Kays Brainwave

Happy Diwali!!!

2009-10-16T14:35:00.000-06:00

Wishing all of you a very Happy Diwali!!!
Have a blast!!!

Varta...

DD News

2009-08-16T12:19:00.020-06:00

Kaveri Mukerjee:
This is DD National news, good evening and welcome and the headlines...
The Bharatiya Janata Party has virtually shut the doors on former Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje.
BJP leader Jaswant Singh admires Jinnah, says he was great.
India wants to buy Mahatma's house in South Africa.
Olympic champion Lin Dan clinches third straight world title.
Blogsville celebrates Blogfare awards in a very grand manner, pulling the world's attention to blogsville.
The news in detail...
blah blah blah.....
blah blah blah....
blah blah blah....
The news will continue after a break...

Welcome back.
Entertainment news
Blogsville celebrates Blogfare awards in a very grand manner in blogspot. All stalwarts of blogsville attended the occasion. Many bloggers from blogsville were presented with awards. Notable few were Gils, R-ampam, G3 and a few more. Lets watch the footage from the awards ceremony.
Show host: We request Mr.Gils to present the next award.
Gils: The next award goes to..... My dear saga and our katchi ko.pa.sa..treasurer..thalaivar ellam..ivaruku tharamaa oru awarda..chaancela..intha award enga sagaaku alithaathaal..awardkay perumai :D

KK awards speech: Thank you Gils... I am dumb struck and I am in total loss of words... I am very proud to get this award from you. I want to thank everyone for their support all throughout my bloging years... thank you...
Show Host: For awarding the next award we request Vethuvaettu R-Ambam to come to stage...
R-Ambam: The next award goes to a person who is Notorious for his comments, I wish he updates his blog more often :) It's none other than.... KK!

KK: I am very much elated, to get two awards at the same time. Thank you.
R-ambam: KK wait wait wait, you just can't go like that. There are rules you need to follow before you can get this award.

The rules of the award are as follows:-
Link the person who tagged you-
Copy the image above, the rules and the questionnaire in this post
Post this in one or all of your Blogs
Answer the four questions following these Rules -
Recruit at least seven (7) friends on your Blog Roll by sharing this with them -Come back to BLoGGiSTa iNFo CoRNeR (PLEASE DO NOT CHANGE THIS LINK) at http://bloggistame.blogspot.com and leave the URL of your Post in order for you/your Blog to be added to the Master List.Questions & Your Answers:

The person who tagged you:
R-Ambam is the one who tagged me with this award. One thing that made me go her blog is her blog title "Vethuvaettu" it was a very innovative name for a blog. She writes small and funny posts which are office friendly :) Wish her to keep continuing her writing for a long time to come.

His/her site's title and url: Vethvaettu (http://r-ambam.blogspot.com)

Date when you were tagged: 10 Aug 2009

Persons you tagged: Blogsville has introduced me to many friends all around the globe. I would like to give both the above awards to the following fellow bloggers.
1. Priya: For her long standing support. She writes many short and sweet thought provoking posts.
2. HTBM: I used to like her posts very much, when she was writing regularly. Now she is back after a break. I would like to give the above awards to her for taking the efforts to come back.
3. Vidya: Another short post blogger., who missing from action for some time. But came back with a bang. This award is for her her zeal after her comeback.
4. Natamai Syam: I am a big fan of his blog. Sad that he doesn't write now a days. Hoping he would come back with bang soon. This award is to encourage him to come back.

Lastly, I would like to say something in tamil...
Ella pugazhum iraivanukke!
God is great!
Thank you!
Weather News, Aug 17th 2009, Chennai will have a high of 32c and a low of 26c with few thunderstorms. There is going to be 60% precipitation and humidity is 89%.

Well, that is all we had for today's news. Good Evening.

Varta...

Bravery? You must be kiddin...

2009-07-28T15:43:00.010-06:00

I don't know what to say after watching this video, all I can say is, people are out of their mind to do something like this. If the children were forced to do this, what were the parents doing? They should have protested against such an act being forced on children. Just because its a state government school it does not mean, they can do anything and muffle it using their power. Glad the media brought this up. TN Government should take responsibility and take action on the state higher education minister, whose wife witnessed the event in person and did nothing about it, to stop it.
The Story

Varta...

Pachees about me

2009-07-05T13:47:00.006-06:00

Long long ago.... so long ago... that, even R-Ambam does not know how long ago... she tagged me with this tag. I took my sweet own time to write this tag. I actually got bored of looking at my own photos in my previous post, so decided to post this tag. One stone two mangoes.
The tag is to list down 25 things about me. I know I am a very famous personality but never thought people were so anxious to know about me. So, here it goes my list sponsored by Youtube...

1. I am like Mahatma Gandhi, immediately don't think I don't wear shirt and I wear only a dhoti... I meant to say I am truthful.
2. I am like Arvind Swami,

I mean patriotic like in this video...
3. I am like Michael Phelps when it comes to Swimming... atleast I hope to be.
4. I am a fusion of Pete Sampras and Roger Federer, soon you will see one more comparison of server along with video (This is one reason why I should buy a Handycam)

5. I am Sachin when I play cricket, only thing when he hits its a sixer, when I hit it goes straight to a fielder, slight timing problem...
6. I am like Usilamani, when it comes to coffee, I am big fan of coffee... besh besh romba nalla irukku! (Darn! could'nt find this video on youtube...)
7. I am like Amithab Bachan in this video...Dil ko jab Khushi Choo Jaaye...

8. I am like Aamir Khan in this video... yeh akela kitne ke barabar hai... Always coca-cola....

9. I love cinema, Personally like true story movies.
10. I am a big fan of comedy, Vivek and Kamalhasan are my favourite comedians in tamil.
11. I am just another IT coolie.
12. I am like Sombu in this video.. err... sorry Simbhu... when it comes to acting...

13. I am a big Fan of Ilayaraja, but at the same time I am huge A/C of A.R.Rahman. ARR rocks!!! any day!!
14. I love music in any form or shape, I listen to a huge spectrum of music types starting from filmi ishtyle to Raak and hard raak music... Is there anything better than music in this world.
15. Well music is something that makes me sad too, I feel bad that I didnt learn music, you may say that I can learn now but, I am confused on what to learn, I like to sing, play guitar, play key board, play sax, play flute, play drums... on and on and on... so its tuff decision :(
16. Currently I like Linkin Park, Pink, Evanescence in English, Shankar Eshan Loy's music in Hindi, ARR, YSR, VidyaSagar and James Vasanthan in Tamil.
17. SPB is my all time favorite singer, with Hariharan, Karthik and Unni Krishan being my seasonal favorite.
18. Uyirum Neeye from Pavithra is my current go to song for soothing me.
19. I wanted to be a Cricketer, musician, singer, inventor, pilot, join Army, join airforce, cinematographer, director etc Basically everything other than what I am actually doing.
20. I love to drive... I drive like the driving god...

21. I love sports in any form and shape... Basketball is my most favorite game to play...With Tennis being a very close second. One man inspired me to play basketball and its none other than....

22. I am weak in Maths can I skip 2 points and go to 25??? ;)
23. I like to travel... my dream job was to be reporter for some travel channel... Well as a matter of fact... I started blogging because of travelling, I started with travelogue and graduated to this blog.
24. I took three attempts to complete this tag... puff... even writing impositions in school is better...
25. Lastly I am like Prabhu Deva when it comes to dance.... neah.... just kidding. But I enjoy dancing whether I dance well or not is totally a different question... You guys tell me if dance ok, Check out my dance...

By the time I wrote this Tag, I am sure this tag has already rested in Peace, so I don't want to tag someone and wake this tag from its grave... So all of you just party in my name :)

Varta...

See through my lens

2009-05-05T20:42:00.011-06:00

Most of you know about my second wife ;). If not, well, I am referring to my Nikon camera. Though I have told that photography is one of my passion, I have never shared any of my pictures before on this blog. So I thought I will compile an album and share it in my blog. I am pretty much an amateur photographer, learning photography by watching photos that are there on the internet on many photo blogs and photo sites such as Getty Images (Getty Images is one my favorite site). Almost all my posts on this blog have images from that site. Here you go, some of the images that I took whenever I had my camera handy.

This album will be continuously updated, as and when I take some pictures. Feel free to drop in your comments.

Varta...

Yaavarum Nalam (13 B)

2009-04-17T19:19:00.000-06:00

Another first time on my blog! Though I do not like to read movie reviews I have always wanted to write movie reviews. So, here comes my very first movie review....

Yesterday I saw the tamil movie Yaavarum Nalam, the cast has Madhavan and Neetu Chandra in the lead role with Saranya, Poonam Dhillon, Ravibabu, Sachin Khedekar, Deepak Dobriyal and Murli Sharma playing supporting roles.
This movie is more a thriller than a horror movie, something that the tamil film field has been devoid of for quite a few years. There were a few so called horror movies in between like Shock and Sivi, but they kind of didn't meet a horror movie's demand.
Yaavarum Nalam has all the right ingredients needed to make a nice horror thriller. Though the movie has the usual horror revenge plot, the way the story has been handled is quite different and keeps everyone watching the movie eagerly waiting on what is going to happen next.
Manohar (Madhavan) and his family buy a new apartment and move into the apartment. From the time the family moves in to the new apartment, some small trivial inauspicious incidents keep occurring on everyday basis but gets shrugged off. But after few days Manohar senses that something fishy is happening, just then, he happens to see a serial that comes on TV which resembles very much like his family. He gets spooked by the similarity of events that happen in his family and the serial. Though all ladies in his family watch the serial on daily basis, none of them realize what Manohar finds eerie. From there, the story unravels as Manohar follows behind the mysterious happenings and finds clues and finally saves his family from any mishap.
In my opinion, a horror thriller is a difficult movie to make when compared to making a masala flick or action or Romantic subjects. Because even if one department falls back the movie will become more a comedy movie than a thriller movie. In that way, I feel Yaavarum Nalam has the right balance of everything that is needed for a horror thriller. Well that becomes obvious when you hear the crew for the film, the movie consists of National award winners like cinematographer P.C.Sreeram, editor Sreekar Prasad, sound designer A.S.Lakshminarayanan and art director Sameer Chanda.
I was not too familiar with the director's name, so watching the movie and having been impressed by the quality of the movie, I googled and found that director Vikram.K.Kumar, has won a National Award for his short film ‘Silent Scream’.
Shankar Eshan Loy, strike again, but with the background score more than the soundtracks this time. The background score gives the required eerie feeling that the movie requires.
P.C.Sreeram has proved why he is such a renowned cinematographer in India, the angles, lighting and the frame compositions speaks his experience behind the camera. His magic with the camera along with Shankar Eshan Loy's background score makes us sit still and watch the movie with lots of anticipation.
One negative in movie is, Madhavan's dialogue delivery during the early stages of the movie, his impatient way of talking kind of irritates. Actually only Madhavan has any scope of acting in the movie, others are all just supporting actors.
The movie was taken in two languages (Hindi and Tamil). So non-tamil speaking people can watch 13 B, I hope the movie should be pretty much same as Yaavarum Nalam.

On KK's Scale Yaavarum Nalam gets 4 stars on 5.

Varta...

Where the hell is Matt?

2009-03-25T19:16:00.002-06:00

Have you ever thought that a silly act on the streets could show how much fun this World is filled with? From the comments (19,671,578 hits) in Youtube for this video, I can for sure say that, simple things like this can bring smile to a million people irrespective of where they are in the World. The song for this video has something special, it makes me feel very light. I am not sure how many of you have seen this video, but this video is like a pill for me whenever I am sober. I may feel dull for whatever reason but this video will bring a smile on my face and make me brighter and spring back and face life in a positive vibe.
Now being a not so good time for many, thought I would post this on my blog and make a few people smile. Here you go.

About this video:
Matt was a game programmer, who got bored with his routine life. So he quit his job and used his own savings to go around places. That time, he decided to stand in front of the landmarks and do a dance step, which he video taped. He posted this video on his website and all of a sudden he shot to fame across the World. His video became so famous that he was contacted by Stride chewing gum and was sponsored to dance around the World. Hear it from the horse's mouth.

Checkout the the original video that Matt had posted on his site. There is a lot of places from Asia in this video, in fact lots of places from India.

BTW, It is Earth hour on March 28th, 2009 at 8:30pm local time. Please switch off all possible electrical appliances during this hour and vote for a green Earth. Please pass this information to everyone you know. For more information check out http://www.earthhour.org

Varta...

A Lost World

2009-03-04T00:05:00.002-07:00

In the Wee hours of January 1st 2009, while the whole World was welcoming and celebrating the coming of New year, hoping the new year will bring joy, hope and prosperity, a small village called Paranthan in the Northern part of Sri Lanka was waiting for the Sun to rise and brighten the air filled with gun smoke and the morning mist.

Appa: Thurai.. Thurai... Thurai Kanna... Happy New Year Karadi kutty... wake up karadi kutty...
Thurai: uuuuhn.... I am feeling sleepy appa...
Appa: Hoy! My dear Karadi kutty wake up soon, I have a surprise for you...
Thurai: You keep the surprise safe, I will get it from you once I wake up appa.
Appa: Chella Kutty, c'mon wake up... c'mon open your eyes... see its New Year!!

[Thurai opens his eyes slowly... his eye lids flutter trying to adjust to the dimly lit home]

Thurai: Is it New Year today?
Appa: Yes, my dear Kutty chellam.
Thurai: What does New Year mean?
Appa: New Year brings happiness and prosperity.
Thurai: Oh! Wow!! So I can play cricket with Sivarajah in the fields like before, go to the talkies and watch Rajini cinemas, buy ice cream from the ice cream peddler... and then.... many more fun things... right appa?
Appa: Yes my dear.

Appa: Ok, fast. Get ready soon.
Thurai: Where are we going appa?
Appa: There is going to be get-together in a near by place, we need to go there as soon as possible. There will be some delicious food for us.
Thurai: Wow!! Wish it was new year everyday! Appa look! There are so many holes on the wall.

[Thurai points to the bullet punctured sand wall]

Appa: Oh! those holes? Yesterday night after you went to sleep there was a huge lightning, which made those holes. Don't worry we can close them once we come back.

[Thurai says ok and starts to get ready to leave for the new year feast while he hums the tune Athiradee kaaran from Sivaji]

Thurai: Appa, I am ready! Why is amma still sleeping? Isn't she coming for the feast?
Appa: No da chellam, Amma was disturbed by the lightning yesterday night, so she is very tired and she asked us to go, leaving her here to take some rest.
Thurai: Oh ok, We can pack and bring some food for her from the feast.
Appa: Sure, nice plan! She will be happy that you got some food for her.
[Thurai's Appa says wiping tears from his eyes.]
Thurai: Why are you crying appa?
Appa: Nothing son, Just happy that you care so much for your mother.
Thurai: Ok, lets not disturb amma, let's leave now.
Appa: Yeah Yeah... Let's go.

[When they were about to step out of the house.]
Appa: Thurai, just wait here for a minute here, don't step out of the house.

[Thurai's appa goes to Thurai's mom and changes the towel that was placed on the bullet wound, which he used to prevent the blood from flowing all over the house. He had placed a towel before he woke Thurai. Because he did not want Thurai to know that his mother is no longer with him in this belligerent World.]

Appa: Thurai Kutty, come lets go.

[Appa peeps outside the house to make sure it was peaceful to step outside. Appa carries Thurai in his arms and sheilds Thurai to the maximum he can and looks around and walks swiftly.]

[After going some distance, they hear a loud bang in a close proximity.]
Thurai: Appa, what was that? so loud?
Appa: Are you asking about the loud bang?
Thurai: Yes.
Appa: Today is new year rite? So, some one is bursting fireworks to celebrate new year.
Thurai: Wish I too had some fireworks.
Appa: hmmm... Lets see if there are any shops to get some fireworks.
Appa: Why don't you sing a song while we walk?
Thurai: Ok.

[They walk some distance while Thurai sings all along.]
Appa: Shhhhh..... shhhhh...
Thurai: Looks like there are many who are bursting crackers in this place.

[Appa holds Thurai tightly and starts running]
Thurai: Appa, look, many people are running to that old building, is that where we are going too?
Appa: [Frantically] yeah yeah.

[A bullet comes from no where and strikes Thurai's Appa]
Appa: Ahhhhh!!!
[Bends down in pain and lets Thurai get down]
Appa: Quick, run to that place, don't wait for me. Quick... Quick... run...
Thurai: Ok
Appa: Thurai one minute.
[Appa hugs Thurai tightly and gives a peck on his cheeks]
Appa: Take care son... Go fast...

[Thurai runs to the old building where a nurse from red cross safe zone area takes him to shelter, Thurai turns back to see his appa lying down on the road sans any movement.]

Few days later...

[Thurai is very sad about what had happened on the new year. He does not talk to anyone, he constantly keeps looking out of the window hoping his mother will come in search of him.]

It's a very saddening thing to see many children loosing their parents during the War. I hope people come forward and adopt kids like Thurai and restore peace and happiness in their lives.

Hats off to Keshi who has adopted a kid affected in the Sri Lankan War.

Varta...

Our Madras Mozart

2009-01-26T22:41:00.009-07:00

First of all Wishing everyone a very Happy New Year!!! (Better late than never)

I am sure that, most of you would have found what this post is all about, from the post's heading. Yes, it is about, the one and only AR Rahman. I am sure I am not the only one posting about him, after the Golden Globe Awards, click here for some goose pimples.
I feel proud to say that I am one of the million fans that Rahman has all over the World. I have been his fan ever since I heard his name in Roja.
Later when I googled (hope they add this word to the dictionary soon :)) I found that many of the BGMs in Indian advertisements which I liked had his magic woven in it. The best example for this is Leo Coffee ad. Even now if I hear this music, my mind is rejuvenated as if I had a strong cup of filter coffee that my mom makes (One of the things I yearn for now a days).

I wanted to see AR Rahman perform live at least once in my life, I was lucky to have got a chance to satisfy this desire when I was in Chicago. It was a treat to my ears and eyes. Can never forget the experience, especially the song from Bombay that Chitra sang.

If Manirathnam and Kamalhaasan made us proud with an awesome movie called Nayagan which made it to Time's Top 100 all time best movies in the World, AR Rahman made us all proud with his debut work in Roja which made it to Time's all time best Top 10 soundtracks in the World. Ever since his first movie Rahman has been climbing new heights in each composition of his.
I am sure Rahman had to fight his way up, but even I had to fight by arguing with a lot of people who did not give him enough credit, saying he was nothing next to Maestro Ilayaraja. I agree, respect and love Ilayaraja's music, but I would never accept to the fact that Rahman is not comparable to Ilayaraja. I thought time had answered everyone and thought the argument would come to rest, but unfortunately for me, my B1/2 is a big time Ilayaraja fan, so the argument continues in our house.
I like Rahman for a lot of reasons, the main reasons being his soul full music, his down to earth attitude, recognizing talent, finding new voices, giving credit to his musician team (he was the first one to list his musician on the cassette cover), his patriotism, for the human he is.
Now, to the movie that got him the Golden globe award, Slumdog Millionaire. It was a good movie, nice screen play and great direction. I loved the way they had taken the movie, the movie really deserves the recognition and awards it gets. If you have not seen the movie yet, I strongly recommend you to watch the movie. Among Indian viewers there have been mixed responses about the movie, as far as I have heard all of them like the movie plot but many find it difficult to digest the way the movie is taken. Meaning, they are complaining like how Mr. Big B is complaining, saying they have shown Indian in a demeaning way. I strongly disagree to that, I feel whatever is shown in the movie does happen in India, I have personally seen child beggary like this in a small city like Coimbatore, then why not Mumbai? Check here to see some true incidents reported in Mumbai which kind of backs the movie. If Big B is so offended I feel he should work on how to make things better in the slums of Mumbai and other cities rather than denying the fact that the movie is baseless.

Check out the following song, this is my current favorite from the Madras Mozart. The song is from the movie Dilli 6. This movie is directed by Rakesh Mehra, the man who colored India with Rang de basanti.

AR Rahman We are very proud for you!! Congratulations and Good luck!!! Hope you make us proud in February again and make us call you O sarkar!!!!

Varta!!!

God's broker

2008-12-08T20:38:00.000-07:00

Another sage joins the fraud list, not in India but in Georgia, USA. Ever since I have known, I have always heard quite a few saints hitting the news stands for the wrong reasons, more than for any good deeds. I was thinking of posting about beliefs and practices and coincidently came across this news report from Fox news in youtube. Check out the following videos where Dr.Commander a so called saint at Atlanta, Georgia was caught for credit card fraud and practicing medicine without a license.

why do we need a broker for god? Won't god answer prayers if you pray directly to god?
I saw one of his speeches in Youtube where he draws analogy between God and Insurance company. He says that just like how we pay premiums every month we should pray to god and when you get in trouble that is when God will come, just like how insurance company comes when you land in some trouble. I rolled on the floor laughing hearing such a speech, and there were so many people patiently listening his crap. God! save all those people who follow blindly. I am pretty sure this incident will project a very wrong picture about Hinduism to people who are curious about other religions.
We can't blame people who do fraud like Dr.Commander, I think even people need to blamed for it. The most astonishing thing is, people believed all the crap such have doing ohmams over the phone and the ohmam video will be sent by mail in a DVD.
One thing I would like to ask everyone is, instead of pouring a lot of money to people like these guys, please help people in need by sponsoring education etc.
Be safe from people like Dr.Commander. Take Care.

Varta...

Top 5 cute romantic tamil movies scenes I like

2008-10-29T21:57:00.000-06:00

Actually I am not a big fan of romance being the core subject of a movie. I feel a cinema field is healthy only when it deals with a variety of subjects. I like the way how bollywood is producing movies recently. One of the recent bollywood movie that I liked was "The Wednesday". It was a nice movie with a nice and different plot. If you have not seen it, I would strongly recommend this movie. In tamil I think of all the new age directors I think Vetrimaran and Venkat Prabhu's movies are promising when it comes with dealing non love based story lines. But Gils' post provoked me to come up with a list of romantic scenes that I like in tamil movies. So here goes my list...

1. I don't think anything can beat the Karthik and Revathi segment in Mouna Raagam. Personally I love the scene where Karthik parks his bike before the bus and compels Revathi to say that she was looking out for him. The following video has all my favourite scenes in this movie.

2. Second one that comes to my mind is Ithayathai Thirudathe. The scenes are pretty much in the same style as mouna ragam but it still makes us enjoy each encounter between Nagarjuna and Geethanjali. The main reason being double damaka, in this movie both hero and heroine are shown as fun loving people. Check out the video below for my favourite scene in this movie.

3. I love every scene in Alaipayuthe but this is one of my most favourite scene. After a long break Mani Rathnam gave us a film in this genre. Another scene other than this one I love the most is, when Madhavan calls up Shalini at work. I tried hard for the video, this is the only one I could find. Sorry about the bad quality.

4. This again is from Mani Rathnam, I wonder how he thinks these kind of scenes. Trully brilliant ones. I like the way he handled this movies subject and the characterizations. After I saw this movie, I always wanted a wife like the one Simran portrays in this movie,independant, fun loving yet a strict mom.

5. Well finally I have a scene in my top 5 favourite which is not directed by Mani Rathnam. This scene is from Sillunu oru kadhal. This scene is a typical Mani Rathnam sequence, I am pretty sure the director of this movie was inspired by Mani Rathnam when he conceived this scene. This is one movie I liked but came to know that many did not like it. I felt it was a pretty decent movie, just that people could not digest the story line.

There are a few scenes which came close but missed my top 5 list.
1. Alaypayuthe climax scene, the scene where Shalini says I love you to Madhavan. Check here.
2. Another Mani Rathnam movie, in which we might not expect to have such a cute scene is Thalapathi. The scene where Rajini justifies cutting a police man's hand to Shobana. Second scene (Pidichuruku) in this video.
3. Gajini romance sequence between Surya and Asin. If the scenes were a little more fast paced, I guess this would have made in my Top 5 list. Click here for the video.
4. The romance sequence in the song Kangal irandal in Subramaniampuram. Click here for the video.

You might wonder why I have listed only scenes from Mani Rathnam's movies, but these are the most memorable scenes that have got stuck in my head. May be because I am a huge fan of him. One commonality between all these scenes is they all make you smile when you watch them, irrespective of the number of times you watch it.

Go ahead fill my comments with your favourites scenes.

Varta...

Crossing over

2008-10-13T22:24:00.002-06:00

[Today]
Rajesh uncle waits in front of the gate to board the flight to his destination. He keeps him engaged by watching the TV that was present in the waiting hall. Meanwhile a very old person sits in the vacant seat next to him.
Hello, I am Vinayagam.
Rajesh uncle returns back a warm smile and says "Hello Mr.Vinayagam, I am Rajesh. Nice to meet you."

[1 month back...]
Welcome! Welcome! Welcome! I am Rajaram, Vidya's father.
Hello sir, I am Rajesh, Vikram's father and this is Seetha my wife.
Lakshmi! Please come here, people from the bride groom's house have come.
Lakshmi comes into the room, gives a warm welcoming smile and says vanakkam to every one in the room.

[Today]
Mr.Vinayagam taps on Rajesh uncle's shoulder and asks "Why sir? Why are you so sad?"
"Nothing sir, had a lot of work to do but before that the time to leave had come, it makes me sad that I was not able to complete all my duties." replied Rajesh uncle.
"Don't worry sir, everything will fall in place as it should."
A man with a grey french beard sits in the chair opposite to Rajesh uncle.

[1 month back...]
Mr.Rajaram hope you or your Mrs are fully satisfied about this marriage.
Ofcourse sir, we are completely happy about it. Vidya is our only daughter and we respect her choice. We are sure her choice will be the best for her life.
Wow! thats nice to hear. My wife and I also feel the same way about Vikram's choice.
Vikram has a younger brother, Vinay, he's got exam tomorrow so we left him back at home.
[Vidya enters the room looking at nothing but the floor. She is made to sit in the center of the room.]
Shall we have the marriage after a month?
Oh sure, but... isn't 1 month too less a time to organize?
Oh don't worry about that, we can work together, and moreover lets have a simple wedding ceremony and a nice reception.
That sounds good, just the way I would like to do the wedding.

[Today]
How come you seem so happy? asked Rajesh uncle.
I am little bit sad about leaving here, but the happiness of meeting my wife again after many years subtilizes my sadness. How about you sir? asks Mr.Vinayagam looking at the man with the french beard who sat opposite to him.
"I am also happy, I will be meeting my wife, son , daughter, my father and my mother. The last I saw them was on December 26, 2004 when we went to Velankani shrine."
"Wow! that is so nice." said Rajesh Uncle.

[1 week ago...]
Vijaykumar as you already know next Monday is Vikram's wedding. Please come 1 or 2 days before the wedding along with your family. Sorry, Seetha could not come with me, since we didnt have much time, she has gone to give invitations to relatives and friends on the other end of the city.
Sure, What da, why so much formality? Vikram is like my son, We will all be there to bless him.

[Today]
"Look at those small children, look how happy they are, they don't even realise what is happening." said Mr.Vinayagam pointing his finger to two children who were playing catching game.
Oh look they have started to board. I think its better we go and join the queue, said Mr.Arokiaraj, the man with the french beard.
Mr.Vinayagam while getting up from the chair said "Yes, lets go Mr. Rajesh".
When they don't hear any reply, Mr.Vinayagam and Mr.Arokiaraj turn back to see Rajesh uncle missing. They look around trying to find Rajesh uncle.

[Today]
Mr.Rajesh!Mr.Rajesh! Mr.Rajesh! Please open your eyes slowly. How are you doing sir?
"Where am I? Why am I here?" asks Rajesh uncle looking at the doctors who woke him up.
You met with a small accident, but you are completely safe now. Your wife, sons, relatives and friends are waiting outside to see you. Let me go and let them know that you are doing great and send your wife and children here.

Mr.Vinayagam and Mr.Arokiaraj see all this unveiled.
Meanwhile at the gate, an important announcement for all passengers leaving to heaven, this is the final call for the flight leaving to heaven. Please report at the gate at the earliest.
Mr.Vinayagam and Mr.Arokiaraj give a warm smile to Rajesh uncle and bid adieu by waving to him and went inside their gate to board the flight to meet their near and dear in heaven.

Dedicated to one of my close friends father and to Randy Pausch.(Whenever you get time (video is 1hr 16 mins long), click on the link for Randy Pausch and listen to his last lecture, Randy was a professor in Carnegie Mellon university who became one of Time magazine's Top 100 most influencial people in 2007.)

Varta...

A year that flew over KK's blog...

2008-09-28T20:06:00.001-06:00

Where was I so long?

I got fused* after marriage, so didn’t have any brainwaves...

*fused with my better half :) (Hopefully this statement gets me tonite's dinner without any problem)

Now to the real blame absorbers...

About the same time last year I set my eyes on my 2nd wife (My B1/2 hates, me being with her). Just to clear the air here, I mean my Nikon SLR when I mean 2nd wife.

I always wanted a SLR ever since I was small. I totally fell in love with it when I tried out my cousin's SLR. Everyone fancies buying a bike or car or house after they start working, but I always wanted to buy a SLR. But correctly when I started working digital cameras came into the picture because of which I decided to wait for the digital camera market to stabilize before I can own my own digital SLR. Finally I got my own Digital SLR in September last year. So I was all excited about taking photos with my B1/2 being my model for all my try outs. The camera since then took me to places like Zoo, Canyons, National Parks, City parks to list a few.

Then when I was almost about to hit the ground after flying high with my new SLR, I had bid adieu to the windy city since my project came to an end. From there I ended up at the Mormon city. New place, new people, new office, new work, new business terminologies, new apartment but same old (new) wife :). So it kind of took some time to settle down in the new place with not a single familiar face around.

When I was almost set at the new place, work became hectic. The Go live date for my project was 1st of January. What kind of sane man would plan for a big release on the 1st of Jan? I would call them sadists, spoiling everyone's New Year unless their role is not that of a manager (rightly called as Damagers). Especially if your Indian manager is involved in coming up with the project estimates, forget planning anything.

Once the go live went fine, when I was thinking of starting to blog again... Steve Jobs' phone fell into my hand (another thing that my B1/2 hates). A cool gadget, which I could not resist. The power of having internet where ever you go (as long as there is cell phone signal) is amazing! I was all excited until 2nd second generation phone came, that's when I felt like... Gawd!! I should have waited!!

Again when I was about to make my second attempt to start blogging, new project, new office, new colleagues and new technologies. So Again I am kind of trying to settle down from all the changes around me.

So, you see, there is nothing to blame on me... Blame it on Nikon, Steve Jobs, Windy City, Salt Lake city, Old project, new project, previous project damager, new faces around me etc. etc. (This statements shows a real sign of Calvin's side effect)

Before anything comes again, I wanted to break my one full year of hiatus with a new post... So here it goes...

Varta...

Road-side Romeos

2007-09-28T12:29:00.000-06:00

Bill walks on the street and suddenly he hears someone calling "Bill! Bill!". He immediately turned to his left and saw all his buddies across the road. He crosses the road and shakes hands with Richie, Tom, John and Mark.
Tom pulls Bill's leg "Bill! busy stalking that lady, uhn? you didn't even hear us calling you. We were like yelling so loud that even Bill Clinton would have heard us."
Immediately after this the whole gang goes in a laughter roll and they give each other a high five.
Immedialy John comes to Bill's rescue, "Dude look who is talking. This bugger agaped at a woman for 20 mins only to find that it was none other than his wife."
Again there was huge roar of laughter and high fives being exchanged between the buddies. They made so much noise that everyone on the street turned to look what was happening.
"Shshhshhshh" said Mark. "Guys watch out the hot chick passing by in the black porche."
Immediately as if some one said eyes right, all the heads turned right at the same time just like the marching soldiers.
Once the car went out of sight Bill conks Richie and tells him "She's gone and so, stop seeing her and also don't forget to close your mouth you hottie old man!"
Richie blushes and turns his head.
Suddenly John says "Guys tomorrow there is a Sox Vs Cubs game at the Wrigley field, How about going for that?"
Mark says excited "Wow! great idea, lets go guys"
Immediately there are 3 echos saying "OK".
After talking for some time each one disperses towards their house.
Next day morning Tom and Richie assemble at Bill's place and wait for Mark and John to join them. They wait for long and finally after about an hour, Mark turns up.
Everyone pounces on him and asks him "Why are you so late? And where is John? At this rate we will enter Wrigley field while everyone walks out of there."
Mark replies "John won the race guys."
In chorus every exclaims "What??? When? What happened."
"It happened today early morning, while he was sleeping. He had a peaceful exit, just the way he wanted to have." said Mark.
"Well, He lived happily for all his 82 years. May his soul rest in peace. Guys this just reminds us that its not too long for us to meet our end." saying this Tom goes inside his house others follow him behind.

Varta...

:-)

2007-09-19T10:30:00.000-06:00

Its been claimed that its 25 years since :-) was used for the first time. It is believed that twenty five years ago, a Carnegie Mellon professor Scott E. Fahlman was the first to use the three keystrokes (":", "-", ")") to represent a smiley in a message.
Since then the messaging industry has added so many emoticons, that it seems almost impossible to send a computer message without using an emoticons.
The creator of the original ASCII emoticons :-) and :-(, with a specific suggestion that they be used to express emotion, was Scott Fahlman; the text of his original proposal, posted to the Carnegie Mellon University computer science general board on 19 September 1982 (11:44), was considered lost for a long time. It was however recovered twenty years later by Jeff Baird, from old backup tapes.

19-Sep-82 11:44 Scott E Fahlman :-)
From: Scott E Fahlman

I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:

:-)

Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark
things that are NOT jokes, given current trends. For this, use

:-(

Below is the list of emoticons that GMail messenger supports.

<3
:(|)        (It's a monkey!)
\m/        (Rock out)
:-o
:D
:(
x-(
B-)
:'(
=D
;)
:-|
=)
:-D
;^)
;-)
:-)
:-/
:P

Its news to me that GMail has so many emoticons. I just knew a hand full of them. Whatever said and done, Yahoo! still rules the net with respect to emoticons. I don't think any other messenger service offers such a wide spectrum of emoticons. Click here for a complete list of Yahoo! emoticons.

:)

(sources: cnn, Wikipedia.org, GMail Help)

Varta...

Roomie Vs Honey

2007-09-12T21:50:00.000-06:00

Hola people! Hope you all are doing good. Well its been a long time since I peeped into this space. Sorry for making you guys wait. It kind of took time to settle down and subsequent to that the crank shaft in my brain seemed to have got jammed being idle for long. I am trying to revive my blog by writing this post. Hope I come back in full swing.

Warning: All characters in this post are fictious. Any resemblance in character with anyone dead or alive is just a coincidence. Hope this post does not become like the above picture(Me throwing sand on my own head)

Everyone says marriage is an eternal bliss. Well, though I would like to disagree, in order to avoid getting a black eye and also to get some food I too will agree with that and say marriage is surely an eternal bliss.
I was just comparing a guy's life BM (before marriage) and the same guy's life AM (after marriage), seems a big contrast.

Guy BM	Guy AM
He goes back home from work at 8:00 PM and the conversation at home goes... Roomie: Early today? Guy: Yeah man, Finished up something, so came home before I started the next module.	He goes back home from work at 5:00 PM and the conversaion at home goes... Honey: Why are you so late? Guy: No Honey, had some work, did that till I reached a logical end. Have to continue working on it tomorrow.
Roomie: Hey! what to do for dinner man? Guy: Let's heat some frozen food and have man, what say?	Honey: Cut Chicken, onion and tomato and cook Chicken curry while I make some Chappati's Guy: Ok, Honey.
Guy cooks chicken curry Roomie: Awesome Chicken curry man, You are the man!	Guy cooks chicken curry Honey: Hmmm ok. You should add some more spices.
Kitchen sink overflows with soiled vessels Roomie: Machan, lets clear this man.	Kitchen sink overflows with soiled vessels. Guy starts to clean them Honey: Here clean these too. And throws in a more vessels Honey: Scrub it nicely, I see few dots of dirt there.
Roomie: Hey! I have sent a request for you to join orkut. Join soon, I will scrap you.	Guy logs in his laptop first time in a week's time and types www.google.com. Even before the page loads Honey: You always sit with your laptop. Instead of me, you could have married your laptop.
Guy: C'mon man lets go play Tennis. Roomie: No man Guy: Stop lazying around, come lets go and play, you lazy bum!	Guy: Honey my old roomie is calling me for playing Tennis Honey: No need Tennis. Spend time with me. Guy to Roomie: Dude, I cant come man. Didn't get ground clearance.

Dedicated to all the husbands and to be husbands in this World. Jai Mata Di!!

Varta...

KK's day out

2007-06-27T21:41:00.000-06:00

One dull sober cloudy day (for a change from the usual bright sunny day) KK leaves from his house in hurry to to be on time for an important meeting with his client. His mom shouts from the kitchen telling him to have his breakfast before he leaves. But he shouts back saying "I am already late and on top of that you want me to have breakfast, vada, pasayam and all?" and leaves the house as he talks.
When he steps out of his house his father, who was sitting outside tells him to post a mail before he goes to office. Again he shouts back saying not today. He then takes his bike on to the road and tries to start but his bike does not co-operate with him. So he bends down to see what could be the trouble. Meanwhile a Santro that was passing by sloshed muddy water from the near by puddle on the road. KK's father and mother who were watching the whole scene unfold smirked hiding their face behind news paper and door respectively.
KK irritated rushes into the house and does a quick change and goes towards his bike to give another try. But the bike still follows murphy's law and refrains from starting.
Giving up with his bike KK heads towards the near by auto stand in the corner of his street. But to his luck there not even a single auto in the auto stand. He then calls one of his friend and asks him if he can give him a ride till his office. His friend tells him to wait at the bus stop so that he can pick from there. So KK starts to wait for his friend.
[Brute's contribution]
It was eight in the morning, KK was waiting for his friend. He was waiting for more than 30 mins and no sign of his friend, not even a call from him nor an SMS. In the meanwhile KK starts feeling hungry and so he walks to Idli banddi which was on the other side of the road.
[Golmaalgopal's contribution]
KK munches some idlies and suddenly tting!!! a brain-wave as usual(vaai summa irukkuma)and asks the idly fellow..."anne...ungaloda vandiyum 4 wheeler dhaan....neenga dhaan idha otittu porenga....pudhusa potta rule padi seat belt enga anne?" (translation: Brother..isnt your cart too a four wheeler? you are only driving this cart, as per the new rule where is the seat belt?)
Hearing that idly fello(ofcourse unaware of our thala's genius)gets enraged and starts to throw idlies at him...KK does some amazing matrix stunt and misses every idly that was thrown at him... But everyone was wondering where the idlies were disappearing, suddenly...G3 enters the screen (camera from low angle)...G3 catches all those idlies and asks the idly fellow 4 sambar n chutney, lifting him off the ground with just one hand. And in this gap our heeeerroo escapes to find his friend...and runs off without paying for the idlies that he downed.
Finally when KK reaches his office he finds that the meeting was almost over. Just when he was about to turn and go back to his cubicle his boss (not Sivaji) calls him and fires left, right and center and suspends him from office for a week.
[Sat's contribution]
Sad about the events that happened that day, KK walks back home sad with his face facing the earth like a sunflower which has not seen the sun for more than 2 months...KK suddenly bumps into something and falls down. When he looks up he finds G3. G3 catches him by his collar and picks him up and puts him on his foot. KK suddenly realizes that he'd better not mess with blogsville big shots hereafter...and immediately apologizes to G3... :P
In order to make his rotten day a little brighter he heads to his favorite sports bar. As soon as he enters he writes down some of his favorite numbers and gives it to DJ to play them. Correctly when the DJ starts to play his favorite numbers, his mobile rings "cloud #9 cloud #9" (Bryan Adam song)
He then pulls out his mobile and picks the call and says "Hey sweetie how are you?"
The voice on the other side yells "Where are you without going to office??"
Scared to tell about his suspension he lies "I got a comp off for a weekend that I worked, so I am at Ram's (how can a story be without a character named as Ram) house."
"Ha! you want me to believe that story. Let me check with Ram. Call him!"
"He is not here sweetie, he has gone to a near by store"
"Ok, then I will call his Mobile and check and cuts the call abruptly."
KK some how manages to call Ram before her and tells him to just continue with the lie and asks him to save him from her.
But Ram thinks himself to be Dil Chata hai Aamir Khan and tells her the whole story how and why he got suspended and which sports bar he is in currently along with the sports bar's latitude and longitude.
KK gets a call again so he picks it up and with confidence asks "Now atleast do you believe me?"
"Get lost!!, don't ever come in front of me again"
KK not knowing what to do, starts repeating "I am good boy (!!!!!)...I am a good boy!...please please believe me...I am a good boy!!!!" But the other side on the phone hangs up.
He just puts down his drink, pays the bill and heads straight to his house. She opens the door and he tries to convince her with all kind of answers but not heeding to him she slams the door on his face.
KK very depressed walks aimlessly on the road not knowing where he was going. Just then he sees a place that many people don't dare going there. He then climbs 140ft thinking about the whole day. Depressed by all the things that happened that day he thinks jumping down from there is the only way he can find happiness and so without any hesitation he jumps.

Suddenly he realizes that his wife, K was waking him up with a sweet smile on her face and a cup of hot coffee which was filling the whole room with it aroma in her hand. (Thinking about this only makes me so happy) Only then he realized that he was so disturbed about his meeting that day that he has had a bad dream about it. He then starts up his day happily with a broad smile thanking god that all that was not real.

Story: Jeevan Screenplay: Brute/GolMaalGopal/Sat/KK

P.S - This story is a compilation of the scenes that some of the bloggers contributed in the comment section in one of my previous posts.
P.S.S- Text in italics are the author's thoughts.
P.S.S.S - Stunt shown in the video is done by trained professionals like KK, do not try it at home.
P.S.S.S.S - Hope Ms.K sees this and wakes me with a bed coffee everyday.
P.S.S.S.S.S -I will be away from blogging for another one month to grow fatter from single to double.

Ha Ha Ha!! exceeded Sat's number of P.Ss :D

Varta...

The Boss

2007-06-13T00:19:00.000-06:00

Well its almost party time in the whole of Tamil Nadu. Every nook and corner of the state is echoing only one word. Yes its "Sivaji, The Boss". Super star Rajnikanth is back in action after a long 2 years of hiatus. Sivaji will just continue to run in the victory run by collecting the baton from the blockbuster movie Chandramukhi.

People from different strata of life, age or for that matter of fact any other diversity adore Rajnikanth on the silver screen. Every person who loves and hates him will see his movie at least once in the theatre. His movies are a total family entertainer.
Rajni is famous for his styles, which keep changing for each movies. One of his most famous style is to catch the cigarette in his mouth. It was in 70's that he started this stunt. Its still followed by many ardent fans across Tamil Nadu.

After styles the next thing that comes to ones mind when we think about Rajnikanth is his punch dialogues. The dialogues attain their meaning and beauty only when he says them. In recent times all new heroes in Tamil film industry have started using the same formula of having a punch dialogue for each movie. But nothing can come close to the way Rajni delivers it.

Rajni has proved that he is a versatile actor who can do varied roles which involves action, comedy and masala. Of all Rajni movies one movie that I love watching again and again is "Thillu Mullu"'. It is an out and out comedy movie. It was a remake of a hindi movie called "Golmaal". I personally feel this remake has surely out done the original. One of my favorite scene in that movie is the one below.

There is very common argument that compares Kamalhassan and Rajnikanth, to prove that Rajnkanth is no good etc. But I feel such a comparison is like comparing oranges and apples. Each one is good in their own way. Rajni's mass appeal, 100% entertainer, mixture of action, comedy, sentiments cannot be compared to Kamal's Acting, dancing, singing, perfectionisms, knowledge in various spectrum's of cinema. While Kamal has talent, Rajni has done hard work to reach where he is today. He is surely a source of inspiration for a lot of people, that if you put in enough amount of hard work, you can reach even beyond the skies.
I am just waiting for June 15th to come for Sivaji to release. Keeping my fingers crossed, hope the movie meets the humongous (this word is an under statement) expectation that people have for this movie.
Irrespective of how the movie runs, Rajnikanth will always remain as Super Star in most of the hearts in Tamil nadu. This post is dedicated to none other than the Super star.

Varta...

Learn Blogging in 30 days! Part-Trios

2007-05-31T21:24:00.000-06:00

For Flash back click here
For Flash back of flash back click here

Ambi was followed by Jeevan to give some tips on how to write patriotic post. He starts by telling about the leader during India's freedom struggle and suddenly Oliveoyl, who was in her own world stands up and says Gabdain Vaazhga!
Deepa who was playing her cricketer trump cards, suddenly sprung up from her seat on hearing about gabdain, she started shouting Sachin... Saaaachin..... Sachin... Saachin.... Sachin Gops who was dreaming about his car shouts "Present sir!" thinking the attendance was being taken. The whole class bursts out into laughter.
After Jeevan, Shiva comes to the dais to share his experience of how he found his long lost friend back again through his blog. While he about the complete, Kavi stands up and asks Shiva what his profile image means. For which Shiva replies that his profile means "Oru oorla oru peiya maram athula oru kuii" and again the class goes on a roll.
Suddenly everyone's attention is drawn towards a girls who walks on the corridor singing "Kallile kalai vannam kandan...". Karthikeyan runs to her and asks who she was and why she is going like this.
She replies "I am Janani, I had actually gone to Mahabalipuram during the weekend along with my mom and her friends. I was very moved by the sculptures and since then I have been going around lost, singing like this."
When Karthikeyan was talking outside with Janani, Sonata runs to the dias and quizes the class about the name of the film of the song which Janani sang. While everyone tries to name the film, Ace stands up and says bibiliki bilabi... Viji who was sitting in the first row stands up and asks "Mama biskothu".
Padma Priya, walks furiously to Ambi and asks "You are no good as a brother.". Ambi wondering what happened asks her what happened. For which she just points her finger at RSubras. He was singing the song "Kai veesamma kai veesu... kadaiku pona kai veesu..." to Prithz.
After everyone finishes with their lecture, Karthikeyan calls Priyamana neram Priya and gives her an award for the the best story in blogsville award for her Kadhal yaanai story. She starts telling about what inspired her to write the story. She gets disturbed by SKM and Chitra who were sitting in the first bench and discussing about each one's son, their behaviour, funny incidents created by their son's. Due to this Priya loses her cool and goes back to her seat. Karthikeyan annoyed by this tells SKM and Chitra to write an imposition on the black board.
Porkodi who was also in the first row, was irritated by the constant telugu conversation between Brute, Contended and Isha in the second row. She turns back and tells them "SKM's writing is like Jangiri alias Jilebi like the one she makes can you understand what she is writing? May be she is writing in telugu.". As soon as G3 hears about food she runs to the dais searching for it. KK hits his head and says "These people will never improve."

The End

Thank you everyone for all your patience and encouragement. You guys are not only stars in my story but you guys are the stars of my blog. Without your constant encouragement I dont think it would have been possible for me to complete one full year of blogging. Thanks Again!

I had fun writing this story with you all as characters. So I thought I will share the fun with you guys. So the next post will be a story with me as the character and written by you guys. So I request each one of you to pitch in some lines for the story as a comment. I will consolidate them and put them as a story in my next post. Unleash your imagination and have fun.

Learn Blogging in 30 days! Part -Deux

2007-05-18T01:32:00.000-06:00

For Flash back click here

Karthikeyan bangs the duster on the desk to make the class quiet.

On seeing this GomaalGopal tells Bharani, "Billu If Princi tells order order... then tell him I want one plate Pongal vada and one coffee".
Hearing this Bharani ROTFL's!! Karthikeyan see's this and calls Bharani to tell about how he blogs. Bharani thinks a lot and then he tells "Actually I think, I think, I think... and inspite of all the think I only blink, then I listen to some song and post that with the lyrics. In short my blog is Powered by Ctrl+C, Driven by Ctrl+V".
Immediately G3 stands up and says "You guys might laugh at Bharani for copying, but its talent and with some public service mentality."
Golmaal tells Bharani "Billu, be ready for a long bill from G3."
Karthikeyan gets the attention of the whole class and introduces Priya to class as the blogger who can literally write about anything from a shopping cart to women empowerment.
Priya comes to dais and talks about her experience in blogging. She tells "Writing blog is like a painting or a writing a poem, you can get inspiration from everything that you see in your daily life"
Suddenly Sachin Gops stands up and tells "Correct! That's why I wrote about my Window, Calculator, TVS 50....." while he was listing all the things that he had written people in the last row including gals started pelting with chalk pieces and paper rockets forcing him to sit.
After that Priya continues to tell about her inspirations and points to someone who was swinging outside on the near by tree. When everyone peeped though the widow they started to laugh, wonder ing what was so funny Karthikeyan looks outside and to his surprise he finds Heidi Kris wearing a white dress, singing and swinging. Sat looking at this conks Gils on his head and asks "Does she think herself as Sridevi in 16 vayathinile?" Gils replies to her in anger "How do I know?"
Sat keeps her cool and tells "Corrs! Corrs!"
Gils just sits back in his place quietly and mumbles "Let me get those Corrs song then I will make you drive a car and see to that you run over the car on yourself."
Meanwhile on the other corner of the room, ItchingToWrite takes out her cell phone and plays the ringtone loud keeping it near Ganesh. ArtNavy, who sits beside ItchingToWrite gets irritated by what she was doing and asked "What are you doing? Even Anush will behave better than you." for which ItchingToWrite replies "This guys mobile keeps ringing every now and then, so I am doing what I do to auto drivers on Chennai roads. It gives me a kind of happiness to do that.". Artnavy says "From tomorrow onwards I will get some of Anush's wooden toys, so that you can play with it.".
When all this was happening, suddenly a small boy dressed in Sharukh Khan's dress comes inside the class room singing and dancing "Devuda devuda yezhumala devuda..". While everyone was wondering who the kid was a small girl enters the room behind him and finds her mother who was hiding under the desk eating the yummy food that was cooked by Lera. Only then everyone realised that the mom of these kids Has to be her.
When everything settled down, Karthikeyan calls on Vidya to tell the class what technique she uses to get topics for her blog. Vidya takes the dias and starts "Sai chien Karthikeyan. Nee how students." The whole class wonders what she was talking. She then realised that she has got the hangover of chinese after attending the chinese new year festival. She then starts tellig about the history and geography of her blog and continues with the physics and chemistry of her blog then starts with dynamics and goes on and on and on as if she is powered by energizer battery.
Bored by the non-stop n............ (Did you think nonsense?? Vidya see what these people are thinking :) I didnt mean that way, I meant naration) Our class love birds Kittu mama and Maami start singing...

When they were about to finish their song, everyone hears Thee thee in a sweet voice. Arun hears this as tea tea and runs towards the door thinking someone was going to give tea and biscuit for everyone. Ambi who was standing near the door catches Arun by his ear and takes him to his place and tells him to sit there quietly. While doing this Ambi thinks within himself "Super, duper. Became a hero in front of all these girls... hehehehehe.... Thanks Arun". Meanwhile Arun repending over how his image was damaged by Ambi fumes and in turn smoke comes out of his ears. Again a sweet voice says Thee thee, and when we follow the voice, it was found that Marutham was singing a song. Venky who was sleeping so long suddenly got up when he heard "Thee Thee" and correctly he saw the smoke that was coming out of Arun's ears and started running out shouting "Fire Fire!". He went running in the college corridor even before anyone could realize what happened to him. Natamai immediately turns towards Kittu and tells "Paththa vechutiye parrata" and does one good morning opicer salute to Kittu Maami.
Shuba immediately turns towards usha and says "These guys are always like this, for no reason they get scared and run away shouting for help. Similar thing happened when I was born, Actor Surya and his brother current heartthrob Karthik (BSK'nu kooda sollalam) came and saw me when I was born. They took a peek into the cradle where I was put and started running like mad itseems. I still can't understand what they saw to get so scared."
For which Usha replies "Yenna Kodumai Shuba, These kind of people we should take them to Swiss alpine and fix them as your skis and ski down the hill."
Ambi is called upon the stage to give some valuable tips for the youth bloggers, there was a huge roar of claps for Ambi's entry.
Thanking everyone he starts his speech "People I am going to tell you how to write 68 posts and find your betterhalf." Hearing this natamai whistles in full flow. Ambi tells natamai "This is not for people who got married and frying potato bondas.".
Ramya raises her hand and asks a question to Ambi "I was told if I write about Eyes and change the color of my blog, dress and my accessories to green, many will fall for me, but all these made me look like a tree. Instead of guys falling for me I think soon some fruit will fall out of me. do you know why?". Ambi replies "If you ask kozhanthai(so claims Ambi) all this, he will start crying."
Krithika who was quiet all this while asks Ambi a question "Do good friends make better girlfriends/boyfriends and couples? Not necessarily.Because a relationship ushers in possessive attitude which brings out a different side of a woman's personality?
I'm pretty confused..."
Ambi replies "Hearing your question I am Kaathu-fused".

The class will continue....

PS - Folks, Thanks for the comments for the previous post, it was very encouraging. Sorry I was unable to reply to them. Hope henceforth I will blog more regularly.
P.S.S - Thought of finishing this story this week but was getting too long so extending it to one more section a la Gils.

I'll be back

2007-04-25T23:33:00.000-06:00

This is exactly what I would like to have currently.... Would any of you be interested for the tech writer post? :)

Learn Blogging in 30 days!

2007-04-06T11:45:00.000-06:00

Disclaimer: All characters in this post are not fictious and they resemble any person or blog in real world intentionally. And so junta take this in lighter vein.

This day one year back, Kays Brainwave came into existence. With all your encouragement it has completed a whole year of blogging. I was almost done with blogging when Kays Brainwave was about 1.5 months old. But comments and encouragement from you guys has made me going for more and complete a year. Thanks People!
Just an imagination of how it will be if all of us were in one class room studying about blogging. This story is inspired from zaban sambalke that used to come on DD long time back.

S0ul enters the class room with a Jamba juice in her hand and sits in the first row next to Keshi and starts to crib about how bad her day was. In reply Keshi was describing about the blue eyed guy whom she saw in the train. Later Sat enters the room and goes straight to the last row and tells Gils to move, saying she wants to sit in the last row. KK tells her that all girls sit on the other side and not here. Sat gets angry and yells "How dare you tell me to go sit along with the girls?". Gils who was watching silently so long smirks and looks at Sat. Sat turns towards Gils and says "So you are laughing at me uhn??? We'll see how you get your corrs". Immediately goes behind Sat and convinces her that he will give a seat in the last bench and also give her son papdi.
Then suddenly Natamai background music (If any one can send me this, I would appreciate it.) starts and Natamai Syam enters the room followed by Bharani carrying the umbrella and Arun carrying the beetle leaves box. Meanwhile Prithz who was sitting in the first row so long, suddenly got up and came to the last row. BSK goes and shoo's her telling her that she cant sit there. Prithz argues for some time and this comes to the attention of Natamai. So he goes near them and asks what the problem is, when he is about to let Prithz to sit where she wants, BSK places a bottle of Bacardi in Natamai's hand, after which Natamai changes his decision makes Prithz go and sit in the first row. Prithz goes and sits in the first row grumbling about how biased Natamai is.
M.Karthikeyan, the Principal of Blogging School enters the room with some teachers. He walks up the podium and greets the students. Prithz immediately goes to him and complains about what happened in the class. Karthikeyan immediately punishes Natamai, BSK, Bharani and Arun telling them they need to post a 100 words post everyday for the next 20 days.
Just then Ponnarasi excuses herself to enter the classroom. Karthikeyan questions her why she was late. For which she replied "There was huge queue for the tickets and by the time I got one, I was late and so I came running all the way from Mylapore." Karthikeyan was astonished hearing this, so he asked her in exclamation "You ran all the way here from Mylapore?Wow!! How could you do that?" he asked.
For which she replied "I got on to the train and ran inside the train until I reached here."
The whole class burst into a laughter and Karthikeyan was totally snubbed and so he told Ponnarasi to go and sit in the class.
Karthikeyan says "Ok folks, now its time to introduce you to our special guests who will give tips on how to write blogs in their own special ways. To start with I would like to call G3 to tell us about her speciality."
Arun whispers to Bharani "Hahaha, is she going to tell us how to put some mokka posts??"
Natamai tells to Arun "No she might tell something about how to write about food and how to find people for treats."
Bharani replies to Natamai "No thalaiva, she might tells us about how to write love poems and fool people saying its for a friend"
"Hahahahaha" laughed all three.
As expected G3 gave the class some gyan on how to write a post when you don't have anything to write about.
Karthikeyan comes back on the podium and says "Before the next guest comes and talks lets see some of your posts and analyze how it can be improved."
"Harish why don't you tell us about your post" asked G3.
Harish said "I wrote this post where I wrote a story in which there was an old man who stayed alone in a village in the middle of the forest and few animals were heading to his house and..."
"and what happened" asked G3
"Then I had a power cut so could'nt write more" said Harish
Everyone laughed out loud again.

The class will Continue...

Varta...

Main hoon na...

2007-03-30T15:24:00.000-06:00

Who is a show stealer? And where can they be easily found? I am sure most of you would have come across show steelers during your life some where or the other. One of the most common place where you can find these show steelers are in a meeting room. There is no other entertaining place in this World like a meeting room.
It is so funny to see different people trying different ways to be a show stealer, especially if the meeting is being organized by someone who is very important, like your boss or someone who has the ability to do a remarkable change to your life in some way or the other.
The leaders of show stealer are the Mr/Ms. KnowItAlls. These are people whom you can find in most of the meetings. These are people who think and try to show to the World that they know just about every thing under the sun and there is nothing in this World that they have not come across. Only if they come to know that others are listening and no one knows anything about what they are talking they immediately shift to the top gear and become so pompous that you can hardly stand them anymore. I feel like putting a cork in their mouth and shutting them.
Then there are Mr/Ms Disconnected who start talking something that is totally not connected to the topic that is being discussed. This includes people who go beating around the bush and finally when you think about what they said, he would not have said anything sensible at all. In one of my recent meeting one guy spoke for about 2-3 mins and suddenly finished. I was thinking to myself, so what is he trying to say here?? Only thing I could think of is, just to make his presence in the meeting he just spoke.
Then are another kind of people who try to make their presence in the meeting. They are slightly different from the previous category of people. These kind of people mostly oppose to anything that is being suggested by the meeting chairman. By revolting they pull everyone's focus on them. Again in my recent meeting, a suggestion of having a technical lead along with a Project manager was suggested for each project. So Mr.Revolt immediately asked how will just one person suffice for a team and they need to have a technical person for every 2 people or something. Hearing this I felt like laughing out loud, if the technical person is the one who is going to tell us how to code then why would the company need programmers they would rather have typists who will type what the technical person tells.
Then there are these Mr/Ms CloseProximity. These are people who always see to that they are seated at a close proximity to the meeting chairman or at least in the line of vision of the meeting chairman. These people may not make their presence by talking but they see to that they get noticed by the meeting chairman. They mostly try to display a very positive body language by nodding their head etc. If you ask them anything after the meeting, mostly they wont know what was told in the meeting and they would crib to you telling how bad the meeting was. If only they used their acting skills in some cinema they could have won some oscars.
Then there are another set of people, Mr/Ms BackBenchers, who do not care what is happening in the meeting. They just observe what different people do during the meeting and have fun at their expense. They generally try to sit as far as possible from the meeting chairman. They generally have the typical back bencher attitude waiting for the meeting to either end or serve food. Well I don't think I need to say in which category I fall, do I?

Varta...

Hazardous Post!!!

2007-03-21T13:26:00.000-06:00

Well true to the adage, An idle mind is a devil's workshop, Now my slowly becoming idle blog has become a devil's workshop. This a very different post in my blog. Go through this post at your own risk. Suddenly I am developing an interest to sing. As my blog name suggests, this blog is about my brain waves. So I decided to record a couple of songs which I sang. I am no where close to a trained singer, so hear me singing at your own risk.

Thanks to Gils for the Mozhi song lyrics. It was his lyrics that instigated me to try singing. So he is kind of a partner in crime.

KatrinMozhi.mp3

Thanks to G3 for all the support and encouragement rendered by telling I sang the Mozhi song well and suggesting some prospective songs that I can try and also by providing the lyrics for the song (Raja Raja Chozhan from Rettai vaal kuruvi) that I decided to sing.

RajaRajaChozhan.mp...

Another special thanks to my online singing teacher Prithz. For helping me improve my singing by giving some valuable suggestions and teaching me some nuances of singing.

Feel free to throw stones and rotten tomatoes but at the same time take care of your computer screen (I am safe behind it :D )

Varta...

Gud ol' days

2007-03-14T00:51:00.000-06:00

Ramya's tag reminded me of my college days. To me college days were one of the best times in my life. I feel I was fortunate to get a chance to stay at hostel. But this post is strictly only about college.
When I talk about college then I should also mention about Kadalai (Peanut) and Pongal (Food). For people who dont know about these, well Kadalai is when people of different gender talk to each other and Pongal is when same gender talk to each other. I am not sure about other places but Tamil Nadu makes it a big issue when a guy and girl talk to each other. So Kadalai is one of the hot things during a students life.
Though many people (including me) had fun by Kadalafying happily in the corridor, stairs, classroom, canteen and every other place in college. It was equally fun to play some pranks on people who were busy talking and disturb them. Some of the pranks that I can recollect now are
1. When a guy and a girl are talking we guys go and talk to each other saying there is too much smoke around.
2. An improvement on the above idea was to hold our nose and trying to clear the air and saying its too much of smoke, smells like some thing is getting burnt.
3. Another improvisation of this Idea is, switching on the fan for the guy and girl saying we wanted to clear the smoke in that place.
4. A very good idea was to run with a glass of water and give the guy and the girl. Because after talking for so long they might feel thirsty, social service.
5. One of my favorite idea was to run all the way to the guy and gal talking, and show them a cone made out of paper and as them if they could share some kadalai (peanut).
6. The best idea we had during our college days was when a guy and a girl are talking form a group of say 4-5 guys and go sit in the next table facing the guy and the girl. After getting seated place a hand on the table and rest your chin on your hand and keep looking at them. I have never seen this idea fail, always the guy and girl used to move out of that place.
Well other than disturbing people talking, there were also instances where crazy things were done just for the sake of bet.
1. Went around telling people to smile and took a photo of them using a paper camera. I got a egg puff and a cool drink for it.
2. A cocktail of coke and coffee and won a cool drink.
3. Drinking a full bottle of Pepsi at a stretch to win another bottle of Pepsi.
Class room was another great place. Whenever a lecturer gives us a problem to solve and goes around the class to see if everyone is doing it, I used to type 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,0 + 0,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 and then "=" in my calculator. By then the lecturer would have crossed us and also by then some studious guy would have solved it and will be shouting the answer on top of his voice, immediately we also used to shout the same answer and escape from solving the problem.
Once for some lecture, we had to refer to a data book for solving a problem, my friend and I did not have the data book. So we wrote "Data Book" on the desk and when ever the lecturer tells us to look at the data book we used look at the word "Data Book" that we wrote on the desk. Well we escaped without getting caught as we sat on the 4th row that day. The lecturer saw only the first and last row people.
Other than this we had our chances to make our lecturers cry on few instances and eating when the class was going, reading news paper and magazines during class.
I don't think a masters program or job will be as good as a bachelors degree program. I think we become more mature by the time we pass out from the bachelors degree. Any day I would say that my college days are the most memorable ones. This post is more of a reminder where I have jotted down things which will rejuvenate my college days whenever I want to.

How do you feel about your college days, when you think of it now?

Varta...

Always with you

2007-03-07T19:33:00.000-07:00

Ram is suddenly woken up by the announcement from the plane captain "Welcome to San Jose. The local time is 13:30hrs and its a pleasant day with temperature 30F. Thank you for using Singapore airlines. We appreciate your business. Hope to see you soon. Have a great day."
"Wake up Ram, its time to get off the plane" says Ram's mom, Nirmala.
"Yeah mom, I woke up. Let every one get down I will go last"
Ram gets up from his seat and takes his hand luggage and walks slowly through the aisle and gets off the plane. After coming out of the plane Ram looks around to find where he can collect his checked baggages.
"Ram see everyone who traveled with us are going that side, I think the carousel should be on that side only."
Ram walks towards that side and finally finds the carousel on the other end of the hall way.
"Watch out for the baggages that has a yellow bow tied to the handle" says Ram's mom.
Ram spots the baggages easily because of the yellow bows that were tied to his baggages. He feels happy that his mom had come up with such a good idea.
He then searches for the person who was supposed to receive him at the airport, but never finds him.
"Ram why dont you try calling him on his cellphone?" says his mom.
Ram calls that person to only find that he wont be able to come and so Ram will have to take a cab on his own and go to the hotel.
Ram reaches the hotel and was amazed to find that his hotel room had a small kitchen. He takes a small nap.
After some time he hears his mother saying "Wake up Ram, go to the nearest grocer and buy some basic things to cook breakfast tomorrow."
Ram gets up from his bed and freshens himself and goes in search of the nearest groceries store. He gets a tray of egg, a can of milk, Nescafe instant coffee and a loaf of bread. He also got a few cans of coke, which he thought he can drink while watching TV.
Once he reached his room, he was keeping the groceries in the shelf and refrigerator. Suddenly he hears his mom yelling at him "I told you not to drink aerated drinks, why did you buy coke? you could have bought some fruit juice."
Ram quietly switched on the TV and started watching a basketball match between Lakers and Bulls.
While watching TV he falls asleep.
Suddenly in the morning, the phone in his room rings, thanks to the wake up call that he had booked at the reception when he went to the groceries shop.
He gets ready in a hurry. He then runs around searching for some thing.
His mother asks "What are you searching so frantically? If its your watch, its in the draw next to the bed."
Ram was relieved, when he was all set to go, he heard his mom "Have your breakfast and coffee and then go".
Ram later reaches his first day work at the client location. He is received by his manager and was shown around the office. He was later introduced to his client manager. After the meet he was free. His manager gave his mobile and asked Ram if wanted to call home. Ram said ok and he dialed the number. The phone rings and after about four rings he hears "Hello, who is this?"
For which Ram says "Hello, this is Ram."
"How are you Ram, How was your journey?"
"I am fine amma, the journey was comfortable, but I miss you a lot amma. I feel as if you are with me every now and then." and the conversation continues...

However far our life takes us from our Mother, more closer she remains...

Happy Women's day to all the women out there...

Varta...

Time pass - 2

2007-02-28T23:29:00.000-07:00

Why do women have more fashionable clothes than what men have? You go to any store, women have more things to buy when compared to what men have. Its mostly in one corner, mostly the back corner, that men's stuff will be kept for display. Is it because women are the big shoppers and that's why the stores have more goods for them or is it because there are more women goods and that's why there are more women shoppers?
Even in the case of fashion, women have more fashionable dresses than what men have. Women have so much variety in their dress. But men have just trousers, shirts and T-Shirts. Also the colors used for the women's dresses are more vivid colored than men. Men are stuck with Black, Blue, White, Grey and Green mostly (I am not counting fans of Govinda, Ramarajan and Gabdain in this list).

Varta...

Simple Tag

2007-02-24T17:15:00.000-07:00

In all my blogging days this is the simplest tag that I have come across. Thanks to ArtNavy and Krithika for giving me a simple tag.
Here is what I am supposed to do...
1. Grab the closest book.
2. Open to page 123, go down to the fifth sentence. (I didnt follow this, because it didnt make any sense when I start from here)
3. Post the text of next 3 sentences on the blog. (I have typed 5 sentences, so that you can try the following at your office and have fun)
4. Put in also the name of the book and its author.
5. Tag three people

Lets say a co-worker is desperately trying to concentrate on a vital project that is on deadline - the kind where any distraction is a horrible inconvenience. Call a person in the cubicle adjacent to you victim and ask inane questions, like, "In your budget projections, are you assuming a hundred cents to the dollar?" Insist that you have a bad connection and ask the person to speak louder and louder. Not only will the person to whom you;re talking get louder, but he wil be angry. Plus he will be saying completely non-sensical things like, "TWO PEOPLE WITH SMALL HEADS ARE NOT THE SAME AS ONE HEADCOUNT!!!"
This will make your victim insanely angry, but not at you You'll be safe and snug in your cubicle yards away.

Book Name: Joy of work Dilbert's Guide to Finding Happiness at the expense of your co-workers
Author: Scott Adams

I would like to tag Arun, Harish, Jeevan.

Whoa! Three down, one to go...

Varta...

Dream Tag

2007-02-18T23:19:00.000-07:00

Welcome back to yet another tag that I have in my sack. I have been tagged by Ponnarasi to write about some dream that I have had. Actually speaking, I seldom get any dream, and even if I do, I very rarely remember them. But I have remembered seeing a dream sometime during my childhood until now, guess I had this dream when I was in the 6th standard.
When we were kids we used to play cricket partially inside the house and partially on the road. Its like we used to open up the gates and plant out stumps in the road. The bowler will be bowling from inside the house and the wicket keeper will keeping the wicket on the road.
At that time only I came to know that Wasim Akram was playing on the road when Imran Khan spotted him and took him in the Pakistani cricket team.
It was the time when Indian team was playing a match in Chennai. So my dream was like Azhar and few more people from the Indian team while going some where see me and my friends playing and they get impressed. So Azhar gets down from the car and calls my friends and me for the net practice.
So the next day my friends and I go for the nets practice and Azhar and Sandeep
patil get very impressed and puts us in the team to play the match next day. The next day during the game, my friend and I have a wonderful partnership and each of us score a century. While another friend of mine bowls very well and gets some 4 or 5 wickets. Our good play leads us to win the match against England. Once the game is over my friends and I are being lifted by the whole team and celebrates the victory and we become part of the team from then on and the dreams ends as we being part of the team and we are very successful and we become stars in India.
The only person to whom I have told about this dream is my sister. She just laughed out so loud that I was so ashamed to tell anyone else about this dream. Now I am telling the whole world about this after about almost 2 decades. Guess the impact is going to be the same this time too.
Now time to tag, The tag goes to.....Heidi Kris, Lera, SKM and Reborn.

Varta...

Proposal meetings

2007-02-11T20:32:00.000-07:00

Looking at the heading did you think that its about the proposal meetings for a project? Neah!!!!! C'mon, We ain't nuts to be discussing about that. Love is in the air, if not this time of the year, when else??This is about the meetings while proposing someones love to another person.
As per me proposing to a girl is one of the most difficult task to do. Its not as easy as it seems. Especially when you have been with the other person for a long time. The more the amount spent with the other person, the more difficult it becomes. Only in the movies, the hero and heroines fall in love in a jiffy. It takes only a song's time to fall in love. In real life even after trying for ages the other person wont even look at that person.
During my freshman year in college, one day I went to the library, you might ask what I was doing there, good question, I had to go there to collect my library card which I could use to borrow books from the library, which I never happened to use until I completed my course. While I was waiting in the line, the girl before me, all of a sudden just turned to see who joined in the queue behind her. It was like a lightning struck me, our eyes met and both of us could not take our eyes away from each other. Immediately song and all started playing inside my head. Suddenly a disturbing sound, "What is your roll number?" asked the librarian. It was like as if the electricity snapped off when you were watching some favourite song of yours.
The girl took her eyes from mine and turned towards the librarian. Wonder how the librarian could think of disconnecting the wi-fi connection between her and me. Once she got the library card she turned towards me looked at me and gave a smile. That's it, I went all the way till Pluto and bounced back (no wonder pluto got pushed out of our solar system) to the library to collect my library card.
Later with not much difficulty I found that she was in the EEE department. She was sitting next to a window. That's the day when my relationship with windows started, until now I am stuck with Windows. What, it started with a wooden window, now currently at windows XP. I used to go up and down to have another wi-fi connection but never managed to get one. My connection requests were always stopped by firewall set by her classmate.
Days just passed trying to ping, telnet, remoting, to make web service calls and to get acquainted but every attempt failed miserably. Finally after 3 years managed to get a intro to her and had a chance to talk to her, but it was all too late by then. She already got a proposal from the firewall guy in her class and she had accepted it. Sigh! this attempt fused off even before the system booted.
Suddenly I had an enlightment that before I graduate from college I have to propose at least once, to have a job winning resume. Then came the Feb 14th during my final year in college, the day when proposals fly left right and center. My friend and myself thought that if we leave this chance we wont ever get another one, without getting beaten up with high heel foot wears. So my friend and myself decided to propose for fun to the girls in the 2nd year (another non-beaten up strategy applied here) thinking it should be easier to propose to a junior. So I picked a girl who was the friend of the girl to whom my friend was going to propose, to do my mock proposal. All morning thinking how I to propose, I came up with the idea of a card. I made the card myself with the wordings "If you accept this card it automatically means you love me :)". After all you dont get anything without a condition in this materialistic World .I found this as a brilliant idea and wanted to patent it soon, as I wont have much problem in handing over the card and runaway without much talking to do. At the same time the girl will love me by taking the card.
It was around lunch time so my friends and myself were walking towards the hostel for lunch. Suddenly one guy comes running down the corridor shouting "KK she is coming!" (Yup! the whole hostel knew that I was going to do it). Now that it became a prestige issue, after all the talking that I did, I could not back out. I had to do it.
So I started walking towards her down the corridor and caught her with her friends in front of the placement office (whether they found jobs for us or not, they found out about this incident). I some how managed to get the guts to tell her "I need to talk to you.". After telling her this I went a couple of steps ahead and waited for her. While waiting I got scared what will I do if she accepts my proposal, because I was doing it for fun. While wondering about this she came near me. Keeping my fingers crossed I said "Can you take this card?"
When the whole world was quiet, seeing what I did, Suddenly there was huge roar from the opposite building first floor (U.S second floor). It was the CSE guys shouting "KK! KK! KK! KK!" like in some cricket match. Damn! Immediately a Niagara falls started from my face, Yes, I had a sweat rain more than what comes in Cherrapunji or Seattle. I felt awkward to take my handkerchief and wipe my face in front of her. So left it as it is. By then even she got scared and refused to take the card.
I wanted her to take the card some how, else it would become a big shame for me in front of all those guys around. So I told her "I am your senior, I am telling you to take, so you better take it.". She took the card with some hesitation. See politeness does not work, only power works in this World. Before anything adverse could happen I just fled from that place as fast as I can. Only after I reached hostel I realised that I became an instant hero, people whom I knew and didnt know came forward and congratulated me.
After this day, she was scared to come in front of me anywhere in the college. If I was in this end of the corridor she would run to the other end of the corridor. Once when my friend and I was in the canteen, she came in with her friends. She saw me and went out of the canteen with her friends. Having seen this, my friend and I waited inside the canteen to see how long she will wait outside. To our surprise she never entered. She went running into the canteen, as soon as we stepped out. Its so funny to think about it now. If at all there was one soul that was scared of me, it will be only she.

So do you have any interesting proposal encounters to share?

Wishing you all a very Happy Valentines day!!!
For people like me who don't have a valentine, have an imaginary valentine and celebrate in style... after all its a complex World. Its got to have an imaginary part too :)

Varta...

Help Needed...

2007-02-06T09:59:00.000-07:00

A colleague of my friend is in need of help, any kind of help will be appreciated. It is for Mr.Narendra Muktipudi who is 31years old,married and having a one and half year old daughter, he had a major Brain Stem Stroke on August 28 2006 due to Hypertension. He has been on life support system for more than 3 months and at this time his insurance company has stopped covering his bills. His wife is fighting it out alone. For more details please check here.

Pedagogy sans purpose

2007-02-05T07:02:00.000-07:00

Well,I thought I will talk about the back bone of India for this post. Education. India is well known for the quality of education. We have one of the best standards of education in the World. This high standard in education has put India on the global map. Though it gives a lot of happiness to see India being accepted worldwide for it excellence in various fields such as Medicine, IT, Business, Rocket science and Nuclear energy, I feel the kind of education or the way of education we under go is not good enough.
If you see in the current education system, it does not matter how much you have understood and what you learnt. All that everyone needs is high marks. I feel its no point getting marks in 90's and 100 when someone did not understand the concepts underlying in something that was learnt.
Recently, I was talking to a person who had excelled in studies during his childhood.The topic went to Chemistry and I was telling him that I used to be scared of Chemistry as I found organic Chemistry very tough and more of a memory test, when compared to physical and inorganic Chemistry. He then told me that he too used to feel the same but everything changed when he went for tuition and his teacher taught him so well that he started to enjoy Chemistry so much. He literally fell in love with Chemistry ever since then.
Another instance was when I was talking to one of my friend. We were talking about Automobile engineering, and I was telling her something and asked her if she remembered that we studied this during our engineering. For which she said that she studied only in exam point of view. Of course she had scored more than me but purpose of learning was defeated when the concept was not learnt.
So it depends on how a subject is being thought. And I feel importance should be given to understanding the concepts than how much marks are scored. Is marks a good way to evaluate the knowledge that a person gained? Does high marks mean that the person has understood everything? But many times I have seen there are many mediocre students who have better knowledge than most of the high scoring students.
How many schools focus on improving an average student. The importance is given more to the brilliant students or the borderline students. The brilliant students are helped to do even better so that they gets some ranks which will rub on the educational institution too. Meanwhile the border line students are given more attention so that every one clears the exam and there by increasing the pass percentage of the educational institution. So what about the average students who have been scoring in 60's? If extra attention is given to them they would be scoring in 80's.
I am not a great believer of a belief that says that some children are more brilliant than another children. I believe that its all to do with the interest that the individual child has. If a child is interested in something, he/she will surely excel in it, if his/her parents and teachers encourage her/him in that line. As a child I used to score well in Physics than Chemistry because I was more interested in it.
I feel it is high time that our educational system is revived because it is no point increasing the number of doctors, engineers, architects, pharmacists or other professionals produced when the quality of professionals produced has been diminishing at a constant rate. Montessori method of schooling is a welcome change as it discourages the use of traditional ways of measuring achievements (grades, tests).

Varta...

Loooooooooooong tag!

2007-01-28T22:50:00.000-07:00

1. Were you named after anyone?
You mean by my parents??? Yeah, after my sister, she was born before me...

2. Do you wish on stars?
Only star I wish upon is 5 star, been long since I had one...

3. When did you last cry?
After seeing that I am tagged for this...

4. Do you like your handwriting?
As per my handwriting I should have become a Doctor, because no one understands what I write. So that way I like it, though I am not a Doctor, my hand writing qualifies to be doctor's...

5. What is your favourite meat?
I dont like to be a racist, all meat are good...

6. What is your most embarrassing CD on your shelf?
Cheeee... who keeps those CD's on shelf...are you nuts??

7. If you were another person, would YOU be friends with you?
If that another person is a girl, absolutely no doubt...

8.Are you a daredevil?
Depends on what you want me to do... I am daring but not stupid...

9. How do you release anger?
Going for a drive...Bikes are the best for this... My bike has absorbd all my anger many times...

10. Where is your second home?
AMC Theatres

11. Do you trust others easily?
Yep, I do.

12. What was your favourite toy as a child?
I used to make my own toys when I was young... I miss the Jeep and Cross bow that I made the most. Bad habit that I had is I used to break my previous toy before I made the next one...

Stay tuned... The tag will continue after a short break...

13. What class in school/college do you think is totally useless?
Every class is important... every single drop of knowledge adds up the ocean of knowledge...

14. Do you use sarcasm a lot?
What do you think my previous answer was??

15. Have you ever been in a mosh pit?
Not exactly on a mosh pit but on the stage a few times...

16.What do you look for in a guy/girl?
Its a secret... (Thozhil ragasiyamlam veliya solla mudiyathu)

17. Would you bungee jump?
Waiting to... Will you take me??? Heard there are good ones in New Zealand...

18. Do you untie your shoes when you take them off?
Yes I do, I am a very organized guy you see :D

19. What's your favourite ice cream?
German-chokolatekake®

20. What are your favourite colours?
Looking at my blog, what do you think my fav color is?

21. What are your least favourite things?
gossiping...

22. How many people do you have a crush on right now?
((10 * 2 + 12) / 4) - 8

23. Who do you miss most right now?
Mommy's food...

24. What are you listening to right now?
Some car shouting "Aiyo aiyo, Muje bachao! I am being stolen"... Wait a sec, let me see if its my car...

25. If you were a crayon, what colour would you be?
Black...(Malavika will like me then)

26. What is the weather like right now?
Cold for a normal day but warm for a winter day...

27. Last person you talked to on the phone?
Voice mail...technically I didnt have to talk... only press buttons...

28. The "first" thing you notice about the opposite sex?
Asku busku...How many ever times you ask same answer...refer #16

29. Do you like the person who sent you this?
Amazing, wonderful, cherubic, gregarious, friendly, knowledgeable person (Ganesh, Next time only small tags ok??)

30. How are you today?
Lazy... dont feel like moving out of my bed...

Be right back...After a short break...
Manirathnam found AR Rahman through the following ad

31. Favourite non alcoholic drink?
Filter kaapi...

32. Favourite alcoholic drink?
Zombie

33. Natural hair colour?
Black.

34. Eye colour?
Brown.

35. Wear contacts?
Neah...

36. Siblings?
one didi

37. Favourite month?
While in school May but now no favourites as such...

38. Favourite food?
Chicken Biryani

39. Favourite day of the year?
January 1st... The whole world celebrates this day...

40. Have you ever been too shy to ask someone out?
You mean "Get out"? I am not so rude...

41. Scary movies or happy endings?
Happy movies with scary endings.

42. Summer or winter?
Tough call, but I prefer summer.

43. Holi or Diwali?
Both are fun, both are great occasions to be with friends...

44. Do you like your name?
Yep. when in short form
Ok types when in medium form
Not so much when in full form

45. What book/magazine are you reading?
I forgot how to read...

46. What's on your mouse pad?
When I dont have a mouse why would I need a mouse pad?

47. What did you watch on TV last night?
Everybody loves Raymond

48. Favourite Smell?
Food

49. Have you ever regretted breaking up with someone?
Neah.

50. Most tiresome thing you’ve ever experienced/done?
Sleeping the whole day... Doing the same thing whole day makes me tired...

Lets see who is the lucky one who's tagged for this tag after a break...

I would like to tag S0ulasylum (Since she is missing for a long time now)

Moral of this Tag: Visit blogs of others regularly, else you might end up doing a tag like this.
Ganesh, I didn't tell any one that you tagged me because I was missing out on your blog :D

Varta...

Timepass - 1

2007-01-24T22:03:00.000-07:00

A question popped up from my small brain today. The question is regarding where France and Japan are originally from. Its kind of a theory of relativity. But not my guru, Einstein kind.
I think most of you will agree with me that France is the fashion capital of the World and Japan is the technology capital of the World. I also hope that you will agree that men are very much inclined to tech stuff and women are more inclined towards fashion stuff. Since men are from Mars and women are from Venus, Does it mean France has its roots from Venus and Japan has its roots to Mars?
Then, where are the other countries from?

Varta...

Go Bears!!

2007-01-22T22:41:00.000-07:00

A cold afternoon, when the forcast predicted a gud 2-3 inches of snow and the mother nature had delivered just what was promised by the weather man. The dark clouds were overcast Chicago not letting the sun fall on the ground.
Suddenly there is a huge roar by a lot of people who gathered there and the lights were swtiched on. Everyone was looking at one guy, who was running carrying it in one hand. There are a lot of people chasing him and trying to stop him from going far. While the partners of the guy running were trying to block the people from stopping the guy from going any further.
Suddenly one of the guy chasing some how manages to penetrate the guys blocking and catches hold of the guy running. The guy running immediately throw it to another guy , who catches it and starts running away from the people chasing. He runs so fast that no one could catch him. Finally when he was about to reach his home the crowd shout "Go Bears! Go Bears!! Go Bears!!!" on top of their voice.
Once he reached his home all his partners come and hit him on his head and do a chest butt. The crowd immediately played the following music.

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The whole crowd sang the following song along with the above music.

Bear down, Chicago Bears! Make every play clear the way to victory!
Bear down, Chicago Bears! Put up a fight with a might so fearlessly!
We'll never forget the way you thrilled the nation with your T formation.
Bear down, Chicago Bears, and let them know why you're wearing the crown
You're the pride and joy of Illinois. Chicago Bears, bear down!

Streamers were flying left, right and center. People jumping, dancing, singing, shouting, everything. They were all over joyed that their home team have become the NFC champions. Chicago bears are going to Miami for the Super Bowl after 21 years.
Chicago is electrifying after yesterday's victory in the NFC championship, So couldn't refrain from not posting a post on that.
The above scene is about a touch down in a Football match. For more info on Chicago Bears check here.

Varta...

Striking a balance

2007-01-15T22:44:00.000-07:00

Work life balance is becoming an important topic of discussion in the working segment of people. I feel this is a very important term that needs to be discussed in today's situation.
In an Indian IT working environment, the peer pressure is very high. Because of this some people are forced to work more than what they can actually can. Moreover there are a lot of managers who feel working long hours means the person is a hard worker and that person gets better benefits in appraisal compared to a person who works the required hours but still more efficient than the person who works long hours. This mentality of the managers forces the efficient employees to stretch their day just to appear in the good books of their managers.
There is a saying which goes as follows which applies to many workaholics in today's IT industry... Its goes like "Work to live. Don't live to work."
I feel we Indian do not give importance to family when compared to work. Work is important i dont deny that, but work is not the only thing. People need to spend more time with their family and also enjoy doing some hobby.
Extended hours of work can create stress to the employees, especially when the employee does not enjoy doing the work much. Some of the conditions in work force that create job stress are :-
1. Hectic and routine tasks give little sense of control for the employee. Heavy work load and long work hours create stress.
2. Lack of Support from supervisors and coworkers creates stress.
3. If employee has little say on decision making creates stress.
4. If the job expects too much from the employee, it creates stress.
5. If the employee feels there is lack of opportunities for growth and promotion it creates job stress.
6. Working environment such as crowded, noisy or polluted office environment creates stress.
Studies have shown that psychologically demanding jobs put employees at greater risk of cardiovascular disease, greater risk for developing back and upper-extremity musculoskeletal disorders and Psychological disorders.
Some of the suggestions for employers are:
1. Have flexible timing for employees.
2. Option of working from home.
3. Employer regularly doing a review of work life balance of their employees on regular basis.
4. Adequate leave options should be given to the employees.
Employees should also take conscious effort to improve their own work life balance. They should choose to work fewer hours and spending more time with their family.
But I have seen that due to bad estimations and due to heavy competition to win a project, most of the projects are executed in crunch time with lots of slogging by employees. So in order to curb this problem, I feel a union should be started like how it exists in mechanical industry. I feel so because the employee do not have much say if their managers expect them to slog for a project which was estimated badly.

Varta...

December-May

2007-01-07T11:48:00.000-07:00

As you may know, Older woman and younger man relationship is become more of a vogue these days. There are a lot of celebrity couples like this, to name a few, Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher. Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins. Anjali and Sachin Tendulkar.
It seems almost one-third of women between ages 40 and 69 are dating younger men (defined as 10 or more years younger). According to a recent AARP poll, one-sixth of women in their 50s, in fact, prefer men in their 40s.
Tina B. Tessina, Ph.D., a licensed family therapist in practice in Long Beach, Calif., and author of "The Unofficial Guide to Dating Again", tells WebMD that

It's not what you think -- the stamina or "re-boot" ability of the younger male. The women like the flexibility and sense of adventure of their more spontaneous, younger companions

Though this is spreading slowly, its still not being accepted easily in the society.
Why is that the man needs to be older than the woman? Does it really matter who is older in a relationship?
I had one such conversation with my friends recently, so one of my friend was saying that women think matured sooner than men and thats why it is preferred to have the an older man and younger woman relationship. But I was not convinced with the explanation. So when I gave a little thought on this, I was wondering if this trend of older man and younger woman was due to the patriarchy that existed across the World. Due to the patriarchy, they wanted the men to be in full control always and it was easier to achieve if the man was older than the woman. Now that woman are becoming more independent the patriarchy is reducing and thus older woman and younger man relationship has started blooming.
After this thought I was even more curious about the reason and so tried searching the Internet. That is when I came across this Fertility and evolutionary psychology theory in Wikipedia. As per that article women begin to lose their fertility as they enter their late thirties. While men remain fertile until much later in life, although it declines over time. The evolutionary psychology suggests that people are more likely to be attracted to people who look like they might be fertile. But all these being said, I feel these theories would have evolved in recent years. But older man and younger woman relationship has been followed for many years. So I feel my reasoning more convincing than these. What do you think?
Interestingly, there seems to be a folk formula that has been evolved to compute correct disparities of age between older and younger partners, this being "divide by two and add seven", else the relationship is liable to be subject to moral disapprobation. I feel the age disparities suggested by this formula seems more.

Sources: MSN, Wikipedia

Varta...

Doordarshan of childhood days

2006-12-29T16:05:00.000-07:00

If you spent your childhood days in India then I think most of us would have scolded the National television channel, Doordarshan (DD), some time or the other during our life. Now when I heard and saw a few things online, I felt so nostalgic about Doordarshan. It brought back some sweet memories of my childhood days and gave me immense happiness, which cannot be paralleled even if I win a lottery worth a million dollars.
Now when I think of it, I really miss Doordarshan for a few things. This post is a compilation of artifacts that I could find that are related to Doordarshan and these very artifacts makes me go back in years to my childhood days. I really wish I could go back to those days again.
This is relatively a new video that used to come on DD. The song is catchy and also has a nice message suitable for current age. This video reminds me of my military bag, running races that we used to have during lunch breaks in 4th and 5th standard, craze for Hero pen, class group photo, school bell etc. Hope the new year spreads education to every nook and corner of this World. Let children be given the right to study.

I remember that Sundays used to be a special day for me during my childhood. I used to wait the whole week just for this day of the week. Sunday is the day when we used to have a lot of programs to watch on TV.
The following song reminds me of Pongal and Sambar/Chutney. Well, that used to be our regular Sunday breakfast in our house. I used to watch this program mostly while having my breakfast.

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I used to love the following program. Where ever I was, I used to run to watch this program. Seems like getting hooked to this program is in our family blood, now my nephews are hooked big time to this character.

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Long long ago, sometime when I was very small this program used to come on DD. I was such a big fan of this program. I guess this was the first program that released toys of its characters. I used to yearn for them then. Wonder where this character has gone? I don't get to see it now a days. By the power of Gray skull...

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There were days when I used to sing along with the following song. This song is sung in many Indian languages. Though I knew only one language of all the languages that were used, I used to sing some gibberish just by sound pattern matching, without knowing what I was singing. It felt great to find this video online. Not bad I still remember a decent amount of the song.

The following video is very very special to me. It is surely a kind of video which will take our memory trail back to our childhood days. I guess this video was made sometime around 1974. It was great feeling to watch this video online. Ladies and Gentleman presenting to you the evergreen and irreplaceable 'Ek Chidiya'

We have been thought a wonderful lesson during our childhood through this cartoon. The song states that if we all work together in harmony there is nothing that we can't achieve. Keeping this in mind lets all take a New Year resolution to work together in harmony and make this World a peaceful and better place to live.
Wish, as we pass through each year, we become younger. But in reality it can't happen. So hope this post rekindles the kid within you and makes you feel younger.

Wishing everyone a very Happy & Prosperous New year 2007!!!

Varta...

Merry Christmas!

2006-12-24T00:37:00.001-07:00

It's Christmas time. The whole World celebrates this festival with lots of zeal. In U.S most of the houses are decorated with some colorful lights and really cool air blown puppets of Santa and rein deers, Mickey mouse, Scooby doo, Simpson etc. All these decorations makes us feel the festive season.
Last year I saw an awesome light show at Saks 5th Ave in NYC near the Rockefeller Center.Following is the video of that light show.

I have seen many houses decorated with lights for Christmas but the following light show in some house is really amazing. Enjoy the video.

Christmas carol is a common activity during Christmas. People go to everyone's house and and sing carol at their house. So to continue the same tradition I thought I will carol in your house virtually.

Wish you Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!!!

Varta...

Caste abomination

2006-12-17T21:42:00.000-07:00

Never in my dreams have I thought that I will be writing a poem. But after I started reading a lot of blog, I noticed that many people write poems very nicely. Inspired by reading poems on many blogs I felt like trying my hand in writing a poem. I just took the theme from one of my earlier post. The following is my first ever poem, Hope you guys like it.Frozen Memories
===============
One bright day, his heart starts to flutter,
Keeping it with in him created storm and thunder,
With lots of apprehension he asked her,
If she could be his forever.

With no doubts in her mind, Yes she told,
giving her hand, saying her heart is now sold,
In memorable moments together they rolled,
Their lives shaping up in their love's mold.

Big No from parents because of difference in caste,
Didnt bother to look at character or cast,
Wonder why parents are still in the past,
Along society, ranking their child's happiness last.

For many years, to convince they struggled,
Caste blinding their parents, their love was ridiculed,
Such a pair can never be found even when googled,
Having high hopes the young pair was only fooled.

When their dreams and reality did not blend,
On a cold dark night everything reached its fag end,
Hearts shattered to pieces and no way to mend,
With tears in their eyes they departed as friend.

I would like to dedicate my first poem to a very special friend of mine. You know who it is, Its for you.

Varta...

Jaage Hain

2006-12-09T18:03:00.000-07:00

Back again with the picturization that I have imagined for another new song. Interestingly this song is also sung by AR Rahman. The song is from the movie "Guru", which is yet to be released. The movie is Directed by Maniratnam, casting Abhishek Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai, Madhavan, Vidya Balan. I could not write it for each line like last time, as it has long music in between. Play the song and read the post and try imagining.

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When the music starts, Its late in the night and we show a small middle class house with one room lit in the first floor. The camera starts from the ground level and goes up slowly to the first floor level.
When the song starts, we show inside the lit room, where Abhishek Bachan (Abhi) is sad with tears in his eyes due to some failure. Abhi lies on Aishwarya Rai's (Ash) lap, while starts singing with tears slowly dripping from her eyes. When she is about to finish her verses, a drop of tears falls on Abhi's face. He looks at her and and gets up from her lap and makes her lie on his shoulder and pats her head slowly like consoling her. Slowly the camera moves away from them.
While the music goes in the background. Next shot, she would have slept leaning on his shoulder, so he slowly makes her lie on the bed and carefully places the blanket on her. He then walks out of a door in his room his room while the music is still playing the background. He comes and stands next to a railing. The camera goes around him and then slowly moves up while he he looks up at the sky. Slowly the camera moves far from him when A R Rahman starts singing and slowly the screen becomes dark.
Suddenly when the song's pitch increases we put on a spot light on Abhi, who is standing in a dark room. The camera starts from the top and slowly moves down and around him while he lip syncs the song.
After he finishes his verses, again the camera moves to top angle. Then there is cycle bell kind of sound that comes so when each time it comes another spot light comes and we show someone working and slowly the number of spot lights increase around him. When the chorus starts we show him surrounded by people working (typical shop floor), with he being in the center and the whole room lit and he starts walking around his shop floor and people wish him as he passes through them, the camera follows him.
Then the camera comes out and shows a huge building and then shows a long queue of workers waiting to enter the factory. The camera moves along the people queued up to enter and slowly the camera enters a room in the top floor and goes up and behind Abhi who stand next to a railing in the 3rd floor and watches his workers working. Then we show the finishing of a meeting with foreign delegates and Abhi gives the foreign a handshake near the same railing, he then turns and watches his workers working with a proud smile. In the end a trumpet music starts thats when the camera moves down and as the camera cross him it faces him and camera moves down making it appear as if he is rising.
When the chorus stops we show him in his posh bedroom contrasting to the one we showed in the starting of the song. Ash is already asleep. He caresses Ash on her head and goes to bed when the music phases out.

Well this is my imagination, Maniratnam always surprises me with a totally different video for songs like this, like for example Hey Ajnabhi from Dil Se. Waiting to see how he takes this song.

All contents above are protected by copyrights ©Kaysonline 2006

Varta...

Corruption

2006-12-02T03:52:00.000-07:00

Well I don't think I need to explain about corruption. I am sure everyone would have experienced corruption is some way or the other.
As per one of the recent news report in IBN-Live it is told that India is ranked 47th in the list of most corrupt countries. So whom do we blame for this the people who take bribe or do we blame the people who give bribe? I think it is due to both of them.
Though there have been many movies which has dealt with corruption as a subject. People enjoy watching how the hero's deal with corruption but how many of us have taken the initiative to not give bribes. Not many I am sure. This actually shows that we are all hoping that someone will do something for this corruption and bring it to a halt. But we do not dare to take the first step from our side. We don't want to take the pains of not giving bribe to get our work done. Are we doing the right thing? No. Corruption has penetrated so much in our society that we need to bribe the officer for him/her to do his work. Its not like he/ she is doing something out of the rule book.
Well I tried to abstain myself from giving bribes about a couple of years back. So once when I broke a rule in Egmore, Chennai, I was caught by a traffic inspector. I told him that I would not pay any bribe, instead I am ready to pay the fine. He did not say anything, he just wrote a charge sheet and gave it to me and I payed him the fine. Though I was sorry about my mistake, I was happy that I did not bribe.
On a contrast there was a incident where I was caught by cops at Mangalore. The cop took my Motorcycle key and asked for my license. Since my license was a photocopy of my Tamilnadu license, he refused to give the key. He was asking for the original, I told him I don't have it with me. So he asked me for a bribe, I refused to pay him a bribe and told him that I am ready to pay the fine. For this he was scaring me by saying the fine will be very high. I told I am ready to pay the fine irrespective of how much it is. But he was so resistant to give me a charge sheet. At last I was left with no other option other than paying the bribe. I felt very sad and angry at the same time.
Another incident which happened before I abstained from bribing, which shows how cheap corruption has gone. Once I took my cousin's bike to the Central Railway station in Chennai. While coming out, I was caught by a traffic policeman. Since my cousins bike didn't have a valid insurance he asked for a bribe. I had only Rs. 50 with me (student days) and I gave him that. So he left me. I took a U turn and I was caught again by another policeman right on the other side of the road. I told him that I have payed another policeman and I don't have any money. So this guy made me stand there and didn't let me at all. After bugging me for sometime he realized that I really didn't have any money so he caught another guy, he took the pen from my pocket and said the pen is nice. I told him to have the pen. Immediately her left me. The pen cost Rs. 5 or something, that was enough for him.
As per Daniel Kaufmann, Director of global governance at the World Bank's research arm.

They are not in the right zone, To sustain their rapid economic growth and graduate to the next level of development, China and India must pay priority to these issues

Can't we eradicate corruption at all? Has it seeped in so much into our system? How can we go about curing this cancer that has gone deep into the system?

(Sources: IBN-Live)

Varta...

Flight BA 420

2006-11-22T21:06:00.000-07:00

Disclaimer: All characters in this story are fictious. Any coincidence to anyone living or dead is purely coincidental. Its just for fun, so please take it in lighter vein.

A bright summer evening at blogodor. At Gate 23 we hear an announcement "The final call for boarding the Blogair flight number 420 to blogsville.". Just when the gate doors were about to close, Venkatesh comes running towards the door. He was delayed because of his partner, she is none other than his car. He then shows his boarding pass and walks towards the flight.
Venkatesh is welcomed by Keshi, one of the flight attendant. Keshi guides Venkatesh to his seat. Meanwhile the other flight attendant, Soul closes the the aircraft door. Keshi joins Soul and closes the door. After closing the door Keshi and Soul get engrossed in their usual talk about nail polish, hair band, perfume and other girlie stuffs. Each one boasting about the products that they use or bought.
Suddenly the aircraft captain makes an announcement "Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen. This is Gils, your flight captain for today along with our captain Arun and flight attendants Keshi and S0ul. We welcome you all on behalf of Blogair and hope you enjoy your flight. The total duration of the flight will be 3.5 hours"
The flight takes off. Once the flight reached the flying altitude, suddenly a huge scream followed by continuous loud crying. Everyone looks around to find who is crying. By then Pavithra consoles the kid who was crying. Meanwhile S0ul goes in search of the person crying. She finds out that the kid in the first row got scared looking outside the window.
"Honey, why are you crying, What's your name honey?" asked Soul.
"I am Prithz, I am scared of heights, so I got scared when I peeped out of the window" said the kid.
"Is this the first time you are traveling alone?" asked Soul.
"Yes" said Prithz wiping the tears on her cheeks.
"Ok honey, tell me, what would you like to have? ice creams or chocolate?" offered Soul.
"I want butterscotch ice cream and Ferero Roche chocolate" said Prithz.
For which S0ul said "Sure honey, Will get it for you".
She then turned and checked with Has to be me if she could take care of her until she returns. for which Has to be me replied "Sure, take your time, I have two kiddos at home".
Soul thanked her and went back to the pantry.
In some time, G3 goes towards the pantry, Keshi asks her "May I help you mam?" for which G3 replies saying "I am starving Can I have some food"
Keshi replies "We do not serve food on this flight as it is a short duration flight. But the drinks and snacks are coming soon, please be in your seat."
G3 goes back to her place and complains to Bharani who sits next to her "What crapy service, no food it seems, atleast if there were some plane stations in between, I can get down and buy something in the next plane station."
Bharani replied "Yes you are correct, I dont understand why there are no plane stations, they have bus station, train station even space station but no plane station. But look!" pointing somewhere outside the window. G3 thought he found some plane station. She looks around and finds nothing interesting. She then asks him "whats there?". For which he says "Birds!!!, I love bird watching." G3 was stumped.
Shankari who over hears G3, tells her "You can have Rendang chicken, if you want to." G3 happily accepts it and gives back the box so clean that Shankari need not wash it.
Suddenly a boy starts running around the plane sounding like a car and all of a sudden he stops with a screeching brakes sound. He honks at Bala.G who was lying down facing up and dreaming. Bala gets annoyed and asks the boy what he wants. The boy replies "I am Gopal Schumugger and I am racing, so move out of my way." They both get into an argument. Pavithra who sits near them steps in and solves the argument and made Schumugger sit next to her.
Meanwhile G3 gets impatient and complains to Priya, the lady next to her. Priya agrees to G3 that the service was bad and she noticed that the flight attendants are busy talking about their new shoes in the pantry. Priya suggests that "A on-board HR should be present to keep track of their service and appraise them based on that".
Keshi and S0ul comes pushing their trolley and they are blocked by someone. Its none other than, Brute. He got up from his place and was trying to strike a conversation with a young babe who was aboard. S0ul says "Son, please be seated in your place." For which brute replies "No, I want to be here, Need to tell her a story and you know, proceed on to win her heart" for which Keshi replies "Sir, please be seated, you can catch up with her later, I will help you if you want. You need some sexy pictures first to attract her.".
Keshi then pulls over to serve the passenger in the last row. "So what can I get you to drink mam?" asks Keshi, for which Kanya replies "I dont like the discrimination shown to women. Only wine and champagne is served for them, but men have a huge variety of drinks to drink. You being a women should not be doing this to another women. yada yada yada..." and stops after 5 minutes of continuous talking. Keshi by now confused tells her "I can get you what ever you want madam.". Kanya replies "Ok good, I like you. I would have a wine". Keshi doesnt know whether to laugh or cry on hearing this. Then Keshi inquires the next person, Starry replies in a poem what drink she wanted.
Meanwhile S0ul serves a gentleman who is seated near the window. Soul asks "Sir what can I get you to drink". For which the gentleman replies "Four Bacardis please." S0ul explains "I can atmost give you two not more than that". The gentlemen gets irritated and says "You know who I am? I am Syam, I am the natamai in Blogsville". Soul immediately apologizes and gives him four bacardi bottles and sprite and moves on to the next person. "Sir What can I get you to drink?" asked Soul. "Dont disturb me like this when I am dreaming, get me whatever Deepika endorses" replied Karthik B.S.
While the stewardess were serving the drinks, Arun walks out of the cockpit to take a rest room break. On his way to the restroom, he tells everyone that he is starting a new office and wants them to take a visit to his shop whenever possible. When he comes out of the rest room, he finds Gils the other pilot also out of the cockpit. When inquired Gils replied that things are under control and he has switched on the auto pilot.
In the first row, Sat was busy listening to her Ipod. Suddenly she finds that her Ipod went low on charge and to her surprise she finds something similar to a Ipod charging station so she plugs her Ipod in it and goes to the rest room feeling happy about her luck. Suddenly the following music starts playing and everyone wonders where from the music was from.

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All of a sudden the plane starts wobbling. Gils asks Arun "Is it wobbling because I put it on Auto? Because in Chennai auto jumps around like this only." Arun tells "Shut up and follow me" and both run to the cockpit. They were shocked to see that some one had opened the emergency exit door. They peeped through the window they found Syam dancing bharathnatyam on the wing. They come running to the door and call Syam. But he was too drunk and dancing to the tune that was playing in the plane. While everyone was wondering who was going to jump on to the wing and save Syam, Shuba and her childhood friend peep through the open door to see Syam dancing. Shuba's friend tells Shuba to jump on the wing and save him. She replies "Are you a nut case or what?". He then threatens to push her on the wing. She some how escapes from him and runs to her seat and belts herself tight to the seat.
By now Sat comes out of the restroom terrified by the wobble and gets shocked to see her Ipod playing loud. Whatever she thought as a charging station was actually a Ipod docking station connected to the speakers in the plane.
Once the music stopped Syam lost his balance and was about to fall and luckily gils had a rope and he threw the lasso correctly around Syam and pulls him in. The passengers go on a roar of claps for Gils for his heroic deed. Usha who was near the door, asks Syam "Yenna kodumai ithu" and hits her forehead.
While all this drama was unfolding, three guys were found to be sitting in their place calmly. One was Harish who was analyzing about people's behavior and making them characters in his next story. Contended was busy preparing for the conference for which he was flying. Lastly yours truly, KK who was busy typing this post.
After a while we hear an announcement from Captain Gils "We have reached Blogville and the local time is quarter past nine. Hope you enjoyed your journey. Blogair appreciates your business. Hope to see you soon.". Once the plane reaches its gate every one except one girl leave the plane and head towards their blogs.S0ul wakes her up "Ms.Arpita... Ms.Arpita the plane reached its destination." after which she wakes up and walks towards her blog.

Happy Thanks Giving Folks!!! Thanks to Brute for his great idea of using the blog fraternity as characters in a story. Hearing his idea I felt this would be a great thanksgiving gift to all the blogger friends. Though this does not have a lot of my other blogger friends, will add them in my subsequent similar kind of story. Hope you enjoyed reading the same.

Varta...

Photos...

2006-11-18T01:55:00.000-07:00

Just came across this comic strip of Calvin and Hobbes...

These comic strips made me think on how I was when my picture was taken. During my childhood days photograph was such a formal thing. My photographs were taken only for some application purpose or it was my class group photo. I was too busy sliding down the stairway rails, filling my pockets with chocolates, eating full meals in the name of tasting the food, etc. to waste my time posing in some photograph during functions and parties. So I never used to be any of the casual pictures.
Later the next stage was, I never liked myself in photos because of my monalisaic face belief. So always used to avoid being in a picture. Then suddenly one day I realized that only whatever is there will come in the picture so started to pose for pictures. I was so bored of just standing facing the camera so I started doing pranks like how Calvin does in the above strip. Now when I look at those pictures, it seems so funny to see what all I have done. Lifting my leg, putting my tongue out, having a squint eye and making many more pranks with my face and hands. The last prank picture that I took was me posing like, the name is Bond, James Bond. With two girls on each side of me.
On the contrary I have seen that many Asians do not even smile when their picture is taken. Instead they give a very cold stare at the camera as if the camera did or is doing something wrong. Just wondering why we stare at the camera rather than giving a warm smile? Is it because of the myth that our life time reduces when our photo is taken?
Have you posed in any interesting poses for photographs?

Varta...

Punishment Tag from Shuba

2006-11-13T08:11:00.000-07:00

Shuba made a hit list and punished us all by creating this tag and tagging us. Shuba here after lets talk it out and sort it out, ok? :)

1.The best thing to do - Sleep. What else can beat this. Thats when I get to become a Director, a cinematographer, an actor, a singer, a scientist, a truck driver, a cricketer playing as part of the Indian Team, meeting Michael Schumacher and many more...

2. The best gift - Still waiting for someone to present me a Mercedes / BMW/ Ferrari... Anyone interested in giving me the best gift???

3. The best thing I've ever heard - "I am a nice guy" I know its a big lie. But only truth is bitter who wont like a sweet lie.

4. The best thing I've said - Everything that I say is the best thing

5.The best thing that happened to me - Yet to happen

6.The best person I've met - Myself

7.The best friend - Many to be mentioned here.

8.The best moment - When I saw her for the first time.

9.The best book - Tinkle

10.The best blog - Every blog is good in its own way.

11.The best place - Dreamland

12.The best food - Chicken Biryani

13.The best song - I just called to say I love you by Stevie Wonder... Hoping to use it some time...

14.The best hangout - When I was hanged upside down from second floor in hostel for pulling many people's legs :) Trust me your head becomes heavy with all the blood flowing to you head.

15.The best eatout - Kaiyenthi bhavan A.K.A Roadside shops...remaining places I eat inside :)

16.The best hobby - Bird watching. There are so many varieties of bird the whole life time is not enough to see all :)

17.The best TV show ever - Didi's comedy show, Everybody loves Raymond

18.The best manager - Mom, especially when I was going to school. Notebooks dont where I left them,
Pencil box dont know where they are,
To search everything there is mom

19.The best musician - ARR

20.The best gang - Surely not Dawood Ibrahim's

21.The best drink - Water, dont think any other water

22.The best quote - Live life king size, dint mean Gold flake Kings

23.The best woman - Mother Teressa

24.The best kid - Me when I was a kid.

25.The best poem - The poem that other bloggers write.

26.The best dancer - Everyone after 4 pegs

27.The best movie - Cast Away

28.The best actor - Tom Hanks, Kamal Hasan

29.The best vehicle - Ecofriendly Bullock cart

30.The best scene in a movie - The scene when Tom Hanks cries when Wilson leaves him in Cast Away. The scene where Madhavan proposes to Shalini in Alaipayuthe.

What does it take to make a nice video?

2006-11-05T03:41:00.000-07:00

Now a days, most of the music videos directors think that if they spend a lot of money or go to some foreign country showing some beautiful places or awesome lighting or colorful screen composition or grandeur sets or show some skimpily clad girls, they can hit the jackpot of making a nice video which will appeal to the people. Here are the videos of a Chicago based group called Ok Go that proves that nothing of that sorts is needed to make people enjoy the video. Both the songs are catchy.
Treadmill is one of the most favorite exercising machine in the World. It gives us the flexibility of burning lots of calories by just letting us walk in one place while we watch TV or while listening to music. Have we any time thought of using it as a dance prop? At least I have never thought so. But check out the video of Here It Goes Again, This is surely going to be one of my favorite videos.

If that was not enough, check out the below video called A Million Ways, to prove that even a dance prop is not needed to make a good video. All they needed to make this video was a camera. Trust me, they didnt even need a camera man to make both these video's.

Hope you enjoyed watching the videos, just as much as I enjoyed watching it. And yes, the songs are also very catchy, I am hooked to the songs.

Varta...

Tiresome three some tag

2006-10-27T00:05:00.000-06:00

This Tag is sponsored by Has to be me.

3 Smells I love:
1. Petrichor - I dont know if this was because my school used to declare holiday for heavy rains
2. Jasmine - I meant the flower not the girl next door.
3. New smell, I mean the smell of new things like car, furniture, clothes, wife... err... sorry no wife...

3 Smells I hate:
1. The smell that you get when you crush a black bug which looks similar to a lady bug. In spite of the bad smell I used to crush it and scare my sister with that. Boy! I used to love doing that. If that smell is not enough, try burning it in a candle light, it smells even worse.
2. Smell when you pass through a brewery. What comes out of the brewery smells like heaven.
3. Smell that comes while burning hair. I used to think that waxing was removing hair but burning hair with the fire from a wax candle.

3 Jobs that I have had in my life:
1. Student (Atleast this is what I used to fill for occupation in forms)
2. Vetti Officer (Job less)
3. Internet browser, don't think I am some kinda IE or Firefox, I meant software professional.

3 Movies that I could watch over and over:
Over and over?????....hmmmmmmm.... gotcha!!!!! Lagaan!!! I could watch over and over during the second half of the movie. Otherwise none of the other movies that I saw had cricket.
1. Finding Nemo
2. Cast away (for that matter most of Tom Hanks movies)
3. All Kamalhasan and Crazy Mohan combo movies, not able to pic one in particular.

3 is too less a number for a movie buff like me.

3 Fond memories:
1. When I went to Indianapolis speedway to watch USGP.
2. When I got the first comment in my blog. Hadn't I got it that day, You all might have been saved now.
3. The day we won our first basketball match. It was a good warm up match. Initial 10 mins I warmed the bench. Then they called MJ err... KK inside the court and the game finished soon.

3 Jobs I would love to have:
1. Freelance photographer.
2. Travel channel compere. Who wont like a paid vacation?
3. Truck driver. Got this fascination after seeing trucks in US. The truck gives a macho look. It would give me a feeling of being Arnold Shivajinagar while driving trucks.

3 Things I like to do:
1. Sky diving
2. Join cinema industry
3. Kayaking
Only thing is that, 1 & 3 are adventurous for me, whereas the 2nd one is an adventure for you guys.

3 Of my favorite foods:
1. Anything made out of Chicken. Chicken are born to be eaten, else they will cross the road and some one starts up a joke "Why did the chicken cross the road?" and tortures tons and tons of people around the World.
2. Anything made out of Chocolate.
3. Any soup which has the name "Cream of ..."

3 Places I would like to be right now:
1. Australia (Melbourne)
2. Andaman and Nicobar Islands
3. Hawaii, Aloha!

3 Things that make me cry:
1. Onions
2. Dust
3. Riding bike. When I go at a speed more than 80Kmph.
P.S - I don't cry for high speed, its like when you go at high speeds your eyes starts watering. Got it Prithz?

Things have made me sad but not cry.

3 people whom I want to tag
1. G3
2. Priya (She escaped last time)
3. OliveOyl
This Tag was sponsored by Has to be me.

Varta...

A Salute to the Champion

2006-10-23T13:45:00.000-06:00

Yesterday was a day which many F1 fans, especially the tifosi's will all remember forever. Schumi stepped down from Formula one racing. Schumacher was one of the greatest drivers that Formula one has ever seen.
He has multiple records in his name. The following is the summary of his career

Grand Prix - 250
Wins - 91
Podium Finishes - 154
Pole Positions - 68
Championships - 7 (1994, 1995, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004)
First Grand prix - 1991 Belgian Grand Prix
Last Grand prix - 2006 Brazilian Grand Prix
First win - 1992 Belgian Grand Prix
Last win - 2006 Chinese Grand Prix
Schumacher was noted for his ability to produce fastest lap at crucial times at any given situation. He had the ability to push the car to the very limit and also his driving abilities in the wet conditions cannot be matched by anyone else. While Wet conditions are often thought of as the great skill tester of a driver in Formula One racing. Schumacher proved to the world that he is the master in that condition by having some of his best performances in such conditions, earning him the title "Regenkönig" (rain king) or "Regenmeister" (rain master).
Schumacher started his Formula one racing with Jordan and later moved to Benetton and subsequently won his first Formula one Championship in 1994, the same year when another great of Formula 0ne racing, Ayrton Senna died in a fatal crash at San Marino Grand Prix at Imola.
Schumacher holds a number of records to his name. The following are the list of records that he holds:

Most championship titles: 7
Most consecutive championship titles: 5
Most pole positions: 68
Most race wins: 91
Most consecutive race wins: 7 (in 2004 - European GP, Canadian GP, United States GP, French GP, British GP, German GP, Hungarian GP)
Most podium finishes: 154
Most consecutive podium finishes: 19 (from the 2001 United States Grand Prix, until the 2002 Japanese Grand Prix)
Most podium finishes in a season: 13 (out of 17 races in 2004)
Again in yesterday's race, Schumacher proved why he is a champion driver. Inspite of his bad luck striking him twice this weekend he managed to come 4th. During his final qualifier there was some technical problem with his car and hence he had to start the race from the 10th position. During the race he advanced to the 6th position and his left rear tire got punctured. Due to this he had to pit and he rejoined the race down at the 19th place. Again he advaced all the way till the 4th place with some breath taking overtaking past Fisichella and Raikonen on the way.
Schumacher all through out his career never complained about his team for whatever reasons inspite of Ferrari having some tough times during 2005 due to Bridgestone tires.
I am happy that one dream of mine came true. I was lucky enough to witness two grand prix and both of which were won by Micheal Schumacher. Both the days are really special for me. Especially the 2006 US Grand prix. 2006 was a neck to neck racing year between Micheal Schumacher and Fernando Alonso. Every fan's dream of Schumi winning the 8th and final Championship shatterred when the engine failed first time in six year for Ferrari at Suzuka Grand prix. Schumacher could not complete the race and hence lost out on the posibility of winning the championship in 2006.
Schumi, we all love you and salute you. Wish you all the best for all your endeavours in future. If not for you, I am not sure If I would have been such a fan of the sport, Formula one racing.

Varta...

Yo!

2006-10-19T17:27:00.000-06:00

There is a general tendency with us to mordernize our names, add accent to the english that we speak and wear dress aping the western culture. I was just wondering why are we so obsessed with aping the west? Is it because we feel being that way is hep and being ourselves is demeaning?
The newer generations are moving more towards the west in terms of dressing. There are lot of guys who do not know how to wear a dhoti. I am ashamed to say I am one amoung the people who do not know how to wear dhoti. But I am happy that I tried dhoti a couple of times. But I feel really very insecure wearing dhoti. Both times when I wore, I needed a belt to have some peace of mind while going around. I feel really awkward especially when driving a scooter or a bike while wearing a dhoti.
Similarly now a days its a big achievement for girls if they wear a saree. But atleast girls wear saree more frequent than guys wearing dhotis. In many colleges and offices saree is accepted as a formal dress but thats not the case with dhoti. Should dhoti be listed as a formal dress for men?
I am asking this because, if things go at this rate, we would loose our tradional dress slowly. Now itself lungi and Dhoti have lost the battle with short pants and trousers respectively. Similarly for girls, Saree lost to salwar kameez/chudithar, salwar kameez/chudithar is loosing to dresses like skirt, trousers etc.
Now to the names, I have come across a few instances where people like to be called by a different name. They change their names to make it appear more westernized. A few names that I can think of are
Padmanabhan - Paddy
Nikil - Nick
Karthik - Kart
Arvindh - Arvi
Jagan - Jag
Hari - Harry
Vijay - VJ
Kandasamy - Kandy
Most of the names that end with samy like Muthusamy, Kandasamy, Ponnusamy becomes either Sam or Samy.
Gayathri - G3
Nandini - Nandi
Maragathavalli - Magi
That's about the names that I could think of, if you know any do list it down in the comments.
Enjoy the following video, its very funny. This is a pretty old video though. The guys shown in the video are exactly the kind of guys I am telling about.

Wish you a very Happy Diwali and Eid Mubarak!!!

Varta...

Gandhigiri

2006-10-15T00:24:00.000-06:00

Hope most of you got a chance to watch Lage Raho Munnabhai. I thouroughly enjoyed watching the movie. This movie was about something that I always believed in for the past 3-4 years. The movie is about Gandhism or so called Gandhigiri, following the long forgotten principles of Mahatma Gandhi.
Well I don't specifically try to follow Gandhi's principles, but I follow my heart. I do things what I feel is right and true. My heart surely knows when I am not true and when I am true. So I guess Gandhigiri is an extension of that. I always wonder why is it so difficult to be truthful. Indians try to be as truthful as possible when they are in other countries, but when they are in our country then all the truthfulness vanishes. Is it so difficult to be truthful?
In U.S I have come across lots of Indians who try to cheat for small things just because the system trusts them. Again those things are not only by Indians but to me it hurts to see Indians cheating. Some of the examples are as follows:
1. In cinema theatres in U.S, we will be checked for the ticket at the entrance itself. Once you cross this section, you can actually get into any theatre hall and watch any movie. The system trusts you to go to the movie which ever you bought the ticket for. I have seen a lot of Indians watch multiple movies using a single ticket just because it is technically possible. Once I had an argument with a person on this, their argument is when the system allows, why not do it? Its a flaw in the system and we are using it. My argument was when the system is trusting us why not be truthful to it.
2. Again in U.S, you have the facility of buying stuff from a store and return it if you dont like the performance of the thing that you bought. I have seen and heard a lot if incidents where Indians buy stuffs which ever they have a one time necessity and return the product after using it saying they are not satisfied. The customers are given this facility to buy a product and have maximum satisfaction. But we are mis-using it. Now due to this, many stores are rethinking this policy.

3. Music, movie and sofware piracy, most of us do this. I too used to do it. But I have realised its wrong. Its equivalent to stealing someones property. If your in software field, imagine if someone in your team tries to portray whatever you did as if he/she did, to your manager. Won't you feel hurt and angry? Trust me, it does, I have been through a situation where a team mate of mine was trying to steal my work by telling the manager that she did it. I am sure its pretty common in all offices and all fields too. When we do piracy or encourage piracy that's exactly how the owner of that music, movie of software feels. Only way to deal piracy is by, each one of us becoming against piracy.
I would like to discuss about another aspect of Gandhigiri. Fight for the truth using non-violence. I am not a vivid follower of the sport, squash, but my blogger friend Karthik is. Through his blog and Niveditha's blog I understand that the Dipika Pallikal is a budding sportswoman for India and is ranked first in the under 15 asian category in squash. Inspite of her scintillating performances in many tournaments, she has been denied a place in the Asian games squad to Doha this year due to some politics in the selection. I feel we can use the powerful medium of blog to protest against this and bring it to notice to the concern officers. Thus atleast in future Dipika and other sportsperson will not be hampered by politics such as this.
To conclude I would say Lage raho munnabhai was a very thought provoking movie interwoven with fun. I just hope people dont leave the message at the movie hall and just take the fun with them when they leave.

Varta...

The weirdo

2006-10-09T21:17:00.000-06:00

To start of, I would like to say that I think I am not weird at all. But since Brute had brutally tagged me I am trying to list down things that I think is weird about me. I am sure there will be many people who might have the same weird habits as that of me, because I found lot of things common in other bloggers weird list. To start with I will list the weird things which are common in my list and other bloggers list.
1. Innocent face, the quick fix for trouble: Brute had mentioned in his tag that he keeps a innocent face and escapes from his mom. Well I too do that pretty often to escape from my parents. Most of the time one of my friend gets caught and I escape with my innocent looks. Once we poured water from top floor on one guy and when my friends got caught, I escaped.
2. Till the End: Starry and I share a weird habit of waiting to see the end of the show or movie until the very end.
3. Shoe watching: You might have heard of bird watching but SoulAsylum and myself love to watch the shoes that others wear. I specialise in sneakers in this habit. I seldom watch other shoes. Since childhood I was obsessed about Nike, Reebok and Addidas. So I always watch what kind of sneakers people wear and first thing that I notice in a guy is his shoes.
4. Powered by Guilt: Prithz and me share the weird habit of being forced to work by the guilt that we feel within us for not working.
5. Song Travelling: You would have heard of time travelling but Syam and I travel all across the globe when we try to concentrate and listen to a song. I have tried so many times, but always in vain and so I stopped concentrating and listening to a song.
6. Facinating strange names: IndianAngel and I share the habit of ordering some weird looking name on the menu at a restaurant. I always choose something from the menu thats difficult to read. My luck is so good that the dish always ends up horrible.
7. Always on: I have seen this weird habit common with many Chennai folks. R.E.B.E.L too has this weird habit. I always need the fan to be on irrespective of how cold or hot the tempreture is. If you ask my roomies, the first complain that they might make will be this. I switch on the A/C even during Chicago winter :)
8. Weight watcher: Do anyone of you watch your weight everyday, Well I do and so does Ramya. She goes an extra step of measuring her height too, which I dont. Trust me, a lot can change over a day.
9. Waste hate: Has to be me and I are so nice to this World that we dont like things like water, electricity, etc. to be wasted. I dont like to waste my food too. If food is on my plate, however bad it is, I will eat it.
Now the following list consists of weird habits that I havent seen in other bloggers list.
1. Monalisaic face: When I look at myself on the mirror, sometimes I feel I am smart and sometimes I feel I look pathetic. I wonder how that can be, because its the same face and its me who feels it both the times. I think my face is like Monalisa painted by Leonardo Da Vinci. When I am happy I look smart and when I am sad I look pathetic. Do you think of any other reason?
2. Flash Memory: I feel that my memory is like a flash. Suddenly I remember something but the next second I forget it. Now also I had something to list here but forgot hence this point. Currently I have writtend down my weird things in a post it note. So that I wont forget my weird habits. Even when I am talking, if some one interrupts or if some chick passes by then I forget what I was talking.
3. Sober attacks: Many times I feel very sad, dull and sober all of a sudden. It shows out on my face and people start asking me why I am sad and when I think, I wont know why I a sad. For no reason I become dull. I am still not able to find out why it happens that way.
4. Floating thoughts: When I am in the restroom or when I am in the shower, my thougts just go wandering and I wont be able to control my thoughts. If we have to visualize this feeling, it will be something like a kite with no strings attached which flies wherever it wants and finally drops on the ground. Thats how my thoughts fly and finally get into my senses.
Well thats about the weido list about me as much as I remember.

PS: Added #8 & #9. After coming across two more bloggers who share a weird habit with me. I was planning to tag the first 3 commenters for this tag, I did not mention this earlier because people will hesitate to comment. So now I tag Priya, GomaalGopal and Balag. S0ulasylum exempted because she already did this tag.

Varta...

Indian BPO's in trouble

2006-10-06T15:46:00.000-06:00

India has been boasting about the success in Information technology business and BPO business. India is popularly known as the Back office of the World. We have also seen significant boom in economy due to these business'.
A recent news report on a UK based channel called Channel 4 was about the data theft scandal in Indian BPO's. The video of the news report is on the site, Click here to see the report.
The video footage shows a undercover reports names Sue Turton pretending to be a businesswoman from UK who wants to startup her own call center. IBN Live reports about the footage on Channel 4.

Having sent out word that she was looking for "financial information on UK customers for her own agents to target", she meets a "former bank manager" in "a plush hotel" in Delhi.
The man offers financial data of UK customers. He offers "leads" — sensitive, confidential data like credit card details and bank account numbers.
The man shows Turton a sample of these leads, which contained complete information of credit card customers — right from their names, addresses to the three-digit security number behind the cards.
The man says he could source the "leads" for a hundred thousand customers.
Turton claims independent experts in the UK had confirmed that the data was genuine.
Turton then travels to Kolkata where she meets a call centre consultant who offers her details of 200,000 bank customers in the UK and "unlimited leads through brokers".
In the second meeting with Turton, the consultant arrived with actual voice recording of a UK customer. A hidden camera recording of this meeting shows an agent soliciting information from a UK customer and "coaxing" her to hand over her credit card details.
The alleged scam was unearthed during a 12-month probe by its Dispatches programme. The investigation was to expose "data farming — the unauthorised ‘harvesting’ of personal data to be sold on or exchanged for profit."

We need to wait and see if the Indian BPO business is going to face any repercussions because of these events. Wish the people in BPO realize the seriousness of these kind of issues.

(Source : IBN Live)

Varta...

Why talk Greek n Latin?

2006-10-04T01:18:00.000-06:00

One of the most annoying thing which I have noticed in a multi cultural work atmosphere is people talking in a language with zero consideration for the other people around who don't understand the language that is spoken. Most of the times the language happens to be the mother tongue of the majority of the people in that group.
Initially I used to think, only I used to feel abased. But when I discuss about this to many people, I understand many people find it very uncomfortable when the people around them talk in some language which they dont understand. I had my first experience of this when I was working in Karnataka. I experienced this many times when I was with a malayalee gang. So I started avoiding to go along with any malayalee gang after that. But later faced the same with some north Indian colleagues too. My sister used to complain about the people from Andra who talk in Telugu, without considering that there is a person with them who does not understand their language. Then a Telugu friend of mine used to complain to me about tamilians who talk in Tamil even though they knew that there were some non tamil speaking people in the group. So I realised people irrespective of where they come from everyone faces this problem and do nothing but point their fingers at some group or the other. They don't think that even they might be doing the same to someone else.
Another common thing that I have noticed on this front is, say if two tamilians discuss about this issue, then they tend to boast that their community (community I mean people who speak the same language) are not like that and they always consider the other people and talk in a common language. Similarly Marathi, Gujarathi, Telugu, Malayalee, Kanadiga, Bengali etc.. also boast about their community. In reality none of them have any consideration for the other community people when they are in majority.
Is'nt it a basic courtesy to talk in a common language and common subject so that everyone in the group can enjoy what others are enjoying? Why is it that we fail to do it? Why don't we think of others by being in their shoes?
On a different note, A tamil speaking man was interogated at Seatle since a off-duty airport authority suspected him and alerted the flight crew. Click here to read the news article on The Hindu.

Varta...

Love is in the air....

2006-09-27T22:23:00.000-06:00

Lets deal with one of the most debatable topic, Which is better, Arranged Marriage or Love Marriage? Though arranged marraige is synonymous to marriages in most part of India, the trend has been moving slowly towards love marraiges. But the shocking fact is that love marriages still creates furor in many families, Kavi describes about the agitation created due to his cousin's marraige.
Most of us feel arranged marriage is peculiar to India, but the truth is, arranged marraiges have been happening even in the Victorian age.
There is wide belief for researchers that arranged marriage was started in India when child marriage became customary. It is also believed that caste system plays a huge hand in promoting arranged marriage.
I am very much a pro-love marraige person. The reasons why I feel love marriage is better are:
1. I have the option to know my life partner well before commiting into a relationship.
2. Solves the problem of Dowry.
3. The man and woman will appreciate each other much better since they know each other pretty well.
4. By increasing the occurance of love marraige slowly the caste and sub-caste system can be abolished.
5. People will become more personality conscious.
6. People will be more motivated to achieve more in life because a person will always try to get the best possible person only.
7. It also puts a urge to settle faster in life.
8. Will reduce the burden on the brides house for marriage expenses.
According to a survey done by Times of India in Lucknow on Aug 2005, love seems to be the way how youngsters feel marriages should be done. As per the survey 56% of Lucknow youngsters feel happy matrimony is by love marriage with parental consent. 31.5% of the younsters said that they will marry the persom whom their parents will choose. While the remaining 12.5% said that they will marry the person whom they love irrespective of who agrees and not agrees.
49% of the people feel that love-cum-arranged marraige works much better than arranged marraige(37%) or even love marriage(13%).
A general mis-conception about love is that it happens by the looks and its more of a infactuation. But as per the survey, it has made it clear that looks does not matter at all as a criteria to choose their partner. The things that matter are career of life partner matters(44.5%), family background(36.5%), looks(11.5%) and income group(7.5%).
When love is appreciated on reel life why not in real life?

(Sources: Times of India)

Varta...

Newyork Nagaram

2006-09-22T00:01:00.000-06:00

I happened to watch the song Newyork nagaram from the movie Sillendru Oru Kaadhal. I was totally disappointed at the way the video has been taken. The video is like watching some powerpoint presentation. I seriously pity A.R.Rahaman. As some of you know, I had imagined how this song will be picturised. The actual song is no where close to what I had imagined. My imagination goes as follows.

1. Newyork nagaram urangum neram thanimai adarnthathu
2. Paniyum padarnthathe...
3. Kappal irangiye kaatrum karayil nadanthathe
4. Naangu kannadi suvarkalukulle naanum mezhuguvathiyum
5. Thanimai thanimaiyo kodumai kodumaiyo.

line 1 & 2: We show a tall rised building in Newyork in the night with the office place dark with light only in one cubicle. Surya sits in that cubicle leaning back in his chair lost in thoughts about Jyothika.
line 3: A small table fan while oscillating, blows some paper on this desk. Surya just watches the flying papers.
line 4: The Camera goes up and shows that he is confided by four walls of his cubicle.
line 5: He stretches while sitting on his chair.
During the intermediate music we show some pleasant scenes of Surya and Jyothika which had come in the movie already.

6. Newyork nagaram urangum neram thanimai adarnthathu
7. Paniyum padarnthathe...
8. Kappal irangiye kaatrum karayil nadanthathe
9. Naangu kannadi suvarkalukulle naanum mezhuguvathiyum
10. Thanimai thanimaiyo thanimai thanimaiyo kodumai kodumaiyo.

line 6 & 7: He gets up from his seat and walks towards the glass window in front of his cubicle.
line 8: He sees out of the window and on the road paper flies due to gusty winds.
line 9: He just spreads his hand little bit and lies on the window glass facing his cubicle and feels for jyothika.
line 10: he turns towards the road slowly and sticks to the glass meanwhile the camera moves as he turns and camera pictures him from outside the building by the time the line ends
Intermediate music he packs his bag and starts and every now and then he sees Jyothika at the door way, elevator etc. but actually she is not there. Its just his imagination.

11. Pechellam thalatu pola yenna uranga vaika nee illai
12. Dinamum oru mutham thanthu kaalai coffee koduka nee illai
13. vizhiyil vizhum thoosi thannai naaval yeduka nee ingu illai
14. Manathil yezhum kuzhappam thannai theerka nee inge illai
15. Naan inge neeyum angae intha thanimaiyil nimishangal varusham aanatheno
16. Van ingae neelam angae intha uvamaikku iruvarum vilakkam aanatheno

Lines 11 through 16 is like Surya recollecting different incidents in the past.
line 11: Surya will be lying on Jyothika's lap and she will be talking, when she turns she finds that Surya has dozed off, she taps on his head and wakes him up.
line 12: Early morning Jyothika wakes Surya by giving a kiss and gives him a coffee, but he will spit it out, because she would have added salt instead of sugar.
line 13: She will try to remove some dust from his eyes with her tongue but Surya will jump around in pain. This is because she would have eaten something spicy just before that.
line 14: Jyothika with lot of strain will try to help him solve some problem, but Surya will just toss a coin and decide.
line 15: Screen will split into two, one half showing Surya in the terrace of a building in Newyork and the other half showing Jothika in India waking up in the morning.
line 16: Surya will be in his office terrace, camera will be low and shows Surya with the sky background as the line progresses the camera will go up (crane shot) and Surya will be with a water back ground(assuming his building is near the sea).
Intermediate music some pleasant scenes of Surya and Jyothika and he reaches the bus stand.

17. Naatkuripil 100 thadavai unthan peyarai yezhuthum yen pena
18. Yezhuthiyathum erumbu moika peyarum aanathu yenna thena
19. Jil yendru boomi irunthum intha tharunathil kulir kalam kodai aanathu yeno
20. Va anbe neeyum vanthaal senthanel kooda pani katti pola aagume

line 17: He takes his diary and writes her name while waiting for the bus.
line 18: While writing an ant walks across his diary page.
line 19: He gets up from the bus stand and starts walking and he passes through a bon fire.
line 20: Walks on a wet road with snow on the sides of the street.
Ending music he keeps walking. In between he hugs a lap post and later swings on the lamp post before letting go and continues to walk. The camera follows till the songs is sung. Once the end music starts, the camera stops and he keeps moving away from the camera on a straight wet road. The road will be with lots of signals at many intersections blinking.
I am so disappointed that I decided to take revenge. So as a revenge I have sung the song. I think for the kind of video that they have taken it doesnt need A.R.R's voice mine is good enough. Listen to it at your own risk. I will not be held responsible to any after-effects on you for listening to the song.

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Have a nice weekend!!!

All contents above are protected by copyrights ©Kaysonline 2006

Varta...

Growing Vs Raising

2006-09-17T21:38:00.000-06:00

Do Indians plan for a kid or do they just have a kid as a duty? Indian's here I mean Indians, not counting NRI's because all the NRI's I have seen care for their kids more than their counterparts in India. I may be wrong making this statement, but this is what I have observed.
I don't know why this question popped in my mind suddenly, but I feel many parents in India do not give enough time for their kids. Just because they have a kid they provide food, clothing, shelter and education. The last one being subjective to the financial condition of the family.
During my days in hostel I have found many guys scared to even talk to their father. They used to look at their father as some Godzilla or something. They used to run away at the sight of their father. I am just wondering if that's how a father- kid relation should be? is it a healthy relationship? I find this kind of father-kid attitude mostly in smaller towns than in the urban crowd. Generally I find that such parents do not enjoy spending time with their kids playing or going out, etc., This has made me wonder if they just have kids just for the mere reason of having kids and for the society?
On a contrast if you consider NRI parents and few parents in the urban community, they love spending time with their kids. Parents are more like friends for the kids, the kids find it at ease to express what they feel. The parents devote so much time for the kids and their activities. Though off late I see a lot of parents being involved in work so much that they have compromised their quality time spent with their kids.
Considering all these I feel that the next gen parents should plan for the timing of a kid than have a kid just because they got married. Luckily my parents fall under the second category, who are like my friends than parents, My parents devoted so much time for me and gave me so much freedom to express my views and feelings. Thanks Dad and Mom!

Varta...

I don't know

2006-09-12T21:10:00.000-06:00

I don't know why people are so reluctant to say that they don't know something when they don't know. When I think about it, I don't understand why they are so scared or ashamed to say that they don't know something.
I feel its perfefctly ok to say "I don't know" when I dont know. I don't like to beat around the bush like how many people do. I dont feel ashamed to say "I don't know". I can't be expected to know everything in this World. There are a lot of unknowns in this World for me. I had one such incident during one of my interviews long time back, It was a technical interview and the interviewer was asking all kind of questions. I answered some of questions for which I knew the answer, for the rest I told him directly that I don't know. So this guy asked me, How I could say I don't know in an interview. I told him that I am learning from my experience and I haven't worked in the area that he was questioning and hence I could not answer his questions. Well I did'nt get that job. But I felt that I did the right thing.
I have also come across people who alter their resume as per the requirement advertisement. They say that they know a lot of things that they actually don't. I feel its completely wrong to do that way. Why not say "I don't know" when they don't know?
I also believe that unless we accept that we don't know, we can't learn. If X beleive s that he knows when he does'nt know then I am pretty sure that X won't be putting the effort to learn what ever he does not know.
When I searched the net I came across some interesting analysis on this subject. Most of us think that we either know something or we don't know something. But the author says that the more acurate way to look at this is

You can either know or not know something, and you can also know or not know whether you know or not.

As per the author, knowledge can be split into four quadrants with "what I know" as a dimension and "awareness of my knowledge" as the second dimension.
The best quadrant to be is in the first quadrant, To know that you know. If not in that quadrant then it is better to be in the 3rd quadrant, where you know that you don't know so you can learn what you don't know. You become teachable when you are in this quadrant. When you don't know what you know, you just wasting your knowledge.
When you are in the fourth quadrant, where you don't know that you don't know, this is when the communication becomes a problem. A person in this quadrant become self-proclaimed experts, ready to share their opinions to anybody ready to listen and thus refuse to listen or learn from others.

(Source: STSC)

Varta...

What's the driver?

2006-09-07T20:04:00.000-06:00

What should be the driving factor? Should it be career opurtunities in your place or should it be driven by the individuals interest? I am not sure how many of you will agree with me that in India we generally go by the career options available. I too have done the same.
But thinking now I sometimes feel that I should have gone by my interests and not by the career opurtunities that are there. I have heard a lot about foreign countries where people go by their interests. I have heard people telling me that one day a person may be a truck driver but another day he might be in the IT department of a company. Another instance which I heard from my colleague, he said that he met a person in Hawaii who is currently a tourist guide in Hawaii but before this he was a programmer earlier.
In India, now everyone becomes a Doctor or an Engineer. Not many people consider other options like for example Forrensic study. I never knew that such a course existed until I visited Madras university along with my friend once.
Like for example if we take Stephen Robert Irwin he could have taken a job just like anyone else, but he went by his interest to become a Crocodile hunter. I feel he has acheived something in his life by being someone distinct during his times. I admire him a lot. May his soul rest in peace and his family be given the courage and strength to overcome this huge loss.
Is money the only driving factor for us? Should't we value our interest also while deciding upon the profession that you want to choose?

Varta...

Dating and its repercussions

2006-08-30T23:48:00.000-06:00

Should parents be easy enough and leave their children to date? Dating is still considered as a taboo in India. A boy and girl going out for a dinner or for a movie is not acceptable. Leave alone dinner, even going for a lunch would evoke a lot of gossip in the community. Why are parents against the idea of dating? Is it because they are scared of what the society will talk about them and their child? Or is it to prevent their kid from falling in love?
In India it is generally considered ok, if two guys roam along. They can hold hands and put ones hand on the others shoulder etc. in public. It is not at all considered bad. So you find most of the guys roaming together with hands on shoulders while walking on the streets.
I don't know how it is for girls, but for boys whoever comes to US, they find it difficult initially to adapt. This is because they are so used to being in contact with another boy in public. But when they do the same thing publicly in US, people will give them a wierd look and think that they are gays. So as time goes guys become very conscious about this. So when they go to India they feel very uncomfortable when some one puts their hand on their shoulders or some thing. But people in India won't understand this, they start thinking he is showing off coming back from US.
Well the main reason for me to post about this topic, that India should encourage girl-boy relationship is because of the alarming increase in homosexuals and the consequences of it. In a recent AIDS conference at Toronto it was reported that there is a high incidence of occurance of HIV due to MSM(Men Sex with Men) in places like Chennai and Mumbai. A government study revealed that there are two million MSM's in the country.

"In India, Pakistan, etc it appears that the epidemic is spiralling out of control. If we don't take action, it could make the epidemic in the gay community look simple. This is growing rapidly," said Kevin Robert Frost, Director, AmFAR(American Foundation for AIDS Research)

MSM is hidden behind the bushes in India and have no access to HIV relates services as homosexual is criminalised under section 377. They also face a great deal of violence from the cops. This brings up another question, Should homosexuality be legalised? This debate is still active in US itself, so I guess India will be taking some time to take a stand on this.
The shocking thing is, that the experts feel that about 10% of the males in India might be MSM's. It was found that 20% are affected in Mumbai and 10% in Chennai and also in Tihar.
Are'nt Indians being hypocrites by saying we are culturally pure when so much is happening?

(Source: NDTV)

Varta...

Friday frustration :( Saturday satisfaction :)

2006-08-27T01:58:00.000-06:00

It was a misty friday night in Chicago, I was all excited to go to a tamil movie called Vettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu. Its been a long time since a tamil movie got released in Chicago and its been more than a year since I saw a tamil movie in a theatre. With all excitement we booked the tickets online for the 7 PM show. In the evening we recieved a email saying the 7 PM show has been cancelled because the theatre still did not get the reels. So our tickets were valid for the 10 PM show.
We reached the theatre at 9 PM so that we could get a nice seat, but when we reached the theatre we were shocked by the news that the reals still didnt reach. Waiting patiently at the theatre door step and making fun of each and every person entering the theatre we whiled away our time. Later we were given the tickets and made to seat inside.
We found a nice place and waited eagerly will lots of zeal for the movie. We waited and waited an waited and it became 11 PM. Suddenly two friends of mine who were outside came running inside saying the box had come and movie will start soon. So we sat back in our place and waited. Again this time we waited waited and waited until midnight and still the movie was not started. Bugged by the Hollywood trivia questions we stepped out of the theatre to know what exactly was happening. When we asked the person incharge he was still telling us the same story that the reals have reached the airport and its on its way. At about 12:10 AM the time for what we waiting so long had arrived, yes the movie was started and Kamalhassan entered kicking through the gate. We all shouted in joy, that alast we got to see Vettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu which came past all the hurdles not only in Chennai since the inception of the movie but also in Chicago for screening.
Movie went on fine until the interval. Suddenly the movie continued upside down. Wonder what language the upside down characters were talking. For the first few scenes we were not sure if the movie was taken like that or there was some problem for us, but once they started to talk we came to know that the operator had loaded the real upside down. So again after a lot of uproar the operator came and peeped through one of the many projector room holes. That guy, thinking everything was fine (Because he anyway does'nt understand what was being screened) disappeared. Again we shouted on top of our voice and waving at the operator we made him understand what the problem was.
We were said that we will have a brief break of 15 mins to re-roll the real. By this time it was almost 2:30 AM, many people gave up and started to get their refund and headed towards home. In between there were some confusions regarding refund. With hope that the movie will continue, we waited patiently.
Finally our patients was acknowledged(Thats when I realised that Gandhi was right), the movie started in 15 mins as promised and we successfully finished watching the movie by 4:10 AM. We felt a sense of achievement after watching the movie fully after so much test of patience. We went into the theatre in the night and came out in early morning.
To compensated this disturbed watching, I went for the movie again on Saturday and watched it the way its supposed to be watched.
I would like to thank each one of you for your constant support and encouragement you have showered through all my posts. This is my 50th post. Its surely a cherishable milestone for my blog. Without your constant encouragement I doubt if I would have come so far. Zealously running ahead towards many more milestones like this, powered by blogger and driven by readers like you guys.

Varta...

The lost temples of India

2006-08-25T16:15:00.000-06:00

This is an awesome video about the temples that lost its identity and importance over the period of time. The video primarily concentrates on the Great King Raja Raja Cholan and the Big temple of Thanjavur (or) Tanjor.
The video discusses about some interesting facts of how the Big temple was built thousands of years ago. The facts include how the huge stones were transported from the granary, How the hardest stones in the World, granite stones were broken down to the required sizes with premature tools, How a 40 ft large stone was hoisted on top of the big temple's kopuram.
The video also explains why the temples in the south are not as famous as the tombs and shrines in the northern part of India amoung the western tourist who visit India. It seems only about 10% of the people who visit India visit the temples in the south.
The video is about 52 mins in length, but surely worth watching. The video will be very educative for young children to know about the history of southern India. It is also our duty to increase the popularity of the temples in south India which lost its glory long time ago.

Have a great weekend

Varta...

Nirali

2006-08-23T11:23:00.000-06:00

Nirali is an Indian origin, 18 month old girl. She is in need of a matching bone marrow donor. For more details on the drives organised across US, please check Nirali's site or Shankari's blog.

Leisure

2006-08-22T22:42:00.000-06:00

I was quite amazed when I found that I could remember something that I studied in my 6th or 7th standard. I came across this poem on Chennai MetroBlogging. Though I could not remember word by word, I could remember the snap shots that appeared in my mind while studying this poem. Here you go.

Leisure By William Henry Davies

What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.
No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.
No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.
No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.
No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.
A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

Generally, I am not that much of a poem person, only recently after I started reading blogs, I have started to enjoy reading poems. But seems like I can call this poem as one of my favourite poems because even after so many years, this poem still persists in my mind.

I know that I like leisure but never knew that I like everything that deals with leisure.

Varta...

Back to back

2006-08-20T12:16:00.000-06:00

Back to back taging by Priya. This tag is aimed at giving an insight about me.
I am thinking about:
Picturising the song Newyork Nagaram of Sillendru Oru Kaadhal(SOK).

I said:
To myself, move out of your bed, it's way past 1PM.

I want to:
Have a full meals like the way we get in marraiges.

I Wish:
I had some device that will type based on what I think.

I regret:
becoming one of the millions of software professionals in this world.

I hear:
Jillinu oru kaadhal...oooo...jillinu oru kaadhal...meow...

I am:
KK, a tamilian, a Chennaite, a male, 6ft 2in tall, educated, a sports freak, a movie freak, activity freak. What else? Rest you guys can ask an I will say if am or not.

I Dance:
When I am in a group. Else If I am alone at home. Dancing is a lot of fun and a good way to burn some extra calories. Dance free's the mind. I havent learnt any dance but in the past 4-5 years I have danced on a stage on quite frequently. Inspite of being a bad dancer I end up dancing on the stage, poor spectators. Biggest nightmarish dance was dancing bharathiya naatiyam for the song "Kanodu kaanbathellam" from the movie Jeans in an organizational level dance competetion.

I Sing:
I sing very well, at least that's what I think, I am sure not a single soul on this earth will agree with me on that. Again I sing loud only when I am alone.

I Cry:
not even in my dreams. Men dont cry! I don't like people around me to cry also. So I will do anything to make the person happy. Does'nt matter even if I have to become a clown to achieve it.

I am not:
a complex person. I like to keep things easy and simple. To me life is like game, every game is different, so I think about only one game at a time.

I make with my hands:
everything that I make. Is there any other way we can make anything? everything includes vendakka Sambar, pepper rasam, Chicken Gravy, Pongal, Veg/Chiken Kurma, Fried rice, Kara kozhambu, Upma, Dal Spinach, Fish fry, Fish Kozhambu, Shrimp gravy and that completes the list of things that I can cook.

I write:
only in my blog. The blog has created a interest in me to write. Earlier to this the only thing that I used to write was exams and programs(coding).

I confuse:
only when some one confuses me.

I need:
to visit all your blogs and comment on what ever I feel about the topic written by you.

That brings the curtain down on this tag, so whom should I tag this time? Blog readers choice, so people, please vote on whom do you think should continue with this tag. The person who gets the maximum votes should take up the tag.

PS: The statement "Men don't cry!" is just a mere quoting of the famous statement, intended to be funny. Please take it in lighter vein. I don't mean to offend or hurt anyone. If I have hurt anyone, I am sorry, didnt mean to do so.

Varta...

Tag on something that I seldom use

2006-08-16T23:26:00.000-06:00

Yet another Tag, this time its a books tag. I should confess that I am a very bad reader. The number of fingers in my hand will be more than the number of books I have read. Lets see how this tag goes.

One book that changed my life:
Well its not one but three books that changed my life. Any guesses? most of you might have read that book during your school days. Well its the Math, Physics and Chemistry books of Class 12. If I did'nt read these books then I would not be here like this. So these are the books that changed my life.

The book you have read more than once:
Does this mean full book?? Not sure, but the book that I have read many times is Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. Since this book is so big, halfway I loose track and start reading from the start again.

One book you would want on dessert island:
How did someone come up with this question??? Reading on a dessert Island?? Tough ask. I dont think I will read anything there. Instead I will find my way to some place where I will get some food to eat.

One book that made you laugh:
Dilbert: The Joy of Work by Scott Adams. This book is awesome to have a nice laugh especially if you like office comedy. Its fund when you think of your manager to be the manager shown in the book. The book also has some nice games to play using your manager. Another book that makes me laugh is Calvin and Hobbes. Its simply brilliant.

One book that made me cry:
Never thought that books can make people cry. Well If I think in that angle, one book that made me sleepless all night is my first year engineering, Chemistry book (Jain & Jain).

One book you wish you had written:
Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code, If I wrote that book, I would have become a millionaire by now.

One book that you wish had never been written:
Its a free World, let everyone write whatever they want.

One book you are currently reading:
Advanced .Net Programming

One book you have been meaning to read:
Kite runner is one book I wish I can read sometime, hopefully. Everyone who have read this book have liked it.

I was tagged by Priya who wonders What happens if she doesnt blog.
Time to tag people, I request Syam (since you are due for a post for long), Barath and Gils to take up this tag.

Varta...

A/S/L?

2006-08-14T22:39:00.000-06:00

Hope many of you might have heard of the term "Online Predators". If not then its high time to know about it. Online predators has become the buzz word in the online world. A/S/L is one of the starting messages of online predators, which means Age/Sex/Location .There have been many instances where children have been abused by some online predator. Its also becoming a growing threat for the children and parents. Children in the adolescence are the prime target for the online predators.
Children are victimized by the conversations that take place in chat rooms or via email or by showing sexually explicit information and material. Most of the adolescent children are curious about sexuality and sexually explicit material and adolescence is the age when children try to move away from the total control of parents and start seeking to establish new relationships outside their family. For these reasons, some older children and adolescents actively seek out sexually explicit materials and strangers with a particular interest in them; and sex offenders who target children will exploit these tendencies. Young teens may also be attracted to and lured by online offenders who are close to their age. Although these people are not technically pedophiles, they may still be dangerous.
The general characteristics of an online predator are:
Online predators are usually:
1. Male
2. Seductive
3. Introverted
4. Sadistic
5. Sexually indiscriminate
Some online predators gradually seduce their targets through the use of attention, affection, kindness, and even gifts. They are often willing to devote considerable amounts of time, money, and energy to this process. They will be aware of the latest music and hobbies likely to interest kids, and will listen to and sympathize with kids' problems. They also try to lower young people's inhibitions by gradually introducing sexual content into their conversations.
Other predators are faster workers: they engage in sexually explicit conversations with children immediately. This more direct approach may include harassment or stalking. Predators may also be evaluating the kids they meet online for future face-to-face contact.
Some of the ways how parents can curb online predations of their children are:
1. Talk to the children about sexual predators and potential online dangers.
2. Abstain young children from using online chat sessions and if children participate in chat rooms, then parents should make it point to know the chat rooms that their children as visiting.
3. Keep the computer with internet access in a common area in the house.
4. Young children should be made to share the family email address.
5. Teach children not to reply to any instant messaging or emails from strangers.
6. If all precautions fail and your kids do encounter an online predator, remember that they're not to blame in any way. The offender always bears the complete responsibility for his actions.
The symptoms to find if a kid is being targeted for online predating are as follows:
1. If the child spends too much time on the internet. Parents should keep a watch on how much time and in what activities children spend online.
2. If you find pornography on the computer, because most of the online predators use pornography to sexually victimize children.
3. If a child or teen receives phone calls from people you don't know or makes calls to numbers you don't recognize.
4. If a child or teen receives mail, gifts, or packages from someone you don't know.
5. If a child or teen becomes withdrawn from family and friends or quickly turns the computer monitor off or changes the screen if an adult comes into the room.
The sad part is that India is still ignorant about this kind of cyber crimes and hence the Indian Judicial system does not have any law against cyber crimes as far as I know. If anyone has any information on this please do throw some light on it.

(Source:Media Awareness Network)

Varta...

Personality conciousness

2006-08-11T00:44:00.000-06:00

I agree in the statement "Beauty lies in the beholder's eyes" but at the same time isn't it better to take care of ourselves? There is an adage in tamil "Aal paathi aadai paathi" which translates to Person counts to half and dress counts to the other half of how a person appears. But most of the time we take so much care about the dress and seldom do we care about our personality which includes the body posture, kind of dressing, presenting yourself in the dress, way we look(thin or fat) and lot more things.
Initially USA had a lot of people with obesity, but slowly people are becoming concious and have changed their lifestyle and food inorder to eradicate obesity. The calorie chart is being printed behind every comercially available food product. This surely helps the people to decide on what to eat and what not to eat. Food is not the only factor that causes obesity, lack of activity also is a prime contributer to this disease. While US is the most obese nation on earth, Australia is not too far behind. But projections predict that in 5 years every third child is expected to be obese. If that comes true then Australia will surpass US.
Well don't be happy that India is not in the top position like how we are leading in population. There is an alarming increase in the condition of obesity in India and other South Asian countries in the past few years. Thanks to all the fast food joints. At survery's done at schools in Indian cities show that 30% of adolescents from India's higher economic groups are overweight. And a Sri Lankan study has shown that 14% of the urban school children are overweight, two thirds of them are from families with high income.
More and more children are being affected by obesity because of the rapid change of lifestyle, more easily available fast food and reduced activity such as excercise or playing outdoor games. Now a days most of the children spend their leisure time surfing net, watching TV, playing indoor games and video games such as Gameboy, playstation etc.
In many asian populations abdominal and central obesity (measured by the ratio of waist to hip circumference) is found to be more common than obesity defined by BMI. Study in India revealed that 20% of adults who are not obese by BMT definition still had abdominal obesity. Professions such as software engineer and call center personnel also contribute significantly to increase in obesity amoung young adults.
Obesity increases the risk of developing Coronary Artery disease, Diabetes, Hyper tension, high blood pressure, Cancers (breast cancers in women and prostrate cancer in men), osteoarthritis, liver disease, reduced fertility and sleep apnoea.
Though obesity is reaching alarming heights in India, obesity has been in the blind spot for long because the government is still fighting under-nutrition. Hence the onus lies on each one of us to take care of us and our children to avoid obesity. In order to avoid obesity eat healthy food with a good mixture of proteins, carbohydrates and fluids and indulge in some physical activity such as sports, exercise, adventure activity etc. We need to be concious about the amount of calories intake that we take during each meal.

(Ref: Hindu Business Line, BMJ Journals)

Varta...

Welcome to Entopia Universe

2006-08-06T18:20:00.000-06:00

Tagged again, it's a very different and creative tag than the usual tags. This is a story tag. A story was started by Da Gal and she tagged a few people who had to continue the story. Though the story has a single starting point, it is being branched into different versions of the stories. Since Arpita could'nt care less, she tagged me and I had to continue with the 5th chapter. So before reading Chapter 5 read the preluding chapters at the following links

- Chapter 1
- Chapter 2
- Chapter 3
- Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Suddenly the door behind me opens. I turn for a second to look at the opening door and turn back to find every single person except me were missing in the room. Suddenly a bright light came out of the opening door, the light was so bright that it was powerful enough to blind me for about 4-5 secs.
Once I got back my vision, I found myself in a totally different place. I was in a huge lounge something similar to the one that I saw in the movie, Titanic, when Jack Dawson gets invited for a dinner at the first class deck. I was wondering how did I come here. Suddenly I noticed a man coming through a near by door. The man resembled Adolf Hitler. The man comes near me and introduces himself as Adolf Hitler and I too introduce myself to him but wondering what am I seeing. I was terribly confused on where I was.
Though I was excited to see Hitler, I was a bit scared to talk to him, I have read a lot about Hitler on lot of books, he was a very strict person, suddenly I felt as if someone conked me on the face, I came back to my senses.
I gathered the confidence and asked Hitler "Could you please tell me where I am?". Hitlet gave a grin and told me to relax and take a seat at the near by couch.
After sitting Hitler started talking "You are in Entopia Universe." Immediately I asked him "Entopia Universe? Where is this place and how did I come here?"
"Let me tell you a something, you are no more alive." said Hitler.
"Not alive?? What do you mean? I asked.
Hitler got up from his seat and started talking while walking, having his hands locked behind "You died while crossing the road. You were run over by a car while crossing the road."
"I was hit by a car? impossible. I remember the car screeching its brake and stopping close to me and later I saw some scientists and suited people." I argued.
"Those are the images we ran in your mind to keep your brain cells alive after you died, during this time, using biophotonics we transfered the electric signals from your brain cells to our server"
"Entopia Universe is a virtual universe and all people here are created using metamaterials, all the people you saw in this room before I came and including me, this couch, this lounge are all formed using metamaterials. We can exist in the regular world just like any other humans who live there. Only difference is that we will be formed using electromagnetic waves." explained Hitler.
"But why me?" I asked.
"We needed someone who was very strong at breaking firewalls of different networks in the least possible time, we realised that you have the potential to do that and hence we brought you here. We are an army fighting to correct this world and make this place a better place to live. All humans have become greedy for money and they are destrying the world. Our target in this project is eradicate all the anti-social elements of this world and make this world a better place to live. Welcome to the mission."

--End of Chapter 5--

Her comes the difficult part of the tagging exercise. I would like to tag everyone in my blogroll. But inorder to make sure someone continues with the story let me take the pleasure of naming a few people - Prithz, S0ulasylum, Ganesh, Karthik, Keshi, Sat and Pavithra. Others please tag yourself and continue the story with some interesting twist and turns.

Varta...

Madonna joins the bandwagon

2006-08-03T23:09:00.000-06:00

First it was Bill & Melinda Gates then Bono of U2 fame followed by Angelina Jolie to serve the people of Africa. Now its the turn of another celebrity to take notice of an African place called Malawi. Malawi is a country in southeast Africa. The country has abundance of AIDS, malaria, drought and Tobacco (its major crop).
Madonna has commited to raise about $3 million to fund programs especially orphan children. Out of the 12 million population of Malawi one million are orphans.

Ground has just been broken on an orphan care center, which aims to feed and educate as many as 1,000 children a day. She has also formed a partnership with developing-world economic guru Jeffrey Sachs on programs to improve the health, agriculture and economy of a village nearby. She's financing—to the tune of about $1 million—a documentary about the plight of children there. And she has met with Bill Clinton to see if they can work together to bring low-cost medicines to the area, as well as partnering with several aid organizations.
"For the last few years—now that I have children and now that I have what I consider to be a better perspective on life—I have felt responsible for the children of the world," says Madonna

I happened to see a program called Anderson Cooper 360 on CNN a few days back. In that program Cooper reports about the poor state of infants and children due to starvation. It was very disheartening to watch the way people live. In the report Cooper mainly shows three kids Aminu, Rashidu(2yrs) and Habu(10 months). The program affected me so much that I could not forget the following lines which were said during the program

The next morning when we return, the arrivals' tent is once again filled, children getting weighed and measured. Some immediately receive milk.
Inside intensive care, Aminu (ph) is still asleep. Rashidu (ph) is awake, and Habu (ph) is alive. His breathing shallow and quick, but the nurses say he's stable.
This is the last time we'll see him. When we return later in the day, Habu's (ph) bed is empty.
(on camera): It's shocking how quickly things can change here, how in the blink of an eye a child can simply vanish. And when we came in this morning, the three kids we met yesterday were doing OK. At least they made it through the night, they were still alive.
Well, now it's the evening, several hours later, and things have changed. Aminu (ph) is OK, and his mom is pretty confident. But Rashidu (ph) is in septic shock. And Habu (ph) -- well, Habu (ph) died several hours ago. He was just 10 months old.
(voice-over): On the bed, Habu's (ph) cup and bowl are all that remain. His mother lives more than 100 miles away and is already returning home. She left Habu (ph) behind, buried in an unmarked grave somewhere on the outskirts of town.
(on camera): Do you get used to seeing this?

I was able to find the whole transcripts of the Anderson Cooper's program, if interested click here to read more. I have not put any pictures related to Cooper's report because it is very depressing to see it.
I salute Bill & Melinda, Bono, Angelina Jolie and many more people who are fighting the odds to make this World a better place to live.

(Sources: Time, CNN)

Varta...

Why buildings?

2006-08-01T21:44:00.000-06:00

An interesting question was asked by my 4 year old nephew during my previous visit to my sister's place. The Question is
Why are only tall buildings called buildings and not for smaller houses?
Only then we realized that it was a difficult question to answer. I some how managed to answer something to him at that moment. Does anyone know the answer for this?

Varta...

Thoughts lined up like ants, of ants

2006-07-28T16:04:00.000-06:00

I love watching the ants or for that matter any small insect which goes crawling on the floor. My favourites are the ants. When ever I see the ants walking in a line I feel as if they are all singing 'Ants go marching one by one' song.

The ants go marching one by one, hurrah, hurrah
The ants go marching one by one, hurrah, hurrah
The ants go marching one by one,
The little one stops to suck his thumb
And they all go marching down to the ground
To get out of the rain, BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

The ants go marching two by two, hurrah, hurrah
The ants go marching two by two, hurrah, hurrah
The ants go marching two by two,
The little one stops to tie his shoe
And they all go marching down to the ground
To get out of the rain, BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

And the song goes on till ten.

If your not able to see the video, try here.

Some times I get inspiration from ants, seeing the amout of hard work they do during summer to enjoy life during winter or rainy days. I used to wonder how the ants are able to carry big food pieces, but later I came to know that an ant can carry about 20 times of their own body weight. The average life expectancy of an ant is 45-60 days. So they wont be alive during winter to eat the food that they stored during summer.
During my childhood whenever I used to see the ants, I used to feel, what if we humans are also being watched by some gigantic living being like how we humans watch the ants. I used to think what those gigantic beings would think looking at the way we humans move around, without any pattern unlike the ants. Imagine a world where we are tiny creatures and suddenly a big fat leg, comes and lands and crushes a few of us. Terrible is'nt it? Well that's how it might be for an ant. Because of all these thoughts, I always used to avoid running over an ant. Whenever I do that, I feel so happy that I did'nt kill an ant.
Sometimes I do get furious on ants, especially during summer, I don't know from where they come but it's always my bed that gets infested with ants and most of the mornings during summer I end up waking up with a swollen eye. Of all places why my eyes??? It's a pain to answer everyone why my eyes are swollen.
There are a couple of ant based animation movies in the recent years. I feel kind of excited about these movies as they are something on the same line of thoughts which I used to have in my childhood. One such movie is Antz. The movies is about a worker ant who accidently goes as soldier during a war with the termites. Another movie that got released today is 'The Ant Bully'. I will surely be seeing this movie, because this is very close to the thoughts that I had in my early years, the story is about a boy who gets shrunk to the size of an ant and lives a life like an ant. May be I should venture taking an animation movie sometime in future.

Hope I watch this movie this weekend. Have a great weekend.

Varta...

True Heros

2006-07-26T17:02:00.000-06:00

One of the first war that I have seen happening in my life time is the Kargil war. This was India's fifth war against Pakistan since the two countries Independence. This was the first ground war between the two nations. The war started during May 1999 and lasted till July 1999. India lost close to 600 brave soldiers during the Kargil conflict.
The cause of the war was the infiltration of Pakistani soldiers and Kashmiri militants into the Indian side of the Line of Control, which serves as the de facto border between the two nations. Initially Pakistan blamed the fighting entirely on independent Kashmiri insurgents but later the documents left behind by casualties and later statements by Pakistan's Prime Minister and Army Chief made it clear about the involvement of Pakistani paramilitary forces. The Indian Army, supported by the air force, attacked the Pakistani positions and, with international diplomatic support, eventually forced a Pakistani withdrawal across the Line of Control (LoC).
There were three major phases to the Kargil War. First, Pakistan captured several strategic high points in the Indian-controlled section of Kashmir. India responded by first capturing strategic transportation routes, then militarily pushing Pakistani forces back across the Line of Control.
The area which witnessed the infiltration and fighting is a 160 km long stretch on the border of the LOC, overlooking a vital highway on the Indian side of Kashmir. Apart from the district capital, Kargil, the frontline in the conflict encompassed the tiny town of Drass as well as the Batalik sector, Mushko Valley and other nearby areas along the de facto border. The military outposts on these ridges were generally around 5,000 metres (16,000 feet) high, with a few ones as high as 5,600 metres (18,000 feet). One of the main reasons why Kargil was specifically targeted for incursions was its terrain lent itself to a pre-emptive seizure. With tactically vital features and well-prepared defensive posts atop the peaks, it provided an ideal high ground for a defender akin to a fortress. Any attack to dislodge the enemy and reclaim high ground in a mountain warfare would require a far higher ratio of attackers to defenders, which is further exacerbated by the high altitude and freezing temperatures. Additionally, Kargil was just 173 km (108 mi) from the Pakistan town of Skardu, which was capable of providing logistical and artillery support to the Pakistani combatants. All these tactical reasons, plus the Kargil district being a Muslim majority, were probably contributing factors to why Kargil was chosen as the location to attack.
Amazing thing is that the then Prime Minister of Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif claims that he was totally ignorant about the preparation of intrusion and came to know about it only when he received a urgent phone call from his Indian counterpart, Atal Bihari Vajpayee informing about the situation.
In some vital points, neither artillery nor air power could dislodge the outposts manned by the Pakistan soldiers, who were out of visible range. The Indian Army mounted some direct frontal ground assaults which were slow and took a heavy toll given the steep ascent that had to be made on peaks as high as 18,000 feet. Since any daylight attack was suicidal, all the advances had to be made under the cover of darkness, escalating the risk of freezing. Accounting for the wind chill factor, the temperatures were often as low as 11 to 15 degree celcius near the mountain tops. Based on military tactics, much of the costly frontal assaults by the Indians could have been avoided if the Indian Military had chosen to blockade the supply route of the opposing force, virtually creating a siege. Such a move would have involved the Indian troops crossing the LOC as well as initiating aerial attacks on Pakistan soil, a manoeuvre India was not willing to exercise fearing an escalation of the theatre of war and reducing international support for its cause.
As the Indian counter-attacks picked up momentum, Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif flew to meet U.S. president Bill Clinton on July 4 to obtain support from the U.S. Clinton rebuked Sharif, however, and asked him to use his contacts to rein in the militants and withdraw Pakistani soldiers from Indian territory. On the other hand, he applauded Indian restraint for not crossing the LoC and escalating the conflict into an all-out war. The other G8 nations, too, supported India and condemned the Pakistani violation of the LoC at the Cologne summit. The European Union was also opposed to the violation of LOC.
During one of my train journeys from Chennai to Bangalore I happened to meet two ex-servicemen of the Indian Army. The conversation started with one person telling me that I have good height and I should be joining the army instead of the usual software techie job. Later while talking to them I realized that I was talking to a soldier who fought in the Sino-Indian war in 1962 and the other person was from one of the batallion that fought in the Kargil war to capture Tiger hills. They were telling me about their experiences in the war and how different and pride full it was to serve the country. This interaction lasted only for about 6 hours but it had an impact for many days and months on me. I always have a feeling that I am not serving my country, I get disgusted at myself many times thinking I am useless to my country.
I thought I will write a post on Kargil war today because today, July 26 is Vijay Diwas, the seventh anniversary of the Kargil war. I dedicate this post to all the soldiers who fought/are fighting bravely inorder to give us all a safe, secure and worry free India to live. Jai Hind.

(Sources: NDTV, Wikipedia)

Varta...

India Shining or India Floating?

2006-07-23T22:21:00.000-06:00

The amount of alcohol consumption has been increasing steadily in India. Thanks to the IT boom in India, many more people in India are open for a drink. Earlier it used to be considered as a taboo, if a person has alcohol. But post globalization the contemporary Indians have broken out of the shell to have liberal views regarding alcohol intake.
The significance of alcohol is class specific, for the elite group its more a prestige issue, for middle class it represent modernity and sophistication, whereas for the people in the lower strata of the society its the antidote to forget the bitter thoughts of social and economic deprivations.
Studies in 2002 revealed that about 20 percent of Indian people consume alcohol and in the past two decades, the number of drinkers has increased from one in 300 to one in 20.
As per another survey, a large majority-62 percent-of drinkers in India can be classified as light drinkers (i.e. social drinkers), 29 percent as moderate drinkers, and only about 9 percent as hard drinkers. Alcohol use appears to be higher among people 20-39 years of age.

Given serious health implications as well as negative religious connotations of alcohol use, prohibition has long been a rallying point for Indian politicians and social reformers. Mahatma Gandhi insisted on prohibition across the country, and the Indian Constitution and five-year plan programmes instituted this policy. In fact, the declaration in Article 47 of the Indian Constitution notes that "States shall endeavour to bring about prohibition of consumption of intoxicating drinks except for medicinal purposes."
The revenue issues surrounding prohibition were glossed over initially; but the lure of lucre from liquor has proven to be irresistible. Liquor is a major source of income to the Indian government, and over time, commitment to prohibition as a cause h as dwindled. Now, all Indian states except Gujarat have lifted prohibition laws. However, concerns persist that the lifting of prohibition leads to increased production and availability of liquor and that this permissive access contributes to more crime , alcohol-related health problems, road accidents, loss of much needed income due to expenditures on alcohol and reduced productivity and life expectancy.

Following is an interesting news that I came to know while researching about this topic. I never knew that India has law against drunken driving as I have never heard of any incidence where the police has caught someone for drunken driving.

The Indian Motor Vehicles Act specifies a blood alcohol cut-off of 30mg.% for drivers, which is arguably one of the strictest in the world. Yet, a recent study in Bangalore city across a calendar month, found 40% of drivers were over the legal limit.

I also checked some matrimonial sites to see how many people are ok with their future spouse consuming alchol, almost 75% of the people are fine with their expected spouse consuming alcohol.

There has been a significant lowering of age at initiation of drinking. Data from Karnataka showed a drop from a mean of 28 years to 20 years. The largest expansion is seen in southern India, which has been driving most of this economic growth. It is visibly focused on the nontraditional segment of urban women and young people, with a noticeable upward shift in rates of drinking among urban middle and upper socioeconomic sections.

Whom do we blame for this trend, Globalization or Modernization?

(Sources: CECHE, The Globe)

Handling Love before marriage, after marriage

2006-07-20T22:41:00.000-06:00

This is one such topic that came up during our usual yapping while having lunch. It all started when one of my friend told about one of his colleague (lets call him X). X's story is as follows.
X was in US on a project, while his parents had fixed up his marriage back in India. The engagement was done and there was about 3 months between the engagement and the marriage. So during that 3 months X and his fiance used to talk over the phone and chat online everyday. All this continued for 2.5 months. Meanwhile X had made arrangement to go back to India for his marriage and reached India 2 weeks earlier to his marriage. With one week to go for the marriage, when X was talking to his fiance, he got a shock of his life. X's fiance wanted X to tell her parents that he does not like her. Itseems X's fiance was in love with another person and her parents forced her to go for the marriage and she could not oppose them so gave in and agreed for the marriage. Now she was not able to accept her marriage with X when she loved someone else. X told her to deal with her parents on her own rather than he lying to them and so the marraige was stopped a week ahead of the marriage date.
In this case what X's fiance did was wrong, she should not have agreed for the marraige in the first place, atleast she should have told X long before rather than breaking the news a week before the marriage. The girl's parents were also on the wrong side, they should'nt have forced their girl into a marriage, that she's not interested.
With this story as a prelude, we were caught up in a discussion, if a girl/guy loves someone and is made to marry someone else, should she/he tell her/his spouse about it? If yes, when should she/he be telling her/his spouse about it? Immediately after marriage or after some time. And same questions when the situation is twisted with the couple(lovers) having had pre-marital sex?
According to me, its the fear of marraige break that hinders one from telling about their past love to their spouse. How should such situations be handled? Is it right for the spouse to break the marriage or should they move on in life leaving the past behind?
I am sure the occurance of the above situation is no more in rarity in our society. So its not something that can be ignored for convenience. So what do you think is an ideal solution other than head butting like Zizou.

Varta...

New way to solve problems

2006-07-17T13:58:00.000-06:00

A new way to solve any kind of problem has been found. Please take a look at the following video to educate yourself on how to solve problems using this new methodology. The video also has a footage on ways to solve the problem discussed in our previous post(eve-teasing) too.
With all due respects to my master who found this incredible universal solution for all problems, I here by invite you to watch the following video.

If you are unable to see the above video, try here.

If you are wondering what's all this about, then watch the following video. The footage in the following video happened during the finals between France and Italy in FIFA World Cup 2006.

If you are unable to see the above video, try here.

PS: Well this post makes me nostalgic about my childhood days. When I was about 3-4 yrs old I had a peculiar way of expressing my anger or frustration. Whenever I used to get angry or frustrated, I used to bang my head against some strong wall. Trust me, strong I mean strong, I never used to bang my head on hollow surfaces, most of the time I use to choose some pillar or concrete surface. I had this habit for quite some time. Feels great that Zidane and I share some common habits of expressing anger and frustration.

Varta...

Gender Segregation

2006-07-12T19:10:00.000-06:00

I am thinking if gender segregation is really required in India. I feel that only when the people are abstained from getting something they yearn for it. More the demand more precious its going to be (as per Demand-Supply economics). Thinking in this angle, I am wondering if gender segregation is also a primary cause for high occurance of eve teasing in India. An interesting article (Dated: Tuesday, Apr 13, 2004) on Hindu has quoted as follows

An interesting fact needs to be mentioned here. If one types 'eve-teasing' in any internet search engine, you would be surprised that page after page of results are almost entirely Indian web pages. Maybe, other countries refer to this more subtly under 'sexual harassment,' but a cursory survey among frequent travellers to other countries confirms that `eve-teasing' in its form of hooting-ogling-loud commenting-whistling, etc., does tend to be more prevalent in India. Not something to be proud about.

The following is the warning given by the US government to all citizens who travel to India.

Violent crime, especially directed against foreigners, has traditionally been at relatively low levels, although in recent years there has been an apparent increase in violent attacks directed against foreign tourists, including robbery, murder, and sexual assault. These attacks have mainly been directed at women traveling alone, but men have also been victimized. U.S. citizens, particularly women, are cautioned not to travel alone in India. So-called “Eve Teasing” or verbal and sometimes physical harassment of Indian women is not unusual. There have been more reports in the past year of foreign women being harassed in this manner.

If from young age a boy and girl move freely with out any segregation in Bus, School, College, etc. a girl will appear as just another human being to a boy (Anything in abundance looses its value) and vice versa . Once every guy and girl gets that feeling of equality I think eve tesing and adam teasing will all come to an end.
So I think the society has a big role in solving the problem of eve teasing.
BTW, does gender segregation help in anyway? I am not able to think of anything other than a girl's parent feeling more secure.

(Sources: The Hindu, US Department of State)

Varta...

India bans lentils export till March 2007

2006-07-10T12:38:00.000-06:00

Due to the shortage of lentils in India, India has decided to ban export of lentils to other countries. This decision was taken by the Indian government to control the prices at India.
Due to this ban shops at Bay Area have started restricting the amount of Dal that each person can buy.

In a cluttered Aisle 5 at Bharat Bazar in the Irvington district, 36 printouts are posted on shelves, serving notice to customers purchasing lentils.
The notices state that "all dal prices have increased" and inform customers that "the price on bag is not valid." Others set a limit of two dals (bags) per person and declare that the store will not accept returns or provide refunds for lentil purchases.

The pulses that are covered under the ban are chickpea, dried leguminous vegetables, including shelled ones, peas, black matpe (urad), arhar (pigeon pea), small red beans, broad beans, red kidney beans and split beans.

Before this recent surge, 10 pounds bag of lentils costed around $5.99, whereas now the cost for a 2 pounds bag of lentils is around $4.99.

(Sources: ChicoER, Hindu BusinessLine)

Varta...

Is Anger the success formula?

2006-07-08T15:19:00.000-06:00

Is being an angry person boon or bane? I feel strongly that a angry people get things done more easily and exactly the way they want it. Whereas a soft spoken courteous person has to have a big struggle to get things done the way he wants. Is it not good to be a gentle person?
I generally try to keep myself cool and hardly loose my temper, but I have never found it advantageous anytime, I have always found it to be a big disadvantage. People seldome listen to what I say or the idea's that I have. It's always me who's got to adjust to other's.
Whereas if I was person who gets angry at a drop of a pin, I would get everything I want and people will very helpful. Life becomes so easy.
Is it wrong to be courteous, respecting others opinion and being cool?

Mez tagged for the first time!

2006-07-06T21:12:00.000-06:00

I have seen a lot of people getting tag, I enjoyed reading everyone's tag. Well now its my turn to be tagged. Thanks to Prithz for tagging me.
Desired Celebrity:
I don't think that the person in the picture does need any introduction. Though I am not a big fan of her as an actress, she was the only one whom I could think of as "desired celebrity". I like a lot of male celebrities but I can't put them as desired celebrities as it would mean different. Wish I was as lucky as Abhishek Bachchan :)

Want To Do This Someday:
Well this is surely a long list and its a ever updating list. To name a few its as follows:
1. Bungee jumping
2. para sailing
3. Gliding
4. Sky diving
5. Base jumping
6. Scuba diving
7. Driving a F1 car
Once upon a time watching F1 was in this list, but that desire has got satisfied. I got the oppurtunity to watch my Thalaivar Schumacher twice at US grand prix.

A Place I Would Want To Visit:
This again is an ever growing list. I love travelling, which can be understood by taking a peep at my travel blog. Certain places which I want to visit but yet to go are:
1. Las Vegas
2. Taj Mahal
3. Andaman & Nicobar Islandas
4. Maldives

Random Favourites:
Ferrari and Harley Davidson

.

I was tagged by:
As told in the start of this post, its none other than Prithz who tagged me. Prithz lives her ecstacy again through her blog. Check her blog by clicking on the image below.

Though I would be tagging a few of you, I would like anyone who is interested in tagging to tag yourself.

Indian Tech support on Conan O'Brien show

2006-07-03T15:52:00.000-06:00

Well in one of my earlier post, we saw an article on Time magazine on how India is becoming famous for the back office work. Most of the American TV channels are making a program on India becoming the World's back office. First it was ABC which made a report on India on how IT, Tech support and back office is becoming big in India. Recently in Conan O'Brien show on NBC, there was a really funny report on Tech support from India. Take a look at the video below. Its really very funny.

If you are not able to view the video here, then try here.

Varta...

Day of upsets

2006-07-01T16:09:00.000-06:00

Today seems to be a day of upsets. First it was Andre Agassi who walked out of Wimbledon. Agassi lost to Rafael Nadal of Spain in straight sets 7-6, 6-2, 6-4. Agassi showed his emotions while from the center court of Wimbledon where he won his first Grand Slam event back in 1992. Well this was not exactly an upset as Agassi is quite old.
Later England lost to Portugal in the world cup quarterfinals. Portugal won 3-1 against England in the penalties. Neither of the teams scored any goals during the 120 minutes of the game. But later Portugal scored 3-1 in the penalty kick to secure their place in the semi finals.
Then it was the turn of Venus Williams to exit from Wimbledon. She lost to Jelena Jankovic 7-6 (10-8), 4-6, 6-4.
Later in the afternoon Brazil to go back home empty handed from the Soccer world cup 2006. France beat Brazil in the Quarter finals 1-0. It was nice match to watch. France had the whole game in control, with Zidane steering France to victory. Ronaldo was not as fast as he was earlier.
Back to Wimbledon, US's favourite Andy Roddick was sent back home by a 19 yr old Scottish player Andy Murray. Murray showed Roddick that power is not the only thing that can win matches for a player. Murray played some teriffic placements from baseline during the game. Murray beat Roddick in stunning three sets 7-6 (7-4) 6-4 6-4.

Well But it was wonderful display of sports today though the results were all upsets.

(Pic Courtesy - Wimbeldon)

Varta...

Should children be spanked or not?

2006-06-30T18:27:00.000-06:00

Well I came across an interesting article in Time Magazine. The article discusses about whether children should be spanked by their parents or not. This is a hot button issue in U.S as most of parents do not spank their kids. But in contrary its a common sight to see parents (and relatives) spanking kids in India. I have thought about this many times, I am always pro to no spanking. But after reading this article I feel that it's not really bad to spank the kids once or twice if the kid did something which he/she is not supposed to do.
A strict no spanking will make the parent loose control over the kid and it will be difficult for the parent to bring up the kid disciplined. But spanking should not be over used. Parents should also be careful on how they behave in front of the children because the children learn from the parents (afterall parents are the first role models for the children). If the parents keep shouting around the house to get work done then the kids will also try doing it if they want something.
People in US follow a interesting way to punish the kids for their wrong deed. Its called 'Time out'. If the kid misbehaves, then the kid is made to stand in a corner or in a room for some definite time. After the time out is over everything is normal, the parents then reasons to the kid about what mistake he/she did and why he/she was punished. This makes the kid realise their mistake and won't repeat it again.
Well I should say that I was lucky to have parents who seldom spanked me. But I still remember the day when my dad spanked me real hard for some mistake that I did'nt do. I think that's the only time I got spanked by my dad.

Varta...

India, Why no sports?

2006-06-28T20:19:00.000-06:00

Why is sports not given much importance in India. Now a days most of the kids do not play any game, instead they watch TV or they play video games. And most of the parents encourage their children doing that. The parents think that watching TV is better than playing as the kids wont get tired.
Sports is not only for fun, It builds character, makes a person competetive, strong decision maker, makes him/her think of strategies to win and teaches the person to take win and loss on his/her stride.
I have seen quite a few people in my office who are academically brilliant but they find it difficult to handle unforeseen situations. They just succumb to the pressure or they are not confident to take a decision or they become to scared of losing. If at they loose in their attempt the loss affects the person a lot. And the person takes a long time to come back.
Whereas a person who was/is a sportsman handles pressure situations well. The person keeps his/her cool during the pressure situation and takes a confident decisions and also ready to face the consequences of of the outcome of the situation.
Considering all this I dont understand why Indians dont favour sports. In U.S.A the parents try their best to make their children involved in some sport or the other. Probably thats why Americans are better managers than we Indians are.
I am not telling everyone should become a sportsman at big level, but I feel that everyone should play some sport or the other and become stronger individuals.

Quotes on sports from famous personalities:

You can't win unless you learn how to lose.
~Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Former LA Lakers player)

I don't know anything that builds the will to win better than competitive sports.
~Richard M. Nixon (37th American President)

Games lubricate the body and the mind
~Benjamin Franklin (American Statesman)

When a man wants to murder a tiger, it's called sport; when the tiger wants to murder him it's called ferocity.
~George Bernard Shaw quotes (Irish literary Critic, Playwright and Essayist. 1925 Nobel Prize for Literature)

Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence wins championships.
~Michael Jordan (Former Chicago Bulls player)

When I play, I'm boiling inside. I just try not to show it because it's a lack of composure, and if you give in to your emotions after one loss, you're liable to have three or four in a row.
~Chris Evert

Varta...

Vrrrrrooooooooommm!!!!!!

2006-06-25T14:32:00.000-06:00

Yesterday I watched Disney/Pixar 's Cars. It was an awesome movie. I really loved the way the movie is taken. The whole movie was for about 122 mins and I loved every minute in the movie. There were few scenes where you dont realize that its an animation movie. Great job by Pixar!

Cars is about a rookie race car called Lightning McQueen, who things only about two things, The Piston cup and the freebies such as fame, helicopter etc. that come with the championship. All this changes when he finds some new friends at a place called Radiator Springs on Route 66 which runs between Chicago and Los Angeles. At Radiator Springs he comes across some interesting cars such as Mater, Sally, Hudson Hornet, Luigi, Guido and many more. From his new friends he learns new things in life and reconsiders on the kind of car that he wants to be.
The movie does not entertain only kids but does entertain even adults. The movie has got comedy, sentiments, speed, rivalry and more.

Varta...

Utterly Butterly

2006-06-22T17:02:00.000-06:00

Well suddenly I got reminded about Amul Ad's that are put up on hoardings at strategic traffic lights all through out India. I used to love those ad's a lot. I am not sure how many of the Chennai dwellers have seen the Amul ad opposite to Good Shepherd Convent at the intersection of college road and Nelson Manickam road (if I am right).I used to be a big fan of these ads and I used to watch out for any change in amul ad everyday while going to school. I just loved the way the ad dealt with the current affairs in the country from Sourav to Sonia. The ads used to be funny and provocative.
I think the advertisement hoarding opposite Good Shepherd does not exist anymore, thanks to the new Orchard building. I think I remember seeing another Amul hoarding near the traffic lights at Spencer's Plaza (Mount Rd and Ethiraj salai).
Interestingly I found that Amul's website has the list of amul hoardings year wise. So undoubtedly i will be a regular viewer of this segment of Amul's site hereafter.
The site also has the story of how the ad's concept developed.

It all began in 1966 when Sylvester daCunha, then the managing director of the advertising agency, ASP, clinched the account for Amul butter.
"Eustace Fernandez (the art director) and I decided that we needed a girl who would worm her way into a housewife's heart. And who better than a little girl?" says Sylvester daCunha
In 1969, when the city first saw the beginning of the Hare Rama Hare Krishna movement, Sylvester daCunha, Mohammad Khan and Usha Bandarkar, then the creative team working on the Amul account came up with a clincher -- 'Hurry Amul, Hurry Hurry'. Bombay reacted to the ad with a fervour that was almost as devout as the Iskon fever.
That was the first of the many topical ads that were in the offing. From then on Amul began playing the role of a social observer. Over the years the campaign acquired that all important Amul touch.
"We ran a couple of ads that created quite a furore," says Sylvester daCunha. "The Indian Airlines one really angered the authorities. They said if they didn't take down the ads they would stop supplying Amul butter on the plane. So ultimately we discontinued the ad," he says laughing. Then there was the time when the Amul girl was shown wearing the Gandhi cap. The high command came down heavy on that one. The Gandhi cap was a symbol of independence, they couldn't have anyone not taking that seriously. So despite their reluctance the hoardings were wiped clean. "Then there was an ad during the Ganpati festival which said, Ganpati Bappa More Ghya (Ganpati Bappa take more). The Shiv Sena people said that if we didn't do something about removing the ad they would come and destroy our office. It is surprising how vigilant the political forces are in this country. Even when the Enron ads (Enr On Or Off) were running, Rebecca Mark wrote to us saying how much she liked them."
There were other instances too. Heroine Addiction, Amul's little joke on Hussain had the artist ringing the daCunhas up to request them for a blow up of the ad. "He said that he had seen the hoarding while passing through a small district in UP. He said he had asked his assistant to take a photograph of himself with the ad because he had found it so funny," says Rahul daCunha in amused tones.
For 30 odd years the Utterly Butterly girl has managed to keep her fan following intact. So much so that the ads are now ready to enter the Guinness Book of World Records for being the longest running campaign ever.

Kudos to Sylvester daCunha and his creative team in coming up with such a brilliant way of marketting. I think Amul would have been one of the early trend setters in the Indian marketting industry.

(Pic Courtesy: Amul)

Varta...

India is the talk of the World

2006-06-19T23:52:00.000-06:00

Well its been some time now that India has been in the lime light of the World. Thanks to outsourcing. India has become the ousourcing power house for the whole World. I came across a funny thing that had happened in my office( which also happens to have a seperate department for Call center). In one of the project, a project manager(PM) was facing some problem, and since the project was handled by my organisation and another organisation, the PM called up the client manager to ask what he should be doing. For which the client manager gave him a support number in France. So the PM calls the number and talks to a support person. Soon he realised that he was able to hear the support person on the phone as well as diretcly from the neighbouring cubicle. So the PM stands up and peeps into the neighbouring cubicle. Guess what, the support is being done by my organisation and hence the call got forwarded to the neighbouring cubicle. This is heights of outsourcing I guess.

Interestingly Time magazine is going all gaga about India in its Asian version and regular(US) version. Time Asia talks about the remaking of India. It talks a lot about Mumbai.
Time(US) talks about India Awakens, Hooray to Bollywood, Outsourcing, In search of next Bangalore etc.

Varta...

Citibank harasses with fake credit card bills

2006-06-08T16:55:00.000-06:00

Check here to find how Citibank harassed Charanjit Singh with a credit card which Mr Singh did not ask for.
These credit card companies perster people until the person falls as a prey to them. I have personally experienced this. I wonder how they manage to get the extension number at various offices. Representatives from different credit card company call up the extension and force us to take a credit card. Once when I was in Bangalore, a credit card representative from State Bank of India called me on my extension and breifed me about the benefits of the card and asked me to take the card. I told her that I already have one and I am not interested in taking another card. She kept arguing with me and finally she got angry and shouted saying "We are giving you so many benefits, what is your problem taking it?" I got angered and put my receiver down. Is'nt this like intruding into my personal space? Cant anything be done for this? I am very sure most of the software profesionals in India would have faced this from numerous banks.

Varta...

Eight grader from NJ becomes the Queen bee

2006-06-05T17:02:00.000-06:00

Friday when I was doing channel hopping, my attention was caught by the Spelling bee program on ABC. Recently there has been quite a lot of buzz about the spelling bee competition. There was a recent Movie released, a episode on spelling bee on Bernie Mac show and quite a few advertisements featuring kids taking part in the spelling bee competition. All these put together, it made me curious to see how this competition is. Hence I watched this program. Katharine Close, an eighth-grader at the H.W. Mountz School in Spring Lake, N.J won the national spelling title. Her wining word was 'Ursprache'.
This was the first time the spelling bee competition was covered live by a leading broadcasting channel. Take a look at what happened in 2004 spelling bee competition.

If you are not able to view here then try here.

Varta...

Why whine instead of a laugh?

2006-06-05T16:34:00.000-06:00

Why are'nt there many comedy serials on TV now a days. Long before when DD metro (DD2) used to be ruling the television world in India, there were some good comedy serials such as Flight 172, Zaban Sambhal Ke , Dekh Bhai Dekh and Tu Tu Mein Mein to name a few. Recently its all these crying, villainous serials that are dominating the air time of all the channels irrespective of the language.
Whereas the American televisions are dominated by the comedy serials like Everybody Loves Raymond, Friends, Seinfeld, That 70's Show etc. These serials have be aired again and again countless time on every channel possible. My personal favourite is Everybody Loves Raymond. I have watched and I am watching the episodes of this serials whenever I get a chance and I dont get bored at all.
Well television is a medium for entertainment and comedy is one of the best source of entertainment. That being said, it makes me wonder why the Indian media does not produce or try to produce some quality comedy series instead of these tear dripping stereo typed mega serials?

Varta...

The World Islands

2006-06-02T15:05:00.000-06:00

TEN real estates are constructing The World Islands near Dubai. The World islands are a group of man made islands arranged in a shape of the different continents in the World. It consists of 300 artificial islands divided into 4 categories such as private homes, estate homes, dream resorts and community islands.

(Pic Courtesy - Ten Real Estates)

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Youth for Equality

2006-06-02T14:30:00.000-06:00

Most of you might be aware of the strike against reservations by students in India. There is an official site for the students who are on strike. The site is called Youth for Equality. The site has details all about the protest and upcoming events that are being organized at different places. So if any one of you are interested in participating in any event check the site for more details. The image on the left is the logo of YFE, with each color having a meaning such as Black - Protest, Red - Labour, Yellow - Merit, White - Non-Violence and fist meaning unity and strength. It is really disheartening to see the way the police had treated the students who were on stike at the photo gallery. There is also a petition which will be sent to the President of India. If interested, you can sign the petition here. This is a petition requesting the President of India to advise the government against the shortsighted decision on reservations for OBC's.
Interestingly you can see a list of blogs for different regions to inform people about the happening in their city. This is to enable the people in that city to join the protest if they are interested. As per this site there are a few events organized in certain parts of U.S also.

(Pic Courtesy - YFE)

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Spot-light on Tamil

2006-05-31T14:15:00.000-06:00

Google current is a one minute program to see what the world is searching for. On a show that was aired on 12-May-2006, Conor Knighton discusses about the most searched term "Tamil".

If you are not able to see here try here.
(Via Kaps)

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Screen to reality!

2006-05-26T09:35:00.000-06:00

How many times have we wished for something shown in a movie like Star Trek, Harry Potter which comes to the rescue when the lead of the movie is in a situation?
I remember reading in Hindu about a real time project on Transporter. Wondering what a Transporter is? Well its the machine used in Star Trek to transform a person from one place to another in split seconds. I felt amazed to read that such things are coming to real life. Scientist say it is posible to transport a person or object from one place to another by converting (dematerialization) them into a energy pattern, beam them to the target and reconvert(materialization) back to matter. This method is called teleportation. It is told that with the current technology advancement it is conceivable for elementary particles which does not have any sub structure. There is an allegation of teleportation, dating way back on October 24, 1593. Where a person called Gil Perez was supposedly teleported from Manila, Philippines to Plaza Mayor, Mexico City.

The latest news which attracted me to this subject is this. According to this article three scientist have told that they have developed a blue print of an "Invisible Cloak or Fabric" just as shown in Harry Potter. It is reported that their blue print is to make physical objects appear as though they have disappeared when they are covered with the fabric. The primary component to make the invisible fabric is an artificial composite called metamaterials.

Smith, along with Duke's Pratt School doctorial candidate David Schurig, and Imperial College London's John Pendry, presented the theoretical papers, on Thursday. It appeared in Science Express, an online science journal. The United States Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) supported the work.

"The ability to hide or conceal things electromagnetically is a method used to design electromagnetic structures," Smith said. "We've been working on the project for about one year, and would have only been considered practical recently. It's been made possible by metamaterials because it can literally transform space, which is difficult to do with conventional material."

In theory, electromagnetic waves would flow around the object covered by the metamaterials similar to water in a river flowing around a smooth rock. The material would act as though a hole opened in space, and light or other electromagnetic waves were swept around the physical object to emerge on the other side as if materials had passed through empty space, Smith said.

News Courtesy: InformationWeek

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Dirk Nowitzki dethrone's the Spurs

2006-05-23T15:49:00.000-06:00

Looks like the Dallas Mavericks out played the San Antonio Spurs yesterday in the final match of the semi finals of western conference. Though I did not get a chance to see the match, from what ever I heard from people talking and reading news from different sites, it seems like the match was very interesting. The scores were tied at the end of the game and game went on to the over time and winner was Dallas Mavericks. San Antonio lost to Dallas after the over time 119-111 inspite of Tim Duncan's playoff career-high 41 points, 15 rebounds and 6 asists. Nowitzki steered the Mavericks to the western conference finals against Phoenix Suns by scoring 37 points and 15 rebounds.

Pic Courtesy : NBA.Com

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Cricket or Baseball?

2006-05-22T22:38:00.000-06:00

I have come across this discussion many times "Cricket is a better game than Baseball", "Baseball is a better game than Cricket". I have always found that the first statement is backed by Indians and the second statement is backed by the Americans. Is there any way to find which game is more interesting than the other?
I personally find both the games interesting in their own way. Many Indians argue that baseball is just mere showcasing of power. The pitcher needs power and the batter also needs power to hit a homerun. Whereas Cricket needs a lot of skill.
If you ask an American to comment about Cricket he would say that Cricket is such a boring game and it takes a lot of time.
Well I won't rule out Baseball by saying that it does not require any skill, the pitcher does a lot of things when he pitches a ball. The pitcher can curve the ball, throw a speed ball, a slow ball and also the game has a lot of strategy going around.
Be what may, but the following video surely showcases the variety in pace bowling in Cricket. I never get bored watching this video regardless of the number of times I watch this video. Irfan Pathan displays his World class bowling to strike a Hat trick in the first over of the test match against Pakistan. Enjoy the video.

If you are not able to watch the video, then try here.

P.S - Ignore the note displayed in the starting, It's just a foolish message to steal the credits of the bowler. Shows the un-sportsmanship of the person who created the clip.

Varta...

Pistons fire all cylinders

2006-05-22T10:25:00.000-06:00

Detroit pistons are through to the Eastern conference finals to meet Miami Heat. The Pistons came back firing in the 7th game. They have really done their homework in defence. They completely blocked Lebron James. James was restricted to only 6 points in the second half while he had a whopping 21 points in the first half. Once James was stopped, the Cavaliers were restricted to 23 points in the second half tieing the record of fewest points in the second half. While for the Pistons Tayshaun Prince led Detroit with 20 points. The Pistons confirmed their seat in the conference finals with a final score of 79-61. Detroit guard Chauncey Billups said after the win 'If it ain't rough, it ain't right.'

Pic Courtesy: NY Times

Varta...

Nail biting evening

2006-05-20T00:33:00.000-06:00

I am big fan of San Antonio Spurs and Detroit Pistons of NBA. Today both the teams were in a critical stage in the playoffs. Both Dallas Mavericks and Cleveland Cavaliers were leading San Antonio Spurs and Detroit Pistons 3-2 respectively in the series. So it became a do or go home for both my teams. And as if this was not enough, Da Vinci Code the movie was released World wide today. I was waiting for this movie ever since I came to know that Tom Hanks is acting in that. So three things that had to do today.
In the evening I called up my friend to ask if ESPN comes in his house as it does not come in my house and both the matches were on that channel. He was not sure, so I called up another friend to check I can watch there but no luck there also. Meanwhile on three sides three different set of people were calling me for Da Vinci Code movie. After a lot of confusions I decided to go to a pub to watch the matches.
Gators, was the pub to see Detroit Pistons Vs Cleveland Cavaliers. I went to the pub during the 2nd half so that I thought I can extend to watch the second match also. I had 10 Buffalo wings to much and watch the match with lots of tension as the Cavaliers were unstoppable. Especially Lebron James, he goes like a lighting dunks and comes back. No one in Pistons could even go near him for defense. Later in the 4th Quarter Rashid Wallace came to form. This was one of the times when you can see him so serious, else he was always a man who fools around sitting in the bench. He made an amazing Hook + Fade away kinda shot which was amazing. Billups started potting some gud three pointers. With some excellent offensive rebounding, Detroit Pistons managed to win the game 84-82. Even the last second was so much action packed that the game might have gone into the extra time.
As soon as this match finishes the second match between San Antonio Spurs and Dallas Mavericks start. I go to another pub as I was litterally pushed out from there. I entered Cubby Bear and the match was in the 2nd quarter. Again ordered some Buffalo wings and started watching the match. At half time Dallas was leading by 6 points and Tim Duncan already had 3 personal fouls. Again in this game also the Spurs were not able to take defense of the Dallas offense. 3rd quarter Duncan played some interesting shots and brought the Spurs to a lead which did not last for long. Later the score was going neck to neck until there was 5 mins remaining in the game and Spurs took control of the game and went on till the end to finish it 91-86.
After the two wins I was briming with happiness so went back home to write about this and enjoy the moments.

Varta...

Lens care solution sans care for eyes

2006-05-16T10:18:00.000-06:00

Beware of the lens cleansing solution Renu of Bausch & Lomb. Bausch & Lomb has recalled its Renu with MoistureLoc contact lens solution from the market all around the globe. It is said that the solution increases the risk of acquiring a potential eye blinding infection.

The infections involve the Fusarium fungus, which is frequently found in drains and sinks, particularly in tropical regions. Bausch & Lomb said it appeared that common, if frowned-upon, lens care practices - like topping off solution in the storage case instead of replacing it - could leave a film on lenses that shielded Fusarium from the sterilizing agent in MoistureLoc.

Bausch CFO Ronald Zarrella said in a statement on Monday

Some aspect of the MoistureLoc formula may be increasing the relative risk of Fusarium infection in unusual circumstances

Company officials initially thought the infection may have been linked to a potential contamination at its plant in Greenville, South Carolina. After an extensive investigation, it was found that there is no evidence of product contamination, tampering, counterfeiting or sterility failure.

For more details check the reports from ET or Intl. Herald Tribune.

Which music is more creative?Indian or Western?

2006-05-14T17:31:00.000-06:00

Are Western music more creative than Indian music? I suddenly got this question when I was listening to 9 FM. From whatever little knowledge that I have in music, I infer that any song that is made in India, be it filmi song or songs in a album its all based on some raaga from Carnatic music or Hindustani. So all these raaga's act a template which can be used to make a song. Most of the songs are a mix and match of one or more raaga to blend into the environment or situation of the song if it was a filmi song. I find most of the similar situation songs using the same raaga. Just that the tempo of the song will be different.
Whereas in Western music as far as I know there are no specific tunes which they adapt. So what ever song that is created is a true creative song that was created by the artist. Does that mean Indian music is not as creative as western music?

Varta...

Rising sun rises to power in TN, India

2006-05-11T11:10:00.000-06:00

Time for another government change in Tamilnadu, India. It is always noted that the ruling party never comes back to power in Tamilnadu, except for the times of M.G.Ramachandran (M.G.R).
DMK chief M.Karunanidhi takes the Chief Minister's seat for the fifth time at an age of 82 years. I guess this is the reason for the roaring victory of DMK alliance in this times election.
But I have always wondered one thing, what if both AIADMK and DMK fool the people by appearing as fighting to the outside world and be friends behind the scene? Someone who has a similar thought has envisioned and created a funny video. Check below. (Your browser needs to support Shockwave-Flash to play this video)

If your unable to see the video here, try here.

Varta...