Dhoom 2

We saw Dhoom 2 on Saturday, the theatre was full, and the ticket was priced at 120/- each. This movie has the best sequences of all time, Hollywood or Bollywood, infact I can say it beats Casino Royales opening sequence hollow.

Hritik Roshan rocks in the movie, he seems to be getting better and better which every movie of his. Bipasha is really hot, and is seen in a sizzling bikini in the second half of the movie. Abishek is exactly the same as in Dhoom 1, which is not saying much. Uday Chopra is also exactly the same which is saying a lot, since he brings a lot of humour with him.

Aishwarya is okay.

Lots of foreign locales like SA and Brazil. Lots of stunts, lots of songs with slim girls with flat abs, no script to speak about.

Tacky sets though, Junagadh Fort is a made out of papier mache, the place where the Jewels of the Taj collection is placed is aweful. So is the museum.

Lots of shortcuts. So you will not get to find how he gets out of a particular situation, while they show him getting in. Similarly in another situation we have no idea how he gets in, or gets out.

Bajaj bike ad

This is an ad that used to run maybe a year or two ago. Very nice and can still be run, except that maybe the bike model is not being manufactured. Some of the current bike ads suck.

Chap comes home on a bike to some last known address, someone tells him the people have moved away, and our man keeps going with help from people telling the next know address (no dialogues only gestures), finally he and his trusty bike reach a house. He rings the bell and holds a puppy he had brought with him, a beauty with long manicured nails opens the door looks at him and gives a "Oh my god" kind of a look, guy is thrilled but they notices the sindoor and the mangalsutra and gives a "oh damn I am too late" kind of a look. She gives a "You know how I was I to know you were on planet earth" kind of a look in return.

Meanwhile a little boy comes rushing out of the house and looks at man with a big grin, man gives him the puppy, boy is thrilled gives him a "next time bring me a toy train" kind of look, beauty smiles, man waves and goes back to his bike and rides away.

The Great Train Robbery By Michael Crichton

I actually finished reading this Michael Crichton book The Great Train Robbery two months back. It was a a very gripping novel narrating the Great Train Robbery of 1903. Crichton takes you through the characters and the plot and the England of 1903 with such ease that you think that probably he transported himself in a time machine for that purpose. At the end he tells you something though, which thankfully you don't get to know in the beginning. Meanwhile in passing you get to read a little about the Crimean War, in which the Charge of the Light Brigade took place. You read about the Indian Mutiny/First War of Independence, the artocities committed by the mutineers and the British thereafter and so on.

Europa 2000 stamps

In the year 2000 the postal organisation of Europe or CEPT decided to go for a common design for the Europa stamps being issued. Europa stamps are stamps issued by European countries (who are members of CEPT) that are valid for postage within Europe. A little quirky perhaps having a stamp for Europe, but then they have been having this for some years now.

So for year 2000 the french design was chosen for the stamp, and this design was replicated on the stamps of some 45 countries in the CEPT plus also by some not in it. And some like Great Britain, Norway chose not to issue any Europa stamp that year. And some like Yugoslavia and Bulgaria issued stamps without this desgn on it.

2000 was the year I started stamp collecting as a hobby, and also the year India finally allowed the use of credit cards outside of India. So I came across this Europa 2000 design in almost all brochures and then decided I have these stamps in my collection. I now stamps from 52 countries or domains. Totalling 55 stamps since some of the countries have issued these in two denominations.

I started buying these since 2000, so in 2000 17 countries, 2001 10, 2002 4, 2003 4, 2004 1, 2005 3 and in 2006 13 countries.
Of these 18 I bought from 4 stamp dealers (1 in India), 6 on eBay but all the rest from the respective stamp administration. I have collected only those which had issued with the star design on it. I now have four countries still left.

Round Kiwis - New Zealand Stamps

New Zealand has been issuing round shaped stamps with their national bird, the kiwi, on it since 1988. They have had six issues so far, with each issue having a different colour. However in 1999 they took the remaining stock of their 1997 purple kiwi stamps, and overprinted them with a sun on the corner of the stamps. In 2000 when the stamps were re-issued with a gold colour, the rate was increased from NZ $1.00 to $1.10, and finally when it was issued in 2002 in brown colour, the rate had shot up to $1.50.

They have also been incorporated into three exhibition minisheets in 1993, 1994 and 2000. I have not shown these minisheets in these pages. If you click on the links above, the green, red and blue kiwis will open to a page containing an image of the stamp, and its accompanying First Day Cover. The purple kiwi will only have the stamp image and a gutter pair stamp set. The remaining stamps ie the Last Sunset, gold and brown kiwis will all open to an image of the stamp, a FDC and a gutter pair stamp set.

Please note that all the above stamps are of the same size.

Russian stamps

Old Carriages	Antique Russian Cars
Amber Room	Zodiac signs

Stamps from island nations

There are plenty of tiny island nations around the world who issue stamps just like any other country. Except that the revenue earned from the sales of their stamps will constitute a good part of their GNP;-) That is true. So here I have on display stamps from the Norfolk Island, Pitcairn Islands, Falkland Islands and South Georgia and Sandwich Islands. The last three I bought only this year.

Falkland Islands: Maritime Heritage	South Georgia and Sandwich Islands: Navy Frigates and Cruisers	Norfolk Islands: Fragrance
Pitcairn Islands: HMS Bounty I	Pitcairn Islands: HMS Bounty II	Pitcairn Islands: Eclipse

Covers to India II

My stamp collecting hobby means that I get my stamps from various countries around the globe. While most envelopes that reach my table have postal franking instead of stamps, some do arrive with stamps. And that is a good enough number, some which I had made a post of in Covers to India I. Here is another post of another set of envelopes that I have received subsequently. The last one from Sweden arrived with my birthday postmark.

Error on envelopes	Australia
Island Nations II	Europe and US
Europe and Other nations	Sweden

Covers to India

One of the advantages of buying stamps is that they arrive in envelopes with... yes... stamps on them. Well mostly, many come franked, but many others come with groovy stamps on them. There is a market for these covers, for which your cost would have been next to nil, since you would have accounted for the postage cost in your stamp purchase cost it self.

Here are four different posts on envelopes receivde from different postal administrations, four island nations, two in the Pacific and two in the Atlantic, one balkan nation of Slovenia and a set of covers received from the XXII Indian Antarctic Expedition.

Slovenia	St-Pierre et Miquelon
Island Nations	Antarctica.

Stamps from Baltic nations

Here are a few stamps from the Baltics, ie the nations of Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania. What I have here are stamps from Latvia and Estonia, I will put up Lithuania when I am done scanning them.

Estonian Lighthouses I	Estonian Transport	Latvian automobiles
Estonian Lighthouses II		Latvian Lighthouses

Humour at NASA

See this photo of a shuttle mounting point on the NASA 747 aircraft which flies the shuttle piggy back. IT says attach orbiter here, black side down. Heh! Have to admire the humour of the guy who stencilled it there;-) Click for photo.

Error and other envelopes

I have received two covers, one from Iceland and another from New Caledonia which were sent to Indonesia by mistake. Two covers from Gibraltar, one which came postage due, except that this was sent by the Gibraltar Postal Bureau, the guys who make the stamps forgot to affix it. Another Gibraltar cover with a large Indian Customs seal saying unopened. Yes it did come upopened.


Left: Iceland missent to Indonedia,
Right: Gibraltar Postal Bureau cover without stamp affixed

Left: Gibraltar cover with Indian custom seal (no error here)
Right: New Caledonia missent to Indonesia

Boeing 787

Check the new Boeing 787 here. You can also check the Boeing 737 from this page. The 737 site has a large presentation where you can see the plane being put together.

Confession on Wiki

Recent Vandalism By Myself Check this confession by a chap on why he vandalised the page in question.

Pisten Bulley

Pisten Bully is the name of a tracked snow plough. I had come across this vehicle in an old issue of Road & Track magazine. When I saw the movie Cars in the scene where a harvestor is chasing McQueen I was reminded of that tracked plough. All kinds of Googling was only resulting in truck base snow ploughs. Finally decided I search for the magazine. No not on Google, but here in my rack. And yes I did have that magazine still with me. It is a 1998 mag and I still get impressed when I look at the snow plough. Without the snow plough attachment it is used as an ATV in arctic conditions. A Google search after this gave enough an more images and also the official site.

Errors in Iraq

I keep reading that the biggest errors in Iraq was disbanding the army, disbanding the Baathist Party, disbanding the bureaucracy. And then not putting enough boots on the ground, not preventing looting et al. Actually the biggest single error was invading Iraq. Even if there were weapons of mass distruction, or terrorist training cells, or Osama in a guest house in Tirkit, it would still have been foolish to invade that country. So Saddam Hussein was a tyrant, rightly so, if you see the way the citizens of Iraq are behaving, man, they require a tyrant to keep them from killing each other. There are tyrants in Burma but who is bothered about that country? We all know it was for oil. But were the chaps so brainless that they thought they could get in and start pumping right away?

New study

Red Wine Ingredient Increases Endurance, Study Shows Except of course that to replicate the dosage in mice you will have to drink 300 glasses of wine a day.

Live steam toys

When I was little by dad'd youngest brother while leaving to the US left a large non working model train set, one steam boiler toy and a bunch of magazines and brochures. The model rail couldn't work since the engine was devoid of the motor ( as we found on dismantling) and as fortune would have it we never preserved it. The steam I was soon able to work, but eventually the damn thing lost a bit of solder on a pipe and then went missing. But this being the case I have always been interested in steam powered toys. Check this fire engine below, it runs on steam, and is able to send a spurt of water from its water hose. Cost at the eBay seller is a whopping Rs 15,000 plus ($320), which is actually much below the discounted Rs 24,000 ($459) at Yesteryears, which is less as compared to their MRP price of Rs 28,000 ($599) plus;-) WILESCO D305 FIRE ENGINE at eBay WILESCO D305 FIRE ENGINE at Yesteryear Toys Then there is this lovely steam powered locomotive 55005 Marklin steam engine at the same eBay seller above. This one is powered by steam, fill its boiler with water, the water is heated by means of a gas powered system, and the locomotive movement is controlled by remote control. One of these babies minus the track system (it can only be run outdoors) costs a cool Rs 1.15 lakhs ($2468). Edit: Note that I do not own or intend to own the models shown above.

Thrown off a plane

Imams removed from flight at US airport * Six Muslim imams were removed from a US Airways flight at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport Heh! Like there are catholic or hindu imams or something. * Three of them stood and said their normal evening prayers together on the plane, as 1.7 billion Muslims around the world do every day, Shahin said. If they go scuba diving, I am sure they will pray on the sea bed along with 1.7 billion other muslims. I know enough muslims around here who DON'T pray all the while.

Casino Royale

Suchitra called up yesterday and said the power that had failed hadn't yet come back. This meant that the battery backed power invertor could just likely give up on us in the evening when the lights came on. So we decided to drop the girls off at my in-laws place and go and see Casino Royale at 7pm. Later we came to know that the power was restored at 7pm.

BTW there were a bunch of western tourists at the mulitplex who came to watch the movie. After the movie finished they were all going back to see another one. As they were going in another bunch of younger (and slimmer) western tourists where lining up at the ticket counter. These were all dressed in traditional ethic Indian dresses like salwars, gagras and so on.

More about the movie, which is very watchable...



The most spectacular chase scene that I have ever seen, and that too not on a car, on legs. It is not called running btw, it is a sport called Parkour.
During this chase sequence, you will actually wince, yell, gasp and fall backwards in your seat, at the suffering of the two fellow human beings slamming into walls and metal structures.
No car chases, except for one half hearted attempt at following another car.
I am sure there is a plot and story line somewere.
As you all know by know Bond shows a lot of skin, while the Bond girls don't.
Only two Bond girls. And one of them is an accountant! Does she count?
Most spectacular locales. We loved the Montenegro aerial scene, where a castle is on a hill, surrounded by the most cute village.
I did not see Q in the movie at all. Suchitra saw Richard Branson going through airport security in the Florida airport scene.
Bond's new car has a portable defibrillator.
The worlds largest aircraft in unveiled in the move, and it is not the Airbus A380. It is a creation just for this movie, with two jet engines packed into one pod. The plane looks really ugly, but looks very real and very impressive.
When asked if he wants his martini shaked or stirred he says "I don't give a damn!"
One year back I made a post The new James Bond character saying the bad seats in our theatres would look or seem better compared to the new Bond. Now we have a multiplex in town with super seats and airconditioning. So the movie was simply great viewing.
Daniel Craig has the most over powering presence a Bond has ever got so far. He is there everywere, at times the entire screen shows just his two eyes.
The casino scene could be watched by non card players, and card play haters alike.
BUT the casino scene has been broken up to show some other scenes. So the whole thing looks a bit disjointed. Those who have seen the movie can click here to see what I mean.
The last scene in the movie, with the mountains and the valleys and the lake and the magnificent mansion at the edge of the lake, is well magnificent.
Bond doesn't sleep with both girls.
Two and a half hours long incl interval.
Biggest laughing moment - click here.
I still think Live and Let Die had the best Title song! So there!
The Bond theme comes ripping through the speakers as the movie ends. And I have to tell you that it is still the best movie themes ever composed. I would have had tears in my eyes if I was a emotional type.

Shoot out!

Woman, 92, dies in shootout with police Well in all fairness it seems she fired first:-) Not only did she fire at the three officers approaching her house, she found her target too. One was hit in the arm, another in a thigh and the third in a shoulder.

Kellogs Muesli

I first came across Muesli in Bangalore while shopping at Nilgiris. I bought out of curiosity, it was a product by some company called Bagrrys, and claimed all kinds of good health for you if you ate it. I liked it and ate it. And even though I am very careful in my food intake I got a heart attack at of all ages 41 instead of say at 61. Soon after my brother when he came visiting dropped a box of Bagrrys muesli saying it was healthy (not knowing that was what I was eating earlier) But this time when took a bowl of it it was tasteless. Not merely by my contempt towards it, it was indeed tasteless now. Since last month Kellogs ran an ad for their muesli. Saying so many things about it. I bought their smallest box. Ate one bowl and told Suchitra to toss the rest. It really tastes like crap! That too with candied fruits in it. Ugh! We usually have dosa and other Indian breakfast. And have cornflakes say about once a week. The brand now is Kellogs. And I take their Real Almond, or Banana which are really good. I used to take their Honey earlier, but after they rebranded it as Real Honey it no longer tastes as good. Suchitra prefers their Frostys and Sneha prefers their Chocos. Meanwhile before I forget Kavya speak for cornflakes is cornshall!

Indian cricket

Kallis made a 119 in the 2nd ODI at Durban. The entire Indian team was unable to make more than 91. This made Suchitra to say that we should concede our position in the 2007 World Cup. I suggested that a new country like Bhutan or Mongolia be nominated instead. They might stand a better chance. And all Indians would be spared the pain and ignomy that follows defeats like this. Suchitra said yesterday's news scroller mentioned that Vengsarkar is rushing to South Africa. "Why?" I asked! For which Suchitra said "Maybe to open the batting!" Hah! Hah! Hah!

Goods plus money?

Two weeks back Suchitra bought something and gave her card. The guy came back gave her package and also gave her cash equal the amount she had spent. She almost thought if he was having a "cash back offer" or something. Turns out as he sheepishly said, thinking that the first swipe didn't work, he swiped it again. And then found two printouts! Suchitra of course was very pleased with the result;-) I am of course looking at the two swipes online right now;-) I am very careful with my credit card (to the extent possible of course) and left it behind in a store only once. As luck would have it, it was left behind at Suchitra's cousin's store. He called her up to tell "bhavaji has been very nice to leave his credit with us!" Heh! And then of course to those who came to my list late. When Sneha was just 4 years old she came with this very nice idea to banish poverty. I had just taken her to her first ATM experience, and had seen me draw money. (It was also my first experience BTW) And so back in the car she tells us "we should give all beggars an ATM card so they will never have to beg for money!" For a child it was such a nice idea you know!