Frooglepoopillion Vibes

RIP: Dear Leader

2011-10-08T11:28:00.000-07:00

Dear Leader,

It was a crowded local transport bus and somehow I managed to get a seat in the bus to sit. I pulled out my iPod and was about to put in the ear buds. I felt somebody tapping on my shoulder and it was a small kid looking at the iPod. Small kid was shabbily dressed and came to later know that he didn’t ever go to school. He exclaimed ‘iPod!’ and asked how much it costs. After I told him the cost, the little boy said he would one day earn enough money to buy that iPod. After sometime, he got off the bus in next stop...

That image of the little boy whose eyes lit up when he saw the iPod never will fade.

There were millions of people who felt that child like sense of wonder because of Macs, iPods, iPhones & iPads. Every time they saw an iPod/iPhone/iPad, didn’t the grown up boys n gals felt like a little kid in a candy shop…

All of us owed this feel to you.

For us, black turtleneck and blue jeans never felt so fashionable…

Every time there was a keynotes from you, we would never miss it for anything.
You were a magician every time you went on stage. You pulled rabbits out of the hat and each rabbit added that little pleasure and little desire.

That eternal phrase ‘One more thing’ literally became the button, which would open to a new world.

People were so obsessed with you that even a fake Steve blog developed a heavy fan following.

It is hard to digest the fact that you are gone and this time, its forever…

We knew about the battle that you were fighting against your own body.

Every human is mortal. But secretly we hoped there would be an exception in your case.

We will be missing that Charismatic persona, those insanely great keynotes, rumors about the mercurial genius, the vision to foresee the future and the desire to create a new path.

Also a thought that what else you would have transformed after revolutionizing personal computers, music, phone, publishing.

You will be remembered through the iPods, iPhones, iPads, Macs, Toy Stories, road map that you would have set for future revolutions.

I had a wish that I would get a glimpse of you in person. I wish I had an opportunity to shake hands. I would have thanked you for changing the world and for your contribution to making the world beautiful. Its sad that even after traversing the IL for the last few years, I was not fortunate enough.

I’m sure there is another universe where you have plans to create dent..

Good bye and you will remain my favorite silicon valley pirate.

Namasthe

Microhoo !

2008-04-07T00:12:00.000-07:00

Imagine this..

You build this powerful Internet company from the scratch and make it one of the popular brands in tech domain. Within few years, it becomes a house-hold name through its e-mail,messenger,search,auto,photo & other services.

There comes another superior search company which captures the market and pushes this company to number two spot in Internet Ad business. You are still fighting with that company for the market share.

On the same tech planet lies a big bad monarch whose eyes falls on the company you built. The big company announce that it wants to acquire your company.

How would you feel?

Irritated ? Pissed off? Cautious? Defensive? Ward-off?

That is exactly what Larry Yang & his team is feeling now. If you didn't get the clues, the company in trouble is Yahoo and the company trying to acquire is Microsoft.

The drama unfolded almost 2 months ago sometime in January when Microsoft offered to take over Yahoo at an unprecedented $44 billion, almost $31 per Yahoo share. Yahoo rebuffed the offer. Microsoft wanted to acquire Yahoo so that it can form a strong force against search giant Google.

Yahoo's board rejected the offer saying it is too less. Then Microsoft openly threatened to stage a coup in share holders in next Yahoo share holder's meeting. Yahoo postponed the meeting.

Meanwhile Yahoo was trying to form alliance with other players such as AOL, News group & even its rival Google. Looks like it didn't work out.

Microsoft had given deadline to Yahoo till Apr 24, which passed on.

Now we need to see what strategy does Microsoft follow? Will it go for a hostile take-over by staging a proxy board of directors? Will it try to increase the bid and win over share holders?

With recent Yahoo results out, still Yahoo is in tender position. Share holders may side with Microsoft bid unless Yahoo shows some dramatic improvements. As far as Microsoft, they make walk-away from the bid to create a feeling in shareholders that they are loosing a chance.Once dust is settled, they may come back & acquire Yahoo!

Even if Microsoft gets successful in acquiring Yahoo, the real question is how do they merge? They have competing products in domains and in some cases, each of their products are high profit earners. What will be happen to products such as MSN, Yahoo Messenger, MSN Auto,Yahoo Auto?

Technically also, they differ hugely. Microsoft uses proprietary stuff & Yahoo uses open sources.This will definitely create issues in merging & sharing the services.

More than anything, the two companies differ in culture. Microsoft is this huge corporate organisation, while Yahoo is still youngster company.

Lots of challenges ahead for Microsoft acquisition team..

As of now, all eyes on Redmond..

Justice finally ?

2007-03-24T20:30:00.000-07:00

Machan...

That is what his friends called him.

He was a lively person who graduated from IIM in 2003. He could have very well-chosen any cosy job or he could have left India for better opportunities. Instead he chose to join a government PSU,Indian Oil Corporation (IOC).After joining IOC, he realised the harsh realities which no institute teaches. Lakhimpur Kirki, the place he worked was in the sea of corruption, the petrol being sold there was adultered and oil mafia ruled there. He raised voice against them. He closed few petrol bunks and definitely the oil mafia didn't like this.

The result..six bullets found way inside the young man's body.

Manjunath Shanmugam,fondly called Machhan was dead.

That was on a fateful November 19,2005.

16 months after this , court had pronounced all the accused guilty in the killing of Manjunath Shanmugam. In India, where judicial system is known to take painfully long durations to deliver and the accused fiddle with the system, this was amazingly speedy trail. Thanks to the media and Manjunath Shanmugam Trust which never let the things settle down.

Manjunath Shanmugam Trust which was formed by few IIM alumnus to seek justise in the Manjunath murder case, made every possible effort to fight for the cause.They hired a lawyer, attended the court sessions and most importantly mobilised all the resources to fight the case. Newspapers constantly kept the case in limelight, IIM students & many supporting persons attended the sessions.

Now after 16 months the court gave the judgement and it is a small victory for the trust , media and all those seeking for justice in Manju's murder case.

But is this any justice for a soul like Manju's ? Does it in anyways fill the void left for his grieving parents & family ?

What about the adulteration of oil against which Manju laid his life fighting ? Is something better there?

Definitely not..

But at least it is a little satisfaction that some justice is done. A little satisfaction that this case also was not termed as 'robbery murder' as it happened for Satyendra Dubey's murder case.Most importantly it is a little comfort that people no longer are resigning with the fate and at least few of them are coming forward to fight the system.

Manjunath Shanmugam trust has established an 'Integrity award' in Manju's name to be given to people or group working to uphold the values in Indian corporate,government and public matters. Also a Right to Information helpline was opened which provides the help regarding the use of Right to Information(RTI) act .The act enables the people to question the government, inspect their files, take copies of govt. documents, inspect government works, take sample of material from government works.

Similarly the S. K. Dubey Foundation formed after Satyendra Dubey's murder is mobilising against the fight for such cases.

Atleast fight for Manju's case was backed up by his alumni, media & some noted personalities. But how many cases has the luxury of such backing-up?Government has been talking of 'Whistle-blower' policy which provision to protect the whistle blowers.But there are no signs of it seeing light.

But the question which haunts is still how many more lives like Manju & Satyendra needs to be sacrificed?

Will the sacrifice of this martyrs go wasted?

PS: As you read this, court will decide on the exact punishments to be given for the accused in Manju's case.High chances that the sentence will be questioned in higher courts.

Reinventing the phone..

2007-01-13T13:39:00.000-08:00

I'm not a die-hard gizmo man and I do think many times before I buy any consumer electronic goods.

As I have experienced,once in a while comes few things which can shake this whole mentality.It happened last time when that mind-boggling sleek portable music player came into market and how excited we were to get one of those. Apple got rewarded richly for being innovative and that product was called 'iPod'.

Apple every year conducts events such as Macworld Expo and Apple Expo. The highlight of this event will be the 'Stevenote'.It is the slang term for Keynote addresses by Apple CEO, Steve Jobs. Steve is known for his vibrant speaking style and manner of exciting a crowd, particularly during his speeches at Macworld conferences. He usually wears a black long-sleeved shirt, blue jeans, and sneakers. Most new Apple product releases are first shown to the public in this keynote addresses by Steve Jobs.

Before every 'Stevenote', there will be tremendous buzz about what Apple is coming up or which product Steve is going to reveal. iPod was one such product which was revealed in one such Stevenote. So this year it was time for 'Stevenote' and rumors were high about a revolutionary new product Apple is going to launch and Steve didn't disappoint.

Apple introduced 'iPhone'.

I must confess I was totally blown away by its looks. The iPhone looks gorgeous.But when I heard its technical features, there was no way to escape from its charisma.

What folks in Apple did was they combined three different devices - a revolutionary mobile phone, a wide screen iPod with touch controls and a internet communication device with desktop-class e-mail,web browsing & maps. They bundled all these three devices into one small and ligthweight device.

But the best part about iPhone is that there are no physical keys on the phone ! That means the entire mobile phone is a screen. So how do you dial the numbers ? Use the touch screen keyboard and if number is stored then by pointing the finger at a name on the list.

One more striking feature is the 'Visual Voicemail'. If you have voice mail enabled in your phone, then you know the pain of going through of every voicemails in a sequential order.The iPhone eliminates all this and you can pick the voice mail you want from the list!

Now to viewing photos in the phone.You can zoom in & out the photos using fingers.Set any picture as wallpaper and sent it by email all by touch.

Using the built-in Safari browser, you can browse the internet and use mails.With built-in Google maps you can view maps and satellite images or get directions and traffic information

Some high technology talks now. iPhone supports GSM,EDGE,Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.It has acceralometer which detects when you rotate from portrait to landscape.The proximity sensor detects when you lift the phone near to you ears and turn off the display and ambient light sensor automatically adjust the light settings.

And finally you can do the same things you can do with iPod.Play audio songs and videos.

Apple has announced the price of 4-GB iPhone to be $499 and 5-GB iPhone to be $599.But the iPhones will be available only in April,2007 in US and in Asia it will be only in 2008.

Apple had maintained so much secrecy about this product that even for 2 years when this project was going on, nobody was clear about what Apple is into. Even its partners in this project, Cingular,Yahoo and Google were not aware of. Only few in Apple knew it and it was the tightly guarded secret.

So will iPhone is going to take the mobile market by storm. Very early days and difficult to predict.But the way, Wall mart responded on announcement of iPhone was warming.The Apple stocks rose within minutes. On other end, Apple's iPhone was welcomed by a law suite from Cisco which apparently has the 'iPhone' trademark registered.

Few are questioning the pricing kept for iPhone saying $499 is too much compared to any other mobile available in market, even if iPhone offers too many things.But I feel the price will not be a factor as we had seen with iPod. When iPod was introduced with $199 and above price, everybody said why would people buy a music player which is 3-4 times costlier than any available players.Then we know how iPod had stunned everyone.I feel samething is going to happen with iPhone.

A long way to go, lets sit back and wait for iPhone to arrive

Oh ! by the way, congrats on the new name - 'Apple Inc' .

(Earlier it was 'Apple Computer Inc ' and they removed 'Computer' from their name)

Over to Steve and Apple...

Pooja Phenomenon

2006-11-05T11:20:00.000-08:00

Its been more than a year since I've been staying and working with Bengalis. As with any other state, they have their own unique culture, traditions, art, celebrations, food habits, heroes, fights. I'm used to the 'alao' love, 'maach' craziness and 'misti' longings of Bengalis.But one thing which stood way out and for which every Bengali goes bersek is 'Durga Pooja'.

During initial days of my stay with Bengali friends, I noticed that whenever somebody mentioned 'Durga Pooja', they would get energised so much and would never stopped talking about the Pooja. I never understood why Bengalis are so crazy about Pooja.

As I spent more and more time with them, I could only see that it is not few but most of the Bengali fraternity goes in mass Pooja mania. In office, I had seen people trying to somehow squeeze vaccations to India so that they can attend Pooja.And ones whoever couldn't go would be present in office physically and mentally they would be there in Pooja pendals.

What a divine coincidence! This time, things happened such that I was in Kolkata during Durga Pooja and it was time for me to get a first hand feel of 'Durga Pooja phenomenon'.

I arrived in Kolkata just a week before Durga Pooja started. It was already evident that Kolkata was waiting eagerly for Durga ma.Everybody in office & outside had one common favorite topic - Durga Pooja.

Durga Pooja was in the air !

As the days got closer to Durga Pooja, the strength in office started dwindling. In between some serious rain caused some concerns of spoiling the party.But it wasn't to be.

I had heard from Bengali friends that integral part of Durga Pooja is 'Pendal hopping' and I decided to try it myself.On the Pooja day, we started pendal hopping from the block where we stayed.As we started hopping from pendal to pendal I noticed that the crowd on the roads increased as the evening progressed. As the night grew old, there were families, friends, relatives, lovers..everybody out on streets to get soaked in festive atmosphere.

I heard somewhere that Bengalis like 'addabaazi', that is grouping together and having fun.Durga pooja was indeed the perfect time for addabaazi. People were visiting pendals, eating out, having fun.Totally a carnival feel.

The effort these guys put into bring uppendals is unbelievable. Each of the pendals are unique, theme-based and meticulosly planned. The lightings & decorations are so stunning.Most of them are so impressive that it is a pure art work.Durga ma is curved in various forms and using various materials.

While inside the pendal, 'Anjali' is performed and outside pendals 'dhaaks' roar. Anjali is the aarthi program and dhaaks are those drums, which give that unique sound to the celebrations.

We literally roamed the whole night and felt that city will never sleep for the festival.

Newspapers during those Pooja days carried exclusives only on Durga Pooja.Suppliments ran into pages about the best pendals, pooja special food and anything about Pooja.Most news channels too jumped the vagon and came up with exclusives.Most of the Bengali channels took viewers on a virtual 'pendal hopping' with live coverage from various pendals.

If pendals were one event, then Durga immersion procession on the last day was another colorful event.One notable thing was the significant number of ladies out on street , swaying to the dhaks.

Bengal is such a state where communists are ruling for past 2-3 decades and I was wondering how Durga Pooja and Communism can go together.It was sounding such a oxymoron imagining communists celebrating Durga pooja.Then I told to myself that nobody stopped people affiliated to communism from celebration.Even if they don't believe in God, they cant stop believing in celebrations!

That lead to another question..why in first place, Durga pooja generates such interest and celebrations?

I got a feel that Durga Pooja is no longer a festival of some particular caste but people has accepted it as their own festival. Added to this, is the excellent machinary which arranges Durga Pooja in such a stylish manner that people get soaked into it.The final reason what I felt was Bengalis though have several festivals, nothing is compared to Durga Pooja and Durga pooja is the time to let out all that steam accumulated.Contrast this to any South Indian state, where there will be atleast one festival every month.So net result is that people wait for a good year to get the opportunity to feel,enjoy & get drenched in one mega celebration.

And after-effects of Pooja looked devastating ! Next day after the immersion, I saw many people who were down with a feeling that Durga Pooja was over and few were already counting days for next year's pooja !! And few were so used to saying 'Shubh Bijay' that they couldnt stop saying it even after Durga Pooja !

With due regards to Bengalis, as one of my Bengali friend used to stay "Durga Pooja is the only time when Bengalis would be active after which they go back to sleep for rest of the year' !!

The Big Apple

2006-07-10T00:40:00.000-07:00

July 03, Monday

The cheap hotel which we had booked in New York really turned to be 'cheap'. After understanding it was no use arguing with the hotel guys, we shifted to another hotel, which was pretty decent.

After getting ready, we set out for New York expedition, before that we dropped Ponamma to catch her with other appointment. Parking in New York is one hell experience and we promptly returned our car to the agency. Then onwards it was taxi.

First visit was to World Trade Center.

As we walked to the Ground Zero, those satanic images of planes crashing into skyscrapers were repeating playing in my mind. I was thinking how many innocent lives unaware of what is waiting for them would have come into their offices in WTC on that fateful 09/11.

There was emptiness in the site. Once there stood two magnificent towers with booming life. At the site there were boards describing how the transport was restored, what happened at Pentagon and there was a list of all people who lost their lives in the attack. All together 2373 lives. There was graffiti on near-by wall most of them paying homage to all the departed souls.

Paid homage to all the departed ones and a silent thanks to all the firemen. In the near by World Financial Center, there was a model of the upcoming 'Freedom Tower', which is to be built in the place where WTC stood. Mind was still thinking about how anybody would think in such destructive way, what meticulous planning would have gone in this. But what did they gain out of this??

Next took a taxi and landed up in Empire State building. Before getting into Empire State building, something about taxis here. Most of the yellow taxis are driven by Desis especially the Sardars. We always ended up in Sardar taxis throughout our travel in New York.

Empire State building is the second tallest structure in US with 102 floors. There was a huge queue to get into the top of the building. After taking tickets for that, we landed on the observatory section of the empire state building. The view of New York from there was awesome. Good that we took the 'Tony the Cabie's audio commentary'. It was nice to listen to the commentary about each building we were seeing.

From there we landed up in Times Square. The first impression was awe. It was nothing but glittering. So many people, so many lights, sign boards, flashy bill boards, advertisements, it was a perfect place to roam in the night. Roaming in the Times Square was like walking in the Brigade-MG Road. We just strolled the street and had dinner at an Italian restaurant. Times truly reflected the 'never sleeping city'.

It was time to go back to hotel. But we didn't know the address of the hotel! Neither was it written on the key they gave. At that time we were in Time Square at 7th Avenue 47th Street. So 'somebody' in our group called up and asked for the hotel address. Depending on that, we took a taxi and went to 7th Avenue, 146 th street to find that there was no hotel there! Again when we called it was known that the hotel was in 7th Avenue 46th Street. This meant the hotel was next street from where we started! We laughed at ourselves for this, when we saw Times Square from our hotel window!

July 04, Tuesday

As soon as we were ready we went to the Central Park, which was at a walkable distance from the hotel. Central Park was so huge and everywhere people were seen jogging, cycling or skating. After spending strolling across the park and enjoying the central park benches, it was time to bid adieu to Dips.

We were back in Central Park and Archana was insisting that we will hire bicycles to roam around. So hired the bicycles for 2 hours for a rent of 20$. Last time I rode a bicycle was atleast 4-5 years ago. So first few seconds were shaky & finally I got the grip.It was awesome strolling the central park on the bicycle. It was good to see so many joggers, cyclists, skaters & walkers around us.

After 2 hours we returned the bicycles and went for one last round of stroll in Time Square before we left for the airport.

We reached JFK barely with any time left, but plane was made to wait for nearly 2 hours on the runway due to some runway problem, which meant that when I arrived in Phoenix, I had missed my connecting flight to LA. I was put in the next day first flight at 6 AM.The stupid airlines argued that they can't provide accommodation. Suppi took me to his home with an extra burden of dropping me in airport for the first flight.

I almost missed that flight too, but somehow made it! But it was not the end of action as my baggage didn't arrive when I landed in LAX. Finally everything ended fine!

Climbing Statue of Liberty
Getting soaked in Niagara
Drive in the freeway
Silent moments at WTC
Top of the world in Empire State building
Stroll in Time Square
Cycling in Central Park

So many wonderful moments throughout the trip combined with the presence of my awesome friends without whom this trip would not have so much fun and memorable.

Still savoring each moment from the trip...

A magnificent statue and an awesome waterfalls

2006-07-08T10:11:00.000-07:00

It was tough to get back to work in office after spending an awesome time with friends in awesome places. I’m just back from a trip to New York and Niagara.

The idea of this New York trip originated during our last Las Vegas trip. Even though we thought we will book the tickets & hotels well in advance, it never happened. Finally it boiled down to just one week before the trip. Then as always we rushed and in hurry tried to book air tickets. Even though it was little expensive, it wasn’t bad either. At some point, we almost dropped the idea of the trip seeing the prices. Somehow everything fell in place.

But this time, biggest villain was hotel! We literally struggled to get a decent hotel and when we finally booked a hotel at a surprisingly low price, we were elated. Not knowing what was waiting for us next.

When everything was fine, suddenly at my work place, there was some concern about me taking an off. Somehow I convinced them. Same thing happened with Suppi too.

Keeping aside all these initial hiccups, so finally we kick-started the trip from flying to New York. Only after landing in JFK Airport in New York, I and Suppi realized that still there are lots which we need to battle. Our plan of hiring the car from airport went for a toss as there was not even a single vehicle available in any rental agencies. After roaming frantically for 3 hours and after surfing on the spot, we managed to get a car from a rental agency which was 10 miles from JFK.

Mean while it was not going good for our friends who went to hotel to rest. The hotel would have been easily rated one of the worst. We were deceived by the hotel’s flashy website & the price carrot.

July 01, Saturday

Finally it was 10:30 on Saturday morning, when the same gang of Deepti, Archana, Supreeth & I met in Battery Park. Only addition was Ponamma. This was the place from where the ferry would take us to one of the most recognized monument in world, Statue of Liberty.

There was an intense security check, just like in airports, before we boarded the ferry. As the ferry moved nearer to Liberty Island, the famous statue was becoming more and more visible. It was a memorable moment to see the Statue of Liberty in person. After getting down on the island, we proceeded to the statue. Entry to the Statue requires tickets and thankfully I had booked it online.

As we entered the Statue, again there was one more round of security check, this time it had some puff test, which blew air on the body! Now we were in the Statue and the stairs led us to the exclusive exhibition about Statue of Liberty and its history.

Did you know this? Auguste Bartholdi, the sculptor of Statue of Liberty was thinking of ways to provide the support from inside to the statue. He consulted Eiffel and Eiffel suggested that there should be a tower like structure which runs across the statue to support it. And that idea worked. By the way, Eiffel is the same guy after which the Paris’s famous tower is named.

It seems there is a path up till the lamp. But that route is no longer accessible.

So there we were at the feet of Statue of Liberty. The gigantic, green and magnificent statue, gifted by France to US, to mark the later’s independence. The Statue stood as a symbol of freedom, hope & liberty. It was the first sight any immigrant entering to US through New York would have seen during those days. One interesting thing to notice was that right feet of the statue was on toes, something like to ‘ready to go’ state. (Well, Archana cooked up some cock-bull reason why it was like that ! )

The view of Manhattan from Statue was amazing too. We took some funny pictures around Statue, had lunch and started back in the ferry to Battery Park.

According to plan, we left New York for Buffalo, a place 450 miles away. Our Plan was to visit Niagara and come back again to New York. Suppi started the driving from New York and drove till we were totally out of New York traffic. Then I took over and as always it was pleasure driving. Especially driving in the freeway is an experience. We got a good company of some 4-5 cars who consistently kept me competitive. After 4 hours, Suppi took over. It was 1:30 night when we reached the hotel in Buffalo. The hotel was too good compared to other in New York, thanks to our IDM manager !

Buffalo streets was full of Saturday night parties and energy level was quite visible-audible. But we badly needed rest and slipped into sleep.

July 02, Sunday

Tired with the journey we woke up pretty late and started towards Niagara, which was about 50 miles from Buffalo. By the time we reached the place and found car parking, it was already afternoon. Information Center informed us about the combo-trip package which covers the Niagara Falls extensively. We booked the tickets for that and tickets were available only for 4:30 trip.

Meanwhile it was time to attack the lunch at a near-by Punjabi restaurant (In fact the name was Punjabi dhabha which made us to run to it!).After a good buffet lunch, we were all set for the Niagara expedition.

Niagara Falls actually consists of three falls – American Falls, Bridal Vail Falls and Canadian Falls (Horse Shoe Falls).

First of the trip was called ‘Maid of the Mist’. This is the trip where the cruise passes near the American Falls and takes right into the Horse-Shoe falls. Before boarding the cruise, we were given blue colored plastic gowns and as the cruise moved towards the falls, we realized why the gown was required. The entire atmosphere was misty and there was a strong wind blowing, making water droplets flying in all directions.

The American falls sight was magnificent and the sun rays and the water drop had created a big rainbow across the falls. American falls was 1060 feet in width and had a 180 ft height. When we were still enjoying the American falls, at a near distance we heard the thundering noise of water thrusting. The boat took a slight turn and slowly the Horse-Shoe Falls appeared. In next few moments, we were in the middle of Horse-Shoe falls. To the left, to the right & to the center, it was water in majestic form. It was jumping as if it has broken all shackles attached to it, as if there was no tomorrow...

Imagine a waterfall which is 2600 feet in width and 173 feet height and water jumping in full form. It was an absolutely stunning experience. When the announcement in the ship went “Ladies & Gentleman, THIS is Niagara Falls”, automatically all the hands in the ship clapped in unison with loud cheering. Truly, it was a moment to cherish.

We couldn’t stop talking about the view of Niagara after we came out of that ‘Maid of the Mist’ trip. Next on our list was ‘Cave of the Winds’ tour. This time the queue was extremely long and before entering we were given the yellow plastic gowns and water slippers.

There was a small pathway, which lead to the falls and when the path ended, we were right below the falls. Now we knew why water slippers were given. As we climbed nearer to the falls, the water was splashing on us from every side. As wind blew, it carried a barrage of water droplets and sprinkled on us. We stood right below the falls with water falling with massive force and what a force it has. Thanks to the gown, clothes were dry, but couldn’t resist getting the head wet thoroughly.

Up close to the falls was an awesome experience. We could have continued like that forever. It was getting dark and slowly the lights were coming on. We came out of the ‘Cave of the Winds’.

The powerful light sources on the Canadian border were projecting the colors on the falls. The water falls was taking new colors and in the night it was another different world. It was such a myriad image to see the falls in blue, green, red and in many other eye-catching colors. It was around 10 in night now and the fireworks started on Canadian border. It was excellent show but got curtailed due to rain.

We returned back to our car with Niagara running in our minds and the images constantly lingering in eyes. Time for dinner and we went to one more Indian restaurant. There the owner of the hotel and a Desi had picked up the fight and arguing stupidly. We carried with our dinner and before dinner got over, we could see the hotel owner trying to be nice with that Desi customer by calling him ‘Beta’ and hugging. It was hilarious!

After refueling the car, it was 1 in the night when we started our journey back. I started the innings with me being in driver’s seat. After roaming for the whole day, folks were feeling sleepy and soon Archana & Ponamma slipped into sleep. We made Suppi to sleep so that he can take over from me. Deepti tried giving company to me by continuing her request show and talking to me. Finally she also slipped into sleep.

Meanwhile the drive was extremely cool, as always started with 65-70 mph and slowly ramped up to 80-85 mph. This time there was no company to chase or play with on the freeway. Archana, I think got worried twice when the car swayed at few turns. Ponamma was sleeping sound as if she was sleeping in a nice cozy bed. Finally it was 4:30 when I handed over the wheel to Suppi and I slipped into sleep for some 2 hours.

We were on our way back to The Big Apple..

Coming up next...Ground Zero, Empire State building, Time Square and many New York attractions

Football Fiesta

2006-06-09T00:55:00.000-07:00

The Festival of Football is back!!!

If there is one game which can truly be called ‘global’, it has to be Football. What makes Football wonderful is the intensity, skills, passions & emotions involved in the game. Now you may come up with arguments saying that every game has all this and if you say that there is nothing like cricket, then probably you have not experienced the feast of football.

The very basic idea of game is simple and appealing. Two teams of 11 players with an aim to putting the ball in the opponent’s goal post using only legs & head. The next best part about football is the speed. The game is usually played for two halfs of 45 minutes and naturally the game moves at a brisk pace. So the agony of sitting for hours & hours watching something which already is pre-decided is not required.

I don’t know how I got bitten from this football bug.

In our small town of Harihar, there was a football club ‘Town Sports Club’. Everyday evening, when returning from school I used to pass by the ground where these footballers used to practice. It didn’t take much time to fall in love with the game. I was then in 5th Standard, started playing since then and it continued till I was in 10th standard. After that though it was not so regular, I played whenever possible.

So having the first hand of idea about the game, world cups were always a treat for hardcore footballers like me.

First memories of world cup was Italia-90.

After 1986 ‘Maradona’ world cup, his influence was so much that our club’s jersey was designed exactly same as the Argentine team’s. Having heard/influenced of legendary superstar called “Maradona”, me and friends in our club supported Argentine through out that Italia world cup.

But Maradona didn’t take off as we expected, instead there were some other eye-catching players in other teams like Schillaci of Italy, who became popular for his scissor-like passes. I became so influenced by that pass, that I successfully implemented in my game and promptly I was called ‘Schillaci' for few days! Then there was Roger Milla and his Cameron team which became overnight famous for defeating our favorite Argentine. We hated them so much! But to our pleasure, our Argentine team reached the final and it was to play against West Germany.

I still remember the final match was at 12:30 in the midnight and my dad took me to his friend’s house to watch it. Nothing spectacular until that penalty was given and Germans scored that penalty to win the world cup. Totally devastated we were. Next day & for few days, post mortem of the match followed in the school and in the club.

Meanwhile our school was doing great in the inter-school football championship & we had reached the district level.

Next World Cup, USA 94.

Nothing much to remember , except the pony-tailed Roberto Baggio missing the penalty shot and Brazil winning the cup in a penalty shoot-out.And of course that Valderamma's orange bushy hair!!

Out of school, I was now in college and my football play continued with hostel mates in the hostel grounds.

Come 1998, it was France-98 World Cup.

Post Maradona, my loyalty had shifted to Brazil. There is something about South American Football. There is some rhythm, some style and some genuine talents.

Everybody was talking about this 20 year aged bald headed Brazilian Ronaldo. True to the legend, Ronaldo mesmerized and took his team to the final. What a final it was! France playing in their home ground against Brazil. Ronaldo going out mysteriously after the final match started and Zidane heading two marvelous goals. A dream victory for any host!

Now I was working, I was not able to play much except that inter-office football tournament representing my company.

It was Korea Japan -2002 World cup.

The world cup started with many surprises. Defending champions France lost the opening match to a new comer Senegal and eventually was eliminated. Likewise was Argentina.

Meanwhile my favorite team Brazil was making good progress. One particular match I remember was Brazil V/S England in quarterfinals. I had disappeared from my cubicle for the match with few of my colleagues to watch the match! Match was a tight one before an amazing free kick from Ronaldino sealed the fate, defeating England.

The three Brazilian Rs – Ronaldo, Rivaldo and Ronaldino were fantastic and Brazil reached the finals. Final match was against Germany. It was touted as the battle of titans – Ronaldo against the German super goal keeper – Oliver Kahn .Ultimately Ronaldo won the battle and Brazil, the trophy.

Most memorable part of that world cup was the stunning performance by host countries – South Korea and Japan. South Korea managed to reach semis while Japan managed to last 16. Especially the ‘Red devils’ of Korea was such a huge phenomenon and I believe that ‘red devils’ were one of the major reasons behind Korea’s dream run.

Now its time for one more world cup, this time in Germany.

This time also I’ll be backing ‘Seleção’. With a right mix of experience and raw talent, Brazil is the team to look for.

But at the end of the day all that matters is that 90 minutes in the field and that’s is why this game becomes so interesting.

In next one month, there will be millions in hundred countries following teams, there will be spectators highly charged up, there will be passions running high and above all ,there were will be feast of football.

A Priceless Re-Union Trip !

2006-05-30T20:08:00.000-07:00

Flying to Phoenix – several 100 $
Ride to Canyon – several $
Hotel in Vegas – several 100$
Money spent/lost in Vegas – several $
Being with my old Bangalore gang – Priceless

What shall I say about the past 3 magical days, after which it is so difficult to be in the office!

In the first place, it was so astonishing to see how things fell in place and within a week’s time our trip was planned.

It all started with a call from Deepti asking me about the long weekend plan. I was still in the confused and undecided state. Then came the news that Venu may join with us, if we plan something. On other side, we came to know that Archana will be flying to Phoenix in the long weekend, where Supreeth stays. So taking these all jigsaw pieces & after some elaboration we fitted the jigsaw puzzle. After several Google searches and after one conference call, a plan was ready. Phoenix was our first destination.

Friday May 26, 2006

On Friday night I flew from Los Angeles to Phoenix, Deepti flew from San Jose and Venu from Chicago. Meanwhile Archana had flown from Denver in the afternoon itself and was enjoying the privilege of being the early bird by shopping things for the trip with Supreeth.

There we were at Phoenix airport, 5 of us, who were/is part of Lucent Messaging project in Bangalore. Especially for me, I was meeting all these friends nearly after 9 months. How excited and happy we were to see the old gang!

A good dinner at Supreeth’s place (special mention of Channa masala he prepared) was complimented with our peppy talks on LMD days. The next day was supposed to be very hectic. So we retired to bed, hoping to make an early start.

Saturday May 27, 2006

Next morning we started, not as planned at 6 but at 8 AM!

The agenda for the day - visit Sedona, Grand Canyon and finally reach Las Vegas.

Our first place of visit was Sedona rocks. Sedona has these red-colored rocks in different shapes .We had stops at the bell-shape rock & several other spots before we headed towards Grand Canyon.

The way to Grand Canyon was overly crowded & the traffic was extremely slow moving. We hoped atleast, once we are done with watching the 45 minutes movie on ’Grand Canyon’ at I-max theater, the traffic would ease. But it grew still slower. After limping on an annoyingly slow pace, we reached the South rim of Grand Canyon.

I still remember the awe which struck me when I first saw the Grand Canyon last year. I was totally mesmerized and I could see the same feeling on our folks faces. The best thing we did was taking the bus ride along the Canyon points. The Canyon shuttle carries visitors to several view points and the views at few of these points were breathtaking.

Simply put, Grand Canyon is magnanimous. It has to be God’s one of the best creations.

From there we started our journey towards Las Vegas.

If Grand Canyon is one of the best creations of God, then Las Vegas is one of the lavish materialistic creations created by man. As we drove closer to Vegas, the Vegas skyline was making presence with its brightly lit structures. Some land marks like Stratosphere were visible from the distance itself.

Around 2 am, we reached at the Gold Coast hotel, our stay in Vegas. It was a tricky situation. If we had gone out in Vegas at that time, we would have definitely not returned by morning and would have no energy & sleep for the next day. At the same time, it feels bad to sleep early in Vegas! Finally we decided to rest & start fresh the next day. That plan proved to be correct.

Sunday May 28, 2006

The plan for the day was shows, casinos, roaming & fun.

The day started on a bright note with Supreeth getting one heart-warming smiles from a black-lady-security guard at Hotel Bellagio. How our Supreeth used to blush when we mentioned that topic!

I had some fond-not-so-good memories of this Hotel. This was the same place where the touring group had left me deserted, when I visited Vegas last year with them. So all those moments of me finding that our tour bus had left me & I wandering around the hotel looking for my friends/bus was playing in mind.

But it was a feel good factor for me to be back in Vegas-Canyon on the same day as last year!

We roamed around on the ‘Strip’ checking few casinos and looking for goggles. The Las Vegas in the day light has a different look and it was looking like a gift box, waiting to be opened.

Evening session started with a bang with Venu & Archana winning teddy bears/doggies in the Circus Circus games. Probably if we had continued like that, I think we would have got enough stuffs to open a teddy bear shop. But unfortunately we had other things to do in Vegas!

There was nothing special about Circus show and I still didn’t understand why people were sitting there an hour before to see it!

As evening unfolded, Las Vegas was growing more attractive and looking more stunning. I wonder how much electricity would be required for this city which never sleeps. So much colors, so many lights, so many amazing structures & so many different people there for numerous reasons.

The first show we saw in the evening was ‘Sirens of TI’.A musical act with scarcely-clad ladies as Sirens and some hunks playing as pirates. It was visually very rich and entertaining. I liked especially the dance which the pirates did. If Treasure Island people are looking for a new face for that captain’s role, may be they can think of our Venu…

The Volcano show in Mirage was just ok. Before that it had a long delay which we used effectively for chatting all our non-sense talks! We were just about to erupt after waiting for more than an hour to see it, just then it started. But the delay of this show did trigger a series of just misses.

After a quick dinner (Burrito Bol) at Chippendales, we were in front of Bellagio again for the fountain show. The fountain show didn’t disappoint and it was as always amazing. Our luck with Laser show and Stratosphere rides was not that good.

It was around 2 in the morning when we reached Newyork Newyork hotel, where we stopped at a bar to listen to the band playing there. The band was belting some good numbers including ‘Hotel California’. The crowd there was enjoying in their own ways.

We moved across to MGM hotel, just in front of Newyork Newyork hotel. After that Venu & me ventured into some other place, while Archana, Deepti & Suppi were busy in Casino. Finally when we all met & started from the ‘Strip’, back to hotel, it was 6 in the morning!!

We had spent an astonishing 19 hours non-stop in the Las Vegas Strip!!

Monday May 29, 2006

Back in hotel, we hit the bed as soon we reached it. But there was no luxury of sound sleep as we were scheduled to leave for Hoover dam. So after a quick power nap for 2 hours, we were ready for Hoover dam.

As we left Vegas, I was thinking of what all things Vegas offers. It has got everything for everybody’s demands/needs. One thing I again learnt was every time you go to Vegas, you feel that there is still something which you didn’t know/experience about the Sin city!

This awesome line I saw it on a t-shirt summarizes the Vegas experience.
“Las Vegas – Successfully separating decent people from their pay checks since 1911”.

From the Sin city, we moved towards Hoover dam which is almost an hour away .The dam was built on river Colorado to prevent flooding along its way, to use the water for agriculture in California, Arizona & Nevada and for hydroelectricity generation. It is located on the borders of the states of Nevada & Arizona and is named after US President Herbert Hover.

The view from the top of dam was magnificent and the dam has unbelievably steep curved dam walls. An awesome engineering creation!

The winged figures at the entrance of dam were interesting. It seems rubbing the feet of these statues bring some good fortune. So all of us were there, rubbing the feet of that winged figures statues!

With Deepti’s flight at 8 and Archana’s at 8:30, it was time to rush back to Phoenix. It seems it would usually take 5-6 hours to reach Phoenix. But when you have Supreeth who can easily give competition to BMTC drivers back in Bangalore for overtaking, that distance proved too short.Supported by the excellent company for the journey and with some awesome songs playing, the journey just zoomed by. The journey back was blasting with singing & some back seat dancing! We reached Phoenix in little more than 4 hours.

It was time for good byes.

First Deepti, then Archana, finally Venu & Me took our respective flights. I Know Suppi would have felt totally alone at that moment, after being with us for all these 3 days.

The very moment I put my foot in the plane, I started missing the gang and all the fun we had. It was funny to be sitting in the business class among those serious looking folks. All around, folks were busy either digging their laptops or reading some books.

I just closed my eyes and all the wonderful moments of the trip were passing by like a slide show. As each image of the trip passed by, there was a smile sailing through my face.

My iPod was playing the song

Har Pal Yahan
Jee Bhar Jiyo Jo Hai Sama
Kal Ho Na Ho

Popcorn & Holy Grail !

2006-05-20T01:41:00.000-07:00

Scene 1: Feverish frenziness in office, everybody booking tickets online expecting a huge turn over.

Scene 2: Outside movie theater, several groups sitting with boards ‘Blasphemy’.

Scene 3: Pretty long queues for ticket, many of them not getting tickets.

Scene 4: Movie is going on. The black guy next to me slips into sleep, only to be wakened up by his girl friend often.

Scene 5: Guy sitting in next row, shouts ‘Oh Jesus! What are they saying?’

Scene 6: Coming out of theatre, many young men-women discussing about Bible, about Jesus & about Christianity

This summarizes the movie experience of ‘The Da Vinci Code’, the most anticipated & most controversial movie.

Having read the book ‘Da Vinci Code’ twice, the first thing I wanted to do was to see the novel on the screen. Keeping aside the arguments-counter arguments about the authenticity of the contents of the book, the book was simply flabbergasting. Nobody other than Dan Brown could have mixed fiction and fact in such deadly combination.

With story being well-known & almost everything in the story familiar, all I was interested was to see how it is brought to celluloid. Print media and Celluloid media have their own advantages and disadvantages. Often things bridged from print to celluloid will loose some charm in the transition. Da Vinci Code is no exception.

Director Ron Howard looks like did a decent job of being loyal to the novel barring few minor changes here and there. The movie is fast paced and many threads in the story run parallely as in the novel. It makes a perfect broth for an entertainer with murders, secret codes, car chases, cryptography and Christianity. Don’t forget the locations it is picturised.

Casting is usually good. Tom Hanks effortlessly slips into the symbolgist Robert Langdon’s character. Audrey as Sophia sparkles once in a while with her nice smile.Unlike in novel, somehow Collet looks like challenging Fache. Silas is as chilling as described in the novel. But the scenes involving Ian McKellan as Tiebing take the top spot.

Few scenes in the movie where theatre was involved..
Silas whipping himself..Tiebing dramatically saying Mary Magadelane was married to Jesus..Langdon breaking the Draculian Devil clue...

But my fav one is when Langdon asks Sophie at the end "Does it matter if Jesus was married? Does somebody stop inspiring others just because they are human or God "

I was interested to know how few of my friends who had not read the novel felt about the movie. Though they got an outlook, they obviously missed some references.

I need to add that here is not much scope for Tom for his skills..

Over all, if you are a great fan of Da Vinci Code and want to see the movie, only suggestion is don’t expect a holy grail. All you can expect is faithful story & fast narration with occasional tweaking in the plot. A picture speaks more than 100 words doesn’t hold good. Somehow in this case, ‘those 1000 words’ are more thrilling.

Consider it a pop-corn entertainer, but at the end of day it does pops up some questions.

PS: This I heard in the parking lot from a friend about crucification. According to that person, Jesus was never crucified instead Peter was crucified. Jesus passed away peacefully somewhere in Kashmir!!

Dan, are you listening?!!

Curtains Down..

2006-04-14T17:28:00.000-07:00

A void feeling which is hard to describe…

Phones and E-mails with my Karnataka friends has only one topic. As I talk with my parents back in Bengalooru, I can sense that same sad feeling in their voice too. A feeling of losing someone close. Mom says ‘Rajkumar hogbitta’ (Raj Kumar dead)

Do any of us know him personally? Did we ever meet him?
Answer to these questions is ‘No’. But still why we are feeling that something is missing?

A little flashback here…
I think those were the days when I was in my early years of primary school. There is a small theatre ‘Shobha’ in Harihar. We had an occasionally visiting grand mother to our home. Whenever that grand mother visited our home, it meant one thing…movie time, to be specific Rajkumar movie time. Was it because Shobha was just 5 minutes walk from our home or was it because it used to show mostly Raj Kumar movies, I don’t know, but I, grand mother & mom used to end up there frequently for a Raj Kumar movie.

On the screen, while Raj was sparkling on the screen as Sri Krishna, a devotional feeling sparkling in grand mom’s eyes as if Lord Krishna himself has appeared. When Raj donned that energetic role of Babruvaahana or Mayoora, one can sense that feeling of pride sweeping the theatre. Me and my dad watching Raj's action kind of movies such as 'Shankar Guru' and enjoying those whistles and claps whenever Raj making an entry. Those discussions over dinner about the movie and most of it about Raj.

Like me, I think many of us grew watching the movies of Raj. Those were the days when one whole generation was under the strong influence of Raj’s charisma.

There was one of my cousin who was a huge fan of Raj and when Raj visited Davangere, somehow he managed to get him photographed with Raj. I still remember how much he beamed with happiness whenever he talked about that photo and how he went on forever describing how simple is Raj in real life.

My brother too was a huge fan and he had once written a short story of about 2 pages. The specialty of that story was all the words used were nothing but names of all the Raj’s movie names!!!

As I grew, I started realizing that Raj also had an awesome voice. Suddenly everywhere there were songs sung by Raj. In parties, marriages, school functions, college functions & even in temples, everywhere.

I sometimes wonder how Raj became the supreme and how he got so much fan following.Unlike few other superstars in South India, I think he never had any fan clubs funded by him.

Raj never feared to experiment with the roles. Mythological characters, family man, lover boy, comic character and even he played ‘James Bond’ kind of a role.Fans loved him in any avaatar.

No doubt, Raj was an amazing actor. But what stroked the chord was his real life persona, which matched his reel characters. Forget real life, even on screen, Raj never did smoking or drinking. Almost whole Karnataka knew about his famous daily routine of getting up at 4 in the morning and doing Yoga.

His roles were inspirational and always carried some social messages. It seems many college graduates went back to their villages to take up agriculture after seeing that ‘Rajeev’ character Raj played in ‘Bangaaradha Manushya’. His role in ‘Jeevana Chaitra’ fueled the anti-liquor fight and it seems many stopped drinking alcohol after seeing the movie.

I have heard many times, ladies discussing the roles which Raj portrayed. Often I overheard saying comments such as ‘magaa idhrey Rajkumar taraa irabeku’ (If there is a son, he should be like RajKumar).True, he donned the roles of ideal son, ideal husband, ideal lover, ideal father. And what appealed to mass was the fact that even in real life he was the same ideal person.

Whenever Raj was bestowed an award, the whole Karnataka used to rejoice as if each one of us got that award. The 2 national awards, 9 filmfares, 9 state awards, Padma Bhushan, Dada Sahib Palke award, a honorary doctorate, Karnataka Ratna…..it never stopped raining accolades.

As time progressed, the same Raj started appearing little amused to our generation. We started admiringly mock his dance steps and his trademark dialogues in a humorous way. Make no mistake, Raj was still the best.

Still as years rolled by, we realized that Raj like every other person also started growing old. Though everyone wanted to see Raj back on screen, it was evident that his health may not allow Raj to do it again.

Coming back to Raj’s popularity…
The actual reason Raj was liked was the fact that he stood as the proud symbol of Karnataka and Kannada. He actively participated in few movements without which the state of Kannada would have been still worse. I read that Raj literally crisscrossed Karnataka during the Gokak chaLuvaLi, which became major success mainly because of Raj. It was the biggest showcasing of how much the public loved him.

But I think biggest thing which made people bestow their love and affection on him was the thing that he never entered politics, despite being lured all the time. I read he could have become Chief Minister if he wanted. He even had a Chief Minister as relative but Raj managed to remain far from the politics.

It was natural that when somebody of such stature passed away, the emotions would run high. It was also natural that there would be frooglepoopillion grief and sorrow, inspite of knowing that nobody can escape the death. But what was shocking was the rampage which followed aftermath.

Raj’s so-called fans have been creating much embarrassment to Raj off-late. My first memory of such unruly fans behaviors was during a release of a new Raj movie several years back. All Raj fan clubs had taken out a huge procession on the day the movie got released and during procession somebody threw stone on the procession and rest it went bersek.

Next major disturbance was during those days when Raj was kidnapped. I remember we were in engineering and next few days were very tense. The whole of Karnataka was restless in those 108 days when Raj was under captivity. It also showed the glimpse of things to come if something happens to Raj. Atleast in all these cases, there was some provocation.

Call it mob hysteria, planned provocation, mismanagement or whatever… but I don’t understand this case. When Raj was supposed to be given a peaceful & heartfelt farewell, how come the so called fans got into such lawlessness. When the whole state was mourning, how come some one can get into such rowdy acts of burning vehicles, buses & properties? How about those 8 lives which got wasted in the mayhem…

(I’m using the phrase ‘so called fans’ here because I don’t think these people are any fans at all. Any true fan who knew about Raj’s life can never get into such horrifying acts)

Poor Raj’s soul would have been weeping silently, seeing all this frenziness which happened in his name…

May Almighty rest ‘aNNaavara’ soul in peace

Finding a 'Jonathan' within us

2006-02-26T01:41:00.000-08:00

It took about an hour to read through those 127 pages of that book. The reading was a bit of it and the thinking which followed after that was more of it.

This is about a book which is universally considered as a best-seller classic. I’m not going to review or walk you though the book. All I’m doing here is just talk about this book ‘Jonathan Livingston Seagull’ by Richard Bach.

For starters, Jonathan Livingston Seagull is a book ‘authored’ by Richard Bach in 1970.It is a fable about a seagull by name 'Jonathan Livingston' whose passion is to fly higher and who believe that there is something more than ‘just’ living. It is a fable, where this seagull braves the outcasting, age-old conventions-beliefs, & finally shows that there is a world to be explored, beyond what is seen/believed to be.

What appears to be this simple fable about a seagull soon captured imagination and within two years of its publication, over a million copies were sold. Even a movie with the same name was made. Isn’t it amazing that the book written in 70 has its latest reprint in 2005-06.

Still wondering why I’m talking about a 70s book?

What fascinates me is the way the underlying metaphor of the book changes every time the book is read. The thoughts in the book irrespective of time, still remain relevant. May be next time I read the book ,I may see the underlying things in a new light.

In the story, there are ‘seagull flock on the earth’ and ’flock in some other world’, which denotes two different schools of thoughts. The 'seagull flock on earth' believes that their main objective in life is to get the food. But 'other' group thinks differently. For the 'other' group, it is not just about to live to get the food, it is about to discover the potential within, to fly to the heights where no other seagulls fly.Jonathan Livingston belongs to this second group.

Why did it strike cords with millions of people?

I think at some point of time everyone would have felt like Jonathan. But may be not everyone who had such thougths but didn’t venture as Jonathan did.

Isn’t Jonathan denotes all those who stand-out from the crowd? Isn’t Jonathan’s story is about people who had the guts to believe that they are meant for something more than mundane things and about people who showed that new heights can be reached through belief, inspiration and practice?

Now something other than the metaphorical meanings, there is a story about the origin of this book. This is what Richard Bach said in an interview

“It was the weirdest experience of my life, I was walking along one night, worrying about the rent money, when I heard this voice say, 'Jonathan Livingston Seagull.' But no one was there. I had absolutely no idea what it meant. When I got home, I suddenly had a vision of a seagull flying along, and I began to write. The story certainly didn't spring from any conscious invention on my part. I just put down what I saw."

May be these sound bytes sound debatable and fuzzy, but there is even more interesting trivia about why the name ‘Jonathan Livingston' for the seagull’s character was chosen.

It is believed that this book is inspired by a real person by name ‘John H Livingston’. John Livingston was one of top US pilots during 1920-30. He was into barnstorming which was a form of ‘flying circus’ where every known stunts like spinning, diving, rolling and every possible maneuver with the plane were performed. It seems Richard Bach, a ‘reserve’ pilot himself, got inspired by John Livingston’s dare devil life.

That was something about the book, thoughts,origin & names. If you haven’t read the book yet, I think you should give it a try.

Signing off with my favorite line in the book which is in the dedication page !!

“To the real Jonathan Seagull, who lives within us all”

Jonathan Seagull within us?? Think of it!

Celebration of Life

2006-02-02T00:05:00.000-08:00

“I pray that you get the strength to accept the things and to see the tomorrows”

After this line, I couldn’t write anything in that card we gave to her, which was our little token of support.

She….our client manager.I just can’t imagine what all she might have gone though before this. She always was that dignified person with a cracking sense of humor. Make no mistake, when it came to work, she was the boss. But I never could imagine that beyond those authoritative and humor-filled eyes, there was an ocean of grief.

Until the last day when we came to know that her husband passed away we didn’t know anything about that. But what intruded me was the fact that she knew that her husband is going to die and still she maintained the composition!

I don’t know how she managed to put up that brave face when her love of her life for more than 15 years was diagnosed with blood cancer. I heard she did all that she could do to fight to snatch her love with the slowly-inching death. I’m thinking, when she exactly came to know that the battle is coming to an end, how did she take it? From where did she get the courage to face the situation?

I was totally overwhelmed with all these emotions when I attended the funeral service.Funeral service was drastically different from the funerals I had been before. There was no grief, no weeping, no crying and no devastated looks all around. Instead it was like a celebration. I learnt that particular community in Christians does everything passionately, they celebrate everything in life and that includes the ‘final journey’ also.

The funeral service was marked with songs about heaven, meeting the Almighty and about life there. I should say that I felt I was not in a funeral service but in a crowd who was there just to celebrate death or call it re-birth. Then there were friends and family members who fondly spoke about the deceased one. The whole service was aimed at one thing ‘rejoicing’, what they believed that the deceased one is now in a world which is free of pain & grief.

Standing by her young kids, she looked very composed through out the service. Even managed to say a ‘Hi’ to all of us. But at dieing moments of service, she couldn’t control it no more. She broke down and she was escorted out.

These memories are like the waves of sea. They keep coming and making the mind wet…

After the service, we managed to meet her. She couldn’t speak anything but just hugged me, no tears.

I was still thinking about this, when I got this news about a friend’s friend who was diagnosed with a rare case of a blood deficiency. This guy was just exploring and enjoying the life when life handed over this ‘heavy baggage’ to him. He had recently gone back from overseas and was doing great .He had this very happy proud parents and tons of ‘would-be’ father-in-laws looking for him. And now I heard the news that even if all the necessary expensive medical treatment is given, his survival chance is 40%.

My sincere prayers are with him.

I’m just thinking how tough it will be for these people to spend each day. What if you know that you have so many days to live and what if you even know your last days are just a handful? How do you take it?

How about the people who love them? What pain and emotional distress they will be undergoing? How cruel to see that your loved ones are dieing everyday but you can’t do anything but to watch helplessly…

After reading all this, you definitely wonder why this is named as ‘Celebration of Life’.

When I was going through the funeral service which I mentioned earlier, I happened to look at the leaflet given, which described the funeral service as ‘Celebration of Life’. That phrase struck in mind like a bullet.

Do we actually ‘celebrate’ life? Forget celebration, do we actually ‘live’ a life? Even when we know that the days here are numbered, why do we behave as if we are here to stay forever? In such a short span of life, why do we make life still worse with our egos , unrealistic deeds and so many other self-created evils?

I know I’m sounding totally clueless, helpless and philosophical. Can’t help, sometimes life pops up such questions for which we have no answers....

Parade of memories..

2006-01-23T00:12:00.000-08:00

It all started when I was checking my foto albums and my sight got fixed when it came across this album 'Sakleshpur trek-2005'. After that, it refused to come back and still wandering somewhere in those high-bridges, dark tunnels and that deserted house in Yedakumeri.

Now sit back and enjoy the parade of memories….

When we came up with this idea of going for a trek along the abandoned railway trek, we never thought the strength would reach 11. There was Ambarish, Hakim, Ayush, Anmol and Kishore with whom I already had traveled quite a lot. Gurpreeth and Nikhil were probably new to me(who got introduced as roommates of Ayush).To prevent it being an all-boys-trek, there were three beautiful ladies in the trek group – Pooja, Archana and Varsha. I still wonder how the later managed to get permission to come for the trek!

On the day we were about to leave for Sakleshpur (exactly one year back on Jan 22!), we got a surprise half day off in office due to Beny hin disturbance. When we were advised to go back to homes, we freaked into Bangalore Central for trek shopping! We brought MTR ready-to-eats, biscuits, chips and of course those shoes.

On that Friday night when the Bangalore-Sakleshpur bus left majestic, it appeared as if all the people in the bus were going for the trek. Our gang was in fantastic form. Ambarish was busy renaming every one of us. He called himself Dan Brown and called me Robert Langdon for reasons not known till now. Call it after-effects of reading Dan’s novels!

After the bus dropped us in the middle of a forest in front of a tea-shop (remember that aunty & Inchara), our field day started. Our first venture of traveling in a mini open truck, that clear skies, stars sparkling and we all the gang happily sitting in an open truck… we all silently sitting in the early morning hours looking for little sunlight waiting to start our trek..

The best part of journey with the rail tracks was the high altitude bridges and the pitch dark lengthy tunnels. I think there were about 19 tunnels and 25 bridges.Those bridges were so high and sometimes the plates in them were rusty making it ever more dangerous. But I liked the dark tunnels most. Almost mile long tunnels with no signs of any light and bats flying over making strange noises. At places water drop tickling from the roof. It is an awesome experience.

One more thing which made the journey along the track more memorable was the streams, waterfalls and woods which we came across. And of course the awesome anthakshaari all along the way.

Those tired & hungry looks, the way we ate the ready-to-eat food packets for lunch was a thing to remember. I think in between we ran out of our quota of water.

But most remarkable thing for me was the fact that even the first timer trekker though obviously tired had that will to complete the trek and indeed they completed.

Next episode there was about the place where we stayed. It was an abandoned railway station with a ruined house with no electricity. After walking nearly for 19kms, every one of us had crashed in the sleeping bags in no time.Our ‘house’ for the night was a treat to watch & experience. It had those big holes in the roof and no doors!! Those screams by Archana seeing those mighty rats should be still ringing in Yedakumeri !

That waterfalls where we had a natural shower.How cold the water was! And of course that episode where we went looking for a suitable place for our ‘morning activities’!

Getting lost while coming back, taking a truck to travel, asking a mini-truck for lift, visit to Tippu’s fort, standing on the walls of forts posing for photos..still feels it was few days back. Someone who wanted to go by Rajahamsa and at end became such that they wanted to travel to Bangalore by truck!!

Then that truck journey to Hassan and our pranks of waving hands & saying ‘Hi’ to whomever was passing by, those songs we sung (special mention of songs by Pooja & Ambi)…incredible.

I was just walking through Hollywood, thinking of all these wonderful moments. What a coincidence; at the same time I got a call from one of the trekkers.

I wish I had a time machine in which I could fly back to those days & those moments spent with all wonderful people.

Memories sooth the mind just like that massage after that long tiring trek…

One dial and a click away..

2005-12-10T20:09:00.000-08:00

Some voices are like this…

I just feel so good to listen to them. Just spoke with one such voice. It is always a pleasant experience listening to the voice. In spite of all the changes which happened in between, still there is no change in that voice. It is the same familiar friendly affectionate voice. We will never stop cracking PJs. We will never stop talking about our favorite topics.

Wherever it is, let that voice, be always happy & cheerful…

Talking of voices and telephones, I wonder how happy Graham Bell would be seeing his invention connecting so many people separated by time & distance. There may be e-mails, chats, cams, talks…but there is still a charm about these telephones. There is something about dialing the numbers and giving voice to people on other end or getting the feel from other side.

Nothing is pleasant as a surprise call. Same thing happened few weeks back, a friend of mine who was from same school, hostel & college as mine, out of the blue, called me from Boston. Somehow we had lost contact and it was a nice surprise to see his call. It was so much fun updating the things from both sides and talking about our school MKT, Harihar, our Harihar gang and all those silly-wonderful time we spent in Dharwad!

There was another call from another friend who was not in contact for a long time. So this talk was just about our previous project, previous project mates, all the treks & all the picnics we went. When I met this guy, we spent hours talking and looking into photos of our good days in that project.

Other than these calls, calls to home are as always provide the regular supply of oxygen. Calls to friends in India are always a shortcut to memory lanes to India.

If telephones have charm, e-mails have their own class.

It is such a nice thing to keep in touch with friends in home and in different part of world. I sometimes get astonished thinking about being in a global-village. It feels so good to see in the mailbox, a mail from a friend in Japan talking about the Japanese tradition, a mail from Munich about how he is touring Europe (& sharing his little secrets), a mail form Scotland about the lake he visited, someone talking about playing football in UK, someone talking about temperature in Finland, someone mailing about getting anxious about not getting Visa. World surely has shrunk into such a small place.

Then there are regular special doses of mails and which I make a point to mail regularly. Like the ones, which I get from my friend in Bangalore whom I’ve never met, but with whom I mail so comfortably and discuss everything under sun from treks to Boyz!

And there are these gang mails where all ‘reply-all’ stuff will be happening. It is easy to be in touch with and to get to hear from all the folks through these mails. The discussions in these gang-mails often get lively & sometimes go out of control and out of context also!

I didn’t include all the talks we have about one of my favorite topic- previous project in Bangalore. I have so much to say about this, I better will come up with a separate post about it soon.

Whatever it is…one thing that is sure is that friends & family are just a dial and click away.

Escape to Catalina !

2005-12-03T21:00:00.000-08:00

There was aqua blue in whichever direction I saw...

The Pacific Ocean was looking magnanimous spreading itself all across. The wind blowing was chilling & at times the sea looked like was becoming little disturbed.

The cruise was splitting the waters and was heading towards Catalina. Standing on the deck of the ship I was lost in the enormity of the ocean. I wonder what all things the ocean has within it. It is so enormous but yet appears so calm.

No wonder they compare eyes to ocean. It is so true that beyond those eyes existed an ocean…

Before my thought stream took me further deep into the ocean, the island was getting visible. So after an hour of cruising from San Pedro we were approaching Catalina Island, our holiday destination.

Catalina Island…
A tiny but refreshingly beautiful island in Pacific hardly 25 miles away from mainland California. The idea of visiting the Catalina originated when I heard from someone in the office about the island. To accompany me in the trip was the lovely couple – Shikha & Peru.

As the cruise approached the island, we saw the coastline dotted with lots of small ships. The Casino was standing right on the coast. There were few yatches venturing into the waters.

We landed in Avalon, the only city (town) in Catalina Island. The harbor was beaming with tourists, most of them there due to Thanksgiving holidays. As I walked in the very neat streets of Avalon, I noticed that there were not many automobiles. There were restaurants, sports gear shops, souvenir shops, everything revolving around tourists.After having Potato fries & sipping soft drinks, we set to explore Avalon.

There was a range of things to experience in Avalon. Kayaking, Snorkeling, Scuba diving, Parasailing for the adventurers. There were arranged tours for people who wanted to explore the city. There were bicycles & golf cars for hire for people who wanted to explore on their own.And finally there was beach & sun for people who just wanted to relax!

Parasailing was looking very inviting & I couldn’t resist the invitation! Though I had done parasailing before in Bangalore, I had never done that on water. Shikha also got charged up to try parasailing. The motor boat carried us in the deep waters.

The parachute was attached to the boat and we strapped ourselves to the parachute. Slowly the rope attached to parachute started extending and the wind was blowing so heavily that we started floating in the air. As the rope extended further & further from boat we soared higher & higher in the air. Now we were literally in the air with parachute above and Pacific Ocean below, just hanging there with a rope. The view from the top was mesmerizing. The island & the shore were looking still more beautiful. It was blue water everywhere. At one point, parachute started descending down & down, almost few feet away from water. When I thought I’m going to land in the sea, the boat picked up the speed and again we started soaring.

All good things have to an end and so as this. Slowly the rope pulled parachute and me back to the boat. I thoroughly enjoyed the sailing and I think parasailing above water is more pleasant than on land.

Back to shore after parasailing, we hit upon the sand. The mild sun was a welcome sight.Sat on the beach chatting about the parasailing and about few of our favorite topics. Meanwhile came across a group of TCSers whom we had met at Griffith Park in the TCS picnic a week earlier. Had a brief fun chat with them before we moved ahead.

Winston Churchill, Theodore Roosevelt, Charlie Chaplin…What is common to these famous men? I know you must be wondering why suddenly a quiz popped here. The next place we came across has got to say about this.

I think some of you know about Tuna, the big sea fish. Tuna is particularly known as a popular sea food and these days becoming a restricted food due to high mercury level in it. I read that it has pink flesh as against white flesh of most other ocean fishes.

There is a Tuna club which is more than 100 years old and any body who catches a Tuna can become a member. But the catch is that Tuna has to be caught using the ‘rod & reel’ only. Considering the huge size of Tuna fish and the mechanism of rod & reel, it was considered impossible to capture the Tuna fish by rod and reel. There were often injuries sustained when trying to catch the leaping Tuna. So it became associated with really skillful & adventurers. This club was for people who successfully caught Tuna. As the club’s motto say “Fair play for game fishes”, the idea of the club was to provide even chance for Tuna’s life.

By the way, all the above three personalities were associated with Tuna club.

Next on our list was Casino. This circular doom building on the coast is the landmark of Avalon,was built by Wrigley as a tourist attraction (Wrigley is the same ‘Chewing gum’ guy).If the name 'Casino' brought memories of gambling then this is the wrong place you thought of. This casino has nothing to with gambling. It is a huge theatre where movies screened and other cultural programs conducted.

Not far from Casino, on the coastline were 'Kayaks’.These is the slender, small, lightweight water crafts which are paddled with the two-sided oar. The Kayaking looked to be a popular sport in Avalon and I think it is one of the best way to explore the rugged & beautiful coastline of Avalon. Kayaks are available in single and double Kayaks. These Kayaks were said to be developed by Eskimos as a fun & easy way to navigate the waters. Though I was all excited to try it, I couldn't do it as I didn't get any partner to do it and also as my swimming was still below elementary level.

After all these events, it was time to hit upon a restaurant for the lunch. With some effort we were successful in finding a place where Veggie Pizzas were made. The family size pizza was huge but thin & it was successful in filling our stomach.

After lunch, we again hit upon the beach to get some sun. While the couple with me decided to relax in the sun, I set out to explore little bit more. There was 'Lover's Cove' on an edge of the mountain and this place is known for Snorkeling. This water sport includes putting a watertight face mask, insert into your mouth one end of the long breathing tube called a snorkel and put your face beneath the surface of the water. This way it gives a view of fishes & a view of under the water world.

I must tell about the Golf car(t)s here. On Catalina Island, full-sized automobiles, buses, and delivery trucks are severely restricted. I read that they have policy that for every two big vehicles retiring out of island, they will sanction one new vehicle and often the wait time for new full-sized vehicle is more than 25 years!

This intended discouragement of bigger vehicles is to reduce the pollution and has made golf carts the primary motorized means of transportation. Most island residents themselves own only golf carts for transportation. With golf cart speeds topping out at just about 15 miles an hour, and in-town speeds far slower than that, traffic in Avalon moves literally to a gentler pace. These golf cars can be rented to explore the island.

There was semi-submarine ride to explore the underwater world, snorkeling, scuba diving, guided tours, golf car trips and so many other exciting things to try out. But time was running out & it was time to take the cruise back to San Pedro.

So we were back in Avalon Harbor and waiting for 'Catalina Express'.On the Harbor, I noticed there was a stone statue of a seal. It was in memory of a very popular seal 'Ben' who lived on the Avalon coast and who was extremely friendly with people and famous among the tourists.

Back on the deck of the Ship, the evening in Catalina was looking beautiful. The purple waters, the island in dim light and the red sky looked as if it is straight out of a painting.Slowly the lights were glowing here and there. The Casino was beaming with lights.

We took leave of Catalina with memories of good time spent there. As I discovered, the island offered so many things and it got added to my favorite destinations.

Standing on the deck of ship, I was trying to follow the stars in the sky which were scattered all across. The cruise was speeding in the water in the darkness of night and there was a light house standing somewhere at a far distance, beaming ray of light...

Queues,Thanksgiving and Turkeys.

2005-11-25T03:40:00.000-08:00

Think of Queues….

What is the first thing which comes into your mind?

At least for me, it is ‘Tirupathi’ and I instantly remember those long queues and the devotees standing in queue for hours to get the Dharshana. When I had been to Tirupathi last time, we had been in the queue for 4-5 hours. You may be thinking why this guy in US suddenly is talking about Tirupathi’s queue.

Now it is 2 in the morning & I just came back after doing the rounds in the city! Seeing huge queues in front of electronic shops here, Tirupathi flashed in my mind. Now you may be wondering why people here were standing in queues in front of electronic shops.

Last Thursday of November in US is celebrated as ‘Thanksgiving’ day and the day after is known as ‘Black Friday’. On every ‘Black Friday’ all shops offer grand discounts. But the biggest and most attractive offers are given by electronic shops. But the catch is that these offers are limited and only available to people having coupons. And how people get these coupons? Stand in the line from Thursday night till the time the shops open on Friday morning & distribute coupons. And on ‘Black Friday’ the shops open at 4-5 in the morning!

When I heard this from somebody here, I thought they may be joking. But as Thursday night began to grow, it was becoming true. Many people in apartment also started to go out. So I decided that I’ll go and check myself if this is true.

At some distance from our apartment, there is ‘Best buy’ and ‘Circuit City’. When I reached these places, it was a scene to look at. There was a huge line of people waiting outside the shops. They were totally cladded in winter wear. Everyone had brought the folding chairs/stools to stand (sit) in the queue. Few had brought the comforters and sleeping bags and I heard they were in the queue since 9 in the night!! There were families standing in the queue and enjoying the coffee they had brought!!!

So it was looking like people in the queue had well planned and well equipped to stand in the queue. Most people in the queue were Makkoos, Chincos and few Desis who were there to get the laptops, cameras, TVs, players and whatever they can at highly discounted prices.

Just a thought….
Isn’t that we spend most of the time in our lives in queues??

Queue to get ration, queue to get admission to school/college, queue to get movie tickets, queue for walk-in interviews. I have seen people who will be in the queue waiting to fall for a particular guy/gal!

Back to discount queues….
It is so different from the Tirupathi queues. There people wait in queues just to get a glimpse of the God, here they stand in queue to get the things which can be easily termed ‘materialistic’.

In both cases, people return back with a sense of happiness, here people return with a satisfaction that they were able to save so many dollars, there people return with a satisfaction that they were able to spend some time in presence of Almighty. For me one queue reflects materialistic world and another queue stand for spiritual world.

I just took ‘Discount Queue’ as example of ‘materialistic’ and ‘Tirupathi Queue’ as an example of ‘spiritual’. It may not be so clear cut as there may be elements of materialism in ‘Tirupathi Queue’ and vice versa??

Before I get too philosophical and bore you more, let me tell how the concept of ‘Thanksgiving’ day came into existence.

Several centuries back, it seems that few people from England got frustrated with the suffocating religious set-up there and fled to US . They called themselves ‘Pilgrims’. The first winter in US for pilgrims was very harsh with little flood & extreme cold, due to which many of them died. But the next harvest was extremely good for pilgrims. They had enough food and they also got lots of help from native Indians.

So in order to thank natives and thank for all the good things, they arranged a feast for natives. That practice grew up as ‘Thanksgiving’ over the years. It was formally declared a national celebration during Lincoln’s period.

One thing which is closely associated with Thanksgiving is Turkey. Although it is not clear how it became associated with Thanksgiving, this bigger version of hen has become a must for Thanksgiving lunch/dinner.

It is so much so popular that in white house every year there will be a ‘National Thanksgiving Turkey’ function where the US president does something called ‘official pardoning of the Turkey’! This year Turkey’s name which got pardoned was ‘Marshmallow’. This tradition was started when Truman was president and it involves pardoning Turkeys and retiring them to Park where they will spend rest of their live.

Such a contrast that when several thousands of Turkeys make their way to lunch-dinner on Thanksgiving, few lucky Turkeys gets ‘pardoned’ by president and they live rest of their life royally and guess what is the name of park where these royal Turkeys retire?

Frying Pan Park !!!!

Spring forward, Fall back

2005-11-13T01:10:00.000-08:00

Sun rises in the east and sun sets in west.

You should be thinking what big deal in that, everybody knows that. But one thing we usually don’t take into consideration is the time sun spends in each geography. Sun in certain period of year falls in love with that place so much so that he sets at 8 in the night and in another period he hates it so much that he sets early at 5 in evening.What this means in the uneven number of day light hours during different periods of years.

So how to balance this uneven day light?
Advance the time by one hour during summer months and once summer is over bring back the time by one hour. This concept is known as Spring forward, Fall back. This idea was first floated by Benjamin Franklin and it first got used in US during world war time.As of this year, DST begins for US at 2 am on first Sunday of April and time reverts to standard time at 2am on last Sunday of October.But in 2007, DST is going to extend for few more weeks.

US follows three different zones – Pacific Standard Time (PST), Central Standard Time (PST) and Eastern Standard Time (PST).What it means is when it is 8 am in west coast of US, it will be 11 am in Central US and 12 am in East Coast.Along with these three different time zones, which are already confusing, add Daylight Saving Time to make it a perfect chaos!

Same thing happened last week here after time was adjusted back one hour on last Sunday of October.I actually got up on a lazy Sunday morning at 11:30, but due to daylight saving it was 10:30.All gadgets which had daylight savings logic had automatically changed, but few were still showing 11:30 leaving me confused! So after confirming the time few times, I came to conclusion about the correct time!

But more confusion was yet to come in office.

After Daylight Saving Time got over, the time was adjusted back. But what everybody forgot was the fact that there are few areas in US like Arizona and Hawaii which don’t follow DST. So our system calculations based on date & time started behaving strangely in the first few days as the time zone setting was not taken into account for Arizona and other non-DST zones. It took some time to get into the bottom of problem.

But why they do they go for day light savings?
One of the major reasons being quoted is energy conservation. It is said that amount of electricity consumed depend on when sun sets and when people go to bed. As people have same bedtime through out the year, by artificially moving sunset one hour late, the amount of energy consumed is reduced. To prove this, there are statistics which shows that DST reduces the country’s electric usage by one percent.

DST also is said to increase opportunities for outdoor activities.Most people plan outdoor activities during the increased hours of daylight.Other benefits include lesser traffic accidents and lesser crimes!

By the way, this day light savings is not followed in every country. Countries close to north pole or south pole , the daylight period is longer in summer.In countries near equator or in the tropics,the day and night are nearly the same length.So DST is usually not useful in the tropics and in equator.

There is one interesting incident I read about this DST.
In September 1999, the Palestinian West Bank was on daylight saving time while Israel had just switched back to standard time. West Bank Palestinians prepared time bombs and smuggled them inside Israel to their men, who misunderstood the time on the bombs. As the bombs were being planted, they exploded—one hour too early—killing three terrorists instead of the intended victims—two busloads of people!!

Opponents of DST claim that there are not enough benefits of DST.Disturbed sleeping patterns, less productivity due to sleep-disrputed workers, accidents, confusion for people traveling are the several reasons to criticize DST.

I heard India also once tried DST when it was in war with Pakistan.

I’ll leave with you to think on this..
Supposing some lady gives birth to twins on the night when DST is reverted back.Say one child is born at 1:50 am.At 2 am the clock is turned back one hour.Now another child is born which actually is born at 2am but due to DST it is born at 1am, making it the older of two child even though it is the younger. Doesn’t it have legal effects in cases of properties or rights?

What do you say?

Halloween day & Spooky night!!

2005-11-05T17:32:00.000-08:00

Ghosts!!

The ideas, thoughts and imaginations related to the ghosts/spirits are as old as the ghosts themselves. The ghosts form a significant part in every culture and each part of world has its own traditions related to ghosts.

One such tradition prevalent is Halloween Day.

Halloween day, most commonly associated with weird costume parties, spooky nights and candies. It is widely celebrated in United States, Canada, England & Ireland. These days, it is celebrated in other countries also.

I was amazed at the way, houses were decorated here for Halloween Day. Atleast 2 weeks before the Halloween day, there were Jack-O-Lanterns in front of each house. There were ghosts made of balloons & life-size ghost toys put up everywhere. More amazing was the way people were waiting eagerly for the day.

Loads of mails was sent in the office to discuss the dress code for the day.After much debate and voting it was decided that everybody would come in ‘Cow Boy’ dress to office on Halloween day!

The office on Halloween day was looking straight from the old Cow Boy movie. Most of them were in big check shirts and denim with the trademark Cowboy hats.

A part of office was decorated as an old cow boy bar with posters of ‘Most Wanted Cow boys’ pasted all across. There was even a funny skit which was about the outlaws la Cowboys fighting against the sheriffs. The skit was about cow-boy programmers who don’t want to follow any ‘Process Change Management’ and about Sheriffs who want everything to be process oriented. The dialogues were so humorous.

Another group of people in office had dressed up as aliens with antennas, one more group had dressed up as nerds, some other group as Egyptian Pharaohs. It was a welcome change to see such vivid images in office!!

For Chocolate buffs, there were tons of plenty of chocolates everywhere in office.On each of our desks were placed peanuts & chocolates!!

Back in apartment in the evening, I saw people roaming around wearing those ghost masks and dressed up like ghosts. There is an old belief that on Halloween day, ghosts/spirits would be back on earth and would be roaming around to get into the human body. By wearing those ghost masks & dresses, probably that was a way to confuse the ghosts and misguide them that people in those dresses were also part of ghost community!

Jack-o-lantern, which is a carved pumpkin lit by a candle inside, was placed on each doorsteps. Scary face carved on the pumpkins was one more way of frightening ghosts!

One more Halloween related tradition is 'treat or trick'.Children would go to each neighborhood house, knocking the doors and shout ‘trick or treat’. The house occupants would give chocolates, candies or sweets. Candy Apple was the hugely popular item that was given to kids on Halloween day. It was such a nice tradition where children were ‘officially’ allowed to go and demand chocolates, candies or sweets from anyone.

But nothing is allowed to remain straight and simple!

I read somewhere that act of ‘trick or treat’ went for serious scrutiny after rumors that the some individuals were embedding things like razors and pins in the apples that were given to children. The paranoid followed and the hysteria reached such a stage that few hospitals on Halloween day offered to X-ray the candy apple collections. Few incidents where the candy apples were ‘drugged’ or ‘poisoned’ were also reported. So that act of ‘trick or treat’ never remained same. These days I heard children rarely go out & collect candies.

These days the most popular thing is the Halloween night party where there will be costume party with people in all sorts of dresses and which has all the spicy ingredients required for making a ‘spooky night’!

I believe like any other old tradition, Halloween day is no more only about ‘ghosts’.It has acquired new dimensions. More over it has given a chance to people, to be something they are not and to do things which they always wanted to do. Ask anyone who went to Halloween party, they will agree with me!

Ifthiyar with Turks

2005-10-23T20:55:00.000-07:00

Sitting at the dinner table, I was literally clueless about what was spread across the table.I couldn’t recognize any of the dishes there. How could I, after all it was Turkish dinner.

It was the ‘Ifthiyar’ party arranged by the Turkish community and we ended up there after my Turkish colleague Ahmet invited for the party.

Ahmet understood my concern about the food and assured me that he had made arrangements for vegetarian food. While rest of my colleagues digged into the various meat dishes, me and another friend were the only veggies there.

First came the palm dates and then appetizer ‘Ayran’. It was a drink of beaten yogurt, salt & grated cucumber. It was something like our butter milk but not exactly same.This was followed by vegetable salad.Then followed a series of main dishes.

One was an orange color rice item which was made of rice(or rather rice-lets).It was plain in taste with some unknown spices and only thing I recognized in that was that they had put salt in the dish !

There was another green color grain item which was like Kosambari. Even ingredients almost tasted similar. In a flash, Kosambari prepared in home during festivals passed through my head! Next regular rice with vermillion made its way to my plate.There was chutney like thing which tasted familiar but couldn’t co-relate the taste!

Mean while my host friend was giving running commentary about all the dishes coming to my plate.

'Dolma' was the one which I liked. It is rice stuffed in the grape leaves and baked.It is almost like our ‘Patra Oday’ we prepare in Karnataka .I heard from Ahmet that the ingredients of 'Dolma ' can also be vegetables & beans.

There was a rectangular deep-fry item which tasted some thing like pakoda. Or was it that I was trying to find Indian taste in every item?!!

In that dinner party, me & another friend were the only veggies and this food was specially prepared for us. Looked like Ahmet took extra pain for us..

After getting stuffed with the food, ‘Tatlisi’ appeared on the table.Tatlisi is the Turkish term for sweets or desserts.

‘Helva’ was that dessert made of milk, sugar, nuts, vermillion & flour.Before we could finish that small rolls were served on the plate.It was a deep fry sweet & tasted like Jeelabi.One more variation came which with great difficulty made its way into stomach!

During dinner, I had a lengthy conversion with Ahmet about Turkey, his home town Istanbul, places to visit in Istanbul and current political scenario in Turkey.I could notice how excited Ahmet was when he was explaining to me about Turkey. For any ex-patriate, talking about their country is such a nice thing. I remember I also get pumped up when I explain about India to someone here.

By the way, if you are not aware, Ifthiyar is the party arranged during Ramzan month for breaking fasts.If you recollect, Muslims fast through out this month and they won’t have food in between sun rise & sun set.This party was arranged by Turkish community here and I think we were the only non-Turkish people there!

After dinner, a video presentation was made telling significance of Ramadan .We took leave of Ahmet and while returning I had this question hovering me

“Religion is simple and it gets complicated when it gets interpreted.It was invented to show the light in the dark but why it is being used instead to push towards dark?”

Once again in Phoenix!

2005-10-05T21:31:00.000-07:00

South-West Airlines, LAX-PHX flight…

Everything was same & even few of the airhostesses in the flight were looking familiar!! It was nice to be back in Phoenix.How do my office folks know that I love travelling places?

First four days of training was spent, most of the time working in class and rest of the time as usual searching & testing new restaurants in Phoenix. And some part of my hotel stay was spent calling up customer care of hotel asking to rectify the internet connection in my room!

On Friday evening, a long ride of 30 minutes brought me to Deer Valley apartments. Last time I was here in Phoenix, I had met Archana. This time it was to meet one more good friend from Lucent-background and who was part of our picnics & treks in Bangalore. It was almost 8 months since I had seen him. After a little while I heard that familiar voice and there he was sitting on a bicycle…Supreeth Hedge!

Suppi took me to his house & I met Giri, his roommate whom I had met in our Kumara parvatha trek. Chatted with Suppi for a long time and didn’t forget to pull his legs about why he hasn’t shaved for weeks?

Next was visit to Archana for dinner. When she was about to start cooking, she realized that there was no rice & once again we were out on ‘Bhavathi Bhikshan Deyi’ campaign!!!

Archana took me to her colleague Sachin & Mubin’s house & it so happened that we ended up cooking there & eating dinner with them! Mubin is an interesting guy to talk with.As I mentioned any project name to him, he used to come up with few gals names from that project and would ask how they were doing! Had dinner and chatted with them till 11:30 before Suppi called. So these guys dropped me back at Suppi’s place.

One more drive with Suppi this time to ‘Blockbuster’ to get some movies. We were literally ‘Gone in 60 seconds’ seeing the movie of the same name!

Saturday, Oct 1:
Phoenix appeared little cooler now then it was during my previous visit.

After lots of hiccups & last minute changes, finally Suppi was the rescuer and took us to Arizona mills.This is one of the big malls in Phoenix and as expected did lots of window shopping before we went to movie ‘Flight Plan’.

A little girl goes missing in the aircraft and there won’t be any proof left that the kid had boarded the flight. Nobody believes mom that her kid came with her. So mom herself gets into action of searching the kid in that aircraft, of which she knows each & every bit of it!! How she knows the aircraft? Because she will be the one who would have designed that aircraft !! Interesting movie and I heard rumors that the movie may get banned! That may be because the movie has many scenes showing minute details about aircraft and how to goof it up.

After movie, did some small shopping in the Arizona mills. I added one more t-shirt, to my latest hobby of collecting T-shirts bearing city names I visited.

Next stop was ‘Mills Avenue’, which we called ‘Brigade road of Phoenix’. Looks like Brigade road had deep rooted influence on all of us hailing from Bangalore. First thing we do here is compare any dazzling-happening street to Brigades and then we add ‘May be this is little bigger’!

Mills Avenue is across Arizona University and I think the large chunk of that crowd was from there.One interesting thing about Mills Avenue was the huge guitars erected on the footpaths.There were so many of them and each in different color & design. There was a guitar which was shining red, which got its color by the 1 cent coins pasted all over it

The evening was just getting lit up and there were young crowds all set to enjoy the Saturday night. Most of the time here again we spent in window shopping and also followed Achhu to whichever apparel shop she went.Looked like all the shops in that Avenue was meant only for Ladies!

After a quick dinner of Spinach pasta, went to ‘Four rabbits fountain’ and sat there chatting for a very long time. Invariably the topic of treks and finally Sakleshpur trek came and how dearly we remembered that trek.

Anand, who is Acchu’s colleague, was in great form too. Best part about Anand is he speaks so good Kannada. It is significant & heartening considering the point that he is a Bihari !

I know that sometimes I just get pissed off due to silly & stupid reasons. Achhu will definitely be nodding her head to this & saying “I know”!

We left Mills around 11.The crowd was getting bigger and bigger. Came back and slept at 2 not beforing watching ‘Gone in 60 Seconds’.

Sunday, Oct 2:
We got up pretty early for lunch at 11:30. Me and Suppi were in quite a flash back mood after seeing our Kumaraparvatha trek fotos and Lucent picnic fotos.Don’t know how long we sat chatting about that KP trip, about Sandeep who was the 'star' of that trek, about Sudheep's capability of carrying friend's luggage,about Sumanth,Hakim,Mohammed,Ayush,Bhat….

Picked Achhu on the way and went to Anthem malls. It seems the whole idea of that session was to show me huge cactuses and desert landscaping in Phoneix.Indeed there were cactuses on either side of road and there were few cactus nurseries also.On the way back from mall, Suppi, Achhu & I sung some Kannada songs non-stop. Especially that song “Heghe idhey namm desha..Heghe idhey namm bhashey..Heghe idharey namma jana?” was sounding so meaningful!!

Anthem mall is one more shopping mall in Phoenix.If you had noticed, Phoenix has nothing but huge malls and looked like those are the entertainment spots here. Phoenix doesn’t boost huge things as in Los Angeles or San Francisco.

But things small or big, looks good only when you are with good company.
Suppi & Achhu gave such a nice company throughout my stay there.

Achhu & Suppi, I know you will definitely do still better planning next time I come there!!!

5 Rs to 12 $ - A hair cut tale

2005-09-24T19:56:00.000-07:00

I was sitting in ‘Kathy’s Nails & Hairs’ near to my apartment and letting hair-specialist to work on my hair. As that barber went about his work, my mind began running few years back….

I think its name was ‘Mamata Hair Saloon’, which was few doors away from our house in Harihar. But popularly it was known as ‘Chinnappana Cutting Shop’ after its owner’s name.It was the ‘official’ saloon for me for more than 20 years. Till I finished my Engineering and moved out of Harihar, each of my haircuts was done in that Saloon!

Chinnappa na cutting shop was always crowded on Sunday and that’s when I used to go for hair cut. There used to be ‘Prajaa Vaani’ and ‘Nagara Vaani’ newspapers for waiting customers. By the time, my turn came, I would have finished each & every letter in the newspapers from sports page to reader’s letters!

Then hair cut would start. As they knew exactly what hair cut to do (Why don’t they know about their long-standing elite customer!).They would start hair cut as soon as I sat on the chair without asking what to do. I always had ‘Pilewan Cut’ which in other words meant very short hair.

Initially in the school, I used to be taunted and was made fun of because of this ‘Pilewan Cut’.So I did got ideas to change the hair styles. But that taunting soon died out after I became all teachers’s ‘darling’ in the school and after same taunters had to get some help from me in class!

Strangely enough, I never visited any saloon in entire 2 years when I was in Dharwad for PU and instead used to get haircut whenever I visited Harihar, of course in Chinnappa’s shop! I had seen the hair cut price growing over years starting from 5 Rs to 15 Rs in that shop.

Once I was in Bangalore, the hair saloons became like web sites. Go to whichever you feel like!!

In Laksmipuram, CMH road where I stayed for more than year, there was this hair saloon which I went couple of times.That barber was a full fan of Kamal Hasaan and whatever Kamal tried on scene with his hair, this guy would have tried it himself. Then I moved to Domlur and visited couple of saloons there.The average hair cut cost was 25 Rs.

There was no personal touch to hair cuts anymore, no cinema gossips, and no big political discussions.

When in Chennai for 2 months, had to go for a hair cut and that was one of the funniest hair cutting sessions I had. Barber didn’t know anything other than Tamil & I have to use sign language and only word he understood was ‘short’.The barber was happily watching some songs in some Tamil channel and doing hair cut.I was praying that he would spare my ears !!!

So all those hair-cut experiences had left a typical picture in my mind about saloons.’Hair Saloon’ immediately brought images of some (usually small) shop with lots of mirrors,some fancy chairs,scissors-blades-combs,heavily-talking barbers,radio-tv-newspapers-magazines,hair across the floor...

Hair and time wait for none!

So after coming to Torrance I went in search of a hair saloon.My previous image of barber shop was about to change.Near my apartment there were at least some 6 saloons.I visited each of those saloons find out more about them.I have to hop from saloon to saloon because of hair cut costs and also as few saloons required ‘appointments’!

There were saloons offering hair cut starting from 10$ to 25$ and a price left for anybody's imagination. After doing survey of saloons, finally I choose a saloon which I thought was decent where ‘basic’ hair cut was 12$.

This whole saloon looked very high-tech with plethora of gadgets all across.People were sitting and waiting on a nice couch ,watching TV and going through those cine-magazines.There were people getting done variety of hair-operations.There were people who were getting hair colored. People were getting their nails polished & trimmed. There was a lady who was sitting on a chair with a bowl on her head (I came to know later she is trying to get a curly hair!)

My turn came & barber asked me what I want to go for.
I asked for a basic hair cut. It almost sounded like telling to Dell that I want a PC with a basic configuration !!

The barber shoot his next question ‘What stage 2 or 3? “
Stage?? I was puzzled and asked him to show how stage 3 looks like.He smiled & showed his head.Now that I had a bench mark I opted for stage 2!!!

Next question ‘any shades you want try?’ and pointed to the chart.It was looking like an Asian Paints Color chart with different range of shades for hair.I said no but could not stop cross checking the color, guy next-chair had chosen for his hair. It was rose pink shade!

During haircut session, many gadgets were brought out which I had never seen before.It looked barber hardly used scissors but instead used these gadgets. After working on my hair for a while, he declared that hair cut is done.It wasn’t bad at all..

That was my first cut with saloons in US.
I later came to know that there is a ‘Barber College’ where there are courses for budding barbers.

I was brought back to present when barber told me ‘Is this fine with you?’ I nodded my head, paid 12$ and started walking back to apartment, thinking how nice it would have been if those saloons with those 'Prajaa Vaani-Nagara Vaani' and talking barbers were here. How nice it would be if barbers here would talk like there anything about politics & Cinema??

A hairy wish ???!!!

Four days of Phoenix..

2005-09-21T00:34:00.000-07:00

You will be planning to go to some place and at that same time your office sends you to the same place where you were planning to go. How do you feel?

Thatz exactly what happened when our client told me that they are sending me for a 4-day training to Phoenix. I always love to travel, exploring new places and meeting new people.Added to that, this time there was also an old Bangalore buddy whom I was to meet in Phoenix.

Day 1:

Sep 13,2005
Day started very early. The pretty airhostess who was checking our boarding pass was able to shrug my sleep to an extent. South West Airlines took off from LAX finally at 6am.The journey was a very short one for one & half hours. But I never saw that pretty looking airhostess in the plane again. May be she was there in Business class. It was again the case of ‘what you see is what you not get’!!! Before I finished Orange juice and bunch of songs in my iPod, plane landed in Phoenix.

From airport directly we went to Toyota office. Let me now introduce my colleague Jeanne Chu who is a Vietnamese-Chinese. In Phoenix office, we met our another classmate Clarice. The morning training session was very live with our instructor Dan in full form.

Lunch was at Mexican restaurant. Half my stomach got filled by seeing the waitresses and pretty crowd there. After lot of research, I was successful in customizing Burrito suiting my veggie taste. Indeed the Burrito was yummy. Rest of my gang had their own pleasure grabbing variety of Burritos.

Phoenix is lot hot compared to Torrance or Los Angeles.There are cactus all around the place.Some of them were huge and few were looking very catchy.

Afternoon session was little sleepy, but was made live again by Dan. As we had flown that morning itself we were feeling very sleepy. We returned to hotel and slept immediately. I got woken up by Chu for dinner.We decided to explore Italian food.

Olive Gardens was that Italian restaurant we went.The ambience was pleasing and even more pleasing was the service. Warm greetings, nice smiles & feeling that make you feel you are being taken special care. I opted for Pasta and Chu ordered for some Shrimp dish.Garlic bread was a nice appetizer.We sat & chatted for a while before food came.Pasta was tomoto based one with onion & pepper blend.The Pasta was tasty.

Pasta brought memories of those wonderful days of having Pasta in Brigade’s Barista. I was lost for a while somewhere before Chu asked what the matter was. I didn’t tell anything to her and just smiled. Meanwhile, in the next table there was a birthday bash and all hotel staff came & sung birthday song. In a matter of next half an hour so there were 6 birthday celebrations in the surrounding tables!!!I think hotel staff got tired singing b’day songs!

It is always good to see celebrations..I remembered those celebration times when we used to make our friends to stand on top of table in Pizza hut and almost used to embarrass them.

Back in the hotel and retired to our room.I had a nap before dinner,So I sat & watched a movie in the room.I don’t know if you have seen this movie ‘Ali G’.Total timepass movie where a good-for- nothing idiot becomes British MP accidently & then minister.(So you can call that a British movie version of Laloo!).

Day 2:
Class started early at 8:30 and went pretty well till lunch. Now big question was ‘where to go’? After much debate, we decided to go to Indian restaurant. We had an amazing session in ‘Priya’ Indian restaurant. Our menu read something like Chicken Kabab, Sheikh Kabab, Chicken Tikka Masala, Naan, and Navratna Kurma. The last two exclusively for me.We pepped the lunch with Mango lassi.Our team was so overwhelmed with the Indian food that they took some food back as parcel!

Afternoon session was a typical one with sleepy faces all around.Then we got a message that they are having ice-cream party in the office.So we quickly took a break and munched the amazing icecreams.

In the evening, my colleague Clarice took me in her Lexus so that she could drop me at 19th Avenue.It was almost a 30 mile drive.On way we talked plethora of topics.She couldn’t understand how Indian youth still (prefer to) stay with their parents even after being independent, how arranged marriages are possible, how people can manage to live together for decades.I was also little curious to know the social fabric of American society.

After a quite a long drive, she dropped me in front of Palm Courts. I waited there for a while before Archana finally appeared. The office she works is right in front of her apartments. It was so nice to see a known friend in an unknown place.

We went to her apartment and sat there for a long time talking about Bangalore, about Nagapatnam trip and of course our favorite Sakleshpur trip.We were both remembering Bangalore gang so much.We had almost forgotten Achhu’s colleagues who had come with her.After orange squash, Achhu took me out on a tour of her apartment.Showed gym, pool & her friends house.We had a good session of photography in her apartment.

Time was quickly running.So we cooked rice-sambar and finished the dinner.I took the cab back to hotel, which was a lengthy 30 miles.Again time to go back to my iPod, listening to Kannada songs I recently downloaded to my iPod. By 11:30 was back in hotel and tuned into the movie ‘Motorcycle Diaries’.

Motorcycle Diaries is a movie about…I think I’ve to come up with a separate blog for that.

Day 3:
Things were getting heated up in class.Today also class had started early.For lunch,we went to one more Mexican restaurant.I had Black Pea Burrito with hot Salsa.Back to office and things really got rolling.Also it happened that our client manager visited the office and met all of us.

By the time we left class it was 8:30 pm and directly we went in search of a new restaurant.But our search of Thai food was unsuccessful and finally we landed up in Subway.Got the Veggie Paddy Sub to room and enjoyed it with watching the movie,‘Around the world in 80 days’ starring Jackie Chan. Jackie’s movies are always good to watch and I being his fan for a long while, watched the movie with pleasure. I had memory of reading that Julius Varner book ‘Around the world in 80 days’ when I was in 9th Standard.I was curious to see how it is picturised and though movie greatly deviated from the original book, it was a good movie.

Day 4:
One more hectic session in class. Now we were totally into the thing.
Lunch we went to ‘Minni’s Kitchen’, an American Shoppe where I ordered Veggie Stack. Veggie Stack was seriously a stack with layers of vegetables, mushrooms, cheese, and sauces.Topped it with Strawberry lemonade.

Evening flight to LAX was at 6 pm.We decided to check-in early and ‘stand by’ so that we could get into any earlier flights.We somehow managed to got into 5’o clock flight. Flight of one & half hour was over before I finished my bunch of songs.It was good to see Air hostess men in shorts & T-Shirts against that typical suit they always wore.

So it was a good time in Phoenix with most of the free time being spent in restaurants exploring new food. Having people who also wants to explore with me was a plus point.Though there are less choices for Veggies like me, few of the dishes I tried were amazing.

And best part is that I’m going back to Phoenix again soon for one more training!!!

When Nature Chides...

2005-09-02T18:36:00.000-07:00

We had just found that boy’s dead body....

If alive, probably he would have been 5-6 years old. The face was completely eaten by worms and the whole body was swollen as it was in water for almost 7 days. We poured a bag of bleaching powder on that decayed and highly smelling body and somehow managed to pull the body out from that debris. We carried it to the shore and the earth mover dug the grave in few minutes.

Don’t know how many graves the earth mover has been digging for that past week?

After showing the body to that boy’s father (who was the only survivor in that house), I & another friend lowered that dead body into the grave. Earth mover pulled the sand on the body and in no time leveled the ground.

There was a graveyard at each step we kept on the sand there. There were some huge sand mounds which were nothing but mass graves which had 25-30 bodies.

That was January 1,2005 in Nagapattanam, a place in Tamil Nadu one week after Tsunami.

All those heart-drenching scenes started rolling like a movie before my eyes when I read that bodies are being found under debris in US East coast after the recent ‘Katrina’, the killer hurricane.

These natural disasters are like this…
They bring with them so much havoc, so much pain and take away so many lives. Be it the tsunami struck India or hurricane damaged US, there is one language spoken at that time…..’pain’.

Victims of these disasters desperately will be needing help in terms of food, cloths and shelter .More than that they need some emotional consoling.That is what I found when I sat talking with those people in those Tsunami relief camps. The mental trauma and psychological after-affects of these disasters are traumatic.

It may be true that victims if they don’t get enough of supplies can get into acts of looting or something unruly because they want to survive.But there will be few useless-human beings who makes the disaster as an opportunity to loot,to grab whatever they can...shameless human beings..

It will be a challenge to any country to handle these natural disaster. Real strength of a country is proved in that situation.

The way people of India responded when Tsunami struck is really heartening.They did whatever little they can do. They donoted funds, they voluntaried in the relief activities, they consoled the grief-struck ones.

It made one thing clear that there is still something called ‘humanity’.

On another note, when nature regularly chides us with such doses of disasters, why do we want to make things still worse? Why do they still go for all those destructive things like Wars,N-bombs, H-bombs?

Is it not enough pain & stress with these tsunamis, hurricanes, rains??..

I think thatz why iPod !!!!

2005-07-28T18:37:00.000-07:00

Few things make their way into our lives…

You hear about it somewhere, you read about it & before you realize you will be a part of the whole thing. Internet and mobile phones are best examples. I’m talking about something like that but may not so far reaching as internet & mobile revolution…

Imagine that you have an idea of a revolutionary product. You realize that having only ideas is not sufficient, but you should also have resources to realize that idea. You approach few reputed companies with the idea of building the product. Those companies play it safe and reject the idea. Finally you get one company which accepts your idea and decide to take the bet on the idea.

As they say, what follows next is history!!

You see that the product you visualized has become an icon and captured the imagination of millions. (Still capturing is going on strongly).

To cut long story short, the product I’m talking about is iPod, the portable digital audio music player designed and marketed by Apple. A sleek looking audio player with a simple user interface and which can store thousands of songs.

An estimate said Apple has sold over 15 million iPods till June 2005, including 5.3 million in the 1st quarter of that year. iPod currently dominates the digital audio player market, frequently topping best-seller lists. In its fourth quarter results of 2003, Apple reported earnings of $106 million its highest revenue for Q4 in 9 years. Thanks to iPod !

But how did it all happen?

As I told you in the beginning it was because of one man’s idea & one company’s bet.

Tony Fadell was an independent contractor & hardware designer who has this idea to ‘make an MP3 player, build a Napster music sale service to complement it, and build a company around it’. He approached RealNetworks & Phillips with his idea. Both turned him down. Finally it was Apple who at that time was also struggling and who saw the business in Tony’s idea.

Apple hired Tony Fadell and assigned him a team of about 30 people including designers, programmers and hardware engineers. While Fadell may have had the business plan, Apple CEO Steve Jobs molded the device's shape, feel and design. The interesting thing about the project was that since it started, it had 100 percent of Steve Jobs' time. After 8 weeks, the first model was ready for production. Absolute secrecy about all the iPod prototypes was maintained during its production.

To compliment the excellent product, there was an excellent advertising campaign. They pepped up the advertising with some catchy lines and some famous artists performing for it.

Apple provided iPod users the easiest way to download music from CD, computer hard disk or from net. It built an excellent music sale service and accessory business around iPod.

iPod was first released in October 2001.Against all skepticism about its price it proved to be an instant hit. Apple never stopped. After that what followed was an iPod series. iPods with 1 GB, 4 GB, 6 GB, 20 GB & 40 GB hard drives came into market. iPod with Photo storage also made its way. Users were thrilled to see a new player which was as big (& thin) as a Cadbury chocolate, which had such an amazing storage capacity (GBs of hard drive which meant they can store thousands & thousands of songs) and a long lasting battery (once charged the player was able to play for 12-18 hours).But what really caught the imagination was simple user interface designed around a central scroll wheel.

Consumers flocked to buy the new gadget and still now they are flocking.

Once iPod got established, almost a new industry started which developed & produced accessories for iPod. Check the range and number of accessories available for iPod, you will be amazed. You get an accessory if you want to use the iPod in your car stereo, you have another accessory if you like to wear it as an ornament(I have seen people wearing iPod like arm bracelet & as necklace),you have some other accessory to use it in home stereo….

iPod soon became a cult figure. So much so that in early days in New York when iPod was a status & style statement, (iPod is still a style statement but not sure about status statement) robbery was targeted on people in metro trains wearing those white ear buds (iPod comes with a funky white ear phones).Police has to ask people using iPod not to use it in hostile places and if possible to camouflage the ear phones with some other color….

An interesting news story broke out when George Bush’s iPod play list was revealed somehow. The president’s iPod play list seemingly contained songs which went against the conservative image he holds!!

It doesn’t mean that everything was/is right with iPod.
iPod ran into problem when the batteries for its first generation were found to drain off within a year, users couldn’t replace those batteries and hence had nothing but to buy one more iPod. After a public anger, Apple promptly replaced the batteries for all affected users and took care of that battery problem in its next generation iPods.

iPod got into problem with rapper Eminem when he sued Apple for illegally using his “Lose yourself” number for iPod advertisement.

Barring legal & technical glitches, I think one thing which can go against iPod in new markets is its price.The price of iPod looks to be higher than any other mp3 player.

Where iPod is heading now?
There seems to be no stopping the fairy tale success of iPod.

iPod is acting as a ‘gateway drug’ for Apple products. (Gateway drug is one ‘soft’ or slightly addictive drug which will lead to the use of other ‘harder’ drugs!).In the sense that iPod is prompting users to shift from Microsoft Windows based PCs to Apple Mac PCs. In a single year after iPod got released it seems 33% of Microsoft windows users shifted to Apple Mac!!

Looks like the ‘halo effect’ of iPod is benefiting Apple…

Have you heard of this term ‘Podcasting’?

That is the latest thing iPod is into. Podcast is like a radio show published by anyone on the net. It could be a real radio show, some random person airing their views, or a band showcasing their songs. Using software like Apple iTunes you can get your PC to keep pulling new podcasts (which are in mp3 format) down whenever they come out. What it means is that ... you just tell your podcast software to say "I want to download any podcasts whenever a new Britney Spears podcast appears" and it will keep checking for any new ones. So once podcasts are captured, then it can be transferred to iPod and played. This concept is called ‘time-shifted media’ and its set to revolutionize radio and TV. Traditionally, shows have been broadcast on a ‘view by appointment’ or ‘listen by appointment’ basis.

There are even speculations that US elections 2008 will be done by podcasting!!! One more thing happening is the shaping of an opinion among some hardcore iPod communities that iPod inventors should be awarded with Nobel…

If we are to believe Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs, we are entering an age of “iPod economy”.

While you ponder about iPod, let me go & hook to my iPod….

Estados Unidos Méxicanos

2005-07-20T13:27:00.000-07:00

I don’t know who gave that name to that region….
The name was derived from a word which meant “War God”. True to its derivation, the War God played havoc there.

A rich civilization, Spanish invasion, followed by a 400 years of Colonization rule, fighting the Spanish for freedom, independence, before enjoying the independence, war with America resulting in huge losses, followed by a little peace, suddenly an unexpected attack from France. When everything looks settled, civil wars raging for decades. Finally some sort of democratic government forming but again revolution against the government. A single party rules for 71 years. Finally change of government, now an upcoming economy…

I was truly looking forward to experience what this combination would look like and I wasn’t surprised to find the results.

Still if you didn’t get what I’m talking about…I’m talking about “Mexico” and my recent visit to Mexico.

July 16, 2005

My Mexico trip started with a journey from Los Angeles towards Mexico border via San Diego. Mexico is the southern neighbour of USA and California state shares a part of boundary with it.

A stop at San Diego Old town where I visited the historical park. This park has the reputation of hoisting the first American flag in the region during US-Mexican war of 1850.This US-Mexican war resulted in US acquiring Texas, California & Arizona from Mexico.

A quick lunch in Mexican restaurant where we had Burritos.Mexican influence was all ready getting visible in the food, culture & dress in that part of US, a sign to us that we were approaching the border. After a drive of 70 miles, we were struck in a huge traffic jam. Realized that we have reached San Yedra, the Mexican border. Passport and Visa verification was done by the Mexican authorities. After nearly an hour, we were finally in Mexico!

Just crossed the immigration point and we were in a totally different world from America. Suddenly felt like I was in India. A lots of footpath shops where t-shirts & goods were being sold. I was in Tijuana, a Mexican city.

Tijuana

Tijuana, famous in US and other parts as a place for pleasure. A city which has the reputation of being the most visited border city in the world. A city meant for total fun without strings attached.

Got down in Tijuana to be welcomed by kids trying to sell handicrafts and ornaments, vendors trying to lure us into their shops. Just like in our country. The streets were looking good with tons of tourists strolling. The streets were full of handicrafts, restaurants and unbelievably high number of medicine shops! High number of medicine shops is to capitalize on the US visitors. In US, getting medicines without prescription is really tough and these medicine shops here sell anything & everything without prescription. Few medicine shops carried huge signboards shouting ‘Way to Viagra”!!!

One more interesting thing in Tijuana was the Donkeys! It has almost become a custom to sit on these decorated Donkeys, wearing Mexican hats and photographed. Sometimes Zebras replace Donkeys. Streets were also dotted with some nice art pieces.

As our destination was not Tijuana we have to move on from that place. So another 2 hours of journey in a lane where on one side we were in Mexico and another lane was US separated by high walls. Gradually the walls disappeared giving way to mountains and after a while to Pacific Ocean. As we moved into Mexico, English started becoming rare. All signboards, instructions and advertisements became Spanish.

La Bufadora

We reached La Bufadora. Located at the end of Punta Banda Peninsula, this place is known for natural wonder called “blowhole”. Visitors had assembled around a sea cliff area and we made way to the spot. We witnessed an amazing natural blowhole spouting seawater 70 feet into the air. The sea water banged the rocks, entered the cave like structure and finally got thrown out through an opening with a huge roar and creating a geyser which sometimes went to 70 ft in air. Every time the geyser went up, there was a huge cheering from the crowd.

Back from the blowhole into the streets of La Bufadora. A jam packed street with footpath shops. Shops for t-shirts & dresses, marine delicacies, craftworks. I tasted samples of “Churros”, a sweet snack. Back to bus and after another 16 miles of journey we were in Ensenada.

Ensenada

Known as the "Cinderella of the Pacific", Ensenada had become one of the favorite tourist destinations in Mexico. A small town with harbor, very popular among cultural visitors, vacationing families and party animals.

Checked into Villa Marina hotel. Through balcony in my 10th floor hotel room, I had a bird’s eye view of Ensenada. It was looking compact and neat. After getting freshened up, we freaked out to explore Ensenada. The harbor side was very calm and there were tons of love-making couples on the sea side and loads of visitors around the harbor. Roamed for a while along the sea side in the dawn hours.

Walked into ‘Three Heads Park’. This is a tribute to three Mexican heroes, Miguel Hidalgo, Benito Jurez and Venusthano Carranza who were prominent personalities in Mexican history. Miguel Hidalgo was a catholic priest and was the first to mobilize the Mexicans against the Spanish occupation. Benito Jurez, an ex-president of Mexico during civil war and who is called Mexico’s Lincoln. Venusthano Carranza, another ex-president of Mexico and who was assassinated.

Entered the main street of Ensenada. Evening was slowly growing and the shops were twinkling with colorful bulbs. The footpath was interrupted by restaurants which were made of glass walls on all sides. These restaurants looked very pretty with nice seating and lighting.

There were groups of local bands in Mexican hats and playing some catchy songs. These bands usually comprise 4-5 artists, roam around in the streets and play in front of visitors and live on the tips they get.

Also on streets were small ornaments shops. Though they were looking nice, the price was too much. We entered few shops to check Mexican goods. Strolling the streets itself was such a nice thing to do. A very festive air all around…

Entered into Pizza hut to have dinner and had to use all my dumb charades skill to explain to the Spanish speaking Pizza hut people about what we want. One interesting thing is along with Peso, the Mexican currency they also accept US Dollars. While the couple with me retired to hotel to take rest, I decided to explore more…

The best thing about Ensenada has to be the night life there. The main street was alive with numerous discos, bars and what-nots! The sound of Spanish music and guitars was roaring all around the place. Gallons of liquid were being gulped. Scene in disco was exotic with some groovy dance steps and babes moving sensually. Mango-Mango was one of those discos in a prominent location and the crowd kept flocking it.

Checked few more ‘happening’ places. Looked like in Ensenada only agenda is ‘fun’ (Well, the definition of ‘fun’ was varying and there were people finding ‘fun’ in plethora of activities!).Returned to hotel room at 2 in the morning!

Just a note about Mexican babes. In a word they are ‘Hot”!! (After all Salma Haik is also from Mexico!!!)

July 17, 2005

Woke up at 6:30 as our journey on Sunday was about to begin at 7. Left Ensenada and our journey continued along the pacific coast.

Hotel Calafia

Stopped at Hotel Calafia, this was once a Catholic Missionary church and now a huge tourist attraction. Located on scenic Baja coastline, the building is about 300 years old. But it was “Titanic” which made the hotel famous!

There were tables arranged at strategic locations from where the sea view was extremely wonderful. There was a replica of a Spanish ship ‘Corona Aurea’ on the sea side just beside the breakfast tables.

Inside of the hotel building was looking very familiar. It should be… because this was where movie Titanic was shot! The grand dining hall in the movie was straight out of this hotel. The scene which showed the Cabin corridors of Titanic ship was also here.

Our journey continued. Meanwhile into the bus, few local guitarists also alighted and played Spanish songs for a while. It was around 11:30 when we reached Tijuana and Mexican border.

Entering from US side into Mexico seemed to be easy, but other way was very laborious. Everyone in the bus was asked to get down and go to Immigration counter. The luggages where thoroughly checked. Fruits and Vegetables from Mexico were also not allowed. Everyone in our bus finished the immigration formalities in a very short time, but three of us who were on L1 had to go through unnecessary extra formalities at the counter. The officer took his own sweet time to complete the formalities. People in bus thought that it was not feasible to wait for us and left us there with phone number & place to meet. After an hour & half of total time pass in the immigration we entered into US and first aim was to catch the tour bus.

San Yedra

That place was San Yedra and there were trains running from there to San Diego where we were to meet our bus. Couple who were with me were totally panicked after missing the bus. Some how I convinced them that it is fun to take such adventure rides and narrated my previous adventure ride in Vegas! Took the ‘trolley’ which took us to San Diego before few more stints of adventure finding the right train, stop & time.

Met the bus at San Diego Harbor from where our journey continued back…

I was thinking about where Mexico is heading towards?
Though there seems to be still some unrest & clashes, winds of change are definitely blowing. Looks like Mexico has realized that wars & internal clashes don’t help it in anyway. Mexico has opened its doors for free trade and it is trying to becoming more stable democratically & economically. The people have voted out the party which ruled them for 71 years.

Finally this should sum up everything about current Mexico…

Vicente Fox is the current president of Mexico and he was the chief executive for Coke in Mexico before becoming president and he is considered the latest good friend of Bush!!

Meet Mickey !

2005-07-18T15:03:00.000-07:00

July 10,2005

It was the time when Dooradharshan use to rule TV in India and like many; I used to wait eagerly for the Mickey Mouse Show. It was fascinating to watch Mickey Mouse, Minnie, Goofy and Donald Duck. Many of us grew watching Mickey & his wonderful gang.

I was standing at the entrance of Disney Land and thinking about that wonderful time…

Disneyland, the famous amusement park in Los Angeles started by Walt Disney in 1955 and which now celebrating its 50th anniversary. Home to many legendary characters and place for fun and fantasy.

The Sunday was slowly waking up and the crowd was pouring into Disneyland. By 9 we were inside the Disney Park. The main entrance led to Main Street, U.S.A, a long street of shops & building which were looking like from early 1900 days. There was a colorful orchestra band playing in the street. As we traversed through this colorful street, came across a square where the “Partners” stood. Partners is the nick name given to Walt Disney and Mickey Mouse.

An interesting anecdote how Disney came across the idea of his amusement park …
Walt Disney had been to an amusement park, sitting idle on a bench, watching his daughters play; he noticed how ragged and filthy the small amusement park was. He also observed people's reactions to different rides, and noticed how children's parents had nothing to do. They would be anxious to go home, while their children were still having fun, and playing. So he came up with something where both parents and most importantly children have fun.

I was standing in front of partners who virtually ruled the cartoon world for decades. There was ‘Sleeping Beauty Castle” standing right behind the statue. This building shown in the beginning or end of Disney TV shows/movies with “Buenos Vista Production” is familiar with the viewers.

Disneyland is divided into Adventureland, Frontierland, Fantasyland , Tomorrowland, New Orleans Square, Mickey's Toontown and Critter Country.

We entered into Frontierland which is supposed to relive the pioneer days of the American frontier. The Frontierland had Thunder Mountain, Mark Twain Ship & Tom Sawyers Island. Thunder mountain Rail road was too much resist and we took the indoor/outdoor roller coaster based on the concept of a runaway train careening through an abandoned mine complex.

Fantasyland was the next land visited. We moved to Peter Pan’s ride, Toad’s ride and Snowwhite’s ride which were more suitable for kids. “It’s a Small World” was the name of a beautiful ride through puppets which represent various cultures and regions of world. There were puppets dressed in Indian costumes dancing in front of Taj Mahal. It was like a quick glance through many colorful costumes of different countries.

Visiting Disneyland without visiting Mickey and gang is not feasible. So we moved to Toontown, the place where Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy & Pluto live. Met Goofy & Pluto. There was a queue to meet Minnie. After a wait was in Minnie’s house & met the Mickey’s lover gal. Walt Disney never would have imagined that his mouse character would one day become a legendary character. To prove that legendary point was a big queue to meet Mickey. After roaming in Mickey’s house & a little long wait met Mickey in the greenroom of his house.

A quick lunch at Toontown was followed by the monorail ride, which was one of Disneyland’s signature rides. The monorail took us from Tomorrowland to Disney Downtown and back. This ride provides a quick preview of things in Disneyland.

We were back in Fantasyland to take ride through Matterhorn Bobsled. There were few persons doing a hiking of this 140 feet mountain. I heard sometimes Mickey & other characters also try to climb this mountain. This was a way paying tribute to former Disney president Frank Wells, who climbed mountains as a hobby and who was tragically killed in a helicopter accident. The rollercoaster here was the first tubular steel roller coaster in the world. Though it was thrilling it never was so much gasping. May be I’m used to bigger thrills!

After a bumpy ride I met Aerial, the mermaid character. The gal in mermaid costume was really pretty J Glanced through Tomorrowland attractions like Astro-Orbitor. It was now time to get into some adventure and so we were in Adventureland.

Probably this was the land with larger crowds than any other lands. We entered into the Indiana Jones adventure, a ride based on the Indiana Jones movie. (Indiana Jones movies were directed by some famous directors like George Lucas and Steven Spielberg). In the ride we played the role of tourists in 1935, who visit the Temple of the Forbidden Eye, which is supposedly located somewhere in India. The ride was one of the best rides in the park and it was truly exciting to escape from a falling boulder and snakes.

We climbed and walked through Tarzan’s tree house. It was nearing 3’o clock which meant it was time for ‘Parade’. The Parade is the most anticipated event in the park where all the Disney characters walk through the streets of Disneyland in a colorful procession. Visitors had already thronged both sides of street everywhere.

The ‘parade of dreams’ as it was called, began with a procession of several Disney characters. Nice dance steps to a wonderful foot-tapping music followed it. Then followed marriots who were swinging in the rope. This was followed by Lion king and his group, which was followed by Snow white & 7 dwarfs. Pluto and Goofy entertained the crowd. Finally, came the grand daddy of all, ‘Mickey Mouse’ with his gal friend Minnie.

After the parade we went back to Adventureland to continue our adventure. Got into Jungle Cruise, this was a humorous boat ride, hosted by a ‘skipper’ who took us on a journey through the jungles of Asia, Africa and South America. There was piranha attack scene & Gorilla wrecking scene. During the ride also came across our ‘Ganesha’ in a forest part of Asia. I was wondering what our Ganesha was doing there!

There was “Enchanted Tiki Room” which housed a Hawaiian-themed musical show "hosted" by four lifelike macaws. The presentation featured a "cast" of over 150 talking, singing and dancing birds, flowers, a "magic" fountain, tiki drummers that performed the attraction's signature tunes. Only thing which I didn’t understand was why they located that attraction in Adventureland!

Checked into New Orlean square to ride with ‘Pirates of Caribbean’. That looked like yet another ride to me. We quickly moved to Critter Country and its main draw was ‘Splash Mountain’. After going through the longest waiting time we came to know why ‘Splash Mountain’ was so popular. A 52-and-a-half foot drop (the largest in the park) at a 45 degree angle was too thrilling.

As we were running out of time, we ended the Disneyland tour. As I was coming out of the park, something which I read about the opening day of Disneyland splashed in my mind.

“Opening day, was a day to remember. Six thousand invitations to the Grand Opening had been mailed. By mid-afternoon over 28,000 ticket holders were storming the Magic Kingdom. Most of the tickets were counterfeit.

Walt Disney was 53 when he dedicated Disneyland Park. It was a memorable ceremony. There in Town Square, Walt could look around and see the fulfillment of his hopes, dreams, and ambitions in the form of a spectacular entertainment kingdom.

Opening Day was a terrible disaster. Heat wave raised temperatures up to 110 degrees Fahrenheit. Also, due to a plumbers strike, few water fountains were operating in the hot weather. Asphalt still steaming, because it had been laid the night before, literality "trapping" high heeled shoes. After opening day, the heat wave continued, and almost wiped out the park.”

Initial hiccups and failures didn’t deter Disney much. It was not yet another amusement park. It was a dream of a man who was determined to create a dreamland.

50 years later, it still stands there as a mark of American dream...

A spectacle called Golden Gate....

2005-07-11T17:20:00.000-07:00

A city barely 48 square miles made up of hills. The city which stood up despite the total destruction once by massive earthquake & once by fire. The city which embarrassed liberal look towards the immigrants & resettlers, when other parts of America were gripped in Conservativism. The city which became the laboratory for the world where revolutionary technologies & trends got incubated.

Welcome to San Francisco!

On a cold Sunday afternoon we entered the city. The bus took us over “Bay Bridge” & the view of SFO downtown from there was excellent. Went through the streets of downtown before we stopped at Pier 39.We got down & walked to the cruise, which was about to take us on a ride in the bay. A 24$ ticket and 10 minutes later we occupied the deck of the “Blue & Gold” cruise ship. The entire three floors of ship were packed.

The ship started moving away from the shore & the skyscrapers of San Francisco were looking like a deck of cards on a blue skyline. On the ship, a running commentary about history & milestones of the city was going on. Blue water was all around & the ship was making its way. A bunch of seagulls were following our ship. Few seagulls got very adventurous & started flying at a hand distance height. The seagulls had got attracted by the food packets which people in the cruise were carrying.

Now at a distance in the sea, a thin outline was getting visible and our ship was progressing towards it. The outline slowly grew as “Golden Gate Bridge”, the famous bridge. There was an air of anxiety as the cruise moved towards the famous landmark. All cameras were focused on the orange color bridge. Due to the heavy fog, the Golden Gate looked like a bridge which connects heaven & earth! The two towers on which the whole bridge suspended was lost in the clouds. I started frantically clicking my camera.

When the cruise was barely few feet from the bridge, I noticed that my camera was no longer responding. The battery had exhausted. I literally snatched batteries from one of my friend & continued my photography. It was overwhelming feeling to see the mighty bridge so close & from beneath.

Here is a quick history of Golden Gate Bridge…
Despite the great depression, scarce funds, tons of technical challenges and lots of skepticism, the 1.7 miles long across the San Francisco bay was constructed in 1937 due to the relentless efforts of Joseph Strauss, the architect. One of the most interesting facts was that ‘only’ eleven workers died during construction, a new safety record for that time. ‘Only’ because in the 1930s, bridge builders expected 1 fatality per $1 million in construction costs, and builders expected 35 people to die while building the Golden Gate Bridge. One of the bridge's safety innovations was a net suspended under the floor. This net saved the lives of 19 men during construction, and they are often called the members of the "Half Way to Hell Club”!!

Back to the cruise..
On our way back, we came across Alcatraz. The most infamous federal prison which was the subject of numerous books & movies.

The island prison was the final destination for the hardcore criminals & nobody escaped from the prison live. For several decades it remained a focal pint of curiosity, suspense & rumors. After prison escape attempt in 1963, the prison was closed. The island was then occupied & claimed by native Indians, who were evacuated quickly. Finally the island was declared a monument.

Meanwhile in the cruise, there were interesting people to watch out for. There were two ladies who were in their own world ever since the cruise had started. They were unusually displaying the liking for each other through kissing & hugging. It didn’t take much time in realizing that they were lesbians…

Remembered something which I read somewhere …”San Francisco is known as ‘homosexual’s capital’ and there is a ‘Castro’ street exclusively for them”.

From the cruise, we could see the Bay Bridge, which was elder than Golden Gate Bridge. The bay bridge is one of the longest combination bridges in the world; it is a combination of two suspension bridges and a cantilever bridge.

We were back on the shore after an hour in the cruise and moved to Palace of Fine Arts.This was a temporary palace created in 1915 during the Panama Pacific Exposition. But the structure was so good that they decided to preserve it. The temporary material was replaced by the existing material.

We walked through the park around the palace. I ventured inside the palace which was looking like straight out of old Rome. There were huge columns and rotunda. There was a wedding party photo sessions going on at the palace. The wedding party was dressed in extremely eye-catching color combination, which I captured in the camera.

From there we came back again to our Golden Gate Bridge. I quickly rushed to the bridge & walked across the bridge for a while. I tried taking in my arms the two main cables which pass over the top of towers. The cables were so thick that it couldn’t fit in arms. I later came to know that the cable diameter was 37 inches, there were 27,572 strands of wire, 80,000 miles (129,000 km) of wire in the two main cables, and it took over six months to spin them. Visited the ‘dedication’ on the bridge, which talked about all the engineering genius which resulted in this landmark. Then saluted the statue of Joseph Stroup, the architect for his master creation.

Golden Gate stood there as a mark of determination,hard work,creativity,engineering genius,relentless effort...

We came back to Pier 39, which is also known as “Fisherman’s wharf”. A nice place to shop, dine & roam. Caught a glimpse of sunset across the sea. We did little bit of shopping, little bit of chocolate eating and lots of roaming!

Back to bus and from there to Hotel Merriot, which was our stay for the night. Quickly grabbed my recent favorite Mexican item, Veggie Burreto and went to sleep watching some TV.

There was still more to explore in the City of Golden Gate Bridge...

July 4
American Independence Day. The day started with a visit to Lombardo Street, world’s most crookedest street. The street was at a slope of 47 degree. The roads were in totally zigzag fashion. The flowering plants around the zigzag path gave a unique look. Truly, a crooked street. After Lombardo, we moved to the China town.

This is supposed to be the largest Chinese settlement in North America. The shops & restraunts everything was in Chinese format. Roamed across the streets & it did gave an feeling of India because of the garbage thrown on the streets, people happily walking across the road without caring signals, few people extending their shops to the footpath.

We tasted Almond drink & pop-corn made of some beans, met accidentally another set of TCSers who were also on SFO trip. We got back to bus & left for SFO as we needed to travel atleast 7 hours back to Los Angeles.

While traveling, I was thinking of China Town, Solvang the Danish settlement, our Indian community. US accommodate them all, but still something American is maintained. How do they manage?

Definitely we need to learn something how to progress but still don’t loose our roots..

Yosemite

2005-07-11T12:18:00.000-07:00

July 3,2005

It was around 4:30 in the morning when I woke up to get ready on a Sunday morning. By 4:45 everyone was in bus & the bus started the journey for day 2. Day’s objective was Yosemite & San Francisco.

I slept as soon as bus started & woke up to find the bus moving through a Ghat road amidst forest. After passing through 3 hours & a big dark tunnel (But not as big as those in Sakleshpur trek!) reached the Yosemite National Park.

The view was simply mind blowing. There were range of mountains covered with green forest, beautiful valleys & numerous waterfalls. Added to that was a thin cover of mist & sunlight trying to pierce through this mist blanket. Total effect was mesmerizing.

I sat there for a while savoring the nature & capturing the images in my mind & my camera, which these days had almost became my extended body part!

Along with these mountains and waterfalls, the park also houses El Captain, the world’s largest single monolithic granite rock and groves of giant sequoias, the world's largest living things.

We passed through the towering El Captain and Bridalveil waterfall which was in front of the granite rock. Next we stopped at Yosemite waterfall, which was supposed to be the world’s 5th tallest waterfall & USA’s tallest waterfall (2450 ft). The waterfall is having three parts – upper fall, mid fall & lower fall. The waterfall was visible among the pine trees. It grew bigger & bigger as we walked through the pines towards it.

With little more effort we reached the bottom of waterfalls. The water was falling on rocks with roaring sound and demonic force splashing water droplets all across. The whole atmosphere was looked like wrapped in droplets. (I quickly went for a flashback when I had been to Abbe falls in Coorg with my Bangalore gang)

We roamed around the stream & woods before we got into bus. The bus took us in a route which was running parallel to the Yosemite river. I was observing how the river was taking shape. I had seen this river which was ferociously jumping from the hill top, bursting through the rocks with great force. The same river now was flowing gently & steadily.

Doesn’t river is almost like humans?

Initially it bursts with energy, it deals everything with power, it meets so many new things on the way, take so many new things. Gradually it gains it steadiness & starts flowing maturely….

Stopped for lunch to have Pizzas & after the journey continued. The guide was telling some gold-rush stories from California.

I remembered something which I read about the gold miners who invaded this native American territory during those gold rush times.The way the opposition was smashed & horrible crimes commited against the natives was a gruesome account.Looks like the natives/tribes always are the victims in the process of some men's quench for gold, glory and other nature given gifts.

Three hours of journey we were nearing the city which gave to the world some famous terms – Silicon Valley & Golden Gate bridge.

We were on our way to San Francisco…

Building a Castle...

2005-07-11T10:46:00.000-07:00

It was a foregone conclusion that I would be landing in some new place in the Independence Day long weekend. Only thing of interest was “Where I would be going”?By the time I decided that I should go to San Francisco, there was a gang of 9 people with me, whose destination was also San Francisco. It was San Francisco via Solvang & Yosemite.

The journey began on Saturday morning from our Willow Tree apartment. After a stop at Travel Design office, we moved to Montary Park, LA and boarded the bus from there. It was nice to see a lady driving the bus. Our itinerary for the day was visit to Solvang & Hearst Castle. After a 2 hour of journey along the scenic Pacific coast, we reached Solvang.

Solvang is a mini-Denmark in US. Solvang, meaning sunny fields, was founded in 1911 by a small group of Danish educators wanting to establish a Danish-type folk school. . Along with the teachers came farmers, carpenters and artisans who constructed the first shops, homes, hotel and church. Danes from the Midwest and Denmark continued to migrate west to Solvang bringing their skills as farmers, teachers, carpenters, merchants and artisans. In 1936, as part of Solvang’s 25th anniversary celebration, the future King and Queen of Denmark visited and more interest in the community developed. Tourists started coming and more shops, bakeries, hotels and restaurants were built to make their visits more enjoyable.

We got down at Solvang & the whole place was looking totally European. Buildings, streets & entire atmosphere was Danish-like. There were wind mills on the street. We had Pizzas for lunch there. Then we roamed around the streets appreciating the colorful Danish streets.

We took leave of Solvang & the journey continued along the Pacific Coast. At some places, there were high mountains on one side & sea on other side. After another 2 hours of journey, we were in Hearst castle. Hearst castle is supposed to be the only castle in US.

A little bit of history about this castle..
William Randolph Hearst was one of the richest man during 1950s.He was a media tycoon with more than 50 newspapers/magazine publications under his belt & earning tons of dollars. He purchased some 150 acres of land which included 50 miles of beach for his outings. One fine day he called architect Julian Fraser, and told that he need to built a ‘little something’ in the land he brought. Julian Fraser had no idea of what she was venturing into. The ‘little something’ took almost 18 years to complete.

The castle was magnanimous. Antique art pieces, paintings, rare statues….Hearst bought everything to fill the castle. Castle was not small either, it had 165 rooms. Hearst had the habit of collecting rare things which included coffins, roof sealings, doors, windows.

He wanted to make the two swimming pools the best. The outdoor pool was placed among the gallery of roman-style buildings & statues, specially curved out by Italian architects. The indoor swimming pool was nothing special except that 24-carat gold was used for design & decoration of walls & floors of the pool !!!

We arrived at the Castle’s Visitor’s information centre. It was an extremely well organized information system. There were tons of information easily available, lots of Castle merchandise, theatre where movies about the castle was played, food court…We took the shuttle bus (21$ ticket) which ferries tourists from visitor centre to Castle. It was another half an hour journey in the bus with commentary about the castle & its history. The trip we took was for the first time visitors & we came to know that there were many trips .One for beginners, one for people who want to explore more. It was just like Java Basic & advanced certifications!!

We got out of bus at the castle to meet the castle guide. The guide walked us through the guest houses, outdoor swimming pool, through few of its rare collections & finally to the castle. We came to know that castle was never completed due to Hearst’s death. We went through the elegant paintings & art works inside the castle. The dining hall, the billiards room & the theatre were just too much to handle. If that was not enough, we reached the indoor swimming pool. We were literally walking on 24 carat gold which made the designs of floor. The walls were also decorated with gold carvings.

Came out of the castle talking about all the things & our shuttle took us back to Visitor centre. In one sentence, it was a rich man’s fantasy for something little which created something very grand.

One thing I liked about the castle was the way it was projected & presented to tourists. The information provided & packaging was so good that you feel excited about the castle. I had been to many palaces in India & this was not so outstanding compared to them, but the way they made it big was really appreciable. A lesson or two to learn for our tourism industry.

After the castle visit we headed to Fresno, our stop for the day. On the way stopped for dinner in a Chinese restaurant. I was content with rice & some paneer dish. But my non-veggie friends had a tough time there! There was a pre-defined menu for dinner & without any choice the items kept coming. Some of the things which occupied the table were sparklers (some vegetable with octopus/star fish), pork pieces, one whole big fish. Even though all friends there were hardcore non-veggies, I heard that they had a horrible time. Finally I had to share my veggie items with them!

Checked into Radisson hotel. We roamed around the beautiful lobby of hotel & watched some TV before we slept. The waterfall in the lobby was nice. It reminded that the next day we were going to visit beautiful natural waterfalls....

Universal Studio

2005-06-29T14:23:00.000-07:00

Last time I took you through the Hollywood, the stars & the Oscars. How about going behind the scene this week? Come…this time I’m taking you to Universal Studio.

Universal Studios Hollywood is reputedly the world’s largest film studio and theme park, and one of the most popular tourist attractions in Los Angeles. The park was opened to the public in 1964, allowing the public to see behind the scenes of the film world. The park features the latest in state-of-the-art video and audio technology, and uses impressive special effects and stunt shows to entertain visitors.

On a bright Sunday morning, I & Prosenjit took the Metro bus 444 to LA Downtown. On the way we were joined by Sudipto, Sita (both of them Prosenjit’s project mates) and Suchitra (Toyota Project but in different module). So after a long one hour in the bus we got down at Pershing Square (This name should sound familiar for those who read the previous posting on Hollywood).From there, the metro train flew us to Universal City. At Universal City, after waiting for a while, the Universal Studio Shuttle arrived & it took us to the Studio.

The trademark globe of Universal Studio was at the entrance of the Universal Studio. Photo sessions begun immediately there. We walked into the studio to find ourselves in front of a nice fountain with three sculptures, one of a director, a cameraman & a light boy, which truly depicted the essence of movie making. Analysis of the map & prioritizing the rides & shows was done. There were atleast 15 rides/shows in the park. The ladies with us had come without having breakfast. So we moved into a food court. After everybody’s stomach was satisfied, we rushed to the first in the list of our rides, Jurassic Park. We were literally carried to the place by long escalators.

Jurassic Park
We moved through the famous gate on which “Jurassic park” was beaming & found ourselves in a long waiting queue. But the queue was really moving fast & for company there were visuals from the “Jurassic Park” movie being played. So very soon all of us got into the ride. The ride started very smoothly through the very cool stream of water in a picturesque surrounding and herbivorous dinosaurs gazing on the stream bank. There were some small & big dinosaurs making movements all around. When everything was looking fine, suddenly a car written “Jurassic Park” started rolling towards us & fell just few inches from us splashing water all across. Then there was some red alerts everywhere telling that there was danger ahead. We entered a dark tunnel & suddenly from the top we saw Tyrannosaurs ‘Rex’ almost trying to engulf us. We picked the speed & moved across its jaws .It kept following & then there was a shout “escape”. Next few seconds we were falling freely & almost everybody’s heart stopped. The ride came to an end after that free fall.

Got out of ride & there were survivors photos to see & buy. The images of each one of us when the ride was in free fall were captured on camera. It was a hilarious photo to look at. Prosenjit was almost in coma stage, some look like that was the end of world. Suchitra was in deep penance closing tightly her eyes. Sudipto was very expressive with mouth wide-open in awe. Sita had resigned from life closing her eyes. I was laughing like a mad when the fall was happening. Thought of picking that photo, but it was very expensive (29$).We came out of the ride thrilled & kept talking about the ride for a while. Then we moved to the ride ”Revenge of Mummy”

Revenge of Mummy
We kept all the bags & cameras in the automatic locker provided & entered the tunnel. It was a typical Egyptian setting inside straight from the Mummy movies. There was a sound of the insects humming everywhere & few clips from the movie were being played. We got into the ride & the ride began with a slow journey through some amazing Egyptian gold like pharaoh statues. Then we entered a cave where suddenly lots of mummy hands came out of walls & roofs to grab us. The ride picked up the speed & started flying very furiously. Now it was moving down the slope with great speed & there was darkness everywhere. There was light at end of cave where the ride was heading towards & suddenly we saw it was dead end & we were about to hit the walls with speed. The tram stopped just few inches from hitting the wall; it went back & took another turn. Then again it sped up to reach a bright sun like object, before we realized there was a sand storm trying to engulf us, so the tram moved back in the same speed it went. The ride came to end after that. But we were expecting much more from that ride.

At each location of the park, there were sign boards showing all the rides/shows, next ride/show timing & expected wait time. That was very useful to plan our schedules.

Shrek-4D
We moved to watch the Shrek-4D show. That show had a very long queue. We patiently waited in the queue talking about the Shrek movies. Back ground story so far where Shrek & Fiona get married was told. Then we got into the theatre & wore the 3-D goggles.

The movie was simply flabbergasting. There was wonderful 3-D effects & excellent story with characters I love. If that was not enough there was this 4th dimension! Imagine a scene where there are spiders hanging around & Shrek picks these spiders & throws. You see these spiders flying at you & falling on the ground (till here 3-D effect), next moment you see spiders moving on the screen & you feel something is climbing up your legs!! You get an impression that the spiders are actually climbing up your legs!!!

One more scene, Shrek is chasing the villain in a chariot & as the chariot moves; the chairs also start moving giving the impression that you are also involved in chase. Too good!! Everybody in our gang was very happy after the show. We took some snaps wearing those 4-D green goggles.

Terminator-2 3D
We moved to the Cyberdyne Institute to see the Terminator-2 3D show. As we entered there was presentation about the fictious Cyberdyne Institute which gets interrupted by Sarah Cornors & John Cornors (All Terminator fans should be familiar with these names!).Then as we get into theatre, there was an amazing display of 3-D effects. What better combination than T2 effects & 3-D effects. It was a ‘super’ show.

Universal Studio Tour
This tour allows the public to see behind the scenes of the film world. Today, a visit to the park, which attracts around 35,000 visitors per day, begins with an exciting behind-the-scenes tram tour of famous film sets, with a simulated earthquake, a collapsing bridge, and several surprise attacks from key Hollywood film characters, such as the shark ‘Jaws’ and the famous giant gorilla ‘King Kong’.

The tour started in a tram which was equipped with audio-visual aids & a commentator explaining the history, geography & milestones of Universal Studio. We were taken to the production place where sound generation was done. We went next to few permanent sets put up in studio like the streets of England, streets for cow boy movies & Mexican street & a house setting on a snowy winter day. The metrological department of studio showed how they convert the seasons quickly when they created rain & flood in few minutes. Then a bridge which collapses & gets back to normal form was shown.

There was a patch of thick forest which was looking familiar & suddenly it became clear that where I had seen that. It was in movie “Jurassic Park” where the Tyrannosaurus “Rex” gives entry in the movie on a rainy night. Do you remember the scene where the kids are struck inside the car & they see Rex breaking the fence & plucking the wheels of car? That particular scene was shot here. I always thought that was in Costa Rica.

We came across a pond where suddenly a shark almost attacked the tram. Then we were explained that the famous scary beach scenes from “Jaws” were created in this pond. The shark which was moving was a mechanical shark called “Bruce” (Also learnt that Spielberg named the shark as “Bruce” after his attorney’s name!!)

Then it was time to see some ‘live set’ which means the shooting had happened recently in the set & they preserved the set as it was. The place where we were taken was a airplane crash site with plane pieces scattered everywhere, aeroplane seats thrown all across, a car half burnt, broken houses .We were then told that was for the latest Spielberg movie “War of the Worlds”(which gets released sometime in June end).

The tour now entered a place where there was a railway station set. Suddenly it started shaking & the station roof got collapsed & a heavy truck started rolling towards us & stopped just in front of our tram. If that was not enough, a train coming to the station started moving out of rails towards us. That was the earthquake scene. Next we moved across the tunnel & out of blue, a huge figure emerged at started shaking the tram. It was ‘King Kong”, the famous tall towering ape.

We were taken then to the place where the moon landing scene from movie Apollo-13 was created. After all the wonderful time, the studio tour came to an end.

Back to the Future
We rushed to “Back to the Future” ride. That ride was all about virtual reality & it took us smashing through the glass windows, through a boiling volcano mouth, through a valley almost hitting mountains, through dinosaur’s mouth. That was an excellent ride too.

I went & took snaps of me with Shrek & few on the “Fat Boy”. Fat Boy is the Harley-Davidson bike used by Arnold in Terminator-2.That was such a macho bike & it really looked powerful.

Evening was getting closer & we went to the Van Helsing. Unlike other rides, this one was a walk through the haunting castle. The castle was dark & walk was exciting with ghosts jumping suddenly & skeletons rolling all around.

Still there were lots to do in the park, but time was not on our side. We took leave of Universal studio. Came back to Universal city by the shuttle & caught our metro train which took us to Union Station. Ladies proceeded towards Torrance in 444 bus, while me & Prosenjit went to explore one more route to Torrance, which we did successfully!

Hollywood

2005-06-22T17:45:00.000-07:00

“Hollywood is a place where they'll pay you a thousand dollars for a kiss, and fifty cents for your soul. I know, because I turned down the first offer often enough and held out for the fifty cents.” -Marilyn Monroe

“Hollywood“
What do you think when you hear this word? Doesn’t the word reminds of so many things at a time – movies, stars, affairs, sex, scandals, Oscars. Last Sunday I had an opportunity to be in that place which is all about movie magic.

The day started with a bus ride from our place, Torrance to Los Angeles. As I told earlier there is a daily pass which enables for unlimited travel in Metro buses & trains. So we took this daily pass along with zone pass (total 4$ ticket). After a long drive of 1 hour in Metro bus 444, me & my friend, Samrat got down at Pershing Square in Los Angeles.This area is in Los Angeles Downtown & hosts some of the most amazing looking buildings. We decided to come back later to the square.

From Pershing square we took the underground Metro train to a station called ‘Universal City”. The Metro train service is awesome with fast moving trains and picturesque underground stations. It is a treat to watch & experience. Our journey of 15 minutes in tram was spiced up by a young couple who were sitting right in front of us. From the time the train started they got involved in passionate kissing. After witnessing this ‘kuchi-kuchi’ stuff, we got down at Universal City. The kissing-couple also got down & they were so lost in their world that they continued their passion even on the escalator.

At Universal City, my roommate Prosenjit was waiting with his friend Samdarsi. As Samdarsi (Somu) had been staying in that part of LA for a while, he was naturally our local guide for the day. From Universal City, we took a train to a station “Hollywood Highland”. These trains fly so fast that before we could figure out we were in Hollywood Highland. (Do you remember the train & bus in the movie “Speed”? These are the same metro trains & stations). We emerged out of Hollywood Highland Metro Station & found ourselves in the middle of a very busy street.

Right in front of us was the “Kodak Theatre”…

Kodak Theatre
Kodak theatre is the home of Oscars, which has been hosting Oscar award ceremonies and will be hosting atleast till 2021.Along with Oscar awards; the theatre has the distinction of hosting many grand events such as American Idol finals. The theatre has a huge shopping complex which always is crowded & some or the other musical bands keep playing there.

Inside the theatre, we walked on the famous staircase where the Oscar nominees, stars & guests arrive to the Oscar ceremony.

From balcony of this complex, we saw the famous “Hollywood” sign which was there in the distant Griffith Park.

Hollywood Sign…
The Sign measures 450 feet long, its mammoth letters are 45 feet high, and it's visible from all parts of Hollywood. Erected in 1923 as an advertising sign for a real estate development in Beachwood Canyon, the Sign originally read "Hollywoodland." The last four letters were removed in 1945, after Hollywood had become the world's movie capital, and the Sign had already become a well-known landmark. (In fact, it's been officially declared "Los Angeles Cultural-Historical Monument #111.")

In 1932, during the Great Depression, one despondent young actress, Peg Entwistle, even jumped to her death from the Sign's giant letter "H." The original sign contained thousands of light bulbs, which were changed daily by a caretaker who lived in a small house behind one of the Sign's giant "L's."

We came out of Kodak theatre into the Hollywood Boulvede Street. Suddenly I realized that I was on the “Walk of Fame”.

Walk of Fame…
Designed as a publicity stunt in the late 1950s, the Walk of Fame is now the most famous stretch of cement in the world. More than 2,500 bronze-inlaid stars commemorate some of the most famous individuals in movies, radio, TV, recording and theater. A bronze star embedded in pink and charcoal terrazzo on the pathway is dedicated to selected celebrities. 20 new celebrities are honored every year during public ceremonies. Walk of Famers are nominated by the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce for "career achievement”.

There were sidewalk stars spread across the pathway everywhere. I was standing right on one star…I was so happy to see it was star of my favorite director Steven Spielberg. After saluting the master director, I moved across the street looking for more ‘stars’. There was Jack Nicholson, Marline Monroe, Nicole Kidman & many other celebrities all in one place that too on the street (or call it on footpath!).

On the same street was another landmark “Chinese Theatre”.

Chinese Theatre..

This theatre is the most sought after place for any movie premieres. (Do you remember the ending of “Charles Angeles-Full throttle” movie involving a premiere show in Chinese theatre?). Fans flock to these premiere events to see the celebrities arrive and walk up the red carpet into the theatre. This theatre built by Grauman in 1927 was recently renovated with several earthquake retrofits.

In the foreyard of the theatre was another piece of cement which was made famous by footprints & hand impressions of celebrities. There are foot & hand impressions of John Woo, Spielberg, Stallone & so many other entertainers.

Looks like Hollywood Blvd never lacks any action and at that moment, there was a movie promotion happening right in front of Kodak & Chinese theatres. What better place than Hollywood Blvd to get publicity for the movie? The movie being promoted was “Harbie: Fully loaded”.The whole cast & crew of the movie was present. As the movie is all about the Volkswagen car, the whole street was literally filled with those cute cars.

Volkswagen Beetle 2005 model is the latest craze which is gripping the US. Popularly known as “Beetle bug”, the car has captured imagination of millions people (I confess that I’m in love with this car :)). The car looks very cuuute.The movie is hoping to cash on this new phenomenon.

After roaming around in the walk of fame, we entered into the McDonalds for lunch.While I settled for fruit-peanut salad with French fries, my friends attacked chicken stuffs. After a quick lunch, we decided to move on. There was Guinness records museum, Ripley’s Believe it or not museum & Hollywood wax museums on the same street. But due to time constraints we proceeded to next destination, Beverly Hills.

We were back in metro & got down at Veremont/Beverly. From there we took a metro bus to Beverly Hills. As soon as we got into bus, the bus driver asked us “Kya haal hai bhai?”. We were thrilled to listen to ‘Hamara Hindi’ in Beverly hill. Now that we know the driver is from India we started chatting with him.To my friends’ surprise they came to know he was also from Bengal.S o the next conversions went in Bengali till we got down.Once we got down at Beverly Hills, we walked to the Rhodeo Drive.

Rhodeo Drive..
This is called the “Holy Grail of Shopping” and supposed to be the most recognized street in the world and has been featured in movies from "Beverly Hills Cop" to "Pretty Woman". The street is famous for latest in fashion.

With no intentions of doing shopping there, our only objective was people-watching and window-shopping. It didn’t take much time to realize that most of the people were also doing the same thing like us! The whole street was full of shops for fashion accessories, apparels. There was one F-TV anchor hosting a show in front of some fashion store. The experience of walking in the street was like our Brigade-MG Road walking experience!!

Every Father's Day, Rodeo Drive hosts a vintage car show that's free and open to public. As we happened to be there on that day we got to see some antique cars & few really rich people buying some amazing cars.

After strolling the street, we got into a juice junction. I took some juice called “Vibrant-C” which was a cocktail of banana, pineapple & lemon.

We took another metro bus from there & were back to “Western” Stop. From there we moved to Wilschire Vermont where Somu got down. We continued to 7Th street, which has some seriously tall buildings. Met few doctors who had come from India for a conference.

Then after we moved to Pershing Square, the point from where our journey had begun.As soon we got out of metro tube, we found ourselves surrounded by some gigantic buildings in all directions. Really some wonderful looking architecture stuff. This has Pershing Park adjacent to the square, named after the famous World War I general. When we went to the park, the whole area was full of beggars & homeless people.

Talking of buildings, I was reminded of one of my favorite book “The Fountainhead”. I was thinking of all the architects mentioned in the book, when I was looking at those buildings which were looking like a pack of cards. I thought of Howard Roarke, the central character of the book & what he would have said about these buildings.Not to mention that I thought of all Roarke fans whom I know!!

The day came to an end with another long ride back in metro train to Torrance. As I was travelling back , I was pondering about what Marilyn Monroe said...

Namma Bus

2005-06-17T19:04:00.000-07:00

Bus arrives at the stop. Passengers gets into the bus through the front door. Puts the money in the ‘cash machine’. Driver issues a ticket. There are hardly 10 people in the bus. They hear a voice “Thank you for choosing Gardenia Bus Service to bus travel”.

Now a bus stop is approaching. The bus stop name flashes on the display which can be seen by all passengers. Simultaneously there is an English announcement telling “We are approaching Western Avenue….Norborne School”. This is followed by Spanish announcement “Labra sima parara…”.People who wants to get down at that stop pulls the wire which makes a sound & triggers a light in front of driver. Bus stops & passengers get down. Driver won’t forget to say ‘Have a good day!”. Passengers often say “Take Care” to driver.

This is the local transport bus here...

Efficient, relaxed & very well connected.Often I think that the government is running these buses irrespective of losses! Please bare with me for this "bus puraana" for a while:)

Lets talk of bus tickets..
Ticketing system here is extremely good with absolutely zero leakage. As soon as you board bus, you have to put the coins or the note in the machine which counts & after the amount is flashed, driver gives the ticket. If you want to get down at some stop & take another bus, there is an option of special ticket called ‘transfer’ ticket. Transfer ticket indicates the direction & time for which the ticket is valid. As usual there is a daily pass which is for unlimited travel in any direction & time. There is no concept of ‘change’ in the bus. You should have correct change. If you have put the extra amount, the machine won’t give you back any change.

Special care for handi-capped...
It is heartening to see special attention given to handi-capped. Whenever there is any wheel-chair person at the stop, the bus door which is at little height than the platform is lowered. A metal platform extends from bus , on which the wheel chair is rolled .Once the wheel chair is in, the driver puts the belt across the person. Till all this is over, everybody patiently waits.

Talking of the bus drivers..
Most of them are very courteous. They always smile, wish & sometimes even joke. They dress smartly too with all goggles, jackets & gloves. Half of the drivers are ladies. One particular lady driver (She had a very long nails & golden color hair) in our route had become very familiar that she is used to ask next day why we didn’t come one day!

While talking of buses and bus service here, suddenly namma BMTC bus comes into mind…

A typical day in BMTC bus...
BMTC bus arrives totally packed, number of people hanging out are more than the number inside. Passengers tries to get into the bus. Few lucky & strong ones get into. Few men tries to sneak through the front door of bus meant for ladies. Gets scolded by driver, conductor, ladies & other ‘true’ men. Somehow manages to be in the bus.The conductor moves like a snake making way in the forest of people. He asks in the trademark style “Yelligrii? Chilrey kodrii..illa andhre ilkollri”. He starts cursing each and everyone.Writes the change on the back of ticket which most of the time, we forget to collect. With great difficult, we get down & a breath a sigh of relief…

It took few days to digest these two ends of spectrum.

I know it is not fair to compare the two systems. BMTC is doing fair job considering all the limits.But couldn’t help dreaming when our buses will be like here & when our drivers will be courteous like this.

Having said all these things….
That bus crowd, those rude conductors, those pity fights in bus, and those adventures to get in/out the bus…. there is nothing like these things.. because after all it is “Namma Bengalru”!

Initial few days I traveled in public transport bus. Now travel by bus has reduced as commuting to office is done in my colleague’s car. But now & then I travel in bus as I simply love to travel in bus....be it in Bangalore or Torrance.

Before ending my bus episode, a thought which I always think when I see bus..

Isn’t bus similar to life….
People travelling together often become very close with each other . We get into a false impression that they will be there with us till the end of journey, only to realize that they had got down at some other stop.

Some other people gets into the bus..they get down...

But the bus journey continues just like life….

Pakoda,Redando Beach & SPA !

2005-06-14T17:11:00.000-07:00

Two lazy days...

Saturday ,11-June-2005

After past few unusual days when the day started for me at 3:30 in the morning, Saturday appears to be such a nice thing. So got up from sleep at 10:30. Had noodles for breakfast.

Meanwhile my roommates were in full action in kitchen. They were preparing Aloo-Gobi curry & some sweet out of milk & rava (Bengalis call rava as ‘Sooji’).Once the lunch was ready, we went to swimming pool in the apartment to build up the apetite.

Though I don’t know swimming, I enjoy being in water. Tried to get some tips to learn swimming. After the attempt in pool, it was time to go to SPA. It always feels good & relaxing to be in the hot steamy SPA. Back to apartment to have lunch.

Now to spend evening we headed to Redando beach which is near Torrance.We reached the beach by Metro bus.

Redando beach has King’s Harbour, Redando Pier and Seaside Lagoon. Though the beach looked to be ordinary, the way the infrastructure is built around it to make it a visiting place is impressive. Couldn’t help thinking of some amazing beaches of India which are handled very badly.

Walked through the beach & seaside lagoon. Everywhere there was only smell..’fish’. The restaurants were cooking up marine delicies out of fishes,crabs,shrimps & what not!

After the beach, our next destination was the Indian Grocery Shop in Crenshaw Boulavde.A travel in metro & a little longer walk, we were in the shop.We had came across this Indian Grocery Shop in google when we were looking for some grocery items.

Raj,the owner of shop was more than happy to see us again in the shop.We picked up rice bags(these are imported from Bangalore & have address of Bangalore on the bag with a kannada name “Ravi”!!), dhals(My Bengali roommates picked up ‘moor dhal’,a red variety of dhal), basin, mustard oil(Bengalis use this for cooking ), pickle & butter. But the problem now was how to take all these to apartment.We were about to call a taxi,when Raj told us that he is going to drop us to our place.We for courtesy told him why he should take the trouble.He insisted & we agreed.

Raj closed his shop, took us in his car & dropped to our apartment.

We couldn't stop admiring Raj’s helping nature. Looks like Indians will be (more) good to fellow Indians (only) when they are away from India!!!

Time to cook…
I prepared Sambar & rice. While Asis, roommate was busy with the basin.I was wondering what he is upto.Slowly the intentions became clear.He was about to make ‘Onion Pakodas’(which Bengalis call “Piyabji”).Meanwhile few visitors came to our apartment to meet my other roommate, Prosnjit.For courtesy we offered the pakoda plate & those guys almost finished the plate :)

It was a nice dinner with steaming rice, sambar, pakodas & pickle. Looked like roommates liked the sambar!

Post-dinner,as usual it was time to sit & talk. As always talks went through Bangalore,Calcutta,Toyota,Honda,Torrance,Vegas,LA,Bryan Adams,football and many other things.As both my roommates have spent few months in Bangalore,they have a strong liking for Bangalore. Mention Bangalore, they will be happy to talk about it. One guy in particular is a big fan of "Corner House" icecreams.Couldn't help going for a small flashback to Corner house & time spent with friends there.

Sunday

12-June-2005

Our plan of going to LA was called off because of my lazy roommate!!

After preparing lunch,we headed to the pool. I spent some time in pool & more time in SPA.I had carried the book “Selfish Gene” given at the airport by my Bangalore gang to the SPA . So sat in the SPA reading the book.

Walked out of the SPA & spread myself beside the pool in an easy chair & continued reading the book. My roommates were still in the water.

Came back & had lunch. For lunch , again we had pakodas! Asis & Prosnjit slept after having lunch. I took the book & went back to the pool side. Sat at pool side overlooking the water & read the book. This time there was coke can to sip while reading. The reading went good may be as there was no much distractions in the pool!

It is such a nice thing to sit in a mild sun, beside green-blue water, sipping the cold drink & reading..

I forgot to tell about the refriegerator we got. After the refrigerator came, my roommates have stuffed it with coke cans, juices, butter, vegetables, fruits, puddings. So everytime we open the door, a coke can or a pudding comes out!

Pakoda seems to be the order of day! For dinner, again it made its way to the menu but this time with a variation half were onion-based & other half were brinjal-based(call them 'bajji') . As told by my Bengali roommates, Bengalis have high affinity for these fried pakodas and they live on these.

amar konu samsho nahi.ami keno kora uchith :))

Lost in Las Vegas !

2005-06-06T17:54:00.000-07:00

29-May-2005

Las Vegas is known as “Entertaintment Capital “of the world. Few striking features of Vegas before we go ahead

It has 17 of the 20 biggest hotels in the world.
It is the gambling capital, where gambling is legal.
More than 100,000 couples obtain marriage licenses in Vegas, making it the “Marriage Capital”!!

It is the place for anything and everything in the world of pleasure.

It was almost 5:30 in evening when we arrived in Las Vegas.

6:30pm
The bus took us to Hotel Riviera from where people went to explore the city by themselves. Few went with the guide to see some baley. We entered the Casino to try our hand. The Casino was very huge & there were people, few sitting at the card tables, few at spinning machines, few at bar watching baseball. All varieties of people doing all sorts of things!

The Casino was glittering in all its colors. Gambled bit here. Then we decided to roam around in the street. We just strolled by the street watching the magnificent buildings. Slowly the neon lights were coming to life.

7:00pm
We entered one more Casino & decided to try our lucks. I needed small units to gamble, so went to break the dollar into cents. We were asked to produce the passports to check the age. Gambling is allowed only for ages 21 & above.

First few spins at the gambling machine were disastrous. I lost almost a dollar & tried last bit when I got 5$.Now I know why people go crazy in gambling. I would have walked out with 5$.I betted that & lost almost everything I won. Then again luck turned its side & regained the loss. Before I was slipping into the vicious cycle, I walked out of the Casino with no loss-no gain status!

8:15 pm
I quickly grabbed sub-way delite as I was feeling hungry & went back to Hotel Riviera. There everybody was asked to assemble back.

We moved to Ferment Street where the much acclaimed laser show happens. Just before it was about to begin, due to technical problems the show was delayed. So we thought we will go & catch some other show & come back later.

9:00 pm
Next was the light-parade in Flamingo hotel. The parade was in the air, which means balloons & chariots moved, hanging from the rails in the roof. The balloon & chariot shaped objects were highly lit; the ladies & few gentlemen in these were dancing to some upbeat music. These people were throwing some sort of bead-necklaces at spectators. I caught one thrown at me.

10:00 pm
We were in Bellagio hotel to see the amazing garden inside & the mesmerizing ceiling with colorful mushroom like structures. Truly interesting place that was. There were lots of ‘escort’ services around.

Just in front of Bellagio hotel is the Eiffel Tower hotel, which has a replica of the famed Eiffel Tower of Paris. It was looking very beautiful in glowing neon. I thought I’ll just go & capture that image in camera & come back. So I went there.

But when I came back....I couldn’t trace any of my friends or our bus. I searched around the hotel frantically. They had left me there & went….

There was no way I could reach them as nobody there as cell phone or I had no idea where they would go next. So there was no point in searching them. I resigned the job of search and instead decided to explore Vegas on my own…

11:00 pm
So after spending some good 45 minutes searching for my bus, there I was alone, lost in a totally unknown territory…all alone & ready to go on my own!

I started my exploration.

I went to Ceaser’s Palace. This palacial hotel is in Roman style. It is the place where Celion Dion performs shows regularly & Elton John performed. Asked some unknown tourists to take my photo at horse-like sculpture. It was a truly elegant structure.

11:20 pm:
Right across Ceaser’s palace is Flamingo. Bugsy Siegel named his casino the Flamingo after the long legs of his showgirl girlfriend. This is one of the Las Vegas’s oldest Casinos situated at "Four Corners," along with Caesars Palace, Bellagio and Bally's.

11:30 pm:
At a little distance from Flamingo is Aladdin hotel. This has 2567 rooms and 2093 casino machines! A very elegant looking resort-hotel.

11:40 pm:
I came across a building which had this Harley-Davidson bike was seen coming out of walls. That was “Harley-Davidson Café “.It seems to be a place where all Harley-Davidson owners who come to Vegas meet & party. To prove that there was a line of Harley’s parked, some really huge looking guys & some pretty looking babes were in that café.

11:50 pm:
Suddenly I came across this statue which is a token of USA. That is Statue of Liberty. If you are thinking that the statue is in New York, you are right & also wrong! There is a replica of the statue in Vegas in hotel “New York- New York”. I was there standing at the statue which was looking beautiful in that midnight light. There was a roller-coaster going on & I could hear the joy-fear screams.

30-May-2005

12:00 am
Right in front of New York-New York is the “MGM Grand”. It is nicknamed “City of Entertainment”. There is huge LED screen which beams what is going on inside the hotel. The hotel hosts some prominent shows like Madonna, Rolling Stones, Championship boxing, David Copperfield magic. There seems to be 5300 rooms in this hotel spread across 30 floors.

12:30 am
We earlier talked about famous-four corner made of Flamingo, Caesars Palace, Bellagio and Bally's. There is one more famous-four corner made of MGM, New York-New York and Tropicana. I just walked through the casino & cruised to the hotel Excalibur.

After roaming around in the hotel & I decided to go back to hotel Riviera where our trip had begun. So I was in a taxi going towards the hotel & chatting all sorts of things with the taxi driver in the middle of night.

1:00 am:
Back in Riviera. Thought of watching some show, but the tickets were sold out. So roamed again across the hotel in lounge.

1:30 am:
Went to Balley Club & there the dress code is so strict that they didn’t allow anyone with snickers. Formal shoes were required!

1:50 am:
Felt little tired, so entered a piano bar & sat there. Piano bar is the place where there will be musicians who will be playing the songs on request. People keep drinking & keep asking for songs. It was good to hear some classic old English songs at that time. People threw dollars on the musicians.

2:30 am:
Out of that bar & enter into a dance bar. Totally wild characters in total swing. Lots of things happening on the dance floor & outside!

This city never seems like sleeping. The fun & frolic kept flowing. The city was infact, getting better & better, wilder & wilder as the night was growing. At that time, the streets were full, traffic flowing as in day & every shop was open.

I never felt I am walking alone in an unknown place at odd hours. Nothing seems to be odd in Vegas!

3:00 am:
Decided it was high time to go back to hotel & sleep. So went near New York-New York hotel & called a taxi. To my surprise most of the taxi drivers didn’t know the hotel “Howard Johnson Inn”. Walked to the MGM hotel & there was a senior tax driver who knew the place.

4:00 am:
Reach the hotel, surprised to see my friends back in hotel & woke them up. They gave the most horrifying look to me!

Then I realized there was a panic after I went ‘missing’. Due to some communication gap or mis-communication, I had got information that the rest of the gang will return to hotel only at 4 in the morning. So after getting missed, I came back at 4.Meanwhile the rest of the gang instead had gone for 4-hour trip (not till 4 trip!!) & returned at 12:30.They waited for me also to come at around same time. When I didn’t come, one of my friend had called Las Vegas Police & lodged a ‘missing’ complaint :)

They felt very relaxed & happy to see me back. I felt little bad to give them some tension. But what can I do if I had got the misleading information about the schedule. So everything got settled & slept immediately.

7:30 am:
After quick shower, started the day again. Talked with the guide about what happened previous night & the issue was settled there.

8:00 am:
We were back in New York –New York. This looks totally different in day light.

If you remember we had both Eiffel Tower & Statue of Liberty in Vegas. How about the Pyramid & Spinx?? No problem, at a distance from New York hotel we have these things also!!

Hotel Luxor houses dark bronze pyramid & brightly colored sphinx. It seems it took 18 months to complete these structures. Luxor's pyramid is held in place by 150,000 cubic yards of concrete poured around a steel skeleton. It seems the curator of the original of Giza Pyramid himself was consulted during construction of this pyramid in Vegas.

9:00 am:
We take leave of Las Vegas.

As we were returning, I was thinking to what extent the entertainment industry can go to woe the customers. They can erect Eiffel Tower, they create Liberty Statue, and they bring Pyramid & what not?

37 million visitors a year, billions of dollars exchanged, all the glamour & glitterati… it is the “World’s Entertainment Capital”

The Great Canyon

2005-06-06T09:34:00.000-07:00

29-May-2005

The day started too early. By 4:40am we started for Grand Canyon.

It was dark yet & it was looking like light is struggling to make its way through the dark. I was feeling very sleepy, but thought will see sun rise. It was worth an effort to be awake. I saw the picture perfect sun rise. After that I fell asleep. Woke up as the bus stopped at a gas-station. Grabbed a chocolate muffin. Journey continued.

Grand Canyon, exceptionally deep, steep-walled canyon in northwestern Arizona, is created by the Colorado River. The Grand Canyon is 446 km (277 mile) long, up to 29 km (18 mile) wide, and more than 1500 m (5000 ft) deep. The entire canyon is extremely beautiful, containing towering buttes, mesas, and valleys within its main gorge.

It not only attracts tourists but also geologists & adventurers. Many adventurers tried to explore the Canyon, but in vain. Many perished in the attempt to explore the Canyon.It generated more mystery, challenge & passion about the Canyon. In 1869, after a very tough time, Major John Wesley Powell and his team successfully explored the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon.

Our first plan was to see a 45-minute movie on “Grand Canyon” in I-max theatre in the Canyon national park. It also told stories of human adventure to explore the Canyon & the success story of Powell. It was worth a movie with amazing photography of the Canyon.

Outside the theatre was a replica of the boat which Powell used to explore Colorado. One thing which was highly inspiring was the fact that Powell had a single arm and inspite of many in his team deserting him, he made his destination.

Brave men never give up…

Our bus arrived to the Great Canyon. We got down & walked to the ‘South Rim’ of Canyon. Once I reached the edge of the Canyon, I started realising the magnamity of the Canyon . It is so magnificent, so huge, so awesome…no words can describe it.

It looked to me like nature was mocking the Humans; by standing in all its magnificent form & making the so-called intelligent, creative living beings appear so insignificant before it….

We spent almost one hour in the Great Canyon. It was like seeing a tip of a huge ice burg. I think ideal ways to explore the Canyon are through trekking, sailing in Colorado or by flying in the helicopter through the Canyon.

Some day hoping to do it...

Came back to bus and our journey continued...with images of Grand Canyon repeatedly playing in the mind

Next destination was Las Vegas....

London Bridge is falling....

2005-06-03T18:29:00.000-07:00

London-Bridge is falling…

As soon we came to know that Monday is holiday due to Memorial Day, our brains started working how to make use of this long weekend. I was wondering about going for a packaged tour. My colleagues Asis (who is my roommate also) and Samrat came up with this 3-trip plan to Grand Canyon-Las Vegas. Without any hesitations, the plan took off & we booked the tickets. I also went promptly & got a new digital camera which I always wanted to have!!

28-May-2005

I woke up to see that the time is 6:20am & remembered that the bus starts at 7am!! So rushed in a taxi to the tourist agency from where the journey was about to begin. Made it in just in time. This travel agency is totally run by Chinese. From Hathoven Blvd here in Torrance we were taken in a mini van to Lincoln Avenue, Los Angeles. Lincoln Avenue is a mini china town. There the bus was waiting for us.

Got into the bus and soon we found that the whole bus is full of Chinese. It took a while to digest the language which we were hearing. Our first place of visit for the day was London Bridge. Wondering how come London Bridge is there in US? Even I got puzzled the first time I heard about it. I’ll tell you more on this.

So finally the bus left LA around 9am.Our tour guide was a Chinese lady whose name was Hel-o-yan, which we promptly renamed as “Halloween” :)She was speaking in a strange and pathetic English.After undergoing this ‘Chinese torture’ for 1.5 hours,we stopped at a shopping mall on the way. As my bladder was full, I desperately wanted to release my tension.So rushed to the rest room to find a huge queue.Then I realized there are at least some 3-4 buses which came at the same time.So waited patiently & finally got relieved :)

As I was hungry, I grabbed a veg-sandwitch & returned to bus. The bus started again to stop at a Chinese restaurant. Me & Asis decided to check the Chinese buffet(8$).I didn’t know any of the things there.Only few things I could recognize was veg salads,fruits,pappad,coke & groundnut with small fried chillies.I took them & was about eat the groundnuts when I saw the chillies were not similar.Then I realized they are not chillies but small dried fishes!! So groundnut was discarded.

After lunch (?), the journey continued. Meanwhile the bus has entered Arizona State. Major parts of this state are covered by barren desert. Our destination as I told you earlier was a place ‘London Bridge’.London Bridge is there in Lake Havasu city.

Now some interesting trivia why it is called ‘London Bridge’..

In 1962, it was discovered that the London Bridge was falling down, sinking into the Thames because it was not adequate for the increase in traffic. Robert McCulloch,an American business man,learned that the British Government was putting the bridge up for sale.

He submitted the winning bid for $2,460,000. How was this figure arrived at? The first question was how much it would cost London to cut the granite so it could be used again. The figure McCulloch and C.V. Wood (Master planner) came up with was $1,200,000 and they doubled that since McCulloch and Wood, thought someone else might figure the same way, they added $60,000. The reason for this figure was that Mr. McCulloch would be 60 years old when the bridge was dedicated. So, McCulloch and Wood added this amount, making the total $2,460,000!!

The bridge was dismantled. Each piece was marked with four numbers: the first indicated which span; the second noted which row of stones; and the last two indicated which position in that row.

The bridge was shipped by boat 10,000 miles to Long Beach, California. From there, it was trucked to Lake Havasu City where it was stored in seven-acre fenced storage compound.

Reconstructing the Bridge in Lake Havasu City was done in the same manner as the Egyptians built pyramids. Sand mounds beneath each arch were carefully formed to the profile of the original bridge arches, serving the same function as molds. When work was completed the sand was removed. A one-mile channel was dredged and water was diverted from the lake, under the Bridge, then back into the lake.

The Bridge was completed and dedicated on October 10, 1971.

Buying a bridge from some part of world, getting it dismantled, shipping & reconstructing it as it was earlier… Sounds crazy but it is true.

Back to journey…
It was 4pm when we reached the bridge. The bridge area was full of tourists in all shades & (good) shapes ;) There were visitors sitting and boozing heavily. Few after boozing went for a ride in the water. Took a walk along the water, everywhere I went there were ladies n gentlemen in their minimum basics and highly drunk. In middle of all these boozers & lusty babes, one man was sitting under the bridge and playing saxophone not bothered about anything in the world. I heard the man comes & plays the saxophone daily there. Don’t know whose memories bring him to the same place again & again….

After these picture some views, we took a walk on the bridge. Lake Havasu is actually a Colorado River reservoir created when the Parker Dam was built. There is a statue of Robert P. McCulloch and C.V. Wood, the master planner.

After having ‘rainbow’ ice-cream, it was time to return to bus.But me, Asis & Samrat were late by 7 minutes.As a punishment for coming late, we were asked to sing some Indian song.As we knew that nobody there in the bus knew Hindi, we sung “Choli ke peche kya” song! When someone asked what the meaning of the song is, we gave an answer which nobody could ever understand!!

So the journey continued for another 45 minutes before we stopped at a motel. That was our night-stay place. It was already 6:30pm when we reached there. We quickly had shower & went out to explore the area.We were looking for some good place to eat.I settled for Pizza Hut Veg Pizza (8$), while other two went to Chinese restaurant. We slept early at 12 as next day we were supposed to leave the place by morning 4:45!!!

Next morning we were going to Grand Canyon………

Time,TV & that HBO program....

2005-05-23T15:00:00.000-07:00

Time
Poor fella...I almost scared him !!!

That was one evening... I saw a man who was almost running & was looking to be in great hurry.He happened to stop at me and asked me the time.I told 7:05pm.The man almost fainted & was just about to do a sprint from there.Then I realised that I have told the Indian Time!

I hadn't not adjusted my clock to local time here & didn't feel like changing. Looking at watch,I can always think what people there in India will be doing at that time ..I can visualise that all my friends are now coming to office and my folks are going to temple when I am about to have dinner..

BTW then I quickly recalculated the time & told the man the time is 6:30pm.

Seperated by time & space.....

Subway
I'm in love with Subway Veggie delite.(I have to love it).As cooking is not yet started,so c/o of
subway.

TV
When I arrived here,it was the time for Los Angeles mayor election. Looks like elections here gets very personal as everywhere,but the interesting part was spilling the venom using the medium of TV.I saw TV ads showing why a candidate should not be voted.

BTW LA got its first Latino Mayor.This is something like a Bangladeshi immigrant
becoming Mayor of Mumbai!!

Talking of TV ads..I came across an official ad.This was from non other than from California governor Arnold himself. In the ad,Arnie in his typical english urges citizens to be more liable for tax payment..

Looks like the whole country is lost in 'American Idol'.Next week is the grand finale.I came to
know our "Indian Idol" title music is directly taken from "American Idol"

Final byte...
I saw a program(TV series) on HBO,which I think will never ever be telecasted in India.That program was xxxxxxtremely graphical.....