LCD TV - US to India

Based on my quick research (googling), following are some of the things to be considered in buying an LCD TV from US for use in India

1. US uses NTSC and India uses PAL: Options to solve this
   a. Buying a PAL to NTSC converter
   b. Having a VGA box. Dish TV in India provide a package with a VGA Set top box and it seems to work fine. All that is to be done is to check whether the TV has a PC Input option (VGA input).
   c. Connect the video source to an external TV Tuner box. From the TV Tuner box connect to any of the input sockets on TV other than the cable input (RF). This is the best possible way since the Remote provided by the Tuner box can be used to change channels.
   d. Other methods include using a DVD recorder with built in Tuner (PAL Tuner) and then connecting the cable directly to DVD Recorder, taking the output from DVD recorder to the TV. However, in this method the channels cannot be changed that easily.
2. 220V in India Vs. 110V in US
   a. Need to buy a step-down transformer for the TV
3. Warranty: Need to check if the warranty is international
4. Transportation:
   a. Possibility: It is not possible to carry the TV from US to India. Need to check if the manufacturers will ship it. Amazon and Walmart don’t seem to ship outside USA.
   b. Cost of shipping the TV
5. Customs: I heard that new TVs are charged at 30% of their price. Not sure if this is true.
6. 1080p Vs. 720p: This is resolution (like the mega pixels for digicams). The question is, would we need 1080p for the transmission in India. I believe 1080p is more for blue ray discs. The next question is, how soon will the blue ray technology come to India?
7. Deciding on the screen size:
   a. For 20 to 27-inch displays, you should be able to watch comfortably from 2.5 to 5 feet away.
   b. For 32 to 37-inch TVs, you should sit back 6 to 8 feet from the screen itself.
   c. For 42 to 46-inch TVs, you'll need 10 to 14 feet between you and the screen.
   d. 50-inch LCD displays look best when viewed from 12 to 16 feet away.

Wheat Vs Rice

Whenever the talk about fitness comes, my friends ask me to shift from rice to wheat. I have been curious for some time about the nutritional values of both the cereals. Few clicks in wikipedia gave the required values. The below comparison is on the expected lines except for the fat content, which is quite a surprise.

If we consider the Indian diet, apart from the above absolute values I guess we have to consider the fact that we would eat less grams of Chapathi than rice. That would be a substantial reduction in calories straight away.

Geography Bits

Geography was always a subject of disinterest for me. Except for some amount of "Australia - Flora and Fauna" and "The South West Monsoon", I don't remember much from the geography classes of school. But God has been great in working out my travel calendar and has provided a good bit of opportunity to see places. This has increased my interest in the world and the different cultures. Of late this interest has still been increased by.... a game! The Travelers IQ challenge game has been interesting and educating to me. It hasn't thought me too many new things, but has served as a refresher, a sort of catalyst that helped fill the void. My increased inquisitiveness made me research a bit on things that have confused me for years. Here are few things I learnt in geography recently, but wish had known earlier 1) Croatia is a country that came out of the erstwhile Yugoslavia. I had somehow thought that it came from USSR. Frederick Forsyth's "Avenger" helped me understand that Yugoslavia split into Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia 2) West Indies is not a country! It is an ensemble of countries like Jamaica and Barbados that play as a single cricket team 3) If someone had asked me for the countries in the Australian continent, I would have probably said Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania and Papa New Guinea. Well, I am not sure of New Zealand anymore. Wiki says that New Zealand belongs to a continent called Zealandia. I get a bit confused in these kinds of trivia since I studied in school that there were only 7 continents and Zealandia is not one of them. 4) There are several countries that belong to multiple continents. My ex-colleagues from Alcatel who have traveled to Turkey have told me that Turkey is transcontinental. But I got to know of few more countries like Indonesia, Russia (though we all associate it with Europe, it is actually 71% in Asia!) and Egypt. Did you know that a part of Italy, Spain and Portugal are in Africa?