October 26,2007 6.30Am
I was in deep sleep when the alarm started buzzing. I turned around and snoozed the clock for another half hour so that i could squeeze in a short early morning nap!! I had set the alarm at 6.30, coz, i will be going to the 40th annual Tokyo motor show today. i was working yesterday evening when my Japanese colleague Rentaro Sato came to my cubicle and asked me whether i could join him for the Motor show.I gleefully accepted the offer and asked him about the tickets. When he told me that he some free passes are available, i was double happy.So, we decided to meet at sharp 10 the next morning at office.
October 26,2007 7.00Am
The annoying noise of alarm woke me up again.This time i switched off the alarm and immediately without getting up from my bed switched on my laptop to check for mails, scraps or messages!!!This has become an habit for me this last one year when i am away from India. I get a feeling of being in India whenever i am online.The moment the network icon shows the status as connected,everything around me changes and i feel like sitting in the living room of my house in Chennai. After checking the mails, i switched on the music player and as the songs were being played in the background,i started getting ready to Office.By 9.40 i was ready sipping my tea sitting in front of the laptop.Once i was done with my Tea, i locked my room and left for office. I always have this doubt of whether i locked the room or not.I had come downstairs when i had this doubt again. So again i went and checked whether the room was locked or not. After confirming it again i was satisfied. My office is just 5 mins walk from my room. So,i reached the office well before the scheduled time.
October 26,2007 10.00AM
We had already left the office and were on the way to the Makkuhari Messe, where the show is being held. I was sitting inside the new car of Rentaro which is a 3.2L V6 Volkswagen Passat. This one was a beautiful black sedan with all the latest safety and entertainment features. We had to travel for 2.5 hrs to reach the destination and one of his friend too joined us on the way. His friend greeted me in the traditional japanese way and i too reciprocated his gesture. Then these two started chatting in Japanese!!I switched on my ipod and started listening to songs, while gazing at the tall skyscrapers that jotted all through the way!!
Let me brief you abt the history of Tokyo Motor show.The first Tokyo Motor Show was held on April 20, 1954, after the industry established a Motor Show Office in Automotive Industrial Association. The first All Japan Motor Show was held at Hibiya Park.In earlier days, Trucks where the mainstay of the Industry and hence most of the vehicles that were on display were the trucks. The shift towards the passengers started after the 5th motor show.The one i am going to is the 40th Motor show represented by all major auto manufacturers all over the world, the exception being the Indian auto manufacturers!!
October 26,2007 12.30PM
I was standing at the counter and showed my ticket to the girl who had a very beautiful smile!! i got a feel of the things to come ;)..once i went inside, i was completely awestruck by what i saw. the floor was covered with red carpet and the entire arena was filled with cars and more cars. I, rentaro and his friend decided to go on our own and decided to meet again at the same place in the evening. i started from the volkswagen stall, where the new concept space 7 was displayed. there was also a long legged european, possibly german, model standing next to this lifeless beauty, trying to catch attention, but without success. I was thinking why a model should pose along with a new car.But,i got the answer for that. if the car is really good, then she will be the center of attraction for sure!!! if that is not the case, then the model gets all the attention!!! So, the Space 7 was a clear winner!!! another thing that caught my attention in Volkswagen stall was the Gasoline engine fitted with both turbo charger as well as a supercharger!! it was quite interesting to learn about that.
Then i moved over to audi, where the concept car in display was a metroproject quattro, which was quite good. Then i glanced over lamborghinis and bentleys which had nothing new to offer. Since, it was held in tokyo, most of the attention where on the japanese car manufacturers. Peugeot, Subaru Daihatsu all had their stalls, where the models were better than the cars!! The first section of the center also had toyota, where the concept car Ireal was the show stealer.
Next i moved over to the next section, where i saw the bmws, mitsus, hondas and nissan. The biggest attraction of the day was the Nissan GTR which is a sports car. there was also the nissan's second generation pivo which is more of a concept car.
October 26,2007 3.00PM
By now,i was hungry and came out to have some food. as usual options were limited for a vegetarian and i had to settle for two packs of french fries and a glass of coca cola. i took rest for sometime and by now i was exhausted. I had to spent another 3 hrs there since rentaro had said that he would meet me at around 6. i decided to go to mitsubishi first, since i had to collect the brochure for my brother who is working with them here in India. luckily, there was a dance show in that stall and stood there for sometime watching the japanese dance!!! To tell you, the song was really good...after mitsubishi, i moved over to the final section where most of them were european manufacturers. i directly went to see my favourite Mercedes benz and saw the F700mind. since the explanations for that car was in japanese, i couldnt get the details of the car.after that i tried to complete the others stalls, with my interest completely gone. by now, it was 5. i had to spent one more hour. Finally, i decided its time to take the pictures of all the models who were there!!! initially i was apprehensive abt that...since, i had nothing else to do, i decided to try my luck...it was no big ask, since all of them were interested in posing. i kept taking pictures of all the models on my way back!!! one hour was gone like a minute ;)
October 26,2007 6.00PM
Rentaro and his friend were waiting for me when i reached the place where we had decided to meet!!! we discussed abt the cars that we saw and each had our own preferences. rentaro was more interested in european cars and i was happy with Nissan and Honda!! Since his friend was working with VW, he stuck to VW...we decided to leave early so that we wont be stuck in the traffic!! since rentaro was a really good driver, we reached my place by 8!!
October 26,2007 9.00PM
I had done with my dinner. since, i was very hungry, i made some roti and dal...after that, i started my laptop and connected to net..and...i was back to india again!!!!!!!
Friday, October 26, 2007
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Sports Inside
Last week, i was having a chat with one of my friends and the topic of discussion was abt the school days.Then we started talking abt the good old days and the kind of troubles we used to create in the class room for the poor teachers.Then i remembered the games that we used to play during the class time without being noticed by the teachers.what a life that was and i really miss those days:(...Okie, let me talk abt the games that i used to play during the class hours.
The following games were popular when i was studying in 10th Standard, Circa. 1996 :D
Pen fight
Desk Golf
book cricket
hit or miss
1. pen fight...two or more can play this game at a time!!! Rules are very simple.Place the pens of ur's and ur opponent's on the desk 30 cms apart. the pens should be exactly parallel to each other.Take turns and try to hit the opponents pen using ours!! the player who strikes the opponent's pen out of the desk win this game :p the tactics that are normally used include going for an heavier ink pen instead of ball-point pen. some people try to cheat by putting some paper inside the pen to increase the weight..Sometimes the competition becomes so intense that the pens used for playing are freely used as weapons to fight against the opponent..These fights normally happen during interval or lunch!! Sometimes even the principal joins the fight with the players getting a tight slap on the cheek, made to stand out the whole day or both, depending on his mood :D
2. desk golf.... This is one nice game which can be played even sitting in the first bench..One's skills in this game should be as good as tiger woods or Greg Nicholas,coz even a small error would cost u the game, set and the match..a small hole of diameter one centimeter and depth of 0.5 cm is made on the desk...The equipments normally used to make these holes include compass and divider. You need to purchase a Camel Geometry box specially for this even if you are not interested in Geometry and Trignometry..anyway, who cares :D...Take the middle pages of your notebook which is easier to tear a paper!!! a bit of paper is rolled up to make a small ball.. a line is marked at around 10 0r 15 cms from the hole...and then the rules are similar to golf..the one who takes less strokes to put the ball in the hole is the winner!!!!
3. book cricket : this is one of the most famous games played in the schools all over chennai!! very easy...take any one of ur science,maths or history books, preferbly the one you hate the most :P...Decide which team you want to represent..note down the name of the players from each team in a note book.Then use a small stone for toss.Use the normal "In or Out" procedure for the toss and the one who wins the toss decides whether he is gonna bat or not..Now, starts the game..the player who bats, randomly open the pages of book!! the unit's digit of the page number that comes will be the run's scored!!! for eg, if we open the page 24, then it's a four and if you open the page 10...then it's a 0 which means you are out...normally world cup matches are played since there are 8 periods to go in a day and if there is any lab work, then one can stick to one dayers!!!so with this you can play one day, test cricket and even 20-20!!!!!!
4. hit or miss : this game is played with our palm and five fingers :p....any number of people can play this game, but three or four persons will be the most appropriate!!! for eg, if there are 4 players. then 4 players multiplied by 5 fingers will give 20!! so, all four has to select a number less than 20!!! after all of them have selected a number, then the real game starts!! once the game starts, all has to place their palm on the desk and at the same time, they have to say a number using their fingers..if you don't want say zero then close all your fingers and place your palm on desk...this has to be done in split second!!! After this the numbers displayed by each participant is counted and the sum total is found!! If this sum total is same as the number chosen by any one of the participant then he wins..so he is out of the round for a while!! Then the other three will play and now all has to choose a number less than 15...the game is repeated again..and another person is eliminated...the one who stays finally is the loser!! Now comes the fun part :D....now this guy has to extend his arms with both the palms touching each other and all others who have won the game will try to hit him on the back side of his palms. Each partcipant can hit the loser based on the number they chose and got eliminated. The loser can try to move his hand up and down to avoid that..once everybody is completed with their turn, the next round starts again...
So, thats it for this post!!!
Ananda
The following games were popular when i was studying in 10th Standard, Circa. 1996 :D
Pen fight
Desk Golf
book cricket
hit or miss
1. pen fight...two or more can play this game at a time!!! Rules are very simple.Place the pens of ur's and ur opponent's on the desk 30 cms apart. the pens should be exactly parallel to each other.Take turns and try to hit the opponents pen using ours!! the player who strikes the opponent's pen out of the desk win this game :p the tactics that are normally used include going for an heavier ink pen instead of ball-point pen. some people try to cheat by putting some paper inside the pen to increase the weight..Sometimes the competition becomes so intense that the pens used for playing are freely used as weapons to fight against the opponent..These fights normally happen during interval or lunch!! Sometimes even the principal joins the fight with the players getting a tight slap on the cheek, made to stand out the whole day or both, depending on his mood :D
2. desk golf.... This is one nice game which can be played even sitting in the first bench..One's skills in this game should be as good as tiger woods or Greg Nicholas,coz even a small error would cost u the game, set and the match..a small hole of diameter one centimeter and depth of 0.5 cm is made on the desk...The equipments normally used to make these holes include compass and divider. You need to purchase a Camel Geometry box specially for this even if you are not interested in Geometry and Trignometry..anyway, who cares :D...Take the middle pages of your notebook which is easier to tear a paper!!! a bit of paper is rolled up to make a small ball.. a line is marked at around 10 0r 15 cms from the hole...and then the rules are similar to golf..the one who takes less strokes to put the ball in the hole is the winner!!!!
3. book cricket : this is one of the most famous games played in the schools all over chennai!! very easy...take any one of ur science,maths or history books, preferbly the one you hate the most :P...Decide which team you want to represent..note down the name of the players from each team in a note book.Then use a small stone for toss.Use the normal "In or Out" procedure for the toss and the one who wins the toss decides whether he is gonna bat or not..Now, starts the game..the player who bats, randomly open the pages of book!! the unit's digit of the page number that comes will be the run's scored!!! for eg, if we open the page 24, then it's a four and if you open the page 10...then it's a 0 which means you are out...normally world cup matches are played since there are 8 periods to go in a day and if there is any lab work, then one can stick to one dayers!!!so with this you can play one day, test cricket and even 20-20!!!!!!
4. hit or miss : this game is played with our palm and five fingers :p....any number of people can play this game, but three or four persons will be the most appropriate!!! for eg, if there are 4 players. then 4 players multiplied by 5 fingers will give 20!! so, all four has to select a number less than 20!!! after all of them have selected a number, then the real game starts!! once the game starts, all has to place their palm on the desk and at the same time, they have to say a number using their fingers..if you don't want say zero then close all your fingers and place your palm on desk...this has to be done in split second!!! After this the numbers displayed by each participant is counted and the sum total is found!! If this sum total is same as the number chosen by any one of the participant then he wins..so he is out of the round for a while!! Then the other three will play and now all has to choose a number less than 15...the game is repeated again..and another person is eliminated...the one who stays finally is the loser!! Now comes the fun part :D....now this guy has to extend his arms with both the palms touching each other and all others who have won the game will try to hit him on the back side of his palms. Each partcipant can hit the loser based on the number they chose and got eliminated. The loser can try to move his hand up and down to avoid that..once everybody is completed with their turn, the next round starts again...
So, thats it for this post!!!
Ananda
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