Vicky Lalwani

I can’t remember the first time I went to this restaurant, but I can never forget the way it’s food taste. One thing about Chinta Ria that I love, is consistency!

They always have that same great flavour and aroma, and never have I felt the need to return a dish back. Overall, it comes with a reasonable price tag - a little pricey, but reasonable.

The menu stocks a good variety of Malaysia style food, and it appeals from vegetarians through to seafood lovers. The curry puffs, tofu quartets and fried Lohbak (mince chicken wrapped in bean curd) are great entree choices. For mains, I have previously had the Red Temple chicken (red curry), Curry lamb, Ayam Ria (stir-fried chicken with spices and veg) - and they all taste amazing. I suggest you try them with coconut rice for a change. I hear the Beef Randang isn’t bad either.

The wine list isn’t short and it gives you a good variety of reds, whites and sparkling. My favourite from their list is - Juniper Crossing Margaret River Chardonnay (Margaret River) and Boat O’Craigo ‘Rob Roy’ Pinot Noir (Yarra Valley).

I haven’t had dessert at this restaurant, because I don’t know if they actually have a menu for that course.

Located at Cockle Bay wharf, near the Darling Harbour in Sydney, the ambience hasn’t been sacrificed in order to provide good food. Their interior is dim lighted and calm, and a large Buddha statue at the entrance almost amazes everyone who comes in for the first time.

One thing that I noticed when I last went to Chinta Ria, was the background music. It’s not pop, nor techno, nor anything commercial - instead it’s repeated chants that Monks listen to when praying. I think it subliminally calms your mind.

Now there are couple of things that disappointed me:

1) You cannot make a reservation. It’s first come, first serve
2) The place can get very crowded and you can end up close to another table
3) It can get loud depending on where you sit, making it a little hard for friendly conversation.
4) A busy night means lack of service - we waited a while before we could place our order and another again before we received our glass of wine
5) The food came out very quick, almost too quick where I felt we were being asked to eat up and leave

Overall, I love dining here and its always had great memories. It is a great experience in itself and I would highly recommend it.

Food: 8/10
Wine: 7/10
Atmosphere: 8/10
Staff: 7/10
Value for money: 8/10

This is beginning to take the piss. Since I got the IQ2, I have started to record TV shows that I can’t see at it’s broadcast time, to then later watch at my own convenience.

Gordon Ramsay’s The F Word was scheduled on Channel 9 at 9:30pm. So I decided to have it recorded and watch it later on.

At 11:30pm I started to watch the recorded show. At the start of the recorded video, I noticed that the first 10-15 mins was of the previous show “The Farmer wants a wife” - who bloody cares!

So I fast forward through that, and start watching the beginning of The F Word.

Now you have to remember something about the IQ2, it only record’s a few mins before and after the show ends - I am in no way blaming them for that. The IQ2 is not smart enough to know exactly when a show starts and stops other than relying on the TV guide provided by the broadcasters.

But if Channel 9 is running late on one shows (”Current Affair” always runs over time), then all the later shows are also delayed.

And no, Nine doesn’t cut any ads to ensure it’s following programs all start on the time that it provided to the IQ2 TV Guide.

So my recording from 9:28 to 10:32 included 15 mins of some shepherd looking for love (go smack your sheep!!), and it therefore meant that I lost the last 10 mins of the F Word - where I missed the result of final cook off and the result of the brigade’s performance.
   
Surely you readers think that I am crazy to complain and you think that I absolutely adore The F Word, but it’s a matter of principle.

What if you recorded a movie and then missed the last 10 mins of the ending - disappointed?

When a network is in control of what they broadcast, surely they can control their content and ads to ensure that their programs start on the time it provides to the TV guides.

If it’s running late, then cut your ads back! Channel Nine, pick your socks up!

6 months ago, LVMH (Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy) filed a case in the Paris Court against eBay for selling fake Louis Vuitton goods on the world famous auction site.

LVMH has various sister brands that include Louis Vuitton, Christian Dior, Givenchy, Dom Perignon and Moet & Chandon to name a few.

LVMH won the case and the courts ordered eBay to pay 19.28 million euro to LVMH, 17.3 million euro to Christian Dior Couture and an additional 3.25 million euro to various perfume brands (Christian Dior, Kenzo, Givenchy and Guerlian).

The multi-million dollar luxury lifestyle company won on the basis that eBay failed to make any attempts to prevent the sale of the counterfeit items. Also, eBay is not an authorised site to sell and advertise the LVMH branded products.

Not long ago, eBay also had to pay Hermes 20,000 euros in damages for selling its counterfeit goods (3 Hermes handbags of which 2 were fake - all sold for 3000 euros). The case against Hermes was bought forward by the traditional auctioneers in France who claim that eBay encourage trade of pirated and stolen items.

eBay has 84 million active users and 39 markets worldwide and in 2007 they recorded sale of all items on its auction platform to a total of $US60 billion.

Source: http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/ebay-cops-hefty-penalty/2008/07/01/1214677979204.html

I came across this article, on The Big Chair, that was written earlier this year - and I laughingly agree with Conrad Walters on this following extract from the article:

10 things that won’t change in 2008

1. Google will still have access to more information about you than your mother has.
2. The DVD drive on your computer will still be ideal for holding your first cup of coffee while Windows Vista loads.
3. Internet filters will still require children to help their parents view the websites they want.
4. Spammers will still exploit the inverse relationship that exists between IQ and greed.
5. Social networking sites will still be the best place for identity thieves to refine their craft.
6. People will still visit Second Life trying to discover if there’s something to do other than to see if there’s something to do.
7. YouTube will still be the definitive source for guidance on how to train cats to flush a toilet.
8. Mobile phones will still come with a choice of 200 ring tones, none of which anyone wants.
9. Broadband in rural Australia will still involve paper cups and string.
10. Video iPod users will still squint into postage-stamp screens and convince themselves they’ve enjoyed watching something.

I doubt this is real, but I thought it was rather funny.

Mark Cohen bought this article to my attention. It states that LimitNone, a company that developed an application, about a year ago, would allow users who use Microsoft Outlook to export all its contents into Gmail.

Back in 2007, LimitNone demo’ed the software to Google’s senior executives and were assured by Google that they would not roll out a competing product, but would instead work with LimitNone to roll it out.

However, all that changed when Google produced its own Google Email Uploader, an app similar to LimitNone’s gMove.

Originally LimitNone’s app was called MY GRATE, but on Google’s recommendation they renamed it to gMove.

“Google claims its core philosophy is ‘Don’t be evil’ but, simply put, they invited us to work with them, to trust them — and then stole our technology,” said Ray Glassman, CEO of LimitNone, in a prepared statement.

LimitNone claims the damaged to be worth US$1 Billion

Don’t be evil eh?

After dropping out from Harvard, and spending most of his day in a garage back in 1970s, multi-billionaire Bill Gates will be leaving Microsoft this week.

It has taken 3 people to fill the shoes of the man who started it all. Chief Software Architect will be Ray Ozzie, Chief Research and Strategy Office will be Craig Mundie and infamous Steve Ballmer will be the CEO.

While Bill will stay on Microsoft board as Chairman, his focus will be on his personal charity - The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Analysts say that Bill leaving could impact the direction or image of the company. Bill Gates is the heart of Microsoft, and he pushed it to where it is today. With his departure, the executive directors are all responsible to preserve that image.

It has taken 1 year for Bill Gates to officially step out of this position to hand over to the above 3 mentioned successors. However, in that past year while Bill has stepped away from the operation management of Microsoft, several hiccups have been made. For example, launching the new Office and Windows platforms - it’s been a year since those products have been released, but the strategy of them replacing its predecessors haven’t been successful. In fact, customers prefer to stay on XP rather than upgrading.

It’s almost like Microsoft has no answer in what to do next - and all this while Apple’s OS is gaining traction.

Aside from the Desktop Market, Microsoft has to deal with it’s ever-growing competitor Google - who now offer free online document collaboration tools called Google Docs.

Then there was the whole failure of Microsoft - Yahoo takeover of nearly US$50 billion.

On the flip side, the server and tools division are the bread and butter of Microsoft’s profits. While it’s entertainment unit, which makes Xbox and it’s games are yet to record a profit.

A founder and CEO of a company has so much more value added that they are sometimes invisible to where the company is heading - though they are the ones making those little tweaks which are often never realised.

Did Gates leave at the right time? Will he ever come back? Where will Microsoft be positioned in 5 to 10 years time?

At first I was a bit sceptical about the Foxtel contactors turning up between their proposed hour of 7am and 12noon. It was 9:45am, and I had decided to call up Foxtel. After waiting for about 5 mins, I got through to a representative who confirmed that the contractor is due to come out today and will call an hour before arriving.
 
My intercom buzzes at 10:30 and it was the contractor (though he didn’t call me and hour before arriving). I wasn’t going to complain - he walked on in and checked my TV and set it all up in about 10 mins.
 
Since he had replaced the smart card with a new one, he had to call Foxtel technical support to make the change. At first I thought he would have his special number to get straight through to a support representative - wrong! He had to wait for 20 mins (a taste of their own medicine) before he could get someone at their technical support end to activate the card.
 
25 mins later, and he started his demo on how to record, pause live TV, schedule a record, and record a series of episodes. All in all, within 40 mins I was up and running with IQ2.
 
Am I pleased? Very much so.
 
Is it worth the money? Very much so.
 
So let me explain why:
 
1) Pause live TV.
You know the times when you are focused on watching something on TV but the other people around you just want to talk or if your mobile phone goes off, well I now do one simple thing - hit the pause button. That pauses live TV broadcast, and the room is silent to finish the conversation. Once you’re ready, hit the play button and you are back onto watching from when you paused.
 
If there are ads in this program that have been recorded in the background while you have it paused, you can simply fast forward through them (eventually you will catch up to live broadcast if you keep forwarding).
 
2) Recording TV
I love watching the F1, but I love sleeping even more. Given the time zone differences, the European F1 races are broadcasted here between 11pm and 2am. I simply hit the record button the scheduler and I can watch it at my own ease on Monday evening after work. And since you can watch the local HD channels through IQ2, I can record it at even better quality. I can keep my recordings for as long as I want, understanding that it takes up hard drive space.
 
3) Planning my TV from work
Foxtel has an online TV guide where you can register online and link your Foxtel account with your online profile. Therefore from work, I can log on and select what I want my IQ2 box at home to record while I am at work or remind me when I am at home.

4) HD channels
While there aren’t many channels on HD yet, all the local channels are available and the same with Discovery, National Geographic, BBC, Foxsports and ESPN. I never had IQ before, so not having to buy a seperate HD box is a bit of a relief.

The above 4 points are worth the extra $20 a month for me.

Seen on www.smh.com.au this morning. On the above image, you see an article about obesity and then right below a recipe for making your own chocolate wagon wheels. I think that explains why Australia is obese.

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