Dreams

Rough night.

I hardly got sleep yesterday night. I could see dark clouds turning into fireballs and then falling on earth. It was engulfing everything on the way. My car got burnt.

Wonder what this means when you "interpret dreams". My wife says, it is all because of work and stress.

I am so looking forward to Sep 30.

Open Source == Communism?

Search for Chuck Norris

The result is ... :)



Probably the same would apply to Rajnikhant and Vin Diesel.

Parking sensibly

Not probably the right way to respond but, this is hilarious. "Beaches are fun"

Frog Princess

Thought this one was hilarious. Read On:

A boy was crossing a road one day when a frog called out to him andsaid, "If you kiss me, I'll turn into a beautiful princess". He bent over, picked up the frog and put it in his pocket. The frog spoke up again and said, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a beautiful princess, I will stay with you for one week." The boy took the frog out of his pocket, smiled at it and returned it to the pocket. The frog then cried out, "If you kiss me and turn me back into a princess, 'll stay with you and do ANYTHING you want." Again the boy took the frog out, smiled at it and put it back into his pocket.
Finally, the frog asked, "What is the matter? I've told you I'm a beautiful princess, that I'll stay with you for a week and do anything you want. Why won't you kiss me?"

The boy said, "Look, I'm a software engineer, I don't have time for a girlfriend, but a talking frog is cool."

Rejection Letter

Ran into the ultimate rejection letter:

Herbert A. Millington
Chair - Search Committee
412A Clarkson Hall, Whitson University
College Hill, MA 34109

Dear Professor Millington,

Thank you for your letter of March 16. After careful consideration, I regret to inform you that I am unable to accept your refusal to offer me an assistant professor position in your department.

This year I have been particularly fortunate in receiving an unusually large number of rejection letters. With such a varied and promising field of candidates, it is impossible for me to accept all refusals.

Despite Whitson's outstanding qualifications and previous experience in rejecting applicants, I find that your rejection does not meet my needs at this time. Therefore, I will assume the position of assistant professor in your department this August. I look forward to seeing you then.

Best of luck in rejecting future applicants.

Sincerely,
Chris L. Jensen

Love Story 2050

Biggest mistake ...

We ran out of the movie hall half way through the movie. It was a disaster right from the start, with Harman Beweja being asked to do everything literally possible to make him look like Hrithik Roshan. My wife tells me, "He can probably act in a TV serial as a mythology character, may be Ram or Lakshman or something. That's about it".

We went to KFC immediately after we ran out of the hall and we completely forgot that we had been to a movie 10 mins back.

Rajeev Masand says:

If there’s one thing the film succeeds in doing, it’s in uniting the audience in their relief as they step out of the cinema. Coming out of the film you feel like prisoners of war who’ve finally been let out of concentration camp.

Do not watch it even if it coming on television and you have nothing to do ...

Google is a great place to be?

Everything is pretty much run by the engineering - PMs and testers are conspicuously absent from the process. While they do exist in theory, there are too few of them to matter.

The Google Manager is a very interesting phenomenon. On one hand, they usually have a LOT of people from different businesses reporting to them, and are perennially very busy.

Post by Sergey Solyanik when he moved back to Microsoft.
Having worked at Microsoft before, I think there is an inherent bias in the way he has expressed his opinions, but I do not think we can brush aside all of his comments.

Sex Education

Another one from Geek & Poke:

The Vagina Dialogues

"I hated being a woman. The restrictions, the rules, the fears of my mother, it made me angry."
"I hated being a woman. Bleeding every month, feeling pukey and giddy-headed and sticky and smelly."

I hated being a woman. 10 years old and being told, “Boys can do whatever they like. But a girl’s reputation is like glass.” Twelve and my tuition teacher’s voice, “What a horrible laugh, so loud and monstrous! Look at Sonya, how prettily she covers her mouth when she laughs. And she doesn’t make a sound.” Thirteen and being admonished, “Sit with your legs together. Only a slut sits with her legs apart.” Yes, I really and truly hated being a woman.

Bold one ...

World's dirtiest cities

If you thought I would list Kolkatta, Chennai, Mumbai etc., you are wrong.

None of the cities in India are there in the list of World's worst 10 cities.

Arsenic-laced drinking water, lead-contaminated soils and choking air pollution are sadly just the start in some of the world's dirtiest places

There is still hope for us.

You must also see some crazy ideas for future cities here.
Pod Car, Energy Highway, Algae Park, Power Sidewalks etc.



By the way, the traffic signal was not working at crazy Kothaguda junction on my way back home and no power at home when I reached.

Outsourcing Course Work

Students from US and UK are outsourcing their university coursework to graduates in India.

Students contract their work to the lowest bidder, with prices ranging from £5 for simple undergraduate coursework, to £100 for postgraduate dissertations.

Birmingham City computing lecturer Thomas Lancaster said the practice is spreading as more websites spring up, particularly in India and Romania, and that it could be more prevalent as it is very difficult to detect.

What next?

Miss Teen USA South Carolina 2007

Now ! This one below is hilarious ...

Are Americans this Dumb?

I am left speechless ...
Unbelievable stuff and they have problems with outsourcing ...

Google Saree !

Another one in Google Merchandise ...

Social Network for Football

It's a plethora of social networks ...

Check Footbo.com

Now, that's because of Euro 2008, but soon we can see for IPL, ICL, NBA, NHL, NFL etc ...

How can a user manage his accounts across these unless you have a common account facility like that google provides.

Single Sign On !

Romance for lonely men

Robots who kisses on command ...

Weirdos ...

Indian scientists say - God exists

Interesting read !

As many as 64 per cent scientists said they would refuse to design biological weapons because of their moral and religious beliefs, while 54 per cent said they will not work on nuclear weapons for the same reasons.

>> More

Companies, Salaries and Reviews

This post at TechCrunch lead me to Glassdoor.

Here is something that you will find interesting:



and more ...

Update:
Some of the interesting comments I read about Google:

Pros -

Google is an extraordinary place to work: the perks are second to none, the quality of employees is exceptionally high, and the products are mostly cutting edge and interesting.

The total compensation package is generous, with opportunities for earning more through good, hard work. The caliber of colleagues is very high, sometimes daunting even.

You interact with great developers, original thinkers and interesting people all the time. Unlimited munchies are great, three free meals a day (or two in satellite offices) is great, medical benefits, partial subsidy of fitness membership, subsidy for ongoing education (though in reality you are unlikely to have time to use it) are all pluses.

Advice to Senior Management -

"Stop acting as those you're King Midas…just because you struck it rich with AdWords does not mean whatever you create will be tech gold. For a company that prides itself on innovation, I can't think of any product Google has released since AdWords that has been truly innovative…unless you are calling Google's mergers and acquisitions innovative (just because Google owns YouTube does not mean you can take credit for the innovation)..."

"Google engineers tend to be first rate but managed by unqualified, self-obsessed managers who were promoted into their positions just by being in the right place at the right time. This cannot possibly be optimal for Google's long term growth. Listen to all the voices trying to tell you this. Stop listening to the voices of managers telling you what a great job they are doing, because their main skill is self promotion. They don't care about the welfare of the company or their reports, only about themselves."

Interesting right? ... It is fun reading it and gives an insight into to few of the giants in technology.

Monstrous

Blogging is good for you

Ran into this article through Slashdot.

Research shows that it improves memory and sleep, boosts immune cell activity and reduces viral load in AIDS patients, and even speeds healing after surgery. A study in the February issue of the Oncologist reports that cancer patients who engaged in expressive writing just before treatment felt markedly better, mentally and physically, as compared with patients who did not.

Some hospitals have started hosting patient-authored blogs on their Web sites as clinicians begin to recognize the therapeutic value

Read more here.

I am just wondering why it is not helping me de-stress myself ...

The girl who silenced the world for 5 minutes

Got this from Hari's blog. Amazing eye-opener.

Back from vacation

Yes ... I went on vacation ... Finally !

I was hoping to start chasing the monsoon right from Thiruvananthapuram where it hits first. But luck has not favored me in long time. Though government of Kerala predicted monsoon to hit Kerala on 20th May (I do not know if they predict by consulting an astrologer or meteorology department), there was no sign of it. Over and above that it was the "Kerala" climate where I think humidity was 150% or something.

It was so sweaty there that you could collect my sweat in buckets.

The experience was not too bad either. It was much needed break from work and the first thing that I made sure, I do, was not to open my laptop to check office emails. I was getting irritated the moment I though about work. Pretty much relaxed at home. Had a lot of beef. Went for couple of movies.

Oh, by the way ! DO NOT go for Indiana Jones - 4.

When I thought that I was going to take a vacation, relax, and get re-charged and get back to work with renewed energy, by Friday, I started to get disturbed sleep and started feeling depressed about our travel back to Hyderabad . This, I am sure, happens to quite a lot of guys. Then you hate yourself for having to work. You want to become invisible. You want to fall sick and take another week off. Sigh ...

Back in office today and my delivery manager walks up to me and says "How was your vacation? Hope you had a good one. Welcome back. Now me and Karthik can take a vacation."

I wish I could meet H.G Wells and figure out how to become invisible.

Is it just a problem with IT industry and the expectations causing this or it is really the work that you do?

What will you do if you are in space and no toilet?

I am not sure how technology can help here. Poor guys.

We have a problem Houston, the space toilet's broken!

Bringing world music to India

I was on youtube today and found some interesting videos. I posted (here) one of those findings, but the ones below made me laugh so much that I fell off the chair. I could not resist posting it on my blog.

Pritam ... his effort to bring world music to India ... (or plagiarism) whichever way you want to put it.





Dear Pritam,

Have you heard a term called "Originality"?

Lets make it better

This is a less known single from AR Rahman for a very good cause. Watch it !

New way to salvage failed IT projects

Officials at Nepal's state-run airline have sacrificed two goats to appease Akash Bhairab, the Hindu sky god, following technical problems with one of its Boeing 757 aircraft, the carrier said Tuesday.

Nepal Airlines, which has two Boeing aircraft, has had to suspend some services in recent weeks due the problem.

The goats were sacrificed in front of the troublesome aircraft Sunday at Nepal's only international airport in Kathmandu in accordance with Hindu traditions ... said.

Read the story here.

I was wondering if we could really apply this on failed IT projects and salvage it. But should I do this inside my office building or client site?

Fancy Google T-Shirt

You would not really understand what it is when you see the snap. These were T-Shirts distributed at Google I/O conference. Check it out here.

Britain's got talent

You have got to see this ...



WATCH IT TILL THE END ... This is what is called ORIGINALITY

Hottest IPL Cricketer

No ... it's not what you think it is ...

This is a survey by www.gaybombay.org

Winner: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (Chennai SuperKings) - No question about it, the gay community is just as hot as the rest of India for the boy next door hotness of Dhoni. He swept the polls with 22 votes, way ahead of the first runner up.

First Runner-Up: Yuvraj Singh (Kings XI Punjab) - Classically handsome and a winning captain too, with his team already qualified for the semis. He was voted first runner-up with 11 votes

Second Runner-Up: Manpreet Gony (Chennai SuperKings) - One of the revelations of the IPL, both for his bowling and his hunky Punjabi looks. He's the one hottie who's really been exposed by the IPL and the gay community has voted him second runner-up with 10 votes.

Read it here. It is interesting to see such things in India. India is certainly a land of paradoxes.

Guru Gyan

Received these through email from my brother. Hilarious ones !!!

Finally .....

I came back home yesterday by noon and was completely drained. Exhausted. Tired. Slept for a while and woke up fresh.

I needed a break. Time off from work.

Guess what, I am taking a vacation. I am off from work for a week, a COMPLETE week.

Finally !

Uma was super excited to hear this. I will believe myself once I sit on the flight to Kerala.

Paanchvi Paas?

When the show Paanchvi Paas started, I was one of those people who said, what is this publicity stunt? They will definitely ask questions that are not in syllabus and all that crap... I am being honest ...

I happened to see this episode where there was this Class XII pass girl who came in and floored by Mr. Khan's charisma. She kept on saying "I love you". Now came the interesting part.

Question 1:

SRK: Who invented the lamp?
GIRL: Errr .... Edison??
SRK: Are you sure? Was it not bulb?
GIRL: Oh yeah !! Lamp is different, bulb is different... I would like to take a life line?

... and she answers with help of the kids there

This girl even got confused about where Gateway of India is.

In essence, Star Plus has managed to pull of an entertaining show in which people come in and make themselves look like idiots on national television or be made to look like an idiot by Mr. Khan.

With incidents like producer of Paanchvi Paas getting murdered in a crime of passion, the TRP ratings are definitely going up. And hey, this murder story has caught bollywood's attention.

New Site

So ... I changed the domain name and created achilles-punks.com.

Now, this blog(here) is being redirected to the new site.

My technology blog still is in blogspot and will get moved sometime soon.

How to rescue a project !!!

One of the blogs that I read on a regular basis is Geek and Poke. Here is a good one from them. I am sure everyone will relate to this one pretty much.







It's the same everywhere !

Change in title

I was somehow feeling that the previous title was just too common and was not even making me feel that it was really 'My Space'.

Hence, renaming it to 'Random Notes' - the nature of my posts are like that. I am still in search of a good title and then planning to buy own domain and host everything there. Probably, have some kind of Google Apps integration also will be done.

Let's see how it goes.

Suggestions for domain name and blog title are welcome.

Day at home

After a long long time, I got a full day at home ...

Uma was not feeling really well. She went to sleep yesterday night with 100.3ºC and then when I was planning to show up in office because of some deliverables, Uma's situation got worse. She could not even speak.

So, finally I dropped the plan of going to office and did some basic work allocation and analysis work from home during the first half and then started the fun part. Uma started feeling better ...

Both of us, right from noon, have been watching the third season of Desperate Housewives ... even when I am writing this ...

I would not say it was relaxing ... I got so many calls from work, that it looked as if I was virtually there ...

But it was still a day away from work and I can see the smile on Uma's face ...

Terrorist attacks and reactions

“Obviously, it’s a terrorist plot,” A.S. Gill, the police chief of Rajasthan, said hours after the attack. “The way it has been done, the attempt was to cause the maximum damage to human life.”

Totally unexpected from terrorists?

"The wicked designs of terrorists will be thwarted boldly and their attempts will be foiled" - Shivraj Patil

Hmmm ... Terrorists are going to be shit scared !

"So many such acts of terror have taken place, Malegaon, Banaras, Mumbai, but how many places have the communal disharmony erupted? Are the terrorist’s fools to repeat the act which is not having the desired result?" (Here)

Hellooo! They want to kill people. That's about it. They are least bothered about communal disharmony. Please direct that to our politicians.

PM condemns the terrorists attacks

Give me a break boss. What difference does it make? Transform terrorists into saints?

"We are not comfortable at all", "Terrified", "I have wife and 3 kids back in Melbourne and they are less than impressed with the part of the world I am in" - Darren Berry and other Aussie/South African guys in Team Jaipur (IPL)

Oh yeah, I understand. And I am so enjoying what I am seeing on TV, so many dead, Indian population coming down.

Where is your brain boss? We are not aliens. Indians are also human being and we are putting up with the terrorism crap for years now. Would you really refrain from going to NY, US Of A? Well, I heard that there was something called WTC and in 2001 some saint named Osama Bin Laden brought it down entirely by crashing 2 planes.

Stay in the line man !

I do not know what's it with Indians and conveniently evading a queue.

No ... It is not just the illiterate guys, it's the 'educated' bunch also.

Simplest of examples is the canteen in my office. I work for one the leading consulting firms in the world, and we are known to hire "real" professionals. When it comes to buying coupons to get meals, instead of standing in a, it is just chaos at the counter.

People, who try to maintain a queue look like idiots (me !!) and couple of times, few guys had to bear the wrath from me.

What I fail to understand is why it is so difficult to have some basic discipline? From my experience, I have seen this only in India. I have been US, Thailand and UK but never saw this kind of disrespect.

Here is one conversation that my friend Karthik had at our canteen. There were few guys who were just barging in when there were 10 other guys waiting to get the coupons.

Karthik: Hey, dude ... there is a 'Q' here ! would you mind standing in the 'Q'?
XYZ (updated to XYZ after comment from my wife): Oh! there was a 'Q', I thought it was 'P'
Karthik: THAT is not funny !

I am still surprised, why Karthik did not slam that guy's head on to the plate of biriyani kept there.

Women are even better. They want equality and then 'reservation' also. Sonia Gandhi is trying hard. Now, you go to any place in India, you will see separate line for women. OK, I understand to an extent because the way a queue is formed in India is usually a 'warm' experience. The idea is not leave even tiniest of space between you and the person in front. It can be quite a warming experience when the soaring heat touches 42ºC.

But women usually consider it as a privilege.

Last day, this girl happened to bypass a long queue I was standing in and directly went to the canteen counter. I was again the same irritating, pissed off, over reactive self, requested her to stand in the queue. "Queue??? I did not know there was a queue ...", she reacted. Stared me down as if I was from interiors of the Amazon jungle.

(This is just my observation and does not apply to ALL the women out there)

I do my part in setting things right, but I go down as one of those guys who try and then get 'advise' from people that, "You cannot repair the system. It's all screwed. You will just raise your BP, with no result. Everything will stay as is ... ".

I will still do what I can.

What the hell !!!

Woman Gives Birth to Triplets at her Desk; Finishes Marketing Reports

uughh !!!

I hate corporate life ...

IPL craze

At this very moment I am watching Chennai Super Kings Vs Punjab Kings XI.

IPL has turned out to be a bigger success than what was anticipated. Their trump card was city loyalty and I think Lalith Modi has been successful to certain extent. Let's see what happens when they start trading the NPAs.

Good thing is the matches start late in the evening, so atleast I get some productivity from the guys in the team.

As for me, I am actually loving the game. Short, aggressive and about sheer brute force and innovation ...

Favorite team: Chennai Super Kings
Reason: Nothing special

Aaaah ... Piyush Chawla hit for a six by Dhoni ... !
Let me get back to the game ...
de-stressed !!

Oh yeah! I am going for the Deccan Chargers - Knight Riders game tomorrow...
I want both of them to lose ... Is it possible?

Break from work - for 6 hours

Finally I got proper break from work yesterday. It was for around 6 hours.

The whole project team had an outing and quite a few guys showed up. As usual there were people who chickened out. I do not know when they will understand what professionalism is and how important is it for them to communicate about their absense early. I do not know when they will understand how to gel into a team and not act like demotivated, selfish morons.

Ok. Let me tell the good part of things.

So ... the trip was to Pragati resorts, around 40 kms from office. Scorching heat ... normal bus.

Summer heat was taking it's toll on the guys. No one is used to the heat. Software engineers, being locked in air-conditioned environment, never get to feel the Hyderabad heat. But, now the work around is also simple. Before we reached the resorts, guys gulped around 20 bottles of beer.

It just set the tempo and was exciting to see guys acting like live wires, who otherwise would be sitting in the corner of a project floor and you wouldn't even know when they left office.

There were couple of smarts kids who organized some interesting games. I really had to turn myself into something to that I was not. Making noise and getting guys to be involved in each and every activity. (I am not known for being social AT ALL)

And then came the best part ... DJ
I am the worst dancer in the world ... And I would say that robots are better than me in dancing ...
But 2-3 beers down, it was fun dancing to trance, hip-hop, pop, and the native telugu percussion in less than 5 mins.

I was sweating like a pig ... but it was great fun ...
Away from work ... no conference calls setup ... no official calls coming in ... lots of booze ... team enjoying the time off from work ...

What could be better ? ...

But it was again another day when I reached home after 12 in the night !

Educated morons

Raj Thackeray has been going ballistic about Northies in Mumbai. Well his publicity stunt seems to be working pretty well. I do not know what he has against Mr. Bachchan, but why does he have to finger him so often? It's Mr. Bachchan's free will as to what he wants to do with his life. Atleast he is not promoting regionalism and fueling the already sensitive topic of communities and religion. Even worse is to see other educated and uneducated people in his party going around creating havoc in daily life of people who are leading simple lives in the crowded world called Mumbai. - MORONS !!!

It is the people settled from other regions that has made Mumbai what it is today. Sr. Thackeray also had his issues with people from outside of Maharashtra and Jr. is just following it.

From one of my Marathi friends, what I have known is, Marathi's have left Mumbai because of the Thackerays.

There are enough number of issues haunting Mumbai and other places in Maharasthra. Why are these politicians not spending time in community service instead of mud slinging and adding fuel to fire? I do not see any political party getting involved in community service.

What have the politicians done to make the lives of people better?

Answer: NOTHING - All they are busy is with the pursuit of power, mud slinging and flexing political muscle.

Secularism and Incredible India

I found this nasty one at India Uncut.

Read this. Watch this.

No Honking !

I respect Deepak Lokhande for not honking. I also understand that his BP might have shot beyond all levels.

I would not survive 100m in Hyderabad without honking.

No Title

Ok!

Here is the thing. I work as a software engineer. Worked hard, worked smart, grew pretty fast in my career. Looking back at it, it is quite impressive when I compare myself with others.

The software industry is such a huge attraction to young engineers/graduates. There are tremendous opportunities and lots of money whether you are worth it or not. The financial muscle of the industry is unbelievably huge. Now that does not stand true when it comes to salary hikes inside the organisation - but that is a different issue altogether.

Since it is all about money, organisations are also smart. Take some star performers, some average guys, mix it up and put them on a project. What I do not understand is how they expect same productivity from all guys.

Underestimated project execution hours and over-estimated support function efforts combined together makes life miserable. The end result is you end up spending extra hours in office. Here is when you identify the other factor. The mixing up of talent in the resource pool results in a bunch of people who are either self-demotivated or requires a lot pampering. What happens as a result of this is that star performers end up spending crazy hours in office.

You see two kinds of people in the industry. The first kind is a set of people who see the problem and complain about it, get irritated and get de-motivated. Then there are a set of guys, who are real problem solvers, who make themselves part of the problem, get inside it and try to solve it.

Ok. I am losing direction here and have starting venting out. But let me continue.

The Gartner report on IT in 2010 talks about a lot of aspects. One of them being evolution a breed called "Versatalists". They also talk about "Generalists" and "Specialists". I do not think I saw a lot of "Generalists" in the industry in India, but yes I have seen a few in the US and the UK. "Specialists" is what everyone wants to become.

Here is one conversation I had with a team memeber:

I: How's work going?
ABC (Re-named): Hmmm, yeah, ok.

I: So what is the problem? Let me know.
ABC: The work is not interesting. It's repetetive job

I: But this project has it's own challenges. I think there is enough that you can contribute here.
ABC: Yeah, but there is no motivation.

I: OK. So I understand that you are not really getting interesting work. So what is it that you would like to pursue further to grow in your career?
ABC: I want to become a Solution Architect. We are using only 5% of "PRPC" in this account. I am losing all my knowledge on PRPC that I had. I want good work on PRPC.

[ I (In my mind): Grow up kid!! Become a Solution Architect? Work on PRPC for sometime and take a certification and that's it? You become Architect in 5 years?. ]

ABC: What about promotion? When will I get promotion?
I: I shall talk to you later.
( end of conversation )

This is so irritating. Just because you work some extra hours, they assume that they have done enough to go to the next level. Everyone in the industry feels that they work hard and is eligible for a promotion, but is that the case?

No software developer is born as a "Java" developer or a "PRPC" developer. It's about what they got to work on when they initially joined the organisation. 90% of the software engineers in India join the IT industry for the money. Infact, to be frank, it true in my case too. Only 10% join it to pursue the career as a software programmers because they love programming. I know couple of guys who worked for LIC (Life Insurance Corporation of India) for 15 years and joined my company. They expect special treatment. But if I have to see their performance, I feel that they should not even go back to LIC.

In the midst of all this, did I have a life? Got married almost a year and a half ago. Do I really have a married LIFE?

Answer: No. Not at all.

My wife, one of the most tolerant people I have ever known is trying hard to put up with this.

And I guess I have answered the question as to why I am not able to have a life.

Hmmm ... I need to figure out something.

It never stops

Rape victim beaten up by kin and neighbours:

Read here >>

India - 'Fraud Haven'?

Check this out.

India a 'fraud haven,' says report

New Rules to be kept by ICC while playing against Australia

This was forwarded to me by one of my friends.

To ensure cricket is played in good "sportmanship" spirit, visiting teams shuld follow this rules......

After watching the test match, I feel some rules have to be incorporated by ICC to give the other teams a perfect clarification

(1) Ricky Ponting – (THE TRULY GENUINE CRICKETER OF THE CRICKET ERA AND WHOSE INTEGRITY SHOULD NOT BE DOUBTED ) should be considered as the FOURTH UMPIRE. As per the new rules, FOURTH UMPIRE decision is final and will over ride any decisions taken by any other umpires. ON-FIELD umpires can seek the assistance of RICKY PONTING even if he is not on the field. This rule is to be made, so that every team should understand the importance of the FOURTH UMPIRE .

(2) While AUSTRALIAN TEAM is bowling, If the ball flies anywhere close to the AUSTRALIAN FIELDER(WITHIN 5 meter distance), the batsman is to be considered OUT irrelevant of whether the catch was taken cleanly or grassed. Any decision for further clarification should be seeked from the FOURTH UMPIRE. This is made to ensure that the cricket is played with SPORTIVE SPIRIT by all the teams.

(3) While BATTING, AUSTRALIAN players will wait for the ON-FIELD UMPIRE decisions only (even if the catch goes to the FIFTH SLIP as the ball might not have touched the bat). Each AUSTRALIAN batsman has to be out FOUR TIMES (minimum) before he can return to the pavilion. In case of THE CRICKETER WITH INTEGRITY, this can be higher.

(4) UMPIRES should consider a huge bonus if an AUSTRALIAN player scores a century. Any wrong decisions can be ignored as they will be paid huge bonus and will receive the backing of the AUSTRALIAN team and board.

(5) All AUSTRALIAN players are eligible to keep commenting about all players on the field and the OPPONENT TEAM should never comment as they will be spoiling the spirit of the AUSTRALIAN team. Any comments made in any other language are to be considered as RACIALISM only.

(6) MATCH REFREE decisions will be taken purely on the AUSTRALIAN TEAM advices only. Player views from the other teams decisions will not be considered for hearing. MATCH REFREES are to be given huge bonus if this rule is implemented.

(7) NO VISITING TEAM should plan to win in AUSTRALIA. This is to ensure that the sportive spirit of CRICKET is maintained.

(8) THE MOST IMPORTANT RULE : If any bowler gets RICKY PONTING - "THE UNDISPUTED CRICKETER WITH INTEGTIRY IN THE GAME OF CRICKET" more than twice in a series, he will be banned for the REST OF THE SERIES. This is to ensure that the best batsman/Captain will be played to break records and create history in the game of CRICKET .

These rules will clarify better to the all the teams VISITING AUSTRALIA .

Resolutions 2.0

You want to stick to your New Year resolutions? Here is a post on Webware.com that takes you to some of the coolest sites.

if you're dead set on changing your life in 2008, many Web sites can assist with tallying and tracking resolutions. Some will continue to ping you with reminders, or even enlist other folks to pester you over the next 12 months. Facebook users can pick from various third-party widgets for setting and sharing goals, but other sites offer more customization.

Few of the prominent ones listed are:
1. Joe's goals
2. 43Things
3. LifeTango
4. Remember the Milk - Beta
5. Hassle Me

Resolutions 2.0 !!!

No Smoking

I am not a good example, but I liked this one.

Whiskipedia

Yes, you guessed it right. It is Whiskipedia, wiki for and about Whiskey.

Will it help reduce alcohol consumption?

Haunting New Year

Mumbai has done it again. Putting India to shame when 2 women were molested by a mob of 60 men.

Mumbai's top cop, Commissioner D N Jadhav feels that the incident is being blown out of proportion and that the police did whatever they could to rescue the girls. The commissioner also said that molestation can happen anywhere.

God's own country is not far behind. A Swedish minor was molested by a 17 year chap. Every time India puts a satellite out in space or tries to buy a brand like jaguar or even shows a GDP of 9%, we somehow do not miss an opportunity to show that there is still that faint element of uncivilized tribal in us.

Where is the CULTURE that we boast of? Where is the moral police?

Top Blogger arrested in Saudi Arabia

NYTimes reports in it's post:

Gen. Mansour al-Turki, an Interior Ministry spokesman reached by telephone, said the blogger, Fouah al-Farhan, was “being questioned about specific violations of nonsecurity laws.” Mr. Farhan’s blog, which discusses social issues, had become one of the most widely read in Saudi Arabia.

Mr. Farhan, 32, of Jidda, was arrested Dec. 10 at his office, local news sources reported. Two weeks before his arrest, he wrote a letter to friends warning them that it was imminent.

Farhan writes at alfarhan.org.

Mr. Omran said Mr. Farhan was one of the first Saudi bloggers to post items in Arabic and to use his real name. At the top of Mr. Farhan’s blog is a call in Arabic for “freedom, dignity, justice, equality, public participation and the other lost Islamic values.”

So much for freedom of speech ...

Australian Government to implement Internet Filters

Slashdot.org reported in it's post about Australian government's intention to put Internet police in place.

Here is a snippet from the actual article:

He (Senator Conroy) says the scheme will better protect children from pornography and violent websites.
"Labor makes no apologies to those that argue that any regulation of the Internet is like going down the Chinese road," he said.
"If people equate freedom of speech with watching child pornography, then the Rudd-Labor Government is going to disagree."

I fail to understand the concept of allowing the content (pornographic) to be published and then setting up a security system to keep the kids away from it.
The best way to kill this kind of problem is to attack the source.

It's all about ridiculous moral policing about showing people what is right and what is not after allowing all sorts of crap. Why don't you try to find sources of Pedophilia and save children which makes more sense and cut off the sources from where this kind of content is uploaded on to Internet? In this hi-tech age, is it so difficult?

Imagine a situation where India is to implement Internet Filter. I am sure Orkut will be one of the first ones to be filtered because it promotes hate groups. Apart from that, the so called unofficial moral police like BJP and Shiv Sena (Read this, this and this).

Sigh !!!

Year 2007 in words

I want to try and put some words out here which I can pick from Year 2007. This is not necessarily in the order of events of alphabets.

Shilpa Shetty (Thanks to Jade Goody)
Abdul Kalam
Disaster in Cricket World Cup
Lumbini Park
Panjagutta flyover
Narendra Modi
Google
iPhone
Web 2.0
Blogging
Sonia Gandhi
Rahul Gandhi
Merchant of Death
President and Astrology
Social Networking
Lord Rama and Ramsethu
Barack Obama
Britney Spears
Lindsay Lohan
Iraq
Sanjaya Malkar
Amitabh Bachan (The farmer)

Britney Spears - Most Searched Term On Yahoo

Another one from Geek And Poke.
Here is a hilarious cartoon on the subject.

Propose using iPod

The highlight of this post is this:

Best part is that some day this guy's kids are going to ask him about how he proposed to their mother, and they're going to be totally incredulous at the thought of an iPod that can only hold 20GB.

Commercialism killing music - Watch B4MD

Ran into this site:

BEFORE THE MUSIC DIES tells the story of American music at this precarious moment. Filmmakers Andrew Shapter and Joel Rasmussen traveled the country, hoping to understand why mainstream music seems so packaged and repetitive, and whether corporations really had the power to silence musical innovation. The answers they found on this journey–ultimately, the promise that the future holds–are what makes BEFORE THE MUSIC DIES both riveting and exhilarating.

I feel that it's not just American Music. It's the same everywhere. Record labels look for "marketable" and quick money making albums. Check out one of the latest "Outrageous" songs. But, a band like Mekaal Hassan Band does not get promoted enough.

Checkout the trailer:



Buy it here.

Tsunami

It's third anniversary of tsunami. May the souls rest in peace.

IT in India heading for a fall

Economist in it's post Is India's computer-services industry heading for a fall? talks about the challenges that India Inc. will face.

The reasons that they quote are:
1. Insufficient infrastructure
2. Talent shortage - India Inc. runs on man power.
3. Employee "jumping"
4. Competition
5. Future threats - American economy slump, automation

While I agree to all the points, I have few points to add.

Methodology and capability to deliver

Foremost challenge Indian IT giants face is the struggle to offer innovative solutions. Please note that I am not talking about product companies and only about IT services companies. I have not seen major application development deals being won on the basis of traditional methodologies. There is a lack of ability in solving new business problems.

All IT companies have "Onsite-Offshore model" and their proprietary "development methodologies". Essentially, these are all flavors of the same thing. All of these showcase the company's ability to deliver and how it can help the client go to market with reduced costs. But, you cannot see these IT firms pitching in for new technologies. Atlease not too many of them. If I try to find out, how many IT services firms India have expertise in ILOG JRules or IBM Process Server, there will be only very few who can offer solutions. Unless the client asks for a specific technology to be implemented, or a Software Products vendor recommends a services firm to the client, this never happens. There are CoEs (Center of Excellence) coming up in most of the IT firms to nurture talent and help innovation. But, the effectiveness has to be questioned. Also, the employees in services firms are so busy doing billable work that they hardly find time to spend on CoEs. However, there are new small firms sprouting all over India, trying to provide innovative solutions, but they do not have the nerve to hit big deals. Here comes the other factor, which I want to talk about.

Resources

The quality of resources have gone down. IT firms are increasingly relying on Non-IIT graduates, and offlate B.Sc, B.A and B.Com graduates. The justification is that these resources are cheap and the work that we have can be done by these guys. But, with this approach, how will you nurture innovation? Another aspect to the resources issue is career growth. After 2 years of industry experience, most of them wants to get into management side. This, either leads to employee leaving the company, or we end up seeing a lateral hire/fresher.

Quality of recruitment also have be inspected. 80% of the hires turnout to be just machines with no brains of their own. SOA is the latest buzzword. While you see sales team and architects suggesting SOA based approach, how many employees in an IT services firm understand what SOA is? How far can this organic growth go? With dollar value falling and rising inflation, how will we sustain the 10-15% growth in salaries?

Aquisition and merger trend

Yasu Tech bought by SAP. Wipro acquires AMS and Nervewire. Infosys acquires Expert Information Service. And the list goes on ...

This is a good strategy. Inorganic growth, no IT investment required, no more hiring required. Acquiring European firms will definitely help penetration into Non-English market. But, how will they face the challenge of integration issues? We have seen this time and again.

My project lead in one of my previous projects, had told aroudn 2 years back. Most of what we do now will be automated. We will end up becoming machines doing maintenance job. I hope not. All of this when Internet is facing a meltdown in another 3 years.

Biblical Images - Google Earth Style

Guess !!!
It's amazing.

Wipro to bid for Capgemini in Jan

Sudip Nandy, chief strategic officer of Wipro says:

“We would not want to comment on market speculation. Of course, we are interested in larger deals and aggressively looking for inorganic growth options,”

Another speculation in the making? Read more here.

Where do we walk?

If you are in Hyderabad, and do not have your own means of transport, I would like to know how you manage to walk around? In or around Panjagutta, I am sure, it is a nightmare.

Where are the footpaths? In the name of development, and road expansion, authorities have completely ignored pedestrians. One has to see the bus stop at Panjagutta and how people "try to stand" and wait for the bus.

Road to ISB was one of the best roads in Hyderabad with trees on both sides. But, 2 weeks ago, the trees were cut and is evidently an attempt to expand the roads. There was always congestion in that road, but that was not because of the road, but because of lorries and 7-seaters. It needs to be seen if there will be footpath available for people to walk.

Couple of years back, it was the same story with road from Jubilee hills check post to Madhapur. It was one the best roads that you will find. Even in summer, it was a pleasure to ride your bike or walk on that road. It was all planned with wide footpaths. Now, there are no trees. No footpath either.

I don't understand why authorities turn a blind eye towards this. Traffic has always been a mess in Hyderabad and imagine a situation where you have walk on the roads.

Pathetic !!!

Lost - Season 4 Trailer

It's back. I can't wait for it to start.
Oh yeah! I love LOST. Believe me. I saw Season 2 in 2 days. ;-)

New Face Of India

Apart from Tendhulkar, Shilpa Shetty, Sonia Gandhi, Sania Mirza (hmmm ...) etc., we have a new face in newspapers - Arindam Choudhari.

Most of the times, I see him on TOI. Now why Planman ads feature most of the times in TOI only, somebody tell me.

Arindam Choudhari is a marketing genius. He is conspicuous in the print media, but is conspicuous by his absence in visual media. He has his hands everywhere. Planman Consulting, Planman Motion Pictures, Planman Technologies, The Great Indian Dream Foundation(GIDF) and Planman Media is what I know of.

His awards include Example to Youth, Personality of the Decade and The Management Guru.

I admire him for GIDF and they have Tendulkar endorsing it. I have not read his books yet, but the theme is progressive. But I still fail to understand how he could get into directing a movie called "Rok Sako Tho Rok Lo". It was a disaster. I regret watching that movie and it's not something that you would expect from a marketing genius who is expected to know the pulse of the market. Roping in Sunny Deol was again a blunder on top of his blunder. I am waiting for his "The Last Lear" and "I M 24".

In his recent write up in TOI, he mentions the significance of marketing and it's role in converting a movie into a block buster. He, however, has mentioned that the story line has to be good (Is it a new piece of information?). Having seen a disaster like his first movie, you better get the story right.

Then, I googled for more information about him and then I dug out this, this, this and this. Ridiculous !!! Must read. I do not want to comment any further about it. The issues have been beaten to death.

As for IIPM, I came to know about it in 2002 when one of my friends joined IIPM. I was also an MBA aspirant and wanted to join a B-School in 2003 and tried to take his input. His input was not too great. One would imagine, after 5 years, IIPM would have grown in it's capabilities to generate better managers and get into a situation where it can compete with IIMs and other premium B-Schools. Well, even after the massive publicity campaign and marketing, I still haven't seen people saying great things about it.

Traffic: Initiative

Here is a blog each and every Hyderabadi should read. Actually, it's for everyone: Traffic in Hyderabad

Sameer,

Thanks a lot for taking the initiative. Not too many people do that. We crib and crib and crib, but to go out there and taking it face on is really commendable. You are an inspiration.

For people reading this for the first time, you need know that this initiative featured on CNN-IBN. See it here.

India !!!

We are an ancient civilization.
We are a young republic

40% of the population illiterate.
We are second largest producers of scientists and engineers.

Land where peasant organisations once attempted to close down KFC as a threat to the nation, where a former prime minister bitterly criticised the sale of Pepsi-Cola because 250 million of our countrymen and women don’t have access to clean drinking water.
Land which yet invents more sophisticated software for the world’s computer manufacturers than any other country on the planet

Place where bullock carts are still an indispensable mode of transportation for millions.
Place with one of the most advanced rocket and satellite programs.

A leading nuclear power.
A land where 600 million Indians still have no access to electricity and there power cuts in the capital of the nation.

Non-violence as moral principle.
Bloody riots since the time of Independence.

Bollywood, the largest producer of movies in the world.
150 million Indians are blind and cannot see movies.

10 more Indian names added to the top billionaires list.260 million people living below poverty line.

We boast of IT boom and adding 1 million in IT work force in last few years.
We do not have jobs for 10 million people added to work force each year.

*Courtesy: Shashi Tharoor

We take pride about our "CULTURE", and call this place a paradise. We boast about secularism though religion and caste still remains a sensitive issue which can burst at the drop of a hat. We have so called socialists who have bungalows and luxury cars. If we add up the worth of top dollar billionaires from India, it is more than GDP of most of the nations.

We have a long long way to go !
No point in changing political parties. What we need to change is the politics and administration.

There is always room for a BEER

A recent email I got. Must read.

A philosophy professor stood before his class and had some items
in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly he picked up a
large empty jam jar and proceeded to fill it with rocks, rocks
about 2" in diameter. He then asked the students if the jam jar
was full? They agreed that it was.

So the professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them
into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles, of course,
rolled into the open areas between the rocks. He then asked the
students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was. The
students laughed.

The professor picked up a box of sand and poured it into the
jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else.

"Now," said the professor, "I want you to recognize that this is
your life. The rocks are the important things - your family, your
partner, your health, your children - things that if everything
else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be
full. The pebbles are the other things that matter like your
job, your house, your car. The sand is everything else. The small
stuff."

"If you put the sand into the jar first, there is no room for
the pebbles or the rocks. The same goes for your life. If you
spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never
have room for the things that are important to you. Pay attention
to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your
children. Take time to get medical check-ups. Take your partner
out dancing. There will always be time to go to work, clean the
house, give a dinner party and fix the disposal." Take care of
the rocks first - the things that really matter. Set your
priorities. The rest is just sand."

But then... A student then took the jar which the other students
and the professor agreed was full, and proceeded to pour in a
glass of beer. Of course the beer filled the remaining spaces
within the jar making the jar truly full.

The moral of this tale is: that no matter how full your life is,
there is always room for a BEER.

Traffic: A Bane

My brother forwarded me an article by Shashi Tharoor in The Times Of India. I couldn't agree more with what he wrote about traffic.

Shashi Tharoor writes:

Is the bane of all Indian commuters. Chaos and crowds are hardly unknown elsewhere, but our extraordinary variety of means of transportation has long since outstripped the length and breadth of our roads, and the problem gets worse each month. And the constituents of Indian traffic make for fairly remarkable conditions. Only in India can one get stuck in a jam at a non-functioning traffic light amidst six Ambassadors in various states of disrepair, five Korean vehicles of assorted sizes, a Maruti almost crushed underfoot by a Tata Sumo, two minibuses facing each other both on the wrong side of the road, a tram madly if impotently ringing its bell, three buses heading in different directions with passengers dangling from the tailboards and from each other, six rickshaws, one autorickshaw with a broken silencer, a homesick cow, a small flock of goats milling about at the zebra crossing and some 300 pedestrians picking their way gingerly through the confusion. Exaggeration? It happened to me on my last visit to Kolkata.

Read more here

The Programmer Dress Code

Justin Etheredge writes:

I really want to know what it is about programming, or computers in general, that makes people want to grow a beard, have long hair, and dress like a slob. I can say these things without guilt because while I do not have long hair, I do have a beard and I do in fact dress like a slob. Not horribly sloppy or anything. I am actually pretty fanatical about hygiene, I just am not big on tucking my shirt in or ironing it or shaving. So who was the guy that started the unkempt programmer code of honor? [...]

Read the post here
PART 1
PART 2

My Tech Blog

I have moved my blogs about technology to Tech Stop. Going forward, I will be blogging about technology there. Do check out.

The Truly Scary Thing About Narendra Modi…

Read this : The Truly Scary Thing About Narendra Modi….

I do not want to say anything more.

Traffic menace

This is a traffic signal on my way to office. I had to go straight, but all the vehicles in front, left and right wanted to go right. I got stuck in this signal for 10 mins which I usually pass in 2 seconds.

300: Simpsons & Family Guy Trailer

This is hilarious !!

NBA TV Top 10: December 2

Watch for No: 1 by Kobe. Whew!!

Life in reality

I keep getting forwarded emails most of which I delete, but here is one that I found good:

There are two kinds of seekers who become interested in truth. One starts looking for scriptures: he may become a great intellectual, he may become a giant, but inside there will be darkness. All his light is borrowed, and a borrowed light is not going to help in the real crises of life.
I am reminded of a Christian priest who used to repeat in every sermon Christ's saying, "If somebody slaps you on one cheek, give him the other, too." Everybody
liked his sermons, he was quoting such great statements. But in one place a man really stood up and slapped the priest on one of his cheeks. The priest was shocked, because he had just been quoting Jesus. But anyway, to save his face, he gave his other cheek. And that man must have been a real rebellious type; he
slapped the other one, too. Now this was too much!

The priest jumped at the man and started beating him. And the man said, "What are you doing?" He said, "The scripture stops with the second cheek. Now I am here and you are here: let us decide this."

Borrowed scriptures won't help in actual encounters. In life there are everyday realities to be faced. In death the ultimate reality has to be faced. And borrowed knowledge is not going to help at all. The second type of seeker does not go towards the scriptures, but starts searching for a master

Hyderabad development

In relation to my post below about Hyderabad being on of the best places to live, here is one snap that I want put up. Check it out.

This is on my way to work.

Hyderabad is developing, but is there a way we can introduce something called common sense in people? Half the sand you see in the lorry fell on my car and that guy was not ready to give me way.

Wish they had atleast a buffalo's IQ. As for me, I have to clean my car.

Pain in the ***!!

Microsoft: Piracy

Recent post by Ina Fried (Microsoft: Vista piracy rate is half that of XP) on how Microsoft has reduced piracy by introducing more security features in Vista.

A post in Fortune a while back (July '07) narrates about Microsoft's strategy of tolerating piracy to increase the popularity and market share (in China ... should be true in Asia-Pac). They have the market share, but their long term strategy to tolerate piracy was to get traction and then translate it to revenue.

Reducing piracy will actually reduce the usage of Microsoft or may be prompt users to switch to Linux flavors. Apart from corporates, I have not seen huge audience for MS products. With rumors about Operating System under works by Google (Check this), it's time Microsoft starts sweating.

In addition to the pricing of MS OS, here is a snippet from CNET News which featured this post about ex-Microsoft employee moving to Linux(here) due to DRM issues.

Johansson said that DRM software is not only ineffective, but a waste of money that is damaging businesses attempting to use it to control the way consumers use copyright material
"How many billions has the industry spent on DRM schemes that the bad guys break in weeks? How many perfectly legitimate users has the industry annoyed and driven away? How many lost DVD sales has it caused? How many lost sales of Microsoft's Media Center software and Windows Vista has it caused because the DRM subsystem randomly decides that you must be a criminal?" Johansson wrote.

DRM protections have done very little to stop bootleggers from hawking counterfeit software, he wrote, after witnessing a bustling trade in pirated material on a recent trip to Asia. Johansson wrote that he is now contemplating using LinuxMCE to avoid further difficulties

Microsoft is popular in India just because of piracy. The moment Microsoft imposes stringent security measures(which they are trying to), they will see a drastic drop in users.

Government organisations in India are switching over to Linux and open source tools, and with various flavors of Linux available and the kind of education people get about Computers, they do not need professional help in resolving technical issues. Additionally, most of the users do not need technical support from the vendor to fix their issues. Thanks to Google again! You have access to vast amount of information.

Recently, ICICI Bank switched to Open Office. (Check here for the latest Open Office deployments here

MS is, of course, user friendly and has revolutionised the industry. With with the increase in number of users, they need to look at their pricing. If Microsoft opens up, the open source community will be able to take the product to higher levels and not rely on developers who are being paid to write software which they might not be even interested in.

Avial - The Mallu Rock Band

While you notice rock bands cropping up like mushrooms from all parts of India, rock in regional languages has not been getting huge traction.

Here is a band called Avial (website) which explores Malayalam rock which not many have done before.

Check their videos in You Tube. Here is one of my favourites.

Notebooks: DELL Vs Sony

I was reading a review about a budget laptop design.
It compared Dell Inspiron 1420 and Sony VAIO NR160. Factors that are compared are keyboards, profile and looks. It is, however, not a comprehensive list of factors that you would really measure.

My take on this:

1. Sony is easy to purchase in the open market whereas DELL is not. DELL leverages on direct sales. There are no DELL kiosks that you will find in any mall in India(atleast I have not seen any!)
2. Service centers for DELL are much easier to access as they have call-support. On the contrary, there are no service centers you can walk into.
3. Sony is overpriced like its other products(usually ... I have not had a good experience with my Sony Music System and Car Stereo)
4. With DELL, once you purchase with Vista, and later on if you downgrade it, they charge you more for support.
5. DELL can easily be customised online, but Sony is a bit rigid about that.

I would prefer DELL to SONY for its value for money and on call support. With SONY, I have not seen any presence in corporates the way it is for DELL, Lenovo and HP.

Yuo can read the original post here(Dell vs. Sony: Budget laptop design).

The author, in a way, recommends HP pavilion. Also, from what I have read online and seen until now, HP seems to be the one which satisfies the domestic sector with its high quality servicing.

HP is my next buy I guess ....

India's hooked !

If TIMES NOW is asking "Is there anyone who doesn't watch TIMES NOW AT 9 PM?", then what is the market share showing?
TIMES NOW as shown in the ad has 34% share. So evidently, rest of India is not watching TIMES NOW.

Making money out of Blogging

When I started blogging (or so called blogging :-)) I wasn't aware of AdSense which can be used to generate revenue out of what you write.

Well, my content does not seem to have enough meat as of now to take a step in that direction. But, while reading a few blogs about tips for blogging, I found its power when combined with AdSense.

Here is a blog by VIN (Here) which explains quite a lot about AdSense and generating money by blogging. (There is some JavaScript issue opening this blog but I guess it's just my machine.)

Check it out!!

Hyderabad - Best place to live?

I heard a discussion on Radio City FM today about why Hyderabad did not figure in the list of the best places to live in India. At the same time they were puzzled about how 5 cities from kerala got on to the list.

Here is an article Best cities to live, invest and earn in by Rediff.com.

It says:
--------

The best cities to reside are Kochi, Kozhikode, Shimla, Thiruvananthapuram, Mysore, Goa, Thrissur, Pondicherry, Kannur and Thiruvalur. Interestingly, five of these cities are in God's own country, Kerala. Shimla is the only northern city in this list, while Chandigarh, among the few fully planned cities in the country, failed to find a place.

The list of 'earn-in' cities has been topped by Gurgaon, followed by Silvaasa, Noida, Faridabad, Rupnagar, Chandigarh, Surat, Bangalore, Gandhinagar and Pune.

Indicus considered six parameters - health, education, environment, safety, public facilities and entertainment - for preparing the 'reside-in' index

Now about Hyderabad. The pic shown above is my way to office. If you look at the full image, you might be able to see something that looks like fog at the end of the road. Well, that's not fog, but dust. Pure dust. If I leave my house uncleaned for a day, I can start drawing on my floor or the TV screens for such is the dust accumulation in the city. I start wheezing if I stand in the smoking zone. My lungs are doing only 30% of what they should be doing. Thanks to Hyderabad and it's pollution and chaos.

Having lived here for over 4 years now, believe me, Hyderabad is not among the best places to live. If you are using a two wheeler to commute, you have a high chance of getting all sorts of bronchal issues by the time you hit 30 and if you have a 4 wheeler, your BP will pump up to dangerous levels. The city is growing, no doubt about it, but with it, the supporting infrastructure is not.

Here are some points.
1. There are no foot-paths in the busiest part of the city (a city which boasts of the best roads. It is assumed that pedestrians can fly)

2. The real estate and construction boom has increased the use of lorries right in the center of the city carrying mud with nothing to cover it with.

3. The worst traffic sense and if you are one those who stick to the traffic rules, man, you are the biggest fool.

4. Hyderabadis are color blind. There is no sense in having red lights at traffic junctions. Everything looks green to people.

5. Blame it on the development, there are no more grasslands near Madhapur and you should not be surprised to see a buffalo standing right in the middle of the road pondering about what YSR or Chandra babu Naidu could have done to make their life better.

6. If you need to get anything done which involves customer service from any vendor, you need to be ready to accept that the service personnel will come late. There is no value for time (I do not think that I found this issue with any other city)
......

I can go on and on but I better stop ...

Subprime meltdown

I was going through Niraj Juneja's blog(Industry Observer) and found this hilarious take on the Subprime meltdown. Check it out.

American Elections

I was going through Amit Varma's blog and found this:

Obama, Clinton, Dowd (Here)

Cleaning up the mess - Is it just the spirit of Mumbai?

Here is an example of the sense of ownership when the whole of India cribs about problems with cleanliness and slums.

Syed Nazima Amir Ahmed, 39, is a real case of leading by example. You can read the article here.

However, I do not agree with the whole mumbaikar concept. Of course there is a certain level of spirit associated with people in Mumbai because of their fast paced life and lack of time to mourn over the issues hounding the place.

It's not only Mumbai which needs people like Nazima. Look at Chennai, Hyderabad or any other place in India for that matter. We need people who can clean up the mess just for the fact that authorities are least interested in doing their job (what are they getting paid for??? Our tax is going waste !!!).

As for me, I have stopped littering. Not on my own, of course.

Changing the view - ;-)

This is my latest buy:

Samsung Bordeaux Art

It's pretty huge for my place, but it feels awesome to have something like this.

To go with it, ONKYO Home Theater.

Thailand trip

10/6
First thing you notice is the warmth in the people around. Very cordial and expressive. Once we stepped out, it looked so much like kerala. The weather, the place, the vegetation.

10/6
We were blown away by the resort. Amazing setup and ambience. Nothing like what we had thought of. We went to the Patong beach. It was not something that will impress you in one go. Sit on the beach and settle down and then you realise that you are in Phuket.

The shopping area draws your attention immediately by its color. You find everything that the US has offer. We sat on the beach, lurked around the street, drank and had amazing food. We were tired by then but excited at the same time thinking of our island hopping ride the next day. We had booked a trip to the Phi phi islands. We went off to sleep watching a show on muslim radicals and terrorism on CNN.


10/7
It was a day to look forward to and it lived up to its expectations. We woke up early, had an American breakfast and got picked up by the tour operators. We started off to Maya beach where the movie BEACH was shot. It was a stunning place. The experience did not end. Right after maya beach, we were off to monkey beach. It was interesting to see monkeys on the beach. We moved on to see the viking cave. A rocky island with a cave which opens up in to the sea. Apparently tourists are not allowed to enter the cave. From the cave the ride took us snorkelling. It was not the best place to do it but for first timers it is an experience. Well, my leg hit a rock and bruised. I came to know of it only when fish started gathering at my feet. :-) Snorkeling did not last for long as we were rushing towards Phi phi don for lunch.

The location was mind blowing and the lunch even better. Then it happened!! The boat ride from Phi phi don to another island 45 mins from there! It had rained during lunch and it was a cascading effect of the typhoon that hit Taiwan and Vietnam. I have heard about the effect of typhoons on the sea but we had a first hand experience on the boat. The waves were as high as the boat. It was a scary, bumpy ride. We reached a lonely island just for relaxing. The beach was a bit painful to walk on because of the remains of the reef on the beach. Suddenly we noticed few Indians staring at us and one of them was dressed like he was in the Hawaiian islands. And then we found that it was Ravi Teja, the telugu filmstar. :-) Off all the places, we found a telugu person in the smallest island in Thailand and that too a movie star dressed enough to embarass us in front of the people sharing our ride.

10/8
A day to relax. Nothing but relax. Had a lot of food. A bit depressing towards the end because we had to leave Phuket.

10/9
Reached Bangkok. Reached Amari atrium. It is advanced, technology-driven and the life is more like in India. Far better night life than the west (it's pathetic there). We shopped!


10/10
Birthday :-)

We went to the grand palace and Wat Phra Kaew. The Buddha there was amazing. Looking at it makes you feel like that is the topmost thing in the world. There is nothing above it. No videography is allowed inside the chamber. We could not see Wat Pho. It was wednesday and the temple was closed for some ceremony. Uma was very upset. Seeing the reclining buddha was one of her biggest wishes. We went shopping later at MBK again and did good amount of buying. We were getting the knack of bargaining in thailand. And it was time to leave.

Off to Thailand

I am writing this from the hyderabad airport waiting for the thai flight to bangkok. This is a much needed vacation. After slogging for so many months finally we are off on a vacation where no one can reach us. There is no headache of checking mails, no disturbance of a constantly ringing mobile phone. I write this for starters hoping to continue it throughout this vacation. First snap attached.

"THE AD"

I have always been a critic, but this one blew my brain off.

Recently, an ad has started to show up on TV. A person dressed in casuals?, formals?, well I don't know really what !! ... He is wearing a formal shirt, jeans, sneakers, a cap and icing on the cake, A TIE !! This guy is stranded in a desert and asks a guy for a ride. The guy lets him in and right then he starts talking about his company controlling the stock broking system software and informs him of a stock market crash !! Apparently, the guy giving him a ride is an investment banker !! He rashly pulls his car over in shock and then our "HERO" starts talking about how his company develops software for car safety and informs the banker that he is out of gas !! ... Is the driver blind that he needs a consultant to tell him that???

Best part of all, he gets off at a place where there is a chopper waiting for him. He says "I am going abroad for a Life sciences project." GIVE ME A BREAK !! ...

To catch a chopper, this software consultant (WHO IS IN THE MIDDLE OF A DESERT - God knows doing what !!) needs a ride. The chopper can't pick him from the place where he was stranded? Which company flies its consultants abroad in a chopper for any project especially when he is dressed in the weirdest attire ever possible?
I can't believe that the people who brain stormed to get this concept out to the market got paid !! How can a huge firm like that make such an ad which makes no sense whatsoever?

Westernisation

One feature in NAT-GEO about outsourcing and call centers was featuring a lady in her mid 40s. She was definitely Indian. But she passes a statement. "i was never much of an Indian because i have been following woodstock and beatles". Now my first question. What the **** does she mean? Second question. All the other rockers in India (she doesn't have any idea of the count), are not Indians? What is the big deal if you can speak in an American accent? You cant understand nuts about Indian culture. These people are the ones who bring shame to India.