A Coming Together!

These are dark times of the Coronavirus. The lockdown has already been in place for about 20 days now, return to normalcy is not close, and the grim news just keeps on coming. It is no help to keep worrying about the future so I thought that I will take a trip down the memory lane, about a great American vacation.

For a vacation, it's not the location but the people that matter and I had that covered. A reunion of college friends, sparked by a wedding, made grand by the presence of our girlfriends/partners/fiancees and truly special in nature with everyone flying from all across the world on their student stipends just to rekindle the flame of the good ole' days. This was a homecoming that beckoned an adventure. To rise to such an occasion, we planned an 8-day vacation through the American West and Southwest, beginning from our friends' LA wedding, looping through the motley landscapes of three national parks, seasoned with Vegas, and dipped completely in the American style road-trip.

Unlike every year when we got barely managed to scrape together a couple of days during Christmas break, this time we had 8 days of bliss, largely unconcerned with the post-vacation mayhem of work. Right at the wedding, everything was new yet familiar. We partied all night just like we were back in the hostel but the location was a well-endowed hotel suite, the jokes remained crass but this time we also had our female companions, the booze kept flowing but this time everyone wanted to pay, the food was sumptuous but it wasn't Dominos BOGO offer. As everyone caught up with each other and their jet lags set in, time just fast-forwarded us through the wedding. It was a beautiful affair and with a desi-style flash mob, we bid adieu to the bachelorhood of one from our gang.

The next day we were to set out on our trip. The take-it-as-you-go gang surprisingly started organizing themselves on time! As I drove our 15-seater monster van into the hotel driveway, everyone was packed and ready to go. With a push and a shove, it seemed like a cakewalk to pack the 12 of us + our luggage into the beast.  Wheels rolling on the afternoon of Dec 29, we were on our way to the Death Valley National Park. Sun gave way to absolute darkness as we navigated the traffic of LA, bid adieu to the tree-lined roads of the city, and transitioned from the massive interstate to the empty state highways. En route to our hotel for that night, not many cars crossed our path as we tread along at 60mph in the eerily dark California. Just before we reached our old western-style motel, our gurgling stomachs took us to a local pizzeria. Full of fresh pizza, and exhausted with the last two nights of wedding parties, everyone just took to their beds quickly.  

   
The next day we found out that some of us sneaked out at night to enjoy a couple of beers and have a gala time with the locals. As the stories and games began, we reached the Death Valley National Park within an hour. Even after 5.5 years in the US, new landscapes continue to amaze me. A barren, rocky, hilly park full of white sand spanned as far as I could see. Cameras were out and spirits were up (a good nights' sleep helped). We hiked across large swaths of dunes near the Visitor Center, and around the Uhbebe Crater. It was just a day that we spent in the park but our sand-filled shoes and overstocked photos looked like they had been there for much longer. I don't remember what we did for lunch that day but everyone sank into their gluttony at Denny's diner that night.

As we woke up to another splendid day, the new years' eve awaited us at Hoover Dam and Vegas. The most expensive part of our trip didn't pan out as we planned. Everyone was disorganized, no one wanted to drink or gamble, all the parties were full, the strip got boring too soon that night, and to top it all a mishap caused a muscle tear for Ashu, who was actually visiting Vegas for the first time (quite a few of us had been to Vegas before, I included). After everyone realized that no one is awestruck by the extravagance of Vegas, we finally celebrated New Years' at our Orleans Hotel terrace with the fireworks. It was painful to see everyone trying so hard to make the most out of Vegas. Thankfully, the following days were so much better.

A sumptuous breakfast the next day set us back on track. Well, not quite! We did run a bit late. Our plan was to reach the Hualapai Reservation and visit the Grand Canyon West Rim. A couple of stops and 100s of photos later, we finally reached the reservation just in the nick of time to enjoy a beautiful sunset from Guano Point. In my opinion, visiting the reservation was quite expensive.
That day our nigh pit stop was in Kingman, AZ. For some reason, close to the city there is a Punjabi Dhaba in the middle of the American countryside catering to the truckers. As soon as I found out about this, I turned the wheels for an amazing desi-dinner. A great end to a beautiful day.

A long drive awaited us the next day as we had paid tickets for a tour of Antelope Canyon, all the way around the Grand Canyon. The van was abuzz as everyone engaged in different games, made sandwiches in the moving van and we drove this distance without many stops. On our way, we came across roadside Native-Indian shops, dilapidated vehicles, and mobile caravans. This was a very different countryside to the one that I am used to seeing in Wisconsin. Close to the canyon, we made a stop at the Horse-Shoe Bend. It has become an organized tourist spot, unlike my last visit of 2015. After another ton of pictures at the Horseshoe bend, we finally reached the Antelope Canyon and were greeted by our local guide. The tour was like muscle-memory for her.
She bossed her way around, telling us exact locations where to take pictures, an uninterrupted description of the canyon, and identifying specific features that were beyond beautiful. With the beautiful canyon captured in our phase, we were back on the road. After another short drive across the state line into Utah, a long wait for our dinner, and reaching our frigid hotel location in Tropic, UT, everyone just sprawled across a room. All of us played an online mobile game 'Psych' and finally snuggled into our beds after deciding to see the sunrise in Bryce Canyon, our final major destination.

As expected only a few of us got up early enough and I am glad I did. The Hoodoos of Bryce Canyon greeted us with a beautiful snow-capped landscape in the briskly cold weather. We were a bit late but still, the sun looked like it was splitting the landscape in the distance as the rays reached us. After soaking our eyes aplenty of the sunrise, we headed back to pick up the rest of our entourage and some grub for our tummies. We didn't loiter around too long and headed back to the park. At the visitor center, we found out that our attire was not sufficient to go on a Ranger hike. Nonetheless, we decided to do a different hike deep into the canyon, which was open to us. We ventured into the Navajo Loop and Peekaboo Loop, marveling at multitudes of unique rock formations. It's fascinating to think that these beautiful canyons have been carved out due to the ice, water, and airflow patterns specific to only this particular part of the world. We only stayed close to the Bryce Amphitheater in the park. Had it been a longer trip planned in better weather, there are plenty more hikes and the other end of the park left to explore.

Procuring dinner was a big hassle that day. In the off-season, only the famous Ruby's Inn was open. Everyone was exhausted with the hike so I and Ameek went there to get a supper packed for everyone. Our order was too overzealous and we had plenty left after everyone was done eating back at the hotel. The freezing night turned darker as we scrolled through all our pictures, played more games and recalled the beautiful memories we have made so far. The next day was the beginning of our return journey. We stuffed all our bags one more time in all the cramped spaces of the van, the way we had been doing at every stop-over.

No more plans, just the busy highways of Arizona, Nevada, and California. On our return, we were supposed to reach our final cheap hotel right outside LA, convenient to catch our flights the next day. On this last long day of driving, we planned for lunch at an amazing Indian restaurant, me and Nidhi had stumbled across the last time we visited the area. It's called the Red Fort Cuisine of India near St. George, right on our way. Managed by a Sardar Uncle, we relished the great tasting Indian food. We touched Vegas by early evening to pick up Nidhi's credit card. Oh yes! She forgot it while paying for our breakfast the day we left Vegas. I am glad we called in and asked them to hold it for us. The winding roads kept moving away, puzzles started to float in the van, snoring and dozing heads in all rows, and eating the left-overs from last night just passed our time. On the last night, everyone was tired of the long drive. We planned on how to return our super-van tomorrow, and how to get everyone to the airport on time before calling it a night.

Just like that, a beautiful week ended and made way for a year of excitement until of course the pandemic. I defended my Ph.D. thesis three weeks after that breakfast in the dingy truck-diner, and moved back to India a month later. That trip was a true reunion and we missed all of our gang who were not able to come. It did make me hopeful that no matter where we are, our network follows.

An Alternate Workspace

Gazing into the distance from my terrace, I can see the Jaipur I may have never seen from up here in all those vacations I spent at home during this decade of my adulthood. It’s ironic that this is the most chaotic situation that the world has ever been in, yet the naked eye sees the most peaceful ‘Pink City’. An explanation for this clean, fresh air that blankets the city needs no scientific analysis or statistic. The reason is obvious: the pandemic-forced full stop to traffic and industry.

I am not an extremist. I feel that the environmental carelessness of human growth was natural and that a woke society needs to right the wrongs done in the past. But not like this. Not at the mercy of a microscopic virus. Not at the cost of an overflowing morgue. I am fearful of the emergency brakes that have been put on our economy, abhor the complete isolation everyone of us has to live in and in nervous apprehension wait for the post-lockdown time. Yet, I can’t help but look at the silver lining of chirping birds, fresh air, and a clean Ganga. So, after twenty days of lockdown with another twenty in sight, I can’t simply go on lamenting. Let’s look at the future. Today, I saw an ad in our daily newspaper appealing its readers to come up with any ideas that can help us navigate this catastrophic Coronavirus situation. This motivated me to pen an idea I have held for some time now: Decentralized Working.

Let me systematically unravel what I mean by this phrase and why it is a viable alternative to the current office model of our companies and industries. Since the 90s, the world has shifted its workforce from largely manual labor to a growing legion of professionals who work on their computers. About 29% of Americans “can” work from home as per the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (Source). I am not familiar with such a statistic for India, but there are at least 3 million (Source) IT professionals in the country who can work from home. As the world stays home to stave the dangers of coronavirus, many of my friends, who are software developers, consultants, accountants, lawyers, and scientists continue to work; voraciously gulping down their Wi-Fi data. Can we continue on this path beyond the lockdown?

Maybe not to this extreme of completely staying home for work. As Prof. Raghuram Rajan mentioned in his recent interview with Prannoy Roy, we have started to appreciate the importance of human interaction as a basic need. Personally, I didn’t need the Coronavirus to make me realize this because I have spent the last 5 years doing my Ph.D., a painstakingly lonely and solo undertaking. Besides, there are logistical issues in India for a rapid transition to working from home. About 54% of HR leaders believe that poor internet infrastructure results in inefficient working conditions (Source). Another social study taken over a small dataset of about 10,000 individuals (Source) suggests that 99.8% of our workforce is inept for work-from-home culture. While reiterating the lack of social interaction, the study also attributes this inaptitude to poor communication skills, lack of individual drive, and inadequate personal management skills.

The solution of “Decentralized Working” that I am proposing here could be a mid-way of traditional office space and work-from-home model. It hinges on the idea of having multiple satellite offices within the city instead of a single main office that everyone rushes to at 9 a.m. in the morning. The retail sector like mobile stores, and banks, have always used this model by creating multiple outlets in the same city at key points. But with the proliferation of the Internet, this model need not stay just in the retail realm. The key distinction for other companies would be that instead of optimizing sales, they may choose to locate their offices strategically to optimize travel distances for its employees.

These offices can be made economical in a co-working model, where many companies identify city hotspots beneficial for their employees and are put together with another company with a similar location need. Existing infrastructure/buildings/campuses of many companies can be repurposed into these co-working nexuses as they themselves head into the decentralized model.

The social and economic benefits of decentralization can be manifold. At first, traffic congestion in downtown cities would decrease substantially. More employees will have reduced commute time associated with general well-being (Source) or can commute on foot associated with a healthier lifestyle (Source). The burden of providing conveyance to their employees will be greatly reduced on the companies. Moreover, since the growth of WeWork, Regus, and other co-working space startups, plenty of studies have touted the business benefits of this paradigm (Source).

Decentralized working is an amalgamation of traditional offices and working at home. The traditional concept of the office allows us to overcome several shortfalls of working-from-home such as lack of individual drive to work, personal management, and infrastructure capacity. However, the multiple office novelty of this concept introduces the challenge of communication skills already being observed during this lockdown. Teams may still need to coordinate across workspaces and Zoom/WebEx/GoTo Meetings will have to fill the void.

Coronavirus has already put us in a tough spot. The lockdown rules will only gradually wear off with partial relief from the curfew across a city. The transition can be made easy with this Decentralized model, which could simply be an investment to judge its efficacy for the future. Governments can actively encourage the adoption of this model especially in cities like Bengaluru, which has notoriously earned the title of the traffic-king of the world (Source). The government’s help with land acquisition for building such spaces, rebates to companies moving to this model, and push to advance infrastructure in such special localities, can systematize the chaotic urbanization of our cities.

I am not a city planner, not a businessman, and not a policymaker. As a concerned citizen, I just wish to see the clear skies of today across my city, state, and country till the day I am here and beyond!    

When Fantasy transcends to Reality - A Road Trip

A couple of weeks back I set on a new experience with my new friends in a new country and now when I am back in front of my laptop I can just amaze at the fact that we really have been able to finish our extraordinary trip with no problems at all. This article is just a memoir of my road trip from Madison, Wisconsin to Los Angeles/Highway 1, California and back.

The plan was simple, 6 enthusiastic friends, 1 powerful car that we rented from Hertz, 5000+ miles to cover and 2 major cities as destination. We set our wheels rolling, on the chilly winter morning of December 21 with an aim to drive through a major part of the road that day. We had our two drivers buckled up with me in the navigator position (#Sad - The car rental agency doesn't allow drivers below the age of 24 to drive). As our car cruised at a speed of 70mph the darkness made way to dawn and a wide expanse of Wisconsin farms emerged in front of us. The weather was on our side that day as we made way through two state borders and a line of Omaha buildings emerged around the silhouette. By this time, the countryside had already won over our sleepy eyes. The amazing farm machinery, large windmills, cattle grazing all around and a rustic feel of the barren trees made us realize that we were getting away from the racing time and those laptop screens we have been so intently looking at throughout the semester. Making occasional stops at gas stations and playing all sorts of games in the car, we befriended the road quite easily. As it became clear that we will be able to make our ambitious target of reaching Colorado Springs on the first day, I called Expedia to make a reservation for a hotel room. Well, that was super fun because the guy on the other end was not able to follow my simple instructions to book a room for six in Hotel Marriott. After about 20 minutes when all of us had extracted enough fun out of that conversation I calmed the guy down who had become real nervous by then and told him to leave the reservation. As we had got our LTE signals, we made the booking online.

After a 17-hr long drive on the first day when we reached the amazing hotel, we took a huge sigh of relief. We had not expected such an amazing place for such a cheap rate and though we were all tired from the drive, we kept on talking till 1 in the night. The next morning, after my first-ever western breakfast complete with waffles and orange juice, when I went outside, the scene took my breath away. It had snowed after we pulled in the driveway of the hotel last night and the snow covered peaks of really close by hills made it look heavenly and rightly so, because the place we visited in Colorado Springs was called the Garden of the Gods. That day we took a slight detour from our originally decided path and the dusty roads of Colorado led us to the 'Royal Gorge Bridge'. It is an amazing piece of architecture but what made it memorable for me was the Sky Coaster ride that I did there with a couple of my friends where we swung like a pendulum over the 300m deep gorge. An adrenaline rush shot through my head as I saw the large hilly terrain of Colorado from high up in the air. After the thrilling experience, we hit US Highway 50 which is a really beautiful stretch of road and you can actually imagine yourself in a movie from there. That beauty showed its true colors when we met with heavy snow and had to turn back from one point to look for another route. At one point, we stopped right in the middle of a junction and started contemplating on which way to go. A moment of genius struck me and I asked the two girls for some lady luck and to choose between the two routes. It was already pretty late at night and we were applying all sorts of calculations to make the decision but the girls were oblivious to all that contemplation and simply took a guess at one of the routes. Guess what! It turned out to be one of the best decisions as we reached our pre-decided destination and it made our subsequent days a little more easier for drive. To all those, who plan on hitting the roads in Colorado & Wyoming during winters, planning will not help. In the midst of all this we did see a herd of stags pass infront of us on the road and some deers along the route.

All is well that ends well and that day ended with us comfortably snuggled in a nice hotel room with everyone ready to visit Grand Canyon the next day. The following day blessed us with sunshine and a beautiful landscape of the Grand Canyon. The myriad shades of red that one sees in Grand Canyon is uncomparable and the view of the tortuous Colorado River making way through it at sunset will remain embedded in my memory forever. I am sure that the true spirit of the place can only be experienced through hiking but I am happy that the iconic place had so much to offer in the short span of a day we spent there. We drove to Flagstaff via the Historic route 66 (Its the same route that has been shown in the animated movie "Cars") to reach our hotel. The next day we were supposed to reach the brightest city on Earth. Through the curvy paths we reached Vegas via Hoover Dam which reminded us of the action scene in Transformers. On reaching Vegas, I was simply awestruck by sheer lighting of those casinos/hotels. You just wish that you keep looking at the colour that comes out of that city at night. People say that "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas", but maybe that sort of Vegas getaway is planned for some other time for me. This time, I simply enjoyed the place and the best part was Caesar's Palace. The indoor city is very beautifully created with the sky rooftop just completing the aura. Oh yeah! We did catch a glimpse of Britney Spears performing in one of the shows at that time. I only have limited details for the two nights we spent there but I guess that is obvious ;)

We reached the city of Hollywood on the night of December 26 and I saw an Ocean for the first time. The Pacific greeted us with chilly winds at the Santa Monica Pier and the beautiful song of a singer at the pier stopped me in my tracks. It was a time when I realized how far I have come and it made me proud of myself. A cherry on top of this cake was, us winning a huge soft toy in the game of "Toss a Ring". The problem of stuffing that huge piece into the car, came later :P. At first sight, Los Angeles looked like a really Indian city not because I came across a lot of Indians infact I didnt see any Indians there. It was just the way, the shops and houses were lined up. The day quickly went by while we were clicking pics with the famous names on Hollywood Boulevard, driving through Beverly Hills, enjoying the sunset at Venice Beach and observing a lot of things at Griffith Observatory. We also saw a guy proposing his girl at the Observatory. I always thought that it was the stuff for movies but apparently people do like a little bit of Hollywood in their lives.

Our return journey started from LA and that day we were traveling through the most scenic driving routes in the world. US Highway 1 cannot be expressed in mere words especially not by a novice blogger like me. I would just ask you to go there and experience it for yourself. Enroute we also came across wild zebras and seals who were resting along the shore lines. Oops! I forgot about an amazing part where we took an exit for gas station and ended up having a countryside breakfast near Los Alamos. With a bright sun, serene setting of a small town and a luscious serving of Croissants, Bagels & Grilled Sandwich, a meal cannot be any better. Getting back to the the drive, after highway 1 ended it was slightly tedious as all of us were overwhelmed with the beauty of the place and dreams came naturally to everyone. Anyways, we reached our destination that day and another major stop waited for us the next day. We visited Lake Tahoe in Nevada the next day. The confluence of snow covered mountains, green coniferous trees and clear blue water was exquisite. We simply didn't want to leave that place because no more destinations awaited us. We took our time to capture the landscape in our memory. Following this, a long drive through the inhuman temperatures of -19F with no set destination was a little difficult. We ended up on the border of Utah and Nevada and stayed in the small town of Wendover that day. 

We were lagging behind our schedule for the return journey and the weather was no help either. But our friends who were driving braved all odds and we kept moving the next two days. On December 30, we stayed in Gothenburg, Nebraska. This was our last stay and we reached home for New Year's Eve which we celebrated with some delicious Indian food. I was thinking that the return journey will be really boring but all of us kept talking throughout the way. Bonding with each other and remembering different landmarks we saw in our onward journey made the route really easy. Also, trying different eatery chains made it even more fun with mouthwaterng food. In last 10 days we had covered a major part of the US seeing all sorts of terrains and experiencing temperatures ranging from -20F to 70F. Simply put, it was an all encompassing trip.

Now, onto some pointers we learnt from this trip:

1. Plan but give some leeway for changes. eg. You cannot plan the weather.

2. Expedia is not the best source of bookings. Just a couple of experiences during this time.

3. Be enthusiastic and keep a group large enough to have fun but small enough to gel up easily.

4. Don't force improvising in the plan, on such long trips you will do it eventually

5. The travel is a major part but so is the destination. We always hear it the other way round but for such cases you might end up covering just a lot of ground and see no particular attraction.

6. Keep a full size hard-copy map handy.

Traveling is fun, just give it a try and dont be afraid of planning big!!

For interested readers, here is a basic overview of our drive. There were definitely hundreds of miles of detour that we took but this covers the gist

A Chaos Joint!

In a Universe not so far away
Lies a never ending alleyway
Full of thoughts with no point on the thoughtful quay
So works the mind, a chaos joint

With twists and turns that become a part of our life
You never know whats a jolly ride and what may become a strife
Studying each move with a rationale knife
So works the mind, a chaos joint

One may see his distant dreams become a reality
Only to realize, he has a somewhat different propensity
Flooding you with the unquenchable thirst of a little more time
So works the mind, a chaos joint

A stride into the future, leaving the soul into the past
Seeing those fleeting thoughts abnormally blown apart
Making a beeline, diverge like a casanova's heart
So works the mind, a chaos joint

Overwhelmed with a problem you dont want to miss
Comes a moment of joy when you pull a solution out of abyss
Patting itself, while riding this caravan of bliss
So works the mind, a chaos joint

Feeling annoyed at the noise around you

Sit a while alone and see the uneasiness brew

Reflecting in silence as this loneliness grew
So works the mind, a chaos joint

Having fun like a teenager in a party

And going all wise in an official repartee

Changing persona in this acclimatizing marquee
So works the mind, a chaos joint

Writing this doggerel from every thought that crosses
Trying to figure out who is the winner and who bears the losses
Detaching itself from the body it houses
So works the mind, a self-proclaimed chaos joint

It's the weight of Good byes!

It's a promise in disguise
Feeling sorrow nonetheless wise
Trickling tears of mixed feelings from your eyes
It's the weight of those good-byes

There is never a last good-bye
We are always a phone call shy
Still dawns a heaviness in your sigh
Its the weight of those good-byes

Here is the future, calling you up a level

With the wonderful memories clenching like a devil
An undue pressure on making this moment special, with those everlasting eyes

Its the weight of those good-byes

No apologies and no regrets, they are our very own with whom we fight and befriend
All paths shall cross again in this life's complicated blend
Today through this poem all my emotions have been penned, this time just flies
Its just the weight of those good-byes

No one remembers the beginning none shall remember the end

As the world is full of surprises planning another serendipity around the bend

Wishing you all the luck filling the vacuum with hope my dear friend

Never shall we feel the weight of good-bye ever again