Parsed Participle

I'm moving out of my East Harlem apartment today. The actual moving took place on Friday (August 28^th), and was a complicated affair involving a route that took us (and the movers) through various neighborhoods in Manhattan picking up and trading used furniture, rendezvousing at intricately planned moments and locations, and finally arriving at the new apartment, where two entire van-loads of furniture, books, appliances, CDs and random junk were hauled up four flights of stairs.

I should point out that the new apartment is on the fifth floor of a very old pre-war walk-up building. You never realize that you've been taking elevators for granted until you suddenly don't have one.

In general, my new residence seems typical of apartments in the Upper East Side. It'll take me a while to get used to, and it appears that I've grown used to thinking of Harlem as home - despite having lived in the area for only seven months. I am at my old apartment on 120^th street as I write this, and I'm still feeling regretful of my decision to move. Today is the last day of my lease. It's only natural that I feel this way: This apartment was unusually spacious for Manhattan standards, had a great view, an elevator big enough for my bike, and a washer and dryer inside. It was a much higher standard of living than I anticipated before I arrived in the US. But the real reason I am sad to leave is the neighborhood - despite it's stereotypical reputation as a 'dodgy' neighborhood, El Barrio is not only very safe and peaceful, it also has a lot of charm, great food, lots of family run businesses and restaurants, hardly any chain stores, and a sense of community which you can find in only very few other neighborhoods in New York. There were several times I felt guilty about the comfort I was enjoying. It's a well known fact that gentrification has been forcing local residents out of the area for a few years now, and newly-built 'luxury' apartments such as this one - which sticks out like a sore thumb among beautiful old townhouses - are to blame for the rising rent.

Prices seem to have fallen badly this year, though. We were offered a decent reduction on the monthly rent by our landlord, as were our neighbors. The offer came too late; I had by then, already signed up for a new place (the UES apartment), and plans for the move were pretty much irreversible.

On the bright side, I will be saving some money (I had better, given that the new house is nowhere as comfortable as the last). I'll also be closer to work/University, which means my bike ride will be shorter. The most interesting thing is my room: It is connected to the house by a spiral staircase, and leads straight to an almost private terrace!

In search of coffee after a light dinner at a Manhattan Izakaya (probably on either 46^th or 47^th Street and Lexington Avenue), we stopped at Big Daddy's, a diner with Americana themes ranging from comic books to retro video games. Something on the menu caught my attention just before I was about to say "just a coffee for me". Frozen Black Cow! Despite not originally being in the mood for an ice cream soda, I simply had to try one, having learnt of it from the opening track of the Steely Dan album, Aja.

Another drink I know from a Steely Dan song, again one with rampant Manhattan imagery?

Bad Sneakers and a Piña Colada my friend
Stompin' on the avenue by Radio City with a
Transistor and a large sum of money to spend

This entry is one week late. I got to New York last Monday, and have been attending classes since Tuesday. The lectures are engaging, and I've already got some homework. I have spent the week getting settled into student lifestyle at NYU. The initial jet-lag was effectively handled with some energy drinks that I picked at Narita Airport (to get rid of extra change in Yen).

I still have a few left.

New York is very cold, but the snow is gone. East Harlem, where I now live, is obviously in every way imaginable, a huge change from the various Tokyo localities where I've lived over the last few years. But it has a lot of character. Not far away is a Mom-and-Pop joint that serves delicious Dominican food. Many a five-dollar meal was had there until a home-food routine was finally established this weekend. A trip to Flushing, Queens has provided a reassuringly high selection of Korean (Kimchi here is delicious) and Japanese groceries. In Manhattan, I have been spoken to in Spanish a few times; I probably ought to start learning it. I am taking the subway until I get down to re-assembling my bike. (I carried it with me on the plane!)

Initial impressions of grad school:

• Fewer classroom hours than I expected, but much more than everyone else (who asks me how many courses I am taking) did.
• There are too many interesting courses, and too little time.
• Homework is harder than lectures.
• Both the central NYU library and the department library are to me, utterly awe-inspiring.
• Lecture-halls (at least the ones I've seen) are strictly non-posh.
• Superficial differences at the inter-departmental level (appearance and styling of infrastructure, etc) are enormous.
• Efficiency: Things are so fast and low-ceremony (at NYU). I got an ID card in less than a minute.
• Campus food is good.
• I think it might be more fun than I expected.

I'm off to grad school. I will be leaving Japan to go to the US - in 2 days from now! I got into New York University, and will be starting the program this Spring.

The Computer Science department at NYU is part of the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. The department seems nice, and there's a decent amount of interesting research they do. While the program is more computer science as opposed to engineering (which is what I want anyway) it appears in line with NYU's reputation for interdisciplinary research/study.

So, after five years of working in Japan, writing software and programming in too many languages (for my own good) I find myself headed off to academia. I honestly never thought this would happen. But I'm looking forward to it, and as much as I am dreading actually leaving Tokyo, I am excited by the prospect of change. Classes begin as soon as I get there. I arrive on Monday morning, and with any luck I can make it to the semester's first lecture on Programming Languages.

While my research interests and long term goals are still fuzzy, I'm looking forward to a semester of course-work, and most of it seems like fun.

Having moved out of my apartment, I am staying with Thilo and his wife Cissy and their seven-month old son. My visa finally arrived (i.e., in hand - I was told that it would be approved but after a delay), thus making me feel somewhat confident about announcing that I am actually going!

I just found this surreal photo of me sharing dried squid with a dog in the Thar Desert.

I believe this was in December, 2005. The sand dunes are the ones a little outside Jaisalmer, Rajasthan. I distinctly recall sleeping tent-less, and that it was very cold.

After YAPC::Asia, I still have a few days left before I start work on June 2^nd. On Saturday (May 24^th)Yurika and me left for Sapporo after deciding to buy plane tickets on the spur of the moment.

For a late lunch on Saturday, we walked to Burger Mania:

Burger Mania provides authentic hamburgers while providing a diverse cafe experience that brings people together.

Despite having decided not to go to Hokkaido earlier that morning, we remained indecisive till late afternoon, before finally giving in. We bought Air Do tickets at 5:45 PM for a 7:15 PM flight; packed and left home by 6:15; Got to Haneda by 6:50, making it just in time.

So my sabbatical ends in the same place it began. Sapporo has great weather this time of the year, and there was more cat-sitting as I got a chance to improve my radio-controlled chopper skills.

I decided that this was a great time to overhaul my Zaurus, since I've been meaning to upgrade the OS to Ångström for a while now. I unearthed some interesting code that I probably wrote on a plane ride a while ago, but that I shall save for another post.

I also discovered a great Soup Curry restaurant. I notice that Wikipedia does not have an English entry for Soup-Curry yet. Must I start one?

At a time when I'm understandably confused about the notion of feeling or not feeling at home in different places, this is welcome indeed: I'm experiencing this joy of being 'back home' - to my tiny apartment in Tokyo.

I got back to Japan on the 3^rd of May, and walked around Ueno station smiling to myself like a fool. It was a great trip, I've met a lot of people, put in a lot of quality time, even visited Chennai after over two whole years - but I'm feeling great just being back in Tokyo.

I get back to work from June, so that means that this is probably the only stretch of time I have (or might ever have) in Tokyo that I do not have to 'work'.

That said, there are plenty of things that must be done; It seems that Leg-4 is not going to be a vacation at all. But for right now, hmmm... Kaki-fry sure sounds good...

After an eventful return to Tokyo, and a night spent sleeplessly tidying up my apartment, I took a flight the next morning (April 22^nd) to Chennai, via Bangkok.

I reached Chennai late on the same night. I had tried to convince my parents otherwise, but they remained keen on picking up both me and my sister (whose flight was coming in at around 5AM, only a few hours later).

Chennai has changed. Roads have widened, only to be left as congested as before, or perhaps worse: so many more people seem to be buying cars. The most significant change - and a very recent one - is that Chennai is no longer The City Of Hoardings: All signboards and roadside hoardings have gone, and the absence of the largest of them feels strange. All of a sudden, the city looks unusually green: Buildings that had been hidden for decades are now exposed; continuous stretches of greenery have been freed into full view. Chennai is one of the greenest cities, and without all these trees, it would have choked up and died years ago.

My goals for this trip are:

1. To pick up academic transcripts from both the Universities I graduated from while I was in Chennai: (a) University of Madras ('96-'99), Bachelor Of Electronic Science, (b) Pondicherry University ('01-'02), Post Graduate Diploma in Computer Applications
2. Meet with an ex-professor from (b)
3. Other than my folks and my estranged sister, spend time with, or at least meet:
   • Praveen Dass
   • Arvind Balan, who complains of London
   • Prasanna, who has now been through multiple baptisms of fire in a start-up
4. Sort out some personal finance issues, including an ugly mess that ICICI bank and BSNL seemed to have created (the same thing mentioned in this complaint happened with my old, dormant account itself; and while I cannot say that it cost me 'mental stress', it was a lot of trouble indeed.)

My folks were so determined to make the most of their time with me that they actually came with me as I ran around both University campuses trying to coax disgruntled government employees to process my request for the transcripts!
I must admit that it turned out to be a good idea; we sort of multi-tasked and got stuff done. I was especially lucky that my street-smart and wily sister (whose 'Chennai skills' have not eroded much despite so much time spent in far-away Chile) helped.

So Leg-3 is done; and only objective (2) has not been satisfied. Oh well.

An Unexpected visit to Nagoya. (!!)

My flight from LaGuardia to Detroit (NW 1195) was delayed due to bad weather. It was my connecting flight back to Japan, so I ended up missing my flight from Detroit to Tokyo(NW11 or perhaps NW25 - there was some confusion). At Detroit, the Northwest folks got me to an alternate flight, to Nagoya instead of Narita (Tokyo), and the plane was just about to begin rolling along when they opened the door and let me in . I was running all the way, so I didn't even get to ask what sort of options they would be providing, if at all, once I reached Nagoya.

I was supposed to get to Tokyo on the 21st evening, catch a night's sleep in my apartment, and then fly again the very next morning, beginning Sabbatical Leg 3 (Chennai, India). Had they not put me onto the Nagoya-bound flight (NW71), I'd have missed my flight to India for sure. But here I am now, in a train bound for the JR Nagoya station, with a reimbursement-promised Shinkansen (Bullet-train) printed schedule in my hand. They were waiting for me soon as I arrived at Nagoya and informed me that Northwest would pay for my Shinkansen ride back to Tokyo.

So, instead to arriving at Narita and taking a train to Tokyo, I ended up arriving at Nagoya and taking a (slightly faster) train to Tokyo!

Anyway, they were really sweet and efficient about the whole thing. I'm glad to be home.

The second leg of my sabbatical is just about done.

I'm at LaGuardia Airport, lamenting the lack of wireless Internet access, as I wait for my flight to board. I'd hoped to write about my days in New York as they rolled by, but I'll have to settle for a last-minute account. This trip has served its purpose as a holiday, and I managed to spend a good deal of time walking around Manhattan, meeting cousins, friends, and a lot of surprisingly friendly people. At least twice, complete strangers offered me a ride in the city when I was actually looking out for a cab; and everybody I asked for directions were extremely helpful. Needless to say, a great part of the trip was spent in long, desultory walks. The sublet culture is awesome; I'd say it's easily the best way to stay in Manhattan if you are there for over a week.

Yurika and me took a bus ride to Washington DC where we spent a couple of days with a friend of hers. DC is a nice city to walk around in, and I walked great distances both by myself, and with Yurika and Omura-san.

There are two restaurants that we recall best as part of the eating experience in DC - a seafood place called Legal Sea Foods and a concept Pizza restaurant called Matchbox, which seemed to be almost always full with huge crowds waiting outside throughout the day. We got to visit the Smithsonian museum at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center (the other half of the National Air and Space Museum) when we went to see off Omura-san at Dulles Airport. The NASM was not as much fun as might have been had I actually visited when I was a child.

Back in Manhattan, I was lucky enough to attend a colloquium at the Courant Institute (Where the NYU Computer Science department is located), which featured a project that makes the night sky search-able. It implements a search engine for astronomical images that uses geometric hashes (as opposed to words) derived from the pixels of the patterns that stars form in random images. Got a taste of what a CS lecture might feel like (and there was breakfast as well).

Funk: The Headhunters (sans Hancock, whose absence was noted in many ways) were playing at the Iridium on Broadway. I dragged (my cousins) Aamer and Zafar to see the second set. Earlier on the same day, Aamer had taken me on a guided walk around the West Village all the way up to the Meat-Packing District;

His brother Zubair on the other hand, showed me the Lower East, and his symbolically located apartment which stands on the eastward-pushing demographic border of the lower east.

...