Impact of recession

Choosing a baby name - Easier said than done

Maho Arnaha Saraswati Pra Chetayati Ketuna Dhiyo Vishwa Vi Rajati.
Asmantsu Tatra Chodyendra Raye Rabhsthavaha TuVidyumna Yashsthavaha

What do the above lines mean to you?
If you are a follower of/believer in the vedas, you would recognise the above as lines from rig veda and would start on trying the understand the meaning conveyed by the lines. If you are a quizzer, you would look at these lines as a probable source of esoteric questions which you as the quiz master would only ever know. But, if you are an expecting parent, then these lines would be a treasure trove of possible unpronounceable names which you would carefully note down in your "Big book of names for my baby"!
This is where Confuso-Kiddo-Name-o-graphy, the art of getting confused by writing down too many baby names, comes into the picture. Recently, my friends had a kid and when we visited them in the hospital, i saw a fat book lying beside the bed. On picking it up and looking inside (i didn't see the cover), i saw lot of strange words and their meanings. I was wondering as to why she was reading Rosenblum's word-list for GRE. Then, on seeing the cover , i realised that it was not the rosenblum book, but a book on Hindu baby names written by "I-shall-unlock-all-the-cages-in-zoos" Menaka Gandhi.
The book was in fact, more confusing that a GRE word list. I guess what Menaka would have done is to copy over the english transliterations of all the holy writings of Hinduism into Excel, then sorted them and then added a random meaning to each one of them. Well, a normal person wouldn't anyway know what a name such as "Caksusa" really meant. He would just go by what is written in the book. It must be the easiest book she must have ever written!
Sometimes, being born an Indian has many disadvantages - for the parents. They have the unfortunate task of naming the child according to zillions of naming conventions. Imagine if the child is Cypriot, they have just few names like Andreas, Christos, Nicos and the feminine forms of them. So, it is pretty easy to choose amongst them. Parents who are a bit religious and want to do things the traditional way would rely upon numerology, the baby's horoscope, vaastu (the location where the baby was delivered and the direction the mom was facing when delivering the baby) , vedic mathematics and few other dozen rules. After doing all the above calculations, if they end up with a restriction that the name should start with the letter "Q" or "X", they immediately turn modern and name the child Pinky, Rocky, Sweety etc.
Americans have it easier still. They can name their children bush, gate, forest or based on practically any word taken from a regular dictionary. Take the case of Tiger Woods. Earl and Kutilda, tiger woods' parents were going for a walk in the remote forests of Vietnam. Kutilda was heavily pregnant at that time. When they went around a corner, Earl suddenly saw what he thought was a tiger and yelled out "There is a tiger in the woods". Kutilda went into a shock and delivered a healthy baby. Considering it a good sign, they named the child "Tiger Woods".
Back to our case - We Indians have to consider a lot of things other than the above mentioned factors in naming a child.

• In today's global village, we have to even consider how americans would react to the name. What if the name was "Manish Bhatt". Americans would be talking about Manish's butt whenever they refer to him. We can't even name our kids with our favourites like Raghunathan Ramakrishnan or Somasundaram Pattabbiraman, as americans find it difficult to pronounce anything more than 2 syllables.
• We also have to think about the possible nicknames that could arise from the name when your kid goes to college. If there are many possible nicknames, rest assured that the one with the most vulgar meaning will be the one with which your child is christened in college.
  
• You also have to attend french classes, german classes and classes of few other popular languages to check if the name you have thought of doesn't have any unintended meanings in these languages.

After all this confusion, many parents give up and name their kid some shit, i mean Samchit!

Technorati Tags: baby names naming a child hindu names

Man-Mosquito war: A true story

Why does a mosquito always hover close to me ear and disturb my sleep? Is it because

• It is checking whether I am in a deep sleep or not, so that it can plan its strategy of attack?
• It is trying to draw blood from the sensitive part of my ear?
• It is trying to communicate to me that I am doomed for the night?

I don't know the reason for this, but the fact remains that my sleep was ruined. Any number of attempts at chasing away the blood-sucker didn't work. All i managed was to slap myself on my ear many times and also almost fall off the bed in a desperate attempt to outwit the devil. At one point, i decided to act like an ostrich and pretend that the mosquito did not exist. So, rather than chasing away the devil, i tried to ignore it.
Well, it was obviously difficult to sleep with my back on the bed and also cover both the ears with my hands (imagine such a posture and you will understand why it is difficult). So, i tried sleeping on my side with one of my ears firmed lodged on the pillow and the other one covered with my hand. Still, he was hovering close to my ear. So, i smartly pulled my blanket over my head. Still, i heard his noise. Then fear struck me! Had he penetrated the impervious domain of my blanket or did he have accomplices inside as well as outside? But, Vidhya was sleeping peacefully seemingly unaware of the crisis i was in. Why was the mosquito discriminatory in his actions?
All this while, I was praying that the mosquito was a male (referring to him as "he"), as i didn't want to get into trouble with the fairer sex of the mosquitoes, the dangerous female anopheles type!
Now, i wasn't sure whether he was alone or with friends. I also started scientific doubts whether the sound of the mosquito flapping his wings can penetrate the cover of the blanket. This was an issue, as it was not the prospect of getting bitten which was bothering me, but the prospect of spending a sleepless night listening to his flapping wings which was troubling me.
Suddenly, as fast as he had come, he vanished. There was no more sound. I even sat up to look for him. When you are half-asleep, you think you can do things which you normally can't. So, i sat up on the bed and looked all over and concluded that i had won the battle. I was even looking forward to finding his dead body by the side of the bed the following morning. So, i went back to the usual posture of sleeping with my back flat on the bed. It was calm, peaceful and wonderful.
But, little did i know that this was just the calm before the storm. A few minutes later, when i had drifted into 3/4th sleep from being half-sleep, i was rudely awaken by a sound, a sound so deafening that it couldn't belonged to the original mosquito which was a whimper by comparison. Then, i realised that the worst had happened. The original guy (and probably his accomplices) had called for reinforcements. These reinforcements were not more of their kind, but they were the big guns of the mosquito world, akin to the F16s and the falcons. They were big, they were loud and almost impossible to intercept in air. War had been declared!
The noise produced by these big guns were like the sound of the army helicopters and they reached the depths of the inner ear. Neither the hand nor the blanket could block this sound. I was doomed! It was then that i realized the extent of the invasion. The big guns were attacking my body all over. The t-shirt was a very thin line of defense which didn't stand any chance against their all-penetrating blood-sucking missiles. I gave up. I didn't even have time to raise the white flag.
Few minutes later, it was all over. The raid had finished and it was very successful, for them! I started to evaluate the damages. When i tried to sit up on the bed, I heard a cracking noise. Had the mosquitoes drained my body of blood that the bones were hitting against each other? I was paralyzed with fear. Too afraid that i fell back on the bed and went to sleep!

All you wanted to know about South Indian Weddings

or to be more precise, a tamil wedding ceremony. Head over to Krishashok who took time off from doing jalsa and showing jilpa (not to be confused with Shilpa) to write an excellent article on Tamil Weddings. A must read!

Flight of fancy or was i on it ?

Well, it turned out that i really flew and it was not a dream. But, the flight on the low-cost carrier Spice JetBut turned out to have all the ingredients of a "spicy" dream.

I had to go to Pune from Chennai and the first option that turned up on makemytrip.com was the SpiceJet flight which had, incidentally, been started only a week back. The price was too tempting to let go and after a few exchanges of mails with friends about low-cost carriers, i went ahead and booked tickets for me, vidhya and my mom from Chennai to Pune and back.

It has been more than 7 years since i went on a domestic flight and i don't remember anything from that experience. So, practically for the first time, i was walking into the domestic terminal at Chennai Airport. We went through a big lobby and within 1 minute, we were at the boarding gate. Or was it a boarding gate? It just looked like normal door out of the building. But, there was a Jet airways person next to it and there were people queueing up. So it must be a gate.

But, where was the SpiceJet gate? There was just one door and Jet Airways was next to it and our flight's boarding time was just 5 mins away. It was just then that i saw a remarkable manoeuvre from the staff of the Jet and Spice Jet airlines. There were lot of those wooden stands (from where people make speeches, i forgot the word for it) with the nameplates of the different airlines. As soon as the last Jet Airways passenger went through the gate/door, in one swift move, the Jet airways person moved her "stand" away from the door and the SpiceJet person rolled over his "stand" next to the door.

"Ladies and Gentlemen, SpiceJet is happy to announce the departure of its flight to Pune. Passengers are requested to proceed to the boarding gate."

So, this is how the same door becomes the boarding gate for the different airlines. Didn't know that! So, we are in the flight and comfortably settled in. Even after i explain the intricacies of low-cost carriers, my mom is not able to comprehend a flight without food. But, it was good that water was free and my mom was happy!

After some time into the flight, the flight attendants brought some food for sale. With it was also Litchi Juice costing around 30 bucks. Litchi juice of all juices! if they had brought Mango Juice, Orange Juice or even Lemon Juice, it would have been ok, but how may people actually drink Litchi Juice? I decide to skip the juice and dozed off for the rest of the flight to Pune.

Once we landed at Pune and people started disembarking, i looked out of the window and expected to see a bus/van to take us from the plane to the terminal. I had been expecting too much. It seems that you have to get down from the plane, walk across few parking lots (meant for other planes) and you enter the terminal, just like you would do in any railway station.

As we were standing inside the terminal getting used to the small building and contemplating on our next move, there was an announcement: "Ladies and gentlemen, this is the last and final call for spice jet flight xxx to coimbatore. Passengers are requested to ...". Interesting, we thought. There are people who fly to Coimbatore even from Pune. A few minutes later, another announcement: "Ladies and gentlemen, this is the last and final call for spice jet flight xxx to coimbatore. Passengers are requested to ..." !!! I never knew that there could be many instances of "last and final"!

The stay in Pune was very eventful and it requires a separate post. So, we finished whatever we had to do in Pune and the next day, we were on the return flight home. We were one of the first to board the flight at Pune. Looking out of the window, we saw a big group running very fast towards the plane and crowding at the base of the stairs up to the plane. Vidhya and I were discussing that this flight probably had a unreserved section and these people were the poor ones who were without seat numbers and it was a matter of "first come, first seated".

But, as one soul entered the plane in the front, we realised that this was not the case. In came a scantily clad middle-aged man accompanied by a twenty something. Ah, this has to be a sadhu. He fitted the profile perfectly. I was right. He sat in the first seat and everyone entering after him (this was the big group) managed to somehow find enough place in the cramped aisle to prostrate completely before him and get his blessings. There were many foreigners also in tyhis group. I thought Indians went abroad and took the jobs/money of foreigners, but now i realised that we invite them to our country and do the same, saving the cost of travelling abroad. I watched the faces of the people go by. They were on cloud nine, on seventh heaven whatever you want to call it. Even an autograph or a kiss from aishwarya rai would have paled in comparison.

There was a couple seated behind us and they were on the edge of their seats to get a glance of the sadhu. I asked them who this was and they said in unision "guruji, sarath babu guruji". Had Sarath Babu changed professions because of low returns from films ? No, it wasn't the actor as i remembered him from his films and guruji looked a lot different.

So, after a few dozen people had finished getting their blessings, the plane was ready to depart. Until then, the air hostesses had a tough time getting people to move towards the back to their seats. It was Deja Vu! When i was in school, our school bus conductor always kept shouting at the boys to move to the back, away from the girls' seats in the front. Anyway, after all was finally ok, the captain announced the departure.

Then, out of the blue, a guy starting running towards the front of the plane. Vidhya panicked "Was this a hijack attempt?". I didn't think so. The plane had not even moved and it was too early for a hijack. But, you never know, this guy could have been one of the low performers in the "School of Hijacking" and in his eagerness to pull off his first hijack, could have acted a bit too early. But, it was not so, thankfully. It seemed that he had suddenly developed some mysterious sickness and was feeling very uncomfortable and had to get off the plane. The air hostess tried to explain that it was too late now as they had already got the clearing for take-off. He started getting agitated and demanded that he disembark from the plane. The captain relented and asked him to get his baggage.

So, he got off the plane and the captain announced that there was some paperwork to be done before they left and it would take another ten minutes. Then there was an announcement "Ladies and gentleman, please check whether all your cabin baggages are still inside the plane". Everyone panicked! Though he had gone out in clear view of everyone carrying a dark blue bag, my mom insisted that we check all our baggage even though none of our bags would seem dark blue, even to the colour blind! Imagine a hundred people jumping out of their seats in unison, opening all the overhead lockers and jumping up and down to check whether all their bags were there. After a few minutes, all were satisfied that he had not taken any other's baggage with him.

Suddenly, an Eureka moment came for Vidhya: "Whats the point in checking whether he had taken anyone else's luggage? What if he had left a piece of baggage behind? a bomb?". A perfectly logical question from Vidhya (was the moon blue? I peeked out to search for it, i couldn't find it). So, for the rest of the journey, any ticking sound from a watch would get nervous glances from my mom.

We were in the air, finally. After the seat belt sign was switched off, people started to throng the front row preventing the air hostess from bringing the Litchi Juice. Then, one smart gentleman, seeing the opportunity, decided to stand next to the guruji and act as the coordinator and started issuing coupons for the visit to the first row (well, almost!). The air hostess begged, pleaded and tried every trick in the air-hostess' guidebook to get the passengers back to their seats, but nothing worked. Then, a knock on the cockpit and few words were exchanged and an announcement: "Ladies and Gentlemen, due to the prevailing turbulence, we request all of you to get back to your seats and fasten your seat-belts". I settled back in my seat and looking at the crystal-clear sky through the window, dozed off for the rest of the flight.

The unknown past of a celebrity

This video uncovers it all...

I originally had the flash playing in this post, but few complained that it was too obnoxious a sound to be playing continuously whenever this page is opened.

So, I am linking to the swf file. Right-Click and then Save-as on your PC and then view it in a browser window.

Click here to download the swf file.

Out of the Past

I was tagged by MiddleZoneMusings to post on a new meme called "Ten of my Favourite Posts" started by William Tully Sounds like "Oprah's Favourite Things for Summer"! Anyway, the idea of this meme is to pick ten posts from the past, which will give an idea , to new readers , of what this site is about.

The title of my blog is "Thoughts of a Rambler". So, you can understand the difficulty in choosing posts to give a sample to readers. I write about "anything and everything under the Mediterranean sun" and occasionally under the other celestial objects which show up over other parts of the world.

So, here are the ten posts which i think might give you an idea of what to expect at srajaram.com(oldest to the newest). Btw, most of them are from the "humor" category, as i actually don't write about anything useful on this site!

• Bird Flu mania gripped the world, especially Asia in early 2006 and that was probably the best time to make the movie "One flew over the bird's nest".
• If you ever visit Cyprus as a tourist, one of the main tourist attractions on your itinerary should be a visit to a Cypriot Doctor (No, i don't wish you to be unwell, just go there as a tourist). If you want to be prepared in advance on what to expect, read "Quack Quack, Is the Doctor in?".
• Rules in Cyprus are different for locals than for outsiders. You should know the tricks of the trade if you want things to happen your way in Cyprus. Some theories just don't work in Cyprus - Failure of queuing Theory in Cyprus.
• Everyone, for whatever reason they may have, likes to make fun of American Politicians. So, why should i be different? God Bless America! and If America wants more oil
• How soon or late do you adapt to the modern technology surrounding you? Sometimes, even basic things like operating an ATM can become a nightmare. Read about The mystery of ATMs to find out.
• If you are from India or from the UK or from the US and have happened to attend any Indian party, you might be able to associate with my observations about Punjabi songs titles "What is it with Punjabi Songs".
• If you have had a conversation with an Indian and there was no mention of cricket for more than 5 minutes, consider yourself to be very very lucky. Why are Indians so crazy about cricket. Cricket is after-all a stupid game, a waste of time!
• The history of the Mallu Nairs. Don't read this if you are not from India, you wouldn't understand a thing!
• What i have learned from my wife. This was part of a Group Writing Project at Middle Zone Musings. Well, after Vidhya (my wife) read this post, i learnt many more lessons.
• My first ever music concert and it rocked! Photos from the Bryan Adams Concert here in Cyprus.

Enjoy reading!

Technorati Tags: Group Writing project Blog Meme

What i learned from driving in India

Before i moved to Cyprus six years back, i had been driving motorbikes (or motorcycles or just bikes as they are called in India) and cars for more than 5 years then. This experience proved to be invaluable in being able to drive comfortably in Europe and the US. Driving in India is an enlightening experience, especially for any non-indian who is coming to India for the first time and lands up in any of the crowded metropolitan cities.

As part of the Group writing project currently on at Middle Zone Musings, i decided to pen down whatever i have learnt from my experience of driving in India.

• Indians are way ahead of the rest of the world in nano-technology. USA and Europe might be taking big steps in nanotechnology, but India is already light years ahead. Imagine, in the US, they have six-lane highways where you might find, if you are lucky, vehicles on four, or maybe if you are really lucky, five of the lanes. But, in India, we have single lane roads (ok, we actually don't have lanes, only roads) where, on a normal day, you will find a lorry, 2 buses, 3 cars, 4 vans,5 autorickshaws, 6 bicycles, 7 motorcycles and a few stray dogs within a range of a dozen square metres. Do you really need more inspiration for nanotechnology?
• Now i know why cars are damn cheap in India as compared to US or Europe. In fact, you can get a new car for under 4000 USD in India and in the last few weeks, many Automobile manufacturers have been announcing sub-2000 USD cars in India. Such a car would be an impossible dream in US, that even sci-fi movie and fantasy movie makers would not dare to project such cheap cars in movies lest the audience dump them for being over fantastical. So, why are cars cheap in India? To understand this, we need to look at cars being sold in the US. Cars are always released in many models, the basic one and the X-one which has many extra features like Bose Audio Systems, Rain Sensing Auto Wipers (or is this on the basic one?), anti-theft mechanism, and the like. So, you expect the X-one to be a lot costlier. In India, a similar X-model would have the following extra "fancy" features: Rear-View mirrors, Seat Belts, Rear Window Wipers, Child Lock and Air bags. The basic model is a car that runs, that's it. No wonder, they cost so less in India.
• Indians were the first in the world to introduce indicators on cars. The world was used to drivers pointing their hands in the direction they planned to take a turn. It was the same sign used in India too. But, the situation in India was different. Since the cars and other vehicles in India loved each other and travelled a few millimetres away from each other, showing a hand sign was an indication that you wanted your hand amputated. The growing number of hand amputations led the government to fund research and thus they came up with indicator lamps for the cars!

If you commute a lot to work daily and feel stressed out by this, take a vacation in India and drive around the cities. When you go back to your country (unless you are from Thailand!), you will feel as if you are driving in space with the whole highway built just for you. Enjoy!

If you are interested to participate in another group writing project, check out the Friday the 13th Group Writing Project.

Technorati Tags: India, driving in India, cars, traffic

Dogs, no sex please!

Sign posted outside a bakery in Limassol, Cyprus

The Cypriots love their cats. They are all over the place. The cats even have a monastery for themselves called the Cat Monastery. But, the poor dogs, they don't even have the basic rights! God save them!

What more ? New Coach ?

What more does the Indian Team want? The Indian team wants Whatmore. I am worried by the current trend of demands put forth by the Indian team. They want more perks, they want the restrictions on the number of ads they can appear removed, they want more salaries and now they want whatmore!

This is ridiculous. What more can a cricket board provide for its players?

Whatless, a 21 yr old woman from Trinidad and Tobago was shocked at the way the Indian cricket team played their game in the world cup and now, when she heard that they wanted whatmore, she burst out into profanities and even composed a song extempore.

Dude, this is a song by whatless,

for a cricket team which is toothless!

When ur bowlers bowl the ball,

it gets hit to the next-door mall.

when ur batsman face west-indies

they start peeing in their undies!

How dare you ask for what more?

In fact, you won't even get whatless!

Whatmore, on hearing this song, had words of praise for whatless and even proposed marriage to her and wanted to raise "more or less" a family.

Technorati Tags: cricket indian cricket team Dave whatmore new coach BCCI

What i have learned from my wife

or is it learnt ? I have always known the past tense of learn as learnt. So, when i saw this "writing project", asking bloggers to write a post on what they have learned from XXX, i was confused. I then checked many pages online to sort this out. It seems that Americans use learned more than learnt, while UK English stipulates that the past tense of learn as learnt. I found this surprising because Americans have the tendency to do away with anything that they feel is unnecessary like the u in colour.

Anyway, back to the writing project. I have been married for a little more than 5 years and this seemed to be an appropriate opportunity for me to write as to what i have learned from my wife.

• I had been a fashion disaster all my life before marriage. Even after 5 years of marriage, I am still arguing about this fact by quoting various instances of fan-following at various stages of my life. I fail to understand as to why she fails to understand that pieces of thread hanging from the bottom of my worn out jeans are a fashion statement and not something befitting a pauper! Because of this, i am used to getting a "dressing down" every morning.
• The living room couch/sofa should always be in showroom condition. Well, when i sit on the sofa, all parts of my body stretch out in different directions with the leg sometimes (ok, almost always) ending up on the hand rest. Cmon, this is my house, my sofa. I should be allowed to be comfortable on it, not sit like a junior employee in a board room meeting with just the edge on the butt placed on the seat! Another point i always raise is the fact that we are not going to get any visitors at midnight. If so, why should i take the effort to set right the sofa and the cushions on them when i go to bed at night after watching TV.
• I am supposed to follow the Six Sigma Methodology in my daily life i.e make only 3.4 mistakes in a million tasks. But she doesn't realise the mental stress that goes into planning so many tasks like folding up the clothes i am wearing before going to bathe or hanging the towel in a proper place after bath and not just leave it on the bed. Motorola employees do much simpler tasks, so it is easy for them to follow this methodology, not me!
• Wash my face every 15.3 minutes to always remain fresh. I know whether i am feeling fresh or not. How can she decide that I am not feeling fresh and force me to have a face-wash. I go to the extent of even doing some acrobatic exercises to prove to her that in spite of the fact that my face might look like i have just gotten out of bed, I am feeling fresh and fit!
• Finally, Vidhya was the one who suggested to write about "What i learned from my wife" for this writing project on Middle Zone Musings. So, she finally makes a decision which she is going to regret about :-)

Update: Here is the complete list of entries, each one finishing the phrase “What I Learned From…”

“… Teen Girl Squad”, by Markk at My Opinions Are Important
“… the Mt. Pinatubo Eruption”, by Ronald Huerca at Ronalfy.com
“… Drugs”, by Sam Brougher at Forest Azuaran
“… a Mesquite Tree”, by Mike DeWitt at Spooky Action
“… Drinking Starbucks Coffee”, by George Manty at Can I Make Big Money Online
“… My Wife!”, by Rajaram Sethuraman at Thoughts of a Rambler
“… Having a Daughter”, by Marco Richter at FitForFreedom
“… Norm”, by Joe Raasch at The Happy Burro
“… my mentors”, by Karin H. at The Kiss Business Too
“… Procrastinating”, by Yvonne Russell at Grow Your Writing Business
“… a Squirrel”, by G.L. Hoffman at What Would Dad Say
“… Blogging”, by Gayla McCord at Mom Gadget
“… a Weight Problem”, by Monique Attinger at Insurance Guide 101
“… Taking Out the Garbage”, by Michael Chantrel at Mortgage Guide 101 Blog
“… RUMMAGING!” by William Tully at LOGICal eMOTIONs
“… A Light Switch”, by Robert Hruzek at Middle Zone Musings

Enjoy!!

Technorati Tags: Middle Zone Musings Writing project Blog Wife

No more Idlis and Dosais on Indian Railways

If you are the kind who doesn't like Noodles, vegetable burgers or pakoras, then you may have to go hungry on Indian Railways. The Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation Limited is planning to do away with South Indian way and bring an uniformity in their catering services on our rail networks. According to the NDTV report,

As per the plan only 21 approved food items will be served on trains - a move that south Indian rail passengers feel is in bad taste.The IRCTC has decided to remove the south Indian delicacies from the menu, initially on a pilot basis for three months. The order has left a sour taste in several mouths.

There are bloggers who have expressed their "distaste" over this issue. Let the Indian Railways go ahead with scrapping the South Indian items from their menu. Anyway, the food offered on the trains is nothing to crave about. We will always have the same items on the platforms and they taste better too.

I still remember my Pilani Days when we used to make the bi-annual trip on the Tamil Nadu Express from Chennai to Delhi. We used to served a meal which consists of miniature pooris, the sizes of which indicate that they were probably made from the leftover dough of proper sized pooris. These pooris were very fascinating for the Bitsians with the "scientific" bent of mind, for their extraordinary elastic properties (It required the effort of two people to tear a poori in two) and they have even gone to the extent of questioning the on-board cooks for the ingredients in them which gave them this magical ductility.

Back to the issue of Dosais. Many people, particularly the north indians, refer to the dosai as dosa. Ok, a little misspelling might not hurt, but this destroys the essence of this particular food item being named as dosai. Here is a way to make it easier for the northies to remember the name as dosai. When the dough is poured on the hot pan, you are supposed to hear a "saiiiii" sound made by the contact of the room-temperature dough with the hot tawa. If you had been to a bad South Indian restaurant (easy to find in Delhi), you would notice that the dosai is crispy on one side and "doughy" on the other. This is because the chef didn't turn the dosai around on the pan. If he had done this, there would be another "saiiii" sound made by the other side of the dosai. So, there should be two "saiiii" sounds for a good dosai. Two in hindi is "Do". Put them together and you get Dosai! Easy, isn't it ? As scientists say, never mug-up the end result, always remember the logic behind the result and you shall always be successful in getting the solution.

Lets hope that the IRCTC doesn't ban the South Indian food items from the platforms too, for no one is definitely going to touch the burgers or the pakodas when you have hot and fresh idlis and dosais available.

Technorati Tags: Idly Dosa Idli dosai Indian Railways

An Intriguing Puzzle : Infinite Loop

In the front of the building:


In the back of the building:

Since i was not smart enough to solve this puzzle, i couldn't find a way to enter my office and hence had to take the day off!!

India will win the ICC world cup

so says this email forward which got today. It also quotes various "mysterious" coincidences between India's world cup victory in 1983 and the current world cup. Btw, non-tamilians might not understand the dialogues in the pictures below.
I hope that i don't have to update this post after today's India-Sri Lanka match!

Update after the India-Sri Lanka match: Ok, The theories below have "almost" been proven wrong. "Almost" because, i still hope that today's Bangaldesh-Bermuda match has been fixed by the biggies at BCCI.

Trivia – 1
Year 1981
1. Prince Charles got married
2. Liverpool crowned Champions of Europe
3. Australia lost the Ashes
4. Pope Died
2 years later India won the Cricket world Cup!!!

Year 2005
1. Prince Charles got married
2. Liverpool crowned Champions of Europe
3. Australia lost the Ashes
4. Pope Died
2 years later Will India win the Cricket world Cup ?????

Trivia -2
1982 Football World Cup won by Italy
1983 Cricket World Cup won by India

2006 Football World Cup won by Italy
2007 Cricket World Cup will be won by India ??

Trivia -3
1983 Cricket World Cup India lost its first match by 5 wickets
2007 Cricket World Cup India lost its first match by 5 wickets



Haiyo!!! Haiyo!!!
Ippadiyae usuppethi usuppethi udamba ranakalama akkittanungappa!!!!
Innumada engala nambikkittirukinga?

Technorati Tags: cricket world cup cricket Rahul dravid Inzamam

Rajini and Karunanidhi, the Chief Minister

Caught at the wedding of Prabhu's son.

Technorati Tags: Rajini Chief Minister

The history of the Mallu Nairs

To understand the origin of the Mallu Nairs, we first have to understand the history of the Tamilians, the neighbours of the mallus.

Long Long Ago, only Brahmins lived in TamilNadu. They are nowadays popularly known as Tambrahms. When the English first landed on the shores of Tamil Nadu, much before they had explored other continents, they were surprised to see people who spoke a strange language , wore strange clothes , even had strange markings on their forehead and other parts of the body. So, when they enquired around (in English of course), there were few who ran away and there were few who answered "Naan Brahmin" and then ran away fearing that the English would spoil their orthodox holiness. "Naan Brahmin" in Tamil means "I am a brahmin". The English were not expected to understand this and classified this group of people as non-Brahmins. Thus, Non-Brahmins came into being and the English exploited this to create the caste system in India. In fact, all south Indians were only vegetarians at that time. A similar misunderstanding led to few people being understood as non-vegetarians and thus forced to eat meat.

Now, Brahmins consisted only of Iyers in the olden days. But, there were two "different" classes of iyers. One, who worked for daily wages and the other, who had their own businesses. The second category prospered over the years and eventually made enough money to buy and import cars from England. This group wanted to differentiate itself from the daily wage group. So, whenever they had to introduce themselves, they always said "Iyer with car".Over the next 132 years, this phrase "Iyer with car" slowly evolved to "Iyengar". Thus started the quest for dominance between the Iyers and the Iyengars.Since the Iyengars had cars, they slowly moved towards the eastern part of Tamil Nadu near the coast, where they made broad roads like the modern ECR, while the Iyers moved onto the hills close to the borders of Kerala.

Now back to Mallu nairs. When the British reached Kerala and started moving inwards towards the Tamil nadu Border, they were shocked to see two similar group of people at war with each other. Both were dark, spoke unintelligible language (they learnt later that both the languages were different) and yet, were fighting each other for control of the coconuts. So, the British started enquiring. Of course, the locals didn't know English, but were proud of their own culture and identity. Since the British (through Knowledge Transfer) from their counterparts who landed in Tamil nadu, already knew about Iyers, they assumed that all dark people in this people were Iyers. So, they started addressing even the Mallus as Iyers. This enraged the mallus a lot and they started adding "Not an Iyer" at the end of their names like Harish "Not an Iyer", Anil "Not an Iyer". Because of the accent of the Mallus and the evolving of language over time, the surname "Not an Iyer" stuck to the mallus and it eventually transformed to Nair. Thus, we have harish Nair and Anil Nair.

All you Nairs, be proud of your history and be proud of the fact that you are "not an Iyer".

Technorati Tags: Mallus Nair Tamil+Brahmins Kerala Iyer+Iyengar

If America wants more oil

It doesn't need to invade Iraq, Iran or other Gulf countries in the pretext of them having Nuclear weapons, Bazookas, water-guns or firecrackers, but all it needs to do is to invade the European country of Cyprus.

Cyprus, is it a country, never heard of it or seen it on the map. Well, don't feel bad if you are asking these questions. Many do. Because, Cyprus is small enough to be conveniently ignored on many maps. How do you put a country 400*200 Kms across on a world map ? Well, by a dot. Many of us would think that printing ink accidentally spilled in the middle of the Mediterranean sea and ignore it.

If you knew Cyprus, you must be wondering what America would gain, in terms of oil, if it invaded Cyprus.Welcome to the European Underworld, governed by the governing body of the EU. A Cyprus Pound is worth more than 2.2 USD, not because of the million-odd half-naked britishers who come to this island every year in search of the sun and the sea, but because of the flourishing underground oil business.

But, before i reveal the truth, i need to take you into confidence. Not many, including Cypriots, know about this and you must never talk about this to any person named Andreas, Christos or Giorgos. Cypriot men have either of the three mentioned names only and you can be safe by this way that you don't reveal this to Cypriots. What about Cypriot women, you might ask. Forget them, they never have time outside the beauty Parlours.

The secret to the oil business in Cyprus are ... paper napkins. Yes, the very ordinary paper napkins you find on all the tables at the restaurant. Cyprus is one of the world leaders in the manufacture of paper napkins. Cyprus has brilliantly used these to "throw sand in the eyes" of the British and American Oil scouts. Indian politicians were implicated in the "Food for Oil" scam with Saddam's Husseins government in Iraq. But, they were just the scapegoats. The actual culprits were the Cypriots.

It all starts with the simple humble Bread Pakoda. Since it is an Indian dish, no one in Cyprus really cares about the quantity of these made in the local restaurants here. Cyprus exports thousands of these bread pakodas to Iraq and Iran. They are shipped back to Cyprus. No, not because there are not tasty. They were not meant to be eaten in the first place. These bread pakodas are re-processed, filled with oil, in secret plants in Iraq and Iran and shipped back to Cyprus. Since there are hundreds of Indians working in my company and other offshore companies in Cyprus, no one really bothers about the tons of bread pakodas landing on the shores of Cyprus. They just comment "Ah! it must be for the Indians, they eat all such crazy spicy stuff!" and let it pass through.

Now comes the genius of the Cyprus underworld. They take these bread pakodas to remote factories within the troodos mountains and extract the oil within them using plain paper napkins. These paper napkins are then repacked and exported to African countries. What the world sees is that Cyprus is exporting paper napkins, but the reality is that Cyprus is actually exporting illegal Gulf Oil to African countries to fund the ganglords there.

Now, you might ask, how did i come to know of this? No, I am not involved with the Cyprus Mafia. No process is bug-free. Some of the bread pakodas which come from Iraq into Cyprus somehow fell into the wrong hands, that of the caterer supplying stuff to my company and he, seeing the weird name, promptly assumed it to be exotic Indian stuff and supplied it to our kitchenettes.

In the below series of pictures, you can see the way by which i unearthed this underworld secret. As i said before, don't ever share this information with any andreas, christos or giorgos!

Technorati Tags: America oil Bread Pakoda Cyprus Oil price rise

Racism against Shilpa Shetty in Big Brother

So says the media, so say the thousands of people who have written in to voice their opinions. I have only seen a few clips which were again and again shown on NDTV, Sky and Star News.But, i have my own opinions as to whether what happened could be called racism. Even if it were racist, it is after-all happening in a reality show, pretty much like a movie. Would someone complain if a movie had racist dialogues or had scenes of racism. It is a show which is supposed to have its melodrama to attract an audience.In fact, the producers of Big Brother would the ones most pleased with whats happening right now, because its drawing in audience, big time!Just because the people in the house don't speak rehearsed dialogues doesn't mean that they don't qualify for all the liberties awarded to movies. If there are sections offended by the show, let it be given a suitable rating.Ok, Shilpa Shetty was called "The Indian" and the "paki" by other housemates, but is it something new for Indians?Wherever we go, we are the target of racist attacks. Other way to look at is that whoever makes these racist comments are doing so, because he has an inferiority complex looking at the growth/success of a "browner" kind and hurling abuses are the only way to quench his anger.

Well, at the end of the day, Shilpa Shetty for one reason or the other is responsible for the massive increase in viewership of Big Brother and I am sure that they will try their best to keep her in and kick the rest out!

Technorati Tags: shilpa shetty big brother racism shilpa shetty big brother racism reality show uk

The facts behind Saddam's hanging

Slowly, but surely, many facts about what happened in the days prior to Saddam's hanging are being uncovered by the world media. Tapped phone calls reveal that Saddam and other accused undergoing the trial had many rounds of discussions with someone in an African country. There were also some speculations that Al-Qaeda was making these international phone calls to destinations faraway from USA in the hope that USA might send some of its troops to each of these places thus leaving only George Bush in the mainland USA to defend the country.

Sources say that there were extensive debates between the Iraqi Regime, George Bush, Tony Blair, Sasha Baron Cohen(Borat) and Al-Qaeda's spokesperson as to the way Saddam should be dealt with. Borat was always put in the conference call to act as a mediator as he had had extensive cultural learnings in the USA to make benefit other countries. Al-Qaeda expressed a keen interest in this, as they felt that Osama Bin Laden would also have to go through the same process when he is captured and put on trial just before the November 2008 American elections.

Weeks before the mid-term elections, the Iraqi regime had called on George Bush to find out what had to be done with Saddam Hussein, as his food bill was proving to be too expensive for the Iraqi government. Bush said, "Hang on for some more time, I am busy as it is just before the mid-term elections". Unfortunately, there was no translator available and the little English that the Iraqis knew, they understood it as "Hang him some time before the mid-term elections".

So, the Iraqis announced to the world that they were hanging Saddam. The media started collecting the reactions from around the world. One very famous news channel called NDTV started talking to people around India and the very first person they spoke to was the chairperson of the National Muslim league. This guy would have, under normal circumstances, blabbered something about the ruling Congress Party being responsible for the mess in Iraq etc. But, our smart NDTV reporter asked him, "As a devout Muslim, what is your opinion about this?". This triggered a response of the day being a festival day for Muslims and the like. Then, the reporter goes to the head of the Indian Christian Front and asks him "Do you think Saddam is a direct descendant of Adam and the US is trying to project him as a Muslim?". That guy replies,

The news is so bad,

that it makes me very sad.

A person called Saddam,

whose ancestor was Addam (rhyme it here please)

is being hung,

in a country far-flung!

Bush took extreme precautions to prevent a Fahrenheit 911 kind of video happening again with Saddam's hanging, but an amateur videomaker who wanted to make a movie like "The Blair witch project" started shooting the hanging of Saddam and released the video "The Hangman project".
Technorati Tags: saddam hussein hanging video iraq NDTV USA elections

Sehwag is the worst Indian opener

so says gooogle ...

Check out Gooogie for more such revealing facts.

Technorati Tags: indian cricket team virendar sehwag gooogie googie