The new clean and healthy Avatar of a dirty club

Avatar is about changing the image. Metamorphosing to good from bad. Reincarnate to something more meaningful and useful. This picture explains the concept. How design Change Perceptions.

The Earth Hour - My Second Speech at Toastmasters

How many of you flipped the switch during earth hour last weekend?

Hmm nice response.

Earth Hour 2010 took place on Saturday 27 March 2010. Look, the thing about Earth Hour is – it’s fun. You have dinner or a drink in the candlelight, or get to a viewpoint where you can watch your city’s lights go out, then blink back on 60 minutes later, or give your kids an excuse to run around the house with a flashlight. If you’re more ambitious, you go to an event in your home town. And if you don’t like any of those options, I’m sure you can come up with some other fun stuff to do in the dark ;) I know, you guys are very creative.

Like a lot of you, I also switched off my lights both in 2009 and in 2010. However, the earth hour in 2009 was quiet different for me than 2010.

In 2009, We enjoyed the earth hour with a candle light dinner and strawberry margaritas at home. And in 2010, we enjoyed our dinner with original lemon margaritas :) You are probably thinking, Oh! so the speech is about the Earth Hour. No it is about strawberry margaritas vs. lemon margaritas. Sorry for the disappointment! It is not about the margaritas but about the evolution of my perception for the earth hour.

Last year in 2009. Like many, I also thought that turning off the lights for one hour will make no difference. But I still participated. You know why? For three reasons:

1. To look cool.
   
2. To have a story to share when someone asked me if I turned off my lights.
   
3. and the biggest and most motivating - To drink margaritas and party.

After the earth hour was over, I was so excited to share my story that I shared it with my friends and colleagues even when they didnt ask about it. I was happy answering the "How did i participate" of earth hour but when I could not answer the "Why did i participate" of it, I decided to give it a closer look.

Earth Hour started in 2007 in Sydney, Australia when 2.2 million homes and businesses turned their lights off for one hour to make their stand against climate change. Only a year later and Earth Hour had become a global sustainability movement with more than 50 million people across 35 countries participating. In March 2009, hundreds of millions of people took part in the third Earth Hour. Over 4000 cities in 88 countries officially switched off to pledge their support for the planet, making Earth Hour 2009 the world’s largest global climate change initiative. Reports show that the United States topped the Earth Hour participation with an estimated 80,000,000 people, 318 cities and 8 states participating.

In one corner are those who believe that Earth Hour is an important communal statement: up to a billion people flicking their switches to signal their commitment to energy efficiency as a way to lower our collective environmental footprint.

In the other are those who can’t believe so many suckers fall for the idea that Earth Hour is important, because they feel

1. Light brings safety. There are safer ways to make a statement and raise awareness than to create a controlled time when thieves will be harder to spot.
2. The energy spent raising awareness about Earth Hour just might cancel out the energy saved that hour
3. One hour out of 168 in a week, 720 in a month, and 8760 in a year will not make a significant dent in your energy use. People consume energy in many forms and not just electricity. Earth hour does not provide any insights on those important aspects.

I agree with anti earth hour folk's sentiment when they say that earth hour does not "really" save energy. And even if it does, it is negligible. But I disagree with them when they say that it is an exercise in vain. it's OK if the campaign does not save energy but it definitely helps politicizing against "climate change" at the global level. It is the hour when every body across the globe come together and join hands against climate change.

Climate change is essentially a political problem, and the language of politics is symbolism. Switching off lights together is a symbol to draw attention towards climate change. "Unlike most of the issues that we grapple with, climate change is global. The pressure is on us to do the right thing." If shutting off the lights for an hour and doing yoga in the dark makes that political support, well, then let us do it.

The environmental movement is reaching a delicate moment. We're well past the point where going green is novel. We've become inured to the existence of global warming, to its inconvenient truth. But this is the moment when we need to keep pushing in every way we can. The technologies that will help us decarbonize energy are developing, but they need a push — and that will only happen if we keep climate change near the top of our political agenda. Earth Hour, Earth Day, Earth Year — Yes, I am waiting for 2011. But next year it will be margaritas with real strong emotions against climate change and not just for fun.

Unpredictable Life - My Ice Breaker Speech at Toastmasters

Mr. Toastmaster, fellow toastmasters and welcome guests…

I think all of you will agree that life is unpredictable. You may plan life for every hour but cannot stop it to take its own course.

I never planned standing here and speaking in front of you but it just happened.

Abraham – A jewish theologian and philosopher – said “The course of life is unpredictable. No one can write his autobiography in advance.”

This is so true. They were those unpredictable moments that shaped us in what we are today. Today, I would like to share some of those unpredictable moments from my life. Hopefully, you will know me better from today onwards.

Year 2000. I am a junior student of my 4 years degree program. I somehow survived 3 years of chemical engineering. Like a junior, I am also worried about my future. I hate chemical engineering so much that I do not want to become a chemical engineer. What else do I do? I want to become a computer engineer but it is too late. Today, my friend Tim will go to meet his cousin in the evening in his new Mercedes. Yes, his parents are doctors. Man, life sucks! Irrespective, I will get a ride in the brand new car. Jack, Tim’s cousin is 2 years older to us and has just returned from Germany. We all go to a bar. Jack sponsors us because he is making good money and has a great job. Jack introduces me about the Industrial Design course that he completed last year in his graduate school. Design? Designers? Ummm….So are you a designer? Hmm…Designers are cool. Oh Yea, I want to be one of them. Jack explains everything to me and I also become a designer. I never had planned to meet Jack. But it happened and changed me so much.

Year 2001. I am in design Graduate school. Online chatting is in vogue. All my friends spend days and nights chatting in their dorms and never go to college. The concept of finding a girl online is interesting and fascinating. You do not have to look like Leonardo DiCaprio to seduce her or you don’t have to have guts like Arnold Schwarzenegger to ask for a date. Anyway, like others, I go online one day and search for chat sites on Google when I land up with Smashhits.com. After hours of persuasion and denials, I end up finally with a girl that has interests like me. We talk and talk and talk and talk, and Oh yea, I can feel my heart pumping hard. Online friendship, online flirting, Online breakup, Real world meetings, Real world proposal, Real world marriage. Yes, Jan 29^th 2010 I got married to the same girl who I met 9 years ago. Again, I never predicted to be on smashhits.com, never predicted to go in that chat room, and never predicted to have found her there. But it just happened.

Jan 2010. Kellogg Apartments; Saint Paul: After a tiring day at work and a fight with my boss, I sit on my study desk and open my laptop again. Yes again! I cannot live without it for more than 60 minutes. I start to tweet, read news, visit face book, etc. Oh there is a Netflix move also sitting on my desk which I just picked on my way upstairs. I open it to see the title “Office Space”. I play it and get glued to my desk. Oh my! How do they know my frustrations about timesheets, bosses, and everything else? They must be spying on me. What a movie? I am so happy that I have not even looked at the pile of clothes waiting to go to the laundry room. It is kinda stuffy to watch a movie in shoes and office clothes so I get off my chair. Finally, I saw the pile. Oh god! I have no choice but to pause the movie and go to the laundry room. I throw my clothes in the washer and am about to leave the laundry room with the beaten face. Before I reach the door, somebody else pushes the door with such a force that it helps this paper on the notice board to dangle and grab my attention. I read about toastmasters for the first time. Being a glutton, I always wanted to join a food club. Yes, I want to master the toast - the voice comes from the deepest corners of my heart. Alas! I read more and find something else about the club. Despite of it being a personality development club and not a food club, I like the idea and decide to join it that very moment.

Once again that unpredictable moment has changed me a bit more. Perhaps, to become a better person.

Life will keep on surprising us with many more unpredictable moments. It does not give us a choice to accept or reject them, so embrace them with your widest smile.

Mr Toastmaster!

Image reference: http://www.thingsihavelearnedinmylife.com/files/imagecache/preview/files/UNPREDICTABLE1.jpg

Smith Museum of Stained Glass Windows - Navy Pier, Chicago

Couple of weeks back I spent my Sunday afternoon at Navy Pier in Chicago with my wife and Shaurya. We had a great time watching beautiful Smith Museum of Stained Glass Windows.

The Smith Museum of Stained Glass Windows is a permanent display of 150 stained glass windows housed in an 800-ft.-long series of galleries along the lower level terraces of Festival Hall. Open since February 2000, it is the first museum in the United States dedicated solely to stained glass windows. It showcases both secular and religious windows and is divided by artistic theme into four categories: Victorian, Prairie, Modern and Contemporary. All of the windows were designed by prominent local, national and European studios and most were originally installed in Chicago area residential, commercial and religious buildings.

More details: http://www.navypier.com/things2do/rides_attract/smith_museum.html