Doctor Kinjal Ahir

A very soft and sweet sounding voice answers my call. I was pleasantly surprised that she took the trouble to find out how to properly pronounce my name and throughout the 10 or so minutes that we were on the phone she remained soft spoken and friendly, chatting with me in a way that probably wins over the hearts of her students. Having discovered her liking for Economics in college, she begins her year taking the 40 hours she spends with her students as a challenge to make her favourite subject an interesting and exciting one for them as well. Hard to imagine anyone bunking her lectures.

Apart from teaching Economics, Dr. Ahir also conducts classes in Spoken English and this is not surprising considering how charming she sounded on the phone especially when she spoke about her son Aditya. I, for one, am looking forward to seeing her at TEDxSabarmati and believe that her talk which refers to "You'll See It When You Believe It" a book by Wayne W. Dyer will be worth hearing.

The Countdown

Starting tomorrow, there are exactly 10 days to the 28th of May, to the day that Team Eureka is waiting for, to the day I have been writing about, to TEDxSabarmati.
It was decided at today's meeting at a cafe on Judges Bungalow Road that the next ten days are going to be dedicated to our speakers with interviews, info, photos and an update on what's happening behind the scenes.
One speaker a day until the 28th of May.
That begins tomorrow.
Today, I'm excited to post a talk by physicist Leonard Susskind, a friend of the well known scientist Richard Feynman, a Nobel Laureate  ("Feynman, jointly with Julian Schwinger and Sin-Itiro Tomonaga, received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1965" - Wikipedia)  and the author of one of my favourite books 'Surely You're Joking, Mr.Feynman.'

For All The Time You Spent Scratching Your Head Over Physics

Yes, just one exercise to go... So how annoying is it when you've been working on the first and easiest problem for 10 minutes and it seems like you're getting nowhere? Very? Well, here's what you do. Get up from that table, hop around a bit to rid your feet of that weird tingling sensation ( I just found out it's called Paresthesia), go to your "sleeping" laptop, open Google Chrome and  type http://www.khanacademy.org/ into your address bar. Voila, if all goes well, you're back at your table, ready to face that problem and more in under 20 minutes. Unless, of course you decide to sign into Facebook, which means all other books will have to wait as you grin with anticipation at the sight of 26 notifications only to discover you now have to delete 26 spam videos from your wall.

Anyway, Khan Academy is one of the reasons you should thank God for the Internet. They have videos and exercises covering arithmetic, physics, finance, history and that's not all. Give it a shot. Here's a video on Newton's First Law of Motion..

If you liked that, or even if you didnt, you can watch Salman Khan, the name behind the Academy talk at TED2011...

Look What I Found

Aha! Read Aastha's status update on Facebook. Tune in to 94.3 FM to listen to daily updates on TEDxSabarmati. Sweeeet. The train is racing along..

One Day At A Time

I am glad to be alive. Honestly, today was quite an eye-opener. Ever been trapped with 6 other people in an elevator meant for five with the watchman away on holiday? No? I thought so. Well, that's exactly what happened to me today and boy, did those adrenal glands go into overdrive. Though I was quite calm mentally and was praying, physically, my legs were tingling. Getting out of that lift unharmed and wiser made me realize how much we take for granted our safety. 

If that wasnt enough to make me grateful, I was also witness to a car enveloped in flames. What a day! Anyway, valuable lesson learnt. Even as you count the days to 28 May, I say Hallelujah for every day that was, is and is to come.

Game Time

http://www.seenandshared.com/circle-the-cat.htm
Hmph, you never got back to me on how you liked the previous game. Anyway, here's one more for you to play..

Meltdown

It's summer time and I'm getting more tanned, thirsty and tired each day. But then again, every passing day brings the 28th of May a little closer. I'm pretty much zapped and raise your hand if you become bad tempered and moody when you're exhoausted but I've got everlasting love that keeps me going and stops me from becoming a monster, and yes, I'm talking about the love of Christ here so please keep those imaginations in check.
Anyway, I've just jotted down a few tips to defeat the heat.. Yeah, I know "beat the heat" sounds cooler but it's been so overused..
--- I got one word for you - HYDRATE
--- Go get sunscreen. P.S. - buy the most appropriate one for you.. dont let those rashes remind you how sensitive your skin is.
--- Try to go out more in the evening than in the morning..

Yeah, they're basic and plain common sense and you probably hear it every summer so this is just a little "DO NOT FORGET" note..