Memories

As 2011 stands on its final legs, I am compelled to reflect on how it has perhaps been as fine a year as I could have hoped for. In fact, I always dreamed of making end-of-year diary / blog entries where I gloated about how everything that transpired in the previous 12 months went exactly as planned. This past year is perhaps the closest I have come to making such an outlandish statement. The last occasion I was so infected with optimism was when I realized that I actually passed my 12th grade "board" examinations, thus having the opportunity to attend one of the finest institutions in the world.

The last five years have been, simply put, the greatest five years of my life. Not to say it was all smooth sailing. Far from it - very far actually. I expected my college experience to be a cake walk, but boy, I had no idea how much further from the truth that line of thinking was. Also, don't ask me why I thought it would be easy. I would only blame the naïveté of youth.

But saying goodbye to the University of Texas, the city of Austin and friends that have been there through the good times and the bad is a task as hard as any. Austin has grown on me. So much so that I never actually contemplated what it would be like having to leave this fabulous city.

They say what you remember most are the people. I couldn't agree more. I certainly would not have become the person I am today without having the sort of support I was fortunate enough to fall back on, from my closest friends to my family - you guys have been terrific.Words will not do any justice to the impact you have had on my life.

Austin, Texas has outdone itself and has proved to be the ideal city for a confused college student in the formative years of his life. It will remain a second home to me and will always hold some of my most cherished memories. My orientation on day one, the UT speech and debate team, the Vector newsletter, Longhorn football, cricket (yep, in Texas), French language circles, surprise birthday parties, swing dancing, World Cup watch parties, SXSW, awkward Halloween costumes - life has seldom been as good. College has changed me for the better - or so I would like to think. Additionally, more than anything I learned in my classes, it is the life experiences of the last few years that instill me with the hope that I am reasonably prepared to handle the real world. Spending the last few years with rather awesome people helped me grow up in ways that I could never have imagined. Perhaps I digress since this is supposed to be an ode to 2011. But y'all will never be forgotten.

Here's to hoping that 2012 will be half as memorable as the years that preceded it.