Wed. Jan 10 – Chennai

Amy and I decided that the first part of the business plan was to get the foreigners some decent clothes. I mean, we knew that there was no way to prevent us from sticking out like sore thumbs, but at least wearing kurtis and Indian-looking clothes would reduce the number of full-on stares that we would be getting. We also figured we could take them walking a little, to help get them accustomed to the chaotic process of crossing streets and so on.

The Indianized Visitors

The Indianized Visitors

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WordPress Upgrade Done, and Vacation Stories to Come

So, I just upgraded my WordPress installation, and that seems like a good enough excuse to stop being lazy and start back posting some stories here.

Actually, I haven’t really been lazy—just busy. First, it was the holidays—Christmas and New Years. Then, it was lots of school and getting ready for the big Indian vacation with Axle, Henny, and Karin. And then the vacation itself, during which I really didn’t have much time to write, took up pretty much all of January.

So, what’s the plan here? Well, I’m going to post a day-by-day account here, with the first post being the one I write after this. I intend to write one post per day for the next 20 days or so, and the only thing that would stop me is if I end up falling behind in organizing and uploading my photos (which might happen, but I’ll try to prevent it from happening). Also, at some point later, maybe Amy’s stories will start joining mine here too. She was actually taking notes during the trip for Henny, and when the vacation was over, she started tracking down websites for a lot of the places we went, so that might be kind of fun too.

Now, as a predecessor to the first post of The Indian Vacation….

Axle, Henny, and Karin arrived late at night on Tuesday (January 9)—or actually early Wednesday morning, about an hour off schedule. Amy went to pick them up (so that they would all fit in a single car) and ended up rolling into the house at around 3:50 in the morning. After a half hour or so of visiting, we decided to head off to sleep.

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Thanksgiving Turkey, Treadmills, and Tamil Nadu

While Amy and I were at the TATA-Dhan Academy wandering around, we ran across this wild turkey. Yummy. But they are all veg people at the academy.... Oh well....

While Amy and I were at the Tata-Dhan Academy wandering around, we ran across this wild turkey. Yummy. But they are all veg people at the academy.... Oh well....

So, it has been a pretty busy month for me, and as such I haven’t really written much here. I just finished another class (Integrating Educational Technology in the Classroom) and jumped straight into another (Standards-Based Curriculum and Instruction), installed MediaWiki on the IFMR server and put up some articles to start the “content” base, and all the other random stuff that goes on….

Another Thanksgiving abroad. So far, I’ve had Thanksgiving in Vietnam (in Hanoi—they even tracked down turkeys for us and cooked a special meal), China (in Jinan—tried to find turkey, but settled for Peking Duck instead) and now, India. Since we don’t have a real oven, and since cooking here is pretty annoying anyway, Amy and I decided to go to one of the fancy hotels that had advertised a Thanksgiving dinner. A nice costly Rs. 1,000 (~ $20) per head bought you an all-you-can-eat buffet.

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John Bender – I Don’t Remember Now

I don't remember now
I Don’t Remember Now

Ok. I know this breaks a lot of the rules in terms of “blogging etiquette” but I don’t really care. I got the mp3s posted here from two different sites, but for the sake of having three John Bender LPs in one location, I thought that I’d re-post them here.

So, here’s John Bender’s “I Don’t Remember Now” thanks to Yarrost.

And as an added bonus (courtesy of Curved Air):

Posted in (all categories), Electronic, Music, So sue me already | 5 Comments

They just like to be petted

I went to Madurai last week, and while I was there, I remembered about a video I hadn’t yet uploaded. So here it is!

Amy’s grandmother, Henny always likes to comment about animals that “Oh, they just like to be petted….” despite her complaining about how they are messy, and take up too much time and energy, and she doesn’t like pets. Well, this time, the animals are returning the favor and are petting Amy instead of the other way around….

Posted in (all categories), General News, Humor, India, Videos | 2 Comments

Raining Words of Wisdom

You Will Fall

So, the rains seem to have started, though I’m still not certain that this is supposed to be the Monsoons. From what I hear, the weather has been irregular in the past couple of years. Where hasn’t it been? Global warming maybe? Read More »

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New (old) Pictures

Wow. Posting three days in a row? Don’t expect it to become a regular feature….

I’ve recently added a few galleries to photos.mrdwab.com, so be sure to check them out at some point.

Amy's Madurai Pics (December 2005)
Madhya Pradesh Pics
Posted in (all categories), General News, India, Pictures, Website | 1 Comment

Viva Los Angeles (II)

Viva Los Angeles (II)
Viva Los Angeles (II)

I was able to take advantage of some quiet time in the office and upload all of Viva Los Angeles (II) a couple of days ago. So, instead of uploading half now and half later, here’s the entire compilation.

An unexplained feature of this particular compilation is some text in the liner notes about Psi Com, making it seem like you sould expect some music from Psi-Com (featuring Jane’s Addiction’s Perry Farrell) on here… (there isn’t any, though…). But on a related note, maybe some of my Radio Tokyo Tapes comps will be posted here soon.

Read on for the tracklist and to dowload the mp3s….

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“The Smell of Sulfur in the Air” aka “Stereoscopic Explosions” aka “If only Martin were here….”

Naked babies dancing to the explosions
One of the many leftover packages Amy picked up from the streets near our flat. Yes, you too can be a naked baby dancing around to the explosive sounds of Divali…. (or at least you can act like one)

Well, last Saturday was Divali, and it sure was a different experience here than what I was accustomed to growing up in Trinidad. Amy described it as seeming like Christmas, New Years, and the Fourth of July all rolled into one. There was lots of gift giving, stores staying open for extended hours, “Divali Sales,” and so on…. And then, of course, there are the firecrackers and fireworks.

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Viva Los Angeles (I)


Viva Los Angeles (I)

This is one of those cool random compilations that I picked up when I was in my “I’m going to collect everything that Savage Republic is on” phase (which, by the way, is probably a lost cause, so I don’t recommend trying it…. It would be like me trying to collect all the random Man Is The Bastard releases out there…. Stick to the official releases since they all rock….).

The Randall Kennedy stuff is pretty cool, and you get some bagpipe works thrown in with the Bay of Pigs song, so enjoy (and look out for Viva Los Angeles II coming in two parts in the weeks to come).

Posted in (all categories), Compilations, Music, So sue me already, Vinyl-to-mp3 | Leave a comment