The best was kept for the last. Visited Gagan and Bharti at their place. Gagan and I worked together in my first start up experience. We had no kids and the four of us had grown very close. Those start up days demanded so much work, we barely used to go back to our apartments to sleep. Sharmila and Bharti used to come over to our office and I recollect them learning roller blading in the corridors of our office over the weekends while we pounded away at more code. Well, Gagan was pounding away at more code. I was just eating those free chips and food we used to stock up 🙂

One challenge of keeping the Aroras for the last was that we missed a few other i2 friends who were there at their place and had left by the time we came over. We missed Sanjay, Priya, Vijay and Mamtha. We did manage to stop Atanu just as he was escaping!!

Getting to see the three of them and their kids was the best ending of a day in Seattle. For the first time ever, after dragging Natasha and Nikita thru four meetings of our old friends thru the day, even they declared that it was a great day for them too!!!

Next stop was to meet Piyali – Sharmila’s senior from her engineering school – and her family. I remember having met Piyali and her husband – commonly referred to as “PPD” – long long time back when they used to live in Houston. I think our common friends – Indrani and Aniruddha – had brought them over to our place in Dallas. This was way before any one of us kids.

Funnily enough, yesterday, I did not even have to start to find out what common connections we had. We walked into one such immediately as we stepped into their house. Ashok and Bipasha – our dear friends from Dallas – and their daughters were staying with them on their way to Banff! Turns out Ashok and PPD were classmates from their engineering college!!

But the best part was meeting Piyali’s mom. Like every Bengali mom she kept a hawkish eye on my plate and glass. Every time I had finished my food or drink, she would immediately indicate to her daughter to replenish it. Ah! What would we ever do without our Bengali moms and their care in our lives!!

Sometimes it is about meeting old friends… sometimes it is about making new ones. We visited Sharmila’s school friend – Saimoon and her family yesterday. I met her and her husband Indranil for the first time. Needless to say, we found out a lot of common friends from our past! The girls – Natasha and Nikita took to Saimoon’s daughters (they are similar age groups) very quickly. We had a great time all around!!