Full Circle

Today life seems to have come back a full circle. Around 3 years ago, I landed in the US in Seattle for the very first time and today it was like a home coming when I reached here this morning.

Seattle -> San Francisco -> Boston -> San Francisco -> Seattle

This has been the summary of the approx 3 years that I have spent in the US. But Seattle has always been special probably because this was the very first place and first ones are always special. Or may be because we had such a big group of 16-17 fun loving fantastic people which made living here very very special. Or may be because it is one of the most beautiful and livable cities of the US. Or may be because my lovely wife is also here :)

Whatever the case may be but I am delighted.....Chalo I am tired after almost 44hours of journey..I 'll catch some sleep..rest a while before I am "Sleepless in Seattle"

The Reunion

Just fresh from a reunion with my school-time friends (1996 batch infact). Wow....it was great fun, so gud to see my chuddy-buddies after such a long time..I meet some of them after about 13-14 years. Ahh..in case you are wondering why I am excited here is a small introduction to each of them. All these guys are now successful and doing well in their respective fields but I 'll just restrict myself to the childhood memories that I have of each of them:

1. Bhedu- For me he is still 'bhedu' ("bhed" or "sheep") because of his curly hair. We also used to call him carpet since everytime we used to hit his head some amount of dust came up. How he managed to collect and store that dust in his hair is still a mystery.

2. Rhodda- He got his head shaved once and got this name foreever. Poor Chap. He was the first and quickest to complete his revision before the exams. Methodology was simple- Take the book, rotate it around you head thrice and everything in the book enters your brain- revision complete!!

3. Knight Rider- I guess was shortest in hieght, used to be the first person in the assembly queue. Despite his hieght- was always ready to fight with everyone and didn't mind getting beaten up. had a typical robotic style of running which made us assume he is half human- half machine, hence the name Knight Rider

4. Kaali- To this day I wonder why he was named Kaali. He was relatively fair and that too a boy. Kaali - the name never made any sense. In fact I posed the question to him this time and the answer was "Naam shakal dekh ke nahin harkaten dekh ke rakha gaya hai"

5. Nitin- His white Sunny and the cricket that we have played together will always be fresh in my memory. He was the permanent goalkeeper in our games period.

6. Munshi- You will find many people who mimic actors etc but here is one person who can copy just about anybody's style and mannerisms. Extremely talented..given a chance he could have given a run for their money to the likes of Raju Srivastava and Johnny Lever.

7. Shammi- Shammi was instrumental in getting this get-together happen. He was one who got his "connexions" together to bring everyone to the party. Next Harshad Mehta in the making....

8. Jossi- I think he was the strongest in our class who could have beaten up anybody if he wished but he has such a heart of gold that at most times he was at the recieving end and didn't hit back fearing that the other person would get hurt. A person who wouldn't mind walking miles because that made his muscles stronger...

9. Channi- If you look at him..he's a perfect gentleman..quite..sober. Give him some time to open his heart and he will blow you off with his sense of humour :)

10. Harry- He was one of the most studious people in the class till about 8th and then he grew out to be one of the biggest brats of the school. This time when we met I felt a certain maturity which I had not seen before

There were a lot of other people who could not make to this meeting and were badly missed. But I 'll restrict this blog to the people I met this time