Colorful vegetarian food

A week in Kenya

This was my first trip to Africa. I have been to Egypt before. But Egypt has a more middle-eastern vibe to it than an African one. Compared to Egypt, in Kenya, almost everyone speaks English. And compared to Egypt, much less touting. Kenya is known for its world-famous Masai Mara reserve. Apart from seeing the big five animals (lion, leopard, rhino, elephant, and Cape buffalo), I would recommend a trip to the coastal city of Mombasa.

Bad and good ways to test code

Writing tests at an early-stage startup is always heatedly debated. If a function has one call, adding a unit test doubles the number of calls, this not only doubles the current work but even slows down future code changes 2X! Further, if the code is not finalized, it is legitimate to ask why even bother writing test code. Here’s a better way to write tests

GraphQL vs gRPC

RPC calls allow one service to call functions in another service as if it is a part of the same service. And unlike a REST API, one gets strong type checking. The two services can even be in different languages. gRPC is a great framework for implementing an RPC service. Another language-agnostic framework for making RPC calls is GraphQL. Many people don’t think of GraphQL that way, however, it can serve the same purpose....

The different layers of a web applications

There are three mandatory layers of any non-trivial user-facing web application. Storage, compute and view. The view is the front-end website and the mobile app(s). The storage is the database layer like MySQL or Mongo DB. The compute layer is the actual backend service serving the web content and related APIs.

The biggest impact of ChatGPT

In the decade of the 2010s, after Facebook became mainstream, social became a building block for websites. A lot of websites added a concept of user profiles consisting of a name, a display picture, a profile description, and the ability to see/follow the activity stream of other users. Slowly, this became the standard expectation. ChatGPT will have a similar impact. More and more users will get used to asking questions in natural language....

Ħaġar Qim Temple

Malta in winters

We visited Malta in winter. Water activities are not possible in winter, so, this post will tell you what else there is to do in Malta. If you have only one day then go to Mdina. If you have two days, then do Gozo as well. If you have three days, then do the old temples. And if you have four days then do Valletta as well. The island has excellent public transport that you can count on. 1.5 Euro one-way ticket valid for a 2-hours journey in any direction. I would recommend staying in Sliema or St. Julian’s for maximum comfort. If you want a Mediterranean-style stay then go to Valletta or Mdina instead. The Tallinja app gives better suggestions than Google Maps regarding intra-island public transport.

How do businesses make money

A charity is when your customers capture value when you don’t. A scam is when you capture value but your customers don’t. A business is when you and your customers both capture value. - unknown

January 21, 2023 · 2 min      Finance

Selected quotes from "How I Invest My Money" by Joshua Brown and Brian Portnoy

The reasons behind our portfolios and investment choices reveal a lot more about us than we might initially think. Half of all US mutual fund portfolio managers do not invest a cent of their own money in their funds, according to Morningstar. " How Doctors Die” showed the degree to which doctors choose different end-of-life treatments for themselves than they recommend for their patients. This book does the same for financial money managers. “Don’t tell me what you think, tell me what you have in your portfolio.” - Nassim Nicholas Taleb.

Indians and food

One unique aspect of Indian culture is its desire to innovate in culinary. Tomato was first introduced to India in the 16th century. Now, it is an integral part of Indian cooking and is used in ways most others cultures won’t.

January 8, 2023 · 2 min      Misc

Book Summary: One Man's View of the World by Lee Kuan Yew

One Man’s View of the World is a book written in 2012 by Lee Kuan Yew. Lee Kuan Yew is one of the most impressive leaders of the 21st century. In 1965, Singapore was dejected from Malaysia for not being Malay enough. In only a few decades, Lee Kuan Yew transformed Singapore into one of the richest countries in the world.