Hey guys, after a brief hiatus (albeit a long one :P) I've finally gotten the time, motivation, desperation (you name it..) to pen another article. Last time we met was when I was en-route to London to read out some paper (yeah, that's how I roll .. ;) ) and we left it at that. Then, I was all set to start working after my BE, until I decided I loved school too much to leave it so soon so veered off course to pursue grad school instead at Carnegie Mellon. One hell of an experience! But that's for another blog, today lets talk something else. Fast forward August 2015, San Jose, California.
Its Friday night. After a harrowing week at work, complete with meetings, brainstorming, whiteboarding and what not, trust me, no other word sounds sweeter that 'weekend!', unless of course if its 'vada pav' or 'baida roti', which thump home any day! Anyway, so as I was saying, Friday night, you're just heading off work and life is awesome. The birds are singing, the people look excited like the ones in the 'Kayam churan' ad and you for once don't even seem mind the traffic build up on Montague, which on its day can put Mumbai's chuna bhatti to shame. So in such productive milieu, I decided to make plans. Now I'm not really the one who makes plans and organizes things. For all I care, best plans are the ones involving food and TV followed by a nap. But hey, sometimes even the toughest grouchy generals are swayed by the Friday storm. Never a sloucher from action, I started calling up my friends to set the ball rollin'.
S: "Hey Man! Its Friday!! Lets do something!"
A: "Um..what?"
S: "You know, the usual. Dinner and movie. We can go to this awesome chaat place I found in Sunnyvale and I heard there's a new Sunny Deol film playing."
A: "Um..no thanks man. I'm personally sick of Indian food and your kind of movies. Why dont we jus-"
S: "Oh alright! Know what, lets party it out grand today. We'll go to that gelato place and maybe catch Mission Impossible instead?"
A: "Actually I need to visit my relatives in Cupertino, man. They've got this Pooja at their place and they're insisting me to come."
S: "Whoa...who's Pooja?"
Sadly, he hung up on me for some reason. It seemed like a valid question, no? But it looked like everybody other than me was busy that day. Some were attending office parties, some were out for weekend trips already while some were conspicuously working on a super secret project in a super secret place which they couldn't tell me. Fair enough. A true Kulkarni never backs down. We're always good at holding forts on our own. With a Subway to-go and YouTube, its party started already! After a while, however, when the playlist changed from Honey Singh songs to Baba Sehgal's evergreen hits, I decided to call it a night.
Next morning, after all that partying, I woke up early and made myself some extra spicy adrakwali chai. Usually the dog who stays in the apartment opposite to mine wakes me up. He hates the sight of me. His owner makes more muscles by holding the leash when we come F2F than twirling those freaky gym instruments. I tried being friends with him (the dog) once, but negotiations fell apart and we agreed to disagree from then on. As I sat on the steps outside my apartment sipping chai, I could see him curled up in the opposite window. He saw me with his one eye open or maybe he was just jealous of my awesome chai, but next second he went all gung-ho mode and started barking his head off and being a nuisance to the whole building like he always is. Smiling to myself, much to his chagrin, I wished myself a good morning :) A day well begun.
Usually I don't stay at home on weekends, really. When not hiking (read driving up to a nearby hill where there are a bunch of shrubs to look at) I enjoy my hobbies like reading stuff or doing the laundry for a change. This time however I thought I'll skip the usual El Camino eat out lunch and cook something instead. I've always believed that home cooked food is healthy. Especially after facing those hostile fellows at the restaurant who didn't think too highly of my tipping
(Hey, 90 cents == 57 Indian rupees!!) So as I was cooking it up while looking at people going up and down the street (my apartment has a great vantage point ;) ) I received a call from my younger cousin in India.
C: "Yo bruh.. waddup?"
S: "Um..bas badhiya. You tell me. How's school? You must be in 8th standard now, right?"
C: "Ya...school's cool. Boring. But I had lotsa fun today."
S: "Great! School took you out for a picnic or something?"
C: "Wha- No! I went out on a date. It was our second one in a month now. I wanted your advice actually. How do you think I should proceed? Should I take it slow or...."
Now, to say that I was thoroughly dumbfounded would be an understatement. Someone asking me advice about dates is like asking Ashish Nehra for batting tips on a bouncy wicket. The only experience I have had with 'dates' are the skype calls which my folks (who are incidentally, strong followers of 'Got a job, get married' movement) set up for me at a moment's notice sometimes and the ones with almonds that I get at the dry fruit shop, which I actually enjoy. So mind you, this is a totally unchartered territory.
S: "Um..you know what, you should concentrate on studies. Clear your tenth, then the world is yours"
Yeah right. Load of BS. Do kids buy it anymore? 'Clear the 10th, then the world is yours'. 'Clear the 12th, then the world is yours'. 'Clear Engineering, then its all easy'. 'Get a job, then you're all set!'. Being a recipient of these all this while, it felt funny to give all this gyaan away as the source.I could now see what they really mean about inside jokes! :D
C: "Easy for you to say. You're in California. Surrounded by awesomeness. Tell me, what exciting are you doing today? I won't tell aunty, promise!"
S: "Um....Okay. I'm making Khichdi today..."
Maybe my younger brother thought I'm a lost cause after all. After spending a couple of awkward minutes talking about weather, I ended up speaking to my aunt for a longer time, who seemed very interested to know whether we've got access to 'Ambe mohar' rice here.
After a very unspectacular Saturday when even ripper the psycho-dog started getting bored of baring his fangs at me, I dragged myself out of the house to do some grocery shopping at the local Indian store on Sunday (I was running short on chai..). While I was busy fighting for my rightful place at the checkout queue in chaste bambaaiya hindi and giving my advice on 'which roti brands don't stick to the tawa when heated' to inquisitive grannies, I ran into my senior from college who seemed to have bought groceries to ration the whole downtown Mountain View for a week.
S: "Hey, great to bump across you here! What's up?"
F: "Nothing much. Sunday shopping. My in-laws would be coming next week", making a face similar to that of Vinod Kambli's when India lost that '96 match at Eden Gardens
S: "Wow..you got married and all, eh? Congrats!"
F: "Yeah..whatever.."
S:"Where're you at? I live right here in San Jose"
F: "I live in Santa Clara. but will be moving to Cupertino soon. Buying a house there", he forced a smile like a person having a bad toothache but enjoying god's bounty all the same.
S: "Yikes! Congrats are in order! Cupertino, eh? You're one rich guy.."
F: "Yeah right..its a small house but you know, good school district?" shrugging and wagging his eye-brows importantly.
S: "Yeah..I know, I know. Very important.." pfff. Yeah. I also know why Kattappa killed Bahubali.
F: "Anyway, what's up with you these days? Where're you working at?"
S: "I'm a Cloud Security Engineer. I work at- "
F: "Yeah..its always cloudy in Silicon Valley. Looks like my wife is waiting by the car. Gotta go. See you man, Come home sometime" and with another pained look, he heaved the wheel barrow of his cart towards the parking lot.
After negotiating my way across the checkout queue, I drove back into the Sunday evening sunset, thinking about Clouds, networks and Salman Khan movies.
Its Friday night. After a harrowing week at work, complete with meetings, brainstorming, whiteboarding and what not, trust me, no other word sounds sweeter that 'weekend!', unless of course if its 'vada pav' or 'baida roti', which thump home any day! Anyway, so as I was saying, Friday night, you're just heading off work and life is awesome. The birds are singing, the people look excited like the ones in the 'Kayam churan' ad and you for once don't even seem mind the traffic build up on Montague, which on its day can put Mumbai's chuna bhatti to shame. So in such productive milieu, I decided to make plans. Now I'm not really the one who makes plans and organizes things. For all I care, best plans are the ones involving food and TV followed by a nap. But hey, sometimes even the toughest grouchy generals are swayed by the Friday storm. Never a sloucher from action, I started calling up my friends to set the ball rollin'.
S: "Hey Man! Its Friday!! Lets do something!"
A: "Um..what?"
S: "You know, the usual. Dinner and movie. We can go to this awesome chaat place I found in Sunnyvale and I heard there's a new Sunny Deol film playing."
A: "Um..no thanks man. I'm personally sick of Indian food and your kind of movies. Why dont we jus-"
S: "Oh alright! Know what, lets party it out grand today. We'll go to that gelato place and maybe catch Mission Impossible instead?"
A: "Actually I need to visit my relatives in Cupertino, man. They've got this Pooja at their place and they're insisting me to come."
S: "Whoa...who's Pooja?"
Sadly, he hung up on me for some reason. It seemed like a valid question, no? But it looked like everybody other than me was busy that day. Some were attending office parties, some were out for weekend trips already while some were conspicuously working on a super secret project in a super secret place which they couldn't tell me. Fair enough. A true Kulkarni never backs down. We're always good at holding forts on our own. With a Subway to-go and YouTube, its party started already! After a while, however, when the playlist changed from Honey Singh songs to Baba Sehgal's evergreen hits, I decided to call it a night.
Next morning, after all that partying, I woke up early and made myself some extra spicy adrakwali chai. Usually the dog who stays in the apartment opposite to mine wakes me up. He hates the sight of me. His owner makes more muscles by holding the leash when we come F2F than twirling those freaky gym instruments. I tried being friends with him (the dog) once, but negotiations fell apart and we agreed to disagree from then on. As I sat on the steps outside my apartment sipping chai, I could see him curled up in the opposite window. He saw me with his one eye open or maybe he was just jealous of my awesome chai, but next second he went all gung-ho mode and started barking his head off and being a nuisance to the whole building like he always is. Smiling to myself, much to his chagrin, I wished myself a good morning :) A day well begun.
Usually I don't stay at home on weekends, really. When not hiking (read driving up to a nearby hill where there are a bunch of shrubs to look at) I enjoy my hobbies like reading stuff or doing the laundry for a change. This time however I thought I'll skip the usual El Camino eat out lunch and cook something instead. I've always believed that home cooked food is healthy. Especially after facing those hostile fellows at the restaurant who didn't think too highly of my tipping
(Hey, 90 cents == 57 Indian rupees!!) So as I was cooking it up while looking at people going up and down the street (my apartment has a great vantage point ;) ) I received a call from my younger cousin in India.
C: "Yo bruh.. waddup?"
S: "Um..bas badhiya. You tell me. How's school? You must be in 8th standard now, right?"
C: "Ya...school's cool. Boring. But I had lotsa fun today."
S: "Great! School took you out for a picnic or something?"
C: "Wha- No! I went out on a date. It was our second one in a month now. I wanted your advice actually. How do you think I should proceed? Should I take it slow or...."
Now, to say that I was thoroughly dumbfounded would be an understatement. Someone asking me advice about dates is like asking Ashish Nehra for batting tips on a bouncy wicket. The only experience I have had with 'dates' are the skype calls which my folks (who are incidentally, strong followers of 'Got a job, get married' movement) set up for me at a moment's notice sometimes and the ones with almonds that I get at the dry fruit shop, which I actually enjoy. So mind you, this is a totally unchartered territory.
S: "Um..you know what, you should concentrate on studies. Clear your tenth, then the world is yours"
Yeah right. Load of BS. Do kids buy it anymore? 'Clear the 10th, then the world is yours'. 'Clear the 12th, then the world is yours'. 'Clear Engineering, then its all easy'. 'Get a job, then you're all set!'. Being a recipient of these all this while, it felt funny to give all this gyaan away as the source.I could now see what they really mean about inside jokes! :D
C: "Easy for you to say. You're in California. Surrounded by awesomeness. Tell me, what exciting are you doing today? I won't tell aunty, promise!"
S: "Um....Okay. I'm making Khichdi today..."
Maybe my younger brother thought I'm a lost cause after all. After spending a couple of awkward minutes talking about weather, I ended up speaking to my aunt for a longer time, who seemed very interested to know whether we've got access to 'Ambe mohar' rice here.
After a very unspectacular Saturday when even ripper the psycho-dog started getting bored of baring his fangs at me, I dragged myself out of the house to do some grocery shopping at the local Indian store on Sunday (I was running short on chai..). While I was busy fighting for my rightful place at the checkout queue in chaste bambaaiya hindi and giving my advice on 'which roti brands don't stick to the tawa when heated' to inquisitive grannies, I ran into my senior from college who seemed to have bought groceries to ration the whole downtown Mountain View for a week.
S: "Hey, great to bump across you here! What's up?"
F: "Nothing much. Sunday shopping. My in-laws would be coming next week", making a face similar to that of Vinod Kambli's when India lost that '96 match at Eden Gardens
S: "Wow..you got married and all, eh? Congrats!"
F: "Yeah..whatever.."
S:"Where're you at? I live right here in San Jose"
F: "I live in Santa Clara. but will be moving to Cupertino soon. Buying a house there", he forced a smile like a person having a bad toothache but enjoying god's bounty all the same.
S: "Yikes! Congrats are in order! Cupertino, eh? You're one rich guy.."
F: "Yeah right..its a small house but you know, good school district?" shrugging and wagging his eye-brows importantly.
S: "Yeah..I know, I know. Very important.." pfff. Yeah. I also know why Kattappa killed Bahubali.
F: "Anyway, what's up with you these days? Where're you working at?"
S: "I'm a Cloud Security Engineer. I work at- "
F: "Yeah..its always cloudy in Silicon Valley. Looks like my wife is waiting by the car. Gotta go. See you man, Come home sometime" and with another pained look, he heaved the wheel barrow of his cart towards the parking lot.
After negotiating my way across the checkout queue, I drove back into the Sunday evening sunset, thinking about Clouds, networks and Salman Khan movies.
