Python for Beginners | Chapter 8 | Conditions Explained

In this chapter we will learn how condition statements work in python. 

If you are new in here, you may want to start from the beginning by following the playlist at 

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEBST-qOOwm5us9jjYIUcOW-gZBmafdj1

The Latest Technology Trends: Virtual and Augmented Reality, Artificial Intelligence, 5G and IoT, Blockchain

Technology is advancing at an unprecedented rate, and it's important for businesses, individuals, and society as a whole to stay informed about the latest trends. In this article, we'll take a closer look at some of the most significant technology trends that are shaping the future of our world. 

Virtual and augmented reality (VR and AR) have been around for a while, but they are now starting to gain traction in various industries. VR immerses users in a completely computer-generated environment, while AR superimposes digital information onto the real world. Both technologies have the potential to revolutionize industries such as gaming, education, and healthcare. For example, VR can be used to create realistic simulations for training purposes, while AR can be used to provide real-time information overlay in the field of medicine. However, the VR and AR industry is still in its infancy and there are some challenges that need to be overcome before it can be widely adopted, such as the high cost of VR headsets and the lack of standardization. 

Artificial intelligence (AI) is another technology trend that is gaining a lot of attention. AI refers to the simulation of human intelligence in machines. It includes subfields such as machine learning, natural language processing, and computer vision. AI is being used in a wide range of industries, from finance to transportation to healthcare. For example, AI is used in fraud detection in the banking sector and in self-driving cars. However, it also raises ethical concerns such as job displacement and privacy invasion. 

5G and the Internet of Things (IoT) are two more technology trends that are poised to have a significant impact on our lives. 5G is the fifth generation of mobile technology and it's faster, more reliable, and has a lower latency than 4G. It will enable a wide range of new use cases such as telemedicine and smart cities. IoT refers to the connection of devices and machines over the internet. It allows devices to communicate with each other and with the cloud, which enables new applications such as smart homes and predictive maintenance. 

Finally, blockchain is a technology trend that is gaining a lot of attention in recent years. Blockchain is a decentralized, digital ledger that can be used to record transactions across a network of computers. It is best known as the technology behind cryptocurrencies, but it has potential applications in other areas as well, such as finance, supply chain management, and voting systems. However, the adoption of blockchain technology is still in its early stages, and it faces challenges such as scalability and regulatory uncertainty. 

In conclusion, these are just a few of the technology trends that are shaping the future of our world. From virtual and augmented reality to artificial intelligence, 5G and IoT, and blockchain, these technologies are poised to have a significant impact on society and the economy. It's important to stay informed about these trends so that you can take advantage of the opportunities they present and mitigate the risks.

Course Outline for Python Beginner course

 Before learning a course, knowing the course outline will prepare you with high level concepts that you are going to learn. In this post, you are going to see the key chapter outlines you will find in many Python beginner courses. These may not be exact chapter names and also some courses may have some additions or omissions on these. But this should give you fairly a good idea on what you'll be learning. 

Chapter 1: Introduction to Python

• What is Python?
• Why use Python?
• How to install and set up Python
• Basic syntax and data types

Chapter 2: Variables and Data Types

• Understanding variables
• Basic data types (numbers, strings, lists, etc.)
• Typecasting
• Basic math operations

Chapter 3: Control Flow

• If-else statements
• For and while loops
• Break and continue statements

Chapter 4: Functions

• Defining and calling functions
• Parameters and arguments
• Return statement
• Scope of variables

Chapter 5: Modules and Packages

• Importing modules
• Creating and using packages
• Standard library modules

Chapter 6: File I/O

• Opening and reading files
• Writing to files
• Working with CSV and JSON files

Chapter 7: Exception Handling

• Understanding exceptions
• Try-except-else-finally block
• Raising exceptions

Chapter 8: Object-Oriented Programming

• Classes and objects
• Constructors and destructors
• Inheritance and polymorphism

Chapter 9: Advanced Topics

• Decorators
• Generators
• Lambda functions
• List comprehensions

Chapter 10: Project Development

• Planning and organizing a project
• Debugging and testing
• Deployment and distribution

Note: The above course is a brief introduction to Python language and its features. The chapters are designed to give an overview of the concepts and not a deep dive. The actual course would be much more detailed and would include examples and exercises for each chapter, and it would be run for a longer time for the students to practice and master the concepts. 

Python for Beginners - Learn Python Without IDE - 2 (Variables)

 Python beginner tutorial encourages you to learn by doing. Follow along this Python course to get started. This is Part 2 of the python full course for beginners which just gets you started by showing how to install python on your machine and write your very first program. Subsequent parts will follow shortly.

I have chosen not to use any python specific IDE (Integrated Development Environment) in this course. IDEs tend to do lots of autocomplete which hinders learning. As you get familiar with python basics, programming concepts and get comfortable writing python programs without an IDE, you will find IDEs more productive later. As a python beginner, start from the scratch. I value all feedbacks. If you liked this method of teaching or have any constructive criticism, please share that in the comments. Please subscribe to be notified of the next part of the course.

TABLE OF CONTENTS 0:00:00 Sample Programs for Mathematical operations 0:01:53 Command Prompt Tip 0:02:14 Program Data and Useful Output 0:02:43 Handling Multi-step processing and Hard-coding Elimination 0:03:08 Need for a Placeholder 0:03:39 What is a Variable? 0:03:48 Sample Programs Using Variables 0:06:35 Math operations using Variables 0:07:44 Sting concatenation using Variables 0:08:47 One last math operation Variables - Division with Decimal

Transcript:

Let us create a program that can do some mathematical operations. For that I'm going back to my folder where I was creating my Python Programs. And I will create a new program in notepad. So, I'll open notepad and I'll give a name math.py. Python programs will have an extension of dot py. So let me open this and I'll make use of the same function which is print and as mentioned before if you are calling a function, it needs to be followed by a parenthesis. The last time, we gave a string as an argument. The string was "hello world". This time we are not going to be passing a string argument. Rather, we are going to pass a numeric argument. So let us try giving a number like 3. And let us see if the print function will be able to print a number. Let's save this and exit out of here. And let us execute this program. python math.py . It was able to print out number 3. So now let's open notepad again and what if instead of printing this number, I did some math operation like an addition. Let's try it. python ... and pass the program name which is... math.py and we got our result which is 7. Going back to our program, what if I did a subtraction; say 3 minus 4. Again execute the program, I got a -1. How about division? What if I gave 16/2? Let's execute the program. If you are not very familiar with the command prompt, doing a up arrow or down arrow will bring back your previous commands that you typed. So, I'm not retyping these things. I'm just using the up arrow to bring back my previous commands. Ok, I'm going to execute this program. so we got 8.0 which is correct. So, a program consumes data, does some processing on it and creates a more useful output. In our examples, the data for our programs were hardcoded directly in the programs. However, in real world applications, the data comes from outside of the program. The data could come from an user input, or it could be coming from internet, or it could come from any external devices. Or it could very well be a file on your system. The operations performed on the data is not a simple addition of number. Data typically undergoes complex set of operations to produce the desired output. The output of the data processed in the first step is passed on to the second step and the output from the 2nd step will be passed on to the 3rd step and so on. It so appears, that the program needs some place holder to store these intermediate results from one step so that it can pass them on to the next step. To rerun our program with different set of inputs, we need to avoid hard-codings in the program. Again, we need a place holder that can source the input data from the outside world and pass on to the operational steps. This place holder is called a Variable. Variable is just a name given to a piece of memory that can be used as a temporary place holder for your data. Let us create a new program where we can make use of a variable. So, let me name this program variable.py. How do I define a variable ? It is very simple in python. Unlike other languages, where you need to first declare a variable and then make use of it later, in python you can create a variable and directly assign a value. For example, I can create a variable like welcomeString. And I can assign it to a value like "Hello World". Or I can put like a = 2 , b = 3 . All these are variables. welcomeString is a variable. and you assigned a value "Hello World". Here a is again is a variable and we assigned a value 2. b we assigned a value 3. b is a variable. Similarly you can define c and you can give a decimal value like 8.4. c is a variable again. Now that we have assigned a value to a variable, let us print them out. print ... And how do I print the value in a variable? In the argument of the print function, you just give the variable name. welcomeString. And I want to print the values, the variables a, b and c hold as well. So, let me print them up by providing the variable names within the parenthesis of the print function. print(a)... print(b) ...print(c). Ok, let's save this and execute it. python variable.py. We can see that we were able to print the value those variables were holding. Let us do something more with the variables. So far we have just printed the values of the variables. Now let us try doing some mathematical operations with these variables. In the last example, we added numbers like 3 and 4 by directly using the values but here we are going to make use of the variables that hold these values. So instead of just adding the 2 numbers, here let us add the variables like b and c. How about we assign the sum of these 2 variables to another variable say d ? d = b + c. It is not just enough that we assign the sum of b and c to d, but also to print it out. So let us print(d). So, let's see if this works. As you can see, we added the variables that contain the value 3 and 8.4 and we got the result of d which is now 11.4 (that is the sum of 8.4 and 3) . Let's go back to our program. How about some string functions? So, we know we have a variable called, welcomeString that holds the value 'Hello World'. How about we add one more variable: name and let it have the value 'Shan' . And now we want to concatenate these 2 strings. 'Hello World' and 'Shan' . How do we do that? Let us define another string: newString and let us try using the same plus operator and see if the concatenation works. welcomeSting + name and let us print this newString. Hope you are able to follow this. Let us execute this program. It was able to concatenate "Hello World" and "Shan" together. Let us go back to our program. Let us define another variable e which can be a division of b and c. b divided by c. the value of b is 3. the value of c is 8.4 . so 3 by 8.4 . Let's see what the answer is. It is 0.35. So we got our value here.

Python for Beginners - Learn Python Now Without IDE

Python Tutorial for beginners encourages you to learn by doing. Follow along this Python course to get started. This is Part 1 of the python full course for beginners which just gets you started by showing how to install python on your machine and write your very first program. Subsequent parts will follow shortly. I have chosen not to use any python specific IDE (Integrated Development Environment) in this course. IDEs tend to do lots of autocomplete which hinders learning. As you get familiar with python basics, programming concepts and get comfortable writing python programs without an IDE, you will find IDEs more productive later. As a python beginner, start from the scratch. I value all feedbacks. If you liked this method of teaching or have any constructive criticism, please share that in the comments. Please subscribe to be notified of the next part of the course.

 Welcome to the Beginner Series in learning Python. Learning Python will be one of the best decisions you have ever made. Python is a very powerful, yet simple to use programming language. You can create solutions to very complex problems with very few lines of code. Also the syntax of python is very readable and it is easier to maintain. Many top companies use Python because it improves their productivity. It is also a very portable language, meaning you can deploy it easily in multiple platforms like Windows, Linux, Mac or any of the mobile devices. For all these reasons, python is one of the most popular programming languages in the world. Without further ado, let's get started. The first step to learning python is to have a python environment where you can write and execute your python code. This environment can be in your laptop or your computer or it can be online. I recommend you setting it up on your machine first where you can write and execute your code. 

Below is my free course on python. Enjoy!

#pythonBeginner 

Installing Raspberry Pi from Canakit

 Raspberry Pi is a wonderful mini computer that consumes less power and can be a very powerful machine for a variety of projects like running your own vpn server or running a web server, media server or game server. Raspberry Pi has become more and more powerful over the years. It is extremely tiny making it very portable. We will see how to setup a Raspberry Pi device. I bought mine from Canakit. 

After burning my first Pi after heavily loading it with accessories, I decided to be a bit careful on my 2nd device. On my first Pi, I had only bought the board and I used my own power cord. This time I bought all the necessary accessaries from Canakit, including pre-installed Raspian OS, a case, heat sink, a fan and a power cord. 

Mine is a 8 GB Ram and I got a 128 GB sd card which comes with pre-installed Raspian OS. It was very easy to install the Raspberry pi board on to the case. Also installing the fans, heat sinks and connecting with the power cord was super easy. 

Below is a video demonstrating the setup. 

Kansas City Zoo - Review

 A few days back we had gone to the Kansas City Zoo, a trip that was very worthy of our time and money. 

My 4 year old enjoyed identifying all the animals she had seen on her books and Tv. This zoo is bigger than the Topeka zoo and even the St. Louis zoo. It is 202 acres in size and houses around 1700 animals; so you can plan your entire day for this zoo. 

I was really surprised to see some Polar Bear, Jelly Fish and Penguins in this zoo. However Polar bear wouldn't be bleach-white you would have seen on movies. I had thought Polar bears can live only in the Arctic and the Penguins can live only in the Antarctic. Kansas City Zoo proved it can live anywhere with the right temperature settings. 

The Penguins were in a temperature controlled glass rooms which had both snow in one section and a large swimming area in the other. 

I hadn't seen a Jelly fish so up close before, so it was a visual treat.

                                       

 The Sea Lions demonstrated some acrobatics while the their coach narrated their life story. See video below

The zoo is divided into sections where it houses animals from different geographical locations. Australia and Africa the popular ones. You can either walk across the zoo or use one of their trams. We bought a platinum pass that gave access to their African Tram, African Sky Safari, Carousel of Endangered Species, KC Zoo Railroad and the Kenyan Cruise.

African Sky Safari:

View of the Zebras from Sky Safari

Feeding the Goats in Kansas City Zoo

The Tiger:

You can buy tickets online for both admission and the rides on kansas city zoo website - https://www.kansascityzoo.org/

8 Reasons Why You Should Learn Python?

Here are 8 reasons why you should consider leaning Python irrespective of whether you have programming background of not. 

1. Language of the future:

You have heard the name of this programming language not just because it is a hot cake today,  but it will be for years to come.  Artificial intelligence and machine learning programs are written on python as it is easy to develop with and readable. So you will be learning a technology that will be in use for years to come.

 

2. Great career opportunities:

Many top companies use python and are in the constant lookout for people with python among other skills.  Knowing this language increases your probability to get selected in these companies. 

3. Quickly develop POCs:

Even if your company doesn't use python,  you can still use it to quickly develop proof of concepts to ensure your algorithm will work. 

4. Automate your manual tasks:

Often you will come across manual tasks that are repetitive in nature eating much of your time. Having knowledge in python will enable you to quickly automate those tasks and save your much valued time. 

5. Easily portable:

Develop your software and package it in one machine and deploy in any machine and you can expect it to work the same way in all machines.

6. Easy to learn:

Python is one of the easiest languages to learn.  It is simple and very readable.

7. Powerful: 

Python is a very powerful language meaning you can achieve complex tasks with very few lines of code.  This is achieved with many libraries that can be easily imported in your code. 

8. Easy to maintain:

Maintenence is one important aspect to consider when choosing any technology. While the developer may know how the code works, the support personnel should find it easy to maintain it and add functionalities. Since the number of lines of code in python is typically lesser and the code is very readable,  it makes it easier to understand what the program does and how it works. 

Review of our stay in "The Westin Hotel at Crown Center" in Kansas City

 We made a last minute plan before memorial day to visit Kansas City Zoo and stay overnight in kansas city and visit places in Crown Center area. 

The zoo is really around 1 hour 15 minutes from Topeka. Hence this stay wasn't really necessary but thought it might be very tiring after a day's visit in the zoo. Also, since we planned to explore areas near Crown Center, we thought it may be better to stay nearby. 

We explored hotels very close to Crown Center and we came across 'The Westin Hotel'  which was within the Crown Center itself. 

Having worked for Hallmark Card as our client a decade back, I knew the Crown Center may be something my 4 year kid might enjoy. 

The hotel was very pricey around 300+ USD (incl. of taxes) per day, partly may be because we chose hotel last minute. We wanted to see what experience this pricey hotel might provide us. 

For one, it was the best location - right within the Crown Center, you can walk to any attraction within Crown Center area. The best of all, you can use 'The Link' which is a climate controlled Glass bridge running across the streets connecting different buildings in the Crown Center area. The Crown Center itself is a mall. Right across the street you have Lego Land and Sea Life which the children will enjoy. 

You can also walk to Union Station via 'The Link' where you have 'Science City' and Planetarium.

The view from our hotel was great. You could see the War memorial from there. 

The next is cleanliness. The hotel, its corridors, the room the bath - everything was impeccable. So, the hotel scores in that. 

However, we didn't like the below aspects. There was no microwave oven in the hotel. For this price, I would have expected it to have provided a hotel with microwave. I should have checked what facilities were available at the time of booking. But since I was booking at last minute, I didn't really research much upfront. I just assumed these things are a given, especially when charged a 300 usd. 

Second, the parking. It is not free. So far in the hotels we had stayed so far, we never had to pay for a parking. Here Parking is extra - $14 per day. I just think that is unreasonable to charge hotel guest for parking. 

The unbelievable part was that there was no free WIFI either. You needed to be in some paid membership to get a free wifi or pay like $20 for some limited data. If video streaming or calls are going to be used, that is still extra. What world they are in - charging for the internet in a hotel?

Not all the rooms provide complimentary breakfast. Ours had. The ones didn't have also weren't like cheap rooms or anything. they are also above 220 USD/day. On our day, the dining room was just blocked for some 'special people'. So, it meant, we could grab the breakfast from there but had to bring it to the adjacent dining area supposedly meant for Starbucks. There weren't much options in food for us. We had some scrambled eggs and a bread. 

For dinner, we bought aVeggie Cheese Pizza from Spin Pizza (within the Crown Center) which was good. 

If you just want to be within Crown Center and want a super clean room, you can consider this hotel but it is very pricey for the facilities it provides. If you get a deal on the price, you can definitely check this out. but note you still need to pay for parking and internet and don't have an option to microwave. 

Question for the day: What flower is this?

 Identity the plant.  Leave a comment. 

Answer: This is the onion plant when it flowers. The green part is called the green onions.

Topeka Public Library

I have been interested in libraries since college days. I wouldn't say I read a lots of books, but I did take the time to enjoy reading select technical books especially those of foreign authors. Now while in a foreign country it was just natural to explore the library here. Topeka, capital of Kansas state, USA boasts a wonderful library. 

Topeka public library is more than just lending books. They are about developing communities. They have lots of programs that encourage kids and adults to visit the library, read books, learn a skill and even help them do a project. 

If you don't have the time to read books in the library, you can borrow a generous number of books for a generous number of days and they do automatic renewals a number of times if you missed to return it or renew by yourself. They even let you order the books online and you can just pick them up at the parking lot where they deliver your books at your car though I don't endorse that. The best you can do for yourself and your library is by visiting it and making use of the various resources they have for you and your kids. 

Not interested in books, rather prefer watching a movie? no worries. The library has a section dedicated for movies. Not just a handful of movies for namesake. they have an huge collection of movies in various genres. If you aren't just keen on the the movie released last week, i don't know why anyone should buy or rent a movie outside. They have international movie section also and I have seen many Indian movies too including Tamil movies of Manirathnam, Dhanush, Rajnikanth and more. You have a good collection of all famous TV series. 

You still don't have the time to visit the library or drive to the library for a pickup? they can deliver it at your neighborhood. The mobile library of theirs have scheduled visits to all the neighborhoods in Topeka and people can order online and get it delivered closer to home. they can return the books at multiple drop boxes near your neighborhood. 

The library also has conference rooms equipped with TV screens and computers. If you want to meet as a team, these are best places to block some time and work on a project. The digital collection of the libraries are enormous too. you can browse them online via Hoopla or OneDrive or use one of their many computers on the premises. 

They also have a makerspace where you can do 3d printing or build your electronic project. Interested in arts, they have a section for various art forms not only equipped with books, but actual kits that you can take home and try out. Interested in learning knitting? Borrow their knitting kit which comes with the needles, instructions and some consumables like the threads (which you don't have to return). Interested in learning to bake? they have a kit for that too? Want to 3D print your project? They got it. they have regular 2d printers as well if you want to take a print of your documents and don't have a printer at home. 

Need a notary signature? Topeka library provides that for free whereas UPS or anywhere else the charge is 30 dollars +. 

They have a complete wing dedicated for kids. The library staff are extremely friendly and make sure you and your kids have a great time in the library. My 3 year old Varnikaa enjoys the kids section. This section has lots of books for kids of various ages. Your kids have seen Sesame street or Peppa Pig on Tv?, they got books on all that. They have a school bus setting in one spot which has some more books. You can also get some play kits which you can borrow and those have lots of consumables that you don't have to return (like finger puppets). There is an aquarium which Varnikaa loves very much. A huge dinosaur and some planets hanging from the roof. There is a small slide and some numbered mats to jump. She loves them all. 

The library serves the community in a way I haven't see any other library does (at least in India). The least you could do to support their efforts is to make use of them. Read a book, bring your kid to play in the kids play area, rent a movie, do a project, learn a skill or teach something you know. 

Last but not the least..were you paying to visit the zoo or the Children Discovery Center in Topeka. I recently learnt that you didn't have to if you were referred by the library. The library can give you a 'passport' which you can use at the zoo or the discovery center and get admitted free of charge. 

Aren't libraries like a temple in a way? They are quiet places - you can cut off from all distractions around you and do some peaceful time for yourself! 

Here is a video of the automated book return inside the library. 

Happy new Year

Wishing all my readers a happy new year! My resolution is to complete writing a book this year. What is yours? Leave a comment!

The Best thing to Have when moving things up/down the stairs

Moving has always been stressful no matter how well it is planned. It exerts strain both physically and mentally. Before my recent move, I decided to sit down and list down things that make move stressful. One of the things was moving things up and down the stairs. once you box things, you need to lift those heavy boxes down your apartment to the truck. I have seen big stores like walmark using what they call a hand truck or dolly to move things around their stores. But here the challenge is to move things down the stairs. Could some one have something invented to ease that process? Again Google and Amazon came up the answer. The answer was 'Stair Climber'. This is a simple yet very innovative hand truck to moving things up and down the stairs. I did extensive research on some of the stair climbers out there. Each had its own merits and demerits and fundamentally each of these devices had what you call a 'tri-wheel' structure instead of a single wheel which gives the device the ability to climb up and down the stairs. The tri-wheel structure is a set of 3 wheels mounted together on a single axis separated 120 degrees apart. As they climb up and down the stairs, the 'three-wheel' assembly rotates and the next wheel in the assembly get in touch with the stair below and facilitates a downward motion. Below is a video of how I used this 'Stair Climber' to move things down the stairs. This stair climber are also called Stair climbing Hand Truck or stair climbing dolly. Here is the amazon affiliate link for the product I bought. There are similar products available in the market. do your own research. https://amzn.to/3G0Ko81

The Dream World

It has been 2 years since we did the shoot for our short film. Started with a different story, but evolved into its current form, we are excited to finally launch it. Join with our actors during the premier of the movie on 1-Aug-2021 at 10 a.m CST/8.30 p.m IST. 

Watch the movie in youtube with the link below 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0XHhMTmVLI 

or the embedded video here. 

How to Clean Your KeyBoard

Keyboards with use can easily gather dust under its keys. It is important we clean this from time to time. 

once you get to see the dirt beneath it, you will wonder how you have been even placing your fingers on the keyboard so far. 

Below is a step by step process on how to clean your keyboard!

International travel during the Pandemic - Points to Consider

 I recently had to travel from US to India urgently. Below are my experiences as on late September 2020. 

Processes are constantly changing all around the world, so take this as an information or just a read that might be useful and refer to the latest news and airport information for up to date processes. 

India was providing special flights (Vande Bharath) to bring people from US to India. they had tie ups with United and Air India. 

I was to travel from Jacksonville, Flordia, US  to my native in Cuddalore in the state of Tamil Nadu (India). 

The best option I had was a 38 hour journey across 4 flights

Jacksonville to Washington (United)

Washington to Newark (United)

Newark to Delhi (United)

Delhi to Chennai (Air India)

I had a 12+ hours of wait time in Delhi overnight. 

Better to arrive at the airport well in time even if the first leg is domestic. i arrived at least 2.5 hours earlier than my departure in Jacksonvill which was at 2.30 p.m

when I reached Newark,

 I went to the gate and we were asked to stand in a queue and one of them took the temperate and was verifying if we downloaded the 'Arokya Setu' mobile app which is for contact tracing and they also wanted us to show our browser history to let them know that we have submitted the online form 'Self Reporting Form'. they said these are mandated by the Indian government. 

i didn't know about these and downloaded the app right there. Within the delhi airport website they had the 'Self reporting form' which I filled and submitted online. you get a SR# which I noted down to later download the submitted form on my phone. i thought I'll use it as a proof when someone asks for it in Newark but they didn't check again. 

I was also given Personal Protection Equipments (PPE) like the face shield and a full gown free of charge. 

This is the food given in the United flight from Newark to Delhi. 

The naan like thing was very soft and good. 

While on the flight, the airhostess asked if we needed some forms. I asked them if it is the same 'Self Reporting Form' i had submitted online. they said yes but also mentioned that i might still want to have that form. How right were they. 

At the Delhi airport, it gets a bit tougher as no one speaks much of English and they always respond in Hindi which i wasn't familiar. 

there were multiple queues and you need to ask everytime what they were for. mostly people in the queue will not know why there were standing either. they just follow the crowd. 

The first queue they asked if I had the Self reporting form. they accepted both hard copy or soft copy. i showed them the soft copy of the self reporting form i had downloaded on my phone. 

one of the queues, I learnt was people who were needing an exception. they had to have an exemption form. In the Delhi airport website, along with self reporting form, there was one more 'exemption form' which could be filled if we needed an exemption from Covid testing and quarantine. 

The reason for exemption was that either you are pregnant, or seriously ill, sudden death or you already got tested in the last 96 hours. 

So I wasn't pregnant or seriously ill and i was very much alive and that i haven't tested ever i didn't fill the exemption form and i skipped that queue. 

Then there were long queues for Immigration and Customs. while halfway through the Customs queue, i saw a money exchange counter. I thought i might need some Indian money in Chennai and so told the guy behind me that I'll join him back shortly. I stepped out of the queue to the counter where there were 2 queues and my bad one rogue guy just pushed his way in before to the front and was trying to change his foreign currency to Rupees. Since he was talking in Hindi, i couldn't fully follow the conversation but he was arguing with the guy at the counter that he should be given more money. the guy at the counter was explaining that he doesn't decide on the amount and the exchange rates are published on the LCD monitor above. He could either accept that or move. but that guy wouldn't just leave. he argued that he had to go till Surat and how could not manage with the money he would be given. people in the queue were getting annoyed as he took a good 15 minutes  before the guy at the counter stopped talking to him and started processing mine. That guy wouldn't still leave and stand right there. i changed my 200 dollars - got close to Rs. 13,000 which i thought was sufficient for any unforeseen expenses. 

by then the guy who was behind me in the Customs queue had gone past the customs check. so i couldn't join back there. i stood at the tail end of the queue - that long tail that made many shapes along its path. 

i wasn't worried as i thought i had enough time 12+ hours for my next flight and i was in no hurry. how wrong.

After going past customs, there was another spot where it was all crowded and took a while to figure out that it was actually a queue. I asked the jawans there, that I had a connecting flight to Chennai and where should i be standing. they said they have 2 options for anyone coming to the airport. either self-paid quarantine in Delhi or pay Rs. 5000 and do the Covid test and board the connecting flight. 

i said I'll get the Covid test. I initially thought we have to give the test and travel to Chennai and when the test results are ready they would communicate to me via mobile or mail. but as i stood in the queue i learnt that we have to wait for the result and only if negative they'll let us take the connecting flight. 

and the wait time for the result was 6 hours. i was standing in the queue at 11 p.m and 6 hour wait time still sounded okay for my 10 a.m connecting flight the next morning. instead of waiting alone for the connecting flight, it was better to wait in some queu with many folks. i started to sense a problem only when i realized that the queue was barely moving. after an hour's wait, the queue moved by 3 feet, and there was at least 30 more feet visible to me. 

it wasn't clear if the testing was being done at the far end of where i could see or if we have to go elsewhere from there. i checked with some officers who were sitting idly and chatting saying that i had a connecting flight at 10 a.m and if they could prioritize folks based on the timings of their connecting flights. i knew some of the folks standing before me didn't have any connecting flight at all and are Delhi based folks. The officer didn't want to do any work of that sort. he said there is just one queue for all and it is the process. after 2 more hours of wait i checked with few other Jawans they all said that they could do nothing and that the officer to whom i had spoken earlier can do any change or prioritization. i spoke to that guy again and he didn't care about my connecting flights. 

At around 2.30 a.m, i was standing at the front and the guy asked if i had the hard copy of the 'self reporting form'. Luckily i had the form given on the flight filled and i gave it to him. There were 6 folks sitting there and most of them were sitting idle. there was no longer a queue at that point as folks were crowding around each of those folks. there is no clear communication of what needs to be done in what order. they collected the passport from me and let me go not telling what to do next. when i saw some people having a small form on their hand i asked them what it was and they said when i hand over the passport,they would give it to us to fill. that form had details on what my passport number was and so on. so i had to ask for that form again from that person. all the 6 people's job was to collect the passport take a copy of the passport. they don't hand over the passport at that time. you get it only after getting the test results.  they just had one printer and so there was no real use for some 3 to 4 folks there as the printer was with just one person and the pass port collection was done by one other person occasionally done by one other person too. the small form was still with one person only. they knew how to create bottlenecks. At least one of them could have walked down the queue and handed over these forms well in advance instead of people having to wait there. 

after they printed a copy of the passport, they handed it over to me and collected the small form from me. they could have simply had a mobile app to scan the passport pages for people on queues and really avoid these bottlenecks with printing out a copy of these passport. i asked them what is the next step and they said to just wait there in the lounge and that we would be called. i waited there for some 10 minutes and i suspected something wasn't right as many folks who were there before me were missing there. i explored what was beyond that lounge and i found an elevator to the next level. Where I saw a huge queue again people waiting to give the test. they were equally mad that people downstairs said to wait and no one called them upstairs. so, if you were expecting your name to be called waiting there nothing would have happened. 

waited in this new queue for another 2 hours and around 4.50 a.m they collected the money for the test.

 

they don't accept card and luckily i had cash. there was just one counter for collecting the sample from nose and throat. then they made us in a lounge with a recliner seat for the next 5.5 hours. I was given a breakfast there (covered in the Rs. 5000 for Covid and Lounge charges)

i had lost hope to catch the connecting flight by then. before collecting the test result, i saw some folks were filling another form called the 'Undertaking' form. when enquired they said after the test results are handed over, we need to take it a counter where we need to present the test results and get back our passport. but before they hand over the passport, they ask us to sign this undertaking form which kind of assures them that I'll be in home quarantine at the so and so address. so, keeping this form filled up saved some time during passport collection. 

I got the result as negative around 9.20 a.m and in the next 5 minutes i collected the passport and ran through the airport to catch my 10 a.m flight. But around 9.30 a.m when i reached the Air India counter for the boarding pass, they said the gates are closed and i can not board. I asked them if they can book me in the next flight. they said, since United booked the tickets for me i need to work with United in re-booking my flight. United didn't have a counter there. there was one counter that handled many airlines including United but no one was there and the phone number they listed, no one answered. 

I called United customer support number and asked them to help rebook on the next flight. With masks and a noisy environment it makes it very difficult to speak on the phone. Somehow i managed to have them book a next air India flight that evening at 4 p.m. when i checked with the air India counter again, they said they see that request from  United but they can not approve it as what i originally booked was a special 'Vande Bharat' flight and I can not simply be booked to any next available flight. what they could do is have me book on the next day's Vande Bharath flight. i asked them for other options. they asked be to try with Indigo flight. 

after a long queue at the Indigo counter, I made payment for a 2.30 p.m flight to Chennai. around Rs. 5300  but before issuing boarding pass, they said that i need to have a epass to Chennai. i created an epass online. 

you need few things to get a epass. 

1. Have enough battery in your phone after all the long waits. there was charging points in the lounge then again many people will be having their phones as well.

2. have an internet connection. airport has a free internet connection, but to connect to the airport wifi you need to give a mobile number where they would send the OTP. since my India number wasn't active, i couldn't use the regular route. One of the acquaintance at the Delhi airport covid test queue showed me a 'short cut' where i could enter '1122334455' as the phone number and the next page would let me to register a pin and reconfirm. you can give something like '1234' and confirm and it will let you connect there. the connection gets reset every half hour or 1 hour but it was good enough for my purpose. 

3. while registering the ePass, i had to again provide a phone number for getting the OTP and i gave the phone number of my parents in Cuddalore and got the OTP code via whatsapp. 

Indigo then issued my boarding pass and for the check-in baggage, since it is a domestic flight the baggage allowance was only 15 kg and not the 23kg for international flight. i had 16.5 kg and had no space on my carry on to accommodate that. so, i paid another 500 rs. for the overweight. 

Unfortunately, they checked the baggage in the same terminal (3) whereas the flight was in terminal 2 which was not mentioned anywhere on that boarding pass. they didn't have any gate information either on the boarding pass and said that I'll have to look up on it on the display inside the terminal. 

after going through security check, the security verifies the boarding pass and looking at the flight number he said that the flight is actually from Terminal 2 and i was standing in Terminal 3. i asked them if there is a way i could go there from here. they said no. they also enquired how i got into terminal 3 in the first place. i had to give a history about my international flight and i was supposed to be in the air India flight in terminal 3. he then connected me with an Indigo staff going by that side and asked him to help me out. That Indigo staff guy took me to the counter at front and told the lady there that Indigo had mistakenly checked in my baggage at the wrong terminal and that it needs to be taken out and handed over to me so that i can get to Terminal 2. 

I asked them would they not internally move the checked in baggage to terminal 2 instead of handing it over to me and me again having to go through the process of checking in. they said no. I asked them how much time it would take to get to Terminal 2, and she said 5 minutes. I told that lady that i needed their help in getting me all checked in Terminal 2 as it would difficult for me to get in the queue there get in time. after some 30 minutes wait there, they got me the baggage and on my request, the Indigo sent one lady staff to assist me in getting to terminal 3. First for me to get out of the terminal 2, she had to make up some story with the Security guy. She had told me not to tell anything about Indigo checking in at the wrong terminal.I said it is difficult for me to make up stuff and if she can do all that story, I'll co-operate by being silent. She said that if we tell the truth, the security will have more questions and will delay me. i will be risking missing the flight again. She filled up some register for me to exit the terminal and had me sign it. A security officer was exactly questioning why i was moving out of the terminal and she said that i missed the flight. before he was about to ask the next question, she ushered me out of the terminal and asked me to run with her to Terminal 2. 

this was no easy 5 minute walk to Terminal 2. we literally ran across multiple buildings and roads for the next 10 minutes. With both of us wearing masks and me dragging a baggage as we ran, anyone on road might have thought that we are eloping. But the actual twist was that i was going to be eventually leaving her behind and get on a flight alone to Chennai.  She ushered me all they way till the entrance of Terminal 2, made sure i was able to get through the entrance security and advised me to get to the Indigo counter 'fast track' and explain the situation. With all that rush, i didn't have enough time to really thank her and appreciate what she did. i ran into the terminal and followed what she had told. they quickly checked me in and i was in no time at the right gate. 

The epass i had was a provisional approval one and that I had to provide the vehicle number of the cab picking me up from the airport. i had no one picking me up at the airport. i was planning to take any cab at the entrance of the Chennai airport to get where i wanted to go. 

When i reached chennai airport, before exiting, the security was checking the epass and i was just told him that i was coming from US and showed the provisional epass. he just let me out. 

An airport cab driver offered to take me to Cuddalore for 4000 Rs. i didn't negotiate and just went with it. it took another 4 hours for me to reach home. 

Feel free to post your questions if any. will try and answer what I know.