Don't swallow you gum!!

Get your bums on the saddle!!

I know I shouldn't be preaching this as I am not good at following it, thanks to my mind (it has this little inertia which opposes and combats any move/change that tends to disrupt my rhythm of daily conventional activities). But, I just came across this cool idea of commuting in Bangalore, shared in the Ignite Bangalore event and couldn't help passing it on to the readers.

Yeah! I am talking about "Bicyling in Bangalore" or rather "Biking in Bangalore" (if that would convince you ;)) With the growing pollution, crowd, commotion and fuel costs at its worst-best in Bangalore, this seems to be a perfectly feasible and last probable resort left for the people. I understand that , the elite-few who are already into this movement (an accidental pun??) or those newbies who are getting inspired, are susceptible to some cranky talks around. Facing the traffic one fine morning in a tiny bicycle with a constipated face madeup to look cool while you are actually getting stresssed out pedalling hard is disgusting indeed. It takes nerves and ***** to do something that invites a dozen souls to giggle at you. Perhaps, there would be a saturation limit when the roads can no longer hold automobiles anymore, when the traffic real-estate will become immensely precious and ways to optimize it will be talked of, a web of flyovers spanning the entire 3-D space would have been built and that's when the city might think of conversion to this mode of transport. This is certainly a great idea atleast for those who are willing to take it up. I have myself known a friend of mine, who bicycles through the city.

Why Bangalore makes it easy?
- Great weather all around the year
- Good wide pavements along most roads and there's a talk of cycling lanes too
- Prospects of social networking on the way is high in the city ;)

Positives
- Healthier - exercise built into your commute - the treadmills were inspired by bicycles, now it's time you revert back :)
- Fuel efficient (unaffected by lorry strikes and market)
- Often quicker (average speed) than cars/autos (this you 'll best realize when you drive short distances monitored by multiple junctions and during peak hours)
- Physically and mentally reduces the feel of congestion
- Reduced (rather nil) carbon footprint
- Talk to people on the route and build friends ;)

So, guys! get your bums on the saddle..


Links:
Bangalore Biker's Club
Blog@BumsOnTheSaddleDotCom

Zero Rupee Note - Can it stamp out corruption??

Imagine that you are going to a government office to get some paper cleared & the lazy guy out there refuses to clear your documents & asks you to come back in another few days, weeks or months. You know that he expects you to pay bribe and you really don’t know what to do. So how would you handle such a situation? You want to yell at him, but you don’t know how to express your anger. Here is a solution proposed by a Chennai based NGO.

Fifth Pillar India, an NGO set up to fight corruption, has printed over 200,000 zero-denomination notes that resemble Indian currency and has begun distributing them around the country. The zero rupee note, which resembles an original rupee note, is a sign of unwillingness to bribe. It has the picture of Mahatma Gandhi on it with a pledge "I promise to neither accept nor give bribe" printed both in English and Tamil. It also resolves to 'eliminate corruption at all levels.' The idea is whenever an official asks you for a bribe, just give him the zero rupee note and hope that he'll get the message. It’s to help the corrupt officer understand the message that there's even an oath that's printed on the note. The note is being translated into other languages as well.







Rupees - Front











Rupees - Back






While this is undoubtedly a strange, innovative and daring measure taken by 5th Pillar, it is going to be a herculian task and practically difficult to uproot corruption parallely from all levels. They need a firm support from the public. I have myself been a witness of acute bribery while applying for my passport, getting travels tickets and so on.. An immediate target should be the traffic policemen who demand a whooping sum of money, most of the times unrelated to the offense.

I just hope this helps in bringing out a change!

Links:
Fifth Pillar India
Timesonline Newsletter

Kanjivaram :: A Tamil historical..

The latest hubbub of movies like Slumdog Millionaire and Ghajini has eclipsed a movie which deserves far more attention that what it has received. The movie Kanjivaram (Tamil) showcases a stellar performance by Prakash Raj who plays the lead role that sweeps the viewer completely off his feet by the dedication and theme he portrays.

The movie captioned as "a communist confession", is staged during the British era in the ancient (famous) city of Kanjivaram and is based on the life of silk-weavers in Tamil Nadu during that period and the revolution following it. The following prelude appears before the movie -

"Pushpeshu Jati Purusheshu Vishnu Narishu Ramba Nagereshu Kanchi" - Kalidasa
The above verse "Nagareshu Kanchi" written by the famous Sanskrit poet Kalidasa, states that at one time Kanjivaram was amongst the best cities in ancient India.
In Hinduism, the Pattu (Silk) epitomizes purity of the highest degree. Being an auspicious symbolism and a holy blessing, silk plays a very important role in every Hindu's life in India, and it is a strong belief to be adorned in silk twice in life.
Once at the time of marriage, to ensure the purity of the relationship and once at the time of death, to purify the soul and carry it to heaven.
The silk weavers however, never succeeded in practising this due to their meagre salary. Thus it always remained a distant dream to them. And so, came a revolution..

The movie revolves around a silk-weaver Venkatam (Prakash Raj) cherishing the above dreams and showing the course of his life as he chases them, misfortune and ill-luck striking him on the way.

He dreams of getting his wife adorned in a silk saree and bringing her home, but the huge pile of coins he had saved for years together out of his weaving seems insufficient for it. Soon he is gifted with a girl child and during the traditional ceremony following it, he promises the child as a father that he would get her married in a silk-saree. This evokes immediate ridicule and brouhaha from the people around, but Venkatam is determined to fulfill this for his daughter.

A series of events span the story henceforth - Venkatam, being the best among the weavers is asked to weave a special saree for the marriage of a landlord and he is rewarded by an Englishman who is impressed by the work. While he puts his best efforts daily, he describes his artistic patterns for the saree to be woven, more poetically to his wife and she gets curious to see it once. Venkatam carries her miles along to the wedding of his landlord's daughter so she can get a glimpse of the beautiful saree he had woven and claimed accolades for.

His wife - Annam (Shreya Reddy) dies of illness soon and he is left alone with his daughter, who keeps asking him to show her the silk-saree he had promised her for her marriage. Venkatam buys a weaving machine and hides it behind his home where he secretly works on the saree for his daughter every night. But, the love for his daughter and the desire to fulfill his promise blinds him completely and he steals silk-thread from his workplace to complete the saree for his daughter. He is caught, accused of being a thief and traitor, is mercilessly beaten up and sent to jail, while his daughter is left all alone is her hut. Soon, Venkatam learns that Annam is struck by a paralaytic attack and comes home to see her. <<Senti scene>> Realizing that there's effectively no-one to take care of her until he returns from jail, he lays her to eternal sleep, begging her to forgive him! The last bit of the movie is touching, when he gets reminded of the piece of half-woven silk cloth still lying in his house and gets it to cover her body atleast now, but he finds that it is not long enough!

With a couple of other trivial events, Director - Priyadarshan has made good attempt to take the audience into the English-era , with the B&W screenplay, rickety old-fashioned vehicles, attire of the Zamindars and the weavers, and petty things like the zeal among people to see a motor-vehicle and the excitement about getting their son educated/sending him to army.

I would term this movie as a big success for the director and Prakash Raj!
Definitely worth watching..

Wayanad Trip..

Readers,
Its been ages since my last post. I understand that the world has completely changed by now, several significant events have taken place since my last post :)

* Chandrayaan I launched
* Bush winning the Shoe-Dodging-ing World Title!
* Terrorists & NSG playing hide&seek at Taj
* Obama trying desperately to ban at least the Jokes/Ads on Recession (if not recession itself)

I agree and wholeheartedly accept that my lethargy and only my lethargy attributed to this hibernation. Many a posts still lie as drafts and I don't wanna publish them as they would be now chronologically insane and invite abuses from readers more than anything else :P

So yeah, I have been a regular blogger (at least of my travel-logs) and this column is just to do justice to this ancient practice of mine. It was exactly an year after the Trip to Chikmaglur (NOT to be interpreted as Chick-maglur!), Dec 20 2008, that this one happened.

Wayanad, 255 kms from Bangalore is supposedly called The Plantation District of Kerala and true to its name, it was as we later discovered. A weekend was ahead and we (6 of us) decided to make the best of it. I managed to get hold of a Tavera (I am becoming more inclined to this vehicle and will vouch for it as my favourite trip vehicle, following one of my trip to Tirupathi with Driver_Basavaraj), with high-quality DVD/CD players and a more calm and composed driver than I had seen before. The new guy was rather more posh with a bluetooth headset, had fitted his vehicle with a LCD television screen and the vechicle looked clean. Accomodation was taken care of, we booked a resort at Kenichira called Hilia Resort , where mallu twin sisters Cicy and Elsy (I 'm not cooking things up here!!) were awaiting our arrival cleaning their koart-yaard (mallu for court yard) for our campfire :)

00:30 am, Dec 20 - we started off. The trip till Mysore was cool, none of us slept, there were music and jokes to keep us bright & awake. Highlights were the spike-strips that we so eagerly watched for in the Bangalore-Mysore highway and claimed points :) And ofcourse, Bino told us how our car looked like an aircraft and the highway a runway..
I bet anyone who travels to mysore on a private car will/must stop at one of the CCDs on the way. The ambience these have during the night can never be explained. We had some basic snacks & chai there, but Abheek had some visual entertainment as well :)








The route we followed was: Bangalore >> Mysore >> Nanganund >> Gundlupet >> Sulthan Bathery >> Kalpetta (Wayanad)



As we neared Sulthan Bathery, the stretch of bamboo forests began and we drove past the Bandipur Wild Life Santuary. It was exactly the time when Bino grabbed the front seat and a sudden enthu siezed him and he began paining people (esp his bong prey) to sleep. Our idea was to visit one of the falls in Wayanad and then head to our resort. It wasn't until 9 am that we reached Meenmutty Falls, supposedly one of the biggest falls in Wayanad. I hadn't the slightest idea that this was gonna be a cleaverly disguised intensive trekking as well.

A guide accompanied us into the forests leading to the waterfall and the path got more and more wilder and unnavigable as we moved on. Fatigue took charge and frequent sutta breaks became a necessity! We kept paining the guide at regular intervals to tell us how far we had come close to the fall & about the return route. After a stretch, we could see ropes tied to trees along the mud way to help people move ahead. After an hour of intense trekking, we reached a point from where we could see the Meenmutty falls flowing down from the hills. There was bright sunshine now and it made the water dazzle in a rainbow attire. The rocks where the falls hit the floor, threw off little white flakes of water. It was a visual treat to watch, the roar of water being a stress-reliever. We dropped our initial decision to return after a glimpse of the falls, deciding to instead head till the foot of the waterfalls and probably drench ourselves in the water :)





But, getting to that point wasn't easy either, the rocks were horrendously slippery and gaining a firm foothold was as difficult as trying to touch your nose with the tongue ;) (Well, don't try it now..). Failing our grip, we were once even dragged into the water. I was reminded of the Anjuna Beach in Goa, where wandering in the beach was equivalently painful, the situation there being worse because of dozens of crabs lying clinged onto the rocks. So, reach we did finally and my little Sony Ericsson k530 2MP camera captured all images there (I am glad it's still working despite being profusely drenched). We perched on top of a rock which was continuously hit by the falls and turned around. Boy! Looking at the huge column of water 200 meters high, cascading down towards us and getting us wet was simply smashing. Meenmutty was undoubtedly a prospective candidate for the next Liril Ad ;)



It was now noon and the trek back to our car made us starving souls. Our guide brought us to a hut where they had buttermilk and water as energy-replenishers. Finding a way to Hilia Resort, Kenichira now became a pain. We drove on & on, Cicy and Elsy directing us to all wierd places and routes. But, Hilia Resort wasn't that bad after all. We checked in quick, had a quick shower and darted off to the kitchen where Manu (our patient, strong mallu-englished attendent) served us food. Personally, I loved the food at that moment of hunger and dived into all possible dishes. There were deserts as well - "Sir, please taik these Benena", Manu remarked :)

After this heavy lunch, we decided to take a nap. And Bino, who had brought with him his sentimental tent (his life-time ambition to sleep in a tent was going to materialize!), unpacked his stuff. We found a lawn nearby where we began setting the tent. I was excited to spend the entire night in it. After a heavy nap (an oxymoron??), we woke up in the evening and called for the campfire which was lit just beside the lawn in the koart-yard (as Cicy & Elcy had sincerely mentioned). It was then that we spotted few hammocks in the garden and in the scurry to capture one for myself, I tripped not noticing a broad ditch and sprained my toe!



We ordered some starters sitting beside the campfire. While we were wondering what to talk about, Bino began unravelling his secret questions ;) The ones over which he had pondered for long and for whom the answers he never knew. We argued on ones like - "Euthenesia being legal or not!", "AI taking over the world entirely in near future?" and a holistic talk about topics like marriage, sex etc.. We finally realized that everybody has a opinion of his own and establishing any conclusion/consensus wasn't always the right thing to do. But, ofcourse the brainstorming was good :) I remembered my college days, it was during the exam nights that we used to do the popular group study. We would discuss about all social/political/xyz/.. topics. Couple of hours before the semester exams, there would be arguments on why Sachin is better than Ganguly, why Bush was an a******, which famous business idea would revolutionize the world, hot vs homely girls :P, etc.. We decided that we shall have the dinner and come back to the campfire and spend some time late night before we went to bed. Bino & me planned to take the tent. We stayed awake till 2 am singing/screaming in the night (ironically we were the only people in that house, so it didn't matter), till sleep and the pain in my toe almost took over and I had to crash in the tent. It was cozy and warm, we zipped the tent from inside and kept little windows open. It was a cool feeling to lie down listening to sounds in the forest and the moist fragrance of the trees around. I had a sound sleep and woke up at only 10 am next morning. We had planned to wake up early and visit most places before we left Wayanad, but it seemed like we were late already. Calling up Manu, we decided we would pack up, have lunch and leave to Bangalore, visiting two places on the way, Pookot Lake & Lakkidi Hill View. The lunch was taking a while and we thought of exploring the Hilia Resort garden where we found that they had impressive recreational facilities as well - a badminton court, TableTennis, Carrom and a Cricket Kit!

We had our last food @ Hilia and left the place at 3:30 pm. It was getting dark and we had to cover ~35-40 kms to reach the Pookot Lake. When we did finally, we realized that we were late by 5 mins and the boating was closed for the day :( There was now no choice but to walk around the lake and we moved on not knowing what else to do. But, this walk was significant in several aspects - we had the most hilarious of all conversations and came up with some business plans as well. Sanjay and Bino devised their Healthy Cigarrettes product, cigarrettes which could basically serve a purpose to heal people of ailments and be used universally with the statuatory warning - Cigarrette smoking is now RECOMMENDED for good health :) A little further, we found a whole new concept of social networking <<content suppressed>>..



Taking couple of snaps, we headed to the Lakkidi View Point, which was just a roadside on a hill, where from one could see the district of Wayanad below. The highway to Calicut meandered amongst the forests with little lights of vehicles flashing (it was getting dark now and cold as well). We spent couple of minutes there and started off back to Bangalore, it was 6:30 pm now.



By the time we reached Mysore, we were shit hungry and were lucky enough to get into a good hotel for dinner. And after the food, we decided to relax and played a movie in our Tavera. When we got back home (Bangalore) it was 2 pm.

Overall, an extremely memorable trip - full of Bino ;) We missed out few other places in Wayanad, which are noteably good as well. If you are planning to visit Wayanad, please note the following:
1) Wayanad, is not a town by itself. It's an entire district.
2) Other Popular places (apart from ones mentioned above) of visit are - Muthanga Wildlife Santuary, Chembra Peak, Edakkal Caves, Soochipara Falls, Kuruva Dweep
3) A weekend may not be sufficient to explore all of them, especially if you are planning to relax at a resort :)

TWU kicks off..

ThoughtWorks University (Batch 9)



Trip1 : Bangalore City tour - Jun 6, '08
Places Covered
* Bull Temple
* Lalbagh Botanical Gardens
* Lunch @ Koshys, St Marks Rd


Trip2 : Trip to Mascal - Jun 14, '08


TWU Graduation Function : July 18 '08

Some of the best Vadivel's Dialogues..

Couldn't stop myself from sharing these hilarious tracks online..













P.S> For the benefit of those who aren't aware of Vadivelu - "He's a leading comedian
in the Tamil Cinema"..

Definition of Cricket..

You have two sides, one out in the field and one in. Each man that's in the side that's in goes out, and when he's out he comes in and the next man goes in until he's out. When they are all out, the side that's out comes in and the side that's been in goes out and tries to get those coming in, out.

Sometimes you get men still in and not out. When a man goes out to go in, the men who are out try to get him out, and when he is out he goes in and the next man in goes out and goes in.

There are two men called umpires who stay all out all the time and they decide when the men who are in are out. When both sides have been in and all the men have been out, and both sides have been out twice after all the men have been in, including those who are not out, that is the end of the game! Simple!

Know your new Airport..

The new Bengaluru International Airport will commence operations on Friday, May 23, 2008 (00:01 hours of May 23). All flights landing and departing after midnight will operate from the new airport and flights arriving before midnight (on May 22, 2008) and departing after midnight will also operate from the new airport. As the date fast approaches, some insights into the whole new passenger experience that awaits you.

Departure from Bengaluru International Airport
Please find information on the location of the airport and the various means of transport how to get there in the attached materials. Once you arrived at the airport, enter the check in hall, which is common for domestic and international passengers. There are 53 Check In Counters and 18 Self check in machines. There is no need to screen your bag before check in.

Once you have checked in, follow the domestic and international departure gate signs on the first floor and proceed through security. Post security check you have on offer a wide array of retail and food & beverage outlets. There are also comfortable lounges for first and business class passengers. Free Wi-Fi Internet is also available for those carrying their laptops.

Arrival at Bengaluru International Airport

The airport is equipped with adequate number of immigration counters and baggage carousels for quick baggage retrieval. A large duty free shop is also located in the baggage claim area.
The following means of transport are available from day one:
* AC Volvo Buses operated by BMTC to key destinations in the city (Indicative Price to MG Road: Rs. 120)
*Reliable professional taxi services operated by MERU and Easycabs, with a metered fare (Indicative Rate to MG Road: Rs. 600)
*Premium Limousines operated by Hertz and Akbar Travels – cars with drivers as well as self driven cars are available.

However, Please note that all international passengers would be charged a user development fee of Rs 1070/- per ticket.

This way your travel experience should be to “Breeze in & Breeze Out”.





Documents for your reference:

Traffic & Parking Map - Upload a doc

Read this doc on Scribd: Traffic & Parking Map

Airport Shuttle Service - Upload a doc

Read this doc on Scribd: Airport Shuttle Service

Easy Guide - Upload a doc

Read this doc on Scribd: Easy Guide

Landmark Map



(Courtesy: Official Website of Bengaluru International Airport)

Innovative Film City, Bangalore

Last week, I happened to discover yet another place to hang-out for a day & loot all the fun :)

Ever heard of the upcoming theme park - Innovative Film City ??

Though much of it is not functional and the theme center is still under construction, they have opened up a sizeable number of activities right now itself (termed as their Entertainment District).
Visit their website for more updates.

Masti UnPlugged!

This place lies on the Bangalore-Mysore highway, precisely near the Toyota Industry in the Bidadi Industrial Estate. So, if you plan to start on any "bangalore-morning", set your timings meticulously to avoid getting there late absorbed by the "baffling" traffic en-route.

We reached the spot @ ~10:30 am, our initial reactions were those of a cornered scapegoat since we were skeptical of the complex and by inspection it sounded/seemed as though entire thing was running on a Trial-Basis! "Laboratory rats" - was the term used by one of my teammates.

Jokes apart, I must say - lot of preliminary planning has gone into this arena and they have planned to endow it with a versatile set of activities that run from the typical rides found @ Wonderla, water park, beach, museums, sports and theatre experience. My personal suggestion would be to visit Wonderla with your peers (as its monopolized with rides, quite unsuitable for older folks & family members) and spend time @ Innovative Film City with your family (trust me, all age-groups have been targeted).

The whole place opens up with the air of a authentic film shooting spot with palaces, pillars and ancient structures designed. Quite a lot of this was still under construction, I just imagined how the whole place would seem when it gets cent percent going.

But, going a little further I could sense that there were actually quite a lot of activities operational and we decided to explore them all.

Dino Park
Excellent for kids. An attempt to revitalize the era of the dinosaurs, with artificially resurrected dino's of all species in their native habitats. They have been made to move and make noises adding to the ambience.

Mirror Maze
Cleverly designed maze wherein you are supposed to figure your way out to the exit. The interiors deceive you at all corners with your brain battling to differentiate the real from the image. If you see your friends anywhere inside, beware! It might just be their images..

Ripley's Believe It or Not!
Consists of Ripley's miracles and all his mysterious collections. What you see inside truly leaves you spellbound!

Wax Museum
Its all a huge collection of Louis Tussaud's Wax works and his expertise shows up in the lusture and intricate looks of all his subjects inside. You find wax statues of renowned hollywood personalities, political leaders, religious and national leaders, fictional characters, etc..

4D Movie Theater

I had been making wild guesses about the fourth-dimension here right from the beginning. But, when it unfolds before you in the theater, believe me - you go wild! Its a movie about the evolution of earth, origin of life, time of the dinosaurs, bla bla bla.. But a fourth-dimension of "sense" has been added to the movie, thereby making you feel the ambience. You find the dinosaurs' walk up to you, open it mouth right at the tip of your nose and a jet of hot air hit your cheeks!! You are taken into the realms of the ocean and you find yourself "actually" drenched!!
You are able to sense octopuses that sneak past between you legs with their filthy skin and touch! Meteors and other celestial bodies that hit the earth leave you reverberating physically!
An enchanting movie during which you buzz off into a dreamland :)

Mini-Golf
My first experience with golf and I would that its the best way to play this game if you don't have the patience to travel long distance with the clubs and time to take your shots. You have 18 holes to complete and get all kinds of terrains to battle through. Surprisingly, I got addicted to this game sooner than I expected!

Go-Karting
Usual stuff. A comparatively smaller race lap. Its designed to lend a completeness to the entertainment-district rather than offer a professional racing experience.
Amateurs - Welcome!
Professionals - Its not your cup of tea!

Aqua Kingdom
Contains an artificial beach ridden with palm trees, benches and a beach-volleyball court. There are wave pools operational in the evening.

The excitement and fun here is gonna double as Innovative gets the rest of its facilities ready!



Download Innovative Map
Download Entertainment District [1], [2]

Another blog bearing details and more profound pics from this place

Contact:
Mr Varma, 9844700098, varma@innovativefilmcity.in
http://www.innovativefilmcity.net/index.asp
Innovative Film City, Bangalore

Does a fish go pee..

Does a fish go pee
when it's swimming in the sea?
Does it ever get the notion
when it's swimming in the ocean?
Does a fish take a leak
when it's swimming in the creek?
Do they do it in a muddle
when you see them in a puddle?
Does a fish ever miss
when it's taking a p___,
Does a fish find urination
when in the farmer's irrigation?
Do you think they're rather fond
of going potty in the pond,
and, then, for goodness sake,
do they go while in the lake?
Do they tinkle at all
while in the waterfall?
Could you see a yellow gleam
as they do it in the stream?
Now take a little quiz:
Does a fish ever whiz?
Does a fish go pee
when it's swimming in the sea?

Courtesy : FunnyPoets

This Is Going To Hurt Just A Little Bit

Just flew past this poem and I thought you should give it a read.. I remember the laughter we cracked when we first read it as our school lessons..

This is just going to hurt a little bit

One thing I like less than most things is sitting in a dentist chair with
my mouth wide open.
And that I will never have to do it again is a hope that I am against hope hopen.

Because some tortures are physical and some are mental,
But the one that is both is dental.
It is hard to be self-possessed
With your jaw digging into your chest.

So hard to retain your calm
When your fingernails are making serious alterations in your life line
or love line or some other important line in your palm;

So hard to give your usual effect of cheery benignity
When you know your position is one of the two or three in life
most lacking in dignity.

And your mouth is like a section of road that is being worked on.
And it is all cluttered up with stone crushers and concrete mixers and
drills and steam rollers and there isn't a nerve in your head that
you aren't being irked on.

Oh, some people are unfortunate enough to be strung up by thumbs.
And others have things done to their gums,
And your teeth are supposed to be being polished,
But you have reason to believe they are being demolished.
And the circumstance that adds most to your terror
Is that it's all done with a mirror,
Because the dentist may be a bear, or as the Romans used to say, only
they were referring to a feminine bear when they said it, an ursa,
But all the same how can you be sure when he takes his crowbar in one
hand and mirror in the other he won't get mixed up, the way you
do when you try to tie a bow tie with the aid of a mirror, and forget
that left is right and vice versa?

And then at last he says That will be all; but it isn't because he then
coats your mouth from cellar to roof
With something that I suspect is generally used to put a shine on a
horse's hoof.

And you totter to your feet and think. Well it's all over now and after
all it was only this once.
And he says come back in three monce.
And this, O Fate, is I think the most vicious circle that thou ever sentest, That Man has to go continually to the dentist to keep his teeth in good
condition when the chief reason he wants his teeth in good condition
is so that he won't have to go to the dentist.

- Ogden Nash

Scripting a World of Imagination!

“What a blind person needs is not a teacher but another self” – Helen Keller

TMGi team members at NAB.

There was tremendous joy in the air during the recently concluded TMGi Q1 quarterly event, as every year the team devotes its first quarterly event for a social cause. On March 21, 2008 the team was all set for an exciting visit to the world of folks who are challenged and strong willed. The team along with RDC school children visited National Association for Blind with much curiosity to see how the NAB trainees/individuals are trained to become successful software engineers, call center experts, textile weavers in their own ways.

One of the trainees at NAB displays amazing dexterity in using his Braille notes.

Highly elated, Director of NAB, Mr. Srinivas briefed the team about NAB and its objectives. This was followed by a stunningly fluent and impressive speech by one of the trainees at NAB. He displayed amazing dexterity in using his Braille notes. In order to engage and connect with the NAB students a number of Intel-NAB team building games were organized. The activities included – Blindfolded games, Scavenger Hunt, etc. But the highlight of the day was the Dice-Cricket which set out a flutter of excitement from the trainees.

Highlights of the team building games
Unique Scavenger Hunt: A very interesting and unique Scavenger Hunt was organized, wherein the list of items to be collected were engraved in Braille script and the team comprising of employees and trainees had to find the complete list of items ranging from items like pink clip, leather belt to a dry leaf.

Dice cricket in progress.

Dice cricket: Dice-Cricket was organized by the NAB staff, wherein two teams stood facing each other with a table in between. This table served as the Pitch. The game progressed by players of the fielding side rolling the dice on to the ‘pitch’ and the batting side doing the same to score runs.

Pass-the-parcel game in progress..

Pass–the-parcel: Two teams made up of both trainees and employees were formed. The employees were blindfolded and were asked to pass the parcel. The trainees were all excited and anxious to grab the parcel and record their win! With all the high energy flowing around, few employee volunteers took up the initiative to engage the RDC school children in a variety of events like drawing, coloring, lemon and spoon, singing and dancing events.

The team visits the NAB workshop.

After a lip-smacking and yummy lunch the team visited the training centers to understand how NAB provides training to its participants to become independent individuals. We saw them work on lathe machines, filing, drilling, and engaged in carpentry work as well as programming in VC++/Oracle on the computers. It was a pleasure to see all the resources that NAB had, these resources ranged from Braille Scripts, Slits to help the trainees punch their letters, a full-fledged library with versatile collection of Braille-ed books, electronic Braille Printer and other Multimedia devices just to mention a few. Besides this, NAB also showed us their excellent placement records with their trainees joining leading companies which included IT firms too.

After this short excursion through NAB, we witnessed yet another feat that proved to us that these trainees were multi-skilled despite being differently challenged. Quite a few of the students volunteered during the tea break to entertain us with their melodious songs. Prizes were given away to the trainees who came forward to sing and we must admit we noticed a couple of budding artists.

With fond memories of the day, we bid adieu cherishing the wonderful moments that we spent at NAB with the vivid thumb impressions of all the employees on a flip-chart. It was a feeling of joy and content to watch these students have fun amidst all the challenges that they were faced with.

"Opportunity, rather than charity" is what these individuals need.

Gallery :

Get in Touch with NAB :
NAB Rehabilitation Complex
CA Site No:4, NAB Road, Jeevan Bima Nagar,
Bangalore-560 075
India
Ph: +91-80-25281590 / +91-80-25281439
Mail: nabkarnataka@yahoo.co.in
Website: http://www.nabkarnataka.org/innerpage.html

"Honesty is the best Policy" (Proof & Contradiction)

I am not gonna take you into any proverbial training here! It was an auto-walah who raised this saying (fyi, he did it in English), and impressed us by his square actions.

[All conversation in red are by the auto-walah and are reproduced exactly.. He spoke in English, Mind you!]
I took an auto from Murugeshpalaya (a.k.a Chemfort vicinity), after having had a proper dinner @ Maduri Grand. I was with two of my friends (Antony, Varalu) and we began to chatter in Tamil. We had barely gone few mts that this guy grew interested in us - "Sir, Are you all from Tamil Nadu ? Which place are you from Sir ?".
"Yes, all belong to different places..". On hearing that one of us were from Chennai - "Sir, I would like to travel to Chennai and see the sea there!" (He grinned, glancing back at us, impressed by the literary effect he had successfully created). I was taken aback by his remarkably flawless syntax. Everybody speaks English, but this one was too polished & well laid out for an auto-walah. And so, we told him what he had to do to see the sea :) He seemed happy and continued (willing to converse more in English) - "Sir, how is my English ?". I was too overwhelmed and hit him with my appeciation - "Wah! kya english hai :)".
"Sir, I have been practising this language for the past one month, in just this small time I was able to learn this. I have been reading this newspaper regularly". And he showed us the Mid-Day Newspaper. "It is a very good feeling Sir. Everybody should learn English. Hindi is just our National language, but English is International language!". We nodded. It was a short ride and we soon got down. As we glanced at him to tell us the fare (for every Bangalorean who makes daily auto-trips, this is the most aweful moment with butterflies in his stomach while the auto-walah comes out with his G.P.F - greatest possible fare and presents his magical formula that helped him arrive at this stupendous figure!). He didn't budge, instead - "Sir, how much does the meter show ?". Then he took out his paper that would help him magnify the fare - "New rates sir, for 38 it comes to 40, look sir, correct ?". We would have given him any amount he demanded for the impression he had created, but he insisted - "Sir, it is the right of every passenger to see this and check". The G.P.F for him, pointed to Rs 60/-, which I happily paid (now this is what I called cent-percent Customer Satisfaction) and moved out wondering how the city would be had every auto-walah been like him.
As he rightly said - "Honesty is the best policy".
HENCE PROVED !

Now comes the contradiction, (I cite for this, an incident which occured on the same day, infact just couple of hours before we had dinner and got into the above said auto). We were returning from the brandfactory (marathahalli) in a BMTC bus and I held out the fare (which is also a G.P.F here in Bangalore, bus rates being mercilessly high) - 20 Rs. He gave me tkts which costed 18. I knew I had to get the change back, so waited as the conductor buzzed by to issue tkts to others at the other end of the bus. As my stop grew nearer, we asked him for the change for which made a jeering remark calling us software engineers and hinting at us not to make a big fuss about it. He finally pulled out the 2 Rs and tossed it to me, asking me for our tkts. I was under the impression that he wanted to cross-check and do some ksrtc fundae. But, he did something different. He got our tkts and handed them over to another fellow ! We were spellbound. This was the finest execution of day-robbery (regret : directly translated from its Tamil equivalent).
I have witnessed conductors get money & sneak away without issuing tkts. Others procrastinate issuing the change to passengers till its too late and the passengers let it go. I have often wondered about the number of commuters that BMTC serves and such petty incidents hit the corporation severly in terms of revenue. I must say the goverment takes heed of such acts and ensures people are issued tkts to the right place and at the right scale (leave alone the possibility of them not buying a tkt, its becoming the other way round - Conductors not issuing tkts!).
HENCE, CONTRADICTED !

Dev Camp - Bangalore

DevCamp 2008 was my first unconference & I was pretty much excited to be a part of it ! (missed the BarCamp narrowly!). Getting done with my college review I rushed to Bangalore (accompanied by Varalu) to be on time (the alarming number of registrations being my primary concern - 600 or so). We lined up at ThoughtWorks by 9:30 am on where the preliminary registration got over & we got in. There was a reasonable crowd actually - 200 participants or so.
We got started at 10:00 after an introduction of all those who had planned to deliver talks. My greatest delight was on seeing Martin Fowler there, who though dint plan any talk (as he said : "This camp is for the bangaloreans, not for a Phirangi !"). It was a reasonably large list of sessions and we managed to attend some real cool ones among them.

Sessions I attended :
LINQ: Working with data in a natural way - (by Bijoy Singhal)
Poshzones - A bazaar approach to the Semantic web - (by Sriram Narayan)
Aakraman - A game where your Ruby code competes with that of others - (by Chirag/Akshay)
Monads in Depth - by Ravi Mohan
A brand new approach to Indic Language Typing - by Nigel Fernandes
Mashup of Wordpress and Twitter - by ujji
Programming with Android - by Selvan
Let's Develop an Open J2ME Mobile Game - by Zarina
Session on TringMe and its applications
Product design and definition for developers - by Yogi

And, a special mention to ThoughtWorks for hosting the event & volunteering it well.

Pics on devcamp '08 can be found here : (sad that I couldnt carry my cam!)
Digest1
Digest2


Btw, we did some live blogging too. Read More..

Traffic Tamasha.. (Odd/Even Rule ??)

That Bengaluru is a genuine Garden City is a known & well-accepted fact, with adequate number of parks set everywhere and the wisest decision taken ever - retaining all those good old trees along the roads! But how long this city is going to inspire its inhabitants is a million-dollar question. With congestion developing all over the city and every possible space knit with flyovers, congested roads turning into a candidate for the highly popular one-way philosophy & over 200 new vehicles hitting roads everyday adding up to the already fragile network of roads (one-ways I would rather call them!), I see this cosmopolitan city inching towards a deadend !

Gone are the days when motorists stuck to the roads & traffic signs, new axioms have now emerged - follow the road when the signal shows green, follow the footpath when the signal shows red! The inventor of this new style of driving deserves sheer appreciation. Dangling up & down between the pavement & the road when the signal toggles, these prank loving auto-geeks make it miserable for a typical 'sadhu' driver to move ahead peacefully.

Traffic jams have become inevitable part of the daily life - I have seen the worst ones materialize and worsen in Airport Road and Outer-Ring Road (to mention just a few), wherein vehicles stay lined up for hours together without batting an eyelid. The capacity of roads in Bangalore is in total disproportion to the exorbitantly high number of vehicles plying, thus flushing out traffic from a junction or a signal is not a cakewalk. Statistics reveal that every km road has about 714 vehicles, hence proving that traffic density in bangalore is greatest. Read this wonderful post on Bangalore Jams.

The City Traffic Police has come up with a novel (thoroughly debatable though!) idea of introducing the alternate day system to reduce the congestion on roads (Source: Times of Indian, Jan 13). This rule will allow vehicles ending with odd and even registration numbers, respectively, to ply on alternate days. This means a vehicle owner takes out his/her vehicle on alternate days. By doing so, 30% reduction in the traffic is targeted. Government & Public Transport would be however exempted from this rule. Besides crunching the traffic down massively (a 30-50% decrease == massive), it would reduce pollution and promote use of public transport. But, again these are days of nanos and so if this rule gets a permanent nod, car buyers could go for two nano's (with odd & even registration respectively) thereby, not falling prey to the govt ;) Its now left to the govt to decide within a month's time whether the rule is to be approved or not. Meanwhile its a sit-n-debate time for the audience.

The govt could also take some time off and take some sane decisions regarding widening roads (esp because most of the roads are reported to be surrounded by ditches and wastelands) and limiting the number of vehicles being registered perday/perperson or whatsoever.


Other links I hit upon:
Driving India is a site dedicated to provide Driving Education to people.

Apple releases MacBook Air !

Apple unleashed yet another revolutionary gizmo of its world on Tuesday - "MacBook Air". Delivering the keynote address at the Macworld Expo (I would recommend you to watch this out!), CEO Steve Jobs introduced this phenomenal laptop to the world as "the world's thinnest laptop", probably only comparable to Sony's TZ Ultraportable but ruling it out on "thickness" grounds !

I particularly was impressed by the way he pulled out his MacBook Air out of an envelope & held it at the audience, advocating - "you can get a feel of how thin it is !". Sporting a silvery finish, the MacBook Air features a 13.3-inch LED-backlit widescreen display that has a 1280 x 800 pixel resolution. The backlighting saves power and provides "instant on" response from the moment you turn it on, according to Jobs. The MacBook Air also features a built-in iSight webcam and a full sized MacBook-style black keyboard. The keyboard is backlit, similar to MacBook Pros, and has an ambient light sensor that automatically adjusts brightness. The MacBook Air trackpad has something termed as "Multi-touch gestures", which are an extension of the conventional gestures built-in in some standard laptops and ofcourse the iFone !
For instance, one trackpad gesture could be 'moving your finger clockwise on the trackpad to rotate an image clockwise!!'

Air has relied on an 1.8-inch hard disk drive with 80GB of storage capacity standard, with a optional 64GB solid-state disk (SSD) drive, which Apple indisputably relies upon having shipped tens of millions of such miniscule harddisks for its iPod devices. 'But the real magic is in the electronics' - remarks Jobs. Its a complete Mac (all the electronic circuitry) on a board that's just as long as a pencil. It uses Intel Core 2 Duo processor @ 1.6GHz (and optional 1.8GHz).

Turning to the networking dimensions, the Air has its most advanced 802.11n-based wireless networking support and Bluetooth + EDR. Jobs claims that with wireless networking turned on, one can get about 5 hours of battery life.

Jobs is pricing the Air at $1799, its shipping set to commence in two weeks.

For more details and a visual experience of the Air take the Guided Tour !

Other stuff worth heeding to:
Xavier Lanier's 'how-the-laptop-looks-like-in-the-real-world' video
What Sony thinks of MacBook Air

Misty Monday Morning !

This morning was undoubtedly the best ones I have seen in Bangalore, with weather striking perfection. The 17 degrees Celsius Bangalore was clad in cent percent concentrated fog that hovered over every possible corner. As I stepped into the big busy Sony World Signal @ Koramangala, I was only astounded to realize that this junction that saw scores of cabs pass by every morning was literally invisible. Now, this is what I call Zero-Visibility! Company Cabs crawled through the whiteness, headlights on while people standing around waiting for their's marvelled at the meteorological spectacle.

Desperate to ensnare the bewitching weather, I shot a few glimpses of this delightful ambience enroute to my office, resonating between the window seats of my bus. I wondered how my driver managed to creep through, with absolutely nothing to see ahead. Such was the terrific fog that the huge Ecospace building (that housed Accenture) and the entirety of Intel Campus went completely untraceable from the Outer Ring Road. And if the reader wishes to get a hands on experience of this, I would suggest him to buzz by the 500 mt stretch of Sarjapura Road at Agra, wherein the entire space behind the Lemon Grass Restaurant remains disguised in fog, most of the days.

For those who missed out, here's the experience :

(P.S. Special thanks to my friends for their mobile cam's)

(NOTE:: Technical error caused this post to be dated SUNDAY Jan 13, though it has been posted today ie. MONDAY, Jan 14)

LakhTakia gets a rapturous welcome !

Keeping up his promise made 4 yrs ago to deliver a "people's car", Ratan Tata unveiled this Rs 1 Lakh car christened Nano, that's being nick-named "LakhTakia" because of its "One Lakh Price Tag".

Nano comes with a Rear mounted all aluminium 2-cylinder 623cc petrol engine, promising a mileage of 20 km/litre and surprisingly meets all emission/safety standards. Though it is 8% smaller than the revolutionary Maruti-800, it is claimed to be 21% more spacious from inside. Initially, the car will have 3 variants, a Standard Model costing 1 Lakh & 2 luxury(deluxe) ones that would be slightly costlier than its standard counterpart. More variants would be gradually introduced, including one with a Diesel engine.

Technologically speaking, Nano has staged a milestone for not just Indian automobile industry but even the Global auto sector by providing the cheapest conveyance for just $2500, whereas in US the cheapest car comes in a price range of $10,000 - $15,000.

Key Features of TATA Nano:
* Smaller than Maruti 800 in length, more spacious inside.




* Dealer price of Nano - Rs 1 lakh,VAT and transporation cost extra.

* Nano meets emission norms : Bharat III and Euro 4. In safety norms, Nano is equipped with crumple zones, intrusion resistant doors, seat belts, strong seat anchorages & has passed the full frontal crash test.

* Minimal instruments (speedometer, fuel guage & oil light), single windshield wiper.
* Front luggage compartment that holds a battery, windshield washer container and enough space for a SINGLE SUITCASE.
* No radio, air conditioning, power steering or power windows available in the Standard Model.

However, there's leading concern among the Environmentalists that on gaining victory, Nano might clog the Indian roads & add up to the already soaring pollution levels.

Whether Nano makes its mark in the auto-industry & wins the hearts of the Indian population or goes down as another sober design model remains to see !!

Why product testing is so important !