A year to the day...

August 4, 2005: It's been a year to the day I landed up in the US. Don't worry - I am not going to bore you with how I have been to the Grand Canyon, California and Sedona in the past year (yes, I have also found the time to study once in a while). There's actually quite a bit of nothing to write about the last year in America. I am not even sure what exactly I am about to write in this post because hardly anything I have done in that time would be of any special interest to anyone, I think. So, what I will do instead is just list a few things about life in the US that I have observed:

• Graduate school has just as much advantages to it as there is hard work. While it teaches you a lot of interesting academic stuff (and hopefully gets you a good job), you have to forget a relaxed week{day,end} for the whole semester. I can't remember a day when there was nothing to do. There's always something or the other due for submission next week and you are sunk if you fall behind schedule. But it's not all that bad. You get to enjoy an independent life, fun times with roomies and managing studies with housework is another interesting learning curve that sets you up well for the rest of your life :)
• Road trips are amazing. If you want to take some time off work/studies/whatever else that gets too mundane for you, there's no better way to get together with a bunch of friends and hit the road. A superb network of freeways, excellent car rental services and Google Maps for directions... a great setup for a fun trip - and there's no dearth of places to go around!
• I will never understand shopping. Well, I'll accept that I am an awful shopper - if the world was full of shoppers like me, retailers would have pulled the shutters down for good. But somehow, I just can't make any sense of shopping malls. There is always too much stuff to get you all confused. They are big and fancy and all I can think of inside a mall is that all that glitz is going to come out of my pocket. I buy stuff only when I absolutely need it, so wandering around shopping malls is just a grand waste of time for me anyway. And its not just about malls - even department stores! I mean what on earth happened to the good old corner shops? I have to bike out a mile in this god forsaken desert for simple groceries like milk and eggs!
• Online shopping is perhaps the only way I'll be able to buy anything it seems and that is big business here in the US. Almost all my purchases (and that's hardly saying much) has been online - its easy and quick. There's also this great thing called rebates which actually get you back your money (if you have a combination of luck and patience)! I have been hooked on to sites like Deals2Buy and edealinfo ever since I have arrived here. You can get some great deals on loads of stuff if you keep an eye out for them.
• Advertising in this country sucks. I am afraid I am rather poorly gifted when it comes to satirical humour, so all I'll say is that the television ads I have seen here are mind-numbingly stupid. You just have to watch them to fully grasp how unimaginative they are, I can't even describe them that well. Forget engineering and medicine, you could make a fortune in advertising if you have even an iota of imagination :)
• Basketball is the only American sport that is interesting enough to watch. I followed the NBA Finals between Heat & the Mavericks and enjoyed it immensely. Baseball and Foot(?)ball are just too boring and somehow don't look skillful enough. That is where BB beats them hands down. It's fast and requires tremendous skill - the end result is great to watch.
• There is just too much internet bandwidth whether in the University or at home. And it is simply abused to the extent of making you feel guilty about it :). Streaming video, music, infinte downloads - you name it. Raaga and Musicindiaonline become pseudo homepages on your browsers and stuff like MP3s are all but forgotten.
• If you don't already have one, you get an online life. Since phones (esp calls to India) are not all that cheap, and since everyone has wierd work/class hours instant messengers become the preferred commmication media.
  

There's other stuff to rant and rave about as well, but I can't think up all of them right away. Maybe some other time, some other year :)