We all have anniversaries. I recently had one- of my wedding, many years ago. OK, 28 years to be precise. I was in the U.S. at the time we married (in Pune), two-thirds of my way through a Ph.D. and living with 3 flatmates in Clemson, a university town in South Carolina, on a student budget.
After the Ph.D., we moved to another town, Greenwood, with exactly 15,000 as its population. Two Indian friends, Samren (and wife Annie, below)
and Dr. Soni (and wife Shakun in this pic)
kept us great company, and some American friends too (like Leslie, and Ron Green, who are in touch). Alok, my senior at Clemson (and Pam, his wife), and the former flatmates (Satish, Anil and Suresh) and their partners Marla, Vinita also occasionally met with us. Some of them are in this pic taken outside our Greenwood apt.
My wife Anuradha (Iyer/Nargundkar) was able to manage the chaos of all these new friends effectively, and we also agreed on coming back to India, proving that it's possible to have unanimity after marriage :). Of course, we visited Vegas before we came back, and Europe too.
Our stay in India so far has included Bhubaneswar (XIMB), Hyderabad (Vignana Jyoti Inst. of Mgt), Harihar (Kirloskar Inst.), Lucknow (IIM), Kozhikode (IIM), Bangalore (PESIT and IFIM Business School), together. After this, for the sake of our daughters' education, she set up base in Pune and I moved on to IMT Nagpur, Ghaziabad, and on to IIM Indore. It has been an eventful journey of 28 years, and we made new friends in each place- and more importantly, retained them even after we moved from a place. Having a large contingent of relatives also helped us in many ways, including in the US where my cousins Jayashree and Sheelu (and friend Kiran Kenjale) have lived for years. With the support of friends, relatives, well-wishers including former students (between the two of us, we have about a million), it's been a great ride- and continues to be. This pic is of Prarthana, Pooja and their mom in Jaisalmer on a trip last year.
After the Ph.D., we moved to another town, Greenwood, with exactly 15,000 as its population. Two Indian friends, Samren (and wife Annie, below)
Our stay in India so far has included Bhubaneswar (XIMB), Hyderabad (Vignana Jyoti Inst. of Mgt), Harihar (Kirloskar Inst.), Lucknow (IIM), Kozhikode (IIM), Bangalore (PESIT and IFIM Business School), together. After this, for the sake of our daughters' education, she set up base in Pune and I moved on to IMT Nagpur, Ghaziabad, and on to IIM Indore. It has been an eventful journey of 28 years, and we made new friends in each place- and more importantly, retained them even after we moved from a place. Having a large contingent of relatives also helped us in many ways, including in the US where my cousins Jayashree and Sheelu (and friend Kiran Kenjale) have lived for years. With the support of friends, relatives, well-wishers including former students (between the two of us, we have about a million), it's been a great ride- and continues to be. This pic is of Prarthana, Pooja and their mom in Jaisalmer on a trip last year.
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