Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Monday, April 28, 2008
Lake Tahoe
It was a little less than a year ago that I visited Lake Tahoe, a freshwater lake which is located along the border between the states of California and Nevada. Surrounded by mountains on all sides, the area is also home to a number of ski resorts and other summer outdoor recreation facilities. Picturesque and pristine, it is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. Emerald Bay, in the picture here is just an example of how straight-out-of-a-picture-postcard Lake Tahoe really is. Interesting places to visit nearby include Heavenly Ski Resort and Squaw Valley, the latter being a Winter Olympics Village.
Also of note here is the fact that Lake Tahoe is one of the best developed and maintained tourist places I have ever come across. Neat, clean, accessible and convenient, it is definitely a great place for tourists. Wish they'd do something like that for tourist places in India. The hustle and bustle of most places can turn you off from the very moment you set foot in most tourist destinations in this country. Not that tourist places should necessarily be secluded, but the crowds and the dirt is what one is trying to get away from, remember?
Readership has fallen to deplorable levels on this blog and I'm sure that one of the major causes is lack of new posts. I shall make an attempt to bring back the faithful by ensuring regularity of posts.
Readership has fallen to deplorable levels on this blog and I'm sure that one of the major causes is lack of new posts. I shall make an attempt to bring back the faithful by ensuring regularity of posts.
Friday, April 04, 2008
About Time...
Its amazing, the amount of willpower required to maintain a blog. It must be quite obvious that I lack in this essential quality from the fact that this is the first post in about a year. There came a point and time where I'd completely forgotten that Stray Thoughts existed. I come back here, after reading blogs maintained by quite a few people and I've realised how stray these thoughts really are. No poetry, no intense philosophy, no political thought; just arbitrary thoughts passing through my mind. Looking back at some of my posts, the very few that actually got around to getting published, a couple of them seem bemusing or even downright embarrassing, but I'm guessing hindsight does that to one. What this also says is how much of a transformation I seem to have gone through in the period of this one year.
It isn't like things got any better. What I went through has been labeled as one of this University's "greatest screw-ups" by a friend of mine, and yet this entire transformation that I'm speaking of, has been nothing other than positive. Out of academics for half a year, pretty unenthusiastic about everything else, it didn't seem like things could get any worse. And yet, I stand here today and look back at the year gone by and it seems to have done more good than harm. Maybe this setback was what I really needed. Maybe the negativity had to exist but only to spur me on to aspire for a fitter environment for all of us here. That precisely is what I desire to see at our beloved University. A fitter tomorrow. A stronger and healthier tomorrow.
The new batch came in, got treated to the same spread. Some became cool, some mooters, a few adopted higher horizons. Same story all over again. Numerically, this batch seems superior to every other one of its time, as of now. They have higher grades, more people with higher grades. Also, they are as good at ignoring the few at the bottom of the ladder. Another successful batch. Another dream story. Children taken out of school and made into great lawyers, forget what they become as individuals.
On the positive side, this batch injects energy into the football scene here bringing in quite a few talented kids, amongst fears of the enthusiasm dying down, what with the messiah of football graduating. Looking for more positives, can't come up with any right now.
A different bunch of talented and fun-loving kids managed to win both cricket and football this year and yet failed to become the best sporting batch, primarily because they were fun-loving and not award-loving. Unprecedented, this record will take some beating. To surpass this, a batch will have to win both these tournaments without dropping a match. Highly unlikely. Well done, batch of 2011. It would be unfair to fail to mention the overwhelming support they received from their batchmates, unrivaled and abundant.
Spiritus, Outlawed and Invicta deserve special mention and a specific post for them alone can do justice. Beyond spectacular achievements, these events brought about unprecedented bonhomie. Bringing people together, I believe, is the purpose behind the concept of a University fest and this year's editions of Spiritus, Outlawed and Invicta, seem to have achieved that with flying colours.
The finest of our times leave us this year, the last episode of their five years marked mainly by the sentimental, sometimes over-sentimental, status messages on various repositories of the world wide web that provide ample opportunities for most to publish dregs of wisdom. These sentiments have seen diverse reactions, from those living every emotion to those dismissing it all. "This is not the first and only batch to graduate, you don't have to remind us that you're leaving..." opines my accomplice in cynicism. For once, I don't know if I agree.
Quoting people now. Seems like I'll have to come up with mysterious nicknames also. Good fodder for further posts. Hoping this keeps me posting.
It isn't like things got any better. What I went through has been labeled as one of this University's "greatest screw-ups" by a friend of mine, and yet this entire transformation that I'm speaking of, has been nothing other than positive. Out of academics for half a year, pretty unenthusiastic about everything else, it didn't seem like things could get any worse. And yet, I stand here today and look back at the year gone by and it seems to have done more good than harm. Maybe this setback was what I really needed. Maybe the negativity had to exist but only to spur me on to aspire for a fitter environment for all of us here. That precisely is what I desire to see at our beloved University. A fitter tomorrow. A stronger and healthier tomorrow.
The new batch came in, got treated to the same spread. Some became cool, some mooters, a few adopted higher horizons. Same story all over again. Numerically, this batch seems superior to every other one of its time, as of now. They have higher grades, more people with higher grades. Also, they are as good at ignoring the few at the bottom of the ladder. Another successful batch. Another dream story. Children taken out of school and made into great lawyers, forget what they become as individuals.
On the positive side, this batch injects energy into the football scene here bringing in quite a few talented kids, amongst fears of the enthusiasm dying down, what with the messiah of football graduating. Looking for more positives, can't come up with any right now.
A different bunch of talented and fun-loving kids managed to win both cricket and football this year and yet failed to become the best sporting batch, primarily because they were fun-loving and not award-loving. Unprecedented, this record will take some beating. To surpass this, a batch will have to win both these tournaments without dropping a match. Highly unlikely. Well done, batch of 2011. It would be unfair to fail to mention the overwhelming support they received from their batchmates, unrivaled and abundant.
Spiritus, Outlawed and Invicta deserve special mention and a specific post for them alone can do justice. Beyond spectacular achievements, these events brought about unprecedented bonhomie. Bringing people together, I believe, is the purpose behind the concept of a University fest and this year's editions of Spiritus, Outlawed and Invicta, seem to have achieved that with flying colours.
The finest of our times leave us this year, the last episode of their five years marked mainly by the sentimental, sometimes over-sentimental, status messages on various repositories of the world wide web that provide ample opportunities for most to publish dregs of wisdom. These sentiments have seen diverse reactions, from those living every emotion to those dismissing it all. "This is not the first and only batch to graduate, you don't have to remind us that you're leaving..." opines my accomplice in cynicism. For once, I don't know if I agree.
Quoting people now. Seems like I'll have to come up with mysterious nicknames also. Good fodder for further posts. Hoping this keeps me posting.
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