Wishing you all a Merry Christmas…
I’m posting this at the wee hours of Christmas morning after having gift wrapped gifts for my daughters and placing it under the Christmas tree.... playing Santa. We don’t have Chimneys down here, so had to convince my daughter to leave the window open for Santa to sneak in.
Cheers for a safe Christmas. Don’t Drink and drive instead dirnk dna wtire
Thursday, December 25, 2008
A Week of Flip Flops and Shoes…
This has been a rather entertaining week of Flip flops; Shoes and President elect six packs.
Let’s start with the Flip flops, Pakistan seem to be in a holiday mood and slipped on their ‘flip flops’ the entire week. Their statements were as slippery as the slippers or the flip flops. Asif Ali Zardari flipped ‘non state actors are responsible for the Mumbai attacks’ and then flopped by saying that ‘non state actors on their soil were his responsibility’ and almost immediately not to be out done, our gud ol friend Nawaz Sheriff who has spent more time in exile than in Pakistan flipped that he had personally checked out on the lone surviving terrorist’s Pakistani links and confirmed it and then went on to flop saying that India needs to provide evidence that Sir (‘Night’hood here …cos the boy has probably seen his daylights removed in the past days) Kasab was from Pakistan.
The next was the poor Iraqi journo getting the projectile all wrong or was it that Mr. Bush well trained in the last 8 years on the art of avoiding being shoo shooed …All said and done in cricketing parlance the delivery was pretty flat and more ‘pie chucker like’ with not enough flight. The Middle East press gave Bush's Middle East 'footwear farewell' the best possible coverage. One freak did it out of sheer frustration and no more. Bush would have won a lot of brownie points had he actually pardoned the journo. It would definitely have done a world of good on his way out. Not that it’s going to matter anymore.
Finally the President elect Barack Obama was shot on camera by the erstwhile paparazzi literally in a ‘Kulli scene’ as they call it back home. Well as some one said there’s no supply without demand… we the public suck up to all the exclusives with a thirst for fantasy thereby encouraging such ridiculous acts of invasion of privacy.
Let’s start with the Flip flops, Pakistan seem to be in a holiday mood and slipped on their ‘flip flops’ the entire week. Their statements were as slippery as the slippers or the flip flops. Asif Ali Zardari flipped ‘non state actors are responsible for the Mumbai attacks’ and then flopped by saying that ‘non state actors on their soil were his responsibility’ and almost immediately not to be out done, our gud ol friend Nawaz Sheriff who has spent more time in exile than in Pakistan flipped that he had personally checked out on the lone surviving terrorist’s Pakistani links and confirmed it and then went on to flop saying that India needs to provide evidence that Sir (‘Night’hood here …cos the boy has probably seen his daylights removed in the past days) Kasab was from Pakistan.
The next was the poor Iraqi journo getting the projectile all wrong or was it that Mr. Bush well trained in the last 8 years on the art of avoiding being shoo shooed …All said and done in cricketing parlance the delivery was pretty flat and more ‘pie chucker like’ with not enough flight. The Middle East press gave Bush's Middle East 'footwear farewell' the best possible coverage. One freak did it out of sheer frustration and no more. Bush would have won a lot of brownie points had he actually pardoned the journo. It would definitely have done a world of good on his way out. Not that it’s going to matter anymore.
Finally the President elect Barack Obama was shot on camera by the erstwhile paparazzi literally in a ‘Kulli scene’ as they call it back home. Well as some one said there’s no supply without demand… we the public suck up to all the exclusives with a thirst for fantasy thereby encouraging such ridiculous acts of invasion of privacy.
Doha Shots...
A traditional touch to the teller...
A typical Arabic Souq
A typical Arabic Souq (contd..)
Thats the Zig Zag Building ...Contractors were also true to its name...kept on meandering with the work...
The Doha Skyline in the making
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Parvathy Omanakuttan --- What’s in a name after all!!!
Parvathy Omanakuttan just proved me wrong that even with a blatant and loud Mallu sounding name you can still be successful in a field that is dominated by women with names as glamorous as them. I always carried the (wrong) notion that only names like Sushmita, Aishwarya, Diana, Priyanka with surnames of Sens, Rais, Haydens, Chopras could ever make it to the glitzy and glamorous world of beauty pageants and from there to the Hall of Fame of Bollywood.
With a name like Parvathy Omanakuttan one would have thought she is a new face cast in one those Adoor Gopalakrishnan movies or a village lass dancing in ‘Pavadai’ and ‘Davani’ in a Bharathi Raja movie. However you will soon see her gyrating to Himesh Reshmiya’s remixes in a Bollywood flick titled Dhoom 3 or 4 or Don 5 or 6 but I still cannot fathom myself staring at a Bollywood poster that says Starring Parvathy Omanakuttan. It’s kinda similar to hearing something like the ‘Oscar for the Best Actor goes to Srinivas Raghavan Ananthapadmanabhan’ it would fall in place better, if it sounded something like ‘and the Nobel Prize for Physics goes to Srinivas Raghavan Ananthapadmanabhan’, I guess you kinda get the picture now. Though I have nothing against such names you just get the feeling that there are some genres of names that you are conditioned to associate with certain events, professions etc…
The coming days, weeks & months will see the stories on Mumbai Terror, Spirit of Mumbai and Ajmal Amer Kasab being pushed into the insignificant quarters and telecast times on the print and the electronic media, and in particular the Malayalam media will go on an overdrive, and claims of daughter of the soil will start ringing in. They will find the remotest of links to authenticate such claims.
I just hope she retains her name when she makes her forays into Bollywood and sets the trend for future Parvathys, Kamalakshis or Gnanasambandams to make it big in the world of glamour in spite of their names.
For all you know we might hear of one 'Parvy Omna' an anagramic distortion of her name doing the rounds in Bollywood in the days to come.
With a name like Parvathy Omanakuttan one would have thought she is a new face cast in one those Adoor Gopalakrishnan movies or a village lass dancing in ‘Pavadai’ and ‘Davani’ in a Bharathi Raja movie. However you will soon see her gyrating to Himesh Reshmiya’s remixes in a Bollywood flick titled Dhoom 3 or 4 or Don 5 or 6 but I still cannot fathom myself staring at a Bollywood poster that says Starring Parvathy Omanakuttan. It’s kinda similar to hearing something like the ‘Oscar for the Best Actor goes to Srinivas Raghavan Ananthapadmanabhan’ it would fall in place better, if it sounded something like ‘and the Nobel Prize for Physics goes to Srinivas Raghavan Ananthapadmanabhan’, I guess you kinda get the picture now. Though I have nothing against such names you just get the feeling that there are some genres of names that you are conditioned to associate with certain events, professions etc…
The coming days, weeks & months will see the stories on Mumbai Terror, Spirit of Mumbai and Ajmal Amer Kasab being pushed into the insignificant quarters and telecast times on the print and the electronic media, and in particular the Malayalam media will go on an overdrive, and claims of daughter of the soil will start ringing in. They will find the remotest of links to authenticate such claims.
I just hope she retains her name when she makes her forays into Bollywood and sets the trend for future Parvathys, Kamalakshis or Gnanasambandams to make it big in the world of glamour in spite of their names.
For all you know we might hear of one 'Parvy Omna' an anagramic distortion of her name doing the rounds in Bollywood in the days to come.
Friday, December 12, 2008
Koothapiran, Abdul Jabbar, Ramamurthy & Co – Oh How I miss them…
Another Test match is underway at the MAC Stadium in Chepauk, Chennai, 4 weeks a lil too early. Just as the boxer’s day test match is a very traditional affair for the Australian cricketing fraternity so is a Pongal test match significant in the Madras cricketing calendar. Although this time we have an unscheduled test being played at Chepauk.
When I switched on the TV early in the morning and heard the likes of Gavaskar, David Lloyd, Ian Botham and L Shiva holding fort at the commentary box, I was reminded of a few of the legendary Tamil Cricket commentators on All India Radio whom I grew up listening to as a kid.
Warning: This blog will be enjoyed by only a very niche audience, an audience who appreciate Tamil and Cricket with the same fervour.
It was a pleasure to listen to one of the above commentators describe the first ball of a Test match and say, ‘Ithoo wallajah salai muniyilirunthu mudhal pandhu vissuvadharkaka Haryana Singham Kapil Dev kudhirai ottathaipola padi padiyaga vandhu seerana vegam pettru valakai vikettin mel vara pandhai veessugirar’ It just meant ‘Here comes from the Wallajah road end, the King of Haryana, Kapil Dev, running in like a horse cantering and following it up with a gallop to bowl Right arm over the wicket’.
When one was just dependent on the radio commentary and trying to visualise (mind you these were pre Hawk eye days) what was going on in the middle this was the best way to describe the first ball of a test match. We have seen many an acclaimed commentators over the years, including an alumnus of the esteemed IIM in the commentary box but I do doubt their capabilities in doing a better job than Koothapirans, Abdul Jabbars & Co to narrate the visuals to the millions of transistor dependent fans of Cricket.
In fact I’m not sure if All India Radio still does broadcast the Tamil commentary for the Madras matches which I doubt particularly in the present BCCI era when you need to pay even if you walk past Wallajah road for the rights to just hear the crowd applauding a match.
The way Abdul Jabbar describes a G R Vishwanath Square cut or a Sandeep Patil going down on one knee to cover drive the likes of Bob Willis will surely stand out as possibly the best descriptions of a shot by any standards, sometimes even better than the shot itself.
When I switched on the TV early in the morning and heard the likes of Gavaskar, David Lloyd, Ian Botham and L Shiva holding fort at the commentary box, I was reminded of a few of the legendary Tamil Cricket commentators on All India Radio whom I grew up listening to as a kid.
Warning: This blog will be enjoyed by only a very niche audience, an audience who appreciate Tamil and Cricket with the same fervour.
It was a pleasure to listen to one of the above commentators describe the first ball of a Test match and say, ‘Ithoo wallajah salai muniyilirunthu mudhal pandhu vissuvadharkaka Haryana Singham Kapil Dev kudhirai ottathaipola padi padiyaga vandhu seerana vegam pettru valakai vikettin mel vara pandhai veessugirar’ It just meant ‘Here comes from the Wallajah road end, the King of Haryana, Kapil Dev, running in like a horse cantering and following it up with a gallop to bowl Right arm over the wicket’.
When one was just dependent on the radio commentary and trying to visualise (mind you these were pre Hawk eye days) what was going on in the middle this was the best way to describe the first ball of a test match. We have seen many an acclaimed commentators over the years, including an alumnus of the esteemed IIM in the commentary box but I do doubt their capabilities in doing a better job than Koothapirans, Abdul Jabbars & Co to narrate the visuals to the millions of transistor dependent fans of Cricket.
In fact I’m not sure if All India Radio still does broadcast the Tamil commentary for the Madras matches which I doubt particularly in the present BCCI era when you need to pay even if you walk past Wallajah road for the rights to just hear the crowd applauding a match.
The way Abdul Jabbar describes a G R Vishwanath Square cut or a Sandeep Patil going down on one knee to cover drive the likes of Bob Willis will surely stand out as possibly the best descriptions of a shot by any standards, sometimes even better than the shot itself.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
E-Invasion
Our lives have been E-jacked, every thing we do in life these days is prefixed or rather dictated by the ‘E’. E mails, E commerce, E learning, E relationships, The eees are turning out to be pest just like the ‘ees’ in Tamil (‘ees’ in Tamil mean common houseflies). A Brahmin lady of wisdom told me when I was a kid that we are normally invaded by the fly’s ‘(eees) during the Tamil months ending in ‘phonetic ees’ like ‘Avani’, ‘Aadi’ and the likes…Well if u notice its kind of true.. I don’t have any proofs to put forward, but guys following the Tamil months back home please check it out.
The Electronic ‘E’ that Im referring to here is not seasonal but here to stay, an ‘E’ (Never thought I would be using ‘an’ the proposition in this format when I was taught English Grammar as a kid) that has made an irreversible impact in our lives.
It’s Christmas season, and as a child I remember an annual ritual of my dad picking up 50 odd Christmas cards and we as a family sitting around the dining table together to write out Christmas Greetings to all our friends and relatives. This was one ritual followed in all its sincerity irrespective of recession or hard times... The envelope was pasted with a 50 Paise ‘Gandhi’ stamp if it was within its stipulated weight and without any adders, the envelope was unsealed and this was called ‘Book Post’ and one had to write it in Bold on the envelope. I repeat ‘write’ and not ‘type Ctrl B’ on MS Word.
Today my six year comes up to me and tells me that she wants to log on to 123greetings.com and send an E card to a friend.
Recently one of my newly married younger cousin sent me an E mail and asked me for my postal (Snail mail address). Im sure he wanted to send me a Christmas greeting signed by his beau and him. Poor guy, lil does he realise that after a couple of years the only dotted line a wife would wanna sign would be the ones on the right hand bottom corner of a cheque leaf that says ‘Self’ on the top.
Little did I know as a kid that the ever silent and insignificant ‘E’ would shoot to such prominence in the years to come? You are so ‘E’ dependent these days particularly when one’s on the move… so much so that Emotion has also become a kind of ‘E’ in Motion.
The Electronic ‘E’ that Im referring to here is not seasonal but here to stay, an ‘E’ (Never thought I would be using ‘an’ the proposition in this format when I was taught English Grammar as a kid) that has made an irreversible impact in our lives.
It’s Christmas season, and as a child I remember an annual ritual of my dad picking up 50 odd Christmas cards and we as a family sitting around the dining table together to write out Christmas Greetings to all our friends and relatives. This was one ritual followed in all its sincerity irrespective of recession or hard times... The envelope was pasted with a 50 Paise ‘Gandhi’ stamp if it was within its stipulated weight and without any adders, the envelope was unsealed and this was called ‘Book Post’ and one had to write it in Bold on the envelope. I repeat ‘write’ and not ‘type Ctrl B’ on MS Word.
Today my six year comes up to me and tells me that she wants to log on to 123greetings.com and send an E card to a friend.
Recently one of my newly married younger cousin sent me an E mail and asked me for my postal (Snail mail address). Im sure he wanted to send me a Christmas greeting signed by his beau and him. Poor guy, lil does he realise that after a couple of years the only dotted line a wife would wanna sign would be the ones on the right hand bottom corner of a cheque leaf that says ‘Self’ on the top.
Little did I know as a kid that the ever silent and insignificant ‘E’ would shoot to such prominence in the years to come? You are so ‘E’ dependent these days particularly when one’s on the move… so much so that Emotion has also become a kind of ‘E’ in Motion.
Monday, December 8, 2008
Enough of ‘enough is enough rhetoric’
Well, well, Post 26 / 11 we have been pounded with rhetoric’s like enough is enough…. and ‘what’s next ‘questions.
The fourth estate fraternity have thrown open theirs airwaves /columns to forums, discussions, polls, idea collections, opinions and what not in an effort to bring about change and awareness and have roped in the rich and famous and the movers & shakers from Page 3 in their endeavour.
But will this help???
The English speaking population of India makes up only 7.95 % of its total population and only 30 % of its total population is Urbanised, so any awareness that is brought about here is not necessarily going to ring in a change that can effectively put in place constitutional reforms needed to tackle these situations which we find ourselves more too often.
The real change needs to evolve from the most interior of regions in the likes of UP, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, and Northeast etc… Illiteracy and corruption in these regions need to be rooted out and, in my opinion; change has to start from there and not from the swanky by lanes of Colaba. A placard holding Sharmila Tagore who is wedded into one of the most affluent of the Nawab families of India or a solidarity expressing Preity Zinta carrying a candle and marching down Marine Drive, who is the beau in tow to one of the heirs of the richest families in India who also happens to be the great grandson of the founding father of Pakistan Mohd Ali Jinnah…are not definitely going to make a difference, this will only provide the cosmetic quotient to the real issue.
The rural Indian needs to rise to the occasion and bring about this change. The minority affluent urban Indian views which are in my opinion, biased and city centric cannot do more than just write pieces like this on the blogosphere.
The fourth estate fraternity have thrown open theirs airwaves /columns to forums, discussions, polls, idea collections, opinions and what not in an effort to bring about change and awareness and have roped in the rich and famous and the movers & shakers from Page 3 in their endeavour.
But will this help???
The English speaking population of India makes up only 7.95 % of its total population and only 30 % of its total population is Urbanised, so any awareness that is brought about here is not necessarily going to ring in a change that can effectively put in place constitutional reforms needed to tackle these situations which we find ourselves more too often.
The real change needs to evolve from the most interior of regions in the likes of UP, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, and Northeast etc… Illiteracy and corruption in these regions need to be rooted out and, in my opinion; change has to start from there and not from the swanky by lanes of Colaba. A placard holding Sharmila Tagore who is wedded into one of the most affluent of the Nawab families of India or a solidarity expressing Preity Zinta carrying a candle and marching down Marine Drive, who is the beau in tow to one of the heirs of the richest families in India who also happens to be the great grandson of the founding father of Pakistan Mohd Ali Jinnah…are not definitely going to make a difference, this will only provide the cosmetic quotient to the real issue.
The rural Indian needs to rise to the occasion and bring about this change. The minority affluent urban Indian views which are in my opinion, biased and city centric cannot do more than just write pieces like this on the blogosphere.
Friday, December 5, 2008
Music heals...
At a time when things back home are not looking too good on the secular front, I just wanted to share the link to 2 songs on Youtube which has had an impact on me... Here you go...
Maha Ganapati by Susheela Raman
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy7D_FIkWIY
A is for Allah by Yousuf Islam (Cat Stevens)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L-GOHa5-YQ
Maha Ganapati by Susheela Raman
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy7D_FIkWIY
A is for Allah by Yousuf Islam (Cat Stevens)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-L-GOHa5-YQ
Saturday, November 29, 2008
A Gateway to Terror
I sat through nights witnessing yet another terror act unfolding on TV. It was, I should say one of the most harrowing of experiences in recent times. I just sat there helpless, miles away, pained, frustrated, angered and sad at the situation we found ourselves in. I thought it was just another attack that would end in a couple of hours but even after close to 55 hours when I write this, it’s not completely over.
A handful of insane trigger happy kids held Mumbai to ransom and brought the commercial capital of India to a standstill. Images of weeping people frantically looking for the loved ones at hospital door steps kept me awake for nights. Terrorism does not belong to any religion; it is a RELIGION on its own for a few.
One of the most telling images of the night was watching the flight of doves/pigeons, symbols of peace and tranquillity, being displaced from the century old dome of the Taj Mahal Hotel, their nocturnal abode for generations, by the deafening sounds of fire power and the raging flames of terror. This image said it all. Peace had been shattered.
I see no reason in complaining about the break down of machinery, inefficiency of the system, intelligence gathering failure so on and so forth, how can one simply prevent a group of highly motivated people, so motivated with malice that they are willing to even kill themselves for a cause, known only to them, from running amuck. In situations like this even the best of machinery is bound to crumble. I was surprised in the way the western media particularly CNN portrayed the situation, they seemed to be indulging in the traditional Indian system bashing and criticising our inefficiency in handling such emergency situations, they should look back 7 years and see how they reacted to 9/11, attacks unprecedented such as these could not have been handled better.
On our own national front, not long ago in the very same Mumbai the cronies of a political party got together and thrashed the daylights out of small time Pani Poori vendors, Taxi drivers, menial labourers for not belonging to their state, here you had kids also not belonging to the state nor the country holding up the city, and heroes again not belonging to Mumbai trying to protect a potpourri of nationalities. Wonder where the neta and his cronies were???
The foreign minister of the biggest democracy claims on the aftermath of this dastardly act and I quote ‘I am sure that India will be unified to ‘FACE’ such acts of terrorism’ a typical quote coming from a 70 + year old foreign minister, I would have approved of his statement had he replaced ‘FACE’ with ‘COUNTER’. Words like ‘COUNTER’ would send a stronger message than the subdued ‘FACE’. Why should the so called ‘super power in the making’, the only country that has not declared recession in these times of worldwide economic turmoil ‘FACE’ acts of terrorism when we are capable of ‘COUNTERING’ them.
I’m sure that the think tank of the Bollywood, Kollywood, Tollywood and Mollywood are already drawing out plans to make movies probably titled ‘One night at the Taj’ or ‘60 Hours in Colaba’, ‘Colaba Killings’, ‘Mumbai Massacre’, ‘Nightmare on Marine Drive’. (I guess I should patent these titles). The likes of Madhur Bhandarkars, Sanjay Leela Bhansalis, Mani Rathnams and Priyadarshans might already be working on the script. I know its no time for humour, but wish these events are not made into just another movie or end up being completely forgotten after a couple of weeks, instead I really hope that this act brings about a drastic change in our systems and the way we look into securing our citizens.
Bombay (Mumbai) is a city that churns out heroes by the dozen, day in and day out in the erstwhile Bollywood who even in the last scene of their REEL life return unscathed after a successful hostage rescue mission with dialogues like ‘Main Hoon Na’ but what we witnessed in the last 60 odd hours were heroes from the REAL life who said ‘Main Hoon Na’ (I AM THERE) before the operations and were martyred by the words ‘Main tha na’ (I WAS THERE) after doing all they could to protect us from the ensuing danger. A real life ‘Main tha na’ will run eternally at the box office of our hearts compared to the Reel life ‘Main Hoon Na’s’ 100 days at the box office. I salute all members of the Army, NSG, Navy, Police, Hotel Staff, and members of the common public who have laid down their lives and have become immortal heroes in real life.
A handful of insane trigger happy kids held Mumbai to ransom and brought the commercial capital of India to a standstill. Images of weeping people frantically looking for the loved ones at hospital door steps kept me awake for nights. Terrorism does not belong to any religion; it is a RELIGION on its own for a few.
One of the most telling images of the night was watching the flight of doves/pigeons, symbols of peace and tranquillity, being displaced from the century old dome of the Taj Mahal Hotel, their nocturnal abode for generations, by the deafening sounds of fire power and the raging flames of terror. This image said it all. Peace had been shattered.
I see no reason in complaining about the break down of machinery, inefficiency of the system, intelligence gathering failure so on and so forth, how can one simply prevent a group of highly motivated people, so motivated with malice that they are willing to even kill themselves for a cause, known only to them, from running amuck. In situations like this even the best of machinery is bound to crumble. I was surprised in the way the western media particularly CNN portrayed the situation, they seemed to be indulging in the traditional Indian system bashing and criticising our inefficiency in handling such emergency situations, they should look back 7 years and see how they reacted to 9/11, attacks unprecedented such as these could not have been handled better.
On our own national front, not long ago in the very same Mumbai the cronies of a political party got together and thrashed the daylights out of small time Pani Poori vendors, Taxi drivers, menial labourers for not belonging to their state, here you had kids also not belonging to the state nor the country holding up the city, and heroes again not belonging to Mumbai trying to protect a potpourri of nationalities. Wonder where the neta and his cronies were???
The foreign minister of the biggest democracy claims on the aftermath of this dastardly act and I quote ‘I am sure that India will be unified to ‘FACE’ such acts of terrorism’ a typical quote coming from a 70 + year old foreign minister, I would have approved of his statement had he replaced ‘FACE’ with ‘COUNTER’. Words like ‘COUNTER’ would send a stronger message than the subdued ‘FACE’. Why should the so called ‘super power in the making’, the only country that has not declared recession in these times of worldwide economic turmoil ‘FACE’ acts of terrorism when we are capable of ‘COUNTERING’ them.
I’m sure that the think tank of the Bollywood, Kollywood, Tollywood and Mollywood are already drawing out plans to make movies probably titled ‘One night at the Taj’ or ‘60 Hours in Colaba’, ‘Colaba Killings’, ‘Mumbai Massacre’, ‘Nightmare on Marine Drive’. (I guess I should patent these titles). The likes of Madhur Bhandarkars, Sanjay Leela Bhansalis, Mani Rathnams and Priyadarshans might already be working on the script. I know its no time for humour, but wish these events are not made into just another movie or end up being completely forgotten after a couple of weeks, instead I really hope that this act brings about a drastic change in our systems and the way we look into securing our citizens.
Bombay (Mumbai) is a city that churns out heroes by the dozen, day in and day out in the erstwhile Bollywood who even in the last scene of their REEL life return unscathed after a successful hostage rescue mission with dialogues like ‘Main Hoon Na’ but what we witnessed in the last 60 odd hours were heroes from the REAL life who said ‘Main Hoon Na’ (I AM THERE) before the operations and were martyred by the words ‘Main tha na’ (I WAS THERE) after doing all they could to protect us from the ensuing danger. A real life ‘Main tha na’ will run eternally at the box office of our hearts compared to the Reel life ‘Main Hoon Na’s’ 100 days at the box office. I salute all members of the Army, NSG, Navy, Police, Hotel Staff, and members of the common public who have laid down their lives and have become immortal heroes in real life.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Pink slips…
Wonder why they are called Pink slips. I was told that in former times in the US when an employee received his pay slip on a pink colour paper with all dues cleared it meant that his services were no longer required by the organisation. One hears so much about them these days… but why pink... A lovely colour associated with lil girls, their toys & joys. Being a father of 2 daughters, I eat pink, sleep pink, and slip on pink occasionally, but fortunately so far for me I’m yet to receive the pink slip. My house is full of Barbie in Pink, Cinderella in Pink, and my daughter’s bedspread & pillows are also in Pink So much so that if I were to receive a pink slip from my boss I guess I would believe it to be a gift for my daughters from the company I worked for all these years. In the good old letter writing days, one used to begin a letter by writing ‘I hope you are in the pink of health’…I just hope & pray people refrain from using this age old jargon while addressing each other these days.
As a person who has spent all my professional life in the heavy industry I always believed that we are grossly underpaid compared to our IT, ITES, and Financial peers. By the way, I sell Pumps for a living. I sell different kinds of centrifugal pumps, but amongst them all, I take great pride in introducing myself as a person who also sells Sewage pumps for a living. One can imagine the ‘eeks’ and the ‘yuks’ I have received at social gatherings graced by Code crackers / creators, Networkers, and Number crunchers. It was a turn off almost at every party / get together. But I used to console myself saying that I have the possibility to earn my bread & butter atleast until the last day of civilised mankind’s existence. How true this has turned out to be….Recent times have made me realise that at times Shit matters…and being in the business of moving them matters even more.
As a person who has spent all my professional life in the heavy industry I always believed that we are grossly underpaid compared to our IT, ITES, and Financial peers. By the way, I sell Pumps for a living. I sell different kinds of centrifugal pumps, but amongst them all, I take great pride in introducing myself as a person who also sells Sewage pumps for a living. One can imagine the ‘eeks’ and the ‘yuks’ I have received at social gatherings graced by Code crackers / creators, Networkers, and Number crunchers. It was a turn off almost at every party / get together. But I used to console myself saying that I have the possibility to earn my bread & butter atleast until the last day of civilised mankind’s existence. How true this has turned out to be….Recent times have made me realise that at times Shit matters…and being in the business of moving them matters even more.
Visit Maldives in Dubai…
Well!! Well!! I’m not insane…Was just proposing a possible relocation option to the newly elected President of Maldives, Mohammed Nasheed who recently went public that he is on the look out for a new home for his people. Relocating a country!!! A big business opportunity for the movers possibly, but however weird it may sound, it also has an aura of graveness about it.
Climate change & Global warming have played major roles in causing the sea levels to rise around these islands and possibly sink them in due course.
Middle Eastern countries like the UAE, Qatar & Bahrain are going full throttle on creating more beach based real estate by venturing into mega Island / reclamation projects, One calls it the Palm, the other the Pearl and another the Petals while one even builds an entire group of islands in the shape of the World… Seeing all this, a wild thought went through me. Dubai is finding it tough to come to terms with the world wide recession and is going slow on one of the Palm Islands. Why not lease out one of them or atleast the ‘Maldives’ in the World Islands they are building to the Maldivian government and ask the whole of Maldives to relocate to Dubai.
On a more serious note it is a rather deeply depressing idea that Maldives could be the first nation on Earth to lose their homeland due to Global warming and rising sea levels.
Climate change & Global warming have played major roles in causing the sea levels to rise around these islands and possibly sink them in due course.
Middle Eastern countries like the UAE, Qatar & Bahrain are going full throttle on creating more beach based real estate by venturing into mega Island / reclamation projects, One calls it the Palm, the other the Pearl and another the Petals while one even builds an entire group of islands in the shape of the World… Seeing all this, a wild thought went through me. Dubai is finding it tough to come to terms with the world wide recession and is going slow on one of the Palm Islands. Why not lease out one of them or atleast the ‘Maldives’ in the World Islands they are building to the Maldivian government and ask the whole of Maldives to relocate to Dubai.
On a more serious note it is a rather deeply depressing idea that Maldives could be the first nation on Earth to lose their homeland due to Global warming and rising sea levels.
A tribute to one of the greatest villains in Kollywood.
The erstwhile villain M. N Nambiar is no more. As a child I grew up watching him on Sunday evening movies on Doordarshan perpetually playing the villain in movies alongside MGR. I remember vividly his well modulated dialogue delivery and the characteristic palm rubbing; eye rolling & tilted head were his trade mark histrionics that used to give me nightmares in those days.
He was a perfect example of a person who never took work home, one of the best villains in reel life and a saint in the real one.
He was a perfect example of a person who never took work home, one of the best villains in reel life and a saint in the real one.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Creativity shown the door at fancy dress competitions.
Last week we were confronted with the challenge of dressing up our daughter for a fancy dress competition in her school. The topic was Birds or Animals. The missus as usual went through all available pedias at home and came up with this brilliant concept of dressing her up as a Barn Owl. My first reaction was… A Barn Owl!!! What in the world is that????? Well when my wife explained we could use existing resources at home with some value addition I immediately seconded the barn owl. I learnt that a barn owl was white in colour (Could reuse her last years Christmas play white coloured angel costumes) and used to hunt mice from the barns and hence called a barn owl.
I can tell you we spent more than a couple of hours on constructing the wings and a mask. On completing it I complemented my wife’s efforts, though my daughter looked like a genetically modified cross between a Polar bear, Owl and a Human.
On the big day at school, I was in for a shock, almost all the children were wearing off –the-shelf costumes of a tiger, lion, dog or a donkey. The efforts that my wife and I put in were overshadowed by these made to order costumes.
The classes that had occupations as their topic were dominated by Doctors, Nurses, Teachers, Engineers, Pilots etc… I reminisced that we in those days used to also dress up as Bus Conductors, Rickshaw wallas, Fishermen / Fisherwomen or even a road side beggar. I’m not sure if the concept of dignity of labour has caught up with the young minds or the parents are just not willing to see their children in lesser light, even in a Fancy dress competition.
I clearly noticed that Fancy dress competitions had lost its creativity and was falling prey to financial might even during these times of recession. If one had the money one could be a Tiger one day or a donkey the other.
My daughter might not have won but I was really happy for the efforts we took to make a difference.
I can tell you we spent more than a couple of hours on constructing the wings and a mask. On completing it I complemented my wife’s efforts, though my daughter looked like a genetically modified cross between a Polar bear, Owl and a Human.
On the big day at school, I was in for a shock, almost all the children were wearing off –the-shelf costumes of a tiger, lion, dog or a donkey. The efforts that my wife and I put in were overshadowed by these made to order costumes.
The classes that had occupations as their topic were dominated by Doctors, Nurses, Teachers, Engineers, Pilots etc… I reminisced that we in those days used to also dress up as Bus Conductors, Rickshaw wallas, Fishermen / Fisherwomen or even a road side beggar. I’m not sure if the concept of dignity of labour has caught up with the young minds or the parents are just not willing to see their children in lesser light, even in a Fancy dress competition.
I clearly noticed that Fancy dress competitions had lost its creativity and was falling prey to financial might even during these times of recession. If one had the money one could be a Tiger one day or a donkey the other.
My daughter might not have won but I was really happy for the efforts we took to make a difference.
With luv from Marrakech...
I was in Marrakech last week. In my opinion Morrocco is a country that represents a melting pot of cultures from 3 different continents, Africa due to its geographical location, Europe due to its French colonial past and proximity to Spain, and Asia ( Middle Eastern) due to its historical past. Morrocco is also refered to in Arabic as Al Maghrib Al Aqsa which means the farthest West.
The trip was purely official, and hence got to see very little of the infamous wilder side of Morrocco. Though, after long sessions on strategies, synergies and synopsis we managed to have sips of some good Morroccon Red wine. One of the many bottles emptied is featured above.
Friday, November 14, 2008
Gambhir caught Shah bowled Patel.
Hang on… it’s not a Ranji score card nor is it a Delhi Vs Gujarat match.
It was India Vs England. An English team that had 3 PIO’s (People of Indian Origin) Owais Shah, Samit Patel & Ravi Bopara playing for them at Rajkot, was akin to the English team of yesteryears during the pre independence times, when names like Ranjitsinghji, Duleepsinghji, Ifthikar Ali Khan Pataudi figured in the English playing eleven.
India might today be the financial power house of cricket but a scorecard in an India / England match that reads Gambhir caught Shah bowled Patel is definitely a testimony to the Indian contribution to this great game of the colonial era. By annihilating England, India has sent a message that the cricketing world is currently witnessing a power shift not only in the financial prowess but also in talent.
Finally I see no harm in India playing bully these days when I see the likes of Mathew Hayden once back home in Australia call India a third world country. It is to this same third world country to which he will head again in a couple of months to receive an oversized wallet from Chennai Super Kings. If Hayden wants to remind us of our third world status I guess we ought to remind him of Australia’s 18th and 19th century penal colony past too.
It was India Vs England. An English team that had 3 PIO’s (People of Indian Origin) Owais Shah, Samit Patel & Ravi Bopara playing for them at Rajkot, was akin to the English team of yesteryears during the pre independence times, when names like Ranjitsinghji, Duleepsinghji, Ifthikar Ali Khan Pataudi figured in the English playing eleven.
India might today be the financial power house of cricket but a scorecard in an India / England match that reads Gambhir caught Shah bowled Patel is definitely a testimony to the Indian contribution to this great game of the colonial era. By annihilating England, India has sent a message that the cricketing world is currently witnessing a power shift not only in the financial prowess but also in talent.
Finally I see no harm in India playing bully these days when I see the likes of Mathew Hayden once back home in Australia call India a third world country. It is to this same third world country to which he will head again in a couple of months to receive an oversized wallet from Chennai Super Kings. If Hayden wants to remind us of our third world status I guess we ought to remind him of Australia’s 18th and 19th century penal colony past too.
Monday, November 10, 2008
A rare Arab perspective on Indians...
I recently came across this article in a newspaper in Qatar called the Qatar Tribune.
Since this is still not available online I had to post the scanned copy of the article as an image.
A wonderful eulogy on Indians from an Arab scholar. Read it and enjoy the moment with pride.
Saturday, November 1, 2008
Of Open houses and online report cards…
I recently attended my 6 year old daughter’s open house in school. As a student I used to dread the open houses, even though it was a practice that I had to go through only during the last 2 years of my schooling. I have always been of the opinion that the trinity of Parent, Pupil and Teacher should never find themselves within the confines of the 4 four walls of a class room neither by choice nor chance. It invariably spells doom for the pupil.
Well this time it was a reversal of roles and I was ‘virtually’ shocked when the class teacher gave me a user name and a password and asked me to check out my daughter’s report card online.
An online report card…I thought to myself… The walk home the day I received my report card was a long one, thinking of ways to explain to my dad why I had lost those couple of marks in Maths, Science or Geography… The fear of presenting my report card to my dad and getting his all elusive signature on the dotted line was more than a stimulant to help me perform better in those days. Those were the days when we performed / excelled in our studies out of sheer fear and not out of promises or incentives that are doled out to the kids these days, A Barbie if you get a A+ in KG 1 or a play station if you do well in class 3 were never around in those days… Believe me the fear tactic worked better than the incentives.
I just realised the world has changed in more than one way I know, when I see my 6 old year watching Cartoon Network on TV and biting into a bar of Mars and makes a ‘by the way’ remark asking me to check out her report card on the web.
I just hope and pray that the time when my daughter sends me a user name and password to login to find out where she is, doesn’t confront me in the years to come.
Well this time it was a reversal of roles and I was ‘virtually’ shocked when the class teacher gave me a user name and a password and asked me to check out my daughter’s report card online.
An online report card…I thought to myself… The walk home the day I received my report card was a long one, thinking of ways to explain to my dad why I had lost those couple of marks in Maths, Science or Geography… The fear of presenting my report card to my dad and getting his all elusive signature on the dotted line was more than a stimulant to help me perform better in those days. Those were the days when we performed / excelled in our studies out of sheer fear and not out of promises or incentives that are doled out to the kids these days, A Barbie if you get a A+ in KG 1 or a play station if you do well in class 3 were never around in those days… Believe me the fear tactic worked better than the incentives.
I just realised the world has changed in more than one way I know, when I see my 6 old year watching Cartoon Network on TV and biting into a bar of Mars and makes a ‘by the way’ remark asking me to check out her report card on the web.
I just hope and pray that the time when my daughter sends me a user name and password to login to find out where she is, doesn’t confront me in the years to come.
Friday, October 24, 2008
Its Deepavalli down South and Diwali up North….
Having grown up with a lot of Hindu friends, this festival is as close to my heart as Christmas.
The pre-adolescent days saw me shooting away the ‘capes’ in a gun a la Sean Connery, during Deepavali or bravely lighting a ‘Busvanom’(Flower Pot). Then came the teens, when I started toying with explosives from the real world ‘oossi vedi’ a firecracker in the 20 dB range... And since the teens extend a full 6 years, these were the years when I graduated from an Explosive to an Aerospace Expert… The Explosives increased in their dB’s and their cylindrical diameters, moving from ‘Kuruvi vedis’ to ‘Lakshmi vedis’ and finally ended in the 'A'– Bomb. The Buddha would have smiled but definitely not my mom who often woke up startled from her afternoon nap. Then came the mother of all experiments with firecrackers. These are days when we are sending rockets to the moon but we in those days tried something different like firing a ‘Rocket’ horizontally and getting the projectile all wrong and ended up in the drawing room of the newly moved in neighbour uncle who had a lovely looking daughter.
What’s Deepavalli without the mention of the 1000 walla, 5000 walla or the 10000 or more walla depending on one’s economic standing in the society? This was the Crème de la Crème of all fireworks. Thousands of high powered ‘oossi vedis’ in series were these wallas or more colloquially called the ‘saram’. The longer they lasted the richer you were.
It was a time when the economic might of a neighbourhood was measured by the decibels generated or the quantum of fireworks left over’s post Deepavalli.
Happy Deepavalli to all my friends who have Iyer, Iyengar, Krishnaswamy, Rao or Bhaskaran as their surnames and a Happy Diwali to all my friends who have a Sharma, Gupta or a Kulkarni as theirs surnames.
The pre-adolescent days saw me shooting away the ‘capes’ in a gun a la Sean Connery, during Deepavali or bravely lighting a ‘Busvanom’(Flower Pot). Then came the teens, when I started toying with explosives from the real world ‘oossi vedi’ a firecracker in the 20 dB range... And since the teens extend a full 6 years, these were the years when I graduated from an Explosive to an Aerospace Expert… The Explosives increased in their dB’s and their cylindrical diameters, moving from ‘Kuruvi vedis’ to ‘Lakshmi vedis’ and finally ended in the 'A'– Bomb. The Buddha would have smiled but definitely not my mom who often woke up startled from her afternoon nap. Then came the mother of all experiments with firecrackers. These are days when we are sending rockets to the moon but we in those days tried something different like firing a ‘Rocket’ horizontally and getting the projectile all wrong and ended up in the drawing room of the newly moved in neighbour uncle who had a lovely looking daughter.
What’s Deepavalli without the mention of the 1000 walla, 5000 walla or the 10000 or more walla depending on one’s economic standing in the society? This was the Crème de la Crème of all fireworks. Thousands of high powered ‘oossi vedis’ in series were these wallas or more colloquially called the ‘saram’. The longer they lasted the richer you were.
It was a time when the economic might of a neighbourhood was measured by the decibels generated or the quantum of fireworks left over’s post Deepavalli.
Happy Deepavalli to all my friends who have Iyer, Iyengar, Krishnaswamy, Rao or Bhaskaran as their surnames and a Happy Diwali to all my friends who have a Sharma, Gupta or a Kulkarni as theirs surnames.
The Aura of Aurum….
Recession….. Where? What?
These pictures tell the story……of the Great Indian Gold rush when gold prices fell by almost 5US$ on a gram on Thursday…23rd October 2008.
These pictures tell the story……of the Great Indian Gold rush when gold prices fell by almost 5US$ on a gram on Thursday…23rd October 2008.
4 Slips, A Gully, Silly point & a Forward shortleg….Oh what a field to bowl to!!!
This week saw the resurrection of Test cricket. The 5 day version which is on the verge of being taken over by their wham bam rivals and be pushed into obscurity, had something to cheer about this week.
I was fortunate to watch a few minutes of good cricket on the morn of the 5th Day of the second test….thanks to the time zone I’m in. I was running late for office…but I hung on and told myself that these are moments that are best watched live and ones that do not come often for an Indian cricket fan. Zaheer Khan had bowled 2 wonderful deliveries and one of them to a fellow fast bowler, Bret Lee, and the furniture was rearanged first ball.
What fascinated me the most and inspired this blog was what followed…
In walks Mitchell Johnson the Number 9 Ausy batsman…and the field was set for Zaheer who was on a hat trick. The field placement took me to the early 80’s when as a 10 year old I watched Clive Lyod setting a similar field for Dilip Doshi, the then India No 10 bat with the likes of Garner, Marshall or a Holding running into bowl.
The field was 4 Slips, a gully, a forward shortleg, a short fine leg, short mid on and a short mid off. A field placement that spells absolute dominance…well if you were rooting for the bowling team, it gave u a sadistic pleasure watching the batsmen taking guard to such a field. But unfortunately India never found itself in this situation often and on the day I was watching, India set this field, and mind u it wasn’t against Bangladesh.
Its ages since I have seen India in a position to set such a field to an opposition. The heart swelled with pride and was about to take off when my mind brought me back to ground zero and let me know that the only thing consistent about Indian Cricket was their inconsistency!!!
I was fortunate to watch a few minutes of good cricket on the morn of the 5th Day of the second test….thanks to the time zone I’m in. I was running late for office…but I hung on and told myself that these are moments that are best watched live and ones that do not come often for an Indian cricket fan. Zaheer Khan had bowled 2 wonderful deliveries and one of them to a fellow fast bowler, Bret Lee, and the furniture was rearanged first ball.
What fascinated me the most and inspired this blog was what followed…
In walks Mitchell Johnson the Number 9 Ausy batsman…and the field was set for Zaheer who was on a hat trick. The field placement took me to the early 80’s when as a 10 year old I watched Clive Lyod setting a similar field for Dilip Doshi, the then India No 10 bat with the likes of Garner, Marshall or a Holding running into bowl.
The field was 4 Slips, a gully, a forward shortleg, a short fine leg, short mid on and a short mid off. A field placement that spells absolute dominance…well if you were rooting for the bowling team, it gave u a sadistic pleasure watching the batsmen taking guard to such a field. But unfortunately India never found itself in this situation often and on the day I was watching, India set this field, and mind u it wasn’t against Bangladesh.
Its ages since I have seen India in a position to set such a field to an opposition. The heart swelled with pride and was about to take off when my mind brought me back to ground zero and let me know that the only thing consistent about Indian Cricket was their inconsistency!!!
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Celestial conflicts caused credit crisis
The title might sound like a Karan Johar film (Replace all possible C’s with K’s) or a Balaji Telefilms soap… but what follows is about, the now good old global meltdown we are in. One Raj Kumar Sharma, a Mumbai based Astro Finance Specialist was kinda tracking the shit we are in today and never bothered to warn us, atleast me ahead of time. Wasn’t Astrology all about foretelling…. …and by the way I never knew a profession called Astro Finance existed???
He goes about explaining that the whole crisis could be zeroed in on unfavourable planetary alignements of Saturn and Leo and their Indian mythological contemporaries M/s Rahu, Ketu & Co.
Saturn happens to be the son of Leo the Sun, who is the father…makes sense???.
He further goes on to tell us that the father and son don’t get along in the same house and would you believe it, they happened to be in the same house, since around July and this bloke didn’t bother to inform any one of us.… but for the world of me I just fail to understand how the poor brothers (the Lehman) got involved and closed shop lock, stock and barrel in this celestial, but father-son conflict.
One Christopher Kevill a financial astrological columnist (an extension of the profession I never knew existed) quotes ‘When Saturn is 150 Degrees away from another planet and in this case Rahu, the North Lunar node’ (whatever or wherever that is) ‘tends to reflect a state of uncertainty, of fear. Its more complicated than that but its just one layer of the explanation’
But the interesting fact here is that Mr. Sharma our Astro Finance Specialist is bullish while Mr. Christopher Kevill is bearish, but we the people will only be seeing stars on any stock market index for some time to come. So folks check out if an Astro Finance Specialist is sitting on the board of your Portfolio Managing Company.
No wonder in those days The Hindu used to print the Night sky during a month a couple of pages before the Business pages….
He goes about explaining that the whole crisis could be zeroed in on unfavourable planetary alignements of Saturn and Leo and their Indian mythological contemporaries M/s Rahu, Ketu & Co.
Saturn happens to be the son of Leo the Sun, who is the father…makes sense???.
He further goes on to tell us that the father and son don’t get along in the same house and would you believe it, they happened to be in the same house, since around July and this bloke didn’t bother to inform any one of us.… but for the world of me I just fail to understand how the poor brothers (the Lehman) got involved and closed shop lock, stock and barrel in this celestial, but father-son conflict.
One Christopher Kevill a financial astrological columnist (an extension of the profession I never knew existed) quotes ‘When Saturn is 150 Degrees away from another planet and in this case Rahu, the North Lunar node’ (whatever or wherever that is) ‘tends to reflect a state of uncertainty, of fear. Its more complicated than that but its just one layer of the explanation’
But the interesting fact here is that Mr. Sharma our Astro Finance Specialist is bullish while Mr. Christopher Kevill is bearish, but we the people will only be seeing stars on any stock market index for some time to come. So folks check out if an Astro Finance Specialist is sitting on the board of your Portfolio Managing Company.
No wonder in those days The Hindu used to print the Night sky during a month a couple of pages before the Business pages….
Sachin Tendulkar…. A tribute to a legend.
I’m sure most of you must have seen, heard and read enough on Sachin’s milestone today. Just wanted to write a few words as a tribute to a legend.
I just want to recall a small article in The Hindu around 23 years back about a 12 year old playing the Nutrine under-14 tournament at the Chepauk Stadium in Chennai, the article mentioned that a 12 year old had cleared the MAC Stadium’s main boundary line and was definitely a cricket prodigy in the making. Since I was a 13 year old then and the only page I read in The Hindu those days was the sports page, I remember this vividly.
Just happy that 23 Years later I had the privilege of watching him live on TV, become the highest run getter in the world. Congrats Sachin…
I just want to recall a small article in The Hindu around 23 years back about a 12 year old playing the Nutrine under-14 tournament at the Chepauk Stadium in Chennai, the article mentioned that a 12 year old had cleared the MAC Stadium’s main boundary line and was definitely a cricket prodigy in the making. Since I was a 13 year old then and the only page I read in The Hindu those days was the sports page, I remember this vividly.
Just happy that 23 Years later I had the privilege of watching him live on TV, become the highest run getter in the world. Congrats Sachin…
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Cash 'N' Carry...
US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson on Monday named Neel Kashkari, a 35-year old Indian-American whiz whose parents migrated from Jammu and Kashmir, who is currently the Assistant Secretary for International Affairs in the Department of Treasury, as the interim head for its new Office of Financial Stability, including the Troubled Asset Relief Program, to oversee the $700 billion bailout program
A wiseacre on Market Ticker forum wrote
"Seriously? The guy overseeing the $700 billion is named 'CashCarry'? You really can't make this stuff up..."
A wiseacre on Market Ticker forum wrote
"Seriously? The guy overseeing the $700 billion is named 'CashCarry'? You really can't make this stuff up..."
Call it a day at 36…is in
This has been a rather demoralising week for me…Firstly for the me who is an ardent cricket fan and secondly for the me who is on the wrong side of the 30’s. The axe over the Fab 5 in Indian cricket is looming large ever more than before, of which 4 of them are contemporaries and 3 of them made their debuts the year my professional life was launched too, 1 hit a century (Saurav) on debut and the other a 95 (Dravid) and both went on to do very well. The axe finally fell on the one who hit a 100 on debut, Dada… We are a nation that celebrates the 25th anniversary of winning the cricket world cup with much pomp and splendour, when countries like Australia have made winning a habit that they don’t even remember the dates they won a ‘x’ or ‘y’ tournament. However when it comes to treating legendary players we tend to forget the past glory one has brought the country and go by one series where a new kid on the block bowled a funny ball with a couple of fingers and mesmerised the fab 4.
In a sport where the likes of CK Nayudu played at 62 his last Ranji Trophy, its hard to believe that 35 is already a time when people are expecting you to hang your boots / bat. Saurav was one of the best captains India has ever had, one will never forget the grit the determination and the arrogance. The first arrogant captain India has ever had, the first non middle class cricketer in modern India after the likes of Ranjitsingjis, Duleepsinghjis and Pataudis…Dada took on everyone, from the board to the rival captains and even the grounds men. One person who will breath easy will be Nasser Husain the former Chennai born English skipper who was made to eat his words after he remarked that the Indians have to come out of their skin to win a game, dada’s team did just that and the memories of dada waving his shirt and mouthing unprintables is something that will treasured in the heart and minds of the Indian cricket fan for generations to come.
In a sport where the likes of CK Nayudu played at 62 his last Ranji Trophy, its hard to believe that 35 is already a time when people are expecting you to hang your boots / bat. Saurav was one of the best captains India has ever had, one will never forget the grit the determination and the arrogance. The first arrogant captain India has ever had, the first non middle class cricketer in modern India after the likes of Ranjitsingjis, Duleepsinghjis and Pataudis…Dada took on everyone, from the board to the rival captains and even the grounds men. One person who will breath easy will be Nasser Husain the former Chennai born English skipper who was made to eat his words after he remarked that the Indians have to come out of their skin to win a game, dada’s team did just that and the memories of dada waving his shirt and mouthing unprintables is something that will treasured in the heart and minds of the Indian cricket fan for generations to come.
Friday, October 3, 2008
Elimination Communication
Came across this term recently in an article under parenting tips… Being a father of a 6 Month old toddler daughter I have started to read these sections after a gap of 6 long years after my first daughter was born. My first thought was, what’s a management article doing in the parenting section of a newspaper. I then told myself that it must be one of those articles on Effective Communication or Corporate communication or the likes and I even interpreted it as a softer way of communicating an inevitable retrenchment during these times of recession.
Surprise!!! Surprise!!! As I read along I realised Elimination Communication or EC was nothing but the strange noises and faces you and your forefathers or in this case foremothers made just to empty your bowels and bladders when you were a toddler. The ‘ssssssssh’ and the ‘pisssssss’ are actually what today is called Elimination Communication …ELIMINATION COMMUNICATION actually sounds better than ssssssh. Well Im not getting into the nuances of EC, briefly they use Parental instincts, facial and bowel contortions to figure out when your toddler needs to let it go sans a diaper …
These are days when even an act as normal as a cuddle or a hug is termed ‘Parental Bonding’ so why shouldn’t potty training or toilet training assume such euphemistic terminologies.
This article came at a time when the inflation was directly proportional to the number of diapers used, and I wouldn’t mind to spend a couple of hundreds of dollars to do a crash course on Elimination Communication to eliminate the dreaded diapers out of my weekly ( or is it hourly) shopping list. God save P & G once I have mastered the art of EC.
So folks you would find an additional qualification listed on my CV and my Linkdin pages soon… Post Graduate Diploma in Elimination Communication…Guess Stephen Covey would soon include this as the 8th habit of highly effective people.
Surprise!!! Surprise!!! As I read along I realised Elimination Communication or EC was nothing but the strange noises and faces you and your forefathers or in this case foremothers made just to empty your bowels and bladders when you were a toddler. The ‘ssssssssh’ and the ‘pisssssss’ are actually what today is called Elimination Communication …ELIMINATION COMMUNICATION actually sounds better than ssssssh. Well Im not getting into the nuances of EC, briefly they use Parental instincts, facial and bowel contortions to figure out when your toddler needs to let it go sans a diaper …
These are days when even an act as normal as a cuddle or a hug is termed ‘Parental Bonding’ so why shouldn’t potty training or toilet training assume such euphemistic terminologies.
This article came at a time when the inflation was directly proportional to the number of diapers used, and I wouldn’t mind to spend a couple of hundreds of dollars to do a crash course on Elimination Communication to eliminate the dreaded diapers out of my weekly ( or is it hourly) shopping list. God save P & G once I have mastered the art of EC.
So folks you would find an additional qualification listed on my CV and my Linkdin pages soon… Post Graduate Diploma in Elimination Communication…Guess Stephen Covey would soon include this as the 8th habit of highly effective people.
Monday, September 29, 2008
Cricketing whites a mobile billboard…
Being a passionate cricket fan of the good old version and not the IPL wham bam types, I sat down to watch the Irani Trophy match between Rest of India and Delhi live on TV (not before inviting the wrath and cold looks from the missus) over the weekend.
Watching our cricketers in the so called ‘whites’ during even a domestic tournament like Irani Trophy stumped me. A close look at one of them, showed the who’s who of the corporate world strategically embossed, painted, stitched all over the body, except you know where. There were days when the likes of Gavaskars, Amarnaths and Kapil Devs would walk in for a tournament as trivial as the Buchi Babu Trophy in pristine whites and mind you, when they were representing only their employers and not even the country.
Cricket is probably the only sport that has inspired some high quality poetry & prose over the years and to think that people like Sir Neville Cardus wrote on Cricket and Classical Music is itself a testimony to the grace and charm associated with the game, the players, the attire and the rules of the game.
Moving on from Cricket to Boxing. We are masters at deifying sportsperson in India, the ‘Ring to the Ramp’ was the mantra last week for our bronze medallist boxer, Vijender Singh who was seen walking the ramp and strutting his stuff to the tunes of Singh is King and later went on to address the media and talk about everything but boxing. Im sure this is the last we have heard of this guy. It’s not his fault, it has been our undoing. When such a heady mix of celebrity status is thrust on a young mind and shoulders it’s more difficult to stay balanced than a rain of left hooks, counter punches and jabs…
Watching our cricketers in the so called ‘whites’ during even a domestic tournament like Irani Trophy stumped me. A close look at one of them, showed the who’s who of the corporate world strategically embossed, painted, stitched all over the body, except you know where. There were days when the likes of Gavaskars, Amarnaths and Kapil Devs would walk in for a tournament as trivial as the Buchi Babu Trophy in pristine whites and mind you, when they were representing only their employers and not even the country.
Cricket is probably the only sport that has inspired some high quality poetry & prose over the years and to think that people like Sir Neville Cardus wrote on Cricket and Classical Music is itself a testimony to the grace and charm associated with the game, the players, the attire and the rules of the game.
Moving on from Cricket to Boxing. We are masters at deifying sportsperson in India, the ‘Ring to the Ramp’ was the mantra last week for our bronze medallist boxer, Vijender Singh who was seen walking the ramp and strutting his stuff to the tunes of Singh is King and later went on to address the media and talk about everything but boxing. Im sure this is the last we have heard of this guy. It’s not his fault, it has been our undoing. When such a heady mix of celebrity status is thrust on a young mind and shoulders it’s more difficult to stay balanced than a rain of left hooks, counter punches and jabs…
Friday, September 26, 2008
A sibling walk makes headlines....
Events as trivial as a noon walk by siblings, in this case a brother and sister makes headlines.
It was a day, when Indian journalism showed signs of the paparazzi culture of the west. The siblings were of course from the first family of Indian politics, but does that warrant an intrusion into the privacy and cover a luxury (in our case a routine) of a walk down Lodhi Road.
Captions like ‘Gandhis out for a walk’ and ‘A Family that walks together stays together’ were immediately flashed across different Medias. The interpretations / speculations from the visuals shot from more than a 100M away gave enough fodder for the newsmongers for a couple of days. Rahul looked disturbed was one version and the other said Priyanka was seen advising Rahul on important issues. For all you know they must have just discussed a book or a movie in open air.
But stuffs like ‘Now playing… Rahul and Priyanka out for a Walk’ was quiet disturbing…The spontaneity with which the media covered the walk was as though it was an arranged press conference. The very fact that a decision between 2 siblings to go for a walk reached the eyes and ears of the media calls for a serious breach of security.
It was a day, when Indian journalism showed signs of the paparazzi culture of the west. The siblings were of course from the first family of Indian politics, but does that warrant an intrusion into the privacy and cover a luxury (in our case a routine) of a walk down Lodhi Road.
Captions like ‘Gandhis out for a walk’ and ‘A Family that walks together stays together’ were immediately flashed across different Medias. The interpretations / speculations from the visuals shot from more than a 100M away gave enough fodder for the newsmongers for a couple of days. Rahul looked disturbed was one version and the other said Priyanka was seen advising Rahul on important issues. For all you know they must have just discussed a book or a movie in open air.
But stuffs like ‘Now playing… Rahul and Priyanka out for a Walk’ was quiet disturbing…The spontaneity with which the media covered the walk was as though it was an arranged press conference. The very fact that a decision between 2 siblings to go for a walk reached the eyes and ears of the media calls for a serious breach of security.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Lehman to Layman
It was blood bath on the world financial markets, the bear ran amuck on some of the big names in the financial world, Merril Lynch, Lehman Brothers, AIG ...(and I just hope its not so on and so worth)…these were reputed names that spelt trust, integrity and long-term stability, and above all these were the very institutions until not so long ago were doling out dream jobs to the B School grads, offering them pay-packets in which the young grads counted the zeroes as I counted stars. The week that went by has seen one of them going bust, one on the verge of going bust and one went on sale, call it what ever u want euphemistically Mergers, Acquisitions, Consolidation, Correction…it all just boils down to in ‘layman’s’ terms…. a major screw up.
The debates on print and visual media were centred on collapse of these big names, some blame it on personal greed of a handful, some on mismanagement, and some simply accuse the American way of handling their economy as the reason for the biggest financial crisis in recent times.
Im neither a financially savvy economist nor do I have stakes in those big names but for a layman like me Lehman going bust is absolutely incomprehensible. Im sure some of my financially astute readers might help me understand this.
Only a couple of weeks ago an insurance / investment agent was trying to sell me a product and in the process went on to assure me that the product was backed by one of the biggest names in Insurance and I was nodding approvingly, when I heard AIG, little did I know then that exactly a fortnight later even 89 Billion USD would not be enough to bail them out …
I guess its time to dust those good old State Cooperative Bank passbooks and renew our post office savings accounts. For those familiar with the TNSC Bank (Tamil Nadu State Cooperative)... jog your memory down to their advert / logo …It used to show a tiny sparrow feeding its lil ones, symbol of some modest aspirations and integrity, we have come a long way since then… the tiny sparrows have been upstaged by the Vultures and Eagles of greed…
The debates on print and visual media were centred on collapse of these big names, some blame it on personal greed of a handful, some on mismanagement, and some simply accuse the American way of handling their economy as the reason for the biggest financial crisis in recent times.
Im neither a financially savvy economist nor do I have stakes in those big names but for a layman like me Lehman going bust is absolutely incomprehensible. Im sure some of my financially astute readers might help me understand this.
Only a couple of weeks ago an insurance / investment agent was trying to sell me a product and in the process went on to assure me that the product was backed by one of the biggest names in Insurance and I was nodding approvingly, when I heard AIG, little did I know then that exactly a fortnight later even 89 Billion USD would not be enough to bail them out …
I guess its time to dust those good old State Cooperative Bank passbooks and renew our post office savings accounts. For those familiar with the TNSC Bank (Tamil Nadu State Cooperative)... jog your memory down to their advert / logo …It used to show a tiny sparrow feeding its lil ones, symbol of some modest aspirations and integrity, we have come a long way since then… the tiny sparrows have been upstaged by the Vultures and Eagles of greed…
A Russo-Chettinad cuisine...
What else would you name the collaboration that went into the making of an Aachi-Kozhi-Stroganoff …this is one of the dishes I had at a small joint overlooking the Elliot’s Beach in Besant Nagar during my last visit to Chennai.
One can trace the origins of Stroganoff to the Stroganov family of Russia supposedly the pioneers of this dish, a Russian dish of sautéed pieces of beef served with sour cream…now comes the most interesting twist…a chettinadan maternal twist… prefix Stroganoff with Aachi, (the Chettinadan mother) and hit the desi psyche hard with the motherly/home cooked food funda …and add generous helpings of spice to turn the sour cream in sautéed beef, in our case chicken strips, to a spicy one …and u have a Aachi Kozhi(Chicken)Stroganoff. A truly multinational dish atleast as far as the name goes…and ironically this sounds similar to the other famous Russian import the AK 47 just that, in this case it is AK (Aachi Kozhi) Stroganoff…I’m not pulling a fast one on u guys … u can check out a pic of the menu shot with my phone a la paparazzi style. Apologies for the poor clarity…
One can trace the origins of Stroganoff to the Stroganov family of Russia supposedly the pioneers of this dish, a Russian dish of sautéed pieces of beef served with sour cream…now comes the most interesting twist…a chettinadan maternal twist… prefix Stroganoff with Aachi, (the Chettinadan mother) and hit the desi psyche hard with the motherly/home cooked food funda …and add generous helpings of spice to turn the sour cream in sautéed beef, in our case chicken strips, to a spicy one …and u have a Aachi Kozhi(Chicken)Stroganoff. A truly multinational dish atleast as far as the name goes…and ironically this sounds similar to the other famous Russian import the AK 47 just that, in this case it is AK (Aachi Kozhi) Stroganoff…I’m not pulling a fast one on u guys … u can check out a pic of the menu shot with my phone a la paparazzi style. Apologies for the poor clarity…
Saturday, September 13, 2008
Onam 2008
This weekend was the Onam weekend. In fact I got the hang of Onam only after I came to the Middle East (cos there are more malayalees here than back home in Kerala). We were invited to 2 Onam dinners and the missus cooked one of her own on Friday afternoon.
The Onam sadhya (the feast for the rich and the poor alike) basically is a vegan’s delight, all the lans, the yals, the sherries will make an annual appearance on this day. No clue yet…. the native Malayalam speaker must have figured it out by now…the kallans, ollans , aviyals, poriyals, and the errisherries and pullisherries make their annual appearance.
Well I’ll try & get u the nearest English translation for the non-Malayalee readers of mine.
The Onam sadhya (the feast for the rich and the poor alike) basically is a vegan’s delight, all the lans, the yals, the sherries will make an annual appearance on this day. No clue yet…. the native Malayalam speaker must have figured it out by now…the kallans, ollans , aviyals, poriyals, and the errisherries and pullisherries make their annual appearance.
Well I’ll try & get u the nearest English translation for the non-Malayalee readers of mine.
Errisherrie = Well done mashed yellow pumpkin in thick coconut sauce with a dab of mustard seeds.
Pullisherrie = diluted sour yoghurt discoloured with a lil turmeric and large pieces of white pumpkin / cucumber.
Ollan: - white pumpkin and black eyed bean in white coconut sauce.
Kallan: - Yellow pumpkin curry with a consistency lil more than the ollan
Aviyal: - a general cocktail of all left over veggies which u kind of hated when u were young, but the ones which ur friendly neighbourhood doc advises u to have after 35 …again with some grated coconut.
Poriyal: no cocktail of veggies this time just cabbage or beans with some grated coconut served dry.
Payasam : Vermicilli Milk pudding.
Oh Oh … this grated coconut and the malayalees…
All this with some accompaniments of the likes of the Injee pulli (Sourrrrr ginger), Upperry (banana fries, the Kerala equivalent of French fries) and some Sharkaraverrattti …(Sweetened & hardened banana pieces) ..that I believe was the king of tongue twisters… try saying it once again and I bet ur tongue would be twisted for life.
All this served with some nice Palaghatan Matta (Locally Genetically modified rice which is sold at a premium in the Middle East) on a banana leaf which you end up buying from a Nepali vendor (what an irony, a Malayalee having to negotiate for banana leaves with a Nepali) for a fortune. I guess this is what the HR babes & blokes in this part of the world call experience of working in a multi cultural environment.
However the essence & the joy of Onam lies in cooking up all this at home, by the lady of the house ably supported by man who ends up chopping / sautéing / tasting in-between the 'smallings' (a gud ol keralite slang for the act of drinking a measure which is a lil more than a peg). The men donning a mundu, (though the hemlines of the mundu keep rising depending on the number of 'smalls' one has had) and colourful silk shirts/jubbas (south Indian equivalent of a kurta) and the women in a ‘set’… a half white sari & blouse with zari work on the pallu.
The rich and the poor, the IT and the non IT folks... celebrate Onam with the same fervour.
Pullisherrie = diluted sour yoghurt discoloured with a lil turmeric and large pieces of white pumpkin / cucumber.
Ollan: - white pumpkin and black eyed bean in white coconut sauce.
Kallan: - Yellow pumpkin curry with a consistency lil more than the ollan
Aviyal: - a general cocktail of all left over veggies which u kind of hated when u were young, but the ones which ur friendly neighbourhood doc advises u to have after 35 …again with some grated coconut.
Poriyal: no cocktail of veggies this time just cabbage or beans with some grated coconut served dry.
Payasam : Vermicilli Milk pudding.
Oh Oh … this grated coconut and the malayalees…
All this with some accompaniments of the likes of the Injee pulli (Sourrrrr ginger), Upperry (banana fries, the Kerala equivalent of French fries) and some Sharkaraverrattti …(Sweetened & hardened banana pieces) ..that I believe was the king of tongue twisters… try saying it once again and I bet ur tongue would be twisted for life.
All this served with some nice Palaghatan Matta (Locally Genetically modified rice which is sold at a premium in the Middle East) on a banana leaf which you end up buying from a Nepali vendor (what an irony, a Malayalee having to negotiate for banana leaves with a Nepali) for a fortune. I guess this is what the HR babes & blokes in this part of the world call experience of working in a multi cultural environment.
However the essence & the joy of Onam lies in cooking up all this at home, by the lady of the house ably supported by man who ends up chopping / sautéing / tasting in-between the 'smallings' (a gud ol keralite slang for the act of drinking a measure which is a lil more than a peg). The men donning a mundu, (though the hemlines of the mundu keep rising depending on the number of 'smalls' one has had) and colourful silk shirts/jubbas (south Indian equivalent of a kurta) and the women in a ‘set’… a half white sari & blouse with zari work on the pallu.
The rich and the poor, the IT and the non IT folks... celebrate Onam with the same fervour.
I have managed to upload a couple of pics of Onam in Doha. The Onam sadhya spread, one of the family and finally one of a friend who managed to pose for a photograph (all rights reserved) to represent a global image of a perfect Malayalee on an Onam eve with a ‘small’ in hand.
(Need to inform people at Microsoft to include Onam in the spell check list of MS Word cos it always returns Oman for Onam).
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Man playing God yet again….but will this be the last time…
At least after the first day of the so called earth shattering experiment you are still around to read this blog, guess it wasn’t literally earth shattering after all. Revisiting the big bang and the search for the 'God particle' is on…As I write this, protons are zipping around happily inside a collider tunnel oblivious to the fact that mankind is actually dreading at the prospect of one of them misbehaving.
Well for lesser mortals like me it’s just another experiment. The only coincidence was that a tremor of 6.2 hit Bandar Abbas, Iran. I’m sure a statement would soon be released by the President of Iran, that the quake was a result of the experiment and sabotage by the western powers.
Cloning was the other experiment where man played God, luckily that so far has been limited to Dolly the sheep. Just hope cloned Pamela Andersons don’t appear overnight… it will be one ‘TWO’ many.
Personally I’m a strong proponent of DON’T MESS WITH NATURE…that’s the reason why I don’t even dye/color my strands of grey even after repeated threats from the missus.
Well for lesser mortals like me it’s just another experiment. The only coincidence was that a tremor of 6.2 hit Bandar Abbas, Iran. I’m sure a statement would soon be released by the President of Iran, that the quake was a result of the experiment and sabotage by the western powers.
Cloning was the other experiment where man played God, luckily that so far has been limited to Dolly the sheep. Just hope cloned Pamela Andersons don’t appear overnight… it will be one ‘TWO’ many.
Personally I’m a strong proponent of DON’T MESS WITH NATURE…that’s the reason why I don’t even dye/color my strands of grey even after repeated threats from the missus.
Saturday, September 6, 2008
36 – 28 – 32
These are no vital statistics of a super model... no way …these were the vital statistics of the Middle East, a lovely lady alluring u to the land of yellow and black gold, a land of dreams, promising a great future ahead…For all my confused readers these are just the key figures one ends up following during ones life in the Middle East. Wondering what they are???? Here you go.
On the 6th of September 1996 …
36 Rupees made a $
28 $ cld buy you a barrel of Oil
32 Dirhams was the price of a gram of gold.
A dozen years back on the 6th of September 1996 the fateful day on which I set foot on the sands of Arabia thinking that the greener pastures lay here… how dumb of me, greener pastures in a desert !!! I was probably looking for an oasis. It was exactly the same time the pastures in India began to look fertile… I kinda missed it by about six months…
Like ooll other malayalees I simbbly & blindddly folloooowed the Gulf dream.A dream that empowered you to shift from a 4 Figure salary to a 5 Figure salary overnight...by sheer virtue of the exchange rates and nothing more...
For a person whose only idea of a skyscraper was the 14 Storey LIC building on Mount Road in Madras, here I was, all awed at the 32 storey World Trade Centre building in Dubai. Today its dwarfed amongst its newer and much taller cousins like the Emirates Towers, Dusit and the likes and the relatively new and still growing Burj Dubai already at 688 M.
Just as the buildings grew taller and the cityscapes saw a sea of change propelled by the petro dollar, so has the vital statistics of the alluring lady of the Middle East been disfigured ...and it reads something like this today …. 45 – 106 –99… (Use the same correlation as above). How ugly and unattractive the Middle East has become 12 years on…
On the 6th of September 1996 …
36 Rupees made a $
28 $ cld buy you a barrel of Oil
32 Dirhams was the price of a gram of gold.
A dozen years back on the 6th of September 1996 the fateful day on which I set foot on the sands of Arabia thinking that the greener pastures lay here… how dumb of me, greener pastures in a desert !!! I was probably looking for an oasis. It was exactly the same time the pastures in India began to look fertile… I kinda missed it by about six months…
Like ooll other malayalees I simbbly & blindddly folloooowed the Gulf dream.A dream that empowered you to shift from a 4 Figure salary to a 5 Figure salary overnight...by sheer virtue of the exchange rates and nothing more...
For a person whose only idea of a skyscraper was the 14 Storey LIC building on Mount Road in Madras, here I was, all awed at the 32 storey World Trade Centre building in Dubai. Today its dwarfed amongst its newer and much taller cousins like the Emirates Towers, Dusit and the likes and the relatively new and still growing Burj Dubai already at 688 M.
Just as the buildings grew taller and the cityscapes saw a sea of change propelled by the petro dollar, so has the vital statistics of the alluring lady of the Middle East been disfigured ...and it reads something like this today …. 45 – 106 –99… (Use the same correlation as above). How ugly and unattractive the Middle East has become 12 years on…
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
A tribute to someone who walked with me all these years…
This week saw the passing away of an icon whose family name is a household name in India. Mr.Thomas Bata, the Czech shoe mogul died on the 1st of September at the age of 93 … (never knew Bata was of Czech origin until today) and this blog is a tribute to him. Bata… those four letters was a brand, a generic and above all the only footwear the people of my generation and above knew and wore. The bright red neon with that curvy font that has never changed over the years is a sign board that does not slip your eye which ever city you are in.
It was a ritual, days before schools reopened to visit a Bata store back home, and buy a pair of normal black shoes which would have lasted longer had not your feet grown further and u didn’t try to emulate a Maradona playing football, with a ball ¼th the size of a football. In spite of all this, it would still last a couple of monsoons before it would go under the neighbourhood cobbler’s knife and needle to keep them running and kicking for a few more months. Their price tags always ended in a...99 or a dot 95 paisa from which evolved the infamous ‘Bata rate’ for anything that had price tag that ended with 99 or a 95 Paisa.
Bubblegummers, North Star, Power, Marie Claire were some of their labels, Marie Claire was the one that drew the women to a Bata shop which until then for them was a shoe shop (not a footwear retailing outlet as it is called today) that sold boring black boys shoes. North Star was the Reebok or the Nike of those days and Power was for the middle class morning walker. These were before the entry of the big names in footwear retailing and also before the arrival of Nikes, Reeboks and the likes… From an ordinary black shoe to a Nike + Ipod Sports kit…owe it to the pioneering efforts of this family which started taking care of your feet since 1894…
It was a ritual, days before schools reopened to visit a Bata store back home, and buy a pair of normal black shoes which would have lasted longer had not your feet grown further and u didn’t try to emulate a Maradona playing football, with a ball ¼th the size of a football. In spite of all this, it would still last a couple of monsoons before it would go under the neighbourhood cobbler’s knife and needle to keep them running and kicking for a few more months. Their price tags always ended in a...99 or a dot 95 paisa from which evolved the infamous ‘Bata rate’ for anything that had price tag that ended with 99 or a 95 Paisa.
Bubblegummers, North Star, Power, Marie Claire were some of their labels, Marie Claire was the one that drew the women to a Bata shop which until then for them was a shoe shop (not a footwear retailing outlet as it is called today) that sold boring black boys shoes. North Star was the Reebok or the Nike of those days and Power was for the middle class morning walker. These were before the entry of the big names in footwear retailing and also before the arrival of Nikes, Reeboks and the likes… From an ordinary black shoe to a Nike + Ipod Sports kit…owe it to the pioneering efforts of this family which started taking care of your feet since 1894…
Monday, September 1, 2008
Class of ’88 Rendez Vous…
Its almost a week since this event took place, I am miles away since then, but the day remains fresh and keeps coming to my mind as Wordsworth describes the Daffodils ''….In vacant or in pensive mood they flash upon the inward eye…''.The memories of that day continue to flash upon the inward eye.
A group of 26 of us class mates / bench mates for 10 Years at Christ Church Anglo Indian School met up after 2 decades…for the first reunion of the Class of 88 ….it’s a special feeling to meet up with friends with whom you began your scholastic pursuit, Friends with whom you literally learnt the A, B, C’s of life’s initial years. The friends who were with you during those most fragile but moulding years in a life span, Childhood and Adolescence.
So, we were all assembled at the picturesque Sea Crest at the MGM resort on ECR by 11.30 AM, with almost every one having You-have-changed-a-lot conversations. Some grey, some looked like they had worked long hours to hide their silver strands, Some receding hairline, some with no hairlines, The girls were all gracefully ageing women with different surnames from what we knew, the childhood giggles and loud laughs were replaced with very dignified smiles and not so noisy chuckles… wasn’t those close-up ad types though.
Each one had to talk about his / her crush in school though nothing worth mentioning came out of this much awaited session and after which we went on to share what we did since we last met, our family, kids etc etc…
We had a round of Dumb Charades in which we cracked some of the not so dumb movie names which we would have dreaded to even utter when we were in school, like Basic Instinct and Avaluday Ravugal…Faheem kinda did his best at being dumb but all of us were dumber that we cldnt crack it, or was it the other way round, we were less dumb than him and hence cldnt crack it.
Finally we helped ourselves to the memorabilia of the day, a nice mug with all our names printed on it, and on returning to Doha I reverently unpacked it and placed it in the front room.
A special mention should go in here to the people who made it possible, Chocks, Venket, Faheem, Pamela, Glady and thanks to all those who made it to the event.
Friday, August 29, 2008
The Chennai I kno(e)w
Hi folks, back frm a 3 week vacation to Chennai, couldn’t keep the blog going due to various reasons namely connectivity, lack of time etc etc and I realised I was yet to become a blogaholic at least one holic I am yet to become….rather than boring u with You-know-what-I-did-this-summer types I thought I’ll put down some snippets on my trip. Some sights and sounds and my experiences this summer. I was caught quoting , ‘when I was younger’ and ‘in those days’ more often than required...signs of ageing I suppose or is it that, the changes are happening faster back home??? The gen next looked beyond reach and repair…
Nikes, MP3’s and Kancheepuram Sarees!!!
If I asked u to pick the odd one out, u wld hit Kancheepuram sarees immediately, well unfortunately I realised that it was not. Gud ol mamis of Besant Nagar where burning their calories to keep their Chol and Diab levels in check by walking up and down the beach, but were doing it in real style…with the right tools one should say. Proper branded walking shoes, MP3’s tucked away in their ‘madisars’ listening probably to Suprabatham or Thyagaraja Keerthanais, I guess Im wrong here, it might have even been Sweet Child of Mine by Guns ‘n Roses...The sweet child who probably sent her all this from the US…
The L’s and C’s of Real Estate in Chennai.
The real estate affordability in Chennai and me seem to be separated by just an alphabet when people were talking about L, my affordability was in the K’s, when I was finally ready for the L things have moved into the C’s, wish it was the roman numeral C unfortunately it is the C as in CRORES… so u see, by the time I try and make that elusive C before I retire, it wud have moved to CC that’s an hundred crores...God save me. However I wish to put down an interesting anecdote I heard from a real estate agent during one of my land hunts… I saw a huge area of land between Velachery and Medavakkam (2 places in Chennai for those not familiar with Chennai). There were lotta developments around this, but none on this. I was curious, the real estate agent revealed a trivia apparently familiar to the locals of the area. The land belonged to the Ettayappan family, Ettayappan was Veerapandi Kattaboman’s confidante who betrayed him and revealed his whereabouts to the Brits and incidentally this was part of the land gifted by the Brits to Ettayappan as betrayal fee to him. Hence this piece of land was branded a Traitors Land but I was told that there were a lot of JV’s signed to develop this land with the Ettayappan family. The real estate value in Chennai definitely overshadowed the curse of a traitors land! Readers to verify independently the authenticity of this info.
You better insure your homes or else…
As soon as I entered the ICICI bank in Chennai I was confronted with a notice almost every where I turned. It mentioned a Technical study conducted by Anna University and Geological Survey of India on the condition of the soil in and around the area I lived and confirmed the earth quake proneness of the area etc etc… scary stuff .. Right next to it was a table showing rate per lakh per month to insure your homes. Some marketing this…
Night life in Chennai…
A couple of friends and me decided to check out the night life in Chennai during this visit, and wanted to desperately check out Zaras a pub in the erstwhile Alwarpet area of Chennai. We were bounced from there since we were not wearing the right attire... can u imagine a dress code in Chennai for simply having a beer???
Dressed for the occasion & venue we once again ventured into Zaras on a Sat night and we were bounced again, Reason: no reservations and moreover we were single men looking for a drink. Just before this while I was waiting for my friend I realised I might be a lil outta place for this pub, cos the majority of people entering were all women/girls hardly past their teens with a ciggi in one hand and the other wrapped around the designer briefs poping out of the low waist jeans of their funny looking partners who had equally funny looking hairdos and tufts of hair on the face which I presumed were beards. Here I was, a father of 2 daughters contemplating an hour back to return to Chennai for good to inculcate gud ol Chennai values in my daughters was giving my thought a second chance.
Soon after my friend arrived we hit another pub in town, Bikes and Barrels, since we were stags we were guided to another level from were we could see the couples and single women thro a NET, yeah man a net…a level below us. The place was not definitely worth our presence (or atleast that’s how we consoled ourselves). Since kids half our age were happily drinking beer at Rs270 a bottle with utter disdain….while my friend a Senior level executive in an MNC and me a NRI were finding it a lil too expensive to hang around for a second drink…. some consumerism this…My friend & I finally ended up at a club in which my friend was a member and we realised that this is why one should have a membership in clubs after 35
The Hindu’s finally got competition…
On the drive from the airport I found a series of signboards advertising THE HINDU, a newspaper I grew up reading and the one paper which was simply a generic in this city when it came to newspapers, the Indian Express was a distant second, The adverts were obvious signs of the usually laid back The Hindu being elbowed by the new kids on the bloc The Times of India Chennai edition, Deccan Herald and the revamped and new look New Indian Express. I was told The Hindu even fell prey to the price war and had reduced their prices…I did check out the others but my heart rules over my mind and still beats for The Hindu...though clearly the gen next prefer the new comers…
Nikes, MP3’s and Kancheepuram Sarees!!!
If I asked u to pick the odd one out, u wld hit Kancheepuram sarees immediately, well unfortunately I realised that it was not. Gud ol mamis of Besant Nagar where burning their calories to keep their Chol and Diab levels in check by walking up and down the beach, but were doing it in real style…with the right tools one should say. Proper branded walking shoes, MP3’s tucked away in their ‘madisars’ listening probably to Suprabatham or Thyagaraja Keerthanais, I guess Im wrong here, it might have even been Sweet Child of Mine by Guns ‘n Roses...The sweet child who probably sent her all this from the US…
The L’s and C’s of Real Estate in Chennai.
The real estate affordability in Chennai and me seem to be separated by just an alphabet when people were talking about L, my affordability was in the K’s, when I was finally ready for the L things have moved into the C’s, wish it was the roman numeral C unfortunately it is the C as in CRORES… so u see, by the time I try and make that elusive C before I retire, it wud have moved to CC that’s an hundred crores...God save me. However I wish to put down an interesting anecdote I heard from a real estate agent during one of my land hunts… I saw a huge area of land between Velachery and Medavakkam (2 places in Chennai for those not familiar with Chennai). There were lotta developments around this, but none on this. I was curious, the real estate agent revealed a trivia apparently familiar to the locals of the area. The land belonged to the Ettayappan family, Ettayappan was Veerapandi Kattaboman’s confidante who betrayed him and revealed his whereabouts to the Brits and incidentally this was part of the land gifted by the Brits to Ettayappan as betrayal fee to him. Hence this piece of land was branded a Traitors Land but I was told that there were a lot of JV’s signed to develop this land with the Ettayappan family. The real estate value in Chennai definitely overshadowed the curse of a traitors land! Readers to verify independently the authenticity of this info.
You better insure your homes or else…
As soon as I entered the ICICI bank in Chennai I was confronted with a notice almost every where I turned. It mentioned a Technical study conducted by Anna University and Geological Survey of India on the condition of the soil in and around the area I lived and confirmed the earth quake proneness of the area etc etc… scary stuff .. Right next to it was a table showing rate per lakh per month to insure your homes. Some marketing this…
Night life in Chennai…
A couple of friends and me decided to check out the night life in Chennai during this visit, and wanted to desperately check out Zaras a pub in the erstwhile Alwarpet area of Chennai. We were bounced from there since we were not wearing the right attire... can u imagine a dress code in Chennai for simply having a beer???
Dressed for the occasion & venue we once again ventured into Zaras on a Sat night and we were bounced again, Reason: no reservations and moreover we were single men looking for a drink. Just before this while I was waiting for my friend I realised I might be a lil outta place for this pub, cos the majority of people entering were all women/girls hardly past their teens with a ciggi in one hand and the other wrapped around the designer briefs poping out of the low waist jeans of their funny looking partners who had equally funny looking hairdos and tufts of hair on the face which I presumed were beards. Here I was, a father of 2 daughters contemplating an hour back to return to Chennai for good to inculcate gud ol Chennai values in my daughters was giving my thought a second chance.
Soon after my friend arrived we hit another pub in town, Bikes and Barrels, since we were stags we were guided to another level from were we could see the couples and single women thro a NET, yeah man a net…a level below us. The place was not definitely worth our presence (or atleast that’s how we consoled ourselves). Since kids half our age were happily drinking beer at Rs270 a bottle with utter disdain….while my friend a Senior level executive in an MNC and me a NRI were finding it a lil too expensive to hang around for a second drink…. some consumerism this…My friend & I finally ended up at a club in which my friend was a member and we realised that this is why one should have a membership in clubs after 35
The Hindu’s finally got competition…
On the drive from the airport I found a series of signboards advertising THE HINDU, a newspaper I grew up reading and the one paper which was simply a generic in this city when it came to newspapers, the Indian Express was a distant second, The adverts were obvious signs of the usually laid back The Hindu being elbowed by the new kids on the bloc The Times of India Chennai edition, Deccan Herald and the revamped and new look New Indian Express. I was told The Hindu even fell prey to the price war and had reduced their prices…I did check out the others but my heart rules over my mind and still beats for The Hindu...though clearly the gen next prefer the new comers…
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
From the land of Dish Dash to Desh
So Im off on my vacation and can you believe it, Im actually blogging sitting at the airport...ah ah tech savvy me huh... Ive always scorned and given cold looks at people working on their laptops in airports. Always wondered if pple are that busy that things cant wait.. and I thought to myself well Ive probably not reached that stage in my professional life .. but here Iam putting on a serious face and keying away happily. I bet the passers by are thinking exactly wht I used to...
Its after a very long time Im travelling alone to desh... Im travelling light... and right in front of me at the check-in counter, I see the all familiar sight, a husband & wife having a I-told-u-so conversation, since obviously the baggage had exceeded the magical figure of 40 + 40 + 10 Hand + 5 Leg allowances.. and here I was with a proud been-there... done-that look... Its a such a pleasure to travel light believe me.
If u rip open the baggages of any of the South India (read KERALA) bound flights u will definetly hit upon the following..Tang, Nido, Maggi Coconut Milk powder this one was always baffling to me, coconut milk powder to kerala, kinda Thirupathhikkey Laddu funda and invariably 9 outta 10 men wld pick up a Napolean brandy and a Wincarnis from the DUDY FREE....Actually I missed out the gud ol Kerala lungies ...the colorful ones which cld serve the purpose of flourescent reflector at night... absolute optical illusions these were.
Thats abt it for now... time to take off... lemme grab a cuppa cappaccino ...forget it I cant even spell it.. Ill have a tumbler of filter kapi...thats sounds better, Im headed to Chennai mate not Las Vegas...
Its after a very long time Im travelling alone to desh... Im travelling light... and right in front of me at the check-in counter, I see the all familiar sight, a husband & wife having a I-told-u-so conversation, since obviously the baggage had exceeded the magical figure of 40 + 40 + 10 Hand + 5 Leg allowances.. and here I was with a proud been-there... done-that look... Its a such a pleasure to travel light believe me.
If u rip open the baggages of any of the South India (read KERALA) bound flights u will definetly hit upon the following..Tang, Nido, Maggi Coconut Milk powder this one was always baffling to me, coconut milk powder to kerala, kinda Thirupathhikkey Laddu funda and invariably 9 outta 10 men wld pick up a Napolean brandy and a Wincarnis from the DUDY FREE....Actually I missed out the gud ol Kerala lungies ...the colorful ones which cld serve the purpose of flourescent reflector at night... absolute optical illusions these were.
Thats abt it for now... time to take off... lemme grab a cuppa cappaccino ...forget it I cant even spell it.. Ill have a tumbler of filter kapi...thats sounds better, Im headed to Chennai mate not Las Vegas...
Friday, July 25, 2008
Behind every forgetful man there is a nagging wife....
Its the last weekend before I travel to Chennai for my vacation... The last 40 odd days without the family around was terrible (to be read by everyone except my wife as rocking). Well, in fact she had prepared A To Do List before she left.
Things to Do
1 Nestle Water every Sunday
I kinda religiously followed this one. It was only Nestle water on Sunday’s, All other days it was J & B with soda, Fosters, Old Monk etc
2 Leah’s Open House - 27th or 28th June
A good opportunity to meet my daughter’s teacher without the wife around, to my bad luck this was cancelled.
3 Turn off the Gas
Wld have loved to. It wld hit the Qatari economy real bad.
4 Clear fridge of all the unused food items
Well actually cleared it of used and unused food Items. The fridge has been a revelation the past days; I just realized its too small, If one of the racks holds 330 ml Fosters the other doesn’t hold the 500ml Carlsberg’s. We need a bigger fridge.
5 Wash all dishes
Didn’t have to… ate out of the frying pan
6 Drain the water and wash the drip tray
See Note 5
7 Close all taps properly
Again carbon credits…or is it Hydrogen and Oxygen credits
8 Lock the bedrooms
Hum Tum ek Kamrey mey bund ho or chabi ko jaye.. Have actually lost the keys.
9 Water all the plants and keep them inside the room
More carbon credits please
10 Switch off all the electric mains (microwave, washing machine, computer etc…)
Even more carbon credits
11 Collect clothes from the drycleaners (if any)
Actually have rented out my clothes for some cash
12 Pay the telephone, electricity & water bills
You think I still can afford it????
13 Ensure the garbage is thrown and the garbage box in the kitchen is washed
Will know when the neighbors complain in a couple of days.
14 Pack your bag
Where’s the bag???
This could serve as a Rapidex guide for things to do before one travels on vacation.
Things to Do
1 Nestle Water every Sunday
I kinda religiously followed this one. It was only Nestle water on Sunday’s, All other days it was J & B with soda, Fosters, Old Monk etc
2 Leah’s Open House - 27th or 28th June
A good opportunity to meet my daughter’s teacher without the wife around, to my bad luck this was cancelled.
3 Turn off the Gas
Wld have loved to. It wld hit the Qatari economy real bad.
4 Clear fridge of all the unused food items
Well actually cleared it of used and unused food Items. The fridge has been a revelation the past days; I just realized its too small, If one of the racks holds 330 ml Fosters the other doesn’t hold the 500ml Carlsberg’s. We need a bigger fridge.
5 Wash all dishes
Didn’t have to… ate out of the frying pan
6 Drain the water and wash the drip tray
See Note 5
7 Close all taps properly
Again carbon credits…or is it Hydrogen and Oxygen credits
8 Lock the bedrooms
Hum Tum ek Kamrey mey bund ho or chabi ko jaye.. Have actually lost the keys.
9 Water all the plants and keep them inside the room
More carbon credits please
10 Switch off all the electric mains (microwave, washing machine, computer etc…)
Even more carbon credits
11 Collect clothes from the drycleaners (if any)
Actually have rented out my clothes for some cash
12 Pay the telephone, electricity & water bills
You think I still can afford it????
13 Ensure the garbage is thrown and the garbage box in the kitchen is washed
Will know when the neighbors complain in a couple of days.
14 Pack your bag
Where’s the bag???
This could serve as a Rapidex guide for things to do before one travels on vacation.
Poverty makes it to Page 3
It looks like the Indian media is on an overdrive these days. The new avatar of the Gandhi scion on the floor of the house, mustered up all his Doon School honed debating skills to try and whip up a passionate ‘neta like’ speech under the guise of a R K Laxman’s common man. As we all know there can be no better head turning anecdote in a ‘neta’ speech than the one on the poorest of poor? He did exactly that.
He spoke of one Kalavati whom he met, a person living under abject poverty in a non-descript village in Maharashtra and linked her to the benefits of Nuclear Energy. He could have shown some respect for the privacy of this person by atleast using a fictitious name.
Barely had he mentioned this, our media friends were knocking at the doors (if there was one) of this poor lady’s house with OB vans et al and one prominent media even went to the extent of reporting that she had’nt eaten for 2 days. Where are we headed for… I wish the lady had shown some business sense and sold the rights to her story and pictures for a good sum and probably been out of poverty atleast for a few days. Never have I witnessed such blatant trespassing of privacy. Privacy is not a privilege for the poor I suppose.
Kalavati will be forgotten in a couple of days and will continue to remain in poverty, but how does it matter, the media had its moments and so did the ‘neta’.
But the irony was that poverty had attained a momentary celebrity status and catapulted to Page 3.
He spoke of one Kalavati whom he met, a person living under abject poverty in a non-descript village in Maharashtra and linked her to the benefits of Nuclear Energy. He could have shown some respect for the privacy of this person by atleast using a fictitious name.
Barely had he mentioned this, our media friends were knocking at the doors (if there was one) of this poor lady’s house with OB vans et al and one prominent media even went to the extent of reporting that she had’nt eaten for 2 days. Where are we headed for… I wish the lady had shown some business sense and sold the rights to her story and pictures for a good sum and probably been out of poverty atleast for a few days. Never have I witnessed such blatant trespassing of privacy. Privacy is not a privilege for the poor I suppose.
Kalavati will be forgotten in a couple of days and will continue to remain in poverty, but how does it matter, the media had its moments and so did the ‘neta’.
But the irony was that poverty had attained a momentary celebrity status and catapulted to Page 3.
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
The Great Indian Democracy...Post 22/7
Im back as promised with the post 22/7 commentary ...The great Indian democracy's week of diarhoea finally ended in a nauseating climax that left a trail of stench as bad as the one emanating from a Sewage Treatment Plant working with a dysfunctional deodorising unit.
I will not write on the happenings of the day inside one of the biggest icons of democracy in the world, the Indian Parliament, cos it will be simply be more dirt.
But at the end of the day, a man of conviction prevailed, thereby saving the Nuclear deal. A deal that cld bring self sufficiency in clean energy to India, energy that would light up the remotest of villages.
A friend of mine recently gave me a feed back that I shld refrain from writing contemporary stuff since these are short lived domestic issues. Well, if this blog and me,were to live for a couple of decades more, I would reminisce on the importance of this day then.
On a lighter note it was a day when the 'Singhs' sang their way to victory and the new bollywood number 'singh is king..., singh is king...' prevailed over 'money money money ...how I look so funny....'
I will not write on the happenings of the day inside one of the biggest icons of democracy in the world, the Indian Parliament, cos it will be simply be more dirt.
But at the end of the day, a man of conviction prevailed, thereby saving the Nuclear deal. A deal that cld bring self sufficiency in clean energy to India, energy that would light up the remotest of villages.
A friend of mine recently gave me a feed back that I shld refrain from writing contemporary stuff since these are short lived domestic issues. Well, if this blog and me,were to live for a couple of decades more, I would reminisce on the importance of this day then.
On a lighter note it was a day when the 'Singhs' sang their way to victory and the new bollywood number 'singh is king..., singh is king...' prevailed over 'money money money ...how I look so funny....'
American Economy
Investment guru Marc Faber concluded his monthly bulletin (June 2008) with the following:
" 'The federal government is sending each of us a $600 rebate. If we spend that money at Wal-Mart, the money goes to China . If we spend it on gasoline it goes to the Arabs. If we buy a computer it will go to India . If we purchase fruit and vegetables it will go to Mexico , Honduras and Guatemala . If we purchase a good car it will go to Germany . If we purchase useless crap it will go to Taiwan and none of it will help the American economy. The only way to keep that money here at home is to spend it on prostitutes and beer, since these are the only products still produced in US. I've been doing my part."
" 'The federal government is sending each of us a $600 rebate. If we spend that money at Wal-Mart, the money goes to China . If we spend it on gasoline it goes to the Arabs. If we buy a computer it will go to India . If we purchase fruit and vegetables it will go to Mexico , Honduras and Guatemala . If we purchase a good car it will go to Germany . If we purchase useless crap it will go to Taiwan and none of it will help the American economy. The only way to keep that money here at home is to spend it on prostitutes and beer, since these are the only products still produced in US. I've been doing my part."
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Mangatha & 3 Cards – The two ultimate card games…
All right, taking a cue out of the comment made by my friend Susheyl, I thought its time to graduate to Adult games we used to play… Yeah Adult Games…. I can kinda see all the wicked eyes, ears and whatever pop up… no pun intended.
Im jus talking about a game of cards called the Teen Patti in Hindi, Three Cards in English, Mucheetu in Malayalam, Munnu Seetu in Tamil… Well one should know that variations of this game is Poker, yeah maaan Poker, played in the high profile gambling dens of Las Vegas… Incidentally this game was also India’s contribution to the world.
I would say we started young at it…The stakes used to begin with 50 Paisa and on days whn we were rich and famous we started on rupee deals. Boy the kinda high this game used to give us wouldn’t match the best Scotch in town. The contract was that the winner would share his booty buying us all Panneer Sodas (Pepsi's and Coke on the days of higher stakes) or dums (Ciggys) for the smokers… a win win situation for all.
Talking about ‘panneer soda’ carbonated Rose Water in English, I’m wondering y this is yet to be canned and marketed as Paneer Cola or Paneer Pepsi…Yeh Dil Mange More….Its still sold in the same bottles I drank from 2 decades back…some recycling this…
Coming back to the game 3 cards, it was a game which needed an equal measure of luck, mathematical and statistical skills, since a lot of probability, frequency and the likes were involved… Some acting skills were also required to feign a make-believe-face that u hold the ultimate three cards with u. The convenience of playing this game was that it actually didn’t need any infrastructure, all u needed were a pack of cards …No Wait a minute… we did’nt even need that... we used to create our cards and play during a Strength of Materials or a Fluid Mechanics class… God save the guys who are buying pumps from me...(btw, that’s what I do for a living).
On the other hand, the game of Mangatha depended entirely on your stars on the given day. You needed a pack of cards, 2 contestants (read gamblers) and plenty of spectators around u to chant 'ullaey', 'veliyae' in unison… You also needed to declare the table money upfront and the winner takes em all. Player 2 needed to pick a card which he does after invoking all the gods…
Player -1 starts throwing open cards one by one into 2 sets, the ‘Ullae set’ (Inside set) and the ‘Veliyae set’ (Outside set). If the card bearing the number picked by player 2 falls in the ‘Ullae Set’ player 1 wins, if it falls in the ‘veliyae set’ Player 2 wins.
So you see, if 3 Cards was Test Cricket this was the 20-20.
Wish I could do it all over again ‘Orru Kai Mangatha podu machee’ translated ‘hey dude lets play another round of poker’
Guys looking to brush up their basics on 3 Cards here u go
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teen_Patti
Im jus talking about a game of cards called the Teen Patti in Hindi, Three Cards in English, Mucheetu in Malayalam, Munnu Seetu in Tamil… Well one should know that variations of this game is Poker, yeah maaan Poker, played in the high profile gambling dens of Las Vegas… Incidentally this game was also India’s contribution to the world.
I would say we started young at it…The stakes used to begin with 50 Paisa and on days whn we were rich and famous we started on rupee deals. Boy the kinda high this game used to give us wouldn’t match the best Scotch in town. The contract was that the winner would share his booty buying us all Panneer Sodas (Pepsi's and Coke on the days of higher stakes) or dums (Ciggys) for the smokers… a win win situation for all.
Talking about ‘panneer soda’ carbonated Rose Water in English, I’m wondering y this is yet to be canned and marketed as Paneer Cola or Paneer Pepsi…Yeh Dil Mange More….Its still sold in the same bottles I drank from 2 decades back…some recycling this…
Coming back to the game 3 cards, it was a game which needed an equal measure of luck, mathematical and statistical skills, since a lot of probability, frequency and the likes were involved… Some acting skills were also required to feign a make-believe-face that u hold the ultimate three cards with u. The convenience of playing this game was that it actually didn’t need any infrastructure, all u needed were a pack of cards …No Wait a minute… we did’nt even need that... we used to create our cards and play during a Strength of Materials or a Fluid Mechanics class… God save the guys who are buying pumps from me...(btw, that’s what I do for a living).
On the other hand, the game of Mangatha depended entirely on your stars on the given day. You needed a pack of cards, 2 contestants (read gamblers) and plenty of spectators around u to chant 'ullaey', 'veliyae' in unison… You also needed to declare the table money upfront and the winner takes em all. Player 2 needed to pick a card which he does after invoking all the gods…
Player -1 starts throwing open cards one by one into 2 sets, the ‘Ullae set’ (Inside set) and the ‘Veliyae set’ (Outside set). If the card bearing the number picked by player 2 falls in the ‘Ullae Set’ player 1 wins, if it falls in the ‘veliyae set’ Player 2 wins.
So you see, if 3 Cards was Test Cricket this was the 20-20.
Wish I could do it all over again ‘Orru Kai Mangatha podu machee’ translated ‘hey dude lets play another round of poker’
Guys looking to brush up their basics on 3 Cards here u go
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teen_Patti
Friday, July 18, 2008
Games we used to play...(Contd)
As I told u Im back with this particular blog by popular demand …actually singular demand since I got a comment from my gud ol friend Nelson, who incidentally is the only one who reads my blogs and hence by singular demand here I go.
Thanks to Nelson, I was reminded of this most important terminology in the game of Marbles (Golli) ….’Jaan’. Though it means ‘my love’ in Hindi, what is relevant here is the 'Jaan' in Tamil when translated in English is a Span, a unit of measure between the tip of ur thumb and the tip of ur lil finger whn ur palm is stretched until the pain is unbearable, the bigger ur palm the bigger ur span and u cld almost touch the two marbles and be declared a winner…
And the next one Mudhu Punkcher Translated as (Ones back pierced or punctured) or the anglicized ‘Seven Stones’ was a pretty violent game and sometimes as painful as its second cousin Accupuncture…
There’s nothing much to explain here, as soon as some one knocks those pile of seven perfectly flat stone … u better run for cover ….or else u r dead..
Thanks to Nelson, I was reminded of this most important terminology in the game of Marbles (Golli) ….’Jaan’. Though it means ‘my love’ in Hindi, what is relevant here is the 'Jaan' in Tamil when translated in English is a Span, a unit of measure between the tip of ur thumb and the tip of ur lil finger whn ur palm is stretched until the pain is unbearable, the bigger ur palm the bigger ur span and u cld almost touch the two marbles and be declared a winner…
And the next one Mudhu Punkcher Translated as (Ones back pierced or punctured) or the anglicized ‘Seven Stones’ was a pretty violent game and sometimes as painful as its second cousin Accupuncture…
There’s nothing much to explain here, as soon as some one knocks those pile of seven perfectly flat stone … u better run for cover ….or else u r dead..
Games we used to play….
I find my daughter of six often online at Barbie dot com (well wrote it like that cos If I use the ‘.’ Dot followed by the com u will get the HTML link and hit upon Barbie dot com and never end up reading this blog) would try to dress up a Barbie or feed a Barbie or … or arrange a date for Barbie with that bloke Ken…
the nearest I got to a date was my date of birth.
The games we played when I was a kid were very seasonal and we used to religiously adhere to it.
There was a kite season, there was a kalanggol season (the most interesting game I have ever played, will go on to explain it), followed by the marbles or alleys or (Golli in tamil) season, The Top Season (bambaram in Tamil) the cricket season, the hand cricket season and during winters the book cricket version for indoors. Imagine a IPL kinda extravaganza for book cricket....
Lemme go on to give a ‘How to Play it’ briefs on all of the above.
The Kite season
One needed to be a professional at this and I was not one, but was an ardent follower of this game and knew all the jargons.‘Deal’ was to enter into a direct aerial conflict with your opponent who was a couple of buildings away, the victory or defeat depended on how strong the coating on your thread was, the ‘Manja’ that would do it… each one had a secret recipe for the manja the ingredients I was told ranged from Glue to finely ground glass or bulbs to add strength... kinda glass reinforced coating... but believe me, that was some serious cutting edge technology.
The Kallanggole Season.
This follows the kite season after the finances have dried up for the funding of Kites,thread and manja, venture capitalist were not around those days…..
The funda was to use the remaining ‘manjad’ thread and test its strength with a stone tied to its end and try and cut your opponents thread…
The Marbles or the Alleys Season
This game has its roots from the colonial days. Here's a list of some common marble terms to get you started:
• Mib/Kimmie: One of thirteen 5/8" marbles placed in the center of the circle.
• Shooter/Taw: The marble that the player flicks toward the target mibs. The shooter must be more than 1/2" in diameter, but not over 3/4" in diameter.
• Knuckling down: A player must have at least one knuckle touching the ground while flicking.
• Flicking/Fulking: While knuckling down the shooter is flicked by the thumb out of the players hand.
• Alley: A marble made of marble. Alley is short for alabaster.
• Bombsies: Dropping your shooter on the target marble.
• Keepsies: Playing for keeps. You get to keep all the marbles you win.
• Lagging: A way of choosing who shoots first. Players roll their marbles toward a line in the dirt (the lag line). Whoever gets closest without going over gets to shoot first.
• Plunking: Hitting the targets on the fly.
Well I just got to know all of them recently in English but I can relate to each one of them with a terminology we used in the local parlance then.
For more info on the game marbles (golli) chk out this link
http://www.kidsturncentral.com/topics/sports/marbles.htm
I don’t intend writing much about cricket cos most of you know this game. The only stuff I would wanna write abt is a version of the modern day run outs we used to follow then, called ‘current’. The ‘current’ concept was that you touch the stumps with any, yes, I meant any part of your body with the ball in hand and if the person is short of the crease is then declared run out. Well ICC cld take a cue from this.
Will be continued on request... cos only a very niche audience can identify with this.
the nearest I got to a date was my date of birth.
The games we played when I was a kid were very seasonal and we used to religiously adhere to it.
There was a kite season, there was a kalanggol season (the most interesting game I have ever played, will go on to explain it), followed by the marbles or alleys or (Golli in tamil) season, The Top Season (bambaram in Tamil) the cricket season, the hand cricket season and during winters the book cricket version for indoors. Imagine a IPL kinda extravaganza for book cricket....
Lemme go on to give a ‘How to Play it’ briefs on all of the above.
The Kite season
One needed to be a professional at this and I was not one, but was an ardent follower of this game and knew all the jargons.‘Deal’ was to enter into a direct aerial conflict with your opponent who was a couple of buildings away, the victory or defeat depended on how strong the coating on your thread was, the ‘Manja’ that would do it… each one had a secret recipe for the manja the ingredients I was told ranged from Glue to finely ground glass or bulbs to add strength... kinda glass reinforced coating... but believe me, that was some serious cutting edge technology.
The Kallanggole Season.
This follows the kite season after the finances have dried up for the funding of Kites,thread and manja, venture capitalist were not around those days…..
The funda was to use the remaining ‘manjad’ thread and test its strength with a stone tied to its end and try and cut your opponents thread…
The Marbles or the Alleys Season
This game has its roots from the colonial days. Here's a list of some common marble terms to get you started:
• Mib/Kimmie: One of thirteen 5/8" marbles placed in the center of the circle.
• Shooter/Taw: The marble that the player flicks toward the target mibs. The shooter must be more than 1/2" in diameter, but not over 3/4" in diameter.
• Knuckling down: A player must have at least one knuckle touching the ground while flicking.
• Flicking/Fulking: While knuckling down the shooter is flicked by the thumb out of the players hand.
• Alley: A marble made of marble. Alley is short for alabaster.
• Bombsies: Dropping your shooter on the target marble.
• Keepsies: Playing for keeps. You get to keep all the marbles you win.
• Lagging: A way of choosing who shoots first. Players roll their marbles toward a line in the dirt (the lag line). Whoever gets closest without going over gets to shoot first.
• Plunking: Hitting the targets on the fly.
Well I just got to know all of them recently in English but I can relate to each one of them with a terminology we used in the local parlance then.
For more info on the game marbles (golli) chk out this link
http://www.kidsturncentral.com/topics/sports/marbles.htm
I don’t intend writing much about cricket cos most of you know this game. The only stuff I would wanna write abt is a version of the modern day run outs we used to follow then, called ‘current’. The ‘current’ concept was that you touch the stumps with any, yes, I meant any part of your body with the ball in hand and if the person is short of the crease is then declared run out. Well ICC cld take a cue from this.
Will be continued on request... cos only a very niche audience can identify with this.
Losing my religion - Kerala Style..
Page 24, Social Studies Book, Class VII, rings a bell, well this is one page which has brought an entire government machinery and a state to standstill and thereby plunging the common man into varying degrees of hardships.
Madham Illatha Jeevan (Life without Religion)
The lesson is set in a school room where the parents and their kid meet the Principal for a school admission. The Principal fills in the forms,
Principal: “What is your name?”
“Jeevan”
Principal: “Nice…father’s name?”
“Anwar Rasheed”
Principal: Mother’s name?”
“Lakshmi Devi”
The Principal looks at the parents
Principal: “What should I fill in for the kid’s religion?”
Parents : “Keep it blank…or else add No Religion”
Principal: “Caste”
Parents : “not needed”
The Principal leans back on his chair and asks solemnly
Principal: “What if he wants a religion when he grows up?”
Parents : “If he wants a religion when he grows up, he can choose the one he likes then”
End of Lesson
I simply don’t understand what all the hue and cry is all about, and as I write this, a son of the soil hailing from Ottappalam, Palakad, Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon is trying to convince IAEA Board of Governors and delegates from 54 countries on the safeguards agreement and other aspects of the Indo-US nuclear deal.
Why is it that all the Mallus, once out of Kerala end up being brilliant????
I guess you should blame it on one Dr Vipin Gopal who first coined the phrase.... ''Gods own country''...to promote the state.
Everyone in Kerala thinks he is GOD!!!
Madham Illatha Jeevan (Life without Religion)
The lesson is set in a school room where the parents and their kid meet the Principal for a school admission. The Principal fills in the forms,
Principal: “What is your name?”
“Jeevan”
Principal: “Nice…father’s name?”
“Anwar Rasheed”
Principal: Mother’s name?”
“Lakshmi Devi”
The Principal looks at the parents
Principal: “What should I fill in for the kid’s religion?”
Parents : “Keep it blank…or else add No Religion”
Principal: “Caste”
Parents : “not needed”
The Principal leans back on his chair and asks solemnly
Principal: “What if he wants a religion when he grows up?”
Parents : “If he wants a religion when he grows up, he can choose the one he likes then”
End of Lesson
I simply don’t understand what all the hue and cry is all about, and as I write this, a son of the soil hailing from Ottappalam, Palakad, Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon is trying to convince IAEA Board of Governors and delegates from 54 countries on the safeguards agreement and other aspects of the Indo-US nuclear deal.
Why is it that all the Mallus, once out of Kerala end up being brilliant????
I guess you should blame it on one Dr Vipin Gopal who first coined the phrase.... ''Gods own country''...to promote the state.
Everyone in Kerala thinks he is GOD!!!
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Remixes SUCK BIG TIME....
Check out these two to believe me....
The gud ol Illayaraja 's Maasi Masum Allana Ponnu from Dharma Durai
http://musicmazaa.com/tamil/audiosongs/movie/Dharma+Durai.html?ssid=1165&x=48&y=12
and the f*£$%&* remix
http://www.raaga.com/playerV31/index.asp?pick=90688&mode=3&rand=0.5660402589975078&bhcp=1
Have fun....
The gud ol Illayaraja 's Maasi Masum Allana Ponnu from Dharma Durai
http://musicmazaa.com/tamil/audiosongs/movie/Dharma+Durai.html?ssid=1165&x=48&y=12
and the f*£$%&* remix
http://www.raaga.com/playerV31/index.asp?pick=90688&mode=3&rand=0.5660402589975078&bhcp=1
Have fun....
The Great Indian Democracy’s week of Diarrhoea
The coming week will see the biggest democracy in the world hit a new nadir.
The wheeling’s and dealing’s, the winnings’ and dining’s are all happening in the corridors of power to muster up that ever elusive number of 272.
The political equivalents of marriages-for-convenience, divorces, live-in’s, wife swappings are going on, all in pursuit of that magical majority. It’s unfortunate that the most wanted guys in the country who are languishing behind the bars for cases ranging from extortion, rape, murder and kidnapping are also the ‘most wanted’ in parliament on the 22nd of July.
On a lighter note I thought up of a rock/pop version of the situation…here u go…
The left signing ‘We Will, We Will, Rock you’ while Mayawati goes ‘Oops I did it again’ and Mulayam, Amar Singh and co go ‘Brothers in arms’ (no, not the Ambani’s) and happily singing ‘We are the Sultans of swing’ (swinging from one coalition to the other) while the Bihari babus rant ‘We don’t need no education’ and Achumama in Gods own country joining in ‘Hey Teacher, leave the kids alone’ and finally the BJP proudly belting out ‘We didn’t start the fire’
The common man & the 'back street boys' (porambokku passunga) just hope and pray the Great Indian democracy doesn’t end up in ‘Dire Straits’.
Watch this this space for post July 22nd commentary.
The wheeling’s and dealing’s, the winnings’ and dining’s are all happening in the corridors of power to muster up that ever elusive number of 272.
The political equivalents of marriages-for-convenience, divorces, live-in’s, wife swappings are going on, all in pursuit of that magical majority. It’s unfortunate that the most wanted guys in the country who are languishing behind the bars for cases ranging from extortion, rape, murder and kidnapping are also the ‘most wanted’ in parliament on the 22nd of July.
On a lighter note I thought up of a rock/pop version of the situation…here u go…
The left signing ‘We Will, We Will, Rock you’ while Mayawati goes ‘Oops I did it again’ and Mulayam, Amar Singh and co go ‘Brothers in arms’ (no, not the Ambani’s) and happily singing ‘We are the Sultans of swing’ (swinging from one coalition to the other) while the Bihari babus rant ‘We don’t need no education’ and Achumama in Gods own country joining in ‘Hey Teacher, leave the kids alone’ and finally the BJP proudly belting out ‘We didn’t start the fire’
The common man & the 'back street boys' (porambokku passunga) just hope and pray the Great Indian democracy doesn’t end up in ‘Dire Straits’.
Watch this this space for post July 22nd commentary.
Fundamentals on plate tectonics from a Pashtun taxi driver!!!!
Visited Dubai after six months last week and decided to hop in and out of taxis instead of driving. Almost all the drivers who drove me around were from the NWFP (North Western Frontier Province) of Pakistan a place re-known for, and living up to the adage of ‘a bombing-day-keeps-the-Americans-away’.
The people from this place speak Pashto. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pashto_language
A language spoken by the inhabitants of NWFP in Pakistan and Afghanistan, one of the drivers I met took off on his Pashto laced with Urdu laced with a lil Hindi to a guy, that’s me, who speaks a lil bit of Tamil & Malayalam laced Hindi.
My first attempts at Hindi way back in 1996 when I first landed in Dubai was nightmarish, I still remember my first sentence in Hindi, ‘MERAAY KOOOO DEIRA(a place in Dubai) JAAANAAA HAAAII’ (to be read transliterated exactly the way its spelt). The driver just replied back ‘Erry okkarunga saar’ in Tamil (meaning 'please hope in sir'), so u know my Hindi was a give away on where I was from.
Coming back to our Pashtun friend, he explained to me that he has heard that the high rises under construction in Dubai needs very deep foundations, and hence these numerous excavations in close proximity causes movement of the Earths crusts, thereby causing Earth quakes!!!!! Maaan this guy was terrific...Fundas on plate tectonics…That was not all, we moved on to the Middle East crisis, he ‘explained’ to me America’s policy on Iran, he also revealed stuff that the likes of A Q Khan and Musharaf refuse to admit. He declared that the only country apart from the America to possess the THE BOMB was Pakistan. He went on to say that Iran was even faking their nuclear prowess.(Are u listening Mr. Ahmedijinad)
I paid him a good tip for enlightening me (or rather taking me for a ride!!!) on Plate Tectonics and the Middle East politics.
The people from this place speak Pashto. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pashto_language
A language spoken by the inhabitants of NWFP in Pakistan and Afghanistan, one of the drivers I met took off on his Pashto laced with Urdu laced with a lil Hindi to a guy, that’s me, who speaks a lil bit of Tamil & Malayalam laced Hindi.
My first attempts at Hindi way back in 1996 when I first landed in Dubai was nightmarish, I still remember my first sentence in Hindi, ‘MERAAY KOOOO DEIRA(a place in Dubai) JAAANAAA HAAAII’ (to be read transliterated exactly the way its spelt). The driver just replied back ‘Erry okkarunga saar’ in Tamil (meaning 'please hope in sir'), so u know my Hindi was a give away on where I was from.
Coming back to our Pashtun friend, he explained to me that he has heard that the high rises under construction in Dubai needs very deep foundations, and hence these numerous excavations in close proximity causes movement of the Earths crusts, thereby causing Earth quakes!!!!! Maaan this guy was terrific...Fundas on plate tectonics…That was not all, we moved on to the Middle East crisis, he ‘explained’ to me America’s policy on Iran, he also revealed stuff that the likes of A Q Khan and Musharaf refuse to admit. He declared that the only country apart from the America to possess the THE BOMB was Pakistan. He went on to say that Iran was even faking their nuclear prowess.(Are u listening Mr. Ahmedijinad)
I paid him a good tip for enlightening me (or rather taking me for a ride!!!) on Plate Tectonics and the Middle East politics.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Thiruvalluvar & the Art of Living
Im wondering why such a book is still not on the the bestseller's list or on the 'How to Make it Big list'. Well I first read Thiruvalluvar in an Anglo Indian school.. yes an ANGLO INDIAN School and fell in love with the couplets at first sight. For all those who want a dope on who or what Thiruvalluvar and Thirukural is, here u go.
''Thiruvalluvar (திà®°ுவள்ளுவர்) is a celebrated Tamil poet who wrote the Thirukural, a well known ethical work in Tamil Literature.
Thirukural is one of most revered works in Tamil . It consists of 133 athikarams or chapters. Each athikaram consists of 10 kurals (rhyming Tamil couplets) thus making 1330 kurals in total. Each couplet consists of four seers in the first line and three seers in the second.
Well I googled for ''Thiruvalluvar and the Art of Management' but ended with a lotta results on books and research papers from Madras University to the Harvard. But not a single book has reached the fame or sales as the Art Of War by Sun Tzu or the Stephen Coveys or the Deepak Chopras..Thirukural which is all of the above put together was not at all marketed well.
What prompted me to write this was, I read a Kural in the most unlikely of places.
In the Library Bar, at the Ramada Hotel, Doha. The library bar is a bar themed on a Library, the table, the ambience, except the noise around resembles a library. One of the walls is fully painted with pictures of lot of open books with gibberish scribled all over.. One of the open books drew my attention ....They say one hears and sees better after a couple of beers... well wht I saw was unbelievable and till date I believe that Iam the only one who has spotted it ....It carried the first Kural. Will try and get a pic of that and post it in here.
''அகரம் à®®ுதல வெà®´ுத்தெல்லாà®®் ஆதிபகவன் à®®ுதற்à®±ே யுலகு''
''Aghara Mudhal Ezhuthellam Aadhi Baghawan Mudhetre ullagu''
which is translated as ..
"Alpha is the first and source of all the letters. Even so is God Primordial the first and source of all the world''
I started to look around the painting for a signature... and finally zeroed in on one Ramesh... cld figure out that he had set upon his assignment with the first Kural, there by singing praise to the Gods, but Im sure, lil did he know that his work of art would adorn the walls of a bar some day....
The Thirukural consists of three books, the first book on Aram (the way or dharma), the second on Porul (material or artha) and the third on Inbam (joy or kama). These go on to make the very foundations of the society we live in .
Its been a long blog but I would like to sign off with one of my all time favourite Kurals....
''Selvathul Selvam Sevichelkvam Achelvan
Selvathul Ellam Thallai''
Translated as
The gift of good listening is a basic Wealth that affords other forms of Wealth ... Hence the best of wealth to possess.
Well we run behind the Feng Shuis, The Zens, The Sun Tzus and the Stephen Coveys... stuff we cannot even spell or pronounce correctly ...yet we overlook the 4 - 3 meaningful and relevant couplets from our very own Thiruvalluvar...
''Thiruvalluvar (திà®°ுவள்ளுவர்) is a celebrated Tamil poet who wrote the Thirukural, a well known ethical work in Tamil Literature.
Thirukural is one of most revered works in Tamil . It consists of 133 athikarams or chapters. Each athikaram consists of 10 kurals (rhyming Tamil couplets) thus making 1330 kurals in total. Each couplet consists of four seers in the first line and three seers in the second.
Well I googled for ''Thiruvalluvar and the Art of Management' but ended with a lotta results on books and research papers from Madras University to the Harvard. But not a single book has reached the fame or sales as the Art Of War by Sun Tzu or the Stephen Coveys or the Deepak Chopras..Thirukural which is all of the above put together was not at all marketed well.
What prompted me to write this was, I read a Kural in the most unlikely of places.
In the Library Bar, at the Ramada Hotel, Doha. The library bar is a bar themed on a Library, the table, the ambience, except the noise around resembles a library. One of the walls is fully painted with pictures of lot of open books with gibberish scribled all over.. One of the open books drew my attention ....They say one hears and sees better after a couple of beers... well wht I saw was unbelievable and till date I believe that Iam the only one who has spotted it ....It carried the first Kural. Will try and get a pic of that and post it in here.
''அகரம் à®®ுதல வெà®´ுத்தெல்லாà®®் ஆதிபகவன் à®®ுதற்à®±ே யுலகு''
''Aghara Mudhal Ezhuthellam Aadhi Baghawan Mudhetre ullagu''
which is translated as ..
"Alpha is the first and source of all the letters. Even so is God Primordial the first and source of all the world''
I started to look around the painting for a signature... and finally zeroed in on one Ramesh... cld figure out that he had set upon his assignment with the first Kural, there by singing praise to the Gods, but Im sure, lil did he know that his work of art would adorn the walls of a bar some day....
The Thirukural consists of three books, the first book on Aram (the way or dharma), the second on Porul (material or artha) and the third on Inbam (joy or kama). These go on to make the very foundations of the society we live in .
Its been a long blog but I would like to sign off with one of my all time favourite Kurals....
''Selvathul Selvam Sevichelkvam Achelvan
Selvathul Ellam Thallai''
Translated as
The gift of good listening is a basic Wealth that affords other forms of Wealth ... Hence the best of wealth to possess.
Well we run behind the Feng Shuis, The Zens, The Sun Tzus and the Stephen Coveys... stuff we cannot even spell or pronounce correctly ...yet we overlook the 4 - 3 meaningful and relevant couplets from our very own Thiruvalluvar...
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Cricketers and TRP's
I happened to watch the first episode of the program IF- Indias Future on NDTV last night , very rightly named cos atleast after watching the first episode Im sure that IF and only IF the guest goes on to become India's Future this program would continue.
The anchor Vishnu Som who is a personal favourite has to his credentials some of the best news shows including the ones on the F16's. To see this one anchored by him was rather pathetic. Not a fault of his but that of the quality of the guest on the show. None other than our slapgate Sreesanth.
Watching the guest display a few obsolete steps of break dance which was in vogue 2 decades back on prime time in 2008 was absolute misery. A cricketer who is more popular for his antics rather than for his on field skills, a kid who has shot into fame overnight was definitely not the right choice for this show. The replies to some of the questions were a perfect blend of empty arrogance and ignorance... I hope NDTV gets better guests on this show or else India Future will remain an IF.
TRP's matter more than good programming I suppose.
The anchor Vishnu Som who is a personal favourite has to his credentials some of the best news shows including the ones on the F16's. To see this one anchored by him was rather pathetic. Not a fault of his but that of the quality of the guest on the show. None other than our slapgate Sreesanth.
Watching the guest display a few obsolete steps of break dance which was in vogue 2 decades back on prime time in 2008 was absolute misery. A cricketer who is more popular for his antics rather than for his on field skills, a kid who has shot into fame overnight was definitely not the right choice for this show. The replies to some of the questions were a perfect blend of empty arrogance and ignorance... I hope NDTV gets better guests on this show or else India Future will remain an IF.
TRP's matter more than good programming I suppose.
Friday, July 4, 2008
The Alphas and Betas in a Relationship.
Well Im not talking about an algebraic relationship where finally the LHS = RHS and hence QED.
Im refering to the simple or rather not so simple man - woman relationship. Where the LHS does not quiet square up to the RHS these days..
To try and understand what the Alphas, Betas and Omegas in the context of a man - woman realtionship is, here's a lil dope from our good ol Wiki ...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_(biology)
I hear and read more and more young women on the threshold of their nuptials are on the look out for Beta Males the reason being....
“The definition of marriage for an individual directly affects the choice of partner. If a woman is looking for social and financial security she will choose an alpha-male. But if she’s looking for love and space in the relationship without compromising on her career she would prefer a beta-male.”
So all you maidens out there who are at loggerheads with your moms & sisters on the choice of the man in your life .... you now have the option of looking for a Male, an Alpha male or Beta male... its akin to ordering your Dosas... Sada, Masala or Mysore Masala and this would well become part of the matrimonials in the years oops days to come.
Related links below...
Im refering to the simple or rather not so simple man - woman relationship. Where the LHS does not quiet square up to the RHS these days..
To try and understand what the Alphas, Betas and Omegas in the context of a man - woman realtionship is, here's a lil dope from our good ol Wiki ...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_(biology)
I hear and read more and more young women on the threshold of their nuptials are on the look out for Beta Males the reason being....
“The definition of marriage for an individual directly affects the choice of partner. If a woman is looking for social and financial security she will choose an alpha-male. But if she’s looking for love and space in the relationship without compromising on her career she would prefer a beta-male.”
So all you maidens out there who are at loggerheads with your moms & sisters on the choice of the man in your life .... you now have the option of looking for a Male, an Alpha male or Beta male... its akin to ordering your Dosas... Sada, Masala or Mysore Masala and this would well become part of the matrimonials in the years oops days to come.
Related links below...
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Border Thottam to Besant Nagar
Had actually reserved this title for a book I wanted to write someday, on second thoughts y not for a blog.
These are 2 places in Madras(now Chennai) very close to my heart and the 2 places that equally contributed in making me.
Well Besant Nagar needs no introduction...and Border Thottam also needs no introduction to hardcore Madrasis, but for the not so hardcore ones heres the link that gives a lil dope http://wikimapia.org/5286895/Border_Thottam
Both these places sit at the 2 extremes of the social strata of Madras. I was fortunate to have experienced both the places in equal share. The first dozen years of my life at Border Thottam and the other dozen in Besant Nagar. (doing my third dozen in the Sheikhdoms of the Middle East).
I end up meeting a lotta people from Madras where ever I go, Pubs, Airport Lounges , Get togethers, general parties.... The convo almost goes like this every time I meet some one from Madras(if he/she is above 35 or Chennai if he/she is below 35).
''U frm Chennai / Madras'' (apply logic described above)
''Yeah''
''Whr in Chennai / Madras''
Besant Nag....
''Oh wht a place to liv maaan..Kewl... the place rocks..''
Hang on I say ''I used to live in/on Mount Road.''
''How cld u possibly live on Mount Road''
''Well u know Border Thottam'' I go on to explain the geography
''Yuk u lived there....'' but any one who knows the place well gives u different kinda respect
It wasnt kewl to live in Border Thottam but it was really macho....a Highly notorius part of the city....believe me even today if I wanna handle the auto guys in Madras I still tell them I live in Border Thottam...The Fords, the Toyotas, Mitsubishis and the Mercs landed here much before Madras came to be known as the Detroit of India.
These are 2 places in Madras(now Chennai) very close to my heart and the 2 places that equally contributed in making me.
Well Besant Nagar needs no introduction...and Border Thottam also needs no introduction to hardcore Madrasis, but for the not so hardcore ones heres the link that gives a lil dope http://wikimapia.org/5286895/Border_Thottam
Both these places sit at the 2 extremes of the social strata of Madras. I was fortunate to have experienced both the places in equal share. The first dozen years of my life at Border Thottam and the other dozen in Besant Nagar. (doing my third dozen in the Sheikhdoms of the Middle East).
I end up meeting a lotta people from Madras where ever I go, Pubs, Airport Lounges , Get togethers, general parties.... The convo almost goes like this every time I meet some one from Madras(if he/she is above 35 or Chennai if he/she is below 35).
''U frm Chennai / Madras'' (apply logic described above)
''Yeah''
''Whr in Chennai / Madras''
Besant Nag....
''Oh wht a place to liv maaan..Kewl... the place rocks..''
Hang on I say ''I used to live in/on Mount Road.''
''How cld u possibly live on Mount Road''
''Well u know Border Thottam'' I go on to explain the geography
''Yuk u lived there....'' but any one who knows the place well gives u different kinda respect
It wasnt kewl to live in Border Thottam but it was really macho....a Highly notorius part of the city....believe me even today if I wanna handle the auto guys in Madras I still tell them I live in Border Thottam...The Fords, the Toyotas, Mitsubishis and the Mercs landed here much before Madras came to be known as the Detroit of India.
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