Good News!

Dear all,

Today, I was informed that I have been selected for the position of "Chargés de Recherche 2e" (junior researcher) at INRIA Paris-Rocquencourt.

Thanks to all of you for your support ... more details coming in the coming days.

à plus!

-A

Time for Desi Pride

Today there are Gay Pride parades all over, and this is my tribute.

For some context, here is an excellent piece from the New York Times.
40 Years later, still second class Americans.


For those of you who like video, here is Colbert on the topic:



And finally, here is a heartwarming love story from India of two women in love with each other who were finally able to find a place and jobs and "get to be who they are".

Hopefully soon the Indian Govt. will repeal the law that keeps gay people in India from being themselves. Or maybe we need our own Stonewall incident?

The Truth

XKCD is always witty, but sometimes it outdoes itself :).



bonus points for reference to WarGames.

4000 Words

When we last left our protagonist, he was enjoying free Wi-Fi in the super-fast Thalys train to Eindhoven, Netherlands. Here are some snaps from afterwards...

First, Lunch and laptop, at 250 kmph (yes, that is Salmon)




Wall of food at Eindhoven station




Basanti da dhaba, at Amsterdam Airport




and now, I am back at INRIA, where apparently there are too many cats!



and now, back to work, and sending out psychological support for the people of Iran.

-A

The best part of my train ride to Netherlands

That and the wonderful food they are serving me in this super-fast Thalys train. :)

On the Iranian Elections

We have been talking about the Iranian elections for some weeks now, since one of our interns, Aamir, is from there. As most of the non-resident Iranians, he is not a supporter of President Ahmedinejad, and is pretty disappointed with the results that have been announced.

Given I am super swamped (doing to Eindhoven, Netherlands for a meeting tomorrow), I will leave you all with these two amazing video clips, in which Fareed Z covers Iran. Good stuff. [ref: HuffPo]

First, a report.



Then, a panel discussion.



My wishes are with the people of Iran. I hope their spirit prevails, but no one can say what will happen...
-A

Feeling the Magic

After much deliberation, and even more going-to-store-and-not-finding-it, I finally got my HTC Magic, the latest phone powered by the Google Android operating system, which allows me to easily deploy my own code to the phone, in addition to being snazzy :-).

Here are some pics, taken and uploaded from the phone (you may want to bookmark the album for getting updates when I upload more snaps)



and here is a video, again taken from the phone, and effortlessly uploaded to youtube.



All said and done, the best part for me are two apps: the metal detector, and the SSH client :). (I have installed a chess app, will post my comments once I use it)

more updates as I explore more features :)

cheers,
-A

Rebirth and Near-Future Plans

Yesterday was my rebirthday, (Those who do not know of my 7 year old car crash story, check this post out.) but I wasn't able to post due to the recent work-trip to Munich [preceded by work-trip to Pisa, and to be succeeded by work-trip to Eindhoven, Netherlands :-) ]. Happy rebirthday Ashish, Akshay, and Rahul!

Still pretty tied up with stuff, but wanted to let you all know that due to some recent developments, it is pretty certain that I will be at my current location (Paris, France) for three more years [till summer 2012].

at least.

-A
P.S. Happy birthday, Karthik!

Hanuman Laughs

No no, this is not like "Buddha Smiles" - India didn't just do another nuclear test (and neither did Kishkindha).

This is about some new research that claims that some apes (gorillas, chimps, bonobos), indeed laugh when tickled.

Go to the article, and click the "Listen Now" link at the top. You won't regret it.

I wonder if they would also laugh if they read the daily tamasha, which has become a regular source of chuckles for me :-).