a dream..

What's your name?
Sunny

How old are you?
(an enquiring glance at his mother, responded to by a giggle)
i don't know...perhaps 9

What have you made?
A house

Whom for?
simmi didi (name changed)...she is ill so I thought I will gift her this house on Diwali
(the mother pitches in) this will bring her good luck and good health.

Did anyone ask you to?
No

From where did you get all this cardboard?
They are making a house next door. A man there gave it to me.

Who gave you all this wrapping paper?
I bought it from my own money.

What do you mean your money?
The money I get every now and then on festivals etc.

How much did you spend?
(proudly) Rs. 40/-

That's a lot of money!
(the smile gets wider) I had collected it since Holi

How long have you been making it?
1 month.

But why did you spend all your money on this?
So that simmi didi gets well soon

Do you really like her that much? Is she nice to you?
She lets me play with her video games and gives me her old books to read.

Do you know how to read?
Yes. I learned my tables, and alphabet in school back at home. I also know counting till 200 and I know how to write my name.

Do you like to read?
Very much

Then why don’t you go to school?
Mother says she has no money and the schools here charge a lot of it.

(Once more the mother speaks, this time she can’t help crying) My son is very bright. We had come to delhi so that he could go to a better school. Now I don’t have money to send him to school , or to go back. I don’t know what to do.

What do you want to do when you grow up?
(still smiling) Earn money and go to school.

When was the last time you or I gave up practically everything we owned and put in so much of sheer effort to do something so selflessly for some one else ? This rat-race…is it really worth it?! Can we not stop armchair politics and actually do our own little bit to make this world a slightly better place? Is it really that impossible a target to achieve?

I couldn’t go on after the last question, and till date I cannot shut my ears to the answer. Can you???

Jab We Met

2 words. Pretty enjoyable. After a really long time, I saw a hindi romantic comedy I actually liked. The protagonists, Shahid and Kareen, carry off their roles with a natural panache, making you feel that no else could have possibly been a better fit. While Shahid looks custom made for this role of a lost-in-love oh-so-lovable millionaire (though I do feel the essential vulnerable element was somewhat missing from his character), Kareena plays the bubbly, cheerful full-of-life 20-odd chatterbox of a girl with unaffected ease and simplicity. Club it with the only other role where I found her irreplaceable till date, the unforgettable "Poo" of the otherwise tear-jerker epic, Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gum, and you understand why people say she can steal the limelight at any party.

Not to forget of course, that a movie is made by an entire team and a single element cannot be examined in isolation. So, if Jab We met is doing well at the box office, it’s because of its simple plot, sensible execution, identifiable characters and a great script.

And that brings me back to my quest tonight. After a really long time, I saw a hindi romantic comedy I actually liked. The last movie I remember thoroughly enjoying was Bheja Fry (though it fell in a different league of comedies). And before that Pyar Ke Side Effects. All the 3 movies had 3 things in common – identifiable characters, real-life settings and great scripts perfected by their seeming simplicity.

Now, I am not a movie critic or an expert of the field but I am what makes or breaks a movie at the box-office; the general public and a movie lover at that. And yet, in a span of over a year and a half, I have thoroughly enjoyed only 3 light-hearted movies. This, amidst an entire flood of the likes of Dhols, Dhamaals and Golmaals, not to mention the better-forgotten-continued-miserable attempts at comedy by Priyadarshan, whose definition of comedy has somehow come to be pathetically limited to huge star casts and loads of forced confusion desperately trying to make the audience laugh, after perhaps a chance hit with Hera-Pheri.

What is so difficult about making a comedy that is so impossible for our movie-makers to comprehend anyway? And why only movie makers and comedies? Take our TV serials for that matter with their never ending supplies of the tulsis and the parvatis , who give up their careers, their education and their dreams, even their clothing preferences the day they get married, clad themselves in heavy banarasi sarees and 2 inches of makeup 24-hours a day and devote their lives to saving their thankless families from the ever-impending disaster and the continued plots of the even-more-heavily made-up “vamps” . While the “heroine” turns into a 20-odd looking woman playing a 5-times divorced (at least) 52-yr old tycoon grandmother of half-a-dozen adults, in her quest, the “vamp” never tires in the face of defeat and with her slick planning and ruthless execution leaves you thinking that perhaps Osama isn’t such a bad guy after all.

Ok, so, tired of senseless TV and sleazy comedies? Turn to the news. And what do you see, a “breaking news” coverage of which saree Aishwarya is wearing on Karwachauth and how many bangles!!!! Flick to another. “Aishwarya will be celebrating her diwali with hubby Abhi…” . And another. “Aishwarya celebrating her birthday in Agra with …..” WHAT!!! Is there nothing else happening in this world?! Or is our world restricted to Aishwarya’s personal life ??!! And when the media is not drooling over some or the other celebrity, its busy encashing a disaster, asking a poor blast victim lying in the hospital, obviously in pain, “So being a victim..how do you feel…??” ???!!!!!!. Whatever happened to “news” as we knew it!?! The media that provoked an entire nation to fight for freedom. Whatever happened to the Power of the Pen?! What saddens me even more is that such sleazy sub-standard movies, mindless serials and junk news sells. BigTime!

Now I am not a cynic, nor am I one of those people who drool over the USA. I consider myself a sensibly positive and an intensely patriotic individual. And I am saying all this not despite of my patriotism, but because of it. For a country that boasts of soaring GDP, stock markets and intellectual prowess, we can do so much more and so much better than 3 good comedy serials, 2 serious News channels and 3 good romantic comedies in 1.5 years !!

Explanations awaited

Despite all my senses rebelling hard and strong, screaming of fatigue, I had been forcing myself to concentrate on my screen and at least finish the task at hand. After about a half hour of relentless struggle on both sides, my senses, with my eyes leading their front, won. I shut my laptop and moved out of my room. And suddenly it hit me. The air outside was perfectly still and calm, as if at the advent of a storm. Laced with the fragrance of lilies, almost bitterly mixed with that of wet cement and sand, the night felt like a strange mix of eerie and heavenly. Almost as if drawn against my will, I went to take a walk.

An early October night, the on-spring of the much awaited dussehra-diwali festive season as well as the much anticipated harsh yet-not-to-be-missed winters, I wasn't walking exploring new arenas. Everything looked as it should have. The ubiquitous silence and stillness could be attributed to the reasonable assumption that everyone must have been out, celebrating a stray holiday in the middle of the week, hence explaining the lack of any famous soaps sounding off TV sets, the noise of loud air-coolers, even the regular parking and reversing car alarms. Logically, everything made sense, and there was nothing wayward. And yet the night's touch felt only faintly familiar. The stillness of the night had enveloped the entire neighborhood. It was only 8 PM, and though the markets outside must have been bustling with people, the absence of human life in the area seemed unnatural. Even the stray dogs, which never fail to make their presence felt, seemed too quiet, too meek for comfort. A sudden chill made me shudder. I instinctively pulled my jacket closer and hastened my step back towards home.

Suddenly, at about 50 meters away from my comfort zone, power went out and I was engulfed in complete darkness. “Just a power-cut; no need to over-react!” I convinced myself. Then, I heard footsteps: calm and deliberate walking towards me. I hugged myself and gingerly looked around. A neighbor, walking towards his home, with his dog, looked at me and passed a courteous smile. He seemed unfazed, almost enjoying the dark and still night. Needless to say I was scared, and the fact that he hadn't been anywhere around a few moments ago didn't help. Clutching my racing heart, I smiled back weakly, and walked as fast as I could to my home, sometimes breaking into a sprint.

As soon as I reached home, I stopped dead in the tracks. The front entrance was ajar, the house pitch dark and hauntingly silent. Pushing the main gate further, I treaded silently inside, and went straight up to my room. It was locked. I knew I hadn’t locked it. I fumbled for my set of keys in my jacket, I didn’t have them. More baffled than ever, I went downstairs and tried the door to my LG's room. No one answered. I pushed the door open. The room had a 100% power backup and yet was as dark as outside. Taking a deep breath, I fumbled for the switch, put one foot out and let out a gasp....the deserted room's floor, which had been intact till the afternoon, was missing. The entire room had been dug at least 3 feet.

Praying hard that the digging was due to the ongoing renovation, I was about to turn around and go to my room, when I thought I heard the sound of running water. Maybe someone had left a tap running, and I had missed the sound before. I turned it off. I had walked barely 20 steps away, when I heard the same sound. This time it was a different tap. By now things were getting too much for me and I was nearing complete panic and frenzy at an alarming speed. There was no one around. Something told me the tap wouldn't turn off. With trembling hands, I turned it off. At almost the same instant I heard the sound of water starting from somewhere else. I muffled my scream, dropped the candle and ran upstairs to my room...

But the nightmare wasn't over yet. My room was no longer locked. Not knowing what else to do I threw the door open. This room, just like the rest of the house was completely dark. I flicked the emergency backup lights on. Everything looked as I had left it, thankfully. My rapidly failing rationale and courage weren't equipped to handle any more surprises.

So here I am, sitting on my bed, typing my fears away in the light of the

laptop screen, running on battery power. I am pretty convinced that power will be back soon, and so will the people in my house and that everything has a logical explanation, the locked front door and my room, the absence of people in the entire neighborhood, including my house, as well as the malfunctioning power back up and plumbing. All the movies also show that the paranormal world has a liking for thunder and lighting. And that ghosts don't really show themselves on still clouded early winter nights, but I have locked my room nevertheless. ..…Just in case…

smiles are free...so give them away ... :) :) :)

arz kiya hai...
aashiq wohi jo maashooq ke haathon qatl ho jaaye
uski friend ke haathon marne waale ko toh
pati kehte hain ;)

extracted from tpb-arz-kiya-hai

IF-2

another one of my favorites in the IF series
[IF]

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!

--Rudyard Kipling


If ...the most powerful two letter word

practice makes a man perfect...women are simply born perfect ;)

nice repartee ;) my work ofcourse :P, though im not sure if it was original , i think not, :P so i guess i cnt really tk the credit or creation, though timing was perfect :)

but jokes apart, do we really seek perfection...we always keep saying oh, this would be so perfect, i wish this could be perfect , but do we really want things to be perfect? are we not always looking for something that has gone wrong somewhere?? i think we do, coz if we were really looking for perfection, then just like happiness, we can attain it as a state of mind, at any moment that is good, you can always, or at least sometimes choose to ignore the missing elements and say "ah! this is perfect" ...then why don't we ...or do we and i have just missed out on the observation part, i dont know about everyone, this isn't something that i have really observed a lot of people on, maybe because i have never, for as long as i can remember, wished or wanted anything to be perfect...i feel that perfection is boring and stagnant, because if you are perfect, you don't have anything else to become. you can't grow any better, so either you die of stagnation or start growing worse..so in that sense, may be perfection is even detrimental, its not a good thing to achieve, its just a very good thing to aspire to become,

perfection is like life, its the journey that matters, the end is already decided.

IF-1

If you think you are beaten, you are.

If you think you dare not, you don't!

If you like to win, but think you can't,

It's almost a cinch you won't.

you think you'll lose, you're lost;

For out in the world we find
Success begins with a fellow's will;

It's all in the state of mind.

If you think you are outclassed, you are,

You've got to think high to rise,

You've got to be sure of yourself before
You can ever win a prize.

Life's battles don't always go
To the stronger and faster man,

But sooner or later the man who wins
Is the man who thinks he can.

---i read in school, guess it kind of holds :)

ok, so here's a question...what turns you off in someone .... the most common response I have ever heard to this one is "Hypocrites" .... I mean please!! give me a break!! who likes hypocrites? and yet, who isnt one?? tell me one person who doesn't lie, cheat, fake , one person who isn't a hypocrite and i'll tell you of a pig who flies!! havent you ever lied to your parents that u had extra classes and gone out for a movie? didnt you ever smile and swallowed an unedible piece of food some one made, just so you wouldnt hurt their feelings? didnt you ever tell your boss/clients
that you agree, when you couldnt disagree any more? didnt you pretend to be fine and put up a face, when inwards the only that kept you from screaming was the fact that you had company? ...

bottomline...everyone lies. everyone cheats. and yes, not saying anything may prevent you from lying, but that doesn't mean you are not cheating..you still are. coz someday, if the information you withheld is found out, it'll still inflict the similar kind of damage ...so why is it that we have such difficulty accepting it? why is it so hard for us to look deep within ourselves and admit, even to ourselves, our own shortcomings? and why is it that the only outlook with which we ever introspect, is to learn and improve...overcome our shortcomings..why?? why not for once can we accept ourselves the way we are, and feel ok with it?? but then , wouldnt that mean that being a psychopath was ok, that you could scrape the nails off people's bodies after murdering them and feel ok about it...well, i guess its once again about drawing a line, balancing things out, differentiating between right and wrong , good and bad, which are subjective for every person and yet governed by generic rules of the society, so that people may co-exist perhaps even happily..

so while you and your friends n family may accept your urge to get mad and scream at times, dont give your boss the chance to present you with a card to address management lessons ... ;)

smiles are free...so give them away :)

Generation Gap??!!!

You Are Totally Like Your Mom

You and your mom are practically clones. You think alike, and you even seem to read each other's minds. You're definitely you're mother's child... and that's just fine with you.

Are You Like Your Mom?

God i so love my mother!!!

heard this one...

har kisi ko muqammal jahan nahi milta
kabhi zameen kabhi aasmaan nahi milta...

well i always used to think that this was incorrect
that since nature balances out evthg,
its not possible for sm1 to get evthg in life so it should actually be like

kisi ko bhi toh muqammal jahan nahi milta

but now i feel that maybe i was wrong. maybe the way nature balances out things is to tk away evthg from sm ppl and give it to others. or mayb its ur own perspective. after all happiness is a choice. just tht for sm ppl, its always a hard choice tht they forcefuly hv to mk. sm ppl find reasons for happiness easily while others hv to go looking desperately and then perhaps settle for simply a faint light at the end of the tunnel.

so may be it is true, ....

har kisi ko muqammal jahan nahi milta
kabhie zameen toh kabhie aasmaan nahi milta

just a thought

Everyone is looking for validation from the outside world. no matter who you are and what you become, no matter "how much you believe in yourself" , nothing makes you feel as secured and sure about yourself and about what you are doing, as does acceptance from the people around us. And by that I don't mean only friends and family, but people in general...the greater the number of people appreciating us/our deeds, the better we feel about ourselves/what we do. So then I guess believing in yourself holds only till you complete whatever you have at hand, against opposition, with only this one thought that what you are doing is right. But how do you define right.
Princeton defines right as correct: free from error; especially conforming to fact or truth;
Now, if right is only that, which is fact and truth, then why would there be any opposition or the categorical and emphatic need to believe in yourself? Maybe because right is also something beyond truth & fact. Its your own personal belief, and foresight and loads of other things as well. And that is why the definition of right differs for every individual. And also because at times for reasons of their own, people oppose what they know is right.
So you believe in yourself, in what you think is right, and do that. And yet, the main driving force, for most of the people most of the times, is that in the end others would see things their way. and Validate them. In the end, we just need others to agree with us, thats all that matters.

Strange...I think I just went around a roundabout...didn't I?!!!

see...I always

Your Personality is Very Rare (INTP)

Your personality type is goofy, imaginative, relaxed, and brilliant. Only about 4% of all people have your personality, including 2% of all women and 6% of all men You are Introverted, Intuitive, Thinking, and Perceiving.

How Rare Is Your Personality?

told people I am not insane and I don't need to go to an asylum...I am just too rare and most mortals can't understand me :P :P ;) ;)

Its ironical

,...that everytime I want to tell someone that they make too many typing mistakes, I end up typing,
"you mkae too many tpying mistkaes"

not to mention that I always spell Worng -> as Worng (instead of worng...see what i mean, I cant help it 8-|

first day sightseeing in London-Part2

(...Continued)

The tower of London

We took a guided 2-hr long tour and then wandered in the castle for another 2 I guess. The guided tour is given by , what are called the beef-eaters, though I don't remember why...not that the guide himself was very clear about this...but in reality, they are the castle's protectors(for the lack of a better adjective), who must have served in the British army for at least 25 years (If I remember correctly) and have (obviously) an impeccable record! So you see, being lead around the castle by men you know are highly accomplished had me completely awed, right from the start. The tour was nice, filled with history and loads of light hearted humor, and covered a brief overview of the castle and its (nearly) 1000 yr old history. Then my friend and I had an ice-cream before starting our own excursion ;P .

We first saw the White Hall Tower (the main palace - and now quite expectedly a museum), which had around 3 floors displaying arms and ammunition from different periods of a 1000 yr old history.

Next came Beauchamp Tower( which mainly served as the prison), and more of a tower actually than the earlier one, it had a marrow staircase leading to the chambers where, at different periods throughout history, people of different stature, class and historical significance, were held as prisoners, most of them before facing a ruthless and a lot of times, unjust, execution. The walls of the chambers were filled with carvings, ranging from mere initials-inscription to elaborate works of art, probably done by people who were held there for much longer than the others. These carvings in this tower, the ammunition in the earlier one, the execution site inside the palace where the queens were executed mostly on charges of infidelity-termed-as-treason against their kings, the mere thought of so many deaths, so much blood-shed for power, left me quite speechless. And though my next destination was to be the bloddy tower, where supposedly 2 young princes were murdered and their skeletons found centuries later buried under the tower's staircase, I decided to take a break from so much death and go instead to the Jewel House.

The Jewel House is the museum displaying all sorts of jewels related to the tower's history. I actually saw a 530-carat heart shaped diamond!!! And I thought I wear diamonds!!! It was so huge that my eyes are still aching :P and the Kohinoor( well a third of it at least). :P H aving taken that relief, I went back to the bloody tower, but sadly it was closed by then. :(

Its strange, the effect such history and war ridden forts always have on me, the sheer magnitude of things and place, the sheer size, the way time seems to float away into centuries...and how I always wish I could see even one of those moments for real...I guess that happens to everyone...

Anyways, I guess I was really pensive and quiet after that as my friend and I walked across the Tower Bridge, so he just cracked a few jokes, took some pictures of me on the bridge with the Thames in the background , then we just walked n walked n walked n walked along a small dockyard on the other side of the bridge, somewhat in circles, ;P looking for a nice coffeehouse . We didn't really like anything, and came to a place where we walked straight down to the river,. just a direct open walkway down to Thames. It was the closest I got to the river, and but for the very slippery stones, cold and violent waters, and my friend's fears that I was still not out of the whole Tower of London experience and might just decide to jump-in :P , I would've gone closer and touched the waters :P

We then walked to Globe Theater, saw more ruins of some palace and a very David-Copperfield style stoned street. It was just a beautiful moment that I cursed my camera for having run out of batteries just then!! Had a nice refueling tea and lots to eat at a nice riverside restaurant inside the theater premises.

Back home, with a phone that had gone completely dead, I dropped off to sleep, dreaming of the next day and a new/working phone :P

dont-ignore

allright, so I got this fwd. and maybe it was the fact that I had been working for over 16 hours non-stop, that I temporarily lost my senses and actually decided to read through an true-predictions-don't-ignore forwards before deleting it! :P

But I am glad I did, because by the end of reading through the article I was laughing so hard that the only reason I didnt fall off my bed was the laptop sitting on my lap ;) ....in case you are wondering why, here is the mirror image of the message, no technically mirror image, but you 'll see what I mean

AMAZING/EXCELLENT/GREAT kisser : Scorpio, Aries, Aquarius, Leo, Cancer, Tauras

atleast 5/12 people in this world are great kissers. The rest 7/12 need classes...hmm, good business idea for the highly priviledged 5/12th ?? can be started with zero capital investment ... ;)

Their Love is one of a kind. Silly, fun and sweet/Have own unique appeal/Rare to find : Libra, SAgittarius, Gemini, Pisces, leo

so 5/12 of the ppl in this world are rare to find...where are they all hiding?? I wonder if they have together formulated a unique formula for love , so that it remains "one-of-a-kind" ;P

Loves being in long relationships : Scorpio, Aries, Aquarius, Leo, Taurus, Sagittarius, Capricorn

wow ppl!! that more than half the world's population wants to stay committed. Divorce lawyers, get packing !!!

Always get what they want : scorpio, virgo, pisces, capricorn

so if a scorpio-virgo pair wanted different things ...what would they finally settle for?? oh i know!! alimony!!! :D

Not one to mess with. : Leo, Sagittarius, Tauras, Aries, Libra,

I've decided not to mess with anyone...just in case ;P

Not a Fighter, But will Knock your lights out.: aquarius, gemini, cancer,

I am not even sure what that means ???

Amazing in...: aquarius, gemini, sagittarius, libra ... ahem. prudence forbids me to finish or comment ....

The most caring person you will ever meet, funny, intelligent , romantic, irresistible, blah blah blah:

all of them!!!( well give or take a few adjectives) :P

and here's my favorite bit

SAGITTARIUS - Nice to everyone They meet. Their Love is one of a kind. Silly, fun and sweet. Have own unique appeal.Most caring person you will ever meet! Not the kind of person you wanna mess with- you might end up crying.

LIBRA: Nice to everyone they meet. Their Love is one of a kind. Silly, fun and sweet. Have own unique appeal. Most caring person you will ever meet!however not the kind of person you wanna mess with ... u might end up crying...


Ok! So I really wonder how can two people, well 1/6 the population of this world actually, be identical in traits and yet have "own unique appeal" and "love of a kind" .... and if you know one of each, ( and assuming the caring nature percolates to other relationships as well) , then are you allowed to make them compete for being " the most caring", ??!! :P

oh and i almost forgot, all of the above ppl, who were unfortunate enough to not receive this mail at all, or silly enough to not read it or stupid enough to not forward it, are going to have extremely bad luck for the next 2-24 years...so maybe the 3rd world war is inevitable!!!!!!!

The mail doesn't really say anything about inverting it, and blogging it, so I hope I get the benefit of doubt... ;)

On a somewhat more serious note, why would a mail with more-or-less 5 different sentences, 8 different adjectives, ,exactly 5 different numbers for the years of bad luck and no predictions ofcourse, right or wrong, manage to do so many rounds of senseless emails ...have we really ran out of good reading stuff and other means of keeping working blues away that badly??!!

We all agree, that sex sells. and at some point or the other, we all buy it as well, publicly or not (;))!! whether its a legendary book (and rightly so) like the Godfather, or a commerical senseless flick, all rely, and sometimes unfortunately and solely so, on some or the other form to increase the respective viewer/reader ship. And well, it wouldnt sell, if no one bought it, and no one buys things they don't like or don't want, except insurance ofcourse ;) so I guess if ppl do like it, and buy it....then why am I complaining?? maybe, because too much of everything , is an overkill ...

the first day sightseeing in london...

long awaited (by me only :P) and much delayed (again by me only :P) ...here goes my account of the first day i spent sightseeing in london

a windy, chilly day, it rained for the better part of the day starting early afternoon. my host practically made me wear her sneakers and jacket, and made me change from the summery skirt and strappy sandals before I left in the morning, and God bless her for that!!! I'd've frozen to death on my first day :P

first day on the national rail and tube. first destination : Buckingham palace - change of guards ceremony. train from clapham junction, platform 14 to the victoria station, from there walk to the buckingham palace, as always lost the way in the first attempt and went in the exact opposite direction, amazing how I manage to get lost on a 5 minutes walking distance :P Well I walked back, and met an indian lady,
her daughter and grandson , delightful company :). The place was so heavily crowded that I wondered if it was even worth it, and maybe it was because I was tired of tip toeing, I decided it wasn't after half an hr and so I turned around and took a walk along the st. james park instead. A beautiful park, and the weather actually made the walk more enjoyable. :) I then walked towards traffalgar sq., again in the exact opposite direction, and reached BigBen and the Houses of parliament instead. Took some pictures and walked on to traffalgar sq..

By now I was quite starved, so I bought a sandwich n juice along the way from a tesco metro where all the cashiers were asians?! , and a bangladeshi cashier played a prank on me asking for 13 pounds instead of 3. That was when I realised what it feels like to be tourist, its like you are holding a placard saying "I am a tourist" :P, a

Neways, ate my sandwich at the traffalgar sq. took a few pics and asked sm1 for westminster abbey, and realised it was next to bigben!! :D :D :D . So once more I was stabnding in the exact opposite directiion to where I wanted to go :P

I walked back, adn decided to walk across a bridge instead. In middle of the bridge i asked for directions, and well, was again in the opposite direction, :O

By now I was quite used to being me, so i just kept moving, crossed the bridge, came along the other side on thames, walked past the london eye with the intention of coming on same evening there, took a few pics a lot of ppl were doing these entertainment shows on the street and sm were dressed as statues!! neways, walked back across another bridge reached westminster abbey only to realise that it was time to meet a friend at tower bridge!

so I went back to the westminster station, found and bought "the film" for another friend, entered the platform , this time for the train going in the opposite direction, walked up the station again and went round the other way to the actual platform i wanted, hopped on the tube, had the rest of my sandwich, got off at

tower hill station, walked up the station to tower of london, where I did find my friend sitting there, waiting for me. First day all alone in london, getting the oppsoite direction 4 times since morning and still Only 20 min late :P, I felt really proud of me :P :P

to be continued...

allright! so I went to london. it was a short, very short 15 day work trip, so didnt get to do a lot, but for 15 days, i think i did pretty ok. thnx to my perfectly delightful hosts, who made sure I had the best time possible :)

But what am I, if I dont get into philospophical moods and dont have a lot to say on almost everything I experience :P And it definitely wouldnt be like me, if I actually did say it all, instead of putting it up on this blog :P so from now on, as and when I get time , I'll keep writing all that I have in my mind ...epsecially w.r.f to this trip.

Ofcourse, I could write a piece like I did on Hyderabad, but it was 3 days, ...and I really dont want to scare everyone off :P and I could give the link to pics on the blog as well, but I have crossed my limit on flickr, and am still trying to figure out different access rights for different pics in the same album in Picasa... well i coudlnt, so i created a new one on picasa, here's the link

so till then, I guess things will have to wait and come in bits and pieces :P

hmm..i like this one ;)

Your Chances of Being a Multimillionaire: 52%

You have a decent shot at being a multimillionaire. Surprised? You're confident and a hard worker. Keep it up!

Will You Be a Multimillionaire?

...though I wish it had been slightly higher , like 98% maybe ;P

just a snippet ....

pacifier: common sense is the most uncommon sense to be found around us
frutrated: and non-sense...the most common .....

curiousity-turned-into-sparkle

There's always a first time for eveything. and though the first time may not always be perfect,or the most memorable, its still always completely unforgettable.Whether its a small car, which you invariably want to upgrade , or a house that's too small, or too noisy or your stupid first crush on your seventh grade teacher...its special because it was the first. Because it was something new and it gives your eyes that curiousity-turned-into-sparkle of a wonder revealed for the first time, a fresh mystery unravelled. And I believe that life is just one day at a time, and no matter how much we grow up, it is the desire to feel and experience new , hitherto unexplored arenas that keep us looking forward to the next day. If at the end of each day, we have discovered felt or created something new, no matter how tiny, that the feeling of achievement brings a smile so genuine that it doesnt matter if that smile lasted a flip second. That's why children enjoy life more than anyone else, and as we grow older our frustration, stress and dissatisfacion levels increase because we forget to notice the wonders of life around us and get lost in the struggle for survival and race for acquisition....

So what do you do when you see a grown up adult, a teacher and a mentor you hold in high esteem, telling you that he had never seen a hailstorm till a few yearsback, and has never tasted hail till date???? ......you pick up the most perfect piece of hail you can find, wash it it the rain for a few moments and hold it out to him. And as he eats it, you click an everlasting mental picture of that childlike curiousity-turned-into-sparkle in his eyes, of a wonder revealed for the first time, a fresh mystery unravelled....

and create an everlasting memory of the first time you actually taught your mentor something new ;)

I need an a-pin

I thought infinite loops exist only as bugs in softwares. I sincerely hope I made some very stupid mistake, or else, this morning's incident is bound to have a lasting impact on my notion... ;)

Worried about not being able to check my credit card outstanding statement, I decided to generate an a-pin for my credit card. And so I called up the ICICI helpline...Here's how it went...


me: dial...
them: (its ringing)...please enter your 16-digit credit card number
me: xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx
them: please enter your 4 digit a-pin...
me:?????
them: or to generate a pin online, press 1
me: 1
them: please enter the verification code on the reverse of your card...
me: xxx
them: please wait while we connect to a phone-banking-officer, your wait time is approx 4 minutes
...after 4-5 minutes of listening to the safe banking instructions(which if I had practiced I wouldn't be calling thwem up...and now that I have called them up, its obcviously too late !! )....
them: goodafternoon how may I assist you?
me: I need to get an a-pin generated for my cr. card
them: can I have your cr card no. please?
me: (again??) xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx
them: can I have your Date-of-birth please?
me: dd-mmm-yyyy
them: can I have your Credit Card expiry date for verification purposes?
me: (pfff)...mmm-yyyy
them: thankyou ma'm!! I'll transfer your call to the appropriate menu, you can generate your a-pin directly...
me: (finallly!!!) thnx..
...back to the menu....
them: please enter your 16-digit creadit card no.
me: (iiiiiiiii!!!!) xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx
them: please enter the verification code on the reverse of your card...
me: xxx
them: please enter your 4 digit a-pin...
me: oh-God-is-this happening all over again!??!
them: or to generate a pin online, press 1
me: 1
them: please wait while we connect to a phone-banking-officer, , your wait time is approx 4 minutes..........


If you can figure out where I made that seemingly un-apparent stupidity and chose the wrong option, please let me know, else... I'll call the ICICI helpline again ... :P

u-turns...

Does life take u-turns?? I don't know, people do say though, that "Time comes a full circle" and "History repeats itself" ... so I guess it must. but lets not get into the rhetoric since I have also read and heard many a times,... it is the journey that matters more.Well nor do I know if it always matters more than the destination, specially when the destination is not death, but a movie show, or a wedding, where getting late may mean missing the actual event :P ....

But then what is a little sacrifice of a movie or a wedding functgion or a dinner party, to a lot of driving, losing the way and getting stuck in traffic... not to mention an occassional crash encounter with another equally lost driver, or a uniformed officer looking to make a quick buck ;) ....and most of all loads of joking, no-bars-laughing and some unfogettable memories and loads of u-turns.....


lost1:

1 car, 5 friends, an expected 2.5 hr drive, a friend's engagement party...
planned arrival time: 9:00 PM
actual leaving time: 10:00 PM
2 hrs down the road...car going at 80 km/hr

frnd1: allright, so now we're about the enter the state, take out the invitation card and tell me the address
frnds2-5: ??????????????????????????????
frnd2: i'd asked u guys to take a print out...u have it right??
frnd3: im the guest, you ppl are suppsed to organise the logistics
frnd1: somebody tell me if we have to take a left or a right from here, its the highway i cant stop
frnd4: take left
frnd5: i think u shud take a right...

20 minutes down the right...

frnd2: we're nowhere ...let me call them up, do u have his parents' no.?
chorus: NO!!
frnd2: fiance's parents?
chrous: NO!!
frnd2: his roommate's
chorus: NO!!
frnd2: ne1's no...???
frnd4: i have my PL's no...do u want it??...
frnd1: lets just take a u turn, and go back and take a left from there...
phone-a-friend: have u reached
frnd2: no, u connected to the net? check ur mails, dig the card out and tell us the address....

another 40 min down the left, armed -with-the-address...

strngr1: sir, go straight and take u -turn at the first cut, go back to flyover and take a left, its a 30min drive (we had taken a u-turn after 20 min)
another 10 min and a u-turn later
frnd4: im feeling sick, can we find a chemist first....
the-chemist: sir ur taking the longer route...take a u-turn, go straight...take a left from the round-about, go straight till the road ends in a T, and take a right, 10 min from there....

final arrival time: 1:30 AM
function status: engagement over, dinner almost over, guests have all left long ago, its just the family, and us!!!
Commments: some of the best times with my friends...

lost2:

4 cars, 12 people, headed for an office dinner party ...
expected arrival time: 9:00 PM
actual leaving time: 9:30 PM

driver1: who knows the way??
driver3: I do....just follow me
driver2: cool...

10 min later, the expressway.....

driver1: hey driver2, look, that car is trying to race me,
driver2: lets roll........
driver4: i'm in

another 8 minutes (or so) and the race which-never-happened later...

driver1: oh shit! where's driver3? we were supposed to follow her...
me: Let me call her up... its busy , and so is driver2...i think they're talking to each other..
driver1: oh there's driver2, ahead of us, lets go...

...10 min later...

driver1: where's driver2 going, right , no left, there's no left here...oh no there is! wait!! now what!?! why has everyone stopped??!!
driver2: (on a call)@driver3, we've taken the left, where are you?? what!oh ...we're one left early
driver1: lets take a u-turn
driver4: lets go back in reverse, it'll be fun...
another one like me: i know the way, this road joins that one, just take a right
driver1: allright...ev1 follow us...

...a right, a left, and the next traffic light....

driver1: we take a right from here right??
another one like me: yes
driver1: oh shit, no we should not have taken this right, this is not the one...let's take a u-turn...

....back at the traffic light...

driver4: now where to?
me: driver2 has reached the meeting point
driver1: i think we should've gone straight, so now we take a right
driver4: okie

...and the next signal,

driver1: there's nothing here, we shud've taken a left, let's take a u-turn...

....back at the same traffic light...

driver1: let's go straight

...straight and the next left turn....

driver1: bingo! there're the other cars.
driver3: plz just follow me now

...2 min & a left turn later...
driver1: oh shit! we're here!! its was this close!!??!!

final arrival time: 10:30 PM
dinner status: lets not even get there....
comments: i never knew I could laugh so much without my friends...

Looking forward to the next series of u-turns....after all life is a u-turn ;)

I write. Though the infrequency of my posts, and their intimidating length (:P) does indicate that I am not a very reader-friendly writer, but the fact still remains that I write. And the fact that I write must obviously imply that I believe in the power and beauty of words. Right?! Wrong!! I detest using words. I am not a very talkative person, atleast not with most of the people, most of the times. I prefer listening way more to talking. My role in most of the conversation is that of a listener, varying from intent to polite ... depending on the content of the conversation ofcourse ;) somehow listening is just so much better than talking. Though I am sure people around me don't agree with me, they are so fed up of not being able to extract
more than a "hmm" , and that too after much effort :P ....But seriously there's so much you can learn by listening to someone, not just about or from the content, but about the person as well. Their eyes, body-language, nature, specially if its a personal story. And besides, most people are quite comfortable talking about themselves, and quite fond of it rather...that its the easiest way to get into a relaxed, easy conversation.

So you come to know about a person, by listening to them. And you come to know a person by being with them, observing them in their most natural day-to-day activities, interactions with their families, friends, colleagues and strangers. But when do you know you really connect to somebody. At any level, a colleague, a friend , your parent, child, lover, spouse, anyone....when do you really connect with a person?? Have you ever realised that you can stay with someone all your life, talk your heart out to them each passing day, and yet feel that the other person does not understand you?! That some inexplicable day, you feel utterly alone simply coz u have ran out of words??? Its because you never tried the power of silence.

Have you ever that quote, "With your best friends, you can sit silently and walk off feeling you've had the best conversation ever"... its not just a quote. and its not limited to just your best friends. Mom's head massage, a relaxed quiet dinner all by urselves,a movie with your sibling, a drive across a drizzling path with lush greenery on both sides, a coffee with a friend as you both just look out the window, lost in ur own thoughts, holding the phone silently for a few moments followed by a simple goodnight....

The best moments in life, the best memories, more often than not, have nothing to do with words.Silence speaks louder than any number of eloquent speeches, and the people with whom we learn to share our silence are the ones we connect with most strongly and intimately.

The power of silence is far greater than any other mode of communication, words, perhaps topping that list....and yet, if silence speaks, then too much silence kills as well. So I guess its just about striking a balance between the two.

Yet, it remains my favorite mode of communication...though I know people who'd respond to this saying, "Your favorite mode of no-communication-at-all" :P .....

Hyderabaad....

Today is a rare day! I am sitting in my office, no that's not the rare part, the rare part is that the net has been down for more than 2 minutes at a stretch and is showing no signs of coming back to life. Now for an internet technologies company, that's RARE! and it actually gives me some time to do something that has become even rarer for me, writing.

Ah! so now that I have these few precious moments, I mustn't take too long choosing a subject, so here goes what's the most recent in my life....

I went to Hyderabad , last weekend, with a few friends to meet more friends. It was my first such trip with friends and the first travel by air. Now I know the whole world knows what's it like to travel by air, but it was my first experience, and needless to say, exhilarating :) Right from the check-in at the domestic airport of Delhi, to the landing at NT Rama-Rao airport in Hyderabad everything was a wonder to me.

But the fun began after we collected out baggage, and went to the ladies room to freshen up, before . We were greeted by very courteous, very helpful female staff members , which was, having seen the indifferent Delhi staff, came as quite a surprise to me. And, on our way out, just I was beginning to credit their courteousness to the high values imbibed in the culture, I was brought back to reality by their hollering demands of 'chai-paani' ....Welcome to Hyderabad!

OVer the next 2 days, we travelled across the twins cities of hyderabad & secundarabad, escorted by our friend who turned out to be a perfectly delighful hostess , meeting with even the most ridiculous demands we could make in two days, from wanting to see everything that was something to be seen to the crazy shopping. Not-to-mention, ofcourse, the fanatic photography I am so addicted to!

After landing in hyderabad, our first stop was Indian School of Business, where a friend studies. Located in GachhiBowli, the campus is next to the campuses of Infosys & Microsoft and is huge by all proportions. All the buildings including the main college, the student villages, & the recreation center are circumscribed with lush greenery. The hyderabad dry heat made it impossible for us to walk around for long , but we did have lunch in the ISB mess and later coffee in the canteen. Some quick snaps, congratulations on the graduation of our friend, and we were off to our next destination, Salarjung museum.

We reached there in about 30 odd minutes, in an auto, only to find a closed-on-fridays board hanging at the front gate.

Oh well! we did not have time to waste moping , so we took the same auto and rushed off to chaar-minaar. The oldest, most famous landmark of Hyderabad. Standing in the heart of the busiest market of hyderabad, the building has clocks on all of its sides, which actually tell correct time! :) At Rs5/- per head, we took tickets to climb up this ancient monument. A steep narrow spiral staircase one in each of the minaars, is what leads people upstairs, and currently, thanks to sheer governmental neglect & the lack of respect by the civilians, tourists & locals alike, lies in a dilapidated, heart rending state with spit marks across the walls, & broken , dysfunctional bulbs. Finally on the top, we took a walk along the square periphery of the monument, taking in the view at each side. Not that it was very different, with busy markets and unbelievably heavy traffic everywhere :P

Walking along the interior periphery one can look down and across the monument. There are narrow domes along this path, perhaps intended for placing candles for illuminating the path. The monument is not too large in terms of area, but standing there, looking across to the other end and looking down, left me speechless for a few moments, as space n time collapsed and mental images of the sultans seemed to float into reality....

After the climb down, which was scarier the climb up, owing majorly to the steep, curved stairs, we took one last look at the minaar and proceeded to the famous chudi-bazaar, the bangle market, on one side of the minaar. A hustling busy street, laden with beautiful stone-work, and displays of excellent craftsmanship. Some tough bargaining, and quick pruchasing, where all of us ended up spending much more than we had anticipated, we took another auto to our next destination, The Golkonda Fort.

We reached there in about an hour, owing to the rush hour traffic and reached just in time for the famous Light-n-Sound show. Rs.50/- per head, if I remember correctly, and we practically ran all the way to the area where the show was actually being held. And though the run must've been atleast 1 Km, the path was well-lit & and well paved. The show lasts for about 45min-1 hr with the voices of the likes of Mr. Amitabh Bachchan & Mr. Sayed Jaffrey as the orators. The show talks of the history & the architecture of the Golkonda Fort, and is orated mainly in English, with urdu & telugu songs thrown in to add to the effects of the lights and the realistic sounds of the show. An amazing experience, and a must watch in hyderabad. The show being over, we clicked some quick snaps and regretted at not having enough time to come back the next day and take the trek across the fort.

On our way back, I started chatting casually with the auto-walah, who spoke in characteristic hyderabadi hindi, different form the telugu, urdu, and broken accented hindi and english I had heard in Hyderabad till then. Auto-rickshaws are the second most common mode of conveyance, the list topped by buses, in this city of a hilly uneven terrain and very heavy, atrocious traffic.
Many-a-times, one can see auto-rickshaws passing within centimeters of each other, especially at Panjaagutta. Panjaagutta is the central, busiest traffic junction of the city, which connects to all parts of the city and gets its name from being the meeting point of roads coming from 5-different directions. During our trip in Hyderabad, we passed this junction atleast twice everyday.

Back home, we had the famous hyderabaadi biryaani :) , both veg and chicken flavors from a place called Hyderaabaadi Biryaani House in Madhavpur. Needless to say, I am now a fan of the culinary skills of the place.

Next day was booked for a trip to Ramoji Film City. Located way off the main city, we took a package tour to Ramoji and reached in about 2 hours. Tickets, Rs. 250/- per head, at the main entrance, and we were taken inside by our tour bus, which then left us at the actual entrance of the film city with instructions to be back by 5:30 PM.

Claimed to be the biggest film city in the world, it is spread over 2000 acres of land, with 1300 acres already adorned with beautiful sets, gardens and pathways. Whether it is Delhi's Jaama Masjid, or Mughal Gardens, and right from Mysore's Vrindavan Gardens to streets of Zurich, not-to-mention broken down buildings for fight scenes and 36 different gardens, every possible set seen in any movie serial or TV show can be seen there. Built with Plaster of Paris and/or wood, the sets are re-usable and fully customisable.

We took our lunch at Chanakya restaurent, which offered amazing buffet at Rs. 99/- per head (plus a complimentary ice cream ;P ), with the dim lights & a soothing ambience providing a much needed relief from the scorching heat outside. We just relaxed for a while after lunch, and got up for the fear off actually dozing off :P

To add to the tourist attraction, there are also amusement shows, like wild-wild west, and aalampanah, the talent show, a mini-amusement park and a meena bazaar where pearls, local handicrafts and gift items can be bought at fixed prices.

The day was spent walking, snacking and trying to see everything the place has to offer! In the end we did have to miss the joy rides, owing to the non-stop snacking we had indulged in, but the farewell Bihu dance made us forget about our disappointments soon 

A quick shopping spree at the pearls market, which left all of us nearly bankrupt, ;) we ended the day with a relaxed dinner at the Eat street located at the Hussain Sagar Lake-side. Soothing weather, cool breeze, awesome view of the lake, and the necklace road, and a plethora of food options, from subway to biryaani, the street has it all.

Our last morning in Hyderabad, a quick breakfast at the open-air Barista and we were off. As the plane took off and I took one last look at the char-minaar fading away below, I knew that despite its traffic, I still enjoyed being here, and would want to come back for more….
Click here for pics

Optimizing Web Pages

Something had been nagging me for quite some time. The home page of my website took way too much time to download. And I am talking of a 100 Mbps broadband connection. Now if this was my take on the page, then the ordinary users’ reaction, with a standard 33.6 Kbps Dial-Up was definitely not going to be encouraging. So as soon as I got some time away from the client’s never ending modification requests ;). So I decided to get to the bottom of this and see if I was not being just paranoid. Here are some of the findings, (for obvious reasons I have removed the actual URLs in question)

test URL1

Download Times*
Connection Rate Download Time
14.4K 200.10 seconds
28.8K 105.35 seconds
33.6K 91.81 seconds
56K 59.33 seconds
ISDN 128K 25.52 seconds
T1 1.44Mbps 11.90 seconds
Comparing with some of our other websites,
test URL2

Download Times*
Connection Rate Download Time
14.4K 91.80 seconds
28.8K 50.80 seconds
33.6K 44.94 seconds
56K 30.89 seconds
ISDN 128K 16.26 seconds
T1 1.44Mbps 10.36 seconds

test URL3

Download Times*
Connection Rate Download Time
14.4K 137.93 seconds
28.8K 70.76 seconds
33.6K 61.17 seconds
56K 38.14 seconds
ISDN 128K 14.18 seconds
T1 1.44Mbps 4.52 seconds

It was time to get things in action. I dug up some material on the net. Most of the things I found were not news to me, and the rest seemed like plain common sense. And yet it was surprising how trying to meet impossible deadlines and keeping the clients happy, they had been conveniently forgotten, by me of course: P, during the development phase.

Well below is a small summary of the tips I found useful, followed by the respective links.

The basic idea is to
1) Reduce the number of bytes being transferred over the net
2) Reduce the number of individual HTTP requests per page load and
3) Increase the number of concurrent HTTP requests by spreading out content on multiple servers

• Page Layout and Size
o 30K – the ideal maximum size for your Web page,
o 12K the ideal maximum size for each image, sound file, or applet This includes animated images and anything downloaded with the page
o Use multiple pages Instead of one long page
o Use special effects sparingly Make sure that the site needs the effect you want. Whenever you add Java or JavaScript or other effects, it impacts the download time of your site.
o Use CSS for layouts instead of Nested tables - Normally, when a page loads the browser starts at the top of the HTML and loads it sequentially down the page. However, with nested tables, it has to find the end of the table before it can display the entire thing. Also, if you're trying to write valid XHTML, tables should not be used for layout at all. Tables are for tabular data (such as spreadsheets) not for layout. Instead you should use CSS for layout - this renders more quickly and creates valid XHTML.
o A table will load more quickly if each row is a separate table, because the browser would render the first table and then render the second.
• External Objects
o Use external stylesheets and Javascript files wherever possible. Since once they are downloaded, they will be cached by the browser, and the subsequent downloads will be much faster. For this, however, you must include the stylesheets and javascript files in the head part of the HTML page, instead of the body. Also, allow static images, stylesheets, and javascript to be unconditionally cached by the browser.
o Consider evenly spreading uncache-able objects over multiple hostnames, thereby allowing for more concurrent HTTP connections.
o Load fewer external objects. Due to request overhead, one bigger file just loads faster than two smaller ones half its size.
o Turn on HTTP keepalives for external objects
o Set an Expires header on everything you can, with a date days or even months into the future thereby reducing unnecessary HTTP requests for validating the cached content
• Using CSS effectively
o Use contextual selectors
Instead of assigning a value to each individual paragraph, we can nest them within a <div> tag and assign a value to this tag:
o Use shorthand CSS properties
You can use the following shorthand properties for the margin CSS command.
Use:
margin: 2px 1px 3px 4px (top, right, bottom, left)
...instead of
margin-top: 2px;
margin-right: 1px;
margin-bottom: 3px;
margin-left: 4px
o Use relative call-ups
Try to avoid absolute call ups as they take up more space. An example of an absolute call up is: <a href="http://www.URL.com/filename.htm">. Much better would be code><a href="filename.htm">. But what if some files are in different folders to other ones? Use these shorthand properties:

• <a href="/"> - Calls up http://www.URL.com


• <a href="/filename.html"> - Calls up http://www.URL.com/filename.html



• <a href="/directory/filename.html"> - Calls up http://www.URL.com/directory/filename.html


• <a href="./"> - Calls up index.html within that directory


• <a href="../"> - Calls up index.html one directory above



• <a href="../filename.html"> - Calls up filename.html one directory above


• <a href="../../"> - Calls up index.html two directories above

o Remove unnecessary META tags and META content
Most META tags are pretty much unnecessary and don't achieve very much.
o Use / at the end of directory links
Don't do this: <a href="http://www.URL.com/directoryname">
Do this instead: <a href="http://www.URL.com/directoryname/">
The presence of the slash "\" at the end woluld tell the browser that the destination is a directory which, the browser would otherwise have to find out for itself.
• Optimize GIFs
o Make sure that only the relevant parts are in the image. Cropping can make your Web image smaller both in dimensions and download size.
o Saving a three color file as a 256-color indexed GIF will increase the size. When saving as a GIF, it's a good idea to convert the image first to Web colors (if you're using Photoshop, choose the image mode, indexed, and then choose Web colors). This will make sure that the colors won't dither on the Web. Then convert the image to the least number of colors it can use and still look correct.
o GIF images use an index of colors for the image, colors that are not used in the image, don't need to be included in the index.
• Remove Extra whitespaces
o Remove multiple carriage returns
o Close tags on the same line you open them on
o Keep related block items on the same line For example, paragraph tags or table cell tags should be on the same line as their contents,
o Indent using spaces And only use one space for each indent. You get the same effect, and use less whitespace.
• Use Google's Load Time Analyzer extension for Firefox from a realistic net connection to see a graphical timeline of what it is doing during a page load.

(..Excerpts from)

Webdesign/Speed
Webdesign/Optimizing Images
Musings
Webdesign/Tips

WHAM!! WHAM!! THUD!! THUD!! Dear God!! My head hurt so much it was almost as if the
splitting sounds were coming from the outside. And they kept coming closer. Oh NO! Wait! They WERE coming from the outside. I looked up to realise there was cabling
work going on right at my desk. "Madam, can you please move outside, we need to move
your table and finish the cabling" .... I reluctantly got up from my seat where I
had put my head-down on my arms and closed my eyes, trying to shut out the noise. I
left to see if the coffee machine had been set up. I badly needed a cup. We had just
moved into our new office and it was the first day. The move was from a semi-
deconstructed to a semi-constructed office and life , as can be expected, was
chaotic, and I am not talking about just work. Scattered furniture, half-laid
cables, and non-stop hammering & drilling everywhere. I hadn't had a coffee since I
arrived 4 hours ago, and the drill machines had given me a splitting headache.It was
a nightmare. At last I found the coffee machine, and realised once again, how
heavenly a cup of coffee could be. :) Refreshed after that short break, I finally
forced myself to look around the place. And realised that it was not only bigger but
also much much nicer. Loads of windows everywhere, and a lot of moving space. The
view outside the windows was nothing spectacular, but I could see till far-off,
trees, mingled with single storey buildings, the perfect blue skies and the cool
wind on the perfect March afternoon. It was actually a nice place. The next day was etter, we even had a small ganpati-pooja, completely in-house ofcourse ;) and after we had finally managed to drag our CEO out of his non-stop meetings and embarrassed him visibly ;). This followed a samosa-party , well no celebration is ever complete without a samosa-jalebi party rt!! ;)
Its been a week. The drill machines are still on. But the cabling around my desk is done atleast ;) And, things are settling down.
Infosys founder said in a mecture, "Love your job, not your company" , I dont think thats possible. I dont think you can enjoy your work, unless you like the sorroundings, the ergonomics and the people you work with. Its the whole picture that can be viewed and taken in totality. Maybe that, or maybe I am too retarded to understand that :P
Well, its a saturday afternoon, and part-of-why I am still sitting in my office is because slowly, but surely, I am falling in love with it, all of it :)

shit! no1 agrees i shud be in s/w

not even my own intelligence ... :P

Your Dominant Intelligence is Interpersonal Intelligence

You shine in your ability to realate to and understand others. Good at seeing others' points of view, you get how people think and feel. You have an uncanny ability to sense true feelings, intentions, and motivations. A natural born leader, you are great at teaching and mediating conflict. You would make a good counselor, salesperson, politician, or business person.

What Kind of Intelligence Do You Have?

hmm....maybe i should finally talk to my parents.... ;)

i am thai...

.... food i.e. atleast thts wat the results say :P

You Are Thai Food

Trendy yet complex. People seek you out - though they're not sure why.

What Kind of Food Are You?

and come to think of it, i dont even like thai food ;-??

happy valentine's day ;)

last night, while i was waiting for some droll work realted files to download and generally hating my life, i started browsing through the net, something, the net content made me realise, i havent done in a realllllly long time. neways, owing probably to the valentine's day fever, i kept running into v-day ads and banners of gift vouchers, and cards and ballons and oh-so-many-red roses, so just out of my insatiable curiosity, i clicked on one of the ads,

"This v-day ! Love, be-loved and appreciated....."

and the homepage completed the sentence

".....tips to kiss, love..." and many more such how-tos. now i am not against romance, but somethings are too amusing to be anything else actually ;) in search of such similar amusement, i read on...

so, the first page i landed on had the following content,
(its hilarious and i really cant stop laughing, )

Get your partner to the sea shore at sunset. Give her smile. Buzz a latest romantic song. Hold her tight and give a moist kiss.
==> dont forget to carry a good stereo system, her favorite song cd , a lip gel, reach half hour before sunset, prepare the ground, and by the time you are done, ofcourse you do realise you could've just stayed at her place, the sun does set around her roof as well

You are with your girl friend moving in the car. Stopped at a traffic light. Hold her hand and give a soft kiss.
==> and in case the signal suddenly turns green, im sure she'll not mind getting her hand crushed while you shift gears

Take a stop watch. Ask the girl to help you maintain a long kiss, longer than a minute and so on.
==> statuatory warning : lack of breath or sudden stopwatch alarms going off can cause injury so keep your mediclaim ready before doing this one & do this near a hospital :P

Make a sign of first letter of your partner’s name with your lips and slowly gently fix a kiss on her cheek.
==> hmm. now I know why Xena must have never gotten kissed

Order a pizza. With the help of tomatto ketchup make a sign of kiss on pizza. Ask her to make same sign with her lips at your cheek.
==> come again??

When you are travelling with her in a car. Tell her whenever we see a dog or any other specific animal, on road side, we will kiss each other. A good excuse.
==> so no one actually looks at the traffic while driving? and i think i cant drive!

Tell your love that something is there below her eyes. Ask her to close the eyes. Use the opportunity and give her a kiss.
==> ofcourse if during this time whatever is there actually bites her below the eye, then you could end up with a blue eye

Move in the rain without umbrella. Grab rain drops on your lips and then slowly place them on lips of your love.
==> i cant stop imagining a guy standing in the rain, cold and wet, trying to figure out why did the girl leave him, after all he was only grabbing his own lips repeatedly, trying to catch hold of a rain drop!!

when i stop laughing at imagining these mental images, i'll read on... maybe find-your-true-love-tips next time ;)

till then have a nice v-day. and avoid all kissing disasters if you can ;)

another delayed post...

my day out...

...may be with a lesser fan following than the movie, but close to that much fun. Very, very close. Last saturday I went out for an office picnic, or more like a 2 hour parasailing plan that most luckily turned into a day long picnic :) I would've written earlier, but there were just too many pics and videos to drool over, and show-off to friends :P

We planned to assemble at 7:15 in mini-groups and re-assemble into a larger one at 7:45 AM Saturday morning . After all the good-hearted early morning wake-up calls by the night shifters, which were responded to with much grumbling & mumbling, frantic pick-up and "im waiting" calls, amidst of which I almost got left behind ;), almost,, we manage to assemble, re-assemble and finally leave by 8:30 AM in a convoy of 3 cars, all of which, as I was to realise later, were driven with great panache. Given that we are talking about nearly 15 people dragged out of bed one early cold January morning, I think we made pretty decent timing. This was followed by a great drive accompanied with snacks and singing , along the highways of gurgaon & sohna, an awesome strech of some flyover, I forget the name, taking a wrong turn, customary for any group going on a picnic and finally reached our destination at 10:00 AM, only an hour late ;)

Sorrounded by mustard farms on all sides, the field expanse was vast, by any means. After some initial excited photgraphy and instructions we were too excited to heed,,the actualfun began. One person at a time was secured with a gear, containing lots of hooks, a rope tied to a jeep and ofcourse the parasail. Once the gear was secured, the jeep drove off, tugging at the parasail ropes,as a result of which, sometimes aided by a little running on the parasailer's part, the parasail took off. The whole experience wouldn't have lasted for more than 7-8 seconds,I guess, but the feeling of being air-borne, at 250 ft from the ground,even if you were tied to a rope, is, quite literally out of the world!!!
One after another, we went off and came back asking for more. Ofcourse, that's how the jeep left us in the end, asking for more, since there were not second chances :P

Accompanied by a friendly game of football, as friendly as football games can be, volleyball, and followed by kho-kho, yes even that, and lots of photography ( a good excuse for lazy boneheads like me trying to avoid any kind of physical activity requiring more than moving a finger ;) the parasailing experience left us thrilled , to say the least. And we moved on towards our next destination,
Dumdum lake, a local tourist attraction. I would give you the exact location and distance in kilometers, but one, I don't intend to write an itinerary and two, I dont know. :) All I know is, 4 boats, 15 people, and a lake. We rowed, and rammed the boats, quite deliberately ofcourse, splashed water over each other, on the same cold January afternoon, but oh well, who cared by now,got stuck in the mud near the shore, jumped in and waded the boats out, and collapsed back on the shore.

Some more photography, a car-race back till a local dhaba, disgusting amounts of food which all of us ate ravenously, quite literally, and another great drive back home via another great road I never knew existed anywhere near Delhi/NCR.

The traffice jam as soon as we entered the city would've jolted me back to reality, but I was too tired.
I reached home , and crashed for a goodnight's sleep, dreaming of being air borne , soon again, this time... without the rope may be .....

I have the best friends in the whole world! and that makes me the luckiest girl ever :) not only they actually put up with me, (believe me difficult is easy if you're comparing it to me) , with all my mood swings, temperamental remarks, awkward questions, non-stop cribbing and God-knows-what-not , this time they actually gave me a surprise for my birthday!!! they took me out, promising a small simple idyllic picnic, and before I knew what was happening, we had crossed gurgaon and were on Delhi-Jaipur expressway! A plan I had categoricallly refused for, I was all sulking, not caring about their effort, ready to get off the car , bang the door in their faces and march off, if only they would pullover. I did ruin that part for them , coz then they had to tell me what was happening, and after cooling me off with road-side ganne-ka-juice, and sm pics, they took me to dumduma lake near sohna. I cut the cake, had the birthday song sung for me, even got gifts, despite the tantrum I'd thrown on the way!!! Then we boated in the not-so-clean-nor-so-deep-but-no-option dumduma lake, and had a blast of a time even there. Trying to row a boat and going more in concentric circles than along the lake, each one of us trying to do worse than the others, ;) and ofcourse I won.!!! We had lunch at a roadside dhaba, another long standing demand of mine, followed by a long drive back home by the road I preferred , we crashed Costa at the end of the day, quite literally since we were too tired to sit up, and after a few hours, reluctantly left for home.

And all of this 3 days in advance coz I had said I was too busy to meet them on my birthday!!! So much so that at the end of the day I felt my birthday was already over!

The most awesome day by the most awesome set of friends on earth :D
(touchwood!!)

Kaun Umraoo....kaisi adaa aur kiski jaan....

Smthg I had written long back, but forgot to publish


I recently went to see this latest much-overhyped flick with a friend. I am not exceptionally fond of movies or movie stars, I'd rather be in the comforts of my couch, empowered with a huge pack of potato chips in one hand and the remote in another surfing my day away. Moreover, spending money to sit idle in one chair for three hours is too much of a temptation for me to rather nuzzle up in my bed and get a good sleep. But well, the hype over the movie, the praise of the original version by family veterans and, most of all, sheer boredom, made us go.

We reached, as always, 10 minutes after the movie was supposed to begin. We got the topmost row, and a "Enjoy-the-movie" accompanied with a sly smile. We had known the movie was not a big hit, and I guess that's what made the ticket-guy give us a sly smile ....ah!! how difficult to live in a world of prejudices and presumptions! what would people not think of a guy and a girl going for a not-so-hit movie ... or rather what is all that they would think But well, more on the rhetoric later, we entered the hall and realised the extent of slyness of the smile and its full implications sank in. There were, in all, including the two of us, 11 people in the entire theater!! I've seen, having been a regular Delhi collegiate, and keeping up with the rep , practically every movie that released while I was in college, and yet a theater THIS empty, was a new experience for me.

Realising what probably a bore of a time we were in for, we mutually decided we will refuse to get bored, come what may, and would crack a joke at every line. and learn some urdu, if possible :)

So there we were, two great pals, sitting in a nearly empty theater ,, watching a period movie, with a much overhyped actress and bad reviews, prepared for the worst,and yet determined to have the time of our lives...

For the less enlightened and more fortunate, allow me to say a few words, in english for now (urdu can wait till i learn it), about the movie. Its about a girl, who gets abducted, while a still a child, from her financially constrained but loving and wholesome family staying in a forlorn village of the then Awadh, and sold off to a prostitute in Lucknow. The girl gets a luxurious upbringing and more than a decent education in subjects beyond music and dance as well. But as luck (read story writer) would have it, she falls in love with her very first professional encounter. And then comes the usual obstacles put in the way of two lovers by the inevitable family cries of honor by brothers & fathers, even the prostitute-clientele, and societal differences , the synchronized glycerine overflows by women of all color , caste , and ahem, well, character , and the easy-to-miss occasional villain and ofcourse the hard-to-dismiss misunderstandings thrown in to complete the drama.

All this drama, leaves the lovers separated, the families lost and divided, the ekta-kapoor fan following in the audience beating the women on screen with genuine tears, and you wondering why would , a prostitute who doesnt mind screaming her love in front of the world would not utter the truth in front of her lover to clear out the misunderstanding ?? and then why would she actually use her profession to find out about her family, and then shy away from the world finding out lest it brings bad name to the family, and then go and meet her family in broad daylight?? i mean could she not have faked her identity ?? what was she thinking, or was she (or the story writer) thinking at all?? and then, that perfectly "perfect" woman, with her fame and clientele still intact give everything up and go into a permanent reclusion? if that's what she had to do, why she didnt she give up when her lover left her or before she went looking for her family, i mean,.... then she wud've gained smthg out of leavng her profession and after she'd lost all stakes and had nothing else to lose, she could've atleast continued being rich amd famous,. or even if she had to give evthg up, did she necesarrily have to go back to the same city and live a life of desolation? why didnt she just go to some other far-off place and started afresh,. as smrich fat lady's maid maybe. i mean if it was too difficult for people to travel to far off places, it must've been easier for people to lose their identities rt?

it left me thinking if logic did not exist in the days this story was originally written? or come to think of it, does it exist now , with people still making such movies and serials where 1 character gets married atleast 5 times in less than 5 years to perhaps all members of the clan and outside, smtimes, multiple times to the same person!! and weirdly, no matter how many times a woman has been married/divorced/jailed/even "murdered and re-incarnated", she does not a SINGLE fine line!!! she looks EXACTLY as a grandmother, as she did the day of her marriage.!!

oh-well-whatever!!! the movie made for a great time for the two of us atleast, as while struggling with noting down hard urdu words we cud use later to show-off in our vocab ;) had all the attention of the rest of the 9 audience, not-to-mention the wrath of the ekta-kapoor audience in those 9 people, and back cramps from laughing too much .... that does explain one thing though, we are better and definitely more of crowd-pullers than abhishek and aishwarya, its just that we choose not-to-be, ;)

sar se utar kar kaandhey pe bikhar jaati hain,
kambakht zulfon ko bahut sar pe chadhaa rakha hai


.....i heard these smwhere