Resistance to 'Change' is the reason for being stuck in mediocrity.

Knowledge of the above and still being resistant adds just another adjective - agony.

As I enter the last of my boyhood years (huh !), I am feeling that my thought process is being refined in a way that should have happened 10 years ago!


Signed.

I was a Rajni fan for most of my school days and also in college.

And then Anbe Sivam happened. I watched it again 2-3 hours after I first watched it. Most of my thinking for the next 2-3 days was about the movie. It was supposed to be directed by Sundar.C but who was behind most of the scenes was no secret. My 'thalaivaaa' changed to Kamal. And its been him ever since.

I was desperately hoping that the movie would be a hit because there are directors who could make nearly as good movies as this but dont want to do so for commercial reasons. It would've been ushering in a new era in Tamil Cinema if this had happened. But..

Still, I am amazed by Kamal and his restless energy. I think I loved every1 of his movies in the last few years except for PKS. Panchathantram left me in splits like none other including MMKR.

Rajni is some 1 who gives you plenty of 'feel good' doses when you watch him on screen - he endears himself so much that you dont even care about the logic in the movie. But it doesnt affect me once the movie is done.

Kamal's movies can actually keep you thinking days after you've watched the movie, and when you finally connect to his ideas, it's an experience in itself.

Hope I get to meet my Thalaivar sometime !

Saw ChandraMukhi. Not a bad time-pass.
But for a guy who makes 1 movie in 2-3 yrs, it could've been much better.
Though should admit that Rajni looks 'not bad at all'. I was totally reminded of his '16 vayathinile' when I see him as the villain Raja. Boy, was he a super villain or what! I would rate it somewhere between Arunachalam and Padayappa. P'appa rocked and moreso, coz of A.R.R. They should've roped in A.R.R for this too.

Somehow, quietly confident Mumbai express would only be better than CM. (Kamal fan(atic) you see)

I dont know why most of the city youth look down upon vijay as if it conveys their sense of sophistication. Granted, he did some cheap movies earlier on, but that was an entry level thing.
Even now, there might not be much logic in his movies but in whose movies other than Kamal's do you have a truckload of logic? If you dont expect logic in a superstar movie, then ...
Though I dont like Vijay as much as Madhavan, I am sure he's not bad at all.
There are some roles only he can play. He would fail if he does something like surya in KaakaKaaka. He's best at doing roles like in Gilli. I thought Gilli was so much fun, which might not have been with Surya/Maddy instead of Vijay.
Someone who loves rajini but hates vijay would be interesting to meet.

vArtA

Pakistan would've lost both series' by now if it had played against the T.N ranji team instead of this Indian team.

Or do I smell something here??

Gasp!
Read this
$181000.
Gasp!

Thats what maybe even the cream at Harvard and NorthWestern would get !

After such a media-blitz in recent times about the salaries for mba grads, me thinks parents back home are going to ask their college kids to study for CAT and other mgmt exams and get an MBA from some good school rather than study for GRE/MS hereafter.The children know that unforutnately, it is not as easy to clear cat/other exams as it is to get an arbit score in GRE, get into an arbit university in some arbit part of USA. I dont know if the parents would realize that ! Some of my college friends have been writing CAT for years now.
It would not be bad to have fewer desis to see here so that the notion that am in USA might atleast stick then ;)

chill.

Even like 2 months back, I used to laugh at people watching golf of all sports on TV.

Today, I think I witnessed one of the finest moments in all sport that I've seen. Of Tiger winning at Augusta. More than that was his shot on the 16th hole. It was drama, high-octane drama seriously; the ball stayed near the hole for a moment and then went in after a few teasing moments.
My heart went out for DiMarco. He did a great job in taking the competition to a play-off but Tiger was sublime. I dont remember the last time when a moments in sport have sent me into fits of tension and ecstasy as this one. Maybe these two come close.
1.'Desert Storm' @ Sachin.
2.Sampras outgunning Ivanesevic at Wimbledon (dont remember the year.)

Have watched some really good Hindi movies of late. Have always been prejudiced w.r.t Hindi movies after watching some cry-fests . The ones that I saw of late include Page 3, Ab Thak Chappan, Swades and Rog. I thought Page 3 and Swades are pretty well-made movies. Swades, especially so. My friend asked me as to what I dint know that Swades showed. I said Swades had almost everything that I knew. I could relate to it which really cannot be said about the cry-fests.

When I think of a genius, few people come to mind as quickly as Brian Lara time and again. He came back and scored in a fashion that is uniquely his. When Lara is on song, it is good for world cricket. His batting could even be a graduate coursework in Arts. (ok..ok)

vArTa

Today was some day..

I had little sleep the previous night. had to get up for a class from 8 to 9:30. Then had a class at 2 and then a meeting with my advisor. Was talking about my thesis with my advisor; I think i confused him a bit or so; He suddenly asked me as to who my advisor was ! Even I felt that my speech was incoherent. Fortunately, my advisor was in a pretty jovial mood.

Then, was walking past the University center and stumbled on 1 of the sofas in the lounges and thought I'd do my 'nap' thing. There were a few students, I think Chinese students working on some stuff. 2 hours into my nap, I was woken up by a roar and realized it was me snoring. There have been a few occasions when I get into subconscious fits of sleep or something that I hear myself snoring. Not a very nice experience. There was no1 when i woke up. Must tender an apology soon to those guys. The lounge was supposed to be 'Quiet Study Lounge' !

Then hurried to starbucks and felt a coffee was the sureshot way to clear this muddled state of affairs. I felt good until I realized I had done nothing the whole day with just a month to go for finals and projects. Then thought of checking out some wacky stuff on raaga as I'd come to the point where I decided nothing normal would do for the day. Checked out 4 students.
I listened to Lajjavathiye once, twice,..and have been listening to it for like 4 hours straight. Jassie Gift is something. The song borders on the sublime. With some traces of normalcy returning to my attic, felt blogging would make the process complete.

Over n out.

There was this post on The Hindu some time back
http://www.hindu.com/2005/03/28/stories/2005032803920300.htm

Basically about the big I.T co's hiring like there's no tomorrow.

I was a little amused to see a strong reaction on different blogs to this news item, generally opinions against the s/w companies with even 1 comment on a blog saying "India will only improve if its free of these companies" .
Gulp !
I seriously cant still understand the big deal about this. Why should this mass-hiring be a bad thing at all? Why should not civil engineers write code in TCS if they get paid better and presents them a good chance of settling down quick and easy. If at all the bloggers feel the 'core technical' junta is dwindling, we can always 'outsource' those core jobs over a period of time. The actual 'core' junta ( my definition of core is only R&D junta ) would not change that much. And we dont have a sizeable 'core' population anyway right now.

The only thing that concerns me about IT in India ,from what little I know, is the fact that the big 3-4 companies contribute too significant a chunk to the total s/w mkt share. The smaller companies must evolve and contribute proportionally in the long run for a healthy I.T India.

Was reading an IEEE Proceeds paper today.

Suddenly was reminded of the undergrad days when every third person i knew in college did like a paper presentation. It was a hot thing at 1 time, like in the 3rd year i guess. The wildest things - like , design of optimal blue-tooth technology ( o yeah..papers with such 'explosive' titles would find takers at umpteen colleges), State of the art Neural network (this was another perennial topic at different presentations) along with an occasional HVDC/AC topic !
Even I did some stuff on some design of super-efficient resonant converters (phew !) . Preparations were no laughing matter ! Most of the focus was on using the best software tools to write our stuff and do plots (what plots !) along with some occasional reference on google as to what some scientist in Estonia was actually upto on our paper topic . Our lecturers would be very encouraging and appreciative when we used to tell them about working on a paper presentation. They werent amused, however, when we asked them a few questions on whatever we understood from that publication from Eastern Europe !
The best part however was the trip to the college. Most colleges always had some culturals going on at the same time ;participate in them. I cant forget once at Mepco engg college, when we pocketed quite a cool sum in all this but dint actually win anything in the event for which we actually went there ! Then, collect the bus/train fare from the organizing committee with a smug smile; watch a movie and make umpteen jokes on any/many of the organizers on our way back home !

Boy, that was fun. Paper Presentations.