More than thirty years ago, I wrote up the story of how I traveled from Jaffna, Sri Lanka to Kharagpur, without even knowing where Kharagpur is. I called this story “A pilgrimage to nowhere.” I am not sure why I picked such a depressing title. Perhaps it was the twenty-something angst of not knowing where my life and career were headed.

Fast-forward three decades, a friend who read this thirty-year old piece asked where the rest of the Kharagpur stories were. They didn’t exist. But I had just begun my year-long sabbatical (and was enjoying every bit of it). So, I wrote two follow-up pieces: one (primarily) about our first year at Kharagpur, called “KGP Chronicles,” and the other, “Ersatz Homeward Journeys,” about my trips to Chennai during the four years I spent in Kharagpur which we, unable to return home to war-torn Sri Lanka, had to resort to unlike everyone else who went home during breaks.

The reaction I got for my earlier post on my improbable career trajectory, “How I Met Security Research,” made me think that I should post about these three pieces of my Kharagpur experience.