A few weeks back, when I realized that the world’s largest automaker was heading towards bankruptcy, I did a nostalgic photo-post of General Motors World Headquarters at the Renaissance Center and Detroit. This week, Six Flags, one of the world’s largest amusement park company in the world announced that it is filing for bankruptcy. It seems that in this economic downturn, people don’t want to spend their hard-earned money to get amused. So here is another nostalgic photo-post of a day at an amusement park that was loosely affiliated with Six Flags.
Cedar Point at Sandusky, Ohio currently holds the world record for the maximum number of roller coasters, one of which is the world’s second tallest and second fastest roller coaster. It has been voted The Best Amusement Park In The World for 11 consecutive years (yes, over Disneyworld in Florida). This is how the park looks from the air (not my photo):
It was a cloudy, rainy day that we went to Cedar Point. We were anxious, but the rides were fortunately open and running. Click on any of the pictures to get the higher resolution.
The cable car runs through the entire length of the park, since walking around the whole day can become quite tiring!
It was a bit difficult to get good outdoor photographs because the light was poor in rainy conditions.
The Top Thrill Dragster has been the most thrilling experience of my life. Paragliding at the foot of the Himalayas didn’t come anywhere close. 0 to 120 mph (193 kmph) in 4 seconds. A 90 degree climb up to 420 feet (~ 50 stories) and a 90 degree straight fall while spiraling 270 degrees. All over in just 17 seconds. I managed to capture a train climbing, at the top, and descending:
See more pictures of this demon here. The official page has more technical information as well as additional multimedia. And if you want to know how it actually feels like, I found this on YouTube:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPjN7zArwiI&fmt=18&rel=0]
Yesterday’s news about GM cutting 21,000 more jobs and killing the Pontiac brand evoked nostalgia and some mixed feelings. So this is a photo-sequel to my almost two year old post about life in Detroit.
For two years, I lived, worked, breathed, ate, and slept in the shadow of this landmark. General Motors World Headquarters, the Renaissance Center, affectionately known as ‘RenCen’. RenCen is one of the world’s largest office complexes, totaling 5,500,000 square feet. It is so confusing inside for newcomers, that I had made a PowerPoint presentation for guiding our new team members.
The red monorail is the ‘People Mover’ – a public transport system in downtown ‘World Auto Capital’ Detroit.
These are views from my apartment window.
A few snaps of Detroit downtown at night. Just like the darkness of the night, and unlike the men of the Renaissance Era who brought the light of reason in our lives, GM’s Rencen is headed back to the Dark Ages.
Since it was introduced last year, Wordle has been very popular with bloggers and the general public. So I decided to join in the fun. Here are the US and Indian Constitution wordle outputs:
Observations? Nothing surprising here.
- Putting aside Law, observe the emphasis on Legislature, Legislative, and Court in the Indian constitution. Neither of these are prominent in the US Constitution.
- Government is prominent in the Indian constitution. Nothing like that in the US.
- Citizens are People in India, and Majority is not so important in the constitution as in the US.
- Time is easily visible in the US, not in India.
Oh, the more you look at it, the more you’ll find stuff!
Sudheendra Kulkarni says that major political parties in India are taking manifesto preparation very seriously. He says:
When it comes to manifestos of political parties, a section of the intelligentsia and the media exhibits a dismissive tendency that riles political activists like me. A major national daily last week called manifesto-making nothing but a “cut-and-paste” job. This tendency is symptomatic of a larger habit of the chatterati sneering from the comfort of their well-furnished drawing rooms at all political parties, indeed at the political process in general. The reality is quite otherwise. Most political parties, especially those with a national perspective, have begun taking policy issues—and, by extension, manifesto preparation—far more seriously than before.
So let’s look at the Congress and CPI (M) 2009 Election Manifestos. The BJP one is expected this week. I’ve removed ‘Indian’, ‘National’, and ‘Congress’ from the Congress one, and ‘CPI’ from the CPI(M) one.
- Public Sector and workers are obviously very dear to the Left, while the Congress is betting a lot of money on youth.
- Women are equally important to both parties.
- Protect – clearly visible in the CPI(M) – is nowhere in the Congress, while it is strongly focusing on something New.
- Police finds a reasonable mention in Congress, while I couldn’t find it in the CPI(M).
- Growth is huge for Congress, it is nowhere in the CPI(M).
- Reforms are equally low on the agenda of both parties.
I had earlier mentioned Text Analysis Tools, but Wordle makes it simpler and more fun than ever before!
These images tell a story.
The Twin Towers, a symbol of US capitalistic superpower, have collapsed. The US is busy fighting the war against terror.
In the meanwhile, Burj Dubai, the tallest free standing structure in the world, just reached a soaring 574.5m (1,885 ft) with 154 completed stories. It is predicted to be the tallest man-made structure in the world, as well as the tallest building by any measure. It’s official web site is here. Note the ‘.com’ address of its URL, it’s not a cryptic ‘.ae’ address.
Here are some of the amazing developments in Dubai:
- Dubai’s revenues from oil and natural gas currently account for less than 3% of the emirate’s revenues.
- Dubai Mall aims to be the largest mall in the world when completed.
- Its port, Jebel Ali, constructed in the 1970s, has the largest man-made harbor in the world.
- The Burj al-Arab, a luxury hotel in Dubai, at 321 meters (1,053 ft), is the tallest building used exclusively as a hotel.
- Dubai World Central will have the Dubai World Central International Airport, the world’s largest passenger and cargo hub.
- It is a hub for service industries such as IT and finance. Dubai Internet City, combined with Dubai Media City includes IT firms such as EMC Corporation, Oracle Corporation, Microsoft, and IBM, and media organizations such as MBC, CNN, Reuters and AP.
- The World is a man-made archipelago of 300 islands in the shape of a world map currently being built off the coast of Dubai.
- Dubai Financial Market’s trading volume stood at about 400 billion shares worth US$ 95 billion. The DFM had a market capitalization of about US$ 87 billion.
- The Palm Islands in Dubai are the three largest artificial islands in the world.
- Dubai Healthcare City is scheduled to open by 2010 to promote medical tourism.
- Dubailand is an entertainment complex under development, to include mega-tracts of various kinds of attractions.
- The Dubai Waterfront is proposed to become the largest waterfront and largest man-made development in the world.
Is anyone observing the contrast? While the US is struggling to fight a war against terror, a country right in the middle east is stealthily rising economically – without relying on oil – in the global economy. The contrast is stark. The US has to realize and focus on its core strengths, if it wants to remain an economic superpower, and not be swayed to distraction with the war against terror.
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An Unquiet Mind by Mahendra Palsule is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
