Sophomore/Junior Year at USC/Break in India/Summer 2009 Part I

Hi everyone..
well.. people who read my blog.. i believe atleast some do.. and i am just trusting god on this one.. i enjoy talking about myself.. the little experiences of my life.. i like telling things.. and i think most of people around me like listening to those things that i have to say..
anyway, so i havent updated this page since like a year.. AMAZING stuff has happened since then.. and when i say AMAZING.. i mean AMAZING.. its not awesome/great though.. it has taken away a lot of things from me.. and yet.. its knowledge i aint gonna forget anytime soon..

Sophomore year
heres some stuff about my life as a sophomore at USC.. so 2nd year in college was all about one guy.. he occupied my entire life, thoughts, emotions even though i tried my best to get out.. i was under the spell..
so, this guy who used to hook up with one of my dormmates in freshmen year.. (and thus we all hated him) was stalking me day and night during my sophomore year.. everywhere i went.. i saw him.. in class. in meetings. in elevator. on the street. it was ridiculous.
and then he talked to me and pretended to be my friend.. and cried about how he doesnt have any friends and he wishes he was a tall white boy ( which btw he is not).. well i listened to him and genuinely wished i could help.. took his seriously (my biggest mistake)..and thats how he got to know me and for the whole first few months he worked his best to win my affections.. and he succeeded too.. a little too well for me.. i started believing that we shared what looked like a very cute friendship.. which was all real on my side btw.. i always felt there was somthing wrong but i didn't suspect the lies to be of this magnitude.. i didnt care.. i was happy..
but there was more surprises awaiting me..
as soon as i decided in my mind that i like him.. that he mattered a lot to me even though he chooses to hook with my blonde white blue eyed dormmate and likes to talk about how great his ex girlfriend and how everything about her is so great.. even though he doesnt respect india (my country) or engineers ( my major).. i still thought he was likable..

its coz.. there was an innocence in our relationship.. a sweetness.. something real.. very strong.. that made me believe that we had a beautiful friendship/loving relationship.. .. i knew i liked him.. even after all his faults.. i was attracted to him.. like never before.. he was selfish.. he was insensitive.. he was horrible to me and others at times.. and yet i still liked him..

however, seeing the situations i was also strongly determined to keep the magnitude of my feelings to my self and let the friendship grow.. get to know him better.. etc

but he had other plans.. as soon as he realised i had feelings for him that weren't going to change.. he completely turned his back on me.. he became the meanest, most unapproachable, rude, insulting, uncaring, insensitive horrible hardly a human being thing towards me..
it was hard, depressing time for me.. for i had never loved anyone this much my entire life.. and been treated like this.. normally i would have cursed that person and kicked him out of my life.. but this was different.. this was real.. i couldnt get him away from me.. i couldnt get away from him..
so second semester sophomore year passed in frustration, depression and a constant feeling of being a looser.. i thought i wasnt good looking enough.. wasnt thin enough.. didnt have good hairstyle or clothing style.. or party attitude... or the perfect cool slang of english that everyone must speak.. i tried hard.. embarrassingly hard to improve.. but those are not things you can improve in a day..
in the end.. i confronted him.. i told him he was being horrible and this has to come to an end.. i wrote him a letter.. i asked for answers.. on the last day before we left for summer he hugged me and told me he will answer.. this was in front my family who was visiting me at that time..

summer came and thats when i was in bangalore.. doing pretty much nothing.. but playing basketball.. anyway i talk about that i another blog.. i spent a fun summer.. and did all i could to get over this guy.. and then came junior year.

Junior year
So when school started in Fall 2008.. i was a proud junior at USC.. i was proud of having finished 2 years of college life successfully and launching into the third or the second last year of undergraduation at USC.. i had gotten a new hair do over the summer.. a bunch of new USC t shirts and short that made me look hot.. and lost couple of pounds which added to my beauty..
i had chosen Reese Witherspoon's character from legally blonde as my ideal to look up to. i even ordered a poster of that movie from amazon.com and put it up in my room..
i was a little disappointed to have to live with yet another roommate that i didnt know.. but that was ok since she was a nice person..
i had decided to study hard, look great, and get over him.. find a nice boy for myself who'd REALLY like me and not pretend to..
so life went on.. i went about in search of a tall white boy who would really like me.. and i did meet a tall white boy who liked me i think.. but i couldnt feel anything for him.. i just didnt.. it never became anything.. i couldnt even think of him as more than a casual friend.. although he was nice, good looking, smart, athletic... i just didnt feel it..
in the mean time.. there were some crazy party stuff that complicated my life too.. my head was still constantly full of buzzing thoughts of the guy.. i just couldnt get over him..
so i am still surviving somehow.. trying my best to keep going.. survive this semester.. still getting no reply from him.. until one day i finally run into him.. we talk for a long time.. looooooooooong time.. he still rubs in that he thinks his ex gf is just great.. i almost tell him that i love him but change my words at the last moment.. i also tell him that he has been good to me and helped me a lot.. something i never accepted earlier.. and then he hints that he does want us to be together.. except that he also wants other women to be a part of his life..
it took me a few weeks to figure that out and when i finally did, i was furious.. he wanted to keep me as a subdued housewife or something.. and go around hooking up with other women including his ex gf whos the great stanford student and the great kathak dancer.. and everything that he knows i want to be..
so when i finally figure this out i curse him in my head and give him the most disgusted looks when i do have to see him.. still not being able to get over the disgusting life he had imagined for us..
until one day... i realise that he is a horribly sad person.. and yet again i decide to talk to him to figure out his problem.. and thats the day well... things turn around.. this information cant be revealed without bad implications in some aspect or the other.. i just trust time that will have the truth known.. but what happened in those few minutes of talking/communicating changed my life forever.. mysteries were solved.. mysteries were created.. millions of my questions were answered in that one moment.. and millions just popped up.. ofcourse the realisation of all this came later.. and is still in process.. and i am still waiting for something real...

Cisco Internship, Bengaluru, India

So i ended up in Banglore, India this summer. Working in Cisco. It has been quite an experience. I have a lot of written material that i wrote about what i felt about this place. Its edited version will soon be uploaded. I hope some of you guys still check my blog and will read that. Its a detailed analysis of life in india in comparison to life in US, about ppl in india, whys and whats of growth in india in the IT sector, relationship values in India, hinduism vs christianity and future of india. I hope you guys will look forward to it and enjoy it when i do post it. :)

Back to Reality..

Ok i know i have bored you ppl enough with all the harry potter drama.. but that was important to me and its only appropriate that i wrote about it... something that i can always refer to for the rest of my life.. pata hai thora jada ho gaya.. but koi bat nahi..
ok ab tum log soch rahe hoge (AKNB) yani ki Aur Kuch Naya Batao... to hum batate hain.. hmm.. second year me aye hain.. life bahut busy ho gayi hai.. i really should be catching up on my work right now but i am kind of stuck in a program and cant seem to progress anymore so i decided to blog instead... waise bhi bahut din ho gaye ap logo se batein kiye hue..
i have joined a lot of different organisations this year... i am learning the process of organisation of a community.. how to get things done.. how to collaborate with ppl.. how to get the funding.. its probably a very good training for my future professional life.. but it also makes me popular and known around the SC community... it feels good to get calls from random ppl who didnt know me last year.. it takes a lot of time and effort and thoughts.. but i am learning a lot and improving my personality each day.. and its somethig that keeps me involved.. and i feel happy that i am making an impact on the lives of the people over here.. and also finding good friends in the process..
ok so there have been funny exciting happenings in my life lately... dunno if i should tell you ppl about it all.. but i can surely tell one of them... MERE GHAR SHADI KE PROPOSALS AYE.. wo bhi mere lie!! :O
arey yaar i am too young for that.. i hope this explains the last point in my last about me.. my parents obviusly said i am too young..haha.. but its so hilarious.. cmon ppl.. shadi.. hmm.. one word describes it - BORING!
anyways... haan to aur kya batae tum logon ko... hm... padai bhi bahut bad gayi hai yaaron... kab bakshenge ye log mujhe... roz roz homework due rehta hai.. mai to thak gayi hu..
koshish kar rahe hain ek indian get together rakhe... sabko bulae... girls only though.. and party around.. it should be fun..
ummm... aur kya..
bahut bore ho rahe hain.. padne ka man nahi hai.. kya kare? kuch batane ko bhi nahi mil raha hai.. achcha i ll talk to you ppl later.. jab kuch soojhega to likhenge...

Harry Potter 7

It was an amazing book. i got answers to all my questions. i am sad that the series is over now. although i will still look forward to the movies. it is, has always been and will always be the part of my life. Love you Harry!

Harry Potter and My Life

first of all guys, i am sorry for being dormant for a while.. i was busy.. the internship project was going through its last stages and i had to work a lot.. but now that its done and its about time to leave... So now, i can sit and chat with you unknown, nameless, faceless ppl who are gonna read my blog.. :P
so as the title says, this blog is dedicated to harry potter and how that book has affected my life.. harry potter has been a part of my life since i was 12.. the first book was a gift from my daddy's best friend for me.. just a casual gift when he came to visit us coz he knew i liked reading.. it was the first novel i ever read and honestly i fell in love with it..
i still try to think why it affected me so deeply.. maybe it was the magic.. the fact that harry was special.. and i always compared harry with me.. (to be noted- never with hermione even though i was a lot more like her than harry).. maybe the fact that he was just a simple boy.. yeah thats what attracted me most.. his simplicity.. thats an attribute i have always value beyond anything else..
so with harry's journey in the first book i got caught up in the wizarding world.. pondering over question like what would i see in mirror of erised.. or whether hogwarts really exists.. i went thru my journey of book 2 and 3 which were equally amazing.. i found myself wondering what would a boggart change into in front of me.. or whether i would be able to fight a dementor..
While i was lost in the wizarding world and dreaming of king's cross, in my real life i was spending days and nights locked in my bedroom.. secluded from my family and the rest of the world.. i was being deeply affected without realising..
this book is probably the reason for how my most important values in life became friendship and bravery and simplicity and loyalty - instead of coming first in class.. lol.. i still dont know whether that was a good thing.. but it happened because i idealised harry and not hermione.. as he was the one portrayed as a better person by j k rowling and she was like my ultimate moral science teacher..
then i read the 4th book which wasnt as great as the earlier ones but harry had found a place in my heart and i was still equally fond of it.. my idea of first perfect date became being in place of cho chang and going to yule ball with harry/cedric.. lol..
and man, i cant tell you guys how extremely happy i was that harry got chosen as the champion of hogwarts even if it was cheating.. and i had felt the same happiness when he became the seeker or got the nimbus 2000 or the firebolt.. at those moments i felt like i was being gifted by those things.. just blissfully happy.. i remember how i craved for dumbledore to explain things to harry more and yet enjoyed the mystery in his words.. trying to imagine what it might be that he means..
i was so deeply affected by the books that i used to wait for an owl on each of my birthdays since 12 to 14.. at night i would go out and stare at the sky looking out for any owls.. owls have had special significance in my life since then.. i used to ask anyone i thought had sense enough about whether they thought magic was real.. i also started looking for those ppl in my own life.. i even named some friends on that basis.. i gave tr. shukla the place of dumbledore and many others were characterised in my mind.. i was living in a world which existed in my mind.. it helped me thru every bad happening in my life.. and there were many at that time.. when i was in 8th and 9th.. just starting to grow up.. there were many new startingly unjust realities facing me.. but i went thru them with help of this virtual world in my head.. this was the reason i was still innocent and childish as a result when i reached 11th.. another reason was always being under protection and shadow of a big brother..
anyways, i made decisions in life according to what harry would have done.. i considered him my idol.. but after i read the fifth book - mind you, to buy which i had a huge tantrum until i was given 800 rupees to get it- i had a setback when sirius died.. i was sad for days.. my heart burning with frustration.. i hated umbridge.. David was umbridge in my head.. he still is.. that book ended up leaving me in frustration for a long time.. and when i couldnt bear it i finally thought maybe harry is not that great after all.. i started trying to look at him realistically.. and that was my first attempt to get out of the childhood obsession of that book..
and because 6th book took so long i got quite over my obsession... but still a longing and a fondness both lingered for the magical world of harry potter in my heart..
i remember very clearly the day in the summer vacations of class 11th when my brother had bought me the 6th book.. he came up to me and took that book out which he was hiding behind him and gave it to me.. and i almost screamed in happiness.. what can i say.. i love my brother..
and i continued the journey of life at hogwarts with harry.. this book was more satisfying to me than anything else.. there were so many queries that were answered and i was absolutely fascinated by voldemort's life and what made him to be what he was.. and i was also fascinated by dubledore's knowledge and intelligent conclusions about voldemort's life.. i loved that book.. but death of dumbledore was another setback to my heart.. i never thought that could happen.. i hated snape.. i hated him.. the only thing that was able to console me later was the site dumbledoreisnotdead.com... amazing site man.. almost convinced me he was not dead until i heard it from Rowling confirming herself that he was.. :(
and then a lot of things happened in my life that changed my life and me drastically... but i will talk about them in my next post here.. more about harry and my life next time...till then.. stay tuned.. love ya all!

I Love Microsoft!

I got a FREE Zune from Microsoft today!!! I LOVE Microsoft!! YAY!!! OMG i cant believe it! this is the most amazing time of my life.. i love it here so much! NOW, i have an ipod and a Zune! I love Microsoft! I love Microsoft!! Yay!!! :)

First Blog Ever

Hi, so this is me.. shivani.. i am a freshman at University of Southern California and i live in los angeles, CA.. i am originally from India where i completed my 14 years of study in one school.. called St. John's D.L.W. and then came to U.S. for undergrad.. my family and closest friends are back home in india.. right now i am doing an internship with microsoft after my first year at college.. its a great experience and i consider myself very lucky to have got this oppurtunity..
so i am in seattle at the moment for the summers.. although i will spending the last part of it in florida where we are going to visit disney world with my family in U.S..
life in seattle is great and i usually enjoy a lot at weekends.. but since i am living alone, i get really bored when i come back home from office in weekdays.. i miss my friends and esp. one friend whos name i would rather not mention.. you guys reading this blog can keep guessing :D...
ok so i had read many blogs.. discussed about it and even written about it in my writing class.. but its the first time i am actually writing a blog myself... feels weird... i dunno who all might read it and here i am writing my life away..
but i already told you i am a lonely soul and i have nothing better to do.. or rather i dont want to do any work.. coz.. well you guessed it.. i am a lazy lazy BUM.. ok nvm.. i am not that bad.. when i am really into something i can deal with the worst problems ever and find clever short solutions for even the toughest problems.. heh.. no kidding man...
if i sound too proud forgive me because i solved a difficult problem in our project today and am feeling proud of myself..
i suppose it would be difficult for one person to imagine a girl who is youngest in her house to go to some new country in a city where she knows nobody... haha.. ok i am making it sound very dramatic.. no it wasnt bad when i came here.. although i would agree it took a LOT of effort to ajust to the life, people, language and culture here ... but once you get used to it, the only thing left to do is prove yourself.. which is not too difficult either.. just do what you are supposed to do and dont break your head over other things.. but one sad thing is that i have only one friend whom i would say is as good as my school friends.. which is sad.. but then considering the amount of pressure i was in trying to adjust i wasnt really secure enough to make good friends.. nvm.. its all over.. lifes good.. i made some real nice buddies over here during the summer.. too bad we will separate after some time.. i ll miss them.. :(
achcha i forgot to tell you people about orkut and my life.. but.. oops.. that discussion will follow in the next blog.. for now i gotta sleep folks.. and also make an important call.. anyways.. bye for now.. happy orkutting! :)