Inscrutable!

J: So, How are you doing Santosh?
S: I am doing OK, pretty busy off-late.
J: Yeah, life’s been crazy for everyone I guess… and how is your daughter?
S: She is doing fine
J: Did she get the swine-flu yet?
S: What!??
J: I mean; does her school have cases of swine-flu?
S; None, so far
J: Ohh yeah, she goes to the school here… right?
S: Yeah, and I believe it originated here…
J: (a long silence....)

I felt like getting up from the chair, lifting it up, and smashing it on the other party to put an end to it.
Well, some people are inscrutable!

I nearly fell off my seat...

Got this one through a forwarded email from a friend & I nearly fell off from my seat laughing. who ever created this one, I should say, real talent!!



And well deserving for the kind of statements that comes out of people like Jayarajan. Can't they stop making a fool of themselves?

രാഷ്ട്രീയക്കാരോടുള്ള വിശ്വാസ്യത മാത്രമേ നഷ്ടപെട്ടിട്ടുള്ളൂ. ചിന്താശക്തി നശിച്ചിട്ടില്ല! കഷ്ടം!

Image courtesy: Malayalam Fun

Day 3 – Disney’s Hollywood Studios

Disney World has 4 theme parks and 3 Water parks in Orlando. Water parks are more or less like the Veega Land / Wonder La kind of parks – though I had been to neither of these places :) – and do not even have a good liking for Water Parks. The 4 Theme parks are Magic Kingdom – Built on the theme of the fairies and princesses, Animal Kingdom – Built on the themes of the getting to know the different animal species around the world, Hollywood Studios – A sneak preview of how the different Disney & Pixar animation films are made and EPCOT which is an acronym for Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow – An Utopian idea of Walt Disney which was never completed.

I was very impressed by the way they are organized and especially the way how everything is managed in the parks. During the 5 days while we were visiting the Disney Theme Parks, I was NEVER disappointed for anything except the weather – which of course, they can do nothing about :). Parking lots up to the size of 20-30 football fields, trolleys that keep running every 5 minutes to take you to the gates, the SMILE on the face of EVERY employee starting from the parking booth attendant to the sweepers cleaning the walkways– it is just amazing! It is very true that a smile can do wonders and I really wonder how they manage to have each and every employee to have a pleasant and smiling face always - rain or shine. I am sure there must be lot of lessons for organizations on induction and orientation programs for employees.


So, Day 3 belongs to Disney’s Hollywood Studios!

The Park has various streets named Hollywood Boulevard, Sunset Boulevard, Streets of America, Pixar Place where they had the various attractions & the shops selling Disney Merchandise. The first show that we got into was the ‘Voyage of the Little Mermaid’ – Little One’s favorite – in the Animation Courtyard. Almost every other day, ever since she read the story of The Little Mermaid, she turns out to be Ariel and myself King Triton!! This was a stage show with real people acting up as characters and I was really awed by the way how they created the 3D effects without having all of us wear those polarized glasses. The best one that I thought was very innovative was how they created the effect that all the audience was under the Ocean, They created some mist in the theater by fine spraying of water and used the laser beams on the 4 corners of the theater to make an illusion of the waves at the water level – which was projected on the mist! Little One did not want to go out even after the show ended & made up a small scene there.

We went on to the see another stage show next – Play House Disney. If you are a regular at the Disney TV Channel, you would have come across this show; the only difference was this was live. The kiddos had the option to dance along with their friends Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy, Daisy, Pooh, Tiger, Handy Manny, Piglet et all (Phew! I got most of them…:) ). Little One was very cranky by the 10 minutes waiting time and added to the fact that she wanted to use the rest room, but wanted to go home & not use the public one – Her paranoia of public restrooms still continues after she got really scared by the noise of the flush after using one in an airplane. She also met Mickey in person near the Animation Courtyard & we took a couple of photos with her & Mickey.

The next pit stop was at the Toy Story Midway Mania where we rode on spinning vehicles wearing polarized glasses to play interactive 3D games by using the Toy Cannons to throw darts/shoot at an imaginary projectile to hit the target. Little One enjoyed this one and I was pleasantly surprised to note that she & SH had a better score than me!! (enough to brush up my male ego… grrr). We went on to see the attraction of the Chronicles of Narnia which did not really excite us – mainly due to the factor that we hadn’t seen the film series and had no clue on what is going on – I had an after thought at this point of time. If Little One had not been in our lives forcing us to read & see most of these story characters, we would have been really lost in most of the places not knowing what was going around. All I knew about animation & cartoons until she came to our lives were Tom & Jerry and Mickey Mouse (mascot)!

We decided to have our lunch at the Mama’s Italian Grille near the Streets of America where SH & Little One had a bountiful lunch of Raviolis, Pasta and Spaghetti. I ended up paying through my nose for a tuna steak, grilled to perfection (?? huh) on a fire-wood grill decorated by crossed asparagus resembling the swords in the Saudi Kingdom’s emblem. After lunch, we started off to see some of the attractions in the Streets of America. We skipped the Indiana Jones Epic Stunt Spectacular and the Extreme Stunt Show where they enact the various stunt scenes from the movies to give you an idea on how some of the scenes are shot in the movies. We did some walking around in the Streets of America around the sets created as New York City and San Francisco and we ended up at the Kid’s attraction – Honey, I Shrunk the Kids! Based on the movie by the same name, you get into a kids play area where you have large grass & weeds & Coke cans as large as you – A total change in perspective when you get onto a lawn as a small ant or a fly. I rested a while under a ‘leaf’ while the girls went around playing in the play area. I lost my cool for the first time during the vacation because the girls went missing & I ended up scouring the whole area to find them. We then decided to check out the 3D Muppet Show. The waiting time was boring – mainly because we were not a big fan of the muppets, but however the A/C hall on a hot afternoon was welcome :). Indirectly, we were ready to even get bored to hide away from the Florida Sun. It was almost 3:30 PM by then and we decided to get back to the hotel for a quick nap.

Up and recharged by 6 PM, we decided to make a quick entry to the Disney’s Magic Kingdom since we knew that this park is open until 10 PM (We had a park-hopper ticket which actually allowed us to hop between the parks). The best park among the four, truly living up to their punch line – “Where dreams come true” – Magic Kingdom is a true wonder.

From the parking lot, you are ‘transported’ into a Magical World either by a Ferry or by a Monorail (you can chose what to take) and this place is where all the characters in the Disney’s Princesses, Fairies and other animated magical stories live. The kind of happiness and surprise that I saw on Little One’s face when she got to see Tinker Bell, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, Rosetta, Jasmine & Aladdin in life – It is just beyond description! Very true to their slogan and the punch line – To believe in your dreams, you should believe in yourself – they motivate children to dream bigger, larger, king size and to believe in their dreams… It will then come true… It is not a surprise that even now, most of the innovations happen on this side of the world.

The biggest attraction and the icon of the Magic Kingdom is the Cinderella’s Castle. We walked through the Main Street USA which leads to the castle and went through the castle to the Fantasy Land. SH & Little One rode on Dumbo – The Flying Elephant and the Cinderella’s Golden Carousel - The oldest ride in Disney World, while I went out to get the Fast Pass for the Mickey’s PhilharMagic – A 3D movie experience with Mickey & Donald. It was already 8 by the time we finished up with Philhar Magic and we wanted to grab our dinner and get a nice place to watch the “SpectroMagic” parade that starts at 9 PM and “Wishes” - The Fireworks Spectacular that will start at 10 PM after which the Park closes for the day. We grabbed some bites from the restaurant at Tomorrow Land since we could not find a good place to watch the SpectroMagic Parade, and waited for the fireworks to start.

And the Fireworks, it is all in here!!! Just no words to describe (Listen with the Audio on to hear the background theme song – Wishes!)

I was again and again impressed by the management & organizing skills of the Park while at the end of fireworks, thousands and thousands of people exiting out of the park at the same time, and the only way to get back to the Parking lot (real world - as they say) was through the Ferry or the Mono Rail, it took us no more than 25 minutes, end-to-end. Talk about Capacity planning…

Day 3 ended past 11PM while we crashed back at the hotel.

The absent minded -

Sometimes, your brain tells you to stop, take a breather and then step on the gas again. And you don't listen because of 'priorities' - A convenient name that most of the professionals use to hide behind. And after a while it starts intervening with your day to day routine.

I had been having very long working hours in the past few weeks - thanks to some of the excellent support I receive from my counter parts. And it started to show off. I came to office one of these days to realize that I left my laptop back at home! Thankfully, I stay just a mile away from office, I could drive back & pick it up with in 20 minutes.

The best one happened yesterday evening. I locked myself out of my office with my car keys inside the office at 6PM. The regular office time ends here at 5, so visibly only a very few folks around. The icing on the cake? The keys to my office AND my home was inside my car! Thankfully, the admin assistant had left her office open last night and I was able to search the drawers to get the spare key to my office.

I & little one would have been stranded yesterday without the car ending up walking to our home or call a taxi to home which is just a mile away and waiting outside for SH to come home at 8:30PM (She carries a pair of the house keys)!

I think I should learn to stop for a while when my mind tells me to -

Day 2 - The day with Shamu @ Seaworld

The Day 2 started off well after a relaxed waking up at 7 & a nice & filling continental breakfast at the hotel. The breakfast was complimentary for the stay (which is normally the case for most hotels in the US) and was really filling. We have also developed a liking towards bagels, eggs, sausage & cheese off-late; but the real advantage was that little one would have a decent meal in the morning because this is her normal routine & breakfast at school – most of the days!

And the plan for the day was to spend time at Sea World Adventure Park in Orlando. We picked up the print-outs of the vouchers which we will have to exchange at the gate for the tickets, punched in the address in the GPS & started off. It was just 5 miles away from where we stayed & we were at the gates in less than 25 minutes. The walk from the parking to the gate gave us a taste of the day that was ahead of us, the temperature soaring at a 90F by 9:30 in the morning.

The crowd was big, being a Sunday and we started short-listing the attractions from the maps – after a photo-shoot with the mascot of Sea World – ‘Shamu, the Killer Whale’ near the entrance. Deciding to take the stroller was one of the best decisions, especially due to the heat. We walked past a few Flamingoes towards the Dolphin nursery and also stopped near the Sting Ray pond to see the ‘teacher’ of the famous Disney movie – ‘Finding Nemo’. Little one was expecting a larger fish as the teacher and was quite disappointed to see that the Sting rays aren’t as large as she thought it was. SH came up with the idea of going to see the Dolphin show that was scheduled to start at 11 in the Dolphin Theater. We thought of seeing the Dolphin Nursery & the Alligator pond so that we spend our time judiciously until the show starts. Little one wanted to pluck a bunch of flowers from the garden (and she managed to do that without us noticing it!!) to hold it in her hands & that led to some ‘exciting moments’ with dad & daughterJ.

We got our seats in time for the Dolphin Show which was choreographed as the story of a girl who meets her Prince intertwined with some suspense, drama and some exciting stunts by the dolphins. We also met Kirsten from Ohio, a year-and-a-half old boy who had come to visit the Sea World with his Mom & Dad – He was in the row ahead of us and was very friendly & playful with us (especially my hat & the sunglasses) – until the show started! The show lasted for almost 45 minutes and we decide to stop near the watering hole before we headed towards the Penguins Cove. The girls ordered the frostees and I had a large glass of lime-soda a.k.a Sprite. The Penguin cove was an indoor attraction & not surprisingly was very crowded – the heat must have been in the upper 90s by then. One of the interesting designs that I found in there was the multiple levels of Penguin spotting – the upper level was a hard floor level where people who want to stay for a while, take photographs & spend some time could use, while the lower level had an escalator belt that kept moving at a minimal speed so that the people who just want to see it as a part of their checklist, could do so without really feeling disappointed by the slow moving crowd! There was also a whole bunch of Artic & Antarctic birds apart from the Penguins that were show-cased in a glass enclosure with a temperature appropriate for them. And then, it was lunch time!!

After lunch (What else? Burgers, nuggets & fries…) at the waterside restaurant, we started off to the Shark Tank where after the display of various sea creatures, they take us though a glass tunnel under a large tank of Sharks. The conveyor belt ride was deployed even here, may be to reduce the congestion inside the tunnel by people getting crowded there. The mood of the crowd (me included) started switching, thanks to the heat and we decided that it is time to get into the crowd puller show - Shamu, The Killer Whale. We checked the map to see that it is half way on the other side of the park and planned to get there for the 2:30 PM show with a quick stop over at the Marine Carousel where little one rode on a little dolphin with her mommy standing by!

The Shamu show was disappointing mainly because of my ignorance (I think). Shamu is not a ‘Whale’ in the true sense. It is an Orca (sea wolf) and belongs to the dolphin family and are apex predators in the sea. They are the largest species in the dolphin family and an adult male can measure up to 6-8 meters in length. The reason why it is called a ‘whale’ is still unknown, though that is the commonly referred name to Orcas. So, partially due to my ignorance & partially due to the marketing gimmick of the Theme Park, I was really disappointed to see a gloated dolphin with some other distinct features like the eye patches & the dorsal fin as the Killer Whale! But that provided a good rest of 40 minutes in the open shade for a very hot day outside.

It was almost 4PM then and the heat had started taking a toll on each of us (yeah, the first day of fulltime out-doors after a very long time) and we decided that it would be beneficial for all of us to return back to the hotel before the situation gets worse and ending up spoiling a good vacation. Good sense prevailed and we decided to head back to the hotel, with a small stop over at the dolphin nursery. The guard at the gate had a very pleasant smile asking us if we enjoyed our day & we told him that we were tired of the heat & was unable to see a lot of the attractions. He took the initiative to process an additional set of tickets for us to come back to the park on any of the days within the next seven days – absolutely free of cost! – Talk about Customer Service!!

We reached back at the hotel by 4:15 and little one had already slept off in the car. We too had a quick nap for an hour to jump into the swimming pool at 6. By 6:45, we were all fresh and recharged and that’s when SH suggested that we go to the Downtown Disney Shopping Area. (Did I hear shopping!???!! LOL ). We had picked up some bare minimum groceries for the week while returning from Clearwater the previous day; SH prepared a quick dinner and then we went for a drive through the Downtown Disney. I was very particular that we drive very slowly near the stores, with special emphasis that we are not stopping anywhere… LOL

End of Day 2!

Day 1 - The 'Home Alone' Story

The end of another tiring week and by the time I & my girls came home on Friday, it was 30 minutes past 8 in the night. We were very excited, not just by the fact that it is going to be a weekend, but that we were going to be on a week long vacation!! At the same time, we hadn’t even started packing for the week. I am a very ‘light’ traveler, (there had been instances while as a bachelor, I had gone home from Bangalore empty handed – and Amma would be like…Did you lose your bag?) but things have changed since the last 7 years… My significant half (SH) is a ‘check-list’ traveler. She normally keeps a checklist of stuff that she plans to carry & ensures that they are packed (talk about quality control…) and 2 girls – they are a crowd!

It was past 1 AM by the time we finished packing, finished QC checking round 1 & 2 and retired to bed. With the fact that we have to catch a 7 AM flight and the airport 14 miles away from home, we decided to wakeup by 4 so that we can plan to push-off by 5:45. I was entrusted to change the daily alarm to 4:00 AM from the regular 5:45 AM, which I religiously did & we crashed.

PAPPAAAA!!!!
That one jolted me up from the sleep!

“The alarm did not go off… It is already 5:30!!!” The long story short, we literally enacted the ‘Home Alone’ scene to start off in the car by 6. I did my first ever (in 2 years) over-speeding of 15 miles above speed limit of 65mph (in patches) and managed to reach the Airport by 6:20, returned my rental car at the counter, caught the air train to the terminal, went to the counter for baggage check-in, security check & to the gate, to see the half the crowd has been boarded & the rest of them in the queue. “Run, run, run… run baby run….” I bought some chocolates & some other stuff to engage little one during take-offs & landings and we finally boarded the Jet Blue flight 531 as the last set of passengers heading towards Orlando Florida.

The three and a half hour flight gave some time for SH to catch up more on sleep, little one to mess-up with the drawing board she carried & me to introspect why the alarm did not go off. After the take off was complete & the permission granted to switch on electronic devices, I switched on my phone to see what went wrong. It didn’t take longer for me to figure it out… Advanced settings are so convenient, but do not take care of exceptions! There was an option in the Alarm settings – ‘Ignore on Weekends’, because they knew most of the people will sleep longer on weekends & my phone did exactly what it is supposed to do. It ignored the Alarm on the weekend! Damn!!! So far so good, thankfully the vacation did not start off with a disaster & the excitement started to flow back in…


We landed at the Orlando International Airport at 10:45 AM (on time), collected the baggage & went to the car rentals office - Our companion for the next 8 days was a Chevrolet Equinox. I am no expert in SUVs (never owned one & have had some of the drives with friends), but I felt it was a decent one & comfortable. I started the GPS, punched in my hotel address & started towards our hotel in the Lake Buena Vista area. We decided to have our brunch before we checked in & had a Mexican brunch at Chevys (A Mexican restaurant chain). After an initial hiccup (check-in time was 3 & the rooms weren’t ready), we managed to check-in to the hotel at around 2 PM & got some sleep for a couple of hours.



At around 4, we started our drive towards the Clearwater Beach, Florida. It is around 100 miles from Orlando & takes about 2 hours to reach there. The sunset at the Pier 60 is a famous attraction and even though we visitied the place we couldn’t afford to stay until sunset which was around 8:30 PM because it would be too late for us by the time we get back & we may end up spoiling our next day too – especially since we hadn’t had a good sleep the previous night (After all, a vacation is to relax & unwind – right?) Little one & SH had a good time at the beach (I am very reluctant to get into the water) while I watched them from the shore & took photographs. The real paradox of the story is that among us, I am the only one who knows swimmimg & I am the most reluctant to get into the water (at public places)! Little one did a very thoughtful act of collecting sea shells to give it to her classmates when she returns back after vacation (And she did that yesterday!). I am pretty sure that ‘sharing’ was out of my dictionary when I was 4… LOL.

We wound up by around 7:30 after an hour and half in the beach to get back to Orlando. One sight that amazed me was the drive over the Howard Franklin Bay Bridge on the Interstate 275 just before you arrive at Clearwater, immediately after you cross the city of Tampa. It is approximately 8 miles long over the Old Tampa Bay. At one point of time, you feel like you are driving on a bridge at the middle of the sea – though you can see buildings on each side, pretty far away… We stopped over at a Thai restaurant for dinner to reach back at the hotel by 10:30 in the night.

End of Day 1

The vacation of a lifetime!

Back with a big-bang after a month of hibernation! And yes, I am planning to write a tour-diary about our week long vacation to Florida from 9th May 09 to 17th May 09 (Heavy draught of topics - you guessed it.. LOL). Hectic schedules at work, stressful days of uncertainty, and what we really wanted was a break. A good long break to chill off from the day-to-day scrambling with work & home.

Our schedule looked something like this when we planned & it pretty much stayed on plan throughout the week, except for some tight moments… :)

Day 1 - 9th May 2009 , Saturday
- Take the 7:00 AM flight from Newark Airport to Orlando
- Drive down to Clearwater Beach (2 hours drive from Orlando) for the evening
- Return by 10 PM & crash.

Day 2 – 10th May 2009, Sunday
- Visit the Sea World Adventure Park

Day 3 – 11th May 2009, Monday
- Visit the Disney’s Hollywood Studios

Day 4 – 12th May 2009, Tuesday
- Visit the Disney’s Magic Kingdom

Day 5 – 13th May 2009, Wednesday
- Visit the Disney’s Animal Kingdom

Day 6 – 14th May 2009, Thursday
- Take the bus tour to Miami

Day 7 – 15th May 2009, Friday
- Visit the Disney’s Epcot Center

Day 8 – 16th May 2009, Saturday
- Visit Universal Studios, Orlando

Day 9 – 17th May 2009, Sunday
- Catch the 8 AM flight from Orlando Airport to Newark


And the day by day adventures will follow…

Happy Vishu!

What a better way to start a new year than by standing outside the office at temperatures close to 4 deg C for almost 45 minutes starting at 7:30 in the morning because somebody tried to toast a bagel & forgot to pick it up while it got stuck in the toaster!!!

The fire alarm went off in the adjacent building early in the morning with just 3 of us in our building and none of the floor wardens around...LOL. The security panicked and chased all of us outside the building while 2 fire engines & 4 to 5 police cars raced to a screeching halt near the front lobby. It was a good 45 minutes by the time they fixed it and I already missed my first meeting...

Anyways, here is wishing all of you a wonderful beggining in the Malayalam New Year - Vishu!!!

The Fairy Tale Concert

I have realized that my hobbies are getting switched pretty frequently - off late. Sometimes I am on full throttle with my still camera & then sometimes into video mixing & editing. And then the next day I get bored of each of this & gets settled with a book.

In between this switches, I had my baby's Annual Concert held at her school on the 6th of March 09. It was named as the "Fairy Tale Concert". The initial agreement (between the halves) was for me to handle the still camera whereas my significant half decided to record the show in the video cam. And I messed up by picking up the wrong lens with me (I was expecting that I will get a seat at the far end of the hall & carried my telephoto lens - whereas we were the first one to come in & took the second row seats...) And given the fact that I did not want to trade my seats for a better camera vision, I decided to trade on the camera. [:)] And here comes the icing on the top. My better half packs my "puttum kutti" (as she calls it) and pulls out her POS camera with a statement - "I knew this would happen, so I carried mine too..."

And we went on enjoying the show. It was wooookke..., but to the level of the kids, I think they put up a good show. The best part was the children themselves had made the stage decorations painted... end to end!

Watch it here - The Performance & my Camera work, Editing & Mixing... LOL

In Layman's Terms...

On our way back from school, walking to the parking lot...

Me: How was your day baby?
Baby: It was fun, Dad.

M: What did you do in school?
B: We played in circle time

M: And then?
B: Shared my little Ariel toy during show & tell... And I passed it around for everyone to touch & feel it...

M: And then?
B: then... we practiced for our concert, we sang the speckle frog song....
(I don't know what on earth is a speckle frog!!!)

M: And then?
B: then.... we played the freeze dance and... Kavi is not my best friend...

M: Oh! why?
B: Because he pushed me...

M: So what did you do?
B: I said... stop it... it is not nice to push friends...

M: okay...
B: So, what happened in Office?

M: I was working in the office
B: what work did you do in the office?
(Where is this going!!??)

M: Well, I attended meetings, wrote emails, talked to people
B: And then?
(This is definitely not getting good...)

M: And I attended more meetings...
B: You already said meeting, what else?

M: And I worked on documents (trying to simplify spreadsheets & proposals)
B: That's Mama's work, she writes documents...
(aahh... so a similar talk had happened on the other side too...)

M: OK, but I too have to work on documents
B: What work do you do with documents?

M: Well, Baby, do you like this song? Do you want to sing along?..
(We are already in the car by then and the stereo starts playing when I started the car...)

There was a time when I grew up in school where I used to think what do so many people do developing banking software while all that a bank does is to keep your money & give it to you when you want it... And later when I joined one of the German banking giants as a software developer, I realized that 'retail banking' is only a very small portion of the larger business called 'Banking'...

And another one was that - a company/factory would have an engineer who helped make the machinery (my understanding of engineering was only mechanical... LOL), so what do all other engineers do for a living?

How difficult would it be to explain what you do for a living? - in layman's terminology.
Does anyone want to try it out?

Thakara (തകര)

A word, A statement, A comment - When used in a wrong fashion, that can ruin your day, sometimes even a week.

That is what happened with me today. When you give all that you have got for a genuine cause, when you go beyond R&R in running that extra mile for your team, the last thing that you want to see is mistrust, skepticism and doubts on integrity. It just put me off today - first thing on the first day of the week.

I always believe that when it comes to knowledge, the more you share, the more you get. Same applies to teamwork and networking. What really matters is what you are giving to the team/network. When you do that, leverage will happen & will just come in search of you. You dont even have to ask... And I can vouch for it from my own experience... anyways...

Thank you 'X'! You proved it once again! And it is a shame.

Note: The heading (തകര) is a type of weed. It is a symbolism that I use for such instances in life.

Shortcut to Success

Is there a shortcut to success? Of course, it is a magic potion that has the following ingredients - commitment, hard work & perseverance!

I stumbled upon a videoclipping from a Tamil movie - Mayakannadi - the last day (Thanks to Pam's orkut updates) and I was pleasantly surprised that even now, there are some movies made that does its small bit of social justice to the community as a medium. You could hear various kind of arguments that justifies the storyline in various movies about the mass appeal, box office formulae and some amount of poetic expression of ideas & stories. Whatever may be the underlying factor, there is no doubt that cinema as a medium has an impact on the viewing public. It only varies in degree by the personality of the viewer.

I grew up viewing a lot of movies where we have the protagonist who has a poor financial & social background - have to face real hardships and finally we see him go off to "Bombay" or "Madras" - Time flies in a few seconds on the screen and we see a very well-to-do person return back to his hometown to take "revenge" (huh!?) on the people who insulted & assaulted his family in the past.

What happens to the protogonist during exile? How does he get so succesful in a short span of time? What makes him an overnight success? What other quality does he develop in a short span of time that he did not have in the 25-30 years he struggled in his village?

I feel dissappointed when I see a lot of youths nowadays who take on to making a quick buck, but not really ready to work or invest their time and efforts towards it. There are definitely a lot more smart ways now - than earlier - to develop a successful career or build an enterprise. Provided, you have the commitment towards that, you put in your hard work in building that, and finally having the perseverance in trying again and again when ever you fail!

I used to have a bookmark with me (forgot who gifted that to me!) which read like this -> It does not matter whether you get knocked down, but what matters is whether you get back up on your feet!

And here is the clip that I saw on youtube:-




I have started to like Cheran as a film director for some of the thoughtful movies that he had made in the last few years. Take out some of the sentiments & the masala from the scene above, I guess the message is loud & clear...

Exploring the Frontiers of Happiness - Talk by Dan Gilbert

Invest a 30 mins of time in seeing this video - Pretty interesting!!
Especially when Behavioral Economics is getting a great deal of attention off-late - in the wake of what we have made out of this world!!!

Won the contest - Finally!

For me, 2009 does not look as gloomy as the market - after all! Things had been picking up for me (on a personal note) slowly since beggining of this year and here is the icing on the top - My photo got selected in our organization's calendar contest! Yes!! it is my photo that decorates the September 2009 month in our organization's calendar... yippeee...

Thanks a bunch to my friend Lalitha, who took the pain of photographing the calendar & sending it across to me. (I still haven't gotten a hard copy of the calendar yet :) )

And here is the link to the original photo in my photoblog:-
http://grinbear.blogspot.com/2009/01/calendar-contest-winner-entry.html

Welcoming the New Year

Another year went by... with its share of ups & downs.
And it is already 2009 at some parts of the world while I write this, we share messages and wishes for a very 'Happy' New Year...

There was a phase in my life when we partied (read as get drunk...) the whole night, have count downs and even light fire crackers at the middle of the night to welcome the New Year. The New Year never used to be a good start; thanks to the swearing of the neighbors who lost their sleep & worse got startled in the middle of night due to the fire crackers and finally thanks to Bangalore, the long lasting barking of the canines that followed the crackers. That was never a botheration, but celebrate - was the motto.

I have realized that over a period of time, the whole fizz of this celebration with me has gone over, and to my own surprise, I responded to a friend today morning who asked me about my New Year celebration plans, I made this bland statement - "New Year?? Arrgh, just another day. Whats the big deal about that..." And he was taken for surprise to the level of asking me if everything was OK with me.

Sometimes I ask this question to myself - What should I be happy about 2008 that I take into the New Year? Family relations getting staler day by day? Or the credit of 10+ terrorist attacks in my homeland? Or the fear factor that leads to the fact that I regularly get "randomly" selected for additional security screening even at domestic flights in the richest country? Or the fact that we still continue to waste food & other resources where a significant percentage of people in this world does not have access to even clean drinking water? Or even the fact that religious fanatics are showing their thump on the nose to humanity and taking over control of the people by literally running parallel governments?

There is this point of the seeing the glass as half full or half empty based on each one's thought process - whether you are an optimist or a pessimist. But here is my point - Irrespective of whether you are an optimist or a pessimist, the truth is that the glass is only half full where it ought to be really FULL. There are no excuses for having it just half full when we have the calibre to make it really full.

I hope this New Year be a fresh start (as always!) to hold up our values in building humility, resilience and appreciation for what each one of us is and have.

A salute to humanity!

Worries

Read in an email...


We need not worry about those who have come through the boat;
Its hightime we start worrying about those who have come through vote (for note).

And the list continues...

A whole lot of my colleagues here had been asking about Mumbai & showing their solidarity & support to pray for the victims of the barbarious act. A handful of them were actually surprised by the way I responded as 'yet another one' - only people like us know how these attacks has become a part & parcel of the common man's life & it made sense to take a look back of the attacks in 2008.

1. January 2008 - Terrorist attack against Rampur CRPF camp - 8 dead
2. May 13, 2008 - Serial blasts in Jaipur, Rajasthan - 68 dead
3. July 25, 2008 - Serial blasts in Bangalore, Karnataka - 1 dead
4. July 26, 2008 - Serial blasts in Ahmedabad, Gujarat - 57 dead
5. September 13, 2008 - Serial blasts in New Delhi - 26 dead
6. September 27, 2008 - Serial blasts in New Delhi - 3 dead
7. September 29, 2008 - Blast in Modassa, Gujarat - 1 dead
8. September 29, 2008 - Blast in Malegaon, Maharashtra - 5 dead
9. October 21, 2008 - Blast in Imphal, Manipur - 17 dead
10. October 30, 2008 - Serial blasts in Assam - 77 dead
11. November 26, 2008 - Terrorists open fire at public in Mumbai - ~200 dead so far (many critical as on date)

And the value of 463 lives (in 2008)? Absolutely nothing!

Apart from making the general statement of blaming ISI & Pakistan & Jehadis for the blast, our leaders did nothing! Now I hear that we had intelligence information about this shoot-out from the fishermen folks after their boat was hijacked - and what did our police/intelligence do? NOTHING.

In the past years, we saw terrorist aggression in many other countries and what makes them different from us? Other chose to ACT upon information and thus prevented many more to come. People, parties, leadership & the intelligence stood together for their country.

And us? The latest I hear that the DCP denied that there was any prior information about the Mumbai attack & the fishermen is making up stories. And I can guess how easy it is to wipe out a complaint from the books if there is a political reason to do so. We have seen cases like 'Abhaya murder' case go on without the culprits being punished for 16 years - reasons are political.

I dont have many choices at the ballot box - It is like chosing between the devil & the sea. But I hear there is a section in our constitution that talks about null votes - which means the voter can decide that none of the candidates are fit to be chosen.

Additionally a provision should be made to ensure that a percent cut-off like 5-10% of null votes means that re-election needs to be conducted and the cost of such a re-election should be recovered from the present candidates because they denied the opportunity for a qualified one.

I don't know - It is my frustration talking...

Sad, shocked & as blank as it can get

My mind is as blank as it can get after hearing the shocking news about the terrorist attack in Mumbai. Does killing innocent public help anyone get their revenge? or does it make any statement? I fail to understand what drives the mind of such people.

More than anything, I am baffled to see the whole fraternity fail in their intelligence (everyone as a team), this being the 8th ot 9th terrorist attack in India in 2008 where the common man is targetted. As expected, our leadership has come out with statements of deploring the incident, condemning the incident & all sorts of mud slinging.

I am totally at loss of words. My prayers are with all of you who lost your dear and near ones or got injured in the attack on Wednesday.

What do we see on their face? Hope? or What next? or the indifference that nothing more can be expected from the government - except 'hot' statements?

Photo courtesy: Mathrubhumi

Some secular thoughts...

I am a Hindu by birth. I am a Hindu by my beliefs. But I am not a religious lunatic. My beliefs & my faith are very personal to me. And I don’t wear my religion on my sleeves and I am a strong believer of secularism. And I believe we can co-exist. Before writing this post, I had thought about whether to do this or not - for a long time because I feel I am going to be ‘profiled’(1) soon by who ever reads my blog. But I am what I am – so beat it!

Do we have agendas in our life? It is quite possible that we have goals in life ranging from who you want to be 10 years from now to how can I secure my next meal? Can we call our personal goals in life as agenda? What differentiates somebody’s goal from an agenda?

I see a lot of secularists around me in my day to day life; or rather people who call themselves secular, media who call themselves secular, organizations that call themselves secular. Off-late, I am getting a feeling that many of the so called secularists think that being secular means being the one who ‘dares’ to bash up the majority. Being that ‘smart-ass’ who only sees problems with anything and everything the other does and adding that typical twist in the tale. The permanent “devil’s advocate”. To be more specific, in the Indian Context (Kerala in particular), secularism has reached an all time low which means that any Tom, Dick & Harry who can talk loud and shout on how they think Hindus in India are proponents of in-house extremism (read as terrorism) – They are secular! What a Shame!

And on the other side, there are a bunch of maniacs who believes that ‘Indian culture’ has to be safe in their hands & the solution for that is to send every non-Hindu back to their original roots. While it is true that many religions, faiths that came to India thousands of years ago have chosen to stay with us and we embraced them as family and we co-existed for all these years. We are still known to be one of the most resilient & civilized communities ever known to man kind. I (a south Indian) might have many things common to my Muslim/Christian neighbor than a Hindu in the North or Eastern India. And this is the most talked about 'unity in diversity' of India. The culture or the ‘way of life’ as you call it - that everyone chose to adopt & live with

I condemn and do not subscribe to any kind of aggravation in the name of faith or belief that amounts to intentionally or unintentionally overstepping on anybody else’s beliefs or faith. Some do it covertly and some others in the open. The guys who do it covertly are the more polished ones that create support in terms of money, media and education. And they know how to be politically correct to ensure that they stay within the boundaries of the law of the land, but still push through it. 61 years into Independence, I am wondering if it is time to re-write a few sections of our constitution.

Do we still need caste/religion based reservations? Is it really helping the real needful? Or has it got to a rotten state, only to be another money minting business in the hands of religious leaders and vote bank politicians? We left casteism & untouchability two generations behind us – and it looks like we are getting our children ready to really go back in time there. A lot of examples to quote here starting from the 7th standard textbook controversy(2), compulsory teaching of subjects not prescribed by the state department (e.g. moral science for non followers) in minority controlled schools, racial profiling in similar schools in the pretext of uniform codes that amounts to banning the use/wearing of any commonly accepted religious symbols of other beliefs to school – e.g. head scarf, bindi et all. These activities have really started undermining the resilience and is really testing the patience of the so called majority.

As far as I understand from my modest upbringing, Hinduism consists of a very loosely coupled set of beliefs and is more a way-of-life than a religion with a four wall boundary & a binary approach (us vs. them). I don’t remember my parents or anyone else telling me when I grew up that I would be penalized for not going to a religious place once a week or once a month by denying me a place for burial or revoking the heaven for me when I die. It is more of a faith that deeply intertwined into our day to day lives and I believe a lot of other religions have also adopted a large part of this 'way-of-life' being a part of the Indian culture – vidyarambham – is a classic example.

Given this background, I strongly believe that the real people who help maintain the secularism in Kerala is this set of majority and not really the Congress or the Communists or the Janata party or any other Political party who proclaims themselves as the custodians of secularism. We see their secularism in colors of orange & green & blue & yellow flags flying high during the elections. I feel sick in my stomach when I read about secularism in election manifestos that has a Rashid or an Abdul contesting from Malappuram, a Chaco or Mathew contesting from Kottayam and a Narayanan or a Sekharan contesting from Kollam – irrespective of which ever party they claim allegiance to. It doesn’t come to me as a surprise that the common man has distanced himself from the politics and found solace in self proclaimed swamis and vicars and mullas who don’t give a damn about society or national integrity or co-existence but just to fill up their pockets, spreading religious hatred and sucking up to their promoters sitting out of Vatican or Pakistan or Gujarat.

With all due respect to the blogger community, there are many bloggers out there who talk about these issues from a text book stand point, from the constitution, quoting IPC sections and other academic stand points. And I don’t know how many of them face it in reality. I am really starting to get worried about the society into which my daughter will grow up to, in the next 15 - 20 years – (beyond which I expect that she will acquire the maturity to handle issues on her own). She is a half Hindu through me & half Christian through her mother (a living example of Jeevan). I am seriously worried about the crisis that she might face in a severely polarized society that is even intolerant to ‘Jeevan, the Casteless’ in a textbook(2), constantly subjected to provocation by each other and the related smearing by the lousy “secularists”.

And that makes me rethink on my plans to return back, invest or do anything worthwhile in this piece of land called Kerala – It may be much better to stay in the city to be a Bangalorean & ruminate the past & nostalgic memories of my village & homeland.

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(1)An interesting trend that I see off-late (especially on the web media) is profiling. It has to be either us or them – always binary. If you are not a communist, then you are a capitalist; if you are not a believer, then you are a communist; if you don’t agree with what I say, then you are one among them. And the latest among that nowadays is that if I don’t massage the minority’s bottom for anything and everything and condemn the majority, then I am not secular – which indirectly means I am a ‘Hindu extremist’ – I totally fail to understand this crude and narrow point of view that ‘if I don’t agree with you then you are one among them’.

(2) There was a large controversy that was caused by a chapter introduced in the 7th Standard Social Science text book of Kerala syllabus - The Chapter name can be roughly translated as 'Jeevan, The Casteless'. The chapter progresses through an admission interview of a child named Jeevan whose parents are from different religions and the related topics - underlying the fact that which religion you belong to is secondary, but thought provoking to children to start looking above race, creed & religion to humanity. Read more about it here in one of my older posts.

Change that you can believe in...

Finally, the United States of America voted for the "Change that you can believe in..." by a landmark decision of having a non-White as an American President. One of the key statements that stay fresh in my mind from Obama's speech is that: - "The rule by instilling fear in people is over and this is a fresh start, with hope & change that the Americans can believe in".

While I neither know nor have any say in the American political system, all I hope from the new president of this nation is that they stop acting the "world police" and act more responsibly towards the rest of the world, take definitive steps for peace among countries & start sharing resources by giving the shrewd "interests" a back seat.

The world is the world. The world is not only America!