Speaking at SAP Labs soon

A first for me, this one. I'll be speaking about my cycling tours at SAP Labs (office in Whitefield, Bangalore) on 26th March 3rd April. Nothing technical about this !

The title of the talk will be

A journey on the road; a journey into the mind

I have a three hour talk slot (including breaks). I'll be addressing a group of 20-30 people. Keeping the audience awake could be a challenge! Seriously, an unfinished travel spanning five years needs to be compressed into 2.5 hours - and that will be the real challenge.

Many things would need to be talked about

1. the travel itself in some detail, interesting stories, the regular FAQ style answers.
2. the motivation for doing the journey
3. how the travel affects and changes the travelers' thinking and views
4. the changes in perception and behaviour of the others
5. some philosophy!

All but the first are the difficult pieces; they're the interesting ones as well. Also, these change over time, and I'll try my best to address the change that I saw over time. That calls for some introspection: looking back at the material that I have, thinking about them, making sense of what I think. Finally, talking to others and see if they also noticed those changes is quite important too. The introspection part will help me no doubt, perhaps it may even give me a sense of direction ! And who know, I may even end up finding/talking about the real reasons why I did something.

To my rescue, I have a lot of material : log books, pieces of papers of significance, lots of pictures, some audio captures from my last tour, GPS tracks. Some of these I will show during my talk. I can also boast having a decent memory. The task remains a challenge, however.

I need to thank Jayanth Bagare for offering to host this talk. Jayanth is a manager at SAP labs. The audience of this talk would be mostly his team. I'm convinced that making the talk enjoyable would not be easy, but more than worth the time spent on it !

Finally, if you have any suggestions for the talk OR want to post any questions that you'd want me to address during the talk, feel free to post them here.