Sadness & Seeing India -- Weeks 18-22

Yes, I'm still alive and kicking in India...it has been a while since my last post, and I hope I haven't lost any loyal followers.

SHOUT OUTs
Sept. 4th - Parent's anniversary and bro's bday...
Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad -- love you! (mom & dad with all their grandkids)

Happy Birthday Pauly--enjoy your last year in your 30's little bro!

SADNESS -
One of the toughest things about being all the way over here in India is missing out the birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, etc.  I was hoping to not have too many reports of friends moving out of Seattle while I was over here, but these last couple weeks brought news of 3 friends moving on from MSFT and leaving Seattle.  Funny enough, all 3 of them are moving to CA, and although I couldn't see them off, I wish them all the luck with their new ventures...Good luck Amy, Kofi and Paul!

To the rest of my friends in Seattle...no one else is allowed to move! I'm afraid I'm going to come back to Seattle and not have any of my friends still there.

(Me, Kofi & Amy)

(Paul w/ Kara & Ellen)

In addition to friends moving away from Seattle, the Wolverines also lost their home opener to Alabama...the only good thing about that was that I wasn't in the states to get shit from all the Michigan haters (Vanags, Wooley, Little Keith, Al, Phil/Allison, Mark, the list goes on and on).  But I hear they came back with a win over Air Force--it's ok UofM, you're allowed 1 loss!

GETTING AROUND INDIA -
I don't like to use work as an excuse for falling behind on my blog, or for not staying as in touch as I'd like, but this last month was particularly busy for me as I was traveling to several different cities/college campuses around India.  Definitely one of the perks of my job is seeing the country and meeting some great students.

Cummins Women College of Engineering (Pune & Mumbai) -
One of the few all women's engineering colleges in India, and the talent was impressive.

MIT (Manipal) -
The "other" MIT ;-).  This was an amazing campus and definitely the largest group of students I've ever presented to--there were @ 350-400 students that attended the presentation.  I have to admit, I did feel a bit like a rock star up there on stage with all eyes on me ;-). 

IIT Bhu (Varanasi) -
At one of the schools, IIT Bhu, it was great to have colleague and friend from Seattle come out to interview students with hopes of making some hires for Redmond roles...great seeing you Mark and good to catch up!

This is where we interviewed on campus--the Alumni Guest House...what was amazing is that where ever they were doing construction, they made these bambo scaffolding, which they hopped from one level to another--it was pretty cool to see...

.

Varansi - the city which IIT Bhu is located, is the oldest city in India, and one of the oldest cities in all civilazation. Every night they gather on the Gangi's River to pray and worship--it really was an amazing site...even if I didn't understand a word they were singing or saying, to see all those people in one place (night after night), was pretty cool. They boats tied together and people just walked from boat to boat and popped a squat where ever they wanted, regardless of who's boat it was.

This is just little kid that I couldn't stop watching in the airport--I think because he reminded me so much of a dark Dane ;-) (my nephew). He was so cute and just kind of sauntered around like he didn't have a care in the world. He easily could've fit in my suitcase...but there were way too many people around--kidding!!

IIT Kharagpur -
This was a fun campus visit--we didn't start interviewing for interns until @ 7:30pm and ran interviews until 2:30am...needless to say, I was a bit slap happy by the time we were wrapping, hence my idea to have all our intern hires put on their Microsoft t-shirt to pose...such a good feeling to see their smiles after hearing the news they were receiving offers to intern next summer at Microsoft!



So as I said above, we were interviewing until 2:30am, so I didn't get back to where we were staying and check in to my room until 3am.  Luckily I had picked up my room key earlier that day, because when I arrived in the hotel, the front desk clerk and the security guard were both asleep on the couches in the lobby...NOT KIDDING--I walked into the lobby later than my colleagues because I needed to wrap a few things up at the campus and all the lights were off and I used my phone as a flashlight and saw no one behind the desk or anywhere in the entrance.  Then I heard something next to the registration desk that sounded like snoring, and sure enough, both the front desk worker and security gaurd were sound asleep and both snoring.  They didn't hear me come in, or clear my throat, so I took it upon myself to try to find my room because I hadn't been to it yet...it took me a few minutes to find the elevator, and then I realized I was in the wrong wing.  Normally I would've been a little upset, but all I could do was laugh that I was walking around this dark hotel at 3am and using my phone as a flashlight.  When I finally found my room, I was so happy...and I didn't even care when I pulled back the comforter on one of the beds to find the below picture.  There were two twin beds in the room, and the other one had sheets on them, and I didn't even dare pull the sheets up to see what that matress and pillow looked like.  I was so frickin' tired that I didn't even care and just threw a t-shirt around the pillow and went to bed.

On my way out of Kharagpur, I happened to see this Hi-Tech Cyber Cafe and I actually asked my driver to turn around so I could take a picture ;-).  Unfortunately it's tough to make out all the details on the signs, but let's just say, that this is irony at it's best...I actually walked into the cafe as well--and the power was out!  ha, ha--very Hi-Tech.

FIRST DINNER PARTY -
I've been here now for almost 5 months and was invited to my first dinner party last night...and had a great time. When I first moved out here, I was reading books about how common it was to be invited over to people's homes for dinner...and how it was very impolite to refuse the offer.  Well, I haven't had to worry about refusing any offers because before this past week, I hadn't been invited ;-).  Who knows, maybe I give off the vibe "don't invite me to dinner", but I didn't realize how much I missed just going over to someone's house and hanging out and having a home cooked meal.  I met some great people and had a lot of fun.

MY SUNDAY ADVENTURE -
This story isn't going to be nearly as funny as if you would've seen it in person...but I have to share it with you.  Today I went for a run and ran to the golf course, which is about 3.5 miles from my place. My run to the golf course was pretty uneventful, besides EVERY single person I passed staring at me...I just wish I could read their mind because the looks I get make it seem like they've never seen a white person running before.  So after I hit a bucket of balls, I started to walk back to my place and my driver had said there might be a short cut through this construction site next to the golf course.  Since I had no where to be, I thought I'd check it out and see if there really was a short cut.  Well, past experiences should have taught me better then to listen to that part of my brain that says "what's the worst that can happen??"  The walk/short cut started out fine and then I realized the construction site I was in was supposedly off-limits and I somehow walked right by the guard and didn't even notice that the whole place was fenced in until I got pretty far along.  At that point, the short cut turned out to be not such a short cut and I finally ran into another guard and he just looked at me and waved.  I walked up to him and asked him how to get out and pointed to my apartment complex, which was literally a stone throw away, but on the other side of this big fence. He pointed down this path and was telling me how to get there...I'm guessing he was telling me how to get to my complex, but he was speaking Hindi, so I couldn't understand a lick he was saying.  For all I know, he was saying "you stupid white guy, what are doing walking around in here and if you think you can get to your complex from here, well, unless you're SpiderMan, you're screwed". 

Well, I kept walking and figured I need to go under this bridge and climb up this small hill on the other side to get to the main road.  Well this is where the funny part comes in...I walk under the bridge and start crawling up this hill and come to a fence.  There happens to be a gap at the bottom of the fence that looks plenty big for me to get under.  So I throw my back pack (w/ my phone and keys in it) over the fence...and then think "oh shit, what if I can't fit through the gap", then my bag is on the other side of the fence and I can't get to it.  I'm just glad there was no one around b/c I was laughing at myself as I laid on my stomach and pulled myself through this gap in the fence and had no problem getting through--forget the fact that I was covered in burrs once I got up.  Anyway, after I scooted under the fence and climbed up another hill, I was just about home!  Like I said, I'm sure it would've been a lot funnier if you were watching me from afar trying to figure out how to get out of this fenced in area and crawling through a hole in the fence.

DEEPAK THOUGHTS BY KEITH -
Over the past month, I've seen some amazing places in India, and on the whole, it is a beautiful country, but sad to see so many areas where the people just don't seem to take care of their surroundings/environment--the amount of garbage in the streets, even on the golf course this weekend I saw 2 different people just put their cigarettes out ON THE GREEN (major fopuex).  As I was waiting for my driver to pick me up for work one morning, a little girl came out on her balcony and just threw some garbage over the railing...and 2 seconds later the mom came out and did the same thing--and they didn't even try to hide the fact that they were throwing garbage over the balcony.  Here's my deepak thought:
- What if EVERYONE in India could set aside one day out of the whole year to go out and pick up garbage for 1 hour...that would clean this whole country up maybe (but then again, where would they put all the garbage)