I was a PhD student at Duke University, advised by Sayan and his best friend, Jonathan. I was initially drawn to Sayan’s work on applying abstract mathematics to cutting-edge data science applications, but I became even more attracted to his warmth and sense of humor. I particularly enjoyed hearing his stories about his friendship with Jonathan and his playful jokes about birth-death stochastic processes, all accompanied by his whimsical smile. The three of us could have become much closer if not for the pandemic and Sayan’s move to Germany. Despite this, I was happy for him and grateful that he continued to support me. Fortunately, we managed to find a time when we were all in person at Duke for my dissertation defense. The atmosphere could have been more formal, like other dissertations I had seen before, but instead, it felt like just a group of friends talking about math, just like we had before the pandemic. After my successful defense, the three of us went to a steakhouse, and Sayan said to me (in essence), “You are a talented researcher. Ask Jonathan. I wasn’t joking.” Those words have stayed with me, even though I am no longer in academia. After the meal, Sayan also thanked me for being his student, as it gave him the rare opportunity to work with his best friend, even though the three of us never worked on the same paper together. We no longer have that chance anymore.