Interesting Facts # 2

• The sound you hear when you crack your knuckles is actually the sound of nitrogen gas bubbles bursting.
• Cats, camels and giraffes are the only animals in the world that walk right foot, right foot, left foot, left foot, rather than right foot, left foot.
• Everyone's tongue print is different, like fingerprints.
• Grapes explode when you put them in the microwave.
• Male mosquitoes are vegetarians. Only females bite.
• It snowed in the Sahara Desert in February of 1979.
• Wearing headphones for just an hour will increase the bacteria in your ear by 700 times.
• There is a hotel in Sweden built entirely out of ice; it is rebuilt every year.

English is a CrAzY Language

1. There is neither egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
2. English muffins weren't invented in England.
3. Look at the paradoxes- quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.
4. In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell? How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?
5. If Dad is Pop, how's come Mom isn't Mop?
6. If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?
7. Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend?

Can you read this?

Can you raed tihs? Olny smoe plepoe can. I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!
If you can raed tihs. . .YOU are a Genius!!

Play With Words

ADULT: A person who has stopped growing at both ends and is now growing in the middle.

CANNIBAL: Someone who is fed up with people.

CHICKENS: The only animals you eat before they are born and after they are dead.

COMMITTEE: A body that keeps minutes and wastes hours.

DUST: Mud with the juice squeezed out.

EGOTIST: Someone who is usually me-deep in conversation.

GOSSIP: A person who will never tell a lie if the truth will do more damage.

HANDKERCHIEF: Cold Storage.

INFLATION: Cutting money in half without damaging the paper.

MYTH: A female moth.

MOSQUITO: An insect that makes you like flies better.

RAISIN: Grape with a sunburn.

SECRET: Something you tell to one person at a time.

SKELETON: A bunch of bones with the person scraped off.

TOOTHACHE: The pain that drives you to extraction.

TOMORROW: One of the greatest labor saving devices of today.

YAWN: An honest opinion openly expressed.

WRINKLES: Something other people have. You have character lines.

How did Companies Names originate?

Apple Computers
It was the favourite fruit of founder Steve Jobs. He was three months late in filing a name for the business, and he threatened to call his company Apple Computers if the other colleagues didn't suggest a better name by 5 O'clock.

CISCO
It is not an acronym as popularly believed. It is short for San Francisco.

Compaq
This name was formed by using COMp, for computer, and PAQ to denote a small integral object.

Corel
The name was derived from the founder's name Dr.Michael Cowpland. It stands for COwpland REsearch Laboratory.

Google
The name started as a joke boasting about the amount of information the search-engine would be able to search. It was originally named 'Googol', a word for the number represented by 1 followed by 100 zeros.After founders - Stanford graduate students Sergey Brin and Larry Page presented their project to an angel investor, they received a cheque made out to 'Google'

Hotmail
Founder Jack Smith got the idea of accessing e-mail via the web from a computer anywhere in the world.When Sabeer Bhatia came up with the business plan for the mail service, he tried all kinds of names ending in 'mail' and finally settled for hotmail as it included the letters "html" - the programming language used to write web pages. It was initially referred to as HoTMaiL with selective uppercasing.

Hewlett Packard
Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard tossed a coin to decide whether the company they founded would be called Hewlett-Packard or Packard-Hewlett.

Intel
Bob Noyce and Gordon Moore wanted to name their new company 'Moore Noyce' but that was already trademarked by a hotel chain so they had to settle for an acronym of INTegrated ELectronics.

Lotus (Notes)
Mitch Kapor got the name for his company from 'The Lotus Position' or 'Padmasana'. Kapor used to be a teacher of Transcendental Meditation of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.

Microsoft
Coined by Bill Gates to represent the company that was devoted to MICROcomputer SOFTware. Originally christened Micro-Soft, the '-' was removed later on.

Motorola
Founder Paul Galvin came up with this name when his company started manufacturing radios for cars. The popular radio company at the time was called Victrola.

ORACLE
Larry Ellison and Bob Oats were working on a consulting project for the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency). The code name for the project was called Oracle (the CIA saw this as the system to give answers to all questions or something such). The project was designed to help use the newly written SQL code by IBM. The project eventually was terminated but Larry and Bob decided to finish what they started and bring it to the world. They kept the name Oracle and created the RDBMS engine. Later they kept the same name for the company.

Sony
It originated from the Latin word 'sonus' meaning sound, and 'sonny' a slang used by Americans to refer to a bright youngster.

SUN
Founded by 4 Stanford University buddies, SUN is the acronym for Stanford University Network. Andreas Bechtolsheim built a microcomputer; Vinod Khosla recruited him and Scott McNealy to manufacture computers based on it, and Bill Joy to develop a UNIX-based OS for the computer.

Yahoo!
The word was invented by Jonathan Swift and used in his book 'Gulliver's Travels'. It represents a person who is repulsive in appearance and action and is barely human. Yahoo! Founders Jerry Yang and David Filo selected the name because they considered themselves yahoos

Strange Coincidents

• After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch.
• Any tool, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible corner.
• When you dial a wrong number, you never get an engaged line.
• In a very busy day, your boss only approaches you when you are taking a break.
• If you change queues, the one you have left will start to move faster than the one you are in now.
• The probability of meeting someone you know increases when you are with someone you don’t want to be seen with.
• The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the reach.
• At any event, the people whose seats are furthest from the aisle arrive last

Interesting Facts # 1

• Coca-Cola was originally green.
• City with the most Rolls Royce's per capita: Hong Kong.
• Iceland consumes more Coca-Cola per capita than any other nation.
• The only 15 letter word that can be spelled without repeating a letter is uncopyrightable.
• An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.
• The first product to have a bar code was Wrigley’s gum
• The shortest English word that contains the letters A, B, C, D,E and F is Feedback.
• The dot over the letter 'i' is called a tittle
• Venus is the only planet that rotates clockwise.
• The term Cop comes from Constable on Patrol. It's from England.

Answers Quiz # 2

Hi All,

Winners Quiz# 2 are

First: Kapil Nema, New Delhi
Second: Apoorv Kapse, Bangalore
Third: Abhishek Pachori, Singapore & Naina Gupta, Noida

Congrats!! to you all

1.The first bowler in Test cricket to take a hat-trick in the first over?
Ans: Irfan Pathan
2.The country whose name has only four letters but is a complete sentence, i.e. it has a subject and a predicate?
Ans: Iran I- Subject, Ran-Predicate
3.The Deepa Mehta film that focuses on the plight of castigated widows of Varanasi?
Ans: Water
4.Lollywood is the name given to the film industry of which country?
Ans: Pakistan
5.‘CRY’ used to be Child Relief and You. Now it is?
Ans: Child Rights and You
6.The only food that does not spoil?
Ans: Honey
7.What is the name of India’s first fully air-conditioned train for the poor?
Ans: Garib Rath
8.Name the Elton John’s song that became a funeral hit?
Ans: Candle in the Wind
9.Another name for lady’s finger?
Ans: Okra
10.Teddy bears get their name from
Ans: Theodore Roosevelt, Former American President

See you all in the next quiz.
Cheers,
Amit

Quiz# Two

Hi All,
Welcome to Quiz#2
To make it more interesting I am giving some hints this time.

1.The first bowler in Test cricket to take a hat-trick in the first over? (Hint: He is from India)
2.The country whose name has only four letters but is a complete sentence, i.e. it has a subject and a predicate? (Hint: It is in the gulf region)
3.The Deepa Mehta film that focuses on the plight of castigated widows of Varanasi? ( Hint: John Abraham acted in the film)
4.Lollywood is the name given to the film industry of which country?(It’s a sitter, so no hint please)
5.‘CRY’ used to be Child Relief and You. Now it is? (Hint: Use search engines)
6.The only food that does not spoil? (Hint: Dabur has branded it quite well)
7.What is the name of India’s first fully air-conditioned train for the poor? ( Hint: Recently announced by Lalu Prasad Yadav, Railway Minister of India)
8.Name the Elton John’s song that became a funeral hit? (Hint: In memory of Princess Diana)
9.Another name for lady’s finger? (Hint: Ask veggies)
10.Teddy bears get their name from (Hint: It has to do with one of famous US Presidents)

I hope you all will find this quiz interesting.
So get into the quizzing mode and send me your answers at the earliest at dasamitk@gmail.com

Cheers,
Amit

ANSWERS QUIZ#ONE

Hi All,

Thanks to all for a wonderful response for the quiz.
The winners for the Quiz#1 are:
1st: Amit Bhusan Bhatnagar, Delhi
2nd: Aditya Sanyal, Chennai
3rd: Abhishek Pachori, Singapore
Congrats!!! to you ALL.

1.What is the original name of Kishore Kumar?
ANS: Abhash Kumar Ganguly
2.Who was the first Indian to get both the Nobel Prize and the Bharat Ratna?
ANS: Dr.C.V.Raman
3.Name the famous university in US which is named after a Governor of Madras?
ANS: Yale
4.What is the full name of Football legend Pele?
ANS: 'Edson Arantes do Nascimento De PELE’
5.Name the person who got both the Nobel Prize and the Oscar?
ANS: George Bernard Shaw
6.What was the color of the original American Express card?
ANS: Purple
7.What is the past tense of English word “dare”?
ANS: Durst
8.Name the only bird which can’t fly but swim.
ANS: Penguin
9.The shortest “-ology”(study of) word is-
ANS: Oology-study of eggs
10.What is the smallest breed of dogs known as?
ANS: Chihuahuas

Again thanks a lot for your participation and encouragement.

Cheers,
Amit
dasamitk@gmail.com

Hutch-Essar Deal

Who will be Numero Uno in the Indian Telecom Market?

With Hutchinson-Essar deal making headlines all over, this deal possibly would be one of the biggest attempts towards consolidation conforming to the fact that there are immense opportunities in the Indian Telecom. With biggies like Reliance Communications, Bharti, Maxis from Malaysia and now Vodafone this deal has not only generated a lot of interest among analysts, industry observers, and stakeholders but also has led to various speculations about Telecom Market scenario in future.
And this is not all the list of potential bidders has risen to double digits with Singapore’s SingTel, South Africa’s MTN, Qatar’s Qtel, Norway’s Telenor and Egypt’s Orascom now seen as showing some interest. Others being named with some degree of caution include Telstra of Australia, Deutsche Telekom, France Telecom, Telefonica and NTT DoCoMo.
But Anil Ambani’s Reliance Communications is leaving no stone unturned as if it has become a question of self esteem and pride for him to clinch this deal. So to ensure that this deal is through in his favor he has used all his financial wizardry and pulled in all the biggies from banking world and private equity firms. This includes UBS, ABN Amro, Citibank and Chartered Bank as consortium of bankers and Blackstone and Texas Pacific as private equity firms.

The dealmakers are working on a package that will involve buying out both Hutchison and Essar. While the 67% Hutchison holdings could cost $9 billion, buying the Ruias’ sub-33% stake will cost another $ 4.5 billion, taking the total deal size to around $13.5-14 billion. With competition heating up Reliance Communication has revised the deal size to $ 15-17 billion. But Ruias’ still hold the key as they have to decide
whether it makes sense for them to sell their 33% stake in Hutch Essar along with Hutch’s 67% — which would leave them richer by about Rs 22-23,000 crore — or get into a potentially bruising battle for control of the company.

Another twist to tale is the aggressive interest shown by Vodafone of UK which can create obstacles for Reliance Communications plans. One school of thought believes that if Vodafone were to buy out Hutch's 67% abroad without touching Essar's stake (which they can easily do without violating the Govt. of India FDI policy for Telecom) it would rob the Ruias of some of their bargaining clout and force their hand.

The other school of thought believes that Vodafone is unlikely to buy out Hutch without carrying the Ruias with them since it would lead to a situation where it is not clear whether they will get management control.
Without a say in the day-to-day running of the company, Vodafone may not be interested.

What this deal would entail for Reliance Communications is multifaceted; the purchase of Hutchison Essar will give Anil Ambani an additional 17% market share (total of 45mn subscribers) in the Indian mobile telephony market. This will also augment the efforts for value added services market in India for Anil Ambani. With this deal going through Reliance communications can make a smooth transition from CDMA to GSM as in the current state Reliance ends up paying Qualcomm huge sums of money which anyway it wants to save.

Only time will tell who will emerge as the winner in this battle but for Reliance Communications the stakes are certainly very high……

QUIZ # ONE

Hi All,
Welcome to the exciting world of Quizzing!!
Send me your answers by next week at: dasamitk@gmail.com
So go Quizzing!!!!!!!
Quiz# ONE
1.What is the original name of Kishore Kumar?
2.Who was the first Indian to get both the Nobel Prize and the Bharat Ratna?
3.Name the famous university in US which is named after a Governor of Madras?
4.What is the full name of Football legend Pele?
5.Name the person who got both the Nobel Prize and the Oscar?
6.What was the color of the original American Express card?
7.What is the past tense of English word “dare”?
8.Name the only bird which can’t fly but swim.
9.The shortest “-ology”(study of) word is-
10.What is the smallest breed of dogs known as?