2 States

I presume that everyone is aware that 2 states is the name of Chetan Bhagat's latest book. I got an opportunity to read this book last week. I had read, Five point someone, and felt that the book was a little ok. But when i started reading his other books, i felt irritated. Somehow i felt them to be a repetition. 3 guys, a hero among them, a gal, screwed up family, they get into trouble and finally escape blah blah blah. I felt i had nothing to take from his books. So i had stopped in the middle of his other books.

But there was lot of hype about 2 states and moreover it involved TamilNadu. It kindled a little of my curiosity to know what Chetan had to say about TN and Tamil people. But the story was impressive. The book was a bit fast paced and had something not to let my interest die. Both Punjab and Tamilnadu had suffered some serious humiliation at his hands. But it was enjoyable, has humourously brought out the defects or funny sides of both the cultures, starting from the dressing sense, education, food, society etc etc.  Also at few places, some philosophies here and there.

Though on the whole, it was a mass masala like a hind film with just songs missing, i liked it. Worth reading once....

A short Break

An unintended short break from Blogging. Not that i am totally occupied with work. At the same time, i am not totally free too to think about something and blog about it. Is twitter a reason. Yes think so. If not for twitter, i might have tried posting about few social or personal happenings.

Anyway, the habit of blogging helped me a little last weekend. I was fighting with a bank, regarding Credit card fee blah blah blah. Had been sending them a series of mails and i was getting a number of junk replies. Was really pissed off with them. So wanted to send out a mail, containing all the information, the dates when i had called, when they had called me etc etc. If it was an actress birthday or movie release date, i might have remembered something. But dates of call, was something that i never paid attention to. Fortunately when i had received the call, i was in theater, about to watch "Unnai Pol Oruvan" and i had blogged about it. So visited my blog, got the info, mailed them with the exact date. I did see some positive response and action after that mail. Blog is in a way acting as a tool to immortalize the feelings and happenings. So I am determined to blog about significant, unsignificant, rubbish, repeated stuffs. My determintations and resolutions are volatile, lets see how this goes.

Thirumayam Trip

During the diwali holidays, had been to Thirumayam. Thanks to the effort of the organizers, as a result of which i was ready early on Sunday morning for the trip for the trip to Thirumayam. The trip was different, and first of its kind since it was not a fun trip but rather a trip to learn something about the history. If we had gone alone it would have ended with discussion about film history or heroine history. But this time we were accompanied by Dr. Venkataraman, archaelogist & retired history professor from Madurai Kamaraj University and Prabhu anna's father. At the age of above 70, Dr. V as he is called, remained active and energetic. Rich in the subject, his beautiful explanations left us awestruck. The temple was absolutely free, giving us a lot of time and space to explore. Then we visited Kundrakudi rock cut shiva temple, to look a number of beautiful statues left to ruin. Looks like the original temple was built by Pandiyas for shiva, the Murugan temple was built later on the hill.

Thanks to Prabhu anna for coming up with a full list of what we discussed that day. I have a copy of mail to read, and dont want to replicate the same here in blog. You can check Prabhu anna's post and also my pictures for which i had tried adding a lot of comments so that it explains something. Pics at Picasa.

Hope to have few more in the future.

Unnai Pol Oruvan

Three days leave but i was here in Bangalore for a change. So one full day to be spent. The obvious choice was a movie. So decided for Unnai Pol Oruvan. As usual, headed to Balaji theater for the movie. I had not seen the hindi version "A Wednesday" that got released last year. So UPO is like a new movie, with nothing to compare to find flaws, and very little idea about what the story is. The movie turned out to be good one. It does create an impact. Few good things about the movie is fast screenplay, fabulous acting from the veterans Kamal and Mohan lal, no masala moments, not using technology as some magic, strong story borrowed from hindi version, good selection of artists. The music by shruti hassan, did not disturb the flow of movie, so i would safely quote that it was good. The film was short and ended in just 2 hours including the 15 minutes break. No unnecessary songs, no separate and idiotic comedies.

The movie has a strong message at the end. But the movie seems to be strictly for A class audience. Heavy usage of English which evoked some instant comments from some audience. One such dialogue was "Please talk in binary",  when Kamal needs  a yes/no response. Not sure how many would understand dialogues like that. So i am not sure about the response in B and  C centers. Usually i  feel Kamal is over acting, in this case, i could not find anything like that too. So i liked the movie, it is worth watching and should be watched atleast once.

Thats it, got to get ready for office, so leaving now, do watch the movie.

Trip to Jaladhama

After a long time, a trip once again. This time it was a different one and first of its kind. Weekend visit to a resort. After some discussion, the place was fixed as jaladhama, the resort near Talekad. We started from bangalore at around 7.30, basically to avoid all the traffic and reach the mysore road witout trouble. The drive through Mysore road was cool. First pit stop was at Bidadi, idly shop. It is just a road side shop, but the crowd there ascertained that it is going to be good. It lived upto the expectations and idly superb. Next at shivalli MTR shop, where we had bisibele bath, which was also superb.

The road was good upto Malavalli, after which the tough times started. Every 50 meters of good road was interrrupted with 500 meters of worn out, demolished, road that contained just stones. So had to go slowly. Finally reached the resort at around 1.00 PM. Have to cross the river in motor boat to reach the resort. People there welcomed us with a welcome drink. The room was neat and clean and had all the amenities. The resort has two basketball, volleyball, badminton court and a cricket and football field. So we had 24 hours to spend with all these. After a nice lunch, started playing with badminton, followed by basketball and then with volleyball. After that went for a rowing in the river for around an hour. The most interesting part was the swimming that followed. It was great to swim after around 6 or 7 years.

Next morning, once again started with early morning swimming where we tried some underwater swimming. Then a heavy breakfast and then some badminton once again. After that we headed towards Shivasamudra. This is the third visit to the falls. This time our friend took us to a different view point, near Dargah where i had not gone during my previous two visits. The view of Gaganachukki falls from there was awesome. This is the first i am seeing so much of water there when compared to previous visits. Bharachukki also it was the same, the place where we had taken bath during was nowhere to be seen. After that we started the trip back to our Bangalore. Thus ended yet another good trip.

A quick recap

Quite long, since i logged into wordpress and blabbered something. Was quite busy with my distance learning MS programme and last week completed the mid semester exam. After that it has been quite fun with three movies in two days and a mind that is more or less empty with nothing to care about. Before two days, i was struggling to stay awake when i tried studying, today when i wanted to watch movies i am doing it with ease ;)

Also last week saw Kanthsamy. The movie was a mass masala one, with lavish spending on the locations and very little spending on shriya's costume. Vikram's acting was as usual good. Other than that, not much in the movie.

As far as the exams are concerned, it is the same old strategy of burning the midnight oil before the exams, looking at the question paper and laughing to make sure that you stay happy even you are going to lose everything, writing non sense without pity for the guy who will be correcting it, and after the exams blogging about it. The best part of the answer sheet is the margins.

Other than that not much as of now. Hope to blog often from now, till the next exams.

Few Updates from Madurai..

Had never seen so much crowd at a single place in Madurai. It was totally packed. Though there were squads to control the crowd, they were of little help as the crowd wandered as per their wish. A large group of paati's caught a corner and were resting along with their grand daughters, unwilling to enter the crowd. They resembled like a few old protesters gathered to fight for their rights. From their face it was fully evident that they were tired. One could easily lose their kids in the crowd. It had brought together people from all around Madurai. I would not be surprised if it was some festival in temple or something, when you come across such site inside a garment shop, i was a bit surprised. That too in Madurai, where i had shopped peacefully, where shop owners usually invite with a gentle smile. All this happens inside Pothys, which has opened a new outlet in Madurai.

First visit was by mistake and alacrity to see the new shop. Last week, wanted to test it once again, to see whether it can tried. Had spent some time thinking over it and came up with the idea of visiting the shop in the afternoon hoping sun would help us in keeping people at home. But we were wrong. For once again, we were forced to waddle through the crowd. This is the first time i have seen so much crowd concentrated in one shop, not sure whether it is my ignorance or it is actually uncommon. Is it the name or the advertisement or curiostiy or the escalator that has attracted the crowd, i am not sure. But it wont be favourite shopping spot till i hear some positive update. Anyway they seem to be doing a good business there, and is evident from the shop's bags and plastic covers that can be seen with most of the people. So how are other shops doing ? God only knows.

Weblogger mode with Tag support

Right from May, all posts to this blog were made from Emacs. Slowly losing the habit of using the web interface. Thanks to the hard work of geeks out there, who have tweaked the weblogger.el to a greater extent. With the new version of Wordpress, and introduction of Tags, the main problem i faced with the weblogger mode in Emacs is the lack of support for the tags. Hence though the draft is created in Emacs, used to edit the blog posts once it is posted and add tags. Was searching for the weblogger mode with Tag support for wordpress. From the wordpress site found that it can be done specifying the tags in the mt_keywords in the metaweblog API. Thats all it ended there. Did not go beyond that.

After some time came across the link, http://blog.nethazard.net/emacs-weblogger-mode-with-wordpress-tags-support/ where the weblogger with the Tags support was available. From then, it has been a satisfying experience while i blog from Emacs. If i could find someway to type in Tamil, will soon try posting to my Tamil Blog from Emacs. Still without luck, :( If anybody is aware of some way to type in Tamil in Emacs, let me know.

Upgraded to Debian Lenny

Upgraded to lenny about three weeks back. But it took three weeks for a blog post on it. Could not get enough time to post about it(Belive me ;)) When i moved from Ubuntu to Etch, i had faced a lot of issues. First issue was with Wireless card. Next one was with ALSA. Not sure what the issue was, but at times the volume remains at 0 and when tried raising goes upto 100 with a lot of noise. Running alsaconf fixed the issue everytime, but i could not get enough time to set it right. Badly needed Firefox 3.0, but it required GNOME higher version hence the rendering was not all that great. So was waiting for Lenny for a very long time.

Once Lenny was released, i started the download but took so many days to download it. Finally it was done. I was a little worried about the upgrade, since saw fw issues in mailing lists. But the upgrade went smoothly without troubles. I had copied all the DVDs to the disk and made sources point to the filesystem dump. Booted expecting to see some issues, but till now, it has been great. Impressed with the look and feel.  Actually it looks great. Though the packages are not the latest, i am happy with the versions available. Totally impressed with Debian this time :)

Kemmanagundi, Bababudangiri and Mulainagiri Trek

It started as a highly spirited trek. The photos from other blogs added a lot of excitement to the already excited mind. So thus started the trip to Kemmanagundi, with most of them belonging to the usual gang(Nilamagal Kadhalargal) and without few. We started off in Shimoga Express that starts from Bangalore at 11.30PM. Reached Tarikere at around 5.45 since the train was late by around 1.15 hours. From Tarikere took a bus to Lingdahalli, from where we paid 500 to a mini vegetable van to take us to Kemmanagundi. The driver chose the shortest route, but it has to be the worst one i guess. With 11 packed inside it a little difficult one. Anyway thats the only option left to you since the first Bus to KG is only around 9.30AM. We started the much awaited trek after refreshment at Traveller's Bungalow.

The weather at KG was unbeatable. Neither too cold, nor too hot. With the mists, caressing the grasses at will, it was a wonderful sight. And the mountains covered with green lush grasses, i am seeing it for the first time. Occasional drizzling, ran out of words to explain. Now the excitement level crossed 100% with ease. Finally the trek started. The tall grasses and the drizzling raised some suspicion about leeches, the tiny insects we dread the most. But we didn't find any then, so the trip started with a lot of enthusiasm. First point of confusion came, when paths(looked like) diverged towards left and right. We took the right one and thats where it was not right. Little did we know we are invading the leech territory and there are millions of armed warriors waiting for the taste of blood. Worst part was we were unarmed, or not prepared. Worstest part was two of the gang were not wearing shoes :) Courage disappeared, panic stroked, in the rush of adrenalin think we reached the top in few minutes :) Thanks to the leeches!!!

Two in the gang, Mani and Peter were the feast for the leeches. I suffered a small one, where a determined leech has started sucking blood through my socks. But it was nowhere when compared to the attacks Mani, Peter and Pramod has suffered. Next hour wasted in cleaning the leeches, soaking the socks in dettol, applying tobacco mixed in castor oil to the legs etc etc. Make it a point to remember that, tobacco mixed with castor oil when applied prevents leech attack to an extent. Good that leeches have not caused much damage. Bad that this was enough for the courage in people to disappear. Adding to all these, there was a small forest cover to cross. Done. Few wanted to take the risk, few did not. Taking the risk and safety, the end of group discussion saw us retreating with the trek put on hold and with plans of continuing it next day from a different location.
The best part of the trek was the lunch. We had burnt some energy, and even bread and pickle were delicious. We were left with just few bread packets.

Next plan was to go to Gallikere by bus. Went to the bus stop to find that there are just two buses to KG one at morning 10.15AM and another one at 4.15PM. With nowhere to go, decided to stay in KG and started setting up our tents. To our dismay, one of our tent was in a very bad shape. This time we had tried renting out tents from "Adventure Era" or something and we had to pay the price. We setup two tents and decided to just sleep inside sleeping bags with the tent just spread out. Luckily we rented out a room in the dormitory available there and the night went without further troubles.

The next day, woke up early and started to Hebbe falls. Adding to our woes, wheel of a jeep we went got punctured. But that gave opportunity to trek for two KMs to few of us. We had to walk few more kilometers, crossing three small streams and tackling the leeches to reach the falls. Bath in the falls was awesome anyway. Managed to catch the 10.15AM bus from KG, reached Lingdahalli, caught bus to Chickmagalur, finishing the lunc there and started the trip back to Bangalore.

Bababudangiri, Mulainagiri remains unexplored. Few misses, few hurdles, but the trip was great and enjoyable one. What matters the most is the crowd with which you go. We have a great gang which rocks everywhere. Blog cant end without mention of the the people involved, it was Prabhu, Pramod, DP (Deepy), Thirukumaran Annas and Mani, Musi, Praveen, Bharathi, Peter, myself and our Captain, Muthukumar.

KG offers a great scope for photography, since you get a glimpse of virgin nature in purest form at few spots. So every photo looks beautiful without special efforts. Check out mine at http://picasaweb.google.com/sens2003/KemmanagundiTrip#.

Waiting for the next trip/trek.

Pasanga

Though i blog about all movies that i see in theaters there are very few movies that are make an impact. "Pasanga" belongs to that genre. Cant be better than this. I watched the movie in Sathyam cinemas, Chennai after attending a marriage there. I have heard a lot about Sathyam theatres from my friends and it did live upto my expectation.

The movie rocks from the begining and a slight tint of humour follows till the end. This makes the movie more enjoyable. The core concept on which the movie is spun seems to be a little weak, it is just about the silly fight that exists between two sixth standard students, but the dialogues and screenplay makes sure that you get fully engrossed with the movie. The director is to be appreciated for the child artists deliver what was expected. Could not find any flaw from any of the characters in the movie. Vega who did not have any role in Saroja, plays the role of a homely village girl with perfection and makes an impact. The directory has not failed to notice even small things. I am not sure this was the result of his observations or he remembered his whole school life. The second half turns a bit serious, with the director making attempts to deliver some message out to the audience. There were few unwanted scenes at the ends which could have been removed. On the whole it was a great movie to watch. It is a must watch for grown ups, for children i am not sure. The movie goes a bit too far in displaying the rivalry among the students. The melody "Oru vetkan varuthae" impresses.

On the whole the movie is great, would recommend watching it.

Auto experience

This happened when i started for the Munnar trip from Bangalore. Usually i patronize the BMTC buses when compared to the autos. The main reason is because of the already bad experiences with the auto drivers. Anyway coming back to the story the KSRTC bus to cochin starts from KSRTC satelite bus stand at Mysore road. I decided to go to Majestic bus stand and then get a bus from there. Since it was late, i was forced and unwillingly started the hunt for auto. I was searching for the Prepaid auto counter. I was lucky to find the counter soon but unlucky since it was closed. This is where the drama started.

There were around 5 to 6 auto drivers there and here are the dialogue in my words that should give you a picture of what happened there.

Auto driver 1: Come sir, where do you want to go ?
Me: Looked at the auto drivers suspciously, i usually avoid group of auto drivers, since it is a lot more difficult to handle them when compared to a single guy.
Auto driver 2: What is your mother tongue sir ?
Me: Tamil
Auto driver 2: Where do you want to go from there(in Tamil)
Me: To ernakulam
Auto driver 2: Ok ok. Buses to ernakulam will start from there only. Might have felt that they are very very supportive.
Me: ok
Auto driver 2 to Auto driver 3: Looked like Auto driver 2 was the head and he ordered auto driver 3 to take me to the destination.
Auto driver 4: Give him 150 Rs only. (Suddenly this guy popped up from nowhere)
Auto driver 3 (One who is supposed to take me): No sir, he is just kidding, you need to give me Rs 150.

(I was pleased for a moment)

Auto driver 3: You can pay me just Rs 120, that should be ok. I will drop you there. He told this with such an innocent face, that even who knew the place would believe it might take 120 Rs to reach there.

Luckily i had done some survey and i was aware of the distance and the route the auto guy has to take. The total distance was just 4.3 KM from Majestic and it would not cost more than 35. I knew what he is asking four times the original amount. I decided not to go in that auto, so started the argument.

Me: 120 for just 5 Kms or what ?
Auto driver 3: I will take you for free if it is 5 kms.
Me: It is 5Km.
Auto driver 3: Do you know about the traffic at that place.

I was not aware and need not be. So putting a full stop to the useless argument walked away letting his cries get lost in the noise. Soon i found a good guy who did not ask for anything except the meter amount.

The experience was totally different when we reached Cochin. Everytime the auto drivers demanded atleast five Rupees less than what my friend told as nominal.

This post was mainly for someone who are new to Bangalore. Best way is to use the BMTC, if not check out google map and btis.in so that you have an idea on the amount. btis.in will even give you auto fare between two places, but does not cover all routes.

The Munnar Trip

Since most of my school friends will be joining college for further studies next month, we thought of going for a trip before that. Initial plan was to go for an IPL match, but soon it was ruled out once IPL was moved to South Africa and we decided upon Munnar. The trip turned out to be nice and enjoyable though we did not plan well enough.

Started on thursday evening to Cochin in KSRTC special bus. The speciality of the bus is it will start late, bus will be bit older than normal buses and we will have to rely on just one driver who will have to drive for the next 14 hours without sleeping. Anyway reached Cochin safely at 12.00 and went to Vinod's home. He had changed a bit and was talking like Major Sundarrajan, who has acted in old tamil movies. To lend more clarity, Major Sundarrajan says a dialogue in english, and repeats the same in Tamil. He was behaving in a similar way :) cant blame him, with nobody to talk in Tamil at cochin the change is expected. Anyway we started to Munnar in another KSRTC where K stands for Kerala and not Karnataka. Kerala buses resemble the buses shown in 1960 tamil movies. They definitely have a large scope of improvement. But driver's expertise in driving the bus through the hilly terrain was impressive and we reached Munnar correctly at 7.30 PM.

Once we stepped into munnar, we were sure that we are not going to get any room. Looked like tourists have invaded Munnar trying to evade the summer heat. We tried hunting for rooms but could not get anything, finally with the help of an auto driver Subramani, booked a room which i can safely call as bit expensive. We retired to sleep on that night with plans of going for sight seeing the next day.

Next day (saturday) we started towards the Mattupetty direction stopping at places wherever there was a scenic view. Soon we discovered that the entire path is going to be liked that, with Tea estates covering the entire hills and provided a pleasant in every direction. Few places of interest in that direction are Mattupetty dam, Kundale dam, Top station.

Next day (Sunday) since we had to return back to Cochin to catch the bus back to our city at 7.40, visited just the Leckam waterfalls and came back. We had stayed away from the scorching heat for two days, and Cochin heat was untolerable. The return journey was also in the same special bus, with the same driver who once again managed to bring us back to the city safely. If we had gone to Munnar directly skipping cochin, we could have got more time to spend in Munnar. Munnar will need atleast three days to rest and enjoy the weather. Also book for rooms in advance to avoid troubles at the end.

The post was more about my personal experience, check my friend's post for more details here.

Check out the snaps at http://picasaweb.google.com/sens2003/MunnarTrip#

Vacation once again...

Back on a weeklong vacation and in my sister's home with nothing to do actually. So you know why i am typing this now. The trip was in fdoubt till the last day, since there were too many issues on my plate to finish. Burnt a lot of midnight oil on thursday, transferred a few cases to few kind people in the team :) and i was on railway station to catch the train. Boarded S7, and got an unexpected welcome. Looked like Mom and Dad have already given a good introduction about me. Even if i travel for 4 days, there is a very little probability of getting friendly with someone. The same does not hold good for my parents. Two days of little sleep pushed me to sleep in few minutes. Thought of setting an alarm, but once i saw the tiny toddler in the lower berth, decided not to. Knew he would wake me up at 4.30 or 5.00. He did not disappoint me, and he let out a loud cry at 4.30AM. Now i had 12 long hours to kill with very little options. Tiring, boring, sweating, disturbing, thats how the journey was.

When i started browsing the pages of Anantha Vikadan, the expected problem in this train has already started. In the south, boarding the Reserved Compartment with open ticket is not approved and the rule is strictly adhered to. But it is the reverse in North. So it happens in every train running from South to North. The issue was resolved soon. Anyway coming back to Anantha Vikadan, looks like i am reading it after 36 weeks. Think should start the habit once again as it seems to be more informative.

Found a lot of people to be sleeping and tried it. But could not since the train was more like mobile oven. What else can be expected during Indian Summer ? The tiring journey ended finally at 4.30 and now i am once again bugging you people with this post :) One guy warned over phone not to post about this, but i had already drafted spending my valuable time. Anyway BFN :)

What awaits in office after the vacation, is a bit scary to imagine. Lets see how it goes.

Rail Payanangalil

Policeman: Is there a round table conference happening ?
We: No sir, just a small chat
Policeman: Dont feel sleepy ?
We: No sir. We will not get opportunity to meet only during train journeys. So just having a little chat. We will sleep in another fifteen minutes.
Policeman: Ok. Keep an eye on your belongings.
We: Sure.

Hmmm, things like this happen when you stay awake and keep chatting even when the clock ticks 12.00 or 1.00 in train. Though it invites cold stares from most of the policemen and ticket examiners we choose to ignore them and continue. Anyway thought these train journeys deserved a mention. Journey to hometown nowadays resembles a mini tour, with ten to twelve of our friends in a single coupe. It is a heterogenous crowd consisting of juniors, seniors and colleague friends. The discussion starts with update on what has happened to each and every guy since we last met. What could have happened to a bunch of s/w engineers who spend most of the time in front of the computer. So it is always the other guy who talks about his friend, with imagination playing a major role. The noise we create is at its peak, since most of the times all people talk together or laugh together. The crowd slowly disperses after lights are switched off in all coupes. But it does not end there. Only after 12.00 people get realization and start talking about company, present situtaion, future plans, recession, india, world, college etc etc inviting cold stares from the roaming policemen. Trips were boring when i used to travel alone and books usually help in passing time. Now i take books but seldom read them. I dont feel bored or dont have a feeling that there is some time to kill. Hope it continues.

P.S. For those who donot understand the title, it is a title of a famous tamil movie which roughly translates to happenings in train journey.

Malpe, St.Mary's Island and Udupi Trip

After a lot of confusions, and lengthy discussions, and around 300 mail discussions we decided upon Malpe, St. Mary's and udupi. Started from Bangalore on friday night for the first time with a group of 12. After a sleepless journey, reached kudremukh early in the morning when sleep was about to conquer us. The scenary brought us back to our senses but soon we lost ourself in the virgin beauty of mother nature. We could see green tea plantation on one side and a pool of cloud on the other side. The whole journey through kudremukh was like that but we missed a bit of it because of the tablet that was taken to get rid of the vomitting sensation managed to successfully put us into sleep. Could not avoid taking the tablet, since the sleepless night journey combined with sharp turns in the ghats did a lot of damage.

Finally woke up at Udupi where we booked a room in a decent hotel. First visit was to St. Mary's Island near Malpe beach which is famous for basalt rock deposits which look like hexagonal cylinders. From Malpe the isle can be reached by ferry. The island is small and secluded and the serenity is disturbed only by the noisy tourists like us. We had a good bath there in the sea waterddddd. The waves seems to love visitors and When the waves recede they try to take you away with them. After a long time i had opportunity to take bath in sea like that. After spending one hour there we returned back to malpe and went to have lunch. We tried fish there but it did not meet our expectations.

Next halt was at Maravanthe beach to see the sunset. Once again there was little human activity in the beach, which meant it was time for some football action. Next one hour was devoted to football. As usual it turned out to be interesting. End result: Arsenal beat Manu 5-3. Funny, anyway thats how we named the teams. I contributed two goals to the winning side :) One hour of football was too much for people like who rarely involve in physical activities. After the sunset, we went back to hotel after having dinner at Udupi.

Next day i.e sunday, we went to the world famous Udupi Krishnan temple. The architecture looked different. It has a history associated with it which i am not aware of. Anyway after visiting the temple, started to Kaup beach. Kaup was not an exception, and there was not much human inhabitation except for tourists and couples who donot want to be disturbed. It remained comparatively clean. We could not visit the Kaup lighthouse since it is opened only between 4 to 7 in the evening. Around six of our people started playing volleyball, we resorted to cricket with plastic bat and ball. One good thing about cricket is that you can convert any available wood to stumps and bat. Only thing you need is a ball, but we have also played cricket with something that looks like a ball :) This time, we had a plastic bat and a plastic ball, and water battle served as the stump with cap serving as bails. Still it was good.

We decided to go to kodachadri after that, but decided against while on the way to kodachadri. Thoughts about office next days always disturbs and the same thoughts managed to reconsider our decision. Soon we decided against since we might not have enough time to go to kodachadri and return back. So we restricted ourselves to a visit to River Tunga at Teerthahalli and came back to Bangalore. Once again it turned out to be a fun filled trip as it is always. Digi cams gave us the liberty of clicking everything that we thought would be good. People looked a lot generous while taking pictures, and here are the links,

http://picasaweb.google.com/sens2003/MalpeTrip#
http://picasaweb.google.com/kpraveen85/Malpe#
http://picasaweb.google.com/rajesh.kalaivanan/MalpeStMarysIslandMaravanthae#

SMB Saga continues

This is entirely useless to those who donot travel by Train in India. This is a continuation of my previous post Side(u)-Middle(u)-Berth(u).

When i read the news that side middle berths are going to be removed from the trains, i felt elated. The Side middle berth concept did not go well with me as it created more confusion and problems and made the trains more congested when compared to the older system. So the news meant it alleviated all the worries about the concept. But looks like Indian Railways will not drop it so soon. It has already tasted some success with this. Though newspapers carried the news that SMB will be removed, Indian railways is conducting a survey to check the response.
To attend the survey visit, http://www.indianrail.gov.in/. If you travel by train, and would like the SMB concept to continue or removed, better respond to the survey. So that atleast the response of the majority of the people get reflected instead of some independent decisions.

Nothing But Repetition

This is just a pure repetition of what was flashed in news and already posted by numerous people all around the world and from India. Yep, as you might have guessed correctly, it is about the Oscars. Nothing much, wanted to remember this day, as ARR fan. He deserves it, no wonder he has achieved it, hope he continues it. This was the moment the whole country was waiting for. Finally he has fulfilled the Indian Dream. Hope he does a lot more and brings more laurels to the country.

Yelagiri Trekking

This trip deserves a special mention as it exposed me to some hardcore trekking for the first time. I was totally out of energy yesterday to post it, and gathered some today to post about it. Saturday morning, 3.30 AM we were awake and successfully disturbed those sleeping in our friend's home. At 4.50AM we were out and on the way to Majestic. Luckily we got a bus to Majestic. Thats where our luck ends. Reached Majestic at 5.30 or so to see a three loooong queue for taking tickets. Waiting to get the tickets meant, we will have to travel to Jolarpettai standing for two hours. Since we travelled together as a group, the trouble was esily overshadowed in the fun we had during the journey.

After finishing the breakfast at Jolarpettai, we were on the way to Yelargiri. One unique feature of the route to Yelagiri is that the hair pin bends are named after tamil poets like "Pavendar valaivu", "kabilar Valaivu" etc. Yelagiri seems to be a small town, left undisturbed till now and Yelagiri people seem to live closely with the nature. First stop was at Poonganur lake, a small artificial lake which looked ok and did not attract us very much. After that we started our trek to Jalagampaarai falls. We trode along examining the reasonably developed Yelagiri, with hotels lining both sides of the road. We had a different opinion about Yelagiri before we went there.

The trek to Jalagampaarai was a lot tiresome as we started at around 11.00 AM when Sun was ready to suck the full energy. On the way we found Mr.Raman, who from then acted as our guide. Good that we met him, it could have been really difficult to find the way. Mr. Raman, who could be easily around 55 to 60, astonished us with the stamina and strength he possessed. He rarely stopped in the 10KM trek. We were left with no other option than to run behind him :) Anyway we covered around 10KM trek in around 4 hours with very few stops except for the a long stop for lunch. It was sad to sight few plastic papers even in those untrodden hills.

We were lucky, since there was some water was tickling in the falls, hence we were able to take bath and derive some satisfaction. The most important part of the trek is that we stayed in tent. This is the first time i had stayed in tent. We started back to Bangalore the next day after having "Kaara Panniyaaram". Together we managed to eat 50 panniyaarams. To our surprise it costed us just Rs. 50.Yet another sign, Yelagiri is yet to be spoiled. We made sure that we don't disturb Yelagiri by throwing the plastic covers, and carried dozens back to bangalore to be disposed safely. The only disappointing fact about the trip is that there are not much scenic spots that would gather the attention.

Before i end, people in the trip include Muthukumar Anna, Deivapalan, Rajaguru, Sai, Nachiappan, Praveen and myself. Check out my picasa and stay in touch with the same, as there are more snaps to follow,

http://picasaweb.google.com/sens2003/YelagiriTrekking#

So there ends yet another memorable trip.

Naan Kadavul

Naan Kadavul, the much waited Bala's movie created a lot of news even before it was released and continues to do the same, three days after it got released. I did go through the reviews, and everybody seems to be enthralled by the movie. I belong to the small group which seems to have a different opinion, AFAIK.

So is the movie so bad ? No, not at all. But it failed to impress me for reasons i am not sure. Probably since cruelty and brutality was a little more than my tolerance level. Before going to the movie, i heard that the movie is all about Aghori Sadhus. I had even read the wiki about them (Preparations for the movie :)) but it turned out to be a film about the beggars and the pitiable life they lead. Bala has handpicked each and every character and has sketched athe role with full perfection and i failed to find a flaw. He also deserves an applause  for tuning Pooja and make her look exactly like that of a blind gypsy. It took minutes to realize that the girl singing in train is actually Pooja. Pooja, is exceptionally remarkable in her performance and can hope for an award.

I know i haven't said anything about Arya. Blame Bala for that. Arya's role is very minimal except for walking at a rapid pace like a sadhu, uttering few slokhas and two fight sequence at the end. Though Arya shines in the Aghori sadhu role, he does not get much opportunity. Wondering why it required three years during which Arya did not act in any other movie.

A lot of work has gone behind each and every scene. Bala has sculptured it a lot carefully. There are many situational comedies through out the movie but it gets overshadowed by the acts of the merciless villain. I don't know his name but he has done a commendable job. Though it is a wonderful depiction of the cruelty mended to the poor, think it has bit too much for me, hence i could not get myself to the position of liking it.

I usually don't mention the story. Sorry if you had come here searching for it.

"Record Breakers"

"Record Breakers" is how i fondly call the Indian cricket team, the most acclaimed team in India. Do they break records so often ? No, Not at all. So why that name ? They break the dreams of a team which is on the verge of setting a record. AFAIK, i would quote breaking the conitnous wins of Australia in test cricket.

I am thinking about adding Nadal also in the list :) But the difference between, Men in Blue and Nadal is that, Nadal himself is on the path to making history. Atleast thats what i feel as i could not see any other "Record Breaker" grooming. Enough of Nadal, i am not a Nadal Fan. I adore the way Federer play. Since i was at home, i did see the final match between Federer and Nadal. Great match, both played well. Federer was one victory short of making history and he succumbed to that pressure :( Other than that his shots were as beautiful as they used to be before few years. Still at 27 he has a long way to go. Hope he comes back strong and wins few more titles and continues to be the king.

Licensed to Drive

Got my four wheeler driving license at last after months of self imposed delays.It came as a birthday present as i chose that date for taking the test. Experiences in the RTO office was the same in the past, and it has not changed now, hope it changes atleast in the future. If you don't go via a broker or Agent, you will never be able to get what you want in a day. Though there are boards advising not to go via agents, it falls on the deaf ears of the employees and also the people. Though there are counters, there is absolutely no information about the steps you need to follow. Agents and the employees seem to be reaping rich.

Hope situation changes. Anyway i think i will not be stepping into RTO office for another 15 years.

2008

Just after the 8 days vacation i am here back in bangalore. With few minutes left to start to office, i am trying to recollect what happened during 2008, that is worth to post in this blog. So it is going to be a bit personal so you can stop reading here if you wish.

Anyway 2008 was an uneventful year and not much happened through out the year.

Not much to comment about the job.
Saw too many movies in theater and through CDs and DVDs. No new year resolution to reduce that also :) So i expect the same situation will prevail in 2009 also.
The best part of last year is the trips along with my friends and seniors, lets see whether i can get them in the correct order.
Jan - Kollimalai, Shivasamudra, Bandipur, Mysore
Feb - Chennai
April - Goa
September - Jog, Murudheshwar
Oct - Tirunelvezhi
Nov - Trichy.
For the first time in lifetime saw a cricket match in stadium. Went to the IPL T20 match between Chennai Superkings and Banglore Royal Challengers.
My sis was blessed with a baby girl and i had a great time playing with the kid.
Attempts to learn hindi and kannada went in vain and almost dropped the idea by end of the year.
For the first time started reading tamil novels with Kalki's Ponniyin Selvan and soon completed Sivagamiyin Sabatham and Parthiban Kanavu.

I am not sure whether i have missed something. Since memory is not willing to cooperate, ending the post now.

Just one resolution for 2009,

Try to come home early :) I tried and failed a lot many times last year trying to do this. Lets see whether i can make that a habit this year :)

Happy New Year.