Instrument of Surrender

35 years ago, at this time of the year, we were at war. At war against a military junta, that was responsible for a genocide on its own people. I just found the original scanned copy of the Instrument of Surrendar of Pakistani Eastern Command led by Lt. Gen. AAK Naizi.

surrender Hosted on Zooomr

Times Square Billboard

TimesSquareBillboard

This picture is taken by my friend's friend's friend and made my inbox through chain mail. I laughed my heart out.

Update: Seems that this is an ad for a new sitcom. :O

A step in the right direction

A friend of mine forwarded this video. Its a debate in a Pakistani school about the nuclear tests.

Update: For those who are not able to view it, here is the URL where you can find it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSlVaKMO258&eurl=
Thanks Shruthi for letting me know that its not working for you. :)

Lost in Translation

There are numerous thoughts and feelings that can be expressed only in the native tongue. Manual translation from one language to another can be a tedious process. And even with great care, the translated text may not convey the same feelings that the original text does.

If manual translation is prone to such inconsistencies, what about the automated translations? I think everyone agrees that this is one of the most error prone activities. One problem is the inability to express a language as a finite grammar. The only language that I know which can be expressed like that is Sanskrit.

What’s the point of this post? Well, it’s a message that one of my colleague got on his IM. We interact with some persons in a certain East European country as part of our office work. These interactions are very often, serious technical discussions. While one of them can still chat with us without using a translator, not all are that lucky. One certain person there uses a 'pocket translator'.

This is the message that my colleague got from him on his IM in middle of a serious discussion.

-> are you there?
-> I must replace my ass to another place. I will entor to internet from home in 45-60 min

His smart pocket translator has conveyed the message, though with wrong choice of words. :)


P.S. I have just started using telugu font on my computer. I have an idea to create a telugu blog, but given that these days I rarely blog, I might drop the idea.

Caption Please!

bush hyderabad visit
Originally uploaded by rmutyala.

Can you caption this picture?

All captions are welcome in comments. I thought of one which I will update later.

Update: My caption for this: 'The bumpkin with a pumpkin'

Orkut invite... anyone?

Any of you care to invite me to Orkut?

As if I dont have enough on the plate, I am now iching to see how the Orkut community is.. As someone who got the gmail invite in the very first month .. (ok.. it might be the second month), I cant understand how I haven't managed to get invite to Orkut yet.

So, if you are already a member of Orkut, what are you waiting on..? go and send me the invite.. !!

[Update: I got the invite from Shuuro
Thanks Shuuro!]

Interviewers, Beware - Never appreciate Mushy's pants!

Below is Karan Thapar's experience .

During the interview with Mr. Musharraf, which was a very charged one for obvious reasons, during the 1-minute commercial break, just to keep the conversation going I commented to him that it was a nice tie he was wearing. He asked me if I liked it. At the end of the interview, he removed his tie and gave it to me, saying he would like me to keep it. I think it was very nice warm gesture."

Good that Karan Thapar had appreciated Mushy's tie. What it he appreciated Mushy's pants :o