Lady at the airport reading the Gurbani on her iPad. In Gurmukhi. Any time you feel there is a barrier to mass technology adoption, remember that the barrier is in your head. People will continue to do what they've done for millennia, and figure out ways to use new technology to do it better.
First Charlesbhai Darwin said I'm an evolved monkey. Now Jeremyseth England says I'm just a glorified thermodynamics system that's maximising the amount of energy it dissipates.
If such is the case then why bother? Sab maya hai. Why strive for a better world? Why build new and awesome things? Instead, I should head for the Hills and work off all these accumulated calories inside of me. Obey the underlying laws of physics, we must. Dissipate energy and increase order in a chaotic world, not go around creating 'disruptive' innovations.
Photographer friends, need camera recommendations. Urgent, only have tomorrow to buy. Tushit, Rupam, Alistair, Bhaskar, Umesh, help a friend in need.
+ portability is important. I still have a painful shoulder. But I am considering an SLR this time. Point and shoots don't do justice to the locales I visit.
+ mostly outdoor nature photography. Different light conditions.
+ photographing kids, usually not in motion.
+ indoor events. Often in dim lighting. Need to take photos from the gallery. Videos would be nice.
Not much flash photography. No closeups of flowers and stuff. I already have a tripod.
Innovation and achievement requires high risk capital investment. Would the east-West railroads have been built without the accumulation of wealth in the hands of the few?
With the rich becoming super rich in recent years, VC activity has also increased.
When I deride the 1%, do I bite the very hand that feeds me?
Listening to Gulzar Sahab's music. Chugging along in a train that follows a winding stream through the Sierra Nevadas. Looking out the window at the snow and tree clad mountains. Enjoying the feel of the warm sun. Photographing quaint salons in remote mountain towns.
For this, I must put up with so much. Its worth it. Life is good.
Republican woman in the dining car: We Americans are taking care of the world. That's why we're fighting so many wars.
Noise canceling headphones: 0
Snoring pig in the adjacent seat: 1
This is gonna be a long night.
Note to self: when you drink three large cups of coffee in one day, you must balance it out with two pints of beer to prevent a sleepless night.
Oh look, a tunnel.
Utah has the nicest people in the world. Hands down. No wonder LaDon moved here.
Americans dig dinosaurs, it seems.
Waking up to a view of majestic mountains. I'm having a little competition with the boys here... Shantiniketan versus Salt Lake City.
I think they're winning hands down!
Just another Tuesday morning at Salt Lake City.
Attending SaltConf15. Any of my friends here too?
Because I came all the way to the top of a mountain in driving snow, in crazy weather, to basically bust my ass, I'm gonna bore all of you with horrible selfies. What else am I gonna do? I'm not skiing. And there's signal. And my phone is apparently snow proof.
Also, white people be crazy. How is this supposed to be fun? Or safe? Or healthy? Or sane? And then when we brown people ride on top of trains all these westerns go ohmygodthatsbatshitcrazy.
Apparently there's crazy amounts of UV here. My photochromatic glasses just dialed themselves up to 11. But its not even bright.
Continually amazed by the beauty of the place and the warmth of the people here.
I can say from experience - those bears be dangerous. It takes a lot of guts to do what those folks did.
Easily the most stunningly beautiful panorama that I've ever seen when landing at an airport.
If this is how high altitude deserts are, then I've surely been missing out by not visiting Ladakh.
Snow and salt, here I come!
Folks with skiing and snow adventure experience, please do guide me. What can I do for two days in Park City? I have no real experience with skiing or other snow activities.
Attending SaltConf next week at Salt Lake City. Anyone else here attending or in the neighbourhood?
http://saltconf.com/
Why are bagels?
All of the following discoveries/inventions were made by the same scientist:
* The Haber-Bosch process for Nitrogen fixation - multiplying world food production many times by enabling the production of chemical fertilizers.
* The basis for the theory of adsorption - enabling us to make all manners of purifiers, and understand how virii and the human body work.
* The weaponisation of chlorine, phosgene, and mustard gas. He was a proponent of chemical warfare till his death, and personally oversaw the first deployments of chemical weapons 100 years ago by Germany in WW-I.
This was my WTF moment for the month! What do you do about the legacy of such geniuses, who simultaneously committed themselves to both good and evil? The Haber-Bosch process is vital to international food security, and is mentioned in every high school textbook in the world. Are we honouring this mass murderer by teaching his name? Can we right this wrong by renaming the process and purging his name from textbooks? Does rewriting history change history? Does erasing him change the fact that half the Nitrogen in my body will continue to come from a process he invented?
http://chemicalweapons.cenmag.org/who-was-the-father-of-chemical-weapons/
Your daily dose of inspiration... err, perspective.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buqtdpuZxvk
Unfortunately this behaviour/fact only reinforces the popular Indian belief that no one can achieve greatness without committing sins on the way up. Most Indians firmly believe that all rich/powerful/famous people, whether they are politicians, businesspersons, saints or movie stars, have committed wrongs on the way up, and now that they no longer need to commit sins in order to maintain their positions, preach goodness to all.
Aam Aadmi Party, you are seriously overdoing this. It's like Arvind Kejriwal is a pop idol and you guys are his tween fans. Oh look, Justin Bieber likes bananas!
Pictures of a person meeting people. What is this place, Instagram? It's getting a bit Justin Bieber-ish now.
Someone actually managed to make watching cricket interesting!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFPxSn69pcc
I have BSNL and Airtel DSL lines terminating on the same host in Gurgaon. If you ping/trace one from the other, packets are routed through Chennai! Airtel does not peer with BSNL or NIXI! Instead it hands over traffic to VSNL (TATA), which hauls them all the way to Chennai and then hands them over to BSNL. I have an ugly feeling that Bangalore also figures on this journey. BSNL's retail broadband operations are headquartered in Bangalore. It is quite possible that they route all their broadband traffic through some core switch in Bangalore, for billing/monitoring/big-brother purposes.
$ tracepath 117.198.121.150
1: localhost 0.297ms pmtu 1500
1: airtel 0.903ms
1: airtel 0.891ms
2: airtel 1.050ms pmtu 1400
2: abts-north-static-072.220.160.122.airtelbroadband.in 40.439ms asymm 3
3: no reply
4: aes-static-005.68.144.59.airtel.in 33.364ms asymm 7
5: 14.141.116.89.static-Delhi.vsnl.net.in 32.105ms asymm 6
6: 172.31.17.5 84.003ms asymm 7
7: 14.141.139.146.static-chennai.vsnl.net.in 115.703ms asymm 8
8: 218.248.235.141 117.483ms asymm 9
9: 218.248.169.41 113.957ms
10: 218.248.169.41 118.894ms asymm 9
11: 117.198.121.150 150.196ms asymm 10
12: 117.198.121.150 154.696ms !H
Average RTT 118ms
Oh wait! Before we jump to the above conclusions, let's try the reverse journey, BSNL to Airtel:
# ip netns exec bsnl tracepath airtel-global
1: localhost 0.186ms pmtu 1500
1: bsnl 5.377ms
1: bsnl 5.675ms
2: bsnl 5.784ms pmtu 1400
2: 117.198.120.1 47.735ms
3: 218.248.169.38 68.787ms
4: 218.248.235.130 46.593ms asymm 5
5: 218.100.48.20 57.748ms asymm 6
6: 182.79.255.101 186.722ms asymm 8
7: no reply
8: no reply
9: no reply
10: abts-north-dynamic-007.3.68.182.airtelbroadband.in 155.566ms asymm 11
11: abts-north-dynamic-007.3.68.182.airtelbroadband.in 156.832ms !H
Number 5 is NIXI Delhi! Hurrah! Average RTT is 123ms for this path. What? More than when we were using TATA? I suspect something is amiss in the handover from NIXI Delhi to Airtel.
Hey guys! Is anyone around SF today? I'm going to be in the city today. Planning on visiting Chinatown and participating in some walks of the city.
http://sf.funcheap.com/valentines-day-walking-tours/
Hey guys! Is anyone around SF today? I'm going to be in the city today. Planning on visiting Chinatown and some walks of the city.
Now here is something I feel very dearly about. There is nothing that any political party has done for the Bhopal gas tragedy affected people. Nor can the AAP, for that matter, while ruling Delhi. But it is heartening to know that the AAP gives the gas tragedy affected some hope.
Paid versus Earned!
हो गया भइया पाँच साल केजरीवाल। अब बदल लूँ अपनी profile picture?
मगर अब बदलने को जी ही नहीं करता। क्या छप्पर फाड़ा है भइया!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTCairp1FVk
Just collecting memes for Tuesday. जाने ऊँट किस करवट बैठेगा।
I think the smartphone really changes the game for public involvement in government functioning. With a high quality video camera in their hands, citizens can capture videos of police brutality, corruption and malpractices, and force the government to take action, force politicians to react.
Whether it is racial profiling and violence by the police in the US, or electoral malpractices in India, a viral video ties the hands of the cops, bureaucracy and overall legal machinery.
What CCTV could not achieve in 45 years of existence, smartphones+social media are achieving in 10 years! Long live the network effect, and the power of the common man!
या हा हा हा हा हा! आज मोकाम्बो बहुत खुश है! अब जन्ता जागेगी और चोर जेल में सोएँगे।
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Z3vxaaeUPo
आज दिल्ली फिर से इतिहास रचेगी
IIT Madras sends me a survey. Has a question about how many hours you work per week. It starts at 40 and ends at >100. Really? The minimum an IIT grad is supposed to be working is 40 hours/wk. What if I've, like, made it, and I don't need to put in that much work to survive. This whole notion that hard work (as opposed to working smart) is critical to your existence is absurd. And the whole survey is all about pushing students to work harder, spend more hours in "academic pursuits". But guess what... the world is changing. And there's more to life than just slogging on acads all your life!
I'm in the mood to send out postcards and letters again. If you want postcards with philatelic stamps on them, please send me your full postal address. Cheers!
(representative pic of a postcard for those of you who have never seen one)
Had a one-minute chat with a chaat vendor at India Gate last week. The hafta that policemen demand from vendors at India Gate is Rs. 100 a day, Rs. 200 on Fridays and Saturdays. I asked the guy if AAP would come back to power this time too. He gave me this incredulous look and said, "Just now I told you the hafta rate, didn't I? That much every poor person will save every day. Then how will AAP not come back to power?" He later confirmed that there was absolutely no hafta paid during the 49 day AAP rule.
So according to my one-person survey, AAP has a 100% chance of winning Delhi :p
When you've wanted something so hard for so long that you can no longer recall how hard and how long you've wanted it. When you've dreamt and wished for something awake and asleep. When, after years and years of trying, you've given up all hope; but you still try once in a while.
And then, in one magical moment, it all just works, so easily and suddenly as if to mock your years of struggle and pain.
When Rakesh called out, "Sir, it worked", I didn't turn around to look immediately. I needed time to hush my beating heart. For those of you who've worked with me on this, you'll know what it is if you look hard. For those who haven't, let it be a mystery :)
National museum is a regular hangout spot. On the far right, Lord Buddha's actual relics, and dude praying to them. On left, sculpture and budding artist sketching it. Both chaps were completely oblivious to folks wondering what they were up to in the middle of a museum.
Weaponised Mallu jewellery!!! At the national museum.
E-charkha
These kids find something interesting wherever they go...
Lovely food. Fond memories. Come here for the coffee. Stay to meet fellow book lovers.
दिल्ली की सर्दी में cozy
"Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right."
- Foundation (1951) by Isaac Asimov
Happy Birthday, Asimov. And a big thanks to the unknown benefactor who flooded my school library with his books. Without them I would never have survived the trauma of high school.
Mission accomplished... 700 km from home
तीर्थ
My grandfather would have been so proud that I could bring the boys to Sutlej Bhavan. This is where one of modern India's proudest achievements, the Bhakra Dam, was born.
Seen in the picture - Panchsheel principles of peaceful mutual coexistence adopted inside this structure; not being followed outside by the current generation.
Joy of being in the first row. The performance comes to us...
जित्ते ख़ैर मंगदा सोड़याँ मैं तेरी
दुआ ने कोई होर मंगदी
Living the good life
It's going to be snow time for the kids
I'm going to miss 2014...
Wild child
Take the kids to see pk they said. Only UA certificate they said. Hah.
Successfully explained to the boys why condoms are embarrassing to many. No lies. No embarrassment for either party. Goggle eyed only they became with new and interesting knowledges.
http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/breaking-down-news-to-each-their-own/99/
Eye candy for nerds and patriots. This beast is gonna take Indian astronauts to space. And it just test fired and reentered successfully. Go ISRO.
Christmas carnival craziness!
Thought provoking Sunday morning read on education in India. Concise yet covers a wide spectrum of issues. Pallavi Phatak, if this is the kind of work you do for a living, then you must have a very fulfilling life.
http://m.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/beyond-the-language-tussle/article6665681.ece/
Was just a witness to workplace harassment. A waitress turned up at the bar to mix a drink. The DJ started playing Baby Doll. The bartender turns to the coworker and says 'hey baby doll'. No response. He repeats himself. She simply ignores. Within moments her drink is mixed and she's gone.
This shit happens man. And it happens so fast you don't even know how to react. She was just serving me at the restaurant and went out of her way to help me choose a good vegetarian dish. And now suddenly this.
All this years I've only heard of workplace sexual harassment in corporate trainings. Never thought I'd experience it in such an in-your-face manner. And just sit there goggling and do nothing.
