I have to admit: Sun folks really know how to have fun! My JavaOne experience was full of parties, dinners and evenings, all with Sun employees and peers! Sun has super-geeks know how to have fun! Here is the roundup of all the official and unofficial JavaOne evenings I’ve had!

Sunday (May 31st)

• Dinner at Anzu - A delightful dinner at the japanese restaurant called Anzu, at the hotel we were staying with Gary, Tzel and all the CA's on the evening we arrived itself. . I had this amazing cook-it-yourself japanese speciality called the "Rock". They serve raw slices of beef with a real sizzling black rock heated up to 400 degrees F. You're supposed to cook the slices by laying 'em on the rock. That was so cool! Just like barbeque! The vegetarians from India had some trouble choosing what to order though, as in most restaurants in the US veg items on the menu are too scanty.

Monday (June 1st)

• OpenSolaris and Sun Cloud Party – This was in my opinion the best party of JavaOne 2009. A killer band called the Spazmatics had set the stage on fire (and they didn’t limit themselves to just that stage!). Play dodge ball, drink Martini Luge, eat some great food, roll on some cool segways and listen to a scintillating band performance to keep the fun going!
  
  
  

Tuesday (June 2nd)

• The Thirsty Bear – the connected student party. This place was a cool pub located just a walk down the Moscone center. The CA program folks were there: Gary, David, Tzel, Liana, all the campus ambassadors/tech leads/coordinators – Tom, Felipe, Kevin, Hyejin, Avinash, Ashwin, Abhishek, Kira. Naveen Asrani and folks from his team were present too. Tirthankar also gave us company and showed off his skills at the dart board :). I beat Avinash to a quick game of pool just before leaving.
  
  
  
• XYZ – It’s a club at the Hotel W just off of Moscone. An only party at the XYZ, Hotel W, San Francisco.. all the top people at Sun drinkin and chilling like ordinary people. This is where I met James Gosling (again, after the student Q&A) and got my picture taken with him.
  
  
  
  
• JCP Party - Intercontinental Hotel, 4th floor – This party was for the people connected with the JCP (Java Community Process). It was a fun party with a lot of good food. I got a photo with the Duke there.
  
  
  

Wednesday (June 3rd)

• Buca Di Beppo - A memorable dinner with the CA family - awesome Italian food, witty humour and lots of gifts presented ;)
  
  
  
  
  
  
• 4th Street Bar & Deli – How can we go home without drinkin. ;)
  
  
  

Thursday (June 4th)

• After Dark Bash - A dazzling way to end JavaOne with an extravagant party, and an amazing rock band performance at the Mariott. The band was totally rocking and after a while we saw half the crowd up on the stage dancing in between their instruments. It went crazy near the end! It was first supposed to be held in the beautiful Yerba Buena Gardens but later taken inside due to speculation that it might rain. We got pics clicked with the rock band at the end.
  

Friday (June 5th)

• Dinner at the Louis Diner – This wasn’t an official dinner. I went out with Abhishek to explore the nightlife of San Francisco on the last night of my trip. We went to this restaurant on North Beach which greatly resembles the All American Diner chain in India serving fantastic American cuisine.
  
  
  
  
• The Stinking Rose – I couldn’t make it but still mentioning as I was supposed to there. This was the last dinner, which David hosted for the CA gang, just before everyone leaves the next day to go back home. I came back from Stanford a bit late in the evening so couldn’t join them.