Young Tam girl, well educated, only minor tendencies towards violence, seeks geek for purposes of audio reproduction

The faymbus Neha bids us pass this on:

Global Voices Conference in Delhi: Help required.

The annual Global Voices Online conference is in Delhi this year on the 16th and 17th of December 2006. The conference is scheduled at the India Habitat Centre. The first day is open to anyone who is part of Global Voices or is interested in their work.

So here's the question. We're looking for someone to help with our live audio webcast for that day. A volunteer Geek in-charge would very much smooth out the process. Anyone interested? Please leave a comment here or mail me: nehavish[at]gmail[dot]com. Thanks!

Hutch ado about nothing

Local Hutch to Hutch calls at just 30p/min! Also get 100 minutes of local Hutch to Hutch calls FREE at just Rs30/month. To subscribe SMS 30Y to 6565 (toll free).

'Swot our service provider SMSed us the other day.

Erm, does that compute?

Like 100 minutes at Rs 30 works out to Rs 0.30 per minute, which is the rate being offered. So where's the FREE then, huh? Fact is, if you don't make 100 minutes worth of calls in a given month, you're actually paying more per minute than 30 paise a minute for the calls that you do make. Now, is it just us, or does that sound a tad slimey?

What mortal hand or eye framed thy fearful symmetry?

Tyger One:

Logo recently designed for Madhya Pradesh Tourism by a leading, award-winning Indian ad agency.

Tyger Two:

Logo of Save China's Tigers, an organisation that's been around for a few years.

Hem, hem, kof, kof.

Update: Shodan, in the comments, points us to..

Tyger Three!



The Shotokan Karate symbol.

Shodan informs us that

The tiger was painted by the great Japanese artist, Hoan Kosugi, to honor Master Funakoshi (father of modern Karate) who used it on the cover of his first book.

This logo is from the International Shotokan Karate Federation. You can also see it at Shotokan Karate of America, Shotokan Karate International India the Shotokan Karate-Do International Federation official site, and, oh, a bunch of other sites.

Now we don't know about you, but personally, we wouldn't advise anyone to go borrowing logos from folks who can smash bricks with their bare hands and all that.

Update 2: We did a bit of digging. Here's a much better version of the Shotokan symbol. And this page tells us that Gichin Funakoshi's Ryukyu Kempo: Karate (the book Shodan pointed us to) was published in 1922 in Japanese. And here and here you'll find a little more history.

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

All ye who enter here, be warned.

Innovation, thy name is Zig

We were travelling, in Munnar and Valparai, visiting bungalows that once served as the residences of tea planters. Most of these edifices sank foundations around the turn of the century (the last century, natch), when, we deduce, there were no three-point plugs. And our battered Compaq Armada, old though it is, is not, we hasten to tell you, of quite that vintage. Its battery being shot to hell, it needs a power source or it dies in about 15 minutes. Power was available only via two-pin plugs. Net net: the darn thing was just so many extra kilos in the backpack.

So, while we traipsed from bengalow to bengalow (that is the prevailing pronunciation among the Malayali cognoscenti, so we do as the Romans do), therefore, we took notes in our handy paper note book.

(Now, of course, we're faced with the grim task of transcribing our own handwriting. We had atrocious handwriting in school. In college, our professors whimpered softly when we submitted papers. Computers were our salvation. For years, no one has known that we produce hieroglyphics instead of copperplate. And, as a result of lack of practise over the last decade or so, our writing is—believe it or not, Prof Vishwanathan—even worse. Oh yes. Digression from a digression: we write beautifully with a brush. Weird, innit?)

Said notes were dated, random and self-indulgent scribblings recording our impressions of the past few days, wee turns of phrase that struck us as being save-worthy, a lot of essential data that we had to make sure we wouldn't forget. Which, if one thinks about is, how we've always used this blog. So (fanfare), ladieeees and gennelumen, we are proud to present our latest invention: the paper blog!

Ha, you say. That's just a diary. nuffing new about that, smartarse. Wait, we say. If the the erudite geeks at BlogCamp can call a bulletin board (the real as opposed to virtual type, y'know, board, cork or otherwise, where folks could come pin up or stick on notes) a paper wiki, then we old economy types can damn well re-label other stuff in nonsensical ways too, no?

En route from Munnar to Top Station

The first wild elephants we have laid eyes on. Max zoom, of course. One doesn't want to upset critters this size.

Missed out on getting a glimpse of the old tusker who raids the vegetable garden at the Tallayar plantation, though.

Munnar - dawn

UFO - somewhere between Munnar and Valparai

Anyone care to identify this magnificient creature for us?

Valparai 2

Valparai 1