Life Of Navin

Human ingenuity has given us two great innovations...... gas guzzling beauties like the Rolls Royce Phantom and the ubiquitous innovation we know as the cellphone. So why not combine the two to create a cell phone store in the back of a Rolls-Royce Phantom? Leave it to an Indian to come up with such an idea!! The guys at The Mobile Store purchasing a Phantom instead of a brick-and-mortar storefront, painting it up, and traveling the hillsides hawking mobile phones. Vending mobile phones in a Rolls Royce Phantom is, without doubt, one of the craziest things I have ever come across. Check it out below!!


More attention-getting than Aishyarwa Rai, more convenient than the home delivered Domino's Pizza, eh!! The world is an amazing place, no??

So I guess everyone knows by now that I'm a complete space freak!! I've signed up for literally every newsletter on earth that promises to keep one updated with the latest happenings in the world of space technology....... And today morning I received an email that completely blew me off!! Read it for yourself.... (click on the image to see it full sized)

Woohoo!! Chandrayaan II designs have been finalised!! The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), which has just made a profit of $ 40 Million by launching the W2M satellite, has gone into top gear on India's own Lunar Expedition.

What makes Chandrayaan II different from Chandrayaan I is the fact that the second expedition includes plans to land a rover on the lunar surface and collect samples of lunar soil, as well as analyze these samples (Chandrayaan I focuses more on the terrain mapping of the moon). Russia's Federal Space Agency Roskosmos is joining hands with ISRO for development of Chandrayaan II Rover. The rover will weigh between 30 and 100 kg, depending on whether it is to do a semi-hard landing or soft landing. The rover will have an operating life-span of a month and will operate predominantly on solar power.

The launch of the sequel to Chandrayaan is slated for launch in 2012. I simply can't wait!!

The designs for Chandrayaan II have been completed and we hope to launch it by 2012 --G Madhavan Nair, ISRO chairperson

(some) Related Posts:
Chandrayaan-I, Locked And Loaded!!
Send Your Name To The Moon
Coloumbia Shuttle Hard Drive Solves Xenon Mystery
Virus Busting Beyond The Final Frontier
ARES V -An Astromomer's Dream!!
Goodbye Ulysses.....Thou Shalt Be Missed!!

I'm pretty sure you've heard about Slumdog Millionaire.

If you haven't then I suggest you get out from under your rock and read the next line: Slumdog Millionaire is the film critics are raving about these days. This film is already being hailed as the 'Juno' of 2009.... infact many believe its even better!! The film is set to release in India in January 09. I can't wait for this movie to release, Infact, if quality torrents appear before the Indian launch, I'll even torrent it!! However the movie is all the more special for Indians since its soundtrack is composed by Indian Legend A.R. Rahman.

The soundtrack has gotten a Satellite award and is nominated for the Golden Globe as well. Trying to see if the soundtrack was actually up to its name,I decided to check out the tracks of the movie, and here's what I felt about them:

The album starts off with the song O..Saya, which has been performed by A R Rahman in collaboration with Sri Lankan rapper M.I.A. The background is an African drum beat which sounds exactly like an Indian train running across a bridge. A Brilliant piece for the bass freaks, this song has loads of tribal elements in it, including whistles, shrieks and the like. A R and M.I.A complement each other brilliantly. This explosive track sets the pace of the album, and is a must hear if you're a fan of fast paced electronica music.

Following O..Saya is the song Riots which has an eerie feeling to it, very eerie, in fact I won't be surprised if RGV uses this track in his next scary film.

Next comes the mindblowing song Mausam & Escape. This song is absolutely unbelievable... a genre-defining Rahman track!! No one, in India or anywhere else, can pull off a song this complex with such dexterity. The oddly named song ( Mausam means climate!!) starts off slow but picks up speed brilliantly.The tracks starts off serenely with Rashid Ali and Sanjay Joseph plucking at the guitar but at about 40 seconds into the track it shifts the gear to overdrive and takes off on a crescendo of ridiculously thrilling Sitar plucks by Asad.

Then the album moves onto the M.I.A segment, with Paper Planes and the DFA remix of the same song. Paper Planes is, in my opinion, the best song of album. M.I.A. simply rocks!! The song has an amazingly original chorus (almost no vocals in the chorus!!) and everything in the song simply works!! M.I.A.'s breath is heard in quite a few places and this gives the song a very humanish feel. Seriously, rappers need to understand that breathing into the mike is not a bad thing in some cases!!

The DFA remix of the song, which has been used in some of the trailers of the movie, has a catchy feel to it, but slows down a bit too much for my liking towards the end with an unnecessary piano segment.

Following these rocking tracks comes the mindnumbingly stupid Ringa Ringa which is a neo version of Choli ke peeche kya hai, but sounds more like the background music of a bad Dantmanjan advert. This song makes you wonder if you've played a song from a different album by mistake... Its completely jarring!!

But the next song reminds you that you're definitely on the same album.... The song named Liquid Dance is another genre-definng (definite) smash hit. Its one of those sounds you've never heard before and probably never will again. An amazing piece of Indian Fusion music classical Indian vocals from Palakkad Sriram, this song gives me a high even after hearing it for the millionth time!!

Then comes Millionare, which is a fast racy track, which sounds OK-OK but is nothing to write home about, followed by the two slow tracks, Latiqa's Theme and Dreams On Fire, which feature Suzanne, who gives soulful vocals to these more-than-decent tracks.

Following these, comes Gangsta Blues, featuring Blaaze (Of BnB and Ban The Police fame) and Tanvi Shah. You don't really expect an Indian composer to do full justice to such a track but Rahman does a good slick job of it. Too bad that parts of it sound more like the Channel [V] Full On song more than a rap.

The album ends up with Jai Ho and Aaj Ki Raat, both composed by the trio of Shankar Ehsaan and Loy. Both these songs sound nice, but after listening to songs like Mausam & Escape, Paper Planes and Liquid Dance, you pretty much find these songs crappy.... but still better than Ringa Ringa!!

My Final verdict: With his latest international venture A.R Rahman has once again proved his ability to produce tracks which will make you go "woot woot woot!!". Being an Indian, I have known about A.R Rahman all along and am well aware of the musical genius in him. But most of the Western world are unfamiliar with this gem of a talent. I hope this soundtrack will change that.This is easily the best International work by Rahman and will go down in the history as one of the greatest soundtracks ever made. Rahman has many names- Mozart of Madras, Indian Timbaland, Musical Prophet- all of them agreeing on one thing- he is a musical genius who makes music on a level which is totally different from anyone else.

I'd buy the album even if it had only the tracks Paper Plane, Liquid Dance and Mausam & Escape. The addition of Gangsta Blues, Dreams On Fire, Latiqa's Theme and Paper Planes (DFA Remix) add to the CD's VFM.

A definite must buy, in my opinion

I rate this album 4.5/5

What about you??

So we've all heard the reviews of the iPhone 3G right?? Its among the crappiest phones to ever be made.... yet it sells like hot cakes, simply because of the oomph factor associated with the Apple logo on it. Any self respecting geek would rather move about with a rock than with an iPhone.... or so they claim!! And to prove this, some guy came up with a comparison between the iPhone 3G and a rock!! You heard that right, a ROCK!! And the results are amazingly funny..... see them below

Haha..... Funny but pretty much true!! What say??

P.S I got this as an email a few days ago and it was just so funny that I had to post it :)

Well, my first semester in college just ended a day ago and I spent the last twenty four hours just reminiscing some cool and some not-so-cool *stuff* that have occured over the last 5 months. So, on that note, I come out with this personal post titled "Stuff I Did This Semester".

OK, So here goes:





1) Became An Engico (woot woot!!)
I Joined College this year.....and after loads of pre-admission hoopla, and trips to NIT-K and to MANIT, I finally got into GEC, Goa. I won't lie, I did have my premonitions about the college, but all my doubts were cleared within the first two weeks in the college.

To put it simply, the college rocks, the teachers are pretty helpful and most importantly, the spirits of the GEC-ians (who're called Engicos) are at eternal highs!!

My branch (which I simply wouldn't compromise on to get into a so called "elite institution") is Computer Sciences & Engineering (duh!!) and as such I became a member of the coolest college students association: TEAM CURSOR ( Cursor stands for "Computer Students Organisation"). You can check out the cool video that the third years made about a third year Comp student's college life below.



2) Got Ragged
I dunno if you'd call what happened to me as ragging, but I guess you could call it that....The seniors tried to break me, but I guess I managed to maintain my dignity all THREE times

a) On the bus.... right up front , I ended up laughing at other blokes along with the same guys who "ragged" me!!
b) On the same bus on the same day... at the back ( Read No. 3 in my top 3 bloopers)..... My mistake, I admit!!
c) At the Nescafe, with a chocolate donut in my hand the whole time. The best part was when they asked me why I'd take Computers even though most people with ranks around mine had taken Electronics and Telecommunication (ETC) and I'd told them that I was interested in network security and practical quantum computing. Then I'd been asked to give a short intro to quantum computing, which I gladly did. I guess that I spoke pretty well coz for the next week or two, whenever I crossed paths with that group of seniors, they constantly called me 'E=MC^2'.... hehehe

3) Wrote An Sem Exam Without A Textbook
I'd heard about this kinda stuff happening in college, but I didn't expect it to happen to me in my first sem itself.... the subject was 'Applied Sciences' (Physics And Chem), and I somehow ended up with no text books to study the subject from.... the paper went pretty well... now its just a wait to see if my "tactics" worked or not.

4) Made New Homies
Once again, I had premonitions about the kinda people in GEC, but once I got here it didn't take too long for things to start clicking. I was pleasantly surprised to meet my new friends who're extremely talented and bright and I hope to strengthen bonds with them over the next few years!!

5) Broke Ties With A Really Dear Friend
I dunno how this happened, or why, but somehow I ended up completely shutting out this really close friend from my life.

6) Made Some Moolah $$$
Oh Yeah.... This sem was pretty good to me as far as raking in the money is concerned.
I made a pretty cool amount of cash, around Rs. 13000 (not counting a Rs.2000 prize I'm supposed to get for No.8) through different competitions ranging from technical ones like writing papers on Network Security, to literary ones like essay writing, to the extra curricular ones like quizzes. A special thousand bucks came for No. 12.

7) Got Myself An iPod
As I said in No. 6 I made quite a bit of cash this sem, and after considering buying a cellphone,I finally got myself an iPod nano..... but the sad part was that a month after I got my nano (3rd Gen), Steve Jobs launched the 4th Gen iPods and their price is nearly the same as the 3rd Gens!! But still, it feels great to be part of the Apple family. See my iPod here

A cellphone coming up next I guess :)

8) Wrote A Prize Winning Essay
The competition was organised by the ETC student's association of my college, ASSETS

The topic of the essay was "ENGINEERS AT HEART".
It felt good to get in touch with my literary side, and winning the competition was the cherry on the cake. You can read my essay in their monthly magazine IMPULSE here (Its a download).

9) Joined a Rock Band
Do I hear you rubbing your eyes in disbelief?? Well, its true alright...... At a College fest, my friends had planned to rock the crowd with Linkin Park's "Bleed It Out".... too bad one of the singers, the self proclaimed "e8rNl R0kr" Krishna "Kris" Sehgal had a bad case of Laryngitis two days before the big gig....

And guess who was in Bengaluru for those very four days?? Moi!! This great event occured just before college started but technically in my first semester.

I handled the chorus and with Aneesh "AD" Dhritye on the drums, Swapnil Shenoy in lead and the keyboard, and Riyaz Sheikh on the guitar, and Prakash on the synth, the show went on!!
I had barely 6 lines, 4 of them being " I bleed it out
Digging deeper just to throw it away" but the experience was totally awesome nonetheless, and people actually came up to me and said "well done" so I guess I wasn't really as bad as I'd expected to be!!

Plus, we got a cash remunerance of Rs.7000 , one-seventh of which went straight into my hands......

10) Went The Open Source Way
Somehow I suddenly realised that I had almost zero experience with open source software and so decided to go the open source way.
Starting off with a few live CD's, and slowly moving on to actual installs, I'm finally going open-source!! Even checked out some open source software and games... They rock!!

Just as I completed this post, the doorbell rang, and guess what, the postman handed me the CDs of Ubuntu and Kubuntu 8.10 that I'd ordered a month ago ....woo hoo!!

11) Set Up My Personal Site
Another personal milestone acheived.... I have my own personal site now, and I'm proud of what I've created. Not yet hosted it though....still stuck between free hosting/ paid hosting and some free webspace offered by friends in the business of web hosting. Also, some tiny kinks need to be worked out. But overall, I guess I'm all set to go live with my site.

A good friend from Delhi came up with this great idea for a site name --> Nav.In .... Cool huh??

Else, it'll probably be navinpai.com/.in/co.in/.co.nr/.org

Lets see how that shapes up!!

12) Lost My Grandmom
Not something I did, but something that has impacted me strongly. On an extremely sad note, I lost the greatest, most rocking lady I've had the opportunity to know, my grandmom, Sumitra Pai, who'd lived 84 years of the most amazing life possible. I seriously have been left with a void in my heart since she's been gone.

OK, I guess thats it, but I'd just add a few more lines under the subtitle:

TOP 3 BLOOPERS OF THE SEMESTER:

• Messed with a senior!! I learned Rule No. 1 of college life the hard way.....NEVER MESS WITH A SENIOR......It was a mistake that ended up with me becoming the butt of some pretty crude jokes one day on the bus. (Read No. 2 in the previous list)
• Confused a guy with another guy for over two months....... Even called him by the other guys name..... when I realised my mistake, I apologised, and thankfully he didn't mind too much.
• .::drumroll please::.
  OK, I can't explain this one as such, so I'll just give you the script of the conversation I had ( which is the blooper!!) with two gals, lets call them "A" and "B", in the presence of a dozen other people or so
  
  Everyone's listening to this conversation
  A: Hey Navin, You were from Peoples right?? (Peoples High School ........ my school till the 10th)
  Me: Yeah :)
  A: Do you know this teacher named XYZ??
  Me: Yeah, I know her..... She never taught me but I completely hated her
  (A dramatic pause.......everyone gasps)
  B: XYZ is my mom!!
  Me:(Oops) Sorry Sorry Sorry Sorry.......( Why can't I just keep my mouth shut??)
  
  This was followed by me trying to convince everyone that I din't mean what I'd said, and thankfully "B" was a darling and sort of understood that I didn't mean to offend anyone!!

So as you can see, I'm having a lotta fun in college and do pray that life continues like this. Next sem will probably be a little slow and uneventful as compared to this one as I have "other plans" which'll keep me pre-occupied!!


(eebd-ebde-eebd) That's All Folks!!



Comments Anyone??

Ever wish your life had a soundtrack with sound effects? Now you can! Play our 20 built-in sounds, or upload your own customized sounds and punctuate your life with awesome! For reals!

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Cool Huh??

BTW: Got My Semester Exams going on right now, so I probably won't be able to post actively for the next few weeks (Till the 15th Of December). But you can read the older posts on the blog. You could also search through the blog for topics that suit your taste.

Also, I'd take this opportunity to express my deepest sympathies for the guys and gals in Mumbai..... U guys ain't alone, its not just about Mumbai or Maharashtra but about India as a whole. Lets show those uncivilized terrorists that we won't be broken by their despicable acts.

Rock On