Aviraj’s Blog on Posterous

You can call me Avi

Boulder + Bikes = Awesome a.k.a. The Boulder Bike Story

This is the Boulder Bike Sory.

I saw this video a few days ago and couldn't help reflecting on why it means a lot to me.

Here it is in brief -- my bike has been the best investment I have made since moving to Colorado. There's no question about it. Facts first: I have lost approximately 25 pounds / 12 kgs within 4 months of moving here (I bought my bike 10 days after landing). Now, anyone who knows me well enough, will know that that's significant. I had been gaining weight continuously for over 3 years, so this is definitely a big thing for me. Heck, when I went rock-climbing, I was shocked I could even lift my own weight. 

But then it's not just about the weight. I feel so much more awesome after my daily bike ride. Yes, my ride is only for commuting reasons, but that's what I find awesome about it. I've surprised even myself when I sometimes skip the bus to get somewhere and prefer a 4 mile bike ride instead. My friends know that I had been dying to buy a bike to commute to work for over a year when I was in Mumbai. But it was clear -- if the cars on the road did not kill me, the pollution certainly would. A good biking experience was one of the significant factors in my decision to move here. Not kidding. And Boulder has not disappointed. I just love how bike friendly this town, in fact, most of Colorado is. As you would've seen in the video, 95% of roads in Boulder have a dedicated bike lane or bike path or both. All buses have bike racks and cargo storage. It's super impressive.

Bottomline? Boulder is awesome.

So I went rock climbing. On real rocks. In the mountains.

And I loved it.

Yeah, it's been a couple weeks since I did this and I had wanted to write about it earlier but, you know, school came in the way. 

It was my *first ever* outdoor activity and for that I think I did fairly well. No, I didn't manage to go all the way up the "beginner-level" (my ass!) climb, but half-way up wasn't bad considering the bike ride up Baseline Rd. killed me before I even got to the Gregory Canyon trail head. And I promise you, I could've gone a lot higher had the drizzle not made the rock as slippery as it was. At the end of the day, if you ask me, I was surprised I could lift my weight at all :)

I want to thank my classmate Ryan Mazer and his friends for organizing this awesome outing for us. I totally need to do this again.

I'm hoping for more Boulder awesomeness as my life here continues. I really couldn't be happier. And I promise I'm going to post more often.

                                     

I just joined the Boulder Photography Club

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I'm so damn excited about this. Photography has long been something I've wanted to take seriously, but never found the time or opportunity for it back in Mumbai. Boulder, to me, is an ideal location for someone with a passion for photography. It's just so freakin beautiful!

So, today I joined the Boulder Photography Club at the University of Colorado at Boulder (CU). It's a simple student club on the CU campus that has a whole bunch of undergrads. I don't care, it's still the best opportunity I've got to pursue photography. That too for just 15 bucks for the whole year, haha.

No, I'm not a great photographer, far from it in fact. I'm still going to run around with my trusty point-n-shoot (Canon SD800IS), that I love dearly. The goal is to understand photography from a technical standpoint, get a grip of exposure, ISO, shutter-speed, what have you, and figure out when to use what. I also want to learn some basic post-processing techniques in Photoshop or whatever (yep, I don't know how to use Photoshop). Once I'm down with all that, I'll unquestionably graduate to a dSLR; I just feel the need to be ready for it.

As I've been saying about everything Boulder these days - so psyched!

"Boulder has more 'collaboration per capita' than any other city in the US"

my life’s work is to find the most compelling startups in the Intermountain West and I’m going on record to say that there’s no better place in the region to start one than Boulder, Colorado.
There’s a very unique culture there and I think successful regional entrepreneurs from all over the country should go visit Boulder to see the impact of the culture of caring which exists there.  Successful entrepreneurs, lawyers, VCs and countless others devote a very significant part of their lives to mentoring local startups not because there’s something in it for them, but because they simply care deeply about entrepreneurs and they’ll do anything they can to help them.
via highway12ventures.com

I've written about this before and I guess I'll keep saying it over and over again: Boulder is fantastic for startups. Okay, I haven't got a chance to experience the startup environment as closely as people like the author of this quote have, but it's only a matter of time before I do.

*So* psyched.