Our apartment in Fremont, CA

Hi everybody!. We have finally managed to find a decent apartment in Fremont, CA. We have been scouting for the last 3 to 4 weeks - two weeks from India and the rest here, in the US.

We were looking for a one bedroom apartment with an inbuilt washer and dryer, as opposed to a commonly shared one. Apart from this, the other criteria that we had were a good school district, safe neighbourhood, and a convenient location - either near work or the general shopping area.

Incidentally, a lot of the rates for apartments in the US are decided on a bunch of factors. Apart from factors such as proximity to shopping areas, malls, public transport systems, the key factor is the school district. Most of the education in the US revolves around public schools and people residing in a particular district can send their children only to that district's Public school. The better the school, the bigger the influx of people in the district, which in turn leads to the rise in apartment rates in that area. We checked out a couple of places in central Fremont such as The Avalon, The Estates, Mission Peak, Presidio, Archstone, Waterstone, etc. and the rates ranged from $1245 to $1600. Astronomical and way over our budget!!!

We scouted some more, and finally managed to find an apartment in Ardenwood Forest, about 1.4 miles from work. This is a really nice place. There are a total of 862 units(apartments) here. Very well laid out. It also has basketball courts, tennis courts, swimming pools, saunas, club houses etc.

As of now we will be moving into a two bedroom apartment, as the waiting time for any of the one bedroom apartments is almost 6 months. But then again, by virtue of us becoming residents of the community, we will be placed on a priority list, and so the moment a one bedroom setup would be available, we would be intimated.

The inset photographs are the ones that I pulled off the web. Once we move in, which is next month I'll post some snaps up.

Car Hunting

Hello everyone!! Aloha!! Today we formally started car hunting - looked at the Honda's and Toyota's of the world. Also looked at some of the Lexus models (these are the premium segment of the Toyota group).

Incidentally, for the uninformed, in the US, virtually each car manufacturer has two segments which they market. One is the usual segment such as the Honda, Toyota, etc, while the other is the premium / luxury segments, where the same manufacturers push out luxury cars - as in Honda has the Acura, Toyota has the Lexus, in their luxury segments. I'll see if I can get a consolidated list out to you all.

Anyhow, we saw the Honda Civic (normal & Hybrid) as well as the Honda Accord. We also saw the Toyota Yaris, Corolla, Camry and Prius (hybrid). We also saw a few used Lexus cars whose pricing was kinda comparable to that of a new Camry.

The fact of the matter is that in this country one could go bonkers with the amount of choice that is available. Hopefully, within the next couple of weeks we would have narrowed down our search, and finalized our car!!!

It's all about the numbers

Have you ever wondered as to how the numbers that we know so well came to be. There are primarily two major forms of number system - Roman (I, II, III, IV, ....) and Arabic (1,2,3,4,....). The Arabic number system as known so, as they were popularized by the Arabs.

While the Roman numbers are easy to understand, as evident by their usage, have we ever thought to wonder as to why 1 = one, 2 = two, 3 = three, etc., or for that matter the logic behind them?

Well the fact is that it's all about the angles !! As is evident from the image inset, the naming revolves around the number of angles which each contains when written in their older forms.

1 has one angle, 2 has two angles, 3 has three angles and so on till 9 having nine angles. Zero being a circle has no angles! I have depicted the angles with circles. Click on the image for a better look.

Our initial experiences in the US

I know it's been quite a while since I posted anything here. Well the reason for that was that we (Mahi & I) were in the critical phase of an overseas transfer. What with the running around for the Visas, ticketing, travel procedures, packing etc, we hardly had any time to post anything!!

We sold our car in India, a panther black Ford Fiesta 1.6 Sxi ABS just after 9 months of purchasing it. Thankfully didn't end up taking too much of a hit on it. Also sold my XDA II mini to a colleague.

As of now, we both are based in Fremont, California, and are put up at one of the Extended Stay hotels. These hotels are designed keeping in mind the fact that people might need to stay long term here. Each room had a mini kitchen, TV, DVD, refrigerator, etc. Also there are laundry machines within the building itself, a multi-gym, pool etc. The company will put us up here for 2 weeks, post which we would need to move into an apartment. We have hunting for the same in and around the Fremont and Newark areas.

Met up with Mayur and his wife Purvi and they've been great help in taking us around. Incidentally, they have recently picked up a Lexus 350 SUV, and boy is it good!!! Amazing.

Also, did some basic grocery shopping for the essentials to get operational on the cooking front.

Traipsed around New Park mall today, taking in the sights and the sounds. Also, made the traditional stop at the ColdStone Creamery for some soulful and sinful ice cream!! The ColdStone Creamery chain was setup in 1988 (almost 20 years ago), by Donald & Susan Sutherland, and they serve up what they call "Creations". This basically means that one gets to customize their ice cream, they way they'd like it. You can choose from a range of nuts, toppings, biscuits, mints, fruits, chews, etc. and not to forget - ice creams, to make your unique creation. The ingredients that you chose are placed on an ice cold granite slab and they mixed together. That's where the name is derived from. You can read a lot more about it here and here.

Will post more details as we experience the sights and sounds here.......