Social Networking

For a second, I froze in excitement! AR Rahman had posted me a message!!! I didn’t know how to react. And the very next second, it was “phew…” It was someone else with his picture. Very funny ah! I don’t know why for God sake people don’t have their own picture or their name legible in their profile. All kind of junk characters, funky quotes take on over.

Nowadays I am completely into social media alone as I have nothing else to do. LOL! Pritish Nandy tweets “Love comes from unexpected quarters…. Animals, trees, flowers, internet…” Even trees have nice names like Neem Tree, Coconut tree, Chickoo and so on like animals (dog, cat…) and flowers (rose, lilly…) and why is that we want to put a mask to our own names! Think about it. Meanwhile, I shall imagine what if Rahman really posts me a message.

(Note: I know you are intelligent but pls dont question me what is this tripleR)

Whose responsibility is it?

Two persons Mr Shivaraman and Mr. Gopalakrishnan from Chennai hold a patent for an innovation that enables a hard disk to store 30TB of data and this is with the help of Nano technology. They are offered a job by Seagate for 1.4 crore. Is there no Indian company to utilize their innovation??

I remember my old days where our team tried to bring out such innovations especially in Nano technology and Bio metrics. The event was conceived to showcase these kinds of innovations to the corporate world in the budding stage itself which would help our country and the individuals as well in their early stages with proper support. We couldn’t execute what we dreamt for the only reason that we were students at that time.

The point here is there are so many Shivaraman’s and Gopalakrishnan’s out there spread all over. Who is going to recognize them, nurture them with the necessary support and make our country grow healthy??

Movies and our lives

Very often few movies make an impact on the lives of people. Few such are Godfather, Sholay, Rang de Basanti, Titanic and so on. A recent tamil movie of such kind is Vinnaithaandi Varuvaaya. Well, I wanted to blog about the songs of the movie brilliantly composed by our own Rahman. But, what I write now is entirely different from what I wished to.

While watching the movie, I felt that I was seeing myself in the screen. Starting from the hero of the movie wanting to become an assistant director and lot other things was very much related. (I wanted to make movies after my MBA and was in front of Madras Talkies office for a month, but managed to get into TV serials only. Gave the lead to another friend and I quit). I couldn’t make out whether I liked the movie or not! Two days passed and a friend of mine asked me whether I liked the movie or not. I told him what I felt. He said “That’s the feel of the movie” and everyone feels the same. My thought process started by itself! How come a director make every audience think about himself / herself in the movie? One hero, one heroine, one plot and how come everyone feels the same?? My friend added, “What shown in the screen is reality and that’s what is happening around the world…”

It was a love story. Boy falls in love with the girl and is behind her. The girl denies him. The boy then asks for friendship but has love in his mind. The girl after a long time accepts his love. They are in a relationship for some time and suddenly the girl drops a bomb saying “it’s all over”.

This is what happens in reality all over. Strange to think that this is the same what boys do and it’s the same girls do also. The catch is neither of us is going to change. Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus and we both live on Earth! We learn, adjust / compromise ourselves in future building a think tank that he / she is not the like the same person what we experienced in the past. Also it is not that there can be no change within at all. I know and have seen people who are really into each other and have stay put, but they are very few. Otherwise mostly its the girls calling the shots, few are mutual and rarely the guys call it quits. And now, I understand why this movie makes an impact on almost everyone.

Back to the movie, I couldn’t stop murmuring the songs. I saw the audio release of the album where all the singers performed live on stage. It was so mesmerizing. Lovely and soulful music from Rahman! This album from Rahman is like Sachin knocking a splendid knock of 200 after all these successful years of glory. My favorite pick from the album is the song “Anbil Avan”. The lyrics, composition, interludes, singers and every part of the song excels. This song brings a joyful mood with the lyrics meaning the basic wedding vows. The music takes us literally to a choir in church and flows to a temple wedding. Altogether the song is all about endless love and eternal bonding. Do hear the song especially the interludes. It’s a peppy number.

Lots of songs, either lack good lyrics or if there are good lyrics they lack good music. It’s rare that they both come together. This “Anbil Avan” song, “Hairathey” and “Tere Bina” from Guru are Rahman’s classic compositions. The beauty here in VV is, the lyricist is a female named “Thamarai”. Her earlier songs are super hits as well bringing out the emotions from a women’s perspective. One brilliant line from her in this movie is “Yen Idhayam Udaithai Norungave…En maru Idhayam koduppen nee Udaikave…” which means “You broke my heart scattering into pieces…Yet, I shall give it again for you to break…” Altogether, it was a good watch. Guess Swades was the last movie which made me sit glued into the screens along with the music before this movie.

Couples Retreat

“The city is heading towards earning the notoriety of being the country’s divorce capital” read a national newspaper about Bangalore. Bangalore is the city full of disposable crowd mostly from the IT background.

The state government is under pressure to create 3 more family courts in addition to the 4 family courts functioning now. There are around 10000 cases pending in the existing 4 courts. On an average day, there are 25-30 fresh applications. The last 3 months has seen around 1400 applicants mostly in their late 20’s and early 30’s. And the catch here is most of the applications are filed by women. Experts and counselors almost of the cases are on petty grounds which can be solved easily but stated as incompatibility by the applicants. This is not only in Bangalore alone. Other cities are also on par with respect to divorce.

Something striking in the head…!? May be… Well, everybody has issues and problems in life. The rising number of similar cases in every city brings out the fact of the qualities like patience, commitment, love, understanding, care and so on diminishing in this fast paced world. Hardly people get time to sit, think, re-assess and reclaim their love for each other in life. Married couples divorce, unmarried couple breaks up. Both are same expect the legal entities involved.

I was watching the movie Couples Retreat (music by ARR). 4 couples: One thinks that they make things work together but actually taking each other for granted: one close to get their divorce after several attempts to conceive; one living a dissatisfied and lost love life and another fresh couple wherein the guy had got his new girlfriend after a break up.

They all end up in a vacation spot requested and suggested by their friend couple who are close to get divorce. What they dislike to hear is the fact that relationship can be worked out types as they all have their own notions and conclusions in their relationships.

The movie is scripted in a funny and absolutely practical way. The vacation island offers them a stage to reclaim their lost life that at the end of the vacation they all unite together with their loved ones. It’s a good watch.

There is no magic performed in the process of uniting the couples in the movie. Nothing can be performed in real life too! “There is not one problem in life. There are millions of problems and everyone has problems” goes a dialogue in the movie. Very true! Lives are with adjustments and compromises. But it matters for why and mostly for whom we compromise. Life is just once.

May be all the divorce applicants should be given an exclusive access in a private hall to this kinda movie and make it a law that they should have spent subsequent time on vacations or any such things which offers exclusive time for themselves before they apply for divorce. Courts have to do it practically. How long will they keep talking!? Any couple would have come for divorce after failed talks only. Talking more and more complicates and the courts got to deal with a practical approach.

Otherwise, get to watch this movie which has a very good feel; music by ARR including a song in Tamil and that goes as my favorite as well.

Skandagiri

There are lots of blogs and descriptions about this place with guidance and direction which is well known for trekking and it’s specially known for moon light trekking on full moon day. This is my encounter with nature in that place.

We (me and my 2 cousins) had a different, risky and adventurous trek on the last full moon day. The regular route to the hill top was closed as the path was under fire. It was forest fire. We were able to look the fire while on the way itself. Getting closer we tried to take an alternate route which doesn’t exist. We started off and at a point we noticed that the fire was spreading fast along the route we intended to go. Within a minute we spoke about that, a tree which was about half a km in altitude from us caught up with fire. Strong wind was blowing and the fire engulfed the tree in a minute. Fire particles were flying up in the sky.

We got s*** scared! With nothing to think and in a jiffy, we started sliding down the hill which was more of bushes and rocks and few thorns as well. Could never forget the way the tree caught fire and it was the first time I saw a forest fire and its might up so close live. Suddenly there was orange light coming out of the flames around us. Coming down, we did want to go to the top and managed to hire a guide who took us to the top in an alternate route. Climbing up the hill in the moonlight was to get a glimpse of the sunrise from top next day and it was a wonderful spectacle to see the Sun rising early morning in red, pink, orange and finally the bright white showing its might.