Maldives on verge of annihilation...

:) may be too exaggerated of a statement to use.... but these guys have insured themselves against inevitable deluge and are already looking for another place in the world... check the link.. "http://peakenergy.blogspot.com/2008/11/maldivians-looking-to-buy-new-homeland.html"

interestingly enough one of my distant cousin has just decided to marry a doctor there.. need to raise alarms i guess :)

Democrats vs. Republicans

looking at the electoral map of the USA showing reds against blues... wondered if the red i predominant rather than blue... well there is another way to look at that and that is found below... 

As Professor Newman points out,

“The areas of red and blue on the cartogram are now proportional to the actual numbers of electoral votes won by each candidate. Thus this map shows at a glance both which states went to which candidate and which candidate won more electoral college votes – something that you cannot tell easily from the normal election-night red and blue map.”

source : http://www.britannica.com/blogs/2008/11/2008-election-map-standard/

further reading : http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2008/

U.S. astronauts cast votes from space

this is something i hadn't expected ...

..Mission Control at Johnson Space Centre in Houston, Texas shipped digital ballots to the space voters, and local election officials sent passwords directly to them. The ballots were returned, encrypted, via Mission Control...

source ... "http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/news/2284/us-astronauts-cast-votes-space"

Vande Secularists!!!

Sadhvi pragya and new face of Hindu fundamentalist turned terrorist raises yet another vertical bar on which our current society stands today... of course societies used to stand on the pillars of education, governance,tolerance,law and order,culture etc etc...

So, I have an idea to give a right balance to this current order by bringing up Secular Terrorists. They are no one but those who has no God behind. May be they are atheist but most importantly they are the ones who hate those who kill those belonging to other side of the line.

So this is the way i m trying to create a balance in power where all the terrorists groups (Muslims, Hindus, Secularists, why not Christians, Sikhs, Zoros, Hebrew etc and yeah Buddhists .. they too have suffered enough on hands of Malaysian Junta or Chinese Imperialists) have there way in society, politics, and of course education. And, so we have all these groups trying to bring in right order by killing all those who don't believe in them or those who have brought in woes of despair, humiliation, atrocities to them.

i can go on writing what should be the ideologies, agenda, action plan etc etc if the new face of Secularists, but i shall restrain myself in over indulgence of hate plain drafting... bye

Bye Bye Monsoons...

zigzagged lightning patters over the dark sky visible from a 6th floor balcony of my Mangalore apartments... no better sight to have a laptop right ahead and start writing. The thunders have died down and so has the rains. The only spectacle remains is the blazes flashing around every 2 second or so. This is the retreating monsoons of southern India.
First thing they are not the threatening streaks of lightning which would rip apart anything downunder. They are simply sprawling across the 2 dimensional sky and are absolutely beautiful!! They are the left overs of the thunderous storm that just passed by and i am just enjoying the farewell, watching the absolute white streaks saying "sayonara". This is how wonderful the mangalore weather and this is why I would never cease to love the place.
It had all started last Thursday afternoon. The heat had over powered us. So was the fate of the studies i m still bound to. With my balcony facing westwards, I could see almost clear horizon at the distance with tiny flashes of saline water reaching my naked eye. It was pretty sight as it meant the monsoons clouds will no more block the beautiful sunsets. But alas, the winds starts gathering some speed and so does the the black clouds over the northeast sky. The baneful clouds with the silver linings were approaching slowly and dreadfully.
In no time, the clouds had taken over the Mangalore sky with little hope of any clear sky and clear horizons. The day was the last day of the navratri festivals or to say the dusshera. What better occassion to celebrate the festival with cool winds buzzing through.
This is the time of the year mangalore streets witnesses the rally. The rally of the dancing tigers, ruthless rakshashaas, swirling fire balls and pompous lights. All this while, the folks and devouts carry there idols for visarjans. The processions are beautiful and extravagant (pretty much for the city which sleeps at 10).
Only thing which is marred in the whole affair is the street traffic which ofcourse was the last in the planning list for the city cooperation babus. This is what reminds me the date that day was ofcourse 9th Oct. Greater details on the significance of this day later though.
Well the time is - to put off laptop and go to sleep for i need to ofcourse go work every morning. Good bye Monsoons... hope to see you soon!! :)

TV shows come to YouTube... but alas

since when has internet also become bound by nation boundaries?
When do we see same programs in India?

Bubble Gum...

read the conversation the author has put forth between him and IIM investment banker in US...

http://www.hindu.com/mag/2008/10/05/stories/2008100550010100.htm

excerpt "
Flashback to year 2003:

Me: Why do the banks sell these home loans to you guys?

Rohit: Because we allow them to keep a significant portion of the interest rate charged on the home loans and we pay them upfront cash, which they can use to issue more home loans. Otherwise home loans go on for 20-30 years and it would take a long time for the bank to recover its money.

Me: And, why does Lehman buy these loans?

Rohit: Because we get a fat commission when we convert the loans into CDOs and sell it to investors.

Me: Who are these investors?

Rohit: They include everyone from pension funds in Japan to Life Insurance companies in Finland.

"

Ingenuity of the markets -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mzJmTCYmo9g

Secret Passageway...

before it fades away...

mickey world was a famous games cum hangout parlor in Navi Mumbai. The place we reached out to escape. The place the fun meant that the only competition is the virtual demon controlling those games. It was (and may be still is) over the Gupta sandwich waalah (vashi sector 17). The place is not great 50x50x50 meters area, but suitable for a 20-30 teens or a preteens to keep their heads busy in.

I had been to this place (not many times but yeah have had fun) and had my earnest fun (sounds ironical.. well yeah fun sometimes for me is this way). So I am here after 5 years of gap and 2+3 years of college and job. I await the chaos and thrill .. the exulted expressions and few proud guardians watching over. I guess, the time must be evening 4pm when i reach the place. The regular watchman and the hustle, both are absent. May be the time is 4 and day of the week is 4(Wednesday). I ignore, the expectation still doesn't fade away until i reach the place and open the door!!!

The place has turned into a ghost room. Neither are those machines blinking neither are there any joyous faces. There is no one. There is no one stamping there foot (either in joy or anger). There is no one queuing up for the those tokens to play again. Strangely, the machines and the counter still present. I couldn't be mistaken to have come to wrong place at wrong time. This definitely is the place and there is definitely something wrong. What's wrong? The place simply was shutdown with low turnout and revenue and consequently niggling between the brothers. (yeah i found this out when i did find the watchman downstairs).

Now, the time was to redo the place. Redo the stroll and redo the experience. It all has to be in mind but with the memories and experiences as sharp then, nothing dies down so easily. So I walk in again only to find the the superheroes dashing machines on my right and cop acting upon the bank robber on my left. Further walk down, it was the place for popcorn and soda. Yeah of course, the steering wheels with which I vroomed virtual cities. Oh come on, how come kids don't enjoy this anymore??

The place is deserted but the items and brink surrounding them still in place. The partition always use to halt my way but could only manage to wiggle my whim by 1 mm, next moment i had my friend calling on to buy more coupons before he runs out of time 6....5..4.3!!!

But this time i was alone and i could see through the partition and the back door. I chose to take step forward rather than sway right. I creaked in and kept moving in. The passage is lit but dim lit. This is inviting to those who take on invitation for anything but the weddings and engagements. Walking in, there is no thought but to keep walking and of course keep that fist geared up in case someone tries to act smart. Well in dark corners anything could take place and anything could go wrong, why take chances (at least my fist will be safe). The passage leads to another door which swayed open just like that (no it wasn't the wonderland, nor was i Alice to keep toggling to get the key and open the door.)

The room next was again lightly lit but awesomely bright. The place is justly embellished between the like a chandelier gushing out to all corners and candles filling in bare necessities. The place has cubicles but of the size of rooms. I rolled my eyes to disbelief of the architecture. The columns were no where!! Just that one large space with nothing holding it. If only they had managed to keep the boundaries out of sight, the room would have been such that trees and birds could live in harmony. The decor was of course amazing with the fine cubes partitioning the place into many rooms. Those partitions were wood and carved with "i don't know wat!!". Know what, it still felt amazing and beautiful. Colors and carvings were not following a definite pattern but they were symbolizing anything or may be something. The symbols were of sunflowers, crayons, footballs, fishing nets, sunset. None of these were actually there to be interpreted as mentioned. I guess i assumed them this way.

Now, now what ... I had to enter one of those rooms and check out "whats going on???". Another thing.. footsteps never seemed to have no sounds. I wonder, was it just by chance or were there sensors nullifying any sound. It accompanied, those computer beeps and peeps. I wasn't thinking about this when i entered the the room. I was wondering who is this playing games here!!

As soon as i enter the room i find things which i haven't seen ever before. Not unless you have seen the 42" sized PC monitor with its keyboard (cordlessly attached)and huh?? third component missing (CPU). Amazingly, the ubiquitous wirejams were huh MISSING! not even to the power plug. The eyes went past that and the guy(whom i did notice before but can take a back seat now) was playing the intense graphics game. He lets me play that and i realize no way this could be played on my PC. So what is this guy running here...

Well the guy briefs me (well this happens only after he himself gets over initial shock of "who is this?") .. briefs me about the the high end stuff he has procured for in-house testing for the processor giants. They give away a complete assembly to test those quadras and tetras here. I actually didn't ask further, except for the controls to the game...

When i was leaving from the place, I met up with few more who carry out there secret operations in secret community and have fun with those thunderous counter strikes!!!... yeah so while i was leaving the place i realize that i have never felt this good since the time we (I and Tanbir) bumped our bicycles into heavy stream near Nazira(Assam).

Those were the days when the we looked out for the secret passages everywhere. The places hidden to our horizons, places beyond our imaginations, places closest to us. So where are those places, or where are the new kids going to look out for new dreams and new friends and new ghosts. Where will these guys find their caspers?

Future Shock personified

Go through following links and see if it scares u ...

Future Shock -
http://speedbird.wordpress.com/2008/09/11/thoughts-for-an-eleventh-september-alvin-toffler-hirohito-sarah-palin/

Women from no where -
http://www.economist.com/world/unitedstates/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12066224#top

The sane world...

As i was watching Forrest Gump and was asked by roommates whats this about .. i tried to sum this up ..

"how only an insane (with his jenny) could survive through sanity of the world around" ...

How he made it past - the shackles of polio, schools of sane, college of brights, Vietnam war (by and for the sane world), Hurricane Carmen and Shrimping venture...

How he could only be in trust with few -
Mrs. Gump (because she did let the stupid do as stupid does),
Jenny (because she didn't believe there is anyone who could be trusted.. not even herself),
Bubba (because he had no dream but to dream about shrimp),
Lt. Dan (because he could not understand if the Forrest was curse or the blessing to him)

What Forrest never understood -
"Who I'm gonna be? ... Aren't I going to be me?"

How Forrest sums it up -
"Now, because I had been a football
star, and a war hero, and a national
celebrity, and a shrimpin' boat
captain, and a college graduate, the
of fathers of Greenbow, Alabama,
decided to get together and offered me a fine job"

Re:Hey! whos this?

nope it doesn't exactly work as that... this feature is only available for users in US and for some odd reason it was enabled for me and now it is not.. but still i m able to access to that for i had sent link to one of the albums to my friend on that day... so click on that link and all those features are there for ME :)

Hey! whos this?

Remember those old albums sittings with your friends answering them who is this and who is that?? and answers use to be ... well thats my mom and yeah thats my cousin sister .. :)

So gone are the old days of rolls and prints and so are the ways to communicate. So here is the application from google Picasa Web Album. I am sure you must have used it ...

Ask it to process all your photos and there you have it, it has recognized all the faces in all the photos for you. So now your only work remains is to take that face and name it! And what next, well it is mostly able to sort all the similar faces but on the places it is confused - it simply asks you to name it. Well out of some 700 faces i saw they 699 were actually faces of people except for one which it could not recognize well. So its 1:699 buggy :)

So there you have it, all the people in all the photos right at your finger tips. And of course the Google tries to associate each name with ur contacts available with google and we have these faces identified with friends, family and colleagues in Orkut or Gtalk or Gmail ... man just like that!!

Beware of those faces you may wonder who are they??? ... well those are petty by standers or hawker or a beggar roaming at remote corners of your photo.

Another thing, i am not sure if it can recognize animal faces yet. But yeah try that out.. may be it might just :)

In my case i m almost done with my current set of photos and have named each and every person i could find. So with that, whenever i go to a my album i have list of people recognized alongside the album ....

Another thing ... this is addictive. The UI and interface is so snazzy that you may just keep naming all of them without realizing how lost at time you are ...

So what are you waiting for ... go to "http://picasaweb.google.com/home"