I'm back, well, almost, but not quite.

Feels like forever since i've been here. I see the follower's count hasn't increased. That is, perhaps, a little too much to expect when one isn't blogging. I have to see how to make this thing work on the phone so that i don't have to sit in front of the computer to do this. Or, so that i can write paragraph after paragraph every morning on the loo and post it at the end. I'm consider myself quite healthy not to finish an entire blog post in one sitting. Thank you.

One of the reasons why i haven't written about anything lately, is quite simply because there isn't anything to write about. Some other parts in life, like culinary skills, running, a small matter of my thesis and not to mention the new found interest in languages are happily munching away my time. My "writing time" as well has been taken over by the fountain-pen. The pen, indeed is mightier than the sword, or here, more aptly, the keyboard. Finding new pen friends, having a mom who loves to write and a new found interest in making people take up philately by sending them new stamps, also consume time, especially when people set themes for what stamps i have to send them. Gladly, but takes time, you see. But lately, a person totally unrelated to my blogging sphere asked me whether i still keep writing. It was also inspirational and a reason to start again. Thank you Thomas.

Lately, my life has gone towards drooling over academic titles like "Model Concepts for Non Isothermal Compositional Liqid-Gas Flow and Transport" By Holger class or "Multiphase Flow and Transport Processes in the Subsurface" By rainer helmig. Firstly, because of this, i don't have enough time to read other stuff, like a normal book written by a non-acadmeic author. Secondly, i cannot write about what i read here, because, (a). I will have to cite everything, an annoying activity I try to avoid doing because it might lead to someone revoking my degree ten years later because of improper citation. See, german politics for example. (b). I need LaTeX and i don't wanna do that here, too many equations.

I sometimes try to put out a post on my culinary achievements, later realizing that it would be a hundred times in the internet already (see my explanation about citations and relate to this).

So, for the next months, i will have limited access to normal literature, normal english literature, normal non-academic english literature and hence a reduced posting frequency related to it. It's sad, but somehow i wish to get through this phase with my interest to blog still intact at the other end. Your wishes and inspirational words are warmly welcome! Till my next post! Ta-ta!

Thoughts

Here's the thing with weekends, they just end even before you get into a grove! And if you're in my phase of life, not to mention; part of the world, you'll spend it panicking about the week ahead, if you're good, or the entire month; and thats when you need professional help. Mind you, not worrying, under certain circumstances, will also be eligible to necessitate professional help, but in most cases a long whip will solve that trend.

The interesting part of the weekend is how you can come up with seemingly unrelated stuff and worry about it for hours together, losing sleep and sometimes forgetting to cook and eat until your thought process dulls down and you realize you require some fuel. That's when i usually have several bars of chocolates to choose from handy, to take a bite from each would mean you get half an hour before the mind and body goes on strike to cook yourself a warm meal (if you're not used to cold sandwiches that is; I'm not).

One of the thing i was wondering so much about the last weekend was, apart form my assignments and presentations which're coming up; and the exams too, was how civilizations seemingly managed to destroy themselves usually at the most advanced phase of their development . Like the Indus valley for example. They had water conduits and public baths and roads and everything. Some say the river dried up and so everyone died. But still, that was probably just one reason among many.

The fact that mesmerizes me is that, in ancient times, every civilization, without being in touch with each other, went through the same phases of development, in the same chronological order, this is somewhat beautiful and in a certain way mysterious and, for the lack of a better word, fishy even! I say that because, all civilizations were not exposed to the same set of resources. Each civilization had a different set, some had more ores, some had more rocks, and some had more trees, and some had more sand. But the people with ores did not come up entirely with metal underwear, people with rocks, didn't exactly make everything with rocks, people with sand didn't come up with glass (if you look at it, that was how metal was discovered, when they had a fire, the ore melted and they found molten metal, but the same analogy doesn't go with sand and glass). Each one searched out for something particular, found it somewhere far away and dragged it all the way back to do something that meant something great to them. That's just one incident. But if you look at the bigger picture, almost without knowledge of each other, all civilizations, went through the same phases, the discovery of clothing and shelter, the evolution of language and script, the concept of God or a supreme being, formation of society and the workings of that, the concept of after-life, of building structures which are of seemingly no other use than to please some supreme being that they allege exists.

It wasn't like they sent a pigeon saying "dude, we built a temple....... Losers!" and the other guys replied saying, "HAha, we built one too, and you know what, exactly on winter solstice, the sunlight comes straight into the inner temple, beat that, Suckers!". Think about it, doesn't seem right, does it?

Glimpses

These are some snaps from the available resources i have in my reach!

#1: is the classroom

#2: left 1/3rd of my table.

Snow!

Finally! My first experience of Snow! well, was nothing special or tears-bringing, but still it was a strange feeling to touch it, cause of the humidity, it is still rough and "sharpy" quite unlike the image it portrays. As things start to get drier, it should soften up! Anyway, my first pics.

Guessing Game!

Some interesting stuff i got my hands on this morning, and really complex stuff i learnt about them in my engineering and also learning a great detail now. Lets start a guessing game, what is it, where exactly it is used. If you can mention it to an accuracy of 5 inches. you're good! :D

Random Pics

Dhobi Central @ Stuttgart

This one is the dhobi ghat for coloured clothes :P

Glipses of Fall

More Gadgets

The Wohnheim

Race 2 Tee

So, Boring Saturday afternoon in Stuttgart, with even the sun on holiday for all of central Europe, a promise of a beautiful weekend by the weather forecast was ruined by mother nature. I, for one missed my weekend run, and stayed home all day long. So, when i was getting bored in the evening, so was Subbu on the port of Goteborg, and we both had no clue what to do to drive away the boredom. The crazier of the two came up with a plan, a race, to make tea, yeah, however stupid sounds, it was actually what was agreed upon! a race to make tea.

The rules were:

on count of 5 we'd go to the kitchen put the kettle on, boil water and put the tea bag. But then it was agreed that since the tea bags are dipped for 2 mins constant by both of us, only the time taken to heat the water, put it in a mug and getting it back to the computer desk is what counts.

So, the race started on the count of 5. How much time we each took is immaterial, but then what's important is that he took about 20 seconds later to to finish it. you know why? duh! you'd be a total idiot if you hadn't guessed it out by now already! a total dork! I'm telling you, if it doesn't flash by the time you reach the end of this sentence, then you shouldn't be reading this, really, because then you'd be too stupid to own a computer! give it back!

oh well, I'll tell you anyway, let me ask, you, can you handle it? the truth? well, don't say i didn't warn you! the reason is so simple, i gave away the clues in the first paragraph of this blog! c'mon! nothing yet?

well anyway, this time for real! Stuttgart is at a elevation of 450M above sea level and Goteborg is a port! nothing yet? doh! well, water boils faster at higher elevations than at sea level! water boils in Goteborg at 99.997 degrees and at Stuttgart at 98.7 degrees. So, the time to bring 250ml of water through 2˚C took 20 seconds :D (Specific heat+latent heat)! C'mon, you didn't know that much? Get back to books! who ever bought you a computer! Dorks!

Kidding! Cheers!

--Gecko.

Differences

Having students from different countries around can be really amusing sometimes. Today in the break (literally!) from the German class, there was a small group which was formed, in it there was a person from Palestine, one from Jordan, one from Bengal, one from Gujrat, and one from Maharashtra. Eventually, we were tired of speaking a foreign language all the time so the Palestine and the Jordanian started talking in Arabic. That was when i thought "those two are from two different countries, how can they speak the different languages!!"

But immediately i realized the various questions asked to me by other people. A few are

Brazil: how can two Indians not speak the same language

Turkey: Is it true that India has more than 200 Languages

Somebody i don't remember: How can all three of you be the same country and still talk in english all the time!

This is how the world is, we all have our own notions about the world, and distant parts of it which really come as a "culture shock" when we actually experience it. One guy though did really believe it till i pulled out one of my Indian currency notes and counted the languages for him.

Heh! And in Germany, it seems there're dialects which sound nothing like textbook German and this evening, luckily, when one of my neighbors had his friend, from just-out-of-Stuttgart, over for dinner, i had the privilege of listening to one, and compared to the "special German" (compare to 'news in special English' from VOA) we're used to at class, it sounded something like how Brad Pitt sounded in snatch, talking "English" to a slick looking, country-speaking, Jason Statham in "Snatch"!

And, @Adithya's comment about chucking the dictionary for one of my previous posts.

Learning German by chucking the dictionary is like trying to learn Sanskrit by listening to the Sanskrit news on TV every weekend, you'll miss the news, and will never learn the language too, apart from wasting time that is. Well, even if it's slow, when you learn, learn it technically!

Culture

Well this might come as an old topic but then i felt the need to state it yet another time, as a few incidents, in which i was involved, reminded me of it once again this evening in the Masters' students meet arranged by the international students office in my college. It was supposed to be an evening where people would get to know others cultures, traditions, their views and opinions in a way which would benefit us all, but then as with most cases involving two, or rather, three very explosive factors, namely young age, freedom and to a certain extent, fundamentalism, of a sort which is not really dangerous (certainly not as dangerous as explained by the media) but all while equally annoying and insulting to the person at the opposite end.

The event began as usual, with a very warm welcome by a very polished German lady wishing us all a good time. And then we were all asked to help ourselves to some cookies and some juice and sit down in a circle, chairs already arranged. We then had to introduce ourselves and tell our names, the country we're from, what we're here to study in and what we expect from these two years in general.

So, People were like, all enthusiastic, with replies ranging from learning languages, to learning cultures, meeting new people, seeing new places, drinking lots of beer and, like i said, just having a good time. But then, the thugs probably forgot, you don't get to learn new cultures or you don't get to meet new people, learn their language or have a good time if you laugh on their face for the way they speak their language, make laugh at their beliefs, mock their population or the demographic distribution of their population in other parts of the world, and not of all things, their religion or their religious beliefs, and neither if you start comparing with your own.

The main activity of the evening was for people to group around according to the continents (almost) and then come up with a proverb that everybody, in that group, knows, write it down in the language in which originated, and explain the literal meaning and then the actual/contextual meaning of the proverb. That was when, the very same people who came up with some really beautiful proverbs and read it out with all vigor and enthusiasm to the audience were acting like jokers, laughing at the meanings of the other proverbs and making fun of the way its spoken, thankfully it didn't really run anyone in the wrong way (i think and i dearly hope, cause i don't wanna be punished for something I'm not responsible for), but then it got me thinking, fundamentalism is in each and everyone of us, it is not our duty to question whether its wrong or right, it's our responsibility that it doesn't come in the way of others or that we don't step on anyone's toes because of it. Cause yes, i too sometimes am angered that, people here expect me to know German from the day i landed here, immediately, *poof* and I'm German!, like that! and the anger is not cause they're don't speak English, but because they're not giving me time to learn german, We're all humans oder? But, i don't go around accusing Germans in front of other Germans, or keep reminding them of things they're trying to forget and, mind you, especially, for those of the things they're trying to forget that the present generation was never ever even remotely responsible for.

Accept it! you prove nothing by arguing, they're like that cause they're like that, they wouldn't be Chinese or Russian or German or Indian or Spanish if they weren't like that. Had they been anything else, they would just be "people from" China or Russia or Germany or India or Spain.

Rule number one, don't question "why" in a culture; that is that way cause it was in any other way, it wouldn't be "that" culture, now would it? Now don't try to act smart, i know what's on your mind, yes you can question some things, but if you don't know what to question and what not to, then learning other cultures is not your cup of tea, try table-tennis.

I hope those of you reading this would try not to piss someone from another region off. Learning is fun, don't spoil it. Cheers.

Gecko.

A flashback, sort of

A few days ago, when i had nothing to do after my class, i decided to take a walk to the supermarket instead of a bus, do myself, my legs and my pocket a big favour! Save 4 euros and stuff, while i was walking one the small quiet roads, i came across, in a narrow road, parked silently at the side, one of the most iconic cars of the 2000's era in terms of competition. A car which came in and dessimated the competiton on all surfaces, tarmac, gravel, ice&snow, mud, mized, you name it, it's won on that. One of the rare pieces of engineering excellence which help shed off the image of the French as "tarmac-specialists" (drivers and cars).

What looks like this

take this mule, keep the Logo, the name of the car and donate the rest to a washing machine plant. now, build a tubular space frame chassis, fit magnesium alloy wheels, enough braking power for 5 average cars and dampers and springs capable of taking a 10G impact. add a transverse mounted 2 litre, turbo charged, intercooled, in-line 4 cylinder, water injected, 310bhp, Magnetti-Marelli controlled engine. Put in a fire spitting anti-lag system for the fun factor. Gel this machichery to a longitudinally mounted non synchonized six speed sequential shift gearbox through a high performance clutch. finally throw-in three high performance, electronically controlled, active differentials, cockpit contollable anti-rollbars, variable engine maps and such small fancy things and you get this!

which, by the way looks nothing like the original road-going car, except for the name and the logo of course. but, you get a car which can do 0-100kmph in 2.5 seconds on gravel! or take a jump at 170kmph (and "fly" for 55 meters), or hit 230kmph on snow with tungsten spikes in the tyres. It's a Citroen Xsara WRC. One of the many French cars to have dominated rallying (and specially tarmac events in the past).

This domination started as early as the Group-B era in the 1980's and the Renault Maxi Turbo, then the Peugeot 205 T 16, and later in specialised dakar cars, the Peugeot 405, the Pikes peak Peugeot and the Cirtoen ZX (that time both had pulled out of rallying and were looking into rallyraids). Then the 90's was a quiet time for the French, as most of the sweeping was done was Lancia (late '80s and early to mid '90s) which went on to become the most successful Company in WRC history and also Mitsubishi to a considerable extent (mid '90s to late '90s and years 2000 and 2001). Somewhere in the middle, Carlos Sainz (Toyota Celica, Corolla group-A cars, champion 1990, 1992), Didier Auriol (Toyota Corolla Group A , Champion 1994) and Colin McRae (Subaru Impreza Group A, Champion 1995) turned up and won everything they laid their hands on!

At the end of the 1990's Ford announced their new car to replace the Escort, which was the Ford Focus WRC and Peugeot announced their return to WRC in 1999, and made the debut with the Peugeot 206 WRC. Citroen did too, but with a modified two wheel drive Citroen Xsara Kit car. The xsara was immediately on the pace, Philippe Bugalski, who was somewhat of a mad man, capable of lightening speeds on tarmac but could not always keep his head together, he gave the Xsara Kit car (which was still a semi-official entry by Citroen) its first victories in 1999 in the Rally of Catalunya in Spain and the Tour de Corse in Corsica. The year 2000 had three Tarmac events, Spain, Italy and France. Bugalski (he's French) won again in Spain, and Gilles Panizzi won in France and Italy in a Peugeot 206 WRC.

Marcus Gronholm was crowned champion in 2000, him alongside with tarmac specialists like Didier Auriol & Gilles Panizzi who dominated tarmac events gave Peugeot a very high rate of success as soon as their debut. During those times Citroen, peugeot and many such teams employed surface-specialists (there were really few drivers who could win anywhere, any time, any condition, any car, Carlos, Tommi and Colin were almost the only ones).

2001 marked the announcement of the Citroen Xsara WRC, the official car prepared and entered by the Citroen factory team into selected events, and had it's first win in the Tour de Corse 2001, this time piloted by Jesus Puras. The other two Tarmac events, Sanremo of Italy went to Panizzi and Catalunya went to Dider Auriol.

2002 was the year of Peugeot, With them winning in most of the events, but, however, their luck on safari continued to be down, they haven't won in Kenya since 1978 and although a peugeot finished second, it's still just second. Citroen competed for the first time, officially in many rallies with tarmac specialist Philippe Bugalski, Gravel Specialist Thomas Radstrom, and the-then rising star Sebastien Loeb (he had his first ever WRC win in the Rally Germany that year)

2003 was Citroen's year, although petter won the championship, citroen made quantum leap in development and with Carlos and Colin joining, were easily crowned the Manufacturers Champions.

During the years 2004, 05, 06, 07 and 08 Sebastien Loeb was unbeatable, with only ford being able to take the chase to the line on some rallies, during this period, Sebastien has either made or broken most of the records in the WRC.

But as it is with any sport, there's always progress, and the Citroen Xsara WRC had to give way to the Citroen C4 WRC in 2007 which has proved to be just as successful (or maybe better?) as the Xsara, while Peugeot entered their 307 WRC replacing the 206 WRC in 2004 and pulled out at the end of 2005. Citroen pulled out the same year too but promised to come back in 2007 (with the new C4), in the meanwhile helped Sebastien who competed as a privateer (and was perhaps the most successful privateer world Champion, when he won it in 2006).

When i saw this car, a memory of an era, perhaps not as inspirational as the Golden era of world rallying, but tough nonetheless came back to me, an era which inspired me to follow rallying, to know more about the drivers, the cars, teams, the history of the sport, the skills involved, the techniques (and perhaps to implement a few in my everyday riding, for which i've been cruelly criticized either as being suicidal or as a show-off :| ). Just felt like writing it down, so that next time i see a Xsara/Focus/Impreza/206 /307 i can open this, read and feel good :) Cheers!