One day journey to Sydney for eResearch’09

On 10th I went to Sydney to attend and give a talk at AustralAsia eResearch’09. It was a terrific experience. Probably the first conference I really enjoyed being at. This is just the non-technical side of the experience I am posting here. I will later on post some of the technical sides particularly on the feedback I got for MeTA Studio in coming days.

Ok, so first of all this was unique travelling experience for me where I took road(cab and walk), air, rail and water(ferry) transportations [only missing in the equation was a “bail-gadi” or a tractor, but the well this is Oz :-)]. Taking all these modes of transport and still reaching well in time for the conference to start was quite an experience. The best part of course was the ferry ride.

The road and the air transport were rather standard, nothing exciting to describe about. But I was eager to experience a train travel in Oz. If any thing I came out not being really thrilled about it (may be next time I should try monorail). I do still feel though that train travel in India is a lot better experience. Next, I have travelled in ferry a lot before (in Kerala), but never so big (well this was actually a ship), and never in sea. This experience turned out to be the best of all them. The ferry ride was from Circular Quay to Manly (where the conference was being held). And on the way you see pretty much of every thing Sydney has to show on its shores. The best is the Opera House.

The beach on Manly is also pretty good, and the best part was that the conference was organized in a hotel just facing the beach :-)

The journey back was made by sitting on the ferry deck rather than inside, another wonderful experience. In short, any one coming to experience Oz, a ferry ride in Sydney is highly recommended.

 

 

And well finally some pleasing experience :-)

 

A few snaps ;)

Was writing, writing and writing this week (don’t ask me what :( … ) , so though will take some break and put on some snaps …

The bubble: does it appear to be cut through?

And what about this? Progressively becoming transparent ;-) Wonder if something like that could be used for making the “disappearing act” gadget.

Well … am … the picture says as thousand words, they say!

Have fun!

Trying to capture moon

After a long time had some stint with photography. These shots were taken during 25/26 th night. I attached my small telescope's (30x magnification) eyepiece to camera lens (with another 3x magnification) to get these photos. Are not really good ones as there is lot of chromatic aberration in these images - Must learn how to correct these. In the last photo there is a strange black spot, that kept on moving in my subsequent shots... looks like some moon satellite ;)

spider!

One more kind of spider found in Pune University campus.

mobiphoto !

Well just trying to make up a little note of things that my mobile camera saw in Pune :)

When Lalu ji makes the next Budget announcement, he should allocate some funds for improving English for the sign boards put around railway station:



Next time you see street lights on Jangli Maharaj road in broad daylight, you can be sure that Pune University is undergoing power problems and safely head on to E-Square or Mangala!



Typical crime scene: Mice ate Mouse! Only was too late to catch the mice red handed!


On some +ve note: reflections