The world has changed

I am just thinking how much the world has changed during the past decade or so.

Who would have expected to bump into more Chinese than Westerners at famous tourist destinations and air ports.

Who would ever thought that the 'Super' power could face a debt crisis.

Who would have thought protests which were earlier considered as a disruptive tool be converted into a revolutionary tool and educated youth will be running them to topple leaders who had conquered for decades.

Who would have thought that there would be riots in London.

Who would have expected the English Cricket team of being capable of winning series' and winning the world cup or being number one in any form of cricket.

Who would have thought that an Australian Cricket team could actually loose matches.

Ah the list is too long. I quit, but the world has changed!

Pigeon pics

Taking pictures of birds is not an easy task, but pigeons are usually an exception. They allow human's to get close to them and also are relatively slow moving. I took these two pigeon pics at Treetops.

Sighting the leopard at Aberdare

In Kenya leopard sightings are very rare. From what I have heard out of the big five, leopard sightings are the rarest. Our guide for the game drive told us that this was the closest sighting he has had in his almost 25 year old career. He quipped that usually we say that we sighted the leopard even when we get a glimpse of its tail. As usual even the leopard didn't want to miss the date with us. So it turned up and did all the posing for us!

As usual I had a field day taking pictures till the others said, dude its time for us to leave.

Last Home of Lord Baden Powell

Lord BP lived his last 3 years of his life at Nyeri, Kenya. His humble one room home has now been converted into a museum and the adjoining part converted into Hotel Outspan.

As I mentioned in one of my earlier blogs I did get a chance to visit the place and these are the pictures I managed to capture there.

[picture on left]The plaque at the outer side of the house	[picture on right]The house as it stands today

The scout and the Girl Guide badges engraved on the walls

Lord BP's office room

From two angles

Collection of his sketches

The Royal story

We came to treetops and I was told that my room number was SB and Harsha's one was SA. His was on the 2nd floor and I was told that I need to go one floor above. I walked around the floor and couldn't find a door marked as SB. I was more interested about picture taking hence forgot about the room and went to the roof top.

After some time when Harsha inquired something about the room I remembered that I have not sorted it out. So I went and told the staff I cannot find SB. They replied, so you are the King, I replied no I am Sayanthan. All of them laughed and said you are going to stay at the queens suite so you are the King. I was still clue less, then they took me to the room marked as queen Elizabeth suite and explained to me the history of the place. Apparently its at the old tree top which is about 100 meters away from here where then princess was on Holiday when she descended to the thorn. The room I had been given, I was told is the one in which she had stayed during her visit in 1982 and hence named as her suite.

I am not a fan of Royals and monarchy, but one thing that still fascinates me and fascination increases the more I travel is on how they managed to rule the half the planet with such a small number of people from a relatively small country. Its something which I had not been able to understand or interpret. Right now I am not worried about the nostalgia about the room I am typing this from but happy for the splendid views I am having right in front of my eyes.

Plus I have just returned from a game drive at which too we were lucky. I would write and post pictures of what happened there during the next few days. Keep reading!

Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Nyeri->pedro->scouting->Lord BP->Nyeri

I am seated at a balcony on an elevation facing the rows of pine trees on chilly Nyeri night. Behind me is a fire place, for which I am planning to make a request to have it lit for me later in the night. For now its very relaxing and I cannot stop making comparisons to the Pedro camp site in Sri Lanka, which was the place to which I went on my first camping as a 11 year old. There is something similar, perhaps the coldness, perhaps the wooden furniture, perhaps pine trees, perhaps the ceiling and the wood work reminds me of Mr. Gnanaprakasam, who was our legendary scout master.

As a kid one of the best things I choose to do, is scouting. I choose to do scouting not because I understood anything about it, but it was because my siblings were scouts and I have heard too many tales from scout camps, hence I wanted go and experience the same.

As soon as I joined, I realized that I was a junior and I am not really a scout till I passed tender foot. Initially I was told that I will be given four weeks and if I don't pass the exams; I cannot make it to the camp. I tried hard but still I couldn't pass all the exams on time. I struggled to pass the history of scouting exam. It was not easy to pass for two reasons, one because my hard disk has always been bad secondly, when Mr. Gnanaprakasam asks those questions its impossible to recall what you memorized.

By being a scout I learned a lot of things which are helping me in each day of my life. Starting from travelling, cooking, getting along with people and above all it has contributed in crafting my value system. As a child I was thankful to scouting for giving all the fun. Today as an adult I admire the contribution that it has made to make what I am. At that time Lord Baden Powell was just the founder of the movement, but today I realize what an admirable man he is, to have started such a movement and enriched the life of millions ( or is it billions).

Although I was weak in the history of scouting, right at this moment here I am seated at Nyeri in Kenya, right at the scenic place at which lord BP picked to spend his last three years of his life and doing the best I can do by writing a blog to pay tribute to the great man!

Tomorrow I plan to make a visit to the lord BP museum and then a game drive in to the adjoining nature park and spend the night there. Be prepared to read my post tomorrow.

Note: Nuwan has been chasing me to write about our days of scouting for many months, I guess it was fittingly postponed and probably meant to be written from this historical place!

Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

How a mother's treatment differs

After a lot of research I had concluded the following as the biggest difference between Sri Lankan monkeys and African Monkeys (or is it Baboon?). Interestingly local ones (as long as I had seen) carry their little ones below the belly, where as the African ones seems to carry them on their backs!

African ones - I called this picture the "parents meeting"

Our ones - This one is called as "lil one"

But irrespective of the continent or species the mothers love doesn't change!

A Liking for lakes

Seems as if I have a liking to take pictures of lakes. See the collection I have from different places,


Pokhara Lake - Nepal


Kandy lake - Sri Lanka



Lake Nakuru- Kenya


Lake Naivasha - Kenya

The Hell's Gate

The place, currently is a pleasant environment, although its still called as the Hell's gate. Some say that it has been named as hell's gate since it had some connection with slavery. It is one of the rare national parks where you are allowed to take a bike ride or even a walk. After reading a few reviews which said it has predators I was wondering when walking around what would happen if a lions or cheetah jumps in for a surprise, but after getting their and seeing so many people being on foot made me realize that sightings of predators in this park is very rare.



The Caves

The caves at the Hell's gate national park, Naivasha, Kenya as I mentioned on another blog kept on reminding me the film 127. The landscapes and the formation was something similar to the Grand Canyon pictures I have seen, I might be completely wrong since I have never been to the Grand Canyon.


The landscapes

It has a beautiful variation of landscapes and taking a drive along the Savannah and taking a walk among the antelopes and zebra's is fun.



Volcanoes

The place is also home to extinct volcanoes but still the products of it our largely visible, including hot springs, lava rocks and of course the extinct volcanoes.

The revolution fever

The fever of revolution has been spreading from one country to the other for the last few months. First it was called as the Arab unrest since the issue was in the Arabian countries and Western Africa. I guess now it has spread much wider and the latest revolution is in India with a 74 year old Gandhian by the name of Anna Hazarae leading the charge.

I was trying to find whats common in all these revolution using my little knowledge of politics. First what I see is that in all cases a youth segment has rallied around these revolutions. Few years back youths and politics didn't have any connection, they were a segment which disconnected themselves from the decision making process. Although they were disconnected they did have a frustration about politics and politicians at large. This particular generation of youth were the people who were not from affluent backgrounds but mainly from middle income and low income families. But in most cases they were full of accumulated frustration about how their country was being ransacked by the elected (in some cases self elected) representatives. This generation had a majority that was dependent on private sector hence automatically they start thinking on the lines of transparency, good governance and professionalism. So this youth segment just needed a rallying point and in most cases the governments out of sheer arrogance and without knowing the gravity of actions tried to curb a protest in an unethical way and ended up in converting them into revolutions.

Crucially at the same point of time this generation of youth got tools which helped to fuel the fire within them, one the social networks, through which news could spread like wild fire and secondly the news hungry 24X7 news channels which easily sensationalize a protest and project it as a revolution.

What worries me is the end result of such unsustainable revolutions, in most cases they do the revolution and then they do not have an alternative. Take the case of Egypt, its probably the only instance in the history of the planet where people did a revolution over threw a dictator and handed the governance to military! Military else where try hard on coup to capture the chair, but in this case people did everything and presented the crown in a plate! I hope revolutions also give better alternatives and do not become a fad which replaces one devil with another.

Hippo

Last week it was the my turn to meet the Lions, this week it was the Hippo's turn. Both these creatures are known to be brave, as per the Zulu's Hippos are even braver than the lions. Probably because of the better looks, the lions are more popular in folk lore than the hippos.

Seeing these man eaters in wild gives me a childish  excitement (but then I am a child so I should be getting that excitement). Yesterday we took a boat ride along the Naivasha Lake in Kenya, it took us to the close proximity of the herds of hippos. They put up quite a good exhibition, some carrying the young ones on the back while swimming,  some doing summersaults in the water but ending up with a huge thud and others were making a noise which was very similar to a babies cry.


The seated on a tree and watching the exhibition is a fishing eagle.


A herd at work


get off my back

We were devils even before going to Hell's gate

Yesterday we got a mail saying have a nice time at Hell's gate but don't come back as devil, but then weren't we devils even before it!

Anyway I was actually supposed to fly back home today but was forced to stay another week in Kenya. People were laughing that we were 'forced' to do this, but what they forget was that we are people who make sure we pick up something and get up even when we fall down. So we vowed to allocate all the saturdays for safari's and we had been having a ball since then. First was a trip to Nakuru, of which I had bored the readers of this blog with a week full of pictures from there.

So today we set off in the morning to Hells gate national park, which is about an hours drive from nairobi. We enjoyed some breath taking landscapes and the caves which kept on reminding me the Danny Boyles film ,127, which I guess was filmed at the grand canyon.

After about 5 hours of walking, driving and rock climbing within the park we went to the Naivasha lake to take a boat ride at sunset. The finale of the day was the date with the hippo's! Check the blog next week for the pictures.

Heartfelt thanks to the nice people who helped us to go to both Nakuru and Naivasha.

Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Anthems from my generation

I had never been into English songs for obvious reasons, like not being able to understand the meaning of that is being sung. But while we were schooling there were a few songs which had cult like following among our generation. The popularity of certain songs made it reach even a non-English song listener like me. Today for some reason I remembered a few of them and thought of posting them here.

Colonian Cousins - Krishna
A gem of a song with superb lyrics, which always be applicable until the human race is around.

Other two songs are more to do with the catchy tunes,  one is from backstreet boys, i guess that's the only male singing group I know of!

The liking for the song "Mysterious girl" was more an acquired taste from a friend who was addicted to it and kept on re-playing it.

The touched bird

When it comes to picture editing what I am capable of doing are only changing the contrast of the picture and cropping it. An expert can do a lot more to the picture to make it nicer.

I had this picture which I took at Nakuru National park of a nice little bird. I was showing it to Lewis who is a graphics Guru and this is what he did in 5 minutes! btw He nick named it the Angry Bird ( nothing to do with the application )

Before editing


After editing

Never ever believe technology

Technology has this peculiar ability to fail you at crucial times. Today I came back to the apartment with 1001 plans. I wanted to make a few calls, write a blog comparing two pictures and most importantly was planning to prepare for two important meetings.

I happily came back switched on the computer connected to internet and was about to make my call. There was an electricity outage. I was a bit worried that I might get late a bit, but I expected it to be a small hic up.

After two flashes the electricty "arrived" and I was delighted. But the delight was short lived. The wifi was not working :( the power with it had taken the wifi network. Still I had hope, I have a dongle. I connect and check the balance to see that it has touched zero :( worst part is that, I was actually reminded by the lady who sells top up in the morning, that I might be running out of credit, I told her "not really I have 200 bucks and will come after I use that up". Now the fail over plan is also screwed. Now I have only one option that is to ride my luck tommorow!
Hope that lady luck is with me.

Lesson learnt - never depend on technology and don't leave things for the last moment depending on it.
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Rhinos - Their misunderstanding is as big as them

Its a large fat animal with a small brain (now if you are comparing to someone known its not my fault :P ) which feeds largely on leaves (its a vege I guess). Unfortunately traditional asian medicine's misconception that its horn is a "life saver", has led to poaching and smuggling. Unfortunately this foolish belief had led to a situation where the species is under the threat of extinction. I met a conservationist in Africa and he half jokingly told me "You Asian's are largely responsible for them to be endangered". This actually reminded me the amount of myths we Asians live with, starting from cat to crow we had made all of them mythical figures. In some cases it has helped the species existence and in other cases made them extinct.



Another misconception that people have about Rhinos are that since there are two species of Rhino's named as white rhino and the black rhino, hence they expect them to be differentiated on color. Unfortunately someone probably had made a mistake when naming them, both are similar in color but the difference is in their lips. So next time you go to a game park stop looking for a white color rhinos, since both species are actually gray :D

Flamingos

One of the main attractions of the Nakuru National Park are the flamingos.



Apparently now the numbers had decreased when compared over a decades time but for us foreigners its still a delightful scenery to see them.

step by step guide to flying

On your mark get set ready go







PS: They are three different birds in the pictures. All pictures taken at the Nakuru National Park Kenya

Meeting the Lions

Four months ago on a Saturday morning we scanned the Nairobi National park and couldn't get a sighting of a Lion, at a distance we saw a a lion like walk but in an effort to get nearer, we lost track of it. We returned disappointed without being able to see it.

Today I got a a second chance, this time it was a trip to Nakuru National Park. The objective was again to see the Zimba in wild! I vowed that if I do not see it today I will declare that Kenya doesn't have Lions. Kenya didn't obviously want its reputation dented ;) But for the first 3 hours of the journey the writing seemed to be on the wall. No lions and other visitors also hasn't seen the lions on the day.

We lost hope and were returning to have a peak from the cliff. All of a sudden we notice a car signaling to us, we approached it and they indicate to us that the Zimba is here! Rest is history we were at close proximity intruding the privacy of a Lion and Lioness while they made love!

See the pictures which would tell the story!

Mind Maps

When I was studying for the CIMA "case study" paper one of the tools which was recommended by the study guide was to prepare a mind map. It was recommended to have the case name written in the middle of a page and then to start jotting down all the points that come to the mind in circles around it while connecting to the relevant points. It was my first experience in using mind maps.

TT's TODO list for a day

After joining hSenid it became a daily activity to use mind maps. Instead of doing it on paper I moved into software tools to do the same which gave me more flexibility and clarity. The mind map plugin was the major reason I liked google wave. It allowed to create mind maps in collaboration. Making life easier for teams to work on a single file.

What I had realized over time is that mind maps are useful to plan out daily activities, requirements gathering and planning, strategic analysis, product design, report planning, solution analysis, etc. The biggest advantage that I have seen from a mind map is the ability to capture the "eureka moments" that come up in a spur of a moment while we are analyzing something, which if we had been thinking in a traditional sequential way of analysing, we would have ended up ignoring or delaying to put down on paper and eventually forgetting it altogether. Hence mind maps have the ability to capture a good brain dump and then allow to organize them into associated groups making it easier for analysis and execution. Give it a try its worth it!

Design Patterns - More than a Software concept

Out of my four years of learning computer science the most important concept I had learnt revolves around design patterns and re-usability. Design patterns in software engineering implies a re-usable solution to a commonly occurring problem within a given context. The concept originated from Architecture and embraced by computer science.

I see this concept even in a more general form than in software or architecture. I see its application in life, business, philosophy, etc. What I had realized is that I am a person with limited capacity and I am no Einstein, this is a fact. But crucially the problems that I face and want to solve are problems, which others had already faced and either solved or narrowed it down. So instead of trying to re-invent the wheel from scratch its much more easier to go look for 'borrowed knowledge" from the people who had documented the derived pieces of wisdom in the form of books, articles, blogs or  pick their brains.

The point of  "nirvana" I got with regard to this is from the day I realized that the problems that I am facing are things someone has already faced and found a solution to and stop imagining that "This problem is unique to me". This belief has made me read more books and also helped me to use other peoples experiences when coming up with the solution for the problem at hand.

my weeks anthem

During the last few days I had been listening to this song over and over again.

I do not have a clue why I got addicted to this. I had not been a fan of this song and it was a song which I accidentally bounced onto when I was engaged in pointless "follow the click browsing".

Out of all that I have a special  liking for the following three stanzas,

ஏழையின் நீதிக்கு கண் உண்டு பார்வை இல்லை 

பசுவினை பாம்பு என்று சாட்சி சொல்ல முடியும் 

காம்பினில் விஷம் என்ன கறக்கவா முடியும் 

காவியங்கள் உன்னை பாட காத்திருக்கும் பொழுது 

காவி உடை நீ கொண்டால் என்னவாகும் மனது 

Riots - Coming Colours not good

Today I went in for breakfast and sat in a seat facing the TV screen, the news was about England, it was showing images of hooded youngsters rioting and vandalizing property. Without me realizing I was getting goose bumps. Many thoughts were crossing my mind. Including the jokes my relatives tells me about 83 and that I would have been nipped in the bud if they had missed the 'catch' when thrown from the retaining walls to the ground! Then I imagined myself as a visitor who is at the wrong city at the wrong time. I was seated at a foreign land and was concerned about a possible viral effect and what a a possible scenario a visitor would face. Worst was the next thought I got, what a precedence is this setting to the rest of the world? Every other Tom, Dick and Harry would find this as an excuse and say if this can happen in England why not in some other banana republic.

What I remembered at this point is a colloquial idiom when directly translated says "coming Colors not good" Good Bless this world!

Compact Rooms

Once upon a time I went to an Asian country which had the most compact hotel room I had ever scene. At that time it was the most expensive price I had paid for the room. But I was told that that this was a tightly packed country and with very high real estate prices hence the prices were high. This was an explanation I had to accept. I was wondering how good an interior designer you should be to pack all that into such small space and then place the mirrors strategically so that it gives an illusion of space.

Once I was talking to an Architect he explained to me how creating spaces in architecture can make a huge difference in the environment it creates. It was something that I saw being practiced here.

Who has put us on the Map

We were waiting to board the air craft to be told that our seats had been upgraded to business class. Who wouldn't take a bit more luxury. Last time I got an upgrade I got to meet the Pakistan cricket team, but this time it was just normal. Nothing eventful than a better place to sleep and a larger screen in front.

Then I arrived at Dubai for the transit, as usual picked the sport360 paper to read and what I saw on cover was a full page picture of Dilshan leaping for joy after scoring a century. I was suprised to see a Sri Lankan thing to be making such headline news in a non test nations sports paper. It was indeed nice to see this.

When reflecting I remembered that last time I was in transit the same paper had a huge middle page potrait of Shahid Afridi after he has master minded the win against Sri Lanka at the world cup. The news of Pakistan beating Sri Lanka took up one third of the paper with even a timeline showing how it happened with pictures. I could understand Pakistan making such news in Dubai, but then how come a Sri Lankan match is in limelight. Only pointer that I could pick was it was to more do with being anti australian in cricket than to do with supporting Sri Lanka.

Anyway one thing that cannot be denied is that two things that has put Sri Lanka on the map is Cricket and Tea. There is a third one on the way you, would know it soon ;) air hostess is worried that I am using an electronic device when its about to take off so, that's it for today. I will tell about the third thing later :P
Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device

Monk's and Politics

When someone becomes a monk, he is supposed to disconnect himself from worldly things. He wouldn't have social bonds, he is beyond usual social categorizations, wealth is not a priority, no desires, no temptation and no ambitions. Further to this I do understand the path to self liberation is a hard continuous process and like any other human being a sanyasi should also work and develop the mind to come to a state in which all those conditions can be satisfied. I can accept the fact that they can also make mistakes in the process, just like all of us do.

Given all this one thing which is hard for me to digest is seeing Monks doing politics. It becomes even more annoying to see parties formed by them and perverting the name of the religion for their own gain. For me politics is one of the worst form of worldly pursuits, seeing a sanyasi in it I cannot stop thinking of the epitome of the irony. If your cause is liberation of mind, dude what are you doing politics?

Recently I was following the news about the fasting Sanyasi, who through his trust owns a island in Scotland and flies in private jets, fasting with a demand to eliminate corruption. The demand was good I agree that corruption should be killed but then I would have loved if he hadn't been wearing the saffron robe and wasn't planning to start a political party. What they should realize is that "when you fight with a pig, both get dirty - but the pig likes it!"

Light house story - where I stole from

I am currently reading the book called as "who will cry when I die" by Robin Sharma. I started to read it last Sunday while returning to Colombo. I haven't finished reading it but I can see it has given some new energy and impacted on my life! I read this book at 5.30 on Sunday evening and the effects starts by 5.45 AM the next day. I woke up in the morning like never before and all of a sudden was on the road taking a morning walk.

Now it has become a routine, for me to set off in the morning and sit by the beach all alone and admire the beauty of the sea, while recounting and reflecting! All of a sudden I have more time to my life and more energy each day! Anyway I am a bit worried how this habit will be kept when I start travelling next week :(

Second benefit that got out of this book is at today's strategy meeting, we wanted to tell a story as an ice breaker and set the tone for a pitch. Then I remembered the lighthouse story from the book which emphasized the need to be focus on the priorities. So as usual I banked on borrowed knowledge and used it and really enjoyed using it!

Animals and Mountains

In the Annapoorna range there are two mountains which have resemblance to animal or it part and hence frequently referred by those names.

Fish Tail


This resembles the shape of a Tail of a fish and is also referred as Holy Mountain or Macchapucchre . Easily the most exotic of the annapoorna range, but supposedly is not high as it looks when compared with the others in the range.

Annapoorna III- the elephants back


Look a bit closely you could visualize an elephants back in there. If you really concentrate and see you would see the ears and if you are intelligent you would see the elephants trunk too! Those who can see it please do let me know.

Why we have a scarcity for IT sales and marketing personnel

In Sri Lanka almost all the IT companies, which have their Sales and Marketing arms locally, face a huge challenge to find competent and experienced personnel to do the job. Almost everyone in business agrees about this scarcity but they disagree on the reason for it. 

Some tell me that its because there isn't the right type of education for this, others tell me that although IT industry has grown most of them are foreign based companies thus having those activities abroad hence not churning out resources with these competencies at the rate they churn technical people. I am not sure whether they are the main factors. I think I see a larger problem. Let me try to put this issue into perspective here.

I was just trying to reflect and think what are the factors which had made me less willing to get into marketing or Sales. In the mother language class I cannot still remember a day in which I was asked to speak about myself, where as the English class was the only exception where we had "myself" as a topic. As children we were taught at the religion class that "ஆணவம்" ,I guess its pride in English, was an evil thing. We were told by everyone around that trumpeting about ones own self or something that you own is bad. At least I as a kid or even while being at the university was under the impression when thing is of good quality that there is no need of Sales or marketing, so always expected the marketing to happen by itself. It was only after a certain amount of education that I got to know even viral marketing should be triggered. Further to this, I had also observed that kids who had been abroad are more confident when it comes to speaking about them self or something they own. 

So looking at the above facts it makes me feel that the natural instinct of a good Sales or Marketeer are killed off at the bud and no longer part of our DNA. 

PS: I wish I am proven wrong by a new crop of youngsters who get into this and prove themselves. 

Naming the two things that had got cheaper over time

Usually businesses face the dilemma where quality and cost move in the same direction. So when something is cheap usually its considered as a thing of inferior quality. Secondly in our economy you find prices of every commodity increasing with time. Take gas, clothing, food etc everything has one way traffic and it never looks back but keeps on ascending.

In Sri Lanka there are only two things that I had observed to get cheaper and also at the same time get better in quality. The first commodity is of course the mobile tariffs, over the years they had been decreasing in price while increasing their quality of service. This is a world wide phenomenon in which the margins had got thinner and the competition has increased.

The second one is surprise factor the popular veg restaurant in Colombo has slashed the price of a packet of lunch from Rs 120 to Rs 100 at the same time making the quality of food better and had started serving luxury items like Cadju and cauliflower as curries. If you are in Colombo you need to pay a visit to it and have a serving. There are few bloggers who are carrying out mud campaign against this place, but do not take their word on this :P  click here to read vimal's side of the story

You know I cannot write bad things about the place because I learnt at school,
"உப்பிட்டவரை உள்ளளவும் நினை "
which when directly translated says "remember the person who gave you salt"
Find A1 on the map marked in blue marker.


View 6.923756, 79.850006 in a larger map

Modes of Transport in Dhaka

South Asia offers a fascinating array of modes of transports. Our own Trains and Buses are usually a treat to a foreigner. In the same way for a first time visitor to Dhaka the Tricycle and the improvised tuk tuk's are attention grabbing stuff.


Tricycles is a primary mode of transport and the humbleness with which they cycle and take people around is really touching. I found almost all the tricycle drivers very humble and honest.

On the other hand they have the three wheeler, but its a bit upgraded version with extra security features and special drivers suite ;)