Air travel/moving, childhood dreams?

Getting some notes I made earlier finally published in blog form- phew, I can get some guilt for pending TO-DO's off my chest now! It's been a long while since I posted if you neglect this and the last post published on the same day. Procrastination- the ultimate fall mechanism of even great men. Hey, but as Mr. Wayne says in 'The Dark Knight' movie, "Why do we fall?-- So we can get up again!" or something like that ....[Batman maniacs don't point out mistaken wordings].

For those in the US, the new check in bags fee added to the cost of air travel (was when it was introduced almost industry wide some months ago and) will continue to be a burden-- this is not a temporary spike thanks to the oil and economic crises. However, there are variations in the monetary penalty between various airlines. For example some offer free check-in of 1 bag at least [the last time I checked!]. As far as I know, from online search I found that these airlines follow that system:

• continental
• delta
• northwest
• airtran/frontier
• southwest
• jetblue

I performed a comparison of a single trip between 2 major cities. First of all I must mention that I found the average industry overweight cost [assuming you are fined for going over a few pounds or kgs of initial limit of each check-in bag, and you aren't violating higher limits like 2x etc. which invite higher fines] to be $100.

It was found that when it comes to base ticket cost, some airlines' cheapest option was more than $100 the average base ticket cost for the trip considering the average of cheapest ticket cost from all airlines. This stand-outs include- fares for the trip from :

delta northwest jetblue

I don't know about you, but as a recent penny pinching graduate, I will steer clear of these folks when looking for my airfares next time.

If you are moving for good from one city to another you may be looking for rooms or apartments or full houses and will be no doubt using the ever powerful Internet in your endeavour. If you scout out search results for rentals or roommates, you are bound to come across these websites which I suggest you avoid:

• sublet.com- information not free, requires subscription
• easyroomate, metroroommates--contact info not accessible unless you create a member account
• Localfiles, Locanto: can't narrow search using keywords like 'laundry' or 'rent includes cable'

Instead I suggest you get straight to the point with these sites especially when you are operating in a short timeframe:

craigslist olx sulekha

Sulekha.com has a pretty neat system where you need to supply your e-mail to get to see the party's contact details [of course there are many things I hate about Sulekha.com not related to housing rental results that can take a whole post of their own]. This way the advertiser and responder can be assured [to a limited extent] that they don't waste time with prank callers or scam artists who get access to their contact details.

Ever noticed how you want to do so many things in life but get to do only a small percentage ever? That is the truth and reality of life staring at your face [it becomes bitter the more you compare yourself with someone extraordinarily successful that everyone admires]. There is no real way to achieve your childhood dreams except to roll up your sleeves and work hard towards them.

Due to the 'technological singularity' [a term that roughly represents the elevation of machinery to such advanced levels that man integrates with machine] that we are approaching, we are facing exponentially more change every year [maybe more change than some of our great x n grandparents - say 10th century experienced in a lifetime]. So childhood dreams themselves become a moot concept: things move so fast that before you develop a liking for something as a child, more things pop up to distract you.

This rapid change means we increasingly shy away from getting used to and attached to something. Doesn't this imply we get more dispassionate and machine like as time goes by? Maybe someone I know is already lost the ability to emotionally attach to an activity or hobby or technology (or even person?). What will this cause?

Closed communities, funny orkut behavior

Let me guess, there is a good chance you were expecting to see something about 'social websites' (Facebook. Orkut etc.) here once you saw 'Orkut' and 'communities' together. If so, it amuses me; funny how we humans get programmed like buggy AI to jump to incorrect conclusions.

Let me turn to my recent experience with Orkut recently. Many times over many weeks [maybe months] past, I had huge delays or 'infinite' waits while loading some pages/features in Orkut and I don't even use the advanced features![Call me old school , but I am not one who tries out all features available in a system just because they exist- we should dictate what tools must use, not the other way round-- see the theme of becoming machine-like again]. Turns out when I checked my community page [after letting it gather dust for God knows how many months]- surprise, surprise- we have about a dozen communities which I didn't recognize, let alone join! Looked like someone had cracked my password? Anyway, changed it and for the moment, things seem to be OK.

So, let's return to the other 'protagonist word' of this post: Communities. What I have in mind is closed communities. Examples would be the ghettos made by Muslims in corners of a city-complete with walls and fort-style gate. I became aware of one old Hollywood silent movie which was like a pioneer horror movie ['Gollum' is the tile I think]where a Jewish community life is portrayed. Didn't know how the Jews lived in the past, but the movie was a revelation. When I come to think of it, 'agraharam' of south India, which is a close knit [I think this involves walls too] community of priest class Hindus which forms a more or less independent social unit providing for itself, resembles such set-ups. What could be the origin, development method and motivation for such closed communities? If they are all due to some common fears or attitudes, then what is the primary mechanism for development of such groups so as to totally physically exclude members not belonging to the set? Is it fear of violence[most mid-east/Indian cities in mythological and historical Islam,TV or movie depictons tend to make the cities targets of armies], necessity of compensating for being a 'social minority', or the desire to maintain inbreeding? Any interesting thoughts or presentation of details I don't know are welcome. I know in the past especially, megapolis cites were impossible and smaller communities were the norm given that there was no automated mass production fo goods, but building walls- that seems like an extreme step. It is eerie to note similarities between such diverse cultures.

Maybe you are a history student at some college, looking for a doctoral/thesis topic who happened to randomly read this! You lucky @#$@#$!!!!!@#.....