Website Review - Business Directory Nepal

Website Review - Business Directory Nepal

The theme for this month is

"Business Directories (Yellow Pages) of Nepal"

Connection Yellow Pages

The oldest yellow pages directory of Nepal, started in 1991. On the website you can search the directory from search box, alphabetical listing and popular categories.

I personally found their advertisements to be more highlighted and the main directory less highlighted. Even the fonts are so small. And the add listing link is not easily viewable either.

Nepal Home Page Yellopages

Another popular yellow page directory of Nepal. The homepage makes you feel there are lots of listings here than in other directories. The directory is simple and effective - there are lots of categories you can choose from right at the homepage (along with number of listings under that category). A click on the category takes you to the sub category page, from where you can choose your listing. The listings are shown in table form, from which you can select the desired company for more details.

There is also a search box at the botton, though not so prominent. Also the add edit link is not easily visible. Other useful links at sidebar are also nicely highlighted. One thing missing perhaps is browse alphabetically or other methods of browsing.

Nepal Yellow Pages Business Directory

Probably the simplest yellow page directory. There's a big search button at the front page, as well as an advanced search option, based on city name, address etc. Then there browsing option by categories, which take you to sub categories page and then the individual listing. Couldn't be more easier and to the point.

Another interesting function for this directory is the membership. The site uses lot of AJAX like fancy technologies, which make the site browsing easy and fun. Once being member there are other functions like bookmark individual listing for further use. You can also select the listings directly from the Classification Index page. And getting listed is quite easy as well. You can even manage your own gallery and profiles. Pretty cool site from yoolk I must say. The site even has a yellow color theme for yellow pages. Just that the spelling of "yolk" is incorrectly mentioned as "yoolk". How lame!

Want to feature your website or blog here too? Drop a mail at nepalsites@gmail.com with some description about your website with the subject line "Website Review".

Pokhara

Pokhara

Pictures of Pokhara taken some time ago. Pokhara, beautiful as always and less polluted than Kathmandu valley. Places to see in Pokhara include Fewa Lake, Sarangkot, World Peace Pagoda, Bat Cave, Begnas Lake (the largest lake in Pokhara), Devi's Fall among several other wonderful places.

A morning view of Pokhara Sky as seen from a Lake Side hotel. On the background, the World Peace Pagoda can be seen. The World Peace Pagoda in Pokhara holds a giant statue of Buddha.

Devis Fall (also known as Devi's Fall or David's Fall or Devin's Fall or "Patale Chhango") is an attractive waterfall in Pokhara that runs through the "Gupteshowr Mahadev Cave". The water can rise quite high on rainy seasons.

Considered to be the most difficult cave to pass through, Bat Cave (or "Chamero Gufa") is so called due to the huge number of bats present inside the cave.

The most popular of the lakes in Pokhara, Fewa Lake (also known as Phewa Lake or Fewataal) also holds the temple in the middle of the lake named "TaalBarahi". On a clear day, the Annapurna range and Machapuchre are visible from this lake. One can also climb to the World Peace Pagoda after a short boating in Fewa Lake. The place around Fewa lake is popularly known as Lake Side where there are lots of hotels or guest house to stay in. The Lakeside is the most attractive destination for tourists in Pokhara.

The World Peace Pagoda is a short distance upwards from the base of Fewa Lake. On the route you can see this beautiful view of the Fewa Lake and the Annapurna range.

The Fool's Prayer

The Fool's Prayer

The royal feast was done; the King
Sought some new sport to banish care,
And to his jester cried: Sir Fool,
Kneel now, and make for us a prayer!

The jester doffed his cap and bells,
And stood the mocking court before;
They could not see the bitter smile
Behind the painted grin he wore.

He bowed his head, and bent his knee
Upon the monarch's silken stool;
His pleading voice arose: 'O Lord,
Be merciful to me, a fool!'

The room was hushed; in silence rose
The King, and sought his gardens cool,
And walked apart, and murmured low,
'Be merciful to me, a fool!'

- Edward Rowland Sill, 1868

I read this prayer on the novel "Gump & Co." by Winston Groom. With the last king of Nepal kicked out of the "Narayanhiti" Palace, I thought the poem made some sense. Anyway, the novel is a humorous sequel to the famous novel "Forrest Gump" by the same writer, which was even made into the movie "Forrest Gump" in 1994. The movie went on to become the biggest movie of that year as suggested by Oscars. I thought it was bit unfair to the movie "The Shawshank Redemption", released on the same year, which I believe is a must watch movie for anyone. Incidentally, the movie Shawshank Redemption currently ranks at number 2 in the IMDB top 250 movies of all times (right after the movie "The Godfather"). The Shawshank Redemption is an inspiring movie about friendship and hope, played by characters like Tim Robins and Morgan Freeman, in seemingly desperate times of life imprisonment in a notorious jail. I believe the concept of hope is applicable to anyone, anywhere.

Well we are drifting too much off topic here. Back to the Fool's Prayer. But then again, there's not much to talk about the fool; except perhaps that one should/could learn from their mistakes.

How to Make New Nepal

How to Make New Nepal

Here are a few suggestions on how to make new Nepal.

1) If you are in front of computer right now, find and replace all the words "Nepal" with "New Nepal" (or "NewNepal" or "New-Nepal" or "nu Nepal" or even "knew Nepal"). For best results, it is recommended to use an open source software such as OpenOffice. As always, backup previous data.

2) If you are into design and arts, use your favorite image editor such as Photoshop or Gimp to select Nepal from the world map. Nepal is small, so be careful, especially at the borders when selecting. Now you can paste it anywhere in the world map. Or even better, open a new file and paste Nepal there. Save it as "New Nepal" and there you have it.

3) If you are into science and chemistry stuff, you should have no problem with the next one. Initially we had Ne-P-Al. These are nothing but atomic symbols of Neon (Ne), Phosphorus (P), and Aluminum (Al) respectively. Now we will slowly add "N-E-W" to our "Ne-P-Al". Again the "N-E-W" are the atomic symbols of Nitrogen (N), Einsteinium (E), and Tungsten (W). Some of these elements are hyperactive or even radioactive. Adult supervision is needed for children. Also these experiments tend to be unpredictable and hence not advisable for very senior citizens either. Stories of successful experiments have been reported to produce new Nepal this way.

4) If you are into programming, let's say Java or C++ programming, the "new" function already exists. Just like you can create new instance of current date with the function new Date(); you can try to create new instance of current Nepal with the function new Nepal(); this method is recommended for programming gurus only since the new Nepal thus created is known to have serious memory allocation issues.

5) Literally, new also means fresh. So we will learn the recipe on how to make a fresh Nepal. First take a slice of Nepal. Rinse thoroughly in clean water several times till it is free from all the dirt. Add some fresh garnishes or toppings onto the Nepal according to your flavor. Fresh Nepal is ready. Serve chilled.

6) Well if you want more, hopefully you can find them online. Use your favorite search engine such as Google or Yahoo to search for how to make new Nepal.

P.S (Not to be taken too seriously!)

Website Review - FM stations in Nepal

Website Review - FM stations in Nepal

The theme for this month is

"24/7 FM stations in Kathmandu, Nepal"

Hits FM 91.2 MHz

Hits FM is one of the oldest FM stations of Nepal. It is especially recognized for pioneering in music awards in Nepal with the Annual Hits FM Awards. The station is accessible 24/7 online over the Internet as well. The website has quite a busy forum too at www.hitsfm.com.np/forum. Currently, the station is broadcasted in the capital Kathmandu only.

Kantipur FM 96.1 MHz

Kantipur FM is another very popular FM station of Nepal. The station is broadcasted to a wide range of audience all over Nepal. With its sister associates as Kantipur Publications, Kantipur Online and Kantipur TV, obviously Kantipur is a powerful brand in Nepal.

Image FM 97.9 MHz

Image FM is also one of the older FM station in Nepal. It is part of the Image Group of Companies and broadcasted to any corners of the country, along with the TV Image Channel. So Image FM has a very large audience from all over Nepal. Image FM also runs its annual music awards in Nepal.

BBC Radio Service 103 MHz

BBC Radio is a part of the BBC World Service in Nepal. Along with the normal BBC programs, BBC Radio in Nepal also features 45 minutes of Nepali programs starting from 8:45 PM NST or Nepal Standard Time (NST = GMT + 05:45). These programs include news, talk shows to drama shows which are produced here in Nepal and broadcasted from within the capital, Kathmandu.

Nepal FM 91.8 MHz

Nepal FM is the latest in the list to be broadcasted 24 hours a day.

Headlines and Music FM 97.2 MHz

Headlines and Music FM is also a relatively new FM station in Nepal. Currently as the name suggests, the FM plays just continuous music followed by brief news every hour.

Some other FM stations broadcasted in Kathmandu (that I am aware of) that are not yet 24/7 are Radio Upatyaka 87.6 MHz ("Radio Valley"), Radio Mirmire 89.4 MHz ("Radio Dawn"), FM Ujyalo 90 MHz ("FM Light"), Times FM 90.6 MHz, Capital FM 92.4 MHz, Gorkha FM 93 MHz, HBC FM 94 MHz (Himalayan Broadcasting Corporation), Metro FM 94.6 MHz, Star FM 95.2 MHz, Voice of Youth FM 96.8 MHz, Keeps FM 98.3 MHz, Radio City 98.8 MHz, Maitri FM 99.4 MHz ("Friendship FM"), Radio Nepal 100 MHz, ABC Radio FM 100.6 MHz, Classic FM 101.2 MHz, Radio Filmi FM 101.8 MHz, Radio Sagarmatha FM 102.4 MHz ("Radio Everest"), FM Paryawaran Chakra 104.2 MHz ("FM Conservation Circle"), FM Adhyatma Jyoti 104.8 MHz ("FM Meditation Light"), Good News FM Radio 105.1 MHz, CJMC F.M 106 MHZ, Radio Audio 106.3 MHz

Quite a long list there! The number of registered FM stations are still increasing in Nepal, so the list will only get longer.

Want to feature your website or blog here too? Drop a mail at nepalsites@gmail.com with some description about your website with the subject line "Website Review".

Web Plagiarism

Web Plagiarism

I was going through this website copyscape, which shows the duplicate contents of a website. When I searched for my blog http://nepalsites.blogspot.com I was surprised to see results from other websites with duplicate contents.

It may be alright if you use someone else's content and credit the original author for it, or express your views on that content, but to use someone else's content and take credits for it yourself - is just web plagiarism or cheating. I don't see how duplicating someone else's work can be acceptable in any part of the world. You don't need laws to tell you that piracy is illegal. Web piracy is unacceptable. Simple as that.

No web plagiarism please!

The Rain Song

The Rain Song

And the rains descended last night
some through the open windows
others through the closed doors
one by one
came those intruders of heart

and the rains danced
while the thunders cheered along
in perfect harmony at times
and patiently I listened
each of those chimes

asked I -
oh dear,
where have you been?
please come near.
smiled the rains -
come with us
and let's dance together

and the rains grew bigger
one by one
and sang their song
and i felt smaller
small as the raindrop
and so we danced
and danced all night long

Website Review - Extreme Adventures

Website Review - Extreme Adventures

The theme for this month is

"Extreme Adventures in Nepal"

Skydive Everest

As scheduled on October 2008, there will be Mount Everest tandem skydiving for the very first time. Which means that a group of extreme adventure lovers will have a free fall around Everest and land on to the highest drop zone ever. They will be jumping from an altitude of about 29035 ft. to about 12350 ft. That's about 16683 ft. of free fall in the air past the highest peaks of the world! And they even plan to film it. Incredible Indeed!

For details Visit Incredible Adventures website.

Bungy Jumping

They say "If you don't succeed at the first attempt, then skydiving probably isn't for you". I haven't heard such thing for Bungy Jumping though. Bungy Jumping is considered one of the top things you must do do before you die. The Bungy Jump in Nepal is considered one of the best, if not the best in the world. The 160 meters jump in the gorge of "Bhote Koshi" river is one of the longest free fall in the world. Even I jumped there few years back and was quite out of the world experience, I must say.

For Bungy Jumping and other extreme adventures in Nepal visit website of The Last Resort

Want to feature your website or blog here too? Drop a mail at nepalsites@gmail.com with some description about your website with the subject line "Website Review".

Google PageRank - some myths and truths

Google PageRank - some myths and truths

PageRank (PR) is a trademark of the search engine Google. Basically, PageRank is an algorithm or formula that calculates the importance of a webpage based on the number of links linking to the page, and the PageRank of the linking pages themselves. The Google PageRank is based on a scale of 0 to 10. It is based on logarithmic scale - which means that getting higher PageRank needs significantly large number of backlinks (that is, pages linking to your page). Assuming 10 as the base of the logarithmic scale, you can get PageRank of 1 from 1 backlink, PageRank of 2 from 10 backlinks, PageRank of 3 from 100 backlinks and so on. So you will need 1,000,000,000 backlinks to get a PageRank 10. In practice however, the base is less than 10, and there are other factors too, so you won't need that many links. Some sites with PageRank perfect 10 are such as the home page of Google.com and Adobe.com

Mathematically, PageRank is an iterative or repeated process which determines the final PageRank. Also PageRank is updated continuously by Google so your PageRank of your webpage will change over time.

Let's look at some myths and truths about PageRank.

My website has PageRank 0, I will never get high rank in Google or Yahoo!

That is so wrong. PageRank is NOT the same as search ranking. Your website can rank on the top in search ranking for a search term but still have a PageRank 0. Getting a high PageRank does mean that your site has many backlinks, or that your site is considered important, but it doesn't mean your site will rank well for your target keyword. Sites with good content will have good results in search engines irrespective of the PageRank.

In fact the PageRank doesn't take in account of the keywords at all - it just makes calculation based on the number of backlinks and the PageRank of the backlinks. While PageRank is one of the factors used to determine the search results in Google, it is not the only one. You should be worried if your site is not listed at all, not if you don't have high PageRank.

Also, except Google, other search engines don't understand PageRank at all.

But it says page rank! isn't it the same as website rank?

Not really. Like said, it is a process of calculating importance of a page based on the number of backlinks or so called the "votes" for a page. Whereas ranking on the website is about being seen in search engines when someone searches for search terms (known as keywords). If you have a website related to selling coins, you want your site to appear on top when someone searches for "old coins", or "buy coins". As long as that happens, getting higher PageRank is a secondary subject.

It would be worth noting that PageRank was so termed because it was initiated by one of the founders of the Google - Larry Page. It could so easily have been termed LarryRank!

Isn't PageRank same for all pages in my site?

No. PageRank is based on calculation of value of each page in the world wide web. It is perfectly normal to have different PageRank for different page within the same site. In fact that is how PageRank works.

It is the part of the webmaster or the SEO analyst to organize the pages in the website to get the best results.

My Google toolbar shows a different PageRank!

Google toolbar shows an old value of PageRank rather than the live value. You might want to check PageRank in sites such as www.prchecker.info or http://livepr.ezer.com/ to find your current PageRank.

Also it should be noted that Google shows PageRank from the closest datacenter (server). So if you are checking PageRank from Germany, it may not be same as that from USA or Nepal. You can have different PageRank from different datacenter.

Can I increase my PageRank? How?

Of course you can! Since PageRank depends upon backlinks, the only way is to increase number of backlinks.

For that all you need to do is write good/useful content or articles and promote them. Organize your website. Get good traffic into your site. Submit to search engines and directories. Use social networking sites to spread words about your articles. As other site find your site useful and link to your site, you will get better PageRank. You can use link exchange with other related sites. But never use link reciprocals to get cheap or spam links to your site.

Will my PageRank decrease when I link to other site?

Your site's PageRank will not decrease directly by linking to other site. PageRank depends on backlinks and their PageRank. The outgoing links in your site don't affect PageRank of your site. It is the incoming links or the links to your site that contribute to your PageRank, not the outgoing.

As far as incoming links are concerned, internal linking to your own site also contribute to your site's PageRank. So you have to understand how to build and organize your internal linking well.

However, if you are linking to bad sites on bad purpose, you will be kicked out of the search engines altogether sooner or later. So if you have a good site, don't link to bad sites and check that you don't get linked from bad sites either.

What about PigeonRank? Is it important too?

Ok. This isn't a myth really. Just that Google comes up with something to fool their users every now and then during April Fool's day. On April 1st 2002, Google came up with this wacky idea called PigeonRank™ that was supposed to be the heart of Google's fast search algorithm!

Another April is coming near. So be prepared for surprises from Google!

The bottom line is that PageRank is a methood developed by Google that ranks a webpage based on the number of backlinks it has got. Getting high PageRank is very desirable for getting popularity, but it is not enough to ensure that your website will get listed or rank well for given keyword.

Website Review

Website Review

I will be featuring website reviews related to various topics starting from this month. If you want your website or blog to be featured too, you can drop a mail at nepalsites@gmail.com with some description about your website with the subject line "Website Review".

The theme for this month is

"Photographs of Nepal"

eyescoffee.com/nepal

This site www.eyescoffee.com/nepal contains Black &White photography related to Nepal. The B&W nature of the photographs give them a nostalgic look. Some of the photos look like they are from centuries ago. Most of the images reflect the day to day life in many parts of the country. Such as that of children, animal sacrifice, and cremation.

In the words of the author, "EyesCoffee is not iced coffee. I also hope that it is not eyes candy, but something bitter, just like life."

photoblog.com.np

This site www.photoblog.com.np contains mostly images of flowers and nature related to Nepal. Made on wordpress, it has an easy navigation ideal for photo browsing. The vistors can comment on the photos too.

The site doesn't have many photos yet, but the ones on the site are eyecatchy, and hopefully the authors will post more often.

maion.com/photography/nepal

This site www.maion.com/photography/nepal has a wonderful collection of stock photography by the outdoor photographer Jef Maion. The site has many photographs related to trekking and the Himalayas, such as Shorong Himalaya, Lumding Himalaya, Khumbu Valley and Everest.

Absolutely fascinating photographs!

Want to feature your website or blog here? Drop a mail at nepalsites@gmail.com with some description about your website with the subject line "Website Review".

The Fence

The Fence

The white fence is gone
I saw today,
as I walked by the lane
the fence so bright and white
the fence we passed by each day
the fence is gone today


even yesterday,
the fence I saw still there
not white, not bright
just lying dirty there
waiting for someone near
but I wasn't there
and you weren't either


some other day,
I will see the memories again
of the fence so close
the fence bright and white
always behind us smiling
will you see too
the memories of our fence dying?

Dashain Greetings

Dashain Greetings

I remember the childhood days when the sky used to be colorful with the kites in Dashain. And the ground used be be full of people showing off their new dresses for Dashain. It is basically still the same, just that somehow this fifteen day long festival seems to be enjoyed lesser than it used to be. Whether it is the emptier looking sky or the busier lifestyles, I'm not sure, but the holiday spirit is somehow missing. The turmoils in the country definitely don't invite festive atmosphere, but that doesn't necessarily stop you from enjoying life - after all that's the spirit of Dashain - the celebrations, the home comings and the unifications of families.

Unity is certainly something that we are missing badly. With all the running and the pushing and the fighting, everybody needs a break. Hopefully Dashain will bring some good times back in everybody's life around the globe. Also why not carry celebration spirit of Dashain globally like the Oktoberfest festival?

Let the celebrations begin. Time for some drinks may be.

Happy Dashain!

Pink Floyd's Bike

Pink Floyd's Bike

Anyone who loves the music of Pink Floyd will know that Syd Barrett was the main person behind the formation of the band and its initial musical identity. (Un)fortunately, Syd was into too much drugs that caused him to be kicked out of the band that he himself formed. After three decades of solitary living, he died in the year 2006. But in his golden days of success, came the legendary album Piper At the Gates Of Dawn in the year 1967. Apparently Syd lived a troubled childhood, which showed in that album. It included lyrics that were childlike yet came from a psychologically disturbed person. And then there were trademark psychedelic rock music of Pink Floyd that made the album stand out. There were songs such as Matilda Mother, The Scarecrow, Interstellar Overdrive, Pow R. Toc H., Astronomy Domine, Lucifer Sam and of course Bike.

The song Bike went something like this..

I've got a bike
You can ride it if you like
It's got a basket
A bell that rings
And things to make it look good
I'd give it to you if I could
But I borrowed it

You're the kind of girl that fits in with my world
I'll give you anything
Everything if you want things

I've got a cloak
It's a bit of a joke
There's a tear up the front
It's red and black
I've had it for months
If you think it could look good
Then I guess it should

You're the kind of girl that fits in with my world
I'll give you anything
Everything if you want things

Now flash forward to the year 2007 and I see the never ending line of bikes (motorcycles this time) in the streets of Kathmandu. Let's do some hypothetical, theoretical and practical maths and logic combination. Let's say an average person spends 3 hours each week in the queue for petrol. With around 52 weeks in a year, that means an average person wastes 3x52 = 156 hours a year in petrol queue. If we assume a half a million people queuing up like this every year, this means we are losing about 500,000x156 = 78,000,000 hours in a year. Again, by simple practical maths, there are 24 hours in a day and 365 days in a year. This means the waste is about 8904 years in a single year! Let's continue our simple hypothetical logic. The life expectancy of an average person here is 60 years. So dividing that 8904 years by lifespan of a human being, that is 60 years, we soon realize that we are losing about 148 person in a year.

The summary is that the country is losing 148 citizens each year in the petrol queue. 148 citizens are disappearing while waiting for petrol for their bikes!

Damn, where are all the human rights organizations who have been carefully following the disappeared citizens?

About the Pink Floyd's bike, the last lines of the lyrics goes something like this

I know a room full of musical tunes
Some rhyme
Some ching
Most of them are clockwork
Let's go into the other room and make them work

May be it is good time to look for some alternative energy or hybrid vehicles.

PRASHANT TAMANG - the next Nepali / Indian Idol?

PRASHANT TAMANG - the next Nepali / Indian Idol?

Well the name of the show is Indian Idol. But the final contestant Prashant Tamang is equally or more popular here in Nepal. Partly because he's from Darjeeling, which happened to be a part of Nepal once upon a time. But mostly because he is a Tamang, a simple guy with Nepali origin. Also it is probably because of his simple behavior that has been able to capture the hearts of millions of people in India and Nepal. Or may be the harsh treatment by the judges at times, has been a factor for his massive popularity. Whatever the reasons, the fact is that he is extremely popular in his home town Darjeeling, overall India, and even Nepal. And being in the final two it is very likely that he is going to be the next idol.

It would be a great story if he wins the contest because he's not a trained singer and works as an ordinary Indian policeman. Also it can be said that Prashant Tamang would be a double idol - both an Indian Idol as well as a Nepali Idol. That said, he already is an idol for many people. The extravaganza for the SMS voting is something like never seen before. With free traveling and accommodation to his home town Darjeeling, the promotions is quite bizarre. Singing wise, he's believed to have a lesser edge against his competitor Amit Paul, but looking at the excessive hype for Prashant, its definitely a case of who performs better and gets the most votes.

Outside Kathmandu - NAGARKOT

Outside Kathmandu - NAGARKOT

Getting stuck in the streets of city like Kathmandu can be boring at times. Taking a break & climbing up the hills of Nagarkot to watch the sunrise/sunset is one way to relive the life. Unfortunately for us, there was no sunrise to see this time due to rain - but still its worth going up there to catch a glimpse of the Himalayas close up. Many sky topping Himalayas, including the Mount Everest are visible from here on a clear day. And the legendary Bhaktapur isn't very far from here either.

Googly!

Googly!

Almost everyone knows the popular search engine Google. But many don't know the little story behind how the name actually came up. Actually there is this mathematical number 'googol' which means a very big number 10¹⁰⁰, that is digit 1 followed by 100 zeros. Just like thousand is a number with digit 1 followed by 3 zeros, that is 1000, the googol is a digit 1 followed by 100 zeros. Obviously this is a huge number. The founders of the now search engine Google wanted to make a search site that would index huge number of websites, like the number googol itself. But the problem was they thought that the spelling of that number was 'g o o g l e' and not 'g o o g o l'. Hence they registered the website by the name www.google.com and were even surprised to know that such website name doesn't exist already.

But the website by the actual googol name already existed under www.googol.com. Currently this domain has expired and you may just find rubbish page in the site. But the old versions of the pages are still available under the Internet Achieve Wayback Machine.

Here's what the website www.googol.com looked like in the year 2002.

And here is what the search engine www.google.com looked like in its early days in 1998.

There also exists a term called 'googly' in the game of cricket. This term is used for a sort of a "trick ball". It is a way to trick in which the opponent thinks that the ball is coming in one direction but the ball actually moves in another direction. The Google and googol reminds me of the googly. Also its safer to know that in the world of internet, there are lots of fake sites that may mislead a user as the real site. Such as the sites you get when you misspell the domain names.

By the way you can track the early versions of many sites in the Internet Achieve site. Or may be add yours too.

About the Crow that Took Our Ear

About the Crow that Took Our Ear

Recently there is this project going on disaster Management, which is supported by INGO's like UNDP and EU. The project is trying to aware people about the hazards of natural disasters and how we need to plan for/against them. In one particular campaign, there is this little girl who says
"Our teacher says Natural Disasters don't come with an alert notification...."
And then the campaign closes by saying
"If your child knows about natural disasters why don't we become aware too?"

The campaign was/is promoted in various medium - TV's, radios, newspapers & likewise. I personally thought it was a catchy campaign for general awareness. How much people will implement those information during disasters will definitely be a subject to study later on.

But then the truth is that there has been a greater impact on the general people from a certain website which went on spreading the rumors of a predicted earthquake on exactly a certain date, much more than the whole campaign against disaster management has yet received. Its kinda funny too and makes you wonder if we are giving the wrong message to the generations to come.

What's more interesting is that its not just the illiterate and old people that believe them - the more 'educated' person seems to be making up bigger rumors. I believe historically we have been living a suppressed life. Be it depending upon parents or our cowardice and over-dependence, it has something to do with believing in whatever others say. We believe in mysteries, fantasies and miracles but are too lazy and unprepared to accept the hard facts. And then we think in group - make decisions in crowd. And we back off when it comes to make or own decisions. If someone tells us miracle stories - be it stars falling or stones talking, we are more than happy to believe. Some fraud comes up with idea of doubling your money by keeping it in magic box and we believe them. Somebody comes up with idea of hard work and we get bored. We never try to feel our own ear - just run after the crow just because somebody fooled us saying it took our ear. Someone says it again and again and again and yet we keep on running after the crow. I don't think we get tired running after rumors, do we?

Into Thin Air

Into Thin Air

It seems like there is a frenzy of people queuing up to the summit of Everest. This season alone hundreds of people have ascended through the thin air of the summit. This includes many foreigners and many Nepalese as well.

Now climbing Everest is not something that everyone would consider as their dream vacation. I would not even compare it as an adventure sport, although the huge number of people climbing makes you wonder if its really that easy. And then there are people like Appa Sherpa, who climbs the Everest for 17th time and makes climbing the top of the world look like a piece of cake.

Few years back I had read this book titled "Into Thin Air" by an American Journalist Jon Krakauer about his personal experience on climbing Everest and the disasters that followed when several members of his team died. It was one of the best adventure novels that I've read. I think there was also a movie made on that disaster climbing. Even this season, several people have died climbing Everest.

I was also wondering at the same time that stories and heroic of climbing Everest are portrayed so beautifully by the foreign climbers. While Nepalese have climbed the peak more than anyone else, they don't seem to tell their stories. And even the journalists don't seem to bother telling their stories.

I personally have no intentions of climbing Everest or any of those big mountains. But hats off to all the climbers! Or caps off rather - because we generally wear caps here instead of hats ;-)

I do want to trek the Annapurna base camp trekking though.

Ghosts. To believe or not.

Ghosts. To believe or not.

I am sure everyone of us has heard ghost stories at one time or another of our life. From the ghosts without head to the spirit of the dead relatives, we have heard them all. Or may be even told some stories ourselves.

The funny part is that most ghost stories are related to darkness. Its almost an untold fact that ghosts don't appear in crowd or in the daylights. Or may be ghosts are afraid of us in daylight.

I have heard about the sex workers or the prostitutes who would dress up as Kichkannis (so called ghosts in white dress with their toes pointing backward). Yes, there are people who would spread rumors of haunted homes or haunted areas to carry out all sorts of illegal activities. And yet the rumors go on spreading as real stories of ghosts. And we feel excited to tell and hear those ghost stories.

And then most of the ghost stories appear from homes with their relatives dead recently. The dead people walking and talking kind of stories. Again almost all ghost encounters seem to happen to those who believe in ghost stories. Then there are parents who like to tell their little kids to be good kid or else some sort of ghost would come up. Of course no human likes darkness. But that doesn't mean you have to scare off your little kids with ghost stories in dark.

Do you really believe in ghost? Or got ghost encounter stories?

Web 3.0 & Beyond - Are Machines Ruling Us Already?

Web 3.0 & Beyond - Are Machines Ruling Us Already?

The Year: 1982. Time Magazine says that the person of the year (or machine of the year rather) is The Computer. Back then computer was becoming so popular. People believed computers could provide answers to many of the questions, send letters at speed of light etc etc. Then there was personal computer becoming reality and accessible. Computers were helping people in day to day life. All sorts of calculations and computing jobs. Life was getting easier. Then there were games, internet, emails and stuffs like that. All good.

In the years to follow, internet really gained momentum. The world was turning into a so called global village. Businessmen thought we have to have website to reach a wider clients around the globe. And indeed web was becoming the number one source for information. Thus we had Web 1.0.

The Year: 2006. Time Magazine says that the person of the year is YOU. It was talking about the Web 2.0 generation by now. There were people generated pages scattered everywhere on the internet. There were blogs, there were social networking sites like the Myspace, hi5, user generated sites like wikipedia, youtube, flickr, community sites likes delicio.us, digg and countless others. Almost everyone were busy writing content more than reading contents. People were starting to live their lives based on computers. People knew each other from web. Some were racing the web race, while others who were left behind were finding it harder to catch up. Everything was moving fast.

The computers got smaller. People got mobile - always on the run. Now people were even using their tiny hand held devices to do things. YOU were getting busier. The Web 2.0 phenomenon was racing.

The Year: Very near future. Time magazine released its last print edition of the magazine. The end of the Web 3.0 & start of the Web 4.0. But what did we have on Web 3.0? Initially there were people trying to sort all the mess created by Web 2.0. People thought they will build a more easier web world, where everything is organized. They called it semantic web. People could do just about anything on the web. All data & information were synchronized. They were trying to make the computers & the machines act like human. The way human thought. Computers now had intelligence. When one typed their name all the details would pop up. From the likes and dislikes to all the secrets. When you transferred someone's photo from you digital camera, the computer would immediately say - "Hey I know that person..he came to this house yesterday too. He's a weird person. In fact I hate that person..." Machines talked, machines walked, machines did all the things. Humans were left behind.

Actually it might not be as weird as it sounds now. We might actually be heading towards a better collaborative world wide web. We all hope for a safer & smarter web for humans. Just that we need to make sure machines are there to make the human lives easier; rather than machine dependent.