Thursday, January 17, 2008

Bharat Ratna & Nobel Peace Prize 4 My Grandma

For the just concluded harvesting festival Pongal, I went to my home town Kovilpatti on a week long holidays. Having good amount of time in hand, I decided to visit my Grandma for Pongal, who is living in Virudhunagar, which is some 50KMs away.

Who wouldn't be happy if some one like me visits them??? Hee.. Hee... It might sound like too much self-appraising, but in fact for my Grandma I'm one among the few specials. So after few minutes of usual-mutual blah-blah of well wishing s, she got into action to cook something delicious for me. Its quite interesting to see how she could able to stock up so much cooking raw materials even after its difficult for her to move out and buy something of her own?? Hmmm it must be because of the good culture of the generous village people who helps each other all through their life time, a trademark feature of traditional village wallas.

Now getting back to my Grandma's cooking, as a starter she cooked "Bonda", a kind of fried hot cake made of a kind of flour -maida- I suppose. While I was taking up that one, she has started griding up the dal(pea) items to make flour for cooking Vadai, a fried spicy hot cake and Susyam, a fried sweet cake. Though the items she going to make is not the most sought after dish in star hotels but the way she used to make them stand out of all, even the star hotels.

Only people of her times and few from the present time can able to follow suit to make the flour manually without the use of auto-griding machines like Kitchen Grinder. She used a heavy grinder made of rock to break the pea to make flour. Nowadays women never dare to do that and if they can do it for one day influenced by thought saving pride, they wouldn't be able to do it more...

here are the few pictures of my 75+ year old young Laila Ali AKA Lakshmi Ammal in action...









There are immense number of advantages in this way of Griding....

First -> Obviously it helps keeping our health in right track by keeping many illness at bay, thus saving huge amount of Government money which are allocated for the old age health care. So if everyone follows this practice, the money saved can be spend better for other development activities, that will advance the human race to next step.

Second -> Because the griding been done manually, my Grandma has just shown a great way of energy saving methodologies. Huge amount of electricity can be saved by avoiding the Auto-Grinders, lights in the Kitchen. So again Government can save lots of money by reducing the investment in the power sector and it can be invested in other most needed projects to advance the human race into next step. Remember this has big impact over our eco-system and Mr. Al Gore, former VP of USA is talking about the same in all stages around the world. Keep this in mind, this will be useful at later point of this article.

Third -> By doing the Griding in outer space and choosing the place which are easily accessible by the various not-so-harmful organism like Ant, my Grandma has let amble amount of food to them knowingly/unknowingly spill out of the Grinder. So if an Ant eats/takes it, it strengthens the Ant colony in the surrounding area. If an Ant colony grows, it has many advantages for its surrounding eco-system.

Fourth -> The just strengthen Ants clears out the otherwise non-perishable/too-much-time-taken perishable items like dead rats, dead snakes, dead lizards etc.. out of the streets and make them clean thus avoiding potential diseases like Plague from originating/spreading. The saves government from lot of pressure and gives its valuable time to look in to productive areas so as to advance the human race to next step.

Fifth -> The just strengthen Ants helps the trees, forest areas to grow manyfold by keeping potential insects at bay. By this lots of trees will grow and make a world more greener and helps reducing the impact of Greenhouse gases. This saves Government from lots of money and yes it then can be used for advancement of human race to next step. Remember Dr Rajendra Pachori, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is trying to promote the same idea around the globe on stages. And again keep this in mind, this will be useful at later point of this article.

So by showing this many ways to save Planet, advancing human race, saving huge amount of Government money, instead just talking about the climate change - she does that in day to day to life - what is stopping United Nations from giving away the Nobel Peace Prize for my Grandma??? This is my humble request making on behalf of my Grandma.

And still there is one more question left with out answering?? Yes its about Bharat Ratna.... Taking cue from the recent spat of recommendations for the Bharat Ratna for the politicians patrons... Why this shouldn't be given to my super Grandma Venkata Ramanajum ammal, elder sister of Grandma who was just recommended for Nobel Peace Prize, also my Mom's Mom, who was the leader in all the techniques my Grandma following posthumously???

These were the humble questions I have got while eating out the deliciously cooked Vadai, Susyam and Bonda. Anyone out there like to share it and my thoughts????

Monday, January 07, 2008

Revised International Cricket Council (ICC) Code Of Conduct

In lieu of recent developments around the India - Australia test series 2007-2008, an unnamed Cricket Guru has written some rules have to be incorporated by ICC to give the other teams a perfect clarification of what would be it is if they play in Australia,

(1) Ricky Ponting – (THE TRULY GENUINE CRICKETER OF THE CRICKET ERA AND WHOSE INTEGRITY SHOULD NOT BE DOUBTED) should be considered as the FOURTH UMPIRE. As per the new rules, FOURTH UMPIRE decision is final and will over ride any decisions taken by any other umpires. ON-FIELD umpires can seek the assistance of RICKY PONTING even if he is not on the field. This rule is to be made, so that every team should understand the importance of the FOURTH UMPIRE.

(2) While AUSTRALIAN TEAM is bowling, If the ball flies anywhere close to the AUSTRALIAN FIELDER(WITHIN 5 metre distance), the batsman is to be considered OUT irrelevant of whether the catch was taken cleanly or grassed. Any decision for further clarification should be seeked from the FOURTH UMPIRE. This is made to ensure that the cricket is played with SPORTIVE SPIRIT by all the teams.

(3) While BATTING, AUSTRALIAN players will wait for the ON-FIELD UMPIRE decisions only (even if the catch goes to the FIFTH SLIP as the ball might not have touched the bat). Each AUSTRALIAN batsman has to be out FOUR TIMES (minimum) before he can return to the pavilion. In case of THE CRICKETER WITH INTEGRITY, this can be higher.

(4) UMPIRES should consider a huge bonus if an AUSTRALIAN player scores a century. Any wrong decisions can be ignored as they will be paid huge bonus and will receive the backing of the AUSTRALIAN team and board.

(5) All AUSTRALIAN players are eligible to keep commenting about all players on the field and the OPPONENT TEAM should never comment as they will be spoiling the spirit of the AUSTRALIAN team. Any comments made in any other language are to be considered as RACIALISM only.

(6) MATCH REFREE decisions will be taken purely on the AUSTRALIAN TEAM advices only. Player views from the other teams decisions will not be considered for hearing. MATCH REFREES are to be given huge bonus if this rule is implemented.

(7) NO VISITING TEAM should plan to win in AUSTRALIA. This is to ensure that the sportive spirit of CRICKET is maintained.

(8) THE MOST IMPORTANT RULE: If any bowler gets RICKY PONTING - "THE UNDISPUTED CRICKETER WITH INTEGTIRY IN THE GAME OF CRICKET" more than twice in a series, he will be banned for the REST OF THE SERIES. This is to ensure that the best batsman/Captain will be played to break records and create history in the game of CRICKET.

These rules will clarify better to the all the teams VISITING AUSTRALIA.

Saturday, January 05, 2008

Movie Outing 2 Devi Theaters, Chennai For Film - Kalluri

For the new year, even though I don't take it as big event, I fell prey to the surrounding's and under the pressure of 'must-do-something-different', I decided to make first move from my side to invite my friend Siva to the movie for new year eve. Out of the movies currently running, only one have the right mixtures of interesting aspects and that is from the house of none other than Mr. Shankar the mega-director of Tamil film industry. Though the movie 'Kalluri' which I selected has not been directed by him, he produced it so definitely he must have liked the story before deciding it. And the director Balaji Sakthivel has already worked with Shankar to give a blockbuster movie 'Kadhal'. So with no doubt, decided to goto that movie for new year eve day.

Fortunately or Unfortunately the movie was again screened at one the screen at same Devi Complex which I have went to that many times before. But this time 'Kalluri' movie was screened at the mega screen of Devi Theaters. Added advantage is its very near - walkable - from the wher I stay and we can safely avoid the cunning 'P' people who always waits for the new year eve time to nab party goers, others to get some good amount of money after asking unanswerable questions.

So having said all those, this is time to check out the pictures,



Here is Mr. Karthikeyan R @ Karthik R @ Karthikeyan Ramchel waiting at the steps of Devi Complex to get into movie screened hall...
(For new readers, the reason behind I write my names is for the blind web crawlers like Google, Yahoo, which knows nothing other than text. So for them to identify me and my blog, I need to spew my name Karthikeyan R @ Karthik R @ Karthikeyan Ramchel here and there... Oops I did it again.. Sorry.. Actually the reason was.... I can see people scrolling down.. So I stop here.)


Is there any time Karthik R sits idle??? No.. Never...
So made use of my camera mobile and clicking the pictures of crowd coming out of the theater at the end of some other movie.


Since technology has improved so much, why still using only the picture camera and why not the video camera? So I did that and here you are looking at the same crowd in moving picture...


Some weird promo hoardings around the theater complex...


Finally got into the screen hall and have a look the capacity of the main Devi Theater and the screen size....


Who is not greedy of money.... Some ads forcibly shown to us inside the locked doors of the screen and why wasting time by hearing this useless buck making trick.... so here is exclusive picture of the hero of one of the ad shown.... He must be doctor since he has all the basic qualities of weird beard and interesting spectacle design....


So again the same doctor in the full length ad.... It must be something about AIDS awareness I guess... Since the ad was in Hindi and its mindlessly been shown in Tamilnadu which in fact, other than few 100 school Hindi teachers, no one understands what language it is...


Yet another ad from the Chennai silks has been shown inside the closed door hall which can be compared to the concentration camp ran by Nazi Hitler. Thankfully this time ad was in Tamil and people had some kind of consciousness...


Here comes the lead female actor of the movie.... Otherwise called as heroine..


A lead supporting female actor... A good friend of our heroine....


A clip from the movie... The guy who comes with weird look at the end of the clip is our Hero....


Another promotion movie shown in the interval time... Movie name is 'Palani' and according to the visuals, it seems the movie has all time horrendous unsuitable hero scenes and which is highly recommended to avoid this movie at any cost.... Here is the exclusive visuals from the yet to be released movie 'Palani' starring actor 'Bharat'

Movie Outing 2 Devi Theaters, Chennai For 9 Rupee Note Film

As usual my film-fanatic friend has made up my mind to goto movie on one Satuday night show. The reason I said OK was partially because he generally take care of all cost factors of the event and rest for some good time enjoying hearing people's comment in-between the movie scenes.

This time we went to check out the Satyaraj starring movie 'Onpathu Rupa Notu', in english it comes '9 Rupee Note', directed by none other than Mr. Simple @ Thangarbanchan. Movie starts with how elderly couple deserted out by their siblings, then it moves to how they survive for sometime before finally resting with god amid all those heart touching dialogues and scenes. This film is screened at one of the smaller screen halls in Devi Complex, Mount Road, Chennai.

Here are few pictures of the movie,



Devi Bala Screen @ Devi Complex, Smaller one compared to main Devi Screen


A conversation scene from the movie 'Onpathu Rupa Notu' @ '9 Rupee Note'


Here comes our hero Mr. Satyaraj with an elderly man makeup...
The guy wearing green T-Shirt though has not played any major role in the movie, his presence can be felt in across the length breadth of the screen very often since he is the kind of catalyst which prompts our hero Satyaraj spelling all the beans, I meant story...


A comedy scene in the movie.... Since the story has been narrated to our green T-Shirt guy by our hero Satyaraj on the bus while returning back to the remote village after many years of exile in another remote village, definitely director has ample option to have comedy scene tailored around the scenario's bus - many people - limited seats, so our director utilized this and has made so called comedy scene....


Our hero narrating the sorry story of his desertion from village, infighting among family, bankrupted family savings etc.. to our not-so-important-but-still-everywhere green T-Shirt personality....

Friday, January 04, 2008

My ICICI Complaint

After frustrated waiting period to get my credit card from the ICICI Bank, today I decided to write them a online petition stating my problem... Below is the unedited version of letter I sent to ICICI... Hope this is not offending anyone and just purely in the anxiety...


Hi, I have applied for the Credit Card through a promotion campaign held at my company premises. When applying card, by seeing the process, I thought ICICI has made the process much simpler by understanding the demanding nature of working people. But later only I understood that story wouldn't be same till the end. Even though my card application has been approved and I received the online access/PIN details, I haven't got my main item - the Credit Card. It has been nearly a month since I received my first call from a Tele-Executive about the card approval. After that there is no information from anyone and even if I try to reach through phone banking, I end up mostly with heartless IVR system which asks me repeatedly the same option over and again. Suggest me what I need to do now? Where is my card hanging now? What I need to do clinch that? Is that as tough as Indian team winning Cricket World Cup???? Please help me out in this... I hope machine's are not assigned to read this and again on the phone ask me 'Sir, What's your problem actually????'