Married Wisdom - 1

This is the first post in the long awaited (from my end that is :D) series on marriage; and what you get to learn out of it. This is just a process of making notes along the way to serve as documentation (to me and to that rare person who thinks I'm sensible) and that being said, let's move on to the "What's not said is not understood!" chapter.

Usually, I'm a big fan of abstract expressions and implicit communication. Even in the movies, I love shots that implicitly convey something as opposed to the ones that dramatize the whole thing. Unfortunately, that's the last thing a married man should do. Until you are married, you are like a pet. Free to wander and permitted to do what you want to do, no questions asked, unless it's something incredibly stupid or irritating. The hope there is that you will return home no matter where you wander and you will be in the vicinity no matter how long you keep wandering. The moment you are married, you are expected to be responsive and responsible. Your best friend, your immediate surrounding and even your parents start believing that your life would change drastically after marriage, whether that happens to be true or not. So staying out of touch, forgetting to call, avoiding touchy-feely dialogs are strict no-nos. Unless you say "I love you" nobody is going to believe that. Unless you call, nobody is going to believe you are interested in their welfare. Unless you express, nobody is going to understand you!

So rule 1 in short, if you want to say something, say it instantly and explicitly without the the least bit of ambiguity or abstraction in it.

(To be continued... ;))

A moment to cherish!

I often wonder how nice it would be to have a tool that blogs contents from our mind automatically (of course upon approval and moderation :D), as that's the need of the hour for me. If I even blogged 10% as much as I wanted to, this blog would be overflowing with posts. Of all those events I wanted to blog about, there was one, strong enough to drag me all the way into blogger - India's victory in Word cup.

People who know me well would probably be surprised, as I'm known for being the devil's advocate ever since the Azhar, Jadeja days. Even a couple of days back, I was arguing about how this whole thing is becoming one big masala movie and I was totally sure that India will win, listing out the reasons why a hero should triumph over all disasters in the end. I was stunned when Ravi Shasthri projected a 275 total when Srilanka were making less than 3 runs an over and that turned out to be the exact target for India to chase. IPL scheduled within the next few days, India beating all the old rivals on its way to the final and so many other things made/make me think that there is some form of predefined results involved.

But all that said, I was immensely proud when Indian team lifted the cup and earned the top spot in ODI and here's why.

1. The most awaited moment - I don't know the exact stats; but I'm sure that at least 60% Indian families are interested in cricket in varying degrees. If there has been one thing that all these viewers have been waiting for, it's India's triumph in the World Cup tournaments. Nothing could match a great milestone achieved after a long period of expectation, anxiety and longing. This definitely is one.

2. The respect it earns for the nation - Facebook is flooded with updates, Twitter has no energy to tweet anymore and Gmail Buzz hits the 100+ mark in less than 10 minutes; and everything just boils down the one word - respect. Even people who don't know much about cricket turned their heads to see what is so spectacular about this and why so many people are euphoric. Knowingly or unknowingly, this creates a positive vibe about the country and I felt like I was watching "Invictus" live.

3. The first step to being a superpower - In all these years, I've never known a field where India dominated so much, owning the stakes and having command over things. Cricket without India is almost a fantasy right now and needless to say BCCI now owns the space. From how we were treated a couple of decades ago, this is what I call an achievement.

4. Inspiration - When something good happens, there is always a free supplement to it - inspiration (advice is another). Dhoni is now being studied as a great leader who stood up for the nation, taking charge of things and standing by his decisions. That is something that Indians are going to remember for a long time.

5. The future of sports - If India (hopefully) wins a couple of other tournaments as well, it could very well be the start of the golden era of Indian sports. I sincerely hope this would put an end to the days when over a billion people eagerly wait for a bronze medal to celebrate an "achievement".

The largest continent!

I'm not a big fan of gyms; but recently I was contemplating joining one primarily for diversion from this world of computers that I'm living in. As usual, the Libran in me chipped in and I was confused if I should make use of the apartment gym/swimming pool - though they look more like a store room and a water tank respectively - or I should pay like 30 bucks a month and drive 10 miles to get to the cheapest gym around. I didn't come to a conclusion, quite as expected; but I had an interesting experience.

Anyone who's spent some time in US, especially the US gyms would be able to tell the difference between the way a desi guy works out (I'm not talking about fitness freaks here); and an American works out. Most of the desi guys hardly have a clue as to what they should do next and they most often end up in the next available equipment! :)) It's kind of weird to describe but extremely funny to watch - like a pregnant cat trying to decide the place where it's going to deliver! When I went to the gym to do my case study, there was another desi guy there looking around and trying to figure out the best workout strategy. That made two of us and I was happy to know I had company... You know... You don't really feel all that silly when someone else is also doing what you are doing; even if you are doing the dumbest thing on earth! A feeling of being with the community :D

So I ended up in one of the treadmills (just so I don't like like I'm picnicking there :D) and started to walk at a snail pace; quietly observing the other guy. There was a TV at the far end of the gym and some night mode shots and a sand boa were combined in an attempt to scare the viewers. I decided not to look stupid and I stuck to my treadmill while this guy was cycling, weight-lifting, walking and jogging within 15-20 mins; and just as it goes with desi guys, we hardly exchanged smiles or names.

After a while, I felt I walked too much (the meter almost approached 0.5 miles which is too much :D) and I was just about to start back home when this guy started a conversation...

"Are you in C block?"

"No... E block"

"There are many desis in C block"

"Oh..."

"Which part of India are you from?"

"Tamizh Nadu"

"I am AP" (like Gounder saying I yaam Mekanikal bullet jaaki) "My name is Raju"

"Oh..."

"Where are you working"

...Told my office name...

Which technology, which client, how long have you been here and all other de-facto questions followed and I had no choice but to answer them all. Then came the most interesting part of the conversation.

"Did you see the program? They were showing big big snakes"

"Yeah" (Paamba paatthu dhaana bayandha)

"What was the name of the program... Big konda... no no Megakonda" (Konda = Mountain in Telugu :D)

"Yeah"

"Here they have big big snakes..."

"Yeah! African snakes are quite large" (Thinking that he was talking about Anacondas)

"US and Europe snakes are also big."

* continues curiously *

"In Africa, is it big?"

"Yeah. Those snakes are supposed to be the largest"

"No no... I'm asking about the size of Africa"

"Yeah... It's quite big. After all, it's the second largest continent in the world"

"The largest is Europe?"

"Err... No Asia" (I thought Geography was mandatory till X grade)

"Oh... Next"

"Africa" (Adhaan sonnaenae da)

"Next..."

"North America and it goes all the way till Australia" (vittaa paadam nadattha cholluvaainga paola irukku)

...A short pause...

Me: "How long have you been in US" (out of curiosity and badly wanting to change topic)

Him: 6 years (Super la :D)

On a normal day, I would've extended the conversation to have fun; but I was in no mood the other day and the entertainment session ended there. I know that a vast majority of the American people (no offense meant) are ignorant of such basic facts; but for the first time I met an Indian who thought Europe was the largest continent in the world.

Oh... The second year is over :)

Just when I had this spectacularly long break in blogging, I got an email from the Clustrmaps that said my map has been reset; indicating that my blog is turning 2. :-)

I've been giving a lot of thought about resuming blogging at the pace I used to; but somehow one thing or the other kept me away; leading to this predominantly dormant year. I'm just hoping to see a change this year, possibly one blog a day at least.

So what I've been up to these days? A question that people who get to know me exclusively through my blogs (trust me there are a few :D) would be having in their minds. A few quick things that I could think of...

A loooooooooot of movies

This is perhaps the first thing I would say, though there were other serious stuff going on; because of the sheer time I spare for them and the interest I have in watching more and more of them. Today for instance, I'm on my 3rd movie (Vinnai thaandi varuvaayaa, American Pie - The book of love and Theeratha vilayaattu pillai 'now running' :)) The interesting part is I've been into a lot of foreign language films as well (German, French, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, you name it :D) and the sad part about it is that most of the scenes that I enjoyed in Tamizh/Indian movies seem to be a straight lift from elsewhere which makes me sick.

A loooooooooooooot of work

Anyone in a desi consulting company would vouch for this. If you get paid a 1000 dollars you usually work for approx 2495 dollars and 35 cents :p The end of last year has been horrible at that and I've been working like crazy for 3-4 months straight. Now, I'm still working like crazy; but the better part is that I'm at a client location in a "developer"/"dev lead" role (I'm leading myself, you know :D) which kind of restricts work to office as opposed to the way it used to be before. I'm expecting another hectic season; but hopefully it wouldn't be as hectic as it used to be a couple of months back.

A loooooooooooooot of travel

I'm going to an office 15 miles from my place as opposed to the one 0.5 miles away; but that's not the only thing I'm talking about. Took a welcome break and went to India on a vacation; but the vacation was more than tiresome. 3 weeks and I just kept spinning all the way. Couldn't meet many or do much about anything. It was like around the world in 21 days :) I know some are upset that I couldn't meet them; and I'm sorry about that!

A looooooooooooooot of boredom

I've been doing quite well at work; and recently, I even got a client appreciation; but somehow it doesn't help me get over the void that is omnipresent in my life... I somehow feel I should try something different (a lot of things in queue as usual); but at the same time worried about a secure future. Typical Libran indecisiveness one could say; but it's not all that bad after all. As much as I want to do something I love, I also need to make sure that I'm not being accused of being irresponsible. Kind of working on this right now, trying to figure out some plans and arrive at a balance; but don't know how long it's going to take before my life turns into a Hindi movie (following your dreams is kind of the trend in Hindi movies these days if you didn't notice :))

So... I'm quite happy that I made it this far and authored "The Crux of My Invisible Days" and I hope I wouldn't have to write any such summaries in the future.

Birthdays... :)

I didn't change my Orkut first name, last name for a while and since it reads "Yogaesh blogs regularly", quite often people ask for the quantitative description of "regularly" :) It's indeed been a long break this time; and though I thought of writing about a lot of things - movies I saw, my workload, mood swings, thought process, etc; I never got the time and the yearning to write together. To be more precise, I got both of them a couple of times, but I used those wildcards for continuing with my script which has been on hold for a longer duration than my blog :)

Anyways, today is my birthday and thanks everyone who wished me over mail, phone and Orkut. Unlike the usual b'days where the Indian version would be an early wakeup, sandhyavandhanam, temple visit, semiya paayasam and some sweet words; and the US version would be midnight get together's that last for about an hour or so; this birthday was extremely unique. Only one of my two roomies even knew it was my b'day and I was busy with some project work at midnight. I slept only by 5:45 and that pretty much ruined the rest of my day too. Some of my regular wishers missed my b'day; but I got some pleasant surprises from a few. So it's been a quite unique b'day in a lot of ways. Despite all this, there were a couple of things that this b'day had in common with my other b'days - temple visit and thoughts. The former is nothing new and anyone who know me faintly will be aware of my theistic thoughts; so I'd rather not get into religious philosophies now :)

Coming to the second part, every b'day is a natural alarm that rings in your mind, reminding you about your age and handing over the key to the world of thoughts and retrospection. The alarm has gone off every single year and this b'day was no exception. Career, personal life, relationships, philosophies and a million other things crowd my mind and somehow my mind finds out a way to ponder over every single thought that comes up and give its judgement. My blog would become a trash can if I pour them all out... So let me not do that! :) But this time the processor was quite occupied all through the day; and let's see if these thoughts turn into any positive change :) Fingers crossed in all possible combinations... :D

Across US in two and half days...

When I first came to US, I had a stupid dream or rather a wish that I should cover all 50 states in the nation before I go back to India for good. I always wanted to do a coast to coast road trip for this purpose and time and again, I couldn't do that partly because of laziness and partly because of practical limitations. But this time, it became a necessity and though it's not technically a coast to coast drive, this 2700 miles drive did take me through a many parts of the nation I've not been to, before.

Ironically, as much as I wanted to do this trip before, I didn't really have the mind to drive all the way this time because of several reasons. First of all, I was driving my own car and I didn't want it to break down or get damaged during the long and almost continuous course. Second, unlike a trip with a group of friends (or at least one good looking girl :D) I had to travel all alone and third, I couldn't really enjoy the trip or halt at different places. I just had to rush from end to end and reach the destination by Saturday (Jul 4th) in the worst case, so that I have a day to relax before I get to work. So as much solitude lover as I am, I thought that the trip wouldn't let me enjoy it.

But the trip eventually turned out to be pretty interesting; and I took away a lot of memories from this trip. Usually I drive at very high speeds and my objective would be to cover the distance in the shortest time possible. But this time, I was averaging 80 miles may be because I'm getting older; or because I was too cautious not to add any more direct/indirect expenses because of speeding :)

Before I talk about anything else about the trip, I should definitely appreciate the US government for building such a neat transportation system. I've travelled about 2700 miles which is more than the distance between Kanyakumari and Kashmir; and this I was able to do without any sort of pre-planning. A printout of the route and I'm all set. I sincerely wish Indian roads were as organized. (Fortunately for us, we have the railways and we could really boast of our rail network :))

The drive through the North-Western states was unbelivable and the scenaries were awesome to say the least. Uploading a few photographs that I managed to click on my way... Wish I had more time to spend clicking. :)

Apart from these, a lot of thoughts/ideas were going on and off in my mind; and to recollect them all or write them in a blog would be an impossible task. But sure enough, I'd say this would be one of the most memorable trips I ever made - thanks to my stallion which was smooth as silk throughout the journey, the police department for not noticing my ocassional speeding :D and of course God for well... everything! :)

A quick catchup...

Memorial weekend, tennis matches and movies succeeded in keeping me away from blogging for a while and I thought I should just sum up whatever I wanted to write over the past few days.

Haircut:
People who read my blog regularly (or atleast once in a while just so the count would increase a wee bit :D) would know about my haircutting experience here. With the first hair 'mowing' effective for 3 months, I had to trim my hair again; and living in a great metro like Clinton, I had no choice but to go to the same shop again (I should get my clippers and try 'suya sevai' once). This time, I made sure I sat on a different chair; and I did succeed in dodging the big mower :D This lady, a typical red neck seemed to understand my description better; and the way she explained it (just blend it all the way to the top, etc, etc) I believed she would do a better job (nammmmmmmmbi okkaandhaen :D). Everything looked fine until the machine almost reached the centre of my head. I was thinking "aaaahaaa... Wanted a vandhu vaangaayittiyaeda" (digging my own grave); but fortunately she wasn't as dumb as the previous mower. As she set a virtual boundary almost at the center of my head and started playing around, I thought I'd end up in the infamous Beckham style; but she had some soft corner for the right side of my head. So ended up having a cap of hair at the center of my head with my left portion completely mowed and the right portion cut as I wanted it to be. Hmmm... At least I was 50% close to what I wanted. :)

A trip to Arkansas:
Long weekend usually means a trip; and memorial day weekend was not an exception. We were out to the nature state on road and pretty much covered all of Arkansas. Needless to say I took a lot of photographs and I'm trying my hand on post processing now. One of the them turned really well... A pic that looked so ordinary appears exceptional now. Let's see how it goes. Highlights of the trip -
1. Met my friend Karthik after a long time, 2. Rode a boat :) Not a hand motor boat; but a pontoon with a steering wheel. That was fun to say the least, 3. Visited some excellent spots. Usually, we would be going in search of such spots. But the whole Ozark area was splendid when it came to the view points and scenaries. In short, enjoyed the trip. :)

Some movies:
Saw quite a few movies over the past few days... New roomie being a gulte, I was catching up with a few Telugu movies too. Of the ones I watched, I liked Sarvam. It's not an exceptional movie or something; but the concept behind the movie (butterfly effect) was awesome; and it's definitely worth a watch. Newtonin moondraam vidhi was also good; but one should forget logical aspects to watch the movie.

That's all we have for now... Stay tuned as we come back with more updates shortly. (Itthudan indha seidhi arikkai niravadaigiradhu :D)

Back to blogging! :)

People who follow my blogs quite regularly will know that breaks in blogging aren't extremely new to me. There have been occasions when I didn't blog for a while and then resumed blogging. This is one of them and the only thing that is different this time, is the reason for this break.

Usually it will be either because I didn't have a peaceful mindset or because I had a lot of work; but this time it was because of a combination of lot of factors. First and the most important of them being a gap/block/impedance/whatever you like to call it, in writing. I'd be flooded with thoughts; but I just didn't have the mood/nerve to put it down in writing. This is not just for blogs and it was also noted with my other works - script writing, poems(?!), short stories, etc. Something wasn't just so right!

Second, I'm having a pretty bad internet connection at home and outages are not rare. If at all I got the mood to write, I wouldn't have the internet connection working; and blogging from office has never been my cup of tea. :)

Third, the topics I wanted to write about were quite complex and I'm sure half of the readers (as though I have a million followers ;)) wouldn't get what I'm trying to say unless I'm really clear about what I'm saying. So it needs some time and concentration to come up with a presentable, comprehensible content.

Put together, there was an inevitable break and now it's kind of over except for the second point! :D I thank all my friends who have been inquiring about the break in my blogging journey (trust me there were quite a few :D) and I hope I'd be making a lot of posts in the recent future! :)

OMG! It's boring...

People who have been working for quite some time will know that being without much work to do for a prolonged period of time can be really boring; unless you have a host of personal activities to do (as in my case :D). Today, I got the opportunity to see my manager getting bored. No offense meant to managers, but though their job profile means much lesser job and much greater pay; today it was the peak of joblessness for my manager. Usually he has something or the other to bug me with and if he runs out of ideas, opens the stupid effing site and comes up with some brilliant 'proactive' thoughts like "Can we place this drop down on the left end because I often tend to miss this one..." and leaves me thinking "Vittaa oru kanna moodittu innoru pakka screen teriyala nu solluvaan pola irukku" (I wouldn't be surprised if he closes one of his eyes and says he is not able to see the other side of the screen). But now that the application has become decently stable, he is literally running out of tasks to give me and hence work!

Today, I could sense that obvious restlessness in him and we had about 5 or 6 meetings today, discussing nothing. He would first go into a meeting room, draw some crap on the board (some time can be spent there) and then he'd come back to us (me and the tester) and start the meeting. There will be virtually nothing to discuss but the tester and my manager would be so seriously discuss about it; while I'd be happily sight seeing through the broad window (how much I wish I had my cam and the 70-300mm VR lens with me :D). Inbetween meetings, he will come to my cubicle and ask me "what's up boss?" and though I'd be dying to say "Server is up, North is up, roof is up, your time is up; I'd control my instincts and the evil grin, and tell him something about what I'm doing with the complete assurance that he won't understand it.

The whole day went in repeated iterations of these activities with an hour and half long 'power-lunch' inbetween. Needless to say I'm enjoying work these days! :D :D

First B'day!!! :)

366 days back...

A casual conversation that I was having with my friend on a sunday evening about my interest in writing/maintaining diaries/journals ended up in an interesting question - "why not start blogging?"; and on the Monday that followed, I gave an answer to the question - http://libran-mind.blogspot.com. At that point, I wasn't even sure if I'd continue blogging because I've attempted to write diaries innumerous times; and every time I quit writing for one reason or the other. But this one, on the other hand had been a quite different, pretty continuous and highly cherishable journey for me. After all, 130+ posts on my opinions and experiences is not a bad milestone for a year's time :) I wish I go on blogging with an improving interest and pool together as much thoughts as possible; in the years to come...

Happy B'day 'Agni'... And btw, I thought I wouldn't get a better time to start my Tamizh blog than this. So ladies and gentlemen: presenting - http://manakkann.blogspot.com/ :)

It's been movies and work all the way!

For the past few days, work has been real tight and personally I have the habit of taking frequent surfing breaks and that way I didn't miss Orkut or Gmail that much. But blogging on the other hand demands some time and thoughts and I haven't been too successful in finding both along with the mood to write, over the past few days. So apart from work, the only thing I've been doing is watching some movies and fortunately, I got to see some great movies. Let me just summarize them...

Kanchivaram:

Amazing movie. A Prakashraj starrer directed by Priyadharshan. A classic example of beautiful art direction and camera. I initially thought it was a Brahmin bashing communist film from its name; but it actually turned out to be a completely different story. A simple story of how an inidividual weaver's life is affected by the exploitation of silk weavers in the last century; this movie is definitely a must watch for anyone who likes simple, well presented films.

The City of God:

More of a masala movie; but still it's definitely worth a watch especially for the stunning screenplay. Connecting n dimensions together to narrate a plot isn't easy and it has been handled very well in this movie. If you are a lover of gangster movies, this one is a must watch; and even otherwise you will enjoy the movie.

Oldboy:

This one is actually a Korean movie; but for the first time (or at least the first time I remember) I enjoyed a movie made in an unknown language to this extent. The theme is sick and many might shun away from the taboo concept; but the impact this movie creates is mindblowing. It really takes a completely different plane of thoughts to come up with such a story and narrate it in such a striking way.

The curious case of Benjamin Button:

Again a completely different concept; but IMHO not as good as the above three. It's good, pleasant and different. But nothing in it says it is a must watch. The novel plot and the makeup carries the movie apart from a few exceptional dialogs and scenes.

Squeezing in time for these four movies was an achievement. So pretty much that's how I spent the last week... :)

No time to write some blogs... :D

I remember reading a poem in my high school, called "Leisure". I believe it was written by William Henry Davies... The first couple of lines are still fresh as morning dew in my heart

"What is this life full of care... We have no time to stand and stare"

I feel the same thing... But in a modified way

"What is this life full of clogs... We have no time to write some blogs"

Work has been really tight over the past couple of weeks and I'm just managing a few 5 or 10 mins breaks in between, which are consumed by gmail, Orkut and occassionally a few (very) short stories. The rest of it is caught in debugging and fixing one of the worst codes I've ever seen... :) So not getting too much time to write about everything...

Wanted to write about Slum dog millionaire (an amazing, must-watch movie), Abhiyum naanum (good film but not good enough), some of my old school memories, my work and a flood of other things; but I hardly managed to squeak in some time. Today, I did but I felt that I should be writing on the technical error that drove me nuts, before I write about anything else. So pretty soon, I'll try to clear up the backlogs... :))