HodentekPlus: February 2018

Thursday, February 22, 2018

What kind of a person are you doing business with?

There are lots of criticisms regarding the visit of Donald Trump Junior to India to promote his family business . I have no problem with that, that is what businesses do, go where the business is. There are politicians questioning the ethics. I am not political and I really do not care, there are courts and the congress to deal with that.

What I am really concerned, is the insensitive nature of the individual. He is a hunter and he hunts innocent endangered animals and feel great about it!

I ask you, what kind of a Mumbaiwala are you if you have to sit with dinner with this person and apply kumkum to his forehead! I ask you, are you a Hindu?

Look at these pictures of elephant killing. I definitely will be offended if Mr.Modi sits down with him for dinner!

Source:
https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=trump+junior+elephant+hunt&qpvt=trump+junior+elephant+hunt&FORM=IQFRML

I always had this feeling that God Ganesh is most revered by the Maharashtrians and Mumbaites. Look at the juggernaut at Ganesh festival.

Source: Bing Images

I suppose business comes first.

It is amazing that business can silently do business with this guy who blatantly goes about his killing and getting tilak on his forehead by his Hindu(?) business associates.

It's amazing, I am speechless.

Love elephants support this organization:
https://hodentekplus.blogspot.com/2016/08/love-elephants-help-this-organization.html

Tuesday, February 20, 2018

Lang Lang at Blaisdell: Hawai'i Symphony Orchestra event

On February 18 I attended the Orchestra event at Honolulu's Blaisdell Concert hall. The hall was packed and people appeared very excited.

The first part of the event was without Lang Lang but the orchestra was conducted by Joann Falletta.
Mussorgsky(Arr.Ravel) - Pictures at an exhibition
Promenade
1. "The Gnome"
. The
Promenade 2nd
2. "The old castle"
Promenade 3rd
3. "Tuileries(Children quarrel after games"
4. "Cattle"
Promenade 4th
5. "Ballet of Unhatched Chicks"
6. "Samuel Goldenberg and Schmuyle"
Promenade 5th
7. "Limoges". The Market(the Great News)"
8. "Catacombs(Roman Tomb)"
9. "The Hut on Hen's Legs(Baba Yaga)"
10. "The Bogatyr Gates (In the Capital in Kiev).

Modest Mussgorsky was inspired after attending the exhibition of paintings from his friend of the artist, Victor Hartmann.

Source: http://kuaf.com/post/note-wednesday-october-28-2015-chills-exhibition#stream/0

The music was awesome with so many instruments.

The orchestra was the one defined by Maurice Ravel :

"Scored for 3 flutes (3rd doubling piccolo), 2 oboes (2nd doubling English Horn), 2 clarinets, bass clarinet, 2 bassoons, contrabassoon, alto saxophone, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, tympani, glockenspiel, chimes, triangle, tam-tam, rattle, whip, cymbal, snare drum, bass drum, xylophone, celesta, harp, and strings"

During the intermission I went out for a bit of air and lo and behold! the entrance had a throng of people witnessing the 'Dragon Dance', that you can see here.

https://youtu.be/zIcwOCrtJdE

The second part of the program was the addition of Lang, Lang and his piano partner (left hand), Maxim Lando.

Before the start of the second part, two dragons entered the stage and played with the pianists, the conductor and others of the orchestra. This was a nice touch considering that it was the Chinese New Year season and a renowned Chinese artist performing.

Here is what the dragons did on the stage.

https://youtu.be/ttJiVq73dvQ

After the dragons left the stage, the following four pieces were played:

Saint-Saens: "Aquaurium" from Carnival des animaux
Tchaikovsky: "Dance of the Sugarplum fairy" from the Nutcracker
Bernstein: "America" from West Side Story
Gershwin: Rhapsody in Blue

Awesome evening!

Saturday, February 17, 2018

Trasfering photos over WiFi from iPhones to Windows PCs

Microsoft 'Photos Companion' iPhone app allows for easy transfer of pictures to Windows 10 PC over WiFi.

This is a good (really, great) feature as it is presently not possible to transfer pictures from, for example, iPhone to PC. iPhone6 does not have any USB ports, nor its Bluetooth is not supported when transferring to a PC.

It is good if it works all the time.

Windows 10 Pro: In photos, under Settings there is no Preview item, under which you are supposed to turn on Help Microsoft test the mobile import over Wi-Fi feature.

I downloaded the Photo Companion app on my iPhone 6. There was no problem.

I tried in my PC which has a Microsoft photos app. It is supposed to import from mobile over WiFi option. However this option does not exist. You can either import From a folder or From a USB device as shown here.

I am not sure if it is something to do with Build 1707_prerelease-flt.180116-1539 version of Windows 10 Pro OS.

I tried to download an update for 'photos' app, but it failed to update.

I sent error code (Code: 0x80073CF9) to Microsoft.

Tuesday, February 13, 2018

Email Outlook Paralyzed!

For the last couple of days the Outlook (my preferred email) is paralyzed. I havent sent for an ambulance.

The program starts up and stops!! Then you take a couple of pencils and play darts.

This happened after the installation of the latest OS, the Insider's Preview.

Update:
It finally came back by itself. Outlook forum suggested that some components may be broken and suggested a repair. However, it was not needed.

http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2018/02/new-update-of-windows-10-pro-insider.html

Problems noticed so far:
http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2018/02/is-microsoftedge-in-new-insider-preview.html

Tuesday, February 6, 2018

Benedictine Monastery at Monte Cassino, Italy

September 22: This was a big day as we were moving out of Maiori in the Amalfi coast to Rome. Stopping for a short coffee break, we stopped at Monte Cassino – a hill-top, Benedictine Monastery, 88 miles to the north.

After the visit, we stopped for lunch at Area Varlese in the foot hills and arrived in Rome after another 85 miles.

Although the drive to Rome was a little tedious, the tour director made it somewhat enjoyable with Italian songs (Buongiorno a te by Luciano Pavarotti; Tu Vuo Fa L’Americano; Volare, etc.) from a music box; a 101 intro to Italian phrases; meaning of Italian hand gestures and signs; a little bit of Italian politics and of course, the screening of ‘Roman Holiday’ in the internal infotainment screens. The memorable part of this trip was that one from our group had the energetic, operatic voice who joined Buongiorno, Volare, etc. and gave us a great time. It was a long day.

We arrived around 4:00 PM or so and glasses of Prosecco was waiting for us in the lobby of Empire Palace Hotel (www.empirepalacehotel.com), a former palace converted into a hotel.

Source: Empire Palace Hotel

The hotel was centrally located, and we could just walk to Spanish Steps in about 20 minutes. The WiFi was working although somewhat slow. The hotel was comfortable and there was a courtyard restaurant which served the rooms as well as guests who wanted to sit out. We were to stay here two more nights and have our breakfast (Ristorante ’Aureliano’) in the ground floor; the coffee was just so, so. The lunch and dinner were not included in our program as there was a large selection of restaurants close by. Of course, there was a gelateria close by as our group was particularly partial to gelato.

After depositing our luggage in the rooms and taking some rest, we went out for dinner. We chose a nice restaurant not too far, about 5 minutes from our hotel. The food at Taverna Flavia was pretty good.

Source: Via Veneto Roma

The service was extremely slow and getting the bill was even slower. This was very common in all the places we visited so far, and I began to feel that perhaps we are chronically fast paced compared to Europeans. We returned to hotel as I was down with cold, but the rest of the group went out for more drinking. Altogether it was an enjoyable evening.

Monte Cassino Monastery

The Monte Cassino Monastery (altitude 1706’) was built in 529 AD by Saint Benedict himself by demolishing the existing temple for Apollo and building an oratory for St. Martin. St. Benedict wanted to wean away the locals from devil worship; sorcery and paganism. The monastery was and still is the home to the Benedictine order of monks.

Monte Cassino (sometimes Montecassino) has seen a lot of changes after being destroyed in the past at least four times due to various invasions (Lombards and Saracens); earthquakes and battles starting in the year 581. More recently in 1944, it was bombarded and destroyed by the allies to get the occupying Germans forces. On the way back from the monastery we saw various memorials to the fallen soldiers from the allies.

Monte Cassino was rebuilt according to the original plans but had a not so old appearance.

Source: Wikipedia Commons

St. Benedict (480-543) or more correctly St. Benedict of Nursia (or Norcia) founded the Benedictine Order. He laid down the Benedictine Rule, set of rules for living and participating in monastic life.

Benedict rules mandated the monks the task of taking care of the sick and the frail; established hospitals (first ever in Europe) in Subiaco and made provisions to grow medicinal plants at the monastery. The monastery at Monte Cassino became the template for future establishments and educational institutions. He also established what was the most important medical library with extensive references from European and Arab medicine at Monte Cassino.

Pope Paul IV (1964) proclaimed St. Benedict to be the patron saint of all Europe.

His sister(twin) Scolastica joined St. Benedict at Monte Cassino’s nunnery. St. Benedict died soon after the death of his sister. Their relics are buried in the crypt at Monte Cassino.

Here are some pictures of our visit to the Abbey of Monte Cassino.

Getting ready to leave.

Fig 5

Arrivederci Maiori.

Fig 8

Visting the abbey and the crypt

Fig.13

Fig 16

Fig 17

Fig 18

Fig 28

Fig.30

The mosaics are not probably by Byzantine craftsmen but the technique, motifs and layout for the floors, walls, and such are typically Byzantine but crafted locally by italian craftsmen.