After the stress of the prospect of having to cancel our India trip (visa issues for Natasha) and the scramble to end the year at office, meeting Amitesh for a few late hours was the perfect antidote that the doctor had prescribed. Nothing can take my mind off than sitting with Amitesh at a very quiet bar nearly into midnight discussing topics that few would think of as “bar topics” 🙂

Today, we spent a lot of time discussing (and researching on internet)
(*) the effect of Calcium level in heart by high level of LDL in blood. (don’t ask me how we got started)
(*) the importance of understanding why we do what we do (especially in professional life)
(*) the relativity of the definition of happiness (this is an effect of a prior FB post)
(*) the plight of gays in India (recently, India has taken a Russia-like position on gays)

While the topics can be mundane, the discussions are always lively !!

I have a question for all of you…
Last night, my colleague Leigh Ann and I went for dinner in London and we ordered some champagne. You see those flaky stuff in the drink ? Those are not bubbles – those are 23K gold flakes!!!
I have never had any drink with gold flakes in it! The funny part – the price was no different than any other glass of champagne. So here are my questions:

1. What is the root of this practice of putting gold flakes? Is it just to make it seem fancy?
2. Is it not dangerous to health to ingest rare metals like gold? Conversely, is there any known beneficial effect?

It was a little jarring though. I kept having this visual in my mind where I was eating food along with the aluminum foil it was wrapped in 🙂

Quiet evening with Sid and Atashi…

Browsing my Bengali friends’ updates on FB after coming back from India, I have come to the general conclusion that dousing your face with some red powder and posting it on FB is highly correlated with your friends finding you very beautiful 🙂 I gotta try that sometime 🙂 🙂

No trip to Dallas is complete without meeting this guy. After our business work was over and we left, I suddenly remembered that I forgot to take a picture of him.
One quick phone call later, both of us pulled over to the side of the street. Unfortunately, there was nobody to take a picture of us. So, we had to make do with a precariously balanced iPhone and a couple of stones on a raised concrete step and a misfiring camera app!!!

Today was the start of Durga Puja in Atlanta – the biggest festival for us Bengalis. Everyone dresses up in the best traditional clothes and shows up for various events for about three days.
I, too, showed up in my traditional clothes – which is a pair of shorts and a panel shirt. 🙂
The first thing that happened was that I got a dressing down from my wife for showing up in shorts. As I was cowering down and settling in a bench, the second thing happened!
A guy walked up to me and asked “Are you Rajib Roy”? I was almost like “Yeah. Who wants to know?”, when I looked up. And in a fraction of a second, thousands of neurons and dendrons must have connected (or whatever it is that connect when you remember something from the past) – and I yelled “Prabasaj Paul”?
He was one year senior to me in the residential school I went to for junior and senior years of high school. (11th and 12th grade). He was a legend in his academic prowess. So many times, he was my last resort when I was absolutely stumped with a problem and nobody could help me!!!
Last time I saw him was in March 1984!!! Almost 30 years back!!
It was unbelievably good to see him again!!!

… a week after I heard the “news”

Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning’s hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there. I did not die.

Poet: Mary Elizabeth Frye (1905-2004)

It finally hit me like a ton of bricks this morning. As I drove away after dropping my daughter at school and headed to office.
He is not going to be there. I will not see him. Not today. Not tomorrow. Not ever. Howmuchever I loiter around his cubicle.
I was able to block away the thought of he having died the whole of yesterday. I kept reminding myself about how I walked up to his cubicle to wish him a happy birthday just a few weeks back.
Staring at the road waiting at the traffic light with dawn barely breaking, I realized that his wife will soon be on the road like me – dropping their kid or grocery shopping – and realizing that he will not be home when she went back. Not that day. Not the next day. Not ever.
Remembering how my daughter told me “I will see you in the evening” before she trotted off to school, I realized there is not going be any such evening for his three kids. Not tonight. Not tomorrow night. Not ever.
It is the finality of death that quashes all hopes of being ever together – even for a fleeting moment. And it is that snatching away of any hope of being together that I cannot ever deal with.
I am the guy who is still looking for his friends who crossed his path 40 years back.
He crossed my path barely a few days back.
If only – if only – I was given one more “intersection point”, this is what I would say-
“Teach me how to be humble like you, teach me how to always smile like you, teach me how to be a great father like you”.
God, I miss you, David Yankey.