Srinivas Padma: Personal Musings on Life, Growth, and Connections

India won the first Test against Pakistan by six wickets Cricinfo 26 Nov'07: Handshakes all around as the players congratulate each other on a hard fought and thoroughly engrossing Test match. Tendulkar and Laxman walk off to loud cheers from the Feroz Shah Kotla. India needed just 6.2 overs this morning to score the 32 runs needed for victory. Tendulkar scored 24 of them off only 24 balls. Anil Kumble is the Man of the Match for his captaincy , his seven wickets and a useful 24 in the first innings. Kumble: "This ground has been very special, everything had happened on this ground. I think the boys responded really well and getting Pakitan out under 250 in both innings was creditable. The partnerships between Laxman and Dhoni, Dravid and Jaffer and Sachin and Ganguly were all very crucial. [On his own performance] It was excellent to get into the [bowling] groove right away. Three months is a long break at my age and I'm very happy with my performance." So that&

Less than a year after Shilpa Shetty became the victim of racial slur in Britain, two of Bollywood's leading actors have claimed that they're also racially abused while filming in the country. "Sexiest Asian Woman" Bipasha Basu and her co-actor Arshad Warsi were verbally roughed up by a group of white men while they had been shooting a scene for their latest film Dhan Dhana Dhan Goal near Glassy Junction, a popular Indian pub in Southall, west London, some months back. "I was shocked. I'm not used to this sort of thing. A car stopped with a couple of white guys. They just lashed out at us. For me it was an alien thing. It was like, do people actually think like that?" the media reported on Sunday, quoting Warsi as saying here. Even fellow actor John Abraham, who was also present on the sets of the film at that time, has said he's astonished too. "When you come to London and you are shooting, it's the last thing you expect," he sai

A GENETICS website encouraging people to send in swabs of their saliva began operating on Monday in a closely watched Silicon Valley venture with links to the search firm Google. The site, 23andMe.com , is named after the 23 pairs of chromosomes in the human body It claims to offer the first "personal genome service" for $999 (about Rs 39,000) a customer Using hi-tech analysis software, the company says it can read up to half a million points in an individual's genome. The service is intended to help people understand their inherited traits and to allow them to compare themselves with friends and family Anne Wojcicki , one of the co-founders, said, "We believe this information provides intriguing insights into an individual's genetics, with the goal of expanding the collective knowledge base by enabling active participa- tion in research." Wojcicki is married to Sergey Brin , Google's co founder The venture is based in Mountain View, the same Silic

San Francisco (Reuters) - Picture having an Olympian view of millions of photos the world's photographers and camera phone users have produced over the last day. That's what Flickr , Yahoo Inc's online photo sharing site, said on Sunday the company plans to offer this week, by introducing a set of mapping features that makes it easier to find photos based on their location. Starting on Monday, Flickr will unveil a way for Web users to browse photos from tens of millions of geographically located photos loaded up to its site, http://www.flickr.com/ . The service, called "Places," identifies on a global map the latest hot spots for photo contributions. "It's a new way to browse what is happening in the world," said Kakul Srivastava, senior director of product management at Flickr. Flickr Places also allows users to search by more than 100,000 geographic place names to find photos that might interest them. Many of the

The Ahmadiyya Muslim community believes that Jesus survived the crucifixion and travelled to India where he lived a full life and got married. They believe that his tomb is in Kashmir and that he had adopted the name of Yuz Asaf in Kashmir. A new Hollywood film will now focus on Jesus' years in India, along with the three wise men, during the "missing years" of his life between the ages of 13 and 30 that are not mentioned in the New Testament. The film, Aquarian Gospel, is based on the book of same name that claims to be the true story of the life of Jesus, including "the ‘lost' eighteen years silent in the New Testament." The book, first published in 1908, was written by Levi H. Dowling during the late 19th century. Details from The Unknown Life of Jesus Christ by Russian anthropologist Nicholas Notovich have also been included in the script for the film written by John F. Sullivan and William Keenan, who is also the producer of the $20 million adventure sa

Islamabad: Defying a growing crackdown on dissent by President Pervez Musharraf, young Pakistanis are using blogs and social networking sites such as Facebook to hit back at a state of emergency. Plans for "flash" protests in Islamabad, Karachi, Lahore and other cities are being posted at the last minute to skirt a ban on all political rallies under repressive emergency laws. The Internet has become a vital tool for them, with the government shutting down the country's biggest two private television news channels on Sunday and rounding up thousands of Opposition leaders. "We are coordinating protests with other universities across Pakistan using Facebook , using blogs, cellphones and text messages," Ahmad, a student in his 20s from Lahore, said. He asked that his full name not be used in case he is traced by the authorities. Protesters can face jail if found guilty of inciting unrest, especially since Gen. Musharraf ruled that civilians can be tried i

DUBAI: MTV hopes hip-hop and reality television tailored and sanitized for the Middle East region will draw young Arabs away from dozens of locally produced music video channels that already dominate the market to a new regional version of the pop-culture channel. MTV Arabia , which official launched over the weekend, will feature 60 per cent international music, 40pc Arabic music and local adaptations of the channel's popular non-music shows. But MTV, which is known for airing provocative videos featuring scantily clad women, says its Arab version will show less bare skin and profanity. "When we come to people's homes, we want to earn their respect," said Abdullatif Al Sayegh, chief executive of Arab Media Group, which along with MTV Networks International, owns MTV Arabia. He explained that there will be "culturally sensitive editors going through content of the programming." The station aired a pre taped show featuring Grammy award-winning rapper and