All, a BIG thank you to all those who attended the summer picnic the Sunday before last at the Uvas Canyon County Park. 22 XLers & their families attended, which is the largest gathering that we had.
Madhukar Shukla, who was visiting Santa Clara University on some work, was the big marquee name. Everyone gathered around him, breaking away only to dive into the excellent desi pizza that Pal sourced. Pal made the wait worth it, hauling 22 boxes of delicious pizza.
Fortunately the beer was at hand, so most of the people were well lubricated. And thanks to Mei’s (Navi’s wife) sturdy corkscrew & Murali’s perseverance even the wine bottles could be opened.
We had many new faces this time (Murali, Navi, Ruchi) & a second visitor (Dorjee). It looks like we have a good momentum going. The kids broke all age, batch, BM/IR barriers & showed the rest of us the way to interact.
A few of the folks went hiking along the many beautiful trails, & my dogs managed to convince the kids to give up their food for them. Next year the plan is to have a real live barbeque (big enthu from Meghna for that). I wish I could have spent more time to talking to all of you, but between the organizing, video shooting & keeping track of babies & dogs, I didn’t get much chance.
Madhukar Shukla, who was visiting Santa Clara University on some work, was the big marquee name. Everyone gathered around him, breaking away only to dive into the excellent desi pizza that Pal sourced. Pal made the wait worth it, hauling 22 boxes of delicious pizza.
Fortunately the beer was at hand, so most of the people were well lubricated. And thanks to Mei’s (Navi’s wife) sturdy corkscrew & Murali’s perseverance even the wine bottles could be opened.
We had many new faces this time (Murali, Navi, Ruchi) & a second visitor (Dorjee). It looks like we have a good momentum going. The kids broke all age, batch, BM/IR barriers & showed the rest of us the way to interact.
A few of the folks went hiking along the many beautiful trails, & my dogs managed to convince the kids to give up their food for them. Next year the plan is to have a real live barbeque (big enthu from Meghna for that). I wish I could have spent more time to talking to all of you, but between the organizing, video shooting & keeping track of babies & dogs, I didn’t get much chance.
I still plan to do a winter potluck at home in December (there is some construction going on, which hopefully won’t be a hindrance), so watch for future announcements. I understand Shailley is planning to do some smaller scale pub type events in the fall.
I also want to recognize Pal & his wife Joan for managing almost all aspects of this picnic (starting with a suggestion for the spot), with some able support from Shailley, Meghna & Kieran. Everyone pitched in to make this a successful event.
Madhukar & Murali took some amazing photos, which are at http://photobucket.com/xlersuvas. The password is xxxxx(Contact an Xler in the US for the password, I'm not posting it here - Kim). I also uploaded my weekend video project on YouTube, which includes a selection of the photos & some cell phone camera videos I recorded at the picnic. Unfortunately the audio didn’t come out well. It is at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1gx0t_J50G8. Shailley also has a small clip of the picnic up at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RnXL8UdvVuw. Please view & enjoy & leave comments.
Here is the final list of XLers who attended (in descending order of graduating year):
Ragini Mathur, IR05
Pooja Arora, IR01
Herambh Athavale, BM00
Anurag Chhabra, BM00
Shailley, IR98
Asmita Katdare, IR98
Ruchi Gupta, BM98
Samba Yarlagadda, BM96
Tipu Purkayastha, IR96
Sheela, IR95
Murali Mazhavanchery, IR93
Dorjee Tsewang, IR93
Sandeep Harpalani, BM92
Navi Singh, BM90
Aashish Bhargava, BM89
Sameer Govil, BM89
Meghna Virick, IR89
Kieran Gonsalves, BM87
Vivek, BM86
KP Naidu, IR81
Pal Luthra, BME 72
Regards,
Tipu
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