We planned to go to Italy. We planned and planned again. And planned over again. And then, we ended up in France. Normandy to be exact, with a small detour to Brittany. Nevertheless,the holidays were lovely, as they always are. Normandy has a lot to offer - from sun kissed beaches to historical D-Day monuments to marvellous cathedrals and châteaus (more on them later). But after 2327 kilometres on the road in a span of 10 days, it feels good to be back home. Good to come back to the unfailingly gloomy Dutch weather, which almost always surprises you with a glint of sunshine, just at the moment when you have completely given up on it.

And its really good because I have five more days before I start work again - one more glorious week of doing what I may please. I woke up today morning to a lovely cup of coffee (the French make terrible coffee, BTW, and for one week, my caffeine thirsty soul have just about been hanging in there) and a audio rendition of Naranath Brandhan - if you are not from Kerala, chances are you have no clue what that is - it is a famous poem by V. Madhusoodanan Nair, and literally means the mad man of Naranath.

Now, lets not really read too much into why I am attracted to mad men the first thing on my free Monday morning (free Monday morning!yoo hoo! Sorry, I can’t seem to get over it). Be that as it may, Naranath Brandhan is a very interesting character in Kerala folklore (and if you understand Malayalam, I would highly recommend the poem).

He was one of the twelve sons of Vararuchi, one of the nine wise men (Navaratnas) of Vikramaditya’s court. To make a very interesting story short ( I will hopefully get to the long version sometime), Vararuchi married a Parachi, one of the low castes of the time. They went on a trip (the ancient version of honeymoon, I presume), during which they had 12 children (I wonder at which stupid period in our history we decided to shorten honeymoons), whom Vararuchi insisted they abandon on the banks of Nila river. The 12 children, subsequently, grew up in 12 different home, in 12 stratas of the society, from the highest to the lowest. And every year they came together for annual family gatherings and such(so much for the caste system, really). And all 12 of them have their own stories, but Naranath Brandhan remains my all time favourite.

If you are in Kerala and would like to trod the untrodden path and not just the backwaters and the beaches and the tea resorts, make a day trip to visit the places of the 12 kids of Vararuchi - the amazing thing is you still find vestiges to most of the stories when you go back to the places where Vararuchi’s wife abandoned them. And the locals and the direct descendants of these families would be happy (or they were, several years back) to regale you with very interesting stories and tales of family traditions.

Well, enough of France and Kerala. Amsterdam is where I am. With this filler post, I leave you till I get some time to sort through the pictures and write some travel notes (if intentions ever come to fruition).

Yes yes, I know. Its been a month since my last post here. I am well aware that one of the cardinal sins of blogging is inconsistent writing. And I am guilty of it again. I won’t apologize, coz I have barely had time to breathe, let alone surf the net. I am quite proud of the fact that I managed to delete most of my comment spam within a reasonable timeframe, and saved any remaining readers from objectionable materials. But I do know and understand how annoying it must have been for any remaining regulars here. So, I will really try to be more consistent - things are getting a bit less hectic, and I will aim for two posts a week (putting a frequency down, hopefully, will make me stick to it). For all those blogs I haven’t visited for ages, I’ll dedicate this weekend for some serious catching up! And lastly, if you are getting sick of irregular updates, yet wouldn’t like to miss anything, do consider subscribing to the rss feeds (its on the right side bar). And I am really in a customer-service mode today - if you don’t have rss feeds, you can sign up for email updates everytime I write a new post - just drop me an email (also on the right side bar).

So, whats kept me busy so far? hmm..lets see. I started a new job. I must have met close to a hundred new faces in the last one month, many of whose names I can’t even begin to remember. Spent some quality time in Paris and Belgium for my work. Finally moved all my stuff to Amsterdam and set up my apartment here - picture frames, curtains, plants et al are all in the right place . And heres the bit I am most proud of - cooked and served a house warming dinner for 18 people!(i am never accepting any snide comments about my cooking anymore).

Bought myself a second hand bike, which looks like a second hand bike (a very important criteria in Amsterdam, or its going to get stolen before you can say “Ikakanabikaboo”) and did a fair amount of ‘bika-vanting’ and added to the confusion and chaos of Amsterdam roads with total ignorance of biking etiquette. As if that wasn’t enough, I further add to that whenever I exercise my non-existent driving skills, because I completely don’t know how to watch out for bikes when I am in the car (Its not as simple as it seems, really!). Bikes and cars should belong to parallel universes, definitely not on the same roads! Reading the Netherlands traffic rules book is definitely on the top of my to-do list (and has been there for a while now!) I signed up for skiing lessons and will spend the next few weekends on the slopes, in preparation for a grand ski trip in March somewhere close to Geneva (the destination is still a well-kept secret, which I am not privy to). If any of my insurers are reading this, maybe its a good time to temporarily suspend my insurance.

Despite all the external distractions, work (the usual suspect, isn’t it!) is really what is keeping me busy. Its quite different from what I used to do, and I am still in the adjusting-to-everything-around-me phase. But I am completely ‘lurrving’ it, which means I end up spending more time than I should at my work. Aha, and did I forget to mention learing dutch. Whoever told me that I don’t need to speak Dutch in Amsterdam (there were many of such people), is a complete moron! Yes, maybe to buy groceries at the supermarket, you can get away with English, but to work in an office which is predominantly Dutch, speaking the language is a definite bonus.

So, now I hope you can begin to forgive me for my MIA (that’s Missing In Action, if you have never done military time before) phase, and lets all make merry and have a great weekend.

To my surprise, I managed to get into the Indibloggies 2005 finals in the “Best New Indiblog” category. If you like what you read here, pls do consider voting for me there. Thanks!

I couldn’t have imagined that my little unknown corner of the Internet will receive 845 visitors (it may not be a big number for a lot of you, but for me it sure is) in a day (still a few hours left), based on a single post! I am overwhelmed (in a happy way) - I am taking my time to enjoy the moment, for soon DD will be back to normal.

A Big Thanks to all those who linked to the post: Tomorrow, DesiPundit, From a Singapore Angle, Blowin’ in the wind, Memory and Desire, Diodati, Mysterialite, Gordee, Global Voices Online, Singapore Classics , Untitled, And Sparkle Too.

Update: its 1343 over two days!..:-)

Came across Jakob Nielsen’s Weblog Usability: The Top Ten Design Mistakes (via Ministry of Propaganda). And this is how Dutch Diary fares in the usability tests.

1. No Author Biographies - FAIL.
I don’t intend to put up a whole bio, but I will get down to putting up something abt me sometime in the near future. I guess Jakob Nielsen is right when he says “users want to know who they’re dealing with.”, coz I know that I look for the About page the first time I come across a blog. Coming Soon. Coming Soon.

2. No Author Photo - FAIL.
And thats gonna remain a fail.

3. Nondescript Posting Titles - FAIL.
I tried to pass this on this post and don’t you think its utterly boring?

4. Links Don’t Say Where They Go - FAIL.
I think this one is unnecessary. if you place the mouse on the link and take a look at the status bar, it shows you where its headed. And usually the context gives you the reason you might want to click on it.

5. Classic Hits are Buried - FAIL.
This is a valid point. By the time I have enough posts, and hopefully some classic ones, I will fix this.

6. The Calendar is the Only Navigation - FAIL.
I have categories, but then a whole lot falls under Musings. ButI fail this one because the teacher is too strict.

7. Irregular Publishing Frequency - FAIL.
Something for me to think about. Now I post almost daily or at least once every two days. But thats because I am not in a particularly busy phase in my life. So I am essentially setting up expectations that I know I won’t be able to keep up. Oh what the heck! I will post when I can..:) I have rss feeds, so that should make up for irregular postings.

8. Mixing Topics - FAIL.
And I fail this happily. I think a blog is someone’s journal. And people are versatile and multidimensional. I write about all the interests me and all that affects me. Its like accepting a person as a whole. Accept my blog as a whole, with the range of topics that I write about. I don’t think its necessary to start a blog for different topic you write about. Having categories is good enough.

9. Forgetting That You Write for Your Future Boss - FAIL.
A girls gotta say what she wants to say.

10. Having a Domain Name Owned by a Weblog Service - FAIL.

Overall Score : 0/10