Wednesday, August 23, 2006

My little secret


Now that another batch of juniors and few of my friends have come to US, I was trying to recollect my initial days here. My biggest complaint used to be that everything here was the wrong way. It wasn't just the traffic on the roads. Too many things, including the flush in the toilet were on the wrong side and it was just too hard for me to get used to. However, that's not what I want to talk about now.

I was thinking of something stupid that I did after landing here; something that came to my mind yesterday and made me smile.

After landing here, I was just getting used to the new place and surroundings. Everything was new to me and I was curious to find out how each thing works. After playing with the stove and the TV remote for some time, I noticed the telephone. Immediately, I picked up the phone, dialed 161, hung up and waited for the phone to ring. Actually, 161 is a simple automated test call system in India and we used to play with it a lot. We used to make these 161 test calls, pretend as if someone had really called and then fool others by telling them that they had received a call. Obviously, it didn't work here although I did try some 4 - 5 times before accepting defeat.

Now that I think of it, I guess it was just me trying to find my home environment in a foreign place where everything was different. I was probably just trying to find things that hadn't changed. I am quite sure everyone else too would have tried the same or at least something similar. I wonder why we all hate change so much.

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PS: I guess my post title made you read through this fully. I might employ this dirty trick again. Beware !!
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Friday, August 11, 2006

LTNS-2


Ooh, I wanted to write this post a lot earlier. Anyways, now I am going to squeeze in few other recent happenings that wouldn't have made LTNS-2 but for the delay.

1. Bad Movies: Bad luck. Almost all the movies I recently saw (English/Foreign/Indian) were bad. Not bad, but BAD. The last good movie I recall is POTC2-DMC which doesn't seem as much funny now. The worst of the lot was certainly Fanaa. I knew it was bad, and watched it for the sake of my cousin. But didn't think it would be as bad as it turned out to be.

2. Moving out - Moving In: I shifted to a new apartment and had to go through the pain of cleaning, packing, cleaning, unpacking, cleaning and more cleaning. However, it wasn't too bad because of two reasons - One, I generally keep my place pretty neat ('how much neat is pretty neat?' is relative!!). And two, I left for Detroit the very next day after moving and my room mate did most of the cleaning. What was actually more painful than the actual shifting process was the change in address forms that I had to go and fill out in different places. (They should simplify this process - its too much work for students). Well, the new house is great and I am almost done with taking the wrong corridors and barging into wrong houses.

3. Traveling Michigan: I went to Detroit to my Aunt's place for a week. From there, we all (Uncle, Aunt, Cousin and myself) went on a road-trip to many places in Michigan - the Upper and the Lower Peninsula. The week long vacation was really great and the places we went to were awesome. You can have a look at the pictures in my photo album.

4. The God of Small Things: Without doubt among the best of books I have ever read. It was as if I was transported to Ayemenem and the entire drama was happening right in front of me. The narration moves back and forth and had me hooked throughout. The very first chapter gives away the (sad) ending and raises a lot of 'how's and 'why's. The rest of the book answers these questions little by little. With every new bit of information you are given, you get drawn more and more into the tragedy. The only little thing that didn't go well with me was the character of Baby Kochamma. She was a bit too dark and her lack of remorse even years later was a bit hard to take in. All in all, a must read for everyone.

5. Say Cheeese: I have uploaded new photo albums in my website. These include pictures from my Michigan trip, Sania Mirza match pictures (see my previous post) and few others. You can have a look a look at them here. Because of the low space in my website account, I have uploaded only few of the good pictures and the quality is not all that great. Let me know if you want to see them all in better quality.

I guess that sums up most of it. Other posts will hopefully follow soon.
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