Sunday, October 28, 2007

Elegant Universe

After a long long time, I am reading a book on physics, "The Elegant universe", by Brian Greene. It's quite interesting to know the conflicts in Newton's theory and how the proposed "STRING THEORY" tries to resolve them. Okay, so now what are the conflicts

1. According to Newton's laws of motion, if you run fast enough you can catch up with a departing beam of light. Interesting, what newton thought that what would happen if you catch a beam of light with speed of light. The conflict occurred as according to James Clerk Maxwell's laws of electromagenetism light always travels with speed of light, it never slows down or tire down.

2. To resolve conflict 1, Einstein came with "Special Theory of Relativity" (time dilation and Lorentz contraction"), which says that space and time state depends on one's state of motion. Einstein established that no influence or disturbance of any sort can travel faster than the speed of light. This conflicts with universal theory of gravitation, it has been shown influences that are transmitted over vast distances of space instantaneously.

3. Einstein came up with "General Theory of Relativity", which says that not only time and space are influenced with one's state of motion, but they can wrap and curve in response to the presence of matter and energy. Now this led to conflict between quantum mechanics and general relativity.

Proposed STRING theory is quite interesting, what it says is that matter is composed of atoms, which in turn are made of quaks and electrons, all such particles are actually tiny loops of vibrating string.

More as I read ...........

Sunday, October 21, 2007

Country Vacations India

Me and Radhi got a call from Country Vacations India http://www.countryvacationsindia.com/, and they told us as usual we have to come to their SHIVAJINAGAR office and attend a one hour presentation. After attending the presentation we can collect 3 free gifts 1) A week holiday for two people 2) One day free at their Sarjapur CLUB and 3) A set of six bowls.
We went to their office and attended their presentation for about two plus hours and they told us about their memberships. They have 2 memberships, one 30 years of holidays with them plus 30 years of RCI membership and 2 plots in their latest land development near to Devenhalli Airpot, sounds interesting and the cost of that is 2.4 LACKS, with this they also give club membership for all their clubs for Three Generations !!!. Second membership was for 5 years of holidays, 1 plot and club membership for three generations, price 1.4 Lacks.

We decided that we will visit their properties and then decide on whether to take their membership or not, and we told them the same. They came back with the offer that you can pay 35K and then upgrade your membership. You will get all the benefits, as that in 1.4 lacks membership, except for the plot. We thought that we can give it a shot and came back home with the 35K membership.

When we came back we were shocked to see what all is there in the membership, they had promised us 1 week of holidays, but this membership only had 2 Nights of vacations !!!!!. After this and next 4 days was a head ache for me as I wanted to cancel the membership and they were not ready to do so. I even called their MANAGER, he was also no good.

Then after a BIG fight with them and visiting their place some 4 times, they gave me 4 holiday vouchers, a 2 nights free vacation and some extra coupons for their SARJAPUR club.

We have not visited their properties yet, but what all has happened so far, it has not really been a pleasant experience and their customer service is not good at all. At this point we would say to AVOID country vacations !!!!!!!!!!