SAST Wingees

Italy Moblog #1

We are vacationing in Italy this year. As an experiment I decided to start a moblog (mobile blogging). Time permitting, I’ll blog my experiences every day. Here is day #1:
Landed today morning in Rome, Italy by an Alitalia flight from JFK. The flight was uneventful, but for the woman sitting next to us, who refused to sit next to a man and forced me and my wife to swap seats. I thought I left that one behind in the buses of Chennai. Yeah. Yeah, the world is small and now flat as welll.

Once we landed, the immigration officer peppered us with a lot more questions than typical. She actually made me pull out my credit card and show it to her. Strange are the ways of Immigration Officials. Once we came out, we realized our limo driver had not shown up. So I had to make a call to the taxi company and after a 30 min wait, the guy showed up. He later blamed the delay on the traffic. The drive from the airport to the hotel was a long one. There was plenty of traffic.

Around 2PM local time, we reached our hotel Caprice on Via Liguria near Barberini Square (Piazza De Barberini, if you are local). The jet lag got to us, I think. We wanted a nap but ended up sleeping for a few hours.

Freshened up and hit the streets for dinner. We had some fabulous Italian food at a Alex Cafe on Via Veneto. Interestingly, all major restaurants on this street have a glass-covered gazebo on the sidewalk in front of the main restaurant. The gazebo serves as a mini-restaurant and food is served from the main restaurant. Seems like a concept unique to Rome. Have not seen this in any other city so far.

Haven’t explored the city much yet. But somehow resembles Athens a lot. Tomorrow we are off to Pompeii, the famous city destroyed by the erupting. Mt. Vezuvius. This was not part of the tour we signed up for. Priya Raju insisted that we go here, so we have signed up for a side tour to Pompeii. More on Pompeii in tomorrow’s despatch.

Notes:
1. Avoid Hotel Caprice. Rooms are too old and cramped. The elevator is a piece of work as well.

Chance encounter with Cheeyan Vikram

Had a chance to meet Vikram – the reigning no.1 in Tamil movies. I took his auograph and also got a group photo with him and several of my colleagues. His rise to No.1 status from a nobody is inspiring to me – the big turn around came about in the movie Sethu. I had expected him to be surrounded by an entourage of fawning assistants. But all he had with him was one manager who was also very friendly. Vikram is so unassuming and modest for what he has accomplished. He quietly flew in the same flight as us, went to the baggage claim area, picked up his bag himself and walked off quietly. Humility comes naturally to him. Lot to learn from this man.

Unsung Blogger of the week #14

This week’s featured blogger is 21-year-old Daniel Hegder from Australia. He has been maintaining his blog hedger.blogspot.com since September 2004. Text from the email interview follows.

1. ‘Please write a brief profile of you and your involvement with blogging.’
I am a 21 year old student from Melbourne, Australia, currently studying Criminology and Anthropology. I’m also a singer and budding writer.
At first I started blogging because I didn’t understand what the fuss was about. When I started getting into comedy writing, I realised my blog could be a creative outlet and have treated my blog in this way. I prefer this to the ‘diary’ style blogs, which can often be tedious.

2. ‘How do you publicize your blog?’
Aside from having it listed in various profiles for message boards etc. that I might contribute to, my blog gets very little publicity.

3. ‘Which techniques have worked for you and which ones have not?’
Reading other people’s blogs and leaving comments can be a good way to publicise your blog. However, if you comment on blogs that are dissimilar to yours, this won’t necessarily work. Also, very popular blogs get so many comments that it can be hard to get noticed by commenting alone. When it comes down to it, people just have to make that leap and check it out for themselves.

4. ‘What do you consider as your best post so far? You can include upto 3.’
That’s a hard one. After the London bombings earlier this year, I did a series of blog entries about different ways of dealing with terrorism (for example, http://hegder.blogspot.com/2005/07/governments-consider-abolition-of.html and http://hegder.blogspot.com/2005/07/our-impotence-in-face-of-terrorism-is.html). One from July 8,  “Guy Tries to Masturbate Fear of Terrorism Away” was a little controversial.
http://hegder.blogspot.com/2005/07/guy-tries-to-masturbate-fear-of.html

5. ‘What are your Top 5 Unsung Blogs ? (please include only those that
are not in any Top 100/500 lists).’
I’m not sure if these are on any Top Lists, but anyway:
Toe to Toe – http://www.steppinonyou.blogspot.com/
Bitch Pulled My Weave Out – http://psychadelicbuttersnazzy.blogspot.com/
81 Vaginas – http://81vaginas.blogspot.com/
Japanese Lee – http://japanlee.blogspot.com/
BoltWatch – http://boltwatch.blogspot.com/

6. ‘What are your current book recommendations ? (1 or 2 is
sufficient).’
A Devil’s Chaplain – Richard Dawkins

7. ‘How is the blogging scene in Australia?’
Thriving. There’s no shortage of Australian blogs, anyway.

Peter Drucker – Rest in Peace

Its exactly a month since he passed away. If there is a management hall of fame, Peter Drucker would be the first one in it. No one in management can avoid not learning from the master. But here is a must-read article on how Peter Drucker himself learnt major lessons in his life. (Via Milind Sathe).

Unsung Blogger of the Week #13

1. Please write a brief profile of you and your involvement with  blogging.
I’m a software engineer, working out of Chennai, India. I’m interested 
in a variety of things, one of them being blogging. I find it a natural vent
for my thoughts. I’ve been blogging on and off for almost three years 
now. VKpedia is my only serious (?) effort. Predictably, it is a 
play on Wikipedia. 2. How do you publicize your blog? No real publicity efforts. However, I try to leave comments in blogs, and 
this I’ve found drives people to mine. 3.. Which techniques have worked for you and which ones have not? Content. That is what works. I’ve discovered quite a few good blogs, 
may not be very popular, yet rich in content, and then they become popular. 
So, the technique is good content. Another is to find out what others 
feel about a topic you’re interested in or have written about. 
Technorati, IceRocket, even Blogger Search are quite useful. 4. What do you consider as your best post so far? You can 
include upto 3. That’s a toughie. Probably the entire Notes of a Nomad series, the Thiruvasagam review 
[Excellent review. Need to listen to the CD I bought a while ago after this! – Ed.], 
and Dude, where’s my shirt? 5.   What are your Top 5 Unsung Blogs ? (please include only those that are not in 
any Top 100/500 lists). That’s tougher still. I’ll suggest 
Joe Anderson’s Webby’s World, 
Soumyadip Chatterjee’s Mindless Musings, 
Anthony’s A Journey Called Life, 
maverick’s freewheelin, 
and Mandar Talvekar’s Ink Scrawl. 6.  What are your current book recommendations ? (1 or 
2 is sufficient). Freakonomics is definitely the book of the year, according to me. 
[Sibu was not impressed. Check out his rant. -Ed.]
I would also recommend Tuesdays with Morrie. 7. What are your current movie recommendations 
(1 or 2 is sufficient). None in particular. I would recommend Yves Robert’s 
My Mother’s Castle (it’s not a 2005 movie though) and 
Parineeta.