In search of the perfect desktop

I am usually in favor of change. It takes a lot for me to say "This is too much of a new thing". However, recently there was one such moment. I got a new laptop at work recently and I had to decide which Linux distro to go with. I usually go with either Fedora or Ubuntu on my desktops. However, recent versions of both Fedora and Ubuntu have had major modifications to the desktop environment. While Fedora ships with Gnome 3, Ubuntu has put Unity interface on top of Gnome 3. Although both are major changes from Gnome 2 based distros, I was confident that I would be able to start liking them easily and quickly. How wrong was I!

My first choice of distro was Ubuntu 11.10. Unity desktop was okay, but there were many minor irritants that I found tough to adjust to, even after a week of using it. Pidgin notifications wouldn't work the way I want, some window switches required more keystrokes than before and so on. I started looking for options to tweak Unity to suit my taste. Slowly I realized that this may not be easy. Hence I decided to try Gnome 3, so installed Gnome 3 shell on top of Ubuntu 11.10. I was able to adjust to Gnome 3 much better than to Unity, but there were still some irritants that I just could not fix. So I decided to try out other options. The first stop was KDE. I was an old friend of KDE, so it did not take any ramp-up time, even though I had never used KDE 4.x before. In the mean time I got Linux Mint 12 installed on another disk partition. Mint has done a great deal of work with Gnome 3 to make it behave like Gnome 2. It fixed pretty much all my grouses. I could have just lived with that. However, by now I was determined to try as many options as possible before finalizing my desktop. Sometimes I get into this sort of mode.

The only other reasonable option seemed to be XFCE. XFCE on top of Ubuntu 11.10 worked like a charm. It seemed to do everything I wanted and nothing more. It is simplistic by today's standards, but not short in functionality. After using each desktop environment for a couple of days, I was convinced that I should stick with XFCE. At least till Gnome folks make Gnome 3 useful again.

So I cleanly re-installed my laptop with Xubuntu 11.10. I like some of the tweaks Xubuntu folks have done to XFCE. I have stuck to Xubuntu as my primary desktop for the last few weeks and I think I will stick to XFCE for an year, if not more. End of search. For now.

Mekedatu

I had been to Meke Daatu / Mekedatu / ಮೇಕೆ ದಾಟು recently. There are enough travelogues that cover this place, so I will restrict myself to a few specific bits that could be helpful to visitors.

Time needed: Half day visit from Bangalore. Usually combined with other places to convert this to a full day visit.

Distance: Around 90 Kms. Easily drive-able. I saw a handful of buses too plying to this place from Kanakapura.

Directions: Google driving directions.

How to drive: Go to Kanakapura. Enquire about "Sangama Road" and take that. Sangama is at the dead end of that road, around 35Kms from Kanakapura. No confusion at all.

What to do: You can play in the waters at Sangama, but be careful about whirlpools. From Sangama, you need to cross Kaveri river on a theppa (a local boat, round in shape). These boats can topple, so respect the instructions given by the boat driver.

A tip: Irrespective of what the boat driver tells you, a little bit of water does get into the boat, so your trousers can get wet! Take stock of what you put in your hip pockets before getting into the boat.


There is a bus service from the other side of river to Mekedatu (5KMs). At Mekedatu one can enjoy the views of river Kaveri rushing through a narrow rocky place. It is not possible to touch the water here. It is dangerous to venture too far out on the rocks because there are no guard rails or any safety measures. People die regularly by falling into the river here. Government has put this friendly notice board and washed their hands off.





Road condition: Very good as of now. Even for motorcyclists. Bangalore to Kanakapura is an NH. From there on, it is an SH in very good condition.

Fuel: Fill up at Kanakapura. There is no fuel station beyond that. Hence you need enough fuel in your vehicle to cover around 70Kms round trip from Kanakapura.

Food: There is a brand new restaurant in Sangama, overlooking the river. Servers both veg and non-veg. Clean, but not necessarily tasty. Limited menu options. Very few options other than this restaurant. A lot of people carry their own food.

When to go: Preferably on weekends/holidays. Many of the facilities may not be working on other days. Choose a cloudy day as it can get really hot and uncomfortable on the rocks and sands of Mekedatu. If you are going there on a sunny day, plan to be there early in the morning (9AM) or late evening (5PM). Everything closes down when it gets dark, so don't be too late. The crowds here can be quite rough on the new year day. So avoid this day if you are planning to take your wife or girlfriend.

Cost: Car parking: RS. 50. Theppa across the river: Rs. 50 per head (to-and-fro). Theppa driver demands Rs. 10 tip either way. Bus ride from Sangama to Mekedatu: Rs. 40 for bus ride (to-and-fro). Veg lunch: Rs. 100 per head.


Finally, a video:

How to make your auto/taxi ride interesting

Whenever I take an auto or a taxi ride (which is quite rare... I usually take my own vehicle everywhere or I take the bus), I chat up with the driver during the ride. These chats kill my boredom, as well as give me a glimpse of how these people think. The topics discussed and the viewpoints expressed are radically different from those at my office lunch table.

Rarely have I seen an auto or taxi driver who is not interested in chatting. Most of them have very strong opinions about things around them and will not shy away from expressing them. Be it Rajanikanth's health, Yeddyurappa's wealth, Veerappan's death, Katrina Kaif's dancing skills, Upendra's dialogue delivery, quality of traffic in Bangalore, rains, ration cards... anything. Also, their perspective of things is very different from your friends/colleagues. An auto driver once said the worst drivers in Bangalore, starting from the worst, were 2-wheelers, BMTC, BPO taxis, private cars and then autos! A taxi driver said it is insulting for the man to let a woman drive... he would never let his future wife do that! Another talked about how teenage boy/girl pair behave in the passenger seat of his auto and what he does to prevent that. Yet another told me that he knew everything about Mumbai because he visited the city some 15 years ago for 2 days. On one occasion an auto driver refused to turn the meter on, but told me a figure that was pretty much what the actual metered amount was going to be. During the ride, I asked him why he did that. He said "Sir, if I knew you were a localite I would have started the meter... I try to avoid traffic junctions by taking interior roads... outsiders who are not familiar with the roads think I am taking a circutous route and complain "ghuma diya"! Hence to avoid all the trouble I fix the cost beforehand!

Most of them, when narrating some incidence that happened in their life, the road, blow up their role with lots of masala. This is especially true when they are talking about their verbal or physical fights with others. It appears that they add up some of the characteristics of their favorite screen hero while talking about themselves.

Another topic they are usually eager to talk about is their financial condition... most autos and taxis are not driven by the owners, so they will have many things to say about the owner of the vehicle.

Finally, one last interesting incidence. This taxi driver had seemed to be especially well behaved and cultured. He was driving for 1.5 hours in busy traffic and was at a signal wanting to turn left. A couple of cars which were in wrong lanes had blocked our left turn. My driver turned restless and started honking. Immediately, the driver of the Innova in front of us got down and started charging towards us. He was a tall, decent looking man dressed in jeans, a kurta and a rudraksha chain around his neck with kumkum on his forehead. He looked like the owner of the Innova and he must have been from a well to do family. To my horror he started shouting unimaginable obscenities at my driver, tried to pull him out of the car and landed a couple of blows on his face. My driver was startled, but realizing the situation was not in his favour, went on defense mode, pleading guilty and begging the other guy to stop. Then the signals turned green and the guy went back to his car and drove away. I was slightly shocked from what happened, but I would have never anticipated what happened next. The driver called someone on his mobile and complained. No, not the police. He called someone who he called "Anna" (brother), gave him description of the car, it's registration number and the guy's description. I asked him "Who did you call and what will they do to him?" "We have our own support system sir. They will take care of him". He refused to say anything more than this. A chill ran down my spine, imagining all sorts of things "taking care" could mean!

Are we friendly to each other?

I am sure each one of us has heard about incidences where foreigners, especially westerners, asked us some questions about India that are genuine from their side, but amusing to us. With a large number of jokes on this theme, it is hard to say which incidences are genuine and which are not. Long back I myself have been asked "Is there telephone in India?" from a person who was working with people in Indian every day. When they visit India, they ask different types of amusing questions. One such person had asked me "Why are footpaths 1 foot higher than the road here?" and just then a 2-wheeler zoomed past us on the footpath. On the positive side I did not have to answer his question :-)

While most of the questions asked by westerners are just funny, sometimes you get a questions that makes you think long and deep. I faced one such question recently. We were a small group at the lunch table with our European guest. The topics of discussion were the usual. The guest was asking us a few questions about how things work in India. He then asked a question that startled us. "Wherever I have been in Bangalore, people have been very friendly to me. Are Indians naturally this friendly to each other or are they being extra friendly to me?" I tried to explain "I suppose the people here realize that you are from outside and might need some assistance with various things, so may be they are being more helpful to you". But the man persisted "No, I am talking about friendliness, not being just helpful. For example, are you as friendly to each other as you appear to be to me?" Now there was a silence at the table for a few seconds, while we were thinking how to answer this. Luckily, it turned out that the group at the table was indeed quite friendly to each other, so we just told him "Yes we are". However, this left me thinking about whether we are we really more friendly to our visitors than we are to our own folks.

I suppose foreigners indeed think we are more friendly to them, possibly because of the way we interact with them when compared to how they interact with us when we are in their country. May be we do go an extra step or two to make them feel comfortable. As far as friendliness is concerned, I think we are much more friendly to each other within our personal network than they are among themselves. To an extent we do that with any outsider to our cities or home, although we do not say "Hi" to total strangers as Americans do. However, are we as friendly to someone from another state/city who we personally don't know as we are to a foreigner? I guess we are not. But then, when we see someone from another state/city who is totally lost and needs help, we are likely to go an extra mile to help them out.

On the other hand, we also regularly hear about people from out of town, including foreigners, being duped, mugged or even murdered for gains. This too happens all over India. All of us would have experienced that when we are not in our home town we are much more likely to be cheated one way or the other.

So I can only conclude what we already know: No rule can be generalized to all of India. This makes it difficult to say "This is how we are". That's what makes our country so interesting.

For the record, the "foreigners" that I know are mostly from western countries, mainly US and England. I am not very familiar with how people from other countries behave.

Do you live in Bannerghatta?

I was in a training session. During a break, the people in my table group started chatting. As it is usual in casual conversations in Bangalore, the topic moved to traffic and the amount of time it takes to travel. I was fairly sure I had the bragging right for the longest journey back home. However, what one of the ladies, who had been in Bangalore for years, said startled me. "I live at Kankpura, so it takes a really long time to reach home". I was surprised, but I quickly realized that she probably lives somewhere on Kanakapura road, not in Kanakapura town. I asked her "Do you really mean you live at Kanakapura?" "Yes" "Kanakapura is around 55 KMs from the center of the city, so from here it must be around 70 KMs. Why do you live there?". It was her turn to be surprised now. "No, it is around 25 KMs from here". I was now certain what she meant, but I was in a mood to play a bit. "But you said you live in Kanakapura". She gave me a confused look. I persisted "Do you know why that road is called Kanakapura Road?" "No" "Let's say you lived on Jaipur Road in Delhi... would you say you lived in Jaipur?" She was from Delhi, so she got it immediately. "Oh! is there a place called Kanakapura on that road? Now I got it!". "Do you mean you really didn't know that Kanakapura is a town 55 KMs down that road?" "No".

I am sure she is not the only person who has migrated to Bangalore who hasn't made an attempt to know much about the surroundings. In fact there are huge corporations, including banks, who make this mistake regularly. I live close to Bannerghatta road, so I see plenty of examples of people referring to the entire road as "Bannerghatta", although Bannerghatta is roughly 30 KMs away from Bangalore. For example, the "Bannerghatta branch" of a famous bank is NOT in Bannerghatta. It is in Bangalore, on Bannerghatta Road, at least 10 KMs away from Bannerghatta. There is a 5-star hotel and a huge mall coming up on Bannerghatta Road, 15 KMs from Bannerghatta, which says it is in Bannerghatta.


A lot of people seem to think that the entire road is called "Bannerghatta". The same applies to other towns around Bangalore, the most prominent being Sarjapura. One can see lots of other examples of people who know close to nothing about the state, city and area they live in. Our cities are not melting pots, but salad bowls.

Wish there was a horn at the back of my car

It was one of the days when I had spent unusually long amount of time on the road. The ordeal seemed to be finally getting over as I approached my office campus. It is just this last stretch of service road, then I will be at the security check. There is a line of cars backed up at security check... I am very likely to be late for my morning meeting. I stop my car in the line and casually look at the rear view mirror. The car approaching from behind at 20-30 kmph has a lady at the wheel. As the car approaches mine, I suddenly notice that she is not looking at the road! She is instead looking DOWN at her laps, possibly reading a message on her mobile phone. Her car isn't slowing down at all. She is oblivious of the line of cars stopped in front of her. I feel like screaming at her, but there is nothing I can do. I wish my car had a loud horn pointing backwards. I am now convinced that she is going to slam my car. The cars in front of me have moved ahead, so it gives me an idea in the last second. I take my leg off the brakes. Her car crashes against mine with a loud thud, but my car absorbs some of the impact by rolling ahead. The lady is startled. I get out of my our car to investigate the damage. A few thoughts run through my mind as I walk back: How much damage could it be? Will there be an altercation? Oh man, that's a lady... if a crowd gathers she will get all the sympathy. I am surely going to be late for the meeting. Would the bumper have broken? How much does it cost?

By the time I walk back the lady has gotten out of her car. "You were not even looking at the road" I scream. She seems to be genuinely shocked and is pleading "Sorry... sorry". There is a mobile phone in her hand, which very likely is the cause of this accident. Looks like there won't be an argument about who the culprit is. Surprisingly, the back bumper of my car is intact except for a couple of scratches. WOW! Her car, on the other hand, is in a worse shape. The front bumper is broken and the number plate has fallen off. There is no crowd. Many drivers in cars lined up behind us start honking impatiently, but nobody gets out of their cars. I realize that there is no need to wait there any longer. She was the culprit and luckily she is the one who got punished as well. The whole incidence was over in less than 5 minutes and I drive ahead into my office. Not the best start for the work day, but it could have been much worse!

School day for kids

It all started a few weeks ago when my 3 year old daughter started singing and dancing to a particular Kannada movie song (Gaalipata). We initially ignored it, but when she kept on doing this every day, we got curious. My daughter is notoriously bad at telling us what happens at school, in spite of her excellent verbal skills. Hence it took us quite a few days to figure out that the teachers were preparing the kids for a dance program, which we later learnt to be the school day event.

Eventually the day came last week. It was the school day and "graduation ceremony" at Podar Jumbo Kids, Vijaya Bank Layout branch. If you have not attended such an pre-schooler event, please do so when you get your next chance. It is more fun than you think it can be.

The meat of the event was a number of dance performances by kids of various classes. We handed over our kids to the teachers as soon as we entered the venue and waited for their little one to get dressed, come on stage and perform. A noticeable thing with kids of this age is that most of them have no idea what stage fear is. So they are not bothered whether they are dancing in the living room of their home or in front of hundreds of people in an auditorium. However, there are a few who start crying the moment they are on stage. Some of them recover and join the dance, while a few them continue to cry at the top of their voice all through the dance. Some kids saw their parents in the audience and started screaming "mommieeee" and running towards them unaware of the 6 foot fall at the end of the stage! A couple of kids did not seem to want to show their faces to the audience, so they turned away from the audience and danced throughout. Some of them were distracted half way through the dance and started doing various things like chatting with their co-dancers, giggling uncontrallably and so on. Some ran backstage while the dance was still going on and the teachers had a tough time catching them and bringing them back onto the stage! All this while the teachers stood at both sides of the stage and danced with the kids, trying to bring a semblance of co-ordination to the dance. The kids mostly chose to ignore their teachers and did not let much order creep into their dances. They can get away with this.. even receive wild applause only because they are kids... being watched by starry eyed parents. Photos from the event are here.


I must appreciate the efforts put in by the school for the event. The teachers had prepared for weeks. The venue, JSS Auditorium, was quite good. They had arranged for dresses themselves and done a great job at that too! They showed a lot of enthusiasm and commitment to make the event a success. The teachers had their own dance performance as a surprise package at the end of the event. One of the good things they did was announce right in the beginning that they were going to give a DVD of the event to every kid. This avoided the chaos in front of the stage with eager parents trying to capture their kid through their cameras. They even sent us off with food packets.

My daughter will stop going to this school in 2 weeks and I am going to miss this place. Their infrastrcture, while not great, is not bad either. However, they seem to have put together a nice bunch of teachers and support staff who all love kids. I would certainly recommend this place (Podar Jumbo Kids, Vijaya Bank Layout branch).

Everyone and their aunt want to wish you

I have often heard from my colleagues that the "politics" in Tamilnadu is far "advanced" compared to other states. They say the kind of things being seen in Karnataka political circles now-a-days were tried and perfected in Tamilnadu decades ago. I don't know whether that is true, but they sure seem to be ahead in erecting gigantic flex banners. In the above banner, more than 130 people seem to be wishing rest of the village (if anyone is left out) whatever they want to wish. "Happy Pongal", I suppose... sorry, I cannot read the language.

Pondicherry

Recently I did a trip to Pondicherry that I had been thinking for quite some time. As a typical techie, I did a lot of research on the internet before heading there to make my trip smoother. However, I found many new things that I think might be useful to people planning a trip. This is not a travelogue, just things I did not find by googling, but learnt first hand. I was planning to have a leisurely vacation, so I did not make an attempt to maximize my sight seeing there.

While there are good bus services from Bangalore to Pondicherry, I chose to drive my Santro because of a few reasons. Having a car makes it easy to get around Pondicherry. I didn't want to mess with the autorickshaws there. You can rent 2-wheelers in Pondicherry, but that is not suitable for families. Lastly, the distance to Pondicherry is around 310Kms, which is well within what I can drive in a day.

I took this route, which is by far the shortest at just 310 Kms. The alternative is this, but it takes the distance up by another 110 Kms. The road was smooth till Krishnagiri as expected, because it is the Chennai highway. However, from Krishnagiri to Tiruvannamalai I hit one of the worst National Highways I have ever driven on. It was 110 Kms of pure misery, with not even a single Km of stretch in a decent shape. I took more than 3 hours to cover this distance. I had high hopes on the roads of Tamilnadu, which this road totally destroyed. The road from Tiruvannamalai to Tindivanam (67 Km) was in a decent, though not great shape. From Tindivanam to Pondicherry (40Km) it is the Chennai-Pondicherry road, which is an excellent 4 lane road. Total drive time: 7 hours. While returning, I wanted to avoid the Tiruvannamalai-Krishnagiri stretch like I would avoid Plague. I took the advice of taxi drivers: I knew these guys would know best. They advised me to take the state highways from Tiruvannamalai-Dharmapuri through Tanipadi, Naripalli, Harur, Morappur and then drive on the NH from Dharmapuri towards Krishnagiri. Google maps doesn't know about this road! This added 50-60 Kms to my journey, but the roads are very very nice. Just 2 lanes, but very little traffic and a scenic road. Recommended.


I stayed at Kailash Beach Hotel. There are many "beach resorts" in Pondicherry and some of them are just lodges, calling themselves resorts. Kailash turned out to be a good place. You get whatever they claim on their website. Their swimming pool is pretty good. Rooms don't face the beach, but it is just a 2 min walk away. This place is 10 Kms south of Pondicherry.

Pondicherry beaches have apparently become very hostile since the Tsunami. The slope of beach is very drastic, so you can hardly go 10-20 feet into the water. The water brings tonnes of sand with it. Hence it is not a great place to play in the beach. I listed 3 famous public beaches in Pondicherry, but it was possible to play in the water in only 1 of them: Auroville beach.

Do not under-estimate the traffic of Pondicherry. The traffic generally remains low throughout the day, but during morning and evening busy hours it can get very crowded. Traffic moves at snail's pace along the main arteries of the city (Cuddalore road, roads leading to ECR in the north, etc). it took me 30+ minutes to drive 10Kms at 6:30PM. Drivers are better behaved than in Bangalore (probably any other big city). Most signals have free left turn and the drivers are decent enough to leave the left turning lane clear. Bicycle riders seemed to be on a suicide mission though. The roads in the core of the city (shopping areas and french quarters) become very busy during evening shopping hours. The police cut off 4-wheeler entry on many of the roads to avoid traffic jams. Parking can still be found in the smaller lanes. Watch out for 1-way roads.

The people were very helpful. Whenever I asked for directions, the people were willing to stop what they were doing, walk up to me, give clear directions and make sure I understood the directions. They would realize that I do not speak Tamil and try to explain in English. I had seen such people in Paris long back... may be it is the French culture thing!

Language wasn't a big hurdle because I realized that I could understand more Tamil than I thought I did. However, I realized that I could barely talk even a couple of words in Tamil. I started asking them to talk in Tamil, but I would reply in English. At least one road-side seller in Promenade beach, (who was probably a Muslim), was more comfortable with Hindi than with English.

Promenade beach is the show piece of the city. However, there is no sandy beach here... the water directly hits the embankment rocks. It is a beautiful place to sit in a roof-top restaurant on a full-moon night (which was the case when I went) and enjoy the beauty of the ocean while having your food. There are many hotels and 'guest houses' on this piece of road.


I visited the Chunnambar water resort. This is a highly advertised and recommended place. However, there are some drawbacks. The main (only?) attraction of the place is boat ride in the backwaters, leading up to Paradise Beach. This was one of the most beautiful and clean beaches I had seen. However, they were not even letting us touch the waters in Paradise beach. This killed most of the fun for us. We took a speed boat ride in the river, which was worthwhile.


Everyone talks about Auroville, which is 15Kms from the city. The place is peaceful and nice and is filled with westerners. You will see pictures of a spherical building in golden color in many websites: It took a 1.5 Km hike to reach that place from Auroville parking lot. They were not allowing us into that structure, so we only got to see it from quite a distance. I put the zoom on my new Canon to full use to take some pics. I couldn't associate myself much with Auroville or even Aurobindo Ashram, which is in the heart of the city.


Visited the Arulmigu Manakula Vinayagar temple. Air conditioned, which I guess will be very useful in summers. Tamil was essential to understand anything the guy at the counter says.

Sacred Heart Church is a good place to visit. 110 year old. Right in the city next to Railway Station. Good architecture. Belgian glass that looks so good. Also visited the church at Villianur, which is 10Kms from Pondicherry. Though older, the building was not all that great.


I ate at Hotel Surguru, Adyar Ananda Bhavan, Hotel Ajantha Sea View (nice terrace restaurant facing sea), Sri Krishna Sweets (restaurant attached), Auroville cafeteria. All good, nothing to write home about. Being a vegetarian, wasn't too interested in trying out French cuisines.

There is a memorial for French soldiers who died in the First World War on the Promenade Beach.


I went there in the 3rd week of January. The weather was nice: 30 degrees and a bit sticky at noon, but comfortable in morning and evening. I suppose December and January are best months to visit.

How many Indians are vegetarians?

While I was studying college, most of my class-mates were vegetarians. Later, while working in Bangalore, it just turned out that the majority of my colleagues in my group were vegetarians too. Whenever we went out for a team lunch, it was common to renegate the non-veggies to one side of the table by the majority vegetarian gang. A colleague who eats non-veg often comments that vegetarians should just graze on the lawn!

I have heard many of my colleagues and friends comment that the majority of Indians are vegetarians. That opinion was understandable, considering the surrounding we were in. Most of the restaurants (self-service fast food types, a.k.a Darshinis back then) were purely vegetarian. Whenever I attended any function, the food wood be vegetarian too.

I slowly learnt that my surrounding was not a true sample of this country. Though India indeed has the highest number of vegetarians in the world, the percentage of vegetarians in India is not more than 40% and is just 20% per some sources. Further, contrary to my expectations, the southern states have smaller percentage of vegetarians than the northern states (not the north-east).

Recently, at a team lunch in office, I turned out to be the only vegetarian in a group of 10. I knew that this was closer to true percentages of vegetarians in this country. However, I felt quite strange about this change. It made me wonder whether this was just a co-incidence that I was the only vegetarian in that group or whether the demography changed significantly in the last decade.

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