Category Archives: reviews

Water Bridge in Germany

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Look at this wonder. It’s a Water bridge over river. Water Bridge in Germany…. What a feat! Six years, 500 million euros, 918 meters long…now this is engineering!

This is a channel-bridge over the River Elbe and joins the former East and West Germany, as part of the unification project. It is located in the City of Magdebur, near Berlin.

The photo was taken on the day of inauguration.

Sad demise of my Laptop :(

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I am having a bad time during my year end vacation. I have planned to visit my sister in New York and Harrisburg, PA.  I was all excited to go around Time Square, Empire-state Building, Central Park and the New Year bash. I was little more excited for this holidays as i am meeting my both sisters, my parents and its the new year’s party.

The moment we landed in New York, before even we could see the city, we lost my backpack. My backpack always contained the most valuable things in my life…… the laptop. This laptop contained all my research effort from past 3 years of time and all my personal photos. As one might expect, the laptop was a very very dear one for me. The backpack also contained my Canon camera, my wife’s purse, few of my important documents, etc… We were so stunned and disturbed about this occasion that it took 3 days for us to come out of this. We did complain to the Airport police and also made numerous calls to the airport. I lost it on December 20th and today is December 31st and i have not received any encouraging messages from them. Its a monetary loss of 2000$ and more of a sentimental value.

This incident definitely taught us few things, which we would never forget in our life.

  • Miracles do happen 🙂 We never ever expected that we will loose our backpack.
  • Things do happen. How ever careful you are, sometimes fate rules YOU.
  • Move On. Bad things do happen and its necessary to move on. You can build almost everything as long as you are alive.
  • Tomorrow is a New day. However bad or worse is today, tomorrow WILL be a better day. You need to believe in this. 

And yes…..i am moving on…… 

Carmel-By-The-Sea on Route 1, CA

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On October 13th we have started to see few places on Route 1 and to stay overnight there in Monterey. We stay in Fremont and its only 90 miles away from Monterey. After few weeks of time, we wanted to go out and have a great time with the California beaches. Monterey is the place we are visiting for the 3rd time and its worth many visits.

Relax

Carmel-By-The-Sea is a small city along the coast. A small left turn onto the Ocean View Ave from Route 1 after the Monterey takes you to this wonderful small city. The life here resembles me of the small villages in Germany and Swiss and i always love that kind of life style. Everyone is relaxed, lots of food, wine, shopping and a great ocean view. Wow, i can spend few days just enjoying the shopping and walking in the small streets. The best thing is to go along the Ocean View and at the end of it, you can actually park the car and there you are…. you can see the ocean and if you have a nice book to read…you have made your day. And of course its definitely a romantic place for young couples like me and my wife.

Monterey

17 Mile drive a another great drive which takes almost around half day. It totally has around 21 scenic spots and each and every spot accounts for your memories. Some of them i remember are Cyprus Point, Ghost tree. Another amazing thing on this drive are the private mansions / houses of filthy rich people. Even you can see some of the private golf courses. The greenery that you see all along the 17 mile drive is fantastic. You can imagine the ocean on right side and golf on the left side.

CarmelByTheSea  We  Bird Rock  Ghost Tree

And finally Ghosts are very famous in both Carmel-By-The-Sea and in Monterey. Each shop that you visit has hundreds of books on ghosts and their stories. Somehow we did not even dare to visit some of the haunted houses near to Monterey.

Overall it was a great and memorable experience and i recommend everyone to visit when you get a chance.

Must see places in Germany

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Hummm….i am writing this and suggesting as a person who lived in Germany for almost 4 years and have traveled throughout Germany over the weekends. The first thing i like about the europe is the public transportation system. Where ever you are and where ever you want to go , there is always something that takes you there (could be trains, trams, buses). I have not seen such a punctual and well maintained system any where else. I live in USA now and you can forget abt that kind of public transportation system.

In any case if you are planning to visit germany, do take time to plan and see the most of what you can. Dont miss the opportunity. Following are some of the places that i have seen and many people did liked these. Hope this list helps if you are looking for some nice places.

One thing for sure is that there are still lots of places to watch out and Germany is Beautiful. If language was not a barrier i would have settled in Stuttgart, Germany. Anyway now i landed up in usa and life if going on.

I would definitely visit Europe when ever i get a chance. I still cant get those memories out of my mind.

FolsomLake – Sacremanto : Awesome lake for a 1 day trip

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On 26.May.2007 i visited folsomlake near Roseville, Ca. It was the lake that we found on a detour. We went to the Auburn city with full of small hills and lot of cultivation around for the berries and christmas trees. We were at a place by name SHILOH TREE FARM in Auburn and by the time we went there we were told that the farm is oipened only during the monthof december. The farm owner has kindly let us in to see and stroll the farm a little-bit. But with a little bit of caution that he killed around 2 rattle snakes in the past week and to watch carefully around. That took the party mood out of my peopld and everyone is like….when are we getting into the car and run out of this place. We barely managed to take few snaps and then we hurried to come down the hill.

But the interesting part was that from that hill, we could see the beauty of the lake at a far distance and its was beautiful. I did visit few lakes in Germany and Swiss but i am truly amazed with this one. As i hear there are 3 or 4 entry points to this lake and once you get in…. you can take your own time to move around in the car and park it in a place where you can spend some time alone. There are some places that are really crowded. You have to take your beach ware kind of stuff is you really want to enjoy. They do rent some boats.

We really enjoyed a lot and i woud definately recomment this place.

Germany-Stuttgart : A life time experience

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In the initial stages of my career i was working for Robert Bosch GmbH, Germany. I was deputed to germany for almost 3.5 years. As Bosch’s head quarters is in Stuttgart, i had to stay here for all the while. This place has a decent amount of indian colleagues with some Indian and Srilankan restaurants. People who used to come on short term assignments stay at Hotel Domino, Stammheim; Hotel Feuerbach im Biburturm, Feuerbach; and so many other places. Every one used to prefer Hotel Domino as its near to Bosch in Feuerbach.

I was initially staying in the Hotel Domino for a long time and then i moved to an apartment in Nier Steiner Strasse, Gerlingen. Most of us were kind of bachelors and used to really have a radical time 🙂 . Tipical life is to get up around 7.00am in the morning and smoke, smoke, smoke, no breakfast, go to office by 9.00am, ….start work…smoke, lunch, back to work, back to home by 6.00pm and then got to jogging, dinner, pep-talk with your friends. Honestly for vegitarians, it is a hell there. But still better than USA. A lot better. Atleast you get boiled potatoes, zuchini, carrots or brokkali.

There used to be the Rosen Stein Park near Haupt Bahn Hauf and it used to be really lively and we (myself and Ramakanth) used to go for cycling. You cycle for around 2-3 hours and you feel so nice. Especially there is a beer hub in this park. We used to have a beer and used to peddle back.

There used to be a Fern Zenturm(TV Tower) and it is really nice. It used to be around 200 meters in height and by the time we go up you want to have a coffee or some hot drinks. The view if Stuttgart we get from there is awesome. We used to take trams and go there in the evenings.

Who can forget the Mercedes Benz museum. Wow its a master piece of its own. If you go in, it will take minimum of 2 hours to see all the car models. The kind of key-chains, sovereigns you get there are really cool.

Daimler Benz Stadium is a place of its own to hang out… the foot ball matches that happen there are a worth remember. The kind of cheering that goes on, beer cans smell, the crowd, the music, etc… are worth a million.

The local wine that you get there is really awesome. I gor got some of the names….but Trollinger, Lemberger are some. Neat feuerbach we used to be regular visitors of Wichtel. Its a beer place and nice pizzaaaaaaasssss…. Anyone would have to visit this place.

In the end i would like to goback to Stuttgart for a vacation. Right now i am married and my wife does not speak German. So its better for me to stick to English speaking countries 🙂

Competition and Self Identity in India

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Competition : An occasion on which a winner is selected from among two or more contestants. Are you a Winner. Ofcourse, most of us are winners at some point or the other. Thats the time we have felt the top of the world, a little high, proudness, recognition in the crowd/society, increased respect from the family members, and a lot more. I am sure we do agree that all these are the factors that drives us to be competent.

Self Identity : Its a set of qualities and passion that distinguishes one from another. e.g. BillGates and Myself 🙂 . I have my own and he has his own identity. This is also a result of mental state and perception that we have right from the childhood.

I am sure all of us depending on our backgrounds and ethnic grounds, we have dreamt of many things. I wanted to be an Actor. Believe me….i always dreamt of to be a best actor in the world (till 13-15 years of age). Right from my 8th grade, i wanted to be a scientist. I wanted to do something with the fundamental and astro physics. Was verymuch interested to see if i can increase the days length. Instead of 24 hours, it shoudl be around 48 hours. I wanted it coz, i want to spend more time with my Girlfriend in school and also can get more time for Cricket. Neverthe less that never happened. And finally after all these years of becoming this and that….Ya…..now i am a Software engineer 🙁

After some time i get to see lot of world outside my home, city, state and country. I was one of those young people, to get to travel to many countries. And all the time i was thinking i have achieved a lot and i am gr8. But when i saw the world outside, i have started “thinking“. In the due course of time, we all get into a kind of competitive mood, to get into Engineering, Medicine, Law, etc… And now ritght from the 10th grade we have been PUSHED to get good grades and show that u r capable. Its the result of peer, family and society pressure. When i got an average of 80% in my +2, the postman in my area, has made a remark that his son got around 90%. Wow thats great, for a moment i felt deminished. Anyway, who cares…thats what i have got and thats what i am.

Inida is a country with 1.3 billion people. As i know tehre are around 200+ engineering colleges in the state Andhra Pradesh. Now you can assume the amount of the crowd that comes out of the collage every year. Now all thse kids need to be placed in soem companies 🙁 .

The irony is that, from 10th grade we stop every thing. Literally every thing. Dont do excercises; Dont go to dancing lessons; Dont play; Dont watch TV; Dont attend parties; Dont go to Swimming lessons; No social work; All these are a waste of time. Inshort, anything thats not books related is a time of waste. Wow…by the time we come out of the collages and getinto the jobs, we are worthless kids. Except the work related topics, we are not good at ANYTHING else.

And what we also lack is the realization that we are becoming too focussed on studies and letting other side of the life near to EMPTY. Ofcourse all this while we are so focussed and so TUNED towards this kind of “lifestyle“, we believe thats THE LIFE. Instead of giving our kids all the necessary KNOWLEDGE thats required to lead a successful life, we give then only a CAREER. In my view the CAREER is a part of the life but not the LIFE it self. We dont train them emotionally. Else, we woudlnot see so many suicide cases, coz they did not get through a competitive exam. Thats funny right…

Do any of us remember days when we actually set aside out official work, coz we want to spend time with kids, parents, wife/husband and friends. Did we fight at office saying that, i cant do this work coz i want to attend my gym/trecking/longdrive/painting/social work. I am not saying that we dont do it. But how often and how passionately we do the other things in life.

The Society that we have….this is a real tricky part. When we go to public gatherings or fucntions, did we ever see ourselves talking something other than our professional topics. A person who has done medicine cant get close to a engineer. We say..ha…his attitue and ideas are different. I cant talk to him in terms of engineering design, mechanical structures, the 8th wonder of the world i have in mind.

I am just wondering why dont we BE what we are. Its important ti be competitive and at the same time we also have to give importance to over all development and SELF IDENTITY. If all software engineers, if all are doctors, then WHO AM I. Do i have a recognition as a PERSON, other than my profession….