OpenDaylight Summit 2015 and Santa Clara

Love this name tag from the OpenDaylight Summit

~~ Ready to return home after a very productive conference and unconference, in a few hours. Now it is time to get back to my regular life for a while, and focus on my projects.

This year was full of travels for me, with 11 (short and long) international travels so far (and 2 more upcoming). The best part of this trip was to meet many interesting people, listen to many awesome presentations, and present my project. Unlike the previous trips, I did not do any random walks this time. But will continue in the upcoming trips. :3 I am unpredictable in my travelling habits anyway. I just don't have any pattern. :D

Next year seems more interesting as well, with an array of travels and "migrations" already planned - Shenzhen 2016, Atlanta 2016, and Louvain 2016. Sometimes I suspect that I am becoming a gypsy. lol.

Traveling light weight

Fresh water river in Andorra la Vella

I returned to Lisboa from Croatia after my summer internship a few hours ago. Now I leave home again with my suitcase, to the metro station. Going to the airport for my next flight to San Jose for the ODL Summit. I walk like a zombie - brain doesn't work; but  my legs move in the right direction. I surely lack sleep. Do I really need to do this? I ask myself. It happens to me at times - I overdo things to tire myself. But then, I say, "I will never remember these tiring moments spent in transit. But the good memories will last."

 

I used to travel heavy with lots of luggage. Eventually, I learned to travel light. I often avoid even taking the checked in luggage with me, so that I directly go to the border gates, as I already check in at home. By this I avoid the long queues at the luggage drop and further delay at the baggage claim belts. Sometimes I just go on a flight with a small backpack, which also happens to be my laptop bag. I carefully pack the bare minimum stuff with me. This helped travelling further. An ideal example was my travel to Andorra this year, just a day before the EMJD-DC Spring event in Barcelona. 

Since it was a Sunday, most of the shops were closed. I had a look at the books, written in Catalan, speaking the history of the Catalan region. Andorra is the only country which has Catalan as its national language. Andorra la Vella was pleasant, and felt like the hill country in Sri Lanka. I know that the winter will be different, with mountains covered in snow.