The Lonely Corner

My Culinary Favorites...

2011-12-28T06:40:00.000-08:00

As the year comes to an end, I thought it is a good idea to list down my culinary favorites.


Fish:                  Salmon (pan seared fillet on a bed of garlic spinach)
Meat:                  Grilled Steak (medium well)
Poultry:               Rotisserie Chicken
Poultry, Boneless:     Grilled Chicken
Eggs:                  Sunny-side Up
Kebabs:                Chicken Malai Tikka
Non-Veg Curry:         Mutton Roganjosh
Veg Curry:             Methi Matar Malai (Fenugreek, Peas and Cream)
Dal:                   Yellow Dal Tadka (Pigeon Peas)
Beans:                 Red Kidney Beans
Breads:                Garlic Naan
Parantha, Non-stuffed: Methi (Fenugreek Leaves)
Parantha, Stuffed:     Paneer Parantha
Rice:                  Jeera Rice (Cumin)
Noodles:               Maggi (Plain)
Pasta:                 Penne (with Pesto Sauce)
Curd:                  Bathua Raita (Lamb's Quarters)
Sweet:                 Moong Dal Halwa
Ice-cream:             Butterscotch
Wine:                  Merlot
Cocktail:              Bloody Mary
Liquor:                Chivas on-the-rocks
Coffee:                Espresso (arabica, medium roast)

Please do comment and add your favorites to the list and do mention where should I try these...

Finally found an old whitepaper written by me...

2011-07-23T06:10:00.000-07:00

Those were days when Internet wasn't common and email was rare. The speed was measured into single digit kbps (as in 4 kbps)...

Wondering where to upload that...

My Article...

2010-11-29T11:22:00.000-08:00

I have co-authored an article on how IT can play a significant role in achieving business cost optimization and increased agility and have listed down few things CIOs should embark upon. If you find it interesting, discuss it here...

Learn from Melbourne...

2010-09-14T01:59:00.000-07:00

Melbourne is doing something that really excited me. They are putting up bicycle stands for people to take the bike for short to medium distance travel. See one stand above... It is a great idea for people that come to office in car or public transport to use these for small distances. You can leave it at next stand. There is a fee for use and longer usage plans are available.

One thing that I think should be included is helmet rental. I wanted to try out one but was told by a passerby that helmets are required for usage. I am a visitor. Why would I roam around with a helmet around my back?

Inception - great movie to watch

2010-07-24T08:11:00.000-07:00

Finally, I would say their is a film this year, that I enjoyed thoroughly. One of the best movies ever made. If you haven't seen it, go watch in theaters while you still can.

I like to watch movies on big screen but time constraints and small release window mean that you should be a continuous lookout for good movies and follow them closely to meet their release schedule. It has happened to me more than once that movie I wanted to watch came to India in a period, when I was in USA and the movie was no longer in theaters in USA. Perhaps, for people like me, global release within days of each other helps a lot. Anyone listening...

Outliers.. an interesting read

2010-07-24T07:55:00.000-07:00

Just finished reading Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. A really well complied book and fascinating analysis. Given my slow pace and (lack of) commitment to reading, I did well to finish the book in under 3 months. But the book kept its attention thorough out the period and I keep returning to it whenever the book reading itch got to me.

I like the depth and must confess that similarity of analysis between the way I contemplate and the way he has done. Perhaps, that's what kept me at it. I would recommend this to anyone who care to think different...

180 Pounds and Falling

2010-06-14T17:41:00.000-07:00

I have finally hit the scales at less than 180 pounds. The long term weight trend is now bearish. There was a medium strength pull in last couple of days but yesterday's fall has taken me below 180 mark and also established that the trend is continuing to be bearish. I have lost 7 pounds in last 7 weeks and I used to weigh as much as 212 pounds at some time. But those days are gone... I still remain a foodie and perhaps have to work on it more to go further.

Reducing weight is pretty much like traveling close to speed of light. For acceleration, you need to spend more fuel than what you spent previously. (and for additional weight loss, you need to exercise more than previously) And like there is a limit to how much fast you can go, there is a limit to how much final weight loss you can achieve...

Moving iTunes collection from Windows XP to Windows 7

2010-03-17T09:52:00.000-07:00

I have just moved my collection from XP to Win 7 verbatim ... complete with all playlists, ratings and play counts. Thought of sharing the various steps I did to make it happen. It is easy enough if you can do basic copying.

First, move your complete collection to a portable drive .. say F: (and let iTunes manage the collection).

Backup your My Music folder as well as your Document and Settings folder in XP. (generally found under C:\Documents and Settings\...)

Next install iTunes on your Win 7 box. Pretty straight forward.

Start iTunes and deselect all auto search et al. You have a clean iTunes installation. Close down iTunes. Wait for few minutes to ensure that it has exited completely.

Next Follow These...

1. Copy "C:\Documents and Settings\yourusername\Local Settings\Application Data\Apple Computer\iTunes" from XP backup to "C:\Users\yourusername\Local Settings\Application Data\Apple Computer\iTunes" in Win 7.

2. Copy "C:\Documents and Settings\yourusername\Application Data\Apple Computer\iTunes" from XP backup to "C:\Users\yourusername\Application Data\Apple Computer\iTunes" in Win 7. (this look identical but notice Local Settings in path.

3. Copy "My Music\iTunes" (from my documents backup in win xp) to "My Music\iTunes" in Win 7 Libraries.

In above steps, replace with your user name (yourusername) in corresponding operating systems. Also, if you are like me, you would have moved My Documents from default location to separate drive. Remember to change the path accordingly.

Now start iTunes again.

All your music, playlists and settings are back. As if nothing happened.

Note that if you are in different systems, the path to removable drive should be same (such as F:) in both systems. Change the system drive letters, if need be to achieve this. Choose a path that is rarely used such as letters from M: / N: / O: etc.

Good Luck...

Changing Face of India, or, is it?

2010-01-31T01:41:00.001-08:00

The new version of old DD classic national integration song "Mile Sur Mera Tumhara" (old one, new part 1, part 2) has been released on Zoom. What a waste...

The new version lacked the soul and essence of old in spite of being 3 times longer. Not sure what are they trying to depict. None of the so called "heroes" are in a single frame. They don't want to share screen with each other and you are trying to depict national integration? I don't understand what is Karan Johar doing in this. At least, old one had 3 top actors of that time in single screen shot. Unity shows. You don't have to sing or act. It reflects.

Also, India is much beyond *ollywoods and musicians. We have great sports persons across shooting, chess, hockey and many other beside cricket, great scientists, great industrialists, great entrepreneurs, great social workers, great war heroes and of course, great politicians! And to say that none of the current living souls in India would qualify on proper merits and fill such a national integration song with bogus screen artistes is an insult to Indian citizens and India.

How much low would media go to gain TRPs and exploit us as a nation? We anyway don't have a news channel and I have to rely on BBC world to get meaningful news. We have horrible movie channels that elongate a 2.5 hour entertainment into 4 hr painful experience. And I have to pay to watch this s**t. I'm sick of Neo Cricket for not allowing us to see replays and watch the game on full TV with their cricket-in-an-ad broadcasts.

Capitalism is good, Capitalism-with-curry-and-tadka is bad. But perhaps this is what happens when Indians do it...

What is "Outsource"?

2010-01-28T02:01:00.000-08:00

Obama vows to fight "outsourcing" and using tax credits as one of the means. I don't know why...

Does he plan to put tax burden on companies that "import" finished and unfinished goods from outside US. Creation of toilet paper is outsourced to China. Creation of T-Shirts are outsourced to Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. Creation of numerous clothing is outsourced to China and to other countries. To me, outsourcing of manufacturing is equivalent to outsourcing of IT services. If Obama is serious, he should find the grass root problems and fix them. What is the additional value add that a highly paid US worker brings over meagerly paid people elsewhere?

GM Diet Final Day

2010-01-23T01:02:00.000-08:00

Well, it isn't working the way it supposed to be or hyped to be. I'm still 194 pounds on Day 7. Don't know if it was worth trying. Today is the final day and it is past lunch time... whatever "lunch" there it is...

After six and a half days, I'm still the same. Some people say that I look thinner but scale does not agree...

The most difficult part so far on this diet to me is 10 glasses of water every day. It is cold over here and you don't feel like drinking water that too at a rate of 1 glass every hour...

GM Diet Day 5

2010-01-21T06:59:00.000-08:00

Till now, I'm able to follow the veg version of GM Diet. But I cheated today with a cup of tea, a la Indian, with sugar and milk.

Haven't seen much weight loss by this diet. Today morning I tipped the scales at 193 pounds. This is within the tolerance limit of original weight by measuring scale so could be that. Also, it is within the natural fluctuation of body weight so difficult to attribute this to diet plan (It could be also said that I lost more but the scale is showing positive variance).

However, I am now starting to disagree with the diet plan given in above link. If I do succeed in some weight loss, I'll evolve my own variant...

My natural fluctuation in body weight over the years has been between 80 to 90 kg (176 to 198 pounds). It is winter and a couple of kg less in this season may translate into natural shift to leaner me...

Let time be the witness...

GM Diet Day 1

2010-01-16T21:45:00.000-08:00

Today is my first day for a new week-long diet plan. Let's see how this one goes. I'm also under medication for back pain. I hope that will not interfere with dieting...

Starting Weight: 196 pounds.

Worst Experience

2009-12-18T12:41:00.001-08:00

I'm currently staying at Renaissance Orlando Airport Hotel in Orlando, Florida. This is by far the worst hotel (value -for-money wise) that I have ever stayed in. They charge $9.95 per day (+ tax) for Internet!!! Majority of hotels give Internet for free and few have nominal charges. This is exorbitant for something that should have been free to start with. Being a 4-star, the rates aren't cheap, breakfast is not included and this is extortion. Amenities in room are basic, nothing great, in fact they are not even 4-star grade as many 3-star have better room layout and amenities. Unfortunately, I'm stuck here for next 3 days. Never again.

Holiday Inn Express at Des Moines, Iowa was a much better hotel that this. And that's just 2.5-star.

Lovely Monsoon Rain... Finally in Noida

2009-07-27T10:14:00.000-07:00

Finally, we had rain the way we wanted... full wrath of monsoon...

I enjoyed getting all soaked up and so did my family... getting wet in rain combined with dance music and Chivas Regal on the rocks is a damn good combination... so liberating... it made me forget the enormous loss I had in day today in margin trading on NSE...

Getting sober again now after all the fun... and it is still raining though the fury has subsided considerably.

Trying to Fix Broken Fedora 11 Install

2009-07-16T13:31:00.000-07:00

My tryst with Fedora 11 started on a bad note. First, preupgrade from Fedora 10 couldn't resume where it left off earlier, due to some python errors. Tried couple of times to resume, but didn't succeed. Perhaps, some patch release fixed and preupgrade finally worked.

After downloading all required packages, I hit that button to reboot and continue install. Mid way thru the install, the screen goes blank.. no error but just to save power... but my hitting shift key to wake it up, fired keysym package errors and resulted in broken install. bad omen!!! never before I have seen a linux crib about key press...

Anyway, the system boots up back to fedora 10 but look at it... the keyboard no longer works!!!

My attempts to fix the broken install failed. the rpm repository is perhaps damaged beyond repair.Somehow I managed to boot the machine with same install image from preupgrade. Not much help. Didn't go well at all...

So I have a broken F-10 that won't work due to no keyboard (and thus I can't login). Finally, I decided to download fresh F-11 images...

Booting F-11 live from USB is the only thing that has worked since...

F-11 DVD download resulted in bigger problem. My other laptop doesn't have DVD burner. So somehow using that damaged laptop remotely to burn the DVD image from other laptop, I got a F-11 DVD. Directly mounting image is not working as it is on LVM and F11 not able to recognize that during installation.

Now, latest is that F-11 complains that DVD I burned remotely is not good... test is failing after 85%... I'm running low of patience on this...

N97 Maps?

2009-07-01T19:02:00.000-07:00

The post at guardian claims that maps from Nokia don't work. I have an E90 and have been using maps for quite some time. They keep getting better with every new upgrade to phone OS. Though, I miss a couple of features from good old initial days in maps (easiness to mark a landmark on map is no longer there) but the quality and accuracy of these maps is awesome, even in India. Perhaps the author didn't know how to load maps using Nokia Map Loader...

I have use the maps, GPS navigation and voice guidance in USA as well as India on E90 and it has worked extremely well. The fact that maps are stored on phone memory (or in SD card, in my case) means that it is much faster to load (about 1 sec). GPS has worked very well and latest release has added location positioning from telcos towers while GPS signal is still being acquired to give a better initial experience.

Not to say that there isn't room for improvement, but I find it much better than various other options I have seen for its size.

I wish there was a video out on E90...

Fairytale...

2009-05-01T11:48:00.000-07:00

Kamran Khan story is very interesting and shows that if you have got dedication, you can overcome the odds. It shows that there are always opportunities, even in a country like India, for a dedicated sportsman. Wish him further rise and would like to see him play in national team.

I also think, apart from auction of players, there should be a performance linked pay which is same for all players. It was disheartening to see Kamran getting 16,000 GBP while Flintoff went for 1.5 million USD.

Videsh: Heaven on Earth: Torture

2009-04-08T10:25:00.000-07:00

This is one movie that I regret watching... pure waste of time... It is not in imdb yet otherwise I would have voted it 1/10.

Fedora 10 Basic Up and Running

2009-02-21T22:36:00.001-08:00

I was able to install Fedora 10 using USB boot and it has been successfully update to include latest updates as well as openoffice... next step, testing out hardware compatibilities for my use...

My Tryst with Windows Vista

2009-02-21T08:42:00.000-08:00

Well, today, my tryst with windows vista ends, for now...

Finally, I have managed to corrupt the partition table of my HP laptop's hard disk (that's what it looks like to me). The recovery option on boot up (F11) is not working. HP does not give recovery CDs so that means that I have reached the point of no return...

It all started with I bought this laptop about 10 months back. Vista didn't impress me at all. Given that I had successfully managed to install x86_64 on my earlier laptop that was perhaps first to be shipped with Anthlon-64 way back in 2004, I decided to give this laptop dual boot the day I bought it :). I like linux enough to start on this route... anyway, that meant shrinking windows partition and as someone who tried shinking partitions on vista would know already, windows does not give up space as easily. It kept occupying huge space unreasonably that could otherwise be freed. Anyway, I managed a near perfect install of Fedora 9 and got everything working including my TV and my Music System from it... but it was too good to last...

Vista never worked without problems, occasional freezing issues that became too frequent and its refusal to upgrade to SP1. Finally I upgraded to SP1 that lasted for few good days and problems came back... Today, I decided, enough is enough and decided to delete vista partition from hard disk and recreated a smaller one and thought that HP recovery partition would reinstall in that... but that was not to be...

So, today, I'm downloading Fedora 10 now and with a complete reformat of HDD, going one way... I have forgetten some tweaks so I thought let's use blog to keep track... so here is an effort...

Belated Happy New Year!

2009-02-16T22:36:00.001-08:00

Well, after long time, I get to post a happy new year greeting to all my blog readers... enjoy where you are.

I have been busy these times, with a course that I'm doing as well as customer engagements and traveling to US... haven't found breathing space yet but I need to start some anyway.

The really black "Black Friday"

2008-11-28T22:30:00.000-08:00

The bargain hunting ritual of Black Friday needs to stop. It has increasingly become a pain to society. What happened yesterday had it coming for long. Shopping is celebrated in US and bargain hunting is seen as a sport. The scene outside shops resemble refugee camps of famished people waiting for first meal in years.

Worst part was when people refused to cooperate and kept "shopping". So much for civilized society and developed countries.

Aamir (The Movie)

2008-07-29T19:23:00.000-07:00

This is a great movie. I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with the opinions in the movie but it surely has enough good to make it to one of my top lists. I'm a bit liberal in awarding 10/10 to movies, as perhaps you can see from imdb voting lists, if I have enjoyed a movie end-to-end I give it a 10.

I would recommend everyone to watch it at least once. I wish more movies like this were being made in Bollywood.

Nightmare...

2008-07-23T23:08:00.000-07:00

I just woke up by a nightmare. It was bad, i mean real bad. I haven't seen many nightmares that are that bad. I woke up badly shaking and sweaty even in A/C. In fact, I'm still shaking. The last thing, perhaps the only thing that I could recall, is seeing a road flooded in water full of snakes, predominantly king cobras and I see myself falling into that... It was bad and I'm unable to stop shaking.

Earlier in day yesterday, I and a friend of mine, met with an accident while parking the car. Nobody got injured. The apartment complex was without power for several hours as he had accidently hit transformer supplying power to complex. It needed to be replaced. Everything, except his car and probably his driving history, returned to normal in couple of hours.

It had been a bad day... and a bad night...

Had Ghalib been a developer...

2008-07-05T15:32:00.000-07:00

While chatting with a friend of mine, we came with following:

hazaaron alogorithms aise ki har algo pe code crash ho.

bahut nikale mere code se bug par phir bhi kam nikale.

aadab!

Reusing the music...

2008-06-21T22:38:00.000-07:00

I just realized that "Yaara Yaara" from "Hum Tum" and "Chanda Chamke" from "Fanaa" has same music. Jatin Lalit reused the same music in 2 years... I don't know if that would count as plagiarism?

Though, I have numerous instances where a piece of music from earlier bollywood songs have used as main theme music in later movies. In fact, most of movies from Yash camp have reference to music from earlier movies but this much more common. This is first time that I have discovered an instance where music is same.

BTW, here is the original for recent hit "Pehli Nazar" from Race. Those who want to sing along this number "Sarang Hae Yo" from "Kim Hyung Sup", here are the lyrics... (I can't translate)

Ee jeu meh suh nal sa rang heh doh dweh ni ah joo jo geu meh ni poom eh suh na...

From The Horse's Mouth

2008-06-04T11:40:00.000-07:00

Here you have, from the horse's mouth, enough clues to tell you what happened behind the curtains. It is very obvious, at least to me, that it is a case of deliberate distribution of nuclear weapons by a sovereign state. I also think that USA knew it all along about "America's Best Ally on War on Terror". Only when things went out of hand, US forced them to admit it and they made him an scapegoat. Scientist generally act in best interests of their nation. It is only the politicians who screw it up.

Forrest Gump

2008-05-11T22:38:00.000-07:00

Just finished watching Forrest Gump on TBSHD. Tom Hanks' acting is just superb. He doesn't speak much (except narrative) but the emotions are so clearly reflected... It is just awesome... I have seen this movie multiple times... and every time to the end... It is one of my all time best...

Do you believe this?

2008-05-08T20:32:00.000-07:00

I can't believe the words coming from US diplomats, Rice and Bush. This article analyzes it in detail and I agree with most of what is written there. It is strange that growing corn prices are attributed to India, though, as I understand India consumes much less corn and our primary diet consists of rice and wheat. Corn is being increasingly used for biofuels and the money there is more than money on grain itself. Given that the size of arable land in world is limited and probably decreasing every year, spending valuable grain to produce energy is probably waste of an important resource. You can't grow grain in ocean... for now, that is. Until such innovations are possible, grain should be used more intelligently. India is a net exporter of grain so making these statements proves nothing. US needs to stop the dictatorship attitude that it has.

Edit: The data shows different reality... US consumption is about 1 ton per capita with an increase of 11% last year while Indian consumption is 0.15 ton per capita with an increase of 2% last year. And, US is still crying foul!!!... Looks like some people never get it... with oil threatening to touch $200, corn will probably follow similar trend...

Edit: Putting things in right perspective...

The New India: Part 2...

2008-05-02T13:09:00.000-07:00

Here is another example about the new India... It is pity that mere 27 story building is being termed as skyscraper... still a long way to go...

Another Gruesome Story

2008-04-21T16:00:00.000-07:00

This is horrible. Very filmi style. In an orthodox society such as India, this will create further apprehensions about adoption. I bet attention hungry morons at media channels will play adoption as a card to create stories like paraya khoon aakhir paraya hota hai...

We as a nation still have a long way to go to realize the value of a human life. The fact that we are billions+ is not helping either.

The New India

2008-04-21T11:33:00.000-07:00

Well, here is an eye-opening article. For the people outside India, at current forex rate, 1 crore Indian Rupees is roughly equivalent to USD $250,783 (see at today's rate here). That's a lot of money, in any country. People are no longer hesitant to talk in millions of dollars.

With rupee appreciating the way it has been, it is hurting the indian economy. Though, these people may be justified in asking for huge sums of money, the gap is widening fast. Quoting above article,

Noted economist Y K Alagh puts it in perspective when he says, “It’s the hype that counts. This is definitely a post liberalisation phenomena. But the stark difference between the haves and have nots is worrisome. Thousands of people are getting crores and crores of people are only getting thousands. That’s the irony.”

This is definitely a big warning. It is irony that huge population of India (~ 25% or 287 million people or roughly equal to population of USA) still lives on less than a dollar a day.

What?

2008-04-16T21:39:00.000-07:00

I am feeling the need to write something, anything... Nothing on mind right now... Actually a lot on mind but since most of that is confidential, nothing is left to share as of now... weather has been crazy here in Bismarck. Yup, that is where I am in case I forget to mention about it, at latitude 46.78 and Longitude -100.75 in a small city. I have learned that Maza in this state is the smallest city in USA! Now I suddenly feel that I'm a BIG city :)

The Trick Shot...

2008-03-30T12:58:00.000-07:00

What an elaborate setup and trick shot... Well, not really a trick shot in this but domino setup is well designed...

Airtel Broadband

2008-01-23T18:21:00.000-08:00

Aise hi, did some connection testing of internet connection at my home. Here are the results. All tests I ran from various sites gave the results between 200 - 270 kbps. Pick your favourite. Looks good enough for me. My typical use is surfing, emails, and occasional downloads. Emails are the biggest as I connect to office servers. And of course, all those auto updates that keep downloading every alternate day.

Have been using Airtel for last 1.5 years and I haven't faced much problems with their service. It is a bit expensive for the speed they provide but reliability is better. In last 7 years of using non-dialup connections, this is so far the most reliable. And dial-ups earlier to that were not reliable and pretty expensive. I hope it remains as good.

Will upgrade to higher speed only if they give in same price. Can't pay anymore than what I'm paying them now, which is Rs 999 + taxes (US$25 + taxes) per month. Yes, downloads are unlimited.

Seeing Is Believing - The Sydney Test

2008-01-17T02:40:00.000-08:00

I hadn't been following cricket since India performances are not something worth spending my time on. Lately, this controversy after Sydney test caused me to check back on how a significant part of my country's economy is doing. After watching this video on youtube, I was shocked... ok, not so much. The most comments on this video are in bad taste but nothing can take away what happened on the field.

I personally feel that a lot of decisions do go against India and fellow countries in Indian sub-continent - Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. Australia has been playing good cricket but they are not great on human scale. Honestly, I don't expect them to be. There is lot at stake - lots of money. In cut-throat competition, nobody wants to be at losing end. If we expect Australian players to walk, we are dreaming.

It is more disturbing to see the level of umpiring falling to such a low. The technology is here. We can have a complete match without the human umpires. Why do we still need them. It does not take away much time away from cricket that people seem to think. Why can't balls be fitted with sensors that will tell if it is bounced? Technology is cheap and available - we have kids' toys that glow when bounced off the ground.

If that sounds impossible, just have more umpires on ground (virtually), separate for no-ball, stumping, LBW etc.

Cricket is a big money game. It is high time, this money be spent on betterment of technology and better umpires rather than just being paid to players.

Casablanca

2007-12-02T18:56:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I saw Casablanca, a 1942 B&W classic. This is definitely one of the best movies I have ever had a chance to see. It was so great that I watch documentary that was included in DVD and then watched the movie all over again. Highly recommended.

Later I did research and came to know that it ranks at #9 in Top 250 List at imdb and #7 in Berardinelli's All-Time Top 100. Well deserved.

Today I went to rent "Seven Samurai"... too bad Blockbuster didn't have it...

iPod ships individually from China!

2007-11-28T04:14:00.000-08:00

I recently ordered my iPod Mini and was surprised when looking at the shipment tracking details at FedEx. The shipment originated in Shenzhen, China. I knew that lot of manufacturing happens in China for majority of US products, but was surprised that they are being individually shipped. Rather, I expected a bulk shipment to US warehouses.

Why does it do so? It amazes me. I thought this was the costlier option.

The Drift

2007-11-25T18:48:00.000-08:00

Recently watched "The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift". It was great. Drift sequences were awesome. It was a good balance of action and storyline. It didn't feel like too much action nor it felt like we are not having action.

DVD features included some real life sequences from real life Drift King Keiichi Tsuchiya. This a new learning experience for me to see how do they do it in real life.

Bollywood in Hollywood

2007-11-09T12:25:00.000-08:00

I was watching Inside Man day before yesterday and was pleasantly surprised in its end... There was chhaiyya chhaiyya, a bollywood song and dance number from Dil Se, playing with original music with partial english lyrics thrown in.

I don't think I have seen any other hollywood movie that is using a bollywood number from a bollywood movie keeping original lyrics and music.

Have you?

Too Busy To Blog

2007-11-04T05:28:00.000-08:00

Things have been busy and hectic around here. It is so difficult to keep up with Blog in this life.

This is just to say that I'm alive...

Disassembling the external hard drive

2007-08-16T09:19:00.000-07:00

Well, it had to happen one day... During last few weeks, ever since I'm back from my US trip - about which I need to write - this backup device of mine is giving me troubles. At 200 GB, it is still my primary backup device and when it starts showing signs of fatigue - it is 3 yr old - it is time to take stock. It has developed a problem of shutting itself off without any apparent reason. The music I'm playing stops and almost always data being transferred gets corrupted. Sometimes, it even refuses to start!

I was pretty annoyed with this. May be it is due to Wii, which I installed right next to it, or may be it is just jealous of a newer and smaller 160 GB pocket drive that I purchased recently, whatever it is, I wanted to dig deeper into the cause of its failure, so I got the screwdrivers and started the process of opening the external casing to see what could be the issue. The casing was hot, and I was surprised to find the hard drive inside too hot to hold. Guess, it could be overheating. I found no visible signs of dust inside but gave it a cleaning nonetheless. It took good 10 minutes to cool down. Looks like these drives are not designed for hot weather of India, or should I say Delhi, as it never gave me any problem in Bangalore. With heavy data transfers, it perhaps is getting too hot and shuts off as a precautionary measure. Air conditioner in my room is not enough to dissipate the heat and the casing design with no fans is proving a big deterrent in the thermal process.

The drive looks at peace now and I need to give it time enough to cool down between heavy activities as a workaround. But it was heartening to learn that it can open and replace the internal hard disk to higher capacity as I need. Next buy, 1 TB disk :)

Need to Write

2007-07-12T01:29:00.001-07:00

I need to get back to the writing something on this blog. Long time have passed and lots of things have happened. Perhaps, I can post them this weekend. Let's see. Keep watching.

Airtel Again!

2007-03-13T00:30:00.000-07:00

The Airtel is at it again. Last a marathon calls with their call center last month, that damn charges have come back again this month. I'm really pissed off with them. The call center cut me off again. They told that they could see that request is in process! since last month!! more than 35 days to process a cancellation for a service that I never asked for!!! Just does not go well with me...

Airtel Customer Care

2007-02-08T11:58:00.000-08:00

Lately, I am very disappointed with customer care 1-2-1 of Airtel. They have been charging me for some "ringtone club" that I never subscribed and I have to call the customer care to cancel the charges every time (I still end up paying taxes) I get the bill. This is real bad.

To make it worse, this time every time I go to billing CSR, call gets mysteriously disconnected with a disconnect tone. This happened atleast 4-5 times. Finally, I get thru to a CSR ("Hemant") and he agrees to reverse the charges and puts me on hold and call gets disconnected. After several attempts, I get reach a CSR ("Imran") who says that nobody named "Hemant" is there. He says that his system does not work and he can't transfer. I ask for superior and call gets disconnected again. Further attempts again don't go thru. After some attempts I get another CSR ("Lalit") and I ask him not to put me on hold. The call gets disconnected again!!! I got real unhappy and wrote this blog.

Now, the "Lalit" has called me back and told that due to some "technical problem" the call got disconnected and he has given the waiver and asked me to check it next morning.

Long time, Lot to say

2007-01-17T03:44:00.000-08:00

Plenty of things have happened since my last post so this one may be a big... first I watched couple of movies...

"Dhoom 2" was below expectations except for Hrithik.
"Guru" confirms that Aish is a terrible actress.
"Don 2" was not as bad as I thought though the first one was still better. This one without any songs would have made better experience.

Apple iPhone is looking awesome. I can't wait to get one. But it won't be available till 2008. I know tons of people who are unhappy with PDAs. They are more happy with a fully functional phone and a fully functional laptop rather than carrying a combo that does none in a neat way. They always complain that sound quality on Treo is terrible. I felt the same when I used one briefly. I wondered if using google talk is better option than Treo.

Couple of days back I attended a seminar on "Blue Ocean Strategy". That was good and got me thinking. Also taught me about "yellow tail" wines :)

Finally, I had some time to enjoy Matrix trilogy again on my new LCD TV. This was amazing. I'm more than happy with my choice of Sony Bravia 32". I need to get a UPS now to enjoy the experience non-stop. Only thing I'm worried about is overloading my power outlet. Need to do some maths here.

Visit to Carson City

2006-12-16T18:47:00.000-08:00

I reached Carson City, a small sleepy town of 50,000 people, midnight on last Monday. The journey was long with pretty long stops in between - first at Heathrow and next at Los Angeles - both long halts.

However, I really enjoyed the view I got from London to LA. The flight path and time meant that I had an opportunity to see 3 sunrises and 3 sunsets in a single day! Seems unbelievable? Let me say that we crossed the earth's shadow two times in flight path. That should be enough to explain.

This is closest I have ever been to north pole. The view was brilliant. Hudson Bay looked magnificent. Now, I want to go even closer to north pole. This is second best view I have ever seen from a flight. The best still remains flying over snow-capped peaks of Himalayas on the way to Leh from Delhi. That was just superb.

Today morning it was good warm weather here. But in afternoon, it started snowing and the mercury is now at 6 degree below zero. Earlier post has the pictures.

Carson City, Nevada

2006-12-16T17:11:00.000-08:00

Casino Royale

2006-11-18T11:46:00.000-08:00

Today I got my chance to watch the latest bond flick - Casino Royale and it was great. Best part of the film was the opening chase sequence in which bond chases Sebastien Foucan, the famous freerunner. It just flew so smoothly. The rest was usual bond stuff.

I did miss Q (or should I say R?) and I felt Craig isn't that great as Bond. He isn't as cool as Brosnan.

Overall, it was a great movie.

Finally, I'm on to Orkut

2006-11-11T02:31:00.000-08:00

Finally, I have convinced myself to devote some time to create an orkut profile. It so happened that an old friend of mine located me via orkut (via my sister). So I thought I may be a good idea to create a profile of my own. Now the next big task is to add my existing friends to the orkut list, sooner or later.

Way To Go!

2006-09-21T09:47:00.000-07:00

I really appreciate what Mr. Anand Kumar is doing. This is what India needs on a much larger scale if she wants to become a knowledge super power.

1857 Mutiny

2006-09-08T13:45:00.000-07:00

I haven't been following the news lately, but this is an interesting article on 1857 mutiny and its research.

It is described as "war of religion" rather than independence movement. I remember from the books, that the primary cause of revolt was indeed the religion with sepoys being forced to do certain things their religion prohibited (primarily, the meat). Definitely, in the subcontinent, religion was a very strong motivating and remains so to this date as observed in day-to-day news articles. It could very well be that some souls used religion to rally support for the independence cause like the way taliban uses it.

Archives are one way to look at the history and predicting the alternate course is next to impossible. Things might have different but how much? Would we have had another "Asoka" instead of "Bose"?

I would think that this revolt would have definitely happened if not in 1857 than few years later. It was a very socialist India then and hurting people from your neighbourhood definitely causes discontent among people. Another cause would have been the uprooting of village micro-economics by opium production policies of British Empire. That had led to unemployment (or rather ungainful employment or forced labour) which would have fuelled the revolt.

Intel Laptop Gaming Technical Development Kit

2006-09-08T04:18:00.000-07:00

This is a nice toolkit to modify the games. I always wish if my civilization III can show me the status so that I can save the game before the laptop starts to hibernate!

Terrorists attack the duty-free shops this time

2006-08-26T01:05:00.000-07:00

Did you get the twist? With new boarding rules in place, no hand-baggage, and almost all airlines prohibiting liquids on-board, the biggest people that I think will loose out are duty-free perfume shops. No sales. In fact, I wondered why they are still open? I haven't seen anybody inside them. The sales girls are outside the shop trying to get the customers but I don't think they will get any given the current scenario.

Nothing Better

2006-08-26T01:00:00.000-07:00

Well, if you have Internet and nothing else to do, what do you do? blog. Some would differ from me on this, with "chat". However, here I am at KLIA airport waiting for flight gate to be opened, blogging. I tried to kill time with some games and reading some useful material but it gets boring. The airport is good but the seats are not comfortable. Waiting seats don't have a back either and only few recharge points. Finally, found couple of them but the plug won't fit neatly. Anyway, "jugad" works and I get the pleasure of writing another blog.

Yesterday

2006-08-24T22:51:00.000-07:00

Here is my important timings for yesterday...

5AM: Slept (burned the midnight oil)
7AM: Wokeup
9AM: In office
5PM: Ready to leave
upto 6PM: Waiting for mail from offshore
6.15 PM: Decided to leave anyway
6.15 - 6.20 pm: called up all cab companies... no cab
6.20 - 7.40 pm: tried to hail a cab... there is huge traffic jam... all over KL... no empty cabs... tried calling again during this period from mobile too... that didn't help either
7.40 pm: returned to office... keep calling cab companies after every 15 mins...
8.40 pm: thought I will have some food... went to coffee shop... closed... :(
8.45 pm: back to office desk... again called cab... they said no... i got frustrated... i told them u get a cab here, i'll pay double... she tried for 5 mins for me... got a cab (on double charges)...
8.53 pm: cab arrives... i'm in cab...
9.00 pm: i'm in cab
9.30 pm: i'm still in the cab... hungry, angry and tired... now working on laptop... nothing better to do...
10.15 pm: reached hotel... finally...
10.20 pm: called room service... good they are still serving... ordered some food...
10.30 pm: waiting for food to arrive... called up the room service again... finally it arrives... set the alarm to 5 AM next day morning for an 8.30 presentation... need to be in office at 8...
i don't remember any times after that...

Now, its 2 PM... the morning presentation went well... lasted 2 hours... another presentation at 3PM... need to make arrangements for that...

It wasn't the worst day... not even close to that... but now I can write about bad days... if, I happen to have time and connectivity on next day... connectivity... that reminds me of this article

Kuala Lumpur, Rains, Traffic Jams and Blogs

2006-08-24T05:00:00.000-07:00

Seems like a strange combination, isn't it? Today, Kuala Lumpur received a decent amount of rain (not that much, I thought) but that results in huge traffic jams (I heard there were flash floods in some parts of city). I couldn't call any cab - none available - and after my efforts to hail a cab for one and half hours resulted in no transportation, I felt hungry, angry and uneasy. (There were huge crowd waiting like me to get a cab.) So marched back to office. After day-night-and-day long toil, after I only slept for 2 hrs last night, and required to return to work at 8 AM next day, the best I could do, given the conditions, was to write a blog. Strange circumstances, strange outcome! (well, not that strange, but I would have been listening to Kenny G if it wasn't office)

So much for their claim to be a developed country! They need to upgrade their newly built infrastructure.

Malaysia Visit Update

2006-08-20T22:15:00.000-07:00

Well, I finally have some time to update the blog. In the meanwhile, I have visited the PC fair at KL which was great.

On Janamashtami, I went to ISKCON temple after a full day of fast. It was great except for getting a cab on return. I met Anurag there. Here is a picture of me and him.

After that, on weekend, I visited Aquaria @ KLCC. The trip ended prematurely before I could enjoy it completely. Here is a chameleon relaxing.

Then went on KL city outskirts tour. Visited the Royal Selangor factory. They are the world's largest pewter maker. Here is my picture next to the world largest beer mug. This mug can hold more than 3,000 litres of beer.

And I took some pictures of twin towers too. My hotel is pretty close to it. Here they are:

A view from the front of twin towers. (From main entrance)

In their magnificent glory (from the KLCC Park)

East side view from the skybridge (170 meters, 41st floor, twin towers). West side view is not so great. Also it was not a good day for pictures.

View of KLCC park from the skybridge

Me @ skybridge

Petronas twin towers at night. I think its one of my best shots given the conditions. No tripods and no SLR. Just a mere 3 MP camera. This picture is serving as my laptop background for time being.

Do you find the pics interesting? Leave a note.

Malaysia

2006-08-03T21:45:00.000-07:00

If you noticed a lull in the posts, that's because I have moved my base to Delhi for various reasons. Right now, I'm in Malaysia on short trip.

The country is hot and humid and I don't like the weather here. It rains pretty often for my comfort.

The twin towers are magnificent but they could have been much better. The looks aren't as soft as empire state bldg in NY. The Suria KLCC is a good hangout for any kind of activity.

Haven't had much time to myself. Will posts some pictures once I'm back to Delhi.

Rhymes...

2006-06-16T01:39:00.000-07:00

Its shocking to know that nursery rhymes are more dangerous for children than an average evening watching TV. May be we should not be complaining about english rhymes being replaced by M.P. State Government.

Why do people always criticize moves to introduce mother tongue material in the schools in India? Shouldn't the kids enjoy speaking in their mother tongue rather than a phoren (foreign) one? I think its unfair for young minds to be subjected to literary materials from more than one language.

Is there any study by any one showing the stress effects and corresponding decrease in learning abilities of kids studying in foreign-medium schools vs. mother tongue medium schools?

After Apple, Its the turn of E.ON

2006-06-16T01:00:00.000-07:00

Close on the heels of announcement by Apple to shutdown its newly established Bangalore centr e, E.ON owned Powergen corporation is to shut down call center operations in India.

Different reasons, same outcome - "Quit India". (Wonder what Mahatma Gandhi would have said to these BPOs?)

I partly agree with their decision that its difficult to answers queries related to energy supplies by call centers located in different countries. Though, I feel that the actual reason is probably customer backlash against outsourcing.

Mac Advertisement

2006-06-13T03:41:00.000-07:00

I liked this ad from Apple a lot.

My Strengths

2006-06-02T07:00:00.000-07:00

I had recently read the book "Now, Discover Your Strengths" by Marcus Buckingham. I was feeling inspired and went ahead to take the test. Here are my top 5 strengths as discovered by the StrengthsFinder test:

1. Focus
2. Deliberative
3. Learner
4. Intellection
5. Relator

I must admit that I was disappointed by the fact that it wasn't able to guide me towards an ideal profession. They have their reasons, but that left me in dark. What do you think would be the right profession for me?

How Left or Right are you?

2006-06-02T06:33:00.000-07:00

This site has a great test to find out how left or right are you. The questions are very intriguing and ask you to pause and reflect on your beliefs.

I am -0.75 on Economic Left/Right scale. I didn't considered myself to be on left. Strange!

I am -2.15 on Social Libertarian/Authoritarian scale.

I'm actually pretty close to Gandhi on this. He being slightly more left than me.

Google + Dell, Yahoo + eBAY, and Microsoft

2006-05-26T04:04:00.000-07:00

Yahoo and eBay joined hands to fight Google. And, Dell boxes will ship with Google pack from now on.

Shares of Yahoo! went up, eBay went up, Google went up, and Dell went up. And Microsoft went up too!

I don't know if Google's move is counter to Yahoo's since only hours separated these news. But one thing for sure, Google definitely hit upon a great idea to realize the real estate offered by Dell. Eversince HP and Lenovo have been successful in cutting the fab and consumers starting to prefer window shopping PCs to ordering over Internet, Dell share has been declined. Their results were below expectations. This will increase profit margins for them.

As a consumer, I see it as going in positive direction. I see a future where minimal configuration PCs preloaded with search and other discount coupons for shopping be real cheap if they were subsidized by search engines and shopping portals? How about mail-in rebates for amazon.com when you buy a PC?

Rube Goldberg Machines

2006-05-26T02:44:00.000-07:00

I have always loved the idea of complex machines doing simple tasks and had "invented" lots of them during my childhood. I didn't watch TV or cartoons that much, so never noticed similar ideas floating by. One such machine was a complex device to catch bees that keep disturbing us on summer afternoons.

Recently, I hit upon the quiz that talks about famous Honda "Cog" advertisement. I had seen it on Internet and liked the commercial a lot (being similar to my childhood machines). However, I never know that these are called "Rube Goldberg" machines after the famous cartoonist who invented them. Now I know that they are also called "Heath Robinson contraption" (in UK) and Pythagorean Machines (in Japan).

I loved playing The Incredible Machine a lot after I first learnt in G-20, Ravindra Bhawan at the university. Me and N. V. P. Iyer spent nights playing this game. Those who haven't played it should give it a try. I still play the later versions of this game: "Return of the Incredible Machine: Contraptions", and "The Incredible Machine: Even More Contraptions". They are so much fun.

Workrave

2006-05-25T20:05:00.000-07:00

RSI is getting lots of attention from computer addicts all over the world. I'm just another addict and thus, I recently downloaded Workrave to give it a try. Though the interface is good, I find it pretty annoying. Or may be that reflects how little breaks I take while working. However annoying it may be, I want to keep it on default settings for a few days and if that's still intrusive, I would like to try never-had-a-rsi-problem settings of 10 seconds micropause every 10 minutes and 5 min rest break every hour.

I would have liked a lighter version. A small applet consuming 20 MB of RAM is not a good one.

Reservations: OBC View

2006-05-22T06:56:00.000-07:00

A wonderful post by an OBC in an IIT and his take on reservations.

True Mandal

2006-05-22T02:57:00.000-07:00

This article from ChandraBhan Prasad is eye-opening and shows the true Mandal. I agree with him that if powerful OBCs are removed from the list, the anti-sentiment will cool-off. However, ecnomonic considerations should be part of it to be acceptable to me as a short term solution.

Misuse of Reservation System

2006-05-22T01:55:00.000-07:00

Well, as I was reading the articles, I found the misuse of reservations system in India is not in isolation. We, Indians, can get an OBC or SC/ST certificate so easily that the main purpose is lost anyway. But here, I found that Americans are using DNA tests and technology to claim certain rights. E.g. a white person undergoing DNA tests to claim that she is 2% Asian and gets into college (after claiming she is Asian) and gets a scholarship too!

I should also undergo DNA test to find out that how much % of me is OBC! That alone can ensure some future to my offspring. Where have we come?

Reservation hurts

2006-05-22T01:01:00.000-07:00

As if killing IITs and IIMs are not enough, they want to kill private sector now. Our vulture government is adamant now on introducing reservations in jobs in private sector too. If I own a company, I decide who I employ. That’s none of government business. I pay taxes for you to set-up whatever you want to. Keep out of my company.

I think India is heading for a long civil war. Slowly but steadily.

I thought of various alternative reservation mechanisms to follow up my earlier post. I still think we don’t need the reservations but owing to current state of affairs with respect to primary and secondary education, I propose following alternatives:

A. Government is given 25 years to get primary and secondary education systems in shape. Let there be reservations for economically backward classes (people below 50% of per capita income) in all institutes. Let this be pegged at 30% from year 1 and reducing in one percentage point every year for next 25 years (29% in year 2, 28% in year 3 and so on... till 5% is left in year 26). Then let 5% continue for another 25 years period and probably forever. Allow vacant seats be filled by general category.

B. Identify what people actually need reservation. Analyse their demographics. Install a point scale from 1-10 for these people. Award them that many % extra marks. That’s the way it is done for NCC cadets, War Widows and like. No reservations, just plain, pure and simple affirmative action.

C. Same point scale as in B and gradually decreasing reservation as in A. And the cut-off of reserved category be set at 10% below (at 90% of marks of) last general category student admitted. Again, allow vacant seats be filled by general category.

None of my alternatives are based on castes (scrape the SC/ST quota too), as I don’t like discrimination and don’t want to divide based on caste. I remember an OBC leader saying that they have suffered 2000 years of oppression. Are we supposed to pay for (claimed) sins of our ancestors? Where are the facts? Didn’t Muslims invade India in last 1500 years? Should we throw them out? Those same Muslims now want reservation too! The same leader also said that OBC in India are worse off that Slaves were in USA. Also the reason he says that since upper caste people get coaching for entrance, OBC need reservation. I say that coaching system favours people based on their economic status not caste. So he should instead be arguing for economically backward not socially backward. Another argument he made that % of OBC population is more even more that it was when decided by Mandal commission. Well, so population control goes against you. People are being rewarded for multiplying faster!

See where it is heading? Why don’t the government reserve everything in this country to everybody in their share of population? OBCs drive on road in OBC lanes. SC/ST in SC/ST lanes. Let’s reserve seats in airlines, railways, buses, and all public and private transport. Let’s designate half of country’s lakes as OBC lakes. OBC and other backwards take east shore of any river and general category the west shore. 50% of “sulabh” toilets are reserved for OBC. So are 50% of hospital beds. And, 50% of all cars sold. And, 50% of all two-wheelers sold. And while are at it, 50% of parliament seats and 50% of cremation grounds, too. To hell with it, why doesn’t the government divide India into two equal parts? A general category India and a backward India (consisting of all self proclaimed backwards – SC/ST/OBC). Give us our country back. Let us progress. We will create new IITs and IIMs. We don’t need Congress or UPA. You go head the Backward Republic of India. Leave us in peace.

I hate being unable to do anything about it. That’s where I don’t like democracy. You own the cow and neighbours decide who gets the milk. Democracy probably depends too much on average IQ of the population below the median IQ.

Saas Bahu Saga and The Sensex

2006-05-18T04:37:00.000-07:00

I feel bad at naming the post so similar to CNBC TV-18 program's name "Saas Bahu and Sensex". But nothing else sum up my post better. Though the issues are not interlinked here as in the program.

I found how much Afghanistan loves Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi and was, honestly, a bit surprised. Ekta Kapoor promoting genesets sales in Afghanistan. I don't happen to like soap operas but I know how many people prefer to get involved in Tulsi's life. It does not matter to some that may be their own problems will get resolved if they spent the same half an hour discussing with their hubbies. Well, their life, their choice. On the same note, I wish these serials have significantly less *noise* of heads turning, eyeballs meeting etc. Each such scene repeats thrice with ill-conceived sound effects. It is deafening and boring. Unfortunately, other serials have started copying it too. I wish TVs have programmable automatic sound filters.

Sensex has tanked today. Markets witnessed their highest absolute fall till date. Down 826.4 points (-6.76%) at close. Black Monday is legacy now. Lets talk about Black (or rather Red) Thursday. It had to happen. But the slope surprised me. Looking at advance decline ratio, recovery seems remote. It may fall further on Friday. And FIIs may come to feast on it if it 11,000 is broken.

Consumerism.... vs Philanthropy

2006-05-15T03:26:00.000-07:00

See Nitin's comment on earlier blog here.

I agree that consumerism is a good thing. Car, flights etc are neccessary things which are offering value (such as reduced travel time) and has an associated cost. Ofcourse, people can travel by train rather than the plane and spend the money thus saved into philanthropic causes. People have done that and are doing that. But thats not I would expect from anybody or everybody.

Dogs, however, serve a different need, that in my opinion can be substituted in most of the cases. Perhaps, thats my perception and prior experiences with dogs and their owners. Most of them treat their dog as their (super)kid and flant them. They also believe their dog is superior to many poor kids living in the neighbourhood. This was in reference to these scenarios.

Dogs also serve other needs that can't be substituted such as aid to blind persons, sniffer dogs and other specialized roles. Its not about that.

Consumerism is good for society so long as it remains within reasonble realm. Its good as long as it does not strain resources. If resources are plentiful, consumerism is good. If resources are scarce, proper measure ought to be taken. Imaging water scarcity driving water prices to $20 per liter. Would you say that poor have no right to drink water since they can't afford it? Would you say in that scenario that water industry is creating lot of jobs and lots of money for shareholders so its good for ecnomony? You could say the same about opium trade. (in negative sense, though. They generated lots of jobs and lots of money. But do we want it?)

With money comes responsibility. Atleast for those, who understand that money isn't everything.

Dogs: Best Friend or Enemy of State

2006-05-12T01:47:00.000-07:00

What inspires this post is a news item in CNBC TV-18 news yesterday on lifestyle. The focus, as you would have guessed it by now, is on dogs - so called man's (or to be politically correct, human's) best friend.

The case in point is the expenditure incurred on dogs vs the kids. As per the news item, buying a dog could set you back by 50,000 - 75,000 INR. And their monthly maintenance expenditure runs from 15,000 - 30,000 INR. That's a whopping INR 180,000 to INR 360,000 per year per dog. For international readers (if any) of my blog, that translates into $4,000 - $8,000 per dog per year.

Sample these facts. Indian per capita income is less than $600 per person per year. So an average dog has higher per capita income than an average Indian (or for that matter, higher than an average citizen in half the world's countries). Even on purchasing power parity, Indian at $3,400 falls short of a dog.

But that's not what I want to debate on. My concern is the next fact.

It costs INR 800 to educate one child for one year, that's less than $18 per child per year. You can sponsor a balwadi, (place where 35 below-poverty child below 6 yr old stay so that they don't get dragged into child labour) for a sum of INR 30,000 (or $670) for a year.

That to me translates that a dog consumes equivalent to 210 - 420 toddlers' basic needs; or education of 225-450 kids.

Still with me?

Another fact: India is home to 17 million child labourers (official). Unofficial estimates put this figure to close to 75-80 million.

I live in Bangalore. I have seen that the dog craze in this city is much more than in places such as Delhi. So much so that I am often disturbed by their indiscriminate barking that I can't work or live in peace. I wonder how people cope with that.

Estimating that only one in 50 families have at least one dog in Bangalore (I think I'm being conservative here); with population of more than 5 million, that would translate into more than 20,000 pet dogs in Bangalore. But even by this standards, that dogs consume more than what it would cost to setup up 240,000 balwadis caring for more than 8 million toddlers or about 10% of India's child labourer population. And that's just one city.

So, these dogs to me are more of enemy of these poverty stricken kids than human's best friend.

Talk about getting the priorities right?

I remember one poem from my school days. I forget the name of poet, but was probably, Sumitra Nandan Pant (one of the four great Hindi poets during 60s - 70s). Let me know if that's right. It goes:

"Kutton ko milta doodh, bhooke balak akulate hain.
Maa ki haddi se chipak chipak, jaade ki raat bitate hain."

Its in Hindi, written sometime in 60s or 70s. Here is English translation:

"While the dogs enjoy the milk, hungry kids agitate and go restless.
Clinging on the mother's bare bones, they pass the winter night."

(agitate is probably not the correct word here to Hindi "akulana" which is feeling of hunger, restlessness and feeling of being not able to do anything to change status quo)

Next time, you decide to buy a dog, think of how many kids you can rescue from the clutches of poverty. Go here and save the India's future.

Education and Reservation System In India

2006-05-11T03:59:00.000-07:00

I have always had a simple opinion on reservations - "we don't need them". By we I mean Indians of all varieties, shapes and sizes. 12 yrs of primary and secondary education is enough to train kids to be competitive. If you can't do it in 12 most productive years, as far as learning is concerned, you can never do it. I also strongly advocate that education upto 12th should be free and compulsory. We should learn from Japanese what they did after WW-II. But making education free means money, and India is left without any with growing tax breaks, inefficient tax nets, tax evations bigger than economy of Pakistan, and richer, fatter and power-hungry politicians. Our politicians are busy making law to get more "offices of profit" when they should be making "12 yrs of education" into law.

People say we are poor country. A miniscule percentage of Indian public, who invest in primary markets and who are into "retail" segment with less than $2000 each to invest, coughed up more than Rs 200,000 crores or more than $ 4.5 billion. This excludes high-networth investors and financial institutions.

I think government should setup "Basic Education Fund" which has tax exemption of 200%. So if you have income of 10 million, donate 5 million to this fund and pay no tax. I'm sure this will lead to decent corpse. But the execution also counts a lot. We need to maintain public account of this fund to see how much goes where.

With so many politicians, incl. Arjun Singh and Left, saying that so-called backward castes need reservation, I challenge them to donate all the money they have for the cause of upliftment of their caste-brothers. No. They won't do that. They want middle-class to suffer and pay for their cause, reducing their right to education at the same time. I have never seen worse arguement that this. Kill the golden goose. Kill the middle-class. Kill the India. They never think of middle-class fellows who study 16-hr a day for their right to quality education. Rich will escape to foreign education. What about your bank-clerk's daughter? What mistake has she made in her life, apart from being born in India, that deny her birth-right to fair competition to quality education.

Also, those same politicians say merit will not suffer. I received a wonderful suggestion in email, that I would to share. How about reservation in Parliament? Let all doctors that treat MPs, MLAs be from backward classes. Let all aids be that. This will ensure jobs for them and provide good oppurtunities to growth. Let all government jobs for unskilled labour be reserved for backward classes. But ensure free and fair competition for skilled jobs.

I also don't like the concept of pre-nursery, nursery, LKG and UKG before getting into 1st. Poor kids. Give them a break. Let them enjoy atleast first 5-6 yrs. After that, its competition for the rest of life.

On the same note, I found this article from Rahul Phondke interesting from my alumni site. I can't link that here but here is how it goes (quoting verbatim)

<quote>
In a significant move today, Congress announced 50 % reservation for all Left Handed people in IITs/IIMs. Said a congress spokesman , "In 60 years of independence there has not been a single left handed CEO. It is time to set the system right " . This reservation will be over and above the existing reservations taking the total reservation to 99.73 %. In order to take care of the fractions, the government also announced an increase in the number of seats taking the total IIM seats to 1000.

The official bill would be signed soon by the PM's office ....with his left hand ...
</quote>

Fellow Blogs

2006-04-24T23:53:00.000-07:00

I recently discovered that others in my graduation batch, Nitin Goyal and Satnam Singh, also maintain blogs, so it would be a good idea to link them here. Satnam has some great pictures and adventure stories a la Marco Polo kind but in different area of expertise.

Its great feeling that atleast somebody I know is enjoying the life to the fullest. Mangesh is the other one I know. Rest seem too busy to write even one mail per month. Last meet I organized nobody but Rupi turned up. Let me see if I can organize another one.

BTW, if you are wondering which batch I am talking about here, its University of Roorkee 1996 B.E. batch.

Updates

2006-03-23T19:33:00.000-08:00

It has been a long time since my last post. Apparently, this blog business is difficult to keep track of. At least, for me.

There have been so many events since last post. India lost the cricket test series to England. Yes, 1-1 draw with a part time team to me is loss. They can't bat full day to draw a test. What with the world's most formidable line-up that fails to deliver when it matters. Always. When was the last time they batted days out to save a test? From a winning position to losing one, thanks to their kiddish fielding. Anyway, its time I should stop watching cricket or at least hoping that they have balls.

South Africa showed what will power can achieve. Beating Australia in a world record mammoth run chase. That was superb.

What else... well, there has been huge uproar in parliament on "office of profit" issues, a violent mob in Mumbai, nuke deal between India and US as well as India and Russia etc. I like the nuke deal. This shows that everything is negotiable if you have the right cards. For years, China has violated NPT by arming Pakistan. Nobody questioned China. NPT has, anyway, became useless. Now Pakistan is crying that Indo-US nuke deal signals that NPT is dead. Well, China put first nail in coffin. Pakistan the rest by acting like Chinese agents selling Chinese nuke technology to Libya and Iran. Pakistan paid 9/11 investigators to remove its name from report. Look who is talking?

As any Indian would tell you, most of us laugh on Pakistan's inability to comprehend the changing global scenario and still behave like it was cold-war period. They do have higher per capita income compared to India. But that's it. I'm sure it won't be long before we beat them at this too.

Sun Tech Days, Chennai, 2006

2006-02-14T23:50:00.000-08:00

Well, I have just attended Sun Tech Days at Chennai. Somehow, I always feel that event management is not the first priority on their agenda. First day was running a hour late. Though, the music fiesta at the day end was great. I really enjoyed the Gattam. But again, there were not enough seats to sit so I was standing for a fairly long duration till I finally found a seat once audience started rushing home. For reasons unknown to me, I could not get a train ticket to chennai so have to take a bus ride. I don't recommend anyone taking a bus to Chennai from Bangalore. Its too much pain.

Second day was better though again the event management showed off their weakness. Food served on both days was not up to the par and I just don't like the T-shirt throwing in events like these. Crowd (should I say mob?) goes crazy for these T-shirts and many get injured. This is not for weak-hearted. Why can't they just give it to ones who participate or give it to all. I think, they didn't expect this much crowd.

Also, I feel that they should stop doing multiple tracks. I feel like attending more than one but have to sit out another due to concurrency. Somehow, there is duplication of information across sessions. They should streamline and review the contents of all presentation so that it is crisp and upto the mark.

Overall, barring few sessions, I felt it was not worth travelling 500 kms in a bus to watch this event.

2006

2006-01-04T23:28:00.000-08:00

Well, finally 2006 is here. Delayed by a second. I didn't notice that delay. All I felt was jammed networks. So people sent me SMS well before 2006, just to make sure they don't miss out. Somehow, it is no longer strange to wish people in advance, such is the hectic pace of life now-a-days. Imagine, wishing happy fatherhood to somebody whose wife is expecting 8 months later... "better later than never" is now changed to "better earlier than ever"... Wonder what next? If we could predict future, perhaps the day when son is born, we would congratulate the new father with his son's first rank in college and then strut around to show what we are the first one.

Another new year. Another resolution. I have seen some people who make a long list of resolutions for the coming year. I don't make one. I am yet to follow the last one I made couple of years back. Times have changed but the need of that resolution is fresh as ever. So continuing with that. If I can achieve that, I'll make another.

Been very busy lately. Got some relief today. Wrote a small poem on the new year resolutions for my close friends, similar to that jokes/poems of Ahsaan Qureshi of The Great Indian Laughter Champions fame. I like his style more than any one else in that show. आखिर, व्यंग भी काव्य का एक अंग होता है ।

God's Debris

2005-12-27T03:23:00.000-08:00

This a good read by Scott Adams. I like his books (and Dilbert) but this is very different. In fact, this is the first time I finished a book at single sitting. Its interesting. Or perhaps, that comment says something about me.

I think he has used a lot of concepts from Hinduism in the book. Wonder from where the thinking came from? If you have read vedas, mainly Rigveda, you will discover a lot of similarities.

The best sentence of the book, IMHO, is "Ideas are the only things that can change the world. The rest is details."

Cricket: Videocon Cup - India vs Sri Lanka

2005-12-20T22:21:00.000-08:00

Well, everybody in India loves cricket (the sport). I'm no exception. I was thrilled by the performance of Indian team in the 3rd test match (till now). I felt that last pair should have been given chance to score till they can, when Sehwag declared at 316/9. Bhajji was in top form and could have made a half century, and would have given much needed batting practice to him looking at the fixtures coming up. 509 or 519, there isn't much of difference to either side. Sri Lanka looks set to loose this one unless two of their players hit double hundreds - highly unlikely on a 4th and 5th day pitch. Surprisely, pitch is holding much better than I thought.

I think the fielding efforts from Indians have been slipping below the standards again but couple of fumbles and some strange field settings. They should not let these victories go in their heads. Like Chris Rock says in "Head of State", God bless India and everybody else.

Architects in Software Industry

2005-12-16T01:09:00.000-08:00

I was reading this article on architect personas. I tend to disagree with just 3 there. I believe there are many more here. From experience, I'm listing down what roles I think should be here:

Enterprise Architect:
Defines what enterprise needs in terms of application and integration.

Application Architect:
Evaluates applications/softwares in line with directions from Enterprise Architect. Makes Build/BUY decision.

Integration Architect:
Defines EAI standards

Data Architect:
Defines flow of information and events (Senior, enterprise wide app-to-app, junior, at app level)

Network architect:
Defines network topology, DR strategies

Technical Architect:
Defines architecture for single app and its interfaces

I believe "Software Architect" is best suited as general term to differentiate from general (Civil) Architects and in all of the above you can replace Architect with "Software Architect" as "Enterprise Software Architect" to better quality them.

Big Bang

2005-12-15T22:13:00.000-08:00

Finally, I have made myself start writing a blog. I had been thinking about it since 1998, but wasn't able to commit to it. Oh gosh, thats 7 years.

Now I have to think(?) and type... or may be just type. I remember I used to be a good writer but my writing skills are fading with more and more concentration on technical documents. I hope to revive them.

Actually, construction is going on in my office near my cubicle so it is really difficult to concentrate on work now a days. These wanderings have finally led me to create the blog.

I guess, before I start on it any further (and post my profile), I need to introduce myself. I know the risk I run looking at examples of people getting fired for expressing them liberally, so I will keep my office life separate. Ok, I'll try my best at that. Though, I don't mind getting fired since market is hot and I can make more money that I'm doing now but I like the work I have (since last 3 months).

So I'm a 28 yr old guy who likes to play Civilization III and used to play billiards and snooker. I like history, particle physics and astronomoy. I also like working on computers, travelling and trying new things. I have been to USA (Boston, New York, Indianapolis, San Francisco), The Netherlands, Germany, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Vatican City, Singapore, Thailand, Japan and New Zealand, apart from my home country India where I have been to Agra, Ahmedabad, Allahabad, Badrinath, Bangalore, Chennai, Darjeeling, Dehradun, Delhi, Devprayag, Gaya, Gangotri, Guwahati, Hardwar, Indore, Jaipur, Kanyakumari, Kausani, Kedarnath, Kolkatta, Ladakh, Lucknow, Madurai, Manali, Mumbai, Mussoorie, Mysore, Nainital, Nalanda, Ooty, Rameshwaram, Rampur, Raipur, Roorkee, Shillong, Silchar, Udaipur, Ujjain, Yamunotri and various other places. My next plans for India is Andamans. If I can get to convert the videos to computer formats, I'll post some here.

One day, I will be a CTO in a big organization.