Journeyman

Things do change a lot in short time period. I’m out of good old Sri Lanka at the moment. Office has packed me and another collegue off to Canada for training / working program for a project that we are working on. Will be gone for about 4-6 months. Yipee, lucky old me. Since our parent company is Canadian, our people are regularly sent to Canada for work.

Left SL at 00:15 hours on the 29th to Dubai, where there was a four hour transit. From there, straight on to Toronto. I tell you, being stuck on a plane for 14 hours straight is NOT a fun thing to do. Luckily it was a daylight flight, so at least could enjoy the view.

Nearly 24 hours after leaving SL, and thanks to the rotating earth, landed in Toronto at about 4:30pm on the 29th. We get a nice apartment courtesy of the office, so getting settled in at the moment. The weather at the moment is like Nuwaraeliya in December, overcast most of the time. Winter is coming soon so must brace myself for that. Hopefully I won’t turn into a frozen human popsicle.

I’ve put some pics for now, more will follow later.

Adios

Dubai Airport

Snow Capped mountains of Greenland

Miscellaneous Pics :)

Long time since a post :D. Been a very very busy coupla weeks and my brain feels like a fried Tomato :P. Really can’t think of anything to write, so thought I’d put some pics for now.

This is my best side

You cant see meee....

Contemplating Life

Ok dude...U'r seriously getting on my nerves

I'm going to start charging for these now...


Iron Man on the Prowl...


Nothing is too big or heavy for me


My kingdom for a ton of Iron


erm...pink flowers...

True Spirit of the Olympics

Whatever the critics say about China, I say that they did a bang up job of the Olympics and showed their colors to the world. They managed to beat the US of A with the highest number of gold medals, 51 ranking 2nd in the total medal count with 100. Sadly we didn’t get a medal, but hey, there’s always the next one. I’m sure that there’s bound to be a Sri Lankan champion in the future generations he he

I’m not what you call the sporty type, but I am a fan of the Olympics, coz it shows what the world can be if humans can just do away with petty things like hate, greed, etc.

This month’s Readers Digest carried a nice article about the true spirit of sportsmanship, so thought I’d put some excerpts of it here.

Lucien Duquesne – Amsterdam 1928
A Finnish long distance runner by the name of Paavo Nurmi carried a stopwatch to pace himself and during a qualifying race of the 3000m steeplechase, he fell down and lost his watch. Frenchman Lucien Duquesne stopped and helped Nurmi on his feet and even helped to locate his stopwatch. Nurmi ran the rest of the race along Lucien and even offered the finish line, but Lucien has declined.

Ralph Hill – Los Angeles 1932
In the finals of the 5000m, Ralph Hill of the USA came from the last place to challenge the reigning champion Lauri Lehtinen of Finland and twice tried to pass the Fin, but was blocked. Lehtinan won by centimeters. Even though Hill could have made a formal protest for being blocked, he chose not to, saying that he did not believe that the Fin would purposely cheat to win.

Shunzo Kido – Los Angeles 1932
This Japanese equestrian team member was leading the steeplechase event, when he noticed that his horse was fatigued, and rather than risk injuring the animal, he dropped out of the race.

Anton Josipovic – Los Angeles 1984
Josipovic of Yugoslavia won the boxing gold by a technicality because Evander Holyfield was disqualified after winning semi finals. During the medal ceremony Josipovic invited Holyfield onto the top of the platform to share the glory.

Larry Lemieux – Seoul 1988
During the one man sailing completion, Lemieux of Canada was in second place when he spotted Joseph Chan of Singapore who was competing in another race get into trouble after capsizing his boat. Lemieux came to Chan’s rescue, sacrificing his own medal chance, for which he was awarded the Pierre de Cobertin Medal for sportsmanship.

Bjornar Haakensnoen – Turin 2006 (Winter Olympics)
In the cross country team ski race, Canadian Sara Renner’s left ski pole broke in half, but she pushed forward. Suddenly a man came forward from the sidelines and handed Renner a new ski pole, ultimately giving Canada the Silver. Renner’s helping hand was given by Bjornar Haakensnoen, the coach of the Norwegian team, which came in fourth.

Are these just in the past or would we such actions these days, with all the doping scandals and all. Already the US is trying hard to prove that the Gold medal wining gymnasts from China are under aged and to disqualify them.

I think Haakensnoen comment says it all about what the true spirit of Olympics is all about.

“The Olympic spirit is the way we try to follow. If you win, but don’t help somebody when you should have, what win is that”

Canadians hail Norwegian coach's sportsmanship

Laughing you head off

Man, some funny stuff, and some very talented entertainers. I’ve only posted a sample; you can search for more on YouTube.

Nina and Monk





Achmed the Dead Terrorist




Ron Lucas and Scorch




Terry Fator

Of Bird’s Nests and Water Bubbles

After waiting for four long years, the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games are just a four days away. I’m not what you’d call the sporty type, but I do look forward to the Olympics. It’s nice to see people from all over the world in one place and not trying to kill each other :D.

To ensure that things go off smoothly, China has been making preparation since over 4 years. The mainstay of these preparations is the two new Olympic stadiums. They have some very cool architecture for these.

The main stadium is known as the Birds Nest, coz it actually looks like a bird’s nest, with twigs running crisscross all over it. It will hold all the main track and field events. Actually construction started back in December 2003 to a cost of USD 500 million. Total capacity is 91,000.



The Bird's Nest

The other one is the national aquatic centre, also known as the water cube coz it looks like a big ice cube stuck in middle of a city.



The Water Cube

These two are probably the weirdest looking stadiums built for the Olympics ever. The Chinese really want to show the rest of the world who’s the boss.

However there’s also a lot of controversy about the games being hosted in China too. Things like Human rights violations, pollutions etc.

One report says that officials are pushing their athletes over the limit to get more medals than ever so that China is at the lead of the medal tally. Saw a report on CNN this morning where kids as young as 6 are put through tough training regimes, I doubt even US Marines go through, and for what, a Gold in 2018? The look on that kid’s face was not a very happy one. The parents encourage this, even though they admit that the kid doesn’t want to do it, coz they believe that this is the way to prosperity for the kid.

Sadly Olympics have also become another “who’s got the biggest dick” competition for the powers that are. Hopefully the competitors will be the winners in the end.

Anywhoo, all the best for the Sri Lankan contingent, make Sri Lanka proud and bring back few Gold medals :D. Even if you don’t win, show good sportsmanship, coz that’ll go a long way.

ඔලිම්පික් තරගය සදහ යන අපෙ කට්ටියට ජයෙන් ජයම වේවා

Links
Bird's Nest
Water Cube
Beijing 2008 Official Site

Breaking the Language Barrier

Pic from uncyclopedia.org. It's worthwhile to go through the site, many more funny stuff available.

Cheers

Your very own Iron Man suite

Wouldn’t it be cool if we can borrow the Iron Man suite for awhile and wreak havoc around the place? Well the a Japanese scientist by the name of Yoshiyuki Sanaki from the Tsukuba University engineering facility has come up with, what I’d like to think of as Iron Man suit stage I :D.

Actually this is old news, and I first saw this last year, but forgot about. Came across it suddenly some days back so I thought I’d put it here.

Named HAL 5, it’s basically an exoskeleton suite that will enhance the body’s capabilities. It can allow a person to lift up to 10 times the normal weight capable by that person. The real use for the suite is to provide mobility to paralyzed people. Other uses include in nursing, factory work and disaster relief.

It’s just in a frame like suite for now, but add on some bullet proof armor and some jet packs and woohoo, instant Iron Man suite. Tony Stark you better watch out. He he.
Isn’t it great that what someone dreamed of nearly 40 years ago are slowly become a reality? After all Iron Man first made his appearance way back in 1963, and what imagination the creators must have had to come up with the concept.

Must start saving now itself, might be able to get one when I’m 50 at least :D

Hal - 5

Well I’m still alive and kicking he he.

Been a couple of busy few weeks at office so haven’t had time to check out interesting and weird things happening around the world. Although I’ve been keeping up with my fav bloggers :) Work wise things are getting back to normal, but me’s got some exams coming up :(. Luckily finished off the assignments so have to hit the books now. Ayi caramba… there’s soooo much to go through.

Read some really moving posts about Black July experiences by Cerno and David Blacker. I was lucky enough to be too young to remember any of it. Can’t really imagine what the victims must’ve felt and gone through. A lot of meaningless violence and destruction. It’s sad really that we humans only needs a very little bit of encouragement to revert back to the levels of the wild animals.

I leave you with one of my all time favorite songs



Peace y’all

What Your Desktop Says About You

Cerno has asked bloggers to put up a post with a screen shot of the desktop.



Well this is mine at the moment. Surprise Surprise, it's a Harley :P

Desktops never stay the same. Changes with the mood of the user. However they do give a glimpse into the interests of the users.

I've had desktops ranging from Garfield, to motorcycles, cars, fighters, and metal bands. On the other hand I'd never put one up of a bunch of flowers, or babies or things of that nature. Cats, yes, but not kids :P

I've had this one for couple of months now, so guess it's high time to make some changes :)

Namal Perera: Media Security in Sri Lanka - Appeal to the Sri Lankan Blogsphere

This is a re-post of Dinidu's post as requested by him. The original post is here. Please feel free to re-post this and link it back to the original by Dinidu. :)

Cheers to all...

As you might be aware, senior journalist and media person Namal Perera was assaulted yesterday evening on his way home from work at the Sri Lanka Press Institute. This comes as a severe blow to the media industry in Sri Lanka, and the freedom of expression of the Sri Lankan people. Namal is currently undergoing treatment under police protection at a private hospital. Daily Mirror carried the story as today’s lead.

A demonstration is organized tomorrow (2nd July) at 12:30pm, at the Colpetty Junction as protest for the continued war against the media in this country, and calling for increased safety and security for the country’s journalists, and for action to be taken against the perpetrators of these crimes. Too many of these things are going unsolved.

Please try to make it for the protest.

As a personal favour, I’m appealing to the blogsphere of Sri Lanka to please repost the above in your blogs, and mail it to your mailing lists. And please link back to this original post so we can keep track of how many people viewed the post. Thank you.

Why do bus conductors charge fares from clergy and not from cops?

Shouldn’t it be the other way around?

Guess that’s the way we are programmed. Suck up to authority and be safe. After all, the policeman can make trouble for you, while what can clergy do? Damn you to hell? Most people are already there so it won’t matter to them.

It’s very rarely I’ve seen a bus conductor not charge clergy. Saw it yesterday, hence the post. On the other hand, never have I seen a cop being asked for money. Bus conductors who normally shout at passenger “Salli ganna, salli ganna”, gets partial blindness when cops get in. Ok most of them are probably cursing the coppers at the end of the day, but if they can let them ride free, why not clergy? I guess it depends on the moral standards of the bus conductor. Unfortunately it is non-existent in most of them.

5 Non Blondes

This is a cool mix up of Eminem and the 4 Non Blondes :D

Enjoy

The Chersterfield Hotel and LankaZone.com

** Launch of new site **

I mentioned in one of my earlier posts that a friend of mine launched a hotel in Nuwara Eliya, called the Chesterfield Hotel, and finally the web site is online. In addition to information about the hotel it offers information about Sri Lanka and about some other hotels in the country, and basically to promote Sri Lanka tourism to the world.

www.lankazone.com

So the next time you are planning a trip to Nuwara Eliya, make sure to check this place out.

Cheers!!!

Can People be this Stupid?

A conversation that happened in a Liquor store in Hawaii

Cashier: “Aloha, how are you today?”
Tourist: “Oh, I’m sorry, I don’t speak Spanish. Could you talk in English please?”
Cashier: “Hello, how are you today?”
Tourist: “Fine, we just flew here from America today.”
(The cashier rings up the tourist’s few items.)
Cashier: “That will be twenty five dollars and eighty five cents.”
Tourist: “Do you take American money here? I only have American money. I have not been able to get to the currency exchange yet.”
Cashier: “Ma’am, we are in the United States. We take dollars here.”
Tourist: “Oh really? You take this money?” *holds up her $20 bill*
Cashier: “Yes, ma’am, those are dollars, and being a US state we do accept those.”
Tourist: “Well that’s very nice of you to accept foreign money.”
Cashier: *puzzled* “Mahalo, have a great day!”
Tourist: *under her breath* “I told her I didn’t speak Spanish!”

Conversation between a Pizza parlor and a customer

Customer: “Hi, I ordered a pizza from you guys a while ago, and they delivered the wrong one.”
Operator: “Oh, I’m sorry! What was your order?”
Customer: “Mushrooms and green onions… the one we got had sausage. We can’t eat sausage! We’re vegetarians!”
Operator: “Okay, do you still have the pizza? We can come by and switch them for you.”
Customer: “No, we ate it.”
Operator: “You ate it?”
Customer: “Yes! Now, I’d like to get my money back. It was the wrong pizza.”
Operator: “So… you want me to give you your money back… for a pizza you already ate.”
Customer: “Well we didn’t LOOK at it, we just ate it.”

Tech Support

(Back story: the customer was getting a blue screen of death on their computer.)
Operator: “Hello, thank you for calling tech support. How can I help you today?”
Customer: “I was wondering if you could tell me who general failure is and why he is trying to read the C drive on my computer?”
Operator: “Ummm…excuse me?”
Customer: “I said that some guy named General Failure is reading my C drive.”
Operator: “…How did you come to this conclusion?”
Customer: “When I booted up my computer I get a big blue screen that says “General failure reading drive C,” and I demand to know who this person is!”
Operator: *stifling laughter* “Okay, if you don’t mind I am going to place you on hold for about 10 minutes while I do an investigation as to who this person is…”
(I placed customer on hold and told my co-workers. We laughed our asses off for 10 minutes.)
Operator: “Thank you for holding. I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is I was able to find some information for you. The bad news is that I wasn’t able to confirm who this ‘General Failure’ is; I am sure he doesn’t work for us. The other thing is that your hard drive is fried, and I would advise you to try to pull any data you can off the drive and invest in a new one. Is there anything else I can do for you today?”
Customer: “Um…no thank you.”

In a Supermarket

Customer: “What the f**k, you shortchanged me!”
Cashier: “Ma’am, I gave you the exact amount of change that is on the receipt.”
Customer: “BULLS**T! YOU SHORTCHANGED ME YOU STUPID LITTLE F**K! I DEMAND THAT YOU GIVE ME MY MONEY BACK RIGHT NOW!”
Cashier: “I’m sorry, ma’am. I will go get a manager for you right away.”
Customer: “F**K YOU, YOU LITTLE PIECE OH S**T! I WILL NOT STAND FOR THIS. YOU WILL PAY!”
(At this point the customer began to storm down the aisles. She lit a cigarette and began setting merchandise on fire. Afterwards she ran from the store because she realized that she had in fact had gotten the right amount of change!)

This were real conversation that had happened between customers and shopkeepers. There’s a whole site dedicated to these called http://notalwaysright.com/, and I seriously suggest everyone to go through them. :) It’s a great pick me upper when those blues kick in.

http://notalwaysright.com/

Cheers

Equation for Men and Women

Got this in email today. It’s true aint it? :)

----> Equation 1

Human = eat + sleep + work + enjoy
Donkey = eat + sleep

Therefore,
Human = Donkey + work + enjoy

Therefore,
Human - enjoy = Donkey + work

In other words,
Human that don't know enjoy = Donkey that work

----> Equation 2

Men = eat + sleep + earn money
Donkeys = eat + sleep

Therefore,
Men = Donkeys + earn money

Therefore,
Men - earn money = Donkeys

In other words,
Men that don't earn money = Donkeys

----> Equation 3

Women = eat + sleep + spend
Donkeys = eat + sleep

Therefore,
Women = Donkeys + spend

Therefore,
Women - spend = Donkeys

In other words,
Women that don't spend = Donkeys

----> To Conclude:

From Equation 2 and Equation 3
Men that don't earn money = Women that don't spend.

So, Men earn money not to let women become Donkeys! (Postulate 1)

And, Women spend not to let men become Donkeys! (Postulate 2)

So, we have?
Men + Women = Donkeys + earn money + Donkeys + spend money

Therefore from Postulates 1 and 2, we can conclude

Man + Woman = 2 Donkeys that live happily together!



Donkey Image: Rick Roach

It’s One of Those Days

Yep, one that right royally screws you up early in the morning.

I take the train in the morning coz I’m a fan of riding the rails, and I usually take the express coming from Matara, since it only stops at two of the stations out of the eight between where I get on and off. It’s about 15 minutes faster than a slow train. As I came to the stations it was announced that it will be 15 minutes late, which is not unusual. So there’s a slow train that goes right after the express and it came and left, then out of the blue another slow train comes up, with no sight of the express in sight. So a lot of the usual express crowd get on that one, including me. When it stopped at one of the stations, where the express also stops, some of the people got down saying that the express was right behind. If this is the case then the slow train is held up until the express passes, so thought why wait and got down. Five minutes go by, ten minutes go by, but still no express in sight. After about 15 minutes it slowly makes it way to the station, by which time the previous train, the one I got down from, so that I can go faster, might have already reached its destination. So what else to do but get on the late express, and what happens, the bleeding engine gives up and the train doesn’t budge. Yes how wonderful.

The thing is that if I had stayed on in the earlier train, then it would have been definitely stopped to let the express pass on, but since I got down, oh no everything has to go wonky. Mind you this station is about 2.5 km’s from the Galle Road, so you have to take another bus to get to the Galle raod. Waited for another half hour in hopes that the engine will start and we’d be merrily on our way, but no such luck. Because of this fiasco all trains coming behind are also stuck.

I wait for about half an hour and decided to take the bus, and guess what happens after the bust starts to go. Yep you are right, the broken train starts to move. I tell you my timing is way off today. Apparently they’ve brought in another engine to push the broken down one from behind. Well what else to do but go ahead in the bus, with all the traffic and all.

These railway people need to be taught a lesson in information dissemination. Would it kill them to let the passengers know if the problem is solvable or not, and give some kind of time estimate? Whether they are even trying to solve the problem or not?

Anyways wasted 3 hour on the road on what is normally a 1 hour commute. I usually come to office early so it didn’t really matter, still managed to come as same time as others. Luckily the office doesn’t have strict working hours and we can waltz in any time we please. :), but what about the other people who have to get in before the “Rathu Ira”?

Normally something like this would have really pissed me off, but funnily enough I was highly amused by all this, and laughing to myself. Two conclusions, either I’m becoming more Zen like or I’m totally losing it, and I sincerely hope it’s the first one.



Image Source: www.imagezoo.com

Sieben

(Ok couldn’t think of a witty title so Sieben = German for Seven)


Aiy caramba…been tagged again, to write up 7 weird facts about moi. Aye, such brutal honesty stuff makes me feel like I’m running nekid through a crowded street. Oh what the heck eh?

I’m supposed to display the rules as well. Don’t ask me why.

- Link your tagger and list these rules on your blog
- Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
- Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
- Let them know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog

Hmmm here goes…

- I have this imaginary fantasy world, a cross between LOTR and Star Wars (go figure), where I can have my own little adventures. I usually go there when I pissed off at the real world, which I find myself doing quite a lot recently.

- I’m not much of a talker. Talking bores the hell outa me, especially idle chit chat. What annoys me is that people mistake that, coupled with shyness, as being a stuck up snob, which I’m not. It’s just the way I am. However, come up with an interesting subject, and will talk for ages. Otherwise get me drunk as a skunk.

- I’m not comfortable with letting people get close to me.

- Had a thing for tattoos since I was a kid. Wasn’t until recently that I was able to get them done. Already have two, and the number will definitely go up.

- I have a feeling that even though the body is growing the mind stopped growing somewhere around the age of ten.

- Fascinated by mythology, the occult and the dark side of things. The light side is so overrated and boring.

- Most of the time I feel disconnected with the rest of the world, and funnily, it doesn’t bother me either.

Ok there we go. A selected few ;)

I’m going to be the evil one here and will not tag anyone else, not because i dont care about you, but mainly coz everyone I know has already been tagged and secondly, I want to see what curse will befall me Mwuahahaha…

I invite any one who wants to write up some facts about themselves and take up the tag.

Cheers y'all

Tom, Dick and Harry

Disclaimer: This is NOT a review!

It’s been awhile since I went for a play so thought I’d drag my lazy self to see the “Silent Hands” production of Ray and Michael Cooney’s Tom, Dick and Harry at the Wendt. If I’m correct this is not the first time they are doing it, but this time it’s for some worthy causes. The proceeds of the first night, Friday the 30th of May, went towards the vehicle fund of Methodists College and the Saturdays performance was in aid of the Welfare fund of St. Peters College. Don’t know about the third night :)

Well it was just what the doctor ordered to drive away the blues of a depressingly wet day. Laughed my head off from the beginning till the end of the show. It was a hilarious script, and wonderfully delivered by a great cast. Credit for Jehan Bastiens and Neidra Williams for a great job in adapting it with a local flavor, and directing the play.

A big round of applause for all the guy and gals for putting on a great show.

Cheers!!!

A Piano with a Tech Boost

The piano or pianoforte is one of the most versatile musical instruments available, capable of making beautiful music. From the classics to rock and roll, it has made great contributions to music throughout history.

The beginnings of the Piano dates back to the early 1700s’, where a man called Bartolomeo Crsitofori from Padua, Italy is credited with its invention. Later during the period from 1790 – 1860, it went through a lot of changes, which led to its modern form. Well you can read more about the piano here if you are interested :)

In this day and age where everything has gone hi tech, it’s quite appropriate that the humble piano to get a facelift as well. The latest such instrument is the Yamaha Disklavier Mark IV version 3.0 upgrade, which is billed as the world’s most advanced piano.

One of it’s main features is its audio recording capabilities in .WAV format, not just in MIDI, so people can use it as a recording studio to capture not just the instrument, but external sound like vocals and other musical instruments as well. All recordings are stored in the piano’s hard drive (he he who would’ve thought that we’d ever use the words ‘piano’ and ‘hard drive’ in the same sentence) and can be easily transferred to a PC via USB.

Other cool features include:

- Can be controlled by Pocket Remote Controller along with PC’s and Mac computers

- Video outputs can be viewed by connecting monitors. Piano Soft Plus Graphic files combine MIDI, audio, text and graphics to offer true multimedia experiences

- Easier search function to quickly find songs

- Improved timer play controls

- Improved support for DisklavierRadio and DisklavierMusicStore. DisklavierRadio is a streaming radio which includes a MIDI feed in each channel, which enables the instrument to play live. DisklavierMusicStore offers songs with both piano and MIDI accompaniment tracks, which users can purchase and download.

- An open-ended software-based architecture built on Linux operating system. Updates can be downloaded directly from the net. Comes with a 80GB hard drive.

All in all, this is one cool piano. Imagine if Mozart was alive today what kind of music he could create with this baby.

Now the important question is how much would all this gadgetry set you back? Well the Disklavier Mark IV, version 2.0 starts around $35,000.00. Well frankly, I’d rather spend that on getting a customized Harley and stick to playing an old fashioned traditional piano, but then again that’s just me :D

Press Release by Yamaha

Gizmodo Article

නව තාක්ශනයේ පියානෝවක්

දැන් කාලයේ හැම දේම දියුනු වෙද්දි, පාරම්පරික සංගීත භාන්ඩත් අලුත් වෙන්න එපැයි. මේක ඒවගෙ අලුත් වෙච්ච පියනෝවක්. යමහා ආයතනයෙ සංගීත අංශය විසින් නිශ්පදිත මෙය නම්වේ.

මේ අපූරු සංගීත භාන්ඩය පරිගනකයක් සමග සදා තියෙන්නෙ. එහි සමහර විෂේෂාංග නම්:

- ශබ්ද පටිගත කිරීමේ පහසුකම්
- පරිගනක තිරයක් සවි කිරීමේ හකියාව සහ එමගින් රූප මාද්ය නැරබිම
- පට්ගත කරපු සින්දු පහසුවෙන් සොයාගැනීම
- මේ සදහාම සැකසූ විෂේශ සින්දු අන්තර්ජලයෙන් ලබගෙන එවා වාදනය කිරීමේ හැකියාව
- 80 GB දෘඩුකාංග තැටියක් (Hard Drive)

දැන් අපිට වෙදගත් වෙන්නෙ මොනවත් නෙමේ, මෙම අපූරු භන්ඩයේ මිලයි. දල වශයෙන් මේක ඇමරිකනු $35,000 ක්



Pic source Yamaha

A Study in Miniature

Since of late, have this urge to buy toys, especially these model cars. I seriously think my brain is doing some funny stuff.

When I was a kid, had this fascination with recreating accidents so naturally my toys never had a long life span. It bothered me if they didn’t have any kind of damage in them, and I’d find inventive ways to cause them damage too. Luckily lost interest in toys early in life, and moved on to books… er reading them, not burning them.

Oh what the heck, what’s life without these little oddities he he :D

Cheers y’all

Southern Gems

Went down to Galle with the gang during the Vesak hols for a bit of sun, sand and sea. It's been a long time since we went down south, since we usually head for the hills during holidays, so this was a nice break.

Not many people were vacationing down south so Unawatuna beach was not very crowded, which was ideal.



Statue of Lord Buddha erected in remembrance of the Tsunami in 2004, Can't remember the exact place, but closer to Seeningama :)


Peace and Serenity


Roarrrr - Lion Carving at the entrance way to the statue.


Cut off from Man - Seeningama Devalaya


Beacon of Hope - Lighthouse inside Galle Fort


In praise of Allah - The mosque inside Galle Fort


Standing Tall - Roomassala Temple


Come and Pray - The Old Dutch Church inside the Galle Fort



Along the Ramparts - View of the Lighthouse and the Mosque


Tis the time when the Lycans stroll the lands - The Vesak full moon in all it's glory

Greetings for Vesak | ෙවසක් ආසිරි

I should say the most important day of the Buddhist calendar, and for Buddhists all over the world, celebrating the birth, the enlightenment and the passing away of Lord Buddha.

Even though I’m not a Buddhist, I greatly admire the teachings of Buddhism. If lived according to its teachings, it is the ideal way to live. I personally believe that no matter what religions there are, the most basic truth of them is “to be nice to your fellow man”. Ok maybe not in the same words, but it’s do. If we can follow that, then this world would be a much better place.

Unfortunately not all humans think alike. For some people it is “as long as I survive, damned be the rest”. Fortunately a majority of the people are good by nature, it’s just a few bad apples that upset the whole cart. These bad apples can cause a major damage even though their numbers are few.

It doesn’t matter what religion or faith you follow, as long as you think a bit about your fellow man. That can make a very big difference in the world.

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වෙසක් පුර පසලොස්වක පොහෝ දින අථි වැදගත්කම ගැන ඉථින් අමුතුවෙන් කියන්න දෙයක් නැහැනේ. ගෞතම බුදුරජනන්ගේ ඉපදීම, බුදු බව ලබීම සහ පිරිනිවන් පෑම සිහිපත් කරන මෙ දින ලොවපුරා බෞද්දයන්ට ඉතා වැදගත් දිනයක්.

මම බෞද්දයෙක් නොවොනත්, මම ඒ උගැන්වු දර්ශනය ඉතා අගය කරන කෙනෙක්. හරියට පිලිපදිනවානම් එය ඉතා සාර්ථක ජිවිතයක් ගත කරන්න හොද මාර්ගයක්. කොහොමවුනත් මම විශ්වාස කරනව හැම ආගමකම ඉතා සරලම උපදේශය අනිත් මිනිසුන් සමග හොදින් ජීවත් වීමයි. අවාසනවකට සෑම මිනිසෙක්ම මේ විදිහට හිතන්නෙ නැති එකයි මේ ඔක්කොම ප්රශ්න වලට මුල.

ඔබ මොන ආගම දහමක් ඇදැහෙව්වත් වැඩක් නෑ, ඔබ ඔබගෙ සහෝදර මිනිසුන් ගැන සිත්තන්නෙ නැත්තම්.

ඔබ සැමට වෙසක් ආසිරි !!!

10 Random things that maketh Azrael high

I’ve been tagged by several folks to write this up, so here goes. Who am I to deny my fans?
This is not in any particular order :)

1. Reading books – well that’s no secret, I’m a readaholic.
2. Music – Both listening and playing. Erm…no singing…
3. Travelling – Basically anywhere, either with friends or by myself.
4. Visiting new places and seeing them for the first time.
5. Hanging out with my friends – I’m solitary animal by nature, but there are my small groups of very good friends that I like to hang out with. They know who they are.
6. A lazy evening at the beach – with maybe a couple of drinks and a BBQ
7. Riding my bike – I don’t mean daily traveling, but riding the open roads just for the pure fun of it.
8. Solving a problem – When you get stuck and finally coming up with a solution after torturing the brain. It’s basically along the lines of succeeding at something after hard work.
9. Cooking – Not the everyday kind but planning and making something special once in awhile.
10. Cartoons – Yep still love them, and will do so till the day I kick the bucket.

Well there it is.

Cheers y'all

Ride Free…

Hmm… not a lot of work today so was browsing the net to fend off boredom, and came across these.

Ok ok I was drooling over them. *sigh*.

Check out the links for more…

Enjoy

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අද වැඩ අඩු දවසක් නිසා කම්මැලිකම යන්නත් එක්ක අන්තර්ජාලයෙ පොඩ්ඩක් සැරිසරන කොට මේ ටික හම්බවුනෙ.

ආතල් යතුරුපැදි ටික. අනේ ලන්කවෙත් මෙවා තිබ්බනම්


Harley Davidson – All hail the kings…

MGS Custom Bikes

Custom Bikes of Lauderdale

Thunderstuck Custom Bikes







Images from MGS Custom Bikes and Harley Davidson

සින්හලෙන් බිදක්

දිනෙන් දිනම සින්හල භෂාව බ්ලොග් ලෝකය ජයගන්නව, එනිසා මටත් හිතුනා සින්හලෙන් බ්ලොග් ලිපියක් ලියන්න ඔනෙ කියල මේක ටික දවසක ඉදන් තිබ්බ අදහසක්, හබැයි වැඩෙ කල් ගියේ, සින්හල යතුරුලියනය කරන්න තිබ්බ කම්මැලිකමයි. හැබැයි දැන් ඉතින් වැඩ ලේසි කරන මෘදුකාන්ග තියන නිසා හොදයි

අපේ සමහර අයගෙ මතයක් තියනවනේ ඉන්ග්‍රිසි විතරයි, සින්හල ඔනෙ නැහැ කියලා. ඒ අදහස හොද අදහසක් නෙමේ, මොකද සින්හල කියන්නෙ අපේ මවු භෂාවනෙ. ඒකහින්දා අපි ඒක රැකගන්න ඔනෙ මුලු ලෝකෙම සින්හල කථා පමන. ඒකියන්නෙ මුලු ලොක ජනගහනයෙන් ඉතා සුලු ප්‍රමනයක්. හැබැයි ඉන්ග්‍රිසි කතා කරන අය නම් ගොඩක් ඉන්නවනේ. ඉතින් අපි අපේ භෂාව රැකගත්තෙ නැත්තම්, ටික කලයක් යද්දි සින්හල කියල භාෂාවක් නතිවෙලා යයි.

ඒ අතරම තවත් කට්ටියක් ඉන්නව ඉන්ග්‍රිසි ඔනෙ නෑ සින්හල විතරයි කියාගෙන. ඒකත් හොද වැඩක් නෙමේ. තමාගේ මවු භාෂාවට වඩා තව භාෂාවන් දැනගෙන ඉන්න එක ඇගට ගුනයි , විෂෙශයෙන්ම ඉන්ග්‍රිසි. මීට හෙතුව, මේ ගොලීකරනයවූ ලොකයේ, ඉන්ග්‍රිසි තමයි වියාපාරයේ භෂාව වෙලා තියෙන්නෙ. ඉන්ග්‍රිසි නොදැන හිටිය කියල දියුනු වෙන්න බැරි කමක් නැ, හබැයි දන්නවනම් වැඩෙ ලේසි වෙනවා.

සින්හලෙන් යතුරුලියනය කරන එක තාම හුරු නෑ, එනිසා අදට මේ අති.

ඔබ සැමට ජයවේවා!!!

If you are seeing gibberish on your screen, don’t worry, this post is in Sinhala and requires Sinhala fonts. Thought I’d also join the bandwagon to promote Sinhala blogging :D

I do apologize for all mistakes, still getting the hang of typing in Sinhala :(

Coincidently, this is also my 100th post so it’s a good thing to mark a milestone he he…

Odd Stories for the day

It’s no secret that there are many individuals in this wonderful world of ours, who does not possess a full set of marbles in their upstairs region. Fortunately, they provide a bit of comic relief to us, the depressed and stressed out lot, to bring a smile and give hope to get on with our miserable lives.

A man in Zion Illinois, wants to legally change his name to “In God We Trust”. The future Mr. I G W Trust says that this will be a symbol of the help that god gave him during tough times.

Link

Another man in South Chicago Heights Illinois loved his beer so much that he made a custom made casket resembling a beer can. He hasn’t kicked the bucket yet, so he’s using it as a giant keg.

Link

A politician in Germany is thinking about donating his beard for charity.

Link

In Virginia, a woman taking her driving test, crashed into the DMV building instead of parking next to it, as instructed. Guess she was in a bit of a hurry to get that license.

The Manitoba Bar Association had to forego filing a brief because it lacked necessary funds to hire a lawyer. If the lawyers won’t take their own association pro bono, would they even bother to take other people’s cases?

A 15 year old student in Connecticut is preparing to sue his school officials for an ear injury. Apparently his teacher had rapped on the desk too hard to wake him while he was sleeping in class.

Some people in Hawaii have built a self sufficient community on burnt out lava rock just a mile away from Mount Kilauea, a still active volcano. One of the residents says that he’s more afraid of people than the volcano, which is unfortunately true these days.

A would be criminal with loose nerves had spent a little too much time trying to build up the courage, but when he finally got the guts to do it, he couldn’t go in. The bank had closed for the day.

Another smart criminal decided to call ahead at the store which he planned to rob to tell them to keep a lot of money in hand. Of course when he went to rob the place, he found himself wearing a nice pair of handcuffs.

On similar theme, a man gave his number to a store employee, and told the employee to call him when the manger, who has access to the safe, comes. And another pair was arrested after they gave detailed description of how they were going to rob a man, to that man. I just can’t understand what was going through their minds. That the victim will nicely wait for them to rob them and give all the money up?

A guy already serving 8 years for fraud has filed over 1000 lawsuits amounting to several trillion dollars against a list of people President Bush, Martha Stewart, Steve Jobs, Britney Spears, Tiger Woods (luggage theft), Barry Bonds (illegal moonshine production).

Ok that’s enough for the day.

For more weird news visit www.newsoftheweird.com


Cheers

And now once more, Twisted Rhymes…

Haven’t come up with one of these in a while, so here goes…

Wee Willie Winkie
Runs through the town,
Upstairs and downstairs
In his nightgown
Rapping at the windows,
Crying through the lock,
"Are the children all in bed?
For it's now eight o'clock.

The neighbors were unhappy
At the thought of Wee Willie
Running about the hood,
In nothing but his jammys
Peeping into their homes
Like little perv,
Scaring the little kids
Out of their little wits

The people in the hood
Finally had enough,
They called on the police
To make a complaint,
“Please lock up Wee Willie
And throw away the keys,
We're tired of his antics
And want them to cease”


The sun went down
And out came Willie,
Running around merrily
Only in his jammys,
Rapping at windows
Like he always does,
What a shock he got
On that fateful night,

A big bunch of cops
Came out of nowhere,
Jumped on poor Willie
And took him down,
They roughed him,
Cuffed him,
Read him his rights,
And bundled him off to jail

The law came down hard
On poor Wee Willie
Off he went to the county jail
For a very long time indeed
He now raps on iron bars
In a brand new striped suit,
Amusing other prisoners
With all sorts of tricks

Thus goes the life
Of Wee Willie Winkie
Who couldn’t keep his nose
Out of other people’s business
He got into mischief
And burnt his tail
Now spends his time
Singing jailhouse blues

Of Road Races and Canned Pol Sambol

Along with Kavum and Kokis, another undying avurudu tradition is the marathons and the cycle races. Frankly I can’t understand how they became an Avurudu tradition in the first place, but it’s there so we have to live with it. Come to think of it, I think this year there are less of those as well. Maybe they couldn’t find any big wigs to do the start off. Anywhoo, came across two cycle races this Saturday, which is quite irritating when you are trying to get somewhere in a hurry.

My gripe is not with the cyclists, after all they are sportsmen and participating in a sporting event. I’m annoyed with all those other idiots who ride along the cyclists on motorcycles. For every one, there are about ten of these freaking idiots riding around the cyclists, like a guard of honor. They go weaving through traffic, shouting at other motorists like they own the road, trying to clear a path for their charge. Reminds one of those dreaded ministerial motorcades. What’s up with that? These posse riders should be banned from doing this.

Then there’s the other set of people who lineup along the way, eagerly waiting to throw a bucket of water at the cyclists. Why does a cycle race turn normal, sane citizens into water throwing maniacs? Another mystery of life yet to be answered. I wonder if the racers actually like this. I mean I would get pissed off if someone threw a bucket of water at me while I’m trying to win a race, but then again different people have different tastes. What a whacky and weird world we live in.

Source nedgallagher.com

As for the other part of the title, has anyone else out there seen Canned Pol Sambol made by MD? I’m not sure for how long this has been in the market, but I only came across it couple of days ago. Has it come to a point in time that people are too busy to make even a simple pol sambol? It is sad. I don’t even want to know what it tastes like. Call me old fashioned, but I still prefer fresh homemade pol sambol any day over canned stuff.



On a more serious note, today, the 22nd of April is Earth Day. I Did a post last year also on it, ranting about the things happening. You can get more information at the official Earth Day site and as well as Wikipedia.

We only have one planet to live on people, let’s try not to blow it up, coz we got no place else to go!!!

Cheers!!!

17th of April

Well I haven’t been assigned any work for the day, yippee. So it’s going to be a lazy day. Oh well might as well put up a post :D

And in headlines today:

The Olympic torch has reached New Delhi India

At least 44 people have been killed after a bus plunged into a river in the western Indian state of Gujarat

At least 22 people, including 5 Palestinian children, have died in Gaza's worst day of fighting since Israeli incursions in early March.

A Yemeni court has annulled an eight-year-old girl's marriage to a man in his 20s, after she filed for divorce.

Cleveland zoo researchers find rare giant turtle in Vietnam

Three days after stealing a rare collection of coins, a thief in Germany took them to the bank for safe keeping - and delivered them into the hands of the man he had robbed.

Let’s see what interesting things have happened in the past on this day.

1861 - American Civil War: Virginia secedes from the Union.

1864 - American Civil War: Battle of Plymouth begins – Confederate forces attack Plymouth, North Carolina.

1865 - Mary Surratt is arrested as a conspirator in the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

1924 - Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios is formed from a merger of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures, and the Louis B. Mayer Company.

1941 - World War II: The Kingdom of Yugoslavia surrenders to Germany.

1949- At midnight 26 counties officially leave the British Commonwealth. A 21-gun salute on O'Connell Bridge, Dublin, ushers in the Republic of Ireland

1961 - Bay of Pigs Invasion: A group of CIA financed and trained Cuban refugees lands at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba with the aim of ousting Fidel Castro.

1964 - The Ford Motor Company unveils the Ford Mustang at the New York World's Fair.

1969 - Sirhan Sirhan is convicted of assassinating Robert F. Kennedy.

1971 - People's Republic of Bangladesh forms, under Sheikh Mujibur Rahman at Mujibnagor.

1973 - Federal Express delivers its first package.

1975 - Cambodian Civil War ends: The Khmer Rouge captures the capital Phnom Penh and Cambodian government forces surrender.



On the same note let us wish our very own spin wizard Muthiah Muralidaran a very happy birthday, who was born on a day like today back in 1972. He shares his birthday with the following famous people:

1734 - Taksin, King of Thailand (d. 1782)

1837 - J.P. Morgan, American financier (d. 1913)

1894 - Nikita Khrushchev, Premier of the Soviet Union (d. 1971)

1929 - James Last, German band leader

1954 - Rowdy Roddy Piper, Canadian professional wrestler

1968 - Prince Maurits of the Netherlands

1972 - Jennifer Garner, American actress

1974 - Victoria Beckham, English singer

Today is also World Hemophilia Day.

Source is as usual Wikipedia. You can find the complete list here.

Cheers y’all