Traveling Cargopants

Posted By Hargobind on March 12, 2010

Much like Tupac, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s talent has gained him a highly memorable place in history and in the ears and hearts of generations of listeners around the world. Also like Tupac, his music has long outlasted his physical presence on this earth as previously unheard of songs and beloved classics continue to be released into the public airwaves, sometimes with new flavors and spins. Such an example is the album Dub Qawwali released in 2007 by a world famous global music producer named Gaudi.

Gaudi was one of six producers who were initially offered a single Nusrat track to remix by the Lemon Group — owners of the song publishing of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s works from 1968-1974, in association with Khan’s original Pakistani label Rehmat Gramophone. The company loved what Gaudi had done with the material and offered him complete access to the recording sessions from 35 years ago, including rare and unreleased vocal parts. The original studio reels where sent to Gaudi’s studio in London in 2005 and work began.

After two years of work, Gaudi released a first album, Dub Qawwali. This album blends organic and digital dub stylings with original vocals from Pakistan’s beloved Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. The result is a moving body of work that respectfully brings Khan’s Qawwali songs together with Jamaican dub via superb 21st century studio techniques. Dub Qawwali is a celebration of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s life and was released on Six Degrees Records in August 2007, marking the 10-year anniversary of his death. The followup album, Dub Qawwali Remixes was released a year later.

To get a taste of these albums (and buy them), click over to https://www.beatport.com/, then type “Dub Qawwali” into the search box. When the results window below changes, click on “Releases” on the left to see both albums. You can play a preview of the albums directly, or simply add them to the playlist in the player at the top of the window.

~ Enjoy.

Category: Music | 1 Comment »
Tags: dub, electronic, indian, world

Posted By Hargobind on March 6, 2010

During my last couple days in Boulder/Denver, I met up with a girl named Rachel who was also couch surfing for a couple nights at Dave’s house. As we shared our stories of our travels, she told me how she had been practicing Kundalini Yoga for a while in Florida… very cool, especially since it’s a form of yoga that is not well-known in the USA, and it’s the style of yoga that I’ve been doing my whole life. It turns out that she needed a ride west, and I was leaving in a couple days, so it worked out perfect that I would have a travel buddy for the next part of my journey.

As we were leaving Boulder and starting to head West, we stopped at a place just outside of Denver called Red Rocks Amphiteater (wiki, official website). The area has a large collection of massive boulders and rock formations. In particular, there is a natural amphitheater shape formed by two, three hundred-foot monoliths (Ship Rock and Creation Rock) that provide natural acoustic resonance making it a great place for concerts. Seats have been carved into the top of a low-lying rock between the pillars which fit up to 9,450 people. In addition to the amphitheater, the nearby rocks in the area also contain many dinosaur fossils which are viewable by nearby hiking trails and a museum.

Unfortunately my camera ran out after a few shots, so I wasn’t able to get any pictures of the amphitheater itself. But I did get some beautiful shots of the hiking trail in the surrounding area.

[View Slideshow]

12►

Category: Journey | 1 Comment »
Tags: Denver, hiking, nature, pictures

Posted By Hargobind on February 21, 2010

Here’s a few fun things I found in/around Boulder while I was there…

• Pearl Street Mall, a pedestrian area in Downtown with tons of stores, restaurants, bars, etc.
• College area shops & hangouts at the University Hill
• Hiking in many places around Boulder including the Flatiron hills (e.g. Chautauqua trail), Boulder Creek Path, or up Boulder Canyon
• Boulder Farmer’s Market
• Boulder Public Library (free WiFi, nice place to chill)
• Live music at the Fox Theatre
• Tasty Tibetan food and tea at the Dushanbe Teahouse
• Best ever Indian restaurant called Tandoori Grill (few miles south of downtown)

Here’s a few other sources of things to see/do in Boulder.

Category: Journey | No Comments »
Tags: Boulder

Posted By Hargobind on February 21, 2010

Just wanted to say something that you probably already knew… I rock.

I’ve now played Frisbee/Disc golf at 3 of the 5 active courses in Las Vegas. Looks like the first course that I learned to play the game on, Red Ridge Park, is actually one of the nicest courses around. All the fairways are beautifully outlined by gravel barriers. All tees (starting point for each hole) have concrete slabs from which to launch your frisbee, and there are well illustrated maps at each hole showing the birds eye view and par for the hole. Three times now I have driven 20 minutes across the city just to play at that park because it’s a whole lot nicer than the other two which are 5 and 10 minutes from where I’ve been staying. It’s worth it for such a nice course.

But back to why I rock… I’ve noticed that my average is about 2-4 points under par for the 9 holes. That means I’m throwing my discs farther than average, and I’m putting with accuracy at the baskets. I can also see clear rough spots in the grass where people tend to pick up their frisbee after each throw as they progress down the fairway, and my discs typically land 15-30 feet past these rough spots — indicating that I throw my discs fly farther than the average player. And I’m not even using a specialty distance disc, just the one that comes in a 3-disc starter kit. That’s a nice feeling.

Category: Journey | No Comments »
Tags: Frisbee, Golf, Las Vegas

Posted By Hargobind on February 21, 2010

I found a few new games recently which are great to keep you entertained and waste time.

• Bloons and Bloons Tower Defense 4
• Boombot and Boombot 2
• Crush the Castle

In other news, Apple is coming out with a new device called the iPad — something like a larger version of the iPhone. Its features set is apparently quite disappointing to many people. Here’s a hilarious spoof on what Hitler thinks about it.

Category: Random Fun | No Comments »
Tags: games, Random Fun

Posted By Hargobind on February 1, 2010

Probably my favorite sport to play is Ultimate Frisbee, a game very similar to rugby or American football where the object of the game is to pass a frisbee disc to your teammates  from one end of the field down into the opposing end zone. Although there are many leagues where teams practice vigorously to compete, I prefer the more relaxed play of a “pickup” game where anyone can just show up and play for fun.

In the town of Española where I lived for the last 4.5 years, we played a pickup game every Sunday afternoon all year round. The game gets really fun when you have 6-8 people on each team, and on average about 10-15 people would show up to play, but sometimes we would have over 20! Ultimate became a regular activity in my life because it’s so much fun to play, and it challenges you to become skillful at throwing, catching, and coordinated play with your teammates. And you can do lots of running so it’s a great form of exercise.

Ultimate is definitely a love of my life for many reasons! So I’ve been kind of bummed in the last couple months because most cities that I have visited on this trip haven’t had any nearby pickup games. Enter the manifesting power of the universe — “ask and you shall receive”!

When visiting REI a couple weeks ago, I saw some Frisbee Golf discs for sale and I thought “what the hell, that looks like fun” and I grabbed a couple. After being cooped up inside doing too much work this week, I needed to get outdoors and get some exercise. That’s when I remembered the discs that were just sitting in my car. So I went online looked up Frisbee Golf courses in the area and I found one nearby and went to try it out.

Frisbee Golf is pretty similar to the game of Golf where you have tee-off areas, a big fairway (a long, narrow grass field), and a target at the end to get your frisbee into. But instead of clubs and a ball, you’re playing with frisbee discs which are smaller in size than a normal Ultimate/beach frisbee. The discs generally come in three types, a driver, a mid-range and a putter, and you can often buy them in a starter kit for the low price of $25-30. Each type of disc has a slightly different shape that can give you more distance or more control in your throws. The goal of the game is to continually chuck your frisbee down the fairway and eventually throw it into the basket to score. Scoring is generally done by keeping track of the number of throws for each hole and totaling all the throws at the end — the fewer throws the better. Well-built courses will have signs that tell you the “par” (average throws) for each hole.  Most courses generally have 9 holes, though some of the nicer courses have up to 18.

Although the game certainly offers opportunity for competitive play by keeping track of your score or tournament competitions, many people just play for fun or to hang out with friends. Don’t worry if you don’t have anyone to play with… most times you can just show up at a course and either play by yourself or join up with other people who are already there.

I went out to play for a couple hours yesterday, and joined up with a few people of varying levels of experience who showed me the ropes and gave me some pointers. Because the goal of the game is to get the frisbee into the basket in as few throws as possible, it’s generally a good idea to chuck the disc as far as possible on each throw. Because my arm was out of practice for not having played Ultimate for a few months, the 2 hours of play yesterday left the muscles in my shoulder a bit sore. Still, I loved it so much that I had to play again today and so I went out for half an hour at lunch time. Ultimate Frisbee will always be a love of mine, but I now have a new best friend in my life, Frisbee Golf!

Category: Journey | No Comments »
Tags: Frisbee, Golf, sports, Ultimate