Extra-Ordinarily Ordinary.......

Anger Management

2011-08-03T19:48:00.001-05:00

While a lot of folks who know me can never guess it, I suffer from an acutely short fuse. When the stars align themselves just about right (which happens once a day), I get angry for every single thing. While age and a lot of public outbursts has taught me to bury the outward reaction to anger. What was not taught by the previous two factors was taught by a job wherein a lot of my time is spent in listening folks telling what is going wrong in their organization. And when you see there are folks who try to channel frustration to better themselves, you cannot help take a leaf and try to achieve that zen state when you can use your anger to make yourself better.

Talking about anger, I think the subject of my anger been, not very surprisingly, been my family. Any other mother or father would have completely disowned a son who in a spate of anger is prone to say anything that happens to be thought at that very instant. The only person in the family who perhaps should be fine with me is my anger is my sister, who has no fuse at all. In fact compared to her, I appear to be a shaanthaswaroopi! With most of the outsiders, when I know I'm angry, I just move away - knowing that all it takes is a couple of sentences to irrevocably break the rapport built over years. There have been occasions where I have snapped and have paid the price of burning bridges forever.

Recently there has been a lot of changes at work and unfortunately, there are people who have no clue about what their position entails with whom I have got to tango. Not exactly the ideal situation for a person like me. Last Friday perhaps was a day that could have ended up being really bad - the day was saved by a very good colleague/friend of mine who was on Lync chat with me who sent me the IMDB link to the movie above. It had a quick effect to get my ranting off - perhaps he was aiming at self preservation but seeing the link made me take a chill pill and perhaps get off the kool-aid train at the right time - I'm sure I would have fired off an email to someone which would have ended really, really badly. Already a couple of work folks inquired on Monday if everything was alright on Friday - they were unfortunate recipients of some of my emails that day! I know that there are folks who suffer from the same malaise as me - anger. I have, with experience, identified the following ways to control anger - sharing them here with the hope that I'm passing the wisdom :-)

Physical Exercise: I once read Bjorn Borg (my third favorite Tennis player after Sampras, Federer) had a resting heart rate of 32 bpm. I have over the last year, made it a habit to eat healthy and work out - not necessarily pump iron - but to swing the racquet (Racquetball or Tennis) whenever I get a chance, making it a compulsory habit to run at least 30 miles a week. And recently, I got a low cost boxing bag which has allowed me to let the atrophied muscles let it rip when it rains/when I wake up late etc. As a result these days my normal resting heartbeat rate is 45-50 bpm. I initially I was scared that it was bradycardia, the absence of any other weird symptoms convinced me I was on the right track. A subsequent good effect has been that I have lengthened the short fuse - It takes a lot to get me angry these days. There are still certain buttons, punched in the right order can make me snap like a crocodile.
Work & Allied Activity: I would (very loosely) classify myself as a technology enthusiast and spend a lot of my time reading (possibly useless) stuff on Engadget, CNet, Mashable, Techreview, Tech Republic, SmartPlanet and almost anything that talks about Cell Phones, Computers, Cloud Computing - thanks to this acquired interest for a guy who had no clue about what IMAP and POP meant 5 years ago, I was till recently considering setting up a home email server. Thankfully, Office 365 saved the day.

Hopefully I make progress on the new found Zen state of mind and not regress into an Adam Sandler mode!

Don' Sit - We don't need Android at Home!!

2011-05-16T09:05:00.002-05:00

Via: Medical Billing And Coding

Dream Come True

2011-04-20T21:29:00.001-05:00

There were countless hours when I used to argue about Tendulkar versus Richards with my dad, Tendulkar versus Lara with classmates in school, Tendulkar versus Ponting in college. Just talking for Tendulkar gave me goosebumps, leave alone glorify him. If I had the opportunity to watch him play - which was sadly curtailed ever since the idiotic Set Top Box made its presence (rather, absence) known - there was untold joy. Straight Drives were imaged in the memory to be spoken about with friends the next day. Statistics were religiously studied, analyzed and thesis were presented on why he was God and others were not. Cover Drives and flick of the pads brought more smiles than deepavali crackers and badaam halwa. But as fate would have it, if there was Tendulkar batting at one end, the batsman at the other end would be Manoj Prabhakar (or Sanjay Manjarekar or Praveen Amre or Vikram Rathore..) casting a dark shadow on the unbridled joy of watching SRT bat. If at all irony had a visual definition, a random Indian batting score card in a game played in England/South Africa/Australia/West Indies between 1990 - 1996 will suffice.

Since 1996, SRT had two other sidekicks - Rahul Dravid and Saurav Ganguly. While one of them was a flat track bully and the other a technician of the highest order. Apparently, God had smiled on another God - or so it seemed. But combine some inept captaincy (1999), some Theevetti Dhadiyan attitude (2003, courtesy Sodha) and horrible planning (2007, Courtesy Greg. C), SRT could still not get the one thing that would foolproof his resume - the World Cup winner's medal.

2010 - An Indian Team where SRT is referred to as Paaji. And then, the captain, MS Dhoni. In my opinion, M.S. Dhoni is the best thing that happened to Indian Cricket since Sachin Tendulkar. Both of them have completely different batting styles - while one is the surgeon, working with finesse and precision, the other was a brute-force butcher. But it needed both of them combined to bring home the silverware that every person in my generation coveted and desired beyond a lot of other things. MS Dhoni has brought a quality that is often not found in a lot of Indian leaders - a straightforward approach and a never say die attitude. And best of all, consistent with the adage that "when the going gets tough, the tough get going", Dhoni just slapped all his critics with one masterful, mother-of-all-captain's-innings and father-of-all-under-pressure-innings in the WC Final.

SRT and Dhoni, both of you deserve to be venerated. You have made my 20 years of cricket fanticism culminate in a memory that will live with me forever.

My two favorite pictures from the final (courtesy: Cricinfo)

P.S: For morons who say MSD is lucky, you can be called lucky only when things go your way once in a while. When you get things done consistently, then the appropriate word will be "good" and not lucky.

Mathematics from the Mahabharatha

2011-02-08T08:57:00.002-05:00

Hats off!! Click

To Whomsoever It May Concern

2011-01-25T09:04:00.000-05:00

This is just a vent for my frustration - I know this really makes zilch difference to the issue at hand.

Dear Prime Minister's Office,

First off, congratulations for heading one of the most openly recognized corrupt Governments in recent history. An achievement that requires dedication, hard work, perseverance and of course, the X-factor which only the Congress Party can provide. After Kalmadi and Raja have had a field day with what used to be called as public money and after our beloved 'son of the soil' Rahul Gandhi has clearly and conclusively demonstrated why he should never be given the keys to his own apartment, you've managed to surpass all my expectations in one masterstroke.

Sachin Tendulkar is one of God's gifts to India. On this particular aspect, I want to make it clear that it is not an opinion or an argument being put forward, but an established and inarguable fact. Of course, with the entire (pseudo) secularism that is being spewed by Digvijaya Singh and the like, I should perhaps qualify that statement as Tendulkar is the Holy Father's / Allah's gift to India. I do not care if the news that was leaked was a rumor or not. Once there is this talk about presenting him with the highest civilian honor amongst the public and/or the media, the graceful (and respectful to Sachin) thing that you can do is to just go ahead and confer the honor on him. Sachin who has brought joy and pride to countless Indians deserves at least this much. Whether a player who plays for a club team (BCCI is not a Government organization - On a parallel track, thank God for that or else Sachin would have had to pay a bribe to the Sports Minister to have gotten into the team in the first place) deserves the highest civilian honor is a moot point as you have on multiple occasions conveniently recognized the BCCI Cricket team's achievements as possible and probable cause for National pride.

Bowing to this public pressure would surely not rank as one of your worst decisions in the last so many years. I understand that your blatant pandering to vote bank politics means that Kalmadi is removed from his post 3 months after the Common Wealth Games and our esteemed ex-minister A. Raja has the gumption to state that he is being targeted because of his socio-economic status (a new euphemism for caste), when even his own kid will tell him that he is being targeted because he was at the epicenter of one of the biggest scams in Indian politics/administration. And of course, your party sees it fit to have an alliance with one of the parties that was originally alleged to be behind the plot to assassinate an Indian Prime Minister (it is very convenient that the commission that investigated the entire matter gave a clean chit to everyone who mattered and their grandmother). After so many brilliant moves and decisions, actually, conferring Bharat Ratna on Sachin might be your best achievement in the current term at office.

Apparently, the reason being propagated for denying Sachin the honor is that he is too young. I do not know about the places where you come from, but as far as my (limited) knowledge goes, in almost all major sports realms, you achieve immortality before you are forty. And to a level of certainty we can safely state that what Sachin achieves after he is 40 and before he is 60-70 (or dead) will be definitely lesser than /equal to in magnitude to what he has already managed to achieve between 16 years and 40 years. If you are still going to maintain that he is too young, I would kindly entreat you to apply the same paradigm of constraints on Mr. Rahul Gandhi who has systematically and conclusively proved that he neither has a sense of history (RSS slight - I doubt whether he would know who Veer Savarkar is) and current affairs (saying Hindu Fundamentalists are the major threat to the country's security when fundamentalists from a particular religion periodically engage in long term ethnic cleansing in the Kashmir valley). Based on his (lack of) knowledge in history and current affairs, involving him in any capacity in the Government is a bigger threat than corruption, religious fundamentalism and other perceived threats, as it is precisely such ill informed folks who engage in the afore mentioned threats to the country.

Again, based on the 50 plus years of Congress rule, expecting you to do anything that would seem sensible and logical to most of the people in the country will imply I'm smoking a banned substance. The only silver lining is I can get away with it as long as I agree to pay the bribe.

2010 - The Year of SRT

2010-12-30T16:49:00.000-05:00

To the man who has had a wonderful year - breaking ground on the 50 test centuries terrain and beating all the young, T20 bashers to scoring ODI's first 200 and of course, taking the Mumbai Indians to the IPL final - Sachin has done it all.

Truly, blessed are we to have been able to watch this genius in live action. If at all there exists anyone/thing that can be called God's Gift to India, SRT is the one.

Thanks to Cricinfo/Getty Images for the picture.

Endhiran!

2010-10-01T03:31:00.001-05:00

**Posted in Claps and Boos**

Sci-Fi movies have been rare in Tamizh movies. The genre is a difficult one - especially given the fact that the exposure of people, to enable them to think akin to the Matrix or the Bicentennial Man, is going to be difficult outside of the major cities in TN. Shankar, thanks to Sujatha's collaboration (my suspicion), has been able to deal with the concept/question of 'what if machines could feel emotions?' in a way that is very layman friendly.

Instead of trying to do a structured review, I think let me collate things that made me clap my hands (nod to where I'm writing this!)

Rajni Kanth - he is there in every scene of the movie and has stood up and delivered in a way that only he can. Thankfully, the movie had zilch heroism/image boosting scenes. Having said that, Rajni shows us a sneak peek into his power-packed performance days of 70s and 80s by playing the character of the Robot quite well. His robot character pretty much dominates the second half of the movie and if done badly would have caused a nasty stink. His comic timing, dialog delivery timing are almost impeccable and make us wish that he can turn the clock backwards and start growing younger. Of course, there were scenes where you were able to see through the make up of the scientist Rajni Kanth; But it is only a sad attestation to the fact even when he is 60 years old, there is no other lead actor who can take over the mantle from him. In terms of style and charisma, Rajni beats Vijay, Ajith, Surya, Vikram and all later actors put together black and blue. If any other actors claims to aspire to be the replacement to the Superstar title, they should be made to watch Endhiran and that will cure them of their conceit and vanity.
Graphics/Props - for Tamizh Cinema standards, the special effects, props and graphics were fantastic. Special mention has to go the sequences with multiple robots and the scenes where the skeletal robot makes its appearances. Lots of times money is spent in tamizh cinema on song sets and costumes (Shankar himself being the guilty one lots of times) - but here Shankar (and of course Sun Pictures) have put the gargantuan budget to good use. The detailing in some scenes and real life dynamics that have been incorporated into some scenes were quite good, again, considering we are talking about a tamizh movie.
Story/Screenplay - After some patchy work like Boys and Sivaji in terms of story and screenplay, Shankar makes a refreshing switch back to his halycon days of Mudhalvan, Indian with a solid story with a screenplay that kept me from looking at my watch for the entire running duration - a feat that only few tamizh movies have lived upto recently. Though not entirely flawless, I would say that Shankar's admission that this script was thought of a decade ago is true, given that is very well thought out and laid out like a crisp dosai!
Background Music/Songs - ARR - enough said!

Try as I might, it is difficult to pick a negative (fanatics of arthouse cinema, indie film junkies and perfection pattabhiramans, will not be seeing this movie and would not be reading this review as well!); But if I had to, the only thing would have been that though Rajni Kanth pulled off the role of the robot, it would have been amazing to see him in his youth doing the same role.

After a really really long time, I have seen a tamizh movie in the theaters which has made me feel that it was worth every cent!! Not often do you see a costly and hyped movie living up to its expectations, but Endhiran does; and I think Shankar owed me a big one after ditching me and robbing me of my money in Sivaji!!

If you liked Endhiran as well, go ahead and review it at www.clapsandboos.com

Get Ready Folks!!

2010-09-12T12:27:00.001-05:00

Thalaivar back to form. I hope Shankar does far better than Sivaji - The graphics in the movie is fantastic - almost comparable to Hollywood standards! Sep 24th, can't wait for it!!!!

Fake Email - A Rant

2010-08-25T12:00:00.000-05:00

I keep getting these obviously fake emails - from places like Uganda, Nigeria etc. I really do not know which moron will even believe these fake-sters. In fact there is a variant of this that tells you that you are being offered a $10000 per month job in some god forsaken place on an oil rig. The next time I get that, I'm going to put it up here as well: So here is you dose of humor for the day:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Attn:Sir/Ma,

This office received an instruction to release your payment.The chairman Africa union (au) in conjunction with his European union (eu) counterpart have agreed to ensure that the good relationship existing between them is re-echoed and therefore have decided to make payments to all beneficiaries been owned by Africa union member states via contracts,inheritance and lottery winnings/other related payments.

In their recent interview with British broadcasting co-operation (bbc) they agreed that the recent grant to African union be utilized for the payment of such debts through our bank. However the (au) secretariat will handle all the processing to avoid the battered image of our continent concerning financial transaction.

You are hereby requested to choose from the below options of payment for confirmation.

1) BANK TRANSFER:

Requirement : Your bank details.

2) BANK DRAFT:

Requirement :Your present home/office contact information.

3) Automated Telegraphic Machine (ATM)

Requirement :Your present home/office contact information.

We wait to hear from you .

Yours faithfully,

Mr Edward Van (SECRETARY).

AFRICA UNION SECETARIAT BENIN REPUBLIC).

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Abivaadhayae...

2010-08-24T22:19:00.001-05:00

When you are the son in a household with one son and one daughter, you pretty much learn the basic fact that your role in the general auspicious days in the household is to be the 'edupudi', helping my folks to move objects, cleaning spaces and of course, going out to get the items for the festivities. The one day in the year when the guy in the house is given a token 'vanakkam' is on the Aavani Avittam. You get asked if you would like Poli or Sakkaraipongal. In spite of it being a fleeting moment of being attended to, it is a reassuring feeling.

Till the time I was in school, the advantage of studying in a 'nambalavaa' school was that Aavani Avittam was declared a holiday and the school used to start late on Gayatri Japam day. The only catch to the Aavani Avitam holiday was since you were not supposed to eat anything before doing sandhyavandhanam and the fact that typically the main food was served at 11am meant that you had to wake up early, bathe, do sandhyavandhanam, then go to the samithadhaanam and then do Kaamo-kaarsheeth japam and then the poonool changing meant that as soon as the 3 course meal was served, you pretty much crashed for 2 or 3 hours after that. The disadvantage with these one-off holidays in India is that once you sleep during the afternoon, once you wake up, you feel depressed that you lost the day. One more round of batchanam in the afternoon and religiously do the evening sandhyavandhanam (you feel guilty if you don't do it as the entire day revolves around the poonool) and do 'palakaaram' (consisted of good tiffin material - Dosai, Chappathi kinds) and then since I was supposed to not have rice, do a mega round of fruits after the tiffin and then go to bed. All this made the task of waking up on Gayatri Japam all the more difficult. You still had to, and you religiously use all counting tools (fingers, thannile kodu, dharbai pichu podudhal) you make sure you exactly say the mantram 1008 times. Then, the advantage of studying in the 'nambalavaa' school was that you could proudly display your 'nambalavaa' traits of forehead markings and kinda overdo the part by having painted wrist and arm markings. You and the most of your 'nambalavaa' classmates talk about how you did/did not do the 1008 thingy (this was in middle school). If you were in high school, then sufficient care was taken to wipe out the marking sufficiently so that there is just a hint of it, leaving people to guess whether your were religious or not. Oh, the stupidity you go through during adolescence.

Once you go to college, though the Aavani Avittam day goes as usual, Gayatri Japam does not come with a late start. So you hurry through the 1008 and you are extra careful to wipe out all traces of your early morning activities and you go to the college bus stop and take extra care to make it seem that it was just another day. The fact that I studied in one of the most wannabe colleges in Chennai meant that you had to publicly disassociate any link to 'nambalavaa' activities. You could either do this by going and eating 'chicken pizza' in Pizza Hut, eat from the same plate with nanbargal and do all those cinematic stuff or silently not commit to being a believer. You just shrugged off questions regarding Aavani Avittam and carried on as if it were just another day.

Once I came here, the first year was marked by an extra-ordinary enthusiasm to follow our rituals in this 'ayal'naadu. With typical trademark vetti scene that characterizes me, I not only went through the rituals myself but also forcibly dipped my two room-mates in the Aavani avittam sauce as well. But unfortunately, none of us could cook well and so we ended up going to an Indian restaurant and I ended up eating onion chutney - talk about irony. I think God kind of decided that I was too dangerous to be left alone and so I ended up being a part of the 3-S veedu, where one of the S, he of the perfect tambrahm cooking skills and the perfect vetti scene skills took me under his wing for all Aavani Avittam days. He pretty much made sure that I at least said the correct version of the chants (Dakshine paarswe v PaschimE Parswe) and made sure I did not do 'aagadha' karynam such as putting the discarded poonool on the Southern side or using the wrong pavithram etc. This year, I had to be travelling on Aavani Avittam. I always consider that sometimes coincidences seem to favor me. On that vein, I ended up travelling to the same city where S lives. And the height of coincidence being my work and hotel being 15 minutes away from his place. So I almost invited myself to his house in the morning and went through the ceremony and in the evening, went to his home and had dosai and chutney (made the authentic way using wetgrinder and India mixie). I have on various occasions, questioned whether God likes me or not, but today, I can say, I was one of God's favorite beings.

David McCandless: The beauty of data visualization | Video on TED.com

2010-08-24T17:49:00.000-05:00

David McCandless: The beauty of data visualization | Video on TED.com

Sins Against Gender Stereotype Tag

2010-08-22T08:09:00.000-05:00

After RealNirmal tagged me, he has at least on 10 occasions reminded me of how evil I'm to not complete a simple tag. From what I understand we gotta say traits in us that go against the typical gender stereotype.

1. Cleaning
I like to clean my apartment, car, desk.. whatever that can be cleaned. I'm quite religious when it comes to cleaning that I get multiple cleaning utilities - Clorox Wipes, Microfiber cloth etc. I do not mind if things are scattered around and look clumsy, but I cannot bear to see things with a layer of dust or strands of hair on the floor etc. The only time that I do not clean is when I'm mentally preoccupied. In fact, when I'm going through phases of unhappiness/distress, the first signs of it are a dirty car and apartment. I also love to clean my utensils. I believe more in me cleaning the utensils than on the dishwasher. Talk about being an engineer.

2. Shoes
I have a collection of shoes - literally. I cannot wear the same pair of shoes to work two consecutive days. I have a belief that if I wear the same pair of shoes everyday, I'd put my foot at risk of an infection.

3. Shaving
I hate shaving. While I know its good to sport different beard styles, one of my secret wishes is for some technology to either make shaving a monthly once activity or, better, once-for-all activity.

4. Gambling/Poker
While anyone who is someone knows to play the Texas Hold'em, I do not know ANYTHING about Poker. In fact through most of the movie 21, I was just wondering what the hell the game was. I have never been to a casino or Vegas. My only reason to Vegas, if at all, would be to see the sights and shows that are famous.

I really cannot think of anything else being my sin against my gender.

I really do not believe in tagging folks, so if you are interested, go ahead and spill the beans.

American Airlines - Sucks - Part II

2010-08-18T18:33:00.002-05:00

http://www.cnn.com/2010/TRAVEL/08/18/new.airline.fees/index.html?hpt=T2

No more reason to board the flight for fools.

American Airlines

2010-08-14T14:06:00.001-05:00

I generally try to avoid American Airlines, the company that has led the way in customer dissatisfaction for a long while now, in my opinion. Though they might whip out some random study that shows they are best or whatever, my co-workers and I have all had really bad experiences with them, consistently. Yesterday was no exception. At Dallas Fort Worth airport, the flight to Tampa had its gate changed three times, and each time from one corner of the terminal to the other. And the icing on the cake being there was not even a hint of an apology from the personnel announcing the gate change. They had the smugness that comes from the knowledge that the passengers have already paid money and are about to be screwed, one way or the other. And the flight was delayed by an hour and 15 minutes and again, till we got into the plane, there was no hint of any reason as to why it was delayed or an apology. Once we got in, there was an apology all right, but for all the passengers, there was no reason offered as to why they are being delayed on a flight for which they have paid money in advance.

All this reiterates my opinion that American Airlines is one of the worst airlines companies in America. Never again will I make the mistake of booking a ticket with them, even if the next ticket is 100-200 dollars more expensive.

Homo Phobia and Intolerance

2010-08-07T14:27:00.001-05:00

With the recent ruling in California annulling Proposition 8 - Marriage Protection Act, immediately, a section of population erupted saying that Planet Earth is going to be overrun by Homosexuals and all that.

It is quite interesting to note how people have labelled a particular trait in humans that has been scientifically ruled out to be a conscious choice is generating so much of intolerance from folks. Given enough padding for the demographic inequalities, I can surely make a statement that the number of heterosexual sex offenders is greater than homosexual offenders - the dehumanizing that section of the population seems to more a result of the fear of the unknown than anything that is qualified.

As soon as I make an argument like this, the immediate question from some acquaintances is whether I'm gay. While it is interesting to see that people assume that if you are just portraying how intolerant people are, they assume that you have a personal stake in the issue. While I have never had a gay friend/acquaintance (at least not openly or known to me), I don't think I can see a couple of guys making out (I exactly stopped watching Sean Penn's Milk in the first 5 minutes and I never had the gumption to see 'those' parts of Brokeback Mountain), I don't think that should influence my tolerance towards a microcosm in the population that is increasingly being portrayed as evil, sex maniacs and what not.

While this is one side of the story, the homosexual populace does not endear itself to the other section by displaying outright 'weird' habits - like guys sporting perfectly shaped eye brows, wearing some ill fitting clothes and of course talk without any 'raagam' and feminine hand movements and all that. The other day, at the airport I saw a guy who was wearing a ill fitting Golden jacket and a big peacock feather on his neck. All this outward declarations and crazy dressing does not help this group to be seen as just another group of people by the section which is already scared of what it does not know/understand.

But the biggest surprise has to be Glenn Beck supporting the ruling and of course, my question to Comedy Central is when they are planning to screen Sarah Palin interviews as a part of regular programming.

Sachin

2010-08-02T23:48:00.000-05:00

Perhaps the most well remembered part of my childhood would be watching SRT bat. I did not have the opportunity to see Albert Einstein or P.G. Wodehouse. But I will always be glad that I saw SRT in action. To me when it comes to the art of batting, there is God, then there was Bradman and now it is SRT. {In ODIs he is in a level of his own - but the World Cup scar remains! :( }

I think I can tell generations after me that I have watched Sachin play live in action - and I think that shall define the sports experience of my age. There cannot be a more hounded public figure who has never had any scandals or gossip or other dirt attached to him. There has been no other player who has simply represented India on the wold stage like he has and like he will.

To the best possible man to achieve the ultimate feat of longevity in tests, Salute!

Food for Thought

2010-08-01T18:34:00.003-05:00

A very interesting (albeit old) set of videos:

Trivial - No More

2010-08-01T18:10:00.000-05:00

I have, over the last one year, had the opportunity to see the impact of online persona over the actual persona. Recently, a few of my friends launched Claps and Boos, which is based on the desire of people to be socially networked online and the other big interest of most Tamizh makkal/Desis - movies. As a part of doing some spadework, I realized how much people let others know of themselves online.

I have over the last one year, hoped to maintain some form of online anonymity. I make sure my updates on Facebook is seen only by people whom I know and trust, deleted my Orkut account and of course, culled out most of the personal references from my blog as well. While people have called me anything from paranoid to being a jerk to keep most of my facebook friends on the other side of the wall (pun intended), I can only say that there is some method to the madness.

Family - Previously when I was in high school, college, there was an easier way to keep family and friends apart - but now it is beginning to get difficult. When a friend puts one number risqué comment on my wall/blog, I'm quite at a dilemma as to what to do. I hate to delete people's posts/comments as I do not believe in censorship - but, I can only imagine my mom doing a double take seeing some of the stuff that my friends seem to say/write. I have not solved this one just as yet as the only other way is to put my family on the other side of the wall - which will have serious repercussions which I do not desire. Right now, I think my family is becoming sane enough to realize what to see and what not to see. :) And recently, when Orkut Tamizh Cinema Community was hacked by a moron and was held to ransom, I realized how open/vulnerable personal information is when some idiot tries to hack you over reasons that are so stupid, that it is not worth risking your family's online information - especially when you have a substantially younger sister. Nothing is worth seeing your family pulled into the public over some stupid (non-)reasons

Work - Recently, when my company was trying to hire someone, my manager walked up to me and asked me to do some Facebook/LinkedIn research on a potential candidate he is vetting. even though I knew since 2006 that people were looking into these stuff, being asked to do that and finding some information that was really not pleasant to report to my manager has created a permanent scar on me to ever attempt a completely transparent online profile of any sort - especially Facebook which is supposed to be a completely personal application. I do maintain that I try to have a different set of actions at work - just because of the industry we work for, I cannot be as opinionated as I'm in my personal life. So, that has a great deal in this desire to be anonymous.

Friends - This is one of the prime reasons, though its been listed third; I have over the course of last few years, gotten to know some fantastic people online - with Blogeswari, Hawkeye and MeThinks topping the list, who, I would have never known if not for the internet. In fact, internet has also been responsible for me knowing RealNirmal better from the image I had of him from my college days - he had a particular nickname which was not easy to like, you see! :) But for the past couple of years, I have been waging a battle against many of my friends' perceptions of what certain comments/blog-posts/wall posts mean. While I have completely avowed my lack of trust/interest over finding any kind of relationship online, people seem to want to give their own spin to what I say, the pictures I post etc. This is fine when it happens to be tongue in cheek comments from people I know well, but sometimes some idiots online do not know the level of liberty to take and barge in on a completely personal thread with a friend. Decidedly random acts of adding people, liking something online are given twists to bizzare, that I have stopped accepting any friend requests from people I do not know!

To summarize, I want to see whether I can doctor/cultivate my online image. I have already seen some success as some of the folks who read my blog think I'm an extreme right wing guy, while people who talk to me in person are of the decided opinion that I'm quite on the other side of the world. So far so good, lets see!

Bad Fake Prank

2010-07-30T00:47:00.001-05:00

Endhiran - Sneak Peek

2010-07-25T13:17:00.000-05:00

You saw it first here! :D

$75,000 Needed

2010-07-20T06:14:00.000-05:00

For all those of you who think you owe me something, please feel free to contribute towards this expense. I accept checks, credit cards, cash and for the really interested, the book itself.

Please note that any dhaanam and dharmam done towards one number ezhai brahmanan will make your life sezhuchify.

Endhiran - Thalaivar back with a bang

2010-07-19T05:55:00.001-05:00

Albeit my 'wig' concerns, these stills raise some hopes

Ramarajan Meets Assasin's Creed?

2010-07-14T06:41:00.000-05:00

LeBron (Loser) James

2010-07-08T22:24:00.001-05:00

Michael Jordan - Six Time NBA Champion. Brought a franchise which no one knew of - Chicago Bulls - into a major brand the world over. Two Three-Peats, an amazing college career as well. The greatest basketball (NBA) player ever. No arguments. If you had 3 seconds, trailing by 2 points, the man you want to pass the rock to is this guy.

Magic Johnson - Five time NBA Champion. Took a perennial runner up team ALL-THE-WAY. Magic Johnson rejuvenated Lakers like anything that they were finally able to take the fight up to the Green Monster of NBA - Celtics. Could play all positions, from being the Robin to Kareem Abdul Jabbar's Batman, Magic became Batman and much more. If you take players who can be spoken of in the same breath as Jordan, Magic is right up there.

Kobe Bryant - The best player NBA has produced after Jordan and Magic. He was a part of a three-peat, then saw his team enter a rebuilding mode, get thrashed in the play-offs, lose the greatest coach ever Phil.J - he got so frustrated that he almost though of quitting Lakers - but DIDN'T. He stuck it out, saw Dr. Buss get Pau and build a roster from scratch around Kobe and one of the best role players ever - Derek Fisher. The Lakers still got mauled by Celtics in the finals in 2008. But came back and won it all in 2009 (Championship and the Finals MVP) and did a repeat in 2010. And with Phil.J coming back, Kobe has a chance to emulate Jordan in being the player to be a part of two three-peats. He is the undisputed king of LA. And right now, if there is one player who can aspire to be spoken of in the same breath as MJ, it is Kobe.

Larry Bird - if there is one player I reluctantly hate it is Larry Bird. The reason I hate is because he played for Celtics - the team I absolutely, completely hate. Add to that that he thwarted Magic from the championship - you get the picture. But this man ruled the court like few did. As much as I hate to admit - he is one great player.

Notice a similarity? All the players achieved greatness with one team - they went through feast and famine with the same team. And they emerged stronger and perhaps cast their reputations and legacy in rock solid iron.

LeBron James - He has in his one hour of egotistic, self glorification porn fest has given Cleveland (and Ohio) the most brutal and unkindest cut of all - while the 'The Drive' was 5 Minutes and 2 seconds long, 'The Catch', 'The Fumble' and 'The Shot' took a few seconds as well - what LeBron did was to kill the fans of Cleveland and then patiently and clinically chop them into fine pieces. I was not able to see the telecast the second that he declared he is going to South Beach.

LeBron - you will never be spoken of in the same way of the folks listed above. You will be another Kevin Garnett - you might win 5 championships or even 6 - one for each year you have signed up for Heat - but you are the scum man. You lost the respect of fans and Cleveland folks as well. You are a WIMP. You did not have the heart of a champion and more importantly, the character to be a Jordan or a Kobe. Go and ride on Wade's coat tails. I hope Cleveland wins the championship before your tenure at Heat ends - just to bloody sully your already sullied face. YOU SUCK!

Hinduism and Science

2010-07-05T17:41:00.000-05:00

Thanks to Huffington Post.

Religion comes into conflict with science when it is defined by unprovable claims that can be dismissed as superstitions, and when it treats as historical facts stories that read like legends and myths to non-believers. Other aspects of religion -- what I would consider the deeper and more significant elements -- are not only compatible with science but enrich its findings. The best evidence of this is science's response to the religions of the East over the course of the last 200 years. As the French Nobel laureate Romain Rolland said early in the 20th century, "Religious faith in the case of the Hindus has never been allowed to run counter to scientific laws." The same can be said for Buddhism, which derives from the same Vedic roots.

Most of the Hindu gurus, Yoga masters, Buddhist monks and other Asian teachers who came to the West framed their traditions in a science-friendly way. Emphasizing the experiential dimension of spirituality, with its demonstrable influence on individual lives, they presented their teachings as a science of consciousness with a theoretical component and a set of practical applications for applying and testing those theories. Most of the teachers were educated in both their own traditions and the Western canon; they respected science, had actively studied it, and dialogued with Western scientists, many of whom were inspired to study Eastern concepts for both personal and professional reasons.

As early as the 1890s, Swami Vivekananda spent time with scientific luminaries such as Lord Kelvin, Hermann von Helmholtz, and Nikola Tesla. "Mr. Tesla thinks he can demonstrate mathematically that force and matter are reducible to potential energy," the swami wrote in a letter to a friend. "I am working a good deal now upon the cosmology and eschatology of Vedanta. I clearly see their perfect unison with modern science." Had Vivekananda lived three years longer, he would have rejoiced in Einstein's discovery of E = mc², which united matter and energy forever.

In the early decades of the 20th century, the great sage and Indian independence leader Sri Aurobindo, who had studied in England, blended East and West by extending Darwinian concepts to the evolution of consciousness and the cosmos. In 1920, Paramahansa Yogananda set a precedent by calling his first lecture in the West "The Science of Religion." He befriended a number of scientists, growing so close to the great botanist Luther Burbank that he dedicated hisAutobiography of a Yogi to him. Later, Swami Satchidananda, whose own teacher, Swami Sivananda, had been a successful physician before becoming a monk, encouraged the scientific study of Yoga; one of his early students was Dr. Dean Ornish, whose groundbreaking research sprang directly from Satchidananda's teachings. And Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, even before he became famous as the Beatles' guru, prodded scientists into studying the physiology of meditation, setting in motion an enterprise that has now produced over a thousand studies.

The interaction of Eastern spirituality and Western science has expanded methods of stress reduction, treatment of chronic disease, psychotherapy and other areas. But that is only part of the story. Hindu and Buddhist descriptions of higher stages of consciousness have expanded psychology's understanding of human development and inspired the formation of provocative new theories of consciousness itself. Their ancient philosophies have also influenced physicists, among them Erwin Schrödinger, Werner Heisenberg and J. Robert Oppenheimer, who read from the Bhagavad Gita at a memorial service for President Franklin D. Roosevelt. In his landmark TV seriesCosmos, Carl Sagan called Hinduism the only religion whose time-scale for the universe matches the billions of years documented by modern science. Sagan filmed that segment in a Hindu temple featuring a statue of the god Shiva as the cosmic dancer, an image that now stands in the plaza of the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Geneva.

The relationship between science and Eastern spiritual traditions -- which many prefer to think of as psychologies -- is still in its infancy. In recent years, the Dalai Lama has carried the ball forward, hosting conferences and encouraging research. Western religions would do well to emulate this history. Their historical and faith-based claims conflict with empirical science and probably always will; but to the extent that their practices directly impact human life, they can be treated as testable hypotheses.

Current Events - Rant for the month

2010-06-29T08:41:00.001-05:00

Its been a while since I saw 'The Daily Show' or 'The Colbert Report' my source of humor, satire and of course, news! Things I learnt over the last few days are:

1. Vivos Doomsday bunker

Fox News is fast becoming Paranoids Anonymous by trying to scare people out of their wits just because there is a black democrat president in the office. While anyone who is an American has to be feeling thankful for the fact that they survived W - the greatest catastrophe let loose on this country, Fox News is trying to scare the living daylights out of anyone who cares to see that moron channel. The dollar is sinking, jobs are being shipped abroad, terrorists are planning to annex America, Mexico is planning to release Swine Flu 2.0 blah blah blah. The top of the scare mongers is this guy Sean Hannity - he is a lying, two faced journo (I'm using the word Journo very very loosely here) who is fine with convicted felons working on his show, but questions Obama's citizenship (which is now so boring that seriously this dude needs to stop referring to it). In fact, I can challenge any one to see Fox News for a week and still say they are not depressed or feeling some kind of psychological disorder.So on top of all this comes this.

Now, come on, do these guys think that people will seriously buy this kinda of scare fueled services? And apart from providing a service that is seemingly safe from Nuclear, Volcano, Terrorist attacks, the best of the features are protection against PLANET X (if a planet collides with Earth), Global Tsunami and ANARCHY. If at all there is going to be any anarchy, then it will be from those folks who are Fox News Patronizers. Those of the tea party group which will not pay taxes but will complain if the roads are not of the pristine quality they expect them to be. Touche, Fox news and terra vivos!

2. English Sports

Be it any sport, England always has a team that is a contender. In fact barring the World T20 title that they have won recently, their soccer and cricket teams have sucked pretty much in every major event. But that does not stop them from tagging themselves as contenders for the title every time. So it was with utmost glee that I saw them being bundled out in their own jock straps to the ol' country. Rooney who looks like Paa Amitabh (he is 24 years old and balder than Rajini Kanth, no less), is a hyped up guy any day. Of all the superstars who came into this World Cup, I think he had the least time under the spotlight. I was hoping he would be his usual self and kick some one in their balls and get red carded out - unfortunately did not happen.

3. Rahul Gandhi

I really do not understand why this guy gets so much attention. After Ilayathalapathy Vijay, one guy who is completely unsuitable for the job he is doing/wants to do is Rahul Gandhi. Looking like a cross between a lost puppy and those 'pseduo intelluctual', jeans and kurta wearing leftist guys (this category of jeans kurta, kurundhaadi, kudumi hairstyle guys deserve an entire post - for being the most wannabe bunch ever), the media tries to hype this guy to glory. Recently, there was a poll on CNN-IBN (yeah, the same guys who are also paid for being the PR for the Congress party) or NDTV (again, belonging to the league of Congress Chamchas) asking something about R. Gandhi's marriage and what he should wear etc. All this when there is a global recession and economic uncertainty. Surely, the Gandhi family continues to be a primary hindrance to any progress that India might make. And on the same topic of how Congress and Gandhi family has screwed India, seemingly, the way that Anderson got let go in the Bhopal Tragedy seems very close to how the Hindujas and Quattarochchi was let go in the Bofors scam. Vaazhgha Jananaayagam, vaazhgha Gandhi Pugazh!

Kill the Brahmin - 1

2010-06-13T14:38:00.000-05:00

After a really long time, I saw that Krish Ashok and Hawkeye had had a tete-a-tete, albeit of less friendly nature. Its a subject that has been argued ad nauseum and I hope this post does not end up being one more to the heap.

Tamizh Nadu has been the recipient of lousy atheist propaganda ever since I could remember. Those calling out against the caste system calling out a section of the population as "Paarpan", a tamil scholar explaining that the meaning of the word Hindu in Sanskrit is 'Thirudan' when sitting and having soup for Ramadan with a group of Islam following folks, bad mouthing the saint of kanchi as a hoax, but not having the nerve to call out that 90 percent of terrorism in India spawns from the faulty interpretation of Islam. But we (Tamizh makkal) of course are 'sotraal aditha pindangal' and so conveniently forget that such hypocritical guys are being called as statesman, pagutharivaali etc.

From what I have noticed recently is that all this 'sick'ularism that we have been force fed from our childhood has made people get confused and more often than not self-deprecating. I have met countless tam-brahm friends of mine who speak about how Brahmins encouraged slavery, how reciting the vedas is a trait of atavism and how we, mankind, is at its technological peak. What I'm trying to do here is to just ask a few questions to this section of the population which says vedas are humbug, trying to pass off as 'modern, sophisticated, educated' folks who will bad mouth brahmins, hinduism at every easy opportunity.

1. Stories based on Vedas are Bullshit - they are not believable.

The most consistent argument I have seen from people who do not want to believe in the Vedas is that how they came about to be. They say how can saints/scholars listen to the wind and write down the vedas? They argue that the cell phone technology is so advanced only now and all the yada yada. The best thing about our current generation/mankind is the kind of arrogance that leads them to say that we are at the technological peak that was never seen before. But there is historical proof that humans from BC era were able to predict movement of stars, the lunar and solar cycle and of course the Vedas, much before Galileo or Kepler, very correctly assumed a heliocentric model. But the yuppie puppies will say that but for Galileo we will be still believing that the Earth is flat. And on the same vein, the same populace do not want to acknowledge the fact that while elsewhere people were nomads, during the reign of Karikal Chozhan, a stone dam was built across the Kollidam river, an engineering feat of no small scale. So the basic assumption that our forefathers were technologically backward though propagated, it is not completely proven. While I don't want to appear puerile or a fantasy lover and say that people in the BC time period had a nuclear reactor or some such stuff, I'd like to just say that we do not know - there is always a chance that mankind lost some technology and we are now discovering them, rather than inventing them. While all pagutharivaalis pounce on me, by your own definition of pagutharivu, kindly prove that such technology did not exist before we go further.

2. Brahmins practiced Untouchability - So they must now be subjugated/submissive

This is a really curious thought that has been drilled into our heads. While no one is going to dispute the fact that Brahmins exploited social conditions and practiced untouchability and other social evils, this tit-for-tat logic seems to be applied to only certain section of the people. India as a country did not have any people following Islam till there was the Mughal invasion. And we all were made well aware of how gruesome the invasion was, how come the same logic being applied to Brahmins not being applied to Muslims, the section of the population who owe their origins to the invaders who raped and plundered India? When the Babri Masjid was demolished by Ram Sevaks, the so called Secularist Flag bearers fondly recalled logic such as "Eye for an eye makes the world blind" but then conveniently bury that logic when it comes to discriminating against Brahmins. While quacks such as Nityananda and other fakesters get their due, Hinduism is portrayed as a barbaric and retarded religion, all the while, conveniently, the secular media in India forgets that the Christian church is being plagued by child molesters and sex offenders who masquerade as men of the faith. Why this double standards? I have no particular love or hate for any religion or community. But why do the so called rational/pagutharivu pazhams not apply the same logic to everyone?

There are a few more thoughts - which shall come later.

(Contd.)

Shutter Island - Scorsese Toys with your Mind

2010-03-06T23:47:00.000-05:00

When Tendulkar is at prime form what do we want him to do? Take on the best bowlers - previously it was Akram, Waqar, McGrath, Warne, later Lee and Akthar and now, Dale Steyn. That's what precisely Scorsese has done. He has taken an extremely challenging story and given it in a way that will blow your mind away.

Warning: Please do not wikipedia the movie or read the book. I did not and I enjoyed the movie. Beware of some spoilers below

Teddy Daniels (DiCaprio) is a Federal Marshall, a war hero from WW II who is assigned to investigate a disappearing person from the Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane along with another deputy marshall, Chuck Aule (Mark Ruffalo). The hospital is situated on an island (source of title) whose only connection to the outside world is a ferry controlled by the authorities on the Island - Dr. John Cawley (Ben Kingsley) and his police force. Teddy suspects that the folks on the island are engaged in some unethical activities with patients they are supposed to treat there. Teddy sees that most of the folks on the island are either insane or are coached to act/lie to him. Parallely, some of his past comes back to haunt him as well - his wife's death in particular. And on top of all this, Teddy's migraine get worser by the hour.

The movie now enters a vortex and the twist that comes is a master twist, though it has many 'clues' in the scenes before the actual twist.

The screenplay and direction are terrific. They cause the intended effect on the viewer. The subtle background score raises the tempo and keeps you on the guessing game till the director chooses to reveal his cards. The cinematography, again, chooses to be pliant to the story's needs :)

On the acting front, it is a 2 man show - DiCaprio and Kingsley and both of them try to out do each other. DiCaprio, after Departed, Blood Diamond, Revolutionary Road and now S.I is firmly on track to join the league of celebrated actors.

I'm constrained to not write more as I do not want to give away anything (spoil the movie for most of you). But if you want to really to come out of the theater thinking "Whoa! What did I just see back there??!!", think about this review!

Bottom Line: Haven't you checked when it is releasing in your locale yet? And if it is already released, haven't you booked for the next show?

Vinnaithaandi Varuvaaya?

2010-03-06T22:26:00.000-05:00

http://www.clapsandboos.com/reviews/whiff-of-fresh-air

Recently, Tamizh Cinema has been engulfed in a wave of nauseating, stale air of egotistical heroes and creators who have hyped up efforts or have ended up giving movies so bad that at the end of the movie, you saw a wave of people trying to scramble to the exits to go home and douse their burning stomach for shelling out money to another mass masala movie.

Amidst this, விண்ணைத்தாண்டி வருவாயா? (Vinnaiththaandi Varuvaaya)comes as a whiff of odor neutralizer. This movie might not impress folks as one of the classics, but, surely at this point of time when the people who go out to see Tamizh movies are forcefully made to take dip in the 'masala' sauce, Gautam Menon tries to respect the intelligence and the sensibilities of today's audience. He has presented a simple tale - with a good screenplay and of course aided by some very mature, understated performances from his lead pair. And of course, he has also made a masterstroke with some of his casting choices - the best being Ganesh as the Kaakha Kaakha Cameraman character.

The tale in a nutshell is that Karthik (Simbu) and Jessie (Trisha) are living in the same house. While Simbu falling in love is predictable, the twists after that are not the usual fare for the Tamizh Audience. Jessie seems to be modeled on the modern day young woman, who does not know what she wants and the highlight of the movie is that Gautam has shown her wavering mind without making her character seem slightly lunatic, the case with movies like Aanadha Thaandavam. The movie is about whether Karthik and Jessie make the relationship work and make their families happy as well.

Simbu has morphed himself from the his previous unpopular version to a subtle, cool and good looking hero. His reactions and dialog delivery, while reminiscent of Surya in Vaaranam Aayiram - which I think originates from Gautam Menon - are cool and bring that smile on your face. Trisha looks like a freshly minted coin and passes muster in a complex character, based on the scope for heroines in today's movies. I seriously hope that Simbu sticks to this uber cool version and Trisha maintains her radiance and the slight streak of acting talent she has shown in this movie.

The movie has a very strong technical performance from its crew. The first and foremost person who makes you sit up and take notice is Rahman - He has delivered a killer soundtrack with almost every song in the album a noteworthy one. He backs that up with terrific BGM work. I think after Mani, Gautam has been able to get Rahman back to his standards of Alaipayuthey and Kannathil Muthamittal. The psychedelic rock based Aaromale was just a precursor to the influence of rock music in VTV. While Rahman had served classic soft Jazz in Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Naa, here in VTV, Rahman has gone into the Pink Floyd - AC/DC mode with some great rock based BGMs in the movie. All pretenders to the throne in Tamizh Film Music move over, the Emperor who was on extended vacation abroad and in Hindi hinterlands, has come back to reclaim his throne with a killer soundtrack giving hitherto unexplored genre in Tamizh Music and depending on the scene, soul stirring, heart warming, rousing and peppy BGM/rerecording.

The next guy to thank would be the camera man, Manoj, who has made sure that the visuals are pleasing, soft, and of course has made the lead pair look cool and romantic. There are a few unusual shot compositions and camera angles which reinforces he is here to stay, especially with what we had already seen in Eeram. It has been a good sign that Tamizh Cinema is unearthing good DoP in the last decade or so with Ravi K Chandran, Santosh Sivan, Rajeev Menon, Nirav Shah, Mani Kantan and a few others, trying to add to the illustrious bracket comprising of Balu Mahendra and P.C. Sreeram.

The final and the force behind the movie is Gautam himself. My respect for this man grows with every movie. After Mani Ratnam (on whom, admittedly, he has modeled himself), here is a Tamizh director whose movies give respect to the viewer. His dialogs at various points in the movie is very apt. While I have always been a proponent of the director not taking on too many hats is a movie, I think Gautam is a person who does well writing dialogs for his stories as he infuses the necessary feel in to the dialogs. While pondering on this it is curious to note that people complain about English dialogs and over urbane feel in his movies - I feel while we have been led to believe that 'realism' is 4-5 bush-bearded, 'its-been-10-days-since-i-took-a-bath' guys, sickles and lungi and beedi, I guess Gautam's movies are representative of another side of reality - the urban middle-class/upper middle class.

On an ending note, I guess there are two people who reiterate what they can do - ARR and Gautam and a few others who show you that they too are relevant in the current day scenario - Simbu and Trisha, the people in question. I just hope they continue their form from VTV onwards into their future movies as well.

Bottomline: Double Thumbs-Up!!!

Politics in Tamizh Cinema

2010-02-21T15:00:00.000-05:00

Written for Claps and Boos.

Since the time that Kalaignar M. Karunanidhi and Bharat Ratna M.G. Ramachandran used their movies to propagate their ideals to the masses, Tamil films have always had a intertwined relationship with the politics in Tamil Nadu.

While there has been no dearth of actors in politics and politicians in movies in Tamizh Nadu, there have been very few movies dealing with Politics in Tamizh Movies. Here is a look at few of them (not exhaustive or based on any merit - just a few of the recent ones):

Iruvar - This is, in my opinion, one of the best bio-pics made in Tamizh Cinema. Mani Ratnam does an amazing job in picking two characters best known in Tamizh Arasiyal (politics) - that of MGR and Karunanidhi and has based his movie on their lives. (To be politically correct, lets just say they were based). The best thing that Mani Ratnam did was to avoid showing one of them as the villain or a negative character. Anandan's intentions behind politics (To eradicate poverty) and Tamizhselvan's Dravidian philosophy are shown countermanding from the first scene in which Anandan and TamizhSelvan meet. The weakness and insecurity that both these giants of TN Politics go through in the movie are brilliantly portrayed by Mohan Lal who plays Anandhan and Prakash Raj who plays Tamizhselvan. The scene where Anandan comes out on the terrace of Tamizhchelvan's house and sees the crowd is a perfect scene of movie making basics, and of course A.R. Rahman's awe-inspiring BGM. For many Tamizh Cinema fans who complain that Rahman does not do justice to BGMs, please see his works with Mani and you shall know the man's genius. The others in the cast, too, perform amply within the scope - with the pick of them being Gauthami and Rajesh.
Ayitha Ezhuthu - A populist story, Mani Ratnam deals with college politics and how rowdyism has come to play a ever present role in politics. This movie literally revealed two actors to Tamizh Cinema, who have gone places after this movie. First is the best performer in this movie, R. Madhavan, who playing Inbasekar, completely overwhelms you. He is not playing a likeable character - and being recognized as Alaipaayudhey Madhavan, it must have been difficult for him to convince the audience as a out and out moral-less and unscrupulous character. The real victory for Mani and of course, Madhavan is that by the end of the movie, you really hated Inbasekar, which was an accomplishment of sorts, for the public image of Madhavan at that point of time was that of a chocolate boy. The second winner in this movie was Surya - who played a populist, slightly-left student politician, Michael Vasanth. Surya, who had matured through Nandha, grown through Kaakha Kaakha, arrived through Ayitha Ezhuthu. It is interesting to note that R. Madhavan has scaled new heights in Indian cinema with varied and versatile roles in Rang De Basanti and 3 Idiots, while Surya is now a frontline actor who, has carefully balanced mindless masala movies like Aaru and noteworthy, versatile movies like Vaaranam Aayiram. Inspired from Amerros Perros, Mani Ratnam crafted a screenplay wherein a shooting incident is the central spot of meeting for the the three characters in the movie. This movie though, was not one amongst Mani's best efforts and the third track involving Siddarth was not as well developed as one expects in a Mani movie. The other revelation in this movie was Bharathi Raja, who plays the corrupt minister, Selvanayagam who brings such realism to his character that it sometimes hurts! This was the first album where Rahman went all out with an international feel - Dol Dol, Hey Goodbye Nanba and Yakkai Thiri being new sounds for the Tamizh ears. And incidentally, Yakkai Thiri was one of those few songs in Tamizh music that does not have any verbs in it. (Trivia time?!)
Makkal-aatchchi - R.K. Selvamani's masterpiece tells about a the tale of Mamootty, who gets involved in politics purely by chance and rises to the position of a Chief Minister of a state. This movie put in solid scenes what people were till then assuming about the rich and powerful in politics then - that they had little to no ethics, no morals and would go to any lengths for money and power. The movie starts off well and the first half is as good as any other movie in Tamizh Cinema. The second half has lots of twists (some of them unneeded) and at the end of the movie you do not know whether you can believe what our leaders say in the media. Mamootty as expected, takes the honors in the acting department while the movie also boasts of some sharp editing work. The music, as can be expected of non-Ilayaraja or non-Rahman movies of those times is hardly note-worthy.
Mudhalvan - Shankar's take on current affairs and politics, this movie creates a fantasy genre in political movies. Originally supposed to have been scripted for none other than the Superstar Rajni Kanth, this movie, surprisingly has Arjun Sarja in the lead and ends up being one of Arjun's best works - apart from Gentleman and Ayudha Poojai. The movie has a very identifiable cause - that politicians are more concerned about their vote-bank and so resort to caste politics and of course Shankar's pet theme - Corruption. The screenplay is one of the best in TC - there is almost no sag in the story till the end. And the lines by Sujatha were brilliant, especially the interview scene between Pughazendhi (Arjun) and Aranganathan (Raghuvaran). The only complaint with this movie was the romantic angle, played by Manisha Koirala who pretty much comes only for duets. Coming to duets, this movie again has A.R. Rahman at the helm and he churns out delightful numbers and some terrific BGMs too - especially for the scenes when Arjun is the CM for a day.
Bharath Bandh - This was a movie I had seen when I was really young and I suspect is a Telugu dubbed movie. This movie again, is based on Political intrigue and as suggested by its title is based around a bandh organized by some politicians for their personal gains. This movie, though, not great in terms of acting or cast (the lone saviour being the national award winning actress, Archana), shows you a sample of how politicians make self centered and short sighted decisions, purely based on their and their kin's well being with little or no regard for the public who voted them to power. The movie also features some gruesome killings and violence.

The interesting thing has been that though the perceived ills of politics - namely, caste/religion based politics, pseudo-secularism, corruption, coercion and rowdyism have been graphically represented in movies like the ones listed above and many others, it is pitiable that nothing has changed. It is really disappointing to see even well educated people getting involved in caste wars and tax evasion issues, even as recently as yesterday!!

B and C Center Audience - Modern Day Mythical Creature

2010-02-06T19:18:00.000-05:00

For the original, please visit: Claps and Boos

How often have you come across these?

Hero gets down from a car. Camera low angle pans from the heroes shoe lace to head. And then the camera keeps a low angle shot and the hero walks as if he in constipation (aka slow motion).
Some horrible ‘punch’ dialog, where the line has no relevance to the movie or the scene – but has loads of meaning of the star’s real life activities
The hero is allowed to gallivant with whores, call girls and all that. But the heroine has to be a vestal virgin. If she was previously married, it would not have been consummated.

The reason that the hero (in the case of non-acting actor Vijay) or the directors give us, the audience, is that they are catering to the B and C center audience. I have been long wondering who this mythical C Center audience is who is receiving so much leniency from the director and the film fraternity. The scenes in Vettaikaaran or Aegan did not impress anyone – which is why you see the movies had a poor run in the theaters starting not only in Sathyam in Chennai but also at Kottaampatti.

I strongly believe that today’s heroes treat cinema as an easy way to make money. If you have some political backing or financial backing, you can quite easily make a movie and then using the political strings make a publicity splash with “Siraapaga vetri nadai podum” being tagged to the movie right from the first of the movie’s screening in all TV channels. And from thereon, all you got to do is to turn up for shooting and you are an ‘actor’. Bash up 5 goons, sing 5 duets, talk some utter crap dialogs as ‘punch’ dialogs and go home and in the process make a bit of money. This seems to be a sweet deal to me.

In Shankar style, while MBA’s from IIM or B.Tech’s from IIT fight to keep themselves at the top of the pecking order in their industries by taking up more certifications, the Tamil Hero has perhaps the cushiest job that you can imagine. He has an excuse to do nonsensical stuff – tell the population that B and C Center audience only like that kind of stuff, conveniently hiding the fact that their recent movie was ripped in every available center. Starting from Rajni Kanth and Kamal Haasan to the newest kid on the block like Vishal and Bharath invariably are nowadays using this reason of center audience for giving stupid movies.

From all these, I can have only two inferences – that this mythical B and C center audience is nobody but the brainless fans/fanatics for these actors. These fans have to be classified in the lowest possible IQ group known to mankind. How often have I seen some guy say “I’m seeing this movie for __________”. These fan boys are not only insulting their intelligence (assuming they have some) but also spoiling Tamil Movies for the general audience too (Point to be noted: Any actor’s fan boy population is surely less than the other group of normal Tamil cinema audience). These fans/fanatics of these heroes are the reason number one that Tamizh cinema has denigrated to its current levels. That is why you see a substandard actors like Silambarasan or Jai or any other new actor who do not have even an iota of acting skill in them trying to ‘praise’ another established hero to make sure he will get some stupid fan boys of the established hero to support him. So this fan boys syndrome is like a plague, threatening to make Tamil Cinema irrelevant and stupid in this age of realistic cinema. While we see an Avatar and are wowed by the technical aspects in it or 3 Idiots and cannot stop gushing about the story, we turn a blind eye towards stupid movies being churned out in Tamil cinema.

In this regard, I declare the fan boys of heroes as Public Enemy No.1 for Tamil Cinema.

Takkunu Oru Tale - 6

2010-01-30T09:41:00.000-05:00

Krish was hard at work, biting his lower lip as he is always prone to when thinking hard. He had to think hard. After all, its not daily that you think about ways to kill a man.

Krish was one of the nicest guys you can come across - pleasant, sociable, witty and humorous. At any party, Krish was the bee's knees with his one-liners, pun and wit packed repartees. People liked to be seen with Krish - after all such nice celebrities are not that easy to find. But any one of those who had seen Krish at those parties would be shocked at seeing Krish now. His evil intent was plainly apparent on his face. And of course, Krish didn't make an effort to hide what he was thinking as he had doodled a stick figure in a noose, an exotic dagger and a bottle of pills. The name Ajay was written on the paper of course.

Krish had to kill Ajay. Ajay had stood against whatever Krish's ideals in life were. To start off, Ajay was the proverbial, tall, dark and handsome guy. And he knew he was all that too. Which gave him such a kick that he took people for granted - the trail of hurt people that Ajay had left behind, justifiably warranted a novel to be written. And of course, Ajay had cheated on every relationship he had ever been in. He had cheated his parents by swindling them of their retirement nest egg, on the pretext of starting a business; he had cheated on his girlfriend with a filthy rich widow; he has ratted out on his friend who was out-of-status in the US for a week. Think of a vice and it would be difficult for Ajay not to have had that. And most of all Krish could never forget that Ajay caused the widow's death with terrific planning to inherit the multi-million dollar estate. Krish could not think about any other treatment to Ajay - he had to die. But dying, was not wholly sufficient. He had to die that would make all his dirty deeds seem puerile. Left to his own methods, Krish would like Ajay to have been fried in a cauldron of oil (Krish could help smile at his tam-brahm upbringing which caused him to think of this) - but Krish was known for realism - he could not do something like that......

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The phone startles Krish out of his thinking - "Hey Keshav, yeah man, my draft is almost ready. I'm writing the end sequence and have got to kill Ajay's character. I shall send you my draft by email by tonight. Yeah... I know that your intern leaves on her vacation from this Friday - so you shall definitely receive it much before that so that she can proof read it before she leaves... bye!"

Beating Evening Boredom

2009-10-28T13:31:00.000-05:00

-------------------------------------

This episode is definitely up there in terms of any Family Guy or Daily SHow episode!!

School of Rock

2009-10-26T08:44:00.001-05:00

TBS played this movie yesterday. This movie's soundtrack qualifies for one of the best collections for rock music and the BGM uses bits like Back in Black, Cocaine and Smoke on Water. And not surprisingly, I found that Jack Black is a part of a Comic Rock band, Tenacious D.

The kids in the movie, especially the kid who plays the lead guitar riffs the living daylights out of you. The comic portions are amazing and its just super that you see the "We Don't Need No Education" on one of the props...

A must watch if you like comedy genre in movies and rock music

Iron Man - 2

2009-10-22T20:42:00.001-05:00

Wow!!

Religion

2009-10-21T23:50:00.000-05:00

Recently, I have had to speak for God and against religion that I think I should collate my thoughts somewhere.

My take on Religion:

Religion has long since outlived it use. In the early days of human development, people were under no barrier and the development of human beings with regard to their environment was literally in infant stages. As time went by, the early human realized that without any kind of a forced social structure, the more dominant specimens will get the best of food and men/women (as happens in every other animal society). And based on the popular 80-20 Pareto Principle, it would have come to be that 20 percent of the population enjoyed 80 percent of the 'good' stuff. So as time went by, this pattern could have come to be unsustainable which resulted in the institution of religion. Humans decided to deify anything that could not be classified with their knowledge/experience. But as with any first system, the religious system had certain drawbacks, which was why the legal/Governmental branch of structuring came into being, where the people were fooled into thinking about 'social good', common good and other such principles. But both the systems had few basic similarities that the power to decide what was acceptable and what was not acceptable was vested with a few individuals. Most of the rules/regulations were based on the current knowledge in science and social living. But as we have apparently seen in politics, unless there is a continuous improvement in any system, it is sure to go to waste. The problem with religion has been that people have not only neglected to improve religion as the change with time, but have rather regressed a lot. Since I have been brought up as a Hindu, I can confidently say that the folks have started concentrating more on the means than the end. I cannot otherwise, understand how people are now fighting over which matam is greater or whether worshiping Narayanan or Mahadeva is going to get you moksha. I have seen thousands of brahmins claiming to be devout and performing sandyavandhanam thrice (twice) a day, claiming to read the vedic scriptures but totally ignoring the basis of santhana dharma. People are proud to say that they can recite a particular stanza from the Gita, but they are more or less blind as they cannot see past the metaphors that kṛṣṇa uses to drive home the concept of God and who the brahman is. More awful are the folks who perform a 1000 parikarams, 20000 homams and all that without thinking once to see if they do sandyavandanam everyday. Even more inexplicable is the fact that people more often than not have heard about 'Thoonilum Iruppar, Thurumbilum Iruppar' logic, but do not pause to think that a God who can reside in a thing like a pillar or a twig, can as well be manifest in an orphaned kid or the homeless guy who is asking you for a couple of rupees at the street end. And to add insult to injury, you see folks fighting over religion. Christians, claiming to be followers of Jesus of Nazareth, condemn gay people - I do not know if Jesus particularly said Love Everyone* (* - does not include homosexuals or immigrants). I cannot, for lack of a better term, understand the religion of Islam, so I don't want to include it here. I see conservative people saying that being homosexual is not natural. Tell them that certain animals indulge in homosexual behavior in the absence of the opposite sex and they tell you that they do that to copulate/reproduce. While they recognize that nature/God is powerful enough to make 2 same sex animals reproduce under certain circumstances, would it be that impossible for nature to influence certain humans to turn homosexual so that the population explosion and the subsequent plunder of the ecosystem be controlled? As fantastic as this idea might sound, think about how an ape would have reacted if another ape told that one day their species will give way to humankind. Nature is too complex to be understood and it works in various ways - so never dismiss something that you don't understand.

God:

I'm a strong believer in God - Not that that God has 4 hands and either a mace or a trident. The God is the untapped potential/power inside each one of us. We can choose to give it a particular form - male or female - and try to tap the potential by meditating on it. This doesn't mean that Sri Rama didn't exist. For all you know, he might have been one of those humans who truly had self realization and so was considered God by others and we continue to believe that without realizing the significance behind it - as has been the wont of the human race. Surely, even for staunch non-believers, they've got to accept that there are certain things which are beyond control - while we know that all living organisms grow, based on scientific evidence, we do not know why they grow. We can say that the Universe originated with the big bang - but what caused the big bang to occur in a particular time instant in the way it did? Our current scientific, technological and mathematical prowess do not allow us to give a concrete answer to these questions - some of us have tried but there are no definitive answers - so I cannot see a logical/rational reason to eliminate the existence of God - in fact the more you analyze nature and the world around, the more you are awed by the total lack of scientific progress/explanations regarding many things.

Human race has always been an arrogant one. We talk about we impacting the planet, global warming and all that - but what we are trying to do is to analyze the impact of a process that has been in effect for 200,000 years on a system that is 4.54 Billion Years old. I agree that these numbers are again the result of the same human mind - but since both the numbers are from the same source, humans, I can assume that the error factors in them balance each other out. If the current global warming is solely caused by the human kind, I would really like to know what caused the original Ice Age and the subsequent meltdown. The day that we, humans, realize that we are but just another living species whose control over the planet and the ecosystem is as limited as that of any other living species, we should have a much better life

(P.S: Don't start telling me that how man made certain species extinct by hunting etc - biological extinction has always been there - just that we think that we are superior than a lion hunting a deer versus a human being killing a deer - the reasons might be different, but the basic act remains the same. And also, we see that man causes a particular impact on the environment based on 30 years of data/observation, but you never know how its going to play out when nature/the biological system decides to restore parity. For more confusion, read about the recent article on how the planting of more trees is causing slower wind speeds which impacts the effectiveness of wind mills and you shall start realizing that we trying to understand Earth and trying to extrapolate or predict its behavior is like a blind man trying to feel the tip of the titanic's hull to judge its size)

Funny Video for the Day

2009-10-15T12:03:00.001-05:00

Homes of the Rich and Famous

2009-10-13T19:48:00.000-05:00

Jackie Chan

Ricky Martin

Will Smith

Liz Taylor

Microsoft Mobile Under Seige?

2009-10-12T09:55:00.000-05:00

In the last 1 week, Microsoft Mobile is finding itself battered and hounded.

First, the Windows Mobile got a response which could only be compared to Microsoft Vista in terms of the catatrosphically disastrous reviews - the most damaging one from Mobilecrunch, which, to quote, says:

Windows Mobile 6.5 is a spit and polish job on 6.1 — nothing more, nothing less. Every single change in Windows Mobile 6.5 feels like it was made by a team of homebrewers or modders, rather than a huge corporation with truckloads of money to blow on one of their flagship products.

And of course, the disastrous Sidekick upgrade and the wordplay on Microsoft and Danger is overwhelming.

All this might perhaps, finally, make Steve Ballmer (and of course, the Windows Mo) quit and in fuse young blood that might yet make Microsoft more relevant in these changing times of Cloud Computing, SaaS and internet based technologies, where Microsoft has been lagging for quite a while. {It was quite interesting to see Ballmer play the Google's Anonymity and Underplay card when questioned on Windows 7 during his EU Trip}

Microsoft's success in the 80's and 90's came from the fact that they were what Google is now - a company which consistently tossed up good products, with a sound financial platform and of course, one of the best talent pools in the world. The talent and the financial platform still lives on, but the new and innovative products have died out. In the last 10 years, I can count only 2 success stories - Windows XP (which was really a milestone) and Bing (take the Bing ads with a pinch of salt, however). Perhaps make a younger person, who, might be able to make decisions to move the company in the right direction - I don't want to see the Motorola story happen once again to a company which I'd like to see exist in an meaningful manner for more years to come.

Cony

2009-10-12T09:16:00.000-05:00

When I used to be young, there were these imitation walk-man units / calculators which had quite innovative names like Cony (Sony), PPL (BPL), EIWA (AIWA), Ponasonic (Panasonic). Seems nowadays, subtlety is no longer in vogue.

Click.

Tag Tag

2009-10-09T07:29:00.002-05:00

I have been tagged and have tagged many of my blog friends. Recently, I have noticed a few things online which causes immense irritation or frustration. I'm sharing them here. Anybody interested can continue this from here:

1. Funny spellings and morse code English - Lots of people use spelling which are downright funny - apparently, nyc = nice, lyk is like and cool is kewl. What I cannot understand is these alternate spellings are in no way an easier option as kewl and cool are four letter words. and lyk is one letter shorter than like. I do not know what the person who is using these funny spellings is going to do with the time they save by typing these funny and hard to decipher spellings. The best of them all is the 'moi'. I'm linguistically challenged, knowing only English and Thamizh. I first thought that moi was the thing that people used to give during weddings or other social occasions in India. It was one of those kind souls who later explained that moi was French for me.

2. The usage of 'awwwwww' and 'Muaaaah' - These words must be officially banned from usage. I do not know how the hell they can either sound or be cute/romantic for anybody. Awwwww sounds more like the sound that Vadivelu makes. And Muaaah, with its spelling and all that sounds like the sound an erumai maadu (buffalo) might make. While I cannot for sure rule out that the janthu's which type these muaah's are not erumai maadu's, I'm reasonably sure that they do not want the general populace to know that they are one.

3. The 'Like' feature in Facebook - Someone says on their facebook status - "Enga veetile inniki ezhavu" and you would see a couple of their 'friends' liking it. I cannot fathom how people could 'like' certain stuff which they seem to do on Facebook. I will not surprised if somebody might actually leave a suicide note on facebook and unsurprisingly, some of their friends will like it.

4. Babe - The last time I really liked using this word when a movie about a piglet/pig came out when I was young(er). Nowadays you find every roadside romeo addressing every female he knows with this word. Again, I cannot see a reason as to why they cannot refer to that girl by her name. I cannot see why calling somebody as Babe (variant - babes) will be cool.

5. Use of the word Only - Recently there is a spate of sentences which end with only (colloquial usage = wonly). Popular examples - I'm working on a sunday wonly, I'm drinking beer wonly. If ONLY these F'ed morons stopped using this word!!

6. Having work related status messages on Facebook/Gtalk - It is understood that when an employer pays you for 40 hours, they would expect you to work for the money that they pay you. And of course, all jobs come with the clause that at certain point of time during the job, you might have to stay back on the odd day or have a crazy week once in while. And I guess most of us undergo this, irrespective of where you work - starting from Google/Microsoft/Intel to Mannar and Co. Then why the hell should someone crib about 'Oh! I had to work like a dog', '10 hours at the office'. If you are so bloody busy with work, how the hell can you find time to login to twitter, facebook and update the status with these 'oh-i'm-so-busy-look-at-me' not so subtle message? Inda madri vetti velai panra nerathile ozhunga velai panna, veetuku ozhungaana time ku polaam!! I cannot understand how these foolish people expect to be paid to update facebook status and put some 140 character nonsense in Twitter.

7. Twitter - I own a Twitter account for the past 6-7 months and cannot, for the limited intelligence that I possess, understand the purpose of Twitter. I assume that no-one on this planet would be interested in knowing when I woke up, when I sodikified my kai-viral and when I had my last coffee. At this rate, I'm quite afraid as to what other personal detail can come out on Twitter. And when I saw that twitter was recently valued at 1 Billion, I could not help think, Kali muththi pochchu.

8. Blog jaalras - Nowadays, celebrities use Blogs, facebook as an easy means to publicize themselves / reach out the public. A good case in point is Chinmayee's blog, where, except for those sporadic weird posts which scares the living daylights out of you, you more or less get information about her shows, songs etc. I generally do not find posts like these irritating, as I understand that as a celebrity, your market value is only as good as how well people remember you. In fact, I only hope more celebrities take to blogging so that we get to know how various industries work, the dynamics etc. What does get me is those makkal who put some comment like "Oh! You are the living legend of acting", "You are the vidivelli of tamizh cinema". Ada Raama!!

Apple - The Shine Never Comes Off

2009-10-08T23:18:00.001-05:00

I've been using the iPhone from Apple for more than a year now - while I can say that this is the coolest phone I've had, I find the media and the online folks are way too liberal to Apple - I do not know what Apple has done to be dealt such a sweetheart deal. The iPhone has lots of bugs and very frequent fixes. The number of Software updates to the iPhone software is way too many and perhaps Apple has not right to spoof Microsoft in its TV ads anymore. And the network that they have partnered with, AT&T, deserves to be one of the worst in terms of coverage. No wonder Verizon has its latest ad up and running successfully. Recently, I'd been to Boston and the only way that I could be on a phone call was if I came out of my hotel room onto the parking lot! Thank God, I make at the most one personal call a day. The Apple Yippies (these wannabe folks who are like Rajni Kanth or Kamal Haasan fanatics) blindly ascribe any shortcoming of the iPhone to AT&T - while I agree that network coverage and the ability to have 3G anywhere in the US to be issues related to AT&T, the phone arbitrarily crashing out of Apps, The removal of the Google Voice app, 3 years to introduce the MMS feature and the inability to provide a stable OS release that does not need to be updated every 3 months seems to be very poor performance coming from a company which likes to project itself as ultra cool and very pragmatic. And not to say, quoting an Apple Support Rep., you SHOULD switch off the phone once a day and you SHOULD connect to iTunes every week to make sure you iPhone works well. If Windows OS had a similar flaw, Apple would have a field day with its oh-I'm-Apple-and-so-I'm-cool ads with that young guy and the bespectacled guy having yet another pointless commercial. I feel that while Microsoft is culpable in certain issues - especially, with their Internet technology, by any standard, Windows is the best OS for a person who uses the PC (or the PL - Personal Laptop) - which has been there, done that and most importantly, walked the walk and talked the talk - I especially like the fact that they support their earlier versions - very recently a friend of mine forwarded a Powerpoint presentation which we made in the 11th grade - Powerpoint presentations were a big deal back then and it was really nice to get to view it once again. I really doubt if I could do something similar on the iPhone (10 years from now) if the iPhone exists till then.

Talking about gadgets, my laptop is on the verge of natural death and my camera has kicked the bucket, quite unexpectedly. Bringing hope, Thanksgiving is around the corner and Black Friday is there, too. But if anyone finds an amazing deal somewhere (apart from fatwallet, woot, edealsinfo and cheapstingybargains - which I almost habitually check), please let me know. Of course, I would like to have the free Windows 7 upgrade option :)

Speechless....

2009-09-30T21:49:00.000-05:00

Enna Kodumai Saravanan Idhu?!?!?

Champions Trophy

2009-09-30T13:10:00.000-05:00

Thank God, India exited the tournament. I don't want to use 'crashed' out as they never had any momentum going into the tournament or during the tournament to 'crash' out. Harbhajan Singh, as always thinks he has a God-given right to be successful and kept bowling poor line and length. Ishanth Sharma is a trend-setter. In my memory he is the first Dravid of bowling - meaning, he is a test match bowler, where, you can afford to have attacking fields and not have a concern about being containing - He is young and so can improve on his temperament and perhaps comeback to the ODI team.

Dravid - needs to go back to Bangalore and only come in on overseas test tours (but the way the pitches around the world are being 're-laid' to convert them into batsman friendly ones, he can retire from all forms).

RP Singh - another vetti. I think to motivate him, the BCCI has to pay him like he gets during IPL - which is not viable/sustainable. He could be India's answer to Flintoff's mercenary ways.

Dinesh Karthik - I think he is the true modern reincarnation of Hrishikesh Kanitkar.

Sehwag and Tendulkar - the best opening combo can have at this moment. They complement each other well, yet, are similar in certain ways which makes them a potent combo.

Google Wave

2009-09-30T12:07:00.001-05:00

If Google can pull this off, without too many bugs, then they might be onto something - but I'm surely skeptical at this point of time.

Retrospect

2009-09-22T17:10:00.000-05:00

Recently a good friend of mine told me that he was waiting for my review of Unnaippol Oruvan - This part pleased me as I was at some point of my previous life calling myself a Tamizh Padam PhD - but the reason he gave me stole my thunder - that I generally kizhichify every movie and he was looking forward to see what faults I will find in this one.

Apart from this guy, there is always rathathin raththam, arumai thangachi who keeps telling me that I write blogs to instigate people, make them angry and perhaps sambadhichufy their vayitherichal/sabam. Of course her accusation comes from the fact that amongst our likes, there are only 2 anomalies - Shriya Saran (I like her) and Saurav Ganguly (Akka is a Udal Mannuku, Uyir Dada-ku kinda of fanatic, while I'm, quite evidently, a passionate hater of Ganguly and his ideas {rather the lack of them} ). I generally discount her criticism as I thought she was over exaggerating - but now I'm tempted to think that I've got to definitely tone down. I'm passionate about my opinions and views, but when it encroaches on others' sensibilities, I guess, at that point, I become something I don't want to be - overbearing and hypocrite - so no more rants and raves - no more criticisms - at least for a while so that I can get the "too-much" of it out of my system.

The Lost Symbol

2009-09-20T18:55:00.000-05:00

I loved Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code and Angels & Demons for the same reason(s) I like Alexandre Dumas, Charles Dickens (Great Expectations) and Robert Louis Stevenson - the uncanny ability to weave a fictional story around historical events and characters. In utmost honesty, I liked Angels and Demons more than the Da Vinci Code, though the latter had more shock value. Less said about D. Brown's Digital Fortress and Deception Point, the better as, they are worser than the masala movies that Dr. Vijay gives out.

I digress. In his latest book, Brown returns to his favorite topics - Symbology, Pagan and Christian origins and of course an esoteric cult, here the Freemasons. The book starts quite in the Da Vinci mode, with Langdon being brought into a crime scene, him trying to evade authorities, a few twists and turns and the final denouement, followed by a fill in the blanks session between lead characters. To me, having spent almost 6-7 hours at a stretch to complete the book, it felt like a huge letdown. Highlight the next para for spoilers:

The plot itself is very reminiscent of the Da Vinci - there it was Jacques Saunière, here it is Peter Solomon. And you feel that book has too many parallels and you would not notice this, had the plot been thicker and more interesting like, the da Vinci Code. The character of Mal' akh is quite a mix of the psychotic Ghost from dVC and the Hassasin from A&D. The only new thing in this book is that P. Solomon is alive till the end, while Leonardo Vetra and Jacques Saunière were killed in the previous book. And to please the crowd that he displeased in his previous outings, here Brown plays to the religious galleries. I was amused to find that Brown was liberally using the Advaitam, propounded by Sankara (since there were multiple Sankara's, he is referred by his popular name, Adi-Sankara, who, single handedly established the shanmata and stopped the rampant spread of Mimamsa and Jainism and Buddhism which was the case in South India - read Ponniyin Selvan for another historical-fictional work by Kalki). Brown expounds on the asAvAdhithyO brahma | brahmai vAhamasmi concept and towards the latter portion of the book, ends up preaching to the choir (for most of the tambrahm crowd).

If you have not read the dVC (which is going to be a remote possibility) or its been a long while since you read the book, give this one a try and you shall be happy you did. Else read the book some months down the line when the paperback edition is released.

San Jose

2009-09-16T15:24:00.000-05:00

When I used to be really young, whenever my mother made my favorite palagaaram - Kesari mudhal baadam halwa varai - I used to eat them till I used to feel sick - sometimes I used to be choked with the sweet taste. San Jose is like that - continuously predictably good weather, at the least one Indian in every direction you turn your head, one big company per street... But all this is making me hate this place more and more. Wonder why.

Good riddance

2009-09-13T13:44:00.001-05:00

Good final on the cards - may the best man win!!

Internet Explorer and Shopper Discounts

2009-09-12T15:15:00.000-05:00

One of my rule of thumb is that Microsoft is internet challenged. They cannot produce one internet based product which is useful for your daily life (including Bing, which is more interested in giving you some service related search results instead of what you are searching). See below: Shopper discount is a scamster online who have a pop-up for IE and when you use your CC it phishes for it and uses it to charge $12.00 every month. I googled the word shopper discount and also searched for it on Bing. While google's second link was about scams, the money hungry Bing tries to promote this scam service. And the LYAO part comes with the Bing advertisements on TV parodying Google. There is a typical tamizh cinema thittu (dad to udhavakarai son) which comes to mind. I don't want to say that. What I shall say is even if Microsoft drinks water standing upside down, they cannot get any close to Google in terms of Internet technology. When it comes to OS and Software suites, I take my hat off to Microsoft - they are God - Windows XP might perhaps be one of the best things that ever happened to me in my life, but when online, run away from Microsoft as if they have the Swine Flu.

Point in case: I'm an Internet Explorer averse person. In my opinion, Internet explorer is like an American car - useless, unreliable and of course, susceptible to every tom, dick and harry out to make a fast buck. A person whom I know quite well is, well, for personal reasons a big fan of Microsoft - and sadly, Internet Explorer and so via that channel, this moron Shopper Discounts phished my credit card number and have been happily charging me 12 every month. Since I quite recently, with a superlative mind control methods chose to zap out all balances on all credit cards, I was surprised to find that there was a balance in one through this shopper dicsounts. So, this whole blogpost might be a result of some personal experience/bias, but the point to take is stay away from Internet Explorer. Use Google Chrome. I swear on God that I've not had any pop-ups at all - even when I visit the usual suspects like Rediff.com, Cnn.com, Ibnlive.com. You never know - when Internet Explorer might let you down next.

The Sun TV effect

2009-09-09T09:03:00.000-05:00

Whilst I was in India, Sun TV used to play and replay certain songs and manufactured them to be hits. A good example I would say were those stupid thathuva songs of Dr. Vijay. Now that effect that has been revisited. This song has been played and replayed so many times in the last few days that I catch myself humming the tune - worsht!! The guy who wrote the lyrics for this song deserves to be flogged till he promises to learn thamizh and write better songs.

How the web views you...

2009-09-09T08:09:00.002-05:00

This tool from MIT is cool - try it!!

Tennis

2009-09-08T12:51:00.000-05:00

Seeing the current US Open, I think Men's Tennis is at its nadir with regard to service games. There was a time that Sampras used to serve out 4 aces to seal the deal after he has broken his opponent. There were other guys like Rusedski, Ivanisevic and Philippoussis who had killer serves and of course you had Becker and Co. for a very good serve combined with all round playing skills. The only person currently who has the ability to move the ball in the box on a regular and consistent level seems to be Roger Federer. Tennis, in particular, the women's game, is becoming more and more a baseline slugfest (complete with guttural moans and cries - Nadal, Sharapova to be noted). If any one of you had seen the the Wozniacki - Kuznetsova game yesterday, you would wondered if there is any more subtlety or nuance in the game at all. It was like 2 barbarians having a battle with racquets. Nobody cares about serves. The average first serve percentage for a Women's game is around 30-40 and in the Men's its closer to 60. A pity, really....

Hilarious Stuff, this!!

2009-09-03T12:30:00.002-05:00

Eeshal

2009-08-31T19:05:00.000-05:00

1. Agassi being honored at the US Open - and the commentators hyping him up and saying he 'gave competition' to Sampras through out Sampras' career!! I simply cannot understand why these American commentators try to lick Agassi's ass so blatantly and unashamedly when Sampras was also an American player.

2. Agreed that Roddick played out of his skin in this year's wimbledon. Hats off!! But then putting him as a favorite in the US Open when you have Federer, Djokovic, Murray and of course, the Mudhevi from Mallorca, Nadal in the fray is another obvious attempt to something by Pam Shriver what Brooklyn Decker must be doing at their home.

3. I don't understand what standing Pam Shriver has to comment about other women's tennis player. For all her alattal and atoozhiyam, she went to one Grand Slam open. She keeps referring to her playing days and talks as if she was a Martina Navratilova or Steffi Graf. Bullshit bullock-carts, I say!!

4. James Blake being referred to as a 'great' player is a bit too much - ivanga kosu thollai thaanga mudiyalada naarayana!!!

Tamil Cinema

2009-08-26T18:31:00.002-05:00

'Tamil cinema' community in top 10 Orkut India communities -http://www.google.co.in/intl/en/press/pressrel/20090825_orkut.html

Been a part of this for the last 3 years and to say the least, the ride has been an interesting one.

Bucket List

2009-08-22T11:52:00.001-05:00

This movie is an anti-climax. You have the best cast possible - Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman and some amazing lines written. The villain is the screenplay. What could have been a brilliant movie is let down by unwanted mushi-ness you can ever see in Nicholson movie.

Edward Perriman Cole died in May. It was a Sunday afternoon, and there wasn't a cloud in the sky. It's difficult to understand the sum of a person's life. Some people will tell you it's measured by the ones left behind. Some believe it can be measured in faith. Some say by love. Other folks say life has no meaning at all. Me? I believe that you measure yourself... by the people who measured themselves by you. What I can tell you for sure is that, by any measure... Edward Cole lived more in his last days on Earth... than most people manage to wring out of a lifetime. I know that when he died, his eyes were closed... and his heart was open.

I wish somebody would say the last two sentences about me when I cease to be. The thing that I like about the movie, is that the fact the 2 guys are able to accept the fact they are going to die and are able to actually have a few pun-filled conversations about it. I see folks around me planning for next year and the next 5 years and all that and though I do realize that this kind of long term planning is essential, we should not lose focus of the fact that you never know if you'd be around the next day. This denial of the actual fact is what makes people flip over when something bad happens. You see folks committing suicide when the stocks fall, putting up stupid Facebook messages (emotional of course, as stupid alone is fine with me) when a loved one either passes on or a relationship they'd assumed eternal ended up having an expiry date. I think this thought of mine was inspired and is now, very succinctly captured by Melchizedek's story in The Alchemist.

Shaaa rook Khaan

2009-08-20T22:31:00.000-05:00

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-august-19-2009/shah-rukh-khan-detained-at-newark

Public Fawning 101

2009-08-18T14:53:00.000-05:00

A former room-mate of mine used to say that Tamizh makkal, and Indians in general try to take pride in what other Tamizh-makkal or Indians do. That is one of the primary reasons why you see these film stars like Shah Rukh Khan expecting people to 'know' them and their bloody star status.

A few months ago, Abdul Kalam was frisked by continental - lots of Indians felt angry/humiliated. I didn't. All these politicians, leaders and executive fucntionaries are at the best, first amongst equals (thank you, J. Archer) and so, I don't believe that they should enjoy any special privileges that we do not enjoy. As much as they enjoy the free plane travels, free train travel to their onnu-vitta-chithappa, let them also go through the stuff that the aam-aadmi goes through.

And, Shah Rukh Khan saying that he was targetted because 'his name was Khan' (a generous nod to the next moronic movie that K. Johar is making) - though sounds bad, is the bitter truth. As much as I disagree that majority of moslem followers are jihad-fantics, it is a verifiable fact that most of the who's who of the world's terror list are the followers of the moslem faith. Honestly how many times do you go to the airport and see the DHS poster up asking for names such as Srinivasan or Sabapathy or Abithakujalambal? So, Shah rukh Khan, instead of blaming the folks who did their job in spite of you creating a ruckus, blame your holy brothers who are involved in holy wars to stop the nonsense and co-exist. Till then all the Khans will be subject to these 'random' checks. Also, SRK must be thanking his stars that those guys did now know him. If they knew him and had by their ill-luck seen such masterpieces like Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi and Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna, they might have requested Obama to re-open Gitmo and put him there and kick his insolent arrogant ass into shape.

2009-08-04T06:38:00.000-05:00

அரசன் எவ்வழியோ, மக்களும் அவ்வழியே.
I wonder how the authorities, who themselves hold similar views about women and harassment are going to say to this. After all, India is a country which blames the women for instigating men to harass them. Well, well.

Chumma nachchunu sonney machi!

2009-08-03T12:22:00.003-05:00

Long Live Ganguly, The Messiah!!

2009-08-01T05:02:00.000-05:00

Link

Scandinavian Trip - Travel Memoir

2009-07-29T21:48:00.000-05:00

One of the few advantages of a travelling job is the travel itself. Apart from the thousands of miles that you collect on your mileage accounts, the Platinum Elite status in hotels, you do get around to seeing lots of places, though the sightseeing is strictly restricted to 6pm - 12am time slots.

Courtesy one of the projects, I had an all expenses paid for trip to Denmark and Sweden sometime in the recent past. After a few tense days of waiting for the visa ( I applied for my visa 10 days before I was scheduled to leave - which included a weekend) and some innovative packing techniques later, I found myself trying to trying in vain to print my boarding pass. At this point, I seem to have a curious disability - I can never use the check-in - what with a 30 character name with 4 spaces in it, each airline takes immense sadistic pleasure in playing permutation combination with my name(s). It seems like those times when I had math problems which went like there are 4 empty seats in a row of 30 seats - how many ways can the 4 empty seats be distributed without 2 empty seats being next to each other. Well, I digress. So after some trouble and swears, I found myself being attended to by an agent - but at that particular point of time, lady luck seemed to favor me - and so I got a free bump to business class with no miles lost. So there I was, a happy camper. The flight from Tampa to Atlanta was over in a jiffy. The one from Atlanta to Copenhagen drilled into you that you were travelling to an European country. Accented english, strong smell of alcohol 5 minutes after take-off and of course the danish instructions that the stewardess was giving on how to save myself if the need to came to that. The best thing about being in business class is that, every sitting moment, you realize what you'd have been condemned to. The bend yourself into two and act as if your shoulders don't exist routine. You get a laptop charge port and free wireless and of course, the choicest juices and snacks from time to time.

Without more ado, let it suffice that I reached Copenhagen feeling at peace with the world. My feeling of cheery well being was also prompted by the fact that I was 6 hours earlier in time and so, was waking through my usual deep slumber time. But then, my reverie was broken by the number of Indian junta at CPH. My room-mate had joked that I would be detained at CPH immigration because of my Indian passport, but seeing the number of salwars and formal pants - sneakers combination, I would not have been surprised if the Immigration guy greeted me with a "Vanakkam, Thalai". An hour's travel journey and a 20 minute ferry ride later, I found myself at Helsingborg, Sweden - a quaint little harbor town which was historically owned by Denmark and Sweden for almost equal portions of time.

After doing the biggest tourist attraction in Helsingborg, the Tower Karnan, I was quite politely told that all restaurants close by 3pm on Sundays. After much roaming around I found an Irish-American pub, complete with the Bo-So and Celtics banners, I had bruschetta and a coke. Not that it was delicacy, but the devil was in the details - the bruschetta had a fine layer of turmeric powder. As hard as I can think, I cannot logically think of a way that our turmeric reached the viking territory. Perhaps one of those Vike-Dude married an Indian chick and got apart from the usual paruppu-thenga and murruku, some manjal stuff too. I say this because, the next day - I had fries, which had, as you might have guessed, turmeric powder strewn on top. And Pepsi was conspicuous by its absence and the monopolizing Coke was selling at $3 per serving. For some strange reason, the folks over there do not refill beverages and look at you like you are from some unknown place if you ask for a refill and of course, they charge for it :)

The work itself was easy - thankfully, as the team was known for its tough workstyle and they were nice enough to drive me to Bastad, the place where the King of Sweden used to hang out some years ago for summers. They still play the Swedish Open there and it was heartening to see a life size metal sculpture of the great Bjorn Borg. The beach over there was one of those pristine beaches, existing just for the rich and famous. By my limited knowledge of the modelling world, I was able to recognize 2-3 super models.

(To Be Continued)

Kali Muththi Pochchu

2009-07-02T02:57:00.000-05:00

What Torture This Is, Saravanan?

The Dilemma

2009-07-01T02:59:00.000-05:00

Going by my Wall Street Survivor performance over the last 6 months, I seem to have made a killing in profits. Does this mean I can graduate myself to the real thing? Well, well, well......

King of Pop

2009-06-25T21:17:00.000-05:00

I have seen politicians in India using the hyperbole unnecessarily on each other! Like once when Manmohan called Dr. Kalaignar as the Architect of South Indian Heritage or something like that - Mostly, they should be taken as the aberrations of a delusional mind - but it won't be an exaggeration if I said a big chunk of the global music industry died today with the inarguably, most deserved King of Pop - Michael Jackson.

I think he was perhaps the inventor of the Music Video concept - with his smash hit Thriller. MTV, VJ etc etc - I think need to start everyday doing a poojai to MJ with the Thriller video on. While everybody recognize his dancing and singing skills, the man was a lyricist and the year after he was inducted to the rock and roll hall of fame, he was inducted into the Lyricist Hall of Fame.

My 5 Favorite MJ Songs (Audio only): Heal The World, Stranger in Moscow, Thriller, Ben and History (and perhaps Ghosts at the same list too)

My 6 fav videos: Thriller, Bad, Beat It, We are the World (it had the leading singers of that time in a single video - it was rumored that Jackson and the other guy who produced it, wrote the song and recorded the video on a single night) and Blood on the Dance Floor and Smooth Criminal (just for its Rajni-esque intro).

R.I.P

Siesta Beach

2009-06-21T10:48:00.000-05:00

Accidentally, while flipping channels on the Travel Channel last week, I heard about Siesta Beach being in the top 10 beaches in the US. So the decision to check it out was made. The telly told me that this beach was special for its water color, sand and the sunset - the typical beach-y things.

The Travel:
The beach is difficult to map/GPS, basically because, it is not your typical touristy beach with lots of shopping areas nearby - so if you are interested, here goes: Take I-75 South, Exit# 205, proceed West on Clark Rd., cross US-41 and you shall hit on the Stickney Point Drawbridge and subsequently, Stickney Point Road. Proceed and the road hits on T intersection. Take the right and proceed approximately 3 miles and you shall see the beach to your left. Alternately, if you are a scenic route person, take the I-275 South, and it will join 75 after SunShine Skyway.

The Beach:
The beach has one of the whitest sands I have ever seen. Mainly, the beach is extremely clean and the absence of the typical beach commerce takes you by (a pleasant) surprise. The beach is quite long, by Florida standards, and on one end you see the skyline (whatever little it might be) of the Sarasota City and the other end of the beach is a awesomely located house which has water on 3 sides! The beach lends itself to a pleasant and long walk along the shoreline. The water, though not comparable to the sublime colors you see in Miami, is a cool blue for the Gulf Coast. The best aspect for me the conspicuous absence of desi junta in the beach.

Sunset:

The Sunset, was surely not over-hyped at all. It was absolutely breath-taking and I think this is the best sunset that I've seen, along with the ones I saw on board the ferry at San Fransisco, underneath the Golden Gate Bridge, near the Alcatraz prison. We reached the beach at 6.45 pm and the sun did not show any sign of going down anytime soon, though my Google Weather had predicted that the sun would go down at 8.30-ish. Right on cue, the awesome spectacle began around 8.27pm - the colors and the effect of the rays on the water has to be seen to be believed.

Super Commercial

2009-06-20T13:48:00.000-05:00

This commercial from AT & T is really good - it has a basic theme, a very strong message, sugar coated enough to not jar you.

Bing-u Para Bong-u

2009-06-16T15:34:00.001-05:00

Apart from shoving Bing (previously Live Search) down your throat by having it as a default browser tab in IE 8, Microsoft has got it completely wrong in trying to somehow make you do a bing search by making links on MSN.com as bing search results. This is basically a bong-u from Bing in trying to increase their search count and I recently saw a statistic where they said their bing searches have increased by 3 percent in terms of market share. What I do just to thwart is that I hover over the link to see what the search keywords are and google it - there - I added a search to the Google count. As much as it sounds silly - this not too subtle (rather, showing down your throat) approach of Microsoft is going to rant the people. Those who were already anti-Microsoft are going to run like crazy to Google. I guess that Microsoft and subtlety cannot be in the same sentence unless there is a negating term present.

P.S: While playing gilli cricket - there used to be this older guy who will willingly play himself in the weaker team (or the team with lesser number of makkal) and take a double gaaji - this is exactly what Microsoft is doing.

The Mentally Detached State

2009-06-15T23:14:00.000-05:00

This last weekend, had to make a trip to the airport to pick a friend of mine and I found myself blissfully overshoot the exit - The road to the Tampa airport is peculiar that the airport exit is the last exit before you hit a 10 mile bridge, which cannot and does not have an exit for 10 miles. It just got me thinking as to how you can end up doing something, almost on auto-pilot - without thinking actively about what you are doing.

The first recollected instance of this happening was my english exams - the last time I did any academically related activity before my english exam must be way back in my primary school when we were really tested on grammar and all that stuff. Thankfully, when I was in the sixth, the CBSE had a brain wave and abolished any direct grammar testing questions - or so my school told us. So grammar was more or less nullified to complete the sentences kind of practical testing which didn't demand that I know the difference between adverb, adjective and all those stuff - till this date, I really do not know what an adverb is. One of the best things that was taught to me in PSBB was by my 'class' teacher, Mrs. Asha Kannan, back in my 4th standard who said that a grammatically correct sentence is one which sounds right to you. I have stuck on to that logic and so far through my school, UG and GRE-Toefl-CAT times, this logic has helped staying away from actually studying wordlists or Wren and Martin or Nurnberg and Rosenblum. In fact, my recommended book for GRE would be the Big Book which has 50 practice tests out of which you take, arbitrarily, 10-15 exams and you should be really fine for the GRE. And the version of the CAT exam that I wrote was more RC specific which helped me ace the verbal section (though I majorly flunked the DA section :) ). SO more or less, my english exams back in school involved taking the question-cum-answer sheet (thankfully to avoid junta from writing their sondha kadhai sogha kadhai, we were given allotted spaces to write our answers). So, my only aim was to finish the paper inside of 1.5 hours and to have a sound nap on the desk. This might sound pure lunacy, but somehow I loved to sleep on the desks - and so throughout the exam, I was more or less on auto pilot with the formal letter, RC and all that stuff.

The next 'remember-able' instance of me being on auto pilot was my electrical machines laboratory in my UG days. The lab was a very simple one. They gave you all the circuit diagrams and all you have to do was to make the circuit connections and take the I-V readings and depending on the experiment, do a plot and end up with the shunt resistance or series resistance of the armature and all that stuff which all had pre determined formulas. So all the work involved was to rig up the connections, take the I-V readings and do a rough plot and see if it looks anything like what it is supposed to. As long as you didn't mess up with your 3ph connections or didn't do outright silly things like connecting a voltmeter in series, you ended up with the correct readings. And the remainder of the time was spent in which guy was line vittufying for which girl in the class - this was a pretty fun activity. We were grouped based on our roll numbers and being named what I'm, I was pretty much preceded by 4 guys with the same name as me and succeeded by the same number with the same name (the first and second portion of my name are perhaps, the most common south indian names ever, though I don't think there are many people with my exact combination - based on the fact that I pretty much got my name in all the social networking/email accounts). And I had these two amazing guys in my group who were pretty much your enthu-pattani kinds. So more often than not, my lab 'experiment' was done and dusted within the first hour and the for the rest of the time, we guys would have a happy time looking at inter-lab-group line vittufyings and intra-lab-group line pottufyings. The fun would be when our crazy EM professor would start on his rant about 'indha kaalathu engineering pasanga' which would provide us enough entertainment for the day.

While in college, I had the other daily routine which involved me in auto pilot mode - the 40 odd km trip to and from our college to my bus stop - through, some hook and lots of crook, I changed my bus to a route which had the Bus Coordinator Prof in it. That guy - as is the thondru-thotta vazhakkam of people who have power - always made sure that the bus on his route was either an air bus or sometimes, air conditioned air bus. So for the 10K I paid every year, I decided to get a bang for my buck and take the air bus - so reach the bus stop at 7.30, talk arbit stuff about anything till 8, board the bus, get the last but one seat and sleep. Some of those days, the bus coord guy would come around asking for our bus pass to see if we were genuinely on that route or whether we were people who pretended to have missed our original bus to be on an air bus. After a while, unwilling to be disturbed from my morning siesta, I had my bus pass and placed it on the next seat and pretty much had a sound sleep until we reached the Chembarambakkam lake, by which point, some guy would SMS you asking whether you had completed some arbit assignment or record or obse or graph... So the last 10 mins of the bus ride was spent in: 1. Getting to know what was that I had NOT done that was supposed to be submitted. 2. Determine if I could escape from the prof who demanded the submission through the gift of the gab (more or less, my college had this typical categories of professors - 1. female staff who had completed their ME a couple of years ago 2. Male staff who had completed their ME a couple of years ago 3. Senior staff). There was pretty much no escape from the 3rd category and it involved me doing some real work in the bus with my calculator and graphs. Category 1 was the easiest - you could yap to them about some arbit thing - mostly, the prevalent Madhavan padam or some indee padam (depending on their geographical background) and you can escape with pretty much anything, including murder. Category 2 were the ones who had various sub categories:
2 a. The rural quota ME guy - you talk 4-5 sentences in english , putting in every complicated word you know and you can pretty much walk away scot free. But the trouble would brew if you did in the presence of category 1 staff as our rural romeo would feel offended that you asinga paduthified him in front of the 'figures'. So in those instances, you somehow create a familiarity, talk in chennai lingo about some arbit stuff and escape.

2 b. I'm-a-know-it-all-and-you-better-lick-my-shoes kind - these were the kind I absolutely detested. These are the kinds who studied ME because they were para aarvam to continue masters after their UG, but due to either financial status/own principles, chose not to come over to the US and do their ME in MIT (Chromepet) or some other local pultu college. Whatever you do, you never want to let these junta know that you want to go abroad for your higher studies - if you do, every instance that they get, these makkal will say, "Unnaku ellam US la MS admit kudkaranga" - You typically say to these makkal that you are 'thalai-la adichufying' as to why you chose electrical engineering and you put in an extra bit - "epdi sir neenga ME pannenga? Sema padips ah sir neenga?" More often than not, this statement leads the 2 b category person to believe that he is a self anointed guru for you and they tell you some arbit mokka logic that they followed to be in the 'successful' position - you listen to that arbit logic/funda and walk away with a sorry (Naan ennoda appa amma solliye ketka maatein - bloody nee solliya ketka poren plays in your mind when you walk away).

In my department we had a peculiar assistant professor who was once suspended for doing some 3rd rate stuff with girl students - this guy was more or less your sabalist kezham - who at 50 odd years wants to see how he can use his age to do silmisham, which the poor girls would not mind, thinking of him as their thatha at college. So with this guy, we do an Arjuna (of Mahabharatha) - like the way he used Sikhandi to defeat Bheeshma, you channel your gate pass/leave letter (forged) or permission letter (to not submit record etc) through a few of the well favored girls (the thatha, apparently, had some 'taste' in the figures he wanted to deal with) - so you give your requests through one of those favored girls and you pretty much, ended up with his signature on any piece of paper.

I digress - coming back to my point, so, the last 10 minutes of my morning bus journey was most often than not spent in some academic activity. The evening bus journey back was slightly more interesting - as most often my route was linkified to some other route in the evenings (as the bus coord left college at 5.30, he reserved the route to leave at 5.30). So this gave me a ring side view/knowledge of which payyan is dating which ponnu. Which 'pair' was spotted where in Madras - who are all the guys who are putting kadalai to a girl. All this was fun to hear and sometimes, you get to watch these wooings in the bus - and by the time I reached poonamallee, I was pretty much entertained for the day - after which I read the book (non academic, of course) or slept my way through till my bus stop - the good thing being that most of the days, our bus was held up at the Kathipara junction - which, I could have avoided had I just gotten down at Kathipara and walked to my bus stop near the Guindy railway station. But then that would mean that I have to wake up from my stupor and do some actual work, which would have meant that this activity of mine would have never found its way here. :)

After all these auto pilot experiences, I pretty much think, this was my first auto pilot experience in the US, where I was able to do work without actually thinking about what I was doing or why.

Mani Ratnam - Write Up - A request

2009-06-07T15:34:00.000-05:00

Makkale,

Planning to do a blog post on the Maestro from Madras Talkies. Please feel free to comment on your favorite 5 Mani Ratnam movies - with reasons if possible. You can also mail me at karthik[dot]sriram[at]gmail[dot]com.

The Marriage WebSite Nonsense

2009-06-05T09:12:00.000-05:00

I've had a few of my friends getting married (this being the peak marriage maatu-sandhai season) and most of them have the time to come up with a website. Before I start my rant on the website itself - I have a huge problem with people saying, "Please treat this as a personal invite". Till quite recently (before these weblinks became a part of my daily email checking routine), I thought emails were personal. If somebody emails me on my personal email address, I assume that they are addressing a personal issue. Then why this statement? If they mean personal as in meeting us/you personally, then I think that this is one of the oft-used, least meant cliches in normal communication (the first is in tamizh cinema, where there is a dialog - Unga kaiya kaala nenachu ketkaren!). I have made a promise to myself that the next time I see this line in an email, I'm going to press the delete button for the mail.

Now onto the website - most of what I say are observations - add to them if you have come across any other versions/flavors.

1. As soon as you open the weblink, it takes close to 2 minutes to load. Why? Because there is either the mushy romantic song loading or the traditional nadhaswaram and melam music loading. A quick thing to do is while you wait for the page to load is to reply to the original email wishing them the best or whatever.

2. The section which makes my blood boil - Our Story / How We Met or some other such cheesily named section. What I don't understand is there are only options available - either you met someone at work/college/wherever you used to hang out or you had an 'arranged' marriage - which involves the parents putting in spade work to find a well educated and good looking bride/groom and making them talk. A new masala mix which has been added now is this we had an arranged-love marriage, when all it involves is for those makkal who were closet-romantics (either due to parental pressure/considerations or personal incapability) varuthufy kadalai (if they are not in the same city) or roam about the city like let-loose-donkey and then saying - "Oh! we were very much in laaauv before we got married!!" Thu!! But onto the website kandraavi - so when there are only two options/stories boards (okay, three! ), why should they try to put in the site? We all know the route map a-b-c quite well. While I agree for the junta concerned it is still a story of their lifetimes, do not try to shove it down our throats in your website. I know that I have a choice to not click on that section, which is what I do nowadays. Also, another question that lingers is, when I meet someone (in person) and they tell me that they are getting married, my immediate response would be to congratulate them and in the case I know the person really well, I will go on to ask what their significant other is - professionally. I have never had the urge to ask people - where did you meet? did he lick your shoes or did you stand at the bust stop for him in the hot sun etc etc. These are personal details and I do not know how these makkal are brazenly vekkam-ketta kinds to put all these details in a frickking website. The pseudo category three makkal go one step further. To match the masala the lauv option provides, these guys go to a level of cheesiness which borders on stupidity. A popular line from this category is - "Oh! He travelled 10000 miles to see me". The last time I checked the only way to get to India was by twisting yourself into two and packing yourself into an economy seat in an air plane and make a 10000 mile journey to India. There were no fancy phancy particle transfer process which would make you disappear in the US and make you appear at Ranganathan street in Madras (okay, I saw Star Trek yesterday!). So, why in God's name should such matter-of-fact be romanticized? The levels of the desperation of that guy might have made him travel that distance for any girl, leave alone you. I sincerely hope somebody bans publishing "How we first met", "where we proposed", " What color socks was he wearing when we decided to get married" crap online. As I already said, these are personal stuff and should not shared on a website.

3. Photos/Gallery - I'm a big fan of photos and so do not mind this section. This provides the visitors a chance to see the kannalam kattikara makkal together or the actual kannala pictures - either way, I think this serves some purpose.

4. Guestbook - The section in itself is not a bad idea, but the way it is used by the morons who visit the website makes this a puke section. Visitors put in, literally, Orkut type scraps. The most often used words are "Cute", "Chweet" and "Muaaah" (In decreasing order of popularity and also signifying an increase in the sender's stupidity from L-to-R). Recently Blogeswari , blogged about these dimwits who use funny abbreviations/versions for normal english words - lyk for like, gr8 for great, Chweeeeet (the higher the stupidity, more the repeat of alphabets) for sweet, Muaaaah to signify their overflow of emotions aka a kiss. Ezhavedutha peedaigal! I want to meet the praguruthi who set the rule that using these crazy spellings/words are either: 1. Cool, or 2. Cute. I want to give that person two tight slaps and thirigify their thalai like they do for kozhi(s). And this crib of mine is directed towards the female populace who address their friends of the same sex as DA or YA or Babe. All the three usages are highly puke inducing, despicable usages.

5. Contact Us/Details to Reach the venue etc - these are genuinely sensible and not oftenly misused sections, so let me not disparage them unnecessarily.

Please feel free to add any more details kandravi-er versions that you've seen.

Come As You Are

2009-06-05T03:55:00.000-05:00

This is a song which I listen to when I'm not exactly in good spirits. One of Nirvana's best:

Come as you are, as you were
As I want you to be
As a friend, as a friend
As an old enemy

Take your time, hurry up
The choice is yours, don't be late
Take a rest as a friend
As an old

Memoria, memoria
Memoria, memoria

Come doused in mud, soaked in bleach
As I want you to be
As a trend, as a friend
As an old

Memoria, memoria
Memoria, memoria

And I swear that I don't have a gun
No I don't have a gun
No I don't have a gun

Memoria, memoria
Memoria, memoria
(No I don't have a gun)

And I swear that I don't have a gun
No I don't have a gun
No I don't have a gun
No I don't have a gun
No I don't have a gun

Memoria, memoria

Who Will Be Amazing This Year?

2009-06-03T23:04:00.002-05:00

Heart says Kobe, Brain says Howard.

On a parallel note, my workout goal was to reach the Kobe fitness levels - Where you are fit enough and not too huge with bulging muscles and all that, but reading this article left me in no uncertain terms about what my chances are with achieving my goal:

Among a dozen other drills, Bryant does suicide push-ups. At the top of the pushup, he launches himself off the mat so hard that both his feet come off the ground and his hands slap his pecs. He does three sets of seven of these.

the suicide push up pt 1

Media cozies up to Microsoft

2009-06-03T08:20:00.001-05:00

Courtesy: Wall Street Journal, D1, Dt. Wednesday, June 3rd, 2009.

The Search War is ON!

2009-05-31T08:22:00.001-05:00

So after redesigning the Microsoft Live (I have to accept that they made a nice idea of those pictures), Microsoft is trying to beat the God of Search Engines with Bing. Bing from the promotional video seems to be a more advanced version of the Google Suggest and a few other google features already existent. But given the desperation levels of Microsoft to better Google, you can be sure that they have something up their sleeve - which leads us to the next question - What is Google going to do? Its not by luck alone that they are the most successful Internet based company in the last 20 odd years. And remember that they contributed their company name as a verb to the english language.

Sabaash! Seriyaana poatti!!

Another take, albeit by a much more professional person.

Adutha Super Star Yaaru?

2009-05-27T08:37:00.001-05:00

The race seems to be getting hotter between Sam Anderson, J.K. Riteesh and this new star on the horizon .

Ayan - A Review

2009-05-26T10:02:00.000-05:00

I was seeing a tamizh movie in a theater in Chennai after what seems to be ages. So the review might be slightly biased positively towards the movie.

1. Story
Typical Masala fare. But nowadays, tamizh movie directors package their masala quite well with technology that you do not realize what you are being fed. My parents tell me that when I was young they used to feed me when I was gazing at advertisements on TV, as I was very picky about food. Similarly, what was started by Vishnu Varadan (Billa) and Shankar (Sivaji) is now being followed by Anand in Ayan. There are intro songs, some personal reference dialaaks ("Namakku eppovum Jo thaaan!") and some well choreographed fights and a stupid heroine who looks good.

2. Cast
Surya all the way - If the same movie was made by Ajith or Vijay, it would have sunk without a trace as people will clamour for change from them. Surya, who is now on the rise to the superstar status, tries his hand and since he is relatively new to this genre of films compared to A or V, makkal don't seem to mind. Surya seems to have gained weight after his 6 pack look for Varanam Aayiram. His hairdos, costumes and coolness factor makes you realize why every guy who you meet on the streets of Chennai is a 'fan' of Surya. The female population has already seemingly willed their sothu to Surya and cannot get over the fact that he is already married to Jothika. He is now a complete package - Has the looks, seems to have picked up the basics of tamizh padam dancing and is quite good in comic timing and Tammanna Bhatia is good looking in stills but looks like a Vellai Eli in the movie. As is the marabu in tamizh padams, she is shown as a desperate to fall in love, stupid and sometimes annoying girl who goes to college (but rarely you see her studying/going to college) who dances quite well in the songs. Nandu Sindu Fame Jagan is the main comedy track. Though he manages to raise a few laughs, he mainly relies on double meaning jokes to make his stuff work. The villain was more a comical one than anything. Prabhu has seemingly settled to play support to heroes. He carries on his good work from Billa in this movie too, playing his part with quiet efficiency. He somehow was in the same boat as Rishi Kappor in Dilli - 6 (a good role in an average movie. I know I do great flattery to Dilli - 6 by calling it average. It should be called crappy). Renuka of KB Teleserial fame is quite jarring with her kural and chennai tamizh.

3. Direction/Screenplay
The director has managed to take a very normal tamizh pada story and managed to keep you away from looking at your watch/cell phone for time for 3 hours, which is a great feat given the kind of movies I have been seeing in tamizh recently. I think, a major portion of this credit should also go to Surya who has literally appeared in each frame of the movie and done everything from comedy, fight, romaans and the usual hero stuff without appearing tacky.

4. Music/BGM.
BGM was pure comedy for the scenes with the bad guy. The songs though are quite catchy. I didn't like them when I listened to them when the audio released. But seeing the movie, made me a big fan of 3 songs (below). Harris Jayaraj has managed to elevate and seperate himself from the pack of music directors in tamizh - I can say that A.R. Rahman apart, no other music director has been so consistent in giving popular music.

Oyaayiyae Yaa - TamilBeat.Com

Nenje Nenje - TamilBeat.Com

Vizhi Moodi - TamilBeat.Com

Overall Opinion:

One time watch. Watch it for Surya.

The India Trip

2009-05-26T09:43:00.001-05:00

In my limited knowledge of desi-history in US, I guess I had the most impromptu trip to India - I booked tickets 3 days before I had to leave, I had no check in luggage on my trip to India and I spent close to 2 hours to shop for my trip.

1. Lufthansa has improved by leaps and bounds. I always liked their no-nonsense approach to flying - they never miss baggage, they don't get delayed and are quite the epitome of the German efficiency. The only crib I had with them - the Haider Ali-kaalaththu planes have been discarded for newer ones with personal entertainment systems. A cool addition. The food is, as usual, quite good. But the major fun was while I was on my Frankfurt to Chennai leg, I had a desoid (tam) guy who by his looks was a typical onsite software engineer from the W/I/T/C/H companies - he was blatantly and pathetically trying to flirt with the Indian stewardess - I tried to drown myself in sleep (which was how I managed the 26 hour journey) but that frickking guy kept passing 'clever' and 'funny' remarks that I asked for a seat change - thankfully ended up with an empty row of seats where I kattai neetified and slept. :)

2. This might sound cliched - But I had a major reverse culture shock in India. Makkal were hip, had money to scatter on the roads and I was seeing BMW 7-Series car with scratches and bent fenders! The prices of clothes, books, auto fares and groceries have doubled/tripled from my 2007 experience. Sometimes I felt that if I worked in India at the same level as I'm right now, I might be called a poor guy. Makkal were flaunting 25k cell phones just like that and the respect for money (especially for the poor old Rs. 100 note) was floundering.

3. Inox Theater in Chennai is a rip-off. The theater has an odd smell of sweat and butter popcorn. The sound system was the only saving grace. Coke cans cost in 60s and pop corn packs cost close to 100 upwards. And all this for a Wednesday 12.00 noon show. I saw that Friday evening shows costing 360 per head for the latest releases!

4. Spencer's Plaza has passed its days of splendor and opulence. Its now a mere shadow of its former self. Landmark is the only place which will not test your perspiration limits. I do not know if it is me, but I think Landmark has kind of given up on their Nungambakkam High Road store in terms of improving looks and space. The Landmark stores in Spencer and City Center were much better maintained and spacious.

5. Interesting observation at Landmark: Maximum 'youth' crowd were seen around the magazine section, leafing through the Maxim kinda mags seeing Bommai :P

6. Besant Nagar beach has become 'galeej' much like Marina. But it presents a stark picture of contrast - you have on one side, places like Barista with its youth crowd, varuthufying kadalai over a cup of some version of coffee while on the other side of the road you have the typical thalai ku mele duppata 'couples' doing romaans! PDA (Public Display of Affection) in Chennai has reached new levels from my last trip. I saw a couple in CCD (location not important) almost fornicating inside the premises over a cup of coffee.Now I know why they have couch style seating in those places and some (convenient?) dark corners.

7. The dressing sense of youth crowd in Chennai still beats my limited common sense/rational-ness. While I was profusely sweating with just a normal t-shirt on, I saw makkal wearing one t-shirt and another shirt on top in such a way that the t-shirt made up for the sleeves and torso while the shirt was more like a jacket kinds. I sweated a few liters more just by looking at those makkal. But curiously enough, makkal have still not given up on the crotch-lock trousers. The trousers that male makkal wear might make female population in US envious. The good thing to note was that stupid wearing your trousers half way down the legs (which I believe was a direct influence of hip hop videos) seems to have passed.

8. The Chennai Super Kings Jersey at the Reebok Showrooms costs Rs. 700 and Rs. 1999! The difference between the two priced shirts seems to be that the one priced higher has the letters 'D', 'O', 'N', 'H' and 'I' printed not necessarily in that order and Number 7 on it. I think I should be getting the job who is doing that spray painting of the number and letters. If 6 letters are worth 1300, then I think I have a good business plan to buy my dream Ferrari.

9. CNN-IBN is now exactly Indian version of CNN. Paisa peraadha vishayangal are given out as news. Amrita Arora having a fab bod after marriage is discussed at 8am on the news. Some other maida maavu indee shaniyan actor comes to talk about his designer line and all that crap.

10. Chennai airport now has international power outlets and free Wi-Fi. Lufthansa had a rare slip up on my return trip and I ended up spending 3 quality hours at Chennai between 12.00am and 4.45am and the internet helped me catch up on emails and do all the internet-y activities.

11. Courtesy, Jaya TV, Enge Brahmnan is now a big phenomenon in Chennai. I heard Cho Ramasamy now comes on TV and blatantly claims Brahminical Superiority. While I do not exactly support this kinda 'jaadhi' pracharam, I feel that the amount of shit that tam brahms go through from the Kazhaga Kanmanigal, this is an expected and late-arrival of a retaliation. Gone are the days of Tam Brahm! Thank You Ma'm logic.

P.S: Met up with Nirmal, who gave me more insights into the changes described above. He seems to have a balanced head and I do not think 4 years of working life has changed him one bit from the nice guy I knew in SVCE.

Current Project

2009-05-14T09:57:00.000-05:00

Seems quite a mushy song - But I confess, I like it. The guitar can be played by just plucking the strings - the song is quite easy to sing.

Jason Mraz - I'm Yours
Uploaded by jasonmrazworld

Tampa-vil oru Mazhai Kaalam

2009-05-14T09:32:00.001-05:00

The tropical weather is here. 90 degree heat at 1pm - Rain like there's no tomorrow at 5pm. Frogs and other reptilian cohabitants of the 'woods' where I live close to duly note your presence, make sure you notice their presence, and more importantly, size! [Picture taken at 4pm EST]

Sweden, Anyone?

2009-05-13T21:44:00.003-05:00

If someone has been to Sweden and back, please let me know the insider information on actual visa processing times and general travel arrangements that you made from the US. I already got the lowdown from the official Swedish consulate in Washington DC website.

Change is life

2009-05-11T09:54:00.000-05:00

5th May, 2009: Tuesday: Decide on going to India
Wednesday - Friday - Make arrangements for paying visa fees.
Sat - Sun: Wait for the payment to get activated
11th May, 2009: Monday: Book visa apptmnt and flight tickets
15 th May, 2009: Friday: Leave to India.

I don't think I have even travelled officially at this short a notice.

Vodafone Zoozoo Ads - A collection

2009-05-09T11:15:00.000-05:00

There have been a few ad campaigns in India which have been quite good - their conceptualization, execution being on par with any of those ads from around the world. On those lines, here's one more:

Go Chennai Super Kings

2009-05-08T09:36:00.001-05:00

Dhoni - A quick perspective

2009-05-07T16:12:00.000-05:00

P. Roebuck is known to tend towards hyperboles - especially towards mass hero cricketers. So take this with a pinch of salt - forget the adjectives, but he does have a few facts nailed straight on.

Link :

Dhoni has been himself. His approach lies midway between Warne and Kumble. Like the Aussie, he shows faith in his players, is able to think and act on his feet, and does not panic or concern himself with appearances. Like the mighty Indian he is a warrior, unyielding, prepared to hurl himself into the fray. Plain and simple, Dhoni is able to focus his entire character on winning the contest, a task he goes about in a notably unemotional way.

While not exactly a sphinx, he does not give much away, does not react when things go awry, does not glare at blundering fieldsmen or reel at the sight of a long-hop. Instead he seems able immediately to think about the next ball. He is a constant and remarkable man, able to allocate his time and energies so that the field does not drain him, for upon departing he can switch straight into another world. Captaincy will not break him. Dhoni has exceptional clarity of thought. Knowing its leader, his team responds with equal determination, and afterwards relaxation.

Nrusimha Jayanthi

2009-05-07T08:12:00.001-05:00

May 7th marks Nrushimha Jayanthi this year. I can still remember the Saturdays when I made the trip to the Yoga Nrusimhar temple in Velachery. Quite a quaint little temple and the bhattacharyar there was quite proficient too, taking time to tell you the Sthala Puranam. The only other place where I was impressed with the bhattacharyar was at the Varadharaja Perumal Swamy temple in Kanchi (its a different matter that he gave me some chakkarapongal and paanagam arbitrarily - the only apparent reason I can see being that I was a brihmacharin and he was looking for punniyam).

The posture of Sri Yoga Nrusimha in this temple is west-facing with four hands and sitting, which is quite rare. The Goddess is Amirthabalavalli. The Utsavar is Bhakthavatsala Perumal, flanked by Sridevi and Bhoodevi on His either sides.The'Sri Veda Narayana Perumal' in Manimandapam west faced with Prayoga Chakra. The only other places where I know Vishnu with the Prayoga Chakra are Chettipunyam, Thiruvoraiyur and the Veetru-irundha Raaman at Nemili.

If you are a believer and are in madras, do visit:

1. Hindu Article
2. Temple Tour

A Veggie Food Trip in the US

2009-05-06T00:12:00.000-05:00

Heavily Inspired by Hawkeye .

Hawkeye in the above mentioned post did a literal favorite list for almost every tambrahm. Since most of the items I wanted to cover was already done, I thought of listing all the veggie food that you get in US restaurants.

Chipotle: The Burrito Bowl with the Fajita veggies option - Can be had in the normal burrito version but ends up difficult to manage to eat and gets messy. But taste and cost-effective. The combo should typically be Rice, Black beans, grilled veggies, mild salsa, sour cream, corn, cheese, guacamole and lettuce. You can add another type of salsa depending on your hot and spice preferences. This is almost too heavy for anybody to have it at one go - so its always a better idea to have it made as a to-go option. The taste is simply unexplainable in words.

Tijuana Flats - The Black Bean Flautas with all veggies and queso and sour cream-guacamole sides. Make this on a wheat shell, if you really care about the calories. The other dish that would appeal to the sapaaturaaman/raami in you would be the Spinach and Artichoke or Black Bean-Veggie Quesadilla. The best thing about TF is the Smack My Ass and Call Me Sally Sauce Bar - There are four levels - Sissy Sauce, Middle Weight, Tear Jerker and the Death Wish. Even though I have high tolerance to kaaram/hot-spice levels, personally their death wish is quite harsh on your taste buds. But quite a few in the middle weight and tear jerker might make you remember your avakkaai urugaai days back home.

P.F. Chang's Bistro: Quite a pricey option but quite tasty. Amongst asian cuisine restaurants, I find that these guys have the best appetizer - CHANG’S VEGETARIAN LETTUCE WRAPS. It comes with a few leaves of Lettuce and fried shredded tofu and some other stuff which I think is vegetarian (as the menu promises us) and I can tell you that you will most probably ask for a appetizer refill. The Stir Fried Eggplant and Buddha's Feast are the entrées that will make you feel like a well fed python.

Olive Garden - The Eggplant Parmesan and the Five Cheese Ziti are almost the de facto choice of veggie junta. Between these two I always end up buying the Eggplant dish, throw away the Spaghetti and substitute from the 5 Cheese Ziti (which by itself is too heavy for me). But this mandates that: 1. You either go with someone with whom you are comfortable to share food dishes (echchai and all that aacharamaana stuff) or be filthy rich enough to get 2 dishes and waste some portion of it.And having spoken about OG, it would be unfair to miss the salad bowl that you get. In fact, if only OG cuts out oh-we-are-a-classy-restaurant-and-so-you've-got-to-wait-15 mins-to-get-seated attitude, I think the best lunch deal in US is the Salad-Soup combo available here.

CheeseCake Factory: Again, a pricey option, but its a veggie lovers heaven in terms of variety. Almost every pasta can be ordered without meat and more often than not, the waiter suggests an alternate vegetable that almost always is spot on. And the less said about the deserts, the better (I mean this as a compliment). Anybody who is trying to lose weight stay away from this place. The cheesecakes are so rich and tasty that you won't notice that they almost choke you with their creaminess and cloyingly sweet taste.

Maggiano's Little Italy: The USP of this place is that they make the dishes from the scratch for your order. So as long as you have a knack of substituting the correct vegetable for meat, you will end up with quite a good dish. But the Eggplant Parmesan with the provolone cheese makes the eggplant parmesan at IG pale in comparison. But on the flip side, this restaurant has a 'iruttu' decor which sometimes will jar you if you are a person who prefers bright settings. And the Tiramisu - the best tiramisu you can have outside of Italy, is perhaps here. You don't get a nasty whiff of rum at the end and the texture is just divine.

Taco Bell: Cheesy Fiesta Potatoes, Crunchwrap Supreme, 7-Layer Burrito and bean Baja Chalupa. This is something I picked up when I was a student and I still give in to the temptation once in a while. Obviously not healthy to you (might be for your wallet). But it is like the road side pani puri that you get back in India - the taste overwhelms logical (hygenic) reasons.

ColdStone Creamery: If you love ice-creams, you should have been to this place at least once. Amazing texture and God Save You if you have the 'Gotta Have It' size. You can feel the fat calories adding up around your waistline before you find the last scoop of the custom made ice creams. Their ice creams are really sinfully delightful.

German Cuisine - I do not know of any national chain German restaurant - but I don't think you get the cream of potato soup, called Kartoffelsuppe any richer than in a German restaurant. And depending on how good an eater you are, you might want to try the Spaetzle (noodle-like dish) and the potato pancakes. I personally would not recommend the Sauerkraut - but have seen some veggies love that too.

Chili's: The sizzling fajitas - substitute chicken with veggies - but warn the waiter makkal not to include too many veggies. For those not really intent on doing work, you can have quesadilla version. The Texas Cheese fries are amazing, possibly, the best fries in the US. And the molten chocolate cake (Dark or White) is again, up there amongst the best deserts in the land.

I think I have covered most of my favorites. Have left obviously on your face options such as Subway, Greek cuisine etc as they are common and don't score really high on the taste charts. (This comes from someone who eats a subway sandwich almost once in 5-6 days)

Sir Ganguly.

2009-05-02T20:42:00.001-05:00

Ha ha ha!

Rahman Da Man!

2009-04-30T19:00:00.000-05:00

Predictably, Rahman makes it in to the top 100 personalities list of TIME magazine.

Slumdog Millionaire's OST was not a patch on Roja or Kannathil Muthamittal or Alaipayudhey or Kandukondein Kandukondein or a Dil Se. But I believe all that good work got recognition thro SDM. The only genuinely awe inspiring piece of music in SDM was the O Saya BGM/song, but as the great man himself said, SDM would not have happened if his previous body of work was not as popular.

Here's Padma Lakshmi's piece on ARR, the Mozart from Madras .

(and for God's sake, I'm not going to say _ _ _ _ _! here)

Dada and Co.

2009-04-23T08:37:00.000-05:00

Ganguly's fans are a species of mankind which defies the assumptions that I make about life/mankind. I have had arguments (where I try to be as objective as possible, with no personal bias) with them and have found that I have been given these 'reasons' as to why Ganguly should be in the team/why he should be captain.

1. Ganguly went out on a high

This is precisely the issue - Ganguly has had 'high' series every now and then but at any given point of time, you had to make a call about he was in form or not. While on any given day, on any given pitch, you could expect a Sachin Tendulkar or Rahul Dravid to hold their own against ANY bowling attack, you could not do so with Ganguly with the same certainity. If anybody tries to argue against this proven fact, then I think that you are flogging a dead horse.

2. Ganguly did not bat up the order.

From I remember, Ganguly had all the batting spots (except for the No.4 spot, which typically has the team's best batsman coming in - The No.4 needs to be a natural strokeplayer and also have a sound technique so that he can be an asset when there is a platform already set or if the top 2 have fallen cheaply) for his taking - I remember he used to bat at No.3 but could not match Dravid's peerless technique in test cricket. So, given his talent/skill, temperament and technique, the only place that he could occupy was the No.5 coming in after Tendulkar.

3. Ganguly was the talent spotter / Captain Courageous

I honestly do not think that Ganguly turning up late for the toss against Steve Waugh was heroic or anything nice. Sledging while on the field is fine/okay - but being the Captain of the team and coming late for the toss - thats despicable. And for as much talent that Ganguly fostered, he killed as many. I think the ONLY reason that a moron called Yuvraj Singh (the biggest flat track bully in the circuit now). And he has been given such an assured run, that this guy has still not established himself in the test team - perhaps thinking of which model to hang out with next. Similarly, in terms of bowling, there was one player, named Murali Kartik whose career and confidence was wrecked, irrepairably. Not to forget Hemang Badani (who IMO was a better rounded player in terms of fielding, batting temperament and bowling). If I remember, there was this keeper called Saba Karim from Bengal who played with only one working eye, the only plausible reason being that he was from the same state as Ganguly. So actually doing a head count, objectively, either Ganguly is a no loss - no profit or a slight loss when it comes to nurturing new players. And if at all anything he has taught these kids, he has made these pseudo aggression like waving your shirt half naked (at LORDS for Godssake), talking crap and all that is cool. No wonder you seee Harbhajan Singh slapping Sreeshanth and others doing funny stuff.

4. Dhoni is a lucky player/crappier batsman than Ganguly

Perhaps true. Dhoni plays as if he is swatting flies. But I think Dhoni has a better temperament. I (and the whole world) can see that Dhoni has moved heaven and earth to improve his batting from what he was. True, he does not look elegant or stylish - but he gets the job done, and that, I believe is all that matters. And I'm certainly amused as to what people call as Luck/fluke. Every achievement by Dhoni is being attributed to his luck. I can accept or cede a point if Dhoni's successes are few and far spread. But how come a person can be SO lucky that every time when the game is in clutch, his decisions pay off? Come on, if Dhoni was so lucky, he should be playing the lotto everyday and very soon, Bill Gates might have a competitor for the World's richest tag. But again, the resources that Dhoni has and that Ganguly had were different. Ganguly got a losing team (from SRT) while Dhoni got a competitive unit from Dravid. So I do not think its a fair comparison between Dhoni and Ganguly. But definitely, Dhoni's successes are NOT because of luck, just from mathematical or logical perspective (one of those cases when logic and mathematics concur). But just by the fact that to support Ganguly, his fans need to berate/talk down on Dhoni (and sometimes, Dravid), tells me that they lack the proper ammunition. They have come to a gun battle with a knife.

Now I have questions for the Ganguly backers:

1. Fielding

At any point of time, when Ganguly was in the team, he was a weak link in fielding. You could not even classify him as a safe fielder. How many times have you seen him run with the ball till the damned thing stops and then throw it back? How many times have you caught yourself chuckling when Ganguly berates another player in the team for a misfield? And now the game being highly competitive as it is, every run that you save, might save you the match. Not a point of team when you want to carry a fielding liability in the team. As much as you can score a 50 in match and contribute to the team, misfielding not only contributes to runs lost but also demoralizes the bowlers/other fielders.

2. Inability to fix technical flaws

From time immemorial Ganguly has had a weakness against short pitched bowling. At various points of time, SRT and Dravid have had their shortcomings exposed too. But where they went back to the basics and fixed their game, Ganguly with all his (lazy) royal blood took his place for granted. By the time he actually sought help (before the 2004 Aus Series), it was too little, too late. As a person involved in quality engineering, I do not see a sane reason for anybody not to continually improve their game so that they retain their edge.

IPL - Masala

2009-04-21T08:44:00.000-05:00

http://fakeiplplayer.blogspot.com/

Like Kamal says, ippo ellam makkal ellathileyum masala ketkaranga.... kadavule. The ultimate twist would be if Shah Rukh himself was posting as this blogger. I would not put him beyond this as Shahrukh is called as a Badshah Dildo.

Sodhanai for Sodha

2009-04-19T15:15:00.001-05:00

Dada, the ever over hyped, well beyond bury-by date cricketer, finally justified the support of his fan legions by playing one of the best knocks seen in T20 form. While every other veteran player who have been doubted have performed over the last 2 days (SRT, Dravid and Kumble), this guy with the gargantuan ego instead chose to silence his critics. Anybody who have been criticizing Ganguly's hunger for power (which rivals Dr. Karunanidhi and his family's) will I think be silenced - flogging a dead horse is not many people's preferred avocation.

I think, Ganguly has surpassed one Mr. K.D Nikhanj in making people desperate to see him go - at least once Kapil got his 434, he spared us the agony. Ganguly is making sure that we see the various version of the same story. Like the insipid remakes that Dr. Vijay makes of already insipid telugu movies, Ganguly remakes his own - If it was G. Chappell in the Indian team, its Buchchanan in KKR. If it was Dravid in the national team, here its B. McCullum. Frankly, Mr. Ganguly, if you had not noticed, remakes and especially Vijay movies are flopping like anything nowadays. So please take pity on those who want to see cricket (and not your third rated politics/DADAGIRI) and kindly retire from every form of cricket currently being played and those that will be invented in the future.

P.S: Mr. G, please talk to one Mr. Steve Waugh who was dropped after one failed home ODI series about how to make a graceful exit.

Gmail the Mind Reader

2009-04-18T11:38:00.002-05:00

What Next, after this ? Tell me what to type in the email?

Ashton Kutcher endra thaangamudiyadha Mokkai

2009-04-14T10:43:00.000-05:00

I had to keep awake yesterday to make a trip to the airport and so ended up seeing this movie called "Just Married". Man, this guy cannot act. Like oldies in tambrahm families say, Suttu pottaalum nadippu varadhu pole irukke? He hams and literally makes you cringe and I think he actually managed to make me change channels - that does not happen often. I have sat through entirely nonsensical movies/performances like Talladega Nights (don't even ask how I managed it - I ended up cursing myself and hating myself for doing that to my brain). But Ashton Kutcher upped the ante which I think is difficult for anybody to break - Will Ferrell and Keanu Reaves included. And aptly this guy has a dialog in Cheaper by The Dozen -2 when he says his face is the reason he gets roles and not because he can act. Never were any words spoken on screen been more true than absolute truth itself. And it was a good thing that a good friend of mine said no when I wanted to go to that Ashton Kutcher - Cameron Diaz movie - I would have died in the theater.

Gyaan in Life - 1/XYZ

2009-04-11T00:39:00.000-05:00

This week I had one of the things which I fear/hate the most. I ended up managing a project on which a couple of desi colleagues worked. I'm strongly believe and advocate the theory that developing a personal relationship with a collegaue (discount the rare occurances when a person known to you joins the company) at work.

Its quite easy to maintain a strictly professional relationship with non-Indians. My manager is a dutch person and his boss is a korean guy. I maintain a semi-formal relationship with them - I do end up car-pooling with one of them or giving the other a ride to the airport on a weekend - but other than that and the odd weekend (when I end up alone with nothing to do) where I do some kind of activity with them like sailing or playing basketball or going for a combined cuisine cooking - mostly fusion of Indo-Dutch/Continental European.

This entire delicate arrangement becomes utterly impossible in the case of desi colleagues. They end up asking you to help them buy a car or they call you when they are sick and you get to see their softer/weaker side and once you get know that side, the other person, I believe, thinks he has to keep you a personal contact. They try to talk to you in indi (which is a no-no to me) or they ask you about your family/personal life, which again is something I would not like to share with someone who happens to work in the same place as me. So the entire gist of the last few lines have been that, much against my wishes, I ended up with a non-formal/non-semi-formal relationship with these 2 desi colleagues. And I ended up being in charge of supervising their work/approving their work times and all the hajaar work and I can tell you my posish is what one Mr.Bertram Wilberforce Wooster frequently finds himself in the master's works - if only there was Jeeves at work?!

Different Strokes for Different Folks

2009-04-07T13:52:00.000-05:00

So P.Chidambaram was Bush for a day when he got a shoe thrown at him. I was reading a few articles/sound bytes given by P.C and it was interesting to note that he had said that the reservation system was to set right the evils/practices which had been prevalent for the last 3000 years - leaving the credibility of the time line or historical accuracy, why not address these 'social injustices'?

1. The mughal conquest of the Indian subcontinent
Amongst the numerous consequences of the Mughal Invasion, the primary was the spread of Islam as a religion/faith amongst the people. There was rape of women, rampant plunder of resources, systematic and forced conversion, destruction of architecture and the sanathana dharma. Amongst the numerous temples destroyed was one which had Rama in Ayodhya. Numerous sculptures were mercilessly destroyed. So if the Hindus demanded justice, would the Congress Government go ahead and exile the muslims now (who much like the brahmins of today, do not have anything to do with the massacre which was perpetuated by their forefathers?) Can temples like Srirangam or Bhadrinath levy a tax only from Muslims to compensate for their loses (as some the statues that were destroyed were perhaps Panchalogam and might be conservatively valued at a few crores today).Can Hindu men of today arbitrarily rape a muslim women (I know you'd want to hit me - but this is what the forward caste are being subjected to), and be let free? (I know that for one, the Muslims do not even follow the Indian Penal Code - when will India have a Uniform Civil Code)?

2. The English occupation of India
English who introduced Christianity (and so are forefathers of today's Indian christians) plundered the remains of what the Mughals had left and scrapped whatever we were left with - they use Sanskrit words Jabam, Sthothiram - Sanskrit is called a deva baashai and can be comfortably be owned by the Sanathana Dharma religion. So can the Ahobila Matam and Sankara matam copyright Sanskrit words and levy a royalty each time Dinakaran uses it on TV? Even a few decades back, there were forcible conversions to Christianity - so could we go ahead and levy a forefather sin tax on all christians?

All these seem totally ridiculous because they ARE - Very. But then how come this so-called Secularists (who are nothing but anti-brahmins or anti-hindus as the situation demands) justify reservation? These morons are nothing but convenient opportunists who would not think twice before forming alliances with a party and leader who were accused of killing your kith and kin.

Batting for Dummies, Authored by Chris Martin

2009-04-06T21:24:00.001-05:00

Family Guy

2009-04-03T03:03:00.000-05:00

Suntrust - Please do not trust

2009-04-02T14:31:00.000-05:00

I happen to have a credit card from my employer from this bank - Suntrust. I generally do not use my corporate card for anything, but about a month back, I had to schedule a trip to the other corner of the country from Florida on quite a short notice for work and so ended up using this CC to cover the not so cheap airfare.

Now all the expenses were made in the first week of March and this bank is one of those imbeciles who still are in an age where they send you a paper statement and you need to send a cheque and all that 20th Century stuff. And now I see that by the first week of April, even before they can send me the paper statement, these morons have charged a late fee for not honoring the payment.

Am I going cuckoo or such crappy banks still exist?

Stay away from Suntrust bank - The bank for senile and stone-age people.