Goodbye, Shyamal

Sad news – my coworker Shyamal is taking a semi/temporary leave of absence from Grubhub. His Visa fell through this year, and he’s unable to continue working full time at GH.

That said, he’s got a backup plan in place (and had already applied for grad school). He’ll be continuing his studies, and doing some really cool stuff like diving more into Machine Learning.

There’s a chance he’ll be able to continue on at GH on a part-time basis, but a lot of that is up in the air at the moment. Suffice it to say, everyone is sad to see him depart and a lot of the higher ups are trying to figure out ways to work around his current situation.

Today, after work, we decided to meet up in person for drinks. While there are some folks who are in a pilot program and returning to the office… most of my work interactions are all done virtually. Online only.

But it felt best to have a few drinks in person, and to say goodbye in person. So we decided to meet at a bar near his place.

Interestingly for me: this was my first “social excursion” really, in a while. I’ve eaten indoors now a few times, but this was my first Chicago indoor experience.

We were inside the bar for a while, then relocated to the patio after the “Salsa Dancing” DJ was setting up shop (and things got a bit too loud).

I’m super bummed to see Shyamal leave, as he’s one of those rare devs that kicks out a tremendous amount of code, and it’s all high quality stuff. He’s also got a savvy ability to see things at the 10,000 foot level, and has a good sense for not just project deliverables but the whole project overall.

From the day we met, I had a sense he would make a great manager. I think he’s got a lot of tracks available to him, and even more so now with what he’ll be studying. He’s super motiviated (he’s cramming a 1.5 year program into a single year, and also looking to try to work part time during it all).

While I’m sad to see him leave, I’m hoping it’s temporary. I’m glad we got a chance to see one another (after more than a year) one last time. And I do hope our paths cross again soon.

Related:
Braveheart Hackathon 2019 Celebration at the Aviary
A Tour of the Neighborhoods Along the Blue Line
Welcome, Luis!