New Year....

It's that time of the year again when we get all misty eyed about the year that is almost over. Most of us try to cling to the year which is almost over and yet look hopefully towards the beginning of a new year. We try to recollect all the good memories of the year by gone and try to forget all the not so great moments.

So let me also join the bandwagon and try to recollect some unforgettable moments of 2008.

• My first new year in USA. We ushered in 2008 by going out for dinner and celebrating the new year's eve with our friends.
• My bro started his engineering course.
• My dad was finally able to return home after his tenure in Mumbai. (This saved us a lot of tension during the Mumbai attacks.)
• My mom started working as a counselor. She had always wanted to do something apart from the normal routine and she finally took the plunge.
• Lot of trips - My husband & I spent some wonderful time visiting various places including Vegas, Grand Canyon, NJ, NY, PA, Niagra and of course my first camping trip in Cape Cod.
• Best friend's wedding... Only, I couldn't make it :(
• A new addition to our family. My cousin gave birth to a beautiful girl.

Of course we had our share of tense moments and a few disappointments but hey this is a time of celebration and hope. So let's hope that the coming year brings all of us a lot of joy and prosperity. All of us need a little boost in this bad economy. So three cheers for the new year :)

And don't forget to make all those resolutions you always wanted to make and do try to stick to atleast 4 - 5 of them :)

Happy New Year everyone!!!!

Nenjukkul peithidumaa mazhai...

What a beautiful song. I have been humming this song for almost a week now. When I heard the songs of Varanam Aayiram none of the songs impressed me initially. After hearing all the songs 3 - 4 times I fell in love with this song. It has such beautiful lyrics and the guitar strummings are amazing. Of course the voice of Hariharan adds to the magic of the song. Everything about this song is amazing. 

I tried watching the movie but didn't like it so much. What was really ironical was that the characters spent most of their screen time talking in English but when it came to songs they were all pure Tamil. I couldn't figure out how the characters could sing in pure tamil when they could not speak 5 sentences together in tamil :)

Thamarai is the best lyricist around right now. Kudos to the entire team for giving us such a refreshing song. Hope we get many more songs like this. 

Back from a hiatus

My blog has suffered from my new tight schedule. I will come to that later. Since my last post was about license let me finish the license story. It never seems to end. 

Usually when we pass the road test our license gets mailed to us within a week. Somehow my license didn't make it even after 3 weeks had passed. Now this got us concerned since my temporary permit was about to expire. So I had to call the RMV to find out what was happening. 

Have any of you tried calling the RMV? It's one dreadful process. If you are lucky you will get to hear a human voice after about half an hour. Till then you keep hearing how important your call is to them. The way I see it is if our call is so important why don't they put a few more people to answer our calls? Anyway with no great enthusiasm I called up and was told that my address was not recorded fully. I gave my address and waited eagerly for my license.

One fine evening the much awaited letter was received from RMV. I opened it eagerly only to be shocked to see that they had mailed me someone else's license :( The best part was that they had included a letter stating that they were sorry about the delay and that my address had been updated in their system. While that letter was comforting, I had another call to make to RMV.

The next day again I called them to let them know I had got the wrong license and they assured me that my license was on its way. As a good samaritan I promised to mail the wrong license back to them. After all one more person must be equally worried about their missing license. Fortunately 2 days later someone turned up at the doorstep with my license. It had gone to his house by mistake and I had got his. Phew... At last I had my precious license. Does this call for a celebration or what???

Licensed to ..... DRIVE!!!!

Back home in India getting a license is one of the easiest things possible. You just register in a driving school and learn a little driving and then go for your road test with an assurance that you will get the license. The driving school will ensure that you get the license unless you really flop the test. Of course we can be a little adventurous and try to get the license on our own. Here in US getting a license is anything but easy.

I had heard a lot of stories about how tough it was to get a license. I always took it with a pinch of salt. After all how tough could it be to drive the car? But once I landed here and ventured out to the RMV I started believing the legend. My adventures with the RMV spans over 4 chapters. So here goes.

Chapter 1

First step is the written test to get the permit. Before I could go for this written test I was asked to study or atleast read the driver's manual. Now this was something new to me. The book had so many pages and there were so many numbers. Phew... How was I ever going to read through the book and memorize all the fines and penalties mentioned there? I had a tough time trying to cram the wordlist for GRE. Now this?? Anyway with some perseverance I finished the book, obviously I didn't memorize any of the numbers. I just hoped none of it would appear in the test. We headed to the RMV and after standing in the long queues we got to know that we needed one more document. So much for all the learning. We headed back and decided to give it a shot some other day.

Chapter 2

This time we were more prepared. We took all possible documents we had and headed out to get the permit. Luckily they accepted the documents and allowed me to write the test. The hiccup was that I had forgotten whatever I had read hurriedly a few weeks ago. I just hoped that the test would be easy. Last time I was at the RMV I saw a few people who had failed the written test. With butterflies in my stomach I headed for the exam hall. The test seems to be a blur now. All I remember is I had to get atleast 15 or 20 questions right out of the 25 questions. With bated breath I answered each question as it appeared on the monitor. I finished it successfully in 10 minutes. When I stepped out my husband thought I had flunked it since I came out so fast. Fortunately I got my permit that day.

Chapter 3

I started preparing myself for the road test. Driving was not a problem for me. I had to focus more on parking, especially parallel parking. Once I booked my road test we headed out and practiced the parking for 3 - 4 days. Everyone we knew had some words of wisdom to share. "Turn your head and look behind you before you change lanes." "Look at the mirrors every few seconds and make sure the official notices you look at the mirrors." "Drive slowly and carefully." "Don't drive below the speed limit.". My head was filled with all the advise and in all this time I forgot to look through the manual. Little did I know this small error on my part was going to cost me. We headed out to the RMV again on a Friday afternoon for the road test.

After filling the form we were asked to wait for an instructor. A grumpy looking man came out and asked me to get into the car. As soon as I stepped in he asked me to show the hand signs. I stared at him with pitiful eyes and tried to show whatever signs I could recollect from India. Who uses handsigns here? He had me stumped right there. He said the signs were wrong and that was the end of it. We were sent packing home :(

Chapter 4

I fumed for some time over this failed attempt. Nevertheless I booked another test the very next week. Since this centre was full I booked in Worcester. That place could be a nightmare for new drivers. The roads are bad and most of them rise very steeply. With bated breath I went to give this test. All I remember is following every instruction to the tee and driving extra carefully and successfully getting my licence. Hurrah!!!! Now I'm licensed to ... drive!!!

Bittersweet Victory

Yesterday I woke up to the wonderful news that one Indian dream had come true. The elusive gold medal for an individual event had at last been won by Abhinav Bindra. It couldn't have come at a better time. While India is shining in a lot of areas sports has been one area where we lack luster. This win is a very good thing.

The victory though is a bittersweet event. Sweet for the reasons given above and bitter because it took so many years for such a huge country to win a single gold medal. Bindra will be hailed as a hero for a few weeks. After that he will fade away just like the other Indian Olympians like Rathore & Malleshwari.

Once the initial celebrations are over with and the numerous felicitation ceremonies are finished with he will endorse 2-3 products and then as usual be put on the backstage so that we can go back to glorifying our cricket players. We never learn that there are other much challenging games in this world apart from cricket. Even if someone has the determination to pursue a different sport, they are ridiculed and sidelined.

Why is it that though our national game is supposedly hockey we don't even know who is in the hockey team? What happened to our soccer team? The only soccer player many of us may know is Baichung Bhutia. What about after him? Why is it that we are unable to develop any swimmers when Chinese, Koreans & Japanese, who have a similar physique, are able to garner so many medals in swimming?

I hope the Indian Olympic committee does some serious thinking and proactively encourages young talents and starts preparing better teams for future Olympics. Or if they feel that cricket is the only game that deserves all attention then let's just scratch the Olympic committee and refrain from sending any athletes for future Olmpic games.

Now I part with some photos from the medal ceremony of Abhinav Bindra, courtesy my friend who had the good fortune to witness this event live in Beijing.

A proud moment when the Indian flag flies high...

Aadi Perukku

My husband & I were savouring our first cup of coffee on Saturday when my mother called from India. She reminded me that it was Aadi perukku (or padinettam perukku - falls on the 18th day of the Tamil month Aadi). Since it is not like diwali or pongal it never occured to me that the festival was on that day.

All the plans changed and soon I made the traditional kalanda sadam which is special for the occasion. The menu turned out to be semiya payasam, cabbage kootu, coconut rice, tamarind rice and appalam. Once all the cooking was done we offered some prayers to the Lord and then had our meal.

We went to the temple in the evening. My God!! The temple was so crowded. One one side Ayappan abishekam was taking place. On the other end prayers were being offered to Andal. We reached the temple on time to see all the artis. After that we took part in the Ayyappan poojai.

After the Ayyappan poojai they had full course of prasadam. We had sakkarai pongal, tamarind rice, lemon rice, aviyal and curd rice. The food had that divine taste one associates with temple food. Something is really extraordinary about the food temples serve. It has a special taste. Once we had our share of the prasadam we swapped places with the volunteers and started serving. There was a biiiiig line of devotees. When we thought the crowd had dwindled a fresh set of people appeared out of nowhere. It was just amazing about how many people turned up that day.

By the time we got back it was almost 9 p.m. It turned out to be a day well spent.

First Camping Expedition

Friday evenings are usually the time when we sit down and think about what to do during the weekend. For the last few weeks we had tried religiously to get a camp site to no avail. We are slowly approaching the end of summer and soon will have to cocoon ourselves due to biting cold. We were discussing about this when a friend of ours called to share the good news that the elusive camp site had somehow been obtained. We were to start early the next morning for Cape Cod for camping. Yippee!! Camping at last.

We started preparing a checklist so that we did not miss anything. The most important things being sunscreen lotion and some food. The next morning we would have almost missed the trip if my mom had not called early on to convey some news :) If not for her we would have relived the scenes from Home Alone except for the fact that there's just 2 of us here instead of the 20 odd members they show in that movie.

At around 8:30 a.m. we headed out. Our destination - Nickerson State Park in Brewster. Due to time constraints we decided to meet our friends near the camp site. When we hit the roads it appeared as though entire MA was headed our way. Fortunately we didnt have too much traffic jams. Once we reached Cape Cod our GPS got a little confused. We made 2 trips up and down the Sagamore bridge before it got it's whereabouts correct. To give the GPS some time to figure out we stopped at the all famous Dunkin Donuts, after all America runs on Dunkin so maybe our GPS would start running fine too ;)

We got to our camp site successfully by 1 p.m. As soon as we got to our camp site we set up the tent and simultaneously got the camp fire going. Luckily for us the place was so hot that we didn't have to try too hard to get the fire going. After about half an hour we had set up the tent and started with lunch.

Soon after lunch we headed for the beach.The water was nice and cool. Perfect for the sunny day. After lazing around the beach we went for a long walk and followed it up with some kayaking. Low tide had started and though we headed far from the shore the water was very shallow. Once we were satisfied that we had soaked enough sun we headed back to our camp. After a quick snack we headed towards a lake. Watched sunset there and then had dinner and ended the day with a few rounds of cards.

The next day began early for us. It was so bright that we couldn't sleep late :) This time we had a tough time starting the fire as all the wood was moist with dew. Took us one hour to prepare tea. Finally we had some breakfast and headed back to the lake taking a hiking path. After a relaxed day there we headed out to grab some lunch. By now we were out of energy to start a fire and cook. As we are vegetarians the only option we had there was Subway. We followed it up with a huge ice cream cone. After lunch we drove back home tired from all the activities but feeling great about the fun time.

Our home for 2 days

The Campers

Down a hiking trail

Few random shots

Tale of TOEFL & GRE

The must dos for any graduate school aspirant - writing TOEFL and GRE. While TOEFL was a piece of cake GRE appeared to be a tough nut to crack.

My preparation for TOEFL was similar to those of most test takers - NOTHING. To appear as a sincere aspirant I bought a study book for TOEFL and after leafing through it for 10 minutes I decided I was not going to learn anything so I slept through most of my study time. On the day of the exam I arrived promptly at the centre at the stipulated time in the evening. All of us waited eagerly for the start of the exam. Due to some server problem our exam got delayed just like most of the flights. To add to this I was the second last person to report. And they have this system of starting the exam in a first come first serve basis. So I had to sit idle till the other 11 people were comfortably seated in their chairs.

At last I was allowed to start my exam. I couldn't wait to finish my exam and return home. After all my wedding was just a week away and we had a lot of things to do. I guess this sounds as wierd - writing TOEFL a week before one's wedding. Well it's all courtesy of the college I studied in. Anyway that's another story to be told later. I managed to sit still in my seat long enough to complete all the sections. Best part was not getting to know the score as soon as the test is over. I for one was not extremely eager for the scores. But when the scores eventually did come I was surprised to have surpassed my expectations with flying colours.

Coming to GRE, now this turned out to be a totally different cup of tea. The wordlists loomed like huge mountains. Try as I might I was unable to learn the words and their meanings. Even though I am a voracious reader this type of learning was totally out of my legion. I tried all possible methods known to me to learn the words. All of them gave me the same result - successfully finish one word list and be horrified at not being to able to recollect the words the very next day. This went on for some time. Finally I decided to move to the other sections. They proved to be easier. Quantitative appeared to be my strength. I could never judge my position regarding the essays simply because I could never get myself to write one essay (till the day before the exam). As for antonyms and analogies they depended solely on the wordlist so the less said the better.

Everyday I looked at the Barrons with a frown. This appeared to be a monster that just could not be conquered. After long deliberation I just decided to try my luck with GRE. After all time was running out for admissions. So with a million butterflies in my stomach I scheduled the test and with even more butterflies I ended up an hour early in the test center. Fortunately this time I got to start my test early itself instead of waiting for the stipulated time. The essay sections seemed to be ok.

Next came the dreaded verbal section. Once the 30 minutes were over I was able to breathe a lot easier. Next quants. What I had considered to be my stronghold turned out to be a bit of a challenge that day. Too many geometry based questions stumped me. Finally with bated breath I awaited the next section. To my horror the next section turned out to be verbal as well. So I ended up with two Verbals. Anyway I cruised through this round of Verbal. After completing all the sections I awaited the tentative scores pretty nervously. I was in no mood to write it again. Hey what a surprise. I cleared the test with more marks than I expected. Yippee.. This calls for a celebration. So we headed to the nearest hotel for a delayed lunch :)

The Forgotten Art of Writing

Last week I was watching "Notes on a Scandal". Judi Dench's character maintains a journal in that. While watching the movie I recalled the time when I used to maintain a diary. I used to frequently jot down my thoughts and experiences in the diary. Every year began with the resolution to maintain a proper diary. This resolution used to feverishly pursued for the first week or month. After that occasional jottings would be made. By mid year the diary would be forgotten entirely.

Somewhere down the line I gave up on this resolution totally. Seeing the movie motivated me to start with this practice. Now human tendency is to excel in whatever they do. This did not leave me alone. Now that I had decided to note down atleast the memorable events of my life I could not decide on where to start. Which event should I keep as the landmark? And will I recollect all the details properly?? After a lot of thought I decided on the starting point. I successfully finished 2 pages. While taking a break I tried to list what all I will include and I was overwhelmed by the number of events I wanted documented. Oh my God, when will I ever finish it all? The diary writing became a daunting task.

To ease the problem I decided to phase it out and interspersed my journal writing with other activities. While writing another thought struck me - when was the last time I wrote a letter? As was expected I had no idea. Now with the advent of internet, email and countless number of messengers where do we have the need to write letters and send them by mail? All I do is type a hurried email or even better get my relatives and friends online and chat with them. I guess the days of the letters are gone. What I keep questioning myself now is whether the future generation will learn to write or will they start typing from their kindergarden days??? Any thoughts?

Little Miss Sunshine

It's been quite some time since we really laughed our heart out watching a movie. LMS turned out to be just the type of movie one can see at almost anytime - when you are happy, sad, angry. By the time the movie ends you will be happily laughing forgetting all your problems.

The movie is funny from the word go. It's filled with ironies as well. We have the dad who is a motivational guru who has found the 9 steps to success but is still struggling to meet ends meet, the mom who is overworked, the son who gives up talking till he attains his dream of becoming an air force pilot, the daughter who wants to be a beauty queen, the grandpa who smokes pot and the uncle who recently had a failed suicide attempt. It has some memorable dialogs such as "High school-those are your prime suffering years. You don't get better suffering than that." or "Oh my God, I'm getting pulled over. Everyone, just... pretend to be normal." & "Losers are people who are so afraid of not winning, they don't even try."

The plot is very simple. The girl gets selected to participate in a beauty pageant and the entire family (out of no other options) is forced to drive cross country for the pageant. The movie follows the events as they drive up to the pageant and how each person starts appreciating the value of each other. What hurdle are they going to come across next? Will they make it in time for the pageant? Will she perform properly? Will she win? These are the questions which float through our heads while we see the movie.

One of the must watch movies.

DIYA Featured in Hindu

DIYA, a social service group, was started in 2004 by a group of final year students who wanted to make the life of people around them a little better. We had a very humble start. No high aspirations or false promises. What started as a group which frequented orphanages and old people's home to supply their monthly provisions has now diversified into multiple streams.

• Environment - Partnered with Nizhal to plant saplings in various parts of the city. Taught the neighbourhood to care properly for the plants.
• Education - Started a tuition centre for the kids in Pozhichalur so that they don't have to study in a thatched building which falls off during each rain.
• Empowerement - DIYA helped launch the Life Star program which imparts vocational training to students who are visually impaired.
• Service - Regular visits to old age homes and orphanages to cater to their monthly provisions.

This week DIYA has been featured in The Hindu. Full article can be found here or here.

To know more about DIYA and to join the activities visit http://diya.org.in/

Not so famous movies I Enjoyed...

The number of movies that I watch has risen over the last few months. We manage to watch at least 4 - 5 movies in a week. Not all the movies are the latest ones. The movies range from Godfather to Finding Neverland, Pulp Fiction to Juno and occasionally some good Tamil or Hindi movie.

Last month had been quite momentous in this sense. We managed to watch a few big hits such as Robots, Patch Adams and LOTR. Apart from that we watched a few movies which were not so famous. We actually picked them because we couldn't find any other movies. But as luck would have it we were very glad we picked these movies. They were just awesome.

Let me share those wonderful movies.

This movie tells the true story of Truman Capote. The movie centers on the Kansas murders which Capote wants to use for his new book. This experience affects him like no other. The movie was taken very well. Toby Jones just sank into Truman with ease. The whole movie was very enjoyable and very touching.

This was one those feel good movies which was set in the depression period. The story was very simple. It was about a golfing prodigy who becomes disillusioned after he is the sole survivor of a dangerous mission in the war. Due to a sequence of events he is pulled back to the game of golf but he's unable to touch his talent. A mystical caddy appears out of nowhere and helps him get his strokes back. Once his work his done the caddy disappears again. The movie holds the viewers' attention from the first scene. Very well taken. Not sure why it didn't do so well.

Offside is a very interesting movie. I'm not sure whether to put it as a movie or a very interesting documentary. It is set during the 2005 World Cup qualifying match in Iran. As the rule goes Iranian women cannot go to the stadium to watch sporting events. Due to the love for the game a few girls disguise themselves as men and try to enter the stadium. Some of them are caught. The movie shows how they try to get a glimpse of the match and of the relationship they develop with the soldiers out of pity for each other.

All the 3 movies reinforced the fact that good cinema is still out there. We just need to search harder to get to it. So let me hunt a little more and try to appease my thirst for excellent movies.

Reactions...

Ever since I landed in US I have been amazed by the diversity of the country. You can find people from all parts of the world here. By and large everyone is friendly. Whosoever we meet we are greeted with a warm smile, a friendly nod of the head, a wave or a pleasant "Hi". If you are approaching a door and someone is just passing through it then they hold it open and wait for you. These are all pleasant mannerisms which are quite alien to most of us back home.

Back home we would walk hurriedly past people without meeting anyone in the eye. If unfortunately our eyes did meet we mostly maintained a poker face. There was no system of waiting for people with doors open.. ("Well if they couldn't run to the doors why should we wait and waste time?" was our thought)

Whenever we go out (walking, shopping, to a movie, dining...) we get to see wide variety of people - Americans, Mexicans, Chinese, Indians,... List goes on. And these are the way people react:

• American meets American - The smile nod routine which may extend to a long chat.
• American meets Indian - Again the smile, nod routine.
• Indian meets Indian - This is a BIG NO NO. As soon as one guy or family spots another they either lower their heads or give the best frown or stare possible. Very rarely will the person smile at you.
  

I initially thought something must be wrong with the way I was dressed or maybe I was staring at them. But I realised nothing was wrong from my end. Soon I found from my friends that this was not my experience alone. All of them were given the cold shoulder. Upon more observation I found it to be true. Why is it that those who are capable of smiling at seeing people of a different nationality can extend their hand of friendship to them but not to people of same nationality? What was their fear? Or was it hatred? Did they dream of being the only Indian family in the entire USA?? Well I got news for them. U can't run away from fellow Indians :) The sooner they realise the more they will get to flex their happy smiley muscles. As for me I continue to smile at anyone I see. No necessity to change a good habit.

Good Old Days of Disney

Yesterday I was browsing through the favourite videos of one of my friends and as one thing leads to another on youtube I was soon way off the track from where I started.

Before I knew it I was revisiting those classic cartoons from the older Disney movies. The cartoons back then had such wonderful songs and stories. Who can forget "Hakunamatata" from Lion King or "Colours of the Wind" from Pocahontas?

Some of the videos that I enjoyed...

Hakunamatata:





Colors of the Wind:





Mulan:



Beauty & the Beast:




All these clips made me wonder why we don't get such cartoons or music any more. Somehow such imagination has become a rare thing. We don't get many good cartoons these days. Sad but I guess we have to learn to appreciate the new things. I'll definitely return to this page whenever I feel nostalgic. And keep adding to the collection of wonderful videos. Anyone remember any other great songs or cartoons?

Skyrocketing Prices

If you are a frequent visitor to the grocery store you would have noticed the steep rise in prices of goods, especially Indian goods such as dal and rice. It's amazing how quickly the prices have risen. Rice which was being sold for $8 is now $30 within a matter of 7 days. And same for dal. As usual many people have started panicking and they are stocking up on rice from all possible sources. Costco and BJs have run out of rice stock. And even ordinary shops where no one used to bother buying rice from have put notices indicating one customer can take only one bag of rice. What a turn of events.

What puzzles me the most is this - did all the rice and dal just disappear on one fine day? What stopped the suppliers from rationing the supply initially itself to stop such a steep rise and subsequent stampede of customers? Isn't the supplier playing a foul game by suddenly declaring that we have been hit by a shortage? Some where there has been a black marketing of these commodities and now we are left with the shocking prices.

The funny thing is that the governments of various countries are now doing what they do best always - Playing the blame game. They are trying to figure out which country ate into the world's supply of food instead of forming a strategy to avoid further shortage.

One thing is true though. We have been neglecting farmers for a long time and slowly forcing them into extinction. Now we are paying the price and a little heavily. Let's hope this stops soon.

Baby Shower

Late Friday afternoon Rathnam forwarded an invitation for a baby shower (his colleague's). The function was on Sunday evening so we had two days time to hunt for a proper gift. Now this happened to be the first baby shower that we were to attend. Both of usa were clueless about what to buy.

A little apprehensive, we both made our way to the baby section for the first time. Wow we were overwhelmed by the number of items there. So many varieties of toys, strollers, baby kits, car seats, shades, tin clothes and shoes... Everything was so nice. If at first we were confused now we were totally lost. Everything appealed to us. After a long time of repeated rounds around the various aisles we made a choice and bought a cute set of toys.

Next on our itinerary was selecting a card. This didn't prove to be difficult. We found a wonderful card right away. Still wanting to have a few choices we went through a few other cards but none was as good as the first one. So we completed our first baby shower shopping successfully.

The baby shower was held on Sunday. They had done it so well. Not a single detail was missed. Their house was decorated beautifully and whatever is usually done in India was done here without a flaw. Kudos to the hosts for such careful planning. The best part of the evening was we got Tirupati laddoo. It was nice to receive the blessings of the Lord right here in Boston.

Spring

The much awaited spring has arrived. With it's arrival it has brought wonderful colours into our neighbourhood. Two days ago we went for a walk and I was enchanted by the variety of colours around us. Yesterday we returned to the same path - this time camera in hand.

Few of my favourites from yesterday.

Bogus Tamil New Year

I was happily celebrating the Tamil New Year on April 13th. Little did I know that as of 2008 the new year has been changed. It has been moved to the month of January to coincide with Pongal. This "wonderful" change has been made by the all knowing scholar, the crusader of all Tamilians the world over - Mr Karunanidhi.

Baisakhi is observed as the Hindu New Year in Haryana, Punjab, Assam, Tripura, Manipur, West Bengal, Orissa, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Myanmar, Kampuchea, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand. It marks the first day in the Hindu solar calendar dating back to Aryabhatta and the Surya Siddhanta (fourth century CE). Hindu seers calculated the earth's distance to the moon, sun and other planets at a time when most of the world was unaware of the value of the integer zero. But our so called CM knows more than them.

This change has been the worst thing that has happened to Tamilians ever in this century. It just proves that M.K has finally lost all his thinking capacity and this is a very good example of how power can be misused totally. Why is it that he is only meddling with Hindu festivals? If they claim they are not meddling with the Hindus then why was the reading of the panchangam prohibited in most temples? Why were orders sent that no special pujas were to be performed commemorating the Tamil New Year? It is a shame that such things happened in Tamil Nadu while Tamilians all over the world celebrated the New Year on April 13th. How was MK planning to stop the NRIs from doing so?? While he is changing the festival dates why doesn't he just change the new year to coincide with his birthday and why not celebrate his son Stalin's birthday as the new Diwali?

I believe all his talk about love for Tamil and Tamil scholars is all just a big lie. If he is bent on propagating Tamil and the great scholars of Tamil then why don't we have a special day for Bharathiar? He is one of the greatest poets in Tamil. He was a revolutionary and made many enemies due to this nature. But whatever he followed are the same ideologies MK claims to follow. Bharati was a great freedom fighter and motivated many people to join in the freedom movement. So being the case why does Tamil Nadu not allocate a special day for Bharathiyar?

The only fault of Bharathiyar is that he was born as a Brahmin. That obliterates all his valuable contributions and makes him just another Brahmin who was no good. That's the only reason for the absence of any recognition. MK is no advocate of Tamil. He and his party are just anti Hindu and anti Brahmins. They are not secular. Such prejudiced people should never be allowed to hold any post of power. The dangers of such a thing has been demonstrated time and again. Yet these people rule us. God help the Tamilians. It's scary to think of what he will do next. Let's pray we are able to come through it all.

Good News...

It's celebration time for all of us who love our dirty jeans and refuse to wash it even after numerous reminders from our parents to wash it. Environmentalists have found out that heavy materials like jeans take a lot of resources to get cleaned so we have been requested to wash our jeans less frequently. The icing of the cake being that they don't want us to iron them too. Isn't that amazing??

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Earth/Jeans_wash_hurts_climate/articleshow/2952824.cms

Someone obviously didn't tell them that hard core jeans wearers don't need this advice at all. We love our unwashed jeans. They could have focused on something else. But then I'm not complaining. I plan to take a printout of this news item and save it. Whenever anyone reminds me about my jeans I can just show them this and show my support for the environment :)

Africa

After a hectic day we decided to watch a movie to relax a bit. The only twist being that the movie was not a humorous one but rather a thought provoking and serious movie - The Constant Gardner.

The story in short for those who have not seen it - A British high commission diplomat, posted in Africa, investigates his wife's murder and in the process unearths the illegal and non humanitarian process of human testing of drugs in Africa. The movie portrays painfully how life of Africans are discounted easily and are not held of any importance. Those who stand to protect them are killed by selfish corporates which want to make money.

I remembered another movie I saw sometime back - Blood Diamond. This also shows the poor state of Africans - how they kill each other for diamond and fight to establish power and how they are utilized by diamond merchants for their own profit.

These two movies clearly show how Africans are taken for granted and manipulated by the various developed countries for their personal progress. Africa is such a rich country in terms of natural resources and this is the main reason why it is manipulated so much. Due to all the manipulation it is a very poor continent where many people have a tough struggle for even a single meal. This is really sad. There's so much they can do to improve themselves and become a super power.

What stops them?? The high level of corruption and the money involved it is not easy to get peace in these troubled areas. Everyone wants to make a quick buck and hence they don't allow anyone to stay in power for long. There is some internal conflict or the other as one group after another tries to get total control over everything. All we can do is just observe how and when they resolve their disputes and focus on progress. Till then they will continue to be manipulated by the various super powers. They will remain the dumping ground for all the useless medicines and be the human guineas for the various tests till then.

Tamil New Year

Yesterday we Tamilians celebrated the beginning of a new year. We got up a little early (considering that it was a Sunday). I made a sweet for the auspicious occasion. After a quick breakfast of fruits we headed to the temple. I was able to wear a salwar outside after a long time. The weather was becoming warm at last.

As soon as we turned into the driveway of the temple I was overwhelmed by the number of cars parked there. Luckily we found a parking spot. All the sannithis were closed after abhisekam when we entered the temple. We waited for about 15 - 20 minutes for the sannithis to get opened. In that short span of time the temple got so crowded with people that I thought soon we will have a queue like in Tirupathi.

The Lakshmi temple in Ashland is the only Hindu temple for the whole of New Hampshire, Connecticut and Massachusetts. So all Tamilians and Sri Lankan Tamils (since it happened to be their new year as well) had converged in this single temple. It's nice to catch a glimpse of so many of our country people in this distant land.

After our darshan we headed to a restaurant nearby for lunch. And what a sight met us... One man had come wearing veshti and shirt. I had seen a few people wearing veshti to the temple but this was the first time I saw someone in a hotel like that. By the time we finished our lunch the restaurant was also brimming with Indians. That reminded me that we have a large presence here.

Wish u all a very happy and prosperous new year :)

A Thousand Splendid Suns

I just finished reading the book "A Thousand Splendid Suns" by Khaled Hosseini. He has portrayed how innocent people (especially women) suffer during wars. I have read a few fiction books about covert operations and war (mainly Alistair Maclean and Robert Ludlum). These books always portrayed the war through the eyes of soldiers and governments but never through the eyes of innocent civilians.

This book opened my eyes to the cruelty faced by people when war ravages through their homes and takes everything they love and cherish away from them - brothers, sisters, parents, friends, list goes on.... We see footages of homeless people and refugee camps in news. Somehow it won't affect many of us because we have never known these people personally and a 30 sec footage is not going to make a great impact.

Khaled on the othe hand is brought out the ill effects in such a painful way. The book actually moved me to tears. I say this because I am not the kind of person who cries easily. We feel really sorry for the main characters and are left wondering how many actually suffered like this and how many are still suffering.

It's not just Afghanistan which has these problems. Homes are destroyed in thousands of places everyday. Kashmir, an extension of heaven on earth, has become hell. The beauty of the place is lost in all the attacks and fear. Same can be said about Srilanka.

Time and again we have all seen the damages caused by war. Everyday new pacts are signed and new alliances are formed but still we do not have any solution. Just when one problem is solved the next one shows it's ugly head. History has shown time and again that we do not achieve anything except bloodshed by all the war but man never learns.

A world without war would be so nice. But it's just a daydream. Thousands are oppressed everyday and this leads to the birth of new factions. Where and when all this will stop - no one knows. If only we could forgive and forget and have a fresh start, we could make this place heaven again.

Driving Styles

I am sure most of you must have got this as a forwarded mail. Just thought of sharing it since all of us need a good laugh from time to time :)

Different Driving Styles ...

One hand on steering wheel, one hand out of window. - Sydney

One hand on steering wheel, one hand on horn- Japan

One hand on steering wheel, one hand on newspaper, foot solidly on accelerator... - Boston

Both hands on steering wheel, eyes shut, both feet on brake, quivering in terror- New York

Both hands in air, gesturing, both feet on accelerator, head turned to talk to someone in back seat- Italy

One hand on horn, one hand on holding gear, one ear listening to loud music, one ear on cell phone, one foot on accelerator, one foot on clutch, nothing on break, eyes on people in next car, *** - Welcome to INDIA!

Olympic Fever

The Olympic torch was lit two days ago in Athens as usual. This got me thinking about India's participation in the Games. Curiosity got the better of me and I decided to find out about India's participation in the Olympics this year.

Like millions of other people I went to my favourite site google.com and searched for Team India. After about half an hour's search all my enthusiasm wore down and was instead replaced by frustration and anger. Even after 30 minutes I was unable to find one proper site which listed the people who have been shortlisted to participate this year.

All I got was one lousy site which I believe is the official site for Indian Olympic team. For all eager Olympic followers the site is

http://www.olympic.ind.in/

I don't know where to start commenting about the site. Before that just go through the following two sites as well.

http://www.usoc.org

http://www.olympics.org.uk

Well let me start with the layout and format. This is probably the worst site designed ever for big government. Any 5th standard kid could have done a better job. Some links are broken and the whole look and feel is horrible, to say the least. They have given a number of external links which point to the official Olympic site for Beijing 2008, Commonwealth games, etc. If only the designer had taken some time off and visited these sites the design would have been much better.

Once I thought about my initial quest I forgot about the poor appearance of the site and decided to start the hunt for Team india. Alas I was up for more disappointment. The site had wonderful photos of all the committee members of the association but failed to even mention the members of the team. Not a single scrap of information about anything to do with the team that's supposed to go nor about the accomplishments of Indian athletes in previous Olympics.

Now I'm left wondering why no names are mentioned... Is it because no one is going? Have the old athletes been forgotten so fast? Is it because the committee members are so self absorved that the site is serving as a publicity portal for them? Who maintains these sites? Doesn't anyone bother to update them??

All this when India is supposed to be brimming with software professionals who are filled with talent. Can't the govt find just two people to bring the site to a decent shape and maintain it with constant updates???

I guess these are questions which will never be answered. Questions asked in vain...

Dancing with the Stars

Since nothing interesting was being telecast we decided to watch the season opening of Dancing with the Stars. The star ladies were scheduled to dance on this episode and it had a great list of people (Monica Seles, Priscilla Presley, etc) so we decided to give it a shot.

The show was pretty good and we enjoyed watching everyone trying to tread safely in unchartered waters as novices though each one is a pro in their own area. What really caught my attention was Marlee Matlin's dance.

I have added the link for the video for those who have missed it. Watch it before reading further.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=2kZ5mL-uTBY

This lady is just phenomenal. The main thing for dance is music and rhythm. Marlee, being deaf, can't hear the music. She still managed to dance so superbly in spite of this deficiency. It was just spectacular and really inspirational watching her dance like that. Seeing something like this motivated people to go out and do whatever they are doubtful about. I definitely got motivated seeing the dance.

Before I sign off, a word of praise for Fabian - the dance partner. He deserves praise too. It's no small achievement to make someone like that dance so well in tune. Hats off to both of them.

Sunset

Today evening while I sat reading a book I happened to look outside the window. I was just fascinated by the sight that met my eyes - the beauty of sunset. The dimming rays of light were giving a golden tint to everything that they touched - the leaves, branches, grass and even the garbage bin.

Sunrise and sunset are the most beautiful occurrences each day. I've captured more sunsets than sunrise (since I'm not a very early waker). This sunset made me revisit my photo collection to enjoy the sunsets I had managed to capture.

Hopkinton Park (Frozen lake)

Hopkinton Park

Hopkinton Park

On our way back from Harvard

The Mystery of the Stolen Identity

Two days ago my husband told me that my brother was online on yahoo messenger. This puzzled me for two reasons.
1. It was almost midnight. He never came online at that time.
2. His final board exams were taking place and he was supposed to be studying for that. (For those unfamiliar with the board exams in India all I can say it is life and death matter for us :) )

So I decided to investigate into the matter. I messaged him twice on the messenger but did not get a response on either occasions. This could only mean one thing - his id had been hacked. Now this was bad news. I got worried and told my brother about this. He also wondered about who could have done that.

Yesterday again we found the culprit online with my bro's id. This time my husband took matters into his hand and instead of sending a tame 'Hi' he sent a threatening note about reporting him to the police for having stolen the id. Now we both knew it was a harmless threat coz first of all how were we going to get his ip and then track him down?

Guess what the threat worked. The person who was using the id got scared and sent in a confession :) He turned out to be a friend of my brother. He also sent in a detailed explanation that my bro had signed in using his PDA and due to some problem in the PDA it automatically signed in using my bro's id instead. He sent a long explanation about trying to figure out how to resolve it. He immediately text messaged my bro also about it.

Today I called my brother and told him about it and we all had a good laugh. The funniest part was that his friend ultimately uninstalled yahoo messenger and reinstalled it. Wow... What a classic case of stolen identity and problem caused by technical problems in Yahoo.

Well that solved the mystery. And what a fast closure :)

Karadayar Nombu

Today we observed Karadayar Nombu. For those who are not familiar with this - it is a puja done by married women for their husband (and unmarried women for their future husbands). We make a special type of food called nombu adai (and we need to make two varieties of it - sweet and salty one) which is generally made only for the nombu.

This was my first nombu away from home. Till last year my mother used to make it and I used to eat it happily. Since it's usually done only once a year we crave it a lot and the adais taste more delicious. So now here I was faced with the enormous task of making both types of adai. As u must have guessed I got a few pointers from my mom and m-i-l about what to do for the nombu.

To top the confusion I was told by a few people in US that the nombu was a day before. After much deliberation we decided to go ahead with the initial date itself. So we set the alarm and even tested it to see if it rang and went to sleep.

As fate would have it the alarm didn't ring in the morning. I woke up at only 7:30 instead of the scheduled 6:00. The catch was that everything had to be done by 8:30. Thankfully I had done some preparation last night. So there I was... Got up, had a quick shower and was there in the kitchen at lightning speed. I started my meticulous yet hurried preparation of the offering. Almost by luck I got the first batch done by 8:30... My deadline was met. Phew mission accomplished.

For those who are wondering if it turned out properly, the result is displayed now. I'd say it turned out to be pretty decent if not very good :) Better result next time...

Grand Canyon

Rathnam & I went to the Grand Canyon and Las Vegas for the President's Day weekend. Here I want to share our experience in the Grand Canyon. We decided to take the bus tour to the Canyon since we didn't want to drive all the way. Our package included a trip to the South Rim and an IMAX movie about the canyon.

We set out early in the morning. After a quick breakfast we started our journey. We were really excited about seeing the Grand Canyon. On our way we stopped for a quick photo op at the Hoover Dam. Due to the high security these days no one was allowed very close to the dam.

The road leading up to the canyon was very deserted of human life. Everywhere we turned we could only see plants, shrubs and a lot of open area. The entire route was very scenic. I felt as though I was seeing a series of postcard pictures.

Once we landed in Grand Canyon I couldn't take my eyes off the beautiful place. Nature has truly humbled all the work of mankind. How slowly and with patience nature has worked out such a beautiful sculpture and the best thing is the work is not over yet.

My husband and I have developed an interest in photography and what better subject to shoot than the Grand Canyon :) So we both started clicking from all angles and we managed to get a few good photos.

This trip will always be remembered with fond memories. One regret was that we were unable to stay around the Canyon and capture the sunrise/sunset. Next time we intend to make a long trip and camp there and go rafting as well. Till then these photos will remind us of our beautiful trip...

COLORADO RIVER (Taken from our bus)

No need of an intro... That's the Canyon

This photo along with the next one gives the perspective of the depth of the canyon. The focus is on the huge pillar. Looks very close doesn't it??

Now look again at the rock... It's way down there. One of the best photos we took there.

TV Commercials

I realized that watching TV can be a very stressful process. Back in India we were shown glimpses of our favourite shows in between numerous ads about various products ranging from toothpaste to designer saris, cooking oil to latest cellphones, etc etc. We even had the ads about the so called "mineral water" produced by the leading alcohol manufacturers. All these ads were spiced up with great jingles and the latest hit actress dancing to the music.

Here in US the major advertising segment is medicines, more medicines and even more medicines... They start with depression, restless leg syndrome, bipolar disorder, acne, seasonal allergies, immunization against cancer................ List goes on... Add any other health problems that you are reminded of. The funniest part is the long list of side effects that may be caused by each of these medicines. Now this is done in such a low tone and with such speed that would put most of the waiters in some local hotels to shame... Some of them even mention loss of life as a side effect... Wow now wouldn't that be perfect? A person dying by taking medicine for seasonal allergies.

By the time we finish watching Law & Order or any other prime time show we would have seen all these advertisements at least twice. I'm not sure why they do this. One good thing though is we don't have too many commercials for alcohols and cigarettes.

Back home I used to complain about all the song and dance routine in most ads... But hey I prefer the song and dance ad any day...

First Glimpse of USA

When we shift from one place to another we are subjected to a lot of change. The change is more profound if we shift to a totally different country. My move from India to US was similar. I must mention here that I have travelled considerably so there was no rude shock involved here.

One thing I find fascinating here is the mass quantity of food portions here. The first time I went to a restaurant here I was rather surprised by the size of the glass of water. It was HUUUGE. If I managed to finish that glass of water I would not have been able to eat anything. The same applies to the coffee that we get in any coffee shop such as Dunkin Donuts or Starbucks. It will take me a full day to finish the coffee :)

Another thing that strikes me as a little odd is that almost everyone keeps munching on something or drinking something non stop. I can understand the coffee cup in the hand of the person walking in the cold but why do people keep munching even while walking down the aisles of shops?


All this typing has tired me out.. I'm joining bandwagon too... Wait I'm coming. Where did I put my pack of chips and Coke???

Hello World

Isn't tat wat we all learn first when we study any computer language... So why not enter the world of blogging also with that famous phrase... Hello World... A big HELLO to all the bloggers and readers of blogs.

This is going to be my platform to share my views on a wide variety of topics from the books I read recently to movies to recipes to the general outlook of life. Hope to entertain you while getting a way to share my thoughts with all.