The IndiBlogger meet is finally happening in Mumbai. Its been ages since I had proposed this meet to Renie but due to some reasons it never saw the light of the day. But now we have!

The IndiBlogger meet is for bloggers who are part of IndiBlogger, or otherwise to come together and collaborate, find new information, socialize and much more. Its the event where you get to meet the team behind IndiBlogger and your other fellow bloggers from Mumbai whom you might not meet regularly.

Sunday August 15, 2010 – 2:00 PM, Mumbai

To register for this event, please sign up here.

After my visit to Kerala last month, I was finally able to see those temperatures come down here in Mumbai. The mercury has certainly come down on the scale. I just love the fact that even at home, I no longer sweat like anything which was the case earlier. It so felt like it rained for the first time. The aroma of sand kicks my brains which suddenly goes back to the time I spent in Kerala. Its a welcome move by Rain gods. The Thunder and Lightening are just amazing to listen and see. Hope this continues for a week which will hope fully cool down the humid and hot environment.

I got hold of a pass for the Summer Funk, the dance show by students of Shiamak’s Dance Academy. And it did cost me a good 300 bucks, but was worth it. It was really awesome.

This dance show is organized so that students can get their taste of a stage show after learning the dance for the first time, and for the old timers it gives more experience. There are different categories under which performances were sorted and the one liked the most was the dance done by Victory Arts Foundation which is not – for – profit academy which teaches dance to those who are physically disabled.

When I saw deaf people dancing, I was taken aback. How in the world do they do it? And such coordination of steps left my mouth opened for minutes!  Though I had visited Summer Funk last year as well, this time it was different. It was 15th anniversary of Summer Funk and Shiamak himself was there.

Some funny events also did happen. Barclays had organized a lucky draw where two set of DVDs were to be awared and the winners choosen in the lucky draw were two Mehtas from the same family.  One mom, other was her child. The other prize went to Poonam Davar, Shiamak’s mom. She herself then nominated another women to be chosen as the lucky one than herself.

All in all, it was a great evening.

Let me put the pic right here. Its disburbing, and is against law. Law of the land and the law of human being. Its a message that is spreading hatered and I strongly oppose it. Shortly after this post, I am going to share this picture with most of the leading media channels and newspapers and hope we can start the movement here.

Reader Discretion Advised

Open hated messages in Train

I was shocked to see a message like this! It is usual to find graffiti on the Mumbai local train. I boarded the Kalyan fast from Byculla at 8.37 pm when I was on the way to my home. Unfortunately I was not carrying my deo, with which I would have removed this otherwise.

I am used to see some of graffiti on the inside of locals and those generally are of funny nature where friends write their names, sometimes their crushes or lovers names often. At times, it evens goes to an extent of giving numbers of call girls and boys! I ignore them since these are not those that hurt me bad.

But this one was different, it was disturbing and it was painfull. Who would have this kind off problem with Sonia Gandhi and Muslims? What wrong did they do? Is not India a free, democratic country for anybody having the right to follow their own religion?

It was done by someone who was saddened by the victory of Congress in the General Elections, 2009! Is some one really inspired by what Varun Gandhi said??? That is why he have been booked, but that is done more harm than good. Isnt it?

Why are these brothers of ours against us living peacefully in our own country? Without any differences in caste and creed, there are a lot of Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Sikh, Jains, Buddhists and others who take these trains everyday which gives India and its very financial capital with their man hours!

Why do you want to create a stirr again. Mumbai has left everything behind and has always looked forward to what the future beholds.

I would request one and all and specifically those who travel in these locals, do not go by them. If you can use a bit of your deodrant what you carry everyday to just remove these horrible message with a peice of rough paper, we can remove these messages. Deodrants work!

Make it clean, in the trains and our lives. Let’s pledge!

Aircel now in Mumbai

With the launch of Aircel in Mumbai, the telecom competition has certainly getting heated up. For my dear readers to get a fair view of the services of Aircel in Mumbai, I decided to get hands on one. The following are the few details I have been able to get. The connection will be active from tomorrow so you may just have to wait to know more about its overall performance.

The First Glance

Aircel was launched with a big bang in Mumbai at the Gateway of India and now the advertising banner shout very loudly about the arrival of a new competition. The branding of Aircel had always been different and with Dhoni now jumping as the brand ambassdor things look a lot better for Aircel.

Costing and Ease

The Aircel sim and connection costs Rs. 99 as opposed to Airtel’s Rs. 20. Connection comes with a default talktime of Rs. 10. The biggest difference is that Aircel has launched the card in Mumbai as a full lifetime card only. That means, no validity recharges.

Other attractions include more talktime than the value of the voucher it self. For a recharge of Rs. 199, you get the value of Rs. 250. That is, a full Rs. 51 extra. Top that with Rs. 1500 Aircel to Aircel local call free every month for first three months and 300 local and National SMSes free.

Call cost per minuite has gone in a decreasing mode as call time increases. For example, if you call someone, the first local minute will cost you Re. 1, second minute will cost you Ps. 50, and the third minute ownwards will cost you Ps. 30.

For STD, the call rate for First minute will be 1.50 ps, second minute the cost comes down to Re. 1, and the from 3rd minute ownwards, Aircel will charge you with .75ps.

I have not been able to get more details on how the VAS charges are, but believe that would also be market shattering.

Wait for the full review as I start to explore serviecs of AircelMumbai.Network remains very important to me than any other parameter.

Welcome to Mumbai, Aircel.

Update 1:

Aircel Customer Care in Mumbai is not equipped with much information. I called up Aircel customer care to find out what are the charges for GPRS on Laptop and she was fumbling for an answer. I then had to switch my language to Hindi to make her understand what exactly I wanted. Not an issue as such since I know both the languages very well, but for those who speak English more often might just find the going though.

Anyways, the girl said that browsing internet on an Aircel phone using it as a modem will cost you 10ps. per 10kb. Oouch! That is too much.

Update 2:

SIM activation has taken 3 days which is very bad for a new company to start off with. The customer care continues to be pathetic and not well versed with products and services. On IVR, you cannot go back to menu by pressing 8 as the lady’s sweet voice tells you!

Network remains the biggest issue. Though voice clarity is on par, but the connection is not constand while on the move.

Update 3:

Network in closed areas goes to Zero. Network in Mumbai local keeps fluctuating, hence not consistant and more chances for call drops.

Hemal Shah’s List of Current Best Mobile Service Provider (GSM) in Mumbai:

Vodafone reigns on the top even after Reliance and Aircel came with onslaught with cheapest charges and more talktime. A distant second is Airtel in Mumbai which still has a negative network in Mumbai, though it runs on 1800/1900 Mhz.

Third position is shared by is Loop and Reliance, followed by MTNL and Idea at fourth. Aircel cannot be counted in the ranks because it has not got a fair amount of time to show what it can do.