The tales of beedle the bard -- Book Review

J.K.Rowling should be one of those unique authors around for she has the interesting characteristic of writing stories that are equally appealing and engrossing to both mature and young audiences. The ability to add layer after layer to the stories, making the stories rich in content – without ever making it too complex for a young reader to follow – have been the trademark signature of Rowling’s Harry Potter novels.

When I got hold of a copy of “Tales of Beedle the Bard” (I was not somehow so enthusiastic about the release of this book….), I was expecting something similar to her previous books. May be I should have followed the news and the gossip regarding the release of this book. That way, I would have known that this book was meant more for children and less for adults. This would have avoided the disappointment I had after finishing the book.

The book has 5 small stories (Fables, to be precise) for the young wizards and witches of which Potter and his friends belong to. The stories were too simplistic and none of the stories made any kind of impact/impression in my mind. The fact that I had to find the book and look at the chapter listings to remember the number of stories in it pretty much summarizes how the book was!

Bottom Line: If you are a Harry Potter book fan, this book would surely leave you sourly disappointed. And if you have never read Harry Potter books before, this book would make no sense to you at all. Either ways, you won’t miss much if you decide to skip this book.

A Search In Secret India -- Book Review

Every person born in this world, at some point of time in their life invariably comes up with this question: what is the meaning or purpose of their life? The other question that one might strive to get an answer to is “Is there a way to eternal happiness?” The author, Paul Brunton, from an early age starts seeking the answers for these questions. Having heard about the mystic nature of India, he decides to travel to India in search of a spiritual Guru who can guide him to enlightenment.

What follows after Brunton lands in India is vividly described in this very interesting travelogue on the saints, rishis and the ‘so-called’ fakirs of our country. When I first read about this book in “Ramana Saritham” by Mathura Bharathi, I was greatly excited and wanted to get my hands on this book so that I can learn more about Ramana Maharishi. I also had read somewhere that Brunton is lead to Ramana Maharishi by none other than the Great Sankarachariar (Chandrasekara Swamigal) itself. These two things greatly piqued my interest and I was bracing myself for a great spiritual book. Unfortunately, there are not much of spiritual enlightenments in this book. This book is more about Brunton’s search (Externally & internally) and his experiences during this search. Fortunately, his encounters with so many rishis and saints are captured in such a poignant fashion that the book turns out to be a thoroughly enjoyable read.

Brunton’s eye for detail and his free-flowing narrative – with details so evocative that they spread the image right in front of your eyes- should be considered the hallmark of this book. Brunton, having been trained in the western school of sciences, is no blind believer and he keeps questioning the mysterious things that he comes across till a proper conclusion is reached. This aspect of his lends a great deal of authenticity to his recordings.

Being a person of British origin & with the time of the travelogue happening to be pre-independence, a little amount of superiority complex does seep through and shows up in a couple of places. It is a very minor irritant or a non-factor when compared to the brilliant narration of his experiences.

Bottom Line: If you are looking for a spiritually enlightening book, this book might not be a good choice; but if you are looking for a free flowing narrative interspersed with glowing accounts of the greatness of the spiritual background of our country, then this book is a must read.

The 'zoomed' in flower

The photography course that I have joined is indeed helping me! I would have never 'planned' and 'executed' such a photo without the training that I am undergoing. The trick for the photo is to zoom in using a telephoto lens (I used a 300mm lens) and to have a wide aperture (5.6mm) to throw everything other than the intended subject totally out of focus. I could not completely cut out the wall in front of the flower and is a minor irritant in an otherwise nice photo (According to me, obviously!!!)

Book Fair 2009 -- The Haul!!!

Book fair in Chennai is something that I eagerly wait for every year. With each passing year, the number of books that I set out to purchase keeps increasing. The remarkable thing about the Chennai book fair is that the number of stalls that are being put up is also steadily increasing every year. This time, I found that the number of stalls selling Tamil books outnumbered the stalls selling English books. I was not able to find some of the English books that I set out to purchase like "Into The Wild" and books of George Orwell. I think I will buy these books online and start using the book fair for buying Tamil books alone!!! Given below is the list of books that I got this time.

Tamil Books

Koovam Nathi Karaiyinilae -- Cho Ramasamy
Zen Thathuva Kathaigal -- Guruji Vasudev
China Thathuva Kathaigal -- Guruji Vasudev
Thaneer Desam -- Vairamuthu
Kaakitha Malargal -- Aadhavan
Theivathin Kural (Part II)

English Books

Business Plans for Dummies
White Tiger -- Aravind Adiga
The inheritance of loss -- Kiran Desai
A search in secret India -- Paul Brunton

Thana-Nana Thaana-Nana: Yaar Yaar Sivam

The best thing about some songs is that it connects with you in a highly emotional level that it is virtually impossible for you to distance yourself from those songs. When a song connects with you not because of the singing or the music but due to the lyrics, you can be very sure that the song would connect with you at all times. Yaar yaar sivam from “Anbae Sivam” is one such song that has done wonders to me.

I am not sure when I started paying attention to the lyrics of this song; may be it was when my brother-in-law pointed it out to me. Or may be when I started questioning the philosophy of God. May be it was when I started realizing the importance of the greatest invention of man – namely God himself. The time of my realization of the truth of these lyrics is really immaterial. What is NOT immaterial is the eternal truth that is contained in these lyrics by Vairamuthu. The fact that the world would be a better place when people start loving one another casting aside their differences cannot be stated in a more simple and yet powerful way. When I read in “The Zahir” by Paulo Coelho that this world keeps spinning because of the existence of love in this world, I did not understand it completely at that point of time in my life. Now I am slowly realizing what it means. And then there is the small introduction that comes in the Pandavas background score. “When man gives up hatred and learns to love one another, peace and joy will rule this world”. Those statements and this song take additional significance at this juncture in time when India is struggling to come to terms with the unprecedented terrorist attack on its soil. I only hope that people listen to this song & spread the wings of love across borders.

The song

யார் யார் சிவம்? நீ நான் சிவம்.
வாழ்வே தவம் . அன்பே சிவம்.

ஆத்திகம் பேசும் அடியார்க்கெல்லாம் சிவமே அன்பாகும்.
நாத்திகம் பேசும் நல்லவருக்கோ அன்பே சிவமாகும்.

அன்பே சிவம் அன்பே சிவம் என்றும்,
அன்பே சிவம் அன்பே சிவம் எங்கும்.

இதயம் என்பது சதை தான் என்றால் எரிதழல் தின்று விடும்.
அன்பின் கருவி இதயம் என்றால் சாவை வென்று விடும்.

அன்பின் பாதை சேர்ந்தவருக்கு முடிவே இல்லையடா,
மனதின் நீளம் எதுவோ அதுவே வாழ்வின் நீளமடா.


Translation
(Thanks to Sampath for helping with the translation)

Who are all God? You and me are God.
Life is a penance. Love is God.

For theist God is love.
For atheist love is God.

Love is God love is God eternally,
Love is God love is God universally.

If heart is just made of skin, it becomes a mortal thing;
If heart is an instrument of love, it becomes an immortal being.

Anyone who has taken the path of love has no end;
And their longevity amounts to the expanse of their hearts.

Poster Creator

Found this cool website where I can create my own posters. It's an awesome website. The only problem is that it allows very less options for manipulating the font size and other stuff. Check it out.....

Vaaranam Aayiram -- Movie Review

The most interesting aspect about life is that "it goes on" without waiting for anyone or anything. You can either move on with it or can be left behind to ruminate on the past. When bad things happen, life does not appear to be easy and it is a simple task to be left behind. As someone said "It is not that great men do not fall. It is that they always rise up after their fall". To raise up, dust yourself and keep moving forward requires tremendous will power. This will power or effort to move on either comes from somewhere inside( 'Heart'', as they say) or through an external trigger. Vaaranam Aayiram is one such life journey of a man who overcomes a sad event in his life to become a successful person.

Make no mistake. Vaaranam Aayiram (A thousand elephants) is all about Surya, the actor. He occupies each and every frame in the movie. Some people felt that it was a overdose of a good thing but somehow I never felt that way. Until someone mentioned it, I had not even realized that Surya was virtually present in almost all the scenes in the movie. When Surya can carry a junk movie like "Vel" on his shoulders making that stupid movie watchable, one can easily imagine what he can do when he is offered a movie with a very good plot. He almost lives as those characters and to even mention that he has acted as those two characters is a disrespect to his effort.

If Surya is one of the Heroes of the movie, the other 'unsung' hero of the movie is Harris Jeyaraj. The songs & background score are top-notch and it is really sad to hear that Harris & Gautham Menon will not be working together anymore. I am not sure whether Harris J or Gautham M is the bigger loser but I am confident that the biggest losers would be music lovers like me.

The picturization by Ratnavelu of the songs "Nenjukul" and "Adiyae Koluthe" will remain in my eyes for quite sometime. Then there is Sameera Reddy!!! Do I have to even mention that she looked very beautiful? The surprising thing is that she does a decent job even in the department of acting. This was something that I had not expected and I am very confident of seeing more of Sameera Reddy in several more Tamil movies.

One of the major complaints that I have against this movie is the screenplay. It just failed to keep me continously engrossed. Did Gautham M think that having a screenplay that had few interesting scenes now & then interspersed with lots of dull & flat scenes to be an accurate portrayal of life itself? Whatever the reasoning behind the lousy screenplay, it could turn out to be the difference between a hit & a flop.

Last Cut: Is it a movie that is a must-watch? Of course NOT. But this movie can be watched once for the performance of Surya and the songs. You might have to fight the urge to doze off or walk away at times but trust me, it will be worth the effort!!!

Rating: 7.5/10

The World Is Flat -- Book Review

Author: Thomas Friedman

It is the U.S economic crisis and I am trying real hard to get to the core of the problem and my limited (or lack of) economic knowledge was proving to be a huge dampener. My friend gave some pointers and during that discussion, he pointed me in the direction of this book. I downloaded a copy of this book and read a few pages right away. The introduction was immensely impressive and luckily for me, I found a copy of this book in my company’s library.

The main theme of this book is about how the great technological leaps of the last 2 to 3 decades have made the world an even playing field. Friedman describes the various flattening forces – from the fall of the Berlin wall to the rise of google – that made this even playing field possible. While I was aware of some of these things (Outsourcing, off-shoring), some of the things (in-forming) were completely new to me. The various real life examples that Friedman gives are what makes this book a great read. Be it the person from Lebanon who starts his own business there or the person in Karnataka who works for the uplifting of untouchables, the examples provide a very clear idea of these concepts and the advantages of a flat world.

Like everything else in life, the flat world also brings its own set of problems to the table. One of the major problems we will have to face is that of terrorists communicating with each other in the same seamless fashion that people of the world are able to communicate because of the changed playing field. The author does an excellent job in pointing out the issues that come out of a flat world and also offers some practical solutions for solving these issues.

Two things struck me during the reading of this book and made me think quite a bit.

1) The similarity of ideas between those presented in this book and that of Obama’s plans. Having actively followed the U.S election campaigns, the similarity between these two was striking and did not allow me to brush aside the similarity as something coincidental. Has Obama read this book and been influenced by it so much that it creeps its way into his plans?

2) The economic meltdown in U.S, the reasons for the meltdown and the appearance of the same pattern in India. When people who have climbed to the top through hard work & perseverance begins to forget/ignore the basic tenets and start to assume that their stay in the top is assured, the great fall to the bottom is not far away. This is a theme that is clearly laid out in this book. The present generation in India seems to be bracing itself for this fall because it has started assuming that getting a job or making money is an easy task and starting to forget the basic tenets that brought us to this position in the first place.

One of the best things that have happened to me after reading this book is that it made me realize the power of the flat world and enabled me to think of ways to harness this power for my personal and professional growth. When a book does this to you, it can be safely assumed that the book has indeed left an indelible mark on you.

Vaaranam Aayiram -- Music Review

Music by: Harris Jayaraj

Annal Maelae (Sudha Raghunathan) -- A soft song sung that it is almost like a carnatic song with a simple tabla background that slowly evolves into a pleasant yet minimal orchestration. Don't miss out on the haunting flute interlude after the first paragraph. Nothing to complain about in this song. Nothing impressive either. Allow the song to play.

Ava Enna (Karthik, V.Prasanna) -- It starts like a soft Kuthu song!!! (What a paradox). It is simple and yet beautiful. What is different about this song from the regular kuthu songs is the lyrics. Clean meanigful lyrics is not something that we associate with a Kuthu but this one breaks that tradition. A tune that might not make you go out and dance but a song that would surely make you sway your head in appreciation. The ending of the song is where I was not very comfortable with as the tune seem to have got lost with some stupid voices in the background. Other than that, this is a song that can be enjoyed. Allow this song to play.

Yethi Yethi (Benny Dayal, Naresh Iyer, Solar Sai) -- Sounds very similar to 'Ohh Maama Maama' when the song begins but soon starts to go in a different path. There is also one particular point where it sounds like 'Taxi Taxi'. Interspersed with the 'usual' Harris funny sounds. The differnce between this song and the others is the use of English words in the lyrics. Go for the forward button.

Mundhinam (Naresh Iyer, Prashanthini) -- Starts with a dialogue rendition by Surya. As always, Surya has trouble with 'zha'!!! Naresh Iyer breezes through this beautiful duet. And the voice of Prashanthini is so sweet and she pronounces the words perfectly(and so much better than the Tamil killing Madhushree's). The prelude is something that has to be enjoyed in peace with a headphone. Then, there comes the interlude that rises the bar for the song a few notches. Then there is the so easy on the ear singing. Even for the complex words, they sing it so lightly without killing the word. An amazing song. Go for the rewind button once the song gets over.

Nenjukkul Peidhidum (Hariharan, Devan, V.Prasanna) -- With clear traces of 'Mudhal Naal Indru', at the beginning, I was having apprehensions of how this song will turn out to be. What turns out is a mesmerizing number with the soothing voice of Hariharan. The vintage Hariharan is back in this song and with HJ, they create magic. This song is indeed a drizzle in the hearts. Go for the rewind button once the song gets over. Over & over again!!!

Adiyae Kolluthey (Krish, Benny Dayal, Shruthi Hassan) -- This song has been there in the net for sometime now. I was not sure at that time whether this song is from 'Vaaranam Aayiram' but now I am sure. The song starts like a rock music live in concert. Did you like 'Uyirin Uyirae'? If yes, then you would love this song. Shruti Haasan gives perfect company to Krish & Benny Dayal. If you were shaking head for 'Ava Enna' song, I am confident that you will be dancing for this song. The 3 distinctive voices are beautifully interwoven to produce yet another brilliant song. Any doubt on what you should do? Its obvious.Go for the rewind button once the song gets over.

Oh! Shanthi Shanthi (Clinton, S.P.B.Charan) -- This is one song that tOtally caught me by surprise. It starts like a pathos song, then moves over to be a fast paced song and then again keeps switching tones. SPB Charan does what we have always associated with his illustrious father. The singing while smiling or smiling while singing is a trademark SPB signature and Charan does that to perfection in this song. A great way to finish this album. Go for the rewind button once the song gets over. An even better solution would be to put the last 4 songs in a loop in your winamp.

Perfect tamil lyrics, simple yet haunting tunes, brilliant interludes and unobtrusive music are what we have come to associate Harris Jayaraj's music with. And when HJ works with Gautham Menon, it has always brought out some mesmerizing songs. Combined with the stills that I have seen for this movie, the music definitely raises the expectations for the movie. Harris Jayaraj along with Thamarai have indeed delivered what were expected of them.

Last Shout: Buy 2 CD's of this album. I am sure that one of them will get wasted because of all the rewinds and revisits.

US Presidential Elections

It is always fun to follow politics in the US and if it happens to be an election year, it is double the fun. The freedom that the media enjoys here is unheard/unthinkable of in India. The presidential candidates are openly made fun of in TV and as long as the hosts of these TV shows don't cross the unmentioned taboo line, it is taken as part of the game. The other day, David Letterman was going crazy about John McCain missing his late night show. Then there is also the 'Saturday Night Live' show where Sarah Palin was getting teared apart. If any of the TV stations back in India try this, they can be very sure that their TV stations would be ransacked the very next day. Sadly, what Shankar showed in 'Mudhalvan' movie really does happen in India. How I wish that Indian media also gets this kind of freedom and do this kind of coverage. There is no doubt that the media in India is getting powerful by the day but the only thing that I am hoping for is that the media houses do not start abusing the vast powers that get vested on them.

Manal Kayiru -- Tamil Movie

Disclaimer: This is not a movie review of ‘Manal Kayiru’.

I found a website that had some of the old Tamil movies which I had not watched in a long time. There was 'Manal Kayiru' in there and it was so much fun to watch this movie. Visu had his heydays in the Tamil movie industry and this movie is one good example of why he was so highly successful at that time. A simple plot, a well knit screenplay, dialogues that sit well with the audience and a cast that fits the role to a ‘T’ are the hallmarks of a Visu movie and this movie is no different. The plot is a rather simple one of S.V.Sekar laying down 8 conditions for his future wife and the situations that arise once Visu gets S.V.Sekar married to a girl who does not satisfy even one of his conditions.

When I watched this movie, the one thing that immediately struck me is the way in which the maturity of the audience has increased over the years. A typical example of this happens during a dream sequence. S.V.Sekar has not yet seen the girl that his sister and Visu are constantly talking about and he starts dreaming about her. As he has not seen her photo till that point, the dream sequence does not show her face. All that it shows are the legs and the torso of a girl dancing in the beach. This directorial touch is very obvious but in the next scene, S.V.Sekar says it loud that he is not able to see her face to make sure that the audience understands why her face was not shown! I also could remember how during the days of Bheem singh, when the hero/heroine took a bottle of poison, not only it had ‘Visham’ written on it in bold fonts but the hero would also talk for a minute about the poison to ensure that everyone understood. Then came the period of Bhagyaraj when he just zoomed in on the bottle of poison (The ‘Visham’ in bold fonts was still intact) and then the person (both hero & heroine in the case of Bhagyaraj) would drink it without any dialogues. Then it was Balachander with his ‘touch’. The heroine would search for a bottle from a wooden shelf and would pour their contents into her mouth. No dialogues. No close up shots. No tears. Then finally, we have Bala. Scene one. He shows the heroine talking sadly to someone. Scene two. The camera pans into a room and we have the dead body of the heroine lying there (Remember Sethu?) No explicit explanations. No dramatizations. Just the facts. This change in direction would not have come about without the audience being introduced slowly to these changes. I am hoping that there would be even more changes that enables Tamil movie industry to come up with really world class movies.

According To Me -- US Economy

This post is not to talk about whether the US government should dole out $700 billion to bail out the Wall street. Did you guys think that I had so much knowledge to talk about all these things? The only thing that I clearly understood after reading all the news for the last 3-4 days about the financial situation is that I have no idea about economics! When I tried to research more into the topic, I got even more confused......

Can someone explain to me all this in 'english'? I mean, the only thing that I can understand is that it is going to change the game radically. Whether it is for the good or bad, I have no way of knowing. Will this affect India? It is going to affect India is the simple answer. That is one thing that I am very sure of. When US catches a cold, the whole of India sneezes BIG time. And this seems to be a time when US seems to have caught a pretty bad cold. (The pun when considered with the picture above is surely unintended!)

(And I found the below picture right after I finished this posting. It was too good and so simple that I have decided to add this picture as well to the post)

Guide to 35mm photography -- Book Review

This is not a book review per se as I have still not completed this book. The main reason that I am writing about this book is for the simple reason that I find this book to be fascinating. Any amateur photographer would really appreciate this book for this has all the needed information for understanding the basics of a camera. The concepts like aperture, shutter speed, focal length, exposure, depth of field and so many other things that I have never heard of are given in a succinct fashion. Each of these topics covering not more than 2 pages (The book is also a small one) and with lots of examples, it is very easy for a person to follow. The best way to learn from this book is to carry it in the hand when someone sets out on their photographic expedition. A very good companion. A 'MUST HAVE' reference book for anyone who is interested in photography.

Usain 'Lightning' Bolt

Alright. The image above is not some trial run. It is the Olympics games 100m race and I had all the rights to expect a close finish. And what I saw was a stunning display of one man's greatness. Bolt was ahead after 80m and he even slowed down to look around and thump his chest! What a race and what a man. (Am waiting for the 200m race to see what 'lightning' can do there)

Macro Mode Photography

The beauty of 'Macro Mode' photography in full bloom! A close-up shot of a flower. Each and every strain of the flower is visible in this photo. This book is definitely helping me a lot nowadays to take better snaps. Check it out.

Livonia -- Take One

Photo #1

Photo #1: The angle from which this photo was taken is almost perfect. The two odd looking pink flowers at the foreground of the white flowers seem to highlight the white flowers at the background.

Photo #2

Photo #2: The ducks appeared as though they were giving me a modeling session. They kept appearing at all the right places for me to capture their photos. This one was taken using the beach mode and it has really come out well.

Photo #3

Photo #3: I would rate this as one of the best photos that I have taken till now. I took a lottt of photos of the ducks but this one stands out for the angle of the shot. The camera was brought down to the ground level so that the grass looked blurred. Luckily for me, the duck's eye was perfectly obtained as the focus point. (Check out the full size photo by clicking on the photo to see it for yourself)

Photo #4

Photo #4: Again the angle of photo making a lot of difference to the final output. It would have been perfect if not for the car that shows up in the background. I tried a lot of angles for eliminating the car from the picture but this is the best I could get........

Dasavathaaram -- Movie Review

First things first. A salute to the hardwork, dedication and sincerity of Kamal Haasan. It shows in each & every frame of the movie. Hats off to him.

Kamal has this rather irritating dichotomy; One side of this dichotomy is the serious filmamker who (over)indulges in his creative ability and produces classics like Hey Ram, Anbe Sivam & Virumaandi. Then there is the other side when he flips over to mindless comedy movies like Panchathanthiram, Vasool Raaja and Thenali. The interesting aspect to his dichotomy is the commercial viability - Hey Ram was one of the biggest flops while Vasool Raaja had a decent box office draw. Kamal has always struggled in getting the ingredients right for a movie that could satisfy both the mass and the class audience. With Dasavathaaram, he seems to have got that combination. Take the best aspects of movies like Anbe Sivam, Panchathanthiram, Virumaandi and make them into a formula for a succesful movie - you would probably end up with Dasavathaaram.

Dasavathaaram is about life itself and the interlinks that it creates.Each and every one of us in this world is linked to every other person in the world in either a direct or an indirect fashion. Dasavathaaram starts from the 12th century where Rangarajan Nambi, a Vaishnavite, is tied to a stone statue of Vishnu and left to die in the sea. The story then moves to a biotechnology lab in USA where a team of scientists have just produced a new form of virus that is deadlier than anthrax. As things always happen, the vial containing the virus falls into the wrong hands and it is upto Kamal to save the people from absolute disaster. Kamal's journey starts from USA and finally ends on the shores of one of the Indian beaches on 26th Dec 2004, the day when Tsunami struck. He meets various people(Other Kamal Haasan's, to be exact) during his roller coaster ride to save the nation. The body language, the accent, the makeup & the costumes of each one of these Kamal characters is different and showcases the homework that has gone into the visualization and creation.

Kamal has put his heart & soul into this venture and the movie is yet another proof of his versatility. One of the grouches that I had is that Kamal goes over the top in the old lady and George Bush portrayals. Asin, the heroine, is needlessly portrayed as a dumb person with no compassion. This, I felt, was needless and may be some more effort could have gone in the etching of this important character.

This movie also brings into limelight the story, screenplay & dialogue writing skills of Kamal. K.S.Ravikumar, the director, deserves equal amounts of credit for making this movie possible. The art direction is brilliant and the initial scene at the 12th century temple premises is a case in point. The graphics, which was touted as world class before the movie's release, is adequate. It is definitely not in par with some of the english movies but on comparison to other tamil movies, it is definitely in a higher plane (Watch out for the graphics and the temple set seamlessly integrating in the 12th century temple scene).The background score is a big letdown as it does not enhance the visuals. Devi Sree Prasad must have felt satisfied to allow the visuals on the screen to dominate and the background score is not appealing. The camera of Ravi Varma was patchy in a few places (Or was it the fault of the projectors?); apart from these glaring mistakes, the camera work is brilliant as the number of shots required would have been enormous to capture the different Kamal's characters. The 'Mukunda' song is already a big hit and 'Kallai Mattum Kandal' & 'Oh Ho Sanam' might get added to this list very soon. The fact that Himesh Reshmaiyya, a person of North Indian origin, has given a touching song like 'Kallai Mattum Kandal' is ample proof for his talent.

All said & done, is this a perfect movie? The answer is a definite 'NO'. The screenplay, while racy and kept us waiting for the next scene, had glitches and some scenes were not given a proper closure. The non-linear narration of the story, a brilliantly executed one, did not help the matters much in some cases as there were some loose ends that went unanswered.

Rating: 8.5/10

(P.S: I am an ardent fan of Kamal & hence this review has its fair share of 'personal' bias)

Eight Verses for Training the Mind

With a determination to accomplish

The highest welfare for all sentient beings
Who surpass even a wish-granting jewel

I will learn to hold them supremely dear.

Whenever I associate with others

I will learn To think of myself as the lowest among all

And respectfully hold others to be supreme

From the very depths of my heart.

In all actions I will learn to search into my mind

And as soon as an afflictive emotion arises

Endangering myself and others

Will firmly face and avert it.

I will learn to cherish beings of bad nature

And those oppressed by strong sins and suffering

As if I had found a precious

Treasure very difficult to find.

When others out of jealousy treat me badly

With abuse, slander, and so on,

I will learn to take on all loss,

And offer victory to them.

When one whom I have benefited with great hope

Unreasonably hurts me very badly,

I will learn to view that person

As an excellent spiritual guide.

In short, I will learn to offer to everyone without exception

All help and happiness directly and indirectly

And respectfully take upon myself

All harm and suffering of my mothers.

I will learn to keep all these practices

Undefiled by the stains of the eight worldly conceptions

And by understanding all phenomena as like illusions

Be released from the bondage of attachment.

(I found this poem in a book about Dalai Lama. I had got this book from a second hand book shop for Rs.30 and was just browsing through it for relaxation from the heaviness of reading '1984' by George Orwell. Check out this link to get a deeper understanding of this poem.)

Thana-Nana Thaana-Nana: Ennai Thaalata Varuvaalo

It is the 2nd year of my B.E degree and I had just started working on my GRE wordlist. It was in this wordlist that I first came upon the word 'ubiquitous'. My way of remembering these complex words is to come up with a sentence of my own using some incidents or things that I can easily relate to. And it is no surprise that I associated this word to the song "Ennai Thaalata Varuvaalo" at that time. The penetration of this song at that time was so deep at that time there was not a place where this song could not be heard. Local tea shops, town & city buses, hostels had this song blasting out at every possible occasion. The image that I get when I hear the song these days is the walk that I had to take from my 2nd year hostel to the college mess. In my college, the 2nd year hostel is located farthest from the mess and we need to travel through the 3rd year hostel and go between the 1st & 4th year hostel blocks to reach the mess. During a 2 to 3 month period, not a day passed without hearing this song during that walk from my hostel to the mess. Invariably, one of the hostel blocks had this song playing from their tape recorders.

The greatest compliment to this song is that I never seem to get bored of it. Many songs regularly find a place in my winamp 'Repeat' list but only a few songs retain their flavor even after years of repeated listening. Vijay appearing in different T-shirts and the scene of Vijay kicking a piece of twig will always remain etched in my memory along with the days of walking through the hostel blocks with my plate towards the college mess. Some memories like these are forever engraved in our minds like beautiful idols on the facade of a majestic temple.

According To Me: Greatest Book Ever

I have this list of top 100 books (fiction & non-fiction) that I got from a website. My search these days - to a small extent atleast - consist of searching for these books in libraries and old book shops. I suddenly got this question on what is the greatest book that I have read till now & what would be the best book that I would read in my lifetime?

I somehow feel that 'life' on earth and the interactions of people would be the greatest book that I will ever get to read. All the books (the literal ones) that I have read till now & will be reading in the future seems to me to be just a preparation for me to understand this beautiful book of life that God has written for all of us to read, learn and understand. I am sure that my friend who is a bigtime movie buff would have also realized that the most astounding piece of movie that he ever gets to watch would be the great play called life that the director God plays out for each of us. May be it is God's way of training each of us to understand life in our own sweet terms. My intuition says that there would come a point in my life when I should throw away all my books(hard & soft copies) and start immersing myself in this 'life' book; for that is where my greatest learning would come from.