Mark Twain's The Mysterious Stranger

I recently read "The Mysterious Stranger" by Mark Twain. It hit me and hit me bad!

The plot and words are simple, the message subtle but it leaves you groping for answers. After reading it, I sat for an hour trying to make sense of the multitude of thoughts floating around in my mind. The recent happenings in the news - Iraq, the Pope's visit, various conflicts, religious wars, political zealotry - everything fitted perfectly into what he wrote 100 years ago.

Man has found every single existing way to divide humanity - Language, race, religion, race, politics, money, power - in short innumerable.

Is there one single uniting idea? No.

After reading this realistic story, I am sure we don't need "Judgement Day" or "End of Kali Yuga" to destroy the earth.

We are doing all we can to destroy the human race and in the bargain, this planet also. Love and affection seems self-centred.

How can I enjoy more? How do I become more rich? And I want these immediately.

With such thoughts, do you think humanity has a chance? As Mark Twain says, we should let go of the pretense of "civilization" and claim we are just mammals.

A Trip to Munich

I visited Munich with a colleague last weekend. We had a meeting on Monday and could have made the trip on the same day, but we wanted to see and experience one of the biggest cities in Germany.

With a hotel booking and the address of a close friend, we landed at Munich on Saturday. The "Hauptbahnhof" or the Central Railway Station was clean and BIG and reminded me of Chennai Central. Shops and Stalls were mostly open throughout the night serving travellers food, drinks and other things.

After some confusionwith the U-Bahn trains (we had wrong information from my friend, but we trusted our intuition and didn't do what he said), we reached Garching, where my friend picked us up. We went to his place and some delicious Upma.

We then went to our Hotel and checked in. It is strange that in the enlightened FDR and in an international city like Munich, checkin time is 2:00 PM and checkout is at 11:00 AM. If you happen to check in at 12:00 noon, you pay a full-days rent for 2 hours! Luckily, we avoided it.

Bathed and clothed, we went to the King's Residence, a palace of the erstwile ruling dynasty.
One thing I have never understood about Palaces: How did they avoid getting lost?

You can see some of the pcitures in my Flickr photostream now.

We had a nice dinner at an Indian Restaurant called "Indian Mango" and went to sleep. By the way, there are many Indian restaurants near the central station, but they need some walking!

Sunday was spent in a visit to the Tegernsee, although we got delayed and reached it after sunset, by which time it was pitch dark. My friend, Shiva, was justifiedly furious because we arrived very late to his house (from where we started to the lake). It seems we could have seen the Alps! The loss was indeed ours.

That was our short but memorable trip to Munich.

Badge of Honour

Finally, I am acting the part of a geek!

I got myself a Badge, a Badge of Honour (yes, I use the British spelling still). I was able to create and use a Flickr Badge, which you can find by scrolling down and looking on the left.

Come on guys (and girls of course) [Its always safe to be politically correct] whats the next coolest thing. Bring it on.

In Germany

I am Germany now on an office work! You can imagine why there have been no updates from me. I will find some time to write more on this.

Some photos can be seen on the left panel in the site. You can also find information on the weather here and sympathize with me (sob)!!!