Captive Adaptations

Today for the first time I travelled in a Japanese bullet train on the JR rail. The Shinkansen series of bullet trains are definitely an excellent mode of transport. I travelled on the Tokaido Shinkansen which runs form Kyoto-Tokyo in less then 2.5 hours. The speeds that the Tokaido Shinkansen can reach is over 300 km/hr.

The Kyoto-Tokyo leg of the Tokaido Shinkansen is also the first shinkansen line that was operational. We have nearly 3-4 such trains every hour, and the network of these lines, the accuracy and timing that is still maintained in reaching destinations, the real time graphical display are definitely something that will stick in my memory for quite sometime.

I have many things to discover and learn here, as there are various network of rails, the subways, the express lines and shinkansen’s. All in all right from my trip from Osaka to Kyoto and from Kyoto to Tokyo the JR Expressways, and the JR lines have captured my imagination, and have left me wanting for more !. Can’t we replicate this in India ? I am sure it will decongest all our cities and rid us of the brutal daily commute pains.

I am in Bangkok’s new international airport, on my way to Japan and on to US. For the next 2 months I will be doing a lot of traveling and will learn a little more about time !. Yes, you heard it right !. I believe in that concept. As one travels, one happens to experience and see different times/era/ages. People tend to adapt to changes at their own pace, and hence retain many of the cultural memes that have been passed on to them. This is mostly true in Asia, where civilizations have existed for more than 3000 years, and this rich culture and tradition can easily be experienced in some of the practices that exist in people even today.

Unlike the Western world, which due to its relatively new history, appears uniform through out, because people think in similar ways, act in the same way, and believe in the same set of articles of faith, there is much more diversity in the Asian region.

At Suvaranabhumi, we find lots of evidence of influence of the Hindu culture and tradition. The name “Suvarnabhumi” means “Land of Gold” in many Indian Languages. Also, the depiction of the “Samudra Manthan” with huge statues at the airport is one main attraction, and the airport has a great blend of modernity and mythology. I must say I am begining to like Suvarnabhumi, there are many improvements I can notice compared to the last time I was here 2 months ago, exactly on the day it was opened for commercial flights, i.e, on Sep 28th.

As for the improvements, for starters I am having free internet access on wifi, on a very decent economy lounge, which was non-existent last time I was around. I will blog on many more findings of Suvarnabhumi and my travel in general later, so fasten your seat belts as I plan to publish a flurry of posts on my blog. Yes, I have re-started my plans to blog regularly. Not Again !

On my first visit to Japan. Landed at Osaka, Kansai International Airport last night, and saw the early rays from the land of the rising sun about 2 hours ago.

Japan is an interesting country. While demographically its currently a land where investors would shy away (yes, owing to the graying of Japan concept), for the past 5 years its new charismatic Prime Minister (well not new any more - his tenure will end in early 2007 I hear) has talked about economic reforms and Japan is slowly embracing many concepts that will enable it to sustain its economic hold in many industries.

Will be here for another 10 days, visiting Kyoto and Tokyo primarily. Will try and blog about my new findings about this land, as soon as my schedule permits some leisure.

A couple of days ago I strolled around MG road with my friend, we were hoping to spend some time at Crossword, one of the good book stores on Residency road (near old Galaxy theatre). As luck would have it, we missed our usual parking garage, and ended up on Church Street, even as we managed to squeeze some space close to Amoeba (The favourite Bowling Alley of Bangalore), we noticed Blossom - the house of used books, right across the street.

As both or us are impulsive book buyers, we decided to check it out. Its an interesting place, where you can not only trade in your old used books for a decent price, but can also buy good books at a great prize, and as I heard from the store owner, it was started around 2 months ago.

I picked up a couple of goodies - one is this, and the other is the one book, that has somehow eluded my grasp, but about which I wrote sometime back. I managed to finally pick it up for dirt cheap price, so I have some good reading to do now. What’s more, once I am finished with this, I have the option of trading the book back with the store for 50% of the amount. That reminded me of the vintage “Engineering Days” were this form of trading-and-reading was the norm for all books!.

Sweet Nostalgia, so if you land up on Church street the next time, remember to check out Blossom, and if you need some pointers to interesting books I think this new book of Amartya Sen - Identity & Violence, which I noticed in the same book store, might provide some good fodder for an intense social conversation with like-minded argumentative friends!.

Over the weekend, I took to visiting this holy place of the Hindus which is around 270 kms from Bangalore. Of course I am not religious, and I hate following rituals. Spirituality is however something I am open to discuss as blogged before. The motivation for me to accompany my parents and sisters was the opportunity to trek 13.5 kms from Tirupathi to Tirumala.

I had good company of a new friend, and together we reached the summit from the foot of the hill in around 2 hours and 20 mins, while spending some good time at most vista points along the way with some videography as well. As per most people I spoke to and also as is recorded in Wikipedia, an average person will need 3 hours to reach the summit, so what is nice to note is that I am doing well above average in my fitness right now.

The trek being the only exciting part of the visit, all else in this divine place is not worth even commenting. The basic qualities of human empathy, restraint, regard, care and above all “value for spirituality in people” is simply non-existent with the stakeholders and administration officials who have chosen to openly demonstrate utter disregard towards its patrons. The place just “stinks” without any virtues or values.

This is a post from Incheon, Korea. This is a just like that post. But interestingly I did not notice that I was flying on the anniversary of 9/11 till I landed up at the counter in SanFrancisco. This travel event is worth remembering. All my guardian angels wish me luck

This is my second long stopover/layover in a week at the Changi Airport in Singapore. Last tuesday I had to while away nearly 7 hours, no different today. Fortunately, there are couple of free city tours that the Singapore Tourism Ministry has setup. Each is around 2 hours with themes like Colonial tour, Cultural tour etc.

Its really a good way to kill time and simultaneously learn about the city, its people, and get a first hand experience as you travel on the streets of Singapore. I learnt about some interesting demographics regarding the population density, the type of people, and some interesting cultural practices that Singapore has.

I am not very well equipped, to do justice to what I am seeing. I probably need to carry a good digital camera / camera phone along with me and make sure that next time my blog speaks with pictures more than words. But for now bear with my blah.. blah… blah…

Post Scriptum : Interestingly, I just noticed that Atanu Dey was also in Singapore on Aug 30th. I tried to update this in the comments section as well, but then decided it was worth editing this post itself. Atanu has blogged elaborately on Singapore’s transformation and the man behind it. I was just pondering on this question as I was writing this entry and voila I found the answer. Here is the link.