One year and a little more!

Just more than an year ago was when I stopped living in Bangalore. It was supposed to be a 2 month gig out of India. I was supposed to go to Beijing. After an year, I am in San Francisco following where Cruise goes. Being a strict vegetarian and what not, I was not sure how I would cope up with it. Actually, not as much that, I was not sure how I would cope up with living alone. I guess I have survived it somewhat OK. What with almost dying with no money and crazy diseases? There were ups and downs, lots of ups in fact and steep downs as well. Of course, now I am married and have someone to clean up my mess. Literally.

There are a lot of things that I remember about staying in Beijing and now in San Francisco but one of the most interesting (Interesting is an interesting word, it being subjective definitely makes it very interesting. Don't agree? See?) memory is that of coming out of the plane in Beijing for the first time. I had totally underestimated -10 degrees. I was wearing a puny cap and gloves with a lot of holes in the "wool". I almost froze to death in fact. Then, I had to get to the baggage claim but had no idea where it was because guess what, everything was in Chinese! I tried asking around, but no one knew English well enough to help me get to the baggage area. Not that I did not know that language would be a problem, but it hit me like a generously rolled up snow ball accurately aimed at my groin. I had this brilliant plan of remembering someone's face in the plane and then see where that person goes but it failed miserably because to my untrained eyes, all Chinese looked the same! I finally managed to get to the right conveyor and got my luggage and got to the taxi which was outside the heated area majorly adding to my utter discomfort.

Thoughtworks China is brilliant. Based on a lot of feedback from all the expats staying there before me, they have this thing called welcome kit which basically has "Take me to my home" and "Take me to my office" written in Chinese and English along with the address which I could use to show people or taxis if I get lost. It also had an "Insider's guide to Beijing" which is essentially an expat's Bible and the most important of all, a phone so that I can call home! I finished talking on phone to my then girl friend now wife, my then and now parents and brother. And I looked around only to find...

Bare trees. There were hundreds and hundreds of trees for the next 25kms from the airport through the 6th to the 3rd ring road and they were all as bare as Penelope Cruz's breasts in Elegy. It was 4 in the afternoon, nearing sunset and very gloomy. It was -10 outside but no sign of snow as there was essentially no moisture whatsoever in the air. It was essentially depressing. I reached my apartment complex (I am in love with that place now) but the taxi driver (who I befriended quiet well by the time I left there) left me in the basement of my building. He just took out all my luggage, told me something in what now sounds courteous Mandarin and left. Here was the problem - the basement was insanely dark and had these lights which turn on when you walk in front of it and off when you move away. I essentially did not know where the entrance to the building was and once inside how to get to the eight floor. I spent a good 6 minutes, almost panicking by that time, before I finally figured out where the hell was the lift. I entered the lift and made my way to the most depressing apartment ever. It was ill light, there were no neighbors, there was no internet and only Chinese channels on the TV. I just knew within an hour and half in Beijing that this was the biggest mistake of my life.

Now, come to think of it, that was one of the best decisions I made. I still have loads to write, more experiences and incidents than about travel. Hopefully, will get to jot them down. All that said, Bangalore is where home is. I am coming back by the end of February. Looking forward to catch up with my life there again.

Post engagement woes

Pretty much everyone I know have been asking me how I feel about getting married. To the ones I am not close to, I lie saying I am feeling scared and weird. Ones that I am close to, well, I tell them the truth. I tell them that I actually am not feeling anything at all. I think after 3 months or so, one fine Saturday morning, I will wake up in cold sweat realizing that I am married. Or may be I wont. But as of now I am pretty numb. Pooja, on the other hand, not only gets questions but also advice. She gets pretty annoyed (I pretty much copied her title). I think both of us will be relaxed and back to normal once the event is over.

Also, never get into the mess of getting involved in planning a wedding from a different continent. Its very inefficient and frustrating, like working in a waterfall project for a big organization. I am sitting in the Hong Kong transit and pondering as to how much work I have left to do. If you want to console me with a bachelor's party, I will be more than happy. Go ahead, plan one.

Food Scene

So, I was living in China for 8 months and now in SF. Being a vegetarian, I had to cook bloody everyday to survive in China. SF is a different ball game. Pretty much every restaurant here has at least one vegetarian and one vegan option. Unlike other parts of the US, vegetarian doesn't mean just cheese between bread here. Its pretty healthy. People here are very health conscious as well. Anyway, I don't feel like a single working mother taking care of myself now. I just feel like a working "bachelor" again.

So, now that I don't _need_ to cook for survival, I go easy on what I cook. I experiment. I even went to the extent of letting Raghu, my colleague, cook today. Not that I knew if he was good or not. But, generally, I was prejudiced against him (I am old now. I don't beat around the bush anymore about these things. If I am prejudiced against/about something I say so) and hence hadn't let him cook. But today, he convinced me that I don't need to work and that I can relax and do the dishes! I had a momentary lack of control and before I know, Raghu was in control of the kitchen.

He asked me to cut spinach, onion, 3 different varieties of salad leaves, coriander, curry leaves, some carrots and green chillies. He boiled Moong daal in an oven. He fried some sprouted fenugreek seeds, mustard, chillies and asafoetida in a generous amount of vegetable oil. I had a feeling he also had something to do with a lot of cummin seeds and powdered coconut. Somehow, the very acetic smell that was coming from the pan was not reassuring. When the dal just wouldn't become soft in the oven, not before all the water in the bowl had overflown onto the glass plate (which apparently is the expected behavior. Software engineers never learn how to speak normally), the whole of the said contents were transferred into a big, evil looking vessel and copious amounts of water was added. All this was followed by the official covering of the lid and the infamous, "There is nothing left in our hands now" sigh. The fact that both of us were now talking to our girl friends over long distance calls helped only a little in getting the cooking done. He hurled statements like "All this smoke (aka steam) is not letting me see inside to figure out what's happening", "I will add lemon. It will definitely help" and "You add the salt" which did not do much to improve my confidence in the whole fiasco. Even by Indian standards, 3 PM was pretty late and I was hungry. Within 5 minutes, Raghu called it and pronounced the dish to be complete. And then, I took the bold step of taking the first serving...

It was fucking awesome. I have no idea how he managed to pull it off, but he is apparently pretty famous in Thoughtworks for his daal. The confused statements and requests for random ingredients are all to mislead the partner to increase the overall experience of the daal. This succeeds so well that you actually start imagining the daal to be more good than it may actually have been. Also, the careful planning of cooking late and making his friends very hungry never fails as well. All in all, it was a good eating experience today.

We were thinking of cooking some new food. Random cuisine. Lets see how well can we do it. Suggestions are most welcome.

I am back, I guess

I guess blogging is about discipline just like most other things in life. Sad but true. Most people who know me knows that I can't be the least disciplined about the conventional things, say, formal attire for a formal event, not reaching out for food from others' plates, treating my clothes properly in my room, to say the least. These things are, well, you know, so, useless. Then there is sticking to deadlines and being on time. This is I take are pretty annoying to people, but most people know that Indian Standard Time is an addend of an hour and a half anyway. Anyway (used twice in a row for an "not quiet clear what but I am sure it wont be bad" effect) now that I have established without any hard evidence that I am undisciplined which is not that hard to believe though, I will get to where the heck did I disappear.

I got engaged. To a girl. To the girl even. I went from Beijing to Bangalore to Beijing to Bangalore to San Francisco in a span of 5 weeks. And I got engaged while this was going on. I was on a 15 hour a day customer support for 3 weeks which ended up being the biggest deal for our product so far. Yes, we were supporting before they had actually paid. I have packed and unpacked a lot in general. What little time I have been getting, I have been spending it between home, girl friend, friends, movies and hackery. Its been crazy hectic but its one of those nice hectics. The one after which you are happy that the phase is over, but you have no regrets whatsoever. In fact you are happy you went through it.

This being a come back blog, should traditionally be without any interesting things at all and one can basically ignore it, much like the rest of my blogs I am afraid. But, since I am not happy that one will ignore this blog, much like the rest of my blogs, I will add something almost but not entirely useless.

I have had more than one friend tell me that home is not just the house you own/live in. It is a bigger concept. The shops, people, annoying dog next door, kids playing in your street, the freaking annoying traffic jams, the rains, the summer, the power cuts, fighting to get cinema tickets or a parking space and many more. They all add to what is home. Comfort zone I guess. You of all the people, my dear reader, of course know this in theory. You might have read enough books, watched enough movies even had enough friends who have left home to do whatever it is that they are doing wherever you have met them tell you the same. But, its not until that you have experienced yourself that you realise what is home. The feeling you get when you do go back home, let me tell you, is something that you have to experience. No amount of theory is enough to make you understand how good it feels.

It will be a while till I come back home, but Bangalore is definitely where home is.

Quick Suggestion

I have a proposal to the Kannada, rather, all Indian movie makers. I watched about 4 movies now and all of them waste about 2 hours to show how the hero and heroin fight and then fall in love. EVERY GODDAMN MOVIE. So, please, spare me the horror of sitting through the same damn thing and lets just get to the point of the movie. That's right - THE POINT OF THE MOVIE. Oh wait, YOU IDIOTS DON'T HAVE A POINT!

Well, being a confirmed bad movie addict, I have a need to watch Kannada, rather, all Indian movies. So, please cut me some slack. Pretty please?

I am sure in about 2o years, I will look back at this and go, "Well, it was worth a try".

Missing Elections

I am very sad I am missing the elections this time. On the bright side, I can blame an estimated 69,99,99,999 voters if, rather when, something goes wrong. HA!

Idiots

I am so fucking glad I was not in PESIT. I mean, seriously, look at this! I am a fucking grownup when I am in engineering. Treat me like one ass holes.

The Law that no one talks about

I don't know about you, but I follow this unstated rule while using the Gent's room. I have seen a lot of other guys follow it as well. Its as if we have an unwritten understanding of the "Least distance of distinct urinal" rule. It goes, "You always choose a slot such that you are at a maximum distance from all the people who are currently using the urinals and any new person that comes in can choose a slot which is at a maximum possible distance from everyone else."

So, basically, if you have 3 urinals and all are empty, you choose the one on either end and not the one in the middle so that the person that comes next can choose the one at the other end. Similarly, if there are 5 urinals and 2 people, chances are that they know the rule and are at opposite ends already and you choose the one in the middle. Even if they don't know the rule, there are always legal slots that are optimized for given the situation. However, its a big problem with even number of urinals. That's when you face one of the most difficult philosophical questions of our era - "Do I go next to the guy who is humming softly or the guy who is wiggling a little?". It is a hard one really and there is no "Do I go next to the guy who is humming softly or the guy who is wiggling a little? for Dummies" book that has an easy answer to this. Every time you have to take that call and every time you have to repent your decision. This is what we go through. Seriously, these folks should cut us some slack!

Anyway, a really annoying thing is when you know the rule and some one comes in and starts unzipping right next to you even though there are a lot of legal slots. Its as if time slows down and everything is happening in slow motion. You think you are going on forever, as if you have had 2 liters of water, a coffee, a diet coke, some orange juice and green tea in a span of an hour (you are pair programming basically). The sound of the zipper feels a loud, prolonged, shrill shriek on your ears, physically hurting them. Soon enough, the pain becomes so unbearable that you go numb. You don't feel anything, even the fact that you are done or that you are being billed by the hour. You just stay there paralyzed. Annoying and painful.

And oh, you guessed it right. There is a formula that calculates the discomfort experienced by a person who knows the rule and the next person coming in breaks it. Its "The amount of discomfort caused when the rule is broken is directly proportional to the number of legal slots that were ignored and indirectly proportional to the square of the distance between the given slot and the newly occupied slot". The constant of proportion is called "Yuri's constant", named after the famous, "Yuri Gotta-go-ri". He was very infamous for his strange bladder condition (he had to go once every 15 minutes for 45 seconds while humming softly and wiggling a little) and was inspired by the not so famous Kannada poet B L Lakshman Rao.

Anyway, now you know how to annoy the hell out of someone you don't like and who you know knows the rule. Be warned. I don't mind biting you if you break the rule with me.

Quick Question

What do you do when you realize someone you are related to, like your father, reads your blogs? Do you feel strange at all?

Pavan the thief

So, when you are in a country where you don't speak the language and not know the culture, it is very hard to understand what's going on around you. But, over time you feel confident enough to make simple assumptions as to what's going on and try to pitch in. Especially, when you understand the odd word here and there, you think you know what's going on. Boy, can you be more wrong.

We went out for team lunch to the same place from where I order lunch everyday. Going to the place itself is nicer. Like most of the restaurants in Beijing, the place is filled with people who smoke and yell at the top of their voice "Fú wù yuán" which means "Waiter". This is completely accepted and in fact, the waiter attends to the one who shouts the loudest. So, its like an yelling competition which is so tempting that you do not want to be left out. Anyway, we finished our lunch and everyone left while I was still collecting my coat and drinking water (read forging for the remaining pickled peanuts). I wear my coat, which was under this head resting silk cloth, the kind that they put on fancy chairs to avoid stain from dirty heads, one of those. They apparently think putting a coat on a chair reduces the aesthetic value of the noisy smoke filled, its allowed to smoke in public here, restaurant that smells of pork, fish and a myriad of other dead animals. So they just remove the cover, put your coat there and then put the cover over it. I just thought "Hmm. Weird" to myself while munching on my, oh, drinking water and pulled it out, put on my coat and started to leave. When this "fú wù yuán" came running and said, while smiling, something with an animated body language. I had no clue what she meant, but like a jack ass, went "shá ma" (what)? . Then, she repeated the same words very fast thinking I actually understand what she is saying. I just assumed that she was asking me if I liked the food, gave her a thumbs up, said "zài jiàn" (Goodbye) and left. She was confused, but finally said "zài jiàn" herself. I happily walked back to office having a good time in general and reached back the table and removed my coat when...

An yellow silk table cloth fell down my coat. Here was the problem. There was an extra one of those things that was stuck in my coat and the waitress was trying to tell me to hand it back or she will call the security. When I said "What", she said that I really don't want to be stealing in daylight, especially when China and India doesn't have a good relationship and things can turn ugly. Also, that Chinese prisons are not a nice place to be in and that she was sure I am not here to visit them. Finally, if I leave the table cloth as is, she will not report it but then, I could never go there again. Ever. All with a smiling face. At least, I am convinced now that this was what she said.

Anyway, I did get it back with me and now, it sits on a chair, the chair of dishonesty (going by the theme of Forbidden City) which no one uses. We are planning to decorate the chair further. May be I can pull it once more. May be.