Unravelling the mystery

When in ROME

2010-12-19T21:04:00.000-08:00

One of the most amazing conversations that I listened to and wants to burn it deep down my memory lane.
This is from the movie "When in ROME"
conversation between dad her daughter, the bride (a few minutes before the wedding)
BRIDE: "When you married mom, did you ever think that you wouldn't make it ?",
DAD: "Honey, you are not gonna learn from my mistakes. You are gonna have to go out there and make your own. You could get your heart broken or you could have the greatest love affair that the world has ever known but you're not gonna know unless you try."
BRIDE: "But, what if there was a guarantee that you would never get hurt."
DAD: "May be. the passion is in the risk. Like I always say, IF YOU'RE GOING TO BE A BEAR. BE A GRIZZLY"

Le voyage entre Montréal et Toronto

2010-05-17T14:45:00.000-07:00

It has been a really long time since I made the effort to pull myself to write in this space. I am not really certain why and what made me write today. There is this intolerable and relentless zeal of energy to narrate my first ever train ride in Canada. I rather dunno what to write but wanted to pen down something just to ensure that I do not fail to reopen my blog the next time hoping to look for something different to see apart from that good 'ol movie names. I have now watched exactly 2^{# the no. of movies in the previous post}[I am not kidding!].

It all began on 13th of May 2009 when myself and A started this long but enjoyable road trip to Kingston. It was a lot of fun for A since he got to visit Queens again and catch up with his buddies. The purpose of this trip was actually to attend our first conference away from good ol' Waterloo. Believe it or not, I was supposed to give a half-hour talk at this conference. Talks are fun (only in the literal sense) when one thinks it really matters. Boy oh boy, I realised how I hate those presentations which has got no attractive pictures/videos to draw the attention of the audience. I must admit that I still had loads of passion only for those abstract talks that involve Hilbert spaces or compact operators or semigroups. My talk went really smooth with some interesting questions at the end. I did mess up one of it, thanks to KM for correcting me. [Wait ! Looks like I am deviating from the subject].

I took this opportunity to visit my extended family at Montreal over the weekend. I think I was lucky to grab the $1.00 Mega bus ticket (Yes, thats exactly what it costs) from Kingston to Montreal that comes with a free wi-fi. Rishi is just a couple of weeks away from celebrating his first birthday on this planet. He cried all the time, whenever I took him in my arms, since I seem to look like a stranger to him. I wish he realises soon that I was there to receive him when he came home for the first time. Shruthi
is still that same cheerful 10 yr old kid, who prefers to be more than a grown up. She tells me, "You are so lucky because you are a grown up and not a kid like me." She is hyperactive atleast with the latest trends with due-respect in the context of gmail, orkut, yahoo mail and facebook. She thinks that nobody chats with her since she is a kid. (I could hear you murmur Aaaoooowww !! cho chweet inside your head) It is strange the way the next generation looks up at ours.

Spring time is the perfect weather that every Canadian would love to rather spend their time outside home. Finally here I am sitting on viarail train, on a pleasant spring afternoon from Montreal to Toronto. I spent the last hour and a half watching the Bollywood blockbuster, "Rock on". Part of my enthusiasm to write today comes from it. Other part of it is shared by Vikram Hazre and Chitra roy's sweet voice.

So, then what's special about this train ?

This reminded me of the good old Brindavan and Lalbagh express that runs daily between Chennai and Bangalore. I remember booking tickets purposefully in the last minute to lure myself with "Ponniyin selvan" six sizzling hours straight.
Weather takes a bumpy ride from severely boiling conditions to a nice chilly breeze combined with a quick 10 minute downpour, followed by a warm sunset and the chilly bangalore breeze.

Difference now being I cant smell the freshness in air anymore, since these trains only comes with huge windows which remain closed by hard ubreakable glasses that lets you peak at the outside view but not enjoy the cool breeze. We dont hear that thick whistling noise that engines used to make. Except for the unfrequent quick jerky movement that feels like the ground is shaking, you hardly realise that you are on a train that is actually moving. So much for the era of technology that we are now in, wi-fi internet makes us feel connected all the time even when the train is moving at 110 KPH. I love the leg room.

Unforutnately, the grand old lady sitting besides me would rather prefer a genuine conversation with me than browsing through the only 20 page journal which she is staring at for the last couple of hours. Sorry ma'm, I am not so used to be chatting in a train journey. There are plenty of things which could be enjoyed in silence rather than constantly using the muscles in the mouth.

There's something very peculiar about the lushy green outside which beckons me to keep looking at it. It is unassumingly hard to take my face away from it even for a moment. Sun remains bedazzled in the blue clouds. The view outside window is outstanding. Its like watching a movie which keeps moving only on one direction. I wonder what does it take to live just with the nature by yourself with all its beauty. It feels like you are hearing a beautiful story narrated by the heavens with a melodious sweet music that descends down in the background of this eye-capturing view. The serene blue waters on the left side of the train and breath-taking view of the sunset on my right makes this moment truely magical. I cant stop thinking Kalki's amazing narration of the beauty of mother nature on an island sandwiched between southern tip of India and Srilanka by name, "Mohini theevu" (மோகினி தீவு, http://www.scribd.com/doc/4889655/Kalki-Tamil-Novel-Mohini-Theevu). This day, the seventeenth of May would remain lively and scripted down my memory lane forever.

Movies in summer

2009-09-20T20:15:00.000-07:00

I should probably not do this ! I just thought of putting down all the movies i watched so far in summer . I literally went nuts. Animation movies are probably the most ones not to mention romantic comedies, chidren/fantasy/sci-fi movies.
6 for the weekend and 2 for the week.

Animation/Children/fantasy
1. The road to el-dorado.
2. Scooby-doo ! The mystery begins
3. Bridge to terabithiya !
4. Chronicles of narnia , The lion, the witch and the wardrobe.
5. Chronicles of narnia , Prince caspian
6. Up
7. The lion king 1 1/2
8. The ant bully.
9. Meet the robinson's.
10. Night at the museum: The smithsonian.

Science-fiction/adventure/Action/thriller
1. Push
2. Land of the lost
3. Indiana jones and the kingdom of crystal skull.
4. National treasure.
5. Fast and furious.

Telugu movie
1. Konchem ishtam konchem kashtam

Tamil movie
1. Pokkisham
2. Poo
3. Nadodigal
4. Pasanga

Romantic comedies
1. Just like heaven
2. I hate valentine's day
3. He's just not that into you.
4. The lake house.
5. Seducing Mr. Perfect.
6. The proposal
7. The hangover.

More in the fall

Romance
1. Accidental husband.
2. It could happen to you.

Animation
1. winx club

How to say "No" ?

2009-02-06T18:43:00.000-08:00

Fortunately, I still haven't stained my relation with my boss. If not actually, but I have atleast succeeded in making her believe that I am not slacking out. We had this inconvenient but convincingly presumable conversation today about "Indians dunno how to nod their head to say a No?" It so happened that I didn't grasp a point that she made in our last meeting. She was probably frustrated but politely put it across to me that I still nod the head the same way, for a yes and a no. At that very moment, I just couldn't realise where the mistake was and I nodded again. She smiled,"You are doing it again!".

After coming back to my desk, I gave a pretty serious thought about it and shared this comment with A and S. Both of them laughed out loud. Apparently S's dad faces this problem with his Indian clients and the consequence of which results in a disastrous conclusion that "Indians have a tendency to promise things that can't be delivered". After this quick comment, S tried his best to convince me that,(in action) if you move your head up and down, it symbolically means a "Yes", but left and right movement means a "No". A was laughing even louder watching this. S points at me and asked me to nod my head to say a "No". I tried to be as natural and as instinctive as possible and nodded my head. It took me a while to figure out that I was in no-man's land. I soon,started laughing at myself. The other day when A, S and me went to a talk by a guy from Cornell about Adaptive finite element meshing(God knows what it is !! ), which although none of us understood even a bit of it and even after knowing that for some unknown reasons, I kept nodding at the talk as if I would get up and say,"I exactly knew what you are talking about". S, sitting right next to me, quickly scribbled something on a piece of paper and passed it on to me which said, "Stop nodding your head, I know that you don't get it." I had to literally control my stomach from busting out into the biggest laughter I could ever imagine.

Indians have a strange way of dealing things. I am not very proud of it, but am a part of it anyways.For a long while, our childhood education had groomed around the aspect of giving respect to the elderly. In some wierd sense, the inner conscience knows that nodding the head to say a 'No' is like being disrespectful. So, we are almost never taught how to nod our heads to say a 'No'. Its probably high time to learn this simple rule in life which makes your communication with peers and supers simple, elegant but very effective. If you don't understand/accept/agree upon something, its absolutely alright to say 'No, I don't get it' by not only saying it aloud, but also nodding your head from left to right. End of the day, its probably not the best of the ways but a lesson well learnt.

Movie mania

2008-12-31T12:00:00.000-08:00

I suddenly realised that I have been absent in this zone for a while. Its holiday time of the year when those small white flurries are all around the park. Last year around the same time, we made a short 3-day trip to Ottawa. Sadly, we ran short of drivers this time. It turns out that I indeed forgot how to spend the holiday season.

I knew the lazy part of me is gonna take over completely not giving me a single moment to think abt school. and so it did. It all started with the T.V.Show named "Heroes". By far the most absorbing, science-fiction, thriller/Horror that I have ever seeen. Driven by the mere anxiety of whats gonna happen next, I can't believe, I spent 23 hours non-stop and finished the whole of season-1. What if somebody has unusual abilities like flying, automatically healing any cut or wound, knowing how to break the space/time continuum, reading others minds, painting the future, etc etc. Its not only amusing but also creates an un-noticable passion in you to look for what next ? That drove me for 2 solid days in my home theatre. Towards the end, I was obsessed with it that I wanted to finish it at any cost. Luckily, I did survive without nightmares.

Just to pull myself out of this, I watched a good number of movies. For some reasons, its funny when I think about myself, that I find joy in animation movies. I wanna put up here the list of all movies (shud be fun to read this in future) Ratatouille, Antz, Bee, Scooby doo and the Goblin king, Happy feet, Madagascar-1, Madagascar-Escape 2 Africa. I enjoyed every bits and pieces of all these ones. I dunno if its natural to have a flair for animation movies at this age. I am sure my roomies had a really tough time putting up with me in these days when I used to laugh my lungs out and they get really annoyed looking at me. I definitely think its not my fault. Pixar, Dreamworks, does a good job in making these films with a strong social theme behind it. Ratatouille is about a rat that teaches cooking, Antz shows how to fight against colonisation, Bee brings about an unsual love affair between a Bee and a Human(its funny the way this happens), I dont need to describe my childhood hero scooby doo, I never knew Penguins are so talented untill I watched Happy feet. Madagascar-2 is top notch that shows what it takes for caged animals to find their family back (Its really moving).

My next favorite is the set of romantic comedies. What happens in Vegas ? is the most romantic movie that I have ever watched. Ashton and Cameron diaz try the most vulgourous things to make their marriage not work and in the process they fall in love. Slumdog millinoaire is worth a watch. Kudos to Danny boyle for surviving the Indian. Its a bit disgusting but solid portrayal of What it takes for a boy from slum to win a million.

After watching "A Beautiful Mind" for the second time, I did figure out what it takes to be John Nash. Final few words of his speech after winning the Nobel prize, "Its Only in mysterious equations of love that logical reasons can be found. I hit it only because of you, You are the reason I am. You are all my reasons.Thank you", And you see the Professor's wife shedding a secret tear with a radiant smile on her face - the audience in standing ovation.WOW !! It can't get any better than that.

I managed to find Scorpion king - 2 was by far the only action movie in the list. Its not that I don't like action, but I am unable to put up with violent scenes these days. My soul fails to recognize the feel good factor after two hours of an action film that ends up in utrocious killing. I can't somehow digest the ruthless killing attempts shown on big screen. There's probably a lot more to come in this zone later ....

Happy days

2008-10-26T18:19:00.000-07:00

Before getting started, I would like to give the background of what I want to say here.
"Happy days" is a very recent movie in Telugu well received by an eclectic mix of south Indians. My mother tongue is Tamil. Although Tamil and Telugu are amidst the same neighbourhood, these 2 languages are very different in dialects, scripts and have different ethnicities. I heard excellent remarks about this movie and was longing to watch this from time immemorial. I am especially bad at learning new languages and the very reason this movie was in Telugu put me off every time. I bugged my roommate sufficiently long, when at last today he sent me the link of this movie WITH SUBTITLES in English. Thanks to Ravi.
Happy days is about a bunch of fresher's who start their bachelor's in mechanical engineering in CBIT, getting united by the tag of 'F.R.I.E.N.D.S.H.I.P' during the usual ragging sessions. Starting from friendship, Ragging sessions, gala in first year, beauty and brains, love at first sight, jealousy, chut-chut(small) fights amidst friends, passion to try new things, Cricket game between seniors (claimed to have state champions) Vs Juniors (who finally wins the game), ballroom sessions all the way till campus interviews and the farewell day, all the bits and pieces of emotions is well-crafted into a jigsaw puzzle that makes you tightly bound to the seat for a good couple of hours waiting to unveil the climax. Kudos to the director!! It left me with nostalgic memories of my good old college days.

I gave a little serious thought about recollecting my college days and tried my best to relate most of the events in the movie. Surprisingly, I found a good chunk of it missing in my life. I managed to get into one of the famous schools known very well amidst the elite Indians, lining up right in the midst of the 5 Indian Institute of Technologies. I am one of those poor souls who got ragged right on the first day, when I went to meet Rat, my sole inspiration right from childhood. Also the eventful 2 hours of copying notes for a 3rd year elec. engineering class senior. I distinctly remember crying in saraswathi temple after getting ragged by seniors for showing me the porn magazines which I hadn’t seen till that day. I could actually sit down and count the number of times, I was ragged. It wasn’t much. Might be because I was the neighbour to Mr.G.Su, the chief warden that time. I joined the department of art and decoration and got introduced to a big chunk of people (Reminder: I should write someday about Art n Dee) .
Although, I was tripped with 'n' number of girls,(I should accept, I did manage to have a crush per year), the most unfortunate thing being, I was never actually in a relationship with somebody. Crushes didn’t really make it to the next stage. I admit, I probably remained geeky and spent most of my time worrying about my acads, or rather wondering how to merge with spray painting. Looking back at my orkut friends list, I really wonder how did I manage to maintain such a high girl:boy ratio. But the truth is I never had a girl friend, rather I should put it as “I never had the time to spend with a(one) girl”. I blame it on the bus(y)ness created by the course structure at BITS that didn’t let me have my own time. Wait a second !! Psenti sem (Last semester on Campus) is probably the time when I should have done something creative. May be the feeling of getting old mixed with scripting my final few months of college life could have made me not enjoy the libertines of time. BITS remains still afresh in my memories. I should probably come back to this topic someday.

Graffiti (A one-liner of sweet memories):
Orientation week, first year wing, One-pitch cricket outside billy’s room, oil spa treatment and my meeting with G.Su, fresher’s party, trip back home during oasis 2000, ThermoD, My Gen.B textbook got stolen during a momentary power failure, Art ‘n’ Dee, KG Mess, First sem c.g.-9.05, Best PR (85), Krishna Bhawan’s nite, first year APOGEE, dilemma of taking a comp.sci or a eee dual, Major c.g.drop after 2nd sem, Shadowz wing formation(New-wing upstairs facing insti), Geetha B’s Report writing class, 1st Oasis -2001, .........(owing to current busy schedule am stopping it here. Look for the rest later !!!! )

Was it real(ity) or a dream ?

2008-10-04T11:41:00.000-07:00

I am all set to confess here that something is wierd in my dreams. It is back to one of those good old days of having haunted dreams, and when you wake up in the morning hoping that nothing serious has happened, only for you to find out the nostalgics of living thru such dreams is a dreadful experience. I am anxious to figure out how these dreams fit into the exact place miles before it was supposed to happen that way.

Before getting into this I should say that am really impressed with S's blog only for her mere taste for words and I am a fan of her writings. I admit I do learn a lot from her. I found a tamil cription on the right panel that motivated to me to see what that stands for. "மனதின் வார்ைதகள்". When I digged deep into it, I got stuck on this blog about Ph.D . I am definitely a victim to this thought and was laughing at myself after reading thru this. I frankly admit that the only thought process that keeps me driving is this."I am unworthy of doing a PhD”, “My supervisor is soon going to find out that I am not capable of doing research”, “I am going to be thrown out of the grad school soon”. A satisfied feeling of not being lonely in this world with this syndrome made my day today.

'T' started freaking out one day about a day dream that she had. I consoled her saying usually day dreams aren't and will never have any effect on the real life. But I am not quite sure if thats the same with the dreams we have in the night. Think about how often would you wake up in the middle of the night just because you didnt wanna see the next scene of the film running in your dream. I have had horrible incidents like that in the past. For a moment, I thought that frequency has decreased owing to the incredible 'busy'ness of my life this fall.

Due to my poor memory of remembering dates, I had frequently checked the brithday reminder of one of my closest friend "Sheikh" just in case not to miss it. I knew I am still a day ahead and that night I had this terrible dream where I felt like I was in the middle of nowhere standing right next to my friend, who was receiving birthday gifts from all around the world except from me. He turns his face towards me and with a gentle smile in his face reckoning that I obviously forgot to get a gift for him. I'd rather spend the whole day with him, instead of reminiscing that scintillating moment throughout the day. I soon woke up realising that I am atleast a good 2,00,00.. (dunno how many 0's to addd) miles away from him. That morning, quickly checked my mail just to ensure that I really didint miss his bday and so was it. The following night, I saw him online and wished him just to find myself in a curse. Apparently, his bday was the previous day and my birthday alarm was showing a false date. I narrated my dream and he laughed aloud in the office, when I was screaming at myself for having such a dream.

I made a bold faced full stop to my investigations into it and got back into my bed with a sultry feeling. After couple of nights, I saw somebody vomitting just before my eyes. May be for some reasons am either closely related to that person or may be not,I went to help out and in my futile attempt to avoid cleaning, I found myself spoiling my hands. Just that moment I realised it was another dream. The next day, I panicked when I heard from 'L', that indeed it so happened that way to her because of eating outside. I cursed myself and that triggered me to understand little closely about dreams and why do they arise. Atleast till date, I haven't tried to make sense out of dreams but I have always wondered why is it that it never made any sense. Especially those ocassional night dreams after I succesfully crack an exam, those few mistakes which might have made me loose a couple of marks, those boomeranging epsilon and delta's would come dilly-dallying before my eyes would annoy me, finally, leading me to the obvious solution that dreams can't be interpreted.

Does dream ever make sense ? If it never does, then why in first place it arises ? Why do you have this feeling that you have already seen this somewhere, when you get stumbled upon soemthing thats hard and unreasonable in life to believe. I am not quite sure if I have found a open question in my research, but I am sure of having found one here for my life. !!!!

My first vacation at Uncle sam's

2008-08-29T17:59:00.000-07:00

Its been a while since I made sense in this viscious space of mine. It all started when my boss announced that she was gonna be out of station almost the whole of august and requested us to match our holidays around august. I wasn't really thinking abt taking some time off as I vouched myself that I will go to India only after the succesful completion of my Ph.D comprehensive exam. I knew my best friends were getting married in late june and early july. Just a thought arose in my mind why not lemme plan a trip to U.S. to meet them. And it all started there.............

Thanks to Haran for pushing me to plan things early. I only expected things to go the way I planned. Am sure its not such a huge expectation. Gotto know that Yamini is arnd in Newyork as an intern in IBM. I was planning to visit Usha nd her huubby since long time. I planned things well in advance. I got some good deals missed a few but hit the major ones.

And here I am waking up at 4 on the morning of 29th July, with cool and a chilly breeze all arnd found myself on a easy conversation with a 30 yr old lady, driver of my cab to Charles terminal, Kitchener. I never knew I was so good in making a healthy conversation with a stranger. Reached toronto early 7 ish. Wandering a while all around the University avenue and Front st, Toronto for a good one hour, looking for the NEON board, I finally spotted the neon bus arnd 8:30. It was quite a long drive to Newyork from toronto that costed me 10 hours of sleepless day time. nevertheless with 3 movies, free wireless internet and power cord for your laptop, I cudnt ask for more. Yamini picked me up and dropped me at the bus stop to board peter pan to Hartford. With Kungfu panda in the bus another 3 hours passed. Usha and Raja picked me up from there. After a really long day in the bus, I finally dozed into a long nap at Usha's place.

Amherst, Masachasseuts, its a university town, loads of greeny stuff all arnd, a quiet graduate housing, newly married ph.D couples doing their own research work and leading a life full of carnatic music. I cudnt ask for more. Took a shower in Raja's melodious flute everyday in the morning and lovely home food prepared by usha. Loads of talking. Evening walk arnd Quabbin reservoir, unlimited bowling, Boston Harbour, MIT, Get Smart movie. Thanks to Usha, the new driver and Raja for providing me such a good time. http://picasaweb.google.ca/k.dhanaraja/Masachasseuts

Saturday morning, I got all set to leave to Newyork. expecting a bus for my 15$ ticket to commute from Hartford to Newyork, ended up in a small CAB. cudnt complain beyond that. Yamini picked me up. dropped my luggage at a frnd's place and went to a pakistani place for a quick lunch. Her order wasn't upto the mark, nevertheless compensated with saravana bhawan at the 29th street, Newjersey. Got down first at the remains of WTC crash site, a quick tour arnd the church converted to a museum, followed by an actual Museum that lasted for atleast 3 hours. After a satisfactory dinner at Saravana's stepped into the Empire state building. It was close to 12 in the night and the crowd looked like the one warming up for a dharshan of Mr.Venki at tirupathi. Had a glimpse of the outrageous night life of Newyork. Got back for a short nap at 3 in the late night and got up at 8 to make my way to meet the glorious liberty madam. Again a long line lasting an hour. Took some really nice pics of the manhttan skyline and the lady liberty. I am not sure if the americans feel proud of being an american or not but sure it gives such a sensation to the visitors when they look upon the US flag flying soaring high at all tourist hotspots. After a quick sandwich at sub, and a disgusting snap near THE BULL, continued our walk into the Wall street. I got sick of walking all the way across till I saw the Brooklyn bridge. I appreicate yamini's efforts in planning it all out really well. But humans have their own limits with respect to walking mine is a lot lesser than an average human being. Had dinner with yamini's brother after watching a regretfully stupid musical movie, Mamma mia. Wandering around Times square marked the end of the day. http://picasaweb.google.ca/k.dhanaraja/Newyork_nagaram

All said and done,I started my next 5 hour bus trip to Washington D.C. Kyle XY was there to entertain me all the way. With not such a high expectation of looking around places but to spend quality time with Kaka and kola, having missed their marriage in Chennai got thrilled and very happy to see them together back in the capital. With the time they took to reach D.C from Virginia, I had a quick walk to the so-called White house in the Federal triangle. The life in D.C was so different compared to Newyork. I soon realised every city had its own flavour. Kaka and kola moved into this brand new appartment which is atleast half an hour away from Vienna filled with all luxurious things one can ask for. Bitter truth is they are yet to find the path that leads to the swimming pool in their own appartment. Sleeping till noon, Major lachcha session, gossips of BITS, motivated kola to watch KYLE were the only few things that I did at their house. Went to D.C, temple, and a private screening of Mummy 3 with the couple. Ramnath was at work the whole day and wud take us out in the evening. Had the glimpse of calm and composed lifestyle of Ramnath, the after-effect of a terribly poor american style social life. Ever bubbling kola with all liveliness made me wonder at the reality of life. On thursday I had my first horrible bus journey of waiting in the traffic away from my own home country. Hurrying to the airport in a taxi with a Bangaldeshi driver, I came to know the reality of moving families across borders. I waited for almost couple of hours inside the flight just to take off from the Kennedy airport to fly to Minneapolis. http://picasaweb.google.ca/k.dhanaraja/WashingtonDC

Reached MN at st.pauls close to 1 late in the night. I was so thrilled to see Deepak haran after 3 years. I felt like thrashing him when he told me that he was watchin me from a distance for 15 minutes soon after I got to the exit of the airport waiting for my baggage. I woke up almost middle of my sleep when I heard the calm and silent voice utterring "KD....KD, shall I make some coffee". Middle of the day, after speaking to Deepak's dad and mom, and my mom, started to look around the twin cities downtown, University of minnesota and proceeded for lunch with Ramji. Arnd 5 ish myself and deepak started the 350-mile drive across Wisconsin to the northern most tip of the Door county. After the 7 hour journey, we reached sister bay and checked into the hotel room that was booked. The next day morning after a heavy breakfast, we set on a ferri that also carries cars to the Washington Island. Its a small island that has a number of tourist spots in and around. after walking up a mile, we rented couple of bikes and travelled all around the island with it. First stop was a 1 hour halt at mini golf. I should mention Don't ever play Deepak in miniGolf. He gets too clever in cheating. Then we proceeded to a ostritch farm followed by a long drive to the Mountain tower view point followed by the beach. Where in the world wud they charge you 500 $ for moving a pebble in a beach ? We walked all the way back just in time to catch the last ferry back. Had pizza in the night followed by a drive-in theatre to watch "The Dark knight". That was my first experience in a drive-in theatre. It was quite windy in the evening, so we were pondering abt keeping our windows open to hear the sound track. I was quite amused to know that they had tuned and stream-lined the audio to FM 101 and the theatre effect was amusing to sit inside the car with heaters on providing good warmth and also hearing the audio thru FM with video right before your eyes projected onto a giant screen. The next day we started our way back with stopovers at Fish creek, Egg harbour and Peninsula park ( all these are places where u get an amazing view of the beach/shore and an island). We reached back Minneapolis the same day evening arnd 10 ish. except for a brief half an hour nap, we spent the whole time talking the whole day about everything that happened in life in the last 3 yrs for me and for him. I really enjoyed that part of this trip.
http://picasaweb.google.ca/k.dhanaraja/MinneapolisWisconsin

The last part of the trip went completeley away from what I had planned. It was a disaster/terribly hard but a new learnin experience. I had to fly from Minneaplis to Newyork with a brief stopover at Atlanta (which is in no-man's land) for 3 hours. It all started when I figured out that the airTran flight I was supposed to board at Atlanta was late by 4 hours. I had an allowance of 4 hours at NY to board the bus back to Toronto. I was thinking of a deadly, neck crunching finish if I make it to the bus. It was disastrous feeling when I came to know that the delayed flight was actually cancelled becos of traffic congestion in NY. I felt annoyed and being grounded in no-man's land with the feeling of being lost in an unknown place. I panicked. The hard grip slowly started releiveing me seeing the people around suffering the same way I was. I reached NY at 9:15 p.m when my bus to Toronto had already taken off at 8:45. To add oil to the wicker, I found my luggage missing. I was asked to give a written letter indicating the address and phone number to contact if at all they get my luggage back. I was feeling so annoyed as I didnt know how to tell them I am an international student living in Canada and not in Newyork. A little ray of hope arose when the lady at the counter told me the next flight was arriving in 15 minutes. I waited patiently for an hour.I experienced what it means to walk on cloud nine, when I saw my black american tourister turned upside down rolling happily on the conveyor belt. After a quick trip in M70/subway, I reached the Grand central to look for the timing of the last bus to Toronto. After seeing 3 closed counters finally managed to see one open and boarded the last bus for the day at 11:45 P.M. And finally, with some unknown acquaintance experience at the bus, I felt like home sweet home when I set foot on Toronto coach terminal after 12 hours. I reached Waterloo at 3 P.M to mark the end of my first vacation to the United States of America.

Wanna know more about the one you wanna spend the rest of your life with ?

2008-02-14T12:38:00.000-08:00

I have been fiddling around to find some spare time to write about my thoughts on this fairly new concept to India, called "Live-in". Flurry of thoughts kept hindering me for a long time after I saw this.

Frankly, I seriously fell in love with this. This is the title song of "Kaadhalikka neramillai" means "There is no time for love". This brand new serial, filmed entirely in Singapore, is about two working professionals, Shakti [Prajin] and Divya [Chandra Lakshmanan] meet by chance, fall in love and then go through a series of changes in life. These two characters seek answers to some of life's greatest questions on love. How do these two individuals and their love develop?. Check out this new age soap opera from Monday to Thursday at 9 p.m., on Vijay TV. Its a pleasure for me to wait till somebody uploads it on youtube.

I have had a long discussion about this with my friends, room mates, friends back in India, UK, US etc. No doubt the serial has travelled continents (Wonder how ?). This is a brief background of whatever has happened so far. Shakti and Divya like each other. However, the thought of spending the rest of the life with one another made them realise that they don't know each other really well. After a few episodes of romantic drama, they both agree to live-in with each other in the (realistic) sense.
Before you get into conclusions here, live-in doesnt mean having sex. It is just two friends living in the same house trying to understand the original traits of each other, where they don't live in a fancy world where they do things to make the other person like him/her, rather live upto their individual's original way of life as long as they dont disturb each other mentally as well as physically. The concept was first brought up to India in the "Salaam Namaste" movie, but the it was crucified before inception, because of the unexpected curves, flavours of a Hindi movie.(Perharps!! Thats just a Bollywood movie) However, in here both of them live up to their promises not crossing their individual borders, put into a self-test under live circumstances and get into a stage where they really love each other, in the deepest sense of the meaning of 'Love'. The serial is still on. But back to my view point about this. I am not saying here that this is the best option. But I wud strongly suggest to give it a second thought about this before eliminating it the moment you here the name (It doesnt always strike a ring but still !!)

I agree the traditional way of finding your life partner is the least responsible job that you have rather counts for your parent's sleepless night. If its me who's gonna live the rest of my life with somebody whom I never met rather my parents know abt him/her really well(and knows that he/she is the best fit for my life) makes least sense to this stupid 10-gallon head. Alright, assuming Indian mentality is now slowly turning towards western direction in trying to choose their life partner by themselves. The most common and frustrating things in life, like no time for breakfast, no time for Television, work ,job , home coming, classes (life's too hectic to find a place in your busy schedule to give time for girl/boy friend). Even more common thing that happens in those chut weekend meetings, dating is that both guy and girl puts up with their goody goody, cheerful looks such that both like each other very much and under those circumstances the true nature of the boy/girl ( Am not saying he/she is cruel ), but then the originality in the boy/girl disappears for that rosy period of love. People tend to forget the saying "Be yourself". And thats the very reason why not all post-married life goes with the similar sense of love that existed before marriage.

I am not doing a research here on Love nor Live-in relation. But am just trying to emphasize that its only when you live-in together that you tend to forget that you need to put up a really good show, rather you try to be yourself. Living your life upto fullest of your desires and dreams with your friend who may be sharing and spending the rest of their life with you. Its not too hard to find counterexamples for this lemma. As always exceptions may be there. But One has to be true to his heart and let the rest speak for itself. The fear of failure has its own pitfalls. It all boils down to the amount of trust in you for the other person and for the trust the other person share with yourself.

Newton is a genius for his 3rd law of (e)motion ("Every (ac/emo)tion has equal and opposite reaction" --- It totally makes sense and has the deepest meanings inside it.) I happened to see one of the most recent light headed, without emotional psentiments(rare occurence!!)a tamil movie named "Pirivom Santhippom" (Lets part now and meet you later). It sounded like the most stunning hard core crying mentally tortured emotional kind of a movie. But this movie turned out to be that light, thin wave of clean air that whizzles thru you at the beach (rare occurence isnt it). Cheran and Sneha played an excellent role in bringing out the traits of the personalities that the director imagined. The guy and the girl don't really know each other but the husband pours in extra large size of love and care for which wife reacts in a very positive manner. Before it gets too late, the hubby understands the original attitude of his wife and brings her back to the place where she always wanted to be.

Contrasting thoughts. All said and done, when it comes to me, am I gonna choose the former path.
The procedure involves several steps.
Step 1:- Get a Friend who is a girl.
Step 2:- Do I really like her ?
Step 3 : Do I fully know her ?
Step 4:- Do I really wanna spend the rest of my life with her ? Before answering this question pause for a minute, go back to step 3 with 'I' and 'her' positions shifted.
Step n:- Blah Blah Blah ( Do you see the pain ? )
The latter means I need to be a perfect husband for the perfect wife,(Isnt that all age old myths ? ).

As always its the problem of choices that makes life so complicated. But what makes life interesting is having known the choice that you have already made and the path that leads to the realisation of that choice is really exciting .........

When you say nothing at all !!

2008-01-22T16:33:00.000-08:00

It's amazing how you can speak right to my heart
Without saying a word you can light up the dark
Try as I may I could never explain
What I hear when you don't say a thing

The smile on your face lets me know that you need me
There's a truth in your eyes sayin' you'll never leave me
The touch of your hand says you'll catch me if ever I fall
You say it best when you say nothing at all

All day long I can hear people talking out loud
But when you hold me near, you drown out the crowd
Old Mr. Webster could never define
What's being said between your heart and mine

The smile on your face lets me know that you need me
There's a truth in your eyes sayin' you'll never leave me
The touch of your hand says you'll catch me if ever I fall
You say it best when you say nothing at all

The smile on your face lets me know that you need me
There's a truth in your eyes sayin' you'll never leave me
The touch of your hand says you'll catch me if ever I fall
You say it best when you say nothing at all

First day @Church

2008-01-13T10:42:00.000-08:00

This is a wonderful piece of emotions that I went through just a short while back after my succesful first visit to the church. To present a little background, I have always longed to go to a church, just to know how the christianism has evolved, the format of worship. When compared to the various kinds Hindu worship methods, mabbe I would wanna see a change. Whatever little knowlege that I had previously about christianism, Jesus, Churches has undergone a vital change inside me. Myths shattered, enjoyed the feel of coming out of a smaller circle into a wider circle. My office mate Alex (origin in Hongkong, settled in Canada since his childhood, baptised early in life) and myself used to have really long conversations about religions. To be frank, I found so much joy in sharing the knowledge that I had about Hinduism, and whatever he knew about christianism. I was longing to have the feel of god for quite a long time since I came to this country.

After my futile attempts in trying to figure out a temple nearby waterloo that actually gives me the feeling of being in a temple, I looked upon a church. I would never say that I am an Atheist. But I believe and truely acknowledge that there exists a god who's there all around taking care of us every moment. He could be of any format, Allah, Jesus, Shiva, Vishnu, Durga devi, or a baby that smiles, you, me and even my laptop that dances before me is all a manifestation of god. I had requested Alex to take me to the church that he regularly visits. We decided upon it this sunday 13th of January 2007. Although, I slept at 3 in the morning but with the help of my inner consciousness, I made myself stick to the timing that we decided, made a wake up call to Alex to make it to the 10:55 free school bus ride outside SLC.(The school buses in here are a lot more sophisticated than the ones in India) .

As the bus was making a turn around 660, conservation drive,
www.creeksidechurch.ca, I could smell the sweetness in the air, a feeling of seeing someone whom I knew long back to drop in to tell a "Hi, Mr.God Howz u doing ? " kinds. The building was very modern which shattered the picture that I had imagined. I expected it to be a wonderful architecture outside the church with a holy cross on top of the building, and inside with all benches lined up before the statue of Jesus christ on a small front dias where Father sits. I was taken aback by surprise. That was the hardest thing I could ever imagine to be there was what I saw. It was an old gym converted to a small auditorium and on the diars, I could recognise big drums set with guitarists and vocalists lined up.

It started with a couple of songs sung in the most informal way(just like how music clubberz perform on stage) that aroused me into my deepest desires of God. This is the first time ever in my life, that I sung English songs, with the complete understanding of each word that I uttered. The verses was displayed in a giant monitor screen, Whenever a line made its complete sense to me a trickle went passed my eyes. I was amazed at the way the crowd responded. Everybody stood up and sang with a whole heart that immersed and dissolved me so much that I tasted the real spirit of God in each and every line of it. HE was there all around me. When I was looking around people's expressions, I had the sensation of a mountain moving inside me. There was a girl who was showing all sorts of wierd hand signs at each and every word of the song that she murmured. It didnt took me much time to realise that she was handsigning the way dum and deaf people express the english words given to them. I wiped a big tear trickling down at the end of my eyes.

A big guy came up after a couple of songs and briefed us about the old testament. That was the first time ever I had heard of it and it was impressive. All this while, I knew Israel had some wonders hidden inside, and this was the first time it got revealed to me. The Bible consists of 39 books of old testament ( that talks about christianism before Jesus ) and 27 books of new testment (that talks about Jesus and churches). He whizzled through an hour of the most liveliest presentations of the old testament at the end of which he wants us not to remember wat he said but just to get a glimpse of what the holy bible contains. This aroused me the feeling of reading bible atleast in somepoint of my life.

The best part is right now. After the session I boarded the bus back and was excitedly explaining and asking questions to Alex in the last seat of the same school bus. A chap sitting before mine apparently heard our conversation. He turned back at me and asked "Is this the first time you are at a church ?". With a touch of astonishment, I exclaimed, "Yes" proudly. He said, "You might wanna take a look at this" and he gave me his copy of the "New testament ; Psalms and Proverbs". I was startled at his behaviour. I was wondering if he had a duplicate copy with him. As I flipped thru the first few pages, I noticed "This copy is not to be sold". I was in a complete ecstasy at that moment. When I got down from the bus, I started a small conversation with that undergrad student, when his girl friend and his buddy were looking at me dazzled. After a couple of dialogues, he questioned me, "Are you coming down to the church some other time ?". That moment felt like, an arrow faster than Arjuna's best shot pierced my heart and ripped apart. It made me realise, how much Church means to those kids. I said in next 4 weeks for sure, as I know alex will be travelling the consecutive 4 weekends. I am not sure, if he felt good about my reply, but it left a sizzling bee stung inside me.

The whole experience that I had today made me taste success, much sweeter than honey, in my attempt to have the feeling of god in canada. I am sure I can't forget this day nor its exhilarating moments right through the day. It made me very well prepared to take it right through the day as the non-stop journey of life continues ....

Bienvenue au CANADA

2007-12-18T20:48:00.000-08:00

Its the biggest thing that happened in my life that made an absolute 180 degree change in my career. Lots and lots of changes happened back and forth in that seemed like getting me nowhere. Just to reiterate that whole big saying from Alchemist, "If with whole heart you desire and choose to follow your dreams, the whole world will turn around and aid you reach your destiny". And thats precisely what happened. I received an admit to pursue doctoral studies in the so-called MIT of North America, University of waterloo, in the field of applied mathematics. That basically means the problem of choices in here is solved. I am not gonna bother justifying the choice I made , because I haven't done much on this side of the shore. I need to really do something before I even start thinking of how worthy is this for me. I call this phase of my life, as "being happy" ofcourse at a corner of the mind still uttering, "intruded into a foreign land"

Life changed and it changed for the good, I guess. Most importantly my brother made a job, and I should say I can't be much happier than that at any point of time in my life and that sweet news had to come only when I left the country ending up not getting a chance to congratulate him personally. As a gift (Oops !! I jus realised that I have never done this before) from the elder brother , I bought him a brand new laptop. Although I do torture him with my brotherly advices every now and then, the truth is I still love him and I desperately want him to move out of the country, to shape his career. It might be a little burdensome for my parents, but being a family of professional engineers teaching all through their life, I hope they will know how to manage. With technology growing at such a high pace, reaching them at any point of time will be just a matter of few seconds.

I landed in this country, with hopes of doing something different, something that will change my life and may be someone else's life too further down the line if not in the immediate future. When sun arose on 7th September 2007, it stayed up for more than 36 hours just for me untill I finally landed at Pearson International Airport, wishing that I will do something useful in life not only to myself but also to the human kind. I got some really good roommates for which I am very thankful of, Sumanjit singh, as cool as cucumber, Punjab kaa puthar, but a Permanent Resident here, doing masters in electrical engineering, Mukesh Meshram, a gem of a person, originally marathi, (altho he is a gujarati for me for some strange reasons .Mukesh, I beg your pardon here !! ), doing ph.D in chemical, Ravindra reddy (cool post doc chap) , from near hyd but lived in bang for the past 12 years and One more yet to join us. Some very cool snaps of them are here !!
and new friends whom I made , Thenmozhi Shanmugam ('zh' needs to be pronounced as 'lh') It was fun hearing this name from my room mates, sorry for u ! then !!, doing Masters in business entrepreneurship and technology, vow doesnt it ring a bell, coming from good ol Coimbatore district. A perfect example for "good and sweet things come in a short package", doing masters in civil engineering. She is the most cutest girl I have ever seen in life. I simply can't resist myself thinking how well I gotto know her in such a short span of time. ( Did I ? pls tell me I did !!! ) This Chatter box (sorry!!) becomes wild when somebody tells her, "Grow up girl". I dunno why but, I simply adore her for being that way. Forgot to mention, She is also a very very bold person who could walk me all the way from MC to Ride safe (Huff ;-))even if it is pitch dark. My office mate Alex shum, (I got his name up correctly this time!) doing Masters in applied math under the same supervisor, as mine, a never say die, do it last minute, cool canadian to hang around with. we spend a lot of time chatting than working, and several other co-grad students in the math dept. Its been a really wonderful term getting to know many and many new people in my life all at once.

Fall 2007 had made me quite busy with 2 courses and 2 T.A's ( first experience with black board and a chalk, teaching calculus to kids, nervous initally , but unbelievably exciting ). Most of my research was concentrated on cooking this term. I was a freshmen, when I begun, but offlate, I have excelled in preparing italian delicacies. Its quite an achievement for me !! (Welcome home any time)

Boy oh boy need I say more about Canada. Its terribly cold out here. Simply love to watch snow all day long hearing mild, slow and romantic songs in the background. Its been truely a pleasant stay so far. Altho, I definitely miss my home and friends back home, it seems like I found a new home and a family here. And the life continues.....

waiting for the winter break

2007-11-18T08:52:00.000-08:00

This is just to remind myself that I am waiting for the winter break, a sweet little break for 15 days, which is jus sufficient to stop nd look back and rewitness the tonnes of changes happened in me over the last 6 months !! huh !! Altho' I become restless waiting for that time to come, I wud rather tune in that this phase of my life which i am passing by is one of the happiest in my journey so far. I am definitely enjoying this exciting phase of my life the so-called "first couple of months in a foreign land"

Wedding bells all around !!

2007-07-27T10:12:00.000-07:00

Huff ... I know that its been a long time since I made sense in this viscious space. Its been a hectic schedule for me attending loads of marriages all around my very close set of friends. My wingie Amar's marriage at Coimbatore gave me the opportunity to meet a lot of my old friends... After a year's time got a chance to drop in Tiruppur to say a hello to my paati (grand mom). I cudnt make it to Ranjani's nd yadee's wedding. Managed to attend their receptions. The very next week saw shashi tying knots with janani. nd ofcourse my sweet friend DS's wedding was the last one in my list.

The good thing about all the ones mentioned is that none is an arranged marriage. People have parted ways from the traditional good old marriages. I don't have any second thought about going in for love marriages. Put in the shoes of such a person thinking abt the dreadful path down the road of letting their parents know abt it, followed by a lot of chut chut mini clashes from all directions, parents, relatives, cousins, grand parents etc etc. untill they finally make it thro' in a relation, I am sure ppl hav had terrific experiences. For one moment it looks as if everyone else except you are in a commanding position of how your life partner needs to be.
And that part of life is what I call it as "Being brave and strong, holding on to the lonely log sailing downstream". Several people hav crossed oceans in this fashion and a few have crossed just small ponds.

I feel happy for those people who have finally reached their destiny...I am yet to find out my own destiny. The requirements from my side have become bare minimal offlate. I dunno if my life is gonna take a bumpy ride for the next 3 to 4 years, but the nets are all fine tuned for fishing my so-called "Golden fish". It was funny when once I was forcefully giving a thought of how I wud perceive my wud be as and that was the time when nothing arose in my mind and it was pitch dark and blank. But now things have started to change. Hopefully for the good. My parents have stopped bugging me to get married early. Should I do them justice by taking up the whole repsonsibility to myself for searching my bride ? I dunno since when my mom got this indestructable confidance in her that am incapable of doing it. Should I prove her wrong ?

Take a moment to see !!!

2007-07-27T10:06:00.000-07:00

We have all heard the expression: "Remember to stop and smell the roses." But, how often do we really take time out of our hectic fast-paced lives to notice the world around us? Too often we get caught up in our busy schedules, thoughts of our next appointment, the traffic or life in general, to even realize there are other people nearby.
I am as guilty as anyone of tuning out the world in this manner, especially when I am driving on California's overcrowded streets. A short time ago, however, I witnessed an event that showed me how being wrapped up in my own little world has kept me from being fully aware of the bigger world picture around me. I was driving to a business appointment and, as usual, I was planning in my mind what I was going to say. I came to a very busy intersection where the stoplight had just turned red. "All right," I thought to myself, "I can beat the next light if I race ahead of the pack."
My mind and car were in auto pilot, ready to go when suddenly my trance was broken by an unforgettable sight. A young couple, both blind, were walking arm-inarm across this busy intersection with cars whizzing by in every direction. The man was holding the hand of a little boy, while the woman was clutching a baby sling to her chest, obviously carrying a child. Each of them had a white cane extended, searching for clues to navigate them across the intersection.
Initially I was moved. They were overcoming what I felt was one of the most feared handicaps—blindness. "Wouldn't it be terrible to be blind?" I thought. My thought was quickly interrupted by horror when I saw that the couple was not walking in the crosswalk, but was instead veering diagonally, directly toward the middle of the intersection. Wthout realizing the danger they were in, they were walking right smack into the path of oncoming cars. I was frightened for them because I didn't know if the other drivers understood what was happening.
As I watched from the front line of traffic (I had the best seat in the house), I saw a miracle unfold before my eyes. Every car in every direction came to a simultaneous stop. I never heard the screech of brakes or even the peep of a car horn. Nobody even yelled, "Get out of the way!" Everything froze. In that moment, time seemed to stand still for this family.
Amazed, I looked at the cars around me to verify that we were all seeing the same thing. I noticed that everyone's attention was also fixed on the couple. Suddenly the driver to my right reacted. Craning his head out of his car, he yelled, "To your right. To your right!" Other people followed in unison, shouting, "To your right!"
Never skipping a beat, the couple adjusted their course as they followed the coaching. Trusting their white canes and the calls from some concerned citizens, they made it to the other side of the road. As they arrived at the curb, one thing struck me—they were still arm-in-arm.
I was taken aback by the emotionless expressions on their faces and judged that they had no idea what was really going on around them. Yet I immediately sensed the sighs of relief exhaled by everyone stopped at that intersection. As I glanced into the cars around me, the driver on my right was mouthing the words "Whew, did you see that?!" The driver to the left of me was saying, "I can't believe it!" I think all of us were deeply moved by what we had just witnessed. Here were human beings stepping outside themselves for a moment to help four people in need. I have reflected back on this situation many times since it happened and have learned several powerful lessons from it. The first is: "Slow down and smell the roses." (Something I had rarely done up until then.) Take time to look around and really see what is going on in front of you right now. Do this and you will realize that this moment is all there is, more importantly, this moment is all that you have to make a difference in life. The second lesson I learned is that the goals we set for ourselves can be attained through faith in ourselves and trust in others, despite seemingly insurmountable obstacles. The blind couple's goal was simply to get to the other side of the road intact. Their obstacle was eight lines of cars aimed straight at them. Yet, without panic or doubt, they walked forward until they reached their goal. We too can move forward in attaining our goals, putting blinders on to the obstacles that would stand in our way. We just need to trust our intuition and accept the guidance of others who may have greater insight.

Finally, I learned to really appreciate my gift of sight, something I had taken for granted all too often. Can you imagine how different life would be without your eyes? Try to imagine for a moment, walking into a busy intersection without being able to see. How often we forget the simple yet incredible gifts we have in our life. As I drove away from that busy intersection, I did so with more awareness of life and compassion for others than I had arrived there with. Since then I have made the decision to really see life as I go about my daily activities and use my God-given talents to help others less fortunate.

Do yourself a favor as you walk through life: Slow down and take the time to really see. Take a moment to see what is going on around you right now, right where you are. You may be missing something wonderful.

- Jeffrey Michael Thomas (Chicken Soup for the Soul)

Changes, changes and more changes ....

2007-05-12T04:59:00.000-07:00

Theres a lot happening in my life. And whenever I think of stopping for a minute and taking a look back into the last 6 months of my life, it looks like the dreadful typhoon had just passed thru'. Its a wonder to know how the mood swings from one end to another so quickly. It was end of march when I realised that my dreams have been beaten to death. Early Apr, I recd an amazing news from one of the fore father's who groomed my first step. I was almost set to deny it or perharps postpone the offer b'cos of insane reasons. I was always under the false pretence that my dreams have been shattered to pieces and there's no glue available to stitch them up. I still can't forget that dreadful night of quick talks with Dindu and sheikh which turned me upside down. It was a serious eye-opener. After talks with my frnds I got reassured that things are possible if neatly worked out. I can pursue my dreams and still enjoy all the priveleges that it once asked for. It does look like the first stone was not really turned upside down, rather I have put down my feet so firmly on it that things have started opening up. To more precisely put it. It was really my big fat second stone called CAT that had actually awakened my deeper sense to realise the amount of passion hidden inside the first stone. The idea is clear that I need to put an end to my materialistic thirsts as it was never drenching me. Rather, the feeling of satisfaction never creeped into me on comparing the hike in my monthly payslip or rather the numbers in the smith barney's acct. never appealed me. I knew there's no end to the feeling of asking for more.

There's still a long way to go to open the door and set myself free for the next 4 years. Have I been day dreaming ?? When I sit down and imagine myself after those 4 yrs and step back into life, I don't see much ahead. Whats gonna be my future ?? Its a huge question mark ? There's something inside me that gives me big guts to go for it. I am just driven purely by my passion. Just as said in Alchemist. "this whole world turns arnd and aids in reaching your destiny." It all depends on how strong you are driving it. The road mabbe full of ups and downs or mabbe there's no road at all. Still what matters most is how much you relish on your dreams.

An eclectic mix of events happnd arnd me in the middle of April. I got the opportunity to travel for the first time to the so called Uncle sam's house. The job that was given to me was pretty clear and indeed was slogging there big time. I managed to spend some time talking to my frnds about future prospects that made my plans more and more clear. Things fell in place for me to freak out couple of weekends with a trip to LA - the 12 hour drive along the west coast, and a trip to the SFO downtown, sausalito and muir woods with couple of gals made life little more interesting. Mabbe this has added the reqmnt for the curent trend in a marriage alliance search but am sure the next 4 yrs is gonna rock it back and turn my resume upside down.

Its time to draw a mark and take a U-turn and go back to my good old college days. Haaah ... The grass there looks so green. There will be some tests, assignments, mid-terms and compre exams. Looks like its not much... Am gonna enter the thick crest of knowledge called "Research". This term loooks goad damn big and my dictionary didnt have an entry for this before. Its time to back myself and say that I am gonne enter the world of huge tunnnels which might lead to some closed boundaries. To peal of its skin and rip apart and come out is something thats really challenging... Not as dumb as sitting idle before the computer and generally browsing thru without even knowing what you wanna do.

Is that all that I want in life ? or Am for sure foresee some sharp curves / bends in this skimful path

Pls remember to post the blog once u have written it. don't keep it for months together like this one .

Pursuit of Happ'y'ness

2007-03-27T01:56:00.000-07:00

I have enough things to keep myself bzee during weekends. My usual schedule for a weekend in Bangy runs like this. On a lazy saturday morning, sunlight hits my face a little past 9 followed by a nice shower and an attempt to clear dust in all the nozzles of 8-holed bamboo stick accumulated during the week. I reach Kalaanjali for my flute class arnd half past 11 and my flute teacher, Indira carries the time forward till 15 to 1. May be half an hour more on somedays when I am royally screwed up. I usually claim that I did practise the whole week when I had originally blew the dust off the holes only couple of hours back. The result is usually visible crystal clear to my teacher. I don't wanna become a profound flautist. I love this instrument from I don't recollect from when at this moment. Little can I claim that I do have some inclination in learning Carnatic,after my futile attempts on vocal in childhood for atleast 2 years from 2 different teachers. It used to be fun in my class, when my teacher asks me to observe the way she plays the swaram, I often get so much engrossed into the eternal music that I get completely lost in it and get my middle stick dancing in the air right thru my defense.

Coming back to the subject, I usually make it a point not to miss my mid day sleep after a heavy meal on saturdays. However, last weekend I purchased my bus ticket and on the way back sheikh picked up a movie named "Pursuit of Happ'y'ness" with a 'y' and not 'i'. I knew I might doze off anytime in the middle, but eventually, I didnt. This movie had a deep impact on me. An excellent Will smith movie very well crafted, with no trace of his usual hi-fi stunts, a fevicol bonded relation with his son, putting up even when his love ditches him and runs behind money. He sweats hard for every penny that he makes. Becomes crazy on one fine day when he comes to know that the US govt has stuck hands into chris's bank acct for paying taxes. For an internship opportunity at a stock broker's firm that pays him not a single pie for 6 months, having known that only one out of 20 people get chosen to get a job there, chris faces all sorts of ups and downs during that short span of life. It made me realise how compilcated, it is really to stick on and gel with the family life and make the wheels move when you have a job that pays you way too less that you hardly make your ends meet. Even the rock solid hard heart throbed person would shed atleast one tear, when he imagines himself being in the shoes of chris.

It happened to be a real life stunner and a living example. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Gardner
Eventually, Chris Gardener has moved on all the way till being the founder, CEO of Christopher Gardner International Holdings his own brokerage firm, that houses the most succesful futures traders in the market.

I doubt if anybody ever imagines to be a person who could hardly make a living. I don't refer to the street beggars, who inspite of having good health, is just too lazy to do any job. But just trying to imagine thousands or even millions of young boiling blood steaming under the hot sun with no proper awareness of how to lead a meaningful life. Several thousands of them are automatically motivated into non-social ways of making money and ending their life as criminals. Its just money that everybody craves far for a living. I believe there are lot more human values added to it, smartly illustrated by the movie.

Although there was a power shut down that denied me in watching the last half an hour of the movie, putting aside the so-called big match of the world cup, Aus - RSA clash, saw the last half of the movie. Probably deep down inside, this movie has made a sizzling wave thru the dry leaves accumulated over the last 3 months. Will this instill a change in me, or am I just an on-looker of this event too that just rushed past me leaving no traces behind ?

In the last 3 months......

2007-03-15T01:47:00.000-07:00

I have been denying myself from entering this site for quite a while now. My heart says just do it atleast this time and here I am. Loads of things have happened for me and around me over the last 3 months. I really dunno if I was waiting for something big to happen. But the truth is I have been saying myself " not this time, perharps some time later ... " for such a long time that before I turn back, alas I am already into the 3rd month of the brand new year. In the early December, I gave myself a forceful thought of what I am really upto for the end of this year. Now when I look back at it, those colorful days seems to be just a dream. My ego claims that I cannot do that anymore. Loads of changes around me have happened. I tried to refrain myself from those changes. By the time I realised that those changes have strolled past me, I found myself torn to pieces that can't even be stitched together. With peer pressure knocking in all directions, I survived a dark foot path in late december. But I should say the so-called Ultimate power saved me by giving the opportunity to attend the Ashtavakhra geetha sessions. (!!! That reminds me I must have to write a separate blog about those sessions!!!). I am unable to make out that sheer strength in me that drives me towards divinity, eternity and peace. I got royally screwed with tonnes of work at office, combined with faster deadlines for satisfying my thirst of research. Those were the days when it appeared that the grass was really green on the side on which I dreamt off. It didnt strike me that there were huge pillars on the path which were blocking that serene look. And so I went on collided on one of them and got stopped on my quest for knowledge. Hopefully it’s temporary. With not so satisfied temperament I did finish off all that was calling before me.

Towards end of Jan 2007, I got voluntarily caught in the wave of Real Estate. The strikingly disastrous question, "Should I do this now or not?” troubled me quite often in past. It did this time as well. But something inside me told that I gotto go for it now. Several questions like will I be able to bear the loan now? Should I pass on the responsibility to my parents when I am off? Does it serve justice to them? were dangling before me. On the other hand the alarming growth of the interest rates for home loans was dilly-dallying. So I went for it as I also knew that I can deny paying huge taxes from the pennies that I save. I knew my dreams might be doomed. But still I went for it, hoping that it will also satisfy my long time thirst of buying more space for my house. It used to pain me at the deepest roots of my heart when the so-called rare visitors/guests ask my dad “why don’t you move to a bigger house?”. That’s the internal reason behind why I wanna give more space for my family so badly and dearly. My mom n dad were very happy with the one built right opposite to my current house. So I launched myself on it and finished all the formalities with in a fortnight. Next came the unfortunate month and the unfortunate day on which I was born 24 years ago. I had to put up with tonnes of bad news hidden in my horoscope on the very same day. I was startled to hear that my dreams were about to get battered and beaten to death. A whole lot of do’s and don’t’s. Maan !!! It just can’t get worse. Eventually I started realizing that it will happen that way, as I didn’t have that sense of happiness which I used to enjoy for tiny things in life in my childhood during the time when I was striving hard to pay the tickets for setting my foot on the distinctly huge second mountain. Slowly, I was getting the sense of “why not rebuild my first hill?” But perhaps with a little more confidence and the sense of cracking it atleast this time. I could already hear the wedding bells ringing all around me not only in my team but also in the closest of my friends’ circle, and has started to hint me that there’s someone waiting for me. I still don’t understand what stops me from nodding my head before my parents for searching a partner for me, as I feel that am yet to step out of my cradle when it comes to this so-called beginning of a new phase in every man’s life.

Although, the results of my leap on the big fat second mountain will be known to me only towards the later half of March or even later than that, it looks like the nine-planets standing and shifting from different positions have already pre-decided on what I am upto at the end of this academic year. And this is the part which I hate the most. Its great to check your horoscope to find a meaning for your life, or rather find a matching partner. But I hate the conviction of following closely on what’s in a horoscope. I am sure there are millions of lives in a planet which doesn’t even know the fact that “There exists a horoscope for every element belonging to this lonely planet”. Why not I am one of them? I doubt if there’s ever a horoscope which looks green from all directions. It seems like, in mine there are hardly any green patches surrounded by thick dense red forests. I strongly believe that one should lead his life chasing his own dreams, desires and ambitions and need not fill the pockets of the horoscope reader who only tells you that you ought to say a hello to so and so, on so and so day of the week at the end of which you don’t find a day on whose right side you find no name. I would love to go back in time and question the first person who understood and developed that 3 * 3 matrix and predicted the future of somebody else’s lives. I am extremely anxious to figure out if he has really read his nine boxes first in place.

Whatever is supposed to happen in this 60 to 70 odd years of my life, let it happen. I will have to try and rework on what I really wanna do with this lifespan. Will I achieve what I wanna do? And how should I proceed to plan the thing that I wanna achieve? All these guys come one after another tormenting the wounded soldier. Give some more time to the soldier to rest in peace within himself. Let time operate him.

Coming back soon

2007-01-18T10:21:00.000-08:00

This is just to make myself aware that there's a lot of empty space here which i need to fill in pretty soon ... Waiting .. Waiting nd Waiting for something big.

le de salsa ...

2006-11-28T00:08:00.000-08:00

Exactly One week after CAT .. I wanted to freak out as mush as possible. Loads of things happened in this week. Both good and bad... Had tonnes of plans for the week. Started with the Casino Royale on the D-day. Altho didnt understand much out of the movie, it really kickstarted me for the so-called freak out week.. Started off pretty well with one movie for 2 days. Meet the parents (Awesome), Sivapathigaram (Pathetic)...R.V, E to follow on... Got some time to spend with friends and with my flute... Fortunately or unfortunately my Flute teacher is delayed for 3 more weeks from her U.S trip. It gave me some more time to blow off the dust particles hidden inside the instrument... Dreams of Salsa Workshop was also high on the list for sunday... But then the so-called "Yes, Have no problems .. so far" said partner ditched me which was pretty much expected. Thirstily was searching for partners, found another who again didnt last for more than 2 days. Atlast the day before I found another partner who did finally manage to stick on.

Although Dindu's chennai ticket glittered in my eyes, I forcelly put it off for the next weekend, owing to the inclination towards learning salsa. Had dinner with Vetti one day along with Sheikh and Dindu. They tried their best to pull me into the dinner talk. But somehow that day I was not really willing to share much. I tried hard imagining what my wud be would be. I think my power house shut down that time owing to disinclination towards the topic. I was always enthusiastic talking abt the future life partner, but somehow that day, am still not able to figure out why I cudnt recollect any of those hidden misteries. Mabbe my focus has so much shifted out that I have been trying hard to fulfill the fun stuff that happens in day to day life... I completely washed myself away from the topic of discussion. I did feel that I could have done better that night, but it soon got over.

I was very anxious to see off friday soon. End of friday I knew how exactly am gonna spend the weekend. Oops the 2 days was filled with event after event.

For Saturday morning, I got myself engaged into the Project LOTUS initiative of Broadcom in conducting drawing competition for 3 of its adopted government schools. Thoroughly enjoyed the freezing morning drive. Met a whole bunch of school kids who were completely disconnected from the urbane life. I have never seen such a small school with not more than 3 closed rooms but housing from std 1 till 5. Government schools are the schools of least priority when it comes to upgradation, better infrastructure, etc. Unable to recognise even one word of what they spoke, felt like a stranger in a foreign land, I started to learn to communicate with them thru hand signs. I found that there are very good souls in my colleagues who took the real hard initiative to go and give back something to the society. Whether its serious or fake, it doesnt matter. I felt at cloud of nine when the competition got over and was about to take off, all the school kids came towards us wished thanks and shook hands with everyone of us. It cannot get any better than that. I joined my ex-roommates for lunch and ofcourse the whole important midday sleep. Met Guja in the evening, drove to the srinivasa temple with him. Came back to gluttonise the pizza ordered and delivered at home. Took loads of pics and went back home with sweet memories.

Somehow, I was desperate to learn salsa over the weekend. Although I was let down by 2 partners, I knew the fact that we really need not bring our own partner. I really thought that the weekend did not want me to learn Salsa. But finally it happened that way. Sunday as usual started with morning 7 kriya followed by breakfast at murali's house. Had a quick lunch and started off 15 mins to 2. Myself and Madhurima in my bike and sheikh and raji in another. After some wandering, waiting for the lost bike/route we managed to find out alliance franchise. Was not able to stop myself in goin for a sugarcane juice. Hit the dance floor soon after the registration process. Altho I initally had problems with a few steps, managed to pull in, but cud not avoid myself getting tired very often. I guess I was supposed to partner with Ashwini, but i did partner with everyother girl there. Salsa steps were quite interesting and didnt require much of an effort (especially the 1-2-3-5-6-7). Steps were not so difficult at all. However, I cannot forgive the instructor who damaged me openly as we were making too much of a noise there and also in making us do the same basic step atleast a thousand times. They didnt really teach us the whole of salsa rather just bits and pieces here n there. The original dance looked awesome. Frequent visits to rest room for freshening up and the quick 10-minute break sessions which saw india lose miserably against southafrica in a yet another debacle combined with meeting a few bitsaa ppl marked the whole day with fun n frolic. Nikhil too joined us for a good dinner at Palm grooves. We made our way back to Zero G. Probably I can proudly say that atlast after working for 9 months in the same building I got a chance to slip in Zero G. End of the day we took a long trip midway to coimbatore to Raji's house. Had a refreshing chai to hit back the house for the next week. With the nostalgic memories of hang over of D.W 2K4 (for which I was the so-called D.W Coord), the week jus started and the journey continues....

hufff ....... with a sigh of relief

2006-11-19T22:24:00.000-08:00

Have been anxiously waiting for this time to come to pen down all my thoughts stacked up for about a month now. I exactly knew whats' to come in the last month and knew how to handle it. I knew the end result well in hand still tried my best to keep myself away from getting affected by it . I was in a tranquilised state preparing for CAT. During the course of last 2 weeks that I spent in home under the false pretence of preparation I had a nice time off work. I enjoyed the 2 weeks thoroughly eating, sleeping and ofcourse taking tests and analysing. In the mean time I got to know that I stepped across my first step and most probably the only step. On trying the big leap forward across on to the second step my bum hit the thick and sharp pointed pole and I hit back and fell right across without clearing the menial height. I was defeated thoroughly. I realised that I am slowly starting to mature in taking up the defeat. I knew there's always the next time. Although I was taken aback, I havent really lost the touch of fighting. I didnt bell the cat but atleast it had left a euphonious ring in me to do it next time. The more I felt miserable about the failure the more passionate I became about cracking the next.

All work and no play makes a jack a dull boy is what I learnt previously. But with the kind of work that am in for the last 2 years I dont think there was any thing to work upon. Several technologies come and go and perharps the person who introduces the technology uses much more grey area in his brain cells than the one who implements it. I havent bothered really to unleash darker regions of my brain so far. For these two years I have never faced a real challenge and I used to avert it more often. CAT is a big challenge. Its not easy and at the same time not too difficult as well. I really enjoyed a lot preparing to take up this challenge. I gave it all up thrice in the middle but due to some unknown calls from the nature, I was called back in again and again. I had a really nice time trying to learn shortcuts. Revising back all that I studied 5 years ago gave me a relishing experience. I relied too much on Quant and DI which I knew I was good enough. Verbal was onething that daunted me right from day one. And on the D-Day I lost miserably in that. During those few days of learning the basics and solving some potentially very good problems, I figured out that I spent more time in appreciating the wonders of math rather than really solving it.

I think more or less I have realised that Math is gonna play a major role in my life. I must mention, about my IISC prof here who warned me at this stage. He brought up an unusual argument when I visited him last time. He asked me on what grounds have you understood that Mathematics is your interest ? I was stuck for a moment. Although I gave him a quick reply it is still echoing inside my mind. Perharps he still has a point which I have not got yet. Feeling more passionate about something is very easy. Questioning your passion is what leaves a bad remark on the self. Well still long time to go for the final choice. But more or less the choice I believe was pre-decided for me. Realising the choice is what lies ahead of me. Am planning to take some stern steps inorder to do this.

I got to mention about my frame of mind one day before the D-Day. I was advised not to study anything means absolutely nothing. Had plans of taking a test but as ppl advised it cud be suicidal, i dropped it. spent the morning watching friends and laughing my heart out. Afternoon took a lovely drive to Rajaji nagar dropped into a Hanuman Temple near ISKCON. Had a heavy lunch and came back home and slept.I did have the hint of "whats for tomorrow" was always vaciallting in my mind. evening I went to Satsang that reverberated me. Lost in singing songs abt the divine, I felt gracious of feeling something supernatural. b4 it ended I started thinking abt the misery felt by my close circle of relations for my indifferent attitude towards their relationship in this month. I just realised that I was away from home for 4 months completely (one sem of BITS) denied myself of T.V and all celebrations in that time. Thats when I felt home sick. Well I think its now time to begin hunting for all that I lost during this time. My mind became clear after Satsang. Without unduly worrying about the D-Day, I revised all formuales.

As the D-Day is past now, I got to focus on my fun part of life. I am now dilly - dallying between the Salsa workshop / home visit for the weekend. Lemme see what works out. Got to spend some time on planning the stern steps for the future as well.

One step more . . .

2006-10-22T22:10:00.000-07:00

I thought it was high time now, to get back and look at what I had scratched previously. Similar piece of advice from many of my friends is not to write blogs that run for pages. I wasn't really sure how well did I drive the point which I wanted to in the previous two blogs.

Yesterday, I finally managed a big heap on top of the first stone that I had on my way. I gotto wait for another month, to really know if I have cleared it. Atleast my mind is in a clear state about what to do next ? Got 1 more month from now to take a run up for the second jump. The even more painful thing with the second stone is that I got to wait for a month and a half more to know if i fell down hurting my ankle or crossed another stone on the way. I have started relying too much on time to decide things for me. Is that a correct strategy or am I just convincing myself with an invalid reason. Atleast I hope I will realise what to do as time rolls by. Maybe becos I exactly know what to do for the next one month. I also do know what to do for today. My hard disk drive got crashed and I gave it for service last week. All the time when my laptop was there with me, I never cared even a bit for him. I missed my laptop too much last week. Hopefully my guy will come back to action today.

I wanted to put down something about my boldness in putting off celebrations last weekend.Considering my previous bashy but painful experience around same time last year, I really didnt wanna make it up this time. But things have changed so much between the last one and this one. I believe , that I knew from deep down the burrows, that I am goin to miss it big time. I prepared mentally for it for quite sometime. When the day arrived, I was invited to my friend's place for a bash with them. Took my time , and went coolly and filled up my stomach and killed time watching Vasoolraja M.B.B.S in parallel with Hariharan's fabulous display of his vocals. Just didnt feel indifferent at all at that time in Kuka's house. They were so go damn kind and it looked like they already knew the thing that I missed this time. Jus when I was about to leave, Kuka's parents made me believe that they were more like my parents, gave me a lovely gift and home made sweets as well. Felt out of the world. Got blessings from them . All fit and fine went back yday and stepped across my first stone. Then came the most amazing time that I spent leaving apart my usual mid afternoon sleep filled with a horrible dream. I visited Hema Ma'm and their family. Was extremely glad to know that I am goin to meet them inside N.A.L for the first time. I did miss company at that time. Went on for a lovely long evening walk gazing past the calm and relaxed N.A.L environment. I felt like this is the place I wanna land up to. Even when I was strolling past those lovely colorful flower pots inside the campus, I didnt feel a thing. I met sir and ma'm and cute ishita. They requested me to join them in bursting crackers in the night. Thats when a pinch of sense of missing something crept into my mind. Later spoke to my mom and dad abt the day. Thats when I felt I could see the difference in their voice too realising the fact that both their sons ditched them on a lovely ocassion. With home grub on its way, i dun think I can redo the pain that I went through, but I can ensure now that am not gonna miss anymore. Waiting for the big thing coming in January. Keeping my fingers crossed hoping that nothing else comes up in the way.

I think from now on, its high time to catch up the tide I missed. Will take off here now. Gotto put in a lot to make my dream of flying past the second stone come true.

The day of mixed thoughts

2006-10-13T08:56:00.000-07:00

13/10/2006 is definitely an unforgettable day in my life,not for my mind but for my soul. I don't know why Americans say '13' is a bad number. I usually do not believe in numerology. But my mind told me, that I am gonna suffer this day (Is it because of 13).I had a wrathful dream last night that, although my internal alarm woke me up at 6(I then realised that I had forgotten to set the alarm in my mobile the previous night), my dream forced me to sleep for some more time to see the end of the story. I am not able to make out what my subconscious mind was thinking. But when I woke up at 8:30, I realised that it was terrible and disastrous. My mind told me that I am gonna face something terrible this day. Thankfully, I didnt get damaged physically,I almost hit a maruti 800 that was going in front of me this morning. I have never applied such a heavy brake so far. Soon after that happened I realised that my heart was beating at a pace similar to a flight taking off. So then it had got to be in my mind. I appreciate the power of Supreme's virtues in carving out my day in such a mixed manner that end of the day I understood the whole plot behind how he has done this day. I wonder if this mechanic has ever tightened the screws in my head tightly. But I am able to feel the bondage between the mind and soul today. This day was meant for my mind to undergo non-stop questions and quick replies which would although put me in a driver's seat but some unknown creature in me woke up and told me that I am goin to regret that solution.

It all started at 11 in the morning with my Mr.D's phone call that led to the complete collapse of my inner creature. My inner creature cried out for help. But I know there's something wrong with me. But my mind asked me to cover it up and defend it. I did that very well, but still my inner creature had a very tough time. I quickly went to my very own Mr.L and told him everything. He soothed me and suggested that I could still cover it up. From somewhere today I got the power to accept my mistakes as well. My mind is usually very lazy to accept mistakes. I was surprised how come today it accepted everything. Then I understood that my mind had developed a strong enmity for Mr.D and had proposed to attack him not by an arrow but by words and prove a point which was never revealed to him by anybody so far. My inner creature had been burning in agony for quite some time now and the 11 a.m phone call added some oil to the wick. Now I realise that I had tried to pour out too much of water into it that it burnt even more than before. I was restless and nervous from 10 till 12.30 when my Mr.M was in a meeting. Finally got him at 12.30 and poured out my frustration in a separate conference room to him. He was quick to understand my struggle and soothed me a lot. I came to know that he was also on my side. My mind felt out of the world when it knew that I am going to attack Mr.D in the afternoon.

I had almost forgotten what the day was when I went for lunch today.Didn't know why, but I took out a totally unrelated question in the lunch table and was getting everybody's views about it. Well,I think my stupid mind came to know the pain experienced by my inner soul and it tried to divert my thinking. Just then when I finished my lunch I got that fear of facing the afternoon phone call. My Inner guy knew my problem and as usual he made me restless. But something stopped me and said that "wait dude just cool it. You have got it right this time and give a damn about what other people think and just go attack it." At 2.30 it was only me and Mr.M ringing up my Mr.D . A small fear came in but it was quickly white washed with not even a single mark of stain and my brand new school of thought of attack came into my mind. The meeting started with me accepting my mistake and promise that I won't repeat it. My acceptance of the mistake didnt put me down rather it poured in a bucket full of ghee which blewed up my inner soul to glow even brighter. When I figured out that the meeting was about to get over and I didnt yet attack made me panic for a moment. Then I quickly started and poured out that one long golden ntence. Probably even a person who has mastered the Webster's dictionary would not be able to make out the structure of that long sentence. I am still not able to recollect what I spoke. But that my mind knew what exactly to utter. He came out and he fired non-stop without breaking even for a moment just like one of those machine guns that Arnold Schwarzeneger uses which fires thousands of bullets in a matter of 5 seconds. There we go. Made the boldest of my statements. Before I could realise the sense that it made on the other end, it looked like the perfect message was conveyed. huff.... my god.... I didnt know that inner guy was so rude this time. Mr.D precisely understood what that 500m long sentence meant and he quickly reacted to that . The reaction was already expected by me, so i didnt waste a moment there further and quickly walked out. My mind felt out of the world for a moment and as usual quickly went to Mr.L to enjoy with him. The inner soul came out of the hot fumes and was bathing in cold water.

The very next moment this inner guy went back to the passive mood again. Something hurted this guy very badly. Now, my mind came out with a big vengeance. Everybody nows that the most powerful way of expressing things is email. So my mind started pouring in a quick email. Baap re... it was so powerful that a person who reads it will get a heart attack. Just to avoid that heart attack, here n there I added a few please's and kindly's. My mind again felt happy for that and went back to Mr.L to share such a joyous email. Mr.M caught me in the middle and told me to just calm down a bit. Mr.L is extremely supportive to me. He came and removed all the please's and kindly's. This email was now an extremely powerful weapon mightier than the Sultan of Akbar's thin and sharp sword. Email happily went and I was feeling at cloud of nine.

I was well into 5 ish. I quickly did a very few impt things which was due for quite sometime now. I gludged on the Dhahi vada in snacks and was about to leave. Slowly and gradually my inner guy told me that I did something which would hurt somebody. It got reflected then. It has really affected Mr.D that the issue got escalated to the Mr.B . Finally, my lead came out and told me to relax. Things are fine. Mr. B feels that the point which was made was very right and understandable, but the way it was told was little too stronger for my level it seems. I thought I gave a damn about it. Well, I don't know why but my inner guy has now started feeling the pain even more stronger. Did I really hate somebody ? It is true. I did hurt Mr.D and I enjoyed it . But Why was I still feeling bad. Mgmt always considers the level of mine as irrespectable. We are compared to the level of freshers. This hurts me even more. I don't understand why people in India are reluctant to respect people for the work they do rather than the expereince they have. This is one major reason why I hate my job. Indeed I don't hate my job but I am getting too much pissed off becos of the amount of politics revolving around.

Best part is just abt to come. Well, I came back at 7 in the evening . Wanted to narrate this whole stuff to my mom. But she was busy with a show from her favourite sanskar channel. Didnt disturb her. I wanted to take a test. But , then the frequent power cuts upset that plan as well. Vehemently was waiting to blurt out all that happened with me today to somebody. I know the person who wud be shud be sheikh. I called him and asked him to come home early for a coffee. Power got cut twice in the mean time. When I met sheikh and before I started to talk about him outside our famous bakery, he started talking to me. The amount of intensity that he had showed looked like he had had a similar fight at his office. And infact it had happened that way it seems . After he finished I told the whole stuff to him. Was feeling a bit relaxed.

Then I came back home and was surprised to see a new email in my inbox. It came from my mr.b . I read that slowly and steadily. Didnt understand it at once. So I again went over it. After going thru the same email 10 times, I understood the content of that email. My cute little mr.b had so politely sketched that email with what he learnt from Bhagavad gita. This email touched me so much that in that moment, it looked as if I was floating in the mid air. Well it was so much moving and appeasing all my senses that my inner guy felt the difference. It felt as if my guy was waving through the cloud of nine. I didnt know that my dear mr.b had changed so much. When I read through the email I really felt like kissing him that moment,if he had been nearby. That email was the least of my expectations and it calmed down all my spirits, body, mind and soul. Boy Oh boy, I got to thank my mechanic for pulling all the strings in my head together in the same day. He pulled up each and every other string and squeezed it for a minute so tightly with a strong rope and when he left the rope it felt as if every other string landed in heaven.I enjoyed this moment so much. i quickly rang up mr.b and solved one more of his issue. It feels gr8 to be at this part of time. That very moment I decided that I have got all reasons as to why I should write this blog. It took me close to 3 hours tonight. I just didnt feel like giving it up at all. I really don't know if I will ever sleep tonight. Rather what will go into my dreams. Whatever it is, I am not going to bother at all. Bcos I have reached the saturation limit of all possible ups and downs at all levels on the same day. 13/10/06(Technically, 14/10/2006 1:20 a.m)

Stuck with the problem of Choice

2006-10-11T04:49:00.000-07:00

Every individual born in this world will at some point of time in life encounter this dangling question of what does he really want to do with his life. How does one realise the solution to such a tough question. Is the answer to that question actually defines his destiny. Is that destiny ever a happy ending or a sad demise. Ultimately, what would an individual like to prove to this world ?
Sadly, I am also a part of this humanity that bears the sin of "Knowedge to think".

What do I want to do in Life ?

My dreams are haunted by this stupid question. I didnt have any idea abt what this is all about untill atleast 6 months back. I don't know who was that crazy person and what was he upto when he drove into me this riddle. Usually, I enjoy a lot solving puzzles. Once this question creeped into my mind, I have almost stopped solving puzzles. I don't understand head and tail of where I am heading to in my career.

Only now I started realising what am I working for in this company. What is it that I really want to do in life ? I don't see any point why should somebody hate my kind of work in a semiconductor industry like the one where I am. Neither do I. All that what I do is the verification of a network swiching hardware. we roll out something like 3 to 4 SOC's per year. I will be working on atleast 2 per year. Before I entered the work life, I have had really big dreams of what I wanted to work on ? Looking at what I was doing all this while, I would feel thats it. You got the thingie dude.

But trying to imagine like 5 years down the line will I still be loving to do the same stuff. "No way , Am not in for it ?" are the quick words that my mind utters.
Then what is the thing that I wanted to do in the prime time of my life is a HUGE mark lying just in front of me. This question has been hitting me left and right for quite some time now.

The first panacea to the problem is this. I have always been passionate about Mathematics. During my college days, the topmost layer of the so-called creamy days was that of my 3rd year in which although I didnt do everything to the best of my potential,but still I had developed tremendous passion for mathematics. Especially the interest, enthusiasm and the satisfaction that I get when I understand a theorem full fledgedly was at its heights in the core math courses, I am here referring to the abstract study. But I am still wondering if I have the right skill set in me to do research in Mathematics. Will pursuing higher studies in Mathematics really drench my thirst for math and my love for abstractness. Thinking down the lane after 5 yrs of acquiring a ph.D what do I still want to do ? This annoys me more. God give me the power to know what I am 5 years from now. But then, its fun without knowing it anyway. I think rather everybody will have to answer this question. On Analysing a little deeper, what will make me really happy in mathematics may not be the research that I do, rather, if I am able to convey what I think to atleast one person in life and make him understand the same.I will be on cloud nine. When both my parents are teacher, then why shouldnt I be a teacher too.

What really instigated me is the vast knowledge that our Vedas had which was never understood by ourselves. Rather it took years of western intervention to really understand the values which we oursselves had in abundance but were lost for a while. I have been referring to rather one section of Vedas which is Vedic Mathematics. There had always been an inner motive in me to understand Vedic Mathematics full fledgedly and pass it on to the younger generation. That way I guess my soul will reap its happiest moments when I make atleast one young kid not to hate mathematics anymore in his life through the knowledge of Vedic Mathematics that I had share with him. (Just now I remembered my middle school teacher, named Sethuraman, was the first person to teach me vedic mathematics that drove away the fear of mathematics that I had in my lower grade. I become too nostalgic when I remember that summer in school which had really kicked in my interest for math.)
Now I really know the roots of this solution. But is it all. I have got one more option.

The other solution which arose in my mind is this mad craze happening with the Management education. I have got infinite set of questions stored in this think tank for this one as to how will it suit me. But the most striking question that I have had for quite some time now is
"Exactly what is it that management education has that just sucks students into it. Why is there a mad rush towards MBA ? "
Offlate, I have been spending sleepless nights trying to resolve this dreadful set of questions. Definitely the end result of the financial status is something I had the wildest dreams about. I am very much aware of the status of my family. I have heard bed time stories starting from my ancestors 5 generations above me all the way till the 5 sisters and 2 sons of my grandfather. The best example of how a community had its sons and daughters who received outstanding awards of very high status for their hardworkmanship to all the way till my unemployed grandfather was vivid from my sect of the so -called vellan chettiars. But I am not gonna worry about the past. Rather think of getting a good ,if not the best and the luxurious and a neat house with a lovely little garden outside with couple of easy chairs for my parents facing the sunset in a clean and an open environment , so called living with the nature. I hope my next generation will provide one such thing to me as well. Putting aside this factor of money what else would I bank upon as my motivation towards management.

If you ask me about this, from the deep down inside, comes this word called "Entrepreneurship"? I don't even know if I have spelled it right.
But I have had night mares thinking about this question. Think of the satisfaction that this young, bright and energetic, never say die soul would receive when I can start a firm on my own employing hundreds of people, serving the daily bread for atleast 400 members of their families and that can bring happiness to atleast 1000 more survivors who depend upon them. There are thousands of villages in India where there is no electricity and even the meagre little basic emenities. I do dream about getting them to higher status. But still I am not this social worker kinds who spends the whole life on it. I don't say thats wrong. But am not for it. Mabbe if I can open an organisation which just shares the sufficient and required information in creating an awareness in atleast one village ( that's too much ) atleast in one villager about the rights that he actually own in this country, the fundamental rights which he should enjoy here although he is not, then I would definitely feel that India is really developing. There are so many poor souls who stays out of their village for earning their daily wages. For only 5 years , I have suffered the pain of staying away from my parents. how would a person survive in foreign land just for this one thing called earning money. Instead if I am able to open even a small cottage industry in the rural side and employ the villagers through which the basic amenities would be fulfilled in their lives, then it really shows signs of improvement of the nation as a whole. So Am I really game for it ?
I would proudly say, my motivation had been the rags to riches tale of Sarath babu who is none other than another Bitsiian. Well I don't know if I am going to succeed in my pursuit. But I think this will open up a lot other young minds of india who will soon realise their responsibility in life and serve atleast a penny to their co-survivors.

Now comes the really tough part of having understood the things that I really wanted to. Is that ALL ?. Well what should I choose.

Off late, I have started realising how the problem of choice has been the biggest threat to mankind's progress. I definitely don't have the courage to take a stand on this right now. I definitely feel I still have a long time to go in life before which one day I have to say YES , I am goin to do this and this only.

Is there a solution to this. Rather there is, but when will i realise the solution ? how long can I postpone this wrathful dead of facing the problem of choice. What's written on my head. Well I don't wanna know the future, but will time provide me the tools to realise the option that I gonna choose .

A for apple

2006-10-10T05:08:00.000-07:00

Believe me, it took ample amount of time for me to realise the necessity of blogging. I indeed had an opinion that guys who never knew what to do with their time were maintaining this sick website.
Having realized the fact that I too belong to the good old species of the so - called "Homo sapiens",born with the sin of "Knowledge to think", finally decided to step in today 10/10/2006. 5:56 p.m. Hats off for this grand opening of unravelling the mystery