Welcome

I am C. Vikram Surya, a computer scientist, writer, activist, and entrepreneur based in Washington, DC.

Site Purpose
The intention of this site is to live an Open Source Life and to encourage others to try for the same. When experience benefits others in some way, that multiplies its significance many times over. I share my views here as a private citizen speaking to other private citizens; nothing I say on this site represents the views of any of the organizations in which I am involved.

News

Professional & Scholarly

It's a gift to serve the following efforts: 

The US Peace Corps where I serve as Domestic Infrastructure Lead in the Office of the Chief Information Officer.

QRel, a project advancing a Natural Philosophy of Information that I've been working on intuitively for about five years now, and actively since January 2008.

DC Represent  An effort to get franchise for DC voters in Congress, which we still do not have. If you have a moment, please review it and sign the petition if you can support the proposal. The original full text of the original article that inspired the org is here.  If you are a reporter, please particularly note that I speak out on this issue as a private citizen and Co-Founder of DCRepresent only.  It would be inaccurate and damaging for me to be presented in the press as a spokesman for the Peace Corps on any partisan or political matter including this one--thank you!

Georgetown University, where I support the research of Father Patrick Heelan of the Philosophy department, shepherding his 50 years of research into the Philosophy of Science, Hermeneutics of Quantum Mechanics, Philosophy of Perception, among others, onto the web.

Progressive Informatics is the  not-for-profit company through which I do various consulting & business development work.

Here are some pointers to my past affiliations and a recent CV.  

And here is my personal blog.

Affiliations

Community

I'm grateful to participate in and support each of these organizations actively:

AdoptAVolunteer, which is Brandi Walker's terrific organization advancing her work with women victimized by sexual violence at Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, on the western edge of Lake Kivu in  the Congo.

Dupont Circle Club, a DC clubhouse providing meeting space for self-help groups where I serve on the Board.

The Valley Vista, my condo building, where I serve on the Board as well as informally leading a Green Roof effort.  I'm very interested in helping to make it one of the greenest buildings in the country.

WABA, the Washington Area Bicyclists Association, a great org for anyone committed to biking in DC

Spiritual

AmmaDC, the local satsang of the living saint, Amma.  Great short video about Amma here. She says "My religion is love", and hugs everyone who takes Her darshan.  Jai Ma!

On a related note, though I didn't grow up in a touchy-feely home, I am now a great believer in hug therapy as matter of daily life practice, as I have had many, many great friends and teachers of both sexes, who have taught me about how to give and receive touch and connection in the supportive, social sense, rather than in a romantic sense.  It is, I believe,  instrumental to good health.

A blog dedicated to my grand-uncle Surya Narayana Chiruvolu (N.C. Surya), who was one of India's earliest Western-trained psychiatric doctors, but who then spent the last 20+ years of his life at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry, in service to the Mother and the mahatma himself. While there, he wrote a wise, witty collection of essays entitled Aham: Personal Autonomy, many of which appear on the blog site in some form. His example has been so instrumental in the development of my personality and character that I took his name as my middle name in my mid 20s.

A nicely done video on AUM--the Hindu term for the Universal Vibration--which is the symbol at the top left of this page.  It is auspicious to remember it at the beginnings of things as a way to recall one's right relation to the process and outcome--as a participant in something far, far greater...

Insight Meditation Community of Washington.  A treasure trove of warm, wise, funny dharma talks on applying insight meditation is available on IMCW's website, and I can highly recommend them if you're seeking free help to apply meditative practice to your life.

 

Politics & Advocacy

I am also a member of these groups: 

NCADD-NJ, the National Council on Alcohol and Drug Dependence through their very active NJ branch, as well as the DC Recovery Community Alliance. I believe strongly that no one need ever die from active addiction--we have intervention and recovery methods that work, and we have research rapidly advancing our scientific understanding. This is a cause near and dear to my heart as both my late, great father, Arun Kumar Chiruvolu, and his late eldest brother, Sudhakar Chiruvolu, an entrpeneurial and creative powerhouse, both succumbed in the end to the damages alcohol caused to their health. The shame, confusion, and stigma of addiction should be straightforwardly rejected; it is just the matter-of-fact that wonderful people can get stuck in a physiological trap which no amount of willpower can fix. Addiction is a disease, and we are all responsible, as a society, for supporting people in recovering from it.  That begins with changing our own attitudes and ideas around it.

I also am a deep believer in Science & Technology for Peace. When 2 billion people on the planet may never drink a clean cup of water in their lives, the United States commits a grave error to invest $200 billion annually for warfare and defense, but scant few dollars on encouraging its scientists and engineers to address the needs of those who don't have the basic life conditions to participate in the global economy. I hope for various technical, social, and economic development efforts to ally under the heading of a Peace-Innovation Community, as counterpoint to the Military-Industrial Complex.  I have nothing against national defense whatever; I just believe our need for it has to be balanced with the needs of the world for basic life security.  

Environment America a great, recently-formed org focused on a greener future.

The American Democratic Party, including the DCCC, DNC, and Barack Obama's campaign. 

The DC Statehood Green party, which voices the needs of the poor and the cause of an environmentally healthy future in the nation's capital.

Fun

I collect Kalamkari paintings and sculptures of Indian origin. I just love them.

TennisDC, a great way to connect to tennis players in DC.  I also created a Google map of courts in Northwest.

Kirtanorama, for keeping current on devotional chant and yoga events on the East Coast. 
DCKirtan, for keeping up on DC region kirtan.

Family
My family is so terrific. This pic is myself, my fiancé Sraddha, the warmest, wisest, most deep-down-beautiful person I know. She is in her final year of the Masters in Theological Studies program at Harvard Divinity School; after she finishes, we plan to get married sometime in 2010 and live in DC.  And her Mom, a ballet teacher and gifted intuitive, and my Mom, who has worked for the US Army since '86, and has been our rock through some tough times. And my brother Pramode who at 23 already has a biomedical device startup under his belt; he graduated from the Hopkins BME program in May of '08 and now is planning to go to law school, focusing on Intellectual Property law.