LAB Cultural SKIT

Before the curtains are drawn for the year 2008, We(FEL-FUN Team) decided to host a skit, making a comical parody of the events and people here. We started a week back, and came out with a brilliant script wherein some real people out here were mimicked. Preparing the script as a team was a fantastic experience for me, especially it made me to understand how tough it would be to write, screenplay and direct accordingly.

I took up the role of an employee and the main crux in that is I had to dance for a telugu song(aa ante amalapuram) and enact for a Hindi song(jo tumko ho pasand) The Dumb-C played during my school days helped me in acting properly throughout, but the dance part still eluded me. Trying hard, yesterday night to memorize some dance steps placed me in a better position and the skit performance hogged the limelight.

Infact, appreciations started pouring in from all sides, from Lab director & other section managers too and a meet-up to appreciate our efforts also took place.The other cultural events like the solo song and group dance made the cultural a grand success. Now I realize how much fun I had lost in my college days by not participating in any cultural events!!! The SKIT was videotaped and right now I am playing that again & again

gearing up for Potluck Lunch and further

Hmmm, Last minute preparations for the Potluck lunch took off from the FEL's Fun Team and as usual I was asked to design the poster yesterday evening. Totally helpless, I started from scratch last night and gave the finishing touches in the morning. unlike last time, this poster got so much of attention and appreciation.

The screen is set for the D-Day, but the main thing still lies in cooking something and taking over to the office tomorrow. Armed with nothing but a burfi recipe I am planning to sweep many off their feet. Let me see whether the ONE is getting sweeped or not!?!

Jogging isn't my piece of cake!!! (Part - II & concluding part)

YAWN!!! That was interrupted by a Final Year girl chipping into our class, when the boring afternoon sessions were going on in full swing. she made the announcement for the "TCE MARATHON RUN" for world peace or something. We were in the second year by then, and somewhat excited we gave our names. The run was scheduled to start by 5:45AM from Germanus Days Inn entrance and supposed to end in our college for guys and for the fairer sex it was to start somewhere near Pykara. Now everyone joined in the run with their own ulterior motives like.......freebies :) Sriram was reluctant to join because of his wheezing problem, but I saw to it that he was there in the race too.

And so I got up early in the morning woke up my roomates in hostel(Sriram, Hariprasad and Yuvaraj) The former two murmured and got up, the latter cursed like anything in some foreign language :) and went to bed again. Our college had arranged the college bus to drop us at the CSI church near to Germanus, and I was irritated for they had worked out even the finer details like arranging separate buses for Boys and girls :( There they were, in the midst of the crowd subramani, our super senior Bamu with high levels of adrenalin and flaunting the T-Shirt given as part of the Race. Shocked to hear that the Freebies were over, we(myself, sriram and hariprasad) started looking around for some guys of our sort for the race, but before we could find any, our principal had flagged off the Marathon.

We were with the crowd initially and Bamu ran along with us and when we came near the Aparna Towers(400 Mtr from starting point) I made the first Pit stop. From then on there was no more running, only pit stops one after another near to places like Raymond showroom etc. By this time Bamu got irritated and started advancing ferociously. By the time we had covered some 1KM, I can safely confirm that we were the last ones in the race and we could not even see the runners in front of us anywhere near the horizon :) It was around 6:25AM

Totally dejected, I turned around seeking for some help from someone, Goddess Meenakshi came to our rescue!!!

We were standing opposite to Madurai Meenakshi Bhavan on the By-Pass-Road. A look at Hariprasad told me that he too had what I had in mind. Then by Veto we overpowered sriram and he too budged. We turned the course of the Marathon and the three runners were spotted running through the entrance of Madurai Meenakshi Bhavan as early as 6:30AM. The watchman told us that it would take another one hour for the Tiffin to get ready. No probs was our reply and we sat and started chatting coolly. By 7:30AM we got our Pooris and then we helped ourselves with the second serving and finished off the Breakfast with a cup of Coffee. Slowly and clearly evading the refreshment centers set up for Marathon(In fact, they were already packing the stuffs) and also any college guys from spotting us coming out of Meenakshi Bhavan, we reached Palanganatham by walk.

We boarded the bus and were glad that we had given a nice slip and happy over the fact we had been saved from the embarrassment if anyone had spotted us when we came out of the hotel or when we had boarded the bus.We were quite sure that by now the Marathon would have ended and people would safely be in the respective classes for the sessions to commence. Clad in Tracks or rather Pyjamas, some local sports shoe and T- shirt we got down from the bus HORRORSTUCK!!!! The whole college was in the bus stop!!! Our Principal had cancelled the first two periods because of the run and people were going back to their house and hostels to change their dresses!!! Most of the good looking girls of that time were there giggling at us. And our set guys, would they be left far behind somewhere?? they were also there roaring with laughter. We dashed towards our hostel and by the afternoon we entered our class only to hear fresh peels of laughter from both the sides.

After one year, one Final guy asked for excuse and entered into the class. I started looking at the ceiling to avoid Sriram's glare who was sitting next to me when the announcement was being made for the next series of "TCE MARATHON" :)

Jogging isn't my piece of cake!!! (Part - I)

It was one of the chilly wee hours in the month of December 1992, as decided, myself and my cousin got up for jogging for the first time in our lives.My mother was already up and putting that big Kolam(that month being Margazhi, nice day chosen for jogging isn't it??)My cousin was already in his mid teens and I was barely a 7 year old kid by that time.I am still unsure of his motive as why he came up all of a sudden with an Idea to go for jogging..Hmmph so clad in a full hand shirt and a full size pant, and a sweater + scarf + BATA white canvas shoe(no nike, RBK those days) to wad off the cold we started off. My sister knew already that it is not going to take us any where and she didn't bother to join us.(In fact she doesn't involve in anything that is done before 7 AM :) ) We saw to it that we woke up everyone in the house, Grandfather, father, paternal uncle et all.

They all stood by the door as though they are flagging off an marathon event, and finally we started by 4:45 AM amidst the downpour of advice from all sides.At that time we were staying in BHEL Quarters, Trichy. Our aim was to reach the Training centre,(a place in BHEL) By the time we turned round the corner, our pet dog spotted us and he had a quizzical look in this face that could only mean "What the HELL are these two BOZOs up to in this unearthly hours?" Eventually, two runners became three and we moved on..Whenever any yelping of any other street dog came through, our dog used to cut that off with a sharp bark.

By now we had reached my school and I was no longer jogging and my cousin was grudgingly walking along with me after his morale boosting vehement encouragements failed to move my leg any faster. It was those days when not many used to go for jogging(when you have office(BHEL) by 7:40AM who would?) The milkwallas and newspaper Boys were whizzing past us to supply the commodity.When we were somewhat nearer to the Park in the double garage road I could no longer bear the brunt and I started pestering my cousin to return back.My cousin and myself settled for a rescheduled destination to reach ie, the present Thiruvalluvar Roundana in Double garage road.

Finally, after some umpty number of Pit stops on the benches by the roadside, and my cousin's continued persistence we reached the rescheduled destination.By this time, the Sun was rising(6:25AM), and it lighted up the sky in varied hues.Enjoying the Sun's first rays falling upon us and much to the disgust of my cousin, I started collecting the flowers that had bloomed on the central divider in the double garage road and also on the road side exposed, low hanging branches from the residence quarters. If we are caught plucking the flowers, the inmates of the house would obviously leave off the 7 year old cute kid from scolding, but not the 15 year old. Keeping his heart in his mouth, he watched tensely as I collected different varieties of flowers.When we finally decided to turn back home, it was around 7:15AM. My cousin was relieved that we had not been caught by any for plucking the flowers and he looked forward for a nice walk back home.

But fate extinguished his desire, my paternal uncle and my father had come in their scooters looking out for us. I enjoyed this not very expected Free ride from the back of the scooter and clearly avoiding my cousin's glaring eyes. By the time we reached home, my grandfather started scolding my cousin for taking so long to return back(It is always good when one is not the oldest). For a change, now it was my Mother's turn to add up some ginger to my cousin's plight. she had made sorasam (a juice made from Ginger etc, good for health, but the taste really sucks!!!) We were forced to gulp that down to maintain good health. That afternoon, after lunch my cousin went to bed to take a small nap, I dutifully followed him and asked "Super ah irunthuthu da inniki kaathala!!! Naalaikum Pollama?? (It was really super today morning, shall we go tomorrow too?)" But the reply never came.

In the next part, I would recount my next jogging session when I was in college!!!

Jog Falls - Murudeshwar - Kollur - Sringeri Itinerary

Inmates : 9 People
(Myself,Senthil,Prabhu,Rajesh,

Shyam,KB,Venkat,Pramod,deivapalan)

Commuting in koramangala @ Prabhu anna's house, has always been our routine, and this time it was no exception.Boarding the Tempo Traveller we started from Bangalore by 9:30.As we travelled through the NH-206 Bangalore - Shimoga, it seemed we were the only ones
travelling in that direction on the totally isolated uninhabited highway. When the Highway was not arrayed with any Tea shops/Petrol Bunks/Mechanic puncture shops, the weirdness in our minds soared. By
3:00 we crossed Shimoga and we stopped @ Laxmi Lodge,a mediocre inn @ sagar for refreshing. we started again by 8:30 and reached Jog Falls in an hour.At first the massiveness of the falls didnt strike us.

We trekked through the unlaid, stone path to the bottom of the falls.The mammoth height of the falls and man's miniature standing made us realize the sheer size of the drop.After taking photos we retreated back, Extinguishing our desires to venture out into the waters.The return to the top was a torturous one, especially for Faint hearts, we thought we could never make it any sooner :) Once at the top, we moved towards Murudeshwar and booked a 3 - 3 bedrooms for 350 each. We rested for a while and then dragged ourselves to the beach.

Murudeshwar Temple is put up in the midst of the beach and the view from the mound is a beauty.After playing Football for some time we came came back to the lodge to refresh and started again to visit the temple.The Temple Gopura is 249 Feet surpassing Srirangam's Raja Gopura of 236 ft, but the base is not as huge as in Srirangam.We barely made it on time before the temple closed by 8:15PM.After having the dinner at Naveen Beach Hotel, we went to sleep like logs in the lodge.

Next morning, i made a rendezvous to the top of the mound to capture some snaps and soon after we started to Kollur Mookambiga temple.Kollur temple's style and custom resembled that of the one practiced in Kerala.Next we made an vain attempt to reach Sringeri temple (one of the four mutts started by Adi sankara) before it closes, through the Agumbe(of Malgudi days Fame) route.We took some breath taking pics at the sunset point in Agumbe and moved on planning to make a dedicated trip to Agumbe sometime later.Since the temple was closed. we justed visited the Temple complex and the River Tunga by its side.The fishes in the Banks are really HUGE and needs special mention.There are two temples inside the Temple complex, one built with the South Indian style having the sharadambal deity.Another one is of a Hoysala structure.

Then we drove to Chickmangalur and then to Bangalore.These two days we had seen ghat roads more than what we had seen in the whole of our lifetime.Mountains, valleys, Fertile River banks, filled the scenary.The Rice cultivation done by means of contour ploughing needs special mention too.This trip turned out to be a Trekking trip + relaxing trip + Pilgrimage too.Too much in one shot.

More than anything else, this time with my new Camera, i was mainly standing behind the Lens rather than in the Front :)

http://picasaweb.google.com/kpraveen85/JogFallsShimoga
http://picasaweb.google.com/kpraveen85/Murudeshwar
http://picasaweb.google.com/kpraveen85/SringeriKollurAgumbe

Its time for the Aperture's Cynosure

Certain interests doesn't pop out of thin air, it grows as one develops.One such was my passion for Photography.It got intense when i made some trips without a camera to picture the rusticated locations.A small chit-chat with a professional photographer of the national geographic gallery calibre brought me some insight into this Art.I narrowly missed being part of the Photographer's forum(special interest group) in college.The bereft of a proper DigiCam during those days atleast prevented that.

Now that, i bought a magnificent marvel from Kodak, this is another dimension in which i have to delve into.The Kodak Z1012 IS is a 10MP camera with 12x Optical Zoom fitted with Schneider-Kreuznach Variogon, f/2.8-4.8 Lens.It is a calculated Risk that i took when i selected this one over Canon S5IS.This could be taken as a signal to check my picasa & Flickr album then and there.Thanks to Ekanth and Prabhu anna for ordering & carrying this Cutie from US :)

Specifications @ http://www.kodak.com/eknec/PageQuerier.jhtml?pq-path=12456&pq-locale=en_US
Reviews @ http://www.digitalcamerareview.com/default.asp?newsID=3527

Rolled out a Poster

Last week i rolled out this poster design for our Lab's Independence day celebration.

Chaotic theory - the buzz word

In all age circles, dasavatharam has penetrated Some are sarcastic about it for not being a Commercial masala, some are acerbitic for the involvement of religion. But look at it, it is a beauty by itself, first time in the Tamil film industry, a physics theory is advocated and illustrated with a storyline and it has become the talk of the town.It is not like a shankar's film with the stereotyped corruption problem as the storyline and the moral of the story being spoon feeded. The beauty of it lies when you do your homework and analyse the storyline for the interwoven chaotic theory. Here is a link to some analysis on the storyline.

The showcasing of Tamil History in the first 20 minutes with the icon character of Ranganatha nambi cant be done any better.When Hollywood derives its film from books like Bourne series, jurassic park etc. why dont the Tamil film industry make a film out of Sivagamin Sapatham, Ponniyin selvan, Paarthiban kanavu?? Dasavatharam effect still lingers in me and i feel Kamal Haasan is the right person for this venture.

Kudos to Kamal Haasan and for his well researched film "DASAVATHARAM". I am not saying all Tamil films should be like this, but it would be good if it is :)

The Malayali Touch

Be it the south indian stranger @ the Cafe Coffee day or the South indian receptionist @ the Computer Gadget store (to name a few), they have popped out the same question, "Chetan malayali yo?" Then with a blush they would accept the fact that i am a Tamilian the moment i tell them.Whether it is by my looks or by my name or by the way i speak tamil leads them to this doubt, i dont know. To get to the bottom of this, i had my ancestral line under the scanner, only to find that my Grandfather's sister's grandson is the closest in blood line who happens to reside in Kerala :) I also doubt whether i got that touch from the three sorties(comprising of 2 days each) to kerala that i did in the whole of my lifetime. A tamilian in reality, and a malayali by recognition, cool!!! i am enjoying this dual "States"manship as long as it leads me to something good and worthwhile. When it happens to be the North Indians across the desk, they have no problem in identifying,because they use the rule of generalization.Madrasi is the term coined by them for anyone from the four southern states of India(Madrasi => People from the province of Madras during the British rule.Sixty years of independence, four states have formed in the south, Madras got liquidated into Chennai, still the same name lingers for anyone from the south)By coincidence the Northies gets my state's capital right, and then i would go on to tell them that i am not a chennaivaasi(Resident of Chennai) but from the state of TamilNadu, blah...blah..

கலி காலமடா மனிதா!!!

பேருந்திற்காக காத்திருந்தாலும், தன்னவல் இந்த கூட்டத்தில் இருப்பாலோ என்று
வழி மேல் விழி வைத்தவனை நோக்கி வந்தால்,
தன்னவல் அல்ல, வறுமையினால் "Thin" னவள் கை குழந்தையுடன், கை ஏந்தி
கால் அனா கூட அலக்க மனம் ஒப்பாமல் இருக்கையில் முரையிட்டான் ஒருவன்,
"Excuse me Sir, Could i have your attention for a minute? i am from xyz child foundation blah blah"

கனிசமான ஒரு தொகையை வழஙகிய பின்,
இன்று ஒரு நல்ல காரியம் செய்தோமே என்று எண்ணிக் கொண்டே அவன் மறைய
"ஒரு அற்பனுக்கு பொருள் தராமல் coat போட்ட சுப்பனுக்கு தந்தானே!!!!" என்று
குறை மட்டும் கூரிக் கொண்டே தோன்றியவன் இதை பற்றி "blog" கும் செய்தான்.
கலி காலமடா மானுடா இது கலி கால்மடா!!!

International Tech Park, Bangalore

For today's lunch, our team planned to go out somewhere nearby to eat, and we zeroed up on ITPB's Food court. Most Tamilians would have sighted this in the Film Ghajini where Surya and his PA walks along with a laptop and attends a call from Asin :) This ITPB is built by Ascendas. The plush green grass and the glass buildings looked pretty sophisticated.The Food court, other amenities, and the people coming out for lunch made me think as though we were inside a Mall or something. I wonder how one would get the mood to work from there :)

The wrath against the Software engineers

The Software engineers are the poor souls who end up being criticized, be it in films (Tamizh M.A, Arai En 305il Kadavul) or in the walks of life for the high renumeration package that they are receiving.When it comes to the dilapidated rise of commodities and real estate prices in Chennai and Bangalore, the software engineers are the most bashed.The people on the other side find the high salary unreasonable and undeserving. Point Taken that the higher salary has created the divide, but why spitting the flame at the software engineers who never committed the crime for the divide, the only thing that they did was in selecting computer science as their major in the college. The Real estate people took advantage of the higher salary and rised the prices, the common people who owned the plots earlier took it as a cue and raised instantaneously. At a grocery store people never question why beans are always priced higher than the potato, but they expect every job to have the same salary level.

During the 1960's Government jobs were the most soughted,In the 1970's it was the era of Industrial revolution in India giving ample scope for Civil and Mechanical engineers, 1980's it was the time that a Job in a Bank was the most lucrative, from the 1990's the craze for being a software engineer could be sighted.nobody bashed the previously most soughted jobs of their times.When the employment at the core companies were reaching the brim in the 1990's the alarmingly rising levels of unemployment was extinguished by the IT Industry. Could any industry challenge the IT industry for its ever increasing intake thereby keeping the unemployment levels at its check? In fact because of the higher salary the software engineers falls into the 30% tax slot and end up paying most part of their renumeration as tax, this goes unnoticed by the masses. When Dr.Manmohan singh ruffled the feathers of the Corporates asking them to cut down on the CEO salaries, did he consider whether all the MP's and MLA's in India had a PAN card on their names first of all and declared their asset owning properly? In a System where quota is given based on the caste rather than on the scale of poverty you cant expect anything better.

The Projects of the IT Industry predominantly comes over from Americas and Europe and hence the salary levels are compared with the salaries up there and tried to be in par with them. It might also lead to fluctuations if the foreign currency rate decreases. Due to lack of Domestic market this Industry is highly prone to Various risks like cut-offs and lay-offs. Ever heard of the core company shedding off its employees in thousands?? On parallel lines, this is more like a Stock market where you profit when there is a Bull-run and bear the brunt when there is a Bear-run.Easily said, but the high lucrative package of the software engineers would continue to be grudged untill a new burgeoning industry replaces the IT industry.

Goa Trip - Cavalossim to Baga Beach

The idea of going to Goa got conceived two weeks back and the preparations eventually followed for a 3 day trip to goa from 4th to 7th.

Day-1 : Colva to Majorda Beach
Inmates: myself, Senthil, Musi, Sap, Prabhu, Rajesh, Keyankay, KB, Venkat, SenthilKAS.

Taking the Marmagoa express on friday night, we chugged through the Deccan Plateau and then through the scenic Western Ghats to reach Goa by 1100 hrs. The train went through many tunnels and we had a chance to cite the Dudh-Sagar waterfalls as soon as we entered into the state of Goa.We stayed at the Vailankanni Guest house near the Colva Beach.Colva, a south bound beach in Goa is prominent for the low waves and white sands but it is somewhat isolated.We then proceeded to the colva to take a dip and then started off with the beach volleyball.Lunch was at Josefa's corner, a beach shack.

By Evening due to the non-availability of any motorbikes in the area for hire, we had to dump our plan of going for the Goafest @ the cavelossim beach.But we hired autos to reach Majorda beach relatively nearer to colva. Majorda had only a few takers and is devoid of many refreshment parlours.We watched the sunset over the horizon here and continued on with a dip and football.Instead of taking the auto back to colva, we treaded to colva beach by walk (more than 5 kms) along the beach.@ the colva beach we dug up tunnels and a huge pit, Prabhu anna fell for the trick of measuring the depth of the pit by getting in.We then buried him in it till the hip and took snaps :) Totally exhausted we had our dinner at Sher-e-Punjab.That night followed with a round of playing cards.

Day-2 : Colva to Baga Beach

Next day we hired 5 Honda Activas(Rs 300 per day) and started of to visit the north bound beaches till Arambol (65 Km from colva approx). First hit was the Dona Paula, but instead of the beach we visited the Dona paula Jetty from where we had a good view of the sea below us.The road as it uncoils to the top unveils the scenic beauty of the seas below springled with yachts & boats bordered by palm and coconut trees.From there we reached Panaji(by now we had travelled 30 kms) we crossed the River Mandovi along with our bikes in a Ferry at free of cost provided by the Goa Tourism development.We then set out for the coco beach,the most isolated one where waves could not be found in the water.Here we set out on a Boat to spot the dolphins @ 100 per head. Yeah, we spotted some dolphins and then the ship's captain :) set out on a sight seeing tour showing us the Palace owned by a malaysian, Kingfisher's Cruise, Aguada Jail, Portuguese building ruins etc.

Having our Lunch at the Octopus, we visited the Aguada fort, a portuguese strong-hold in their times.Now it holds a Light-house nothing more.Taking some snaps of the sea atop the highly forted walls, we started towards Sinquerim beach.Sinquerim is a visibily rough beach(b'cos of that water bike rides are famous here) where the sky blue water strikes against some old rocks and fortified walls near the beach's edge. One by one went in for the waterbike ride @ 150 per head. As i stood there taking photo of Sap and prabhu, i was nearly run over by the Bikes in which they rode :)We vacated the place soon after to visit Calangute Beach. Here myself and KB in the bike got lost and by the time i almost reached Calangute our set was returning back as they found the beach highly crowded. We then went to baga beach, but managed to see it only in the moon light as the sun was already down.The beach was crowded and it looked heavenly with a highly lit-up resort on the road overlooking the sea and the water strinking its bolstering walls.There was also a shallow back-water going in.It was almost 8PM and we missed out visiting Anjuna, vagator & Arambol Beach(atleast 30 - 40 more Km to travel)

We started heading towards colva,and because we lost track of the bikes in the front and back, we had to stop here and there for a reunion.By the end of the day the speedometer showed that we had travelled some 145 KMS. In that I drove for nearly 105 KMs and i found that really fantastic, remainded me of the motorcycle diaries :) We had our dinner at one of the beach shacks @ the colva beach.We found ourselves playing Beach Volleyball by 1:30 at night in the Colva beach.Trully it was amazing and we enjoyed every moment of that.

Day - 3 : Colva to Cavelossim - Old Goa - Panaji

We planned to visit the south bound beaches till Palolem (55 KM approx from colva) First pit stop was @ the Cavelossim Beach where we hardly sited people. Cavelossim beach stretches for eons together at both the ends and we treaded only for a small distance by walk along the shoreline after a quick dip in the seas.We then set out for Palolem beach, but due to lack of time(40 KM approx more to go) and petrol we turned back after covering some distance. On the way back we visited Benaulim Beach where we had our breakfast & rested ourselves in the recliners under the umbrella.That day we had travelled 48 KMs.After returning the bikes and vacating the Guest house we boarded a bus from colva to marmagoa. From there we boarded a bus to Old goa through Ponda.The whole bus trip consumed some two hours of our good time :( we had onion pakoda,Mysore Bonda,Chilly bajji,potato Bajji for lunch at a way-side yummy joint @ old-goa.We visited the Basillica Dom Jesus Church here and then boarded the bus to Panaji.

From Panaji bus stand we made our way to Panaji market buying trinkets and Cashews(its really cheap just 270 per Kg) all through the way.This way is bordered by the River on one side.The well lit-up pavement with stone seats at regular intervals overlooking the river makes one wonder whether it is Panaji or Venice!!! We treaded our way to the bus stand to catch the Bus @ Sharma Travels.It was a nice and enjoyable 3 day hang-out for us.

Would upload the photos and give the links soon...

The Elusive Freebie finds its way through

Upon purchasing the laptop, i was promised a freebie (that would be shipped ) which glued me like a child to a lollypop. I used to check up for any parcels that had come for me everyday and after this routine stunt for about a month, the watchman got curious and he too started waiting in on the parcel.But it was nowhere to be seen.

After some three and half months finally i received the freebie that one could only dream of.Well it is a pack of 20 English DVD movies.What then!! its movie time the whole of this month!!!

Jesus lived in India

The following content is just a gist of the book that i read and it may or may not inflict my opinion,

This book by Holger kersten could be considered as an addendum to the issues dealt with in Da Vinci Code and the only difference being the fact that India is pulled into the vortex of the issue.The book is about the early life of Jesus Christ and His days after crucifixion.

The book starts of with Nicolai Notovitch, a Russian historian 's startling discovery of manuscripts in the buddist monastery of Hemis which details the stay of Issa during the early First century.He found the characteristics of Issa strikingly similar to Jesus Christ.Then the author takes us through the research that many has undertaken about the early life of Jesus Christ(ie before the Baptism at the age of 30) There is a lead which unveils a possibility that Jesus Christ could have reached India through the Silk route and settled in Kashmir in the Ladakh region where he came to know about the buddhist preachings.

The Author then shows the striking resemblence of some the preachings across the religions by quoting them from the Bible, Buddhist scriptures, and from puranas.Indeed some stories are similar.It seems that the world religions are more interconnected than we had thought.Later the author evaluates the new Testament primarily the works of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John for any clues about Jesus Christ's early life.

Next he moves back to the time of abraham who is said to have lived in haran. This haran could well be the one in Kashmir and he gives striking resemblence of the etymological names specified in the old testament in Exodus and the places in the present day Kashmir.Then comes the interesting episode of Moses who liberates the people from Egypt and takes them across the River Jordon to the Promised land by God. This land could be Kashmir because in Exodus the place where moses tomb lies is specified and those 5 reference landmarks could be found in Hasbal, a town near srinagar, even more he takes us to a tomb in that town which dates back before the christian era and the tomb is set in the east-west direction customary of the jews.

Another instance is when soloman sents his navy to tarshish and the soldiers brings back gold, tukki, etc. This tukki refers to the peacock feathers and the hebrew language did not have a word for peacock hence it uses the word "tokei" as used in Tamil itself, easily proving the fact that soloman's soldiers reached the western coastal line of India well before the christian era.

The Ten Lost Tribes of Israel is the most sought of mystery in History and some of their DNA traces could be found in the people of Kashmir, and in the north-western frontier region illustrating the fact that the Ten Tribes of Israel had migrated to as far as Kashmir in the pre-christian era itself.The book then takes us through the places where the shroud of Turin had been and the author explains why the shroud of Turin is real and not hoax.

Nearing the end, the author explains how Jesus Christ survived the Crucifixion and his journey to Kashmir with many proofs in literature(even in Koran!!!) and also by understanding the etymological meanings of places.By understanding the meanings of place, the author found the tomb of Mother Mary in a town near Taxila.Next he uncovered the Tomb of Jesus Christ in rozabal, khanyar quater of srinagar who the author claims to have died at the age of 80.The author is still trying to open that tomb to unveil the truth to the world with facts, but the tension prevailing in the region keeps him on the hold.

Based on this book and another, a hollywood film is brewing with the title Aquarian Gospel and it is expected to hit the theatres in 2009.

visit http://www.tombofjesus.com/2007/home.html for Photos and more information

This saturday i was in Friday

With a neatly pressed Cotton Khaki and a german flag coloured stripped T-Shirt on i set out with no particular destination in mind. At Indira nagar a college friend joined me and by that time rain started playing havoc and we decided to settle down at TGI Friday's (Thank Goodness it's Friday), an American restaurant chain. We were welcomed by 2 waiters with a big smile and badges all over and we were shown the seats. Everytime we visit a bar attached restaurant, the Bar menu would be promptly handed over to me and the food menu to the others by the waiter, i dont know why and this time it was no exception :)

We ordered 1/2 of mushroom soup each and i went for veg chimichanga while my pal selected chicken tchoupatoulis and dismissed the, order one beverage get another free(Happy Hour) funda explained by the waiter(Note : Coke costs 95). A look around certified that we were inside a sophisticated watering hole with couples holding each other's hand.The chit-chat primarily centered around how could these guys afford not only for themselves but for the damsels by their side. By then our mexican food had arrived and it ressembled somewhat like indian food with rice and chappati kind of stuff and it was not the type of experience we had at little italy eating italian food(details in next post).

Now comes the interesting part, the bill came and we found ourselves astonished, looking at a whooping bill of 1102 just for the 3 items we had. The net bill was 900 and the Vat of 12.5 % and Service tax of 10% amounted to 1102.First time i am paying 22.5% tax :) We shared the bill and left the hang-out place with a free gift coupon of 500 which could be redeemed next time(who cares?? who gonna come again? atleast if they had waived the tax part alone this time i would have been happier) .The expenditure spree didnt end here, as my friend took out his bike the Security charged 20 for the parking lot fee :)

Visit http://www.tgifindia.com for more info

adding splash to life

Being a member of the fun team of our Lab, the onus of creating a poster for our Lab outing coming friday fell on me.Designing posters is an interesting job, and i used to envy the graphic designers for their creativity and the splash of color combination.Looking back at the posters created during my college days be it for cyber, fstival, primarily the base was a picture which conveyed the meaning. Thats the only thing i could think of. Somehow something new clicked my mind, and i experimented with Vector Graphics. Vectors are cartoon representations, be it human figures, objects, scenary etc which resonates with the mood.

The initial idea was something and it got transcended to something else in the end.The poster was optimized for A3 size.The base theme i used for the poster is some kind of exuberent mood in every vector, listing out the various fun events zeroed up on activities like dance, Sports, Relaxing in a scenic place etc. Next task was to come out with two Main components of the collage and getting the color tone synonymous with all the vectors used. Orange & Black goes well for gaity activities hence selected that. Churning up a caption and text was the next job. Once this is over, The poster is complete but with lot of blank spaces, hence patching up the poster took some time and the final output was attractive and appreciated :) Atlast got that thing printed out and stuck it up in all the floors.These posters brings alive the memories of the past if i take a look at them, hence i am holding all the posters which i had created in my college days too.The whole collage was created using Gimp.

Configuring Perl IDE using Eclipse + EPIC + Perlcritic

Though not an ardent fan of any IDE (integrated development environment), i just thought of setting up one for PERL. i decided to stick on to the one available Free & Open option ie, Eclipse.This tutorial is a sneek peek into the getting this IDE for Perl up and running in Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon.

Softwares needed:
JDK or JRE
Eclipse 3.2
EPIC
Perlcritic

First Install the Eclipse platform preferrably 3.2 or above.Ensure that the JRE or JDK is already present because eclipse is dependant on that.As of now Eclipse would support java only, to set it up for Perl, download the EPIC package from http://e-p-i-c.sourceforge.net/ To install the plugin EPIC in Eclipse, in the eclipse window, navigate to Help -> Software Updates -> Find & Install -> Select for new features to install -> New Local site. Now select the downloaded package and the installation would go on fine.

It is assumed that creation of workbench, projects and files in eclipse are known.Now we have come to the interesting part of setting up perlcritic. perlcritic is a static analyzer which analyses the file on compilation and spits out warnings in case it does not fall in line with Perl Best Practices by Damien Conway. This comes in handy to write efficient and discernable code.Perlcritic is dependant on a number of perl modules most of which are not part of gutsy but part of hardy. Before installing perlcritic from http://packages.ubuntu.com/hardy/perl/libperl-critic-perl look into the dependencies and install those by dpkg -i file.deb once the perlcritic is installed configure the EPIC properties in Eclipse which is a easy one to do.

Now for perlcritic to throw up the warnings, install the perl module criticism from http://search.cpan.org/~thaljef/criticism-1.01/ then in the code that you write include the line use criticism 'gentle'; remember to remove the this line before shipping your product :) Now you have a perfect IDE for Perl up and running.

I am still on the search for a perl source code browser something like cscope or opengrok which works for C. If someone knows of any, dont forget to share it with me in a comment!!!

Treasure

Clive Cussler books got my attention after i saw his filmed masterpiece Sahara starring Matthew Maconaughey and Penelope Cruz. Treasure is a novel which weaves around the Lost books housed in the Library of Alexandria which were burned down by Theodosius in 390AD.Clive Cussler tries to converge two or three independent plots at the same focal point which irritates some times.The same goes with Sahara.

Dirk Pitt, the james bond's alter-ego of Clive Cussler stories is sometimes overhyped.The Author could have shared the intelligence of diagonocise with other characters too.The plot is thick at the start where Julius Venator, a roman statesman of 390's relocates a part of the invaluable books of Alexandria Library along with the Alexander's coffin (before the library is burned by theodosius) to an unknown location in the planet.Dirk Pitt and an archaeological team stubbles upon a clue which leads them to the treasure 1600 years later.

Also looms behind is a conspiracy by capasperre brothers to unseat the government of egypt and mexico by hijacking the cruise containing the presidents.COuld Dirk save the presidents and also dig up the treasure before it is too late? Read the book to know the climax.

good old pals meet up

Boarding the Cauvery express, V 4 (me,sen,subbi,Musi) transcended to Chennai.We disembarked at perambur where our sanikutty #1(sriram) was waiting. Slowly we tottered our way to his house and after devouring the yummy idly sambar we started to FossConf. After a rendezvous with Priyan and the juniors we had our lunch along with stylesen & Ranjani. We spent the evening in the Besant Nagar Beach with Vanniaperumal and Joe joining us.finally we had our dinner out there.

Next day, we packed and left for Mahabalipuram in a Auto.The Auto ride was exhilarating filled with pattrais.Though i had been to these places before going with friends is something different. At mahabalipuram we covered most of the places except for the five rathas.Later we came to spencer to while away the time, where vanni joined us.Some of the juniors who came to Spencers did not even care to say a small 'hi' which irked us, after all we mingled with them just like good old pals rather than like super-seniors when in college.No one to blame, because thats how some ppl react weird when they have someone by their side.Atleast they should have known that we are decent enough to know how to behave when there is a lady by the side. Later at the Chennai Central Shanoof paid us a visit, and the train started chugging along with myself trying to start the fan by rotating the blades with a pen since it was having some starting trouble :)

visit the album @ http://picasaweb.google.com/kpraveen85/Mahabalipuram

Kolli Hills Trip

Another Mission(To Kollimalai), Another Troop(V 3 -me,sen,subbi, and our 5 year seniors - prabhu, Rajesh, Muthu, Rajasekar, Sadeesh,SenthilKAS) this time waded through the ourskirts of Bangalore to each salem and from there to kolli-hills. Under the command of Captain Muthu things were perfectly on track,like room bookings@PA Lodge, 1000 songs in 1 DVD. A traffic jam down the way kept us on the loop and we reached kolli-hills only by 10 AM. This prompted us to gobble up the idlies on the fly and we set out to have a bath at Akash Ganga, the waterfalls in the Kolli-hills.The ascent after the bath proved very tiresome and we rested our bones at the aarpaleshwarar temple sipping up a medicinal tuber soup.Later we got some picturesque view from the suicide rock and then we commuted at semmedu village to have Tea at a Joint and to have a look at ValVil Ori statue,ie the king who ruled this place.Wrapped up the day with Dumb-c.

Next day very early in the morning when the mist covered the whole mountain we went astray through the paths where not many had tredded.It was when we got the news that Muthu anna could get promoted to the post of Father any time.We started down the hill and dropped Muthu at Rasipuram bus stand from where he planned to catch a bus toTenkasi.We continued on our way to Hogennakal, our next stop in our
Trip.Speechless!!! the amount that we paid for the rowers ofthe boat is totally worth the view and the bath.The river cauvery fall from the gorges on both sides and we were rowing in between!!! Then in the lagoon we had a nice bath where i practised swimming with the help of Rajasekar.Sunday night 11 PM saw us cuddled at our usual residence of the weekend ie subbi's place.

Visit the Album @ http://picasaweb.google.com/kpraveen85/KolliHills

Bandipur Trip

This trip was undertaken some 2 months back yet, scrapping on the blog to reflect upon in the sands of Time.The inmates include V 4(me,sen,subbi,musi) & our seniors (SAP, smartsara, Elango, vichu,vasanth, shyam, ramesh, palani, sri and vimal).We started on a finenote by bathing at the sivasamudhra falls, and then continued forward towards Bandipur but fate thought otherwise and a mechanical snag inthe Tempo traveller made us to reach Mysore for repairing the

vehicle.Once done our indomitable spirits lead us to Bandipur Forest in the unlikely hour of the eerie night.We 14 ppl managed to cuddle up in a single room(all other rooms got booked) for the night and the morning rays saw us boarding the Safari van by 6 AM.Photographing only the deers and peacocks which caught our eye we started of to mysore.Out there we saw The Mysore palace, Daria Daulat Bagh in
Seringapatnam.We closed our trip at the forum departing our ways through the chaotic Urban crowd....

Visit the Album @ http://picasaweb.google.com/kpraveen85/Bandipur

How Poetic!!! great writings

Recently i came across a community in orkut by name

'GETHU' dhaan aamblaikku sothu

The greatest thing about that is the description of the community. read it below and have fun!!! The community owner must be a great poet :)

neenga pallu theikkum bodhu kooda orkutla irupavara??

neenga orkutla,ice-vikkra-maari ponna kooda aiswarya rai nu solravara??

neenga orkutla irukkura parama attu figure ellarayum mt.everest heightkku yethi vidravara??

neenga sappa figure album paathu jollu vidravara??

idhulla edhavadhu oru category la kooda neenga idam petrurindhaal----kettukunga..

maanam getta naaye,
band-width waste panra b***u,
communaatteee naayee--indha community pakkam thala vachu kooda padukaadhaa!!!
po engayavaadhu poi scrap adi po...

neenga eenam-getta pasanga adikkira maanam-getta scraps ah paathu vendhavaraa?? nondhavaraa???

ivanga ellaam pasanga dhaana nenachu vekkapattavaraa?? dhukkapattavaraa??

pasanga inamnu innum onnu irukkaa?? illayaa??

apdi onnu irundhaa,adhulla neenga orutharaa irundhaa-----indha community ungalukku dhaan!!! ungalukku mattum dhaan!!!

join pannunga,mudinja alavu kalaasunga!!!

visit the community @ http://www.orkut.com/Community.aspx?cmm=14271910

Another community worth notifying is "Sappai ku Laddu"
-Sooper figure ku, sappi pota manga kota mari oru payan kidaicha, vayir eriyira makkal ku indha community.

visit the community @ http://www.orkut.com/Community.aspx?cmm=3939191

Guys dont miss those two communities forums chanceless conversations.

Tippoo Sultaun: A tale of mysore wars

Daria Daulat Bagh(Sea of Wealth), the place craved for attention at first sight and thus i started the journey backwards by turning the pages of history.Daria Daulat Bagh is the leisure palace of Tipu Sultan in seringapatnam.The silhoutte of the ruined fort of seringapatnam has a story which not many have penned with authenticity.

Tippoo Sultaun : A Tale of Mysore Wars by Meadows Taylor, unearthed some of the untold events in history.The book is written from the perspective of two persons Kasim Ali alias Meer Sahib and Herbert Compton.The former being a soldier among Tipu's Army who raised in rank and later jumped to the British side.The latter is a British soldier who was a POW and released after the storming of seringapatnam.

This Book is more a Love story between Kasim and Ameena & Herbert and Amy than anything about Tipu.The Book written way back in 1800's is simply marvellous in the way it was written.But it leaves a black shadow on the character of Tipo portrayed as an Tyrant and arrogant which we have not heard in India.Perhaps this could be a ploy by the colonial masters to reduce the majesty of Tipu or could they be right?. Who knows what was true!!! only the ruins of seringapatnam could tell.

The events are woven around the citiy of Coimbatoor, R.Bhowanee, R.Barauti, Seringam, Trittinopoly, Balapoor, Nundidoorg, Bangalore, Mysore,etc. The author had made reference to pillaging the temple of srirangam in 1798 by Tipu's army.I dont think this ever happened, because being a resident of trichy i have never heard of any story like this.But a rumour remains here that a tunnel between trichy rockfort and seringapatnam exists and Tipu had been in trichy for some time.Tipu could have been here to defeat the british but not to plunder is what i believe.

go Wi-Fi easily!!!

Recently i Wi-Fi'ed my house by running Linksys WRT54G Broadband Router. We got Airtel broadband 384 kbps connection along with a Beetel BX220 Modem. Though the net is filled up with a lot of tutorials on configuring the router, a complete start to end procedure couldn't be found. hence i thought of taking a ride along this path.

The Beetel BX220 is a modem cum router.Now you can access this modem at 192.168.1.1 When you attach the Linksys router it would also take up the same IP. So there are two work-around.one is by bridging the modem or to change the IP in the Linksys router.To bridge the modem connect to it and disable the DHCP server in it and change from PPPoE to Bridging.By this the modem would act just like an relay nothing more.

Now connect the cables in the following way.from phone to modem and from modem to router.now connect the computer to the router.The router could be reached at 192.168.1.1 The configurations out there are quite simple (refer to the userguide of the router for more info) Since the modem is now no more than a dump relay the router has to dial-up and other stuffs .Hence select the PPPoE by providing the username and password provided by your ISP.Enable DHCP server in the router.


4 points are to be addressed here to ensure security.

1. Change the password of the Router.

2. setup a Security pass key .Though WEP is widely used, going for WPA is recommend as it is tough nut to crack than WEP.

3. Disable SSID broadcast.By doing so your Router connection name wont be seen at all.Only the people who know the SSID can connect to the Wi-Fi.The crackers now have another field to crack apart from the Key.

4. Enable MAC Filter.By doing so you can allow only the systems with the MAC address you have enlisted to connect the Wi-Fi.

By now you would be up and running Wi-Fi

The Motorcycle Diaries

Looks like i have hit upon a film whose lines are the same as i have in mind for quite a long time.Spare yourself from the routine life filled with monotonous happenings and start exploring life the way your heart yearns for."Diarios de motocicleta" is a true story of Che Gueveara and his friend who embarked on a 12000+ Kms across the whole of south America on their "la Poderosa(The powerful)"a Norton 500 motorbike from their hometown of Bueunos Aires, Argentina

The film is awesome in spanish and the scenary behind is breath-taking, especially when the path unfolds through chile,peru where the incas once lived unyielded.Machu picchu is also shown during his travels.Atlast both of them end up in Venezuela from where Ernest takes flight to his hometown whereas his friend lives by practicing in a hospital in venezuela.

The friends recounts with awe as how they managed to come out of many trying times during the journey which looked bleek with no escape route and always showed the path to end of life.Highly recommended film during your hearts low and it would ebb you out and bet that it would kick alive the desire to start up a motorcycle journey on your own.My Verdict: Ultimate!!!!

The Devil's Alternative

This book by Frederick Forsyth would be loved by people who like plots involving political background strewn with scandals and spies.The novel is neatly brought out from the three countries perspective(USA,Russia,Britan)With the land on either side filled up with spies deep inside the government and the satellites accessing each and every move of the soviets, the Russians have to come up to the Table for talks on reducing arms if they need the help from America for its forthcoming famine due to crop failure.The side track which emulsifies into the main part near the middle is the rising of the Ukrainians for freedom.When the Dublin treaty was about to be signed, a new twist awaits the readers and the American president faces two options both of them would lead to death of men and the situation is called the devil's alternative.Now the British spy Adam Munro comes to the forefront and clears the things out.

But The story doesn't deserve a so simple and predictive end.As already said this would entertain readers who love treading on the two 'isms' (capitalism & communalism)on a large scale not a person whose heart lies in legendary heros in historical backgrounds.After crossing Tolkien's Rowling's & Dan Brown's i am now sampling uncommon authors with one of their works, so that i could settle in for an author's full collection once i like his/her plot and narration

Sampling includes,

Stephan King's Shawshank Redemption(Nice one to read,Film - IMDB rating 9.2)
Michael Crichton's Timeline(starting looks cool,yet to cross 460 pages)

Jab We Met

i dont have the habit of watching Hindi movies unless i get good reviews from my peers.This time my sister pursued me to watch "Jab We Met". The narration or the screenplay is the heart-throbe of the film.The incidents are neatly portrayed from the first scene which glued me to the seat till the end .Though The story is somewhat like minnalae or its hindi equivalent "Rahena hai teri dil mein" it is different in many aspects. especially the chemistry between Shahid kapoor and kareena kapoor has done the trick added to that is the childish pranks of the kareena who plays the part of a sikhni from Bhatinda.How could they break off in real life after a film like this wonders me.After watching many films in a row without logic and reason this film strikes a better note in this regard to earn itself a high rating.Not a film to be missed

Linux Internal Training

i attended a linux Internal Architecture training for a week in a training center @ 80 feet road, indira nagar.it was a informative session conducted by Venkataraman RadhaKrishnan.he covered mainly the following topics,

Linux Kernal Intro
Development Environment
Process Management
Kernel Compilation
Kernel Programming - core API's
Character Device driver with eg
Memory Management
PCI Programming Intro
USB Programming Intro

The Examples taken to illustrate helped to understand better.In Short It was a full semester OS subject neatly and clearly taken in a duration of one week.