Hemanth.Net: The Personal Website of Hemanth Meka Rao

Life: Friends

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Atlantic College 10 Year Reunion
Friday, June 09, 2006 [Friends]

As most of you would have seen, I studied at a lovely place in Wales called the United World College of the Atlantic (fondly called AC, or Atlantic College). It was the memories created there, that initially launched this website.

Now, 10 years have passed since I left AC and therefore the start of this website.

For the 10 year Reunion that is due to take place in Wales between August 4th - 7th 2006, I thought it would be best to create a page where people can see the list of people that have said Yes to coming for the Reunion. This might help other people also to make plans to come.

So without further ado, here's the list (This is unconfirmed - mainly word of mouth. If you'd like to shed some light either way, drop me a line!) : (62 at last count)

AK.Symmonds
Akari Yamamoto
Andrew Metcalfe
Anest Allaway
Arne Pohlmeier
Ase Bergstrom
Caroline Humer
Catherine Langabeer
Chiinga Musonda
Christian Halle
Claudia Chibici-Reveneanu
Collin Mothupi
Daniel Castro Perez
Dave Campbell
Edleen Ariffin
Emily John
Gail Hayword
Hanna Hellquist
Heike Mayer
Hemanth Meka Rao
Henry
Irini Mavroudis
James Chitty
James Riley
Jessica Lightbourne
Joakim Sande
Joe Cripps
Johanne Bagge
Karina Dostalova
Kate Geier
Katrine Wilson
Katy Leech
Kiki King
Laura Thompson
Louise Grinsted
Luc Berden
Lushendran Pather
Martin Zalesak
Marzena Gemra
Meredith G
Michal Kalinak : michal.kalinak@stuba.sk
Mirko Fajoni
Nanjika Nasiiro
Nathalie Taylor
Niko Vuori
Omari Mtiga
Richie Hughes
Rosamund Prince
Rudoloh Kredeit
Ryan Poynter
Sabine Rouffaert
Stella Chow
Stuart Buchanan
Sulakshana Bala
Tavis Wright Carpenter
Tom Rowson
Tom Startup
Tom Williams
Vanessa Culverwell
Veronika Lid Tatum
Vusimuzi Sibanda
Yael Krupnik
Zsuzsanna Egry

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Back in Munich 8 years later!
Monday, October 18, 2004 [Friends]

Woke up rather early and was online chatting with Sravanya. So by the time Amar, Tiffany and Daisy (You wish! Daisy's their cute little dog!) I was yet not ready. So I went like that in my tshirt and tracks. I think I was the most underdressed person for breakfast! But its all good. Did the same thing in the Pulitzer in Amsterdam as well. By the way, German's LOVE - AND I MEAN LOOOVEEE DOGS! You become a mini-celebrity when you have a dog! They are allowed on the seats in restaurants, in hotels everywhere. Only not in American joints (Health reasons for the Americans. Cos all the rest of the world is diseased right!) And Daisy's a doll!

After getting ready, we headed into Munich. After getting off the S-bahn, we walked around Marienplatz. They saw Neuschwanstein Castle the previous day, and I had already seen it. My plan was actually to see the castle again (Saw it in 1996 when I travelled around Europe). Its the most beautiful castle in my opinion. If you're looking for a romantic place, this is it. Well, since these kids had seen it, no point going again. So we walked up and around. The place was buzzing with people! And soo many shops! It was hilarious how Tiffany and me were trying to get Amar to improve his dressing sense! Tiff's brought him a long way! But there is a long way to go still.

It being a Monday, the museums were closed!? But its all good cos Munich's got little to offer culturally through museums. See, you can overdo it and go to every single museum in every city, or just focus on what the important aspects of the city are. So we walked around the Marienplatz. The Glockenspiel was under some sort of renovation. They didn't see it, but I saw it many years ago. Its a giant clock where huge figures come out and dance with music playing in from the clock. Quite cool

Soon we got hungry and finally settled on eating Italian (Indian, Chinese and Japanese lost out!) We had noticed that the Germans were more rude than other places we'd been to... So when we met this German couple who ran an Italian restaurant who were SOO sweet, I had to take a pic of this nice German lady (Oxymoron? Please prove me wrong..)

After lunch, I wanted to do a little shopping. I walked by the Karlsplatz. I was at this exact spot 8 years ago, when I was on my trip around Europe. Finally found the pic of me in this same spot (the one on the right is me, May 1996 at the Karsplatz, the one on the left is me, October 2004 - at Karlsplatz!). It was here in Munich that I bought my Soligor zoom lens (60mm to 300mm) for my Minolta camera. What a beautiful piece..

Joined Amar and Tiffany after, and the city was about closing down. Was cold outside too now. Walked around a little more. By now, it was getting time for dinner. As we tried to figure out the maps to find a restaurant, we chanced upon a restaurant called Ganges. An Indian restaurant. Hadnt' eaten Indian food since I left, so was definitely time for it! We introduced Tiffany to paneer masala, chicken makhani (which she did have before), dal and naan.

The steward who served us was actually a Chartered Accountant from India, who's married to a german lady who works in Seimens. But since the poor guy can't speak German, he cant' get a job. So Amar gave him some tips on how to learn fast. Can you imagine - a Chartered Accountant waiting tables? What has the world come to. Guess love can make you do some crazy things.

We were STUFFED after that meal! We trudged back to the S-Bahn cos Amar didn't allow me to take a taxi back. I was stuffed! I was walking around like a pregnant lady! Well, we got back to the hotel. Amar and me hung out for a bit, just chatting. And as my friend went back to his girlfriend, I went to sleep alone. What has the world come to - The guy I used to call gay ass mofo is next door with his girlfriend, and I'm sleeping alone. God really gives it back doesn't he :)

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Leaving Amsterdam -> Munich's next
Sunday, October 17, 2004 [Friends]

*No pics today*

Woke up in this beautiful hotel like a lazy dog! After breakfast and a shower, I checked out of the hotel. Stayed in for a few hours doing work on the laptop. Asked for a taxi to the airport as I was just feeling too lazy to carry luggage up and down a taxi to the train station and then the same process again. And as luck would have it, I found someone to share the taxi ride which would have cost the same then by going by train!

After reaching the airport in good time, I checked my TID books into a locker cos they're soo bloody heavy! Would pick them up on the way back to Bombay.

The lady at KLM was a sweet lady. And on her name tag it said F. Singh!
This was quite surprising and yes, she's married to a Punjabi. Soo helpful and really sweet. Now this was an interesting pattern. Monique from TID also was in love with an Indian guy many years ago!

Got onto my flight to Munich.

Munich Airport was pretty dead compared to Schipol Airport in Amsterdam. Amar my friend from Georgia Tech and one of my closest friends came to pick me up. Amar was at Tech with me, in RHA, SGA and about every other thing! VERY smart guy, but his niceness hides that. Now Amar is working for the engineering company GKN on an engineering leadership program. So they taught him German in six months, and sent him to Germany to wor and he's been working near Frankfurt in a place called Offenbach for the last 6 months.

Now when Amar was at Tech, I'd call him a gay ass mofo. Why? Cos he'd never look at women! Yes, I know Georgia Tech had a serious lack of the female population (even amongst the females - just heard that one of the hotties in SGA came out!!). So THIS is what Tech can do to you!

Well, Amar was in love with a girl from his high school days. Her name's Tiffany. We'd call her Tiffany from Dalton cos that's what Amar would call her. Tiffany from Dalton.

Guess what - they started dating about a year ago! So a few months ago, Tiffany came to stay with Amar in Frankfurt! My boy's become a man!! So when I saw him with a girl, that too a very pretty, intelligent and sweet girl, I was like THANK THE LORD!!!

So Amar came and picked me up from the airport. We took the S-Bahn train back to Hauptbahnhof and walked it from there to the Sheraton Hotel. Not all that. But will do. Doesn't matter so much as we were gonna be out for most of the day.

Crashed out!

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Weekend in Brussels & Antwerp - 2
Saturday, October 09, 2004 [Friends]

The next morning was a lazy Saturday. After croissants for breakfast with Anuj's parents, we got ready and headed over to the city. Anuj's cousin's from Bangalore were also over so while Nishita was talking to them, we sneaked out as Anuj took me for a quick spin in his father's 1985 Mercedes 560 SL! Wow!
That's one of my dream cars. Whats special about it is that its one car BOTH me and my father like. (The pic on the right is what the Mercedes SL looks like from the mid-80's, the same one that Anuj has).

After that, we went into the lovely city of Antwerp. Here you can see the Town Square or Grote Markt. In the middle of the 'Grote Markt' stands the Brabo fountain. The statue was made in 1887. According to a legend, a terrible giant, called Druoon Antigoon, lived on the banks of the river Scheldt in ancient times. Whenever sailors on the Scheldt river refused to pay toll to the giant, he punished them by cutting off their hand. A Roman soldier, Silvius Brabo, managed to kill the giant. Brabo cut off the hand of the giant and threw the hand away in the river. Hence, according to the legend, the name of the city : hand ( Engl.: hand) -werpen (Engl.: to throw). A nice legend, but untrue. Nevertheless, the 'hand' is the symbol of Antwerp.There are hands in the town flag. (courtesy http://www.trabel.com/antwerp/antwerp-grotemarkt.htm).

So at the square we met Saahil - a friend of Anuj and Nishita's, who took us out for a nice Italian lunch at Arte. The food was excellent as was the restaurant. Now, I like my chilli flakes on my food. So instead of bringing the flakes, they bring the chilli which Nishita & me crush and put on our food.
Within seconds, we were jumping for water! The chillies were bloody hot! Never tasted anything like this! In fact, it was so hot that by my just touching my cheek by mistake - my cheek started burning! Nishita and me had to go stand outside in the cold wind to cool ourselves down. Was quite a scene and I think Anuj & Saahil had quite a laugh!

After lunch we walked around some nice shops. I love this photo of all four of us. It looks straight out of a movie poster. After checking out some stores, Nish, Saahil and I headed out while Anuj met Maart.

Saahil directed Nishita out of Antwerp, to go to his house. We had to anyways go right there as we were meeting Grishma & Pulkit at Grishma's parents house. G&P married recently. They were dating for a while and then got married. Really lovely couple. And Grishma looks very serious etc, but she's a blast once she starts. And I can see Pulkit loosening up already!

So we hung out with Grishma's family - her dad was there but a little tied up. Her mum is a jaan and she treated me like I was malnourished! She would keep giving me delicious food - from Belgian cake and chocolate, to Indian bhel! Did I say no? No way!
Her brother Bhavin and his beautiful wife Shweta and their kids joined us too. You can see the entire family below :)

From there we headed back to Anuj's place. It was the funniest thing cos Nish's been married quite recently and that too lived most of her married life in Shanghai. So Antwerp's not completely familiar that too in a car with out a Navigator.

Well, after we got back to their place, we got ready and headed out for dinner! Chinese! Yum! Food was excellent and was nice hanging out with Anuj's brother Aditya and their cousins.

After a very full dinner and playing a little pool and table tennis, called it a night. After all, had an early morning cab to get to Rotterdam by 7:30am! We were going to the Deltawerken (Delta Works)

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Dinner & Taboo nite!
Sunday, September 26, 2004 [Friends]

Another lazy Sunday at home.. Had a long chat with my parents - just about life in general. Sravanya's back in Delhi to prepare for her dance performance. I'm feeling so bad that I'm going to be missing her performace since I'm going to be travelling over the next three weeks.
My friend Rolee is visiting Bombay from Hong Kong, so we had a dinner at my place for her. We had such a blast.. There were Ash Chandler, his wife Nethra, Dilawar Nense, Rahul Mallar, Bobby, Rolee and me. We started off by just chilling in my room until we all were starving! The cook made some great Chinese food. Smarty that I am, I totally forgot that Rolee's coming from Hong Kong. The LAST cuisine she wants .. is Chinese!! So the cook additionally made her roti, daal and some vegetables. Nethra actually had received an award earlier that evening and had come earlier. So she and I hung out before everyone came. That was another blast! We talked about life - and where my family started from etc. In fact she said hows its amazing how you can meet someone so many times, and still know so little about them.

So Ash & Nethra ask whats for dinner. I'm like "Chinese". Ash says - "Mofo, you want me to come to your house and don't give me Andhra food!?"

So the cook then made Andhra food as well! Lemoni rice, 'bangaladhumpa' which is basically potato fry with mirchi masala, and some other things.

When we finally hit the dinner table, we were famished and just went through the entire layout! And to top it off, we had Baskin Robbin's icecream at the end :) Mummy and Daddy came in from a dinner that they had gone for and chilled with us as we hung out downstairs.

Afterwards, we went back to my room and played this game called Taboo. Surprisingly no one had heard of it. Its a board game a lot like Pictionary but here you have to explain the word without using any of the taboo words. By the end of it, Nehtra was the star and the team of Nethra, Rahul and Ash won 7-5 against the rest of us! By this time, its was half past 12 and tomorrow being a workin day, we decided to call it a night.

The happiest person was of course my dog Maximus - between Nethra's affectionate belly rubbing and Ash's dodgy kissing, he couldn't figure what made him more happy! And the biggest achievement was Bobby finally losing some of his fear of dogs with Max!

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