Miles to go....

2009-10-21T16:05:00.000-07:00

Moving my blog.

I will not be writing here anymore. All new postings will be available here.Please modify your subscription..

2009-10-09T07:04:00.000-07:00

President Obama wins the Nobel Peace Prize!!!!

My first reaction was "W H A T ? !!!!!" :-O.

I do admire president Obama for the amazing life that he has had, to be born in a middle class family and to rise to become the first African American president. His words motivate millions of people around the globe and he talks about fundamentally changing the world.

But is it for motivating people that he won the Nobel ? NO. It said that the prize was for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples." So, does someone get a Nobel for "trying hard" or for "producing results" ?

Mahatma Gandhi never got the Nobel Peace prize, ( All he did was to teach a nation about truth, non-violence, Satyagraha and then take on the mighty British Empire to free India).

Do they give Nobel prizes to scientists for "trying hard" or for "contributing to the knowledge base in their respective fields" ?

I respect the president, but show me the results - "the results" !!!

2009-10-08T17:09:00.000-07:00

Evolution Versus Intelligent Design.

In this interesting conversation, Richard Dawkins, the celebrated Oxford University Professor and evolutionary biologist takes on Wendy Wright, a noted creationist. You will see that Wendy's concern is not with "accepting" evolution as a fact, but with its repercussions on the society. She fears (and rightly so) that a society based on Darwinian principles will not be based on love, care and mutual respect. But would you let such a fear blind you from the truth? or would you find God's design in evolution and use it to build the society that you dream of ? I am certain that the Catholic church would some day embrace Darwin (remember Galileo ??) and would come to the conclusion that it was God who put evolution to work. :-).

I am not an atheist and have my personal beliefs about God and religion. But I firmly believe that we should ask questions, search for answers and above all show the courage to walk down the path that science throws light on. Some day when we humans (if we haven't destroyed ourselves already) master inter-galactic and inter- dimensional travel, colonize galaxies billions of light years away, overcome death and become immortal, people would laugh at the days when life began on a tiny little planet called "The Earth" which revolved around a small star called "The Sun" and where the "early men" argued over evolution and intelligent design.

2009-07-14T06:30:00.000-07:00

Evening Walks

Arjun is becoming more conscious and curious about the world around him. His vocabulary of baby words is also improving.

2009-06-29T16:33:00.000-07:00

Arjun turns ONE !!

Time Flies and a year just swished past us !! My son Arjun has turned ONE. We had a wonderful party this weekend.

2009-05-26T06:57:00.000-07:00

Back to Gatlinburg, Tennessee.

May 2009, Re-visit

September 2005, My first visit to Gatlinburg.

The spell of the mountains still overcome me. We drove from Gatlinburg to the Ocanauluftee Indian Village through the mountains, stopping several times to capture the breathtaking views of the clouds nesting among the mountains. Four years ago, I wrote "Gatlinburg, Tennessee is a wonderful place. I remember Ruskin Bond saying that mountains have a magical effect on humans. Standing on one of the rocks in this mountain stream and listening earnestly to its sounds, i felt my spirits lifted, a cloud of calm settled on my otherwise turbulent mind. True, mountains have an inimitable charm, an overpowering presence that can blow away all perturbations of the mind and humble any inflated ego."... Still feel the same !

More details in another post.

2009-05-16T17:12:00.000-07:00

Kudos to my Country.

Today, the Congress party swept to a resounding victory in India's national elections, defying expectations as it brushed aside the hindu nationalists, the communists and a legion of small regional parties. I would like to set aside my opinion on what this could mean to the future of India and express my appreciation of how effectively and successfully we have been able to conduct this phased election and choose a government that would now steer the fate of a nation of over a billion people. Those who are aware of the political geography of the subcontinent would be aware of the fact that this nation of a billion people, the largest democracy in the world, has in its neighborhood countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, China, Burma, North Korea and also the Arab world. Preserving and sustaining a vibrant democracy in such a negative environment is an admirable achievement.

Long live democracy, Long live freedom !

The Congress candidate, Shashi Tharoor trumped his nearest rival by close to 100,000 votes in my home constituency. Here are a couple of brilliant speeches by Mr. Tharoor,

CPD Distinguished Speaker Series: Shashi Tharoor - INDIA

Shashi Tharoor: Restoring America's Image in the World

2009-05-12T05:44:00.000-07:00

Currently reading,

Excursions in Number Theory

2009-05-11T13:09:00.000-07:00

Dan Brown needs a tonne of wax!

I read the book "Digital Fortress" by Dan Brown, the famed author of "Da Vinci Code". Unlike DVC, DF appears to be poorly researched and leaves the reader flabbergasted by some of the events depicted in the novel. Does Mr. Brown really expect his readers to believe that someone can write a worm that overheats a giant super computer, which then runs on end till all the sillicon it carries explodes, leading to the destruction of the building that houses it ? ....then when all the hackers of the world are at the doorstep of NSA, to lay their hands on US Intelligence secrets, Susan Fletcher- the beautiful and talented NSA cryptologist and her lover saves the country (and what the pass key finally turned out to be had me roll on the floor and laugh)!! That is Bollywood masala. Mr. Brown has the potential to be a great script writer in one of India's *ollywoods.

The story is certainly not without wax ! ;-)

2009-05-10T15:14:00.000-07:00

Currently reading,

Digital Fortress

Data Modelling Essentials

2009-05-07T07:19:00.000-07:00

Mathematically Analyzing a War !!

This video from Ted Talks presents a wonderful idea. It shows how a team filtered the noise and commotion out of an event as turbulent as a protracted war, derived a mathematical equation from their observations, analyzed it and attempted to arrive at conclusions which could then be used to predict outcomes or help manipulate the variables involved, to generate desired outcomes.
It reminds me of Steven Levit's book "Freakonomics" where the author investigates several topics both intractable and trivial by analyzing huge chunks of data to identify patterns.

There is probably no noise in the world we live in. The right minds equipped with the right tools could probably identify patterns or clues to an underlying grand design in almost everything that we see or hear but consider unworthy of our attention.

2009-05-04T17:10:00.000-07:00

Certified Project Management Professional (PMP)

I passed the PMP examination a couple of weeks ago. My strategy was pretty straight forward,

1. Read the PMBOK and the PMP Exam Prep guide by Rita Mulcahy and

2. Took a few mock tests.

If you have good Project Management experience and follow a strategy similar to mine, you ought to be able to sail through the exam without any trouble. Try these mock exams for free - This, , This, and This.

2009-05-04T16:42:00.000-07:00

Both Sides of any story

Phil Collins sang,

"White man turns the corner, finds himself within a different world
Ghetto kid grabs his shoulder, throws him up against the wall
He says would you respect me if I didnt have this gun
cos without it, I dont get it, and thats why I carry one
We always need to hear both sides of the story"

Here are two videos that deal with the flip side of two very famous events - The Assassination of Mahatma Gandhi .
Here is the Transcript for you to follow this Gujarati play.

and the American Civil War.

2009-04-27T16:50:00.000-07:00

This is an awesome idea - Pond Scum helping to run automobiles !

I wonder if anyone is investing time/effort/money into investigating the uses of Salvinia Molesta (a.k.a African Payal). If there is a way to use this water monster in manufacturing Fuel/Medicines/Comestibles, it would save several water bodies in my home state.

2009-04-14T08:23:00.000-07:00

THIS was all over the news yesterday.

"MOMBASA, Kenya - In a daring high-seas rescue, U.S. Navy SEAL snipers killed three Somali pirates and freed the American sea captain who had offered himself as a hostage to save his crew."

One of the them was infact shot through a window ! And all this happened in the middle of the night in a rocky sea !!

Hats off !!!

THAT is what comes to mind.

But, THIS one singes the mind.

2008-11-26T12:17:00.000-08:00

A Visit to the Saratoga Battle Field

This post is long overdue, but better late than never. I and Philip visited the Saratoga Battle field shortly before I moved from New York to South Carolina a few months ago. Not unlike this post, the visit too was long overdue. Saratoga witnessed one of the decisive battles of the American Revolution. Here are a few snaps,

A Cannon atop Bemis Heights

Freeman's Farm

Charging downhill

After walking for a couple of hours ....

I now live in Greenville, South Carolina about 30 mins drive from the Cowpens Battle field. I plan to go there in summer.
Someone once asked me what the fun is in visiting a battle field. Let me answer it this way - It is not about fun, but rather about what that trip makes you do before you go there - like reading about the battle, its context, its aftermath and about letting the mind roam freely while one walks around the park which then travels back in time, tries to get a sense of how that gory day would have been and what could have happened had the result been opposite ..etc etc. It is also about the lung full of fresh air that you get to inhale in those wild empty plains. It certainly has something to do with my fascination for green, vast, open plains - the sight of which I believe has an emollient power.

2008-11-17T13:07:00.001-08:00

Cisco Telepresence

Today, I had my first Telepresence meeting at work and it was an amazing experience. It is truly as shown in the picture above(courtesy Human Productivity Lab) where folks join from different parts of the globe, but all appear to be together in the same meeting room, sitting next to each other or right across the table. The attendees get to see and talk to each other in real time and high definition. Cisco has really hit the ball out of the park !

2008-11-12T10:23:00.000-08:00

Hello World !! :-)

It has been a long time since I blogged. My son is now 4 months old and keeps us busy 24*7. Time flies when he is around. He has turned over and is now trying to crawl. He has become very curious about the world around him, turns his head towards light and sounds, coos, smiles and laughs. He also talks to us in an arcane language which only has sounds like "Aaa", "Eee", "Ooo", "Urr", "Aee" !! He can go on and on as long as we reciprocate. I have now started to get a hang of his language and we engage in conversations ;-). He demands attention and needs somebody to play with all the time and by evening when we are weary and drag ourselves home from office, we crave for some kind of energy booster to keep up with him.

Being a parent is an amazing experience ! And by the way...to all those "parents-in-the-making", I strongly suggest Dr. Harvey Karp's book "The Happiest Baby on the Block". He talks about the missing fourth trimester and also the 5 S's to calm babies. We have tried it and it really works !!

2008-07-01T07:56:00.001-07:00

It is a boy !!
My son was born on 23rd June. We've named him Arjun.
I was away from work the whole of last week...so many things to catch up with and several documents to read. Shall post an update soon.

2008-05-28T20:12:00.003-07:00

The Road Ahead..

More than 10 years ago I joined College of Engineering, Trivandrum with the simple dream of getting a decent job as soon as I graduated. At that point in time, becoming capable of fetching my family three square meals a day was more important than anything else. Engineering looked promising in terms of getting a job (a campus placement), and Electronics or Computer Science at CET was what most students (not all) with good entrance exam scores (ranks) opted, So did I. I hadn't heard of any student who had opted for Mechanical, Civil or Architecture inspite of getting a rank that would have qualified him/her for Electronics or Comp Sci (Ofcouse there are exceptions and I later came to know a few). I didn't have any worries about choosing a subject - all I wanted was a job at the end of four years to head off the financial disaster that stared my family in the face. That was more than a decade ago and since then life has come a long way. I am happy that I could achieve my dream inspite of running into a tempest following the 2001 economic recession and 9/11 fallout.

Presently, I am preparing for GMAT and dreaming of joining a Top Tier B-school. But unlike what I did 10 years back, I spend time thinking and discussing about what an MBA could help me achieve, where,what and how I should study, What my focii should be, What I should target to achieve in the next 10 years, What kind of companies I should aim to work for after my MBA, Where I should take my career..etc.

Today I had a very enlightning and fruitful discussion with Himanshu Joshi (First Year student at IIM-A ) who is currently in New York city for an intership with the famed BCG (The Boston Consulting Group). Thanks to my friend Saurabh Jindal, another first year IIM - A student, for the introduction. I wanted to know in detail about the life in a consulting company. I was curious about the kind of problems consultants work on, the variety of challenges they tackle, their growth, remuneration, career options and above all what they learn in B-Schools that opens the doors of great companies like BCG or McKinsey.

I have posted the salient points of our discussion here. Thank You Himanshu for your time and effort.

2008-05-20T03:48:00.000-07:00

Way to go Shiyas

This post is to congratulate my old classmate Shiyas (College of Engineering Trivandrum, 2001 Batch) for making it to the Indian Administrative Service (IAS). Shiyas has cleared the Civil Services Examination - 2007.

Shiyas,
Hats off to your dedication and hard work ! I wish you all the best. First it was the IES and now the IAS. You seem to have a special knack for clearing rigorous entrance examinations. :-)

2008-05-13T14:16:00.001-07:00

Point of Rumination

This amazing series is by far better than any book I have ever read on Evolution. I haven't yet waded through all the facts and theories that are laid out in the course of this eight hour, four part series. But the first two parts that I have seen so far have given enough food for thought. The question, as my colleague Pablo Lopez points out is not "Whether you believe in Evolution", it is rather "Whether you really understand the Theory of Evolution".

Currently reading :
The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins.

2008-05-11T17:33:00.000-07:00

Train of thoughts
I went to the Niskayuna Park for a jog today. It is amazing what a lung full of fresh air can do to one's spirits. It was mostly deserted except for an occassional biker or a skater. The park has a narrow bike trail which stretches for several miles and has the Mohawk river by its side. The chirping of birds and the rustle of leaves were pretty much the only sounds. There were birds of several plumage patterns and an occassional rabbit or a deer. I have always loved to let my mind wander and at times I stop the train of my thoughts and wonder how far I have strayed and attempt to retrace my thoughts. It is amazing how the web of thoughts work and is amusing to realise how interconnected the thoughts are and how one's mind can leap from one set of thoughts to another seemingly disparate set.

How is a "rabbit" related to "Sanskrit" ? Staring down at a little brown rabbit that ran across my path, I started to wonder how fast thay move and how long they live. I wondered what they eat and how they survive the six to seven months of sub zero temperatures. I wondered how the fish in the nearby Mohawk survive the winter when the whole river freezes, it then reminded me that my classmate (Mandarin class) Patrick was going fishing for four days next week. I recollected the stories he told me about how he and a couple of other guys caught and cooked an alligator down in Mississippi or somewhere. I, then started to think of the other stories he told me about how as a kid, he lost his little library to fire. Pat had been to India for four months where his daughter learned to speak hindi. I thought about the different places foreigners visit in India and remembered seeing a book at the Schenectady Public library on Kumbhamela. That reminded me that another classmate of mine - Tashin who is from Tibet, spent a few years of his life as a monk in Varanasi. He runs a Tibetan Gift shop in Albany these days after renouncing his monastic ways. Then I thought to myself that I had met a lot of people in my life who have had interesting stories to tell - Stories from their lives which they may or may not have time to share with others, then I wondered how much or how little I knew about my friends and family ! I questioned myself as to how many stories I knew from my father's life, my mother's, my sister's, my brother's, my wife's lives, from the lives of my dearest friends. I decided that I would share a lot of my stories with my kid (if you don't know already, I am going to be a dad this july :-) )....and then I remembered some of the stories my mother had cooked up to make me study Sanskrit when I was six or seven years old - Stories that really made me study the language for three years (Grades one to three)- Stories of how Gods in heaven spoke only in Sanskrit and how I could talk to them if I remained a good boy :-)). May be, I'll pass these along to my kid and I am sure he/she would grow up some day and laugh at these stories and may want to pass it to the next generation. I hope they add a few twists of their own to make it more interesting and relevant...and who knows, the story might grow in length, might change forms, might look totally different from the original. I may not be around to hear how the story would appear a hundred years from now..but let the stories pass on, as they have always. Along with the story would pass a piece of my thoughts and my mind. Isn't that the way Kunta Kinte's story passed through several generations and finally reached Alex Hailey ? And that finally brought me to one of the greatest stories ever told. I watched this documentary just yesterday on YouTube. Obviously, it was the controversy surrounding it that made me curious.

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

Toddling...

I have been a student of the"Chinese for Adults" course at the Albany Chinese School for the last five months. Here is my contribution to what was collected for the School Magazine from our class ;-)
It simply says,

My name is Sarath.
I am from India.
I would like to learn chinese.
I can speak, read and write in three other languages including English, Hindi and my mother tongue Malayalam.

Here is a picture of our class,

The classes are held every sunday from 1 PM to 3PM and the current semester ends on May 11th. The next semester classes begin in September. If you are in the capital region and are looking forward to learning Mandarin, there is no better choice. The instructor Xuewen Wang (aka Sherry Wang) is a gifted teacher with endless patience. Although I am still light years away from being fluent in Mandarin, I think this course has helped me reach a stage from where I can start learning the language on my own. Let me know if anyone has tried "Rosetta Stone" ..I have so far received one positive first hand review from one of my classmates.

Now coming back to the obvious question of why I chose Chinese. Well, there are several reasons,
1. I have always wanted to learn a foreign language.
2. I can still learn one of the European languages after I return to India (hopefully in a few years, unless I fall victim to the N+1 syndrome).Unlike Mandarin, it is not very difficult to locate French or German instructors in India.
3. With my dreams of relocating to the Eastern Hemisphere after graduating from B-School, I am sure a little Mandarin would come in handy.
4. I want to truly understand this phenomenon called "China" - this great trasformation that we have witnessed and are witnessing.
5. Visit Tibet someday (certainly not this year :-)) )
6. Learning (if voluntary) is a healthy break from the drudgeries of the "Land of Cubicles".
7. Resist Cerebral Atrophy :-).

Well, this is a long haul and I certainly have no illusions of it being a smooth ride.I hope that in the next few years I reach a stage where I can read chinese websites and news papers.

2008-04-21T14:27:00.000-07:00

I watched Ron Maxwell's movie "Gettysburg", which depicts in good detail the first and second days of the battle of Gettysburg. The defence of "Little Round Top" and Jeff Daniel's portrayal of Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain were impressive. I liked the movie pretty much although I haven't seen many American Civil War movies to compare this with. Suggestions welcome.. :-)

If all goes well, I plan to visit Saratoga and Gettysburg this Summer.

2008-04-08T12:03:00.000-07:00

Would you believe that a seeemingly endless list of names of strangers could tell a poignant tale ?
This long list is a snapshot of "Booming" India's Agrarian crisis. What it doesn't talk about is the plight of the families of these deceased men. Each person on this list may have had at least 3 or 4 lives dependent on him - lives that may have withered off by now !

Sainath's book titled "Everybody loves a good drought", is a collection of stories from India's poorest and unheard-of districts.I read it about a year ago. It paints the true picture of my land - The land of contradictions, The land of abundance and paucity !!

More here.

2008-03-31T10:14:00.000-07:00

Currently

Reading..

Watching..

2008-01-02T08:02:00.000-08:00

Books for January

In the Market: The Illustrated History of the Financial Markets

The Rational Unified Process Made Easy: A Practitioner's Guide to the RUP (The Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series)

2008-01-01T14:22:00.000-08:00

WELCOME 2008

2007-12-31T09:05:00.001-08:00

As 2007 retreats....

2007-12-27T16:21:00.000-08:00

As the winter lumbers along...
This year, the snow arrived on the first of December and it has been fairly cold all through the month. Here are a few snaps that I took today,

2007-12-14T15:20:00.001-08:00

Search engine trends and stock performance

This is the kind of stuff that I usually write in my other blog.

Can Google Zeitgeist help you predict the stock market trends ? I heard about this today on Fast Money !

Given above are the following charts,
1) Google Trend chart for XBOX and Playstation searches
2) Stock Price chart for Microsoft (Left)
3) Stock Price chart for Sony Corp(Right)

The question here is whether the spikes on the trend chart have immediately preceded (at least often) spikes on the stock price chart. If yes, Is it possible to closely follow such trends in every market and make the right stock picks ?
I need to take a look at several more jagged peaks before I make up my mind on this. Anyway, the idea that search trends can be tracked to predict stock swings had never crossed my mind before. Well, long way to go :-).

2007-11-30T20:17:00.000-08:00

Of Nukes and Mutually Assured Destruction
Yesterday, I was watching an interview with General (Retd) Shanker Roy Choudhary who was India's Army chief from 1994 to 1997. The General spoke about India's nuclear policy which was one of second strike as opposed to Pakistan's first strike and with an India focus. Well, that may sound like an effective strategy for deterrence. The General's comments were well balanced and he made no malapropos statements. But words, no matter how civilized or ominous they sound cannot substitute for proper planning.
I pass in front of the Schenectady Masonic Temple every day on my way to office. The building houses a fall out shelter, one of the several hundreds in this country. Built during the days of the cold war, such shelters would act as asylums for ordinary folks to escape from nukes and the ensuing radiation. National Geographic channel once ran a documentary on how adults and kids were taught to duck and cover in offices and schools during the cold war days when the threat of a nuclear war loomed large. The military spent millions of dollars building nuclear bunkers and also made plans to save the leadership in case of any such eventualities.
Now coming back to my earlier point - If India truly wishes to abandon the ability to strike first, it should prepare to survive the enemy's first strike. If they attack the metros and other large cities, the casualties could easily run into several millions and then comes the deaths due to radiation. Attacking major cities and vital installations has the potential to break the country's communication backbone. So the General's answers made me think..

1) Why have I never heard of any shelters being built in the major cities in India ?

2) Why is the population not taught survival strategies (At least in the major cities) ?

3 ) What if the attack is massive and it destroys our nuclear assets there by hampering our ability to launch a retaliatory attack from India ?

4) Shouldn't India have bought/built nuclear submarines capable of launching ICBMs (wonder where we are on the much vaunted "Surya") and have them scattered across the globe ? All I have heard about is a protracted tug of war for leasing the "Akula" from Russia. During the cold war, the Russians and the Americans built nuclear submarines which guaranteed them the ability to strike back.

5) Shouldn't we think of building some kind of missile defence system ? President Bush's invitation was readily shot down by our mandarins .

Well, I hope that the Indian leadership who ought to be far more intelligent, knowledgable and smarter than me, has answers to all these questions.

And above all, I hope and pray that a nuclear war always confines itself to literature and imagination. May it never happen in real life. Peace to All ! :-)

2007-11-18T08:34:00.000-08:00

Certified Business Analysis Professional (CBAP) Examination
I have cleared the CBAP examination conducted by the International Institute of Business Analysis. I have received some mails asking me about the examination / certification after my comment on the IIBA community in orkut. So it may be worthwhile posting what I know, if it helps at least one person out there.

The CBAP examination is a test of your knowledge of common Business Analysis processes and practices. This is no rocket science and IMHO all you need to crack the exam is a week of dedicated effort ( ~ 30 hours of study ) - well, that is for a person of average retention like me. If you are smarter, the lesser hours you need to invest.

The CBAP questions are from 6 main topics,

1. Enterprise Analysis,
2. Requirements Planning and Management,
3. Requirements Elicitation,
4. Requirements Analysis and Documentation,
5. Requirements Communication,
6. Solution Assessment and Validation

A quick glance at the BABOK (Business Analysis Body of Knowledge ), would convince anyone who has spent a couple of years doing Requirements Analysis that these chapters contain processes that they follow in their day to day work. The CBAP certification is aimed at intermediate and senior Business Analysts ( you need 7500 hours of BA experience + a few other things..check the IIBA website for details. )

A couple of mails were about how I prepared for the exam. Well, this is what I did,

1. I read the BABOK cover to cover twice (300 pages of processes and practises. I had to read it twice for the ideas to percolate deep enough). As I said earlier, If you are smarter than me, you may have to read it only once.

2. CBAP exam questions/question papers are not available online and hence I bought the CBAP exam guide from B2T Training. Here is the link. It contains about 450 multiple choice questions that you can attempt after you read the BABOK.

3. A few questions ( I recall about 4 or 5) are from outside the BABOK. They may be from the PMBOK ( the one used for the PMP certification) or any of the reference books mentioned in the BABOK. I didn't spend any time reading these books - most of these just need common sense to answer. Example :
In which level of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs does Problem Solving belong ?
a) Self-actualization b)Esteem c)Belonging d) Safety

I had no idea about the 5 levels of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs when I first saw this question ( It is also not mentioned in the BABOK ). But there is a no reason to think that it would belong to Esteem, Belonging or Safety. Problem Solving and Creativity should be associated with Self- Actualization.

To cut a long story short - Read the BABOK cover to cover, take some practise tests and you should sail through. Good Luck !

2007-11-17T10:29:00.000-08:00

This is interesting. It tells you how to charge your iPod ( or for that matter any small USB powered electronic gadget ) using,
1. An Onion
2. A Cup of Gatorade
3. A screw driver.

Boy, Renewable energy sources are certainly catching on in this country ;-).

2007-10-21T16:27:00.000-07:00

Most of the trees have turned bald, I am a week late and the rains have played spoil sport.

2007-10-21T16:16:00.000-07:00

FALL PICTURES :

2007-10-08T11:21:00.000-07:00

Changed gear ..

I started writing this blog around two years ago. Septemeber 2005 saw a couple of posts and then onwards I have been regularly irregular. On a few occassions there have been a flurry of posts which was indicative of interesting happenings in my life that included travels and/or reading wonderful books. The ebb and the flow, the activities and the inactivities, the buzz and the torpor have all been there, as always in the last three decades of my life. But the last two years have helped me balance certain personal equations, fill certain voids, wipe some tears and bring about a few smiles.
I have changed the title of my blog as I wanted it to be relevant to this phase of my life ( God willing, I shall change it again few years down the line). So what is this phase ? Well, if the previous phase could have very well been called "Losing early wickets", I would call this phase "Scoring run a ball" or "Consolidating" or "Building a partnership".
Doesn't make sense ? Forget it. It makes perfect sense to those whom it should.

2007-08-07T19:11:00.000-07:00

Trench War !

On saturday the 28th of July 2007, I led a WWI German unit towards well fortified Allied positions under heavy fire :-) . The rule set we used was Trench Wars and the Game master was Steve Robinson.

There is no major strategy that you can follow while attacking such a well entrenched enemy as shown above - just get your men across the killing field as soon as possible and use your tanks well. Tanks have to pass a "break down test" every round which requires a roll of 5 or higher using a D20. My tank made no more than 3 moves and before it could recover, it was destroyed by artillery fire. A similar game was played the day before and the Germans were completely wiped out before a single soul could reach the trenches. Our fate wasn't that bad. We took around 80 % casualties getting to the trenches ( A blood bath was predicted by Steve, given the fact that the attackers had no air support or cover. ) A great amount of luck is involved when you rush towards the enemy under relentless machine gun fire and artillery bombardment. There were 10 German units in all and only two tanks found their burial ground across the trenches, the remaining 8 were busted well before they could reach anywhere close. With the tanks destroyed, the attackers had to rush towards the enemy to avoid being sitting ducks. Artillery fire aimed at the defenders needed to land inside the trench to kill the enemy (Dice are rolled to check for Scatter and hitting soldiers inside the trench wasn't as easy as killing them in the open.)

I did the best I could - Kept my troops dispersed while advancing, moved my tank as fast as possible with my Infantry under its cover (but there was no escape from the enemy artillery), with the tank gone I moved my men to the trenches as fast as possible (Retreat was not an option) . I could get my flame throwers up to the trenches, but were destroyed before they could use their weapon. Braving the enemy barrage, a couple of my soldiers entered the trenches only to die at the hands of the enemy trench fighters.

How would I play it next time?? ... Hmmmm.....Not sure how I can do it without air support. But if air support were available, I would try softening the enemy with aerial bombardment while my troops dash across the killing field.

2007-08-07T18:39:00.000-07:00

Miniature Painting !

I thought my wife would feel bored like hell while I was playing at Historicon, but it turned out otherwise. She had accompanied me as a non playing family member and spent her time taking photos and learning minature painting. She joined the painting sessions and came out with these figures shown below. She has also offered to paint any figure that I ever purchase :-)

2007-08-06T17:59:00.000-07:00

Battle of Longewala, 5 Dec 1971 (Played at the Historicon, 27th July 2007)

I played on the Indian side at Game Master Dan McDonagh's table, where we re-created the Battle of Longewala, which saw the clash between the Indian and Pakistani forces at the border post of Longewala in Rajasthan, India. The formidable Pakistani force comprised of 65 tanks (T-59s and Shermans), Field guns and mounted Infantry against entrenched Indians who had nothing but mortars and recoiless rifles. Later in the game, the heavily out-numbered Indians also received support from their centurion tanks and mech infantry.

The major difference between the real battle and this game was the Pakistani Airforce. In the real battle the Pakistani tanks were laid to waste by the Indian Airforce. In our game both sides had air support. There were plenty of dog fights and loss of aircrafts. I wasn't too lucky with my fighters which required a roll of 1 using a D10 to score a hit.

"Ground War" is a simple rule set (I believe it was designed by Dan himself), easy to understand and with very few complications. What I did not particularly like was the treatment of ambushes - they were all put on the table right from the beginning and hence the enemy clearly knew which route to avoid. The justification for this treatment was the presence of surveillance aircrafts which could give advance warning to the attackers- I somehow couldn't accept that. Hence, with the enemy clearly avoiding the ambushes and tank traps right from the offset, the Indians were forced to fall back and fight for their lives till their centurion tanks and armoured carriers arrived.

The battle ended in a draw with both sides failing to accomplish their objectives in the given time. The Pakistanis failed to cut a wide (2 ft on the table) secure path through the Indian side and the Indians failed to drive the Pakistanis back.

All said and done, it gives me goose bumps to think of the Indian Soldiers who fought that decisive battle. Heavily out-numbered and without enough resources to thwart a tank attack of such proportions, they managed to hold on till the fighters arrived at dawn. The result which in my opinion may have had a lot to do with Pakistani stupidity and incompetence, takes nothing away from those jawans who stood their ground. Hats off to Major Chandpuri !!

On a lighter note, I should have prepared for the battle by watching J.P. Dutta's film - Border. It may have given me a lot of ideas like engaging my enemy commander in a verbal duel before the battle or asking my soldiers to walk towards the Pakistani tanks with anti-tank mines in their hands and thereby forcing them to retreat. Bollywood ! S I G H !!!

Tomorrow, I shall post a write up on the WWI game that I played the next day.

2007-08-06T10:58:00.000-07:00

Back from Historicon !! I played two games - the 1971 "Battle of Longewala" using the "Groundwar" rules and a WWI German offense on entrenched Allies. Shall post a write up along with snaps in a day or two.

Here are a few snaps.

2007-07-26T11:11:00.000-07:00

Historicon 2007 !!
Packed and all set. Heading for Historicon in a few hours :-)

2007-06-29T11:28:00.000-07:00

:-O : With the Prince of darkness ??

;-) : Yeah, Right !!

2007-06-29T11:15:00.000-07:00

Beside the George Washington memorial.

2007-06-26T21:05:00.000-07:00

Aye Captain !! I am at the wheel, seated is Mahesh and the guy in black is Chindu.

This was a dream come true - Lake George, NY, where I got a chance to drive a speed boat. The experience of the cold wind brushing you wildly and the leaps from one wave crest to another is incomparable. This is far more exciting than hitting 100 mph on an open highway !!

2007-06-25T18:16:00.000-07:00

Fermat's Last Theorem
This is amazing.
Andrew Wiles proceeded to solve Fermat's last theorem (For n>2, the equation a^n + b^n = c^n has no solutions for non zero a,b and c) by proving Taniyama - Shimura Conjecture. Does it not sound incredible that a man who lived about 400 years ago could come up with a different solution, which even the greatest mathematicians of our time have not been able to reproduce ? It speaks volumes of that man's incomparable genius.

2007-06-23T20:44:00.000-07:00

A small gain at one end, a massive loss at the other !!. The foreground shows the destroyed Panzers and the British tanks responsible for it, while in the back ground the common wealth forces are being slaughtered and their machines obliterated !!

2007-06-23T20:39:00.000-07:00

The Germans make an all out offensive on the entrenched defenders. This was the bloodiest part of the whole battle. The Common wealth forces suffered huge casualties and were wiped off the field. Needless to say, the Germans too paid a heavy price.

2007-06-23T20:30:00.000-07:00

The Panzers under fire !! Even after destroying a couple of Panzers through a successful ambush and suppressing yet another, the British tanks failed to carry the momentum forward. The Germans wiped the Common wealth forces off the field at the other end of the battlefield. The success that you see above was fleeting.

2007-06-23T20:27:00.000-07:00

Ambushed !! The Panzers run into well concealed British Cruisers as they make their way around a dilapidated building.

2007-06-23T20:23:00.000-07:00

A burning Panzer, after it took a hit on its flank.

2007-06-23T20:17:00.000-07:00

Germans vehicles getting toasted by the well entrenched Common Weath forces, as they try to push uphill. Capturing this hill was one of the key German objectives.

2007-06-23T20:01:00.000-07:00

The "Road To Kozani" - April 13, 1941 ( Wars in Greece )

On April 13th, 1941 the German 9th Panzer division - 33rd Panzer regiment entered Ptolmais. As the Germans began to push out of Ptolmais, they had to move through a hostile territory consisting of Swamps, Anti Tank ditches and rough terrain. While under the constant barrage of Artillery and anti tank fire, the German forces moved slowly through the swamp and were able to flank the Common wealth forces. The Panzers were then engaged by the tanks of the 3rd Royal Tank Regiment and elements of the 19th Australian Infantry brigade.

The Germans were finally successful in inflicting heavy losses on the Common Wealth force and also driving them off the field. The battle was bloody and the Germans lost several lives, tanks and support vehicles.

2007-06-23T19:44:00.000-07:00

Game-a-thon @ SWA - 23rd June 2007

I had the chance to watch an amazing WWII game using "Battlefront" rules today. There was a big crowd at the table and hence I couldn't play, nor was I familiar with this rule set. So I spent my time watching the game and trying to learn the rules. Anyway, Steve and Pete have offered me a place on one of the teams in an upcoming game and also at Historicon , where they are planning to conduct a few games.

In the afternoon session, I played Junta and managed to finish second with a decent swiss bank balance. It is a game that takes you through the political and military life in a typical banana republic, where Coups, Intrigues and Assassinations and part of everyday life.

2007-06-17T06:36:00.000-07:00

We played Cities and Knights of Catan at the SWA yesterday. Got back home after midnight to get some quick sleep before rushing to office on Sunday morning, as my project was going Live. SWA is conducting Game-a-thon next Saturday. This is the line up of Games,

Morning Session ( 11am - 4pm )
FCS Dungeons & Dragons - "Ambush at Gelding Glade" (Chris Ford)
Dawn RPG - "Under Lock and Key" (Dennis Perlstein)
Battlefront Minis - "Clash of Armor" (Steve Keyer)
Army of Ireland - 1866 Battle of Ridgeway (Dave Cuatt)
1830-Railroads and Robber Barons - Railroading...Tresham Style (Eric Paperman)

Evening Session ( 5pm - 10pm+ )
Seventh Sea RPG - "Elizabethan England" (Charles Moorehouse)
Galactic Destiny - Intergalactic Intrigue (Mike Haggett)
Junta - Political Hijinks (Peter Landry) Settlers of Catan - Cities and Knights Expansion (Daryl Kimmel)

For more details, go here.

2007-06-13T09:04:00.000-07:00

Obsolescence-o-phobia !!

I have read somewhere that English gains about six and loses about four words a year. So if anybody is into the art/profession of coining new words, please create one for the "fear of the light speed obsolescence of gizmos". I suffer from it. For well over a year I have been vacillating about buying a camcorder and everytime I hear someone say that their gadget now costs half of what they had originally spent on it and that better and far more capable devices are available now, my heart sinks.

Anyway, a couple of gadgets have finally made their way into my life recently. After being blown away by the GPS I had on a car that I rented to travel to Washington DC, I decided to buy one. I am sure I would have lost my way and wandered around in the night if I had relied on my printouts from Mapquest alone. So I finally bought the "Garmin Street Pilot i3". To put it simply -"Its a great invention". StreetPilot i3 offers me everything I need for my peregrinations - A robust navigation system with good signal strength, Automatic routing, Voice guidance with turn-by-turn directions , address lookup and 2D/ 3D maps. It has 32K-colour display and mounts perfectly on my wind shield. This particular model has been discontinued but I got a a very good deal and hence went for it, inspite of gravitating towards the c330 model.

The next one to walk the ramp and catch my attention was the ubiquitous Ipod. I had no plans of buying one till I saw an offer on Amazon where the 4GB nano was being offered for $149 (the original market price being $199). I have loaded a couple of audio books and some music that I got from the Schenectady Public Library yesterday.

The third one is a real life saver. With my laptop having crashed twice already in the last one year, I needed to take periodic backups of my data. I hated storing them on multiple DVDs and therefore went for a portable hard drive. Now, this baby is unbelievebly small for its capacity. It fits into the palm of my hand, weights roughly 100 grams but stores a whopping 120 GB. I am certain that the days of Tera and Peta byte storage are not far away. The Blue Ray disk has not yet reached many hands and it has already been overtaken by holographic storage.

Wonder how many more new technologies would become obsolete even before they hit the market !

2007-02-26T10:49:00.001-08:00

Quite a Sight !!!

I have read about mythological beings capable of walking on water. May be this is the closest i can get to see one. That guy in the picture is standing on top of what is a river during the warmer days of the year. I watched him dismount from his car, walk on the frozen river for quite a distance, drill a hole in the ice and fish nonchalantly.

2007-02-26T10:25:00.000-08:00

Winter View - February 2007. The whole darn river is frozen !!

Lock 7 on the Mohawk River

Summer View- June 2006

2007-02-17T18:36:00.000-08:00

Finally the sun showed its face to beam down on us and we ventured out, driving through mountains of snow everywhere.

2007-02-14T13:04:00.000-08:00

Winter View (February 2007)

Summer View (July 2006)

2007-02-11T15:58:00.000-08:00

I have just finished reading "The Walmart Way" by Don Soderquist, a former Walmart Vice Chairman and Chief Operating Officer. It is a fairly good book that borders on being an advertorial and talks about the emergence and growth of Walmart and its culture. There are a few questions at the end of each chapter that looks at Walmart and its principles from different angles. Mr.Soderquist very passionately explains the story of a man who had a simple dream of owning a store and ended up creating the world's largest retail empire. It paints a very impressive picture of Walmart, something that may not amuse many people especially those who are trying to survive in a Walmart World. And then there are those who believe that there is a high price to this low cost.
The book does not spend pages discussing the most familiar allegations against Walmart which include Employee health benefits, pay or the closure of thousands of small businesses.
Anyway, this book presents several good lessons and i shall focus on those rather than what it doesn't. The book is divided into twelve chapters and each focusses on a particular facet. To summarise, the book talks about Sam Walton's Vision and how he pursued it, The Walmart culture, its focus on customer delight and how employees make a difference, Its passion for excellence and the drive to check bureaucracy,Its reliance on technology and the reinvention of Supply chain, Its efforts to forge excellent supplier relationships, to be a trend setter in Corporate social responsibility and finally about the future of Walmart.
Although you might become a little tired of hearing Walmart being praised up to the heavens and Sam being regarded a Demi God, i am sure it provides some food for thought.

2007-02-04T14:46:00.000-08:00

2007-02-04T14:45:00.000-08:00

2007-02-04T14:41:00.000-08:00

Made quick trip to the Maple Ski ridge in Schenectady today.

2007-02-03T11:45:00.000-08:00

Freakonomics is an excellent book. It is veritably called "Freakonomics" as it uses tools that economists generally use to investigate problems that do not seem to be in the purview of Economics. The author investigates several topics both intractable and trivial by analysing huge chunks of data to identify patterns. "People may lie but data do not." is Mr Levitt's argument and he proves it conclusively. Some of the topics he has covered in this book are,

1)What makes a perfect parent?
2)What defied the popular belief and contributed to the decline of crime in the 90s?
3)Match fixing among Sumo wrestlers in Japan?
4)Cheating by teachers
5)How sincere can real estate agents be?
6)What brought the Ku Klux Klan down?
7)Why do crack dealers live with their mothers?

Undoubtedly, Mr.Levitt is a maverick and he makes seemingly meaningless piles of numbers tell tales that turn conventional wisdom on its head. What i felt most striking was his reasoning that the decline of crime in the 90s was not due to better policing strategies or a buoyant economy (they may have made a small difference) but the legalization of abortion two decades earlier. It removed a sizeable population of "would be criminals" and crime nose dived.
To summarize, i find this book excellent and insightful and it shows a world seen not just through the eyes of an Economist but that of a criminologist, a sociologist and above all someone who is free from the shackles of convention.

2007-01-15T16:46:00.000-08:00

As a wimpy winter lumbers on, we received a mild ice storm today and i stayed indoors reading "The Iraq Study Group Report". The report begins ominously stating that "The situation in Iraq is grave and deteriorationg. There is no path that can guarantee success, but the prospects can be improved." Hmmmm...I don't want to take any sides when it comes to the recent debate on increasing the troop levels. I see valid reasons for doing so and i also admire the sacrifices many families have made for this nation. I can also understand why many Americans want their government to cut and run. So I shall keep my judgements to myself and hope that everyone finds peace and respect.

I also watched the movie "Kingdom of Heaven". I think Ridley Scott did a better job with "Gladiator".

2007-01-01T13:21:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year !

2006 ended on a weekend that saw me hibernate on my couch under a blanket where i finished reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Book 5) and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Book 6) . A warm blanket over my body, A fantasy novel in my hand, Cold wind and snow outside.Bye Bye 2006. You were good in many ways and excellent in many more. The drudgery as i am aware was a conscious choice, never foisted. Thank You for all the smiles :-)

2006-12-19T20:26:00.000-08:00

Today's Snippet
Currently iam reading Essentials of Supply Chain Management by Michael Hugos and i came across this interesting section. It is about something that used to happen in the days of yore when companies indulged in Vertical Integration.
"In the first half of the 1900s Ford Motor Company owned much of what is needed to feed its cars. it owned and operated iron mines that extracted iron ore, steel mills that turned the ore into steel products, plants that made component car parts and assembly plants that turned out finished cars. In addition, they owned farms where they grew flax to make into linen car tops and forests that they logged and sawmills where they cut the timber into lumber for making wooden car parts. Ford's famous River Rouge Plant was a monument to Vertical Integration - iron ore went in at one end and cars came out at the other end. Henry Ford in his 1926 autobiography, "Today and Tomorrow", boasted that his company could take in iron ore from the mine and put out a car 81 hours later."
This might sound incredible in today's world where every company focusses on its core competency, outsourcing all other activities. Well, the world has come a long way !!

2006-12-15T18:03:00.000-08:00

I finished reading Anderson Cooper's book Dispatches from the Edge: A Memoir of War, Disasters, and Survival and it was truly riveting. I frequently watch his show on CNN and have pondered over the kind of life journalists of his ilk lead. Anderson compares himself to a shark which has to keep moving to survive. He interweaves his experiences in different corners of the planet with insights into his personal life and the tragedies that probably made him the man he is. The Talk about war, death, disease and destruction in the world he sees, the pain and suffering of the victims in those regions along side his own personal tragedies and losses opens a window into his soul. Suffering knows no language, race, colour or religion. The seething pain, tears, hunger and blood are all the same.
The author launched his career with a fake press id and a borrowed camera. His profession took him to several places including Burma, Srilanka, Somalia, Bosnia- Herzegovina and Niger.He has seen the trail left behind by destruction in its myriad forms, be it Kathrina, Tsunami, famines or civil wars. The book does not go to the root of any problem or offer solutions. It is like a photograph which in addition to the colours, took a snap of the pain and suffering too.
Good book, worth your time and money.

2006-12-12T17:43:00.000-08:00

Always Low Prices
As an impenitent Walmart customer, i was amused to read what Michael Hugos wrote about "Cross docking" - an inventory management system pioneered by Walmart. "Cross Docking was pioneered by Walmart in its drive to increase efficiencies in its supply chain. In this approach the product is not actually warehoused in a facility, but the facility houses a process where trucks from suppliers arrive and unload large quantities of products. These large lots are then broken down into smaller lots which are then reassembled and loaded onto outbound trucks".
Now let me collate this with what Thomas Friedman says in "The World is Flat"
" I had never seen what a supply chain looked like in action until i visited the Walmart Headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas". My Walmart hosts took me over to the 1.2 million square foot distribution centre, where we climbed up to a viewing perch and watched the show. On one side of the building, scores of white Walmart trucks were dropping off boxes of merchandise from thousands of different suppliers. Boxes large and small were fed up a conveyor belt at each loading dock. These little conveyor belts fed into a bigger belt, like streams feeding into a powerful river. Twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, the suppliers trucks feed the twelve miles of conveyor streams and the coneyor streams feed into a huge Walmart river of boxed products. But that is just half the show. As the Walmart river flows along, an electric eye reads the barcodes on each box on its way to the other side of the building. There the river parts again into a hundred streams. Electric arms from each stream reach out and guide the boxes - ordered by particular Walmart stores - off the main river and down its stream, where another conveyor belt sweeps it into a waiting Walmart truck, which will rush these products to the shelves of the particular Walmart store somewhere in the country. There a customer will lift one of these products off the shelf, and the cashier will scan it in, and the moment that happens a signal will be generated. This signal will go out across the Walmart network to the supplier of that product - whether the supplier's factory is in Coastal china or Coastal Maine. The signal will pop up on the supplier's computer screen and prompt him to make another of that item and ship it via the Walmart supply chain, and the whole cycle will start anew. So no sooner does your arm lift a product off the local Walmart's shelf and onto the checkout counter than another mechanical arm starts making another one somewhere in the world. Call it "Walmart Symphony" in multiple movements with no finale. It just plays over 24/365: delivery, sorting, packing, distribution, buying, manufacturing, reordering, delivery, sorting, packing..."

Truly Amazing. The latter part of this whole activity where the customer triggers a signal to the supplier forms part of another act that Walmart has pioneered - Electronic data interchange with its suppliers.
What ever may be the cons, this is an amazing, well oiled beast of a machine ! Indian retailers have real reasons to worry. The price conscious Indian customer is an ideal Walmart target. Are the days of mom and pop stores really over ? Hmmm...it is sad to think so, as my father used to own a grocery store till a few years back. Well...it is an ever changing world.

2006-12-06T16:19:00.000-08:00

Here is my namesake.He seems to be living his life to the fullest.

2006-12-06T15:58:00.000-08:00

Okay, here is how i would solve the problem below,

When the cube is disassembled, we have 8 cubes with 3 black sides, 12 cubes with 2 black sides, 6 cubes with one black side and 1 cube with none.

Now when the cubes are put back, the 27 cubes can be arranged in 27! ways and each of the cubes can have 24 different orientations. So the denominator would be 24^27 * 27 !

Now going for the numerator.

The cubes with three black sides have to be arranged in the 8 corners and can be arranged in 8! ways and they can each be oriented in 3 ways so that the outerside is black and hence the total number of arrangements = 3^8 * 8!

The cubes with two black sides can be arranged in 12! ways and they can each be oriented in 2 ways so that the outerside is black and hence the total number of arrangements = 2^12 * 12!

The cubes with one black side can be arranged in 6! ways and they can each be oriented in 4 ways so that the outerside is black and hence the total number of arrangements = 4^6 * 6!

Now the last cube , the one with no black face has to go at the center of the cube and can be oriented in 24 ways. So total number of arrangements = 24.

So the probability that the reassembled cube is black
= (3^8 * 8! * 2^12 * 12! * 4^6 * 6! * 24) / (24^27 * 27 !)

Did i miss anything ??

2006-12-04T20:38:00.000-08:00

Thought for the day

Twenty-seven identical white cubes are assembled into a single cube, the outside of which is painted black. The cube is then disassembled and the smaller cubes thoroughly shuffled in a bag. A blindfolded man (who cannot feel the paint) reassembles the pieces into a cube. What is the probability that the outside of this cube is completely black?

2006-11-30T20:09:00.000-08:00

More about 1729.

Ofcourse any school kid can tell you that the "Ramanujan Number" 1729 is the smallest positive integer that can be written as the sum of the cubes of two numbers in two different ways.
1729 = 10^3 + 9^3 = 12^3 + 1^3
I learned few interesting stuff recently.

1+7+2+9 = 19 and 19 * 91= 1729

Consider the prime numbers 7,13 and 19 which form an arithmetic progression, 7*13*19 = 1729

1729 is not "really" the smallest number with the property that Ramanujan discovered, infact it is 91 if negative numbers are also considered.

91 = 4^3 + 3^3 = 6^3 + (-5)^3

2006-10-22T10:30:00.000-07:00

Big Rock Candy Mountain

I watched the movie "O brother, where art thou" and i have fallen in love with it. I played the movie several times hopping to the songs and i have already listened to the "Big Rock Candy Mountain" at least ten times today.

"Big Rock Candy Mountain" is a song about a hobo's idea of paradise - a modern version of the medieval concept of Cockaigne.The Land of Cockaigne was the medieval peasant’s dream, offering relief from backbreaking labor and the daily struggle for meager food. It was where,

"The houses were made of barley sugar and cakes, the streets were paved with pastry, and the shops supplied goods for nothing. Roasted pigs wander about with knives in their backs to make carving easy, where grilled geese fly directly into one's mouth, where cooked fish jump out of the water and land at one's feet. The weather is always mild, the wine flows freely, sex is readily available, and all people enjoy eternal youth"

Big Rock Candy Mountain

One evening as the sun went down and the jungle fire was burning
Down the track came a hobo hiking and he said boys I'm not turning
I'm headin for a land that's far away beside the crystal fountains
So come with me we'll go and see the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains there's a land that's fair and bright
Where the handouts grow on bushes and you sleep out every night
Where the boxcars are all empty and the sun shines every day
On the birds and the bees and the cigarette trees
Where the lemonade springs where the bluebird sings
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains all the cops have wooden legs
And the bulldogs all have rubber teeth and the hens lay soft boiled eggs
The farmer's trees are full of fruit and the barns are full of hay
Oh, I'm bound to go where there ain't no snow
Where the rain don't fall and the wind don't blow
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains you never change your socks
And the little streams of alcohol come a-trickling down the rocks
The brakemen have to tip their hats and the railroad bulls are blind
There's a lake of stew and of whiskey too
You can paddle all around 'em in a big canoe
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains the jails are made of tin
And you can walk right out again as soon as you are in
There ain't no short handled shovels, no axes saws or picks
I'm a goin to stay where you sleep all day
Where they hung the jerk that invented work
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

I'll see you all this coming fall in the Big Rock Candy Mountains

2006-10-21T20:11:00.000-07:00

On the shores of Lake George! The winter is finally here ! The water is stark blue, something which i failed to notice when i went there in Summer. It was crowded with boats in summer and now the winter has forced them ashore. The shops and restaurants have all shut down and and the streets are empty.The bustle and commotion of summer have made way for the torpidity of winter. Soon, the leaves will all be gone. Snow storms and blizzards will take over this land. The beauty of spring and the heat of summer will all be memories. But the winter will bring with it its own adventures. I would love to go snowbiking and skiing.Spring and Summer were welcomed with cheers. Winter may always be an unwelcomed guest who overstays.

2006-10-09T20:07:00.000-07:00

The Fall in Newton, NJ. That is nature at her colourful best.

Visit to Swartswood State Park

2006-10-09T19:46:00.000-07:00


This was taken during a visit to Swartswood State Park, New Jersey yesterday. It surprises me that the fall has arrived in NJ while the trees are still green up where i live (Schenectady, NY).

The Horse Shoe Falls - NIAGARA

2006-10-05T16:57:00.000-07:00

I took this video from the boat "Maid of the Mist" right from under the Horse Shoe falls which is the largest of the Niagara falls. The view from the boat is breath taking as it takes you close to the falls and makes you feel all its power. The clip is brief and is hazy due to the heavy mist near the fall. Enough water flows down the horse shoe falls to fill a million bath tubs every second. It was a truly great experience.

2006-10-02T13:10:00.000-07:00

A typical week end swished past me and before i could even realise, it is the uphill climb - It is monday !! Weather played the spoil sport on saturday and i stayed indoors with my books. Sunday saw me watch two movies - "An Inconvenient Truth" at the Proctors and after reaching home , i watched Kevin Costner's "Dances with the Wolves". Simple story, well told. Inconvenient Truth, on the other hand is a poignant tale of a beautiful planet called Earth being eaten alive by a species called Homo Sapiens. It makes you walk out of the theatre with a heavy heart. But for the positive note on which the movie ends, the heaviness would have lingered on longer. Forget Al Gore, forget global warming, i have myself been witness to the slow and tragic death of a river that flows through my erst while neighbourhood. We used to swim in those waters long ago, now it is nothing but a sewage canal whose stench can be felt several yards away.
I am depressed :-(

2006-09-27T18:29:00.000-07:00

Theism to Atheism, Agnosticism to Realism

I generally loathe putting text copied from another page on my blog. But this time I shall make an exception. At the very end of this post you will find an excerpt from Bhagat Singh's diary, written in 1930 and his musings on Atheism.
It has prompted me to write something on "My Faith" - This is certainly one of the toughest subjects to write/speak about. At least, that what I have often felt. Questions about the existence and perception of God, raise a tempest in my mind. When my thoughts tend towards Atheism I feel an urgent need to caution myself, a reminder that my thoughts are driven by the laws of the Universe as I perceive it. Any amount of Free thinking will have an element of bondage to it. My rebel and rational mind never accepts religions, in the form they are today and hence I prefer keeping my debates private. The very fact that I am posting them here causes consternation. This is supposed to be a deeply personal matter. That being the case,I am not going to use valuable bytes to paint my mind here. Instead, let me reminisce.
I recall those rebellious teenage years when I refused to visit temples, how I refused to go out an bow before the deity when the procession from the temple arrived in front of my house, how much these words from Rabindra Nath Tagore's Gitanjali inspired me (It was a poem that we had to study in school) ;

Leave this chanting and singing and telling of beads!
Whom dost thou worship in this lonely dark corner of a temple with doors all shut?
Open thine eyes and see thy God is not before thee!
He is there where the tiller is tilling the hard ground
and where the pathmaker is breaking stones.
He is with them in sun and in shower,
and his garment is covered with dust.
Put off thy holy mantle and even like him come down on the dusty soil!
Deliverance?
Where is this deliverance to be found?
Our master himself has joyfully taken upon him the bonds of creation;
he is bound with us all for ever.
Come out of thy meditations and leave aside thy flowers and incense!
What harm is there if thy clothes become tattered and stained?
Meet him and stand by him in toil and in sweat of thy brow.

I remember singing this aloud when my mother sings her evening prayers, I remember discarding an amulet that was given to me by my father, I remember refusing to fast, I remember studying on Vijayadashami I remember all those arguments with my devout friends. Years passed by and I changed , I became a turncoat,I started to read works of Swami Vivekananda The metamorphosis kicked in and I found myself a Theist. Things never stopped there. The rebel in me was still searching for an identity, I didn't get my answers or consolation in religion. I became doubtful, felt that my actions were nothing but self deception, my faith was another hypocrisy, my mind squirmed when my tongue uttered prayers, the wheels started to move...days and months went by and I called myself a Realist. I didn't care if the glass was half full or half empty...If I was thirsty I just wanted to drink it ! If God existed, good for him. The void in my heart and mind, my bones and flesh coalesced, I was hollow from within. My version of Realism gave me an opportunity to run towards ignorance. I didn't care if there was a soul,I didn't want to know, it never fetched me three square meals a day. It was no more a rebellion, it was the pure bliss of anarchy. Anarchy in my thoughts made be return to non - vegetarianism, I didn't know what I wanted. Anarchy in my life moved me to heavy metal music ( I remember being moved to a trance listening to "Nothing Else Matters" and "Unforgiven" by Metallica). Anarchy in habits led to wasting study hours pondering about who knows what. I used to think extensively lying on my bed, gaping at the stars through my window and I used to think extensively the next day and the next day too, but I don't think I ever got my answers, if so I might now remember what these extensive ruminations were about, but I don't. I wrote poetry, may be the diary still lies in my drawer back home. I don't recollect much of what I wrote, but I could channel a lot of my angst through the tip of my pen. I remember a few lines of one such outbursts,
--------------(some lines I do not recollect)
like a joker at a circus,
I laugh and clap and jump around,
but when all are gone I stand alone,
my shadow is with my under the lights,
but late at night when the lights are gone,
my shadow leaves me all alone,
I sit and think like a forlorn child,
how my days come and go,
then I lock myself in my room,
and then get locked in my world,
where I walk and wander alone,
the sun never sets and the night never falls,
but still I tell my shadow "Please don't go"
coz if at least you are not mine,
who else shall me all that mine,
------------- I forgot the rest. :-)

Sometimes I laugh , but mostly I have sympathy and warmth for that boy who was stuck somewhere in the turbulence of his age. I would like to talk to him someday when all my hairs have turned grey and I clutch on to a stick only to walk with a stagger. May be I can reach to him in ways that no one has or can ever reach and make him be at peace with the world.
I have changed a lot. May be I have not let gone of all my idiosyncrasies but another metamorphosis has moved me through Agnosticism and unnamed, unknown realms. I do not know, for sure whether there is an omnipresent,omniscient and omnipotent force who conjured this Universe up, but I realise that I am just a blip on screen. I have not have seen, heard or felt the Almighty and I have not seen or heard about anything that corroborates its presence. But I think often that if I could "see" a lot more frequencies of the Electromagnetic spectrum my Universe would change for ever. Those Cosmic and radio waves originating in outer space will not simply pass through me, but would evoke something in me and open my mind. I tend to think that people in their beliefs, in their religions, in their practices and in their lives in general are doing nothing but search for that elusive metaphysical place where there will be no turbulence and no further quest. I may not have answers to everything that my mind throws at me. I try hard to rationalise and "now" for me, where rationality ends, Silence begins.
:-) Long post...never thought I would write so much when I started. By the way here is the link to Bhagat Singh's thoughts.

2006-09-10T18:03:00.000-07:00

Visited an Apple orchard today. Came back with a bag full of apples, fresh and plucked right off the tree. Not sure what to do with so many of them. Apple Pie, Apple dumplings, Apple Muffin, Apple Cake, Apple Shake, Apple Crunch, Baked Apple, Fried Apple, Apple Cookies, Apple Nut Dessert, Caramel Apple Dessert, Grated Apple Dessert......Jeez give me a break !

2006-07-23T07:29:00.000-07:00

Beating India to the Drain !
Recently, I was disheartened to read about the Indian Government's move to introduce reservations in Universities, public and the private sectors. The news left me pondering whether any other nation on Earth would ever perform such a self destructive act. Well, the Economist (July 15th 2006 ) tells that we are not alone in the race to the drain. Brazil, too is coming up with "Quotas". While it is caste based reservation in India, it is going to be based on colour in Brazil.
The government of Brazil is planning to reduce the official race types to five - White, Oriental, Indigenous, Black and Pardo (Brown). Unofficial surveys say that there 136 terms by which Brazilians classify their complexion, from "Snow White" to "Cinnamon".
The Racial Quota Law and the Racial Equality statute would create reservations in Universities, Civil Services and the private sector. An initial quota of 20% (which would in course of time rise to 50%) of senior civil service jobs and vacancies at federal universities are to be set aside for those of "African Ancestry". The Indians too would benefit from these new laws.
Like India, Brazilians too appear divided on this issue. Those in favour of the draft point to the deep racial divide and the poor living conditions of the majority of the negroes and pardos. Those against the law argue that what is required in the place of such a law is a broad system of incentives - study grants and tutorials for the poor which would reach all Brazilians, whatever be their complexion.
So, what is the moral of the story ? I would say that America's greatest export - democracy is not the panacea for all political evils. Infact, democracy brings together demons who become intoxicated with power and leave no stone unturned to divide the masses and stay in power.
Blame the hoi polloi for staying blind and deaf.

2006-06-12T14:05:00.000-07:00

I have joined the Schenectady Wargaming Association. They seem to arrange games regularly during the week ends. I am off to see and if possible play one this saturday.It turns out that the studio is just about 2 miles from my home.
On another front i bought The Power of Gold : The History of an Obsession . It appears to be a real page turner. This seems to be the right season for History buffs. History Channel has been telecasting a lot of interesting programmes of late. All this seems to add fuel to fire and i am eager to attend the Historicon this year.

2006-06-11T20:26:00.000-07:00

Mr.Jack Welch and Capt Jack Aubrey
I was reading WINNING by Jack Welch over the weekend and also watched the movie Master and Commander.
Mr. Welch in his book,has listed 8 rules of leadership. While watching the movie, quite naturally i started to look for these traits in Capt Jack Aubrey (enacted by Russel Crowe) who was out hunting for the french Man-O-War "Acheron".

1. Leaders relentlesly upgrade their team, using every encounter as an opportunity to evaluate, coach and build self confidence.
Capt. Jack Aubrey is shown mentoring his subordinates. In one particular scene he severely reprimands one of his midshipmen for tolerating insubordination and tells him about earning the respect of his subordinates and enforcing discipline. He talks about walking the fine line between befriending the foremosts jacks and being a tyrant. He also entrusts junior officers with important tasks and motivates them to succeed.

2. Leaders make sure people not only see the vision, they live and breathe it.
The Captain is shown as a fine orator who tells the crew that England is under invasion and though they are far away from land, the ship is no less than their country. He eggs them on telling anecdotes from the days he served with Lord Nelson in the Nile. The crew seemed to well understand that they were not merely fighting a ship to ship battle , but were part of a larger campaign to defeat the Bonaparte and to stop him from conquering Europe.

3. Leaders get into everyone's skin, exuding positive energy and optimism.
The Captain can be seen climbing up the Mast, talking to the carpenters, the lieutenants and other members of the crew in a very friendly manner and keeps them focussed on their tasks.

4. Leaders establish trust with candor, transparecy and credit.
Captain Aubrey is shown discussing strategies with his officers and also allows them to disagree with him and put forth their points.

5. Leaders have the courage to make unpopular decisions and gut calls.
The public flogging of a popular crew member for not showing obeisance to a senior officer is one example.

6. Leaders push and probe with a curiosity that borders on skepticism, making sure their questions are answered with action.

7.Leaders inspire risk taking and learning by setting the example.
The plan to attack the Acheron is the best example of display of brilliance and risk taking. The crew calls him "Lucky Jack" and appears ready to follow him anywhere.

8. Leaders celebrate.
On several occassions,Capt. Aubrey rewards his team members with an extra ration of grog or rum for their efforts.

"Master and Commander" is based on one of the 21 novels that form part of the Aubrey–Maturin series, also known as the Aubreyad by Patrick O'Brian, set during the Napoleonic Wars and centering on the friendship between Captain Jack Aubrey of the Royal Navy and his ship's surgeon Stephen Maturin, who is also a physician, natural philosopher, and secret agent. The 21st novel of the series, left unfinished by O'Brian's death in 2000, was published in late 2004.

2006-06-08T18:30:00.000-07:00

Freedom of Expression :

When the actions of a nation are at variances with its professed values, is it unfair to call it a land of hypocrites ? When a Government stays in power even after thousands of innocent men, women and children perish in a state sponsored pogrom, when the state is eager to ban movies and books simply because they represent the suppressed views or do not kowtow to the wishes of the manipulators, When 60 years have proved insufficient to pull more than 70% of the population out of poverty, the fattest constitution in the world has failed us. Where are the provisions to prevent criminalisation of politics? where are the rules to recall wimpy representatives? where are the principles of freedom of expression and speech ? Have they morphed into mere ink ?
Why are we scared to face the truth ? Why is it that we read only one side of the story ? The sign of a civilised society is not to shut out counter arguments. On the contrary, a civilised society should encourage debate on controversial topics, It should listen to both sides of any story. It should be through the clarity that emerges out of such a healthy debate that the society grows. Muffled screams can only sow seeds of dissent.
Reading the preamble of my constitution, i wonder how many words are there to whom we have shown true justice,

WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens:

JUSTICE, social, economic and political;

LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship;

EQUALITY of status and of opportunity;

and to promote among them all

FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation;

Are we truly socialist?? If not why keep that word in the preamble ?

Are we secular ?? Does secularism stand for appeasement of religions?? Pandering to religions ?? I believe secularism should be equal distance from all religions. A condition of State and Religion being divorced. Why did we disgrace Shah Bano?

Justice ??? "Justice delayed is Justice Denied". How many innocents languish behind the bars, How many criminals (read politicians) roam scot free ?

Equality ?? What is this hue and cry about Reservations? Why do i have to write my religion and caste in almost every application form that i have to fill? Is it because we all are equal but some people are more equal than others ?

Fraternity ?? The damage is already done ! Having placed "Caste" and "religion" on the center Stage and having played Vote bank politics, what kind of Fraternity have our leaders established ? "A Fraternity for the Cynical" ??

Unity and Integrity of the Nation : Yes !! If a nation is a geographic area with countless people, roads, bridges, forests, lakes, houses and skyscrapers...we have united them, we have built on them....But if Nationalism is something that stems from an admiration for a set of values that the people of that land hold, a set of principles that one believes is so virtuous that it should outlive everything else, a set of ideas that one places above himself and pledges to die protecting them....then i wonder how many of us feel that emotion in our bones !!!

2006-05-07T18:33:00.000-07:00

I felt entranced by this natural kaleidoscope when i went out for a stroll today evening along the banks of the Mohawk. How many words would a poet need to describe this ? How many colours would a painter need to paint this ?

2006-05-07T12:30:00.000-07:00

WildImaginophobia or AIophobia ?
I was at the local Barnes and nobles store yesterday when i was surprised to see a book on the shelf titled "How to escape from a robotic take over." The writer may have caught a fever after watching "The Matrix" and seems to have embarked on a mission to save Morphius and Neo from all the perils. He explains how humans can escape if the robots ever take over the planet. He gives you tips on how to differentiate between a robot and a human lest the robots decide to visit your house incognito. Imagine yourself opening the door to a courier guy who turns out to be a robot which then barges into your house to take you captive. It forces me to think of an Indian context where a robot disguised as a milk man or newspaper boy comes riding a bicycle and rings the door bell. The writer wants the readers to pay attention to the eyes and emotions as the robots cannot fake them so easily. He has ideas on how to inactivate and overcome a rebel servant robot. Now what if you have an intelligent house with several AI enabled devices colluding against its owner. Realising the revolt is about to begin, you try to dial 911...the intelligent phone may either deny you service or tap your call. The intelligent door may not open and just in case you manage to break the window and run to your car, it may not respond to you, thanks to its intelligence.
Well....i remember reading an article in 1999 about the then impending Y2K problem and was puzzled to hear that some people were even building bunkers and other underground shelters fearing the Y2K to be the armageddon. It makes me think that people (or more specifically the Westerners) seem to have a penchant for imagining situations that lead to an apocalypse.Interestingly they start preparing for it and even more interestingly they tend to attract many followers.
More that this being something like an AIophobia, i presume this should be a phobia of another kind. A fear of your wildest imaginations coming true. I tried to read if there was one of that kind, but couldn't find any. Well...i have learned that there are over 600 classified varieties of phobias. Read this.
Now has robotics reached such a stage where humans have to start preparing shields is something i should be asking someone who is an authority on robotics. Till then i can do nothing other than laugh my gut out when i hear/read/see such attempts.

2006-05-05T18:01:00.000-07:00

The woods over yonder,the waves racing to the shore, the green grass by the river, the cool breeze brushing my body, the clear sky above, the ducks in the water,the pensiveness of an evening that watches a dying sun lay a sparkling carpet on the water ...that is me on the banks of the Mohawk !

2006-05-04T15:40:00.000-07:00

I read "The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century" by Thomas Friedman. Undoubtedly, this is one of the finest books i have read in years. Mr. Friedman displays his uncanny knack to accrue facts and follows it with an impressive elucidation of the emerging pattern. He states that the world was flattened by ten forces. They are the fall of the Berlin wall, the emergence of Netscape, the emergence of Work Flow Software, Open Sourcing, Out Sourcing, Offshoring, Supply Chaining, Insourcing, In-Forming and what he calls Steroids ( Digital and mobile communications).
He also writes about the unflattening forces that are at work including the terrorists whom he calls "The Islamo Leninists". An advocate of the free society and capitalism, Mr. Friedman fervently argues that it is not all doom and that for every crazy bearded mullah who is hell bent to throw humanity back by centuries, there is an enlightened soul working his/her way towards making the world a better place to live in. Rather impishly he propounds his "Dell theory of conflict prevention" which states that no two countries that are both part of a major global supply chain, like Dell's, will ever fight a war against each other. In other words he meant to say that if countries like India and Pakistan become part of major global supply chains, which bring a lot of revenue and employment opportunities to its citizens, then the probability of a war decreases. Well, this argument can have crowd on both sides but history has shown us that China has not dared to do anything more than flexing its muscles at Taiwan and India does nothing more than spitting fire on pakistan when the latter indulges in habitual trouble making. None of these nations would take the risk of fighting a full fledged war as the economic costs can be unbearable. These countries have become nodal points in major global supply chains and can disrupt it only at their own risk of causing irreparable damage.

2006-02-24T18:54:00.000-08:00

Playing Cricket when the temperature hovers around 10 degrees celcius is something new that i have experienced . When the cold breeze blows over the ground, bodies are benumbed and limbs freeze. Response time increases and the ball hits your hand like a stone. Within the sweater, the body curls upto itself, otherwise nimble feet are glued to the soil, the fielders jog behind a hurrying ball.
All said, i enjoy this more than playing in the intense sun, which beats you with its red hot rays and suck every drop of the body fluid. It is a different experience, worth the struggle.

2005-10-23T23:42:00.000-07:00

I read Five Point Someone authored by Chetan Bhagat. Small & simple story, WELL TOLD. It is the narration that stands out more than anything else. The lucid yet piquant style of the author succeeds in etching the characters and the plot in the reader's mind. Right through the simple narrative the writer guides an undercurrent of hilarity and sarcasm aimed at the IIT education system and self important professors. A student of any college can empathise with the characters and would have themselves had an experience of surviving amongst characters as described in the novel. It would also serve as a reminiscent of those college days where one would have grappled with the tough choice of whether to enjoy the freedom of life or labour for better academic scores.
Heard that the author has published another novel titled "One night at the call centre." I need to grab it.

2005-10-18T05:43:00.000-07:00

To the surreal world of Gods, Men and Demons ..
I read Homer's "Odyssey" retold by Geraldine McCaughrean last night.
It is not always so easy to carry oneself around in the real world. Especially when you have to work with an application that at times shows you a wait screen while fetching the data from what seems to be a database placed outside the milky way. Click on a button and then stare into the monitor in anticipation of a "never seen before" error, a wait that makes you express all the emotions from curiosity through anxiety through agony through hopelessness. Finally the UI draws itself out, bringing tears of joy in your eyes ! Boo Hoo :-( .
If that was real, then i wanted to have a taste of the surreal, a walk through the wildest imaginations of men, through a world of demons and wild beasts. I hopped on to the ship of Odysseus, returning from Troy and was dragged into a tumultuos world inhabited by One eyed giants, a floating kingdom whose ruler had trapped the ocean winds in a bag followed by a travel through the world of the dead, screaming dragons and wrathful gods.
Aaaaha, there is no better antidote to a dry day that a fantasy.

2005-10-17T08:42:00.000-07:00

How true is truth ?

I just finished reading Bill Clinton's MY LIFE (Early Years) . Every Autobiography claims to be a soul searching memoir in which the person gives a first hand account of the incidents in which he had been a party. And whenever the writer attempts to finally come out in an uncreased, unstained white robe, iam amused. Do people always tell the truth in their autobiographies ? :-) Or do they tell what they want others to think is the truth. Anyway, it would be my fault if i buy a biography expecting nothing but truth in it. Mr. Clinton has not mentioned about any Machiavellian tactic that he had ever used. He has not mentioned about ever intentionally harming or deceiving anyone. Such a confession coming from a person who has been immersed in the turbulence of American politics all his life, puts me in a quandary.
I have also read elsewhere that there have been claims of Mahatma Gandhi dropping several contentious issues from his autobiography. Now let me grab a copy of Mein Kampf. If everyone claims to be fair, why is history replete with stories of deceit and cruelty ?
Well, may be two rights pulling in different directions call eachother "wrong" ! If every act can be justified by some theory, there are no wrongs per se. It is an absorbing activity to read autobiographies and then regurgitate them. When a person's life that spans several decades is laid down on a few hundred sheets of paper, they should naturally thrum with wisdom. Wisdom that was passed on to him by men before him, Wisdom gained through painstaking experiences, Wisdom that would be the beacon if one ever stands at the same cross roads. And they are laid down before the readers who can reflect on them and think of wiser ways to deal with a situation or learn the wiser way from the pages.

2005-09-28T20:33:00.000-07:00

And Miles to go before i Sleep :
Of late, i have been pondering over the course of my life. On a personal front iam quite near to achieving whatever i had been dreaming of during my boyhood days. This leaves me in a peculiar stage in my life where my mind grapples with an unprecedented aimlessness which led me to do an introspection and ponder over what all i should do before it is time to bid farewell to this life. To be honest i never had real "Long" Term objectives in my life. I mean "Objectives" which are different from dreams and are accompanied by a desperate craving for them. The short term objective that i had in my mind is "almost" accomplished. God willing, things should all be hunky- dory in another year. What do i do then ? As a result of my ruminations during the silent long walks that i have been taking during the last couple of days, I have been able to enumerate several things that i need to accomplish in my personal and profesional life before i die. With due respect to life and acknowledging the fact that the almighty might call me back any moment, let me list a few things that i would like to achieve in the years ahead,(by the way, the terms God and Almighty that i have used here have nothing to do with any religion or school of thought. My beliefs are complex, unorthodox, private and are not confined to the boundaries set by both religion and rationality.)

So here i go,

Sailing : To some of the islands of the Indian and Pacific Oceans.
Cross desert Safari : Cross the Thar desert on a camel.
Play Squash
Learn Judo (I have learned elementary Karate)
Visit Tibet and spend a couple of days in a buddhist monastery
Trek in the Himalayas
Visit Kashmir/Ladakh
Experience Weightlessness.
Study at one of the best Business Schools in the World
Teach mathematics in Elementary school, High School and College
Get a Phd in Mathematics
Write a book on Mathematics.
Learn to play a musical instrument
Learn to Speak, read and Write in a foreign language (other than English)
Take a Rollercoaster ride. (Done : Six Flags, New York)
See a volcano
Possess a Chenda and Idakka.
Ride a horse.
See penguins in the wild.
Watch Whales.
Parasail
Travel in a helicopter
Go to Historicon (Done : July 2007)
Play a wargame with complete model set. (Done : SWA and Historicon 2007)
Visit the Taj mahal
Visit the Great wall of China.
Visit the Grand Canyon.
Visit Rome
Visit Wayanad (My wife loves Wayanad :-) )
Row along the backwaters of kerala on a small wooden boat.
Visit Sikkim and Meghalaya.
Visit Coorg.
Trace my roots as back in time as possible.
Visit the cellular jail in Andamans.
Be extremely well read in history.
Run a marathon for a cause.
Possess an SLR camera.
Possess a high definition Camcorder (Done...Bought Sony SR-11..60 GB hard drive, Hi- Def)
Possess a "VERY BIG" LCD HDTV and home theatre system ;-)
Have a short stint as a National Geographic Reporter.
Have a rich personal library. (In Progress..Right now I have 100 odd books and around 25 DVDs)
Go on white water rafting and ocean kayaking.
Go on a tour to Australia and New Zealand.
Shave my head once.
Visit Jallianwalah Bagh, Fort Sumter and Gettysburg.
Write a travelogue.
Sponsor an underprivileged kid all the way from kindergarten through college.
Establish or Work for an orphanage.
Live in a very remote indian village for a week.
Visit New York on a new year's eve.
Be good at programming in some exotic language.
Possess a huge collection of Folk stories from all over the globe.
Have a beautiful garden (where I'll name the various trees)
Talk on radio (I have participated and won a prize in a quiz conducted and aired by All India Radio in 1995)
Address a gathering of over 1000 people. (I have addressed a gathering of around 100).
Learn to meditate deep.

Well, now this makes me feel that life ahead is all packed with fun and adventure and great things to do. From a state of aimlessness i have moved on and now i see a long road ahead with milestones by the sides, stretching as far as my eyes can see.

2005-09-25T16:15:00.000-07:00

Ripley's haunted house : I still wonder how that guys floats there !

2005-09-25T16:04:00.000-07:00

Pirates of the Caribbean :-). By the way, couple of months back i stumbled on this treasure trove of Pirate stories.

2005-09-25T15:59:00.000-07:00

Do you know what this is? It is called "Sea Dragon". I was not aware that such a species existed. Among Sea Dragons, like Sea horses, it is the male that gives birth.

2005-09-25T15:54:00.000-07:00

Thats a shark approaching me.I wonder what it would feel swimming above what would have been "fine delicacies" had the wall of glass given way. Nah, i don't think it would have even looked my way thanks to all the heavy weight men and women around me.