Friends....!!??

I have always tried to be friendly to everyone I move with, besides getting back, lashes of betrayals and negative responses which will paint my heart with carbon black marks of shame. Though I don't care about what others comment on me since I truely believe in "Keep talking shit about me.. You are making me famous". But sometimes, heart tries to wear that dirty shirt of sentiment which has many pockets for fate to fill-in some bad memories that will slowly become a stain in your heart...

I have trusted so many people and sometimes, my friends tease me "Fool..!! this guy trusts people so easily... " and I spice it up, by saying "Yes... I second that..." and I have no second opinion about that since I have always trusted people so easily and still I'm doing the same thing.

This year,(2009) January when I was in New York city, I experienced two things... I would say " One bad news... One Good news " like in Rin supreme commercial. Bad news is that I was fooled by one of my classmates. I purposely avoid using the word "friend" here because it equals betraying or fooling myself.. It is not just a train freindship but was existing for more then 3 years till that incident of that so called friend of mine doing closing ceremony which was magnificent enough that even TIMES SQUARE lost its grandeur.

It happened 7 months ago and till date I don't know the reason for it. I guess its just because he wanted me to learn a lesson. But Yes...!! That was the good thing happened..." Never trust people so easily". I was totally collapsed like twin towers at that time but in the other way, I thank that person for teaching me a very valuable lesson and helping me to shape myself. Because, its only after that incident when I started using my brain instead of heart to judge people. So I add an "^infinity" term to that "thanks" mentioned above.

I believe that friendship can never die even after learning this lesson. But the "FRIEND" thing in that person is dead. Even if that person by chance reads this post, should not mistake me since I'm very specific in my words. I repeat, " the 'FRIEND' thing of him is dead." Once that is dead, nothing can revive it because I find only a nano gap between the quality of friendship and chastity of a woman. ( No offense ... pls !!)

I have read somewhere that Lord Jesus was there always with both hands extended for people to come towards him. But people around him hit him right on his heart rather than showing love. By no means, I'm trying to equalise myself with Lord, but feel that even god has learnt these kind of lessons and through that, he is teaching us how to be in this world.. !!!

Is old..... really G.O.L.D ??? (For those who can read Tamil.!!)

I have often heard this dialogue " Naangellam andha kaalathula......" from so called senior citizens of INDIA.. (literally "perusunga"). What did they just do..?!!!?. I really wanted to pen down those famous sayings and here you go.....!!

1. Eat pazhaya sadham and maavadu and naarthanga and preach us "naangellam andha kaalathula nanna sathulla aahaaram saaptom.... ippo ellathlayum oram pottu kedukuran paavi" ( Yean pa... yean...???)

2. Discriminated women so badly even at home (Wife, sister, even mom) and complaining "Indha kaalathula enga pa pomnaatigal veliya poga mudiyardhu...... enga paathalum porukki pasangalaa irukkanunga..... Kali kaalam....." ( shabba..... ippovey kanna kattudhey...)

3. Examining the gifts given by friends n relatives (Moi..!!!) and keeping a proper account of them so as to give them back a gift of same or lesser value when they have some function and complaning " Nalla manushaala paakavey mudiyaradhilla........ adhan naatula mazhaye varamaataengradhu... "

4. Chewing Tobacco and spitting everywhere ... but saying "iyyo..... enga paathalum asutham pandraley.... enna pannatum ... .veliya kaal eduthu vekka mudiyala..."

5. " Yean dhaan Bhagavaan yezhaigala (poor people) ipdi sodhikiraano.. avanukku kanney illa" besides bargaining for 5 to 25 paise from the Vegetable vendors and thinking for zillion seconds and not giving money to the beggars...

6.And I don't have to tell anything about investing money in some fraud financial company and loosing all the money besides advicing youngsters thinking themselves a "Warren Buffett". ( Karumam da....... )

7. Following all possible cheap techniques in public starting from by-passing the Queue just because they are aged till acquiring seats in PTC buses besides telling everyone "Rules are rules.... yaarukkum adha break panna adhikaram illa"

8. Walking half-naked without shirt and complaining about youngsters wearing shorts in public... (iyyo rama... enna yen indha madhri kazhisadaingaloda lam kootu sekkara.... !!!)

9. Writing useless letters to "The Hindu" and "Times of India" for very local problems like neighbourhood conflicts, small PWD problems.... You just have to imagine how many letters that official will be getting everyday.... ( enakku kiru kiru nnu mayakkam varudhu da saami...!!)

10. Not knowing anything about technology (which cannot be blamed but....), not taking any efforts to learn those things, and talking like "Bill gates" and media gurus. Very famous dialogue would be "you must know to work with computers. Adhulayum , YemYes Ward ( MS word), YemYes Eccsel (MS Excel), Sea programming ( 'C') is a musst....".

( edhukku indha vilambaram....!!!?)

11. Advising youngsters about reading books besides knowing nothing but Ambuli maama and Rani muthu and Rajeshkumar's Pocket novels.... ( Evvalavo paathuttom... idha paaka maatoma... )

....and a lot more to go.... I'm not trying to degrade our ancestors but my post is all about those who fall into "Do nothing... talk evrything" category. No offense....!!

And...... This is a good lesson for me and alarms about how I shud be when I get old... ( Am i right....!!!? )

The Active "ME" ...!!!

I have seen people telling " Summer is the best time for you to do a lot of things" for which my mind voice will say " Holy crap..!! That's not going to work for this Couch Potato ( ya... its me..!!) ". But ................!!! Its time for me to confess that I can also be active and go with all those summer activities...

I have started taking swimming lessons which one of my good friends, Tyler Robbins is teaching me. Also, previously I was gymming thrice a week which I ve changed and I'm gymming everyday ( wow....!!!). Waking up early in the morning and doing yoga for an hour... Going for a bi-cycle ride once in a while for atleast 3-4 miles.... Cooking healthy and nutritious food.....Having a proper Bed time.... etc,. When I type all these things, Im getting that "feel-good" thing and a strong "NO" for my mind which abuses me " Hey Couch Potato ..!!! ".

Well, I have to correct my very first sentence which says summer is the active period for Renaissance or revival of "you". But its our attitude and laziness which produces a lot of "couch potatoes (CP)" like ex-"ME". Anyways, I'm feeling good and may be when I read this post after sometime, this is going to give me confidence and will prevent me from turning into a CP...

Long time .. .No see...!!!

Trying to post something after a long time is always a different experience. You might have lost touch in the way you handle the topic, flow of thoughts will have a very low Reynold's number and worst case would be the lack of a good topic ( which is happening right now...). So many changes around me in this 4 months of time. I generally assess myself once in a while so that everytime I confirm Darwin's theory is true and it is...

Besides everything, I could have tagged this post rightly as " OUT OF RECLUSION".

For some reason, I had to shut down my blog for sometime and that could have contributed me in creating a whole new post. But, I did not want to.

Well, I try least to leave my blog abandoned hereafter.

Jai ho...!!! ( Most of us know the NEWS about this word.. If not, google it)

Why do the laugh everytime?

"What the hell is wrong with me.... Evvvvverytime they pass by,... both of them...... they laugh at me...!!?" - the million dollar question during my college days.

Those two girls.... with same name... Ramya..!!!! the only difference, one of them being very tall ( boyish kinda) and the other one , like kuthuvilakku ( appears to be really silent..but as always , appearances are ... deceptive). Another piece of information is this kuthuvilakku and me, we studied in the same school where I had the most miserable days of my life which I always wanted to forget. I was surprised(a little) when I saw this Ramya the first day in my college... "Oh... this vella paniyaram ( thats how we guys call her...) in MY college.... hmmmm....." exactly this is what my mind voice contributed to the scene..

Later on, I saw this Ramya, always paired with that nettai kudhirai(another ramya)... both of them, studying in CSE..

During my 2nd - 3rd year, I was pretty famous ( ahem ahem... trying to be diplomatic) in my college, because of my participation in TV. I have heard people talking behind me " Dei... ivan than da ....indha sunday, andha TV la padinan....super ah padinan da... win pannitan."and immediately, everyone will turn towards me.... Wow....I will be flying ......36,001th ft from ground. ( 36,000 ft is the height limit for international flights... : P).

I have always encountered these kind of discussions about me, when I roam around in my college. Thats how I took it for the first time when I saw these two specimens laughing at me.. But later on, everytime we cross each other, those two Ramya's will start whispering something, and laugh looking at me.. For the first few days, I did not give it a damn...But one cannot be so ignorant of something which bothers him a lot.. So I started thinking about the possible reasons for this mess-up which will be like "Operation success...Patient no more" case .. I mean, no bulb will light up above my head...

I tried in all possible ways to find out what could be reason... I spoke to some of my friends in their class and one girl, after few days, told me that " It seems the song which you sing (Athangara marame )in college programs is really good and they tease one of their class friends with you for that song...Thats why they laugh everytime". NO.......!!! This is not a convincing answer for that billion dollar question... I still cannot accept this answer...

Till now, its the same question without an answer...... "Why do they laugh evvvrryytime??"

WHY????????? doushite?

Chinmayee... You motivate me.....!!!

Its 10.30 P.M with no other option to go, I had to watch some stupid videos in youtube and somehow that ended up in watching the Blooper episodes of some reality shows... like Airtel super singer... and thats hilarious ..... a small kid giving speech that she had low BP and after sometime High BP... A girl trying very hard to prove that classical and carnatic music are different.. Singer Tippu's reactions towards some funny kids... Singer sowmya, trying very hard to control laughter when a girl asked her "what song can I sing" ...etc ., AND... finally ended up in Chinmayee's bloopers.... Wow... That was completely out of my imagination.....

Few expressions like "ennappa" , "nasama pochu", "saniyane" ," ipdi ellam thadukki vizha vendam", "airtel mobile moolama.... uh. uh.... hehe...blooper cut.."mobile foolama" ( for mobile fone moolama...), "oru kozhandai win panniduchu... innoru kozhandai loose ayiduchu.."chennai maangarathula.... " ( more than 5 times that dialogue was shot...), "ippo yeriyidhunga".... many more to go.... I was just rolling over laughter and got tears in my eyes bcoz of that....

WEll jokes apart, I ve always wondered about this small girl, probably 22 to 25 years old ( like my sister whoz 23) managing a lot of things succesfully... She manages a translation company called "Blue elephant"... Singing, Dubbing ( I dont know if this is the right word), Anchoring, RJ'ing, Blogging... What not... I wish god should add 25th ,26th hours to her clock .... I still remember her Sapthaswarangal show (10 to 12 years back) in which SPB sir was the judge and A.V Ramanan sir was the Anchor and Chinmayee singing thesulavudhey( I even remember her dress color.... Dark blue) and not attempting the change in talam for the first time but getting it correctly for the second time..

History apart, she has been a good motivating factor for me to go to my music classes since when I spoke to her. When I asked her" How do u manage between so many things", her reply was " If you have real Inclination towards everything, you can make it". That one sentence, though not a great combination of words for motivation, but created a small change in ME... I started going to music classes regularly, started blogging, and also a lot of reading.. And now, writing about her....

All I can do now is to dedicate (im not sure whether this word will be the apt english equivalent for SAMARPANAM) this post to her. To Chinmayee - " Please do something and achieve something always ...if not for you ,but to MOTIVATE me"... Mabuhay.

My first Yoga class in U.S !!!!

I just got back from Yoga class. Its my free credit given by the college and that allows me to take one FUN course from these options - Yoga, Aerobics, Salsa, Western music, Golf training, Body Building, Rifle Shooting etc., Well informations apart, I felt like sharing the feel which I experienced when I was doing Yoga. Btw, Im not new to Yoga because I was doing that in chennai itself (everyday morning 6 to 7) and so its not about the feel of yoga in my body, but about the respect they give for the Art of Yoga.

When I registered for the course, I had many misconceptions like,

1. Very few "guys" are going to register for Yoga(except me)
2. The class will be filled with fat ladies who try(!!!) to keep their weight under control(the case wherein the average weight of those ppl will be 90+ kgs)
3. The guy/ Girl who is goin to teach yoga will not know what yoga means and about its origin( For those who dont know ,Yoga is 100% from India.. for which I feel really really proud)
4. Nothing is goin to be perfect and I will probably walk out of the class if it (yoga) is not given proper respect
5. I will probably discontinue the class if it has all the above and take Intermediate Salsa ( Bcoz I know the Basics of it)

But I was commmmmmmpletely W.R.O.N.G !!! It was exactly the opposite.

1. I saw a whole bunch of Enthusiastic guys in the hall.( girls too... in equal number)
2. Young girls with full of josh were there in my vicinity ( colourful..... ;p)
3. A young and Energetic lady named Melissa was the Instructor and she was really impressive and energetic.
4. Evrything was completely in-tune and it was like a real yoga centre or like an Ashram where you can feel the vibes and energy of yoga.
5. Felt really happy that this is one of the few good decisions I have made in my life

But the most important thing is I was given a lot of importance in the class since Im from India and there they asked me to give a short introduction about yoga because the instructor wanted to hear it from an Indian ( and Im being the only Indian in that room).

"Hi everyone. This is Barani from India doin my Masters in petroleum engg. And for people who dont know anthing about yoga and Asana, Its birth place is India and its one of the very few art forms which has a great history and tradition. Now we are all here to learn this wonderful art form and lets do that with full enthusiasm and respect. I also wanted to tell you ,or probably warn you guys that if you dont try wholeheartedly, all your efforts are going to be futile and if you do this with full effort, you will feel the change by the end of this class. Another thing, If you expect yoga to burn your calories and muscles rapidly, that is NOT going to happen. Yoga works mostly with metabolism. Thanks guys and Now its Yoga time !!!!!!"

...and then we worked out for 1 full hour. The instructor played the following shanthi mantra

"Om Saha Naa vavatu Saha Nau Bhunaktu

Saha Veeryam Karavaa vahai. Tejasvi Naava dheetamastu

Maa Vidvishaa vahai.

Om Shaantih Shaantih Shaantih."

Wow.... got goosebumps man... I felt like a Ritual being performed by all those Foreigners and Im searching for words to explain the vibration that I had at that time. That made me feel really proud of my country and this art form. They greeted each other by saying Namaste in American accent ( not that bad...). After everyone left the hall, I introduced myself to her personally and then got back home and writing this........

Today, I feel rejuvenated not only because of yoga but also the "feel-good" thing about my country and about the Art form which I love the most. Adios

A wonderful 25 days trip and Back to square 1 ....

Back to square 1...Got back to my university town Socorro and now getting myself tuned to the routine 9 to 6 life...Once again those self-cooking, wallmart monthly shopping, pay cheques, lab experiments, Hi's and Hello's, small get-to's, etc.

Well, this time, my trip was a real good experience. I started on 20th and reached Pittsburgh and stayed in my cousin's place. The next day, to Morgan town (West Virginia) and stayed there for 2 days. Then once again ,pack-up and reach Cincinatti (Ohio) and celebrated my first ever Christmas with my friends. Then on 27th we moved to Columbus (Ohio) and stayed there jus one night during which I had a good chance of meeting two of my old school mates ( probably friends.. Bcoz im not sure whether they remember me. The reason being , I was not really active and people hardly knew me during those days in Ahobila math where I did my 11th n 12th. I still hate that school for some reason) R.Bharathwaj and Karthik.

The next day morning was really colorful and awesome and the most appropriate reason for that would be Im starting towards New York. NY city .... really majestic and the place which gave an ultimate chance of experiencing that, is TIME SQUARE.. I dont know the reason for that name but what I felt was people had no time such that they felt like time getting squared (Wow.. not a bad one right !?!!?!). They were walking really fast with some major issues running in their mind and I could clearly make it out from their face. That reminded me of the song "velai velai velai...ambalaikum velai.. pombalaikum velai" from the movie Avvai shanmugi.

I also had a good chance of meeting a Chat friend in NY with whom I ve been chatting thru yahoo for the past 7 years(!!!!) and had a good time with his family. And after 6 months, I tasted Saravana Bhavan's Sambar vadai and Rava dosai. Wow...wattey splendid moment that was!!!!

The next 2 days, I visited Statue of liberty, Empire State building, WTC remains, Wax Museum and other places. The last day, tried to shop in Macy's ( world's biggest store) but it was damn costly and did window shopping and came to my cousin's place in Missouri. This time, in my cousin's place, I had a good chance of tasting many kinds of sarakku... I mean, Wine, Tequila, whisky etc ., ( just tasted...he he). And then on 15th jan, here im now in Socorro...... Back to square 1 !!!

Ragini Sri - Talented or Gifted or Favoured?

Its Airtel super singer time and Im watching every single episode online. Everyone is singing very well and they are all talented. The highlight in my case is I have had good time with few of the participants in few programs.

Renu - We both sang in the same episode of Ragamalika ( she made it to finals and also won)

Ranjani - In SPB's Ennodu paatu padungal ( she made it to finals)

Ravi - I hve met him several times in KMC culturals and Sapthaswarangal.

Ajeesh - We both competed in EQ-2 and my college made it to the next round(unfortunately Loyola came second in that episode and we came first)

Ragini - She will not remember me coz during my ennodu paatu padungal shooting, her Friend Sashwati was taking part in that episode and ragini came to support her.

........like this....................
The Reason Im now writing about Airtel super singer is to condemn few people who talk and write wrong things about Ragini Sri. She is a very good singer with a lot of talent in her. but Im seeing so many people, writing bad things about her..

ITS ABOSOLUTELY IDIOTIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, people who write about her should first get one thing into their bloody skull that ,Its not just favourism in every round which is taking her to the next level (Give me a break man....!! not every judge should do favour to ragini....ryt?).
Most importantly, People who comment about her should first clear all these rounds of Super singer and then they hv the bloody Right to talk about her singing skills. If not, its better for them to keep their mouth shut. ( Bcoz its so easy to sit and press the computer keyboard buttons...but not so when it comes to singing...)

Oh My God!!!! When I could not bear some people who comment about her singing, its jus the height of idiotism (and joblessness too.!!!!) to see some people commenting about her attitude, dressing style, emotional imbalances and what not.......my god...!!! why dont they think atleast once before they write something about someone ( either is good or bad).

Those people, they just dont know how bad her mental stability will be disturbed if she comes to know about all these shit. I think Unni was mentioning about this only during medley round and even Chinmayi has written about this in her blog.

So better stop commenting bad about others.Just sit back , relax and enjoy and appreciate the talent rather than having so much of attitude and commenting bad about others. Take it easy....

One piece of advice to the singers ( if they read this blog)- Think well before you perform and do justice to the show which has made you so popular in Tamilnadu. My prayers and Best wishes.

Is cooking really tough?

Well its already 3rd month of my US stay ( to say perfectly, SUCCESSFUL) and its also my successful 3rd month of self-cooking sessions. I m now an expert in making almost all the dishes of south india like sambar, rasam, Kootu , all vegetable curry, and sweets like payasam, kesari and pongal etc etc etc., If you want any recipe , just ask me and I can give you the best "bachelor's " way of cooking.

Why Iam saying all these is because I was affected very badly during first few days of my US stay wherein I did not have any restaurants that give me a good vegetarian food. I had to search for people who will cook for me and by God's grace, I had few of my seniors like Bala, divya who helped me in getting a good food. At that time, I decided that we should Invite these people and feed them good south Indian food cooked by me and I also did that.

Coming to the point, I have never tried cooking in chennai( may be once or twice, that too with my mom's guidance in cooking upma..thats all). But time has changed me to a Good Cook. Now I can confidently do things like from Inviting people for dinner to creating a seperate blog for giving recipes to all the suffering BACHELORS.

Here comes ( Once again) the right way of concluding this post..,

I TRUELY BELIEVE IN DARWIN'S THEORY "Survival of the fittest" and IM SURVIVING ( sucessfully) ..................................................