Thailand Tour, 2018

Representative Temperature
for our Tour Duration: Dec 14-20.

Phuket, Bangkok & Pattaya 

ravel is generally a pleasant thing to undertake, and this winter's tour of Thailand is no exception.

My wife and I toured 3 cities, Phuket, Pattaya, and Bangkok, in that order, as can be seen in the Google Maps snippet on the right. Except for Pattaya City, which we reached by road from Bangkok airport, the other two places were reached by air.

Thanks to my wife who communicated for several weeks in finalizing the tour itinerary with the travel agency, which shall remain unidentified.

In general, we were surprised to observe that the cities were not particularly cleaner than those in India: It'd seem that most Asian cities share this property, save for those in Japan. (Disclaimer: I have only toured a handful of countries in Asia).

The temperature, it can be said, was generally hot and there was no need for me to have packed jeans at all! Shorts and T-shirts would suffice for all of these places, as can be seen from the screenshot of the watch face on my Apple Watch above.

A First-Hand Impression of Driving the Tesla Model 3.

irthdays are always nice.

As a kid belonging to a lower-middle-class family in India, I experienced birthdays always with a certain thriftiness: some new outfits, and a special sweet dish my mother would make to suit the birthday child's interests — usually my favorite ಕಡಲೇ ಬೇಳೆ ಪಾಯಸ for my birthdays — for the occasion. No cakes, no 'Happy Birthday ...' singing, etc., that is very much a modern cultural landscape in most households. Thus, imagine my excitement when very close to, and just days before my birthday in 2018, I got hold of my Tesla Model 3, delivered to our home. I was one of those who stood in line patiently for several hours on March 31, 2016, to register for a Model 3, based solely on a test drive of a Tesla Model S a few years earlier.

Silicon Valley, 2.0.

fter spending about 2.5 years in the Seattle area, I'm back in Silicon Valley, in Northern California. Seattle region is a good place to be; some people even have called it the next Silicon Valley. The lush greeneries everywhere throughout the year have even provided a tag line for Washington State: The Evergreen State.

Why this turnaround?

From a Future Owner of a Tesla Model 3.

veryone has a reason to buy, or acquire, what they wish for.

Most of the things we buy routinely are the ones that we need in our daily lives: groceries, clothes, ...

And, then, we have the big-ticket items such as homes, cars, ... Note that some of these big-ticket items, we don't have to buy; we can rent. Cars are more of a necessity in some parts of the world although, if the Ubers and Lyfts and have their way, even those can be rented as the need arises. (There are taxis, of course).

Why this long preface?

Down the Memory Lane at Airlines Hotel, Bangalore.

You listen to an inspiring convocation speech by Nani Palkhivala for your engineering graduation. Commencement, they call it, in America. You move on to go for a celebration dinner. To Airlines Hotel. Masala Dosa, ice cream and the whole bit. The prime mover, and sponsor, for this kind of graduation celebration, was my uncle, himself an engineer.

That was January 1972.

UberX, UberBLACK, UberCHOPPER, UberWEDDING, ... ?

Uber, the Silicon Valley transportation company that recently raised $1.2B at a post-money valuation of $18.2B, has been expanding its services quite frequently, thanks to the capital infusion.

It seems to be expanding everywhere in the world, including in Bangalore, the Silicon Valley of India.

The latest service to go online, starting today, is UberWEDDING. The black limousine and the whole bit. So, what could be next?

Divine Intervention, or Dumb Luck? At the Movies, Whistle.

Prologue

When I arranged my travel plans for Bangalore this summer, I had a vague discomfort that my return departure date was a Friday, July 12, and early in the morning. In spite of the fact that Bangalore visits are always enjoyable, and that you have to return to your Silicon Valley home some time anyway, I figured 23 days was good enough of a break from Silicon Valley. However, there was some nagging, indescribable, dissatisfaction.

Why?

A Chance Visit to the KSCA Cricket Stadium, Bangalore.

KSCA Stadium Entrance.

KSCA Cricket Stadium, also known as M. Chinnaswamy Stadium after India's prominent Cricket Administrator, is a powerful landmark in Bangalore. The stadium is in the center of the city, and very close to the inaugural campus of my Alma mater, University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering, K R Circle, Bangalore. (KSCA have their own web site).

Just about 3 weeks earlier, I had the opportunity to visit the Lord's in London. Who would have thought I'd get an opportunity to visit the KSCA Stadium a mere 3 weeks later?

A Reminiscing Visit to Cricket's Mecca, The Lord's.

A View of the J P Morgan Media Centre from mid-wicket¹.

There is always a tremendous excitement when you visit an important place with any worldly significance, and particularly if it has some personal significance. If you grew up with Cricket, as most kids do and as I did in India, you cannot but feel the excitement of any visit to the Lord's, the Home of Cricket.

The Pavilion End as seen from the Grand Stand.

The 21 Lord's pitches, as seen from
the J P Morgan Media Centre, the Nursery End².

My New Girlfriend.

Weddings are a fortuitous ground for finding new girlfriends (or boyfriends). The primary reason for this is the presence of romance in the air, not only that of the bride and the groom, of course, but also of many of the guests in attendance.

Linsanity, à la Bollywood.

Lately, Linsanity, or 'insanity' surrounding Lin — Jeremy Lin, a basketball player for New York Knicks — has been a phenomenon of sorts. This 'insanity', of course, is due to a sudden and unexpected rise in his game performance, and his perceived value to the team. Consider these, for example, as of this writing:

On Twitter, Jeremy Lin has 489,576 followers, and counting.
On Facebook, Jeremy Lin has 913,226 likes, and counting.
On CNN's web site, Jeremy Lin is the 2nd most popular topic, after Whitney Houston, the pop singer who died recently.
On Time magazine, an entire article on Linsanity is published [subscription required], and Jeremy Lin is on the cover of the 27 February 2012 issue.
...

The foregoing and many other sources will educate you on the question of "Who is Jeremy Lin"?

An Open Suggestion to BBMP - On Parking & Living.

Every time I visit Bangalore, I feel an inner need to reflect on what particular work can improve life in Bangalore.

On this visit, one Bangalore fact that sticks out in my mind is its parking problem. Most roads in residential neighborhoods in Bangalore, are created by the Bangalore Developmental Authority, and have a 30' width, not including the space needed for drainage. So, if you leave about 5' on either side for pedestrians, you really only have about 20', or about 10' for traffic in one direction. (A frequently found sedan on Bangalore roads these days, such as the Maruti Suzuki SX4 Model, is 69", or nearly 6', wide).

But, the problem is that cars are frequently parked during the day on either side of the street, thus using up to 15' for the 30' width. Pedestrians thus are forced to walk on the asphalt, and this reduces the available asphalted portion for automobiles even further, to barely accommodate a moving car in a single direction.

What is the solution?

Birthday, July 4 and San Francisco.

At the Dosa on Fillmore.

It is always nice to be surrounded by people, and particularly if the occasion somehow relates to you as an individual. In this case, it was a celebration of my birthday, although somewhat belated¹. We made two trips from the South Bay to San Francisco, on July 3 and 4.

That we enjoyed dosa at the Dosa on Fillmore was particularly fitting for me personally; I belong to the select class of people who can eat, and have eaten, dosa for breakfast, lunch and dinner².

SF India Consulate hosts Honorable Janardhana Swamy, MP, in Silicon Valley.

L to R: Susmita Thomas, Janardhana Swamy, Ashok Sinha

Yesterday, June 29, the San Francisco Indian Consulate arranged a reception for Hon. Janardhana Swamy, MP, who is currently visiting Silicon Valley after a week-long series of diplomatic meetings in Washington, DC. Mr. Swamy is also a member of the Parliamentary Committee on External Affairs of the Lok Sabha. Ms. Susmita Thomas, Consul General, and Mr. Ashok Sinha, Consul (Community Affairs), were the chief felicitators.

This event was an invitational-only event and the stated purpose of the community meeting was for Janardhana Swamy to get a better pulse of how the consulate is serving the public in this area. The San Francisco consulate serves 15 US states from Alaska to Wyoming.

This blog post is to capture my personal impressions of the event. Some media personnel were present at the event and you will probably see some reporting as well.

Some Important Improvements Needed in Bangalore.

In a separate blog post, I explained why I almost like Bangalore. As I prepare to depart from the city at the end of this excursion, I feel obliged to write down what is immediately needed in Bangalore. I am sure many have voiced their opinions on these matters before, and many will voice their opinions after.

Congratulations to Today's Marathon Runners.

Today, two marathons took place in the US, and each of these marathons saw a different one of our cousins participate in it:

Chiastic Phrases and Their Ability to Convey Profundities - Serious or Humorous.

We have always come across interesting phrases and twists of words. Recently, my brother mentioned, in the context of healthy living, that we should engage activities that add

"life to years, and
not years to life". 

3 UVCE Alumni Friends at Mt. Madonna

When you meet friends from college days or from years past, the dimensions in which you can converse increase substantially. In the video shown here, which was taken when three of us — M. S. Chandrasekhar, K. Ramesh Babu & K. H. Sathyanarayana Rao, all UVCE graduates in Electronics & Communications Engineering (1971) — visited Mt. Madonna near San Jose, CA, you get a glimpse of that variety.

A R Rahman in Jai Ho Concert at the Oracle Arena

After nearly 75 days of waiting, we finally got to take in the A R Rahman Jai Ho concert at the Oracle Arena in Oakland yesterday. The original date of the concert was June 26, and an accident in an earlier concert forced the rescheduling of the Oakland event. You can see a video of the introduction here.

The concert was an audio-visual treat that I had not experienced in recent years. (Disclosure: I am not much of a concert-goer). Specifically, the thin translucent screen was used to great visual effect, particularly when a Lata Mangeshkar number was presented on the screen along with A R Rahman's live singing.

A Brief Visit to Madison, Wisconsin

Madison, WI, is a nice place to visit during early September. We went there to see some relatives as the primary purpose, and this blog post is to recount what we did during this sojourn.

Friday, 3 September 2010

1. General sightseeing in the town of Madison.


2. Taking in a concert by the group Nay Palm Bones at the School of Music in the University.