Swap’s Blog

My last night in the United States with a wonderful (could have been better) trip coming to the end. I haven’t had much spare time for blogging and other activities as I was busy with work and family. Photos and description of places I visited on previous weekends:

NASA Space Center

Visit of a lifetime! I’ve always been fascinated with Space and Rocket Science. What better a place can be than NASA for a space enthusiast? I had great fun on the tram, landing a space shuttle perfectly on the strip. The best part was the session at the control room. I am disappointed to have not noted the speaker’s name but it was one of the most inspiring speeches I’ve heard in quite sometime.

Kemah Boardwalk

Although not as grand as Moody Gardens, I had much more fun. I wish I had more time to go on all the rides and attractions.

I’ve be boarding my flight to London tomorrow where awaits my actual vacation, can’t wait! Then again, there’s always the nostalgia when saying good bye to home.

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Swap

After 3 days of stay in Houston, I am back in Baytown. I was attending the cPanel Conference ‘08 in the heart of Houston city, Westin Oaks Galleria.

Westin Oaks Galleria is one the best locations in Houston. It comprises of the Galleria (the best mall I’ve ever been to) and two grand hotels. I was staying in Westin Oaks, and the heavenly trademark they use for every part of their decor is worth it’s tag. Albeit, it did burn a rather large hole in my wallet

The cPanel conference took place in the same hotel mainly on the 3rd floor; with some sessions on the roof (21st floor). I was covering it live on twitter and will hence cover only some key points here.
cPSS (cPanel Server Suite) for Windows would be available later which is mostly a clone of the Linux version. The only noticeable new feature is the reseller center which allows nested resellers. The training sessions were of intermediate level. I did attend exhibitor sessions and liked Aplicure’s the best out of them. Their sessions lacked a technical details but their product is promising.

The food (thanks to SohoLaunch, Microsoft & cPanel) was great. I was not too comfortable with the American food but it was delicious; desserts were mouth watering! The only let down I experience during the 3 days of the conference was the interaction. Most of the cPanel staff and attendees kept to themselves and were not hospitable and friendly to first timers. I had traveled almost half way across the globe but didn’t expect that to happen. However, my stay and the conference was a great experience. I have uploaded an album on flickr comprising of both the conference and the Galleria snaps.

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Swap

After 22 hours of tiring (on air) journey, I am here in Baytown, Texas. So my experience in the first week.

1. I will not recommend Lufthansa to anyone, at least not on the route (Bangalore-Frankfurt-Houston) I came.

2. It’s a whole new world outside your country and it’s fun.

3. Driving in India is really hard!

4. Broadband means 8mbps

5. It’s much safer back home and I miss it

During the weekend, I visited the Moody Gardens in Galveston Island with my family and other relatives. I must say the aquarium (albeit small) is wonderful. We didn’t have much time but we managed to see the aquarium and get on the Colonel Paddle Boat cruise; you need at least a whole day or two. I’ve uploaded some pictures to my photo album on flickr.

Alright, I am off to Houston for the cPanel conference which starts in 8 hours from now. I’ll be covering it on my blog and twitter (provided it’s up).

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Swap

I almost broke my new year resolution. A long gap since my last blog post. Although I did have a draft pending since a week, this one’s written from scratch So, my vacation has begun. Although I have not taken any work leave at RH or phpFoX, I will still be taking time off other things, especially college! It’s a much needed break, something I haven’t taken in years. My first destination is Bangalore, not that it’s a vacation spot but I’m warming up before the actual tour begins.

It’s hard to remember everything that has happened since a month, best I can say is getting the copy of GTA4 for my Xbox. I only wish I had time to play it over summer but it’ll have to wait. I got my UK visa as well but it took way more time than expected.

Over the summer, I will be visiting my parents in Houston (flight leaves in less than 2 days). The most prominent part of the US trip is the cPanel conference 08. Although we did have a plan of setting up a booth for RH, we had to drop the idea after Christian foud out he has urgent business to attend to during those 3 days. However, I will still have fun attending conference, finding about the next cPanel version and the much talked about, cPanel for Windows. It’ll also give me a great opportunity to meet fellow hosting company owners and administrators. I will be covering each day’s events on my blog.

Although I will be living in Baytown, it seem more convenient to stay in Westin Oaks for the conference. Thanks to cPanel, it’s going to cost only $204/night. I will be visiting our Datacenter as much as possible during the 3 weeks of stay there. It’s just 40 miles from home.

My next destination is the United Kingdom which is purely a vacation (no business there yet!). Thanks to my wonderful brother who stays in London, I’m going to have one hell of a time there.

It’s very sad that Sony still hasn’t fixed my camera and my Samsung G600 is broken as well. It’s impossible to imagine a vacation without it. My Macbook has been syncronized and I am carrying an extrernal drive as a backup. The Mighty Mouse (forgot to review it) is neat and works out of box on both Windows and Mac. The reliance wireless is decent and fairly better than Airtel GPRS.

My next post will be from USA, so long then!

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Swap

I got my US Visa; I’ll be probably leaving to the States within a month.

The 2 day trip to Chennai (via Bengaluru) was really hectic. Chennai is extremely hot and the wait in the VFS office was a nightmare. I couldn’t even use my MacBook let alone a cellphone. All I could do is stare at the two plasma TVs showing disgusting stuff on Animal Planet. On the brighter side, I was hardly asked for any additional documentation during my interview and it went quite smoothly in contrary to all the horrific stories I had heard prior to the interview. All I now need is the UK visa so that I can finalize my itinerary.

And like Borat would say, US ‘n’ A, here I come!

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Swap