Friday, June 28, 2013

The six tastes in food

Friday, June 21, 2013

Nature's art is the best!

Here is a snap of a delightful wonder of a plant in the nearby public park. Watch Nature's art - how the leaves are tucked in better than the best origami. How we can't make out whether it is a flower or a leaf!

Wednesday, June 19, 2013

What life has taught me

I read a short piece by a great saint about what life had taught him. He referred to a few small episodes which left a deep imprint of learning on him. I started to think, what has life taught me?

I list a few:
       ( taken at butterfly garden, Singapore)


  1. Be bold, be enthusiastic, be quick. 
  2. You can get a lot more done than you think.
  3. We think of ourselves as YouTube videos, constantly changing and evolving with time. We think of others instead as Picasa photos, static and unchanging. The reality is that like us, others also constantly change.
  4. NOBODY= no saint, no astrologer, no self-proclaimed master knows the total reality. 
  5. Reality is supreme, sacrosanct, and cares for none. I mean, it is not obliged to anyone.
  6. We are all constantly searching for something outside. Actually the ultimate truth and happiness are both within us. I mean within me.
  7. Looking for a mantra? Forget it. Every mantra is a process of self-hypnosis, living in your own web. Connecting with Reality is the only mantra.
  8. Everyone gets a chance, everyone can be happy. It is NOT a Zero-Sum game.
  9. Writing what life has taught me is somewhat silly. Because learning cannot ever end or be complete.
  10. Be open. Be truthful. Be loving and be giving. 
  11. The biggest recipe for unhappiness is to expect the other to be perfect in loving and giving as I expect them to be or do.

Thursday, June 13, 2013

What lovely place is this?


I won't reveal my secret way to search Google fast, but let me tell you it took me less than one minute.

I am a Googlu!!!!

Instant Expert Noodles or Googlus

I am not saying anything new here. From NaMo to Obama,  everyone swears by the power of Google. And if you are smart enough to get a smart phone and save 22 days of time waste every year,  you would also know the power of Google.
The last time,  or an important time I used google to win something, was in Sept. 2008. I was part of a team activity set up by GE along the Seine river in Paris. We were teams in different boats who were sailing up and down and getting clues to a treasure hunt.  The last and toughest was a question about when Peugeot Citroen closed their factory that we could see along the Seine, some time in 80's.
Nobody could find out that answer from their boats even though that derelict factory was staring at us from the bank. Well, I had an iPhone with 3G courtesy Telstra.  I found the answer in about 10 sec. And our team won.
That is the trouble with google. You think you're an expert just because you could just google something and find out some factoid which you can throw at everyone.
I call you, if you are one such insufferable human, an Instant Expert Noodle. Named after the Top Ramen inventor who gave the tired factory-worker Japanese noodles that were  hot,  tasty and ready in a few minutes. Instant Nirvana.
But as you know,  all haikus are not born equal,  especially the google kind.
There is also a mystique about IEN's.  They are going to replace gurus.  So i call them googlus.  In fact some of our new gurus are IEN's anyway.

Let me find out what place this is....

Sunday, June 9, 2013

What tennis teaches us


Today I read this article first published by NYT on how Djokovic was discovered and trained by a great woman, Jelena Gencic. That was the period when a war was raging and lives were getting wiped out in their midst:
“I went to practice with Novak and three other boys,” Gencic said in Belgrade in 2010. “There were many other boys and girls, and when they were on the tennis court, they don’t think about bombs. That’s the point of, the reason of, practicing. You don’t think about that.”
Gencic remembered picking practice sites based on where the bombs had fallen the night before, reasoning that NATO would not bomb the same place again.
“I could feel it in my house; it was terrible,” she said. “My sister was very hurt by the bombs and 16 months later she died.”
But the tone of that interview was surprisingly not bitter. Though Gencic expressed regret that she had lost touch with Djokovic at that stage and expressed resentment toward Srdjan for not keeping her better informed, she remembered the eight years they did spend in each other’s frequent company with great tenderness.
“Oh, special boy, that boy was unbelievable,” she said. “Very intelligent. He knew very well what to do, how much to do. He listens, and every word it was, ‘Please tell me again.’ And I’d say, ‘Did you understand me?’ And he would say, ‘Yes, but please, tell me again.’ He wanted to be so sure.” UNQUOTE
This woman died a few days ago, with an unfulfilled wish to touch and hold the French Open trophy along with her pupil after he would win it one day. I believe Djokovic was given the news of her passing after an important match and broke down...
Of course Novak is an unbelievable competitor and the top talent in tennis today. It is so Significant for me how tennis becomes a paradigm for life itself, with all its challenges, and how with the help of a life coach we can achieve our goals relentlessly.
There is also a synonym for relentless.  That is Nadal.  And today again, I read Nirmal Shekar write about him in the Hindu:
Ah, paying attention! What a simple thing, you might think. But it is, in fact, a difficult practice, a seriously endangered process of cultural learning in an age when your senses are bombarded all the time by all kinds of distractions.
In the event, it was with an anguished sense of nostalgia that I remembered my teacher’s words from another age, on Friday.
Watching Rafael Nadal pay attention to the moment, especially when it happens to be a passage of play charged with meaning, is like watching a great scientist — perhaps on the verge of a Nobel-deserving discovery — pace his laboratory, solitary and single-minded.
Living in the now, being present all the time — these are not just quasi-philosophical clichés that have turned many life coaches, especially of Asian origin, into celebrity multi-millionaires in Silicon Valley and Hollywood. UNQUOTE
I wish the likes of Federer, Djokovic, and my favourite, Nadal well. They are the exemplars of what is excellence in every breath.

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

High time they did this co-marketing!!!



Guys, I was just thinking. Days are tough and marketing budgets are getting cut day after day!!
And there are so many products that are bought by the same sets of  people, depending on demographics. So why don't we think of co-marketing and co-placement of products?

To explain my idea, here are some examples that come readily to mind:

THE TOWN's BIGGEST AND BEST BURGER ----------XXXL CLOTHING for the large hearted, large waisted!!!

The town's  best Texan steak, large, succulent, and rich red meat --------Free Creatinine test in this walk-in Lab for master health check-ups!!!!!!

Only CEO's PLEASE for our latest and best Bond suits. ----- try this Isabgol for constipation!!!!!!!!!!


Monday, June 3, 2013

Tips on Creativity



I copy below this set of tips on jump-starting your creativity by Nellie Akalp of Corp.net, that I just read in pulse.com:      .


Whether you want to design a new product, devise a tagline for a client or solve a scheduling problem, creative thinking gives you an undeniable edge. However, we can't just summon creativity on a whim; when we need it most, it's nowhere to be seen.
If you’re in need of more outside-the-box, inventive thinking at work, here are five ways to boost your creativity.

1. Ditch the quiet office.

Unlike detail-oriented, analytical thinking, creativity thrives amidst moderate distraction. That’s why it’s so hard to get the creative juices flowing when you shut the door and block out all distractions.
Researchers at the University of Illinois found that a moderate level of ambient noise induces “process disfluency.” In short, distractions disrupt the flow of thought, leading to more abstract, broader and creative thinking. Researchers also found that noise had to be at a moderate level (around 70 decibels, the equivalent of a radio/TV in the background or someone running a vacuum cleaner) to enhance creativity. Lower or higher levels did not have positive impacts on creativity.
If you’re attempting to think of a creative solution, try distracting yourself by working at a café or park bench.

2. Silence the inner critic.

Whenever we churn out something out-of-the-ordinary, we open ourselves to scrutiny and criticism. In many cases, our own inner critic is the most effective at shooting things down. It’s hard to be creative when you’re constantly worried that x, y or z won’t be good enough.
When children draw, they don’t worry about making mistakes; they take risks, do their own thing and have fun. Yet if most adults picked up a sketchpad, they would start thinking, "That doesn’t look right," "that’s not good enough" from the very beginning.
The inner critic tightens your mind and blocks creative flow, so find any way to silence this negative voice. For example, give yourself permission to brainstorm by automatically writing down ideas as you think of them — then worry later whether they're any good.

3. Experiment with your work environment.

While the distractions of cafés and park benches can help inspire creativity, try to make changes in your workspace itself. For example, studies have shown that the complexity and interchanging notes of Mozart’s sonatas and other classical music can have a positive (albeit short-term) impact on spatial reasoning skills and creative thinking.
In addition to music, you can experiment with color. A 2009 study at the University of British of Columbia found the color blue led to more relaxed and creative thinking, while red boosted performance on more detail-oriented tasks like proofreading.
"Thanks to stop signs, emergency vehicles and teachers' red pens, we associate red with danger, mistakes and caution," said Juliet Zhu, author of the study. "The avoidance motivation, or heightened state, that red activates makes us vigilant and thus helps us perform tasks where careful attention is required to produce a right or wrong answer.

“Through associations with the sky, the ocean and water, most people associate blue with openness, peace and tranquility. The benign cues make people feel safe about being creative and exploratory,” Zhu added.

4. Sift out the busy work.

If your days, weeks and months are packed with “getting things done,” you’re not leaving any time to experiment. Google famously lets its employees use 20% of their workweeks to pursue special projects.
Considering that strategy has worked out pretty well for Google, you might want to try something similar for yourself. Try to carve out some free time every day (even if it’s just 10-20 minutes) to step away from the computer or other obligations and let yourself think.

5. Branch out beyond your comfort zone.

Steve Jobs once said, “A lot of people in our industry haven't had very diverse experiences. So they don't have enough dots to connect, and they end up with very linear solutions.” Sometimes the best path to creative and inventive thinking is to be intentional about experiencing new things in life.
If you’re experiencing a creative block, try picking up a magazine you wouldn’t normally read, have lunch with a friend in a different field or attend an event way outside your industry. Since you don’t know where an idea will come from, feel free to look anywhere and everywhere for your next source of inspiration.