On the Road - 11: Viva Las Vegas

On a sweltering July 27, I set off for a mini-vacation to Las Vegas. With me in the car were two friends, M. and R., both of whom I have known for more than fifteen years. We packed our car wisely: a half-eaten box of Pappa John's finest, two mountainous crates of bottled water ("buy one get one free" at Rite-Aid), a dazzling array of beverages thoughtfully buried in chips of ice in a giant cooler, and two ipods filled with road trip-appropriate music.

This was R's first time to Vegas so he was very excited. He kept asking all sorts of questions, most pertinent, others not so much. Pretty soon we were out on the Interstate 15, going a leisurely 80 miles and admiring the scenery. The land out there is so bleak and so vast that it naturally inspires awe and a deep sense of isolation. The mountains that crop up alarmingly close to the roadside are stark and stern, studded with harsh rocks and nothing else.

While I was busy driving, M. snapped pictures from the passenger seat.

3.5 hours and multiple iterations of "Hotel California" later, the Vegas skyline emerged triumphantly from the desert. I have been to Vegas before, but each time I go I feel the same feeling of contentment at the first sight of the skyline. Vegas has a rejuvenating quality to it. The city itself is nothing short of a miracle, prospering (although not so much in the recent years) in the middle of the desert and being an evergreen hope-refueling station for millions for decades. During day it looks surprisingly ordinary. At night, with all the lights turned on in their full glory, it transforms into an astonishing world, one that is self-contained and endless at the same time. It is earnest without being too ironic. Which is why it is able to pull off showy gimmicks without seeming kitschy. Where else would you be able to visit a replica of the Eiffel Tower or see a miniature Statue of Liberty or a giant-ass Sphinx without lapsing into peals of derisive laughter? Vegas takes itself seriously, and that compels you to do the same. True, its unabashedly consumerist and capitalist nature turns many away, but the beauty of the strip is it offers something for everybody. You can manage to have a terrific time without once having to gamble. Or drink. Just walking around and seeing the charged crowds gliding on the hot concrete is enough to get the adrenaline going. I have walked many many miles on UCLA's campus over the last four years, but none of them can beat the walks I have taken on the illuminated strip at midnight.

An Indian summer - 6: Rain over me

I went through a string of insanely lame subtitles like rainman, rainmaker, rain rain please do come and so on before settling down on rain over me, a reference to the totally badass The Who song "Love reign o'er me". I was even nice enough to link you to it so you can enjoy it.

As you might have guessed (doesn't take much to make this guess, BTW) this post is all about rain in India and how awesome it is. For the sake of gratuitous plugging, let me link to an older post from last year where I waxed lyrical about how I love the rain.

Ok let's move on then. India is one of those places with a regular, well-defined monsoon season. Traditionally monsoon arrives around mid-June and lasts till late September. In the last few years, however, it has rarely followed that schedule. This year was no exception. I arrived here June 22 (Operation Barbarossa, anyone?) and was sorely disappointed  to find no trace of this bratty rain. While Mumbai and even other parts of Gujarat enjoyed healthy showers over the next 10 days, I waited and waited, desperately ready to settle for even a teeny trickle of rain.

He finally decided to show his face yesterday (I use the pronoun 'he' because rain is often referred to as megha raja lit. cloud king). It began like a [insert your favorite musician/musical group] concert: magnificent streaks of light racing across the dark, overcast sky followed by self-assured rumbling. Soon the light and sound show was complemented by the rhythmic pitter-patter of roundlets of rain gliding across window panes. I was visiting my elementary school teacher with a few friends, and we eagerly opened the main door to let the soothing sound effects in.

Of course there was the question of going back. You see, I hitched a ride on my friend's very capable moped and now we were left facing the prospect of driving about 3 miles in this formidable downpour. I fantasized about this moment many times over the last four years. When I still lived in India, I loved racing my bike across rain-drenched streets, splashing water all over the place by zipping through large puddles. Now I could do it again! The journey was very eventful. Midway through a really large puddle (the size of a modest koi pond), our trusted ride sputtered to a stop. Uh-oh. These scenes are all too common during these rainy spells: hapless riders pushing their vehicles through ankle or knee deep water. Our ride started almost immediately and none of us had to wade through the water. I guess it was a tiny tantrum. By the time I reached my home, my shirt weighed twice as much. My hair leaked water. My sandals were drenched. And I had one of the best nights in this vacation. I can go back to the US a content man.

An Indian summer - 5

I flinched as the moped jolted to a halt barely a foot away from my left leg. My leg hugged the metallic body of the scooter that I was riding on. My friend, the driver of this vehicle, seemed totally unconcerned about the invasion of the crazy moped drivers. Just a minute later, he braked hard to avoid a bicyclist. Meanwhile, an auto-rickshaw was trying to sneak its three wheels into a non-existent turn space. It was chaos all around me - honks, brakes, the rhythmic vroom of supercharged engines - and I was scared to be in this traffic. Those around me weren't, though. They dutifully braked and swerved and zipped past other riders with ease and serenity. Organized chaos.

Some kind soul took a picture of typical traffic in Ahmedabad.

Gridlock 3D

Ahmedabad is notorious for its traffic, but in my absence I had forgotten how bad it could be. Located about 70 km from my hometown, Ahmedabad is the biggest city in the state of Gujarat (total population, including suburbs and associated metro areas, is around 6 5 million)and it has grown in fabulously monstrous proportions over the last few years. Strip malls and massive movie theaters are cropping up in the blink of an eye. Hospitals, luxury condominium complexes and megamansions are rising to keep speed with the new urban development.

As a kid, I cherished visits to Ahmedabad. For us humble small town folk, it was a big deal. Since my parents had done their undergraduate and graduate schooling there, they knew the place very well and had a lot of friends too. And Ahmedabad housed the biggest bookstores in a radius of about 200 km. That was, without a doubt, the highlight of every visit. I always came back laden with enough books to shame a pack mule. These visits played a very crucial role in nurturing my early interest in books and reading. This was the one place that connected me to hittite art, translations of Jules Verne's fantastic adventure stories, and unabridged editions of Charles Dickens' works.

Kiddie book collection (pardon the flash)

This time I was more interested in acquiring Gujarati books, mostly from the pre-independence (i.e. pre-1947) era. These books are very hard to find in the US (even UCLA's well-connected library system has failed to do me any good in this department). I have never been too big of a Gujarati novel fan, but Gujarati non-fiction, specifically essays, is very enjoyable. There is an air of worldliness in these pieces, and it is not uncommon for these essayists to quote Dostoyevsky or Martin Buber to explain some social quirk in India.

You'll be happy to know that I was successful in my quest. Sure I had to dodge hellish traffic while holding on to my dear life. Sure I had to perform Indiana Jones-like acrobatics to get there. But I live to tell the tale.

An Indian summer - 4

Naps are an integral part of the Indian culture. Cricket is perhaps the only thing that can supersede naps in terms of uniting the national spirit. Here in smaller towns and cities, it is not uncommon at all to find shops and stores locked up for the oppressive afternoon as their owners go home for a couple hours of delightful sleep. Some of my fondest childhood memories is watching my dad take his naps. He used to come home around 1:30 and sleep till about 4:30 and go back to work. His naps were pretty legendary around our house. He followed a pretty fixed routine after waking up - after sitting up on his bed groggily for a few minutes he would drink a glass of water, wash his face and get ready to leave.

I never understood the allure of sleeping and wasting a couple hours of your day like that. Whenever I asked dad about his sleeping habits, he spoke wistfully about the redeeming qualities of it, as if it was the elixir of life or something. I used to shake my head in bewilderment, thoroughly not convinced.

Until yesterday.

I am not really a nap person , but there is something intoxicating about the potent combination of the hot afternoon air and the cool oasis underneath the ceiling fan. Before I knew it, I was out. I woke up a good two hours later, and that was when I understood every freakin' word I was told about these naps before.  Although I have taken afternoon siestas in the states quite a few times, this was quite different. Richer, more fulfilling, and certainly more satisfying. Like trading in instant coffee for premium Colombian brew.

An Indian summer - 3: Sights and sounds

A weeks since I arrived here. So I thought I would give a few tidbits about the daily routine here.

Transportation: Scooters (the Vespa kind, not the razor kind) and motorcycles are probably the most popular means of transportation here. The traffic situation is not nearly as bad as it is in bigger metropolises, but it is certainly much worse than when I used to live here. It is a problem of limited space, mostly. The roads are narrow and with construction booming, it is becoming difficult to fit all the vehicles on the road. There certainly are more cars than before. Believe it or not, Chevy is one of the more popular brands, alongside Honda, Nissan and Suzuki. Motorists, scooterists (judging by the red squiggly line underneath, this doesn't seem like a word - oh well) and motorcyclists have to share the road with the obvious - pedestrians and bicyclists - and the not-so-obvious - stray dogs. Still, it was quite a pleasure riding out on my friend's motorcycle. Nothing beats the feeling of semi-hot wind hitting you in the face. (I am serious, BTW - it is pretty enjoyable)

The auto-rickshaw (a three wheeled version of a taxicab) remains an overwhelmingly popular choice of  conveyance. Here's a picture of one:

Tricked out ride [source:fractalenlightenment.com]

Cricket: India is a place of many different languages, customs, traditions and cultures. Despite the dizzying array of differences, cricket (I did two posts explaining the basics here and here) remains the one big, glorious unifying passion. One of the few vestiges of the British colonial rule adopted enthusiastically by the country, the sport has lately been touted as a symbol of the nation's growing economic might. I will let the politicos and economicos worry about the symbolism and deeper meanings and whatnot. For me cricket symbolizes simplicity and harkens back to childhood. Find any clear space around your neighborhood, grab a bat (or two) and a ball and off you go. Even as I am writing this, I can hear kids playing with a plastic ball outside.
So it was with great pleasure that I fished out my old bat from the innards of my old room and played for a solid two hours with my friends a couple days ago. Now my friends may tell you that I suck at this great game, but I think I have gotten better with time. Besides, if sucking were ever to be a crime, the entire post-Lebron Cavaliers lineup would be in jail by now.

Entertainment: I have been spending an unhealthy amount of time playing "Uno" lately. You see, since we used to do the same years and years ago, it made complete sense to us to resume the noble practice. Each round is accompanied by an inordinate number of jeers, insults and hoots and heckles. Skips and draw fours bring out the worst in us, I guess.
Our ancient television set at home has, after many years of faithful service, decided to start phoning it in. The color scheme changes randomly on the screen, and depending on the time of the day, everything either turns red or blue. Doesn't take away from the actual scene on the screen, though, so I am OK with that. Most TV programs can be divided into the following categories: Indian soap operas, 24/7 cable news (English and Hindi), music videos and movies, cricket, and more cricket. Lately they've started airing a bunch of American shows (like Modern Family, White Collar, Family guy etc.) on a few channels. Strangely, there seems to be a lot of  "Las Vegas" on air on these channels. Here's your chance to see pre-Transformers and pre-Fergie Josh Duhamel, folks.

I think that's enough for now. More in the next installment.

An Indian summer - 2

Let's play a game. The name of this game is Where in the world is your favorite blogger?

Thank you for playing. Your favorite blogger is currently in a quaint little town called (read twice to memorize; there will be a quiz later) Vallabh Vidyanagar in the western Indian state of Gujarat. But I am sure that's like me saying that white dwarf WD 1620-26 is located alongside pulsar PSR 1620-26 A in the constellation Scorpius some 13000 light years away. (It's true. Look it up.)

Be happy, then, that I spent some time tinkering with Google Maps and GIMP (a free photo manipulation software, if you must know - sorta like photoshop for the poor) to demystify my location.

First, here is the good state of Gujarat. As you can see, it sits happily on the western edge of India, bordering the Arabian sea on the west and the south and Pakistan to the north.

Here is Vallabh Vidyanagar (if you are too tired of the long name, you can call it - as many locals do - V.V. Nagar), roughly 50 km (did I mention everything here is in kilometers, liters and kilograms?) from the coast.

An Indian summer - 1

A warm (and I mean that literally - it's hovering in the high 90's here) hello to our very loyal readers, followers, feed readers, lurkers et al. from India. I haven't written much on these pages for a long, long time and that's because I had other oh-so-slightly important things to attend. Like finalizing on a medical school. And graduation.

But now that I am on a glorious three-week long vacation in India, I have bucketloads of free time. What better way to spend it than churning out blog posts (some of which will, inevitably, be of dubious quality)?

The Flight: The prospect of flying to India from the states is frightening. Total flying time is routinely around 16-20 hours. Unless you are flying to and from a major airport (e.g. Los Angeles to Mumbai), add a few more hours to that flying time for connecting flights, layovers and road transportation. In my case, I flew Emirates airlines from LAX to Dubai and from Dubai to Ahmedabad, a comfortably sized city in the western state of Gujarat. From there, my destination is about 90 km. Emirates is one of the handful of airlines that treats its economy-class passengers as more than worthless cargo. In-flight service is generous and courteous.

I wasted a good two hours trying to like the Adam Sandler-driven trash vehicle "Just go with it", also starring Jennifer Aniston and, inexplicably, Nicole Kidman, finally settling down to watch reruns of my favorite TV show "Mad Men." Dubai's airport is large enough to house an entire eastern European nation or one of those trendy enclaves like Monaco. There I spend a whole $6 on a tiny cup of Haagen-Dazs ice-cream.

After clearing immigration and customs at Ahmedabad airport, I arrived at my destination (a small town called Vallabh Vidyanagar) at 6 in the morning, local time on Wednesday. I had left LA at 1 pm local time on Monday. In all, I spent about 30 hours in flights, layovers and other miscellany.

As I am writing this, the ceiling fan is groaning at top speed, desperately trying to generate enough cool air to ward the heat away. My friends and grandparents told me it was a lot hotter last week. Should I be glad, then?

That's it for this first installment. In the next part, I will talk a bit more about the place I am at (history, customs, what's life like here and so on), but in the meantime, say hello to my little friend that allows me to communicate with the outside world:

It's a series of tubes!

On the road - 10 part 2: Sunday in SF, Monday in the bratmobile

(Part 1 is here.)

I've been to San Francisco quite a few times before, and almost every time I've been bested by the notoriously capricious northern California weather. The first time I went to see the bridge, it was covered in plumes of dense fog. The second time was marginally better, but it was still raining and very cold. So I wasn't too surprised when the forecast for Sunday was rain and more rain. (Not just normal rain, if this hoax viral text message was to be believed. A very vile radioactive rain noxious enough to make you bald and give you nasty burns unless you exercised prudence by investing in raincoats and umbrellas. Ha. The perverted basement dwellers must have had a field day coming up with this hoax).

But my friend BS and I were both armed with some very hi-tech imaging gadgetry and were willing to take a chance. So out we went, with my cousin's freshly baked chocolate chip cookies to keep us some much needed company. We ambled along on the 101 North and hey what do we have here? His highness, the Sun king. The rain had decided to take the day off. After a nice couple hours, we arrived at the bridge.

Since the weather was so nice, we were able to take hundreds of pictures from all sorts of great vista points. Here are some good ones that I picked out at first glance (I think I still need to work on them a little bit before making prints or anything like that):

On the road - 10: I rode in a car on the road for a road trip

Jack Kerouac's On the road is one of my favorite books of all time. The basic premise of the novel is that a thinly fictionalized version of Kerouac and his merry band of lovable misfits romp around the continental United States, soaking in the American-ness of everything on their long drives. More than anything, the book is about the atmosphere and manic energy of these youthful people for whom the world is endless and possibilities infinite.

Many a times, I too have fantasized about going on a super long road trip with friends. The chief motivation behind such a project is not necessarily the places we could visit, but more about the act of driving itself. There is something about the idea of driving 8-9 hours in a stretch with a few friends - the music you play and sing along to, the inside jokes that are relevant only for the duration of the drive, the vistas that zoom by at enormous speeds and so on.

So when an old high school friend of mine from Minnesota (let's call him GW) said he was going to be in Cupertino for a couple days, I grabbed the opportunity with all four limbs. I recruited another friend (let's call him BS) for the project.

We came up with a pretty simple three-day plan: leave LA Saturday morning, see GW in San Jose that afternoon and spend the night at my aunt's house. For Sunday, we wanted to spend a couple quality hours taking pictures of the scenery in San Francisco, before heading off to Sacramento for the night. That way we would leave Sactown on Monday morning and be back in LA at a reasonable hour.

All in all, this ended up being a very entertaining and thoroughly satisfying 1290 miles.

We left LA at 7 in the morning after loading up our friendly bratmobile:

The bratmobile resting on the 5 freeway[pic by me]

San Francisco doesn't like missiles

Currently on a road trip of sorts through Northern California with an old buddy. We made a quick stop at San Francisco en route to Sacramento. 
From the Golden Gate bridge:

Yes, the good folks in charge of the bridge would like you to refrain from launching your very own Tomahawk missile. Good day.

(Not)On the road - 9: The Homefront - You. See. El. A

Last installment of the series
Part 7(Harvard, Boston) is here and part 8(WashU, St. Louis) is here.

So as you can see from the title, not really a on the road post. Well technically, I was on the road. For 12 minutes, which is about the time it takes to walk from my apartment to the admissions office at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. That's quite a mouthful. You'd think a guy donating hundreds of millions of dollars to have the naming rights to a medical school would be kind enough to call it by something short and sweet. Like Dreamworks school of medicine.

The medical school, for those not in the know, is located in one of the nicest parts of Los Angeles in an area called Westwood. The famed beaches of Santa Monica and Malibu are not very far, which in LA parlance could mean anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 hours. Bel-Air hugs one part of the larger UCLA campus, and Beverly Hills is a stone's throw away (if you are Michael Vick). Pretty safe neighborhood and unless you do something incredibly stupid, you can walk around freely even at odd hours of the night. I have done it, with no problems (the waking around, not the doing something stupid, obviously). If you are into that sort of thing, you can spot multiple celebrities from multiple fields. A lot of my friends brag about seeing the Chicago Bulls or Adam Sandler in the gym playing basketball.

Now it is no secret that the med school building is nowhere as fancy as some of the others across the country. It is located in some cramped corridors of the ancient Center for Health Sciences building, sharing space with the dental school. To compensate for this, the spanking new Ronald Reagen UCLA medical center opened up just across the street a couple of years ago.

This much, I knew. What I didn't know was the med school has a first-class top-notch A-grade student lounge that looks like a boring arboretum from the outside. This swank piece of work boasts multiple flat screen TVs, a Wii console and ping-pong tables. Our tour guides touted its exclusivity and its opulence quite a bit during the tour. The library is equipped with an exclusive study lounge as well. The school has the added benefit of being surrounded by multiple research buildings. Keep your friends close, your research closer - as the famous saying goes.

All in all, a damn fine med school.

Anyway, that's the end of the on the road posts. Hope you (and I mean my one and a half readers) enjoyed them. As the looney tunes used to say: That's all folks!

On the Road - 8: Wasssss(h)up!

Second of the final three installments in the series 

Part 7 (Harvard, Boston) is here and part 9 (UCLA) is here.

St. Louis doesn't get much to boast about these days. The city used to be a glamorous, busy hub back in the day, even hosting a World's Fair and the olympics in 1904. But that was then. Nowadays, it is in the news for the wrong reasons, like for being named the most dangerous city in America.

Which is really a shame, because St. Louis is a nice idyllic midwestern city. Absolutely would not mind living here. Plus it has the gateway arch. Can your city boast a giant arch that leads into Illinois? St. Louis is home to Washington University, whose undergrad campus is right next to Forest Park, that is 50% larger than Central park. Take that New Yawk! Someone from my interview group raised the crime question and our gracious tour guides told us that was because the numbers were skewed by East St. Louis, which is actually in Illinois. Oh right, let Illinois take all the blame.

The university and the med school are located in an area called Central West End, which is, by all accounts, a typical college community. The public transportation is pretty easy to use (LA, I am glaring at you yet again) and I had a swell time visiting the city. But I bet y'all (my one and  half readers) want me to skip to the fun part where I visited the arch, right?

Well here you go. Most people don't know you can actually go all the way to the top of the arch and gaze out at the city skyline or, if you so choose, look imperiously over Illinois on the other side. The top is all closed up (obviously) and the windows are tiny, but it is definitely worth the view.

The gateway arch: facing Illinois since 19

They like to tell you exactly how high off the ground you are

 

St. Louis: standing tall

Now if only the Rams had a better season this year...But one must not be greedy, right?

On the Road - 7: Har-Har(vard) in Bahstun

Due to a proper lack of time last month, I have decided to publish three final installments of the On the Road series today. All the trips I describe here were made in the month of November.

Post #8 (St. Louis) is here and post#9 (UCLA) is here.

I arrived in Boston (or should I say Bahstun?) on a chilly Monday night. I jostled my way through the crowded Logan airport (Hey Boston, mind expanding the restrooms a bit? The lines were Disneyland long, man) to begin the first of three legs of the public transportation-assisted journey that would take me to my gracious host's house. You see, a family friend, who is a first year dental student at Hah-vahd, was kind enough to put me up for the night. All hopes of getting a glimpse of the Charles river ("Charlie") were destroyed, however, when the Silver line bus got a massive influx of people. Thirty five minutes later, I was all aboard the Green line subway, en route to the Red line subway. Which reminds me: why are all these subway and bus lines always named after boring colors? How about the Cyan line? Or the Fuschia line?

My friend lives right across the street from the Medical-dental-public health-pharmacy-Harvard hospitals megasupercampus, so I didn't have to worry about waking up early the next morning and scrambling to get there.

Before  my trip, an acquaintance of mine, a resident physician in SoCal (whom I had run into after a long time on the morning of my flight) had told me to savor my interview and take lots of pics because the main admissions building looks like the White House. And boy was he right. Even the damp morning air couldn't put a damper on it (zing wordplay!):

Clearly, Harvard likes to protect its lawns

At the risk of sounding pedantic, let me describe the area a little bit: the medical school is located (along with a host of other professional schools) in an area of Boston called Longwood. Two major Harvard teaching hospitals are adjacent to the med school (BIDMC and Brigham and Women's), as is the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. If Longwood were a solution, it would be a supersaturated one. Security is pretty tight around here. Every building has a guard at the entrance and it is impossible to get past them without having valid IDs.

The Biomedical library, located right behind the main building, is a pure nerd haven. They had an ongoing display on the life and times of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., famous intellectual from the mid-19th century. (His son was more famous then him for, among other things, supposedly telling an incognito Abraham Lincoln to "duck, stupid" at a charged Civil-war battlefield and for becoming a supreme court justice).

They even had a portrait depicting the first surgery under ether (a crude anesthetic used in the late 19th century):

Quite surprisingly, a few in the audience look positively bored

The crown jewel was this exhibit of Phineas Gage's skull. Gage was a railroad worker who suffered a truly bizarre injury when a steel rod pierced his frontal lobe and came out the other end. Miraculously, he survived, but his personality altered irrevocably.

Phineas Gage's skull: educating Neurosci 101 undergrads for generations

It was only later that I noted a tiny sign at the top left that said: "No pictures." Oops. Sorry Harvard.

On the the Road - 6: On top of the world

Quick post: I am in Chicago again, for another medical school interview - Northwestern(Citizen Lafayette has this theory that there is a collective midwestern conspiracy to lure me here because a majority of my interviews here have been in the area haha).

Staying with a medical student host. He graduated from UCLA, so I picked him solely on that criterion. He lives with two other roommates in an extremely posh high-rise (when I say high, I mean it. This place has 40 floors.) apartment complex. They live on the 36th floor and the view here is absolutely magnificent. Northwestern medical school is in the nicest part of the city, right by the Navy pier and practically right across from the lake.

I love Chicago and the culture here. Now if only it was a bit warmer this time of the year...

Just for gits and shiggles, read this statement:

I am the being which is in such a way that in its being its being is in question

That zinger brought to you by French existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, perhaps the only person in history with enough cojones to decline the Nobel Prize.

On the Road - 5: Niceville

If Nashville were to play the role of superspy James Bond, it would perhaps itself like this: "Name's ville. Niceville." And order drinks thus: "One martini. Shaken, not stirred. Please."

People often say the south is a completely different place - almost like its own country. It doesn't take long to notice the difference. Nashvilleans are outrageously polite. So polite they almost me feel guilty.

Am I being nice enough? Is my smile wide enough? 2 millimeters more, perhaps?

I got a lot of honeys and sweethearts from elderly female cashiers and clerks. And it was 94 degrees outside! Nothing seems to faze these bubbling cauldrons of joy.

With a population of about 650,000 (1.5 million if you count the surrounding areas), Nashiville is the second biggest city in Tennessee. It enjoys prominence owing to its status as the state's capital as well as its reputation of brewing country music superstars. Music city, USA, as Nashville is often called, is home to the country music hall of fame, and boasts having an entire area devoted to recording studios. Nashville makes it obvious that it takes music seriously. Get this: the airport features a live band! The musicians kept playing merrily as amused travelers (like this blogger) walked by.

LA: meet your country music counterpart.

Nashville is also home to Opryland, the largest non-casino hotel. And here I thought the frat across the street from my apartment owned that dubious record. Speaking of dubious, the Tennessee Titans and NHL non-powerhouse Predators play in Nashville as well.

Vanderbilt University is the major research university in the city. How do we know it is important? Why of course because it has been called the "Harvard of the south". I wonder how the fine folks at Harvard would feel if their institution was called the "Vanderbilt of New England."

Vanderbilt, or Vandy, was founded by legendary shipping and railroad mogul Cornelius Vanderbilt in March 1873. Good ol' Cornelius was born in a solidly Dutch family in New York and worked his way (the good ol' American way) to become an immensely rich and influential figure in the country's history. He operated steam ferries around the New York area, eventually branching out to ocean lines as well. His shipping prowess earned him the nickname "Commodore." Beginning in the 1850's, he began investing in railroads, adding considerable amount of wealth to his already large fortune. When the civil war erupted, he donated his flagship Vanderbilt to the Union navy.

Think this is all boring history? Well, here is something interesting: fashion empress Gloria Vanderbilt is one of his descendants, and so is CNN News honcho Anderson Cooper (Gloria V's son). Tycoonery seems to run in the family.

Vanderbilt University takes its historical roots seriously. A giant statue of the Commodore greets visitors at the front entrance. Even the school's mascot is called the Commodore. No Falcons or Wildcats for these folks.

The Commodore, standing tall and proud

The campus extremely scenic, full of lush lawns, intriguing modernist sculptures and quaint 19th century styled academic halls. Walking around the campus felt like walking in a cherry orchard (zing! Chekhov reference). Definitely the most scenic campus I have visited.

                                                                                                                                              

                         
Various sculptures seen around the campus        
The VUMC (Vanderbilt University Medical Center) is quite extensive and has a VA, a Children's Hospital and a host of research buildings. You know the Children's Hospital is good because they have a giant, intricately designed model train set for kids (and their parents) to play with.

For the kids and the kid within you

 Lastly, the student newspaper is called the Hustler. Yeah you read that right. No banal names like Herald or Tribune for these Commodores. Vandy's finest get their news from the Hustler. Pretty badass. The hustling commodores. (name coined by my friend RPN)

I certainly loved Nashville a lot. It's cheap (many students choose to buy condos) and despite being a big city, it is mercifully free from the accompanying traffic troubles. Although I didn't get a chance to taste it, I can always train myself to like grits.

On the Road - 4: Pittsburgh (Putting the 'It's' in It's Happening)

Pittsburgh, PA: The erstwhile steel capital of America. Andrew Carnegie's backlot, his sandbox. But that was then. When most people (including me) think of Pittsburgh today, they probably think it is a dump - a dying old steel town that outlived its usefulness, and is past its prime.

Imagine my shock when I looked outside my tiny AmericanEagle airplane (3 seats a row, a plane so tiny even reasonably tall people have to crouch to walk through the aisle), I saw thick plumes of lush green trees, a neat and dazzling array of skyscrapers surrounded by spectacular bridges over wide rivers. No surprise, then, that Pittsburgh was named the most livable city in America .

Pittsburgh, PA. [image:pbt.org]

The city of bridges has experienced a rebirth, and it is all the bit better for it. Everyone I talked to was immensely proud of Pitt's beauty and acted playfully offended when I expressed my surprise at finding the city so pleasant.

I stayed in a neighborhood called ShadySide, about 2 miles from University of Pittsburgh (which is located in an area called Oakland), in a nice little hotel called ShadySide Inn (a converted apartment building, where 50's era radiators are anachronistically juxtaposed next to flat screen TVs). The hotel is so nice that the manager mails signed thank-you notes to guests.

I took it as another mark of the city's confidence that it chooses to call one of its swankiest locales Shadyside.

Oakland is a very vibrant area, owing to the presence of two major research universities: University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University. The two campuses are so enmeshed that buildings from both campuses are often located right next to each other. To avoid confusing freshmen, they label each building's name with the name of the school.

U Pitt, because of its medical school and its associated medical center, is a more forceful presence. Like in Ann Arbor, where Mich dominated the city, UPMC (University of Pittsburgh Medical Center) pretty much dominates the area. UPMC operates about 25 hospitals in and around Pittsburgh, making it the largest health system in the United States. Last year, the system generated about $8 billion in revenues, which gives you a sense of the extent of its multifaceted operations.

U Pitt is also, by far, the older of the two institutions. It was founded in 1787, when none of us were alive.

University of Pittsburgh: founded before you, your mother, your grandmother and your great-grandmother were alive

You can tell U Pitt values education by the fact that they have a humongous Cathedral of learning (I can hear Citizen Lafayette salivating at this factoid) right in the middle of campus. Magnificent and imposing at 535 feet, the cathedral is the fourth-largest educational building in the world, as my friend Wikipedia informs me (second, if you go by the tour guides at Pitt School of Medicine). The building is open 24/7, and its 42 floors house many classrooms and a quiet study room. I took a peek inside and the architecture is just so intricate and awe-inspiring.

The Cathedral of learning: bigger than ANYTHING on your college campus

People here were tactful enough not to mention the harsh winters (last winter's snowstorms virtually crippled the whole city. People reportedly skied down the hilly streets around the Med school.) Regardless, Pittsburgh is a very beautiful city.

Spread the word. Correct the misconception. Squash the rumors.

On the Road - 3: Comrade Bazarov's day(s) off

I decided to combine my Chicago outings into one post.
My cousins here graciously took me out to the city on Saturday and kept me well-fed throughout the day. They even pretended to be tourists and took me to the "touristy" places. I had been to Chicago before (about 8 years ago) so it was nice to visit the city again and refresh my memory.

The first place we visited was the Giant Bean. There is nothing much I can say about it except that it is a bean and it is giant. My friend from Northwestern University informed me today that the structure's official name is the Cloud Gate. But no one calls it that. So we will call it the Giant Bean as well. Situated in the middle of the Millennium Park, the Giant Bean has a very shiny mirror-like metallic surface that reflects the city's famous skyline, providing excellent photo-ops for tourists. Wikipedia tells me the architect Anish Kapoor was inspired by the characteristic liquid shine of Mercury. My friend told me the reflective nature of the Giant Bean caused some considerable controversy a couple of years ago, when the designers of many Chicago skyscrapers filed a lawsuit alleging their copyrights were being violated when tourists snapped pictures of the city's skyline in the Giant Bean and freely distributed these snapshots online. Thankfully common sense prevailed, and a judge threw the case out.

The Giant Bean in its full glory [image: Virtualtourist.com]

On the Road - 2: The case of the missing H

Come gather around people for another exciting travelogue. I spent 2 days in Ann "Where is the H" Arbor, Michigan and am now back in Chicago.

Yes I know Ann Arbor is not a harbor and nor is it near a large body of water. Still, it's unsettling to find a city with a name like that. Wikipedia has some interesting theories about this. One theory states that the city, founded in 1824, is named after founder John Allen's wife Ann. Apparently, Ann was fond of grape trees and since the word arbor means tree, the city was christened Ann's Arbor, later shortened to Ann Arbor.

Ann Arbor, MI. [courtesy of mtctickets.com]

Ann Arbor, located about 20 miles west of Detroit, is a pleasant little city. The first thing you notice is people in Michigan seem to be living in the future! Three full hours in the future, in fact. Very intimidating for someone traveling from the west coast. Once you get used to that, the next thing that jumps out at you is the astronomical number of dead raccoons. In a span of five minutes, I counted about 8 dead raccoons strewn around on the side of the roads, their innards exposed to the open. Sorry if that is a bit graphic, but it was quite jarring to see these very dead raccoons on the roads.

In Michigan, they have something called an "unpaved road", a curious artifact for someone used to eight-lane freeways clogged up with endless stream of cars. A lot of trees (gotta live up to the name, ya know?) in and around the city - living in LA makes one forget what trees look like.

The weather was pleasant for both days I was there and people there seemed excited for fall. "Believe it or not, we get all four seasons here, unlike you Californians", quipped one person I talked to. The same wit (when someone asked about the severity of the winters said) sneered, "There is no such thing as too cold, only weak people. Get a coat and pair of gloves and get used to it."

The University of Michigan (who incidentally beat bitter rival Notre Dame in a very tense and exciting football game today) is the single biggest entity in Ann Arbor and occupies several hundred acres of property throughout the city in the form of hospitals, research buildings, and an assortment of school buildings. You can see their distinctive yellow block M everywhere.

What else? Well, Ann Arbor is sister cities with places like Dakar (Senegal), Hikone (Japan) and Peterborough (Canadia). Ann Arbor is also the headquarters of Borders. But most importantly, more than half of the population of Ann Arbor is single. The city was named one of the most livable places in America by Yahoo! and Forbes.

With its natural beauty, quiet streets, neat neighborhoods and invigorating weather, I can see why. A good trip into the upper midwest. Nice to get away from the west coast.

If I get time tomorrow, I will do a post about my day in Chicago (my cousins graciously showed me around and fed me good food). Oh and I hear someone named Snooki is in some trouble. With a (nick)name like that, I am not surprised.

On the Road - 1: The vagaries of NorCal

Two days, 1010 miles, a very hot and drowsy Sacramento, and a stop in a ludicrously foggy San Francisco - all in all a mighty fine road trip of sorts.

Sorry I wasn't around to do another UG Sports post this Friday. I was on the road for two days, exploring the ferocious wilderness that is Northern California. Some explosive college football today, though, with weak teams getting absolutely steamrollered (is that a word?) by powerhouses.

Anyway, I will be on the road again for about 10 days (Sep 8-Sep 17) so my next few blog posts will be from exciting locales in the upper midwest, midwest and the east.

Back to my road trip, Sacramento was hot and stifling but I liked the feel of the place. A big city with a small-town aura. Saw the Capitol from outside (at 9 pm) and drove around the downtown. Apparently, Sacramento is the city of trees. And they are not kidding. The place is infested with trees, just like old houses are infested with termites and roaches of dubious ancestry. A very bike-friendly city too (I am frowning at you, LA). And get this: it has its very own water tower!! How cool is that?

San Francisco. Well, it was just San Francisco. Stubbornly Bohemian (bikers riding around at 7:30 pm in a furious drizzle) and loopy as always. The streets were all clogged and chaotic - trams (is that what they call those trains?), buses, bike riders, walkers, joggers, wailers, crawlers etc. The fog descended onto the city by 7 pm and it began to drizzle soon after. Very surreal, especially since I was in a 100 degree Sacramento just hours before.

Maybe I will pull a Kerouc and write a book. Just maybe.

Oh and thank Your Faithful Servant for redecorating the blog. She spent hours on this thing and we really appreciate her skills and her help.