Shyam's Blog

See his left wrist. You might just check his right wrist. If no wrist watch, then he got to be a s/w engineer! It is difficult to use the keyboard with the watch on the wrist. So, s/w tend to not have a watch at all. If at all they want to know the time, they have the clock on the right hand corner of their monitor. To verify this, I just scrolled through the office. Each one of them had empty wrists!

Do you know that? Well.., I know that too. Also, one more thing I noticed. No practise or out of touch made my kitchen skill go for a toss. After King Kumar (my dad) handed over Kingdom Kitchen to his Kumaara (me), the citizens are disappointed with the food being served. King Kumar was meticulous and precision perfect right from KOsamri to Kesari bhaath. I am making all 'kuusu mari' and 'kesaru baatu'. So tough to get back to ruling the kitchen! Coming back to the title of the blog - Practise makes MAN perfect. Why so? Why MAN? Why not WOMAN? hmmmm. As one of my friends says "sahavaasa alla guru..."

That was my first home address in the US. The house was behind the city's main bus stand which made it easy to commute to most parts of the city. The house in itself was such a raw home that no one would imagine a kind of that now! I am talking about Spring 2003. Here some highlights of that house. 1) No TV 2) No Microwave 3) No couch or sofa to sit on - all we had were camping chairs which were foldable. 4) No computer in the house - nobody owned a computer. So, no internet access once we were home 5) No vacuum cleaner - hence the place went unvacuumed nearly a YEAR! 6) No chopper/mixer in the kitchen 7) No latch in the restroom :(. We had to obstruct the restroom door when opened with a closet door 8) We were 4 roommates - Nobody had a cell-phone. We had one landline which was shared by all 4 of us 9) None of us owned a car - getting a ride from school or walmart was like luxury for us. With all these "No"s, life moved on without any issues. Now, all 4 of us live in a l...

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' aatak vuntu, lekkak illa ' - meaning, you are in the game, but not as full-fledged player; something like, unofficial player. We used this phrase a lot when we were kids. If a new kid (usually younger to us) comes to join us, and is not strong enough in the game, he is given this 'title'. He can get used to the game before he can be promoted as main player. This was handy in situations where that kid gets out in Cricket, still he is termed 'not out' because he was ' aatak vuntu lekkak illa '. Maybe after getting out couple of times, the kid, as a courtesy, will opt himself as 'out' because he was given a chance to be part of the game!

What is all that wave about Hari Puttar? I mean, Harry Potter! Will want to get some idea by reading/watching about him. I don't know why this million $$$ hype of this!!! Don't we have such stories/tales in India? Our grandma tales are as interesting as any other fantasy stories like these.

A drop of water is enough to create a ripple.

Mom made news - read here in my brother's blog .

NPR: 5-Second Rule Rules Click above and click on the audio to listen to an interesting discussion. This is about, "do you pick the cookie or chips which might slip off your hands on to the floor?" Here are highlights of the talk... "When the first kid is born, that kid is always given new one if something falls of the hand; for the second child, the fallen item is picked up and cleaned and given back to eat; for the third, 'just pick and eat' ". "It has to do with 'wet' or 'dry' item which falls down". "...depends on how people react who are in with you. They might think... 'aaaaaaaaaaah' seeing you pick something from the floor". "God made Dirt and Dirt won't hurt" - What an interesting phrase!

Sunday Special - Pani Puri It is a rare occasion to write a blog as the event unfolds! This is one of them. Dad's Sunday Special - Pani Puri. It started with a meticulous making of 'pani' and then making fresh puris. Dad was making this for the first time and he had to invite the God of all foodmakers - NaLa! This can be termed as 'aavaahanam'. Once he had done that he was ready to make anything just from the inner instinct and seventh sense! Why 7th? Because, first 6 have been taken up by others - First five are basic senses as we read in biology class and the sixth, taken up by Night Shyamalan; next is seventh, which I am referring to! Pani was ready. Curtain unfolded. Drama begins. Oh wait. Why did I tell "curtain unfolded"? In our kitchen, we don't have a real door to close to avoid food-smell and fumes to spread all inside the house. So, my dad came up with a curtain which is typically a window shutter available in Walmart or any home furnishing s...

Oh man! It is already 7AM and I am not ready for Social Studies final exam. There is so much to read and revise. I wasted my time watching a movie last night and then thought of getting up early to complete rest of the chapters. On the other hand, I am getting up late and the exam starts at 8. I think I can make it to the exam hall 15 minutes late and still do well in the exam. dhubbbbbbbb! Suddenly, I got up from bed to realize - This is not exam season. Oh yeah, even if it is, there is no Social Studies exam today. Oh noooo! I got out of High School more than a decade ago - How can there be Social Studies exam for me today? Finally, I thought, "Today is Independence Day, time to sleep longer". Very often I get this haunting nightmares of exams - especially Social Studies and Kannada exams. Why these??? Former, I hated the subject; latter, I always took it too light and used to open the book to read the lessons on the day before exam! Moral of the story for all kids - Prepar...

It is usual for us to think about, "during those days..." stories. Today's Malls in India are so huge and attractive that a family can spend the whole day inside - start with a breakfast, do some shopping, have lunch, watch a movie in the multiplex and then go home in the night. I think this is very much happening with many there. 10-15 years ago, there was no concept of "Malls". All we had were some big stores like the Kids Kemp. Apart from this store, a chain which caught people's attention was "LifeStyle". This is what we can call "Malls" of 1990s. Do you remember one more chain - "The Wearhouse"? That was becoming popular when we were in Hubli. That store was across the street from where we lived and we hardly bought anything there. I think all those chains didn't last long. Now, with malls like Forum, Big Bazaar, Garuda etc., coming up, I think shopping is more fun than ever before. Oh, the word "shop" reminde...

Anybody can use a computer - no age bar. Here is the scene - Dad in the US and mom sitting in India. They need to talk now. Talking over phone is routine - 'usmein kya hai?' (what is the big deal). So, I put a small twist to the tale to make them use the net for communication. Here comes my expert techie dad and novice techie mom. Why did I mention 'techie' to them? Yeah, they are techies now after having started to use PC. The PC back in India is disconnected from power and other wires. Why? Because, anytime, there could be extra super power voltage and destroy the system why nobody is at home for 2-3 months. First task of techie dad is to make mom connect them and Switch ON the computer. We are almost there! Switched ON the power. On this end, techie dad is like expert customer support guy who sits somewhere on the globe almost like blindfolded and tells the customer on phone to do 'that'/'this' etc etc. Mom: "hmmm, Something is displayed on the ...

Java and .NET were/are hot tools to develop web applications. Latest readings show Python being compared with Java. Python is a quick in a development cycle - meaning, just write the code and save it. Go to browser and refresh the page to see the changes. On the other hand, Java, needs the code to be compiled. Many such trivial benefits of Python is making it a easier tool than Java. Pydev is a project plugin to develop python projects in Eclipse. Above all these, Django - a latest (not yet released) Web Framework is the fastest of the three frameworks (RoR, PHP, Django). Here is the futuristic book ( online book ) about Django. Paper version of this is expected for release in August 2007. Continuing on software web development topic, the term pace is playing a major role. Pace has two angles - one, the pace with which the project proceeds to completion; the other, the pace/performance of the application when users/customers use it online. Managers want the project to be kicked off soo...

Talk of the day is about seista, or a small nap during the day. Latest researches show that people have 33% less heart problems when they take a nap compared to who don't. I really think taking a nap makes us fresh. Be it 10 minutes - it will be great to feel the effect of a good nap. Some said, they have long 12-hour days and a nap makes them keep their concentration for a longer time. Also, it is believed that performance of people who took a nap improved by 37%. Whatever numbers say, go take a nap if you missed it today!

A lawsuit on a suit! Meanings of the word "suit" ... 1) a set of clothing, armor, or the like, intended for wear together. 2) the act of making a petition or an appeal. So here is the Suit suit story involving a customer and dry cleaner. - Customer, a lawer by himself, sued the dry cleaner for not giving back his pants. - Dry cleaner says, customer had forgotten which color/what type/etc of the pants he had given and defends that customer is asking for wrong pants! Customer - immigrant from one of the Asian countries, is a lawyer. He thought he could sue and make a million bucks. Other lawyers had noticed his behaviour during his divorce case couple of years ago, which was indifferent. This customer, also filed saying, "am not satisfied" referring to the display, "Satisfaction Guaranteed" which was in the dry cleaner store! Court said - You will not be given a single penny! The "not satisfied" clause does not mean what he thought - it just means,...

Just read that Team India left for UK. This reminded me of 'my cricket days'. I mean, when I was an avid fan of cricket few years ago. Back then, more cricket was played by our team. Here are some of the matches/series still in memory. India-Pakistan match in Bangladesh in which Kanetkar hit the winning runs when India needed 314 to win the match. In this match, Ganguly had batted superbly to keep the run chase possible. The floodlights were poor and India had lost most of their batsmen. Kanetkar and Srinath were at crease when the winning runs were hit! India vs England in England – Kaif and Yuvraj did a great run chase to win the match. India were 5 wickets down for 100-odd. During this match, myself and my friend were on a visit to Kochi on work. We were watching the match in our hotel room and after loosing 5 wickets, we switched off the TV to go for a walk. When we came back, India was winning! India and Pakistan test match in Delhi – Kumble took 10 wicket...

This blog will go for a long discussion within me. If this is Chapter 1, there will be many more chapters to come till I make a decision. Very often, I get this question - "Should I go back?" If so, when? Sometimes I feel, I should. Other times, I don't see the need. This change of answers inside me is just swinging like a pendulum. I have seen people being in this phase and then finally deciding to go back. The end result is so much to take and give that it is a total change of life for someone who has lived outside India for nearly 5 years. Hasn't India changed in the past 5 years? Can I adjust to the latest society and trends? How is it to live in a busy city and work in an office 20 miles away from home. How is the work environment in India? I don't know have an answer to the last question as I haven't worked in India. What will I get going back to India? That is a touch question to answer too. In simple sense, I will get back to 'my' place - the f...

Bought a HP Tx1119US notebook. Looks kewl with Vista on it.