trip to D.C

actually the title should be something like "a trip to my relative's house". that would sum up the whole weekend. I have a few relatives living around the U.S and we have this tradition of meeting up at someone's place once a yr. this yr we chose to meet at our uncle&aunt's place in D.C.
thanks to the weather and comforts of home after a long time, we all just ate, watched movies, and slept. the "mani adicha soru" concept prevailed for the whole weekend, and everything came to the room on time. outdoor activities were pretty much going out to get movies.
now I realize why captain makes all those movies. Its precisely for occassions like these, wherein a lot of people get together and have ultimate fun in watching those mindless movies. thank you captain, for providing us great entertainment :)
we did go out for bowling, but hey isn't that indoors too.

speaking of the weather, never have I experienced such a harsh one. to my astonishment my cousin would say, "Its only -5 C". what?????? we haven't even seen +5 C in california :) I hate to wear all those costumes (read - sweater, jacket, gloves.....) just to go out and get into the car.
for them the worst is yet to come.

I had a stopover at Vegas on the way back. for a change I won this time, about $250. you don't need to venture into the city to gamble, the airport has tons of slot machines. its everywhere, I had to run away from them to protect my money :) the only place they have not yet installed them are the restrooms :)

will not be suprised if they do so :-)

deadly december

this is a sad month for all of us. first came the death of M.S and now a major disaster in the form of tsunami in S.E Asia and India. One could only wish to be well prepared for such a terrible thing. we could have been a part of the warning system, but India went the other path, only to get mired now.
"tidal waves aren't common in this region" - so says all the countries. but didn't one of these take away the port of poompuhar from us a few centuries back? There are references in tamil literature about the poompuhar tragedy.
what could we do now - please donate generously to victims through AID. they are helping out the people in the affected areas, on a war footing.

on a different note, a christian colleague of mine views this as a strong indicator to the end of the world. his opinions are based on the bible and here is the link to that particular section. further strengthening his beliefs is the removal of troops from gaza strip by Israel. This he relates to the occupation of Jerusalem by the gentiles (all nations except the jews). well that hasn't happened yet, but a lot of jews think that Sharon would eventually cave in to the palestinians, as his leadership is supposedly very weak.

feels good to be back

ah, back from a week of silence. I was out of town (more on that soon), and guess what, missed blogging dearly. its such a nice feeling to be back in touch with everyone again, and will only get better when everyone starts blogging again.
for people like me, the state we are in can be precisely described as "solitary confinement". and thats why we never miss out on those long weekend trips, inspite of the strain that comes along with it..... try to maximise our fun whatsoever.
soiltary confinement is not bad either, given to the amount of freedom we enjoy. I never like anything that is routine, and always try to change something here and there. this state of ours provides ample opportunities to do so.

relatives and more relatives.....

we would have known a person for a long time, and to know that they are related to us would only come as a sweet surprise. in my case it was more than a surprise. wanna know my surprise list, here it goes --- superstar rajinikanth (thru his wife latha), actor kamalhassan, director maniratnam (thru kamalhassan), chief minister jayalalithaa, writer sulman rushdie (thru his wife padma lakshmi) - to name a few.
and thru superstar now danush is also my relative (like I wanted it), and soon sonia agarwal too.
had kamalhassan been more cautious, today simran would have been my relative too (ah that would have been something).
ofcourse the path to these people goes like my grandma's second cousin's wife's grandpa's 3rd cousin's daugther's brother-in-law's brother .. hahaha
but a relation is a relation, what say you guys.

motivated by these findings, I'm now in the process of establishing a link to jesus christ and ultimately to moses and abraham :-))

P.S: The Last Blogger is also related to me. Hence he can also have his share of stardom.

Real Growth

This yr has been really good for India. we have started to export more than ever. naturally everyone has started to think if this kind of growth can be sustained. well, we can, only if we start seriously thinking about developing quality infrastructure. the roads in chennai, a hi-tec city, are nothing but a sore sight to the eyes. It takes atleast 30-45 mins to cover a distance of 5 miles. thats pathetic. and come summer, people will soon have to start drinking sea water. and a plan to provide long-lasting water supply to the city is still inactive for more than 30 yrs......

look at china, a country with more population than we do. they are now controlling the world market. most of the stuff we use come from china. to top it all, a chinese company has bought the entire PC business of IBM (yes IBM). needless to ask, their infrastructure is on par with Europe and US. all in a communist stronghold.

why do we fail to recognize basic needs. if this trend continues, soon we would be back to the state we were in early 90's.

a weird law

The Information Technology Act 2000 of India is nothing but rubbish. Owing to its existence, the CEO of Bazee.com has been arrested. why? because the DPS video was put on sale on bazee by some insane IIT student. now why should the CEO be responsible for that. how is it possible for him to keep track of all the items sold on his site.
If that is the law, then our PM Manmohan Singh and President Kalam should also be arrested. Its only fair enough to hold them responsible for all the crime that happens in the country they rule!
Seriously, this is one of the most irresponsible laws that I have ever heard of.
I think I have the right to express my views atleast, and not get arrested for that. I hope so :-)

Thanks to Chakra for the link on the IT Act.

Buy One ..... Get One

this was a very funny ad I saw while in Coimbatore last month. It was on all the local newspapers. It was given by a new hospital called "Kongu Nadu Hospital", and they were offering a free piles surgery with any type of surgery :-)
man, that was something. what if a person doesn't have piles complaint at all, would they still operate him???
another new hospital's ad - "Heart by-pass surgery, Only Rs. 65,000". sounded like "iPod - only $250" :-)
looks like the hospitals are also catching on with the "buy one, get one" mantra. why not, after all they are also acting like any other commercial business.

ocean's 12

what a waste of money. thanks to ocean's 11, I was so excited to watch it on the first day of release itself. alas, the movie didn't live up to the expectations even a bit. I'm not gonna give out the story (whilst I'm wondering if there was any) ....... go watch it if you wanna burn bucks.

only consolation, catherine zeta-jones :)

M.S

this is a very sad day for all of us. M.S.Subbalakshmi, the queen of carnatic music is no more.
It was her rendition of Vishnu Sahasranamam, and Venkatesa Suprabatham, that brought me, and many more close to her. we would all fondly mention the two letters, "MS", as though she was our aunt or grandma.
this is indeed a great personal loss fo all carnatic music lovers. But I'm sure she has attained the abode of Lord Sriman Narayanan.

punch lines

I always have this fascination for punch lines. until a few weeks ago I was using this one ---

'Saranyan sonna Sankaracharyaar sonna madhiri'. In english -- 'Saranyan's words are like Sankaracharyaar's own words'.

now that Sankaracharyaar is in Jail, my friends have started teasing me :-) but as they say in Sacramento, I'll Be Back, with another one.

P.S: I'm working on something like 'Paran sonna Perumaal sonna madhiri' :-)

F L A M E S

was re-introduced to this game by the movie 'Manmathan'. I'm sure many would have known this game.
1. basically pair up your name with whoever you want to
2. cut all the common letters, between yours and hers
3. now add up all the remaining letters
4. Now lets say you have 7 in total. starting from 'F' in FLAMES count 7. you can wrap around. you should end up at the letter 'F'. strike it out. now start again at 'L' now and count 7.
5. Repeat this process until you are left with just one letter.

Here are the interpretations :)

F - Friend L- Love A - Affection M - Marriage E - Enemy S- Sister

we used to play this while at middle school :-). unfortunately for me, whoever I wished to be paired up with, it always ends up either in E or in S.

for serious lovers, play this game at your own risk :-)

Me and my memory

of late I've been forgetting a lot of stuff. today was a classic example. I had the day carefully planned, and at the end of the day I was very happy that everything went smooth. as I was walking towards the parking lot, I couldn't find my car key in the pocket. I searched my bag and other pockets, but it wasn't there. I remembered that the day before I had left the key on the front door lock and after a futile search found it there :) . but I never commit the same mistake twice. so I assured myself, went into the office and searched file cabinets and other places where I keep my stuff. well it was only after a few mins I realised that I gave my car for an oil change in the morning and completely forgot to pick it up :( aaargghhh, now I have to arrange for some ride back and forth.
atleast I was happy that I didn't repeat a mistake, but new ones keep coming up :)

One for India

taking a leaf out of sudarshan's blog..... Please visit http://www.oneforindia.org/ and learn more about their yr end fund raiser. its called One for India. since I know sudarshan personally well, I can definitely vouch for its authenticity.

in the same vein, I'm also looking forward to closely working with him to involve in AID in LA area.

So I'm Back!!!!!!!!!

Ha, feels good to be back to normal life. It was an exhausting 3 week trip to India. Adding to that was a major presentation at our office within 3 days after my arrival. hence couldn't blog as soon as I got back. now I feel happy as I'm fully tuned, else would have taken atleast a week.

It was a nice trip and I had a great time with a lot of friends and relatives. I was mainly in coimbatore and visited Madras, Tirupathi, and Srirangam. my intentions of returning back for good grew only stronger after this visit. I also realised that even though I have more friends here in the US, I don't get to see them often. maybe once in a yr. but its a different situation in India. atleast for now as most of friends are still single.
what else did I do ........ ate in all my fav restaurants, slept well, roamed around coimbatore, relished moms cooking. also got a lot of books, particularly ponniyin selvan (it a 6 book set for Rs. 200 :-) ) and parthiban kanavu. I'm gearing up for one more round of ponniyin selvan.

my parents did raise the marriage topic, ah so finally the interesting part. I managed to convince them that it won't happen for atleast a yr. we did settle on a common minimum programme :) but I couldn't stop them from starting their own process.

I'll come up with more stuff later on.