Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Present brings the past closer..

"Present brings the past closer" can apply to a lot of things in sundry different ways. For me , it applies to UW Wisconsin Madison where i spent two beautiful years. Those two years i grew as a person phenomenally, transforming from a young adult who hadn't explored the world much and had never stayed away from home into a person who saw the world from a completely novel angle. Among the myriad blissful experiences at the University and the memories connected to different places in the campus, one is particularly peculiar. Wendt Library where i spent many evenings, afternoons & late nights. Sometimes doing management assignments with B & S, sometimes studying VLSI with a lot of scare in the mind (source of fear: The VLSI Professor :-) ) or doing CAD computer assignments till late nights to get the program to work at any cost. Me and B almost used to rush to the library during the spring break to go & reserve the window seat on the 2nd floor as a study table for us. That window study table used to overlook the Camp Randall park and the view used to be gorgeous. In addition to that there used to be rocking chairs with that table. Perfect place to study. We then used to take turns to go to Union South to grab some lunch & keep the table reserved for us. Probably the most amount of time that i spent in Wendt was with my best friend B.
Now living in this new apt, the surrounding area profoundly reminds me of the Wendt. The library right across the Street has a very nice park & a beautiful view from its 2nd floor windows. In addition to that, the study tables in the quiet study area are quite similar to the ones in Wendt. I can not ask for anything better...

Thursday, March 18, 2010

A Pleasant Evening

Its been about 5 days since I moved to Mountain View downtown. I didn't get much time to explore the neighborhood, as its already dark by the time i get back from work. In the daytime the area rocks, with a line of fine dining restaurants, coffee shops, beautiful parks & neighborhood. Other than a short walk in the night at 10:30 on Tuesday, i didnt do anything else in the area in the past 5 days. Today i got back from work and there was still light outside. I walked to the public Library, right across the street. Its a 2 story building with a wide variety of movies, books & magazines. I was pleasantly surprised to see issues of India Today and a couple of other Indian magazines. I actually picked a few of them & got them home. There is a nice park behind the Library. The area had a campus like ambiance, with students, elders glued to the computers, or studying in the library, relaxing in the park. It was very refreshing to walk around, its quite a luxury to live right across the library, it can hugely impact your hobbies :-)

Monday, March 1, 2010

In a trance

In a trance since i left India on the night of 27th Feb. Some of it is contributed by the jet lag , some from missing my family & some from getting back to the old routine which i am not in a mood to enjoy right now.

The 4 weeks i spent in India were entirely action packed, with so much to do each and every day of my stay. Till 13th I was in Delhi, shopping & doing other preparations for a very important event. 14th Feb onwards i was in Chennai for a week. This was practically my first trip to the South, i traveled to Trichy, Tirnalvelli which is just 80 Kms from Kannyakumari, the southern most tip of India. The landscape while doing the roadtrip was very pretty at many points with the Western Ghats making a shy appearance once in a while. The coconut trees dotted the landscape every where. The most exciting incident for me was the Elephant blessing people by touching their heads with his trumpet inside the MalaiKotai temple in Trichy. I was quite scared to go near the elephant inside the temple, as it was a first time experience for me. Somehow i was coaxed into doing so, and i dont regret it.
From 21st onwards i was in Delhi for sightly less than a week. We did lots of shopping from Janpath, the malls in Rajouri Garden & ate at a lot of nice places. We did not visit any important places other than Bangla Sahib. We drove past India Gate & the Rashtrapati Bhavan a couple of times & the sights were beautiful. I spent some quality time with my mom, although did not get enough time with my dad & brother.
Since i got back yesterday afternoon, my mind continues to be in India :-).Things & people seem strange here, with lesser traffic, lesser people on the road, no tea in the morning being given by mom, the smell of Delhi in the cold mornings & the buzz during the day. I truly miss the time spent in India...