Arun Has A Blog

In November, I went to Austin to see the F1 USGP with my cousins Navin and Vishnu.

We elected to park our car far from the track and take free shuttles. Parking at the track was really expensive.

Here we are waiting in line to get on shuttles to the track. If you ever go to a race, be prepared to wait in lines. For hours. Everywhere.

We spotted the track from the bus!

This guy made the most amazing hat that I have ever seen.

The race was held at the Circuit of the Americas, a race track specifically made for Formula One’s return to the United States (the first track specifically made for F1 in the US). It was designed by Hermann Tilke, who has held a monopoly in designing new tracks for F1 for over a decade.

The observation tower was designed by Miró Rivera Architects. The views from it are supposed to be amazing. We didn’t go up because it costs $35 for 10 minutes at the top. o.O

Medical Helicopter. The number of life threatening and fatal accidents in F1 has gone down dramatically but you can never be too safe.

The race control car. Not as cool as the Mercedes-Benz SLS Safety Car.

F1 cars are fast. It is really hard to catch them without good timing or great camera equipment. Here is the nose of Felipe Massa‘s Ferrari F2012. Until recently, Felipe was my favorite driver. He narrowly lost the championship to Lewis Hamilton in 2008 by 1 point. He was injured at the 2009 Hungarian Grand Prix when debris from fellow Brazilian Rubens Barichello‘s car hit him in the head. Even though he recovered and returned to F1, he hasn’t been as successful ever since.

The track had plenty of normal event food like hot dogs and burgers, but there were a few local food trucks. I hope they have more next year. I hear great things about the food trucks in Austin.

I wonder how it feels to be a race photographer. On one hand, lugging around heavy equipment probably sucks. On the other, getting exclusive access must yield some great shots.

Earplugs are a must bring for F1 races. The loud, high pitched whine of the F1 engines isn’t deafening, but is too loud to stand for long periods of time.

Massa! I was lucky to get this shot.

The view of the turn 9 bleachers and general admission areas from our seats at turn 6.

We originally wanted to get the general admission tickets so that we could picnic on the grass, but the tickets sold out quickly. We ended up getting tickets on the bleachers.

The view from my seat.

Even though Ferrari fans were the most common, we saw plenty of support for Red Bull, McLaren and Lotus.

F1 races aren’t limited to just one race on one day. They are actually 3 day long affairs. The first two days are filled with practice sessions and races from other series. The F1 race is only at the end of the last day. Here is a 458 Italia from the Ferrari Challenge, a race series that allows Ferrari customers to race their cars in a one make stock car series.

There was also a leg of the IMSA GT3 Cup Challenge held during the weekend. I got a few shots of the Porsches, but they didn’t come out well. :/

Here are the cars of the Historic Grand Prix, a fun race limited to vintage F1 cars of different eras. First is the 1981 Arrows A3.

1983 Williams FW08C

1974 Brabham BT-44

One of the famous Tyrell P34 6-wheeled cars. They were perhaps the most radical cars to ever appear in F1.

1974 March 741

The famous 1978 Lotus 79. It was the first car to take full advantage of ground effects. Mario Andretti won five out of eleven races in 1978 in his Lotus 79 and went on to win the world championship that year.

1982 March 821. A lot of people love the blue and orange gulf oil livery, but one of my personal favorites is the white, blue and red Rothmans livery. It looked exceptional on the Group C Porsches like the 956.

The beautiful 1969 Ferrari 312.

The Historic Grand Prix was a great sight. It was great to see cars spanning 3 decades all racing together.

Check back in a few days for part 2 of this post!

Yet another post from a long time ago. This time it is Halloween 2012. One of the main reasons Caroline came to California when she did was to celebrate Halloween with me.

Me and Caroline. Caroline spent a long time making her costume (including sewing her own skirts), a Victorian era themed black widow. I spent a little less time.

Me and Shrews. We are Birds With Arms.

Mark was the scariest.

Paul was a waiter? John was pretty much a Filipino Psy.

Group Shot.

A Shrews shot.

A ghost!

My has it been a long time since my last post. I have yet another from when Caroline visited last year. This is about our date in San Francisco, specifically our dinner at Michelin two star restaurant Benu.

Before dinner, we spent some time in the Exploratorium, including the Tactile Dome. Unfortunately, I was so captivated by the exhibits that I only took one picture while inside.

After some time in the museum, we drove to SoMA.

Since Caroline rarely drinks and I was driving, we started dinner with some Vignette Wine Country Soda. The soda is made from the same grapes that many popular local wines are made from. It was simple, light and refreshing. I highly recommend it as a non-alcoholic alternative to wine at a dinner party.

When we first sat down at our places, we noticed these black objects that were placed inside the folded napkins on the table. We wondered what they were until our first course came, when we found out that they are just rests for our utensils.

The Amuse-bouche: fresh made tofu with dashi shoyu.

As an appetizer, Caroline had the soft poached duck egg, sausage, smoked cracklings, alliums and black truffle bun.

I hade the abalone grenobloise with cauliflower. A sea snail prepared in a traditional French brown butter sauce.

Next came the starches. Caroline ordered the snail shell pasta made with fermented black bean, caramelized clam jus and cilantro. The flavor of the pasta was so clear and memorable that I can still clearly remember the taste and texture.

I had the matsutake mushroom porridge with pine nuts and sesame. The porridge really focused on the mushroom. It wasn’t overly seasoned, allowing us to fully experience the depth of flavor in the mushroom.

We both chose seafood for our protein. Caroline’s was the whole sea bass, sauerbrussels, salsify, chestnut, pomegranate and ginger.

Mine was the bigfin squid, sablefish, lion’s mane mushroom, broccoli, lily bulb, walnut and yuzu. I liked that every ingredient was placed separately on the dish. It allowed me to try different combinations while eating.

Dessert was perhaps the most fascinating course. We ordered the pear custard, chamomile, buttermilk and pound cake. Take a good look at it. You can probably spot little balls of asian pear, spots of buttermilk, the custard and the most startling ingredient: an almost flawless, clear square of sugar candy.

Lastly, our server arrived with a wooden block that split in half to reveal petits fours sitting atop platforms.

Our dinner could only be described as an experience. The ingredients and their preparation intrigued us while indulging our appetites. Benu certainly isn’t a traditional restaurant in any sense. The staff and patrons are all much younger than at other Michelin star restaurants I have been to. Even though the ingredients themselves may not have been that exotic, their preparations were far from classical. Eating at Benu made me realize the scale of everything I don’t yet understand about food.

I’d certainly recommend Benu, but only for those with more developed palates. If you go, prepare to be surprised.

During the course of the week that Caroline was here last year, we assembled the Bright Bunny kit from SparkFun. I picked it because it combines both electronics (my hobby) and crafts (Caroline’s).

The kit starts with a small circuit board that you solder some components to. The most important component is the black rectangular thing. It’s a reed switch that closes the loop between a battery and an LED when a magnet is close by.

The soldering was really simple. We finished it in a few minutes.

However, the sewing took a long time.

We placed the circuit board with the reed switch inside the body of the rabbit and the magnet inside the carrot. As you can see, the rabbit’s tummy lights up when the carrot comes close to it.

We named him Sandy Cat. Caroline chose the name Cat. We decided to also name him Sandy after the hurricane (that Caroline narrowly missed on her way to California). Sandy Cat now lives happily with Caroline in New York.