US States, I've been

The journey in United States started on July 7th 2006. In this past 6 Years, I have visited the following states.

New Jersey:
Also Known as: The Garden State

New Jersey State Seal

Stayed in Jersey City and worked for MetLife insurance companies.











Wisconsin:
Also Known as: Badger State

Stayed in Appleton and worked for Thrivent Financial for Lutherans.










California:
Also Known as: The Golden State

Stayed in Irvine and worked for Capital Group Companies.

Other States Visited

Sl. No	State Name	Abbreviated as	Also Known as
1	New York	NY	Empire State
2	Connecticut	CT	Constitution State
3	Delaware	DE	The First State
4	Massachusetts	MA	Bay State
5	New Hampshire	NH	The Granite State
6	Maine	ME	Pine Tree State
7	Vermont	VT	Green Mountain State
8	Pennsylvania	PA	Keystone State
9	Maryland	MD	Old Line State
10	Florida	FL	Sunshine State
11	Michigan	MI	The Wolverine State
12	Illinois	IL	Prairie State
13	Minnesota	MN	North Star State
14	Oregon	OR	Beaver State
15	Washington	WA	The Evergreen State
16	Idaho	ID	Gem State
17	Nevada	NV	Silver State
18	Arizona	AZ	The Grand Canyon State
19	Utah	UT	Beehive State
20	Wyoming	WY	Equality State
21	Montana	MT	Treasure State

April Madhathil... My Special Birthday !!

Ok.. Where do I start? Somehow, my heart circles back to my college days when I think of good times. Here is another posting that I would like to share. This incident happened when I was in my second year studies of undergraduate course.

It was 16th December 2002; got up early in the morning wore blue shirt and cream color pant. The shirt had a small writing on the pocket named Kajaniks. On this same day there was four other guys wore the same colored shirt and pants with Kajaniks logo on their pocket. After being to temple I had a cup of milk and took off to College. It was a special day for me as it marked my existence on this world by increasing the value of Age = Age + 1. But why others chose to wear the same type of dress, I still don’t know, may be because they loved me so much? Or maybe I dominated most of the time with my decisions on this group? I still really don’t know. My group in UG had five people Karthik, Jawahar, Nirmal, Krishnaraj and Somu. Now you should have realized what Kajaniks stood for. We had a unmatched bonding amongst all the groups that existed in our class.

We were planned well in advance of going to a movie on this day to celebrate my age factor by cutting cake in the theater. Like Jyothika in the movie poovellam kaetuppar. I even communicated this plan to some of the close teachers that we know off. The first period was discrete mathematics and we five of us were sitting in the first row. After seeing us in same dress (uniform), staff started asking what is special today. And I took a box full of chocolates from the desk and gave it with a smile on my face. She asked me “oh is it your birthday?, then why does others wearing the same dress like you?”. I had nothing to say except to valinjify and smile. (Many say, I am good in doing that).

The second period was Applied Mathematics II – Hell ya, see so many maths period. But this professor was too cool, his name is Marshall Antony and we borrowed hundred rupees from him stating that we are planning to go for a movie this afternoon. He gave us the cash and said “Naan, kaasu kuduthennu yaaru kittayum soleedadheenga pa”. Sir kitaye kaasu vangeetu poi padam paatha modhal pasanga naangala dhan irupom. :)

I don’t remember what the third period was, but during that period, everyone in the class came to knew that the most studious group is bunking the afternoon session for a movie and the news spread across the class just like a forest fire and to my surprise everyone in the class wants to come for the movie. I was happy and pride that my birthday is being celebrated in a grand way. Then in the fourth period, we did nothing but orchestrating and involved in collecting money across the class and confirmed if we had enough cash for the movie. After the fourth period we were all set for going to the theater and few guys and girls sat back in the class just because of the reasons that they are too studious or their parents were part of the same college.

Our class is located just adjacent to the staff room, so the staffs would get to monitor what we are doing during the breaks and also especially to watch out those folks who are bunking class in the noon. If a guy takes his bag and goes out, then it is an indication that he is not going to turn out to the class in the noon session. On this day, Harish, we call him muttai (egg) because of his short and stout character. He will be looking very much like a little dwarf. Ok, this is a funny incident, when everyone was dodging to go out of the class in different fashions, Harish was the guy who was caught behind by our class advisor Ramalingam and questioned where he was heading to. He has stated that he is going for lunch and be back in the afternoon session. But he never returned for the afternoon session rather he was with us enjoying and whistling for the movie April Madhathil.

We were late for the movie by few minutes, but still we did not miss much. Everyone got a ticket and we were in the theater whistling, dancing and enjoying the movie. In the interval Jawahar had bought the cake and also a silver knife (made by him), yeah his family business is gold business. So he knew little about melting and making metals in to the shape he desires. We did not have a table to keep the cake so, few of my friends held the cake for me to cut, and I was feeling pride, josh, fun, nervous everything. When the knife met the cake it was up with roars of sound around me and I enjoyed every moment of it. I have not celebrated any of my birthdays till date to this grand manner. It has been one of the most memorable incidents in my life so far.

The next day in my college was even more thrilling as professors came to the class and stood for an hour without taking any sessions or even opening their mouth. The info was cascaded to the professors from my then enemy Prabhakaran conveying to the class advisor that we went to April Madhathil movie. I did not speak to that idiot for several months from then and it was him again who initiated the dialogue with me during our Industrial Visit. To add fuel to the burning fire, it was again the idiot Prabhakaran went to the professor asking “Naanga enna pannom, engalukku class edunga nu”. I would never forgive that idiot for this.

Every professor asked me if I was the one who orchestrated the movie plan. I had nothing to say other than no. I accepted to the fact that we all went for a movie. I was even prepared if I was asked to bring my parents to college, as I had this plan already communicated to my mom and dad. Obviously my parents would feel bad if I had to get them to college to get blame on them, but still I was prepared for it. But later in the day they did not ask any of us to bring parents. In fact the staffs were confused on what they could do as they have not seen obedient Kajaniks doing so. And later, on the end of the day they agreed to take classes starting from the next day. For me, I did not lose much on this day as I felt I got to enjoy one more day just sitting idle in the class :).

This incident was also one of the reason for me in not getting the best outgoing student award, where as it went to my then enemy Prabhakaran. My college days were so much fun and I had the best of three years, though I don’t remember today of what I learnt, I am happy to be part of such thrilling moments and I will always remember such fascinating incidents.

School Days to Work Days...

It was Computer Period for us and I was sitting in between two guys Santhosh (Santa) and Venkatesh (Dikki) in my 11th class and those two guys were pinching and hitting a fat guy Manikandan (Buffalo). Since three of us were sitting in the same desk, Senthil (Mundhiri Kottai) was the minder (Class Representative) he wrote all our three names on the black board. As soon as Computer Professor (Kamban – this is his nick name, I forgot his original name) came in, he asked three of us to go out of the class. As usual we bowed our heads down and standing in front of him, but that wasn’t convincing enough for him to accommodate us in his class. So, we were all thrown out. Santhosh was standing behind the door hiding him in such a way no one walks in the corridor can see him. This is because his mom is a physics teacher and she works in the same school. I was standing next to him for the same reason, but my mom was not working in the same school but she was was an ex-teacher from this same school and she still maintained contacts with some of the teachers to get periodical feedback about me and my studies. Venkatesh was standing outside the door; he was careless as his parents are not working in this school.

As we were standing outside the door, Santhosh wasn’t aware that the professor was walking close to the door to check what we were doing, and Santhosh started saying “Dei, Kamban vandhutaana da”.. he kept on asking this and I was not able to control my laughter. After seeing us laughing, our professor ended up with usual scolding’s and round of climax, followed by saying we were fit for nothing.

I happened to experience all these tortures in my school days. When I moved to 12th standard, I used to roam around with Ram Prasad by conveying to my mom that I would be in his room for group studies and he did the same at his home and we both roamed all the streets. That is when I experienced my first puff and believe me that was my last puff as well. I will explain more about this in my next blog.

After my +2, where I scored only few marks, but Ram Prasad managed to few extra marks than me. As a dialogue in 3 idiots movie, when a guy roams around you and gets more marks than you, you will always feel bad and I felt bad from that day up until I got admitted in college.

The first day in College..
I was all excited as my granny helped me convince my dad and mom to get me into one of the famous college in city by 'donating' quite a few grands to the college welfare management. Then, from here I don't know where I was going, I just started and tried to be studious and after first year, all professors started liking me and I wanted to maintain the pride that I accumulated. So, I continued to study well. During the interim exams, I would score a good marks and my fate, always pushes me back during university exams. And as every college guy, had few crushes (Divya, we named her as Powder, man I can’t still forget her face). Also some everlasting memories of bunking classes for a movie and a grand b'day celebrations at theater.. Life was heaven those days... Finally, I was able to complete the degree with distinction.

After about three years of college studies, I got a job in heaven. So called software industry. (I don't know how far it is true). But I felt the same way, when I got this job. But, this made me feel bad that I will not be able to pursue my master’s degree. Don’t think I am being so studious here, I was feeling bad that I will have to work from now, and no more fun. I wanted to do my regular masters not for the sake of knowledge, but just to have fun by spending three more years under the feet of my parents. But unfortunately that did not happen.

Unlike some lucky chaps, I had got to be on bench only for few days of my life and had been testing the hell out of the developers ever since. A week back I got piece of code to test and since then my life had been a living hell. I was wondering how tension free and comfortable life would have been if I got a chance to pursue MCA.

Sitting in an Air-Conditioned office, having testing discussions with my team lead, and those were the days where I felt going for bathroom and a tea break would make my team lead feel that I am dodging. And I used to sit at my desk all the time erect starring at monitor even if I don’t have work. But my TL used to roam a lot. After a few more days, I got to talk to my onsite co-ordinator.. that is the first time I am ever talking in an international call.. woow.. wat a feeling, I said to all my friends that I had got a chance to talk with my onsite co-ordinator while most of my friends already did.

After an year, I started growing as an IT employee by staying late at office, tea breaks with girls, mokkai joke, kadalai etc., etc., And then I was like wanting to do something different to establish myself, but I rather had a very few chances to prove myself. And then suddenly world around me started to change and everyone started to initiate visa and then I started to dream about high rises, porsche life, flying in a car, money, my reputation amongst relatives and all about flying to United States.. (Dream of every IT person)..

Then, my project manager said that I am going to fly.. but even before the flight took off, I started to fly up on the air.. and I was not able to control my happiness and josh at that moment.. I went out to call my parents to convey that I am going to United States... As every parent would feel, they started feeling proud of their kid.

Well.. it was a fascinating flight experience with my four best buddies of my batch.. and when we landed we had two more friends to take us from airport to the hotel. That was the most memorable day.. After being here in US, I was taken to Indian street in NJ and it felt like being in the streets of bangalore.. beeda, dosai.. All Indian faces everything was the same except for one thing that even at night 9 it was bright and sun was still smiling at us.

It was a good gang of friends that I had helped me to roam around all the places of United States in less than two months of time.. That was real fun time in my life. I have a detailed blog explaining my trip to Los Angeles.

Then days went on and I was handling a project as an Onsite Co-ordinator.. And as every offshore team.. my team is not an exception to feel what work is he doing at onsite and why is he pushing everything to offshore.. Well.. that is the way life goes..

Since then, with offshore calls and project pressures I have been losing my sleep over infinite loops and run time exceptions, wondering when I would get a life...

A few more years later...

Well, I don't want to imagine right now..

Just for fun.. Array Rama.. Array Krishna..

We all know that the Lord Rama has been addressed by different names
like Janakirama, Kalyanarama, Anantharama etc.
Likewise, Krishna have different names like Gopal akrishna, Ananthakrishna etc.

One day, our Ancestors were thinking how to refer to all those names in an easy way.

You all know that our ancestors are pioneer in mathematics. With their mathematical knowledge, they found a concept called ARRAY.

They decided to put all names of Rama in an array called RAMA and all names of Krishna in an array called KRISHNA ................. ... ...


From then on they start referring them as "ARRAY RAMA ARRAY KRISHNA"

No! No! Don't Cry :-)

Friend.. Six letter that bring the whole new world !!

Down the Memory Lane.. My trip to Los Angeles

After seeing the topic as down the memory line, I remembered about a long email that I wrote to my sister couple of years back explaining my trip to Los Angeles.. I am going to edit it here for this blog with pictures... This may not be a contest winner, but I felt Participation is more important than winning as it gives me an opportunity to write on my own about something...
I was one of the chaps in the group of four luckiest people from my ELT batch who got a chance coming to United States. The good thing is we were known for 2 years and a project at onsite with the buddies whom you know well, can't ask anything better than that.. And, to add more to it.. We got a new cool buddy Manju joining these group of 4 from Georgia.. She is the coolest person that I have seen... The project that we worked helped us in planning for all the fun activities that we wanted to do in United States. And, we planned for every weekend on where we want to go and we orchestrated the trips in the best possible manner.. Here comes a email writing to my sister explaining about our trip to Los Angeles...

We were living in Jersey City, NJ in Candlewood Suites (initial stay) and the story starts from here.. We started from our hotel on Friday evening to the Airport. None of us knew driving and we were dependant on Cab to go from place to place and on this day we had booked a limousine to take us to the Airport.

After our security check-in, we went into the flight.. We had a dream to travel in all the airlines.. And this was the first time I was ever gonna fly in United States.. I always thought they would give snacks whenever you travel in air. But for my dismay they did not give anything special.. Only in the name it had Pride of being called American Airlines.. But the service was very normal. When the flight was on air, asusual Pavi slept off and Reshma accompanied her.. When Ashok and Sarath started to watch movie.. it was me and Manju left with putting mokkais.. 6 hours of journey wasn't accompanied with snacks.. that's bad right... We were only served with Cool Drinks.

So far, I had only seen flight traveling on a bridge in email forwards, to my surprise the flight that I was travelling was running on top of a bridge below the automotive vehicles is crossing without any interruption. That is when I realized that we have reached Los Angeles. It was fascinating to see and I couldn’t stop appreciate the engineering.

We had this trip booked through gotobus.com and I had this reserved for all of us on my name and when we reached, there was a guy standing there with my name plate in his hand waving at the passengers coming out of the flight. I had a little pride as I saw someone holding my name to receive me.

That guy took us to hotel and we had food nearby to where we stayed. Those were the days I used to hate American foods. It was a get together for all our batch mates planned to enjoy our labor day weekend at Los Angeles. So, a group of 6 more people joined us at the hotel. Now, we became a group of twelve to roam around. As usual we had guys chat until 2 AM and went to bed.

Day 1:
The next day morning we went to Universal Studios where we had fun roaming around to different themes and rides. We started off from Van Helsing theme which was supposed to be scary, but as I said, it was not that scary or that interesting. Then we went to several other shows in Universal Studios. I was always afraid to go on a roller coaster ride and I was forced to sit with my friends in the Mummy ride and that was a stunning ride where the roller coaster went in reverse with full speed and we were not able to speak any word except to shout from the pitch of our throat.

Universal Studios was interesting because of the fact that I got to enjoy what I saw on pictures like Jeans in real. After our lunch, as usual we started to take pictures in different poses.
From Universal Studios we started down to Kodak Theater, to see the place where the prestigious academy awards are given. We took some more pictures after witnessing the finger prints of the famous Hollywood actors. At hotel, we enjoyed spending time in Swimming Pool and Jacuzzi, accompanied with hot and cold drinks on the pool.

And again after our dinner, we had guys chat until 2AM where we explored one of the guy’s college love story. College love stories are always interesting to hear and talk about. Even after an eventful day with full of roaming around rides and shows, we were up until 2 AM to hear about his interesting story.

Srini and Balaji were trying to persuade asking him to go back to his College Mate to propose her. I did nothing but to listen this interesting conversation.

Day 2:
The next day we headed down to San Diego sea world, though the drive was for two hours it was very good as on one side it had mountains and the other side was Ocean. It was a scenic extravaganza. On our way to the sea world, we took a break at a shopping place and I took a photo as a cow boy and I am still searching for it. It was a funny picture; I will try to post it in here, if I get it.

From there we headed on to a ship on the Atlantic Ocean. Again, I witnessed a man made wonder; a bridge construction on the sea connecting two different places.

At San Diego sea world, we watched shows like Shamu, Dolphin shows etc., I liked those shows a lot. Two hours ride back to hotel was fun as we started chatting about our ELT days.
After reaching hotel, as usual we ordered pizza, but we did not have chat on that day and unusually everyone went to bed early that night.

Day 3:

Disney Land was a dream place for me, and as usual we had fun in roaming around the theme park. We had the guide getting fast pass and ready at the exit where we came out and we covered max at all the places we visited. He was rushing us in helping us cover most places.

I still remember the Space Mountain ride as it was the first roller coaster ride, for the first time in a roller coaster, I had my eyes wide open, looking for turns and twists. The track of this roller coaster was in the dark and when you anticipate it to turn left; it would turn right and vice versa. It was awesome and made us feel as if we were dark in the sky with stars all around. One of the best rides ever. Of all the three days that I spent in LA, this is one of the best rides that I would remember forever.

From there we gathered at the main entrance by catching a train that runs through Disney Land. After three days of fun and fun, we were sad to get departed from one other. But, as usual tough moments and from there we headed back to Airport.

In our whole night of Journey in heading back to New Jersey, we slept. And the next day I was in the office at around 12 in the noon and for the whole day at office, I did nothing other than composing this big email to my sister.

If you are wondering if I am getting to do such things at office now..
I should agree to the fact that I am not lucky anymore and the days will never return…

Valkailayum VCR la irukara madhiri oru rewind button irundha evlo nalla irukum !!

Life of a Software Engineer

Nice Read.. not my own writing, it is a email forward..

It was raining heavily outside. Dark clouds gathered in the sky and nature was in its ominous best. I took a break from my work and went to the canteen to grab a cup of coffee. I had a sip and went near the window to see the rain pouring down heavily outside the glass structure. I was inside our huge office building, unruffled by even the fierceness of the nature. Through the heavy transparent glass, I could see a small girl trying to hold on to her umbrella which the wind was snatching away from her. I felt sorry for the girl, and was happy that I was not in a similar pathetic situation. Yes. I take pride for the fact that I am a software engineer. . I have everything which a common man would envy; money, status, respect, you name it I have it. I always wanted to be software professional and here I am, working for one of the best firms in the world. But then, am I really happy? Now, I could see an imprint of my palm on the other glass window, through which I reminisced my past, basked in the warmth of the sun shine.

My childhood was so much of fun. I vividly remember those rainy days, when I hugged my mother tightly during sleeping listening to all the stories told by her. Now, I have a big house here, but then it is just a house, not a home. My parents are pretty far away from me now. I have a cell phone to talk to them everyday, but then I really miss those dinners which I had with my family everyday. I could easily afford to taste all the different cuisines these days, but the best of food there, lack the love and affection which is present in the food prepared by my mother.

I threw a lavish party for my colleagues for my birthday, but then they would never replace the birthdays when my friends secretly brought a cake and at the end, half of the cake would have ended up on my face. The couple of hundred bucks that u save for a long period just to give a treat to your friends in the road side chat shop can never give the pleasure even after spending a few thousand bucks these days.

The scene of me crying and refusing to have dinner on the day when I fought with my best friend came to my mind. Today, she has gone far away from me, taking away my love and with it my life, but I am sitting and testing here with a false smile on my face. Everyday I meet new people, but then I long ceased to make a new friend.

It’s true that I have a lot of things now. I have a nice bed, but no time to sleep. The latest designer clothes, but a worn out body. Quite a few to flirt, but no one to love. Awards for technical excellence, but no reward for the crave for peaceful ambience. A confident demeanor, but a reluctant and apathetic mind. Full of rain, but no sunshine even in the farthest distance.

Now, I could see the small girl on the road enjoying in the rain with her umbrella firmly in her grip. She might not have all the comforts which I have, but then she has the innocence and fun which I lost a long time back. I have decided to come out of this false fantasy, even if it is at the expense of losing the tap of the software engineer. I am going to again enjoy my life. I am going to go out in the rain and play with the small kid now. I removed my tie, and went near my computer to shut it down. Just then, I saw a new mail alert in my mail box. I slowly opened outlook and I found a message from my manager with an attachment saying that there was a critical defect in the code and I have to fix it soon. I convinced myself that I am not going to get bogged down again by these pressures and stick to my decision. I ignored the mail and went to the rest room. After a couple of minutes, the software engineer in me came out, his shirt tucked in with the perfect tie knot, sat before the computer, and started typing,

XYZ,

I am looking into the defect and will send the patch files before EOD.

Regards,
Me.