Saket Vora

Days have been fairly balanced this week — a lot of work during the day, then some good social time at night. Probably a little too much of the latter, but it’s a special occasion. Ian, one of the iPod interns who was there from January to June last year, is on a cross country road trip from Tennessee with his little brother, and they are in the Bay Area this week. Ian and I overlapped by a week, and I took over one of his projects. Quick witted, easy going, and a sharp mind — Ian just graduated from Northeastern with his B.S. in EE and will be starting a Ph.D program at MIT this fall. Of all the depth areas, he picked power electronics. Which isn’t easy by any stretch.Top notch fellow – a great friend to have.

So yesterday evening I went down to join the iPod/Apple group for their weekly ultimate frisbee game at a nearby school field in Cupertino. Felt great to see and play with everyone again. After being away from it for a year, it’s just so remarkable to me the camaraderie the group has, particularly in the intern crop (I’ve now seen two years worth). They have so much fun together it’s almost not right.

John, a fellow intern from NC State who started in January, made a salient observation: one trait that is present amongst practically everyone on the team (I can speak from from interns up to director level, at least) is the ability to rapidly shift from play to work, instantly. This is particularly true of the full time folks, who have much more responsibility than the interns. But you can immediate sense it in the tone of their voice, a facial expression, or the way they walk over to your bench — you know when to keep it straight and get down to business. I’m having a hard time describing this, but the end result is a team that can have a great deal of levity and fun while still getting a lot of work done.

In other news, my roommate Charles left for Beirut on Wednesday. It was a mad dash to the airport but he made it with literally minutes to spare. It’s SFO to Dubai, then to Beirut I think. He had been up working insane hours finishing up an interesting paper on Hizballah’s actions towards the US in the Lebanese Civil War and beyond. I read a draft to help with some of the reviewing. On top of that, Charles and his good friend Valerie found a condo just off campus that they will stay in next year, and Charles has been arranging for someone to sublet it for the summer (Valerie is in the West Bank this summer…those IPS folks sure know how to travel). While Gene is in NY for most of the summer, I’ve got a new roommate taking his room. Yao did his undergrad in EE here at Stanford but will be going to UC Davis for medical school. He’s working in a cancer research lab this summer. Yao is awesome — we’ve had so many great conservations in the evenings. Just tonight we talked about cancer treatments, film, LOTR trilogy, Dune (! he has read it!), the Dune movie, NPR, and the healthcare reform crisis. He also likes to cook  and wants to learn some Indian food — a banana bread showdown is already on the calendar.

The day after graduation was spent casually around Palo Alto, with breakfast at Hobees, a requisite trip to IKEA (the nearest one to our home in NC is 4 hours away), and a lovely dinner in downtown Palo Alto with Menaka (remember, Menaka did her undergrad at UNC and they overlapped for 2 years).

On Tuesday the four of us left for Lake Tahoe. Lake Tahoe is the extraordinarily popular destination out here, located 4 to 5 hours from the Bay Area and on the border with Nevada.

Indeed, the state border runs right through the lake, so giant casinos and resort hotels are perched quite literally right on the border. If you are like my family,  Its the sort of border you stare at with a tinge of disappointment; a blight upon this pristine reserve. Lake Tahoe is a major winter destination for Stanford students, as nearly every undergraduate dorm organizes ski trips to Heavenly, the big ski resort in South Lake Tahoe. Yes, Stanford dollars are used to have students hit the slopes.

Being the lame studious pupil I am, I never made it out during the winter, but I didn’t feel I missed much because one doesn’t develop a baked in affinity for skiing when growing up in Austin, TX.

Anyway, we were quite excited. We stayed in South Lake Tahoe at a nice little hotel run by, you might have guessed, a nice Gujarati family. Yeah, that’s how we roll. It was cloudy and threatening to rain that day, but we trekked up part of Eagle Falls before returning to town for some pizza.

Why bother with the chain pizza places on the Nevada side when you’ve got the charming — and delicious — Lake Tahoe Pizza Company right next door? Some of the best pizza I’ve had in California.

The next morning we headed up through the state parks that line Lake Tahoe for the Cascade Falls hike. What’s interesting is that unlike Yosemite just to the south run by the National Parks Service, a jumble of state and federal agencies have jurisdiction over the variety of trails, parks, and preserves surrounding the lake. The hike was perfect for the whole group — great views, relatively short, varied landscape, and a wonderfully diverse trail end where the water forms an active rapids area before plunging over the side of the mountain.

this is the best photo of the trip — kudos to Sapana for taking it*

Next we walked down to Vikingsholm, an authentic Scandinavian castle/villa in the picturesque Emerald Bay. It’s supposedly one of the finest examples of this architecture in North America.

We somehow brought along enough food to survive for two weeks, so we had lunch back at the hotel. A lot of fresh fruit. I think the plums were conspiring against us, because it promptly knocked me out for 2 hours. Weird. Nonetheless, we ventured back for a short hike at Rubicon Point (where the deepest part of the lake is) then watched the sunset. Dinner that evening was at a unassuming Thai place just across from the hotel — where once again the food was excellent. So many vegetarian options that we were stumped (for once) what to order.

We headed out the next day and made it back to Palo Alto in surprisingly good time.  Finally good to have real internet. That evening we had our fill at the ever reliable Chaat Paradise in Mountain View, then the three of us caught a late night showing of Star Trek — what a terrific film. I was always more of a Star Wars guy growing up, but seeing this reboot of the Star Trek franchise was a delight.

*another great photo Sapana happened to take was of the American flag at Red Rocks Canyon outside Las Vegas.

Ok, back from Tahoe and the family has departed back to Chicago and North Carolina. As I work through a backlog of other posts, I’ll start off with a question of the week:

Q: Do you have any foreign language songs you like to listen to? If so, what are some examples?

I often listened to Hindi Bollywood songs while growing up and visiting India, and some were quite catchy despite me not understanding what they were saying. But here’s one that my good friend Chris pointed me to as we shared ideas of fun, upbeat songs.

Yelle – Ce Jeu

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Anyone understand French? I don’t. Come to think of it, this is probably the only French song I’ve ever had in my collection. I’m not sure if this is characteristic of most French music or whether its because I have not heard a lot of French, but the seemingly precise enunciation of the words in Ce Jeu is rather appealing to me.

The day finally came. Time to put on the cap and gown, but this time a funny looking and strangely named “Master’s hood” as well. I’ll let the photos drive this one, offering a just a taste of the characters that have punctuated my time here.

Jonathan is a circuits ‘blood brother’ of mine — we stuck all the way through 214, 314, and 414 together. A fellow Texan (from El Paso), he also worked at Apple last summer though in the iPhone group. He’s heading to UC San Diego to continue his PhD and move more into bio.

Morris was among the first EE grad students I met — a senior leader in Nader’s VLF group. Morris got his PhD and through his researched traveled all over the world, including Alaska, Antarcita, Tunisia, tiny islands in the South Pacific, southeast Asia, Greenland, Russia, you name it. He hosted a well received Planet Earth viewing party series…on a HD projector no less.

Rafe and I shared one class, the energy efficiency in buildings one. We worked together on the final project building the model home. Along with an tremendous easy going personality, Rafe also DJ’ed the Stanford radio station and I was always amazed at the breadth of his indie/alternative music collection when he brought out his iPhone to play music during our model building sessions. Jordan has nothing on him.

Kevin was with us for Spring quarter Hindi and was a delight to have in class and for our projects. He was a champ for our last video, bringing real acting chops and musical talent to our film. Kevin did his undergrad at Berkeley, and just got his Master’s in Aero Astro. I think he’ll be starting at JPL this summer.

Mozzi (left) and I took a MEMS class together and we earned a Best Project Award in it. With his B.S. and M.S. in EE from Stanford, he’ll be headed to UC San Francisco for his MD/PhD. He’s specializing in biomedical implants. Neil (right) and I met at a going away dinner in PA for Sunish, an iPod intern last summer. Neil had gone to the same school at Sunish for undergrad, and was doing his Master’s in EE at Stanford. Very quickly we realized we had a lot of similar interests. Neil was doing research mostly under a MS&E professor. We ran into each other recently at Old Pro, where he gamefully joined us (me, Greg, Kelly, Brent) for game 7 of the Hurricanes vs his beloved Bruins.

Me with Paul. Paul and I shared entrepreneurial finance together, and sat across from the table during the negotiation exercise for that class. Paul got his Master’s in Management Science and Engineering while working at Agilent, his background is in EE. We hit it off pretty well (share the same kind of temperament), and even ran into each at a career fair where we spoke to the 42U company for nearly an hour. Really great guy.

Karla and Michael. I was walking back from work one day last summer when I ran into Michael in the courtyard outside. I thought “wait, why do I recognize him…oh yeah, he was at the intern lunch for the iPod group.” Indeed, he was interning in the same building in iPod SW. That encounter built over the past year into a good friendship. Michael did his undergrad here in EE but his Master’s in Computer Science. I’ve had wonderful meandering conversations with Michael, and we share interests in data visualization, networks, and even social change. Turns out he lives right across from me in the famous 208 building. Karla is Michael’s girlfriend and she just got her Master’s in Civil and Environmental Engineering.

At the EE commencement now, with Kamal. Circuits blood brother too — we went through 214, 314, and 414 together. Kamal is the real deal though — he gained a strong reputation as a great TA for many circuits classes, and he served as President of the Hindu Students Council. A real class act too — when I introduced him to my mom, he promptly bent down to touch her feet in respect, as is the proper Hindu greeting. He was paired with the ever-ready-to-laugh Andy in the 414 lab, and we shared many good times there.

My good friend Bikiran, a fellow circuits blood brother too who was with me through 214, 314, and 414. We also took an embedded systems class and were project partners. So many long hours working on our programs. Bikiran is a unique case — born in Maryland but grew up in India, and is someone that you can have all sorts of discussions with, be it politics, sports, international affairs, etc. We had many meaningful discussions about India as well. He’s up in Cambridge, MA with Analog Devices now.

Chris and I were classmates in corporate finance and Chris invited me to join his homework group. We worked well together, then discovered a deep mutual interest in football and sports during our review for the final exam. Chris took the awesome sports management and marketing sequence through the business schoool. He did EE for his undergrad in Colorado and was working at Boeing in socal before coming up to Stanford to do a Master’s in management science and engineering. Our view of the world and values are very much in line, and this crosses over into music as well, as we have swapped many songs and artists. A really strong, great friend to have.

These are just a few of the friends I’ll leave here with.

And of course….

Me and Mom. What to say? Longwinded as I am, I can’t think of anything to write here that would do justice to her love, support, and encouragement.

Headed to Tahoe for the next few days.

This past Thursday my Mom, Dad, and Sachi arrived into town from Reno on their cross country road trip. Later in the evening, Sapana flew in from Chicago — all five of us together again.

But just hours after arriving, the phone call that haunts all Indians in the US arrived: my grandmother’s health had taken a sharp turn for the worse. It was likely that my Dad would have to head to India immediately. We explored some flight options, then slept on it knowing the next checkpoint would be in the morning. We weren’t sure whether there would be enough time so Dad could stay for my graduation on Sunday. Early next morning, I got a text saying that it’s go time.

Travel arrangements were quickly finalized; the Shahs helped us out big time by planning to meet Dad at the airport in Raleigh with his passport, and that was it. We just spend the rest of the day trying to compress five days worth of discussion into six hours.

It’s alright — we’re strong as a family not to make missing a graduation a big deal. And it’s right for Dad to be back as soon as possible for this and what might follow. He felt good that he got to spend four whole months with her when he went to India after retiring in February. Some context: Dad left home for college when he was 15 years old. Since then, he couldn’t spend more than two months at home due to vacation time, college, work, etc. Things are different when you make your home in America with the entire rest of the family back home in India. A few years ago, he and Mom happened to be in India for Diwali – one of the biggest celebrations of the year. It was the first time they back home in India for Diwali in 25 years — that’s equivalent to missing Christmas at home for 25 years. Earlier this year, Dad got the chance to celebrate Holi with his family for the first time in 40 years. So he should be back there.

I feel regret that he won’t see Yosemite next week though. Dad has been a longtime fan of Ansel Adams, and ever since seeing that iconic photo of Yosemite he has wanted to visit the park. We were going to be there on June 20th, his birthday.

Posts will be sporadic for the next week as I put aside work to spend time with the family.

Last week my good friend Jordan was in the Bay Area for the JavaOne conference being held in the Moscone center up in San Francisco. I remember talking with Jordan all the way back during finalist weekend for the Park Scholarships. In his four years at NC State he picked up a bachelor’s in CS, a bachelor’s in political science, and a Master’s in CS. He been at RedHat since graduating.  We were both studying overseas in the fall of 2005 — Jordan was in Cork, Ireland — and shared an apartment in the spring semester after our return.

On Wednesday he joined Martin — one of his good friends and colleagues from Dr. Rappa’s lab — on the train down the peninsula for dinner in South Bay. Things didn’t go exactly to plan — apparently someone jumped into the train and they stopped it on the tracks. I asked where they were, and they said they had just left Menlo Park. “No problem,” I remarked, “you’re in my backyard. I’ll come get ya!” I discover minutes later that my car is completely dead. Wonderful. An hour later, Jordan and Martin finally make it off the train at Palo Alto, and I biked over to meet up with them. Martin’s finance, Melanie, joined us minutes later. I’ve met with Melanie more than I’ve had with Martin — especially I was living with Jordan. I failed to keep up with them after coming here, and after the evening I really regretted having done so.

We found an outdoor table at University Cafe for dinner. I found out that Martin had spent a year at Stanford actually before taking a leave of absence — he’s working for a startup in SF now. I also discovered that Martin helped create the Google Maps mashup campus map for Stanford — which is the default map I use and a vast improvement over the ‘official’ map. Cool! We followed up dinner with “froyo” at the new self-serve place on University Avenue, the same place that I went to with Greg and Kelly. Two thumbs up from everyone. We had to give Jordan a taste of the frozen yogurt craze that grips Palo Alto. We also took a ride and walked the Quad a bit before Jordan caught the train back up the City.

Sorry I couldn’t head back up into the City to hang out with you more, Jordan. Learn some UX skills and get out here. :)

Laura Lunsford, who directed Park Scholarships program at NC State for a decade, was in the City for several days for a major psychology conference. I was fortunate to interact a lot with Laura during my time at State, and I consider her one of my closest mentors. I’ve learned so much from her and love being in her company.  On Sunday, the final day of the conference, there was a lecture open to the public about intelligence and afterward the Park alums in the area were going to get together for dinner. Mary, Matt, and I drove up for the lecture, which was being held at the Marriot at 4th and Market (the same hotel that I visited in my first trip to SF back in 2007 for the ISSCC conference). 

We greeted Laura and chatted a bit before heading to the lecture. Laura was working on her PhD in psychology (focusing on the topic of mentorship) accepted a professorship at the University of Arizona the year after my class of 2007 graduated. She has settled down in Tucson and by all accounts is loving her new role. The research, the teaching (the poor undergraduates are goign to get their heads turned inside out), exploring the dynamics of a new campus, and more. So great to hear. The lecture was good, though at times a little academic for a public lecture. The keynote speaker discussed what we know about intelligence and then some interesting examples of how education intersects with policy. Some of the things he mentioned I had learned from Radiolab. 

After the lecture, Casey Perry met up with us. Now how’s this for you — Laura goes outside the hotel the other day for lunch break, and who does she spot across the street? A Park alum! “What are you doing here!?” they both cry out. Casey landed an internship in the City’s financial district and will be spending the summer out here. 

We headed over to dinner at a swanky Mexican restaurant in SOMA a few blocks from the AT&T ballpark. 

And how great was dinner! We had a wonderful turnout, with classes both young and old all congregating. Tyler (just finished Stanford Law School!) and Matt, Brock Winstead (working for a state senator and looking into renewable portfolio standards — what timing!), Tim Goodson (whose apartment Terrell and I crashed at during last summer’s concert), Danielle from the ‘07 class along with Paul who serendipitously happened to be visiting her, Ben Darnell and the Google folks, and of course Brent. 

Everyone recounted a favorite story from their years at State, and many inquired about their professors and mentors still involved, like Gerry Elkan. Laura went around the table and told a story about each the Parks present.

A wonderful night of stories, laughs, and re-discovering friends. 

Like clockwork, the big push at the end of quarter comes and is now is almost over. I finished my takehome final for energy policy analysis class — did not expect I’d spend over 24 hours on it. But I feel good about my work and actually learned a bunch from doing it. All I have left is my building systems report due Monday at 5pm. 

The crazy (exhilarating?) part occured in the past week and a half, the stretch from Thursday to last Wednesday. Slides due Thursday morning, policy class presentation Friday morning, Social E-Challenge  the rest of the day Friday, then the weekend filled with marathon report writing and Hindi video filming, Monday energy efficiency class presentation and editing the Hindi film until 5am, Tuesday Hindi final exam and another class presentation, and finally our final policy report due Wednesday at 5pm. And despite the team staying in Y2E2 until 4:30am, the timestamp of submission was 5:00pm. :) The gauntlet!  Frankly the more tense it got the more upbeat and cheerful I was….this stuff makes you feel alive.

So that’s  why I haven’t posted much recently. Over the next few days I’ll be posting about Laura’s bay area visit, the Social E-Challenge final round event, our spring quarter Hindi video, and a word about some of these final presentations and projects I’ve been mentioning.

Wait a second…..two questions in a row? Major blogging faux pas! A lot has happened since the last post, and I haven’t gotten the posts up. But I wouldn’t want to leave you, dear reader, a week gone by without a question. Now that this is a regular feature, I’ve been thinking of questions to ask, often spurred by a particular song I’m listening to at the moment. But, I shouldn’t have all the fun to myself, so if you have a question you’d like to ask, please send it in at saket@saketvora.com. 

Q: What song(s) often causes you to stop what you’re doing and listen to it.  Many of us listen to music across a range of activities, and it can often fall into the background. Writing, driving, browsing websites, brainstorming, whatever. I’m curious about the songs that — practically every time —   force your mind back on the music.

My offering:  Sigur Ros - Sæglópur

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Particularly right around the 1:50 mark…it gets me everytime.

Thanks everyone for your responses!