BLAST FROM THE PAST

Well not actually a blast, more like a tornado which wrecked my house the last two days. Just finished cleaning :P

But the tornado called NiNi calmed my soul and I feel so very grateful to have had her around when I needed a friend the most :D

NiNi happens to be one of the most amazing, crazy, brave, chattery (informed :P), blunt and disorganized friends that I have. And she is also one of the best elder sister to have. I am the oldest and so have the habit of bossing people around, but she bossed me. The first thing she said to me when I picked her up at the airport was “ you look too serious and academic” (!!!), which got converted to “you were smarter at ND, you look wiser now”. And I have no idea whether to take it as a compliment or a wake-up call ;)

Meeting NiNi reinforced the fact that our year at Kroc was one of the best years of my life and the relationships made there are for a lifetime. Never before, or after, have I met so many friends, from different parts of the world, who were at the same intellectual and emotional level, and living together was simply memorable. Even though we haven't met some of them over the years, and perhaps might not meet some in person again, each one of them is not far from our thoughts and prayers. So it was crazy the way NiNi and myself were chatting with Vandy who is in DC (he got married in Dec 09 and just successfully defended his PhD 2 weeks ago), and another day talking to Mireya in Madrid (while she was on her way to vacation) and video chatted with Mica, who is engaged in graduate studies at Ohio, missed Nell and spoke to her answering machine and could not call Cora, Brenna and the others as we did not have their phone numbers! But the catching up was good J

NiNi was lazy in doing any sightseeing in Singapore, had to be dragged everywhere, her famous lines being “I came to see you, not the city”; but the moment she spoke about her work, her Chin community, preserving tradition through weavings, the women she had employed, her education and solar project; she would get transformed. The same zest and dedication was felt when Vandy spoke about his plans for Sierra Leone or Mica spoke about East Timor. And each time I felt so proud of all the brilliant work that our batch-mates are engaged in, the dreams that they wish to pursue and I was thankful that Kroc had put such an amazing team together. Having NiNi here reminded me of many things in life that I am grateful of.

Ofcourse NiNi pampered me no end – from being my sounding board to giving me massages, to keeping me awake till 2-3 in the mornings connecting with our common friends. Time just whizzed past, but I am hopeful that we will meet again – either in Myanmar, India, Singapore, London, US or anywhere else J

And there are many more outrageous things that were said which simply has to be censured here ….. :P