Aloha from Springfield!

Hi there folks! I know this may come as a surprise - since I myself expected my next post would be from Toronto. However, it is not! This post comes to you from Springfield, Illinois...yeah, that's right - home of the Simpsons, or not.

How, When, Why, What? Easy, patience is key here. I mean, a lot of stuff has happened in the past 10 days or so since I landed, but I'll try to touch on everything. Me and my cuz sis Anita drove down here all the way from Toronto on Thursday evening. Yup, via the bordertown of Sarnia (which seemed almost as beautiful as C.S. Lewis' fantasy land of Narnia) - an approx drive of 12 hours. I was pretty skeptical about my chances of coming to the US on my business visa I'd got in 2006 when working in MindTree, but then I found out that I had a B1/B2 visa which could work as a tourist visa as well. Swell!! Well its weird that most Indian companies help get us these visas stamped instead of just B1s, but I'm glad whatever! Of course we spent almost an hour and a half at the border, since I had to get my i-94 done and all that. The officer was almost borderline racist in the way he told me to get my fingerprint scanned and then the photo, which he sneakily commented to be a "mugshot". Well, what can you say - "just shut up and get on with it?" No, so I just kept quiet. It was worth it later when we told him we had 9 bottles in the car trunk (from the duty free - for my cuz bro - cos it's super cheap)...he went "Are you serioussss"? Anyway, we finally landed up at my cousin's house at half past 2am in the morning in one piece and hit the sack.

It's been an eventful weekend alright - complete with barbeques and cocktails and all that. We had a mini road trip the day before when we went to St. Louis, Missouri. Fun outing - went to the zoo, then the gateway arch - which is so stunning I tell ya, and later hit the casinos past dusk. We're heading back tomorrow since I gotta get back soon. Launch Week starts Tuesday!! I know I sound excited but I really don't know what to expect. I skipped almost the entire orientation for International students (cos of the road trip) but the 3 hours I sat through was a drag so I ain't complaining.

Well, that's that I guess. Looking back, the past 10 days have been more of settling in and getting acclimatised...spent a couple of days with my uncle and aunt in Brampton (which I now know is where Russell Peters grew up). Shifted out to campus then with Naveen and shifted our stuff to the apartment. It's on the 15th floor of the apt building so not many complains there either! Especially with the view at night of the city lights and the CN tower. So far the weather's been holding up and has been pretty warm in fact but I guess that's just gonna remain for a week at the max. Univ campus is HUGE and I don't think I've covered even 30% of it yet. Lot's of settling in yet to do so I look forward to that once I get back. More notes about campus life then too. Oh, and York Univ's undergrad gals? Let's just say my analogy of the broken-down bus in the last post seems to have come true ;)

More later folks, have a good one!

A Change of Seasons

I remember a time
My frail, virgin mind
watched the crimson sunrise
Imagined what it might find
Life was filled with wonder
I felt the warm wind blow
I must explore the boundaries
Transcend the depth of winter's snow........

Yes, that pretty much sums up my thoughts right now. Change is inevitable for all, and I feel like I'm on life's rocky highway, just about to head into a hairpin curve, not knowing what lies ahead. It's funny really, this blog's been still and silent for quite some time now, almost an year to be precise. And then at this late hour of the day, almost two hours past midnight, something clicks and I wanna blog again. Wow.

Okay, apologies first and then a super quick recap of my life during the last 11 months or so. Let's see - finally bearing fruit to an idea put forth by my friend Naveen, I wrote the GMAT in October. Scored 710. Wrote the TOEFL in Novemeber. Got something decent again. Put application to ISB in December with just a few days of prep, being the innocent yet arrogant fool that I can be at times. Dinged! Put more applications in January. Get waitlisted at USC and UIUC. Bam! Get Admit at Schulich Biz School in February. That was it really, the hairpin curve was already visible on the distant and hazy horizon.

Accelerating ahead. Got a schol in March and then confirmed my seat. May - ManUtd win the league, Bliss. May again - ManUtd get humiliated by Barca, Distress. Somewhere in between I have my last working day at MindTree. That's right - I resigned after 3 years and 8 months of working in Bangalore. Applied for a visa to go visit my bro in the UK - Dinged again! Apply for my student visa in June - get it within 3 weeks. Do a Delhi-Agra-Rajasthan trip in the first week of August. Say goodbye to friends and family in Bangalore and return back home last week finally. Hairpin curve seems alarmingly close now.

Home, home again....
I like to be here when I can...

Sadly there hasn't been any time for me to relax and warm my bones beside the fire. It's been a crazy week. Shopping, visiting cousins, listening to my dad screaming away telling me to pack, but not bothering to do so until the last minute - Old habits do die hard don't they? Naveen got back from Kuwait today morning. Sohan and Mintu flew down to say their byes. And finally now, I'm just 24 hours away from checking in at the airport tomorrow. Heading to Toronto via Abu Dhabi on Etihad (which I hope isn't as bad as some have warned me!) Please let it be okay...or if not, lemme atleast get a seat next to a pretty female. That should suffice.

This blog always comes alive on my away trips from home. Maybe cos I feel it's a means to connecting with the people back home, in the faint hope that some of them may read it (a heartfelt thanks to those that actually do :P), so I'm guessing that this new chapter of my life will lead me to updating this blog more often that not. Let's hope that it keeps going, so that I'll be able to let you all know what sights lie beyond that hairpin curve. Let's hope it a broken-down bus and some very stranded swimsuit models. That would not be a bad start.

Ciao! Next update, hopefully soon, from the other side of the Atlantic.

JARR

Wow, it's been exactly 3 months since my last post! Seriously, that long? Time has flown by indeed.

On the personal front, nothing's much changed. New project, new football season (wait, that's not personal!), same old job, pretty much the same pay scale too (even with the salary revisions we had last month). Oh yeah, we've got a new dog at home now - a labrador pup and he's a cutey! :) Also, my good friend Rajesh has started blogging, so please do visit his blog which is pretty interesting..I'd say it's a techie's view on the corporate-socio-political aspect of life. Seriously though, he speaks sense about a variety of sensible topics, much unlike me! :P

Anyways, I've been thinking about the saying, 'What goes around, comes around' today while listening to JT's song with the same title. Most people tend to perceive that line in a negative sense - It's almost like this - you do a bad deed and then karma comes around and kicks you in the arse. The row-seap analogy. Accurate enough, but not quite. It can also be used positively, you can actually help someone, and then you are rewarded for your good deed somewhere down the line.

However, what I wanted to say is that we never hear the line 'What comes around, goes around'. Why is that? At first, it seems to be exactly the same as the first one. Again, not quite. What is different about the two is this - Think of a circle with two points A and B. Imagine two people standing at these points. Now think of a bullet being fired along this circle (Yeah, I've watched 'Wanted', but it doesn't matter here! :P). In the first case, the person A fires the bullet, and then sometime in the future gets hit by it from behind. Here, the person A pulls the trigger - he is responsible for his actions. That is why we hear the first line often because it makes more sense, right? You are responsible for your own actions.

However, let's look at the second line - Here, you are the recipient of somebody else's action. In terms of our example, the person standing at A gets shot from behind. And then he reacts to it. Now what makes this line too very important is that we, as humans, will tend to behave in the future just as we've been dealt with in the past. So if someone does something extra-ordinarily nice to you, chances are that it's going to remain with you, and if your chance comes by one day, you'll try to behave in the exact same way to someone else too.

Let me provide a recent example from my own life. A few weeks ago, me and my friends were having a good time at Legends-of-Rock. The tracks being played that day were awesome and kept getting better as the night progressed. Then the distinctive techno tune of a new track started blaring from the speakers. I'd heard it before, and I only knew it cos I'd heard it being played as Team-Intro music for the Chicago Bulls and Manchester Shitty. I just couldn't get the name of the song though, so while I rapped my knuckles in desperation against my head, I kept telling Somu, "I know this song man, I know this!" You know what I mean right, it's like the at-the-tip-of-your-tongue-feeling (Or back-of-your-arse, as Sid would say), and it can drive you insane! Next thing I know, a huge, ripped, scalp-shaven guy (who'd been watching me from a nearby distance) comes by, puts his arm around me and says, "Let me put you out of your misery." Whoa, time-out, I almost freaked out cos it sounded like a one-liner from a Western flick just before you shoot a guy. Well, you know what, he did shoot a bullet, but of the kind I was talking about above :)

He said, "I've been watching you despair about not being able to guess the song. It's Alan Parson's Eye in the Sky." Phew! I was like, "Errr...Yes! Thankyou sir!" (Well now I know better, thanks to Wikipedia - the initial music is actually from the song 'Sirius' which then blends into 'Eye in the Sky', and Alan Parson should be known to all Floyd fans for working on the DSotM album). Just another random person, but it did stick in my mind. A week later, at Hard Rock, I was just on my way to the men's room when 'Layla' started rippling in through the speakers. After I was done, I got out and was making my way back to my seat when I noticed a firangi begging the bartender, "Dude, please tell me which song is this! I just can't get it!" The bartender surprsingly didn't know too and was like "Uhh..don't know, sir." I first thought I wouldn't bother but I then remembered the incident from the week before and I knew exactly what he was going through. So I went over to him and said, "Mate, it's Eric Clapton's Layla." You should have seen his face. He was overjoyed and flushed with emotion and said "Thanks man! Thanks! Damn!" Made me feel good no doubt but the firangi's thanks were not due to me, but to the guy who'd helped me at LOR.

Simple, 'What comes around, goes around'.

That's all, but I wanted to say something else too..oh yeah, JARR! It stands for Just Another Random Rant. But I hope it made some sense too :)

The mango thieves

Last week, my aunt checked their letter-box like she usually does every morning and found a neatly folded piece of paper. She opened it and found it was a letter, addressed to her and uncle. The first line went like this -

"Njan athmahatya cheyyan pova. Ningal kaaranam."

"I'm going to commit suicide, and it's because of you."

----------
Two weeks earlier
----------

My uncle and aunt stay just a few houses away from us. They have a lush mango tree outside their front porch, that leans out over the gate. This is the mango season, and both uncle and aunt had been waiting patiently for the mangoes to ripen. However, in the past few weeks they noticed that the good mangoes kept disappearing every morning. Not sure what was the reason, uncle decided to keep watch one late evening.

And sure enough, once the sun went down and it started to get dark, he noticed three young boys, not more than ten years of age sneaking up to the front madhil (courtyard wall). Two of them helped the other onto the mango tree, and then one more climbed up too. So while one of the boys kept watch, the other two furiously scoured the tree for the best mangoes and kept throwing it down to the kid keeping watch, who would then out them in the polythene bag that he had.

Now my uncle is a smart person. He didn't just rush out to scare them and drive them off. Instead he waited till one of the boys had traversed one branch of the tree that wasn't that close to the front wall, but much nearer to the house itself. Then he rushed out and "jumped" the kid. The boy just froze and was too scared to do anything stupid like trying to climb back out, cos chances were that he would just fall and break a limb. But his partners-in-crime were fast. The other boy (who looked like the gang-leader) was out of the tree in a flash and over the wall. He grabbed his sidekick (the one dutifully carrying the mango sack) and they were both off like the wind. You don't get much loyalty these days from anyone, even fellow thieves!

My uncle then told the boy to get down, or he would get into more trouble, so the boy who was already scared out of his wits did so. Now my uncle can really get angry, or even better, he can really "act" angry and make you feel his wrath if he wanted to. So he caught the boy and made him sit down in the front porch. He then told him that he was going to call the police, and that they would come in their nice little jeep and take him away and put him in jail. The boy went pale and started crying loudly. He said that today was his first time and that it was his friend who put him up to it. After some time, aunty came out hearing all the noise and tried comforting the boy by saying they wouldn't do anything and that it was alright. But the boy was almost out of breath now, crying like there was no tomorrow. Finally uncle let him go and he ran away into the night still sobbing.

-------------
Cut back to the present
-------------

My aunt had totally forgotten about the incident, and so had no idea what this letter was about, but she would understand as she kept reading. It went like this (in broken malayalam) -

"Njan athmahatya cheyyan pova. Ningal kaaranam. Aa divasam ningal enne cheyyatha thethinu chumma pidichillay? Enittu policinu kodukam enne paranjile? Ningalu enthina enne ippalum pidikan nokkunathu? Athu konde njan athmahatya cheyyan pova. Njan chumma parevalla, sherikkum. Njan orru pravasham oru kai nokhiyatha, pakse athu paali poyi. Athoonde njan pinnem shremikum, ningal policinay vilichal. Allengil njan adutha pravasham aa vazhi verumbol ningal enikku orru manga therenam.

Ennu snehapoorvam,
Ningalude manga katta paiyyante kootukaran."

Let me translate it for those who don't understand the language.

"I'm going to commit suicide, and it's because of you. That day you both caught me for a crime I did not commit, and you were about to call the police and put me in jail. Why are you simply trying to catch me now also? Therefore I'm going to end my life. Don't think that I won't try it. I had tried it once before but the attempt failed. So I will surely try again if you call the police. If you don't want me to suicide, you should give me a mango the next time I come that way.

Yours lovingly,
The friend of the boy who stole your mangoes."


If that doesn't make you smile and feel at least a bit sorry for the kid, nothing will :)

Kings of Europe!

Yeah, I know..I'm ten days late to rant n boast about this, but I at least have an excuse that I've been celebrating the win all these days. ManUtd beat Chelski 6-5 on penalties, in a gripping match that had me nerve-wrangled at the end of it. Very emotional too, may I add.

Penalty-shootouts are easily the most twisted and sick way to decide the winner in a football match, but it's the most entertaining too. And this final's shootout ranks right up there in the my list of the most-heart-attack-inducive shootouts ever. Ever. Call me a coward, but I just couldn't bear to watch it straight, and so, like a 10-year old kid, I covered my face with both hands and watched every kick through a tiny slit between my fingers. Screaming all the time. John Terry's slip and miss was followed by one of the most pure moments of euphoria in my life. Then Van der Sar saving Anelka's kick, and the realization that we were European Champions for the 3rd time...my, it's just a little too hard to put into words. It's all a blur now, and I can only remember jumping up and down as if I were on a trampoline, doing a rockstar knee-skid towards the television, hugging Shyam and Sohan, things like that. The exact same feelings every ManUtd fan was going through around the world.

I had put up a poll on this blog - whether ManUtd would do the double or not, in the faintest hope that the dream would come true this year. Now it's seems almost unreal that we've done it. We had our moments of luck in the final, but we were undoubtedly deserving champions of England and Europe! I'm so proud of my team! :)

Champions!

I returned from the US on the 11th, the last day of the league season. It had been a long journey back (24+ hours, three flights) and boy, was I tired. But within me, a mix of excitement and tension was building to it's climax. This was the D-day, the day when hopes would be dashed or dreams fulfilled. The day that would earn bragging rights for another year or a post-season of despair. The last day of the Barclay's Premier League, with both ManUtd and Chelsea equal on points at the top.

A win would see us retaining the title for a second year running, a draw/loss (along with a Chelsea win) would see them pip us to it at the finish line. After a season of exciting and brilliant football, the latter would be just too horrible to comprehend. By the time the match started at 7.30pm, I was a nervous wreck and it was only going to get worse. For around 20 mins in the 2nd half, both teams were leading 1-0 and a goal either way would seal the title's fate. In the end however, it was a time of pure ecstasy with us winning 2-0 against Wigan, and Chelsea drawing 1-1 with Bolton. These moments are what makes being a fan so special.

This season has been different for two reasons. First, in my seven years of following the league, this is the first time the title race has gone all the way till the final day. Second, this is the first season where I've watched more than 50% of the matches online (due to being out of the country and not having access to cable TV for 4+ months). This win means it's our 17th league title now, and we need just one more to equal Liverpool's record of most league wins. It's been one the best seasons ever and it's not over yet! That's right, there is still the small tiny minuscule matter of the Champions League final on May 21st.

Win there also and this season would be the biggest ever since 1999.

BlackStratBlues

It's not often that I put up a post on music, though it runs through my blood. However, some things just beg for whole-hearted appreciation, there's no denying that. This post is solely dedicated to one such endeavor.

A couple of weeks before, I was asked to take a look at the site blackstratblues. It's a website put up by a bloke named Warren Mendonsa, whom many of you having interest in music/bands based out of India might have already heard of. He's the guitarist of the band 'Zero' and though I've never heard them play, I just can't wait to see them play live as soon as I get back from DC.

Well, this site is for his first (and hopefully not last) solo album called 'Nights in Shining Karma'. It consists of eight tracks (all instrumental) and each one is unique. The album starts of with the track 'Incense', that sounds so pure and gripping. You feel the track just crying out - 'You're listening to something special. Don't tune out, there's more magic yet to come.' The next track is 'Soar the sky' which is again beautiful and keeps you hooked on.

Then come the masterpieces. The next two tracks are my personal favorites - 'Anuva's sky' and 'Blues for Gary'. All I can say is - Just go listen to it! Anuva's sky is obviously written for a loved one, and the feel you get from the song is just brilliant. It just throws you into this realm of positive energy and hope. Blues for Gary is Gilmorish jazz (if I can use that word) and is another beautiful creation. Honestly, I've run out of superlatives so I'm gonna stop. The last song in the album is 'Bombay Rain' which is powerful and delivers a punch throughout.

The best part about this whole thing is that the album is available for free download on the site. I ain't joking - I've been listening to this album atleast once everyday for the last two weeks, it's almost like a ritual now! Don't wait for another second, just go to the site and listen to the album (it plays automatically) or download it (192kbps) and enjoy!