Flame of the Forest

I just reached back home after watching the play "Flame of the Forest". I have been wanting to watch a play in a theater for a long long time now. I have always thought that real performance comes out in theaters than in the Silver screen. I have been checking the Rangashankara website for quite sometime now, and came across this play a few days back. The note that the story is based on Kalki's "Sivagamiyin Sabadham" interested me, and just to be sure that I am not disappointed facing another house full, I made the booking for the Sunday afternoon show well in advance. Even though I have heard a lot about "Sivagamiyin Sabadham", I have never put any efforts to read it or know about it. All I knew till I went to the play was what I heard from my mother, that Kalki Krishnamoorthy wrote it years back, and was a big hit as a "thodar kadhai" (serial story) in the Thamizh magazine Kalki, one of the favourite passtimes for my mother during her spinster life. A little googling also revealed that the story was about the King Mahendra Pallava who ruled the temple city of Kanchipuram in Thamizhnadu. But I went with a plain mind to watch the play. I found it very interesting in many ways, that how much semblance does a 65 year old story has with the todays world. The performances were just excellent, particularly the one by Balakrishnan V, as Paranjothi, Pulikesan and Chinnappan, was really good, while the actor who enacted the role of Mahendra Pallava, was truly amazing. I very much liked the dialogue delivery of both. Having said that, I will not do justice if I fail to mention the dance performers, the one dance sequence by Mythili Prakash (I believe) which comes in the middle of the play, "Sivagami" dancing in front of Pulikesi and Mahendra Pallava, was the best. The play had a mix of all, depth in the story, few subtle comedies, strikingly good performances. I liked the direction of using short dance sequences to elucidate the passage of time which is so important in a story which spans across 25 years. The director, Gowri Ramnarayan, who herself appeared as the elderly Sivagami in the later stages of the play, did really well. I liked the way the director presented the scenes in which the elderly Sivagami remembers her past sitting in the Kanchi temple as the devadasi, where the younger version of herself is shown in parallel as suffering in the City of Vathapi in the prison. I also liked the songs that came along the play sung by the actors and was really impressed by their singing capabilities.

One thing I felt was that with little knowledge of the original story, it was a little tough to get a grip of the entire set of incidents unfolding on stage. But with a little effort I could understand the missing links. Particularly, the play (or it was me) failed to capture the fact that Pulikesi actually couldnt break through to Kanchi, and hence entered Kanchi as a friend of King Mahendra Pallava much to his surprise, only to later betray him and destroy the artistic beauty of Kanchi. But the play really did capture the love, war, anger, agony and emotions through which each of the character goes through and how much change each of them encounter as they pass through various stages of life.

While the director opted out of using any huge setups/ stage works, still the play didn't fail to appeal to the audience. I felt, probably this is not such a story which demanded use of a stage spectacle, but at the same time adding a stage splendor would have made it a real grand treat to watch.

This experience has definitely kindled my interest and dream towards acting, but I really dont know how far or long this is going to last. Overall, I thought, I really enjoyed the play, and thought I should more often attend plays. While I was very sad that there is no other English play in September, I will be keeping an eye on the October calendar for sure. Its worth your money to see some good live performances rather than wasting so much money paying the multiplexes to watch movies.

And the biggest surprise to me was the announcement that came at the end that today is Kalki Krishnamoorthy's 108th birth anniversary. So it was kind of a tribute to the great man who was not only a writer/ journalist but also was a freedom fighter in his times.

The Nexgen Kids and the need of the hour...

"Give a brand new mobile to an eight year old and you'll get to learn a few new things that you could do with your mobile from them. "
"You sit thinking what was that model of the car that just passed by, and before your brain can even start querying your database theres a reply from the young one there explaining the model,, the engine power and its other variant models."

Yeah, I am talking about the next generation kids...Oops my cousins daughter Raksha (Age 3) would be angry if she heard me calling her a kid. She calls herself a big girl. She was here a few hours ago and as soon as she entered out house demanded me to give her a paper and some color pencils. With no small ones at home, I couldn't locate any color pencils and could only manage a few normal ones. She asked me what I would prefer for a drawing and I said, anything she wishes. She said she will tell me a story about a man called "do job" and along with the story she drew a nice cute little face built around the words "do job", the d and b as the ears, j as the nose etc. Then she came to my room and saw the white board I have installed. She dragged me around all the way from the kitchen to my room, demanded the markers, and asked me to move my cot near to the board so that she could climb on it to write it on it. Her mother came along and asked her if she would like to write the English alphabets on the board. She immediately obliged and started from A, B, C, D...and completed with X, Y, Z in a neatly managed two lines. My parents were amazed so much reminded me that even after reaching Class 1, I never used complete all the 26 properly and made me feel ridiculous.

I saw the video recorded on a personal camcorder on Raksha' s third happy birthday (as she calls it) a few days back, and noticed that its not only Raksha who is smart and intelligent; almost all of this generation kids are. She wanted to host a cute little party with cake cutting and stuff at home for her birthday and herself invited all her cutee little friends. I saw in the video the fun, and games all the little ones (yeah almost 12 of them) had during the course of the party and realized that with a great depth of exposure to city life, technology and what not, kids these days have become really much much smarter than we were during our days.

While its a very good sign for the future of our own society and country, theres also another side to the story with so many poor kids who don't get a chance to get, leave alone the exposure, even the basic education. Who is to be blamed? One side India is consistently clocking an economic growth of over a nine percentage, but still theres no respite for the poor. The economic divide in the society is, I believe, slowly increasing and is not going to do any good in the long run. What I mean by economic divide is the gap between the rich and the poor. While the government and corporates are taking some steps in defeating this disturbing growth, responsibility lies in each and every one of us, who enjoy the sweets of the so called Incredible India, to share and help our lesser privileged countrymen. As its said little droplets make a large ocean, one should not worry about how small is the contribution and continue with whatever one could manage. I think this is the need of the hour and hopefully the youngest country in the world rises to this challenge. I would make sure that I give my share towards this cause for sure...Will you? Think about it.

Some personal ramblings...

Today I watched the movie, "A Beautiful Mind". I felt like, Wow..!! Everyone knows the story almost but the way it has been shown was brilliant I thought. And acting, Russel Crowe was just amazing.

I thought I am always impressed by such movies, or books that I read or people I see and remain obsessed/ thinking about it/them for a long time until it slowly it dies down and I forget them. For eg. I logged into the blogspot and started writing a blog on the movie, characters, etc., so that I satisfy myself by sharing it to the outside world. But then slowly I got deviated from the topic as I started typing, and then..changed the post title to something I thought would be apt to what I am doing right now....probably I have got a little bit of Nash's mind for now...so let me take a break and then I'll catch up with the blog. :-p

Two years...and a re-entry

And here I am back to the blogging world (uff..how many re-entries do I need??) Its almost two years since I started blogging (yeah I only said started blogging..not blogging). Hmm..Times just flying I should say.

I was just searching something...ended up on someones blogspot and that gave me the inspiration to make yet another re-entry to the blogosphere. I am sure that there are not many followers (thats a big ask) to this blog, so I can post any rubbish down here :-p

Rain Rain...Come Along

After almost a month of scorching heat, finally Varuna Bhagawan smiled at Bangalore. At last there was some respite from some ever increasing summer heat. It was on Wednesday evening, there were some slight drizzles and it gave a hope of a nice shower. I started from office a bit late and thought that I could enjoy(?!) the rain, but probably the rain god didn't want to put me in to the trouble of getting wet. He stopped. But since thursday, there are regular showers in the evenings and is really bringing the temperatures down. Even though I never got an opportunity to get wet and play in the rain till now, but I am waiting for one.

So its no more, Rain Rain go away...its Rain Rain Come Along....

On Television Ads

Television ads have changed a lot in time.

I remember very well, and we have always laughed about this whenever we have discussed this in our family, the first thing that we saw on our ET&T Black & White television that we bought on Jan 22nd (year unknown, maybe 1990), was the then famous Woodwards Gripe Water ad. When we first switched it on, all that we heard and saw was, "Yenna aachu?....Kozhandhai azharadhu....Woodwards Gripe water kudu..nee kozhandhaiya irukarcha, adhaan kuduthen!!" :-)

Today, advertisement making itself is a profession for many and makes up a huge industry. Its all about creativity to advertise and market a product.

I just love some of the ads that have come up recently. Particularly Hutch. The recent ad which showcases the TalkSize feature that Hutch has introduced, is at the top of my list. The sweetest of this series is the small kid who comes to talk about her pet dog. Anyone, who is not even interested about a mobile phone would love that. The ad is so sweet.

Another ad which recently caught my attention was the one for Videocon Air conditioners. The catch line for this one is "Keep your mind cool" - Videocon air conditioners keep you and your mind cool and relaxed. The wife remains cool and undisturbed, in fact engages in an interesting conversation, when another women tells her that she is in love with the husband. (If you want this to make some sense, please go and watch this ad.)

Creativity has no limits!!!

Pray for me brother...

One of the best compositions for a long time, from A R Rahman. And what more this ones for a very good cause, the song penned by Rahman himself and Blaaze will surely touch everyones heart...So here it goes.

If you would like to listen the song, here are the links:
Instrumental: http://www.indianpad.com/story/37688
Video: http://www.indianpad.com/story/37687

Pray for me brother
Pray for me brother
Pray for me sister
Are you searchin’….
Pray for me brother

Lookin’ for the answers To all the questions In my life
Will I be alone Will you be there By my side
Is it something he said Is it something he did
I wonder why
He is searchin’ For the answers
To stay alive

Could you ever listen Could you ever care
To speak your mind
Only for a minute For only one moment
In time
The joy is around us But show me the love
That we must find
Are you searchin’ For a reason to be kind, to be kind…
He said… Pray for me brother

Pray for me brother Pray for me sister
Pray for me brother

Say what you wanna say now
But keep your hearts open
Be what you wanna be now
Let’s heal the confusion
Pray for me brother

Don’t let me take When you don’t wanna give
Don’t be afraid Just let me live
Don’t let me take When you don’t wanna give
Don’t be afraid

Say what you wanna say now
But keep your hearts open
Be what you wanna be now
Let’s heal the confusion

Pray for me brother Pray for me brother

I’m ashamed ah, brother be dying of poverty
when he down on his knees its only then he prays
And it’s a shame ah, brother be dying of ignorance
cos the world is a trip and everybody’s a hypocrite
Need to stop ah , taking a look at the other
I’m not ashamed of poverty
need to be making his life better
So think about it, think about it once more
cos life is a blessing and it’s not justa show, ah

Round and round the world is spinning around
We need to be singing a prayer, we need to be singing it now
Round and round the world is turning around
We need to be singing a prayer, we need to be singing it now
Need to be feeling the power, need to be feeling the faith
We need to coming together just to win this race
Need to be feeling the power, need to be feeling the faith
We need to coming together just to win this race (twice)

Round and round the world is spinning around
We need to be singing a prayer, we need to be singing it now
Round and round the world is turning around
We need to be singing a prayer, we need to be singing it now
Are you searching for a reason...to be kind

Not any more!

All along I have been waiting to complete my great long travelogue but it never happened. Not any more do I want to have this as an excuse not to blog. So here I am.

P.S Hopefully I will indeed complete my first travelogue story.. :-)

A Travelogue

I have always liked to travel around but somehow I have never cared much to remember much of my travel adventures. This is one which quite cannot be called as an adventure, but still I thought to write a travelogue on this short family trip to “Gods own country” that we had recently. It was the first long trip after my brother’s marriage and with Vidhya (my manni).

It was meant to be a very hectic pilgrimage actually as we had plans to visit as many as six temples in two days along with visits to some relatives. Might sound simple but with the strict timings that’s followed in Kerala temples it’s quite an achievement, if at all achieved.

It was planned that we will leave Bangalore by the afternoon/ early evening of Thursday, 25th January 2007, so that we can make the most of the three day long weekend, thanks to Republic day falling on a Friday. We got the request/ news that my aunt and uncle would join us, who were supposed to travel the earlier day by bus, and were unable to do so due to cancellation of the bus. (No prize for guessing that the bus was cancelled due to a Kerala bandh (read strike/ protests, famous in communism). So it was a fully packed Maruti Omni with seven of us. Yeah, we have two additional seats on the back of our one year old beach wagon.

Thursday evening, on a long weekend, going out of Bangalore, is a deadly combination. All negatives joined together. Almost half of young Bangalore moves out of the Silicon Valley city on such a day. We started by four o’clock in the evening, picked up aunt and uncle at Madiwala, and by the time we crossed Electronic City, it was nearing thirty past five and getting dark. It was a mere thirteen kilometer drive from Madiwala. That’s the spate of traffic on the Hosur road, but I should say it has improved by leaps and bounds in the recent six months.

So then that’s how we crossed out of Bangalore. Luckily I did not have to drive this patch as I hate driving with such heavy traffic; though I love the challenge it poses to the drivers’ patience. But always you have the up and booming FM radios to your rescue. It helps you keep your calm listening to some of the latest hits. I took up to the steering after we almost reached Krishnagiri. It was almost as we glided our way through a glacier till we reached Krishnagiri, on such good roads. With a short coffee break on the way, we munched on to some snacks that aunt had brought, not fully aware what was in store.

As we started again and crossed Krishnagiri, we were welcomed by an array of potholes on the road which never seemed to end. Our travel speed drastically reduced from an average 70 kmph to 35 kmph. This was in the end the worst patch, roads from Krishnagiri to Dharmapuri and almost up to Salem. We had a long debate over where to stop for the night, Salem or Erode? Both being nearly 60 kilometers apart and time running out very fast we thought we better stop by Salem. We finally reached Salem. We started searching for a nice lodge to stay and managed to find a decent one. We booked two rooms for seven of us and settled down. We had a nice idlis, tamarind rice and curd rice for dinner, which amma had managed to prepare. After a fulfilling dinner with Sun TV showing its prime time mega-serial “Lakshmi” much to the satisfaction to serial watchers of the family, we prepared to take some rest.

To be continued...

Active Blogging

I was just browsing through some of the blogs. Huh! I saw so many things.
- Postings in various languages.
- Postings of players which downloads and plays music when the blog page is opened.
- Hosted their own music recording on to the web.
- Having chat boxes with the blog.

The list goes on. I don't know why feel so jealous about all these hi-fi soft gadgets. But there is no harm is feeling jealous for lack of knowledge. Probably that will drive you towards learning these things and implementing the same with you. But don't ask me, "Are you really going to do all this in your blog?"

So is this what active blogging means?

Choice...

Often we get choices to make in our life. Some could be as simple as choosing a shirt to wear to office, and some could be as critical as choosing ones life partner. Choices we get in life are like finding two paths on your way when you are wandering around the streets trying to reach a defined destination. It ends up so critical to choose the right path.

All said, a very common mentality of many (at least me) is that we tend to think about the choices even long after making decisions. Our mind tends to bother more about "what 'would' have happened, if I had chosen the other option", than working a way out of the current situation. This specifically happens when the path we choose to walk turns out to be the wrong one. We refuse to accept failure. We become week. Weakness unduly forces us to take the wrong paths again. This is a vicious cycle.

Isn't it much better forgetting about the choice we had and go ahead in life?

Air Conditioner

Bangalore is pretty chill these days with the mercury dipping up to eight degree Centigrade during early hours of the day. When I travel to office in the bike, I feel its a natural air conditioner out there, with temperature set to the minimum. But the real air conditioner is inside the office where we feel quite comfortable and warm.

I remember my childhood days in the shore of Bay of Bengal, Pondicherry, where the climate is quite hot and humid. Those days, as a small child, the only thing we know about an air conditioner is that it will be quiet chill inside the room and the more funnier part, we feel very hot when we come outside. I remember quite vividly the Angle French Textile showroom in the Nehru street, was one of the places we would stop by during summer afternoons. Those were the days of joy and fun.

Things have changed and we have air conditioners at almost every place we go today. Its in our own houses, the big shopping malls, every shop we do our daily purchases, and strangely they even make temporary ACs in tented party grounds. Huh! What a comfortable life does a human gets to live in these days?

Its quite chill out here, so let me take a break and get into the Air conditioned room to get some warmth.

Confidence Personified

I joined EMC on January 3, 2007. And with just three days I feel better and confident with the new location, new changes, new role and new company.

Its worth mentioning that the processes here are great and the formalities the new joiners need to go though are well structured, even being one of the scarce recruiters in India. However, off late there has been a steady increase in the workforce here, during which, I assume these processes have matured.

Day One:

On the first day I was mainly occupied with completing the joining formalities, filling up of the employment forms, opening of a Salary Account and so on. I also got the Temporary access badge which can be used till my Main ID access badge is ready.

Day Two:

I was assigned the cubicle, given a laptop (that surprised me) and things were setup on it. I met my team and got introduced to all of them, at least most of them. Apart from that nothing much happened worth mentioning.

Day Three: (Today)

There was an induction program today in the morning session, in which people from all the functions inducted us, by giving an overview of the respective functions. I am still waiting for my email ids and the login ids which are going through its approval process. Hopefully I will be getting them on Monday.

With three days passing away in the new place, I should say I am feeling much more confident than ever before. I feel that I can perform well and the environment here seems to be very much conducive for the same. I am Confidence personified now.

Resolutions...

Last year, when I read some blogs regarding the Resolutions for the New Year, I thought, if theres something you wish to do why wait for the new year. But this year my thoughts have changed. Its always nice to begin something in the new year. So here is my list of resolutions. I have taken this quite seriuosly and I hope that I succeed in keeping up with the promises to myself.

• Blogging - This gives me a sense of relief
• Wake up early in the morning - Off late my timings are becoming worse. Hence I would want target at 6:30 AM
• Exercise in the gym - This is to improve my fitness. I have been doing this - quite irregularly though, would like to resularise this.
• Visit a temple once in a week - This also gives me a sense of relief, happiness and contentness.
• Work Hard - This might sound very generic but, my first focus would be on the official work, particularly because I am stepping into a new company this New Year.
• Read a lot - First half of 2006 was worst in this regard, as I got along with my family after nearly 2 years. I had not read anything at all during this period. The later half was better in a way that I did some technical stuff. This new Year I want to read more, whatever it may be...novels, self help books, biographies, spiritual.
• Buy Books worth Rs 200 every month. This is to compliment the earlier resolution.

I am planning to put these points on my pin up board at home and office, so that I keep looking at this regularly.

All said, Resolutions are NOT meant to be broken, They are to be reshaped.