pushmind publishing

"Bonsai is a work of beauty" - somebody had once said, which is so true when one sees the pictures found here . According to Japan Kogei Bonsai Association, Kogei bonsai is a new art genre which penetrates the depths of Japan's traditional art. "Kogei bonsai is an art form that faithfully creates the trees and plants of traditional bonsai art in forms that are replicas of natural objects, using cloth, Japanese and Western paper, leather, resin, and clay as the principal materials. The techniques of painting and sculpture are embodied in the making of these works. Kogei bonsai, however, is not merely bonsai imitations; they represent an independent art genre that pursues the ideal forms of original bonsai, creating a perfected beauty that outlives that of living trees and plants." "The artist takes inanimate materials and, at the stage of forming the shapes of trees and plants, plunges into a state of nothingness while pouring his or her full energies into t...

P.S. This work is for fun and recreation, and is in no way intenteded for the mass as authentic.

P.S. This work is for fun and recreation, and is in no way intenteded for the mass as authentic.

P.S. This work is for fun and recreation, and is in no way intenteded for the mass as authentic.

P.S. This work is for fun and recreation, and is in no way intenteded for the mass as authentic.

It's 2088 A.D. and Lunar Presidential Voting is about to begin. On Earth, Uranium is missing from 30 cities across the globe. Zorpians from their homeland are eyeing the rich mineral deposits on Luna; where there has been human settlement for some decades now. There's been forecast of war with Zorpians...blah blah... The story is something like this, I hope you got the point... for which I've prepared some imaginary futuristic news for some daily newspapers. The first one on the series is for The Kathmandu Post. P.S. This work is for fun and recreation, and is in no way intenteded for the mass as authentic.

Here are some really time-consuming, mind-blowing, eye-popping, curiously-fantastic web sites that are waiting for your attention. Balthaser 3D Reality Eye4U Penguin Classics NeoPlanet Besides this short list, there is a plethora of award winning sites in the main page that might in the least amaze you, lest inspire you.

According to Tim Berners-Lee, sometimes cited as the father of the Internet, this is the first web page on the Internet. At a single glance, it looks so simple and yet, today it might require a real web-pundit to define what "simple" means in association with Internet's first web page. It might not look more than a series of intertwined links (sounds so normal), but looking at the back stage of this mechanism, we should definitely thank Lee for creating such a wonderful medium.

For over 40 minutes now, I was desperately typing my new entry after a long time. It was about the new version of Microsoft's OS - yes, it's Windows Vista. However, near the end of the post, accidentally the IE window went Back to the CREATE NEW POST page - and I don't feel like typing for another 40 minutes. In a way, it is good because almost everybody now knows about Vista, and nobody might be interested to read about an old topic. Thus, with tribute to Vista, this post ends here.

This is what is found on Google Jobs - GOOGLE COPERNICUS CENTER IS HIRING: "Google is interviewing candidates for engineering positions at our lunar hosting and research center, opening late in the spring of 2007. This unique opportunity is available only to highly-qualified individuals who are willing to relocate for an extended period of time, are in top physical condition and are capable of surviving with limited access to such modern conveniences as soy low-fat lattes, The Sopranos and a steady supply of oxygen." "The Google Copernicus Hosting Environment and Experiment in Search Engineering (G.C.H.E.E.S.E.) is a fully integrated research, development and technology facility at which Google will be conducting experiments in entropized information filtering, high-density high-delivery hosting (HiDeHiDeHo) and de-oxygenated cubicle dwelling. This center will provide a unique platform from which Google will leapfrog current terrestrial-based technologies and bring info...

Some really cool photos - doctored, all right, but full of expressions! Nice play with colours and objects.

Concentrate - Sharpen your memory - command your visual power - choose the difference - guess the logo - take a break! Here .

π, whose approximate value to eight decimal places is 3.14159265, is actually the symbol, derived from Greek alphabet, for the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. It is a universal constant; meaning that its value is always the same for any circle. Pi is an irrational number whose decimal places go on infinitely without repeating or ending in zeros. Computers can estimate pi with great accuracy - the current known value of π having been figured to more than 1.24 trillion (1,200,000,000,000) decimal places. When calculating the value of π, computers use equations; but how does a human calculate the value of π to 100,000 decimal places? Basic arithmetic? Sounds ridiculous. But recently a Japanese man named Akira Haraguchi, aged 60, showed up in Kisarazu public hall claiming to recite the value of π to one hundred thousand decimal places without any aid. In fact, he did succeed in reading aloud the value as he had claimed. Spectators were amazed, the hall cheered alou...

I was in grade 5 when I first touched a floppy disk - a flat 5.25" B drive disk. It was a new thing for my hands, the touch of which I liked very much. With great enthusiasm, I showed it and explained it (from what my dad had explained me) to my friends the next day in school; and for many days, I was the hero of my class. That was in 1992. Two years later we actually started studying computers in school, and it was then that we bought our first floppy-disk for 50R. Those 5.25" were gone and were replaced by the new 3.25" 2HD floppies. All of us starting computers from mid-90's have had experiences somewhat similar to this. The floppy was the only thing which enabled us to carry around those wonderful MS-DOS games, like Dave , Digger , Baghchal , TT6 , Hangman , Fallout , Brick , Dots , Sticks , and of course, Tetris . That was the age of dBase III+ , WordPerfect 5.1 , Lotus 1-2-3 and GW-BASIC - where floppies were the inevitably essential stuff to carry around prog...

Found this link quite engaging. It's a test to test your geekiness . It took some time to complete the test; okay, it took more than 15 minutes to complete this test, but the result is worth viewing. My result was 42.67251% - Major Geek, though I seriously doubt the figure!

Yeah, 84 kbps night-surfer offer from Wlink with a price tag of 750 Rupees. It's a pathetic comparision with this offer, however, our Kathmandu is a growing city - with its own competitions and infrastructure! So, this is a modest offer from Wlink. Below is a brief telephone conversation with a customer-care lady at Worldlink, where I attempted to subscribe to their BROAD band Inernet connection. Hello. Worldlink? Yes. I need a broadband internet connection - can you transfer the line to the section? What section? The section that offers net connection. It's here. My friend has taken a 84 kbps night surfer connection. I was wondering if I can have it installed. It's expired. Any similar offers? None. Honestly speaking, I was fed up at this point because of her limited-words-response . At most, she would speak three or four words in a sentence, and that too, in a curt manner as if she has to pay for every word she spoke. That was enough hearing, so I decided to eat her he...

After a not so tiresome journey of fifteen hours, am back in Kathmandu now. Really, nothing can beat the feeling of being back home! Now I'll be able to use my USR external modem, I'll be able to stay up late, will be able to cook food after midnight, will be able to get up at eleven, play games at my nvidia card, and celebrate lazy weekends with Nepali speaking friends - oh, what a partifular relief it is for me - to be able to speak Nepali again! About the climate, yesterday I was in Cairo in the incredible 42 degrees but since today morning I've had to wear a jacket. Yeah, this much cold!

I had read a theory about two people clicking with each other at the very fist site. According to this theory, there is a blank canvas-like thing in our brain, in the shape of a face. Now, this canvas remains "blank" until it finds the other "perfect face". At the moment when our eyes input this "pefect" face, our brain acknowledges to a maximum degree and hence, tries to fill this blank canvas with this newly seen beautiful face, making us feel clicked . This click is the first click, which lasts for only a short moment. At this first click, however, our blank-canvas is not completely filled - at this time it is like, only 65% filled. But very soon after that, some catalytic agents called feeling, tolerance, devotion, commitment, and frequency of thought, etc. - interefere this canvas, thereby filling the canvas 100% or to the maximum possible limit. This is just what I had read some years ago on the Internet - I wish I had saved the link. * Inspired by...

See this poll result over the Best Nepalese Comedian that the site recently did. This site in question is the biggest news supplier on the web concerning Nepalese motion picutre industry. As everyone of us knows, Madan Krishna Shrestha and Hari Bansha Acharya have always acted together. In every type of show in radio or TV, they have appeared together. For us common Nepali people, it has always been "MaHa Jodi", and not just Madan Krishna alone or Hari Bansha alone. Look at all their programmes - Dashain, 216777, Kantipur, Balidaan, Bigyapan, Nepal Bandha, etc. - look at all their programmes that we have always loved. Even today we talk about their programmes in cities and villages alike; and just talking about their programmes brings laughter among the people. The people love Madan Krishna Shrestha and Hari Bansha Acharya as a single unit, not as separate persons. It is almost a fact that if there was just Madan Krishna or just Hari Bansha, then none of them would have bec...

"This polite request in Japanese means "Do you understand English?", which a gaijin in Japan should use every now and then. Whenever you request this to a Japanese person in order to get some information, he or she will willingly try to help (at least that is what happened with me) in their best way possible. Their response starts with "Japanized- EngRish " pronounciation of words, like, R in place of L in most cases. They keep on talking and instructing until they are sure that they have explained everything and in the end, you're right where you started." This was written by a friend of mine when he was accounting his experiences in Japan. I say, he was not far from the truth. Japan is a place where they really don't need English in any sense. English there, is used as a fashion show-off for your lingiustic abilities, English there is used for product advertisement to make them look cooler, and English there, is also used if you're an Eigo ...

I always think that creativity flourishes amid randomness. This might sound like an excuse to my cluttered desk, but honestly speaking, I like it that way - heavily random desk. The only thing I do is try to keep it neat with a positon for each item on the desk. For example, at any given time, my desk contains some wires, a remote control, some books, a writing pad, computer peripherals that are constantly needed which I keep connected to the machine and hence all their wires, a mug, pens, water bottle, photo frame, lamp, clock, and last but not the least the machine itself. Even like this, I've never had the need to remove any item due to space-shortage or over-crowded ness . The trick? It's simple - provide a proper place for every item. Here's how. If you have wires, a lot of them, then try to separate each one. Now, every wire has two ends - one that goes in the machine and the other that goes to the wall. Jack the two ends properly and tie up the middle with a clip/rub...

A tiresome day - trip to Ras Sudr and back. Three hours up and three hours down : six hours : in the van and not enough sleep for a few days now. That should have kept me snoring right now. However, tomorrow is a holiday and I can sleep all day. Hm... beautiful thought! Ras Sudr is a beach village in Red Sea, around 300 km from Cairo. The water is good and clean, even more than the Mediterranean section of Alexandria. However, in Red Sea, the water is salty - more salty than normal. For the first ten minutes it was okay but soon after, the salt started to make its effect wherever water touched the body, e.g. inside the nose, all over the body, etc. That was kinda irritating for the skin and right now I've changed into a reddish complexion, which will take some days to revert back to normal. And my mouth, oh, I can't feel the taste buds! The chocolate I'm eating tastes like corn and the water I'm drinking tastes like cough-syrup! They say, whenever your taste buds are o...

Ever wonder about alines, extra-terrestrials, Zorpians , Zeta Reticulans or Ferengis ? Ever been a fan of Star Trek and Star Wars - wondering how many civilizations must be out there in the galaxy? Well, you're not the only one! In general terms, our Earth is the only planet known to be habitable for life, i.e., in this Solar System. However, our beloved Sol is said to be just a regular type of star, one among the hundred billion other stars in this very galaxy, and, by an estimated guess, there are about one hundred billion galaxies within the boundaries of this known Universe... blah... blah... blah..., which means it's a pretty big place. So, it is perfectly natural for some inquisitive folks to lift their head and face it to the night sky, wondering how many different beings could be out there; what type of trade they fared; what technologies they ever used; and among all those twinkling dots, how many of those beings have really found answers to their questions. Or ar...

Have you ever clicked the logo of Yahoo! on its homepage? If not, then there's a surprise waiting for you. Just go to http://www.yahoo.com and on the main logo, click on "!" this sign without the quotes. I say it's an easter egg!

There has been much talk about Windows Live Writer, the newest product by Microsoft, which lets bloggers post their blogs from the comfort of their desk, i.e. they can now write their posts without having to log into the blogger service. Additionally, Windows Live Writer, or WLW, says that whenever a new post is published, bloggers do not need to worry about their page layout and text formatting. It claims, WLW automatically imports your settings from the blogger service that you're using (eg. blogger, space, etc.), and uploads your posts from within the WLW window so that the published posts will appear as if you are writing from within your regular blogger dashboard and not from any external application . This sounds cool - and I decided to give it a try. Well, this seems to work fine because this post was written in WLW and published from the same; and I don't see any difference so far, except the unnecessary uneasy space between the header and the text. But this is not a co...

Fifty truths about blogging, which you find nowhere to read. 1. If you want to start blogging and have huge amounts of traffic instantly I can recommend one of three things: be an established journalist/opinion maker; be Glenn Reynold's brother; or porn. Otherwise face facts: you've got an awfully big hill to climb. 2. Never get your brother to guest blog for you. Trust me. 3. Before you start, read other blogs and get a feel for what they are like. Then completely forget everything you've read and seen so you can establish a new and distinct voice that will get noticed. This also helps a common problem: a really sucky first post . Trust me. 4. Prepare for the reality that the rest of the world may not share your high opinion of yourself and your site. Points 5 through 50 follow here . No wonder, the writer of this list should have got a traffic-jam in his blog-site, at first. It seems that he's been successful in bringing more and more folks to read his posts. Myself, ...

Ask a photographer to define humantiy. If he's an expert, he'll keep quite and in turn, probably he'll try to show you photos related to different aspects of humanity. Exactly! Look at these images. Each one tells a story, but not an ordinary one. Each one tries to capture the moment, attempting to rouse that particular feeling. Within these images one can find all aspects of humanity - from oppression to innovation, from famine to femmes fatals, and from innocence to exploration - and everything in between. I'm impressed.

They are giving out previews of DirectX 10.

A notorious jewel thief, posing as a tourist on a cruise ship, attempted to off-load his loot at the end of the trip, when he realised that he was under suspicion. He chose five unsuspecting fellow travellers and secreted one of the stolen pieces of jewellery in each person's belongings. Can you work out where each item was hidden, and who owned the hiding place in each case and their ocupation? Passengers: Mrs Brown; Mrs Green; Mr Black; Miss Grey; Mr White Occupation: Nurse; Solicitor; Florist; Dentist; Journalist Baggage: Camera case; Suitcase; Spectacle case; Laptop case; make up bag Jewellery: Diamond earrings; Ruby ring; Pearl necklace; Gold bracelet; Sapphire pendant Here are the Clues 1. The dentist isn't the owner of the spectale case in which the Gold bracelet was hidden, nor is he Mr Black, who isn't the Journalist. 2. Mr White is the owner of the camera case, the ruby ring wasn't hidden there, nor was it in the item belonging to the solicitor. 3. One...

Imagine what you would do if you had 100 Mbps of Internet connection in your apartment. For many of us, it would be Online TV, Online Gaming, Movie Download, Online PC Server, Virtual Private Network, and if you are really a programming/techy nerd you'd probably make your own smart connection (as in smart homes) with your own gadgets. Of course I'm not talking about Kathmandu, where even a good dial-up connection is still rare. I am talking about homes in Japan, where the commoners are getting 100 Mbps for as low as $36 per month, which is equivalent to ¥ 4,200. A country where a one-time bus ride takes ¥ 250, a can of Coke takes ¥90 and the taxi meter rises by ¥ 700 for every 200 meters (or at least it used to be, back in '97) , I guess that this is really a cheap price tag compared to the offer itself, where the customer can have a unique telephone number served through VoIP. It is just like getting a telephone package for "free" with every purchase of Internet...

Am feeling lazy tonight. Don't want to write, except that I need to go to the kitchen because the milk is boiling and I fear that it must have gotten spilled. Let me check. And another thing, using that milk, I have to convert it into yoghurt, which is really a simple process, which I am sure all of you know.

Yesterday was troublesome for three boys (Edgar, Hal, and Ike) and two girls (Mary and Shawna). The students were required to speak to teachers for breaking some school rules (tardiness, gum chewing, talking, eating in the classroom, running in the halls). The students' last names are Barnes, Catro, Jackson, Mays, and Schultz. The teachers are Anila, Kelly, Rhodes, Unger, and Wells. Can you match each student's full name with the rule violation and the teacher he or she spoke with? Here are the facts 1. By noon, Mr. Kelly had spoken to a student about talking in class. 2. Shawna (who isn't Castro) spoke with Ms. Unger. 3. Hal (who wasn't questioned about tardiness) didn't talk to a teacher until after 1 P.M. 4. Barnes (who isn't Edgar) reported to Mr. Rhodes' room. 5. Edgar (who isn't Schultz) discussed eating in the classroom. 6. Ms. Wells listened to Mary's side of the story. 7. The two girls are Castro and Mays. 8. The gum chewing incident was not...

Below is a quiz written by Einstein the last century. Probably translated and updated since then but teh logic is the same. He said that 98% of the people in the world cannot solve his riddle. Are you among the other 2%? Facts 1. There are 5 houses in 5 different colours. 2. In each house lives a person with a different nationality. 3. These 5 owners drink a certain beverage, smoke a certain brand of cigar and keep a certain pet. 4. No owners have the same pet, smoke the same brand of cigar or drink the same drink. Further Details 01. The Brit lives in a red house. 02. The Swede deeps dogs as pets. 03. The Dane drinks tea. 04. The green house is on the immediate left of the white house. 05. The green house owner drinks coffee. 06. The person who smokes Pall Mall rears birds. 07. The owner of the yellow house smokes Dunhill. 08. The man living in the house right in the center drinks milk. 09. The Norwegian lives in the first house. 10. The man who smokes Blend lives next to the one who ...

Impressive tagline. Sounds like an advert slogan for art school. But wait - there's something more about this. While doing a search for quotes related to life and art, I stumbled upon a site related to human DNA. First of all, when someone talks about DNA, what comes into your head? Intertwined helical strands Strange proteins Source of life Genetic agent What else? And if you are a geek or a scientist reading this post, some technical words might come to your head, like nucleotide, adenine, cytosine, guanine, thymine, base pair, sugar phosphate backbone, nitrogen bases, hydrophobic effect, pi stacking, complimentary pairing, hydrogen bonds, semiconservative replication, plasimd DNA, ribofuranose, and last but not the least James Watson and Francis Crick, ....... and what else? Okay, okay. I am not eating your head okay, but just trying to ask you one simple question: Can you relate DNA with business in the simplest form? You try to figure that out sometime, meanwhile see what the...

Microsoft has started yet another trend - a charge for testing its beta Office 2007 . This sound like a direct accusation, folks, but a Microsoft spokesman says that they had to take the fee in order to manage the unexpected, huge amount of traffic in this download server. Sounds fully logical to me; however, this is a move that MS is taking against the trend. In an age when beta has been free forever, will this new move inspire other big companies to do the same? In that case, hearken ye all thou software makers - the number of beta testers will come to an unprecedented decline if thou shalt start to impose fee for beta products in the future. All hail - free beta! All hail - free beta!

11569 audio files scattered among 6 folders in 2 hard disks with 4 partitions, and contain 500 duplicate files, which I have to sort in 12 hours time. Duplicate files can have any of the following attributes: Same length Same bit-rate Same name same size different names with different length different names with different bit-rate different size with different bit-rate same name with different bit-rate or the combination of any of the above. Any suggestions?

Just watched The Good, The Bad and the Ugly. No comments, except for the music. So, this all-time popular "western" music was originally from this movie! I could never would have known if it was not for Haythem who introduced me to the film. It's been like more than five months he gave the cds for this movie! In between, now and then, he used to ask - 'so how did you like "The Good, The Bad and the Ugly"? ' And I always had to shake my head with a dropped face - but not tomorrow. And amigos, it was quite surprising for me to know that the song The Ecstasy of Gold by Metallica comes from this movie. I mean, near the end of the movie, this song could be heard where they are in the graveyard. Two, okay three, oratorically homologous (is the combination appropriate?) quotes that I found interesting in this movie: Tuco: There are two kinds of people in the world, my friend: Those with a rope around the neck, and the people who have the job of doing the cutt...

Only yesterday I had made a post about coldwar between Google and Microsoft and surprisingly, today afternoon I found a relevant article called IS GOOGLE THE NEW MICROSOFT? in The Economist. Here are some fragments from the article. "...During the mainframe era, IBM wore the crown. But it fumbled the transition to smaller machines in the personal-compuer era, and the throne was usurped by Microsoft. Now, at the dawn of the new era of internet services, Google is widely seen as the heir to the kingdom. As the upstart has matured into a powerful industry giant, the suggestion that "Google is the new Microsoft" has become commonplace in computing circles..." The article continues, saying that Google has awesome power in its hands. "...Google provides the front door to the internet. For many online businesses, their position in its search ranking - the workings of which are closely guarded secret - is a matter of life or death. Too much power is thus concentrated ...

Hmm... interesting stuff! Manish and myself had some talk about something like this back in kec but it was nothing more than an idea for us; and this is not relevant, either. These days it doesn't take a scientist to see that Microsoft and Google are following parallel paths when it comes to services they are providing for users. Both the companies seem to be pushing against each other in order to provide newer and newer products. First, Gmail with 1 Gb. Then Hotmail increased size to 25 Mb. Second, Google Earth. Then Windows Live Local. Third, Google Picasa & Hello. Then Microsoft Photosynth - a recent blog from Microsoft about its new product Photosynth made me think twice about this Google-Microsoft coldwar . Check out Photosynth to believe what they are saying. In fact ever since Microsoft announced the concept of Live , everyone has been hopeful in getting to see new type of products - both from Google and Microsoft - the effects of which have already started to show as...

Burn mp3 cd Arrange photographs Prepare Seagate HD for use - probably have to run it through a high level scan. Copy Haythem's stuffs and return them back this week.

Yeuta arko nakkal! Remember Pyaar To Hona Hi Thaa ? It seems to be the Bollywood version of "French Kiss". I was bored and flipping endlessly through the channels, but briefly stopped for a while in One TV, because a guy (Kevin Kline) had been making an interesting face whie talking to a girl (Meg Ryan). They were inside a train, which was moving out of Paris. Eiffel Tower could be seen in all its glory, the scene being accompanied by a beautiful piece of music. Soon Meg falls asleep and Kevin starts to search her bag. It was at this scene that I felt - hey, this looks like Pyaar To Hona Hi Thaa , and decided to continue. The more I watched, the more convinced I became, when finally he takes her to his farm. He shows her around his farm, the landscape, the grape vines, he fights his brother as soon as they see each other, his family comment about the girl, police looking for Kevin Kline, etc. -all these sequences are copied ditto in Pyaar To Hona Hi Tha with Ajay Devgan act...

It is very easy to loose yourself in front of Google Earth for days, and this needs no explanation. If you have spent some time using this software then probably you have wondered where these images actually come from and how were they taken! Check out the source . It's quite amazing about the amount of geographic data Google Earth possesses. From a closeup view of Machu Picchu to the pinnacle of Mt. Everest and from Eiffel Tower to Rainbow Bridge, it's all here. As a tourist, you can have a great time revisiting the places you've been. Now you can recollect your memories from that particular resort in the Caribbean or that frail yak-trail in Nepal; and from The Great Barrier reef in Australia to that mountain cabin in Cananda. I even tried looking up for my house and lo! there it was - although not a high resolution one, it was however, accurate in portryaing my neighbourhood in Koteshwar [27°48'62.17"N, 85°18'28.66"E]. In fact this version of Google Eart...

Director Narayan Puri is releasing yet another promising film called ALPABIRAM. Starring Rama Thapaliya (the lady we see in many of Santosh Panta's Hijo Aaja ka Kura), Bijaya Lama, Ramchandra Adhikari and my all time favourite Sunil Pokharel. I remember Sunil's first acting in television and although I was of too small age to critisize acting styles, I had liked his performance from the very beginning. It was in a tele-serial shown in Nepal Television (2049/2050 B.S.), where he went by the name Ojha, a new unwanted immigrant to the village - well... with radical opinions! Radical in a sense that the serial was based on a village somewhere in the hilly region, the main script being derived from a novel related to social issues. Anyway. Alpabiram is bringing, for the first time in celluloid, the subject of maoist revolution and its direct impact on society. It shows the encounter of a wounded shelter-seeking maoist and a raiding-policeman together inside the same house unbeknown...

Cyclist Pushkar Shah is on World Tour. For his 100th country, he came from London to Cairo. He has an excellent bike! Yesterday we went to the Pyramids and took some photos. He always carries the flag of Nepal wherever he goes, so yesterday we took some photos with our national flag with the Pyramids as background. I guess that this is the first photo with Nepali flag and the Pyramids together - the common features being their triangular shape and both unique in the world!

I think that ants should be directly awarded the most systematized specis on this planet, who are truly cosmopolitan in nature. Of course there is the human being, but that would be an entirely different story - with so many anatomical advantages. As a child most of us have followed a line of ants on the garden or the attic - red, black, big, small, brown, flying, - you name and it is there! We have wondered where they must be going and how their home would be like! But its all child stuff and most of us don't care about them as we grow up. Well, apparently not all of us do forget about them, however. Doctor Mathias Wittlinger did a certain research about the journey of ants belonging to the genus Cataglyphis , as published in The Economist of early July 2006. It says, ...Saharan desert ants of the genus Cataglyphis have to travel long distances to discover food in their impoverished, sandy environment. How they find their way home once they have done so is a mystery. Ants in mor...

I'm referring to Sarah Brightman's vocal which goes so well along this lyrics, although there are other artists singing the same below: I close my eyes, only for a moment and the moment's gone. All my dreams pass before my eyes in curiosity. Dust in the wind. All they are is dust in the wind. Same old song. Just a drop of water in an endless sea. All we do crumbles to the ground, though we refuse to see. Dust in the wind. All we are is dust in the wind. Don't hang on, nothing lasts forever but the earth and sky. It slips away and all your money won't another minute buy. Dust in the wind. All we are is dust in the wind. Dust in the wind. Everything is dust in the wind.

Heaven bent to take my hand And lead me through the fire Be the long awaited answer To a long and painful fight Truth be told I've tried my best But somewhere along the way I got caught up in all there was to offer And the cost was so much more than I could bear Though I've tried, I've fallen... I have sunk so low I have messed up Better I should know So don't come round here And tell me I told you so... We all begin with good intent Love was raw and young We believed that we could change ourselves The past could be undone But we carry on our backs the burden Time always reveals The lonely light of morning The wound that would not heal It's the bitter taste of losing everything That I have held so dear. I've fallen... I have sunk so low I have messed up Better I should know So don't come round here And tell me I told you so... Heaven bent to take my hand Nowhere left to turn I'm lost to those I thought were friends To everyone I know Oh they turned their...

Here's a conversation between Smith and Neo from Matrix III. I wonder what type of intelligence should a machine have in order to understand the meaning of this, let alone a human! I'm in awe. Are you? Agent Smith: Why, Mr. Anderson? Why do you do it? Why get up? Why keep fighting? Do you believe you're fighting for something? For more than just your survival? Can you tell me what it is? Do you even know? Is it freedom? Or truth? Perhaps peace? Could it be for love? Illusions, Mr. Anderson. Vagaries of perception. The temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an existence that is without meaning or purpose. And all of them as artificial as the Matrix itself, although only a human mind could invent something as insipid as love. You must be able to see it, Mr. Anderson. You must know it by now. You can't win. It's pointless to keep fighting. Why, Mr. Anderson? Why?! Why do you persist!? Neo: Because I choose to.

This is about yet other two web browsers that I newly tried - Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer 7Beta. There is a strikingly parallel similarity between the two! For example, IE7 has introduced some features like tabbed browsing , integraged search , capacity to update live feeds and also the all time favourite pop-up blocker .

Yes, the next software I tried was BitTorrent, the king of p2p file sharing applications. It is a rumour that users of BitTorrent are responsible for ~35% of all traffic on the Internet. That's pretty lot going on! My frist encounter with BitTorrent was when Longhorn was first reported to be leaked from Microsoft - yes the news was not just fake - but it was true because at that time its torrent link was floating all over the net, in fact Sen had even given me to try one. Well, I tried but unfortunately, I could never complete the download because some seeders and leechers had evaporated . BitTorrent is full of catchy jargons like seeder, leecher, etc. and I was confused at first but a quick look at its faq section was really helpful. In fact I was starting to like the program after using for only around 15 minutes - again thanks to the internet connection at ICT. The first search I made was "Garden State", which was suggested by Nira. Plenty of torrents came up for th...

Today I tried a number of software for the first time. I was wanting to test these for a long time now, and today was the day - thanks to the internet connection at ICT. First of all, I was astounded by the efficiency of openoffice.org [oo.o] - as an avid explorer software and tools, I landed at the site of openoffice.org, from where I got the software itself. If you're new to it, it's a free office suite modified from the original code of StarOffice, which was introduced a few years back. Openoffice.org is distributed for free under GNU LPGL licensing. This suite is written by different communities around the world, and is managed by Sun Microsystems. Openoffice.org contains a package of efficient utilities such as Writer, Calc, Impress, Base, Math and Draw, designed to replace or compete Microsoft Office. All of these applications have easy to use GUI with a lot of features that are only dreamt of in MS Office. For example, openoffice.org Writer, the word processor, exports t...

...Spartans were taught to be aggressive, Athenians less so. Among Amerindians, Iroquois were aggressive, while Algonquins were less so. Thus, the problem of making more peace and less war amounts to societal restructuring of an environment that promotes peaceful behavior patterns.... So says Sarup, writing for LA chronicles. Read this article here . How I wish Nepali leaders right now read this article. Here I totally agree with her. Says she, "...peace is an essential aspect of human civilization. It allows societies to use existing resources and infrastructure to improve the quality of life instead of destroying them in communal violence." This article is full of strong views, but what she misses is the point that peace begins from the self. I say, "Once you are willingly ready to accept another individual's freedom to acceptable limits then this will define peace. And for sustained peace, even if the limits are crossed sometimes and violence is on the verge, vio...

Another song that's coming out of my speakers recently. I love Coldplay . I awake to find no peace of mind I said, how do you live as a fugitive? Down here where I cannot see so clear. I said, what do I know? Show me the right way to go And the spies came out of the water But you're feeling so bad cos you know But the spies hide out in every corner But you can't touch them though Cos they're all spies, they're all spies. I awake to see that no one is free We're all fugitives Look at the way with it. Down here, I cannot sleep from fear no. I said, which way do I turn? I forget everything I learn But the spies came out of the water But you're feeling so bad cos you know But the spies hide out in every corner But you can't touch them though Cos they're all spies, they're all spies. And if we don't buy here They're going to find us If we don't buy now They're going to catch us where we see And if we don't hide here They're goi...

I've been listening to Clocks by Coldplay, Hm... something very familiar. Lights go out and I can't be saved Tides that I tried to swim against You've put me down upon my knees Oh I beg, I beg and plead (singing) Come out of things unsaid, shoot an apple off my head (and a) Trouble that can't be named, tigers waiting to be tamed (singing) You are, you are Confusion never stops, closing walls and ticking clocks (gonna) Come back and take you home, I could not stop, that you now know (singing) Come out upon my seas, curse missed opportunities (am I) A part of the cure, or am I part of the disease (singing)

gsm cellphone polite cellphone wi-fi cellphone 3g cellphone breathalyzer cellphone I feel sleepy right now, so expand this later.

New words . Same old crap?

Really enjoyed the match.

I use Winamp. My entire collection is stored in six folders, which I import together in the playlist and then randomize the tracks. I have already turned the shuffle on but whenever I wish to listen to a particular song, I use the J-feature, which is the only reason why I love winamp more than any other media player. The currently playing track being Coldplay's Clocks, here are the shuffled ones in series. [moby] into the blue [sarah mclachlan] drifting [elton john] you can make history [the cranberries] zombie [dido] here with me, acoustic live [the verve] bitter sweet symphony [sting] until [era] the mass [ratm] sleep now in the fire [hanson] mmm bop What's your random shuffle?

I came across this quiz: WHAT TYPE OF ASIAN ARE YOU? It says that I am 17% Asian in Denial, 16% Banana/Coconut and 67% Politically Correct Asian. Here's an explanation of the terms. Nevertheless, I wish I knew the ethnicity of guys who created this quiz.

I have already written about the wires that are littering my room for ages. Now, something to related with that post, perhaps, but today afternoon a cousin who's currently living outside the country came online in messenger in a long time. After some typing, we decided to have voice conversation. He was already in a hurry but I told him to wait a bit, while I fetched the mic. Upon opening the door of my room, on the floor there, one could see a variety of wires - blue, white, and black especially - and I wondered where on earth could I have kept the microphone? I don't have a single-mic alone, but something like mic attached with headphones - that most common one as sold everywhere. Amid all the wires coiled like a snake's nest, I could not, honestly, determine where to look for the chunk of headphone. Surely my cousin would be waiting forever now! I was thinking whether to leave the search or just begin it and if so, where I should begin it - when suddenly I saw that pink...

A heap of old magazines were tied up in a pile and ready to be disposed. While passing through the room, I took out this one at the very top, because the cover looked interesting. It was a picture showing the evolution of man. Later back home, I read the whole of this article - it contained some specific words from biology which I had to consult the dictionary, but the overall article was quite interesting - which said how humanity might have evolved in the past and how, starting from Africa, they migrated around the world. It also gave the ancient migratgion routes. I remember that they had shown a documentary covering a topic like this, some years back but I had missed the show because of elctricity failure. Here is a small clip, I have typed in from the article: ...... In 1987, Rebecca Cann, one of Wilson's students, applied his insight to a series of specimens taken from peole whose ancestors came from different parts of the world. By analyzing the mutational differences that h...

Chinese press is flooding with the news of China’s newest engineering feat – the completion of a railroad linking Lhasa (Tibet) with Eastern China. The country is celebrating this key achievement while the western press is once again applauding in awe and giving out mixed speculations. For example, this photo story contains some lines: “There are fears the railway will speed up the immigration of ethnic Chinese into Tibet, threatening its distinct cultural and religious identity.” “Tibetan groups and foreign critics say the railway’s real aim is political, as a symbol of China’s administrative and military control over a contested border region.” “...............................................” “..............................” All I can say about such statements is that leading people from China will undoubtedly laugh down these types of comments made by western media companies. This task in itself is a great combination of hard work, intellect and brotherhood, which in itself is a s...

I've not exactly decided to abandon using msn messenger, but if it keeps happening to me again and again, I'll leave msn messenger and start using something else. Why? There are a number of reasons:

I am extremely tired because of the lack of sleep. Yesterday night I was out with Haythem and some of his friends and arrived late night, then tried to sleep...well...tried and tried but only around nine in the morning I could sleep well, otherwise mostyly I was roaming around the room, kitchen, here and there. Today got up at around two and from that time till now I'm having a strange headache that comes from little-sleep-disturbed. I've had that kind of experience many times previously, specially in summer time.

Don't feel like writing tonight, probably I'll watch a movie before going to bed although it's already around midnight.

I need nothing to say about the drink, except that I've been trying to collect "coca-cola" written in different languages. Did some searches on the net about this, but with very little results. Here it is - the picture .

dude [dood] noun.Eng ( slang ) plural dudes, or igin: uncertain 1. informal way of saying hello 2. slang, calling for a man or a boy; but generally accepted for female gender as well. 3. a man who dresses flashily I thought why not search about this term which is so useful; so here's a quote below from this paper. ....... dude is an address term that is used mostly by young men to address other young men; however, its use has expanded so that it is now used as a general address term for a group (same or mixed gender), and by and to women. Dude is developing into a discourse marker that need not identify an addressee, but more generally encodes the speaker’s stance to his or her current addressee(s). Further googling into this word, only to find the following quotes from FINDING NEMO Crush: Dude? Dude? Focus Dude... Dude? Crush: Oh, he lives. Hey, Dude! Crush: Hundred and fifty, and still young, Dude. Rock on. Crush: Saw the whole thing, Dude. First you were all like "whoa...

This was where a guy/agent took us when we advertised for a "new apartment wanted" to shift: Central Cairo, fourteenth floor in a 21 storied high-rise. All fully furnished rooms. Twelve toilet/bathroom including the attached ones. Eight bedrooms. Two 63" televisions including one in the gaming room. One chic kitchen - which looks more like a hi-tech lab and less like a collection of fridge/stove/oven/washers. Open space for maybe two hundred people, with luxury sofas. Four telephone lines, ADSL internet connectivity in every room, and of course multiple electric/phone sockets. One primary reception for around fifty people. A wide private office room - something like a personal den with two computers, fax, xerox, answering machine. Total of twenty one air conditioners. Eight external recesses with height adjustable glass walls. One exercise room with irons/treadmills/etc and one tanning bed. All this with the "Pyramid View" and "will-furnish-more-if-booked...

Another week has passed lazily. The room is still cluttered, wires are everywhere on the floor with one recently added extension type which I've been using for lamp since Tuesday. Computer, telephone, camera, lamp, clock, cable, internet, oh.. there are a lot of wires everywhere and I have to step upon them every time I move in my room. Today afternoon I sat down to "fix" the place - and found out that it is almost "un-fixable" until I am willing to remove some items. Means, there are only two sockets, 2 pin type. So, for 3-pin stuff like computer, I've been using an extension socket which runs from the door upto the table in another corner - passing across the entire floor. The other socket is on the right hand corner, partially blocked by a huge closet - which I dare not remove from its place; and I wonder why furniture always has to be so uncomfortable to deal with? And the telephone, it has to be put on the side of the bed because there is no phone socke...

I was calmly drawing a piece of iron and winamp was playing Scarborough Fair. I tried to imagine the borough in the past, when human settlement was just young over there, how it would have been, like Sarah Brightman was singing - to make a cambric shirt, or find her an acre of land - continued imagining, the rural setting in England with scattered population, small town center, roadside blacksmith with sounds of hammer hitting metal, bullock carts passing on the street, a little uphill forest, sheep grazing, some fenced farms...imagined just like in the books of Thomas Hardy... women and girls wearing long gowns, hens clucking and running on the streets, uniformed horsemen striding around the village... and so on. Finally, Scarborough Fair ended and another number started on the playlist, which was something like: ho....ekadashi bazaarai ma... and I prefer that you not listen to the description of painful effects, such songs have upon our ears under such circumstances. And I want to a...

As soon as I learned about the release of Windows Media Player 11, I went to the download section of Microsoft. Always, I want to try out new software – it’s one of the habits I want to change because of the vast amount of time wasted on internet, exploring things like these. I’m telling you, if I had started to write, instead of buying a computer in the first place, then by this date I’d have written a book three times thicker than Lord of the Rings. I'm serious but let's talk business first. So, this time it was the beta release of wmp 11, and some forums on the net discussing this topic had quoted, among other things, “…a lot of bugs, and most importantly, will give you blue screen of death ”. One user had even written, “It’s a total waste of time – go ahead, kill your time.” “Should I download after reading such messages?” Definitely not – after all, it was beta in the first place, and next, the reviews were not suggestive either; and third, being a freeware beta, it had no...

It all started yesterday afternoon in the office. Mustafa was reading the paper, Haythem was writing something and I was on the computer. With no clue whatever, Haythem suggested going to Mokattam, the highest point in Cairo. We agreed, and before the sun was down, we were already sipping coffee on the high hill. Far upto our sight we could see this amazing desert sprawl including the city of Cairo, Giza and Greater Cairo all together. It was difficult to say where one city ended and another began - such is the vastness of this urbanization. Right in front of us was the city of the dead - some ten million arabians resting in peace in tombs of their own. On the left were these new and old skyscrappers belonging to telecom and multinational companies. Farther left, upto the horizon, there was this new construction zone - with at least half a million villas being built in order to ease the congestion of central Cairo. Too bad I didn't take my camera. Haythem and Mustafa went on talkin...

The MSUR over the night of LCAR has finally given rise to PST, not mentioning the VOIP channel used to RLY voice over POTS; and believe me, this is not a guff. The PPR channel previously in use for the purpose of HML has now been regarded to be obsolete. So is TIB, belonging to VOIP. I pretty much guess that by now you must be thinking what the hell I am talking about, then please check this out - for all the sensible meanings for your understanding, with The Cure for Information Overload note. Hooray!!!

This is post number 9 of this blog. Some (not so interesting) fire related NINE dates: 999999 BC : Homo sapiens' ancestors might have been thinking whether fire could be created or not. 99999 BC : Homo sapiens might be sure that fire could somehow be created. 9999 BC : Homo sapiens were actually using fire for their daily activities. 999 BC : Homo sapiens might have explored far-away lands by use of portable fire. 99 BC : Homo sapiens might have learnt well that fire could sometimes be harmful. 9 BC : Homo sapiens might have learnt that they could not live without some type of fire. 0 AD : Cities might have been actually burning due to the spread of fire. 9 AD : Homo sapiens might have started to think as to who created fire. 99 AD : Homo sapiens might have been thinking well, actually who created fire. 999 AD : Homo sapiens might have been still thinking as to who actually created fire. 9999 AD : Homo sapiens might actually meet the guy who created fire. 99999 AD : Homo sapiens mi...

... so this is how they wrote my name in the Old kingdom ? Undoubtedly all the TV shows and books and magazines, including all advertising media, which describe Egypt as the land of mystery, the land of the Great Pyramids or that of Pharaohs; and at times culminated by Hollywood or any motion picture industry for that matter, as an interesting subject, Egypt has remained a land yet to explore. Truly, this is an explorer's paradise, or one would simply say: a land for "detectives of knowledge" - one piece of interesting stone here, a scarred statue there, or a wall full of strange pictures of strange creatures - my god, what were those guys thinking, while carving on a wall in a hot summer afternoon in 4500 BC? It definitely takes a wise detective to find out. Look at the Pyramids, for example - what are those huge structures doing in the middle of the desert? Some say that the site of Pyramids (Giza) was a cultivated, lush green area and the majestic Nile (so called becau...