16 things

Hey everyone! Its been a long long time since I've posted.To clear your doubts on whether I'm alive or not, here's a post that I am making.I am pretty much held up with my UTs ( to be taken as nothing more than a hyperbole ), and plus theres this tension spreading in the air about my 5th semester results, that most often I am made to visit my toilet.If you think its all gas, well......you're both right and wrong.Now while you ponder upon that last sentence, I wish to tell you something.There was this text file that I recently found pretty interesting, that I procured quite carefully from KR's external hard disk.The file is quite interestingly titled '16 things it takes most of us 50 years to learn'.I'll leave you with the contents of that file.

Things It Takes Most Of Us 50 years to learn:

1. The badness of a movie is directly proportional to the number of helicopters in it.
2. You will never find anybody who can give you a clear and compelling reason why we observe daylight-saving time.
3. You should never say anything to a woman that even remotely suggests you think she's pregnant unless you can see an actual baby emerging from her at that moment.
4. The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of age, gender, religion, economic status or ethnic background, is that, deep down inside, we ALL believe that we are above-average drivers.
5. There comes a time when you should stop expecting other people to make a big deal about your birthday. That time is: age 11.
6. There is a very fine line between "hobby" and "mental illness."
7. People who want to share their religious views with you almost never want you to share yours with them.
8. If you had to identify, in one word, the reason why the human race has not achieved, and never will achieve, its full potential, that word would be "meetings."
9. The main accomplishment of almost all organized protests is to annoy people who are not in them.
10. If there really is a God who created the entire universe with all of its glories, and he decides to deliver a message to humanity, he will NOT use as his messenger a person on cable TV with a bad hairstyle or in some cases, really bad make-up too.
11. You should not confuse your career with your life.
12. A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter/janitor, is not a nice person.
13. No matter what happens, somebody will find a way to take it too seriously.
14. When trouble arises and things look bad, there is always one individual who perceives a solution and is willing to take command. Very often, that individual is crazy.
15. Your true friends love you, anyway.
16. Nobody cares if you can't dance well. Just get up and dance.
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Enjoy & Think!

Black is beautiful!

Today after a long time, I stepped into the famous cineplex of Chennai - Sathyam to watch Black.Black is the latest movie that has created a flutter in the bollywood mainstream which has proved with ease that a good storyline, impeccable direction, excellent camerawork and a cast whose acting talent is par perfection can make a great movie without songs.

I went along with Ananth, Shivi, KR, Thanshyam Raj and Another Guy Whose Name I Don't Remember ( AGWNIDR ) to Sathyam after about three months, that is to say after I last watched The Bourne Supremacy with Venki.I just enjoyed a Hindi movie after a long time.It was no usual song and dance romance coupled with treacherous villains, or ruthless fathers or handsome heroes or ravishing heroines or any of that kind of bullshit.The movie didn't even have a song, which is what I have been praying for any Indian director to realize in their lifetime and give a movie without it.The reason is simply because song and dance doesn't happen so well planned in life with hero chasing heroine behind trees, showing platonic romantic scenes and having a great voice with lovely lyrics and all.So that in my opinion makes a good movie.It is positive step in that direction.Its not that I am against song and dance, but that we've all seen enough, and now is the time to come to reality and bring change in the cliched pattern.So there it is - Black that takes care of all that and much more.



The story is of a blind, deaf and mute girl named Michelle McNally, who struggles to find the light in her life that is covered with darkness.The man who helps her discover this is Debraj Sahai, who has had a history of working with blind as well as deaf & mute kids.Debraj first comes to know of Michelle through this Mrs.Nair, whose husband is someone( most probably Mr.Nair ) not shown and not important to the story.She is Debraj's confidante.Anyways when Debraj, first meets young Michelle he finds her treated as an animal with a bell put around her by her family to know where she moves, and that she is all petted and spoilt child who is kept under further darkness to the real outside world, thereby making her inept to take care of herself.Her family, particularly her father, considers that Michelle be put into an assylum.But they aver to the decision of leaving her to the care of her new teacher, Debraj, when he arrives.Debraj tries to suppress the brat in young Michelle by letting her trip and fall, and make her eat in an orderly manner and by not showing her sympathy, but the ways of the world.But too soon, Mr.Paul McNally, Michelle's father, loses patience and hope and curtly asks Debraj to get out.The next day Paul goes on a 20 day tour to some place, within which Debraj is supposed to have left the house.But Debraj stays and convinces Mrs.Catherrine McNally, Michelle's mom that he can make a difference by working with Michelle for those twenty days.Then he begins his days of training which would be hard and dispiriting at first, for twenty days is too short a period to see miracles.On the return of Paul, Debraj is left with no choice, other than to leave the house.But as he leaves he teaches Michelle the meaning and feel of what water is and sees that she quickly understands.To his excitement, he also sees that she learns what grass and flowers are.He immediately alerts her parents who are both only too very delighted to learn this.Debraj is then given permission to carry on with his unsusual teaching methods.Michelle grows to be a fine young lady, who would then try to graduate from a normal university.She slowly does it with a lot of endurance, and sees herself become a graduate at the age of forty.By then Debraj is ailed by Alzheimer's.Michelle on learning this, is quite determined not to leave Debraj to his own destiny, and that she would instead teach her own teacher to gain back his self.The movie ends on that note of hope.





The movie is quite beautifully crafted, and actors all grooved into their roles with great responsibility and knowledge that it is an important movie, by the famed director Sanjay Leela Bansali a.k.a. SLB.Clearly it is his most important and special movie, as he has stated in many interviews.The next aspect of the movie is the cinematography by Ravi K. Chandran who works wonders with the camera.It makes one wonder if it was really possible to capture a scene with so much poise blended with beauty.He makes a mark in Indian film history with such a sincere and magical work.He also has stated that the movie is among his most important movies and that it is one of his favourites too.Prakash Kapadia does fine with the dialogues, with Resul Pookutty resonating well for Michelle's sounds.Monty does a great jo with the background score that holds the audience in a trance.



Amitabh Bachchan, the Big B proves that he really is the Big B of Bollywood with another cameo from this movie.He plays his charcter so well that you are left to believe that the man playing Debraj, really cares for Michelle and that he really has Alzheimer's.You'd once again fall for his performance and talk about it for days to come, if you had seen his earlier movies and are a fan.Rani Mukherji plays Michelle McNally with great dedication and sincereity that is well reflected on screen.She hasn't fooled around or made us drool over her beauty by sizzling on silver screen, but has imbued herself into the life of Michelle McNally, making her mark into the coveted list of great actresses in Indian cinema.Its upto her to hold on to the respect she has earned here, through this movie.Dhritiman Chaterjee plays Paul who is anything but impressive with his acting skills.Shernaz Patel plays the role of Catherine with great elegance and teary-eyed melancholic expressiveness.She is really beautiful and one wonders if she is a Patel belonging to the likes of Amisha Patel.Whether or not one wonders, I do.Anyways then there is Nandana Sen who plays Michelle's younger sister, Sara, who is a babe and a mood changer in the movie.She is quite dazzling in the white dress she wears, with the exception of shots where she wears a lipstick.Mahabanoo Mody-Kotwal plays Mrs.Nair, who cannot be possibly commented upon as her on-screen time is negligible.But perhaps the greates among all of the cast of Black is that of Ayesha kapur who lives through the scenes as the young and adamant Michelle.This acting debutant is just 10 years of age and does her role so well as to demand everyone's attention and make them ask "Is she a really special child or is her acting such?" Truly, I was compelled to ask this question by her on-screen cameo.She does it with such great involvement.I simply don't have any more words for her talent.You have to see the movie to empathize with me on this regard, and I'm quite sure we won't differ.I must say that I was quite moved and my eyes glistened at two or three places in the movie.

The story portrayed is based on the life of Helen Keller, who was blind, deaf and mute and went on to become one of the most influential writers, speakers and activists of the 20th century with her motivational and inspirational views on life.Her life itself is an example to this testimony.She really showed what hope could do.There was struggle behind every achievement of her's and behind every fall there was hope of revival and success.Many of writings still continue to inspire millions across the globe.If you do get some books authored by her please try reading to get a different viewpoint on life.Even I haven't so far got the opportunity to lay hands on any of her works.Besides, her teacher was Anne Sullivan, who through the Tadoma method taught Helen to learn and communicate with others.The rest is a story of tremendous will power and will to succeed.



I'll leave you with some of the quotes of Helen Keller -

Tolerance is the first principal of community; it is the spirit which conserves the best that all men think.

Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement; nothing can be done without hope.

A happy life consists not in the absence, but in the mastery of hardships.

I can not do everything, but I can do something. I must not fail to do the something that I can do.

I do not want the peace that passeth understanding. I want the understanding which bringeth peace.

One can never consent to creep when one feels the impulse to soar.

Taraspassing

It had been a long time since I bunked college for attending a symposium.So today I decided to take a decision in that direction after experiencing much of fickle-mindedness last night over thoughts of what the HOD would do to me if another two dozen bunked today.So after much of clouded thoughts, I found my mind leading me to take the decision as to attend the symposium at S.R.M. Valliammai College of Enginnering named Taras '05.Thanks to Spang and Beta for helping me find my way out of commotion.

So today morning, I went pretty enthusiastically to the bus stop at Blue Star ( Which is a major landmark in Anna Nagar ) to board the bus to S.R.M. Valliammai College of Enginnering, only that the bus would turn up merely an hour later at around 7:35 A.M. So I boarded the bus and sat and had a nice short nap that lasted for about 1 hour or 1 hour and 10 minutes, which is when I opened my eyes to find the bus entering the campus.It was mere coincedence and no jerking activity of the bus or someone waking me up.So I got down all bleary eyed, and was in a daze for some 10 to 15 minutes.I would have entered the chemistry lab of the college along with the first years, if it wasn't for the quick recovery of reason for my presence there by my brain.So thank you sweet brain.I found the way to the canteen.On the way to the canteen I found my zip totally unzipped, so I un-unzipped( zipped ) it and entered the canteen to have a dry and uninteresting pongal.I say the pongal was uninteresting because, it had some kind of a face that seemed to be bored and unexcited and of course uninteresting.Or atleast it seemed to me to be so.So I started eating the uninteresting pongal and by the time I finished 3/4th of it, it seemed to plead me to relieve it from being eaten.So I decide in favour of the pongal and let the rest of it be.Then as I was drinking my tea, the guys - Ajay, Beta, Ganesh, Madhan, Mahadevan, Mukund, Srivats, Sushant(bespectacled guy) and Spang arrived.Just when I tasted the tea I knew that it wasn't my cup of tea.I should have known the signs then itself.But I didn't.By then our Beta had somehow managed to make a "missing" report to my mom.She as usual got tensed and had asked him to call her up once the "missing" me was found.So once Beta found me in the canteen, I threatened Beta that he wouldn't be found if he didn't make a phone call to my mom immediately and telling her that "missing" me was found.Actually I tried making an overstatement in the last statement.It is in fact possible even to threaten Osama Bin Laden, but Beta is way beyond that mark.You'll know why if you meet him.Anyways, so Beta dutifully called up mom and did the good boy work telling her that I was found and all, and my mom came up with a sentimental olden Tamil movie type dialogue - Thanks paa, yein vayathulla paala vaathai paa.

Since I didn't know where exactly was the symposium going on though I was inside the college, I had to wait for Beta to complete his breakfast so that I could go and register for the day's events.We then went and registered me in a mju p programming contest, quiz ( the sole purpose for which I went ) and Adzap.So the first event was that of mju p programming , wherein Beta and I squeezed our brains to answer every single question in that paper.I was happy that I remembered atleast some thing in mju p.Now for all those of my readers who are ignorant about mju p, I would first of all congratulate you, and then expand it for you.Mju ( to be pronounced as 'myu'....so you're thinking why I can't write it right away as 'myu'....well, thats the way things are in this world buddy so please ) stands for micro as in microscope or micro-organism or microskirts.Some say it also refers to 10^-6.I don't know all that.But what is micro is micro and cannot be mega or mini for certain.P stands for processor in the micrprocessor world.Besides it also stands for Phosphorous, pico, peta, penny/pence etc.So after squeezing our brains, we needed to open them a bit for the Adzap event.We found it tough to open our squeezed brains, and hence ended up drawing some crap.Yeah we had to draw for the prelims.Our given product was Invisible Inkjet Printer.Our group had various ideas but I managed convincing them that mine was to be used and we also had to come up with a slogan.So we came up with - Redefining transparency which I know sucked, but we couldn't think of anything else that was funny or that which had more punch in it.Besides it seemed great to us at that time.So after the fiasco, I still didn't realize that the best was yet to come.

We went to another room to attend the quiz prelims.Myself and Beta teamed up and did well enough to qualify.Srivats and Sushant(b) were obviously qualified.So two teams made SSN proud by qualifying for quiz finals of the first ever national level technical symposium of S.R.M. Valliammai College of Enginnering.All of us then attended the Adzap Finals, which really was breath-taking-ly horrible, except for the team from Sri Sairam Engineering College who were way too good.Then started the quiz finals.We did fine in the opening three rounds, Beta and myself.Then I became totally impossible with my answers.I missed things that I knew very well and muffed it up all in all.I was resposnible for a staggering 10% of the correct answers, while Beta managed a measly 90% of them.The percentages turned tables in the wrong answers department.We were close to winning it at the beginning of the 5th and final rapid fire round.Beta managed to get three correct answers getting us 30 points, where I managed to say pass to the others or give brow-raising answers, but either way I couldn't get points for my team.I must say that it really saddens me to let someone down.My principle is such that if I am working in a team, it doesn't matter even if I don't contribute by being a silent partner, but it really bugs me if I don't contribute inspite of putting in efforts, or inspite of knowing something well.I feel so unfit and undeserving of that certificate I got for being a part of the team that ended up third.I must say here that Beta was simply great with his answers, as almost 9/10 of them turned out to be right and earned us most of our points.I still really feel bad for letting him down.So after telling you that we ended up third, I need to tell you who came first and second.The first place went to well deserved team of Srivats and Sushant(b) and second to some team from Sriram Engineering College.Then after receiving our certificates and all we went and had an omlette each, courtesy Srivats.After that we had tea and ice creams and then boarded the S.R.M. buses to our respective places.Thus the day ended.

For once today, I could empathize with Venki on his viewpoint of taking part in quizes. But one very interesting thing about quizzing is that even though you lose, you gain a lot of knowledge and information.Thats why quizzing rocks.Thats what keeps me keen on watching lots of them and also taking part.I'll leave you with a quote of Pierre de Coubertin, who is best known as the founder of modern olympic games.He says something like -

The true spirit of olympics is not in winning, but in fighting well.