11 February 2024

Puzzle: Numismatism – of a slightly different ilk

After putting all those currency notes under the table glass top, I had thought of sitting down and trying to learn all the modern currencies of the world. This has turned out to be much easier than remembering capital names and much much easier than flags (which I am still working on at a slow pace).

See how many of these you can answer. Since the definition of “country” can be a bit subjective, the scope of these questions are the 195 countries in the UN (193 members, 2 observers).

1. What is the currency used by the most number of countries? (US and Canada both use dollars – but they are different currencies with different paper bills – US Dollars and Canadian dollars)

2. If you found the above easy – try this: which is the second one?

3. A surprising number of countries have “dollars” in their currency names (e.g. Canadian dollars). Can you take a rough guess how many of them have it?

4. What would be your guess as the next common word in currency name? How many countries would you guess? I am talking of same currency name but differentiated by its region or country name. e.g. “rupee” is used by both Pakistan (Pakistani rupee) and India (Indian rupee)

5. Speaking of the rupee, and this surprised me – how many countries have the word “rupee” (or its close derivative) in its name?

6. There are many countries which have its own currency – but also use US Dollars (e.g. the Bahamas). But there are other countries than the US that use US Dollars as the only currency. Take a guess how many and who are they?

7. What would be your guess as the shortest currency name (without attaching the country name in it)? How many letters? How many of them would you guess are there?

8. This might be a hint to the previous question. How many countries have currencies that are only 4 letters?

You can find the answers here.

30 July 2023

Did something new today!!

After hearing Prabasaj-da talk about canoeing, I had developed a more than passing curiosity about it. Never got around to taking the plunge. Today, woke up very early and went to Stone Mountain Lake to get the first taste of canoeing in Prabasaj-da’s canoe. In the process, learnt the difference between a canoe and a kayak!

It was very serene at 7 in the morning with near still water! Loved the experience. Might be yet another thing I will get into!!

By the way, I wore my brightest orange shirt and bright colored life vest to leave nothing to chances in terms of others spotting me if I fell in the water 🙂

11 March 2023

“Murder, he wrote”

Went for a typewriter show and tried a few. I think I am zeroing in on what I want. In all likelihood, a portable Royal (e.g Royal Arrow). Last time I had typed on a real typewriter was in 1983. After my tenth class exams, I had started going to a typewriting class in Benachity.

That old feeling of tactile feedback came back all over again. (Very different than computer keyboards). Also got to know Tom – who is an absolute authority on typewriters. He has a collection of over 100 typewriters. That matches my fountain pen count.

But unlike my fountain pens, he makes some serious money by simply renting out his typewriters to movie sets!!

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29 April 2022

Learning one more skillset

Thanks to Gagan and Bharti’s push when they were visiting Atlanta a few weeks back, Sharmila and I finally took the plunge and started learning how to drive a boat (safely). And consequently, enjoy some more time in the water. One day of lessons and hands on training later today was the first time the two of us took a boat out in the water for a few hours!

I have a feeling I will like this hobby and I have to give a lot of thanks to Gagan and Bharti for getting us here.

In terms of picking up skills in the last fifteen or so years, for me, the scorecard looks like this: (you will notice that most people learn these skills much earlier than me)

1. Long distance running (moderate success)
2. Mixology (moderate success)
3. Motorbiking (moderate success)
4. Unicycling (complete disaster; gave up)
5. Flyfishing (did not keep up; need to get back to this)
6. Skateboarding (still a beginner, need to put in more hours)
7. Driving motorboats (too new)

9 December 2020

Now up to 6 language alphabets

Acquired a passing acquaintance with Farsi letters. To be sure, I still cannot get the right pronunciation for “ghein” or “qaf” (identical pronunciations, I am told). And I know only isolated letters. But it was good enough to read a signboard inside the local Bezoria restaurant yesterday. (Needless to say, normally I would have no idea what the word meant but the context was helpful in understanding the word “shawarma”).

So, here are the six language alphabets that I have learnt arranged reverse chronologically of when I learnt them.

Thinking of learning Thai letters next. They almost look like notes on a music sheet (another thing I cannot read, of course).

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6 December 2020

The isolated Farsi alphabets

Have now learnt all the Farsi alphabets and how to write them. To be sure, when I say “writing”, I mean as the letters would be written by themselves. When actually written in cursive handwriting, the shapes can differ depending on whether they are the first letter, somewhere in the middle or the last letter in a word. I have not learnt those. I need more practice still. (If I can rattle off and write backwards – meaning last letter to first letter, I feel I have memorized well enough).

The two letters in red have the same pronunciation but I cannot pronounce them. See a funny suggestion from Anand here.

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