Remembering my tatayyagaru (grandpa)

Yesterday (13th June) marked my tatayyagaru's 5th death anniversary, but I hadn't realized it until I was preparing dinner. There was nothing special about the dinner that made me realize this. As I was cooking I remembered some fond memories of him and my eyes welled up. I then saw the date and noticed the coincidence. 

Although I don't have any memories of falling asleep while he drove me and my baamma (grandma) in our Fiat Premier Padmini, I recollect being told about it many times and that it was a bonding activity for us. My brother and I enjoyed watching cricket matches with him on TV and spent many summer vacation afternoons playing carrom while laughing at silly shots we would sometimes make. I still chuckle about a photo of tatayyagaru with Bill Clinton from my grandparents' first trip to the US and being impressed by the "fact" that he met Clinton. 

He was a handsome man with sleek, backward combed hair and loved wearing the Ray Bans my aunt gifted to him. He enjoyed the simple pleasures of life - hangout with his family and friends, enjoy the occasional ice cream, travel or car rides around Bangalore, which he continued to relish till the end. I got a glimpse of Bangalore from his teenage years through his recollections with his siblings or cousins. During weekends, we would drive him to memorable places around the city from his younger days and I remember him insisting on wearing his Ray Bans on these rides cause honestly, he looked stylish in them 😉. As I grew older, he shared a lot of life advice which seems obvious now, but was quite valuable at that time - like setting aside 10-20% of my earnings for a rainy day. 

I have plenty of such memories of him and thinking of them makes me happy that he was a big part of my of life, but equally sad that he is no more. He had a charming smile and he will forever remain alive in my heart with that smile. Loving and caring husband, father and grandfather - I miss him a lot and cherish my time with him! 

         

Just another day in Chicago

Last Wednesday my good friend and I headed to Chicago to watch the Bulls play the Pacers at the United Center. We got there early and decided to check out some places near the downtown area. We enjoyed spending some time at the Bean and once we checked that off the list we headed to Navy Pier for an early dinner (food is always good!). As we were walking through Navy Pier we found Harry Caray's Tavern, a nice restaurant with good food and sports screening on all their TV screens.

For a long time I was not a huge basketball fan and my knowledge of the sport has been limited, but I have enjoyed watching games and getting better acquainted with the sport through friends I have met while here at Purdue. That said, Michael Jordan was probably the first basketball player I watched, and so I was getting excited to go to the Bulls arena to see MJ's statue for the first time! But, I could clearly see that my friend was thrilled beyond imagination to see the statue.

Gayathri and I in front of the legend, MJ!

The game was good, but we thought it would have been better if it was a close game with a lot more fight than we witnessed. I was definitely hoping for a three-pointer just before the final buzzer to seal the win, but nonetheless a good experience to watch the Bulls play at the United Center.

Pau Gasol going for the layup.

After the game we decided to check out the John Hancock Center and have a couple of drinks at The Signature Lounge there. It's just one of those experiences to check off the list of things to do in Chicago. It was a clear night and we could see quite far away in all directions, mostly lights. The couple of times I have had such a view - the cars below, the street lights tracing perfect lines and the darkness of the sky - it has given me a feeling of calm sitting up high without a bother. Trippy in a way. I shared this with my friend and was surprised to hear her have a completely contradicting opinion about all this. It turns out that she would prefer staring at a forest or nature in general to calm her mind. It makes a lot of sense in a way. We talked at length about this and how all this technology we see everyday has caused so much harm to the environment. 

The view from the Signature Lounge at the John Hancock Center

At first I found it hard to believe that a person who is an ardent lover of cars and an aerospace engineer was this concerned about the environment. If I had not known about her background and had this talk with her I would have definitely thought her to be an activist fighting nature's cause. I have known Gayathri for over a year and a half now and I enjoy these conversations I have with her. They have always made me think beyond what is in plain sight and motivated me to have opinions different from popular ones. This is only one such instance. I remember calling her "one crazy girl" during one of our early conversations and telling her she is a unique person when I first talked to her about philosophy. I still continue to hold this opinion of mine about her and I should say that she has never ceased to surprise me so far. 

Such conversations bring back memories of my early discussions with her and I look forward to many more in the future! All in all it was a good trip to Chicago and none better to have done it with than Gayathri.                  

Summer Travel #2: Park City, UT

         This was something I was looking forward to since March, my first paper presentation at a national conference! I liked the idea of talking about my research to an audience and this conference, the 8^th US Combustion Institute Meeting, was held at Park City, Utah.

Long before Park City became a world class mountain resort and venue for the 2002 Olympic Winter Games, it was famous as a silver mining town, and boasts a lively and colorful past. With its foundation dating back to the late 1860’s, silver mining in the city continued until the early 1970’s. With a population of little over 7,500, Park City boasts of scenic mountains, sprawling lush green open spaces, which serve as canvas for miles of recreational trails which please both beginners and experts alike, and building architecture that goes well with the backdrop. Park City has three world class resorts: Park City Mountain Resort, Deer Valley Resort and the Canyons Resort, and skiing is a major activity that attracts a ton of tourists to this place.

The conference was hosted at the Canyons Resort by University of Utah and there was no compromise with the accommodation provided to the attendees. For dining, there was a good collection of restaurants to choose from and I got to experience food and drink at the Red Tail Grill and Drafts. Both places had a good selection of dishes, and I specially appreciated the food at Drafts which is synonymous with hand-crafted burgers, stone oven pizzas and an array of gourmet pub food. Drafts, as the name suggests, housed over 50 beers from around the world with some of them brewed right there in Utah and this is what they proudly claim:

Being a combustion conference, a lot of my advisor, Dr. Sally Bane’s, colleagues from Caltech were to show up as well. This kind of situation usually opens up quite a few stories from the past and with Dr. Bane not attending the conference there weren't any restrictions on what facts were talked about! :) Let’s just say she was a little concerned about this, but she was kind enough to let me know who to meet from Caltech. That was a big help when going there alone. The conference was well organized and I managed to attend a good number of presentations over the three-day event. I got the opportunity to meet a lot of people from other universities and national labs, and learn about their research. The group from Caltech were nice enough to let me be a part of their group during dinners and I enjoyed interacting with that bunch about their work, academics and their memories of Dr. Bane from the recent past. Dr. Guillaume Blanquart, from Caltech, generously sponsored all our drinks at Drafts on our final evening there and we chatted away around the bonfire till late that evening.

             My trip ended with a visit to the coal gasification lab at University of Utah. Overall, it was a good experience to present at a conference, meet new people, learn about current research happenings and check out whatever little I could of Park City. Next stop Seattle!

Summer Travel #1: Champaign, IL

               My summer started off with Arjun convincing me and Swami to drive with him to Champaign, where he finished his Masters a year ago at University of Illinois. It was going to be a relaxing weekend with lazing on the couch, watching reruns of the Games of Thrones episodes, hanging out at Murphy’s, and meeting new and old friends on the list of things to do. Can’t complain, right? To add to this list was sampling of new oriental delicacies.

                Oh! I forgot that we were actually there for Raylan’s graduation walk at the University. There was a sea of blue at the ceremony! Congratulations to Ray on receiving a Master’s degree in Aerospace Engineering from one of the top universities for engineering education. And then there was good food to celebrate. It was nice to meet Ray’s parents here in the US.

                At the end of the weekend when we finally reached West Lafayette, we dropped Arjun off at his place and drive into a ditch off State Street... FANTASTIC!

Infinity? No, It's Infinitea

After a busy morning on Monday my friend and me decided to meet for lunch. We chose to go to my friend's favorite place. I heard a lot about this place but had never been there before. Infinitea (I guess the name makes it obvious about tea) was the place and you can't see much of the place from outside except for the huge glass window in front.

As you enter it looks like any other restaurant. But as my friend said, the place grows on you and it didn't take much time for me to like the place. Infinitea gave me the feeling of sitting in a ranch in the Californian country(I might be wrong?). The wooden shelves with crockery, framed black & white photographs(as simple as a kettle breaking) and quirky posters adorning the bright walls, or the whole place being lit primarily by sunlight through the big glass window(I liked the old lamp shades too, rather simple but artistic) proved a relaxing and fantastic place for a long afternoon spent talking with a pretty girl(of course our conversion made me lose track of time too...). 

Setup by Gaurav Saria with the backing of a tea industry(Darjeeling and Bengal) of more than a hundred years, the menu features over 50 different kinds of teas(both hot and cold; with and without milk), and each comes with a little descriptor that tells you about the brew. About 27 of these entries are dedicated only to the iced tea variety where the flavors range from the usual Lemon and Peach to the more exotic Blue Curacao and Butter Scotch. Also, the coasters come with interesting snippets about tea.

Though being Gaurav Saria's first tea room, Infinitea serves, probably, among the best Pasta that I have eaten. And frankly, the quantity can fill your tummy for good! The food  was good and alongside our dishes was a generous basket of garlic bread, which was delicious(not the same kind you get in Pizza Hut, etc). The food reminded me of the spaghetti and pasta I had in Valmozzola (Italy) - ample quantity, mouth-watering aroma, heavenly taste and lots of bread!

Quite unfortunate that I couldn't try any variety of the different teas from their menu(next time for sure) but there is definitely magic at this place. Had a wonderful and delightful afternoon after a long time and was a welcome break from all the fast food that is popular now... 

Oh! By the way, Infinitea is on Cunningham Road, Bangalore. Try it if you haven't yet...

Warning: The prices are a slight bit on the higher side...but the food justifies it. YUUMMM!

7th Rock from the Sun

In the fabulous ages of ancient times the appellations of Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn were given to the Planets, as being the names of their principal heroes and divinities. In the present more philosophical era it would hardly be allowable to have recourse to the same method and call it Juno, Pallas, Apollo or Minerva, for a name to our new heavenly body. The first consideration of any particular event, or remarkable incident, seems to be its chronology: if in any future age it should be asked, when this last-found Planet was discovered? It would be a very satisfactory answer to say, 'In the reign of King George the Third.'


...wrote Herschel to Joseph Banks about the new planet he discovered in 1781. But little do people know that this planet was initially called Georgium Sidus, or the "Georgian Planet". Well I am not talking about a planet from some other solar system, I am just about Uranus or Ouranos(Greek God), father of Cronus(Saturn) and grandfather of Zeus(Jupiter).

Now why would I be talking about Uranus? It's just another gas giant in our solar system with not as many moons as Jupiter and frankly appears to have not much of activity happening on it(really?). But what interests me about this one is how it's axis is freakishly tilted to a relatively large angle of 97.77 degrees! Though Venus and Pluto(I'd like to think of Pluto still a part of the planet line-up) have larger angles of tilt, 97.77 gives Uranus a rather awkward and weird alignment. The axis more or less points towards the sun all throughout the planet's revolution around the star and if you lived at one of its poles(you can think about the possibility of this later :P) you'd experience 42 years (not days) of sunlight continuously and then 42 years of continuous darkness! Can you imagine that?? Happy time for those who love sleeping ain't it?

Georgium Sidus, thanks to its popular name, Uranus, has presented some pronunciation issues in popular lingo. Say "YOOR a nus" and not "your anus" or "urine us"(embarrassing connection for Uranus!). Though Uranus is the "butt" of all jokes, the most brilliant view of Uranus is from its back, as seen against the sun. One gets a magnificent picture of its rings and moons with the sun shining against it. You can see the moons revolving around Uranus like clockwork. 

When I saw the rings around Uranus, they looked like icy platforms. Wish someday I have the pleasure of dancing with a beautiful girl on these icy platforms! (that should be a sight :P). I enjoyed the pictures and video simulations of Uranus and its view from behind rather caught my eye! One has to see to believe...