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Today India celebrates its 57th Republic Day. The present President of India – Dr. Abdul Kalam is known for his thought provoking speeches. These speeches usually have a few nuggets of literary classics in them. This year’s address to the nation on the eve of 57th Republic day was no different. There was this classic qoute – “let me recall a Thirukkural composed by Poet Saint Thiruvalluvar, 2200 years ago…Truth in thinking and action will have a power higher than enduring Tapas and generous Charity” (Tapas roughly translates to penance in the form of meditation) The President also quoted the parable of lost sheep in his speech. The transcript of the entire speech can be found on the President of India’s website. |
Archive for January, 2006
भारत का 57 वाँ गणतंत्र दिवस
Thursday, January 26th, 2006A birthday and a car drive
Wednesday, January 25th, 2006The two major highlights of last weekend were a birthday and a car drive.
Birthday.
Last Friday night bunch of us decided to surprise ![[info]](http://stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
parineeta (she now blogs at http://greeneyedgoblin.blogspot.com/) with our now famous midnight express wish service. We show up at her place with all the birthday paraphernalia – cards, cakes, gifts etc and precisely at midnight, we start knocking the door. Once inside her apartment, we sang the birthday song as loudly as possible and as much ruckus as we could. We deliberately created all the commotion since one of her job a responsibility at university housing is to maintain decorum in the dorm building. We all including parineeta had our share of the cake but parineeta got the cake on her face too! We took turns to smear the cake on her face 
*evil grin*
Car drive.
Kelly and I had not met for a long while and we decided to meet up on Saturday at De Kalb. This provided an excellent opportunity for a long drive except for the weather playing the villain and ‘getting used to’ factor of the new car. I think in another 100-200 miles, I will get used to my new car and its handling. I have realized the after the incident, I have become very cautious on the road which sometimes creates some mental stress thus robbing the pleasure out of the drive. Hopefully this will be taken care off in the coming months. The return trip was a scary one! It had become very foggy and visibility had reduced to less than 25 meters – a bad thing when you are doing interstate speeds. I ended up doing 40-45 mph on the interstate where the speed limit is 65 mph. It was quite a driving experience!
Does anyone remember Johnny Sokko and his Giant Robot?
Wednesday, January 18th, 2006
Came across this http://www.stomptokyo.com/otf/Johnny-Sokko/Johnny-Sokko.htm while surfing and I went on a trip down the memory lane.
This seems to be a popular meme…
Sunday, January 15th, 2006| Your Life Path Number is 1 |
 Your purpose in life is to lead others. You have great drive and determination. Nothing is going to stand in your way. In love, you tend to take a protective role. You enjoy being the provider in relationships. You expect others to be like you, and as a result, you are often disappointed. |
Weather Contrast
Friday, January 13th, 2006| Weather – Here and there It is snowing like crazy here. The ground has taken the color of white. It is a little difficult for me to imagine that just 3 weeks ago I was at a place where the weather was warm and there was lots of bright sunshine! |
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| Arturo gave the idea of taking a picture of the office window with the monitor screen showing the wallpaper in the same frame to show the contrast in the weather. Thanks Arturo. |
Photos of the Dec 29 LJ meet in Mumbai.
Wednesday, January 11th, 2006On December 30th 2005, I attended a small LJ meet in Mumbai. You can read about the meet from these entries- http://www.livejournal.com/users/mannu/312751.html and http://www.livejournal.com/users/freegeek/175019.html. Here are some of the pictures from that meet.
Group photo
Half of freegeek, mannu, iamneo, sat2, vipul, avantika, mighty_stylus, half of solzaire, one leg of kanishka_sinha
Half group photo
mannu, iamneo, sat2, vipul
Freegeek
Freegeek and empty beer mug
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Monday, January 9th, 2006 |
Boy! Did I travel?!?
One of the highlights of my trip to India was the amount of travel that I did during the one month that I stayed at home. I visited the following places – Here is the approximate breakup of the kilometers – I met almost all my family members and friends. I also met new friends especially during the Mumbai LJ meet. I clicked close to 3000 pictures during this home visit and I am currently sorting through them. I will post the pictures and pending LJ entries soon. |
I am back to Normal again.
Thursday, January 5th, 2006I am back to the place where I stay and work – Normal. More about the return flight journey and other pending LJ updates soon…
It is time to make the return trip.
Wednesday, January 4th, 2006It is time to make the return trip. In a couple of hours I will take a return flight to America. I had great time with family and friends. I also had so many new and wonderful experiences. I will try to write about these in future LJ posts.
Over and out for now.