(This is the story behind the reference to tea in this earlier chapter of the memoirs.) The phone rang as I started shutting the front door behind me. In one of those momentous decisions that define history I overrode my initial inclination to continue on my way out and stepped back in and picked…
Science fairs for high schoolers were an annual affair. A large area with a perimeter of school stalls showing off hand-made experiments with charts on the walls, manned by eager young scientists, also contained a refreshment area. It was great place to meet students from other schools. I stood there chatting with a…
Ashok found Meena fascinating. She, Meena, liked Jethro Tull. Ashok’s tastes were more Donna Summer’s gasping, moaning, sex-drenched disco. But Meena was friendly, liked Ashok’s company and a movie or two together ensued. One day, I was asked if I wanted to accompany them, in my usual role of chaperone for the Other…
In the early summer of the following year (following the on-time, on-budget arrival of Baby #1, (chronicled in this post) financial conditions hadn't really improved. A meager income was being gleaned by teaching. My wife and I took up part-time lectureships at various schools that were mushrooming everywhere. Schools that gave out diplomas…
Schools, good ones, were hard to come by in Calcutta. Boys had a choice of St. Xavier's, La Martiniere for Boys, the recently rejuvenated and rising fast in the ranking St. James and my own school, Don Boso Park Circus, DBPC for short. Admissions were competitive and parents stressed over the best ways…
Things went back to normal after An Inauspicious Start. Of course, normal was the new normal which wasn't quite the same normal as the previous normal. Progressing pregnancy dulled the pain of financial doom. Sometime in the 3rd month we had signed up for a 5-day package at Woodlands Nursing Home in Alipore.…
Shortly after the "Hello World" episode, the startup shutdown. Cast into the wilderness, not yet 27 years of age, boasting a pregnant wife and mounting debt caused by 3 months of no pay, I drifted out of the corporate world. Disillusioned by the posturing, the politics, burned out from nearly 5 years of…
Read Part 1 Read Part 2 "Well, I'll be damned!", I said. "This looks just like a GW-Basic Interpreter. Where the hell did you find this?" "Well...", he started. "Never mind, everyone go away and leave me alone. I need to think." I waved everyone away. On my table in those days always…
Read Part 1 No, you're wrong. It wasn't my COBOL code, or my system design skills. The floppies were not corrupted, I could see the data outside my code with tools I had. As more boxes were delivered, I went down to ask for tea and a conference with the accountants. I took…
In the spring of 1987, I was lured away from my employer, a fast-growing, much respected Indian IT company by a startup. They offered double the salary, nice. A department to run, nice. A chance to put my reputation as a crazy, wacky and arrogant solver of weird problems on the line and…