Well...I am tired of writing common statement of each blog by each blogger.. like it is 'Its been long time I have written something'.... or I dont know what to write.. and all that crap..
Well.. I found some reason to write today thats why this one more boring blog..Yeah.. I finished 9 months here in USA (9 months meant for something else... but still.. dont think too much in that way :) )So I thought (which is unusual), I will write something about my life here, the things I do in day to day life, my friends, my work(I guarantee, will write very little about this), about Microsoft, and many other things.. I will try to keep it very short and save you from the boredom.. But can not guarantee.. Because, whatever I plan, doesnt go through properly.. Whatever I dont plan works out very easily.. Strange.. But true.. not to be philosophical but I think that is called life..
So...what should I write? Well... it happens to me everytime.. Whenever I plan to do anything.. it doesnt happen..
It all started when I joined MSFT ODC.. with intention of coming onsite in 3 months.. but by the time I came.. it was already 9 months of period. Yeah.. u never know... again my plans dont work out most of the time.. :)
Gave 3 client interviews. Cleared them all. And now finally the day had arrived. 9th June 12.20AM Delta Airlines. I was under immense pressure.. how will I handle myself going away from my parents, which is about to happen for the first time.. uff.. But god willing everything went smooth (with few probs.. but thats fine).Finally.. after 3 years in this industry and struggle of over a year.. I was in US. Reached Seattle. My dear friend Niks had come to pick me up. What a country it was in a first look.. Amazing freeways, clean roads, awesome cars everywhere.. Best in class infrastructureIt was very different for a person who has been in Pune for his whole life.
One more reason to cheer about my US visit was, I was supposed to work for MICROSOFT. Yes.. the biggest Software company in the whole world. And it was always my dream to achieve best in whatever I do. Ohh.. the words won't be sufficient, if I decide to explain abut MSFT. Till now, I was just hearing about Globalization and blah blah.. But at that time, I really saw what is globalization.There were people from all over the world.. literally. In my project, there are people from Russia, US, Czech Republic, India, China, Japan.. Uff.. It is really fun working and dealing with such diverse set of people everyday.MSFT itself is a city. I think 80% of economy of Redmond is entirely driven by Microsoft. They have around 100+ buildings in the city. And the work atmosphere is very healthy.. atleast as compared to that of TCS. :P. It rocks..
After coming to US, it was difficult. Because of 3 reasons.1. I was replacing a guy in my project who had 10 years of experience in coding.. 2. I had never been away from my friends and parents. 3. And the place where I was about to stay was new. And all my roomies were as novice as me. No car, no phone.
Huh.. I remember one incidence, Just to buy one vaccume cleaner, me and my roomie, Karthik walked about 3-4 miles and searched for around 4 hours for the person's address from whom we were supposed to buy vaccum cleaner. But it was fun. As I am travel freak, started roaming around places from the next weekend itself. First few months, my status was 'settling down in US' in each of my messengers.But then, my life(style) changed drammatically. Wherever I go, usually want and find many friends around. That was the missing part for first 2 months. But then fortunately.. things went well... and here I was in the midst of friends.. Yeah made lots of friends from TCS and non-TCS.
hen came the hardest part for me. Festive season. I was not sure.. what am I going to do during festive season.. After all, this was my first festive season outside my familiy, friends and my country here thousands of miles away from my home, it was difficult for me.
First festival, Ganesh chaturthi (Ganpati) is my most favourite season after Diwali. I like it a lot when it comes to Watching Ganpati pandal decorations throughout night and best of all, ganpati dance in 'miravnuk'. But am I gonna miss that all here? Then suddanly, I came to know that few people are planning to organize ganesh festival for one day. I was very happy.. I also joined them.That was really awesome experience. Planning, buying things for Ganesh puja, Ganesh aarti, doing potluck, and best of all, after all people gone, Ganpati dance by we organizers. It was amazing.. We did it for just one day. Kuchh nahi to ek din hi sahi.. That was really nice... But still pune miravnuk is the best...
Immidiately after that, I made second biggest purchase of my life. Yeah my first car. I am really crazy about speedy things like car and motorbikes. I love to ride them a lot.. I purchased Nissan Sentra. Really nice car. When I was in schools and college, I had a dream of wearing nice cloths and going to office by my own car. This one more dream came true after coming here. Biggest advantage of having your own car is, you can go anywhere anytime as per your wish. You dont have to depend on other people and public transport. And also, you can explore new places (which I like a lot)
It was a month of september and had been 3 months, I came here.. But I had not seen any big places away from Seattle and other areas of Washington. And, I said, I am freakin crazy traveller. So I decided to explore other part of US. East coast.Me and my NTP friends (who were in Ohio) decided to meet together and explore something which will be mind boggaling experience for all of us. Guess what would have come to my mind at that time? Yeah, the busiest city in entire USA and probably whole world. Yes.!!! NewYork. We decided to visit NewYork. I knew that it is on the other side of the country, on the east coast. But it was not a problem. I decided to go. Initally, I thought, I will go to NY directly through air. But then, another idea came to my mind, to drive from OH with friends. I knew it was 8-10 hours drive. I love driving. Me and my friend, Anish decided to drive this route from Cleveland, OH to New Jersey. So I went to Cleveland from Seattle through flight. And on the next day, we drove from Cleveland to NJ. During that period, I got a chance to drive Dodge Durango V8 through 3 states, Ohio, Pennsylvania and New Jersey/New York. Amazing experience. You can find more about this in my previous blog post. It was really the most memorable and expensive trip of my life. :P. New York rocks.
Then came Navratri.. Being Gujju, it was tough to stay away from your friends and family during Navaratri and miss all those Garbas, dandiyas and visit to Chaturshrungi temple at night. But again, I found out solution for that. We came to know that, Gujrathi mandal has organized Garbas on weekends. So we planned to go there. Initially, I was not that enthu, I thought there wont be 'GOOD' crowd over there. But I was positively surprised. The crowd was simply awesome (You know what I mean). All typical gujjus from Gujrath, Bombay, Pune wearing traditional dresses like ghagra, chaniya choli, zabbo, kurta etc. And great orchestra not less than melody makers playing typical garba songs like Dholida... Ohh, god.. it was rocking night for me. Played dandiya like crazy, typical gujju. Such an amazing experience it was. Really... couldnt expect more than this in US.
Then one more festival.. which is king of all hindu festivals.. Yeah Diwali.. When we say diwali, I imagine being at home having namkeen and meetha made by bhabhi all day.. wearing new clothes, going to temple early in the morning, going to Sarasbaug to watch Diyas and typical Puneri chicks in Saaree :D. Meeting relatives and chit-chatting with them till late night. Having misal-pav everyday early in the morning during dipawali.. and the list goes on. But I knew, it was not possible here... but had to do something. The day started as usual with calling all the friends, parents, sisters, relatives and closed ones to wish Happy DiwaliMe and priti (just a friend) decided to do some kinda get together. So I told her to make paav-bhaji and pulav. Yeah my favorite dish. So they invited all of us on the eve of Laxmi pujan to their house. Nice food they had made.. Really delicous. Next day, on the day of LAxmi pujan we went to one temple nearby in Bothell. That was a good experience. Another festival went.. without doing anything.. without saying anything,,,,in silence...
So far so good.. enough of compromise on festival celebrations, enough of missing my home country.. It was time to do something as Summer was on the verge of ending and loooooong and boring winter season was about to start. It was time to do something memorable, fun and rocking and happening trips. Some outing to most happening place. Well.. when you say happening.. what comes to your mind? Gambling, night-life, music, adventure sports.. Las Vegas, Loss Angeles. Yeah.. you are right.. Time had come to enjoy most of it. Rock it. Make the most fun out of it. And just simply forget all duniyadari. Awesome trip. Best trip of my life. I drove a lot in the trips on an average 90 mph. And the best part of it was, me and Niks managed the entire trip end to end. We came to know that, we are good event managers too.. :P. Again, you can read detailed description in my previous blogs.
Almost 5 months have already been passed, and now was the month of December. The coolest month of the year in the states. And definitely a lot different than Des. Because of two reasons. Weather and festive season. They have their biggest festive season, Christmas in the month of December.And good for also, since we got long weekend. And as you guessed it right, we planned something different for this weekend.We planned to go to some snow-pass for Skiing and snowboarding. We had never played any kind of snow-sports as like most of indian middle class people. But as a kid, we always wanted to play in snow unlimited.We all planned (means me and niks, as usual) to go to Snowqualmie for skiing on first day and to Leavenworth on next day, which is a german style town, 2 hours from my place.On the first day, we started around 11, and you can not believe this, it took us 6 hours to drive 90 miles. Thanks to great snowfall on I90. We reached there around 5. So as usual, touched and came back without doing any skiing or snowboarding. :(On the next day, started for Leavenworth. But during driving, came to know that, the roads are blocked. So had to stop at Stevenspass, which is another pass for snow-sports.So there, did snowboarding for 5 hours. Oh god.. that was fun but with pain and major attacks on each part of my body, as we were going down without any control and then falling down in every angle. Oh shit. I was on bed for 2 days. But that was fun. This trip will be a memorial onedue to one more incident which was terrific.While coming back, one of our 2 cars broke down (not ours, the other one) due to low battery. And the road on which we were driving didnt have lights and it was around 11PM. It was full of dark, no lights, not even parking lights, no phone range.First time, we got to dial 911 here in states as one of my friend got very little range for just few minutes. They sent someone to tow our car. By the time this all happened, it was 3am already. Nice na..I heard that, people here in US watch movies on Christmas.. Dont know whether it is right or not. So went to watch some movie in Seattle. Overall, it was fun for sure.
Then came 31st. We planned to go to Desi dance club. That was fun too. As usual, did Ganpati dance on Videsi land. Our group of 18 people rocked as usual. Yeah. That was fun for sure..
Year 2007 passed. It gave me many good things and bad things. Learned from bad things a lot. First time came to US, more than 6 months spent in US, met with people from different part of the world, worked with best in class people in the world. Best company, best talent pool, best country in the world. What else do you expect in your career. Truely, this year gave me many many things.
If you ask me to note down happenings of first three months of 2008, my answer would be String.Empty. Yup. that is equal to nothing. I dont remember doing anything exciting in this period apart from few trips to my fav. place kirkland waterfront and playing tennis for 3-4 hours every saturday and sunday. We did nothing? I don't believe that..
But enough is enough. Now is the month of April.. I am getting ready for summer now. The spring has already arrived with few sunny days and cherry blossoms. My few targets for coming couple of months is Yellowstone, Canada, Cascade loop, Long beach. Lets see how the weather turns out of unpredictable snowfall in middle April, which is very unusual in Seattle. May be as unexpected as Sachin getting out on first ball. Yeah.. It's snowing and it sucks..
I started writing this blog when I finished 9 months at Redmond and by now, I have finished more than 10 months. Kyaa kare..Couldn't get my time out from my busy schedule of tennis, movies and other timepass. :P
10 months passed and more to go. Lets see how it goes.. May my soul rest in peace.. and we keep on rocking as we did in past.Till then enjoy..
