Me Playing Drums

For all the people who know that I play the drums, here's a video for you. For all the people who don't know that I play the drums, here's a video for you too.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SzAj37d75g

Note: Any suggestion on what song I should learn next?

Deepavali Again (This Time in Words)

I would like to wish all people (and girls and boys) who read this post a Happy Deepavali. I tried not to burst as many bombs as last year, and I succeeded big time. I burst almost double the number of bombs that I burst last year! And for all the Earth-saving-ecologists who are new to this blog, don't worry! The number is still less, because last year I didn't burst many crackers as I had stitches on my knee (and I didn't say I burst 0 crackers because 0 X 2 = 0). And for those of you who thought I would say "The worlds gonna end anyway!", sorry, because I don't believe in nonsense... or movies for that matter.

So, if you look at the title, you will see that this post was supposed to be about Deepavali. Last year, I just uploaded a few videos of people in our colony bursting crackers, but this year I would like to share some information that my father pointed out in a newspaper (I still don't read the newspapers). There were actually two different articles. The first one said that the noise levels were reducing and they weren't as high as last year. This is good and I hope the noise levels go further down. But the second article said that there were much more dangerous gases released than last year. This is probably because people lit flower pots and sparklers instead of bombs (and if you substituted your bombs with flower pots, now is the time to look at your feet and feel guilty).

According to the first article, the noise levels on Deepavali compared to normal days, in Pragatinagar increased by ten decibels, 4 in Jubilee hills (on the same scale), 3 in Abids, 1 in Paradise and Punjagutta, 8 in Uppal, 5 in Jeedimetla and 1 in Zoo Park. I don't know two or three of these places, so if you are not from Hyderabad, I don't expect you to know any of them.

According to the second article, the air quality compared to normal days, the air quality was worse than normal. The air quality is measured by calcualting the amount of Particulate matter 10 (PM10) in the air. It is specified in micrograms per cubic metres. This year in Abids, the count increased by 84. Similarly, it increased by 134 in Kukatpally, 131 in Panjagutta, 98 in Jubilee hills, 70 in Uppal, 111  in Paradise, 19 in Balanagar and 31 in Jeedimetla. Overall, the PM10 increased by 71% on the day of Deepavali.

Sulphur dioxide and Nitrogen dioxide had gone up by 33% and 32% respectively, but were still within the prescribed standards. I would like to end this post on a negative note: whatever crackers we burst, the environment is disturbed, so we have no option but to burst less crackers or switch to electric crackers. Electric fireworks are new revolutionary lighting systems that simulate the look of  regular fireworks through the use of the latest lighting technology. Unlike normal fireworks, electric fireworks can be displayed for hours on end with several variations of pre-programmed firework effects!

Note: If you are interested in purchasing elecric fireworks, you can visit http://www.air-effects.com/fireworks-palm-tree.html. This website has all information about electric fireworks.



 

My Interactions with Famous Personalities on Animal Welfare

It has been almost three months since I posted anything on this blog. After the exams, I had made a new time table and forgot to add time to post on my blog. I only remembered my blog when something interesting happened.

My father recently happened to be sitting next to Amala Akkineni on a flight. He told me that they talked about animal welfare issues and Mrs.Akkineni told my father about a program that her organisation conducted in Venkatagiri, a village in Nellore district (I will write about what was happening in the village later) in the state of Andhra Pradesh in India. Later, when my father told me about the program, it sounded interesting and I thought of writing a blog post about it. I asked my father for more information and he told me that I'll have to contact Mrs.Akkineni for that since he didn't have all the information. I immediately lost interest but decided to send her an email anyway. At first, I thought it would reach her spam and she would probably look at it some ten years later. Anyway, I really didn't expect someone who had their own page on Wikipedia to reply to my emails; and when I didn't receive any reply for a week, I was convinced that I was right.
Then one fine day... in the middle of the night... I opened inbox to see what was sent out...jokes aside, after a week, I finally received a reply to my email from Mrs.Akkineni and she stated that she couldn't reply earlier because she was busy and she would ask one of the blue cross members - Education Officer Mr.Sriram - to send me all the details I had asked for. After another week waiting for an email from Sriram and then feeling dejected, I happened to open my spam folder and realised that Mr.Sriram had replied to my email 3 days earlier. In that email he had answered all my questions and provided a lot of information about the program they had conducted in Venkatagiri.

It seems that huge number of animals were being sacrificed in temples in the village of Venkatagiri. Small animals like hens, goats, sheep, and sometimes even large animals such as buffaloes were sacrificed on the annual festival days (the dates for the annual festival are declared by the temple committee every year). Mrs.Akkineni had organised a campaigning team, which had been in action in the September of 2010 and 2011, and their campaigning team happens to be at Venkatagiri right now for this year's festival. The team compromised of corporate professionals, NGO founders and students, who were aged from 17 to 38 (I would have liked to be the youngest at 13). The team had used various strategies to educate the people, such as 1) Door to door counselling for households in sensitive areas. 2) Short talks with students in their classes in all high schools and colleges. 3) Huge public gathering addressed by Mrs.Akkineni. 4) Mrs.Akkineni followed by student rally. 5) Celebrity bytes on local cable television channels, etc; The program carried out by this organisation had been funded by the Administration of Nellore district. And guess what? This program really payed off. It was believed that 60,000 animals were sacrificed every year, and now -with the help of district authorities and the police departments - the numbers have reduced by 40%! I am sure that the number of animals being sacrificed will be further reduced this year. After the program, Mrs.Akkineni's team had empowered local NGOs to work accordingly. Now, the Blue Cross visits Venkatagiri during the months of September and October.

Personally, I think this program has been a huge success. The team has saved the lives of thousands of animals in the village of Venkatagiri. Everyday, many animals are killed (especially in India) in the name of sacrifice. Endangered species are becoming extinct. People are killing animals without realising their use in the ecosystem. How many of you like dead animals better than the ones alive? Animals can provide us with many things even when they are alive, and somehow people don't seem to notice this. Why sacrifice buffaloes, hen and sheep, when they can provide us with milk, eggs and wool when they are alive?

Mrs.Akkineni has also spent a lot of times with animals, and she has founded a voulantary organization: Blue Cross of Hyderabad, which has saved over 300,000 birds and animals. And I feel happy to know that some famous person who has the ability to change the mindsets of people (about animals), is helping the world to turn into a better place by siding with the animals (who cannot create guns to defend themselves against the most violent animal - humans).

Note: Articles about the program in Venkatagiri have appeared in National newspapers also. You can read more about the program here (http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-andhrapradesh/article2466314.ece)

Bonnet Macque (Macaca Radiata) Visits the Kitchen

Does anyone know what to do when a monkey visits your house and decides to grab some free bread? I am not really sure, and I am certainly not accepting the answer "FREAK OUT", because I know that's not going to work. And I say that with experience. A monkey actually just visited our house, went so close to my cake that my mother forbade me to eat it, took our packet of bread for snack and polluted the environment by discarding the plastic cover in our yard. And they say only humans cause global warming.

This is like a repeat episode of the Snake in the yard, with one huge difference. The difference: the snake was stopped from entering the house, but the monkey wasn't. 
Details: the monkey was sitting on the wall opposite our back door. I happened to notice the monkey just as i finished a science article about 'Rabies'; talk about coincidences. I was too scared to go and close the door and I started shouting for my mother to come downstairs. I then realised that I could close the door myself, but it was TOO LATE! By then the monkey had come inside and was exploring the dining table (and you might think that it was my fault). That was when the FREAKing OUT part happened.

I picked up an apple and drew the attention of the monkey to it. I then rolled it out of the door and saw that the eyes of the monkey followed the (not so) delicious apple. But no luck; the monkey did not follow the apple outside. I tried the same thing a few more times, and gave up as the monkey turned it's back on me. Man, what all you have to do to impress these modern monkeys. You know how you feel when people ignore you? Somehow, it was worse when this monkey did it.

Then this monkey stepped into our kitchen. And instead of staring at the monkey that had developed a new interest in our stove, I ran for my camera. I was 20 steps and 1 click away for getting one of the funniest pictures. And I missed taking the picture. By the time I jumped the last 9 steps in a single leap, the monkey had gone out the door (and the jump was not because of the influence of some monkey, mind you). I was disappointed and relieved at the same time. But when I saw what was happening outside, I realised that I could still get some good pictures. The monkey had stolen a packet of bread and unwrapped it on the wall. It then disposed the packet into our backyard and scrambled onto the window sill of our neighbour's house, and was enjoyed it's late snack and left from there. That was the end of the bandit monkey episode.

I might have missed a few things so please look below.

• My dog  was barking all along as the monkey committed it's crime. Fortunately it was tied
• You know everyone says that monkeys are incarnations of the Hindu monkey God Hanuman? Unless getting your bread stolen is a divine blessing, I wouldn't believe it.
• People say monkeys are smart. I think that doesn't really matter if they don't have basic manners (don't pollute the environment).
• Forgot to mention, I think the species of the monkey that stole our bread is the Bonnet Macque and thats the English, not the scientific name.
• My mother later told me that when I went to get my camera, I missed seeing the monkey flying from cupboard to cupboard and almost nearly stepping into the cake.

Note: I think I specialize in writing about abnormal animal incidents, which rarely take place.

Timetables, and Death by Bernoulli's Principle

Finally

I heard that it is not a good idea to start a post with if, so I have decided to start a post with "I heard that it is not a good idea to start a post with if.....". I really hope you don't mind. Anyway, if you are wondering why I haven't posted for this long, it is because I was trying to finish 4 posts at the same time, and I didn't have any time. I was actually going to write about my vacation, and the details of my vacation, and something else, and this, but this one got over first and I can finally post.

And coming to my timetable. Well, it's kind of hard to explain. I have almost one free hour the whole week, and I usually end up playing video games or something. I actually wanted to paste the whole timetable in this post, but my mother didn't let me do it. So I don't think I can. Anyway, I would like to conclude the post by..... no, not yet. I skipped the Bernoulli's Principle part.

So, the Bernoulli's Principle is this Principle discovered by Bernoulli, which states that when wind blows really fast between two objects and low pressure is created between them, the objects get attracted to eachother. Take an example of a train. If you stand really close to the train, the wind caused by the train creates low pressure. Then the pressure behind you is higher, and pushes you towards the train. Death by Bernoulli's Principle is when the high pressure pushes you onto the railway tracks. And, I think i'm getting late for school, so I would like to end the post.

Note: Don't stand next to a train to check if what I said was really true. That would not be a science experiment, it would be suicide.  

For Geeks (Only)

I really thought that there was nothing to write about on this blog, and was thinking of writing of something unreal (this thought was real), when I remembered that I was waiting for a few books to release. I thought I should write about these books, the series and the authour. There are five books that I really need to read this year, and maybe some other books will be released that would be worth reading. The five books are:

1) (The 39 clues) Cahills vs Vespers [Book 4]: Shatterproof.





2) (Percy Jackson) The Heroes of Olympus [Book 3]: The Mark of Athena.

                                                                           

             3) The Kane Chronicles [Book 3]: The Serpent's Shadow.
                  (Already released)



                                 

4) Artemis Fowl [Book 8]: The Last Guardian.

                                                    





  5) The Power of Five [Book 5]: Oblivion.










(The ()'s are for the older series, the normal writing is for the current series and the name of the book, and the []'s are for the book number in the current series.)

Note: There is nothing else to write about these books, or I am too lazy to write. The next post will be way more interesting. So, the post ends here.

The Boringest Post I Ever Wrote.

A/C

Every summer, the government is responsible for around 50 million deaths, where the victims are mostly children. The government uses their deadliest weapon, and causes a very unusual death, which you may not have heard of. It is true! The government causes Death by Boredom, using their deadliest weapon: power-cuts. This happens a lot, especially in the summer. Which might be an excuse to post less. Actually, that reason is not valid. We have an inverter at home, so I can connect to the Internet and post, even if there is a power cut. Actually, the reason for more power-cuts in the summer (I think) is that people use more electricity for A/Cs, fans, and there is only a certain amount of electricity that can be used. 

Also, school has been closed for summer vacation. This creates two new problems:


1) Parents making children study from books one class higher.
2) What to do in the school time (other than wasting time, which is equivalent to going to school).

I have tried to come up with solutions. The studying from higher classes books can't be solved, and I hope it's the easier Multiple Choice Questions..... If it isn't, then there is a valid reason to not post or read blogs during summer. 

The second problem depends entirely on yourself. If your parents get you gifts when you top the class, the first problem is a solution. If you are an active person, just swim in school hours. If you are small and do not enjoy out door games, I am sorry, I have zero expertise in that area. And don't forget the things you should not do in the summer vacation. Never sleep for extra hours, and especially in the afternoons. That is when you should watch TV. Just tell you parents it's too hot to play outside. And try not to drink coke for 24 hours straight, it might damage your teeth.

And I got nothing more else to say today. matbe, listen to more music in the summer. That's it.

Note: Please don't over use the A/C, and help the government in making their decision to cause power-cuts. You can save millions of children. (Also note: the boringest post ever because I ran out of ideas)

Cats, Beach Adventures and Stuff.

The worst thing about having a dog (other than shutting it up because of the cats on the street) would be taking it to the vet. As most of you may already know, I have a dog, and unfortunately, I decided to take it to the vet just before typing this post. The veterinary clinic is way worse than the hospital, and the patients keep barking UN-understandable orders. And that can really make you forget how to apologise for not posting on your blog for 3 months.

Anyway, that wasn't much of an apology, but moving on:
1) Leg is better.
2) Exams are done.
3) I am now in the 8th grade.

Exams can be very frustrating. You work so hard, write so much, and next thing you know, people expect you to work harder. I think the only exams that we should be having are the 10th grade exams, and maybe entrance-exams. With exams done, you think I should be enjoying. Yeah, with one month of 8th grade before summer vacation and teachers springing surprise tests on students, consider enjoyment dead. Why do people expect us to work so hard, only to get washed over by nervousness for a week, and then start working harder? Some thing that doesn't make sense.

Another thing I want to write about: cats. I have mentioned that our dog barks it's head off when it sees the cats on the street. Things that I have not mentioned: they are kittens, and their history. One day we saw 3 new-born in kittens in my friend/neighbour's house. Then, their illogical house keeper tried to pick them up the wrong way. You can guess what happened next. House keeper got scratched, kittens were picked up the right way, and kicked (not literally) onto the street. Obviously, they were spotted a day later, under some tree in front of our house, and tamed properly. But not THE END.

They started following my neighbour into his house! NOT GOOD. So my neighbour decided to give them off to the people living opposite to his house. The cats didn't live in the house, but on the street in front

of their house. A few days later, the manager of our colony "took care" of the kittens when no one was watching. Rumours spread. The kittens had been given to the blue cross, they had been put in the park, they had been put in a famous park a few kilometres from our house. I don't know where they went, but I know that they found their way back. The angry manager asked us to do something, and our neighbours moved them into a small garden in our colony (yes, it's a big colony). But the little, excited kittens wandered onto the road. And very very very sadly, I can now agree with the saying "Curiosity kills a cat."


In our holidays after the exams, we went to Mumbai. Our uncle was having a function as he had bought a new flat. We reached a few days before the function and stayed in our uncle's old house. Actually, it was really boring, because our cousin sister had tuitions from six in the morning, till two in the afternoon. She kept on saying that she sat right beside the A/C and had tasty snacks. You think that I would want to go to the tuition too, even though I don't really eat much. But no. Nobody would want to go to the tuition after they saw the amount of homework that was given.

Juhu Beach, Mumbai.

My cousin sister had so much homework that she couldn't come to the beach with us the other day. We went to the beach in an auto. I wanted to swim, but in a hurry, I had forgotten my swimming shorts. It didn't make a difference to me. I swam for half an hour, I think. After that I just waited for my clothes to dry, and had some snacks. There were also many people trying to earn quick money, using trained monkeys for their performances. There was even an artistic woman who was making a huge sand sculpture on the beach. The sculpture was of the Indian monkey God, Hanuman (who was sculpted flat on the sand and was facing the sky). I did not take my camera to the beach, and sadly, couldn't get any pictures. It had gotten pretty late by that time and we had to go home (or our cousin's home), but then, after all we did, it took more time to reach home. We were going to come back in an auto. We told him that we had to go to Santacruz. Unfortunately, we forgot to mention if it was Santacruz East, or Santacruz West. He was just about to take us to the wrong Santacruz, when we got of and took the Sky Walk to someplace close to the house. And I was having a really bad time, because it was getting dark and cold, and my shorts wasn't completely dry. We got off the Sky Walk, and went to the bus station. We took a bus, which my aunt thought would take us home. Just as the bus moved, and we were about to buy the ticket, we realised it was not going to our place. So along with some other people (who were used to this kind of stuff, I think), we got of the bus when it stopped in traffic. I got off at the last second, and actually had to jump of a moving bus.
Shockingly, as we weaved through moving traffic, towards the footpath, we found an auto to drop us home . The driver thought there were only three passengers (my aunt, my mother and my sister) and started moving along with the traffic when the 3 of them were inside and I was still on the road. Just then, I had to do some quick thinking: be lost in some big, noisy city or go home to have a bath. If my shorts weren't so wet, I guess I would have decided to get lost and find my way back home. But my shorts was still wet, and I was freezing. So, naturally, I decided to jump into the moving auto.
Point to note: Jumping in and out of moving vehicles may not be dangerous as it seems but I would still advise against small kids and old people doing it.
Anyway, we got home to see our cousin doing her homework. Our beach adventure was finally done.

Another interesting thing that happned was related to a bird. A baby bird got it's leg stuck in our window. After making sure it could not fly, I picked it up and took it to the balcony, where it wouldn't be chased by my dog. But just as it entered the balcony, it jumped onto a branch. It is still living there, and still can't fly. The bird was in my hand only for five minutes, and I was busy saving it, so I didn't really have a chance to get a picture when the bird was in my hand.

There are two mango trees in our house - one of them has six bats living on them, and that may be the reason why we don't have any mangoes this year - and the bird jumped onto the one with the bats. But I don't really think the bird cares about the bats. Now that I think of it, if I didn't publish this post, then it would have contained much more information and would have been much longer.

Note: Come to think of it, with all the dogs, cats and birds, feels like i'm living in a zoo.

View From the Couch

Every weekend, I noticed the birds in our garden while sitting at home, but I forgot about them as soon as they flew away. When I realised the birds came to our house every day, and the thought got stuck in my mind, I decided to take some pictures.

This explains the bad-luck that I'm having... 

A Black Cat!

Note: I hope you are not superstitious enough to be afraid of two pictures of a black cat crossing my path, posted on Friday the 13th. 

New Year's Resolutions

A resolution is like a wish made on New Year. It's kind of hard to describe..... here's the dictionary meaning: A New Year's Resolution is a commitment that a person makes to one or more lasting personal goals, projects, or the reforming of a habit. This goal must be reached by the next New Year. Keep in mind that this is a goal, not a wish and should be something that you as a person could strive for. I don't think making resolutions is very that popular in India.

the person who wrote the above
should also add "improve handwriting to the list

I personally don't make New Year resolutions, but I do make resolutions. After all, it's not necessary to make resolutions only when a New Year starts. Most of the people (like me) are so busy enjoying themselves that they forget to make a resolution, even if they were supposed to. I have talked about this to my mother, and she says that I should make a resolution to not watch television for the rest of the year... I will make these kind of resolutions only on December 31st, at 11:50pm. I have asked many people if they have made any resolutions after the New Year started. Most of my friends didn't make any resolutions. I guess they are receiving similar suggestions too.

I have also heard that many people break their resolutions with a month!  I think I figured out why this happens. Recently, when my mother went to a store to buy gym shorts for my sister's badminton classes there were no gym shorts available. The shopkeeper said the gym shorts were out of stock because many people had bought gym shorts since new years day. Now, since the most popular new year resolution is to go to the gym or exercise regularly, only very few of the people who made the resolution would have bought gym shorts and everybody else who didn't buy shorts will be breaking their resolution. Now it is easy to understand why many people break their resolutions within a month.

Recent research shows that while 52% of participants in a resolution study were confident of success with their goals, only 12% actually achieved their goals.

Have you made any resolutions?

Note: I think I should make a resolution: post on my blog more often.