Posts

The Data Privacy Myth

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My tryst with the Assistant .. ‘Walls have ears’ is a proverb that has long been forgotten. The new adage should be ‘There is no such thing as privacy!’ Having said that I would like to state that I am a technologically-handicapped Civil engineer whose only active exposure to IT is through Google, Facebook and Instagram – not necessarily in that order. I am one of those who has to check my social media pages every few minutes to ascertain that nothing major has happened in the last few minutes I was out of touch with the ‘World’. What if Trump and Kim Jong Un decide to become friends and shake hands and I am not one of the first few people to know about it on this planet! I often tell my husband, “If Google were a guy, I would have married him!” Not because I have some weird form of technophilia, but because Google really listens! All of us know how difficult it is to find a person who just listens and does not judge you based on your deepest and darkest secrets and is hap
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The Aiport chronicles

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Up in the air I have always found air travel enjoyable. And when my work profile over the years warranted that I travel often, I couldn’t be happier. Every travel brings with it some memories which I can only think back with a grin on my face. The first time I traveled it was with a group of colleagues. I remember not knowing what a boarding pass is and questioning people that when you have a ticket why would you need another ticket to fly. Or the time when I was fumbling with the seat belt and not knowing what goes where and asking sheepishly for help from a kind air hostess. There are all kinds of people one can see on flights. I have tried to classify this ever increasing flock of people to the best extent possible. The avid photographer – the person who has to capture every passing cloud, mountain, city, river and everything beneath him/her. The selfie obsessed traveler – Someone who has to capture those precious in-flight selfies and airport selfies with the perfe
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The beard tale...

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Life with a beardo My beardo and me I am no fashionista. I barely manage not to commit any fashion faux-pas. And so when my better-half decided to enter the fashion game full on, I could only be nonchalant about it. I mean how much ever a man tries, he cannot go beyond a set of socially accepted fashion rituals – Denims became distress denims; pink and yellow became acceptable for men, Shoes can be worn without socks and so on. But it all changed with the advent of the beard game. Beards have often been associated with intellectually advanced people - be it scientists, philosophers, sadhus and the like. So when my uber-cool husband decided to enter the beardies (or is it beardo? For want of a better word!) bandwagon, I was surprised. Little did I realize, the beard fever had by then had an iron grip on most men across the globe. Apparently there are as many beard styles as there are hair styles for women. Men are advised to choose the one to their liking
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Paris! Mon amour!

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A weekend and a few evenings in Paris Towering glory! Second honeymoon It was the perfect opportunity for a second honeymoon. We were in a long-distance relationship then, with hubby shuttling between Pune and Chennai every month. With my new promotion at work, came an opportunity to attend a 2 week training in Paris. (Yay!!! That’s right.. Paris!!!). But what’s the point of travelling to the most romantic place on earth, if you can’t take your love with you. And thus we made the perfect plan - a weekend and a few days in Paris. For the cynical soul, Paris is an over-rated European location with people thronging to visit the tourist spots. But for the mere mortals and romantics, it’s a place of magic – be it the neatly laid out streets, the not-so-daunting buildings, river Seine and of course, la tour Eiffel. (Though, the omnipresent smell of cigarette smoke was a put-off sometimes!) Since I had to be at work during the day, we scheduled our sight-seeing in ev
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Celebrating New year - Far east style!

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Family friendly vacationing at Kuala Lumpur and Singapore Pre-departure planning Having lived in India all my life, I have always dreamt of watching New Year fireworks in close proximity ever since I was a kiddo. But I never could realize my wish until I had a baby of my own. One reason – such grandiose displays of light, colors and sound almost always happens in distant foreign land. And my teeny weeny wallet never permitted such expensive pursuits. My parents are simple folks (read Indian middle class folks) who preferred saving and spending money for our education rather than on such silly wasteful interests like travelling (meh!). But the gen Y people as we are, had other aspirations in life. With more stable jobs and better paychecks, we like to believe, the future will take care of itself as long as you acquire enough life experiences – even if it meant zero savings at the end of year. And so it was decided. An international destination for this year’s New Year vacati
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