You don't say anything

*** You don't say anything ***

You look so great

but you don't say anything

I see you everyday  

your eyes meet my eyes 

but you don't say anything

I wait and can't wait 

till you say a thing

wrote you a stupid mail

still you don't say anything

I like you very much

even you don't say anything

let something happen between us, anything !

*** Vijay ***

Orange Thing

I am extra careful about commitment to any object, especially big object in my life. So when it comes to "owning" something that is :

• Big, heavy weighs more than 500 Kg.
• will need lot of money to keep it going.
• I will be responsible for carrying it around everywhere I go without feeling embarrassed.
• I will be responsible any of it's mistake.

I had to do lot of research. Which I did.
I am now proud owner of Orange (not the fruit) TATA (let me complete) Nano (almost done) Small (finally) Car. Don't believe me, here is the proof:

Orange and Flowers, in Green Backdrop

First impressions:

• Good choice as first car (when you are not sure of your driving skills and you are wondering how you really got the driving license).
• Compact, easy to drive, park on narrow roads.
• Spacious
• Bit noisy (in first and second gear), but not annoying.
• Brakes are not very quick, so you need keep extra distance at high speeds.
• Suspension is OK, be ready to feel every pothole on the road.

Next episode (How did someone passionate about public transportation tuned into a car driving idiot, with no passengers, struck in traffic jam?), stay tuned ...

Marathi Poems

काही दिवसांपूर्वी संदीप खरे आणि सलील कुलकर्णी यांचा "आयुष्यावर बोलू काही" चा जुना कार्यक्रम टीवीवर बघितला. खूप छान कविता आणि गाणी आहेत. संदीप खरेच्या कविता कुणाला आवडत नाहीत. त्याच्या कवितांचे पुस्तक आहे माझ्याकडे.

म्हंटल आपणही करावा प्रयत्न कविता करण्याचा, मनातील भावना व्यक्त करण्याचा. काहीशी अपूर्ण अशी आणि थोडीशी बोल्ड अशी कविता साधार करतो :

 "कोणीतरी"  

कोणीतरी माझ्या डोळ्यात बघून हसावे, लाजावे
कोणीतरी माझ्या केसांतून हात फिरवावा, कुरवाळावे
कोणीतरी ठेवावा माझ्या हातांवर हात, ओठांवर ओठ
कोणीतरी म्हणावे "तू माझा मी फक्त तुझीच"
कोणीतरी, जिच्यासाठी मी जगावे, मरावे !

Comfortably Numb

Have you ever found a place/scene that is similar to something you saw in your dream (that you never forgot) ?

There is no pain you are receding
A distant ship, smoke on the horizon.
You are only coming through in waves.
Your lips move but I can't hear what you're saying.
When I was a child
I caught a fleeting glimpse
Out of the corner of my eye.
I turned to look but it was gone
I cannot put my finger on it now
The child is grown,
The dream is gone.
I have become comfortably numb

(Pink Floyd)

shopping in Hyderabad

Went out for shopping. Reliance trends, Shopper's Stop and other shops are Begumpet, just on the sides of the main road, 4 - 5 KMs from Marredpally. Traffic was okay from Marredpally to Begumpet.

Overall shops are less crowded and prices are reasonable. I got Sandals, could not get Eicher map.

Just looked up for FabIndia address, it is in Banjaraa Hills area, so may visit if there is some work in that area.

मला मराठीत लिहायला आवडते

मला मराठीत लिहायला आवडते. गुगलचे तंत्रज्ञान वापरून मराठीमध्ये लिहणे सोपे झाले आहे. पण अजून blogger.com मध्ये मराठीत टाईप करण्याची चांगली सोय नाही. हिंदी आणी इतर काही भाषा आहेत.

मग मी कसा लिहतोय? गुगलचीच एक सोय वापतोय. आशा करतोय की, मराठीमध्ये लिहणे आणखी सोपे होईल. शेवटी काही गोष्टींवर लिहायला आणी वाचायला मराठीतच मजा येते. समजा मला आईच्या (किंवा तुमची बायको असेल तर)  हातची पुरण पोळी किती छान होती हे सांगाचय? किवा मराठी चित्रपट गीत, संगीत आणि कवितांविषयी लिहाचय? मराठीत लिहायला आवडेल ना !

Nice Person

परवा 'रंगत-संगत' हा कार्यक्रम पहाण्याचा योग आला। उर्मिला मातोंडकर शी गप्पा, संदीप खरेच्या कविता आणि बेला शेंडेची गाणी।
उर्मिलाचे व्यक्तिमत्व खूप सुंदर आहे, अष्टपैलू आहे। खूप छान मराठी बोलते। तीने एक गाणेही गाईले। खूप पुस्तकांचे वाचन केले आहे। मजेशीर अनुभव सांगितले। 'सत्या' मधला तो शेवटचा scene, त्या वेळी बाहेर खुप गोंधळ चालू होता, तरीही तो अवघड scene तिने कसा केला। आपली तत्वे आणि विचार याला महत्व दया असा सल्ला ही दिला।

I hope to see her talent in coming days.

I felt it

Yesterday early morning, I felt it (magnitude 4.9).

Source: http://earthquake.usgs.gov/eqcenter/recenteqsww/Quakes/us2008xace.php

Brand Equity Quiz 2008

Yesterday evening I attended Brand Equity Quiz 2008. It was hilarious. Quiz master Derek O'Brien has great energy and sense of humor. He looked so funny in 60's costumes. Good Pune crowd (around 500) and really great teams (total 30 I think). First round eliminated all but 7 teams. What followed was great rounds of quizzing (the theme was how quizzing was done in 60's, 70's ...till 2008). Finally TCS team won.

In first round, there was a question "So and so is called an ___". Fill the blank. One guy from audience raised his hands and said pension. Bad English !.

Here are some funny one-lines from Derek.
"Right answer. The team looks surprised at that."
"Everything I say today, just take it personally."
"I was going to give 5 points to that team for talking about figures and things of that sort".

One guy won whopping 3000 Rs for knowing that umbrellas are sometimes called "gamps", mainly in Britain and another one won big amount for recognizing a clip from recent 3rd class Bollywood movie (who said bad movies are bad for you).

Good to see Jug Suraiya (he writes in Times Of India and has a comic strip called Dubyaman) and his wife Bunny come on stage.

I was more than happy to see lots of sponsorship. I think spending advertising budget by sponsoring quizzing event is just a fabulous idea. You can already see me talking good things about sponsors like Kingfisher (who sent air-hostesses so beautiful that I almost fell in love) and Nokia on my blog (you get an Idea). Given the extraordinary content of my blog, I estimate trillions of people read my blog :).

I think right now companies are spending (wasting?) their advertising budget on TV (those crap channels who broadcast pictures of bus hitting a donkey as national breaking news) and Cricket. Online advertising and budget optimization will take some time to catch up in India. My point is there are lots of venues/possibilities for effective use of advertising budget. This is even true because India is distinctly different from west when it comes to buying habits and influencing factors.

"You are just 100 meters away from this. Get down at next stop."

For example, imagine I am going from Powai to Brandra by BEST bus (in Mumbai) and when bus reaches near Hiranandani gardens, wouldn't it be nice to display advertisement of newly opened shop in Hiranandani. Just in case Olive Garden decides to open in India. Do not forget me when you use this idea :). Point is think about targeted advertising, agreed it is tough and challenging, but isn't that a good thing.

My mouth is watery. BTW appetizer in the picture is Bruschetta (Olive Garden) . I had it one Italian restaurant in, surprise T.Nagar, Chennai.

Small Cycle Tour

Yesterday I completed a small tour (13.24 miles i.e. 21.18 Kms) on cycle. In case you cannot see map embedded below, please try this url.


View Larger Map

New Year, New World

It's a new world
It's a new start
It's alive with the beating of young hearts
It's a new day
It's a new plan
I've been waiting for you
Here I am

('Here I am' By Bryan Adams)

Saturday Morning and Powai Lake

Saturday morning, woke up around 8.45 AM, decided to have tea and donuts at Cafe Coffee Day and then go for jogging inside IIT.
I thought that I could easily walk from CCD to IIT, would be good idea as there is always traffic jam on that part of the road. However after getting to CCD, I realized that it's too much of a distance to walk, wish they had small road which goes over the lake directly into IIT, would be nice to cycle/jog/walk on a road over the lake.

Spent some time at Powai lake, nice water, enjoyed cool breeze, could see IIT building and RENAISSANCE hotel. There were bunch of boys swimming in the lake, don't know what exactly they were doing, finding pots, wooden buckets etc, probably thrown in the water in last week Durga Visarjan. This is of course a bad practice, throwing idols, plastics and other things in the water.



Saw few worker digging ground adjacent to road, for laying cables, mostly manual, even picking big rocks, can they not use machines? I saw similar use of primitive manual saws by workers clearing the trees on the road where I live.

Last weekend I cycled from my house to the CCD, via Mahakali Caves. There is small pass (kaccha road) which joins JV link road, before SEEPZ flyover. It was a challenging ride.

Bicycle

My office is around 1 km from my home, getting auto rickshaw is not always easy, because autowallas sometimes refuse to go small distances. I have been thinking about buying a bicycle and use it to commute to office and go on long rides on weekends.


So finally I got Hero Hawk. It's light, fast, single gear ratio, no springs and no problems so far.

Yesterday I managed to cycle from my home to Vile Parle (E), market, Dinanath Mangeshkar Natyagraha.

(Photo Source: http://herocycles.com/boyz.php)





I was wondering how much power do I produce when riding the bicycle and how I can measure it. I need to measure crank rpms and torque. For time being I have following figure showing typical power produced by cyclists.

If I assume peak power of 0.2 horsepower, it's (0.2 * 745) = 149 watts.

(Image Source: http://users.frii.com/katana/biketext.html)

According to article at above URL, you need multiple gear ratios to deal with different slopes.

Rain and Books

(Source : http://www.imd.ernet.in/section/satmet/dynamic/sector-vis.htm)

(Source: www.weather.com/maps/maptype/satelliteworld/indiasatellite_large.html)

If you sitting at home due to rain outside (this is likely to be the case if you are anywhere in the western Maharashtra), and want to spend time reading, following is list of books you might find interesting.

• A Mighty Heart By Mariane Pearl and Sarah Crichton



• Indira By Katherine Frank

(Book cover link to Harper-Collins Publishers India)

Mumbai Rain

Yesterday (June 23rd 2007) huge amount of rain poured in Mumbai. In the evening, I went to IITB bookshop hoping to get book '(Matrix Computations by Golub et. al.), I should have checked forecast before going out.





At around 7.30 PM large dark clouds gathered in the sky and huge downpour started. I was carrying a umbrella, started walking towards the gate. I decided to go back to home as soon as possible and picked an auto rickshaw.

There is lot of construction going on starting from IIT main gate till hiranandani and Navy training institute. There are no signs "Under construction", so any driver new to the area, its dangerous driving especially in the rain. I saw a car tilted with its left hand side tires beyond the left border of the road. Due to huge level gap car tilted.


There was water everywhere on the road. Near Cafe Coffee Day there was huge amount of water. We were worried about possibility of auto rickshaw breaking down due to water getting into its electrical system. Thats exactly what happened.

I got down, help driver for some time and later got into another auto. To cut the story short, I finally reached home safely, full wet. Two more places to note down where there was water logging are, link road before SEEPZ flyover, and in front of Akruti Center.

Lessons learned :

• Check local forecast for possible thunderstorms before you venture out in the city.
  
• Do not expect much (overestimate) of roads/infrastructure in general, at least for few more years.

There is lot of good work (road,fly-overs, underground drainage) done, but lot remains to be done, and at some places its not up to to the mark. Is it possible that there is lack of enough competent civil engineers?

Learning Photography, Cricket

Today afternoon, saw few cricket matches between local teams. I took my camera (Canon PowerShot S2 IS), and experimented a bit with its functions like exposure, shutter speed, and aperture. Took some black & white photos.






I am posting couple of photos, which I think are good. I could not really experiment much with shutter speed and aperture, may be later.

Victoria Memorial Architecture

Its made of marble.
From official website of Victoria Memorial, page on architecture.

"The building is 184 ft high upto the base of the figure of Victory, which is another 16 ft high. The groups of figures above the north porch represent Motherhood, Prudence and Learning. Surrounding the main dome are figures of Art, Architecture, Justice, Charity etc. The Memorial is situated on a 64 acres of land with the building covering 338 ft by 228ft."



On the top of dome is 16 ft high statue of angel.
On left hand side is photo of angel being made in Italy (around 1920). (source: http://www.victoriamemorial-cal.org/architecture.html).
Few months back I read in the newspaper that the angels statue actually used rotate (around verticle axis), however now its struct because of some mechanical problems.

Coping with Chennai weather

May has started, yet another hot, humid day in Chennai, temperature are high, traffic is congested, autos/buses are not air conditioned. By the way there are not many cabs available in Chennai.
It really affects your productivity and limits things you can do on weekends. I am looking for some tips to cope with the extreme weather, here is my list (mostly of obvious things), your ideas are welcome.

# Short Term

• Buy good sun glasses and cap to protect you from UV rays, glares etc.
  
• Wear cotton clothes, shorts, deodarant.
• Drink plenty of water, fruit juices, milk shakes.
• Avoid going outdoors between 11 AM to 4 PM, especially to high traffic places like mount road. Basically hot vehicle fumes are no good for your eyes and lungs.
• Do not underestimate the weather, it can get extreme, read weather reports and contact meteorological department if required, to plan your activities.
  

# Long Term

• Get good air conditioner for your office and home.
• Air conditioners are no good without electricity, power outages are not rare, so consider installing portable power generators, or solar power.
• Keep in touch with relevant government departments and advocate them use of solar power. If we don't do this then we deserve power cuts.
• Talk to your representatives in local government, demand for more trees, parks, air conditioned public places, in buses, suggest solutions, ideas.
  

I am curious about engineering solutions which can harness solar power to keep temperatures of whole city low, a kind of artificial winter Is is possible?

Ain't no cool breeze when she's gone
It's not fresh when she's away
Ain't no cool breeze when she's gone
And she always gone too long anytime she goes away Ain't cool breeze when she's gone
It's not fresh when she's away
Ain't no cool breeze when she's gone
And she always gone too long anytime she goes away

See original lyrics by Bill Withers.

Kahn, Gandhi, Simplicity

I got opportunity to meet Soha Ali Khan, on flight to Mumbai. She was nice.

Me (nervously) > Excuse me, can I get your autograph?
Soha > Sure
Me (still nervous) > thanks
I got my diary and pen for her to sign
Me > here
Soha > what's your name?
Me > Vijay, V-I-J-A-Y
while she is signing
Me > I haven't seen any of your movies.
Soha > Huh
Me > but I have read article written by you, one about your stay in Italy, it was good, I liked it.
Soha > Ok
Soha > Watch Range De
Soha > Range De Basanti
Me > Ok

She was cool. Good luck Soha !

Attended National Conference on Management Science and Practice at IIM Ahmedabad. It was good. I talked on airport ground service teams scheduling.

Need to follow up on some presentations on lp/mip formulations, job scheduling, excel/VBA apps.





IIMA campus architecture is so simple, beautiful, brilliant. Use of bricks (instead of lot glass and steel), no colors. Old campus architect is Louis Kahn.



Later we visited Mahatma Gandhi's Sabarmati Ashram, on the banks of Sabarmati river, around 10 Kms from IIMA.

Panya

Panya was in Kolkata for office work. He impressed me with his knowledge and insights on stock markets, mutual funds etc.