Venu's World

There will never be another tonight..

2011-02-18T14:01:00.001+09:00

"Wave your little wand, weave a little spell
Make some magic, Raise some Hell"

That is exactly what Bryan Adams did one day before Valentines at Bengaluru. With the crowd begging for more, he belted out one amazing song after another and by the time the show came to a close, we were begging for more. That is the magic of a live concert.

The first time I attended a live concert, I was a student of MBA Batch of 2006 in IIT Kanpur. The Band was Indian Ocean. Had never heard about them but evidently, they were quite popular among the IITK Junta. The true magic of a live performance lies in 2 factors. First, how the performer handles the crowd and second, how much passionate the crowd is. Some might argue that both are related. That is, the passion of the crowd depends on the performer’s handling of them.

Among the Indian Bands that I have seen Palash Sen and his Euphoria are the masters at crowd handling. Within the first few songs, they usually have the crowd eating out of their hands. My first exposure to Euphoria was during Manfest 2004 at IIM Lucknow. They played for around 3 hours nonstop. The crowd was going bonkers with each song. It was clear that all of them knew all the songs by heart. Being one among hundreds of voices singing along with the band is a really euphoric experience. Another thing that I feel is unique to Euphoria is that they are not fussy about what they sing. They perform their own compositions, old rock classics and even some hindi film numbers. Most of the well recognized bands stick to their own compositions during live shows.

On the other extreme of the crowd handling capability, I would place Atif Aslam. I love most of his songs. But he is so much better when he is singing out of my ipod rather than singing in front of me. His improvisations and crowd handling leave a lot to be desired. While we are on the topic of improvisations during a live performance, 2 guys who deserve a mention but not really for good reasons – Hariharan and Sukhwinder singh. Both awesome singers with lots of chartbusters to their names. But some of their improvisations during liver performances leave even the accompanying orchestra in the lurch. That feeling is best described as “Kabab mein Haddi”.

Coming to the non asian performers. I have had the opportunity to listen to only 2 of them. One I had never heard about and the other was Bryan Adams. The band in the former case was “Poets of the Fall”. They are a finnish band and had performed at IITK as part of the cultural fest, Antaragni. I had attended the concert to get a feel of what a Rock Concert feels like. I wouldn’t be exaggerating if I say they just blew my mind. I have been a POTF fan ever since. The performance, guitar and drum solos, crowd interaction – just awesome. So it was with high expectations that I went to Bengaluru for the Bryan Adams concert. About a month before the concert, when I didn’t even know Bryan Adams was coming to Bengaluru, I had gone on another live concert – that of Yuvan Shankar Raja. It was just a disappointment. The reasons are several – Dead crowd, zero crowd interaction by the performers and most of the songs performed were unheard ones. I remarked to a friend of mine who had accompanied me that the magic of live concert really comes out in Rock concerts. He replied that if Bryan Adams comes to India, we must really take the chance to attend it. Lo and behold, a month later, both of us were at Palace Grounds Bangalore waiting for Bryan to take the stage. Dressed in a Black shirt and Blue jeans, the Canadian star kicked off the night with “There will never be another tonight”. We could just stand and marvel at the silken voice even at the age of 51. Chartbusters flowed one after another. “Here I am”, “Please forgive me”, “18 till I die”, “Everything I do” and if palace grounds were an indoor stadium the roof would have been blown off when the oh so familiar guitar chords struck announcing the arrival of “The Summer of 69”. All in all, Bryan really made it “A Night to Remember”. The secret of an impactful live concert is to stop when the Audience asks “Why” rather than “Why not?” Bryan could have gone on for the whole night without the audience even thinking of dispersing. Such was the Charisma of the man and the power of his music. I for one am now a self confessed addict to live concerts. On this count I am really happy that I am moving from Chennai to Bangalore where the concert scene is much more active. Let’s hope there will be more such one night love affairs with rocking music and mind blowing performances.

Two week Vagabond: Leg 1: Chennai-Delhi-Jodhpur

2010-08-04T00:04:00.000+09:00

Well friends, I had promised you all the story of my trip to North India. I know it was promised a couple of months back. But better late than never. So here goes.
I had planned a 2 week adventure of travelling alone through North India. Covering the deserts of Rajasthan to the snow capped peaks of Kashmir. But as it almost always happens to me, the adventure began a day early.

Friday, March 26th 2010 Morning:
I had packed my bag with the stuff I needed to take on the trip. All the packing was done and I just wanted to check how the weight of the bag would feel like on my back. I raised the bag on to my back and I heard something snap. Lack of physical pain told me that it wasn’t my spine. The shift of the whole weight to my left shoulder in the next instant explained the situation further. The right strap of my backpack had chosen the perfect time to bid goodbye to the buckle that was holding it steady. It was already 10:00 AM and I didn’t have time to take the bag out for repair. I was left with 2 choices; either travel through North India on one strap or go out and get a new bag. Since the weight of the bag was not inconsiderable, I decided on the latter. So around 10:30 in the morning, I found myself near Anna Nagar Round Thana, searching for a suitable backpack. It was almost 11 by the time I reached back home with the new backpack. I had to go through the whole process of unpacking what I had already packed and the re-packing what I had just unpacked. I reached office around 12:00 Noon.

Friday, March 26th 2010 Evening:
I reached the airport by 4:30 PM. So I wouldn’t really want to comment on why I actually went to office that day. I was travelling on Kingfisher airlines and that is always easy on the eye, if you know what I mean. Landing in Delhi around 7:30 PM, I had to face the weirdest pre paid taxi system that I have ever come across. While taking the receipt for the payment at the counter, the guy in the counter wrote a number on the back of the receipt. On enquiry he told me that it was the spot number from where I would get the taxi. On getting out of the airport, there were different parking spots with serial numbers. Mine was number 12. I reached number 12 and found the spot vacant. There were empty taxies sitting idle in many other numbers but they wouldn’t budge their car to number 12 where a passenger was waiting. I had to wait a good 7-10 minutes before a driver lazily drove into the number 12 parking spot. As I had a good 3 hours to go before I caught my train, I wasn’t really bothered.
There was about a 2.5 hrs wait before the train came. The right time of arrival at Jodhpur was 9 AM. After months of planning and charting out, finally there I was, putting the plans into action.

Next: Two week Vagabond: Leg 2: Jodhpur - Jaisalmer

Back into the rut.

2010-04-12T21:12:00.002+09:00

Hello my good friends. After 2 weeks of incessant roaming around, I am back into the daily rut. From the sand dunes of Jaisalmer to the snow covered peaks of Gulmarg, the last 2 weeks took me across a variety of places and met a variety of people. My main aim while leaving on this trip was to take as many photos as I can of all the wonderful places before me. Well that has been fulfilled. I am left with over 1000 Raw exposures to post process. Dozens of Panoramas to stitch, hundreds of exposures to be corrected and lots of shots to be fine tuned. Post processing can be a real b***h. You will have to wait a few more days before the photos start appearing on my Orkut/Blog pages. I will tell you all about my journey and the related stories right here. So watch this space.

Of God Men and their ilk..

2010-03-08T20:55:00.002+09:00

Disclaimer: This write up is not intended to hurt anyone's religious sentiments. This is just me venting on these so called God Men. If anyone finds this offensive, they have every right to navigate away from this page coz I ain't gonna change my stance.

The so called godman Swami Nityananda Paramahamsa becomes the latest in the line of exposed Godmen. For those who have been living in a hole for the past 2-3 weeks, the news update is that Swami Nityananda was caught on video with a Tamil Actress,in a compromising situation. Agreed what someone does in the privacy of their bedroom shouldn't be anyone's business but their own. But for someone who preaches to anyone who cares to listen that he is a practicing Brahmachari, to be caught in such a situation is no less than suicide.

For the less knowledgable, the meaning of Brahmachari is as below:

"A Brahmachari therefore is a male (and brahmacharini a female) who observes sexual abstinence unless intentionally procreating."

The first time I heard the usage of the word "Godman" was in reference to Chandraswami. You might remember him as the "Spiritual Advisor" of the then PM, Narasimha Rao. In 1996, he was arrested on charges of swindling. He is still facing trial in 9 Foreign Exchange Regulation Act violation cases. So much for being a man of God.

From the time I started to form my own opinions about the world around me, I have had a revulsion for these men/women who gets worshipped as god. May it be Satya Saibaba, Harsha Mata or Mata Amritanandamayi. Hinduism as it is takes pride in having the maximum number of gods as compared to any other religion. According to the Puranas, there are 33 Crore gods. And as if they are still not enough, people create gods out of men/women and start worshiping them. I have no problems with the so called messengers of gods. Take for instance Kabir, Surdas, Tulasidas or even Mirabai. All of them supposedly have had experiences where God interacted with them or they have gained enlightenment. It is when the messengers start posing as the real thing that I have to disagree with them. As it is said,

"Believe Me....Not in Me....The Messenger is seldom worth it".

Religion, as they say, is the opiate of masses. Any small time crook, two bit hustler who can do a couple of conjuring tricks can put on a saffron robe and be Sri Sri Sri Swami Blah Blah Blah. With a majority of the population looking for short cut to salvation, within no time you would have your own following. Take for instance Sree Santhosh Madhava Vidyadhiraja Parama Bhattaraka Swamikal. This slimy son of a bitch got sentenced 16 years of Jail in May 20,2009 and can you guess what was his crime? Molesting 2 underage girls and making videos of the same. So forgive me if I don't trust these god men as far as I can throw them.

People like Satya Saibaba are said to perform Miracles in front of huge crowds. Creating ornaments, food etc from nothingness. Turning water into another drink and Gasoline (source:wikipedia). He performs all these in front of thousands but has not agreed even once to do it in a controlled environment. If he is indeed the real thing, what's he afraid of? Hey here's an idea....Make him the Petroleum Minister of India. Water is something we have no shortage of and once he turns enough water into Gasoline, no more dependency on these pesky OPEC countries for Oil. And if he can conjure up enough food to feed the hungry/starved population in India, then I'll call him God. Till then he is just another 2 bit parlour trick magician.

I sincerely don't understand the logic behind people worshiping these so called human gods. Is it because they have lost trust in the real thing? Do they think God will hear their prayers before others if they have some Swami So and So's recommendation? What does it say about the faith of the general public who would sooner trust any 2 bit crook wearing saffron robes than trust their own faith in god? One another thing you would notice about all this God people is that none of them lives a life of Sanyasa.

Sanyasa is a phase of life where the person attains "Vairagya" i.e.a state of dispassion and detachment from material life and spends the rest of his life in spiritual contemplation. But with all the plush Ashramas and A/C cars, don't you see a conflict?

These are people who make religion a business. They peddle faith to the common public for whom it is just another way of getting high. They are actually no different from the drug peddlers who are taken to task for selling charas/ganja/heroine to junkies looking for a temporary high. But you can't be caught for dealing in faith. That is what makes this field so attractive. Starting from the road side astrologers waiting to predict your future, who invariably needs an extra dakshina to tell you the solution to some impending problem to the Tantriks performing yagnas/havans for showering you with good luck to the Godmen and Godwomen of our country, all of them are making money dealing in matters of faith.

So what does it tell about your faith when you stop trusting your connection to god and start paying someone to intermediate?

The Record is where it belongs...

2010-02-24T21:32:00.002+09:00

Finally...all is right with the world..Sachin Tendulkar, the best batsman in the world now holds the record for the highest individual score in an ODI and becomes the first batsman in the world to score a double hundred in an ODI.This was something he threatened to do in the Innings of 186 n.o. and 163 against New Zealand and 175 against Australia. Fate conspired in different ways to keep him from reaching the milestone. If the first time, he ran out of overs, second time he was hampered by injury and was unlucky to receive an awkward bounce during his knock of 175. But against South Africa at Gwalior nothing could stop him. From the first ball he faced, it was as if he was playing in a different zone altogether. This was a day that destiny had chosen to put the rightful heir on the throne. Right from the time he started playing, there was a belief in the people who watched him that if someone were to score 200 in an ODI ever, that would be Sachin Tendulkar. But as the wheel of time rolled by, that belief slowly started to die in many hearts. They thought at almost 37 years old, it was beyond him now.

Personally, I wanted Sachin to get a 100 yesterday and I am not ashamed to say that I didn't care if India won or lost as long as that happened. The way he started and got to the half century in a flash, I started getting a bit nervous. In my mind were many of his innings in 2008-09 where he fell in the nineties. There was no way to watch the match as I was in office. Cricinfo and AIR commentary on my iPod was the only avenue to keep abreast of the happenings. When he reached his century I started breathing easier. I was expecting him to cut loose after that and lose his wicket in the bid to accelerate the scoring. But as the scores started climbing, I was slowly realising that we were witnessing something special. Next milestone, 150 runs, came and went. With that he became the batsman with maximum 150+ scores. With each ball I feared the worst. A mis hit to long on, cramps, a run out while trying to pinch a double. Then exactly that happened. While going for a double, the stumps were broken and the decision was referred to the third umpire. I could not see the replays first hand and had to wait about a minute to know the verdict from the commentators on all India Radio. Might have been the longest one minute of my life. My palms were all sweaty and I didnt have enough nails to chew on. But even before the commentators confirmed it, the roar I heard in the background from the stadium told me it was not out. Then the belief set in...this was going to be Sachin's day. On this day in 1988 he entered the record books for the first time along with Vinod Kambli for the partnership of 664. After 22 years, he was meant to make history all over again. He crossed his personal best and entered the 190s. A small matter of the highest individual score was passed on the way but sights were set on the big one. Then something happened. Dhoni came in and started hogging the strike. Even though he was murdering the bowling and scoring heavily, never have I wished more that he mishit one and keep a boundary to a single. There were 2 overs left and Sachin was on 199. 49th over from Dale Steyn was played out by Dhoni and more irritatingly, he took a single off the last ball. I would have cursed him out loud if it were'nt for the fact that I was in the Office. I couldnt imagine Sachin being left stranded on 199 n.o. But then finally Dhoni took a single and Sachin wasted no time sealing the deal. First double hundred in an ODI by a batsman. Okay....not really a first double hundred in an ODI. Belinda Clark from Australia scored 229 against Denmark. But who cares about Women's Cricket?

Batting through 50 overs in the swealtering heat and then taking the field in the first ball of the South African Innings, add that full length dive in the first ODI to save a boundary and thus save the game, Sachin Tendulkar is single handedly proving that age is just a number. There might have been comparisons earlier...with Lara, Ponting, Richards, Bradman. All that stops now. Being Sachin Tendulkar means the following

Lose the chance to live a normal life
Bear the expectations of 1 Billion people every time you walk out to bat and they expect nothing less than a century from you....every time
Singlehandedly reclaim people's faith in the game after its darkest hour of match fixing. (The bookies would accept bets on Indian matches only after Sachin got out)
Put a smile on the face of the nation after the grievious terrorist attack in Mumabi (by leading the run chase with a century in the 4th innings against England.)
Remain untouched by any scandal whatsoever to such an extent that he was compared to Mahatma Gandhi.
Maintain the boyish enthusiasm and the love for the game after all these years (Even Lara took a break from Cricket to re focus)

When someone does all these for a span of 20 years and performs as Sachin has done, Then and Then only will one be eligible to be compared to Sachin Tendulkar. Throughout the time Sachin has played cricket, he has been the embodiment of what Aamir Khan preaches in his movie 3 Idiots.

"Success ke peeche mat bhaago...Excellence ke peeche bhaago, Success chak maarke tumhaare peeche aayegi"

The Joy of Travelling

2010-02-12T15:45:00.002+09:00

There are two kinds of people in this world. One who like to grow roots and stay put in one place. They are happy with where they are and they like the comfort of familiarity. In free time they would rather enjoy some quiet time at home rather than venture out. The second kind are the ones bitten by Wanderlust. Their aim in life is to see everything. Given a couple of free days, they would pack their bags and head to explore the world. I have been finding out more and more each day that I belong to the second category.

The joy of travelling is a heady one. Earlier, during my student life, travel was kind of a necessary evil. I would have avoided it if I could but sadly I couldn't. I have had some horror stories of travel from those days. Once during my engineering days, I had to travel a 6 hour journey home literally standing on one leg, as I didnt have enough room to put my other leg down and I was getting poked in the back by a huge carton all the time. I didnt have enough space to move to a more comfortable position. Think a can of sardines and you will have a rough idea of what it was like. Another time, I travelled from Kanpur to Delhi sitting on the train doorway and one fine gentleman kept spitting his pan out of the window. No amount of reasoning could get him to stop doing that. While these experiences were tough to swallow at the time of happening, later I realised that whatever happens on a journey, they nevertheless make excellent stories. Like someone has said, "Adventure is discomfort recollected in comfort".

The first major travel I undertook voluntarily was after my summer internships during my MBA life. I had around a week left before the next semester was due to begin and I decided to spend that travelling. The sole purpose of this travel was to meet my geographically spread friends. First from Cochin to Chennai. Land in Chennai early morning, start from Chennai late night. From Chennai to Bangalore. Couple of days in Bangalore catching up with old friends. From Bangalore to Pune. Spending some time with my brother at AFMC. Then from Pune to Mumbai and Mumbai to Kanpur.

Once I got employed and became able to bear the cost of my own travels, I have taken all the opportunities that came my way to see the world. I have a group of friends equally bitten with the wanderlust. We plan and conduct tours at regular intervals. St.Mary's Island Mangalore, Bekal Fort, Tada Falls, Pulicat Lake, Nelliyampathy, Ottapalam, Wayanad, the list goes on. When I cannot find any company and I have some spare time, I travel alone. I once travelled 19 hours (up and down) to spend about 5 hours at a village that used to be a Dutch Outpost called Tharangambadi. Check out the archives of this blog for details on that trip. I also joined Chennai Trekking Club to avail of opportunities to explore the world around me. With CTC, I have been to Nagala, Talakona, Yelagiri, Kalrayan Hills and most recently Ooty.

Till now my travels have been limited to 2-3 days at a maximum. Now I am planning to take it to the next level. I am all set for a 2 week trip of Rajasthan and Jammu & Kashmir. If everything goes right, I will be flying out of Chennai on March 26th and will be back on April 12th. In this time I would be covering Jodhpur, Jaisalmer, Jaipur, Amritsar, Jammu, Srinagar and Delhi. Tickets are booked, Accomodation arranged and leaves have been approved. Another month to go before I set off on this trip. The current plan is to make a travelogue out of this trip. If my laziness does not hold me back from writing it down, you can bet you will read all about it right here. So till then I leave you with the famous lines from Robert Frost

"And Miles to before I sleep, and Miles to before I sleep"

So I love Comics. What's so bad?

2010-02-11T15:40:00.002+09:00

I am an ardent fan of comics. This includes titles from DC and Marvel Comics. Superman, Batman, Flash, Green Lantern, Captain America, Hulk, X-Men and so on. I have a huge collection of the soft copies (at last count I had around 140GB worth of it) of these comics. The problem is that whenever I tell someone that I like such type of comics and start talking about my collection, they look at me as if a third eye just opened up on my forehead. And then comes the oh-he's-still-just-a-kid smile. Really,what's so bad about liking comics?

Most people think that these are meant for kids. I respectfully disagree. Actually with some of the storylines in these days' comics, you would want to keep them out of children's hands. For e.g, In Identity Crisis, Dr.Light rapes Sue Dibny when she finds her along on the Justice League Sattelite. Comics are meant for children? Yeah..Right.

My attraction towards comics has different dimensions. Firstly, it is about what the character portrays. Superman is not just faster than a speeding bullet and more powerful than a locomotive. Superman is a character with such depth that we seldom think that much. I'll give you a taste. Those who read comics or atleast know about Superheroes know that all the Superheroes have a secret identity. Batman is actually Bruce Wayne, Spiderman is actually Peter Parker and so forth. They put on their costumes to become the superhero. In the case of Superman, he came to earth from a doomed planet Krypton. Earth's yellow sun gave him superpowers. He is actually Superman. He puts on a costume to become is alter ego Clark Kent. Clark is a mild mannered reporter. So, Clark Kent is how Superman sees the human race. Clutsy, Stumbling and a bit dumb. That's just one part. There is much more to the Superman mythos if you think about it.

Similarily Batman- the only superhero with no super powers, Spiderman - With great power comes great responsibility, Green Lantern - The power of emotions - Will, Hope, Fear, Love, Rage, Avarice and Compassion, X-Men : Another take on Racism. All these characters have such depth that you cannot help marvel at the brains that thought them up.

Secondly, Comics to me is an escape from the daily dreary routine life. For a few minutes I get transported to a world where arch rivals Hal Jordan and Sinestro are teaming up to fight Nekron who is bringing the dead back to life as his slaves. For those few minutes, I forget all my worries and fly with them. This serves as a stress buster for me. A safety valve for all the pent up tension of the day.

Thirdly, I admit, it fills the child in me with wide eyed wonder. The wander lust in me is sated to some extent by seeing new worlds ,albeit fictional and in a digital media and leaves me in awe of the great comic writers like Grant Morisson and Alan Moore. They created worlds out of nothing. The sheer creativity and attention to detail boggles the mind.

So I like Comics. Before you criticise, try it out yourself. I have some great graphic novels in mind for you. If you ever want to know about the magic of a great comic, you know where to find me.

Photography and Me

2009-11-17T20:37:00.000+09:00

It's been about 2 years since I have taken up Photography as a serious hobby. Unlike most of my hobbies, where after some time I lose interest and move on to something else, Photography has kept me engrossed in it. Maybe it's because there is so much to learn in this field. Every day you come across some new technique or a different perspective of an oft seen subject. The wonders of photography never ceases to amaze. I still remember the first camera I held. It was a Konica. My mother was the one who first instructed me on how to take a photo. It went something like "Look into this hole. You will see 2 square brackets. That should be in the centre of the photo and then click this button". I just loved the noises the camera produced. First the click of the shutter, then the motor whirring to turn the film to the next unexposed frame. As we were kids, me and my brother were not usually allowed to take pictures using this camera. It was a real treat when on a trip my parents would give me the camera and say "Take a picture.". Before I grew up enough to handle this camera, it stopped working. If I remember right, it had some problem with the shutter. Noone at our home cared about Photography enough to go through the pains of getting this repaired.

My second camera came as a gift to me from a family friend. I was asked what I wanted when I passed my 10th with Distinction. I don't know what prompted me, but I told him I wanted a camera. He gifted me with a Fuji compact. Unlike the more expensive Konica, this was almost fully manual. One had to load the film manually( meaning hook the end of the film to the chamber and rotate it till the first frame was loaded. After each shot, the frames had to be moved manually. But still, I didn't mind. The only thing that stopped me from going around and taking pics was the prohibitive cost of developing the film and taking prints. Developing and printing a full roll cost around Rs.300. So this camera came out only on special occassions like School Excursions or camps. Once I had gone on a camp conducted by Rotary Club Alwaye. As usual, I carried my camera along with me and took around 35 pics (1 roll of film). Then it happened that one the way back, my camera fell down and the back flap opened. The film got exposed to sunlight and all the pics were lost. There was nothing I could do. The camera itself didn't suffer any damage. This camera lasted till my engineering days. But as time went by, it was relegated to one corner of the cupboard as Rs.300 for an engineering student was not a small amount.

My third camera, which was my first Digital Camera was also a Fuji. Fuji Finepix a 210 if my memory serves me right. I had written CAT and was in the process of attending the interviews. I had to travel all over India for these interviews and I convinced my dad to buy me a digital camera. Digital Cameras were just coming into the market at that time. It was a 2 Megapixels, 3X Optical zoom camera. This served me well throughout my MBA. Photos that appeared in the IITK MBA placement CD and IITK MBA placement brochure of 2006 were captured using my camera. Till then, photography to me was more of documentation than an art. I'll tell you the difference. Suppose you go to see a waterfall. You and your friends pose in front of the waterfall and get a pic clicked. This proves that you were there at the waterfall. This is a piece of documentation. These are the kind of photos that you usually see in Newspapers. Suppose you take few pics of the same waterfall. Noone is posing in front of the waterfall. You increase the shutter speed of your camera to give a smooth effect to the flowing water. This is photography as an art. I was under the impression that photography as an art is the domain of experienced photographers only. The ones with big cameras, long lenses and an external flash. As I have written before, this was around the time I came across a photoblog maintained by one of my friends. On enquiring with her, I came to know that her camera was just another point and shoot. This brought about a paradigm shift in my view on photography. That was when I decided to try my hand at taking some pics. But I needed a better camera.

My fourth camera, which is my current camera is an Olympus SP 501 UZ. 7.1 Megapixels, 10X Optical zoom. This is the first camera that I have bought using my own hard earned money. Buying this camera was the beginning of my current phase of being a Photography enthusiast. After I bought this camera, I started reading up on photography, starting right from the basics. What is aperture, what is shutter speed, what is depth of field in a picture, so on and so forth. The more I read, the more I saw, the more enthralled I got. I have been working with this camera for the past 2 years. Now I have started getting a feeling that the limiting factor in my pursuit of excellence in the field of photography is my camera. I believe it's time to change this and step into the field where big boys play by buying a DSLR.

One major change that pursuing photography brings in you is that you start to notice the beauty in the smallest of things. Where earlier you never gave a thought to the waterdroplets on your window pane, now you start to think whether it would make a good subject for a Macro Photograph. Where earlier, you didn't even notice when a butterfly fluttered past you, now you observe what species it is and whether it would sit still enough to take a picture. That is the beauty of being a photographer.

Moral Policing

2009-11-09T20:48:00.006+09:00

"God created man in his own image. In God's image he created him; male and female he created them." Genesis verse 26

"God blessed them. God said to them, "Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the sky, and over every living thing that moves on the earth." Genesis verse 27

This is how Bible says god made man. At the beginning god didn't put forth much laws of do and don't. Then came the Ten commandments. Ten "Thy Shall nots" which man was supposed to live by. Then once the civilization set in, more laws came. The gray areas were fast being separated into black or white. In the modern society, there is a system of laws in the country which needs to be followed by the citizens. How applicable those laws are and to whom is an entirely different discussion which I do not wish to delve into at this time.

So In India, we have a set of written laws and we have a police department who sees to it that the laws are enforced and any breaking of the laws are appropriately handled. Till then it was alright. In these recent times, there has been a peculiar kind of homo sapiens who deem themselves the protectors of moral laws. They are self appointed and they work on an unwritten code which basically says anything they don't like is immoral. It can be the violence against people celebrating Valentine's Day or the attack against girls in a pub or in the most recent event, slapping an MLA who was taking his oath in Hindi.

These are a set of people who are hell bent on telling us how to live our lives. For them celebrating Valentines Day is westernization. Wearing western clothes is against Indian culture. What Indian Culture are we talking about here? India is the land of Kamasutra and Khajuraho. In the land which taught the world secrets of sex, talking openly about sex is against its culture. While it's ok to depict various sex positions in a temple, an actress wearing a short skirt is against the moral code. Do you see a disconnect here?

From the moral to the regional. The self appointed defender of Marathi Rights Mr.Raj Thackerey and his company of goons who calls themselves the MNS stopped a politician from taking his oath in Hindi in the Maharasthra assembly. Who the politician was and what his background is is not relevant to the discussion here. The constitution clearly states that any politician may take his oath in Hindi, English or the regional language. Last time I checked, Maharashtra was still a part of India and Indian constitution still applies there. Then what law gives these goons the power to stop a constitutional act? The latest news is that 4 MLAs who manhandled the said politician have been suspended for 4 years from the assembly. While I appreciate the quick action taken, the question remains as to how could you let such an incident take place in a meeting of so called "representatives of the public". Whether criminal charges would be filed against them and if any action would be taken on that front remains to be seen.

So look how we have progressed. In the garden of Eden, there was just one rule. Don't eat the forbidden fruit. Now we have laws spanning every human activity. Over that we have people telling us how to live our lives. We have the Moral police, Fashion Police and Censor Police over and above our regular police. If we don't nip this in the bud, it won't be long before we wouldn't have a choice but to live our lives as others dictate it.

Chennai in the rains

2009-11-09T15:18:00.004+09:00

When I came to Chennai around three and a half years back, I was not very fond of this place. The weather was too hot to handle, the autodrivers were daylight robbers and the roads were almost always congested. But over the time, I have made peace with most of the irritating aspects of Chennai. I came to understand that life in Chennai makes you appreciate the little things about life outside Chennai that you used to take for granted. Like the weather in Kerala or the disciplined auto drivers in Bangalore.

One thing though that I cannot come to terms with is Chennai during the rains. I am a big admirer of rains. During monsoons when I used to be in Kerala, I would sit in the verandah just watching it rain. The pitter patter of the raindrops was music to my ears and the cold rainy breeze would freshen me up from the inside out. Then I came to Chennai and encountered the Chennai rains. This city has a very low water threshold. All it takes is a brief drizzle and the roadsides are already flooded. If that drizzle turns into a downpour, rest assured that you will have to wade through knee deep water. Knowing the condition of the city's drains, and wading through the knee deep water is a self inflicted torture that you cannot do without.

I have a friend who loves rain but hates walking in the rain. The main reason for that is the feeling of mud beneath her feet in her footwear. I can definitely understand what she feels. For me it is the feeling of the squishy shoes that I hate. In that context, I love my new Merrel shoes. I got this for trekking purposes. It is made up of webbed material. The water drains right out once you are out of the puddle. No more squishy shoes.

Last year, Chennai witnessed one of the heaviest monsoons for quite some time. This was the same time when terrorists hit Mumbai. If man made terror was flooding Mumbai, Natural terror was flooding Chennai. It had been raining for 4 days non stop and I had decided to work from home as you had to either know swimming or own a boat to reach office. And I had neither. On the 5th evening of this non stop downpour, I was watching a movie with my feet propped up on the table when my phone rang. It was the next door neighbour. He asked me where I was. When I told him I was at home itself, he asked me how come I didn't know that water had entered my house. I stood up in shock to see my house flooded with ankle deep water. In the next 15 min, I stowed off my bedding and important documents out of reach of the water and I put my PC's CPU on top of my couch. I packed some essential items and left the flooded house to seek abode at a friend's house.

The next day I came back to check out the situation at my house. I was dumbstruck to see that the water in my sitting room was up to my knees and the CPU which I had put on my couch was waterlogged. There was nothing much I could do so I just locked up and left.

It took another 3 days before the situation returned to near normalcy. So now each time it rains more heavily than usual, I start preparing for the worst and keep watching my door sil to see if water has started flowing in.

Tail Piece: A week after this disaster, a team of sales folks from HCL landed in Chennai as part of a training program. One of their requests was that they wanted to go to the beach to see the Sea. I had to bite my tongue real hard to keep myself from replying "The Sea had come to meet you. You are about a week late"

Belief

2009-11-06T15:50:00.005+09:00

For those who are not aware, there is an ODI series going on between Australia and India. Yesterday they played the 5th match in a series of 7. Australia went ahead to score 350 runs in the allotted 50 overs. I was with a friend before the Indian chase began and I was going on about how if we got a good start, this total could be chased. His reply to me was " You are talking like a typical Indian Cricket Fan. You should know a lost cause when you see one. We have already lost this match".

I can tell you upfront. I am not a big optimist. But I have written earlier about supporting the underdogs. In this case, India was firmly the underdog. But more than that I believed in one man. I believed in Sachin. He has this habit of seeing victory when others see only defeat. In 1998 during the Coca Cola cup in Sharjah, when India was faced with a target of 285 and needed around 254 to qualify, most of the country would have believed that we wouldn't win the match but atleast we can qualify. But one man believed that the match could be won and his now famous "Desert Storm" knock of 143 almost did the job. Yesterday when everyone else seemed overawed by the size of the target, one man went about doing what he does best....hitting a cricket ball hard.

When Sachin bats like he did yesterday, he makes believers out of us. As a famous banner read "Do all your crimes when Sachin is batting. Coz even the god would be busy watching him". As long as he was at the crease, no target seemed too big and it seemed the first double century in ODIs seemed near. But he fell at 175 needing 19 more to win. The others were good enough only to make 15 out of it. But I can vouch that noone who saw Sachin bat yesterday would have said that we were going to lose the match. The kind of surety in his strokeplay, the sheer domination of the bowling...who the hell said Sachin needs to retire?

Yesterday when Sachin was on the verge of 17000 runs, Sunil Gavaskar made a comment. He said that the crowd is celebrating his 17000 so hard because seeing them makes them feel that each of his runs are theirs. Thats what sets this man apart. You want to end all the communal issues in India in one stroke? Declare cricket as a relegion. Nothing...i repeat Nothing unites India like cricket and nothing personifies cricket better than Sachin.

As the saying goes, "If Cricket is a relegion, then Sachin is God".

Back on Popular demand...

2009-11-06T15:26:00.002+09:00

It's been 6 months since I have ventured into this part of the blogosphere. I started a malayalam photoblog in the meantime. If you understand Malayalam or just want to check out how good I am with a camera in my hands, visit www.nimishaardham.blogspot.com. "Nimishaardham" in malayalam means splitsecond.

So I was focusing on this blog and this combined with the fact that I was going through a bit of a writer's block resulted in this blog being dormant.

However, I am now back (don't know how long it's gonna last..but still). This is due to 2 reasons.

Firstly, one of my regular readers asked me yesterday why I don't write anymore. Secondly I got a topic on which to write a post.

So friends, romans and countrymen, I am back. Let's see how long this stint lasts.

The art of writing Assignments - Part 2

2009-04-15T18:35:00.002+09:00

MBA course work is all about groups and relative grading...You prosper or perish in groups. This group work opens people to a whole new world of free riding. "Free Riding" being an abstract concept is executed by different people in different ways. Before I get into that, let me tell you what is meant by Free Riding. Free Riders are those people who would tag along for the ride but would hardly move a finger to do anything. But as the group is graded as a whole, they get the same grades.

Now let's see the different approaches to Free Riding.

First there is the "I am not a Free Rider" approach.

These sort of people work very hard to look as if they are working. They will run around...shuffle papers...talk about timelines and appear worried. But they hardly do any work. They are really offended if someone hints about free riding.

Second category is the "I don't give a damn about grades" free rider.

These guys make their intent clear at the beginning of the assignment. Their usual statement goes something like this. "Dude....I don't care about grades.....I am not going to do a single thing on this assignment....if you guys are worried about grades, you go ahead and do the work". Their honesty is hard to deal with. As you are stuck with them in the group, all you can do is do the assignment and watch as they get whatever grades they get for free.

The first category of free riders are very deceptive. To an unattentive eye, it seems as if they are doing the whole assignment by themselves. It has often happened that 4 free riders of the first sort formed a group. Each one was left thinking that others are working hard and finally the assignment never got done. So it is in their advantage to seek out tried and tested Non-Free riders and form a group with them.

The second category is a necessary evil. They are often tolerated because they are good friends and atleast they were honest (brutally so..) about their free riding.

Although from individual work, the focus shifts to group work, the basic premises of assignment writing does not change. Here also there are Do-Gooders (DG), Do-No-Harmers (DNH) and We Don't Cares(WDC). The second category of Free riders come under the WDC category.

As MBA is a higher degree than B.Tech, the execution of assignments become even more last minute. Night outs become the norm and discussions are often called to start the midnight before the submission day. If it wasn't for the DGs in every group, the assignments would have never been submitted on time. I have had experiences where there were three of us in a group. All three were DNHs and we rarely submitted an assignment on time.

Whether it be B.Tech or MBA, if it is group work, the DGs are the driving force behind the group. They are the ones who crack the whip and sets the ball rolling. DNHs pull their own weight and go along with the flow without hindering it. The WDCs are the ones who act as the deadweight which arrests the group's momentum. If it was not for their contribution (or the lack of it..), assignments would have been submitted days before the deadline. (Oh the sheer horror....I can't even think of it..). Working in groups prepare you for the proffessional world...or so they claim...and it is the healthy mix of DGs, DNHs and WDCs in a class that makes working in groups worth it. You get to make deals, negotiate and sometimes even threaten people...what better to prepare you for the cutthroat corporate world?

The Art of Writing Assignments- Part 1

2009-04-09T19:14:00.002+09:00

Assignment- The Merriam Webster dictionary defines it as "a specified task or amount of work assigned or undertaken as if assigned by authority".

In school days, we used to call it homework...take down a few problems dictated by the teacher with a cute "H.W" written on the corner of that page...These were meant to be completed during that day's study time...and it was almost always diligently done so.

Then we grew up..we went to college and we needed a new name for homework, as calling it by its old name made it look childish...thus we entered the era of "Assignments".

Anyone who has an Engineering degree knows how these assignments are tackled during the course of the semester.(Warning: The views below are written solely from the viewpoint of a boy and might not be always applicable to girls).

Before I get into the theory of tackling assignments, let me tell you about the demographics of any Engineering class..

Firstly, there is one category of people whom I'd like to call the Do-Gooders (DG)...these are the students who almost always take up the first two rows of the class (though there are exceptions....I'll come to that later). Their note taking capability is beyond belief....Even the forced jokes that the lecturers make to wake up the rest of the class, might find its way to their notebooks. They often get ridiculed for this fact, but all that is till the exam time draws near...once the exams are at your doorstep, these Do-Gooders obtain the status of the Hollywood superstars....Their notes which were ridiculed before are so much in demand that the photo copies of the photo copies of the notes are being photo copied.....Even during all this demand, these DGs never try to get even for the ridicule....they selflessly offer the notes and never do they utter a word to the tune of "You should have thought this before...."

98% of the Do-Gooders are Girls.

Next category is what I'd like to call Do-No-Harmers (DNH)...these are the people who populate the middle to back rows of the class and they are not as meticulous in taking notes as the DGs. DNHs take notes of the points that they feel are important and can be often found sleeping in classes which bore them to the hilt...When the exam time comes, they are most of the times happy with their own notes and do not bother others.

DNH population is often split 80-20 with 80% being boys...

The last category is called We-don't-cares(WDC). This category is almost always completely made up of boys and these guys rarely populate the class (coz they prefer populating the canteen or the juice shop instead). These are the guys who create the huge demand for the DG's notes.

So now, let's see how the assignment is tackled by various groups..

DGs find it difficult to sleep unless they complete the assignment on the day it has been given. Even if there is a week before the submission date, DGs would like to finish it off as soon as possible.

DNHs find it really difficult even to think about the assignments before the due date. Then on the day before the due date, they borrow a few DG's assignments and engage in honing their CP (copy-paste)skills....The CP technology is perfected by the DNHs to such an extent that no proffessor ever accused a DNH of copying an assignment....the original matter of a DNH's assignment would be spread across maybe half a dozen DG assignments....

WDCs rarely submit an assignment on time....if they do, rest assured that it was written for them by a DG friend....(Some DGs are always in a crusade to convert WDCs to DNHs....I've seen them succeed and I've seen them fail.....Oh the good old times)...

Let's move on....from the individual submissions in Engineering college to the group work in MBA...

The shore of Singing Waves....

2009-01-30T23:00:00.008+09:00

[This Blog was in Deep Freeze for quite some time: This trip was undertaken on 25th of Jan. ]

It was a long weekend....the originally planned Wagamon trip didn't seem to materialize...I had to do something to prevent the weekend going to an utter waste. Then out comes Ergo (a newspaper(?) supplied for free at major companies) with a list of little known places for a weekend getaway near Chennai...One of the places which caught my eye was Tranquebar...a Danish outpost in the 1700s....which the article said was on the way to Chidambaram....the only place to stay was the Bungalow on the Beach whose standard room rate was 3500 + 12.5% tax. The cheaper hotel Tamil Nadu was booked fully till Feb 28th. Since I didnt want to wait till then and I couldnt even think of paying almost 4000 bucks (If I had that much to spend, I'd have put in 1500 more and bought the complete calvin and hobbes collection...)for a night's stay...I decided to make it a one day trip. The plan was as follows

Sunday the 25th of January, 2008

0000 hrs: Reach Koyambedu Bus Stand
0005 hrs: Get on a bus to Chidambaram
0600 hrs: Reach Tharangambadi and catch the sunrise on the lovely shore
1000 hrs: Enter the Fort Dansborg museum and roam around
1300 hrs: Get out of the musesum, proceed with photography
1700 hrs: Think about returning and try to get a bus to Chennai
2300 hrs: Reach Chennai...reminisce about what a fantastic trip it was...

Now let's get to what really happened...

I reached Koyambedu Bus Stand on time...I went to the platform reserved for Buses plying to Chidambaram and I find it empty....I enquire about the next bus to Chidambaram to a shopkeeper and he replies that it would be here in 30 min. Although initially miffed, I overcame it...plugged my ears with the ipod headphones and lost myself in the world of Kishore Kumar...30 minutes turned into 90 minutes when finally a bus with the Chidambaram board came (It's not as if I could read it....my understanding Tamil script is like pattern matching....so I should say a bus with a board that looked like it said Chidambaram came). It had hardly stopped and it already had people hanging off the windows and footboards. That finally did it for my patience. Out came my Nokia E71 with Google Maps...I navigated my way to my destination and to my utter horror, I found that it was not anywhere near the way to chidambaram...it was on the way to Karaikal from Chidambaram. After showering some choiciest of abuses on the "informative" Ergo, I got on the next bus to Pondycherry. As my good friend Ashok had done his Engg. from Karaikal, I had a vague idea as to how to get there. I got on the bus and slept off...or tried to sleep with my butt killing me because of the quality of the bus seat.

I reached Pondycherry at around 6.15. The next Karaikal Bus was not much behind. I got on the bus at around 6.30. The bus might have had a problem in the transmission or the bus driver wanted the passengers to reeeally enjoy the journey.....the bus never went above the second gear speed....I was half the through the second intolerable Sathyaraj starrer shown in the bus before I reached Tharangambadi...or Tranquebar...and the time was 10:30....I was running around 4 hours later than planned....

The first recognizable sight that I saw in Tranquebar was the King's Gate. It was built in 1792 and it stands at the beginning of the King's Street which takes you to the beach..

Once you enter through this gate, it's like you have stepped into a time capsule. The churches and buildings on both sides of the road are straight out of sepia tinted photographs. A straight walk on that road would take you to the Tharangambadi beach. On the left side of the beach there is a temple. It's dome was knocked down by the Tsunami that hit the west coast but now the repairs are done and it is a riveting sight. The temple has sea on 2 of its sides.

Another landmark in front of the beach is the Fort Dansborg. It is a Danish Fort and the architecture is very different from the Indian Forts. If you are familiar with Age of Empires 2, you might find this fort similar to the castles of Teutons.

This majestic sight alone was enough to make my trip worth it...I spent quite some time walking around the fort grounds and exploring the museum in the first floor.

I was really tired by then...I had a quick lunch of chocolates and Kurkure sitting in the shade of the temple...and dozed of there itself for sometimes. The sound of the singing waves lulled me to sleep. Once the fierce noon sun had subsided, I took a walk along the beach....This was one of those beaches where someone who collects shells would go crazy....there were new kind of shells at each step....I collected some that caught my fancy...Before thinking about going back, I had to visit the churches in the neighbourhood. There are two...and behind those churches are some graves from the time Danes ruled here.....One of the graves was of a 3 month old baby boy.

After a brief tour of the churches, it was time for me to think about my return journey. From Tharangambadi to Karaikal...karaikal to Pondycherry..Pondy to Chennai....I reached back by around 1:30 at night....I had spent 19 hours travelling to spend about 6 hours in the shore of singing waves....But I know one thing...If I had to go through it all over again, I wouldn't hesitate for a second....

Insanity

2008-12-12T19:14:00.002+09:00

It's been quite some time since I blogged about something. Initially I thought about blogging about the mumbai attack....but then everyone under the sun was talking about the same thing....not that it didn't deserver such importance...But still, I didn't want to be another voice in the crowd. While majority focuses on the terrorists, our lovely neighbouring country and the politics of all this, let me take some time to remind you of the 300+ lives that were lost. My latest poem is one of the darkest ones that I have ever written....once my friend said that however dark your poems begin, there is always a ray of light in the end....I tried for something like that here too....but for me atleast, there isn't one...So here goes...dedicated to all lives lost in Mumbai

The sky goes black
Sun spewing flames of darkness
The lights go out on the world
And the universe is a mess
Life starts colouring outside the lines
And when the colours run out, blood starts flowing from the eyes
Life, being painfully ignorant, colours on
With the whole picture now blood red tone
Only questions remain in life
All answers seem to have given up the fight
Question upon questions bury you deep
And doubts are the only company you keep
Fear, with its tendrils infinite
Grips the world and the souls in it
Was that a bullet? Was that a scream?
Or was it a remnant of a terrible unholy dream?
Death in its lovely pale dress
Waits with its alluring smile and open arms
One by one she takes lovers into her embrace
Where they lose their souls and the world forgets their face
Bodies become numbers and numbers cease to matter
And false, hollow promises doesn’t make it any better
Cries from the grave fall on deaf ears
Righteous anger fails to hold back the tears
Blood demand Blood, Blood demands justice
But where water is costlier than blood,
The red fluid loses its sheen
Patience runs out, Frustration kicks in
Unbridled horses with no direction
Running everywhere, going nowhere
The road ahead is unclear
Unsure destination, hesitant travelers
Where time will take them, noone can tell
When insanity lords and logic is dead,
Be prepared to find strange partners in your bed.

The joy of an underdog win...

2008-07-07T17:53:00.004+09:00

Whenever I watch sports, as long as India as a team is not involved, I tend to side with the underdogs...Maybe it's because it is a win-win situation..if they lose, it's because they were the underdogs anyway...and if they win...well that's great too....or maybe there is a mysterious romance of an unfancied side taking on much more established opponents and winning....

Right from the time David fell Goliath with his slingshot, the joy of an underdog win has been something else...It has the story of hope...it has the charm of the fight against the odds...it has that few moments of disbelief when they finally pull it off....it just makes my day...

So when I rooted for Greece in the 2004 Euro cup finals or when I was step in step with the most unfancied team of the IPL to their pinnacle of glory or when I desperately wanted Lewis Hamilton to win the F1 Championship on his debut, I was siding with the underdog....

Same was the case why I chanted "Rafa..Rafa..." when Rafael Nadal took on Roger Federer in the finals of the greatest grass court tournament in the history of Tennis. Before this final, the turf division was clear...Nadal rules the clay and Federer reigns over all that is grass....if the World No.2 has to go in to a final as an underdog, it just has to be Roger Federer across the net....They met 2 times before in the same situation and Roger's crown was not disturbed...But this time, there was an impending feeling....that something has changed....

So when Federer, who hadn't dropped a set on grass since the last Wimbledon final, dropped the first 2 sets, that impending feeling was getting an aura of certainty....then again the story twists....showing why he is World No.1, he wins the next 2 sets....even the rain gods dropped in from time to time to check the score....But at the end of the heart stopping 5th set..it was the underdog who took a bite out of the World No.1's aura of invincibility...

This might be the beginning of an exciting new era in Men's Tennis....where the World No.1 status switches hands quite often....each of them biting on other's heels constantly....the status of the underdog being traded from tournament to tournament.....Well, interesting times lay ahead....and as always, I'm with the underdog...

IPL - My picks so far...

2008-05-13T20:51:00.006+09:00

All of India is dancing to the tune of IPL. I ensure that I reach home from office by 7.45 PM so that I won't miss the beginning of the match and I don't have to sit through the insufferable Extra Innings....(How I wish Mandira Bedi still was a part of it....). But the matches have been amazing...Shane Warne carting Andrew Symonds for 16 in 3 balls to win the match in the last over...The return of that 1000 watt smile to L.Balaji's face after his Hat trick.....Badrinath ekeing out the last ball win for Chennai to end its streak of 3 loses....It has been a real treat....So here's my list of the best and the worst of IPL....

Batsman of the Tournament: Ok, so Gautam Gambhir is the top scorer in the tournament as of now...but my pick for the Batsman of the tournament is Sean Marsh. This guy has 295 runs to his credit and just from 5 matches. See him batting along with Yuvraj Singh and try if you can make out who just played that flick off his hips for six.

Bowler of the Tournament: Again...Irfan Pathan, Sreshant and Zaheer Khan has 13 wickets in their kitty, making them the leading wicket takers....but my pick for Bowler of the tournament goes to Glen 'Pidge' McGrath. If he hadn't retired, he still could lead the Aussie pace pack....Even the bowling machine may err in line and length...but don't ever expect that from Pidge. This fact is further proven by his economy rate 5.71. In a 20-20 tournament where 8 runs per over is supposed to be really good, Pidge shows why is a class apart from the rest of them.

Fielder of the Tournament: Virat Kohli has been outstanding in the field for RCB and so has been Sean Marsh for KXP. But my fielder of the award goes to Ashish Nehra....for his full length dive and stop at long on in the match against Rajasthan Royals.

Captain of the Tournament: Well...no doubts here...take a team of rank youngsters...mix them with a couple of International stars....add a pinch of Midas touch...and shake well...you get the IPL's cheapest team but leading the board both in terms of wins and fair play. The man who made this possible goes by the name of Shane Keith Warne....the best captain Australia never had...Seeing his magical hand at work with the Rajasthan Royals, many an Australian might have wondered...If only his other 'head' didn't call the shots from time to time......

Non show of the Tournament: Pick a 20- 2o match....any 20-20 match...now think of a team with Andrew Symonds, Adam Gilchrist, Hershelle Gibbs and Shahid Afridi. It would take a really brave man to bet against them...but it seems sometimes the whole is way lesser than the sum of the parts....if even 2 of the had fired consistently, there would have been no stopping the Deccan Chargers...but instead, they went from bad to worse....but one silver lining in this dark grey cloud has been the batting of Rohit Sharma...man he bats like a dream....The questions to who at No.4 when Sachin retires seems to be getting an answer at last....

Ball of the Tournament: There have been many outstanding deliveries in these matches...but the title goes to the twin of the "Ball of the century" also known as the magic ball...Shane Warne to Dhoni...pitched outside leg...turning viciously...taking the outside edge on the way to hands of First Slip....Gatting might have had something like a De ja Vu seeing that ball...

Best Package of the tournament: When teams could not get over the obsession with Kings and Royality, SRK's Kolkatta Knight Riders showed us how to do it...and in style....with arguably the best uniform in IPL and without doubt the most innovative name, their packaging rocks...Their anthem/theme song..Karbo Larbo Jeetbo re is an instant classic. Once you hear it you keep humming it...contrast it with the Royal Challengers' song..Jeetenge Hum Shaan se....Other than the once in a life time sight of Vijay Mallya with no female accompanying him, it does nothing for you.So in terms of packaging, as the song goes...aami Kolkatta....We rule....

So my dear readers...that's all from my keyboard right now....maybe if IPL throws up something extraordinary in its second half or if I feel like it, I'll be back with more IPL buzz...till then..Peace out.

Thanks Sachin...

2008-04-24T14:32:00.004+09:00

Like any average Indian, I started following cricket as soon as I could hold a plastic bat in my hands. At that time the legends were Sunil Gavaskar and Kapil Dev. I used to hate Ravi Shastri for his slow batting and then I was witness to the birth of a phenomenon. The first thing I remember about this baby faced teenager called Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar is how he danced down the track repeatedly and hit Abdul Qadir for 4 sixes in an over. Sunil Gavaskar was no longer my favourite batsman after that knock. That crown was awarded to this little genius. I grew up watching Sachin play...and play as only he could. As time went by it was getting clearer and clearer that this was no one hit wonder. This was a class act and he was here to stay.

He is often considered the next best batsman after Don Bradman. I wouldn't argue there. But I seriously doubt if any other batsman in the history of this game called Cricket has had a heavier weight of expectations on his shoulders. 1 Billion people hoping for a century every time he adjusts his crotch guard and takes strike....We even had a phase before the emergence of Ganguly and Dravid where the Indian Cricke Team rose and fell with Sachin Tendulkar. With his failure meaning the failure of the whole team, look how he has delivered....Just for that I would say that he is the best batsman ever.

Sachin was there when Ganguly and Dravid started playing ODIs. He is there even now when the senior-junior debate led to the axing of these two. When it was touted that the Juniors were going to rock Australia in the one dayers, finally it was Sachin who showed that age was not a criteria as long as one could perform.

He has been paid many complements by people all around the world. But I guess the best reference of his ability to single handedly win matches came from the bookies. According to them, as long as Sachin was at the crease, all bets were off. The betting would begin only once he got out.

Before we close, an excerpt from today's Cricinfo. "The silence when Micheal Hussey under-edged one from Dhawal Kulkarni was all-pervasive and it suggested that IPL fans are quickly becoming one-eyed, like every good home crowd should be. The sole exception was when Sachin Tendulkar was spotted on TV, talking to the commentators. God, after all, transcends parochial boundaries."

In India, where Cricket is a relegion more unifying than any other around, the highest seat on the pantheon of gods belong to one man and one man only: Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. Thanks Sachin....for all those memories....

The Letdown that is IPL

2008-04-22T15:14:00.002+09:00

The whole cricketing world is going Bonkers at the mention of the Indian Premier League. Supposed to be the next biggest thing to happen to the cricketing world since Kerry Packer, I have to say it has been a letdown for me. It's not the matches....it's the packaging that sucks. Take a few guys from the Sony soaps and put them in the anchor's seat. Their lines seem very forced and the kind of spontaneity that you see from someone like Harsh Bhogle is zilch...non existant..they go according to the rehearsed lines and still make a royal mess out of it. The commentary team sucks big time...ICL had a great commentary team..Even with little known faces on the field, listening to the commentary made it worthwhile....here even though the superstars and the international players are lighting up the scene, we hear Arun Lal saying how the batsman "skied the ball in the air". That acts like a literal haddi in the kabab....spoils the taste of the whole thing.

Moving on, the camera men seem to be in a hurry to get somewhere...often they cannot wait the microsecond to determine where the ball has actually gone....Someone playing a cover drive and gets an edge. The viewers can see that the ball has gone towards mid off but the camera is in a hurry and pans towards the extra cover region. By the time they realise the mistake, the ball has been fielded and returned to the bowler. That's really low quality camera work. Not something expected in such a high profile event.

Don't even get me started on the advertisements....As soon as the batsman plays his shot on the last ball of the over, cut to commercials...if the last ball was a no ball, chances are that you miss the free hit. And in screen commercials which drown out the commentary...especially Godrej and Vodafone...I feel like tearing my hair out on occassions...then I remember how little of that I have and go back to cursing the TV Channel.

All these are the norm rather than the exceptions when you are watching a telecast on Doordarshan...but a channel like SetMax which till now used to provide us with high quality cricket telecasts...this is simply unacceptable.

Last but not the least....another complaint is that they don't give the cheerleaders enough screen time...Cut back to the 20-20 world cup when they used to focus on the cheerleaders after every boundary or six. Come on guys...the Washington Redskins, the first ladies of football were flown in exclusively to cheer for Bangalore Royal Challengers...and you don't give them enough screen time....talk of sacrilage....

Farewell

2008-03-31T19:19:00.002+09:00

I am sure we have all come across the situation of saying farewell to a very close friend....It is a whole gamut of emotions that goes through you at that moment....You wish to say a lot of things but words are really hard to come by at that point in time....My latest poem deals with all this....So, aptly, this is titled "Farewell"

And you’re off
With a final wave and that lovely smile
Off to take on the world, take hold of your life
Leaving me further behind with every step you take
Leaving nothing but memories in your wake
I remember the first time I saw you
I was lost in the crowd and friendly faces were few
Then you came and you smiled
And we started talking like old friends meeting after a while
You’ve seen me in my happy days and held me through the sad ones
You were always by my side and did never falter once
I am what I am because of you
Because of you I was able to start anew
And then it was time for you to leave
I didn’t know whether to be happy for you or to grieve
There were a million things I wanted to tell
But all that came out was
Farewell my friend, Fare ye well
I wanted to tell you what you were to me
How our friendship was just meant to be
I wanted to thank you for being by my side
And helping me out when I was not able to decide
All these and a million more things were to be said
But I chose to hold your hand instead
‘Coz somewhere within me I know
That words hardly play a part when I talk to you
When silence speaks and the unspoken is heard,
You would know that I mean much more than my words,
When, for lack of words, I just manage to tell
Farewell my friend, Fare ye well.

Some Pics from our East Coast Road Outing...

2008-03-18T16:38:00.005+09:00

The Strangers

2008-02-14T15:07:00.002+09:00

This is one creation I have been thinking for some days whether to delete or not….finally I figured what the hell…I took the pains to write it...and I own a blog...So why should it go unpublished? So the thing is like this….The poem is a 2 in 1. The words in red can be replaced by the words in brackets…If you replace all the words in red with the words in brackets, you get a new poem. Here is a question…In each version of the poem, who do you think the lady is and which version would be your choice?

The sun was burning like a ball of rage
But still there as an eerie chill,
I was on the road and beginning to tire
And then I saw an inn beyond the hill
I entered through the door and had a look around
Two others sat there on the floor but making no sound
Making myself comfortable, I looked at the other two
The first one an old man, he seemed to be blind
And deaf and dumb and seemed to be losing his mind too
The other, a young woman with a pale white (heavenly) face and a killer (brilliant) smile.
To look away from her eyes, it took me a while
Getting tired of the silence, I spoke
Where do you come from and whither goest thou?
And then she spoke, voice tinkling like silver
I’m taking him to my home (the beginning), where he will be peaceful forever (able to start over)
“What happened to him” was my next question
“What robbed him off his senses?”
“He had just one dream in his life”
“And when it shattered, it robbed him off his sight”
“His ears were thirsty for words of trust and love,
But he got betrayal instead and chose to hear no more”
“He always spoke of the good in everything,
Then the best thing in his life went sour,
After that he spoke no more”
As I listened to this lady,
I could not help but feel sorry
“The place where you are taking him,
Are you sure he will be at peace?(able to start over?)
“Oh yes my friend, I assure you, Once there, everyone is at peace (It’s again a new life)”
A bit relieved, I spoke again
“Pray tell me your name oh beautiful dame”
With a smile she replied,
“You know me. I am a part of your life”.

New Year Sunrise..

2008-01-07T19:06:00.000+09:00

Weekend Getaway...

2007-12-26T20:51:00.000+09:00

I had written in one of my earlier posts about the thrill that one gets in being the creature of the moment..not being shackled by routines and flying on the wings of your fancy...well...after a long time...I did something like that...

It was just another Friday evening with another potentially boring weekend in sight. We were munching down on our so called "Special" Friday snacks. Conversation was going on about something or the other till someone mentioned the word Pondycherry. I don't know whether it was sheer abandon or the craving to leave everything behind that prompted me to ask whether we were up for a weekend visit to Pondy. A phone call was made and the decision was taken...we were going to Pondycherry for the weekend.Planning to decision in under 2 minutes. Now that's what I call dynamic decision making. We didn't know anything about Pondy. Where to stay, what all to see...everything were just question marks. But there were no second thoughts...

Nearly by Friday midnight, we caught a bus to Pondy from Koyambedu Bus stand. After trying in vain to sleep on the bus, three sleepy headed young men disembarked at the Pondycherry bus stand at around 3.30 in the morning. The plan to go see the sunrise was pushed back to the next day in favour of grabbing some shut eye. We found a hotel room which was just big enough to hold a double bed and was charged at 300 bucks per night. The operative words for us being "double bed". We were asleep within no time and got up at around 9.30.

Plans were discussed over breakfast. Where to go? First idea was to visit Auroville- The universal village. But as Her excellency The President of India chose the same day to visit Auroville, we had to postpone our plans to the next day. Then from among the other places to see, a place called Raj Niwas looked good. It was where the French Governer used to stay. We caught an auto and he took us promptly to Yatri Niwas, which is a government guest house. On further discussion with the auto driver, we came to know that noone recognizes the name Raj Niwas. That building is called Governer House. (Lesson Learnt: Don't trust the info on the net to be be all and end all).

We asked some of the locals as to what all we could see around that area. The prominent sights were the Aurobindo Ashram, Vinayakar temple, park etc. The catch was that entry to most of the places like the Park, beach etc would be open only from 2 PM. We visited the Aurobindo Ashram and the Vinayakar Temple.

It was still 11.30 only when we finished these places and we were at a loss as to what to do next. We wandered around, trying to get more information about any other places worth seeing. Finally we decided to rent some bicycles and continue our expedition on wheels. So after lunch, put this plan into action. First pit stop was the botanical garden. Next was the war memorial on the beach and after a 15 min nap on the beach, it was time to check out the rest of the sights. 2 churches (Sacred Hearts Cathedral and church of our lady of immaculate conception) were visited and we had to search a bit for the Joan of Arc square (Those who don't know who this lady is, check her story out on wikipedia. It's worth knowing) which finally turned out to be just in front of one of the churches. After paying our respects to St.Joan, it was time to call it a day and chart out the course for the next day.

First action item of the day. Watch Sunrise at the beach. Result: Failure. Reason: Heavy Mist.

We just walked along the beach for some time and returned to the hotel. We checked out from the hotel and started to our next destination- Auroville. Auroville is a universal village where people of any nationality can come and stay. It's a nice concept. First shock of the day- Autofare to Auroville Rs. 150. Second shock of the day: There is no transportation to return from Auroville which is 8km from the main road. We had to ask the Auto driver to wait for us and he charged us Rs. 100 extra for the return trip to Auro beach.

Auroville is pretty good place. Very calm and quiet and a really nice place if you want to retreat from the helter skelter of the daily life. The whole Auroville township is in the shape of a spiral galaxy. At the centre, we have a structure called the Matrumandir.

It's a quite awe inspiring structure. We spent about 1.5 hrs in Auroville and had our lunch and proceeded to Auro Beach. There I found a starfish.

We had a fun time cavorting in the sea and soon it was time to head home. It was a really fun 2 days. We had been planning to visit pondycherry for the past 6-8 months. I would have never thought that it would come to fruition in such a way.

A Homecoming...

2007-12-18T16:28:00.000+09:00

You know how it feels when you have travelled the whole world and finally return back home? Well that's how I felt when I started my Malayalam blog. I did'nt want to have the malayalam posts in this blog because this blog has readers for whom malayalam, greek, latin etc fall under the same category. So any malayalees who happen to come across this blog, check out my brand new malayalam blog at www.kathiyadi.blogspot.com. Lots more to come there....and here too...so keep checking this space...and the other one too...

Aping the West...Way to go....

2007-12-11T21:48:00.000+09:00

Date: April 2oth 1999

Place: Columbine High School, Jefferson County, Colorado

Two students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, embarked on a shooting rampage, killing 12 students and a teacher, as well as wounding 23 others, before committing suicide. It is the fourth-deadliest school killing in United States history.

Date: December 11th 2007

Place: Euro International School, Gurgaon, Haryana

A 14 year old Student, Abhishek Tyagi was shot dead by his classmates. He was shot 5 times including one on his temple and two on his chest from close range.

Well...overall it seems like we are about 8 years behind the western civilization. Whom do we blame for this? For the blaming game on the former incident, watch Micheal Moore's "Bowling for Columbine". He blames everyone (and most of them rightly so) from Lockheed and Martin to Kmart for what happened in the Columbine High School.

A bit more details on the incident in our own backyard. The 2 murderers (Yeah I know they are minors. But what they did was murder. So don't expect me to take their age into account) are sons of a prominent real estate developer. They had a fight with the dead boy. They are in the eighth standard. Who has not fought with their classmates in eighth standard? Now it gets interesting...Their father had a licensed revolver which that dumb witted idiotic son of a bitch used to leave on,of all the places, the TV Trolley and that too with live ammunition. The kids having enough exposure to our Prime time television to know what a gun does and how to pull the trigger, saw an easy way to settle the fight. They smuggled the revolver into the school by hiding it in their socks. Remember how cool the hero looks when he pulls out a pistol out of his ankle holster? No wonder they wanted to do it too. Then they hid the pistol in the bath room and waited for the school to end. Once the school left, they got the gun out and it was bang bang time. The first boy shot the victim 4 times and handed the gun to his brother who shot him once more for good measure.

What really shocked me was all the planning that went into the act. Sure we have settled fights when we were kids. We have gone to the extent of letting the air out of our antagonist's cycle tire. But the cyber age kids are a really different breed I guess. Having grown up on a healthy diet of violent television and FPS(first person shooter) video games, pulling a trigger didnt seem like a big deal to them. Eighth standard is not a time when you have full grasp of the concept of life and death. For all I know, they thought that if they shot him enough times, he would turn to dust like the enemies do in their video games. But still, the thought that went into the action was apalling.

So tell me, whom do we blame? Do we blame the kids? I don't know. I am not able to even grasp at their mind set when they thought of doing such a thing. Do we blame the school for not keeping a closer eye on their students? Well who would ever have thought of finding a gun in an eighth standard student's bag? The worst they could have imagined would have been an issue of debonair/chastity or a pack of cigarettes. But a gun? No way. There is one person whom I can blame without a shadow of doubt. The moron of a father that these kids have. You have 2 kids studying in 8th standard who have just begun experiencing life and are willing to try anything. You have a loaded gun. Leave it on the TV trolley where the kids watch their television every day. Good call Stupid. Guns and 8th standard kids don't mix well together.

This post might seem a little different than my usual posts. That is because this was a venting out of rage or frustration whatever you would like to call it. I somehow cannot digest the fact that two kids planned to this extent to take the life of their classmate. I really feel sorry for all the parents. What assurance do they have that their kids are safe at school? The world is getting less safer by the minute. In another 5-6 years, when I would want to have kids of my own, will I be brave enough?

Mangalore Madrigal....

2007-12-03T22:31:00.000+09:00

A pleasantly cold night......An open terrace.....Stars above and friends with you....chatting the night out....THE best way to spend a saturday night if you ask me. This is exactly what I did last saturday night.

After our fantabulously succesful Tada trip, our plans for other trips were dying an early death. We planned several trips only to have them postponed indefenitely due to some reason or the other. That is why this Mangalore trip deserves a special mention. The plan was born on Nov 19th and by Nov 30th, we were on our way. Planning to conceivement in 11 days....

When the idea was born, it was a company of three which had decided to go to Mangalore on a weekend to meet a friend and visit the much-heard-about St.Mary's Island. When it finally happened, it was a gang of 8 travelling to Mangalore with 3 more people to join from there. Don't you love it when things work out in a really big way?

We started from Chennai on Nov 30th at 5 PM. Had lotsa fun during the trip including a hilarious round of Dumbcharades.....We reached Mangalore at around 9.30 in the morning and after a quick round of freshening up, were on our way to St.Mary's Island.

Legend has it that Vasco da Gama had landed on this island in 1498 on his way to India. He was the one who named it 'El Padron de Santa Maria'. A unique feature of this Island is the hexagonal volcanic rock formations on one side.

Warning: Trying to climb those rocks...however low they may seem can be dangerous for your leg. You may have to wear a crepe bandage and buy a new pair of sandals to suit your swollen feet.

On the other part of the island, the beach is made solely of shells....with enough patience and time, you can collect all sorts of rare specimens there.

As they say in Titanic, we were "Unable to stay, unwilling to leave" from this piece of paradise. But the call of the boatmen had to be heeded to. Back we went to the other side.

Seeing how this weekend was turning so much differently from our usual ones, we decided to take it a step further. Have dessert and then the main course dinner. This took us to Pabbas ice cream parlour where the injured members of our raiding party were taken care of. Once the hurt were safely taken to shelter, off we went into the night of Mangalore to hunt....for a place to eat...about a 2km walk at night...was a lovely experience.

This was when the plans for the next day were made. Majority said Bakel fort and being a democracy, the voice of majority was to be upheld. So the where was resolved. Now came the how and the when. This brought about some interesting results which led to our night out on the terrace.

Bakel for could not withstand an assault from us the next day morning and it fell. We underlined our victory with a re shooting of the famous song from the movie "Bombay".

All in all it was a really memorable trip. There is just one regret when I look back on the whole thing...Try as we might, we couldnt get the sun to rise in the west.... But then that is another story for maybe another time.....

Placement Blues

2007-11-26T15:30:00.000+09:00

The most anticipated time at any B-School is the time of placements...It's the time when true colours of our co habitants come out(for the better or for the worse). It's the time which decides the future of dozens of wannabe business tycoons..and it's also the time which gives birth to several interesting anecdotes. The focus of this post is one such incident and the word "fantabulous".

Answers.com defines the word fantabulous as a slang, meaning "marvelously excellent".

So the incident happened in the cold winter of 2005. The IITK MBA placement season was just starting. The first companies to find its way to the MBA placement committee were the likes of TCS who was offering us a pay at par with the engineers- something around 2.4 lacs per annum. This was looked upon with disdain. Lots of inner voices went like "Saala B@^&#(^*d....2.4 de raha hai....phir 2 saal hum ne yahan pe ye Ch******p kyon ki hain?". A more polite version of this would be "The esteemed company is giving us a package of 2.4 lacs. Pray tell us why we went through this 2 year course in vain". Then one fine morning, a mail comes announcing the arrival of GCEB (Identity masked to protect myself) bank on campus for their PPT(Pre Placement Talk). For those who are not aware of the structure of a PPT, it goes like

1. Introduction
2. A brief about the company
3. The details of the openings they have
4. Pay structure
5. Details of the selection process

Most of the audience present would be hanging on point no. 3. There were people who were willing to betray their specialisations for the proverbial 30 silver pieces. i.e. If paid enough, a guy specialising in operations was willing to stab his specialisation in the back and grab a marketing job.

So once the news hit the campus, the well oiled ppt preparation machine sprung into action. 3 piece suits were being broken out, shoes were being polished, the history of GCEB bank was being researched and then some more. There were lots of banking enthusiasts who were willing to give a pound of flesh to get into the banking industry. Being very sure that I wanted nothing to do with the financial sector, I stayed away from all this. Little was I know what I were to miss. The PPT was at 1000 hrs one day. When I met my batch mates at the lunch table, they looked as if they had seen a ghost. Their faces were drained of colour and I heard one word being repeated often- "fantabulous".

After lunch, with lots of questions on my mind, I approached one of my close friends who had gone for the PPT. Then I came to know the whole story.

All of them reached the venue well ahead of time with the full back ground preparation to make that killer first impression. The bank officials came and the PPT started. The kicker is that their PPT never went beyond pt. no 2 on the above list. They spent about an hour extolling the virtues of GCEB bank and how kind they were to come to our institution to offer us job opportunities. (ok. the second part of the statement is a bit exaggeration. Learn to live with it.). So once the PPT was over, obviously there were lots of questions. Especially regarding the points 3 and 4. The excerpts from the question answer session is as follows.

Enthusiastic Student 1: Hello Sir, My name is ES1. Could you tell us a bit on what kind of profile you would be offering us?

Overenthusiastic Official 1: Don't worry about the profile. Wherever you join in our bank, you will be growing exponentially. In the post you will be joining, you will be handling lakhs of rupees every day. It will be a job that will require tremendous mathematical aptitude and qualities like honesty and diligence.

ES1: That sounds very promising sir. What post would that be?

OO1: You guys will be joining as Assitant Cash Managers.

This reply was the beginning of the very painful end. Some of the pessimistic lot had a suspicion about this embellished job title.

Pessimistic Student 1: So what exactly would we be doing in this post?

OO1: You will be in charge of collecting the cash from our customers at the bank and ensuring the correctness of the accounts.

PS1: You mean we will be working as Cashiers?

OO1: We have abandoned all those derogatory job titles long back. Now we use the term Assistant Cash Managers.

There were still some people in the crowd who if paid enough were willing to be a cashier. Well if you get paid 5.5 lacs to do nothing but count money each day, some would say it's a bargain.

Optimistic Student 1: So what would be the pay package be like?

OO1: Don't worry about the salary. You will be compensated adequately.

OS1: Still, it would be great if you could give us a ball park figure.

OO1: According to your qualifications, your pay can be up to a FANTABULOUS 1.75 lacs per annum.

This was the last straw that broke the camel's back. Those who were bad mouthing TCS for their low pay were now assigning the dream company title to TCS. They had no retorts for the bank officials. This was a blow below the belt.

One thing that came out of that fiasco was embellishment of the vocabulary of the whole class with the word "Fantabulous".

Tail piece: Although we stumbled at the first step, we soon started galloping afterwards. The placement week of 2005 was an unprecedented success with big wigs like IBM, Accenture, Citibank and Infy all recruiting heavily. After all these, the story of the bank officials offering a fantabulous 1.75 became one to be laughed about over a cup of chai and an aloo pyaz paratha at the Hall 8 Canteen.

Writer's Block

2007-11-21T16:39:00.000+09:00

It's been more than a month without a single blog entry from my side....seems like I am going through some sort of Writer's Block. For those who don't know what that means, Wikipedia defines Writer's Block as

"a phenomenon involving temporary loss of ability to begin or continue writing, usually due to lack of inspiration or creativity"

That defines it pretty well....It's not that I haven't had topics to write on...After all, I had been to Antaragni at IITK and attended the first ever performance in India by the Finnish band, "Poets of the Fall". I could have written about how great it was or about how disappointing Atif Aslam was on his Professional Night. But the words were just refusing to come out....The fire in the belly which said "I gotta blog about this" was just not there.....and I didn't want to just go through the motions and post something....Maybe life is becoming a bit too routine and that is draining away the creativity....you become creative when you are exposed to new stimuli...doing the same thing over and over again all throughout the week hardly counts as new. The fact that we have been planning many trips, none of which worked out doesn't help either....maybe it's time we got one of the plans into action...a trip with friends to a new place, clicking a few photos and just unwinding may act as a defibrillator to my fast flat lining creativity....Or as they say in "Dr.House M.D.", call a code and get me 10ml epi...stat......

To Walk or not to walk?

2007-10-19T17:14:00.000+09:00

In the last Ind- Aus ODI, which took place in the Wankhade Stadium, Mumbai, India was saved the blushes by two of its front line bowlers, but not with the ball- with the bat. Murali Karthik and Zaheer khan put together a gutsy partnership of 51 runs to take India home. In the post match ceremony, Karthik admitted that in the course of his innings, he had nicked a delivery to the keeper and as it went undetected, he did'nt bother bringing it up himself. When his turn came to speak, Australian captain Ricky Ponting suggested that it would have been nice if Karthik had walked. For the cricket ignorant, 'Walking' is the term used when the batsman knows he is out and does not wait for the umpire's signal to go back to the dressing room. This is seen as a show of sportsman spirit and upholding of ethics in the game. But as we know, talking about ethics is travelling on a very slippery slope. So get ready to slide..

There are 4 major perspectives on what is Ethical: Rationalism, Egoism, Utilitarianism and Deontology.

Rationalism says that end justifies means. i.e. even if you do something wrong to achieve a good purpose, it is justified. This might be the principle Robin Hood lives by. Steal from the rich to feed the poor. Even in Mahabharatha we can see an illustration of this perspective. When Krishna asks Yudhisthira to lie to Drona that Aswathama has died, he says that telling a lie to achieve a greater good is not a sin. So this view point has been in force for quite a long time.

Egoism says that whatever done for the benefit of one's own is justified. You can lie, cheat or steal as long as you are benefitted. Sounds like something our politicians would just adore.

Utilitarianism says that if you do something that benefits a majority, that is ethical. For eg, say you do something which benefits X no. of people and harms Y no. of people. If X>Y, then according to Utilitarianism, what you did is ethical. People like Terrorists are usually judged by this principle. They crash a plane into the twin towers and Al Qaida is benefited but the people in US are harmed. Since the population of US >>people in Al Qaida, it is deemed tha Al Qaida did a wrong thing. In the same way, US bombs Afghanistan in retaliation. Again, some people are benefited and some harmed. In this case as the latter is lesser, US stands justified in its actions (atleast according to Utilitarianstic theory)

And finally, Deontology. This is somewhat the other side of Rationalism. Where rationalism says that Ends justify means, Deontology says that means is also as important. i.e. stealing from the rich to give to the poor does not make you any lesser a thief. This is the theory which governs most of the law and order in our society. This society does not look kindly to an orphan who steals bread for his hungry sister. He is also as guilty as a hustler who makes millions cheating the public.

So now lets see if Karthik was justified in not walking.

Rationalism: Ends justifies means. In the end India won. That should be justification enough for Karthik's not walking. If he had walked, there was no guarantee that the last pair would survive long enough to take India to the shores of victory. So in this context, Karthik's actions are justified.

Egoism: Do what benefits you. While bowling, Karthik had put up a record breaking performance of 6 for 27. It was quite obvious that he did'nt want to see his bowling efforts go to waste. Who can blame him? Here too his actions stands justified.

Utilitarianism: Do what benefits the majority. Another defeat at the hands of australians would have plunged millions of Indian cricket fans into a state of depression. The reaction of the Mumbai crowds after victory was sign enough that they didnt remember that we lost the series. They just remembered the day and on that day, India won. Seeing how the population of Australia is not even a distant competition to that of India, what Karthik did benefited the majority. So here too he stands justified.

Now here comes the twist.

Deontology: Not just results, Actions too matter: If you have to win a game, win it fairly without any external help. When he knew he was out and still stayed at the crease, Karthik was cheating. He didnt play fair and whatever the results, his actions were wrong. Or so says deontological ethics. So here he does not stand justified.

In any democratic society, usually when 3 out of 4 people have one view on a topic and the last person differs, the majority view is upheld. I am not judging or anything. But if 3 mad guys call you mad, who is really mad? Is it you because they are the majority or are they in spite of being the majority?

Go Karting etc

2007-10-15T17:52:00.000+09:00

The word 'Promenade' means a leisurely walk...It was on last saturday that HCL Telecom team decided to take a promenade to Mayajaal Resorts...Well we were not walking literally...coz that would be stupid given that the resort is about 40 km from Chennai....But still it's the thought that counts....So off we went to Maayajaal, promenading in buses...It's a quite happening place..A multiplex, Indoor games, Resort, Swimming pools, Cricket grounds and last but never the least...A karting ring...I would not be describing the activities there and how good or bad it was...coz if I were doing a PR job, I would never do it for free (or maybe I am just not in the mood)....So sorry guys...no accolades for the organizing team and no criticisms to our bus coordinator who managed to get us lost even before starting the journey in earnest....The point of today's post is (no prizes for guessing....Ya I know you read the heading...)Go Karting....There was an hour long break after lunch when we were free to waste time as we saw fit...jump into a swimming pool...Go to the waterfalls..No its not a natural one....or just sit there...Noting already that there was a karting ring in there and not wanting to just sit there, me and my comrade in arms Vinayan, went to pay them a visit...The charges were steep..Rs.150 per head for 5 min..But the call of speed needed to be heeded to (need, speed, heed..nice alliteration...Man I'm good)...Soon wallet was Rs.300 lighter and we were buckling up for the ride...Pedal to the metal and off we went....it was a real good experience...I would do it again in a jiffy even if the prices were a little more steep...There is a wishlist of activities that I have always wanted to do...Trekking to a desolate place and Karting can be crossed off the list now...The remaining items include Parasailing and Bungee Jumping.

I am actually a bit squeamish about heights...Looking down from the top of a tower makes my legs go numb...but still bungee jumping has always been something that I wanted to do...Once during my school days, a carnival at Ernakulam introduced Bungee jumping to the public in Kerala...When I expressed my desire to try this out to my mother, she assured me with utmost sincerity that if I did something like that, she would beat my life out of me...But the temptation of the adrenalin rush was too much and I was ready to risk a date with the cane for that...Being a high school student, my collected earnings at hand totalled to about Rs. 275. Keeping apart the money for the bus tickets and auto fare, my ability to spend topped out at Rs.250. I was determined that even if it took every paisa of those Rs.250, I would tie myself to the bungee cord and take the leap...I reached the carnival, marveling at the structure set up for the Bungee jump. I was just beginning to get excited about it when a board there nipped my hopes in the bud...Per jump Rs. 1500....I had fought through threats on my life for this but at the last step, I was thwarted by the root cause of all evil....Money....and now, when I have a job and money is not that much of an obstacle (well my mom would still flog me if she came to know I spent Rs.1500 on a potentially life threatening spectacle)...there is not a bungee jump in sight...So my dear readers...if you have any information on places where this adrenalin pumping, mind numbing experience is available, please let me know. People living outside India need not bother reply..Yes I know there are lots of spots in US that offer this..but I don't have a free ticket to US (and back).

That brings to mind an anecdote about a bumper prize won by my friend..Just this more and I'm done for the day...This friend of mine bought a Sony ericsson phone lately and won a Bumper prize...an all expenses paid vacation in Thailand...but as alway's there is a catch...travel is not included (it costs "just" Rs. 30000)...If you manage to reach Thailand by begging, borrowing or stealing, they will take care of you for the time period of the stay till you have to begin begging, borrowing or stealing to get back to India....I am sure now he wishes that if only he had got the second prize...which was an apple iPod.

Everything is Forgiven....

2007-09-25T15:37:00.001+09:00

As Indian cricket fans, we are proud of having a short memory span...All it takes is a victory to purge our hearts of all the past defeats.....but it cuts both ways.....a defeat after a huge victory does not deserver forgiveness....But now is not the time to dvelve into such matters....now is the time to rejoice....till another 20-20 world tournament comes along, which could be real soon going by the success of the first one, the bragging rights are ours....India stands as the King of the 20-20 mountain....left in the dust of this trailblazing journey are the horrible memories of the carribean....After 22 years, India has won a world championship...Everything else is forgiven....

Dreams.....

2007-09-10T19:03:00.000+09:00

This thought process was started on our 60th Independence day. I was thinking about how we holler that we are free and celebrate our freedom every year......but are we free really? What does freedom mean to any one of us? Does freedom mean only that we are able to select our own representatives to govern us? How is that different from the freedom of a convict given the choice of poison he needs to take? These thoughts were swirling in my head but till today I was not able to structure it well enough to put it into words...Then today morning while mailing a friend, something I wrote took me back to all these thoughts...and the result is given below for all of you to see...I have titled this..."Dreams"

When I was just a child,
I was told"dream"
And let your dreams run wild
Knowing only to obey, I dreamt
Dreams of a world well kept
I dreamed of days without bloodshed
And nights without fear
Where everyone was well fed
And a smile was always near
I dreamt of a world where love prevailed
And hate was never there to be blamed
I dreamt of a land where people were free
Free of all the bonds, free as they should be
But still there were chains that tied them together
Golden chains of love, tying brother to brother
Silver chains of trust tying man to man and
With hand in hand to the new future they ran
And then I woke up with a start
I heard them shouting from the rampart
"Hear ye Hear ye all who are free"
"It's been sixty years since freedom was given to thee"
Still dazed from the sleep, I look around
And I don't see any freedom to be found
All I see around me are chains
Not the gold and silver of love and trust
But dirty black ones full of rust
Chains of lies, hate and betrayal
And man in them in a state of denial
He chooses to close his eyes
When with a final cry, his brother dies
My dreams return to haunt me
And they show me a picture of what has to be
It's about time we stopped dreaming
And make a little sacrifice
A small sacrifice of dreams
To realize the ones we've already dreamed.....

??

2007-09-03T19:01:00.000+09:00

Last weekend, I had gone to Trivandrum to attend a friend's wedding. While coming back, a board in the Trivandrum Railway Station caught my attention. I still don't know what to make of this.....

2007-08-31T18:54:00.000+09:00

See the soft and yellow petals, touch the morning mist and cry

Holding out green velvet fingers in conversation with the sky

2007-08-31T18:36:00.000+09:00

Tamasoma Jyotirgamaya...

(Lead me from Darkness to Light)

Chak De....

2007-08-21T15:08:00.000+09:00

It's not a well known fact among my friends that I am a loyal Shah Rukh Khan fan. It's true that I don't have his posters adorning the walls of my bedroom or the desktop of my PC (Those are reserved for a Green eyed beauty.......). But I watch any movie as long as SRK is in it. I have endured movies from the really painful Badshah to the overhyped underperforming KANK. I even watched a dud named "Shakti" just because SRK had a guest role in it (and also because it featured a certain someone in the "Ishq Kameena" song). So it was just a case of time before I churned out Rs.90 for a ticket to SRK's latest movie..."Chak De India". A sunday matinee at Satyam Cinemas, Chennai and all I can say is "Wow".

Chak De is an out and out sports film. This genre has been largely overlooked in Hindi movies. Except for some utterly forgettable movies like "Avval Number" and a real rarity like "Lagaan", Hindi Cinema has seldom focused on Sports. Even in Lagaan, the cricket was just a means to an end. Although the movie focused on the match, there was always a bigger picture. So I wouldn't call that a real sports movie. In Chak De, Hockey is the means and the end. Hollywood has had lots of real good sports movies. "Remember the Titans", "The Replacements", "The Mighty Ducks", "Coach Carter","Any given Sunday"....the list goes on. When I mentioned to one of my friends that "Chak De" is not doing good overseas, she remarked with typical innocence "Foreign teams ko haraaya hai na...Isi liye nahi chal raha hai...". Well maybe she is right...or maybe it is the fact that they have seen loads of such movies and its not a new thing to them....Whatever be the case, this was certainly the best movie that I have seen since Lage Raho Munnabhai...

Now coming to the movie, The topic is nothing new to those who watch English movies...Firstly, there is a disgraced player who was supposed to be the best of his time...then you have a team from which noone has any expectations...then you have the amazing turnaround...standard formula for a sports movie...Kabir Khan was India's best Centre forward in Hockey till he missed a crucial penalty stroke in the world cup finals against Pakistan. Then ignominy follows and he disappears for 7 years. He then surfaces to apply for the coach position of Indian National Womens Hockey team. The team is a mish mash of players from various states including Jharkand and Mizoram. It has some really interesting characters like Komal Chautala, who according to my friend is a "typical" Haryanvi and Balbir Kaur who is a "typical" Punjabi. The rest of the movie is all about how the team bonds and how they reach the pinnacle of glory in the World Hockey Championship. There are some really good scenes in the movie...one that needs to be mentioned happens when the girls take on a gang of boys who were hitting on them...one of the boys try to hit a girl from the back with a cricket bat. SRK stops him and says " Hamla karna hai to mardon ki tarah saamne se karo...Kya hai ki hamare hockey mein Chakke nahi hote"....The writer couldn't help taking a potshot at Cricket. Afterall, hockey is supposed to be our national game and it has been largely looked over in favour of Cricket. The Hockey-Cricket divide is also portrayed in the relationship between one of the team members and her boyfriend. Anyways...the best scene of the movie belongs to none other than King Khan. It happens when India wins the world cup. There are no dialogues...just acting at its best....the look of a man who has found a meaning to his life that was lost till then....You gotta see it to believe it....News is that the DVD print has already hit the IITK LAN. So I will be getting a CD written...coz this is a movie for the collection....

This makes it all worth it....

2007-08-06T18:56:00.001+09:00

Base camp 2

2007-08-06T18:54:00.002+09:00

Taking the first steps..

2007-08-06T18:54:00.001+09:00

The Gang - 1

2007-08-06T18:51:00.000+09:00

Boys Gang in front of Oneness University

2007-08-06T18:49:00.001+09:00

To Mother Nature's Lap...A Trek to Tada Falls...

2007-08-06T18:33:00.000+09:00

Well….how do I begin….It often happens that when you plan something to more than a certain extent, you build some expectations around it and when finally you are there, you feel let down…as your expectations were much higher than what it actually turned out to be. We had done our share of planning for this trek to Tada falls…For the uninitiated, this is situated near the Tamil Nadu- Andhra Pradesh border, in the district of Nellore…It is about 80 km from Chennai and is a piece of the world that commercialization has seemingly forgotten or overlooked…..So as I said we had done our share of planning for this trek….meticulously go through every blog written about treks to Tada, try to forsee any eventualities that might occur, etc…what we were not able to do was get an idea about how the whole thing is going to be….thats the difference between knowing the path and walking the path. When we finally walked the path, it was beyond our wildest expectations...one of the best saturdays in my life...The call of the wild was heard and heeded to...and back we went into the embrace of mother nature...

We had planned a 5.30 A.M start from Chennai. It should be said that our planning was a success because we were on our way by 5.50 A.M. Our gang consisted of 7 people…Seven is supposed to be a very powerful number in the world of Magic..thats why Lord Voldemort wanted to have seven horcruxes and all…anyway…I am drifting from the topic…7 people, 4 boys and 3 girls. Selwyn, Vinayan, Vimal, Aswini, Nandita, Vibitha and myself. One thing bothering us when we started was the tax for crossing the border of which we had read about in the blogs….I’ll come to that in a moment. Our first photo opportunity was the Oneness University.

The Construction of this University is something worth looking at. It reminds you of palaces of the old…We spent some time there clicking photos and were soon on our way. Then came the border crossing….our fears proved to be unfounded as we just had to pay a toll of Rs.15 and move on…We reached the town of Tada by somewhere around 7.30. Hunger pangs were striking most of us…some of us are used to having pretty heavy breakfasts…so they were on the lookout for a hotel…finally we got into what seemed like the last hotel available…Had our breakfast…Iddly for some and Puri for others….We hadn’t lost our way yet, thanks to the blogs and the local support…but after breakfast, we took a wrong turn somewhere and added about 4-5 km to our total distance…the mistake was soon rectified and we were on our way ( the right one this time..). Tada to Varadiahpalayam and from there to the falls…with locals willing to offer help throughout the way, it was quite easy. Then the going began to get tough….So finally we decided to get down and start our trek in earnest.

We had done our homework and knew that we need to walk for about 3 km before reaching a waypoint in the form of a Shiva Temple. We were in no hurry at all. So we took our time. At the first sight of flowing water, some of us could not resist it and had to get their feet wet…aah..what the hell…time for some more photos

Finally we were able to get everyone out of there and continue on our way. The first phase of the trek is actually climbing up a hill…we took a break when we reached the top of the hill. We sat there for sometime taking in the raw beauty of nature. Soon it was time to start marching again. Now the journey was downhill. At the bottom of the hill we came to a stream with an Idol nearby (which we nicknamed Indian Idol). This could be called Base camp 2 (Atleast that was what they called it in the Blogs). Another stream to cross and after a fruitless effort to keep my shoes dry, I crossed the stream.

After another short break, we were again on our way. Finally we reached the last point on the path that was the Shiva Temple. Thereon, there was no clear path to the falls. It was all about charting your own course. The best thing to do is go upstream…or you can also follow the litter…cross the stream..climb the boulders and keep walking until you reach a situation where you can see the falls and a seemingly insurmountable rock formation. This was our greatest challenge….It is almost impossible to scale this thing unless you are an expert trekker or you have friends….I was the one who had most difficulty climbing this..and took what looked to be a nasty fall attempting this climb…But as always in life…in tough situations, there are friends to see you through…and finally I was there on top. I had hardly laid down and there came the next problem…cramps…My leg muscles were cursing me for making the work so hard without any kind of an advance warning…A bit of flexing and a lot of Amritanjan did the trick. In the mean time Vinayan managed to strike a rapport with one of the bees nearby and was rewarded with a sting at the back of his head...I had taken a fall and Vinayan had a sting to his credit. Little did we know that Selwin was planning to better both of us...the final tally was Vinayan: 1 sting, Venu: 1fall, Selwin: 1 fall and 1 sting. As there was nothing to see on the top, we climbed back down..which was surprisingly easy and it was time to give meaning to all the effort…to take a shower under the Tada falls….Pristine ice cool water falling on top of your head…the feeling of being embraced by mother nature…that few minutes spent under the falls made it all worth it.

A few minutes under the fall, a few more minutes to take it all in and we decided to start our return journey as the falls were a bit too crowded for comfort. It seemed we had chosen a very popular day for this trek as wherever there was any water to be found, there was also some company that we could really do without. So we continued our journey back in search of some peace and quiet where we could spend some time in the water. This was found only at BC2. There we stayed for about an hour. On the return journey, one main agenda was to see if Aswini had fallen down...it was more of a question of when rather than if. She had taken to falling to such an extent that we were thinking of changing the name from Tada falls to Aswini falls...But as someone said "Its not about how many times you fall...its about how many times you get up..." To her credit, she was on her feet after each fall in no time...

And finally it was time to bid adieu to this beautiful place. We made our way back to where our vehicle was parked..singing songs all the way and having a great time. Once we got into the van and the return journey started, it was time for some fierce Antakshari. In the end, as always, we showed why boys are better , beating the girls 2-0. All in all, this was a fabulous experience with whole lot of fun and a little discomfort. But after all, as someone has said, “Adventure is discomfort recollected in comfort…”

Belated.....

2007-08-02T16:01:00.000+09:00

The beginning of First world war.....Birth of arguably the best all rounder of all times, Sir Garfield Sobers....Birth of the City of Miami....Passing away of the Father of Nuclear Chemistry , Otto Hahn....the birth of the Blog titled "Venu's World"....Whats common in all these.....It all happened on July 28th.....So belated Happy birthday to my Blog.....I am happy to say that unlike my Diary writing habit, I have been successful in posting regularly in the blog (don't u dare mention quantity over quality..). I hope to continue this until i start getting death threats from my readers....As it is born on July 28th, My blog is a Leo...So here's what my blog's nature is like

"Leo is the fifth sign of the Zodiac and is popularly associated with the keywords magnanimous, generous, hospitable, caring, warm, authoritative, active and open.Leos are typically pictured as very dignified and regal. They are hard-working, ambitious and enthusiastic,however they are prone to laziness and can often take "the easy way out." They are known to be exuberant, extroverted, generous with a natural dramatic flair and very creative.They are typically very self-assured, and love taking center-stage in whatever arena they are in."

I guess that describes it quite well.....So thats all for now.....Will be posting shortly with details of a trek that has been planned( if everything goes well...). So Auf Wiedersehen........

The Wizarding hour is nigh......

2007-07-17T23:55:00.000+09:00

July 21st 2007......

Alone

2007-06-20T20:39:00.000+09:00

This post is inspired by a friend who told me that she was feeling lonely. When noone is there with us, there are 2 states of mind that we may adopt. One can feel lonely or one can feel alone....and No these are not the same thing. When you feel lonely, you miss others....you feel sad...you don't feel like doing anything...overall you are in a depressed state of mind.....But being alone is not so.....aloneness means you enjoy your own company...you enjoy the fact that you are alone...your mind is at peace and you take the time you are alone to talk to yourself....in daily life we talk to all people around us but not ever to the person inside you....Being alone gives you time to resolve any heart vs head conflicts you may have....all in all being alone is being in your own company and that is never boring...Someone has said" If you don't like your own company then why impose it upon others?" So on this note..let me present to you my latest work..titled "Alone ".

Just waves of Silence till the unseen shores
And the road of my life has taken this uncharted course
They may say I am lonely
With no one around to keep me company
But I say I am alone
With no one around to stop me from going on
They may say you’ll be cold
With no one around for you to hold
But I say that I have fire in my heart
That will keep me from falling apart
They may say it’s all silent out there
With not a voice till the end that you can hear
But I say there’s music in my soul
And as long as there is music I’ll always be bold
Loneliness is a curse, a terrible one at that
With your heart weighing a ton, you’ve fallen flat
But aloneness is not what it seems
It doesn’t stop you from shining like a sunbeam
When you enjoy your own company
There is no need for another one or many
With a smile on your lips and peace in your soul
You just need to go on as if you will never grow old.

So That's it for now folks...so always remember...you may be alone...but never feel lonely....

2007-06-01T17:16:00.000+09:00

One wonderful thing that photography does is that it changes the way you look at the world around you....you begin to notice the smaller things, which are ignored usually. You begin to see the beauty of nature....Like the photo above. This was taken in a rubber estate, the last time i visited home. If it had not been for the camera around my neck, I would'nt have given these mushrooms a second look. But there was...and I did...Thats why I love being a photographer....

Shadows by the Bright Moonlight...

2007-05-03T18:11:00.000+09:00

A moonlit night in God's own country

2007-05-03T18:03:00.000+09:00

Beautiful Dreamer, Wake unto me...

Starlight and Dew drops are waiting for thee..

My Worldcup Memories....

2007-04-25T19:30:00.000+09:00

I was about an year old when India won the Cricket World cup....Like any other Indian, Cricket was in my blood from the time i learned to hold a bat...I don't remember the 1987 world cup...But I have some memories of the 1992 Benson and Hedges World Cup. One day when I came back from school, India was playing Pakistan...the scores and the situation escape my memory but Imran Khan was just coming in to bat when I arrived...With typical childish knowledge, I declared..If Imran goes for a duck, India will win...and thats how it happened....Imran was out for a duck and India won the game...The next memory I have of a world cup is also an India Pakistan encounter...you know how that clash means the world to both countries...This was the Ajay Jadeja's destruction of Waqar Younis in the 1996 world cup..I remember being devastated when Sachin got out in the semi final (Well I feel devastated every time Sachin gets out..)...The 1999 world cup was more closely followed...that being after my 12th standard exams....Memories from that include..India's 373 against Sri Lanka in Taunton, with Sourav Ganguly scoring 183 and having a 300+ run partnership with Rahul Dravid...I remember being torn between wanting them to bat on and having a wicket fall and have Sachin come in....I remember being baffled in the India- Zimbabwe game as to why Sachin was not there...I remember Sachin's hundred against Kenya after he came back from his father's funeral...But of all these, the world cup I would cherish the most (the same might be the case with almost all the fans of my age) was the 2003 edition...I love it the most not because of India's progression till the finals...But for one man's mastery over the rest...Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar at his best...Thrashing Akhtar over the point boundary.....Hooking Andrew Caddick out of the ground...Missing 2 centuries for the want of 5 runs...Maybe fate thought it all was getting too perfect...I don't have any memories to share of the ongoing world cup, mostly owing to the fact that I have not seen a game in its entirety....No motivation to stay awake till 3.30 in the morning...I hope the last 2 games left will do something to redeem it....

Courage

2007-03-28T15:04:00.000+09:00

There comes a time in everyone's life when you feel totally down and out. You feel miserable to the extent of contemplating suicide. I've had such times too...When you have lost everything but the courage that you can face whatever is thrown at you. This courage can come from amazing sources. One of it is the reluctance to cause sorrow to your loved ones through your lack of courage. But you will see that this courage will carry you through the worst of the times. Ok..enough of intro. Now to my latest poem and surprise......It is titled Courage.

A lonely boat in a stormy sea
Facing the forces of nature
Lightning of Bad luck, Thunder of Confusion
Waves of Misery and Winds of Damnation
The boat had in it riders four
First one was man without whom this story is no more
Second rider had faith as his name
Faith, that the path he had taken was one without blame.
Third rider, Hope was a shining maiden
She said, “All these troubles will soon be at an end"
One named Courage was last one on board
He vowed that whatever comes, he'd stand his ground
Now you know the passengers four
Let’s see how the story unfolds
The storm was raging on all sides
Not a ray of sunlight anywhere in sight
It seemed that the world was at its end
The amassed fury seemed too much to defend
Faith was the first one to burn,
Hit by a lightning, he said," Maybe somewhere I took a wrong turn"
Saying thus he breathed his last
The journey ahead was worsening quite fast
Hope was the next one to die
"I don't think this will ever end" was her last cry
Even when left alone, Courage refused to give up
Through the devilish storm, he managed to keep his chin up
It took what might have been a lifetime
For the storm to vent its fury and start dying down
The winds began to slow, thunder and lightning ceased
The waves started losing their malice and the sea was coming to peace
Then courage did a wonderful wonderful thing
With a kiss, he breathed life into his kith and kin.
Faith and Hope got up with sleepy eyes
"Well what do you know" said faith, "Maybe my path after all was right"
Hope looked about taking in the scene around
"Forward my friends" she said "There is a shore to be found"
And a shore indeed did they find
A shore with peace and tranquility of mind
Once at shore, Man turned to courage, with tears in his eyes he said
"Thank you my friend! Without you I'd sure be dead"
Courage smiled and said to man “Never bother my friend"
"Stay with me and I'll take you to any journey's end"
"Never think that I don't feel fear in each breath I take"
"But what keeps me strong, what drives me on is that there's no choice to make"
"I know fear but I also know that something else is there"
"Something that is more important than all the fear everywhere"
"This something that keeps me driven until the road's end"
"Is the knowledge that I can bring you happiness my friend"

Guess Not!

2007-03-24T19:14:00.001+09:00

Let the self denial begin.....

Will a Billion Prayers be enough?

2007-03-23T16:18:00.000+09:00

March 23rd 2007. Friday. This is the most important day of the year till now for all the Indian cricket fans. India faces Sri Lanka in Queens Park Oval, Trinidad for a berth in the Super 8 of the 2007 ICC World Cup. A loss here would mean that India would be out of the world cup, barring a miracle of Bermuda beating Bangladesh. A loss here would mean that normal life will resume starting on Saturday. But no fan of Indian Cricket would want normal life to resume so soon. It has taken us 4 years to forget the thrashing in the 2003 World Cup finals. It has taken us 4 years to hope again for the pinnacle, to hope again for a 1983. We just cannot let all these hopes die in just 2 weeks. Being an ardent cricket fan myself, I know that it is not possible to passionately support any other team than India. It is not possible to forget the world cup and start following EPL from tomorrow. In the football world cup when Argentina fell early, we coloured ourselved Canary Yellow for Brazil. But here our souls are coloured Blue, the blue of Team India. Try as we might this colour will not come off. So if India falls at this step, then it is a weekend of self denial ahead of me. To tell myself that this does not matter and there are better things to be done rather than losing my sleep watching world cup. As difficult it might be, It will have to be done. That is why right now all I can do is pray. It is said that One day Cricket is a game of glorious uncertainities. If a prayer can tip those uncertainities slightly in India's favour, then why not? But here lies the bigger question. With the sort of form the team is in right now, Will a billion prayers be enough?

Full Moon rising.....

2007-03-12T18:46:00.000+09:00

Full moon rising, be with me forever stay with me tonight

Full moon rising, take the stars from the sky and put them in my eyes

Dark Side of the Moon

2007-03-06T18:19:00.000+09:00

And if the cloud bursts, thunder in your ear,

You shout and no one seems to hear.

And if the band you're in starts playing different tunes

I'll see you on the dark side of the moon.

2007-03-05T18:43:00.000+09:00

A dash of colour in my otherwise grey life...that's what you are to me.....

Sunset in Chennai...

2007-02-19T21:17:00.000+09:00

I have been warning you all that soon I will be getting a camera and my blog will have more pictures. So here it begins with a sunset...Well you've gotta love the irony when you are beginning something with the end of something...Or maybe it is not Irony...maybe thats what is called "The Circle of life"

Of Rediff and Reviews

2007-02-19T21:04:00.000+09:00

Confused about whether to see a movie or not? Looking for a dependable review? going to rediff.com? All the best.....The story begins one friday afternoon when I was in a quandary as to how to spend a saturday afternoon. I don't remember what was on my mind when i opened rediff and went to the movies section. Knowing that the latest multi starrer Ekalavya has gotten released, I checked out the review on rediff. Rediff reviewers who are usually stingy with good words about a film had waxed eloquently about the above mentioned movie...Toting it as a must watch, I must have gotten brainwashed, that i promptly booked a ticket for the saturday 1.30 show. the movie began and according to rediff it is a gripping story which never relents on the pace of story telling...well don't take it as a compliment for the Indian Cricket Team when i say that listening to the commentary of the match going on in Vizag proved more gripping than what was going on on the screen. Well apart from the Big B, the movie is pretty dumb. The opposite of this also has happened to me many a times...rediff critics tear apart a movie in their reviews and it goes on to be more than worth the ticket money...so lesson learned from all this: Don't trust rediff

A Picture is worth.....

2007-01-30T16:27:00.000+09:00

Its been more than a month and not a single blog entry from me....Well thats not acceptable at all...Atleast when I used to write the diary, I unerringly posted an entry on the Jan 1st. This year, no diary writing ..enough diaries have been wasted. This year I thought of a writing a Blog on Jan 1st...Well now you all know how that turned out to be...Anyways...this being the first blog entry of the year, one might be tempted to touch upon the topic of New year resolutions....Well, My new year resolution has been the same for about the last 10 years..Don't take any resolution that you won't be able to keep...Other than that, on the topic of resolutions, I have the same opinion as Calvin ( of the Calvin and Hobbes fame). You don't know what he thinks about New Year resolutions? Well go find out yourself....After all, I had told you a long time ago to start reading calvin and hobbes...This is what happens when you don't do your homework.

Another thing that has my attention this year, you could call it my latest crush or craze or something like that...is photography. See I had a 2MP digital camera and I was pretty happy with it. Then, thanks to Orkut, I came across an Old friend who keeps a photoblog. Going through her blog showed me the unexplored realms of photography that I have been ignoring. Check out this blog www.jeenajayakumar.blogspot.com The pictures in there truly are worth a thousand words or more..So now my interest was captured and the next step is to get a camera that will serve all my needs...and now I just might have found the one..Olympus SP 510 UZ. 7.1 MP, 10X optical zoom with digital image stabilisation. I will be buying that soon and then you can expect a more picture laden blog than the boring text that you usually get. And while I am on the topic of Megapixels, here is a little tidbit...Do you know what is the resolution of our eyes? I read somewhere that it is around 26-27 Mega pixels...Don't know how much true that is..but still ....Thats all for now guys and gals....I promise that you won't have to wait another month for the next blog entry...Till then this is Venu signing off...Ciao.

Making history in the Bullring.....

2006-12-18T19:43:00.000+09:00

When you have nothing to lose and everything to gain, thats when you create miracles.....same was the case with 11 men over the past three and a half days...The Indian team, starting the test series as overwhelming underdogs has shown that even the bites of an underdog hurts....The south african team were cock a hoop before the test, asking for pitches with pace and bounce...Well, as the saying goes....Be careful what you wish for...On a lively pitch where the batsmen struggled, Indian bowlers, lead by an eccentric but excellent pacer from kerala (Ahem..Ahem...) taught the proteas bowlers a lesson or two on how to bowl...and the rest as they say is history....For all the ganguly fans out there...See how Team India's fortunes took an about turn as soon as Dada joined the camp? (Is fate conspiring for Ganguly?) anyways...if keeping him gets India to win, why the heck not? Well...well begun is half done...There is one week before the next test starts...For once India has more answers than questions...In the batting of Ganguly, Laxman, Zaheer and VRV Singh and in the bowling of the hungriest pace pack seen in recent times, India can place their trust...One thing that pricks me in all this is Sachin's bad run....If only he too blossoms into runs...Well, two tests more to go...plenty of time for him to hit top form...Hope India does not do the "India Act" again and somehow manage not to win this series...Come on guys....you are in the driving seat now...don't let SA crash this honeymoon wagon...I am not greedy enough to ask for a 3-0 clean sweep of the series...Just win the series...and you will have told us that the trust of one billion was not misplaced.....

Hope

2006-12-01T18:05:00.000+09:00

One of the movies that I might have never seen if it wasn't for IITK is The Shawshank Redemption. For those who have not seen it, It's about a guy breaking out of a prison. No big deal you might say. But it is a cult movie of sorts. You will have to see it to feel it. Anyways, there is a small dialogue in that movie which has been quoted often on many occassions. It goes something like this, "Hope is a good thing, maybe the best thing there is and no good thing ever dies". This holds a lot of meaning in our daily lives. When you are fed up with your job, it is the hope of a good weekend that drives your week. When you see Indian Cricket team losing continuously, It is the hope of a Sachin Century that makes you tune in every time there is a match. It is hope that makes the world go round. Hope for a better tomorrow....This was a intro to what comes next....Yes, I am here with another poem. No prizes for guessing the topic. After all, after giving such a lecture on Hope, I won't be presenting a poem I have written on Osama Bin Laden. So here it goes....A poem titled 'Hope'

Night is gone
Brilliant rays of sun chasing away the demons of darkness
Light and warmth starting to fill the dark emptiness
Just like a smile lights up a dark face,
All uncertainties are about to be erased
Doubts, like storm clouds, darkening the sky
And Hope, like nine suns leaves the clouds behind.

Hope, is a strange thing
Quite marvellous are its doings
Making a long wait bearable
Making deepest secrets sharable
Tells us to go forward and not look behind
Yes, it is the only thing of its kind.
It might be too faint for others
But for the ones who hope, it lasts a hundred years

Hope to meet a long lost love,
Hope that someone is watching from above
Hope to hear just three little words
Makes life far better rather than worse
When new dawn brings new life
And new rays of hope to get over the strife,
With new beginnings and new turns,
The flame of hope still burns.
It is this hope and nothing else
Which will be by your side if noone else.
Hold on to the Hope and you shall see
The new dawn is the brightest that shall be.

The Fire Within

2006-11-13T18:07:00.000+09:00

"Burn with Passion without ever burning out". This sums up Antaragni...the IITK Cultural Festival..."the time" to be in IITK and for the IITians(boys especially), also described as "do din ki chaandni". The whole campus fills up with colours(of all kinds)..there is electricity in the air...Some great people take their yearly bath during this time....haircuts...wardrobe changes....Its Antaragni Time...The allure of Antaragni is strong enough and the experience unforgettable enough to pull IITK Alumni from all parts of the nation. I am no exception..so I was there...Morning of Thursday November 2nd, I met an old friend again.... Kanpur Railway Station...Although I had sworn that I hate Kanpur the minute I set foot on the railway station the first time, like many relationships, the hate slowly turned into a quiet liking....When you have to sit in the railway station for 12 hours waiting for your train, you tend to notice the finer details...the smells of hot pooris being made...the sounds of haggling with the porters...the sight of people waiting for their delayed trains with infinite patience...all this was brought back on that day. The excitement had already overtaken me even before I had reached the IITK Campus...and once I entered the campus, it was like I never left...the same energy in the atmosphere...the banners and other decorations..the sign boards..Well, I was back. One thing notorious about IITs is its gender ratio. For every 100 males, there are like 10-12 non males.(Did I forget to mention that the female species is almost extinct at IITK?). Well, thats why Antaragni holds such a high place in the hearts of all IITK boys...for 2 days they get to see what they are missing and in that two days, they try to live their whole life. If you are a pretty girl in IITK at Antaragni time, I assure you, you will face no difficulties at all...For travelling there will be any number of chaffeur driven bicycles at your beck and call. For food, just point and ask, there will be someone eager to take you out for lunch. You just have to sit there and look pretty. You will make the life for some poor IITian. Other than these obvious reasons, another heavyweight at Antaragni is its Proffessional Night. This time it was Euphoria. It is only fair to say they didnt dissappoint. Living up to every expectation I had, singing all the great songs...Its the second time I was seeing Euphoria perform live and I gotta tell you...Theres nothing else like it. And then the next morning, everything is back to normal...people are rushing to classses...banners and decorations being taken down and last of the pretty ladies leaving for their own campuses...But its not about how long it was...Its all about how it was...Its about living to the fullest in the 2 days you get...Its about collecting memories that will last you till the next Antaragni....Its about burning with Passion without ever burning out.

Expecting the Unexpected.....

2006-10-24T19:49:00.000+09:00

Hey there folks....thanks for missing me....I know its been a while since i gave words to my random thoughts in my blog. Well...I've been busy.....coping with the unexpected and trying to make the most out of it has almost become the norm of life...One fine monday morning I get a call saying that my boss wants to meet me in Noida and I need to fly there for a day..the operative words being "a day". I get all excited about joining the jet set life style folks....soon to be having breakfast in Berlin, Lunch in London, Tea in Tokyo and dinner in Denver...Next day morning I catch my flight to Delhi where i get my first bombshell...taxi charge to Noida Rs. 2000. You are forgiven if you thought i mistakenly put an extra zero in there. It was really Rs. Two thousand. Well, as I didnt know about any other option, I had to shell it out in crisp 100 rupee notes. I reach Noida and wherever I look i see an HCL office. First went to sector 16. Then i came to know that i was meant to go to sector 60. Took a rickshaw there and there too HCL has two offices....Somehow or the other I find my boss's cabin and that afternoon the second bombshell drops...I will not be able to go back by evening flight and will have to stay for 2 more days...Ah what the hell..I think...the next day at lunch, this 2 days gets extended to 10 days...I end up buying a new wardrobe and mobile charger.....One good thing that came out of this unexpected stay in Noida was the side trip to Kanpur...Man...I had almost forgotten how fast DC++ was....Anyways..now I am back..in Chennai. My boss left me with a warning that such short notice long trips will be the norm of the future...So now i am preparing myself to expect the unexpected...Maybe this is how life works in the corporate world...I wouldn't know as I am still finding my feet in this new world.

Mi Amigo....My Friend...Mon Ami

2006-10-04T19:44:00.000+09:00

Hello friends...its been some time since i wrote something here. It was a product of lack of good themes to write on and lack of time to write in. But when something interesting comes by, which catches ur attention, you tend to eke out time for its cause. Well same case here. You know how from the time we were little kids (well some of us still are...though we look older), we have been hearing that true friends are there with you in your troubled times.....and we heard about a fair weather friend who is there with us only during the good times...Well, I was reading Paulo Coelho's 'Zahir'....he has an interesting twist to the age old belief....he says and I quote "Our true friends are those who are with us when the good things happen. They cheer for us and are pleased by our triumphs. False friends only appear at difficult times, with their sad, supportive faces, when, in fact, our suffering is serving to console them for their miserable lives." This got me thinking....which is true...There are people who are with you in your happy times...when there are all smiles around....life is just fantastic...they laugh with us....joke with us...and everyone is happy....And there are people who come to us when we feel that the whole world is crumbling beneath our feet...some come with sympathy....some come with strength...some come with understanding....I feel that the kind Coelho mentions is the ones who come to us with sympathy....to show how much they care and how sorry they feel for you...I know those kinds...like hyenas....preying on a wounded soul....But don't ever do the mistake of mistaking someone's understanding of your situation as sympathy...doing that you might just lose a precious friend. When someone is ready to be silent with you when you are not in a mood to talk, hold on to them...they are your true friends....You might be thinking how i am going on blabbering on about friends and what authority do I have to talk on this topic? Well....I am an Aquarian....we have a habit of using the word friend quite frequently....Whoever i meet becomes my friend....theres no other way to describe them....I once had the misfortune to hear someone being described as " a profitable acquaintance". In my mind I still have the word in "What the hell does that mean" category. My friends are one thing that I treasure more than my life....so looking for profit or loss from person whom you are friends with, takes the friendship out of it and makes it mere business. So when you know that a person understands you more than yourself, is there with you in your happy and your sad times...treasure them...they are gods gift to you for being a friend.

God is Back...

2006-09-18T21:11:00.000+09:00

"If Cricket is a relegion, Sachin is the god".In a country like India, Cricket is indeed a relegion more powerful than any other. Where relegion divides, cricket unites. Be it a Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Sikh or Parsi, when Sachin is flaying bowlers all around the park, there is a sense of oneness in their minds. A feeling that unites India ike none other. And noone brings out this feeling better than a dimunitive genius called Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. Just think, how many other players are referred to all over the world by their first name? It is most of the times, Dravid, Ganguly, Laxman, or Agarkar. Rarely does someone refer to them as Rahul or Saurav and others even more rarely. But Sachin has always been Sachin. Since his broken nose on his debut tour to Pakistan, India has bled with him. Each time he is injured, the whole country prays for his quick and healthy return...because noone else does to them what he does. So it was no big surprise that India's opening match at the DLF cup was a real big match. It was the return of the god. We had all been waiting for the moment and it was well worth the wait. It was a statement to all those who said Sachin's best is behind him and he should consider retirement. It said to them "In your Face". Sachin was never one to respond to criticism or provocation through words, whether it be a bowler or a so called "expert" who is on the other end. He just lets his actions talk for him. You can ask one Shane Warne who initially said that he has drawn out plans for Sachin and later modified that statement saying that he has nightmares about Sachin. Or you can ask Henry Olonga or Andrew Caddick or Shoaib Akhthar....the list ges on. So this Innings was a statement...done in style.The only thing that spoiled the occassion was Rain and the @#$%^*& Duckworth Lewis System which seriously needs to be scrapped. But I don't care if India wins or loses as long as Sachin keeps scoring big hundreds. Rain may have played spoilsport here. But the signs are clear. If you thought that Sachin is over the hill....If you thought that he has nothing more to give to the game....you'd better wake up and applogize...Coz the God is back and he is here to stay for a long long time. Go Sachin......

Lage Raho Mamu....

2006-09-12T18:13:00.000+09:00

Apun ne pichle satterday ko "Lage Raho Munnabhai" dekh dala...kya mast pikkchar hai mamu....Apni Sanju Baba aur Arshad ne kya mast acting kiyeli hai....maa kasam mazaa aa gaya..aur woh Vidya Balan bhi kya dikhti hai baap....ekdam dhinchak...Apun ko pikkchar mein sab se mast to hamara circuit hi laga...Koi bhi doubt ho na...circuit se pooch dal... "Abe Circuit..ye October 2nd kya hota hai?"..."Dry day hai bhai"..."Kyon"....."Bilkul idea nahi hai bhai....Lekin tension nahi lene ka....pata lagate hai na.." Abe agar Circuit nahi hota to Munnabhai ki to vat lag jaati...bole to "durgati" ho jaata...Har ek ki life mein ek circuit hone ka...nahi to kya life hai yaar...aisa koi honaich mangta jisse kuch bhi bol sake......dil khol ke jiske saath baat kar sake...Apun to bahut lucky aadmi hai...kyonki apun ki life mein to aisi logon ki koi kami nahi hai....Kya Maamu...apun bhi kya bake jaa raha hai...phaltu mein dimaag ka bheja fry...to hum baat kar rahe the pikchar ka...Apun ko pata tha ki baapu akha country ka father hai...lekin isme to baapu munnabhai ka bhi baap nikla...bande ne sahi acting ki hai...Aur gaane...kya mast gaane hai....pehliwali pikchar se bhi mast... Bande mein tha dum....Pal pal har pal...samjho ho hi gaya....lage raho munnabhai...sab ekdam dhinchak gaane hai...To apun sabse vinamr se bol rahela hai..jaake bhai ko dekh ke aane ka....Aur agar lucky singh type ka koi aadmi aapke aas paas ho to usse bolne ka.."Get well soon". To apun abhi chalta hoon...phir mulakaat hogi..tab tak..goodbye..goodnight..Sayonara...

Its Onam......

2006-09-01T20:12:00.000+09:00

The festival that brings a flood of sights and smells into mind. The sight of the flower carpets...in newspaper photos (nowadays rarely do people lay it out on their courtyards)...the sight of posters of all the Onam special audio cassettes..(mostly mimicry cassettes like De Maveli Kombathu and Onathinidakku Puttu kachavadam). More than the sights, its the smells that appeal to me..the smell of new clothes...the smell of payasam boiling...the mixed smell of the Onam feast...I really missed Onam for the last two years....As coming from Kanpur to Kerala took about 52 hours on train (didnt want to waste dad's money flying), it was just not possible..In the first year of MBA we had an Onam celebration at IITK with all the mallus there...Although it was some 2 weeks after the real Onam, i didnt want to miss it (it being the mallu food that was prepared for that occassion. Getting good mallu food in Kanpur is like finding an Oasis in Sahara Desert...or maybe even harder). So I took advantage of the opportunity and reached promptly for the feast and had a good time....Last year we were planning to have Onam celebration on Onam itself. I was busy discussing about the activities that we should have on that day with the president of the malayalees association, who happened to be my wing mate. Little did I know that someone up there was watching me and saying,"Plan on dear boy...But I have something else in mind for you". About 3 days before the celebration, including the sumptuous feast and a Mohanlal Movie, I was diagnosed with Jaundice and promptly admitted at Health Centre IIT Kanpur. The Onam Feast for me was 4 bottles of intravenous fructose....Well the stint in the health centre is another story altogether...maybe I'll save it for another time..So this year I have vowed to make up for the 2 lost Onams...I'm off to Kayamkulam today...Monday and Tuesday leave...will start back to Chennai after the Onam feast..Mmm.....Just thinking about it makes me hungry...Let me go and grab a sandwich...Happy Onam to all my readers (using plurals instead of naming my readers gives an impression that there are a lot more of them). So catch u all later...

And I write poems too...

2006-08-30T19:32:00.000+09:00

Hello all...If anyone has any misconceptions that my creative skills are limited to this blog only, I'd like to use this post to clear that....as the title suggests, yes I write poems too...I don't know when it started, but my first poem was titled "My Mistake"( it was not refering to my act of writing poems...and I'm not gonna tell you what it was about). Then after writing 3 or 4 poems on the evergreen topic of love, I matured as a poet (atleast I like to think so) and expanded my horizons to include topics like life, nature etc in my poems. If someone wants to read it, mail me I'll send them to you. (Ha Ha....whom am I kidding? Somebody wanting to read my wild ramblings....that was a good one). Anyways, there are atleast 2 people on this earth who reads everyone of my poems and has the ability to endure it without cursing me for wasting their time. So being the owner of a blog now, I thought that my poems should get published...atleast in my blog...as I am too lazy to type up all the old ones, I thought I'd spare my readers and expose them only to the latest quirks of my creative cerebellum...or was it cerebrum??? Aaah who cares..So here you go..my latest work..titled...Regrets

Moments in Life,
Come and go by.
When your heart tells you to go ahead
Speak your mind without being afraid
But then your brain kicks in
All the doubts and fears start to set in
You ignore your heart and keep the silence
Though after sometime it stops making sense
But then you fear whether the time has passed
For you to let out all the feelings you have amassed.
These thoughts draw your silence longer
And the longer it gets, it becomes harder
Then one day you realize
How foolish you were when you thought you were wise
The time that you had just ran out
And you were left waiting without a whisper, leave apart a shout.
And now the words come pouring
With all the love, hurt and pain you were bearing
And then it starts-Regret
Of not speaking out when time was at your beck
Because all that you say after it all ends
Are just words without meaning,
Sounds without sense.

So thats all for now folks, do let me know how much you liked it (or didn't like it)....

The days are just packed......

2006-08-29T20:59:00.000+09:00

There was a time when I had a routine in my life...but that was long back...when i was in school, to be exact. Get up, get ready, have breakfast and off to school. Come back, chill out, study, dinner and off to bed. Then came the college where there was no such thing as a time table that was followed. Well, if teachers don't need a routine, why the heck should we? That was the beginning of the spot decision kind of life. No class in the afternoon....next second comes the decision...cricket...or a movie...That was a really fun time of life..then we moved into the IIT. IIT is about 10 times my engineering college..so i compensated by making my life 10 times routineless...nightouts- both for academic and counterstrike/age of empire purposes became the norm of the day and if not night outs then it was playing tennis at 3 in the morning. Well IIT never sleeps is another matter altogether. At whichever time you decide to take a stroll through the campus, you will find people on the road, lovebirds, junkies, bhasad groups and what not. That was a time when we could never have enough time to do everything...something was always left undone..and most of the times it was studies..kya hai yaar...padhaai to har jagah hota hai...har jagah aisi LAN thode milta hai...to poora utilise karo facilities ko...Maan..I miss those times....when we used to swear by DC++..the omnipotent..the provider of all needs...the ultimate..And now it seems life is coming in a full circle...Something like a routine creeping into my day to day activities...Get up at 8...thanks to a wakeup call full of love...get ready by 9. Reach the bus stop by 9.15, take a share auto from there to bus stand..catch bus no. 15B to office. Reach office by around 10.30 and get going with the daily grind. Return to flat after dinner by 8.30. Sit in front of the PC...gaming...browsing..watching TV (that too on PC)...till 10. From 10-11 phone calls..Another stint of gaming (Currently Return to Castle Wolfenstein) for half an hour and then off to bed you go. for(i= monday; i<= friday;i++) (For any computer illiterates out there...and i know there is atleast one reading this, this means repeat from monday to friday).Then comes saturday and sunday when miraculously one day shrinks to 12 hours. I don't know how but before i realise, the weekend is over. Due to this grind, the one off break gains utmost importance. And such a break is just round the corner for me...next weekend..Onam...am going home on friday...am damn happy :D. I make sure that every month I have something to look forward to. Now i have my activities planned till november. God and boss relenting, I will have a small break each month. Touchwood. So thats all guys...One last thing before i end this post...this thing about routine being necessary..is way over rated. There is no fun like being the creature of the moment. Ride on the wings of your fancy...be dynamic..do what your heart tells you to...do everything before you get shackled in the chain called routine.

Aamchi Pune..

2006-08-21T17:44:00.000+09:00

I'm back. Been a while since i visited these areas of the world wide web. But renewed resolution not to let my blogging go my dairy writing way, I'm back. Last week was a welcome break from the daily routine of office to home to office. With gods of time showering blessings on human kind (especially the employed human kind) in form of consecutive holidays on 15th and 16th owing to our Independence day and Shri Krishna Jayanti and these holidays falling just one day after the weekend, this meant that for the ones looking for a long due break, taking one day leave meant a vacation of 5 days. Now there's an offer you cannot refuse...So I took it. My boss was kind enough to grant me leave (might be due to the fact that for some days before the weekend, i reached home at 2 in the morning. Well thats a different story altogether.) So as i had planned well in advance for the vacation, I caught the first flight on the weekend to Pune. A long overdue visit to see my bro and his friends at the esteemed medical establishment, Armed Forces Medical College (AFMC). My mom and dad was there already. So it was like a family reunion at Pune. Pune is a really cool city. All the facilities of Mumbai minus the hustle bustle. Lots of places to hang out and a wide range of eateries, ranging from pure kerala food to Thai food at "Banthai". Then for people of my age (especially males), going from Chennai to Pune gives your eyes a pleasant exercise with all the beautiful scenaries there (if you know what i mean). As a practice, whenever i visit Pune, there are a few places that I always visit.

One, Burger King with its amazingly tasty burgers

Two Jaijalram bookstall at FC road for its amazingly cheap indian edition books

Three One or more of the multipexes for obvious reasons

Four, the vada pav vendors near the railway station for their best in the world vada pavs. Vada pavs from bombay pale in comparison to the ones that you get in Pune.

All this, a treat for the AFMC P2 batch gang and roaming with my bro took up 4 days and my vacation was at an end. Well, time really flies when you are having fun. Now its 2 more weeks and I'm off to home for Onam, the festival of festivals for malayalees around the globe. Its always great when you have something to look forward to. Thats what keeps life going on. When you have nothing to look forward to in your life, then you are not living, you are just existing. Anyways, I had fun and am waiting for my next visit to the coolest city in the world thats..Aamchi pune.

God Bless Orkut Büyükkökten

2006-07-28T19:33:00.000+09:00

In case you didnt know who the above mentioned guy is, then you might be one of the 5 people left who is not aware of the gods gift to mankind called orkut. This guy is a google employee and is also the father of orkut. Its not that we didnt have such sites before. If I am not wrong, there was something called hi5 even before orkut came into the scene. But nothing changed the way you keep in touch with friends like orkut. Today you can easily stay in touch with all your friends even the ones from school with whom you had almost lost touch. Its a sheer pleasure when you search a long lost friend's name in orkut and end up in his/her profile. First there were letters, then there was the e-mail and now we have orkut scraps...the easiest way to stay in touch with your friends network. Well, leave apart mails...I know people who use orkut scrapping as an alternate to Yahoo Messenger or Google Talk..when the scraps touched around 1000 with around 50 friends, you know its not orkut scrapping, its orkut chatting...Another beautiful feature is its birthday reminders..As long as you login each day to orkut, you never miss an important birthday...Well, stay in touch with old friends, meet new ones, join like minded people in communities..all this eats quite a bit of your time...As a result of this, most companies have banned orkut access through the office machines..I'm one of the lucky few in my company who has access to orkut..and I intend to make full use of it. So lets hear it for the worlds best web site...Hip Hip...Hurray...

Its a Magical World

2006-07-26T21:35:00.000+09:00

Even before it gave me my first salary, HCL gave me something more wonderful. During the 2 weeks we spent at Vadapalani office Library waiting for our fates to be decided by the management, I discovered the magical world of Calvin and Hobbes. The little boy and his imaginary(?) tiger took me to their world...a world of spaceman spiff and transmogrifiers...of calvinosaurus and tracer bullet...of calvinball and wild whacky imagination...I was enthralled and mystified. Its my request to all those who have not yet met this little 5 year old devil, you are really missing something. Just start reading from the material available on the net. Within no time, you will be addicted and will want more and more of his inncocent imaginative pranks. Whether it is grossing out susie by describing his lunch or testing his mom's patience with his tantrums before a bath, you just can't help but loving him. Then when you think that he is all energy and no thinking, comes a few words that make you see him in an altogether different light.

"I'm Significant...!!"..screamed the dust speck

"Sometimes I think that the greatest proof that life exists outside earth is that they have never tried to contact us"

These words make anyone think for a minute. Seeing the world through a 5 year old's eyes is not a thing that you get to do often in life. So I have started saving...to buy the complete Calvin and Hobbes Collection...worth Rs.5300. So All you guys and gals out there...Take some time off to meet this kid..he might just change the way you see things around you...He sure did for me...So thats all for now...Catch u all later...Lots more to come...Watch this space..

Lobocraspis griseifusa

2006-07-24T16:04:00.000+09:00

Reading fiction and watching TV serials ( not the Saas Bahu type), you pick up some strange nuggets of knowledge that amazes you and sometimes come real handy.... The heading of this post is the scientific name of a moth found in south east asia and this moth lives on just one thing....tears...Yes you heard it right..it drinks only tears for sustaining its life. Mostly it feeds of herbivorous mammals like Water Buffaloes. And do you know where i got this piece of information from?....." The Silence of the Lambs". Who said reading fiction has no value addition? Another useful tip that i got from a TV series named CSI is that grinning suppresses the gagging reflex. So if you are travelling and you feel like you are about to throw up, start grinning...it really works..I've tried it..Well thats something to start your day off after a nice weekend.

Me, Myself and Me Again

2006-07-21T17:10:00.000+09:00

I wanted to give this blogging thingie a try for quite some time. But I was afraid that it would also go the way my decision to start regularly writing a diary went.Now I have 4 diaries with maybe 20 pages written among them. Each year I renew this promise to myself to be more regular and within a week, its all back to square one. But hey..I try. I was afraid that my blog might suffer the same fate. But you've got to try everything atleast once...Well not everything..but still..Going by this policy I have tried my hand at Music, Karate, Painting, Story Writing, Stamp Collection, following English Premier League and Formula 1 etc etc etc..Maybe later I will add blogging to this list...But till then, I promise to regularly update my blog and keep you all updated with whats going on in my life.

For anyone who is visiting this blog and does not know me yet, let me give you a quick introduction, My name is Venugopal K.G., I prefer to be called Venu. I completed my schooling from the best school on earth, Chinmaya Vidyalaya, Tripunithura. I did my B.Tech in IT from CoOperative Institute of Technology, Vadakara...We were the first batch there..Then i got bored of all the technical stuff and thought i should try something else..The result of that was an MBA Degree from IIT Kanpur...How I still miss IITK...DC++, Bulla Sessions..Night Phatta..."And If I had a choice...Yeah I'd always wanna be there...."..So from there the corporate world beckoned me and I joined HCL Technologies. Currently I am in Chennai and might be here for the foreseeable future..So that's about me...This ends my first posting..Lots more to come...Watch this space...