quest for the heartstone

cry freedom

2011-12-21T23:02:00.000-08:00

god is finally dead, man is finally free!

there was a time before time, when man roamed free, enlightened one might call it... and then he invented god! a good invention, for it could now be "the uncaused cause", the "uncreated creator", the "reason" behind all that one did not understand... for enlightenment was a state of being, not of understanding...

why invent a god at all? simple really, a perceived higher power was needed to control the other men!

i shared with my fraternity the other day that space and time are curved, and the bain of all laughter was upon me... surely he jests said one, surely the space in his head is curved said another... however, when i quoted that it was einstein that had said that, there was doubt in their minds, and colluding with another friend who claimed the same as me, who subsequently backed me that other prominent scientists had also said that and i was merely quoting einstein, their doubt started to turn to belief... it wasn't going to be long before a few well placed quotes, articles, and other material gave them belief and me credibility...

of course, the fact that it was all staged, and they were completely manipulated was lost in the noise...

well, we live in times where scientists play games in silo's or small teams, always looking to better the other - such are these beautiful times, that they bring about a level of objectivity as no global brotherhood is formed, and science being grounded in repeatable empirical proof requirements, continues to better itself all the time...

not so for spirituality and religion... for man to control man, a god had to be created, something superior... and early on, the creator of god called themselves priests and gave themselves exclusivity on the channel of communication with him... furthermore, because god was a "superior" entity, he could not be rationalised, questioned or commanded...

so went the ages, and due to the mystical irrational nature of god, the cult of the priest became all powerful, and control was their fruit, control over the rest of the species...

over time, they started believing their own lie, and as time progressed, myths became known as facts and so god became real, and even a thing for the priesthood to achieve themselves...

some countries took a step further and created casts, with the priests being at the top of the pyramid of course, so that much like the lure of any pyramid scheme, they could give the perception of privilege and control to those that could have questioned... and so, they shut them up with little power, sufficient enough for them to have something that they did not want to lose, and so went the ages...

until that is, one day, a boy woke up and said that the emperor did not have any clothes on... people rubbed their eyes, not wanting to believe, but it was undeniable... the people in their desperation put on glasses, still murmuring to others that the boy was wrong, after all, he was one of many, and everyone else could surely see the emperors fine dress, why, had not many a poet praised it in immortal song...

the voice was drowned out... however, there was another boy who had heard it, and another... and a whisper had started... the "game of life" had begun... with the seeders in a few areas... some were quashed, but others lived on... and as any virus does, the truth had started to permeate deeper and deeper, time passes and the truth of the boy is morphed, but a strand of it remains... enough, enough to have madmen shout it from the hilltops, enough for some more to even live by it...

the masses however, were addicted, addicted to the disease that now "needed" that something greater, something that could change their fortunes instantly, some called it lies, damned lies and statistics, while others called it god!

that little boy lives though, one of many who saw what he saw, and he lives in freedom, for his god is finally dead, and i am finally free...

the motif of existence

2011-04-16T04:43:00.001-07:00

in the living room, with the candlestick holder, for profit!

a reason not needed, any tool unnecessary, and no motive - freedom, just total freedom

belief without purpose
action without motive
result without desire

let it flow! :)

void and the search for meaning...

2011-02-08T23:58:00.000-08:00

any reaction, given enough time, will come to a state of equilibrium...

we expand our knowledge exponentially because we are good inference engines... we are relatively good pattern detectors, and intuitively know when things are out of place...

how does one stay here though, in this exceptionally comforting equilibrium of predictability and mediocrity... well, one brings meaning to why things are the way they are... the karma theory of course is the biggest proponent of that thought...

the sage's we know of were smart, but not enlightened... for their names live on but their philosophies have become mere rituals...

it is not unusual to hear the desperate throws of a dying desire to find meaning and stay relevant proclaim - we pour the sacred ganges water towards the sun, because "even science" now says, that light filters through the water we pour, and when that light falls on our bodies, it is good for our skin... of course, some still hold that it purifies the soul as well, but in an attempt to stay relevant, you here many hands go up on the "scientific justification", with additional proclamations stating - "see, even science now finally agrees what we have known all along on what is good for you"...

relevance by association, further claims are made, that it does purify the soul, and like lambs to the slaughter, the masses walk right into the trap...

we are so desperate for reasons... that the victim in us believes that it was all for the good, lessons we had to learn... the aspirationalist in us believes that our good intentions and actions will ensure that karma will turn around and reward us... we need meaning... we are desperate for it... for that is the mediocre comfort zone we are in...

the past my friend, along with the future, belongs to only those that live in the present, with conscious ignorance of all else...

there is no god, there is no devil, there is no me... there isn't even a "there is"!

with your infrencing capabilities, romanticise the past, fantasize about the future (and make it interesting please, or be a run of the mill... in the future i will have a bigger car if that tickles your fancy!!!!!), in the present, borrow a spark, but light your own fire...

that's just the way i am

2010-04-28T11:06:00.000-07:00

"that's just the way i am!"

how many times have we heard those words? are they an exclamation of the passion we live by, or an excuse we make!

the answer my friend, is not known to me... but i often think, should we be asking ourselves, "is that they way i want to be?"

a person who is straightforward but rude, might often use the "that's just the way i am, i say things on people's faces" excuse... but would it not be more appropriate to change and be honest but not hurtful? surely it would... surely in that case, the "that's just the way i am" statement is an excuse not to change and a coverup of ones fallacies... for "is that the way i want to be" in those scenarios would make us change... change takes effort, takes us out of our comfort zone, but is there an alternative to growth that does not involve change?

10,000 kilometers away, but words apart

2010-03-23T05:58:00.001-07:00

the earth exists under some very specific conditions, conditions that when seen on the scale of infinity, are infinitesimally small! as humans we are frail... we need a body temperature of 37.4degrees celcius... a 15-20% variance and we are most likely looking up from six feet under!

two arms, two legs, two eyes, one nose, and a number of other things are virtually identical (in structure and concept) amongst most of us... (sure there's the occasional variant that we try to beat back into the "norm", but even those are relatively minimal variants in the scope of the universe and eternity).

we are predictable... our variances there as well, are few and far between... we are an emotional people, some thinkers and doers and some feelers.

our reactions can be predicted almost to the tee, virtually internationally, road rage is road rage, love is love and friendships are friendships.

within those guidelines though, if you look deep enough, there is a world of a difference... much like a river one meter wide is naught but a stream to jump over for us, to an ant it is the sea that must be ingeniously crossed!

much the same, from a universal level, the same we are... but from within the system, the differences are quite apparent!

i sit here, in sydney, 10,000km's from the subcontinent india (where i was two days ago, and where i will be again soon), and i see a lovely people... a people i relate to... a people that are mostly calm, carefree, natural and honest... after all, i was here for 23years (until recently, and it will no doubt be home again some day), and consider this home to quite an extent - probably because i can relate... relate to the thinking pattern, the responses, the understanding i feel i have of this system... its like riding a bike, after a while, you can anticipate the balance for the turn...

india having been home for a little while now, is also getting to that stage... its different, its flexible, its colourful, its what you might call - full of potential with somewhat lesser kinetic energy :) but it is different...

the challenges of people in india, are not the challenges of people in australia... in india, the need of t he common man to find a days hard work is much more desperate, for food shall not be on the table for the family on the day the work is not found... in australia, the need for efficiency creates a conformity (partially through understanding, partially through fear of fines and prosecution) that is virtually the opposite of the flexibility that exists in india (albeit, in australia, things are thousands of percent more efficient).

being in the two varied systems, means that the mindset of the people are vastly different... are either of them better... i think not... i consider myself fortunate that i get to experience and love both...

a brief history of fear

2010-03-17T02:07:00.000-07:00

there were once three monkeys in a cage (lets call them Orig1, Orig2 and Orig3)... in the cage also, were yummy bananas in the corner... however, whenever any monkey went to get a banana, all the monkeys ere sprayed with water from the firehose, and that was not a pleasant thing indeed... so much so, that after a few tries, it deterred the monkey's from trying to get any bananas.

Now, monkey Orig1 was taken out of the cage, and monkey New1 was put in... New1 of course, did not know the history of the situation... whenever he went to get a banana, monkey Orig2 and Orig3 would fight with him and pull him back for fear of all 3 of them being sprayed with water...

Time passed... the firehose was removed... and the rules changed... the monkey's were not under any threat of being sprayed with water now... but they of course did not know that...

Now, monkey Orig2 was out, and monkey New2 in... when New2 went to get a banana (not knowing the history of course), both Orig3 and New1 fought with him... Orig3 because he anticipated the water spray, and New1, because that is what you do when someone goes to get bananas. New2 learned the rules quickly.

Now as it happened, Orig3 was taken out of the cage, and New3 put in... and lo and behold, when New3 went to get bananas, New1 and New2 fought with him and stopped him...

Now, in the cage, we had New1, New2 and New3, none of whom had experienced the water spray... they only thought that what you had to do when someone goes to get bananas, is stop them! Generations changed, but the fear did not... not until a rebel came 10 generations later, did the theory get tested again, and it was found at much cost to the rebel (cost of fights and scratches and broken bones) that it was perfectly safe to get the bananas and enjoy them.

How many fears do we carry from generation to generation, from past to present (even within our lifetimes, sometimes, even within the same day!) that should get challenged! Are we the rebel or a sheep in monkey's clothing?

Be the rebel, question... for without it, ...

holy cow!

2010-03-17T01:58:00.000-07:00

once upon a time, a farmer and his son lived in the countryside and had a cow that they looked after and that looked after them.

the cow however, got thoughts of freedom, no longer did it want to be milked, it wanted adventure... it decided that it would go on a trip...

but lo and behold, how would it... for daily, at the end of the day, the farmers son would come and tie the cow to a pole...

the cow got used to the fact that it was tied down daily... and the thoughts of adventure remained memories... but memories still alive...

one day, the rope that the cow was usually tied with, was nowhere to be found... the farmer's son was nervous, as he knew that the cow wanted to run away... he asked his father for advice... his father being an old hand it it, knew just what to do... said he: "go forth my son, and pretend you are tying the cow just like you do daily, do not miss any step"... and so that is just what the son did...

come morning, the cow was still there... still full of thoughts of adventure and escape... but in the believe it could not go as it was tied down!

the moral of the story being, we are not tied down... but constantly are told and believe that we are... we make our own beds, we cut our own paths... but seldom know or acknowledge the fact at more than just a superficial level...

follow your head and your heart... you have a choice! most importantly, understand what rope we think we are tied with - its the ropes of "society norms" and communal beliefs and superstitions... break free of them today, and lead a fuller life! lead your own life!

hacking and the art of creating a puncture

2010-02-22T17:58:00.000-08:00

It was many summers ago, in university, learning about computers, a curious mind, and some intelligent friends, a journey was embarked... a journey that was to lead to roads forbidden. Go not there said "norm", for therein lies a life of danger, perhaps moral bankruptcy and perhaps even physical restraint. The adventure called though, and born i was not to follow the road well tread.

curiosity often led to the downloading of useful software.. no apt-get, no yum, it was tarballs and xmkmf/make and c compilers all the way - after all, it was the year 1993...

installing stuff in my bin directory, and having so many useful tools at hand, and a tendency to share, i chmod'ed bin and all therein to 751.

community was the order of the day... and a communal bunch of us, that frequently installed helpful software for all put each other bins directory in our paths...

learning was the order of the day (as it remains today), and as the word learning depicts, it acknowledges that we do not know all... so a lack of security consciousness coupled with the need to have quicker locate times (IO was much slower back in the day!), a few of us set our paths as so:

export PATH=.:/home/friend/bin:${PATH}

now, to the glassless eye, it might look innocent enough, but you can be sure, frought with danger it was.

a system administrator at the site set his PATH as above to my bin... i had tools like xv, xterm (as a script with some good defaults such as -fn 9x15 -bg cyan3 (or "peach puff") -bg black), zsh, xboing, xkey, ctwm and some imagemagick tools and various other binaries and scripts in my bin directory...

it occured to me one day, that if when the admin typed "xterm" it was my script that ran and not /usr/bin/X11/xterm (even though, that was the resultant file called from my script), what if i emulated other commands... the implications were obvious... after all, the file "xterm" in my bin directory was in essence a "trojan"! a harmless wrapper, but a trojan none-the-less.

what if, just what if i created a binary called "su" and did not do a passthrough to /bin/su, but rather prompted with a "Password: " pormpt and captured the password... of course, i could pass the captured password to the real /bin/su program them and the admin would be none-the-wiser. I had trouble doing the passthrough, but managed to capture the password, and returned with a "su: Authentication failure" message. The binary removed itself after the first run, so upon the admin thinking they had made a typo in the password, when they did a "su" again, the version that ran was /bin/su and everything worked fine.

The above was particular handy, as the admin's had a habit of doing a "secure keyboard" (right click on xterm and select "secure keyboard") before entering any password... this made it impossible to sniff the password off their X interface using xkey.

Once i had the root password, it was game over... or was it? The root password was routinely changed as a security measure, and i wanted longevity in my access, and leaving a terminal open forever was not an option... besides a "who" would have given me away relatively easily... and running a persistent process too, would have been detected with some curiosity by the admin and with very little pain.

what i had noticed that was special about the real "su" binary (and some other binaries on the system) was that they had their permissions so:

-rwsr-xr-x 1 root root 31124 2009-07-31 19:25 /bin/su

now, i knew what rwx was, but what was this "s" in place of the "x"?

remember those intelligent friends i mentioned... well, they were a curious bunch too, and together we figured out what it meant... it meant that it was "possible" to change the runtime userid of the user running the binary to that of the owner (or group, depending where the "s" was) of the file...

looking at the source of su.c one saw that the function doing this was the C function "seteuid" - what i hear ye say... seteuid = set effective user id! well, bob's your uncle, and jane's his aunt!

/bin/su of course was asking you for the password, doing a crypt on it and comparing it to the encrypted password in the /etc/password file (where the first two characters were the salt of the encryption. of course at the time passwords could be a max of 8 characters - very crackable with today's computing power, but in those days, with only access to IBM XT's on personal time, it was tough... (of course, once via shoulder surfing, the first two letters were detected, and the rest of the 6 were easy to brute force in a few days - even on an XT, but that is a adventure, the telling of which is left for another day :)

so what would happen if now that i had root, i created a file with the "s" bit on owned by root and performed a seteuid(0) inside the binary... a trial was called for... and judgement was in my favour... a simple binary compiled with source as such:
#include
#include

void main(void) {
seteuid(0);
system("/bin/sh");
}
chmod to binary to 7555... and we have magic! run that binary as any user, and you got a shell as root... no password, nothing!

now a binary could be had, where perpetual access to root was possible, no matter how many times they changed the password... the password was no longer needed.

such a file (with the "setuid" (s) bit) set was obviously unusual, so would a standard scan find it... it probably would, but tripwire was not installed, it was early days... (in fact, most systems still don't have things like tripwire installed), so it was a risk, but a measured low risk...

fast forward 17 years... and the memories are fond, and enthusiasm still alive and kicking... the thirst for knowledge grows, although the time to practice is lesser... having said that, oftentimes i give in to the thirst, and practice to experiment...

so, on that note, i release punture - a program that exploits the setuid bit, but does it with more finesse... it can pass through arguments to the real program you want it to emulate, and dynamically, quietly, create a "punture" into the other person's account and hide it in your directory... so, for example, a typical run might be:

1. Create the trojan
% cd /home/simran/punture
% perl punture.pl --hide-puntures-in /home/simran/puntures --emulate /bin/ls --shell /bin/sh
* This will output two files in the "out" directory
a) out/trojan-autogenerated.c
b) out/trojan-autogenerated
The ".c" file is the C source that is compiled to the trojan binary

2. Put the trojan somehwere where people are likely to run it:
% mv /home/simran/punture/out/trojan-autogenerated /home/simran/bin/myls

3. Trick someone into running the "myls" command (see blog above for ideas)
This will produce a file as such:
* /home/simran/puntures/testuser-12121212/punture-23232323
Where "testuser" was the username of the person that ran the myls file and
12121212 and 23232323 are randomly generated numbers.

The program will ensure that the testuser-12121212 directory is left owned by you (the owner of the trojan) with permissions 700 (so other users (except root) cannot snoop around and run the punture-23232323 file (which by the way will have permissions 7555, so that it has the right bits set for you to get a shell as testuser).

4. You run the file punture-23232323 and walla, your effective user id will be that of testuser.

Points to be careful about... if you copy the trojan-autogenerated file or the resultant punture file, you will LOSE the setuid permission bit... this will make the trojan/punture ineffective... a "mv" should retain permissions as long as you are not moving across file systems.

Some filesystems have options to turn of the possibility of files having the setuid bit set when mounted... this will obviously thawt your plans!

Have fun, and happy hacking :)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Puncture can be downloaded from: https://sourceforge.net/projects/puncture/
Patches for fixes/updates most welcome.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

pyar impossible

2010-01-16T10:53:00.001-08:00

saw the movie "pyar impossible" very recently... was initially reluctant to go to it as the main actress is usually quite tacky!

the movie turned out to be quite nice and fun... you of course have to forgive much contradiction in the movie... (as you have to do in pretty much any movie)... but overall, quite good.

ironic, that i actually genuinely found priyanka much nicer when she dressed up as a geek (of course, her makeup was still caked on, but the clothes had really been changed to quite "normal")...

the irony of real life is though that after doing some searches on google images and yahoo images, i cannot find a picture of her (in relevance to that movie (or even otherwise!)) where she is wearing "normal" clothes... its all pretty much glam shots! something she (as the actress in the movie) found quite disconcerting - "that people were only judging by looks"... her "character" found that to be quite shallow... interestingly, it appears, actors are also not immune to not learning a thing from the work they do!

even within a group of sheep, there must be a leader if a change is to take place... unfortunately, the person the industry usually looks to as a demi-god (amitabh bachan) is the manifestation of vanity himself!

no atheletes here, its only school sports... move right along... when a real star shall come, we will surely notice!

when lightning strikes...

2009-12-28T09:08:00.000-08:00

its night, its dark! we lie there, we shiver with thoughts of the unknown, we hear a thud and our mind races with panic! above us, we see blurry shapes in misty light... there is this constant rythmic sound... is it the breathing of a lion waiting to pounce? we know not, we lie fearful, our mind races, and our actions will soon be based on those thoughts!

boom! lightning strikes in the distance... we notice that we sit at the beach, with beautiful coconut trees behind us, the soothing waves in front... we feel the cool breeze on our faces, and at peace we are! the flash was but momentary, but enlightening.

as moments drift by, our thoughts wander, but now they can be of peace, with the knowledge of where we are, or they can be fearful again, for in habit, doubts creep in!

what is the choice you make with the lightning flashes that happen in your life?

a passage to india

2009-10-08T08:34:00.000-07:00

it started 18 months ago, the opportunity to move to india for what i thought at the time was probably a 3-6 month timeframe...

i was not in love with the country, i was born there, so did have some attachment, but could not really empathise with the culture or the ways people went about their stuff...

to sum it up, india was great for a holiday, but as a lifestyle destination - especially a lifestyle that included work - it was going to be unprofessional, untimely, round in circles, unclean dealings (as in bribing for the small stuff), and just generally relatively frustrating, but hopefully, financially rewarding.

sure enough, the first few visits (trips back to australia were very frequent at the start) to india were exactly that... had people not heard of "value for time", and "honoring your word", "commitment", "professionalism" or "cleanliness"?

Ad-hoc, a JIT (just in time) approach - or more accurately a WAT (well after time) approach summed up life here... there was little or no structure, no discipline and whatever else you might find under the definition of professional or good in the dictionary.

Oh, and oh... don't forget the pretense of the clubbed life... frock it or lock it... one must be seen with the right crowd, the right attire, and of course, be fashionably late!

Then came two moments of truth...

1. At Hydrabad airport, a friend - holding his boarding pass for a flight to bangalore, which his luggage going down the conveyer belt changed his mind... he decided he wanted to go to mumbai instead... there were 20 minutes to the plane's departure (for bangalore) things were already being rushed, but upon announcement to the checkin-chick that our friend had changed his mind, and in fact, was now going to take a different airline altogether, i braced myself for hurling abuse from her in our general direction - i was expecting luggage to go flying and words like "you will be banned for life" coming his way. Imagine my amazement then, when she responded with "no problem sir" in the most pleasant of tones and a huge smile still on her face... this was followed by a "oi, woh wala luggage wapas lao!" to a baggage boy down the track. I was left pondering, things might very seldom be on time here, but this sort of flexibility i have never seen. I was used to being given dirty looks for (assuming my request was not refused outright!) requesting chesse to be taken out of a sandwich!

2. Another friend sat me down one day and said, look - "go back to where you came from", and if you are going to stay, learn to not be such a whiner about things here... some of us live here and like it!

Such events created a paradigm shift in me... i decided i was going to like the place... it was a conscious decision... and guess what... the next day, i saw smiles on people's faces, noticed the ridiculously funny road rules and carry on luggage, enjoyed the traffic and found how to organise myself to be productive in the car, saw that i was surrounded by life! life! and life! the smiles were real (despite the circumstances of many, especially the unfortunate ones), i even learned how to "work the system" to an extent, i learned how to be flexible and give time in "ranges" and not to the minute, i realised people gave me the same flexibilities - for good reason, the traffic is unpredictable! - a "no" could become a "yes" with enough effort, and a "yes" into a "no; in short, i relaxed and enjoyed the differences.

fast foward a year, and i absolutely love the place... and not that i like australia any less for it... i really do see the differences (some good, some bad) and enjoy them!

the goods of australia (in my experience of course):
* its a simple culture, people are honest and straight forward
* people are relaxed, its mostly a no fuss approach and there is no desire (for the most part) to keep up with the joneses!
* the "no worries, mate" culture! my favourite term in the world!
* the environment is beautiful, and quite unique... simple access to nature's beauty abound! our land abounds in nature's gift, with beauty rich and rare!
* life is structured, organised and geared towards self sustenance (in a personal way)

naturally, such things lead to a somewhat predictable environment (grossly speaking) - can be really good, but can feel a little robotic (in the nicest most fun sort of way) as the boundaries are well defined...

the goods of india (in someone else's eyes... just kidding, in my eyes of course ! :):
* colour, life is full of variety, be it emotional, physical or spiritual...
* the passion for survival leads to innovation - after all, isn't necessity the mother of invention!
* simplicity of acceptance of change - if one is disciplined in themselves, such flexibility really provides amazing potential
* nature - one needs to go out a bit further from the cities - but once you do, the natural environment rivals anywhere in the world

naturally, such things lead to chaos (in the nicest most mathematical (like a mandelbrot) sort of way), but if one is disciplined in themselves, the potential knows no bounds!

All this of course, lead to much confusion about where destiny should be defined for... but must not one loose sight of the shore if one is to find new land and new adventures.

The ship sails, it sails where the wind will take it, with the ship's steering wheel firm in hand... and a keen eye from the crows nest!

hp website error

2009-05-28T19:13:00.000-07:00

gives away a lot of info... not a very security conscious thing to do!

=============================================================
https://h30456.www3.hp.com/project/Gateway.aspx?co=Aus&PromoID=62&PromoTypeID=1&ProjectID=1113&SC=2
=============================================================

Server Error in '/project' Application.

Compilation Error

Description: An error occurred during the compilation of a resource required to service this request. Please review the following specific error details and modify your source code appropriately.

Compiler Error Message: BC30456: 'Theme' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

Source Error:

Line 1:  <%@ page language="VB" autoeventwireup="false" inherits="Gateway, App_Web_vvbieksr" theme="HP_Black" maintainScrollPositionOnPostBack="true" %>
Line 2: 
Line 3:

Source File: C:\web\websites\hppromotions\project\Gateway.aspx Line: 1

Show Detailed Compiler Output:

c:\windows\system32\inetsrv> "c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\vbc.exe" /t:library /utf8output /R:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\assembly\dl3\035f6e01\39731c6b_66dec901\App_Web_vvbieksr.DLL" /R:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\assembly\dl3\5d01a747\21a82f1d_dab8c901\App_Web_wcqhbw77.DLL" /R:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\assembly\dl3\8964da45\5066c9ec_aec1c601\Microsoft.Practices.ObjectBuilder.DLL" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System.Configuration\2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.Configuration.dll" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System.Drawing\2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.Drawing.dll" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System.Xml\2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089\System.Xml.dll" /R:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\assembly\dl3\1187eee2\0038b27f_683cc701\System.Web.Extensions.DLL" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System.Design\2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.Design.dll" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System.Web.Mobile\2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.Web.Mobile.dll" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_32\System.Web\2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.Web.dll" /R:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\assembly\dl3\58d51c87\0065e380_683cc701\System.Web.Extensions.Design.DLL" /R:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\assembly\dl3\d80a9078\7041c7f3_aec1c601\Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.Data.DLL" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System.Management\2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.Management.dll" /R:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\assembly\dl3\02575cf3\993b4436_f4dfc901\App_Code.DLL" /R:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\assembly\dl3\eab0994e\d0b890ee_aec1c601\Microsoft.Practices.EnterpriseLibrary.Common.DLL" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_32\System.Data.OracleClient\2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089\System.Data.OracleClient.dll" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_32\System.EnterpriseServices\2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.EnterpriseServices.dll" /R:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\assembly\dl3\d97e4a47\0056f393_70b1c701\AjaxControlToolkit.DLL" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System\2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089\System.dll" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System.Web.Services\2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.Web.Services.dll" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System.Configuration.Install\2.0.0.0__b03f5f7f11d50a3a\System.Configuration.Install.dll" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_MSIL\System.Windows.Forms\2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089\System.Windows.Forms.dll" /R:"C:\WINDOWS\assembly\GAC_32\System.Data\2.0.0.0__b77a5c561934e089\System.Data.dll" /out:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.dll" /debug- /win32resource:"c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\8ywr2ypv.res" /define:_MYTYPE=\"Web\" /imports:Microsoft.VisualBasic,System,System.Collections,System.Collections.Specialized,System.Configuration,System.Text,System.Text.RegularExpressions,System.Web,System.Web.Caching,System.Web.SessionState,System.Web.Security,System.Web.Profile,System.Web.UI,System.Web.UI.WebControls,System.Web.UI.WebControls.WebParts,System.Web.UI.HtmlControls  "c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb" "c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.1.vb" "c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.2.vb" "c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.3.vb" "c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb" "c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.5.vb"


Microsoft (R) Visual Basic Compiler version 8.0.50727.1433
for Microsoft (R) .NET Framework version 2.0.50727.1433
Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

C:\web\websites\hppromotions\project\AD_Gateway.aspx(1) : error BC30456: 'Theme' is not a member of 'ASP.ad_gateway_aspx'.

           __ctrl.Theme = "HP_Black"
           ~~~~~~~~~~~~            
C:\web\websites\hppromotions\project\AD_Gateway.aspx(1) : error BC30456: 'InitializeCulture' is not a member of 'ASP.ad_gateway_aspx'.

           Me.InitializeCulture
           ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
C:\web\websites\hppromotions\project\AD_Gateway.aspx(1) : error BC30456: 'MaintainScrollPositionOnPostBack' is not a member of 'ASP.ad_gateway_aspx'.

           __ctrl.MaintainScrollPositionOnPostBack = true
           ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~      
C:\web\websites\hppromotions\project\Gateway.aspx(1) : error BC30456: 'Theme' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

           __ctrl.Theme = "HP_Black"
           ~~~~~~~~~~~~            
C:\web\websites\hppromotions\project\Gateway.aspx(1) : error BC30456: 'InitializeCulture' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

           Me.InitializeCulture
           ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
C:\web\websites\hppromotions\project\Gateway.aspx(1) : error BC30456: 'MaintainScrollPositionOnPostBack' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

           __ctrl.MaintainScrollPositionOnPostBack = true
           ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~      
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(34) : error BC30554: 'AD_Gateway' is ambiguous.

       Inherits Global.AD_Gateway
                ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(35) : error BC30154: Class 'ad_gateway_aspx' must implement 'ReadOnly Property IsReusable() As Boolean' for interface 'System.Web.IHttpHandler'. Implementing property must have matching 'ReadOnly' or 'WriteOnly' specifiers.

       Implements System.Web.SessionState.IRequiresSessionState, System.Web.IHttpHandler
                                                                 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(35) : error BC30149: Class 'ad_gateway_aspx' must implement 'Sub ProcessRequest(context As HttpContext)' for interface 'System.Web.IHttpHandler'.

       Implements System.Web.SessionState.IRequiresSessionState, System.Web.IHttpHandler
                                                                 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(45) : error BC30554: 'AD_Gateway' is ambiguous.

           CType(Me,Global.AD_Gateway).AppRelativeVirtualPath = "~/AD_Gateway.aspx"
                    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                                             
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(49) : error BC30456: 'GetWrappedFileDependencies' is not a member of 'ASP.ad_gateway_aspx'.

               Global.ASP.ad_gateway_aspx.__fileDependencies = Me.GetWrappedFileDependencies(dependencies)
                                                               ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~             
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(56) : error BC30456: 'Context' is not a member of 'ASP.ad_gateway_aspx'.

               Return CType(Me.Context.Profile,System.Web.Profile.DefaultProfile)
                            ~~~~~~~~~~                                          
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(60) : error BC30284: property 'SupportAutoEvents' cannot be declared 'Overrides' because it does not override a property in a base class.

       Protected Overrides ReadOnly Property SupportAutoEvents() As Boolean
                                             ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~            
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(68) : error BC30456: 'Context' is not a member of 'ASP.ad_gateway_aspx'.

               Return CType(Me.Context.ApplicationInstance,System.Web.HttpApplication)
                            ~~~~~~~~~~                                               
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(120) : error BC30456: 'form1' is not a member of 'ASP.ad_gateway_aspx'.

           Me.form1 = __ctrl
           ~~~~~~~~        
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(195) : error BC30284: sub 'FrameworkInitialize' cannot be declared 'Overrides' because it does not override a sub in a base class.

       Protected Overrides Sub FrameworkInitialize()
                               ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(198) : error BC30456: 'AddWrappedFileDependencies' is not a member of 'ASP.ad_gateway_aspx'.

           Me.AddWrappedFileDependencies(Global.ASP.ad_gateway_aspx.__fileDependencies)
           ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                                              
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(199) : error BC30456: 'Request' is not a member of 'ASP.ad_gateway_aspx'.

           Me.Request.ValidateInput
           ~~~~~~~~~~             
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(203) : error BC30284: function 'GetTypeHashCode' cannot be declared 'Overrides' because it does not override a function in a base class.

       Public Overrides Function GetTypeHashCode() As Integer
                                 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~            
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.0.vb(208) : error BC30284: sub 'ProcessRequest' cannot be declared 'Overrides' because it does not override a sub in a base class.

       Public Overrides Sub ProcessRequest(ByVal context As System.Web.HttpContext)
                            ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                                        
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.1.vb(57) : warning BC40003: property 'Profile' shadows an overloadable member declared in the base class 'TestDeleteThaosTemplate'.  If you want to overload the base method, this method must be declared 'Overloads'.

       Protected ReadOnly Property Profile() As System.Web.Profile.DefaultProfile
                                   ~~~~~~~                                      
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.1.vb(69) : warning BC40003: property 'ApplicationInstance' shadows an overloadable member declared in the base class 'TestDeleteThaosTemplate'.  If you want to overload the base method, this method must be declared 'Overloads'.

       Protected ReadOnly Property ApplicationInstance() As System.Web.HttpApplication
                                   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                               
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.2.vb(57) : warning BC40003: property 'Profile' shadows an overloadable member declared in the base class 'Default2'.  If you want to overload the base method, this method must be declared 'Overloads'.

       Protected ReadOnly Property Profile() As System.Web.Profile.DefaultProfile
                                   ~~~~~~~                                      
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.2.vb(69) : warning BC40003: property 'ApplicationInstance' shadows an overloadable member declared in the base class 'Default2'.  If you want to overload the base method, this method must be declared 'Overloads'.

       Protected ReadOnly Property ApplicationInstance() As System.Web.HttpApplication
                                   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                               
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.3.vb(57) : warning BC40003: property 'Profile' shadows an overloadable member declared in the base class 'ServeFile2'.  If you want to overload the base method, this method must be declared 'Overloads'.

       Protected ReadOnly Property Profile() As System.Web.Profile.DefaultProfile
                                   ~~~~~~~                                      
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.3.vb(69) : warning BC40003: property 'ApplicationInstance' shadows an overloadable member declared in the base class 'ServeFile2'.  If you want to overload the base method, this method must be declared 'Overloads'.

       Protected ReadOnly Property ApplicationInstance() As System.Web.HttpApplication
                                   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                               
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(34) : error BC30554: 'Gateway' is ambiguous.

       Inherits Global.Gateway
                ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(35) : error BC30154: Class 'gateway_aspx' must implement 'ReadOnly Property IsReusable() As Boolean' for interface 'System.Web.IHttpHandler'. Implementing property must have matching 'ReadOnly' or 'WriteOnly' specifiers.

       Implements System.Web.SessionState.IRequiresSessionState, System.Web.IHttpHandler
                                                                 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(35) : error BC30149: Class 'gateway_aspx' must implement 'Sub ProcessRequest(context As HttpContext)' for interface 'System.Web.IHttpHandler'.

       Implements System.Web.SessionState.IRequiresSessionState, System.Web.IHttpHandler
                                                                 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(47) : error BC30554: 'Gateway' is ambiguous.

           CType(Me,Global.Gateway).AppRelativeVirtualPath = "~/Gateway.aspx"
                    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                                          
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(49) : error BC30456: 'ReadStringResource' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

               Global.ASP.gateway_aspx.__stringResource = Me.ReadStringResource
                                                          ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(52) : error BC30456: 'GetWrappedFileDependencies' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

               Global.ASP.gateway_aspx.__fileDependencies = Me.GetWrappedFileDependencies(dependencies)
                                                            ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~             
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(59) : error BC30456: 'Context' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

               Return CType(Me.Context.Profile,System.Web.Profile.DefaultProfile)
                            ~~~~~~~~~~                                          
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(63) : error BC30284: property 'SupportAutoEvents' cannot be declared 'Overrides' because it does not override a property in a base class.

       Protected Overrides ReadOnly Property SupportAutoEvents() As Boolean
                                             ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~            
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(71) : error BC30456: 'Context' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

               Return CType(Me.Context.ApplicationInstance,System.Web.HttpApplication)
                            ~~~~~~~~~~                                               
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(123) : error BC30456: 'form1' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

           Me.form1 = __ctrl
           ~~~~~~~~        
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(198) : error BC30284: sub 'FrameworkInitialize' cannot be declared 'Overrides' because it does not override a sub in a base class.

       Protected Overrides Sub FrameworkInitialize()
                               ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(200) : error BC30456: 'SetStringResourcePointer' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

           Me.SetStringResourcePointer(Global.ASP.gateway_aspx.__stringResource, 0)
           ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                                            
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(202) : error BC30456: 'AddWrappedFileDependencies' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

           Me.AddWrappedFileDependencies(Global.ASP.gateway_aspx.__fileDependencies)
           ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~                                           
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(203) : error BC30456: 'Request' is not a member of 'ASP.gateway_aspx'.

           Me.Request.ValidateInput
           ~~~~~~~~~~             
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(207) : error BC30284: function 'GetTypeHashCode' cannot be declared 'Overrides' because it does not override a function in a base class.

       Public Overrides Function GetTypeHashCode() As Integer
                                 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~            
c:\WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files\project\a541a5de\8fae2379\App_Web_8ywr2ypv.4.vb(212) : error BC30284: sub 'ProcessRequest' cannot be declared 'Overrides' because it does not override a sub in a base class.

       Public Overrides Sub ProcessRequest(ByVal context As System.Web.HttpContext)
                            ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Version Information: Microsoft .NET Framework Version:2.0.50727.1433; ASP.NET Version:2.0.50727.1433

the "great firewall of dubai" - access to flickr - hacked!!! :)

2009-04-16T14:39:00.000-07:00

tried to get to my flickr photos today, but am getting the following message:
Dubai blocks flickr!!!! Dubai blocks flickr!!!!!! I was astounded... i have used that site for naught but looking at some excellent photography people do... photography is an artform of beauty, a science of the heart, an untainted joy... what could possibly be wrong with flickr! Upon further investigation, i found that flickr also has some content that would be considered "objectionable", yet, i was astounded that a blanket block would be put in place!

It got me thinking on how lucky i am in the countries i reside in... there is freedom of speech, and i gotta say, i took some of it for granted, as, although i had heard of "the great firewall of china" et al, i had not myself experienced a block to the freedom to access information. Today i have!

The mentality of some "rulers" is to block exterior information that they believe might "corrupt" - but its their own hearts that are unpure. An argument of, "we are protecting you, just as a parent would protect a child" are also unsustainable! A good parent protects a child from immediate harm, but educates them so that they learn to make their own decisions in time to come, and protect themelves!

This thuggery, especially in the name of god, seems to be a common trait, particularly amongst the middle east and the within the 4 walls of the "born agains" all over the world.

I look at how to bypass this filter, and came across a solution touted by many: the "access flickr" plugin. I had a look at the code of it and tried it... it didn't work... the code showed that the names are being translated to IP's (which i presume the proxy never used to filter by; it must have been filtering by the domain name, and other stuff) and it used to fix some of the cookies then to belong to the "right domains".

I can install my own ssh tunnel one of my servers and browse anywhere i like, but i thought i would give simple things a go first... surprisingly http://flickr.com/search/ works! but of course, you can't actually click thru to any image as that is outside the /search/ releative path.

Upon further investigation, i found that simple tricks like:
% telnet flickr.com 80
GET /search/../photos/c0t0c0s0/ HTTP/1.0
Host: flickr.com

Also did not work!

Researching further... i deduced that the proxy is allowing /search through on flickr.com, but me doing a ../ is caught by the proxy and so /search/../photos/c0t0s0d0/ is translated to /photos/c0t0s0d0 and then blocked!

I gave accessing by IP another go... and this time it worked!!!! walla!!!! My ears stood up, there are possible race conditions that can be exploited there somewhere (as an IP block is wokring *most of the time* but *not all of the time*. However, before i went down that path, i thougth of simply malforming the URL and seeing what happened.

The result of:
% telnet flickr.com 80
GET /photos/c0t0s0d0/

revealed pleasing results... i got my page!!!!!!! Omitting the protocol/verison as part of the GET line worked. I suspect POST would be similar!

Looking into it further, i put back the HTTP/1.0 info, but omitted the Host header... and guess what... "bob's your uncle"!!!

So, initial results... it appears that flickr at least is being filtered based on the Host header... which every current browser version under the sun will send these days! It would be simple enough to write a local proxy in perl (about a 10 line script using the modules on cpan, so even script kiddies could do it!) to omit the header the use flickr to your hearts content.

No doubt the "great "firewall of dubai" shall detect this technique and enhance the way content is filtered in time to come.. until then... enjoy!!! :) and post that... remember: a race without a finish line, is never won, but enjoyed for eternity :)

Content of http://www.etisalat.ae/assets/document/blockcontent.pdf below
("research" showed that they are filtering based on many different criteria, such as keywords in the domain name, etc as well... so the above technique will not work for every site... but it does work for flickr, and i dare say, there are many sites that have classified in the same category, and those sites will be possible to get to via omitting the Host header... bypassing the domain name keyword filter is left as an excercise to the reader for the moment... suffice to say, start with trying to substitude ascii for unicode, etc :) or if you are lazy, just use an open proxy or a already existing unblocked ssh tunnel! :) ... if you can get your traffic "out" of the UAE to any server encrypted, there's nothing they can do! :)

http://www.etisalat.ae/assets/document/blockcontent.pdf

Prohibited Content Categories

1. Internet Content for Bypassing Blocked Content
This category includes Internet Content that allows or assist Users to
access Blocked Content.

2. Internet Content for Learning Criminal Skills
This category includes Internet Content that either provides instructions for
or identifies methods to promote, encourage or provide the skills to
commit illegal or criminal or unethical activities. These include bomb-
making, phreaking (breaching phone security or phone service theft),
scams and fraud, terrorism, evading law enforcement, stalking, lock
picking, selling pirate material such as commercial software, music, videos
or others.

3. Dating Internet Content
This category includes Internet Content that provides online dating or
matchmaking which contradicts with the ethics and morals of the UAE.

Exemptions: Chatting services, chatting groups, social networking and
forums.

4. Internet Content for Illegal Drugs
This category includes Internet Content that provides information on
purchasing, manufacturing, promoting and using illegal drugs.

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slumdog billionaire

2009-04-09T09:38:00.000-07:00

a hundred thousand crores... that's about 30 billion AUD... that is what the worth of the redevelopment of dharavi (one of the world's largest slums) is touted to be worth.

i visited the slum this morning with a few friends... doing some stuff with a company that has an interest in the "rehabilitation" of slum dewellers for various reasons... not the least of which is wanting to help create a better life for the slummers!

After visiting it this morning, there is a few things i think blind freddy would have noticed if he had gone there this morning...

The community in the slums is amazing... the people are friendly and for the most part... actually happy! For the most part, the unhappiness we see, is because of the tainted glasses we were on our souls!

The industries thriving in there include, "milk making" (with tablets), surgical thread making (which johnson and johnson buys), clothes that globus buys, and various, various other industries.

The people take pride in their homes and in their lives... as SK (as opposed to SKM) noticed, there was rangoli outside many a door, and people sweeping near their homes to try to keep them clean as much as possible.

Having said that... lets not get carried away into romantic escapades... swerage is open, it stinks to high heaven, and sanitation education seems non existent...

We walked into some of the dark alleyways, where people fear to tread for the safety of their beings... i learned that what they mostly fear is that even with the muck, their soul might get washed! The people were friendly, but yes, there were live electrical wires just hanging about, and diseases apenty i'm sure, so perhaps the fear or life is not so unreal, although not for the reasons most people hallucinate about!

The "rehabilitators" we are interacting with, have good intentions in their hearts, and the plans being developed are with good intentions... they don't claim they are doing it as charity... they are doing it for profit... a very large profit, but not without a conscience. I applaude them for the passion and effort... but i wonder of the chances of success.

Visiting the slums today, we entered some buildings that have obviously been built by some rehabilitators the past, and they were nothing but vertical dumps (calling them slums would be an upgrade to their status!)... here was open sewerage outside the building, as stinky as in any other area not "rehabilitated", the people in their small units were cramped, the land outside was baron and littered, maintenance in the building was non-existence and yes, there were live electrical wires hanging from the roof in every corridor!

The current plan, to not just build buildings for slum dewellers and officially giving them rights on a property (which by the way, means little to them, as even though they live in "illegal dwelling" at the moment, can be sold and bought on the black market, so they are already worth "real" money!), promising schools, sanitation, hospitals, factories to work in, and much else is a good plan... but in my eyes, there is one fundamental flaw... they are to be kept segmented. The reclaimed land (in the prime region of Mumbai, right next to the airport) is to be commercially developed (for housing, offices, hospitals and schools for the richer). Its a good plan, but history shows, the slum dwellers will be forgotten about, their schools will get uneducated teachers, their hospitals will get "experimental" drugs and their factories will pay naught but minimum wage at most. The dwellers are not realy being given command over their destinities. The claim is that they are, but that is just a trick we play on ourselves... yes, a handful of families might become better off and "succeed", and if that were the result and nothing else... i say its well worth it... but what of the hundreds of thousands of families that become far worse off! They do have a lot to loose... they are not hopeless, but rather have a happy life in progress, albeit, many other aspects need to get taken care of!

In my view, undertaking such a large project, without "proving" the inentions to the residents, via organic improvements is a fools errand. Noble, but doomed for failure.

power of substance

2009-03-29T03:40:00.000-07:00

i was once told a story that a mother took her little boy to a saint, and requested the sage to tell the child to eat less sugar. the sage asked the mother and child to come back in 3 weeks... and when they did, he simply said: "oh child, do not eat so much sugar, its not good for you"...

the mother questioned the sage... why could you not have said these words 3 weeks ago? his answer was simple... "because at that time, i used to eat too much sugar, so had to give it up myself before my words would have authority and substance"

i find this in my life daily... i get advice from numerous people... many a time i attempt to follow it... and sometimes succeed... i have recognised a pattern though, that more often than not... in fact, much more often than not... without knowing it... i follow advise from someone better if they actually live what they advise...

if i come across some good advice, and am not strong enough to follow it on my own, i seek a person who embodies that quality so that i can have them give it to me...

a friend of mine once told me... "i don't watch much tv, its in the cupboard, and it comes out when someone tells me there is something exceptional on"... since that moment, my TV has been cut down by 90%... he did not even "advise" me to do something... he simply stated what he did... but he is a man of substance... and something clicked...

the lesson i need to learn is, to give less but more meaningful advice... i just need someone with that substance to show me the path :) (and in this case, its proving a hard task indeed :) :) :)

life lessons for the aquarius man

2009-03-16T07:06:00.000-07:00

today, i have the opportunity to either feel distanced from the home (bricks and mortar, not the people) i live in... there were rules defined within the four walls that helped me consider it my house...

Today, the rules are under challenge, or rather... there is no challenge at all... a fundamental rule has been broken without any consultation... and when highlighted, disdain was the order of the day!

So, today, either i can consider this "house" (the bricks and mortar) not my house, or i can start to truly consider what is outside these walls as my house as well... after all, the rules did not exist outside these four walls... and i was okay with that!

Should i expand with acceptance, or contract with legislation!

I think i shall choose the former... it will take some work... but the example of today, will ensure that the essence is not forgotten... and with diligence, i shall be better for it.

Thankful i am to life, for teaching such a valuable lesson with so little a pain.

religion as the cause of much evil

2009-03-07T11:32:00.001-08:00

If someone is having a terrible headache, and you give them some medicine, are you helping them? On the face of it, the answer seems obvious... of course you are! Their immediate need is for that headache to be over... of course, we must study as to why the headache occurred, so that we can solve the cause as well to ensure it does not happen again.

However, if the medicine is one that will sort out their headache, but give them cancer... what then? Is temporary relief, albeit much appreciated at the time, really justified if later it is the very same thing that will kill them in a much more painful way!

Religion (as opposed to "spirituality") is much like the medicne that gives cancer. In India, many missionaries come, they offer hope to the poor via food and financial support, but only if they become christians (something i'm sure Jesus would have been horrified at the thought of!), and religion (be it any) is a cancer! It teaches protocols and imposes beliefs. People are deceived by the very devil himself (the missionary), who offers food but steals their souls! On the face of it, it looks like an angel himself came and gave them nourishment, so when he/she asks them to follow certain beliefs, they follow assuming that this "angel" knows what he is saying in all aspects of life!

Beware, for therein lies the trap! Don't judge the quality of the engine by the cleanliness of the car! Every person knows that an agent (in fact, especially the dodgy ones) get second hand cars cleaned up immaculately, and many buyers think a clean car equates to a "good car"! The missionaries use the same technique... albeit, they are themselves pawns in the game.

The same holds true for all religions.

Spirituality... spirituality is a matter for the heart and the soul, and a person matter at that... one that is ineffible, and proclaims the teaching that one must find the truth for themselves. The Buddhists proclaim this, but then he noble truths interfere!

oscar is a sesame street puppet, and slumdog is not an indian film!

2009-02-22T09:21:00.000-08:00

oh, the oscars! the oscars! the oscars! wow, aren't we proud that an indian "filum" has received oscar nominations!

what is with this fascination with wanting to be recognised by the west. The "west" has some really good philosophies we can learn from and some cultures have a lot to teach... but why are we so desperate for recognition from them!

Of course other Indian film's have not done that well at the oscars... they have been mostly made by Indians with a different culture and a mindset in mind... of course slumdog is doing well in the industry, its been made by an acclaimed western director, with the primary target as westerners, where the slum can still be romanticised!

The oscars are a western award, judged by western standards... why must indian cinema judge itself by a foreign cinema industry that is not at all relevant to the indian industry.

Why the insecurity of people, wanting recognition, rather than accepting difference... must we compare!

I for one hope that it does not win any awards, if only for the rebellion against comparison it might spark!

Unreasonable compassion

2009-02-06T09:24:00.000-08:00

Ten years or so ago, i had to deal with a non-performing employee. His role was to look after windoze servers, and his attitude did not lead him to doing very productive work.

In a "first warning" meeting (as numerous chat's and other methods had not worked), Richard indicated to me that he would be more motivated if he had a laptop instead of a desktop because then he could work on some server fixups stuff from home. I in my naivete told him that i would authorise a laptop purchase for him to motivate him, but he would subsequently have to perform.

Indirect feedback i got from other employees (Richard's colleagues) , clearly showed me the rotten moral i had created amongst other performing employees. They grudged - "we don't have laptops, but a non-performing employee has just been promised one".

Luckily, i learning my lesson quickly... i thougth i was being compassionate to Richard, but in fact, i had just been cruel and unfair to the rest of the employees. Was i setting a standard where everyone should become a non-performer to get additional tools (that were "nice to have's" in all their jobs).

I keep that lesson learned in the forefront of my mind, and reward effort, not the opposite.

Recently though... i have come across numerous situations in life... well, i guess we all come across them a lot of the time, but recently i have had a few highlighted examples... whereby one person is making a practical effort to resolve certain issues... they might not be perfect, but they are making what you migth call a 90% effort. The other person was until recently making 0% effort... feels bad even saying it... but that be the truth... perhaps they were thinking of resolutions in their mind and heart, but action did not follow [initially, in the last few days it has, which is brilliant].

Surprisingly, or rather, unsurprisingly, the people close to both these people, were focussing on the lacking 10% effort by the first person... the second person's lack of effort was hardly even recognised and compassion was the order of they day for them. In their blame and advise, the first person was focussed on... and i was reminded of my promising a laptop to Richard.

planes, trains and automobiles : a journey through the southwest indian coast

2009-01-24T22:14:00.000-08:00

Bangalore to Mangalore
It was on the night bus... leaving at 10pm from the ksrtc bus stand. It was a sleeper bus which was great, i wanted to have slept the whole night so as to be ready to go when we reached mangalore.

I had had a light dinner, i knew the road was going to be long and bumpy, and going slightly lighter was definitely going to be the better option. I had decided with determination that the meals of my next few days in fact were going to be well timed according to the road ahead! :)

After a few stops within bangalore, i felt the speed pickup, there was a spring in the drivers mind, because the only thing on his foot was lead. Once that accelerator went down, it was not coming up for anything as we were the biggest vehicle on the road!

I was tired, so after some window gazing, i fell asleep. I woke at 1:30am to find myself at the first (and only) pit stop. There was a coconut seller there, and not much else. Perhaps the bus drivers union had decided to give maccas commissions a miss... in any case, i appreciated the rawness of it... because when i looked up, i saw a billion stars - one which would not have been visible if there was much light around.

Soon, back in the bus (and just in the nick of time, because time and an indian bus wait for no-one) i fell asleep. Every bump was like that of a masseuses knead as i was having too much fun (and too deep in sleep) to feel or think otherwise. The "kneads" were hard though!

I awoke refreshed, but to the knowledge that i was in luxury... feeling the bumps i could have been forgiven for thinking i was with midst of real people... however, the sound of two indian girls talking with american accents (girls who had never been to america), reminded me i was in the midst of the upper crust.

Staring out the window again at life abound and nature everywhere, it was eye-pleasing and soul fulfilling moments.

Soon the bus arrived in Mangalore... and upon my query on the next bus to Udupi, i was told to grab my backpack and rush to a bus standing opposite. Its the "super fast" one i was told...

I rushed, and managed to catch it just as it was starting... jumping on a moving bus (even though it was only just starting and very slow at that stage) was exciting... and something i had longed to do. Always remember, its the right leg that must step onto the bus first, otherwise, tripping will be the order of the day... and not the sort of tripping you might get at a night club!

Mangalore to Udupi
Thus began my journey to Udupi... the conductor came... i requested a ticket to Udupi and he said it would be 280 rupees... i was suspicious, but took out 3 notes of a hundred rupees each. He gave a huge hearty laugh and said it was only 28 rupees. I laughed along, but only so as to feel it was not at me but with me everyone was laughing. I had caught a bus / bought a ticket after many many years myself, but now planted into my mind the approximate cost of what works out to be approx 50 paisa per kilometre on long distance busses.

When i had been told this bus is "super fast", i had imagined it would be like an "express train" in sydney... same speed, but not stopping at all stations. I was partially right! This one also promised renewed spiritual astral journies and near death experiences with every oncoming car/bus/truck/cow/camel/elephant/auto amongst numerous other types of roadworthy transport.

Surely, a god does exist, and surely a hundred thousand god's exist... for a complete god's undivided attention is needed to guide every bus driver, and more gods are needed for other roadworthy vehicles to ensure they "miss" the bus!

After spectacular scenery and 10 winks, we arrived at Udupi.

Udupi
The bus stopped for the best part of 3 seconds, it was a "complete stop" though, so there was plenty of time to even ask for directions while getting off. I had heard that there was an amazing sri-krishna temple in Udupi... and that was going to be the order of the day for me.

First however, i went on a mission to find a place to shower... as it was still early - approx 8:30am - most basic places were closed, so disgruntled in walked into the lobby of a hotel. How much for 2 hours i said... they said a 24 hour charge was minimum and it was 260 rupees... It was going to be an expensive shower, but one i much needed, or krishna himself would have moved the temple - no matter how historic - to another city!

I took the basic room, and had a good shower... then off for a walk around the city till i reached the temple it was.

There were people everywhere, people crossing the street, auto's crossing the people, busses crossing the auto's and on and on it went. Having not taken some rubber chappels, i bought some, as shoes were going to be cumbersome to take off and put on often.

The temple was unassuming from the outside... and grand is not a word i would use for the inside... it was a historic temple... about 800 years old... but it was very peaceful and amazingly designed. The smell of camphor and incense, a cow in the small temple being fed and the priests carrying diya's all over was quite a sight.

Manipal
In the afternoon, i took the time to go to Manipal. I had heard much about the places and getting there, put many pictures to the stories i had heard... it seemed every bit the university town i had heard it was. I didn't see its night life, but i suspect the night life would be one i was wilfully not accustomed to.

On the recommendation to go to Kaupe beach, the lighthouse of which i had heard lots, i went to feast my eyes yet again. The travel in the auto was pleasant and again surrounded with green. Coconut trees sway in the wind, the water reflects a shimmering sun and the people go about their daily business not just like there is a tomorrow, but a day after and a day after that as well.

Reaching the spot, i treated myself and the auto-wala to a cool drink and took the tree lined, sand covered, shaded path to the beach.

Reaching the beach, i would see only a few people, and i think was more the scarcity of people than the beach itself that reminded me of beautiful garie beach in the national park in sydney.

Kaupe beach
Kaupe beach was not to be outdone, and proved to be miles and miles of beautiful sand with a tall lighthouse to boast. The backdrop of some backwaters and the coconut trees looking very surreal reflecting green and yellow was spectacular.

Udupi to Cochin
After catching up on 10 winks i decided to make my way to the train station. I had bought a ticket to Cochin that afternoon and the train was to come at 11:08pm. I was initially planning on going north towards Karwar, but a train there would have probably been only 6 hours, and i felt like a longer train journey. Given that no-one was dependant on my plans, i changed my mind on the spot, and bought a ticket to go south - it was going to be warmer down south as well, and hot and sweaty is the way it is in heaven. Hell really is the place that is frozen over!

I reached the station with 3 hours to go, typically my style... i don't like being late... relaxed, and with my backpack upon me... i walked up and down the mile long station a few times. It was dark, but i reminded myself, its people like me others are worried about, not the other way around. The moon was beautiful, virtually full and the occasional glint of it on a metal hand rail where it wasn't rusted shone like a bright star in the sky.

The train came on time, and everyone rushed on... i looked for my seat and found someone else sitting on it. Nudging him i said that i wanted that seat. He looked annoyed, but got up, grumbled about him being on some waiting list and went away.

Sleep was the order of the night again... and the rythmic sounds of the train and the constant rocking were like a lullaby in a cradle.

I awoke early morning and opened the window further to let the breeze in. Sitting beside it, i could see the countryside whizzing past. A feast for the eyes it is, but the last supper it surely wasn't, for there was a lot more to come.

I noticed that the people opposite me and on the seats above were sleeping... they included a few kids. I knew window seats were a premium, so decided to refresh myself before they awoke and come back to my much coveted window seat. I went and was back within 3 minutes, however, the seat was gone! One of the kids had apparently been keeping one eye open awaiting this very moment. If looks could kill, i would have succeeded a thousand times over, or perhaps i would not have, this guy was only about 10, but he was a tough cookie! I decided 10 minutes was going to be my patience limit, then it was going to resort to physical violence!

Seven minutes and a precise 30 seconds later, the boy found that he too needed to refresh himself. By this time, his brother, a little younger than him was awake and eyeing that seat. I think they had a pact that as one got up, the other would slide in... little did they know how determined i was. As he got up, my leg decided to straighten itself sideways, and the other boy out of courtesy did not sit on my leg... but only tried to push it aside. Desperate times bring forth strength and adrenalin rushes that aid in survival though, and my leg pushed his hand aside with power that Napoleon would have envied. Simultaneously my body shifted to the right, and i found myself at the window seat and enjoying the wind on my face again.

As we closed in on Cochin, with just less than 3 hours to go now, as it was already 7:30am, people started getting down at various stations, and the train was emptying... window seats lost their premium and the boys found one each for themselves. I too got up and decided to throw caution to the wind and feel what it was like to be hanging outside the open doors again. The arms are strong though, and i placed much faith in them (and in the nuts and bolts that held the handrails that i hung onto) as the life giving breeze embodied me.

Cochin to Alleppey
Reaching Cochin, i enquired about busses to Alleppey, and found that the stand was an auto-ride away. Getting there, there were plenty of "super fast" busses to Alleppey and the ride was less than 2 hours.

Alleppey
Reaching Alleppey bus station, i intentionally looked a little lost... i wanted to attract dubious houseboat agents - i was not looking for a luxury yacht, and a rust-bucket vendor was unlikely to come to one who looked like he knew what he was doing.

The ruse worked, i was soon on the back of a motorbike being driven to a place to view "the equivalent of a luxury yacht" to roam the backwaters. I insisted i wanted something on the smaller side as i wanted to go into the little canals and to places tourists would not naturally venture. Ten minutes (and a few phone calls by the agent while ridding his motorbike with me on the back carrying a huge backpack - hey, the camera's i took were heavy and large, and i did take them and multiple lenses and batteries and other supporting equipment) later, we arrived at something that indeed looked rather luxurious from the outside. Upon inspection though, i was delighted, it was a rust bucket from the inside with most things not working... this was going to be something i was going to be able to negotiate within my budget.

Negotiations began, and the agent was convinced he made a mistake by assuming that because i carried a backpack, i must have been one of those "overseas indians come to see the country with dollars in his pocket". Even though it was high season, there were plenty of boats as many overseas visitors had cancelled their trips after the Mumbai attacks late last year. I negotiated a good price and soon we were on our way.

I insisted on the "captain" taking the little canals, and he did... words i find can do little justice to this enchanted place. Pictures too can show the visual, but the turning your head in any direction and finding natural beauty is ineffable.

Come evening, i wanted to go in a little canoe into the even smaller waterways, and the boatman, who was a local, organised for one of his fisherman friends to take me on his little canoe. We setup the rondavue point of where the houseboat was going to park for the night, i was given a chappu (oar) and with the fisherman and me in it, the boat was given a small push in the water.

I had requested a short half an hour trip, and off we went. The view from virtual eye level with water was quite different. It was looking at the backwaters anew... the washerwomen beating their clothes, the chidren running on the banks, the men farming, kids swimming and me staring at everything wide eyed were all a sight to be seen.

The boating went on and on... and track of time was lost... however, after my arms reminding me that i was not quite he-man, and that we had probably rowed quite a number of kilometres.. i enquired how far it was still go to... after numerous attempts to cross the language barrier, i got my question across and the answer came in the form of a question... "turn back now?"... if i had had any strength, i would have whacked the guy... but i did not, so rowing is what we did... and enjoyed it too.... the sunset making the trees gleam and water shimmer was like being in a fairy tale.

At long last... and all too soon, we reached the houseboat and after a sumptous dinner, i packed it in for the night.

Luckily the rust bucket did have a extension cord long enough to reach someone's hut on the shore and we plugged in for some electricity so that i could use the fan... Had it not been for the coachroaches, i would have slept on the outside floor, but there were just too many of them, and i was not going to be anyone's feast that night.

The fan came on, click, clunk, click, clunk... it was again a rythmic sound, but not very soothing... i can give kumbkaran a run for his money when it comes to deep sleep though, and so slept i did. The imagined the springs i could feel through the thin mattress top layer to be jets in a sauna, and the fan to be naught but the sounds of a printing press...

Sleep came easily... but so did the dreams that night... dreams of staplers chasing me... going click, click, click, click... not scary.... just weird... i awoke just long enough to throw my pillow at the fan which stopped clicking... this went on all night every half an hour... and i now have renewed respect for staplers.

The next day in the morning, 5am, i saw the fishermen coming back from all night of fishing... the light unfortunately was too dark to get any photos, even with an f2, ISO800 and long exposures... the boats (including mine) after all were in water and exposures of any longer than 1 second were too blurry...

The morning was spent with feed dipped in water, and the boat slowly trudging along. Come afternoon, we parked it in a small waterway, and i decided to go on a walk inland... the rice paddy's, smaller waterways, little villages were enchanting. I managed to get some coconuts right off the tree and drink their blood (whoops... i meant water!), and it was sweeeet!

After a long walk, and surprisingly not getting lost (for which i do have my blackberry with gps to thank) i was back in the boat with feet in the water.

Evening came all to quickly, and the sun started to set again... this time i had my cameras at the ready and got some shots i will remember forever. The colours were first that of a great golden glow and then a rich red. Contrasting with the deep greens of the earth, it was a spectacle to be beheld.

Alleppey to Trivandrum
Mid morning, i wad dropped off near an auto stand, and off again it was to the bus station. This time i found a "super express", and the driver ensured it lived up to its name.

Trivandrum
Reaching Trivandrum, i went straight to the train station (which was just opposite the bus stand)... i wanted to catch a train to kanyakumari... reaching there, i found the train was not till 3:15pm... i would miss the legendary sunset there, so decided to give it a miss...

Staring me in the face was a place called the "Indian Coffee House"... it sonded like a nice place for lunch... i walked in, and interesting it surely was... it was a tall round building, with a ramp all the way to the top... the benches were to the right of the ramp equally spaced... a basic place, but an amazing design...

After a meal that befitting a king and his army, i wondered where next to move... having seen some cute kids on the bus, i was longing to see s&s&s again... so off i went to the airport to catch a plane.

Reaching the airport, they were reluctantly happy (as they are taught to be) to put me on a waitlist , i would be unlikely to get on, but there was a small possibility... it would have to be on a full fare though... just over 10k... this of course was unacceptable to me, not having spent anywhere near that much on my entire trip thus far! That's far more than the 50 paisa a kilometer i was getting rather accostumed to! I opted to go the next day, and bought a ticket for less than one third the pirce.

I then decided that i needed a good hot shower... and rather than stay in trivandrum, i might as well make my way to kanyakumari... for the fabled sunset and sunrise! I went to the "rent a car" sign... and found that i needed to step just past security to get to their window. Of course, security would not let me past without a plane ticket for the same day! Debate with them was productive... i was allowed to put one foot past the "checkpost" and call out to the car rental people. They came, i hired a car and in no time, off to Kanyakumari i was!

Trivandrum to Kanyakumari
The drive was via a highway, we only had 2.5 hours to sunset, and i wanted to be ever the tourist and stand at the place called "sunset point". The drive again was beautiful, but there were some diversions, which caused delays and we found ourselves rushing towards kanyakumari. The grapes are sour however, because i did not get any... we missed the sunset by about 30 minutes... but upon my insistence, we still went to sunset point. Getting there, i really did feel i missed nothing... there was a bunch of local and foreign tourists standing on a few rocks pretending the sunset looked more beautiful form there. It was a complete anticlimax.

We then drove to an upmarket hotel, where i booked a sea facing room - i didn't want to miss the sunrise! I opened the massive windows, and let the breeze in... no complaints there! I could clearly see vivakananda rock... yet another gimmick in the let down called kanyakumari... i mean, what's so great about a person swimming the olympic length of 50 meters and getting to a rock, on which they sit! Granted its more than i can do... but it didn't inspire thoughts of world peace.

After an exotic dinner and numerous coconut puddings, i fell asleep.

Kanyakumari to Trivandrum
Early to bed, early to rise, wakes a person with bags under their eyes! For me howerver, i'm falling for the traditional saying... so waking up refreshed again at 5am, i eagerly anticipated the sunrise!

The sun came and the sun rose, but once again, no thoughts of eradicating world poverty sprung to mind. The sunrise was beautiful over the sea, but to me, the sunrises in cronulla and anywhere else on the east coast have been far far more beautiful. I was fascinated by the view of my fellow primates however, who all eagerly anticipated a great sunrise, and waved their hands with glee when it did come up. Sometimes i guess, its better to just convince yourself something is great if you have already made the effort.

Although the flight was just before 5pm... i left at 8:30am, as i wanted to go back the coastal route... stopping frequently, and often taking the "wrong road". I did just that... many a road taken was a one way, and we had to backtrack, but the beauty along the tamil coast was unanticipated, raw and some of the most amazing coastline i have seen in my life.

The drive through the rice paddy's and little villages too was inspiring. We often came across little churches as that part of the coast was most invaded by the missionaries of yesteryear. It was great to see though, that despite all the efforts they would have made... people did not convert to a religion unknown to them, but merged bits and pieces of all they knew. The buildings might bear a cross, but the hearts still bear untamed truth and beauty.

Trivandrum to Bangalore
As i was again running rather early, as its my personal trademark... i decided to take a detour to trivandrum beach. Again, stunning beauty, but with the availability of local chai-walah's and ice cream men.

I was also rather surprised at the rather unmodest and rather large statue of a mermaid in such a traditional state. It was there however, for all to see for miles around, and from ever plane that passed by!

Reaching the airport, the car was returned, and then it was a wait for the plane. The plane was running a hour late... lateness such as i had not experienced on any bus or train - surprising, as i had expected differently.

I picked my seat carefully... we were going to be flying north-north-east... the time was ripe for a sunset, so a window seat on the left of the plane wold produce spectacular views. As usual, i requested for the last row, and as usual, i got it!

The sunset from the air was indeed something not to be missed... the likes of which i had only seen a few times before, but this time, with the rangefinder in hand, it looked even better...

Soon, i landed in bangalore... and thus ended the adventure of 5 days... a short trip, but a full and sweet one... the likes of which i shall surely repeat soon.

To see all the shots from my trip, go to: http://flickr.com/photos/c0t0s0d0/sets/72157612870528260/show/

...

i am therefore i am: musings on existence, part 2

2009-01-04T23:16:00.000-08:00

i am

the age of aquarius

2008-12-24T23:59:00.000-08:00

the age of aquarius has begun! aqua, water, something you cannot snatch at, but must accept as a blessing, with your hands upturned while you sip them at their cusp!

the economic downturn is going to make many an entrepreneur, a philosopher, and perhaps even an engineer!

fundamentalists, watch out!!!!!! this can be a short term gain for you, but your promises will not last long... people will think, evaluate and progress.

who are these fundamentalists that i refer to... they are fundamentalists ranging from economists to doomsday sayers, but mostly, they are religious fanatics who don't want people to think for themselves!

Believe this, and you shall be saved! This is undoubtedly the message going out to thousands during christmas celebrations. Trust me... the "christ" has gone from christ-mas... he left long ago.. now it is just simply "xmas"!

How nieve does one have to be to believe that a "belief" is all encompasing and substantiating. We have had such as those in history, they leaped off cliffs with manuractured wings in the full belief they would fly! did they? no, no and no! they fell down and died! Was their belief doubtful... not at all, they believed a 100%.

The fact of the matter is, belief is a strong composite, but not everything! It will *not* save you! The ones who say to others "if you don't believe in jesus, you will go to hell", are the ones living in a current hell... and no heaven awaits.

The new age of such people are the most misled of them all... so called "born again" churches have sprung up, they profess confidence (but at the cost of humility), strength, but at the cost of meekness - they do not understand that true confidence comes *through* humility, and true courage through modesty.

I say onto you, forget those that ask you to dream big for its god's promise that you shall own a billion dollar business, or get that new car! Those are not god's promises, they are commercial temptations! Those that claim such things, want money out of you, and so money is what they must tempt you with! After all, lottery tickets don't come free, do they now?!!!

Be a man, or a woman, and forge your own path, do what Jesus really did... forge his path, not follow another's! Don't be just a byproduct of mass hysteria!

viva la revolution!

the drag and drop generation...

2008-12-11T10:42:00.000-08:00

look its easy.. i just drag this box here, click on the arrows and type in the fields i want the user to input...and then maybe write some sql to insert what is entered and wallah! tom and jenny are your brother and sister!

computer security is a process and a journey! it is neigh impossible to outsource it to a specific team setup for checking it, although that is a very necessary measure... few companies have the resources and the tenacity to pull that off reasonably successfully though.

for most, it is imperative to have people who "understand some computing security fundamentals" in addition to your security validation team.

today i saw an example whereby a teacher, yes, a teacher, teaching advanced JavaEE was giving the class an example of sendRedirect as so:

1st attempt: response.sendRedirect("servlet2&attr1=value1");
when it did not work and someone in the audience said, replace the "&" with a "?" his second attempt was:
2nd attempt: response.sendRedirect("servlet2 &attr1=value1");
... after numerous other struggles and repeated suggessitions of trying a ? without a space after the servlet name... he got it!

Such things are concerning though... it wasn't so much so that he just made a typo... in his repeated attempts, it was obvious that he was not sure! Surely someone teaching advanced java - especially in the web context would know the construct of a URL, and such a basic thing at that!

Other than that.... he was actually a good teacher... but i wonder, if sometimes, because development/code can now be "autogenerated" to an extent, by entering things into a nice GUI box, do people realise how things glue together.

This gluing together, or making applications talk to each other, passing messages, parameters, etc, is where obvious security holes can exist... and it appears, with the advent of tools that make this step easy... people know less and less about how the fundamentals actually work! And by people in this case, i mean "developers"... a cause for concern indeed, unless you are a hacker of course, in which case, cross site scripting, sql injection attacks, ..., here they come!

terror in mumbai

2008-11-28T10:58:00.000-08:00

city under seige! mumbai under attack! its pakistan's fault! our security forces have failed to protect us! i am devastated! i am disturbed! the politicians are at fault!

they are but a few headlines and emotions being depicted while the attacks have been on (and as far as i know, they are still on, or at least, the taj mahal hotel still has one terrorist in it, the other places i believe have been "recaptured" or "liberated"!).

what i have not heard in the last few days is:
* would would make people do desperate that they would do a thing like this
* are we part of a system that generates such desperation
* have the security forces failed us, or have we collectively as a people failed!

I think the response to the terrorists has been appropriate, the NSG (indian national security guard?) and black cats etc, have gone in with a mission to free people trapped and capture the terrorist. I don't at all condone what the terrorists are doing, and for the most part, whatever the NSG serves them, they deserve.

I guess i can only say this because i am not emotionally personally attached to the situation by way of the fact that i don't know anyone who was a hostage! If i did, i doubt i could have made a "non-emotional" statement... and i can sympathise with the statements the relatives of those injured or killed are making.

So what made the terrorists act in this way... no doubt there was a lot of brainwashing involved by cowards who would not dare give up their own lives, but ask the young to give up theirs! But could it also be that what drove such people is the loss of the lives of their families - perhaps ordinary humble normal civilian families that not long ago had simple lives that were destroyed by the bombs that america dropped in iraq?

Could extreme poverty and perhaps the loss of ones family due to starvation or lack of medicine due to sanctions be driving such desperate acts!

I believe such questions and many more are critical if the cause is to be addressed - otherwise, all we can ever do is react to the symptoms!

On the point of "if the security forces failed us"... perhaps they could have done more... but how much can anyone really do... if people want, they can use their car as a weapon... does that mean cars should be banned or that one must see a shrink for 3 years before one is judged with "safe intent to drive"!

If i have found one institution to be mostly to blame for the after effects of what is happening in people's hearts and how they will react out of fear, its the media! they sensationalise, and like sheep, people watch! Its these very same people that will then voice their opinions (at least for the next 3-4 days before all this is forgotten and the next sensation is being searched for) and perhaps get politicians to react (perhaps for right, perhaps for wrong).

Stop, Think! and take appropriate action!

run rabbit, run rabbit, run, run, run

2008-11-07T20:24:00.000-08:00

tricking oneself seems to be a quality a few possess to the extreme. in fact, so much so, that they convince themselves that the voice of their ego is the voice of god! that is a fanatical and dangerous position! delusion is but a part of it!

actions... actions of course speak louder than words... there is only so many stories you can make up and tell others, but if your actions are to the contrary, over time, the truth does prevail. best (or worse?) of all, children learn from actions more than they follow instructions. i "worry" for those whose actions are so disjoint to their claimed intentions, because no-body respects them.

theft, yes, outright theft and running away in secrecy (no matter what story is portrayed to friends and family) are not signs of bravery and trust in one's integrity. the character is in question, or rather... the character is no longer in question...

why live in so much fear that the mere presence of a small metal statue must be removed (from other people's property, even while just visiting) so that the family is not impacted by "a picture of the devil" - the truth is, regardless of the family, the item is removed because of fear in one's own heart - because of a deep rooted, subconscious doubt in one's own belief.

a belief that everyone is an idiot is also not stemmed from god! god loves, not despises and pity's!

wake up!

paradise lost

2008-08-30T08:23:00.001-07:00

here i stand, at the observatory... a telescope is a power magnifier, but alas the limitation might be my eye.

there were visions, visions of paradise, visions of purity, visions of help and compassion. there were visions, visions of principle, visions of depth, visions of god!

alas, even the potential of power seems it can corrupt! the thought of money can tint. a challenge now calls for backup rather than courage, and reality calls for new alliances.

come back o dear friend, come back! for paradise shall surely be regained!

frog in well

2008-07-28T19:47:00.001-07:00

a frog in his well can still see the stars at night

bombay by flight

2008-07-28T10:33:00.000-07:00

interesting flight to bombay today... not as bumpy as promised, but pretty good all the same :) when i'm by myself, i like the little bumps.. i like the absolute back row window seat... ahh... the window seat.. endless hours of entertainment looking out the window.

saw the slums from the air today, they seemed to go on forever... there were kilometres and kilometres of slums... and they actually touch the edge of the runway.

people here seem a little more relaxed... i wonder if its because that was also my preconception ... or because that is what is actually the case.

sitting in the lobby of the hotel today, was wondering what the life of all the people around is.. where does the doorman live, what are his aspirations, what are his challenges and his dreams... i wonder if they live here in the hotel, or go home in the evenings? every life on earth is so rich with adventure... and i mean every life, including life for each animal and each plant... fascinating to look through the eyes of mystery again.

also did a bit of photography today... loved it... and i have a few lamp shots that one of my friend's in particular is going to be quite proud of :)

kaboom...

2008-07-27T00:09:00.000-07:00

bomb blasts in the city... sent all employees as soon as we found out home day before yesterday ... no riots resulted, but people do get on edge a little bit... race based blame game has started... doesn't look like it will blow into more than just words but faces of suspicion are seen all around...

the twilight zone...

2008-07-27T00:03:00.000-07:00

i'm back in the twilight zone :) and glad to be here... the dreams have started again and the buzy-ness of administrative tasks is now back in perspective :)

interesting thing noticed in the last few days... diesel shortage due to a truckie strike in bangalore... half the diesel cars on the road are at a stand-still... effect, less traffic... more at the petrol pump (as everyone is using their petrol vehicles more), but generally, most of the public (most people i have spoken to) seems happy about the lesser traffic - they don't own diesel cars :)

the butterfly effect seems to be more pronounced here... in a western society, there seem to be numerous "normalising" factors that mitigate the flow on effect of small variations - not to mention, variations at the mid-level are a lot less often in western societies anyway (mid-level variations like strikes)... but in india, the effects onwards of something changed at the start has is much more impactful ... interesting :)

the pensieve and the freedom to think great thoughts

2008-06-08T04:42:00.000-07:00

> on the 6th of every month, pay the rent
> don't forget the morgtage payment on the 15th and don't forget the amount every month
> remember its dumbeldore's birthday on the 5th of june
> what, another meeting with the marketing manager on the 16th and what more, weekly from then on!
> oh yeah, and don't forget the flight to singapore on wednesday next week
> touch base with ndambuki, lisa and simon (earthwatch buddies) sometime this week/month
> interview project manager in india next week on tuesday at 10am
> don't have no any sugar after 5pm
> keep both the green and blue bins out this tuesday evening
> 25 day backpacking trip in india with an/rg/bs from the 1st of april to the end of april next year

... oh, the list goes on and on and on... it does for all of us. some of us are very good at remembering stuff... i need a pensieve!!!

my pensieve is google calendar, and here is how i use it as an effective tool for the organisation of the operational part of my life!

I have a few different types of things i need to remember:
* time critical things (meetings, absolute commitments, etc)
* reminders that need some action but not absolutely time critical - aka, you can't pinpoint an absolute minute on when the action will start... eg. pay rent - needs to be done sometime before the 11th of every month
* reminders that don't need action - but need to bring awareness at a certain time - eg. no sugar after 5pm
* reminders that i might want to action (awareness points with discretion on action) - eg. send ndambuki an email saying hello!

The types of alerts i need are:
* email reminding me to do something at some point in the near future (eg. pay rent)
* time critical reminders (eg. meetings) that popup on the phone (and i possibly receive an SMS before the meeting if its very very critical)
* points on the calendar as awareness points that are there when i see the calendar, but no reminders attached to them

I also had some other requirements, such as something that can export in open industry standard formats so that i can get the exports regularly and do stuff with them :)

I was quite willing to have to write plugins myself to do what i wanted, i didn't think there would be anything out there that did everything i wanted... i searched, and soon, lo and behold... i found that google calendar did all i wanted (and more!).

I setup three calendars for myself in google calendar with the following defaults:
* default calendar - popup alert 20 minutes prior to event
* reminders (email only) - that remind me via email 1 hour prior to an event
* contacts (entries that are there, but there are no reminders for them)

Google also has a great display style whereby all your "all day events" just stay up the top above a blue bar and don't clutter your screen with a huge event show on the time schedule of your calendar.

Having setup the above calendars, i was away... i could schedule pretty much everything i could think of... of course sticking to what is on your calendar is a topic for another day, but the organisation was there, and now there were no excuses for "forgetting stuff" (unless it was forgotten between the time of deciding that an event needs to be entered, and actually entering it... for which i have also setup things like voice notes on my phone so things can be noted immediately! :)

So, for the above list of events, here is how i would enter them in:
> on the 6th of every month, pay the rent (cal: reminder - email only, monthly)
> don't forget the morgtage payment on the 15th and don't forget the amount every month (cal: reminder - email only, monthly - scheduled about 5 days before the money actually needs to be in the account)
> remember its dumbeldore's birthday on the 5th of june (cal: reminder - email only, yearly; could have been a "contact calendar" entry so it had no alerts but only a presence if i saw the calendar if dumbledore was not such a good friend, but i wanted to know as a fyi)
> what, another meeting with the marketing manager on the 16th and what more, weekly from then on! (cal: default - popup 20 minutes, weekly with first event starting on the 16th)
> oh yeah, and don't forget the flight to singapore on wednesday next week (cal: default - popup 20 minutes, plus i added the following custom alerts when entering that event: popup 2 hours, popup 4 hours, sms 4 hours prior to event, plus email reminder 1 day before event; i really don't want to be missing that flight!)
> touch base with ndambuki, lisa and simon (earthwatch buddies) sometime this week/month (cal: "contacts" - i must say ... i am very slack with this one... i notice all the entries, but rarely make the effort to actually contact the people, its something i must improve on, and i leave it there as a reminder that i need, and as i improve, i will start to be more diligent about following through on it at least one in every so many entries (which are an entry every 3-4 months for most people on it) which is my intention!)
> interview project manager in india next week on tuesday at 10am (cal: default - popup 20 minutes)
> don't have no any sugar after 5pm (cal: default - popup 20 minutes)
> keep both the green and blue bins out this tuesday evening (cal: default: popup 20 minutes; this does not need to be done at that exact minute... bit i often find myself doing it very close to when its scheduled, as on a weekday, the time i have picked to do it is very realistic - 7:30pm, just after dinner!)
> 25 day backpacking trip in india with an/rg/bs from the 1st of april to the end of april next year (cal: reminder - email only - email 1, 3, 4 and 6 months before event)

The colours i picked above are important in that they are consistent with the type of calendar/reminder. See the picture on this blog to see my actual calendar for this week :)

The "no sugar after 5pm" one is an interesting entry... i use the calendar to encourage myself into change of habits ... i often find that i sometimes say i will do something differently, and intend to.. but forget - eg. no sugar after 5pm - then i by mistake might have a teaspoon of sugar in a cup of tea and maybe at 8pm and then remember the next day that i should not have - and had i remembered prior to having it, i would not have.

So as a habit changing exercise, i enter "habit changing" reminders often as weekly reminders for the first 6 weeks, then monthly for 3-6 months. By then, the habit should have changed... if not, i was not very serious about the change anyway and a better memory would not have helped me! The calendar they go into depends on the type of event... eg. no sugar after 5pm went into the default (with popup reminder) calendar... whereas, "drink more water" might go into the "reminders - email only" calendar.

So there you have it... the systems work very well for me... i have been using it for quite a number of years, and i don't recall the last time somebody said - "hey, why did you not turn up to that meeting" - perhaps they have said it recently, but i can't remember... they'll need to put an entry into my calendar to remind me that i forgot ;)

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

As a note of interest... the ICAL URL google calendar gives you - the one you can plug into ical and numerous other programs, works well except that google strips out all alarms! Hopefully they will fix that bug someday soon, but as of yet (and since the start of that feature) - that bug exists. I wrote a little proxy-script to insert 20 minute prior to event alarms into the ical feed that google calendar outputs. So, i give my ical (mac calendar program) the ical URL of: http://tlims.cc/tools/google-ical-alarms/alarmit.cgi?ical-url=http://www.google.com/calendar/ical/....../basic.ics
Feel free to use the URL yourself to proxy your own feed through if you want default 20 minute sound/popup alarms inserted into all events. If there was a demand for it, i could make the proxy more configurable... but unfortunately reinserting (into the ical feed) the actual alarms you entered into google is more challenging, as the ical feed does not contain any information about them at all! A way to do it would be to scrape info from the google calendar website, but then your username/password is needed, and the programming is more intensive and time consuming...

enlightenment part two

2008-06-07T18:04:00.000-07:00

spiritually - recognise grace
intellectually - work smart, play smart
emotionally - relax and smell the roses
physically - work smart, play hard

the awakening

2008-06-04T07:28:00.000-07:00

its been an interesting past few weeks... starting a business in india... always knew it would be a challenge ... but that's the key... i always "knew" it would be a challenge... but now i "understand" some of the challenges.

to say that there have been a few frustrating times would be an understatement! i mean, what are those indian's thinking! some people would call me an indian too... i was born from Indian parents, in India and lived there for the first 12 years of my life... does that make me an Indian... absolutely not! am i an Australian then... having lived here for 22 years... does taking up the passport of australia make me an Australian... only to the intellectually challenged! a piece of paper does not change a thing! i think its more to do with who you associate with, who you can relate to, what you aspire for - and i refuse to be bound (in my spirit) by boundaries drawn by man (for practical purposed of crossing "man made borders" i follow protocol as the path of least resistance in those circumstances)...

anyway, back to business in India... i was reading about the collapsing of the wave function in quantum mechanics today, and the paper was discussing the fallacy of the existence of time as a fundamental building block. had these physicists never been to India i thought? they would have realised that a thousand years ago!!!!!!

on the point of "my word is my commitment" and if i am not following my word... then you can safely assume that something must be *unusually wrong*... well, Indians decided to teach me a lesson in life there as well! funny thing is, indian mythology is full of sayings like (and in particular the one that i mention now): "jaan jai magar vachan na jai" - which literally translates to, may i loose my life before i give up on my word! now i know where the "myth" in mythology comes from too!

having said that... the other side of the coin was extreme flexibility and an understanding for me (at a different level altogether) of exactly what happened to schrodingers cat and the issue of superposition!

I mean, when was the last time you got your boarding pass to go somwehre, your luggage had gone towards the plane... and you said to the people behind the checkin counter... "i've changed my mind, i think i want to go to a different city altogether" - and if you have, i would love to hear the tale and see the scars, as well as the blacklist that you are no doubt on! Well, in India, the response was "no problem sir, followed by a shout to the other employees of "oi, bring the luggage back", followed by very helpful assistance with getting on another flight... and the flight booked was just standard economy class... nothing special!

I'm used to getting dirty looks when i ask for a modification my my sandwich! "what was that.. you want a pizza without cheese, not only will that be an extra $5, i will also tell you what an idiot you are and how you are wasting my time - we have a 'standard build' for a reason, its because its what we have decided is best for you!"

Also, after telling someone exactly what i thought of them (and trust me, i don't swear, but i came very close that day on the phone to this guy, and black magic threats were not just hinted at but explicitly stated!) after they were stuffing me on a home rental deal - i of course also told them where to go and never to call me again... i have heard that my family has heard from that owner and he is willing to rent us the property! what the!!!!!!!!!! life lesson for me... relax! don't get so uptight about things... learn how to multitask, so that when one task takes longer, you can still be productive on others.

That brings me to another point... the most important point... i am fast approaching the "understanding" that india is different... not good, not bad, but different... and i really am starting to "appreciate" that its "different" rather than just saying that word but implying "bad"! Things take longer... but rather than fight that... learn to work with it by being able to switch between things... and delegating whereever needed. For example, you can assume safely that the agent will not turn up to the house on time to show you a property, so don't go yourself either... be available to go immediately when needed and have the ability to get there quickly, but send your lacky to go and wait and he can call you when the agent comes, or use another method. Might seem like a waste as its not very efficient of everyone's use of time, but hey, when was the last time you built software directly in assembly with only efficiency in mind... if with software it can be "the right tool for the right job", then why not with situations, circumstances, cultures, people, everything!

recognising both sides is really showing me the beauty of india, and that in my circumstances over there, its not about honouring your word or not honouring your word, but about inching forward for the progression of all.

there are some circumstances where there will be absolutes (and people have accepted them as such)... such things include the departure time of singapore airlines from any indian airport! people do make it on time for that... but the trick is to be able to adapt onself so that we don't go there and try to impose our set of absolutes on everyone there... but rather understand how the society at large works and gain the ability to work with it, and call out the absolutes where there really are some... but call our fewer absolutes in india than i would have in australia, as a result of the cultural difference, but in return for the appreciation that the system there is a lot more flexible (and one must be very flexible themselves in return)!

in short... a car trip today, fresh air on my face, helped me come to grips with "understanding" the mystery that is india, and the almighty enlightened me with power to enjoy that mystery and be productive with it - a great life lesson that is increasing my ability and making me a better person.

changes at work

2008-05-01T03:58:00.001-07:00

life always moves forward, never backwards... for everyone!

there have been some changes at work (well.. ex work now :) ... and two people in particular have stepped up to new roles... lets call them M and P.

i can't wait to see the great successes M and P achieve in the coming months... they are going to do absolutey fantastically... in line with my last email... M and P are people that step up and fulfill and go beyond any call of duty... their pride makes them excel... and most importantly, they are open to evolving... they don't pretend to know everything... which is so great to see (as no-one knows everything!!!, even though people believe believe they do!)... what that recognition does it give the heart and head the chance to learn new skills, new emotions, new controls and try new things and have new discoveries.

i know they will surround themselves with smart people to deliver real innovation and take the company much further... the last GM did great things, and the greatness of his legacy is that more greatness shall follow... of course the exGM shall do exceptional things elsewhere, but at exWork now... P and M will no doubt do greater things than any of us had even imagined... they will deliver innovation none of us dreamed of... i can't wait to see how P and M's spirits take the place further... and in faith, i congratulate them even before the events, for great things are sure to follow.

the emprors new clothes

2008-04-30T00:43:00.001-07:00

i am going to india soon and looking to start a venture there... as part of the venture, we will have to deal with some "high level" business people in various sectors in the industry.

i have "learned" that i should have a suit etc, so as to be appropriately attired to talk to these people.
(you might have guessed that i prefer casual clothes :)

i am very excited about the new ventures, and have few delusions about what the challenges ahead will be... and superficiality will be a MAJOR one of them! i generalise here, but only about those that really lack confidence and need to tell themselves that they are really "something" - but these indian "somethings" (high level management in various industry sectors, banking etc), for some of the part (not all of course) judge clothes, not talent... they judge by image, not substance... beauty is something that is only skin deep for them! how disgusting!

oh, i'll take a suit... one suit... but only to the extent that i want to not have that as a barrier to talk to someone, but then that suit will soon come off (i will wear something... my modesty would not allow otherwise, but the superficial barrier breaker will soon disappear)... and we will find out if the people are "really worth dealing with" ... if judgements are made on superficial elements alone, then they will be people i will not deal with.

i do not start a business to be locked in a cell in my heart but be able to more freely express the freedom that already exists in the heart.

India here i come... ready or not! I know i will not be rejected by the poor for they are usually rich in heart, and yet, i will only be rejected by the poor - the poor of spirit and the poor of heart!

I'm no mother teresa... but isn't it amazing, that the people who put her on a pedestal, are the same people who would say she is no beauty queen - when in reality, its their eyes that are dirty! mother teresa is one of the most beautiful people that has existed, open your real eyes and see!

Nim's Island

2008-04-06T22:53:00.000-07:00

Saw a movie last night, Nim's Island - loved it. It was a simple, cute, light
hearted movie where there is no "tradegies" and it has a happy ending. The
leading elder actress (not the little girl) was annoying, i recognise
her from some other movies and i can't recall liking her acting
before... and yesterday was no exception... i wish they just had
no-name actors in all movies, its so much better - easier to get
"into" the movie.

The show was a 9:15pm show... sunday night... the movie i think has been
running for a few weeks, so it wasn't a "just released" - which is
what i wanted... i like it when i don't have to sit next to a stranger in
a cinema :)

I rocked into the theatre at about 9:05pm, and noticed no-one else had come
in yet... it was one of the bigger theaters (palace cinemas - dendy, brighton),
it was a 400 seater (as one of the workers there told me). I walked around,
went to the front... felt the "curtain" in front of the screen... it was like
chain mail! it was made of metal! i even decided to take a self guided "behind
the scenes tour" and walked behind the big screen" - it was an interesting
experience :) I of course took a lot of photos with my phone camera (did not
take any from behind the main screen, it was dark, the photos i took were
of the theatre and the curtain in front, and the seating as a whole).

At exactly 9:15, i was still the only one in the cinema, i took my seat,
and one of the workers came by to check if they needed to "turn the projector
on" :) he saw me... and decided they could not go home early :) he was
friendly and we shared a joke about me having the most luxrious personal
movie experience :)

Right on que, the curtain lifted, the ads started rolling - about 10 minutes
in, a thought occured, "i should have asked them just to skip the ads" - the
funny part is... they probably would have... but anyway, there was only 3
minutes of ads left, so i didn't want to have to go out and tell them to
"fast-forward". The worker did come back a minute later, and handed me a large
popcorn... said it was on the house... seeing as i was alone and he was
emptying the machine, he thouht i might like it :-) now there's customer
service... he was thinking of the customer when he was emptying a machine,
and it was a gesture i appreciated.

I did the customary - "hey you there, turn your phone off" and then turned
my own phone on silent so as not to disturb myself. Loved the movie and
the experience.

Its not the first time i have been in the theatre by myself... was unusual
that it happened on a sunday night at 9:15pm this time though, usually
you get at least a handful of people. Not that i was complaining :-)

I was left wondering though, i wonder what a person in another country, another culture might think of this experience (would they like it, or would they be freaked out by it)... its not something you can probably even imagine happening in most countries around the world... or rather, in most countries, its only something that can be dreamed of and imagined, but it would be beyond hope to expect it to "really happen" :)

As for the movie, it comes highly recommended :)

7 years on, still looking fresh!

2008-04-01T03:45:00.000-07:00

food, glorious food... never before has a boy wanted more!

food is an important aspect of our lives... very important in fact... physically, we are indeed what we eat, our cells are made of it, our bones, our blood, our skin and all other physical aspects of us.

so why is it then, that we take so lightly, decisions about what is good or undesired. not in terms of taste (taste usually rules our lives), but in terms of discriminating between what will be good for our bodies.

Of course, our physical does also touch into the transcendental, our body does effect our mind and spirit... they are all connected.

I am indeed directly implying that not taking care of your physical, will limit you in your mental and spiritual. The spiritual is the strongest, but when its time to progress, it will send a message to the body to let go of some foods so that it is not held back.

At the end game, its probably inconsequential what we eat... its just atoms joined up in different ways, but we should not use that as an excuse unless we truly understand that... and if we did understand it, all our ways would be very different right now.

I became a vegan on the 24th of December 2006, and have never looked back. This decision was due to ethical reasons... i don't judge people that are not vegans... i am a hypocrite in many ways myself (probably more so than anyone else i know), but life is not about black&white but about a journey... and that was a step in my personal journey.

from tomorrow, for a limited time - i don't know its length, but i'll know when its time to stop, i am going to have nothing processed. i bought lots of fresh fruit and vegies today and have packed my lunch for tomorrow, the carrots, red capsicum, apples and bananas look delicious. its not easy keeping such a diet... i have done it for an 8 month period before (when i was about 21), and it was a time of extreme fitness, mental clarity and spiritual growth, much of it directly attributable to the food.

this was a very tough decision... not because of what i wanted to do... but i want to do it in a way that is mindful and respectful to others (as this is not yet an ethical decision, which for me becomes black and white, even thought with those i still try to maintain mindfulness and respect of others, but more in terms of learning how to politely disagree). last time i did this, i used to take my own food to restaurants when we went out for family outings, i even took my own food to someone's wedding reception. this time, i hope to be a bit more mindful of that... i'm thinking that i will stick to my decision, but make exceptions for special occasions (which might include the occasional lunch or dinner with friends).

i'm also not extending this to drinks.. not that i have alcohol... never had it... but to fizzy drinks etc... i think that time will come too... but now is not it... i'll know it within me...

anyway, wish me luck... not that its about luck, its about determination and knowing why... and my why is because i do want to cleanse firstly and foremostly my body - the mind and spirit will automatically get a boost.

when i die though... i want to decompose... not be like a macdonalds burger that has been on the shelf for 7 years... soft, still looking new... that's *not natural* by any stretch of the imagination!

free hugs

2008-03-29T00:21:00.000-07:00

come heither, come heither all ye who will participate in "earth hour" tonight... come here and let me give you a good whack!

a little knowledge is a dangerous thing - or so it is said! personally, i think a little knowledge can be a fantastic start - but you must know its little... for to mistake it for a lot is where the fallacy lies!

is some effort towards making the earth greener good... absolutely, but please, if all you are doing is turning off your lights and not consciously thinking about how you can change your lifestyle, come here and let me hit you! perhaps you can go on a diet and then put the weight straight back on at the end of it! perhaps you can give $10 in guilt money to the next beggar and think you are eradicating world poverty!

these actions make the world a "worse" (yes, that's right... i meant "worse") place in the long run, because they enable you to justify the current ways without significant change... and significant change is what is *needed*.

for all those that are taking the time to turn your lights off and taking that time to think how you might change your life to be more greener, how you might change your habits, how you might spread the world, how you might change something fundamental, come here and let me give you a hug!

all those charities that are promoting "earth hour" on the streets of melbourne, let me give you a good hiding!

today, met this guy who gave me a postcard type of thing with a huge "turn your lights off for earth hour" thing on it, produced by the WWF. first question by him was, do you know what WWF stands for... i said - sure, its: "world wildlife fund" - apparently i was wrong... very wrong apparently its "world wide fund for nature"... i'm not sure if its the same organisation that has changed its name or someone capitalising on the name. anyway, he then said... i don't want any money (always a good start, as i am very suspicious of these "charitable workers" on the streets that sign people up for commissions they get), but give me your name and we can send you info... i politely told him that i would pull the information from the website and save them the hassel to push it out to me via paper... he looked and saw that i was not about to change my mind... he said, "well, in that case, can i have the postcard back" while his hand moved towards the postcard in my hand... instantly i pulled back and said - "no". He gave it to me as information and i'm keeping it... too bad he might not have got a "signup commission" for my name. As i walked away, he yelled, "i want that postcard back", all he got was an emphatic "no". For him to use that (giving and taking back if no signup) as a temptation/marketing tool is just way below the belt.. not the first time i have heard of it happening, and i'm sure it won't be the last... but know this you dodgy charities, you might be doing some good work, but don't kill your moral fibre in the process. The poor lady that gave all she had is better than the rich man that gave lots more in absolute terms but little of his possession.

and all ye that are turning their lights out... come, come hither, either for a hug, or a whack and then a hug :)

signal strength

2008-03-26T04:36:00.000-07:00

this post is mostly a copy/paste of a poem by Khalil Gibran on "giving" - particularly aimed at a person i know who i believe can grow in the area of "receiving" - with bits highlighted specially for him... although its such a good poem, i think all of you will enjoy it (that's my entire readership of 3 i'm referring to now :)

(1234, its not you i am talking about, i think you need something a lot stronger than this poem :)

(ironic though isn't it, that a poem of "giving" is being used to show why "receiving" can be done with a much lighter heart).
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Then said a rich man, "Speak to us of Giving."

And he answered:

You give but little when you give of your possessions.

It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.

For what are your possessions but things you keep and guard for fear you may need them tomorrow?

And tomorrow, what shall tomorrow bring to the overprudent dog burying bones in the trackless sand as he follows the pilgrims to the holy city?

And what is fear of need but need itself?

Is not dread of thirst when your well is full, thirst that is unquenchable?

There are those who give little of the much which they have - and they give it for recognition and their hidden desire makes their gifts unwholesome.

And there are those who have little and give it all.

These are the believers in life and the bounty of life, and their coffer is never empty.

There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.

And there are those who give with pain, and that pain is their baptism.

And there are those who give and know not pain in giving, nor do they seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue;

They give as in yonder valley the myrtle breathes its fragrance into space.

Though the hands of such as these God speaks, and from behind their eyes He smiles upon the earth.

It is well to give when asked, but it is better to give unasked, through understanding;

And to the open-handed the search for one who shall receive is joy greater than giving

And is there aught you would withhold?

All you have shall some day be given;

Therefore give now, that the season of giving may be yours and not your inheritors'.

You often say, "I would give, but only to the deserving."

The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your pasture.

They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.

Surely he who is worthy to receive his days and his nights is worthy of all else from you.

And he who has deserved to drink from the ocean of life deserves to fill his cup from your little stream.

And what desert greater shall there be than that which lies in the courage and the confidence, nay the charity, of receiving?

And who are you that men should rend their bosom and unveil their pride, that you may see their worth naked and their pride unabashed?

See first that you yourself deserve to be a giver, and an instrument of giving.

For in truth it is life that gives unto life - while you, who deem yourself a giver, are but a witness.

And you receivers - and you are all receivers - assume no weight of gratitude, lest you lay a yoke upon yourself and upon him who gives.

Rather rise together with the giver on his gifts as on wings;

For to be overmindful of your debt, is to doubt his generosity who has the free-hearted earth for mother, and God for father.

deboo - drums do drum

2008-03-26T04:25:00.001-07:00

spoke to S today (who is currently in India), she said that she had booked her tickets to france and greece.

the process is fascinating... you can book any one of multiple ways, internet, phone etc... in this case, the phone was used, S was told that the ticket would be electronic (you'll see in a minute why i emphasised that), but for the payment, an account would be sent home with a credit card swiping machine so that he can physically take the card and swipe it!!!

I find it so funny that because of fraud levels in India, the cheapest fix they have found is to go to people's home and take credit card swipes... while the tickets are still delivered electronically! :)

In countries where labour is expensive, i'm sure a diffrent solution would have been created to take care of fraud rates... but not so in India, where an accountant with a masters degree and 5 years experience under his belt is getting half of what an IT graduate in Australia would get straight out of uni.

You get what you pay for is a phrase often heard in the corridors of time where the black dragon guards the gates of wisdom, perhaps it has some merit, but i wonder if its mostly getting used by people who get paid for what they cannot give!

chaotic comprehensions

2008-02-25T03:32:00.000-08:00

"To see the world in a grain of sand,
And heaven in a wild flower:
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour."
- so said william blake!

quite a quote isn't it... are you shivering yet, longing for salvation, bursting with emotion and past your depth in understanding.

infinity... oh infinity... what art thou?

in school... year 10 i think it was... mr.sneddon, the teacher said, if there is a frog 1 meter from the wall, and he jumps half the distance towards the wall every time... how many jumps will it take him to get to the wall...

first it was analytical... after 1 jump, he will be half a meter from the wall, after another jump, he will be 0.25 metres, after the third jump he will be 0.125 meters... then it stuck me... he can jump for all eternity, make an infinite number of jumps... but he ain't getting to that wall!

what was that... eternity... infinite... the heartbeat rose, the mind swelled, muscles ached, my knees got weak... but, but, but... the frog could see the wall... almost reach out and touch it, and yet, in all of eternity ... after an infinite number of jumps, he was not going to be at it!

infinity was a fluffy concept before then... something that was unbounded... and here it was... "infinity was bounded by the distance of 1 meter"! how could that be... what really is outside the shell of the universe, the walls on which are stuck the stars!

then came more concepts of infinity... infinity squared was greater than infinity... what!!!! "infinity squared" did i hear you say... surely infinity is just infinity... i mean half of zero is still zero, right? (i was not to learn that zero too is not quite zero until university, but that is a blog for another day! ... ahh... zero... what an amazing thing... oh how my heart rises in praise for zero, and wants to sing about it until infinity come)...

i got a glimpse into eternity, and understood "the more i learn, the more i realise there is to learn" - the mystery only deepened the more i studied...

oh, how i pray for salvation... and find it i do... not in comprehension, but in the mystery of knowledge!

oscar the fluffy green doll...!!!

2008-02-25T03:20:00.000-08:00

did you know that apparently 800 billion people in the world watch the oscars... don't believe me... just listen to their commentary... i think they are still on!

i got a passing glimpse of them tonight... never seen anything so boring - and to think it comes out of the "entertainment industry".

even in the 5 minute glimpse though, it was obvious that a lack of being able to change makeup and the ability to "take 30 second takes 2 hours apart so there is enough time to change the makeup" is really not doing them any good... you really do need some time to repaint an expression on your face when you have had it all pulled back and stuffed with botox!

the only movies actors can get away doing these days without putting makeup on are horror films!

i always did like ernie and burt better anyway!

oh, and i do wish to thank my producer, director, sidekicks, underlings, overlings, middlelings, cast, crew, the transport industry, airlines, bus drivers, helicopters, cars, ships, cameras, red eye reduction tools and the gimp!

its a good thing that at least they are [insert cliché here!... oh yeah] "keepin it real"!

a wake up call...

2008-02-24T04:29:00.000-08:00

i have a friend at work... i will change the name to protect the innocent (and guilty :-) - lets call him "James Dean" - JD for short...

well, the other day, as many of us sat around the table - discussing work and life, this person seemed quite contrary...

we we all making comments and gossiping about another particular person at work (goosy gander - GG), who has proven to be very unethical and has verbally (emotionally) threatned one of our colleagues (count drac - CD) - we were of course all astounded that GG was earning so much money (when we found out what he approx earns) - and quickly made links to unfairness and how some bad people seem to get the money and made links to how he was a liar and a cheat for even getting that money...

of course, JD objected... he was not in agreeance with what GG does, but said that he thought it was just fine that GG had managed to fool enough people to get him his salary... and that "good on him" for being able to do it...

shock! horror! was the order of the day... we of course were blinded by our emotions and took JD's comment to mean that he endorsed how GG operates with other people... and in particular, how he operated with CD.

Oh, i too was on the bandwagon with everyone else, and sometimes the most verbal having goes at JD... but... fortunately, very fortunately, i was lucky enough to be giving JD a ride home and got to discuss the issue further...

When JD clarified what he meant... that we were not ultimate judge jury and executioners in deciding why what GG was getting financially was "fair or not" and that if we were serious about what we all meant, we would be doing things very differently in our own lives... and that to quite an extent, we are all living in our ivory towers passing judgement on others - i realised the foundation from which he was coming - and that he was not defending GG's action or demeanor at all, but he did not coralate that with the amount of money he was getting.

it was a real wake up call... and i have realised that JD is one of the very few people i know that is not "fooling himself" into thinking that he is helping eradicate world poverty by going to work every day.

he's lit a flame, and i intend to feed it!

mysterious universe

2008-02-24T04:23:00.000-08:00

one of my favourite podcasts is the one from mysteriousuniverse.org - brilliant, just brilliant... even if half the stuff is guff, it makes you think, if people can even imagine such things, they must surely be out there... for surely the universe is infinite...

the comprehension of infinity is for a post of another day... but lets just say... if you don't get goose bumps, if your skin does not tingle, if you mind does not go into a frenzy, if your heartbeat does not increase, if you are not in awe, on your knees, begging for more, if your soul does not yearn and long for enlightenment when you hear the word "infinity" - then you don't quite comprehend what infinity is...

women prime ministers

2008-02-24T04:04:00.000-08:00

as the saying goes... behind every successful man, there is a woman - and behind every unsuccessful one, there is two!

well, so much for men... but what about women... i'm not one for equality - i think the strengths of the different sexes are different, but i am one for not holding someone back based on their gender, when the gender has nothing to do with the skill in question...

too many men are held back from emotional and intuitive contributions because of the fact they are men... and too may women are held back in intellectual or corporate success persuits because they are women... and i believe that in both those cases, the skills mentioned are not gender specific at all.

that brings me to... the US is making a big deal at the moment with hillary clinton wanting to be the first woman president (esentially, the primary person in government power) - australia is saying that julie bishop or julia gillard might be the next female prime minster here. to top it all, this is all placed in their marketing as leading the world in women's lib etc etc etc... in fact, most of the marketing says that in various 3rd world countries, women are so opressed, they could never even dream of a powerful role in society until "the system is fixed".

i recall a few women prime ministers... in fact, the only ones i can recall are from 3rd world countries, indira gandhi (india), srimavo (sri lanka), benizar bhutto - pakistan... what.. pakistan... an islamic nation... how could they have had a woman lead their country - i mean they are a male dominant opressive society right?

oh yeah... there was the one in the west as well, the iron maiden... or the iron curtain or iron lady or whatever she was called.. margaret thatcher that is...

having had much exposure to 3rd world countries, i know the women are generally very oppressed - especially when they are below or near the poverty line (and perhaps even in the lower middle classes)... but it also made me think... perhaps things are not as black and white as they are portrayed to be... the west is not the leader in women's lib and we should stop thinking on how to fix the worlds wayward governments, before really looking at our own backyards, and seeing if democracy is really serving our country the best...

the power of words

2008-02-22T03:00:00.000-08:00

"once there was a little child that used to eat too much sugar - his mother took him to a preacher and asked the preacher to tell him not to eat so much sugar. the preacher asked them to come back in 4 weeks and he would do so. 4 weeks later, the mother and child returned, and the preacher simply said: 'child, you must not eat so much sugar', the mother was astounded at the simplicity of the saying, and asked the preacher why he did not utter the very same words 4 weeks ago - the preacher simply said, lady, that is because at that time, i used to have too much sugar"!.

what a profound story... i have seen the truth of it in my life, over and over again.

many a person had told me, tv is no good, you should watch very little of it, or not at all... yada, yada, yada, yada! sure it made sense, it even had impact, many a time great, but always temporary.

then - one fine evening walking back to the car from work, a person who is an absolutely inspiration to me said (in context, as we were talking about it), i don't watch that much tv, its kept in my cupboard, and if there something particular i want to watch, i take it out, watch it, then keep it back!

flick! went the switch... call it a revelation, call it enlightnment, call it whatever you will, but from that moment on, my attitude to tv has been very different... i actually find many others things more interesting - tv has become a virtual side thing that is more insignificant than anything else.

not everything is that instant, but i have found that when it comes from someone who has a solid foundation, it usually sticks!

many would claim that perhaps i was ready at that time to hear that sentence and no matter who said it to me, it would have had the same impact... well, let me tell you with no uncertainty, perhaps i was ready, but that being ready was just a prerequesite... the power of words spoken by someone who live it, had impact... my ego is big, but its not so big to assume i am the sole proprietor of everything (including my feelings, values and beliefs)... we are not islands, we might look like and island, but underneath - we are all connected, and the impact a living person can make is real.

there have been times, when i have "drawn inspiration" from something someone had said that really appealed to me (even though i though they themselves were frauds), but that takes hard work - and although not afraid of hard work, it also be a fallacy that unless you have worked hard, you don't know the value of it. over time complacency "can" set it... but its not a mandatory!

1001 ways to wage a war

2008-02-22T02:48:00.000-08:00

a pen is mightier than the sword, unless that is, you are fighting someone who actually has a sword!

a war can be waged in many ways... probably even a 1001 ways - and possibly even more than the number or arabian nights that are out there!

gandhi uttered these pearls of wisdom: you must support your friends in their mistakes, but make sure it is the friend and not the mistake that you are supporting!

someone once told me... i'm brutally honest. interesting saying, but is it necessarily to be brutal??? could diplomacy have been used to achieve a deeper and more meaningful and lasting result?

i fear we live in the age where brutal honesty is honoured as a value rather than just honesty, with the brutal part only being used when necessary! and sometimes, it is necessary.

subtlety however can achieve much, slapstick humour can make you laugh out loud, but subtle humour tickles the brain.

a person who is one of the greatest inspirations to me (the next blog in a few minutes will cover many a thing that is related to him) says, that at most times, things are not always black and white, many a time they are shades of grey!

today (and herewith), i see much wisdom in those words :)

innovation

2008-02-21T02:54:00.000-08:00

what really is innovation?

ever heard "necessity is the mother of invention" - i have... too many times, albeit in different ways!

recently, i was at the enterprise 2.0 forum (and i detest that term, see: this for my rant on that! - ringlerun's my name, playing the trumpet is my game!) and some of the talks said that to deliver good innovative products, we needed to find out what the user wants and then deliver on that.

in fact, there was a distinct "so what" element to any development... "so what" if you are building stuff that can do xyz... "real innovation is when you build something that the user wants" was claimed!

well, in my mind, that is a type of innovation, yes, if we focus on the user as the element that makes innovation, "innovation"! - then we stand to loose out of a much more important type of "innovation"

the type of innovation i have in mind is not something that has a destiny or goal in mind... it's not trying to fulfill a need... its pure in its pursuit of itself. applications will come "out of" the innovated, surely they will, but you cannot build them as a goal. for example, a branch of mathematics is the chaos theory - which includes fractals. who ever would have thought that fractal algorithms are one of the best ways of compressing data - that application of fractals was never thought of when the chaos theory came about... compression was but a side effect of the innovative theory.

so, my question to you is, are you always trying to fulfill a need? or are you taking the time (in your own life personally, and your organisation in general) to pursue "real innovation in its purest form".

less is more!

2008-02-11T03:58:00.000-08:00

ever read a book and then thought the movie did not do it justice! happens most of the time... not always, but most of the time (for me anyway, and i suspect for most people).

a book gives you so much more details than a movie, and yet, somehow, leaves a lot more to your imagination. it feeds your imagination, you have to fill in the visuals and quite a bit of detail yourself, and from having to do that yourself, you engage in it in so much a deeper level.

of course, there is the odd movie that has done justice to a book, and in rare cases in fact, even done a better job than the book.

i find b&w photography a bit like a book... leaves a bit to your imagination... gives it emotion, despite there being no colour (in fact, as a result of there being no colour)... connects with you as it engages you at a deeper level. of course, i have not given up on colour photography... i think there are circumstances when its brilliant, but as a preference, i think i quite like the aspect of mystery a b&w has :-)

in a pub without a plan!

2008-02-02T04:55:00.001-08:00

have you heard that "its a fine line between a saint and a madman".

well, let me tell you that it ain't so!

i saw a few photos of a family friend today... at a night club... drinking, dancing and doing the usual mumbo jumbo...

how ordinary!!!

now firstly, a disclaimer... i don't think i'm perfect (well, actually i do (just like i believe *everyone* is perfect)... but not in the context you might perceive perfect... so in that context, lets say i'm not perfect) ... this post could very well have been about my short comings, but its not... however, hopefully i'm not so blind that i cannot see the parallels between what i am about to write... so as to start doing something about my shortcomings at least...

anyway... so this guy had beer in hand, appearing all happy... but what was his emotional state... well, he wants to be cool and different... and he is driven by those emotions and his actions reflect that... he is consciously and subconsciously thinking of ways to appear cooler... or to try to achieve significance through material means...

now, a saint might find himself in the same circumstance... but his mindset would be in a completely different world... and therein lies the difference... he is not driven by peer pressure, by the need for superficial fulfillment...

the mental states of the two people could not be further apart... and there is no fine line there... in outward appearances, it might appear to be a fine line... but in the inner state, they are a universe apart...

now, most of us might think that we are saints... our mental state is that of saints... but let me share with you this also: if someone does not drink, you will not often find them in the pub!!! and, if they are constantly in the pub, because that is what they have always known, but are always thinking of other paths... then there are two major options... be lazy, and only think of the outside like a dream... or do something about where you are!

remember "norman" from the TV ads 10 years ago, he was fat... always used to "think" that he had just won the australian open, or a golf trophy... but never got fit... and always wondered why because his thoughts were always great!

well, if your thoughts are to do great things... solve world poverty and education issues, help the needy, feed the hungry... then i ask you this (and its not just you i ask!), what are you doing in a 9-5... what is your plan? are you a non-drinker sitting in a pub without a plan?

where do you go to my lovely

2008-01-31T21:38:00.000-08:00

where is it that you go to, when you are alone? where do your thoughts drift? are they in fantasies of faeries and forests, do you travel to the moon and back?

i know where you go to my lovely, cause i can look inside your head!

i remember the back streets of naples!

there is freedom within

2008-01-31T02:11:00.001-08:00

how do you let go of what you cannot control? by taking charge of what you can of course!

not my will by thy will should always be in our hearts and minds - but what is thy will? well, that is where taking charge comes in... we need to work... work hard, consistently, diligently with all the fire in our heart to ensure that we do our best to understand what thy will is so that we can fulfill our destiny.

the rest of it is about letting go and about learning to accept with faith and grace.

we must fight... there must be a war... there will indeed be blood.. that fight is with the demons within... with the doubter, with the laziness, with the greed and with any addiction - a few are lucky to say they do not suffer from the above, the rest of us are addicts but don't know it... be it an addiction to TV, food, gossip, anthing really... - think you are not addicted, then give it up and see if you get "bored and itchy" or if you know how to live with yourself... oh yes, there must be war indeed... and many a battle will be fought...

a calmness shall descend though... and it shall set us free, not from our cells, but within them.

sounds of silence!

2008-01-31T02:10:00.000-08:00

wo dakho bandar gaya!

2008-01-27T04:04:00.000-08:00

"look, there goes the monkey!" is a common cry i have heard amongst some indian's these days when they see andrew symonds get out and walk off the field!

the funny thing is, i had never heard him being called a "bandar" before the media beat it all up in australia!

although mass media is in its dying throws (give it another 7-15 years before its completely wiped off the face of the earth!), they do have a significant amount of power at the moment, but they never exercise it with responsibility.

the days of reporting are long dead... the days of sensationalism are here and now... wake up to it, and subsequently, get over it and be part of the people that kill the mass media, not part of the followers that will claim it was their idea after its dead!

mac world madness

2008-01-16T03:45:00.000-08:00

hype hype hype... hype hype hype... hype hype hype...

do you know who needs to create hype all the time, people who are not confident their products can do their talking.

its one thing educating the public on what is available and generating some excitement about how one could use something new... its another thing altogether to get carried away and treat gimmicks as an end in themselves - that's the shallow end of the world!

today, at mac world, steve jobs presented on some new things... i did not hear the talk, but i heard some people absolutely raving on about the "new laptop that is the thinest in the world" ... sure... great... so its like 0.1mm's thinner than other stuff out there already... whoaaaeeee. what are its uses, how is it going to help change the industry for the better i asked... of course, no answers were forthcoming... the thiness was an end in itself...

i think its fantastic... but nothing to be fanatical over... apple deserve a pat on the back for always pushing the boundaries... but they with this particular piece (thin laptop) are not causing any revolutions! empty vessels make the loudest sounds! - is that clapping i hear echoing again!!!

i'm no mac basher... i'm in fact typing this blog on a macbook... its pretty good... i have found idioms about "apple just works" to be false... well, apple products do "just work" unless they are "not working at the time". the macbook i have crashes frequently... its nothing awsome... 50 gazillion times better than windows for sure... but still nothing awsome... (says something about windoze doesn't it!)... my favourite OS is linux (ubuntu is my OS of choice and is on my primary computer) - as much for its philosophy as for its quality, but unfortunately there is some software i like that is not available on linux, so i got this macbook as well... anyway, back to the "i'm no mac basher" - i do have an iphone... and i love it... i can imagine another 100 things it should have, but even without them, i think apple bought out a product that did and is changing the market... its multi touch enabling new types of software to be developed for it and enabling a paradigm shift in usability. all the other components work reasonably well as well, and i congratulate apple on that great product that is causing a shift. i think much praise that apple got over the iphone was deserved, but please, please, please, don't be so blind that you cannot see when the hype is just simply hype without substance, and when its deserved.

this time, the new products do not deserve the level of hype they are getting, a little pat on the back for apple perhaps... but if you are one of those people that was clapping at the keynote with a glint in your eye.... get a life!

early mornings with the camera in hand

2008-01-12T03:42:00.000-08:00

my new routine, wake up sometime between 4:30am and 5:30am and start to head out (so far i have been numerous times to different parts of the beach) ... walk with the camera in hand for about an hour taking pictures of anything and everything.

at first i thought, having the camera in hand will restrict me and bind me to look at certain things and ignore others - this might be true, but more on this in a second. However, for the most part, i found it gave me a heightened sense of awareness as i was attentive to the surroundings.

to me, carrying the camera and learning a bit of photography at the moment is a bit like learning the alphabet and reading... it might restrict your thoughts (for more on this, see my essay on Language, Rationality, Science, Philosophy and Faith), but once you know how to read, you can start reading books, novels, fairy tales, anything, and they open up your world to the thoughts of others and worlds undreamed of.

similarly, although i believe its very important to be able to enjoy nature and learn to be with yourself without a camera (a habit i am ensuring i don't loose, by making sure i don't take the camera every time), having the camera and learning some photography (albeit in a very experimental way) is in ways enabling me to see things i used to miss.

cricket is a gentlemans game

2008-01-12T03:28:00.000-08:00

bah! sack em! sack em all! sack all those arrogant aussie cricket players - ones who sledge others and then in the most "unaustralian" way dob in the indians! but while we are at it, we should sack all the indian fans, those calling up ponting's parents and threatning them, those that burn effigys of players they don't like, those absolute hooligans that don't know how to treat a visiting country with respect (refer to australia's last visit to india), those that have not enough sense to see the good (australian players are doing some very good stuff for the poor in india, but you don't often hear about that!)

let not the pot call the kettle black, and let he who has not sinned throw the first stone!

i honestly believe that most of the aussie team should be sacked... they are very bad sportmen - a good sportsmen is not one who wins all the time, but one who knows how to accept a win - with humility, and accept a loss, with grace - most australian teams do not know the meanings of the words humility and grace - but while we are sacking most of them, ensure that we also ban any international cricket games in india until they rowdy crowd learns the meaning of the very same words!

a laugh at life, i laugh at my tomorrow

2008-01-09T02:57:00.000-08:00

i laugh at life, i laugh at my tomorrow. a little trippy, but very true.

time a dimension that makes our life linear, memory is an aspect that makes it volatile. what if we could implant memories, would you do it? post experience, is there anything more vivid than memory? in fact, is there anything such as the "now experience"? after all, in a dimension constrained by time, it takes time to absorb the experience even while having it, making the experience of the experience itself historical.

when you look out at space, what do you see? do you see the stars? i see history, i see what existed, not as it is now, but as it was hundreds, thousands, millions and in some cases, billions of years ago. can we then ever be able to experience the now? i did have an answer once, but that now is history!

perspective

2007-12-12T02:40:00.000-08:00

i was watching one of my favourite songs and videos of all time:

i heard this song and really got into it just before an earthwatch expidition that i had joined that was about elephants in the tsavo east national park in kenya/africa. I got reminded of it today by visiting one of my first attempts at blogging!

Its bought back some perspective... the trip which i wrote briefly about and which is covered on the earthwatch site was really a life changing experience. Every moment is a life changing experience in some sense of the word, but that was an experience that i often recall and that gives me a sense of perspective and really does renew me with hope! (just doing a serach on google, i realise that the story has made it into next years expedition guide as well - sorry... was just stroking my ego there... nothing else :)

anyway, back to the real issue... the trip gave me a sense of perspective that i often recall... out in the jungle, it was just life in raw and it was beautiful... the emotions too were unfiltered... i was scared... it sure was "r.a.w" primal fear that kicked in when i heard the lions roar well before sunrise one morning... there used to be a pathway with a platform at the end of it (which we were not supposed to go on when it was dark as the lions don't have any problems jumping 2 meters high - but that was not going to stop me :-) !) the lions were a few hundred meters away, and i have heard them roar from closer before that and since... but that time, i believe they had just completed a chase and the lions were probably wanting to eat while the lioness having done all the hard work were showing their displeasure at the lion's just walking in when the job was done... anyway, the fear was very real and i charged backwards...

what was obvious though, is that when you take away the many layers of what we believe is necessary, you come to learn some good stuff about youself and other people... the people that were there... i will hold as treasures in my heart forever... they were not there for any personal gain... they wanted to contribute to and to learn about the environment in some way... that common goal had bought us together, and it was beautiful... i really got to know them for them as there were no hidden agendas and nothing to prove to anyone. What astounded me was i too was a slightly different person with them... and i loved it.. i like the way i was/am (no traumatic background that needs to be dealt with here), but in the company of good people, i got to jump a level too... purely by association and influence i think... as i was very open to their influence...
i have of course tried to embody some of the qualities i tried to develop there in daily life now... i do some of the time, at other times i falter.. but get picked up again... :-) and that is what i meant by life changing... i was in an environment whereby the rawness of it, and the good naturedness of it gave me a glimpse of what can be, and that helps set a direction in your life, it helps you fine tune your goals, vision and aspirations...

a few tangent offshoots on this blog... i started with something in mind, which i can't recall now... it became more a sharing ... which i loved - hope you did too :-)

i highly highly highly recommend taking a trip with earthwatch (or any other org that does similar stuff) ... alone, not with someone you know... alone is really a key on it i think... its something special... and its something i know i will be doing numerous times in the coming years...

time for reflection

2007-12-10T01:02:00.000-08:00

time for reflection seems in short supply these days... and i'm not talking about the java api on reflection :)

i'm talking about people taking the time to reflect and think about things... i heard once that the king thinks and thinks and never does act, a wise man thinks then acts and the jester acts then thinks "what have i done!".

i would squarely put most people that use social networking sites in the jester's category! there is so much noise, so much to tell, so much to say, in fact, i want people told about things automatically, i want a broadcast of my status, i want people to see my photos, and... i want to see there's! this is the information "consumer" society... consume, consume, consume!!! consume, consume, consume!!! its the greedy capitalism of the information age!

... oh, sorry i disappeared for 2 minutes, had to update my tweet saying that i was writing this blog... now where was i! oh yes, doing multiple things at once "can" be an asset... but in things that require devotion or dedication, its a liability - you cannot drive and watch a movie at the same time - and if you do, you are very stupid and you will not be able to do either properly.

keeping up with friends on the social networking sites to an extent is like that... some people think that saying "hi" on a social networking sites is called "maintaining a relationship" and that sharing all the time brings collaboration and innovation... they think knowing people's status' is knowing them better, whereas its worse than not knowing anything as it gives false sense of knowledge!

And having thoughts and putting them into one line tweets - in fact even having the ability to be able to put them into one line tweets, shows a real lack of understanding and a very surface thought.

Real stuff takes time... you cannot feed a malnourished person 100 meals in a day and say, "they should be normal now"!

Deep thoughts take time, meaningful relationships take time...

I'm all for mailing lists and social networking and tweets, but in a responsible way! Even the good Lord took time to go into the desert and reflect and pray. Salvation can and will be ours in an instant, it does not take longer than that... but that instant will come after hard work and trust and faith and reflection and prayer.

So i ask this to you, are you tweets after deep reflection, and you taking time out for real relationships (including your relationship with yourself!).

I'm all for keeping in touch and keeping abreast of what is happening, there is many a mailing list i have joined to keep abreast of the topics interest without actually digging deep and contributing in code... but i did not consider my being a member of the list and level of participation as significant contribution.

I feel however that most people who use social networks today consider the superficial level to be all that is required and in many cases, the network is only built and maintained as a network that one can "use" in time of need to find a job, to solicit to, or outright plain just get something from the "connections"!

Don't be surprised that even though you might have 50 CEO's as your "connections", you can't get a job! You have been banking with the wrong bank! The CEO's are not your salvation, the CEO's are not your saviour... The Lord is your salvation, the Lord is your saviour! And if you take more than 10 seconds a day maintaining your relationship with the Lord, do the same with other people and you will find that the Lord speaks to you through them, and to them through you, in deep and meaningful ways you never knew existed.

Disclaimer: I know people that manage to have an active online social network and some of them even tweet regularly, and yet they maintain deep and meaningful relationships too and are very intelligent people. If you thought i spoke about you in the previous sentence, then it was not you i spoke about, because the people i speak about would be busy reflecting on how they use the medium!

commitee meetings...

2007-10-29T03:30:00.000-07:00

policy, policy, policy!!!!! when will i stop hearing that word... well, in all honesty, i stopped hearing it quite a while ago... its reeks of "constraint, restrained and contained" to me...

i feel our company sometimes moves to slow... sure there are certain constraints, but often times, its because people are not very dynamic...

let me put a disclaimer in here first... "good thing i'm perfect" (yes, that was meant to be sarcy!) ... some people i know use that phrase as vindication for whatever they are about to say... they let loose after it as if now its all right to shoot anyone and everyone with whatever words that follow...

well, having said that... it is a good thing that *i am indeed perfect*

in this morning's meeting, i made the mistake of asking people what they thought about an idea for the website... i said the concept of what was possible (putting live stats on the website) and immediately people attached the specific example rendered to showcase the concept... i tried to distinguish the concept from the idea and get a decision, but boy... once those horses were loose... there was only "red hat" thinking going on!!! there was no way we were going to be reaching a 5-minute-decision today! people had empires to build, processes were thrown at me, procedures and the right "approval path" the who should be involved... (as an aside... the next time i hear someone say, they never involve the right people... i have expertise in this area and i was not told about that project till the last minute... i'm going to throw water on them or something... maybe, maybe... just maybe, they don't render their opinion in a way that the other person thinks it valuable... maybe they are not asking us because they can work it out on their own.. a not everone is "dumber-than-me" attitude would go a looong way to building the right attitude!!!)

oh, and about policies... i won't renender the specific example... but all too often, when someone comes up with an idea... everyone else says in chorus... lets ammend the policy, but how will we make that into a policy - after all, we have to be "fair" to all... policy, policy, policy... arrr!!!!!!

have a framework... and a framework is a lot looser than a policy... have a vision... but for heavens sake, don't turn everything into a policy... hire people you trust, work with people you trust and then do something amazing... "trust them" ... they won't abuse the system... and genuine mistakes don't need to be dealt with the development of a "policy"!

a framework a vision is to help keep everyone's eyes on the same goal... a policy is to keep everyone at the dumbest common denominator!

sionara!