Innovative design for traffic signals

Eko traffic light concept, designed by Damjan Stanković, promises to reduce traffic accidents by including a countdown timer that indicates how much time is left before the light changes.

Countdown Stop Light Benefits

Less pollution/fuel consumption: Drivers can turn off their engines while they wait for the green light.

Less stress: Since you know exactly when the light will change, you can sit back and relax. No need to keep your foot on the gas.

For more concept designs by Damjan Stanković, visit relogik.com

(source: TOXEL)

Electrocuted on Train Top

It’s sad and shocking! A video of a man (maybe retarded) walking on top of a train and then reach up and touching the electrical lines on top. He gets charred to death within a second!

 

Iraqi Gets $240,000 for T-Shirt Incident

An Iraqi-born resident of the United States who was ordered to cover a T-shirt with Arabic script before boarding a plane in New York has received $240,000 in a settlement with two officials of the Transportation Safety Administration and JetBlue Airways.

The Iraqi, Raed Jarrar, was headed for a JetBlue flight from John F. Kennedy International Airport to Oakland, Calif., in August 2006 when, according to court papers, he was told at a security checkpoint that his T-shirt, which said “We will not be silent” in Arabic and English, would have to go.

One federal employee, according to Mr. Jarrar’s account, told him that wearing a shirt with Arabic script to an airport was like going to the bank in a shirt that said “I am a robber.”

Ultimately, the JetBlue workers gave Mr. Jarrar another T-shirt to wear over the first one, and led him to a seat at the back of the plane, even though his original ticket had been issued for a seat at the front.

In an interview, Mr. Jarrar, 30, a legal resident, called the experience “very painful.” At the time, he said, he was a new immigrant to the United States and had been reading histories of discrimination and the civil rights movement, which he thought of as “things that happened in the past, and in this other place and time.”

“When it happened to me,” he said, “it was very much of a shock.”

Impossible is nothing!

Amazing…. I am going to print these out and clip it to my cube walls. Next time, someone tells me something is impossible… I am going to just lean back and point them to these pics!!!

This is a case of photographer photographs another photographer. The following photographs were taken by photographer Hans van de Vorst at the Grand Canyon, Arizona.  The descriptions are his own.  The identity of the photographer IN the photos is unknown.

I was simply stunned seeing this guy standing on this solitary rock in the Grand Canyon. The canyon’s depth is 900 meters here. The rock on the right is next to the canyon and safe.

Watching this guy on his thong sandals, with a camera and a tripod I asked myself 3 questions:

1. How did he climb that rock?
2. Why not taking that sunset picture on that rock to the right, which is perfectly safe?
3. How will he get back?

This is the point of no return.

After the sun set behind the canyon’s horizon he packed his things (having only one hand available) and prepared himself for the jump. This took about 2 minutes.

At that point he had the full attention of the crowd. After that, he jumped on his thong sandals… The canyon’s depth is 900 meters here.. Now you can see that the adjacent rock is higher so he tried to land lower, which is quite steep and tried to use his one hand to grab the rock.

We’ve come to the end of this little story. Look carefully at the photographer. He has a camera, a tripod and also a plastic bag, all on his shoulder or in his left hand.

Only his right hand is available to grab the rock and the weight of his stuff is a problem. He lands low on this flip flops both his right hand and right foot slips away…

At that moment I take this shot. He pushes his body against the rock. He waits for a few seconds, throws his stuff on the rock, climbs and walks away.

Get out of MY MOON!

Hmmm…. This is interesting!!! Ok.

Who owns the moon???

At first you could own your moon in your backyard. Now, we are talking about owning your backyard on the moon. That’s definite progress for mankind!

Now after fighting over the land by calling them countries. We are now graduating to fight over the land on the moon!! That’s improvement. It’s interesting times ahead! I can already see the Hindu’s claiming the moon as theirs as God Siva has the moon mounted on his head (Lord Siva is also called ‘Chandrachoodan‘. Check out this illustration and note the moon on his forehead).. The Muslims also have the moon in their religious symbol. For the Christians… well, I couldn’t google out anything that links the moon to Christianity. But, no worries. Somebody somewhere would ‘figure out’ some mythology/theory linking Christianity with the moon and soon we can have unemployed, illiterate morons blowing themselves up on the earth and the moon trying to force the ‘Infidels’ out of their country.

Hasn’t this been the story? Everyone these days seem to be very happy in blaming and branding the muslims as ‘the’ terrorist culture on earth. But, stop. Take a look at the history. Almost all the religions have a very bloody past. All the religions have been involved in what would be called today as terrorism or barbaric acts. The Hindus (remember the ancient hindu kings of India?), Christians (read Da Vinci code), Budhists (Remember the budhist monks who practiced martial arts), Sikhs (Operation blue star in India?), the Mayans, the Aztecs, the Egyptians… the list goes on. Every civilization, every religion even embraced by humans have led them to fight among themselves in the name of god, lifestyle, color, creed and most importantly land or in other words their homelands.

Within the next 10 years, the U.S., China, Israel, and a host of private companies plan to set up camp on the moon. So if and when they plant a flag, does that give them property rights?

A NASA working group hosted a discussion this week to ask: Who owns the moon? The answer, of course, is no one. The Outer Space Treaty, the international law signed by more than 100 countries, states that the moon and other celestial bodies are the province of all mankind. No doubt that would irk all of the people throughout the ages, like monks from the Middle Ages, who have tried to claim the moon was theirs.

But ownership is different from property rights. People who rent apartments, for example, don’t own where they live, but they still hold rights. So with all of the upcoming missions to visit the moon and beyond, space industry thought leaders are seriously asking themselves how to deal with a potential land rush, cowboy-style.

[ source ]

Now, that we are bored with the earth, we can fly to the space and fight over the moon. Gives a whole different meaning to the phrase mooning! right?

Is this what America stands for?

I read this whole story and felt dazed. I thought many times before putting this stuff on my blog. I know that writing stuff on to the internet always has the risk of it coming back to bite me. I have heard that some people’s blog entries have been reason enough to be denied entry into some countries. But, then the more I thought about it, I realized one simple truth. No matter which country, no matter which land, no matter which faith, a handful of people are enough to cast a bad name on the entire community.

The United States is a country that I love a lot. I respect the American citizens for how they have turned their country into. The history of America is always interesting for me. As in the History, even now some people act and behave against what America stands for. This I guess is one such incident.

At first I thought of posting an excerpt from the original post and add the link to the original post as is my usual habit. But, the sheer nature of this post prompted me to have the entire post on my blog itself. Just in case the original post vanishes….

At JFK Airport, Denying Basic Rights Is Just Another Day at the Office

I was recently stopped by Homeland Security as I was returning from a trip to Syria. What I saw in the hours that followed shocked and disturbed me.

Homeland Security

I arrived at JFK Airport two weeks ago after a short vacation to Syria and presented my American passport for re-entry to the United States. After 28 hours of traveling, I had settled into a hazy awareness that this was the last, most familiar leg of a long journey. I exchanged friendly words with the Homeland Security official who was recording my name in his computer. He scrolled through my passport, and when his thumb rested on my Syrian visa, he paused. Jerking toward the door of his glass-enclosed booth, he slid my passport into a dingy green plastic folder and walked down the hallway, motioning for me to follow with a flick of his wrist. Where was he taking me, I asked him. “You’ll find out,” he said.

We got to an enclosed holding area in the arrivals section of the airport. He shoved the folder into my hand and gestured toward four sets of Homeland Security guards sitting at large desks. Attached to each desk were metal poles capped with red, white and blue siren lights. I approached two guards carrying weapons and wearing uniforms similar to New York City police officers, but they shook their heads, laughed and said, “Over there,” pointing in the direction of four overflowing holding pens. I approached different desks until I found an official who nodded and shoved my green folder in a crowded metal file holder. When I asked him why I was there, he glared at me, took a sip from his water bottle, bit into a sandwich, and began to dig between his molars with his forefinger. I found a seat next to a man who looked about my age — in his late 20s — and waited.

Omar (not his real name) finished his fifth year in biomedical engineering at City College in June. He had just arrived from Beirut, where he visited his family and was waiting to go home to the apartment he shared with his brother in Harlem. Despite his near-perfect English and designer jeans, Omar looked scared. He rubbed his hands and rocked softly in his seat. He had been waiting for hours already, and, as he pointed out, a number of people — some sick, elderly, pregnant or holding sobbing babies — had too. There were approximately 70 people detained in our cordoned-off section: All were Arab (with the exception of me and the friend I traveled with), and almost all had arrived from Dubai, Amman or Damascus. Many were U.S. citizens.

We were in the front row, sitting a few feet from two guards’ desks. They sneered at each bewildered arrival, told jokes in whispers, swiveled in their office chairs and greeted passing guards who stopped to talk — guards who had a habit of looping their fingers into their holsters. One asked his friend how many nationalities were represented in the room. “About 20. Some of everything today.”

No one who had been detained knew precisely why they were there. A few people were led into private rooms; others were questioned out in the open at desks a few feet from the crowd and then allowed to pass through customs. Some were sent to another section of the holding area with large computer screens and cameras, and then brought back. The uninformed consensus among the detainees was that some people would be fingerprinted, have their irises scanned and be sent back to the countries from which they had disembarked, regardless of citizenship status; others would be fingerprinted and allowed to stay; and the unlucky ones would be detained indefinitely and moved to a more permanent facility.

ULTra PRT – Sustainable Transit for future

Wow! This is so coool!!! Is this the future of transportation. Guess it will take another 25 years before we Indians start having these luxuries…

Nope, this thing isn’t photoshop. Though it has an uncanny similarity to the cool mobile vehicle used by Tom Cruise in Speilberg’s Minority Report, this thing is already in the process of getting implemented. Check out the pictures below for the construction snaps. To actually experience this… maybe you should visit London Heathrow Airport sometime during the fall of 2008.

Till then, check out their website @ http://www.atsltd.co.uk/

ULTra is a battery-driven, 100-mpg-equivalent, elevated personal rapid transit system with many four-person vehicles. First deployment is scheduled for London Heathrow Airport in Spring 2009, to serve Heathrow’s new Terminal 5. Working as circulator transit for office parks, airports, universities, and other major activity centers, ULTra is faster than a car. In these applications, ULTra makes carpooling and conventional transit more effective, by solving the “last mile problem.”

Here are some snaps of the cool thing!!!

AD 2012: Bangalore (Population: 10 million)

Which will happen first? A population burst or bubble burst?

Bangalore: India’s IT hub, Bangalore is not only exponential in urban growth but also in population too. With Bangalore’s current population of 80,84,676, the directorate of economics and statistics estimates that its population is expected to touch by one crore by 2012.

As per the official figures, Bangalore’s population growth rate has been 35 percent. However, considering the urbanization pace in Bangalore Metropolitan Area demographers say that Bangalore’s population might have already touched one crore.

[ Source: Here ]

Today’s flavours: Viagra, Octopus, Pit viper, Raw horselfesh, Shark fin noodle, Squid

Nope… These are not out of the Animal Planet or Discovery channel. These are ice creams…!!! Believe it or not!! This is really interesting…. How can you even eat anything with those names… I wonder how they taste!! Hmm…. I have no intention of finding that out myself….

The Yokahama Ice Cream Festival wrapped up last weekend. Considering some of the bizarre flavors featured at the festival, I can’t help but admire how innovative the Japanese are … and how BRAVE!

Ice cream that makes us all scream!

1. Beef tongue
2. Cactus
3. Charcoal
4. Cheese
5. Chicken wing
6. Chili pepper
7. Garlic
8. Goat
9. Octopus
10. Oyster
11. Pearl
12. Pit viper
13. Raw horseflesh
14. Salt
15. Shark fin noodle
16. Soy sauce
17. Squid
18. Tomato
19. Viagra

[ Check out here for snaps of these ice creams]

Wasabi

If you have nothing to do, take a seat.

This is what happens when you have too much time in your hands and NOTHING to do. You go crazy!

Man breaks record by sitting in 39,250 seats

PASADENA, Calif. – Jim Purol took a seat at the Rose Bowl, and then another, and then another, until he broke a world record. The Anaheim man set a Guiness World Record on Wednesday for “Most Seats Sat in 48 Hours” by sitting in 39,250 seats. He began the task Monday morning, and he’s still going, hoping to rest his tush in each of the stadium’s 92,542 seats by sometime this week.

The 56-year-old, who already holds several other world records, says he has dreamed of tackling the Rose Bowl seats for 20 years — ever since he sat in all 107,501 chairs at the University of Michigan’s football stadium. The feat has taken a toll on his body and his cleanliness, as soot on the seats rubbed off on his clothes. He says he loves the Rose Bowl but calls the place “filthy.”

[ Source: Man breaks record by sitting in 39,250 seats ]