Phew...

What a week so far...

Things have been really hectic (you can make out from the number of ... actually the absense of...posts).

So today has been a good day so far.

But I still have a headache. Mostly caused by the late night discussion with a few friends of mine.

This friend is about to sign a huge design contract for a housing project in KL. This deal is huge and it's a big step forward for him. I am really happy for him and so we were having a really long chat last night.

He, and another friend, came over to collect medicines from my wife (she's a Homeopathic doctor, in case you didn't already know that) and she's helping him stop his hair loss. So after he came over, we sat chatting for a while at home and then decided to take it outside where we could talk some more.

This went on until about 2am in the morning.

I need some sleep.

Is Hell exothermic or endothermic?

The following is supposedly an actual question given on a University of Washington chemistry mid-term. The answer by one student was so "profound" that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well.

Bonus Question

Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?

Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.

One student, however, wrote the following:

First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving.

As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different Religions that exist in the world today. Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell.

With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially.

Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.

This gives two possibilities:

1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over. So which is it?

If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, "it will be a cold day in Hell before I go out with you", and take into account the fact that I went out with her last night, then number 2 must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over.

The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct . . .leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting "Oh my God."

THIS STUDENT RECEIVED THE ONLY "A

PS: Thanx to Thomas for sharing this.

Eeeeeeeaaaawwwwwwww....DHHAAUUMMM...

That's how it sounds when an F1 car goes down the start finish straight (at least that's the best way I can describe it)

Yesss...... I finally managed to get the tickets and am at Sepang for the Malaysian Grand Prix 2006.

As a follow on from the last post, I took the flight out of Singapore into KL. An extremely uneventful flight, mainly because it is a short 50min flight and the fact that it was Sri Lankan Air (which I have sworn never to fly again). The flight was delayed by almost 3 hours and I was generally loitering around at Changi (which is a great place to loiter...just wish I was at Terminal 2 rather than Terminal 1).

After landing at KL, I took a cab (RM40) to Sepang and approached the ticketing counter with some trepedition. I had the booking information (my pal had sent all of the information on e-mail last night), but it was still on his name and one of the criteria for collection was the passport as proof of identity. Luckily for me, the nice lady did not even bother to check whether the name on the ticket is the same as the name on the passport.

Ten minutes later, I was walking towards the gate with a big grin on my face.

At the gate, there were people checking if anyone was carrying food and mineral water into the grand stand. I dont think they were bothered with knives, but Mineral water was a strict no no. How else could they sell you the same thing at double the price? I had come straight from the airport and so I had the bottle of Glen Livet (15yrs!) in my bag. The friendly people of Sepang invited me to a drink on me after the GP was over :-)

Aah, the atmosphere of the GP. People dressed in their favourite team colours. Beer stands. Merchandising stores. Manufacturer displays. The works.

I promptly bought myself a Michael Schumacher Official Collection series Ferrari Cap. With the prancing horse and the #1 sign. Yea!

And then I sat down and practised some high speed photography on the much slower cars that were racing on the circuit as a prelude to what was coming. I think I did quite well, but capturing these cars is a lot different from capturing the actual thing.

The weather was hot and humid. I was sweating all over the place. Even in the shade, it was extremely hot.

And then there was Qualifying.

We were already told that Schumi had had an engine change and so would drop 10 places for the race. So it was interesting to see what he would do.

I have to tell you...the sound is deafening!

Imagine a bad quality speaker. Now imagine feeding 100W RMS to the speakers. The way they will crackle is how your ears feel every single time an F1 car goes past. The vibrations you feel on your chest are part of the F1 experience.

You can hear the cars change into 7th gear on the start finish straight and it's almost like the gear DROPS. The sound it makes is amazing. Like a big DHOM.

So the starting grid looks like this:

1. Fisi
2. Button
3. Rosberg (Well done! Fabulous for only his second GP)
4. Schumi (drops 10 places tomorrow)
5. Webber
6. Montoya
7. Kimi
8. Alonso
9. Klein
10. Ralf (also has an engine change...blew up during qualifying)

Let's see what tomorrow brings.

That's a bummer...

A friend of mine and I had decided to go to Sepang for the GP this year and had planned it all. He had booked the tickets and I had booked the hotel. We had taken care of our flight tickets and so were all set to fly into KLIA and meet up on the morning of the 18th so that we could catch the Saturday morning practice session.

I called this friend in the afternoon on Friday and he told me that he was just getting ready for the flight (packing and the works) and that he would see me at my arrival gate in KL.

Then I got a call from him, late in the night. It seems that Malaysian Airlines was refusing to let him board because he does not have an ECNR stamped on his passport.

Now an ECNR on an Indian Passport means "Immigration Check Not Required". It is something that you have to apply for seperately if you applied for your passport before you graduated. ECNR allows you to travel to practically any country. If you dont have ECNR, you cannot go to certain countries. Tonight, my friend discovered that Malaysia fell in that category.

So his trip is off. Now I am in a bigger dilema. He has booked the tickets and the confirmation and pickup is based on his passport number. So here I am with my trip planned and paid for, but with a distinct possibility of not being able to see the GP.

I am planning to go anyways, since I already have the flight and hotel paid for. In case I dont get the tickets, I will just have to buy them there. If they are even available.

Let's see how it goes.

An interesting Singaporean law

I encountered this for the first time in my life.

I am used to buying stuff off the net. DVDs, software, apparel, equipment. You name it. And I have been doing this from India as well.

A couple of weeks ago, I bought some DVDs from DeepDiscountDVD.com (a nice site with prices at least 10% off Amazon). Most of them arrived in 2 weeks. I was waiting for the 3 remaining DVDs from the order when a letter arrived in my letterbox.

It was from SingPost and it said that my package had been retained by Singapore Customs and had been passed to the Media Development Authority (MDA). They had enclosed an address on Maxwell Road where I could go and collect the package.

I could not even remember which DVDs were in this package. And I could not imagine why this particular package should be withheld after some 5 had been delevered to me since I moved to Singapore.

So I went to the MDA office this afternoon and waited for the lone attendant to finish with 2 people ahead of me and then attend to me.

What she offered as an explaination staggered me.

She said that Singapore has a rating system for each movie (PG, PG-13, M-18, etc...) and that each movie needs to be rated (irrespective of where it comes from). She told me that I would have to open the package in front of her and then she would have to check if these movies are exempt or they need to be rated.

So I opened it up to see Bowfinger, Erin Brockowich and Liar Liar peep out at me. The idea of rating these movies was a little too funny for me. The conversation that happened after this was anything but funny, though.

The lady checked for each of these DVD and found that they were all PG rated. So I thought, "OK, so they are rated and so not a problem. Maybe I can watch one of them when I get back home".

Boy, was I wrong!

The lady, very politely, told me that while they were all rated, they needed to be "certified". Which is another way of saying that they need to be tagged on with a certificate. Which, for all I know, will be stuck on the shrinkwrap that comes with the DVD which I will promptly throw away once I get the discs. For which I need to pay a dollar eighty on each title.

This is one of the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard.

I get my discs on Monday with a sticker ... costing $1.80 each for no reason.

And these are discs that are for personal viewing only.

No wonder a lot of people here buy their movies outside the country. It's things like this that drive up the cost of movies here in Singapore and force genuine buyers like me to shop elsewhere.

I pride myself on my DVD collection, even though my wife gives me a hard time on spending so much money on my DVDs. But I like quality and there is something about an official "Special Edition" disc that makes my heart sing. So I always buy from online stores to keep my costs low.

Looks like I am going to have to cut down on the number of DVDs I buy.

Exhausted to the bone

What a painful last few days....oooh, I am hurting just thinking of them.

The last few days have been ridiculous. Have been working until 2am in the morning and then rushing back to office and working some more.

Apart from that, my mom and my aunts are in town. So after I get back, I have to take them around for dinner and the likes. Only after we get back can I sit down for work. Which is why I am staying up late the last few days.

Yesterday night, I was up until 2:30 making a presentation for this customer conference today. Then I had to wake up at 6:30 this morning and get to the conference venue where I had to setup the display and demo that we were showing. And then there was the standing.

A lot of people came to our booth and at least pretended to be interested in what we were saying...and not just waiting to get the freebies that we had on offer. Overall, quite a successful day. But damn tiring.

I am seriously dead tired.

Have just come back to office to finish off some work which needs to be done today, else a lot of shit will hit a speeding fan on the ceiling. Hopefully I will be done in some time. Then I can go home, eat and crash.

Can't wait to get into bed. Maybe a soak in the bath tub for a while and then hit the snooze.

Funny Singapore traffic rules

I noticed the first part as soon as I landed here. The second part came in only when I started to visit more often.

Assume you are driving a car on Singapore roads. You have come up to a traffic light and you are waiting for it to turn green. Now depending on which way you are going, there are multiple ways in which you will respond.

If you are going straight, you will just wait for the light to turn green and then scram.

If you are turning right, you will slightly nudge your car towards the right and wait for the flow of traffic from the opposite side to ebb before you turn right...even when your signal has not turned green. This is similar to the "Yield" sign on American roads. The opposite side traffic has right of way, but you are OK to take that turn when cars are not headed your way.

If you are turning left, and here is where I find it strange and funny, you will nudge your car a little ahead and let the pedestrians cross the road and then gun the car before the light turns red. When it turns red, you stay put and wait for the light to turn green.

Why do I find it funny, you ask?

Cause Singaporeans will take turns when there is probability of oncoming traffic, but not when there is a certainity of NO traffic coming.

Strange, huh?

The left turn should be a free left turn. Pedestrians and other cars will still have the right of way, again like the "Yield" sign, but you should be able to turn left.

Especially since the country drives on the left hand side of the road.

But then, when were these things based on logic?

Indians cant wait to get rid of their accents

And I think this is a firly universal fact.

No matter where you go, I am sure you will bump into Indians. There is no place on earth where civilisation exists and Indians have not settled there. And there is one thing common about all of these Indians.

They all try to speak like the locals.

Now I am not talking about kids who grew up in a different country and so grew up listening to a different way of speaking English. I am talking about the people who had trouble speaking coherant English in India, but who now put on an American or British accent to...I don't know, maybe enlighten other people about where they work.

You see this only with Indians.

Even here in Singapore, you find Indians most likely to speak Singlish, which is widely acknowledged as a severely distorted version of English. Despite the fact that they are not exactly speaking English, Indians here go out of the way to speak like locals.

I have never, repeat NEVER, heard an American or a Brit or a Spaniard or a German try and speak Singlish! They wouldn't be bothered.

The only people who do, and in the process try and fit in, are us Indians. It's almost as if we are so ashamed of the way we speak, we're just waiting to drop it. I see it even on conference calls. One moment, this Indian collegue of mine is talking in a right "desi" accent. The next moment, as soon as an American or a European comes on the call, he's talking as if he was born a few thousand miles west of his actual birthplace.

I am not sure if you have noticed this. I certainly have. Mostly because people find it very strange that I don't talk quite like most of the Indians here. They ask me why I like to be different. I'm not different. I just don't think that there is any reason to change the way I have always spoken,

My question is, why does everybody else feel the need to want to blend in?

Strategy wins it...

Fernando Alonso won the first GP of the year, ahead of Schumi, who despite being on pole and leading for most of the race, came out behind Alonso after the second pit stop.

Full marks to the Renault team for a superb strategy and to Alonso for making the strategy work. This is Ferrari getting a taste of it's own medicine, having won on the back of great strategy for quite a few years.

What I do have a problem with is hypocrisy. While it is OK for other drivers to win because of good pit lane strategy, it is not OK for Schumi to do so. A lot of my pals (and we are great friends, just warring tribes when it comes to F1 and Soccer) would be applauding the strategic win for Alonso, but have cried foul when Schumi pulled off a similar win.

Don't you think that having dual standards is pathetic?

So it's OK for everyone else to do it, but not Schumi. It's the typical "Support the underdog" mentality.

You can see from my post that I am seething about the loss yesterday, but then again, we didn't exactly lose.

After all, the season is not about one race.

My Mumma is coming to town

Yep...My mumma is on a flight to Singapore...as we speak. Am waiting at Changi for her flight to land (the flight is delayed as usual).

This is her first visit to Singapore and I am hoping she will stay with us for a long time (as long as immigration rules allow her). My daughter is so thrilled that she has been counting down the days.

Mumma is coming along with her two favorite sisters...and my two favorite aunts. They will be here for a couple of weeks.

So you can imagine...The house is going to be a noise pollution zone the next few days (my mom & her sisters don't believe in speaking softly :-) ) and my daughter is going to make all kinds of excuses to not go to school :-)

As I said, the flight is delayed & I am just sitting here @ Changi waiting. Hope it lands soon. Can't wait to see my mom :-)

Another Record Waylaid

Today, Michael Schumacher equaled another record, Ayrton Senna's long standing 65 pole positions.

With this, Schumi, who according to me (and a lot of statistics) is the greatest F1 driver of all time, has all possible records to his name!

Max no. of World Championships
Max no. of Wins
Max no. of Pole positions
Max no. of Podium finishes
Fastest Championship victory
Max no. of points in a season

He is truly the best!

Go Schumi

Something I never thought would happen

All of a sudden, I could not get my mail, my chats started to disappear and all hell broke loose...only on my google window.

I checked and made sure all the other apps/sites were fine. I was having trouble only with Google and then I got this error.

Hmm...Even the exalted Google has trouble like the rest of us.

While the service came back up pretty quickly, I think it just goes to show that even Google is not without it's fair share of problems. I think what differentiates them is how well they have been able to deal with these kind of problems without the general public knowing about the problems.

Making new friends

One of the reasons I moved to Singapore was to experience a new culture and to meet people from different backgrounds.

Funny how you end up people, huh?

When I moved here, for a long time, I could not play golf. Mainly because I did not have a handicap. What I did not know was I could get a handicap from any club as long as I took the test from the local pro and paid them some money.

A collegue of mine suggested the golf pro from whom he was taking lessons. So I called him up and fixed up a time for the test. Of course, I wasn't worried about the test, since I was playing quite regularly. So the test went thro fine and I made a good acquintance.

Then this guy called me up and said that they were going to Palm Resort for a game and asked if I wanted to join. I jumped at the opportunity, having not played for quite a while. And then he called up again to say that Sebana Cove was having their monthly medal competition and if I would like to join.

I was, of course, happy to go. He told me on the ferry to Sebana that all of his students were high handicappers and that they would slow me down if I was paired with them. So he paired me with a single handicapper.

This is the guy who I now regularly play golf with. I really enjoy playing with this guy. Both of us like to play golf and enjoy playing competitive. By the rules of the game, he is supposed to give me strokes depending on the handicap difference. But I don't take a single stroke from him and try to take the game to him.

We have had a few great battles on the course.

We also click very well when we are not playing. In just three meeting, we were comfortable enough to make fun of each other and to invite each other home.

Yesterday, he had invited me and my family over to his palatial house here in Singapore. He and his gracious wife went to a lot of trouble to make us feel comfortable. Of course, the food they had cooked up (he claims he cooked it all himself) was absolutely fabulous.

It was a Malay-Indonesian fusion kind of cuisine and both me and my wife loved it. I haven't had such a great meal since I moved to Singapore.

After dinner, we retired to this loveley patio he has right outside his bedroom and sat chatting there for a long time. It was as if we have known each other for a really long time, when in fact, we hardly know each other.

This is the funny thing about meeting people. Some people you click instantly, others you don't get along no matter how long you know them.

Funny, huh?

My daughter and golf

I probably mentioned on one of my earlier blogs that I was getting my daughter to appreciate The Game.

So I thought I will take her downstairs (we have a small putting green in our apartment) and show her how it's to be done.

You will not believe me when I tell you this, but she was putting like a Pro in 15 minutes flat! I tried to keep it simple by explaining to her that she needs to tell the ball where to go and then get into a position to send it there.

So I kept repeating four things to her everytime she got on top of the ball. I kept saying "Allignment, Grip, Posture, One...Two"

After a while, she started doing these things in that order...And started sinking EVERY single putt I put for her.

At first I thought it was because the ball was closer to the hole. But boy, was I wrong. I moved the ball to more than six feet away from the hole and she put it in.

A couple of days later, I wanted to give her the feel of putting rather than just putting the ball in the hole. So I kept telling her that as long as she alligned correctly, had the right grip and posture, and then kept her rhythm, the ball will fall in.

And so I asked her to do all the things she did before tapping the ball. And then I asked her to close her eyes!

She put all four balls she stood on into the hole! With her eyes closed!

You should have seen the expression on her face when she heard the ball plop in. It was full of wonder and amazement. And I told her that it just reiterated what I was telling her from the beginning.

Now, she does not move her head at all and does not move till the ball has left for the hole. And her putting stroke is like butter!

I am so proud of my daughter.

We will be moving to chipping next!

Don't see O2

Like I said, I just bought the O2 Atom and like a good customer have registered it on the www.seeo2.com site. So the site has given me a username and password with which I can get updates and stuff.

But when I try to log in, it first fails to reach the site. Then it says login incorrect, then it logs me in, but asks me to update my device profile and as soon as I submit my changes, it says login incorrect.

I have tried re-registering, I have checked network connections. Even changed browser. But the seeo2 site refuses to budge.

I hope this is not a preview of things to come with my atom.

The Mighty Atom

Yep, I have one too...

After watching the O2 Atom stablizing over the last couple of months (you can read all about at the www.indippc.com forum), I finally took the plunge.

Now the story goes thus. My O2 xdaII has been my faithful companion for the last two and half years. And I have no complaints for it. The only problem I saw the last few weeks is the battery life, which rightly so, was on the verge of dying.

So I checked the price of a new battery and then added to that the amount that I would get if I traded in my xdaII and suddenly, the Atom looked like a great thing to have.

Of course, it was new technology. More features, latest OS, a bit faster and a lot smaller. So I finally succumbed and am now a proud owner of the O2 Atom.

Have already started playing around with it and have customized it to the hilt.

90

So the improvement this time is more than a stroke :-)

Yep, hit 90 yesterday. Had 4 pars, 10 bogeys and 4 double bogeys. While my putting stats are at 33 putts for the round, they could have been a lot better. I remember at least 4 holes where the ball almost ran into the hole, but then stayed out. A couple of the holes, the ball circled the cup and stayed out :-(

This was the third round where I was using my R5 driver consistently. And while I am getting a lot more comfortable with it, I still dont have a lot of control over it. Most of my tee shots with the driver I tend to miss left. And the rest of them, I overcompensate and hit them right.

Only thing in the last couple of rounds has been the fact that my recovery shots have been a lot better. And my approach shots are getting fabulous.

Chipping is horrible. I just can't seem to get the feel. Most of that prays on my mind when I hit an approach shot. I keep thinking that if I hit the ball on the fringe, I will have to chip the ball on the green and I will end up wasting a couple of shots. And that puts a lot of pressure on the approach shot.

Putting is OK at best. There is a lot of improvement that I need to do to get better. At least, now I know which departments and which clubs I am consistently screwing up with.

To the Range, to the Range...

One stroke at a time...

Yeah, looks like the improvement is coming a stroke at a time. Played to 94, then 93 and now 92.

I played with the gang at the Cempaka course at Palm Resort, a course that I was playing for the first time, and came away with a 92. While it looks like an improvement in a way, it's actually not a good round.

Highlights of the round:

• Scorching hot weather and an afternoon tee off. Energy sapped
• Completely new course, so no idea on the layout and the pace/break of the greens
• Game OK for the first 12 holes
• Getting a lot more comfortable with the driver...
• Occasional fades with driver, but mostly straight off the tee
• Chipping still terrible
• Putting horrible this round. Just refused to drop. 40 in all.
• Gave a single handicapper a run for his money
• Swing feeling a lot more confortable and feels like it's almost back to what it was when I left India

But, stats don’t lie...and so the game was a real shitty one. Especially the last few holes.

It was the first time I felt that the round should just get over. I have never ever felt that on a golf course. By the time I reached the fifteenth tee, I was physically dead. I know you will say that I am making an excuse for the last few holes, but you can choose to believe me if you want. Especially when you know how critical I am about my game.

Only solace is the fact that my driver off the tee is a lot better. Except for an occasional slice, which I attribute to a bad grip on the tee, I am getting a lot more consistent with it. And a lot more comfortable as well. What it is allowing me to do now is to hit a strong long iron which takes me very close to the green.

And then I promptly screw up all the good work with a horrendous chip. Maybe I will use a smaller iron and then pitch it on instead of chipping.

Today, even my putter refused to co-operate. Even when I was Green In Regulation, I was taking three putts to get off. The last couple of rounds, I didn't make a single three-putt. This round, I made four.

I can say that I was playing on these greens for the first time, but then, I should have got the hang of them in the first few holes. So no excuses there.

But the game is definately getting better. In a month's time (hopefully), I will be back to the form that I was playing before I came in to Singapore and with my grip and swing change, probably be able to attack the score with a little more consistency.

I am hoping for getting into single digits before the end of the year.

Insert, use your thumb, take it out, walk away

For all you dirty minded kinky people, this is a reminder that things are not exactly as they seem and that you should not jump to conclusions.

If you have checked out the IACS (Immigration Automated Clearance System) facility, you would know what I am talking about.

What this little card allows me to do is skip the immigration queues and get in and out of the country of Singapore in a flash. All I have to do is insert the smart card (that I got made for exactly the same purpose) in to the IACS machine, get my thumb scanned and then take my card out and walk thro the gate which has just opened for me. As simple as that and it hardly takes 10 seconds to clear immigration. It's really convenient.

Getting the card was not a hassle at all. All I had to do was carry a photograph, my passport and employment pass to the ICA building in Kallang (which, FYI, is right next to the Lavender MRT station). I proceeded to the second level and to counter 13 (which had no queue) and was attended to immediately. My documents were verified, my photo was scanned, they took both my thumb prints and then asked me to wait. After exactly 4 minutes, I had my very own smart card with my fingerprint details on it which would allow me convenience during immigration into and out of Singapore.

And considering the fact that you have to step out of the country if you have to leave Singapore, it's a good idea, huh? All the more convenient since I frequently go to Malaysia to play golf.

I tried this for the first time last weekend and it worked like a charm (of course it did, not that I was worried that it wouldn't). Super convenient. While my golf buddies waited in the queue to finish immigration formalities, I was done with it and I also finished a little bit of duty free shoppoing before they joined me...looking considerably sour, I must add.

Residents of Singapore, I definately recommend you try it.