Why?

A moment of silence was maintained today to honour the people died in the Mumbai terror attack. People around me were praying(atleast thats what i thought), but i end up only with my usual unanswered questions. To whom i should pray, What for and Why for? 

I dont know if i will ever get an answer for this...

Comments Please

This is my first post about reviews on the places i dine out. I would like to know your comments on this...

Cascade@Celebrations

Place: Cascade @ Celebrations, Hyderabad

Landmark : Ten minutes walk from Jubilee Hills Checkpost towards Ameerpet

Food : Indian & Chinese

Ambience: The caption says its a water side dining, but it doesnt look like that exactly. The seating is inside a bamboo structure and the water runs like a stream a little far. Dining in the bamboo surroundings gave me a dhaba feel.

Food: The dishes we tried were only chinese and the taste was typical. The best part of the food was the dessert 'Gulab Jamoon'.

Tag: This will be a  decent place for people who dine out occassionaly. For someonee who frequently eats out in different places(like me), this will be a pretty ordinary experience i guess.

Silhouetted

Some Silhouetted snaps taken against Hussain Sagar lake in Hyderabad. Conceived by Ram, realized by Ram and Vel.

Thanks to Ram for letting me use his works :-)

Impressed

I happened to see some one like this today,physically challenged, busily drawing close to the main road in Madhapur. As a matter of fact, i have seen this person many a times on the same place, but never gave much thought about what he is doing . Today while passing by him again, i had a little thought and felt good about his act(drawing).

These days I see a lot of ppl and children begging in the traffic signals. Irrespective of however they beg (sometimes the kids touch our feet and beg), i never felt like giving anything.

This guy, though physically challenged, he chose to use his art to earn his bread rather than panhandling. I felt his intention should be something close to this (might not be also :-)). Instead of going around begging people for money, he wanted to show people his art\talent, there by letting the interested and impressed ones to donate if they wish.

I felt this one is far better than panhandling.I was impressed.

Section 377

Looks like the Government of India has decided not to scrap the controversial section 377 of  the Indian Penal Code. 

It should be interesting to see the Government's argument to retain the law. Possibly the Government might argue that criminalizing this practice might reduce STD and AIDS in the society. Surprisingly the NGO's and other human rights organizations also quote the same reason for scrapping the law, along with the recogonition to these people in the society.

Irrespective of whether the law will increase HIV awareness and  prevent AIDS or not, the question here is whether is it  right to criminalize an induvidual based upon his\her sexual orientation ?

I dont feel it is OK to criminalize some one based upon their sexual orientation. Irrespective of whether it is against natural order, moral ethics or causing health issues, i dont think it is OK to brand them as criminals. 

Rather than defending the current law, the Government and Health Ministry can seriously think about scrapping the current law and enact new laws  to recogonize such practices and insist on monogamy among them. This might have a positive impact on their relationship as well as in the health issues of the society.

A Twist in the Tale

The view is not clear, looks distorted.. Not sure what day it is,infact not sure even what time of the day it is... The place seems to be familiar, but again not sure if i have been here before.. Walking around for a while.. No one seems to be around... looks like the place is deserted... 

Have a strange feeling that some one is watching me.. Not able to see any one around.. Am looking at something weird.. looks like a distorted figure... The image is not clear.. Looks like the image is watching me.. Seems like an evil spirit... 

Something seems wrong and I am running now, as the weird image gets closer. There is no place to hide around.. Am stilll running, the spirit is still chasing. 

At last, a place to hide... Got inside something that looks like a house.. But still feeling unsafe. Searching for something that can protect me from the evil spirit. Something struck..A Feel that reading mantras from a holy book might scare the evil and save me from it.. Am searching the house for a holy book...

Found atlast. The book thats going to protect me from the spirit.. Started reading it with hopes without looking if the evil is anywhere around..

Am still chanting the mantras from the book without looking around..Things around me seems to be fine now.. The place is calm and serene..

Hoping that everything is fine around, i raised my eyes from the book for the first time to see if the spirit is still there...

The ghost is there right in front of me... Right in front me, without looking at me...

Chicken skin all over my body  to see the Ghost's act  right in front of me

The Ghost is also chanting mantras from the same holy book that am chanting !!!!!!!!!!

Losing all hopes, I screamed aloud ....

....To wake up and realize that it is 11 in the morning  and with the chicken skin still on me..  :D

P.S. The crux of the above writing was a real dream my room mate had recently. I was fascinated with the little twist he had in the end, the ghost reading the same book that he was reading :D . 

As Kamal said

As Kamal said in Dasavatharam "Kadavul illannu enganga sonnen, irunthaa nallaa thaan irukkumnu solren"..

Keep off the Grass

Karan Bajaj - an IIM-B grad comes up with an impressive debut work Keep of the Grass.A Fiction from another B school grad sounded like it might be something similar to Five point someone.Albeit the initial hostel day events reminded five point.., this book is quite absorbing. The story is about an American(born to Indian immigrants) Wall Street investment banker,Samrat, travelling to India to pursue management degree in one of India's top Business school as part of his search towards self realization and happiness. While the farangi's experinces of chasing grass in the streets of Banglore, sharing a joint with the Aghori's and selling shampoos to rural Indians are fictious, the Sarkar's ideologies  and Vinod Singh's principles adds pinch of philosophy to the fiction.

Karan,being an IIM grad shows a quite snapshot of the competitiveness and the trauma prevailing in the atmosphere of the top business schools.Its pathetic to see students giving in, unable to face peer competition in such institution. The farewell speech by the alumnus shows sense of reality.

A nice blend of fiction,reality and philosophy makes Keep of the Grass an interesting read.

Fear Factor

"My heart is afraid that it will have to suffer," the boy confides to the alchemist one night as they look up at a moonless night. "Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself," the alchemist replies.

Isn't it true that we stop following our heart\dreams just because of this fear of failure and its sufferings. We often fail to realize the strength and confidence that we gain when we follow our dreams, irrespective of whether we achieve it or not. I think Barathiyar's Acham Thavir (Puthiya Aathi Soodi) is not a mere verse just to pass our grades in school. I guess it is a verse for the life.

Not alone our dreams, Fear stops us from being righteous, stops us taking right decisions at cross roads. Unless we Kick off this Fear, It is going to imprison us and create our destiny. If not we, then expect none to stand for us.

Blaft Anthology of Tamil Pulp Fiction

Blaft publications private limited, a chennai based publishing house has published this book - "Blaft Anthology for Tamil Pulp Fiction ". I had to literally postmortem the title to find what it means :)

Blaft - The publisher
Anthology - Collection of literary works
Pulp magazine or pulp fiction - Inexpensive fiction magazines

The book is a collection of fiction stories, translated into English, written by some of the great Tamil Pulp authors . The anthology includes stories of Subha, Rajesh Kumar, Vidya Subramaniam, Indra Soundararajan, Ramanichandran,Pattukottai Prabhakar, Pushpha Thangadurai, Tamilvanan,Brajanand, Resakee..

I was surprised to see such a publication. Its a welcome approach and a honor to all these great writers. Am not sure how good the translation version will be, as am yet to read it. But it will be a good read for the readers who will not be able to read Tamil. I guess the book should be available at all leading book sellers.

The publishers also have a vision of translating other South Asian Regional language books into English. With this we will get a chance to read the good works of writers from other languages too... Good work Blaft .

Green Vs Red

This one came to my mind, when i saw the symbol in the pizza box differentiating a Vegetarian Pizza and and a Non Vegetarian Pizza . The Vegetarian one had a Green colour and the other one had a Red Colour..

What does these colours signify..?
Green for vegetables and Red for the blood?
Is this a global representation used by the food outlets and manufacturers?
I remember seeing the similar green color symbol in a chocolate wrapper...

When i tried to Google for the global standard symbols, i was able to find a set of symbols for Vegetarian . But none for Non Vegetarians :(

The Three Mistakes of My life

The Three Mistakes of My life - A story about Business,Cricket and Religion.

Chetan Bhagat comes up with another fictitious story, whirling around the streets of Ahmedabad blended with business,cricket and religion. Simple narration, realistic characters and witty dialogs looks like his forte. Unlike Five point some one, this time the story involves more serious characters,historical events and reflects how politics and religion are inseparable in our country.

Though a little part reminds one of his previous novels it doesn't make you feel bored. This book is a decent read for fiction readers.

Hope

When ever i hear this word hope or hear someone speak something related to hope, the thing that often comes to my mind are these dialogs from the movie "The Shawshank Redemption".

Here is a small back ground if you have missed to watch this movie. Red (Morgan Freeman) and Andy Dufrense (Tim Robbins) are life time prisoners and Andy is convicted for a crime that he has not committed. Red delivers this dialog to Andy when they are in prison. Years after this, Andy escapes from prison and places a letter in a spot from where Red can pick it when he is released from the prison. This is one of THE MOVIE.

The Shawshank Redemption

Red: Let me tell you something my friend. Hope is a dangerous thing. Hope can drive a man insane.

Andy : [in letter to Red] Remember Red, hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies.



These are one of my favorite dialogs and this movie is one of my all time favorites. :)

It's a Wonderful Life

This is wonderful....

Many a times we never know what difference we make to the life's of people around us. Here is a man, whose dreams are just dreams throughout his life and makes him feel better not born . Trying to kill himself, he experiences a wonderful thing. A thing that makes him realize what he has done to the people around.. Thats the beauty of the movie..

There are certain movies that makes us feel good after watching.. This one belongs to that genre for sure..

This movie is available online in Google videos.





P.S Nandri Hi to Bala for suggesting this movie :)

Do it

Until we do it, we will never know "how" "much" we can do something....

The Kite Runner

After reading Ponniyin Selvan for months together, i picked up "The Kite Runner" three days back, hoping to complete it in a months time. But to my surprise i completed it quicker than i expected. Easily it becomes one of the best books i have read so far.

The Kite Runner derives its name from an ancient Afghan hobby of dueling with kites. When the opponent's kite has been downed, then the real battle turns into a race, the kite run, to see who retrieves the fallen kite. In 1994 the Taliban regime banned the kite flying

Khaled Hosseini's first novel unfolds a remarkable story of parenting, love, remorse and pain between two young children Amir and Hassan..Life is not same always, it changes for them too and puts them in a spot they would have never imagined. It brings you back your old memories and shows how life gradually changes in course of time.

Besides this the book gives you a picture of how the social and political climate in Afghanistan has made thousand of people homeless and made them live as refugees in other countries. Its sad to see how th monarchies, the Russians, followed by the Talibans and the anti terrorist wars(???) has made Afghanistan into a land of turmoil.

The story starts with a beautiful saying "There is a way to be good again", and ends with a hidden message, "Learn to stand for yourself, else their will be a day you will regret for not standing up for your loved ones"

Ponniyin Selvan

Ponniyin Selvan - Many of us would have heard about this novel. But only very few would have got the pleasure of reading it.. Written by Amarar Kalki, the story was initially published as a serial in his own magazine Kalki, for three and half years and later it got published as a book in multiple volumes.

It started like a pretty ordinary historical novel, but later it turned into a roller coaster ride with all twists and surprises.Mr. Vanthiyathevan Vallavarayyan's kusumbu and heroism, Kunthavai's saamarthiyam, Poonguzhali's attitude, Nandhini's revenge, Manimegalai and Amudhan's kadhal, Arulmozhi's gesture ellamey super.. The way the author has depicted the human feelings, their desires and the extent they go to achieve it, is the real beauty of the book. I was reading it like a mega serial, slowly and intermittently and when it got over i felt little empty.. :(

Reading it even after 50 years from the time it got published,this book gives you an immense pleasure .This is a must read for all Thamizh readers..