My First Year Working

Feb 2026

2025 was the first year I didn't step foot in Chennai,
or a classroom.
Two constants of my life just… gone.
Not going back home at all, or not stepping onto that familiar ground, not feeling that specific humidity in the air, it sits with you.

Also, the year Virat Kohli retired from Test cricket.
Yeah. That one hurt too.

Working full-time for over a year now, and actually being independent, felt different.
Buying small things guilt free. Treating yourself to a Toblerone. Going to places you've only seen as wallpapers.

Startup life moves fast. Too fast sometimes.
You're either working or recovering from working. For a while, my life was just a big blob of work, an equally big blob of rest, and some great traveling in between.
Tried to fix that.
Went to the gym almost every day.
Started playing cricket and tennis again.
Started reading again.
Took way more photos, as you can probably tell.
Still, it's a constant battle, coming back from work and finding the energy to do something that feels intentional.

Started visiting national parks. Went to a lot of them.
That, more or less, was 2025.

Highlights of the Year

• Tech
  Attended YC Startup School. Met a lot of smart people. Heard some genuinely great talks.
  SF is a strange place in the best way. The passion for tech is real.
  Is there such a thing as too much tech? Asking for a friend.
  Heard Andrej Karpathy speak. Huge fan.
  Heard Varun Mohan speak. Huge fan.
  Then he moved to Google...
  
  Went to DAC, the EDA conference, representing Bronco AI at our booth.
  Did sales. Talked to customers. Spoke to academics.
  Got a ground-level view of the EDA tooling industry.
  First conference. Learned a lot.
  Exhausting but very fun.
• Nature
  One of the nice things about living in the Bay is how close you are to some of the most beautiful parks in the country.
  I didn't really plan for this to become a thing, but at some point I started measuring weekends by how far I could drive and still make it back by Sunday evening.
  
  Went to many national parks.
  Here is something I wrote about it: National parks
  
  Big Sur, Carmel-by-the-Sea, Monterey, Shasta.
  Big Sur changes fast. One second you're looking at open ocean, the next everything disappears into fog.
  It was the first time I felt like I was above the clouds.
  California is kind of absurd. Beaches. Cliffs. Views that don't look real.
  Stopped at Point Lobos. Muir Woods - Redwoods are unreal. Saw Mount Shasta.
  Point Reyes might be my favorite part of the Bay: the elks, the beachs, the cliffs.
  The North Bay feels different. Quieter. Better.
  
  Went to Tahoe.
  Sunset on the lake. Mountains. Perfect reflections.
  First time skiing. Collided with a few poles.
  Graduated from the bunny slope by the end.
• Sports Keeping Me Sane
  Went to the Laver Cup.
  Watched Alcaraz lose to Taylor Fritz. Pain.
  Saw Roger Federer in person.
  Privileged.
  
  Went to an Major Cricket League game. Supported the Texas Super Kings.
  Quality of cricket was… mid.
  Somehow still turned into a thriller.
  Cricket finds a way.
  
  Started playing cricket every weekend.
  Realized how much I missed it.
  Played for Marin Cricket Club. Arguably the most beautiful ground I've played on.
  Great people. Loved it.
  Sucks that it's mostly a summer sport. Need more reps.
  
  Played a football league, runner up.
  Played a softball league, runner up.
  The bat swing translated suspiciously well from cricket.
  Started playing tennis again.
  Serve speed: work in progress.
• Concerts
  Saw The Weeknd live.
  He leaned heavily into the new album. Slightly wished for more classics.
  Hearing Blinding Lights and Save Your Tears live hit different.
  Took me straight back to COVID days where those songs used to be on repeat.
  The classics still carry.
  
  A R Rahman concert.
  Went to one about 12 years ago. Went again this year.
  Timeless.
• San Francisco Things
  Ice skating in SF. Almost rolled my ankles.
  SantaCon. An unreasonable number of Santas.
  1 a.m. near BART. Someone always throwing up nearby.
  Halloween - Dressed up as Jesse Pinkman. Said "bitch" to everyone.
  Saw the Golden Gate from many angles.
  Started recording my Beli stats.
  Red Bull came to SF. Saw an F1 car for the first time.
  Still haven't gone to the Palace of Fine Arts or Golden Gate Park.
• Quotes That Hit Different This Year:
  "Be irrationally optimistic, but uncompromisingly realistic" - Varun Mohan
  "Matches are won by what's not shown in the highlights" - Harsha Bogle
  "Pressure is a privilege" - Billie Jean King

Looking Ahead

I'm not really a New Year's resolution person.

But there are goals from 2025 I didn't fully get around to. I want to carry them forward.

Professionally, being one of the first engineers at a startup and now watching the team grow has been surreal. Looking forward to building more at Bronco AI.

Physically, I want to improve my cardio and become a better cricketer.
These aren't new goals. They're ongoing ones.

I also want to learn a performing art.

And I want to do something adventurous and spontaneous. Something that scares me a little.
Life has been great, but it's also fallen into a rhythm. I want to disrupt that a bit. Commit to something hard. Move in a direction that feels new.
Maybe it's a motorbike. Maybe it's something else.
Life can quietly take over if you let it.

Somewhere in all of this, I want to be better at calling old friends. Staying in touch. Not letting time quietly do its thing without me noticing.

Peace.