DesiReflections

Recent Book Read - Social Chemistry         Author : Marissa King  Social Chemistry is capable to    transform the way one    thinks about “networking.” Understanding the contours of social network can dramatically enhance personal relationships, work life, and even your global impact. Author shows how anyone can build more meaningful and productive relationships based on insights from neuroscience, psychology, and network analytics. Conventional wisdom says it's the size of your network that matters, but social science research has proven there is more to it. King explains that the quality and structure of our relationships has the greatest impact on our personal and professional lives.  The author divides networkers into 3 main types: expansionist, broker, or convenor. An expansionist is at ease with approaching strangers and exceptionally talented at forging spontaneous ties. If you're an expansionist, you probably have an addres...

जंगलों   के   मिज़ाज   बारिश   की   झड़ी   के   बीच   प्रतीक्षा - रत   धूप   का   निकलना   ठीक   वैसे   ही   जैसे     अरसे   बाद   आप   से   हो   जाए     मिलना   धूप   के   टुकड़े   चमकने   को   बेताब   हैं अंधेरे   में   गुम   पेड़ों   के   शिखर   तक    पर   रस्ते   नहीं   सूझते   इन   घने   जंगलों   में   इन   दिनों     मध्य   प्रहर   तक    कब   तलक़   हम   देख   पायेंगे   पौधों   पर   कलियों     का   खिलना   बारिश   की   झड़ी   के   बीच   प्रतीक्षा - रत   धूप   का   निकलना   कान   सुनने   को   तरस   गए   हैं   पक्षियों   का   चहचहाना क्या   झड़ी   लगी   बारिश   ...

Recent Book Read  AI Super- Powers  Kai-Fu Lee  This book was first published in the year 2018, and what I read is its second revised edition. After three years , the author    still feels that America and China are the major players innovating and adopting AI much faster than other players . He sums up that AI is going to create a new world order.  The best part is Kai dedicated this book to his mentor Raj Reddy , pioneer of AI . The culturally influenced, very different approach to research and integration of AI in society is interesting. So the methods to compensate for the loss of jobs and changes in society will be different and it will be interesting to see which strategies will be successful. And wh ether even more beneficial mixed forms from the best Asian and Western approaches will be mixed together. Politics, especially democracy and economic systems, will be accelerated with the help of the AI, and new, yet unimagined variants will develop....

अजय अनुपम की किताब - दर्द अभी सोये हैं        -प्रदीप गुप्ता  जब मैं बारहवीं कक्षा का छात्र था , भाई  अजय अनुपम हमारे हीरो होते थे . वे संभवतः एम ए में थे , वे उत्कृष्ट वक्ता हुआ करते थे , हम क्योंकि भाषण कला का कहकरा सीख रहे थे उन्हें अपना रोल मॉडल मान चुके थे , जब  वाद विवाद प्रतियोगिता में बोलने खड़े होते निर्णायक अंक देने की जगह उनके विचारों के प्रवाह में खो जाते थे . कालेज़ से निकले हम सब रोटी रोज़ी के सिलसिले में इधर उधर हो गये . भाई अजय को अपनी रुचि और सिद्धहस्त कला का जॉब मिला यानि वे प्रवक्ता बन गए , मुझे पूरा भरोसा है कि वे अपने छात्रों को भी रोल मॉडल  रहे होंगे . उड़ते उड़ते खबर आती थी कि भाई अजय अच्छी कविताएँ भी लिखते हैं लेकिन  सच्ची बात यह कि उन्हें सुनने और पढ़ने का अवसर नहीं मिला .  आज डाक से यहाँ अमेरिका में उनके नये संग्रह का पार्सल मिला बहुत ही अच्छा लगा , सब काम  छोड़ कर एक एक करके उनके गीत पढ़ना शुरू किया , तब लगा कि उन्हें अब तक सही सही जाना ही नहीं था .  अजय जी के गीत दरअसल गीत नहीं हैं ये एक संवेदनशील बु...

Fall Season : Take deep breath and enjoy nature at its best . Trees take beautiful Avatar  It is fall season. This is the best season for watching trees gradually changing colors in US . These autumn colors are seen everywhere :  parks and woodlands, in the cities, countryside, and mountains.  One can see the reds, oranges, golds, and bronzes of the mixed deciduous woodlands in Eastern part and in the West the bright yellows of aspen stands and larches contrasting with the dark greens of the evergreen conifers.  The timing of color changes and the onset of falling leaves is primarily regulated by the calendar as nights become longer. None of the other environmental influences – such as temperature, rainfall, food supply – are as unvarying as the steadily increasing length of night during autumn. As days grow shorter, and nights grow longer and cooler, biochemical processes in the leaf begin to paint the landscape with Nature's autumn palette. Different trees gives di...

Kannauj - महक इतनी कि क़स्बे की नालियाँ भी ख़ुशबू बिखेरती हैं ! Fine art of making perfumes in Kannauj  has its traces to the time of Emperor Harsh .  This  small town in Uttar Pradesh, had mastered the art of capturing the delicate smell of the fresh rain on dry soil into a perfume many years back. It was long before two Australian mineralogists, Isabel Joy Bear and Richard Grenfell Thomas, discovered the chemistry behind the heady smell and name it ‘petrichor’. It is known as ‘mitti-attar’, it is one of the most sought-after perfumes of Kannauj. Not far away from Kanpur once the industrial hub of entire north India, this small town Kannauj looks like any other dusty town of Uttar Pradesh. Little remains of the once glorious city-state that traces its antiquity to the days of the Mahabharata and which rose to its greatest height as the capital of Emperor Harsha (590 to 647 CE) when it was called Kanyakubja.  As you walk through the streets of the old town, you canno...

If you’re in New York and you want to go to London, at the moment flying is the best option. It’s the quickest route from A to B, with the only other means of travel being to go by ship . But there is another out of box possibility: to create a super highway.  A man named Vladimir Yakunin who is the head of Russian Railways presented a plan to create the ultimate road trip highway, by proposing a superhighway that allows transport from Nome, Alaska to Russia, through the Bering Strait, and on to Moscow and London. Yakunin’s project is called the Trans-Eurasian Belt Development. The drive from London to Alaska would be around 8,064 miles, and the total distance to travel from New York to London would be 12,910 miles. The superhighway will have super challenges due to very tough climatic conditions on the Russian part and connecting road by creating 51 mile long bridge on the Bering Strait between Cape Dezhnev, Chukchi Peninsula, Russia, the easternmost point (169° 39' W) of the Asia...

Latest Read - A Beginner’s Guide to the End: Practical Advice for Living Life and Facing Death - BJ Miller and Soshana Berger                       -Pradeep Gupta  Death is  something that’s often in the top fears of people. Nobody wants to talk or even think about it. The subject has the power to take our breath away, paralyzing our thoughts.  Whether you choose to think about it or not, you and those you love will die someday. That is the hard reality of life.  I don’t say that to be morbid, but rather because acknowledging and talking about it actually makes death a little easier. That’s because knowing what to expect helps you not be so blindsided when it finally comes for you. I remember few years back I read Shobha Dé ‘s book ‘Shobha at Sixty’, therein she had devoted  a chapter talking  about getting ready to accept death of self or spouse . But A Beginner’s Guide to End covers all aspects r...

Best Airports across the globe……. Frequent World Travelers have different experiences of boarding a flight at different airports . Condé Nast Traveler is one of most respected travel magazine, from last 35 years , they are giving rankings  to the airports based on purely their reader’s experience. This year they have come up with list of top ten best airports around the world and no surprise Istanbul and Singapore Airports are in the top league. Surprisingly it does not include any of the airports in America what to talk of India. You may agree or disagree based on your own experience!  1. Istanbul Airport For centuries, Istanbul has sat at the crossroads of international trade and travel, so it’s only natural that the Turkish city has finally stepped into its position as a global transport hub in the age of air travel as well. Opened in 2018 amid great fanfare—and bold ambitions to become the world’s biggest airport—the new airport  gets praise for its modern design by ...

Recent Book Read : Envisioning Better Cities  Written by Patricia Chase , Nancy Rivenburgh  This is a beautifully written, highly engaging book that above all inspires us to think anew about the cities that shape our lives. From a fresh and novel perspective, it doesn’t stop at inviting us to make a difference, but rather shows us the way in terms we may never have arrived at on our own. Striking color images throughout the book illustrate points made and add to the pleasure of reading it. What seems like just a few years ago, planning and design critics were bemoaning the death of public space, a victim of municipal neglect, overt commercialism, and media disinterest. Apparently we had surrendered our urban fabric to an unholy alliance of myopic traffic engineers, duplicitous developers, disingenuous elected officials, and undiscerning pedants. Pedestrians were suspect, sidewalks shunned and parks avoided. Pervading all was a fog of civic unease.  Today, urbanists are ce...

मिलवाते हैं ऐसे पौधों से जो बिना मिट्टी और पानी के भी जीवित रहते हैं ………. जी हाँ बिना मिट्टी, पानी के सिर्फ़ हवा के दम पर जीवित रहने वाले प्लांट भी प्रकृति में मौजूद हैं . ये हवा में मौजूद नमी को ख़ुद ब ख़ुद सोखते रहते हैं . इन्हें आप अपने घर को सजाने के लिए इस्तेमाल कर सकते हैं. इनकी देख रेख यानी मेंटेनेंस कुछ ख़ास नहीं है . इन्हें एयर प्लांट के नाम से जाना जाता है . बॉटनी में इन्हें  ब्रॉमिलियाड परिवार का सदस्य कहते  हैं , यह प्रजाति मूलत: लैटिन अमेरिका के देशों में पाई जाती  है जहां इन्हें   भी कहा जाता है . लैटिन अमेरिकी देशों में ये चट्टानों, पेड़ों यहाँ तक कि टेलीफोन लाइनों पर भी खूब लटके पाये जाते हैं. इन पर खूबसूरत फूल भी आते हैं . फ़ोटो में दिया प्लांट हाल ही में मैंने ख़रीदा है . इसे सप्ताह में केवल एक बार पानी में डुबो कर तत्काल निकाल लेना होता है और इस पर  जो पानी की बूँदें मौजूद लगें उन्हें हल्के से झाड़ देना है बस इतनी ही देख भाल कि ज़रूरत होती है .  इसकी वृद्धि के लिए केवल एक ही सावधानी बरतनी है इसे सूरज की सीधी किरणों से बचाना है. ...

Next Big Thing In Seattle After Birth Of Boeing  A prototype all-electric airplane took its first flight Tuesday out of Moses Lake City two and half hour drive from Seattle.  The plane, named  Alice, was in air for eight-minute at an altitude of 3,500 feet.  A dream  of electric power propelled aircraft became a reality three days back when first flight was executed with near perfection.  Gregory Davis, President and CEO of Eviation shared his joy with people gathered to witness the event.  The plane operated with electric fuel  that do not produces carbon emissions, significantly reduces noise and costs a fraction to operate per flight hour compared to light jets or high-end turboprops. The plane is developed by Eviation an aviation startup, it is targeting the at the commuter and cargo markets and aims to operate flights ranging from 150 to 200 miles.   As per estimate,  50% of the global air travel is to the destinations less than 500...