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Japan Trip 2008

September 25th, 2008 | 1 Comment | Posted in Photography, Travel by Roshan V.

On the way back from Hyderabad, I stopped in Japan for 15 days of vacation. Singapore Airlines has daily flights from LAX to Tokyo to Singapore, LAX to Singapore, and LAX to Taipei to Singapore, as well as flights from SFO to Hong Kong to Singapore. I planned my business trip to Hyderabad with the direct LAX to Singapore flight, and returned to LAX via Singapore and Tokyo. I left Hyderabad on Saturday night just before midnight for the 4 hour flight to Singapore. I couldn’t sleep so I drank many Bombay Sapphire Tonics and watched Hindi and Korean movies. On Sunday morning I had a few hours in Singapore, where I just stayed in the airport, and then hopped on a flight that reached Tokyo in the evening. I took 10 vacation days and spent 15 days in Japan, mostly by myself. Here are the photo albums from the various cities I was in. A best of album and more writeups coming soon.

God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything

September 23rd, 2008 | No Comments | Posted in Books, Tech Talks by Roshan V.

Last summer I went to an Authors @ Google talk by Christopher Hitchens where he discussed his book God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything. The talk is entertaining and a good summary of the book.

I received a free copy of the book at the talk, which I got signed after he was done, and recommend it to others - atheists or not. Well, you’ll probably like it more if you’re an atheist. I found the writing to be pretty interesting, but not always completely engaging. It ended taking me a month to finish the book because I couldn’t read more than a chapter at a time. Still, I agreed with most of his points and found his arguments to be sound. This is in sharp contrast to when I’ve seen or read his views on foreign policy, which I completely disagree with.

Also, I recommend reading the book with a condescending tone and a British accent in your head. Religious skewering is entertaining as it is, but even more so like this.

I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to go to that talk, but the title of the book and the following clip from Fox News’s Hannity & Colmes peaked my interest:

After the talk when I was getting my book signed, I let him know that this clip was one of my favorite YouTube videos of the year.