Lamborghini Gallardo

Lamborghini Gallardo
Not just a car but An Automotive Art....




video source : paultan.org

AR Rahman Won Double Oscar!

Congrats to AR Rahman!!

He won two oscars for the Best Score and Best Song.
And there is nothing to be commented about the Mozart of Madras.
His music really speaks for itself.

In case you have missed his thank you speech, here it is below:

A Violinist in the Metro

It has been a while since I last written a post, and looks like same goes for everyone else. Guess all are quite busy though, most with their workloads, and some with their studies. Anyway, i just happen to come across an article
"A Violinist in the Metro" which clearly explains what we are really missing in our life while tirelessly chasing for money. Peace.

-----__Attached Article Starts__------

An interesting story and a reminder to slow down and appreciate the beauty around us during this frenetic time of year!

From The Effective Club
A man sat at a metro station in Washington DC and started to play the violin; it was a cold January morning. He played six Bach pieces for about 45 minutes. During that time, since it was rush hour, it was calculated that thousand of people went through the station, most of them on their way to work.
Three minutes went by and a middle aged man noticed there was musician playing. He slowed his pace and stopped for a few seconds and then hurried up to meet his schedule.
A minute later, the violinist received his first dollar tip: a woman threw the money in the till and without stopping continued to walk.
A few minutes later, someone leaned against the wall to listen to him, but the man looked at his watch and started to walk again. Clearly he was late for work.
The one who paid the most attention was a 3 year old boy. His mother tagged him along, hurried but the kid stopped to look at the violinist. Finally the mother pushed hard and the child continued to walk turning his head all the time. This action was repeated by several other children. All the parents, without exception, forced them to move on.
In the 45 minutes the musician played, only 6 people stopped and stayed for a while. About 20 gave him money but continued to walk their normal pace. He collected $32. When he finished playing and silence took over, no one noticed it. No one applauded, nor was there any recognition.
No one knew this but the violinist was Joshua Bell, one of the best musicians in the world. He played one of the most intricate pieces ever written, with a violin worth 3.5 million dollars.
Two days before his playing in the subway, Joshua Bell sold out at a theater in Boston and the seats average $100.

This is a real story. Joshua Bell playing incognito in the metro station was organized by the Washington Post as part of an social experiment about perception, taste and priorities of people. The outlines were: in a commonplace environment at an inappropriate hour: Do we perceive beauty? Do we stop to appreciate it? Do we recognize the talent in an unexpected context?
One of the possible conclusions from this experience could be:
If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?

-----__Attached Article Ends__------

So as the final question points out, sure now we do realize that
indeed we are being ignorant to all the beauty surrounding us. If we just could allocate a few minutes to enjoy it, should we will able to find the peace which our heart desires the most!

In case you were wondering what note did Joshua Bell played in the busy metro? Just have a look (or indulge) to the music below...




Peace and Harmony for the World.

Twinkle Twinkle Indian Desi Styles

I just happened to come across this video, entitled as stated above,
which remixes the infamous "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" in some traditional Indian folk songs,
particularly in Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, and Punjabi styles.

The first portion of the video is taken from a comedy serial which happened to be shown in NTV7 years ago, meanwhile the second might be taken from a movie....

Anyway, enjoy watching it.!!!



**In case you can't watch it, click here.

3D cross-eye stereograms

A stereogram is an optical illusion of depth created from flat, two-dimensional images. Originally, stereogram referred to a pair of stereo images which could be viewed using stereoscope.

Stereogram was discovered by Charles Wheatstone in 1838. He found an explanation of binocular vision which led him to construct a stereoscope based on a combination of prisms and mirrors to allow a person to see 3D images from two 2D pictures.

Here are some really impressive photos I’ve found on the net and there are hundreds of them. These images do not need stereoscopes to view and can be viewed by slightly defocusing your eyes and then cross them until an image appears in the middle and then relax your eyes to get a stable 3-D image. It’s worth the trouble.

Click on pictures for larger view

And finally a video stereogram,

Let public benefit from price falls

Source: The Star, Friday November 21, 2008

TINKERING with prices is pretty dangerous business at the best of times especially if the customer is not paying the underlying market price for the product for whatever reason.

In bad times, it becomes explosively risky and the wrong move can have wide-ranging repercussions, as the government found out to its dismay when it hiked fuel prices by some 40% on June 5 and introduced a complex mechanism of rebates to mitigate the effects on some sections of the community.

The country has not quite recovered from that shock and because of prices being sticky downwards - difficult to come down when they go up easily – the impact on inflation has been very severe.

The fuel price and electricity tariff increases, combined with rapidly rising food prices at that time, pushed inflation to a record level in 26 years.

In June, the consumer price index (CPI – the official measure of price increases for consumer goods) was 7.7% higher compared with the level a year ago.

Not only were consumers hit by this directly as food and fuel prices soared, the higher costs would have suppressed economic activity, leading to lower growth in output of goods and services and hence incomes as well.

With 20/20 hindsight, that move to hit Malaysians with a massive two-fifths jump in fuel prices at a time when food prices were already climbing, was disastrous, especially given the spectacular collapse of oil and prices of food components such as vegetable oil, rice and wheat shortly afterwards.

It is a painful reminder that the saying “What goes up must come down” does not apply to prices. Despite all the efforts of the domestic trade and consumer affairs ministry, prices have not budged much although costs of materials have fallen across the board.

That oil price hike represents a case study on how pricing policy should NOT be conceived and implemented and offers some important lessons for forward planning.

First, price shocks should be avoided as much as possible. A 40% increase in fuel prices represented at that time one of the largest single jumps in fuel prices anywhere in the world.

Inevitably, with such a shock, there will be expectations of high inflation and it will give the excuse for all and sundry to raise prices.

True, oil prices (see chart) were reaching new record levels almost everyday but the better thing to have done is to have opted for a gradual increase on the fuel price over a few months instead of trying to capture the effect of the increasing prices in virtually one go.

If that had been done, the government would not have had to increase fuel prices in one jump to the top of RM2.70 a litre for petrol from RM1.92 a litre on June 5 and then bring it down all the way to RM2.00 per litre earlier this week as oil prices fell.

With oil prices at record levels, the Government should have allowed for the possibility of lower oil prices shortly afterwards.

As it is, inflation has risen sharply and the higher costs of energy and poorer sentiment would have affected growth in output, an expensive lesson indeed for Malaysia.

But the Government does not seem to be taking lesson number two. If it wants prices to reflect the underlying market, it must bring fuel prices down when oil prices go down instead of only raising them when they go up – it must be a two-way process.

The public cannot be expected to put up with higher prices and then have the gains limited when oil prices fall.

The gains here must be passed onto the customer as well and not go to the Government through what are effectively increased taxes.

If you are removing subsidies, the fair thing to do is to remove the taxes associated with them as well.

One is hard put to understand why the Government wants to limit the gains to the consumer especially when passing on such gains will increase the disposable income, or money available for spending, of the man on the street. That will contribute to greater output as demand for goods and services increase.

We have already made one mistake when the oil price was going up. Let’s not compound that by making another one when the oil price is going down.

• P. Gunasegaram is managing editor of The Star. He says that the key to good policies is consistency in both word and deeds.

National Fatwa Council to make a ruling on yoga

source: the star, Thursday October 30, 2008

GEORGE TOWN: The National Fatwa Council will soon come out with a ruling on yoga exercise.

The Islamic Development Department’s deputy director-general (operations) Othman Mustapha said the council’s chairman, Prof Datuk Dr Abdul Shukor Husin, would make the announcement.

Othman told reporters this after opening the two-day seminar on Islamic Jurisprudence and Eternal Islamic Thinking at Universiti Sains Malaysia here yesterday.

On Tuesday, lecturer Prof Zakaria Stapa of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia’s Islamic Studies Centre advised Muslims who have taken up yoga to stop practising it as it could deviate from their belief. – Bernama