Bharti Airtel is on its preternatural move on upgrading broadband speeds of its existing customers (on 64, 128, 256 Kbps) to a minimum of 512 Kbps by the end of June, 2010. Furthermore, customers currently on 512 Kbps plans and 1Mbps plans will have their speeds doubled to 1Mbps and 2Mbps respectively. These upgrades come at no extra cost to existing customers.

My 256 Kbps plan hasn’t got its kick yet, but one of my friend’s (256Kbps) plan has already got it. He received a mail from Airtel stating about the upgrades and is now experiencing an average download speed of 60 Kbps. (Previously it was 30 Kbps)

SpeedTest details conducted at his end (Wireless):

SpeedTest conducted from my side:

Additionally, Airtel also announced the ‘Impatience Plans’, by offering 4 Mbps speed plans starting at a path breaking Rs. 899/month. The Impatience Plans will be available in Delhi, Noida, Gurgaon, Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore.

K Srinivas, Joint President-Telemedia Services, Bharti Airtel said,

We are delighted to provide superior internet browsing experience to our customers through these high speed plans. Massifying broadband experience in India has been the pivotal to Airtel’s strategy for Broadband. These initiatives bring in a new paradigm for broadband in India.

‘Impatience Plan’ Details:

It was 7:00pm on a Saturday evening when I reached BTM layout and was waiting for a Volvo bus. It was just 7:00pm and I don’t know where in the hell were all the Volvo buses that evening. I waited for over 25mins for a Volvo to turn up, but it didn’t. I was forced to board a normal bus which was crowded like hell with drunken stinking losers hanging inside. Most of the public buses in Bangalore have hydraulic doors. The hydraulic system is so horrible that the speed at which the doors closes is like smashing a door in anger! Scary!

With the fear of those hydraulic doors, I rushed inside the bus. There were 4 guys who were blocking my way from going inside the bus. I requested one guy to give me some way, but he refused. I tried pushing him, but he didn’t move! I was like, “F it!” and stood there itself. I then realized that I was expecting an SMS and I reached my hands into my pocket to take my phone and found out that it was missing. I searched all over and I looked at the guy standing next to me and he was in a hurry to get the hell out of the frikkin bus. All the 4 of `em were rushing out of the bus when one man asked:

Man: What happened? Is something missing?

Me: Yeah! My phone is missing!!!

Man: I think the man who stood next to you took it.

Me: Agrrr!!! You telling me this now after he got down?

I went mad and jumped out of the bus and ran back to the place where they got down. I caught the guy who stood next to me in the bus and checked his pockets, but he was clean. I think he had already passed the phone to someone amongst the other 3, but those 3 were missing. People at the bus stop were curious to know why I was checking him.

He deviated my mind saying:

Thief: Look there! He’s boarding the bus. Catch hold of him. He has it.

Me (Holding his hand tight): WTF? How do you know it’s him?

Theif: It is him! You check him!

Me: Okay come with me.

I literally shouted the man boarding the bus to get out and he innocently got down and this guy (the thief) starts to escape. He tries to board the moving bus and I try to pull him off the bus. His slippers fall off and hops on the bus with bare foot. I followed the bus till the next stop and couldn’t find him. When enquired with the people inside the bus they said, he got down mid-way. I was so frustrated and walked back to the previous stop thinking if I could find him somewhere. While I walked back, a man who saw me holding his hands at the bus stop came to me and said, that guy just came back, took his slippers and ran away from there. I lost all hopes of getting back my phone and the next thing that came into my mind was to block my sim. It was 8:15pm and I was sure that the Airtel office would have been closed by that time. I felt so helpless. I shouldn’t have had fallen for the trick he played

After a night and a day without a phone, I feel so lifeless.

Image Credits: Outlook India & Blogshank

TweetUp

Few days back, Bangalore tweeps had organized a PaintBall Tweetup. PaintBall is a sport or rather like a war where two teams battle on a small ground. Located near Total Mall in Sarjapur, which is quite near to my house.
We reached there by 12 noon. We were instructed on few rules and regulations and were waiting for another team to finish their game.

Later, we were given a gun (CO2 pressurized) containing pellets (paintballs) made of a gelatin shell filled with food coloring and vegetable oil for some practice. It was our turn to get in and start our game. We played “Capture the Flag”, where one team has to go to the other team’s base and capture the flag and vice versa. Had loads of fun though and will definitely attend the next tweetup which is gonna happen in the next month. (We are planning to go to Wonder La )

If your planning to go to this PaintBall (Sarjapur) then here’s some info you gotta know. Rs 500 per member with 4 rounds and 100 pellets/member. Rs 4 for each extra pellet. If your wallet is filled then start splashing and don’t care about your shots

Here are some shots Prashanth captured from his Nokia N97

Click here for more shots…

Bangalore Photo Walk – Lal Bagh

Yesterday I had been for a photo walk – Lal Bagh. Thanks to Priya for bringing up this idea and making it a successful one Photography is one my hobby and I just love it.  I had great fun meeting great people who were into photography from years and most of them who were real PRO. Learnt a lot of new things about photography from them.

Walk started sharp at 9 in the morning. I was 1 hour late coz of unavoidable conditions. Had a tough time finding the group in that BIG place. I thought I was lost. I was out of currency and wasn’t able to get in touch with Priya. It was only her contact that I had. Thanks to Airtel, I got an emergency recharge. Sent an SMS, Loan to 121 and Airtel credited me Rs 10 immediately! Got in touch with  Priya again and finally I joined the group after half-an-hour search. Phew! We then continued our walk capturing shots that we found interesting.

It was a fun photo walk though. Here are some of the uploaded shots that I captured. Not all shots were uploaded.

Click here to see what others have captured

Anyways, if you want to attend the next Twitter meet up or the next photo walk (which is happening this Saturday) then follow me on Twitter. Will make sure that I’ll keep you updated