Everything's Cool - Trailer

Saw this movie yesterday. It's a pretty good presentation of controversies surrounding Global Warming (unfortunately this has become politically uncorrect word today).

It has a good historical background of this issue which will be helpful for the people who hate Global Warming issue just because it was raised by Al Gore, a political leader.

Cheers
~Raag

McDonalds Advertising in Hindi in Mountain View, CA.

I just saw this ad on a Valley Transit Authority (VTA) bus on route 22. It's interesting that they are advertising in
Hindi.

~Raag

We Indians are very proud of you Abhinav!!! And now more medals

India Challenge - India@Beijing - Beijing 2008 Olympics - The Times Of India

EDIT: India won another bronze medal on Aug 20. This time in wrestling by Sushil Kumar. There is another medal confirmation by Indian pugilist Vijendar. He is in semis. These medals are more so appreciated as they are won not only against the strong opponents at Olympics, but they are won againts lax system, poor resources, and pathetic politics. This Olympic will be a record as "most won medals won by India in any Olympics", three.

Abhinav Bindra won first ever individual Olympic gold medal for India. This is a gold medal for India after 28 years. He won it in 10 m air rifle event. This is a really proud day for India.

~Raag

"You look familiar, I think I have seen you in Cisco"

Me: "No, I do not work in Cisco. I work at Company 'ABC'."

Mr. India: "O sorry! By the way, I am Mr. India. Where are you from?"

Me: "Oh, I am from Jhumari Talaiyya!"

Mr. India: "Great, I have a friend from that place too. So what work do you do?"

Me: "I just lay eggs."

Mr. India: "Fantastic, lets meet up some time. May I have your number please?"

Me: "Uh, it is XXX-XXX-XXXX."

Mr. India, calls and checks, if I get the ring.

Mr. India: "Ok, see you later."

Exactly two days later.

Ring Ring.

Mr. India: "Hey hi, Mr. Jhumari Talaiyya, this is Mr. India here."

Me: Hi.

Mr. India: "How are you doing?"

Me: "I am fine, how about you."

Mr. India: "Great, Thanks for asking. Hey listen, I have an e-commerce business. It's a partnership based business. You look very enterprising and I think it would be a good utilization of your spare time."

Me: "Is it related to Quixtar, Amway?"

Mr. India: "Uh, why did you ask?"

Me: "Get the heck out of here. Do not call me again, and I am not interested."

This is a very familiar conversation, many Indians could relate to. Walmart, Malls, Target, Ross, anywhere you go, you get constantly cornered by fellow Indians trying to talk you into their "e-commerce" business. Bay area and Silicon Valley is very badly infected by these menace. It is scary to talk to any other Indian whom you do not know. Either they will be interested to sign you up to this business, or they will think that you are looking for to sign them up.

It has made difficult to make new Indian friends in the Bay area as you are always doubtful of other person's intention. I am sure, many of my friends have their share of horror stories with these people.

Although, I have not been very succesful to avoid all of these attacks, I can give you some tips to avoid them. Do not stray around an Indian couple who are formally dressed in a location, where other people are casually dressed. Be especially away from Indian couple who appear to do shopping at these places, but have empty shopping carts. If somebody wants to talk to you out of blue, just do not give your phone number. And if you do, save them as "Do not pick" in your phone book.

I hope keeping these tips in mind will save you some harrassment from the e-commerce business people.

~Raag

Follow up post to "Providence, RI is partly responsible for the food problem in World"

EDIT: The previous post was also discussed here.
I got several responses to my previous post regarding my experiences at Providence, RI. Thank you all for that. My friend Sumit wanted me to mention him specifically as he was responsible for part of the eventful trip I had in Providence. First of all I was so excited to meet him that I forgot my suitcase at Boston airport and then he took the keys of my rental car :).

Several people responded my food observation in Providence. I mentioned that restaurants in Providence serve monstrous proportions of food. Many people had views mentioning that restaurants should serve that much food, and people should be able to bring leftovers home. First of all, I would like to mention it that although I wrote what I observed, almost everybody in my group observed the monstrous proportions of food.

I have visited nearly fifty or more cities in US and if I note only a specific city for its food quantity, then there is something to note. Regarding leftovers, its a good idea to take the leftovers and eat it later. However, if restaurants regularly serve us more food than we can eat it at one sitting then there is something wrong. Plus restaurants charge us more money for that. Leftovers is a once in a while thing. It is like if you want to go to buy grocery, the merchant makes you buy extra grocery than you need.

Leftovers are not always a good idea. For tourists its not convenient to take leftover back to their hotel and eat it next time. Somebody in the comment suggested to get a hotel that has all the possible amenities. No Thanks. I don't want to spend extra fifty bucks to get all the amenities so that I can warm up the overpriced food next time.

Leftovers are not a sustainable solution either. First of all, extra food is cooked, packed in styrofoam box, stored in refrigerator, reheated mostly in styrofoam boxes, or thrown in trash more often than not. Wastage at several steps.

One of the respondents suggested that he wants to have a full satisfactory meal when he is in a restaurants. If you have a little more appetite, then you can order several dishes along with main course. It doesn't mean that restaurants should serve food which has twice more than recommended daily nutritional requirements for a common person to each customer.

In a world, where food prices have gone over the top, several places have had riots due to food price increase and food unavailability, supporting a culture of food wastage is a sign of ignorance and arrogance in my view.

~Raag