I read an article on MuslimMatters, I can't stop bookmarking this video, its worth watching, a talk by AJ Jacobs, a journalist.
At times, when you read a forwarded email from one of your friend who hardly mails you, though you do not want to or do not have time to read it, you still do (since its from one of those who hardly sends an email). When you read it, while reading the mail, you think about it and smile/laugh at it, and realize why that seldom-communicating person sent you this mail. I felt like the following is an interesting one and falls in to that category, so here you go, and feel feel free to add yours when you comment.
LAW OF QUEUE: If you change queues, the one you have left will start to move faster than the one you are in now.LAW OF TELEPHONE: When you dial a wrong number, you never get an engaged tone.
LAW OF MECHANICAL REPAIR: After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch..
LAW OF THE WORKSHOP: Any tool, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible corner.
LAW OF THE ALIBI: If you tell the boss you were late for work because you had a flat tire, the next morning you will have a flat tire.
BATH THEOREM: When the body is immersed in water, the telephone rings.
LAW OF ENCOUNTERS: The probability of meeting someone you know increases when you are with someone you don't want to be seen with.
LAW OF THE RESULT: When you try to prove to someone that a machine won't work, it will!
LAW OF BIOMECHANICS: The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the reach.
THEATRE RULE: People with the seats at the furthest from the aisle arrive last.
LAW OF COFFEE: As soon as you sit down for a cup of hot coffee, your boss will ask you to do something which will last until the coffee is cold. LAW of NEWSPAPER The one you are looking for will be the only one missing from the neat pile...Here are some of mine:Law of Search: When you search for something, its the last thing that one would get if not you dont get it at allLaw of Punctual: If you make a point to attend something punctual, its very likely that you will not be.Law of Craving: When you have one, you do feel need to it, as soon as you loose it, you will crave for itFeel free to add yours.By the way, I just figured its a FOOL's DAY ;)
It is a pinned article, author's credit: unknown creative email author & MM
THE CURRENT ECONOMIC CRISIS EXPLAINED - IDLI, VADA & SAMBAR
Appakkaaran is the proprietor of a Idli, Vada and Sambar Shop (a rice cake & lentils fried cake dish) in Chennai. Sales are low and, in order to increase them, he comes up with a plan to allow his customers to eat now and pay later. He keeps track of the meals consumed on a ledger.
Word gets around and as a result increasing numbers of customers flock to Appakkaaran’s shop. Appakkaaran’s suppliers are delighted and are very willing to sell more and more raw materials for the meals he prepares. Appakkaaran shows them his ledger of receivables and they extend him credit.
A young and dynamic customer service consultant at the local bank recognizes these customer debts as valuable future assets and gives Appakkaaran a credit line and then increases Appakkaaran’s borrowing limit.
Taking advantage of his customers’ freedom from immediate payment constraints, Appakkaaran jacks up the prices of his Idli, Vada & Sambar. Customers don’t mind as they are not required to pay on the spot. Sales volume increases massively; Banks and suppliers lend more; Appakkaaran opens more outlets. He sees no reason for undue concern since he has the debts of the customers as collateral.
These securities are then listed on the Stock Exchange and traded on markets worldwide. No one really understands what the names mean and how the securities are guaranteed but, nevertheless, as their prices continuously climb, the securities become top-selling items.
One day, although the prices are still climbing, a credit risk manager of the bank decides that the time has come to demand payment of one of the debts incurred by Appakkaaran. Appakkaaran in turn asks his clients to pay up. One by one they refuse; the clients cannot pay back the debts. Appakkaaran refuses to serve them any more. The clients stop coming.
Appakkaaran is really in deep trouble now. He cannot fulfill his loan obligations and therefore claims bankruptcy. All Bonds drop in price by between 80 to 95%.
The suppliers of Appakkaaran, having granted generous payment due dates and having invested in the securities are faced with similar problems. The rice & lentil supplier defaults on payment to the wholesale supplier and claims bankruptcy. The spice supplier is taken over by a competitor; Appakkaaran lays off the cook and staff. Bankruptcies soar, unemployment mushrooms.
The bank that lent the money in the first place is set to collapse. It is saved by the Government following dramatic round-the-clock consultations by leaders from the governing political parties with Appakkaaran commuting back and forth in his Executive jet and Mercedes 500SEL, brokering the deal.
The funds required to save the economic collapse are obtained by a tax levied on the citizens, most of whom do not eat Idli or Vada.
That’s the reason……………………
P.S: Aaappakaaram vachuttaanya Aappu!!!! --- Appakkaaran messed up myaaaaaaaan!!!!!!!!
Here are the top 5 reasons why Desi parents in the West want their offsprings to be a doctor:5. Noble Work ( I know you are laughing, come on, after all, thats how it was)4. Financial Stability ( Unless one has high-paid-insurance )3. They will be busy studying to the extent they have no social life (son/daughter wouldn't even think about anything other than books :P )2. When they are old, they can get free medical service, no need to worry about Medicaid :)1. Easy to find a desi spouse by the way, when I say doctor, i mean physician, by no means I mean doctors who have PhD (Poor hungry Doctors - Pira hua Dimaagh) , whose parents do not benefit except 3 and/or may be 5.
Toll Free Numbers in India
Airlines
Indian Airlines - 1800 180 1407
Jet Airways - 1800 22 5522
Spice Jet - 1800 180 3333
Air India -- 1800 22 7722
Kingfisher - 1800 180 0101
Banks *
*BANK OF MAHARASHTRA 1800222340 & 1800220888
ABN AMRO - 1800 11 2224
Canara Bank - 1800 44 6000
Citibank - 1800 44 2265
Corporatin Bank - 1800 443 555
Development Credit Bank - 1800 22 5769
HDFC Bank - 1800 227 227
ICICI Bank - 1800 333 499
ICICI Bank NRI - 1800 22 4848
IDBI Bank - 1800 11 6999
Indian Bank - 1800 425 1400
ING Vysya - 1800 44 9900
Kotak Mahindra Bank - 1800 22 6022
Lord Krishna Bank - 1800 11 2300
Punjab National Bank - 1800 122 222
State Bank of India - 1800 44 1955
Syndicate Bank - 1800 44 6655 **
Automobiles*
*Mahindra Scorpio - 1800 22 6006
Maruti - 1800 111 515
Tata Motors - 1800 22 5552
Windshield Experts - 1800 11 3636
Computers/IT
Adrenalin - 1800 444 445
AMD - 1800 425 6664
Apple Computers - 1800 444 683
Canon - 1800 333 366
Cisco Systems - 1800 221 777
Compaq - HP - 1800 444 999
Data One Broadband - 1800 424 1800
Dell - 1800 444 026
Epson - 1800 44 0011
eSys - 3970 0011
Genesis Tally Academy - 1800 444 888
HCL - 1800 180 8080
IBM - 1800 443 333
Lexmark - 1800 22 4477
Marshal's Point - 1800 33 4488
Microsoft - 1800 111 100
Microsoft Virus Update - 1901 333 334
Seagate - 1800 180 1104
Symantec - 1800 44 5533
TVS Electronics - 1800 444 566
WeP Peripherals - 1800 44 6446
Wipro - 1800 333 312
xerox - 1800 180 1225
Zenith - 1800 222 004Indian Railway
Indian Railway General Enquiry 131
Indian Railway Central Enquiry 131
Indian Railway Reservation 131
Indian Railway Railway Reservation Enquiry 1345,1335,1330
Indian Railway Centralized Railway Enquiry 1330/1/2/3/4/ 5/6/7/8/9
**
*
*Couriers/Packers & Movers
ABT Courier - 1800 44 8585
AFL Wizz - 1800 22 9696
Agarwal Packers & Movers - 1800 11 4321
Associated Packers P Ltd - 1800 21 4560
DHL - 1800 111 345
FedEx - 1800 22 6161
Goel Packers & Movers - 1800 11 3456
UPS - 1800 22 7171
Home Appliances
Aiwa/Sony - 1800 11 1188
Anchor Switches - 1800 22 7979
Blue Star - 1800 22 2200
Bose Audio - 1800 11 2673
Bru Coffee Vending Machines - 1800 44 7171
Daikin Air Conditioners - 1800 444 222
DishTV - 1800 12 3474
Faber Chimneys - 1800 21 4595
Godrej - 1800 22 5511
Grundfos Pumps - 1800 33 4555
LG - 1901 180 9999
Philips - 1800 22 4422
Samsung - 1800 113 444
Sanyo - 1800 11 0101
Voltas - 1800 33 4546
WorldSpace Satellite Radio - 1800 44 5432
Investments/ Finance
CAMS - 1800 44 2267
Chola Mutual Fund - 1800 22 2300
Easy IPO's - 3030 5757
Fidelity Investments - 1800 180 8000
Franklin Templeton Fund - 1800 425 4255
J M Morgan Stanley - 1800 22 0004
Kotak Mutual Fund - 1800 222 626
LIC Housing Finance - 1800 44 0005
SBI Mutual Fund - 1800 22 3040
Sharekhan - 1800 22 7500
Tata Mutual Fund - 1800 22 0101
Travel
Club Mahindra Holidays - 1800 33 4539
Cox & Kings - 1800 22 1235
God TV Tours - 1800 442 777
Kerala Tourism - 1800 444 747
Kumarakom Lake Resort - 1800 44 5030
Raj Travels & Tours - 1800 22 9900
Sita Tours - 1800 111 911
SOTC Tours - 1800 22 3344 * *Healthcare
Best on Health - 1800 11 8899
Dr Batras - 1800 11 6767
GlaxoSmithKline - 1800 22 8797
Johnson & Johnson - 1800 22 8111
Kaya Skin Clinic - 1800 22 5292
LifeCell - 1800 44 5323
Manmar Technologies - 1800 33 4420
Pfizer - 1800 442 442
Roche Accu-Chek - 1800 11 45 46
Rudraksha - 1800 21 4708
Varilux Lenses - 1800 44 8383
VLCC - 1800 33 1262
Insurance
AMP Sanmar - 1800 44 2200
Aviva - 1800 33 2244
Bajaj Allianz - 1800 22 5858
Chola MS General Insurance - 1800 44 5544
HDFC Standard Life - 1800 227 227
LIC - 1800 33 4433
Max New York Life - 1800 33 5577
Royal Sundaram - 1800 33 8899
SBI Life Insurance - 1800 22 9090
Hotel Reservations
GRT Grand - 1800 44 5500
InterContinental Hotels Group - 1800 111 000
Marriott - 1800 22 0044
Sarovar Park Plaza - 1800 111 222
Taj Holidays - 1800 111 825
Teleshoppin
Asian Sky Shop - 1800 22 1800
Jaipan Teleshoppe - 1800 11 5225
Tele Brands - 1800 11 8000
VMI Teleshopping - 1800 447 777
WWS Teleshopping - 1800 220 777
Others
Domino's Pizza - 1800 111 123 *
*Cell Phones
**BenQ - 1800 22 08 08
Bird CellPhones - 1800 11 7700
Motorola MotoAssist - 1800 11 1211
Nokia - 3030 3838
Sony Ericsson - 3901 1111 *
Courtesy: Mail Forwards ;-)
Free Plastic Surgery in TN, India from March 23 - April 4th:
Here is the forwarded email
"Hi friends,
If anybody met with fire an accident or people birth defects in ear, nose and mouth can do free plastic surgery at kodaikanal by PASAM hospital…
The period is from 23 march to 4 th april by German doctors…
Everything is free of cost.
Contact : 04542 - 240668, 240668, 245732
Regards,
Dhinesh.S"
P.S: This is one of the forwarded mails, if someone can confirm this, that would be great. :D.
Pixar University's Randy Nelson explains what schools must do to prepare students for jobs in new media.
Courtesy: EDUTOPIA.ORG
Final week for the spring semester is just over in almost all universities across the globe, the best and worst part of the final week is its the 'final week'. Best part is everyone gets a break after the final week and worst part for the student and not necessarily the professors is final exams and grades.
I just finished Grading, I am tired at this moment as I was grading continuously (almost without a break) for about 17 hours and totally about 30 hours in the last 3-4 days (will post some pics soon). But this is not the part that I dislike the most, often I enjoy grading.
Grading, as much as students dislike the grading, teachers and professors do hate some part of grading at least many if not all (at the least I know many including myself) though there are something enjoyable in grading. One of the enjoyable moment is when you see your student makes a perfect score.
When I say, I am not fond of grading, I do not mean just grading the exams, I mean including the results and reading through the answers carefully (though some of them are not even remotely related to the answer).
Exam and Grading is very important in academics as it sets the standard for learning and understanding the subject. Grading experience is like some sort of reading a novel except that you will always will not have a good ending. One will have joyous moments, saddest moments, a laughable and funny moments, interesting moments and horrifying moments.
Joyous moments are when the grader see some perfect score or a best answer that you have not presented or taught. I deal with mathematics so I often do, when I see a solution that I didn't teach or totally with different approach or different tool is used to solve the problem, that gives me a pleasure that I got across the understanding of the problem (or my passion of problem solving) to at least one student.
Graders will have funny moments too, an example of funny moment is just like what you have felt when you see the display pic of this post. Thanks to those who don't know the answer to the question but tries his/her best to answer the question in the best possible innovative and logical manner. Generally some tend to give them credit to such answers as in the picture, since the answer is logically correct (question should have properly worded). Having noted about having fun, this article is a nice joke read on grading, read here http://www.scribd.com/doc/1707/A-Guide-to-Grading-Exams-VERY-FUNNY
One might have hopeless moments as you see answers that are not just incorrect but totally irrelevant. Actually some answers even bring the graders morality of teaching totally down to the extend he/she revisits the way he/she teaches.
Interesting moments are when the student writes about why he/she did not do well on that exam and by the way sometimes it was very horrible too. By the way, some of my friends make jokes that 'you better give the students good grade, otherwise you never know what happens...'
Easiest grading of all is grading multiple choice, especially grading using scantron machine. I personally and strongly do believe that multiple choice exam does not evaluate the student in the best manner. Show the work or open ended problems give an idea how does the class is doing and where the class needs to concentrated and the level of understanding of the students etc. I will later write about the various exams in a different post if permitted.
Last part of the grading is actually looking at how the class did overall, doing all the statistics, mean, median, mode and the normal curve etc. A general thumb rule on academics is that normally one will have a 'normal' curve :). Best part of the result is the curve being skewed to the right and the worst part is, curve being skewed to the left (with the assumption that 0% is on the left and 100% is on the right of the scale).
How did I feel as a student about grading?, will have a post later if permitted, if you have any interesting experience as a student or as a teacher, be my guest and feel free to share them here.
Disclaimer: Since i sound like grading the university exams, do not assume I am an OLD and BALD professor, I just passed my mid twenties 'recently' ('recently' is a subjective term though ;) ).
Thanksgiving sale, thats right, something that I used to be crazy about. Being a student and our first rule of thumb on finance is 'a penny saved is a penny earned' (still its the same though). I have bought many stuff for free (yes, thats right, almost absolutely free except for the postage on mail-in rebates) and collected 'treasures' (my room mates used to be sarcastic with me since some of them I hardly used, but hey, its free anyway remember).
The place I used to live didn't have any stores other than Walmart, Kroger and few other small shopping places, after all, it was a university town anyway. We used to plan few days before and get our traveling plans worked out (X commutes with Y, and A commutes with B, C and D etc -- since many of us will be going to our back home countries in december, many of us even rent the car and do the shopping for the loved ones back home).
Second thing on our list is to get a list of things to buy, spend hours around on the net and searching for deals and finalize the list with optimal price. And we share the shopping places, like X goes to OfficeMax, Y goes to Office Depot, Z goes to BestBuy etc buy 4 items of that, 7 items of this etc.
We get up early in the morning (i mean literally, we get up around 3:00 am, by the way, most of our room mates including me do not have the habit of getting up before 10am on the weekends) and drive for about an hour to the shopping places. Generally we reach around 5 am and we stand in the line in the freezing cold (as you see in the picture). Actually, in some places, people come to shops the day before evening and wait until the next day for early bird deals (you can even get laptops for $200 once a year, if you are desperate, you wouldn't mind doing). We stay outside the shops for about an hour in the freezing whether to shop around.
Generally our credit cards will be used left and right and will be bleeding at the end of the day. Finally, we sense the fake joy of winning the friday sales and be proud and will be bragging around with our colleagues for couple of days.
This is my past semi-decade year of thanksgiving, and the place that I moved to recently have all the shops, you name it, its here. But, I lost the interest in that crazy shopping ( may be my friends are not here with me or I'm not a student anymore :) ).
I found out that it was a joyous moment to shop around with the friends that was one of the main motivation behind the continuous semi-decade blackfriday shopping march on a freezing weather and I lack that here.
By the way, I still bought few things in the later day though. And I read that this year there is a 7.2% increase in the average spending on thanksgiving day (see here) - hey after all, country in a recession and its understandable that people are making use of the deals.
The worst terror attack ever witnessed in mumbai, india yesterday Nov. 26. There was reportedly 11 attacks and so far the more than 101 dead and around 300 injured. There seems indiscriminate mindless heinous assault on streets and public places like railway stations etc. It’s saddening to see that these maniacs can carry out such horrendous acts and my prayers and hearts are with the victims of such a terror attack on innocent people.
People behind this should be viewed as enemies of humanity irrespective of religious affiliation. They should be punished and made an example of.
Will update more as it gets updated.
Michael Jackson 'to become a Muslim', yes thats right, thats the headline in the media today,
Other Headlines
Telegraph's Headline: Michael Jackson 'converts to Islam and changes name to Mikaeel'
The Sun's Headline: The way you Mecca me feel
There has been rumour for many years and discussions that he became a muslim once in a while and he refutes it back or keeps silent. One thing that I do not understand is that people used to spread this news as if he had done some favor..., I personally think, its other way around.
May Almighty guide everyone.
CNN's Jessica Yellin goes holographic to chat with Wolf Blitzer from Chicago - first ever report in television, very impressive...
Severn Suzuki addressed the issue of environment at UN Earth Summit 1992
This might be interesting addition to those who are aware of what is known as Dyslexia
'The word dyscalculia comes from Greek and Latin which means: "counting badly." The prefix "dys" comes from Greek and means "badly." "Calculia" comes from the Latin "calculare." which means "to count." That word "calculare" again comes from "calculus," which means "pebble" or one of the counters on an abacus', according to Wiki.
Well Why am I saying this, few days ago, there was an interesting, rather unique incident happened to me. As a TA (Teaching Assistant), I went to the computere lab where and there was a student (mid or late forties I believe) who had some questions with probability. By the way, In this lab TA's are there to answer questions related to computer oriented mathematical projects (me mostly helping with MATHEMATICA).
I helped (rather solved) her one of the problems, next one I thought its easier than what we have solved just now. She seemed to be smart and studious student. She had a hard time understanding the question, I realized quickly that she has a problem with relating the question as what to do, in simple, interpreting the question. This time I decided not to solve the problem myself, rather I let her solve the problem (I was confident she can). Ofcourse, I believe teaching is not to solve the student problems but to teach them how to solve the problems, don't y'll agree?.
I asked her, please explain the question to me (I even tossed a dime 6 times, surprisingly I got 5 tails and 1 head). Dont think of it as a math problem, think of it as a day to day problem, its plain english... after going over the problem again and again, tears rolled her eyes (not kidding). I quickly realized the situation and I kind of started saying, dont assume me as a teacher think of me as your brother and please explain me just the question. She felt comforted little bit but still tears were rolling...
Then I quickly went down to explain the problem and solved it.
She asked me the following questions:
If a fair coin is tossed 6 times, what is the probability that three or four tails will be obtained?.
She said she is afraid of math (this is typical of students -- I heard this may be1000 times) and what caught my attention was she said she has a problem with reading numbers, like she might get the numbers mixed up... by the way, she is smart and intelligent its just that she has hardtime with number... Its hard to believe it right... (Yeah!!! its hard for me in the first either)...
According to her, its a "recognized disability" in US. Listen to her here
Find out yourself more here on Dyscalculia :-)
Lecture by CA M.R. Venkatesh, Chennai Part of INDIA RE-DISCOVERED A Seminar on Global Economy By SWADESHI JAGARAN MANCH and VISION INDIA TRUST
