Sasani

Angles and Demons

2009-03-08T11:09:00.007+11:00

When a leading scientist at C.E.R.N is brutally murdered with the symbol

Try looking at the symbol upside down

branded across his chest, renowned symbologist Prof Robert Langdon is called in to investigate. It is hard to believe that a centuries old brotherhood is still in existence, deep underground. Illuminati, the enlightened was formed in the 16th century among the intellects of the era who were tortured and hindered by the Vatican, because their findings challenged the teachings of the Catholic church. Its most known member being Galileo.

When it's discovered that CERN's scientist's latest creation an 'antimatter' canister has been stolen, and is now ticking away like a time bomb somewhere deep inside the Vatican city, Langdon and Vittoria Vetta, a CERN scientist involved in the project rushes down to the Vatican to try and find the canister along with the missing cardinals that had gone missing just before the Vatican conclave.

The story is one filled with mystery, puzzles, riddles that need to be solved, clues and symbols, and intrigue. Dan Brown has done an excellent job at keeping the reader glued and in suspense with unexpected twists through to the end.

However the framework is pretty much the same as that of "The Da Vinci Code". Robert Langdon, a female accomplice, an ancient brotherhood, Vatican secrets, anagrams and ambigramm, solving puzzles for survival, brutal killings, the one person that is trusted in saving the day turning out to be the mastermind behind the brotherhood, and eventually a happy ending.

However it is understandable why Da Vinci Code made a bigger impact than Angles and Demons. With the story unfolding in one of the world's leading physics research institutions with particle physics terminology and concepts, it is easy for a lay person to lose interest in the story.

For those of you who prefer the big screen to the paperback, Angles and Demons the film is set to be released in the coming months. However as was the case with The Da Vinci code, I believe this will also be a disappointment. There is so much information and action packed in to each and every page of the 600+ page book, that it is next to impossible to cram it into a 2 hour audio-visual.

Lord of the Weather

2009-02-09T14:17:00.004+11:00

In a grizzly reminder that man is still at the mercy of the natural world, during the last two weeks Australia's southern states South Australia and Victoria experienced the worst heat conditions the country has ever seen.

Victoria sweltered for 4 consecutive days with temperatures over 40 degrees Celsius, with South Australia experiencing the heat over more than a week.
What's living in a a 43 degree temperature you'd ask, on a personal level it's like living inside an oven. You can feel your skin burn, your head ache, you breathe hot dry air, you lose so much moisture that you constantly feel dehydrated and restless. Nights are slightly less hot but not enough to get any shut-eye. Three consecutive days of that and you are at the end of your sanity.

At a metropolitan level, there arises other problems. Rail and tram lines expand way beyond their tolerance levels and buckle-up forcing the cancellation of public transport. The demand for electricity doubles over the capacity and causes blackouts, but worst of all Australia being the driest inhabited continent such conditions easily give way to massive bush fires.

The last few days have seen several storming fires raging across the state, taking many a people, animal and property with them. The death toll is over 100 and rising, with some townships completely reduced to ashes.

This includes the picture postcard town of Marysville I've blogged about here and here. I hear there's nothing standing in the whole town or its surrounds.

It's not about the bike

2009-01-29T08:52:00.005+11:00

No it sure isn't. It's about courage, an unwavering determination and a fighting spirit.

Lance Armstrong grew up in a rugged town in Texas, without the love of a father or the comfort of a stable income. But he was surrounded by his mother's tireless caring which instilled in him the confidence and the fighting spirit that saw him through not just the record breaking 7 Tour de Frances' but also through the even more difficult cancer treatments.

I've spent my life racing my bike, from the back roads of Austin, Texas to the Champs-Elysees, and I always figured if I died an untimely death, it would be because some rancher in his Dodge 4x4 ran me head first into a ditch. Believe me, it could happen. Cyclists fight an ongoing war with guys in big trucks, and so many vehicles have hit me, so many times, in so many countries, I've lost count.

At the age of 25 Lance was the picture of health, and begining to look the picture of wealth. All troubles seemed to be behind him, but the feeling was short-lived for fate had other plans. He was diagnosed with testicular cancer which had already spread into his lungs, he was in stage 3, and there were only 3 stages.

I thought I knew what fear was, Until I heard the words 'You have cancer'. Real fear came with an unmistakable sensation: it was as though all my blood started flowing in the wrong direction. My previous fears, fear of not being liked, fear of being laughed at, fear of losing my money, suddenly seemed like small cowardices. Everything now stacked up differently: the anxieties of life- a flat tire, losing my career, a traffic jam- were reprioritized into need versus want, real problem as opposed to minor scare. A bumpy plane ride was a bumpy plane ride, it wasn't cancer.

Immediate surgery was needed followed by an intensive chemotherapy, but the tale took another twist, the cancer had spread to his brain, his chances were slim, as slim as 3%, this information was somehow withheld from him, and he believed he had a 20% chance, whereby he started researching the disease, trying to strategise how to beat it. The game plan!

Brain surgery was called for to remove the malignant tissue. Followed by months long Chemotherapy.

The question was, which would the chemo kill first: the cancer, or me? My life became one long IV drip, a sickening routine: If I wasn't in pain I was vomiting, and if I wasn't vomiting, I was thinking about what I had, and if I wasn't thinking about what I had, I was wondering when it was going to be over. That's chemo for you.

The sickness was in the details, in the nasty asides of the treatment. Cancer was a vague sense of unwellness, but chemo was an endless series of specific horrors, until I began to think the cure was as bad as or worse than, the disease. What a casual bystander associates with cancer- loss of hair, sickly pallor, a wasting away- are actually the side effects of the treatment. Chemo was a burning in my veins, a matter of being slowly eaten from the inside out by a destroying river of pollutants until I didn't have an eyelash to bat. Chemo was a continuous cough, hacking up black mysterious, tar like matter from deep in my chest. Chemo was a constant, doubling-over need to go to the bathroom.

Despite the odds stacked up against him, he made it. And the cancer made him a different man.

People think my comeback as a triumph, but in the begining, it was a disaster. When you have lived for an entire year terrified of dying, you feel like you deserve to spend the rest of your days on a permanent vacation. You can't, of course; you have to return to your family, your peers, and your profession. But a part of me didn't want my old life back

With the help of his friends and newly found wife, he fought the depression and did get back on the bike. His previous contract with the professional cycling team "Cofidis" was withdrawn while he was in hospital. They didn't beleive he was going to make any more money for them. As Lance puts it, "The rug was pulled from beneath my feet" ,and "they let me there to die"

They searched for months for a team who would be willing to risk signing in a weakened ex-biker, until a new organization, the US postal services team decided to sign him up. And he didn't let them down.

Lance Armstrong went on to win 7 Tour de la France Tournaments, considered one of the toughest sporting events in the world. He established the "Lance Armostrong Foundation" which continues to raise funds for cancer to date.

Udawalawe Elephant Sanctuary

2009-01-19T13:08:00.004+11:00

The first in line!

Glub....glub.....a bucket load of milk

"Next!!"

"ooh...me me me!"

"Hey you, the one with the inconspicuous look, you already had your turn!...cheeky!"

A happy looking mob :)

Place: Udawalawe National Park

Time: 3:00 pm daily

Free entrance, but any donations for milk is gratefully accepted.

Until the babies are old enough to be released in to the wild, they need gallons of milk a day.....literally.

The Ancient city of Anu

2009-01-14T12:32:00.009+11:00

The great Stupa from afar

Anuradhapura, affectionately (or conveniently) referred to as "Anu" in the book "The Winds of Sinhala" by Colin De Silva is one of my favourite places on earth, as is the book a favourite book of all time of mine.

If you haven't read "The Winds of Sinhala" already........!?! What the hell have you been doing all this time???!!@!#!#

Ruwenweli Dagoba

Anuradhapura doesn't possess the cool climate of the hill country nor its natural beauty, yet there's some magical force that continues to mesmerize the visitor.

"Eth Pokuna"

A hub for the water channel-tank network in ancient Anu, with underground water tunnels running in and out to tanks many kilometers away, ensuring flow control and minimising waste.

Isurumuniya

Tissa Wewa

The Citadel Sigiriya, "Lions Rock"

Sitting there looking pretty

David Attenborough once narrated the complex social structure and behavioural patterns of these fellows in Anuradhapura/ Pollonnaru areas

View from atop Dambulla temple

Recovering from....

2009-01-12T12:56:00.004+11:00

A blissful five week holiday in the land of serendipity....... more on that later

winding up with long boring flights in the middle of the night......ad hoc sleeps.....transits.....flight delays....security checks....more awkward sleeps

Back at my desk early on a gloomy Monday morning, sooo out of touch......now what was it that I was doing here? and what are all these stacks of samples on my desk?

Half the people still on holiday.....

C-C-Cold!!!!! and it's supposed to be summer!

Sleeeeeeeeepy......
With images of the verrry comfy bed and cozy blankets flashing through my head........

mwwaaahh..... I want to go home!!!

As Easy as Pie

2008-11-25T14:57:00.005+11:00

Heat up the frying pan with a tad bit of oil. Add chopped onions and fry until translucent.

Then dump in all the things that you'd like to find inside the pie...... the meat(s) of your preference, mushrooms, capsicums, sun dried tomatos (mmm...)..........whatever takes your fancy!

A wee bit of white wine or vinegar helps to infuse the flavours together.

Don't forget the salt and pepper!

Grease and line up the pie dish with pastry dough.

Chuck the filling into the pie base, add tons of grated cheese, and if you, like me find that the filling is not enough to fill-in the whole dish, just think of something to make it full, maybe pieces of bread or some leftovers or something.

Use another pastry sheet to cover up the pie. Leave an incission on it to let the steam escape.

And pop it in the oven (pre-heated of course).

Your nose will alert you when it's done

Enjoy!

Random Memories

2008-10-31T16:56:00.004+11:00

The incident happened many many moons ago......in Sri Lanka at home. We were wrapping up an ordinary day, past 9 o'clock in the night I think...... When our Bindu started barking somewhere in the garden. It was a bark with a certain alarm to it, as if saying "I'm not too sure what this thing is but I need to get some one's attention here!!!"

Now Bindu has always been a garden dog as he was never granted visa to enter the house by his superior, Bingo. So one would expect him to know his territory well, and he's not the kind of dog who barks at just about anything, so naturally this got us worried.

So torch in hand we approached the suspicious scene cautiously. The sight of 'back-up' sent Bindu into a frenzy! and he started jumping around this suspicious object and then looking towards us for an explanation.

Upon closer inspection the black rounded heap on the ground, turned out to be a tortoise with its head inside its shell!
Naturally we bursted out laughing! which seem to add to Bindu's confusion.
It wasn't the first time that we found a lonely wandering tortoise in the garden, but it has certainly never happened in Bindu's lifetime.

My father told us what they used to do (back in the good old days) when they found a tortoise like that. Light a candle and erect it on its shell, and send it on its way!

This was all good fun but somehow Bindu didn't seem to be convinced, so he decided to continue with his woofing and waffing. What with the tortoise going nowhere fast, we decided to lock Bindu up in a room, unknown to Bingo that is! ah the drama!.

And that's how we managed to get some sleep that night.

Points to Ponder

2008-10-30T16:36:00.003+11:00

Been a long time since I last put anything up here. I'm rather caught up with work these days so here are some interesting questions for you to ponder on in the meantime.

Enjoy!

1) How long did the Hundred Years' War last?

2) Which country makes Panama hats?

3) From which animal do we get cat gut?

4) In which month do Russians celebrate the October Revolution?

5) What is a camel's hair brush made of?

6) The Canary Islands in the Pacific are named after what animal?

7) What was King George VI's first name?

8) What color is a purple finch?

9) Where are Chinese gooseberries from?

10) What is the color of the black box in a commercial airplane?

So you think you are smart eh?

The Tessellaar Tulip Festival

2008-09-22T08:54:00.012+10:00

The annual Tessellaar Tuip Festival held in Victoria is an event dedicated to celebrating the beautiful flower that has captured the imagination of many a poets, artists and laymen alike.
It's an excuse to put on a spectacular display of colours that just make you go "wow!"

Despite the fact that it's the spring time, the weather wasn't too kind and spoiled half the day with heavy rains and gusts which made things a bit difficult for us tulip admirers.

Rows and rows and rows of tulips

Red Hot beauties

Stepping out of the conventional image, a more modern look.

A little touch of Holland....the home of the tulip.

Some Dutch folk dances and music

A taste of Netherlands.....'poffertjes' small fluffy pancakes with a dab of butter, icing sugar and maple syrup. mmmmmm........

A mix of colours
Couldn't find the precious black tulip that caused so much trouble in Alexander Dumaas's "The Black Tulip". However it was easy to imagine the grand tulip festival mentioned in the book, the only difference being that here there were no candidates from Ceylon who were exibiting tulips, only admirers. Yes Dumaas was misinformed that tulips were grown in Ceylon!

A close-up with rain drops

Blues and purples

There were some others who were screaming out for attention.

The LHC, Dark Energy, Black holes and us

2008-09-12T10:06:00.006+10:00

I'm sure most of you have heard of this new experiment running at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Switzerland. It's just one of those pieces of news that you have trouble avoiding with all the hyper media attention. Black holes and the possibility of the world ending as the scientists push the button for this gigantic machine to work!

Remember the Y2K bug? yeah almost forgotten by now, but at that time there was much speculation of the possibility of the world ending, with all the computers getting confused and unimaginable chaos to follow....... but you just woke up the next morning only to find that you are still alive and you still have to make your own cup of morning tea and go to work.

Same story.

So what's this thing about this LHC experiment?

Warning: Mild Science Content!

When I put on my scientific shoes, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) experiments are one of the most exciting things to have ever happened, right there along with the man landing on the moon.
We might finally find the answer to the age old question of how did the Universe begin and
this might sound funny but what are we made of? and also was Einstein correct?

Now the possibility of answering these questions would get any scientist jumping up and down with excitement! And that is quite understandable for these were THE questions that kept these people awake at night for centuries. And the uncovering of these answers might open up a whole new dimension literally!

So what's the big deal you may ask, we can still go on living life without knowing these gobbledygook. That's where I put on my philosophical shoes.

It's true that we don't need to know how the world began or whether relativity is correct to go about our daily lives. And besides what's all this knowledge for? ok suppose we did prove that there was a big bang and the universe is expanding and we are made out of this elusive Higgs boson and that Einstein was correct! So what? We still have to take that crowded train to work, we still have to put up with the troublesome boss and we still have to eat through our mouths.

The pursuit of all this incomprehensible knowledge is just to quench the humans thirst for curiosity.

Or is it?

Since the beginning of time humans have had this curiosity, to know who's living in the next cave, to perfect the art of hunting and to find out what's up there in the heavens. This curiosity is what has brought us to where we are now.

Most of the time when discoveries are made we don't realize it's potential straight away, it takes time to find applications. So could these experiments at the LHC be one of those that hands us the key to unlocking a door, behind which lies endless possibilities???

Only time can tell!

The Mystical Dendenong Ranges and other stories

2008-08-25T13:51:00.017+10:00

The Dandenong ranges are located just about an hours drive Eastwards from the City of Melbourne.

The area is a horticulturists paradise! Which does explain why there were so many plant nurseries, bonsai nurseries, gardens of all sorts and fertiliser vendors all over the place.

Mist.....thicker than the Beijing fog! This along with the winding mountain roads made driving a bit scary at times

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils

There were Lots of unknown flowers like this one, even in the winter.

A green flower, looks like a variety of Euphorbia.

More Unidentifiable flowers and plants

Huge Gum trees!! makes you feel kind of ............... small.

?? Not sure what this was all about

A Crimson Rosella

A Laughing Kookaburra. There were plenty of these around but none came so close as to get a good shot. Why is it called a Laughing Kookaburra you may ask, well in that case you haven't heard the Kookaburra's call. Unfortunately I couldn't catch one on video for your listening pleasure so you'll have to have a listen here.

I wish more birds would sing like that!!

There are some very interesting aboriginal stories built around the Kookaburra. On Saturday night I read that aborogines in the area had this story that the Kookaburra's loud call is a request to the sky people to light up the mighty fire that lightens up the world. And sure enough the next day I heard the Kookaburras going on about something before day-break, and what do you know before long the sun was up!

A puffed up Australian Magpie

Ruby! One of our very friendly hosts for the night

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.......... a local lunch!

The William Ricketts Sanctuary

One of the renowned gardens & parks in this area. William Ricketts was a sculpture/ artist who was inspired by the spirituality among the aboriginal people.

It is said that the aboriginals have (more so had) a very close connection with mother nature, instead of fighting nature and overcoming it, the aboriginal people knew that the best way is to live with the nature in harmony.

This lead William Ricketts to do his bit to let the word spread. Therefore his sculptures depicted aboriginal figures blending in with the soil and the trees and the rest of mother earth.

A man with two lyer birds on his shoulders

Mother Earth

Thun Sithaka Raavaya

And to top off the great weekend, we got to listen to some intoxicatingly beautiful voices.

Dooooowili.................

This was not really in the Dandenong ranges, but it's not often that the diaspora get to listen to this kind of thing so didn't want to miss this!

The unforgettable Apple mala

Thun Sithaka Raavaya taking leave from the stage.

They didn't forget to sing all my favourites.........which was quite a lot!!

Typical day with machines

2008-08-21T16:45:00.002+10:00

Through the eyes of a wild animal: Part 2

2008-08-12T16:38:00.008+10:00

Our general idea of an eye is a round white ball with a black circle in the middle of it. However not all animals have this kind of geometrical arrangement. One example you would be most familiar with is the cats eye, which takes an elongated oval shape during the day time. But you probably wouldn't have come across some of these unusual pupil shapes that I've got below.

Most of us know the cat's version of the story. These cute fur balls have eyes that are able to see in dark conditions, increasing their sensitivity to light. Thus to protect their eyes from the glare of the sunlight during daytime the pupils contract to a mere thin vertical line. And if you see a cat lying around with droopy eyelids with that typical 'don't care' attitude, it's nothing more than trying to protect his eyes!

Next time you visit New Zealand, you can directly look in the eye of a local and see if this is true. Sheep and even horses (below) have a horizontally elongated pupil, increasing their field of view to around 290 degrees. Again another adaptation for a animal of prey.

I have no idea why these beasts have got a bean shaped pupil, the elongation is probably to do with being the hunted party.

Look at those heavy eyelashes! Would work very well for a mascara advertisement!!?
Seriously, the square shape is a very uncommon shape in nature. The heavy lashes are to protect their eyes against sand storms, but square pupil?? no idea.

That shape looks quite funny, but that bump in the pupil is to give the hippo the ability to see out over the surface of the water. So he can keep himself half immersed in his luxurious bath and gaze out over the water level.

The magnificent horse has a blind spot directly in front of it, so even if he can see a wide field of view, the image will have a dark slit at the front.

This half circle can be rotated. So when the deer is grazing the hemispheric pupil will come down, keeping level with the horizon.

I must mention that I borrowed these pictures from this site (what with all these allegations of photo theft going around in the blogosphere!) And if you do like to know some more interesting stuff about how frogs, birds etc use their vision you will find them here.

Through the eyes of a wild animal: Part 1

2008-08-02T17:50:00.010+10:00

The location and structure of the human eyes enable us not only to see how long and wide an object is but also to see how far away it is from us and how thick it is. If we had 2D vision (like what you get when you close one eye and look through the other) we would still be able to see objects clearly but judging the distance would be a problem, so we would look rather clumsy trying to grab things that are further beyond our reach.

So for this reason nature has decided to give the natural predators/ carnivores the ability to see in 3D. Or else finding something to eat would be quite a challenge! Thus most of the predators have their eyes located at the front of their head, a feature of 3D or stereoscopic vision. So think of the big hunters like the tiger, cheetah, leopard, lion (lioness rather), wolf, hawk (more or less), bear, owl etc. all of these have their eyes located at the front of their heads. This gives them the ability to judge the distance to their food and pounce upon it at the right moment.

awww.......... purrr

And what about the prey? the hunted? Well, as far as they are concerned they would rather prefer to have the ability to scan a wide area than be able to see in 3D. Because ill judging the distance to the grass patch is not going to be fatal, but not being able to see the hunter creeping up from behind is! Therefore most of the hunted animals have their eyes located on either side of their heads giving them access to a panoramic view. Deer, antelope, horse, zebra, goat , sheep, buffalo and the like. These animals can only see in 2D, but they have a wide field of view almost close to 360 degrees enabling them to spot any suspicious activity around them.

Eyes focused on the grass

But of course nature is pretty diverse. And there are very many types of visionaries and all of them can't be categorised into these two classes. But at any time in your life if you do find some unidentifiable wild animal charging towards you, and if it has got its eyes at the front of its head, you are in deep trouble!

And what about us humans? does this mean that we are born predators? Well I'm not an expert in natural history but if you ask one he or she would probably argue that this has to do with humans being descendents of apes, if you believe in Darwin that is (the natural historian not the blogger). So for our predescessors it was vital to be able to judge the distance to the next swingable tree branch (I just made that word up I think). So we humans inherited the 3D vision due to this reason.

So you could say we were born to be Tarzan!

A Bird's Tale

2008-07-21T19:44:00.008+10:00

Reading Gallicissa's blog reminded me of an incident that took place about 3 years ago.

Setting: Sri Lanka, parent's home

It wasn't just once when birds searching for a place to make a nest to raise a family decided the best location for the new house was on a Ficus tree in our courtyard, inside the house. The parents-to-be would come into the house, inspect the location, the tree, all the branches and all the while talking with each other (trying to make a decision I guess) and then leave, after about 2 or 3 inspections, they would decide whether they are going to build the nest or not.

The first time someone decided that a high-up branch on the tree is the best spot were a couple of Kondayas (apologies for not knowing the real or scientific name of these birds, maybe Gallicissa can help!).

They built the nest and laid the eggs. There were 3 small eggs with brown spots. We could conveniently see into the nest from the second storey. We watched as the parents took turns in hatching the eggs, and going out in search of food. We watched as the eggs hatched and two teeny weeny pinky babies came out. The third one was a bit late, but eventually did manage to squeeze out. We watched as they grew feeding on whatever their parents brought home.

And then one fine day the little ones decided that it was time to stretch their wings. This was quite an exciting and anxious time, not only for the parents but even more for us, because just a few feet away from the foot of the tree was the fish pond. And then there was good old Bingo. Dogs are not generally interested in a bird for a meal, not even for an afternoon snack for that matter, but anyone fluttering around in 'his' house becomes his problem, so was a bit scary. And then there was the stealthy kitty cat, always choosing the most inappropriate times to show up.

So the little birdies took to the sky...... or more towards the ground. They would fly as far as their little wings would carry them........like a few centimeters at a time. Then they would sit on a low hanging branch of a plant, sometimes on a fern just over the edge of the pond (gulp!) and rest for about an hour before finally gathering up the strength to do it all again! The bird parents were behaving like any normal Sri Lankan parent would when their little ones first start moving around.......screaming, or rather chirping at high frequency and running behind the little ones excited and nervous at the same time. And whenever it seems that the babies were having trouble getting back to the nest, the mother or the father would demonstrate how it should be done, over and over again until the little birdie made the attempt.

This drama went on for a few days, quite nerve wracking for us knowing the potential dangers lurking in the vicinity. Fortunately everything went according to plan. Once the babies had had enough training the parents led them out to see the wide world. They flew up to the window, sat there for what seemed like ages, and finally made the move. The younger sibling, who seemed a bit smaller and backward than the others took a few more hours in mustering up the strength, but he (or she) too finally joined the others. The parents were heard making quite a racket outside for a while.

A couple of days later I spotted three Kondayas on the bird's eye chili tree (their favourite fruit, I think) and I knew it was them because one seemed a bit smaller than the other two. And they seemed to be happy, and it was really nice to see them doing well in bird society!

However not all bird's tales have a fairytale ending.

A few months later (or was it a year.....not sure) a couple of kondayas came in to inspect the ficus tree (Deja vu). I'm not sure if it were the same couple, for birds don't have facial features where we humans can distinguish between Tom, Dick and Harry (or maybe more likely chirp, choop and cheep). Anyhow, they built the nest again, and this time there were 2 little eggs. The eggs hatched and two little kondayas came out.

But this time the story took an unexpected turn, the bird mother was most tragically murdered.... the suspect was caught red handed (or feather mouthed) licking its paws and lying on its side quite content with the deed. The cat didn't get any lunch from me that day, he didn't seem to need any either....well, that's what he was born to do I guess.

The bird father had his hands full bringing up two children on his own. The elder one seemed a bit rebellious, for he left the house and straight into the wide world while the father was away gathering food. The father returned to find only the younger child on a plant in the courtyard, so he rushed outside chirping away to look for his other child.
The next day the younger one was seen sitting on the window grill looking into the unknown world out there. He looked quite vulnerable without the mother to guide him out.

Later on the day I was just outside that window, filling in the bird bath under the frangipani tree, when the little guy suddenly decided to make a dash for the nearest frangipani branch. Awwww...

As I watched the little bird sitting on the branch, I could see past him another pair of eyes watching intently. Kurulugoya! (again sorry I only know the names of these birds in layman's terms). It was such a helpless moment....I knew what's going to happen, and I knew I can't do anything about it, but I wanted to do something to save this innocent fellow, but there was nothing I could do....I can't shoo away the little guy for he could hardly fly, I can't stop the predator bird I didn't have enough time to cover ground...And all of these within a fraction of a second. So I watched helplessly as the big bird whizzed in.... like a missile, eyes focused on its target.

Swooooosh!!

Gone!

Spam News

2008-07-16T12:49:00.004+10:00

I'm doing some experiments today and taking some measurements. In between each set of measurements I have to keep an interval of about an hour for the machine to cool down before I take the next set of readings. I need to take about 5 sets of readings which means it's going to take 5+ hours of the day, and in between those readings what do I do?

First hour or two I managed to finish off tit-bits of other unfinished work, play a game of sudoku, arrange my desktop folders etc. Then I opened my junk mail folder to sort through the junk and to see if some non-junk mail has been wrongly accused by the mail authorities. Fortunately there wasn't any, however one mail title caught my eye

"Afghan bomber kills Bush"
This sudden suppressed laugh/murmer escaped me. Seems the spammers are being creative nowadays. They are probably begining to realize that the old fashioned 'remedies for bodily defects', 'designer wear at low prices', 'free tickets to watch Oprah', 'Winning a lottery ticket in some remote land' and of course 'the death of an unknown relative who left you a million dollars' is now a bit too known to their victims.

So they are coming up with new ideas to get those people to click! And of course who can resist "Afghan bomber kills Bush" I have to give credit to those spammies, that title looks very tempting!

Pani Kadju!

2008-06-29T14:28:00.005+10:00

Crush the cashews

Caremelize some sugar
Stir in the crushed nuts into the mixture
Pour it over a flat surface and cut into squares

Simple as that!!

Mrs. Craddock by W Somerset Maugham

2008-06-25T11:23:00.002+10:00

Bertha Ley is a beautiful, intelligent and well- refined young lady who falls madly in love with the handsome Edward Craddock, a farmer and a tenant of his father. The objections of her well-bred relatives’ only aids in driving this determined young woman to marry this man who she believes is the only man for her. But the honeymoon ends too soon and Bertha realizes that Edward can’t return her the romantic love she offers him. Edward is a dutiful and rather self-centred gentleman who respects everyone’s wishes in the same way as to those of his wife’s. He has no priority set towards his wife’s requests and sets out to drive two ladies to town while his wife is on sick bed after a still birth simply because Bertha’s request for him to stay at home with her came later than the ladies’ request of driving them to town.

Depressed and bored Bertha sets out to join her aunt in travelling to Rome on holiday only to return to Edward again and again, and find herself trapped in a loveless marriage that she didn’t wish for. Ironically the man who was initially loved only by Bertha but looked down upon by everyone else ends up being loved and highly admired by all but one…...Bertha.

Somerset Maugham takes us into the lives of a handful of characters very different to each other and when brought together inflicts pain and joy upon each other due to their differences in nature, and not because one person is morally better than the other.

Nice read.

What goes into a Marshmallow

2008-06-17T09:39:00.010+10:00

Heaps of sugar mixed with a little bit of water

A touch of Gelatine for that sticky feeling

Pinch of colour & essence
And a dip in icing sugar for the finishing touch

And loads and loads of air bubbles trapped inside!!

Being Project Manager

2008-06-02T15:15:00.008+10:00

When you are in charge of receiving a specialized piece of equipment, doing the site preparation, installation, getting it up and running, and making sure it's doing what it's supposed to do, everything that can go wrong does go wrong! When you've thought through all the necessary precautions and think you've handled them all, you find there's something you missed! When you think that it cannot get any worse, it does! Finally when you think you've worked out all problems, you are proven completely and utterly wrong!!

I'm talking about this new piece of equipment that our research group decided to invest in. Yes it's a great investment specially for my research work. But so far I've been going out of my mind with trying to set it up!

It all started when the dispatch of the equipment was delayed by the manufacturer who's in the UK. Not my fault, but it's pretty annoying when you've got an oblivious agent who has got no idea what's happening, and a 9 hour time difference with the main company!

All the while I was doing the site preparation, like finding a suitable place (negotiating with people who are very possessive of their labs is not too easy either), thinking through the connections, and placing orders for the accessories and fittings, which also gets either delayed or ends up in someone else's mail box!!!(for some obscure reason)! and all the while I'm running around like a headless chicken trying to locate the parcel which had been delivered two days ago!!!

Anyhoo,, at long last the equipment comes in....hooray!! so we gather around and unpack everything, and with a lot of manpower lift up the 70kg unit up onto the trolley/stand that I designed and got custom made for this, only to find that it's sagging under the weight! grrr! I wrote it down in plain English that it needs to withstand at least 80kg!

Then we eagerly rummage through the rest of the package. Lots and lots of accessories, fittings and parts all in a number of boxes......but no instructions manual!!! oh yeah there was one with about 5 pages which said, open the package, locate the pump (as if a 20 kg vacuum pump is easy to miss!!), check whether everything is in order etc etc...........But no instructions as to how to set it up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Unbelievable! They send us a highly specialised piece of equipment which is all disassembled and expect us to try and put everything together!!!???!!@!!

So I write to them and again the 9 hour time difference means I have to wait till the next day for a reply. And the next day I get a reply, with apologies about the shortcomings of the current instructions manual (shortcomings??!!*#&*!) and instructing me as to how some of the pieces fit together...and I said 'some' not all! so again I have to write to them specifically asking them about each and every connection, and I get a reply the next day. And the worst part is we need to set this up really fast, and test if it's working properly before we pay them! and we need to pay them within 30 days! already 2 days down for the missing instructions which wasn't even my fault to begin with!

Ok finally we get all the instructions that we need, and we go about putting it together, only to find that fittings don't fit, joints don't join and their tubes and hoses are not long enough!!!!!!!
Unbelievable!
So I start looking for vacuum hose suppliers, not very many around where I can get a fast delivery, but finally manage to find one and to my relief it's in stock (at least that's what I was told), so should be here in 2 days.
And I get the workshop person to grind, drill and modify the fittings to fit!

Then I find that there's a small issue I overlooked. I was planning to connect the gas tube of the equipment to the gas supply of an existing system, through a simple T connector. I measured the sizes of the tubes and both of them seem to be 6 mm (never rely on a broken vernier calliper!). Later on I realize that the existing system is from the US which means they use the imperial system so that tube is actually 6.35mm or in other words 1/4 inch! Doesn't really fit with the new UK equipment! Gggrrrhhh!!! Why can't the Americans use the metric system like everybody else does?? would make life that much easier for us poor souls!
But luckily the workshop guy managed to fix the problem but not before teasing me around with "oh, you are in big trouble here!".

And of course there were other subtleties that sent me running around looking for solutions, but I'll spare them here.

Ok, so now all the connections are done and everything seem to fit! But I still haven't received the vacuum hose that I ordered. Expecting another 'sent to the wrong person' escapade, I run around to check the mail centre of the university, only to find it never got here.
So I call up the supplier, who answers my question rather sheepishly "ehh...we kind of ran out of it.., so we had to wait for the next delivery" !!!!!??!!!!##$*?&**#&^!!???

Oh god! so now we are nearing the 15th day mark. Hopefully the hose will get delivered tomorrow morning, in which case 'hopefully' I will be able to get the thing up and running (fingers crossed!) but of course I wouldn't be surprised if some issue does turn up! I'm kind of sure that something will turn up......I have a gut feeling.......but of course I'm feeling paranoid!

Wish me luck!

Bruno's Sculpture Garden, Marysville

2008-05-14T15:10:00.009+10:00

As promised here is a glimpse of the Sculpture Garden that we had the good fortune to pay a visit to.

Bruno is a Belgian expat with a talent at making sculptures that are a bit on the funny side. And just like his sculptures he too has an unusual sense of humour. Most of his sculptures are made out of Terra cotta along with some day-to-day accessories.

The fun part of it is exploring through his rather overgrown garden. There you get to meet various creatures and people in every nook and cranny, some hidden away among the bushes, some having a bath in the ponds and puddles and some up in the trees.

An alligator on the rocks

This one is a bit creepy... it's located such that it catches you off guard

The mouse man....take a closer look (below picture)

How many mice can you count?

Carved out of a tree

If you follow the sound of the music, it will lead you to this man

A handful of water

Pocahontas

The bird man

A Yogi

We started off the morning visiting this place, so needless to say the whole day was invigorating!

Shades of Autumn in Marysville, Victoria

2008-05-12T11:13:00.010+10:00

The Victorian ACS conference was held last weekend in Marysville (that's about 2 hours drive from Melbourne city). So Yasas was to attend the conference and I was to tag along with him.

Expecting a remote country area I took along two books with me to keep me company. I was expecting to be stuck up inside a hotel room reading about Nanophotonics. Fortunately that was not to be. Nature was so unforgivingly beeeeauuuutiful that I spent both days outdoors.

The mountains.... the trees.... the mist.....

Yellow is now in fashion

A combination of colours

Look at the shades of colour!!!

An unusual mushroom

A serence duck pond

Cockatoos, looking for lunch under the bed of fallen leaves.

Parrots in colour

On the second day we formed a kind of wives' club, Several spouses of the conference attendees got together and did some walking.

We all enjoyed "The Sculpture Garden" which truly deserves a separate post. And then the 4km walk through the woods to see the Steavenson falls.

Waterfall in the middle of the woods

Ballarat, the city of gold

2008-05-03T13:56:00.005+10:00

Ballarat is just over 100 kms west of Melbourne. Even though there's not much happening there right now, it has been 'the place to be' less than a century ago.

It all started when a couple of wanderers came across a nugget of gold lying around on the ground. How lucky is that?? So the news spread and as you would have guessed, people around the world packed up their things and came running down here. Most of these migrants came from England and China.

But of course not everyone was lucky, according to statistics only 1% of the gold miners actually hit the jackpot. However the consolation prizes were enough for most miners to buy their own cottage and move out.

The preferred method of transport in Sovereign Hill

According to a guide there Ballarat has (or rather had) the most purest form of gold occurring in nature, second place went to Kalgoorlie in Western Australia, and third came South Africa. However I could not find any sources to back this up, so I'm still a bit critical about that statement.

Anyhow, just over a period of half a century the city of Ballarat managed to export tonnes of gold before the last mine was closed down in the 1920's. So there isn't much gold around these days.

Some people are still hopeful that they might find something that glitters!

The major attraction of the place is "Sovereign Hill" which recreates life in the 1850's golden era. It's a whole village with gold mines, blacksmiths (who process the dug gold) miners quarters, shops, schools and what not. This is a real nice place to experience life back then, and you can easily spend a whole day walking around, exploring mines and learning all about gold.

A blacksmith, pouring the molten gold (1200 Celsius) into a mould, to make a bar of gold.

Towards the end of our small vacation in Ballarat we popped into "Kirrit Bareet"which is an aboriginal gallery. The place wasn't marketed as much as the other attractions, and it wasn't a very commercialized entity either. But there we learnt that there was another side to this gold coin. The pictures and stories on the walls told us a different side of the gold rush.

Before the whole gold rush thing began, this area was inhabited by the aboriginal people. The gold rush created in the mid 19th century saw them losing their lands and their lives. Few of the natives stood up against the white man, only to be perished under their aggressive rule. Some miners actually had an aboriginal person's skull hanging outside their door, so as to scare them off!

All the other places we've been to in Ballarat talked in detail about the harsh conditions the miners had to face in making a living, the way they stood up against the unfair conditions under which they had to work, but I don't think that in any way compares with the injustice that the aboriginal people had had to face, and it was a bit disappointing that it wasn't even mentioned anywhere other than on a wall in this small silent gallery.

An unexpected find. A vintage car exhibition

Once in a blue moon

2008-04-14T15:12:00.006+10:00

The blue moon from NASA

I've wondered about this expression once, sometime back. Blue moon? why blue? were there any instances where the moon appeared blue?

Today, I came across the answer in an unexpected manner. I was reading through a Physics book called "Absorption and scattering of light by small particles", which is quite nicely written I have to say.

Anyhow, the part about the blue moon....I think we are quite familiar with the reddening effect at sunrise and sunset, which is partly the result of light scattering from airborn particles. Ok I'll spare the scientific details......

Similarly there's a 'bluing' effect, but for this to take place the airborn particles must be within a narrow range of particle sizes, which is very hard to come by, hence the term 'once in a blue moon'.

However, there have been instances recorded in history where the sun and moon were observed to be blue, specially after the giant eruptions of the volcano Krakatoa and following huge forest fires in Canada.

If you'd like a more scientific explanation see here & here.

Mini Pizzas

2008-04-01T11:19:00.004+11:00

Ok, so they are not exactly pizzas for they were made out of puff pastry. But they look pretty much like pizzas! So that's good enough to call them pizzas. and if you really love pizzas you can use the pizza dough instead of pastry dough.

Eeeeazy recipe, great for an afternoon snack, or any other time for that matter.

Just get a layer of puff pastry (yeah the frozen ones the that come all packed up for your convenience) cut out circles of the size you would like them to be. Well, if you are the very traditional kind of person with lots of time to spare, you can spend a few hours to make the dough, knead it and what not......as for me I've got other things to do.

So next apply a bit of tomato puree (or again if you want to go conservative, do it the traditional way) on the pastry. Top it with a slice of cheese, mozzarella preferred, but any cheese would do. And add bits and pieces of whatever you like. I used mushrooms, capsicum and tomato.

If you want to get the browned pastry effect just brush the pastry with some egg wash.

Then pop it in the oven (180 degrees Celsius) for about 15 minutes, when the pastry aroma begins to leak out into the kitchen, you'll know they are ready to be consumed!!

The Phillip Island

2008-03-24T17:52:00.007+11:00

The Easter gave us a chance to take a break from our busy schedules and dash out to Phillip island, which is a small island (literally small...only 26km across at its furthest) just off the Australian mainland. Even though it's an island, it's connected to the mainland by a bridge which made it a lot easier to be able to drive down.

The Penguin Parade

This is what Phillip island is famous for. Everyday at dusk little fairy penguins (The smallest species of penguin in the world) would return home from a day fishing at sea and make way across the shore to their burrows. So we all gathered at the beach where this spectacle was to be seen. Just past 8 pm shiny white bellies started appearing at the edge of the waves and started making their way slowly ..cramming their necks and doing the swaying back and forth penguin walk! Cute!!

But it takes quite a lot of patience to observe this parade, for little penguins are very very scared of potential predators like Sea-Eagles. The funny thing is by the time penguins come ashore the sea-eagles would be safely asleep in their nests, but little penguins don't know that, and every time an inquisitive sea-gull flies past all of them would turn back and run towards the waves.

Unfortunately no one's allowed to take any photos, because the camera flash would temporarily blind the little penguins.

Working Horse festival

We were in luck! this festival took place right on the weekend that we were there.

Met some very interesting characters and societies..

hee haw...

The Chocolate Factory

Yum!!!

Sleepy Koalas

And other species...

That was quite a good holiday!!

Cricket at the G!

2008-03-06T13:43:00.007+11:00

Ok, so this is a long overdue post, 7 days overdue in fact.

We went to see the cricket match between Australia and Sri Lanka, at the Melbourne Cricket Ground also known as the MCG, and yet again known as "The G".

SL were batting first and apart from a couple of exciting shots from Jayasuriya, (who decided to get back to the pavilion in a hurry) the first session was quite ehh.....boring.

Coming out to play

We would have fallen asleep if it wasn't for the "illegal" Mexican wave that kept going around the stadium. Yes, the Mexican wave is banned in Australia. But that didn't stop some enthusiastic Aussie fans from keeping it going. And every time the wave was 'flowing' through the crowds there would appear a message on the giant screen

"The Mexican Wave has been banned from sporting stadiums, persons who are found starting the wave will be evicted from the ground"

Funnily enough this seem to only add to the enthusiasm! Thankfully nothing really drastic happened, however towards the end of the match it was evident that there was a huge decrease in the number of people in that stand.

Another one bites the dust

Anyhow, Sri Lanka put up a score of 221 and Australia came out to bat, we were expecting a 'murder scene' but pretty soon things started to turn around when the Aussie batting line-up came crashing down. Things got a bit exciting at the end where there were still 2 overs to be bowled and Aussies needed about 12 runs (I think) and it was their last wicket which the SL bowlers were having trouble getting through! This is where Jayasuriya came to the rescue and bowled out Brett Lee who was itching to hit some big shots.

Yeeeah!!!!

'The G' at dusk

The feeling that someone's watching you.....

2008-02-28T11:40:00.008+11:00

My cubicle is located in a rather inconvenient place, kind of in the middle of a big room where the exits of the room are located such that people walk right behind me. Since the day I sat here I've noticed that some people and when I say some I mean only 2 or 3, tend to shot a glance towards my computer screen when walking past this point. But not everyone did that (so I thought) and since I myself often found casting a glance or two at other's screens when I'm walking past theirs, I didn't really take much notice of these 'peeks', until I changed my wallpaper.

It was a close-up of a cute little puppy looking playful, that filled my computer screen this time.

First it was my supervisor,
"I like your puppy"
"huh?.., puppy?"
"yeah the one on your desktop"
"Oh!"
hmm.........so he's keeping an eye on what I'm doing.....Caution!!!!!

Next the admin lady
"Oooh! nice one!"
"ehh..thanks"

Then later in the day comes this professor who hardly notices anything!
"Oh that's cute! Is that your puppy?"
"(me smiling) no it's not, but I wish!"
"hahaha...."
Oh god!

And of course the other students
"Awwww"

"Hey! a doggy!"

"Cuuute!"

Gheez!!!! This is pretty creepy!

Word of advice: Always keep a spreadsheet (filled with thousands of data values) or some complicated graph (for me a spectrum: which nobody can understand) always ready to be 'maximised' when needed.

The Elephant Man

2008-02-26T19:24:00.004+11:00

Joseph Merrick was born with severe deformities in his body, which made him earn the nickname "The elephant man". After the death of his mother at an early age, he ended up in a sideshow attraction as a "freak", where he was discovered by Dr. Fredrick Treves (later knighted) as a 'priceless specimen' of human deformities.

Initially Dr. Treves made it a good opportunity for himself to have access to this anatomical marvel, and let Merrick stay in the isolated patient's room in the London hospital. However, gradually as Merrick started warming up towards Treves and the nurses, the human within started to emerge.

Merrick's life was far from 'normal'. Often people were freaked out at his sight, and not many would feel comfortable in his presence. He was often the subject of ridicule, and several opportunists made it a way of earning cash by taking people to see the 'freak'.

Inspite of all odds, Merrick went on to make a lot of friends at high places including the then Queen of England, Queen Victoria.

The film brings to life this unique character from history. Even though it was shot in 1980, the film is in black and white emphasising the rugged and colourless England in the late 1800's. John Hurt plays the main role (of course who the actor behind the heavy make-up is anyone's guess) while a young Anthony Hopkins plays the part of Dr. Treves, which I thought wasn't a remarkable performance (maybe I shouldn't compare with his later works).

But a good one to watch! Makes you wonder about the nature of humans.

A bundle of ......physics??!

2008-02-13T17:06:00.004+11:00

I got this mail just a couple of days ago from a former researcher in our centre (Me being a newbie, have never really met this one). Apparently his wife has given birth to a baby, and he sent this mail to his former coleagues to let them know of the big news!

(I'm not displaying his name just for privacy sake!)

Hi all,
I just wanted to tell you that since 07.02.08, 4.52 am (german time) N----- and I are not alone anymore: With 4390 g distributed over 54 cm, we named our son Ruwen (pronounced: Rouven, hebrew: "behold, it is a son"). The boy is well and the mother is recuperating: with 39 cm head circumference he has a "bullhead".
I hope you join us in our happiness!

XXX

It sure looks like he could do with a break from work!!

Anna Karenina

2008-01-31T12:33:00.000+11:00

The character of Anna Karenina in the 1967 screen version .

It appears that the story for "Anna Karenina" came out of an episode in which Leo Tolstoy arrived at a railway station shortly after a young woman had committed suicide. She had been the mistress of a neighboring landowner, and the incident stuck in his mind...

As Tolstoy biographer writes, "A dreadful lesson was brought home to him... He tried to imagine the existence of this poor woman who had given all for love, only to meet with such a trite, ugly death."

A couple of years later “Anna Karenina” came to life.

“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
And thereby rolls out the colourful life of Anna, the most beautiful and charming of women, caught in a loveless marriage, finds herself swept off her feet by the dashing and playful Count Vronsky. Her yearning for happiness only brings more tragedy upon her as she is cast aside from the society and separated from her own son.

In the meantime ‘Kitty’, who was first led on by Vronsky but later ignored with the arrival of Anna, finds love in a very different “Levin” whose struggle for life, for labour, and the understanding of life and death brings another dimension of life to the story.

Tolstoy has masterfully interwoven these two stories without confusing or boring the reader, and has left any judgement (if any is needed) for the reader.

This is truly a masterpiece! It’s beautifully written! I haven’t read Tolstoy before and now I know why he’s regarded as a Great in the literary world.

The only thing that irritated me was the aristocratic life style (which of course has nothing to do with Tolstoy, for it’s the way the Russian societal structure works!). Maybe he was trying to portray its absurdity through the character of the down-to earth Levin.

It’s not at all possible to sum up the book in a few paragraphs, for the book itself was 850+ pages! But to put it in two words, an “Epic Masterpiece”.

Have a break, Have a Kit-Kat!

2008-01-25T11:23:00.001+11:00

For those of you wondering whether I'm dead....... not so soon! For the last month or so I've been living in the micro world or rather the nano world! Yes it's a very exciting place!! Where atoms and electrons mingle together and where vapour particles deposit forming beautiful patterns, ............well, at least in my imagination!

And for some weird reason all the equipment that I use seem to be behaving themselves very well! hmm........that's a first!

Anyway, after a very 'occupied' couple of weeks, it's Friday ahead of a long weekend, with fine weather (outside; not in the lab) And my supervisor is nowhere to be seen!

I need a break to get back to real life! (before the boss appears back at his desk!)

Good, I'm going to grab "Anna Karenina" which I've been trying to read for more than a month , and slip out of here!

Maybe snap up a Kit-Kat on my way!

Sydney!!

2008-01-07T16:59:00.000+11:00

The City of Sydney

Guess what this is?

Yup, it's the Australian landmark, The Sydney Opera House.

The Sydney Tower

The view from the Sydney Tower

Someone I met during the Sydney trip

An African Safari??

2008-01-03T10:58:00.000+11:00

Yup it's a Safari all right! but not in Africa.

The Australian climate is so close to that of the Sub-Saharan Africa, many of it's locals feel completely at home here.

White on Black or Black on White?
According to our Safari tour guide it's White on Black, how you determine the original colour of an animal is from his nose or snout.

Why do Zebras have stripes?
Zebras live in packs, when a predator like a lioness attacks, they would start running together, keeping their young ones in the middle, the movement of black and white stripes together creates an optical illusion, which confuses the predator and makes it difficult for him to single out one Zebra, or more preferably a Zebra cub.

Isn't nature amazing?

This lazy looking bunch can actually achieve speeds of upto 40 miles per hour!! close to that of a race horse!

Their eyes are tiny so their vision is not very good. So they rely on their sharp hearing for anything happening around them. Their aerial like ears could gather sound signals for upto 3 kms!!!!!!

The big fellow wasn't quite happy with our bus being close to their space, even though we were not making any noise under our guide's instructions. So we had to flee the area, before he got all worked up.

Ah! The tallest of them all!
They say a Giraffe never sleeps!
Which is partly true. They are supposedly closing their eyes for about 20 minutes a day, but that is while standing up! They never lie down! So if you ever see a Giraffe lying down, it can only mean one thing, it's dead!

Geez, I wonder if they ever get foot aches!

Busy vacation!

2008-01-02T15:43:00.000+11:00

Back at work after a rather long holiday! well, it was just about 2 weeks, and a very hectic 2 weeks it was!

My parents came down under for a holiday so was quite busy visiting all the places that are worth visiting in Melbourne and Sydney......... within 12 days!

Watch this space for some pics from our travels....coming soon!

1:18 to Lilydale

2007-12-14T16:27:00.000+11:00

I got on to a train to come back to Uni, after some small business in the city. It wasn't rush hour so I easily found an empty seat at the front of the compartment. Just a few feet away from me were two middle aged men engaged in conversation, apparently friends who bumped into each other on this very train.

With one of these men were a young lad of about 20 years of age. Despite his healthy appearance one could easily see that something wasn't quite right with him. He had a very distant look in his brown eyes, which betrayed his good looks. He was holding a bottle of Coke and standing near his companion despite the numerous empty seats around him. "Why don't you take a seat?" asked the man to which the boy replied "I'm alright here" in a loud voice, but did sit down next to him even before finishing the sentence.

Then his companion's friend addressed the boy and asked him how he was, to which he replied "alright" and straightaway inquired back

Boy: When's your birthday?

Man: August Xth (didn't quite catch the date)

Boy: Which year??

Man: 1951

Boy: You were born on a Saturday

Man: That's right

The man probably knew about this boy's speciality that he didn't show any surprise..

Boy: Your next birthday is going to be a Thursday

By now, he had gained the attention of the whole compartment. Apart from those who had their ipods stuck in their ears (too bad!!)

The people who were bent over books were peeping over their books, the ones who were just staring out the window were glancing in this direction.....all the while pretending that they are not really looking at him..

Boy: The year after next, it'll be a Tuesday

And with that his distant eyes wandered off to something on the compartment wall....

There was a few seconds of total silence, with only the continous rumble of the train. The man got up to get down at the next station.

Man: You are doing very well boy

Boy: Yeah, I'm going to graduate next year

Man: That's excellent!!

With that, he said his good byes and got off...

The boy kept on staring at something else on the wall which attracted his attention....

Oh!! I'm also supposed to get down here!!!

I grabbed my stuff and got off before the doors could close.

The Adventure of English

2007-12-06T17:00:00.000+11:00

Ever wondered why English is so complicated?

This is the fascinating story about how a tribal language in a remote corner of Europe came to be spread throughout the world; across Asia, Europe, Africa and America.

The story begins in the far north of what is now known as Netherland, and travels to England around 500 AD. From there on the language of English slowly takes form, but the journey is far from being smooth.

The constant invasions from foreign armies pushes the use of the language to its limits. Sometimes wiping out English speaking communities and sometimes supressing the use of the English language by the order of the foreign king.

Despite the hindrances the language of English survives, adapting to different conditions, borrowing words and expressions from the foreign invaders and thereby making it stronger and more flexible.

During the early Viking attacks, words like "ill" entered the English vocabulary creating a synonym for the existing "sick". During the Norman conquest thousands of French words took to English, but were mostly confined to the high society. Therefore the "cows" the farmers worked with became "Beef" at the rich man's table (Boef in French).

Throughout the ages English which has its roots in German had borrowed words in their thousands from Latin, French, Spanish, Gaelic and many more. Adding to its versatility as well as complexity.

After the renaissance (which is also a French word) and the developments during the industrial revolution Britian begins to form its empire across the world.......... and so does the language.

But the journey is far from over; not only does English travel to new countries and continents like Australia and America, where they take on a unique dialect of its own, but in the unsuspecting depths of India, one of the earliest relatives of the English language is discovered.......Sanskrit.

Some interesting words borrowed from the Dutch

This story is most fascinating, entertaining and sometimes astounding. Tracking the evolution of the English language through some of the most prominent times in history, and discovering the impacts it had on the language, from the Anglo Saxon tribes to Sheakspear, Wordsworth and Burns.

This work of magic was created and presented by Melvyn Bragg from the BBC. And is one of the most incredible documentries I've ever encountered. There is also a book in the same name also written by Bragg.

In loving memory

2007-12-01T19:27:00.000+11:00

After being a part of our family for more than 11 years, Bingo passed away yesterday.

Bindu looking sad over Bingo's grave...

Photos courtesy of my bro

Life goes on......

2007-11-29T16:19:00.000+11:00

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy?
- Mahatma Gandhi

Woke up to the disheartening news that some innocent people were the victims of a cruel war in which they played no part in…one they didn’t want in the first place….which only exists because of a few greedy individuals who want to hang on to every inch of land they could get. It’s not fair…...for those who just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, and had to pay the ultimate price…..it’s not fair for their loved ones to have to go through the rest of their lives trying to get over it……

And at the same time, here in another part of the world, a person on morning TV was winging about having to pay an extra dollar for a coffee at the airport ………….!!!&^##!*!

It’s a funny place…this world……..some people are worried about which restaurant they are going to tonight and what they are going to wear…when some others are wondering whether they will be able to find a couple of bucks to feed their children …at least this one meal for the day…………………..
Some people are worried about the new furniture they are hoping to buy and whether it will blend in with the existing interior………..whereas some others are very grateful to have found a canvas shelter in the refugee camp along with hundreds of others………..on the gravel bed…….

But I guess that the world has been like that since the beginning of time…….even in ancient times there were wars, where innocent people were killed for no fault of theirs….…. Empires have risen and empires have fallen….. from the Roman empire to the British.
There will always be wars even in the far future…….people fighting over things that sometimes doesn’t even mean anything! …. like the Jammu-Kashmir border struggle. Both countries have massive land masses but after more than half a century, are still fighting for a small piece of land in the cold mountain tops… that is neither arable nor habitable.

It’s a funny place …this world…..one has to put an effort into keeping oneself sane……. Accepting that getting all worked up with issues that one has to face on a personal level isn’t really the end of the world.

Making a difference: The Horizon Lanka Foundation

2007-11-12T09:23:00.000+11:00

I used to visit the popular Sri Lankan blog forum Kottu on an ad-hoc basis up until recently. But some very inspiring blogs that started appearing on the blog roll some months ago, made me visit it more regularly. These blogs are not from well trained authors or prolific writers, but from a group of determined youth, who someday just might come to be known as such.

The Horizon Lanka Foundation founded by Mr. Nandasiri Wanninayaka, has been around for a few years now. It started in Mahavilachchiya and have now expanded to several other areas of the country which we regard as 'rural'. But there's nothing rural about the young minds of these villages, who exhibit the courage and the spirit that could help them go all the way to achieve their dreams.

The work done by the Academy is very impressive, and not to be outdone the effort put in by the students is heart warming. You can find some blogs of these inspiring young minds in the Kottu blog roll.

Great work!

Good Advice

2007-11-07T18:11:00.000+11:00

The photo looks a bit blurry, because it had just cleared after a heavy downpour.

Mooo.......

2007-11-06T11:27:00.000+11:00

A dairy farm in country side Victoria.

Captured during our trip down the Great Ocean Road.

Just my luck!!!!!!!

2007-10-19T12:51:00.000+10:00

After waiting for a whole week, just to get my turn at the SEM (Scanning Electron Microscope), I arrived at the Research lab with my precious little samples, well ahead of time so as not to waste a single minute of my booked 3 hours! .....no...it's not plenty of time to get work done.....these high resolution imaging stuff takes ages for a scan!

And if I don't manage to extract all the information I need within this 3 hours, it might be another week before I can find an available time slot to continue my work, the SEM seems to be in very high demand.

So the person who's responsible for the SEM, let's call him Dr. H, was kind enough to explain to me how it all works before he began scanning the samples for me. And again no....we are not encouraged to 'do it ourselves' with this sophisticated piece of equipment which is worth $$ big bucks $$!!! So there's this Dr. H who operates it for us.

So, all was good and we were just about an hour into our work, took some images of the sample surfaces and was getting into the more interesting and important part of the work when suddenly the computer got stuck!!!

hmm...ok, so he did what he would normally do, shake the mouse a bit....sit patiently for a while....shake it again.................no response.......Esc.......Enter.......shake the mouse again (this time a bit impatiently) and now the mouse was also stuck!!! .....now that's weird....

When we came to the point of realization that the shaking is not going to work, we had to Ctrl+Alt+Del; once,...twice.......thrice....still nothing..........so Dr.H got really impatient and he kept pressing hard down on the keys till it shut down!

And then restarted it...but this time it wouldn't log in! The computer has gone seriously bananas!!!!

And it's not just a stand-alone computer, it's linked to the SEM, so we had to abandon my work!!!!!!

And my precious samples are still stuck inside the SEM! and they will have to stay there until some service people come down and figure out how to fix the system. Grrrr!!!**&&^# I wonder when that's going to be.

The SEM has been functioning very well for the last couple of months and just my luck it decided to crash right now!!!??!!

Wyomi making a fashion statement! :)

2007-10-19T12:20:00.000+10:00

My School class-mate and University batch-mate Wyomi has been selected as one of the finalists of the Fashion Designer of the Year competition in Sri Lanka. Although it doesn't come as a big surprise to me since I've seen her create works of art throughout the years, it sure comes as good news.

At school our class always won the Wesak lanterns competition all thanks to Wyomi's creativity. And she was always the brains behind the annual "Kala Ulela" (Cultural show) decorations.

The article appearing on 13th October edition of Sunday Observer can be found here. And anyone (as long as you are in SL :D) can vote using the coupon in the "Spectrum" section of that newspaper.

Great work Wyomi!

Muilti-culturalism

2007-10-12T13:43:00.000+10:00

Melbourne is known to have a very multicultured and diverse society. People from all over the world call the city home.

And I've got a fairly representative sample of that population at my research centre. I share an office space with an interesting bunch of people. an Australian, an American, a Russian, a South African, a Vietnamese, a German, a Chinese, an Iranian, a Spaniard and a Sri Lankan (that's me!)
Funny mentioning America, Vietnam, Germany and Russia all in one sentence :)

So it gets very interesting when we get a chance to talk outside of work, like during lunch or tea, you discover very interesting aspects of life and different cultures. But that sort of occurence is very rare! because all of us don't feel hungry at the same time, and tea/coffee is something you have all day long.....one after another........at your desk...until you finish your work, it's kind of like.... fuel.

Anyway. and even if a few of us meet up in the lounge area for lunch (by coincidence), after a brief chat, as it starts getting really interesting, someone goes "aah.....better get back to work!!"

The joy of experiments!

2007-10-05T09:53:00.000+10:00

During the most part of this week I've been locked up inside laboratories doing some very delicate experiments, with the "Laser on" warning light going on outside the door, so that others would think twice before disturbing.

Everything was going very well, and I was feeling very productive for getting so much done within a couple of days, and was just about to wrap up the first stage of my set of experiments. I only had to do an extra set of analysis of the teeny weeny Silicon samples that I prepared so carefully...and patiently!

So I put them under the microscope, which is connected to a PC, a CCD camera and a spectrometer. After adjusting everything, I hit the "Acquire Data" button on the software programme. Tuk..tuk....peep...tuk..tuk....peep........that's the spectrometer analysing the sample and the computer outputting the graph....after a few minutes of tuk tuks and peeps, the computer showed me what the final graph looked like........... "What the...??!!!*&^#"
I didn't need my well experienced colleague to tell me that that is not what we are expecting!

hmm...ok, so back to the begining, adjustments......laser, camera, focus the microscope, cables...etc etc.... ok! Hit the button "Acquire Data"
tuk...tuk....peep...tuk...tuk....peep......

Final graph...."Darn!! What in the world is going on?"
So we were running around the set up, scratching our heads trying to figure out what's wrong.
After about two hours of tampering around, we discovered that the laser we were using was 15 mW in power, which is about 50 times more than what it should be!!!!!!!!!!!
How the hell that happened we don't know, but what it means is that not only were we subjecting our eyesight to potential damage but were burning holes right through my precious samples all this time!! Oh Joy!!!

A Breath of Fresh Air

2007-09-17T11:48:00.000+10:00

The music of Yanni is a fresh breath of air during a hectic day at work, so I always keep a set of earphones close by ready to plug in and listen to a healing piece of music, to relax a bit before I set off again.

The complete compositions from his latest album "Ethnicity" can be listened to over his web site using either Windows Media Player or Real Player. As for the rest of his albums you can only listen to the samples.

My favourites from Ethnicity are "Playing by heart", "Rites of Passage" and "Never too late", not that I don't like the others!

What doesn't kill you, only makes you stronger

2007-08-29T11:12:00.000+10:00

When we mess something up, it's very easy to attribute ourselves with "I'm terrible with this kind of thing". But every mess-up has a lesson to be learnt, if only one would sit and recollect "now, where did I go wrong?"
If you can spot that, next time you are sure to do a better job than the last.

This brings to mind the famous story of Thomas Alva Edison's light bulb. It is said that his attempts to produce a light bulb failed him over a thousand times (I don't know how far the figures are correct, but sure must have been a long 5 years!). He tried with Platinum filaments...doesn't work....Nitrogen gas...doesn't work......
but after each failed attempt he said "I just learnt another way of how you can't make a light bulb!".

So, the best way to learn something is through mistakes, you generally learn more through making mistakes than through getting it right the first time.

So the next time you make a mistake be glad that you did, for 'failures are the pillars to success'

The arcane world of vacuum technology

2007-08-24T12:26:00.000+10:00

If you’ve watched the film Matrix, you probably would have got that eerie feeling when you switched off the tv and looked around you, “is this the real world or is there something going on underneath that I’m not aware of”.

I recently read up on ‘vacuum technology’ as part of my work and revisited something close to that weird feeling.

There are so many things that we use in our day-to day lives without realizing the work that lie hidden beneath it.
The technology of vacuum coating is something that goes into your pair of sunglasses, reading glasses, your car windscreen, fluorescent lights, LCD screens on your mobile, calculator, digital watch, computer, CD’s, DVD’s and the small chip on your credit card, magnetic strips on your ATM card and old cassettes, inside all electronics and much much more.

Something as simple as a pair of sunglasses goes through a couple of vacuum chambers (which are deemed of air) to get its UV reflection coating, polarization coating (to reduce the glare) and other coatings that are needed to protect your eyes. Same goes for your laptop screen, car windscreen and shutters (tinted or not) and now that I’ve mentioned it tinted thin film layers etc.

All these fine coatings can’t be done under a normal environment with air and water vapour present for they get in the way of the coating and you get a pretty lousy product.
So what manufacturers do is they put them in a vacuum chamber and evaporate the material that needs to be deposited on it, which then goes and sticks itself onto the product, and since there’s no air, you get a high purity coating. And of course it’s not as simple as it sound, a lot of consideration goes into the process, like maintaining the right temperature, rotating the sample to get a uniform coating, and making sure that the coating thickness (which is generally less than a hundredth of a milli meter) is just right.

This is a technology that is vastly present behind many things that we use everyday, but most of us don’t even know it exist.

Back with a few changes

2007-08-24T11:19:00.000+10:00

A vacation has to be a vacation so didn't even open my blog when I was in Sri Lanka.
Now Back at work not much time to blog.

:)

Interview with an IT professional

2007-06-25T18:11:00.000+10:00

Debbie Timmins of ACS interviewed Vishuddhi about IT in general, if anyone is interested the interview can be found on her blog.

Just 2 and a hlaf days to go!!!

Exasperated, Confused, Tired, Angry, Irritated and Bugged!

2007-06-22T12:42:00.000+10:00

I've been trying to design a set up for a vacuum chamber that I have never seen, using components that I never knew existed, and trying to calculate the electrical loads and wire connections and what not using just the pictures and very little details provided in catalogues!

Simply driving me nuts!!!

And I can't get the required information from the component manufacturers! Obviously they are not in a hurry as I am.

Once I decide on the design I have to order the suitable components (based on my hypothetical design). If by some chance I overlook some small detail on one of these components and the thing turns out to be unsuitable, it's going to be my neck!

And I'm supposed to complete this before I leave to SL, so that an order can be placed for the components.

I hate deadlines!

Specially when I'm totally confused about the subject matter.

Countdown

2007-06-18T17:24:00.000+10:00

Nine days more to go.......

Home and the World

2007-06-18T10:04:00.000+10:00

A scene from Satyajith Rai's make of the film, based on the book.

Yet another piece of magic by Rabindranath Tagore. The way Tagore understood the complexities of the traditional cultures and the mind frames of people living in his time is simply amazing. His ideas are ahead of his time and even our times.

I won't go into a review here because Ineshka has done some excellent work on this.

And for anyone interested Purnima has found an online resource on this as well.

A Million Little Pieces

2007-06-15T10:40:00.000+10:00

An alcoholic at the age of 10, a drug addict at the age of 12 and a drug dealer at the age of 15, charged with offenses and crimes in 3 US states by the age of 18, James Frey was at the point of no return when he was dragged into rehabilitation aged just 23. This is the compelling memoir of James, the son gone wrong of loving parents.

Hallucinations..... Sleepless.... Seeing things, Hearing things...... Blacking out........ Throwing up blood...... Craving.....Craving for drugs...and alcohol... screaming....screaming for drugs....This was his state when the story starts at the rehabilitation centre. And it's no joy ride to recovery, if he ever gets there.

But still deep down inside him he discovers the strength....the strength to make a choice....to live or to die. He protests against the rehab staff, and refuses to follow their instructions simply because it doesn't make sense to him, despite the fact that every one seem to insist that following their rules is the only way out. Despite the instructions of the counsellers, he refuses to 'give himself to God, and have faith in Him'. James is adamant that it's not God who made the decision to take drugs, it's me who did it, so if anyone is going to make the decision to quit it, it's going to be me and only me!

During the rest of his time at the centre he surrounds himself with people who were at one point drug addicts, dealers, womanizers and criminals. But out of this bizzare combination springs some extraordinary friendships that brings out the human counterpart of these people who are despised by the general society.

A best-seller; this is a very powerful and moving story that brings insight to the dark side of life. It's got a considerable amount of foul language and graphic details which only adds to the reality of life.

Read this and you will never look at a drug addict the way you used to.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I wil just quote a part from the early chapters of the book, but this is definetly not for the faint-hearted. Warren and the bald man here refers to his room mates at the time.

My heart is racing and it's racing irregularly and there is pain with every beat and there is pain with every irregular beat and the pain shoots through my left arm and the left side of my jaw. The liquid has stopped flowing through my body and out of my mouth, but the action of vomiting has not stopped. It feels as if my stomach and my throat are coming out or they are trying to come out. It feels as if my body is trying to rid itself of itself. It is trying to rid itself of me.

I can't do this anymore. I cannot continue to live this way. I am an alcoholic and I am a drug addict and I am a criminal. My body is falling apart and my mind fell apart a long time ago. I want to drink and I want to smoke Crack even though I know drinking and smoking Crack are killing me. I am alone. I have no one to talk to and no one to call. I hate myself. I hate myself so much that I can't look myself in the eye. I hate myself so much that suicide seems like a reasonable option. My family is ready to write me off, my friends are ready to write me off, I have destroyed every meaningful relationship I've ever had. I am vomiting for the seventh time today. The seventh f** time. I cannot continue to live this way. I cannot continue to live this way.

The gagging slows down and I start breathing. Warren is holding me steady and the bald man is staring at me. I raise my hand and I motion for Warren to step away and he stands and he steps away and I lean my head against the front of the toilet. I breathe. I take in as much air as I can. I know the air will slow my heart and calm me down, so I breathe. I take in much air as I can. Calm me down. Calm me down.
Warren speaks. The bald man stares.
"Are you all right?"
I nod.
"Do you need help?"
I shake my head.
"I'm going to get someone"
I speak,
"No"
"You need help"
"No"
"James, you need help"
I stand. I am unsteady.
"I decide what I need. Not you!"

I take a deep breath and I stumble to the sink and I turn on the water and I wash my face and I clean the vomit out of my mouth. When I finish, I turn off the water and I turn around. Warren is staring at me and the bald man is staring at me. I walk past them and I walk out of the bathroom. Warren follows me out and he heads to his area of the room.

"Let me at least give you a shirt"

I look at my shirt. It is white and brown and red. Covered with streaks of bile and patches of shit that I have never seen before and streams of blood.

"Here"

Warren tosses me a shirt. I catch it. It is a starched white Oxford. I look at it and I look at him. He speaks.

"It's the only clean shirt I've got left"

I look at the shirt. It is not a shirt I would wear. I laugh and I look back at Warren.

"Thank you"

He laughs.

"No problem"

The Passing Away of a Pioneer

2007-06-08T09:57:00.000+10:00

Vidya Jothi Emeritus Professor V K Samaranayaka had passed away in Stockholm, Sweden. He was a pioneer in the IT industry in Sri Lanka, and an intellectual that we as Sri Lankans can be proud of.

Even though I hadn't had the honour of attending his lectures at University, it was through his work that myself and thousands of other students past and present benefitted immensely. And generations to come will benefit into the future.

It was a life well lived!

Good times

2007-06-07T16:32:00.000+10:00

Was cleaning up some folders on my computer and I came across some old photos, old like in just over an year ago, so not that old.

In a temple in Rajangane (Damn! can't remember its name), up on the rock is the earliest known map of Sri Lanka carved in stone.

The temple is being run by a Buddhist monk who used to teach me when I was in Sunday school (and he was in Colombo for his studies). Very rough life, but admirable!

Thanthirimale.

Not the most convenient place for a living, but for those people and monks who opt to stay here helping each other out through all hardships is very touching to see.

Ramya Uncle (who took the photo) insisted on stopping the van and reversing it, to get a few photos of these fellows.

On the steps of the "Biso Maligawa" in Anuradhapura.

And on the way home, we had a good climb at the Rosa thirivana mountain in Namal Uyana as well.

Ali-gata Pera

2007-06-06T10:23:00.001+10:00

Came across this by chance yesterday.

Ever wondered where "Ali-gata pera" (in Sinhalese) got its name from? It surely doesn't have any connection with Elephants..?!

Well....... due to their rough green skin and since its shape is close to that of a 'Pear' it's also known as "Alligator Pear"!
:)

The things I miss (from SL) Part 1

2007-06-05T13:05:00.000+10:00

My parents

My brother (wasn't expecting to miss that!)

Bingo, Bindu and Bussy

Bumping into an old friend on the road (never happens here!)

King coconuts!

Mom's cooking

Warm weather

Relatives/Neighbours/Friends paying visits

Driving (driving is too prim and proper here, very boring)

Kola kanda with jaggery in the morning

Down to earth living

Birds and squirrels singing as the dawn breaks (and also when they spot our Bussy hiding in the bushes)
Listening to some real news on tv (and not about Paris Hilton! ugh!)

23 days to go......

Port Adelaide

2007-06-04T10:28:00.000+10:00

Yesterday we paid a visit to 'Port Adelaide'.

Port Adelaide is located about 14km north east of the city of Adelaide and is the main port for the city of Adelaide. It had been first proclaimed as a harbour in the 1830's and it has also been the first port of call for migrants into South Australia.

The light house

The port is located further inland from the outer harbour. The difference between a Harbour and a Port is that a harbour shelters and stores ships, whereas a Port is a coastline facility built so that boats and ships can load and unload goods. Therefore ports are generally accompanied with transport systems, cranes and ramps. Ports can also be seaports, riverports, fishports etc.

I was quite eager to see the bottle nosed dolphins who are living in the waters. There are special cruises for dolphin observation 'up close' (as they say), so we boarded a 2 hour cruise journey onto one of these 'dolphin cruisers'. After about an hour in the calm waters we arrived at the Dolphin habitat, only to see a couple of dorsal fins of the dolphins, they never came close to the boat and the boat didn't spend more than a couple of minutes trying to catch a glimpse of the big fish. Very disappointing!! The journey back was very slow and uneventful.

A Dolphin!

Next we climbed up into the old lighthouse, walked around in the "Fisherman's Wharf Market", no it's not a fish market but full of local produce and souveniers and stuff. Then went to see the 'Sea Horse Farm'. It was pretty interesting, they had an educational video and some sea horses, funny creatures they are! Did you know that it's the male seahorse that gets pregnant and carries children? yup....interesting!

And I got to touch a living shark! Well.....no it's probably not what you would imagine, it was a really small one like a well grown Carp. And boy was his skin rough!!

Up in the light house overlooking the port

Up in the light house overlooking the Wharf and the Wharf market

There were quite a number of museums around but we didn't get the time to visit all of them.

The grass is always greener on the other side..

2007-05-31T12:03:00.001+10:00

When I was in Sri Lanka I always used to wish the country was located a few latitudes further up from the equator, so that it wouldn't be so hot and humid all year round!

When I was growing up, I wished that we had the four seasons so that I could see all the flowers bloom in the spring, the sun shine in the summer, leaves redden and fall in the autumn and cold days in the winter with some snow!! Well, I got over that once I grew up, but I still wished that it wasn't so hot there.

Now, I've been in Australia for almost one year and have experienced the four seasons, it's not as wonderful as it sounds in the books. It's pretty difficult to distinguish between the season changes in the first place, there's no clear cut boundary between spring & summer, summer & autumn etc.

And I can't think of more than a couple of days where I actually enjoyed the weather, it's either too cold that I would start shivering from head to toe or either too hot that I simply have to take at least 5-6 baths a day!

Just a couple of months ago - in the summer temperatures soared past 42 Celsius. It was like living inside an oven! you can literally feel your skin burning! Now it's winter (just starting) and daytime temperatures hang around 10-12 Celsius, and it's like living inside a fridge! Nights are even worse!

How I long for a beautiful tropical climate like that of Sri Lanka!!!

Papadam in 45 Seconds!

2007-05-24T10:48:00.000+10:00

I don't know if this is common knowledge, but it was certainly news to me when I first heard it on a cookery programme on tv a couple of weeks ago. So I thought of sharing this with anyone who enjoys (or rather don't enjoy the hassle of) cooking! Just to make life easier.

All you need is some papadam and a microwave oven. Keep the papadams towards the outer edges of the rotating dish in the microwave (I'm assuming the dish is clean enough!) and turn power on 'High' for 40-45 seconds. Times might slightly vary depending on the thickness of the papadam. Once you hear the 'beep' open the microwave and 'ta-da!!' You've got ready to eat papadam! and without the unhealthy oil.

Bushism

2007-05-22T09:10:00.000+10:00

Found a good book Mr President?

The attack on the world trade centre in NY

-"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we."

Flattening out Afganistan in the search for Bin Laden

-"The most important thing is for us to find Osama bin Laden. It is our number one priority and we will not rest until we find him."

after some time...... when they couldn't find a trace of him

-"I don't know where bin Laden is. I have no idea and really don't care. It's not that important. It's not our priority."

Iraq

-"We found the weapons of mass destruction. We found biological laboratories...for those who say we haven't found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they're wrong, we found them."

I see....I wonder where they are now?

-"Free nations don't develop weapons of mass destruction."

“Governments accountable to the voters focus on building roads and schools—not weapons of mass destruction.”

The U.S. has over 10,000 nuclear weapons

-"Oh, no, we're not going to have any casualties [in Iraq]."

-"We are ready for any unforeseen event that may or may not occur. "

-"I have made good judgments in the past. I have made good judgments in the future."

-"These people are trying to shake the will of the Iraqi citizens, and they want us to leave...I think the world would be better off if we did leave..."

Finally he's talking some sense

-"Iraq and Afghanistan ...are now democracies and they are allies in the cause of freedom and peace."

yeah right!

Refusing to sign the Kyoto Protocol

-" It isn't pollution that's harming the environment.
It's the impurities in our air and water that are doing it. "

-"I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully."

????

Hurricane Katrina

-"One word sums up probably the responsibility of any Governor, and that one word is, 'to be prepared'."

That's only one word

-"Brownie (Michael Brown of FEMA), you're doing a heck of a job."

I wonder why Michael Brown had to resign from his post.... becuase his handling of the situation was so good?

Foreign Policy

-“I don’t have the foggiest idea about what I think about international, foreign policy.”

Tell me something that I don't know already!

General

-"The vast majority of our imports come from outside the country."

-"If we don't succeed, we run the risk of failure."

-"For NASA, space is still a high priority."

I didn't know that NASA has other priorities..

-" Quite frankly, teachers are the only profession that teach our children."

hmm.....

-"The problem with the French is that they don't have a word for 'entrepreneur'."

'Entrepeneur' comes from the French language..

-"'There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — (pause...confused look) shame on you. Fool me (pause...) you can't get fooled again.'

-"To the C students, I say you too can be president of the United States."

-"I'm the commander — see, I don't need to explain — I do not need to explain why I say things. That's the interesting thing about being president."

-"I believe God wants me to be president."

I wonder whether He's is the only one..?

-"God told me to strike at al-Qaeda and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East."

Never have I seen such an entertaining president..in the history of the world

Dictator of the (so called) Biggest Democracy

2007-05-18T09:36:00.000+10:00

Democracy or Dictatorship?

In 2002 Bush decided to attack Iraq, why?..... because they had weapons of mass destruction hmm.....
The UN opposed, the American public opposed, the general public of most other countries including Britain, Australia and France protested. Jacques Chirac heavily condemned and so did the Pope... but did that matter to Bush? .....nah!

Since then everybody has been talking about when the troops in Iraq are going to be withdrawn. Just a few weeks ago, after a lot of drag, the US passed a congressional bill to withdraw troops from Iraq, only to get De vetoed by Bush...

Thanks Powell, I couldn't have said it better!

Glorifying Death

2007-05-10T10:21:00.000+10:00

I thought of writing this post when I saw this news article in the BBC. Two girls aged 16 in Perth, Australia had killed their friend (aged 15) and buried her. Why?... just to see if they would feel any remorse afterwards. This has taken place almost one year ago, after the court hearing they have now been sentenced to life in prison.

Isn't that shocking?

In a slightly unrelated note recently there has been a lot of talk about a certain 'EMO sub-culture' here. Due to a double suicide of two teenage girls in Melbourne who belonged to that culture, and a murder of another teenage girl in Adelaide.

Emo means something close to over emotional, and are usually unhappy and pessimistic. Self-infliction i.e. cutting or harming oneself with knives or sharp objects are common among them. (I'll write a separate one on this) But generally their view of life is gloomy and they have a way of 'glorifying death and murder'.

I seriously don't know where these people get this attitude from. But I have a feeling (I maybe wrong) that tv programmes contribute to this mentality.

Last night on tv, there were 2 crime scene investigation stories on one channel back to back, another murder story on another and a violent prison break story on another.
The day before I watched half of CSI-NY which is a very popular tv series all over the world. And not forgeting the other CSI Miami and CSI Las Vegas which have become quite popular. Anyone who watch this type of drama know how in agonising detail they present the murder. Every small step taken by the murderer to cover up, and every little clue the investigators pursue to find out the truth. The stories really are captivating and addictive.

However, I personally believe that these put ideas into people, specially young ones. Teen years are quite hard for children, and they can be confused and mislead very easily.

I very well remember when I was little there was a drama on tv in which a person hangs himself and commits suicide. Later on in the week there was a news on the paper (I remember my parents talking about it) A boy had tried out the suicide to see if it really works, and had died. Therearfter there was a roar about what should be broadcasted on tv.

My companions back home

2007-05-08T08:51:00.000+10:00

That's Bingo and Bussy at home back in SL : my brother sent me the photo.

They are not really best friends :)

Bingo likes to come in and sit in front of the cat, blocking its way - just to show him who's the boss around here.

Gilchrist and his squash ball

2007-05-07T17:54:00.000+10:00

Here we go again..

After I finished the post 'bye bye world cup' I was pretty resolute in not writing about the world cup again. But the hot topic of Gilchrist and his squash ball which keeps popping up in a lot of blogs and discussion groups just pushes me into writing some thing on it.

The first time I heard that he's got a squash ball inside his glove to help him with his grip I also asked the same question from myself "Is that........legal??" And I've been debating it with myself and my husband....well, if some extra object does enhance a players performance, it doesn't truly reflect his/her abilities, does it? No doubt Gilchrist is a great cricketer, but in this innings he did seem like 'superman'.

There are a lot of arguments going around, and I beleive the question is to be taken up at ICC's next meeting.

http://different-stroke.blogspot.com/2007/05/sri-lanka-cricket-to-question-legality.html
http://andhracafe.com/index.php?m=show&id=22452
http://wordpress.com/tag/cricket-etcetera/

Anyhow, my question is that if he's allowed to do that, does that mean that any batsmen can stuff in any object of their preference under their gloves to enhance their performance?. Surely there has to be some regulation in this.

If the wicket keepers are not allowed to put on extra padding in their gloves, and bowlers can't wear bandages when bowling, and definetely fielders can't wear gloves (even inner ones) to improve their grip on the ball..........how come that batsmen can?

Farm in the City

2007-05-02T16:21:00.000+10:00

This farmyard was in the middle of the city's busiest shopping street.....

No idea why they were there.

Wesak - The Festival of Light

2007-05-01T14:53:00.000+10:00

Today is 'Wesak' full moon poya day. 'Wesak' is the Sinhalese name for the month of May, and 'poya' refers to the full moon days that fall once every month.

The significance of Wesak lies with Lord Buddha, it was on a Wesak full moon day (somewhere around 6th century BC) that he was born as Prince Siddhartha to a regional king and queen near the now India-Nepal border. And it was on a Wesak full moon day, 35 years later that he attained enlightenment. It was also on the same day another 45 years later that the enlightened one passed away.

Buddhists all over the world celebrate this day for its symbolic significance. Some prefer to observe 'sil' which means that they will spend the day, disciplining themselves to behave in the fashion of an 'arhath' disciple. Practicing 'morality', 'compassion', 'humility' and meditation to calm the mind.

In Sri Lanka (I'm not sure about other Buddhist countries), towards night fall people light up the whole country with lanterns and creative work, filled with lights, candles and colours. The creative aspects of children and adults alike come alive during this time. And there's so much to see no matter where in the country you live.

The symbolic aspect of this 'light ceromony' is the depiction of 'enlightenment'. Which brought the light of 'wisdom' and drew away the darkness of 'ignorance'.

Bye bye World cup

2007-04-30T10:57:00.000+10:00

Ok, so the world cup is over, and Australia took it home.

This certainly has been quite an eventful world cup, with a load of controversies, confusions and emotions. Just to name a few

The heavy weights Pakistan was sent home before the Super 8's
Bob Woolmer, Pakistan coach was murdered (so they say)
Inzamam resigns, the Pakistan cricket board president resigns and lots of mayhem
Another big contender India also sent home before the Super 8's
Riots in India
Greg Chappel steps down
Flintoff gets sacked
Critisim towards the ICC at the organisation of the world cup; too long, bad turnout of spectators, loss making, no carribean atmosphere, not enough resources for players etc
Many big names retire; team coaches from Tom Moody to Duncan Fletcher; players like Lara, McGrath, Stephen Fleming, and our Russel Arnold (this will also probably be the last world cup of Jayasuriya, Murali and Vass as well)

Oh boy! It's good that a world cup comes along only once in four years!

The world cup final that shouldn't have been

2007-04-30T10:07:00.000+10:00

We were all excited to watch the world cup throughout the night.. I put on an extra winter coat to keep myself warm throughout the match and was all ready to watch the match. Was feeling very excited and nervous! to my annoyance the tv channel was showing "spiderman" till just past 11 o'clock ??!!!!^%@^&@ (the match is supposed to start at 11) Then finally they switched the channel to the sports channel, where Ian Healy and Mark Taylor were discussing weather, it was raining in Barbados..oh great! so the match is delayed.

Next to keep the viewers entertained till the match started, they began showing the extended highlights of the world cup final of '92, match between Pakistan and England. what the hell?!!@!
Out of all the possibilities why did they have to bore us with a match that had nothing to do with either Australia or SL? At least they could have given us a recap of this world cup or a summary of all the world cups since '75 or something interesting as such. Well, by the time the match finally started I was bored to death watching Imran Khan bowling the same ball to Ian Botham in slow motion over and over again!

Finally,..the match started with just 38 overs, what a pity for a much anticipated world cup final!
You would have expected the most important match in the whole series to have been organised so well, that you could kick back and enjoy. But this match turned out to be a bit of a nightmare. All went well for the Aussie innings, and Gilchrist (Gilly) batted out like mad! it was an incredible batting performance! Specially for someone who hasn't been in form all throughout the series.

Next the Sri Lankans came out to chase what seemed like a humanly impossible target of 281 in just 38 overs, that's a run rate of 7.4! but we still had Jayasuriya so there was a glimmer of hope, so I thought. However, to me it didn't seem like any of our batsmen were confident enough to go all the way. I dozed off and missed a couple of overs around 5 in the morning and woke up to a boundary by Jayasuriya. Jayasuriya and Sanga settled down a bit and lifted the run rate, but the strokes they played seem to be more out of desperation.

To add to the annoyance, it started raining again (just after we passed the 20 over mark; should have been good if the rain poured down a bit earlier :) but that was not to be) anyway, after another while yawning away, the match started again. The batsmen came out into the field not knowing what the revised target was. So both the batsmen and the Aussies stood there confused, waiting for the information from the umpires who were doing the D/L calculations. Wow, how professional. Finally it was announced that the 38 overs were further reduced to 36.

From there on the match went ok until it was begining to look very dark out there. Next came the biggest blunder of the whole series. The SL batsmen were offered to take the bad light condition and call an end to the match, which they did. And the Aussies started celebrating the victory, but not for long, the umpires intervened and told them the match isn't over yet. We were all confused as to what is going on. Next the SL batsmen were called back in to bat in the dark. The commentators were furious. it seriously was absurd, the ground didn't have lights to play on. So Mahela and Ponting discussed to use spinners for the last couple of overs instead of throwing fast balls at someone who could barely make out where they are coming from.

After what seemed like ages, the match came to an end, with Australia winning the 2007 world cup,..... Again!!

Have to admit it the Australian team is doing exceptionally well, and they do deserve to win the world cup.

But the Sri Lankan team has done very well to have come into the finals and put up a brave performance. Win or lose we are with you, you have always been the pride and joy of the tiny little island in the Indian ocean.

Oh well, better luck next time!

World Cup - The Grand Finale!

2007-04-28T21:16:00.000+10:00

Just finished reading a few Sri Lankan blogs and news online and listened to a new song by the Gypsies made for our team, seems like the whole country is on their toes and getting ready for the big thing! The country's president is also in the Windies for the final.

My brother is also ready with enough snacks to last throughout the match.

Here in Australia there's no atmosphere of a Cricket World Cup final going to be played in a couple of hours. Not even an advertisement on the tv about it being telecast tonight. Nobody seems to care about it. It's all footy for them, a game played only in Australia among local clubs, a cross between rugby and soccer. They are just crazy over it. Cricket is just another game, not a part of life as in Sri Lanka.

Wish I was in SL to enjoy the anticipation and the excitement. Anyway, looking forward to a victorious sleepless night.

:)

2007-04-26T16:24:00.000+10:00

A match well played

2007-04-26T10:10:00.001+10:00

Still recovering from staying up all night to watch the match SL Vs NZ, which started at midnight Aussie time. And having to watch the World cup semi-finals on live streaming on the internet (sitting in front of the laptop and cramming our necks) because these people here don't think it worthwhile to telecast on tv!!! outrageous! But of course the Aus Vs SA match was on tv because it was Australia that was playing!

Anyway, we won!! it was all worth it!

Mahela was excellent. At first I was quite annoyed with him for defending each and every ball without hitting it with the bat and getting some runs. But of course they are the experts, and what do I know? He didn't play hard because he knew it's not the way to go. But later on he gradually hit the accelerator and ended up with a century (not out) and a strike rate over a hundred. That was literally a 'captain's knock'!

And all credit goes to Upul Tharanga, and for the team to have kept their faith in him. Comforting to know there's young talent emerging to replace the senior players in the near future.

Next...against the ruthless Aussies in the finals on Saturday...hope...hope...hope!!!!

The art of original thinking

2007-04-23T15:44:00.000+10:00

Our society tries to define a person's intelligence by the level of his/her formal education. but does it really reflect the person's intelligence? I think not. Personally I'm beginning to think that 'formal' education actually restricts our mind frame, teaching us what some other person found out and telling us to carry on from where that earlier person left...in his path of thinking. Well, it is sort of trying not to re-invent the wheel, but at the same time it also restricts our minds to think along the lines of someone else, and does not encourage 'original thinking'.

Perhaps it's not just the teaching, but maybe the way we are taught. As students we are taught things and not encouraged to ask 'why?' and 'how?', and pretty soon we get used to 'hanging on to every word' the teacher say like in blind faith.

After reading Sir Richard Branson's autobiography I was wondering about this factor. He wasn't an A-grade student, not even close! But he understood that the authoritarian rules in his school were restricting the freedom of students, and wrote down a list of suggestions to the administration of the school at the age of 15. He challenged the ideas of most 'conservative' businessmen, and went on to break a lot of 'defined' rules. Somewhere in his book he mentions about the degrees and educational programmes on "entrepreneurship", well..it shouldn't be about sitting down and studying the subject but throwing away the books and getting down to work!

On the same note I was interested in finding out how Einstein coped with this. So I just finished skimming through a book called "The unexpected Einstein", trying to get some insight into this. Einstein excelled at maths in school, but was terrible in other subjects. But the thing to note is that he wasn't interested in what the teachers taught him, (and so he wasn't a favourite with his teachers at all) but he was interested in the subject and he learned it in his way. He didn't get bogged down with the 'formal teachings'. Once during a chemistry laboratory session, he had thrown away the teachers instructions and tried to do the experiment - his way, which had ended blowing up in his face. And later he dropped out of school by the age of 16.

Another example Martin Wickramasinghe, one of the most prolific writers of all time in Sri Lanka, dropped out of school early. But in my opinion Sri Lanka has't been able to produce a better author at handling the Sinhala language since. It's not just the language but his insight into the society and the people is simply amazing. In one of his books 'Yuganthaya' if I'm not mistaken he writes about how this character, a surgeon carries out a delicate and complex surgery on a patient. You can't stop but wonder at the intricate details of the human anatomy and the medical procedures he goes on to explain. How the hell did he get such a knowledge? (There weren't any Internet or the Discovery channel in his time!)

I remember our music maestro Premasiri Kemadasa once saying (by the way that's another example) "when you play music in a class room and ask the children to clap to the rhythm, if there's one child who doesn't seem to be clapping to the correct beat, take interest! he might be seeing something that all the others don't".

All in all it's difficult to define and mould a person's intellectual capacity and original thinking. But the guideline "not to believe in anything anybody says without giving it proper consideration" as preached by Lord Buddha in the Kalama sutra seems to be absolutely correct!
----------

"Do not go upon what has been acquired by repeated hearing; nor upon tradition; nor upon rumor; nor upon what is in a scripture; nor upon surmise; nor upon an axiom; nor upon specious reasoning; nor upon a bias towards a notion that has been pondered over; nor upon another's seeming ability; nor upon the consideration, ..... when you yourselves know: 'These things are good; these things are not blamable; these things are praised by the wise; undertaken and observed, these things lead to benefit and happiness,' enter on and abide in them."

Murder she wrote

2007-04-23T10:46:00.000+10:00

I was reading a couple of Agatha Christie novels during last week. Her novels are among the best sellers of all time, second only to Shakespeare. She's known as "Queen of crime" for her something like 65 crime novels.

All her stories frame work is more or less the same. A death takes place, turns out to be a murder, some detectives or some amateurs get involved in investigating the crime. The most part of the story is on the investigation, the suspicion shifts from person to person, and makes the reader guess all sorts of possibilites and suspects, but at the end the murderer turns out to be either someone you never thought of suspecting, or someone you considered earlier but ruled out at one point. I'm sure I've read at least a dozen of her books and still I've never been able to make the correct guess!! (better luck next time!..maybe)

It's funny that even though the framework is the same for all stories, no two stories are alike, every story is very unique, so instead of getting bored after reading a couple of books, you get kind of addicted to her mysteries. Reading her book is like solving a puzzle or mystery, it keeps you guessing all throughout.

Most of her stories are based in UK, but there are quite a significant number of stories based in other countries like Egypt, Iraq etc. each one giving a touch of its culture.

End of an era..

2007-04-23T10:26:00.000+10:00

Brian Lara, who created a sensation in West Indies cricket retired after a successful career which spanned almost two decades.

It's a bit sad that towards the end of his career, he had to become more like a one-man team for his country.

But in the international cricket arena, he will always be remembered as a legend who brought life to the game of cricket.

An interesting blog

2007-04-20T12:27:00.000+10:00

We found this very entertaining blog

http://www.ranjitfernandosucks.blogspot.com/

so thought I should spread the word... :)

Big deal!!!!

2007-04-18T17:34:00.000+10:00

We lost the match against Australia, which was not a very big surprise, but the surprise was that the SL team decided to rest two of their best bowlers, and that's excluding Malinga who's got an injury.

Well, I agree that it was a bit of a surprise, bit too sudden and made me go like "huh?...what?!....why?... ehhh ........ hmmm ...... blank!" But once the news had time to digest, I don't think there's anything really wrong with that move, it's not illegal or anything!! After all that's why there are reserve players in a team.

But what I can't understand is why everybody is so wound up about it. It's understandable that it's a bit of a shock (at first), but to go to the extent of suggesting that match fixing can be involved is taking it waaaaay too far!

Ponting has been complaining too, but then again he has been complaining about practically everything since the tournament started.

And guess who had joined the list now, the captain of Ireland, preparing for the next match with SL "Every team we've played against has put their full-strength side against us, which is a credit to the way we've played our cricket in this tournament."

!!!!!!!!

Handy game

2007-04-16T15:55:00.000+10:00

Click to enlarge

Good idea to keep a printout of this one whenever you are attending a seminar or presentation,
in case you get bored.. :)

Kangaroo Island

2007-04-09T16:42:00.002+10:00

Admiral's Arch

Remarkable Rocks

Seal bay

Last weekend was a very long weekend as it was Easter, with Friday being "good friday" and Monday also a holiday for some unknown reason. So we went on a trip to Kangaroo Island, which is the 3rd largest island off the coast of Australia. We left home Saturday afternoon and came back just before Monday noon.

Kangaroo Island is off the coast of Southern Australia which is around 100km from Adelaide. The island is separated from the mainland by a 13km stretch of water which is the southern ocean. Access to the island is by ferry which is a huge one which can carry couple of dozens of vehicles as well as passengers. The sea is usually very calm around this area so the ferry ride is generally smooth.

We arrived in Kangaroo island just after sunset on Saturday and we checked into the small hotel, which is a kind of hostel, great for backpackers and travellers. Then we had a chance to walk around and meet up with some penguins who had come upto the shore from the seas as night fell. The island is a far cry from the city life, and nights are pretty much dark as there's not many lights around. And for this reason the night sky looked simply magnificent! I had always been an admirer of the night sky and had never seen it so full of stars, it was simply breathtaking!

The next day we went around the island in a tour coach (bus). The island is quite big ~150km long and ~50km wide. Our coach driver who was also our tour guide talked to us throughout the whole journey (from 9:30 am till around 6:30 pm) and flooded us with information. It was really enjoyable.

The highlights of the tour were Seal bay (full of Australian seals sleeping in the sun), Remarkable rocks (a few big unusual looking rocks on a pure Granite base), Admirals arch (an arch in the rocks near the sea), New Zealand fur seals (again a bunch of noisy big fellows), and a small farm where we had a delicious lunch!

By the time we got back to the hotel we were exhausted. But it was simply great! The island is very much self-sufficient. There are people living in the island something like 4500. Most of them working on farms, it's more like a step back in time, with large areas of land with a farmer's small house in the middle, cattle grazing, flocks of sheep just idling around and of course kangaroos hopping all over the place. (we almost ran into kangaroos jumping across the roads, two times). The manager of the hotel that we stayed in told us that his nearest neighbour is 1km away, and that he often finds kangaroos peeping in through his windows at night.

We came back in the ferry Monday morning. It was a great experience! I could recommed this place to anyone without a doubt. It seems one of the last unspoilt places on earth.

Sir Richard Branson

2007-04-04T16:17:00.000+10:00

Finished reading "Losing my virginity" the autobiography of Sir Richard Branson. WOW!!

Once you start reading the book you find it very difficult to put down, it's always very exciting, funny and very much out-of the box.

To sum it up, he was a normal boy performing quite badly at school, and looking for ways to make money and to improve things. Starting from scratch, he is now the owner of the Virgin group of companies which has over 200 companies under its wing. From Virgin airlines, Virgin rail, Virgin mobile, Virgin Vie (cosmetics) down to Virgin Cola (at present he's supposed to be working on "Virgin Galactic" - space travel !?!) . "Virgin" is considered to be the strongest brand name in use.

His approach to both business and life is very bold. His attempts to fly around the world in a balloon and cross the Atlantic in a speed boat etc. earned him a personality of his own.

The book is fun as fun can be, with a lot of business pranks and challenges to overcome. This is one book that I would recommend to anyone, whether you are business minded or not, it doesn't matter, it's all about guts and glory! Nothing much technical, no it doesn't talk much about balance sheets, the financial accounts and the technical stuff. As he himself mentions in the introduction, "Some people say that my vision for Virgin breaks all the rules and is too widely kaleidescopic; others say that Virgin is set to become one of the leading brand names of the next century; others analyse it down to the last degree and then write academic papers on it. As for me, I just pick up the phone and get on with it".

Mr. Bean is Back!

2007-04-01T21:36:00.000+10:00

Mr. Bean is upto his old mischief again. And this time he has won a lottery ticket prize - a trip to the south of France, Cannes. All he has to do is get down from the train in Paris, take a taxi to the next train station and take the express train direct to Cannes. It's simple really!

But leave it to Mr. Bean to complicate life's most simple things and get himself in a real jumble! And knowing just one French word "Oui" meaning 'yes' doesn't help things at all!

The film was simply hillarious! It's a good one to just go have a good laugh at, because this just might be the last Mr. Bean movie to come out. Rowan Atkinson has mentioned that he had done all experiments with Mr Bean so that it might be the time to call it off.

Siddhartha

2007-03-27T12:13:00.000+10:00

I read this book a couple of weeks back, but couldn't write anything about it. The book had been written by Herman Hesse who's a well respected German author, who once even won the Nobel prize for literature.

When I saw this book on display in the library I thought it to be a peice of fiction based on the life of Price Siddhartha before he left his palace in search of salvation, a work similar to that of Martin Wickramasinghe's "Bhavatharanaya". But it was not to be so. When I started reading it only did I discover that the Siddhartha referred to in the book is not the same prince Siddhartha who atained enlightenment and came to be known as Lord Buddha, but a different person, a Brahmin's son who lived in India during the time of Lord Buddha.

It's a fairly short story, and the story goes as this Siddhartha along with his friend goes in search of the meaning of existence. And just like the prince Siddhartha we know he goes onto learn different beliefs and practice rituals etc. under different teachers but realizes that they are not the liberation that he's looking for. After some time they both pay a visit to Lord Buddha, who they have been hearing so much about.

However, the story takes an unexpected turn here, and from this point onwards I think Hesse had got it all wrong.

Lord Buddha only appears in this book for a very short time, and at this point Siddhartha's friend decides to stay and become a Buddhist monk. However, the main character of the story Siddhartha decides to move on in search of self-realization. His argument is that there's no point in learning from someone else, but you have to realize the path by yourself alone. This point is not directly in contradiction with Buddhism, which says that you shouldn't believe in something just because someone says so or it's written in some book etc.. but analyse it and after due examination if it's intended to be good towards all others you may take it in. (From Kalama Sutta: but not the exact words, sorry about that) anyway, my point is that this doesn't necessarily mean that you should disregard what all others say.

Anyway, this Siddhartha goes on with life, searching for whatever he's searching for, and gets himself entangled with a courtesian, I think this woman named "kamala" is taken from the character of "Ambapali" in Buddhist texts. For later in the story this Kamala donates her mango grove to the Buddhist monks.

So, Siddhartha gets himself in a lot of different situations and finally one day suddenly ends up realizing that this life is meaningless! And goes in search of self-realization again.

The story I thought was pretty weird. The worst thing about it was that Hesse had to name this character as "Siddhartha". I kept wondering about that all throughout the story. Didn't make any sense at all. Perhaps he expected this character to be a close image of Lord Buddha himself. The introduction to the book was given by a scholar who had been studying Buddhism, and he had mentioned that "Hesse's understanding of Buddhism was not very accurate".

In my opinion, this is a book which is not worth reading, it only leaves you confused. Unless you are one of those people who just love to criticise others work!

Weekend...

2007-03-26T09:42:00.000+10:00

Friday night we watched the Sri Lanka Vs India match over the internet. Had a couple of hours sleep before getting up at midnight to watch the match. yeah.. it was not a nice feeling, so only watched the SL innings, then went to sleep at 4am and got up again at around 7, the match was over by that time. So watched the highlights. We are through to the Super 8. I saw a photo on today's online Daily News, a soldier guarding Rahul Dravid's house...hmm.....

On Saturday we went to Marion which is a large shopping centre a little more half an hour's drive from the city. Next went to see a kite festival in one of the beaches. Wasn't as grand as it was advertised I guess.

Sunday at home, the usual household work laundry, cooking, ironing, cleaning etc...
We bought a set of badminton rackets so spent a couple of hours Sunday evening brushing up on our badminton skills, sent the shuttle-cock flying over to a neighbours place a couple of times. However, the weather is getting a bit too cold for outdoor sports now.

Got a new book from the library, Sir Richard Branson's autobiography (the owner of the multi-national Virgin group of companies) titled "Losing my virginity" yeah, it's a weird name, but the guy is weird too. He's one of those people you would have trouble distinguishing between 'genius' and 'mad-man'. I was thinking of just skimming through the book without spending hours, but once I started on it, it just looks too interesting to do that.

We won!

2007-03-22T10:14:00.000+11:00

Got up a bit early to follow the SL Vs Bangladesh match on the net. No game, we won by 198 runs on a Duckworth-Lewis decision. It's nice to see all our key batsmen putting up good scores for a change (without the usual one-man show).

Hope they would keep up the good work!

Mysterious vibrations

2007-03-21T16:26:00.000+11:00

For the past few days I've been trying to figure out whether my lab setup is stable enough to carry out experiments. I've got a vibration isolated 800kg steel table, which measures about 3m long and 1.5m wide, sitting on a concrete block which is something like 7m long. And this whole thing is pumped up in pressurised air just to isolate it from the ground vibrations.

So effectively my experiment which will be sitting on the table and the concrete block will be completely isolated from any ground vibrations. But when I set up a scheme - an interferometer to check this, the table was very good but the concrete showed a small vibration. It's in the scale of micrometers and nanometers, but in optics that's a big issue. I turned off all AC's, exhaust fans and asked my colleagues to keep their voices down, but still I couldn't get rid of the confounded vibration.

It got my supervisor and the other students also thinking.. but finally we managed to find a work-around to it. The vibrations are still there, but I'm going to set up my experiment so that the vibrations will be compensated.

So that done, I'm sitting here blogging, waiting for my big mirror (1m diameter) to be lifted up and mounted for me. That should be done by today afternoon - hopefully!

No Comments?

2007-03-21T15:15:00.000+11:00

I feel like I'm doing all the talking!
So please feel free to leave any comments, ideas, objections, complaints and whatever your thoughts are, all are welcome!

Lasers in a nutshell

2007-03-20T13:42:00.000+11:00

When someone mentions "Laser" we are instantly reminded of a bright light beam whether it's from a James Bond movie or from a stage display. But what exactly is a Laser?

In plain English, it's only a light source. Just like an ordinary light bulb or sunlight, a laser emits light. So what's so special about a laser? Well, there are a couple of differences, the major one being the high degree of coherence (I'm not going to explain that now since it's going to be very technical) another is the high intensities they can produce.

In some instances Laser intensities can be so high that just by looking at an object illuminated by a laser can burn your eyes for good! So lasers are categorised according to the level of damage that they can cause. Therefore lasers categorised as class 3 and above require wearing goggles and protective clothing.

A description of the importance of lasers is beyond my scope, they range from medical applications such as cancer cell burning and teeth whitening to metal cutting, engraving, and precision measurements of incredibly small distances, (I'm talking in the nanometer range).

I'll write about my research later on, for the moment I'm using a He-Ne laser which is categorised as 3B, that means I have to wear goggles, which can be quite a pain, for it cuts out most of the light and I keep knocking on things in the lab like a blind bat!

What did I tell ya?

2007-03-19T17:02:00.000+11:00

In the chain of events following Pakistan's cricket world cup controversy, Captain Inzamam Ul-Haq is retiring from One-days.

....................

Shockers!

2007-03-19T08:59:00.000+11:00

Some world cup this is turning out to be!

It all started when Bangladesh beat the daylights out of India over a 5-wicket victory. Even though it was unexpected it was still not unbelievable. Next day some of my colleagues were debating whether non-test playing countries like Netherlands, Scotland, Ireland, Bermuda etc should be given the chance to play in the world cup. After all it's THE world cup, it's a big thing to even participate in it, so teams should fight to get in!

And Voila!! Ireland defeated Pakistan! and threw them out of the tournament! That was a big stunner!!

Next even before that news was digested, came the news that Bob Woolmer, the Pakistani coach had collapsed and died! within 24 hours of Pakistan's defeat. hmm.......I wonder what the next shocker is going to be.

Water

2007-03-18T20:09:00.000+11:00

Today we watched the film "Water" directed by Deepa Mehta. I'm not going to go into details about it simply because I'm just too tired after playing cricket with Vishuddhi. Anyhow, the film is about child marriages in India, which is supposedly practiced even today. The film was mostly shot in Sri Lanka and casts a few of Sri Lankan actors like Iranganie Serasinghe and Buddhi Wickrama, and of course the main character Sarala.

Cricket World Cup 2007

2007-03-14T13:17:00.000+11:00

The Cricket world cup is here! Not here exactly, it's on the other side of the planet, in the West Indies. And I'm REALLY, REALLY annoyed that the tv stations here are not broadcasting it!!!!!!!!!!! It's the world cup for god's sakes!!!#^%@!&$!!!!

I suspect they are hoping to telecast some of the 'good' matches that Australia will be playing. But that's not fair!!!

I guess we'll have to rely on cricinfo.com for the scores.

I hope Sri Lanka wins! Failing which, anyone but Australia.

For your own safety

2007-03-08T15:03:00.000+11:00

Next Tuesday supposedly there are some folks coming from some OHS (Occupational Health and Safety) thing to evaluate the safe work practices in the Physics building. Much to the annoyance of practically everybody!! Well, we are doing quite well without them, aren't we?

The lab wardens and technicians are annoyed since they are required to take care of all safety related actions and be prepared to deal with these folks, because if something goes wrong they will be partly responsible. The supervisors are annoyed since this 'monkey business' is taking up lot of useful time (research time). And students are annoyed because we are supposed to read up and be prepared to answer all sorts of possible questions they could ask, instead of doing our work! And of course this means that the lab warden would not have time to put up my optical table till after next Tuesday!!!@!?@*#&^!!?!

I don't know why we have to go through these stuff. We very well know how to use a Laser, to wear eye safety and not to poke our fingers into a high-voltage outlet! And above all, only authorised persons are allowed in the laser labs, so there is no risk of some curious passer-by getting into one of them. And of course there are those fire drills that goes off every now and then and we have to abandon all our work and go out of the building - just for fun!!! next there are those forms that we are required to fill out every now and then.

All these paraphernalia is just wasting time. I know it's better to be prepared than be sorry, but seriously there should be a limit!!

One of my colleagues actually believe that he will come down with some mysterious illness on Tuesday. And another a pure Australian, hoping to pretend that he's from France and can't speak any English! Well, he wouldn't get further than "Parlez-vous Francaise?" on that, and specially not if one of the evaluators happens to be fluent in French!...hmm......that would be fun!

Anticipating work

2007-03-06T17:03:00.000+11:00

Gloomy day....no sunshine at all...and very cold...... seems like the winter is on its way...brrrrr!!!!!!

After a lot of remindings and pressuring, the setting up of my lab has been accelerated. So the whole day the lab warden was busy with that work. a-ha!

And I've been trying to understand "surface enhanced Raman scattering", dozing off......reading wikipedia, raman scattering, answering mails, raman scattering ..... I wish they would finish my lab soon!!

The Whispering Wall........shhh!

2007-03-05T10:46:00.000+11:00

Last Saturday we went further north-east of Adelaide to see Gawler, which has been one of the earliest white settlements in the area. Well, it's not that old, just around a century and a half.

The interesting thing around the area was the Barossa reservoir, better known as "The whispering wall". On the outside it looks like just another dam with an arched shape, retaining water on one side and trees and shrubs on the other.

But the funny thing about it is, that when you stand close to the dam wall at one end of the reservoir, you can hear a person talking at the other end (that's about 150 meters afar), as if he's standing right next to you! Spooky!!

The secret is in the shape of the dam. The tall thin concrete dam curved against the pressure of the water had been radical at the time of construction over a 100 years ago and the parabola effect causes sound-waves to bounce so that people speaking at one end of the dam can be heard as if the person is standing beside you ! The wall is one sector of a perfect circle, and the sound-waves bounce in a series of straight jumps along it to the other end. Cool!!

Happens all the time!

2007-03-02T15:31:00.000+11:00

Click on the image to magnify

The sun shall never set on so glorious a human achievement!

2007-02-27T16:16:00.000+11:00

"Never, never and never again shall it be that this beautiful land will again experience the oppression of one by another ........The sun shall never set on so glorious a human achievement!"
- Nelson Mandela, President of South Africa May 1994

Ok, So I finally finished reading "A long walk to freedom" last weekend. So I've got to write about it. But I have a feeling that it's going to be reeeaallly long. I'll try my best to keep it as short as possible but seriously how can you possibly summarize a very eventful 70+ years of history in a few paragraphs??

So with that said here goes.......

Rolihlahla (Literarily meaning "pulling the branch of a tree", Essentially meaning "troublemaker") was born to a tribal chief in a remote village (Qunu) in South Africa. He grew up running around with the village boys, and attending to goats and pigs. He was given the name "Nelson" by his school teacher.

At the age of nine after the death of his father, he was taken in by the Regent of the area. His school years were relatively calm and he fared well at education. Shortly afterwards the suggestion of marriage by the Regent made him and the Regent's own son, flee the town and arrive in Johannesburg.

Here he found some clerical work in a law firm, and completed his BA at the same time. Next he went on to study law at the University where he was the only black in the class. Despite the harrassment from his colleagues and the continuous discouragement from his lecturer (who used to tell him that blacks are not capable in studying subjects as law, and that he should go back to the farm), Mandela kept on his work.

Mandela teamed up with Oliver Tambo to start a law firm which provided legal services to blacks at a low cost. Oliver Tambo later went on to become one of the major pillars of the African National Organization (ANC) and was the president (in exile) of the organization while Mandela was in prison.

The situation in Black South Africa after 1948 was very grim. The minority white government (Dutch/ Afrikaners) was controlling the majority black africans. "Arpetheid" was taking form, first the "Petty Arpetheid" and next "Grand Arpetheid" brought in legislation that made discrimination "Legal ". The blacks had no voting power, and were not recognised as citizens of their own country. They were given ~ 13% of the land to live and to make a living out of. Blacks were not allowed in white cities. This displaced many people and Mandela's law office also had to be vacated. There were separate buses, public toilets, hospitals, beach areas etc for blacks. The education reforms brought limited the level of education a black person was entitled to. A boycott carried out by the ANC resulted in thousands of Children with no education at all.

Mandela joined the ANC and was actively working for the organization, gradually learning and making his way up. During this time, most of the leaders of the organization were banned from time to time, essentially confining them into living in a single city for years at a time, and preventing them from attending any meetings or even speaking to two people at a time. This was a strategy the Government took to curb the rising political movement against them.

The ANC's policy was non-violence, which followed along the path of Mahatma Gandhi, but unlike with the British this method didn't seem to be working with the Afrikaners, for they replied to peaceful, unarmed protests with violence and killings. Mandela's opinion of non-violence was that it was only a strategy, which wasn't going to work in this situation. Much as he didn't want to take up arms, he couldn't deny the fact that people were getting restless and soon a civil war could break out. The military wing of the ANC was Mandela's idea, which was first opposed by the others of the ANC, but later agreed upon.

During this time the ANC was banned, making any member of the organization a criminal overnight. Most leaders of the ANC went underground, and some fled the country. Mandela was in and out of prison before he was sentenced to life in prison for 'attempting to overthrow the government".

He spent most of his prison sentence in Robben Island in a cell which was so small that when he slept lengthwise on the stone floor, his head touched one wall, and the feet the other wall. The treatment of prisoners were brutal and gruesome. They were not given proper blankets, clothes or food, and was expected to do hard labour, despite being political prisoners. They were only allowed one letter from family every 6 months. But Mandela and his friends kept the fight going, demanding their rights to food and proper clothing and fighting every inch of the way. He kept his legal skills sharp by preparing legal cases for those prisoners who sought them, and reading books that were allowed in the prison. During later years he applied to study for a LLB degree at the University of London by remote correspondence. It was during this time that this book was mostly written, in secrecy of course, once a part of it was discovered by prison authorities and were burned, luckily a short-hand version of the book was already smuggled out of the jail to Oliver Tambo through a lawyer.

It's simply amazing how, despite all the hardships and mistreatments, these few extraordinary people kept up their spirit, determination and even their sense of humor, for in his book Mandela recalls many humorous incidents and tricks they played while in prison.

Mandela kept writing to the government and initiating negotiations and trying to correspond with the outside on the arpetheid issue. Finally, the tide turned and the international pressure and the internal chaos in the country pushed the Afrikaners government to reconsider arpetheid. With F.W De Klerk assuming work as the new president, in 1989 arpetheid was lifted, and political prisoners including Mandela was released.

It was another 4 years before the first democratic election was held in South Africa.

And the rest is history.............

Sounds like Greek?!

2007-02-23T12:09:00.001+11:00

The common phrase "sounds like Greek" is usually used when something doesn't make any sense or when something is totally incomprehensible. Ironically a lot of words and parts of words we use in day to day life has been derived from actual Greek And most of which we do understand! Considering the fact that studies and knowledge in the western world had its origins in the Greek civilization, almost all fields of studies stem from Greek words, including the technical terms used within that subject area.

Philosophy: (philosophía), compounded from (phílos: friend, or lover) and (sophía: wisdom)
Biology: (Βìο) meaning life and (logia) meaning the study of
Anthtropology: (Anthro) meaning man or person + the study of
Archeology: (Arche) ancient, foundation + study of
Mathematics : (máthēma), which means learning, study, science
Physics: (phúsis) nature and knowledge of nature
Astronomy: (astron) stars and (nomos) law
History: (historía) meaning a learning or knowing by inquiry,
Zoology: (Zoon) animal + study of
Optic : appearance or look
Thus anything associated with Optic is something to do with eye/vision

So if you put two and two together you will understand how "Pilanthropy", "Opthalmology", "Optimeterist", "Architecture" came about

A few more examples

Geo: meaning earth
Geography, geology, geo-based

Democracy: demos, "people," and kratos, "rule"

Micro: small
micro meter, microscope

Mono: single
monotony, monomer, monogamous

Tele: far
tele-vision, tele-scope

And the list goes on.......