mon voyage

.bend it like zidane.
so, the other day, just for the heck of it, i go and enroll myself in a french language class, from alliance francais. and life takes a whole new turn..

it’s like re-living the first few days at school. the study material is in french, and the teacher talks in french. to communicate the most basic of things, u have to use sign language. and the material is supposed to be accompanied with audio cassettes or CDs, but they are out of stock.

but, regardless, the classes are a lot of fun. we have to read the situations and dialogues in the book, and act it out. mindless fun it is.

and along the way, i have learned many interesting tid-bits. like, the french language has had a huge influence on the english language. the major churning happened around the time of the Norman conquest (1066 AD), when French was declared the official language of the court in England! mMore than a third of all English words are derived directly or indirectly from French, and it’s estimated that English speakers who have never studied French already know 15,000 French words!

then, today in class, we were introduced to a new word; “tournesol”. literally it means, turning towards the sun. yeah, that’s the sunflower. the interesting thing is Professor Calculus in the French version of Tintin is called Professeur Tournesol. (it means, somebody who is lost in his own world! what amazing symbolism!).

.telescope.
my advise to anybody dreaming of making a telescope is, shore up a lot of patience, before u commit to it. i spent around a month, trying to get Pyrex blanks. only one supplier responded (out of several) and that too with prices well beyond my budget. so finally settled on plate glass. then spent a horrendous 5 hours in the maddness that is SJP road, trying to find Carborandum of the correct grit size. but finally, now we (Pavan and Pharaoh) are all set to start the grinding. well, the cut glass is expected tomorrow, but that should go fine.

MI 4

phew! what a week!

.loose control.
last weekend, i was in my hometown. could enjoy only one day. the next day, i had a severe case of diarrhoea (cause unknown). spent hours under a saline bottle. finally, it became too painful, and i ripped it off. fortunately i made a speedy recovery after that. visited my school (for some business) after a long time. alas, i had to feed only on idlis and curd-rice the whole week. was mostly at home, and read up a lot of stuff, like this amazing story of re-discovery.

.wild goose chase.
meanwhile, my friend ACP, whose reputation for getting into adventure runs thick (he got a sprain in his ankle, while walking in a park in Chennai), was trying to track the thieves who had stolen his wife’s mobile. (the police had refused to register a case). after a lot of running around, he had a list of mobile-numbers of the suspects. on friday, he even tracked the guy to Domlur. so, he, me and a relative of his, went to Domlur to track the fellow down. lots of investigations followed. sneaky lies and intimidating calls. but no luck. the chase is still on.

in the evening, we hung around at my place, then at Forum and then went to watch MI-3, with his wife. late night show. liked the movie. didn’t have any dinner. drove tiple-seat on my bike. slept at 3.30 am. woke up at 6.

.meter down… down down down down.
Saturday morning. Venky woke me up at 6am. fortunate, as i had setup an alarm to 5.45 pm by mistake! hurried drive to Banashankari Temple. turns out we are among the first ones there! the others start trickling-in one by one. meanwhile, we munch on banannas. by 8am, there are 11 guys, 10 bikes.