Mumbai Meets

Generally, I do meet some old students whenever I can. I usually have a partner-in-crime who gets in touch with some of their friends, and this time it was Sheetal Garg, one of my pals from IMT Nagpur. Though I never taught her, we get along famously, and thanks to her effort, we (Abha Kulkarni was the third), met and chatted for a couple of hours effortlessly, about various things-life included, but also kids and grown-up kind of stuff. We decided that we'll offer ourselves up to Abhinav Kamal (another IMTian) for acting in his films, since he's the only chance we have..we also did a photo-shoot to impress him.. Abhinav, here it is! Also pinning our hopes on the fact that Sheetal has just won the Miss Congeniality title at a Pageant..you can see why!

Crowning glory- we even managed to put the Taj in the shade! Sunshine around me!!

Kids and Grandfathers

I really feel like a proud grandpa- no, my daughters are not the reason, but my former students who look young enough to be my grandkids. I feel young in their company too, so proud AND young, I guess. Had a great outing with some of these kids, appropriately enough, at Grandmama's Cafe recently.  Some pics-

 Multiple reasons were found for the celebrations- Tosha's and Abha's Dads in the news, Sirisha's enagagement were three. Of course, the fourth was simply the joy of meeting each other- a joy like no other!

Oh, we also celebrated my advanced birthday- I mean birthday in advance. That expression!! Sirisha, you are a photographer's delight :)

A Wedding Party in Nagpur

Went to her wedding and met Abha Kulkarni, a former student (of IMT), for the first time there- I was the bride's guest. Must have happened for the first time. Thanks to Facebook, though, I feel that I know her pretty well. She's been a winner of some of my awards on fb. Anyway, the feeling of meeting someone in person (and seeing the radiant smile in this case) is much more than a facebook friendship. I highly recommend meeting some fb friends regularly when you can, and multiplying your joy. I try my best to meet one per visit to any city, at least. My own alumni meets of sorts.

In this case, of course, I was accompanied by my ex-colleagues Vijayakumar and Anant Ram who had taught her at IMT and told me she was a great student. It was a coincidence that her husband Rohan is from Nagpur, and enabled me to be here for the event. Found out from chatting with her parents that they have lived in Bangalore for many years. I am a fan of Nagpuri stuff like Oranges, and I also like its clean roads in the newer parts. Of course, the speedy Metro construction is causing some traffic issues, but they won't last long, as construction is progressing at 'Gadkari speed'- defined as 20 times the average Indian speed. If he'd been in charge of the economy in the 1960s, we'd never have had to face the "Hindu rate of growth".

I was also happy it wasn't too cold- I am not a fan of sardi-Dilli ki ya aur kahin ki. Just the right medicine for ending the year- Food, Friends and Thums Up, as the old ad said. Thumb's up, totally.