Using a GPS Navigator - Good or Bad Development?

Yesterday I went to south Finland to unknown territory. I borrowed Sunil's Global Positioning System (GPS) Navigator. It is not an expensive one, but has all the basic functions.



After my trip I sat down to analyse whether using the GPS Navigator is a good or bad technological and social development.

It was absolutely superb in that I lost no time finding the half a dozen places that I had to visit. I just followed the voice which told me exactly what to do, and the map on the small screen with the picture of the car pointed exactly where I was.

This development of a couple of metres accuracy for this system had been held back by the Americans for quite a few years as they did not want the general public to get this technology for common use.

The other great feature was that it had most of the fixed radar cameras listed on the highway, and it also warned me if I was above the speed limit when approaching them. I could see which cars had the GPS Navigator fixed, as they would be zooming along, and then suddenly they would slow down from 120 kmph to 60 kmph!

Considering I got a Euro 115 fine a few weeks ago when Annikki and I were on our way to Helsinki, as I could not see a snow covered speed sign, investment of Euro 70 or 80 in a GPS Navigator is certainly paid for in just this as well as the amount of petrol one saves when driving around a new city looking for a location.

I remember on my last trip to Helsinki I drove around 350 km looking for places and spent the good part of a day just missing the right locations!

However, using the GPS Navigator has very serious social implications - - bad ones.

In the old days I had a fantastic sense of direction. I could look at a map and find the location almost with a sense of smell. And once I visited a place, I could go back to it again and again as my brain had registered the coordinates.

That is a human trait which has dwindled over the years. Animals have retained this intelligence, as also many other traits which humans no longer possess. That intelligence will be even further degraded as kids start to use the GPS Navigator as their mode of locating places rather than their brain and the Compass.

The great sport of "Forest Navigation", which is extremely popular in all the Scandinavian countries, will lose its significance and importance as more and more youngsters take to using the GPS Navigator.

The second serious implication is that speed limits on the roads will lose their meaning. As more vehicles get fitted with GPS Navigators, and the speed trap cameras with their radar system are logged on to the system, motorists will drive at whatever speed they want to and slow down when the GPS Navigator tells them that they are approaching a camera and radar installation.

Not only is this a dangerous development but it shows a class divide in that those who are wealthy and technologically savvy enough to get hold of a GPS Navigator will avoid the penalties while the poor will have to be punished, for what sometimes may be just a genuine mistake.

In short, less money for the Government, more danger on the roads, and probably a higher accident rate on the highways!

Technological advancement or a retrograde step in the development of mankind?

"Mysore Matthan" Community on Orkut

I was very pleasantly surprised to receive an email from Helena (Maria) Matthan, granddaughter of the late Kuriyan Matthan, one of my very best friends during my professional life in India, that she had started the "Mysore Matthan" Community on Orkut.

She wanted me to be the Moderator of this Community. I informed her that someone younger should have this responsibility, but I would certainly contribute to its development.

Mysore Matthan was also a Kuriyan Matthan, Dewann Bahadur and First member of the Council of Ministers of the Mysore Maharaja, and was the uncle of Helena's grandfather.

Mysore Matthan helped Kuriyan Matthan obtain his job in Mandya Sugars.

I have promised to recount the story of Helena's grandfather a long time ago,. One day i will keep that promise.

However, may I ask you to join the Dewan Bahadur Mysore Matthan Community on Orket.

What is talent?

(Also posted on Seventh Heaven and Kooler Talk Blogs.)

I usually do not have much time for TV except to throw off my shoes, put my feet up, watch a comedy or detective play and sleep through half of it!

One programme, however, that I have come to like is GPS hosted by Fareed Zakaria on CNN International, late on a Sunday evening.

Zakaria has some fascinating guests. He runs his interviews which do not show his personal bias.

Today was a show in which he had a discussion with an author, Malcolm Gladwell.

Gladwell has written a book called "Outliers". Although I have not read the book and will probably never will, I was fascinated by the discussion and interview.

The main thrust of the view of Gladwell was that "Talent is the Desire to Practice".

I immediately sent this message to several young friends of mine. I wonder how many of them will see this message in all its significance and glory.

The key word is "Desire".

To succeed in anything one must have that "Desire".
To reach that "Desire" one must "Work Hard".
The Hard Work is what we call "Practice"
And Practice leads to "Talent".

Gladwell gave the example of the Beatles, who in 1959 worked 8 hour nights in a strip club in Hamburg playing music. This is enormously hard work. It was this hard work which resulted in the moulding of the most famous Pop Group in the world.

Gladwell made very significant points about the influence of culture on failure or success and also about the development of reading aboilities at a young age which results in the possibility of success.

This statement took me back to the days when Annikki was writing her thesis about the Montessori System of Education. What I heard today was the restatement of what Maria Montessori said 7 decades ago when she noted that a small child will continue to repeat a task till he / she masters it. The outcome is talent, in small steps.

I go back to my school days where I used to watch a dear friend, Elijah Elias, more commonly known to all of us as Ooky, come to school at some unearthly hour and keep on bowling at the nets to achieve pace and direction. That was the talent of Ooky in cricket! But it is this Talent born out of Desire and Hard Work achieved by Practice which has made him succeed in his career in later life.

I take the example of our grandson, Samuel, who at the age of 12 simply loves reading - a book a day.

If his reading is focused correctly, Samuel could be outstanding in his career.

I only hope that in his school in England they realise this. I hope at least one of his teachers has read the book, "Outliers" by Malcolm Gladwell or knows the principles of the Maria Montessori Education System!

Thank you Mr. Fareed Zakaria.

Guess what? I am not the only one who has been skiving!

I took a look around a few of my regular blog bookmarks - after a long recess.

What did I find?

I am not the only one who has been skiving. The last entry by Susanna was on April 10th - a good 14 days ago!

But my most favourite blogger, someone I inspired into blogging, Abe Tharakan, has been going strong.

Today he has some absolutely superb photographs of wildlife by KO Isaac from the Kanha National Park, Madhya Pradesh, India.

It revived fond memories of the trip Annikki and I made in 1989 to the Park where we had some glorious experiences.

On our very first day in the Park we had two experiences with the wild tiger. The first was unique as a huge specimen came wandering down the centre of the road towards our car. Our driver stopped the car and we waited till the tiger approached us, growled at the obstruction, walked around the car with its face not more that a metre from mine, passed us by, came back onto the road and strode off. As we got out after it had passed by and gone a safe distance (safe for us), it turned to look at us and then went on its way.

The second encounter was more forced as we took an elephant ride to a lair where a tiger and its cubs were quietly enjoying themselves.

I wish I could lay my hands on the superb photographs that Annikki took during that visit.

We also visited Jabalpur on that trip and discovered the marble canyon, something I had never heard of during my history or geography lessons in an Indian School. Truly marvelous.

I promise to bring you some of these photographs in my next spate of blogging.

After this period where I suffered writer's block, I have been greatly inspired by Abe to get back to blogging.

Thank you Abe.

My iMac died, Viva la Mac Mini!

(Also posted on my Seventh Heaven and Kooler Talk Blogs.)

My 10 year old iMac finally died. I tried to revive it. Failed.

I went back to my older macs, the Performa 6400 and tried to use that, but it was tooooo slooow.

I decided to splurge and get a new Mac.

I have a perfectly good Samsung SyncMaster 900 SL Monitor. I have many USB Keyboards and Mice, all in good condition. I have USB headphones, a dlink wireless USB adaptor, a La Cie Firewire / USB DVD / CD station, so I decided to buy the Mac Mini.



A difficult decision whether to buy the basic version mac Mini costing Euro 599 with a 120 GB Hard Disk or a 320 GB Hard Disk with 2 GB of memory.

As most of my work will be network computing, the extra hard disk was not important. Also I have many hard disks lying around, from 1 GB up to 60 GB.

I checked the memory prices and found that a 1 GB memory costs just Euro 30 while a 3 GB costs just Euro 60. I will have to determine whether it is user installable and then upgrade. So I spent just Euro 599.

Considering I got the new Leopard system, which costs Euro 128 and also the latest iLife software, which costs Euro 78, Thew Mac Mini actually cost me just Euro 400. Foor a 2 GHZ Core 2 Duo, with a 8 x Superdrive station which is a DVD±R, DL DVD±RW / CD RW, and with a NVDIDIA GeForce 9400M video card with 128 main memory with a DDR3 SDRAM, etc., etc., this must be one of the best buys that I have made in a decade.

On my way to the office I picked up Annikki from home to drop her at church. She was amazed to see the size of my new computer - 16.5 cm by 16.5 cm by 5 cm.

The whole computer set up was done in less than an hour, upgraded to the latest system and it is working just fine. The speaker system is a bit tinny, but as I usually used head phones, this is not a drawback for me. The Mac Mini recognised all the hardware I connected and went to the internet without any problem through the dlink adaptor!

Sunil, who has been commenting on my attachment, sentimental, to my iMac and eMac boxes which occupy almost all the space under my office table, may be quite pleased with the size the new Mac Mini box!! :-)

Felled tree

(Also posted on my Seventh Heaven Blog.)

Have you ever thought how it must feel if one falls to the ground just like a felled tree?

Even during my boxing days, when Neelam Lakhaney (also a Mumbai Cathedralite 59er Savageite), half my size, was whipping me in the Heavy Weight category, I never fell to the ground.

Today, I was on my morning rounds on my scooter. I got home around noon. I got off the scooter, and as is my common practice, I turn around, take of my glasses, then remove my helmet, put on my glasses, hang the helmet over one of the rear view mirrors and then trot up the stairs, home.

Today was a bit different.

As I got off the bike and was wheeling around, it was as if my feet were stuck in a place while my body tipped over and crashed to the ground. My helmeted head thumped onto the cemented section, just a few centimetres away from a huge cement block.

I tried to figure out what had happened. As I twisted around, I saw that the bottom of my track suit had hooked into the metal stand on which the scooter is put to rest.

As I had tried to move away, one feet was pulled away from me and I crashed to the ground, straight as an axed tree.

As my head smashed into the ground, I was ever so grateful for the glass-fibre reinforced helmet which surrounded my head. I was badly bruised on one knee, while the other was just grazed. The palms of my hand were bruised, as was one elbow.

But my head was intact. Was I grateful for the plastic helmet!!

Felt good to have been a plastics technologist which subject and material have no doubt saved many lives in different environments!

Another accident

This time of the year I am usually on my scooter.

Today, just to save a few minutes, I decided to go to the office in the car!

I did not get very far. At the first roundabout near our home, I slowed down and then, as I entered the circle, I was blinded by the ultra-bright sun straight in my eyes. Before I realised it I had hit a car which was in the circle.

The fault is mine, but there were mitigating circumstances. I called the Police and they wrote the report. Although I am the guilty party, they did not charge me.

I needed to report the accident so that my insurance will cover the damage to the other car. There was virtually no damage to mine.

The main outcome is that I will lose some more of my no claim bonus which I had built up over the last 25 years. Sad, but it is true that old age is creeping in and I am no longer very safe on the roads.

Serial postings!!

It is indeed a surprise to put up a series of blog postings in just a couple of days!.

From Joanna returns to Newcastle

Events however dictated such action as Joanna and the grandkids left for Newcastle early today. Annikki bade farewell at Vesaisentie.

From Joanna returns to Newcastle

From Joanna returns to Newcastle

From Joanna returns to Newcastle

I accompanied them to the airport.

From Joanna returns to Newcastle

Ani was dropped off by her parents as she went with Joanna to help out with the kids. She has become part of Joanna's family. Ani has finished her high school, and was doing nothing important till graduation day at the end of May, this was a nice chance for Joanna to get some help as all the children and Joanna really love her. Ani will also accompany the family to India in July / August of this year.

Yesterday was also a strange day in Oulu - weather-wise! (Am I using this word wrongly?)

We had bright sunshine, then cloudy skies, a fierce wind, followed by a snow blizzard, and then tiny hailstones followed by a brilliant sunny evening. The temperature fluctuated between -5 C (-15 C when the wind was blowing) to + 20 C. One does not know whether we are having winter, spring or summer!!

Surprise Party

In Finland, the 40th birthday is usually well celebrated. Tony will be 40 on the 23rd of April.

From Tony's 40th Birthday

Chief mischief maker! Joanna with Maria and Tony.

As Joanna had to return by today, 19th April, Tony's company, LudoCraft Oy and Joanna organised a surprise party for his work-mates and his family.

Tony objects to such events, so the secret had to be total.

From Tony's 40th Birthday

Birthday boy with Samu.

From Tony's 40th Birthday

Cutting the delicious cake.

How Joanna and his work colleagues managed this, I do not know. But they lured him to the party place on Friday evening. He was surely surprised to find all his colleagues and his family assembled there for a great event.

From Tony's 40th Birthday

Brother-in-law, Teemu, sister, Heidi, father, Seppo and mother, Maire.

An Indian meal (Chicken Biriyani, Vegetable Pulav, Rogan Josh, Dhal Makhani, Garlic Nan and Nan with Raita) was served up by The Royal Garden, Indian Cuisine Section. As they promised, the food never ran out although everyone ate more than enough.

The three cakes made by the Huovisen Leipomo (Bakery) with a toffee topping and especially meant for allergic eaters, was outstanding.

There was plenty of coke and orange fizzy drinks as well as fruit juices for everyone. Joanna had brought plenty of spicy Indian Bombay Mixes from Newcastle. Crisps were very popular! The alcohol flowed like water, with champagne, whiskey and beer topping the table.

There were plenty of computer games for the addicts - which is everyone in Tony's company.

From Tony's 40th Birthday

Annikki and Daniel.

From Tony's 40th Birthday

Daniel.

Annikki and I made a soft exit at around 10 pm along with the two younger grandchildren. With the help of Ani, Joanna's right and left hand, we managed to get the two little ones to sleep.

Joanna, Tony and Samu returned just after 3 am, and also just about 15 minutes before little Maria woke up. Daniel obviously ate too much at the party, mainly crisp. When he got home and had a couple of slices of pizza, he had stomach pain and cried in his sleep till he threw up the excess, without waking up!

From Tony's 40th Birthday

Ildikó and Alma.

Altogether a very exciting 40th birthday celebration, and we have to wait for the next one when Joanna turns this age, about a decade from now! :-)

April snowman

The childhood spirit was reignited in Annikki the day Joanna and her kids arrived for the Easter holidays. Daniel (5 in May) was Annikki’s constant companion. They were very busy in the garden.

Many of you will remember how Annikki produced this snowman to greet me on my birthday in 2006. The childlike spirit lives on, especially when the grandchildren arrive on the scene!!!

There was a little snow on the ground.



When I came home one evening, there were a couple of snowladies (identified by the sprigs of twigs on the head) in the garden, one being pulled on a sleigh by the reindeer.



Last night, as Joanna and the grandkids are due to leave for Newcastle on Sunday morning, Annikki decided she would put some colour into her snow scenery and had a plethora of candles burning with her snow friends.

The picture does no justice to the radiant colours that we could see from the kitchen window. The candles have been burning right through the night and will do so till the family depart at 06:45 am this Sunday morning. (Unfortunately, I could not capture the true beauty of the scenery with the digital camera.)

Annikki comes out of her mould

It has been a long time since Annikki has produced one of her masterpiece cake designs. To get one right she has to have the inspiration.

With Joanna and kids here for a short break for Easter, this motivation appeared as she produced one of her best Easter Sunday meals of roast lamb with roast potatoes, and a fresh salad. Joanna helped by getting the broccoli fry absolutely perfect.

Samuel


Daniel


Maria

and the biggest kid of them all:


ME
The four kids enjoyed their meal!

To top the repast, Annikki produced a very traditional "Pasha" sweet. But to top it she created one of her masterpiece design cakes -- a bird house.





Who knows, but this may start a new era of Cake Designing by Annikki!

Chinese fast Food in Oulu

(Also posted on Oulu Best Buy Blog.)

There are literally dozens of Chinese, Vietnamese and Thai Restaurants in Oulu serving very nearly the same food and of approximately the same quality. Noodle House was an exception, but due to a paucity of demand for Chinese noodle preparations, it closed down.

What has sprung up in its place is something quite unique. (AWing Restaurant, Kauppurienkatu 5, 90100 Oulu; Tel: 08 333839<; Mobile: 044 544 0880; Managing Director: BILLY LU.)



The Chef is a Master Cook. His dream is to start a school for Chinese cooking in Oulu. Seeing his talents and verstaility, plus a quiet dynamism, he will succeed.,

Billy Lu's Fast Food Restaurant (AWing) was featured in the latest Kaleva Peto Edition. When he called me on Thursday morning; I told him about it. He was thrilled. He now has it proudly displayed in his small and neat restaurant.

When I first walked into his restaurant, I was not captured by his menu or his food, but the beautiful nature of the the owner. He wanted to talk, and he did. I soon discovered much about this young man. I knew I could try a few of his preparations.

On the next visit I asked him to make me a super hot chicken noodle. Boy, it was good. He then prepared a series of dishes for some of the German residents in India House. The sweet and sour chicken with noodle was exceptionally good.

One Saturday evening I visiited the restaurant to be served a special health soup he cooks for himself. It was truly invigorating.

Billy Lu will go far.

If you want anything special, and he has a huge repertoire of dishes at his command, please call Billy Lu at 044 544 0880. And if you want it spiced - just tell him that you want it as spiced as "JACOB". You will not be disappointed!

Murphy's Law

Whenever I used to lecture about Project Management, the first main topic I touched upon was Murphy's Law:

"Anything that can go wrong will go wrong."

My good friend, Kamu, left for a trip to Helsinki on Thursday night. I promised to take his wife, Naiomi, to work on Saturday morning at 08:40.

I went to the car at 08:10. As life would have it, I found the battery dead - I had left my headlights on overnight.

I thought to go on Joanna's scooter to Kamu's place and use his car - but even though the temperature has been rising over the last few days, I found the scooter embedded in snow, snow which would have taken a good part of half an hour to clear.

So the only alternative was to call for a taxi - but when I looked in my wallet, I had only Euro 10 in cash. As I do not pay by card, I had to plan to go to the automat first to collect cash.

I decided to call the cab but could not find my mobile. I went inside the house and dialled the mobile number to locate it, but then realised I had put it on silent, so I would not hear the ring.

However, I did ring, and I could hear the shudder of a silent phone, but still could not think where I put it.

Then the first piece of luck struck - I put my hand in my trouser pocket - and I found the mobile in it!

From then on Murphy's Law was in reverse as I called the cab, went to the automat to draw the money, and then went to Kamu's place to reach exactly at the promised time 08:40! Kamu's wife reached work ON TIME!

Parallel thinking is a must when faced with such a situation. Parallel action is also a must. So simultaneous actions so that milestones can be reached by any of several routes will always help you overcome the disastrous effects of Murphy's Law. Most Project Managers give up when faced with a series of bad breaks and start to reschedule - a sign of a loser!

I no longer lecture on any subjects, but Murphy's Law along with Parkinson's Law ("Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion.") and the Peter Principle ("In a Hierarchy Every Employee Tends to Rise to His Level of Incompetence") are three of the unique aspects of my experience in working life which have stayed in my mind in my retirement.

Rainbow Sun?

Annikki and I were driving home about 6 in the evening the other day. The sun was well above the horizon. I saw what looked like a rainbow at the same level as the sun, but to the left of it.

I commented that there was a rainbow in front of us.

Annikki was quick to reply that it was not a rainbow, but a duplication of the sun image with a rainbow effect.

Unfortunately I did not have my camera with me.

Does anyone know anything about this effect as I have not seen it before?

Annikki seems to have seen this last year. She is positive that it is not a rainbow but just the same as a rainbow. It is always seen as a mirror image of the sun at the same level.

A quick search of Google, both text and images, did not reveal any recordings of this phenomenon.

Family arrive in Oulu

On Monday, I had a dentist's appointment. Helena Piippo is an exceptionally good dentist. She is so careful that her customers feel no pain.

I had already warned her that I could fall off to sleep at the drop of a hat.

She experienced that when she was working on a difficult tooth. She suddenly found I was fast asleep on her dentist's chair. She did not disturb me till she finished her job. She was in amazement as how I had slept through the series of manoeuvres she had done to fill a rather large cavity!

Late on Monday night, Joanna with her brood, Samuel (12), Daniel (almost 5) and Maria (1+), safely arrived in Oulu. Annikki had dinner for them and they ate after a long and tedious journey from Newcastle.

The grandkids are looking exceptionlly well and all of them were happy to land in their own home in Oulu. Maria is like a little doll which is full of energy! Annikki and I are so happy to be able to be with them, even though it is only for 2 weeks.



The Moon was parked in their garden when they arrived. Annikki had been at work!

Early Tuesday, Samu and I went to the airport to find a book he had lost. The book of 370 pages had been left by him somewhere after he landed in Oulu Airport. He had read 340 pages on his flight and was desperate to finish it! Sadly there was no sign of it either in the Info desk or the Blue 1 counter. Later, I checked the Finnair Lost Property Section, and it was also not there.

More about their stay as the days roll on.

Subject popularity

I wanted to see which topics I had written about in all my blogs got the greatest number of comments. Although I am not running comments-oriented blogs, as most people are in touch with me directly by email or phone, this was just a random opinion gathering study.

I was surprised to see the maximum number of comments I received was when I wrote about my childhood experiences in watching wrestling in Bangalore in the early 1950s.

There seems to have been a nerve there with my thoughts about Dara Singh, King Kong, Flash Gordon, the Masked Angel and many more EXCITING NAMES.

A raging controversy developed as to whether there were two Dara Singhs - the Wrestler and the Actor.

It was Most interesting to see how many people, like me, revelled in all that make believe wrestling bouts that we were shown. All it says it that those Wrestlers were really superb Actors . and besides enduring a great deal of pain, they still could stick to their scripts! NO WONDER DARA SINGH THE WRESTLER WAS ALSO A GREAT ACTOR!

Wrestling Champion of the World - I seriously do not believe there was any such title - it was a game of fun and make believe of stuntmen to be watched and enjoyed.

But I must say, as a 10 year old, I really did enjoy all that tremendous bouts - the drop kick, the throat stamp, the the overhead spin, and many more manoeuvres that I would go home and practice - in secret!

And to finally resolve the controversy about two Dara Singhs - there was only one, the Wrestler who became an Actor and later a Rajya Sabha Member who did a lot for sports in general. IHe was appointed to the Rajya Sabha in the year 2003 for his contribution to SPORT and AS AN ARTISTE.

The following profile is fromthe Rajya sabha Booklet.

Detailed Profile: Shri Dara Singh


Name Shri Dara Singh
Father's Name Shri Surat Singh
Mother's Name Shrimati Balwant Kaur
Date of Birth 1928-11-19
Birth Place Village Dharmuchak, Distt. Amritsar (Punjab)
Maritial Status Married On 11 May 1961
Spouse Name Shrimati Surjit Kaur Randhawa
No. of Children Three daughters, Two Sons
State Name Nominated
Party Name Bharatiya Janata Party
Permanent Address 308, Dara Villa, A.B.Nair Road, Juhu, Mumbai 400049
Telephone : {022} 26206720(O), 26703070(R)
Present Address 10, Dr. R.P. Road, New Delhi. 110001
Telephone : 23712828, 23752112, 9868181233(M)
Email id darasingh@sansad.nic.in
Educational Qualifications Self-educated
Profession Agriculture, Wrestling, Cine Artiste (Producer and Director)
Positions Held Aug. 2003 Nominated to Rajya Sabha Sept.
2003-Feb. 2004 Member, Committee on Human Resource Development
Feb. 2004 - 2006 Member, Consultative Committee for the Ministry of Youth Affairs and SportsAug.
2004 onwards Member, Committee on Information Technology
2006 onwards Member, Consultative Committee for the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting
Freedom Fighter No
Books Published Meri Atmakatha (Punjabi), 1989
Social and Cultural Activities, Literary, Artistic and Scientific Accomplishments and other Special Interests Has written, directed and produced a Hindi film Mera Desh Mera Dharam and a Punjabi film Sawa Lakh Se Ek Ladawn (historical) along with ten other Punjabi and Hindi films; won (i) Professional Indian Wrestling Championship in 1953, (ii) Commonwealth Wrestling Championship in 1959 by defeating Canadian Champion George Godianko and (iii) World Wrestling Championship in 1968 by defeating Lou Theze of America; was conferred the Best Actor Award for the film Jagga by the Government of India which was presented by late Shrimati Indira Gandhi; honoured as honorary citizen of New Jersey by the city of New Jersey, U.S.A.
Sports, Clubs, Favourite Pastimes and Recreation Sports, exercise, reading and cinema
Countries Visited All over the world in connection with wrestling tournaments except China
Other Information President, (i) All India Jat Samaj since 1997, and
(ii) Bombay Jat Samaj since 1987; President, Cine Artist Association since 2005

I am sure this blog entry will draw a lot of flak!!!