Travelogue: The Netherlands - Amsterdam, The Hague

For plenty of reasons, both good and bad, Amsterdam is a popular attraction for any tourist coming to Europe. For young backpackers, this city is very excited thanks to the extravagant escapades described in the EuroTrip movie. Amsterdam has attracting events in small periods around the year. The Tulip Gardens are in bloom during spring and attract a huge crowd of photographers and nature lovers. The numerous parades during the remaining part of the year attract the relevant kind of crowds. As a city, Amsterdam doesnt have grandiose architectures or cathedrals on display. So people coming here after a visit to Rome or Florence would be disappointed by the very modern architecture. Personally I found the construction in Netherlands to be very modern and quite interesting in aesthetics. Driving around the cities you will see a lot of interesting looking buildings.

The Amstel river, from which the city derives its name runs around the southern part of the city. For seeing around the city, there are plenty of options - ferries ply on the canal area showing around some major attractions of the city, if you want to bike around the city there are some cheap deals on the bike tour of the city. There is a good metro running through the city as well as buses and trams. Each to his own taste! Since we were running short on time, we took a city tour on the ferries. Along the canal you can get to see some really old buildings of the city. One interesting feature of the buildings along the canal area is that they are very narrow in width. Sometimes such narrow that the whole house is split vertically, with drawing rooms on one floor, dinning on the other and bedrooms on yet another. Also all the buildings have a huge hook hanging from the top which is used to anchor the ropes to carry any furnitures above into the floors of the building. The actual reason most of the young crowd comes to Amsterdam is altogether a different one -though not a politically correct one in many parts of the world. The colored-district lined up along the canal jumps to life as the sun goes down. A glance at the crowds there, explains the empty streets in other parts of the city!

The Hague is the proxy capital of Netherlands. With around 100 consulates and embasies the city exudes diplomacy. The International Court of Justice attracts a large number of protesters apart from tourists. The city is well connected through trams running across its stretch. The Scheveningen on the northern part of the city is a popular attraction of the city. Windsurfing and Bungee jumping are some of the activities holding the young crowd on this beach facing the Nordsee.

Travelogue: Netherlands - Eindhoven

In the second leg of my summer vacation, I had gone to Netherlands where we had a small reunion of friends from my MSc days in Germany. Our host was staying in Eindhoven, so this small city was a rendevous point for all of us who were coming from different parts of Europe. When my RyanAir flight was hovering about the Eindhoven airport before landing, it was a deja-vu of sorts to me. Each time I have travelled to any city in North Europe, I have always been welcomed by bad weather. Maybe its a coincidence, but be it Eindhoven, Dublin or London, always its rainy clouds and grey weather welcoming me! As I had jetted from a hot (40-degree something) Athens to Netherlands, this change of climate and temperature was not a very pleasant experience.

Eindhoven is one of the largest cities in the south of Netherlands and is heavily industrialised. It is overshadowed by the presence of Philips all over. As a tourist, I guess this city has nothing great to offer and I believe had it not been for our friend none of us would have been there. However, I found it to be a good place to work as the city is quite comfortable and well maintained. The initial vibes I got about the Dutch people are that they are quite friendly people and very open to foreigners. The most striking feature about the Dutch is their height. The average height is quite above average from the other Europeans. While walking in the malls or streets I was often awed by the heights of the girls and ladies, not to mention the men. The Dutch are a very healthy looking, atheletic and fit people. I later realised one of the reasons is the regular cycling they do. All over the city there are well marked cycling tracks along with the driving and pedestrian tracks. Luckily, we were visiting Netherlands during the sale period. Couldnt get the reason for the sale in almost all the stores (not a Christmas or Easter period now), but there were some great discounts and all shopping-bees would have loved to be there during this period!

Travelogue : Athens - People

If you happened to watch the movie "My Big Fat Greek Wedding", then you will know exactly what I am trying to say in the next couple of lines. The Greeks in general are not very different from the eccentric characters portrayed in that movie. The elderly Greeks are very socialising and you can always find them in groups chatting under the shades of a tree or at a cafeteria. They dont shy away from talking to foreign tourists, despite their lack of english vocabulary. I always found myself chatting to one of them at the restaurants or the train stops. Our conversations would start in English and when the threshold for English vocabulary had reached, they would switch to Greek without realising that I coulndt grasp a word (it all sounded Greek to me!). But they would make sure that you are able to follow them and their warmth would not put you off from that conversation of which you are not able to follow anything else apart from the emotions.

One interesting habit I noticed among the Greek men. Most of them always carry a string of beads in their hands and you can spot them playing around with it while at work, commuting, having a coffee or chatting with friends. I couldnt get the logic / science or legend behind this act. As I had posted before, the Greeks love their food (who wouldnt! with all those delicacies). While you walk around the Plaka, you are mobbed in a friendly manner by the waiters from the taverns, holding their menu cards and inviting you to dine at their place. Occasionally the wine/drinks are not charged along with the menu. While dinning you can sometimes listen to some pleasant Greek music played by a live band with their guitars and accordions.

The tourist crowd in European summer is as entertaining as the places you visit. A majority of the tourists are usually Americans. Some of them are families of European descent, visiting their motherlands along with their kids. But a majority of Americans are youngsters back-packing their vacation in European cities. Girls especially who love their shopping and naturally welcomed with beaming smiles in all the shopping stores. Among the younger crowds the Japenese also form a sizeable number. Usually vacationing in small groups of 4-5, the Japenese take their photographs with great zest and fervour. The Germans outnumber the other European tourists. You will usually find middle aged German couples having a quite summer urlaub in most of the places you travel. I havent seen many German youth in the tourist crowd so far.

An interesting point to be noted about Athens is the numerous stray dogs all over the streets. This is the first instance, where I noticed a sight common in sub-continental cities in a european city. The dogs are not harmful to the people, but when you are strolling around with a sandwich in hand, then for sure you are attracting unwanted attention by them. Another usual sight on the streets of Athens is the public street protests. They are as peaceful and orderly as they can be, but the size of the protesting crowd and their noise can sometimes raise an eyebrow. Walking on the streets of Athens, you would seldomly come across an unattractive lady, which is not surprising - after all this is the country of Helen of Troy. Remarkable beauty seems to be part and parcel of Greek genes.

Travelogue : Athens - Plaka, Syntagma Square etc.

Having seen the ancient part of the city on the earlier day, I decided to go to the Olympic stadiums of Athens. The old Olympic Stadium is located at the Arditos Hill on the south side of the ancient center of Athens. The new Olympic Stadium was constructed for the 2004 Olympic games and is located on the outskirts of the city. To reach the Olympic Village one has to take the Metro line 1 and get off at the Irini stop. Though the Olympic village now has a deserted look, its swimming pools and indoor stadiums are open to public use. The main stadium hosts football games and is well maintained. There are some interesting architectural designs in the campus, which are very photogenic. Unluckily, the heat and scorching sun was
unbearable for me, so I had to keep my visit there very brief.

The Flea Market in Athens is a happening place. Located close to the Monastiraki station, this is a very ancient market. Inside the lanes and bylanes, you will find numerous shops and naturally huge amount of tourists. The interesting thing about the market is that you find a series of shops selling the same stuff all lined up beside each other. Here you can find hawkers selling leather goods like Greek sandals and hand bags, jewellry, rings, stones, clothes, music cds etc etc. If you are strolling around with your girlfriend or your better-half then think twice before venturing into that zone, as it is difficult for the fairer-sex to resist the temptation of the goods on sale there.

The Plaka area also has plenty of shops selling souveniers, tourist goods, t-shirts, greek cotton clothes, jewellry, leather goods, antiques, etc. Plaka is also famous for its food stalls. There are numerous taverns and restaurants offering mouth watering Greek food. If you are the sandwich munching guy a-la Joey Trivianni, then you can lay your hands on loads of them here. For the food gourmet, then you can find many traditional greek restaurants having lavish menus filled with - mousaka, kokoretsi, paidakia, brizoles, meat balls etc. which you can have with psomis or spiced potatoes, gigandes (beans), revithia (chick peas). Greece is essentially a meat lovers paradise, but you can find a lot of grilled sea food and veggie stuff as well. Among sea food, kalamaris, sardines, tuna are just a few of the vast variety of fishes the Greek menu has on offer. The desserts are my favourite part. Baklavas and Kataifis are just irresistable to me. You can also find a wide variety of Gelatos (ice cream).

The Syntagma Square is the downtown of Athens in the right sense. Remember the "Down Town" song, I bet when Petula Clark sang those words she meant a place like Syntagma square. The place is always buzzing with people. On one end you have a bunch of youngsters zipping around on their roller blades. On the benches you would find some elderly people having a discussion among themselves. You could also notice a guy or two with their laptops, as Athens provides free WiFi in selected spots and Syntagma Square is one of them. There are a bunch of restaurants lined up on the periphery, offering sandwiches, coffees, ice creams etc. And just below the square is the Metro station, which is easily one of the biggest ones in Athens. One could never feel the time as it flies by when you are at the Syntagma Square.

Travelogue : Athens - Acropolis, Partheneon etc

If you plan to visit Athens, then make sure to book your accomodation closer to the Syntagma Square or in the Ancient Center of the city. The reason for this is that most of the important places to visit are in the vicinity, easily reachable on foot and hence you dont invest much time and money hopping from place to place.

The Temple of Olympean Zeus is located nearby the Hadrian's Arch on the Amalias Aveneu. This sanctuary is one of the most important of the ancient sanctuaries was built as a tribute to Zeus. The construction of the temple had begun in complete marble in the 4th century BC. The final completion however took place many years later by emperor Hadrian. The temple has undergone heavy deterioration by human and natural causes (storms etc). Some of its toppled columns lie still on the site.

The Acropolis or the City of heights is built on a hillock in the centroid of the ancient center of Athens. The entrance is to the west side. You first see the small Ionic temple of Athena Nike. There is the Pinakotheke which had frescoes on its walls. The most visible of the buildings on the Acropolis is the Partheneon, a temple dedicated to Athena. Its columns, walls and decorations are made up of white Pentelic marble. On the outside, the metopes were carved with the various battles between the gods and Giants, the Athenians and Amazons and the Trojan War. The Erechtheion is on the north side of the summit. Its an Ionic temple whose roof is supported by six figures of maidens, the famous Caryatids. There are many other sites in the campus like the altar of Athena, sanctuaries of Zeus and Pandion etc. On the southern side are the theater of Dionysus and the Odeum of Herodes Atticus (where concerts are held usually, the same site where Yanni had once played his concert)

The tickets to enter the Acropolis come in a booklet, which are valid for entering neighbouring sites as well. One good news is that there are discount on the prices for students and elderly people. Though the climb to the temples on the summit is tasking, you can always find bunches of tourists flocking by your side. Perhaps it was owing to the uncommonly hot weather in Greece these days, because during the climb one could feel the scorching sun burning down on you. I suggest to carry a heavy stock of water and dont forget those sun creams. At the entrance however, you can always buy a sluch of lemonade which is a good refreshment to your parched throats. If you need a guided tour of the whole place, you can hire a guide from close to the main entrance, who can enrich your experience with all the useful information and anectodes. One has to be cautious with the slippery marble in the Campus, as I observed many a unmindful tourists slipping around.

The temple of Hephaestos is situated in the Ancient Agora along with the Portico of Attalus. There is a museum in the same Agora, which has some good artifacts on display which were excavated in that area. The Roman Agora, the Library of Hadrian and the Clock of Kyristos is situated a couple of blocks away. Opposite to the Syntagma Square is the Monument of the Unknown soldier and the Greek Parliament. Infact the whole neighbourhood has a very diplomatic aura because of the numerous consulates and government offices. The National Gardens are to the south of the Parliament. The have good promenades in them, where you find a lot of families and senior citizens having an evening walk or sportsmen jogging around. Enjoying the cool evening breeze listening to the chirping of the various birds in the gardens can be very soothing after a stressful day. Further south is the building of the Zappio - which has a congressional hall and hosts exhibitions frequently.

Travelogue : Athens - Arrival

Whenever I enter a new city, I tend to grasp the vibes of the city in the initial experiences I face. When I landed at Athens, I noticed a feeling of warmth and homeliness. Maybeit was due to the Greeks who are very similar in their social manners to the Indians or maybe its the hot Greek weather which reminded me of the hot Indian summers. The other thing I notice while travelling to places is the distinctive color thats reflected from the public places. For instance, when I was in Dublin, one could sense the ominous green color (the Irish have a shade of green, in all their national icons) present everywhere. Similarly, within a few minutes at Athens and I could sense the ominous Navy Blue Greek color in almost everything - from Train stations to notice boards, to Airport Sign Boards etc. Well, the other major concern I had while coming to Athens was the directions to my hotel, where I had booked my accomodation. In normal circumstances, one would check out the Google Maps for the city map of Athens, search out the street and mark out the directions from the airport or the city center. But in this case, if you check out the Google Maps for Athens, you will be surprised to see everything in Greek! Agreed localisation of your product means to present the maps of Greece in Greek - I am sure the Greeks love to see that. But what about those tourists, who are visiting Athens and are in need of a map for directions, you cant expect them to read and understand Greek! A small option of viewing the Greece Map in English would make matters simple for the numerous tourists who could use the Google Maps for finding their way on the streets of Greek cities. Well the engineers in Google must have a reason for keeping it that way, but imagine if I plan to visit Beijing, then I would have to learn Chinese first in order to use the Maps from Google!

The Airport is situated on the outskirts of the Athens City and is well connected through Bus Service, Sub-urban Trains, Metro and taxis. A ticket on the Metro costs about 6 euro something to travel to downtown, while the taxis take about 20-25 euros. Through the Metro it takes about an hour to reach the central stops. The Athens Metro is well maintained and the stations are all beautifully constructed with a great sense of aesthetics. It was around 3 years ago that the Olympics were held here and looks like all the investment the city had put in its infrastructure, is well maintained. My hotel was somewhere close to the Syntagma Square. On reaching that square the first thing I did was to buy a street map with English transliteration of the street names. To able to understand Greek is a great thing for a foreig tourist, but to be able to read is an important thing. After getting my map, it did not take me much time to figure out my way and reached the hotel easily. Since I was too tired from the trevours of the day in Corfu, I could hardly muster the strength to go out for a dinner. I dropped to sleep like a log, hoping to revitilise myself for the next day.

Travelogue : Corfu final day

My flight to Athens was late in the afternoon, so I had couple of hours to walk around Corfu. If you are planning for a holiday in Corfu, then I suggest its best to navigate around the island in a vehicle. There are plenty of options available. One can easily rent a car, a motorbike, bicycles etc - depending on your tastes, preferences and age. Be prepared to travel a lot once you are here, because the good places to see are all stretched far across the island. The beaches for example are all spread around the coast. Interestingly all the sandy beaches are on the west coast while the pebbled beaches are on the east coast. A good prior planning and a vehicle at your disposal - then you are sure to have great fun while you are here. Not to forget the public transport, which costs almost peanuts, is sparsely operational but connects the major attractions pretty well. I managed to visit a beach and take a stroll along the New Fortress which is closer to the port of Corfu. Along the coast you can find several beautiful spots, which are occupied by a couple or two (sometimes with their children) - having the small beach and the entire sea to themselves. The other interesting observation I noticed was, among the tourist crowd, a majority of them were to the middle-aged or higher group. Maybe it was specific to the places I was strolling along. The crowd was evenly distributed, a vast majority of them were Greeks, then Germans and Italians. And as is natural, Corfu is well connected to major cities in Germany through German Wings and Air Berlin and it is well connected to major ports in Italy through a large number of Ferries commuting between them. Talking about the Corfu Airport, it seems to be in its most busy period of operation during summer. I could notice a flight landing or taking off every 10 minutes, indicating that the island atracts a large number of summer tourists (or maybe this anamoly was due to the weekend period). At the various places along the island you can see all the usefull information written in Greek, English, German and Italian - indicating the demographics of the tourist crowd the island hosts each year. There are plenty of Italian restaurants all around, howevere I did notice some Mexican and Chinese as well. The south Italian city of Bari is pretty close to Corfu and hence many of the Italian tourists come along with their cars, motorinos in the ferries. I also noticed a car with number plate from Berlin - that guy must be having one hell of a vacation going around Europe. During the day I felt immensely dehydrated and to supplement that I had to intake loads and loads of water. I never recollect having conciously drinking so much water before. In such a heat a tasty Greek salad with olives, tomatoes and feta cheese is the best refreshment for ones body.

My flight to Athens was late in the afternoon, and surprisingly got delayed only by 15 mins. I bade farewell to this beautiful island with the hope of returning back sometime again.

Travelogue : Corfu - Days 2 & 3

The Workshop was being held at the Holiday Corfu Hotel, which easily one of the best hotels in Corfu. The schedule was from morning 10-ish till late afternoon 5-ish. My talk was scheduled on the first day post lunch session. After the days proceedings completed, all of us headed to the beach close to the Hotel - some for swimming, some for sun-bathing, while some like me for photography. The organisers had held a dinner that day for us, so we had to re-convene around 8 at the dinning hall. Apart from the locales and the beaches, the other thing which is amazing about Corfu is the food. I guess its the same about the Greek food all over Greece, but since this was my first experience, my taste buds were enjoying all the exotic Greek dishes - grilled fish, roasted potatoes garnished with spices, olives, the various salads, desserts especially Baklava - its a food gourmets' paradise. Social dinners like these always tend to go late into the night. We had a good group on our table, discussing all types of stuff, sitting in the lobby of the hotel facing the Ionion Sea under the cool moonlight of a full moon. Then all of a sudden we felt the whole lobby sway for a few seconds and our perplexed looks were answered by the Hotel staff that its a mild tremor of an earthquake. Later in the night I had felt another such tremor in my hotel room as well. I dont know how normal it is for people in Corfu, but for me atleast earthquakes give a feeling of goosebumps. Well after all the topics in our minds were discussed we retired to our rooms.

The second day of the workshop was also too busy. After it concluded, we had not much time left to go to the beach we all were planning to go. Since most of us were flying out the next day, we all had plans of our own to utilize the evening in the best possible way. I was interested in taking the snaps of the famous monastry in the moonlight of the full moon. I collected my lenses and ventured out alone on the part of the town I didnt intend to visit the other day. I started to walk along the coast with the hope of coming across some photogenic beach or enclove. And I luckily found a small patch of pebbles and sand literally cut off from the road and hidden behind some large bushes. I spent some good amount of time there sitting all alone looking out at the sea. It was a great place to be - either all alone with yourself, or with someone you loved the most. The only noise one could hear there was the gently splash of the water on the pebbles. I love places like these - they present you moments of absolute calmness and serenity. On my walk back, I had some roasted Salmons with fried potatoes and bread. The night was a full moon night and the moon was a complete golden yellow rising above the sea. I have managed to click some snaps, which I would filter out and upload them on my Flickr gallery.

I have another complete day to spend in Corfu tomorrow before I leave for Athens. I plan to go to the Barbati beach and its neighbouring locales. Lets see how the plans finally end up in effect. So untill the next log of activities, I am signing out.

Travelogue : Corfu - Arrival

I landed in Corfu last evening to attend a workshop on Personalization in Digital Libraries. Corfu is an island in the north of Greece, in the vicinity of Albania and popular attraction among tourists who love the Mediterranean sea. If you are planning for a good vacation along with your family or your loved one and hoping to have lots of sun and sand then Corfu is the must-go for you. The island has some exotic beaches - sandy, rocky, pebbled - all kinds, with clear waters which are as pristine as they can be. I could'nt find a direct flight to the island from mainland Italy, so had to take a transit from Venice-Athens-Corfu. I hadnt flown out of Italian airports so far, so when I arrived at the Marco Polo International Airport at Venice, the chaos was quite out-of-normal for me. There was no information displayed about the check-in counters for our flight to Athens. And when we finally checked in our baggages and waited at the boarding gate to depart, we had to wait for an agonizing hour for the flight attendants to show up. On asking we were informed that the flight was delayed. The least they could have done was inform the passengers about it, rather than leaving them high and dry with no clue about whats going on.

I have had some bizarre experiences before in my life, but this one was out of the blue. My fellow passenger, sitting beside me was also traveling to Corfu to attend the same workshop. We were both pleasantly surprised. I mean what are the odds to meet someone like that. So we had both found good company, rather than having a boring flight. Athens Airport is quite good, but the first thing I noticed on landing in Athens was the immense heat there. Thankfully we were inside the airport and had to change our flight to Corfu. To our ill luck the flight to Corfu was also delayed. Luckily we both had enough things to talk about to keep ourselves occupied.

When we were airborne we learnt the reason for the delay was due to a fire in the woods on the outskirts of Athens. The flight to Corfu is small and sweet. The island looks great from the flight above. After checking in my hotel, I couldnt spend much time walking around the city, as I was having some body pains (owing to the tasking 8-hour climb on the Monte Bondone in Trento, I had done a day before). So I had some quick dinner in an Italian restaurant and went to bed early on a dose of pain killers. I saw some good restaurants along the coast close a historical monument. I hope to see around parts of Corfu in the evenings after the workshop proceedings close and am looking forward to capturing the beauty of the island on my lens.

A theory behind LOST

This one is for those of you who are passionate LOSTies. There have been numerous forums, discussion pools and conspiracy theorists trying to explain the logic and philosophy behind the concept of this show. Today I stumpled upon this good article explaining one possible theory behind the events of that fabulous island. We cant be sure, if its the exact thing running in the minds of the creators of the show, but in the absence of any refutations, we might as well agree with this line of thought. So, all those LOSTies amongst you, check out this good attempt to put together the events of the island from a different perspective.

Travelogue : Dublin

Last week I was in Dublin for a brief period on some official work. My first impression of the city was quite good. The day I landed there was a typical Irish grey weather with lots of clouds and heavy gusts of wind blowing. I found the people to be very fun-loving and jovial sort. The city as such is not that crowded, even though its a capital city, it has an ambience of a laid-back peaceful town, without any hustle-bustle. Weather wise I found it too windy, or maybe its because the most northern city I have been to I found it a bit cold for a european summer. As a photographer, I was not very much excited with the city architecture. The Irish landscapes are renowned, but the urban side of the city was not very photogenic. Food wise, there are plenty of restaurants to dine in and around the Grafton Street, Dame Street and along the Quays - predominantly Italian but there are quite a number of restaurants which serve Continental and Asian food as well. Well, ofcourse you have the traditional Irish pubs and kiosks where you could munch on some fish-n-chips or have a shot of Irish beer. Ireland is home to the Guinness brand and you see its prominence all around the city pubs. For shoppers in Dublin the major attraction is the St. Stephens Green Shopping Centre. There are plenty of shops on the Grafton Street and the O'Connell Street as well. Though my stay was for a very brief period, I very much liked the people and the general ambience in Dublin and I am looking forward to occassion when I could get a chance to see the beauty of the Irish landscapes. I have uploaded some of snaps on my Flickr page.

LOST ..... and Found ?

In a 2 hour finale, the third season of Lost ends with an interesting twist in the tale (as has always been the case in the earlier seasons). For the first time in the series we see flashforwards in parallel to the story happening on the island. We are shown events from Jack's life, which at the end of the episode give a hint that Jack and Kate have been rescued from the island, while the fate of the other survivors is not clear.

In the climax its revealed that Naomi is not a part of any rescue team. If she is not sent by Penny, then how does she have the snap of Desmond and Penny. The series did not reveal much of how she had got that photograph. There could be one theory that maybe her group had been sent by Penny's father when they realise that Desmond is alive and Penny who is searching for him, can actually locate him. Maybe this team was sent to find Desmond and execute him before he is found by Penny. Well if thats the case then Naomi had plenty of time on the island to carry out this task before getting back to her boat. This plot could only be revealed in the coming season.

We are not sure if Charlie actually drowns or whether Desmond saves him yet again from the flooded station. And what had transpired between the survivors and Ben, when the Naomi's people come to the island. Is everyone rescued or are some people left behind. From the communication between Jack and Kate, it shows that Jack had done something which he regrets doing. There are several open questions left unanswered. There was no hint about the identity of the dead person in the funeral. Obviously it was someone both Jack and Kate knew and someone whom Kate detested. There are hints that Jack's father is still alive, then how does one explain the coffin he was carrying from Sydney in the pilot episode of the 1st season. On the island, the coffin is shown empty with no justification of the missing body. Kate is supposedly living/involved with someone whom she has to return at the end of the episode. We are not informed his identity either. Obviously the love between Jack and Kate seems to have been missing when they meet at the end of the episode. The details of the rescue would clear all these doubts and for that we need to wait till the next season.

There was an announcement that Lost could run uptill 6 seasons, which means the scriptwriters look in no mood to end the mystery surrounding the island. Lets wait and see till the next season, to find out what happened to the survivors.

Hike in the Dolomite woods

A weekend before along with some of my colleagues at work we had gone for a hike in the woods of Madonna di Campiglio. Its about 70 km from Trento and has some beautiful waterfalls. The stream of Sarca runs through the forests and creates the gorgeous Nardis Waterfall, which is an imposing 120 meters high at a gradient of about 60 degrees. These woods are reachable from the small town of Carisolo and are located in the beautiful Val di Genova, in the vicinity of the Adamello-Brenta Nature Park. As you drive through from Trento to Carisolo, you come across numerous cliffs and ridges which are a ideal location for rock climbers.

A lonely walk through the woods, made us feel stranded like Jack, Sawyer, Kate et al. Though I am not an avid climber like some of my friends here, I tried my hand on some easier tracks that day.

Yahoo flips Photos for Flickr

Yahoo has decided that it will do away with Yahoo! Photos in favor of Flickr. It has announced that the transition will occur by the fall this year. The erstwhile users will be directed to other sites like PhotoBucket, Snapfish, Kodak Gallery etc. Yahoo claims that the transition will be smooth with a 'single-click' operation and will occur in a time frame of 3 months. This decision vindicates the rise in Flickr's popularity over the last year. further reading ...

iGoogle - Personalized Homepage from Google launched

Google in an attempt to re-invent its homepage has launched the personalized version titled as iGoogle. This one is similar to MyYahoo (the personalized homepage offered by Yahoo!) who is currently the leader of customizable Ajax-based homepages, in terms of user base. With iGoogle, its users can integrate a large number of Google services, content tabs from RSS feeds etc onto their homepage. Google can also recommend interesting items to you, based on your user behaviour it learns from the past queries made, results viewed etc. Google has also expanded its Web History tool, where it can keep track of much more information of your web activity and not just the search history. Although users might find it irksome and invasion of privacy when they notice the amount of information Google knows about them, however there are options where the user can remove any of their personal information and constrain the logging of the history data. The other good part of the new homepage is that users can now embed their self-made gadgets (similar to Yahoo! Widgets). The users can design their own gadgets by simple tasks like form-filling and file uploads without much coding know-how.

With this, Google wants to take the personalization of its search engine to the next level, by discarding the notion of "one size fits all" and contextualising their results to the user's needs by considering the geographic location of the user (specified by the user in his/her Google profile). At the moment, Google is offering this personalized homepage service to about 40 countries and 26 languages.

This kind of implementation is termed as a push-based recommender service, where the system is pushing or enforcing certain kind of results onto the user, as opposed to the pull-based recommender service, where the user requests for results. A push-based system may not always work optimally. For instance, an English-speaking person living in Italy will have his homepage interface and the displayed content heavily influenced by the regional considerations. An example would be the Google News feeds, which would by default display him news from Italian newspapers, unless the user explicitly selects otherwise. The same argument can be applied to the result ranking in their personalized search, which gives a higher weightage to the previously viewed results and typecasting the information need of the user, which may not remain static over a period of time.

There is a visible bug in iGoogle at the moment, because in my case I was already using the personalized homepage of Google. After this switch to iGoogle, I found much of my personalized content missing and being replaced by regional stuff. I used to have RSS feeds from some sites which I had found interesting, but to my shock I found them to be replaced by some regional content being extracted from Italian sites. I hope Google fixes this one soon and I get to view my favoured content soon. This glitch also raises the issue, of how dependent a web user can become on Google. How much we rely on it for our day-to-day web activity and any minor blip on Google's behalf effects the web usage of an ordinary user.

ICC World Cup - The Comedy of Errors ends

The curtains finally came down on a farcically organised and ridiculously managed World Cup. For the past 45-plus days, there was a lot of talk of how ICC mishandled the tournament. The final match was a sublime example of how worse it can be. Keeping aside the cricket played by the two teams, the chaos created by the delayed start when the crowds were anxious if they would get to see any cricket or not, all the permutations and combinations were being discussed of how the match could proceed given the rainy conditions and when finally the match did get underway, the closing stages were even more farcical. If this is how the ICC wants to increase the popularity of the game, then they are seriously mistaken. There is a fundamental truth in science, keep it short and simple, that way people understand and embrace it better. Any person who is not from a cricket playing nation, could have not understood what the chaos was all about. A moment he watched a team celebrate, moments later he notices them come back to the ground and continue the game, there is no explanation to this situational comedy of errors. The rules are spoiling the fun of the game. I mean why cant we have a simple 50 over match, for heaven's sake, this is the World Cup, we should get to watch a complete game, if not now then whats the fun in the event. We never see a match cut short due to bad weather in any of the other sports (not to mention the much criticised Duckworth-Lewis rule and its pathetic implementations). We never heard of a Football match reduced to 60 minutes, a tennis match being reduced to 2 sets, or (even more imaginative) a 100 meter dash cut short, due to bad weather. All this happens only in Cricket, thanks to the money minded organisers of the game - the ICC, who is filled with people, most of whom have never played the game themselves and who only know how to cash in on the support of the fan following.

Lets talk about the good part of the World Cup - Cricket. Austrailia have proven their ability in all conditions and against all teams. Winning 29 games on the trot spread across 3 editions of the tournament is plainly phenomenal. This Austrailian team has demonstrated, what perfectionism, professionalism and sheer hardwork is all about. Ricky Ponting, who in my opinion is undoubtedly the best captain, has never got it wrong so far. We hear the talk of teams having those nervous moments in the big games, a world cup final for example, we see players doing it all wrong on the big day, succumbing to the pressure and then we see this current Austrailian team who delivers one superlative performance after another in the big matches. Stage-fright, is a word which doesnt seem to exist in the Austrailian Cricket dictionary. This World Cup final was probably the last outing for many players. Most of them got it right and signed out with their heads held high. Mc Grath, though couldnt boast of an amazing spell did manage to get a wicket. Jayasuriya, got a 50 at more than run-a-ball. Gilchrist, who could have probably played his last World Cup innings, scored a century in a typically aggressive manner that has made him one of the best wicketkeeper-batsmen of the game. And yes he took a great catch to grant his old team mate McGrath a wicket in the latters penultimate delivery. In the end it was a well and truly deserved Austrailia who were crowned the World Champions and if they continue their game, they could surely repeat the act 4 years from now. Sri Lanka were the deserving runners-up. They displayed good cricket over the past few weeks, albeit the final hiccup (which is not surprising, considering who their opponents were), they were a strong team throughout the tournament. Much more was expected from New Zealand and South Africa, but both failed to impress in the important semi-final games. New Zealand has made record appearances in the semi-final games so far. Its a pity they have never progressed any further. South Africa, seem to be sticking loyally to their tag of "chokers". The other teams were as un noticeable as a pebble on a rocky beach.

There was a lot of talk of crowds not turning up for the matches. A major reason cited was the early exit of India and Pakistan. For the next World Cup to be held in the sub-continent, I guess the ICC will now chalk up a plan such that they ensure India go through to the second round or even enter the semi-finals through the back door, only to bring in the crowds and the money from the sponsors! With such a great fan following and hero worshiping, the cricket lovers in India deserve an Indian team which is atleast half the strength of the current Austrailian team and not the bunch of pot-bellied non-performers who are gracing the national colors at the moment. Sachin Tendulkar has a huge popularity and is reverred as a god by many of his crazy fans in India. Agreed he was a genius in his prime days, but whats the use of those godly powers, when he could not win the World Cup atleast once in his 18 years of game, when mere mortals like Ricky Ponting have done it 3 times and each time with absolute authority.

Finally we bid farewell to the Carribean spirit which made an otherwise mis-managed World Cup, a lively affair. Even after a month, we dont know the truth behind the cruel murder of Bob Woolmer, the seriousness of the crime seems to have vanished from the public memory. This tournament had its moments, the vast number of player retirements, players being sacked, the minnows slaying the giant teams, the close finishes and tied matches, the six-ball-sixes of Herschelle Gibbs, the 4-in-4 wicket havoc of Malinga, the genius of Muralitharan, the sublime hitting of Matthew Hayden, the drinking fiascos of the Pommies, the rise of the Bangladeshi cricket and above all the continuing authority of Ricky Ponting and his band of professionals. When we reassemble in the sub-continent 4 years from now, I pray that atleast one team can stand up to challenge the Aussies.

an Ode to the beauty of Spring

I love the spring season when nature's beauty is spread all across in its vast abundance. The innumerable flowers you see in the fields, gardens, parks etc. remind you how beautiful our world can be. Personally I love this period of the year to take all kinds of beautiful shots of flowers. I shall be uploading them regularly on my Flickr page. Feel free to comment and criticize them.

IBM OmniFind Yahoo! Edition

It is an open source software solution, that enables you to search both enterprise intranet and Internet from a single interface. Its built over Lucene Apache technology supporting the enterprise features of IBM. An active forum is dedicated for discussing its features. To try it or to learn more about it check out this site

Creating your own Search Engine !

Google offers a nice tool to play around and build your own specialized Search Engine. Exciting ? .... maybe you could check out for yourself. It is actually a service that helps you in designing a search engine dedicated to certain domains or searching for only some type of information. In other words, it asks you to feed some extra information that is interpreted as constraints by Google Search Engine and it filters its results / refines its queries according to them. To know more about it you could check out this blog dedicated to it.

I tried my hand at it, to design an engine to search for BibTex Files. Its not optimised yet, still playing around with some of its options. Alternately, you could desing your own specialised search engine for any specific kinds of data, using some of the open source softwares available (Nutch, Heritrix appended with Lucene indexers)

ICC Cricket World Cup round up

Oh what a week it was. This world cup is turning out to be the most memorable ones in the history of the game. We lost one of the genuine cricketers, with the demise of Bob Woolmer. I had predicted some dramatic events after Pakistan lost to Ireland, but an outcome like this was the most tragic one. The whole episode of Bob's death has raised several questions, regarding how the game is being run by its authorities and the motives of the ICC. The investigators from Jamaica have sensed some foul play in his death. I hope the actual truth comes out and the perpetrators who have done this heinous crime are brought to justice, without the whole matter being dusted under the carpet.

The world cup was a mixture of emotions for the sub-continent teams. While the promising Sri Lankans and the vibrant Bangladeshis proceeded to super-8, the most prolific teams - India and Pakistan disappointed us. The hopes of a billion people were squashed, when India crashed out of the world cup. The men in blue had a bad outing with Bangladesh, but they broke numerable records when they played with Bermuda. Unfortunately, they could not carry the form into the all-important match against Sri Lanka. Chasing down a score of 254 must have been easy for a batting line up consisting of 3 batsmen who appear among the top scorers of one day cricket, but a focused bowling from Vaas and the magic of Murali proved to be the Waterloo of the much hyped Vision-2007 plan of Mr. Chappell. Apart from Sehwag and Dravid other batsmen did not bother the score keepers. Sachin Tendulkar, is worshipped by many as the best batsman in the world, but I personally rate him below par compared to seasoned players like Steve Waugh, Ricky Ponting, Brian Lara and Inzamam. No matter he has scores of records to his name, but in do-or-die matches, where he is expected to stand and deliver, he disappoints most of the time. There was a time when he single handedly won matches for India, but now he resembles an old horse who is well beyond his use-by date. Apart from that single innings against minnows Bermuda, he could not create any magic in what was probably his last world cup. The thought of being bowled for a golden duck, in what could have been his last one day innings, will surely be haunting him for a long while. Well, the less written about the nondescript performances of the Indian team the better.

Australia and South Africa showed how enjoyable cricket can be. The Aussies have been delivering score of 300+ continuously for a while and now they seem to have learnt how to defend them as well. Now, that the teams for the super-8 round have been decided, we can look forward to some interesting matches. Looking at the performances in the past 2 weeks, I guess, it would be Australia, South Africa, Sri Lanka and New Zealand that could make it to the semifinals. After viewing results of the initial matches, we can hope for some more dramatic and high scoring matches in this batsman-friendly world cup.