Ranganathan Street

A Colombian asked me what is the difference between Bogota and Chennai.  I was tempted to elaborate on that (ofcourse good and bad!).  But the main difference I told him was the weather and then the population.  Size of Chennai is nearly the same as Bogota, but the population is twice as much!

I told him, wherever you go you will see people... people... people...  There will be a lengthy queue for everything and anything.  Just to make him understand, I wanted to show the picture of our Ranganathan street in Chennai.  I would say it is a shopper's paradise.  You get everything that you need (The same goods sometimes at a low price, sometimes at a higher price!!).

The problem is, it is difficult to get into the street and come out unscathed.  Once you get in, you do not need to make an effort to walk, you will be pushed by the people around you and when you find the shop you want to get in, you can push yourself towards it.  But start doing it a few yards before the shop otherwise you may get into the next shop.

Especially during festive seasons, it is too much crowded.  If it rains and after you get out of Ranganathan street, you would like to cut your legs than to clean it!

It may sound exaggerating, but it is *almost* true.  If you take a daylight picture of Ranganathan street from top, you will find it pitch black in colour because you will see only heads... heads... heads...  If you drop something from top, it does not reach the ground.  Just take a look at the picture below to believe it.

 

Photo Courtesy: Google Images

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!