Reflections

2008 has come and gone like a bullet train with only a few hours left which I intend to spend in anticipation of the new year. My alluding to a train is in one way fitting because this is the only year in recent times where I have travelled a lot by train thanks to my location and profession. My professional life in 2008 has been a reflection of the global financial market. Nothing much to say and on top of that I have been dealing with some really difficult people. I have been through some tough times but then I have also learnt some good lessons which will definitely help me going forward. I have spent the major half of 2008 outside my country. This has given me a lot of time with my family. I have been able to give a lot of attention to my daughter and play new games with her like the "Magical tooth fairy" game and watch some movies with her. I have also been able to devote lot of time to blogging, poetry and reading books. I intend to continue this in the new year. I have...

It is Christmas time. The holiday season is here and there is sale going on all around. After all Christmas is also a big event for retailers and a big economic stimulus for most parts of the world. Last year I learnt about " The Bhagavad Gita " thanks to my daughter. This year, I learnt something about Jesus, thanks to the Christmas celebration at her school. My earlier knowledge of Jesus, I must admit, was very limited. At her school, the story of Jesus was presented in a nice way, in the form of a TV news, with a TV crew interviewing characters (thereby presenting the story) and with nine songs interspersed in between, each song starting with one letter in the word "Christmas" and describing one event in the birth of Jesus. It also felt good because my daughter participated in this play. Wikipedia tells me that this is one of the traditional ways of celebrating christmas. Today I happened to read about Jesus's famous "sermon on the mount" in a book....

To lead a life seems to me to be like building sand castles on a beach. The rising waves are the environment around us. Some people also call it fate. The past is full of the sand castles you have built, the present is waves eroding the sand castle you just built. The future is all about what you want to do. Do you want to make an attempt to build a better sand castle based on your past experiences? Do you want to sit back thinking about the glorious sand castles you built in the past and do nothing? Do you want to rue your bad luck and curse the water? or do you want to try something totally different? Your future is always in your hands.

scribbled on the back of the sickness bag on the flight to belfast .. posted on the blog from the bus to belfast city. Don't what's happening to me. புத்தனுக்கு போதி மரம் அசோகனுக்கு கலிங்கப் போர் காந்திக்கு அரிச்சந்திர நாடகம் நிகழ்வுகள் எல்லாம் செய்திகள் ஞானமுண்டு நம்மைச் சுற்றி தேடல் தேவை இல்லை பார்க்கும் பார்வை வேண்டும்

On the bus to stansted airport, inspired by the sunshine and the barren trees all around me. One of those moments when I had a pen and paper near by. Autumn comes takes the leaves makes us look so rusty Winter comes shakes us up leaves us looking barren Cometh spring with flowers and leaves Oh we look so colourful! Summer comes we bathe in sunshine end up looking bright Looks may change with passing seasons at heart we remain the same Caring for you smiling at you we even bring you rain Leaves and Flowers may come and go it's roots that hold us through .. It's roots that hold us through and roots are what we are!

I was reminded of the poem on Ulysses today. I had read it almost 20 years back, courtesy the CBSE English book for eleventh or twelvth standard. I remebered Ulysses as an old man, keen to continue his quest for knowledge, leaving behind his kingdom to his son and marching on with his sailors to explore the world. That was the impression left in me when I read the poem 20 years ago. It was thrilling to read the poem again twenty years later. There were some different interpretations that occurred to me, one of them being Ulysses was singing this from his death bed and about the world that he would explore after death. I am sure you will agree that once in a while it is heartening to reassure oneself that the years gone have not been wasted and have enriched one to some extent! Ulysses is a long poem but has some lines that stand out and you might heard them being quoted often, including these two snippets which i like in particular: I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experien...

I signed up recently to twitter. I have not started using it to a great extent yet but some of the features look very appealing to me. Twitter seems to be a great example of Publish-Subscribe put to good use in social networking Some points which appealed to me about Twitter: 1. As a sender you can choose the people to whom you send messages 2. As a receiver you can choose whom you follow and get updates from them 3. And you can stay connected wherever you are. Twitter supports multiple devices - SMS, IM, through the internet I think Twitter was originally started to help people share short updates on what they were doing to people who mattered to them. However read these 2 interesting posts from the twitter blog and they will give you an idea of the power of twitter and how people have embraced it. Twitter helped transform Thanksgiving to Tweetsgiving and raise 10000 dollars in just 48 hours for a good cause Twitter was used by people to provide Live updates during the Mumbai blasts ...

I came across this interesting piece of innovation thanks to JPs blog. If you are walking around on a beach and find strange skeletons made of plastic tubes moving around, don't be scared or surprised. Theo Jansen has been creating animari's (beach animals) from 1990. Animaris are Skeletons made of Yellow Plastic tube which move around on wind power. It looks like Theo Jansen eventually he wants to put these animaris out in herds on the beaches and leave them to lead their own lives. You can read about how he has made these animals move around using wind by clicking on the link below. Amazing how he has thought of legs, muscles and stomachs for these animals using only plastic bottles and tubes and wind power. http://www.strandbeest.com/idea.html I have heard of UFO. IS this a new category - UWO?

When I started my blog the first post I wrote was about my mother. Today I feel like writing a post about another relative who impressed me and has left an indelible mark in my life, my maternal Grandfather. My grandfather was a rare friend from a different generation, a well wisher beyond imagination and the person solely responsible for whatever little decency that prevails in my current English vocabulary. He was a rare and complete person. Unbelievably well read and well informed, that he was, I found him always fresh in his thoughts, reserved in speech, excellent in humour and unparalleled in love for his family. For his dedication, amazing attitude and abundant capabilities, I would say life had been a bit unfair to him but then he never seemed to show that he thought so and what was special about him was his detached attachment to life. One of the amazing things about my Grandfather was his mastery over the English language. He simply seemed to know the meaning of every word th...

I am back to the habit of reading books. Not just one or two, I have been doing that regularly for years. I am now reading book after book, sometimes several books in parallel! I owe this to eclectic collection of books in English county libraries apart from the fact that I have managed to find a lot of time at my disposal for this reinvented pastime. I am just back from a visit to the Blandings castle . If you have read P.G.Wodehouse you might not find this odd but otherwise you will be a bit surprised to know that I have been rolling with laughter while reading the book, bursting suddenly into loud laughter, that too quite frequently only to find surprised faces staring at me doubting my sanity. One of the interesting aspects of the Wodehouse way of narrating stories is the detail that goes into describing the different characters and their actions. The author simply paints carciatures in the mind of the reader with his words. "Full moon" is a typical P.G.Wodehouse book a...

For quite sometime now I have woken up with this strange feeling of having walked out of a door which on hindsight had the name of my current workplace written in bold on it! I also feel that I have continued walking and walking since then but haven't come across a new door yet. Is it that I have continued to look at the closed door till now which has prevented me from seeing a new door open? I am not sure but I have definitely not looked out keenly for new doors. Maybe it is high time I did!

Leadership has always been one of my favourite topics. I have read lots of books on leadership and even written some posts earlier on what Dr.Kalam had to say on leadership, about the way Obama emerged from nowhere and inspired a nation with his speeches on change. I was prompted to write a post on leadership today because I realised that there is a total lack of leadership around me. Today I noticed a strange coincidence between the current state of India, after the recent terror attacks and that of the organisation I work for. There is a dearth of good leaders and in particular, there is a total lack of ownership, when there is a crisis, in both these cases. In my organisation there are several managers at various levels who are self centred and primarily focussed on pleasing their bosses. These managers seem to me to be like the terrorists who tried to blow up the Taj and are rocking the foundations of the organisation. In both these cases, I feel it is high time a leader emerged to...

I came across a book called " Dealing with difficult People" by Roy Lilley in the county library. I have been dealing with a handful of difficult people in my work life in recent times, so no wonder I picked it up. I finished reading the book yesterday. It didn't tell me something totally different from what I knew in terms of approaching such people but I liked one thing in particular about the book. This book gives a positive outlook to dealing with difficult people by saying that they are predictable. Don't know about you but this is something which had not struck me earlier. Quoting from the book itself " Remember this: Difficult people are preditable people. That simple fact makes your life much easier.They are difficult not only to you. They are into themselves and are difficult to everyone. Predictable is easy. You can prepare for difficult people, you can plan for them, you can plot, scheme and collude against them. They are stuck in their ways. All you h...

I came across this video. Thanks to Suraj . http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=M0XTPSYdP08 500 rupees cannot help do anything worthwhile for some, can be spent on Party and drinks for most, reminds few people of unseen movies, is the cost of a haircut for one person ... whereas for some others it means so much! A poor boy says it will help him pay school fees and buy books and another one says he will have the meal of his life time in a big hotel. What would you do, if someone gave you 500 rupees free? Think about it! Isn't it surpirising that not even one person in this video said he would donate it to charity?

I happened to see the much hyped Tamil movie “Vaaranam Aayiram” yesterday. Don’t know what public opinion is and how the movie is faring in theatres but I was totally disappointed with the movie. The first mistake Gautam Menon did was the title. “Vaaranam Aayiram” is the beginning line, of a famous Tamil poem by the renowned Tamil poet Andaal which beautifully illustrates the arrangements for her marriage with Lord Vishnu. "Vaaranam Aayiram" means a thousand elephants. Imagine Lord Vishnu walking in a marriage procession with thousand elephants! And you don’t even get to see Surya walking as his normal self in this movie. The title sets a huge expectation but is not backed up by a good story. “Vaaranam Aayiram” is a haphazard collection of events. A more suitable name would have been “Nigazhvugal Aaayiram” (1000 incidents) because there are too many incidents to digest. Don’t know if I sound extremely critical, but the title that comes to my mind is “ Oru Udhavakkarai P...

I went through a nice romantic and nostalgic weekend. We just completed ten years of married life. That is what started all this. I went back 10 years down memory lane and recapped all the lovely moments over 10 years. I also reminded myself of all those nice Songs which appealed to me in those moments. I have added at least 15 videos to my Orkut profile and there are a lot of songs still left. I have read in one of Stephen Covey’s books that every relationship should be associated with an emotional account something like a savings account. When you do some good things you get a credit and when you do something bad you get a debit. At the end of the day you need to have a positive balance to keep your relationship going. My exercise with recapping songs has made me feel 10 years younger. I somehow feel like Marlon Brando feels in the movie “Don Juan De Marco” after meeting Johnny Depp, who thinks he is Don Juan de marco, the greatest lover in the world. The only difference is I have ...

I was introduced to a Second life by my good friend A.G.B . Now don’t let your imagination run wild. It is not a new habit or a real new world that A.G.B has introduced me to. Second life is a website. http://www.secondlife.com You need to register yourself and download an application and Voila, you are all set to explore a new world. This new world is a 3D virtual world where you can just let your imagination run wild and create things, things that you wanted to but could not do easily in real life! You can choose your own avatar, build houses, conduct events, meet people, build relationships and so on and on an on. The possibilities seem to be endless. In fact you can even convert your real money into virtual money for this world through some websites and conduct business here. You can fix a price for your creations and make other people pay when they use it. Well there is no escaping from money even in a virtual world! If you have watched the Tamil movie Anniyan , it might sound to ...

Following up on my ealrier post, I also came across this poem by Dr.Kalam . Titled "Vision", this is supposedly Dr.Kalam's favourite poem out of the ones written by Dr.Kalam himself. I remember hearing him recite this in the wharton interview which I shared in an earlier post but got hold of the lyrics only today. Dr.Kalam apparently narrated this poem in Parliament. I climbed and climbed where is the peak, my Lord? I ploughed and ploughed, Where is the knowledge treasure, my Lord? I sailed and sailed, Where is the island of peace my Lord? Almighty, bless my nation With vision and sweat resulting into happiness

I was feeling very low today. Not really sure why as it had nothing to do with what happened today. I didn't have such a bad day after all. I had no option but to go back to the magical voice of M.S.Subbulakshmi , particularly the song "Kurai ondrum illai". Thanks to M.S's divine voice and the involvement with which she sings this particular song written by Rajaji , I was brought back to normalcy. You can listen to the song here. It is actually a video which gives you the additional opportunity to glimpse the heavenly face as well. Kurai Ondrum Illai Inspired by the song and its wonderful lyrics, I suddenly felt like reading Bharathiyar's poems but was not sure if I could get hold of one sitting in a foreign land. I started a search on google and was happy to find this site which has all of bharathiyar's works in Tamil. http://www.tamilnation.org/literature/bharathy/kavithaikal/index.htm Particularly liked this one which I had read before but had lost track o...

I came across this interesting piece of news on dabbawalas in mumbai. The news item claimed that Dabbawalas in Mumbai have started including pamphlets containing ads along with the lunch boxes they deliver. I did a subsequent search on dabbawalas in wikipedia and google. I was reassured of the power of google and wikipedia. I wonder what will happen to me if I don't have wikipedia and google and at my service. Google returned the information that dabbawalas have a website of their own. Here is the link http://www.mydabbawala.com/index.htm The site has this introduction which summarises it all 5000 Dabbawalas 200,000 Dabbas Six Sigma certified ISO 2000 certified From the site it looks like advertising and dabbawalas have been going hand in hand for atleast a year. I came to know of this through NDTV only today. It is not at all surprising that someone thought of using these dabbawalas for advertising. They have such a big network! Afterall even in this digital page connecting to pe...

A poem I wrote today. புத்துணர்ச்சியுடன் புறப்பட்டேன் உன்னுடன் பயணிக்க .. நீண்டதொரு இடைவெளிக்குப் பின் பூங்காற்று திரும்பியது ஆனால் நான் எப்படி உன்னுடன்? அந்தக் கடைசிப் பயணம்? மறக்க முடியாத அந்த கடைசிப் பயணம் பரபரப்பான மாலை நேரம் சிக்கி நின்ற போக்குவரத்து அமரர் ஊர்தியின் நிற்காத ஹாரன் சத்தம் மூடாத பின் புறம் வழி முளைத்த பல முகங்கள் மூங்கில் படுக்கையில் நீ அருகில் நானும் தீச்சட்டியும் உன் முகத்தில் தான் எத்தனை அமைதி? மறக்க முடியாத அந்த கடைசி பயணம் .. எத்தனை பிறவிகள் எடுத்தாலும் திரும்பாது உன் தெய்வீக முகம் கடைசி முறை பார்த்து தீயிலிட்டு அன்று திரும்பினேன் நான் எப்படி இன்று உன்னுடன் மறுபடி புறப்பட்டேன்?

Following up on my earlier post on the moon, today is another landmark day in Indian history. The Chandrayaan launched a lunar probe that planted the Tricolour on the moon today. This I believe was Dr.Kalam's idea. A great idea! India is only the fourth nation to do this. I also liked Dr.Kalam's message congratulating the ISRO team. This is the message I heard him say on NDTV "On children's day you have made the children of India dream of walking on the moon, walking on mars. I am sure in 15 years Indian scientists will make that possible" I told in my earlier post that I see patterns and faces on the moon and today we officially have the tricolour on the moon! Talking about Dr.Kalam , I am reminded of another great Indian who was also supposed to be close to children. Today is Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru's Birthday. I was not able to see the moon today but if I had seen it, maybe it would have shown the face of one of the greatest Indians, sitting in peace and a...

I saw this slightly different B'day wish in the daily mirror for Prince Charles on his turning 60 today "Happy 60th birthday Prince Charles but long live the Queen" You can read the article here http://www.mirror.co.uk/opinion/voiceofthemirror/2008/11/13/happy-60th-birthday-prince-charles-but-long-live-the-queen-115875-20891615/ Apparently "The mirror" conducted an opinion poll on the future of the English Monarchy with 4200 people and 89% of them wanted the Queen to continue and felt that Charles should wait to become King. An interesting Birthday wish well summed up in one line by the mirror!

Chandrayaan has gone into lunar orbit today. A landmark in Indian history as India joins the exclusive club of only six moon farers in the world. The moon plays a great part in everyone’s life. The attempts made to land on the moon and the different lunar missions over the years prove the fascination man has had for the moon. I am no different and I simply love the moon. Enough has been said about the moon by poets and authors all over the world. I don’t know if I have anything different to say but I just wanted to write this post on the moon, thanks to the Chandrayaan and the team of ISRO scientists who launched it. The moon has been a great source of inspiration for me and the relationship is longstanding right from the days my mom used to show me the moon to the recent days when I have shown it to my daughter. I always think of the moon when I am low on confidence thanks to some internal politics which has become a permanent factor in organisations these days. I like the moon’s atti...

Oscar Wilde had to say this about the passion for quotations “Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.” Well this is one of my favourite quotations! I send out a quote every morning to a considerably big list of people in my address book. It is not that I borrow these words and try to mimic people it is just that I feel it is a good way to start a day. I think I just imbibed this habit from my earlier bosses. Sometimes I wonder if I am shooting these quotes just like the sun not knowing if people really find it relevant but once in a while I stop sending these quotes and someone comes back to me asking to start again. That keeps me going. I came across a few interesting quotations from Sports people, thanks to the Blogosphere. “Everyone has a plan until they're punched in the mouth” from Mike Tyson Some really good ones then by Yogi Berra thanks to JPs blog Wikipedia claims that Yogi Berra has ...

It is all treat for Obama a week after Hallowen. I hail America and all Americans for the recent presidential election results. What impressed me was that people have given priority to current issues and have also gone for a younger person over someone with huge experience. The media says Barrack Obama has made history. I think it is the American citizens as a whole who have made history by giving preference for the above two points over something trivial as the Colour of the skin. I have listened to Martin Luther King Jr's powerful "I have a dream speech" fully and he makes the following remark in that speech. "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." It is arguable whether King's dream has fully come true given that Obama is African American but I think it is great to see it atleast partially come true. This must have definitely...

An incomplete poem written in July 2005. Have never been able to complete this ever since. இதற்குத்தான் பெற்றாயோ என் அன்னையே .. உயிரெல்லாம் உறைந்து போகும் ஓர் நொடியில் மலர் போன்ற உன் முகமும் மறைந்து போக விட்டன என் கைகள் எரியும் நெருப்பை இதற்குத்தான் பெற்றாயோ என் அன்னையே ..

I read this news on bbc website today http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7707016.stm I don't know if you have used windows 3.x. I have used it for a year in 1999 when I was in the US. I used to do production support from home for a legacy system. I remember waiting patiently for 10-15 minutes several minutes to even get connected to the client network when I had a priority issue that had to be solved in 1 hour. Those were the days when netscape was popular as a browser and we were still using MS DOS. Windows 3.X was very primitive though it did throw out some better OS in those days like IBMs OS/2 , APPLE MAC just because of the GUI. It is supposedly microsoft's first GUI based OS that was a great success but believe me we have come a long way .. It was however good to read this article and to come to know that windows 3.X was used as an embedded system for powering in-flight entertainment on aircrafts. Didn't know that earlier. Though this article made me conscious of t...

I Came across something called the Bradley effect on the news channel thanks to the world attention on American presidential election. This is what Wikipedia has to say on Bradley effect http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bradley_effect I think it is not only about black candidates. This theory has a wider context which is that in general people prefer to say what is more acceptable and fashionable rather than what they actually feel when it comes to opinion polls. I have always felt that opinion polls are more a creation of the media to build a hype rather than something useful. I think this theory makes sense and there are enough examples that stand testament to that. Will the Bradley effect influence the current polls and prove the opinion polls wrong? We will have to wait for a few hours to see ..

This is more of a followup to my previous post. I was just looking up James Carville on Wikipedia. There was this small section at the end on his personal life. James Carville who is a Political consultant for the Democratic party and was managing Bill Clinton's 1992 campaign against George Bush is now married to Mary Matalin who is known for her association with Republican Party and worked for George Bush on the 1992 campaign. They got married in 1993. Sounds like a real life version of "You've Got mail". It is known that "Unlike Poles attract each other" but in this case I am not sure whether to call these two like poles or unlike poles or "like unlike" poles.

The whole world is waiting for the results of the American presidential elections. The Press has gone all out to create a big hype that this is a historic election. This election is supposed to be historic no matter who wins and the media has collected lot of firsts .. The first African American president or the oldest president in first term or the first women Vice president and the list continues.. Obama or Mccain? I am glad to say that I don't have any political leaning be it the US or India. This post has nothing to do with the elections, it is only about election sentiments! You might have heard about the sentiment that Barrack Obama has. It seems he plays basket ball on the day of election. Apparently he has done so in the past and won and he didn't do a few times and lost. I heard on the news that he is going to find time to play basket ball today amidst his busy schedule. Here is an article on the superstitions associated with some of the people who are part of the camp...

Came across this interesting piece of information today. "When NASA first started sending up astronauts, they quickly discovered the ballpoint pens would not work in zero gravity. To combat the problem, NASA scientists spent a decade and Million dollars to develop a pen that writes in zero gravity, upside down, underwater, on almost any surface including glass and at temperatures ranging from below freezing to 300C. Russians were faced with the same problem and they used a pencil." Did a subsequent search and found the following article which claims that the pen was developed by Paul Fisher and not by NASA. http://space.about.com/od/spaceexplorationhistory/a/spacepen.htm Irresepective of who spent the money I think this is a good example to illustrate that the Costliest solution is not necessarily the best!

Haiku is a Japanese form of Poetry mainly used to describe nature, the uniqueness being its limited syllables. I remember having a discussion on Haiku with the threesome of my sister, my mom and my wife on a lovely night on the terrace, several years back. We even tried some sample ones, the theme being clouds. I don't remeber the ones I said that day but for some reason I was reminded of Haiku again yesterday and I tried some out again on the same theme. #1 காலையில் நிலவோடு ஊடல் மாலையில் வானத்தின் வெள்ளைக் கொடி மேகம்! #2 வானத்தின் அடங்காத காதல் பித்து கிழிக்கப்பட்ட தலையனைகள் மேகம்!

I watched an interesting documentary on the Mahatma in Youtube. It was in 5 parts. Here is the link for one of them http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uj1QTs5Lm0Q Some interesting things I learnt about Gandhi mostly his lighter side thanks to this documentary. It seems Gandhi’s highest ambition when he first came to London to study law was to become an English gentleman. It seems he sported a top hat and silver tipped cane and even took lessons in dancing, violin and French in an attempt to become one. In 1930 Gandhi was arrested for the famous Salt march and then released subsequently by the Viceroy Lord Erwin due to international pressure. The Viceroy offered Gandhi a chance to negotiate and Gandhi went from prison straight to the viceroy’s house. He was offered warm water as per his request. It seems Gandhi took out a packet from his loin cloth. The viceroy was curious and asked him what it was and Gandhi said in a hushed voice, “Your majesty, don’t tell anybody. This is the salt I made...

Halloween is just around the corner and my daughter is suddenly showing a lot of interest in Halloween. She is looking forward to going for “Trick or treat” with her friends tomorrow. I took her yesterday to the town centre and got her a beautiful (!) witch costume. I did some research on Halloween to see why it is being celebrated and to tell my daughter some stories about Halloween. Here is what I found out. Halloween is celebrated on October 31st which is the eve of All Saints day celebrated on Nov 1st. For some reason Halloween was thought to be the night when ghosts, spirits and witches are very active. It seems in those days people used to disguise themselves by wearing masks so that ghosts would not recognise them. This is also in one way supposed to be a celebration marking the end of the harvest season. Halloween seems to have originated from Scottish and Irish people and then spread to parts of Europe and US. While Halloween seems to have originally been a function related to...

An imagination .. A typical Software Project manager singing about himself in Aalavandhaan style like Kadavul paathi mirugam paathi as imagined by a team member .. Politics பாதி .. படுத்தல் மீதி கலந்து செய்த கலவை நான் இம்சை கொஞ்சம் .. Insecure கொஞ்சம் புரிந்து கொள்வது கடினம் தான் கையில் விழுந்து காலில் விழுந்து client ஐ கவர பார்க்கின்றேன் ஆனால் issue மீது issue வந்து கலங்கி கதற வைக்கிறதே! Rating குறைத்து வயிற்றில் அடித்து மிரட்டி பார்த்தும் பயனில்லை கூஜா தூக்கி ஜால்ரா அடித்து காலில் விழுந்தும் பயனில்லை அருமை client e அருமை client e நாளை project தருவாயா? Budget குறைத்து வயிற்றில் அடித்து இருக்கும் revenue பரிப்பாயா?

I am a great fan of Dr.APJ Abdul Kalam. A man who rose from a humble background to become the missile man of India and then subsequently the President of India. In his tenure as president he opened the gates of Rashtrapathi Bhavan to the public and made it “People’s bhavan”. The only president who tried to connect with people especially the younger generation. In my opinion his strong character came out when he sent back the Office of Profit Bill to the Parliament for reconsideration. He was a different president and was not willing to be just a puppet in the hands of the government. I came across this video in you tube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laGZaS4sdeU This is an interesting interview with Dr.Kalam. In this video he talks about several things but what stands out are his thoughts on leadership and the narration of his experience with Satish Dhawan in the context of a leader taking responsibility for failure. Dr.Kalam talks about six traits a leader should possess. They are: H...

I mentioned in one of earlier blogs that my daughter is showing some interest in poetry. She gave me a challenge recently to write a song about cinderella in one of her favourite tunes. I chose the song "Sahana Saral thoovutho" from the tamil movie Sivaji .. Here is how my song goes. My daughter liked it very much and was extremely happy. So this definitely helped me score some points. :-) Cinderella dreams வந்ததோ இன்றெல்லாம் நிஜம் ஆனதோ ஒரு Pumpkin coach ஆனதோ அடடா .. நாலு எலிகள் குதிரைகள் ஆனதோ உன்னை palace கொண்டு போனதோ கனவோ.. நிஜமோ .. Fairy godmother மந்திரமோ.. ஓராயிரம் ஆண்டுகள் சேமித்த காதல் இது .. உன் Step mother தாண்டியும் சேர்ந்தே வாழும் இது ..

There is a famous Shakespeare quote on greatness which goes like "Be not afraid of greatness: some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon 'em." There are many things in life which end up in some places where they were not originally intended to be just by chance .. I read this interesting article in Wikisource about our national anthem in light of the above. This is apparently a response from Jawaharlal Nehru for a question on the national anthem in Parliament. http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_National_Anthem I have seen articles else where that our national anthem was actually sung by Tagore in praise of King George V. The counter argument goes that Tagore referred to God, though it seems more appropriate for a King. The above reply from Nehru tells us why Jana gana mana ended up as our national anthem. Following is the translation of our national anthem in english. O! Dispenser of India's destiny, thou art the ruler of the minds...

I was chatting with one of my friends who for some strange reason has "Strange are the ways of life" appended to his id. In a rare moment of inspiration based on this I shared some thoughts on life. This is what I said to him. "Life is a sly criminal that can make you cry and at the same time have the audacity to laugh at you. It stops laughing only when you learn to laugh back at it." This came in a flow, don't really know why! Not that I am in a bad situation crying I was in a circus last week with my daughter. There was an event with horses running around performing tricks. I didn't see the horses but only saw some familiar faces from my workplace running around and a few familiar faces again from my workplace as the ring master. I am sure you will agree that most of the typical managers are ring masters who tame their people and make them run around according to their whims and fancies. When someone is different and he doesn't fall in line he is whip...

As I said in my earlier post, I have numbers dazzling around in my head courtesy my new addiction to Sudoku. I just found something odd about numbers in nature or maybe I should say something about odd numbers and nature! When you talk about a group of things that have come naturally they are always odd numbers. Be it the Seven hills of Tirupathi or the Triveni Sangamam at Allahabad or the confluence of three oceans at Kanyakumari. I have a limited knowledge of geography but I am sure there must be more such instances but I have never heard of even numbers in such cases. The fantasy for odd numbers is not restricted to nature and is evident when it comes to man made things as well. Be it the Seven wonders or Seven sisters, or in stories “Seven dwarfs” in the Snow white story or the Three muskiteers. If you have read Enid Blyton you must be familiar with The famous Five and Secret seven. I wanted to mention of the Trinity of Hinduism as well here but I was not sure if I should call it n...

I have been resisting the temptation of Sudoku for a couple of years now. I finally gave in last week. I saw a book on sale for a few pence and it remained so for a few weeks. So I finally decided to see what Sudoku has to offer. Believe me I have numbers dazzling around in my head as my write. I have solved several Sudoku puzzles over the week and I am qualified to call myself a Sudoku addict now. What appeals to me is the simplicity of the game and its straightforward rules. It is all about permutations and combinations and doesn’t need any mathematical genius. Above all I get it free on the London paper and it is a great companion for the one hour train journey which I do very often! Contrary to what I thought, the book I bought claims that Sudoku originated in the US and it became a big hit in Japan subsequently. I have read else where that Sudoku originated in Japan because of the limitations of the Japanese language when it comes to crossword puzzles. What is your experience with...

The festival of lights is here again. Diwali .. Is it the celebration of the victory of good over evil, Krishna killing Narakasura, as the story goes in the south? Or is it the celebration of return of the good, Rama coming back to his Kingdom after exile, as the story goes in the North? Whatever it is, Diwali to me brings back fond memories of my mom. I must admit that the festival of colours has lost some colour as far as I am concerned for the last 4 years without her. The love and affection in my mom’s eyes as she applied oil on my head in preparation for an oil bath .. The happiness with which she prepared all the sweets and delicacies I liked .. Those lovely moments when she handed me a sweet or asked me to burst crackers.. The glow and appreciation in her face when she saw me in a new dress .. That was Diwali for me for many years and is still fresh in my memory. Today Diwali makes me look forward to only the trip with my daughter to the cracker shop and bursting the crackers th...

I have been watching a lot of Al Pacino movies of late. Have downloaded a few more which I need to watch. Have also seen a lot of ads on " Righteous Kill" starring Al Pacino and De Niro which has hit cinemas recently. Of the ones I have seen so far, I was particularly impressed with " Scent of a Woman ". It is a total contrast from the usual Al Pacino movies and Al Pacino has done an excellent portrayal of a blind colonel. Fittingly he has received the Oscar Best actor award for this. I have been fortunate to see two other good portrayals of a blind man on screen. Naseeruddin Shah in Sparsh (Hindi) and Kamal Hassan in Raaja Paarvai (Tamil). Somehow I see a lot of similarities in mannerism between the 3 of them. Sparsh was released in 1980, Rajapaarvai in 1981 and Scent of a woman in 1992. Kamal must have definitely seen Sparsh and Shah must have influenced him but what about Pacino? Whatever it is , all three are great movies and a must watch. If you have not see...

Logging into Blogger after a long time. My daughter has started playing around with words. I was impressed with this particular one which is her first poem :-) Hi.. Bye.. Where can I fly? Can I fly in the water? Where Should I fly? Or Why should I fly? So many questions to answer! When I fly What if I cry? Maybe I should be a dancer..

I think this is the most recent one I wrote. Written in Oct 2006 :-) தனிமையில் அமர்ந்தேன் வாழ்க்கையை மதிப்பிட்டேன் நினைவுகள்.. நிகழ்வுகள்.. அனுபவங்கள்.. கனவுகள்.. (என் முன்) தோன்றின . . மறைந்தன . . கடந்த காலம் வீணான உயிர் மூச்சாய்த் தோன்றிட தோன்றியது வருங்காலம் வீணாகும் உயிர் மூச்சாய் அழகான ஓர் அமைதி மனம் எங்கும் பரவ கடந்ததும் இனி வருவதும் வாழ்வும் அதன் முடிவும் (நின்றன) சமமாய் என் முன்னே

Number two .. Again concept taken from my uncle's poem and modified in Mar 1997 to see if I could write :-) இன்னமும் இருக்கிறேன் நண்பர்க்குப் பகை ஆனாலும் நம்பிக்கை தீர்ந்து போனாலும் முடிவகளுக்கு அன்னியமானாலும் கனவுகளில் தோற்றம் இழந்தாலும் முகத்தில் கருமை படர்ந்தாலும் கண்களில் ஒளி குறைந்தாலும் இன்னமும் இருக்கிறேன் சில முகங்களின் சிரிப்பில் இனிமையான உன் நினைப்பில் நீல வானின் நட்சத்திரம் என்றாவது என் கையில் மோதிரமாய் ஒளிரும் என்கிற குருட்டு நினைப்பில் இன்னமும் இருக்கிறேன் நான் இருக்கிறேன் அதுவல்லவோ முக்கியம்?

My daughter got hold of one of my old note books while we were cleaning my book shelf. It was full of poems that I had written over a few years. I am giving the first one below. This was the first time I tried writing a poem way back in Mar 1997. I took one of the poems written by my uncle and tried to see if I could write something on similar lines. All lines to be interpreted as a young boy talking about his mother :-) நான் இன்று உன்னிடம் வருவேன் மார்கழி மாதப் பனிக் காற்றாய் மாலை நேரத்து இளம் தென்றலாய் நான் இன்று உன்னிடம் வருவேன் ஒரு மழலையின் ஆர்வத்தோடு கண்கள் விரிய நீ கதை சொல்வது எத்தனை அழகு என்று சொல்லிப் போவதற்கு . . நான் இன்று உன்னிடம் வருவேன் மழையைக் கொணரும் கரு முகிலாய் இன்பம் பொங்கும் கடல் அலையாய் நான் இன்று உன்னிடம் வருவேன் என் நெற்றியில் விழும் முடி விலக்கி நீ கனிவாய் பதிக்கும் முத்தம் எத்தனை அழகு என்று சொல்லிப் போவதற்கு . .

I have been reading Amartya Sen’s “The Argumentative Indian” for quite sometime now. While Amartya Sen is a renowned Economist and a Noble Laureate, he is not much of a historian and this book stands testimony to that. The comments on the back of the book claim a lot about this being the best account of Indian history that must be read by every Indian. I beg to disagree. I strongly feel that Dr.Sen should focus on Economics and leave history to historians. The book is supposed to be a collection of essays on Indian culture, History and Identity. However there is a lot of repetition in all the essays and what stands stark clear is Dr.Sen’s limited knowledge of Indian History. All the essays revolve around one or all of the below points though the titles are different: The Bhagavad Gita as an argument between Krishna and Arjuna in the Mahabharatha Javali’s argument with Rama quoted in Ramayana Akbar’s forming Din Illahi as a combination of religions Dr.Sen’s strong views against the BJP ...

12th Jan The conqueror of Mt.Everest is no more. I remember reading in General Knowledge while in school about Edmund Hillary’s feat. Over the years I had not bothered much about Ed but today he had made the headlines and I read about him in the morning Newspaper. Beyond his achievements and the work done by him in Nepal to set up clinics and schools, which the article mentioned, there were 2 points that brought out Ed's humility which really impressed me. Though he was the one who started the expedition and Tenzing Norgay was only his guide, it seems he refused to accept till Tenzing passed away that he was the first man atop Mt.Everest. In spite of being one of the greatest adventurers of the century, he preferred calling himself an “ordinary person with ordinary qualities”. Ed did not have a picture of himself taken on top of the Mt.Everest. The only photo taken was that of Tenzing at the summit, which was taken by Ed himself. It seems Ed remarked later that “As far as I knew, h...

After the second test which was marred with bad Umpiring decisions and the nasty Symonds - Harbhajan incident, the Australlian team is facing a lot of criticism from their home crowd. The Australlian media has been conducting a lot of opinion polls related to this and the captain Ricky Ponting in particular is getting some nasty comments and rave reviews about the way he has led the team. Majority of the people want Ponting to go! All this criticism is inspite of their record 16 wins in tests and an equivalent winning streak in one dayers! Well sometimes being on the winning side alone does not matter, how you win also matters! Ponting claims that he plays cricket hard but fair but in my opinion accusing an Indian of making racist remarks is slightly overboard and this seems to have been made an issue specifically to divert attention from the bad umpiring that changed the result. This is definitely not in the spirit of the game. The Australlian team is solely responsible for having cha...

I have been listening to a lot of music over the last few weekends. There is a saying in Tamil which goes something like “When there is not enough food for the ears, you think of giving some food for the stomach”. A very true statement indeed! This very well summarises my experience over the last few weekends. I have been listening to the doyens of the Carnatic world. Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar , Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer , M.S.Subbulakshmi and M.L.Vasanthakumari . Thanks to the internet and the world of mp3s. I am too small and I know very little of carnatic music to comment on these great people but I must say I am in a totally different world free of tension and I feel so calm and energetic over the last few weekends. I think all this started because of the Margazhi music season and the talks happening around me related to that. I had been to only one concert myself but then I think it drew me towards music after a gap. I don’t need to write much about music. So much has been writte...

I have been thinking of writing about Dada (Sourav Ganguly) for quite sometime. One can only marvel at this man’s grit and determination. What an amazing comeback Dada has made after being dropped from the Indian cricket team and left totally in isolation! If you ask me who my favourite cricketer is, I would say Sachin any day but then I have always admired Dada. Sachin is a genius and there is no cricketer as talented as him but Dada is still special and loveable. How can one forget Dada’s reply to Flintoff when India won the One day at Lords? A cricketer with limitations but with great determination. That is what took Dada through a successful stint as the captain of the Indian team and that is what has made him stage such an excellent comeback after the Chappell issue. The way Saurav is playing he simply seems unstoppable even for Australlia in Australlia. Hope Dada’s excellent form continues and India does well in the remaining matches. After all this umpiring and racism controvers...

“A Promise is a Promise”, said Ratan Tata with pride after he unveiled the Nano or “The People’s car” as it is fondly called. I was really impressed by the man and his words. I don’t know why but I felt proud that I was working for the Tata group. The group which has given a lot to Indian society, with a wide range of products and services touching almost all walks of life and by way of which has become an integral part of this country. Read Tata’s interview and more about the car here. http://www.tatapeoplescar.com/tatamotors I have read a lot of articles on the Nano over the past few days in various places. It is definitely a great piece of innovation. I was surprised to read that Engineers who designed this have spent so much time on coming up with innovative designs to reduce cost , even for reducing $10. After all it is no mean feat, coming up with a car for $2500. An interesting article from NY times http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/08/business/worldbusiness/08indiacar.html?pagewan...

03rd January 2008 I had mentioned in my earlier post that I am a Frequent flyer with Jet and I travel very often by Jet. I recently travelled by Kingfisher to Bangalore only because the morning Jet flight was fully booked and I had an amazing experience. Kingfisher made a real impact on me, someone so used to Jet, with their excellent service. What a competitive world we live in! While checking in I was told that only middle seats were left. I said I preferred an Aisle seat. After some double checking the attendant got back with a smile saying that there was only one Aisle seat which he would give me. At this point I was not very surprised because almost all Airlines do this. Only thing a bit different was that the seat number was in single digits and I had an economy class ticket. I told myself that it might be an ATR flight. However when I entered the flight I was really surprised. I had been given a business class seat. This was too good to be true and that too early in the New Year...

Another year has gone by. Year 2007 had my hair starting to change from black to grey and has brought me almost into middle age. However it has left me pretty much the same person at the core, maybe a bit polished and better but definitely not dented. I still have the same beliefs and walk in with the same energy into work everyday. 2007 was a mixed year for me on the professional front. Things did not go as well as I wanted them to. However looking back I learnt a lot of hard lessons in 2007. Though I managed to put up a decent show finally, there were some flaws in my approach to Professional life that were exposed to myself (not to the whole world hopefully!). I would say I got the maturity to reflect upon my behaviour and criticize myself in 2007. I started blogging in 2007. Though I have not been able to do it actively in the recent past, it was a great stress reliever for me. I don’t know how it feels to read my blogs but it feels great to write whatever I feel like. I became a f...