagio and nifty Ceaser palaces to the Grand Canyon - vast, empty and deep. Yosemite rocks. The sights are so wonderful! I can bet that every single person who has ever visited Yosemite has been impressed. Lonely Planet puts it best: "Yosemite is the Taj Mahal of all national parks".

November '07: Stay tuned for Shan's continuing adventures in Londonland!

Not to mention other small (but equally delightful) trips in this year: Niagara falls, Ithaca and Delaware water gap!

+++

This post is inspired by Tom's blog : http://existentialtraveller.blogspot.com/

Pizza like no other...

2006-12-21T01:03:00.000-05:00

After being dished some of the worst possible pizzas by a number of companies coming on campus for interviews, I vowed never to touch another slice of pizza again. I guess it takes a trip to Brooklyn to fix that.

So here goes - the list of the finest Brooklyn pizza I've had (in chronological order of discovery)

1. DiFara's: There simply can't be a better introduction to Brooklyn pizza than this. The train ride (Q train to Ave J) is long, and the wait at this small pizza joint can try anyone's patience - but believe me, it's entirely worth it! DeMarco runs a one old-man show at this old joint and dishes one excellent pizza pie after another 364 days a year (I've heard). Three types of cheese are imported from Italy every week to make the perfect toppings on a hand made dough and garden-grown and carefully picked tomatoes. There's magic in his hands. Every bite more delicious than the previous one ...

2. Fornino: The wood fired oven here bakes supreme pizza slices. Extremely accessible, I've found this place having the shortest wait. Nice decor, friendly waitresses coupled with yummy pizza will make your evening!

3. Grimaldi's: There's more to Grimaldi's than just pizza. The best way to make your evening is to get down at Brooklyn Bridge (4,5,6 trains) and walk across the magnificent bridge marveling at the sights of the city (and the Statue of Liberty far away). At the other end on the river bank lies pizza heaven called Grimaldi's. There's generally a wait of about 30 mins at this super-crowded joint, but pizza lover's don't mind that at all. The walk should've whetted your appetite enough for a whole pie! :)

4. Una Pizza Napoletana: Widely regarded as the best pizza in Manhattan, this place is every bit Manhattan-ish as compared to the above Brooklyn pizza joints. Expensive, sophisticated and highly pretentious (make sure you read their pamphlet to appreciate all their Italian ingredients), this is a good place to take someone special. The magic is in the salt. Really, shake the salt on your pizza. It's no ordinary salt, it's a special sea salt imported form Italy! Delicious pizza, completely fresh and made with no artificial ingredients whatsoever, you can eat as much as you want without getting the 'I am stuffed' feeling you normally associate with pizza.

5. Lombardi's: Very famous Little Italy pizza joint. Their margarita is to die for. Highly recommended!

6. Viva Herbal Pizza: This is a quirky pizza joint ... not only is it 100% vegetarian, it also has vegan pizza! It's a refreshing change and very healthy too!

Of course there are more to discover, but one thing's for certain - I'm a fan of pizza now! :)

Updates: Added 5 and 6 in Nov 07

A very nice article - The Tyranny of Choice

2006-11-23T02:33:00.000-05:00

Been a while since I posted something ...

Stumbled upon this excellent article - The Tyranny of Choice

Nicely deals with why too much choice and the maniacal need to find the best deals actually makes you unhappy.

Happy Thanksgiving and oh yes, happy Black Friday - may you find the best deal - that of contentment. :)

The Prince of Persia

2006-07-06T00:12:00.000-04:00

After a looong time - more than a decade actually - I played The DOS (original) version of The Prince Of Persia. It was the first computer game I've played and to date continues to charm me. The prince and his actions were nothing like what I had seen then and I remember spending hours upon hours trying to get that magic tile to open the doors or figuring out how to kill the fat one. The animations are superb and for a child me, completely engrossing.

What makes me remember this and other games though is the strong relationships which are associated with these as well. So, for the Prince of Persia, it's my cousin Jeet, and similarly for "Crusader: No regret" it's my friend Neeraj and Ganesh. And for "Quake" it's another of my college friends, Sanmeet.

By far the maximum time I've spent playing a game is Warcraft III (yeah the old one) with two of my best buddies, Ganesh and Ojas. The time we spent while trying to determine the strategies and attacking and the thrill we got when we destroyed the ogres and all is just unforgettable.

And guess what, the games continue... now I play "Guitar Hero" with Tom and Andy and play board games like "Carcassonne" with Randy and Hubert and all... the fun continues and newer memories get etched onto my mind all the time.

Falling in love with California

2006-05-08T03:28:00.000-04:00

I will remember the last 15 days or so of my life as some of my best days. I was completely bowled over by the beauty of California. I literally fell in love with California, and I'm feeling the pain of separation now that I'm back to New York.

While there, me and my friends visited countless beautiful places. The breathtaking beauty of California can overwhelm even the most hardened city-dweller, what to say of a nature lover like me? I was swept off the feet by the numerous splendid beaches and the vivid coastline. It's poetic to perfection. Nature brings together land and water in all it's glory showing off it's best colors. The balmy soothing weather adds to the magic. It's nirvana, it's seventh heaven... an ethereal experience. To say the least, I've just scratched the surface...

I will remember the last 15 days or so of my life as some of my best days. I decided that if I settle down in the States, it's gotta be California...

Back to square one

2006-04-15T00:40:00.000-04:00

A misty balmy evening and the first weekend when I had no visitors. I take upon a journey down Thompson St and it's like talking a walk down memory lane.

I am at Washington Square "chess district" where the likes of Bobby Fischer have shown their might on 64 squares. I enter a dingy looking "village chess shop" and am overjoyed to find a lot of people pondering over their next moves.

I hang around a bit to get a scent of the air. It feels so yesterday when I was a swashbuckling chess player risen out of nowhere in a short time reaching up to the nationals. Spending all my free time playing chess was but natural to me. I guess it was in the genes...

Satisfied with the inital reconnaissance, I'm all ready to play. I get heads-on with a guy playing a 10 minute match. I haven't touched a chess clock in years... it takes only a few minutes until I lose myself amidst the pieces, it seems I've started living my past life.

Many more wins and a stray loss here and there later, I'm ready to head back. The chess trip was a huge success. Although in my real life, chess lost to computers...

China, Ghana and SoBro

2006-04-06T15:49:00.000-04:00

It was a day full of surprises. First, we had snow - in April and when the weatherman hadn't predicted at all. I was so happy seeing the snow. The small flakes falling down look amazing when you see them from a 16th storey window.

In the snow, we went to a Chinese dumplings place in Chinatown yesterday. It's such an experience being in Chinatown. I guess you don't feel like you are in New York in a way, and precisely because of this reason, you feel like - this is New York man. It's full of exotic things. Chinatown is so ... well, Chinese. The dumplings were good and we had a tea afterwards.

The evening had another interesting thing in store for me. We went to this Ghanian food restaurant in South Bronx (made popular as SoBro by Tom). It was the firs time I'd been to the Bronx, and it's difficult to see when I will be there again (maybe for a baseball game?) But then again, you never know, do you?

The Ghanian restaurant was a complete package from Ghana. The food, the movie playing on TV, the decor, the way we ate the food and the ginger drink were all Ghanian. It felt so far away from my home, my city. A truly cosmopolitan experience that - an Indian, in the United States, eating African food!! But Bronx being the Bronx, I didn't really want to spend a lot of time on the streets (and was happy that there were people with me) and before long, wanted to get back.

Boy, and for the first time, Manhattan, felt home.

An abode in the Big Apple... (2)

2006-03-31T18:54:00.000-05:00

Would you like to live in a place where
-There's no internet and no hope of getting it for at least a week (err, 7 days, that sounds more devastating)
-There's nothing to sit on
-Worse, there's nothing to sleep on
-In the middle of night you wake up coz you are thirsty only to find that there's no glass to drink water.

Believe me, I'm in love with that place coz that's my new apartment! :)

Of course, I've fixed a few of the above problems. But really, having your own place (OK, not owned, but your *own*) is a whole different experience. Never in my life had I thought that I would go out and get pans, bins, spoons and all those small things with so much enthusiasm.

Boy, what fun it is to buy even the first lamp!

Chaat at Gujju Restaurant

2006-03-15T18:36:00.000-05:00

So I went to this cool Gujju restaurant in mid-town called Sukhadia (review). It was a delight for the gujju in me. A chaat lovers' paradise, we 8 people ended up ordering chaat for all of us. Of course a few had buffet too...

Finding a restaurant like this is exactly what I had hoped for in New York City. You expect to find restaurants with you-name-it cuisines scatterred all over the city and that's the beauty of the city. In Ithaca I could barely find a couple of Indian places and there's no novelty left when you've been there once.

Long live the city and it's restaurants!

An abode in the Big Apple

2006-03-13T00:27:00.000-05:00

Hunting for an apartment in New York City is no fun as any seasoned City-dweller will tell you. The chances of finding a good apartment without a broker are the same as the chances of an illiterate finding a good book. Anyway, it’s an ordeal everyone has to go by (decisions-decisions) and I wasn’t to be spared either.

First of all, New York City is divided into a number of neighborhoods some of which sound really dangerous (‘Hell’s Kitchen’ anyone? How about the ‘meatpacking district?’). Deciding which neighborhood works for you is step one. Sure you could select the Village (the Greenwich Village) as your preferred neighborhood, but be prepared to see an apartment where you can barely fit your a** in and expect the realtor to say, “what a great apartment”. Or you could select one that is miles away from a subway station but has everything that you need.

The fun part in going apartment hunting is of course the broker. I’ve met all sorts of brokers. Dorky ones are easier to find. They will fumble with the keys and won’t know the avenues and the streets much less the apartments themselves. Another type of broker is the one who praises each and every apartment you see and tries to give that bewildered “I can’t believe someone can’t take this apartment” look. (On further poking, he confesses he is an actor who couldn’t get lucky on Broadway). Of course they are a very dangerous breed and it’s easy to fall prey to them. I was lucky I got out of the clutches of one…

But on a rainy day you can be lucky enough to see a good apartment which you like. Close to subway, spacious, and all that you need… and you are all set to be a real New Yorker!

Of tears, Christmas, reunions and Everest

2005-12-30T13:07:00.000-05:00

I bid a very tearful good-bye to Lisa. It is so difficult to part. I guess I should be happy to have someone who cries for me, indeed, there are only a fortunate few who have so good friends. While in Ithaca, I knew that I had come far, far away from home only to realize that what I had really come looking for I had left behind me. But I could not have imagined that I would have the very same feeling when I would leave Ithaca. Lisa wrote a new chapter in my life. I wish those beautiful memories never fade away.

I spent the Christmas in New York City with Mayank, Venkat (who had come to NYC), Biz and Aakash. Vijay and I came from Ithaca. It was nice to be with all my friends once again. Of course Chandra was missed. Didn’t do much apart from walking all over Manhattan over foot and seeing the Rockefeller Christmas tree. Mayank’s car rocks.

The journey back was filled with more and more recurrent memories. Ithaca loomed large over my mind. Cornell, the people, and Lisa came again and again to my mind. I saw ‘Million Dollar Baby’ on my laptop in the flight which made me sadder still. Fortunately, I had good seats on the flight and had good neighbors too.

Finished ‘Into Thin Air’ which I had started reading in the flight. This book was given by – no prizes for guessing – Lisa. It’s an amazing first-hand account of the worst disaster atop Everest in 1996. Spine-chilling and very exciting. Unputdownable. Read a book after a long time. Thanks, Lisa.

Homecoming was heart-warming. It was a complete surprise for everyone. Felt nice meeting mom and Rita. Fortunately, there were no tears – only smiles. Can’t help missing Papa though.

There are some things in life which will never come back.

Hail to thee our Alma Mater, Hail, all Hail, Cornell!

2005-12-18T10:04:00.000-05:00

(continued from previous post)

Fortunately, we get up early morning on time, very fresh. “Congrats Swati, graduation day is here” is my wake up call to her. And that sums up our mood. Graduation day. Oh, that magic feeling.

Makhu has not signed up for graduation, forget about having the robes ready. We manage to reach the hall well before time and procure good robes for him. After taking lessons in wearing the robes, we are all set – and, as usual, hungry.

Swati comes to the rescue with ‘laddus’ from her friend to celebrate graduation. We can’t have enough of them. After tons of photographs before the ceremony, we are finally lined up to ‘walk’. Walk – the word suddenly means so much. It is the result of the hard work we have put in to get the degree. It means that ‘I’m a Cornell student’ now changes to ‘I was a Cornell student’. It’s the bittersweet fruit of accomplishment leaving the aftertaste of memories behind.

Dressed in our nice robes, we walk. As graduate students, we actually get to seat in the front row. Makhu is confident that he will fall asleep, after all he has slept in all IR classes in the first row.

The ceremony is nice. The speeches, the ‘morals’ of stories, all pass by. I can’t stop thinking of my mother and father. This ceremony is for you! We’re called on stage and given our diplomas. I did it. I graduated from Cornell University.

The Cornell song is inspiring. It springs forth a number of emotions in my mind. The whole of the past year races through in front my eyes. By the time is finishes, my eyes are moist and heart full of emotion. The chatterboxes that we are, me and Makhu can’t help passing comments after everything is done and faculty is walking out. We completely forget that we are in the first row and we must start following them. ‘Go go, you are out of here now’ cries the usher. That summarizes it all. We sprint behind the faculty, laughing.

It was so nice of Lisa to come to the ceremony. It was nice to have her watch me walk, take pictures of me. I will miss you so much Lisa, and I will miss you very very much, Cornell.

It all happened on Graduation eve...

2005-12-17T17:17:00.000-05:00

It all happened that evening… my graduation eve was a reflection of the whole year I spent at Cornell in a perfect way.

The day was as a beautiful as a winter day could be. It had snowed a LOT the night before, but there was no wind at all. The views were simply breathtaking. The afternoon was nice, sunny and warm.

Afternoon: I toil hard walking all over the campus to get my cap and gown. The place is closed for lunch, I wait. After a trip to ATM in the snow, I finally have it.
‘We’re going to King Kong’ says my friend. ‘I don’t wanna go, it’s loooonng movie’. I say. But he successfully convinces me to come to the movie at 8PM.

6PM: I’m still in the office, completing my research paper. Darn, the remaining 20% always takes 80% of the time… it’s really been such a drag to complete this last piece of work required to graduate. I do manage to finish it though.

7PM: I start my ‘handover’ presentation to my fellow researcher. All right, this really is the final step.

7:30PM: I keep pinching myself – hurray, I’m done, I’m done. Hop on to TCAT for the mall.

8PM-11PM: It was a loooonnngg movie as expected but I enjoyed it. Great graphics. Some of the scenes were ‘made’ funny by Makhu’s and Swati’s untimely laughter. I can never forget the scene where Ann comes in front of Kong in NYC for the first time… both Makhu and Swati burst out laughing so badly, I couldn’t stop laughing myself. (That nothing was funny in the scene was reminded by the glares of those in the audience)

11-somethingish: We are returning, and after almost all the people have unboarded the bus, Makhu tells me one of his great ideas: it’s graduation tomorrow yaar, and we must drink. I’m the one who’s always more than eager to latch on to these ideas. We try to get everyone, but no one turns up. Only me and Makhu are drinking. Swati is a nice girl, she agrees to give us company by having hot chocolate. Venue: CTB of course!

1AM: Makhu doesn’t like beer, and whatever we had, we finish it in amazing bottom-ups. So we decide to move on to Rulloff’s or Stella’s. Darn Tompkins county, it’s illegal to sell alcohol after 1 AM! ( So be it, today nobody can stop us from having fun. Let’s go to Ithaca Falls, we decide.
We embark on a treacherous journey through snow down gun hill to Ithaca falls. Mid-way Makhu feels the urge to relieve himself. I start getting that beer-effect too. Darn, all the dorms are also closed. No way, buddy. Let’s keep going down.
While going down, Makhu reminds us that we will actually have to walk all the way up after we reach down. We end up cancelling the plan of going down. We decide to watch the falls from above, i.e. from North Willard Way and begin our journey up the slope.

2AM-ish: Ahhhh! The scene is superb! So much snow glistening in the night and the sound of water. Ithaca is Gorges!! After some time and escaping from a violently barking dog, we resume our journey homewards (driven by our bladders). Murphy’s law being what it is, we somehow manage to not follow Stewart Ave and instead end up on Univ ave, way below. Imagine the condition, bladder full since long, heart full of the hope of reaching home soon and relieving ourselves, we find ourselves almost at the foot of Buffalo St. Darn, there’s no way we can continue without going to the loo, we both decide. But hey, there’s a park here! (Imagine the rest).

3AM – ish: After the steep climb, we are finally at my place. And as hungry as a grad student can be. I have some rice and stuff – nothing tastes as great as a very late night snack! After the food, Swati calls it a day (pun intended!). So it’s me and Makhu trudging up Buffalo St, carrying my laptop.

4AM – ish: we are in a classroom, with the projector on. Wow, we are watching a movie full screen in a classroom at Cornell at 4:30AM….!! Close to 5AM we both find each other sleeping and decide to go home. After an uneventful journey home, we put our bodies to rest not knowing if we will be able to wake up for the graduation ceremony the next day..

ECO Friendly

2005-12-09T22:53:00.000-05:00

I worked at an office where:

There was a geology enthusiast who collected all sorts of maps and was great at all sports – juggling included.

My boss was called the ‘go go girl’ and she’s the most beautiful boss I had.

There was a person who dressed up as a deer on Halloween (complete with a wiggling tail), won the best costume prize for it, and was the life of a party.

My boss treated me every Monday during the summer with an expensive coffee.

I played volleyball with the peeps, bowled and had fun.

Juggling was a part of your job and work was play. If you didn’t know juggling, you had to learn it.

I got my best friend (+more) at Cornell and she took care of my lunch! (Besides tons of other things we did for fun)

I learnt to mix grapefruit juice with seltzer to make a refreshing drink.

Part of my job involved wearing a hard hat and going to construction sites.

I got the best send-off possible. A surprise party with lots of goodies and a very nice cake.

I loved working at the Environmental Compliance Office (ECO) and I will always miss the peeps there!

Memories - Part 2 (places)

2005-12-06T09:25:00.000-05:00

Some of the best time I've spent at Cornell is associated with places. Some unforgettable places, the memories of which will always be placed in my heart:

Chili's & ABC Cafe: The restaurants I've most frequented. Chili's is great for its Mexican food and of course its Cocktails. The molten choclate is also a delight! ABC cafe bears special mention as it is 100% vegetarain! :)

Libe Slope / Tower: Be it the slope day, the kite flying festival or just watching the sun go down - the libe slope is so much fun. The view from the McGraw Tower, which stands at the edge of the slope is breathtaking.

Beebe Lake & Ithaca Falls: 'Ithaca is Gorges' they say and the proof is in part at the Beebe lake and Ithaca falls. Ithaca falls is sooo cool. Beebe lake has a very nice walk around it. Both of them are green and refreshing.

Plantations & Ithaca Recreation walkway: Beautiful places to walk. I tanned myself walking here during summer! ;)

Maplewood community center: Spent some nice time with friends here. Be it playing pool/ping pong or playing 'antakshari', MCC has always been fun!

Memories - Part 1 (People)

2005-11-30T21:47:00.000-05:00

The rather short journey has come to an end. Tomorrow is my last class at Cornell. It’s simply unbelievable. With a good job in hand, all courses finished satisfactorily, it is the happiest ending I could’ve thought of… and yet, I don’t want to go. ‘Bittersweet’ was the right word Lisa chose when describing the ending.

Here are a few people I met at Cornell whom I will never forget:

Chandra ‘Bhai’ : My closest friend @ Cornell. So close in fact that I call him Bhai. He is a gem at heart. He was the first person I met when I came to Cornell and he has taken care of me like an elder brother ever since. Chandra Bhai, I can’t express thank you enough in words.

Lisa: Lisa is what comes closest to ‘Mom’. It pains me to take leave of her. She’s taken so much care of me… if I want to stay more, she’s the chief reason. What more can I say? We’ve spent some of my most memorable moments at Cornell together.

Prof. Bhas: One of the most enthusiastic persons I've ever seen. Had a superb time together over the summer! I still miss your food (and beer too! ;) )

‘The weak learners’ : i.e. Aakash (note the double A), Mayank (surprisingly a Gandhi, but doesn’t live up to the second name ;) ), Biz and Venkat (plus of course me and Chandra). We had a lot of fun in my first semester. Mayank’s style of a photograph with one hand on chin and ‘solid eye contact’ and AJ’s ‘pata nahi yaar’ style are inimitable.

Swati : The geekiest girl I’ve ever seen in my life. We spent some nice time together over the summer and fought and laughed and sang during the secutiy project.

Ritesh urf ‘Makhu mobile’ : This guy has the potential to speak forever on cell phone and consult everyone about any funda of life. ‘Seattle ke baba’ is another term for him.

Manu urf Manu Manchurian: This guy has a style of his own. ‘Naukri chahiye yaar’….

Prashant ‘conductor’ Kakad: Dude sings really well. Dances well too. Wonder why or how he is an engineer rather than a singer/actor.

Manpreet: The sweetest guy I’ve ever known.

Anisa: She’s one of the sweetest girls I’ve ever known.

and last, but not the least:

10. Prof. Arms : Of my 30 credits, I ended up doing 13 credits under him. I find myself as his younger version. Our ideas, our likings match really well. Will miss his British accent!

Gatecrashing into the dream job

2005-11-29T09:51:00.000-05:00

Flashback to about two and a half years ago. With a good offer in hand, I was sitting cosy at my uncle's place when I got a phone call from my dearest friend (fondly called Kate (blog)). He had come to my city for a pre-screen test for a job interview. I was getting bored anyway, and decided to go and meet him while he was standing in the queue. I did not even have a resume in my hand. To cut a long story short, I not only managed to appear for the test and interview, I also got an offer and ended up accepting it. Lesson learnt: gatecrashing is the way to get a job.

Cornell dayz: A couple of months ago, the most coveted company - Google - came on campus. I was disheartened to find my name missing from the list of pre-selected candidates. With a smile on my face and a resume (no mistake second time!) I went to the HR on the day of the interview and asked for an interview slot. And the rest, as they say, is history. I've got a dream offer from Google and I will be joining soon!! :)

Three cheers for gatecrashers!

Six years, none the stranger

2005-11-12T10:34:00.000-05:00

Flash back six years ago. A newly-formed friendship between four friends has brought them together to a dank messed-up room to study some of the arcane engineering subjects, esp. like Mathematics. All of them are from different places and no one knows where they will be next. Crunching the numbers and trying to cope up with terms like partial differential expressions and jacobians, their friendship blossoms. They have a lot of fun together, eventually calling themselves as the GM group. Teasing and bantering each other and having a fun time in general, just as any other under grad. Discovering the new place Pune, principles like FTG are invented. (Follow The Girl principle: when you get lost in an unknown city, follow the prettiest girl you can see. Miraculously she will lead you to a known street or corner. If not, you haven’t lost much! ;) )

One year thence, all four are following their own path, each fighting a different battle, in a different way, drifting apart with only memories remaining.

Cut back to today. Bharat is in California, Mukesh is in Chicago and Sanmeet is in Rhode Island (last heard). I am of course, in New York. It’s a small world after all, to find all four of my six-year-old room-mates here in USA.

Special thanks to: Yahoo messenger, Orkut, Yahoo mail for keeping us in touch and bringing us digitally together.

Better latte than never

2005-10-24T23:10:00.000-04:00

This post is about a very popular and highly addictive substance. It is available everywhere for cheap. What’s more, more than 80% of the population is addicted to it, and it is 100% legal to produce, sell and consume it. Yes, I am talking about caffeine.

My affaire de la caféine started sometime in the summer. The proximity of a popular coffee joint College Town Bagels is the chief reason why I got started with it. (However, there were other delicacies too see Mango Veggie Chilled). Very soon, I was consuming my favorite Latte nearly everyday. Mondays were especially delightful, since my boss used to treat me to a free latte on Mondays! I truly believe that it was a great way of boosting morale, etc. management tricks. It worked and the magic of caffeine worked too.

A week ago, I thought I was becoming a slave of caffeine and I decided to quit. I quit cold turkey. And that’s when the fun started. Sleepy days and sleepless nights. A feeling that I am going to catch flu. Irritated and nervous mind. Nausea and vomiting. Yes, these are all documented features of caffeine withdrawal, which I went through (rather still going through). I gave two interviews in this state and I am persisting. The urge to have that one coke or just one coffee to get me started is my prime enemy. And I am fighting full strength.

Is there any CA group? (Caffeinoholics anonymous?) If not, memberships are open I am recruiting.

If this post is not as ‘spicy’ as my other posts, you know the reason – it’s caffeine withdrawal!

PS: ‘Mrs Crabtree’, this post is for you.

First, Second and Third

2005-10-15T11:33:00.000-04:00

Back from a cloudy and rainy (and hence gloomy) NYC where I gave my first on-site interview. The stats so far:

My first phone interview (that is what started all this blog-saga) – failure
My first on-campus interview – failure
My first on-site interview (yesterday) - ??

BUT –

My first success at phone interview – third attempt
My first success at on-campus interview – second attempt
My first success at on-site interview (first attempt yesterday) - ??

B +ve => That’s not only my blood group – it’s my attitude towards life…

Update: Well, case 1 holds - I'm out! :( But there will be more opportunities. What's better than B +ve? Always being B +ve ;) )

Treeeeeee!

2005-10-05T18:17:00.000-04:00

Ever paid careful attention to your vocabulary and why it is the way it is? There are hundreds of non-dictionary words in my vocabulary, and many of them have long stories attached to them.

Take ‘treeeee’ for example. (The number of ‘e’s is of course variable). I caught on to it from the audiobook ‘Life of Pi’ (which is an otherwise not-so well narrated book, but we are digressing). The author blows a whistle to ‘tame’ a tiger. And this blowing of a whistle is ‘treeee treeeeeee treeeeeee’. The word has just caught on and me and Lisa put it to uses which I am sure the original author couldn’t have dreamt of. The most common use is to express happiness. It’s so cool to say ‘treeeeeeee treeeeee’ when you are happy – just like a bird chirps! Adding the otherwise innocuous question mark makes it a very potent question. ‘Where are you? Treeeee?’ Definitely means much more than the same question without the ‘treeee’.

Another word is ‘kukoo’. Again, don’t try to find any meaning to it – it’s Lisa’s invention. Saying kukoo to your friend while walking on the road is such a nice way of asking him/her to cross the road. Of course, like treeee, kukoo can be put to many uses. Good ol’ ‘Bye’ is easily replaced by ‘alright, kukooo’ as the last sentence before you disconnect your phone.

‘Shansey-wansey’ (that’s yours truly) is another one. Of course, countless more came and went in my undergrad. ‘Moin’, ‘Pannu’, ‘Bbu’, ‘Mundu’, ‘bugger’, ‘chichu’, ’anna’ (the last three to a limited extent) are all essentially meaningless but serve such an important purpose – they add ‘kukoo’ to life. Treeeee?

How to dress for an interview

2005-09-28T01:52:00.000-04:00

Rummage through the clothes you brought from back home. Find a good blazer, but no suit. Don’t have much money either. Panic.

Ask your very good ‘local’ friend for help. (Note: A ‘local’, not a ‘townie’) The savior drives you through the town’s cheap stores looking for a not-so cheap looking suit. Find one which says ‘young man’s suit’ and fits you – almost. Pay peanuts.

Get the suit altered to your size. Again ask the angel to help you. She finds a good ol’ tailor for you and drives you there. You give your measurements and all. The interview day is coming close. Pray.

The day before the interview go to the Italian tailor to collect the suit. Try the suit while hearing the kind-hearted old tailor tell you his tales from the past. See pictures of his village devastated during World War II. Listen to his unbelievable stories of landing in America with no knowledge of English, only $20 in pocket and lots of courage in heart. Feel like watching Godfather again. Feel like meeting The Godfather the first time. His parting words – keep fighting. Praise, thank and pay (a lot more than the suit).

On the day of the interview, try your best shirt. Find its collar button missing. What the heck, try another. Feel uncomfortable after just 5 minutes – the collar is too tight. Last option, and this shirt turns out to be good. The tie matches. Leave house minutes before the interview but reach on time. Perfect.

Get rejected even after doing well in the interview. Blog about it. Prepare for next.

Writing style inspired by 'Sin City' (Read it again in that style)
Any resemblance to living people is absolutely intentional.

'Fair' Game

2005-09-22T10:34:00.000-04:00

It's called a Career "Fair" for a fair reason. You meet all sorts of people (clowns?) at the stalls. Check out a few:

* The I-will-have-you-for-lunch types: You go and meet this guy from a very popular company and guess what, he is as haughty as he can be. You tell him you have some expertise in a particular area (java, say) and believe it or not, he directly starts asking you intervew-type questions. "Tell me the algorithm for ...." and " What is a better programming construct...." He successfully freaks you out. [amazon.com]

* The me-not-interested types: You go to them with a lot of enthusiasm written all over your face. Standing tall, cheerful bright smile on your face and a strong introduction leads only to a very disinterested response. Poke him/her here and there, but nope, the situation does not improve. You stop short of asking "What are you getting paid for?" [Apple, Goldman Sachs, list goes on...]

* The student-hunting types: This is in direct contrast to above type. They are actively 'hunting' for people. "What's your major"? "CS"? they will literally shout at the top of their lungs and will try to 'pull' you to their table. Some of them are really good at marketing skills, but honestly, is that enough? [Noria]

* The I-like-watching types: These guys will sit behind their table and will watch everyone pass by. They are absolutely content with the state of affairs and are probably very happy to spend a day off from their regular work. Sure they will stand up and speak if you accost them, but hey dude, life's much better with me watching the fun! Run along. [UBS]

* The you-gotta-sweat-it-out types: The real hard-workers. They will work very hard in trying to impress you. Sweat dripping from all sides, they will never stop short of answering the questions and getting you more and more involved in their firm. When it needs to be done, better do it with all the effort. [Verizon]

* The overwhelmed-with-people types: Honestly, no fault of theirs. Their company has got such a reputation that students flock to it like flies to a piece of ... [err, let it be]. These guys have no notion of how to deal with a swarm of people. They try their best to act like Neo fighting off the infinite Mr Smiths in The Matrix, but hey, not everybody is the 'chosen one'. [Nike, Microsoft, Intel]

* The really-good types: If there's a contest among the presenters, these guys are the winners. They are really enthusiastic about their responses and know very well how to deal with 'customers' (job-hunters, in this case). You feel like talking to them forever. A bright smile and friendly attitude, these guys are diamonds in the coal mine. [Bloomberg (Non-technical)]

Romancing the Wall Street?

2005-09-16T01:16:00.000-04:00

Right when you are sure about what you are going to do in your future, new possibilities open up and you are walking on a road that is totally new for you. It’s the thrill you get from exploring new options, new challenges that takes you places.

Back in my high school days I was an avid chess player. I was very serious about the game – so serious in fact that I wanted to make my career in it. By a quirk of fate, I was introduced to computers and I was hooked. Back in those days, the internet was a novelty and computers were rare, I launched my fansite called “The Ash World” devoted to none other than Aishwarya Rai (well, she was a novelty too in those days) and spent a considerable amount of time designing and developing it. The upshot of all this was that I was completely taken by computers and soon enough found myself doing my undergraduate degree in computers.

What with all the IT boom and all that, I soon found a job (actually two) in a software firm and was earning much more than me and my girlfriend could spend (touchwood). The excess money I had again started to turn some wheels in my head and it was impossible to ignore newspaper reports about the Indian stock market. Well, you can put two and two together and I was very soon trading heavily in smaller amounts on Dalal Street (that’s the Indian stock market, for the uninitiated). Some more exploration got me hooked into Technical Analysis (fundamental analysis seemed to be out of scope) and I was devouring articles about stocks and all that. One Warren Buffet quote caught my attention though – “Learn as much accounting as you can”. I soon forgot about it.

Months passed by and I shifted base to Cornell University (still studying computer science, mind you). Proximity to New York City meant that the ‘financial atmospheric pressure’ was high here. With great enthusiasm I enrolled in a course called “Financial Accounting” only because I recalled that Buffet-speak. I stuck on to this really difficult course (made doubly difficult because of its 8:40AM start time) just because the professor was a good guy and made this subject so very interesting. At the end of the semester, I knew that this was the best course I had taken at Cornell. Finance, suddenly was ‘in’ for me – it gave me a better ‘high’ than computers.

So, I followed it up this semester by a course called “Managerial Finance”, and also applied to some finance companies for jobs. And guess what (no, don’t go far) I’ve got a first round interview scheduled in a little over a week for a career in finance!

Life’s interesting, isn’t it?

Oh! That Magic Feeling....

2005-09-11T16:55:00.000-04:00

It was about 2 years ago that I had this very feeling. Here's how it goes.

Everything in this world starts with a hype. So does this phenomenon called recruiting on campus. "Oh they are coming, and there are lots" - as if they are aliens from Mars or something. You are smug: Yeah, I've made it till here, of course I'm gonna crack the interview. Secretly you start looking at the web sites offering resume tips and end up messing up your resume. Then you go out with your friends and forget everything.

The rumors finally start taking shape. Before long, some lists start getting posted. You start attending all sorts of info sessions where some person in a well tailored suit whose skill set is limited to 'excessive boasting capabilities' (sometimes misspelt as 'marketing') is trying to say that they live in golden palaces and eat Ambrosia, and you must join them and see if they really do so. After a couple of these info sessions, you convince yourself that if the presenter in the third info session doesn't show up, you can very well do his job. This uplifts your mood a li'l bit and you congratulate yourself that you find yourself worthy of doing something apart from your 'advisor to budweiser' academic life.

An infinite number of pizza slices go down your throat. For weeks, your staple diet is pizzas. You wonder if the pizza company will sign you up as a mascot. You flood your stomach with an assortment of soft drinks and wonder whether this can cause some toxicity and give you a chance to sue the companies and retire for good. Unfortunately none of these dreams come true. After the amount of garbage in your stomach, you start trumpeting it in the form of burps and make 'networking' impossible. What the heck, I'm here for getting a job, not for shaking hands you say and head for another pizza slice and of course the soda.

Back home you neglect the homework assignment and start spending an awful amount of time trying to squeeze out one line out of your resume. Objective in two lines? Too bad. Oh where are the industry buzzwords? Cover letters must be addressed to specific firms. Watch out for your font-size! Impossible task this, you give up at a point of time. No course in your life was ever this difficult. You start praying regularly.

Finally, you write a blog post about it and tune in to the Beatles:

...
Out of college money spent
See no future pay no rent
All the moneys gone, nowhere to go
...
But oh that magic feeling
Nowhere to go

- The Beatles (You Never Give Me Your Money)

Summer Finale

2005-08-29T12:34:00.000-04:00

I had a thoroughly good time before the start of the semester. I am now refreshed and ready to take on the load! :)

Last Weekend: Went to Washington DC. Had a good time there. Saw all the monuments and some museums (Air and Space and Spy). Had dinner at 'Tapas Bar' DC Metro is cool and Chevy Cobalt is a cool car too. :)

Friday eve: We saw a movie 'Sarkar'. Excellent movie. The director has made an 'Indianised' version of 'The Godfather' - very gripping, even though I knew more or less what was going to happen. I loved it. After that I had amartini @ Chili's :)

Saturday: I went to this place called Watkins Glen. Ah, it's such a beautiful place. I had never known such a beautiful place existed so near from us. I can't even describe how much I loved it. It's simple superb. Haddinner at Rulloff's :)

Sunday: Spent the whole day shopping. Went to Waterloo outlet malls. Didn't buy much. Just some routine stuff and a couple of tshirts, etc. After thatwent to Walmart and got a mini-refrigerator. Tiresome but useful day.

So that winds up my summer. Ready to start this semester which will change my life forever (since I hope to get a job this semester and I don't knowwhere I will be in 2006!)

As tired as a ...

2005-08-15T11:21:00.000-04:00

2 days (a weekend) of my life when:

- I worked more than 15 hours a day - all work was physical (specifically, packing and shifting and backbreaking)
- I did not access the internet at all (absolutely not a single byte - we surrendered our internet connection, you see and mysteriously, the neighbor's wireless internet also stopped working :( )
- I played cricket after nearly a decade :) (Cornell India Association cricket game at Appel Commons, free pizza too)
- I 'wined and dined' out at cool restaurants (Thai Cuisine and Chili's) (We could not cook at home, you see, everything was packed)
- I haven't unpacked, and somehow manage to reach office without being too late

That is my condition right now. And that is why I am blogging right now. :)

PS: The title of this post was censored. Can you guess?

Signs of inspiration

2005-08-08T00:31:00.000-04:00

It's midnight and I am desperately trying to get some sleep so that I can be fresh for Monday morning work, and yet I cannot forget the highly inspiring image of Keily Carr whom I saw in the church today. Seeing her perform all those seemingly random hand movements during the service, diligently translating every word spoken within the church into the miraculous sign language was a soul-uplifting experience in itself. She was doing a real service to all the deaf and hard of hearing people. Imagine what all these people must be feeling with the world muted, and how welcome they must be feeling at the church because of this wonderful sign-languge translation being provided.

I appreciated her then, but quickly forgot all about that later in the day. Now, alone, sitting on the bed, I keep on thinking about it and can't help but wonder the beauty and power of the sign language. Maybe someday I will learn the language too... just for fun. Maybe I will be able to translate something for them. Just to make everyone feel at home. Just to spread love...

ShanSense.com

2005-08-04T11:41:00.000-04:00

Yup! Finally, I've got a .com domain name for my blog - ShanSense.com

I first thought of ShanSense.com as a domain name two days ago when I visited JenSense.com. I thought how ShanSense.com would sound, and I liked it instantly and immensely. Best part of it was that it was available. I was one click away from signing up when the pragmatic part of my brain took over - the fundamental rule of avoiding over-expenses is to avoid impulse buying. Reluctantly, I closed the browser.

I slept over it. It still sounded really good. It was still available.

I slept over it again. The idea was fresh in my mind as the morning. I asked Lisa while we were walking down for coffee "How does ShanSense sound?" "Ummm, it sounds like nonsense". Perfect. "How does ShanSense.com sound for a domain name? A personal site." "Oh it sounds great!" (laughing)

Corroboration. Cool.

http://ShanSense.com is mine.

Haven't really thought what I will put there. As of now, it redirects to this blog.

Perfectly ShanSensical, isn't it?

Mango Veggie Chilled

2005-08-02T12:35:00.000-04:00

"Hi, may I help who's next?" - the lady at the counter of College Town Bagels.

"Hi, what's a 'mango veggie chilled'?" - me

"Well, it has mango, with vege-" - obvious explanations.

"No, I mean what dish is that? Do I eat-" - not-so-obivous questions

"Oh! Oh, it's a soup (You FOB)"

SOUP??? Mango Veggie Chilled Soup?! How oxymoronic is *that*.

"Large or small?" - she goes for the 'close' (marketing parlance)

"Small please" - there, you made a sale, lady. Can't help my love for mangoes.

It turned out to be a great dish (nowhere near being called a 'soup' - at least not by me!). It is something you would get when you refrigerate what gujjus call 'fajeta' or mango 'kadhi'. Apart from that, it's a sheer delight on hot days, don't mind the single small piece of mango you get in it. And oh yes, of course, you get the 'bread roll' with it too! :-)

Chill out with a mango. Land in a soup.

Ray of Light

2005-07-25T15:18:00.000-04:00

For over six years now, Madonna's 'Ray of Light' has been my favorite album. I had thought that my initial infatuation with this 'different' album by Madonna will wear off someday, but even after such a long time, walking down a lonely street with headphones from a portable MP3 player plugged into my ears, songs from this album still give me goose bumps and smiles, and occasionally, tears.

Over time the songs have grown on to me, so much so that most of them are now my credo.

Traveling down this road
Watching the signs as I go
I think I'll follow the sun
Isn't everyone just
Traveling their own road
Watching the signs as they go
I think I'll follow my heart
That's a very good place to start

from "Sky Fits Heaven" is just one of the many songs which power me.

My mind gets completely lost in the songs and I can empathize with Madonna and every shriek and cry of hers in the song. I can feel her sadness, her desperation and also her hope in me. Coupled with great music (though very unlike her other pop albums which I don't like in particular), this album touches me very very deep inside. For me, she's achieved greatness with this album!

The songs are sheer poetry which presents itself with deeper and deeper meaning through all walks of my life, be it the joy of love or the sadness of losing someone. What better way to summarize my love for this album than with lyrics from one of the songs

Like a moth to a flame
Only I am to blame
What can I do
I go straight to you
I've been told
You're to have
Not to hold

(To Have And Not To Hold)

I know what I did this summer

2005-07-13T15:28:00.000-04:00

I know what I did this summer: (The good days are over over, and I thoroughly enjoyed it!)

1. Helped organise and repeated Art of Living basic course at Cornell
2. Juggling - all thanks to Lisa
3. Movies - a lot of them - Cinderella Man, In Good Company, Star Wars (III, IV, V, VI), Dead Man Walking, Some Like It Hot (Marilyn Monroe Classic), Tango Charlie, D, Waqt, Godfather I, II, Bunty and Babli, Shabd, Batman Begins, The Sea Within (Oscar winning Spanish movie at Cornell Cinema), War of The Worlds, The Color of Money, All's quiet on the Western Front, Forrest Gump, Casablanca, Kung-fu Hustle, Mangal Pandey , Dus
4. More Movies - Lakshya, Munnabhai MBBS
5. Books - PG Wodehouse (4 Jeeves books), Agatha Christie (Miss Marple), Journey Through Genius - William Dunham, Black Holes and Time Warps - Kip Thorne, Man Eaters of Kumaon - Jim Corbett, Deception Point (on Audio) - Dan Brown, Harry Potter VI - Half Blood Prince, Sahara - Michael Palin
6. TV - Friends, Arrested Development (on DVD), Seinfeld, etc.
7. Travel - Niagara Falls, The Trail with the Guru (Amherst, Boston, Westchester, NYC), Kingston & Vraj,PA (at Raju Kaka's), Taughanock Falls, Waterloo Outlet Mall, Washington DC
8. Fun at Ithaca - Ithaca Falls, Farmer's market, Beebe Lake, Myers Park (Lansing), Cornell Orchard at Lansing
9. Met Geek Garl, and the three wonderful ladies in my office : Jocelyn (my boss), Sarah (her boss) and of course Lisa (she might be the subject of a whole new post!)
10. Tech:
a. Fedora Core Linux installation and configuration (See article: http://www.cs.cornell.edu/~scs49/install_linux.html)
b. ASP / VBScript
11. Earned a few $ :-)
12. Kitchen/Eating: (hopefully) learnt making upma, flower with crushed peanuts Maharashtrian style), etc. Cooked chole for Lisa. :-), ate sweets from Lebanon (!)
13. Sports/Physical activities - played volleyball, basketball, foosball (all for the first time in my life), pool, table tennis, walking in the sun (nice way to spend your lunch hour! - once again, thanks to Lisa)
14. Attempted to learn something about American birds and trees (well, again thanks to Lisa) - failed miserably
15. Updated Wikipedia article on Aurangabad
16.Designed Cornell India Association website
17. Started using electric shaver (thanks to Raju Kaka and family)
18. Learnt a few Spanish words

Vraj, PA !

2005-07-07T11:49:00.000-04:00

That there is a strong Gujju Community (GC) here in USA was known to me, but the real effect was felt when I visited a place called 'Vraj' (yes yes, that's the name of the place) in Pennsylvania . There is a huge temple (haveli) of Shrinathji with mostly pot-bellied gujjus chattering by and eating 'farsaan' and making merry. Must say it felt very homely there when I ordered things from the canteen in gujju and took home pickles. Evidence that I am not that hardcore a gujju is provided by the fact that I resisted the farsaan though!

The strong sense of homecoming will be forever in my heart and not I'm actually having second thoughts about living in USA. After all, I've been an MBCG (Maharashtra Born Confused Gujju) all my life. ;-)

'Lakshya' of my life?

2005-06-27T16:42:00.000-04:00

My friend Geek Garl provoked me yesterday to think about my life. If it were in my hands, I would've made it illegal for anyone to ask someone else what he or she is gonna do with his/her life. I mean, come on, a guy is peacefully and lazily existing in the world, entirely content with the state of affairs, and someone pops the question - "have you thought about XYZ in the future." Huh? Hell no! This gives me such a complex!

Overall, the conclusion was that I dunno what I'm gonna do. But I must give vent to my strong intuition being felt over the past few dayz - that my life's gonna change a lot. I dunno where this thing has cropped up in my mind, but I've got a very strong feeling that something is gonna happen to me, that too not entirely in my hands. Good thing is, I am patiently waiting for it to happen and I am thrilled at it's prospect. (Believe me, I'm seriously not hiding anything, it's an intuition!) So let's leave everything at that, and I'm gonna continue my happy-go-lucky lazy life full of the joy of doing nothing.

A word of advice: If you ever have evil thoughts and make the cardinal mistake of asking someone what he or she is gonna do in the future, please, wash your sins by helping him/her out of the thing and stop discussing the matter pronto. It helps, you know. The poor guy doesn't have to take the pains of blogging about it to let the thing cool off!! :-)

Journey Through Genius

2005-06-25T13:08:00.000-04:00

Over the past few weeks or so, I've been reading a superb book called "Journey Through Genius" by Dunham. It is a wonderful treatise which takes us through the fascinating world of mathematics right from the times of Pluto and Archimedes to Newton and Cantor. The best part about the book is that it is written in a very non-textbook manner and is very light to read. It reminds me of my school days and I now know what is missing from the mathematics taught in schools. This book presents the history and an overview of the life of great mathematicians over the centuries, and for the first time I appreciated the beauty of mathematics (primarily geometry, algebra and number theory) through this.

Also there are some interesting insights and comparisons in the book. In particular, I was struck by the comparison between the works of van Gogh and the use of abstract (non-Euclidean) mathematics. The author draws a parallel between the abstraction in art and the abstraction in mathematics which was quite intriguing.

To take that further, I do not understand why people, having accepted the concept of square root of -1, find it so difficult to believe in the concept of God. The square root of -1 is imaginary and it cannot be quantified at all. No one has ever 'defined' it. We simply assume it. But it is a very powerful tool and has led to the advancement of the whole field of mathematics. Isn't the concept of God the same? Unproven, unseen, and yet, doesn't it lead to the advancement of spirituality?

Linux - Abort, Retry, Fail?

2005-06-16T14:38:00.000-04:00

After about half a decade later, I (re)tried Linux. Yes, I had it up and running nicely on my good ol' Pentium machine (complete with the lousy and slow GUI, no internet and simply no use of it at all). It's always an adventure to install linux on any computer, and if you want to test yourperseverance, I would like to seriously recommend it.

So, one fine day, an idea strikes me that since I am not doing any nerdy stuff over the summer, I should try my hand at linux at least. After all, they say, linux has evolved a lot over time. Of course, the "I am a CS guy" ego took over and the challenge lover that I am, I soon found myself downloading nearly 2GB of iso files for burning on to CDs and installing Fedora Core 3. The first attempt of downloading was a complete disaster. Not only did I screw up the bandwidth of the office (yeah, I downloaded the stuff at my office) but I also got warning messages from the IT guys saying "I will be watching you". On top of it, all the 4 CDs I burnt were bad. Ibelieve it was a problem with my desktop's CD Writer.

Day 1:
I went through the whole drill of downloading all the stuff again and finally managed to get the three CDs burnt right. Elated, I popped in the first CD and up pops a nice graphical installation screen "Welcome to Fedora Linux". Kool. Except that unlike the earlier Red Hat installations (I am talking of the days of Red Hat 6, which I had successfully tried), there is absolutely no partitioning utility which works with Windows XP. I mean how could that happen? Furious, I had to download the kool <http://www.knoppix.com/>Knoppix distribution which runs completely off a CD (yes, absolutely no installation or anything at all) and use a utility they had given to format NTFS volumes. The reason I can't use Knoppix is because I don't want to carry a CD with me always. And it kinda feels uncomfortable that your CD ROM is whizzing when you open firefox.

Day 2:
OK, So I am all set for the Fedora installation. And bingo, it works fine. :-) My joy knows no bounds. The end of Windows, I gleefully declare. And I set down to configuring the system. WiFi - check. Resolution - check. Sound - check. WOW - linux has really matured. Firefox, thunderbird, tada! I also figure out how to play DVDs on linux. Installing software - 'yum'my. And then I realize that it takes a lot of time to boot linux because it is looking for an internet connection on my LAN card. Come on, I say, I should be able to disable the LAN card, and I find a way to do so. Except that on the next reboot, linux refuses to boot. Rescue disk works, but what setting do I change and in which obscure .conf file or where?

Day 3:
Back to reinstalling Fedora Core 3. This time I decide not to install the LAN card at all. I use WiFi anyway. Everything proceeds smoothly, except that on every other reboot, linux refuses to boot. Solution - simply turn off the laptop and restart. Am I amused? I still go ahead with it - probably there's a solution out there. I patch up the screen resolution as usual and the next time I reboot (no matter how many times) - it just doesn't boot.

Day 4:
Heard Fedora Core 4 just got released. I download all the CD images from horribly slow and congested servers using my ultra - high speed internet connection from a lab in the CS department. I finish it and discover that now they do not give away MD5sums - instead SHA1 keys are available. The server which hosts SHA1 program for windows seems to be jammed too. Let it be, I say, I just want to burn the CDs and start burning them. I can't believe I am so enthusiastic about linux again. Not long after, I realize that I've wasted 3 CDs.

Day 5:
Back to downloading all the iso images again. This time I did a SHA1 check and burnt the CDs. It installed fine. After spending hours Googling, I've finally got my wireless networking, sound, my screen resolution and hibernate working! Cheers! I'm proselytized to linux.

Movie Mania

2005-06-08T12:56:00.000-04:00

In the past week or so, I've watched quite a lot of movies (by my standards, at least!) Right from "In Good Company" which touches upon the corporate American culture in a satirical way to Star Wars 3: Revenge of the Sith which, not surprisingly, is a showcase of what animation artists can achieve on the silver screen. Although, I must say there's a lot of 'human' touch in the movie as well, and the story is fascinating even though we know the end. I also saw Matrix again after about half a decade and I must say, every time you see the movie you make more sense out of it. It is surprisingly fresh every time - truly an attribute of an evergreen movie which will be remembered for generations.

The best one, however, was "Cinderella Man" starring Russell Crowe and directed by Ron Howard. It's a poignant real-life story of a boxing wonder, James Braddock, facing the trying conditions of the Great Depression and emerging victorious. A real life hero who inspired the whole of America. I won't be surprised if Cinderella Man bags a few Oscars the next year. The cast has done their job very well and the director narrates this story in gripping style. Russell Crowe is undoubtedly a gifted actor and he plays the character of Braddock with gravity and depth. A must watch for all.

TA TA Hindi

2005-06-04T21:39:00.000-04:00

After a 'freak' hint for a Hindi TA and a forwarded email from a friend, an impressive letter to the Prof., and an expensive $16 (+tip) haircut later, I find myself walking down the Rockefeller Hall lobby. Rockefeller Hall is an old building (renovated, the Cornell way) and was a nice diversion from the science buildings which are so very juiceless.

So I enter the office of the Prof. feeling all confident and already making plans of spending the big money as if I have got the job. Then she instructs me to speak in Hindi and Hindi only. I had never in my life imagined that if instructed to speak in Hindi, I would not be able to express myself! Admit it guys, our Hindi is damned polluted with the English words to the point where we cannot get our idea through without banking on the window to the world.

My only saving grace was that I hit a point when I said (desperately trying to avoid the use of English) that I don't just want to make people learn Hindi, rather I would like to acquaint them with the wonderful Indian culture through it. I think I also did well in the written essay (imagine that - me writing an essay for an hour and a half in Hindi! :-P) as compared to speech. That is, if at all she looks at the essay I wrote in the first place!

All said and done it was a shamefully eye-opening lesson for us Indians - we have probably forgotten Hindi. No, I am strongly against the likes of Mulayam Singh who said (coincidentally - today itself) that he will drive out English from India. Hey dude, care for us Hindi speakers, please!

Some creative ideas

2005-06-04T01:18:00.000-04:00

At 1:11AM in the night, you can get nothing but creative ideas. Here are two of 'em which just struck me and for the record, I wanted to post it to my blog so that I can boast of it 20 years later when they are hailed as extremely useful or strong business model, or whatever:

1. Libflix: If Netflix can do it with DVDs, why not do it with books also?
2. Amazon library: Amazon has made its database of books(indeed, all items), comments, reviews and all other stuff open to public. It has exposed a web service interface which allows any damn programmer using any damn programming language to tap into this vast resource. Can someone make a "Find this book in a library closest to you" interface for this? (This is akin to "Find the nearest theater playing this movie").

No need to thank me for all those million$. Just write a comment in lieu of that!

Niagara!

2005-06-01T14:14:00.000-04:00

Was at the Niagara Falls yesterday. Set out in the morning for a three hour long grudging drive with me cramped in the back seat.

It was a lovely day when we got there. We had food an Indian lunch there, which was just OKconsidering the exorbitant cost there (OK, I know it's a tourist spot) .

On the web and on TV, the falls seem so magnificent, yet the first view you see is the American side, which doesn't look that impressive at all! I boarded the "Maid of the Mist" ( a ferry boat which carries you close (into?) to the falls) with a little less enthusiasm. The Taughanock Falls <http://www.taughannock.com/> near Ithaca are, after all, higher than Niagara Falls! Height is not what Niagara is famous for and little could I imagine the big surprise waiting for me!

As the maid of the mist moves on, amidst the boastful commentary, we see the American falls first. For most people (like me), they are still the biggest waterfalls ever seen, but "that's definitely not worth the hype" I hear myself say. The American side of the falls is just a small preview of the real Niagara. As we move further towards the Canadian side of the falls, the real picture starts to emerge. The Canadian Falls are horseshoe shaped falls (like a bug U) and the Maid of the Mist carries you right in the middle of the 'U'. That's when I was totally soaked - with the water and with the thrill of Niagara Falls. They are breathtaking, awesome and simply superb! It's a completely different experience to be surrounded on three sides by huge walls of falling water as compared to viewing the falls from a distance. It's simply heaven. It disconnects you from reality and I was lost completely in this natural wonder of the world...

Finished a week at job

2005-05-28T12:44:00.000-04:00

Finished a week at the job. The work's pretty good - I am designing a complete IT system for our environmental compliance group, but to get up at 7 AM in the morning!! Darn it! That's life, I guess... Had a well deservedprolonged sleep today morning :-)

Going to the graduation ceremony today (not mine :( ) - more later

Losing my canine!

2005-05-26T14:55:00.000-04:00

Damn... my lower left canine is coming out... I am extremely sad about it
- feels like I'm getting too old already. NO!! I will have to smile with
lips closed, try not to open my mouth wide.... :-( Sad, very sad. I am
gonna look so funny! ;-)

Tigers actually tend to turn man-eaters after they lose their canines...
let's see what happens to me! ;-)

On trail with the Guru - Boston, Amherst, Westchester and New York City

2005-05-22T14:50:00.000-04:00

Over the past four days I have been traveling all along the north-east USA following Guruji all the way. It has been the most enjoyable journey in many respects. Here is a short personal account.

Guruji celebrated His birthday on May 13th at Chicago. Unfortunately, I had two exams that day and could not attend the event. We, however celebrated the birthday at Syracuse with our cheerful upstate New York AOL teacher, Emily and a few other members of the AOL family. Emily has been associated with AOL for quite some time now, and has been the United Nations representative of AOL. She was associated with the New York and Boston centers of Art of Living and has taught university courses in MIT, Harvard, Boston College, etc. She was with Guruji in the beginning of 2005 in India and went with him all throughout his Maharashtra tour which included Bombay (on Mahashivratri), Pune, Phaltan, Nagpur, etc. She told us that Guruji is coming to Boston and will be going to New York City after that, giving public talks on the way and wondered if any of us wanted to come along. It was the most opportune moment for me since I was twitching to get out of the town anyway. The next day I confirmed that I was coming with her.

Guruji arrived in Boston on May 17th, at Julia's who is a cousin of Emily and had introduced Emily to AOL. We would've loved to start our tour from that point on, but all things didn't fall in place. So, delayed by a day, but not dampened by the spirit a bit, on Wednesday, 18th May '05 we set off for Boston from Ithaca. We hoped to make it to Guruji's educational symposium at 2 PM on time. As Guruji would have it, we took a wrong turn on the way, continued for an hour before realizing it and missed the symposium! However, we were fortunate enough to see Guruji from a close distance after his talk.

There was a public talk at Boston College that evening and we were determined not to miss it. Guruji's public talks are organized as "An Intimate Evening of Music, Wisdom and Meditation". This talk was no different than what was said. It felt nice to hear live bhajans after a long time. Although the accented words sound different, there is no choice but to adjust to them. Guruji came in and gave us knowledge in the form of questions and answers. He talked on the topics of relationships: "A man shouldn't hurt a woman's emotions and the woman must never hurt a man's ego, she must always prop it up" [laughter]. He touched on many other subjects and we all had the privilege of a live meditation with him.

After the talk Emily took us straight to Nilenduji's house which is at Chelmsford, about an hour away from Boston where Guruji was staying. Seeing Guruji seated between his followers and having a very informal talk is so different from seeing him in satsang's and public talks. Guruji is very intimate and informal. He asks about all of them informally. After spending the short time with all of us, as he was going to his room to sleep, and we were lined up along the way. I was shocked to hear Emily step in and say, "Guruji, this is Shantanu, from Cornell.". Guruji looked at me, smiled and nodded. WOW! I had my introduction to Guruji!! I hugged Emily after that and thanked her to no end. Little did I know that more surprises were lined up for me in the coming days.

Guruji's talk the next day was at Univ. of Massachusetts, Amherst, about 2 hour's drive from Chelmsford. We followed Guruji all the way and attended the enlightening talk. Other educational reformists were present for this talk as well. Among other topics, Guruji stressed on the fact that all enemies must not be hated, instead they must be engaged in a conversation and convinced with love.

After the talk, we came back to Rashmi's house where Guruji was staying. We were surprised to know that we had actually made it to the place before Guruji! So we were just hanging around on the lawns doing nothing in particular. I was chitchatting with my friends about random topics, when all of a sudden a car came and stopped right in front of me and Guruji stepped out of it. I was completely awestruck by his presence and unable to move as he was walking towards me. He came straight to me and tapped my shoulder with a great smile. I was dumbfounded when he asked me "So you are a student?". I mumbled out somehow, "Yes, at Cornell University, Ithaca". Then he walked ahead and asked me "What field are you studying in?". I seriously couldn't get the words out of my mouth and after much prodding of the onlookers, I could blurt out "Computer Science". It is simply amazing how the divine can meet you at the most unexpected moments and leave you awestruck! I hugged Emily and thought that my trip had been completely successful, not knowing that even better moments were awaiting me!

After that, we went back to the venue and did some seva for decorating the satsang hall. The evening satsang, was very good and the meditation was superb as well. After the satsang, we were once again lined up on either side of Guruji as he was walking along. We had a few other AOL family members from Cornell and Emily stepped in to introduce them. As I was being reintroduced to Guruji, he said "Yes I know him", and involuntarily, I raised both of my arms and said, "Guruji, I want a hug". He too raised both his arms and as I gave him a long and warm hug, I completely lost my notion of self and became one with him. Guruji's touch is so divine, and believe me, when you hug him, you are hit with a power, an energy which is unparalleled. It is impossible to describe the feeling in words. A power touches your soul and puts you completely at rest, taking away all your worries and sadness. This one moment will be remembered for each living day of my life and will always bring me a smile of inner satisfaction.

On the way back to Chelmsford, where Guruji was staying, we were joined by Marlene, who is a senior international Art of Living traveling teacher. Not knowing her, I asked her where she lives and she said, "I live in any country where I am assigned work"! Emily filled in with the details about her. She teaches almost every course, right from Art Excel, Youth Empowerment Seminar (called Young Adults in India), Basic Course to the Prison SMART course. She is widely considered as the most cheerful person in the Art of Living family. Indeed, it is very difficult to find her not laughing and joking at any given point of time. It is a great experience to be with the teachers of Art of Living and we were completely engrossed as she narrated her stories of conducting Art of Living courses in hostile places where she literally feared for her life. She was also talking about starting an Art of Living school (much like what we have back home in India) in Inner City area of New York City and how the children there are completely deprived of all human values. The ride back was made doubly funny and enlightening with her.

Friday was a relatively less busy day as we were to travel to Westchester, a county just outside of New York City, which is nearly a four hour drive. We once again went to Nilenduji's house and started off with Guruji. On the way, we stopped at Lakshmi Mandir, which is a magnificent temple about half an hour's drive from Boston. Guruji graced the temple with his presence and the priests conducted puja with him. We sang bhajans with great energy and the entire temple seemed to be vibrating with an echo of the divine. Guruji was presented with a splendid book called "The Hindu Temples of North America" by the temple priests.

We set off towards Westchester and this time Natalie was with us. She is a cheerful young AOL YLTP teacher working in New York City. Although all of us dozed off, Emily was steady behind the wheel. She had been driving now for three days, often for 8 hours at a stretch and more than 15 hours a day, but there was no sign of fatigue! Like all AOL teachers, she seems to have a very different type of energy which keeps her going. Hats off!

The evening talk at the impressive performing arts center at SUNY Pruchase, Westchester was the best talk by Guruji on this tour. He conducted a short meditation and we had a superb question and answer session. Everyone in the hall was taken by Guruji's presence, and his expansive aura could be felt by every soul in the room. The radiant faces after the talk gave a testimony of the power of Guruji's words. The Divine shop volunteers were jubiliant to see how many registrations they encountered in a single evening.

The next day, Guruji's talk was scheduled at Waldorf Astoria, <http://www.hilton.com/en/hi/hotels/index.jhtml?ctyhocn=NYCWAHH> in Manhattan, New York which is regarded as one of the most prestigious hotels in the city. For me it was a grand finale of my tour culminating at this stunning masterpiece of human creation. It is a thrilling experience just to be in that hotel, but I won't go in the details, you have to be there to believe it. The hotel was blessed by Guruji's grace adding the divine touch to its beauty. The breathtakingly beautiful ballroom had been booked for the afternoon talk. New York City's famous "Bhakti" Band of AOL sang excellent bhajans which got everyone to their feet. Guruji conducted a meditation and gave an enlightening and witty talk on various topics. After the talk, I roamed around with a few other AOL volunteers on the busy streets of New York City and made it back to my bus back home just in time.

Emily will continue on the tour with Guruji to Washington DC where I am sure there will be many more souls waiting to be blessed by His presence. The celebration moves on...

Jai Gurudev,
~Shantanu

A New Hope

2005-05-17T13:58:00.000-04:00

OK, don't get the feeling that I am in the grasp of a terminal disease after reading the title (although we all are - it's called life) .

I Watched the first star wars movie - "Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope" yesterday at the maple wood community center. This was my first star wars movie ever at the age of 23 (Twenty Three)!

[Time for a one-minute freak out and to recuperate from the shock]

I actually enjoyed watching the movie much more than what I had thought. It has some really nice graphics for a 3-decade-old film and it generates quite a lot of excitement indeed. Han's character, played by Harrison Ford is the best according to me. He has got a flamboyant style and Ford plays the "Look, Your 'Worshipfulness', let's get one thing straight! I take orders from one person! Me!" character very well indeed. Throw in some great dialogs in style ("Wonderful girl! Either I'm going to kill her or I'm beginning to
like her.") and you've got a perfect hero! ;-)

I can now understand why star wars has attained this legendary status. Simple: it was acheived Forcibly!

On trail with the Guru

2005-05-17T11:28:00.000-04:00

Wow, I had never imagined all this would be happenning after my exams! I am now hooked up for a nice long road trip to Boston, Amherst and then on to New York City returning Saturday night!! :-) Guruji is having lectures on these days and probably we will be having a dhinga masti time all the time!

Gotta rush to prepare for the trip and won't be updating the blog probably till Sunday (and expect a large post then! ;) )

A morning with Emily(ji) and the Man Eaters of Kumaon

2005-05-16T01:08:00.000-04:00

I consider myself exceptionally lucky to have got the company of our sweet sweet (yes she deserves it twice) upstate NY Art of Living teacher Emily Peck. Such a nice companion in the lonely Ithaca area (made more lonely because I don't have much to do nowadays!) can make anyone's life a pleasure and make him take notice of the once-again-green trees.

So I got up nice and early in the morning and met her at College Town Bagels. Probably for the first time I felt Upson is a good place because I could take awesome course flyer print outs there :). I am glad Emily didn't complain about our lab though! ;-) Some geeky knowledge always helps in impressing women (warning all ye CS fellows: it does not last, duh).

Quick: How many types of churches are there? 1, 2, 3, ... N? Right - N. Pick one of them. OK, if you picked Unitarian (even if you knew it) - send me your address and you will get a special gift. Back to the point: we went to this Unitarian Church - where people are very liberal, friendly and very good to outsiders - to talk about Art of Living and it seems we can do something there over the summer. Emily plans to have a course in the last week of May which sounds really good. We roamed around at commons and put up our flyers in many shops and common public boards. It felt like coming back to school (and I was feeling good I am back to enjoying my college days!). Let's see what happens.

I experienced Mate Cafe with her. It's an awesome place - very cool and exceptionally good interior. Check it out at <http://www.twelvetribes.com/whereweare/ithaca-matefactor.html> Needless to say the food at all such good places and with such a good person with you has to taste great.

And now after dinner I've got a thirlling book to read from our very own Cornell Library (Mann). It's Jim Corbett's (yes, Corbett National Park wala) Man Eaters of Kumaon. It's really thrilling and check out it's description on Amazon <http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0195622553/ref=sib_rdr_dp/002-4280413-6200829> which probably gives a rough estimate of the thrill. I am sure it's gonna keep me up for nights - it's great! Read it.

Come to think of it, I should start calling Emily as Emiliji as we call all our teachers... Probably EmilyDidi sounds much much better - I will ask her what she prefers when we meet next! GRRRin! (Tiger grin ;))

End of exams and Guruji's bday :)

2005-05-14T17:50:00.000-04:00

I finished off with both my exams (Ecommerce and Financial Accounting) yesterday. ECommerce was good. FA - I thought it was better than what I was expecting, but you never know! (at least these days). Can't help but appreciate the course, the teacher and the amount of work we have done and learnt.

So after finishing off with the exams, we (Sattu, me and Asma) went off to Syracuse - one hour away. It was a good ride - very very beautiful. After reaching there, we decorated the whole house with drapes, and all the decoration material we had (we had LOTS). It was so much fun decorating for Guruji's birthday!

We cooked something for all of us to eat. Teresa had ordered a very good ice-cream cake for the occassion. But before that we had a beautiful guided meditation from one of Emily's tapes. Wow that was simply great. So peaceful. We sang a few bhajans after that. After that we had really nice dinner with great salad, burritos and some dish made of avocado. I wonder how these guys love this fruit so much. Emily said it is tough to select between avocado and mango. I can keep arguing against it.

Anyways, there was talk of experiences with Guruji. I've found this happenning between the AOL community very frequently. Everyone always enjoys it too. Emily also told me her experiences with art-excel kids in inner city, NY. We can't imagine how they behave and their totally different values. We also heard tapes from Tommy Duffy and a song about juvenile kids prison reforms featuring Guruji's voice was simply great.

'No' from Microsoft

2005-05-10T16:45:00.000-04:00

No Microsoft internship for me! :-( I had got my hopes up after the phone interview, it had gone smooth. Anyways, that's life...

A superb quote

2005-05-07T16:09:00.000-04:00

When I was growing up, my parents told me, "Finish your dinner. People in China and India are starving." I tell my daughters, "Finish your homework. People in India and China are starving for your job."
-Thomas Friedman <http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.05/friedman.html?pg=2>

End of semester - II (SLOPE DAY)

2005-05-07T12:32:00.000-04:00

So after the academic recap of the semester, here's the fun part.

Cornell traditionally celebrates a slope day <http://www.slopeday.cornell.edu/> as its last day of spring semester, where all the students party on the library slope (the libe slope). There is star-studded music (this time the attraction was snoop dogg), and best of all its free. To top it up, Cornell allows alcohol on its premises on this day and sells beer for $1!! Now, who can resist that in the sun! So it was a great all-day celebration, dance and enjoyment. I must say I am not that big a fan or rap music and didn't enjoy the music in particular though. There was a gang of ex-cornellians from NYC and San Fransisco. We had Zoheb, Saurabh and Aseem with us. It was fun having them around.

Came back from the slope and had some rest. After that went to von Cramm (Aakash's co-op) where they were having a barbeque. And they were playing rugby as well. I joined in late but had a great time playing rugby. Except that I ran into Nhu (I think I spelled it right) and she unfortunately got hurt because of that. Rugby is such a tiring game! Whew! Tired, we went to Collegetown Bagels where I had a superb californian bagel. Also tried some smoothies at Smoothie Hut.

And after that the best part of the day started at Manpreet's place in Maple Hill. Anisa, the most cheerful girl I've ever met at Cornell was fully charged up and we started a game of dumb charades. My god, that was so fun. I already had a reputation of wild imaginations and she was enjoying that a lot. She's the enthu of us all, we will miss you next time Anisa! I made Chai for all of us :) Then round 2 of dumb charades. Chandra totally rocks at this game and if it were not for him we would've been routed.

Overall a very fun-filled and tiring way to end the semester and start the study break...

End of the semester! (With an all-nighter :)

2005-05-06T12:23:00.000-04:00

Wow, it just seems like yesterday when I came by my Air India flight and landed in USA... Things have moved on so fast! The semester has ended! I really can't believe it! Here's an academic recap:

In retrospect it has been a good semester for me. There were no low points where I fainted or just gave up (These things being common here). We had our share of all-nighters and immediately doing an 8:40AM class after that! I'm sure the profs know who's coming to the class after an all-nighter. And I'msure they appreciate that!! ;)

By far the best class in terms of grade for me will be Ecommerce, and I'm sure I will do great when the final grades come. Our team was selected by the prof for a 10 min presentation at the end as well. My research was good too. Still got the paper to complete. CS classes were the most boringones... Duh.

And the best of the best class awards goes to Financial Accounting! Awesome prof, great subject content - it has been a class which has changed the way I look at companies! It really should've been a 4 credit course instead of 3 since there's a lot of hard work involved, The amount of material we have covered is just awesome. Hats' off Prof Fields. It's made me seriously thinkof an MBA in finance.

Coming back to the last all-nighter. We were finishing off the ICS project which should've taken only 2 hours. Took many many more instead. I discovered some really good issues with the code when it is tested for high performance. It wasn't an all nighter where you fret every 10 mins and walk away with red eyes (mostly out of frustration). It was an 'easy-going' all nighter. Joe talked about his days when he used to play so much, Duane about Guyana, and we all had so many laughs in between. We summarized the characteristic expressions: Joe: Einstein, Monkey, Dutschbag (!), mother fudge, Chump! :) Overall, one of the best all nighters I ever had. Too bad Duane will miss out on his programming competition which could get him anxbox. ;)

We Paanch have a blog!

2005-05-05T12:12:00.000-04:00

Check out the blog of we five SOGAS at http://paanch.blogspot.com :)

OK - done with the interview on phone

2005-05-04T12:27:00.000-04:00

Whew!

I don't think I was tensed. Seems it went OK. Or rather good. I think the only place I goofed up was "Why did you choose Cornell?" - and I said "Because it's a one year course and I don't want to be away from my family for long" - then topped it up with - "because it's as master's ofengineering - not master's of science"....

Otherwise it went OK. What's the criteria for judging a code? What was the largest program you wrote, tell me how you got into computer science. What's your strongest programming lang? Why M$? Routine stuff. Which position? - Isaid testing as that would go on to make me a better developer.

Preparation helps. No two opinions.

Let's see - they say they will send me an email in a week.

Kick start with MS Interview on phone

2005-05-04T10:24:00.000-04:00

Grrr.... Microsoft phone interview in a couple of hours. Thought it's the best time to start a blog! :P Have found a lot of stuff on the net regarding Microsoft interviews and also 3 videos! Goes to show that the internet is slowly going on to become the next platform for multimedia - not the TV... Let's see what happens.

Anyways, will be pacing, smiling and looking in the mirror during the phone interview. Too bad I don't have balloons to kick!! :P [http://blogs.msdn.com/jobsblog/archive/2004/08/04/208403.aspx - see note byMichael G]