Predictive analysis and OK Cupid

Recently, I was chatting with a friend of mine as to how dumb the idea of matrimonial site is and how it can make one depressing. While we were chatting she had an interesting technical take on the whole system. Here is her post on the subject. Also, she is the first guest writer on my blog. Madhuri Haraway.

Madhuri was my junior in MSRIT and completed her masters form USC. She writes more regularly here http://madhurih.blogspot.com/ .

Recently I was going through the TIME magazine's list of ' 100 most influential people in the world' . The list featured Sam Yagan one of the co-founders of the dating website OK Cupid. A note below his name stated that ' What do you get when you combine big data, the quest for love and complete irrelevance? The hippest spot  on the internet: OKC!' 

Though I had heard of dating websites using predictive/ big data analytics I had never  thought about how they collect data and come up with statistical models to predict the compatibility between two people. I started looking online about how OKC collects data. ( Ok you may think I am a nerd but predictive analytics fascinate me! This is what I do for a living and derive immense joy out of it. I love to think of ways to collect data, preprocess it ,come up with the best statistical models and optimize it. Well I won't bore you anymore with my tech talk but it was amusing to know the love of my life is used to help people find love.). I read that they have an extensive questionnaire system which people take and based on their responses they are matched up with various profiles.  To put it lay man's terms the answers become the response variable or the output and the questions become the predictor variables or inputs. This input- output form is then mapped on to a mathematical equation. Basically when people give answers, the server takes in these answers converts into a suitable form, plugs it into an equation and outputs a value. This output value for each person is used to determine the compatibility between two people.

The data modeler aspect of me was curious to know about the questions asked. So I registered on OKC in order to take their through questionnaire , to better understand the data that is being collected and how I would go about designing models for such data. ( I admit I am a data junkie. I get my fix by studying various complex algorithms to process data) As I filled out the questionnaire I realized I had not been very truthful with my answers.  I mentioned in my profile that I was looking for a casual fling (which is a blatant lie because I don't have the guts to go through with it). I answered that looks are more important than a man's smartness. Before you go ahead and judge me if casual  fling is what I am looking for-- I sure can judge the book by its cover. In the middle of answering 158th question an odd thought occurred to me--  sometimes people may twist their answers in order to make them look appealing. The algorithms can't account for this human ambiguity and takes the answers as is. This introduces certain errors/bias in the data and could lead to wrong predictions.  That is when I decided to stop answering the questions and delete my profile because I could not take the predictions the system made for me at face value. It wasn't fun anymore as I did not trust OKC's suggestions.

However this approach to dating reminded me of the middle aged 'aunties' in India who tried to fix me up with the so called ' perfect guy'. I am sure their approach at matching two people is not as sophisticated as OKC but the essence remains same. They collect data about a guy(s) and his family (his qualifications, job, salary, properties owned, how many times he goes to the temple, his family status etc etc) by exchanging details (a.k.a gossip) in social gatherings and try to compare this detail with girl(s) they know of. Next they rank the girls based on what they determine as compatibility and start approaching the highest ranked girl in the list. If it doesn't work out they try the second highest and process continues. So I concluded that OKC is a high tech, 'amoral' (indian aunties don't believe in setting up people for casual sex because they consider it amoral and would take offense if I compared the dating site to the ' Noble work' they do) version of middle aged indian ' marriage broker' aunties. 

P.S. Sam Yagan went to Harvard and Stanford and turned his talents (he was a math major at Harvard) to help people not as lucky as him in finding love (he married his high school sweetheart), made money and featured in the TIME list. I applause his efforts as it has helped bring many people closer. 

P.P.S: I am extremely curious to know how my friends will react if I add OKC as my current employer on Facebook. Ah well! I suppose blatant lying on FB is not a good idea. 

-Madhuri

Aashayein

It has been quite sometime that I wanted to scribble something, I really could not find a topic. Hence, this one.

Its been one of the best phases of life (after that dream period Post PUC before engineering). I have been really enjoying this period of joblessness combined with hope of future being bright.

In the last few weeks joblessness has reached such extremes. I have been watching all the movies on youtube. The other day I ended up watching a Aftab Shivdasani movie (that's limit right). However, this post is dedicated to couple of movies Aashayein and Bucket List. For some reason these movies made me realize how lucky I am or blessed if we could call it.

I was thinking what would I like to do if I would be certified that I have only a few days left. Ironically, I probably would not want to do anything that I am currently doing. So I thought I should make a list just in case.

• Propose to a pretty girl in a very romantic setting. (Even if I would know a denial from her. Well the list is for my happiness not hers :)) The place can be a beach, exuberant hotel something dramatic.
• Earn $1000 with out using anything on my resume. (Funnily, as I write this I am packing to leave to an interview with a huge company).
• Do one painting of my own on 3 X 5 ft canvas.
• Learn to play one song on any instrument. (Can be the birthday song on keyboard.)
• Take an autograph from a celebrity. (Would be great if its Rahul Dravid or may be Lance Armstrong or Yuvraj Singh if the reason is cancer).
• Canter a horse one last time.
• Read 100 books. Visit 100 new places.
• Lastly I would like to spend a week of perfect joblessness like now. (Just that there will be no hope this time).

P.S : I probably will never do any of these unless a professional doctor certifies that I only have a few days left. (Anything less than a year is considered few). For when you do not know the end the goals are completely different.

P.P.S : I took less than 5 mins to type this post. If I thought more I am sure I would have more cravings. These were the first things that came to my mind when I decided to write a post.

Sorry about the gloomy post but I had to do this. Mostly for myself.

Cheers,

Sri!!

Wishful wives!!

Age has got a lot to do not only with the way you think but also with the matters you discuss. More so because you hang around people more or less of your age. I am friends with a few such close friends for more than ten years now. Ten years back the only thing we discussed was "What will we do today" (thats when we were done playing all the card games we knew for the day). A few years later when we were in engineering, we discussed "What makes a girl look hot" (thats when we still had so much to mug for the engineering exams). Then a few years later we would discuss "Who would make a hot colleague" (only after they ranted about how not so pretty their colleagues were, luckily i didnt have much to speak in this part). Latest, we discuss the kind of girls whom we would like to marry (thats after a very brief discussion of the jobs we are headed). I guess we have reached a limit because we are asking one of the guys to hit on his imaginary colleague and give us updates. So hence the post with some of our views of the wives we would like to have.

Top 5 professions we would NOT like to pick a wifey from:

1. Software/Hardware engineer : Most of these girls are strained by the pressures of meeting deadlines. A lot of health problems like repetitive stress disorder, eye sight problems (and weight problems because of free coffee) are direct symptoms of this girl. So its not something we would like. (Real reason is we can not take technical criticism from wifey, in home also. After getting all the yelling from the boss in office).
2. Actor : We think most girls in this category are so used to acting that we think they might be acting (faking: you know the context i mean) in home also. Also the other boy was telling, with the kind of make up they use, probably not too good for long run. (Real reason is we are very confident, we will never stand a chance with any of those pretty actors.)
3. Police Officer : It needs a very gutsy woman to be a police officer. And we are scared of gutsy women. Also, some criminal to take revenge on her could hurt us. (Real reason: We would be ashamed to read headlines "Young police officer arrests her husband for eveteasing ")

Now for the more interesting part.

Top 5 professions we would like the wifey to be :

1. Sports (Any of them but boxing for obvious reasons) : I know a lot of guys like dolled up girls with all the fake makeup, but nothing is more turning on than a girl who sweating after a game of squash or just back from a run. Sports also means healthy, more importantly more stamina. (Real reason : They will be killer where they are supposed to be. And its also the only place a guy would like to be challenged . And its known these girls are capable of challenging with their ability to stretch and thereby open to various positions).
2. Architect : There is something ravishing about an architect. Her ability to look all suave and all but still create something nice. (Real reason : Architects make a lot of money and she could so easily design our house. We dont have to pay also. )
3. IAS Officer : Its a proud moment when you know that your wife in home is also part of cleansing the system. Government work is God's work. (Real reason : Some day if we want to start something and need an approval from govt. Hopefully she can get it .)
4. Nursery school teacher/ Singer : There is something really cute about being a nursery teacher. Well thats the real reason too. Singer because there is nothing more soothing than listening to a very pleasant voice after a hard days work. Here also it is the real reason.
5. Commerce graduate/ MBA/ Fashion designer/ Writer and a lot others all get 5th place. More like the common ground, not too much problem not too much benefits too.

Disclaimer : All the above choices are solely personal choices. Nothing is meant to be derogatory and shouldnt be taken personal by any girl unless you like it.

P.S : If you like anything above, it means you have cleared the first round of being the wishful wife of me or any of my single friends. ("First round" was mentioned solely because its been an interview season and everyone around me are busy interviewing.)

P.P.S : There could be a part 2 coming out too. Watch out.

Cheers,

Sri!!

&Friends.

Band Bajaa Baraath

Its holiday season here in the US. And today is the 4th day of the season. Still a day to go. All I have been doing in the last 3 days is shifting between tabs of Gmail, Twitter, Facebook and Youtube. With youtube winning the race between the others easily. I am seeing all shows, movies, soaps, talk shows and also a complete documentary of SRK. Well thats how bored I am.

In the last 2 hrs, I watched Band Bajaa Baraath. Its not the first time I watched it. However, I had not realized these things the first time I watched. I just couldnt see more than the chemistry of Anushka and Ranveer the first time.

• Spirit of Entrepreneurship : Is fantastically captured in the first half. It shows that irrespective of the binness (like he says :)) and its size, if you have a great team its gonna be a lot of fun. And it would really help if there is a pretty girl in the team, even better if she is a partner. Nothing works like the right team spirit.
• Another realistic fact is that the guys suddenly feel very proud and great about themselves when the realize the girl whom they are dying to impress gives a feeling that she is interested in him. For some reason the interest in the girl dies once she reciprocates, and I wonder the reason is it suddenly feels too easy for the guy. Lesson for the girls : Even if you like the guy you need to keep some mystery and suspense to keep the relation alive. If the guy is a creep, the girl usually ends up being the candy in discussion amongst boys.
• Finally, I guess i am the only guy(amongst all the audience of the film so far) who sympathized with the character of Chethan. What mistake did he do for him to end up like that?? Anushka and Ranveer did business, Anushka and Ranveer had fun, Anushka and Ranveer fought, Anushka and Ranveer broke up, Anushka and Ranveer got back, Anushka and Ranveer got married but what did the poor CHETHAN do for him to go through the trauma of his marriage getting cancelled with no mistake of his. For some reason, I can strongly relate to this character. (I hope not but have a strong feeling, i might experience this). Such is the plight of Chethan that he was not even shown once on screen while Anushka and Ranveer did a lot of things even if it was only on screen.

I had not given thought to these things much while I watched the movie for the first time. Wonder what BBB will bring the next time I watch it.

Until the next watch. I pity you chircut (Chethan).

Luv,

Sri!!!

Funny Conversation!!

Friend : Hey wassup??

Me : Nothing much.

Friend : How is life??

Me : What happened to you. Cut the crap. Come to the point.

Friend : You remember that guy XXXX.

Me : Oh that idiot who would always be in the first bench and acting studious.

Friend : Yeah the same jackass. He is getting married.

Me : Damn. We already crossed the 7 billion mark. Whats the hurry.

Friend : Did you get the invite??

Me : I need to check the other email. Anyways I am not interested in checking others wedding invites.

Friend : I just checked and realized he is not marrying YYYY.

Me : Well I always thought she deserved someone better than that jerk. Anyways who is the poor girl marrying him.

Friend : Chuck him and whoever he is marrying man. Guess what??

Me : Are you fuckin hanging around with too many girls. Whats with this guessing and all.

Friend : OK listen YYYY mailed me. She is coming to the states to do masters.

Me: Oh good. Good for her.

Friend : Dude, I need a favor. I always liked her. And now she mailed.

(Meanwhile I am checking the other mail)

Friend : Hello. where are you.

(After 2 mins)

Friend : What do you think?? Anyways listen she has got an admit to ASU and is coming in spring. You are the President of ISA right. So I will mail her telling you are my good friend and you will help her in accommodation and all.

(After 5 mins)

Friend : Are you there??

Me : Ha what happened??

Friend : Where were you. I think I am serious about her man. She i so PRETTY dude.

Me : I just checked my other mail. She has mailed me too about her Masters plans . I was sending a reply to her .

Friend : Dude WTH man.

Me: Dont worry buddy, I will take good care of her in ASU.

Friend : I wanted to introduce you as my friend man. We were talking right how can you send the mail??

Friend : I had just now even sent an offline message to her about me arranging something in ASU. You could have waited right. What was the hurry??

Me : Dude take it easy man. She is not like your girlfriend or something.

Me : Also she is not your type.

Friend : What do you mean??

Me : Oh did you say you left an offline message. She just added me on Gtalk. She is asking about my studies, blah blah blah and even my relationship status.

Friend : No. It cant be possible.

(After 2 mins)

Friend : Are you there?? WTH man?

Me : Ok dude thanks for the informing about YYYY, I mean about XXXX's marriage. Now wait till I send my wedding invite.

Me : If you dont find YYYY's name in it, then try again.

Me : Ciao. Need to go. Catchya later.

Friend : Fuck you and fuck that bitch.

Me : Ha ha. She is asking me why are you pinging her again and again.

Friend : I neither care about her or you. I just told her what a bitch she is.

(After 5 mins)

Me : Hey are you there??

Friend : Yeah WTF do you need. I am busy dont irritate me.

Me : No I was just wondering if you can give me YYYY's latest email id.

Friend : WHAT THE FUCK??

The Scar.

What happened : Was fielding on one end of the tennis court, the fielder on the other end left the ball under his legs. I made a fast move to stop the boundary. Was too fast and too concentrating on the ball. Couldn't control the body or rather the shoes didn't grip the court.

Next Moment : I left the ball and held my face, only to feel blood gushing out profusely. After 30 secs, players on either side are scared and discussing which is the nearest hospital. Still bleeding on the right side of the face.

Hospital : Too much importance to system. No human touch. While I am still bleeding, no one is even bothered.

Procedure : More painful than the cut.

• Fill the application form to be admitted. Name, Address, SSN etc
• Weight and Height measurement. And then sit in the waiting area.
• After 15 mins, comes a nurse and checks temperature and BP.
• She notes down the case and asks what happened and some random questions. Funniest one being "Are you thinking of killing yourself". If I was why would I come to hospital??
• After she records the case, the wait continues and so does the bleeding for 40 mins.
• Then I am shifted to a bed, where I continue waiting for 40 mins for the doctor to come.
• He checks the wound and tells the nurse to prepare for stitches.
• He then works on stitching the cut for 1 hr while I am too bored and am clicking pictures (with my phone) he operating on my face.
• He says you will be fine and will be discharged in some time. Wait continues for an hour after which the nurse comes and issues the discharge sheet and asks me to leave.
• This was procedure for emergency visit. I cant imagine the normal visit.
  

Pessimist : Two scars on already ****** face.
Optimist : I can still see through my right eye, its better to have a scar half a cm below eye than not have a eye.
Realist : That will be an expensive bill. Getting hurt in US is a costly affair.

Two days later : Eye swollen and black. Since no antibiotics or any medicines were prescribed, fear arises, as the swelling increases, panic sets in. Finally, gave in to the fear and saw the doctor again, went through the entire stupid procedure after which the doctor says, swelling is NORMAL. Nothing to worry. Realist cries again, for it increases the bill by another $100 after insurance cut.


Facebook : Picture uploaded with the caption "My best friend's face art". Some believed, some thought I was beaten up, few concerned called to check. Overall good fun.

The other story : "I was in a bar chasing a girl, her boyfriend pushed me to the edge of the table and this happened. However, I broke a beer bottle on his head and he is still in hospital". I liked the fact that lot of people believed this and thought I was capable of this.

Advices : "U are old now, should be more careful". " Be a little less adventurous".

Thought process : I have done way crazier things than playing cricket in a tennis court to get hurt. Its God's way of telling, "When I decide, anything can happen anywhere".

Lesson learnt : U never know what will happen. How good or bad it could be. So do whatever you like if it makes you happy. For safety is not guaranteed just because u would be cautious.

Prayer : Final bill is yet to come. Hope its not too burdensome. And hopefully, these scars don't work negatively while my parents are bride hunting for me :).

Currently : I am going to Vegas and the doctor is not available to remove the stitches. People come back from Vegas with a scar, broken tooth, tattoo but I am already going in with a scar. Wonder what to expect.

Until next time (mostly after vegas),

Luv,
Sri!!!

The Summer of 2011!!

Generally, I post here when I like something and feel like posting. This is a different one. I am bored on a saturday evening. So I am writing this just to update something.

Internship : Currently, doing the summer internship with Cirrus Logic. Still not the work I would like to do for the rest of my life. Lets see, how it turns out. I sometimes wonder will I ever find something that I would like to do for the rest of my life. But at the moment, I hope to fund one semester fee. And Tucson, is not the greatest of places. Hopefully, it will get better in the rest of the internship. But I like Cirrus, they have a very positive energy and the other reason is they sent me to Austin for a weekend.

Austin : Loved the energy of the city. But what I liked more is the greenery of the place, the climate is closest to Bangalore. Its called silicon hills, i just hope the development does not kill the serenity of the place. Cirrus is situated in the lush green hills of Austin. We had a pep talk by one tech genius and the CEO (who is in his early 40's). There is something about CEO's, I always like their speech. Are all of them so good or is it just my perspective?? Cirrus is rated the best place to work in Austin. Was very impressed by the lovely HR staff there. Overall, at the moment Austin is one place I would like to be if I am given a choice. But I am yet to see the very famous California.

Movies : Watched Pyar ka Punchnama. It was not funny and at the end of I am optimistic and do not think the girls are as bad a s they are projected. Watched Ye maya chesave, telugu version of Vinaithandi Varuvaya. The telugu version does not work for me. I loved the tamil version. Jessie - Trisha - lovely.

Relationships : These are very funny. (You know the type of relationships I am talking.) I do not know much about them but I enjoy when I see others and try to learn from them. A lot of friends are tying the magical knot, this sort of gives me complex. Another good friend is in midst of very funny situation in his relationship. I am enjoying it from a distance.

If there is an award to somebody who like people who are committed, I might win it hands down. I always end up liking girls who are already seeing someone. One of them also got married recently. No no, I am not sad. Life moves on. Now I like another girl, who is also seeing someone else. Pretty much been the story of my life. But no I am not complaining.

For the rest of summer, gymming, research work on two topics along with the ongoing internship is on the agenda. Will update on how much was successfully done.

Until next time,

Luv,

Sri!!

Wannabe Desi.

Its one of those days that I am in a zone of serious thinking about myself. These days I have started thinking too much.

I saw this video on facebook, posted by a friend. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=clRgupTDuW4&feature=player_embedded). I never get scared seeing a video but for some reason was very scared after seeing this one. Makes me think if I am doing the right thing in life. Am I missing an important part of my life. Its been about six months that I left India. I am getting used to this place and thats the scariest part. US has been very kind to me so far, people have been very sweet (although some people say its not the true them, I beg to differ), its very scenic and beautiful but still I do not want a greencard, US citizenship, not even like being called NRI.

Looking back the only reason I came here was I needed a break form my work. And this was the most obvious path or rather a path followed by many before. All thats written in the SOP is not true.

Its almost like a catch22 situation now. Suddenly when I want to go back, I have the loan money running on me. Which means i cant go back after my masters. If all goes well, I would recover my money by working a couple of years after my MS. But do I want to wait that long?? Will I be able to make a decision after 2 years to go back?? These are questions that linger my mind and I still do not have an answer for them.

But the other question which is more interesting one. What do I want to do if I go back to India?? I do not have a clear idea of what I want to do, however I clearly know I do not want to do anything related what I am doing so far. If I had full freedom to do whatever I want, these were a few things I would have liked to do after going back to India.

Politics : Given the number of scams that are coming out, even I want to try and get my share. On a serious note I want to be part of it as I have a gut feeling that I will do good. Not because I am qualified to be there but just for the fact that I want to do good at that stage. This option looks very unrealistic for now.

Race Horse Trainer : The biggest motivation for this is I can combine and work with my uncles and brother. I feel the combination could be lethal. The pure pleasure of working with them would be killer. Although, profession by itself is very challenging one. But if I want to get into it, the biggest challenge is convincing my family for they feel there are enough people struggling there already.

Professor : This is the interesting of the ones for one reason that its actually a realistic one. I dont want to teach the technical stuff, atleast not the way it was taught to me. I want to make education more fun and more intuitive. I would like to take the approach of the US education system back to India.

There are a lot of things that are going to stop me from doing any of this. If I add all of them to this post, it will be unnecessarily long. That will be another post by itself.

So thats it for now.

Cheers,

Sri!!!

Warmup.

I am wondering what the title of the blog should be and am not able to find a suitable one. I do not know what I want to write in this blog but for sure know that I want to get back to writing in this space more consistently. Purely for my own satisfaction.

Friends: A very interesting word. A lot of people pass through my head when I think about this word. At times I feel good to have them all and also miss most of them. Its an interesting stage of life. I have friends doing everything, some are working, some are studying, some are getting back to work from studies. A few of them have married, a few are due this year and there are few who are still accompanying me in the single status. Its all goods so far. I somehow feel some of them could get really busy after marriage and not keep in touch . I hope I am wrong. Hopefully, a reunion of sorts will happen in December.

Family: If there is one thing I miss the most in US it should be my family. The funny part is amongst all the Indians who stay along with me, I call the least to India to speak to family. The reason is everytime I speak to them, I feel like going back. More over we have never been a family who expressed love, celebrated any fathers, mothers or any other type of days. I always thought to myself I am a cool guy and not the one who is too family oriented. Slowly, I realize that at the backdrop, I am a very family guy. And its damn cool to be one.

I have almost finished whatever I wanted to write. Still do not have a suitable title. Lets just call it a "Warmup" for now.

Cheers,
Sri

Welcome back.

Its been a hiatus or rather a long break from this blog space. I promise myself to be more active here from now on. Hopefully!!

Its about a month now since I landed in Arizona, US. It looks like the dream run has ended and the reality has begun to sunk in.

Quadrangles Village, M347 is the place I stay. Its about a mile from school (ASU). Its one of the well maintained communities in the locality.

Work, Classes, Homeworks, Assignments, Labs, Cooking, Cleaning, Salsa, Swing Dancing, Gyming, Partying, short trips, rarely sleeping. Life has never been this busy. But there is something nice when life is busy and you don have to think about your next plan. I am trying to add a sport in between all this. If need be I can cut down on a few things and make life it easier for myself but I definitely do not want to cut down on anything for one reason or the other.

Work : "CPCOM 215. This is Srinath. How can i help you?" is what I say if anyone calls me at work. I work for Computing commons classroom support on the campus. The job profile includes setting up projectors, computers in classrooms , assisting teachers when they have problems using the systems, cleaning the white board, picking up trash, in general ensuring classrooms are in perfect. I work for 20 hrs per week. The best thing about this job is I earn more for cleaning boards of classroom than I used to get for doing Test Engineering. Ha ha.

Studies : I am struggling in this department. I will revisit this when I understand more about this.

Cooking : I didnt know to prepare tea when I came here. But I can prepare a lot of dishes including Rajma, Chhole, sambar, Kheer etc. I realised that preparing eatable stuff is not a big deal. I still wonder why women spend so much time in the kitchen. Overall, I am enjoying cooking.

Fun: I visit the gym once in a while when the tummy is popping out. I haven been to any clubs yet but will do it sometime soon. Salsa is a lot of fun. Its so much better because there are always 3 girls for each guy and the guys never run out of partners. Swing dancing is a lot of fun but have dropped it now for I need to have a balance.

Life: Overall life's a lot of fun. Its a little hectic but its so much better than just staring the computer for 8 hrs a day.

Until next time,

Cheers,
Sri!!

Side effects of Al-Co-Hol.

I was just wondering about the capabilities of alcohol and its ability make people to do funniest of things. Just thought its worth putting it up as a post.

1. Initially you overestimate your capacity and have the drink with out mixing, you then start crying for the acidity in your stomach.
2. Your friend who is equally drunk advices to remove the shirt as he is worried about his shirt which you are wearing.
3. Watching this funny scene, another friend who is equally drunk is unable to balance his seat and falls down his seat and ends up in swollen hand.

4.You getup the next day after alcohol when your friends tell that you were crying last night about your ex-girl friend, you actually believe it when you didnt even have a girl friend in the first case.

5.You are unable to walk on a straight path but you want to drive a car to prove you are ok.
6. You decide to have coffee in a 5 star hotel after drinks in the night, you are unable walk from the car to lobby, so you sleep on the lawn and tell your friends you are appreciating the view of the sky beyond the building.
7. The security guard is scared you will spoil the lawn, he politely walks you across the hotel premises and makes you sleep on the footpath.
8. Your friends who are a little better than you decide to take a leak and end up in the ladies restroom. (Their state of mind is not in position to realise that there are no male urinals).
9. You forget the reason for you entering the hotel and just get out of that place.
10. Your body is so out of control and to avoid this embarrassment amongst your friends, you decide to hide in the toilet for sometime, only later to realise that you havent locked the toilet and your friend comes to piss in the toilet and see you sleeping while shitting.

11.You fall on the floor while playing cards and rest of them do not even realise this and continue playing.
12.You end up doing Bhangra for an English. (This is my favourite side effect : Alcohol brings out the best dance in a person).
13.You fall off a bike and make reasons such as the earth is moving towards me.
14.You fall into a fountain while trying to drink water from it.

15. You are too lazy to serve your own drinks and end up in the hospital.You end up in hospital, because you are puking too much and there is nothing left to puke. You can feel your intestines in your throat. The one who takes you to the hospital cannot take care of the waist belt you gave him, because he is in no state to understand what is happening. The doctor thankfully injects you with the right medication, although he is drunk.



16.And sometimes you end up writing a post on your blog about side effects of Alcohol.



Disclaimer:
All the incidents mentioned above are related to some one living and some one who had fun.

This is an open ended post and anyone's experiences are always welcome. Post your experiences as acomment and I shall periodically upload it to the post.

Until next time,
Lots of Luv,
Sri!!!

Well, I was in Mumbai !!!

But just missed a miracle (Thanks to independence day). To start with I had been to Mumbai for a one day trip, with my uncle who was on a business trip and I was accompanying him.

The journey started on an interesting note, we were waiting for the BIAL bus at Hebbal, and surprisingly we didnt get one for close to 25 mins (till 11.15 and we had a flight at 12.20) which meant we would be late for the flight (with my uncle around I always live on the edge). Luckily, we found a cabbie who came to our rescue and we reached the airport just in time. Thanks to the cabbie who made full use of the wonderful BIAL road. The interseting part of this travel to BIAL was me and my uncle were the 2nd and 3rd passengers in the cab, there was already a female passenger(oh sorry a lady or a girl passenger - this is a completely different story). My uncle stuck a conversation with her (thanking her for the timely drop) and I continued further making it an interesting one till Priyanka revealed that she is going to the airport to receive her boy friend.

We boarded the Indigo flight. Within 1 hour and twenty mins we were flying in the skies of Mumbai. And when you are there in the skies of Mumbai, all you can see is Slums, dirty flats and more slums (No wonder Danny Boyle got inspired by them). Once we landed in Mumbai, the weather was surprisingly pleasant. We headed directly to the Chembur where my uncle had a business meeting to attend. In the whole trip, one thing I was completely impressed of Mumbai was the attitude of the Richshawallahs and the Taxiwallahs. I was apprised by Madhu of the their honesty towards passengers but was overwhelmed when I experienced it first hand (Well if this is the true spirit of Mumbai - I am really a fan of it). Infact to check one of them I purposely gave ten rupees extra but the guy promptly returned it back. Their counterparts in Bangalore or for that matter anywhere in India are such Chors that hardly any one believes them.

In the evening we went to the Siddhi Vinayak temple. I had heard a lot about this temple but was visiting it for the first time. I must say post 26/11 the security in Mumbai is beefed up and rightly so. We went around aarthi time and we had a good darshan. However, I believe the crowd controlling and planning of the queques can be done better to avoid commotion at the Vinayaka. We then went to Mahalakshmi tempple, again a very famous one. Unlike the Siddhi Vinayaka, this temple was not crowded and had a very pleasant and a wonderful darshan of the goddess.

We then thought of chilling out and having fun and headed to Mumbai Central but only later did we realise that it was Independence day which meant a lot of shops were closed. By now we were tired and wanted to get back to the room, so we decided we will catch the local train for the experience. The last time I had travelled in local train, I had a very pleasant experience and had reprimanded Madhu for not using it. But this time around my opinion has changed. I had heard a lot about the Mumbai local trains and how crowded they can get but yesterday was insane. We saw crowds jumping on to the train from the time the train was slowing down till it took speed. 9 out of 10 ten times I wouldnt have travelled in that train but for the fun of it, me and my uncle decided lets try it, we travelled from Dadar to the next stop (I do not remember the name), hanging on the footboard of the train , these five mins were filled with a lot of fear but at the same time had a lot of adrenaline rush. At the next stop my Uncle decided not to continue in train but will take a taxi, but I insisted we will continue in train. We finally took the taxi. All throughout the journey back to room I was feeling, we couldnt do something which was a routine for thousands of Mumbaikars. The next day I woke up to read the newspaper which reported that 6 injured and 1 dead among the many who had fallen of the train because of the excess crowd. I thanked my uncle for the timely decision of opting the taxi.The excess crowd all of a sudden in these trains was because many of the train lines are stopped for renovation which meant the same amount of crowd with lesser trains. I hope somebody does something to control the crowd if not they would read more such reports in the newspapers.

We then checked out of the hotel and reached the Shivaji International aiport, this time much ahead of time, all throughout the trip in Mumbai I saw dirty flats, more slums which made the city look for more dirtier and cheaper than Bangalore but I must appreciate that the roads in Mumbai are twice wider and no pot holes at all. We then took a flight back to Bangalore and reached back in time for my uncle to get back to races and make up the Mumbai trip expenses. By the way this was my maiden flight journey, hopefully many more to come in the future. As expected I was very excited, luckily I got a window seat both the times and was observing different activities and the wings with keen interest while it looked like trite speech for many frequent travellers. I will always remember that my first flight journey was to Mumbai in a Blue Indigo flight, flied by Captain I.G. Singh and this part of information was announced by the very pretty head flight attendant Ms.Reena Verma. I observed that the both the times the head flight attendant had a boy cut and hair was let loose while the other hostess had tied their hair in a bun. I wonder if this was a coincidence or was the haircut part of their uniform based on the grade??


Until next time,
Lots of Luv,
Sri!!!

"24 and Still Single"

"24 and still single, aren't you ashamed??" is exactly what Pande asked when he met me first on 4th April. Yes you guessed it right, It was my 24th birthday and I am still single.

A few hours before that I had been getting calls from friends and family. There is something special about birthday's , you get a lot of calls and people around you try to make it very memorable for you. I really enjoy this, absolutely no complaints. Although I must say that the number of callers has reduced drastically after college. The number of people who wished was nearly half compared to what it used to be in college, courtesy, I had not displayed my birthday to everyone in orkut. Nevertheless I got calls from all of them whom I expected.

Since my birthday fell on a weekend, we planned to go out of Bangalore. Nothing was fixed until the previous night except for the fact that we would go out of Bangalore for a couple of days. Pande booked a very comfortable TT and on the way he had picked up Jayashree, Naveen B, Pooja, Prashant, Pratik and Madhu. It was finally decided that Mysore would be the destination and we set towards that direction. On the way we picked up Bala who was our guide for the next couple of days, from JP Nagar and hit the NICE road. They collect a toll of 18 rupees to travel on NICE road from Kanakpura road to Mysore and its completely worth it. Within 10 mins on the NICE road you will reach mysore road. We still did not have a concrete plan on what would we do or where would we go in Mysore. Bala and me were very skeptical of getting an accomodation in a decent place in Mysore for the weekend. Considering the bad experience of GOA we wanted to have the accomodation booked before reaching the place. Thanks to my uncle while we were having breakfast in Kamat maddur, he made a reservation of 4 rooms in Hotel Sandesh. After a heavy breakfast we headed towards Tannurkere as per Bala's suggestion.This is not the usual tourist spot of Mysore but thats also the best part of it. You cannot see the the lake till the last moment and then you can see a huge lake with very clean water.The 9 of us had one part of the lake completely for us. We swam in thelake for nearly 2 hours and then half heartedly left Tannurkere.

After the swim, all of us were very hungry as we headed towards Mysore. We had lunch in the famous Infy Dhaba which is right opposite Infy campus of Mysore. Lassi is speciality of this place. We then checked in to Hotel sandesh.I guess the heavy lunch was soporific, all of them were into a quick nap except me, Prashant, Pratik and Naveen B. The next 45 mins were very entertaining for me and Prashant because of Naveen's comment on Pratik. I never thought that comment was to be taken that seriously until I saw Pratik's reaction. But after 45 mins I knew we would for sure have fun for the rest of the trip.

At 6.30 we left to the very famous Chamundi hills. This was one of the place we all had thought we would visit for sure in this trip. After a good darshan we had "Yel neeru" (Thanks Madhu we drank a lot of them in the trip). As we climbed down the hill, Bala made a quick call to his friends to decide where should we have dinner. It was between Olive Garden, Opium and Planet X.
Eventually we landed in Planet X. Of what we saw this place has a lot of things from playstation, Bowling Alley, Pool Tables, Go Karting, and a good restaurant. We did not have time to visit any of them. The cakes on the pastery shop was very inviting so I had my share of cake for the birthday and we moved on to the highlight of the place "Hookah". We entered this lounge bar with disc which serves good Hookah at 9. Within an hours time, the change from Chamundi to Planet X was too much to handle. The next two hours were great. Not much can be described here but all of us had a great time. The music stopped at 11 which was an extension from 10 inspite of election because it was saturday. It was funny when these guys started singing the Happy Birthday song in disc for me, what was even funny was the entire crowd in the disc joined and sang the birthday song. We then went back to the room, since we didnt have water in any of the rooms we went around in Mysore searching for water. Mysore sleeps very early, we walked a lot eventually to get water. After fetching a couple of bottles of water we came back to room. None of us had any more energy left after a tiring and eventful day. We hit the bed soon with an important agenda left uncompleted.

Day 2 started on a good note with Bala fetching us a dosa each from the famous Mylari hotel. The dosas were so good that we went back to Mylari again after checking out from Sandesh to break the fast second time. We then went to Zoo. Although I wasnt too keen on this place everyone else enjoyed it a lot.The giraffe was the standout of the zoo. We went to the east gate of Mysore Palace and clicked a photo, much to the persuasion of Jayashree. (Half the people didnt even get down from the cab, Lazy people). We then went to Chitravana resorts to have lunch which eventually was my dinner as well. Chitravana resorts is a very pleasant place with a lot of trees on the way to OOty, a must visit according to me. I only wish the food was served a little faster, however the food being served late gave rise to a lot of interesting conversations.

Pande had picked up a CD at the zoo. We watched movie "Straight", starring Vinay Pathak and Gul panag which ate up close to 2 hours of our journey back. The movie was cheesy comedy. A one time watch. Good time pass. By 11 I was back in my bed because I had to go back to office the next day.

1) Thanks guys for making it one of my memorable days and a memorable trip.
2) A lot of friends were missed on this trip.
3) I wish birthdays are this much fun everytime for everyone.
4) "24 and still Single, but Life still rocks".

Luv,

Sri!!

Helpless Indians.

They had done it before on a Friday, Tuesday, Saturday, Sunday and now they did it on a WEDNESDAY. Do not worry very shortly Monday will be covered as well. Nothing new, It was a terrorist attack again. Everything was the same but the manner in which they did it this time was different. Terrorists came through sea and attacked Mumbai as usual. Instead of common market or a crowded train, they choose Taj and The Oberoi hotels this time. They proved a point that if they really want they can come anywhere, anytime and attack us and we cannot do anything about it but die to their bullets, cover their action continously on News channels and after all this light a candle mourn for the dead. Come Monday we feel bad for the dead and the wounded and we are back in our respective offices doing our daily routine work as always. And people around the world call this the "Spirit of the City" , they do not understand "That we INDIANS are HELPLESS and can do NOTHING other than this". I do appreciate that Leopold Cafe, one of the places terrorists attacked, was open Sunday afternoon for business and there were people coming in as usual, but the point is what could they do other than opening???

Thanks to these terrorists for one reason, every time they attack, we Indians will stand united irrespective of religion and caste. But not too long, within no time our politicians have the ability to divide us back. Its a collective failure of the ruling state and Centre governments namely the congress. Shivraj patil resigned or was rather sacked and now Chidambaram is new Home minister but will things change?? Does that mean there will bw no more terror attacks on India?? No I dont think so. In US after 9/11, all parties came together and saw terrorism as a common problem of the country and took some decisions which have the results. No terrorist ever even thinks of an attack on US anymore. But in India things are different, when such a meeting was called our own Advani and Rajnath Singh were campaigning for elections and highlighting the failures of UPA. Vilas Rao Deshmukh was with Ram Gopal Verma for inspection of Taj. Why was RGV there?? If he was thinking of doing a movie, good but not the time for inspection when many people still did not know where their loved ones were. Mr. R R Patil said these kind of things happen in big cities. He should be ashamed to tell that. If terrorists had attacked his family, would he have told the same statement?? And where is Raj Thackeray who is the latest hero in Mumbai Politics who want to send non Maharashtra people out of Mumbai. He has to be reminded that the NSG forces which saved the city from further damage were INDIAN soldiers and not Mumbai alone. Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan of NSG who was killed while attacking the terrorists was of Tamil origin, brought up in Bangalore, part of the Bihar regiment, and camped in Haryana but when the terrorists attacked he came as an INDIAN and fought against them. The fact is in India the politicans concentrate too much on how to come to power but have absolutely no idea what to do when they are finally in power.

Lot of people say you have to vote to be a responsible citizen of the country but I do not agree with this. Whom should I vote and Why??
Congress : Because I can make a SC/ST certificate and claim reservation.
BJP : Because I am a Hindu and BJP promotes Hindutva.
LEFT : Because they would not allow any industry function smoothly.

The point is this terror would have happened irrrespective of UPA and NDA governments and will continue to happen as long as these corrupt politicians rather the privileged citizens of the country continue the administration as they are doing now.

I know my vote is precious and I pledge that I would not vote any idiot just for the heck of voting. I would vote only when some one comes up and tells, 1) Criminals when proved guilty for acts such as terrorisms will be killed till death. Punishments will be made more severe and will be implemented to one and all irrespective of politician or actors. 2) There will be no reservations based on caste, If it is there it will be only for people who are financially backward and not backward caste as I believe no caste is backward.

Finally Hats off to the Mumbai policemen and NSG for protecting us without caring for their lives. India lost three of its best policemen, I hope we can recover soon from the loss. Its happened in Mumbai this time, not too far it may happen to us in Bangalore here. The corporates here are asking for licence of AK 47, as they think that the government is incapable of protecting us and they can protect themselves. I do not know if this will be granted but it would be great if a rule is passed that all offices, schools etc should have compulsory training for citizens where they can protect themselves from fire, first aid training to save people in need of immediate help etc.

As I write this post the bottom line is "WE INDIANS ARE HELPLESS", I know nothing I told above would happen anytime. Politicians will continue to divide and rule us and we will continue to be as we are.


Until next time or rather
Until next terror attack.

Good Bye,
Sri

First Year Experience

I started my professional career a little more than a year ago.(I started working for Tessolve on 1st August, 2007). Its been a mixed bag at this point of time. In the last one year, technically I guess I learnt more than what I had accumulated(mugged) in the whole of engineering but I cant compare the present life to the amount of fun I had in engineering.

During college I used to get less than 1000 bucks a month and that used to be enough for all the fun we used to have. Now although I get around 20000 every month , and I don't have the time to spend it but still I am not satisfied with my salary. I really don't know the reason why?? It could be because money was never an issue then and now it is.This is probably the first change after I started working. I wouldn't be an hypocrite and say "Salary doesn't matter".

There has been a transition from college to office, friends to colleagues, subjects to projects etc. Before this I never understood "Monday morning blues", as in college everyday used to be the same but in office its not so. In office it some how happens that no one waits for a Monday morning to get back to work and that for all of us the most awaited moment of the week is Friday evening. Actually speaking the Friday evening never repeated more than once or the Monday morning never disappeared in any week but still that feeling always stayed every week.May be this is what we call "Human tendency". Its not that the colleagues are not affable or the work place is clumsy but there is something about college and friends which is absent in office, I am yet to figure it out.

Highlights of the last one year :

1. Goa trip with the gang : For some reason we had to drop the plans of Goa as the college trip and had to settle to Gokarna (No regrets though). Last summer along with the bunch of college friends had been to Goa. We went around places and didn't even think of work even for a single moment. It was like the college Goa trip was fulfilled. I wish all companies make a rule where each employee should go out some where for a vacation for one week in a year where he doesn't have to receive any calls from office or check mails. I wholeheartedly believe this refreshes the employee and he can give better once he comes back.(It happened with me).

2. Current project: In the last one year I worked on a board design of a 40GHz multiplexer and then the other one is the broadband receiver from customer. I really enjoyed doing this project for two reasons a) I got to apply most of the concepts we learnt in engineering. I get a satisfaction that my four years of engineering is not completely a waste after all. Initially, I was skeptical if an engineering degree was required for me to do the work I am doing because we had the best instructor who taught us electronics, DSP etc used in our work in the simplest way but only later did I realise that I could understand what he spoke because of my engineering knowledge. Its really a great feeling to apply concepts like FFT in work which we just mugged equations without even knowing why its being used.

b) The chip for which we are developing test program is a low power broadband receiver which can receive AM,FM and VHF. The chip could go in to the next set of Nokia mobile phones and in navigation chips. So the next time some one is using a posh phone it could be that the chip in it was tested by the test program developed by me. Its a nice feeling to work on some of the latest technology.

Probably, this is what they call "Job Satisfaction".

3. Tessolve Annual day: On the 26th of July, Tessolve celebrated on entering the 5th year of operations in which it had grown from 10 to 370 people. Pande(engineering friend and present colleague), myself and couple of others were asked to handle the cultural programs on the annual day. The show was organised well and the program was a huge hit which had dances, singing, fashion show etc, in between these we played videos of interviews with our CEO,VPs and Directors but the highlight of the evening video compilation of photos of the Journey of Tessolve compiled by us. Be it the shooting of the interview or the preparing the video we really enjoyed working for this event. I read somewhere that "Journey to success is more enjoyable than the destination". We have always experienced it be it the annual day or Phase Shift - telecom fest or the freshers party we used to work for during college. I also agree with Steve Jobs that " One can only connect the dots backward". We definitely feel that we could easily organise the cultural functions of the annual day is such short span because of the experience we had from Phase Shift or the freshers.

We enjoyed engineering because we had fun and I mentioned the above were the highlights of the last year because these were some thing which I did in engineering, something which was fun for me. I believe having fun is the most important part of life.

Hopefully there are many more fun filled events like these which will keep life going.....

Luv,

Sri!!!

Derby Day!!

Well this is my first post on this blog. The first one was posted by a friend. Hopefully many more will follow this as well. I had been to races with a bunch of friends yesterday. So i thought i will start blogging about my experience at Race Course, Bangalore on 13th July 2008.

This year the Kingfisher Bangalore Derby, race for the best three year old horses, run over a distance of a mile and quarter was bigger and better than ever before. The race altogether carried a purse of 1.2 crore rupees with the winner bagging 72 lakhs plus a trophy worth a lakh.

Going into the race Mr.Vijay Mallya's filly Set Alight trained by the Mumbai pro Pesi Shroff was the on money favourite and it was to be piloted by Mallesh Narredu. While Set Alight was trained well and maintained in the pink of condition for this race by the trainer Pesi Shroff. Mallya's organising camp did their best to decorate the club completely in the Red and White the kingfisher colors before the start of the races, and decoration just got better with when the crowd started moving in the Red and white stand or as it is called the UB stand.

As the race began with 9 horses passing through the starting gates, Set Alight was the only filly travelling with a bunch of eight colts. Set Alight set the track on blaze and won the race comfortably by bettering course record time by a couple of seconds. The presentation was fully packed with Mallya camp both giving and receiving the honours. With the colourful atmosphere the presentation was as good as it could be but the icing on the cake was missed with absence of Mallya himself.

More than 80% of the race course wanted Set Alight to win because of its owner and his immense contribution to Horse racing in particular and sports in general. We started backing horses and lost enough money initially that one of them gave up and declared that he wouldn bet on any horse again, but ironically he was the first one standing in the queue for the next race as well. Thanks to Power Punch we not only recovered all our money but made enough money for the party tonight as well. Overall at the end of the day we had a good experience of betting and were satisfied for first timers. (Except Sheshu of course, who will for sure go back to get his lost money).

Well we were at the race course for a different reason and we weren't disappointed at all.While the Stands were decorated with Red and white colors, it was filled with a lot of colors sporting attires of various colors and designs. The quantity and quality of these colors was so good that we concentrated more on them than the horses. One thing that was common among all the colors was Goggles. One of the bunch of friends was so inspired by this factor that he went on to buy one pair of goggles in the evening itself. Along with this we have a huge list of what we aspire to posses, ranging upto a Bentley and a Derby contender some day.

All said and done, this year's Derby was a trend setter for a lot of events in years to come.

Sri!!

First thought

It is probably the first blog in which the first post is not authored by me.
Just so that, it truly sticks to the URL of my mind being plundered, in the true sense.
Watch out for more plundering, soon, by a mind that's truly mine.