Fatehpur Sikri Photos

The mighty Buland Darwaza

Panch Mahal or five storeyed palace

Diwan-i-Khas (Hall of Private Audience)

Many more Fatehpur Sikri photos can be seen here.

 Indo-U.S. Diplomacy at Taj

Here I am shaking hands vigorously with my Indian counterpart - a fellow
tourist from Goa, India. The handshake went on for over a minute (literally)
to make sure that none of the photographers present on location miss the shot!

You can see the rest of the pictures of my Agra and Sikandra tour here.

 Strange Aeroplane Rules

Does anybody know why the airline companies insist that even after the seatbelt sign is turned off, the seated passengers should keep their seatbelts fastened whereas anybody is allowed to stand up and move about in the plane during this time? Why are the seated passengers are in greater risk in case of a turbulance? My common sense (and knowledge of physics) tells me that the standing passengers are more likely to fall down and get injured in case the plane starts shaking or jerking in case of a turbulance.

 Hello Everybody, I'm baaaack!

I had a terrific time off from work. I just returned to USA after spending a month in India doing nothing but sightseeing. Not true ...  doing sightseeing and photographing. I returned home with about 700 photographs on my memory card(s). Now I have to organize them, put them on CDs, and publish some of them. Lot of work. And the tax time is also approaching.

In India I saw forts, palaces, animals in the wild and also on city streets and highways, I saw trees full of colorful flowers, I saw people rich and poor, and I always saw the sun. That is why Indian people never use weather as a conversation starter.

I have to be real brief today. I have a lot of work to do before going back to work from tomorrow. (That includes turning ALLLL the clocks ahead one hour. What a pain in the neck. We don't do such stupid things in India. Still we make atomic bombs, explore the space using satellites, and lead in the manufacture of computer software. Tell that to George W. Bush!)

Okay, I have published this morning my first batch of photos from India (Photos of Delhi). If interested, you can see them here. Many more will follow in the next several weeks.

Below are a few sample photos.

Sorry for "no show"

Hello, Fellow Xangans. Sorry, I went underground for quite some time. I am back. But only briefly. Only to say that my real life is keeping me so busy that I really cannot make time for Xanga. Though I want to. I want to vent all those crazy ideas that go through my mind all the time ... to express myself ... to show off to the world the things I have done or can do.

You know what? I am half-retired now. But it seems like I am busier than ever before. So many things to do, but so little time. Whose law is that which says work expands to fill-in the time available to complete them. Peter's Law?

Anyway, for the past four or so months I worked so hard that I decided to reward myself. I am going on vacation ... for a full month ... to India. Don't be jealous. I deserve it. India is my country. But I have not been there for 10 years at least. The country has made tremendous progress within the past 10 years. I need to see it first hand. I shall be traveling EXTENSIVELY within India in a month ... trying to see as much of the country as possible. Guess what? I shall return so tired that I would need another vacation to relax and recuperate!

While in India, I shall try to buy a few more elephants and camels to bring back with me. Those who have read my past journals know we already have 3 elephants and a camel. We use them as our mode of transportation here. It is so cool!

That's all for now. Please be assured that I am still alive and kicking.

Off to India in a few days. I shall see you all when I get back. I shall post here at least a few pictures from my trip. But you will be able to see them all in my Worldisround.com site. I'll provide the link.

Bye for now.

"But first, this is Today on NBC"

Can anybody tell me what the above sentence means? And why can it not be replaced by sentences like "But first, we will take a commercial break", or "But first, these messages from our sponsors", or "We'll be right back after a short break"? Any of these sentences will serve the purpose, and will be FAR BETTER than "But first, this is Today on NBC". I know I am watching Today on NBC and I know the show will continue till 9 o'clock. It is 7:25 now. You are taking a commercial break. Why can't you say something like "We'll be right back. You are watching Today on NBC."

Who writes their script? What is Today on NBC? The commercials? Non-sense.

I cannot stand this expression. As soon as I hear it, I reach for the red button of my remote and turn the TV off. It is NOT the upcoming commercials that pisses me off, it is their above phrase that leads to the commercials. I remember Katie Couric had her special way of delivering that line (almost as if with a vengeance, with emphasis on certain words), and she always met with my standard reaction to that sentence - I immediately turned the TV off.

Tour India Through Stamps

Building Web sites is one of my hobbies. But that hobby started only from September of 2000 when I was almost 60 years old. I have another hobby that is going on since I was 10 years old. That hobby is stamp collecting. Unlike most people, I collect stamps for enjoyment - not for profit. And I collect in a totally different way seldom practiced by any other collector. I have built a worldwide network of people who simply donate stamps to me. It took me about 56 years to build such an enormous network. I have thousands and thousands of different stamps from all over the world which I have acquired for free! I do not buy stamps for the purpose of collecting. To be totally honest, I may have bought a couple of hundred stamps in my whole life. I think, that does not count.

My first Web site was Stamp Collecting - Doing it for enjoyment, not for profit. That site instantly became a great success. There are over 580 guestbook entries there till date. (This should give you an idea about how popular that site is.) Anyway, that is beside the point.

Another of my hobby is traveling. Some people have asked me after I posted a slideshow of some of my travel pictures here a few days ago, if I traveled for business. No, I am not that lucky. Nobody ever paid a single penny for my trips at home or abroad. I just saved up and took trips whenever I got a chance. And I have been to many more places than what this little slideshow shows.

Recently, I combined my two hobbies - stamp collecting and traveling - to make another Web site having the same title as above. I have many India stamps that focuses on places of tourist interest. I have used some of those stamps to make that site.

Here, I have created a slideshow using some of the stamps from the site called Tour India Through Stamps. I hope you will enjoy the slideshow even if you are not (and most people are not) a stamp collector. I have used about 60 stamps in this slideshow. So to see the complete show, it will take a few minutes. Please feel free to move away, if you are not interested. This show is primarily for me. I shall watch it again and again because it satisfies my appetite for two different things - stamp collecting and traveling.

Thank you for watching. Please visit the original site, if this slideshow generates any interest in you. You will see actual photos of the places shown on the stamps or get more information about each subject in my Web site. I am thinking of personally conducting a guided tour of India in near future. If interested you can contact me through this site.

Language Skill

A professor of linguistics of a very renowned American university once told me the following joke. The professor himself is an American. I am an Indian born American.

A person fluent in two languages is called ...... Bilingual.

A person fluent in three languages is called ...... Trilingual.

A person fluent in only one language is called ...... No ...... American.

Something to ponder about!

Paintbrush Art

I can sketch with a pencil. I can paint with a regular painting brush too. So when Windows offered the Paintbrush program for free, I decided to try it out. But the problem was I had to draw with a computer mouse. Tough. But I decided to give it try. Here are the results:

What do you think? Do I pass?

Around the World

Over the years we have traveled a bit. In fact, quite a bit. Here are some glimpses of the different places we have been to. I hope you enjoy the slideshow.

Many more of our travel pictures can be seen here.