Seeing around

Over the past month or so, I watched some truly spectacular Videos - thanks to Netflix. The first one was Michael Palin's 'Pole to Pole' where he chooses the 30 degree latitude to travel from the North Pole (yes, he stands on the pole) to the South Pole.

BBC's 'Wild China' - a six part television series is truly out of the world. The visuals are breathtaking and I must say that they are much better than any HD I have seen. The first part of the series gives insight into the agricultural system in China and how the people have made farming possible in the slopes of the steep hills there.

Yesterday, I saw 'The Alps' on IMAX produced the department of tourism of Switzerland. Some glorious shots of Mr. Eiger - this is an out-of-the-world visual treat making me (all, I guess) envy those who live there. Sort of dreamland, where you are with nature and live - how blessed.

Watching these videos make my workouts less boring. This is a great way to keep up the work outs. Of course, my work out is mostly on the bike which makes no noise at all. Running on a treadmill might be different and you would want to have some headphones and video monitor handy.

15 minutes of Yoga

Many ask me what they can do as a routine for 15 minutes a day. The question is a pretty hard one as the answer is 'it can vary'. The reason is there are so many postures/asanas to do and add to it meditation - you get the idea. To work up a routine for yourself, here is what you want to do

- Attend a yoga class for 6-8 weeks. Identify which postures you like and enjoy most. Make a note of these and incorporate into your routine. The more you enjoy the better as then you can vary the routine often.

- We can categorize the postures for the above purpose i.e., for someone wanting to enforce practice as a) Standing b) Sitting on the mat c) On the belly d) On the back e) Sun Salutations. Choose one or two postures from each category and try it out. It would be great if you can start with Sun Salutations. For e.g., a routine would be from among the following. Select one from each to start with and then increase.

1) Sun Salutation - either Half-, Intermediate- or Full-.
2) Standing - Mountain, Half-bends, Hero and variations, Tree
3) Sitting on the mat - Twists, Bound angle, Child
4) On the tummy - Half- or Full-Cobra, Half- or Full-Locust, Bow
5) On the back - Bridge, Half-Shoulderstand, Lying Bound-angle, Boat

Follow above by deep relaxation for a minute or two. Obviously, if you are a beginner, you don't know 90% of the above. Hence you need to attend a class and get familar. Going to a class sounds boring, but you will see a TREMENDOUS difference right after a class. Once you start practicing you will start feeling the flow yourself and can 'figure out' what you want to do.

Yoga and Back aches

Recently a friend of mine asked me what to do for back pain. He seemed to have a bulging disc. I started re-reading my copy of 'Yoga Rx' and it addresses this very specific problem. As one would normally think, we shouldn't be doing forward bends. These aggravates the bulging disc. Instead you want to do mild back bends - like variations of the Boat (Navasan) or Half-cobra. The idea is that the bulging disc needs to be compressed back into its place. Forward bends tend to pull them out.

In general for back aches, Yoga has been miraculously beneficial. If you read case studies, people suffering from acute back pain have benefited a lot with constant practice of Yoga. To what extent you need to follow Yoga is something you want to decide with your teacher. Of course, going to a doctor first or a therapist and finding out what kind of motions they recommend is necessary. This information can be then discussed with your Yoga teacher. There are a few things to keep in mind

- Lot of back aches are caused by emotional stress. Yes, it is hard to believe but stress is a big factor in back aches.

- Deep Relaxation or Shavasan is an excellent option to calm down the stress muscles.

- Good breathing is key to fight pain. This takes the mind of pain and onto something else. Moreover, good breathing brings back life into the being as it is supposed to.

- Good posture is critical to keeping the back healthy. The modern, sedentary style of living actuall puts more pressure on the discs with the gravity pulling on them. This causes the discs first to loose the gel (mostly water) and push out into the nerves causing pain (over a long period, of course). Secondly, the blood vessels near the discs also get compressed and deprive the discs/spine of nutrients. A simple exercise such as walking infuses movement along the spine - the gentle up and down movement - and helps irrigate the spine.

Read 'Back Rx' by Vasanth Vad for an excellent book on this topic

Downturn

Ever since the Chinese started to tighten lending, no news has been good enough. Stellar earnings from GS, AAPL, AMZN all have been practically ignored. I wasn't watching at the right time and have let my losses grow. One sense of comfort (maybe over confidence) is that I am fairly long (if 2 years is) on these. Watching your bets go down can be stressful, so if you are a short term speculator (better word as they used to use 100 years back), if you can't watch and act quickly, don't venture into investing. I thought I had a fairly successful 15 year streak for a retail investor making money here and there and not losing any. This downturn has been different enough to shatter my confidence. Cut losses is the key mantra. Then look out for greed and panic.

Good news isn't enough

GS reported stellar earning, nearly $3/share more than expected. Still, it wasn't good enough. In part, due to President Obama's retaliatory regulatory measures proposed to curb risks in banks. GS took a 10% hit in the past two days. This made a deep hole in my LEAPS and GS holdings. I had a 2 year timeframe and I might stick to it. The 5% drop in the DOW in the past two days could be the most anticpating correction for the professionals. With the country on road to recovery, though with bumps, I don't see us going back to negative growth (or recession days). The VIX was up 5 points today; such corrections lead to opportunities. That is, if you hold cash.

Now, on top of the bad news for banks, Gold is taking a hit as the greenback is getting stronger. That hurts my IAG holding. Suddenly the many who were touting Gold going to 2000 or 6000 aren't on the news these days. Given it is a scarce commodity, I feel Gold will be back on the uptrend in a few months time, only if the dollar doesn't further strengthen. With all the debt America has now, I hope some Analyst will issue a downgrade on the dollar; but I don't know if anyone has the guts to do that.

The power of Ujjayi

I guess Anxiety starts with thinking. Yes, we need to think to function. But most of our thinking is useless unless you are so focused on what you are doing. I am talking about when you don't have a task at hand. You think about what has happened in the past, what might happen in the future. Somebody said 85% of our thoughts are useless, non-productive thoughts. So, DON'T THINK UNLESS YOU HAVE TO. Now, what do we do when we are not thinking? We can fill the mind with NOTHING, EMPTINESS, BLANKNESS. You might think this is easy. Just try it. For a few moment, let you mind not think. Then you will realize the challenge. For the moment, the mind starts to think, and the thoughts are non-essential, the mind starts to tire. Not only that, depending on what you think, the mind can start to feel - anxiety, tension, etc.

I have felt anxiety or at least the start of it, in the bed. I usually go to bed around 10:30 PM and after some reading I go to sleep. When I wake up in the middle of the night, I am quite refreshing - at least not tired - enough that the thoughts creep into my mind. I have thought about my future or my family and some of these thoughts (like the possible bad ones) causes me anxiety or insecurity. At this point, I feel sort of a tension near my heart - as though the passage that the blood flows through is squeezed and the flow is restricted. If these thoughts and incumbent tension/insecurity goes out of hand, I can see how it can lead to panic.

Luckily, Ujjayi comes to help at these moments. I have practiced enough Yoga to know that I should stop thoughts when not necessary. Ujjayi is Victorious breath. When you achieve victory over your breath, you are the master of your thoughts. Quite simple put, the simple but enormously powerful practice is just to listen to the sound of your breath. You can make noise while breathing if that helps. What this listening does is to keep the mind from thinking. Simple!

Now, when I say Ujjayi is enormously powerful, this statement is very loaded. I know what difference it makes when I kick out that anxiety from myself when I practice Ujjayi. I know, the effect on my health when I practice Ujjayi again and again and again. It takes you to a state of mind that you want to be with all the time. It is so addicting! Unfortunately, we can't be practicing Ujjayi or Yoga all the time. We live in a system where the system overwhelms us and controls us. Getting back to what I wanted to say, Ujjayi induces calmness and fights anxiety. It fights depression and stress and everything bad for the mind. You will realize what I am saying if you make it a habit of practicing Ujjayi regularly. Please do; that calmness can change your life.

Anger Management

Those few who are always calm are maybe the a happiest people on Earth. My bouts of happiness in the past few years have led me to analyze the reason behind it very much. For if you know the reason you can be happy, you can have consistency to it. The reason in my case is plain and simple. I would get angry needlessly. It could be for very simple reasons. Say, for e.g., I was driving Vikas to his school in the morning. The traffic on Valley Forge Rd can be quite a lot in the peak hours. This one lane road becomes a stopping point to others whenever one has to turn. When you turn on a one lane road, with lot of traffic behind you, I make it a point to move to the center of the intersection so that others can get past you. This way it doesn't hold up traffic. But some, who probably are either ignorant of the benefits of paying attention to others need, or simply don't care, stand right before the light and hold up traffic. This would make me angry or upset, I don't know which word to use. Of course, this feeling to an amount that I know it shouldn't come in my way of daily life. However, even that slightest amount of frustration/anger/upset is a starting point in my way to lose happiness.Unknowingly, my conscious has been planted a seed that will grow; and with its growth it provides me opportunities to aggravate myself at the next slightest possible opportunity. This builds up until at some point I am not enjoying being in the moment, but thinking about things I can't change. The key thing is not to get affected even in the slightest way. That is Yoga.

A Glimpse of the Pacific

Today was the day I was to return to Philly. The migration had gone successfully yesterday. I had finished it much ahead of the schedule. I still wasn’t used to S’Frisco time. When I woke up, it was 3:15 AM PST. Way too early to just while off the time before the flight! I had already visited the Golden Gate Bridge yesterday night. So was wondering what to do with all the time till the flight back home. I started looking at the attractions on Google maps and started to wonder if I could hit the Rt. 1 a.k.a the famed Pacific Highway. First I thought I might go down south, but there was quite a bit of driving to get to the coast. I searched for Monterrey bay and found the time to drive there was 2 hours. Way too long to get there and be back on time, I thought. I figured I had about 5 hours to while away. As I was thinking to get to the Golden Gate Bridge and maybe take a walk, I saw some beaches north of the bay. Why not, I thought, drive across the bridge.

The first place I saw on Rt. 1 was Stinson Beach. The drive was about 55 minutes. That was a good drive in the time I had. I had a quick shower and went down to get some cash. The Front desk girl was asleep in the lobby. My walking woke her up. I asked for the ATM and withdrew some cash; she broke the 20 – I needed change for the toll on the Bay Bridge. After leaving some tips for the housekeeper, I packed up. When I got into the car, it should have been around 4:30 AM. It was very dark and being a big city, I could still hear the traffic on Rt. 101. I stopped to get some coffee and croissant at the nearby Starbucks. Now I was all set to drive out. I called Rama and informed her. She was getting started for here center. She thought I was on an adventure given my flight in the afternoon. I convinced her it was just a ‘drive’. She wished me good luck.

As I headed out north on Rt. 101, I could see the lights on the far off bridge. The roads were a contrast to yesterday evening. Thanks to the Garmin, I could get lost and still be back on time. That always gives me much comfort when I travel. It guided me through the Douglas MacArthur tunnel and there I was – driving across the Golden Gate Bridge for the second time in the past 10 hours. Once across, the lights started to dim out. Soon I was onto Rt. 1. The roads here were empty – I was the sole trooper on road.
I thought what Rama would think if I told her what I felt like driving in the utter dark. Added to the darkness, the road started to wind quite a lot. I was turning every 50 or so feet. At about 20 mph, that can be quite unsettling. I knew I was climbing. I could feel one side of the road gouging, waiting to swallow anything that would drop. The other side was lined with tall trees. Visibility was barely 100-200 feet given the curving of the road. It was too dark to tell if the side was a valley or the waters. The road noise kept me from hearing much outside. I don’t remember anyone passing me or behind me for all the 90 minutes I was driving except when I pulled over on a turnout to get a break.

I don’t know if the amount of winding or the air outside – I started to feel light headed when I pulled over on the turnout. About ½ hour past the bridge, I could see the water on the left; it was glimmering in the pale skylight of the oncoming dawn. While I knew I was headed to Stinson Beach, I didn’t have a specific address. I was hoping to find signs to the beach. Bad luck as I passed the Stinson Beach park which was closed. I pulled out Google maps on my Blackberry and checked out some points of interest and beaches.

The faint dawn started bringing on a few cars rapidly zooming by on the road. I parked besides the water on a road I don’t remember. The air outside had a faint smell of Eucalyptus, reminding me of the Nilgiris near Bangalore. I stepped out and ate the fruits from Starbucks watching a beautiful expanse of water slowly flowing down, the waters rippling on its journey, reflecting the faint light. I was probably about fifty feet above the water. I was at last starting to see some daylight. The absolute quietness apart from a streaming car was mesmerizing. As in the past, I thought what a place to live and compared it with Worcester. Just miles out of the city and it was breathtaking nature. Lucky few who lived here! Now I could see I was opposite a few road-side houses. I am not sure how my first picture of this particular outing came out. I made sure to use both low-light w/o flash and also automatic settings to get as much as I could.

My next destination was the beach itself. I figure the ‘Stinson Beach Grille’ should be close to the shore. When I got there, the parking was cordoned off again due to the earliness of the day. I managed to get around the lot. It is when I saw my first glimpses of the Pacific Ocean. The roar of the waters hitting the rocks constantly was not to be missed despite the height I was at. Now I was viewing the Pacific Highway in all its glory. It was a tremendous sight – the waters crashing about 250 feet below and the coastline winding all the way for miles! The fog kept me from seeing the Ocean in full – it was extending out as far as the eye could see.

It should have been about 8:15 now; the sunrise is past 7 AM here. I thought I should be heading back to the Bridge and maybe try to get some food before the flight. My next stop, though, was at Muer Beach View. A lone SUV was parked in the parking lot. The young man waved to me – it was good to see a smiling face in the morning. I waved back.

As I started driving back, I made maybe 5-6 stops on the way. Now there was traffic behind me. One truck was bearing on me – the speed limit was 20 or 25 mph maybe. The turnouts were rather short and as I pulled into one to let him pass, he honked. I heard the honk again the second time I pulled in. Now I realized the drivers were thanking me – at least, a better way to look at it! By 8:30, I was on my way back to the bridge. I stopped at the recreational area which is way down at the base of the bridge off Rt. 101 S. You get to see the bridge ‘bottoms up’, so to speak. The far off fog kept the photos from coming out sharp, I guess.

After I cross the bridge back to the city, I made at least 3 wrong turns. This never bothers me anymore as long as I have time. It is the start of another adventure, as Rama would call it. This gave me an opportunity to drive into the parts of downtown San Francisco I never would have otherwise. At some point I was driving by the ‘Pond-side’ – don’t remember the name. By now, there were plenty of morning walkers and their dogs, almost crowded by Worcester standards. Also, plenty of traffic for a Saturday morning.

Finally I wound my way to Mangiere on Old Country Road, grabbed some more breakfast for my lunch. Rama was surprised when I called her at 9:45 and told her I was finishing up my food. When you head to the airport, it is better to turn off the Garmin as you get close to it as the directions to the rental car return facility is clearly marked. I did miss the first time and had to resort to my Garmin again. I was well on-time to catch my flight despite the 5 hours or so of driving. As exciting a morning as one could be!

Beautiful SFO Bridge

I was at SFO for the production migration of Walmart.com. Managed to get things going on time. Today evening, I got sick of sitting inside the hotel room and thought of heading out. My aim was to go to the 'Udupi Palace' on Valencia and 26th(?). The North bound traffic got heavier toward Chavez street and I finally got off 101N. Finding parking was a real challenge. Finally after 20 minutes of hunting, I found parking about 8 blocks off Udupi.

I ordered the Dosa platter; it was very good. The idli had a slightly sweetish taste to it making it very enjoyable. The vada was good. The Dosa was huge; it was cut into two making me ask if the plate came with two of them. I also ordered a coffee which should have been Nescafe. All in all, very good food; place was crowded. I was seated besides another pair in a table for four!

As I walked back to the car, I decided to drive a bit. I chose to go to the Golden Gate Bridge. My Garmin gave me directions to the Golden Gate vista point. It took me through the heart of San Francisco downtown. Driving on Lombard brought back memories from the 90s. The street is so curvy that at stop signs, I had to get off my seat to see the road ahead!

I was thinking the vista point was before the bridge, but it was on the northern side. So I got to drive on the bridge as well. I was thinking of doing this tomorrow in daylight. Anyway, driving at night wasn't as exciting as I had to mainly focus on the road and the far-off sides were pretty dark. At the vista point, there were hardly few people. I parked my car - there was a tow truck making me think the point was not welcome for visitors at least at the time. I could see downtown SFO in the far off distance dimly lighted by the city lights. It took me about 5 minutes for my eyes to get used to the surroundings. I took some snaps from my Sony W120, but not sure how it would come out. After calling Rama and another 10 minutes, I headed back to the hotel.

On the way back on Van Ness, caught the heart of downtown SFO. Took some snaps as I drove. Think I got the dome of what I thought as the City center. Back to hotel - this production migration was different with some memories to carry back home of the energy that is San Francisco.

MA is on

After the CEO sell off, there wasn't much to hang on to for the shorts. The day after a nearly 6 point drop, MA started back on it's way up and today it neared 264 i.e., up 11 points since I sold. This was on higher volume indicating the risk of a sell-off was nowhere in sight. So I jumped back in; however, this time I got a 250-2012 LEAP. Eagerly waiting the earnings on 28th. MA, being a processor of transactions, doesn't find the same kind of risks as issuers such as JP Morgan Chase, so the downside is little compared to JPM.