Its that Time of the Week !

Its that time of the week when you recharge your body to face the new week.
Its that time of the week when you relax and take some rest
Its that time of the week when you keep the work tension away and ease your mind.
Its that time of the week when your day feels meaningful.
Its that time of the week where you catch up on pending chores.
Its that time of the week when you go shopping for hours.
Its that time of the week when you do you have time for your favourite hobby.
Its that time of the week when you go out with your Family

Yes its the weekend and Also Haloween..
Have a Ghoulish Weekend!!!

Festive Season.

Hope you all had a wonderful Diwali. I love Diwali/Deepavali, it is the festival of lights in India. It is to commemorate the victory of Vishnu over the asura king "Naragasura". As usual this festival also has different alterations to the mythical story. But the main thread goes as Naragasura being the son of Mother earth (Bhooma Devi) and Vishnu himself (when he took Varaha avatar) , was mighty and powerful with all the boons he got. One main boon was that he can be killed only by his mother and no one else.

With his power he killed many people, he abducted thousands of women and caused trouble everywhere. He also stole the earrings of "Aditi" a god mother. This outraged Sathyabama, Aditi and Krishna. Sathyabama is another form of Booma Devi and Lord Krishna was an avathar of Vishnu. Together they waged a war against Naragasura and finally Sathyabama killed him (as per his boon). Before dying Naragasura got another boon that people should celebrate his death with lights and colors and hence the festival of Deepavali.

The tradition is to make various sweets and savories for the grand day. On diwali people wake up early in the morning, have oil bath and start with offering prayers to God and then bursting fire crackers. Then they visit relatives and friends and exchange sweets, blessings and wishes. Though I am not in my country now, I still got to do all of these including bursting fire crackers! It was fun to do all these when the fall is at its peak here, yes the short days and long windy, cold nights are on its way. The festive season in India comes to a close now and nothing until Pongal in Jan. But here the festive season is just beginning. Halloween is the first followed by Thanks Giving, Christmas and the New Year. The whole place would be covered in a white blanket of snow soon and everywhere there will be lights and decorations. Ironically, the cold weather seems to keep the spirits of people high :).

Time to make some cookies! So Trick or Treat?

Caught in the Wave!

Let’s go on a technology imagination tour and see the power of communication…. ok try these with me...

• Imagine sitting at home, sipping a cup of coffee and the TV blaring in the background you write your design document in Word, show it to your colleague who is across the seas, see him modify it at the same time you go to the next paragraph and write the new one, meanwhile your boss on the way to her vacation starts checking the ones completed by both of you, all in the single virtual document and single browser. In the end you just save a fresh copy as a base version in the same tool.

 Ok easy enough now try this...

• You chat with your friend, show her the photos in your machine without uploading anywhere else, jointly you both edit the titles for the pictures in the same window, select a section of that chat and make it a blog post dynamically and take a specific line and tweet with your fans in a different language on the fly everything in the same browser at the same time. Now a third friend joins you both sees what you have done so far step by step and also both your friends plan for your birthday party in the same window where the 3 of you are chatting without you knowing. 

Ok fair enough, now this.

• You, your parents in Europe and your Sister in USA all shop at the same time in the same browser and each of you select clothes for each other, see each other's collections, comment on the items at the same time you and your parents select an expensive gift for your sister, but she is not able to see that (though she is also in the same window), check out together only to be delivered at your individual locations.

And this

• You get a chance to change the tool to embed your own software/tool or just about anything in it and share that with others with very minimal work and store all the work online and free of cost only with open source products.

In one tool which is nothing but one browser you do all of the above, where each one is called a wave. You can include any number of people in a wave and create waves for endless possible things. How cool is that!!!!
An extraordinary invention from Google! This product is still under construction, but almost ready to be released. Yesterday I saw the demo for this product; it was beyond anything I have seen in these lines.

Check out the new Google Wave! Have a wonderful Surf!

A Happy Dasara!

Festive colors will be all over India now. Navarathri or Dasara is the festival of Good over Evil. Durga/Bhagavathi killed Mahishasura the evil Asura, after 9 days of war and hence the triumph is celebrated. Sakthi which basically means "Power" (in star-wars terms ‘the force’) was given a feminine form in Hinduism. So this Sakthi has several avatars, and this festival is about the Durga avatar. Some parts of India celebrate it on the 8th day of lunar cycle called "Durgashtami", and in the eastern side it is celebrated as "Durga Pooja" on the 10th day and in the south it is the 8th day - Saraswathi Pooja, 9th day - Ayudha Pooja and 10th day Vijayadasami. West Bengal will be the most colorful of all during this festival.

Traditionally this festival is celebrated in my house too in India. When I was young my Sister and I used to build the steps, arrange the dolls, make a small park around it with temples, villages, zoo, motel etc., make rangoli, invite people and eat Sundal :). It was fun-filled-fall-vacation time in India our quarter-year exams will be over by then. Just the thought was enough to get me on my feet to do it here this year. I do not have any idols of the Gods here, so with my mom's idea to base it on "Evolution", I went doll shopping for a few hours. I found all the necessary dolls in the dollar tree, kids shop etc.,

A generous friend with his design skills made the steps out of a card box (without even cutting it), it was remarkable and hence I decided to put a separate picture of it. I made a small shelf for the gods put them on the wall at top of the steps. The only God statues were "Ganesha","Durga" and "Saraswathi". The rest were all "Animalia"- starting from Arthropods (ofcourse the insects scared some visitors) - Fishes - Amphibians - the great Dinosaurs and other Reptilia - Aves, Mammals and ourselves (Homo sapiens). I did go a level further and kept Robots in the end ;). My colleagues came with their families and enriched the festival.

In the beginning of the festival I had challenged myself to make Sundal everyday with a different bean for all 9 days (as is the tradition) and I did it!! The next in my list is Diwali... Lets see how that goes.

Bombing our Beloved Moon

Moon has a special place in people's lives and heart. Ancient times before electricity we relied on moonlight for passing through the night. In many religions and culture a lot of festivals are based on the moon. The white marvel has stayed in its place, far from our earth, growing and diminishing, and still has inspired scienticts,poets,kids, astrologers,lovers, leaders and every being on earth. Do you remember as kids how much you were connected to the moon...

• When we were too young your mom would have made you eat with the promise of the moon.
• Later in the school days you would have caught the moon in your dreams.
• Few years later you might have had goals to reach the moon and walk there.
• In college in that dorm room when you were lying lonely in your bed the rays of the moon would have given a soothing feeling.
• In the evening breeze under the full moon was it not a real blessing even if you were sitting alone or with a girl friend.

Yet today we bombarded it, as a species we got tired of bombing our own planet that now we got this insatiable urge to bomb the only natural satellite that is tirelessly revolving us. Not that I do not believe in extra terrestial, science fiction or life outside dear Earth but just contemplating the simple fact. If you have watched Wall-E you would know, 'that future' is not very far.. us living in a whole new "Earth".In case if you are interested in watching some pictures check out http://www.nasa.gov/

Leaving a foot print...

I have been an active blogger for quite sometime now. In addition to writing posts in my blog page, I like to visit other blogs and would leave comments on the posts that interest me. That does not confine to personal blogs, even the news paper blogs and other sites that host blogs and wherever someone expects an opinion or a feedback. I know I am not alone, there are many among you who tend to do that and I really appreciate it. You know it is the inherent feeling to leave a mark, to let people know what you think about it, a strong imprint so they know you exist.

But there are others who tend to stay in the shades and enjoy watching the sun and the others who scream out loud about its effects. They move as shadows between blogs, assimilate the facts, contemplate it in their dreams and voice out in their minds. Not for a million dollars they will leave their hiding bushes, shrines of their wisdom and blabber loud in a common forum, neither for a thousand pounds of gold will they go public with their views shattering the walls of invisibility around them. Both of you are welcome to read my blog and if u do not belong to the later type you can always leave a foot print, I enjoy knowing you were here..