Me and Kangaroos

Whilst on the tour to Budawangs, on Sunday we also stopped at a beach near Batemans Bay. This picture was taken there. We managed to get really close to the Kangaroos and take some neat close up pictures before they objected to our presence.

Deepak Ramesh Again

Look at what i found said about Deepak Ramesh (aka Dadiyan)

Interesting i would say....Is this the Dadiyan that we all know???

"Deepak Ramesh( a.k.a. Dabba): Have you ever wondered 'how can somebody be honest?....well Dabba has the answer. He is the guy who will come to a movie bunking class - and tell his mom he saw DAUD and didn't attend classes. Further he will answer every question on Urmila (to his Mom!!).A left handed bat,who made history by playing "name,place animal thing" between the strikers' and non strikers' end.He is now in Bangalore with C.D .......watch them carefully ,before you realize they could make it real big."

Quote unQuote from http://nilakantanrs.tripod.com/nilu/id2.html

What does he have to say abt it???

Budawangs

Last weekend i spent in exile at the budawangs. This is a huge forested area encompassing some 4-5 national parks and 10-15 state parks south east of canberra. These are coastal forested regions near the by-now widely popular Batemans Bay area. The temperature was crispy cool, the forest refreshingly fresh, the wildlife abundant and plentiful, the birds always cheerful and loud and the area having been luckily forgotten by the enveloping arms of development still in its pristine and interference free natural state. I made two treks-- The first of them to the pigeon house and the second to Mount Budawangs itself.

The trek to Pigeon house was steep but short. Maybe about 7-8 kilometers. There was a moderate amount of scrambling close to the top. Moreover, the steel ladders at the very top which help the novice climbers climb up the last 500 meters of the climb were dismounted because of some repair work!!! and the climb was closed. But luckily i could talk the supervisor of the work operation into believing that i am a pro rock climber from India. So having accomplished this task i climbed atop the pigeon house. The view was at once stunning and eerily encompassing. 360 degrees of nothing but huge vast areas of unoccupied and un touched forests (bushlands) interpersed with tall mountains and deep gorges were visible. The view was stunning because you could actually see as far as the coast which was atleast a 150-200 kms away from the pigeon house. Not a single man made structure was in sight. It was pity that i couldnt spend anymore time here since i had promised to return within 30 minutes. So i climbed down and returned to the bottom of the dismantled ladders where my accmplice during the trip Karthik Ram was waiting for me. We then descended and camped at the foothills of a mountain between the Pigeon House and the Castle.

The next day we ventured out to the Batemans bay area and spent abt an hour in the beach. We were lucky to spot some timid kangaroos that volunteered to post for our cameras. Then we drove to the foot of the Budawangs mountain. I should of course mention that since these are drives through forest roads (not really roads....just patches of leaves, dirt and stones...no road in the vicinity) we got lost midway. Lucky to get lost i must add. The drive in the wrong direction led us to some Llamas and interesting colorful birds and huge stallions and loads and loads of huge buffalows. Anyway, once we realized we were lost we backtracked and finally reached the Mt.Budawang. The drive was steep (really steep at some places), slippery (as i said it was just forest so no roads and all) and tricky. Finally we parked at the foot of the Budawangs and climbed up the Mount Budawang to have another stunning and truly amaziong view of the bushes around. We could see the pigeon house in the far distnce. and the coast too....

Finally we returned back to Canberra late Sunday night. I shall put up the pictures of the visit online soon. But for now savor this view from the Mount Budawang.

Al old story in a new blog!!!

The Window To My World


My life was sane, happy and contended. I thought i had all i ever
wanted , all that could ever please me and then suddenly SHE entered
and iam left wanting.The rudenes of the shock that i experienced
when i lost myself in what is an ocean of music,an ocean of love
shattered all the beliefs that were once a part of my self - which so
far i thought was under my control.

Yes - little does man realize that he has very little control over
himself and his deeds and more importantly his love.The experience
is, at once both frightening and invigorating and very alarmingly i
find myself wanting more of those utopian minutes.Life
has ,yes,changed and irrevocably at that.

I was the insane old Ashok- the one you have all come to know and
that was one of those nightmarish parties where you were supposed to
know everybody but knew none.The futility of such parties lies in
the fact that the best option for you is to remain aloof,inhale the
music and enjoy the food that is on offer and yet the host will not
allow you to do the same.

The day was pleasant and i was enjoying myself - taking the
oppurtunity to be alone for a few minutes. I took one of those
vantage points in the party-dark but yet providing a clear view of
the entire party and its varied guests.And it did help - the fact
that there were some very
"gawkable" people out there.


I was very discretely enjoying the covert glances ,the all too
familiar "i remember your face but your name escapes my memeory"
phrase
which in effect means "i do not remember you" and of course indulging
myself every now and then in some banal conversation if only to
please my altruistic host.I usually clothe myself with colours not
too bright but that was not one of those days.The yellow t-shirt and
the blue jeans wasnt the perfect disguise if you wanted to be left
alone.Every few minutes there was somebody out there who decided it
was time to get to know this geek dressed in a bright outfit and
there ends my privacy.


And everytime somebody walked up to me introducing themselves i
feigned happiness and i suppose so did they.But somehow my day kept
getting worse.


And then it HAPPENED.

It was an accident.But then again most monumental things are
incidentally accidental.I was having my pav bhaji and moving around
to get some more of it when a dark red churidar caught my eye.I
turned towards it twisting my neck leftwards still continuing my
gallop towards the food.I was suddenly halted ---and being forced to
retrace my eyes----------alas i had banged right into someone.


The bright plain blue saree that now had some orange spots on it
caught my attention.My immediate words of apology were lost for she
was least interested in hearing me. She wasnt even slightly
displeased that her saree had gotten stained-----in fact she seemed
pleased.Her cherubic smile melted me and i was left speechless.Her
first words were " Lets go get some PAV.It tastes great. By the way I
am ......" and the next many minutes were a rapid recollection of the historical events preceeding her presence in the party that night.



She was her buoyant self the rest of the day and she showed me a
whole new world - a world where all that mattered was joy and
pleasure.If only i had known how those moments were to transform my
life--if only i had known the profound impact those moments had-------
---but alas i didnt know the future,i couldnt know the future.

We were quick to realize that we had found each other.And now that we
had , there was no time to waste----there were things to be taught -
to be learnt and this bantering was definitely not going to help.We
finished our meal and immediately she took charge -- took charge of
my life----took charge of our life.She seemed totally in her elements
and experienced in this sort of thing.Very politely and succintly she
sweettalked our host into allowing us the liberty of using one of his
rooms downstairs.


What was i walking into?I didnt as much as know her for an hour and i
was willing to follow her , to obey her instructions. But inwardly i
wanted to talk -- to talk freely with her and what she was providing
was a perfect opportunity.She led me down--- a master player
controlling her puppet.Was i in a trance?was i hypnotised?i'd heard
of all these things and my views about these were always one of
skeptism.But that day i really knew what a trance felt like.

"Climbing down is the only way to Climb up" they say.And yes it is
true.We climbed down 2 floors to enter the host's well furnished room
where again she surprised me with her alacrity.She made me some tea
and we sat there sipping the tea-- talking about various issues----
none important.

ANU



So i have added a few more pictures today...These were taken yesterday around ANU....
The brightness issue with the camera was resolved successfully...But the flash in this camera sucks...
Either that or my batteries were not good enough to invoke a good flash....

Dont forget to check out the other pictures at
http://www.cfar.umd.edu/~vashok/PhotoAlbum/ANU/index.htm

And just before i go, One more thought especially to the hiking and the trekking enthusiasts

I AM FOREVER walking upon these shores,
Betwixt the sand and the foam,
The high tide will erase my foot-prints,
And the wind will blow away the foam.
But the sea and the shore will remain
Forever.

--- Gibran





Children

A poem in this blog http://nous-reigns.blogspot.com/ which of course can be traced back to
http://melancholetta.blogspot.com/2005/05/children-kahlil-gibran.html

Instructive i would say!!!

And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, "Speak to us of Children."

And he said:

Your children are not your children.

They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.

They come through you but not from you,

And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts.

For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls,

For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit,

not even in your dreams.

You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.

For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.

The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you

with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.

Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;

For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that

is stable.

-- from The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran

Lake Burley Griffin



So thats where i went this Sunday....Lake Burley Griffin...a large lake in central Canberra. When you look at these pictures u imagine a nice hot sunny day especially when you see these bright snap...and the others i have posted in

http://www.cfar.umd.edu/~vashok/site/Photos.htm

But, unfortunately, it was indeed quite a cold day...Not extremely cold..But cold enough to warrant gloves if you were bicycling as i was. Anyways, something seems wrong with the brightness setting in the camera...The pictures are all too bright to be good..I might tinker with the brightness setting of the camera before it is used again. I have also got myself a Motorol c116 cellphone and activated a Vodaphone prepaid number so that ppl can reach me. If i have forgotten to send you my number please do email me and i will send it to you.

Dont forget to check out the snaps at
http://www.cfar.umd.edu/~vashok/site/Photos.htm



Cricket in Australia

Yesterday evening (thats Friday eveing) i found some SriLankans and Australians to play cricket with. We went to this Indoor Cricket Stadium in Canberra and played a match against some other team. Boy did we get thrashed soundly...Well we lost pitifuly to say the least, but it was still fun to play anyway. Playing in an indoor cricket arena is very different from normal cricket in a lot of ways.

The fiels is fully enclosed by a net. All around you. Its probably a 35 feet X 15 feet sized net which is about 15 feet high i guess....So the ball cannot leave this enclosed area. The rules are slightly different too. For scoring any run, you must run. If the ball hits the side net and you manage to run a single then you get 2 runs. If the ball manages to hit the back net and u manage to run a single then u get 4 runs and similarly if it hits the back net full toss and u manage to run then u get 6 runs. But the ball hitting the net is not a bounce, so you could get caught after the ball hits the net and comes back to a fielder. That makes stroke playing a lil tricky. Of crse the bowler has to bowl just like in normal cricket. Wides and no-balls are two runs each. and the score is usually high...The games are all 12 overs with 4 overs for each batting pair. Moreover, if a wicket falls you lose 5 runs and the batsmen continue batting. Which again as is true in most modern forms of cricket encourages batters to lose their wickets!!!. There is no price to a wicket these days...Take 20-20 for example. With 10 batsmen to play in a 20 overs game why on earth would a batsman be worried about losing his wicket??? Anyway, fielding in the indoor field is nice fun with the ball bouncing around from everywhere. Maybe, i will go again next weekend, and maybe we will play better that time around...

An appropriate Forwarded Email

A bus station is where a bus stops.
A train station is where a train stops.
On my desk, I have a work station....
what more can I say........

Click Day

Today i have started a mammoth clicking project. In order to validate some tracker that i have built i have to get ground truth tracking data using manual tracking. It essentially boils down to my having to click manually 7 points on each of the 200 frames. Boring job and best of all is....If the 200 frames give a good validation for my tracker then i might have to do it for another 400 frames.... The things one has to do !!!! I have begun clicking....have probably completed 10 %...So took a break...

Veg Puff.

Oye PPl,

I never really knew how much i missed the Vegetable Puff. Its been what about 18 months since i had it last. Anyway, day before yesterday i went to the campus bakery at ANU and they had something called Veg Curry Roll. It was 2$ and 70c . I tasted it and it was very much like the Veg Puff. In fact it was almost a renamed slightly differently shaped veg Puff. Not having had it for so long I ate like it was my last dinner. And i was so craving for more of it that i went back. But alas, they didnt have any more. So i spent an entire day waiting for it. Then yesterday at 4:15 in the evening i went back there for it. Nopes. They close at 4:00. Missed you baby. But i will get u tomorrow i said. Today, i left the lab at abt 3:30 and reached the bakery and ordered the Veg Puff and went for a walk with it. It was so delicious and brought back those pleasant memories of spending countless hours eating Puffs and Samosas while chit chatting away in TNagar. All those memories of my friends and times spent with them returned back to me in a flood. I got reminded of the slanted stance and continuous beard brushings of Sivaprahas. I got reminded of the startled statements and even more startled responses of Aditya. I got reminded of the cool nonchalant cunning wickedness of Viji, and the noisy banter of arun and the huge apetite and uncanny comments of Deepak and of course the highlight of every day life Arvind.....This and more returned to my mind in a flash.

It was priceless.

My Daily Meal Routine

I have been in Australia now for a week now i guess.. So heres the neat lil routine i have slipped into. Wake up early at about 6:30 - 7:00 and get have a sumptuouy s breakfast made of Bread with Stawbwrrey jam and Cereal with milk and Orange Juice. Then reach lab at about 8:30. I have two sandwiches for lunch. Now thats healthy isnt it?? And then to add to it, look at what i have for dinner. I have so far been having something like 2 apples, a banana and some juice for dinner. All because i am lazy. Lazy to move my butt out and eat. I should break this habit...Healthy food is not gooood.

My First Kangaroo

Today i saw my first Kangaroo....I was out in the field at the Beehive where they conduct their experiments with the bees. And as i entered the field i saw three Kangaroos staring at me. I was happy to see them of course. My labmate who was with me then told me that if i approached them slowly with long intermittent stops i might be able to get close to them. So thats what i did. I took two steps waited a minute, then another two steps and so on and so forth. I was about as close as 5 feet from them when they realized my presence. Then they hopped away and my GOD they are quite fast. Inspite of hopping away on two feet, they are still able to move quite fast. Unfortunately of crse since it was unplanned i didnt have my camera on me and off they went without being photographed.

So after that of crse i went and saw the huge beehive and the thousands of bees in them....The buzz they created was quite a noise i should say. I saw the place where they had made long recordings of beeflights. In short i got introduced to the bees. Now i am back in the lab typing away....

Australian National University, Canberra

My flight to Australia was exciting i must say. Cleared the security and other formalities at the crappy IAD airport in Washington and reached the gate much before boarding time. Spent some time looking around. Then bought myself a Italian Panini Sandwich for dinner. Boarding began at about 6:35. But we were all aboard the aircraft and waiting till about *20 or so for them to take care of some last minute technical snags and some other airport delays. Anyway, the hour and half delay meant that i would reach LA late for my connecting flight to Sydney. The flight reached LA at 10:42. My flight in LA was supposed to depart at 10:40. Luckily for me they hadnt yet departed and i could just manage to squeeze in. The flight departed with 5 minutes. Then after several journeys into the sleep wake eat cycle on this long 17 hr flight i finally reached Sydney Intl Airport at about 6AM on Friday. After completing all the customs and immigration formalities I Found a kiosk to go online and checked email et al. Then waited until 9:40 at the airport for my connecting flight. I arrived at Canberra at about 10:30 AM. Dr.Srini was already there to pick me up. He then drove me to Ursula hall (where i will be staying). I got freshened up in an hour and then he took me around the lab and introduced me to quite a few people including a Lot of Honeybees!!!. Then later in the evening i returned back to my room at about 6:00 PM. Was so exhausted and tired after the long flight journey that i slept without dinner. Woke up early today morning and am in the lab now to check email/news mail to junta etc.

As you have noticed i havent yet seen much around here. Not enough to comment upon atleast. Anyway, i am thinking about starting to put some photos also on this blog. BTW, i also bought a new Fuji Digital camera (E510) from Staples just before leaving the US.

Books

My last two books have both been good. I just managed to finish
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1400032717/qid=1115733568/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/103-8253150-9484651
"The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" by Mark Haddon last night.

The book follows the life of a young autistic boy as he solves a murder mystery.
As he is intent on solving the murder mystery he also manages to straighten a few other facets of his life.
The book is recounted in the words of the boy and therefore provides his perspective on human life and human relations. I would definitely encourage you all to read this book.


Also, last month i managed to read this book called "An Unquiet Mind : A Memoir of Moods and Madness" by KAY REDFIELD JAMISON
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0679763309/qid=1115733838/sr=8-1/ref=pd_csp_1/103-8253150-9484651?v=glance&s=books&n=507846

This book is an autobiography of sorts from a scientist and a victim of Bipolar Disorder or as she prefers to call it manic-depressive illness. The book is neither a truly scientific account of a medical condition nor is it a personal account of her struggle with manic-depressive illness. Instead it is a mix of the two. The book is well written in parts. I would recommend this book if you are one of those inclined towards reading and learning more about the human brain and mood disorders but you are not willing to read a truly medical journal.


On the whole if i were to rate the two books on a scale of 1 to 10 i would have to give an 8 to "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" while i would give a 7 to "The Unquiet Mind".

Optical Illusions

I just happened to be led to this webpage on this day of nearly random browsing. Some of the illusions that keep floating around in countless emails are explained here. Hope u guys enjoy this as much as I did. I am truly intrigued by perceptions of reality especially visual perceptions. But in general, the philosophical notion of separatism between truth and perception intrigues me!!!!

http://www.ritsumei.ac.jp/~akitaoka/index-e.html

New Photo Album

I have added a Photo album in my website
http://www.cfar.umd.edu/~vashok/site/openingpage.htm

These photos were taken when we went to an Italian Restaurant in Bethesda. The Restaurant was called "Thats Amore". The food was Ok. Of Course Shyam loved the Bread and Olive Oil Funda. As for me I ordered a totally Mushroom dish and was surprised to receive 9 Huge Mushrooms filled with cheese. No kidding...That was it. Of course i didnt appreaciate it too much. But as usual Shyam loved it. Is there anything that this guy doesnt like. For those who dont recognize Shyam, he is the man in the black T-shirt in http://www.cfar.umd.edu/~vashok/PhotoAlbum/ThatsAmore/pages/ThatsAmore%20013_jpg.htm

Some of the photographs in this list are examples for woefully inadequate attempts at artistic photography. If u want to see photography put to some real good use see my friend Deepaks blog
www.sudasudacoffee.blogspot.com

Australian National University

So its been decided finally.... I will be visiting Australian National University at Canberra. I will be a visiting academic (Pseud name for student) with the Research School of Biological Sciences (Visual Sciences Group) for a period of about two months. I leave the United States in about a weeks time or so. Actually i will be leaving on the 11th of May. Hope to meet some new ppl and make some new friends during my visit there.

Yesterday i talked to Srividya. She seemed livid that i had not told her earlier about my impending visit to Australia--- and maybe she is right to be livid. But the fact of the matter is....I never told anyone( except my roommates of course). The reason being two-fold. One-- it seemed to be highly unlikely that i would go and Two- I had just not convinced myself that i was indeed going....