Season's Greetings !!!

Bonjour!

Je vous souhaite de très bonnes fêtes de fin d'année !

Hello!

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all!


with love
$wamy!!

Great time with parents

my parents came on the 18th and left on the 28th : we had a very good time together and thank God, everything went smoothly as per my plan (including the climate-sun in paris and madrid!). we stayed in paris three nights and two days, covering the most important sights and activities. then to marseille, where my house was our base for the remaining days. and one night in madrid, sightseeing in marseille along with visits to my school and office (lunches there too). one day for nice, monaco and cannes including a short trip to ventimiglia in italy to have a cappuccino :) the last day in marseille was a lunch with my mentor before we left to paris to stay in the airport hotel and they took their flight to Kuwait the next day.

Now i am back to work, with a cold hehe but i am happy that my parents enjoyed the time and they are spending a week in Kuwait for a week before getting back home on the 4th after their first foreign trip!

i did not see any entries between my two posts - folks?? :)

love
$wamy

3 things to say!

First, my parents are visiting me in France for 10 days from tomorrow! I have taken these days off from work and needless to say, I am quite excited about it! I have made a plan to show them my life, work, friends, and a bit of France and Europe. It is also the first trip abroad for my parents, and what is interesting is that they will spend the 18-28 september in France, and then another week in Kuwait. This is because they got the cheapest tickets in Kuwait airways and there is a stop in Kuwait on the way back, where my cousin will host them. So, I was telling them that between India, Europe and the Middle East, they are going to see 3 completely different but equally interesting cultures in 17 days :)

Second, Happy Birthday Siddharth!!! I still remember how we celebrated your birthday in 2004 with a big party at your place :) So, here's wishing you all the good things in life this year and for all the years to come : may you be happy my friend!

Third, what do you think about my new look in the photo above?

It's been again a while of silence here in our blog, come on folks shake up things a bit! Following our past record, I guess Siddharth will start :)

love

$wamy

Missing Everyone

Where's everyone. I'm missing you guys

A new year video

hello dear friends! as usual, i post after siddharth :) well, they say a picture speaks a thousand words and nowadays its video. so here i post a video taken on 1.1.2008 in snow-filled warsaw.

live long and prosper

why is it called life insurance when the insurance is really for you dying?

merry xmas and happy new year 2008!

dearrrr folllks!

warm wishes and season's greetings from marseille! im preparing for the xmas eve dinner now, and wish you all the very best in life, straight from my heart. enjoy xmas, and a wonderful new year's eve wherever you are and may the next year 2008 give you all that you wanted and more!

wid luv
$wamy

image : advertisement showing nutritional value of a beer brand found in a bar in Florence, Italy (credits - Hareesh VH)

50th post...update from $wamy

bonjour a tous!

so heres a little update from me. true its after a little gap but then ive been rather busy. starting with moulin rouge in sep: its wonderful! we cant take pictures though; i think because there are too many sexy, almost-naked girls dancing around. i have a review book which i bought - heres a pic from the book, and what u see is what i saw. but its something i recommend everyone see atleast once - dance scenes almost perfect, great music,comedy shows in between (mixing different languages for a foreign audience) and some amazing circus and acrobatics thrown in. even though the pretty girls are mostly for a male audience, there were as many women as men from all over the world who came to watch the show. its costly, but more than value for money.

in oct id gone with a few friends on a wonderful weekend away from it all, to one of the most beautiful countryside sites of france called ardeche. we had hired a 19th century house and had great food (my french friends cook well), drink and fun. we took long walks along many beautiful natural sites, in what was a tranquil and beautiful experience.

very interesting and hectic work in this french startup where i am interning now, which includes managing an outsourcing project to India(!), marketing activities etc keeps me busy in the week. schedule is now like leave home 7 am and back 8pm, but im doing all that is needed to build a company. last week, i attended this international conference (in montpellier, south-west of france) of Internet companies and technology and guess what, the guest country was India :) so naturally the weekends have to be used well - the last few ones have been filled with parties, a bit of travel around the region and yes, wine tasting: i had got an invitation to a big event in marseille last weekend where we tasted a lot of wine, very good ones - red, white and even champagne. but more than getting drunk, i learned a lot about the wine culture and business. so now i have a better idea on the subject hahaha

hope to see posts from everyone! other than siddharth and me, i don't see many hmmm...hehe :)

how's everyone?

hey guys,

its been sometime since there was a post here. I know this is increasingly becoming $wamy and my 'reaching out' area and I'd really like people to say a few things. So here's the deal. 
answer this simple question
1. Where are you?
2. How are you?
3. What's your mood like (Happy/Sad etc.)
4. Are you up for a drink :)

My answers:
1. I'm in bangalore sitting at my computer writing this blog entry, wondering how everyone's doing.
2. I'm great. I'm happy and i'm sleepy :)
3. I'm happy and feeling a little alone, wanna go out and do something but its too late for any of that.
4. I could use a nice Martini, shaken not stirred 

Lots of LUV!
SiD

glenfiddich, jagjit singh and the rain

this one's for $wamy and Patel wherever you are.
was listening to a beautiful jagjit singh number in which he claims...

tere bare mein,
jab soocha nahi tha...
mein tanha tha magar,
itna nahi tha...

i'm sure those lines don't need any further translation and the translation i'm only afraid will spoil their essence.
come back to india the both of you, so we can have some more Glen, listen to some jagjit singh and sit outside in the varandah of a raining city...

cheers

Happy Birthday Siddharth !!!

Here's wishing you all the joy, love, luck and fun that life can bring through this year, and for all the years to come! Happy birthday my dear friend! I request you to drink the absynth for me today (if u have not already finished hehe) and consider it as ur birthday gift haha Cheers and love! $wamy

A JOKE...

...and a really good one which is relevant to most of us, so i dare to publish it :)

A priest, a doctor and a software engineer die and go to the heavens gate, they hear gods voice and it says " My sons i am really very sorry but the heaven is full and i can accommodate only one of u. so to choose the rightful person one by one tell me what u have done in ur lifetime."

The priest goes up first and says “Well God I am a priest, ur humble servant and have spent all my life working to spread ur message."
The doctor goes up next and says "Well I am a doctor and have helped thousands of people recover from their illnesses and saved countless lives."

The engineer goes up and says "Well I worked as a s/w engineer and...." before the engineer could say any further, the heaven's gate opened and God came out with tears in his eyes and said to the engineer "Say no more my son come with me b'coz u have already been through hell!!"

bon weekend
$wamy

HAPPY ONAM !!

today is ONAM, kerala's national festival (for those who don't know) and a time of rejoicing and family fun! i had an hour long video chat with my folks yesterday and it was quite nice :) otherwise im working today and something exciting which im looking forward to is the show in moulin rouge - remember the movie? yes, the same place!! - in paris, which i will go to this saturday. before the real heavy-duty work of launching a startup site starts in september, its good to be enjoying a show hehe...

and now, blogger seems to have added the video upload option, so to test it im uploading a little thing i made using mixmoov (where i work) - this is a tribute to marseille to show why i love it, so u will have an idea why i keep talking about this place so much. till next time, arrivederci friends..!!

italia ... la dolce vita !!

ciao folks! i am back after a 4-day trip to italy and well i can describe it as...mamma mia! and, put up here is one of the best pictures (i think) i have taken - with my guidebook showing the pisa tower held up against the background of the real one lol otherwise in the three days and two nights in italy, i did florence, pisa and siena.

food - gelato (italian ice cream) - claimed to be the best in the world, is really great especially in terms of the flavours never seen before, like coconut ice cream..would be nice in kerala hehe...pizzerias, ristorantes, pasticherias, gelaterias...giving amazing (and real) italian food! well, its a must-see (or must-eat?!) country, i am now sure ('trenitalia' always comes on time). i had arguably my best lunch so far at a ristorante in pisa, with a kind, elderly italian-speaking waitress patiently describing and suggesting the items and me just enjoying every piece with no care of time - really felt the "la dolce vita" here, the term made famous by a film with the same name, roughly translated to "the sweet life" - canelloni pasta, vino rosso della cassa (red tuscan wine), a tiramisu (yes!), and the final cut - a cappuccino! at the end of an hour and a half (a la $wamy), i was full, and a little drunk hehe, so that when i climbed the leaning tower all the way to th top, i wondered if it was the tower or me that was leaning more, or i wasn't sure if i felt that it was leaning a bit more than it should. the best was when i told the same lie (changing the language to french) as the guy before me did, at the ticket counter that there was a train to rome to catch and i had to get a ticket to see the tower at once, and the lady there said just for you i'm giving it NOW (even the guy before got it half an hour later, for him and family)...i was "grazie mille" for her!! and how i loved hearing them speak their language, well this had started with my italian friends...and was thoroughly enjoyable in their home country, with the cutest accent possible :) i have some "chianti" (wine from the region with the same name, very famous for its wines) bought as a souvenir, got to see how long the souvenir lasts lol!

archtecture, cars and women (in the order siddharth mentioned them in his last post, or whichever order you prefer) - a wealth of these abound hehe, one little thing i found about the names of the fiat (an italian company) cars - "siena" is the city and "palio" is a festival there, fyi. about architecture, there seems to be a syndrome called "stendhal's syndrome", after the french author's experience of dizziness and confusion when exposed to too much of extremely beautiful art, in florence. i am no art person, but yes what i saw stunned me, the famous "il duomo" (the cathedral) in florence and siena topping the list of what i saw. even in august, there is some peace and quiet watching florence by night. add to it all the hearty italian people, and you just feel like asking directions even if you know them (just to hear them speak...i don't know if this is a syndrome..!!)

all the world-famous brands having outlets, and it being a sale season i was able to steal a deal or two of "la moda", well, you'll buy something for the salesgirls if not for the discount prices this season. i haven't seen rome or venice yet, but what i did see of italy is amazing...so much for now, until next time, baci..baci..arrivederci !!

party on dude!!!

hey $wamy

really really cool that you're going to Italy, ooooh! the land of amazing architecture, better cars and even better women. how i envy you my friend ;-)
have fun and looking forward to seeing some pictures of the trip up with you as-usual standing in the middle of some georgeous ladies..

life here is the otherway around atleast for me, been really really busy at work but that should come to an end soon and then i plan to take a few days off myself. can't wait :)

have fun and the rest of you. looking forward to hearing from you...

coucou de marseille!

bonjour folks! i see an 'extended period of inactivity' here but am sure it's because everyone is religiously following the founding principle of this group - doNothing! et bon, now that i have kind of started working, let me shake things up a bit :) its the beginning of another weekend here in the mediterranean and most people are on vacation (france virtually closes down in august), and i just got to know even me, an intern has got 5 days off so did a quick, yes lightning quick plan to escape to italy from 15 to 19 august. the plan (atleast now) is florence, pisa and siena. well, not to tell about the crazy weekend i had with my close friends in montpellier a fortnight ago. work hard, party hard is still true! alora,italia, pasta, dolce vita, ciao bella....practising a little italian from now lol oooh, and theres sth about this facebook.com happening now, and i see lots of people there, so come join in folks!

photos moved to flickr...wtf ??!!

bonjour folks! well, yahoo photos seem to be dying end of sep, and theyve moved my pics to flickr and heres the new URL its strange with so many changes (i see yahoo bought flickr). anyway, it interests me a bit as i am now studying about this web 2.0 stuff at work :) latest update: internship is interesting, planning a little bit of travel if time permits and the mediterranean is wonderful as usual. vamos a la playa!

Re: deletes...

hello folks! oops, i have to tell something about the deletes :) they were something i posted using the site of the startup i am interning with, sorry for not cleaning up in the hurry. however, here it is (may interest some of you) - http://www.mixmoov.com where you can create, edit and publish videos and short movies with text, images, sound and video online free, kind of a second generation of youtube. however it is in french for now :)

love
$wamy

An Inconvenient Truth

"are you ready to change the way you live?"
- An Inconvenient Truth

that's the question. i just finished watching an inconvenient truth and its sad to the point that I'm willing to sit without using my cell phone or computer, wanting to find out how i can stop using my car and make a difference. maybe my little contribution to this vast ocean might, just might, help change the course of the train that's roaring towards a wall...

i'm begging everyone here to see the movie "an inconcenient truth" if you've not already and as Mr. Gore said, don't skip the step in which you ask yourself, "how can i make a difference?"
post suggestions here, mail everyone if you must. do atleast ONE thing to reduce your footprint on this planet.

deletes!

hi $wamy

i'm sorry but i had to delete the last three blogs. looks like there was some virus that was playing games with the last three blogs.
well on a different note, it was sad we guys couldn't have the party on sharadha's wedding day but hope to have one soon. I've got some interesting wine for everyone :)

cheers...