What' s up with Indian railway system, Bangalore Cant station & my family? So weird connection rather some 'shapa' from some bleady fool I guess, since every single time I get to that station to catch a train some thing or the other happens which is totally funny for whoever is listening & damn irritating for me & my family. My kutty family-me, mom & dad set out to a small trip of temples in tanjore dist since I am leaving soon. In our family customs, guess its the same with most tambrahms, there is this habbit of meeting elders & going to "koladeivam" temple before doing some good things. Though I am particluarly interested in the returns I get after I touch the feet which makes my wallet a bit more heavier than the actual zonk currency left in it.

The train was at 7pm & we reached the station at 6pm itself. What else do I do apart from looking at few chicks, have three tea's, go for a walk, twice to the loo & once to the phone booth? So decided to look at the chart in the r-station as to where our AC boogie would come. It was a dad-office-sponsored-trip. So all the way it would be a comfortable, I thought. The chart displayed that the boggies would come right at the end after the normal sleeper class would end. So we waited for some time at this point but when the train arrived it was totally opposite to what the chart showed. The AC compartments where right in the front. So I had to carry the baggage & run, sorry correction sprint till the front.

I should say that my mom is a sooper-dooper packer, she can stuff 20 kilos in a 10 kilos bag & then who the hell will carry it? 'ME'. Why it has to be me? If i ask this question to my pop, he would cooly reply- ' Pinna unnaku en soru pottu valakarom?', 'Naan enna naaiya?' I used to think. But here, there was no time left for thinking. It's been like 6 months since I went to the cricket ground. Else this would have been a 'jujubi'-esp with my cricket kit weighing some 15 kilos. So I sprinted with two bags with looked like 10 kilos bag but actually weighing 20 kilos, which makes it 40 kilos (if my quantative ability is gud enough), running like Ben Johnson (man! he would have been proud). Luckily unlike the tiruppur trip there were no mami's & mama's in th way. So in a way it was easier.

Puffing & panting I reached the AC compartment hoping for some cool ac air to blow my ultra-tired soul. There was a shock awaiting me there. Normal sleeper compartments where much cooler than the AC one. I was like 'Appa, u wasted so much money on this crap?'. I never knew at that point of time that there were more suprises waiting for me in this trip!

Morning 525 am, Tanjore Station. As per some ones promise the so-called-brand-new-ambassador-car-with-AC was ready for us when we landed. I got into the car to find out that it was older than me!. Forget about the AC. Luckily no bullock-carts over took us from the left or right, else I would have killed that driver & the guy who promised to send the car. With all these we managed to reached our "koladeivam" temple at Sirkayi, the great Sattanathan swamy-so now you know why I am Bharathwaj Sattanathan.

In spite of all these 'obstracles' I thought there was a silver lining in this whole thing. There was an another family who had also come there for offering their pooja's to the god. In the morning its the "Mrs.Deity" & in the night its the "Mr.Deity". Among that family out came a 'dhool' figure. I was like- where the hell is that yahoo smiley which moves its eyes & head sidewards. "Indha patti kattuleyum oru pavazhama?". If that itself was a suprise, chk this out. Their family had come there to offer prayers since she was getting married to some wealthy, nerdish, MS, NRI bugger, "May god bless the souls of NRI", who the hell invented this damn word-NRI?!!! Imagine my peelings....Some body please!!!!

After all these shock treatment & the sun shinning as if there was no tomorrow the pooja was over. I prayed to god saying "Nange unnaku dinam-dinam pooje pannurom, nee ennaku ore oru POOJAvavadu set-up panni kodu" :P.

end of the actual post...

Oru small addition:We visited Vaidishvaran Koil, Chidambaram Koil, Thiruvaiyyar, Thirukadaiyur Koil, Tanjore Big Temple, Velankanni Temple & so many to name that I forgot. Anyways it was gud......

1) New York City has 11 letters
2) Afghanistan has 11 letters.
3) Ramsin Yuseb (The terrorist who threatened to destroy the Twin Towers in 1993) has 11 letters.
4) George W Bush has 11 letters.
This could be a mere coincidence, but this gets more interesting:
1) New York is the 11th state.
2) The first plane crashing against the Twin Towers was flight number 11.
3) Flight 11 was carrying 92 passengers. 9 + 2 = 11
4) Flight 77 which also hit Twin Towers, was carrying 65 passengers. 6 + 5 = 11
5) The tragedy was on September 11, or 9/11 as it is now known. 9 + 1 + 1 = 11
6) The date is equal to the US emergency services telephone number 911.
9 +1 + 1 = 11.
Sheer coincidence..?! Read on and make up your own mind:
1) The total number of victims inside all the hi-jacked planes was 254.
2 + 5 + 4 = 11.
2) September 11 is day number 254 of the calendar year.
Again 2 + 5 + 4 = 11.
3) The Madrid bombing took place on 3/11/2004.
3 + 1 + 1 + 2 + 4 = 11.
4) The tragedy of Madrid happened 911 days after the Twin Towers incident.
Now this is where things get totally eerie:
The most recognized symbol for the US, after the Stars & Stripes, is the Eagle. The following verse is taken from the Quran, the Islamic holy book:
"For it is written that a son of Arabia would awaken a fearsome Eagle.
The wrath of the Eagle would be felt throughout the lands of Allah and lo, while some of the people trembled in despair still more rejoiced: for the wrath of the Eagle cleansed the lands of Allah and there was peace."
That verse is number 9.11 of the Quran.
Still unconvinced about all of this..?! Try this and see how you feel
Open Microsoft Word and do the following:
1. Type in capitals Q33 NY. This is the flight number of the first plane
to hit one of the Twin Towers.
2. Highlight the Q33 NY.
3. Change the font size to 48.
4. Change the actual font to the WINGDINGS

‘Vie-06’ the best sports fest in the country was flagged off yesterday by Ms. Reeta Abraham, former Indian athlete & Arjuna awardee, conducted by SBMJC Bangalore. I had been to the inauguration yesterday and the memory still remains very much of the last year I was in-charge of the whole proceedings of the fest, being the Student’s Sports Secretary of the college. I have been to many sports fest in the country from BITS-Pilani’s to VIT’s but nothing is as near to our fest. I am not saying this since I belong to this breed.

Let me start with the things that’s been provided from the VIE organizing committee. Firstly we provide free food, accommodation & transport of higher quality for all the outstation team which participates in this sports fest. This may sound better if I say that we don’t have any grounds, hostel capacities to fit in 500 outstation students & vehicles to drive up that many. The number of events conducted will be close to ten, with lots of events holding men’s & women’s events separately. And Bangalore being such a vast city we have to accommodate everything into consideration while planning for this event.

Basketball is held under lights & Cricket is played with color dress white ball for the semis & the finals. Apart from these two prime events which attract crowds other events such as badminton, football, volleyball, table tennis, tennis, swimming, snooker events are held every year to promote sports in a big way. Most of funds collected are through sponsorship & the students of the sports department have to do everything since it’s for them to learn the importance of doing this fest.

You can imagine the running around I would have done that too being at helm. My ass was on fire for everything & I was ably supported by my team picked & trained by me. Last year we started everything well in advance, as early as in the month of September once we had a little break in the college season. Planning, Co-ordination, Finance, Marketing & Advertising, Strategy & such things to name had to be looked after by this main core team. I was in-charge of the overall activities & took up personally Marketing & Advertising and Strategy for myself since I thought I could do a good job with this. Like wise few other students were given their set which they thought would be good for them. All had to report to me directly & I would propose anything ahead on top to my director.

With Dhanraj Pillai being the Chief Guest for the last year fest, we had to make sure that everything was as much in order than ever before. Cricket attracts in lot more entries than any other game as usual, the main reason for that to start of before the actual launch of the fest. The best part about VIE is not that we get to do all the above mentioned things; it’s something else along with this. All of us representing the best sports college in India have to participate in all our respective events & also win them. If we don’t win I know the kind off bashings we get from our Sports Director.

I remember ‘the’ day where I was in our design place where we get our LCD presentation done. Almost the whole day finalizing on the best suited one for us. And from there had to rush to the airport to pick Dhanraj & drop him at the hotel and then from there to the design place again to collect the CD. After the collection rushed back to the Basketball venue where our inauguration is held since its under lights so that the firecracker show can be lively, to set up things. In the mean while I had to get ready for the inauguration since I had to be up front as the guider of the torch bearer. Once the inauguration was over had to rush to the accommodation, which were set up in three different places due to the number of participants, to check the status of the dinner & also finalize the list for the next mornings break fast. Once that was done had to go to the place where our team meets up to decide the itenary for the next day. By the time this was done over the dinner table it was about 230 in the night. Caught up with some sleep till 400 & had to drive up with my sports sec to the hotel to pick Dhanraj to drop him at the airport. Once that was done had to go the cricket grounds on the way to check in the matches. Then all of a sudden I get a call stating we have a cricket match that afternoon. By the time I reached the cricket grounds after sorting few more issues I was a dead duck. I won the toss and chose to bat first. When I went into bat I saw nothing, I just scored 17 and we won the match the last ball. It was 530 in the evening & lots of work pending still.

This was the way the days used to run. Will try to put in a picture of mine receiving the overall trophy with my counterpart, if possible. Needless to say in spite of all these efforts we also pulled off a victory in many events so ended up as the overall winners. We won the cricket trophy by beating Pachaippas College, Chennai in the finals comprehensively, with me picking three wickets.

VIE-06 Effort is Immortal…………………

“Success is not a result of internal combustion; you must set yourself on fire” is a famous quote from yester years. Every one wants to be successful in life in some ways or the other. This post is certainly not about how-to-become-successful-in-2 years? This post is about motivation, spur, inspirations, impulse which is the primary reason to attain that feat. Success is nothing but putting together few results. When you look at the larger picture of the results achieved by an individual, it is recognized and approved by the society or him saying he is successful in life.

Many people have many ways of measuring success. Some may consider success as being self-sufficient in life without having any liabilities. Some may consider success as building a house. Like wise many may rate success as materialistic things and many may rate it as realistic things. If you would have asked me this question ‘what do you think success will be to you?’ before one year or even six months, I would have replied saying “the day I represent my country in cricket I will feel myself to have succeeded in life”, but this answer would have changed over the period of time. The same question asked to another individual, the replies may vary, but the bottom line is “success is peace”, a sense of accomplishment, a relief some where down under in the heart. Whatever the difference maybe on a larger scale but the basic ideology is the same.

Let me come to the point. Like the very first statement of this post said, the motivation levels required for this achievable feet is enormous. The end result may vary from topping the class to buying a house; nevertheless it makes lot of difference to the individuals who are setting their own standards.

Sometimes we come across these people in our life who are aimless. Most of us would have been brought up by saying so many things that we should achieve when we get older. Like wise I was told there was nothing more superior than representing our country, some other dude would have got his own share of advice from his parents or closely knitted ones. Some of us would develop an interest of our own from watching people. So this inspiration sets in deep inside each of us to become something in life which develops into a strong feeling. Your life is dependent on that most of the times. This leads its way to form a strong motivation factor in life.

As far as I am concerned lot of the people I know derive inspirations from stars. Maybe a Lance Armstrong’s- Its not about the bile would inspire a few, like wise a Mahatma Gandhi’s life would inspire few. But the best source of inspirations would be from people whom we know & whom we can see. I see a friend of mine who has sacrificed a lot of things and yet works hard enough to attain whatever he wants; he sets as an example to me. These small factors in life affect me a lot more than the real big starlets from the sky.

Motivation is nothing else then letting you know what you want to achieve. It is that conscience that pricks you always whenever you are not going in the right path. It’s the ray of light which leads your way through the darkest hours of the night. It is the hammer which breaks all the obstacles on the path to your success. Without this no feet is possible. If you see any man with impregnable heights I would think he would had the utmost motivation levels.

But the main factor about all this to enjoy every bit of it. The main thing we should keep in mind is the very factor for which we are doing all these things. So remember to cherish the smallest pleasures in life, they are unattainable once again. I wish you all the best & a motivated life!!!

Sunday’s are usually not the fun-day types for me. The only thing that makes me feel good about this day is the sleep & off-course the Sunday-Brunch. In fact as a matter of fact I have been having only brunches all these while ever since I quit my job. It was really boring & I turned on the Idiot box. To my surprise there was a program featuring Kamal Hassan on the Vijay TV and the host being Madhan. Think the program is called Madhan’s Thirai parvai. I am not an avid fan of Kamal but I do follow upon good movies of his. So there was this question raised to him about how he is being so successful at what he is doing. The answer was again something close to being the Jack-of-all kind of thing.

Off course there needs to be no mention of what a Jack-of-all means. My dad for all his life has been screaming at top of voice to me about this ability of mine of being a Jack-of-all. When I was young, just a kid, in the first standard or so, my parents enrolled me in a bharathanattiyam class. We were then put up in Delhi & the only way I could get in touch with my routes was to do something like this. I learned the art till a stage wherein I could do my “arrangetram”. But somehow I just couldn’t since my parents got transferred back to Madras. Once when we were back in Madras I couldn’t just continue the art. So next came in Mridangam, Carnatic music, Casio, Karate & Cricket. In each one of this something or the other happened that I couldn’t just continue to an extent that would make a difference to me or anybody. Hence the common form of cursing would be to call me a jack.

Now after all these years I meet this guy who is my boss is some way, who comes down saying that the first thing to do to be successful is to “Master the art of Jack-of-all”. My dogma towards life was very different till then. I thought to be a jack is utterly useless. Then comes in this guy who advises people to be this way by which you can appreciate& also learn so many things which makes you street smart. This same concept was repeated by Kamal today in his interview stating that an actor must be well versed with lot of things from cinematography to script writing.

Ahaa! What a feel. Am I a “Master in the art of Jack-of-all”, time will only tell?!

Sachin ramesh tendulkar- these three words just imply lot of sense to lot of Indians round the globe. I was not a lunatic fan of sachin during my “professional” cricketing days. Infact I went up to arguing with my peers about his inability of not scoring is many crunch games & also playing those big-knocks. Today somehow that feeling is revised & I am feeling lot different in my opinions about this guy. It didn’t come all of sudden just because I saw this new series in espn-star sports named Sachin The legend-His story featuring Naseruddin Shah nor it did when I was watching few special knocks of this guy on Ten sports. In fact I can’t even mention any thing substantial about when I got this feel that he’s a real legend. I know most people have this terminology of using the statistics to discriminate a person. Like in the wonderful hawkeye article about how Indians have this mode of judging a person from his salary slips. I know it is somehow absurd in saying that I only count potential & not performance. But in lots of cases I do consider the potential as to performance. If Marvan Attapatu & Jack Kallis weren’t supported enough by their own boards for a particular period of time they wouldn’t have been where they are rite now. So that doesn’t mean to say that all players have to be supported enough without proper credentials to their names.

The guy whom we are talking about is no Jack Kallis or Marvan Attapattu. This guy is a genius, a legend of his time, only one player among millions of them will be able to achieve this feet. Its not a joke that a former cricketer turns around and calls him “God’s gift to Indian cricket”. But somehow when a player of this caliber is present the world somehow tries to compare him with the second best guy available and the debate over the supremacy comes into question. Yet no one has a real parameter is naming one best among them. I am talking about comparisons between Brain Charles Lara & Sachin Tendulkar.

To be able to distinguish these two cricketers we must first get to the base of the story. Two totally different players, yet having a common trait, the public will love to pay money to watch them play. Having played the game for so many years I cannot figure out a way to get the thing out of mind as to how-not-to-pay-to-watch-a-cricket-game. Yet somehow or someway we end up doing that. From a normal entertaining commodity the game has become a place for corporate battleship today. So this supremacy over the players will come into picture with the advertising & marketing guys ready to poach on the best talents in the world. To keep it simple “Cricket sells, cricketers sell”. If Sachin comes out today says “Boost is the secret of my energy” I knew kids who went up to the supermarkets with their mum to buy Boost. Whether you like it or not this is the truth. But are we really talking about that, are we.

These two players belonged to two different era’s in the same era. I know I don’t make any sense by saying that but what I really mean is the current era can be divided into two, the first era which totally belonged to Sachin & the second which totally belonged to Lara, which doesn’t mean that the other didn’t do equally well. But if you compare the quality of knocks I will put my money on this above statement. Sachin who started as a middle order batsman & went to bat in the top of the order and Lara who started predominantly as a top order or an opening batsman who started batting little down the order. A quality of a person can be only judged under pressure. Its that ability of these two which stand out. But we cannot really compare these extraordinary individuals. If Lara can come out & get a 400 not out to be the first cricketer to achieve this feat, Sachin was no less with a world record amount of tons in test cricket.  

I personally there is not much cricket left in sachin for many reasons. So till the time he is “available” in the scheme of things lets sit back & enjoy this bizarre talent to the core!!!

Am I an orthodox? Yeah I am. I mean very much to the best of my ability that I can say I am one if that’s what you call for people like me. If one of my friends, who is a girl, turns out dressed half naked then I would certainly turn around and say that you are exposing, not when she really wants to do it. If that makes people think that I am orthodox then I can proudly say that I am one. Even then there are few doubts which revolve around my mind sometimes or the other. I am trying to figure out an answer myself during the course of this post.

I have been thinking about this whole paradox right from the time I stepped into something called as a workplace. Since before that I never had a platform to experience a different situation ever before in my life, thanks to cricket. I worked for one of the biggest companies in India in fact you could say, of the world. It employed the most number of people for the last financial year in India. All I worked there is for few months but I can say I met almost thousand people in this three months time I was with Accenture. My workplace was the biggest of its kind’s in Bangalore employing about more than six & half thousand people. So wherever I went there were people, people, people & more people. People from different class of communities, societies, people from various races, religions and backgrounds-few technology, few commerce like me & few who still have to figure out their own backgrounds. This whole question of ‘am I an orthodox’, comes into picture only when you start comparing yourself to people around you. Why do we do this? Society is the answer. We kind of start thinking about what the hell will the guy who works with us start thinking about us if suppose we didn’t have a girlfriend or get drunk in a pub every weekend or maybe roam the city of Bangalore in an awesome ultra cool bike. Who the hell cares that which nobody realizes, all they think about is the way people around them think.

Before I can comment on anything I should give you a small insight into my background in terms of society. What’s a society? A group of people having a similar kind of ideologies, finances-may be, interests, etc in life. Who forms it? No one knows; it just gets formed of its own. I belong to a typical middle class Tamil iyer family. I am not biased about the religion that I follow, but I am certainly biased just a little with the kinds of people I move with. I still belong to a section of society where pani puris are preferred to pizzas. I am lucky enough that my parents don’t raise their eyebrows when I talk with a chick on phone & meet some chick on the road. But they are still worried about me getting drunk or getting into a relationship at this point of time in my life when there are other important things to commit myself to. Thought I can still say that my morals, ethics & values are in order as to the way I want it to be, there seems to be this itchiness that seems to be on with something or the other wherever I may roam. Again these morals, ethics & values differ from person to person; I am merely talking about mine.

Most of the time I tend to feel it’s this complex paranoia inside few people who are too keen in thinking about the outer circle of theirs, commonly get into this kind of trouble. These dudes & chicks prefer doing things just because some one else feels it’s cool. Most of the times I get told off when I don’t get into these silly gimmicks but thankfully I somehow know my routes & where-bout’s to avoid most of these. May be people I met in this recent trip to madras made me realise something different & good about my own community I should say. The “Filter kappi” and “Thayir sadham” has its own exquisiteness compared to hamburger and hotdog to me. “Tamil music” & “Dappanguci” has more magnificence than rock & roll to me, which doesnt mean that I dont't appreciate Nirvana & Iron Maiden. “Bharathanattiyam” is more appealing to me than Salsa, which doesn't mean that I haven't gone to disco's. I would any prefer an arranged marriage with horoscope matching to a love marriage, which doesn’t mean to say that I may not look for a girl. I still feel uncomfortable having to touch & talk with any woman. If doing & liking the former things to the latter things, as mentioned, makes me an orthodox, yes I am convinced in saying that I am one. This doesn’t make me feel convinced alone it also makes me feel comfortable & proud. That’s me! I am not a yo-man dude with a wassup attitude, though I still use wassup to ask someone what he/she has been up to. I am not a guy who wears clothes in the size in which another guy can fit into nor am I a guy who thinks having as many girl friends as possible in life makes me ‘cool’.

There was a phase in my life which I should name it Lost in transition. The so called ‘cool’ Bangalore had changed few of my outlooks towards life. I don’t know why I suddenly chose to write such a post especially after the New Year eve party where an one night stand wouldn’t have been far from impossible. Few guys at my work place thought this whole Sydney thing will make me to be “more open” in terms of outlook towards life. But somehow I am getting to feel that this is going to make me more “Orthodox”……….. my way of orthodox!!!