Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from 2014

Khagol Mandal - Sky Observation Workshop

Despite having slept just 3 hours in last 29 hours, I think it will be worth writing about my experience about yesterday's sky show organized by Khagol Mandal . To give you a little idea, as per their website, Khagol Mandal is - Established in 1985 by handful of astronomy enthusiasts, the organization has grown into a membership of 1000+ within past 20 years. Khagol Mandal is a registered organization under "The Societies Act" as well as with "The Charity Commissioner, Mumbai". Strong volunteer base and continual activity is one of the strongest point of Khagol Mandal. Very soon we will enter 30 year of services to astronomy enthusiasts and we will soon come up with series of lectures and workshops to meet everyone's growing thirst for knowledge. Source - Khagol Mandal - About Us I had earlier attended their sky observation session in December, 2008. It was a good experience then and it got better this time.  My friend and I started our journey

True That!

I think the writing of literature should give pleasure. What else should it be about? It is not nuclear physics. It actually has to give pleasure or it is worth nothing. - Stephen Greenblatt

Marathi Play - Mr. & Mrs.

Last Saturday, I happened to watch the Marathi play " Mr. & Mrs. " at Shivaji Mandir, Dadar . Actually, I had gone there to watch the play " Lagnabambal " which as per m-Indicator was scheduled at 4.30 PM. After reaching the theater at 3.30 PM, I found that there were no boards for this play. Instead, the play " Mr. & Mrs. " was scheduled at 3.30 PM. Soon after my friend joined me, we decided to watch " Mr. & Mrs. ". The story revolves around a couple with Chinamy Mandalekar playing Amit - "once famous but now without work" type of actor and Madhura Velankar playing his wife Meera, who works in bank. Due to Amit's failure to bag any new work and his frustrating attitude, the married life of the duo is in a disarray. At this stage, Amit meets his old friend and producer Ashwin, who had produced Amit's first successful TV serial. He makes him an offer of a reality show. But this show is different - it will be sh

Giving Up

My laptop for past few months is having following quote as background image -   The minute you think of giving up, think of the reason you held on so long... But my mind is always in spot of confusion. Despite the reason, should you always continue and never give up?  In fact, few years ago I had an interesting realization. Suppose, you try to do something and fail in it. You try again and fail. So for those who believe in God, there is a question - Is God trying to test you or is he telling you "dude, don't do it. It's not a good thing for you". Which is the alternative that should be considered. If you take the first interpretation, then you should try harder but if it is the second one then you should quit. It is pretty confusing, as you will never know what is in (so called) God's mind. Apart from the above reason, there are other situations where I felt the indecisiveness in choosing to give up or continue. Say, a guy has a start up. At what po

Ladakh Trip - 3

Ladakh Trip First and Second Posts. The final phase of our camp started with the journey towards Tso Moriri lake. It was one of the three lakes we were supposed visit and as per the verbal poll taken among the campers at the end of our trip, was the best of the three. Most of the journey was parallel to the Indus river. At some places the flow was so strong that one could hear the stream even in the car. On the way, we saw one more smaller lake (Google maps calls it Kyagar Tso) which was much more mesmerizing. As we reached the Tso Moriri lake, we saw a few Bar Headed Geese. We were told that the Chinese border is closer from where we had stayed. The view from my hotel room was amazing. We were strictly instructed to return by 7.30 PM if we wanted to roam around in the area. The place near the lake gets very windy and cold. Thankfully we didn't have to stay in the tents in such harsh weather conditions. However, this time there was no night sky watch. From my room I could

Ladakh Trip - 2

Here is the first post . So let's start with my journey during the Ladakh trip. But before that let me introduce the group I was traveling with. My friend with whom I had booked the tour is an Architect, specializes in City Planning and was accompanied by her father who seemed to be a very avid reader. In fact, we had 4 architects in our group - my friend, a couple who have their own firm and a Pondicherry based architect who is originally from Mumbai. My roommate was a banker by profession but bird lover at heart. He was accompanied by his sister and niece, all of whom had traveled in BNHS camps earlier. There were 2 old ladies, one of which had come with same purpose as mine - enjoy the nature and its views! We had 2 elderly couples one of which ran a equity brokerage firm. One middle aged person who is wonderful photographer (His camera lens was so long and used to take so many pics at an instant, we used to call it machine gun). Another person from Gujrat had a great deal