Make You Smile & Think: January 2012

Life in the Bus

t turns out that the bus can not only move, but it is possible to live! So, for example, does the young American family.

After the wedding, Mike and Natalie Young decided to travel on their own bus, which concurrently serves them domom.U bus even has a name - Rosie. Now an amazing bus-house stands in the courtyard of a family of friends in Austin, but he was soon to leave for Washington. Family accompanies a good friend Atlas - dog, whom they rescued not so long ago.

Curtains on magnets attached to the roof, away from prying eyes closed bedroom.

On the bus home, a cozy atmosphere created by natural light from multiple windows.

Bus on the move, and it can go anywhere.

Atlas thrive in such a house.

Young couple has no plans to move into a house or apartment, they are quite satisfied with housing on wheels.

Kodeeswaran

Capturing history -India's past

In pictures: India Then

The daughter of an Indian maharajah seated on a panther she shot, sometime during 1920s. This picture and the others in this series appear in a new book, 'India Then and Now', by Vir Sanghvi and Rudrangshu Mukherjee, Roli Books, India. Pictures courtesy: Roli Books.

	A throwback from the Raj: A British man gets a pedicure from an Indian servant.

	The Grand Trunk Road, built by Sher Shah Suri, was the main trade route from Calcutta to Kabul. Here, transport leaves Ambala for Delhi.

A group of dancing girls. Dancing or nautch girls began performing at courts around 1830. They were known for their elaborate costumes and jewellery.

A rare aerial view of the president's palace and the parliament building in Delhi, both designed by architects Edwin Lutyens and Herbert Baker.

Women gather at a party in Mumbai (Bombay) in 1910, a sign that women were very much part of the social scene in many respects.

A group from Vaishnava, a sect founded by a Hindu mystic. His followers are called Gosvami-maharajahs and own several temples.

An aerial view of Jama Masjid mosque in Delhi, built between 1650 and 1658 by the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan.

The Imperial Airways 'Hanno' Hadley Page passenger airplane carries the England to India air mail, stopping in Sharjah to refuel.

Nannavan Chalakkudi...

Unusual Deserts

Kilometers of sand, rocks, sandbanks, and sceneries evoking lunar landscapes are all about a journey in a desert and are certainly, a unique adventure. All the deserts are not the same. Here are the most unusual deserts of the world.

01. A Desert With Lagoons - Lencois Maranhenses, Brasil

Amazingly stretched in Brazil, it is almost impossible to believe that the desert where water has no word is full of lagoons. Situated in the State of Maranhao on the north shore, this desert is in the Lencois Maranhenses National Park where white dunes and blue lagoons have a contrasting match.

Fascinating Facts about US Military

The United States spends more on its military than rest of the top 15 nations with the highest military expenditure. The rest of the list includes China ($119 bn), UK ($59.6 bn), France ($59.3bn), Russia ($58.7bn), Japan ($54.5bn), Germany ($45.2bn), Saudi Arabia ($45.2bn), India ($41.3bn), Italy ($37bn), Brazil ($33.5bn), South Korea ($27.6bn), Australia ($24bn), Canada ($22.8bn) and Turkey ($17.5bn). The US spends $698 billion. (Figures courtesy Stockholm International Peace Research Institute).

The total known land area occupied by US bases and facilities is 15,654 square miles — bigger than Washington DC, Massachusetts, and New Jersey combined.