http://www.chetanbhagat.com/speeches/speech_2.php

I wish Chetan had delivered this speech in AU 7 years ago !

Where dreams come true..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyBc33UjvDU

A video worth watching .. about confidence, honesty, teamwork, determination, passion .. for all you women out there !

Decisions...

From What do I want to eat for lunch today? What shoes go best with my outfit? Where do I want to spend my holiday? To What do I want to do after college? Who is the perfect one for me? ...Decisions decisions decisions...now it sounds like a full time job to me! Seriously, this is just what I have been doing for the past one year. There were hard times when I was struggling to get my dream job during the lowest peak in the economic recession. I had to make a decision almost everyday trying to reject options which were not right for me. And I finally made it - I landed exactly where I wanted! Does that mean I don't need to do decision-making anymore? Hell, no!! Everyday, every hour, every minute - there is no way I can call it a day without any decision-making. And that is not the end of it. I am responsible for all the decisions I make. Fortunately, my company has the policy of "safe risk-taking" as long as it is informed. That is, if for some reason the decision turns out to be the wrong one, you can back up most of the times (of course, there is a cost involved...but, the point is - you will come out alive). But does this apply to life? How do I know what the right decision for me is? Or how long after deciding can I be assured that it is right(wrong)? Any thoughts anyone?

Happy Birthday Som..

Well.. Advanced b'day wishes actually. N now its party time ppl.. so choose the party type u want.. it may take a while to load which means u have to be a lil patient.

Enjoy,
Spoorthy

Happy Birthday Sudha!!!

Today is our group Libran's birthday :).. I am sure she is having a blast. But just to be sure, I want all of you out there to wish her to have a blast.

The top smiley wud be u.. the bottom 4 are us, waiting for u to cut the cake so that we can finish it off.. hehe

Nostalgia

Just saying the word brings in a torrent of memories. I still vividly remember the day I was leaving to US, the day I was embarking on a journey to a different corner of the world. It was a day of mixed emotions, excitement about the new phase of my life and the separation from home land and so many near and dear ones. It was ambivalence in its true form. I wanted to go to US and yet at the very same time I wished I could stay back with my parents in my dearest city. Somehow I managed to say good bye and landed here. After spending several years in US, I still miss my home dearly.

I miss the people, the beautiful beaches, Kailash giri, Sampath Vinayaka temple, muri mixture, FoodEX etc. I can never forget those four years we spent together… our plans to escape from ragging sessions, our combined studies, night outs, get-togethers, video games, endless conversations, hunt for birthday gifts, our silly fights and arguments (of course some were serious), our last minute preparation for final exams and the list goes on and on… We used to enter the exam hall almost ten minutes late to face the wrath of the invigilator and despite his warnings to prevent us from appearing for the exams we still repeated the same thing. Just those thoughts bring a wide smile on my face. The best part was the time we spent at shan’s place. Everything is still fresh in my mind. Miss you all…

America is a beautiful country with lot of opportunities. Their desire to enjoy life, independence and their just do it spirit is very infectious. Every place has its share of good and bad. However, to me nothing comes close to my country, my city and my home. A pleasant day at the beach with my family and my dog is my dream day. Waiting for it to come true…

Som

Hey there..

I am supposed to do this a while ago. But I have been postponing it diligently. The reason being – no clue about what to post. Let me warn you, I still got no clue. Now comes the hard part… *sigh*. I guess I shouldn’t be complaining coz I am the one who started this blog thing and have been kinda pestering ppl about it.

Anyways, I guess I can start with what I am doing now. I don’t mean ‘now’ literally but ‘now’ in general. I have graduated *FINALLY* and have received my Master of Science degree from University of Houston. Took me 3 years, of which I successfully wasted 2.5 years. Yeah, the last 6 months I really had to work hard for my thesis. My professor is a very sweet person with infinite patience. But I found out the hard way that the limit to infinity was 2 years.. lol. I am sure you guys really don’t want me to go into the details of my thesis work. Neither do I.. but just in case here is the link http://www.cs.uh.edu/news-events/thesis-defenses/2009/04_28_mareddy.html

Congratulations!!! You graduated. Now what?

Hmmm.. literally ppl.. Hmmmm!!! I am in the process of re-defining my life. Agreed, it sounds a lil too somber. But I think everyone needs to go through this phase of life once in a while. But if you look at the brighter side, it actually means by claiming I am pondering over life, I found another great excuse to waste away time. On a serious tone, I have been through a lot in these 3 years after my bachelors. I have become more mature (Objections overruled here.. :D ). So it is time to become more focused and find out what is important in life.

Ok Ok.. Agreed the post is a little dull but that’s the best I could do right now. And to help the current state of things around me, the economy has been flourishing too well. Aarghh!! Why does this have to happen when I finally graduated? I wish I was born 2-3 years older or younger.

Chalo then ppl.. Will be waiting for the next post.. so whoz next?

Cheers,
Spoorthy

The Pilot - Introductory post

Ive been putting this off for a while now. The usual excuses were at play, too much work at office, all-day plans on weekends, blah blah blah. A stern reminder from Spot was all that was needed :).

A little background for the uninitiated fellow-blogger:'The Five' constitutes : Kuheli (Kuhi), Shanti (Shan), Soumya (Som), Spoorthy (Spot), Sudha (Suji). I know, quite a lot of 'S' s :).

We had met each other while pursuing our graduation (the Indian version of it, as my friends would be quick to point out). I wouldnt call it a particularly blissful period but Im sure each of us would agree that the company of the other four did lessen the pain. We've long since gone our different directions, opting for what we each thought would take us closer to our dream.

We've had fun times aplenty: the "combined" studies, 2 hour telephone conversations, the video games, shopping trips, birthday celebrations, Five Star (was it? bit foggy but will elaborate on it in some other post), heck I even remember the day we spent hours applying make up to resemble devils just because we had nothing better to do. And like any other set of friends, we also had our own share of problems; ego clashes, misunderstandings, frustrations, disapprovals, incomplete get-togethers, infrequent mails, unresponded calls, you name it.

But through it all, the sense of belonging lingered.

What I believe this blog aims to achieve is to serve as a common ground where we would pen down our thoughts, our opinions and our critisisms, our dreams and our reminiscences, our hopes and fears, culminating to offer a glimpse to what we were and what we've become.

So. Here we are. The Five of us.