9 August 2017

Almost there…

Full 28 hours after leaving home in Atlanta, I finally got out of Delhi airport. Of course, there is one more segment of flight left. Went to the nearby Marriott hotel to quickly catch up on office emails from US as well as prepare for the day of office meetings in Bangalore today. Needless to say, first found a gin at the bar – yes they served a Tanqueray No 10 at 3:30 AM in the morning!! and then caught up on stuff. Couple of more hours and then back to the airport I go…

The first thing that hit me once I got out of the airport… was of course the heat and humidity. And here is the bummer. I have two days of office meetings and one day of university stuff. Meaning three whole days of no shorts and loose shirts. Worse, I am carrying a jacket!!

I am ready to melt down!!

Category: Vacations | 29 Comments on Almost there…
8 August 2017

Back on the old trail…

Once more time, I am in familiar land. Just said good bye to Sharmila who came to drop me at the airport and turned around to start the loooooong flights. But that is totally bearable when I think of the opportunities to create moments in life, experiences to die for that lie in front of me…

First there is that good old goal of seeing my own dad and mom. I am lucky enough to see them more often in a year than I had ever thought would be possible after moving to this country. But there is something about being a dad myself and realizing how the hold on my own daughters is fast vanishing that makes me keep going back to them to reassure that their hold is as steady and fast as it always were. Perhaps, this indeed is the history of my future!

Mom underwent surgery two weeks back and dad is back to being bed ridden. I don’t expect a lot of words to be spoken. Just some closeness to be felt.

To tack on to that, I have made it my goal this time to see some of my elementary school teachers. I am actually going to fly to few different cities to spend an hour or so each with some teachers that I last saw in the 70s and early 80s. I hope to learn a few more lessons from them.

I am also going to try and give back to academia by being a guest lecturer in one of the top engineering schools in India (it never hurts that the professor who invited me is my MBA classmate who I will get to see after nearly 27 years)!!

And in one of those rare cases where I mix work with personal life, I will take a couple of days to meet our teammates in our newly opened office in Bangalore.

Back in 1991, I was to take a train to a small village in Puliyannur in Kerala to meet the dad of a particularly bright friend of mine from MBA days. Unfortunately for me, the prime minister of India was assassinated and all my plans were disrupted. Guess what? As of this morning, my friend and I have laid out some careful plans to meet his dad this time.

I just can’t wait for this flight to start… So many intersection points to be created… so many things to learn from others… so many people to say Thank You to!!!

Category: Vacations | 61 Comments on Back on the old trail…
26 July 2017

The icing on the cake in Florida

Words like Florida and “icing” are difficult to put together. But there was really a “cool” reason why we chose last week to make our annual visit to Fort Lauderdale. Because that afforded us a chance to meet Madhumolli and her family – Debjit and Damayanti who were visiting the US of A from their abode near London, UK.

Madhumolli and I were batch mates back in Durgapur. We never were in the same school but had common friends and then over time we became friends ourselves. There is an old story here that I insist mentioning – that those days she could not stand me (apparently, she had standards 🙂 ) and to this day, she has fought my storyline tooth and nail 🙂

We are very different people – she is the quiet and strong types and I am the … Well, let’s just admit she is the quiet and strong one. She loved medical sciences. I loved engineering. And sometimes they did not mix too well. There was something I had said once when I went to visit in her hostel in Calcutta Medical College and she simply grabbed hold of me and started dragging me to the next building – which was a morgue!! It was not that difficult to drag me. In fact, I will go ahead and admit that I was (and am) the garrulous and weak type!! 🙂

Madhumolli’s mom, incidentally, was Sharmila’s Bengali teacher in eleventh and twelfth grade.

Over the years, I have kept up with her by phone and personal visits in UK and Kolkata whenever I got a chance. My last meeting on July 11, 2013 was a memorable one. You can see the picture here… (http://www.rajibroy.com/?p=3385). After a day full of meetings, I had quickly changed into my running clothes and then hauled myself to Slough to keep an old promise I had made to her daughter. She had started running the previous year and I showed up to keep the promise of running with her next time I was in London. In all that excitement, we got Debjit – who had just arrived from Brussels – to run with us for some distance – in his office clothes!! And I turned around immediately, came back to the hotel in London and after a shower went out for a customer dinner!

Almost to the day, four years later, we met again in Fort Lauderdale. Most important, we were there with Damayanti the day she turned eighteen!! It was also very interesting to watch Natasha and Nikita exchanges notes with Damayanti on each other’s countries!!!

We met twice during our stay in Fort Lauderdale. Had the most enjoyable time!!!

This picture was taken as the lovely dusk enveloped the beach where we went for a walk…

Category: Intersection Points, Vacations | 5 Comments on The icing on the cake in Florida
23 July 2017

Back to the future…

This is where our US journey had started. Nearly a quarter century ago, after getting married in a court of law in India, we had headed out to the US. And this was the airport that we finally had stopped our journey in. After thirty hours of flight or so, I was completely dazed and thoroughly ill equipped to understand anything foreign (e.g. I had entered a “Restroom” at the airport thinking that is where I could catch some rest during transit 🙂 Don’t blame me – in India, we called them “Toilets”).

In any case, our entire married life has been in the US and it all started at this airport in this country.

We come back to this airport every single year.

Category: Musings, My Family, Vacations | 5 Comments on Back to the future…
21 July 2017

Slowing down…

Last evening, not having anything better to do, Sharmila and I went for a walk on the boardwalk by the beach. After a bit, we found some rocking chairs lined up along the walk under a street lamp and decided to settle down in two of them. With our plastic coffee cups. Which were filled up with red wine 🙂

I had some powerful “living in the NOW” moments. First, the picture does not do full justice to the ambience. What you do not see is the roaring noise of the waves in the dark in the front. Or the strong sea breeze leaving a very pleasant feeling as it kissed the skin.

It being dark, nothing of the mighty ocean could be seen. Except for the dotted lights of a ship here and a plane there against the large black canvas of a moonless night. What could be seen is a lot of people walking on the boardwalk under the streetlights. It has been a long long time since I had sat down and relaxed and just watched people. You know just watch them as they come and go.

There were old people shuffling along, there were families strolling with the adults having some meaningful discussions and the kids just frolicking along, the young kids in whatever would be considered today’s fashionable beach clothes going in a group, the clearly well to do lady in high heels and the seemingly homeless person with all his belongings in a bike he was pulling along…

I had completely forgotten “people watching”. Just sitting there. Watching them go from left to right and some more from right to left. In a completely non-judgmental way. You know – like they say being “in the flow”.

And then the mind wavered. And speeded to the past. Not sure whether it was the breeze on the skin or the dim streetlight, the mind time traveled in a jiffy to the summer nights in Durgapur when I was barely a kindergartener or possibly in first grade. My dad had an “easy chair” (a cross between a foldable hammock and a lounge chair) and in those sultry evenings, he used to sit down outside in the light breeze. I would join him and sit in a small chair. Pulling up the chair closer to him, I would incessantly ask him questions about those blue twinkling stuff in an otherwise dark sky. And watch anybody who went by the sole streetlight that would be lit up half a block away…

Keeping up with the speed of life, they say is a big challenge.

I find slowing down far more challenging.

Category: Musings, Vacations | 7 Comments on Slowing down…