I reached US after what seemed like a never ending flight. I had to change 5 flights and visit 7 airports to get here! Boy, the airlines should have paid me for trying this route out! I am sure not too many would. Cochin - Colombo - Bangkok - Hong Kong - LA - Chicago - Indianapolis !

Well, look at the bright side, I saw the airports of quite a few different counties :)

Bloomington is a small town, a large bulk of its population coming from Indiana university. The Indian population here is quite small.

I am getting used to some of the american jargon [egg plant, okra, pickles ...] and realising that India has its own additions to the Indian english language.

Cell phones in the US work quite differently. Believe it or not, cell phones in India are quite a blessing and the service works much more reliably. And we crib about airtel and hutch not working in caves and mountains when we go for vacations! Here cell phones are based on minutes [time], it doesn't matter whether you receive or make calls, most plans its just the same. Your usage minutes go down. And this applies for toll free numbers too. Well, the good thing in US is you could sign up for a 1 yr or 2 yr plan and get a handset free [the way our reliance phones work] and that you could change your service provider and still retain your phone number. I guess we'll get there soon.

I have my international students orientation next week. I hope to spend free time in finding an apartment to stay in and buying essential furniture if its an unfurnished place.

I am in Cochin till Aug 9. Thought it was a good idea to spend time with family before leaving for pardes. So the general advice I am getting from family, relatives and their friends is to come back to India soon. All the talk is managable as long as I am being fed good home made food.

Last few days in office, I saw how much of a pain storage still is. About 6 months of photos and only photos and I have over 4 giga bytes of images - none I want to part with. What is the best way to carry this data around? And what is the best way to arrange them without spending too much time on it and assuming that they aren't well catalogued? I don't like the idea of resizing them and uploading them as an album in one of the photo-upload websites. I want to preserve the resolution and exif information of all the images. And we are talking about a few gigabytes here. Any clean solutions?

Today is the start of my last week in Hyderabad and I am seeing the pain of relocation for the first time, thanks to having to do it all by myself.

The moves I made in the last 3 years have an interesting pattern. I moved from Cochin [Kerala] to Chennai [Tamil nadu] to Bangalore [Karnataka] to Hyderabad [AP]. Just about covered the entire southern part of the country. Considering that I am a North Indian, its funny that I never really worked or studied in that part of the country.

I am joining Indiana university, Bloomington to do my Masters in computer science this fall. Back to school, books, assignments, tests, exams, research, blogging, poverty and student life. Sounds like fun :)

Am seeing some of the best times in Hyderabad, the weather is amazing, its like the cool breeze and the alluring smell of sand before a heavy rain. I hear that once the rain Gods make up their mind things are going to get messy, I would [happily] miss that mostly. 

Only 7 more days in Hyderabad, yikes! Wow!!

Looks like we have finally set up thinkingms again. Thanks to Pandu and Rosh.

I realised that in a very short time I have gotten used to somethings ... unknowingly.

Cell phone - 1 day without it and I can't order food, find travel means and ofcourse network & socialize. That was yesterday, 6th July.

Blogging - Another great means of feeling connected.

We moved to the new dasblog engine. There seem to be some bugs with the new engine setup. Gotta fix them and start [restart i.e.] blogging. Yippeee.

The grand canyons; Shot from a helicopter.

Shot from a boat on the Colorado river

The hazy ones are shot from a flight window

At Las Vegas

(The ceiling gives it away). The Venetian.

In full spirit for Christmas J

From Love Story by Eric Segal

She was staring straight at me. Her eyes were brown. Okay, maybe I look rich, but I wouldn't let some girl -- even one with pretty eyes -- call me dumb.
"What the hell makes you so smart?" I asked.
"I wouldn't go for coffee with you," she answered.
"Listen -- I wouldn't ask you."
"That," she replied, "is what makes you stupid."

I have read and heard stories about accent leakages, here is some of what I experienced during my last visit out of India.

I was surprised when people asked me how my name was pronounced, I had thought that there was only one way it could be pronounced, Poo-jaa. Nope, I was wrong [Poozha, pooha are some of the *other* ways].

Poor Gijo Jose [pronounced “geejoe“ jose as in pose] [mis-pronounced hiho hosey].

My friend’s name is Anil [pronounced “Uh-neel”], he has a tough time with introductions. Most firangs are polite and ask him softly how his name is pronounced; others call out loudly, “Anal”.

Poor “Anal Joy” from Bengal [pronounced “Uh-null Joy”].

I went for a training on “working across cultural boundaries” and heard some of the participants talk about their visits to other countries. We spoke a little about cultures and traditions in some of the countries. Apparently, showing a thumbs up in Nigeria means “shove it up your ass”.

[Wonder what showing the finger means there J]

One guy spoke about his experience with conducting a training at Singapore. Apparently, there, relations are valued over everything else. The training didn’t start on time, there was just one guy in the room at the right time. Each time a trainee walked in, the entire room would stand up and go forward to greet the person who walked in. And this happened for every person that walked in. The trainer had to stop, wait for the greetings to be exchanged and then resume the training session.

The same guy conducted the training in some other Asian country [I can’t remember the name]. He cracked some joke and nobody laughed. He did that a second time and nobody laughed again. Then the interpreter stepped in and said something in the local language. People laughed. From then on every time the trainer said a joke, the interpreter would say something and the trainees would laugh. Well, the trainer later figured out during a conversation with the interpreter that the interpreter told the audience “He is going to say a joke. Please laugh when he finishes talking” !

I heard some people say that in India, pointing at somebody with your finger is considered impolite. So people point at others using their chin. Err, Is that true?

Desi – Could you please put this in your dick-ey?

Firang – Err…Sure, I can try...

Firang Interviewer – Tell us a little about your self.

Desi Interviewee – I am <xyz >, I passed out in the year 2002 from <blah blah blah >..

Interviewer – “Passed outt…….??!”

Desi guy to a firang lady at a mall – I need to buy a dress.

Firang – Sorry…

Desi – Do you have *dresses* for me?

Firang – uuh, Sure sir, come in…[disappears inside the shop].

Dude walks in to the computer lab with a new hair do and hair coloured red.
Desi lady sitting with a group of students bursts out laughing seeing him walk in and exclaims – You look like a cock!.

Cool dude – Yeah thanks…
Guy next to the lady whispers into her ear: You mean hen...?

[Desi?]