Celebrating New Year's eve!!

31st Dec 2002: At home with family watching new year's special show on TV and enjoying some delicious hotel food.

31st Dec 2003: In Hiranandani, Thane with friends partying and dancing the night away and finally crashng at a friends place for the night.

31st Dec 2004: In Philadelphia, at Penn's Landing river side with roommates and other friends, watching a splendid fireworks display and trudging back home as we couldnt find a cab!

31st Dec 2005: Where would new year ring in for me? Times Square,New York or Home sweet home in Mumbai?

Years pass by so swiftly and and on 31st Dec we remember fleeting moments of the year gone by, hoping that the new year would be better than the old.Here's wishing a very Happy and Prosperous new year

2005! whats in store? Lets face it as it comes with new resolutions and new resolves

Trip to New York

exams over. tensions over. holidays are here. what should be done? 3 bored people hit upon the idea of visiting New York for a day. Here's how it went
Wednesday 22nd Dec 8:00am: In the Chinatown Bus to New York
9:00am:Over the Delaware river bridge
9:30am: New York kab aayega?
9:45am: Almost there
10:05am: Chinatown,Manhattan
11:00am: Ground Zero
11:30am: Lunch time
12:00pm: Hatching a Plot
1:30pm: Tip of Manhattan
2:00pm: Statue comes to Life
2:30pm: Mile and a half to Empire State Building
3:30pm: Empire State Building
3:35pm: up up and above
5:00pm:86th Floor Observatory
5:30pm: Shimmering New York
6:30pm: Back to Earth
7:00pm: Times Square
7:15pm: Rockefeller Center, Biggest Christmas Tree in USA
7:30: Rushed back to catch the chinatown Bus back to philadelphia at 8:00pm. just managed to get into the bus before it left. was a fantastic trip. Would love to go there again.

winter is here!! view today morning 

view from my house in fair weather 

Exams Over, Fun Begins

Hurray!! Finally the exams are over.Fun time begins. Happy Holidays!!!. Its already three months into USA and I am done with one quarter, three courses, physics TA, quit physics TA, started working for a prof, working on the Indian Newsletter and much much more,whew!!. Its been an activity filled three months. Christmas is here and so is the cold winter. well now there is a break for two weeks before the next quarter begins in January. Have lined up a plethora of activities for the winter break. lets see how it goes. I have yet to witness my first snow shower. Too thrilled about it!so I am back with a bang.happy holidays!!!

Final Week

The most dreaded time in the life of a grad student is here! Finals Week!
6th : Project submission
9th : last quiz
13th : Exam no 1
14th : Exam no 2
16th : Exam no 3
17th : recovery from the shock;)
18th : relief
19th : relaxed:)

well before I get any more shocks I get back to studying!!

twilight 

Fire Alarm

This happened in the first week I came to USA. It was my first test. Cooking!! My roommates were ravenous and none of them was in a mood to cook anything. I felt all eyes boring into me. Thats it.I had been trying to avoid cooking for too long. I had to take the plunge.To keep things simple I announced I am going to cook daal chawaal.
rice done, wow!!, looks fine. now second thing daal. I wasnt prepared for the events to follow. 3 hungry roommates and a rookie chef maketh a 'recipe for disaster'. I heated oil in the pan and then started making tadka(seasoning) for the daal. In the middle of all this there was a phone for me and I forgot everything about the oil in the pan. "ooooo!,ooooo,ooooo!" there was loud siren and all of us froze, I dropped the phone and rushed to the kitchen to see the oil in fumes, the fire alarm couldnt take it anymore. It was all helter-skelter. First two roommates trying to make the fire-alarm stop squealing and then all of us at it. Finally it stopped and everything was back to normal. whew!!.After much dissuasion from my roommates Finally I managed to make some food without the fire-alarm going off again. I had my lesson, no more distractions while cooking. Is cooking a tough job? Well I have come a long way since that day in cooking and now I have the guts to cook for an entire hungry army:).

clouds rushing past 

Philadelphia downtown from my living room