Night at Paddy's in Bangalore

The future of Blogs

I was wondering what would be the future of blogs!!!

1. Would Blogger (read Google) market the blogs such that they would take prints of your blogs, bind it into a book and sell it to you?
2. Would they go one step ahead and let you/your friends order online, make prints and send it to them?

Obviously they would be paying you some kind of royalty on this. But the sheer amount of resources they have built up in such a short span of time is humungous. Well it is a good idea, as I think some of the blogs are extremely funny and would save a lot of logistics problems for the would-be-author.


Anyways having a nice time here in Bangalore!!!

Going Back

I should be in Bangalore tonite.

Well if you are into football then the next two nights are important ones for Football. Though I love this game, I have never really written anything on it. Should be doing that once the World Cup starts.

Btw check this out for some good timepass

Putra Jaya the new capital

India: Our time will come

When we were in school, Geography classes were fun. Except for the monsoon part (I am still confused about the South West Monsoon and North East Monsoon), I loved the subject. The best part was the Map drawing part, where you had to mark the various rivers, cities with iron deposits, mountain ranges etc etc. India had everything that any country would want to have, except for good deposits of Petroleum. So when petrol is cheap in countries like Malaysia (where there are some deposits of oil and gas) and USA (who buy from Canada, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria etc etc), Indians pay a lot for it. It drives the prices of a lot of service goods and commodities in the process and ultimately, our country becomes a costlier place to live in, but with very low standard of living.

The exterme north of India had a different shape of Kashmir. As I left school, I realised that what we drew in geography class and what we see on TV or a globe or atlas was different. There was a particular part called POK, Siachen and people are fighting for their freedom in North east. Well India was a hell lot different place to live in than what you see on the map.

As we left school, I realised that there were lot of problems with the country. Their was rampant poverty, burden of unemployment, exploding population, increasing rift between the haves and the have-nots and many such unheard of phenomenons. The map disappeared from memory. IT was a boon for India. If it was not IT, I wonder which industry would have got so many jobs for Engineers, Science Graduates and now all graduates. It came as a blessing for this country. Suddenly, when technology evened things out, India was a global player. More than that, Indians were being seen as a class apart when it came to putting mind to work.

Slowly India exploded and then the issues that faced the nation were crowded public transport, inadequate infrastructure and tarffic jams. Well these were what affected me. I am sure the poverty, unemployment and illiteracy remained in a corner somewhere. Today we are looking at competing against the Chinese economy and it is one hell of a game. It is a 100m race where the Chinese are starting 20 m ahead of us. India has to get the infrastructure in place before even starting the race. Just to give an example, Beijing airport is being revamped for the Olympics in 2008 and that airport alone would be able to cater to the entire air-traffic of all the airports in India today!!!

Our country has been given a lot of prominence by the recent visits of the French president, the American President and the future visit of the Australian PM etc. So the world has started to take notice. Should we bend over backwards in welcoming them to our country? I am sure Manmohan Singh realises that he is miles ahead of Bush when it comes to intellectual capacity and so will our country when compared to the US, sometime soon. In Mallu there is a proverb, "Kaaryam kanaan chelepol kazhuthe kaal pidikenam", which means, sometimes to get your way through, you have to touch the feet of even donkeys. Thats all.

All I can say is our time will come.

Saw the movie Munich. A good watch. Well made movie. I somehow love the way the Israelis do things. Also liked this particular dialogue by Manmohan Singh "Terrorism anywhere is a threat to democracy everywhere".

When there is Flu change to Sea food

Well how do you tackle this????





With this, ofcourse!!! How???

Like this...

All the best for a fellow FUM

He took a brave step...and I hope this is just the beginning of many more things to come...

All the very best Sidin...

P.S. - Also happy to know that you are going to write for Hindu and not for one of those tabloids :)

RDB

There is no point on cribbing about our system, unless you want to participate in the cleansing of it. One of my friends quit his job and joined a NGO and is doing something he preached, unlike most of us (including me), who say and write but when it comes to action...not yet there. The last time I was complaining of the Political class and their corruptuion, he said, dont sit in KL and pass comments, come here and start or join something which fights them.

There are lot of issues why we/I cannot jump into this. I cannot afford to leave a good job/pay and start something, which might not even get me one square meal a day. Our parents/family depend on us to see them through the rest of their lives. I think these are reasons good enough for us to not step into something like this.

Our time will come...maybe after 10-15 years...I still remember our NTSE camp in Thrissur in 1995, where during the course of some studies and lot of fun, I met up with some really strong characters. I do not know what those guys are doing now. One guy whom I cant forget is, Arvind Menon. I guess my memory is good enough for me to remember names. He went to the stage and made a very strong speech, which impressed one and all. We (some of us from KV Pattom) were talking of general stuff and decided to form a party called People's Party of Kerala. Well, now when I look back, I think we should have started it. I dont have any clue where this guy is now. He was from Cochin. I am sure Bala must have some idea on his whereabouts!!!

Inquilab Zindabad! India needs a second revolution to cleanse the corrupt political class...

Some Interesting and Important Pictures

This is the Indian Restaurant on the basement of the mall. Thats Ayyapan, who is in front. He and one of his colleagues in that restaurant came over to my apartment to watch the Indo-Pak cricket matches.

Claim to Fame : Thats where I sometimes have my 3 meals




The pic below is of a house, which is on top of some pillars, standing on a small hill in Petaling Jaya. The guy chose that plot and made it stand on those pillars. He is crazy about pillars you see.

Claim to fame : He is the Chief contractor for pillars in Flyover work in KL!!!




Finally our man, Aaru. No not named after the Surya movie (yes I have seen more Tamil movies that you can actually think). Works in Philippines, where he doesnt get to see so much of Indian food. So hogs like crazy when he comes to KL, which is once in a month.

Claim to Fame : President, Students Association 2003, RECT

Friends and Wedding

“When I was growing up, I didn't have a normal mom and dad, or a regular family like everybody else, and I always knew that something was missing. But now I'm standing here today, knowing that I have everything I'm ever gonna need... You are my family”

Well this is what Phoebe says on her wedding in Friends. My favourite character in Friends is Chandler, for his smart comments and for his trying hard to be funny. But Phoebe is one weird character in the soap. Each one of us have these weird things to say and think once in a while, only problem with her is that she is like that always.

I wanted to write on weddings and how I missed one of my close friend’s, for a long time and as luck would have it, when I switched on the TV, I saw this particular episode of Friends in TV. So here I am…

One of my roomies, Pal got married couple of days back. I knew that he was getting married this month, but I completely forgot about it. Not that I was planning to go to India for that, but for the fact that I wanted to call him up and chat up with him. Just be part of his happiness for sometime. I did call him up today morning and he was in Goa. It was nice to hear his voice, but I felt “you-know-the-kind-of-feeling-I-cant-describe”, when he recognized my voice, when all I said was Hello. It took me back to those days we had all spent in “Happy Valley”, that’s the name of our apartment complex in Thane. Those movies we frequented in the multiplex, those Royal Stags we opened and poured into the 3 similar and 1 different small glasses we had at home, those walks to the Garden View restaurant for Chai and sutta, those morning rush to catch the Patni bus and the evening arrangement for dinner. Well some memories can never be re-lived.

He is a married man now. God! And in couple of years he will have kids. They might not come back to India, if his work keeps him there in US.

And couple of days back, I was chatting up with another close friend of mine, who is married and is also in US. We were generally talking stuff on life and movies and dinner and how she has become an expert in makin Fish curry and how guys are good at making only one thing in the kitchen, no not “mess” – Egg Curry. You can check with a lot of guys on what they are good at cooking. Don’t be surprised if they say Eg Curry. There is something between Guys and Egg curry.

So we were generally, discussing stuff on marriages. I was telling her that I would be tying the knot in the next 2 years. She gave me some advice on the whole thing and told me about life after marriage. Her final line made me think. She said sex isn’t everything; there are many things which will matter after you get married.

I was stumped. Ya there is definitely something about our marriages, right. I might know that only after I get married I guess. To top it I read this story on Lisa Presley’s fourth wedding, attended by all her ex-husbands, her two kids and the best man for the wedding was her ex-husband, father of her two kids. I fail to understand, why is it that they are not able to adjust their lives with the situations and people.

Different shades

Its raining here

And when it rains it pours...

Reminded me of the rainy season in Kerala with special visual effects (Lightning) and sound effects (Thunder)

In this Taxi you are not allowed to...

RECT...the link continues

I dont buy the newspaper daily, as I think half the stuff is rubbish which I do not read anyways and the only time I read is in the loo. I have Bunker 13 also lying in the loo, which I have just started. So today morning in the loo session I realised that Rang De Basanti is running in Mid Valley...wow. If I had known this like yesterday, I would have gone and watched it...going alone is a pain but when you have no choice it is ok.

So after the morning breakfast I was on my way to the office when this guy approached me.
"Are you from REC Trichy"
"Yes, very much"
"Well thought so, I remember seeing you there"
Thats how it started...and it turns out, he is a junior of mine, Kutty and Vineesh's batch...Kutty do you know him his name is a rather long Tam name...but he calls it short and sweet as any Tam in South East Asia does...Aru...I think its arumugham...2003 batch Chemical...currently working as a consultant with a company called ECCI Consultancy. He is placed in Philippines but keeps coming to Malaysia. His office is in the same floor as mine.

Well my morning has just been made by this little acquaintance. Hope to go for Rang De Basanti with him!!!

Size does matter!!!

This is the parking lot when empty at the Largest Ikea Showroom in Asia...

Notting Hill

Wanted to write something on life in RECT but this movie was playing in TV3. I don’t know how many times I have seen this movie in full as well as in bits and parts. It is not a great movie, but it is one movie which makes you feel good, atleast some parts of the movie do.

If you look at the story this is like a guy’s fantasy come true. A famous actress, chance meeting and happenings, she finds happiness in your simple life and friends, comes over to stay at your place, misunderstands you, goes away, she comes back into his life, she dismisses him, she comes back and he dismisses and finally a climatic ending.

“Aint no sunshine when she’s gone…” is one beautifully picturised song. Hugh Grant plays the loser guy and with his loser friends in a completely loser life and he is not unhappy running the “Travel Book Company”. If something like this were to happen to me, then I would wish the actress to be Julia Roberts itself. She is too cute and her smile is just amazing.

Some of the dialogues towards the end are pretty neat.
“I am fairly level headed bloke…”
“Can I say no to you?”
“I live in Notting Hill…you in Beverly hills. The whole world knows your name and my mother has trouble remembering my name…”

And Julia Roberts with the amazing smile in between a heavily emotional voice says something like…“I am a girl, standing in front of a boy asking him to love her.”
Well I should say lucky bloke Hugh Grant!

Malaysia Snippets 2 – Eating out, Petaling Street, Good deed and Holiday Crazy Country

These Malaysians love to eat out and when I say eat…they eat non-vegetarian for breakfast, lunch, dinner and if there is any other opportunity to eat in between, then also. One of my friends took me out to this restaurant called Sri Paandis (well if there was a restaurant with this name in Kerala, it would have been at the receiving end of many a joke). I don’t know why Malayalees have this thing about Tams and Paandis in general…anyways the point is something else.

I have eaten nice slurpy meals in many a Tam and Mallu restaurant in India. But never in my dreams would I have ever thought I would see this sight. Imagine a Chinese family, sitting around a table, eating rice, sambar, and of course non-veg from a banana leaf!!! Well that is something I should say. Forget the Chinese, even a Sardar family. I have often seen that in India too, the south Indians prefer eating with their hands and the north Indians like to eat with the spoon. Ok this is a very general statement but even then, most of you would agree with me on this. So that was something.

Last Sunday went to a place called Petaling Street here in KL. This is a place where you would get stuff like clothes, shoes, bags, watches etc. So most of the people frequent this place just before leaving for their home country!!! The government has made this small area into a tourist attraction, so you have proper roof which is at a height of 2-3 floors. And guess what music they were playing when I went there – Dil To Pagal Hai.

There is a mall called Mid-valley close to my place. The designer company that is doing the interiors of my office has their office in the office complex of this mall. So we were in the basement parking about to park our car and saw this young girl walking around really worried. In between getting our vehicle parked in the huge and confusing parking lot, we saw this girl pass us atleast 2-3 times. So we thought we will get involved. The girl had forgotten where she had parked her car. All she remembered was that it was near a door and was in section 12. Ok, so there is not much we can do right. Please search. We go to the office, come back in 15 minutes and see this girl, still looking for her car!!!

Ok so we thought we should get involved. She thought someone had stolen her car. Well girls can be sometimes very clumsy with number. So we checked with her if it was 12 only. Coz if she has forgotten the number, then god only save her. So the car was red in colour, Proton Wira, no it did not have the remote locking system. So we told her that she can get into our car and we will go around the entire parking lot section by section. My friend told me that he has helped a lot of people in finding their way around the parking. Well it didn’t take us a long time to find her car. It was in section 11, near a door and wall, past which is 12. So she must have got past the wall, looked around thinking that it was 12 where she parked and got confused. Well she was so relaxed. She was like I thought the car was really stolen and all…we told her we do this to good looking Chinese girls around Chinese new year for blessings ;)

Have you heard of Thaipusam? Well chances are it is difficult if you are not from Tamil Nadu. And even if you have been in Tamil Nadu, say take my case, I was there for 4 years, and you might still not know what it is. I don’t remember getting a holiday for this particular festival. In Malaysia it is a national holiday. Can you believe that? For a festival of Tamilians for which it is not a holiday for the country or the state in India, it is a holiday for the entire country.

Of Tags and Girls

Well personally I don’t like Tags. I think it’s the blogs version of a forward mail or spam! Now why would anybody tag others?

Coz they don’t have anything else to write

Coz they want to know something which the blogger never touches upon

Coz of the human tendency of curiosity

Coz you want to know the opinion of your blogger on this specific topic

Coz you want to show others that you have ten bloggers to tag and passively ask, how many do you have?

So I won’t continue the tag.

But, I have been reading some blogs and I have seen this particular tag being written about by guys as well as girls. I couldn’t resist but make a few comments on certain blogs.

Now since it is about the opposite sex and writing how you want your partner to be. I find the girls to be too ideal. Ok, my friends have been mostly guys and very few girls. My group of friends in Engineering as well as MBA has been a circle of guys who had minimum interaction with girls. Well, we never thought that was important. It was quite normal. We would notice the attractive ones, through nudges and eye talk. Though I used to screw up the clock positions (you know the 6’o’clock and 10’o’clock thing), that was a good methodology adopted by guys in general. Booze and movies, watching friends and movies in crowded rooms, playing footer volley and sleeping without taking baths, sometimes more than 2-3 guys in single rooms was very normal.

So coming back to the point, the wish list that I have seen in blogs of some of the girls (I think I have seen 2-3, I know that’s not a good number to make an assumption, but I am not making an assumption, I am just giving my point of view, I guess that’s the reason I signed up for this blog). Here is my take on some of the comments by these girls

Most of them want us to be sensitive!

Ouch! Well I find silence and indifference to be the most common quality in guys I know. It is not that I always knew the happening guys, but it is quite natural for us to react to the same situation in 2 different ways/emotions at two different point of time. Ok you want to know the reason, very simple, I don’t know. Yes some football/cricket matches make us emotional. Yes we cry but it would be nice if you don’t point it out to us and just let it pass as normal.

I want my guy to be funny!

Yes marry a circus clown then. Better still Shekhar Suman/ Siddhu/Cyrus Broacha. Give us a break, all of us are not funny all the time. It is like sachin’s form, brilliant sometimes, forgettable otherwise. Take us the way we are. If on one holiday you had him cracking a lot of jokes then maybe next time you would find him silent. Reason – Well I was enjoying the drive, nice landscape. So was silent in the entire trip. Now how in the world can that mean that I am upset about something? Maybe one beer or one cigarette can set things on fire again.

I want my guy to be rich and have a car etc!

One of the DJs here made a remake of one of the popular numbers “Don’t you wish your boyfriend was fat as me, don’t you wish your boyfriend had more money” I think he was echoing the thoughts of girls in general. You know what, when you are brought up the hard way, make your own way through the jungles of entrance exams and campus placements earn enough to buy a car, you think I would like to give you a ride just coz you were looking out for a prince charming to drive you around in a Ferrari. I would rather get couple of friends and hit the highway.

Not snore!

Oh c’mon. So what if we snore. I know a lot of girls who wouldn’t mind this particular phenomenon in guys. They too just fall fast asleep, as soon as they hit the sack. If you girls keep a condition of snoring, the subset formed from the superset of studs would be alarmingly small, believe me.

Now, here is a list of clarifications from us guys…

1. Yes we can forget certain important dates and anniversaries. But we don’t get late for our appointments, rather we try to be on time.
2. No we don’t sleep with every girl we think looks attractive. Do you think girls are that easy!!! If you do, you are stupid.
3. Ya so what if we find other girls to be attractive. Some girls have good legs, others good lips, some of them have a good smile. We do admit that we are not Tom Hanks.
4. Football matches are of 90 minutes, which can go overtime by 3-4 minutes. There are 11 players in each team and the best matches are played in Europe, so there is a time difference, hence most of the matches are either prime time (so please excuse us from using the remote) or late nite (the crowds are noisy and it is boring watching in mute).
5. Boozing once a week doesn’t make you a drunkard. Beer is after all Barley water. I do agree that too much of anything is bad for health aswell as family life.
6. I think however tough a guy is from the outside, he will have a soft corner somewhere inside. Remember, even Federer cried…

Yes I have a car but I don’t drive, hope she will drive!

Yes I snore and hope she doesn’t mind!

Khudahafis!!!

Waterfalls near KL

25 mins drive...
then about 10 mins uphill and you reach this lonely place













couple of canned beers


and some nice hard hitting water


roasted chicken and lamb to boot it up

Malaysian snippets

I have been in this place for close to a month now. Overall I think this place is quite accommodating and friendly. It is quite an open society though being a predominantly Muslim country. The vision is to become a developed nation by 2020. Here are some snippets on certain features of this country and its people.

• Predominantly Malays, followed by Chinese, Indians, Sri lankans, Indonesians, Pakistanis etc. Most of the private businesses are headed by people of Chinese and Indian origin. There are lots of privileges allowed to the Malays, say in jobs, education etc. So you will find lots of students of these communities studying abroad. Very recently a group of ministers of these ethnic communities approached the government with some recommendations, which was smartly turned away by the government

• Crime is a worry here these days. The crime rate seems to have picked up with rape and murder dominating the pages in the recent past. The latest sensational case has been of a 20 something girl being raped and murdered when she had gone for a jog in the evening. There have been enough cases of bag snatching that I have come to hear by now from different sets of people. These crimes are done basically by drug addicts it seems

• Malaysians love to eat out. The restaurants are open late night and there are a couple of 24 hrs restaurants as well. Chinese restaurants, Thai restaurants, Indian restaurants and Malay restaurants. The Indian restaurants have different names, some are called Mamas coz they are basically Indian Muslim restaurants and some sell North Indian food as well and are a bit expensive than your normal curry house restaurants etc

• Then there is a chain of restaurants called Lotus. Started by couple of enterprising Tamilians, these are huge restaurants which serve almost the entire Indian cuisine. Some of them are open for 24 hours and are priced at a not too expensive as well as not so cheap rate. The guys who own lotus are building 2-3 mansion like houses near where I stay, so you know how successful in their venture. The Lotus close to my place has a small theatre complex which shows Tamil movies aswell

• The quality of English Newspapers is not so good. The leading ones are Star, New Strait Times (NST), Daily Mail and Sun. Sun is free and make money only from their ads, whereas the other newspapers are priced at RM 1.2 (1 RM = Rs 11.8). Sometimes I wonder if it rightly priced as one Dosa is RM 1 at the Indian restaurant where I have my breakfast. Star and NST are basically 100 pages newspapers and more or less a tabloid. There are some Chinese as well as Malay newspapers too. But I think the quality of our Indian newspapers are far better than what we have here

• Bahasa Malaya is very similar to our Hindi/Sanskrit. There are many words which sound similar like Bahasa itself. Some other examples are Bahaya (Danger), Sandas (Toilet, this is one of the most funny words I find in hindi too!!!)…

• The quality of infrastructure is supreme, no doubt about it. Malaysians have this inner desire to make the tallest and largest of everything. Eg.Petronas towers. The largest Ikea showroom in Asia is here in KL. They make new flyovers in 7-8 months flat. I need not say about the Airport, it is one of the best in the world. Agreed that the traffic jams are still there, but I think even London has got jams that last an hour.

• Talking of transport, the city is connected by Light Rail Transport (called LRT for short). There are 2 separate lines (Putra and Star), which meet in 2-3 common stations, the important one being KL Sentral. This place also has the KLIA (Kuala Lumpur International Airport) Express, which takes you from the city centre to the airport in 28 minutes flat. You can do a check in at this terminal also, very convenient and avoids all the traffic in this city. The bus service I think is lacking in this city, never got into one so far. Cabs are another efficient mode of transport and beware of Teksi Premier, they charge you double the Teksi Berimeter rates, a sthey are the luxury taxis.

• This country has got very rich vegetation. When you land itself you will see the thick greenery around the airport. The largest exporter of Palm oil, Malaysia has a lot of Palm trees. There has been also a recent sighting of a mystery animal of 2 m height being spotted in one of the forests. A la Yeti

• Every country has got this dark shade to it. Be it the Mumbai underworld or the Delhi Mafia or the local Goonda. This country has the Chinese mafia. It seems they have personal stake in the government too. The Dons roam around freely and they control a lot of business in this country. Mafia killings have not happened for some time now but everyone knows about it but no one speaks about it

• The Malay local banks are protected from the foreign banks, so you will find only 3 Citibank branches in the whole country, something similar is the case with HSBC and Stan C. The local banks that are doing well are Maybank, Public Bank, Am Bank (Arab Malaysia, they own the mall where I stay), Eon Bank, Overseas Limited Bank etc.

So that’s about it on life in Malaysia. If anything comes to mind later, will jot in. Btw the Malay way of speaking English is very sidey, most of them add a “lah” to almost every sentence. Their justification is it is like the “you know” which other people use in their English. Hmm...

Also if you ask them, anything like, Will you do this/Can I take this train to KL Sentral etc, be sure to hear this “ Can Can” with a very strong shake of his/her head. “Can” used twice, is to ensure beyond any doubt or convince you to do that or suggesting that you can go ahead and do it. It is very funny I should say.

Ok, this is not Malaysia!!!

Have you seen anything like this before?

A temple with a clock tower!!! This is a Pillayar temple and it has a clock tower...There is another Shiva temple on top of a hill quite close to my place. I heard the view from there is awesome...too lazy to go anywhere...but I think I shud do that pretty soon...not for worship, but for the view!!!

This should help...

Some things in life...

Some days back I read in a friend's blog that sometimes when you hear a song after a long time, it takes you back to those times, with those friends with whom you heard it for the first time. Well, I think it is not just songs, it is the same with movies, cricket matches and football matches too.

Here I get to see a lot of Chinese channels and Malay channels other than the usual suspects – the movie channels, the sports channels and news channels. I get two Indian channels – Sun TV and Astro Vaanavil. Now these are basically catering to the south Indian population of Malaysia, basically the Tamil section of them. Astro Vaanavil shows their own content, other than some programs from Surya TV (Malayalam) and Gemini TV (Telugu) and Jaya TV (Tami again). So my consumption of Tamil programs and movies has increased by many folds.

Now coming to the point of writing this blog. Yesterday I was watching Sun and they showed a little-old movie – Kadhalikku Maryaadhai. It was a super-hit remake of a super-hit Malayalam movie, Aniyathi pravu. The movie stars Vijay and Shalini. It was a different movie in the sense that though it was a love affair going sour due to family pressures, the way the movie climaxes was a refreshing change. The original Malayalam movie was released in 97, when I was in XIIth and the Tamil one was released when I was in 1st year engineering, the following year. The movie was a runaway hit in Tamilnadu and I remember in Trichy there were huge cutouts of the stars and the songs were playing all over the place. The movie took me back to some memories of Trichy. The last movie I watched in Trichy was Minnale (RHTDM original in Tamil), with many sets of friends. Though Dil Tho Pagal Hai will remain the movie where we had the most fun, with the theatre filled with Rectians it was a completely different experience, with us dancing on the aisles during songs, how stupid were we guys!!!

Have you ever watched a cricket or a football match in the hostel TV rooms? Well if you have then you will understand the emotions in the rest of this post. Else you can read and try to imagine how it would have been.

The year was 1998. Brazil was playing France for the World Cup. Well what hype, Brazil in great form, with Ronaldo in terrific touch and France having a sleeping genius, Zidane who had not yet awakened to his true form. We were in 2nd year and the TV room was divided into two, those who support the sambas and those who don’t. The story was short as Zidane scored for the first time in the tournament, that too twice to put it well ahead of Brazil. The non-Brazilian supporters, in blues, had a field day at our expense. When it is a 0-3 verdict, you don’t have much to talk about you see. That was some nite!!!

1999 and it was Sharjah and cricket this time. India was playing Australia for a place in the final to again play Australia. And our man was Tendulkar. Some people still believe that this particular innings of Sachin is the only aggressive innings that he has played to take India to victory. With the huge total that was posted by Australia, few in the TV room gave India a chance. That was the time when the TV rooms across India would be vacated as Sachin got out. Some say that the ad rates in the sports channels also dropped due to this strange phenomenon. Sachin did not get out, but the scoring rate was not all that great. Slowly as India looked like achieving the impossible, fellow hostelites, vacated their own rooms and crowded the TV room. It was hot and humid and rather than Kasprowic feeling the heat of Sachin’s batting, it was we who were feeling the heat. India did not win that match, but that was a match, which made India believe in herself, or maybe in Sachin to do the impossible. We reached the final and Sachin hit another century and we won the tournament. I am sure each and everyone in the TV room that day will remember these two matches for the rest of their life. They will remember the shouts and abuses, the sixes and the quick singles. The Tamilians and the North Indians has different styles of celebration and abusing. There was something like “o” podu, a typical Tamil way of cheering.

Come 2002 and I was in Calcutta. The world cup football was going on when the admissions started and we moved into the hostels. The TV rooms were filled, but these were better TV rooms. Being Calcutta, another football crazy city, the college authorities decided to show the match in the big screen in the lecture halls. So we were all there, me as usual, supporting Brazil. I don’t think there were many who wanted to support the Germans. Well it was a very comfortable environment and Brazil romped through.

The two memories that are etched in my memory of the Calcutta hostel are the epic Natwest final match and the India – Pak world cup cricket match.

It was another final, another chance to be a team of underachievers for the team under Ganguly. And when England scored in excess of 300 (325 I think), half the country had given up hope. And when you do not have a Sachin Tendulkar in a team, you have already started with a disadvantage, at least which is what half the country thought. The TV room was full, expected, when you have somebody like Sehwag doing the opening honours. But after Ganguly and then Sehwag departed, the TV room just emptied. There were some of us who wanted to just see the whole match, as we did not have much to do that day. Slowly Kaif and Yuvraj, moved the score past the 200s and then 250s. Smses were sent to people in classes, guys who were browsing from the rooms, rushed in to see it live. The room was stuffed like crazy. Every run was cheered and abuses hurled at the English. High fives were flying, clapping and cheering made sure that the commentary of the match in the last 10-15 minutes was lost. Well that should go down as the most memorable match, were you watching that from home or hostel!

The other one was the world cup match, which India won, thanks once again to Sachin. But the whole setting was different. We had a huge screen made in a hostel quadrangle, people were watching it from all levels of the hostel and booze was flowing like runs from Sachin’s bat. It was like a party match, with everyone shouting and howling for India. Well that was some atmosphere.

In fact when you are watching a cricket match in a hostel which has presence of students from different states of India, you have some really funny scenes. Like suppose Rahul Dravid is not playing well, then there are abuses and bumps happening to guys from Karnataka. And there are some favorite and lucky positions for some of us who are watching it, so that India just score runs and not lose a wicket. Suppose one guy is just getting into the TV room and India lose a wicket, well then the poor soul is termed unlucky and earns the brunt of the whole room for the rest of the match. And the small tea-breaks we have during the intervals were discussion time for the strategies for the team and speculation on what’s going to happen in the second half.

But what I miss most now are the TV room battles I had with my fellow hostelites during the EPL matches. My close friends were Man U fans and me an ardent Arsenal fan. Well couple of years back, there was no Chelsea, so it was Arsenal v/s Man U for the premiership. The EPL weekends and the Champions League atmosphere in the TV room were more relaxing times, as the room won’t be as crowded as any India cricket match. The EPL passion continued to my Mumbai roomies, who supported Chelsea and any non-Arsenal team. But those were the days when Arsenal was playing good football.

There would be good crowds in the TV room for the F1 too. The McLarens and the Ferraris. The Raikonnen fans and the Schumacher fans used to battle it out in the TV rooms. I was not into F1 like I was into football. But some of my friends were into it and I used to sometimes see the start and end of the races.

Parting shot - Any guesses on what the picture below is about???

My Neighbourhood!!!

Thats where I stay. One side is the office on the 10th floor and the other side the apartment or condominium as they call it here on the 16th floor. Good view I should say. The only problem is they are not connected so I come down 16 floors and then go up 10 floors...








Right opposite Amcorp, you have this. Ok not that I will go footballing soon, but the very thought that I can kick a ball anytime I want is heart warming itself. There are kids playing every evening here. Btw Football is huge here...they even have a weekly magazine by the name EPL!!!







Thats the highway that takes you to KL. If you look hard enough you can see the Petronas. But one tower is blocking the other, hence youo see only one tower.










Well there is this nice little water body (we used to call such small water bodies in IIMC as lakes!!!) with a nice jogging track. Its a place for the kids to cycle around and health conscious people.









Yes thats the swimming pool which I can use, if only I knew to swim. People often ask me - How come you bare from Kerala and do not know to swim??? Well I didnt thats it. I am yet to go down and see it, but what do i do after going there.














Traffic Jam - Well they follow me from Bangalore I guess. But jams are very common in this city. See that gate at the end of the road (partly hidden by a yellow building), well thats where KL starts...You can say, PJ, where I stay is a suburb.

Ivide Elaam Kittum

Well, I shifted to a new address in a new city in a new country!!!

The office and my apartment are both in the same mall and so my life is going to be in and around the same mall, I guess...that is whenever I am not traveling. One good thing about this country is that they have holidays for the Malaysian festivals, the Chinese festival, the Indian festivals and go knows which other community.

I have to come down to the ground floor of the mall to buy a newspaper as they do not allow door delivery of newspapers in my apartment for security reason. So I woke up and walked down inside the mall. The still escalators and the empty corridors look haunting in the morning. And right now…well people do freak out on Chinese New Year preparations.

My office is getting done and so is my business development. So I guess for the next one month my posts are gonna be on conversations in Starbucks!!!

I was checking out this Indian restaurant in the basement and chatted up with this Tamil guy who was running it. I asked him what I will get for breakfast and he told me “Ivide Elaam Kittum”, which translates to “You get everything here”. That was so reassuring. Oh I haven’t told you guys about what happened after I ate ethnic Chinese here the last time…Well some other time.

Also, I can download videos from Google!!!

Continuing the Google argument!

Google has been in the news not just in this blog...A friend of mine works with MS. We met couple of weeks back at another friend's wedding and we had a long discussion on Google vs MS...He is a die-hard MS man and he send me a mail today...it goes like this...

Is Google a threat to Microsoft?

Year 2005 was a year of Google. Google has been churning out software at an amazing speed. But more importantly it has been churning out news at phenomenal pace even faster than software. The result, Google’s stock is continuously touching new heights. The meteoritic rise of Google has caused many people to say that it is fast becoming a threat to Microsoft. Is this a reality?Let’s evaluate the threat and see if it is real or just hype

Google’s speed: Yes, this is true. Each day we see a new product from Google going into Beta. Amazingly, a lot of Google software is in Beta. Google is even better at delivering news. The result, Google seems to be the most efficient and competitive company. What most people don’t realize that most Google applications are web based, hence it is easier for them to keep updating their servers with new versions if they find some bugs. Even when applications are desktop applications they are not enterprise level or critical application hence even if they have bugs it is not critical. Microsoft cannot do this with their applications especially with OS and other enterprise level application servers. I am not saying Google is not efficient, what I am trying to say is that Google can afford to have application in beta and with bugs, so lifecycle of these applications should not be compared with lifecycle critical applications. I would say today Google is doing the same thing what Microsoft did a few years back when they could afford to have buggy OS and applications as most its users were not enterprises.

Google’s stock: Another reason why people think Google is threat is rise of Google’s stock. Let’s go back a few years. In year 1990 Microsoft traded at split adjusted $0.62. Today its stock is at 27$, a rise by 43 times. In fact I am not even taking into account the golden days of year 2000 when it was much higher. Let’s see another stock EMC. In year 1990 EMC traded at $0.12 and today it is almost 14, a rise by 116 times, again I am not taking in to consideration days when EMC was 100$. Hence rise like Google is expected of good companies. What has made Google’s rise spectacular? It is rising in more or less stagnant market and full marks to Google for that.

Sustained Growth: Google is really growing at a phenomenal pace, no doubt. But is growth as such rate sustainable? I don’t think growing at such a pace is possible for long period of time. This happens with all the companies, probably almost with everything. Companies grow quickly when they are young just like humans, then they reach maturity become stable and don’t grow like they were growing earlier. Finally become old and die off. Probably, Google is still in its childhood.So, Is Google really a threat to Microsoft? Not really. It is very good company which is growing very quickly but over the time it would stabilize and there would be new kid on the block which would be growing like Google is growing today and I will write a similar story about it. Only names of threat and threatened may be different.

Well meanwhile I get this link from a discussion board...

Ten Things Google has found to be True!!!

Enjoy reading!!!

~sujith

http://video.google.com/

Is up and running...but I dont think we can download the videos in India yet...

I tried downloadin some nice mallu videos, but this is the response I got

Thanks for your interest in Google Video.

Currently, the playback feature of Google Video isn't available in your country.

We hope to make this feature available more widely in the future, and we really appreciate your patience

So I will wait!!!

50th Post

It’s been more than a year and many thousand words and some pictures since that November 2004, when I used to frequent the blogs of two of my friends, K , a very soft spoken, creative drummist and Sidin not too modest, gifted writer. The association we have goes back to RECT, where we formed the Dumb Charades team in the first year and scared the seniors with a neat performance in the first year.

Ya coming back to my blog. I finally decided to write on Mumbai life, where you remember timings like 7:58, 8:02 because those are the train timings and that is around which my life revolved in that city. The initial period was a little slow and draining as you needed time and later on a laptop to write something. Well time is a constraint in a city like Mumbai which for many reasons are crowded beyond its permissible limits. And time is some 9 hours I get at home on a weekday and that is inclusive of sleep. Weekends were for movies and more sleep. Well in case of my roomies- Goa, it meant more sleep, Prabhu more work, Pal more of both and Vishal, who joined us late, sleep and Powai.

November was also the time when we had to break Pal’s credit card and make into 4 pieces and carry it in our wallets to meet sometime later in life and join them and make merry. I almost lost my piece, but later on realized that it is still with me.

Well sounds stupid but we were very senti that day when first Prabhu left for Bangalore in a train, with his waving hands fading in the darkness… Pal and Goa knew him for more than 7 years and I for 3 years. Sometimes silence is so thick that you can actually take a knife and cut it. Well even if I had one, I wouldn’t want to cut it that day. For long we were silent and just went home quietly. We knew that Prabhu was gonna be very difficult to track once he is out of our radar. Well he was the guy who stopped smoking I do not know how many times. Prabhu is in Bangalore and we are almost in touch!

Then Pal left for US. This time Goa and I did the honors of going to the airport at 12 AM and seeing him off. Well we knew that Pal once gone is never gonna look at coming back to India and would be happy there. He was a masti person who would just have a nice time with any company; he would just gel into any group. We packed many packets of sutta with him and by the time he was leaving, I am sure he knew more of downtown US than the whole of India. The return trip was as usual silent. Just me and Goa. It was hitting him more than it hit me, as two of his very close friends who have been with him from college and work, have just left him in a span of few weeks. But like I said in an earlier post, guys find it very difficult to communicate in difficult circumstances. Pal is getting married in February!


Pal, Prabhu and Goa














Meanwhile, K was also planning to go onsite like any other software engineer. He was a misfit in the Mumbai life or for that matter, work life. Well I went to see him off too. The hilarious thing was we went about buying stuff to brave the cold/snow (in US) a day before he left. Well generally confused that he is, I am not very sure what he would end up doing in the next 2-3 years. It has been a long time since we used to shout in chorus “K we love you” during the western music performance at RECT…he has grown more stubbles, more hair and put on more weight and inches and is braving the snow there in US…He continues to write and amaze people. I have no idea when he is back in India and I don’t think even he has!

Our new roomie, Vishal was a new comer into my life. I knew him only for like 2-3 months. But he was fun and he came up with this one god-level joke once in a week types. And that would be really funny. He took up Japanese very seriously and it was some time pass for us. He never believed in going to a multiplex and watching movies as they would be shown by our cable operator in a week’s time. Well his khichdi is Goa’s favorite dish. Vishal is pursuing some more Japanese classes has become a Tiger!

Goa was the only guys who was stay put in Mumbai till Cap Gemini happened to him and he is set to move not just out of the city, but out of the country. Well this time only Vishal will be there to see him off! But now that he has decided to buy a roof above his head I think things are going smooth for him. He was with me throughout my Patni stint, together in mainframe training then in warming the bench, through the layoffs and then the SEEPZ training and then the Japanese Business Unit. We got into the same project and same parties and then I ditched him and went for higher studies. But I don’t think he nor his bike can change. So he is still sleeping away to glory like those old days in Happy Valley. Goa is all set to grace the Queen’s country very soon.



Vishal, Goa on his bike and me











I left Mumbai in September after another 10 month stint in Mumbai. This time Goa and Vishal were left alone. All that later. Now back to my blog…

Life in Bangalore after some days…

~sujith
P.S. K - I dont have a pic of urs man...It is there in the comp at home
When Pal and Prabhu was there in Mumbai we didnt have a digicam, hence the pic is from a mobile cam and so the low clarity

The Unending Google Story

It was December 2003 and Bill Gates was poking around on the Google website and came across the “Help Wanted” page and found the job specifications put up to be very similar to the Microsoft job specifications.

The scare is slowly becoming a reality now. Google has been slowly unveiling new products – from photo-sorting software to Web-based email to search via mobile phone. It gave users a alternative to write, post, share and print documents without using Windows and MS Word.

As one of my friend’s told me, very soon a time will come when a PC would just be a machine to connect to the net and you would connect to the google server, write documents on their text editor and save it to the server and mail it to anyone you want to, using Google mail. The only product which scores for MS is the Excel. There is a lot you can do with that product which you can’t with anything else. Google has yet to come up with a spreadsheet of its own.

On Jan 1st the LA Times reported on the google-fueled paranoia. And maybe today Larry Page would come up with an announcement in the Consumer Electronics Show at Las Vegas. For the first time maybe, Bill Gates’ announcement of the latest MS offering Vista is being overshadowed by what Google might announce today!!!