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The Journey - A Score to Settle - Part I

Posted by Vikramsinh at Friday, October 7, 2011

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What makes a great endurance athlete is the ability to absorb potential embarrassment, and to suffer without complaint. I was discovering that if it was a matter of gritting my teeth, not caring how it looked, and outlasting everybody else, I won. It didn't seem to matter what sport it was--in a straight-ahead, long-distant race, I could beat anybody. If it was a suffer-fest, I was good at it.
-Lance Armstrong (My Journey back to Life)

It’s a story about long journey, the quest for passion. My experience to participate in one of the oldest and most famous cycling events, Paris- Brest-Paris (PBP). Where the challenge is to ride 1230 kms in maximum of 90 hours. Total 10800 m of height gain which is equivalent to the height more than the height of Mount Everest. Burning approximately 35000 Kcal, spending sleepless nights. Though I could not complete it, the whole journey was amazing, full of ups and downs, extremely wonderful and rich experience. Kids, coffee, and cookies. What's really heart warming about PBP is the support the locals give the riders, whether it be coffee and cookies at 2 AM or an "allez! allez! allez! bonne route! bonne courage!" for all the time, we riders feel like sport stars.


And how it all started...


Around the mid of May 2011.
I was in serious confusion, the question that was giving me sleepless nights was go or not to go (to Paris for PBP 2011). I had already completed 200,300,400,600 kms brevets series within last 5 months, which was the qualifying criteria to participate in PBP, and now opportunity was knocking on the door, Mind full of thoughts - whether I should go to France for participating in Paris-Brest-Paris 2011 ..the prestigious and very famous long distance cycling endurance event which comes after every 4 years and has history of 120 years. The ride starts from suburban Paris, though Normandy and Brittany, out to the coast of Brest and back to Paris.

Few cyclist friends who were planning to go, contacted and asked me about my plans. The decision was not tough if I want to go by my heart but the expenses were also weighing too high. Calculations were showing the figure which was crossing 1 followed by five big zeros, that was lots of money. After few days of restless thinking, I decided to go by my heart. Booked my flight tickets on 17th May with other friends. Countdown began, this was the first time in the history that Indian riders were participating in the event. My plan was 3 weeks tour, 16 Aug- 4 Sep.Mind was clear now, no more confusions, I thought and started to work out on immediate next plan that was another adventure, trekking in Himalayas for 11 days in summer 19th to 30th May.


Horror of “B cubed”…

Coming back from the Himalaya trekking, fully refreshed, I started my preparations. I had two and half months for preparations. Next 2 weeks vanished quickly with regular practice on weekends. But that was not sufficient; the longest distance I covered was 600 kms in 38 hours during my brevet ride. I wanted to do at least one brevet 1000+ kms as a preparation for PBP. As a preparation one should give 110 % while training to face unfamiliar conditions in actual race. It was difficult to get such a long holidays for planning more than 1200 kms, so I was settled for 1000, the opportunity knocked, "B cubed" a 1000kms brevet to be completed in 75 hours in Bangalore. Bangalor-Belgaum-Bangalor (B Cubed) the straight route following the NH4. The plan was to start on 23rd june (Thursday) 4 PM from banglore go to belgaum and come back to banglor by 26th June (Sunday) 7 PM.

I registered for the same and left Pune on Wednesday night. There was fuss to place my bike inside luggage space, as bus driver was not ready. Somehow I succeeded in convincing him. Rest of the journey was peaceful sleep. Next morning, landed in Banglore. Spent whole day at friend’s place. Left for the brevet at 2 PM, before starting I wanted to get spare tube and cyclo computer (speedometer), locating the shop was pain, wasted too much time. I reached the starting point with 15 minutes left for all formalities.

It was raining heavily when we started in the evening on that day. I didn’t have raingear as I was confident about my inner power to fight with rain or cold conditions (which was overly optimistic). At the beginning riding with few other cyclists was joyful, rain was not looking fearful. Moving ahead while chatting with them, discussing the weather for next 2 days. As we moved rain became worse, after covering 50 kms I was all alone, it was dark and visibility was quite low due to rain. Around 7 PM while I thought it was too difficult to ride due to heavy rain, I stopped for 20 minutes and ate some food from backpack. Then next stop was at 9 PM, I stopped at one hotel for getting new water bottle, then started again ....

…and next thing I remember is ....I was seated in the small shop on the roadside, traffic was moving along the highway as usual. Two people were sleeping inside the shop. I looked at my watch, It was 1 AM in the night. My bike (cycle) was leaned against wall. Speedometer was showing 95 kms and I was feeling pain. I saw bruises on left side on my knee, elbow and abdomen, which was clearly indicating that I had crash which I couldn’t understand. I fell down on the left side but no serious injuries except swelling in the abdomen. Gradually I started gaining my consciousness back and tried to correlate the things. Then my cell phone rang, I got calls from my friend in bangalor and organizers, and from my mother, everyone was telling the same thing, something weird, that I called them and asked for help. But I didn’t remember calling to anyone of them, I heard from them that I was asking same questions repeatedly, I was not in the state to get any sudden shock.. 
I slowly understood, it was short term memory loss ..as I was not able to recall any event after I bought water bottle from that hotel at 9 pm, how I crashed and landed in that shop which was on the opposite side of the road.

I was hungry so ate some food from my backpack. I was waiting for friends and organizers to come and it was 1 AM in the night. Bad news, My cell phone battery was dying, what to do now? If I lost the contact to friends then there was no other option but wait till morning also they were going to be worried much more about me. fortunately I remember about the spare battery in my backpack,thank god, I changed it immediately. It would have much difficult to locate me without my cell phone switched on. At last, after 3 hours, at 4 AM in the morning they succeeded in locating me. Car stopped, 3 people came out, to shop and 2 friends on motorbike. I was still not fully recovered and trying to figure out what was going on. They first inspected me for serious injuries , they found minor bruises and swelling, nothing major, they put my bike on the cycle stand attached to the backside of the car and started travelling towards banglore. Now I was feeling quite comfortable and tried to sleep. At 7 AM we were in banglore. It took 2 weeks for full recovery. 

...To Be Continued

 

The Man Who Declined Fields Medal and the Millennium Prize.

Posted by Vikramsinh at Monday, March 28, 2011

2 Comments


"We could use up two Eternities in learning all that is to be learned about our own world and the thousands of nations that have arisen and flourished and vanished from it. Mathematics alone would occupy me eight million years. " ~Mark Twain (1835- 1910).

Human beings are always intrigued with the idea of Mathematics. There is no such thing in this world which in untouched by mathematics. Sometimes we could fail to understand the nature, the laws of nature are specifically intertwined to balance the entire universe. Each and everything has rationale behind it, and understanding that logic always challenges us.

Here is the man who solved one of the most complex, difficult and intrigued problems in mathematics and also denied its recognition prizes. The man is none other than the Math genius Grigory Perelman, who has made landmark contributions to Riemannian geometry and geometric topology. A reclusive Russian topologist seemed to be playing eccentric mathematician as the saying goes "there is no genius without a touch of madness".

In 2006, He refused to accept the highest honor in mathematics, the Fields Medal, Which is also known as "Nobel Prize of Mathematics" for the prestige it carries, “For his contributions to geometry and his revolutionary insights into the analytical and geometric structure of the Ricci flow". In 2010, He also declined a $1 million prize from the Clay Mathematics Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts, for resolution of Poincaré’s conjecture, which remained unsolved for more than a 100 years. The hypothesis involving the deep structure of three-dimensional objects.

“I do not think anything that I say can be of the slightest public interest,” he told. “I know that self-promotion happens a lot and if people want to do that, good luck to them, but I do not regard it as a positive thing."
The man is very inaccessible, Why did Perelman turn his back on the world? This question haunted Masha Gessen and to unravel the mystery of Perelman she tried to put together all pieces from all dimensions, in her book “Perfect Rigor”. Without any help from Perelman himself, she charts the mathematician’s rise from quiet super-student to prickly genius, suggesting that the very perfectionism that fueled his work may have been the cause of his alienation. Book gives ample background on his coaches and classmates, who describe him mostly as “a sort of math angel” who never made mistakes. His triumph at the 1982 International Mathematical Olympiad, when he achieved a perfect score and earned a gold medal. She tried to portray the genius including the eccentricities and antisocial traits that would become so pronounced at the pinnacle of his career. In doing so she has written an accessible book about an unreachable man.

Fields Medal
Fields Medal is conceived as top honor a mathematician can receive. The prize is awarded to mathematicians not over 40 years of age at each International Congress of the International Mathematical Union (IMU), a meeting that takes place every four years. It comes with a monetary award, which in 2006 was $15,000. "Fields Medals" are more properly known by their official name,” International medals for outstanding discoveries in mathematics."


Millennium Prizes
In order to celebrate mathematics in the new millennium, The Clay Mathematics Institute of Cambridge, Massachusetts (CMI) established seven Prize Problems. The Prizes wer
e conceived to record some of the most difficult problems with which mathematicians were grappling at the turn of the second millennium. As of March 2011, six of the problems remain unsolved. A correct solution to any of the problems results in a US$1,000,000 prize being awarded by the institute.

James Carlson, President of CMI, said, "resolution of the Poincaré conjecture by Grigoriy Perelman brings to a close the century-long quest for the solution. It is a major advance in the history of mathematics that will long be remembered."

On December 22, 2006, the journal Science honoured Perelman's proof of the Poincaré conjecture as the scientific "Breakthrough of the Year", the first time this had been bestowed in the area of mathematics.

Poincare Conjecture
This is bit mathematical and perceived as difficult to understand. So you can probably see the video explaining the same.

The original conjecture is stated like this:

"Consider a compact 3-dimensional manifold V without boundary. Is it possible that the fundamental group of V could be trivial, even though V is not homeomorphic to the 3-dimensional sphere?"


I found interesting article where writer tried to explain this in simplified way.

The rationale behind declining the prize and fame is sending signals against the politics in Mathematics, a purist would say that no one person deserves to stake a claim on a theorem. That seemed to be what Dr. Perelman, who has said he disapproves of politics in mathematics, was implying.

I still found it hard to believe. The way great people think, Perhaps no one can.

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See Counterfeit Reality Through Your cell Phone..!!!

Posted by Vikramsinh at Saturday, January 2, 2010

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Recently one interesting news captured my attention, A 21 year old Mysore based girl developed a cell phone application that can find out fake notes. Read full story.




Neha N., an engineering student from Mysore created this application to find out whether currency notes are real or not. Its big relief in today’s world where counterfeit notes are growing geometrically in number. Number of attempts were made in past to fight against the fake currency notes but this seems to be a good solution that common people can use. Thanks to bright engineer who won cash prize of 1 lakh at innovation challenge. Let’s hope that mobile producers add this new innovation to cell phones..!!!

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Take a Moment to Look Back....!!!

Posted by Vikramsinh at Thursday, December 24, 2009

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Another year come and gone, so many things happen sweet and bitter, happy and sad; we got reasons to smile and cry...

As we look back the year was full of so many surprises, things turn upside down and pace of life become faster. We have to keep up with changing time and find out what we want back from our lives, what exactly make us feel happy...

We have to contemplate what we gain and what we loss, mistakes we made, how to avoid them.

News papers, TV channels are flooded with series of articles/shows on this years vital incidents that impact world in a good or bad way. So I am not listing down all those things but one interesting thing I found is Google’s zeitgeist. A way to see what people search on the internet, what is the spirit of the time.

Michael Jackson is the most googled term this year worldwide and facebook comes second, but in India it's different.

Katrina kaif beat Michael in India and become most googled celebrity in India for consecutively second year. For the second year running, Katrina Kaif has also grabbed the top spot as Asia's sexiest woman - as awarded by the UK's prestigious Eastern Eye magazine. Looks like Katrina is poised to rock the world...

Last week tragic demise of Britney Murphy spreads shock waves like Michael Jackson; more interesting thing is Black Hat SEO used it for spreading system infections. As news spread fast more and more people tried to search about it and that’s what is exploited by some cyber criminals. They embedded malicious codes in the links which were listed in top search results. So beware next time when you click any search result link while searching on hot topic. more about this attack




Lastly enjoy the celebration time and make maximum out of your life ...its precious and beautiful..enjoy each moment and life will become a continuous celebration..!!

Merry X-mas




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Theorem that took 357 years to prove...!!!

Posted by Vikramsinh at Sunday, December 13, 2009

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“And perhaps, posterity will thank me for having shown it that the ancients did not know everything.” -Pierre de Fermat


Man is always fascinated by complexity of mathematics. The mathematical problems, theorems, conjectures proposed are sometimes pose such a challenge that it took years of efforts of many brilliant mathematicians to solve it. People who solve it are truly obsessed with only one thought, that is solution to the given problem.

Here is world’s one of the most famous and celebrated theorem which took 357 years to prove. Statement of the theorem looks so simple that any schoolchildren can understand it, even though it poses challenge to mathematicians from all over the world. Yes...it's famous Fermat's Last Theorem...!!!



Fermat wrote, “It is impossible for any number which is a power greater than the second to be written as a sum of two like powers. I have a truly marvelous demonstration of this proposition which this margin is too narrow to contain.”

Mathematically a^n = b^n + c^n where a,b,c,n are integers have no solution for n > 2

Pierre de Fermat (1601 - 1665) wrote it in 1637 and it is very confusing if he had the proof. He wrote that he have proof but the margine of the paper is too narrow to contain it. It's mystery and different people have different opinions about it.

The proof was established by Andrew Wiles in 1994. Proof is not directly related to Fermat’s last theorem its proving another theorem that implies Fermat’s last theorem. As a child Andrew
was curious about the theorem and why it is not solved for so many years. He worked hard but found dead end. He then started to work on elliptic curves which was popular contemporary field of study and coincidently the very field leads to the proof.

He buried himself for 7 years, he left his job as a professor and sideline his social life. In 1993, he comes up with proof. But soon his dreams got bigger blow, he was devastated when one of the questions asked by colleague challenged the correctness of the proof. Once again he obsessed with his work. He started work to fix the problem. After several months efforts with his former student he comes up with the correct proof.


This incredible journey to get proof for 7 years of ceaseless efforts is captured in a movie called The Fermat's Last Theorem in 1996. Simon Singh and John Lynch's film tells the enthralling and emotional story of Andrew Wiles. Here is the link to watch the video.

This is one of the most interesting stories about mathematical proofs I came across. It’s really amazing struggle of man to get the ultimate truth ..!!! and I think that’s what makes our lives meaningful.

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The Three Gorges Dam ...Incredible Engineering...!!!

Posted by Vikramsinh at Saturday, December 5, 2009

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“Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

Man is always craving for more advanced and comfortable life. His never ending quest to improve and excel in all directions and aspects of life brings today’s extremely transformed, complex and wonderful world.

Here is the perfect example of historic engineering feat, Three Gorges Dam. Its stats will amaze you; its view will mesmerize you and changes in the environment brought by Dam will compel you to think about our material greed.

There are around 86000 dams overall on the world and around 46000 belongs to China. Energy hungry China always crave for more and more power. Chinese coal mines already taking many lives, but Chinese leaders are more concern about prosperity of nation than people's lives.

Three Gorges Dam is the world's largest electricity-generating plant of any kind. Constructed on Yangtze river. The greatest of the projects took 17 years. Started in 1994, the dam was expected to be fully operational in 2009, but due to additional projects such as the underground power plant with six additional generators, and due to the complexity of the ship lift, the dam is not expected to become fully operational until about 2011.
Dam costs total of US$40 billion. It causes the displacement of over 1.2 million people from the 60,000hectares of and which will gradually be flooded by the resulting 640-kilometre (397-mile) long reservoir. Here is the Official site.

Statistics shows Comprehensive Project Construction Scale.

The construction includes the following work:

-- Removing 102.59 million cubic meters of stone and earth and filling with 29.33 million cubic meters of stone and earthwork;
-- Mixing and pouring 27.15 million cubic meters of cement;
-- Erecting 281,000 tons of metal structure. It used 463,000 tonnes of steel, enough to build 63 Eiffel Towers;
-- Making and erecting 354,000 tons of reinforcing bars;
-- Building 231,000 square meters of leak-proof concrete walls;
-- Installing 32 power generators with a 700 MW capacity each which results in combined capacity of 18.2 million kilowatts;
-- Creating Dam of height 101 m from river level and 185 m from see level, width 115 m, length 2335 m


The project produces hydroelectricity, apart from that provides greater flood control and river navigation capacity. Up to September 2009 the dam has generated 348.4 TWh of electricity, covering more than one third of its project cost. Project management call it as social and economic success, a breakthrough in the design of large turbines, and a move toward the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. The technological breakthrough is really stupefying. Here is a video animation of the generators.

There are environmental advantages such as reduction in air pollution and green house gas emission by generating electricity from hydropower instead of coal and by providing pollution free navigation. Waste water management. Afforastration. Flood control and drought relief.

But it has darker side also
Threat to Ecology - The dam will significantly decrease the river's flushing capacity, and the pollution ratings will increase.
Erosion and Sedimentation - There are two hazards uniquely identified with the dam. One is that sedimentation projections are not agreed upon, and the other is that the dam sits on a seismic fault.
Affected aesthetic values - Cultural and historical relics are being moved to higher ground as they are discovered, but the flooding will undoubtedly cover some undiscovered relics.
Security - Threat from terrorists.
Earthquakes - There is also the potential for earthquake-induced peak ground acceleration to overcome the strength of the upstream face of the dam which, coupled with the immense weight of the reservoir water, could cause breaching.

I don't know what to say..Whether it is good or bad? Better you decide and tell me ....

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Revolutionary Sixth Sense Technology..and Indian connection..!!!

Posted by Vikramsinh at Sunday, November 29, 2009

4 Comments


Imagine the world where you don’t need specific surface like flat screen or monitor to carry out your digital workouts. All the digital processes that are done on computer or your iPhone can be
done where ever you want, even on your palm you can project key board and screen and start to write email or do any other work same as you do on your computer. Isn't it thrilling ...yes its no more imaginary science fiction but very real world phenomenon. Thanks to Sixth Sense Technology discovered by Pranav Mistry at MIT Media Lab.
'SixthSense' is a wearable gestural interface that augments the physical world around us with digital information and lets us use natural hand gestures to interact with that information. Find more about sixth sense project.

You can feel its true thrill when you actually see the video, you will be mesmerized by technology, what a brilliant invention. It will change the whole world and the way we live. The most interesting thing is pranav wants his invention to be open source so that any one can contribute and use it for free. It’s rare in today’s world where almost everyone thinks in terms of money. He has given demonstration of this incredible technology at TEDIndia talk. TED is Technology Entertainment Design group that promotes new innovative ideas by sharing it. Watch the demonstration video.


Currently Pranav is a PhD student in the Fluid Interfaces Group at MIT's Media Lab. Check out pranav's profile. Recently Venkatraman Ramakrishnan won Noble prize in Chemistry for the year 2009 which made India proud. The inventor of sixth sense technology, Pranav, also
have strong Indian connections. He has done his BE in computer science from Gujarat University, and Masters from IIT Bombay which once again shows the great Indian legacy. Hats off...!!!

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The Numbers Behind NUMB3RS

Posted by Vikramsinh at Wednesday, August 19, 2009

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"We all use math every day; to predict weather, to tell time, to handle money. Math is more than formulas or equations; it's logic, it's rationality, it's using your mind to solve the biggest mysteries we know." - NUMB3RS



We are always curious about predicting future or solving crimes, day to day life's complex problems with some technique and science. This is very difficult task. It requires lots of efforts along with very precise logical, Rational and lateral thinking. Thats what Charlie do while solving the crimes for his FBI Agent brother Don Epps. Charlie is the protagonist of one of my most favorite TV series. NUMB3RS. Amazing TV series, which gives an insight of how Maths can be used to solve complex conundrums of life.

Many people will not agree that Maths can solve the crimes, but charlie perfectly believes in everything is numbers (and so do I). It was started way back in Jan 2005, NUMB3RS completed 5th season this year. In typical episode, Charlie helps Don to solve a crime investigation case using Maths. He is Maths professor at CalSci (California School of Science and Technology), a fictional institute but his math is much more real. Many real world mathematicians are consultants for creation of the series. The presentation of all events in which maths is used for solving crimes is really amazing. Here are some links for watching the episodes.

1. All Complete Series
2. CBS Primetime

Recently I found one fabulous book called "The Numbers Behind NUMB3RS" written by two real world mathematicians. It gives whole lot of things related to series, maths used and related real world situations. Here is the link to download the book.



All other links related to show are given in the section "Road to El Dorado" of this site. Enjoy the reading and wait for the 6th season in September...

Thanks,

Yours
MagicNumb3rs

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Refine..Redefine..your Search

Posted by Vikramsinh at Tuesday, July 7, 2009

1 Comments

We all are victims of our own curiosity...
with the invention of world wide web, Information starts exploding like anything; data explosion and geometric growth of information make it difficult to find information that we are curious about, When it comes to internet use, Search engine is what almost 99% times we use to find required information on any topic, pictures, MP3 audio songs, videos, movies and infinite other things.
When we want to find a particular thing on web, our fingers invariably types 6 letter word beginning with letter G.. in the address bar. Yes, Almost 90% people turns to GOOGLE when it comes to internet search, though invention of google is amazing thing, a highly effective weapon that net users have, The suitability of search results always depends on the search that you want to do. So Google is not always perfect search engine for your search criteria.
When you search the same phrase in different search engines then you will get different results and you may miss some websites if you have myopic to stick to one search engine. Below is the list of General search engines
My First best choice and strong suggestion for general search
Blackle http://www.blackle.com/ - Energy saving search

Others are
Google http://www.google.com -no need to explain
Bing http://www.bing.com - Formerly MSN and live search
Yahoo! http://www.yahoo.com
Teoma http://www.teoma.com
About http://about.com
Duck duck go http://duckduckgo.com/
AlltheWeb http://www.alltheweb.com
AltaVista http://www.altavista.com
AOL Search http://search.aol.com/

Meta-search engines
Now you find it difficult to search same thing in different engines.
So for your help meta search engines are ready, it simultaneously sends your query to two or more general-purpose search engines and eliminates duplicate results. Try Some meta search engines that I find useful ...
Mamma http://www.mamma.com
MetaCrawler http://www.metacrawler.com
DogPile http://www.dogpile.com
Search.com http://www.search.com
Hotbot http://www.hotbot.com

Multimedia search engines
Most search engines help you find text, but what if you want to find a song, a picture, or a video clip? Rather than waste your time using a general purpose search engine to find an MP3 file of your favorite band, try using a special multimedia search engine instead. They are specially designed for the search.
Here are some of the more popular multimedia search engines:

MIDI Explorer http://www.musicrobot.com
Blinkx http://www.blinkx.com/ - Video search engine
Ditto http://www.ditto.com
FAST Multimedia Search http://multimedia.alltheweb.com
picsearch http://www.picsearch.com/ - image search engine.
SpeechBot.net http://speechbot.research.compaq.com
Seeqpod http://www.seeqpod.com/ - Playable search

For today ..That’s all, I will give list of some more specialized search engines next time till enjoy the Search...
If you find any thing interesting then let me know.

Thanks

Yours
Search explorer

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Wartime Diaries ..History Speaks

Posted by Vikramsinh at Friday, June 19, 2009

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Last friday, on 12th June, Anne would have celebrated her 80th Birth day, if she did survive the horror of holocaust in second world war.

Anne Frank will live forever in our hearts.....
"I want to go on living even after my death! And therefore I am grateful to God for this gift, this possibility of developing myself and of writing, of expressing all that is in me. I can shake off everything if I write; my sorrows disappear; my courage is reborn. But, and that is the great question, will I ever be able to write anything great, will I ever become a journalist or a writer?" - Anne Frank
She is the most famous victim of Hitler. Her diary is one of the most widely read book. She wondered if her voice will echo across the centuries? Will people remember her? And her words come true as her spirit will never die and she will go on living even after her death for thousands of years.
She had amazing power to express her thoughts, she wrote her favorite diary in the darkest time of her life. Kitty, her diary, never betraying, faithful friend which she got as a gift from her father on her 13th Birth day, 12th June 1942. Even though she was too young to write something like she wrote in her diary, she worte excellent. Her thoughts were so mature and brilliantly put in words. It always stuns me like anything.
Her hope to experience all the things that anyone desires in teenage, sadly, got crushed as she took her last breath at Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in March 1945 just few days before British soldiers liberated the camp (15th April 1945). At last fate betrayed her.
Her father Otto Frank survived the war and published her diary 'The Diary of a Young Girl'. When Nazi forces invaded Netherland, Otto Frank took his family to a secret place. Anne and her family go on hiding in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Miep Gies and her husband were amongst the few who knew about the hiding. Earlier Miep was working with Otto Frank. She along with her husband took care of primary needs of food, cloths, medicines etc of Frank family and help them in their difficult times. She never cared about risk involved and tried to spread some light of hope. Currently she is 100 years old and live in the Dutch province Noored-Holland. Find more about Miep.
While in hiding Anne wrote her diary. She called their secret attic place as secret annex.
She was a very vivacious girl who loves to express everything in her mind. Her passion for story telling was miraculous; she talked a lot that often got her into trouble. Many times she wrote 100 times that "I am not going to talk so much" as a punishment for her talks in classroom, but she never changed. And how can we forget her story of three ducklings which gifted her new name ‘Ms. quack quack‘. She dreamed to becoming actress. She also had interest in Greek Mythology and family trees of various well-known ancestries. She hoped that war will end someday and she would be free to follow her dreams, but her lifeline ended in unfortunate way.
The Diary reflects the spectrum of emotions of a adolescent girl. It sheds light on how human spirit can break into pieces in difficult times like war, how people fought against the boredom that comes from loneliness in the hiding. How a little girl’s world gets upside down. How her dreams, her desires get crushed under the tremendous pressure of ruthlessness and cruelty, when she wanted to fly in boundless sky.
If you still did not read her diary, then its time to get a new brand copy of the diary. It will strike your mind, really awe inspiring. Hats off to eternal angel.....

Have you heard this name...Rutka laskier?
As we moved on, time can transcend but history has always new secrets to reveal in her heart, deeply buried. Time have power to open these secrets. Some times these secrets vanish somewhere and some times they come up with amazing discoveries.
Many of us know Anne Frank but how many knows the name Rutka Laskier?Her story is almost same as Anne; she was born in Poland and became the prey of the deathtraps in Nazi concentration camp. It is believed that she died in Auschwitz concentration camp. Rutka wrote her diary for 3 months, which describes her life in the time of holocaust in 1943 at the age of 14. Her friend Stanislawa Sapinska hides the diary in her house. This diary's existence remained unknown until 2004, when Stanislawa Sapinska came forward with the diary.
Rutks's father survived the war and relocated in Israel, remarried and had another daughter Zahava Sherz. He died in 1986. Zahava Sherz never knew about the diary until she surprisingly came to know about the diary and her half-sister (Rutka).
"If only I could say, it's over, you die only once... But I can't, because despite all these atrocities I want to live, and wait for the following day." Rutka wrote in one of her last entries in the diary.
Here are some interesting links.
1. Related Snaps.
2. News Entry in Washington Post.

As years pass, men rise and fall but their stories will remain forever, reflecting boundless human spirit. And people from future generations will wonder about these stories. As History speaks....... and story goes on….
Thanks.

Yours,
Eternal Soul.

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