Whew, I am back from the trip to California. That was a lot of flying and sitting at the airports, not a lot of time with my son, unfortunately. I was supposed to arrive to LA on Thursday, around noon, but due to all kinds of trouble with the airlines, it turned out to be after midnight. So my trip to a Mysore practice on Friday was not quite plausible, and I settled for a practice in the hotel room. Boy it felt good after a whole day of sitting!
The commencement ceremony was not very festive. Turns out that two students committed suicide very recently; one in May, the second - just two days before graduation. I can not even imagine what the parents felt. The school honored them with a moment of silence during the graduation ceremony. One could tell that the mood of the crowd was very somber because of that. The gray sky and drizzling rain did not help either. B
But the city was as beautiful as ever. There were lots of trees with purple flowers, and the whole Pasadena seemed to be covered in a purple haze. Falling purple flowers carpeted the ground as well.
Anyway, here are some pics. Unfortunately, my son politely declined the leprechaun jump for me. I am not surprised, though - this is the same person who does not want me as a friend on Facebook! Ugh. I still love him. :)
The commencement ceremony was not very festive. Turns out that two students committed suicide very recently; one in May, the second - just two days before graduation. I can not even imagine what the parents felt. The school honored them with a moment of silence during the graduation ceremony. One could tell that the mood of the crowd was very somber because of that. The gray sky and drizzling rain did not help either. B
But the city was as beautiful as ever. There were lots of trees with purple flowers, and the whole Pasadena seemed to be covered in a purple haze. Falling purple flowers carpeted the ground as well.
Anyway, here are some pics. Unfortunately, my son politely declined the leprechaun jump for me. I am not surprised, though - this is the same person who does not want me as a friend on Facebook! Ugh. I still love him. :)
U.S. Secretary of Energy Dr. Steve Chu gave a really good speech:
Purple trees
And purple carpet....
And this is a little frog - just for Arturo. It was sitting next to the pond at the Caltech campus, contemplating something scientific, I bet:
10 comments:
Whoa, Caltech - your son is seriously smart.
You must be very proud.
hi Alfia
isn't Pasadena beautiful? you can tour some of the historic 1920s craftsman homes there. congratulations to your son. he's funny about the Facebook thing, but maybe he doesn't want you to know things you probably would not be interested in anyway. Thanks for the froggie picture!! going to save it to my favorites.
hugs
Arturo
Hi, Anon:
Thank you, I am very proud of my son! :)
Arturo!
Pasadena is amazing. I wish I could live there and work at Caltech. That is my idea of paradise, in fact.
I am glad you liked the frog; when I saw it, I thought of you and just had to have that picture. :D
Congrats Alfia!!!!!!!!!!
Thank you, Lauren! :)
Now the challenge is to find a decent graduation present.
how awesome for your son!! and how awesome for you that now he'll be a bit closer geographically. (^_^) his smarts are definitely genetic. ;-)
i sure do miss pasadena - i have a aunt and uncle there and always love visiting them.
How fantastic!
Congrats!
Wonderful photos!! Your son is very handsome... Dr. Steve Chu spoke at Harvard too! He's making the graduation rounds, I guess.
The purple flowers are beautiful- loved the parking lot shot. It's always so stunning when the ground is covered in an unusual color.
What's up with flying lately? It's awful. Nothing is on time. terrible!
Thank you, Liz!
Dr. Chu mentioned that he gave a speech at Harvard; moreover, he also admitted that his Caltech speech "heavily borrowed" from the Harvard speech. I wonder if he said at Harvard "You realized that you are not alone, wonder kids are all over the place"?
Alfia, we were bad... we skipped his speech! We had been to 2 ceremonies already and needed food! I'm sure it was a great speech.
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