Now which is worse – getting AIDS, or being treated with Bill Gate’s cash?
A snippet from an IM conversation I am having
BTW If you have not already read it do spare a few minutes and read
https://atulchitnis.net/writings/rising-1.php and also https://atulchitnis.net/writings/rising-2.php
If you are a fan of Open Source, JRR Tolkien with a smattering of Star Wars you will love it. Describing it will be spoiling the fun 🙂
Total Connections: 24
Inclusive:
Friends: 11
Friend Of: 24
Exclusive:
Friends: 0
Friend Of: 13
Friend Both: 11
Just dropped Swati and Aasim to the airport and I am already missing them 🙁
Guess the only option is to work work and work.
But I dread the mornings – I hate waking up alone in the morning. Somehow it is very very satisfying to wake up and see my wife and my son sleeping peacefully. Maybe it has to do with the fact that my whole gamut of daily activity revolves around these two.
Among other things I have left my room keys in the room – I hope it is not too troublesome to get back into the room.
Yesterday was a rough day here – had a show down with the client on feature creep. But it just turned out that it was due to lack of communication and has since then been sorted out.
Yesterday we went to Penthip Plaza it is a huge 5 floor building with shops selling everything related to computers hardware as well as software, new as well as used/stolen!!
Every known software for B100 per CD – sadly these people don’t know a thing about Linux and Open source so you get copied versions of every known distro but sold as if they are doing something wrong.
Have picked up for myself a USB mini hub (those thingies which do 1×4 USB connections) for B500 – great, I no longer have to finger the backside of my PC 😉 – and a USB Palm charger and hot sync cable for B500 – great, I no longer have to lug around the bulky cradle and charger when I travel. Now only if I can figure a way to carry around the correct config files for JPilot in the palm itself which installs on its own… …
It is Swati’s last day here today and she is taking Aasim around the city in the Sky Train.
First, the principle of unity between the army and the people, between the sexes can only be realized in the premise that the enemy cannot conquer us by force or fraud. He may not infringe his right; it may not give special leniency to the intelligent man who disagrees. One declares so many things to do, but precisely because they are such a base that one man is never a villain in his fight for freedom. But flowers work almost as well. All else is surplus age, excrescence, adornment, luxury, or folly which can — and no doubt will keep on trying.
Get one for yourself at https://www.brunching.com/autophilosophy.html
Aasim is with his mother in the hotel pool and here I am working and my work means keeping an eye over the process and co-ordinating between the client company’s COO and our programmers – so very boring… …
The cost of PDA here is more expensive than the US$ price at Yahoo but definitely more cheaper than India. However I did not see any Palm OS 5 models here yet – Tungsten T to be precise. The Sony NR70V (camera, MP3 player keyboard built-in) is available for roughly Rs23,000 and I am quite enamored by it BUT it runs Palm OS 4.1 and the next model is due soon. Before I leave here I will know if we will be returning to Thailand or not – will make a decision then. Have to have a second PDA in the house. Swati is already using my M505 more than me.
Yesterday we also discovered a shop with great camping gear and it is dirt cheap. A tent for 4 (2 adults 2 children) with air mattresses, pillows and some more stuff for just B3500. Aasim picked up a folding stool for himself for B125. There are lovely folding sofas and love seats, picnic back packs with cutlery and thermo ware boxes for food and beverages. Perfect for long mobike rides with your sweetheart… …
Among other things the new Logjam restricts the subject length to 100 characters so I cannot put any interesting trivia in the subject line at least till I figure out an alternative.
When in Siam do as the Siamese do 😉
Well the context is not anything naughty BUT about food, even Aasim is bored of KFC and McDonalds. So we are now exploring Thai cuisine which has most of the spices same as Indian cuisine but the tastes are pleasantly different (and nothing like what they serve in Thai restaurants in India). Swati has picked up a book on Thai recipes and more importantly plans to carry back some spices which are unique to Thailand. I did not dare to suggest that she hardly has any time to cook.
Both of us are however glad that Aasim has got over the advert hype of the two fast food giants – I guess it was just natural that he did, given the fact that Nagpur does not have outlets of either KFC or McDonalds
Swati left office early for hotel and plans to take Aasim to the hotel pool – something he has been wanting to do since day one – not that he knows how to swim!! may be Swati will be able to teach him.
We purchased Lee jeans for Swati yesterday it is about Rs 450/- cheaper than India and they have the model/style which Swati wanted but looking at trousers with waist sizes 22 is bad enough to give any Indian woman a complex. Asking for size 28 is so embarrassing in the context … …
Work is continues to be great but lack of sound cards on the PCs suxs 🙁 I guess I will buy one and put it in the machine I am working on and borrow a headset from one of the call center girls.
Phew! Finally things seem to be settled here. The specs and work schedules are mostly in place, coding has started and there were no nasty surprises in the walkthroughs.
We shopped till we dropped yesterday so much so that we forgot about dinner till well past the closing time… … Had to settle for room service.
Apart from the fact that things are cheaper and there is a wider variety of things available we discovered a very nice thing – you can get a refund of VAT (7%) of all your purchases done in Thailand when you return. The departmental stores even help you fill out all the necessary papers needed for the formalities and provide you a map telling the exact location of where you have to go at the airport to get the refund!!!
Day One in Bangkok. As we draw towards the end of the working day the situation looks much brighter than it did in the morning.
The biggest problem of the day was for Swati – finding a source of Indian food – Vinay does not eat any non veg!! BUT Swati being the resourceful woman she is, went around and managed to find a dabba walla even in Bangkok! So for next 20 days food will be delivered for our programmers right at the office.
The second problem was setting up our working environment here – 3 computers a network with 2 classes of IP addresses, Firewalls, bad hardware were just some of the problems which we finally sorted out – as I write Vinay is giving final touches to the CVS setup
The working hours here are 8:30am to 6pm7pm – good we should implement this in India… …
Aasim is freaking out on the food – Is eating only meat – 10s of varites to choose from.
Hmm… may be from tomorrow I can even go back to my fancy “trivia headings” to my LJ entries 😉
Yawn!!
Finally managed to get the things in place and packed way past midnight
Leaving for Airport in 20 min, will try and keep updating as frequently as possible