Gagan ( From My Lil Window)

বাংলা in Android

2011-10-06T01:43:00.000+02:00

Few days ago my uncle was asking me about how to read bangla web pages in his Android tablet. While I was explaining things to him, I thought I should share this information in case it helps someone else.

First of all, it's quite interesting that even though this Android stock browser and Google Chrome desktop browser are both 'browsers', and came out of the same company, there is little /no communication between these the two development teams! So rendering stuffs are not really the same in those two browsers.

Anyways, so there are basically two problems in Android to render Bangla texts. There is no Bangla font installed in Android, and even if you manage to install the fonts (will show in a bit), Android text rendering cannot handle the font properly, it does not know where to draw ই-কার , রেফ etc.

The easiest way to read some Bangla web pages is to use Opera mini (not opera mobile!!!). Steps:

Install Opera mini.
In the address bar write config:
At the end of the options list, mark "Yes" to use Bitmap fonts for complex scripts. (And that's how it will manage to render without native font)
That's it... now from opera mini you can read bangla newspaper, read your friends posts in facebook mobile (try touch.facebook.com if opera mini jumps to crappier mobile version of facebook)

So far so Good.. but you still cannot see Bangla font in any native apps. You are almost out of luck there, but believing on something is better than nothing, you can try the following step. BUT YOU NEED to have the root access. I am not encouraging you to root your device, do at your own risk, and if you dont' know what rooting is, then you better skip the rest :)

Install ES File explorer from market

From Settings mark Root explorer and Mount file system. Now all the hidden system are free to play with (and yes, accidentally deleting or messing with the files may be fatal).
With ES File explorer go to /system/fonts and create a backup copy of DroidSansFallback.ttf so that you can put it back if you need later. I usually copy it sdcard/backup
Now download some Bangla unicode font. Any font should do, but I recommend Siam Rupali. (Thank you Md. Tanbin Islam Siyam.)
Rename this font Siyamrupali.ttf to DroidSansFallback.ttf.
Paste the renamed bangla font to /system/font (replace the original DroidSansFallback.ttf)
Reboot

Done!! Now you can see Bangla fonts in native browser or facebook app, however, as you can see rendering is not nice!

I have heard 'harfbuzz' text rendering library has been included in honeycomb. Did not find much info about it, but harfbuzz should have no problem to render bangla font perfectly. Does anyone have a honeycomb (and rooted) to try installing font and see if it works nicely? //i have a honeycomb tablet, but unfortunately, I am not allowed to root.

- Gagan

p.s. the screenshots are from my Dell Streak 5 phone.

Euro trip... Starts with a surprise

2011-07-16T21:15:00.002+02:00

16 july 2011.. With a 9.4 killo backpack and 3 weeks of holidays... Euro trip begins.. N looks like
it wont be without interesting events. Writing from Turku airport. Wizzair is supposed to take us to Budapest from here.

It was a really quick trip to Turku airport from train station. Usually it takes 40/50 minutes from downtown to airport in a trypical city, but I was surprised to get there in 12/13mins. And then the interesting part began...

It was a deserted airport, no surpise there, because its Finland, I never expect a crowd anyways. The bus dropped us at T1, we are supposed to go to T2. Outside the airport, there was a sign pointing to T2. So we started heading there... N oops.. Where is it? Upstairs? Nop.. There is no building where the sign is pointing to... We asked a lady at some desk... N it turns out to be around a km farther.

Oukay... we started walking... N strange... It seems there is a road only for cars... No pavements for walking... There is a tiny separate pathway.. Leading to nowhere. Well, we thought may be if we follow a little bit and it leads to T2, there must be some sign soon.

But there was no sign until we arrived at some sort of warehouse... Some random dude playing guiter outside the building on a bench...and a few other ppl here n there... Where the hell is the airport?

Guess what..the old trn out warehouse building turned out to be the airport... We cnt go.inside, the weired looking door is lokced. There was a tiny paper post saying door opens two hours...

It was drizzling very mildly...

I wonder what would hv happended if we ended up here in a stormy day... It would hv been quite a shock.

Oh one pic I took from phone... Could anybody guess that its inside of an "airport"

I didnt really mind abt all these... I rather enjoyed the surprise... Well... Looks like the adventure already began.

Fun in Google maps

2011-07-10T13:31:00.009+02:00

For the last few days, I think my most frequently visited page was Google maps (to plan my euro trip)... oh how easy it is now-a-days to plan a trip! Other than making a trip plan, probably everyone has tried to zoom on the roof of their house, or walked around the street using street view. That's fun for a while.

Anyways, while the google car is silently driving by your window, capturing of interesting moments are inevitable. Kids falling... running box...non-stop fun :D

source: streetviewfun

And of course, interesting sightings from the bird above! For example a WWII bomber flying over England !!!?!

image source

But the fun does not come only from these random sightings, Google engineers have enough humor (typical Google style) to put some funny suggestions for your next trip plan!

From China to Taiwan... just swim

From NewYork to Tokyo, Kayak across Pacific ocean

From Lanzhou to Tokyo, Jet ski over the ocean

Long live Google maps!

আমার মাথার ভেতর বাংলার খরা

2011-03-25T16:11:00.002+02:00

আমার মাথার ভেতর বাংলার খরা

-------------------------------------

আমার মাথা থেকে বাংলা উবে যাচ্ছে.. আগে তো শুধু বাংলারই বৃষ্টি হত কানে...

সারাক্ষণ ভেজা ভেজা থাকত মগজের ভাষা কোষ গুলো... আসলে এতই বৃষ্টি হত যে কখনো মনেই হয়নি অন্য কিছু হতে পারে.

আর এখন? হায়রে খরা... শুকনো খট খটে মাথার ভেতরের ফাকা মাঠ গুলো, আগে কত বাংলা শব্দ খেলা করত ওই মাঠগুলোতে... কী দারুন কোলাহল ছিল... এখন শব্দ খুঁজে পেতে হয়... এদিক ওদিক খুজতে গেলে এখন চোখে পড়ে শুধু ইংরেজি শব্দ... ইদানিং দেখি টুক টাক ফিনিস শব্দও ঘুরে বেড়াচ্ছে... শুধু বাংলার আকাল

হবেই না কেন... এখন তো আর বাংলার বৃষ্টি হয়না আমার ভেতরে... হয়ত কিছু গান.. হঠাত কোনো একটা বই.. এইতো... এত বড় একটা মাঠে এইটুকু তে কী হয়?

কী আর করা.. আবার হয়ত কোনো দিন খরা কেটে শুধু একটানা বাংলা শব্দের বৃষ্টি তে ভাসব..

আশা থাকলো

Paradigm shift or is it Nokia's blue screen of Death?

2011-02-13T15:30:00.011+02:00

Nokia bsod - bluescreen of death - coming soon !

Rovio, the (Finnish) company behind one of the most successful games ever, Angry Birds, twitted :

@RovioMobileAngry Birds

@janole ... Nokia probably beyond saving at this point.

(http://twitter.com/#!/RovioMobile/status/35984875131510784)

When Nokia declared it will make a big shift, choosing Windows Mobile 7 as the primary platform for future smartphones, it's like a 2012 movie earthquake to everyone (I mean every engineer in software industry in Finland). It's not that Windows mobile 7 sucks, neither that nobody saw this coming... what hit hard was the missing of a great plan, innovation and giving a blind-eye to current stuffs - Symbian and Meego.

I know it's easy to criticize any decision. But I cannot help myself being extremely disappointed with Nokia making some 'real bad decisions'. Let's see some good points first.

Given the hard facts that Android is taking over smartphone market within the real short timeframe of only around 2 years (and people are indeed loving the great android 'eco-system'... even I myself switched to Android and still loving it),
- and developers are not liking to write a single line for Symbian, but loving (almost... yah Andriod is having fragmentation issues already) to type nice 'makes-sense' style codes for Android
- and mass people are showing disgusts to sluggish, crappy and 'ugly' Symbian UIs
- and Nokia's stock price is flushing down to the toilet

Nokia really needed a boost. So in that sense it all kinda make sense to choose Windows mobile platform. It has a good eco-system ready, people are already liking the UI and most early adopters are more or less satisfied... so why not adding superb hardware of Nokia, the awesome imaging and camera of N8 and worldwide distribution channel of Nokia?

That could work!! But...

What about the symbian user base? Millions of users!!! and Millions more Symbian devices to come? Take the E7 which just hit the street. Even though it really has superb hardware, won't most people say, naah, Symbian may die soon, I wouldn't take the risk of buying an expensive phone for which software updates, fixes won't come.
When is the first Nokia-Windows phone coming? Next month, next quarter, next year? I don't know... do you? Who knows? Naaah, I can't wait, I would rather buy Andriod / iPhone. At least I know their roadmaps.
What about Qt? May be I better stop spending my time learning this stuff. Looks like currently Qt is not supported by windows phone. Will it be? I didnt hear any mention about it
Everybody else in this phone business has other business too. Microsoft won't die if their phone platform does not fly well. Samsung won't die if their phones are not selling well. But Nokia makes only phones (+ of course the network equipments)... now a broken partnership with microsoft will be a death-blow to Nokia, but won't kill MS.

Let's take a look at the frozen white country now, Finland (I mean it's winter here now). Here this news will affect almost (luckily not all, but yet almost) every software company in Finland. If my observation is not radically wrong, almost all software companies circle around Nokia. Starting from large companies, to the end of one-man company (there are surprisingly a lot of them around here)... everyone earns big buck selling manhours to Nokia. And a great number of those hours are spent behind Symbian, S60, Ovi services, and now Qt, QML, Meego.

Now if the software comes from US, what will Nokia do with all these software people?

Yap, you'v guessed right. Layoff, shutting down hundreds of R&D projects... it's gonna be so huge that Nokia is already talking with Finnish governments

Government Help for Nokia Job Cuts

Just when Finland software industry was about to totally recover from the recession, it's another knock-out punch. Only a handful companies like Rovio will survive, but I think a lot of others will get bad bruises, if not death.

Creepy ad... 'playstation phone'

2011-02-09T15:24:00.000+02:00

Even for me (as a looong time smartphone and horror movie fan) it was a bit creepy...

Check out the new Sony Ericsson Xperia play ads

Mammoth resurrected

2011-01-17T17:21:00.006+02:00

Woolly Mammoth (Source: blog.devonanddorsetcottages.co.uk)

This Mammoth, which is now alive only in Ice Age movie and children's story book, may resurrect to life using cloning technique, said a Japanese researcher. All he needs now is a healthy cell frozen in Siberia (he is flying there soon). If he fails, he will beg to some Russian scientists who have already found some.

Science fiction? Still yes, but to my surprise the target timeline to make it non-fiction is as early as 5 years! (I do have hopes to live until that ;) ).

Well, the theory is simple, find some cells of Mammoth in Siberia, pin point one healthy cell, and use cloning method and a poor African elephant to surrogate the egg, and to the horror of some, the elephant will give birth to a Mammoth.

Source: telegraph.co.uk

That's the theory, let's if we have reached to that sort of level of technology! (By the way, the success chance is around 30% which is quite huge in my opinion).

Helsinki topped best Airport list (again)

2011-01-04T16:06:00.002+02:00

The British magazine Monocle has named Helsinki Airport as the world's best for transfers.

Helsinki Airport serves approximately 13 million customers a year.

Monocle had named Helsinki as the world's best airport in 2009.

The magazine praised Helsinki Airport for its "human scale, outstanding wayfinding, sensible shopping and good network of destinations".

Last year Helsinki Airport was rated as Europe's best airport in the Skytrax survey.

Source

PDFScissors

2011-01-01T23:30:00.009+02:00

Another 365 days have passed by, really fast... when I am trying to look back, I am almost having goosebumps thinking about the speed. Literally even before I grasped the idea that 2009 is gone, 2010 is already gone!!

For the first time in my life I had the new year eve alone. Perhaps it's not bad at all to accept the new year conceptually!

When I was trying to flashback last 12 months, I immediately noticed I have not shared one thing in my blog, about pdfscissors.com !!

What is it? Go and check it out yourself! For those having some ebook readers (like Kindle / Nook etc), this is may worth trying immediately, for others, aamm... i guess there is nothing much to see except just playing the instruction video once!

If you are still confused why I am sharing about pdfscissors.com, hei.. come on... I wrote the software!! ;)

I have bought kindle 3 and I am absolutely loving it (no wonder Amazon has recently declared it is now their best selling product, overshadowing Harry Potter sales).

Reading a pdf book after 'pdfscissor'-ed !

For those unlucky ones, who have not heard about Kindle, it's an ebook reader ! Its major benefit is its e-ink screen. Right... it does not hurt eyes, if you turn off your room light in the night, you can't use Kindle, just like you can't read a paper book in the dark. (and if you know me well, you should already know about my bad eyes). I am absolutely thanking the technology to literally save my life (my eyes). (Ops, enough advertisement for kindle)

Anyways, looking back at the last year, I think pdfscissors made me feel slightly contempt (otherwise 2010 was the most financially-active year of my life, tons of transactions, investment, winning, losing involved).

I would also like to share some reviews already done about pdfscissors.com

- Kindle world blog

- Some japanese review (translated)

- Another usage in Japan (translated) (most of my visitors are from Japan!)

Looks like I have mixed up pdfscissors post with happy new year post!! :P

Happpy New Year everyone... may you enjoy your life in 2011 more than any other year before!

How difficult are nokia device names

2010-10-21T15:42:00.016+02:00

Ok, I have to say, Nokia has been screwing around with device names. It takes ages to have that vocabulary in your brain. So when your friend says, hei have you checked out how slim is that Nokia 6500 classic? Obviously your answer will be "wait a sec.. what device was that?" and your friends starts explaing, "you know, the one which looks like.... "

How boring could those numbers be? 6500, 3230, bla bla !!

As if those numbers meant anything! The numbers are as random as it could get! Okay, if Nokia has to use numbers other than any human-readable names, why not assign some meaning to it? It could be so that

- First number tells whether it's S60, S40 etc.
- Second number could tell about the physical type, candybar/calmshell etc.
- Third number could indicate input type: keypad, full qwerty, touch, touch and full qwerty etc.
- Fourth... Be innovative Nokia !!! Use some brain !!!

No.. Nokia wants you, the dealers, the developers and the platform developers (who have to remember two names, for example 'Tube' is the internal product name for 5800, which somehow got leaked and many websites now use the word 'Tube') practice for years to remember those names.. "YOU CANNOT FORGET"

Nokia device names!!!

Okay, I guess I have done enough whining. Now let's talk about the new practice Nokia invented to confuse you to the most !!

I needed a Symbian^3 for work. I was very busy so I just made a request to another team member to order Nokia C6, which appeared to be the cheapest (I was actually a little surprised to notice how fast Nokia managed to deliver it to the market, as it was announced just a few weeks ago).

Anyway the phone came and what the hell....

This ain't a Symbian^3 !! It's S60 5th, so called Symbian^1 !!!

I am cutting the story short now... this is what I found! There exists two C6 !!

C6-00 : S60 5th edition, Qwerty keyboard, resistive touch screen
C6-01 : Symbian ^3, No keyboard, capacitive touch

These are two completely different devices!!!

C6-01

C6-00

Do you want to know how Nokia presented those devices on their home page? Yaps.. for both the devices, it said "Nokia C6" !!! Only if you open your eyes wider, you will find the 00/01 on the right corner!!

Nokia C6 00 as seen on Nokia home page

Nokia C6 01 as seen on Nokia home page

So obviously I had to return the device, wondering how many others are returning as me!

There has been previously similar cases of adding this 00, 01 numbering, but that made some sense, because it was to indicate some minor upgrade has been done (e.g. internal software has been upgraded).

For example, C5-00 and C5-01. Notice how they buttons are different, but overall the devices are same.

Nokia C5-00

Nokia C5-01

Lesson learnt : From now on, don't count on only the device name, look for the version 00 or 01 etc.

Looking forward to those days, when I can clean up my brain and throw all the meaningless device names I have learnt.

P.S. Not relevant, but as I have already told bad stuffs, so why not adding a few more notes. I have the new N8 on my desk, and guess what... it sucks (comparing the price)

I had big hope for the capacitive touch... but well, it did not feel even close to the iphone responsiveness.
The default theme is ugly boring blue!!! How uglier could those options menu be !!
Same old UI (where touch support is just glued on top of key based UI) with same old options menu stuffs!
Okay there is multi touch support, you can zoom in and out in some applications (like browser, picture gallery), but that was not really feeling smooth. (May be nice enough if someone has not used iphone4)
The weired top and bottom corner design just didnot feel like Nokia !! Some may like the shape, but at least I didnot. (and I heard from others the same too)
The only 'wow' effect I got was from the camera, perhaps that's what that worths your hard earned money.
In summary, I think hardware-wise it's an awesome device, with all those multimedia support. It's the software where Nokia needs a big boost (lets cross the finger for upcoming meego).

Lastly, I came to know how bad Nokia's marketing is (sometimes) when a somewhat long term Nokia user asked me, hei what's those Ovi stuffs? What does Ovi mean?

Two extremes

2010-10-21T00:26:00.004+02:00

Today the index was released about the vulnerability of countries to climate change. The index tells Bangladesh is at most risk from climate change and Finland is at least risk (to be specific second least, after Norway).

In fact, Finland is supposed to gain benefit from climate change, for example, from longer crop growing season.

I do sometimes wonder, how I ended up being so tightly coupled with the two extremes!

Boro hoye gechhi

2010-10-13T20:33:00.002+02:00

Barbadian Dollar?

2010-09-23T14:34:00.004+03:00

Someone has mixed up the flags and put Bangladesh flag next to Barbadian Dollar !!!

Well, I have emailed them, hopefully it will be corrected pretty soon.

Update:

It took less than 20 minutes for them to reply to me that it has been corrected, and indeed it was. Now that was really fast.

Bot chat

2010-09-04T14:30:00.003+02:00

I surely have seen lots of spam over instant messaging... mostly they tell something like, hey dude, got some cool pics.. check out here /link/.

Check this bot... apparently "Major"'s account has been compromised and a bot was spamming through that...

Click on the image to enlarge

This bot was pretty smart !! It first just said "Hey"... surely u are gonna reply to that, if it's coming from a known person!! The bot tried to chat with me several lines, before revealing the link... smart !! It even took pretty decent time to reply (and messenger showed "Major is typing..." for a while before the reply came).

Smart spamming!

Nobel, ahem, Ig Nobel

2010-08-25T16:14:00.006+02:00

Meet clocky, the clock that runs around while beeping, so you have to really wake up to stop it. Ok, I have talked about it before in an older post, so what's new? Well, did u know that the inventor of this, is a Nobel laureate?

What? Nobel prize for that? Yes (ahem)... Nobel price, but Ig Nobel.

"The Ig Nobel Prizes honor achievements that first make people laugh, and then make them think. " Every year early october this parody ceremony takes place at Harvard University's Sanders Theater (originally at MIT hall), often attended by real Nobel winners!

Here are some winners :

- Medicine, 2009 : for investigating a possible cause of arthritis of the fingers, by diligently cracking the knuckles of his left hand — but never cracking the knuckles of his right hand — every day for more than sixty (60) years. Reference: "Does Knuckle Cracking Lead to Arthritis of the Fingers?"

- Physics, 2009: for analytically determining why pregnant women don't tip over (you know, their center of mass changes during pregnancy, yet they can walk?!). Reference: Fetal Load and the Evolution of Lumbar Lordosis in Bipedal Hominins (Oh that's a name for a proper paper!)

- Peace, 2009 : whether it is better to be smashed over the head with a full bottle of beer or with an empty bottle. Reference: "Are Full or Empty Beer Bottles Sturdier and Does Their Fracture-Threshold Suffice to Break the Human Skull?"

The ceremony itself sounds like fun. The prizes are presented by genuine Nobel laureates (!).

One of the joke during the ceremony is Miss Sweety Poo, a little girl who repeatedly cries out "Please stop. I'm bored" in a high-pitched voice if speakers go on too long.

Although due to security reason, now-a-days, the paper plane throwing thing is off, in past years, physics professor Roy Glauber has swept the stage clean of the airplanes as the official "Keeper of the Broom". However, Glauber could not attend the 2005 awards – he was traveling to Stockholm to claim a genuine Nobel Prize in Physics.

The awards ceremony is traditionally closed with the words: "If you didn't win a prize — and especially if you did — better luck next year!"

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel_Prize
http://improbable.com/ig/winners/#ig2010

2010's best country - Finland

2010-08-16T23:10:00.005+02:00

Guess which one topped the 2010's list of best countries, Finland !!

Quoting NewsWeek's own words,

Despite the long winter, Finland is a pretty great place to be--the best actually. It ranked the highest overall and also comes in as the best small country, the best high-income country, and the best country for education. Its students scored first in science and second in both reading and math in the 2006 (the most recent data available) Program for International Student Assessment, a test of 15-year-olds' education skills by the OECD. Finland's schoolkids enjoy a laid-back and inclusive learning environment where shoes are optional, all teachers have master's degrees...

Here is what NewsWeek said about their ranking procedure:

"...Given that there are so many ways to measure achievement, we chose the five we felt were most important--health, economic dynamism (the openness of a country's economy and the breadth of the size of its corporate sector), education, political environment, and quality of life. ... Like all lists, this one is not perfect, but it offers surprising and fascinating answers and plenty of insight into which country is healthiest..." - NewsWeek

Source: NewsWeek

Maxid... is my name

2010-08-16T22:08:00.002+02:00

I made an appointment over the phone, quite a few weeks back. The lady was not that fluent in English, but it was just enough to book the time. She asked me to tell her my last name, so I spelled it out..

EM--AA--ZED--EE--DEE, Mazed

Later when I went there, I almost burst out in laugh when I found my name written as
"Maxid"

Even later I realized what went wrong. Actually in Finnish alphabet, although my name is be written exactly as in latin alphabet, if I want to spell it out, i should say

AAM(as in I "am") -- A'h' (as in 'U'mbrella)-- Tseta(Almost like seta, with a stressed s) -- A ( as in Later) -- Da (as in Day)

Anyways, I kinda liked my name , Maxid :D

Storm

2010-08-13T23:54:00.004+02:00

It was such a crazy thunder storm few days back, I felt like being in a tropical country ahead of a cyclone or something. I could not believe my eyes when flashing of the thunders became so frequent!!

Luckily someone managed to capture some moments in the video! Just one note before you watch it, it's not a fast forwarded clip !!

Visitors

2010-08-13T21:12:00.007+02:00

I dont know exactly why, but my last few posts were mostly about sharing interesting news from around. Little came out from my personal life... here is one I could not help sharing!

We had very special visitors last week. They were special because they were from my family tree, and some who knew me from my very childhood. They were my maternal uncle (Boromama) and his family from the Netherlands.

I was not that worried how we would handle four extra people at my place, I was sure it would be fun. But it turned out to be much more interesting than I had expected.

In those few days I came close to my uncle more than ever. It was very intriguing to spend some time with a programmer from 70's, we had many things in common. I was surprised to able to share my books about string theory, quantum physics. He was able to share some hard earned philosophy (just to give a clue... if every person is unique, there must be some unique thing he cannot fully share, and therefore every person must be alone somewhere). I saw some shadow of him in myself and I guess we both realized it.

Of course my aunt immediately took care of the home with her motherly figure. I was relieved of my 'fixed job', dish washing :D. She noticed what tiny things we were missing in our new home, and guess what.. she bought those for us.

I had very good times with my cousin, a first year university student. He surely surprised me with the strategies he employed in the first game of 'Tigris and Euphrates'. We kept trying to find gaps to play more games, but well... time flew faster than we could keep up with. I also learned some great opposite chess from him. A great fun quick game where the goal is... you guessed, to feed the pieces. The one looses the last piece (in any order, not necessarily the king) first, wins!

My other cousin, the teenage girl, reminded me of my own teenage time... shy and very introvert. I tried to let her feel comfortable being in her own world most of the times. Hopefully she enjoyed her time here.

What I didnot expect is how they liked Oulu, we were afraid of presenting a city with no highrise building, no nice city place to visit...but once we roamed around, they appreciated it so much to be close to the nature, the landscape full of lakes and trees. From their enthusiasm, I was like... hei, I didnt know this place I live in is soo cool!

Time appeared to run fast in those seven days. I took few days off from work, and it surely worth it.

Did I bore you with my personal stuff? I am not sorry in that case, coz these were my some precious moments that I wanted to save and share!

Chick and egg problem? Resolved (!)

2010-07-14T17:24:00.003+03:00

Which came first? Chicken or the egg?

According to the CNN news, after the publication of the rather dry-sounding scientific paper, "Structural Control of Crystal Nuclei by an Eggshell Protein," press headlines proclaimed the answer was... the chicken.

Source: CNN

Using Britain's national supercomputer, they were able to simulate the process of biomineralization, or the production of minerals or solid materials inside organisms. They also found that the egg can't be produced without the protein ovocledidin-17 in the chickens' ovaries, so that means that the chicken must have come first. Right?

Obviously, it's not really what we were trying to get out of our simulations, but it's an interesting question isn't it?" Freeman said.

Well, I guess the problem is not yet solved conclusively! So keep telling the riddle next time you can't solve something, no one will yet mind ;)

My source: Binay

We're all Gonna Die

2010-07-13T10:18:00.003+03:00

The image in the project is 100 meters long, contains portraits of 178 people and… perhaps leaves a little impact on the viewers, considering the title "We're all Gonna Die - 100 meters of Existence"

"it’s meant to point out that life is beautiful, and unless we open up to each other instead of keeping our longings, hopes and experiences to ourselves we’ll fall into the grave with a lot of valuable information and love that we never got around to sharing with the people we’re in touch with..."

Here is the full image : http://www.simonhoegsberg.com/we_are_all_gonna_die/slider.html

"Two hours of shooting a day over 20 days (only two hours because the light falling onto the people I was photographing had to come from the same angle..." said Simon Hoegsberg in the interview.

He added "I have been and am delighted to receive so many emails from people around the world who’ve seen the photograph, and who have decided to write me to let me know that my work has had an impact on them"

My source: Rezwan's blog

BY LAW (!) 1Mbps, for the first time

2010-07-06T17:53:00.004+03:00

(image source)

As of July 1 2010, every one in Finland gets a right BY LAW to have high speed broadband of 1 Mbps. Finland is the first country to make it a legal right that every one of her citizen will have a minimum of 1 Mbps.

"Up to 96 per cent of the population is already online and only about 4,000 homes will need to be connected to comply with the law."

(source: telegraph.co.uk)

The government had already decided to make a 100 Mb broadband connection a legal right by the end of 2015. (Source: yle.fi)

The fruit company is at 1 infinite loop

2010-06-29T17:33:00.004+03:00

The fruit company is at one infinite loop!!

Confused?? What I am talking about is Apple's official mailing address.. quite an interesting address it got.

I can't remember what I was exactly doing, but while surfing I suddenly noticed the mailing address of apple is 1 infinite loop... the name intrigued me and I started looking for more info (wikipedia of course).

Interesting name Apple gave to the street when it moved to that campus, the buildings are called Infinite loop 1 (IL1), IL2 etc.

And of course "Google's car with camera looped around the infinite loop" :D

Pacman on google home

2010-05-22T10:33:00.002+03:00

It's not just yet another image on Google homepage to celebrate something. Obviously it's pacman day, but actually you can play right there !!

Good job and good surprise Google!

P.S. Did you notice the 'Insert coin' button :D?

Snow

2010-03-25T17:40:00.003+02:00

You have probably already heard enough that there has been too much snow in many places around Europe. But a picture tells more than a hundred stories !!

Here is a shot taken just in front of my building, just last week.

Snow biking?

Robbed the Finn bank with bow and arrow

2010-02-09T17:34:00.003+02:00

Not from movie... real life robbery action in the bank, with bow and arrow (source: yle.fi)

Picture taken with bank's security camera

This happened in the morning today. The robber, armed with a bow and arrow, threatened employees at a local branch of Osuuspankki bank around 10 am and managed to escape with 5000 euros (am I the only one feeling it's not too much?).

Even though initially the robber was believed to be a man, however, police suspects that it may be a man behind the make up!

I am trying to picture the scene if I were at the bank. A lady entering with bow and arrow and probably shouting at the cashier and then heroically leaving with the threatening bow!! Hollywood failed!

Bribery? Here you take a bundle of notes

2010-02-01T00:26:00.002+02:00

Bribery..ha? Here you take a bundle of notes!! A big fat bundle of shiny notes!!

Size does matter... surely the look of the bundle will make anyone happy...

But wait... they are all zero currency notes!! What the...

A big fat ZERO in the middle

5th Pillar, a local NGO in India, distributes zero rupee notes in the hopes that ordinary Indians can use these notes as a means to protest demands for bribes by public officials.

The first batch of 25,000 notes were met with such demand that 5th Pillar has ended up distributing one million zero-rupee notes to date since it began this initiative. Along the way, the organization has collected many stories from people using them to successfully resist engaging in bribery.

One such story was our earlier case about the old lady and her troubles with the Revenue Department official over a land title. Fed up with requests for bribes and equipped with a zero rupee note, the old lady handed the note to the official. He was stunned. Remarkably, the official stood up from his seat, offered her a chair, offered her tea and gave her the title she had been seeking for the last year and a half to obtain without success.

Interesting approach to prevent bribery!! Definitely worths attention!

Source: http://blogs.worldbank.org/publicsphere/paying-zero-public-services

On the way home

2009-12-19T21:51:00.003+02:00

Yaps, Home... sweet home... probably dirtier, messier than where I am now, but yet it's home, sweet home.

I am on the way already, at this moment writing from Tampere. Tomorrow will fly to London Stansted, will stay at Aunts place at Essex, then will head to Canterbury to my sis' place and then finally will fly home.

Home... sweet home

This blog was a spam blog.

2009-12-19T21:46:00.002+02:00

Hello again,

There was a loooong pause! Expert bloggers probably already guessed the problems, yah... my blog was considered as a spam blog by google bot and was taken down.

It took a while to get access back. I have also been communicating in google help forum. If you face similar problem someday, you can check here: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/blogger/thread?fid=2eca91d4e705b41300047ac492bf08f3&hl=en

I think I got access yesterday and I got this email as well :

Hello,

Your blog at http://gagan-mazed.blogspot.com/ has been reviewed and confirmed as in violation of our Terms of Service for: NONE. In accordance to these terms, we've removed the blog and the URL is no longer accessible.

For more information, please review the following resources:

Blogger Terms of Service: http://blogger.com/terms.g
Blogger Content Policy: http://blogger.com/content.g

-The Blogger Team

Scary!! Well, I am happy to be back :)

Bangladesh online bill

2009-11-03T21:08:00.002+02:00

A Bangladesh Bank circular says from now, subscribers would be able to pay utility bills online from their bank accounts and also transfer funds to other banks.

It said that transactions between buyers and sellers can also take place online, enabling e-commerce facility in the country.

Commercial banks have been also asked to facilitate online credit card payments in local currency.

Finally !!!!

http://bdnews24.com/details.php?cid=4&id=146101&hb=top

when a sunday evening gets boring

2009-11-01T21:44:00.005+02:00

When does a Sunday evening get boring?

When I type www.youtube.com and it says...

Youtube is down at this very moment :(

- Finland

Local time 9:48 pm

First death in Finland

2009-10-27T00:27:00.001+02:00

Swine flu has claimed its first fatality in Finland. On Saturday, a 25-year-old woman died in hospital in Northern Ostrobothnia.

The woman was diagnosed with a respiratory tract infection caused by the H1N1 virus on October 16. She was treated with the anti-viral drug Tamiflu on the same day. According to medical staff, it was thought she was recovering from the H1N1 virus. The specifics of the cause of death are under investigation

Source: YLE

Txtr reader

2009-10-15T13:36:00.007+02:00

I was waiting eagerly for the last few months for October 15, expected release date for Txtr ebook reader. The spec was really pushing me to grab one as soon as it gets out. However, there was no price information or full spec until today.

Well, http://reader.txtr.com/en/ says

Price: 319€
Order by: December 1st
Delivered from: December 15th

Txtr reader

Hmm, the device is does not come cheap. I expected it would offer a super deal to drag ebook reader market towards it from kindle/sony reader.

Delivery date from December 15th!! Hmm, targeted to holiday season shoppers! Wish it would get out earlier, I could give a second thought to buy it for myself as my birthday gift ;)

Oh a quick look at the things that interested me:

6-inch 600×800 screen
e-Ink (of course! main motivation: no eye strain)
Very good connectivity: Wifi, Edge, bluetooth
Capacitive touch ( I don't really like resistive touch, where you actually sometimes have to push hard)
Good CPU (should help to change the pages faster)
I read it will have an API, so developers can make apps for it (cool!)
Best part, It should be able to read any pdf. I hope the reality is the same as advertised.

Well, waiting seems to be not over yet. I want to hold myself a bit longer to see the first reactions from lucky front line users. Counting for the day to be able to read any pdf (specially Bangla ebooks) for hours 'without eye strain' lying on the couch.

Snow in October

2009-10-08T19:14:00.003+02:00

The following pictures are not from December last year. They are only three days old, from 5 October 2009.

The first snows of the year are usually so mild and quick enough for many people to not even notice. And so much snow in October?? Even natives said, it's rare! very rare !!

Bangla in Google

2009-10-01T22:05:00.005+02:00

A picture worths thousand words? Well, I will follow the rule then :)

Head to http://www.google.com/transliterate/indic/BENGALI and see for yourself !

Oh by the way, try also if you can pronounce the word that I have marked in image with red arrow :D

Anyways, great tool ! Now I won't have to install Avro keyboard in every computer !

Poverty line in Finland

2009-09-06T09:54:00.001+02:00

Image source

News: A few years ago, some 600,000 people in Finland could be defined as poor. Now the number stands at over 700,000.

This probably raises the very interesting question, who are poor in Finland?

The poverty line in Finland is not officially defined. But Jouko Karjalainen, a researcher at the National Institute for Health and Welfare, says those who earn less than 1,100 euros a month, or 13,000 euros a year, could be considered poor.

FYI, 1,100 euros a month will be around 1 lakh taka per month.

Source

Chicane singing in Bangla

2009-09-04T08:16:00.000+02:00

Did you know that Chicane composed the music "locking down" in Bangla lyrics, just because it sounded great?

“A track with a difference this one, mostly due to the fact that it is sung in a mix of Hindi (Hah?? - Gagan) and another foreign tongue by Melissa Baten. We had all but finished the track which was originally sung in English, and just on a whim, decided to see how it would sound sung the other way.
The feel and meter of the new vocal delivered such a new angle it stayed that way and rather glad about it as adds a new dimension to the sound.

Nicholas Bracegirdle on ‘Locking Down’, 2008

Here you can listen the song.

Song: Locking down
Album: Easy to Assemble
Artist: Chicane

Great music!

Laptop made in Banglaesh?

2009-09-03T11:30:00.003+02:00

Mega projects have been made to produce 5 digital products in Bangladesh:

digital telephone sets
cellphones
fibre-optic cables
solar panels
laptops

the digital telephone sets costing as low as Tk 500 ( less than $8) will hit the market next month while cellphones priced between Tk 1,500 (~$22) and 10,000 (~$150) will be sold from January next year!

The projects is run by Telephone Shilpo Sangstha (TSS) and Cable Shilpo Sangstha (CSS)

TSS will manufacture the cellphones in cooperation with Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology.

Well, to be frank, I was quite surprised, why havenot I heard about this before? This great news should have been in hype!

Source: dailystar

ICE - In Case of Emergency

2009-09-02T11:10:00.004+02:00

You probably carry out your mobile phone everytime you leave home, and you surely know who you want to call when you get into some sort of trouble. You probably have saved Fire service / police station number in the phonebook. But have you thought about the time when you have the mobile phone, but you won't be able to make a call ?

A car accident for example? When you will be knocked out unconcious?

Probably paramedic or someone will pick up your phone and will be lost in the huge phone book and wonder who to call.

That's why there is the ICE campaign... In Case of Emergency.

It will save precious time when in need. So grab your phone and save ICE1, ICE2 etc and look for those numbers first if you find somebody else is in need.

This is probably not yet so popular concept, however, there is surely email forward campaign running already and hope this will be well known soon.

Moon cake

2009-09-01T16:21:00.006+02:00

Have you heard about "Moon cake" ? Mooncakes are offered between friends or on family gatherings while celebrating the Mid-autumn festival, one of the three most important Chinese festivals.

How come it's coming to my blog? Because I have been eating those!! Authenticated chinese moon cake, directly from China !! Very special thanks goes to Xia who sent me those via Sakari :)

Before opening the wrapping

Wrapping open, Moon cake ready to bite!

less than a few seconds later... inside revealed !!

Well, the cake does not look like moon, but you will get how the name came if I tell a little background (of course copied from wikipedia).

This mid Autumn festival is linked to the legends of Chang E, the mythical Moon Goddess of Immortality. The Chinese Emperor should offer sacrifices to the sun in spring and the moon in autumn. The 15th day of the 8th lunar month is the day called “Mid-Autumn”. The night on August 15 is also called “Night of the Moon”. Under the Song Dynasty (420), the day was officially declared for Mid-Autumn Festival. And this mooncake forms such a central part of the Mid-Autumn festival experience such that it is now commonly known as 'Mooncake Festival'!

However, most importantly... the cake is Yamme. Thanks again, Xia !

Season change

2009-08-30T18:28:00.002+02:00

Yesterday was a weekend, I was all day at home relaxing and somehow the whole day I was having a strange feeling... I felt like I was at Dhaka.

Later I thought about it and I think the day duration was one good reason for this. I woke up at 8:30 (yah.. way early for me... I know) and a nice morning was beside the window. At around 2 o'clock I took a shower and the day was almost at its pick... and darkness gradually settled down after 7:30.

It was all soo perfect !! I didnt have to look at the watch to figure out whether it's mid day or afternoon... neither I had to look at my watch during a birght day to suddenly notice it's bed time already. Autumn is quickly taking most of the day duration of the summer and nights are getting longer. Soon darkness will win and take over most of the 24H, however, at this point, it's just perfect.

Sunday rainy autumn evening through my little window

All Nokia Phones

2009-08-26T13:24:00.005+02:00

When you now a days look at the Nokia N97, or N95 or browse facebook through them or check email or use GPS to track down the new friends home, have you ever paused to wonder how much these have evolved in lets say 10 years? Do you remember how happy you actually were with those bulky Nokia phones in 95 ?

Well, here is a nice picture to get you into the nostalogia, listing the devices since 1982 (!) to 2006.

Source: Dailymobile.se

Hello Mama!

2009-07-19T12:27:00.006+03:00

I guess one of the most surprised moments of a person is to hold a newly created life... when a mother first holds the newly born baby... I think it's one moment that I will never understand as a man... and one moment thinking of which will always make me say, may be it would have been nice to have a life without Y chromosome as a woman.

My sister is probably having the best moments of her life at this very moment... holding her new born baby. She was telling me over phone, she does not understand how come the baby could be so cute? She was whispering the baby was looking at her. I heard the amazing pride whe she said, the baby is crying as soon as someone is taking off her hands.

I heard the baby crying a little over phone, and for a brief short moment, my whole body shivered. I have become 'Mama'... and I now have a 'Vagne'... it's the ultimate greatest amazing relationship in our culture... I am supposed to become the funniest, most entertaining person to that boy and his expectations from me is supposed to be limitless and I am supposed to fulfill all... it's an amazing feelings that just suddenly overwhelmed me.

My feelings is probably kinda ignorable compared to the feelings my sister and her husband are having... Yet it's a lifetime experience. I was awake the whole last night alone, being so far from the new born does not really bring the environment, but I love to imagine now, I am holding my own sister's baby with the utmost amazement... and the kid with its tiniest body is looking at me!!

"Hello mama" !! :')

Gagan
19 July 2009
Sunday
Oulu, Finland

3D

2009-07-17T14:11:00.003+03:00

I just tried a 3D demo with Nvidia 3D vision. I must say I was quite impressed.

Here is what is required.

First I tried the Nvidia demo application. There was a '3D' logo rotating and running 'into the screen' and coming out (z axis). I was just 'ok' kinda impressed with it. But then suddenly the logo jumped 'out of the screen'. I saw the logo rotating between the monitor and me!! It appeared to float totally 'outside' of the monitor. Cool !

Then I tried the Burnout paradise with the glasses on. Neat ! Even though the 3D vision crashed a few times (and I just had to restart the game), but it felt nice to drive through the roads that appeared like really spreading into the 3D space!

Then I watched few minutes of a short 3D animated movie with it. Quite interesting!

However, I kinda felt a bit weired with my eyes. It may be because I had to put on the 3D glasses on top my own glasses or may be because it was just a new experience. But surely if I would continue for a few hours, at least I would develop a headache (well, I am kinda sensitive with my vision anyways).

This I found from Nvidia web

This technology has a long way to go and it surely does hold a great potential to gamer's world.

Computer Engineer or Scientist

2009-07-13T11:26:00.003+03:00

Before I joined my university, I was wondering about the same question.. what the heck is the difference between a computer scientist and a computer engineer? Well, couldn't find a nice answer about it. Even while studying, the answer didn't reveal itself clearly.

I have recently found an interesting article about it.
http://java.dzone.com/articles/computer-engineer-vs-computer

I don't believe this article is complete...this guy talked only about 'programming' side and did not talk anything about hardware related stuffs. However, yet, I think the article worths a quick reading.

To explain the difference between science and technology, I always refer to the fact that all nations now know the science of nuclear power plants, not all are capable to build it.This guy also dragged a similar example

It took a handful of scientist to come up with an atom bomb, but it took countless of engineers to work out everything else

Gmail out of beta

2009-07-09T16:00:00.003+03:00

Gmail has finally dropped down its beta gown, after 5 looong years. I don't really know if any company had kept a beta tag for soo song for such a popular product.

One of the bad things of beta services is that, they have the right to stop it without any hassle. Just like few days back I got an email, "Google pages" will be taken off, so all the files that I have uploaded there will be gone!

So it's kinda good to know that Gmail is no longer beta.

After all, I love Gmail :)

Coffee explained

2009-07-03T10:36:00.003+03:00

Have you ever went to some fancy coffee place and got confused with so many nice and pretty names and chose one just because the name sounded fancier than others?

Here this handy illustration nicely shows how they are actually made !

Source: lokeshdhakar

This pic even tells how to pronunciate the names, may be it can save you from an embarrassing moment to say the name when you order next time ;)

Summer !

2009-07-02T16:44:00.003+03:00

I am sure my friends at Dhaka is hoping every day so that the sun does not burn the city to an almost hell, but here is a different picture!!

The weather was soo sunny for the past two weeks, allowing people roam around without jacket! It was great! I could feel the whole city happy when the sun was shining, people were in light bright colorful cloths, market places full of music and laughter..

I found the perfect quote for that, on the back of a guy's tea shirt in the super market..

So Hot It's Cool

Catch me if you can

2009-06-02T10:45:00.005+03:00

I got an email, that came through some sort of mailing list. I am copy-pasting it here, deleting all the names etc.

Before you start reading, one information, bike stealing is a pretty common thing here in Fin, (and probably that's the only frequent 'crime' in this least crime zone). You will surely find good bikes locked with heavy locks / chains. However, somehow, someone always manages to become an expert bike thief.

Check out the mail and notice the last line ;)

Hello everybody,I contact with all of you to try to recoup my bike. Someone
stole my bike which was in XYZ, in Road 012, in front of the building
where I live, and it was locked.
I do not remember now which was the model of my bike, it is black, with 24
gear and the bike is bigger than normal bikes. If you know who stoles my
bike, or someone is trying to sell you a bike with the lock of the back
wheel broken, and it matchs to the description that I did, please contact
me. Also I report my situation to the police.

If the person who stole my bike is reading, you have to know that I will
find you. No matter where you are or whom you are selling the bike, I will
discover who you are. You were warned.

My mobile phone: 01234567
Ask for John Doe( Me)

Poor guy !! I wonder what will happen if he actually manages to find the thief.

A friendly note to all bikers, don't lock like this ;)
(image source)

No Smiling please

2009-05-28T11:04:00.003+03:00

Imagine two banners side by side. One says "No Smoking" and the second one...
"No smiling".

I guess, it will soon be not uncommon in most of the states in US. Because, four states has already banned smiling in driving license photos. Why? Computers don't like human smile and they often make mistakes identifying a person by scanning their photos, when smiling.

So four states -- Arkansas, Indiana, Nevada and Virginia -- are telling drivers to wipe that grin off the face. No more happy days for licensing, the states have declared, drivers must adopt "neutral facial expressions. (source)

Many other states are considering similar approach. Some states though are resisting the movement. Pennsylvania Transportation Department spokesman Craig Yetter, states, "People can smile here in Pennsylvania."

Nokia App Store opens

2009-05-26T12:48:00.004+03:00

It's not really uncommon when I find people with a nice smartphone in the hand getting surprised to hear that you can install software to make the phone a nice voice recorder, or schedule a sms at midnight to send automatically next morning, or install other browsers....

There is a huuge amount of smartphone users who are not aware of applications installable to their phone at all !

IPhone kinda changed that picture. It comes with a application store and people were able to find all sorta application they need. And of course people love apps, and some event spent $1000 to buy a 'stupid' app that does nothing, but shows a glowing red stone (It was perfectly named as "I am rich"). Anyways...

Nokia finally followed the legend IPhone appstore created. Today it opened ovi store.

Why don't u browse to store.ovi.com from your nokia phone and check out if there is something fun for you!

Gagan

- Update: I had a big hope with ovi store, but after browsing for a while and looking at the poor apps list, ugly screenshots view page, stupid free apps, it was a total disappointment. Nokia had declared it will have 20,000 item on the opening of ovi store, but I guess the numbers are now mostly filled up with junk videos and wallpapers. If that's how Nokia tries to keep promises, bad days are ahead for the giant.

Math and computers

2009-05-18T15:33:00.005+03:00

To those who never wrote a 'program' for a computer, will most likely assume today's computer are 'genius' in computing and solving math.

So lets try this simple subtraction in Google and yah.. it should return 1.
399999999999999-399999999999998

But, there is always some human writing that math behind the machine and there is always human error :)

Source : digg.com

Lets play cricket atop Everest

2009-04-30T13:18:00.006+03:00

Team Hillary Vs team Tenzing at nearly 17,000 feet above sea level (Source)

They spent a gruelling nine days trekking in the Mount Everest to reach the site... the Gorak Shep plateau, at 16,945ft. Locals helped to prepare the pitch, moving stones, pebbles and rocks - sometimes with pickaxes - out of the playing area. In a highly contested game, team Hillary beat team Tenzing by 36 runs with six balls remaining.

The the Amateur cricketers entered the record books of playing the world's highest altitude game of field sport.

Hmm, If you play cricket on the top of mount Everest, I guess you should not run to the edge and take a big jump a catch a six ball ;) (Image source)

The teams celebrated their record with a giant bottle of champagne followed by cups of tea (much needed tea I guess ;) )

The interesting match was named as The Nokia Maps Everest Test. The team consisted of 50 people, carrying Nokia N79s with SportsTracker. (Source)

Joke in pain

2009-04-29T12:05:00.005+03:00

Being at 40 degree + humidity is enough torture, but add no electricity to that... hmm.. tough !!

Bangladesh is (and has been) suffering from the lack of electricity. Recently the scorching hot weather added to the pain.

Weather of Dhaka from today (Thu, April 29)

Well, I have not been directly suffered, however, I can feel the frustration by looking at this
"advertisement" !

It says that lamp comes with "Free !" damp heat and available for limited time until 2011 ! And guess who is that lady ;)
Hilarious!

Outbreak

2009-04-27T14:33:00.012+03:00

Today, April 27, 2009, The European Union health minister advised Europeans not to travel to the United States or Mexico unless urgent. This followed the first confirmed case being discovered in Spain. One person in Spain has been confirmed as suffering from swine flu in Europe’s first case of the disease. A further 16 people are being tested for the flu.

On April 25, 2009, the WHO determined the situation to be a formal "public health emergency of international concern",

(image source)

The United States of America has declared a state of Public Health Emergency. According to the New York Times, "the emergency declaration frees resources to be used toward diagnosing or preventing additional cases and releases money for more antiviral drugs," including the transfer of approximately 12 million influenza medications from a federal stockpile to states.

Train commuters in Mexico City wearing surgical masks (image source)

Mexican soldiers distributing protective masks to citizens
(image source)

Mexico City, epicenter of the outbreak and home to 20 million people, looked like a ghost town. Millions of Mexicans stayed indoors on Sunday, trying to avoid a deadly new strain of swine flu.

Nuns take precautions against swine flu with face masks during a closed-door Mass at the Metropolitan cathedral in Mexico City on Sunday.(source)

Church services in this heavily Roman Catholic country were canceled -- the first time anyone could remember that happening.

Australia, Japan, Singapore and South Korea are among countries screening travelers for fever, while Hong Kong raised its swine-flu response level to “serious” from “alert.”

- Gagan
April 27, 2009

P.S. Some extracts from Wall Street Journal:

Most restaurants and movie theaters closed their doors, city parks looked desolate, and normally bustling streets had only a few dozen cars. Soldiers handed out blue surgical face masks on the streets. Professional soccer matches in Mexico City were played in front of empty stadiums but broadcast on TV.

"The city is paralyzed, what are we going to do?" asked Marta Robles, a housewife who went to a local pharmacy to buy a surgical mask. The pharmacy was sold out.

Schools and universities were to remain closed in Mexico City until at least May 6, officials said, affecting more than 6 million students

The government is bracing for a big slowdown in tourism, the country's third-largest source of foreign income

"We're renting about three times our normal volume, and most families are renting about six or seven videos at a time," said Daniel Lara, a 21-year-old checkout clerk. Mexico City residents hunkered down with their families indoors, watched news updates, and tried to relax. Local video stores said they were doing a brisk business.

Anyone who sneezed or coughed in the city immediately drew stares from other residents.

one Mexican custom was alive and well: Laughing at the possibility of death. A new song composed about swine flu is circulating on the Internet. Among the lyrics: "Now who's going to help us?/ Call in Superman/ We'll all be dead by the time Indiana Jones gets here."

If you want to follow the latest news, you may check International SOS site
http://urgent.internationalsos.com/Latest%20News/Forms/AllItems.aspx

Max again

2009-04-23T22:48:00.000+02:00

Hmm, I know I have not been posting for a really long time !! I have somehow did not get enough inspiration to post here. Now-a-days, I feel like writing in Bangla a lot, but this blog is in English. That's one reason. I guess facebook has something to do with it also.

However, let's see if I can come back to regular posting soon. I will have to post events backwards. But let me start from today.

Max (remember my 'once' room mate?) was back in Finland for few weeks only and invited us to have a dinner. He did not mention anything about his birthday, but good that I remembered ;)

We had some good time... and that's how time is passing by fast... really fast

No begging by law

2009-04-03T08:44:00.003+02:00

Bangladesh has passed a law in the parliament which states setting jail terms of up to three months for begging. The new laws fix no fines for beggars, but state if anyone is caught begging in public places or shows disabilities to get alms, they will face time behind bars.

This sounded like quite an over-ambitious plan to me. Those beggars can't just really disappear from the streets just like that. For some, it's a profession I agree (you may want to watch slumdog millionaire), but for thousands, there is no other choice.

I myself cannot suggest any bright ideas to unroot this problem in a country which is devastated by nature every year. Beggars on the streets of Dhaka always raised the question to me "WHY??? Why you? Why not me?" . I myself might have personally saved a few lives by helping to set up mini business, but there are thousands others ....

However, there is always a start. May be rehabilitation should have been done first before taking actions to ban, but by setting up this law at least I hope plans will be started to be set out... and more Project Dignity like initiatives.

Bus and gadget passion

2009-03-26T15:08:00.005+02:00

(source)

(source)

It kind of clicked in my mind... I guess I would have not been so passionate about smartphones (and my current career) , unless I have to spend over an hour almost every day in bus!

Doing stuffs inside bus became an inevitable part of my student life, coz it used to take almost an hour to reach my university from home, passing through a long traffic jam almost every day. I used to prepare myself for most of my short exams (quizzes) during the bus rides.

I started using a nokia Symbian based phone to read doc files to go through class lectures, review my power point slides of next presentation etc etc. All, to use my time in the bus.

I also used to chat a lot through msn messenger from my cell phone, specially on my way back home.

Now, I don't usually get time to check facebook and friend's blogs and other feeds except while being in the bus!

It's over 3 years now, I have been using 'unlimited' internet connectoion from my phone. Can't imagine going without it anymore!

If I had a car, I guess I would not have been so intrigued to smatphones with loads of softwares and games and mobile browsers and feeds etc..etc...

Good that I dont have a car now :)

Pass card

2009-03-16T23:22:00.008+02:00

In future time, imagine a trip to a distant great place in another planet. Let's call that planet "Efil". To enter Efil, you need a pass card, a very interesting pass card. We will talk about that Efil pass card now.

Efil pass card contains 'Point's. As long as you have points left in your card, you can stay in Efil. As soon as the points run out, you have to leave the planet immediately.

To access all the entertainment services you will need to spend those points. To get food, you need to spend the points. To buy clothes, you need points. To do everything in Efil, you need to spend some points from your pass card.

The most interesting part of this pass card is, after every certain time, let's say every minute, one point is reduced from your pass card, no matter what you do. So if you just stand in Efil like an idiot, you will keep losing your points and soon they will run out.

Now, the best part... when your pass card is filled up and handed over to you, just before you are entering Efil, you don't know how much points have been given to your card. It can be a very small amount, allowing to stay there for a very short time. It can contain a huuge amount of points, that should allow you to enjoy there for a really long time.

Have you started picturing the fun already?

Some people enter Efil and start using their points very very carefully, in case they have really few points. They try to make strict rules to spend it, spend minimum amount to check the entertainment booths, just spend a few to eat and drink and get a sleeping booth, hoping they can stay there longer. In the end, their cards will automatically run out and they will most likely return without any fun!

Some don't even realize what they are supposed to look for. They roam around, rushing fast, looking for something absolutely great that will pay back their trip to Efil. But, most likely, with time, their cards will run out before they manage to buy what they have been looking for!

Some think, since they dont really know when the card will run out and it will run out in any case, they decide to get whatever enjoyable thing they can get on their way. When their cards empty out, they will probably come back with a smile... telling..well that was definitely fun.

I am sure you can come out with millions of different stories :)

Will it be hard to imagine "Your" story on planet "Earth" with your "lifE" card?
With your "Life" card filled with some unknown amount of "time" credit?
In a world where everything costs some of your "time" credit? Where there is another unit of "purchase" currency card and to get that you spend most of your "time" credits?

With my Life pass card, I am thinking the best use of my points!

Gagan
23:55
March 16, 2009

Welcome spring

2009-03-16T12:32:00.003+02:00

Spring is unofficially here !! First migrant birds have come back !

I believe many flew to Bangladesh or nearby for their "winter vacation" ! Wish I could join them :)

Source: YLE

Important Information

2009-03-10T21:31:00.004+02:00

Few days back I got a white big envelop in my mailbox !

Well, that's a bit uncomfortable to get a note like that!!

And the important information turned out to be an advertisement in the end :@

Well, at least their intention served well, they made me open the envelop right away!

Gagan

Three days of national mourne

2009-03-02T10:36:00.005+02:00

I guess this picture says a lot !!
When an armed force soldier could not withhold the pain to see the massacre
created by "some" BDR (Bangladesh Rifles - border soldiers) mutinies ( ~~swear words~~ )!
(image source: thedailystar.net)

On the last Friday, Saturday and Sunday, the national flag of Bangladesh has been kept half-mast, as the nation mourns for the three days.

I have not talked about it with my non-Bangladeshi friends, neither am I planning to. I didn't want to write any blog post about it, it feels painful and very very shameful !!

I solemnly share my sadness along with the nation (but can never feel the same as those who lost their families there and who are still waiting for the missing) .

Gagan

BanglaSMS

2009-02-23T09:32:00.002+02:00

Greetings on mother language day! A bit late, coz I was quite much busy to 'prepare' for it :)

Well, here is the great news! On 21st February 2009, BanglaSMS has been released as open source!

banglasms.org.bd

Yaps...
Hope you enjoy sending SMS in Bangla and if you like to do a bit of coding, you can surely contribute to the source code or get the source for the fun of it.

You will find all the information you need from banglasms.org.bd.

Oh, by the way, I have been contributing to the source codes, that's what kept me so busy last few weeks (and away from blogging as well :P)

Enjoy!
And Omor Ekusher shuveccha!

Gagan

The frozen sea

2009-02-22T17:05:00.015+02:00

For the people who live in the South, like people in Bangladesh, I guess it's pretty hard to imagine to drive OVER A SEA..frozen sea...I remember the first time I saw a frozen sea! It was awesome.

Few days ago was Shanila's first time over the frozen sea. Great many thanks to Akseli and Sakari who toke us there with their cars. Our plan was to go to an island using the ferry and then come back using the 'ice road'.

We started at around 6:30 pm... Icy frozen around

Clear sky and -25 degree celcius!

At some point we seemed to drive out of city lights

The ferry was just right there... excellent timing.
Ours was the only car on the ferry !

Then ferry started moving through the frozen sea....
It's really dark all around... too dark for the camera to get any better pic.

I could pretty easily imagine how it would feel like to go to north pole aboard a ice breaker!
(even though the ferry was not an ice breaker)

I was excited enough to drag Shanila on the upper deck corridor...
Fweh that was freakingly shiverring cold !!

The corridor felt like the coldest we have ever felt !!

We went to the Island and found that ice road was not strong enough to drive on :(
Bad luck... so we had to wait 1 hour until the ferry comes back!

We stopped in a dark place to enjoy the stars!!
There were so many !!

Here we are except me!!

It was an excellent and frozen night at below -25degree.

Thank you guys :)

Oh I have little video too, but unfortunately it was too dark for my camera to get a better video.

Gagan

$200,000,000,000 USD and still counting

2009-02-19T20:34:00.003+02:00

Who hasnot heard of Chernobyl ? At least the virus named after it served it job, to make people remember the name. But i believe most do not know much details, except a nuclear plant disaster.

Did you know 20 years have past after that disaster and yet the area is uninhabitable ?? And the procetion sheild that was created after a hell of enginnering challenge, is not enough now? And by 2012 it is planned to have another shield , which will be the largest movable construct ever built?

General Nikolai Tarakanov said, he had put the armi larger than Nepolean had, except his was contaminated. I don't know how much truth has been finally reveiled after over 20 years, but at least here is an entire documentary about it.

May be you should watch it for the sake of knowing the costliest disaster of modern history!

Oulu has most advanced bio refinery

2009-02-13T15:43:00.002+02:00

People in Oulu city surely cares about environment a lot. Proof ?
It seems to have some 'third-generation' biorefinery, that processes leaves and grass into biofuels and pulp!

Claim by one news "City has World's Most Advanced 'Biorefinery'"

Another news blog

2009-02-03T12:28:00.003+02:00

Oh, short post!
Probably you didnt know I had actually another blog... where I try to post news (mostly tech) that interests me! You might be interested to check that out too!

http://gagan-tech-news.blogspot.com/

Link is added in the links section of this blog too!

Gagan

Gagan - GPS aided Geosynchronous Augmentation System

2009-01-30T13:53:00.002+02:00

Tooth breaking title !! But look at this map first !!

Look's like a master plan of me, Gagan, taking control of a huge part of the world !!

The map was sent by Bartek ! I got permission from him to share the email he sent me! Here you go !!

Hei my friend :)

Do you know what I have been recently told on one of my satelite navigation lecture?? That GAGAN is Indian Space Based Augmentation System (SBAS) known as GPS aided Geosynchronous Augmentation System (GAGAN). Augmentation systems are designed to improve one or more qualities of a GNSS (Global navigation satellite system), such as accuracy, robustness, and signal availability. Satellite-based augmentation systems (SBASes) augment core satellite constellations by providing ranging, integrity and correction information, which increase accuracy, reliability, and availability of GNSS positioning. SBAS information is broadcast via transponders on geostationary satellites in the same band as the core constellations.

Did you know about that??

When I saw your name on one of the slides with borderlines of the range of this system I imagined it as a huge country ruled by GAGAN :) and smiled :)

I attached a similar picture. If you want more information just google it: gagan sbas :)

CU
Bartek

Gagan

P.S. I hope no one minds about uploading that map image, no information found about the source

New year 2009

2009-01-06T22:34:00.003+02:00

Happy new year every one!! Yah... quite late.. but better late than never :)

For some reason, I think I am still not fully transited to the new year... I still have couple of TODOs from last year (just to give a clue about those, one example, have you noticed I have not shared pics / videos from my last summer Euro trip? There are still a huge amount of data to process). I still have not summed up my last year, neither fixed new year's TODOs ... it seems time is flying away too fast.. somehow!

At this moment, I am trying to archive my digital data. Guess what, my 500GB drive is almost full !! I am quite sure there are lots of garbage deep down there, which I need to clean up very soon, before new year starts in full force after the long holiday mode period.

If you are trying to calculate something from the last year, here is an interesting video for you
... so that you recheck your calculation a bit more carefully ;)

Happy new year again !!

Gagan
2009

The most interesting poll in Bangladesh

2008-12-30T19:10:00.012+02:00

It's a small, yet hugely populated third world nation. I wonder how many cares and follows. But it's my country and I am deeply intrigued by the most interesting election (to me) in Bangladesh.

There are basically two major parties, AL (Awami league) and BNP (Bangladesh National Party) and some others. For last decade, there has been a (nasty) fight between these two parties and I have believed, there were supporters for both these parties, leading to a competition between two parties always. For the last three elections, these parties formed Government alternatively, proving there are balanced supporters for both.

The alternation rule between these two Major parties to form Government has continued, BNP has been replaced by AL, but the interesting part is, AL won a landslide victory, an unbelievable triumph against all other parties !!! That's why this is interesting !!

(source: dailystar)

I don't read political news everyday, so surely I am not an expert in this field. I have been asking few friends about their reaction. Looks like the new generation is quite excited about it. This was summary.

- Almost all my friends went to vote and they reported it was unexpectedly safe and sound environment.

- Everyone (sorry, there must be few supporters) is happy that Jamaat Islam was defeated with shame. This is the 'so called' religion based party and supports some war criminals (of course, they argue they are not).

- The young generation went to vote in festive mode. Their number was huge and undoubtedly had a tremendous effect on the result.

- An unbelievable number of big fishes were defeated, fishes that expected and had been enjoying sure wins in some regions.

- Everyone wanted change (hmm.. obama dialouge)

The popural slogan...
Literal translation:
'It's my vote and I will give mine...
after observing, listening and knowing"

I am also a bit worried, will parliament work smoothly with such a majority from AL. You know, when there is no opposition force, power may become overwhelming.

But after last two eventful political years and serious anti-corruption efforts, I hope everyone learnt the lesson. People want change in politics and time is a bit different now.

(image source: allvoices.com)

- 30 December 2008

(P.S. I must thank to dailystar.net for their nice coverage. Even though their rss/podcast didnot work and here is a news video from NDTTV about the peaceful pole:

)

Shanila met Santa

2008-12-15T22:07:00.010+02:00

I have not been able to meet Santa (the real one, where Santa lives and where your post will go if you send a post card "TO SANTA")... but Shanila made it before me!!

Rovaniemi, Oulu, Finland. Quite north it is !!
And on the way you actually can cross the arctic circle !

Santa Clause Village

Eheeheehe... Cooold

Good job Shanila !! Got a rain deer already!!
(And interesting boots you have there :D)

A tree full of letters !!

Actually all of the letters of this tree are from Japanese kids !!

Now that's a big snow man !!

Hei.. the snowman is somehow confused to see u Shanila !! Look at its just-became-confused face :D

Museum

Looks nice !!

Hoa !! Watch out !!

Santa with the 'children' around
From left bottom Shanila, and her friends from
Switzerland, Cameron, Japan, Russia, Greece, Hungary and Thailand
(Psst.. this picture costed 35Euros.. u r not allowed to take snaps with your camera)

I am OK !!

2008-11-28T10:07:00.025+02:00

I was in the bus, on the right side of it, talking on my cell phone. The bus turned left at Ratakatu, I looked casually through my window while talking, and I saw a truck coming towards us. It just did not feel right to me... next moment, the truck appeared bigger... for a moment I could not understand what I heard through my phone... the truck appeared really big... I think I took a long quick breath, I could feel adrenaline pump with a tremendous rush, I could feel my hair on the neck standing... and something rushing through my backbone... I saw the truck hit right in front me and a nasty crashing sound and then glass breaking sound!!!

The bus stopped and I felt I was Ok and a quick look told me everyone was OK in the bus!!

But I felt worry about the truck driver.. I tried to take a look through the window

I was on this side of the bus, where it hit

The bus door was broken !!

This glass window is completely broken. I talked with the lady who was seating there,
she said she was fine, except her bags and jacket pockets were full of glass pieces.

Police, ambulance and fire brigade arrived! We were told to stay in the bus.

We were told no one was seriously hurt. They collected everyone's name.

Here is what I found after I got down from the bus. Here you can see the bus hit the car...
I think after hitting the truck, the bus hit the car, I am not sure...
The truck in on the right top.. the white one!
But I am quite sure someone broke the traffic signal, because it happened right when the bus turned left !! Someone was on the wrong place !!

I found the people who were inside the red car. The kid was quite much shocked.
But luckily I found no one hurt!

One of the firemen told me to wait, some bus/vehicle would pick us up. After waiting a while, I noticed almost all of the passengers had already walked away. So I told them, if it was ok to leave.

Fewh... well, luckily no one was seriously hurt and I am perfectly alright (except I lost one of my gloves) !!

Final comment, the emergency was handled very well, no body paniced much, except one lady was crying in complete panic !! Most of the people in the bus were very calm and stayed almost quietly. The bus driver first asked if everyone was ok and then told to stay where we were, and he called the emergency through his phone right away.

But one thing that I must say, there were at least 5 foreigners in the bus, and I believe 4 of them did not understand or speak any Finnish and none of the fire fighters / ambulance guys spoke in English. One nice Indian lady translated what they were saying. In the end, the emergency guys started speaking 'some' English, but I think, when they clearly notice some brown colored guys, who 'may not' understand Finnish, they should also instruct in English!! Anyways, no offense :)

Here is the map where it happened:

View Larger Map

- Mazed
(I think the accident happened at around 8:59, 28 November 2008)

Update:

Here is another picture from someone else(source : kaleva.fi)
Check out the scratches on the body of the bus!!
Luckily and strangely the windows where I sat, were perfectly intact, even though the windows behind me (check the very last window) and infront of me were shattered!!

I was caught on camera too, in greenish jacket.. left side, with a shoulder bag (Source kaleva.fi)
Oh, check out the front bottom corner of the bus.

No sun

2008-11-27T17:51:00.003+02:00

It began yesterday.. no, not exactly in Oulu, but far north... there will be no sun from now on until mid-january.

(image source: yle.fi)

I know it's extremely hard for many, specially in tropical countries like Bangladesh, to imagine this situation. I have been asked soo many times these questions, "well, how do you know when to sleep, when to wake up? How do you know when to eat lunch?". True, in tropical countries, the whole habit runs around the sun, during lunch time you expect the sun to be the brightest, you expect to go to work in full day light and come back home when it's getting darker. But once your body clock gets rid of sun clock, you actually then get used to follow your wrist watch. I did'nt say it's piece of cake though ;)

Anyways, there is also another misconception. It is not necessarily pitch black during the "continuous nights". Sun rays actually bend into the atmosphere and give some sort of light, as in the picture. It's called 'night' coz the sun is below the horizon.

Oh, yes, if you dont see the sun for that long, it's freeeeezing cold. And yes, it also affects your mode.

Nokia phone testing

2008-11-21T16:29:00.010+02:00

Have you ever dropped your phone?

Well, I wonder who would say "No !! Never". Now-a-days, I believe, it has become the rough most used gadget! At least I slip it into my jeans and forgets about it until it rings or I need to check my email or TODOs. I sometimes find it in the morning under my belly ( or somewhere else), and wonder when did I put it on my bed? Sometimes, I throw my jeans into the closet and BAM!! Ups, I forgot to take my phone off the pocket !!

Ever wonder why and how did it survive most of the times? Watch this video ( I m quite happy to find this in public servers to share :) )

Oh.. too lazy to watch a video? Well you should watch it.. anyways, some screen shots for lazy ones.

Tap..tap..tap...
Guess how long that keypad will survive?

I m not sure if I should say "Don't try this at home" ;)

One idea for the test guys will be to introduce nail tap test. Most of the key labels of my phone is gone because sometimes I have nails and I guess write a lot from my phone.

Anyways, that video was quite interesting. You can get some more info from here http://www.nokia.com/A4630650?category=design#

Gagan

(By the way, if you don't know how Finnish ascent is, listen to the host who is speaking at the beginning of the video... no offense please, but the point is, I could figure out by the voice that a Finnish guy is speaking English)

USB 3.0

2008-11-18T21:05:00.005+02:00

If you don't recognize this symbol, I would kindly ask you to leave this page, coz it will be very boring for you in that case :)

But most probably you know!! After all, your camera or your phone or your pen drive, at least your mouse / keyboard uses this. Probably the most popular connectivity to your computer so far !!

Did you know that USB 3.0 spec is ready?

If you remember how fast USB 2.0 grabbed the market, this should be an exciting news. Specially if you can transfer4.8 Gbits per seconds where 480 Mbits/s is the current USB 2.0 speed. Consider this, if you try to transfer a 27GB HD movie it will only take 15 minutes with your current USB 2.0 drive, and USB 3.0 will copy jet-fast in only 70 seconds!!! Another example so that you can get the idea that you should now say "woooo", a data drive based on USB 3.0 can move 1G byte of data in 3.3 seconds, compared to 33 seconds with USB 2.0!!

The guys who designed it, noticed the growing number phones and other devices we charge from USB. So now USB 3.0 will provide more efficient, yet more power!!

Well, the cable will be noticably thicker, since USB 3.0 is gonna have 5 more new lines and upload and download lines are no longer the same, rather separate. So I think next time while downloading a big chunk of data to my external drive (well, in my future drive i mean), I can also watch a HD movie without lagging.

Hmm, but for all these we gotta wait until 2010 I guess. Good things come late !!

Gagan

Birthday

2008-11-16T18:30:00.005+02:00

Shanila caught on tape in the shop in the toy section !
Hmm..
I knew not only her, some other people were also upto something

Surely it's impossible for her to hide such a big cake !!
So she decided to make the cake in front me !!
It was the night before the day!

It was a grand canyon size Black Forest Cake!

We decided to hide it in our room, so that no body finds it until the next day!

Almost 12 o'clock... I got a call from my sister.. so left the kitchen to answer the call...
Tanja locked the kitchen door immediately and didnt let me in !!

Midnight a bit after 12 o'clock...
Shup, Tanja and Shanila were inside the room..
with the wonderful table lighted up with my birthday candles !!
It was a beautiful moment!

Tanja had made another cute black forest !!
It was superb!!
Shanila made some dessert also with my name written on it!

Here is Tanja... Enjoying the surprise she brought

The morning.. my birthday morning...
A lonely crow found in the middle of snow through my window

Friends gathered up in the kitchen..
Shanila served delicious 'Polao', 'Chicken korma', 'Egg', 'Booter dal'. Yam yam

Then came the huuuge cake !!
(Everyone awed!!)

Check out the height of the cake!!

After that we started playing the "Modern Art"... which I just got as a gift

Late night, after most other left... I decided to take a picture amidst of absolutely fabulous gifts...
Probably one of the rare birthdays so many really great gifts.
(I wish I got the idea of taking this pic while everyone was with me)

A fantastic birthday... Thank you .. I repeat Thank you, everyone...
for bringing me such a grin..

Gagan.

Three more notes:
- Happiness is realized when shared (You may want to watch the movie "Into the wild", which lasts so loong and kinda boringly, just to prove this line)

- Sad that Sandun, Charamri and Senehas (the Srilankan family) did not manage to come. One of their friends got sick suddenly and Sandun had to go to hospital for him. I hope he comes round soon.

- Timo was not in Oulu and missed the event. He called me while we were eating and asked me to put the phone on speaker. I was quite surprised, wht's going on? Then we heard a crowd singing "Happy Brithday to euuuu..." !! I think he called from some bar and made other people around sing along with him ! Thanks Timo, it was a nice surprise and fun !!!

Happiness

2008-11-14T13:45:00.003+02:00

Happiness!! Isn't that a strange term, a single term that actually might sum up the whole meaning of life!!

Lets say, from most religious point of view, what's the point of life? To serve God, to do good things, ultimately to 'win' happiness at heaven!!

Buddhism is not really a religion, in the sense that there is no God!! But the goal is the ultimate happiness.. the Nirvana !!

People who do not believe in God, live their lives just for one objective... for happiness.

There are workaholic people, who know nothing but working, coz it's their way of having happiness!!

And there are those people who are just leading life , I guess life does not mean much to them.. mainly because they don't know how to feel happiness.

I, myself, sometimes feel tensed about my work, worry about my future plans, get stressed about building a great career... sometimes pressure from these are so heavy that I actually forget about happiness.

However, recently I heard one interesting information about happiness.

Why do you think kids are so happy?

Before I tell what I heard about the answer, let me copy paste from an article.

In adults it has perhaps 100 billion neurons, each connected to its neighbours by 5000 synapses or so. A brain can make and break a million new connections each second. It can store information for more than a century if you live that long, automatically cataloguing, re-filing and editing as needed. It can reconstruct our surroundings using a range of sensors that sample vibration, electromagnetic radiation, chemicals and pressure, and prioritise in milliseconds what might be of interest or concern.
(source: newsceintists)

Back to the question , Why do you think kids are so happy?
The answer I heard is, because they are learning all the time !!

I kinda liked the answer. Learning is definitely fun. Well, not that learning which are forced (like what your most boring teacher in your school). But think about how much fun it was when you visited a new place when you are a kid. When you tried to learn more about your hobbies. How much fun it was to read a new story!!

Ok, I am coming to the end of this post now. If our feelings are because of a processing of billions of neurons, the more you play with it, the more active it is, the more you learn, I guess the more happy you will be. If you are bored someday, I guess, I will advice you to learn something about whatever makes you interested about.

Have fun :)

Bangla Signboards

2008-11-12T19:55:00.005+02:00

Ok, it's not gonna be for non-bangla readers ! Sorry :)

Oh just one note.. just keep the word "passport" in mind. Don't worry, you will understand soon what I mean.

The credit of these images does not go to me. I got this in a forward email chain from Eamon.

Obama

2008-11-10T15:27:00.005+02:00

Surely this word is one of the most frequently used word now-a-days. Quite many historical events are around this word. Some are talking about the first this and some are talking about first that... and I will pick up the word "First tech president" !!

Obama used so many innovative technologies and web 2.0 for his campaign, I guessed he would be the first president of which I would like to read news about !!!

Did you check his www.change.gov , where you can read about the latest news about Obama and his administration, the agenda they will try to solve and how!!

Did you see the flickr images where you can see the moments from the hotel room where Obama was following the election polls?

Anyways, there are many things you can find around. But, I liked this best ...

A screenshot from my gmail says, Barack Obama is following me on Twitter :D

Hmm, surely the president of US does not have time to check my less frequently updated twitter, but I and millions of other people would surely love to follow Obama's news and appreciate his openness!!

If you want to follow him, check out
http://twitter.com/BarackObama

Gagan

Office toilet - Mr. A, B and X

2008-11-07T14:53:00.006+02:00

When I go to office toilet, the first I thing I do is to quickly check if the toilet commode is "ok" ( I hope you know what I mean by "ok"). I kinda start panicing if I find the commode cover is closed!! If it is closed I quickly open it holding my breath, and if it not "OK" I rush out !! and I pray no one is looking at me !! Why??

Ok, this post may not be a 'sweet' post... but what can I do? It's about sharing my ideas in my blog, so here I go to explain why!!

Let's say Mr. A is just coming out of the toilet door and Mr. B is about to go into the toilet. Mr. A and B exchange a smile at the toilet door and Mr. B goes in!! Mr. B closes the door, opens the commode cover and with disgust closes it back !! The commode is not "OK" and Mr. B will surely wont be able to help blaming Mr. A !!

Now my question is, is it really wise for Mr. B to blame Mr. A?? It could be Mr. A did not even use the toilet, he went in just to wash his hands or something !!! There might be some Mr. X who went to the toilet before Mr. A and B and did the mishaps !!

(img source http://justforspite.blogspot.com/)

That's the reason I rush out quickly and pray no one (Mr. B) watches me and makes me Mr. A and blame me for the mishaps done by Mr. X!!

Snow chronicles

2008-11-04T23:08:00.024+02:00

Hmm, I have not been posting for quite a long time actually! Well, even though it's not the reason, but I can easily redirect the blame to... weather !!!

Yaps, I have been hearing many people around excusing, aw!! It's dark!! I'm sleepy!! It makes you depressed!! etc etc
Of course it is true, if you are not careful enough, the dark nights will soon grasp you and make you depressed and feel gloomy!

Anyways... I have some interesting pictures of weather change!! Wanna see?

27 October 2008 4:42 PM !!
Dark already !! Rainy and wet weather!

30 October 2008. 1:30 PM.
The whole city is under heavy dense fog!

30 October 2008. 2:39 PM.
Still under fog !!

30 October 2008. 2:50 PM.
Another look at the fog!!
Ghostly city center!!

31 October 2008. 5:19 PM.
Snow started in Oulu, with the sign of incoming cold winter!!

The deep thick snow soon took away the border between streets and footpaths !!

I think most of the people welcomed snow!! It at least brightens the dark nights to some extent!
But may be this guy did not appreciate snow so much !! He was shivering with the head covered by a thick layer of melting icy cold snow!!

Guess what ! It was Shanila's first ever snow observation!!
Well, the first one seems heavier than anyone expected !!
31 October 2008, 6:33 PM

31 October 2008 6:34 PM.
Snowball in Shanila's hand !!

Next morning!! 1 November 2008 1:07 PM.
Everything is suddenly beautifully white!!
Believe me, it was a beautiful bright day !!

Poor cars!

Poor drivers !! Who expected so much snow to clean so early !!!

Happy myself !!

Happy kids !!

Happy bushes(I hope?? Coz they look pretty amazing?)

Battle of snow and red sign !!

Life

2008-10-20T20:40:00.004+02:00

Life !!

I guess I don't want to write much about this post! A picture sometimes tells more!!

But just three questions...
What do you think had happened so far in this old man's life?
How do you think will it end?
And ..sigh... who do you think is to blame?

Image source : http://dhakadailyphoto.blogspot.com/
(I used some black and white and blur effect on the original pic)

Global hand wash day??

2008-10-15T15:52:00.003+02:00

I have never heard about it before !! But did you know that today, October 15 is global handwash day!!

Although people around the world wash their hands with water, very few wash their hands with soap at the critical occasions.
www.globalhandwashingday.org

So next time (at least today) you wash your hands, dont forget the soap!!

My great 'stupid' sister

2008-10-13T17:02:00.006+02:00

I know my parents or elders will probably say "how rude!!", "How rude it is to call your elder sister stupid". But I wish they would understand how much fun it is to have an elder sister like mine who you can call such!!

But I guess now it will be even harder to call such!! Why? Coz I have a great news to share with you.

Remember I told before that my sister has started for her second Masters degree in University of Sheffield? Well she has finished that in a year, with a superb result. So before her result is out, she was picked up and offered funding for her PhD. So here she goes, to start her PhD in something related to computer security.

She does deserve a "wooo" from me!! Big hug sis!! :)

Quiz: Guess who's my sister :P ?

And I also give a huge hug to my brother-in-law.. Selju Dulvai :)

Wishing the great couple a greater life!! So that they can post pictures like this.. always!
(Oh for the non Bangladeshi readers, in this pic they were in Cox's Bazar, the longest sea beach on the planet)

Gagan

Eid mubarak!

2008-10-01T15:18:00.006+02:00

This is the mail I sent to my colleagues in Finland.

"Eid Mubarak" to everyone!!

Some of you already know about it. Some knew but forgot about it. And I am pretty sure there are some who were looking at the first two words of this mail with eye brows raised.

To put the eye brows back to normal, 'Eid Mubarak' is what you say to greet on the biggest festival in Bangladesh (and of the Muslims). The day is called "Eid" and 'Eid mubarak' means something like "Greetings on Eid".

In Finland Eid was yesterday (Tuesday) and in Bangladesh it will be tomorrow (Thursday). Yes, it is different in different places around the world, because it follows a Lunar calendar and depends on the moon sight at that place.

What happens in this day? Parties, looots of food, new cloths, gifts, 3 official holidays (, unofficially more) etc... sounds familiar? Hmm, I guess I could have answered that question easily by asking back, what do you do in Xmas? (Or may be not... we dont have Santa!)

If you have to say Hello to someone in Dhaka when they are back from their holidays, you can start the conversation by saying "Eid Mubarak" !

Eid mubarak again to everyone with HUG emoticon. (yes, people hug in a special way when they greet this).

--
Best Regards/Parhain Terveisin,

Abdullah Al Mazed (Gagan)

01 October 2008

Gunfire in Finland... again

2008-09-23T11:18:00.008+02:00

Finland !! If someone knows anything about Finland a bit, I think the immediate picture he gets, is a calm, quiet and peaceful place. But looks like some are rocking the quiet place with gunfire.

This morning, I started getting pings from all around with the news of another gunfire, which just happened. The national broadcaster YLE reported that a shooting incident had occurred in a vocational school in the town of Kauhajoki.

People in IRC have already started spreading the links found about the news. Here are some:

BBC news: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/7630969.stm
The guys youtube site: http://www.youtube.com/user/Wumpscut86
And a collection of stuffs left by the guy: http://kuvaton.com/kauhajoki/

Tuomas told me he had uploaded files in rapidshare before the incident.

A screenshot from the guy's youtube page. Looks like full of gunfire practice videos.

The picture he had in another social network site

Did u know this?

The level of gun ownership in Finland is among the highest in the world.
Source: BBC news

Hmm.. I did not know that gun ownership is popular here. I guess the main purpose is for hunting.

However, Finland still remains as one of the most peaceful country in the world.

Gagan
23 September 08

(Remember about gunfire in last year November?)

A post from my father

2008-09-21T10:58:00.011+02:00

If traits pass through genetic hierarchy, could it be that the fun I get from writing, came from my father?

My father has not got enough "opportunity" for very high education, you will not be impressed when he talks in dialects, he suffers from lack of words and has to look up in dictionaries often ... but yet, he used to spend hours to know more. I had even seen him trying to read the huuuuge volumes of Bangla children Encyclopedia (!). I believe he could not finish it, but he dared to start. And I have not so far found anyone else having more dictionaries than him. And the way he honors someone having a Ph.D. is amazing.

However, Bangladesh is a tough place and I had seen him getting more and more into the material world. His library stopped getting more books from him. When I started my university studies, I found him almost never having time to read (and write). It was a bit sad, and I have none but a rough society to blame.

Am I talking too much? Am I just praising my father just because I am his son? Well, may be :)

Today I am writing, because I have found that he is still writing. Well, only Bangla readers may try to check it out. It's in today's The Daily Ittefaq (21.10.08, page 5). You can find it here http://www.ittefaq.com/content/2008/09/21/news0071.htm (I had problems to open this using Firefox, use Internet explorer). If you yet have problems with bangla font, you can try this pdf.

It's good to see my father, MD. Abdul Gofur Prodhan, back to writing. I believe he will go back to his reading enthusiasm soon.

Gagan
21 Septempber 08
Sunday

Me, Myself and my-old-self

2008-09-11T20:56:00.005+02:00

I mean who would say these are all myself !!

Image courtesy: Boromama, my uncle in Netherlands, from who I collected some images... some priceless ones !!

Has LHC destroyed the world .com

2008-09-10T11:49:00.004+02:00

I know you probably have been waiting for some pics from my last trip, but you know, sorting over thousand pics will take some time !!

Anyways, did you know about LHC ? Large Hardon Collidor is the biggest physics experiment of human race... funded by and built in collaboration with over eight thousand physicists from over eighty-five countries as well as hundreds of universities and laboratories.

This giant will try to recreate situation of big bang and will try to confirm the predictions and missing links of physics and could explain how other elementary particles acquire properties such as mass.

Some even claimed it will create a tiny blackhole and will suck the world into !!

There are immense amount of energy involved, accidents could destroy the planet, claimed by some others. Some scientists have received death threats (source)

Today this morning, 10 September 2008 this machine, is gonna power up!!

Has the world been destroyed?

Check http://hasTheLargeHadronColliderDestroyedTheWorldYet.com/

The trip has ended

2008-09-01T22:15:00.005+02:00

2 weeks...
8 new cities...
4 new countries...

One backpack !!(Click on the image to enlarge)

It was full of events, wonders, mistakes, lessons ...
Undoubtedly a great adventure!!!

Finally we are back in Oulu !!

Hope to write about it soon !!

Gagan
1 September 2008

Hello from Poland

2008-08-24T20:36:00.008+03:00

Hello guys !! Hello from Łódź !!

We are in Łódź, Poland !! (marked with A)

Did you know that the longest pedestrian street in Europe is in Łódź, Poland? It is !!

Here is the longest pedestrian road in Europe !!

The gang, with Kate as a tour guide !

We had to pose here!!
Did you know if you rub this poet's (Julian Tuwim) nose and make a wish it will come true?
(Remember what Kate gifted me last year ? Read more )

Did you know that there is an awesome pastry shop in Łódź that won a Guinness Record for a huge cake with 900 candles? (Kate's wedding cake was from this shop, believe me... it was superb)!!

We are having such great fun here, better than I anticipated !!

Well, gotta go now, there is a cooking going on down in the kitchen !! I can't bear the yammy smell anymore !!

Of course I will write more when I will be back home!

Zakładowa,
Łódź, Poland

we are in rome

2008-08-19T11:26:00.006+03:00

Just a preview....

Cyber cafe
Via Geoberti
Rome, Italy

2008-08-17T06:49:00.001+03:00

I am at Tampere railway station now. Cloudy and lightly rainy here. The head feels heavy... less sleep effect!

But the best part is yet to come! Flying to Milan in a few hours! Still actually didnt except the fact i'm on holiday :)
funny !!

i guess no more post in this month.
i'm on holiday,ain't I?

Gagan
Tampere

1st marriage anniversary

2008-08-10T00:29:00.002+03:00

Time... sometimes it's so slow, sometimes it's so fast...
For me, last 12 months went away not only fast, rather super fast.
When we put that "1" on the wall, and I light the candles around the cake at 12 o'clock,
I was really wondering, how could 1 year be gone so fast?

May be it is a wonderful thing !!
Last 12 months were so full of events, that I didnt have time to feel time !

Who knows what's in the future, but I know what was in the past!!
It was wonderful !!

We counted up "1" together on our first marriage anniversary on August 9 2008!

Count up 1

2008-08-09T00:01:00.001+03:00

This is on our kitchen wall now!!

What count up? Just one clue, me and Shanila we both said to each other, "Count Up One" :)

More coming up soon :)

9.08.08

Saija is 8teen

2008-08-05T00:10:00.002+03:00

Well, even the title of this post is teenish !! 8teen ! Who else will write in this way except teenagers?

Anyways, Saija has just stepped on 18! The teenager, who turned to be a very very close friend of mine!! Around her, I turn to be a bit teeny and noisy as well.

Saija with a little surprise from us!!
(Ups, the clock behind is showing we were 2 hours earlier)

"Hello Saija, I want to play a game with you...." naaaaah!! Lets skip the SAW acting. Rather let me wish you a superbly noisy HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SAIJA !!
YOU ARE EIGHTEEN !
WOHOOOO!!

Gagan
5 August 2008

Ryan air

2008-08-04T13:20:00.004+03:00

Those who are a bit aware of European cheap flights, must know about ryan air. I too was wondering about how they make the money with so cheap flights. An example of how cheap flights can be

From Eindhoven (EIN) to London Stansted (STN)
Thu, 28Aug08 Flight FR9272 Depart EIN at 09:25 and arrive STN at 09:25

PASSENGERS

1. MR ABDULLAH AL MAZED ADT 2. MRS SHANILA SHAHEEN MAZID ADT

PAYMENT DETAILS

*********0.00 EUR Total Fare

********19.98 EUR Taxes, Fees & Charges

********10.00 EUR Passenger Fee: Airport Check in

********29.98 EUR Total Paid

Note the price above is for TWO people for flying from Netherlands (Eindhoven) to UK (Stansted) and they charged 0.00Euro as fare. Final price for one person is 15e !!!
Cheaper than taxi from airport to home!!

Hmm, really interesting deal. But here are some recent news about this airlines.

Ryanair has warned it could make an annual loss of up to 60 million euros (£47.4m) due to high oil prices.

BBC news

one more:

BAA Launch Legal Action Against Ryanair.
The British Airports Authority (BAA) have started legal action against the budget airline Ryanair to force them to pay a 15% airport charge at Stansted Airport.

The dispute between Ryanair and BAA is long-standing and reports suggest that Ryanair are pushing ahead with plans to ground 15 aircraft in a protest against the prices at Stansted Airport.

News source

Well, since Ryanair is providing so cheap flights, I wish they live long!!!

Golf

2008-08-01T20:49:00.000+03:00

Thanks goes to Kaisa and her boyfriend again, to invite us to practice some golf. And guess what? I gotta agree that I was wrong to think golf is boring. It seemed that this game can be even quite exciting !!

It might be beginner's luck, but we both did quite well !! (Actually this was not my first, i had played minigolf before, but that's not real golf anyways).

We borrowed clubs from Kaisa and her boyfriend. Frankly, they are unbelievably warm and nice people !!

Oh, here is a short video!!

Sandun has a boy!!

2008-07-31T16:49:00.001+03:00

Sandun and Chamari, the Srilankan family just had a boy !!!

Wonder of life !

Aaaam... no... that's definitely not the mother

Here are the proud father and mother

What can be more amazing than a perfectly healthy new born baby and perfectly healthy mother ! Congratulations !!!

people are on holiday

2008-07-31T00:41:00.003+03:00

people are on holiday

I took this pic from a nearby apartment (Yliopistokatu 16 to be specific)