I live in fear…

I am shit scared….
About the recession? No.
About my onsite stay? No.
About my job staying till the end of the recession? No.

These are probably the things troubling most people today. But, on my mind, there is something much bigger than that (at least for me). I am shit scared of nothing but my marriage…

Is the marriage date fixed? No.
Have I met the girl? No.
Is there someone shortlisted? No.
Have I even talked to one? Hell no.

Then what is there to be tensed about? I have no idea…and that is why I am more afraid than ever… But from the day that Dad sent me a couple of links on some website to have a look at the girls; I am having difficulty in sleeping at night for the first time. It all started a couple of weeks before when my dad decided to start looking at websites and identifying girls for me.

Before that they had asked me my criteria. I gave them just four things:

1. She should have a beautiful smile. Why? When we meet, I just want to look at her smile and forget everything else…
2. She should know Hindi. Why? I don’t want to sit with my friends and have to talk in English, for god’s sake. That would drive me crazy.
3. She should not be one of the mallu nurses. Why? When mallu girls do not know what to do, they become a nurse, so that they can get married to some NRI and earn lots of money. That is a blog in itself.
4. She should be educated. Why? Well, I want someone with whom I can have discussions at my level. [Which in itself is not very high].

Although my parents are in the US, they found 2 girls, who they see as candidates. I had a look at the pics and said, well as long as they meet the above four criteria and your set of infinite ones, I have no reason to reject them. I mean, who am I to reject anybody. I am not John Abraham or John the Baptist for that matter. Essentially, I am no hunk and I ain’t no saint.

Then started the sleeplessness. I am tensed, I am scared, lots of thoughts going on in my mind. With no idea what the future holds, it’s ok to be wary, but scared… Why the hell am I scared? I will try to list down few of my thoughts and probably I will get my answer.

1. How will the girl be? Will she adjust with my parents, or will my life be an endless drive to ensure that both my parents and my wife are happy and get along well.
2. How will she be to me? Will she understand me? Heck, I don’t understand myself sometimes.
3. Will she be my good friend? Someone tell me, is it very difficult to be my friend? Am I very demanding? Am I an easy friend? Am I difficult to be with?
4. What about her, will she be an easy friend? Or will she be a difficult one? Will be running around just to ensure that she remains my friend?
5. Will we love each other, or will it be a life of compromise?
6. How about her parents? Will they be as great as mine? Will I be able to talk to them as comfortably as I talk to mine?
7. Will I finally marry someone who doesn’t understand Hindi, and will I be forced to enjoy with her friends as I know Malayalam. I mean, I am ok to be with her friends as long as she doesn’t expect me to leave mine as she doesn’t understand what I talk.
8. Will she be too modern and out of my control?

You know what? There are times when I think, that if I had had 4-5 [highly exaggerated] girlfriends, then probably, I would know how to handle girls and also exactly what I want. There are times when I think that the four criteria I have laid, seems to be too less. I mean, there is no mention of the clause, that she should be a girl… Ok, jokes apart.

I guess, what I am really afraid of is, that I do not know what to talk to the girls when I meet the person. Obviously, the person would be putting her best foot forward, but is that the person? Or is it some alter ego of the actual person that is being projected. Sourav always tells me that I can judge a person very easily and that I would surely select the right person. But to be absolutely honest, I have lots of ESPs, but they all work as long as it deals with someone else. When it comes to things that affect me, it always fails.

I am scared of making the decision, and of the decision going wrong.

White Christmas

We wanna wish you a merry Christmas, We wanna wish you a merry Christmas,
We wanna wish you a merry Christmas, and a happy new year.. :)

This and many such carols have been a part of my Christmas till date. This year, I will be listening to itialian versions of these songs.. :). Yes, I am travelling to Rome for Christmas.... And hence, although the topic of this blog is white christmas, the only days I will have white is post and pre christmas, but probably not christmas itself.

There is a saying that goes around stating that it is not Christmas on the 25th of december only, but on every day that something good is done selflessly. So I presume, I have had my share of white christmas this year, and hence have nothing to complain about.

So what is so special about a white christmas, its just another christmas with at lease an inch of snow around. As I remember it, when christ was born, it was pretty cold, but there was no snow. :). So a tropical christmas is more realistic than a white christmas. So why be so catchy about a white christmas to write songs (Irving Berlin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Christmas_(song)) and make movies about(Michael Curtiz: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047673/).

I was reading through some websites and I found that there is a reason for white christmas being special. It is said that although december is considered to be the coldest time of the year, geographically, it is rare for it to snow during christmas in most of the countries. Unless you are staying in the coldest of mountains or in the northmost areas world, a white christmas is a rarity. Even in places like UK, Canada and Switzerland where snow is a common climatic anamoly, it is quite rare that snow falls during christmas time.

I guess it is true because as it is approaching Christmas, the weather seems to have warmed in Zürich. In fact there is a forecast of sun for the entire next week. It has not snowed in the past few days and the chance seems to be pretty rare that it will snow this week. So well you see, even though it snowed quite well this month, it does not seem to promise a white christmas (wether forecast predicts sun and clouds, but no snow)

For those who have seen how beautiful snow looks (others can see my photo album : http://picasaweb.google.co.in/libintho/SnowAgain#), it would not be hard to imagine, just how wonderful it would look with all the decorations around. Agreed that the decorations themselves are pretty beautiful and wonderful to look at, but I am sure that the snow would add a lot to the asthetic beauty. Add to that the fun that kids (and some crazy so called adults like me) have so much fun in the snow, it is not difficult to imagine why white christmas has such an important place in most hearts and is a hope to look out for the rest.

Here's wishing all the readers of my blog a very very happy christmas and the best new year ever. Thanks for patronizing my blog... Love you all....

Hum to aise hain bhaiya

For those who didn’t understand the title, it simply means (Sorry, but that’s the way we are). :)

Every single person who joins the software industry has a dream to go onsite and earn some big money. People fight, connive, back stab and push people down to get the opportunity to go onsite. OK, agreed, people go on merit as well. But the previously mentioned scenarios do happen a lot. When I joined WASE, I had no such aspirations. I am a person with limited aspirations, and I expected only to be able to perform well... I guess that is a starters dream.

As time went by and I saw people whom I taught tools, planning to go onsite as a tool expert, after a couple of days of working on the tool in our tools lab, the pangs started. The thought then was, if they can, why can't I. The thought died down quickly as I didn't want my onsite dreams to affect my studies. Then my fellow waseians started to go onsite and came back richer, but my heart was still in studies [yeah right]. I didn't want to fail :). Also, my onsite aspirations were more in terms of being able to tour the world, and hence I had my sights on the Consulting role.

Most people, whom I met, said that onsite is not as interesting as it seems. I didn't believe any of them. What could be wrong with perfectly managed traffics, low crime rates, booming or steady economies, high level of education, perfect landscapes? I mean, what could go wrong? Boy, I was going to be proven wrong.

As soon as I got out of WASE, the itch started, I got a much better salary than I used to get as a waseian, but my wants increased. I wanted more. More money. And since I was done with my studies, there was nothing stopping me from seeing the world, was there?

Well I got my dream role in consulting and also got placed in a country people dream to go for a holiday or for their honeymoons, Switzerland. When I saw my deputation letter and read from our internal website how much the expected expenditure would be for a month, I immediately started calculating as to how much I was going to save... I realized soon that it was a wonderful opportunity to roam around Switzerland. Make the best of it. I always wanted to go for a world tour and I saw this as the first step. I couldn't wait to go....

Well, I landed in Switzerland on the 20th of May 2008. The clouds were clear and I could see city quite clearly from the air... large empty roads, with minimal traffic. Surprisingly, the thought that stuck me is not what I had presumed. I never thought, "Wow empty wide roads, no HOSUR road traffic here". All that I could think of was "Its seems so lonely". I was expecting Sourav to be waiting for me at the airport to receive me in the unknown and lonely county, but still a sense of grief and sadness hit me. I was missing India, I was missing my family, I was missing my friends, I was missing my bike, I was missing the Bangalore office. Heck, I was even missing the Hosur road traffic, and all this even before I landed.

Well I landed and was taken aback by the organised way everything was handled, and a new thought entered my mind. "Why can't my India be like this? What does it lack? Does it not have the resources or the capability to come up like this"? Like every young Indian might think, I started cursing the politics and beaurocracy of India which has made us a second world country. Given that the maximum scientific community in major countries is Indian and most of the brilliant minds driving the growth of other countries is Indian.

It has taken me several months (almost 3) to realize what makes us different from others.

1. Discipline: The discipline in countries like Switzerland is so high, that I have hardly seen children cry. Even dogs don't bark. Can one imagine such discipline in India? I know, if as a child, I did not cry, I would have died... If I had a dog and it didn't bark, I would take it to the doctor immediately. But no sir, not here, no dog barks and no kid cries in Switzerland. Let me give you a good side of the discipline here. There are automated ticket counters on almost all stations in Switzerland, but at the stop at Rhine falls, there is just one board, "Please take a ticket at your destination station", and people actually take tickets. Would that ever work in India?

2. Zombies: The processes and standards in Switzerland are so strict and so much inculcated into the minds of the people here, that they seem to be incapable of free thought. Not that they can't, but they are so comfortable in their templates and guidelines and rules that they hardly think of other possibilities. Majority of the people believe that their ancestors have done everything that could be done right and just follow the rules blindly. Without the free and lateral thinking, to me they are left as zombies.

3. Population: The population of this country is very small and hence tagging and tracking every one is a very simple task. [Yes, every person who is a resident or has come into Switzerland is tracked]. When applying for a new house, the owner may as well tell you where all you have stayed from the day you entered Switzerland.

Take just points 2 and 3, you would know why there are low crime rates and no social hassles. Add point number 1 and the growth automatically comes in. The secret is not such a big secret, but why can't it be replicated in India, I would again say the same there points.

1. Discipline (or the lack of it)
2. Zombies (that is what we are not. Every one is a big thinker. Everybody thinks, why in the hell should I do what others tell me to do.)
3. Population (Oh we have plenty of that one)

Given all these comparisons, anyone would say, that India is a place which people would dread to go to, would never go back to or would never want to visit. But the truth is exactly the opposite, every Indian who comes out of India; dreams of the day when he would have fulfilled his monetary needs and go back to India and every foreigner dreams of visiting India. Why? Because there is something in us that makes us tick.

Given all the problems that we have, we are slowly becoming one of the biggest threats to other countries. Indians are everywhere; we are spreading like a virus in every corner of every country. We are desperate and yet we tick, we move on. Churning like the gears of some large machinery. Each gear in itself, not making any sense, but together going where others are struggling to reach.

So tell me friends, who among you who are currently onsite, do not dream of coming back to India? Who among you who have been outside, had not been haunted by the thoughts of India? Would I be right in saying, "Mere desh mein 100 mein se 99 beiymaan, phir bhi mera bharat mahaan"? And although we ourselves may question ourselves on where we are reaching and what are we doing... When someone asks us the same, 95% of us would reply (even though we may know that we are on the wrong side) “Hum to aise hain bhaiya”. And that my dear friends will never change………

Coorg Trip

A fantastically planned trip converted into a photographic exploration by me. That is how I would describe the trip. 6 of us made plans to visit Coorg during the end of March. But as luck would have it, I got very sick and based on everybodies convenience, we postponed it to mid of April (12th and 13th to be exact). As luck w0uld have it, one of us had to drop out at the last minute because of project pressures (we work in such a lovely company). So it was with much enthsiasm that we planned and packed for the travel, a hotel was booked, a cab was booked and the time to depart was decided as 6:00 AM on Saturday the 12th of April 2008.

As it turned out for me, the previous day was the birthday of one friend's (Deepak) sister and hence we also planned to go to his home and wish the sweety. 2 of the 5 finally travelling were also part of the celebrations that happened (me and my sweet lil sis - Shivani). That night, deepak crashed at our place for the night and we ended up playing UNO the entire night. Jayateerth was also with us and hence in the morning, there were 2 people out of the five who had not slept a bit (me and jayateerth).

At 4:30am, I called up all the others, to wake them up. Everybody complained from arguments ranging from "There is a lot of time left" to "I had set an alarm" to "5 minutes please". But my work was done and everyone was awake. The taxi driver reached our office by 5:30 itself and by the time we assembeled, it was already 6:45. I had bought a new camera (Sony Cybershot DSC H9) and I was busy shooting pics after pics in the morning itself.

As soon as we started moving, with Naveen in the front seat, Jayateerth, Anita and Shivani in the middle seat and me spread out on the back seats, I slept. I am still amazed how Jayateerth had managed to stay awake at all.... Well, I awoke almost an hour later when the vehicle stopped to have the stepny changed. Basically it was the heat which got me awake and staring. I looked at the guys standing outside and taking snaps. I was in no mood to get out so I just dozed off again.. I was again woken up when all of them piled into the qualis not able to bear the bangalore heat any more. We started chatting and Naveen started to feel hungry.

Soon we started from there and by the time we were 20 mins away from out last stop, all of us started to feel hungry.. So we stopped at one of the roadside places for breakfast. We were amazed to see the number of people there... but we found a table and sat down to have breakfast. we had a fulfilling breakfast of Idly, vada, dosa and puri (hey that is what all of us, not just me.). This was followed by tea and cold drinks. Poor JT was the last to get the food and he kept wondering if the waiter had forgotten about his order. He would have reminded the guy thrice before the order actually came. On our way back to our vehicle, the girls wanted to have a go at the swings. We went there and met Junior, a little pup with a big attitude. He wanted Shivani's sandals and Anita's pants for himself and kept pulling at them. Again I was running aroung to get one good snap of the pup, but he proved too fast for me.

We set out with our filled stomachs and stopped only once in between to drink some coconut water. The journey till Mysore was very smooth (thanks to the beautiful roads) but the roads from Mysore to Madikeri(Coorg) were a bit bumpy (again thanks to the roads) in patches. We asked a lot of people about the route and would have had a difficult time, if we did not have JT with us. We would surely have managed with hindi and whatever broked kannada all of us knew, but it was far easier because of JT.

We reached Coorg by 1:30pm and all of us were eager to freshen up and have lunch. We had some difficulty in finding the hotel, but the locals were pretty helpful in the same. The location of the hotel did not promise a very good settlement, but it turned out to be pretty good. We had pre-booked two rooms at the hilltown hotel. We talked to the receptionist to find out what sequence he would suggest for us to travel for the two days and he gave us a brochure with the list of places to visit. He suggested that we should not miss talacauvery, Abbey falls and Raja's seat. Looking at the distances, we decided that for that day, we would cover, Abbey falls, Raja's seat and omkareshwari temple. Then we went up to freshen up.

It was 2:30pm by the time we got out of our rooms. As decided earlier, we started looking out for a hotel which would server traditional Coorg dishes. We walked around town and found a hotel called as Coorg Cuisine and went up to eat. It was a small setup and tastefully decorated with traditional coorg items. There were rifles, knifes and traditional dancing props lined around the walls. We looked at the menu and ordered whatever we felt was unique there. We ended up with a table filled with bamboo shoot curry, dry fish curry, Rice noodles, rice balls, plain rice, mixed vegetable curry and chicken curry. The last three was the result of the suggestion by naveen, that we should have something to bank on incase we did not find the other food good. The moment the fish came on the table, JT started making odd kinds of faces and asked us to get the fish off the table. I guess most of us were troubled by the smell, but Shivani, Anita and I had little bit of the fish. Later all of us had fresh lime water with honey. It tasted very nice. We paid the bill and then called the driver.

Now our ride continued towards abbey falls, the ride itself was as beautiful as we could imagine, we stopped at a very picturisque location to take some snaps and then proceeded from there. Abbey falls is some 16 kms from Madikeri and is known to claim a few lives every year, but still a lots of people go there to take in the beauty of the falls. We also enjoyed the scenary there...It was lush green all around. Shivani, who had been there earlier, told us that during the rainy season, it would be very difficult to stand on the bridge on which we stood on to look at the falls as the waterfall would be in its full swing and send lots of water would be falling on the bridge. She also told that there would be lots of fog there...

Next stop was Raja's seat. To describe it is simple, it was the point on top of a mountain from where the kings used to enjoy the sunset and also watch the cultural programs being held in the lawn. It was a non amusive simple structure. What was amazing though was the view that we got. We were simply mesmerized by the view. We saw a point some way forward where some people had gone through uncertain paths. We also decided to go there and trekked (so to say) to the point, where the cliff literally seemed to drop off... The view was amazing. We could have sat there the entire time, only if it was not starting to get dark. Some clouds spoilt the sunset but truly gave a very scenic view for us to enjoy. I would have liked to put the snaps taken, but i am not able to decide which one to select.

After enjoy the view and pestering everybody with my attempted photographic genius (boy were they pissed). We went to the lawn in front of the Raja's seat to view the musical fountain. Here, Naveen bought ice creams for us and we all enjoyed it. We were also entertained by a little kiddo who was next to us and was troubling the dad like anything... And the best part was, the kid was enjoying it... we also enjoyed the entertainment while we were waiting for the fountains to start. It started as soon as it got dark. We all enjoyed the beautiful light and water works. I took a video of the entire thing which is too big to upload. It went on for some half an hour and then we left the place to go to Omkareshwari temple. Oh yes, I did forget to mention the flower beds in the yard. The entire yard was made into a flower garder with various flower designs and formation. looking at them was a heartful experience.

The next target, omkareshwar temple (dedicated to lord shiva) was a beautiful temple with lots of paintings of various deities hanging around in the temple courtyard. The Shivaling in the temple was supposedly brought from Kashi by king Lingarajendra II who had built the temple to get rid of the curse, that he bestowed upon himself by killing pious Brahmin protesting against the kings misdeeds.

After offering our prayers and comparing the power of my camera's flash with another camera present on the temple premisis, we went back to the hotel. Once there, we all retired into our rooms to get ourselves cleaned. In about an hour, all of had cleaned, scrubbed and were ready to have dinner, but before that JT wanted Tea... (I believe, next time, we go anywhere with JT, we should carry a hot keg full of tea, to satiate his thirst for tea). But when we found out that Tea was unavailable at such unhumane hours (only 8:00pm by the way), we ordered for lassis for everybody and horlicks for Ants.. Then we sat down to watch the snaps on the TV. JT had fallen asleep while we were getting fresh (he was the first one to take a bath) and when we woke him up, he was a bit gorgy and lost. I guess it was only now that the no-sleep of the previous night was kicking in.

Dinner was ordered in the room itself and it consisted of chicken fry, chilly chicken, roti's, couple of veg sabji's (I didn't touch them, so i don't remember their names) and veg fried rice. The food was filling. One thing i should mention about coorg is that I feel that the food there is quite cheap when compared to bangalore hotels. Well food disappeared fast and soon we saw that anita had rolled in comfortably under the bed covers, all ready to sleep. We slowly moved out of the room, waiting only for the attendant to come and clean the room. All things done, it was time to sleep. I gave the responsibility of making sure that the camera batteries were charged to Naveen and went to sleep (he said he would sleep late).

As usual the music of the title track of Tare Zameen Par (that's my alarm tone) woke me up at precisely 7:00 AM. First job of the day, wake up the girls. So, I called shivani on the phone who grudgingly answered the phone and pleaded for 10 more minutes of sleep. I accepted that and then debated weather I should actually pull myself off the bed and start getting ready or just get back to sleep for another 10 mins. Well common sense prevailed and I got myself off the bed and got on ahead with my daily chores. Again called Shivanj after 20 mins to find her wide awake. Next job of the day get the lads up. That was an easy job and was accomplished in a matter of minutes with JT rushing in to work out his daily habits. Another 20 mins passed and I went and knocked at the girls door, only to find them still on the bed, when asked why they were not ready, I got an answer from Anita in the sweetes possible manner "We were talking". Asking them to get ready soon, I went back to my room.

Time: 8:00AM, all the guys are ready and we go and knock at the girls room again, one is ready the other is not... Finally by 8:15AM, we all went down to have the complementary breakfast. It consisted of a bread omlet, 2 plates of idly vada, 1 dosa, 3 aaloo parathas, 2 teas and 3 glasses of horlicks. Again, stomachs full, we went up to our rooms to get the bags and by 9:00 we were all ready to go. We checked out and went to our vehicle. We loaded ourselves into the Qualis and started our journey towards Talacauvery. It was approximately 49 kms from the hotel and took almost an hour and a half to reach. 1 hour of the entire journey is best forgotten by both Shivanj and me. Both my lil sis and me were on the verge of puking because of motion sickness. We also had a hard time finding lemons to purchase as it grows in almost every house. One lady gave us one out of courtesy. I don't know whose face triggered the feeling in her. We were both in pathetic shapes.

When we were some 4 kms away from the destination, we decided to take a hike and asked the driver to go ahead and reach the top. I was grateful to be out of the vehicle. Solid ground felt like heaven. The trecking was tiring for me (I am sure about that). I am surely out of shape. No one else complained. But the journey was in every way worth it. Clouds passed us at regular intervals and the climate was very pleasent. We saw the thalacauvery (place from where cauvery originates) and then went up the mountain to see the view point from where the entire region was beautifully visible. The climb tired all of us, but we were crossed easily by a 93 year old man, who thought it was his responsibility to remind naveen that age doesn't matter, fitness does and talked only to him while telling him that "Look, I am 93 years old and I am climbing the stairs with ease and you are taking break".

Once on top, we dispersed in various directions to get the view available from all directions. I developed a sore index just because of all the clicking I was doing. I just went crazy. Naveen and Ants had problems walking on the rough ground barefoot, so they just stayed on the top, while, Shivanj, JT and I went exploring for better views accross. Now the scenary in all directions was just green and we could not see many houses except from one point. The three of us sat on a precipe for some time and wondered how it would be to go on other mountains as these. Time played the villain and we had to leave, we did not go towards the left of the climibing point where we could see the windmills. I may probably regret it for the rest of my life.

The trip down was simple and luckily, our shoes were still in the exact place where I left them. On the way back to the cab, we had some majjige (buttermilk) which freshened us and elavated our spirits. The travel back to Madikeri was univentful, mostly because I was sleeping. If I was awake, I would have probably spoiled the entire environment and mood by puking. Shivanj however could not sleep, but didn't puke either. People who have this problem will understand what her situation was.

At Madikeri, we went to a hotel for lunch, only to find that the food was over. Dijected, when we came out we found that the driver and car were also missing (The driver had gone someplace else to have lunch). Naveen then took it upon himself to get the food from this hotel only. He used his charms to get lunch for all of us. It consisted of 5 meals, 2 chicken curry, 1 bowl dal and cold drinks. I was not feeling hungry, but the first morsel of food increased my hunger and I ate a lot. Then we left from there and stopped only to get some anti nausea medicines for shivanj and me and later to drink tea till we reached mysore.

We played anthakshari throughout with Anita, JT, Shivanj and Naveen being in one team and me on the other. At the end of it all, we were drawn at 1,1.

At mysore, we went o brindawan gardens and spent some time there looking at the flowers. People were royally angry with me for taking photographs and I got a solid scolding from Shivanj for wasting too much time in taking photographs. We left from there at about 9 and reached M3 office at around 11:30pm. We then left for our homes, our lovely trip over. Looking forward to the next trip to enjoy the seasons and beauty of nature....

Life on bench

I am not sure when was the last time i got so bored in my life. Probably in one of the WASE classes, but well then each one was for 2 hrs only.... not like this...Its three days now, the day in between was good as I got some work to do, but now that excitement is over as well..Waiting for a call from my boss to know what to do now...

What to do now is a question I am unfamiliar with.... In the last four years, hardly had a day when i could sit back, relax and say... What next... It was always busy busy busy busy for me. May it be responding mails, or answering phone calls, or helping out others in the team, I hardly had time at my hands. And that too when I spent 12 -13 hrs in office. Now the situation is exactly opposite and am always looking at the my watch to find out how much time I have successfully killed. :). My target for the hour.

MSN and google have become my best buddies as I am either chatting with friends within my company or searching for material on the net to learn. But, I have realised one thing, when you are in situations where you have strangers around you, you do not like doing anything. Dragging myself to go and have lunch becomes a pain when friends are on leave.

But I am sure i wont be like this soon. Either will get some work or will get used to this... There, I am getting a call from my new boss.... hope its for work :)

uhhhhh

Tired eyes, tired body, tired mind. That would best describe my state now. Working as late as 7:30 on a Saturday (yes this week we had 6 working days) has left me completely drenched. Need a good nights sleep, but may not come as I will be playing Age of Empires [;)]. I just finished reading one of Sourav's blogs and I could not put myself back to work. So thought of spending some time here.

Nothing may come out of this, and that is why I have kept putting the title to the last. Lets see what comes out. Life has definitely changed after WASE. Everything suddenly seems to be in a whirl with the world around me changing.

First Sourav moved to a different group, then sis [smitha] got married, Jai's marriage is just around the corner and Neel is in all kinds of troubles with his project in serious soup (Haven't seen him in 3 days [and nights]). Woah, lots of changes and that is only on the personal front. Professionally also, things have changed, more responsibilities have come on my head, although not officially. Being a senior has its disadvantages :'(.

Classes

Hmmm...classes, well that is a thing that we do not want to go to as of now and are surely going to miss soon. Life takes you to various phases and believe me classes, may it be school, college or even education with work, are an integral part of all these phases. Classes are the best places to attain knowledge (yeah right!!). Ok, let me cut the crap. Yup its more like places to freak out, meet friends, trouble teachers and catch up with all the lost sleep....And for those who came in late [A phrase I stole from late...read as for those who skipped the first chapter and started reading from between], I am a very sound sleeper. Ya you can read it both ways, I do make a lot of sound [snoring] while sleeping.

The most recent phase of clases [I beg to keep it anonymous, for fear of getting thrown out] are no different. Lots of fun (between classes) and lots of sleep (during classes). Friends, tea, gossip...blah blah blah....summing up to an unforgetable time that we all crib about now and are going to miss soon. Yeah, its going to come to an end.

4 years of waking up early morning and hardly reaching classes on time, sleeping in class with open eyes and falling heads [no, they do not literally fall off] and the catching up with friends over tea during the breaks....we are all going to say good bye to that soon. All of us aware of it and also afraid of it in the back of our heads. We all know that most of us are not going to meet as much after classes and are really worried about it. But I feel hardly anyone will speak about it. Its an unspoken fact.

Yeah, we may all write to each other through e-mail, and some of us may not. But the fact remains that all of us have made a place in each of our hearts and none of us can forget each other. Buddies for life, that is what we have become. Probably we will not meet, probably we will not talk, but I am sure, when we all meet anytime again, the flames of friendship in our hearts will kindle up again to bring the warmth back again.

Lets hope our friendship keeps going on for ever. To all my buddies out there.. You are all very very very dear to me...and I am proud to have known you as my friends.

Till I write again...

PS: I notice that I am getting more and more senti...subuk subuk....