The collection of a Libran's honest thoughts about life, religion, politics, movies, music, India, Indians, culture, psychology, philosophy, zodiac and a lot of other topics that left an impact in him!
When I came to the US for the first time in 2006, I hardly had anything needed for a basic life in US - a car, a laptop and a good place to stay. Since it was a short term trip we stayed in a comparatively inexpensive hotel on weekly rates. The hotel used to be pretty strict and rude and I could remember the night we came back from the office and stood in front of the door that didn't open just because we didn't pay the rent in the morning. Life in US without legs is easier than that without a car especially if you are put up in one of the cursed areas where there is no public transport. Every holiday (at least in the beginning) used to be a combination of frustration, expectation and boredom that made us yearn for a timeout. Later on we opted to spend than suffer and we used to pay tens of dollars for cabs and other modes of transport to hang out in the weekends. The client office was a mile and a half away and we used to walk in the cold roads of New Jersey to reach the place. I could still remember the cold wind hitting my nostrils succeeding to cross the layers of my jerkin.
But things have been totally different in Tampa. Even though Florida isn't cold, as with any other place in US, 'near' is a word used to describe 5-10 miles and that obviously ruled out any possibilities of walking. My previous experiences made me settle down a bit fast and I got my license and bought a car within a couple of months. I had the laptop provided in the client office and I got my phone within the first week. Life here started getting comfortable and since then I couldn't remember walking on the streets of Tampa. Partly due to my impression of 'walkers' and partly due to laziness, walking had been quite remote. But today we had a long walk by the road side walking along the residential area to reach a near by pier - a place quite similar to the location in Khakha khakha. It was a beautiful experience - deep brown wooden bridge, navy skies, distant lights, rumbling water underneath and a peaceful atmosphere.
We (four of us) spoke about a lot of things, predominantly things that were running in our minds at the moment and our career. Was pretty interesting to get lost in thoughts after a long time and discussing things that were gushing in my mind like the flowing water. The only phrase that comes to my mind about this good experience is 'Nature and walking are beautiful concepts indeed'.
I heard about this movie in the evening and watched it a couple of hours back. Till date, I've seen movies I loved, movies that were boring and movies that were OK but this is the first time I'm confused so much between the goods and bads in a movie. There were scenes that kept me spell bound and even before I could recover from the impact of the messages there'll be the silliest scene I could imagine, coming up. But despite all the oddities I should say the movie is a pretty decent entertainer.
Shankar has proven that he is a smart producer investing minimally and producing a good movie. Somehow he doesn't turn out to be an economical director and his budget never stays within 30 crores (300 million). The movie is a mix of philosophies, fantasies, absurdities, science and realities but the only problem is that all these don't form a homogeneous mixture. The director is confused by too many things and at one point, I could sense the movie's screenplay going out of control. Imagine Vieta's Formula (2/pi), purpose of God, man's greed, attitude problems with humans, the power of hard work, the poverty that grips mansions in cities, IT - non IT inequalities, a fantasy box that holds God's powers and a series of senseless incidents revolving around that box shown in the same movie and that too in subsequent scenes. That's what this movie is all about...
Even though Chimbudevan claims that this is his creation, to me it sounds like there are too many cooks that made this broth. Prakashraj with his philosophical magic and view of life could be regarded as the person behind the messages on life, God, theism and the practical advices. Shankar on the other hand would've contributed to the science and social portion of the movie (bank exams, Income tax, IT, etc). Chimbudevan (from the impression I got from 23 am pulikesi) would've invented the fantasy box on which the story revolves around. Putting them all in the same movie was a bad idea in my view and had it been just the philosophy, the comical and casual narration of serious things combined with some amount of science from Shankar; the movie would've been one of the best in the history of Tamizh cinema. After all it is not so impressive to see an excellent dialog like
"Life is like a journey... When we are out on a tour we ignore the minor disturbances on the way and keep enjoying the scenery outside the window, singing and dancing all the way. But in life's journey, we forget the window and magnify the minor things"
and a scene where God says He is helpless without a plastic box in the same movie. Height of absurdity is God fighting with a local rowdy to solve the problems of a woman in the locality just because his box is stolen. But things are not always at their best and that is what differentiates a picture-perfect movie like Mozhi from the rest. In short, the movie is a good entertainer and way better than the other movies that came in the recent past but it is also true that the movie could've been much better had Shankar or the director thought about cutting the crap out of it.
Pretty obvious title... Isn't it? To people who aren't familiar about Indian movies, it'd be a surprise that songs are an integral part of a movie. I'm not talking about BGM scores or bit songs that express the hero's mood swings but actual songs where a 40 year old hero and a 20 yr old heroine dance in a completely irrelevant location as a consequence of an important conversation that took place between them. (Read - an Eminem track coming up in 'The beautiful mind' :D) The hero would propose to the heroine in a typical Indian village like Edakkunaattaanpaalayam (don't try reading it but trust me it's the name of a village in India) and the next moment the hero would be in complete Park Avenue gear like a brand ambassador and the heroine would be wearing a couple of colorful kerchiefs (modern attire as costumers call it) and they would be dancing in the Times Square; usually for a song that is loaded with more English words than the regional words. :))
However, being an Indian by heart, breed and brought up, I'm kind of used to this and a movie without songs has something missing in it. Despite the oddities and practical questions like 'Who the h*ck will dance on streets of a no-man's land with a bunch of strangers just because he proposed to a girl', there are certain songs that are too good and fit in the situation perfectly. Sometimes the song doesn't fit in the situation too well but the lyrics and music is just outstanding that you can't prevent enjoying it or pitying the director. So I thought why not list a few of them that impressed me a lot and share something good with you outside the same old outsourcing, religion, philosophy, culture window...
I'm refraining myself to Tamizh movie songs here since we are talking about situation, lyrics and music; and I'll add a post on albums and traditional music sometime later...
Song: Edhilum Ingu iruppaan avan yaarao... Theme: An ode to Lord Shiva (the destroyer of evil in Hindu beliefs) Movie: Bharathi Best points: The strikingly similar writing style of Pulamai pitthan that makes us believe it is a trademark Bharathi (a renown Tamil poet) poetry. The stunning voice of Madhu Balakrishnan. My fav line: Thavazhum nadhiyai tharittha mudiyaan, adiyum mudiyum ariya mudiyaan! (One who wears a flowing river in his hairs, the infinity whose start and end could not be assessed. Please read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_Shiva if you are not familiar with Hinduism)
Song: Engae yenadhu kavidhai... Theme: Betrayal of love Movie: Kandukondaen kandukondaen Best points: Excellent lyrics that express a girl's pain so beautifully, Chitra's voice as usual. My fav line: Paarayil seidhadhu yen manam endru thozhikku solli irundhaen. Paarayin idukkil vaer vitta kodiyaai nee nenjil nuzhaindhu vittaai... (I boasted that my heart is as strong as a rock but you crept into it like a plant that roots into a rock)
Song: Paartha vizhi paartha badi... Theme: A long term desire fulfilled Movie: Gunaa Best points: Music by Maestro Ilayaraja, divine & expressive voice of K.J. Jesudas My fav line: Madhi varuga vazhi neduga ozhi niraiga vaazhvilae (let the moon shine all the way and bring brightness to my life)
Song: Vennilave Theme: Falling in love Movie: Minsaara kanavu Best points: Amazing picturization My fav line: Poongaattrae ariyaamal poovai thirakka vaendum... Poo kooda ariyaamal thenai rusikka vaendum (Should open the petals of a flower without the knowledge of the fragrant wind and should taste the honey without the knowledge of the freshly bloomed flower)
Song: Vidugadhayaa indha vaazhkai... Theme: Pathos Movie: Mutthu Best points: Superstar (thalaivar rocks :)), Hariharan's flawless high pitch My fav line: Pasuvinai paambendru saatchi solla mudiyum, kaambinil visham enna karakkavaa mudiyum (A fake jury can testify a cow for a snake but how will one succeed in getting venom out of a cow)
Song: Mouname unnidam Theme: Silence is bliss Movie: Mozhi Best points: The movie as a whole is awesome. Not sure what I should mention here. My fav line: Sollai kadandha pennin mouna koottukkul pala kodi kodi porul kudiyirukkum (The silence of a girl that crosses the boundaries of words has millions of meanings embedded in it)
Song: Vizhigalin aruginil vaanam Theme: Falling in love Movie: Azhagiya theeyae Best points: Lyrics, picturization My fav line: Irudhayame thudikkiradhaa thudippadhu paol nadikkiradhaa (Is my heart pretending to beat or has it really stopped beating)
Song: Naane tholaindha kadhai Theme: Love Movie: Thavamaai thavamirundhu Best points: Lyrics, awesome melody My fav line: Viraloram kavidhai ooriyadhe... vizhiyoram kaadhal kasigiradhe (my fingertips have poetry flowing and love oozes from the corner of my eyes)
Song: Uyire ennuyire Theme: Love Movie: Thotti Jaya Best points: Gopika's acting, music My fav line: Naan siritthu magizndhu silirkkum varatthai nee kudutthaai (You gave me the boon to smile, awe and be happy)
Song: Poongaattrile Theme: Yearning for the loved one Movie: Uyire Best points: Lyrics, Manirathnam's touch in expressing a girl's emotions My fav line: Vaanam engum un bimbam aanaal kaiyyil seravillai... Kaattril engum un vaasam... Verum vaasam vaazhkai illai (I see you everywhere but I couldn't be with you, I smell you everywhere but that's not called living)
Hope you liked the list. Quite obviously I just listed the first 10 that came to my mind. There are so many other songs that impressed me but it's impractical to put them all in a post. Note to people who know Tamizh - I provided translations to the best lines as an sign of respect to people who don't understand Tamizh. If the translations are horrible or you feel they are funny, please bear with me as always!! ;) :)
Ever since I or rather we (a couple of my friends too) bought the HP Pavilion dv6700t for 1080 bucks with the best configuration (as on the date of purchase), we were happy about everything except Internet Explorer. Every time I closed an IE window, I got an error message that said "Internet Explorer has stopped working" and eventually as a recovery measure Vista will reopen the IE window. Initially I was led to believe that it's a compatibility problem between Vista and IE. But none of my friends who got the other brands (Dell, Sony, etc) faced this issue despite using Vista. I predominantly use Firefox for surfing (even now I'm using Firefox for adding this post) but some sites, especially Microsoft related sites (exchange servers, extranet clients) that are inevitable from the work perspective, work umpteen times better in IE than any other browser. At times, the only browser supported is IE.
After endless searches and frustrations, I landed up on the solution. It had nothing to do with Vista or IE. The problem was with the Yahoo! tool bar for IE that is installed by HP. You know what it took to address the problem?
1. Go to Control Panel - Switch to Classic View - Click on Internet options 2. Go to the Advanced tab and click the 'Reset' button at the bottom of the Advanced tab. 3. Say 'Yes' or 'OK' wherever you are asked for confirmation.
That's it. Your HP dv6700t works completely fine with IE. The only question I had was 'How did HP miss this basic thing and ship its laptop with an incompatible tool bar?!'. But getting an answer to that was not as important as fixing the issue I had! :)
A few months back, the client company for which I was deputed in US decided to switch software/software service vendors and eventually that means that employees from our company would be replaced by the employees of the competitor. But quite unexpectedly this created a buzz in the little town where we live. The link below is an excerpt from a local newspaper's website.
There are a lot of legal and moral issues listed in the article but what attracted me was the comments section. There were so many people who considered that outsourcing is a threat to the employment of US population and foreigners especially Indians take away a lot of their opportunities. Looking at this whole thing from a conservative bird's eye view, there are a lot of reasons to believe so. Some of them are
1. A lot of Indians could be spotted in Oldsmar (the town where I live) especially in and around the client location.
2. Apartments meant for the economically lower section of the US society (the labor class) are largely filled by Indians (the rent is cheap!!!).
3. The state transport buses which were once miracles in Oldsmar could be spotted quite frequently these days. And guess who's travelling - Indians.
4. Gym, swimming pools, public courts, you name it - Indians are everywhere and even worse, their population has grown like insects and the facilities are constantly occupied by them.
5. Walk around the client office and chances are that you end up seeing an Indian in every direction you turn. This may not be true with Americans. :)
And what is the sole reason for having so many Indians - outsourcing and hence outsourcing is bad. This is what majority of the local population believes.
So is this true? Or rather what is the degree of truth in these statements? Let us take a closer look.
The first and foremost thing is cost of operation to the US companies. A truly capitalistic nation should try to minimize its expenses and do good to its people and that's precisely what US does as on date. If an American charges $100 per hour for a job, an Indian does it for $20 or $30. This might sound untruthful but this is the reality. And guess what - the person who comes to the client location has all the expenses that a normal American has and still he is paid peanuts. And surprrrrrrrrrrise! The Indian is able to save quite some money and spend it for his economically downtrodden family back in India. What this means is that an average American charges n times as much as an Indian worker for the same job and trying to justify this, is a policy that US hates - communism.
Second is an impression that Indians do not pay taxes. I'm not sure how much an American pays as taxes. But as an Indian in US, I could say for sure that Indians pay a considerable sum of their earnings as taxes.
Third, the development of businesses that depend on demand-supply system are largely benefited by the floating population. Instances are groceries, household appliances, leasing, mortgage, automobiles, garage, etc.
I could keep listing reasons in this direction but suffice it is to say that outsourcing serves as a benefit to the American client, the American Government, the Indian/American vendor and thousands of Indian families. If the objective is to truly reduce outsourcing and make sure that local population is getting employed, the right way to do it is to compete with the Indian employees in the cost quoted just like it happens in any other business. After all, the lowest bidder wins and so is the case here! Might be hard to digest but this is the naked truth behind all these outsourcing myths.
Sridhar Thyagarajan is an ambitious youngster in his late teens just out of his schooling. He is fair, tall and had piercing eyes that'd spell-bind any girl. Even though the society called them 'upper class'; his family's economic position wasn't any close to it. Sridhar's dad was an accountant in a private firm and his mother was a home-maker. His dad was one among the Julius Caesars of the middle class, who is constantly at war with his liabilities and commitments to meet the basic needs of his family. Right from his childhood Sridhar wanted to become a doctor and the sight of a white coat and a stethoscope decorating him in his dreams was amazing and blissful. The urge in him and his inborn brilliance made him a constant topper especially in Biology.
But as luck would have it, Sridhar had a severe hepatitis attack that kept him in the hospital for 3 months. It was a devastating thing that not just emptied his dad's reserved peanuts but also took away valuable time that he needed to prepare for his board exams. With not even a month left to prepare for all the exams he managed to score a whopping 92%. But 92% wasn't good enough for a 'higher class' 'upper caste' aspirant to become a doctor. It was a crucial position where he might get lucky or unlucky; and all he could do is sit and watch what was about to happen like an injured captain watching his team play from the stands and praying for its victory.
The big day came and the auditorium in Chennai Medical college was flooded with youngsters moving around with papers and files; as busy as bees in a hive. Sridhar has never been as tense in his life. His dangling position gifted him with a sleepless night and endless prayers which were still running constantly in his mind. There was still one seat left in the 'Open Competition' quota and as the candidates were called in one by one for their turn, Sridhar's heart started thumping so loudly that he could hear it echoing across the oblivion. "Sridhar... Reg no 501484" called the peon and with an anxious mind, high adrenalin flow and shivering hands Sridhar stepped into the small room. The officer glanced at him, confirmed his identity and asked for Sridhar's community certificate. Sridhar hesitated and mumbled that "I don't need a community certificate sir! I'm an OC candidate". The officer looked at him like a doctor who let down his patient and said... "Sorry! All OC seats are full. We only have BC, MBC, SC and ST seats left". Sridhar tried to plead but realized that the officer was helpless...
As he walked out of the room with sweat replaced by tears, he heard the officer talking to himself - "Every year, there are vacancies that are left unfilled and poor fellows like these are denied a chance. It's the curse of this country" and Gandhi was smiling as usual above the officer's head with a shining plate under him that bore the words "An eye for an eye makes us all blind".
It's been a year since I came to Tampa and days as usual have flown off like a Ferrari driven by Schumacher in the last lap of a F1 race. Looking back, this year has been different in a lot of ways.
On the career front, I'd say 2006 (or at least the first 8 or 9 months of the year) was much more active and I was an ambitious guy back then, trying to get my promotions and rewards to add color to my resume. Movies were the primary time-pass and I hardly did anything outside work and watching movies.
2007 on the other hand began with a promotion but as time progressed and as I got more used to the idiosyncrasies of the industry, work became more and more monotonous and hence irritating. After all possible pondering, I landed up in the US for the second time and this time it wasn't a short two months trip.
Life at US has been good for the most part and it gave me some virtues that I couldn't have acquired back in India. I sported a lot, traveled a lot, met some interesting personalities and learned how to handle them. With a lot of friends, India-like weather, a car and a laptop I'd say I'm comfortably settled at Tampa but good things don't last long and pretty soon I'd be moving out of this place with new hopes, aspirations and expectations. After all this endless travel is something that defines our lives and the route we travel is what differentiates us. Isn't it?
Nothing too great here... Yet another software engineer working in yet another services company located in yet another US city :) However, that's not what I want to be! Pretty much like a Libran definition - wouldn't you agree? :))
