Same source, Same destination

Friday evening 6:00 pm, I started running from office to take auto to catch Charminar Express, which was scheduled for departure from Secundarabad station at 6:55 pm. Luckily, I got an auto immediately and he agreed to go by meter(which is very not very common). I told the auto driver that its very urgent. He was one of the really amazing driver. He was one of the Alonso for auto rickshaw.

After rushing through heavy traffic, we reached railway station at 6:53 pm. I had 2 minutes more to run and catch the train. With heavy bag behind, I started running through busy railway station parking. It was already 6:55, I had just entered railway station building. But I didn't want to give up, so I continued running inside.

I saw train still standing in the platform with name written in telugu and about to move. I didn't want to be like a movie hero, who would only get into the right compartment and right door, even though all compartments are connected. So I just got into the nearest compartment and started looking for S5 compartment. I reach it in few minutes. My seat number was 16 - side upper berth. I saw someone sitting in my seat. I went straight to my place and kept my bag. The guy sitting there said that it was his seat. I took ticket from my bag and checked my seat number, it was right. So I asked him to show his ticket. He was also having S5-16. Then I asked him to check date, it was also 17th feb, 2012. Then came the big shock.

It was not Charminar Express, but Padmavathi Expresses. I was shocked, but was some what excited. First thing flashed in my mind was that Im going to visit some unknown city (like Nagpur, Jaipur, etc). So I asked him, what is the last place. 'Tripathi', he replied.

Should I be worried or should I be trilled??? All mixed reactions in my mind. Then people around me understood the situation and started advising me in telugu and hindi. As usual I picked only nouns and figured out(this time right) what they were trying to say.
I explained my situation to TTE, he asked me to change train at next station(Kazipet). It seems both trains were late.

Finally I changed train at Kazipet and came to right destination, Chennai.

At pink of my health

Last Saturday, I achieved my personal best of 13.6 second in 100-metre dash. :)

I dunno, if I have ever ran faster than this, but with timer this is my best.

Hello Hadoop

Today I ran my first job on hadoop cluster. It was very simple. Just followed http://wiki.apache.org/hadoop/Running_Hadoop_On_Ubuntu_Linux_%28Single-Node_Cluster%29

I came, I ran, I conquered - Hyderabd 10K run

After snoozing the alarm between 5:30 and 5:45, I decided I should go for it.
Limping my way to office to catch the office bus to Hussain Sagar lake at 6:00 am, I was little bit scared if I will be able to run through the whole 10k. After athletics events from previous day, I badly injured my hamstring.
We reached the lake side road at around 7:00 am. It was heavily crowded like a political rally. We all were talking with each other and looking around for announcement. It was then at about 8:00 we realized that event we were suppose to run(amateur run) has already started at 7:10 am.

So we decided to different event(fun run) at 8:00 am. Soon after the start, I found a group of people who run at same pace. Then it was all fun as we crossed every kilometer.


This was the first time I ran 10 km at a stretch. My previous best was 7 km which I ran while preparing for this run.

That was another interesting thing, 2 1/2 months back we started this program '10 weeks to 10k' in our office. I was regular for the first one month, then I had no clue what happened with the program.

When fresh juices are not for keeping us fresh...

It's my second visit to Hyderabad. I reached Hyderabad at 20:00 on 28th @ Rajiv Gandhi International airport. All that I could say about that airport was 'WOW'. Yes, it was an aaammmaaaazing airport.

Next day morning I was roaming around in the city. I could remember the entire road that I traveled four years back. Then i went to INOX and saw Avatar in 3D. Later in the afternoon I went around the KBR Park and came to the accommodation provided by our company.

At about 4:00 PM, we went on Guided Office Tour. [Im not sure if I can post about my office, so I'm skipping this section]

At about 6:30 PM, we were taken to HICC, the place where usually Sun Tech days happens. The security checking was better designed. They asked to switch on the camera to check if that was really a camera.

I forgot to mention one thing, In the invitation, there was a mention of 'Games for Kids'. We(or at least 3 or 4 of us) had a small thought if those are for us, but nope. Sounds stupid na?? actually there is a reason for it. all these time, most of them were addressing us as 'kids'.

Back to HICC, there was puppet show, unicycle show, magic show, nail art, tattoo, casino, etc etc. Food was from Novotel.

There I met Chris, the person who interviewed me. I had a small chat with her. Then i moved inside the party hall. There, 'skin-peeling-competition' was going on.

Then there was acrobatic show by a Nigerian troop, followed by 'fire stunts' and KK's music show.

At around 12:00, when Video DJ by DJ Manish was going on, i was very tired and my legs were paining. So i took some juice and came outside the hall. There one of my senior asked my why I'm not dancing. I told that I'm tired. He took 2 seconds pause and asked me what im drinking. I replied, 'pineapple juice'. He replied quickly, 'no wonder ur tired'. It was then i realized that most 'fresh-juices' are either sitting or already left, while the.... u know what!

I forgot to mention one more thing, I had Hyderabadi Biryani, immediately after reaching Hyderabad.

Purple December

Last month was very good one. I was very happy throughout the month. The first and the foremost reason being my placements. I got placed in DE Shaw India Software (DESIS). Secondly, I visited Chennai. A lot of things happened in Chennai.
First day I visited my college, Jeppiaar Engineering College. Cycle test was going on at that time. First, I met Director Sir. He remembered my name and department correctly. We spoke for few minutes. He was explaining me all the new facilities that has come up in college in the last one and half year. Felt really proud. My college is fully connected by WiFi. Aeronautical department has been introduced. Then I visited all departments and met all faculties. Later after the exam I met Barkavi mam. Then I spoke with some my department juniors. Then I drove back home in rain. I felt very happy after meeting everyone there.
Second day I went out for lunch with friends. For the first time I played Ten-Pin Bowling, with my friends, who are also amateurs. Lot of funny things happened there. Finally, I won the game.
The whole week went like this by roaming with friends in evenings, visiting EmbSys. Saturday evening myself and Kalyan went to Thiruvanmiyur beach to meet Raajan. He came with his colleagues. We all had good time in the beach. Then we moved on to Ascendas for dinner.
Next week Monday, I attended FACTIndia meeting along with my dad. There I got the opportunity to meet Dr. Balasubramaniam, Scientist (Retd.), ISRO. The whole day we spoke about FACTIndia website, which I just designed.
Again, this week also went well. I ate almost all that I wanted to eat in Chennai, from Thalapakattu Biryani to KFC.
Back to Guwahati, I forget to tell about my placements. Morning 9:00 AM we had written test for DE Shaw India Software. It had four parts including Aptitude test, test on C, C++ & java, Programming test and essay writing. Totally 8 were shortlisted for the interview. Each one was allotted 45 minutes for the interview. My interview started at evening 6:10 PM. It lasted for about 1 hour and 40 minutes. I was very much confident after the interview. I came to hostel and told my friends Anand, Ajit and Prince that, ‘…even if it is only one, it should be me…’.
At around 9:10 PM, Sourabh from MnC dept called and told that I ve been selected for DE Shaw. And that I was the only one to be selected for DE Shaw.
I immediately called my parents and informed them. I was very happy that day. Then I went to Guest House to assist our PR in Oracle interview.
The same night, after reaching room, I recalled each and every word in the interview and typed in a file.

Mawsmai Cave

It was luckily a sunny day at Cherrapunjee, the wettest place on the planet, after seeing few long V-shaped valleys between Shillong and Cherrapunjee, we reached Mawsmai, a place near Cherrapunje, at around 12:30. Near Mawsmai Cave we saw a natural spring . It was protected by walls.

Then we had lunch at a small restaurant near Mawsmai Cave. Mawsmai Cave is a natural limestone cave situated at southern side of Cherrapunjee at about 6 kilometers north of Indo-Bangladesh border. The entrance was very spacious. We were totally 10 and I lead the way inside the cave. Soon the narrowed down into a small passage of less than a foot width. After the narrow passage, cave split into two. The right side was double decked and was very short. Within few seconds lights went off on the right side. So those who came after me didn't get the view of this side. Left side after the passage was again spacious. Water was dripping continuously from the roof. The walls had coarse vertical patterns. Roof had long, huge pointed structures formed due to constant dripping of water through soft limestone.



At many places these huge structures joined with floor to form pillars. At about 100 meter from entrance, the passage again got narrow. This time it was small enough that crawling is the only way to cross. Here we noticed some rubble due to a recent collapse of the wall. After crossing about 150 meter we saw sunlight. But this is not from the exit, but due to a huge cave-in of the roof. Near to that was the exit. After crossing about 150-200 meter we came out of the cave. It was really a great experience visiting that cave.


Map of Mawsmai Cave: