Innovative Film City

Trip Time:
1 Day (10am to 7pm)

Commute:
Bangalore - Bidadi (~50kms)
Take the Bangalore Mysore state highway. After Eagleton resort diversion, look for Bidadi Industrial estate diversion on the left. The route to the place is well marked.

Links:
www.innovativefilmcity.net

Attractions:

• Funplex - has a 4D theater
• Ripleys Believe It or Not
• Mirror Maze
• Bungy Jump (different kind)
• Miniature City
• Wave Pool
• Go Karting
• Wax Museum
• Haunted Mansion (but haunted by nothing)
• Fossil Museum
• Dinosaur Kingdom (for kids)
• Host of other kids games

Review:
I felt the tickets are pricey as either you have get a combo ticket or pay for each attraction as you visit. Individual attractions are priced on higher side and easily this will set you back by 1000Rs per head.

Photos:


Main Entrance


Entrance @ night


Market Street




Classics @ Ripley's




Mirror Maze


View of the film city


Light house @ Miniature city


Falls @ Miniature City


Go-Karting Track

Laptop battery life

The new generation laptops use Li-ion batteries for the power. I have observed that these batteries go defunct within a short time (~1 to 2 years) based on the usage.

As per my usage characteristics, I was assuming that the laptop remains hooked to the docking station most of the time and the discharge cycle from the battery is very low. Very rarely the battery gets discharged completely. And thus this affects the battery life.

On reading a few articles, it seems that Li-ion batteries does not suffer from the "memory" effect. But rather the heat generated from the laptop is the one that reduces the life span of the battery. More over these kind of batteries has the aging effect.

If you use keep your laptop hooked to docking station most of the time and have a reliable UPS backup, then remove and store the battery in a cool place to get most out of it.

Googling glitch

On Saturday night IST, when I was searching for something in Google, all the results churned out of google had a warning and the link did not pass through. I had very little suspicion on google. I overruled the warning in certain cases as I was trying to load pages from wikipedia.

Finally the news turned out to be a google glitch. This reminds me the horror stories of hi-fi science fiction movies, where the computer takes control of everything and restricts/controls access.

Blogger with word verification

Google's Blogger use to have word verification for the posts. When you create / edit a post, the word verification has to be done before publishing the changes. Though it prevents the spamming of the system, some times it is cumbersome to understand the words shown for the verification.

Apart from the sheer lengthy words, the display use to be convoluted which increases the frustration. Off late, I see blogger has removed word verification and does auto save as draft. Way to go!

Finally, I figured out that word verification gets shown for a blog that gets classified in spam category (because of the high number of posts). However my blog turned out to be false positive. Over a period of time (and some tune up to the algorithm), gave a clean chit to my blog . Hence no more word verification.

Bye Bye Side Middle Berth

Over last year, Indian railways came up with the ambitious plan to increase the number of berths in trains to increase the revenue. To cut costs, they came up with the innovative idea of having side middle berth (SMB) concept.

This concept was flawed in many ways.

• Did not give due consideration for comfortable travel
• Getting in and out is difficult
• For day time travel, the person with SMB ticket has to share his place in the other side coup
• The booking system could not be updated with SMB option

There were lot of complains about this SMB approach. Finally the railways gave up the idea this year for the benefit of the people.

Hampi Trip

Trip time:
2N/3D

Commute:
Bangalore to Hospet - Hampi Express
Hospet to Hampi (14kms) - local autowala (haggle for ~100Rs)

Stay:
Ranjana Guest House, Hampi (~1000Rs for a day)

Links:
www.hampi.in

The best website to know all about hampi. Has extensive details on all aspects.

Best time to visit:
Winter season (rest of the year, it will be hot)

Itinerary:
Day 1:
Cover the sacred part of hampi
Virupaksha temple, Hemakutta hill, Vitalla temple, Kadalekalu Ganesha, Sasivekalu Ganesha, hampi bazaar and adjoining areas

One can do this section by walk. Otherwise could hire an auto or moped to do a tour.

Day 2:
Tungabadra dam (5 kms from Hospet) and Royal Enclosure section of hampi
Underground Shiva temple, King's palace, Noble men's quaters, Queen's palace, Queen’s bath, Lotus Mahal and Elephant Stable

Need an auto / moped to cover this part.

Day 3:
Krishna Temple, Lakshmi Narasimha and Virupapur Gadde (other side of TB river)

Can hire a bicycle or by walk.

Review:
Hampi is a historical site. Prepare yourself to face rocks, boulders, stones, carvings, dilapidated temples and ruined palaces. The scared section of hampi and bazaar are infected by local tourists and looks in bad shape. Rest of the places are less crowded (comparatively).

Prepare yourself for a basic stay and facilities. Hampi is still a village with lot of foreigners. Being a typical tourist place, arm yourself to fight against getting cheated at all the places.

Photos:


Virupaksha temple


Dilapidated mantap @ Hemakutta hill


Bazaar @ Virupaksha temple


On way to vittala temple


Vittala temple gopuram @ dusk


Vittala temple


Musical pillars @ vittala temple


TB river enroute to vittala temple


TB river enroute to vittala temple


Postcard shot of boulders


TB dam


From the gardens @ TB dam


Underground shiva temple


Ruined noble mens quaters


Near King's palace


Ruined mahal @ dusk


Stepped tank


Another monument


Lotus mahal


Elephant stable


Lakshmi Narasimha

Airtel misuses Cell Info

Another bashing at Airtel.

Cell Info is provided to notify the users about the cell (tower) to which the phone is hooked at the moment. But most of times in Airtel, I see ads running in that.

Hope TRAI notices this and takes evasive action. This is kind of thrusting ads to your phone without your consent.

Digital fuel gauge

How about having digital fuel gauge to neutralize the rampant fuel theft by pump operators?

The recent cars displays predictions on the odo, about the distance the car can go with current fuel quantity in the tank. Then why not have digital fuel gauge. Before refilling, note how much fuel is in your car's tank. If you add 10 lts of fuel, check whether it reflects in your odo.

This will prevent fuel theft by the pump operators.

Where am I? - mobile service to find location

Wish to start the new year with an idea!

Last week when I was traveling in a train during night, wanted to find out where am I? The best tool I had was my mobile. Tried 'Cell Info', but found advertisements from the cell phone service provider or some location name which was difficult to identify (say like EB Bhavan, CHB colony).

How about having a "Where am I?" mobile based location service. Send a SMS request and you will get a short map with the cell location. For revenue purpose, the reply can include local hotels/restaurants (more like Google Map search).

This might not be as accurate as GPS enabled service. Since the location could be on the border of the cell or there could be overlap of the signals from different cells.

End of KPN monopoly?

I have a couple of posts on the KPN monopoly practices and their callous attitude towards customer and their comfort.

Against KPN
KPN monopoly rant

There was a situation where there seems to be no end to this.

Finally, there is some competition in this area now.

ABT Travels
ARC Travels

Both these guys are conglomerates with long time service in handling parcels. They have started their tour operations recently.

A refreshing change to a normal whining travel. Their buses are brand new and all are air conditioned. Secondly their charges are very fair and way cheaper than KPN volvo charges. More importantly they have decent facilities at their depots and depart in time.

Time for KPN to change or perish.

Airtel Customer Care

It is not worth saying that Airtel customer care (ACC) has still room to improve, rather they have a big warehouse to improve. Exactly, a lot more is desired from their pathetic customer care. For the same issue, every time I heard a different story.

Issue:
Wanted to change my tariff plan to corporate scheme

ACC Executive 1 says:
Need your corporate employee ID copy
Latest Pay slip
Introduction letter from HR

ACC executive 2 says:
Need your corporate employee ID copy
Latest Pay slip
Introduction letter from HR
Clear all your outstanding dues and unbilled amount through Airtel Relationship Centers (ARC)

ACC executive 3 says:
Nothing required. Corporate employee ID copy is sufficient but send a mail from your official mail ID.

With ACC executive 4 in ARC
With Corporate employee ID copy, I could change my plan (effective with in 48hrs)

Belur Halebidu Trip

Trip time:
1 day (from 6am to 10pm)

Commute:
Qualis

Route:
Bangalore - Neelamangala - Hassan - Belur - Halebidu - Hassan - Sharavanabelagola - Neelamangala - Bangalore (Mangalore route NH 48)

Both Belur and Halebidu has ancient temples build in Hoysala architecture. The temples are famous for their intricate artwork using soap stones. The temples were latter destroyed during the invasion.

Sharavanabelagola hosts the monolithic stone statue of Gomateswara.

Links:
Previous visit post is here

Photos:


Chennakeshava temple @ Belur


Post @ belur temple


panaromic view of temple complex


Kalasam


Beautiful sculptures


Carved posts


Carvings @ temple entrance


Eg of intricate carvings


One more example


Closeup


perspective view


Hoysaleshvara temple @ Halebidu


Inside Hoysaleshvara temple


Carvings @ entrance


Example of intricate carvings


Roof carvings


Profile view



View from hill top @ Sharavanbelagola


Stupa on sunset


Gomateswara statue