Aravindhs 'Kirukkals'

A Public Service Post ;)

2012-01-05T15:50:00.010+05:30

Been to 0ne of my favourite place in India on a yet another road trip. Its Tirupathi... I always love to take the 3-4 hours walk to the top enjoying all the way with green surroudings, devotees' loud chants, deers and the exercise. Certain things never changed in Tirupathi in all these years and some of them are sick though.... I have clicked few of them on my mobile and please note, i dont target any particulare race or community with my comments, Tirupathi is a multi cultural place and i just care much about this world's richest Hindu Temple.

Trust me, this is an information stone that is supposed to say 3 KMS and people made it as another god :) (எத்தன விவேக் வந்தாலும் உங்கள திருத்த முடியாது !!!)

I am sorry Mr. Manu, neither Hamsa nor the god you pray will be happy with your love intentions.

One of the pillars on the way... Infact most of the pillars looks the same... (எப்ப நீங்க திருந்த போறீங்க )

This happend right in front of my eyes, a big family totally ignored the litter bins placed almost every 10 meters... ( அர்ரெஸ்ட் பண்ணுங்க சார் அவங்கள )

No one knows why people tie these clothes on trees :) I am sorry if there is any belief and if i insulted it. To my knowledge, there is nothing specific about this funny practice

Yet another Belief !!! (This only reminds the 7 stones game that i play'd during childhood)

South Africa : A country one must visit

2011-12-07T17:16:00.002+05:30

After a year’s stay in this beautiful country, its time for me to pack up. I wasn’t optimistic a year ago when I set off from Singapore as most of my mates only warned me of taking huge life risk visiting this unsafe land. I must say they are as good as ignorant. Ofcourse, the country is not best place interms of safety but its just like any other country. All you have to be is RATIONALE. I had few friends who had horrible incidents like losing their mobiles, laptops etc but I know a lot (including myself) who had their best time living in SA.

Apart from the living, safety etc., this is a must visit place for any type of travel freaks. You can get pretty much everything that you wish on a travel sports, game drives, scenic drives, beaches, snow you name it. Here is the list of places I visited and enjoyed ranked from bottom to top.

Johannesburg

This is the economical capital of SA and my home for whole 1 year. Also, this is the city with most crime rate in Africa. Luckily, I lived all my time in the suburb called Sandton which is supposedly far safe than others. Regarding places to visit, all I could find worthy was Lions park (where you can hug white lion cubs and take pictures), Cradle of mankind (the first humans lived here), Montecasino (Off late, iam a casino freak) and Pretoria Zoo (well maintained and some rare animal species too)

Durban

In theory, it has a lots of history but practically, its just another beach city. The Ushaka marine world is defntly worth a visit for its maintenance and aquarium. I enjoyed the south coast watersports (Jet Ski) Skip this city if you are tight schedule. FYI, its 7 hours drive from Johannesburg.

St. Lucia (Elephan Coast)

7 hours drive from Joburg. Another coastal city where my son cut his cake on his second birth day. Unexpectedly, we enjoyed the place very much with cheetah farm, lovely beaches (specialy body boarding) and a decent game drive there. Go there only if you stay long term.

Drakensburg Mountains

Lies around 4.5 hours drive from Joburg. The trek to tugela (worlds second largest water falls) Was completely exciting and any trek freak would love to go here. The beautiful view of the frozen water falls made my day and will never forget the painful/exciting trek we had.

Blyde River Canyon/Kruger National Park

The only place I went twice in South Africa. Its not too far (4 hours drive) from Joburg but I suggest this place for any one who visits Joburg. This is the worlds 3rd largest canyon and the largest green canyon. The whole drive is eventful with scenic landscapes around. The whole panaroma route has lots of view points and this is an excellent stop over on the way to Kruger National Park. The Kruger National Park is one of the largest in Africa with 360 KM in length and 70 KM in width. Make sure you spend quiet some time and complete seeing all the big 5 (Leopard, African Elephants, Buffalo, Rhino, Lions) Make sure you stay inside the forest to get the real Kruger Experience

Cape Town

Arguably, one of the best cities in the world a tourist must go. The table mountains are the must watch along with Robben island meuseum. They are world heritage sites and good learning for history lovers too. The drive from Table mountains to Cape point is another experience altogether. The boulders beach was awesome full of penguins and I guess one of the few beaches in world with such a huge collection of penguins. However, the beaches are not ideal for swimming due to cold temp. Tip : Stay in Stellenbosch for best countryside experience and what more you want than sitting in the middle of vineyards on a sun set sipping true South African Wines

Scroll down to see my individual blog posts on few of the above mentioned places. If you are visiting South Africa keep two things in mind. Enjoy your best and keep the safety precautions in mind where ever you go. If you rent a car, always have GPS with you. Happy travelling

Durban Diary

2011-11-07T18:22:00.011+05:30

03/11/2011

Its Vimala’s birthday tomorrow. We wanted to celebrate in a far away place and we chose Durban. We left around 3 PM from Joburg. Babu and his family joined us too and we all set for the launch

It was a tiring 7 hours drive and finally we reached Hibberdene (1 hour drive south from Durban) around 10 PM. The kids had a good sleep in car and terribly fresh until midnight.

Babu’s family surprised us with a cake for Vimala’s bday. So, all set for a cake cut at 12 with 2 active kids around. Off to sleep soon after munching the cakes.

04/11/2011

Had breakfast at the beach house we stayed and did a quick walk around the place with kids. It was a decent choice as I always prefer out of the city stay.

Reached Ushaka marine world (Durbans famous tourist attraction/ Water theme park for all ages) around 10 AM and started getting wet. Did my first time Shark cage snorkeling inside. Though its just a small, I felt nice to get closer to those most dangerous creatures. At one point, I realized I wounded my self an hour ago and my legs are still bleeding. Slightly scared if that will distract the sharks but ironically, they didn’t give a s**t

Vimala did her first time under water ocean walk and was too excited about the experience. Her son didn’t seem to miss her at all ;) However, had a tough time to keep him occupied while she was busy with her under water mates

The dolphin show was well organized. I still liked the Singapore one except for the hot and humid part in Singapore (against the chill and pleasant viewing in Durban) Achyut enjoyed the show very much and shouting ‘Fish Fish Fish’ everytime the dolphins jumps.

The Aquarium was also a pleasant viewing. Lots of collections and very well clubbed with the viewing of snorkelers, shark cage divers and the ocean walkers on the go. Altogether, a good walk for us around the huge aquarium.

Did lots of water slides and loved it very much as it was less crowded and I gave a pat to myself for choosing this place on a weekday.

This is the memorable part of the day. The dinner we had in a restaurant called Kashmir is just horrible. The hospitality in the restaurant is close to zero. Friends, stay away : ) To make things worse, my GPS was broke and we have to navigate back on our own. Luckily, Babu was an X resident in Durban and he made it like a piece of cake.

05/11/2011

Got up around 7 AM and had a lovely walk to the beach with my family. We had to cross a hanging bridge and a river (where we got drenched till our hips) It was nice and fun. Even funnier, was the sky started drizzling as we reached the beach and then got back through same route immediately

Got back home, got read and drived further south to a place called, WILD COAST SUN which is like 45 minutes drive from hibberdene and the place lies along the easter cape border. Now, this was a surprise for me. This place had a huge water sports collection all I liked. We all did the Water Scooter ride (called as Jet Ski in South Africa) for the first time. I was bloody thrilled to go at top speed and turned at will with the same speed still not drenched. That was the best experience for me in the whole trip. Again, the sky started drizzling and we couldn’t catch up with other sports there.

06/11/2011

No plans. Just went around shopping in a huge GATEWAY mall. Later, went to this Funfair land for kids. Off to Joburg after a quick lunch in Copper chimney restaurant. Over all, our experience with food in Durban wasn’t all that great : )

Luckily, I managed to fix the GPS and we had a rainy first half drive then sunny as we get close to Joburg. At 7.30 PM we are back home in Joburg. It was a pleasant trip with lots of adventures and misadventures. My wife and me decided to do more water sports in future after this experience.

7aam Arivu : Tamizhan’s Pride

2011-10-31T16:44:00.002+05:30

Until a month ago, I don’t even heard this name Bodhidharma and all on a sudden the term ‘wiki bodhidharma’ went on to be the popular search in India during last 1 month. That’s the massive success that the movie ‘7aam Arivu’ achieved. I was a bit disappointed to see mixed reviews until I watched the movie on Saturday, as I expected this to be a clean-sweep hit like Gajini. Here is my personal review of this movie.

The first 20 minutes of the movie gives the best impression due to heavy money shed on the locations and most importantly recreating the historic events that happened 1600 years ago. Surya as Bodhidharma just impresses with his expressions and stage presence though he haven’t delivered much of dialogues. The Chinese song in the first bit was just cherry on cake. Later, the story gets back to present day and we see Surya again as an entertainer working in Circus. The whole story plot can be told in 3 words Bodhidharma-DNA-Aravind. Here are the good and bads about the movie.

Good good, I Like it

Obviously, the first 20 minutes are amazing with well done cinematography, stunts and extraordinary BGM. Then, enters the villain Johnny. Stand out part was he never talked Tamil (unlike many vijaykanth movies where all country terrorist speaks good Tamil) and he carried himself well with gestures & emotions. Surya’s acting in both roles shows how matured he is getting in the art of acting. Surely, he could better what Kamalhassan achieved ( I sincerely wish) Next note worthy point is the actual intentions of the Director himself. He just showed his class by going out of the box, pick a forgotton character in Tamil history and showed how he went to be the founder of Shaolin Kung fu. As ARM mentioned during the launch, this movie will make Tamil, PROUDER. Indeed, if not for Bodhidharma, for AR Murugadoss who showcased what a class means to modern day Bollywood directors. Tamil Cinema for sure travelling in right path.

What the #$@$!@

While I enjoyed the never been attempted stuffs in this movie, there are few let downs that I felt, though I am not too worried about that. Shrutihassan, pretty & makes good chemistry with Surya, irritates with her Tamil accent. It’s a shame that the daughter of a legend in Tamil film industry can’t get her accent right. Is it attitude? Probably. The needless songs are another issue. I personally felt the heart-broken-surya’s song in the railway tracks and the second duet song totally messed up the flow of the movie and made the audience feel waiting-for-the-song-to-finish rather enjoying it. Besides, all the songs always reminded Harris Jeyaraj’s old tunes. Next thing that hurts is the over exaggeration of the art, Hypnotism. I agree this is a art and achievable but when you see this villain uses this as primary weapon at will is like actually insulting this art. Also, the over lengthen stretch where Johnny does rapid-hypnotism at every one to kill Surya was a bit annoying and why in Indian movies, all the civilians should die except the Hero and his pair?

Wow moments

Bodhidharman’s stunt, neat job by stunt team.

The explanation of what is DNA and how it works. Also, the explanation about Bio-war. These are a bit documentary type but much needed to know. I wonder if this actually reached C center though.

When Surya says ‘There is a difference between courage and betrayal’

Editing, the way they showed how the virus spreads was brilliant (though tiny bit)

BGM, especially first 20 minutes and the rest of the movie

Verdict

A must watch movie for Tamils to know how proud they can be and a must watch movie for Indians to see a good out-of-the-box content and some quality acting from the hero.

P.S : There was a dialogue that says 9 countries together attacked Tamil race. I know who the Tamil race was but what are those 9 countries ? Please leave it in the comment if you know.

Puzzle Time

2011-10-17T15:07:00.004+05:30

I am always a big fan of brain teaser puzzles. Though I am not a great solver, I love brain teasers. During my childhood, my uncle always gives me brain teasers to solve and I succeed in few as well. Later, I found its nice to solve puzzles to keep your brain sharp. Specially in IT Industries, its very common to get few brain teaser puzzles during your first interview to test your aptitude skills. Here are some puzzles I enjoyed. The first 3 are the ones I had in my first interview and luckily, I solved them all :)

The answers are at the end for your reference. Have fun solving

1. Cut a perfectly cylindrical shaped cake in to 8 equal sized pieces. Remember, you can make only 3 slices.

2. You got 2 candles; each will burn for an hour. You have no markings in the candle to measure it. Now, how will you measure 1.5 hours using just these 2 candles?

3. There is a 20 feet well. A Frog, starting from bottom, jumps 5 feet high and drops down 4 feet. After how many jumps the frog successfully comes out of the well?

4. You have a 3 liter can and a 5 liter can. Also, you got a tank full of surplus water. How will you measure 4 liter of water with just these 2 cans?

5. By moving one of the following digits, make the equation correct. 62 - 63 = 1

6. You have 12 black socks and 12 white socks mixed up in a drawer. You're up very early and it's too dark to tell them apart. What's the smallest number of socks you need to take out (blindly) to be sure of having a matching pair?

7. U2 has a concert that starts in 17 minutes and they must all cross a bridge to get there. All four men begin on the same side of the bridge. You must help them across to the other side. It is night. There is one flashlight. A maximum of two people can cross at one time. Any party who crosses, either 1 or 2 people, must have the flashlight with them. The flashlight must be walked back and forth. It cannot be thrown and other tricks like that are not needed to solve the problem. The solution is simply a matter of allocating resources in a certain order. Each band member walks at a different speed. A pair must walk together at the rate of the slower man's pace: Bono: 1 minute to crossEdge: 2 minutes to crossAdam: 5 minutes to crossLarry: 10 minutes to crossFor example: if Bono and Larry walk across first, 10 minutes have elapsed when they get to the other side of the bridge. If Larry then returns with the flashlight, a total of 20 minutes have passed and you have failed the mission.

8. You are a cook in a remote area with no clocks or other way of keeping time other than a four minute sandglass timer and a seven minute sandglass timer. (The kind you turn over - hourglass shaped) You do have a stove, however, with water in a pot already boiling. Somebody asks you for a nine-minute egg, and you know this person is a perfectionist and will be able to tell if you undercook or overcook the eggs by even a few seconds. What is the least amount of time it will take to prepare the egg? And how will you prepare it so that it is neither undercooked or overcooked?

9. You are standing outside a closed door. On the other side of the door is a room that has three light bulbs in it. The room is completely sealed off from the outside. It has no windows and nothing can get in or out except through the door. On the outside of the room there are three light switches that control each of the respective light bulbs on the other side of the door.Your assignment is to determine which light switch controls which light bulb. You are allowed to enter the room only once, and once you come out, you must be able to state with 100% certainty which light switch controls which light bulb.

10. You are given eight coins and told that one of them is counterfeit. The counterfeit one is slightly heavier than the other seven. Otherwise, the coins look identical. Using a simple balance scale, can you determine which coin is counterfeit using the scale only twice?

Answers:
1. 2 slices on top of the cake to get 4 pieces. Then, make a slice side wards

2. Let the first candle burn to get 1 hour. Now, burn the next candle on both ends.

3. 16 Jumps. On the 16th jump, the frog goes out of the well.

4. Fill the 3-liter can.
Pour the 3 liters of water into the 5-liter can
Fill the 3-liter can again.
Fill up the 5-liter can with the 3-liter can, leaving you with 1 liter left in the 3-liter can.
Empty out the 5-liter can.
Pour the remaining 1 liter of water from the 3-liter can into the 5-liter can.
Fill the 3-liter can.
Pour the 3 liters of water from the 3-liter can into the 5-liter can leaving you with 4 liters of water in the 5-liter can.
5. 2^6 - 63 = 1 (I cant make 6 as power hence used '^' symbol)

6. 3 socks. If the first sock is black, the second one could be black, in which case you have a matching pair. If the second sock is white, the third sock will be either black and match the first sock, or white and match the second sock.

7. Lets take the names as 1,2,5 and 10. First, 1 & 2 goes 2 returns. Next, 5 & 10 goes and 1 returns. Then, 2 & 1 goes together.
8. The answer is 9 minutes. First, flip both hourglasses over and drop the egg into the water. When the four minute timer runs out, flip it again. When the seven minute timer runs out, flip it over. The egg has been cooking seven minutes. Now when the four minute timer runs out again (after eight minutes) flip the seven minute timer back over. Since the seven minute timer has been running only a minute between flips, there's a minute worth of sand left. And when that minute runs out, the egg will have been cooking for exactly nine minutes.
9. Turn one light switch on, wait a few minutes, then turn it off and turn another light switch on. Go into the room and feel the light bulbs. The one that's still warm is connected to the switch that you first turned on, the one that is on was the second switch you turned on, and the last bulb is controlled by the switch that you didn't touch.
10. First weigh three coins against three others. If the weights are equal, weigh the remaining two against each other. The heavier one is the counterfeit. If one of the groups of three is heavier, weigh two of those coins against each other. If one is heavier, it's the counterfeit. If they have equal weight, the third coin is the counterfeit.

Must watch for Speed Freaks

2011-09-26T17:10:00.002+05:30

I am a rash driver in general and i used to think its a MAN THING. I am always crazy about speed whenever I drive. Even after marriage, I didn’t change a bit. Fortunately, my chances turned lesser as I moved to Singapore and stopped driving at all for a while. Wait a minute… How does this relates to the context of this post ? You will know… It’s the review for the no-hype-but-full-of-quality Tamil movie, ENGEYUM EPPODHUM

A simple story, two buses collides and the flashbacks of the travelers. What hits the bulls eye, is the screen play. The initial 30 minutes where a bit confusing with too many cuts and moves with characters and locations but slowly you are pulled in to the story.

The director is a new comer M Saravanan and produced by the Gajini fame A R Murugadoss along with Fox Studios. ARM did a worthy gamble with debutant director and full credit to him for choosing the best possible crew for this movie. Besides screen play, another stand out part was the acting performances of the 4 lead characters. Specifically, Anjali who is maturing exponentially after each movie. I was under a opinion that Angadi Theru will always be her best performance but I am sure she wont stop at anything. After a long time, Tamil Cinema got acting potentials from female leads.

Ananya used her limited scope very well. Another cake walk for Jai, he is sure a directors actor. Debutant Shravanand impresses too. The comical events between Jai and Anjali,, not so practical but a unique flavor and enjoyable. The few minutes characters in the movie also makes a good impact and that for me, is another highlight.

The underline theme of the story is the value of life. Accidents and the associated deaths are just yet another news in the media but this movie did a good attempt to shows the emotions of many who are affected by the accident. The mind blowing bit was the actual accident and what happens inside the buses during those few seconds of the accident. This gives a feel of how gory it will be when you are physically there. I felt the movie was a bit too long with too many songs but, over all a wonderful movie to watch for the thought provoking Screen play.

Getting back to the driving habits of mine, I decided to come out of the adventurous age and be rational when am on wheels again. Looking forward for the pleasant Durban road trip next month : )

An Enigma called ‘Arulmozhi Varman’

2011-09-15T15:02:00.005+05:30

What an exciting last few months… How lucky I am… How proud should I be… Conspirators, Assassins, Spy game, The great Indian dynasty.. you can title it anything but in Tamil, its called PONNIYIN SELVAN… By par, the best book I ever read so far.

I read first 200 pages of the book several times in the past but never got a good stretch of breaks to finish the rest… few months ago, I decided I should do what ever it takes and finish the book.. Lots of my friends suggested me to read this book for past 8 years and finally, I felt lucky, privileged and proud that I managed to enjoy every page of this amazing art work by Kalki Krishnamoorthy.

The base line story is a series of true historic events blended with fictions. The title Ponniyin Selvan is actually the greatest king of chozha dynasty, Arulmozhi Varman who never wanted to be the emperor in the beginning. Ironically, the circumstances forced him to take up the throne and went on to be the THE ONE

I have downloaded the ebook in to my ipad and disastrously addicted reading the book. Though the story title is about the king Arulmozhi Varman (Raja Raja Chozha), the actual hero is Vanar kulla Vanthiya Thevan who went in to lots of adventures to serve the Chozha Empire. There are like 1 million characters in the book. Most of them play significant role in this historical wonder.

More than the history and the narrational beauty, I really really admire the indepth knowledge of the writer (Kalki) on the geography. The names of the cities 1000 years ago, the various routes that connects the cities, the transportation methods they used, the communication methods they used, the names of rivers, the various events/festivals etc., Remember, this book is written in 1950 way before the internet and other modern communication techniques existed. One needs extreme patience and pure passion for history to come out with such a master piece. Read the book and you will agree.

Dear reader, if you know to read Tamil and if you have passion for history and if you think you already read best of best thriller/action/drama books, read this before you die. The first 100 pages or so will test your patience with too many characters and unconnected incidents but keep reading if you wanna get addicted.

I truly wish this should turn out to be a movie and here is my favorite casting if at all a movie could be made out of this book.

Direction : Sankar / Maniratnam
Production : Only Sun Pictures
Music : A R Rehman
Vanthiya Thevan : Vikram
Arulmozhi Varman : Surya
Azhvarkadiyaan : Rahman
Aditya Karikaalan : Sampath (the gay character in Goa)
Kundavai : Vidya Balan
Vanathi : Tamanna
Poonguzhali : Anjali (Angadi theru fame)
Manimegalai : Amala Paul
Periya Pazhvettarayaar : Satyaraj
Chinna Pazhuvettarayar : Prakash Raj
Anbil Anirudhar : Naasar
Sundara Chozhar : Jayaprakash (Pasanga fame)
Mandagini (Oomai raani) and Nandini: Nathiya – Double act
Maduranthakar : Aarya
Senthan Amuthan : Abbaas
Parthibendran : Arjun
Kanthamaaran : Sonu Sood
Pinagapani : Karthik (America maplai character)

Whatever the casting is, if given to right directors, heavy budget producer and good technical crew, am sure the movie will be a milestone in Indian cinema. I am so looking forward.

Here are the Ebook links if you are intrested...

To read it as Tamil PDF book

To read it in English

To read it Online

I am now all geared up to start reading the sequel, UDAYAR by Balakumaran :)

Krishna Scores over Sam

2011-08-08T15:19:00.003+05:30

Recently watched Deiva Tirumagal and as a fan of Vikram’s versatility, I enjoyed the movie very much. However, I decided to watch I am Sam from which the Tamil version is hugely inspired from. Here is the comparison analysis of the movies.

Story and Screen play : The story is pretty much similar in both versions. The first half is inch by inch remake from English version. However, I didn’t liked the second half in both versions. In English, it suited for western audience and there fore English was a better one. In Tamil, the inclusion of needless comedies like chasing each other in hotel was rather annoying. If Anushka is not getting married to Vikram, why should there be a un necessary romantic song ? not convincing in Tamil.

Casting : Full credit to vijay. The casting is just perfect for every single character. Vikram as usual did a walk in the park. Special mention should go to the baby Sara and Anushka who made an impact. Though came for short time, the 4 friends was really a delight to watch. Santhanam, black pandi, m s baskar did the home work well for the story. Highlight in tamil version is the addition of mynaa fame Amala paul she very well added the sweet flavor part

Music : Again full marks to GV Prakash. The beauty of Inidan cinema are the songs. In this movie, the songs gelled so well with the story. The story telling song is excellent one, the initial papa song is feel good, the background song when vikram raises sara alone is heart warming. Above all, I really loved the 2 theme music moments were vikram and sara exchanges the actions. Eye jerking. This is the highlight difference from English and so touching moment. Music can speak a lot better in emotional scenes.

Vikram Vs Sean Penn : Sean got the Academy award for his performance in 2001. Personally, I liked vikram’s performance better than Sean but I can see he got lots of inspiration (synonym for copied) from Sean and in many scenes he just repeated it. However, one needs talent to do that too ;) What keeps vikram at top is he is the same one who did multiple personality disorder in Anniyan, visually impaired poor singer in Kaasi, rough and tough seeyan in Sethu, grave yard maintanace villager in Pithamagan etc., the history that Sean doesn't have.

Overall, a must watch film (Deiva Tirumagal) for the individual performances and music.

Mission ‘Frozen Water Falls’

2011-07-12T18:32:00.009+05:30

Trekking was always my favorite activity and the urge only increases every time I attempt one. This time it was yet another unique trekking experience. Here is my experience on the pursuit to world's second largest waterfalls in South Africa.

We left on Saturday morning 3 AM from Sandton. It was 3 of us and its all boys trip. Our objective was to go to the top of Tugela falls which is the second largest in the world next to Niagra. It wasn’t an easy drive after 1 hour with all mist and fog. We finally managed to reach the place called Witsieshoek Resort around 7.30 AM. They serve a decent break fast even to visitors at 65 Rands per person. We further drived for around 20 minutes in a bloody-muddy road to reach the trek start point. We also stopped in between to click pics of the ice layers along the mountain walls.

We finally reached the departure point. The parking lot is quiet good with guards there. You got to register yourself in the office there and pay 40 rands per head for the entry. The weather was absolutely perfect with bright sunny sky and uber cool 5 degrees temperature. We set off with a medium warm jerkin. It was cool walk initially for 20 minutes or so and then slowly steeping up. The path gets rough and rougher but the scenic view of the mountains kept us going. My mates were almost rookies in trekking but they were motivated enough and we kept pushing keeping the destination (Tugela falls) in mind.

We took couple of breaks in middle to get a breather. However, we havent felt the real pressure of high altitude trekking until we reached this dangerous thing called CHAIN LADDER. This ladder was long enough that even if you climb it fast, would take 10 minutes to reach the top. For me, that was the most stunning moment of the whole trek for 2 reasons.

Reason 1 : I never climbed the chain ladders on a mountain trek with no safety harness but I always waited for a chance to climb chain ladders (thanks to the training I once received in SAP Labs outing in Bangalore)

Reason 2 : This is not a pleasant one. Will reveal at the end.

We 3 took our time to get to the top and there after it wasn’t tough walk any more. We reached the top of Amphitheater valley and therez lots of snow all around. It was a serene atmosphere after a long grueling ups and downs. We ran around, jumped around, clicked pictures of snow etc.,

Then we patiently walked forward to see the ultimate view of the frozen long Tugela waterfalls. Man, this is the worlds second largest and 90% frozen.

The sound of ice blocks breaking away with the rising heat is awesome. It was like music in the echo friendly amphitheater valley.

We chilled out there for like 30-40 minutes and enjoyed the unique experience for a while. Sadly, we didn’t get any food with us and we are not camping there like other dudes around there did. We got to leave before its dark ( we havent got the torches either) We then had a relaxed walk until the same chain ladder spot. The climb down activity was more scarier than climb up as you got to often look down with uncertainty.

All 3 safely landed and we continued the walk all the way back through the same route. Once again, lots of ups and downs. The sun slowly getting down and ice started growing again every where. I (with my few other old friends) always have the habbit of doing brisk walk for the final 1 hour or so just to keep the spirits high. So, I jumped out of the path, took the steep shallow down way to reach the bottom and had a quick brisk last leg to the car parking area we started from.

By around 5 pm we managed to get back and kick start the car to our resort. It was a bloody long day with only 4 hours odd sleep over night and there fore you feel like almost beaten to the death.

What was the reason 2 that I was bragging about in the chain ladder point ?

When I finished climbing the ladder, I swung the back pack to front to pick my Nikon D90 and at that point it happened. The zip opened up. The camera flew over and effortlessly, travelled to the deep. Woefully, hit the rocks. Inevitably, shattered in to pieces. There was 2 seconds silence. I couldn’t believe it. I lost the best non-family-companion who was always with me since I got him. In all these, I managed to recover the data card. The best part of the incident is that the heavy D90 camera just missed a girl’s (from another trek group behind us) head who was standing down. Now, I am waiting for the entry of Nikon D7000 in to my life ;)

Must Watch Classics

2011-07-01T20:59:00.005+05:30

It was only last 5 years I came out of the shell of Only-Indian-Movies-are-best-in-all-genres and started watching Hollywood/British movies that were splendid than I thought it was. Ever since I moved to South Africa, my urge only doubled up and thanks to my Colleague and other friends who keep suggesting tried-and-tested movies. Going a step further, I watched a couple of non-indian-non-english classics that really made me feel WoW.

La vita è bella (Italian) – Life is Beautiful

The Italian classic that won many awards took me to surprise with the humor screenplay they built on a bloody-serious-story. The hero (director himself) Roberto Beningi is an Italian Jew who arrives to a new town, fall in love with a non-jew, got married and living happily. When his son was about 4 years old, the family was arrested by the German army as an attempt to eliminate Jews from the country. I thought the movie will take a u-turn and will get traumatic. Further, my wife was worried to see a father and son suffering in a German prison. However, our thoughts took u-turn as the father projected the whole prison life as part of a game and the lil one should survive with the rules to win the maximum points to get the big prize of army tank. Thus moving the story with all humour.

Though the whole movie was funny (felt like watching tamil classics of Nagesh (Ethirneechal), the determination that the helpless father had to give the utmost comfort to his son inside the prison was absolutely eye squeezer. The stunning climax where Roberto sacrifices himself playing a gimmick and got executed will really make any one feel heavy. My wife finally smiled only to see the son rejoined his mom at the end. A must watch movie for a movie lover.

Das Leben Der Anderen (German) – The Lives of Others

This one got academy awards for best foreign film in 2006. This is a classic German drama that showcases the emotions going through between a state security spy (Police officer) and his victim.

Here is the plot…

East Germany’s state security deployed a police officer to spy a stage play screen writer

The officer is a honest and staunch socialist. In our language, a good guy

The screen writer is a communist. A good guy but angry about East Germany’s ongoing dictatorship

The minister who used his influence to assign the spy basically wants to get the writter’s girl friend for good in spite of the fact that she doesn’t like the minister

The honest officer gets to know this and use his intelligence and honesty to reach the inevitable, save-the-good-people

Again, I loved the last sentence of the movie and that’s the Midas touch. Watch only if you like classic movies.

Hey Raam (Tamil)

This is an old Indian-Tamil movie starring Kamal hassan. I watched this movie long ago and didn’t really like it but not after reading this analysis report by a final year film institute student. I strongly suggest you to read all the chapters in the following link and watch the movie again to understand how Tamil movie attempted to match the international standards to deliver a classic.

http://theseventhart.info/2008/06/20/hey-ram-an-analysis-part-120/

Sports- Emotions- Movies

2011-06-03T15:04:00.001+05:30

Its always a wonderful feeling when you hit the winning boundary in last over of a world cup final, when you win the Wimbledon finals in the final set, when the goal keeper stops the penalty shoot to win the champions league, when you show who you are in sports when the odds are against you. The movies all over the world never failed to capture the adrenaline and emotions the players go through on the pursuit to improbable victory.

Since I love emotional movies (like Shawshank redemption, Pursuit of happiness, 500 days of Summer, Anbay Sivam (Tamil), Happy Days (Telugu) etc., ), theme based on sports are always special. Here are some of the movies I enjoyed heart out associated with sports

Rookie of the year : The 1993 American film I watched in my younger days and so inspired with the theme. A young boy accidentally gets a golden shoulder of pitching at more than 100 mph in baseball and turns out to be star. However, the twist is that in the finals of the championship, he loses this gift and gets back to a normal person. How he tackles this to get the team to victory is the climax. Though it’s a movie under comedy genre, I liked the way the movie was filmed.

Rocky : No doubt, truly amazing film making in the field of Boxing and Knock out stuffs. Sylvester Stallone turned out to be a big inspiration lived as Rock Balboa for the whole Rocky series. I vaguely remember this movie as I watched it long back but I remember the opponent in the first part becomes his coach in second part was an interesting sequel and I suggest any one to watch the whole series. However, the last part is a bit let down.

Wimbledon : Not the best of sports movies but if you like Tennis, you may like this movie. All about an average British Tennis player in twilight of his career determined to win the Wimbledon and prove a point on his worth. Watch it if you get a chance. Tennis victories lies in the mind on top of the skill.

Psye : Well directed and well shot Telugu (Indian) movie based on Rugby. The story of how the college Rugby team wins a match against the bunch of hooligans to retain the College land captured by them. I was astonished by the way it was filmed made the sport looked so real. Kudos to Telugu cinema for the brave attempt.

Lagaan : The masterpiece sports based movie ever made in Indian Cinema. Set in pre independence era, a team from a village in India should win the 3 day Cricket game against ruling British to save the tax for the year. A R Rehman was a genius in setting the tone with good background scores and songs. The climax scene where Aamir Khan hits the ball-caught-by-captain-but-crossed-boundary just made every one in the cinema jump on the seats and clapped unanimously. The movie was nominated for Oscars.

Chak De India : Well directed and a lovely movie to watch. I however didn’t liked the plot where a complete underdog womens hockey team in India goes on to win the champions Australia in their own soil. Excuse me, this is height of drama. How will you feel when Zimbabwe releases a movie where the Cricket team under a months time comes from zero to beat India in world cup in India which never happened in history. Hence I rate Chak de India as hypothetical fiction. Ignoring that, Sharukh Khan did the role well of a Coach and the way he builds the team is amazing. A very good entertainment.

Hansie : This is not really a sports movie but all about one of the greatest captains of South African Cricket team, Hansie Cronje suffered by his one mistake and the emotions he went through all the time until his dramatic death. Watch this and you will change your opinions about Hansie Cronje

Invictus : This is the movie that drived me to post this article. I just saw last night and still cant get the movie out of my mind. Its not the conventional sports movie with full of dramas. It’s the true story of the first president of Democratic South Africa, Nelson Mandela inspired the South African Rugby team to achieve the world cup on their first appearance in their own land. It’s a marvelous movie rated based on the accuracy of history. The true story of 1995 Rugby World cup. I was overwhelmed when my South African colleague explained the whole world cup on how it happened. Don’t expect those hi-fi drama like Lagaan or Chak De India in this movie. Its pure classic by Clint Eastwood. Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon lived in this movie. A must watch for the fact of True story. Know what ? I learnt the rules of the game now ;)

I am not sure if I left out anything but guys do leave a comment if you think of any good movies based on sports.

IPL 1 – 1990

2011-05-24T12:33:00.002+05:30

I just struck with this idea of imagining, how it will be if IPL was introduced in 1990 and the players during that period had played. Here is the end of tournament summary report

The Reliance IPL had a grand opening this year thanks to BCCI for making it as huge success as this took Indian cricket to heights ever since 1983 world cup win.

The Calcutta Choker Kings owned by Bollywood fame Anil Kapoor who was confident that the team had a right mix of players like Navjot singh sidhu (Captain), Martin Crowe, Manoj Prabhakar, Wasim Akram etc., with young talents like Ajay Jadeja and Vinod Kambli. However, the team failed to progress after a stunning opening match win against Madras Murderers led by Kapil dev. Anil Kapoor criticized Navjot Singh’s captaincy by suggesting he could rather take up some laughter challenge show as he spotted Sidhu making fun of other teams losses instead concentrating on his job. Calcutta apparently, lost 6 matches in a row out of 7 matches and Anil kapoor is confident they will come back with a bang in next IPL.

On the contrary, Madras Murderers made a poor start with a shocking loss to Calcutta failing to chase the mammoth total of 100/7 posted by Calcutta at the end of 20 overs. Opener Srikanth tried hard by hitting a six with opening ball and a 4 in the following over but very expectedly, got out with a simple catch to the slip. Martin crowe later joined Kiran More to achieve this improbable target but eventually the Madras ended up with 67 all out in 19.2 overs. It was a steady raise after that for Madras murders but only finished fifth in the points table before semi finals. The local star L Sivaramakrishnan was show stealer with his consistent performance

The Hyderabad Himalayan Blunders was never in the contest with series of defeats right from the beginning. The captain Sunil Valson who condemned the franchise owners ‘Zandu balm’ as a bunch of useless management team and the team selection was never right. He however mentioned the under 19 local talent named Mohammed Azharuddin is extremely tolerant in extreme situations showing no emotions for anything and could be right captain in future.

Semifinals :

The first semifinals were between Banglore Backpackers Vs. Bombay Beeda Eaters. The Banglore captain Syed Kirmani led his side to a tight contest. Batting first, the backpackers scored a modest 80 / 8 in 20 overs with Duncan Fletcher scoring an impressive 23 of 26 balls. With easy task on hand, the beeda eaters started well with the openers Allan border and Mohinder amaranth almost scoring run a ball in first 3 overs and then both lost their wickets to Backpackers young strike bowler Anil kumble. Eventually Kumble took 6 wickets in 3.2 overs and got MOM match award. The Beeda eating losing captain Ravi Shastri seriously stated ‘It was an event ful day and the team was confused if this kid (Kumble) is a spinner or pace bowler and no excuse we played poor’

The second semi finals were between Kerala Lungi Masters Vs. Delhi Dum Maaro Dums. The Kerala team owned by Appu kuttan Textiles (Lungi manufactururers) was the only team with out any local talent but still gave a tough fight to the mighty Delhi but the Dummers smoked the lungi and eventually burnt them out of tournament. The Lungi master captain Roger Binny mentioned he is proud of being here and mentioned they are no match to Delhi’s Clive Lloyd who was dominating with both bat and ball.

Finals :

The finals was called off as it was scheduled in Madras and shockingly no one turned up to watch the match as that was the day Super stars Rajnikanths ‘PANAKARAN’ movie was released and all were queued up in Cinemas and proved IPL carries no priority to this Demi god of Tamil Nadu. Clive Lloyd was shocked and frusturated initially but spotted in the night show of Rajnikanths movie 2 days later. Apparently, the trophy is shared between Banglore and Delhi.

ஒழிந்தான் பாதகன்...

2011-05-10T11:41:00.006+05:30

ஒசாமா பின் லேடன அமெரிக்க ராணுவம் வெற்றிகரமா ஒழிச்சி கட்டிடிச்சி (அப்டின்னு தான் நியுஸ்ல பாத்தேன் .. உண்மையாதான் இருக்கும் ) இதுக்கு பிரபலங்கள் என்ன சொல்றாங்க

கௌண்டமணி : அட்றா சக்க !! அட்றா சக்க !!! தெருவல உக்காந்து பிச்சை எடுக்க வேண்டிய மொன்ன நாய் என்ன அட்டகாசம் பண்ணிச்சி .. மிஸ்டர் ஒபாமா அயம் ஒன் டவுட் ... அந்த பரோட்டா தலயன ( செந்தில் - ஒசாமாவ கொன்ன அமெரிக்க சிப்பாய்) நம்பாதீங்க அவன் எதோ ஒரு சொறி நாயா சுட்டுட்டு உங்க கிட்ட புருடா உட்ருகான்... எதுக்கும் இநோருதடவ விசாரிங்க ஆபிசர் ...
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இளைய தளபதி : எவன் படம் பாத்தா மூணு நாள் வாந்தி வந்து தல சுத்தி இ.சி.யு ல அட்மிட் ஆரானோ அந்த படம் தான் என் படம் (தளபதி என்ட்ரி) அண்ணா அவன கொள்ள இவ்ளோ டென்ஷன் எதுக்கு அண்ணா ... என்னோட டி.வீ.டி ரெண்டு அனுப்பி இருந்தா அவனே தூக்கு போற்றுபானே ... ஒபாமா அண்ணா .. அவன கொன்ன கதைய எனக்க ஈ மெயில் பண்ணிடுங்கன்னா ரீ மேக் பண்ண யுஸ் ஆகும் .. தாங்க்ஸ் தலைவா
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சாலமான் பாப்பைய்யா : அன்பு ஒபாமாவே , அருமை அமெரிக்காவே ... எதுக்கையா அவசரப்பட்டு கொன்னீங்க ... பழகி பாத்ருக்கலாமே ... புடிச்சிருந்தா பிரிண்ட்சா இருந்த்ருகலாம் இல்லாட்டி கொன்னுருகலாமே .. என்னய்யா !!
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நிருபர் : கமல் சார் ஒசாமாவ கொன்னுடாங்கலாம்
கமல்ஹாசன் : ஹா ஹா ஹா

நிருபர் : என்ன சார் சிறிக்கறீங்க ... அப்ப கொள்ளலைன்னு சொல்றீங்களா ?கமல்ஹாசன் : நா எங்க சார் கொள்ளலைன்னு சொல்றேன் ... கொன்னுருந்தா நல்லாருக்கும்னு சொல்றேன்

நிருபர் : @#@#@??

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வடிவேலு : ஐயோ !!! ஐயோ!!! ஒசாமாவ கொன்னது யாரு ... அமெரிக்கா தான ... இங்க ஒருத்தன் கேப்டன்ன்னு சொல்லிக்கிட்டு நா தான் பார்டர் போய் ஒசாமாவ கொன்னேன்னு சொல்லிட்டு திரியறான் ... இத நாம வளர விட கூடாது ... அதனால தான் சொல்றேன் ... உலக அமைதிக்காக அய்யா கலைஞர் அவர்களுக்கு உங்க ஓட்டுகள போடுங்க ....

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நீயா நானா கோபிநாத் : வெல்கம் டு லைன் டேட்ஸ் சிரப் நீயா நானா ... என்னோட நிகழ்சிக்கு அடுத்த தலைப்பு ... ஒசாமாவ அமெரிக்கா கொன்னது சரியா இல்ல பாகிஸ்தானே போட்டு தள்ளிருகனுமா ... தீர்ப்பு என்னானா கொள்ள வேண்டிய நெறையபேர் நம்ம ஊர்லையே இருக்கும்போது ஒசாமா கதை பாமர இந்தியனுக்கு தேவை இல்லாத விஷயம் ...

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இந்த கதைய வச்சி நம்ம தமிழ் திரையுலகம் படமா எடுத்தா என்ன பேர் வச்சிருபாங்க

டாக்டர் ராஜசேகர் : இது தாண்டா ஆப்பு

டி ராஜேந்தர் : ஆமா... இவன் ஒசாமா

கெளதம் மேனன் : கிருமிய கொள்ள வருவாயா

சூர்யா : ரத்த சரித்ரம் - பாகம் இருபது

கருணாஸ் : அபோடாபாதில் அம்பானி

இதுக்கு மேலயும் எதாச்சும் மொக்கை தோணிச்சினா கமெண்ட்ஸ்ல தாராளமா போடுங்க :) மொத்த போஸ்டும் தமிழ்ல அடிக்கற அளவுக்கு வெட்டியா இருக்யானு சத்தமா சொல்ற உங்க மைன்ட் வாய்ஸ் எனக்கு கேக்குது... அரசியல்ல இதெல்லாம் சாதரணமப்பா !!!

Before you die !!!

2011-04-26T13:14:00.004+05:30

A Travelogue after a long time. Unsurprisingly, it was a splendid trip to Cape Town. The South Africans are always proud of the rich natural beauty of the country and Cape Town is the primary underlining factor for the statement. I have planned this trip for 4 nights along with my family. Enjoyed every second of it from the accomodation to every meter of the lengthy drives in and around the city. For those who never been here, check out the composed briefing on must see places in and around Cape Town from my experience.

First thing first, mine was a package tour from Johannesburg and the price was 17K Rands (1,12,500 Indian Rupees, 2500 USD, 3120 Singapore Dollars). The price includes for 4 adults and 1 baby return flight from Johannesburg, Toyoto Versa Car rental, 4 nights stay in Protea hotel - Stellenbosch)

Table Mountains : Mr. Nelson Mandela mentioned this as the gods gift to South Africa and rightly so. If you want to use the Cable car to go to top, be there by 9 AM in the morning to avoid crowd and have a pleasant and less-crowded view at the top. Also, the cable car transport will be closed if its raining or heavy winds. You can also do a 1-2 hours trek along the pathway to reach the top. I recommend the cable car atleast to go up as it gives good 360 degree view around and save your energy to spend walking at the top. You can walk like around 1 hour on the mountain top all the way from east to west. I guarantee you will cherish every moment viewing the beautiful beaches and the landscapes around cape town from there. FYI, the Table mountains are the oldest mountain in the world (even older than everest)

Cape point (Cape of good Hope): This is the south western tip of Africa. The drive to Cape point is a pleasant experience crossing the valleys, coasts and several view points along the way. There is a Funicular ride (winch as called in India) that takes you to the cliff. You can explore a lot around the mountain by foot. The more you explore the more you can see and the more your heart will linger with joy. I have seen the views in many many movies and clicked a lot. Good food for my lens. Remember to plan your lunch there in the restaurant (i guess its called two oceans restaurant) in Cape point. Its delicously delicious even for a vegetarian like me.

Robben Island : This is most intresting part. This is an island prison (something like you can relate to the movie THE ISLAND) where the political prisoner (including Mr. Nelson Mandela) was jailed. Before that, the island is the quarrantine area for the leprocy patients. They were isolated and left in the island to suffer to death. You got to take the ferry from VA Water front. The ticket includes the ferry ride, the bus ride and guided tours inside the island. There will be a X Prisoner himself there to explain his experiences inside the prison and how brutal was the treatment inside. At the end, the prisoners where so determined to fight the apartheid with peace so no more from the future generation should suffer in the prison any longer. Dont miss this place, this will make your trip more meaningful emotionally.

Camps bay (Sunset view) : The best i would suggest is leave cape point around 3-4 PM and head on to Camps bay via Kommitije, Houts bay, Chapmans peak to Camps bay. You can stop at several view points along the coast. Refresh yourself and get ready to feel perplexed with the amaizing driving route in the Chapmans peak. The experience of viewing the coast as you drive through the mountains is impeccable. You will love every second of it. Make sure you reach camps bay by around 5 PM. This is for me one of the best place to view the sunset. It was too cold and windy for me to swim in the beach. I guess summer should be best.

Cape town Castle : This isnt visual pleasure as i expected but the meuseum inside the castle is quiet informative. This explains a lot about Anglo Boer war and how the British captured Cape town from Dutch. Besides, there is a Cannon firing session which is a wonderful experience where a representative from SA Cannon Association explains the whole process of firing a Cannon with right tools. Go for the knowledge.

Hermanus (Whale watching): I knew it wasnt whale season but i was told if i can get a boat, i can able to catch glimpse of those monster whales in the mid sea. Unfortunately, the boat was full and we have to return disappointed. However, the long 1.5 hour drive was exciting crossing the mountians and plains. Plan this if you are excited watching Whales.

Ostrich Farm : This is the delight of my own research to make the trip memorable. I found out this unfamous West coast Ostrich Ranch off N7. The farm has like 200+ Ostriches and a guided tour is all fun with the guide explaining end to end about life of Ostrich. Also, you can feed them, touch them and even sit on them for photographs with Table mountains back drop. Please dont miss it :)

Thats pretty much i managed to cover in around 4 days. I would like to go another time by reaching Port Elizabeth (another city) by flight and drive all the way to cape town (800 KMS) staying at different places along the way each day though the Scenic Garden route.

Few pictures are in my facebook and email me for the pictures link if you wanna have a look. But make it as a point that you visit this place before you die :)

The stamp of dominance

2011-04-06T12:37:00.008+05:30

Disclaimer : Please note, the above so-called Poetic lines are absolutely Aravindh's own creation. Any one claiming the rights will be higly intolerated and will be badly bullied ;)

Wolrd cup : The Glorious Moment

2011-03-25T17:58:00.005+05:30

The glorious moment for Indian cricket I witnessed last night. The statement was further justified when couple of South Africans mentioned ‘I am glad the Aussies are out of World Cup’. It’s the expression of joy when a team put up more than a brave fight and showed the exit doors of World cup to a team who dominated more than a decade in world cup.

It was 1996 (I was at school that time) I saw the so called minnows Srilankans who murdered the Australians in the world cup finals and ever since, the Oz team only grew stronger, became dominant. With the stalwarts like Ponting, Mcgrath, Warne, Gilchrist, Hayden etc., they formed their own empire in the world of cricket. They kept fetching all the records possible. They won every world cup they played after that. As the talent grew stronger and stronger, the attitude took a stroll and termed as the RUDE TEAM in the cricket field. Sledging, Controversies, Disciplines joined with their Cricketing talents. That’s when the superstars retired but not the teams attitude and fittingly, that’s when they started losing their pride.

The slide (to me) started when India won the CB Series during last time during India's tour of Australia. There was no luck factor, no hook n crook. It was 'best of 3' finals and India kick started the ‘Beginning of the end’. Sachin Tendulkar rubbed off the stupid superstition by scoring centuries in both matches and still made India lift the trophy with one of the histories most convincing win against Australia in Australia by any team in ODI format.

Later, the Aussies suffered poor crash defeat in Ashes against England which put the message across to the arrogant team that they are just as good as any other test teams.

Back to present, the Aussies started the world cup well staying un beaten until they met the most unpredictable super talented team called Pakistan. Crushed ruthlessly and their stint of 34 unbeated worlcup victories in a row ended. I have to mention that its shame on Ponting who clearly edged and waiting for umpires decision to force him out instead of walking out. Fittingly, Tendulkar only grow as a sports man (besides being top class player) by walking away when he nicked the ball that even replay cameras couldn’t spot.

Yesterday, the big stage was set. India (the favorites) but with lots of bowling and fielding issues to face the defending champions. I was taken by surprise to see the new look Indian team with their best bowling n fielding. Took regular wickets, stopped boundaries and batted with utmost responsibility as a team. End of the day, there was 2 people who were on their knees on the ground. Yuvraj, roaring at his loud best looking at the sky. Ponting, heads down forehead kissing the Indian soil for the last time in world cup.

I saw this funny comment on cricinfo.com at the end of the match

Passenger Announcement : Final call for passengers travelling to Non stop flight to Australian on Quantas Airways.

Disclaimer : This post is not to hurt the Australians but true emotions of Non Australian Cricket fan.

More Tennis

2011-03-04T18:09:00.001+05:30

Ever since I moved to South Africa, the predominant activity goes in my mind and body is Tennis. With chilly climate (than Singapore), well available and free courts, good play mates, the love of the game only increased. Although I am not a power hitter or super fire athletic in the court, I still love the game the way it works. Adding spice, I got my new Racket (a bit expensive, bloody 1800 Rands = 340 SGD) but the best thing I got since my ipad few months ago ; ) Some of healthy tips and tricks I learnt from other mates/experts. This doesn’t mean I am following it well but with my limited exposure, its working well for me.

Shoes : After 1+ years of tennis exposure, I very well learnt how vital Tennis shoes means if you are frequently hitting courts. I used to get lotsa ankle sprains/twists (the cream of Singapore knows the stories well) and then these Tennis shoes joined me only to give the best to my legs.

Racket : I wasn’t sure which one to buy initially (1+ years ago) So my mate and me blindly purchased a 100$ Wilson racket. Surprisingly, that was a wise choice and served us sincerely for long long time (and it still does for me) Last week I came to know what suits me, if you are a power hitting player then predominant light weight stuffs are the ideal choice otherwise go for a bit heavier one. I am still learning on the right selections but smaller racket with heavy head weight works well for me at the moment (Wilson BLX blade 98 rocks ) Obvious, I am married to Wilson now.

Tennis is a wonderful game for activity. I tried badminton for a while but gave up as its more demanding in terms of fitness and stamina. Tennis on other hands blends activity well with your skill. Also, Tennis is more enjoyable if you play singles and more exciting if you play doubles. Certain things to keep on mind while playing the sport.

Warm ups: Always, warm ups first. Its quiet essential. Tennis is full of continuous hitting, hard running, sudden jerks etc. Your body should be all fine before and after every game. Hence atleast 5-10 mins warm ups and stretching is a must do before you start holding your racket.

Rallies: Play bloody loads of rallies. I was stupid myself gave more importance to the fun matches with my mates than actual rallies (practice). Ofcourse, matches are the intresting bit that keeps you going for the whole session but its rally hits that improves you in the game. So, if you play 1 hour game then make sure you play 10 hours rallies accordingly.

Strokes : I myself still a rookie in making my strokes clear but I am happy am learning now to spot the mistakes. The mistakes I used to do always is using my wrist to generate the power but ideally, it should be the combination of your foot work, grip and swing of your arms that should generate the power. Obviously, this doesn’t come over night and you gotto keep hitting lots of balls to get right swing

Cricket World Cup 2011

2011-02-18T18:51:00.005+05:30

It’s a real pleasure and fun being in another cricket mad country that awaits for the upcoming world cup with all the locals being curious. The Cricket fans of SA over here are nice and giving good respect to other teams too in terms of criticizing the game. Herez my analysis of how the teams stand although the groupings looks like the top 8 teams in ICC ranking will go to quarter finals.

Australia : For sure, they are not the god as they were a decade ago. Ever since the last world cup, the team only detoriates with every second with their consistency. No more Gillys, Mcgraths, Haydens or warnes. Winning each game will be a challenge for them. In my opinion, they are not the favorites this time.

South Africa : I could say they are better than Australia but once again they don’t have the talents of Pollock or Klusner or Rhodes or Gibbs which is painful. However, they seem to be the only non subcontinental team who got the potential to win games in Asia against any opponent on any day. IMO, they could give surprises either way. (they still havent got rid off the C****S tag yet)

England : In theory, they are even favorites. In reality, they sweat themselves to win against an associate team in Warm ups. If Kevin Pieterson or Paul Collingwood doesn’t click, England won’t stay longer. IMO, No hopes on them

West Indies : The once superstar of world cricket is not the same now. Gayle is a good T20 player and Chanderpaul got too much load with a less talented team. Bowling is unpredictable. The only impressive news was they gave tough fight against Srilanka in Srilanka during warmups. IMO, no chances even if they make it to quarterfinals

Srilanka / Pakistan : No idea. To me, they are ‘You never know’ teams. They are quiet and less hyped. Supposedly, according to the Theory of Stupid Irony, one of them should lift the cup.

New Zealand : Absolutely no chance. They should be happy they are still playing tests.

Bangladesh : Being host, may lift their spirits and I am sure they wont give a easy win to any opponent. Still, they don’t have what it takes to be world cup dominator.

Associate Teams (Ireland, Neterlands and other lands) : Nothing expected other than 1 or 2 shock in prelims.

India : As a world cricket fan, India for sure proved they deserve to be on top few by giving close fight and winning slaps against many teams in their own backyard. Young team, great hitters, terrific fielders, home side advantage, TENDULKAR the god is with them… With all my heart I always wished to see the Tendulkars XI to lift the cup for more than a decade but this time the chances looks more realistic ever before. IMO, the team got all it takes to reach semi finals and then its Dhoni who should exercise the brain to get ther…

Practically, all the top 8 teams (AU/NZ/WI/IN/SL/EN/SA/BG) reaches the quarter finals eliminating the associate teams and then its 3 good days for any of these teams. One thing i am sure about, it will not be 100% win for any team that lifts world cup.

I am all HUNGRY now ;)

Click Click : Rhino & Lion National Reserve

2011-01-31T00:59:00.009+05:30

Managed to get some sense of creativity unleashed in this beautiful place.... The Sun factor in South Africa is strange for me as it isnt burning hot as it was in Singapore but get bloody lot of Sun burn. So dont forget a sun screen in South African Summer... Doesnt matter how dark you are... Save yaselves.... Some of the clicks that i thought worth posting

The feeding session was not as exciting as anticipated but the scene of a whole horse been killed and fed to the wild was a bit nerve racking.

At first, thought hardly a human but at one point frusturated with lined up cars everywhere. My advice, keep this safari on a weekdays for your peace of mind.

This one scared the s***t out of us as it fetched the meat and ran across our car. Imagine if it doesnt get its meat and my arm on the way instead.

One of em just had the complete lunch just in front of us with out a courtesy to offer the guests (us... hehehe)

This was the cutest i saw over there... These bunch of lion cubs were fighting so ferociously for a while and then lined up to quench the thirst with all unity.... I felt my effort worth getting there :)

Was quiet happy to see this veteran taking an afternoon nap with out bothering any thing in the world....

5th ODI : India Vs. South Africa

2011-01-24T17:25:00.007+05:30

I was all so excited about the fact that am gonna watch a cricket match live in a stadium for the first time in my life… Ironically, I never watched all the time in India (my house in Chennai being only 3 -5 kms away from Chepauk stadium) but with in my first month in South Africa.

This is the 5th ODI between India Vs. South Africa. The series so far is in a balance with 2 wins each. With pride at stake, South Africa should be favorite but you can never write off current Young Indian team. Things running in my mind until the morning of the match…

-- Jo’burg is predominantly cold place so it will be pleasant to chill around in grass
-- Might get good glimpse of players in close vicinity and chat with them
-- get a feeling of the real time pace and look of a match
-- long drive to beautiful centurion supersport park
-- The form of life Indian team is now
-- Can further test the efficiency of my new GPS

How did the day went through ?

The parking was a chaos in Supersport park. As soon as I drived to the stadium there were this bunch of guards rounded me and offered a safe and easy parking space for 50 Rands. I went for it and I was happy that its only less than 4 min walk to stadium. Later, I felt more lucky when there was rain and water level was rising in the free parking space behind the stadium.

The prediction was a thunderstorm for the day and was surprised to see bright sunny morning and the smile didn’t last for ever.. Around 10 am we started feeling the discomfort due to heat and around 11 am we are half fried human meat on the grass… And that was the time the transition took place from choclate brown to dark choclate brown (guess what ??? My colour ofcourse : - ( )

Rubbing salt on the wounds, Dhoni chose to bowl first and made SA feel good toss to lose with their master class batting effort. Harbajhan and Munaf was standing near us in the boundary during the innings and Bhajji was like a robot and didn’t even waved his hands for whatsoever… rightly so, he got the worst swears from the crowd all the 20 overs he stood their.. He complained to the security guards and they didn’t give a S***T

The 40 mins rain in the afternoon was the worst part of my day.. We had to stand all the time with our mats in our hand… luckily it wasn’t a thunder storm. The Indian innings started with wickets flow being generous than run flow… as it looked the match will wrap up before even Indians reach 100, we took the obvious decision ‘TO LEAVE THE STADIUM WHEN THE TRAFFIC IS LESS’

We left after Harbhajan’s wicket thinking there is only a miracle could save India… The Wonderful part is that I was home on time to see Yousuf hammering under the cold living room with snacks and juices on my couch… No regrets as this series was one of the bravest fight back by Indian team with out front line batsmen on a South African pitch. I can still place my money on India for the upcoming world cup.

THE MORAL : Never ever watch an all day match right under the sun. Don’t trust any form of weather.

Just not YET ANOTHER GADGET !!!

2011-01-12T08:16:00.006+05:30

This time its most anticipated post by the cream of my circle :) Its none other than the majestic APPLE's creation, IPAD

a month ago i never had a slightest idea of buying this gadget.... Later, started checking out my frinds iphone 4 and i thought 'WOW'.... later, researched about IPAD and on one fine late night as usual my brain started becmg devil and made me order this gadget online .... in a flash, my 1100$ burnt :( (I made a secret resolution that i should cut down expenses this year... enna kodumai sir)

The gadget arrived from apple online store singapore in next 2 days and from that second i am all glued to the master piece.... So what makes it a 'magnet of human mind'

- Internet : trust me, the speed is totally top class when i compared to my laptop on same WIFI

- Games : You wont believe the quality and clarity... also, the feature of touch screen makes it intresting to play....

- Apple istore : the most intresting part of ipad.... apple has the market and demand ... therefore millions of free applications on various categories... u will never be done with this :)

- movies : again, the clarity is the class.. with 64 gb of space, you can very well store good set of videos and images

-Books : i resumed reading the most intresting 1500 pages PONNIYIN SELVAN and this was my primary inspiration to buy ipad

- there are other features like google map, itunes etc which i also use it on and off...

for gadget freaks, ipad is a 'must have' in their armoury.... for others, jus try it out and u will b impressed for sure....

Verdict : I am sure i wont lose this gadget to any one :)

Advice : if you wanna buy this, i suggest apple store online which is arguably the cheapest and reliable source

Warning : dont get this addiction ruin you ;)

2010 Memories

2011-01-01T13:46:00.002+05:30

Its 1.1.11 today... while am watching Dr. Vijay's Tirupachi (should i call it as Perarasu's Tirupachi) in SUN TV, i felt like registering my first post of 2011... Here are good things happened in 2010 ... note, jus publishing watz on my mind right now and i may miss out things... (Who cares nu neenga solrathu enaku nallavay kekuthu)

Movies (Tamil) : Endiran (Ofcourse), Mynaa & Kalavani (Warm and classic village), Tamizh Padam (brave attempt and a laugter machine), Angadi theru & Madrasa pattinam (classic)

Movies (English) : One and only INCEPTION

Personal : My son's first Bday celebration in Phuket, Surprise Prague and Guruvayur trip, More Tennis, havent given up on blogging/photography yet

Professional : No Official trips for next 3 years (hopefully)

Disappointments of 2010 :

- Dr. Vijay Movie(s) - (2009 la mattum ennavaamnu kekareengala ... !!!)

- Matured and sensible tamil movies

- Decision to leave Singapore for a while

- My bday (getting old u c)

New year pledges ??? No No !!! :)

This time for Africa : Living in Sandton

2010-12-14T14:40:00.001+05:30

Having got in to South Africa and stayed for more than 2 weeks, I can safely give my first impression feedback on living in Johannesburg. Apparently, I got all negative opinions from all sides about my move to South Africa for next few years on a long term project. Personally, I took up this to avoid frequent official trips and to live in one place with my family.

Its true that Johannesburg is one of the cities that holds the highest crime rate. For expats moving in to Johannesburg, its quiet essential to research about the place they live. I am posted in this place called Sandton which is the next CBD after Central Johannesburg and it lies halfway between Central Joburg and Pretoria. Undoubtedly, Sandton is one of the safest part in whole Africa with good infrastructure, clean roads, well loaded malls and pleasant residential complexes with onboard security guards all time.

Having your own car for transport is mandatory for expats though there are local buses and trains as they are considered unsafe mode of transport. I spotted handful of population wandering streets all time. However, you got to be street smart and rationale on where you walk and where you drive alone. Common suggestions for safety includes,

- Never leave valuables in car when its parked
- Always try and park the car in secured area
- Keep the car doors locked all the time
- Try to avoid getting out of the car in the streets especially at night times

The suggestions might look scary but no reason to get paranoid about. Bottom line being smart enough to gauge the surroundings and act accordingly. So far, in my 2 weeks stay here I never felt threatened or worried to drive alone around in the downtown.

Sandton City

Last weekend I drove to Fordsburg in Central Johannesburg (20 mins from Sandton) and found the place quiet contrasting to Sandton. Heavy traffic, non friendly atmosphere, litters every where etc., However, the oriental plaza parking space seems to be safe to park the car and go for some asian shopping around.

Now, the delightful factors about living in Sandton

- The Nelson Mandela Square Mall is one of the largest in Southern Hemisphere (2kms from where I live)
- Pleasant spacious villa type apartment with backyard garden, swimming pool, tennis courts, electric fenced etc.,
- Well laid roads and malls every where makes it easier for frequent shopping
- Most of the restaurants have good set of vegetarian options at more affordable cost
- Friendly locals who are always happy to help (but not all the time)

Watch out this space for more updates from now on and wish me Safe Stay !!!

A Week of Pilgrimage

2010-11-29T11:59:00.008+05:30

I am on holidays at the moment... chilling out in this lovely winter weather in Chennai :) My mom and wife planned an all temple trips in and around Guruvayur, Kerala then a day trip to Tirupati.

Firstly, My thought about the term GOD... I would like to call myself agnostic... infact a slightly modified version of agnostic person... i am not sure if god exists or not... so my message to god is ... if you exist, we are dudes otherwise i am still fine :) (என்னடா கமல் மாதிரி பேசறேன்னு பாக்கறீங்களா இதெல்லாம் படிக்க படிக்க தான் புரியும் ;))

It was a tiring 16 hours drive from Chennai->Salem->Coimbatore->Palagad->Trichur->Guruvayur (I guess the chauffer wud have been more tired than we passengers ;)) The road was smooth all the way from Chennai until Tamil Nadu border and sadly, we encountered few of the worst road and ruthless drivers in Kerala. We stayed in Krishna Inn, Guruvayur located close to Temple and quiet a nice place to stay after all the hectic travel. The next day was a long day indeed. Got up at 3 for first darshan and quiet startled to see long queue outside... Note, if you belong to male classification of human speicies, u gotto wear the traditional white dhoti and go top less/towel top inside temple... female can enjoy saree or salwar

The kerala temples doesnt have complex architecture as in Tamil Nadu or Karnataka... However, the place was quiet pleasant and the heritage is so rich and warm... The elephant parade inside the temple is quiet a scene to watch... we also did anna praschyam (feeding the babies) to my son in front of god and offered thulabaram to god... After a top class kerala breakfast in the hotel, we head to chottanikare bagavathy temple...

And then there is a rule that one should visit the following 3 shiva temples in one streatch otherwise something terrible supposed to happen... we didnt risk anything and rightly so, we completed all those 3 temples in 3 hours frame....

Vaikom Temple

Kaduthruthy Temple

Ettumanoor Temple

Overall it was a pleasant experience and i would strongly suggest this trip for the positive power.

Photography Update

2010-11-07T13:58:00.006+05:30

Havent got much energy to click... neverthless, havent given up yet... This time its Europe... :)

The Beautiful night view of Prague:

The Nithyananda of Prague :

The Famous Charles Bridge in Prague:

Tram in Dresden:

In Zwinger Palace, Dresden:

A bowl of food to a baby : Tips from a tired Dad

2010-10-19T14:18:00.004+05:30

It is common that babies like to be fed by their mom and mom knows every way of feeding their babies. However, there are times where a dad needs to take over this herculean task of feeding food to his son/daughter.

The task is even tougher than playing tennis for more than an hour, tougher than doing an 1 hour trek in a steep mountain, tougher than taking most sophisticated photographs, tougher than writing more than 5 lines of ‘own code’ in a programming language, tougher than thinking of a short story for a blog post, tougher than .. hmmm.. etc.,

No matter who feeds, the babies (around 1 year old) will accept the offer gracefully for first 5-6 spoons and then the project starts. I have adopted the following few techniques to finish the remaining bowl and I thought this post may help other dads too (if they are ignorant or geeks or etc)

- An exclusive baby’s dining chair is always a comfort, they won’t move and they know is food time when ever they sit on it.

- Show them their favorite channels and this will keep their minds occupied and mouth chewing

- Try singing at your best possible melodious voice. The baby will be shocked to see their dad singing and won’t bother eating anything in the world in that moment

- Try and give a piece of their favorite biscuit or chocolate in between so they will anticipate the next spoon from the bowl to be the same

- Start behaving weird like jumping out for no reason or crying or do funny gimmicks that makes baby laugh and make them gulp a spoon in that gap

- Most of the babies like laptop or keyboard as its prohibited play toy at anytime. So just give them the laptop, feed a spoon and take it back

- This is rude way but handy when you reached the last bit of food in the bowl. Just scare them with any sudden speech or dialogue at a raised voice. The baby opens the mouth out of shock and there you go. (Try avoiding this as much as possible but you know, human irony)

- If you still find some food remaining to finish, the last and easy way….. Give the task back to your wife. Perhaps finish the remaining bit of food yourself if your wife is not watching you ; ) (Haloooo, I never done this ok …)

Happy Feeding : )

Boom Boom Robot Da !!!

2010-10-01T09:01:00.004+05:30

The 2 years wait is over and finally the mission is accomplished.... Read on Folks... Its Endiran Movie review exclusively by yet another Tamil movies fan.... After watching first half of Endiran, I felt the following, apart from how the movie actually was.

- Shankar can direct a Hollywood movie with Indian elements to spice it up
- ARR can be a trend setter in hollywood adding more songs to movie s
- Aiswarya Rai can be next Angelina jolie or eva mendis in hollywood
- Kalanidi maran can produce an Hollywood movie at his will
- However, Mr. Sivaji Rao Gaekwad is always for one and only Tamil

This is the first time I watched a Rajni movie on the first day and thanks to Sun TV who hyped over the top and raised every ones curiosity to watch it ASAP. I would love to say this is a 100% flawless and a must watch entertainer. Before getting in to a verdict, few points to highlight.

Positives :

This is not a regular Shankar or Rajni movie we watched all this time. Very much evident that Shankar and the crew undergone a huge thought process before shooting the movie. Right from the evolution of Robot to the phase changes has been justified very well logically. I guess there were a huge group of scientists also involved to learn all those Robotics jargons.

I am not a big fan of Ash, but this movie was one of the few movies I was impressed with Ash… not much comment though… Money was spent lavishly for the sets… for first few mins I thought the movie was shot on US or Europe… Danny is perfect for the role but sadly, the scope was limited. I guess he will be our next villain for another 2 vijay movies and heroines dad for vishal/bharat/sreekanth/shyaam movies. : )

Thalaivar, like any other movie was the highlight… It was a bit funny to see him as a scientist but still he did his home work.. but he outclassed every ones efforts as robot… I am not sure where did they played real robot and where was thalaivar… For one millionth time I am proud as thalaivar fan…

The first half : this is unique for Indian cinema. The way the robot was built, the way he justified the mechanism behind every actions, the way it mixes with people, the screen play, the stunts, the dance, the dialogue delivery of robot… I am speechless…. Dot

Let downs :

I never wanted any words under this section but these are my honest feelings on the let down side of the movie

Lengthy second half: I am sure every one will make this complaint. Especially the last 30 mins were
-fed with too much graphics
-totally predictable
- too lengthy and boring

Wasted cast : Santhanam, Karunas, Kalabavan mani, cohin haneefa etc all are talent bunch but totally under utilized. Movie would have still been the same with out them.

Shankar raised every ones expectation from the meaningful master pieces like Anniyan, Sivaji and though the scope of this subject is limited in Endhiran, he made the movie more predictable even to the screenplay level is a major let down….

Sun TV shouldn’t have hyped the movie with over the top ads like audio release, hifi trailers, trailer release functions etc raised the curiosity exponentially and high expectations are always dangerous.

Verdict : I still liked Sivaji than Endiran but 3 cheers for exhibiting the potential of Tamil cinema to world audience. A must watch atleast once (in cinemas only)

Orchid Garden

2010-09-25T12:00:00.008+05:30

Having explored Singapore quiet a lot, i chose this place called Orchid garden... primarily to exercise my Camera.

This is one huge nursery garden type place located a km away from Singapore Zoo. The easy way to reach there is get a Taxi from any of the MRT from Khatib to Kranji. Wont be 10$.

The collection of Orchids there are quite pleasing. However, the humidity and heat is completely unbearable and i almost drenched with sweat.

There are seldom people over there. Those tourists who isnt aware how un intresting is this place. If not for photography, even i would have skipped : )

If you still wanna go, dont even thnk of going there before 5 PM... otherwise, at your own pain... Do Check out my orkut/facebook page for more pics ; )

Verdict : Not a bad place for desperate clickers.... Period.

Singapore Tit Bits !!!

2010-09-13T12:13:00.005+05:30

I always wanted share the news, happenings in Singapore i hear and there fore am gonna collect the info and publish as one post in a frequency as i like ;)

Unfriendly staff in the GST claims section in Singapore airport : I seldom have forgetable experiences with Singapore interms of service sectors. Recently, been to airport to accompany my dad with his GST claims and the staff we met was so rude. The mistake was on our side too.. We can not open the bag quickly to show all the items to claim the GST for but the staff was highly impatient inspite of very less crowd and constantly pressurizing to make it fast. I believe we are just unfortunate. To avoid issues, have all the items ready before you enter GST claim area and in case of heavy crowds, u better be fast :)

Ananda Bavan @ Terminal 2 : I never been to this restaurant in the airport fearing that it may have the same taste as the Ananda bavan at Little India. However, it was a total suprise and i had lovely time ther with all delicious chaats at a decent price. Do plan your treats over there.. Pleasant experience. My other favourite eat outs are Annlakshmi - Friday buffet (Chinatown MRT), Komalas - Parota with mock Chicken curry (Farrer park and citi hall), Sankaranti - Andra special lunch (opp Mustafa), Macau Express - Fried rice (Expo MRT)

New HDB rule : Singapore govt announced new clause for people buying government flats. The new buyer from now on should not hold any property in any other country otherwise he/she becomes ineligible to buy a flat in Singapore. I can see this as an attempt to facilitate the people who genuinely intrested in buying house in singapore and live in Singapore. However, it makes you angry that those who got the flats already dont have an issue. Grrrr !!! Please make the point clear to me if i mis understood the announcement :)

Train is coming : I started hearing this new kids song that goes like 'Train is coming please start queueing' when ever a train approaches the platform in MRTs... Highly annoying. A decent announcement was nice. However, tourists might enjoy this.

Tamil books collection in Libraries : I was totally stunned to see this lovely collection of tamil book in govt libraries here. Been to Bishan Library last week and so happy to see the collection of tamil books from all top tamil writers (ponniyin selvan by kalki, udayar by balakumaran etc) All this time i was ignorant. Shame, i got my ebook reader already ;)

Tamil Cinemas : The GV Yishun which usually plays tamil movies is now closed for next few months for renovation. Alternatively, you can watch on Cathay - Causway point (My first choice), Rex Cinemas (Little india), GV Beach Road. So badly waiting for Endhiran @ Cathays

Truly Thailand :)

2010-08-21T15:58:00.009+05:30

I wanted to be away from Singapore on my son's first birth day and i randomly chose this place with out any expectation as i jus got a good deal for the vacation from Marriotts. It was jus 4 days trip and truly memorable one. Here are some tit bits incase if you guys thinking about a vacation break.

There are millions of budget airlines flying from Singapore and u can get a round trip ticket for just over 100 SGD (better plan atleast 3 months in advance).

The stay in Marriotts is the most exciting part. The lovely villa along the side of Mai Khao beach is the ideal place. The sunset view is just what i wanted. I initially intend to stay in resort and chill out but my parents wanted to look around and there fore toured selected few

Though many prefer to visit the jamaes bond island and phi phi island... I just stuck with the phi phi as i dont want to stress out much on hanging around. However, i enjoyed my first snorkelling experience and it was more than an experience to remember to swim around the remote island, clear water, observing the underwater world... hmmm one more 'to do'added :)

The phi phi island is the place where the movie 'The Beach'was shot and now i guess i need to see this movie. The Thai people are in general very nice and much respectful with the way in greeting people

The unique point about phuket is the world famous show called 'Fantasea' Visually stunning. The ticket price is around 1500 Bhatts (60 SGD approx.) and to me that is the best way to spend 1500 Bhatts in Phuket :)

Its indian tradition that any one on their Bday visit temple and for my son its another experience to visit thai temple on his bday :) it was the chelong temple and the look of the buddha statues and the thai praying procedure very much resembled indian way.

Over all, i suggest this place as a must visit place in South east asia and for any pleasant vacation one need to find the best resort/hotel to make the stay cheerful.

Lookin at the coconuts, elephants, sea, boats, people, traditions, dance, fights, felt like it was a lovely kerala trip we always missed :)

Confessions of a Blogaholic !!!

2010-08-13T09:39:00.007+05:30

What if i interview the blogger inside me ? The moment of truth has arrived ;) Read on blog reader .......
When did you started blogging ? What inspired you ?

2005 I guess. Just after when I started my work life in Bangalore. I always wanted to be a writer but I thought my skill isn’t good enough and wanted a platform to improve. Many of my mates were also blogging that time which inspired me a lot.

What do you write in your blog ?

Anything that strikes me. Initially my posts were mere status update about the happenings around me. Later, started posting my opinions on various stuffs like movie reviews, short stories, social issues, travelogues, incidents, accidents etc.

Do you think your opinions are right and makes sense ?

(Showing my middle finger) Ofcourse, that’s the human irony (with face full of anger)

So, what is the point you try to make in your posts ?

The point is to be creative as much as I could and check my level of writing and creativity.

Cranky clarification. Heard you write blog to impress girls. Is that so ?

(with anger inside and smile outside) Next question please.

Did you succeed in that ? May be i can keep it confidential

I said, NEXT QUESTION : x

Howz the response for your posts ?

Hardly get anything negative but I believe the number of people reading the blog are more than the people commenting. (thanks to google analytics) Some times I get mails suggesting new topics, changes etc. Overall I am happy with responses and I believe quiet a lot are reading.

How do you get rid of an annoying friend in a week ?

I will repeatedly insist him to read my blog when ever I meet him (I am only being modest here… enna panrathu bloglayum arasiyal panna vendi iruku)

How long you intend to Blog ?

As long as I find writing as ‘Exciting’. As long as some one doesnt file a complaint against me. As long as I am alive. As long as … well, I dunno : )

Why are you doing this post after so many years?

Good question, (with a scholar look) I just found this interesting blog post here and thought why not let me steal this idea. Sorry Jetli (the owner of original idea). Enna panrathu schoola irunthay bit adichi palagidichi

Do you think the whole blogging crap is waste of time ?

Correct. But define ‘Waste of time’ first.

Who is your role model when it comes to writing ?

(Giving a pose as if like published 5-10 best sellers) the one and only Chetan Bagath. I like his style of writing and I try to imitate that in most of my short stories or some of my narrations.

Who are your target audience ?

Any one who could read English. I occasionally be cruel to Non-Tamil sector posting Tamil scripts but that gives a lot of satisfaction (i meant, posting tamil scripts )

Why did the chicken cross the road ?

@#$##@#@... WTF you @#@#!

Endiran Music Review !!!

2010-08-04T11:39:00.011+05:30

The lesson i learnt, dont expect an unbelievable music just because

The music is by an Oscar winner and a favorite of millions (including me)
The movie is India's expensive one ever
Director who never seen failure at all in hi career
All the best in industry involved in for production, lyrics, editing etc.

I found the music on overall is 'an average' given that the wait was very long and expectations was sky high. Neverthless, still a good bunch to listen and with movie out, the taste only gets better. Lemme list down the songs from my favourite to the least.

Puthiya Manitha : Nothing but SPB. Thalaivar's entry song always credited by this singing genius. Be it oruvan oruvan or en peru padayapa or puthiya manitha. The talent of the Musicians goes sidelines when this man lends his voice to thalaivar. Another thing to highlight is the lyrics brilliantly researched and shaped by the kaviperarasu himself. My fav. line

~~iral kanayam thunbamilai.... idaya kolarethumilai.... thanthira manithan vazhnthathilai... enthiran veelvathilai~~

Arima Arima : The song wouldnt have been catchy with out the background chorous singing 'Ivan perai sonathum' bit. Nothing extrodinary from ARR yet. Again very good lyrics, hariharns pleasing voice with the chorus made me listen to this.

~~naan manithan alla... aghrinayin arasan naan... kaamutra kanini naan...sinna sirusin idhayam thinnum....silicon singam naan…~~

Kilimanjaro : Here comes the similar bit like 'Suthi Suthi vantheega', 'Kuluvalilay' that ARR does for thalaivar.. This is the awesome speciality of ARR + Thalaivar combo and never failed to deliver one non-indian flavoured duet for Thalaivar. Nothing special about lyrics except the rhyming... quiet relieved to hear non science words atleast in this song.. Another highlight, the voice of Chinmayi.. you beauty ;)

~~kaattuvasi kaattuvasi pachaiyaga katipaya... muthaththale vega vechu singapallil uripaya~~

Irumbilay oru Idayam : Debutant Karki did a very impressive job to meet the expectation.. I wasnt fond of this song initially (i guess the music bit let me down) as and when i hear over and over again, i kinda adapted now... but the repeated sci-fi words in all songs making me tired with this album... still i liked the line which shows the beauty of inheritance ;)

~~echil illa endhan mutham sarchai indrik kolvaya?... rattham illa kathal endruotthi poga solvaya?~~

Kadal Anukkal : Nothing exciting.. Good song :)

Boom Boom Robot da : Kids song... nothing special... i still cant like this one... CRAP

Now, all waiting for the visual splendour to divulge myself in.... Just few more weeks and check for my personalized movie review in this space ;)

The Dream World of a Schizo-Geek

2010-07-30T11:59:00.004+05:30

Schizophrenia is a severe mental disorder characterized by delusions, hallucinations, incoherence and physical agitation; it is classified as a "thought" disorder while Bipolar Disorder is a "mood" disorder.

Chapter 1

The SUN
London, 20 May 2060
Scientists have achieved new milestone in dream worlds research. Any trained and certified individual can buy the wireless head band which communicates to your brain nerves. The common server hosted by many individuals will share a dream space where an individual can connect using the head bands and enjoy the dream in the shared space they can choose. The over night dream time in real world spans around 1 year in the dream world thus giving extended life feeling to any one possess this invaluable piece of gadget.

I can’t get it wrong this time. The cold weather of Winchester makes me more nervous. Been 7 Months already and I know I am in this dream world but as perfect as real world. The ASDA, the Marks and Spencer, High streets, every corner streets all looks so real. The biggest problem here is, classifying the projections (the imaginary humans) and the people who are actually in using the dream room. Few rules are in this dream world and one of them is no killing others else your dream world access will be banned for ever by the central server. I got to break it, I sure should do, I got to kill Steve. My best mate, my colleague in the research lab got stuck in here due to some technical glitch. I need to kill him to get him back otherwise he is stuck here for ever.

The biggest problem is the dream world being so perfect. The cops are well trained and I have to be at my best to get it done. I have missed my victim in previous two attempts with the knife and now I have to shoot him and I have no choice. Her he is, heading to church from the parking lot. I got to aim, I got to aim right, Am nervous.

‘Freeze’, I pulled the trigger as I heard this loud sound behind me and I missed the target. ‘Put your gun down, Now’, the police.

Next morning in the detention center, with the head of police and psycho doctor from the police.

‘Mr. Williams, may I know who are you aiming to execute in the terrace yesterday’, the police commanded me. ‘Steve’, I have to admit ‘Its steve my friend and I cant explain you why I am doing this’, I cant think much. ‘Mr. Williams, there is no person called Steve in there. Infact, there is no person called with name Steve in our database with the description you mentioned’

‘What ????’, I guess I don’t want to think any more on this crap. I need to get back. I need to wake up. I spotted the police gun in their pouch unlocked. I jumped across the table and grabbed the gun then aimed at him. As I wanted, I am late, I am too late to shoot him, I was shot by the guards and I uttered, ‘THANK YOU’.

Chapter 2

It was more a night mare than a dream. I got up, throwed the head band off and quickly called jack ‘Dude I cant reach Steve’….. ‘ Ya, I know’…. ‘Yes, I tried to use the gun, by the way why are these police confusing me telling there is no Steve. Are they projections or real people from Server security ?’…. ‘Whatever’

‘Honey, you ok ?’, My wife touched my shoulder as I was about to hangup.

‘Oh yes darling, just talking to Jack’, I feel like I am in hangover. ‘What ? Jack ? The one used to work with you in the labs ?’, she yelled in mysterious tone. ‘What you mean ‘used to’ aye ? He is still my colleague. Now go and get some break fast ready’, I pushed her aside and went to shower.

Oops. I forgot my towel. I got back to my room to pick up my towel and just happened to hear my wife talking on phone.

Next morning, St. Jones General Hospital.

‘Mr. Williams, I understand you are working on a high tech science projects on dream research and developing gadgets based on that. I also understand the job you are doing is most demanding and there fore the govt. suggested you for the 3 month rehab program to use your intelligence best for the project. I would appreciate if you could co operate with us’

‘Oh sure, I don’t think I have a choice’, I knew there is something freaky, its my wife initiated it, I know, what it could be ? I have to be patient, I already fixed the mic in my wife’s pocket. Only to know whats happening around me.

‘That’s perfect Mr. Williams, Now give us few minutes while I have to discuss with your wife alone on the procedures and formalities’

‘Fine, I will wait in my ward’, I answered politely and rushed to ward.

‘Doctor, what is happening with my husband ? Whom is he talking to on phone when Jack died due to heart attack few weeks ago and who is this Steve ?’, I can hear my wifes voice loud and clear. I am still in a shock. Why is she asking such questions ?

‘Mrs. Williams, I am afraid your husband is suffering from Schizoprenia where people still think and behave with the people who doesn’t exists, this may be as they can not tolerate the disappearance and their mind can not accept the fact’, What ???? I couldn’t believe why is every one insane ??? I finished hearing the conversation and hidden the headphones in the jack inside the toilet room.

What the hell is happening ? Why the hell the police in my dream mentioned there is no Steve ? Why the f**k every one says Jack is dead too ? I am some schizophrenic f**k !!! What is this ? Is this the real world ? or AM I STILL IN DREAM ?

Chapter 3

The Hindu

Delhi, 20 May 2011
Scientist Dr. Williams, a British-Indian from MIT found dead in his labs yesterday with out any signs of wound. It is known that Mr. Williams and his team were working on the research on Dreams for past 2 years along with scientist from all parts of India. Also, Dr. Williams’s colleague Dr. Jackson was found dead in similar way few months ago in the lab. The opposition party claims that the Indian government should now seriously consider to stop supporting this project only to find more scientists lose their life mysteriously for a project with no much meaning compared to other social problems the country facing at the moment.

Plant an idea, Excuse me !?!?!?

2010-07-23T06:23:00.003+05:30

In short, in Gajini Asin Style,

First 15 mins, why the hell I came to this movie
Next 15 mins, not a bad idea
Rest of the movie, this is the movie to watch

Inception (an event which is the beginning) is a masterpiece taken trusting the intelligence of the viewers. De caprio’s brilliant work is overtaken by the amazing story, screenplay and direction by Nolan. The courage of Warner Bros is to be appreciated as well for trusting in the concept.

For readers who haven’t watched the movie yet, don’t worry, I wont be the show spoiler here. You can continue reading ; )

All the time the only thing human can not steal was your thoughts now, its not any more atleast for Hollywood. While Matrix got its success mainly through those stunning visuals, Inception outscored’em by the thought process taken for the movie itself. I am personally happy seeing this movie as this answered many of my questions about the dream.

- Your dream is much slower than your actual time of dreaming.

- When you die in your dream, you wake up

- When you are splashed with objects like water, you feel that in your dream too

- Some times you realize in your dream that you are dreaming

Some of those I found weird in the movie but not in my dream are

- I can never run in my dream as in real life

- Things are not heavy in dream as in real life

- When ever I drive car in dream, I can not apply breaks, the care keeps going

May be, I failed to understand the point in movie. Doesn’t matter !!!!

Just like Matrix, Inception triggered lots of arguments, disagreements which for me is the ultimate success of the movie. What happened at the end of movie, what is the whole thing about ? is still a question in many people mind and am sure Nolan’s head should be the most priceless living possession at the moment.

If you have seen the movie already, here is the link that makes you think further…. Do you believe its possible that Mal never died in the whole movie ?

http://insidemovies.moviefone.com/2010/07/19/inception-ending-theories/

My Verdict : Brilliant thinking combined with Mind blowing Visuals 9.8/10

Ok.. Tamil Friends, here are some of the movie names if our Tamil stars act for the Inception Remake in Tamil : )

Dr. Rajasekar : Kanava iruntha Enakenna

Superstar : Kanna ithu Kanavu

S J Suriya : Kanavellam Kanaga (or) Kanda Kanda Kanavugal

Parthiban : Kanavu Kirukkan

Dr. Vijay : MGR Kanavugal

Danush : Athu oru Kana Kaalam : Part II

Gowtham Menon : Kanavil irunthu Kalaivaya

Ennathaan Inception vanthaalum, namma Vijay TV’s Kana Kaanum Kalangal is the best for dreams to cherish ; )

Travel : A must possess hobby (passion, rather !!!)

2010-07-14T07:59:00.006+05:30

The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.
~St. Augustine

How in the world I missed this favorite topic of mine, ‘Travel’. You may call it Trekking, vacation, break, de stress, fun, activity, etc… Zeros in to one term called Travel. I am always proud to be a travel freak and make it a point to travel to any new place frequently. The thrill of awaiting whats in store, the fun of experiencing the new culture/food, the pleasant pain of planning & packing for a trip, the anticipation to the trip itself all making it the most intresting hobby of mine (I guess for anyone in that matter)

You never realize you like those tiny things that you enjoy when you travelling

- Food/Munchies when ever you have a train travel in India, samosa, cutlet yummy
- Listening to Ilayaraja when you are on long drive and ARR in your ipod when you are in bus/coach/car as passenger
- Anticipating a killer quick meal on flight journey
- The confusion in airports like finding boarding desk, get the taxi q or finding the stranger waiting to meet you
- The shopping in Airport in duty free area
- The long chats when you travel with the gang forgetting the deadlines at work
- Reading favorite books while on flight or watching a movie u never watched but wanted to watch
- Sleeping out of tiredness cramping yourself in those not-so-spacious seats

Travelers are many types and here are my favorite types I myself experienced and looking forward for more in future too

Trekking : This is my favorite, I love to trek though I am not so physically fit to face any sort of trekking, I still love it for the sake of exploring, photography and finally to reach the end point of any trek and any food there after is heaven : )

Unplanned travel : Experience only very few times but the unplanned ones are the most memorable travels I had in my life. How can I forget the unplanned freak out to charmadi hills in Karnataka (specially after realizing it’s a dangerous forest and not recommended one)

Resort break : Resorts are the ones I prefer instead hotels when visiting a tourist destination and specially beaches. Mauritius is my favorite till date to enjoy resort stay. However, I am still waiting for an impressive resort to stay in hills at 10 degree or lesser

Package trip : For me, it’s a boring way of travelling. However, when you are with family, you will prefer this for the ease of co ordination. If you wanna spend time having fun with family instead planning, go for package and enjoy the rest.

Long Drive : I just love it. Nothing beats a road trip but quiet filled with inconvenience like cramping yourself in a car for long hours, continuous driving, fight sleep etc… I always love to drive long and Chennai-Banglore drives are till date favorites.

Moving on, my plan was to visit atleast one new place/country a year and here are some of them to achieve in next few years

- Thailand (beaches beaches beaches)
- Taj Mahal, India (Shame, never been there being an Indian and this is my next plan)
- Angkor Watt, Combodia (the worlds largest Hindu temple)
- Mount Kinabalu, Malaysia (the 3 days mountain trek to ecstacy)
- Great Wall of China (the long walk in the cold weather)
- Disney land, HK (once my son is grown enuf to enjoy)
- Langkawi, Malaysia (so waiting for the beach break)
- Annapurna range, Nepal (the swizz of east)
- South Africa (forest, safari, food)

Hmm… I don’t think I can finish this list any sooner ; ) Watchout for this space for updates once I accomplish each mission : )

The New Godfather : Unleashed !!!

2010-06-10T05:54:00.010+05:30

Here is the new Godfather in town ive met last week in a granad occassion. He was all style, substance and oohhh scary too :)

‘Do you spend time with your family? Good, beacuse a man that doesn't spend time with his family can never be a real man.’

'If anything in this life is certain, if history has taught us anything, it is that you can kill anyone'

'It's an old habit. I spent my whole life trying not to be careless. Women and children can afford to be careless, but not men'

We're both part of the same hypocrisy, senator, but never think it applies to my family.

Do me this favor. I won't forget it. Ask your friends in the neighborhood about me. They'll tell you I know how to return a favor.

Save your anger... save it. Until you are old enough... and the time is right... then you shall take your revenge.

Only don't tell me you're innocent. Because it insults my intelligence and makes me very angry’

I'll make you an offer you can't refuse

***

Ulu Ulu !!!

2010-05-21T20:38:00.014+05:30

Few things that your heart craves for when you are so stressed out at work

- drizzle splashing on ya face straight from heaven with cold breeze
- riding high speed boat on a river with only jungle surrounded
- eat eat eat a lot in the jungle
- enjoy standing on top of the mountain with the serene view of valleys around

It was a more than expected joy trip last weekend arranged by my company to a totally untouched and unspoiled natural ecstasy in Brunei. Here is the travelogue for your information and pleasure.

Started late afternoon from the small town of Seria (where we living at the moment) and we (40 ppl) met at the Empire (7 Star) hotel in the capital Bandar . That’s our first transport out of 5 stop overs.

We parked the car in hotel and hopped over the bus arranged for us to take us to the Kampong Ayer (River Village). Its my first time ever going beyond the airport in Bandar. The view of the river village was a first time for me. The place is called as venice of East as it has the similar setup but Asian way. So the bus was our second transport to reach the river bank.

Few quick clicks here and there to cherish and then jumped in to the water taxi that can carry 20 ppl at a time and cruise through the river at highest speed possible. We slowly dimmed away from city outlook to travel-in-the-middle of jungle feel with only trees and plants on either side… click click click The ride was around 45 mins long and the sky started to open up slowly with the marshalling rain drop soldiers. That’s our 3rd transport which is from Kampong Ayer to Temburong town.

The heavens opened up completely now once we reached the Temburong town jetty. Now, that’s a proper village and very much pleasant sight. We hopped in to another bus (our 4th transport) from the river bank to another jungle river bank. Now, the planz to split in to groups of 5 each and take these adventurous looking long boats (the 5th and final transport) This was the highlight of the trip as it’s the open top boat and cruising up the hill against the river stream all perfect for my clicks.

The Resort is all bliss along the river bank after another 40 mins ride where no other means of transport is possible to reach there. Since we are 40 ppl, we completely occupied all the suites in the resort. The resort had cinema, pool, lovely lounge with karaoke facilities etc. The evening was leisure like singing, playing, swimming etc. The next morning we got up at 4.30 AM for the sunrise trek to the top of the hill. Being Trek lover, I enjoyed each step to the hill encountering hanging bridges, steep rocks and stairs as well.. sweated ridiculously due to the atrocious humidity. However, the hill top was a colder and all worth sweating for.

Klaus and me were partners for the final canopy walk on top of the hill. Getting in to the construction as the last 2 to enjoy more sun light that uncovered mist partly to give us the sight we waited all long for.

Later, we walked back down and its not tough to guess the amount of breakfast I swallowed once we reach the restaurant back. Amazing food and still digesting it ;) After food was few more photo shoot sessions with in us. Then, jumped in to the river for water rafting, kayaking and free swim. The current of the river is far heavier than I thought. I tried this violent attempt to cross the banks but it was the toughest swim I ever made. Here is the the map of my mini adventure.

Then, we went to a water falls near by. Ive been to atleast 1 million falls in India but the unique thing about this one is I wasn’t wearing my crocs so I have to walk bare foot over the stones and rocks to reach the falls. Another lovely experience was the fishes right under the falls. They all are Dr. Fishes which jus attacks your leg as a gang and eat all the dead cells out of ya.. All tickling was fun to watch every one laughing madly with out bothering about any embarrassment : )

As conventionally said, the rest is history ; ) The photography as usual updated in my facebook/orkut. Shame, I couldn’t get my family in such a serene outing

Tweeting Spree !!!

2010-05-06T13:24:00.001+05:30

I was always worried I couldn’t spend time on blogging due to the busy life am hogged in at the moment. I was observing my friends new found micro blogging revolution called TWITTER… I wasn’t so fascinated initially as I thought am blogging anyway and waz the point in micro blogging …

After few months, eventually, I signed up for a new twitter account and started cracking… initially was a bit funny but later got excited to follow some of the celebrities like yuvraj singh, sachin tendulkar, lalit modi, hrithik roshan, Mahesh babu etc… Feels great to see words hand typed straight from them…

As far as me tweeting is concerned, I feel it a sort of quick scribble diary… I always wonder how can I blog if I want to give a quick sentence like quick movie review, songs review, sports anticipation, wat am thinking etc., etc., Twitter is quiet handy…. Also, a sort of stress reliever for me…

And finally, here is my twitter link and will b happy to see any of u guys over there…

http://twitter.com/aravindhindia

long live the new communication entity : )

Port of Glamour !!!

2010-04-25T19:53:00.010+05:30

Back again after a stressfull month. I gotto fly frequently for all these 6 months (work/personal Demand)... Last weekend i was carrying my dude (Nikon D90) with me and thought i should definetly capture this pleasant thing which always nagged me in Terminal 2 of Changi Singapore Airport.

I was amazed by the point perfect maintanance these guys do for every corner in the airport. There are quiet a few airports in the world which makes the stay more pleasant and extremely comfortable but Singapore always tops my best rankings. Here are the visual spleandours combined with the same redundant imagination of mine :)

You can check all these pictures with better clarity either in my orkut or facebook :)

I am all evil taking pics at airport instead sitting worried and talking to my family. Thanks to them for still being kind enough to shower the love as they always do inspite of my 'What to say' :(

I wont miss you Changi ( and my family ofcourse) !!!!

Bomb Shell Brunei

2010-04-03T18:32:00.011+05:30

Quiet long time in this space (will i ever stop saying that..!!) I am in a fascinating land of nature called as Brunei. Here are some first hand information about Brunei before i move on....

- Incase if you got it wrong, Brunei is not a middle east country. It is very much is South East Asia next to East Malaysia in the Borneo land.

- The land is roughly 8 times bigger than Singapore. However, not even half of Singapore population is. You can imagine how beautiful the place will be.

- For people like me tired watching concrete jungles, Brunei is a welcome relief as the houses are well spaced and independent. The streets are still clean, the country over all is quiet safe and deftly nice place to live with family for a while but not much malls or hang outs like in Singapore

Here we go, this morning ive been on trekking with around a dozen of my work mates and it is sure a topic for me to scribble on... I have not been trekking for a while and i wasnt sure if i will be fit enough but it was a testing time for all the 3 hours when am climbing the mountain

The place was all nothing but pleasant in early morning with cold breeze and the climate is wet. Its quiet close to the airport in the capital city and the mountain stays as a perfect place for quick trekkers staying around.

We begun our walk around 8.15 am and it was not scary at all until we reached this steep path to climb mountain. We started feeling the heat gradually as sun rising.

We worked out hard to reach half way point and i was wondering should i really go. Man some points in life where you really feel like getting older and this is one good benchmark. Specially when you are with a group of young and strong dudes who feels working out is part of their everyday life.

The view points are quiet fabulous. I even felt its better than few i visited in Singapore like Sungei buloh, Pulau ubin. However, nothing can beat McRitchie reservoir in Singapore for the long lovely trail circumfrencing the reservoir.

The Empire hotel view from one of the view points really made me feel worth struggling :) I love this place so much. I should stay in the hotel for atleast a night for the sake of the lovely beach view atleast.

And finally, the group ive been with is just amazing. I am the newest addition and found excited to see quiet a few photgraphy enthusiasts too. Shame, i didnt carry my Nikkon D90 from Singapore and therefore i am forced to snatch these pics from other dudes camera.

Yet another Bunch

2010-03-05T13:02:00.015+05:30

Its been all tired run last weekend and had a chance to click the unclicked part of Singapore with my mate visited me from Banglore.... Here is the exhibition....

Mysterical Underwater World:

The above one is taken in the underwater world and i couldnt recall the name of this creature... Looks like the grandad of aliens just out of an UFO.

The Show is just about to begin: (Sentosa)

Sales Team on a break : (Sentosa)

The Bubble Jump : (Sentosa, Opp. Butterfly park)

Try and Freeze my wings : (Butterfly park, Sentosa)

2 Weeks are 2 Short 2 Live:

Who am i : (Unknown plant in Pulau Ubin)

What lies beneath : (Aimless trekkers in Pulau Ubin)

Miles to go.. Miles to go... : (On the way back from Pulau ubin Island)

H2O in Detail : (On the ocean outside Pulau Ubin)

Don’t you compare

2010-02-25T15:21:00.003+05:30

If you were doing any Sin yesterday (Feb 24, 2010) Don’t worry. You won’t be punished. God was busy watching Sachin making a world record.

A truly awesome moment to see that its Indian (once again) making history with the bat. I felt happier than when I saw Yuvraj Singh made six sixes in a single over.. a bit more exciting than watching Sehwag scoring 300 at will in tests… Equally delightful as India won the inaugural T20 world cup….

200 was always never easy and you gotto watch how he made it look like a walk in the park… The next immediate sentence I saw in many sites are ‘Anwars 194 was a better one given the toughness to reach that score in those cricketing era were team reaching 300 is literally winning score’…. A 100% stupid statement….

Anwar is a good batsman. No Offence but comparing a mole to mountain’s achievement is so absurd. Here is the comparison thingy to underline the flawless achievement made yesterday.

Anwar got a runner in 19th over and the team score is around 320. Means, after 20th over Anwar’s concentration was only to hit and stay cool with out bothering much about anything else happens. Tendulkar played whole 50 overs running for himself and for others took teams total to 400 and tendulkar did it at an age where many of them watching the match with their grand kids (exhaturated out of frusturation ) ; )

Anwar was lucky with 3 drop catches. Tendulkar showed the youngsters how to bat with out giving a chance.

Anwar scored against a below par Indian bowling attack with bowlers like joshi, kuruvilla, Prasad and co. Tendulkar scored against bowling machines like Steyn, Parnell, Langeveldt and co.

Apart from the 194, Anwar never scored above 150 in any other match. The master blaster got 5 already under his belt and still more to come.

If I gotto be unbiased with the comparison I can give credit to Anwar as he scored this in the away pitch. Still, Chennai crowd is known for supporting good game unlike eden gardens known for crazy about Indian win. So, I don’t see a big credit factor.

The verdict is ‘Though Sachin is known for his keen eye to personal records attitude, it always served the purpose of lifting the nations image in international arena and therefore like any other Cricket mad Indian, I am happy that the first 200 in this format is achieved by the one who exactly deserve than any other cricketer in the world.’

The upcoming special moments will be fifty 100s in test, fifty 100s in ODI and eventually hundred 100s in International cricketing career.

Back to Reading ways… ; )

2010-02-19T15:31:00.003+05:30

Firstly, don’t be puzzled with the title of the post. The reading here has nothing related to studies or exams or anything that a typical Subcontinent dude can think as ‘Sensible’… The reading here describes the pure passion of admiring the authors skills in terms of innovation, narration, description, style, imagination etc. I was so admired by many people here in Singapore who gives good preference to reading especially in trains… I thought why not….

I started off reading few books like world is flat, the earth is my butt, the 2 states and now the most recent one was the Namesake by Jumpa lahiri.. This particular book Namesake is too good in its own merit. Firstly, the author an American-indian even though sticks to American vocabulary, used a lovely narration that makes a reader to feel the protagonist’s pain all over. Another highlight is that this is the only time I have studied a book and watched the movie made of the same book entirely. I must confess, the stupid thing I have done by watching the movie and I guess any book reader will agree that a movie can never match the book when it comes to same story. The obvious reason being the imagination of the reader is more vivid than a movie watcher. When you read you can imagine the characters, places, events as the power and versality of your imagination takes. However, when you watch, the imagination is all limited to the visuals you got infront and that makes you dumb at times….

The Namesake is the story of an Indian family migrated to USA and the transition between these 2 worlds starting from 1980s through the eyes of weirdly named boy called Gogol. The typical Indian parents, the American culture the son grows in, the weird name, life-of-uncertainty every thing grips up the story and gives enough fuel to the author to entertain the readers and make them immersed in emotions. I also felt its important and suggest this to any first generation immigrant parents to any country outside india. Probably, this book gives the insight of what the kids may feel when they grown with a Indian family in a non-indian surrounding.

As the movie is concerned, it’s a big let down and no wonder it’s a flop inspite of having the all classic star cast in the movie. I understand you can not fill everything in 1.5 hours time but may be as I read the book, felt the movie is super fast and skipped important events covered in the book.

As a whole, The Namesake is must to read and better not to watch.

A ‘One in Thousand’ Indeed …

2010-01-28T14:26:00.004+05:30

Ok. I thought I wont but I some how need to share my review on the recently released ‘Ayirathil Oruvan’ which attracted super extreme reviews on either side of the scale from -10 to +10. Selva ragavan always have a good respect in my classic directors list. His Kadhal Kondein and 7G Rainbow Colony is still on my favorites and selvas best ever. So, naturally, I was hoping a good show.

A lovely treat until the end of first half. A sense of Deja-vu prevailed in my mind as when I had equal feeling of thumbs-up and oh-f***k factors blipping until the end forming a perfect sine curve repeatedly for every 10 minutes for the entire second half. Rather getting admired for all good things about the movie, I was desperate to clear my confusions on the history and facts. How big were chozha dynasty? How big were the pandiyas? Why the hell is the tamil so ancient ? How old is Tamil itself ? etc etc etc…..

Firstly, let me share my research outcomes before analyzing the movie. The Chozhas were one of the huge empire that spanned across south east asia from South india, Srilanka, Andaman, Malay Archipelago, Vietnam etc.. Their periods were way back like 1000 years ago. From what I have researched, they were shrewd kingdom interms of expanding the boundaries and showed no mercy to other kings when it comes to capture the lands. However, they were pioneers in fine tuning the life style of the chozha period and shapped up the art, crafts, tradition, culture, architecture of what is presently called as South India. Pandiyas were native South Indians who ruled with Madurai as the base. They are equally talented in terms of arts and literature where Chozhas had ther base in Tanjavoor.

Till date, the cities Tanjavur & Madurai are famous for Architectural wonders and Tamil Scholars. This intresting fact interested me to know my blood too. Just was so curious to know if I belong Karthi gang or Reema Sen gang in the movie ;) and ironically, with the information I got, I am mix of both.. My dad and his family totally belonged to trichy (Ruled by Naickars from Pandiya kingdom) and my mom’s are from Tanjore (Chozhas regime) and so I am a confused end node blogging some were in sout east asia belongs to the trail of chozhas (I might be sick with accuracy of my scribblings here but u can still vaguely trust me)

Next, on the language Tamil, First thing I wanted to clear off is that Sanskrit and Tamil have no relation to each other. Sanskrit is mother of European languages and many Indian languages, but Tamil is not in that 'Indian' languages list derived from Sanskrit. You can confirm this from the following link (a research report by auroville language labs)

http://www.aurovillelanguagelab.org/Research/A%20Comparison%20of%20Tamil%20and%20Sanskrit.htm

However, Chozhas considered both Sanskrit and Tamil equally giving equal respect. Infact the best scholars in their era were equally good in both languages. Needless to mention, both these languages are part of the worlds oldest classical languages sharing the status with Arabic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin Etc. The modern tamil (when I say modern tamil, this is considered as tamil spoken in Barthiyars period which is like 50 years ago) borrowed lots of words from Sanskrit and thus confuses many to the statement ‘Tamil is derived from Sanskrit’

The spoken tamil used by chozha gang in the movie is absolutely pure with no Sanskrit words mixed and when I researched further was amazed to see both these languages existed way before 5000 BC. Ironically, Sanskrit is not spoken since few decades back during the British rule. However, you can see there are still some similar words shared between these 2 languages from way back and the explanation quoted was very much understandable. In the age old period, the languages are made from the sounds. For eg, amma (means mother in tamil) formed as many animals (including human the 6 sensed animal) cries the same word and you shouldn’t be wondering why some other language is using a similar word.

Getting back to the movie, Selva spent quiet some time in researching the history in South and scripting a lovely follow up from the uncertainty the history has put, ‘A part of Chozha gang detached from Tanjavore and hiding some were’. An innovative script from Selva but its not convincing to see too much blood and vulgarity jus coz the story plot requires some dark reality. For me, this is one big movie I will never recommend to Indian women or children for their tender heart… Karthi is making us think that this is his 100th movie or something with his flamboyant expressions and cool-dude dialogue deliveries. However, he could have avoided the paruthiveeran influence by changing his look up and tamil accent. 'Atho antha paravi pola' remix is pleasant to ears.

Reema sen is the center of attraction with her out of the box characterization…. Graphics are pathetic.. I know good graphics demands more money but for Selva’s talent along with super good actors, he should have kept graphics to minimum and spent the resource/time/money on screen play… Though gladiator scene suited for the story, the graphics doest impress… The highlight of the movie which I never seen in any other was the exact Tamil they used for Chozha gang… Remember, tamil like few Indian languages is entirely contrasting when it comes to written and spoken…. I guess the black and white tamil movies created an incorrect image that the spoken tamil is same as the written tamil in olden days and this movie created a shock when we saw the spoken tamil is completely different in olden days and it is still so pure…

In summary, AO may not be for masses but surely a brave attempt to take the Tamil cinema to next level. Had the blood spill, vulgarity and length of the movie reduced, would have attracted all sections of audience.

In an attempt to prosper !!!

2010-01-16T08:46:00.009+05:30

Hey all... I have come across a writing contest where i need to script a short story on families... The topic is prettry dry though and i am not much of a family writer too and creating a fiction on this is even more challenging.... However, i wanted to give a go trusting my narrating abilities....

Moving on, this contest is mostly driven by taking the votes of readers (you guys)... With all due respect to your busy time, i kept the book short to just 6 pages. Request your 45 mins time to complete the whole process...

If you got the needed 45 mins, Here is what you need to do ...

Click the promo banner at the top or follow the link here.
Please register yourself to the site as a reader as your vote needs to be casted after you read the book.
Please spend enough time to read the book as i trusted your 30 mins to script the whole narration.
Please cast your vote only if you think i deserve.

I am not being too ambitious to win a prize in this contest. Instead, i need the feed back from my near and dears like you so please free feel to comment and preferably honest ones. :)

Good luck me !!!

The Chetan Chronicles

2010-01-08T13:19:00.001+05:30

A Lovely end to the year of 2009 with the awesome movie that made a record collection. Its ‘3 Idiots’ infact 3 smart idiots who stole the weekend of many Indians at the moment all around the world. I was always an ardent fan of the perfectionist called Ameer Khan.. even though my love for his movies only started after ‘Lagaan’ and continued with Dil chahtha hai, Tare Zameen Par etc… Sometimes, as a person I am a bit disappointed with controversial activities which is more of degrading himself to a person of his caliber… It is understandable that You can not be a 99% perfect human or a Rajnikanth…. To be most popular and equally modest…. ; )

The other person who is in line to lose the respect is the India’s best selling author Chetan Bagath…. I always cherished every moment reading his books… I so far have managed to read all his 4 books which is a big achievement for myself for my poor reading standards…. I mananged to see the movie ‘3 idiots’ on the ultimate day of 2009 with my mates here after hearing its adapted from his first and famous book ‘five point some one’… I was waiting to watch the movie longtime as I can imagine the quality work if giants like ameer, raju hirani and the book of Chetan combines….

No doubt, the movie is absolute spot on with the racy screenplay, pleasant college atmosphere, peppy music and ameer khan above all…. One thing I find wicked with Indian movies for a long long time …. In 1960’s ace actor MGR used to just paste a moustache or a mole to change his look up… In 2009, madhavan did nothing but just shaved his mush and changed the hairstyle to show his 10 years back flashback in his college days…. Watch ‘Curious case of Benjamin button’, you can see same Brad pitt taken in atleast 5-8 get ups ranging ages from 10-60 and you cant guess if he is Brad pitt or some other actor…. I am only being a rude critic here inspite of the movie’s (3 idiots) subject is the theme & screenplay but not make ups… He He He !!! (Manufacturing defect)

The biggest and only let down in the movie is the super hero image of Ameer khan which he got himself… Here are the reasons

- Don’t even think u can get away by being a wise crack and give a shock to your College senior’s private part and get away with your rest of the life in college. Unless you don’t have a private part…. Boss, in ragging, its seniors who should rule anywhere in India…. Wat happened in movie is just a mild version of heroism which doesn’t insults viewers intelligence…. Thaz all

- Going and doing what your heart says is a great thing that Indians are missing.. I agree, but imagine if you are pathetic with your photographic skills and what if you lose your studies and career on your pursuit of being a great photographer with out possessing even a beginner skills…. For me, there is a thick line of difference between talented and interested… Ideally, madhavan should have taken up the job and tried his luck with photography instead dumping up his career right from the beginning… I wouldn’t agree he cant be intrsted in studies otherwise he cant pass through engineering….non-practical end for maddy here

- Don’t assume if you are 100% honest in your job interview you can crack on anything… specially when you have attitude problem…. How many of us will dare to try that…. Its seriously not practical…

- Rancho (Aameer) can possibly do anything in this movie… he is just a super man…. Given a choice any tom dick and harry would love to be a Rancho… but I can bet my pay on the fact that its tough to spot even 1 in 1000 with a character like that…. Its not practical again….

- The professor is such a hypothetical character…. I know there are lots of weird psychic professors in india but not mad enough to pressure a student to suicide level and still not correcting himself…. He is a human being after all…

The major reason for the movie’s success is Rancho’s super hero image, intelligent but a comedian professor, the extra talented friends but suppress ther talent only to project protagonist’s image, the locations and more importantly the engineering jokes used all over the movie…. Sure Raju Hirani is genius…. But I loved his Munnabhai series better insense of blending message with light hearted fun…..

Alright… my point of the post is different… I am not sure why Chetan Bhagath degrade himself claiming the credits/royalty/whatever from the makers of 3 Idiots when his book (Five point some one) is far better classic than the movie… I guess he disappointed his fans by his act of even responding or creating the controversy that sprunged up as a rift between Chetan and Raju Hirani…. Chetan never used the above mentioned let down reasons in his book as his book was far more realistic considering the backdrop of an IIT institute…

My feed back of the movie is, an awesome entertainer for a common man…. For Chetan Bagath’s fans, don’t try to compare the movie with book and take sides… they both are different at their own merits….

For those confused people who are fan of Raju Hirani, Amir khan and Chetan Bagath, Jus add another post to your blog and confuse readers too…. !!!

பயோ டேட்டா

2009-12-22T12:09:00.017+05:30

குமுதமா இல்லை குங்குமமானு தெரியல ஆனா எனக்கு இந்த பயோ டேட்டா பகுதி ரொம்பவே புடிக்கும். நானும் அது மாறி முயற்சி பணலம்னு இத எழுதறேன்.

என்னை பத்தி நானே .... படிங்கோ படிங்கோ !!!

பெயர் : பிறந்த போது அரவிந்த் ( இப்ப மட்டும் நீ என்ன மைகேல் ஜாக்சன் நெனப்பானு நீங்க கேக்கறது தெரியுது )

வயது : காலேஜ் பசங்க மச்சின்னு கூப்டலாம்... ஆனா எதிர் வீடு பய்யன் UNCLEனு கூப்டறான் .....

குடும்பம் : இப்போதைக்கு முக்கோணம் (நாம் இருவர் நமக்கு ஒருவர்)

வசிக்கும் நாடு : மதுரைக்கு இணையாக தமிழ் போற்றும், சிங்கப்பூர்

உத்தியோகம் : பெருமையா சொல்லிக்கற அளவுக்கு தமிழ் வாத்தியாரும் இல்லை... கௌரவமா சொல்லிக்கற அளவு விவசாயமும் இல்லை.... எதோ கம்ப்யூட்டர் கூட இபோதைக்கு காலத்த ஓட்டறேன்.

படிப்பு : தமிழ்ல்ல பிடிக்காத வார்த்தை
ஹர்ட் வொர்க் : இங்கிலிஷ்ல பிடிக்காத வார்த்தை
வெட்டி அரட்டை : எல்லா மொழியிலயும் புடிச்ச வார்த்தை ( ஹி ஹி எப்புடி Rhymingu)

உயரம் : சத்யராஜ் விட கூட

எடை : நமீதா விட கம்மி (எப்புடி)

பொழுது போக்கு : புகை படம் எடுப்பது, ப்ளாக் எழுதுவது, படம் (கேவலமா இருந்தாலும் ) பாப்பது, எதுக்கு போறோம் எங்க போறோம்ன்னு தெரியாம காட்ல அலையறது (Trekking எப்படி தமிழ்ல்ல விளக்கறதுனு தெர்லபா ), நீச்சல், Kayaking

விளையாடுவது : டென்னிஸ், கிரிக்கெட், ச்நூகர்,

சமீபத்திய சந்தோசம் : சிங்கப்பூர், அச்யுத்

நீண்ட நாள் சந்தோசம் : தமிழ் பற்றோட இருக்கறது

சிறந்த மனிதர்கள் : பகுத்தறிவு பாராட்டிய ஈ.வே.ரா, அன்னை தெரேசா, ரஜினிகாந்த், இந்திய ராணுவ சிப்பாய்கள் (தயவு செய்து இதுல கேப்டன் சேத்துடாதீங்க !!!)

தமிழனின் பெருமை : 'ஆஸ்கார்' ரஹ்மான், படிக்காத மேதை காமராஜர், அப்துல் கலாம், திருவள்ளுவர்

கடவுளை பத்தி : பாராட்ட பட வேண்டிய நம்பிக்கை

வெறுப்பது : இன/ஜாதி வெறி, Dictatorship (இதுக்கு தமிழ்ல என்னனு தெர்ல), அறிவுரை சொல்றேன்னு ஒரு மணி நேரம் மொக்கை போடறவங்க, திறமையை தொலைச்சிட்டு திமிர் மட்டுமே வச்சுகிட்டு அலையற 'இளைய' தளபதிகளும் 'தம்மா துண்டு' சூப்பர் ஸ்டார்களும் ... இன்னும் நெறைய ...

மறுக்கா மறுக்கா பாக்கற தமிழ் படங்கள் : அன்பே சிவம், அந்நியன், பாட்ஷா, நாயகன், கர்ணன், தமிழன், மற்றும் பல ...

ரசிச்சி செய்றது : வேலை நெறைய இருக்கும் போது ப்ளாக் எழுதறது, பொதுவான எதிரியபத்தி ( வேற யாரு மேனேஜர் தான்) தோஸ்த் கிட்ட திட்டி தீக்கறது, அடுத்த வருஷம் எங்க ஊர் சுத்தலாம்னு இப்பவே திட்டம் போடறது...

இதுக்கு மேல எழுத முடியல .... இதுக்கே கண்ணா கட்டுது .... பிழையை பொறுத்து படிச்சதுக்கு

நன்றி நன்றி நன்றி !!!

Sing Facts !!!

2009-12-01T14:15:00.005+05:30

Being too long in Singapore for a quick adaptor ;) I found this country too perfect to suit my style but with numerous weird/funny/giggling/crazy stuffs around the country drives me mad at times… Here are intrestng notes on Singapore…. This might be usefull for anyone getting here for short/long term stay….

Law : The law is here is by par one of the most strictly followed in the world.. Not jus major crimes but even tiny bits…. Isnt that sounds funny that if you don’t flush your toilet in the public place, you pay 500$ provided you get caught… Now where the hell is the CCTV cameras hidden ??? Other wierdos like you cant possess or sell a chewing gum, no littering, no jay walking (crossing roads with out signals) etc… Caning is most common punishment for any above average crimes (like pick pockets, loan sharks etc..)…. Remember Captains words ‘Thandanaigal kadumai aakinaal thaan kutrangal kurayum’ ; )

Tourist attractions : No way …. I am totally blanked out checking out cool places for tourists… The word cool has no meaning in hot and humid Singapore… for tourists, on my personal opinion, birds park is ok for its shows and well maintained outlook… Sentosa is a good change…. Nothing else is worth for an outsider travelling all the way to jus tour around…. Shopping should be attractive here but again not worth travelling all the way… may be one can have this as add on if they decide to tour around Malaysia... for me, Malaysia is a better tourist destination… but deftly not for living/safety standards etc…

Cost of living : Deftly not cheap at all… Still more than 50% of the population survives under 2500$ per month income… even though the economic balance is not as worst as india suffers, the cost of living is still a bit high for the 50% population…. However, the tax and cpf here are attractive enough to keep the dudes entertained as long as they live here…

Life style : Many are cruising towards the western way of living.. however, found many families still would like to stick with the conservative living with all the needed harmony to mingle with other races too… truly Singapore !!! if you plan to develop your career path as a gangster, dada to Don.. .you better be ready to P***S on your pants… sooner or later, the govt. will find you out to make u an offer that you cant refuse ; )

Activities : Now, this is the 2nd best part (did I told safety is the first) I like about Singapore… Cricket, Badmitton, Tennis, Kayaking, Trekking, Hiking, etc… you jus name It and I will show a place with in easy reach from your home in Singpore…

Transport : well connected Train network (ofcourse no match for the complexity of Indian railway network) and buses juggling, you will never be puzzled…. The taxis might be a bit expensive but strictly/accurately metered fare is something to cherish…

Hang outs : Pubs and dance floors are cheesy here (from what I heard) may b I am not intrsted any more… but bowling and snooker are my favourites (not getting time these days) … mostly get myself into Indian movies (in GV/Rex/Cathay/Jade cinemas) which u can spot in 2/3 km radius anywhere…

As a whole, the comfort of living in Singapore is subjective to the individual’s needs and intrests (any where in the world for that matter)… bear in mind, the hot & humid climate most of the year and strict laws sometimes p**s u off…

The Godfather of many movies !!!

2009-11-23T14:01:00.003+05:30

Thanks to god for making me watch this movie before I die… I know I am over exhaturating but cant help avoid this sentence… No wonder ‘The Godfather’ is preserved in Americas top 100 movies ever made list…. I was having not much intrest to see this movie as am not a big lover of black & whites and specially b&w classics….. But my mate wanted to watch it so badly and I was surprised… So last Friday after office, we got this DVD of Godfather I and watched the same night… I slowly got in to it and totally enjoyed the whole 3 hours of watching an amazing piece of classic made in 1970s….

The plot is very much orthodox for the modern days… but, this is the father of all gangster movies ever made…. The story is simple… a person who doesnt really belong to the land originally, had immigrated, then become a don for reasons and established an empire…. The screenplay is what to be noticed and my favourites all were the amazing dialogues all the time in the movie…. I struggled quiet tough to understand the flow , so many characters and many many emotions.... being a person, too weak to grasp, took help of My mate who seen the movie like 1 million times, cleared all my spot doubts to enjoy the movie better…

Some of the dialogues made me feel ecstatic are…

‘Don’t move Hagen, if I want you to be dead you will be dead already’

My father made him an offer he couldn't refuse. What was that?Luca Brasi, held a gun to his head, and my father assured him, that either his brain or his signature would be on the contract.

‘Remember, who ever arranges a meeting between you and your enemy is your traitor’

‘The cop, mcclusky is in sollozo’s payroll’ (Sollozo is a drug dealer)

"Fredo you are my older brother and i love you so much,but never take side with anyone against the family ever"

‘when michael is going to shoot the police captain & the dealer, some one good has to plant that gun. Because, i dont want my brother only coming out with his d*** in his hands’

‘Do you spend time with your family? Good, beacuse a man that doesn't spend time with his family can never be a real man.’

‘Only don't tell me you're innocent. Because it insults my intelligence and makes me very angry’

The expressions of Marlon and Al pacino was top class competing each other. It was only Al Pacino’s 3rd movie after 2 minor ones. This gave him a huge lift in to his career… One should deftly watch this to understand how quality extreme a movie cud be with a peanut budget…and a bunch of well talented…

Now on the lighter side, I have noticed that many Indian movies was influenced so badly by this movie… some were massive hits again and some were massive S**TS… Here are some…

Sarkaar : Nothing hide and seek they credited Godfather movie in the title show up… This was a huge hit though a copied one…Good work by RGV, amithab and Abhishek

Nayagan : Most of the plot actually… Nice tweaks here and there to make the tamil version looks intresting…

Baadsha : Other goons kissing the don’s hands… and the Don’s life style (like be always serious, talk always smart, think always clever etc..) I love this movie only for thalaivars style and deftly not the story or plot…

Annamalai : Rajni’s sisters husband will be the traitor.. In tamil, rajni jus punished and let him live but in Godfather there is one justice ;)

Puthupetai : Again, most of the plot… Specially when Danush marries some other girl inspite being committed to one already

Ullasam : Raguvaran shoots the 2 enemies in a restaurant by getting a gun from first aid box

The list is endless…. Surely, they all should send a portion of the profit to the makers of the godfather… now, I can not wait to see part 2 of the trilogy.

Vintage Tendulkar !!!

2009-11-06T16:01:00.003+05:30

Whoa !!! Its worth watching the match waking up till 1 AM inspite of a critical day in office the next morning.

Sachin was at his best when he crossed the 17K runs mark and on his pursuit to 175 his best innings ever when chasing a target. I am not a big fan of this chap as atleast 1 million times he annoyed every one around with his nervous 90s and selfish approach to the game to accumulate runs. However, record is a record and no one had achieved this feat in Cricket and I can not see any one even closer for atleast next few years (provided Sachin retires today) He is deftly India’s proud and neighbours (u kno whom I am referring to) envy….

Rolling back… . it was 1998 April 4 I guess (Sachins bday) Sahara cup and India Vs. Ausralia… I can still rember one of the best memories I got on watching cricket. There is a reason for remembering this.... it was my TamilNadu Professional Course Entrance Examination the next day morning.. I jus finished 12th Std. that time (ippa varaikum nee urupdiya vera enatha kilichanu soldra unga mind voice kekuthu)…. So frusturated with board exams and entrance exams preperations … was waiting for the slog n study days to get over soon… and I cant curb my feelings to watch the match …. My parents gave up after few attempts to keep the house quiet and force me to study for the next days big game….

I thoroughly enjoyed the night throwing away books for one last time…. On the couch whole night watching Sachin belting Kasprowicz and Gillespie so badly that they can never forget for next few months… Those were the days (typical philosophical start punch rite ??) where the whole team is driven by Sachins knock and relatively he messes up lot in chasing the targets specially when its above 250 mark… and he got what possibly could be indias worst batting stretch for a long time aroudn him… to me players like jadeja, nayan mongia, srinath, Prasad were a complete waste of space and money being so useless with batting efficiency….

Later, showed good progress under the dynamic Ganguly… now in safe hands of Dhoni.. arguably the best captain for any cricket team… best captain because he shows the results having a team and balancing the politics part well too with the needed attitude towards the game…. Azharuddins era was jus a run on the mill show producing jus the meeting-the-expectation performance and later when Tendulkar took over, it was unfortunate for him that he got possibly the worst Indian XI line up with another-bunch-of-waste-of-spaces like debashis mohant, abhay kuruvilla, thiru kumaran, harvinder singh, reetinder singh sodhi etc…

Yesterday (Nov. 5) was a literal memory 10 years back with all those flury… infact this was a better one… his stamina was totally impressive for a grand dad of sport… Wish him to accumulate more and more … hopefully to retire from cricket when he is at his peak and hopefully, before he dies ;)

Krishna Leela !!!

2009-10-07T15:43:00.004+05:30

Disclaimer: The characters involved in the following drama are purely ultra-super-science fictional. Any resemblance of any characters living or going to live will be an amazing co incidence.

Drama Begins,

At Home, Bangalore, Sunday Night, 10 PM:

So Tensed. Can I do this ? I never did this at all…. Oh my !!! What atrocity is this ?? I never had this feeling ever before in my life…. ‘Kanna Pennu, Ponnu, Pugazh.. itha thedi naama po koodathu nammala thedi athu varanum’ (Man should not be behind women, wealth and fame… its supposed to be vice versa)… Rajni’s so famous dialogue ringing on my head… thaz because its my ring tone (I have this bloody habbit of having thalaivar dialogues as my ring tone for crazy reasons)… ‘Halo….Yeah… No…Havent slept yet…. Yaa…. 6 AM is it… ok … sounds cool… ya.. count on me… bye sweet heart’… Back to confused-over-confusion state… Why should I do this??? Well …. Thaz it… no point in thinking over and over… I have decided … am leaving in the mrng….

At Bus Terminus, Bangalore, 4.30 AM:

Uhhhhhh…. So cold… never got up at this freaky time… my goodness cant believe am doin this… The hot ginger tea at this time will be awesome…. I slowly searched for a 5 rupees note with still a no-one-should-spot-me here prayer in my mind … though I know am not doing anything stupid…. After all, its my life… I sipped the tea as slow as I could… There is a bus leaving every 15 mins to Hosur and probably ideal to catch the 4.45 Bus…. Heard the bus honking up and quickly bottomsuped my tea and rushed to bus… good I got this monkey cap… I can cover up my face with the mist as excuse….

At Hosur Railway Station, 5.50 AM:

Thank god… the train haven’t reached yet… you can always bet on the Indian railways and the timing perfection…. And for bad reasons ofcourse… The tongue urged for another tea… what if I missed the train… god no…. ‘Aniyayatha kanda summa irukaatha summa adichu thool kelapu’ (Never tolerate anything bad jus go and blast) hehehe… another ring tone… again Thalaivar… hehehe…. ‘Ya … oh good… I have reached already… S3 is it ??? cool will catch you… nahh don’t come out.. I will be fine’ I cancelled my plan for tea and started anticipated the train.

At Hosur Railway station, 6.10 AM:

‘Were you waiting for long ?’, The caring words from her throat flowed like jog falls

‘Nah…Jus 5 mins… was a perfect plan’, I just shrugged my shoulders

‘I told you this is stupid idea.. .Am coming to Banglore anyway So why should you come all the way here ?’, now this time she pretends like caring… after all she initiated this and well I got motivated ofcourse.... however, we share equal responsblty for this meet… god !!! girls!!!!

‘Hey Relax…’, Am acting good…’You don’t know about our gang… we never plan things… and we always like such thrills and adventures… You know what once we wer almost in the middle of naxals in a deep western ghats and still got away… this is nothing’… I added spice to that useless incident happened long back shamelessly…

‘Is it ???’, is she acting or really surprised ???? god I girls !!!!

‘Hey hope no one knows am here though… otherwise I will b screwd up so badly that I need to arrange for my own cremation’… I was acting (acting???) feared to keep her smiling….

‘Is it?’, she smiles….’ What will happen if your friends finds out ? after all we gonna get married soon’, She is so innocent….

‘You don’t know how much I tortured my other gang members in their courtship period…. It’s a long story’…. I can now feel the pain

Phone rings and she went mad hearing thalaivar’s voice as my ring tone…. I gave the totally-shameless-flirty-smile and took the phone…

‘Hey…. No da… I cant… am busy today…. Me??? Ofcourse at home man…infact am in toilet… not feeling good… iam on leave today… you guys carry on’…I was casually handling the call from my friend… and then the shock came….. from other side

‘MR. RADHA KRISHNAN, IF YOU ARE IN TOILET THEN WHY AM I HEARING THE HORN SOUND OF TRAIN AND TEA COFFEE SELLERS VOICE INSIDE THE TRAIN ?... DUDE I WILL CATCH U IN THE OFFICE FOR THE REST OF THE STORY…BYE !!!’

Drama Ends.....

As you can guess, the rest is history…. The story isn’t over yet… The once so called affected gang member of MR. RADHA KRISHNAN got the news from the person who called MR.RADHA KRISHNAN and blogged this incident for his self satisfaction some wer thousands of miles away from Banglore in the title ‘Ridiculous Radha Krishnan’ and the contents almost same as this post……

Locked in LIPS

2009-08-29T10:21:00.002+05:30

Having the absolute pleasant time for past 3 weeks being back to Chennai for reasons to cherish…. Managed to meet my mates yesterday and one place we always don’t miss to visit whenever we are in Chennai… ‘Lips’ our favourite Ice cream shop in Chennai… I know there are few other famous shops but we are so very attached to this shop since our college days…

The shop is located in Annanagar, near Roundtana, near Krishna sweets… If you are an ice cream lover and wanna spend some time with friends for a good laugh in not-so-posh environment, then Lips is the place… Over 100s of varieties and each one is so filling and mouth watering… This place is in my hearts as visitng there often rekindle the memories 8 years back…

The icecream float on a rosewater soda…. I never ever had this in any other country.. may b am not aware of it in other countries… but am sure wont be as affordable as Lips affords…. The taste of Nutty mania (vanilla scoops filled with nuts and flavours) is absolutely matchless…

Though am not supposed to shower myself with icecreams considering the health factor against the age and other problems around the globe, this once in a while fun is always hard to resist…. I suggest this place to any ice cream lover visiting Chennai….. : )
Few other places i would enjoy eating ice cream in chennai

- Arun Ice cream, Besant nagar (You pay based on the weight of the icecream)

- Creamy Inn, Near Ega Theater, PH Road

- New Yorker, Gemini

No Hagen Dazz or Baskin Robins can really match these ; )

How Stupid, It was only Cricket last 28 years !!!

2009-08-03T15:09:00.003+05:30

Life in Singapore is/was a real eye opener in many aspects…. Specially, in terms of sports…. I initially formed a cricket intrst group and some how lost intrst in that…. Later, got in to badminton with the other dudes living in my area…. Badminton was fascinating as well but the indoor courts were quiet expensive… We still played enough and I was taken by a shock to noticelosing 4 kgs in jus 2 weeks of my rookie play…

Off late we discovered there is a tennis court in our office back yard and its so cheap that the money is close to negligible…. My mate and me decided to give a go …. I am hopeless in this game and he had the needed exposure to start.. however, we both wer crazy abt fitness and adventure… we cracked off and got a couple of racquets… the first time I even touched a tennis racquet… so stupid… I din even try the game and I alrdy spent 110$... CONFIDENCE

2/3 weeks back we started off and it was an end to end fun show to whoever watchd us playing that day… the crktng instincts forced me to play boundaries instead of cribbing the hitting instincts…. The ambiguous reflex made me hit all 4’s and sixes instead of placing the ball with in the court… 3 balls over the fence and many of em to the neighbour court… man I thought I wasted 100 bucks….

The next day was ok as we got 2 other mates with us and surprised to see I improved my show with a ratio of 1:10 shots in the court… and We gradually improvised but I was rather too late to pick the game up and with too bad stamina, I was only fighting hard to stay alive until we finish…

In recent days, my focus was more on the serves… mentioning about serves, I love the rule that allows one fault for every time we serve…. This allowed me to try crazy methods of serving… every time I serve I will try 1 million kmph speed in my first attempt and in that 1 out of 1 zillion times get through… I will be too happy to c atleast 1 or 2 in a day get through at the lightning speed…. The feeling of getting the ball placed in that speed and get back a point was awesome…

The other thing about Tennis, the court… for all the time in past, Tennis for me was too posh game and I never thought I will ever play this game in my life… The court here is absolutely awesome with rubber cork grip and gives a playing-in-stadium feeling… I dunno if these things made me love Singapore…

The last thing I wanna mention is Cricket…. No wonder almost 80% (ignore the figure 80%... I know 64.4% statistics are wrong) tennis dudes doesn’t like playing cricket and call it as stupid… I realized the work out I recvd after 1 hour tennis … I can honestly compare to 1 day’s crkt interms of calorie burnt… however, I always love cricket for the good mix of skill, power, strategy and sledging involved… I will never ever stop watching the game though….

Urge to Explore and Passion to Click

2009-07-12T22:16:00.010+05:30

Oh well... its been quiet strenuous, hectic and so so so stupid that i couldnt concentrate much apart from work for a long time and now i was so desperate to get out sme wer and do some thing non routine... Today is Sunday and i still have to work this morning as for the obvious reasons in any consultant's life....Managed to finish the office bit early for the planned visit to St. Johns Island in Singapore... This is for some reason not so famous but deftly a worthy break... Lemme try and explain so to make this post usefull for any Singapore Resident's advantage...

Get the Red line (North South) to Marina Bay Station... get out of it and catch Bus no. 402 to Marina Souther pier... My mate and me took a disastarous decision to walk to the Pier as we thought its only 2 stops away.... We always had this fun of taking the longest possible route to any destination and unwillingly worked this time as well... It was a nasty 40 mins walk but so rlved after having a lovely look at the lone building (Pier) on the shore....

Pain again... The next/last boat from Pier is at 5 PM (the timez 4 PM now) and we got roughly about 15 mins in the St. Johns island to explore and thaz it .... Holy Christ !! (Oops... Enna kodumai Saravanan) We thought we will get back and come again some other day but i din wanna waste the day.... So we took the boat confidently knowing its gonna be a shorter than the anticipated length of fun.... the climate was so apt for my photos.... got in to the buisness straight away clicking with the blend of technology (D90) and imagination (Me yo!!).....

I honestly liked the serene view of the sea and the anchored ships all around... There are two other islands around called as Kusu Island (What the....) and Sisters Island.... but din get a chance to drop and walk.... managed 15-20 mins manuovering in St. johns island... looked like a perfect place (am exaturating though) for a day break swimming, camping, hang around get lazy and get relaxed.... The humidity was still a pain....

I am sure we left about 60% of the place un explored but i made up my mind to re visit the place some time in future... The return was once again painful as we gotto catch bus back and we got down near Tanjong Pagar MRT thinking that could be Raffles place... means we need to transfer train to red line after a stop and then around 40 mins travel....

I stored my so called 'photography' in orkut album and anyonez welcome to visit if you got enough time and needed patience... catch u soon with my next post !!!

Taxi Taxi !!!!

2009-06-27T13:22:00.003+05:30

Managed to find time to blog and this time its about the Taxi drivers in Singapore. I have already written about Auto drivers in Bangalore, Taxi drivers in Malysia but this one is quiet contrary to the earlier themes on driving service for public. In my limited exposure to the non-Indian part of the world, i should insist and say 'The Singapore Taxi drivers were the best'.

Last week i got in to a taxi from office to home after hard days work. The following are the shocking facts about the best taxi drivers in the world ( i don mean the driving talent.. i meant the attitude and the system itself)

- The earning per day of an average taxi driver is just around 60$ provided if they drive atleast 11 hours a day.

- The average earning of the taxi driver in Singapore is around 2000$ which is below par for the cost of living here in Singapore. That too they need to work atleast 6 days a week forgeting almost 100% of their social life.

I know there are other hard working skilled workers who earn even lesser but my point is, in most of the countries the taxi/auto drivers are at their best in terms of earning against the hardwork which means pain to public. Contrastingly, the public here appreciate the Taxi service but the poor Drivers dont get much of the benefit from the govt. they deserve. The Tax and other statuatory payments are a overload for them and they are worried as most of the public thinks they earn bloody lots of money. Few of the quotes i heard from the drivers are

'People dont mind spending 10$ for a flipping coffee but mourn a lot about travelling for the same amount comfortably in an Airconditioned Taxi with the quality of service'

'I feel like am living a machine life driving all the time i am awake and still getting peanuts'

'I would have prefered to be in China selling Tea rather driving Taxi in Singapore where no one bothers about our welfare'

Singapore should hold the credit undoubtedly for emphasising such a law were at any point of time a Taxi driver should never ask for even a cent on top of the meter charge. No taxi driver can say 'No' for any destination in Singapore asked by public unless they are changing shifts. On top of this, the Service from heart is matchless. But Show some Sympathy for this Nation's Pride.

I dont know what i wanna achieve writing this here but I just felt they deserve more than what they are getting in terms of recognition and reward. I just need some space to say 'I Agree'.

I am 28 today....!!!!

2009-05-20T16:56:00.004+05:30

19/05/2009 : 7.30 pm
I know iam turning 28 in 4.5 hours.... here is ARavindh's Irony... will wake up until 2 am if its chennai match in IPL and no hope for anything else... i shd keep myself awake till 12 as i know i wont be sleepin at that time... Idea !!! got tickets for the movie PASANGA for 9 pm and then out to shopping with my mom and wife... all is well as the shopping bill is well with in the boundary...

19/05/2009 : 11.45 pm
Out from the cinema... thoroughly enjoyed and a must watch movie... all about kids from their view.... a lovely BGM by James vasanthan... a good break for me too.... Oh boy !!! i reached home and as 'so called' surprisingly the cake is ready at home for me.....

19/05/2009 : 11:59 pm
I helped my wife placing the candles in cake, lighting the candle in cake, cut the cake myself... had a piece myself and in to my laptop.... i was expecting phone calls from some wer (i dunno who will care to call me at 12 am singapore time) still i was expecting.. bly me !!! spoilt indian kid me....

19/05/2009 : 12.10 am
ahhh !!! none called me yet... so i went online and quiet warm to see few messaged me in orkut... my bro came online and asked me to call him.... he picked the shit outta me once i called him 'un bday ku neeyae call panni wish panna solriyae.... kevalama ilai !!!', a perfect jackass me... is it april 1 or may 20 ???...

20/05/2009 : 9.45 am
got up with utmost hesitation as i am took off that day and really wanted to have a good long sleep... Indian hindu ladies, u beauty... no matter wat is the occasion u wanna start with a temple visit.... and concentrate more on special poojas than the actual prayer.... anyway i din make any argument though am a bit agnostic about these.....

20/05/2009: 11.30 am
gobbled another piece of over night cake with icecream ... crash the bed and slept crazy for 4 bloody hours... quiet a number of calls on an average of every 30 mins during my sleep time ... stilll answered like a fresh one and continued sleeping... after all i get these many calls only once in a year...

20/05/2009: 7.45 pm
sitting on my couch... watching rajasthan vs kkr and bloggin in my laptop munching cookies with tea.... oh well a pleasant day ... bday is all an excuse for my day off and chill out.. !!!!

சென்னை Chennai Super Kings !!!

2009-05-07T20:57:00.004+05:30

Oh man ... this is fun..... jus 2 or 3 tamil dudes in the team but i still love the team Chennai Super kings in the IPL giving the toughest fight in every game they play... as Dhoni always never cares about the results.... A year back, i never thought this tournament will be a far from imagination super hit thing... thanks to ICL who were the primary boost factor.... I understand there is no much Chennai thing in this team apart from the owners... however, i love the team jus coz they represent my CITY.....

Its fun to see all the rivals in world T20 teams rub their shoulders each other and planning a strategy to turn down their own country men.. its all happening in the Indian Premier League.... I am trying best to spend my all evening with any IPL match happening .... but my fate, i am held up with work most of the times.... i seriously hate this...

Like any other average chennaite, i support CSK from my heart... however, my other preference in semi finals will be banglore, hyderabad and kolkota... well kolkota is now out of the tournament but every one else is strongly competing each other raising good funds for already rich BCCI.... Few of the (Indian) players impressed me this season so far are

Yusuf pathan - brimming with confidence and getting more n more consistent

Suresh Raina - A deadly attack from the top order... again a consistent one

Jakati - The goa jewel... A lovely spinner for this format .. unfortunately, not in world cup squad

Yusuf Abdullah - a consistent yorkerer but been belted harshly off late.. poor one

R Jadeja - Another young talent a totally worthy allrounder ... well suited for T20

Rohit Sharma - What is he ? When i think he is useless, he rises like a phoenix

Dhoni - Ofcourse getting clever every game

There were few let down factors too !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sehwag - not an impressive knock yet...further, a handicapped chap now

Laxman - better stick to tests dude

Uthappa - only in patches

Asnodkar - was a big fan of this tiny wonder last season but a total mess this time

Over all, i feel Indians are very well getting a good practice for the upcoming T20 World Cup and ofcourse, the favourites to win the title...

for now, am enjoying the crucial encounter between csk and kings XI punjab ... my team out ther belting out the bangra dudes so ruthlessly taking the total to 68/1 in 7.3 overs.. thanks for the rain for stopping the play so i can blog :)))

Read and Write !!!

2009-04-16T19:03:00.003+05:30

Yesterday I happen to view my favourite show combined with my favorite topic. Its Neeya Nana, a talk show in Vijay TV and the topic is ‘Should the Tamil people know to read and write their Mother tongue (Tamil)’. The sense of Déjà vu always prevails whenever I think about this issue and there fore I have managed to sit and watch the whole 1.5 hours show.

There were 2 groups.. Obviously, one supports and others oppose. I was strongly with the group who supports the topic. I found this whole show useful and observed interesting extracts. Doesn’t matter if its tamil or hindi or telugu or any language… You have all rights to learn any language considering the communication needs involved in the era of globalization. However, there should be no way you can link these reasons to know your mother tongue to the extent of reading and writing. Learning to read and write your mother tongue is the pride factor and not make-money issue.

I found few of my friends feels posh if they say ‘I am a tamil dude but no clue to read and write… therz no point’… I jus feel pity on them…. Coz, the top countries in electronics like japan, china, korea etc… they all learnt the whole technology through their own language…. They din even know what is mean by electronics … I mean the term in english…. They can excel so well coz they can communicate and study the whole technology through their own language and that made them to understand things so clear which no other language can teach em….

The next basic problem of ‘why people don’t know to read and write tamil’ comes from their parents… I understand their concern on their kids to know English better to survive anywhere in the world… agreed… that doesn’t mean you should ignore the mother tongue… even kids choosing second lang. as hindi or French jus for the sake of getting good marks in high school… so kiddish… Learn any number of languages… that’s healthy… but don’t ignore your own language… thaz shame !!!

To be honest, I took hindi as second language from my Standard 9 (purposefully avoiding French as it was a non-indian language).. However, I studied Tamil from primary till 8th Std…. In my middle school, I managed to learn both hindi and tamil parallely… thanks to the school having made this mandatory and my parents encouraging me to learn both… However, in Tamil Nadu, I blame it mainly on the society which ignores Tamil … rather, they prefer other languages instead of Tamil for their kids… on top of it, scoring good marks in Tamil is most toughest thing… its coz the language got so many letters and complex grammer… Think of Iruketta ethir marai peyar echam… you go mad… I agree… but if u give me 2 situations where

I got good feed back when I did a marvelous (English) presentation in my work place that might lead to good rewards and

the other situation being my Japanese friend embarrassing me for not knowing to read and write my mother tongue and I can not spot any of their countrymen in that factor……
I feel the later one will impact me than the pleasant first situation….

The highlight of the show is the German dude who was there and spoke such a lovely tamil for his background was a stunning eye catcher…. When asked, what made you to learn this language… he answered in tamil, ‘See, I came to Chennai to preach Christianity but I was so fascinated by the language history and the heritage… that now made me to learn and am currently working on translating Thiruvasagam to German… The language has so much beauty and knowing mother tongue well is the only way you know your people well…’ I dunno, his words landed as sphere…

I am in mid 28 now.. I know many of the readers of the post are just parents or will be parents in near future as most of them being in my own age group… my request is that don’t let your mother language (not necessarily Tamil) become an extinct when it comes to reading and writing… lets set up a proper platform for the next generation so they wont complain us telling ‘my parents never encouraged me’… again, am not against any other language but the pride of knowing your mother tongue ‘well’ is immaculate….

D90 Rocks !!!

2009-04-07T18:10:00.009+05:30

oh man... i couldnt believe my eyes.... i neva thought i will love my new camera that made me to get up at 5 to capture those serene lake side view of the Selator reservoir.... am slowly getting addicted myself more with photography and the learning curve was never sharper without my new worlds best Nikon D90..

For me, photography always comes with awesome power of imagination.... the passion to imagine... the patience to wait for the right mix of light and the scene...... a bit of technical knowledge with the equipment and the intrst to innovate..... you dont necessarily need an expensive camera to get the best pics.... a point shoot is still good enough....

I always refer to kenrockwell website for my photography/camera/accessory advices.... honestly, that is one big place where i got lots of theoretical knowledge on photography and handling the equipments.... here are some extracts that i learnt from kenrockwell, fellow photographers and my own experience...

never expect a perfect picture in your first shot..... for me atleast.... some times, i wait wait wait and click atleast 10-12 snaps to get a single perfect one (atleast to convince myself) the following one is the example

This is quiet contrary to my attitude... try not to be embarassed if u wanna snap thing that u come across all on a sudden... i always feel reluctant... some how all on a sudden i strike with an idea when i was checking my frnds nikon d40... i thought for 5 secs... decided in 2 secs... and clicked this snap in next 30 secs time....

Some of the snaps might look best when you further edit it.... i am not with the idea of tampering with ones true image... however, jus to unleash the innovation i try out few like these...

If you got a photo link or orkut gallery, dont upload all the pics you have taken... try and sort out only the best ...also, try and keep the pics as unique as possible... repetitive pics sometime makes the surfers boring thing.... if you don get any pics that convince you dont upload any... wait for the moment... some times u get only 1 or 2 out of 100 that really satisfies you.... and that will boost your confidence when you go for a shoot next time....

Try and find an appropriate caption for your pics... be it a description of the place, a poetic line, a humorous pick ... anything that strikes ya mind.... this will create the intrst with the viewers.... after all, photography is primarily for others to see and ofcourse, for you to cherish....

I have collected all the special clicks of mine in my orkut photo space.. you can search for my id aravindhindia@gmail.com and add me as a friend before you can see....or u can try clicking this link.. http://www.orkut.com/Main#AlbumList.aspx?uid=5890502207803063523 am not sure if this works... :)

Neva been ...

2009-03-30T16:58:00.002+05:30

Neva been so much work

Neva been so much sports

Neva been so much excitement...

Am all busy last few weeks since my come back to Singapore... The life dramatically turned just opposite.... The new client am in are so demanding... (kadaseela ennayum vela seyya vachitaanga)... lead to challenge my time management ability.... very much unwillingly, my wife is the ultimate sufferer as i never stay home most of the time....

Luckily, i got this cricket and badmitton goin on in parallel... picks the (work work) stress off from me.... adding to the flavour was the worst flu i ever had in my life.... it sticked to me for a complete one week and the whole life was busy, painful, exciting, adventorous bla bla all on a sudden....

In between, my passion for photography and badmitton is increasing exponentially ... together am confused as am getting all good things at one time and no clue of how to manage to the best....

uhhh... am still confused... what did i intend to write on this post???

Titanium Duck !!!

2009-03-18T17:14:00.004+05:30

Off late, I started to get myself involved in sports. I started to form friends network in Orkut as I don’t know much sports enthusiasts in Singapore (specially Indians, specifically Tamils). I am the one who bashed Orkut long ago for its n number of cons and later I myself reopened the account for its n number advantages. (vidungappa !!! arasiyala ithelaaam saatharanam) We started playing weekend cricket and I got another bunch of friends who taught me playing badmitton and now am more than enjoying the game we play atleast 3-4 evenings during weekdays. Primary reason being to get myself in to some sort of activity and to deviate myself from work stress I am enjoying ; ) (nambara maari ilayo)

What does the above paragraph got to do with my post title ?

We formed a cricket intrst group through Orkut and successfully playing for continuous 4 weekends. Last weekend has become more terrible. It was a 10 over match and we fielded first. I was fielding all 10 overs with out getting chance to bowl. However, I managed to get in as opener in the non strikers end when our turn came to bat. The pathetic part is as follows.

The striker in the other end played his first ball defensively and gave a start up for a single. I was all excited and sprinted to the other (even though it’s a danger end). The batsman coolly came to half way and went back with out even caring my situation. Gone ….. Completely gone….. I have no chance to get back. I know its not a big deal for any one (even myself) but the whole day, I was so angry on myself (ofcourse even with the other dude who contributed a lot in my dismissal) I am not sure why mind is so occupied with this few hours weekend game. May be as I like it so much.

Today I was following the India Vs. NZland Test cricket of Day 1 through internet commentary in Cricinfo.com and the following comment caught my attention

72.3: Patel to O'Brien, FOUR, one more paragraph for the blog, Munaf delivers from wide of the crease and angles it inwards, he gets a thick leading edge which beats the massive gap between slip and gully

I know Ian O’Brien is a blogger. Infact, I sometimes read his blogs too. Cricinfo guys publishes his blog in their own website. But, the ironic fact is that they pick the micky out of OB almost every time when he comes to bat or bowl.

I noticed more similarities with myself here. OB is suffering this in international lever. I am suffering on local level. Other wise even I am treated the same way. When I get back home after Cricket/Badmitton and tell my wife on how I played, her immediate response will be ‘So you got stuffs to blog tonight ?’. Ironically, those who criticizing me are the regular followers. Pathetically, I am still not sure how to react when they pick S**t outa me about my blogging ;-)

The new Click Machine !!!

2009-03-14T17:07:00.008+05:30

Even though i cherish the golden moments with my Sony H50 which i got few months ago, i was fascinated by the quality of Nikon D seires. My friends in Kualalampur recomended this new machine for any photo snapping freaks. I was quiet disappointed for not going for the best option and there came the relief.

My brother was in need of a good camera and there you go. All the excuses i need to get rid off the Sony one. Today morning i visited the IT Sales show in Singapore Convention Center and i presume i got one of the lovely package deal. Here is what i got today for a total price of 2100 SGD.

Nikon D90 Body (DSLR)
Zoom lens - 18 -105 mm
UV 67mm filter lens
Tripod
Big carry bag for camera
8 + 4 GB memory card
Extra Battery
Screen protector
External Flash SB 600
Lens cleaning kit

It was sure a good deal i guess. I just arrived home right after the purchase and obviously, my wife got every reason to bang me with the same tripod i got home. She was quiet happy since my PSP was stolen in Malaysia as i can spare time for some house hold work and now this new enemy (Nikon) entered home.

My first photographical click in Nikon: Further edited using Picassa

I slowly forming a photo interest group in Singapore and we plan to visit few places at wierd Maniratnam timings (at dawns) in upcoming weekends. Meanwhile am trying to learn the features in new camera and work on the ways to improve the art of clicking.

Too Doggish !!!

2009-02-22T01:53:00.005+05:30

I recently watched Slumdog Millionaire in a cinema near by. The theme is good, the screenplay is excellent although this reminds lots of popular Hollywood movies. A R Rehman’s talent might be new to Hollywood but for India, specially for Tamil Cinema, his work is just average in SDM. As most of you know, I am a big fan of ARR and I listened most amazing tunes of him than SDM. However, he still did good work to put himself in the limelight in the world stage.

Now coming to the actual instincts. Though I liked the movie in terms of movie making, I will never bother to watch this again for projecting India as 3rd world to the International Audience. I accept the fact that there are places in India as shown in the movie but I bet there are millions of other places makes you drop your jaws. This applies to Indians themselves as many are not aware of abundant sizzling nature in the country and certainly no doubt. If you still not convinced, watch Maniratnam movies and you will be amazed looking most of his songs and coverages where inside India.

I understand this movie requires a backdrop where the protagonist suffered most of his life in search of life but need not be so disgusting… specially scenes where the kid jumps in shit.. and lot more… I feel so devastated seeing such scenes… Again, they all are ok from the Hollywood point of view but after watching this movie any non-indian will be on the intention that ‘I will never go to this country’… May be I would have liked if this movie taken in any other country.. coz, from my opinion there are lot many places in the world where the director can go for more shitty scenes than he adopted in India.

The Direction is good, music was amazing, Cool screen play, catchy story, the film crew did a spectacular job for the pay they got. The end product is mind blowing but not suitable-to-watch for an Indian who likes his Mother land. I am not trying to show up being most patriotic citizen living abroad but I just cant take this as its not exactly the fact. I can, for one time, agree with Amitab bachan for his remarks about this movie.

அகம் பிரம்மாஸ்மி !!!

2009-02-11T13:02:00.005+05:30

மசாலாக்கள், குத்து பாட்டுகள், அதிரடி சண்டைகள் என்று வலம் வந்து கொண்டிருந்த தமிழ் சினிமாவிற்கு இது போன்ற படங்கள் ஒரு வரப்பிரசாதம். நான் குறிபிடுவது சமீபமாக வெளி வந்த 'நான் கடவுள்' தான்.

படம் பார்த்து விட்டு வீடு வந்த நான் இது ஏன் இவளவு மிகை படுத்த பட்டுள்ளது என்று நினைத்து, அடுத்த நாலு நாட்கள் தூங்க முடியாததை உணர்ந்தேன். காரணம், மனதை பிழிந்த யதார்த்தமான சம்பவங்கள் மற்றும் அதை சித்தரிக்கப்பட்ட விதம். பாலா கண்டிப்பாக தமிழ் திரை உலகை அடுத்த நிலைக்கு துரிதமாகவும் லாவகமாகவும் எடுத்து சென்று விட்டார்.

கல்லூரி, காதல், சண்டை, அரசியல், அடாவடி இது தான் வாழ்க்கை என்று நினைத்து கொண்டுஇருந்தவர்களுக்கு அகோரி எனப்படும் சாதுக்கள் மற்றும் குண்டர்கள் பிடியில் சிக்கி தவிக்கும் பிசைகாரர்களையும், துல்லியமான திரை கதையுடன் நம் கண் முன்னே கொண்டு வந்துள்ளார் பாலா. ஆர்யா அகோரியாக திரையில் வலம் (வாழ்ந்து) வந்தாலும் அவர் தேவைக்கு அதிகமாகவே சிரமபட்டிருகிறார் அல்லது அவர் சிரமபட்டிருபதற்கு ஏற்ப இன்னும் கட்சிகளை வைத்திருக்கலாம் என்று தான் சொல்ல வேண்டும்.

பிட்சை காரர்களாக நடித்தவர்கள் தான் படும் கஷ்டங்களையும் தாண்டி அவர்கள் செய்யும் நய்யான்டிகளும் குறும்புகளும் சிரிப்பை வர வைப்பதோடு கண்களில் நீரையும் எட்டி பார்க்க செய்கிறது. இன்று பெரிய நடிகர்கள் என்று சொல்லி கொண்டு அலையும் பல டாப் ஸ்டார்கள் இவர்களிடம் யதார்த்தமாக நடிப்பது எப்படி என்று பிட்சை எடுக்க வேண்டும்.

பூஜா அபாரமான நடிப்பு இல்லை என்றாலும் கொடுத்த வேலையயை கட்சிதமாக செய்திருக்கிறார். சீ சீ என்ன வேடம் இது என்று பந்தா பண்ணிகொண்டிருக்கும் நடிகைகளுக்கு மத்தியில் இதை சவாலாக ஏற்று முயற்சித்ததில் பூஜாவிற்கு எனது வாழ்த்துக்கள். பாடல்கள் மனதில் நிற்க வில்லை என்றாலும் பின்னணி இசை பிரமாதம். இளையராஜா எதிர்பார்புகளை நிரப்பி இருக்கிறார்.

எவ்வளவு சிறப்பான படமாக இருப்பினும் படத்தில் உள்ள அதிக கோர கட்சிகளாலும் , மனதை பாதிக்கும் சம்பவங்கள் இருப்பதாலும் நான் ஒரு பொழுதும் இதை இளகிய மனம் கொண்டவர்களுக்கும், பெண்களுக்கும், குழந்தைகளுக்கும் கண்டிப்பாக பரிந்துரை செய்ய மாட்டேன்.

அன்றாடம் சந்திக்கும் பிட்சை காரர்களை அலட்சிய படுத்தி அவசர உலகில் அலை பாய்ந்து கொண்டிருபவர்கள் இனி அவர்கள் பார்க்கும் பிட்சை காரருக்கு ஒரு ருபாய் போட்டாலும் படம் வெற்றி என்று தான் அர்த்தம்.

'நான் கடவுள்', செதுக்கப்பட்ட யதார்த்தம்
இருட்டு உலகின் அப்பட்ட வெளிச்சம்

பாலா வின் துணிச்சலான முயற்சிகள் தொடர, தமிழ் திரை உலகம் உயர என்றும் வாழ்த்தும்

- தமிழ் திரை ரசிகன்

Cheapest path Algorithm (KL-SG-KL):

2009-02-10T12:14:00.002+05:30

Last weekend was quiet exciting for me as I had an unplanned trip from Kualalampur to Singapore. I normally take weekend fly back but last weekend I haven’t planned (don’t think I anticipated work … just for reasons). The trip was exciting for two factors being my primary objective. The fastest way to reach Singapore with as much less cost. Here is the cheapest and quickest path on road to Singapore.

I got to Pudu raya bus terminal in KL which is conveniently located inside the city. Even before I enter I see people shouting Johor Bahru which is the last city located close to Singapore. Most of the standard buses charges 31 MYR (Malaysian Ringgits) from KL to JB which is reasonable looking at the high tech bus model. You can get nonstop buses going to JB in less than 3.5 hours but unfortunately I got in to the bus which made 45 mins halt on the way.

The bus travel was quiet pleasing traveling in array of mountains and greeny plantations all the way. With PSP in my bag, I cant ask for more for a pleasant journey. Reached JB for the first time and it resembled more of a KL atmosphere. I quickly got down and looked for the local bus that can take to me to border check point. Bus no. 170 is quiet frequent (every 15 mins) and you can use your EZ link card (this is a travel card used in Singapore local transport). The charge is some where around 1SGD or 1.5 MYR. It takes around 10 mins to reach the check point.

Got off from the bus at the border check point and quickly walked my way to Emmigration clearance from Malaysia and again got the same bus on the other end of the building. Another 3 mins travel to Singapore Immigration check point. Again quick check in as the facility is quiet good to accommodate any number of people. Then I got in to Local bus no. 950 that goes to Woodlands MRT (Local train) station.

I am quiet lucky as my house is quiet close to Woodlands. It took only 10 mins train travel to reach Yishun and am home. I used the same method to get back to KL two days later and the total expense of my trip haven’t crossed 30 SGD (around 1000 Rs.).

I then thought I can publish a post on this which might help out ppl visiting Singapore or Malaysia and want to travel cheap to either locations. However, you gotto have the Visa for the respective locations on hand before you go (Obviously)

Fully Salted !!!

2009-02-03T15:11:00.004+05:30

The breeze of riot dashed us with courage. The ever hot and humid Singapore now carried a lot of MOISTURE IN THE AIR.

Naturally, we were overwhelmed.

Signifcantly, thrilled and

unwillingly, we thought of it.

‘Are you sure ?’, I asked my mate with astonishment. ‘Yes, I am’, he replied with full grace. ‘I thought you wouldn’t like it’, I continued. ‘May be, but I gotto give a go. I cant stay untouched for ever and this is the right time’, he brimmed with confidence. ‘Ok, dude lets go then but don’t change your mind once we are in as am damn curious too’

The conversation is over and we headed to the office area to rent the boat for our first kayaking experience in the open sea. My mate, who never entered any water surface with more than 6 feet depth was equally curious as me to get cracking in with his first water adventure. I had my eye on the water scooter but even am thrilled to get this kayaking experience. We (4 of us) been to Pasir Ris beach (Singapore) for a change in weekend schedules without any plans of adventure but as always ended up with dynamic plans.

The price is 14$ per hour and that sounded reasonably fair to us anticipating great fun. We got this huge double seater boat with paddles to row in to the sea. We din had the swim costumes and gotto comprise ourselves with the tshirt and pant that we were wearing. We cracked in to the sea and it was quiet a pleasant feeling to see ourselved floating in the salty surrounding.

‘Man its fun’,my friend shouted with all smiles. ‘Yeah, be carefull’, I slowly realized the situation. ‘Damn, I missed this for long time.. its fun man’, he cant shut up. We gracefully paddled up for a while here and there for 20 mins odd. Then we started enjoying the ride and felt like king of the sea. We started going towards the middle and some butterflies-in-stomach feeling started prevailing on me. We were fine as long as we sail against or along with the tide. The moment we started rowing parallel to the tides, we felt the intensity of the thrill.

The boat started wobbling and we more concentrated to balance and stay floating.. Our existence is as good as Mathew hayden’s current form. We soon perished jus like sehwag got bowled of Yorker trying to clear the boundary. The boat toppled and there we tasting the salted water from nose to throat.. We both were panic initially but I thought its ok as we got life jackets on. However, my friend totally shocked and started screaming for his life. As we both were in one side of the boat, we are unable hold it for support as the boat kept rolling like devotees doing ‘anga prathatchanam’ surrounding the ‘praharam’.

I normally don’t take up the responsblty in fail safe procedures.. but this time I calmly swimmed to the other side of the boat to stop this rolling spree. The boat stopped rolling, we started to feel secure and my mate realized the life jacket helps him to float. Then slowly we moved towards the shore and felt better at the end.

Few funny points we realized later

- When we fell down from the boat, my friend was screaming for help. The other mates in the sea thought we are just playing and we are asking them to take pics. So they came forward and took few pics (think whatz running inside my mate’s mind)

- The lifeguards there din give a damn when my mate cried for help but cruised in like a james bond wen they saw one of the paddles is floating in the middle. I like the humanity

- Ofcourse, the whole audience in the shore had a free comedy show… not even vadivelu and vivek can better us… not even bagyaraj can frame a better screenplay…

Rashtra Basha

2009-01-19T13:12:00.002+05:30

This afternoon I was heading to lunch with my regular group of dudes working with me in the client’s office. One of em, an Andhraite found me conversing in Hindi to my other colleague and asked in astonishment ‘You speak Hind ???’ … I smiled with grace (like Roger Federer) ‘Yes’… he replied instantly 'I know you are from south … you are not from Andra… are u from Kerala ? … I stopped the smile after 12 secs until than and said ‘I am Chennaite’.. He gave a look as if India announced war against Pakistan… ‘Strange man… I got few of Chennai friends and they have it as a policy of not learning Hindi at any cost’

This is actually not an uncommon scenario…. I heard many times and gave same diplomatic smile with out knowing how exactly should I react… In my opinion, any person in the world should be well aware of their national language… I would consider it as shame if you cant speak your national language… no matter how good you are with your contry’s politics knowledge…. But I wont blame the younger generation in Tamil Nadu for that… It’s the ridiculous society they are brought up….

For some reason, the Tamils generally don’t like to include Hindi in their life other than watching bollywood movies… infact the pathetic percentage of hindi acknowledging public exists in Chennai only due to Sharukh khans and Aamir khans…

I should be thankful to my parents who encouraged me to learn hindi during my school days itself… I even written few exams like prathmic, mathyama and all… this really helped me to survive well and win friends anywhere in India…. However, I can not accept these vote bank oriented politicians banning hindi for their personal benefits…

On lighter side, my friends in chennai felt knowing hindi is as posh as knowing American English to show off with other girls (specially north Indians) and for that sake they are ready to watch any boring hindi movie to learn the language… ofcourse if they are accompanied by girls (preferably non-north Indians) hahaha In many movies I watched the funny scenes were a Delhi guy can converse to Pakistani in hindi… Chennaite can converse to Srilankan in Tamil but too pathetic to see a Delhite and Chennaite can converse only in English… You can notice how practical is this if you happen to live overseas…

In my honest opinion, I suggest any one to learn the national language and avoid the embarrassing incidents which sometimes classifies tamils as racists due to this lone factor… I am certainly not against being a Tamil as am really proud of being it…. Just that to show the unity in us to the outer world through one common language that we can share…. Also, enjoy bollywood movies along with the mighty Kollywood/Tollywood : )

End note : 2008

2008-12-31T13:27:00.010+05:30

As reaching the end of 2008,
Lets pray for no more fight

Though the economic crisis was a big pain,
Lets join to eradicate the crisis rain in 2009

Jingles all the way last week and
New resolutions this week,
Lets make it strong and healthy for the benefit of the HUMANITY

Technically, Year++
Eventually, the world is getting older
Lets fight the pollution to keep the world younger and younger

May it be Spiderman 3 or Terminator 3,
Always be healthy to balance your time and
keep the entertainment slot for free

Do not Drink and drive or Smoke and fly ,
Just keep yourself fit for more New years to come

Be it Grand Canyon or a Local attraction,
Unleash the traveler in you

To enjoy the life with its well deserved fun

One more Deepavali,
One more Christmas,
One more Id,
All awaits For us
To spread the never ending harmony

Easier said than done,
Lets hope this 2009 is a bliss
and retains the joy in us
For ever and ever.

Wishing you a Very Happy New Year 2009 to all the kind/patient hearts reading my posts :)

Note:

Actions speaks louder than words

Silence speaks better than a shout

I believe, personal words cares better than a (e) greeting card

So, please try and send handwritten letters/mails than a greeting card printed by an unknown person to convey your wishes to the one you love/care.

Trust me it works better :)

A 'Mr.Bean' in all

2008-12-22T14:23:00.002+05:30

This is the embarrassing cluster of incidents I had when I first boarded a flight in my life and that too it’s an international flight.

From : Chennai To : London (Gatwick Airport)
Via : Dubai, Flight : Air Emirates

Scene 1:

I reached the airport in a rented quails car with 12/14 people (relatives) in the same and followed by another car load of friends. Adding to the already crowded atmosphere of the airport. However, I was completely excited and totally thrilled with a good mix of nervousness. The scene was a bit embarrassing attracting all the non-first-time-flight passengers offering them a memory of ther own when they boarded a flight first time in ther life.

Scene 2:

I entered the security gate way to international departure and I showed almost every document I had with me while the demand was only the passport and ticket.

Scene 3:

I treated the boarding pass issuing staff almost like a visa issuing officer and totally nervous to answer every single question they ask for.

Officer: Hi
Me : Hi, Good morning … Sorry, Good evening (Confused and nervous)
Officer : (Smiling) First timeaaa ?
Me : Yaa..hehehe… here is my passport, ticket, visa documents, offer letter
Officer : Wo Wo !!! i just need the passport and ticket... Ok your bags to check in ?
Me: (I had put all I got with me) do u want me to put my hand bag too
Officer : (Again with a humiliating smile) Its ok u can take back your hand bag
My take away cabin stuffs are Big leather coat, one more sweater, big bag with full of stuffs weighing 10 kg etc…
Officer: I guess you can not carry more than 8kg on your hand bag
Me: Hehehe…. Student sir.. first time sir…. I need all these sir … please sir….
Officer : (Once again smiles) ok ok …. Have a great flight
Me: Abba am luckiest in the world…hehehe

Scene 4:

I am about to leave and my mom & grand mom opened their tap from ther eyes and the embarrassment continues… hugs, kisses, advices etc…. I was more eager and worried about the rest of the formalities until I reach the destination than getting myself embarrassed…. I said ok for all and got detached finally to the emigration counter.

Scene 5:

Managed to get in to the boarding room after an obvious nervous interaction with Emmigration officer to register my exit from India. Now, who the hell are these people waiting outside boarding longue… wat the hell they are checking with all bags… I was so scared and prayed lord balaji to get my bag safely with out any problems during the scanning… and yes, my prayers are answered…. Again, a person checking my coat, pant, shirt everything …. Embarrassing, I was showing my passport, ticket, visa docs to the security person whose duty is just to check for any prohibited goods that I may carry….

Scene 6:

First time stepping in to a flight…. Prayed balaji again… and entered…. Very cold place and bloody hell (Tamil Nadu’s Thiruavalluvar transport buses are spacious than this flight) anyway that’s least of my concern….
Air hostess: Halo sir, may I help you
ME: Hi… Hehehehe… Am traveling for the first time… could you help me finding my seat….
AH: Your boarding pass please ?
ME: Here (once again I showed all docs)
AH: (jus taking out the small paper bit and had a look) over there sir (she pointed with well polished nails)

Scene 7:

Got my seat and window seat (ofcourse I got my boarding pass 3 hours in prior and askd for a window seat).. I kept(squeezed) the oversized hand bag in the top and retained my leather coat with me…The next 3 aisle seats were occupied by a couple with their 2 year old kid… and the man threw a shock, ‘Hi… can we take the window seat and you can take the aisle seat if you don’t mind as we have kid ‘… I don have a clue wat its in his mind (and vice versa)…. My mind voice talked ‘You #@#@#!@ I was waiting for window seat in a flight all my life to have a good look at the city during take off… what you think I am a regular flyer and looking for aisle seat for my comfort’…. But my actual voice said ‘Ya, sure… no problem’….. some body kill me….

Scene 8:

The flight was about to take off and I started my prayers again and beginning to get myself worried for unknown reason… mind voice->’come on … be a man’ The flight started and I jus curious looking out and praying parallely… I was astonished to see the flight moving so slowly… I thought It will move slowly then pick up the speed and fly…. Later realized the flight is being dragged by some other vehicle to run way… hell… I was too early and started praying… lemme restart… The take off happened finally and I tightened the seat belt as tight as I could….

Scene 9:

The airhostess distributed the menu card for the meals… then I called one of them after 10 mins and asked ‘Can I pick any number of these ? Do I have to pay any ?’ , she smiled and answered politely , ‘No sir, this isn’t restaurant style card… this holds the information on the list of items served in your meal and ofcourse you have paid for all these when you buy the ticket’… yet another embarrassing one … am sure the next seat chap heared and giggled…. When will I reach dubai ahhhhhhhh

Scene 10:

Reached dubai… Clueless on what to do next… first time I saw a lovely airport in my life…. Chennai is no way near… I almost asked 10 ppl for the transit gate to Gatwick flight and quiet surprised its more than 10 mins walk… huge airport man… once again I showed all docs to the security check person in the boarding longue….

Scene 11:

Reached London Gatwick airport and the reall pressure comes in here when I stood in the queue for the immigration… I know I got all docs but still I felt I need to use the restroom… nervousness you see…. The interaction was smooth and I walked out happily to the baggage claim which is the penultimate prayer …. I wonder how my luggage arrived so safely being a non living thing with no sense to think …. Why am I not in the luggage so that I cud have avoided all embarrassments and pain…

Scene 12:

I need to catch a transport to Southampton and the taxi fare is my dad’s month’s pay…. I took the help of a staff there who unbelievably helped me out to get in to a coach and guided me on my cheapest way to travel to Southampton… thank god… all my prayers answered and ofcoure with full of embarrassments…. Any one could never forget their first international flight journey… Phew !!!

I guess i can hand over this script to Mr. Bean for his next play... and ofcourse he cant make it more humorous than the actual incidents.

A quiet vacation

2008-12-09T13:01:00.002+05:30

I guess this is the longest gap I have given between my posts in recent past. As most of you know, I was on leave for a week. No specific reason just told by my boss that I need to exhaust my leaves by this year or those will be of useless if don’t use it. I picked this whole from Dec. 1 to 5 and planned well to spend it very organized (when I say organized, It need not be a usefull one )

I started getting back to gym spree and I made full advantages of the hotel gyms in Malaysia where I am staying on the business trip. So, all days I managed to spend 2 hours odd in gym to get some health back. Swimming after is a bliss to the over heated body of mine. Then comes the KEY part of the day. Its Movie time. All the days I decided to watch one Hollywood movie a day and here you go.

Day Light Roberry : Nice one to start with…BGM is top class… good entertainment as the whole movie is all about clever bank roberry and so u will sure be entertained till the end… I would recommend any one

Journey to the Center of the Earth : Another good BGM movie… I really admired the dialogues as it had british style (addressing all with Mr./Mrs. And a well structured English) Adventure movie with a lovely cinematography… Another good entertainer

80 Minutes: A thriller. He got 80 minutes to return his debt or he dies with the poison in his body… All the troubles in the world hez facing in those 80 minutes… good time pass…at the end…

Witless protection : A total waste of time… supposed to be humourous and totally irritating… don even think…

Pursuit of happyness : The perfect movie I loved to watch when its raining outside and am sitting on the balcony feeling the freshness of the atmosphere…. All about a father who struggled to the core to get a chance to prove his talent and ability…. Will smith is sure a top class actor.. my favourite too

And that is all I have for you on my holiday updates… the weekend was exciting as I traveled back to Singapore as a formal visit that I do once every 2/3 weeks with out doing much… been to bowling with my only mate out there and managed to watch Quarrantine which is a total mental torture for 1.5 hours…. As a whole, it was a total gym and movie spree but totally gone down as I return to work today after good long leave…

Go Gadgeting !!!

2008-11-28T13:44:00.003+05:30

I slowly getting gelled with the gadget world around me and this time its PSP… This is one freaky gadget I aimed since 3 years and now got the chance. I happened to visit with out any plans to Low yat plaza, one of the bargain shopping mall in Kualalampur. Like Sim lim square in Singapore like Ritchie street in Chennai….

However, I found the rates of the items relatively expensive compared to the Singapore. But I suddenly spotted a small shop selling the PSP and just enquired about it… He offered the latest PSP version for 1200 Ringgits which includes

- Cracked PSP set so that I can play any copied game
- 8 GB memory card with around 8 racing games (All NFS) and 4 combat games
- Carry case for PSP
- USB cable for data transfer
- Sony head phones

Totally fascinated by the features of the damn piece

- Play games in high quality graphics
- Watch movie (high quality display)
- Listen to songs
- Surf internet using Wifi
- Watch still images

I can able to use 5 hours nonstop to utilize complete battery power. However, no replacement warranty if I happen to drop the gadget accidentally… if its broken, its gone… Also, this can be connected to any TV for watching movies and can be connected to plasma/lcd tv for playing games with bigger screen with same high quality display…

I guess I am totally mad on this one playing my favourite NFS mostwanted at the moment and watching movies…. Now, I am lookin forward to travel any wer as am sure I wont be bored at all ;)

Note : Did I mentioned that the original intention for the shopping was to buy a touchscreen ipod for my wife for her bday but pathetically ended up with me gifted with this… ok la, compensate later ;)

Unreal Classic... Utter Crap !!!

2008-11-17T13:47:00.003+05:30

I am not much fond of Gowtham Menon’s direction for his uniformed presentation in most of the movies. The slow screen play, narration by one of the characters, kinda maniratnam’s influence etc… At times I feel like watching Maniratnam’s movie… anyways am not a great fan of Mani either…. The only 2 movies impressed me of Gowtham is Kaaka Kaaka and Minnale… I guess music and the hero plays major part than the GM’s role as director.

Watched Varanam Aayiram recently in Singapore.. I had my expectations high as its from Surya and harris jeyaraj comes together again but neva thought it will be total disappointment…. The movie is supposed to tell the bonding between father and son but focused away in many places…

Positives:

Surya conquered all our minds with his variety with make up’s, action and roles…. He done justice to the role with all his hard work

Music was absolutely mesmerizing… am stilling murmering the song and tune all the time…

The 1980s back drop… done with perfection and Surya again matching the glamour.. Also, the cinematography involving Brooklyn bridge and songs… Awesome !!!

Negatives:

Not at all for B and C centr: GM thinks all the B and C centr audience should not watch his movies at all…. This is quiet obvious from the movie… is it a hollywood movie or tamil movie…. Not much of Tamil dialogues… thank god atleast Simran explains the title at the climax… crap !!!

The slow slow screen play: The romance scenes in the second half was way too boring… I felt many are not at all needed (the rescue show from military, the delhi fiasco etc..)

Logic: Suryas all from middle class family but mostly converse in English like a posh family … this is seriously not practical…. Father is not in good health, sister unmarried, family is suffering due to debts, son is just started to click in his financial situation but inspite of all that he gets Visa to USA and is ok to spend lakhs just to find and get back his love at first sight… see how practical this being… I don’t understand on what basis he expcts ppl to thnk this as a classic movie….

Suryas hard work: I think this also was over done for this movie…. Surya’s hefty physique is not at all needed just to show that he became major in the on going stage of his life and just because he got a good physique he needs to show it up with a military rescue operation… toooooo boring.. besides, the dad Surya is too much of a cool dude and always agrees with his son for what ever decision he takes… Son Surya being a middle class family guy, opts to go to Kashmir, Delhi for a change with out showing any way of how he got all the fundings for all his adventures…. Ayooooo !!!! I know Indian cinema shouldn’t be searched for logics… but this supposed to be classic rite.. soo do justify??

Simran did some justice I should say but at times I feel she never reacts enough to be a love lady or caring mother….

Theme: The director made too many love duets and love failure songs with more than 2 heroines but failed to give a thumping, heart touching melody for Father-Son touch which is supposed to be the theme of the movie…

Neutrals:

Divya and Sameera: Refreshing one to see them but again they just don’t lift or let down the movie… they just played their part meeting expectations.

As a whole, I felt 30% of the movie extremely good (Surya, Music, Screenplay in first half) and the rest 70% was close to crap (Screen play in second half, missing logics, mainly direction).. So decided that Gowtham Menon’s movie to be watched only if one doesn’t kno how to spend time or too bored with life to watch some movie or no other good movies released or get viewers review before watching….He should be happy i got so many options to see the movie still...

One line conclusion is ‘Thavamai Thavamirunthu was a great movie’, Thanks Gowtham Menon I just realized that after seeing Varanam Aayiram ;)

Clicking all the way

2008-11-11T11:24:00.010+05:30

Quiet a huge gap again and ironically, was busy at work and finding way to manage my time effectively. Last weekend had a chance to visit the lovely theme park in kualalampur, Sunway lagoon. What interested me was the park was neat and well maintained with varieties of attractions inside. I was particularly fascinated by the well built surf beach, the interactive zoo, terrain bikes, kayaking, scream park, water rides etc...

Top of all, being a clicking crazy dude, i saw the advert outside on the photography contest poster sticked over there. The rules are straightforward, pictures to be taken should be inside the theme park premises and there you go... here are the set of pics that i submitted for the contest. Though, i kno am not all that great and getting the first prize was a far dream, am still excited to send the entries :)

Stay away !!! Even if you like me

Set me free : PLEASE

Rest --- is all i need:

Privacy please !!!

Lone Soldier

Do Not Disturb: Am thinking

Fist of Fury

Busy Pair

I clicked lot more but the above are the ones that interested me :)

Nation’s Shame

2008-10-22T15:50:00.007+05:30

As Part of my work commitment I am now traveling quiet frequently from Singapore to Malaysia and gotto stay in different hotels. So far the experience was not so exciting being in Kualalampur and the main reason being the Errant Taxi drivers.

Eye wash message (Drivers never cared this)

I always use the Taxis or Office shuttles to commute from hotel to office to hotel back and every time I get unique experience. Some of the taxi drivers are quiet generous and honest when they charge. Believe it or not, last week I happen to stay in a hotel close to the office and I paid taxi charge from 3 Ringgits to 15 Ringgits at different times. When I try to wait for the rite person, I am the looser (loosing money and time) ahhh !!!

This week was the ultimate experience. The hotel I stay is quiet far and I had 2 incidents nudging me to quit the country as soon.

Incident 1:

I need to go to hotel from office. None of the call taxis are ready to go there and so I have to take a round tour. So, I called a taxi that goes to KL Central (which is like a center hub where any one would agree to go) thinking I can get another taxi to my hotel from there as they got prepaid taxi counter over there. Once I got in to the taxi, I just wanted to try my luck if the taxi driver agrees to go the hotel straight but he pretended that he don’t know English and so I kept simple English communication to make him understand that I need to go hotel. He refused with a plain ‘No’ insisting that he got the call only to KL Central. ‘Fine’, I said gesturing to go ahead to KLC. On the way the driver asked me ‘You want to go Jalan Ampang (the hotel place)’. I said ‘Yes’….’Can you ?’ I asked him with curiosity. He didn’t answer and kept thinking. I thought no point in askng him and I din bother to make any more attempts. We reached KL Central. When I was about to get down, the taxi driver sed ‘You want to go Jln. Ampng. ?’ … I was surprised ‘Why the hell he is asking now’… I have to get another taxi anyway so I told him ‘Yes’. He then left me in the hotel. Later realized that this guy wanted to make money by touring around the place with me. Such a prick who irritated me a lot with his so called smart behaviour (saala Kaamchor !!!)

Incident 2:

Yesterday again I wanted to go back to hotel from office. This time I got our office shuttle to reach KL central as I have no choice. Again from KL central I went further to Indian eat outs to have my dinner. Again I was waiting for a taxi for a long time. At last, I got one. The driver was a old Chinese. I asked him 'Jln. Ampang ?' and he said 'yes'. I felt lucky and got inside. All I saw in the vehicle is a motor and 4 wheels. It’s a total crap and the car is in a pathetic condition. ’25 Ringgits’ he said and I was shocked as the destination wont be worth of 5 Ringgits. I said ‘Its too much I give u 10 ringgits’. He was angry as if he is the only driverin whole country. ‘Give me 20 Ringgits .. most of the straight roads are closed and I have to go around’…since there was heavy down pour and I am extremely tired, I said ‘ok go on.. but, you give recipt right ?’ I asked back.. ‘Yes, no problem’, he replied and kept driving.. as I expected, there was no road closing.. infact he took the shortest route to reach soon…I thought doesn’t matter as I can claim this from my company with the recipt…. I askd for recipt and that so called smart cheat gave me a folded ‘House rent recipt’ thinking I wont notice. AS he folded the doubt sparked and I happened to chk to confirm he is fooling around. I asked him to give me the taxi recipt and he refused telling ‘This is all I got’….A***le !!! I got pissed off… argued with him with vain… I even threatened him that I will call police and he just din give a damn on that… I was helpless (I was cornered) ;) and got out with complete disappointment…. Thinking arguing anymore is like mud wrestling with pig…..

I then researched on the taxis in Malaysia and I found that it is one of the worst taxi lots country. The country is beautiful and the places are lovely but taxi drivers are the key locals who are turning the impression to other way (specially with the tourists and expats)… So friends, bear in mind if you happen to visit KL. Beware of Taxi touts and also be aware that you cant do anything about it as n number of complaints already registered and the govt. very well knows the situation and never bothered to change this pathetic 'Nation’s Shame' image.

Hey Saala !!!

2008-10-16T14:19:00.003+05:30

‘Hi Vasanth, Welcome to the Performance appraisal meeting’, the manager greeted his next team member. ‘Hi Vas’, the lead gave a crocodile smile (u got any idea what a crocodile smile ??? just refer to my friend Prashanth’s JR blog in my favourite links) ‘Hi Narendar (Manager), Hi Chander (Lead)’ Vas. accepted and returned the same.

‘Ok, here we go’, the manager on his sarcastic voice. ‘Lets discuss on the projects and responsibilities that you have taken for the whole last year’, the usual dialogue he sez in all the appraisals to all the members. Vas(anth) was quiet worried this time coz he went under severe tough year as he had few health related problems, got married and inspite of that he managed to deliver what he could. He had good review last time and won accolades. However, the management haven’t offered much monetary benefits as the company haven’t collected big revenue previous year. This year was ok in terms of overall revenue and no wonder Vas is expecting a good returns.

The talk went on for 30 mins or so where Vas explained almost everything he did for the whole year and then concluded like this. ‘Naren, I feel that I was not best of my potential due to personal problems however I don’t think it was a bad year looking at the work , facts and figures. So, I hope this year I would get back to my best’

‘That’s good’, Naren again with his sarcastic voice. ‘Chander, your comments on Vas?’ he ordered. Immediate reaction from Chander like a dog wags his tail when the owner throws a biscuit. (I think the above sentence is appropriate as Vas hates Chander for some reason due to work and other personal issues. Apparently, the author (me) scripting the story with Vas. As the hero. ; ) so its ok to project Chander as baddie) ‘Naren, ya Vas did a great job but as he said he was not at his best and for me he haven’t met my expectations’, even chander was sarcastic this time. Vas was a bit shocked as he never expected such a chilli coated sentence straight away which almost sounded like a paradox (means first part of the sentence contradicts with second part). ‘A*****e’ Vas murmered deep inside. ‘Why the hell he is talking like this ?’ thousand questions inside Vas.

‘I am sorry’ , Vas interrupted. ‘The figures are correct, the customers are happy, most of the projects went fine except few hiccups’ Vas told in a disturbed tone. ‘I know but these projects haven’t been on time’, he displayed a paper printed with those worst moments he had with the work. ‘But these are only 10% of the work I did during the whole year’ , Vas mind voice speaking to himself. However, he kept silent as he thought arguing with superiors are like mud wrestling with pig (means at the end u will be dirty and the pig would have enjoyed the fight)

‘So I think Vas haven’t met expectations’, Chander continued. ‘Why the hell should I bother about his expectations.. I did my work fair enough’ again Vass’ mind voice. ‘In that case I can give him a rating of 5/10 as he also managed to deliver few. Vas was angry ‘Why Why Why should I get only 5 for the 10% of the work I did messed up’ All the time he was quiet in front of the others to know their final call. ‘Yes, Naren I guess 5/10 is apt’ , Chander agreed with Naren.

Few more formality talks but the end result was clear to Vas. Not a pleasant talk for him. Too many things happening in his mind. Why the F**K this Chander behaves so strange in front of the manager ? Is he being hypocratic to save money to the cost center or is he trying to build a profile for himself at the cost of my dignity ?’ Vas tension increased. ‘I need to think… Think Vas… Think… I cant take this… no way…’

The above scene is not so uncommon. Many Soft Engineer faces this. Inspite of good work they still don’t get the recognition and benefits they deserve. How we react to this ?

Angry man’s approach (Rather F***D up dude’s approach):
Normally stay quiet. Come out and search for other company and put the papers soon as he could as there is no point in staying back to prove his worth whole year which mite again get messed up due to 10% errors which is not sure too.

Wise man’s approach (I can still take more S***T):
Take the feed back in positive manner and work harder forgetting family and friends and social life to erase even that 10%. Try and organize team outings, butter manager/lead, laugh for sick jokes of superiors, spend time often with team in coffee corners even though you hate them… All for a better appraisal.

Ok. Lets forget the above and go to an imaginary reaction that every one loves Vas to react in the end of the same meeting. Lets continue the Scene……

’10 minutes left Mr. Vasanth, Any questions/comment from your side’, Manager once again showing his attitude with the commanding sentence. Vasanth was on the edge of his seat until that time and got himself relaxed. Moved back to occupy the complete chair. Leaned back. Gave a slow rotataion to his shoulder. Raised his chest a bit and lowered again. Stretched his arm so that every one in the room heard his knuckles breaking sound. Once again breaking his neck-knuckles by agitating his head. ‘So’, he sounded like a Vice president of the department. ‘Its all decided by now I guess’, Vasanth commented with a smiling face.

Naren and Chander showed a puzzled face as if they peed in their pants. ‘Hmmm’ Vas didn’t bothere about their reaction. ‘I can see Mr. Chander took some pain in drafting a paper on How to S**T with me’, Vas. Never bothered about his language. ‘Vas, I guess you gotto mind your language’, Chander reacted angrily. ‘I know what I am talking Chander, After all you want to make this whole meet as a formality when you both have decided on what to feed me’, Vas. Was organized when he said this. ‘Feed you ?’, Manager was showing puzzled face again. ‘Ofcourse, the peanuts you gonna feed me just because I messed up a bit and you gonna blow this as if I got your whole business down’

‘No.. No Vas, that was not the intention’, This time Naren was lowering his voice. However, Chandar still pretending to be an angry man as if he was insulted. ‘Your intention my foot. Now listen, I don’t care your intentions here. My opinion is straight forward. You don’t care me and I don’t care you I mean the company’, Vas yelled. ‘Vas, I guess you are crossing your limit’, Chander interrupted as if he is Naren’s boss. ‘Hey my friend, I guess your job is done for this meet up and thank you for your so called observation and analysis. Now, let me talk to the manager while you can keep quiet or leave the room’, Vas. Really enjoying the situation. Chander wasn’t sure on how to react. He was just sitting dumb with confused look.

‘Ok, Naren let me tell you what. You guys are real losers. I might be harsh but you guys deserves this and I don’t care if you escalate this to take action against me’, Vas on top of his voice. ‘Why you say that ? You can take this in a positive way to work better and show your potential’, Naren tried to convince Vas. ‘Positive huh’, Vas smiled again calmly ‘You mean just accept what ever you say with a f***g smile on my face go back and hope that I get my straw berries atleast next year.. My A*S’, Vas angry again. ‘I think you need a coffee, may be we can discuss about your concerns later’, Naren was diplomatic again as if he face 1 million situations like these. ‘Concerns ??? does that have a value here ? Listen Gentlemen do you think am still gonna chase you wasting my time to get what I deserve in a place of professionals with fulla attitude ? you got it all wrong my dear colleagues’ Now Vas. Is enjoying it doesn’t he ?

‘What do you think you are up to ?’, Naren trying to calm things and Chander showing worried face all this time. ‘What else ? Consider this meetin as notice to my resignation. Reason: Non professional attitude by Lead and Manager. I am ready to talk to any one any time on this and further I don’t want to discuss with you guys’. Naren was quiet all these time Bursted out saying ‘Fine. If that is your decision we can not stop you’. ‘I bet you cant. I would prefer changing the field altogether than working under morons like you guys’ Vas exited with a Crocodile smile on his face.

Hope you enjoyed the above hypothetical second part of the post ; ) Now, don’t ask me what made you to write this… Where you one of the victims and bla bla bla….

Hey… Guess why I chose this title for this post ???? nothing la, I was just listening to the Ajith’s latest movie song ‘Hey Saala’ (the one playing in this page) and I thought that will be apt. C ya in next post : ) Now listen to the song again before you click CANCEL.

F1 Fever

2008-10-07T12:04:00.005+05:30

All i know about F1 is its just a 'Help' Key and nothing else but now i got to know further more. I never ever followed any F1 races until the one I watched in Singapore. Initially this whole sport is an absurd to me as lots of money are wasted than most of the sports in the world. However, in the recent First ever F1 Street night racing changed my intentions. It has actually turned out to be a treat to watch.

The Track:

Its no special reserved track. Its just the normal public road which I almost use everyday to commute to my office. I was amazed to see the government well organized and worked on their toes to construct the whole track and got it ready with in such a short period. There was around 150M spent on the whole event and the govt. claims it as ‘Well spent money’ as it has drawed the whole world’s attention to the Singapore tourism. The Singaporeans don’t complain on the problems caused of this to the normal traffic and they are totally proud to be the new host for the F1 spree. For me, what excited me was the view of the track from my office and for the first time I saw a car going around 280kmph live jus few yards away.

The players:

Until that point I never followed any races or know about any players. All I heard was these 2 chaps Felippe Massa and Lewis Hamilton are competing each other for the top spot and this race is gonna be crucial. Then I slowly started to observe the actual rules of the game and all. Though I haven’t completely got, I can still manage to enjoy with what I know.

The Race day:

I haven’t planned to get a ticket and when I thought I want to, the tickets are sold out. I left with no choice but to watch from home. It was still exciting 1.5 hours with all dramatic scenes happening. For this particular track the pole positions was considered as key factor and according to that Massa supposed to be there finishing the formalities for his competence. The crash of Piquet which got the safety car in changed everything. Further, to rub salts on the Ferrari wounds,

- Massa taken off from pitstop before the refueling person took his pipe off from the tank resulting in additional 10 secs penalty

- Kimi Reikonnen of Ferrari team who had a good lead messed up in last 10 mins resulting in no points to Ferrari team which unfortunately pulled them down to 2nd rank with 1 point difference with Mclaren-Mercedez.

Lewis Hamilton can still be happy as he showed some character and managed to stay top in the ranking even though he finished 3rd. His main competitor was Massa who had a worst nightmare that Sunday.

I am now excited and looking forward to watch the upcoming Japanese Grand Prix this Sunday. As of now, I am still not a fan of any particular player but the Hamilton and Roseberg’s skills was impressive looking at their consistency for all the 61 laps. You can check http://www.f1.com/ for updates on F1. Further more I am quiet happy that I got one another interesting sport to follow from now on ; )

Sony H50

2008-10-03T14:44:00.009+05:30

Ok. Finally !!! I got it… The camera that I was waiting for… The brand new Sony H50. I was so damn waiting for it and finally got it… I already know its amazing features and this semi professional camera is just the perfect one I wanted….

Here are some pics taken from it right away on my first family vacation to Malaysia

The lovely street on Putrajay town (Malaysia's Legislative capital)

How is it?

The cool Genting Cable Car (Must visit one)

Another view of 1 million Ringgit Tamil Lord

Array of other gods in the temple

Mind blowing Kualalampur view from KL Communication Tower

14th January 2008

2008-09-19T15:06:00.005+05:30

14th January 2008 : 2:58 PM

I opened my eyes with utmost effort. I. I. I don’t know. I feel the whole room is swinging to and fro. I can hear the ‘Tick Tick’ sound from the clock some where around. I. I. I couldn’t think. I feel so tired. What the hell is happening around ? I managed to open my eyes and noticed that I am inside a tub. Yes, it’s a bath tub. What am I doing here ? Iam covered by ice cubes. I am still not sure. I am confused. What happened ? I heard the talking clock saying 3 pm. I cant feel anything below my neck Why am I not feeling cold even when I am surrounded by ice. What happened last time when I was conscious ? I try to recollect and I barely remember. I noticed the daily calendar in the corner of the bathroom over the slab near the wash basin. It says 14th January 2008 : Monday. Oh my god. Oh S**t. F****g hell. I don’t know what happened last 1.5 days.

13th January 2008 : 12:32 AM

I was walking after a team dinner and dance hosted by our office in a posh 5 star restaurant. The cold Bangalore climate was a real catalyst for reckless dance. I was overwhelmed and got quiet drunk to aggrevate myself. I managed to still be on control as it is office party and not my close mates. The bartender made the announcement for the close of the bar at 12. I wanted to dance so badly but I have to adhere and walk calmly to my home. I was tired of trying to catch autos near MG road. All where quiet busy and finally managed to see one auto reversing towards me after crossing me over. I couldn’t really think a lot. My brain is full of alcohol mixed with 10% of other liquids. ‘Basavanagudi’, I puked when I was telling this to the driver.

14th January 2008 : 3:22 PM

I couldn’t recollect what happened after that. I can not. What happened? I shooked my head to get revived but I felt more pain when I do that. I managed to get up and I cant. Its just my right fore hand moves barely and manages to swing a bit. I don’t know about my left hand its drowned under the ice back below my neck. Some thingz written on the ball front of me. ‘CALL FOR MEDICAL HELP’. What ? Why ? What happened? The room looked quiet scary. I couldn’t sense what place and what happened? I saw the door half opened and tried my best to scream. I could hardly raise my voice. I know I am feeling weak.

I thought there should be some phone around. I just started looking for phone around with hand touching the floor and maneuvering around to see if I could get hold of a phone. Yes, Yes, Yes. I got it. Its my own phone. Oh yes. I quickly grabbed it and lifted up to get it infront of my eyes. I tried to locate Vasanth’s number who is my room mate. I am sure he must be looking for me. I called. I called. Its ringing. Its ringing. ‘Damnnnnnnnn’, I cant believe it the battery is off. I wanted to cry but I am beyond that stage. I screamed to the best. I felt so weak. I cant sense anything below my neck. What happened? I don’t know what they did on my body when I am not conscious. Is it the auto driver or am I being attacked by any other gang ??? Full of confusions.

I am supposed to go to my home town yesterday. I am scheduled to meet my fiancée. I am getting married next month. Why me ? I cried. I am sure my friends and family would have started looking for me. I am missing man. I am not sure if it would be of any help even if I can call. I don’t know where the hell I am. I am panic. I don’t know what happened last 1 day, I don’t know what the gang did with me, I don’t know where I am, I am not sure what to do, Infact I cant do anything otherthan swinging my right fore arm. Ok calm down. Calm down. Let me think. I should think. Don’t panic. Come on think, think, think. I can see blood and its fully red inside the tub. Had they took my kidney and put me here ? Or is it some other organ ? Or have they robbed me and stabbed me ? Not sure. Anyways I cant even sense.

14th January 2008 : 3:55 PM

I slowly observed the room inch by inch to get any clue of the place. I can hear something. The sound of the train. I guess I am near some railway track. Where is this ? Not enough clue. I am trying to observe. Think Think. May be I can try switch on the phone again but it wont last for more than 10-15 secs due to low battery. Whom should I call ? What to convey ? I need to know this address. I don’t have much help. I just managed to get my first promotion in my work place and all set for an onsite trip to USA in 2 months time after my marriage. I was filled with dreams until 36 hours ago. I got angry. I started loosing my senses. I screamed. I tried to get up. I tried to be aggressive. I realized my hand can move much better now.

I should do something. That’s enough I cant die here. I want to live. I still have dreams to ful fill. I can not dieeeeeee. I noticed there is a bin near the tub in a distance where my hands could reach. There is a small plastic bag on the bin to collect the garbage. I got an idea. I started filling the bin with the ice cubes one by one to get a good weight. I notice the bath room’s window is open. Its right on the left hand side of me on top. I jus took a piece of paper from the bag and written HELP PLZ IM DIEING with my blood. I put 2-3 papers inside the bag on top of the ice. The idea is to throw the bag through the window and by gods grace if some one notices should read the letter and get some help for me.

The plan works well so far as I anticipated. I tried to tie the top end of the bag with one hand and inserted all the paper pieces with messages on all sides. I throwed the bag out of the window as fast as I could with my best shot so that the bag land some where in the road avoiding the sun shades or compounds.

I did all I could do and now its in gods hands to save me. I started to pray good as I am a firm believer of this controversial existence.

14th January 2008 : 4:43 PM

I slowly dozing away. I cant think any more. I switched on my mobile to let Vasanth know some how about my trouble. I switched on immdly and called him. He took the phone in first Ring. ‘Vasanth listen I am locked inside a room near railway track call police and sa~~~~~~~~’ The phonez dead. I cried again. I cant take this. Its so unfair. Why me ??? I am getting more weak.

14th January 2008 : 6:02 PM

I slowly started loosing my senses. I slowly started dozing away when I suddenly hear a noice behind the door but I can’t react any more.

S-O-M-E B-O-D-Y S-A-V-E M-E

P.S:

Moral : Nothing
Message : Nothing
Climax : Nope

Why this attempt ? : I am alone on a business trip and this is what all I thought of writing at early morning 1.45 AM.

Note: Try not to be idle or try not to be awake during nights.

Dhoni : Leadership par excellence

2008-09-01T12:06:00.003+05:30

This is all about learning from the new leadership sensation of Indian cricket team, Mahendra Singh Dhoni… Earlier I had few reservations on him as he haven’t encouraged the inclusion of seniors like dravid and specially Ganguly in the team. Now his ideas are proved worthy as he won the ODI trophies in Australia and Srilanka and winning more ODIs… The team’s potential is undoubtedly high right from the beginning and what makes this young lad so special being ‘the leader’ did mattered.
Dynamic decision making skills:

Many leaders go with a strategy and mostly stick to it in the battle field be it a sports or in corporate world… They don’t go out of the box or go with any adhoc strategy to approach the crisis the team facing… this chap stands apart with his quick and effective decisions…. For ex… in the 4th ODI against SL in the idea cup, when Jayasurya was at his best hiking the run rate, he got bajji to attack little early only to disturb his rhythm and getting the catch at 2nd slip by well placed fielding….another ex. Is bringing Joginder sharma during the final of the T20 World cup to bowl the last critical over to win the title… this is ofcourse a big risk.. I appretiate his nature of going-by-instincts which pays good for any professional who is in the field for quiet some time…

Never say die attitude:

This is one of the key quality a leader should possess… this guys approach some times reminds me the Hansie Cronje’s XI of south Africa… no matter how many wickets lost… no matter how many runs the opponents scored… ‘We are still in the game’… although past leaders had this quality, dhoni went on take the best of it when compared with others….

Young blood, bold decisions:

Being young is major advantage…. No matter in whatever field one is in… from wat I observed with my limited experience looking at the world… most of the old managers scare to take bold decisions and also I noticed young managers or old managers who are young in themselves never gives a big thinking on taking bold decisions… ther focus being the team’s victory rather worrying about ‘how worse the impact of my decision making will be’

Good team:

This is a sort of luck factor.. however, I wont completely call it as luck… to me I feel dhoni got a better talented cricketers than what sachin had in his regime….

Taking up the responsibility:

This is something made him the best… he entered in to the team as a disaster man who got impeccable strike rates in every match he plays… I cant forget his 183 that he made so early in his career… This was highest by any wicketkeeper batsman… After becoming captain, he took more responsblty to his shoulder and did justice to his role as a captain.. which is what lagging by most of the leaders in any field… after taking up the captainship, his strike rate significantly went down, the point to be noted is his average… which has immensively raised to show his tempermant and responsblty that he had taken up to show good results rather goin on to improve his personal record… a self less person who worked for his team and country…. Also, made sure he got the best of the money he could make while he is at peak of his carrer through ads, ipl, etc….

I am sure he will get many followers for his leadership, talent and above all his ‘Sportsmanship’ : )

How good is Singapore ?.... Visit KL !!!

2008-08-12T13:02:00.005+05:30

I was so excited and desperate to go on a weekend break to KL (kualalampur)… Lifez getting so monotonous with overloaded work….This is more a observation log than a travelogue abt the new place and trip…

I made my plans well in advance… Its gonna be coach (posh bus) trip to KL… It’s a first class coach provided enough room to park my long legs comfortably … the 10 inch lcd tv, meals on board made life so comfortable as good as a business class flight journey… however, the extreme pain is while waiting near the cause way point (the exit point of Singapore through road) made it quiet irritating .. the tv will be switched on only after the singapore emigration and Malaysia immigration… We (the passengers) all got down to finish up the emigration work and got back in to bus….

The two countries are connected by a 1 km bridge over the sea with their check points on either side…. Sooo that means we gotto get down again after crossing the bridge to finish up Malaysia immigration formalities which means more pain ahhhhh… however, the system is quiet organized as there are n number of vehicles crossing the border every day…. Then I got back and set for a long 5 hours odd journey… the route was quiet scenic with Malaysian vegetations on the way.. but I still only love my scenic rich Bangalore – Chennai route ….. hahaha

I still haven’t found any big difference… I found the price of drinks and snacks quiet cheap wen we stopped for a 10 min. toilet break… reached the majestic KL just 2 kms from the famous twin (petronas) towers and headed to the hotel…. The next day set out for a short hang around…. The taxi guys are not firm believers of meter system.. its more a show case item for them… (I found the auto guys are more generous with their meter in Bangalore) since I have no idea abt the place I have to accept their offer for 10 Ringgits to reach twin towers and he was not even driving for 6 mins… The streets are ok here and there considering the area being posh.. however, wen u go out of the city-posh area you can find the real KL there… so dirty ahhh….

As soon as I kept my leg outside the taxi I found this guy approached me and gave a sarcastic look… ‘Sir, Rolex watch’, he showed that glittering look alike of Rolex… I straight away ignored with a humble ‘No’… ‘Sir, its original’ …ayooo raama…. Leave me yaar…. I wanted to go to the sky bridge that connects the two towers… gosh ! the tickets are limited and normally it will be sold out early in the morning like 8 am…. Wat the ???? I was so disappointed and took few snaps from outside.. then entered the posh shopping mall and found all damn things costlier than Singapore Suntec city mall… Isnt that supposed to be cheap here ??? Eh???

Later decided to go to KL tower which is the worlds 3rd largest communication tower…. 10 Ringgits again for the taxi… couldn’t afford to bargain with out knowing actual distance… the driver refused to switch on the AC as the place is quiet near… What ‘kodumai’ is this….man petrol is quiet cheap in this country yo…. The observatory deck in KL tower is quiet catchy … well maintained and I managed to have a glimpse of the whole city and found its well surrounded my hills… Then got out and hung around for an hour to take few snaps of the tower.. the temperature is same as Singapore but since the place is away from sea, I managed to have reduced sweat with a mild breeze every where…

This time I took a prepaid taxi to Pudu raya bus terminus where I am supposed to take my return coach… The cost is 14 ringgits… and for 20 mins drive…. The driver dropped like 300 meters before the bus terminus stating the over traffic road… I can compare the scene with old paris bus stand in chennai… all garbages, dirty, quarrels and horn sounds… then entered the most scary building called bus terminus… as soon as I got in, I was mugged by several travel agents offering trips to various parts of Malaysia at cheaper cost…

I found extremely hard to find the counter for my agent… not many speak English and I don have a clue abt malay… oh my ….. the place is so damn crowded and It took like 10 mins to find my counter in the middle of the human jungle… then I got my platform and bus number… proceeded to platform…. I would rate my lovely Chennai-koyambedu bus terminus as 123 times better one for its infrastructure facilities, clean toilets, organized bus traffic handling and etc… this international bus terminus is close to crap and I cant wait to get out….

The bus left 45 mins late and reached the check point in 5 hours from that point… quickly finished up the immigration in singapore and I opted to get a local bus from ther to my place as I live quiet close to the Singapore border (like 5 miles)… I had a lovely back-to-home feeling even in the local bus and cant wait to hit the bed… and know wat ?.... till date I was hating this Singapore and all on a sudden this looks like heaven…. However, nothing beats life in India when it comes to livng comfort .... ;)

மாதா, பிதா, குரு, ~நல்ல நண்பன்~, தெய்வம்

2008-08-04T14:13:00.002+05:30

'Mother, father, teacher, good friend and the almighty'

The line literally drawn tears almost from every one in the cinema… I was all excited to see the much awaited movie, Kuselan. I am aware that this onez is not focused on thalaivar but the hype created was so much that audience was expecting a typical thalaivar movie… I still haven’t watched the original ‘kathai parayumbol’ but I guess mamooty wudnt have got such a huge focus in the Malayalam version…

P.Vasu typically tried to deliver his mix of masala in this ‘supposed to be classic’ one… however, I wasn’t impressed with this movie for such a slow screen play… The music is close to crap… the comedy scenes are not appealing rather the comedy element itself is far away for the crux of the story… overloaded comedians like Livingston, vadivelu, santhanam lots others are like too much sugar in coffee which spoiled the taste… for me, prabhu is a useless character with full of over actions….

Thalaivar exceeded the expectations in terms of acting… I never felt myself heavy in any of the other movies in world cinema…. The closest I felt was in Thenali in the scene where kamal Hassan described his pathetic past to the interview… and in the kannada movie 'Mungaru malay' where the hero compares himself with the villain for the reason that they both have lost thr love and treated him gracefully after a fight...

Kuselan is a wonderful classic movie (if u eliminate those irritating comedy scenes which doesn’t fit) and reminded his aarilurunthu arubathu varai…. The last 20 mins of the movie is all that one shouldn’t miss… I was totally embarrassed to see those tiny tear droplets in my eyes when the movie is over… and the reason is one name ‘Rajinikanth’… no one could have acted with utmost perfection like he did…..

The story is quiet straight forward… its all about how the famous numero uno actor found his child hood best mate in an unknown hamlet…. Right from scene 1 I was charged but the slow-non appealing screenplay let my excitement down and I was literally waiting for the finish… but but but… I need to tell again that the last 20 mins was top class and the credit should only go to the thalaivar and am sure with out him the movie is hopeless…

Pasupathy continued his class performance from veyil and this guy got immense talent but thalaivar literally overtaked pasupathi with his experience and class act… Lemme jolt down the minuses of the movie….

- nayanthara – total waste of space .. just a glam doll to satisfy the glam lovers
- bunchy comedians (and the comedy scenes) again a element to add for the sake of it
- screen play – too slow and not-so-practical scenes
- music – ayoooooo …. Total disappointment
- hype – unavoidable when thalaivar is slated to appear but this is the party pooper

The pluses are quiet straight forward, its just the thalaivar and pasupathi… as a whole ‘don’t miss last 20 mins’… (doesn’t matter even if u manage to watch just the last (20 mins) bit)… also, make sure u got your hankie ; )

Lost

2008-07-24T14:39:00.004+05:30

‘Bhaiya Chaai !!!’ the boy shouted on through the windows. Amidst a dream, I was. ‘Uhhhh’, I opened my eyes shooking my head. ‘Man, what a dream… I was in a cruise some where in a European Sea… With my girl friend… Hmmm !!!’. I am still cherishing. ‘You *****, its 8 o clk already… wake up man, its Monday today’, My friend yelled at me. ‘Oh my….. yaaaa… lemme get ready, 10 mins’.

A typical Monday morning in Mumbai, I should say. I suffered all my life to get to this point. Born to a middle class family, my dad took all the efforts to make me to get in to an Engineering college in Chennai and I managed to come out with loads of obstacles. Worked in all useless positions in various companies, finally managed to get in to this prestigious software company in Mumbai. I can’t take my desires out being an average fun loving youth. Miles to go before I could take over completely. I am still working hard to get settled. Its been 4-5 months since I shifted to Mumbai and joined this company. Working hard, harder and to the hardest to get a name and strike a career.

So far, so good. ‘Hey, got ready ? I will leave the key in doors. You get ready and come as you wish’, my friend with no patience. ‘Hey hey… wait… am ready you vennai…. Mannn I can’t take the keys. I will be late tonight. Loads to finish up in the office bro’, all the office tasks came in to my mind.

I joined this company as a contractor and it’s a deal. I made up my mind to deliver the best and be a permanent employee in 6 months time. I took up all those extra responsibilities in the office. Wasted most of the nights in the office working ‘reckless’. Yes, I need to some how get permanent, some how get a good package, some how get a decent flat in Chennai, some how get a onsite chance, some how make my morning dream come true, some how….. uhhhhhh… getting late… ahhh….

I finished my half bath. ‘Quick, drink the tea. Lets eat once we reach the office.’ my friend on a caring tone. He is one good chap who cared me well when I was in need for the most in all the times. I quickly sipped the tea to finish it in the record time of 23 secs. ‘Okiee dude, lets go’, I was rejoiced with the half milk, 30% water, 20% old tea extract that I had just now. The room iam staying is like slightly bigger than a crow’s nest. Its Mumbai, you cant afford much. I am yet to be permanent and get in to a flat.

‘Shall we get an auto? Its late already.’ I asked my friend. ‘Do you think you are a PM or some one, now shut the **** up and walk fast’, he yelled again with angry tone. The humidity killing me ah, I should first get a bike once I become permanent. Can’t run in this scroaching sun every morning. ‘Hey lets cross the railway track, no need over bridge man. I can’t sweat more’, I pleaded and my mate agreed with me too. We got through the bushy area to meet the railway tracks. Mumbai is known for its busy metro rail network. But people normally don’t bother to take bridge to cross the tracks as TIME doesn’t wait for any one to cross on their own slowness.

There were around 5 set of tracks as my place is a junction. So, more distance yo. I need to cross all the tracks to the other end and get in to the road and then gotto catch a bus to have 15 mins. travel to reach my office.

This is was never easy as the walk from my room to bus stop normally takes 20 long mins. Probably 12-15 mins if I do a brisk walk by avoiding the overhead railway bridge. I quickly jumped in to the tracks and jumped across one by one. ‘Hey watch out da, train approaching’, my friend warned me. I managed to cross it quickly but something striked on my back when I did so called safe landing after the last track jump. I don’t know but I cant think what happened. I need to catch the bus now.

My friend was running ahead of me. I was following him worried about my office work. ‘Machi, wait da I feel weird’… He dint bothered. He kept running like a stranger. ‘Dei… I am calling you idiot… Stop’.. He still didn’t bothered to turn back. I am not sure about what is happening, why the hell he is ignoring me. I thought I can go slowly. He got the keys anyway. Let me walk slowly.

I suddenly saw some one running towards me. May be he wanna cross all the tracks to the other end. But he is coming straight in front of me. I was like scared as he gonna hit me any time. But he came too close before I react. And suddenly, I never thought that will happen. He ran towards me he got in to my body and kept running crossing my body. How the hell this happened? What the F**K is happening around me ? ‘Nooooooooooooooo’ I shouted at top of my voice. No one around bothered to look at me. Every one was going towards the track with an obnoxious look.

I turned back and saw a crowd. I just went near. I saw it and shocked. It was ME, lying down dead. I was shouting at the crowd ‘Hey look am here. Am here. I don’t believe this’, no one bothered. I felt some thing at my back head. I touched. Blood !!!

Did I, .…………………… 'LOST' my life ?

Foot note:

The above is a true incident happened to one of my very good friend a year ago. I still can not forget the day we cremated him. He was the only son for his parents. The family was relying on him. The scene was 100% devastating. It was sheer carelessness that ended up with a full stop in the chap’s dreams and his family’s expectations on him. I guess I don’t need to write down on the value of ‘LIFE’.

Centurion me

2008-07-14T13:57:00.004+05:30

Oh wow !!! am in my 100th post…. This post will be a minor recap of landmark posts I made earlier… I attached the links as well for your reference : ) here we go….

My very first post

Tuesday, March 07, 2006

This onez the kick off… I was laughing myself as its very silly with no much info… jus a pic. And a small desc. To show I started engaging myself here…

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2006/03/hi.html

Long time no c... ;)

Monday, March 27, 2006

So jobless and spending my time mostly on the blogging… surprised that I have made like 11 posts in the same month I started blogging… all are just status updates hahaha… this post was little different describing the cinema and ofcourse with the status update…. So far it looked like I am writing a diary.

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2006/03/long-time-no-c.html

Coorg Trip !!!

Monday, April 24, 2006

This is my first decent blog which I liked myself…. So refreshing to read this again as this kindled lotsa old lovely momories on the trip we had….

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2006/04/coorg-trip.html

Mission: Unplanned Freak out !!! :-o

Tuesday, June 13, 2006

This time its an adventure post… I was really happy I put my adventure trip in writing…. I can never forget this experience and my frnds too…

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2006/06/mission-unplanned-freak-out-o.html

Route No. 11 (A Short story)

Friday, October 13, 2006

My very first attempt to write a story… I always loved to write a good long novel but realized I need more training… to start with this short story, I just took a piece of a morning in a typical Software engineer’s life… my friends appretiated this by calling me… that was a surprise : ) More important…. This was my 50th post… hahaha it took only few months to complete my 50th post but 2 years to complete 100th post…

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2006/10/route-no-11-short-story.html

Being Citizen.

Thursday, November 30, 2006

This is one of well appretiated article of mine… I never expect this to come out so well.. my frnd infact forwarded this to his mates… I was so elated when he said this… I wanted to be more practical than being a typical critic….

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2006/11/being-citizen.html

****_-_-_- Time chaser ride -_-_-_****

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

I always love my Bangalore-Chennai drive… specially in the early morning.. now rite time to show up ; ) this memory always there to cherish..

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2007/04/time-chaser-ride.html

10 degree heaven

Tuesday, August 07, 2007

Was always kept writing and I thought of giving a short break to write and put some pics and let the pics do the writing… it’s a lovely Kemmanu gundi trip I had with my office mates…. Must visit place..

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2007/08/10-degree-heaven.html

Jillunu oru Cricket !!!

Wednesday, August 01, 2007

On the lighter side of the life… this post is a kind of Chennai – 600 028 (famous cricket movie in tamil) adaption and its all about a tough match we won with our local cricket team we had… the joy is boundless…

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2007/08/jillunu-oru-cricket.html

Beat this --> "An" adventure !!!

Thursday, November 29, 2007

This is one helluva adventure I ever had in my life… I din intend to write this big but the content is sure worth the size I have written… the most dangerous trip I ever had and it took like 1 week to finish writing this post…

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2007/11/beat-this-adventure.html

Uncle

Thursday, March 13, 2008

First time I tried to write a story from my life by putting myself on the shoes of some other character in the story…. It was much appretiated by my friends and I really love to read this my own post though it was a totally embarrassing story for me….

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2008/03/uncle.html

What the …!!!!.

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

This was the worst experience… I cant stop laughing myself when I went to one of the world famous actor and asked him ‘Are you Mr. Kamal hassan’… hahaha… roadla poravana kooptu kalaicha maari irunthichi.. hahaha…. BTW, this was my first blog after shifting to Singapore….

http://aravindhindia.blogspot.com/2008/04/what.html