tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-73527192024-03-10T08:15:47.830+05:30Yet Another Backpacker from IndiaNotes about my travels and trips and some random observationsAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.comBlogger335125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-27184693695208357802014-10-26T02:27:00.003+05:302014-10-26T02:27:41.329+05:30Random thoughts on public companies<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;">Some time ago when I didn't understand Market economics and how public companies worked, I used to believe that if you have a lot of money you are inevitably going to make much more (money attracts money).</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;">I would imagine that worst cast you can just get a lot of interest on that money. Now I see the problems with that thinking.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;">The companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon, Apple etc. have lots of money through public investments in their stocks, but that money isn't very hard to "keep" or "increase" as the investors are very quick to punish you if they don't see growth of your company (their money). </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;">Turns out just growing doesn't help you have to "beat" expectations which are usually pretty optimistic too. This becomes an issue. These kind of growth expectations usually require companies to either have found a business that is bound to keep growing like Ads or Enterprise or Hardware (with enough efforts for sure) Or keep coming up with new ideas.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;">The new ideas part is tricky and is basically a big bet. Reading a book on AIG's demise I learned how they came up with certain ideas that basically caused them to go bankrupt when markets crashed in 2007. Tech companies don't usually do something as risky but nonetheless any business is a risk.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;">So thats the thing, even if you have money you can just sit on it with interest seeking activities, you gotta find ways to grow the money faster than other alternatives which people could instead choice to do with their money themselves. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: Roboto, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.2000007629395px;">Just being a big company with lots of money (through public investments) isn't enough, which also bring another observation previous performance isn't an indication of future.</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-44278400251090247462014-04-18T10:43:00.000+05:302014-04-18T12:08:49.275+05:30Indian Elections: The subtle difference between naivety, ignorance and being outright dishonest<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I have been meaning to write a post about my view on the ongoing Lok Sabha elections in India. We are in the middle of more than a month long process, so I hoped to give out my thoughts not as a justification of what happened or didn't happen but more about the process of it.<br />
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I got compelled to write this post because of many posts by my friends on Facebook/Google+ and various new articles/comments I have been reading. As I figured everyone (including me) has such a strong opinion that arguments didn't really go anywhere, discussions quickly turned in to flamewars and enimity arouse. One of my friend felt so compelled to support his views that on not liking his views he choose to un-friend me. Well good for you.<br />
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<b>A quick background on the problem/situation</b>.(skip this and next para if you already know) There is a new party in India called "Aam Admi Party" /AAP (translation: Common man's party) which performed suprizingly well in the State election for state of Delhi, coming out second highest in number and decimating one of the biggest part "Congress" to very low numbers. BJP is the third party which was likely the favorite and did come out to be the largest number party but didn't get enough numbers to form government. So AAP formed the government with help of Congress. This government lasted 49 days after which the Chief Minister Mr. Arvind Kejirwal gave his resignation.<br />
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He and his party then started working for a bigger challenge and impact i.e the National elections. Until all this happened it was almost clear that BJP would pretty much win the National elections with big margin because Congress government has done pretty bad over the last few years. Many Indians were looking forward to have Mr. Narendra Modi as the Prime Minister and now with AAP coming into the scene and directly competing against BJP there is a strong rivalry in the supporters of the two party.<br />
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Now the disclaimer: Everything I mentioned till now and most things mentioned below will try to factual and not really try to support one party or another but just try to clarify what I feel is wrong information spread by people in the name of intellectual opinions.<br />
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Okay, so what is the problem?<br />
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As usual many people are expressing their wise thoughts about why Mr. Narendra Modi won't be a good fit. Some of the reasons given:<br />
1) "He favours the rich, gave out cheap land to industrialist etc."<br />
2) "He took land from farmers by force and gave it to industrialist etc."<br />
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There are many other reasons but I choose these as they relates to matters which I have done quite a bit of studies our last 2-3 years and feel that they are very complex matters which people seem to have very simple answers to. Just like how every Indian watching a cricket match always knows how each ball should have been played by every player.<br />
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People seem to have a very noble notion of helping the poor and common man. When asked for a plan its usually, well these Rich people are so rich why don't we take away some of their money and give it to the poor. Why don't we just tax the rich more. Sell them things (Land/Inputs etc.) at much higher price to make all the money. Seeing these arguments makes me wonder if people are just naive/ignorance or outright dishonest.<br />
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Any one who has done some basic studies in economics (some may even just get it from common sense) will understand that things are not as easy as said above. Rich people/companies around the world have many many places they can invest their wealth and governments/countries have to compete for these investments by providing incentives in return for hope of boosting local economy by jobs and infrastructure development which brings money to area through taxes and other indirect measures. If government was to just sell the land to people the only money that could be earned was the current cost of land and some possible interest on that amount. So yes if you just want to give away all the land to poor people to build houses that will not take you too far.<br />
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The argument of taxing the rich more is similar, if you tax them too high they move else-where, what is better <a href="http://www.whichoffshore.com/news/milli-leave">40% of nothing or 30% of 1 Billion</a> ? So the tax can't just be<a href="http://businesstoday.intoday.in/story/an-additional-tax-on-super-rich-will-be-self-defeating/1/191598.html"> arbitrary</a> just as the pricing can't be arbitrary or the production goes offshore and you are left with less revenues and less jobs.<br />
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I am all for a state that cares about the poor and provides welfare to people in need, but these things need government to have money to provide them, the revenues come from developing resources/infrastructure and getting investments rather than by scaring the people who can invest into your economy.<br />
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One thing people need to understand is that when the economy will grow rich will get richer, that shouldn't be a problem as long as people at all levels are ultimately getting the benefit. It won't happen right away but it will happen if the policies are developed properly. Claiming a policy/state/person to be bad because it/he/she helped rich become richer without seeing overall effects of it is again sign of being naive or being dishonest.<br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-17738613819576569792011-09-23T13:26:00.003+05:302011-12-07T12:42:12.150+05:30Bodyboarding at Huntington Beach, Los Angeles<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Not spending much time blogging, I will just post some photos from a few trips to Los Angeles, spending times at beaches doing Body Boarding, my new found interest thanks to Mai. </div>
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<br /></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com6411 Main St, Huntington Beach, CA 92648, USA33.660297 -117.999226533.6074145 -118.0781905 33.7131795 -117.9202625tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-35101485187307961922011-01-17T16:57:00.001+05:302011-01-17T16:58:23.848+05:30Costa RicaCosta rica trip started from Arriving in San Jose in the evening of Tuesday after taking a 8.5 hrs bus from Granada, Nicaragua. This was the first time I crossed inter-country border by land so I was both excited and nervous about the Visa handling stuff, nervous because it was a visa on arrival.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Arenal Green, Arenal, Costa Rica</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Arenal Green, Arenal, Costa Rica</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Arenal Green, Arenal, Costa Rica</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Puero Viejo's Playa Negra</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOz03ao-wI/AAAAAAAAWDU/5cCihqcvjDY/s1600/IMG_4822.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="212" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOz03ao-wI/AAAAAAAAWDU/5cCihqcvjDY/s320/IMG_4822.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Puero Viejo, Playa Negra (Black sand/beach)</td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
The bus stop for Transnica is in the downtown between Ave 3 and Ave 5 on Calle 222.<br />
We had to take a taxi(=2000 colones) from the bus stop to the Best Western Inn. Based on some consulation from the the taxi driver and the hotel personnel we headed to commercial center El Pueblo as the place for Latinos to hangout for reggeaton and other latino music. On arriving El Pueblo we figured it was pretty dead. The place didn't really have any crowd.<br />
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A bar which is very audible from outside played the pop music even that bar didn't have more than 10 people mostly a bunch of white guys :) talk about Latinos hangout and latin music. It was clear that the place is no fun on a Tuesday evening. It turns out that most places are good only from Thursday to Saturday evening. We could try that again when we get back to San Jose.<br />
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Anyway we decided to eat at the place called "Lukas", the place gives a fine dinning feel from the very start and the food is worth the praise on guidebooks and internet. The waiter and cook pays lot of attention to individual details of the order and veggie food didn't have to suck therefore. Priyam mentioned that the non-veg stuff was pretty good and so were the cocktails.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzFn4B_QI/AAAAAAAAV98/Uj8ALraX1yY/s1600/IMG_4692.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzFn4B_QI/AAAAAAAAV98/Uj8ALraX1yY/s320/IMG_4692.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The trail at Cahuita National Park</td></tr>
</tbody></table>Next day as we had planned earlier we left for the Caribbean city of Cahuita, we hadn't preplanned the trip a lot actually and once we were in Nicaragua and heading to Costa Rica we figured our options given number of days(=5). We quickly decided to skip at least one side of the country as the whole transport system was based on the capital San Jose as a hub. So from any city on east to any city in west and vice versa you were traveling inland for about 4 + 6 hrs (to and from San Jose) and most connections won't work late evening. Based on some discussion we decided to see the Caribbean side instead of pacific (turned out to be a good decision).<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzE2H03KI/AAAAAAAAV90/nbkortHLtwQ/s1600/IMG_4690.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzE2H03KI/AAAAAAAAV90/nbkortHLtwQ/s320/IMG_4690.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Beach by the trail at Cahuita National Park</td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
Cahuita city isn't a big one in any way. As the guide book described its pretty much two parallel streets. I was excited to see that it was the "reggae" capital of the area, only later did I realize that Reggae isn't reggaeton and was pretty disappointed. Anyway since we were in the city to see the Cahuita National Park we did that, turned out even the park was nothing but a 1-2 miles trail along the beach. The beach and the scenery are quite beautiful and makeup for the otherwise nothing-worth-visiting part.<br />
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Next to Cahuita is the city of Puerto Viejo where we had decided to stay overnight instead of Cahuita based on the guidebook (fortunately), I can't believe I was actually planning to visit Cahuita for the night-life until I figured the difference between Reggae and Reggaeton. So we were at Puerto Viejo<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzr_a75MI/AAAAAAAAWCM/mMf1emmFhVc/s1600/IMG_4803.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzr_a75MI/AAAAAAAAWCM/mMf1emmFhVc/s320/IMG_4803.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; padding-top: 4px; text-align: center;">Bob Marley is every where in the Carribe side of Costa Rica</td></tr>
</tbody></table>pretty close to the bus terminal stop at a restaurant looking for a place to sleep for that evening. The confidence we had in the Nicaraguan and Costa Rican restaurant for providing free wifi access was showing up and it kept up all the time.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzWLWELgI/AAAAAAAAV_w/4N2TJeVE4jg/s1600/IMG_4738.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzWLWELgI/AAAAAAAAV_w/4N2TJeVE4jg/s320/IMG_4738.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">At Cahuita National Park</td></tr>
</tbody></table>We figured a place nearby called Maritza hotel, went and looked at the place which offered both Dorms and Private rooms for reasonable prices (6$ and 30$ respectively) and ended up taking the private rooms which were pretty comfortable. Talking to keeper I came to know about the Bar in front offering Salsa lessons and dancing on Wednesday i.e that night, wow finally, I was going to be able to dance Salsa. So I did, the number of people was small but the music was great, they even had reggaeton, cumbia, merengue and bachata along with some unavoidable hip hop/pop music. After dancing there for couple of hours we all headed to the place called "Johny's". This is a great nightclub right next to the ocean, great music, lot of people. Though in sometime I figured the social dancing scene wasn't that big and eventually I decide to head back to hotel.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzJvy5gRI/AAAAAAAAV-c/5HbvcVA8s70/s1600/IMG_4703.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="298" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzJvy5gRI/AAAAAAAAV-c/5HbvcVA8s70/s320/IMG_4703.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cahuita National Park</td></tr>
</tbody></table>Next day we were going to try Scuba diving or Snorkeling based on whatever was possible/good. Turned out the water was not good enough for diving (poor visibility) and the guy suggested we instead try surfing. We did. We were able to get surfing lessons from the friend of this guy for about 50$ per person for 2 hours. In short the lessons were just amazing. In 2 hrs we were actually able to stand surf with little guidance and high success rate at the end. (In case you want to try the same, we got the referral from the PADI certified dive center by the Johny's place IIRC the guy's name was Rony.)<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOz4z7hRjI/AAAAAAAAWD4/zhYoMJLgJw4/s1600/IMG_4838.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOz4z7hRjI/AAAAAAAAWD4/zhYoMJLgJw4/s320/IMG_4838.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The famous Playa Negra at Puerto Veijo</td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
<div><br />
</div><div>We took the afternoon bus to San Jose. In short El pueblo was bad even on Thursday night. Anyway as planed we headed to Arenal next morning. The bus ride quite scenic and hilly is about 3 hrs with a change needed at La fortuna (IIRC).<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOziW5ZO0I/AAAAAAAAWBE/5y7DYzwRKPs/s1600/IMG_4785.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOziW5ZO0I/AAAAAAAAWBE/5y7DYzwRKPs/s320/IMG_4785.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Puerto Viejo</td></tr>
</tbody></table></div><div><br />
</div><div>At Arenal we stayed at Arenal green, which is slightly away from the city center but had good room and reasonable prices ~62$. Being home of the famous live volcano makes this city hotels very pricey. So its suggested to stay slightly away from city center and pay taxi charges which aren't that bad plus most tours provide pickup and drop-off anyway. In Arenal we did Ziplining which was my first time. It was good stuff definitely recommended. The zipline tour we had a surprise thing called Tarjan jump which was definitely the best part :)<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzuheTbrI/AAAAAAAAWCk/A6z5VTrOtUw/s1600/IMG_4810.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOzuheTbrI/AAAAAAAAWCk/A6z5VTrOtUw/s320/IMG_4810.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Dos Pasos Restaurant in Puero Viejo</td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
We came back to San Jose on Saturday evening, this evening I was able to visit the place called Fiesta Latino in El Pueblo which was a big dance floor with rotating latin music. Here came to know Costa Rican Cumbia which I am now a big fan of. Here is a illustrative dance video of the same to finish the post:<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TSOz4z7hRjI/AAAAAAAAWD4/zhYoMJLgJw4/s1600/IMG_4838.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.youtube.com/embed/LvbM6zv8XVc?feature=player_embedded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br />
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If you come across some good Costa Rican cumbia music, please drop by a comment.<br />
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</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-21711176129191531132010-12-13T08:36:00.000+05:302010-12-13T08:36:13.414+05:30NicaraguaSo after quite a big break from traveling since my last trip to Sydney, well about 3 months. I went on a trip to Nicaragua and Costa Rica for my thanksgiving vacation + 3 days of leave making 9 days of vacation time.<br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">As usual people asked why Nicaragua or Costa Rica well, the answer was simple we looked at tickets to places where we don't need visa and which are nearby Nicaragua and Costa rica came out to be good candidates. Other option could have been Mexico + Havana(Cuba) or Puerto Rico but Cuba was dropped because of legal issues involved and Puerto Rico was too costly and kinda far.</div><div><br />
</div><div><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TQQUeNa-jAI/AAAAAAAAVKc/i_wrsBUgWuc/s1600/IMG_4396.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TQQUeNa-jAI/AAAAAAAAVKc/i_wrsBUgWuc/s320/IMG_4396.jpg" style="cursor: move;" width="320" /></a></div><div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Managua Night.</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">So we arrived in Managua the capital of Nicaragua on Saturday evening around 9 PM. We already asked Holiday Inn to arrange for a pickup which they agreed to at cost of 5$ (initially quoting 6$, yeah bargaining in developing countries :)). Later we realized we didn't have to pay, don't know why.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The cab played a mix of reggeaton and other latin music but the best part was the remix of "Kabhi to Najar Milao" with a Bachata song, which immediately put a big smile on my face. I sure was in Latin America and would have great music for next few days.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">We were recommended the "Moods" club by the cab guy and I did a basic search but didn't find enough and we decided to give Moods a shot and may be return to Chaman or XS (excess) if it didn't work fine. </div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Moods is kinda far (costed 7$ in cab), the entry was 10$ per head. As soon as we entered I was sure I was in right place. They had good Reggeaton music good is understatement :). Over time they played pretty much all genre of Latin music Reggeaton, Salsa, Merengue and then Rock music and even some Pop songs. The pattern was to play 5-10 songs of each category in a row so everyone can have great time as long as they like some music :).</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The drinks were about 4$ or 81 Cordobas each. The bartender made a Mojito with some thing additional (IIRC called bueno something) and it was super good.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">As we had to travel to Granada next day we left by about 2:30 AM, the party is meant to go all night but by this time there were only about a forth of the people as were when we entered.</div><div><br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: large;">Day 2: Granada</span></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Managua to Granada is about 45 KM and has bus about every 15-20 minutes, the bus takes about 1:20.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The fare was 14 Cordobas. The taxi would have costed about 40$.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The guy who dropped us to the bus terminal have told us that the Granada was a more tranquila city. And it was indeed so. Granada feels much more calm and laid back from the minute you enter the city. Small streets, not too many cars, quiet a few bicycles everywhere.</div><div><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TQQUgMwm0DI/AAAAAAAAVKw/rYuT_U-ENxc/s1600/IMG_4403.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TQQUgMwm0DI/AAAAAAAAVKw/rYuT_U-ENxc/s320/IMG_4403.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" />We stayed at Casa Vivaldi which is about 5 minutes walk from the Parque Central, the original citycenter. The city itself is not too big therefore the downtown is pretty small too. You can walk across the same in about 10-15 minutes. </div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The afternoon we ate the "Nuestra mundo" place after looking around a bit for something smaller but failing to find anything. The place is a multicuisine restaurant just the kind that a food explorer should avoid :) Anyway for me that kinda good. I found Fajitas con tortilas, that was not enough so I also got another Veg fried rice which tasted exactly like Indian fried rice.</div><div><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TQQUgy1Wv9I/AAAAAAAAVK4/eXmvGAVUNF8/s1600/IMG_4405.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TQQUgy1Wv9I/AAAAAAAAVK4/eXmvGAVUNF8/s320/IMG_4405.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TQQUnWJRosI/AAAAAAAAVLw/626mx9mhVBc/s1600/IMG_4427.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TQQUnWJRosI/AAAAAAAAVLw/626mx9mhVBc/s320/IMG_4427.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" />After food we walked to some of the recommended locations, the San Francisco Monastery mueseum (12$ entry). The Monastary is nothing special and we were done very soon. We visited Iglesias la merced which gives a panoramic view of the city for just 2$ which was totally worth it. They play the bell at about every 1/2 hr in case that interests you, its not any chorus though.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The churches I visited didn't look as rich in art as I was expecting. I mentioned on my visit to Roma (Rome) how beautiful the there churches were and how magnificent art was demonstrated on the walls and ceiling, these Spanish churces were very different, very very plain.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
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We also took a free Cigar making tour at Mumbacho Cigar factory right on the downtown street.<br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">In the evening I wanted to go to El Club but we figured it was nothing special on Monday-Thursday so didn't we bother, instead deciding that we will go to Cesar the next evening.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Next day we went to Masaya, Volcano masaya, which has a live volcano called volcan Nindiri. The volcano is surrounded by a national park called Parque National Volcan Masaya, The distance from the main road to the mountain is about 5 KM, being short of time we took the jeep ride which costed just 50 Cordobas each way per person.</div><br />
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Next to live volcano Nandiri is the volcano masaya which is a dead volcano, of course nothing much interesting after watching a live one :)<br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">We then headed to laguna de Apoyo which is among the clearest lake in the world you can also take a dip in the same, we did. We went to Mercado Nuevo (new market) which is a pretty big market to buy any kind of souvenirs you can imagine, we bought Hamocks, magnets, hats and some other stuff. Note that you can bargain quite a bit here.</div><br />
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The night the hotel ownered graciously offered us ride to Cesar's, which was closing so he took us to El Club which was closed and the caffe opposite was dead in activity as per the gatekeeper. Finally we ended up going to "High Bar" which was close to the Parque central and had some music beats audible on the road. I ended up dancing a few songs there. The place even though had good music was pretty dead with only 4 rich old guys with 4 young girls (for obvious reasons) making a pretty dull dancing scene overall.<br />
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Fortunately after few minutes of wait couple of girls showed up and we ended up dancing a few songs, Bachata, Merengue and Salsa. Impressed by our dancing I and the girl got a complimentary drink each from one of the guys :)<br />
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Next day we headed to Costa Rica by the Transitica bus.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-83844914848476674072010-10-09T16:02:00.001+05:302010-10-11T01:45:33.686+05:30Scuba Diving in SydneyI undertook the PADI Open Water Scuba diving course at <a href="http://www.abyss.com.au/">Absyss</a> Sydney, Australia. The course worked out great because it was a 2 day in-water training which could be completed on a weekend. I booked it rt after figuring out that I was in Sydney for one more weekend and I was very excited about the same.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm7LElHzqbZqgdUcTmx0k-1L7DkNY_7lPRHt47lwsCKxyKigWSArs3GH5lz67Tyy0uvyZQreL1fhtx_LeSWD5PTF4wUR8Qa4fnSzYqBMcWpD6rlaBvoeO0s8cKMJqZ-8GUhxxLdQ/s1600/IMG_2826.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm7LElHzqbZqgdUcTmx0k-1L7DkNY_7lPRHt47lwsCKxyKigWSArs3GH5lz67Tyy0uvyZQreL1fhtx_LeSWD5PTF4wUR8Qa4fnSzYqBMcWpD6rlaBvoeO0s8cKMJqZ-8GUhxxLdQ/s320/IMG_2826.jpg" width="165" /></a>The anxiety started right after I got the email from Abyss about the preparation for the in water training:<br />
1) Dive Medical<br />
2) E-Learning Module<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTB-u1wI38IM94wPm4C4W8LU2kR8wjBnIZcPGHpayPFPBAjx68HyQ2P6D4jgVnfUsIigCxyDV_aGDEXBO25rg5Dxl5syJb7IDJuuvsuHgsxYZXqrzkILD9rkioBoZwRRH_k9QfeQ/s1600/IMG_2828.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><br />
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I learned later that the signup etc did mention about both of them, but of course I didn't read the terms and conditions properly. Anyway Dive medical is a very Australian only thing, so you may not have to worry about it elsewhere.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTB-u1wI38IM94wPm4C4W8LU2kR8wjBnIZcPGHpayPFPBAjx68HyQ2P6D4jgVnfUsIigCxyDV_aGDEXBO25rg5Dxl5syJb7IDJuuvsuHgsxYZXqrzkILD9rkioBoZwRRH_k9QfeQ/s1600/IMG_2828.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTB-u1wI38IM94wPm4C4W8LU2kR8wjBnIZcPGHpayPFPBAjx68HyQ2P6D4jgVnfUsIigCxyDV_aGDEXBO25rg5Dxl5syJb7IDJuuvsuHgsxYZXqrzkILD9rkioBoZwRRH_k9QfeQ/s320/IMG_2828.jpg" width="168" /></a>The e-Learning course was kinda long and time consuming specially when I only had one week to finish it. It took about 8-10 hours as suggested. The course was quite interesting as I revised lot of usual stuff about Buoyancy, pressure/density relationship etc. that was taught in science classes at school.<br />
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The actual training takes 2 days, which I choose to be weekend. The first day was testing of basic swimming skills, learning basic scuba diving apparatus handling and a dive at the end. The dive was at Bare Island and the water was kinda rough but it still turned out to be quite fun, must have seen about 8-10 different fishes and we went about 7 Mts down at max depth.<br />
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The next day was more or less all diving day, they had 3 dives each about 40-50 minutes duration leaving aside the initial preparation and instructions time.<br />
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Overall it was a lot of fun and I plan to do it again ASAP. I got my certificate/diving license from PADI within 3 weeks of completing of course. Somehow diving isn't so big here in San Francisco so I will have to wait.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">All our dives were at Bear Island which is a beautiful place to visit even otherwise, its the place where the Mission Impossible 1 bike clash scene was done at.</div><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmfzVf-LjYqZBu5D_ZB8Uzl9MpF9XrNgUU-gNKNh1HrfX84Z6yOp2Bt_ZBpKX5dbGb-K5MLbjNgLEES4twKwFJS0jCeCt-snukOLrmGodehipdOaIMVpiyuj3_XPNFX6ezG1xNpQ/s1600/IMG_2829.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmfzVf-LjYqZBu5D_ZB8Uzl9MpF9XrNgUU-gNKNh1HrfX84Z6yOp2Bt_ZBpKX5dbGb-K5MLbjNgLEES4twKwFJS0jCeCt-snukOLrmGodehipdOaIMVpiyuj3_XPNFX6ezG1xNpQ/s320/IMG_2829.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bare Island</td></tr>
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</div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com3Bare Island, La Perouse NSW 2036, Australia-33.9833333 151.2333333-34.0011258 151.2041508 -33.9655408 151.2625158tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-73310621839454865372010-08-29T07:37:00.000+05:302010-08-29T07:37:21.518+05:30Sydney trip part 2<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />
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The second week in Sydney was as much fun as the first one. I figured some interesting stuff to do on the weekdays after work while weekend was full of activities.<br />
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The Monday night I went to the Salsa Party at Pump House near the Paddy's Market, which turned out to be a majorly LA Style salsa place. I didn't enjoy it as much as I am more in to the Cuban style and hardly know enough about LA style. Its mentioned to be one of the best LA style salsa dance parties in the town and did look so to me but the number of people present.<br />
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Then I came to know about La Cita which had Cuban salsa stuff on both Wednesday and Thursdays. I dropped by on Thursday and was excited to hear some cuban tunes as I went to first floor after being confused abused the place from Pop music on the ground floor.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/THm63_t6yJI/AAAAAAAASAo/YiJGRYQySdQ/s1600/DSCN1066.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/THm63_t6yJI/AAAAAAAASAo/YiJGRYQySdQ/s320/DSCN1066.JPG" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One other out of town Rueda folk from Brisbane.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/THm6z58VQXI/AAAAAAAASAI/-NVCl9jPV0c/s1600/DSCN1062.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/THm6z58VQXI/AAAAAAAASAI/-NVCl9jPV0c/s320/DSCN1062.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Cuban dancing scene at La Cena</td></tr>
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The floor has a Advanced class going on and they won't let us try :( Anyway I figured we would wait for the class to end and then enjoy some Rueda. Guess what, the group only does Rueda in class or for performance practice and even that they don't want others to try. Boooooh. I would expect any group dancing cuban salsa in a lot of place to try Rueda and have others from outside the group join them in casual runs but not this one. They should come down to Bay Area see how much more fun and social Rueda groups can be!<br />
The crib with the group notwithstanding the music was great. I noticed though social dancing is not so common here and people will dance with just one partner song after song.<br />
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The party got much more fun later with the pretty awesome live band and DJ on the ground floor, and though we were about to leave around 10:30 or so, we stayed dancing Rueda and Reggaeton for good 2-2.5 hours. So definitely a party to go to.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglSpvoEwNGLMZwXW_OIAm7_pNXuRPKr_jwF9cHrD48O1i4tumz97FesDKIqQdjizIOfsJDtx-0POxsZBQ9TlvfaHlWwV0u9AjAVADbxf69aBIGQgg9doX8BNL-y4V7_8bW-HgX8Q/s1600/DSCN1087.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglSpvoEwNGLMZwXW_OIAm7_pNXuRPKr_jwF9cHrD48O1i4tumz97FesDKIqQdjizIOfsJDtx-0POxsZBQ9TlvfaHlWwV0u9AjAVADbxf69aBIGQgg9doX8BNL-y4V7_8bW-HgX8Q/s320/DSCN1087.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />
Saturday night the CS group organized a Pub Hopping and we went to couple of pubs of which I remember only Cargo Bar's name, as it was a great place. The music was electronica/House and ambiance and setup was all great. No doubt its one of the highest rated ones. Of course drinks were costly mostly ~ 7 - 8 AUD. Oh In one of the bars I gave first try to Caipiroska and it loved it.<br />
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Sunday I went to the famous Torango Zoo, the best (only?) way to reach is by a ferry from Circular Quay terminal. Interestingly the ferry is part of the MyMulti pass for unlimited weekly travel. The Zoo is vast and pretty well organized. Besides the local animal from Australia they have a big presence of animals from other countries. They also have good shows I attended the birds shows but only got a glimpse of the Seals show which looked interesting too.<br />
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The zoo is worth spending a full day specially they close by 5 PM so earlier you go better it is.<br />
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I also visited the Sydney Aquarium the same evening as its open pretty late (8 PM) and I had to agree with what others told me about that place, its one of the best things to see in Sydney. The colorful fishes and other aquatic life like corals was as beautiful as it gets, I decided on the spot that I was going to try Scuba diving, something which didn't interest me enough earlier. BTW, they have a separate exhibits for Sharks too.<br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com1Sydney NSW, Australia-33.867139 151.207114-33.884956 151.1779315 -33.849322 151.23629649999998tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-63131174797287613692010-07-09T16:52:00.002+05:302010-07-09T16:52:49.624+05:30Sydney Trip part 1Unlike usual travel posts I am trying to live-blog my Sydney trip so that I don't make a super big post at the end.<br /><br />I have been in Sydney for 5 days now, my experience and liking for the city has increased drastically since when I arrived here. I guess the first day was dull because of the long haul flight from United which was a terrible idea (departed 1.5 hrs late, flying time 13.5 hrs and No internet/Personal entertainment system) and the second day the Jet Lag was showing its effect.<br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRYchFcqRI/AAAAAAAAQO8/owJwfri99Bc/s1600/IMG_1095.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRYchFcqRI/AAAAAAAAQO8/owJwfri99Bc/s320/IMG_1095.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /><br />I arrived on Friday and fortunately the evening had a CouchSurfing meetup at a nearby hotel, Pyrmont Bridge Hotel for watching FIFA match of Brazil vs Netherlands (sad story Brazil had lost). Amid the match I went out to check the international Fifa Fan Fest stage nearby which was nice. Multiple projected displays along with one FIFA cup shaped one.<br /><br />Saturday started late partly because of the late night Fifa match watching and may be because of fatigue. I decided to take a walk along the Darling Harbour which is pretty beautiful and a very popular hangout spot for all ages. The evening I walked on the Harbour bridge and realize you can't really get any good shot of the bridge from anywhere nearby unlike Golden Gate bridge. You would get the best shot from Circular Quay area.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRYgF4PeEI/AAAAAAAAQPk/76cWKm1jlkA/s1600/IMG_1104.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRYgF4PeEI/AAAAAAAAQPk/76cWKm1jlkA/s320/IMG_1104.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRYm8iy6NI/AAAAAAAAQQk/ctL_xYwAQ54/s1600/IMG_1116.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRYm8iy6NI/AAAAAAAAQQk/ctL_xYwAQ54/s320/IMG_1116.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3Kt9GNHr4m5WUXjXbhAh62DuanzaCdZWW4Kveysa_P6DCx8Ci2AGvEFEZRwKp9cIG9BzVdAu-ljnLYTSjD4xReWuQwxwXwxm2vRbKJnvtr2wfeRf2bmQyka3FomqCFbiHYs8NRQ/s1600/IMG_1139.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3Kt9GNHr4m5WUXjXbhAh62DuanzaCdZWW4Kveysa_P6DCx8Ci2AGvEFEZRwKp9cIG9BzVdAu-ljnLYTSjD4xReWuQwxwXwxm2vRbKJnvtr2wfeRf2bmQyka3FomqCFbiHYs8NRQ/s320/IMG_1139.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRY6Mlz7kI/AAAAAAAAQTo/k29Y4fCUH98/s1600/IMG_1156.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRY6Mlz7kI/AAAAAAAAQTo/k29Y4fCUH98/s320/IMG_1156.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br />On Sunday I started exploring city with the "MyMulti3" pass that I bought for 57$ allowing me unlimited travel in 60 KM radius around city center. I figured I was to head to Bondi Junction and turned out it was too close and I didn't have enough of train journey so I head towards Cronulla beach. Almost near Cronulla but not sure where I was, I figured I was better off going to Bondi Beach again for its famousness and so I did.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRZNaQRKEI/AAAAAAAAQWo/eJjbirLyXpc/s1600/IMG_1204.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRZNaQRKEI/AAAAAAAAQWo/eJjbirLyXpc/s320/IMG_1204.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /><br />Bondi beach is pretty. There were lot of people on the beach but the weather didn't encourage so many of them to try the waters. There were few brave surfers in wet suits though. The waves seems pretty good for surfing but I better not comment on what I haven't tried. :)<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRZQWezeaI/AAAAAAAAQXI/YzjDvqWddSA/s1600/IMG_1210.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRZQWezeaI/AAAAAAAAQXI/YzjDvqWddSA/s320/IMG_1210.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAYPCaatElzW-idiGHFKUuwlrSIQITY8uMgkY4PHph-VRuggnSNcjvZTedQQcf8-95RL406X2S8FCR9e5SfH1rRPbyWALEWHwzgox73hxfEuzdL3FDcvfuQmIWIAcj3SYJzqSzGQ/s1600/IMG_1219.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAYPCaatElzW-idiGHFKUuwlrSIQITY8uMgkY4PHph-VRuggnSNcjvZTedQQcf8-95RL406X2S8FCR9e5SfH1rRPbyWALEWHwzgox73hxfEuzdL3FDcvfuQmIWIAcj3SYJzqSzGQ/s320/IMG_1219.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRZ-gdy5hI/AAAAAAAAQfM/SX_c3cRxNVQ/s1600/IMG_1286.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRZ-gdy5hI/AAAAAAAAQfM/SX_c3cRxNVQ/s320/IMG_1286.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRanmXLn5I/AAAAAAAAQnY/e4R2eu_RBHk/s1600/IMG_1350.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRanmXLn5I/AAAAAAAAQnY/e4R2eu_RBHk/s320/IMG_1350.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br />I spent the evening going to Circular Quay area. Which definitely has some of the most beautiful views of the city specially in the night.<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRawsNyIPI/AAAAAAAAQpQ/9g1_IU6ti20/s1600/IMG_1374.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRawsNyIPI/AAAAAAAAQpQ/9g1_IU6ti20/s320/IMG_1374.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRa0hVj93I/AAAAAAAAQqA/spjzts_fxQ4/s1600/IMG_1380.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRa0hVj93I/AAAAAAAAQqA/spjzts_fxQ4/s320/IMG_1380.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRa6o0KP3I/AAAAAAAAQrU/H6foAC11vgw/s1600/IMG_1398.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDRa6o0KP3I/AAAAAAAAQrU/H6foAC11vgw/s320/IMG_1398.JPG" border="0" height="213" width="320" /></a></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-58459873821824234672010-07-06T10:03:00.001+05:302010-07-06T10:04:29.477+05:30New York TripI went to New York on the Memorial day weekend, where I was joined by Priyam on our 2-3 day exploration of the Big Apple. I had a great time and the delay in composing this post shouldn't give any wrong idea about the same.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEw8f700GI/AAAAAAAAQAs/lqQeaOYY7fs/s1600/DSCN0753.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEw8f700GI/AAAAAAAAQAs/lqQeaOYY7fs/s320/DSCN0753.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEwQxoJ_yI/AAAAAAAAP64/XALPfQwTuS4/s1600/DSCN0701.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEwQxoJ_yI/AAAAAAAAP64/XALPfQwTuS4/s320/DSCN0701.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><br /></div>I absolutely loved few things about the city which include the Public transport and the busy well lit streets of the downtown and all major tourist attractions. Besides the weather was pretty good at that time much more pleasant than San Francisco city (its pretty hot by now though.).<br /><br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExpgQQZwI/AAAAAAAAQJc/iyOL5GQZi1I/s1600/DSCN0831.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExpgQQZwI/AAAAAAAAQJc/iyOL5GQZi1I/s320/DSCN0831.JPG" width="320" /></a><br /><br />We took the New York city pass for 79$ as we liked everything in the pass and wanted to try doing as many things as possible.<br /><br />The city has some amazing Museums. We spend one full day covering just about half of the Metropolitan museum of arts (MeT), which is definitely the biggest Museum in U.S. Turns out that Loovre in Paris is the among the biggest in the world but I spend a much shorter time most likely because I didn't understand much of Art etc. and didn't have company of someone who did, which in this case was Priyam.<br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExOB_kWII/AAAAAAAAQEM/a7dC_I4MNj4/s1600/DSCN0782.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExOB_kWII/AAAAAAAAQEM/a7dC_I4MNj4/s320/DSCN0782.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEv5HQjq1I/AAAAAAAAP3Q/qhU69Mg8jBM/s1600/DSCN0662.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEv5HQjq1I/AAAAAAAAP3Q/qhU69Mg8jBM/s320/DSCN0662.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br /></div><br />My observation at the MeT was that for up to 19th century the complexity and intricacy (details) etc. in the paintings were increasing as time progressed and then came Modern Art.<br /><br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEwGMh5YZI/AAAAAAAAP5M/ExHBihsM62A/s1600/DSCN0679.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEwGMh5YZI/AAAAAAAAP5M/ExHBihsM62A/s320/DSCN0679.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />In the evening we went to the Empire State building, the line for which took about 2 hours after getting in the building at sunset time. Definitely missed the sunset view and wondered if coming may be around 10-11 pm would have made it easier. The view was definitely great though view we had next day from "Top of the Rocks" tower was far better.<br /><br /><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEvhy-9NAI/AAAAAAAAP2I/ZWK32NJul1M/s1600/DSCN0653.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEvhy-9NAI/AAAAAAAAP2I/ZWK32NJul1M/s320/DSCN0653.JPG" width="320" /></a><br /><br />The next day was for American Museum of Natural History which had a Planetarium show. The show was okay but the Museum is again impressive. You can definitely spend as much time as you want seeing all the exhibits which include life size imitation of many biological species, Meteor rocks and lot of chemical compounds. They have pretty interesting coverage on evolution and movement of ppl around the world in early days.<br /><br /><br />After the museum we went to Wall Street and took a tour of the Island by ferry<br /><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEw-cJYW-I/AAAAAAAAQBE/kqjjbN_Y8rc/s1600/DSCN0756.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEw-cJYW-I/AAAAAAAAQBE/kqjjbN_Y8rc/s320/DSCN0756.JPG" width="320" /></a><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExJqn_IOI/AAAAAAAAQDU/m0mMvTR5vBQ/s1600/DSCN0774.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExJqn_IOI/AAAAAAAAQDU/m0mMvTR5vBQ/s320/DSCN0774.JPG" width="240" /></a><br />In the evening we went to Top of the Rocks tower for the Panormic view which I felt was better than that from the Empire State Building probably because you can see the Empire state building itself from this view :). After we took a stroll on the famous Broadway street and the times Square area which makes you feel like you are in Vegas with its similar lighting and billboards along with big displays and tickers.<br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEwNNv2oOI/AAAAAAAAP6M/BMbI64IjD0E/s1600/DSCN0688.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDEwNNv2oOI/AAAAAAAAP6M/BMbI64IjD0E/s320/DSCN0688.JPG" width="240" /></a><br />Next day Priyam went to see MoMa but I had already had enough of art Museums and I decided to visit whatever beach was possible by public transport, that turned out to be RockPort beach. The easy connectivity by the Metro train makes it a popular destination as was seen by the big number of people on the beach.<br /><br />The water was pretty cold but unlike California there were people in the water. So I decided to try it out, a little girl who was swimming with her father told me how it would be easy after few minutes and it was indeed so. I would have spent next 1-2 hours in the water, when I was initially fearing to soak my knees.<br /><br /><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExTDRCFGI/AAAAAAAAQFI/PuReVtaCmt8/s1600/DSCN0789.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExTDRCFGI/AAAAAAAAQFI/PuReVtaCmt8/s320/DSCN0789.JPG" width="320" /></a><br />What happened next was interesting. Suddenly at about 5 PM or so everybody started leaving the beach at once. I could figure it was something to do with safety on the beach in the evening so I followed everyone. We all walked to the station and were to figure out that the station was closed and there was "Police, do not cross" ribbon everywhere. Anxiety! Fortunately people and cops spoke English and I learnt that we were better off walking to next station which was about 10 or so blocks away as this station was closed under the fear of overcrowding and it was not easy to determine when it would re-open.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExW8RpVHI/AAAAAAAAQF4/XRsnVo0h9A8/s1600/DSCN0795.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExW8RpVHI/AAAAAAAAQF4/XRsnVo0h9A8/s320/DSCN0795.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br />After about an hour or so of uncertainty we were finally on way back to the city. The train was as busy as the busies subways I have seen in multiple cities (though not close to Rio's new year rush at all) and this was a Sunday evening.<br /><br />Once I was back in the city I rushed to the Brooklyn bridge a photo on/of which was required to complete the trip to New York. Thankfully the Sunset was at late as about 8:30 pm giving me enough time to take photos of the bridge before and after it.<br /><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExk7OVEHI/AAAAAAAAQIc/T96cDFXSBFs/s1600/DSCN0822.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/TDExk7OVEHI/AAAAAAAAQIc/T96cDFXSBFs/s320/DSCN0822.JPG" width="320" /></a>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-58977582952425230982010-05-17T06:59:00.000+05:302010-05-17T06:59:05.138+05:30San Francisco move!I was pretty sure about moving to San Francisco city when I moved to Mountain View last October. Ultimately it happened in last week of March.<br />
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The main concern was definitely the commute to South Bay every day for work which was meant to be about 2 hrs per day compared to the local commute of 30-40 minutes(biking). It turns out the commute really isn't an issue now. I have never had to stay back later than the last shuttle from Mountain view and only once had I taken the last shuttle and the overall time for commute is usually around 100 minutes and most of it is used properly either for extra sleep or reading books :)<br />
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Now to the advantages of living in the city, well life is as different as it can get between San Francisco and Mountain View. In MV very often we wondered about what to do and most of the time it meant coming to SF or relaxing at home. In SF every weekend is just loads of fun, so many things going around that you would sometimes pass the opportunity of a weekend road trip with Friends from South Bay.<br />
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An example of what been happening here since I moved(~6 weekends) include Japan town Cherry Blossom Festival, How weird Festival (last week), Bay to Breakers(today). Besides whole lot of dancing classes and parties including Friday evenings dancing at Il Pirata or in Oakland learning Rueda, Saturday evening Casino(Rueda) dancing classes followed by social dancing in Bollyhood cafe from 3-8 pm followed by Lindy hop and Blues lessons and dancing in ODC dancing studio.<br />
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When you can figure out time when nothing of your interest is happening there are tons of parks and trails around to visit, my favourite has been Golden Gate Bridge cycling route and Golden Gate Park. Another very interesting thing that has been happening is the Friday morning SF2G rides I have been taking part in almost every week.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-28850851732609713052010-05-14T11:39:00.000+05:302010-05-14T11:39:29.751+05:30The year that wasHere comes the look back at the year post timed around B'day. Last year I delayed writing this post so much that I never did. This time around I will start with something and try to append it over time.<br />
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New Things:<br />
1) After a long long time I finally took the change of moving to Mountain View, California. The first time I ever relocated out of my country.<br />
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2) My first vacation to a country in South America. I spent 15 days in <a href="http://vardhman.blogspot.com/2010/01/brazil.html">Brazil</a> for the Christmas and New year break.<br />
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3) <a href="http://vardhman.blogspot.com/2010/03/biking-fun-my-new-road-bike-and.html">Bought my first Road bike</a> in December and have been enjoying biking ever since completed about 1600 KMs in 5 months after a relatively poor 300 KM in first 3.<br />
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4) My first trip to United Kingdom: <a href="http://vardhman.blogspot.com/2009/11/london.html">Britain</a> and Scotland.<br />
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5) First Couchsurfing experience being hosted by Maira in Rio De Janeiro amazing experience<br />
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6) First shot at running a half marathon and completing it successfully.<br />
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7) My first ever multiday treking experience in the Uttarakhand (65 KM hiking in 6 days).<br />
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Old Fun Stuff that continued<br />
1) Attended the <a href="http://vardhman.blogspot.com/2010/03/bay-area-salsa-rueda-festival-2010.html">second Salsa Rueda Festival in San Francisco in Feb 2010</a>.<br />
2) Learned many more interesting dance forms including Lindy Hop/Swing/Cha cha.<br />
3) Interest weekend trips in California, <a href="http://vardhman.blogspot.com/2009/12/death-valley-national-park-trip.html">Death Valley</a>, Las Vegas, Mt Shasta and to other places: <a href="http://vardhman.blogspot.com/2010/02/crater-lake-in-winter.html">Crater lake</a> in Oregon.<br />
4) Language learning continued. I am much better in Spanish now though my French and Japanese didn't get any attention<br />
5) Visited Malaysia on a team offsite.<br />
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Looking Forward in next year:<br />
1) Triathlons<br />
2) Visiting (more) countries in Central and South America<br />
3) Scuba diving<br />
...Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-76601486463872488352010-04-21T11:14:00.000+05:302010-04-21T11:14:14.544+05:30SF2G Bike rides from San Francisco to Mountain ViewAfter gaining some basic long rides practice I finally decided to give a shot to the SF2G rides. Given the preparation and practice I had it did look like a stupid idea but some one offered to make it a no-one-left-behind ride and that left me no excuses :)<br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">There a 4 well known/documented routes available from <a href="http://www.sf2g.com/">sf2g.com</a>, the Bayway is the considered the simplest one and definitely the one to start with for beginners. The route is pretty easy indeed with mostly flat roads (except for 3 small inclines in the beginning) and also most of the time roads with little risks to bicyclists because of dedicated lanes and less traffic, which comes at the cost of making the directions pretty complicated. Even after doing my second ride already I am not sure I can complete the ride without some one else leading the way.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">The route is very scenic and if the weather gets favourable like it did last 2 rides for it, it makes the 42 miles ride of about 3-3:30 hour go by quickly.</div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S86MTSj692I/AAAAAAAAPTg/ddlVbTNgo-4/s1600/2010-04-09%2007.37.34.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S86MTSj692I/AAAAAAAAPTg/ddlVbTNgo-4/s320/2010-04-09%2007.37.34.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">On the way waiting for fellow ride to change the tube after a flat</td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
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If you are a biker in San Francisco city heading to South Bay feel free to join us on one of these rides. Note that There are other sub-routes of shorter distances like Millbrae to MV and Foster city to MV and such. Visit the <a href="http://www.sf2g.com/">website</a> for more details.<br />
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Additional fun things: Use "My tracks" app in Android phones to track your path and get detailed stats about the rides.<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" height="350" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=102161985798593353094.000484b8971c8a00308f1&ll=37.599348,-122.255362&spn=0.355537,0.334885&output=embed" width="425"></iframe><br />
<small>View <a href="http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=102161985798593353094.000484b8971c8a00308f1&ll=37.599348,-122.255362&spn=0.355537,0.334885&source=embed" style="color: blue; text-align: left;">Sf2g 2</a> in a larger map</small><br />
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Sorry not enough photos from this ride, may be using Street view would help :)Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-77837129706069992032010-04-08T12:58:00.000+05:302010-04-08T12:58:51.261+05:30Demystifying India: part 2Read the brief intro about the series in previous post.<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;">Eating style and practices</span><br />
The another not properly understood topic about Indian culture is the Eating habits. Many people in met during my Brazil trip had an understanding that Indians don't eat Beef (cow meat) because of sacred reasons but other meat is fine. For a country like Brazil or Argentina (as I was told) vegetarianism is a very rare concept. To some extent people would claim that you can't survive there without meat or that you will only be eating fruits and raw veggies. As you can read on my post on Brazil this was not so.<br />
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So the question about Indian not eating beef: Well, again there is nothing like an Indian religion, we have people of multiple faiths and religion in India and all of them have different sacredness rules about food. The Hindus (the majority as can be unambiguously mentioned at time of writing) don't eat beef. Before I go to other religions its a point to be mentioned that Hindus themselves have many more sub-groups which have varying levels of restrictions beyond beef. For e.g the Brahmans and Vaishnavs don't eat meat at all.<br />
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The Muslims similarly don't eat Pork/Pig meat (In fact the rules are more strict to include only <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halal">halal meat</a>), I don't know of any eating restrictions in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikhism">Sikhism</a> and Christianity, which are the next 2 major religions in India. My family follows <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jainism">Jainism</a> which is another religion. Jains are considered part of Hindus in a broader categorization which counts only 4 major religion, but we have much different guidelines as far as food is concerned. Jains follow restricted vegetarianism mean they don't eat some veggies for e.g root vegetables. I realized reading wikipedia that <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jainism#Emphasis_on_non-violence_in_thought_and_practice">some Jains have follow Veganism</a>.<br />
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As you would expect most of these are religious guide lines and people follow them to varying levels. But one thing to understand is that while Vegetarianism is pretty common in India veganism is not so common. So for most people milk, milk products and cheese are very regular part of the meals.<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;">Eating by Hand.</span><br />
A friend of my host in Brazil was probably shocked and puzzled to see that I was eating Tapioca with Knife and Fork and the underlying debate which was in Portuguese lead me to think I was expected to be eating with hand instead.<br />
This particular debate was difficult to handle as I didn't really understand the reason of eating with hand except that some Indian food really is most easily eaten with hand like Rotis(Chappatis), Naan(bread) and Dosa much like Sandwiches and Burgers. For other food like Rice the eating practice is very regional and matter of choice again. My father insisted us to learn to use spoon to eat rice pretty early in childhood (you don't usually need fork and knife for vegetarian food) and thats very typical way of eating in formal dinning or parties.<br />
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That said many people do eat rice and curry with hand and its very common in authentic southern Indian eating style to do so. Of course people adapt themselves according to places and situations, and therefore the eating style becomes western when you are in the west.<br />
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Coming to the reasoning part of it, I have found couple reasons as I searched on the net, one is what I commonly heard earlier that you can enjoy the food most when you eat with hand<a href="http://foodsofindia.blogspot.com/2006/02/practice-of-indians-eating-with-their.html">[1]</a>,<a href="http://www.indax.com/eating.html"> [2]</a><br />
It should however be noted that strange as it may sound people in India were pretty well aware of "Washing the hands" and similar hygiene even before people in the west started bothering about them due to Swine flu. Its very much part of the food habits to use soap or such to wash hands before eating food specially when you are not going to use cutlery.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-4278458934897988612010-03-22T02:48:00.005+05:302010-03-23T01:36:56.828+05:30Demystifying India: part 1I have decided to start writing about this at multiple times in past but felt very strong motivation during the Brazil trip, so here it goes. I am going to try Demystifying some things about India as country and Indian people, to remove some myths and misconceptions and citing some similarities and differences with other countries/cultures in this series of blog posts.<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;">How it started</span><br />
As I was traveling in Brazil I came to know that people in Brazil (not necessarily Brazilians) had seen a Soap Opera which was based on India. Apparently the whole show was a big hit there and people had developed a great interest in Indian culture to the extend that Indian clothes and Indian music sounds like a hap thing.<br />
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This sounded cool in the first impression but as we become better friends I heard the real curios questions from the people. "Are you a Brahmin ? Are you very religious etc." and then some one showing some Bharanatyam steps and asking me to tell them more about Indian dances :).I quickly understood the series has yet again done the same thing many outsiders do in portraying a country, they mix all hetrogenous parts of the culture and apply them on one family and it feels like thats the typical lifestyle.<br />
(Of course I have seen Hollywood movies and series and spend time in US to have an idea of this disparity).<br />
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So, bewildered as I was, I thought "Am I a brahmin?" probably second time in my life, the first being when I came to know there WAS a caste system in India. Nah, I cudn't judge if I was or not :)<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;">About the Caste System</span><br />
As against the first general impression people had/have, no modern India doesn't really have caste system practices of differentiating people in terms of discriminating them or bounded labour or whatever the caste system implies.<br />
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As it happens with the Surnames/Last names in Scotland or some other places its more like a symbolic or historical concept for most of us now. Like Scott Shoemaker doesn't mean Scott makes shoes,<br />
Being a Brahmin doesn't mean I am priest or a very religious person anymore so does being a Kshatriya not enforces you to be a warrior :)<br />
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Of course there are parts of India which are socially backwards and backwards in terms of development and these things horrible as they are, are still practiced to various extends. Some would claim it means discrimination in terms of opportunities but as you would imagine there are laws against such acts. On the contrary the government encourages people who have been oppressed in past because of their caste to come to level playing field by reservations of various kinds.<br />
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Which of course is a debatable process of its own.<br />
But the point is, when I studied in a school in a relatively small city of Jabalpur (may fall in top 30-40 cities) I never cared for my classmates' caste. We all had same privileges and opportunities. So was the case in my undergrad and post grad college in Hyderabad (a pretty important city) no discriminations but just merit based evaluation based on your performance. Taking further when private companies come to college for hiring the same thing goes on.<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;">About Hindu/Hindi the Religion, the culture, the language</span><br />
The friends from Argentina who had developed some interest about India was always confusing the use of word Hindu/Hindi/Indians and India :) as many of these should be very related but are not same.<br />
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Unlike most other countries India doesn't have a small set of Languages which everyone in the country knows. So as you talk to different group of people you most definitely end up learning more than one language. A good example I always tend to give is that when I joined my college most batches would know three languages 1. Their Mother Tongue, 2. Hindi and 3. English (not in that order always).<br />
As you would realize Hindi is not mother tongue for a big percentage of Indians. In fact many of us may not need to learn/use Hindi all our life. This seems very contrasting to one Language countries like Brazil (pr), Argentina (es), USA and UK (en). etc. Another example of the diversity, when I joined my job my team of four people the only common language between any two people was English.<br />
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So yes, Indians don't always know Hindi, the language. Some people however use the word Hindi to mean the people of India. All I can say is that with all such diversity and recognition and respect for all religions, languages and backgrounds, calling Indians Hindi is inaccurate, though we may have such references in old writings and songs like one song says "Hindi hein hum" (Hindi we are).<br />
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Now Hindu, well Hindu is a word for a person following the religion of Hinduism like Catholics are people who follow Christianity and its relation with Hindi is almost same as that of Christianity with English. In most sense Religions aren't geographical while languages are. So all Indians are NOT Hindus, we have a diverse set of religions too! Of course all this makes India very different and interesting from many other places in the world.<br />
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More to come in next post on the series ..Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-31510837464731094302010-03-14T13:43:00.000+05:302010-03-14T13:43:25.090+05:30Biking fun! My new road bike and accessoriesOne of the luxuries you can't miss to afford living in the Bay Area is comfortable Cycling workouts. The weather is usually perfect and roads are pretty flat and smooth and quite a few have biking lanes. (Not forgetting to mention Google has recently released <a href="http://maps.google.com/biking">biking</a> directions which adds favourably to this experience).<br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;">Bike purchase decision</span><br />
So after discussing with few experienced bikers I decided to buy a good road bike, visited the performance biking shop nearby to realize they didn't sell Trek and then visited the Chain Reactions bicycle store in Redwood city on recommendation that they actually allow you to test ride your bike for 4 miles trail before buying it which is pretty important to decide buying a bike.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEift5xs7hWjEaRzQi1r5v0DakLfe79llUGU5fkUImnUzznwLP2MZezdSv1gn1-jIFzucvZ732mU8osal4OjnDBoLttPLbk80DZ0C7rT_ZkQVq8X00KHboWIWcT6waLQlU-m6VW_Vg/s1600-h/P1020094.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEift5xs7hWjEaRzQi1r5v0DakLfe79llUGU5fkUImnUzznwLP2MZezdSv1gn1-jIFzucvZ732mU8osal4OjnDBoLttPLbk80DZ0C7rT_ZkQVq8X00KHboWIWcT6waLQlU-m6VW_Vg/s320/P1020094.JPG" /></a></div>In chain reaction shop I tried a couple of bikes as usual as the price went up the feeling seemed to improve :) I also had a strong preference for color of the bike (and therefore looks of it), both these factors concluded on me buying a Trek 2.1 Alpha bike which is a Aluminum frame bike as that seems to be slightly more sturdier than Carbon frames and a good one to start biking. I must say after riding this for about 300 KMs or so I fell in love with this bike and kinda addicted to biking whenever possible.<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/Biking?feat=embedwebsite">Biking</a></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-large;">Road Biking shoes and Clip-on Pedals</span><br />
After I put about 400 KMs or so and figured I am going to take it seriously and bought Road Biking shoes which made me switch the pedal to the Clip-on pedals. After getting them on and trying it I immediately felt I have definitely not thought well enough before deciding, as it was a major change and had a bit of learning curve during which biking became uncomfortable. Including a few falls as you are not accustomed to take off shoes from the pedal while stopping or just can't manage it in time.<br />
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This is how the pedal and shoes (with cleats) look like:<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S5yXvBl3NsI/AAAAAAAAO40/MduoR-nPsJk/s1600-h/2010-03-13%2023.57.34.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S5yXvBl3NsI/AAAAAAAAO40/MduoR-nPsJk/s320/2010-03-13%2023.57.34.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S5yYqvAktEI/AAAAAAAAO5A/Cpi3qbKiA5Y/s1600-h/2010-03-13%2023.57.07.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S5yYqvAktEI/AAAAAAAAO5A/Cpi3qbKiA5Y/s320/2010-03-13%2023.57.07.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><br />
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Anyways after trying it in the shop for a while and then adjusting the shoes a bit I came out and very soon had a fall :) and then few more later. I then turned to youtube for help and found these two good videos:<br />
<object height="295" width="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/5KMPEzUeqJo&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/5KMPEzUeqJo&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="295"></embed></object><br />
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Weather has not been that great this winters so biking didn't work very well but its getting better now and last 2-3 weekends I have been pulling good distances. I was able to complete 40 miles in last attempt, which feels pretty good to sustain for a while and then improve upon. More on biking in next post.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-13515473663055317202010-03-14T09:27:00.000+05:302010-03-14T09:27:03.755+05:30Bay Area Salsa Rueda Festival 2010<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">Bay area Salsa Rueda festival 2010 the second of its kind was held from Feb 18-21st this year in San Francisco. If you a Salsa-Rueda dancer in the Area this is an event you cannot and shouldn't miss. Similar to last year the event offered a whole bunch of 1 hour workshops, evening performance shows by many Rueda groups and live music/DJ party for social dancing later in the evening until late night.</span></span><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">The event went for 4 days adding a day from last year and the excitement was there till the very last moment, though you could see with such intense dancing everyday most ppl were exhausted by Sunday afternoon :) And the Mega Rueda held on Sunday evening didn't turn out to be as much fun as last year. The Google Rueda group had group outing on Saturday, unfortunately not many from the big group could make it.</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: medium;"><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">I have few videos from the event put on Youtube, trying to share some here too:</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><object height="385" width="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/F7qFBClbtwo&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/F7qFBClbtwo&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><object height="385" width="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/1TODs1yPWis&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/1TODs1yPWis&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><br />
</span></span></div></span></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><object height="385" width="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/7BKUYTatWI4&hl=en_US&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/7BKUYTatWI4&hl=en_US&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><br />
</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">This year I experimented with the Intermediate class after trying beginners last year. The problem was at many time slots they didn't only had Advanced Rueda class or some other non Rueda workshop. Some one mentioned that based on the feedback last year they had a permanent Beginners' slot guess this years feedback will make sure they have so for Intermediate and Advanced ones too. Anyways in absence of Intermediate classes I decided to try few other things which turned out good experience. Specially some SalsaTon or plain Reggae classes where Marco Ravella from Canada gave some basics of body movements for all Cuban dancing styles with focus on Reggae where they are much more important.</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><br />
</span></span></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-48418411475170222042010-03-01T15:30:00.002+05:302010-03-01T16:04:03.501+05:30Santa Barbara and LA tripI just realized I have gotten careless about blogging trips in California. So trying to catch back on some.<br />
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Santa Barbara is a city called the American Riviera and has been pretty famous for its scenic beaches though various TV shows and movies. So on a long weekend we decided to give this city a visit. This city is reachable by either taking Highway 101 S like for LA or by the Scenic Highway CA-1 route. We decided to take CA-1 as we had loads of time :) We did trip on the Martin Luther King weekend (Jan 16-18th).<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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Very soon on the way we hit the beaches in the Monterey county, which were pretty specially at the sunrise on a clear day. We kept moving the CA-1 highway deserves its name of being scenic. You will never get bored of the scenic beauty around you though the traffic is slower because of roads being narrower and sometimes winding. At someone it started raining and we decided to skip the CA-1 route and take a faster route to reach Santa Barbara (by popular vote, I was veto-ed :( )<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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Now to city SB, after reaching the city in afternoon, we visited the tourist center which is always a good place to get free maps and info about the city and buy magnets, t-shirts etc. As usual the map contained tons of places to visit but the person at the desk helped us decide what to do.<br />
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The two important buildings are the courthouse (with its Spanish style architecture) and the Queen of the Mission (of Santa Barbara). Turned out we were able to visit all of them by 4:00 PM and it was time to hit the beach. The water was cold as usual and no one was in it. We played Frisbee for some time besides walking a lot trying to get out own best shots of sunset.<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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The evening we took a walk around the downtown which definitely was better than Mountain view downtown with tons of clubs but being a long weekend there weren't many people around. and since others weren't interested in going to dance, we didn't (Gotta visit again, huh).<br />
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The stay was in motel six costing around 60 $ for the room.<br />
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Next day was spent in visiting California Six Flags adventure for my second time. The place was fun unlike I expected 3 years is a lot of time to have forgotten every thing and trying rides again was almost a new experience. Sadly it stared drizzling and raining mid way through the day, shutting down a few rides and closing the park early. Fortunately the guys informed that since they are closing the park early we get a free entry to visit again and also we faced shorter queues everywhere.<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/1AQjKYv-rxb2n_tThoF0iw?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc_135NgETzU75E-5gWxIIExAuqZkgmfLIho4rXF4WmTmIvIQGF1oWp_XXRcctdeP56iX_bG-kg7eYZVaJK0gEQR0QMGDF6K2RF7poVIMeHVLQtZNsRIc66Gzz1D6yG0vzJzdI4w/s288/P1030260.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/SantaBarbaraAndLATrip03?feat=embedwebsite">Santa Barbara and LA trip</a></td></tr>
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Third day we went to LA first visiting the Malibu beach which wasn't much fun with all the rain but was still pretty spot. Then we went to UCSC to pick up Nikhil and have a tour of the college. We left LA about 3-4 PM and were back in Mountain view by 11 PM.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-58451112490451741072010-02-11T12:04:00.003+05:302010-02-11T12:16:26.765+05:30Brasilia - Brazil.<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Brasilia is often an ignored city when it comes to tourists visitors who would be overwhelmed by other famous places to visit with associated names like Rio (culture capital), Sao Paulo (business capital), Florianpolis (Industrial capital) and so on. But this Political capital city has its own charm and deserves a visit though may be shorter one than others.<br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/E5q8Nt1N5_Y34EXyKWP4zw?feat=embedwebsite"><br class="Apple-interchange-newline" /><img src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1u6nlqA4SI/AAAAAAAAMIQ/J5v3V2HgzIs/s288/P1020271.JPG" /></a></div></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></div></div><div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px;"><br />
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<tr><td><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/SlEzkkOWPMMWpvtK46qbRA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1u-oh5eWoI/AAAAAAAAMaA/nN5nFpNsWcI/s288/P1020411.JPG" /></a></div></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></div></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></div><div><br />
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Brasilia trip for me was mostly based on the idea of visiting my only Brazilian friend, Camila at that time to try experience the Brazilian culture more closely being hosted by a family and Wikitravel on Brasilia did tell about few interesting places to see like the Cathedral, the TV tower and various government buildings. One drawback for this city is its big distance from other important cities being in the center of an otherwise famous for its coast country. Brasilia is one of the most modern cities of Brazil and being so its very well planned and organized. You would clearly feel so as you drive around, watching well laid out roads, gardens and parks besides the modern residential buildings. Keep it very green and beautiful.</div><div><br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/WmcnjPZlS5s6XsLJae4-qw?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTuzwaQHdR4Qeqd2C6VJm_VapwJtpmTgcRIPbM97ugvKFrk0cqjRKhFycLcQyNaRwIU9vGBMNl0rHGz3e1fW3OCGsSDKnDSIK0TI9Zy4J9u_gjT4XhelZ2-ASsk92Lc7dVCyHDRw/s288/P1020277.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/SCPVDtUvUnqHNL95Lhd3Vg?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1u67Xt8sfI/AAAAAAAAMJg/LksuoQQZ1po/s288/P1020280.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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I arrived in Brasilia from Sao Paulo by plane taking about 2 hrs and departed to Rio from there in bus which took about 17 hours. On that note all websites in Brazil are pretty broken when it comes to English users and more importantly most of them only accept Brazilian credit cards and/or American express cards. So good luck purchasing your tickets !<br />
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In Brasilia my hosts gave me a very warm welcome and the two days I spent there were amongst the best traveling time I have repeated mentioned how big fan I have become of Brazilian hospitality and this family definitely played the biggest role in that.<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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Camila also introduced me to her friends and we had some long discussions about both countries' culture, history, past and present. Dancing, Music, food and politics. As I reflected open these conversations and I realized another great aspect of them their open mindedness and again friendliness. I have lots of sweet memories of you guys!<br />
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So what did we do in Brasilia besides talking, here is the summary (little text, many photos)<br />
Evening 1st day:<br />
W<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">e went to take pictures with the Christmas lights in the center of the city called Esplanada. Followed by going to a party called "Funfarra". I didn't really like the party though it was set in a nice place, the park, next to a lake etc. The music was pretty bad.</span><br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/uYJ5yrBmDGsgeM4dRlD4MQ?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1u7yRb8pRI/AAAAAAAAMNs/K6ln4qIitvE/s288/P1020315.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">2nd Day:</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">We went to lunch in Naturetto and to Ponte JK, Esplanada and Palácio da Alvorada (Lula's house). These bridge and the goverment buildings are very beautiful specially the one of ministry of external affairs. The cities modern architecture differentiates it from those of Rio and Sao Paulo very clearly. The well planed way in which this ~50 year old city has been laid out is itself something interesting to see. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">To dance samba in the afternoon we went to CALAF. </span><br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">At night we went to pub named Velvet but we just stayed like half an hour as some other friends wanted to go elsewhere. We then went to Cristina/Martinica. I tried the Brazilian dish called Tapioca here and loved it.</span><br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/7ISmLUM2e1fc77FGNMavRQ?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1u-TzyS0jI/AAAAAAAAMYw/8TN46Ju7uTY/s288/P1020402.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Zfgb_P1v0Y7fPShhLNYMWA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1u-RDjxbGI/AAAAAAAAMYg/KGY38QgYAXw/s288/P1020400.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;">3rd day:</span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">We went to the TV Tower to get the panormic view of the city but rained spoiled the plan as they stopped the tour at that time. Interestingly the TV tower is surrounded by a market which looks very similar to those big markets with multiple small shops or "<b><i>mela</i></b>" like setup pretty common in India. </span><br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/bHvLpwzpR7LVdttIDolVDA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1u-3xBJ3kI/AAAAAAAAMaw/22x6IaGsrgs/s288/P1020417.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/-jVFahLelAiL5TxzC7NdQA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1u_NIIaN3I/AAAAAAAAMbw/dDVgMZD3DM8/s288/P1020423.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/LL4ProdSfbJJX2HgbzdqZw?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhECEONacp2C_xaXGDI807kgbtYlOJljhbAKbNQkiN349f9drZgNLxWOY3OZzi9RMQblQYRtvgf8Lgi-4VKngrKKhDTZKplrrUaGOSyIuxqbTZxK7XQ43wf5UUHVSc40PArdwu5fg/s288/P1020421.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: medium;"></span></span></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: medium;"><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">We then went to Pontão, a popular hangout place for the locals right next to the lake. </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/RTVExcSyGceMDGSKevAOFw?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1u_hum6BWI/AAAAAAAAMco/FuSvf9dx7RY/s288/P1020430.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/99ecsQsolissOIhJh1cgPQ?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEJOTsQiWpFZwMO4xbRT170kg_iXtZQwzahTi-1ZKavawvWEepBGFzs21JhIh3RtbMq_ClVAT18QsGTD_Mtlamt0E1j_4xG05LVQyMXVQ4qDPKbzA7H7kjz1q7NdWLRH9aj_EAYw/s288/P1020445.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilBrasilia?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil Brasilia</a></td></tr>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #333333; font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">The trip got over much faster than I expected, I was looking forward to Rio but pretty sad to be leaving Brasilia!</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-53182843335490725532010-02-09T13:00:00.001+05:302010-02-09T13:03:45.504+05:30Crater Lake in WinterLast weekend we drove to Crater lake, Oregon. Its a 7.5 hours drive from Mountain View, CA. Its a must visit place. With some interesting facts: Nineth deepest lake in the world and among the purest lake in the world, besides being the most beautiful one because of the perfect blue water. Add snow to that combo and its just amazing.<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/CraterLakeAndMtShastaTripFeb2010?feat=embedwebsite">Crater Lake and Mt Shasta Trip Feb 2010</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/CraterLakeAndMtShastaTripFeb2010?feat=embedwebsite">Crater Lake and Mt Shasta Trip Feb 2010</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/CraterLakeAndMtShastaTripFeb2010?feat=embedwebsite">Crater Lake and Mt Shasta Trip Feb 2010</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/CraterLakeAndMtShastaTripFeb2010?feat=embedwebsite">Crater Lake and Mt Shasta Trip Feb 2010</a></td></tr>
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">During winters the Rims are closed and the only way to see the lake is taking a free walking tour with a Ranger/Guide in the special snow shoes. This is also pretty much the only thing to do here.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Very informative and interesting tour indeed. Lots of interesting information was being given during the tour like:</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">1) Considered one of the purest lakes (according to the scale for measuring purity its clean depth is 143 ft).</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">2) How fishes came in and why Fish and don't leave back is the policy</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">3) Various animals and birds here and how they survive etc.</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">4) About the history of the lake and its surrounding going back to 400000 years.</div><br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/CraterLakeAndMtShastaTripFeb2010?feat=embedwebsite">Crater Lake and Mt Shasta Trip Feb 2010</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/CraterLakeAndMtShastaTripFeb2010?feat=embedwebsite">Crater Lake and Mt Shasta Trip Feb 2010</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/CraterLakeAndMtShastaTripFeb2010?feat=embedwebsite">Crater Lake and Mt Shasta Trip Feb 2010</a></td></tr>
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The weather on the way was not the most pleasant with rain and show fall most of the time but it was not very bad either. We didn't really need chains though its a good idea to carry them, just in case. Its suggested that we go back in Summers which I am definitely doing, but don't miss Crater lake in Winters either, its worth being seen 2 times :)<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/CraterLakeAndMtShastaTripFeb2010?feat=embedwebsite">Crater Lake and Mt Shasta Trip Feb 2010</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/CraterLakeAndMtShastaTripFeb2010?feat=embedwebsite">Crater Lake and Mt Shasta Trip Feb 2010</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-33454745434904019642010-01-31T15:32:00.009+05:302010-02-09T12:00:06.816+05:30Rio de Janeiro part 2<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Continuation of my <a href="http://vardhman.blogspot.com/2010/01/rio-de-janeiro-part-1.html">previous post about Rio de Janeiro</a>.<br />
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Day 4th<br />
So this was the last day of 2009 and it turned out that we were going to celebrate the coming of 2010 with a big feast. So everyone was suggested to cook something from their country/region. The cooking went on for hours and then dinning went on for some more. It was greatest collaborative effort on cooking I had participated yet and also the biggest number of international cuisines in the same meal i.e from 5 different countries!<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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In the evening was the most awaited celebration of New year eve at the Famous Copacabana beach. As per wikipedia about 2 Million people get together to welcome the new year here. Just imagining that got me super excited. The one time when I saw a cricket stadium full of people I was astonished so I knew this was gonna be big.<br />
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Well we started from Maira's place about 9 PM with all those delays waiting for about 5 girls to get ready :D and as lots of departing photographs and good byes as other Couchsurfers were leaving permanently. Anyways by this time it turned out the buses have decreased frequency and the roads being full of water and traffic caused lots of delay, we somehow reached Niteroi stop in 1 hour. Now from Niteroi to Rio was another pain as no one would agree to go (for no apparent reason but traffic). Again some ad-hoc arrangement by Maira (needed Portuguese definitely) and we got a mini-van agreed to dropping us rt at a metro station. The clock was ticking fast it was already about 10:45.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/gRi7aQMKuuOtvN31ByKf5Q?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vGlZjhE5I/AAAAAAAAM4I/N5rh6TjKLQc/s288/P1020678.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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Now the best part, it turns out that at this point the Metro tickets are not sold and you can only use the prepaid tickets which fortunately Maira had bought for the other CSers and who didn't collect from her :) So we got into the Metro! Wow what a relief. Of course the metro were as you would see Mumbai locals but with doors closed. Not an inch to move (well not really) and the crowd all super excited. I could almost felt like being in India during Ganesh Vijarsan, lots of noise, shouting, singing etc. And when the door would open for the people to get in everyone would say "Why, why" in portuguese.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/LQQvWD5j_omtEOobUXAhoA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vGzAcyb8I/AAAAAAAAM5U/ocFTobqg9nI/s288/P1020687.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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We made it on time just about 10-15 minutes before 00:00 we reached the beach and OMG it was superb. Lots of people every where. The lightings from the buildings right across the roads look beautiful as did the well lit beach. The fireworks then begin at dot moment and Wow almost like those in Opening ceremonies of international sporting events mesmerized everyone. We watched and watched as they went on for next 10 minutes. I could totally agree Revillion in Brazil is one of the best new year parties in the world. Of course they had beer and Caiparinhas sold every 50 fts and at 3-5 Reals a glass and even with all that supply by about 4 AM everything was gone!<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/nnJa3rbn8CzNvnksTJxXGA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vH4DR1tSI/AAAAAAAAM_c/jQMhqEMi-tU/s288/P1020739.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/RgsrcdBe1AS_PH6-m-k0qw?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vH_RLU7nI/AAAAAAAANAE/3af2VNwavwU/s288/P1020744.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Day 5th/1st:<br />
Next day was pretty laid back from the last nights party. However as we were about to leave Rio, I and Jake decided to visit Christo. The timings etc didn't work out and after spending almost 3.5 hrs transiting we were on our way to meet others at the Niteroi's beach. Not to realize we were walking on "Rua Rio Blanco" and we almost got mugged as a guy approached us very rapidly and we had to run across the road through the traffic for safety.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/wAAfq-qRg9x_xeSUqfNxPw?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vIt0gYM2I/AAAAAAAANDs/aqq_dCSAt6s/s288/P1020772.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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Niteroi's beach was pretty cool. Not very rocky or dirty and the much more safe (or may be because we were in a big group). Maira then showed us a bit of Sao Gancalo city through a car tour.<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Q5tPilrTz1dsf0yXUMJqjQ?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vJZbgzhjI/AAAAAAAAN24/_nSgU6dPgPw/s288/P1020803.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table></div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Day 6th/2nd:<br />
As we missed visiting Christo last day, we went to Christo again, this time as a big group. On the pretext of being a very crowded day they increased the price of ticket by 10 Reals per head to 24.4 Reals. BTW, we decided to go in car instead of talking the train all the way which is recommended but costly. Also the lines for getting a ticket and entering are different so you can divide the group in to two and optimize time.<br />
Besides the statue itself being huge and impressive in all senses, the views from the place are just as great. You can see islands, buildings, green mountains and perfectly blue ocean everything from that point. I wondered how nice would be the helicopter tour of the place be as I saw few helicopters go above us.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/57jYfDyf4AcfswrLj-gNjQ?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vJoJxJg6I/AAAAAAAANIM/NBeQl4k6I5o/s288/P1020821.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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Being in the city I suggested visiting Copacabana beach, which I haven't seen in day light yet! That beach is beautiful but as with any common and popular beach has its share of dirtiness in the water as people through stuff around as the like. The beach front is pretty big and you can see lot of people walking or running across or playing beach Bollyball or other games.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Lkq-wu7jFBBinlR4cOqIiA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKLyS75VLJUCsaPITvD3m1kPG-IWjdN1BURpS_HHxUciKfXaTepc7WJbLrcH6MzNbl6EbXSU7rHYObAQHM_alVLyaumkQOji_DMbtjAV-noMRMbMm_EaGoHblvujdR-_-2WcJZoA/s288/P1020827.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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In the evening was a surprise event, Paulo took us all to the <b>Forro dance</b> place. This place was huge, it was more like a stadium size location and as you would enter you will see a big active market along with multiple big dance performance venues/stages. Pretty impressive. I found myself tapping on the beats of Forro pretty soon as Paula has already given me some idea at home. I call that dance a double-merengue based on its beats. I was also impressed by some superb dancers there. Not unlike other days the party went on :) We would have come back home by about 6:30 AM.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/mlv4B4uE8gnrp4bAdgOgOA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vKVCAGQKI/AAAAAAAANLQ/_qgCFjUwbc0/s288/P1020844.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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The next day was the last one of the trip, we lazed around and by the afternoon it was time to leave to Paraty.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/1p3yaFBG71y_xA3mlU_isA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vLbB5kOEI/AAAAAAAANPc/4Ql1RJ8N7xI/s288/P1020877.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table></div>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-17492804589375063662010-01-31T15:32:00.006+05:302010-01-31T16:28:37.654+05:30Rio de Janeiro - Part 1<table style="width: auto;"><tbody>
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Rio was expected to be the highlight of the whole Brazil trip and it was. Based on some articles on the web I imagined seeing 2 Million people on the Copacabana beach was going to be a very special moment and it turned out the whole journey to the beach from Sao Gancalo reaching the beach just in time was one of the happiest new year moments :)<br />
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</td> <td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/EdWEsskYThrWEyFBEp5exQ?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiP8OQ8wI-G-ohvLLej-maeDBH5PTW0wchN9DOfjVn7NtdLLkzOal1kywSMt1Bu4uTKsCSAHLqxq5ZbVlD7LAswJkGekA7SESg9ZE7C8xmohhg_uQbjTI89Uqkx9YJuNvaOcbTQKg/s288/P1020822.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Lkq-wu7jFBBinlR4cOqIiA?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKLyS75VLJUCsaPITvD3m1kPG-IWjdN1BURpS_HHxUciKfXaTepc7WJbLrcH6MzNbl6EbXSU7rHYObAQHM_alVLyaumkQOji_DMbtjAV-noMRMbMm_EaGoHblvujdR-_-2WcJZoA/s288/P1020827.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilRioDeJaneiro?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil - Rio De Janeiro</a></td></tr>
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Day 1st/28th: Arrive in Rio bus stop from Brasilia, picked up by Maira and Paulo. The first thing we did was a lunch at a per kilo restaurant, I love them because you can eat what you like and the price isn't for everything :) that was available to eat but "how much" you are eating. Then we tried buying a SIM card as it was going to necessary to coordinate with my hosts and other CSers and in case I get lost somewhere. I tried at least 3 different companies, Vivo, Claro and TIM but my cellphone which is a prepaid Nokia handset from T-mobile refused to work. Don't know what was the problem. By now I have figured that "Calling-card" for public telephones was the only other option against buying another prepaid phone. I bought the calling card. More on it later. <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/D5bU6UbP6vbriR9Q02WEBQ?feat=embedwebsite" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vAp32ehnI/AAAAAAAAN9k/fspvs4ZCsnw/s288/P1020488.JPG" /></a></div>Went to Ipanema after leaving luggage at Maira's office for the "Free hugs" meeting, what a great way to the Rio PAN meeting, I met a lot of great CSers. But then it rained and we had to run before the scheduled ending time. We went to a bunch of hotel/bars to see which one can accommodate about 25 of us, most couldn't but after 3-4 trial we found a good place. As is common in Brazil restaurant/bar/hotel etc is a mixed concept, so you would typically go to one of these place whether you want to drink alcohol or eat food with non alcoholic drinks. I tried the Orange juice and liked it. Had to run to catch up Maira at her office. <br />
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</tbody></table> In the evening(meaning about 9:30 PM) I along with other surfers hosted by Maira headed out to Lapa the so-called (and appropriately so) Night life district for the CS talent show at .... The other folks who came with me decided to hang out of the pub and make there own "Caipiranhas", I went in instead where a big party followed all night. Later when it was time to leave I figure they had gone, OMG. With all you hear about Lapa you don't want to be in that situation of searching for them on the streets alone. So I asked a few surfers if they can host me for the next few hours and someone agreed, Relief :) <br />
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</tbody></table>The fun didn't stop there apparently the host was pretty drunk :D so after finding the right bus and going around the city for about 30-40 minutes at about 5 AM, we were told this is the last stop :P. Now the four of us got out and the 2 other visiting CSers pretended they know the locality etc but we decided to take a car to reach the hosts' house. As it happens they had no idea. The cab took about 30 minutes and a lot of distance to reach the right place. First evening couldn't have been more fun :D Now this is what you miss when you go well planed. Btw the place of the host was amazing, beautiful view of beach right from the balcony. And icing on the cake it was about the sunrise team. <br />
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Day 2nd/29th: Okay the next morning, I woke up and realized OMG I have no idea where I am (I mean not in who brought me here sense, but where in the city am I kind). I met my hosts' father who was the only one awake at about mid noon. In my broken Portuńol I asked him how to go to metro/downtown etc. (Knowing I can reach M's office from there). As I got out I found it inevitable to walk on the beach. Went ahead and discovered I could get the nice Coconut water(aqua-coco) and cream thing, like roadside on South Indian highways, man that was amazing and totally worth 3 Reals(~1.9 dollars). After walking a lot on the beach I decided to go to downtown/metro. took a bus for Central thinking its downtown or Centro station, turns out it wasn't. Anyways I found myself near Botanical garden and having been recommended to visit I got down to visit it. Soon to realize I was low on cash, I tried multiple banks(Itau, Banco de Brazil) with no luck but ultimately Citibank gave a ray of hope and actually worked (Charging 10 Reals for Out of Bank or Out of Country transaction, whatever) The visit to Botanical garden was wonderful. You can definitely spend the whole day at that one place and still want to go back because of its tranquility, nature and beauty. After the visit I figured how to reach Metro (taking a Metro No-superfecile bus to a metro station) and wen on to Meet M, what a relief once again, The idea is that as it gets dark you don't want to be walking alone. Anyways she took me to the Colombia pastry place, which is huge. Its the first pastry shop of Rio city and would easily be the size of about 6000 square feets with 2 floors (so much for a Pastry and snacks place). <br />
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</tbody></table>Later in the evening (again 10 PM or so) we headed to a party in Lapa again. This time M's friend Ellis gave me a ride to/from Niteroi where M dropped me with an excellent demonstration of her Brazilian driving skills, oh I should I tell, I can blindly trust a Brazilian to drive me around anytime now. They are just superb. The party mostly occupied by CSes went on pretty late, but at about 4:30 AM we decided to leave. That would have been a simple ending to a great evening if I got dropped home, not that didn't happen. E dropped me at a place with some ppl so I cud catch a bus to arrive at M's house and all three of them said, "Don't sleep off in the bus" and they said it for a reason :) <br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/ThrXvbXowZ1wyqM1Toubkw?authkey=Gv1sRgCKLr-qiinICs_gE&feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vD835nFVI/AAAAAAAAMs8/m7LtQOwPPvo/s288/P1020588.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
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</tbody></table> I was pretty aware of bus and the stops going past and that I was getting closer to the destination but next thing I know the bus conductor wakes me (from outside the bus) at the bus stop. OMG! I can't believe I did that. Anyways the good thing it was already well lit and I decided to walk around and see what I can do. Asked directions to the people around and figured I was pretty close to the address. Finally some bit of walking and I was home at about 7 AM. What an adventure again! Day 3rd/30th: The third day went more relaxed. I slept all day long missing my plans to meet the CSers for something in the afternoon. I waited for M, so we cud go to the Scenatarium party. I became a big group soon and we were pretty late for the party. <br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/OThgxUefkHQAWw-5HDaL5Q?authkey=Gv1sRgCKLr-qiinICs_gE&feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vExUzhRAI/AAAAAAAAMwg/kZRrBSV7r94/s288/P1020618.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
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</tbody></table>The club seemingly is one of the best and the line was about 100 ppl long when we reached. Soon we figured they have raised the cost of tickets from 15 for CSers to 30 for everyone (including CSers). Based on a common decision we left for some other place. <br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/NTgvWJagwToIQfrdhjQMQQ?authkey=Gv1sRgCKLr-qiinICs_gE&feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vEkGtlDGI/AAAAAAAAMvs/SwBGWMfIhRE/s288/P1020612.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/b5znBsxfAbcE8AUQz9PzYw?authkey=Gv1sRgCKLr-qiinICs_gE&feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vFNNtSh8I/AAAAAAAAMyk/g9Jr7JIZsGw/s288/P1020635.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
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</tbody></table>This place, MOFO bar, had a live band which I didn't enjoy much and therefore waited for DJ to bring some good music. Ultimately we danced till about 4:30 AM again and left for home. <br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/pOqldbwV-fdV5NbDWxlafw?authkey=Gv1sRgCKLr-qiinICs_gE&feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1vFYa7cDzI/AAAAAAAAMzY/IA3mIlg7DAQ/s288/P1020641.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
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The post is already long gotta continue part 2 in next one.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com0Rio de Janeiro - RJ, Brazil-22.9035393 -43.2095869-23.219795299999998 -43.676505899999995 -22.5872833 -42.7426679tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-53067819618052959132010-01-23T17:33:00.001+05:302010-01-24T04:54:16.710+05:30Sao Paulo - BrazilI spent about 3 days in Sao Paulo during my Brazil visit. First one on 24th December when I arrived in SP at GRU airport from San Francisco.<br />
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From GRU airport I head directly to the "Okupe" youth hostel near Vila Mariana metro station. Unlike you would imagine reading Wikitravel/<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%A3o_Paulo">wikipedia</a> or travel guides going to SP downtown from GRU airport isn't the toughest thing in the world. Often you would hear recommendation of traveling taking a taxi which would have costed me about 85 Reals (~50 USD).<br />
I anyways decided to take public transport as it looked decent and safe enough. The bus from Airport takes you to Tatuape Metro station for 3.55 Reals taking about 30-40 minutes. Then you can go to where-ever you want (and can) by Metro for 2.80 Reals. Overall 1.5 hours of transit time is a good upper limit<br />
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A word about the metro: Unlike some other city metros like Paris, UK, the Metro ticket price is fixed for any trip, irrespective of number of stations and transfers you have to take to reach your destination. Sweet isn't it ? zero confussion and very efficient. You can also buy a Unico card which comes for zero cost but minimum 15 Real initial credit and works for buses (and provides some discount on them).<br />
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Anyways, the Okupe hostel is pretty nice and close to Vila Mariana metro station. In the evening while going for the CouchSurfer's "Sem-familia" meeting the guy at the reception suggested me a walk along the Ave. Paulista to see the Christmas decorations, and I was very thankful to him for suggesting so. The buildings were pretty nicely decorated. Besides the photos I took a video too. Definitely recommended.<br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilSaoPaulo?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil-Sao Paulo</a><br />
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Next on was the first Brazilian dinner at Bella Paulista, I was imagining that would be Pasteries but not so I could find great dinner options (well for veggies anything more than 1 option is great :D). I ordered Pasta and liked it. We then had the "secret santa" game, now I don't know how its done elsewhere but here it meant we all pool in our gifts and then one person picks the name and whosever name is picked up gets to choose a gift, pretty interesting, everyone would try to guess the gift by weight, sound. Now I have never really celebrated Christmas (very strange why) so I definitely enjoyed every moment of this.<br />
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After the dinner we headed to some bar/pub, but most were closed. Eventually we hoped 2-3 cheap bars on the road side and selected one. I was not too keen on just sitting at one place and wanted to go to some place with music and dancing but decided to hang around, it turned out great. We must have reached the right bar by about 11 PM or so. Then the beer started pouring in and much as I remember the drinks continued till about 3 AM. I realized one thing you can definitely bet on a Brazilian's beer drinking capacity to be very high.<br />
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Next morning/afternoon, I decided to try the Ibirapuera park before heading to Airport for Brasilia. I followed the directions for a bit, found empty roads with loads of terrible(scary) graffiti and quickly decided to confirm at a nearby shop. Language barrier kicked in and ultimately I gave up.<br />
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-- After returning from Paraty --<br />
I spent 2 more days in SP at the end of my trip. I knew that the city has lots of places to see and I can definitely finds things to do for 2 days.<br />
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For the first day, I went to Google's office in SP to make sure I have a laptop for my return stop-over at Mexico city airport for 14 hours. The office is on the Faria Lima avenue which is remarkably different from the rest of city, in some sense its like Greater SP which developed recently and is mostly commercial buildings.<br />
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In the evening I went on to attend the CouchSurfer's mid weekely meeting at Brigederia. Being slightly late and rainy I decided to take a taxy and realized very soon that dishonesty in cabbies exist in Brazil too. The guy quickly figured that I don't speak Portuguese and even with written address he won't feed it in the GPS but rather ask me how to go (fooling around). He drove me in a loop and was heading in wrong direction of road (Taking Google maps direction idea was a good thing). I asked him to pullover and walk by myself.<br />
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As the guide book says and locals concur, Av. Paulista and some streets around are pretty safe and active even late in the evening.<br />
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The CS event again went on till about 4 AM or so and then some of us with no agenda for next day spend another 30-40 minutes outside the restaurant before going home. As I had discovered by this time its very Brazilian to party up to 5 AM.<br />
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Next day my friend Jakeline joined me for a tour of the "Praca da Sé" and nearby places in the downtown, including Theatro muncipal, Cathredral Sé and famous Edificio Italia.<br />
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Cathedral sé is remarkably beautiful and magnificent. Its so grand that I was not able to take one proper shot from inside so as to cover a lot of the church in it.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/uW7rltsg7RuaF3_VtQrD8Q?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1ld_H0KFtI/AAAAAAAALsg/wbxWKNDH66k/s288/P1030139.JPG" /></a><br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilSaoPaulo?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil-Sao Paulo</a><br />
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We went to the Edificio Italia to see the view of city from top, but by 4:30 PM they won't allow you to go up until you dine in the costly roof top restaurant, you can catch some great views from the penultimate floor though:<br />
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<tr><td><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/X8gLytJL73kGWmsz6UWeow?feat=embedwebsite"><img src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/_Je3Cabg8pxA/S1leT0bDbhI/AAAAAAAALtQ/4jJFpnpQfTI/s288/P1030145.JPG" /></a><br />
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<tr><td style="font-family: arial,sans-serif; font-size: 11px; text-align: right;">From <a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/vardhman/BrazilSaoPaulo?feat=embedwebsite">Brazil-Sao Paulo</a><br />
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My search for the magnet from Brazil wasn't very successful one but eventually at a Mall we found at least basic Brazilian magnets. The dream of finding a shirt with some good Portuguese message remains un-accomplised during this trip.<br />
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As I was warned by a friend 24th/25th isn't a great time to see the city in action as most places are closed.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-23506899075734287542010-01-11T13:32:00.001+05:302010-01-23T18:02:40.557+05:30BrazilFor the Christmas and new year vacations of 2009-10 I went to Brazil. Looking back it looks like one of the best trips ever. I would be writing detailed post about every city but this one is a summary.<br />
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If the first thing that comes to your mind when you think about Brazil is beautiful girls in Bikini on the beach on Rio you are not very different from most who have mostly got that image from TV. But once you visit Brazil you will realize its much more than that. Its a country I fell in love with much before I reached Rio's beaches.<br />
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Whats so special about Brazil ? Well to start with the people are amazing, hospitality and friendlyness is in the viens. Second Brazilian undoubtedly are the most party people I have ever seen. Its not unusual for a Brazilian party to start at 7-8 PM and go-on till 5-6 AM. Which implies the point that Brazilians love food and beer (and very rarely other drinks but definitely Caiparina) besides music and dancing. Overall the most merry ppl you will ever find IMO.<br />
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Now on to non-people things the country itself is beautiful with large landscapes filled with greenery, mountains, water bodies and beaches. On this regard its very similar to my other favourite place Kerala (in India). Brazilians definitely love greenery and water as you can see by either natural or man made lakes.<br />
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Another interesting thing about the country is that its amoung one of the fasted growing developing countries and if you see the new cities like Brasilia clearly give the feel of a developed country with all those good roads and buildings. <br />
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The country does has some problems of its own. Brazil's big cities like Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo are infamous for their crimes rates which clearly emerge because of a big social divide between the Rich and poor. The cost of living in Brazil is pretty high and increasing and the poor have increasing difficult time coping up.<br />
A different language from most countries in the region and very limited English friendly environments can make the travel for a person not knowing portuguese quite hard. If you know at least some Spanish you are in much better spot but only English is not gonna be very helpful.<br />
I am pretty sure these two issues does cost Brazil at least some Tourist loss.<br />
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<iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=yetanot-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=1741042976&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe><br />
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<br class="Apple-interchange-newline" />Would like to mention this book which came pretty handy to start planning the trip. I have now used LP for Europe and Brazil and would probably buy it for any place I am spending quite some time at (thanks to my friend Thomas for suggesting the travel book idea based on his experience of exploring India.)<br />
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I visited 4 cities of Brazil, Sao Paulo, Brasilia, Rio de Janeiro and Paraty which were all amazing and came to realize that I want to see much more, I already have some place in mind for my next trip: Ilha Grande, Foz de Iguazu, Florianpolis, Salvador and Amazonia.<br />
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Now some details many people ask about (and even I search for on net):<br />
Approximate Costs: (find<br />
My flight ticket (return) 1189 USD (+65 USD for travel insurance) from Orbitz via Aero Mexico (a post on why not to choose it follows)was<br />
Plane ticket from Rio to Brasilia ~ 200 Reals (from Oceanair.com).<br />
Bus ticket from Brasilia to Sao Paulo ~ 163 Reals (from util.com.br)<br />
Hostel (dorm) costs typical 30-50 Reals<br />
Food: 10-20 Reals for normal. 30-50 for fancy.<br />
Overall cost about: 2100 USD (but be aware that I was hosted by friends for at least 8 out of 15 days).<br />
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Vegetarian Food:<br />
- Not too many choices but you won't die.<br />
- Ask them for custom sandwiches if you don't like any in menu, most shops can make Cheese sandwich for you<br />
- Juices are amazing and very reasonable in price. Fruits are abundant too.<br />
- Try going to Self-Service Per-Kilo restaurants to get a chance to pick food selectively.<br />
- Italian food is you friend, Pasta places make them to your order, Pizza places always have cheese only pizza.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-90813987818602872302010-01-09T13:08:00.000+05:302010-01-09T13:08:30.810+05:30Getting a Brazil VisaSo, I applied for Brazil visa at the <a href="http://www.brazilsf.org/">Brazil Consulate in San Francisco.</a>. The process is very straight forward. The consulate is very helpful, welcoming and timely. I would think using a visa agent won't provide any great advantage.<br />
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0) Get an appointment from the website (this gets you a appointment time for visiting the Consulate).<br />
1) Needed: 1 passport size photo, pre filled form.<br />
2) USPS Money order for required fees addressed to Consulate General of Brazil (fees for Indian citizen, 20$, for US 130 $).<br />
2) Passport with 6 months validity<br />
3) Return tickets/Itinerary (I just took them to be sure, the website doesn't mention this to be required).<br />
4) For getting the Passport returned by mail, use Express mail from USPS. (costed 17$).<br />
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The application process took about 30 minutes in total. The visa took about 10 business days, my passport was returned duly is about 12 business days including delivery time. I choose to get the passport delivered as I didn't want to travel to San Francisco again.<br />
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BTW, when the consulate mentions they will only process 42(or whatever) applications per day it doesn't mean that you may or may not be able to apply visa that they if you get the appointment if means that you are in those 42 applications.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com59tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7352719.post-53373513817130985262009-12-16T12:31:00.000+05:302009-12-16T12:31:12.659+05:30Aluratek Internet Radio Alarm Clock rocks!<iframe align="left" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=yetanot-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=B00192VWVY&fc1=000000&IS2=1&lt1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifr" style="align: left; height: 245px; padding-right: 10px; padding-top: 5px; width: 131px;"></iframe>I recently purchased this device from Amazon mostly imagining myself to keep up to date with the news and music from channels other than locally available on FM/AM. Besides the fact that I was in love with the iHome Radio alarm clock which wakes you up to your choice of buzzer, Radio or iPod.<br />
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This one beats that, it wakes you up to Internet Radio, FM/AM, Music from USB disc or a simple alarm. As expected it also allows you to use all these options to listen to music. As the photo didn't mention it actually comes with a Remote control.<br />
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The setup of the device was pretty straightforward even on a WIFI with security enabled. It did take 2 attempts to get it right but then it immediately showed a impressive list of channels.<br />
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First thing I wanted to do was to check Indian news channel, specially seeing people talk about listening to BBC (in Amazon reviews), to my dis-appointment Indian news channels still don't offer internet radio channels, but I could listen to news from BBC or other ones easily.<br />
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Next, I was quickly able to get a list of Bollywood channels along with multiple other music channels (Go Locations->Asia->India (the list has about 7-8 channels including Tamil/Telgu music).<br />
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As people mentioned on amazon one single issue I can think of with this device is the lack of battery support, but in my extensive review for the products at this price range this one beats all.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08397269248099196734noreply@blogger.com3