Wii

I gifted myself [:-)] a Nintendo Wii for the Christmas and New Year!  It is awesome.   I was fascinated by the innovation they had in it.  Wii is for everyone in the family.  Simply put you do not play Wii, you experience it.   It ships with a few games like Tennis, Golf, Bowling, Boxing and Baseball.  It also comes with one pair of controllers(Nunchuck and a remote) that you use to play with.  I got another pair so 2 people can play the games.  It is compact compared to XBox or Playstation.  When I experienced it, I was not surprised why people go berserk about it.   Wii has revolutionised gaming.  You have to try it out yourself.

YouTube

I just came across *playlists* feature in YouTube.  I feel it is a cool feature.  It is very easy to create playlists on the fly as and when you watch a video you like most.

I think the first video I saw in YouTube was Russell Peter's comedy show(a few years ago).  Then there is this ad from AirTel which will be liked by almost all.  The ads are really impressive and I searched for all these ads in YouTube and made it a playlist.  The first AirTel ad was done by world famous Indian musician AR Rahman.  The ads are awesome.  Click here to enjoy some of the AirTel ads.

RAB (Roamed Around Bogota)

Just coined that title for fun!  Me and some of my colleagues roamed around Bogota.  We all shared the same feeling that this is the only city that we have seen so far is so well decorated for Christmas!!

That's right.  The city was beautiful.  Lights all around, parks, museums, shopping malls and roads were all beautifully decorated.  Wondering how much they would be spending on electricity. 

We visited most popular parks (park el virrey and another park in calle 93).  Shopping mall like Andino and also visited Monsarratte just to have a view of the city during night.

My view of Bogota can be seen here

Ciclovia Nocturna

Yet another thing that I observed in Bogota is that every Sunday morning at 7AM they close some of the roads for vehicles except for the Cyclists (of course for walkers and joggers).  I like it.  It is called "Ciclovia"

Similarly couple of days back here they had something called "Ciclovia Nocturna".  This is similar to Ciclovia but it starts in the evening and goes on the whole night (I think so). 

The only inconvenience I had was that on my way back from work I had to walk a lot as some of the main roads were closed.  But that was ok for a day.

I went out with my Canon and started shooting after 11PM.  The city was awake and unusually active.  I could see happy faces riding cycles and people were standing on the road and watching the cyclists.  Small shops cropped up on the platform selling corn, winter hats and what not. 

I wanted to try out some tricks like motion blur and the like using my Canon and I think I achieved it to an extent.  You can view the fotos of Ciclovia nocturna by clicking here.

Exponential Times

Did you know, we are all living in exponential times? 

There are over 2.7 billion searches performed on Google each month.  To whom were these questions addressed B.G (Before Google).  Are we going to call the time span as B.G and A.G (After Google)?  Perhaps.  Don't be surprised to see a term coined, BG and AG, atleast among those nerds who always try to find an answer for something that bogs their mind.

More than 3,000 new books are published daily.

It is estimated that 1.5 exabytes (1.5 x 10¹⁸) of unique new information will be generated this year.  This is estimated to be more than in the previous 5,000 years.

Third generation fiber optics has recently been tested by NEC and Alcatel.  This is capable of pushing 10 trillion bits per second down one strand of fiber.  This is nothing but 1,900 CDs, or 150 million simultaneous phone calls, every second.

 

47 million laptops were shipped worldwide last year.

What does this all mean?  Shift happens.

Note: This is a compilation from the world wide web.

Dance... Dance... Dance...

I went to a Christmas party yesterday with my colleagues.  This party was hosted by the Ministry's IT team.  It started with a welcome drink.  It is a tradition in Colombia to mix Jaggery dissolved in water, aguardiente(another traditional drink of colombia) and Lime. After a few minutes I could see everybody was dancing. 

It was really good to see people dancing to music.  To my surprise everybody was dancing well (may be according to my standards!!)  I feel that dancing is a national sport in Colombia. 

I too was invited by a couple of ladies for dancing and one of them was nice enough to teach me dancing.. he he he!!  But I was really bad at dancing.

Car Themes

Two days back, I just visited Gmail and they have introduced themes.  The themes change themselves depending on the geography you are in and the time of the day. 

Themes and skins bring in a kind of harmony, they are spontaneously visible and they bring out the taste and mood of the person choosing it.  The software world has adopted it long time ago.

But how nice it will be to have themes in cars?  How about having a forest theme?  As soon as you fire the engine, you will see the dashboard having a background picture of a forest with the mellifluously flowing brook, when you apply the brake you hear elephants trumpeting, when you open the door you hear birds chirping and when you shift gears you hear frogs croaking and when you honk you hear lions roaring.

The dashboard, the steering, the music, the honking everything should look and sound in line with the theme. 

Then there should be themes that could be downloaded from the internet and uploaded into the theme gallery in the car with the help of the CD / DVD drive in the A/V playback systems in the car.  Or perhaps the mobile devices like the PDA, smart phones can be used to just apply themes in your car using bluetooth or any other similar technology.

I can see that day is not too far or perhaps somebody is already working on it! 

Bomb blast in Bogota

It was nearly 10PM when I reached my apartment building and I pressed the buzzer for the security to open the door.  At the same moment, I heard a huge noise and I could see bright light on the wall of the opposite building.  The first thing that came to my mind was it could be a burst from some electric transformer.  The burglar alarms, cars and pets started screaming due to the heavy vibration that it created.  But the security was telling me that it was a bomb blast.  That sent a wave of fear inside me and I looked up the building to see what is happening in my apartment and I could see the light glowing in one of our bedrooms.

I went in and spoke to few friends on the phone and slept.  The next day I came to know that the blast happened near the apartment where we are staying.  There is a Blockbuster in the same street and somebody planted a bomb in the parking lot.  But it was not a very powerful one and so did not injure anybody.

I was just walking past that place say 30 seconds ago and I was returning from work.  On that day, to my surprise that place was deserted.  Usually it will have cars parked all around and people going in and out of Blockbuster.

Somebody told me that it was all just to remind people that there are groups that are unhappy about the Government.  Strange isn't it.  Face of terrorism!!

Back in Colombia

Hola todos.  I have come back to Bogota, Colombia.  The trip was good.  After my trip to Montevideo, Uruguay this is what I think about Uruguay or consider it my opinion.

All Uruguayans(we call them Uruguashos)  drink something called Yerba (so called herbs) in a container which is called 'Mate (pronounced as Maathey).  So everybody carries his own mate kit'.  A mate kit has a flask(for hot water), the mate, a straw (called bombillo) and the yerba.  They prepare the drink on the spot and keep drinking it. 

     

We saw a couple doing shopping in a mal.  One was pushing the cart and the other was holding the mate and drinking.  When the other wanted to drink, they changed their roles.  A simple task like shopping takes 2 people and so you can imagine other tasks.

So, always one hand is not free (carrying the kit and the mate) and they have to do things with the other hand.  Don't you think it takes twice the time and resource to do a job?

The Rambla

I have submitted my Visa at the consulate of Colombia in Uruguay. The visa department person is on holiday today and I hope to get my visa tomorrow.

We visited the Rambla over the weekend we spent in Montevideo, Uruguay.  It was very good and we had a very long walk on the Rambla.  Rambla is nothing but the shore that runs all along Montevideo.  Especially the evening view was very good.

But to my surprise nearly all houses were painted gray, the city was not so clean and the whole of Saturday and Sunday everybody does barbeque in their lawn or in their terrace.  So we could smell smoke in the air. 

The people in Uruguay eat a lot of meat and it is difficult to get vegetarian food.  My colleagues took me to some restaurants where you can get vegetarian food like pasta, pizza and rice. They export all their good meat and import meat from Brazil. 

Uruguay is Good!

There you go! I am in Uruguay, I went straight into an apartment arranged for me and my family.  The cab driver who came to pick us up at the airport spoke a little English and told that he and his family were devotees of Sai Baba in India!

I went to work and took the Visa department personnel to the Colombian consulate in Uruguay.

The place where I am in Uruguay is called Montevideo.  The country itself is very small and has a population of 3 million.  Montevideo being the capital city, it is considered densely populated (approx 1 million).

Visit to Uruguay

I am on a business visa to Colombia which is valid only for 3 months.  I need to go out of Colombia get my Temporal visa (more or less like a work permit and then enter into Colombia).

I need to travel to Uruguay to get this done and return to Colombia.  I heard Uruguay is a very safe place and you can walk around at any time during day or night.  I got my visa and I will be taking my family as well. 

I cannot imagine that 3 months got over.  Time is flying!!

Time Zone

The only way my family in Bogota and India communicate is through Skype or GTalk. We have taught our daughter (2 yrs old) how to say Good morning (Subrabhatham)and Good night (Shubhrathri) in Indian tradition whenever it is day time and night time in India respectively.

But due to time zone difference (10 and half hours difference) she started thinking that Shubrathri is for Good morning and Subrabhatam is for Good night!!

Español

I have started learning Spanish. A professor from an University comes to my apartment to teach me Spanish. Me, my wife and some of my colleagues have started learning it.

The language has lot of similarities with my mother tongue (Tamil). Seems to be interesting.

**CHECK**

I work as a consultant at the Ministry of Public credit in Colombia. It is in front of the President's house and is heavily guarded at night. Some of my colleagues (non-spanish speaking people) left the office very late in the night (probably 1230 in the night) and were waiting outside the office for Taxi.

While they were waiting outside, the security guards asked them a few questions and because my colleagues did not know Spanish, they did not understand what the guards spoke. Probably, my colleagues gave some irrelevant answer and the guards asked these guys whether they can *check* them. Without understanding much these guys said yes. Can you imagine what could have happened?

These guys were made to stand against a wall facing it and the guard frisked them. These guys felt strange as they never expected this and it was a kind of embarrassment for them. Perhaps this could be the least expected for a guy who works in an Information Technology industry (a white collar job!!).

Funny and sad!!

End of 1st Month

At the end of the 1st month, here it is about Bogota, Colombia.

- I see gun men all over the city.
- If you book a taxi, it is safe. The taxi services have IVR and so you need not know Spanish.
- Almost everything is expensive (Food, Clothing etc). But taxis are cheap.
- There is an excellent mode of public transport called, Transmilenio.
- The weather is good.
- Some parts of the city is new and some old.
- In almost all the places(office, shopping mal etc), the security guard checks your bag.
- Outside office very less people speak English.

Day 1 at work - Stayed overnight

Bogota is OK. I feel people are a bit tolerant and friendly. On my first day at work, I stayed overnight and returned home the next day morning. Due to jet lag and all these, I was falling asleep after 8PM.

At work I found quite a lot of English speaking people. I found an Italian restaurant which serves vegetarian food and also the owner of the restaurant speaks English.

In Bogota, Colombia

We have reached Bogota now. It was a 23 hours flight in Air France and unfortunately our luggage has not travelled with us. The luggages came the next day.

I would not say that the flight was comfortable. There was no leg room, The hand rest did not raise fully so we could not make our child lay down on our lap. No channel varieties in the in flight entertainment. The food and hospitality was not good in the flight. I feel it is important that the hospitality should be improved especially when you are travelling with old aged people or children. Other airlines we have travelled especially Emirates is satisfactory in all these aspects.

My employer was good enough to find an apartment for us in a good residential area. We entered into the apartment straight from the airport. The apartment had internet connection and it is spacious enough for us.

My friend and collegue was at the airport with sweets and coffee (Colombian Coffee). I myself am a coffee lover and I hope to have a great time drinking coffee in Colombia.

Fly to Bogota

Ok... I have made up my mind to go to Bogota, Colombia. I have a friend of mine in Bogota who needs my help now and I do not mind the change in role or location. I am travelling with my family and I don't know how I will manage things in Bogota.


I have got my visa (business) and my wife and kid got their tourist visa. I have asked for Air France or Lufthansa. These are the only airlines that reach me to Bogota as quick as possible.


I came to know that no Indian spices will be available in Bogota. I have asked for more baggage allowance and I am planning to carry nearly 10 kgs of Indian spices. Sounds strange, isn't it? I have read somewhere that Mexicans carry their spices with them wherever they travel.


Hasta Luego... Oh... I forgot to mention that I have started learning espanol with a CD and a book. BTW, Hasta Luego means..... search http://translate.google.com and find out.