An island called ShikineJima

Will post the details of this place afterwards.
Till now enjoy the snaps.


The place is so lovely that I have dedicated a blog ot this place where you can find more snaps and videos too. Click here.

DVD Rental Vending Machines turning up in Japan

You must have heard about itunes, Amazon, Netflix, CinemaNow, Movie Link who are battling for the online Movie rental space in the customer`s heart.
At the time when in the US the war is about who will be the biggest online Movie Rental retailer, at the same time in Japan known for its technlogy touching people`s life is gearign up to introduce more and more in DVD Rental Vending Machines in the premises of the main railway stations in across the Tokyo.


THE NAME:
"JiRenKi" as they call it in Japan is the short form of "Jidou Rental Ki" (Automatic Rental Machine), is places just before the exits of the Railway Station. Tokyo is know for its one of the world`s well planned Railway System has already placed such machines in the major stations and growing like anything.This service is introduced from a company called "Astala Vista".

The touch Panel on the machine.




THE OPERATION:

It offers the user with a rental DVD in simple 3 steps.
1. Choose the DVD from a touch panel system.
2. Swap your credit card.
3. Get the DVD just as you get a bottle of Coke from a Vending Machine.

and returing it back is also done in the same order...
1. Touch "Return"..
2. Insert the DVD
3. Press Ok...and you are done.

THE PRICING:
The pricing is also pretty straight foward.

For 24 hours rental
1. New Release : 350 Yens ($ 3.05 approx.)
2. Standard : 250 Yens ($ 2.18 approx.)
3. General : 150 Yens ($ 1.31 approx.)

For 12 hours rental
1. New Release : 150 Yens ($ 1.31 approx.)
2. Standard : 100 Yens ($ 0.87 approx.)
3. General : 100 Yens ($ 0.87 approx.)

As you can make out from pricing its really very aggressive pricing so that its really affordable to people here. This pricing really makes us ponder on Steve Jobs thought process that "people want fix prices". But when I see the above price from customer point of view the pricing really seems to be practical enough, more for new movie and a bit less for a older one.This makes both the customers and Movie banners happy.

The solution may suit well in the Japanese society since the life style moves around the internal railway system network. Will the war like US will start here not is not sure yet, but the introduction of one such service can stir up the competition here too. This also makes us think about what is the best delivery model for a DVD Rental ? is it Manual like this or is it online delivery model or old school DVD rental shops or all together...or something else....well it will be intresting to watch out...

Google adds "Presentation" in its arsenal against Microsoft

Google finally added "Presentation" against "PowerPoint" of Microsoft to complete its suite of Online Office in Google Docs and Spreadsheets. May be the name can change in near future.


I guess this tool can come really handy to all the presenters around the world since nobody it is such a thing that you want to share with someone else and hence on need to carry it to the place of presentation (of course, provided the place has Internet connection). With the addition of Presentation functionality, Google is now ready with weapons against MS`s Word, Spreadsheets and Powerpoint. Now these three application are ready for normal usage , but Google has to toil hard to make it professionally useful to make it look appealing to business world.

I tested with it by creating a slide as follows.


The competition between Google and Microsoft will be interesting to see from now onwards.

Apple Store in Ginza (Japan) ! The new iPods` response.

Was in Apple Store here in Ginza to check out the latest offerings by Apple.It seemed to me , Japan welcomes the
introduction of new iPods with open hands but are waiting for iPod Touch which whose delivery dates are supposed to be this moth end or early october.

Lot of people gathered around the "fatty video nano" and seem to be delighted and amused to see/touch such a small piece of music player from Apple. I guess there no guided tour available for iPod Touch in Japanese hence the smarty employees of Apple Store with Green Shirts(with adv of iLife`08) on them were explaining the customers what was launched in the "Beat Goes On" Event by Steve Jobs. Lot of Apple Store Employees were advertising by taking nano and Classic in their hands.People didn`t seem to be intrested in the iPod classic, even though the lauch of heavy duty 160GB.I didn`t notice the buzz around new red shuffle too. People were saying "Sugoi" (great) and "Chichchai ne"(small) around the fatty along with "Kirei"(beautiful) while seeing the video playing on the 3rd generation nano.

Was just thinking about that will iPhone can also be successful in Japan, I guess it will be taken with quite a lot reluctancy because of one major reason. People here are so much used to writing mails using the phones specially designed for Japanese language that it might be difficult to replicate that thing in iPhone since Apple. Apple will have to do something of the keyboard before launching the iPhone here. E-Mail/SMS is the life line here. Since people follow "Mobile Manners" here in Japan inside a trains, the use of mailing/SMsing becomes more in the trains. All mobile phones have a setting called "Manner Mode" which put the mobile phone on silent vibration mode. People are not suppose to talk on mobile phone inside a train near a priority seats for elederly and handicapped people . But I am sure the genius of Apple can overcome such problems. But this is something which cannot be ignored here in Japan.

The above ginza Apple Store is the same store whose opening resulted in the greatest queue in Tokyo.
See it to believe it

Steve Jobs - The lord of Innovation !

In the world of technology innovation, one name will always remain in the hearts of millions - Steve Jobs.
His legs are always on the accelerator of innovation and he drive his competitors nuts with the launch of "WOW" products one after the other.Steve Jobs becomes very restless if he doesn`t ship out some fantastic product at least every year.Call his insecurity to be at the top of his product line, call his brilliance and passion towards designing such products, each and every product Apple comes out which shows a kind of taste of excellence and design wizardry.

After steve stongly covered the PMP market right from 1GB to 160GB , with such an elegant technology, every competitor must be doing something as follows !


iPhone is still just 2 months before story when the world went "Ga-Ga" over its beautiful touch screen technology. People started waiting for the same kind of technology update in iPods too. Jobs acknowledge that demand and released today the best PMP experience in the world ! iPods competitors hardly reached to a situation where they were able to replicate some of the functions of iPod in their products, with the launch of iPod Touch, they will be again left behind in dirt to figure out how to do that in their products again. Steve Jobs is such a person who stretches its company`s limits internally to that maximum for innovation and in turn compels the competitors to accelerate thier process of developing new products. With iPod Touch Apple again goes miles ahead of the other products of same category.

See it in motion to believe this marvel once again


People apart from USA were not able to use the iPhone since it was locked with providers and they had to wait till it comes through thier local providers. There were people in such countries who wished "Forget the phone, I want to use the rest of the iPhone". I was among them too :) And guess what, it really turned true.Now iPhone minus mobile phone function = iPod Touch is available to rest of the world for holiday season. The timing is so right. the people who really want the functionality apart from mobile phone functionality , they will buy it certainly.
It comes with spectacular specs as below:

• Thinner than the iPhone - only 8mm
• Same multitouch pinch & spread zooming controls for photos as the iPhone
• Same coverflow as the iPhone
• 3.5" diagonal screen
• Wi-Fi 802.11b & 802.11g - it can save your home network setup
• Home button
• Slide to unlock - same as the iPhone
• Sensor for auto-landscape viewing
• Safari - connect to the internet via WiFi
• YouTube via WiFi
• 22 hours audio, 5 hours video playback
• Shipping worldwide this month - already localized into many languages
• 8GB - $299
• 16GB - $399

Apart from iPod touch - iPod Shuffle (red) and fatty nano with video and iPod Classic (Video) were also refreshed from the ground up all set for the holiday season.

One more thing..the iTunes Wi-Fi Music store and the partnership with starbucks is again a trend setting ventures in the digital age where people will buy songs on the go!

"Man thinketh, Jobs Giveth"

Have some fun with your snaps !

If you have Internet Connection, Browser and a webcam then you can generate following results and can use these snaps in any of your "Web presence Sites" or can take the hard copy of it from your nearest photo developer store or you can just take it for fun to share with your family/friends.

You can have following fun with your snaps.

Clear :


Filter:
(You can select any one of it by clicking on one option amongst them.)


Distorted:
(You can select any one of it by clicking on one option amongst them.)


Scenes:
(You can select any one of it by clicking on one option amongst them.)


Frames:
(You can select any one of it by clicking on one option amongst them.)


So how do you do this ? The answer is pretty simple and straightforward ! MAC users must be quite aware of a built-in software called Photo Booth. This is its brother on internet which works both on MAC and Windows. So the process is as follows.
1. Fire Up your Browser
2. Go to this link.
3. It may ask you "Can I use Camera" Allow or Deny...? Choose `Allow`(at least it asked on MAC,)
4. Then you will see your snap on your screen. Then experiment with the right vertical strip on the right side.Try Different
options and select your options like Clear, Filter, Distort, Scenes and Frames. Select your fav among it and then press "Camera" mark to take snaps.

When you are through taking the snap, you have three options to do,
1. You can save it to pulic Gallery
2. You want to download the taken snap
3. Print it to full page
4. Delete it

We will most of the time like to download, so download it and see the result. Use the snap then where ever you want, print it and have fun.So take some snap and share with me too if you like.

Technology like this one can really bring some fun in our lives.

Japanese KBC or Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? [The TV Series]

This TV series was first aired in the United Kingdom, where it was hosted by Chris Tarrant.The first time it was aired was on Sept 4th 1998. So not so much old. The peculiar thing about this show is that, the emphasis is not on speed but its on the suspence the question create. Apart from that the concept of "Lifelines" and using real "cheques"is also unique.It was such a hit that after UK, many other countries like US, Australia, finland, France, Germany, Norway, Sweden, Japan and ofcourse our India and more countries also followed the same suit.

Yesterday i was seeing the Japan version of it.
Everybody has seen KBC, but just thought about how Japan plays that game and discovered this following video which is a episode with legendary sumo wrestler "Konishiki".The sets are almost same but because of his size, the show had a special seat made for him. Also note the Japanese Version of "Phone a friend" which is actually in this version have people related to contestant (Friends, Associates and Teacher) called "Study" to help the contestents. That was kind of intrestign to me. Also see how they use 50-50 and the use of "Final Answer" in the end. Also see how everybody prays when the contests is waiting for the host(Minorikawa Norio also known as Mino Monta) to answer. That also reveals the emotions of this part of the world. A word about the host. "Minorikawa Norio" also known as "Mino Monta" is the host of this series in Japan.On November 28, 2006, he set the Guinness World Record for the television host who had appeared live for the most time (21 hours, 42 minutes) during a week.Also note how they introduce theie celebrity guest and see how the answer is explained in the end.

The clip below is a cam recording of TV itself, hence the poor quality but I guess above description whould help us to understand the clip.


KBC, is really a "food for thought" kind of game and really our TV Technlogy is helping us to improve on this aspect of our lives in each county in its own unique way.
Do tell me what thoughts came to your minds when you were seeing it.

The Speeds of the trains !

Was just wondering about the high speed trains(Long distance)in the world. In the process discovered some amazing facts about the high speeds train in the world ranging in the speeds.

First of all I started with the search on our Indian trains.
Bhopal Shatabdi Express from Bhopal-New Delhi is the fastest train in India with the Commercial Speed (i.e., total distance covered divided by total time taken, including scheduled stoppages) of around 89.49 kms/h. The same train has recorded a top speed of 150kms/h recently. Mumbai Rajdhani is second highest in India with the commercial
speed of 86.76 kms/h.

Feel the speed of Bhopal Shatabdi Express crossing a station.


Get a glimpse of Mumbai Rajdhani passing by on the tracks.


Then moved towards the international scene and discovered as follows.
"MagLev" (MAGnetic LEVitation) of Japan is the fastest train under the sun which set the highest record speed of 581 Kms/h (Commercial Speed : 501 kms/h).

See this video to meet MAGLEV in person :


A normal Airbus A380 has a speed of aroung 900Kms/h.

Not all trains in Japan run with that speed. The average speed of long distance journey with Shinkansen (a.k.a Bullet Trains) is from 130 to 300 Km/h. Like for explample the distance between Tokyo and Osaka (like Mumbai to Delhi) is baout 550 km and with shinkansen it takes around 2.5 hours for the journey.

Who are the competitor to Japan`s Maglev then in the whole world. The Maglev is number one in the world using the unconventional track (magnetic-levitation), but in the uncocnvetional (non-magnetic) tracks its French TGV (Train à Grande Vitesse) recorded a test speed of 574.8 Kms/h.

There are few more intresting trains in Italy(Direttissima: 254 kms/h), Germany(Transrapid 08 : 501 km/h), Taiwan (THSR: 335.50 kms/h) and South Korea (KTX : 300 kms/h).

So lot of latest technology is helping human being to reach to their destinations as fast as possible.

Man simply started with the invention of a wheel, then bullock/horse cart, bicyle (Speed : 15 km/h), then automated mopeds, then Cars, then Trains, then Planes, then Rockets and going towards making of time machine. May be soon in the near future the dream of human being "With the press of a button I am in India, With the press of button I am in Japan or anywhere else in the world " may come true. I don`t know that will we be able to witness that era. But whats wrong in hoping of such time since we have evidence of human progress in that direction.

World is getting hotter ! (Tokyo witnesses highest temperatures ever).

Its official summers here. Tokyo witnessed a highest temperature ever of 40.9 degree Celsius in the month of August. This is the highest in last 74 years. 40.8 C was recorded in the year 1933.Sicne the country is not used to such heat, at least 3 people died and more than 530 people were taken to hospital apparently due to the heat, according to public broadcaster NHK.Normally in the summers the temperature use to fluctuate between 32 to 38 C, but this year Sun has been very angry on this part of the world too.The humidity is also unbearable. Things should be better from next month. In Tokyo they have started planting more trees as a counter measure to improve the situation.

In India, the highest recorded temperature till date is 50.6 C at Alwar, on the fringes of the Thar Desert and lowest of -45 C in Dras Ladhak, says source wiki.
Its really astonishing to notice that during this rainy season of India, cities which were not humid are also experienceing tremendous humidity like the one we use to have in cities like Mumbai, Chennai and Vizak etc.

The global warming is showing its true colors.

Well How can we contribute in handling this problem on personal grounds ?
We can do as follows....
1. The car you drive: the most important personal climate decision.
2. Choose clean power
3. Unplug a freezer.
4. The ligh bulbs we use.
5. Plant a tree : You can make a difference in this world by planting tree in your backyard.

So till the time our bureaucrat become aggresively involved in solving the global warming problem, we can start our own small efforts in this hot world.

This goes for All Orkut (SNS) Lovers !

(SNS = Social Networking Service)

See this short and sweet Video describing how orkut is there on people`s minds and how it can be used without a computer !

[It`s a brazilian video :

What did they communicate ?:

He said: Drink with me tonight?
She said: I can't..
He said: Why not?
and then the boyfriend appears.
]
If you are interested in more information about SNS, "Orkut" - the famous social networking site was developed by a Turkish Software Engineer named Orkut Büyükkökten (Don`t ask me his sirname`s pronounciation :) ) while working in google.He developed Orkut as an independent project, the outgrowth of a company policy whereby all employees at Google can spend 20% of their time working on personal interests.While previously working for Affinity Engines, he had developed a similar system, InCircle, intended for use by university alumni groups.

At the end of July 2004 Orkut surpassed the 1,000,000 member mark, and at the end of September it surpassed the 2,000,000 mark. As of August 2007, the number of members was over 67,000,000.Yes thats big number.

The Japanese counterpart for orkut is "mixi".The word "mixi" is a combination of "mix" and "i", referring to the idea that the user, "i", "mixes" with other users through the service."Mixi Station", a client program that detects songs being played in iTunes and Windows Media Player and uploads them automatically to a communally accessible list in the "Music" section, was implemented late in June 2006. By July 2006, support for winamp was implemented via a winamp plugin, which was quickly made official by Mixi.Batara Kesuma was the only developer at the start of the social networking site.Started in February 2004, there are more than 10 million (1 crore) members and 1 million communities as of July 2007.

If you are an orkut member, then you can actually go to orkut and see his profile too
Orkut`s Orkut Profile

I know my profile is not so important like His Highness Mr. Orkut but just in case any of my friends/relatives read this blog, I am pasting my profile link too for them, but sure you need to be a member of orkut to get in touch with me.
Prem`s Orkut Profile

iPhone - Finally Unlocked

It`s almost 2 months from the release of iPhone and people around the world were trying to free the iPhone so that they can use it with any GSM Service provider they like.

Now, iPhone can be finally used by "ANY" GSM carrier service across the world !

So finally team from "iPhoneSIMfree.com" have freed the iPhone from the clutches of AT&T and have provided evidence of their claims by demonstrating that they can used with T-Mobile (The Second carrier in US). Engadget confirms this news.

Below is the around 1 minute video from Engadget showing the proof of concept of Unlocked iPhone.


http://www.iphonesimfree.com/ has announced that they will start selling the SIMFree mobile very soon.
For us it means that now iPhone lovers don`t have to wait till Apple ties to their countries` local carrier. If your country has GSM network you can buy it now instead of waiting for next year which was the prpbable release date for iPhone in countries other than US and Europe. To simplify it more, now if someone buys the iPhone from "iPhoneSIMfree.com", it can be readily used in countries like Japan, India, China and any country with GSM Service. So no more roaming charges. Use Local provders on the move.

History shows, when people were trying very hard to install windows on MAC, Apple relaeased "Boot Camp" officially to relieve the pain of the general users who are not so good at hacking. When people wanted iTunes with DRM free music , Apple fulfilled their wishes. Now when hackers have unlocked the iPhone, will Apple release a Unlocked phone itself ? Lets`s stay tuned when that happens.

Hey Steve, make the iPhone free. That`s what expected from you. That`s what this Unlocking of iPhone proves.

Update 1: iPhone Unlocking software delayed a bit due to the lawyers of AT&T

Vacations are never enough !

Following are the snaps during the 2 weeks trip to India in August 1st week to 3rd week, year 2007. The conclusion is "Vacations are never enough !"



Was in India for last two weeks. On the way back, we enjoyed the lovely clouds before our flight landed in Mumbai via Singapore(I am hearing that business class direct flights from Narita (tokyo) are starting from September 2007). From Mumbai we started our journey to my home town Amravati via
1. Shirdi (Abode of Sai Baba),
2. Trimbakeshwar (One of 12 JyotirLingas) and
3. Lonar(The world's only salt water lake in basaltic rock is in Lonar. It's a crater lake that is believed to have been caused by a meteorite hitting Earth.).

Apart from my brother Babloo, Mom and Dad, Mama and Maami also joined the gang for the tour. The weather was awesome as Monsoon has just started, Greenry everywhere with cosmic clouds everywhere. If you are going thru road you can stop, sip a cup tea, enjoy the scenery to make the best use of your tour.

Lot of other things to share, but this blog is not enough. To name a few, met my oldy frinds, went to my college, went to my school along with my Mom and Swapnesh, got an opportunity to address to students of my alma mater and met my old teachers, met few relatives, watched "Chak De India", on the full screen which i never get to see in Tokyo. Lot of others things were also planned, but the title of this post explains everything :). But it is said "Something is better than nothing" and is true in this case. Went riding to kondeshwar, a beautiful temple near Amravati with all 12 JyotirLings in one temple. It was awesome too.

In short time was less but every second of it was enjoyable. Felt quite tired coming bck to Tokyo. Hence a bit pause today and office again from tomorow. Lot of things ahead in that front too.

Where are we in the whole cosmos ?

(Read this if you have uninterrupted peaceful 5 minutes with you. Will suggest you to see the below video in full screen mode.)

Ever thought where do our home/family/pets/friends/beloved stand as compared to whole earth ?Ever thought about where this earth came from ? What is the the comparitive size of the earth as compared to other space entities ? I am sure must have thought about it atleast once. So, as we go on searching about the answers, it turns out that earth is just a tiny little particle in the galaxy.



How can we compare it with other planets, stars? Well we can do it by observing the snaps of it from all possible distances from the earth. I guess the farther we will be able to send our spacecrafts from the earth the greater will be our understanding to understand the whole cosmos. Till that time enjoy the snaps in above video.

Video games making sense in life.

(above is the video for the games introduced last year for sports in your drawing room)

The earlier games made you very lazy and couch potato as it just involved pressing of few botton or some joysticks. But the companies are now thinking wisely and trying to make video game players more healthy, smart and intelligent. For knowing "How ?", read on..
Nintendo "Wii Fit" as it is aptly called, is again a new concept which is brought by the japanese company Nintendo. Nintendo is very famous in local market from quite some time with its very intuitive learning games on a portable device "Nintendo DS", is now out in the world with innovative stuffs with what they call "Wii" console.With "Wii" we can actaully enter into the game and play games like tennis, boxing and other games with really moving our hands as we would really do in the real world.

(the latest one that which keeps you fit)

The above video "Nintendo Wii Fit", is one more step in that concept which helps you to play funny on a thing they call "Balance Board". They exploit the concept called "Body Mass Index"(BMI) and help us to train in pushups, soccer headings, Yoga and other exercises. You can have a look at the video what change these games can bring in your life. So now with Video Games, we have a digital personal trainer in our lives which helpts us to be fit and remain healthy.

Pranayama - A Conscious breathing.

Just came across a lovely video which talks about how we should do Pranayama in much great details. It would be worth watching it again and again till you get it right. There are simple 3 basic steps to follow. Just have a look at it and tell me if it helps.

The omnipresent videos era are helping a lot to make us understand the life in more better ways. The video above is a link in the whole chain for such kind of experience. Earlier we need to go to some expert to know whats being explained in the clip.But things like youtube helps us a lot.

Our Second Wedding Anniversary

My mom always wanted to see the our snaps on the web. But I must say the technology is still not very simple for someone of the age of our mothers and fathers or grandparents . Ofcourse they can get along when they learn it over a period of time. Such was the case when i asked my mom to see the snaps by logging into a Photo uploading website or sending her a mail. This is still too difficult for a casual user like my mom, untill i discovered this Picasa feature of embedding the whole album into a simple embedded slide show. Now I just refer her a single URL of this blog and "boom" she can just see on the page itself.This is also one of the reason i am shifting my blogs here, since it gives me such features.

Yes the above snaps are taken on our 2nd Wedding anniversary (26th June) for which we decided ato spend some time in the cruise in Tokyo Bay from a compnay called "Symphony". It was really a "titanic" effect and it was a pleaseant surprise to discover that in the last 30 min a live piono show was there. Apart from all other things that was the best part in the end.

The Jesus Phone comes in US on 26th June, 6pm Local Time

Day : Friday
Date : 29th June
Time: 6 pm Local time

This day will be markd in the human Cyber History as on this The Reality Distorter (Steve Jobs)present to the world "The Jesus Phone" which is the name given by media to iPhone.Its a big news in the US today, while rest of the world awaits when it will hit thier countries.

It was previously announced that first it will be launched in USA, then Europe and then Asia inyear 2008. Now come on man, we cant wait for that long.

Hey Steve, please make this baby available during the holiday season this year man.

But anyways, this will speed up other mobile manufacturers to speed up the innovationin their phones too. All bug players like Nokia, Motorola, Samsung and LG wait nervouslyto see how this phone perform. For me, I dont care how the phone performs, I am fascinatedby the basic idea of it that its a best ever video iPod and a breakthrough internet browser with Wifi.

Waiting anxiously to buy this puppy as soon as possible.

Wandering in woods of Mount Mitake !

Monday April 23, 2007

The day was Saturday the 21th Aprtil, 2007 when we (I N Swapna, Rajan N shraddha, Bipin N Beena) decided to go for a one day trip to Mt Mitake.

The weather forecast said it will be partly cloudy and partly sunny. But we took a chance since from the Monday of that week it was continuously raining and we all were sick and tired of that. Hence we really needed a freak out. So we decided to start our journey on Saturday morning aroung 8 am to a place called Mt Mitake.
The route was to go
from Myoden --> Nakano -->MitakA -->Tachikawa -->Ome-->MitakE...

You can find snaps at the following link
http://new.photos.yahoo.com/straighttoprem/album/576460762399356930

The journey till the Mt Mitake was intresting. Trains took us till Mt Mitake Station and from there we need to take Bus till a station where Cable Car was waiting us to take us till the Mt Mitake trek start point. We reached at the trek start point at aroung 12 pm. It was a lovely view point from where we could take a glimpse of Tokyo, Chiba and all palces which we left for this place. There we decided to have our breakfast with sandwitches. Its really very "Anandmayee" to eat at such lush green places. So after break fast we decide to visit two famous spots called "Rock Garden" and "Nayana Falls". While on the way we enquired checked about the possibility of doing night stay in those lovely woods and hece we enquired to a "Visitor Center" for the availability. And to out surprize we got a cottage kind of place for 8 person. Since we were only 6 the place suited us very well. We went to take a look at it. It was a lovely duplex cottage with the windows facing the beautiful and deep valley. Everyone reminded of their honeymoons with the similar views :) We were informed there was no food avialable for dinner in that village after 6pm or so. Mount Mitake trek start point is a small village type place where the shops almost close by 5pm. yes you read it right. We requested a hotel owner to provide us dinner by 7 pm. The shopowner was a lady and she readily agreed for that. simultaneously we booked the cottage also and dumped our bags there and again started for our trek with a plan of returning by 6pm.

So again we were on the trek. The rocks on the sides of the trails covered with green things are called as Rock Garen and the Fall were also quite decent.We had lot of fun while going deep into jungles, specially when searching of Rock Garden. The route was never ending only. Along the route came big shrines, small shrines, small wooden bridges for crossing shallow waters, very very tall trees, untouched natural wooden sticks (which i carried all the way till we departed for tokyo), the passing by trekkers and lots of other stuffs. It was all fun in deep jungles.


Around 4:30 pm we started our journey back to our Cottages. We didnt planned to stay when we were leaving for this trek. So there were no extra clothes, towel, tooth brush, soap, cream or anything like that which we carry when we are supposed to stay. So have to struggle a bit in buying those things since it was not easily available there. But at last managed to find brush/toothpaste/towels/soaps from shops and resteraunts().That part was also fun.

When we returned to the palce where cottage was located , sat somethimes, sang few songs in the open and then proceeded towards the cottage. Evreybody was tired and need to freshen up a bit. After gettging rejuvenated, the lovely dinner was waiting for us. The dinner included "O-Soba"(like noudles), "Chyahan" (chinese masala rice :)) and "Onigiri" (Rice bowl which is covered by a Sea Leaf and inside there is a pickle like thing called Ume-Boshi).We also had our lunch left whcih we didnt eat "Theple" and "Dahi", which saved some lifes :). It was a filling dinner and around 6 onigiris and few theples were left for next day breakfast.

We took dinner on the ground floor and then we went to 1st floor. There someone suggeted we wil play "Dumb Sherads" It started with me where i was asked to act the movie called "Bewafa". I really couldnt act that moview :((. After that we went on playing till 11:30 pm and it was becoming very hillarious specially when Bipin was asked to act for "Badhai ho badahi" ,"Atank hi Atank" (you can imagine how you can act such movies), "Wajood", "Ina Menna Deeka", "Sailab", "Hakikat", "Tejaswini", "36 Antop hill" and more and to end with "Hawas" (dont imagine anything ):))...In a nut shell it was all fun on that saturday night.Then we went to sleep.

When we wake up next morning I came to know nobody was able to sleep except I and Bipin. When we asked why we came to know that we were "Snoring" like anything :)) I really really felt bad for that.OK, then I and Bipin went out to take morning Tea and Milk from vending machines (somebody shud introduce the "Tapri" concept here yaar, badly need it) to compensate bad their sleeps. Then by 10 am on that lovely sunday morning we strted our journey back. In the return journey we decided to go on foot skipping that Cable Car.On the way we sang and sang and sang ans said "Konnichiwa" to all passing by people.Took lot of humourous snaps, took shortcuts (first i and bipin only , for which I got scolded too :)) but soon it was peace :)) but i m sorry for that and soon we took shorcuts with our betterhalfs :)))

It was a lovely journey, took us aroung 1 hour 30 minutes and then when we reached as bus stop the bus has just left hence we need to wals again for arnd 45 minutes. On the way we got good and close glimpse of a river where people we fishing untill we finally reached at Mitake Station from where the journey back to Tokyo thru train was about to start. Everybody was very tired and wanted to get in the trian as soon as possible.

So as a whole this one day freak out turned into a night stay at Mount mitake and it was all new experience again.Its a must go place for anyone who is a nature and adventure lover.

Japanese Dance On Indian Tunes !

Sunday April 1, 2007

Yes, you read it right.The place is Indian Embessy, Kudanshita, Tokyo.Occassion is Cherry Blossom in Japan.Indian embessy organized this program where the Japanese people were made to dance on feet tapping songs like "Kajraare".."Nach Balliye"..some South Indian Songs and Marathisongs too (I do not know the lyrics though but the tunes were the same foot tapping)..They were really performming like professionals in India :) given theirfirst performance.The things got more exciting when spectators took over the stage withthe their wildest dance steps...And yes our UniKaihatsutians also showedtheir "Jalwa"..Here is the link to some snaps...http://new.photos.yahoo.com/straighttoprem/album/576460762395965854

Watch out Shailendra, Jimit, Bhavesh and more...and here is just a 11 sec clip uploaded by on youtube to give just a glimpse (end of the song "Kajraare") of a Japanese girl and a boy dancing on the stage.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18F28RZ9yiY

At last, the revolutionary Touch Screen iPhone is born(announced).

Wednesday January 10, 2007

Yes , at last the wait is over of all Mac Fans...with Steve announcing the most awaited Apple Product of the decade "The iPhone" at MacWorld 2007, San francisco. A soon as i came to know that Synaptics is the partner Company of Apple then I started imagining the possibilities the future may have for all of us. The "onyx" concept of synaptics technologies...which are innovators in Human Interface for computers/devices is really a revolutionary within itself which says you don`t require any harware buttons for operating a device. See this link for that concept. http://www.synaptics.com/onyx/ But i was wrong in guessing the partner company for multitouch screen.There were independent researchers too like Jeff Van who demoed themultitouch screen concept on big screens in Feb ` 2006 itself about a year beforethis iPhone was intorduced.Video can be found here,http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=884017118027634444&q=multi-touchBut later i cam to knew that the company behing this tech is FingerWork ergonomicswhich was well know in making gesture pads for MAC and PC both.See one example of it.http://www.fingerworks.com/gesture_guide_web.htmlI also happen to visit some places on net which gave insights about what was Apple upto...
http://hrmpf.com/wordpress/51/apple-multipoint-touchscreen/
http://hrmpf.com/wordpress/54/touch-sensitive-ipod/
http://hrmpf.com/wordpress/48/new-apple-patents/
Everything can be converted to a software and just a pointing device like "Stylus" or "Finger/s" will solve the purpose. As Steve Jobs said in yesterday`s key note (9th jan at MacWorld 2007) that we have solved this problem in computers 20 years ago, where you use a bitmap image as a button for any operation and a pointing device like "mouse" for this purpose. In the same fashion that solution has been finally introduced by Steve in the third revolutionary product "iPhone"....after "Macintosh" (revolutionized Computer Industry) in 1984 and "iPod" in 2001 (revolutionized the Music Industry). It is bound to shake it for Cell Phone Industry now and Oh boy...he introduced the "iPhone" in his own unique electrifying and captivating way. Apple loves uniformity in such a way, that they have kind of squeezed the MAC OSX and built it as a foundation for software in the mobiles. A solid MAC OS X foundation helped Apple to make waht they called "Desktop Standard" applications...which i take it as..fully functional applications...no crippled small adjustment kind of application. The look of the phone is similar to ultra-brightening shine of MAC OS X on Macbooks, MBP or iMacs...Its a sunshine phone... iPhone consists basically a combination of 3 devices.. 1. iPod (Music, Video, Photo and other) 2. Phone (SMS, Normal Calling, Conference CallingTouch Screen, BlueTooth, WiFi Enabled) 3. Internet Communicator (Mail, Safari, Voice Mails Visualizer) In addition to this it has three special sensors for sensing the proximity of your face so that when you are picking up the phone the video fades out, then for a light sensing (for adjusting lights according to surrounding light conditions) and for mode sensing (Portrait or Landscape for automatic fliping of screen) When you are scrolling a list, the faster you move your finger the faster will be the movement of list....and it would be like you are playing with a wheel. Stay tuned...more to come....
I think this is just a begining of real digital age. We wil also see more innovations from other companies too..since this "iPhone" has triggred a new race for out of the box innovations.