Will FIAT abandon Italy ?

http://www.thedetroitbureau.com/2012/09/could-fiatchrysler-ceo-marchionne-say-ciao-to-italy/

Fiat Strada - AutoBlog

Will Chrysler Fiat launch this small pick up as its Italian Cousin  ?

http://www.autoblog.com/2012/09/20/2013-fiat-strada-first-drive-review/

CNG Versions of Chrysler 300 and RAM Trucks

Natural Gas-fueled Cars and Trucks Elude Market for Now - Going the Italian way to make the world a better place

http://www.hispanicbusiness.com/2012/9/21/natural_gasfueled_cars_and_trucks_elude.htm

The All-New 2013 RAM 1500 Light Duty Truck

Does The 2013 RAM Truck Finally Have The Ammo To DO SERIOUS Damage To Ford's F-150?

Why not - Read on. Ram Truck is back in contention to be the "Best in Class" in the Light-Duty Truck Category

Link - http://goo.gl/7CCGS

Make this World a Better Place

The question I ask myself before I start this blog –Am I trying to be a NRI or Am I asking for too much from others??

Gone are those days, those rainy evenings, May flowers, lost in the eternal beauty of Bangalore! No more a pensioner’s paradise. The traffic in Bangalore was the most disciplined I had ever seen. There was abundant patience in the way people travelled around; there were “Uncles” on Bajaj scooters who would never turn without that out-stretched hand indicating where they were heading to. I would remember the route to school we took, because we comeback every day in the same way. Bangaloreans were more concerned about others when I was a kid, because every passerby would stop by if someone was injured or met with an accident. The roads looked so neat with all vehicles parked in a uniform manner. But thanks to the growing Bengaluru and development – things never seem the same anymore. Commuting in Bangalore is like walking on tight rope today. You do not know when you can get ejected off your vehicle.

Make his work a little easier !!

If you come to think of it, there are certain things that we can do to help make Bangalore a better place to live and let live. For all my friends and family who know my work profile – I am not preaching my work ethics and even I was, think again, it will make more sense to every one of us.

1. The most important rule – Follow the Lane rules. Do not try to jump lanes unless it is safe for you and others. Also use the blind spot concept. The LDW (Lane Departure Warning systems in India are light years away)
2. Don’t park your vehicle out of the designated line obstructing movement of other vehicles.
3. When you intend to stop, use your rear view mirrors and ensure only you are stopping and not others along with you
4. Use indicator signals to indicate where you are going.
5. Please wait for your turn at cross roads where there are no signals, don’t stop a speeding vehicle or a number of vehicles just for you. At the same time, keep in mind to be courteous to pedestrians crossing roads.
6. If there is heavy traffic don’t start moving is wrong direction till you getting clearance to move on to the other side. Do not use foot paths while driving or riding - they are for pedestrians.
7. Buses, cabs and autos can do their little bit, take an extra minute and park vehicles to the curbs when passengers alight.
8. Two-wheelers must try to stay in the slowest left lane.         
9. Use Google maps to get to new places. They are getting better everyday
10. When waiting for your turn for green signal in long traffic, please don’t jump the queue of vehicles causing trouble and traffic jam.
11. Basics – Use Seat belts, helmets. NO MOBILE PHONES while driving/riding, NO DRINK & DRIVE.
12. You are not the only one on the road. Don’t make the roads unsafe for others.

Since Bangalore has the highest number of traffic signals in the country, you need to have more time and planning your route.

Please remember • If you give way, you will get yours quicker • Smile often & have patience while driving. • Its simple to keep it simple, follow traffic rules. • If you have made a mistake while driving, be the first to apologize • Never indulge in road rage • If things go like today, we will continue with the Swalpa Ajdust Maadi attitude 

Henri Dunant - The Unknown Swiss

"Never think that war, no matter how necessary, nor how justified, is not a crime" - Ernest Hemingway

Henri Dunant, 30 yrs old, was a very wealthy Swiss banker and financier. His life would have probably have continued as much as it had except for that fateful day, 24th June 1859, that changed everything for the rest of his life. Henri had been sent by the Swiss government to speak with Napoleon III. He was to discuss a business deal between the Swiss and French that would benefit both countries.

But Napoleon was not in Paris; he was on the plains of Solferino (present Italy) about to battle with Austrians. Henri Dunant tried to read the scene before the battle started, but he was too late. His carriage reached the hill top that overlooked the battlefield. Suddenly trumpets blared, muskets cracked, cannons boomed. The two cavalries charged ahead and the battle was on. Henri Dunant, as if in a front seat of a movie theatre, sat transfixed. He could see the dust rising, hear the screams of the injured, the dying. Dunant sat as if in a trance at the horror below him. But the real horror was later - when he entered the small town after the battle was over. Every house, every building was filled with the mangled, the injured, the dead. Driven by pity at the suffering he saw all around him, Dunant stayed in the town for three days doing everything he could to help the people who survived. His life was never the same again.
The War was barbarous. He felt the world should abolish it. This was not the way to settle differences between nations. And most of all, there had to be a International organization to help people in times of suffering and chaos.
Henri Dunant returned to Switzerland, but in the next few years he became a fanatic on the subject of peace and mercy. He began to travel all over Europe preaching his message. Eventually his business suffered in the effort and he was soon broke. But he persisted. At the first Geneva conference, he carried on a one-man assault against war. As a result, the Conference passed the first international law against war - a movement that was to give birth to both the League of Nations and the U.N.
In 1901, Dunant was awarded the first Nobel Peace Prize. And though he was penniless and living in a poorhouse, he gave the entire prize to the worldwide movement he had founded. Henri Dunant died in 1910 almost totally forgotten by the world. But Henri no monument to mark hid grave. As a symbol of the organization he had fathered, he had taken the Swiss flag, a white cross on a red background and reversed it: a red cross on a white background. The organization that became his everlasting monument was the "Red Cross".

Jaane Kahaa Gaye Wo Din

I was in khaki shirt and shorts – Navy Blue and Yellow Belt and a similar looking tie, a short “summer” crop of hair well-combed, a small bag slung over my shoulder and a lunch basket - on my way to school. When a neighborhood 'Uncle' asked me the name of my school in the evening, I still remember taking a deep breath before starting - 'St. John’s High School'- a mouthful for me even today. When it all started, I was just a shade less than three years old when my parents felt that my time would be far better spent amongst children of my age rather than a houseful of adults. So one fine day, I trooped off to my first school- Rinku Nursery - with my tiny hand firmly clenching my grand dad's thumb as he strode through the crowded lanes and by-lanes of Bangalore, past the busy Wheelers Road Railway Gate, past the every increasing traffic jams and honking vehicles and through the gates of my first school. I was so excited going past the railway gate every weekday morning, eagerly waiting for a chance to see the trains pass-by.

As year went by, I was made to switch my allegiance from Nursery Schooling to Kindergarten at St John’s High School in the summer of 1988; I remember spending most of my days in school in care free frolic. There was a definite thrill in going to school each day, opening a book and turning a fresh leaf that held with it images and experiences of places, times, things and a world I did not know. Teachers in all shapes and sizes filled up our days with charming, cajoling, strictures and detentions too! Till when I was nearing my ICSE board exams, I remember the heaviest part of my school going ensemble was my lunch-box, which my mother would assiduously pack every morning with piping hot food, that would remain a mystery till the mid morning recess.

Life was possibly easy then. We had friends, books, paints, squabbling siblings, playgrounds, alleys, the terrace and the sky. We didn't have Barbie, Lego, a certain Justin Beiber or the Jonas Brothers to contend with as we grew up along with our friends. (We just had our own heart throbs in Knight Rider, Peter Parker, Prince Adam a.k.a He-Man and Jesse of Street Hawk fame). What we also didn't have is the huge pile of books that kids of today have to drag all the way to school regardless of their age, aptitude or the list of subjects on the schedule each and every day of the year. And while I can't say that things continued this way all the way through school, college and University for me, the fact is that I spent the most unforgettable years of my childhood enjoying my childhood both at home and at school.

The youngsters of today are a lot smarter, significantly more aware, and considerably more tech savvy than we were at their ages. The present generation of plenty has provided them with easy access to science, Technology, information, knowledge and learning that we had never dreamed of. What it is also provided them with is a bulging bag of books that is perhaps much better consigned to the weight trainers at the gym than to the overflowing classrooms of today. Today’s smart phones are faster than the fastest home computer that we could afford fifteen year ago as a middle-class family.

As I drive to work every morning, I see school children at the Pontiac District School getting off their school buses, cars or just walk to school. The smiles that I remember, the carefree laughter, the splashing in the pool and the childhood pranks seem to have paled and faded into the background, as has their childhood. They have IPods, smart phones and other fashion gears that define their socio-economic status today. The days once filled with games, friends, cousins, picnics and outings are now filled by tuition classes of every conceivable nature and hue; homework by the sack full; and finishing classes that were far out of their reach.There is an added pressure from parents to perform and excel in academics and extra curricular activities.

Harried mothers and preoccupied fathers hurry back from their chores to attend Parent-Teacher meetings in the hope of ascertaining that single flash of brilliance that will put a alliance between their children and the mass. And teachers, eager to bask in the glory of their accomplishments, focus all their dynamisms and profligate all their praise on the same set of students who, they believe, will bring laurels to their roost. What do we really hope to achieve through this mindless pursuit of success? As Ranchoddas Shamaldas Chanchad says, “Pursue excellence, and success will follow, pants down.” A generation of androids who have been obligatory to sacrifice their childhoods at the altar of adult triumph. A race of self helping prodigious children who even Darwin would be proud of. Or a breed of mature young adults to whom we can bestow the heritage of the planet. I don't know about you, but I definitely want the last.