Random Thoughts

I've been thinking of all the fruits I was used to as a kid in India. I have not seen most of them for a long while now. I was talking about a pomegranate I ate recently to someone and I thought I'd go about listing the fruits. So then, lets start with the pomegranate. Its a strange one alright. Did you know that the Afghans are now shipping crates of these to Vancouver and other areas? It is a bright red fruit that tastes somewhat sour but is awesome to eat. And its good for you. Then there is the creamy Sapodilla. I have never seen it in North America. Apparently the plant itself is a native of Mexico. Either those facts are incorrect or people don't eat it for whatever reason. This thing grows like wild back home and I remember having tonnes of them on dining table fruit baskets... sometimes going rotten, or over-ripe. There is the guava with its coarse flesh inside. With little seeds on the inside. Again, endemic to Mexico and yet, I have not encountered any in the Unit

Well, maybe it is the holidays. Maybe its the fact that I just had dinner alone. Maybe it is because I am watching Virtual Users abandon with glee and spiteful disregard for my cheering them on. Whatever the case is, I do remember lots. I thought I would list a bunch of things I'd rather be doing today. I'd like to walk in the rain in Vancouver. Yes, I know the few of you that read this page think I am crazy. But I kid you not. Try it out sometime. There is something remarkably refreshing, one would almost say a soul cleansing quality, to a walk in the rain in Vancouver. I think I've come up with more good ideas and made peace with more things walking in the rain all by myself than I have at any other venue. Granted, it isn't the easiest. But it is something that I do miss. And no amount of walking in the DC rain makes up for it. For one thing, rain is a rare thing here. Secondly, it pours like crazy when it does rain here. And I am not inspired by the rain here. No of

Why, its Christmas Eve already! A couple of things that stand out for me this year. I still don't have a TV. No this isn't a message to jolly old St. Nick telling him that I want a 50" plasma TV. I'll buy it myself. Besides, I have no chimney. The reason I put the TV bit here is to express the joy of not being bombarded by annoying Christmas advertisements. No more, jesus was born a couple of millennia ago and now you need to buy this cell phone with this amazing feature at a price that can't be beaten... no more you need to buy this car (a Japanese luxury one) so you can wrap it with these ugly bows and surprise your significant other... none of that bollocks. Why? Because I have not a TV, nor do I have a functioning radio! Just the blessed Interweb thingy. I've had to do very little if any Christmas shopping. I am staying in DC. I am spending Christmas alone. I am sure there will be many emails forwarded and sent, facebook wall postings etc on the blessed day

A lot has been going on recently in life and the world. I've been thinking about what I am doing here and why I am here. Who am I? What is my purpose in life? What works me up into a passionate frenzy? I am no philosopher, but I've been thinking about what it is that excites me. There are plenty of things that do. Cars do. Women do. Sadly, some of the servers I get to play with (I mean a 16-core SunFire box is awesome... but for what?) excite me, politics does, seemingly useless knowledge does. Food does. Learning does. Science does. When I was young, I wanted to fly jet aircraft. Many young boys dream of that I suppose. I saw MiGs and Mirages in action on a military airfield in North India when I was 9. That was one of the most awesome nights I have had. Me, twin-engined MiGs, single-engined Mirages, darkness, afterburners, the deafening noise of the engines on that deserted runway excited me. I still love the spectacle of a military airplane. Biology excites me. I've had

Well, its been snowing out here. My apartment is hot. I am sitting in my shorts and a t-shirt and I am sweating lots. What's going on in my world? Well, let me give you a random sampling of stuff I can come up with. Windows Vista, so far is not that terrible. After about 2 weeks, I had to press Ctrl-Alt-Del. It looks different. Maybe I don't use it much, but it works for me. I watched a video on Iran from the American Public Broadcaster PBS's show Frontline. The idea brought on are quite interesting. Kiefer Sutherland is apparently going to prison on account of drunk driving. It is rather sad I must say when Canadians, and that too notable ones go out and do such things. I mean, think of your family man! Your grandfather, well, he is something else to most Canadians. And yer poor mother! I ate salmon today. Its not sitting well with me. Some poor MP in Ottawa was blamed of looking at scantily clad women. Turns out it was his dog! Looked like a Gordon Retriever. Heard about

I did something I haven't done in a very long time. I asked another employer to evaluate my skills and see if they'd like to take me on to do some interesting things. Who knows if it will come to fruition, but I took the very first step in my eventual journey back home. The wonder is that if I do get the gig, I will be working in familiar quarters, with people who I have known for a while. Familiar faces, familiar surroundings, familiar rain, familiar coffee, familiar bagpipes... One piece of me is so excited I can't wait for it to happen; another piece of me is a bit sad that my learning has been cut short and that I am leaving... I hate to walk away from a good fight as it were. Only time will tell what really comes of this little endeavour. Wish me luck.

I have a very special spot for the song that goes by this title. Bill Withers sings this. I've heard it in the movie Notting Hill. Not quite my daily cup of tea when it comes to movies. I do love the scene in the movie though; you see all the seasons in one shot... I am no real fan of movies. I find their realities stupid. Depressing sometimes. Maybe its because I started probably before I even knew what a movie was by watching various Indian movies. I still don't get why and how people watch those wretched things. I admire the ability of the folks who produce that garbage and make a lot of money on them. Many, many countries are spanned in the process of a movie. Hell, one stupid song in an Indian movie probably takes you to Australia, Switzerland and New York. Those seem to be the staple places to prance about. Anyway, I am not here writing about Bollywood. This one is personal. The song is true you know. There really is no sunshine once she's gone. I have no idea what I

Before you get your mind out of the PG-13 frame of thinking, let me clarify... this will be a rant. When I refer to nutjobs, I refer to the noun interpretation (check urban dictionary for the verb version of it, if you really didn't get the drift) of the word nutjob. Let me also preface what I am about to say by adding a disclaimer... I do not usually write about my work that much. Its not because I don't have the urge to, it is more because it is inappropriate and I don't need to get fired. I have bills to pay... but at the risk of getting yelled at or worse, I feel the need to write about the nutjobs I have to deal with. Lets just say that my sanity is on the line and my ability to be civil is fraying away. Of late, my work has started to give me ulcers in my tummy. Don't get me wrong, its not as stressful as my Support gig in Vancouver. But it is getting to the point where I am starting to feel nostalgic for those days. Its quite scary that I am having such delusion

I'll say it is somewhat of a strange title for a blog post, but I thought I would blog about the second wedding I have had the pleasure of attending since I moved to North America. Let me give some background by saying that the first wedding I went to was of my friend from UBC, Reza. He married a girl he met at UBC and the wedding took place, what feels like eons ago now. I believe it was on the 19th of June, 2004 that they got married. And, last I heard, they are still happily married. That was an interesting one; he's Persian, she's from Central America I believe, she's Catholic, he's Muslim. It isn't often that one gets invited to a wedding. At least that is my feel for it. I have a few friends that have been going to weddings every weekend or so for the past few months, but I think that is the exception rather than the norm... and I am sure they realise how lucky they are to be present at such an important event. My co-worker and friend Dave (and his then br

I finally took the plunge and headed to the beach! Now, this isn't like a trip to Kits beach in Vancouver. Why? Well, for starters, the beach is two states away! Where did I go? I went to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware . So that leads us to the question, how did you get there? Well, it is a simple enough story. I woke up early Saturday morning and took the metro to National Airport, rented a PT Cruiser from Avis equiped with a GPS unit and headed off to the beach. The drive to Rehoboth Beach is quite interesting. You see plenty of things along the way. Getting out of the District of Columbia seems to take for ever. The GPS unit decided that I had to head North first, then across to the North-East and then South for a bit. At some point, I join in a large highway (I think 495) and head East. Once I got out of DC and into Maryland, there was still plenty of traffic. I was surprised that it was so busy early on a Saturday. Soon enough though, you end up in parts of Maryland where time seems

So, the Friday before I left, I met up with a few of my friends. Ivan and Tamara were there, so was Tomo and Nikola as well as Diana. We met up at Pub Med around 6:30pm (I got there around 7pm). I had invited a few more people, but many of them were either too late or didn't make it. One person missing was Voja. Now, its not normal for Voja to miss out on going to a bar. And I doubt he would miss it especially because I was leaving early the next morning. He called me at some point that day saying that he had already made plans to go hiking with Len and couldn't change it. He said we could meet up later and go for a coffee or something. I was a bit surprised, but I guess plans were made, and he had to go through with them. I was just a bit surprised that Len was that much more important than saying goodbye to a good friend... Voja calls me after 10pm and tells me that he's sorry he couldn't make it out earlier. He had just come back from hiking the grind and having win

So, this is my first day back in the US. I left DC two weeks ago and headed home to Vancouver. I spent a wonderful couple of weeks in Vancouver working out of the office there. Lots happened while I was there. I have blogged about some of them in my previous posts. I also tend to complain a lot, so bear with me. This is my blog after all and what good would it be if I didn't let out my frustrations a little! So, lets start with my journey in: My flight was at 8:18am PDT today from Vancouver. Reasonable time right? Well, I don't like it. I woke up at 4:30am. I then stumbled about getting ready: took a shower, found my clothes etc. I woke my mum up. She has to give me a ride to the airport. We leave the house around 5:30am and I left half my coffee in the sink, unfinished. I hate wasting coffee... Somehow, I end up listening to 730 AM on the radio in the car. That has got to be the most boring station I have listened to in a while. They went in a 5 minute loop on traffic, border

So, what have I done since I got back? Lets see. I went for DS on Sunday last week. I ate all sorts of things that I haven't had in a while. I also met friends from work who I haven't seen. We've moved onto other things for about 10 months now, but it is always, always, always a pleasure to run into them. Perhaps it is strange to some to want to see people you work with outside of work, but perhaps this is a testament to how much we care for each other and how much we appreciate each other's company. Not all of the folks I usually socialise with while in Vancouver did make it to DS though... so I need to find another venue to meet up. Liz mentioned sushi and I think I'll go for that. After DS on Sunday, I went to Samurai to each Sushi. We got late to DS and so we didn't have our fill (well, really, we did, but the gluttons that we are..., we had to eat more things). Then we wandered around Robson (I bought a shirt for the wedding...), then went to the Cactus Clu

Its about 1 am here. I am heading home tomorrow. I am excited. I haven't been home in about 5 months. I can't believe I have been away from Vancouver for so long. Since I came back from my last trip, I've been melting, burning, sweating in the weather that DC seems to have for half the year. I've fought bugs, been bitten by god knows what, seen things I never expected of a first world country and began to learn why this palce is the way it is. I am looking forward to going home and working from the Vancouver office. I feel like it is a privilage to work out of the office there... yet a piece of me lashes out at that thought. Why did I move? Why did I have to move? Why couldn't I just work from Vancouver? In the grand scheme of things as far as my company goes, I am small fry in a decent sized pond. Either transplant yourself or find another pond. Life is scary, I chose to stay with the same pond that I am somewhat familiar with and transplanted. I want to go home a

Its almost 60 years since India won her independence from Great Britain. I have been a big fan of history of all sorts and my people's history is something that I am very interested in. When I was born, India was a country run by the Congress party and a Gandhi was in charge. Its quite funny that 26 years or so later, another Gandhi (an Italian one) is running the show in the background. In the meantime, the country has changed and improved by leaps and bounds. But what about from 60 years ago? I have read a lot that many of the founding fathers of our country have written over time... I can only imagine the anticipation, the hope and the dreams of many Indians who are on the brink of that day. Remember what Nehru said? He said, "L ong years ago we made a tryst with destiny, and now the time comes when we shall redeem our pledge, not wholly or in full measure, but very substantially. At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedo

Society is an interesting concept. I guess at a very broad level, it is a bunch of creatures that spend time together, do things together, help each other and so on. In the world of the Internet, there have been many different social networks. There was friendster. There was hi5. There is linkedin. There's orkut. And now there is the mother of it all, facebook. Why do we flock to these social networking sites? Well, I am no psychologist or anything, so don't look to me for a serious answer. I think people go to these sites because they allow you to keep in touch with real people. You know, those people you went to school with, those people you played softball with... those people. We go there to renew acquaintances, catch up on gossip, as a creativity outlet to read, write and heck, even draw. I think this will be one of the big changes to the web. It has gone on for a while now, this web 2.0 business... people are having an easier time creating content and publishing it eas

I have seen 3 movies in the last month or so. And a lot more previews. I like the previews a lot. They give you just enough information to make you want to go and get your hopes dashed. I watched Spiderman 3. That was terrible. There was singing and dancing. If I had wanted that, I would have watched a musical or an Indian film... I saw the latest pirates of the caribbean without watching the prior ones. I got to say, I liked the way that Depp fellow acted. He was refreshingly funny. I watched Knocked Up on Saturday. By far, the funniest one I have watched in a while. It didn't have too much drama, it was funny along the way and there was something refreshing about the cast. And all that Canadiana. I miss home. But then again, what is home? There was a fellow at the theatre (some places in the US spell it theatre... I find that strange because they forgot to mis-spell it or perhaps they are reforming their ways and spelling correctly) who kept farting and burping throughout the mov

I am now a member of facebook. Except, I didn't really want to join. So my name says Full Name... and I can't figure out how to change it. Oh well. Why is everyone and their dog on facebook? Is it any better than things like orkut? I've been on orkut for a while... and I got to say, its fine. Facebook looks pretty neat, it is quite picture centric, I guess that's what it was meant to be. I don't entirely get the point of it though, I mean, there are plenty of these sorts of sites, but lately, it looks like everyone is up with facebook. I got old co-workers asking about me, I got friends messaging me about it, heck, I even have one of my not so technical friends on facebook and enjoying it. I guess he has finally found something he can use effectively, kudos to them. I say this often enough at work... we need to write instructions so my mother can do the task at hand... I think facebook has created an interface easy enough for my friend to use, and that should be wh

Its memorial day today. The day the United States remembers its war dead... and there are plenty of wars they've been in and plenty of dead to remember. Now, its not like I have seen a memorial type mindset here, like Remembrance Day back home and frankly, it surprises and saddens me. Back home, we used to wear poppies at least for our war dead. I mean, even if you didn't really think about what sort of sacrifices they made in the name of King and Country, you wore a red poppy as a sign of respect. Here, I see lots of sales of things, mattresses at Matrress Warehouse, Nissan cars in some place in Gaithersburg or some (sounds like alligator country)... It is also allegedly the beginning of summer here and the weather sure is a testament to that. Anyway, I could rant about war dead for eternity, so I will leave that one alone for now. So, what did I do for the long-weekend? Let's see. I left work early (it was after 5 but not that much after) and went with a bunch of Canadian

Its almost 6 months since I left home! That scares me. I still have boxes that I shipped from home staring at me in my living room. Lazy. I have been through fall, winter, spring and what is hopefully summer in DC already. I'd hate to have it get any warmer here. I've been working pretty much the whole time. I did take a week off in March to go home and visit the family and the new dog. Other than that, I have not done much else. Like going to go see all the monuments, museums etc that dot the landscape in the District. I have learned a few things in the last 6 months: IT is expensive to live in the district - despite all the things the folks from here said before I moved here. Eating out is scandalously expensive. You get twice as much... but it costs a LOT. Rent is scary expensive. I spend almost twice what I do in Vancouver. Except, I had a three bedroom house there. I don't have that here. Getting pants hemmed costs an arm and then some... 2 pants = a cool 36 dollars.