Stay Undefined ...

God behind glass

2010-03-08T23:56:00.013+05:30

Want to get a glimpse of Lord Venkatesh in Tirupati in few minutes, get Rs 2. rice from ration shop, want to know the law that is going to be submitted in parliament a day before, answer to all the is the same and simple. Many claim the answer is been taught at Pre-KG. Bribe.

Unwritten law of bribing doesn't work here, because this is the place even the Hyderabad constables perform their duty so proactively. If they had done the same duty in the rest part of Hyderabad, the traffic chaos created by color blinded citizens of Hyderabad would never have become this worse. Clean roads, calm area, sounds of the birds believe me I am still in India, but in a place where Indian Law can't be enforced. You can see papers before the barricade but not a spec of dust after that.

Many would have guessed the spot by now, but for those who haven't you are about to witness the more worshiped place in India, a place worshiped by all religion people, the place where every one speaks only one language despite their acquaintance with 26+ states in India. Dream of every college student begins here, destiny of many terrorists ends here, place which provides the gate pass for heaven a.k.a land of opportunities. U.S Consulate. Chill out, my ears can sense your yelling for such douche explanation.

A moment before the barricades of the Counslate you can hear names of eternal beings which even missed to get listed in the million deity list. As I crossed the first level of security, a lady with her kid signaled her success of getting dependent visa, and her father immediately called someone probably an old age home agent. While I was waiting in the gate, guy came out pumping his fist for giving an opportunity to eat his self cooked pathetic food for rest of his life.

I was able to hear my foot steps when I reached the first security gate of the Counslate office. Security guy alerted that iPod and electronic instruments are not allowed inside the consulate. Put restrictions for your own inventions. BTW, isn't ipod an electronic instrument?

Except for that two year old one, who has just completed learning English alphabets, everyone was comforting each other when ever they cross every level. I was anticipating someone to pump their fist after crossing Security check, probably I was busy putting on my clothes, I failed to notice that.

As I entered Document verification counter, there was guy who was literally shivering during the finger print scanning, probably this day could be his life changing moment. Step back and look at the benefits he would get after two years - of eating the cart food, subways, burnt Sambhar, pungent panner curry, hogging gtalk and skype - when he returns to India. US Return. His matrimony website page will have a US return in bold characters, his earnings section would have a mammoth amount after converting dollars into one of the weakest currency in the world, rupees, adventurous trip snaps to prove he is braveness, photo with Micheal Jackson (so what even he is dead, his wax statue is still alive).

Till he entered the counter the GOD was that blue sky, but all of a sudden He is sitting behind the glass, ready to grant the wish. It seemed we pushed foreigners out of our country so that we can go to their countries.. and claim they are racists. Even I too fall in that category, in consulate terms, a goddess in formal dress granted me B1 visa to look at some pretty gals out here and eat Ready to Eat foods for the next 3 months.

But when are we going to be GOD ???

Vinnaithandi Varuvaya

2010-03-02T22:22:00.011+05:30

Google real time search was tweeting Vinnaithandi Varuvaya as a clean family movie and so I decided to take my parents to that movie. They desperately wanted to watch Dhanush's Kutty which has been kicked out of all the theaters in favor of three movies released by DMK family. Its kind of difficult to take a school teacher to a romantic movie. As soon as she stepped into the Movie hall almost half of the crowd screamed "Teacher.. Teacher..", even Trisha wouldn't have got this welcome. My mom stared at me, she had warned me this would happen. All her students bunked the school, just like her and came to the movie. Amidst all the screaming we finally found our seat but unfortunately near a bunch of college girls, who had lipstick all over their face. (For god sake, please put a caution on the lipstick that even if it is their friends lipstick it shouldn't be over applied.) People were so excited that they started applauding for Shree Devi saree advertisement. Finally, Simbhu face appeared on the screen and a shower of shinning paper from the top row welcomed him. My mom was patiently removing the paper bits which fell on her hair and after few minutes investigation, realized that it was the question paper she gave to her students the day before. (She should be happy at least they used the question paper in the movie theater.)

First scene was shown several times, they kept showing Simbhu coming out of the same home -- short rip off of Memento. Bored of seeing Simbhu's terrifying face several times, they decided to show someone pretty. Trisha's introduction. In this movie, she is just a year older to Simbhu. You have no options other than believing it. Makeup artists have put their heart and soul to make her look really pretty, except for few scenes where makeup couldn't cover her aged face.

Simbhu was narrating the whole movie, his voice has a wonderful melody that made the guy next to my dad snore. Except for the scene where Simbhu proposes and where he tries to flirt with Trisha, first half an hour of the movie is almost a documentary and background score tried really hard to keep people awake. Many scenes reminded me of Vaaranam Aayiram, love at first sight, traveling to Kerala and obviously - the dragging screen play.

Scenes in Kerala was so elegantly captured, you would fall in love with the locations. To make the dragging story short, hero finally constructs a beautiful flat in heroine's heart, which heroine decides to rent it to some one else (that's a different love story!!). Here comes the Directors touch, he takes you back to the first scene where Trisha marries another guy. My mom screamed, unintentionally waking the snoring guy, "Hey the movie is going to be over without an interval", and the next scene was Interval. She then looked at the watch and felt sorry for herself that only one and half hour has gone. Only thing which was echoing in my ears during the interval is "Intha ulagathula inthana ponnum irundum nan yen intha ponna love pannanum", whenever they run short of dialogues they use this. Might be an attempt for a different screen play - Repeat every thing.

Second half soon found some beautiful romantic sequence in the backyard of Trisha's home, and now they love each other in full josh. To make the story different, the director has brought in a unconvincing breakup. Now Simbhu realizes that his love story is so different, and decided to take a movie out of that. Which is then followed by a bold climax (in Telugu the climax is changed), which would for sure surprise you.

Yes it is clean,
Yes it is romantic,
Yes it is different.
and
Yes it doesn't convince audience.

My dad turned to me and said "Intha Ulagathula ithana padam irundum nan yen intha padathuku vanden" and without even waiting for a second my mom replied "Kotta kotta Trisha va pathu puttu lolla paaru.. ". I felt that chemistry was far better than the unbelievable chemistry/mystery shown in the movie.

2 States

2009-10-25T23:17:00.009+05:30

After watching the EVAM's Five Point Someone stage show, I had good reputation for Chetan Bhagat's novel (despite many claimed EVAM show was better than the book version), and his recent novel 2 States, didn't disappoint. A great soul gave me the book, as the soul had a severe stomach pain from laughing and wanted to see me suffer from the same (FYI, If you want to become a great soul, lend me a book and if you wanna become greatest then don't ask it back). When I saw the front cover, the first thing which attracted me was the TamilNadu's outline, bcz I hail from there (well I realized there was a another state's outline, in the cover only after I finsihed reading the novel, a typical Indian state of mind towards their states), and the second was synopsis

Love marriages around the world are simple :
Boy loves girl. Girl loves boy. They get Married
In India there are few more steps:
Boy loves girl, Girl loves boy.
Girl's family has to love boy. Boy's family has to love girl.
Girl's family has to love boy's family. Boy's family has to love girl's family.
Girl and Boy still love each other. They got married.

Whole novel revolves the additional few more Indian steps, with a neatly carved characters Krish and Ananya. Ananya, a modern Tamil Brahmin, who wanted to substitue curd rice with Chicken and Rasnana with Beer and Krish, the narrator of this story, a Punjabi settled in Delhi, who would never dare to replace the paranthas floating in Butter with idlis floating in a cup of Sambhar, meet in a hostel mess. Krish scarifices his rasulla for a supposedly above average looking but as per IIMA standards a strikingly beautiful, Annaya. Krish, like many other guys, suffers from the disease of falling in love on first sight. News of the Strikingly beautiful gal spreads in IIMA faster than Swine Flu. (For god sake, some one find a vaccine for this love at first sight epidemic). Now Krish with his IIT'an formula solving ability solves the mystery of love and breaks the heart of many of his friend. And this smooth drives gets a break on the convocation, when the hyper-talkative Punjabi family meets the more reserved Tamil family. Rest of the story revolves around the efforts taken to convince the Paranthas and Dosas and finally end up creating a new dish. Why am I thinking too much about food, focus... focus on the blog...

It wasn't roller coaster ride, but definitely a journey in a Hyderabad roads with sufficient twists and turns. I really enjoyed the description and sequence of actions happening during the Punjabi and Tamil marriages. Lucid and the hilarious style of writing, would make sure it would never get nominated for a Booker's prize but would definetly keep the publisher happy.

Bottom Line : Happened to miss this book, don't worry you wouldn't miss much as you might this watched the same story in many movies. Of course a lot in the recent tamil movies (Boy and Girl trying to get approval for love, by convincing than revolting). I recommend this book for people suffering from love at first sight syndrome and wanna convert the infection into disease by marrying the same girl.

NetBook Windows War!

2009-03-10T12:21:00.004+05:30

Programmers around the world, might not be heartened with the Microsoft strategy of giving layoff to 5,000 employees to win the war against recession, but Notebook lovers would be happy to hear the Microsoft's plans to retain the support to Windows XP despite its release of Windows 7. Both Windows 7 and Windows XP, Netbook will be available in the market leaving the customers to chose what they want.

Good that Microsoft learnt a lesson, from the disastrous launch of world's most processor hungry operating Vista, which frowned many Notebook users, for away from stable XP and forcing people to use its pre-matured Vista.

Create shiny buttons in few clicks

2009-03-10T01:36:00.005+05:30

Da Button Factory, a web app which allows you to create shiny buttons online, and embed them in
your web app. Your can export your creativity, either as an image (png, gif, jpeg) or as a CSS. It had few templates/examples like Apple Button which you edit to get your own format, and check out my version of that button, in just few clicks.

Making it more social, and allowing people share more of their buttons might make this factory more productive. But it worth visiting this factory, and it won't fail to keep you busy for a while.

LeapFish - Clickfree Search

2009-02-27T19:12:00.009+05:30

Leapfish, yet another search-aggregator, which inturn relies on the olympian search engines, Google, Yahoo and Live. But suprisingly you wouldn't sigh, or can't navigate to another page. The portal lives to the tag line "just type it", and you type it, and result is getting updated accordingly as you keep typing. It gives aggregates multiple results from various blogs, images, news, answers, shopping info in the same page. But don't try to search for a "Search" Button, you might endup being upsted with zero results.

Leapfish, as described by its President and CEO, Behman Behrouzi

LeapFish offers a one-stop convenient solution for more complex searches by querying the web's most sought-after destinations and rendering the results to users in a surprisingly easy-to-use format

And what else, you can hover over the image, to get a thumbnail view of it, without troubling the mouse buttons. UI was sensibly designed to take to you the top of the search results when you click the next button, so you need not click to scroll.

Leapfish lacks the Google Image search by type, size of the image. May be a good to add feature to this Beta version.

Related Article : Search Socially through Scour

Scour - Search Socially...

2009-02-27T16:42:00.005+05:30

Searching on how to earn Money?, how about earning money by Searching. Scour, a new search engine, which consolidates the Google, Yahoo, MSN search results, offers this. Before going all about the reward program. Lets check what else it offers, hey it got lot dude! Hold On!

You can enjoy the incredible GYM results in one roof, with rankings of the results in their respective search engines. Its a democratic engine, you have write to speak and vote. Thumbs Up/down the results for your query. Post public comments on the link which the engine has thrown. Google too supports this, and they term it WikiNotes, but the UI is not intutive as Scour has.

Reward Program, though many claim attractive doesn't seem to be, you get every point for a search, comment, and 25% of the reward points of your referral program. May not make you rich overright, but you can get 25$ gift voucher for 6500 points. But a good marketing strategy intended to get the traffic to their page.

Can Hinduism be claimed a Religion ??

2008-10-17T23:27:00.000+05:30

Disclaimer: A verbatim of a discussion we had in our room, about this topic, slightly dramatized. NOT INTENDED TO HURT ANY ONE's FEELINGS/OPINION ABOUT RELIGION.

My recent interest in Yoga made me to read about Vedic chants, in Sanskrit. Google made my life easier and brought a lot of Sanskrit transliteration pages. Not surprised by the sudden hit on my head, I received tea cup from one of my roomie. People generally dare to taste the tea prepared by him, despite his claims that he hails from a state Kerela, which is known for preparing awesome Tea. I dared, as something is better. When a person enters a room with a tea, and gets one for you too, it means he likely has no job and wanna chat on issues which is not a penny worth. He was followed by my another room mate with a half litre milk in a glass (shouldn't a half litre glass be called a jug?).

With monitor showcasing the vedic chant, I turned towards the crowd (why am I calling just two people as crowd??. I can answer this with a risk of getting my face burnt by the hot milk in the jug).

Every one was curious to know why I was reading about vedic literature, and they wouldn't have been so, if it was a switched-off monitor which was staring at. Even I need to kill time in weekends, I was in a mood to feed their curiosity by expressing my motto behind reading vedic chants as I don't want our culture to die. Ahh!! Culture where did I get this from, it came out of blue. What-so-ever now for the crowd I am a person who is more concerned about culture and as a reader you too should assume that. What a great person am I???

But my answer doesn't seem to have entered in to the ears of "Tea Master", who immediately started reading the slogas, and proved that the 10 years of his Sanskrit learning in his school didn't go in vain. Chant which caught his eyes was

Aum Poornamadah Poornamidam
Poornaath Poornam Udachyathe
Poornasya Poornamaadaaya
Poornameva Vasishyathe.

It was listed with a following Meaning:

God is perfect (infinite). This Universe is also perfect (infinite). If perfection(infinity) is taken from anything perfect (infifinite) what remains is still perfect (infinite). Let there be peace, peace, peace.

He started to give a lecture on this chant, stating that infinity is defined even few hundred years back. It demands for society peace and kept continuing making sure that lecture word suits for the description..

To keep me awake during the lecture, I fired a question, which I thought was an intelligent one, "What does GOD to do in this chant, why perfection is been tied to infinity"

It was tackled with a single line reply (slapping on my face for thinking it was an intelligent), "It was interpretation that was posted by persons who modeled this religion, I doubt this could be the idea of those yogi's who formulated these chants".

"So vedic chants have nothing to do with the Hinduism?", another roomie questioned, I think he planned to give a break as keep on drinking that milk could have bored him. I was astonished to see that he was listening to our speech, with a half-litre jug his hand. My astonishment didn't stop, as I was thinking from where does Hinduism come here??. Question was again posted against the previously asked one, without giving time for my astonishment to settle.

When and by whom this religion got originated ?

I realized one thing it is easy to answer a question by posting another, and as always he didn't wait for me to reply and as the other one again started to continue to his duty of finishing the milk. He continued to extend his question..

Jesus Christ birth is the beginning of Christianity, Prophet Muhammad could take that place for Islam, and Buddhism by Buddha. But say me one person who started Hinduism ? If you find some one I will give him my whole property.. (Whole Property as if he is owner of Reliance Industries, what I am going to do his dirty dress, razor and I decided not to answer this question). My silence made the room silence, expect for the sipping sound of the milk, now that too stopped as he posted another question...

Define Religion ?
(Hey hold on every one is asking questions, is the whole discussion is about practicing how to ask questions..)

I am allergic to questions with word define and to get rid of that I made my mind to answer it at the earliest, and searched Wikipedia, which claimed).

In summary, it may be said that almost every known culture involves the religious in the above sense of a depth dimension in cultural experiences at all levels — a push, whether ill-defined or conscious, toward some sort of ultimacy and transcendence that will provide norms and power for the rest of life. When more or less distinct patterns of behaviour are built around this depth dimension in a culture, this structure constitutes religion in its historically recognizable form. Religion is the organization of life around the depth dimensions of experience — varied in form, completeness, and clarity in accordance with the environing culture."

As you tried now, even I tried to understand above lines which I never could understand. So again chose silence. Reply came with a soft note, as if he was answering a viva-voce in college, "Religion is faith, a belief that makes you think a God exist". It made me to wonder whether drinking milk will make people think like this.

But his answer made me happy, as atleast this broke the rally of question, despite the fact, it may or may not be a correct, but the happiness can't sustain as it was counter-attacked by yet another question:

"So who is GOD here? Is it Krishna, Vishnu, Siva, Murugan, Vinayakar ? Why so much Gods in this religion ? If you say GOD as a single entity then how come such huge lot came up. "

Entity!! Ahh.. I remember seeing the Object Oriented Programing book in his room, he read it and wanted to use it some where. An immediate thought sparkled, that I could write a blog about "Hindusim as a Single Entity", and later ditched it as it would be horrible.

I thought if I maintain silence, I would get a soar throat, so cleared my throat and getting ready to answer that question, but when was I allowed to do that, he continued, "Hinduism can't be claimed as a religion it is a moral practice which was imposed on the people, and it was easy in the past to impose moral practices through stories that GOD will punish you if you do this, and people who have story writing skills created their own character and give them some power, thats it. All the Ramayana and Mahabhartha are somehow tied up with Hinduism which has nothing to do with them. Geeta was made like a Bible for Hinduism, while it has nothing to do with Hinduism".

I said "Hmmm... " after his lengthy dialogue, with an aim to stop this discussion, but I never expected the half-litre milk would have vanished by then and which made him to pounce into the discussion with a lecture: "I don't agree that there is no GOD, I don't know whether there was Krishna who has a chakra which acted like a Boomerang. But GOD is who created the universe....... " Lucky, that he didn't remember Big Bang Theory, but the word Boomerang made me to dream about my college days, there used to be an ice cream parlor named Boomerang near our college, where you would love to enter only with a gal, and it used to taste great.. I was thinking on whether the ice cream tasted great because it was good or because you went with a pretty gal who was good....

A call to my rescue, and I rushed to materialize the opportunity, and picked my phone and said "Hello.. " and kept walking away from my room without expecting an response from other end, then I realized that battery in my cell phone has already drained and the call came in Tea Master mobile ... Crowd again gathered around me and now not for chatting.. !! Oh No.. !!

Disclosure : My certificate holds "Hindu" in the Religion column. You can see me inside temples, so I can't claim myself an atheist.

Vaaranam Aayiram - Nenjukkul Peidhidum Lyrics

2008-10-17T20:06:00.000+05:30

A song in an unadulterated Tamil, and that too was damn impressive, hats off to Thamarai Harris Jeyaraj (All his albums follow a template despite the fact they are awesome).

Why should such an unadulterated Tamil song should be in English ?? (For those who can't read Tamil, lyrics in English)

நெஞ்சுக்குள் பெய்திடும் மா மழை
நீருக்குள் மூழ்கிடும் தாமரை
சட்டென்று மாறுது வானிலை
பெண்ணே உன் மேல் பிழை

நில்லாமல் வீசிடும் பேரலை
நெஞ்சுக்குள் நீந்திடும் தாரகை
பொன் வண்ணம் சூடிய காரிகை
பெண்ணே நீ காஞ்சனை

ஒ சாந்தி ஷாந்தி ஒ சாந்தி
என் உயிரை உயிரை நீ ஏந்தி
ஏன் சென்றாய் சென்றாய் என்னை தாண்டி
இனி நீதான் எந்தன் அந்தாதி

நெஞ்சுக்குள் பெய்திடும் மா மழை
நீருக்குள் மூழ்கிடும் தாமரை
சட்டென்று மாறுது வானிலை
பெண்ணே உன் மேல் பிழை

ஏதோ ஒன்று என்னை ஈர்க்க
மூக்கின் நுனி மர்மம் சேர்க்க
கள்ள தனம் ஏதும் இல்லா
புன்னகையோ போகன்வில்லா

நீ நின்ற இடம் என்றால் விலை ஏறி போகாதோ
நீ செல்லும் வழி எல்லாம் பனிக்கட்டி ஆகாதோ
என்னோடு வா வீடு வரைக்கும்
என் வீட்டை பார் என்னை பிடிக்கும்

இவள் யாரோ யாரோ தெரியாதே
இவள் பின்னால் நெஞ்சே போகதே
இது பொய்யோ மெய்யோ தெரியாதே
இவள் பின்னால் நெஞ்சே போகதே

நெஞ்சுக்குள் பெய்திடும் மா மழை
நீருக்குள் மூழ்கிடும் தாமரை
சட்டென்று மாறுது வானிலை
பெண்ணே உன் மேல் பிழை ஒ ஒ

நில்லாமல் வீசிடும் பேரலை
நெஞ்சுக்குள் நீந்திடும் தாரகை
பொன் வண்ணம் சூடிய காரிகை
பெண்ணே நீ காஞ்சனை

தூக்கங்களை தூக்கி சென்றாய்
ஏக்கங்களை தூவி சென்றாய்
உன்னை தாண்டி போகும் பொது
வீசும் காற்றின் வீச்சு வேறு

நில் என்று நீ சொன்னால் என் காலம் நகரதே
நீ சூடும் பூவெல்லாம் ஒரு போதும் உதிராதே
காதல் எனை கேட்க வில்லை
கேட்காது காதல் இல்லை

என் ஜீவன் ஜீவன் நீதானே
என தோன்றும் நேரம் இதுதானே
நீ இல்லை இல்லை என்றாலே
என் நெஞ்சம் நெஞ்சம் தாங்காதே

நெஞ்சுக்குள் பெய்திடும் மா மழை
நீருக்குள் மூழ்கிடும் தாமரை
சட்டென்று மாறுது வானிலை
பெண்ணே உன் மேல் பிழை

நெஞ்சுக்குள் பெய்திடும் மா மழை
நீருக்குள் மூழ்கிடும் தாமரை
சட்டென்று மாறுது வானிலை
பெண்ணே உன் மேல் பிழை

நில்லாமல் வீசிடும் பேரலை
நெஞ்சுக்குள் நீந்திடும் தாரகை
பொன் வண்ணம் சூடிய காரிகை
பெண்ணே நீ காஞ்சனை

ஒ சாந்தி ஷாந்தி ஒ சாந்தி
என் உயிரை நீஎந்தி
என் சென்றாய் சென்றாய் என்னை தாண்டி
இனி நீதான் எந்தன் அந்தாதி

Technical Section (Ignore if you aren't a softy):

Transliterated using Google Indic Transliterate. Despite great features offered by this transliterate tool, it wasn't successful in converting a whole text, you might have to type text and enter space to trigger a conversion. Planning to write some tool for automating the transliteration of whole text into desired language. Many Tamil/Telugu/Hindi lyrics which are currently transliterated in English could be translated to into their desired language. Hope language lovers would love that.. will soon update more on that.

Internet gets a new dimension..

2008-08-16T14:33:00.000+05:30

"Whats next?", this question always stays un-answered only for a stint period when it was about internet. Of late, "3-D" would be easy make its way to the top answers..

Two decades back, when Tim-Berness launched their text based browsers they could have never anticipated such a immense and handy browsers would evolve. Microsoft look a lion share of the browsers by moving the porting the text based browser to PCs naming it IE, what IE has achieved using 7 versions, Firefox blasted with just 3 versions, and the new 3-D browsers even breaks that in one version.

3-D browsers despite doesn't have commendable percentage of the market, mainly due its resource intensive process and a demand for graphics card to render.

One such browser which is creating waves is SpaceTime . There are cool futures in Spacetime and the one I loved the most is 3-D tab browsing. It took IE years to copy the tab concept of Firefox, but those years has been used by these folks to make it 3D. Browser lived it what its developer claimed "I think I have found a product that makes the Google interface looks like it was developed by Apple".

Its pretty cool, but highly resource intensive, might be even because of my not so efficient nVidia GEForce 6150. I can comment better if I get a chance to test it in some other machines.

Another browser which lured me much is 3B . Browser gives you the feel of virtual shopping, it creates 3D rooms, where you can move your avatars, where the web-pages will be on the walls or display racks. Wanna travel a long distance in that, take a cab. Whats great is you can shop with your friends too...

Take a sneak preview of the browser: http://www.3b.net/browser/demo.html

These browsers requires a separate installation, and you might have to get accustomed with the new browser features, for lovers of Firefox or IE this might some time be over killing or might seem to be over killing till things familiarized.

Cooliris team, has moved a step further by making the right now the world's most popular Open Source web browser Mozilla Firefox. Now PicLens add-on would take move the web-users to a new dimensions. PicLens renders images, videos in what it claims "an impressive view" and it is. Major sites like Google, Youtube, Yahoo, flickr, myspace gets a view in them. You can even make your webpage/blogs which has plently of images to be PicLens compatible.

Image search in Google using PicLens makes us view the thumbnail with a much better look and can peep through more pictures which when viewed through Google might require multiple page loadings. And these images are just loaded with low resolution till you select them, which makes loading faster than ever.

Amazing stuff PicLens happens to be that every picture is being loaded with a low resolution unless you select them, so it makes it faster. Now this approach won't let you to stick only to the top 10 or 20 results which is posted in the first page of Google. It brings before you some cool photos which was hidden in the web, just to lack of traffic.

Given said, its awesome, doesn't mean it doesn't have any shortcomings..

1. Images viewed can't be saved.
2. While one video is streaming, you can't browser other tabs in your Firefox. In short the tabbing options could be great help.
3. For people using Dual Monitor, life is going to so pathetic as a click any other applications would close this window. Again this is in similar lines with the Shortcomings #2.
4. They don't support any text based view where every search result is nothing but a snapshot of the web page, just like what SpaceTime does.

Subramaniapuram -- Electrifying!!

2008-08-09T01:26:00.000+05:30

If you want me to name one of the most electrifying Tamil movie, it would be Vijayakanth's Naramshima, where VijayKanth gives electrifying performance by giving shock to the current itself.. goshh...!! 2008 has seen an electrifying movie, but this time its not the actor giving shocks, but the debutant director SasiKumar in his flick Subramaniapuram...

Kudos to him, by taking immense effort in bringing the life @ 1980s. I even used to wonder how Director dared to take such a risk, by spending some good amount in set without a great star value. In history of the Kollywood, debutant movies would be a low budget movie, then the heros emerge then plunder the producer wealth. I was more impressed when I heared the voice of New Reader which used to wake me up every morning when I was kid, the scotter and the TV....

When even Music Director even doesn't have a Star value, James Vasanth.. Oops!! Amazing talents with the person who is known compering the TV show which digs out great talents.. But attimes you Kangal Irundal songs is awesome, but its very difficult to stop us feel these were in the lines of some of the illayaraja's master piece work. Picturization of the song is cute, the majority of credits goes to Swathi, who has already stole many hearts of the Telugu movie buffs.. now had successfully conquered the Tamil buffs.., and rest goes to director by not making didn't dance with 100's of juniors artists, yet make a amazing sequence of events... Jai smile reminds the Paruthiveeran movie.. I would dare to say that Swathi literally acted only through eyes, which Jyothika tried in most of her movies...

Movie is nothing different from old ones which you have watched, even it reminds of lot of hit movies like Pattiyal, Paruthiveeran.. but the shock treatments provided by the director towards the climax makes you forget those.. what remains in your mind is the mind blowing Kangal Irundal song and the innocence friendship between Alagar (Jai) and Paraman (SasiKumar) !! I was more happy to hear songs, in which I can understand the lyrics.. !

First half dwells around 5 friends who spends time by getting them involved into street clashes... Their professional ethics states, pay back for every good deed that been done, despite it gets you in trouble.!

In the second half, they keep on weaving the trouble and finally realize they corned themselves. But you as a audience you would realize that what they finally realized is not true!! Confusing!!

Get it clarified by watching the movie, you wouldn't regret for spending 2 and half hours, unless you are a weak hearted and ardent fan of feel good romantic flicks..

Short Story to flick..

2008-05-30T19:41:00.000+05:30

So here it goes my short story, published some time back, I Need You.. will soon be converted to a short flick by Milind Shriraam. Poster for the flick...

Kalloori Review

2007-12-20T02:17:00.000+05:30

Tags: Kalloori, Kallori, kalloori movie, kalloori review, kalloori tamil review,kallori movie, tamil movie, review, Tamanna Bhatia, Balaji Shaktivel, shankar, tamil
When Kalloori movie was set to be released after years of production, Sheker Kammula's "Happy Days" was making heavy waves and redefining blockbuster in Tollywood. 'Happy Days' was successful due to its comedy, the feel good factor and importantly Tollywood has seen quite a less number of college based movies. Not the same with tamil, which has been flooded with a lot of movies burgeon forth with the same theme (Idhayam, Boys, Kadhal Desam, April Madham). But college based theme are evergreen and can never become a yesteryear, even yesteryear movie/song remake are making huge hits, I thought this could best bet by Shankar. But to my surprise, Shankar has taken huge risk in this. The movie goes in similar lines of the conventional college story, where you have a group of friends and love blossoms, but the risk is taking up a huge concept which would get political opposition, bringing in lot of new faces, and allowing the director to take a movie which revolves around rural education, which would reduce the commercial values of the movie. Kalloori is all about life at rural colleges which rarely hears the sounds of the bikes, sizzling cars, cell phones and the life of those students, who had to sacrifice his siblings education to get himself educated, a contrast to what we have seen these days in college based movies. Many won't get the nostalgic feeling which drives every college based movies to succeed commercially, but you will definitely get to see how hard is to educated in rural India and how hard to survive in India which is cursed with politicians.

Tags: Kalloori, Kallori, tamil movie, review, Tamanna Bhatia, Balaji Shaktivel
Kalloori movie opens with a few people silently clearing a ground, near a tree and it takes us back in time where a bus heading towards the Government Arts college. Director doesn't take much time to introduce a group of people, who claim themselves as friends for a long-term. Despite a movie without much of heroism, the lead role Muthu enjoys a good built-up introduction. All the students enter into the Lecture Hall to see a city cultured beautiful gal Shobana from Banglore (played by charming heorine of 'Happy Days' Tamanna Bhatia, with a lot of glycerin and with a little makeup). She being undisturbed by the comments passed by her colleagues, disturbed the attention of our weak hearted hero. Gang was given strict rules of maintaining friendship with gals only if you are ready to live without promoting them to Girl Friend. Rule was heavily backed by a Kayalvili, who believes in friendship and hates love which arises due to friendship, and her single dialogues haunts Muthu's mind which is now ready to accept Shobana as his friend. Muthu, who has joined the college with a dream of getting into government job through sports quota, haunted by Shobana's care and affection goes into a dream world, unaware of the fact She is still in real world. But when Muthu realizes its a dream, he loses his concentration in the game. Shobana on the other hand, in an effort to make him win the game, loses her heart. Transformation of the friendship into love was pretty natural, you wouldn't complain much on it.
After falling in love, Tamanna expresses some matured acting when she tries to control her petty jealousies when her friends take care of Muthu. Her longing to be with her fellow but not convinced to do that at the cost of her gang was nicely expressed..

Tags: Kalloori, Kallori, tamil movie, review, Tamanna Bhatia, Balaji Shaktivel
Efforts taken by the students to learn English and few interesting characters in the group had succeeded in provoking laughter at some places. But trying to carry the same comedy till the end was bit annoying. Director has scored in portraying the actual sufferings of the students which they forget when they are in group. Misunderstanding, hot discussions didn't miss to find its place. Every character in the movie did their role well. But the dialogues and the background doesn't seem to have induced much of our emotions given the great effort taken by Sakthivel in scripting this. Not to mention the music director's effort to make the good songs, with clearly understandable lyrics. Of late, its rare we get songs with a clearly understandable and good lyrics. Unnarugil Varugayil song will be hummed for next few months..

Tags: Kalloori, Kallori, tamil movie, review, Tamanna Bhatia, Balaji Shaktivel
But what makes this movie speaks for itself is its climax, the last 15 minutes should have turned many peoples eyes to wet and mind to blaze about political curse in India and the blind Indian Judiciary.

Tags: Kalloori, Kallori, tamil movie, review, Tamanna Bhatia, Balaji Shaktivel
Spoiler Warning:
It was all about the true incident of the Tamilnadu Agriculture University bus ablazed by Political mobs to show protest of the arrest of Jayalalitha on Feb 2, 2000 in Dharmapuri. To avoid any more volience due to this movie director has shown them to happen in Andhra Pradesh. But it would be very difficult for any person who has watched those horrified incident in the early millennium to ever forget this.

Tags: Kalloori, Kallori, tamil movie, review, Tamanna Bhatia, Balaji Shaktivel
In a nutshell, Kalloori a movie throws light on a horror-struck incident in a sublime of friendship and love. Natural narration, flawless performance and credible songs has been weakened by the lack of excitement in the dialogues, background music, careless editing.

Kudos to Shankar for encouraging to take such a bold non-commercial movies in the Tamil Flim Industry..

Verdict: Miss the movie at your own risk.

Tags: Kalloori, Kallori, tamil movie, review, Tamanna Bhatia, Balaji Shaktivel

India Vs India

2007-09-25T00:06:00.000+05:30

An excellent commercial which speaks for India, catch the script at the end of the video.

There are two India's in this country..

One India is straining at the leash, eager to spring forth and live up to all the adjectives that the world has been recently showering upon us.

The other India is the leash.

One India says, give me a chance and I'll prove myself. The other India says, prove yourself first and maybe then you will have a chance.
One India lives in the optimism of our hearts, the other India lurks in the skepticism of our minds..
One India wants. The other India hopes..
One India leads. The other India follows....

But conversions are on the rise. With each passing day more and more people from other India are coming over to this side. And quietly while the world is not looking, a pulsating dynamic new India is emerging.

An India whose faith in success is far greater than its fear of failure.
An India that no longer boycotts the foreign made goods, but buys out the company that makes them instead.

History, they say, is a bad motorist.It rarely ever signals its intentions when it is taking a turn.

This is that rarely-ever moment. History is turning a Page.

For over half a century our nation has sprung, stumbled, run, fallen, rolled over, got up, dusted herself and cantered, sometimes lurched on. But today, as we begin our 60th year as a free nation, the ride has brought us to the edge of time's great precipice.

And one India - a tiny little voice at the back of the head - is looking down at the bottom of the ravine and hesitating.

The other India is looking up the sky and saying. It's time to fly.

I need you....... - A short story!

2007-07-19T16:38:00.000+05:30

Clock undisturbed by the incident ticked 12.. Dark covered the whole hall, except for a small night lamp near the portrait, picturing Rathore, his wife Sheela and their 8 year old son. After viewing Sheela's face filled with smile in the portrait you would dare to see that face with bullets. With a Pistol in one hand Aravind was walking away from her. Most of her body is being accommodated by bullets.. Only GOD knows how he could do such an idiotic thing...

He made his way into one of the room out there, with clothes scattered all over the room. With a paper on the bed, he slided the red knob on the top of the paper which turned into a PC. Sheela's photo popped up with a message..

He touched her face softly.. Fear in his eyes was almost surpassed by the affection. Tears in his eyes wouldn't have allowed him to see the message at the right side of the photo, which read "I would be late to home... Take care". The message was sent some few hours back..

An alarm could dismay any body at such an depressed situation, this fear can sometimes makes you more foolish. Picking up the call was one such act..

"Ohh.. sorry dear.. Got busy with my work.. I will come in another hour. I will pick your Mom on my way home.". It was Rathore on the other end.

Rathore would definitely be surprised to hear the beep sound.. rather than his Son's voice..

Rathore's call induced the Adrenaline flow in him, he rushed towards Sheela. Sat in the couch opposite to the one which holds Sheela. He sat in the couch as if he has achieved a great thing in his life.

Other than time nothing moved... Clock ticked 1'... Rathore and his wife Sheela entered their home...

Aravind was waiting for them to come to him.. and they did. And not less than a second, Aravind could feel a forceful blow on his face.. Pistol touched the floor..

"How dare you to shoot her, now who will take care when I am out for work? Its almost my earnings which I had put to buy a Robo which looks like me. Don't you understand I did all these for your sake.. "

"hmm.. hmm... Sorry mummy... !! I.. I.. need you... "

Water rushed out of his eyes like a flood.. How long can an eight year old kid control his tears?

Not being moved by those words... Sheela's next question knocked Rathore's ears..

"Rathore, is there any way to get her back to the normal life?? "

After a few minutes of investigation,

"Aravind shot at the main circuit board. A short circuit has completely burnt the Processor. The probability of bring her back to normal is quite impossible.. "..

"Ohh.. Do you mean daily I have to come home early to take care of Aravind ?" Sheela cried...

Rathore nodded...

Aravind smiled...

Acknowledgment: Thanks for the beta readers whose valuable comments made this story readable...

Disclaimer: Not inspired by any true story :D..

Love Makes Life beautiful*

2007-06-24T05:23:00.000+05:30

Statutory Warning: This is my first attempt to write a story.. Read at your own risk!

So you are ready to take risk. It might be difficult task but make sure you read the story till the end..

After placing an order for a bouquet, I was waiting outside the shop reading a magazine featuring an interview with a celebrity, who was popular for his much-publicized love affair that ended just a while ago than his acting. When asked about his love, he had to say this ~
"My love is true! Right now we may stand apart, but every mind has a theater and you can never prevent flashbacks from occurring in them". My mind has already started to travel back with a supersonic speed giving space shuttle 'Atlantis' a complex....................

Its Deepika's mobile which is ringing loudly waking all the ppl in the floor including me... She picked the call and the person on the other end ~ "Good Day Mam! I am Priyanka calling from Pizza Hut, we are pleased to inform you that you have won a ticket for sivaji this weekend, through our lucky draw contest. Ticket has already been couried to your address, you would be receiving them soon.. "

Deepika outcried, "Oh.. MY GOD! I can't believe it, I gonna watch the movie the day it is getting released.. anyhow thanks a lot.. ". She hung the phone..

I was making a call, admiring the way she was blazoning out to her friends near by. Person at the other-end picked up and I said "Thanks Priyanka!"

Next day at the personal courier collection/dispatch desk in my office:

"How many days do you generally take to deliver a courier? "

"Depends on the location sir! For International we would generally take a week, for any-places within the country would take a max of two days. Utmost a day for local couriers..", explained the courier person

"That's cool! so how much time do you think it would take to dispatch the courier from your desk to the cubicle out there? ". I asked him pointing out Deepika's cubicle.

"A minute.. ", he replied with a boasting smile..

"Then just do it right away.. ", I handed over the cover, which has the tickets for the show. Of course it befuddled the courier guy.. I moved my feet without wasting any-more moment..

Come Saturday Morning...

Maybe the first day in my life I was washing my face before my Dad baths me in my bed..

I entered into the theater after making sure Deepika's scooty marked its presence into multiplex. She located her seat and was about to take them she noticed me sitting beside her..

"Hey, what a surprise! What are you doing here?", she posted a stupid question...

"Hmmm.. Dancing.. ". I know that was bad reply, but She giggled for almost a minute.

She started boasting.. "You know I won this ticket through lucky draw.. ".

"Really!!" I exclaimed, "Only I knew how many hours I stood in a queue to get your tickets.. " I told to myself..

Flim intermission and some slow moving scenes were the only time I enjoyed during the movie.. That night, I threw a party and shared my happiness with my friends, as always they urged me to propose her soon..

"Your bouquet is ready!", shopkeeper's voice paused my flashback..

While collecting the bouquet, a scooty crossing me caught my attention. I did take effort to stop it, but for sure she won't be able to hear my shout in the midst of the heavy traffic. I placed the bouquet in my bag and started my bike but by that time she has gone out of sight. What's real use with a high CC bikes when I wasn't able to catch a scooty?..

Adrenaline was rushing and I had butterflies in my stomach.. It was sweating already. My hands was trembling. Even at signals I used to rise the accelerator to reduce my tension, but in otiose. At a signal, I finally found the scooty at the other side of the road, I tried to reach her, only to get scolding from people behind me. She flew again.. After all the efforts I overtook her bike and stopped her! It took me seconds to bring my heart down from throat..

I parked my bike in the side lane, walked towards her, took a deep breath and said .. "Can you please tie your shawl behind you, it was sweeping the road and it may get stuck in your wheels"..

She faked a plastic smile tied them out and said "Thanks!". Not less than a moment she flew away..

I took my bouquet and walked towards the cemetery.. I placed the bouquet on the grave which had Deepika's name engraved on it, "If someone could have warned Deepika like that, she would not be sleeping here". Rain took care of wiping my tears away...

DISCLAIMER: Climax of this story was based on in Kumudham (Weekly Tamil Magazine). Don't have any references to that.

Keywords:love, love story, short, short stories, stories, story

A stylish Investment

2007-06-19T20:14:00.001+05:30

Cool! This is not about investing on stylish fashion dresses which run for 1 cm length, this is all about AVM's recent 80-crore investment on a person, who pulls in the crowd (and obviously the money) through his style.

In recent years, the producers are more lured towards the star value than a story or rather a good screenplay. That sounds to be decent investment rather, the previous investment made on Rajini by Sivaji Productions has got 300% returns. Top ranking Funds could not even give you 100% returns. So why not Producers start issuing shares? Would be good if we have an IPO for these movies :)

Sivaji a blend of Shankar's social views and Rajini's stylish acting, incredibly hyped through out the world. Don't be surprised to hear even in Hyderabad, people stood in a long long queue to get tickets for Sivaji(dubbed in telugu). Historical Rush for a dubbed movie in Hyderabad.

Spoiler Warning: The text below is about parts of the story or how it ends. Read at your own Risk

With heavy expectations we marched into the theaters. Songs was aired inside the theaters to keep us entertained till the movie is screened, but I am pretty sure no body could have dared to hear the song, in the midst of the huge applause and shout. But all these hype and expectations shattered into pieces after Super star's introduction. There’s a terrific stretch of conversation during thalaivar's introduction. Sivaji was taken into the prison and the prisoner in the neighboring cell enquirers why he’s there. He asks if it was murder. Sivaji says no. He asks if it was fraud. Sivaji says no. He asks if it was pornography. Sivaji says no. He asks what, then, got him arrested. And Sivaji replies with a smile, “Makkalukku nalladhu pannen.”. I personally felt that wasn't a pretty impressive introduction. First 15 min was bit slow, a song which moves from a Pub to outdoor for no reasons. Surprised to see newly slim Nayantra in that song, but it wasn't that impressive despite a great efforts made by belly-artists. Vivek, Super star's sidekick breaks through the tedium. Vivek has a superb scene where he punctures this whole punch-dialogue business, pretty much everyone collapsed when he let loose this gem: Six-ukku apparam seven da, Sivaji-kku apparam yevan da!.

In another movie, I would have sniveled with suddenness the songs break appear, but here I was looking for songs, which glitters with Shankar's lavishness. Athiradi songs, shows Rajini as a comic hero, Graphics and obviously Rajini style scores. Vaji Vaji songs which unfolds in grand Thotta Tharaini's set, like a Amphitheatrum Flavium perforated by shafts of light.Sahara songs was well picturised, in a set similar to famous Louvre Pyramid,Paris, thanks to the makeup artist and the lighting arrangements which portrayed Rajini in 1990's in that song. And Shivaji mimicking, real world Sivaji, MGR and Kamal was pick of the lot.

Second Half opens with a classic clash between Rajini and Villian, when Suman (charming villan) tries to call Commissioner of Police, Sivaji's response in vadivel's style 'Kanna.. Comedy ethuvum pannalaye.. ithu black money ma.. ' made the whole audience broke into laughter. But the movie losses its charm when Sivaji keeps grabbing all the black money and there is no room for the villian to play their game. Even in epic ages Valmiki made Ravanan to be a powerful opponent, to make things interesting. Somehow trendy Shankar missed it!. But the biggest milestone for the movie is the climax. Style in the climax was really awesome.

In a nutshell, except for few pitfalls, the movie has the charm to make it a blockbuster.

From Forehands to Fashion..

2007-05-30T03:10:00.000+05:30

Sometime in the recent past a sport-magazine claimed.. "Serena Williams seemed more non-plussed when she dropped her earring than when she dropped her serve at the US Open on Monday, no surprise since the diamond confections dangling from her lobes were worth $A53,000"

Future generations who happen to see Serana Williams, Maria Sharapova or Anna Kournikova might forget the fact "The first women to play in the tournament wore full length dresses".

You can't help yourself from getting surprised when you happen to see the player's outfit when Lawn tennis has marked its presence. During those period lady's used to make the presence to the parties and would be playing in the ground as they were dressed for their party. I was balled over to see their actual outfit in the Ageless Patterns

Who are the major people behind this dramatic switchover from full sleeved outfits to sleeveless apparels?

Maud Watson, the first woman to win two Wimbeldon titles in a row. She was gossiped to have shocked the viewers by her ankle-length white dress (Not sure what blowed them out of water!!)

In fact many tennis criticizers claim that the fashion-business started after the first world war, and they attribute this credit to French woman Suzanne Lenglen. She seems to have made a history by reducing the full sleeves to 3/4th. Even on hot days, she used to wear fur coat. (I shouldn't laugh on seeing this, bcz I used to wear blazer and tie for college functions even at 40c)

Suzzane's band became her trademark, and it seems ppl began betting on the color of band she used to wear the next match (Is this betting business still happening around???)

But gradually, ladies tennis apperals became totally practical - short skirts and sports shirts. The only light relief were the sponsors' logos.

Anne White made her name in the eighties by trying something different. For her first round match at Wimbledon, she wore an all-white, skin-tight body suit. At one set all, the match was postponed overnight and she was quietly told by the Wimbledon authorities not to wear it the next day. She lost that match but worldwide coverage followed and did wonders for her confidence.

More recently, William sisters, Sania Mirza, Anna Kournikova made photographers to flocking back for tennis fashion photos.

Wondering what could be the length of tennis apperal's in the next decade, if the current length reduction rate continues ???

Koffee Chat

2007-05-29T00:16:00.000+05:30

Drama and emotions, glitz and glamour, sugar and spice, and a tad bit controversy! The key ingredients of this blog. Slip in during your coffee time, have a sip of my views and spill the beans like you have never had.

Kanda Nal Mudhal -- Review

2005-12-01T03:05:00.000+05:30

Now Kollywood has a movie which defines, in an enjoyable fashion, what "Chemistry" is.. Hey hold on, this is not something which your bald headed chemistry professor trying to explain (I don't know how most of the professors head turn bald so early which psychologically makes them to catch our hair when we don't answer their wage questions.. ).

Love always starts with a fight, yuck how many movies are still to come with this almost a half-a-century old theme, the amazing thing is the way it was conveyed, even if Narashima Rao were able to understand Tamil and happened to watch this move it would be difficult for him to be tight-lipped.

Movie flashes in a function where two kids (Krishna, Ramya) fight and the girl bites the guy's cheek, and the whole scene is transformed into a college function, where the both these now youngsters (Prasanna, Laila) continue to fight, but luckily now the girl doesn't bite the guys cheek.. The college scene is nicely picturised good fun. But I really don't understand reason for the song there, I think despite a good story Director wanted to say to the audience "Its Tamil Movie you idiot.. and basic qualification would be 5 songs.. ", but Yuvan's Music made sure that only quite a few would go out for smoking. Now comes the real story, Aravind (Krishna's Friend come Boss, yeah life is gonna difficult under such conditions) comes from US and Ramya is being engaged for him. Aravind expects, his life partner should never be dependent, should bold enough which obvious means fight enough (may be he wants to get trained in Martial arts without providing few bucks to the trainer). Ramya in a effort to deceive Aravind tries to act as a traditional girl, and Aravind doesn't seem to be impressed cancels the marriage after engagement. In the mean time Ramya's sister elopes with a guy, when takes her mother to I.C.U. Now Ramya consider his childhood enemy the reason for this. Krishna being Kind hearted guy when it comes to beautiful girls, gives his intelligence few time and convinces Ramya's mother that the Ramya's marriage hasn't be jitter-ed, but the alarming fact he is arranging for his marriage. I have ended it so easily, but spurting of the love between the two was an flawless entertainment. Later Aravind decides to return back and marry him, rest is bit dragging towards the climax with quite lot of dialogs, finally chemistry is defined. Director states, "When a Girl slaps you or even bite your cheek.. don't worry it means the Chemistry is working between you ppl.. !! " ;)

Cast has been nicely chosen, Laila was awesome when trying to be arrogant and when expressing their love. Even Prasanna did their best.. Songs are really good, Yuvan make the most of part composing an excellent music while Priya brought some creative way of directing the songs..

On the whole a nice entertainer! Worth waching more than once..