Ratan Tata turns 72

Dear Mr. Tata,

I would firstly like to wish you a very happy 72nd birthday and advance new years wishes. May this new year keep you in good health and help the TATA conglomerate flourish as always.

I have off late been hearing that you are to retire in the coming years and your in search of a successor. I don' know if I am eligible to apply for the post ;) .

I am a final year student of engineering , will be graduating in 2010 majoring in IT. I have been deeply bit by the business bug and has always been inspired by the TATA group for the ethics and values they bring in to their employees and their management systems. I am also looking to do an MBA course in the coming years which I believe would feed my quest in know about business and management.

It was some four years back that I decided I wanted to become an entrepreneur and that time around I got to read your biography and that was it and I decided then that I should definetly meet you atleast once in my life time :) .

I read in a business magazine stating that you aren't particular about any constraints for applying for the post of the chairman , though the designation sounds a little contradicting with me being a woman , I wouldn' really mind it ;)

Many happy returns of the day to you Sir :)

Holidays - Part 2

Well, I jus' remember writing about my holidy eve before I could full fledgedly get into the holidaying mood. Vacation and weekends are keeping me more occupied than the usual times.

Firstly, I would like to thank you all for the votes, support and encouragement that all you guys showered me with when my travelogue was nominated among the top 12 in the country by Indibloggies. I'm so glad to say its been ranked second :) Thank you all :)

This time over it wasn't a complete vacation either since I had an exam coming up once in every 10 days or so, so couldn' plan on a trip too but I jus' wish we get to go on one soon, else I will run out of topic to write in my travelogue.But, it was fun in its own ways.

This time over it was truly a vacation in one aspect. I don' remember getting up before 11 am in the morning except may be for a couple of days when I had to travel to far off distances to my exam centre and my folks were cooperative as well by not trying to wake me up early :)

I'm already in the near end of my holidays. Though my college officially re opens on the 4th of Jan , our classes for placement training have already started and has been going on from the beginning of this week. Apart from that 3 birthday parties + 7 movies + innumerable eating out times + a couple of family get togethers + 2 wedding + some preperation of my test = MY HOLIDAYS.

In the eve of my holidays we celebrated Richa's bday , a couple of hours before she could board into the train. It was a fun evening with all the friends out for dinner at Kabul.

The next morning or rather afternoon when I woke up I jus' realised I was late and had to rush and get ready for a bday lunch treat at Mainland China.

The highlights of my vacation were the family get together we had with my uncle, aunt and cousins , a day along the ECR , the Fun times with friends and the silver jubilee reunion for my mum's batch (CEG) which I attended as well.

P.S. Will come up with a detail post on all these :)

Charitable bidding

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Bidazzled. All opinions are 100% mine.

Bidding online has become so cmmon these days, jus' like buying good online or walking to the shop around the corner to get your groceries.

At Bidazzled the auction winner gets to save around 80% of the actual retail price. There were also two very lucky auctioners who got to win Nintendo wii games with their free bids.

Bids at Bidazzled cost $1, there are also bid packs available as low as $25. Bids are purchased in advance and are used for auctioning. If one doesn't win they get around 50 Bonus Bids as a thank you token for particpating. No one looses in this process.

Now with the gifting season on and everyone is busy making purchases, it is one of the best times to make best use of this service and save a major chunk of your income. That's not all , by participating in the auction you also connect with a social cause since Bidazzled is designed and created to fund a lung cancer charity (The Rich Foundation).

This gives you an opportunity to not jus' make purchases at a low cost but also contribute at the same time. Let's all end the year 2009 and ring in 2010 with some good deed.

That is not all, you can use this code BBP1202A to avail 15 additional bids and this is an exclusive offer for the readers of this blog.

My semester that was ..

(This post is more about getting my thougts 6 months back .. whoosh ! and fast forward with all the events that has happened with me in college since then .. until now. )

This happened to be my pre final semester . Usually the odd semesters turn out to be longer and so was this one streching from July to November (comparitivley shorter than the usual odd semesters).

My 7th sem started on a very positive note, well no specific reasons but then jus' the general feeling you get coz of the people around you. Thanks to you guys! This sem I guess was one of the fun filled ones with lots of hanging around with friends, I can hardly remember the time we ever had class this semester.

What did we do in class ?? Sudoku .. Chennai times, metro plus, movie in the laptop, CHATTING, canteen times .. There were also some delightful moments , which I'm really glad about and will always be a part of my resume ;) .. The fun trip to Annamalai University, Chidambaram in July 09 to present papers in an International Conference and winning it was jus' an icing on the cake :) .. Cressida '09 (our department symposium) in August where I was part of the core team who conducted Paper presentation .. Aarush (our college tech fest) saw us participating in a couple of events .. Friendship day celebration , Diwali celebration :) ..

I also got to know a lot of new juniors in the bus who eventually turned out to be my very good pals. My so very peaceful bus journey, which is how its been the last couple of years is turning out to be a total hungama with all these new found friends :)

This sem was FUN :)

Monday Morning Inspiration # 82

1. Once, all villagers decided to pray for rain. On the day all people gathered and only one boy came with an umbrella . That's faith

2. Example of the feeling of a baby . When you throw him in the air, he laughs because he knows you will catch him. That's trust.

3. Every night we go to bed , with plans to be accomplished the next morning. That's Hope.

To read other Monday Morning Inspiration click here.

Dhruv's cooking expedition ..

One of the factors that bond me and Dhruv to be such good friends is our love for good food and our passionate dream to start a restaurant chain in the near future. This atleast was one of the reason why we found each other interesting atleast in the start when we came to know each other almost 2 years ago.

Now, this has jus' got a step further and this post is a result of that ... D is turning out be such a wonderful cook .. oops! sorry Chef and me the lab rat who get to taste all his experiments , which eventually turns out to be AWESOME !!

After the conversation we had here , this is the sandwich I get from him and it was absolutely YUM ! D I'm jus' so proud of the chef that you are ;)

YUM !! I ended up eating 2 whole sandwiches all by myself at one go .. those of them who know my eating abilities know how much this means to my stomach ..

On the other day at D's place after me and his mum started kidding about how he made his mum do most of the things and called it " Him doing it all " . D was in to treat me with a pizza this time , all totally made under my inspection ;)

hmmm .. YUM ! D I'm sure our restaurant needs one chef less when your on board .. :) Now whats on your mind next ?? What are you gonna cook for me ?? ;)

Movie Review - Paa

*no spoilers*

A big thumbs up to the whole crew of Paa. It was one of those movies where you didn't wanna miss even a single scene. Amitabh Bachchan play Auro, a 13 year old boy who is affected by progeria ,a disease that makes one look older than their actual age.

Junior Bachchan plays father to Auro and the beautiful Vidya Balan play mom to the child. It is only in the later part of the movie that Abishek Bachchan comes to know that Auro is his son. How this happens ?? What happens to Auro ?? makes the story line.

The character Auro makes the whole movie lively with timely humour.

Paa was directed by Balki and Music scored by Illayaraja , which only added beauty to the already strong story line.

I would surely recommend everybody to watch Paa. My favourite in the movie was the timely humour by Auro :)

Movie Review - Aadhavan

*No spoilers*

I caught up with Aadhavan over the weekend with my parents. When we found that every other movie that we were planning to see had no tickets available finally we zeroed in on this one.

With all the rave reviews I recieved from almost everyone whose seen this movie I was a little skeptical but I was pretty much sure that I wouldn' be disappointed with Surya (one of my favourite actors) playing the lead.

Surya as usual was at his best and so was Vadivel. The other actors did a good job too. The one other factor that I was totally excited about was that, one song sequence from Aadhavan was shot in my college campus.

(The rain sequence in this song was shot in my college) :)



The picturisation of all the songs were beutifully done.


The movie was a very good entertainer and my whole family liked it. You can surely watch it once, but I didn't really mind watching it the second time :)

Some people some moments .. # 1

After so much speculation I have finally decided to come out with this post. I jus' have so much to write and my speculation was all about which to write first .. and finally decided on this one.

It was jus' another random evening when I got a call from friend D.

D: Hey, Wasup?
Me: Nothin' much, jus' online doing a post on my travel blog. What you doin ?
D: I'm in Hot breads , getting loaves of bread
Me: oh ok.. Mom asked you to get ?
D: no, im getting it .. I'm planning to prepare a dish today
Me: oh ok what ?
D: Sandwich
Me: Cool .. have fun ..

He calls again after half an hour

Me: Are you done making the sandwich ??
D: Yup, its in the grill now .. thats y called u .. ok I got to go now. c ya ..

He calls again after 5 mins

D: hmm.. yum! the sandwich is too too good, one of the best I ve ever had.
D: I'm gonna have the entire loaf all by myself.
Me: great! so what all veggies did u use ?
D: capsicum, tomatoe, boiled corn kernel, olives and some baby corn
Me: (thought to my self - not bad ! ) oh ok .. Where s the sandwich for me ?
D: I ll get you tomorrow :)
Me: Ahh! sure ! thanks :)

(The next day)

Me: Hey what you doin ? how come ur up so early ?
D: I'm making sandwich will come and give you in sometime
Me: Cool .. (smiling to myself)

After about an hour D comes and gives me the sandwiches he s made.

Me: thanks da.. thats so sweet of u!
D : my pleasure .. don' forget to heat it before eating , it tastes better that way..
Me: sure!
D: ok i gtg .. c ya

My first bite into the sandwich , the second bite .. yummmmm .. it was indeed very very good! Like D said one of the best sandwiches I ve ever tasted...

(pics coming soon)

Now, guess what this led to ?? This hurt my female ego deeply and the next 2 days saw me doing khakra and aloo paratha and for a first timer it turned out to be pretty good. Years of shouting from my grand mom and mom asking me to learn to cook which saw no improvement from my side .. has finally been changed by this piece of sandwich .. Finally, everyone including me is happy that I finally cooked !

P.S: I hope you guys like my new template, I found this template very apt to go with the christmas and holiday mood :)

Monday Morning Inspiration # 81

Mary and Susan were friends for years. They grew up together and attended the same schools. They were now both in their 40's, and both had great careers. They both had a similar upbringing - same education, same family values, similar support and financial position. But there was one main difference. Mary never seemed to have enough time. She watched her life long friend Susan. She had similar responsibilities and interests. Susan had a career, she had three children, she had her hobbies, one of which included golf. Over lunch, Susan was telling Mary about the golf game that she played last weekend.

"Susan, where do you find the time to play golf?" asked Mary. "I never seem to have the time, now with the children older and doing there own thing I thought I would have time to play golf like we did when we were in college."

Susan looked at Mary and laughed, "Mary, we both have the same hours in a day. You do have the time to play golf!"

With a sigh Mary replied, "That's easy for you to say. I never seem to have time. My work takes so much of my time. I am in the office at 7:30, I leave at 6:30 in the evening. By the time I get home and have dinner, it is 8:00! And, then I usually have a briefcase full of work. The weekends are full of more work. Just to keep up, I have to put in the hours. You know what it is like!"

"Of course, I know what it is like," Mary said. "But what would happen tomorrow if you got sick? Who would do the work?"

"Sick. Who has time to get sick! exclaimed Mary. "But if I did get sick, someone else would do the work, I suppose."

"You know something, Mary, I used to be like you. I worked night and day and of course on weekends. When I got home I was exhausted but I would push myself and read my children a bedtime story. By the time I went to bed, I would be more than exhausted. The boss I had was very demanding. She was there early in the morning, late at night, and she always worked weekends. I felt I had to do the same - I needed the job to help support my family - just as you did. But then I had a change of bosses. The man I worked for was older and much wiser, I might add! Of course, I continued to work the hours I had been working. One day he came to my desk and passed me a card that had a quote on it which said, 'What I do today is important, because I will never have today again' - then he left.

I sat there stunned. I suddenly thought of what was important to me. While my work was important, I realized my children were more important. I also realized that time for me was important. It was 4:30, the official closing time of the office. I straightened my desk, felt a twinge of guilt about leaving, but I forced myself to leave. I was home by 5:00. My children and husband were surprised. I had a wonderful evening. It was not a chore to read that bedtime story that evening."

Mary was looking at her friend thoughtfully and then questioned Susan about the work she had left on her desk.

Susan replied, "I never thought this possible, but I actually accomplished more the next day then I had in weeks. As I was leaving the next day I stopped at my new boss's office and thanked him for the quote. He told me a story about advice his dad had given him many years ago when he was working night and day. He referred to it as 'Balance of Life'. His dad told him to keep balance in his work, in his family life and in time for himself. He explained to me, while all aspects of our life are important, without a balance, you become addicted and like all addictions you lose .

Mary smiled at her friend, "Thanks for talking with me. We have been friends for so long. Thank heavens I have balance with your friendship! You have convinced me. I will leave the work in my briefcase this weekend. On Monday, I will make the list first thing. Perhaps next weekend, I will have the time to go golfing with you!"

"Balance of Life" - important for us ALL!

- Catherine Pulsifier

I am so glad that my family and friends know this Balance of life so well and my upcoming movie reviews are a result of this :)

To read other Monday MorningInspiration click here

Remembering 26/11

With every down fall comes the perseverence to become stronger and act to the best of your abilities to emerge successful. I'm sure our nation has only become stronger from the aghast 26/11 terror attacks in Mumbai which exactly started on this very day last year and lasted for 3 dreadful days.

May the soul of all the brave souls who lost their lives in this mishap R.I.P.

HOLYdays Wohoooo !! - 1

Finally and officially my holidays have begun. With jus' one day gone I'm already done with eating at 3 different eateries.

The time my exams got over we decided on visiting Mahindra City which is a good 10km away from my college and the first sight of the place ..OMG!! I still can't believe we were in Chennai or rather India .. We decided on going there for lunch but here I have much more to talk of the place rather than jus' going there to eat.



Mahindra city is HUGE and VERY well maintained.I'm already thinking of going there another time jus' to have a look at the place. Now getting into the the real reason we were there for.

Bunch of four hungry kids(??) set right into the food court that caught our eye with its Pizza hut outlet, we didn't find the other outlets very appealing. After treating ourselves to yummy pizzas which were such a delight to our taste buds after tasting IS this pizza?? kinda dish in our beloved college ..

Now it was time for desserts. We headed to the Wings - Taj Cake shop (My and Dhruv's favourite pastry shop in the city, more so coz of the memories we share of the place from the time we were kids). After the Chocolate truffle , Noughat pastry and some fruit salad.

It was time to get back home as we have had a surprise bday planned for our friend Richa who had a train to catch the same night.

This got me thinking !!

Was in a conversation with dad this evening and he reminded me telling that this might be my last semester vacation with me graduating in May 2010. huff! time jus' flies ...

P.S: This post is jus' the first sequel of what I'm upto in my holidays.. Since a lot of things have been happening at my end I'm jus' planning to post it as a sequel.

The holiday mood is setting in ..

With jus one more exam to go and that too a not so tough one I'm already into the holiday mood. Last evening was out with my parents for dinner. After hunting all over Khader Nawaz Khan road for the newly opened Chinese restaurant "White Pepper" which we eventually couldn' find , we settled in for New Yorkers (this is one of my favourite place in the city for its sizzlers). But their Pizzas are a huge let down.

This morning I was in a conversation with my friend D talking about the Oh! so many new eat outs I came across in Khader Nawaz Khan road and there we go again making plans on where to go and what to eat.. This vacation will also see a lot of my relatives flying down to Chennai and this is gonna increase the fun quotient for my vacation :)

Dirt devil holiday buying guide

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Dirt Devil. All opinions are 100% mine.

With the holiday season getting closer most of us are already expecting friends and relatives visting our place. With the fun and excitment comes the dreaded task of cleaning our homes and putting the right things at the right place. That sure is gonna turn out to be a nightmare.

If jus' the thought of cleaning makes you wonder as to where you kept your dirt cups, hand vacs and brush rolls after your last clean up like the way I did, worry no more with the Dirt devil holiday buying guide already out. This guide actually helped me in buying the right kind of upholstrey that I will be needing depending upon the type of cleaning I was planning to do and the stuffs that I already had.



The holiday deal also comes with a variety of gifts which would suit anyone in your family. It is an easy to use holiday buying guide which has close to 300 ways by which you can save on your online shopping. That is not all there is also shortcuts to avail free shipping of the products.

Now, you don't have to spend time and fuel going to the store to make your purchases. It is all just a click away and this online shopping experience comes with loads of benefits.

Totally Impressive !!

What am I upto ??

Enjoying the rain that's been hitting the Chennai city on and off over the last couple of weeks .. Saw a movie on TV last evening (Dhaam Dhoom) .. Went to Mc D for lunch with friends .. Full time in FB .. Resuming my blogging skills with a new post in my travel blog .. Blog hopping .. Playing Farm ville .. Waving trying to figure out how to use google wave.. catching up over phone with my old school buddies ..Downloading and listening to all new song releases

In case your wondering im on vacation. No, I have my semester exams going on and what better time to appreciate good movies , music , food and the other finer aspects of life :)

The new wave ..

Ah ! there I am finally in Google wave .. Well, for almost a week now I have been so obsessed about getting an invite to google wave and finally got one yesterday and since then been trying to figure out how to use it ..

I'm jus too lazy at the moment and time doesn permit me to (coz of my on going sem exams) to watch the looooong video about Google wave which runs close to 1hr and 20 mins.

Those of you already in wave .. I have a doubt .. Are you able to send invites already coz I don' really see any facility to be able to invite other friends ?? or rather I haven't found out yet ..

I love it this way !

Waking up from a peaceful sleep .. getting out of your sheets .. rainy day .. hot tea .. news paper .. Ah .. bliss!

This is how my day began :) .. a hearty welcome to the torrential rainfall that s been drenching the Chennai city since yesterday .. I love rain !

Peranmai - Movie review

**spoiler alert**



Jayam ravi (Dhruvan) plays the role of a forest incharge officer , he basically is from the family of mountain tribes and has grown to become the officer he is now. He trains a group of NCC cadets (girls) of which 5 of them are selected to go into the forest.



During which they encounter foreigners entering their forest (which they assumed to be a virgin land inaccessed b human beings) later they find out that the intention of the foreigners is to prevent India from launching the satellite that they have planned to ..



How they go about exploiting the plan and how jayam ravi along with his group of 5 girls fight to save their nation's satellite launch sums up the movie.



It is one if the good movie from kollywood that has hit the screens in recent times. Everyone s acting is appreciable and the way the movie has been taken is beautiful and vey realistic :) A must watch I would say.

I quit my job to become a full time farmer ..

• I need to reach the next level today.
• Setting up the alarm to get up at four and harvest the strawberries.
• When your mostly using your calculator to calculate on how much you gain by investing on a crop ...
• When your counting your days to buy a farm house ..
• When your panicky if you have to shell out coins to buy a tractor ??

Well, im talking about THE farmville .. game in FB to which me and most other friends of mine are addicted to for quite sometime now. Are you one of them too ?

It's interesting to live a life of a farmer atleast virtually .. I'm making this post in the time gap I ve got before my pumpkins are ready for harvest :) .. Thou' its time consuming.. its fun ! im not much of a game person but this game has got me totally into it .

Did you miss your favourite TV show ?

I love watching TV , though im not glued to it all the time ( yup, im sticky eyed with my laptop than TV ever since the last few years ) but I can never miss out on my favourite TV shows .

But it gets a little too annoying when I'm loaded with assignments, projects and when I can't catch up with my favourite TV programme , its even more when you are at school and your friends are talking about what happened in the F.R.I.E.N.D.S episode yesterday when you were busy out with your family.

This might also come to you as a solution when you are busy fighting with your brother when we wants to watch his favourite soccer team play and you jus' don't wanna miss out your favourite chef dishing out some delicious recipes.

This is not gonna be this way anymore with charter.net where you can catch up with your favourite TV shows and movies being aired on TV at your convenience learn more at charter.net/ondemand where you can watch any Tv show or movie being aired at your place of convenience and time. Probably, you can even invite all your friends over at your place for a TV show night.



That's not all get updates and fun extras on Charter’s Facebook page to keep you updated with what is happening in the world of television.


Now,you can carry on with all your other activities without having to worry about your favourite TV show :)

Diwali celebrations ...

The weekend right after our practical exam and jus' before our model exam could commence was Diwali .. but that didn't stop us from having fun ..

Diwali fell on saturday but the fun began right from wednesday when my practical exam got over .. shopping for sweets .. standing in long queues .. then getting to know that the gift pack you ve been looking for has jus' run out of stock .. Well, probably we should change the saying from it sold out like hot cakes to .. it sold out like diwali sweets .. such was the demand for sweets in all stores in the city ..

After repeatedly visiting for another 2 days we got our stuffs .. made some savouries at home .. and came to know that friday was a holiday too ..

I had a lunch invitation to one of my friend Garima's place on friday .. a whole bunch of us were there at her place since noon till evening eating .. snacking .. gossiping .. playing ... playing .. n more playing .. this set us into the full festive mood ..

Got back home only to find myself all tired and worn out and wanting to hit the bed .. but that didn' stop me from doing the rangoli which i had planned to do for Diwali ( will put up the pic soon) ..

Diwali day started on a very traditional way visiting friends and relatives .. distributing sweets and since early evening it was time for us friends to get together at my place and this time it was for bursting crackers and to dine out .at Thali corner for some traditional north indian food.. Ah! its total fun when family and friends get together :)

Sunday saw us all getting together for lunch again at Palki ( jus' the post diwali celebration ;) )

guess this would be my last diwali with this bunch of friends since we are in the final year of college and most of us would be moving to different places .. So, we saw to it we had as much fun as possible .

Monday Morning Inspiration # 80

There was a man who had four sons. He wanted his sons to learn not to Judge things too quickly. So he sent them each on a quest, in turn,to go and look at a pear tree that was a great distance away.

The first son went in the winter, the second in the spring,the third in summer,
and the youngest son in the fall. When they had all gone and returned, he called them together to describe what they had seen.

The first son said that the tree was ugly, bent, and twisted. The second son said it was covered with green buds and full of promise.The third son disagreed; he said it was laden with blossoms that smelled so sweet and looked so beautiful, it was the most graceful thing he had ever seen.The last son disagreed with all of them; he said it was ripe and drooping with fruit, full of life and fulfillment.


The man then explained to his sons that they were all right, because they
had each seen only one season in the tree's life. He told them that you cannot judge a tree, or a person, by only one season.That the essence of who they are, and the pleasure, joy, and love that come from that life, can only be measured at the end, when all the seasons are up.

If you give up when it's winter, you will miss the promise of your spring, the beauty of your summer and the fulfillment of your fall. Don't let the pain of one season destroy the joy of all the rest.Don't judge life by one difficult season.

Persevere through the difficult patches,
and better times are sure to come in time.

To read other Monday morning Inspiration click here.

Getting Into the festive mood...

I am one person who can never sacrifice a fun thing for anything more serious in life, but I was surprised when I held myself back to sit and prepare for my semester practical exam which was on the very next day when there was a Diwali Bash happening in the floor jus' below me .. all my neighbours getting together .. music.. dance .. cultural programs .. yummy food.. fireworks display .. and me studying *sigh*

Last Diwali Bash me along with family and a bunch of my college pals were having a gala time ,how much thigs change in such short span of time.

Neverthless, 3 days down to diwali i'm already in to teh festive mood keeping aside all college work. My high priority jobs for now is to get my diwal dress pressed and to distribute sweets to friends :)

I've not got much of major plans this Diwali but im not sure as to what is gonna pop out in the last minute.. So, what are you doing this Diwali ???

Eatin' Out

Well ya thats my new blog which i'm sure is gonna be very close to my heart as I love Eatin' Out. It's been quite sometime since I had wanted to write posts on restaurants that I ve been visiting, but now I thought it was high time I do it before I start forgetting how it felt being there ..

I would like to invite all of you to visit my new resto blog Eatin' Out and let me know your views. This place is gonna be filled with my experiences in eateries right from the street corner pani puri shops to the glitzy glossy high end restaurants .. If your a foodie like me, im sure you will love it too!

Final lap of college ...

I'm jus' starting to feel the essence of the final year in college thou we ve come to the end of the pre final semester ..

There hardly is anything happening in classes these days, we ve got more of free hours than lectures, more fun than studying, projects, entrance exams ..... Well, though it is time to get all responsible there are times when you feel the pressure to be jus too much.. I jus' hope all goes well :)

Movie Review - UP

Last evening after the celebration of Ayudha pooja at home me , mum and dad set to watch the 3D animation movie UP.

*spoiler alert*

The movie is all about a young couple both adventurists wanting to visit a far away land and meet one of the renowned explorers of all time .. The couple grow old and unfortunately the expedition could be carried on only by the old man after his wife's death .. and the various incidents that happen and later finding that the renowned explorer is a cheat makes up the story..

The first half of the movie is a drag, but the later half gets over in a jiffy ..

I'm sure the kids will have fun watching it :)

Eid Mubarak !

Eid wishes to all my muslim friends .. I hope you had a great time feasting after mor than a month long of fast.

I'm jus' looking to have my share of Biryani from a few of my juniors and yea few of them were so sweet willing to get some veg. biryani for me , me being a pure veggi :)

I would be glad to hear your Eid experiences and what eid means to you .

P.S. I guess this is the longest time I have stayed away from my blogspace (almost close to 2 weeks) .. not that I don' have anything to write but its more of me lacking the drive to log in to blogger and make a post ..

As I think it jus' gets me wondering that I hardly do anythin apart from college work these days .. This is really not a very good sign .. I guess it would be a lil hard for me to get into my regular day to day blogging .. but I still will make it a point to make a post a day whatever it may be .. I desperately wanna be here, since blogging has become a part of my life and so have all my blogger friends and also for the fact that I love to identify myself as a blogger :)

Monday Morning Inspiration # 79

An emperor in the Far East was growing old and knew it was time to choose his successor. Instead of choosing one of his assistants or his children, he decided something different. He called young people in the kingdom together one day. He said, "It is time for me to step down and choose the next emperor. I have decided to choose one of you."

The kids were shocked! But the emperor continued. "I am going to give each one of you a seed today. One very special seed. I want you to plant the seed, water it and come back here after one year from today with what you have grown from this one seed. I will then judge the plants that you bring, and the one I choose will be the next emperor!"

One boy named Ling was there that day and he, like the others, received a seed. He went home and excitedly told his mother the story. She helped him get a pot and planting soil, and he planted the seed and watered it carefully. Every day he would water it and watch to see if it had grown. After about three weeks, some of the other youths began to talk about their seeds and the plants that were beginning to grow.

Ling kept checking his seed, but nothing ever grew. 3 weeks, 4 weeks, 5 weeks went by. Still nothing. By now, others were talking about their plants but Ling didn't have a plant, and he felt like a failure. Six months went by, still nothing in Ling's pot. He just knew he had killed his seed.
Everyone else had trees and tall plants, but he had nothing. Ling didn't say anything to his friends, however. He just kept waiting for his seed to grow.

A year finally went by and all the youths of the kingdom brought their plants to the emperor for inspection. Ling told his mother that he wasn't going to take an empty pot. But honest about what happened, Ling felt sick to his stomach, but he knew his mother was right. He took his empty pot to the palace. When Ling arrived, he was amazed at the variety of plants grown by the other youths. They were beautiful in all shapes and sizes. Ling put his empty pot on the floor and many of the other kinds laughed at him. A few felt sorry for him and just said, "Hey nice try."

When the emperor arrived, he surveyed the room and greeted the young people. Ling just tried to hide in the back. "What great plants, trees and flowers you have grown," said the emperor. "Today, one of you will be appointed the next emperor!" All of a sudden, the emperor spotted Ling at the back of the room with his empty pot. He ordered his guards to bring him to the front. Ling was terrified. "The emperor knows I'm a failure! Maybe he will have me killed!"

When Ling got to the front, the Emperor asked his name. "My name is Ling," he replied. All the kids were laughing and making fun of him. The emperor asked everyone to quiet down. He looked at Ling, and then announced to the crowd, "Behold your new emperor! His name is Ling!" Ling couldn't believe it. Ling couldn't even grow his seed. How could he be the new emperor?

Then the emperor said, "One year ago today, I gave everyone here a seed. I told you to take the seed, plant it, water it, and bring it back to me today. But I gave you all boiled seeds, which would not grow. All of you, except Ling, have brought me trees and plants and flowers. When you found that the seed would not grow, you substituted another seed for the one I gave you. Ling was the only one with the courage and honesty to bring me a pot with my seed in it. Therefore, he is the one who will be the new emperor!"

So be careful what you plant now, It will determine what you will reap tomorrow, The seeds you now scatter, Will make life worse or better, your life or the ones who will come after. Yes, someday, you will enjoy the fruits, or you will pay for the choices you plant today.

To read other Monday Monring Inspiration click here.

Happy 40th bday Internet !

Wohoo!! Internet is 40 years old .. :)

Internet , now a house hold name in most parts of the world was first used in University of California, Los Angeles when two computers passed test data through a 15 foot long grey cable. It was then called ARPANET and was widely used by the Department of Defence in the United States. But now, right from toddler to senior citizens everyone s got something to do with the Internet.

My Internet story

I'm happy to be in the Internet age , the time it got popular and the way it has turned out to be an incredible part of all our lives. I was first introduced to the internet when I was in my 3rd grade, when my dad and mom used to spend long evenings trying to connect to the internet and I used to fall asleep in my mom s lap since it used to take so long to connect (definetly not less than half an hour). It used to feel like celebration if we could actually get our laptop connected to the internet.

I started using the internet all by myself when in 6th grade when a friend of mine in class asked me if I had a mail ID ?? I knew my parents had one , so that evening when I got back I asked my dad to help me create a mail ID and that was the start . Those days we had vsnl connection and my parents let me know the username and password so I could check my mails when required. Since then most of my saturday afternoons were spent pondering over the internet .. those were times when online chatting was getting popular .. And I remember spending hours together in various chat rooms .. Thou' not directly but indirectly these time spent chatting with random strangers has helped in so many ways ..

Then came our own social networking, blogging, tweets .. what more ??? Now , for years together I don' remember a single day I haven't been using the internet .. Hats off to the inventors, this I consider to be one of the greatest inventions of my time :) A very happy bday Internet , may you rock as always !

My eventful happenings in College - Part 1

I have been wanting to write about a few things thats been happening at my end in college for a while now, but my laziness to transfer the pics from my cam has stopped me from doing so .. but not any longer :)

I for many reason like my department (Information Technology) in my university , I kinda get this feeling that its one closely knit unit with its not so vast number of students and very friendly staffs :) For the inaugration of the IT Association for this academic year my dad was invited to be the chief guest for the event and I loved the day and the way things turned out to be that day ..

Planting sapplings were also a part of our event proceedings , it was fun time with the department faculty and friends .

Monday Morning Inspiration # 78

His offsprings are 2 daughters, through whom she had 15 grand children, 30 great grand children and 5 great great grand children. She's the world's fastest woman in the category of above 90 years of age. She holds the world record for the 100m in that category and also in the 400m and 800m in the above 85 category. In a world where people invite diseases by abusing their body and find it so difficult to remain healthy, here she was even at 93 who was given the honour of carrying the olympic torch in Mexico on its way to Athens.

She was a newspaper vendor by profession, delivering the dailes to her customers covering 11km everyday by foot at a brisk pace. It was only then a customer of hers, who has been noticing her asked her to take up running and she did take part in her first race at the age of 80 and won. It was then she started to train with her grandson and won most of the races at the national level in Mexico. She eventually set and broke many world records.

She lifted the spirit of every human in the world by showing that it is never too late to start and win in life. Challenges just don't exist for the one who wants to achieve.

Courtesy: Frozen thoughts

To read other Monday Morning Inspiration click here

Madras Day ..

Chennai the city with a long beautiful coastline along its east coast has the second largest beach in the world - Marina .. This place , the once oh so conservative Madras has grown in to become a super cool Chennai and me having been born and brought up here .. I'm in total love with this place and glad to see the way its evolving in all areas of business ..

Once the land of idlis, dosas , sambar and Sari s is now home to a multitude of restaurant serving a variety of cusines right from Mediteranean, chinese, Italian and also to a bunch of international names MC D , KFC, Pizza Hut ... and also houses numerous boutiques of the famous names from the fashion world ..

Chennai is also known as the Detroit of India - coz of the numerous automobile companies mushrooming in and around this place.

The land which is home to A.R. Rahman, Kamal Hassan, Indira Nooyi etc ..... I'm proud to be a Chennaite . HAppy Madras Day to all Chennaites around the world!

I would be delighted to read about your best time in Chennai from non-Chennaites and also from Chennaites who would like to share your views about this place :)

Break - ing !

I jus' got back home from college less than half hour back and I'm here off to blogging and checking mails .. This feels like bliss .. the blissfulness is also since I had pani puri on my way back home treating myself to my not so successful cycle test performance . I can't remember the last time I actually spent some quality time jus' for me ... I jus' hope I could get a weekend all by myself but that looks unlikely atleast in the fore seeable future.
For now .....
I'M GOING ON A MOVIE MARATHON starting in a few mins .. I wish I could continue with this for the next few days apart from my time in the college ... lets see :)

Monday Morning Inspiration # 77

To read other Monday Morning Inspiration click here.

Happy 63rd Independance day ..

A very Happy 63rd Independance day :)
I jus' got back home an hour ago after the flag hoisting ceremony in my flats , it felt good to see most of them in a white attire or the Indian tri color attire with the flag pinned up enjoying the spirit of this day.

I sang the national anthem after so many months , which earlier used to be an everyday routine when in school and it jus' put me to thought as to how many of us actually know the whole meaning .. well I didn't until I found it in the net this morning

National Anthem Lyrics
Jana-gana-mana-adhinayaka, jaya he Bharata-bhagya-vidhata.
Punjab-Sindh-Gujarat-Maratha Dravida-Utkala-Banga Vindhya-Himachala-Yamuna-Ganga Uchchala-Jaladhi-taranga.
Tava shubha name jage, Tava shubha asisa mage, Gahe tava jaya gatha, Jana-gana-mangala-dayaka jaya he Bharata-bhagya-vidhata. Jaya he, jaya he, jaya he, Jaya jaya jaya, jaya he!

The following is Tagore’s English rendering of the anthem :

Thou art the ruler of the minds of all people, dispenser of India’s destiny. Thy name rouses the hearts of Punjab, Sind, Gujarat and Maratha, Of the Dravida and Orissa and Bengal; It echoes in the hills of the Vindyas and Himalayas, mingles in the music of Jamuna and Ganges and is chanted by the waves of the Indian Sea. They pray for thy blessings and sing thy praise. The saving of all people waits in thy hand, thou dispenser of India’s destiny. Victory, victory, victory to thee.

WOW ! Whata week its been ..

After a week of bunking classes, skipping lunches, long hours of meetings, planning, coordinating, driving around the city, replying to mails and phone calls, running, jogging , hopping ... and doing almost everything that I could think of I'm SO proud to say CRESSIDA was a super duper hit and so was our event Manuscript - Paper Presentation.

Thou' it wasn't possible for me to be a part of every event , since I had to stick on to my event im so very happy with the way things turned out to be.. Thou' each of us were completley worn out to say the least , the appreciation we got from our staff and participants jus' over shadowed our tired selves.

I think it was during last month - July 09 hat I majorly got to check out so many new restaurants in and around Chennai (all this was partly coz of Cressida - driving around the city to get different work done), this actually inspired me to start a new blog "Eatin out" in which I should be starting to write shortly...

July 09 was one very eventful month in all aspects and would be one that i would always remember as one of the best times of my college days..

I'm yet to transfer pics from my cam .. will do it shortly and there is so much I wanna share with you all here.. (It's jus' recently did I realise that there is some prob. with my camera .. looks like its getting old ;) )

Happy friendship day!

A very happy friendship day to all my blog buddies .. It has been an amazing day for me thou' it didn't start all that well .. It turned out to be awesome fun .. I had loadsa plans in mind but couldnt really meet all my friends whom i wanted too , but was neverthless fun !

Cressida 2k9 - its not just a symposium ...

Here I go with the formal invitation to our national level technical symposium Cressida 2k9, hosted by the Department of Information Technology , SRM University.

SRM University, a silver jubilee institution proudly presents
Cressida 2k9, a national level technical symposium organized by Department of Information Technology during 7th and 8th of August 2009.

In our pursuit of goals and aspirations, we have prepared several activities to be shared with other university/college students. The events in Cressida 2k9, are designed to realize the objectives of Information Technology among the Universities at National level.

The symposium will not fail to portray the importance of cutting edge technologies in the field of IT, with invited talks and guest lectures.

In this regard, we invite you become part of this great event Cressida 2k9.

Looking forward to seeing you there.

For more details log onto http://www.srmit.net/

You could also mail in your queries and abstracts for the event Manuscript - Paper presentation to - it[dot] cressida09 [at] gmail [dot] com.

I personally feel the logo and poster requires a seperate post in itself for the amount of quality work the team put in creating them.

Monday Morning Inspiration # 76

An American, Linda grew up in the deep south, in Alabama and I was raised in northern Ontario, Canada. You could say that fate brought us together. Shortly after we were married, we were wandering through a Super Market when Linda asked me what I would like to have for dinner.

I told her I would like to have some turnip. As I picked one up and put it in our basket, she said, "What are you going to do with that?"I replied, "I'm going to eat it."She said, "Well, I'm not going to eat that."I asked "Why not? I thought you liked turnip?""I do, but I wouldn't eat that. It's the root of the turnip... we feed that to the pigs."

You know, as strange as this may seem, I had never heard it referred to as the root of the turnip! It was always just a turnip to me.I must have looked at her rather strange when I said, "Well, what do you eat?""We eat the green of the turnip."I said, "Isn't that strange, we feed the greens to the pigs."To my knowledge, I have never eaten turnip greens.

I reluctantly put the turnip back where I got it and we went on our way. But I began wondering how far back I would have to go in our family tree to find out who made the decision that we would eat the root of a turnip and feed the green to the pigs or how far back I would have to go in Linda's family to discoverwho made the decision to eat the greens.

Neither Linda nor I have changed our eating habits with respect to turnip, as a result, we just don't eat turnip anymore! But every time I hear the word turnip or see one in the grocery store, I smile and it causes me to think of all the ideas that are controlling our lives that we inherited at birth.

You see, I never woke up one morning and decided which part of the turnip I would eat - I just ate what I was served. And I'm darned sure that my mother didn't wake up one morning and decide which part she would eat either. She just ate what she was served.How much of your life is being controlled by a decision you inherited that was made by some ancient ancestor? The turnip story is true. Laugh at it if you choose, but the idea it represents is huge.

To read other Monday Morning Inspirations click here.

Wassup with me ??

College is turning out to be so much fun in the final year, not that it hasn't been till now .. but jus' the fact that it is the final year is pepping up everyone's mood to have as much fun as possible , so we don' regret later for all the fun we missed.. Studying has always been scheduled for the last few days before exam .

I've been reading this book "The Alchemist" written by Paulo Coelho which I borrowed from my friend after hearing a bit of what the book is all about. It seemed to be a very inspiring book, thou it being a lil philosophical ..

When the often used quotes like " When you wanna achieve something in this world so desperately, you will always find someone to help you" (I totally agree with this one and many such lines used in the book often). These seem pretty inspiring when reading it alone as a quote but as a book , its such an irony I felt so heavy hearted while reading this book .. This has not jus' happened with me but a few other friends of mine as well ...

A few other friends of mine have left abroad for higher studies and a few of them will be leaving very shortly . It is hard to believe that they are no more around in Chennai where they are jus' a call away and tada ... all of you meet as and when you want .. *sighh*

We have our department's technical symposium coming up on the 7th and 8th of next month , where i ll be coordinating for the paper presentation event along with my friends...thats keeping me lil busy as well .

All that apart we are planning for a movie watching spree .. all old and new movies with a lot of new releases ..

I along with my friends caught up with this movie " Vedigundu murugesan" (I don think this movie requires a seperate post, so thats the reason im putting it along with a lot other miscellaneous stuffs).

I fell asleep 2 times and would have continued my sleep hadn't I been woken up by my friend .. A movie with no well defined storyline .. in fact im still wondering where the story started and how it ended .. The only entertaining thing about it was the comment we could pass ... I strongly reccommend not to watch this movie even if your totally jobless ...

You could find a lot of book and movie reviews coming up in this space in the coming days ..

Yayyy ! We won .. :)

We (Me and Dhruv) were selected to attend an International Conference in Annamalai University, Chidambaram and present our paper and b-plan.

We were totally excited about it not for attending the conference but it was more like a family trip , we along with my parents and his mum set to Chidambaram on 17th and were there by the evening after a bit of photo sessions in the sunflower field on the way and we had the evening to practice our presentations which we were to deliever the next day.

Our B-plan was the first one we had to present which went on pretty fine but ended in a tie between us and another participant and for reasons unknown (we assume it to be the age factor- he was around 60 ) he was awarded the best presentation award ..

With a bit of gloom we headed to the hall in which we had to present the next paper .. on entering the hall the first impression was that it is going to be even harder to get an award here and fortunately or unfortunatelt there was jus one prize in each category . And here again we were the last participants to present our paper ...

And with everything done .. with the judges on to the stage .. we were in for a complete surprise when we heard " The best presentation award goes to Shalini G and Dhruva Prakash" .. I actually had to contain me from jumping on the stage .. It really made our entire trip fun filled and worth our energy spent :) :)

I don' think it would have been possible for us to have been in this joyful moment hadn't it been for our parents who were willing to accompany us and especially my mom who was there to help us in each step of our presentation .. Thank you so much ! :)

This, that and a lot more ..

I have been a lil too lazy offlate , thats also the reason why I haven't been posting very regularly here at my blog. I apologize.

With too many things to think about, plan, execute .. like Gre, Gmat, placements, paper presentations ...life looks all muddled up. Me and my friend D are off to Annamalai University tomorrow for a paper presentation. I guess this is the first time in my 21 years of life that I would be travelling to my native place within a month of my last visit.

Jus' hoping all goes well !

Entering the last lap of my college life ..

I have jus' stepped into my final year of college and I'm already starting to feel a lil insecure about parting ways with my friends even if it going to be only after almost a year .. But the first week of my final year went on really well , very eventful actually.

It was my parent's wedding day on the 9th, so had dinner out with parents and grand parents . And on the 8th was my friend's bro's wedding so a bunch of us from college had been there to bless the couple ;) well actually jus another reason to enjoy with friends .. And we have our department symposium coming up in my university , that is again keeping me occupied.

This was in the metropolitan train while on my way back from the wedding .

Looks like the final year is going to be a lot very eventful :) I hope all goes well :)

Monday Morning Inspiration # 75

I will never forget what my old headmaster told taught me. Normally when you are only 15 years of age you do not remember most of the things that are preached by your teachers. But, this particular story is one such lesson that I will never forget. Every time I drift off course, I get reminded of this story.

It was a normal Monday morning at an assembly, and he was addressing the students on important things in life and about committing ourselves to what is important to us. This is how the story went:

An old man lived in a certain part of London, and he would wake up every morning and go to the subway. He would get the train right to Central London, and then sit at the street corner and beg. He would do this every single day of his life. He sat at the same street corner and begged for almost 20 years.

His house was filthy, and a stench came out of the house and it smelled horribly. The neighbors could not stand the smell anymore, so they summoned the police officers to clear the place. The officers knocked down the door and cleaned the house. There were small bags of money all over the house that he had collected over the years.
The police counted the money, and they soon realized that the old man was a millionaire. They waited outside his house in anticipation to share the good news with him. When he arrived home that evening, he was met by one the officers who told him that there was no need for him to beg any more as he was a rich man now, a millionaire.
He said nothing at all; he went into his house and locked the door. The next morning he woke up as usual, went to the subway, got into the train, and sat at the street corner and continued to beg.

Obviously, this old man had no great plans, dreams or anything significant for his life. We learn nothing from this story other than staying focused on the things we enjoy doing, commitment.
We should remain true to our course; which may mean committing yourselves to things that people around you would normally disapprove. Let nothing distract us from being happy, let nothing else determine our fate, but ourselves.

What makes us happy is what matters in the end, not what we acquire.

To read other Monday Morning Inspirations click here.

Courtesy: Internet