In terms of hobbies, the stuff I was mostly involved in at Stanford was bridge and table tennis, as noted below. More on my recent (and now clearly past?) exploits is below.

SPORTS AND GAMES

BRIDGE

I've been a little more involved in sports and games since I came to Stanford. The Stanford bridge club met every week in a very informal fun-filled session. International events are well covered at Bridge Plaza . I've been involved in a few interesting competitions over the last few years.

• Most recently (2001), I was part of the Stanford team that qualified for the National Collegiate Team Championships (by beating Caltech :-), as part of the Toronto NABC . The ACBL paid all the expenses. We lost a close semi-final to MIT after leading at the half and finishing 2nd in the previous day's preliminary round-robin. UCSD deservedly won the event, having beaten us and Caltech in the qualifying round, won the preliminary round-robin in Toronto, and beating MIT in a close final.
• We started going to tournaments on President's day 2000. We had some good beginner's luck. I was part of a Stanford team that won Flight C of the teams in the Milbrae regional.
• Prior to all this, I was involved in Big Match 4, against UC Berkeley in Nov 98. Unlike our players of the gridiron, our weak team suffered its first defeat in this encounter. We went down 70-61 in a wild match that could have gone either way, and to compound that, the other team suffered a horrendous 143-32 loss. Still it was a fun game.
• I've also played a number of other regionals and sectionals with varying success, besides some unsuccessful forays into OkBridge collegiate championships.

TABLE TENNIS

After being coached by Wei Wang at Caltech, I was surprised to find not much attention being paid to Table Tennis at Stanford. The Stanford table tennis club was operational my first year there, but then died due to lack of interest. I was playing off and on in the Palo Alto table tennis club and in some tournaments though. My rating was 1341. Some successes were

• In September 2000, I won this gigantic trophy for reaching the finals of the U1400 event (my rating at that time was 1291) in San Francisco. It was quite an exhausting event. I got there by the first train in the morning and came back by the last train at night. In between, I played 13 matches and 30 games, in a variety of events. I didn't eat anything during the tournament; I was way too tired. The event also had Chen Longcan in an exhibition match (with announcements entirely in Mandarin :-)
• Prior to this, I'd played a number of tournaments in 1999 and 2000, but without any success. I got hooked into this when the Stanford club was functioning my first year there. In Feb 99, I was in Fresno to play an intercollegiate tournament. I finished second in my group in both the inter-college and the under-1750 tournaments, and didn't advance further.
• While at Caltech in my senior year, I placed 3rd in singles and 2nd in doubles in the Caltech tournament. In both cases, I was the highest ranking student.

OTHER SPORTS AND GAMES

I also play badminton, though I haven't been very active lately. Here is a link to the world badminton federation .

I haven't played for a long while, but I do follow world chess, especially if Anand is playing. Gratuitous links to FIDE's web site , and Chessed where you can play rated games. For information about current tournaments such as Wijk Ann Zee and Linares, the Week in chess is a good reference.

Hockey has been my best outdoor sport over the years. Unfortunately, the only hockey people in America know is the one played on ice, not astroturf. A good site is here or the official FIH site .

Like most others from the subcontinent, I enjoy watching cricket, though I don't play. CricInfo is the authoritative source on cricket.

NEWS

• The Times of India
• The Indian Express
• Samachar (all the headlines)

BERKELEY

• The main Berkeley page
• The EECS Dept
• The CS Division

COLUMBIA

• The main Columbia page
• The CS dept

STANFORD

• The main Stanford page
• The CS dept
• The Graphics Lab

CALTECH

• The obligatory link to Aure's new and improved Caltech Web Page
• The UGCS homepage
• Blacker house where I used to stay
• The CS dept. and GG