Vanity control

A year or two ago, one of my nieces was telling me about her kid sister - about how the eight year old knew exactly what she wanted in terms of clothes, that she would visit the store and demand for a certain style of garment in a certain colour - the one Kareena Kapoor wears in the first part of the song XXXX in the movie YYYY etc. It was funny for sure, but I was also surprised at how fashion-conscious our kids have become when compared to what we were as kids ! This whole thread of memory was probably born from reading another post on beauty consciousness among today's kids.

When I was young, the world around us made sure we were never vain about our looks. First, our school and the school-uniform they strictly enforced. Girls were to wear a navy blue skirt and a white shirt. That sounds nice enough, doesn't it? Well that was not all, we also had to wear red ribbons on our hair and not in any manner we thought which would reduce the blow of having to wear red ribbons - but with 2 braids that were folded such that the red ribbons looked more like brightly painted horns on two-sides of our heads. To complete the costume, we had to wear black shoes and white socks. I sometimes think that the uniform was formulated by a group of people who had varied tastes and the uniform was actually a kind of compromise to accede to everyone's individual requests and tastes!! The interesting thing about the whole thing is, that never once, during my school days or even later when I was at college, did I ever stop to think how ridiculous the costume was!! In fact, I rarely bothered to change my hairstyle or remove the ribbons in the evenings, when I would go out and play. Not just me, none of us at school ever thought it was uncool to wear a totally uncoordinated costume to school or about going to school with hair soaked in oil.

The next influence was of course our families. Anyone born in a family with sisters/brothers know the torture that we go through in the name of uniformity. Our parents thought it would reduce competition and my sister and I would always be dressed in clothes that looked exactly alike ! If I call it torture, I can imagine the plight of my sister, who had to wear her clothes that were identical to mine and then My clothes, which I had outgrown, thus reliving the pain!! As kids, we did not suffer from any sort of pride in accepting hand-me-downs from our other relatives, which the relative always assured were 'never-worn' and were 'like-new'. How a 'never-worn' dress had multiple hand-sewn patches never struck my mind till then! And we didn't care!! After all, we got to wear what grown-up girls wore (salwar-kurtas) instead of the drab skirts that we had to wear then !!

Make-up was a strict no-no. My mother would braid my hair and fold the plaits with red-ribbons (later we got the 'luxury' of black ribbons too), would put kajal in my eyes with two tails at the edge and would say that I looked like her favourite heroine in black and white movies. I was a child and would innocently take it as a compliment and would return to play. Only later, after growing up did I realize that this 'favourite heroine' was actually middle-aged and looked ridiculous with her two braids and a saree. My mother meant well of course !

The influence of media was not as much as it was today. Our heroines were seldom fashion-icons. If we had to look like our heroines, we had to eat more and exercise less (I am talking about our well-fed south-indian heroines). Their fashion-sense, if it can be called that, if imitated would have people around us in splits. Most heroines I remember from then wore really shiny and gaudy looking clothes and pink or other horrid looking hair-pins right next to the partition in their hair (wigs). But then, the movies that we got to watch (about 52 a year), were the outdated ones that played on Sunday evenings in DD, where the heroines had a permanent bump on their head and 3-4 inches of makeup on their faces. Some styles were probably copied by a few, but this never reached children. We were allowed to dress as badly as we wanted.

This was till an actress called 'Nadiya' was introduced to tamizh movies. She was considered hip and cool and became a style icon. As I said, our exposure to movies was still very limited, but we had the other kids talking about hair-styles and skirts and ear-rings named after her!! My most funny memory of our 'fashion-sense' is about some plastic ear-rings that my aunt had bought for us in Chennai. To us, in the small town Coimbatore, Chennai was the fashion-center. My aunt had bought these ear-rings on the suburban train and had sent them through my mom. The colours ranged from bright yellow, to copper sulphate blue. There were a couple that would reach till my shoulder and I used to wear these regularly to school, not in the least bothered about how I looked!! I must have looked like a walking rainbow !!

But coming to think of it, we were not assaulted from every direction with 'fashion-shows' or movies with heroines who looked like their food-plate was snatched from them even before they started eating and clothes like they were dragged out of the bathroom before dressing up! Eating was encouraged and mothers repeatedly told us that we were growing children, who had to be fed like pigs !! Exercising was never enforced, because we were playing the whole evening, after school. At our school, we had some wonderful teachers who never believed in homework and who thought that the child's time spent in school was good enough and that homework was an unnecessary burden.

Clothes and accessories were necessary evils, nothing more and were only distractions from the more important concept of playing and having fun. We were not subjected to peer pressure when it came to appearance. We did not have televisions and magzines talking about losing 20lbs in 20 days or how actress A achieved size zero! We didn't care about size and thought that to pose for a photograph, the red lipstick that we had literally smeared over our lips (and around it) and the very obvious layer of powder were necessary and had to be washed off afterwards !!They were truly to me, days of innocence !!

Of Red Rocks and Vortexes

No, you did not read it wrong ! Don't pride yourself on catching me making a grammatical error !! I know that the usual plural form of Vortex is vortices, but not so in Sedona, AZ. You will hear people talking about spiritual 'vortexes' in Sedona and that is where I went on Saturday!

Sedona is about 2 hours from Phoenix and is known for its breathtaking sandstone formations called the Red Rocks of Sedona.These red rocks were formed due to deposits of iron oxide over layers of sandstone and limestone over millions of years, that later started rusting giving the rocks a bright red colour. We started pretty late in the morning and like all drives that initiate from Phoenix, found the landscape really dull and boring with endless rows of cacti lining both sides of the freeway. However we did not need any board announcing Sedona to us, the town announced itself. All of a sudden, we saw red rocks all over. Nature or God, depending on what you want to call the creator had literally painted the town red. Even the soil on the road had turned from a drab brown colour to bright red !!

To spirituality and metaphysics enthusiasts, Sedona has a little more to offer. Sedona supposedly houses 4 energy vortexes. These are supposedly places of high cosmic energy concentration. Spiritual energy is supposed to flow upwards from the earth much like a vortex. Many people claim to experience a heightened awareness of spirituality on visiting these vortexes (that's how they are called here, instead of vortices. All my friends and most of you who have read my posts regularly (Pride, thy name is Rathi !!), know that I am anything but subtle and sensitive! I have been initiated in Reiki, but have never felt the 'tingling sensation' that most Reiki practitioners claim to experience. Similarly, with TaiChi too, I have heard my fellow students talking about 'out-of-the-body' experience or energy flowing through them while practising TaiChi. Not so with me. I generally tend to smile stupidly (I like to think it is mysterious), when people talk about such experiences and usually leave the other person confused about what I felt (if I did feel anything at all!). So I was hoping to experience this energy that everyone was talking about and chose to visit one of the energy vortexes called The Bell Rock in Sedona.

We parked our car a little distance away from Bell Rock and took the trail that went around the rock, which is actually a misnomer, since it is more a hill than a rock ! It was quite chilly that day and I was cursing myself for having believed weather.com on the weather forecast ! While I was dressed in jeans and t-shirt and was cursing the weather, I saw many mountain bikers who wore shorts and sleeveless tees and were biking away to glory !

There are multiple beliefs about the energy vortexes. Each energy vortex is supposed to enhance a certain kind of energy within a person. One of them is believed to increase energies associated with strength (and hence called masculine energy) and power. A second one is supposed to enhance the feminine side of a person, like kindness, goodness etc (Men please note !!). The other two are supposed to increase the balance, i.e., both energies. Bell Rock is supposedly the vortex that works on improving the balance in the two types of energies. This worked for me, for I have no idea whether I am strong (I would like to think so), or good (I hope others think so !) and increasing one of them alone would have made me deficient in the other one!

I had done my homework about the place and had read that the juniper trees that grew here were twisted from the trunk, thus proving the theory of energy vortexes. My main aim during the short trek was to take pictures of at least one such tree. I managed to find not one but quite a few of them ! I would have given anything to be able to climb the cliff/hill/mountain, but had to satisfy myself by climbing over a few rocks to get a better close-up of a beautifully twisted juniper tree. Unlike trails in the Grand Canyon which are treacherous and scary, these trails were easy and safe, because they were on the base of the hill. There were people who were climbing the mountain though. I saw at least 3 people on the top of the hill - 2 seemed to be walking on the hill while the 3rd guy seemed to be actually climbing ! Since I was with my mother and there was no one else to whom I could show off my 'courage' I did not attempt or pretend to attempt the climb up the hill.

We chose a flat rock on the way to sit down and practise reiki to see if we 'felt' anything different. Unfortunately my mom is as (in)sensitive as me and the result was that we were sitting with our eyes closed palms open for a while, hoping something would happen. My palms became warm, but that could also have been because of the sun ! Meanwhile I badly wanted to open my eyes and glare at the hikers who were passing and were commenting about us (I think it was about us, because I heard them saying, 'it scares me', 'don't go near' etc. ! I remember thinking, How dare they say that !! Bloody racists !! etc), but had to control myself because I wanted my mother and those idiots to think I was deep in meditation !!

My original plan was to go to the Red Rock state park after this trek and trek there for some more time till sunset and then return after the sunset, but this trek had tired us, not because it was a tough one, but because -

• we were out of shape
• it was quite sunny
• and frankly I was quite tired of seeing red rocks everywhere !!

I realize now that I missed out the sunset which is supposed to be glorious. I plan to go again soon and catch the sunset in one of the other vortexes and see if that one has any effect on me.
Below are some pictures from the trip. I am sorry for the number of pictures of the juniper trees. I was fascinated by them and could not stop clicking away !!

1. The crop of the state

2. The lone climber - a long shot


3. The lone climber - a closer shot


4. A close-up of the bell rock - makes me think of red cheese !


5. I call these Shaivaiite mountains - note the streak of vibhuti on them !


6. One of the many twisted juniper trees

7. Another one ! - I climbed on a few rocks to click this one.


8. And Another !!


9. The trail with the play of light


10. The Bell Rock


11. Red Rocks all the way !






12. A twisted family !



13. My mother thought this rock formation was like Lord Ganesha !


14. The trail



15. Picture perfect

King of Suspense !

For a long long time, I thought Alfred Hitchcock was a writer !! In fact, I almost made a fool of myself when I was in class 8 by going to a library in Hyderabad and wanting to show off in front of my cousins, asked the librarian if he had any books by Hitchcock. The only reason I was saved that day was the librarian was ignorant either and thought I was a child prodigy or something, who read books by unknown authors !! Once again fate saved me from disgrace!

I started watching some of Hitchcock’s movies, without knowing they were his. ‘Suspicion’, ‘I Confess’, ‘The 39 steps’ and ‘Vertigo’ were some of the first few movies that I watched. My casual interest turned to admiration and later to a sort of obsession, thanks to the roadside DVD vendor in front of the Wipro office in Chennai. For a mere 50 bucks, this guy was selling DVDs that had 5-6 movies! I jumped with joy when I found some movies that I had already watched and bought 3-4 of them. The more I watched them, the more I loved them and my respect for Hitchcoke grew exponentially.

For some reason, in our country, at least in the past, ‘good cinema’ was usually a bad thing. I talk from my personal experience of watching almost every single movie screened on Sunday afternoons in DD, in the regional cinema section. If the movie was touted as a National Award winner, it was bound to be very very boring. Today when I get appreciated on my patience and tolerance level, I remember these movies with gratitude. I remember a Malayalam award winning movie, where the director spent about 15 minutes of screen time on showing the hero’s morning activities. Hero wakes up, brushes his teeth, takes a bowl of oil, applies it to his hair, and later body.. you get the drift.

Why am I talking about this? Its because I realized after watching some of Hitchcock’s movies, that good cinema can also mean interesting cinema. Hitchcock or Hitch as he was fondly called made movies that were critically acclaimed and were commercial successes. Although his favourite genre was suspense and thrillers, his movies had a lot of humour, mostly the gallows variety.

Hitchcock usually adapted his screenplays from short stories. It is also said that he usually roped in the original writer to collaborate on writing the screenplay. His movies had razor-sharp dialogues and a brilliant background score. Many of the techniques that he introduced in film-making are still used today and some of his movie sequences like the shower sequence in ‘Psycho’ have achieved cult status today. Movies like ‘Rear Window’ have been referenced in many subsequent movies and modern day remakes like Disturbia have been attempted.

One thing I discovered while watching (or re-watching, if there is such a term) many of his movies, was how well he used the celluloid as a visual medium. I was amazed and still am on watching quite a few sequences that are more than 2-3 minutes long where there is absolutely no dialogue and yet the viewer hardly realizes that. The script is taut and there are no unnecessary sequences. Most refreshingly the climax is usually very crisp and to many of us used to a grand finale for every movie, almost abrupt. That does not mean that they aren’t grand. For instance, the climax of ‘North By Northwest’ was shot at Mount Rushmore (and a set of it); in ‘The Man who knew too much’, there is a brilliant nail-bite inducing sequence of a concert where an assasination attempt happens and so on.

Having said all that, the fact remains that almost all his movies entertain! As a viewer, you don’t have to understand the nuances of film appreciation to appreciate movies by Hitchcock. His movies are first and foremost entertainers. With every watch, you will realize a little more of what has gone into making the movie what it is. I am now watching many of these movies for the 3rd or4th time (and this time the excuse is my mother!!) and I find them getting better with each watch.

Here are some of my personal favourites not necessarily in sequence:

a. Rope - Story of 2 psychopathic homosexual (subtly indicated) people who commit a murder at the beginning of the movie and invite people over for a party to prove a point.

b. Birds - Strange things start happening with a woman. Birds keep attacking her all the time.

c. Psycho - I dont have to talk about this one.

d. Dial M for murder - A husband plots to kill his wife to get her wealth.

e. North By Northwest - An advertising company executive is mistaken for an intelligence agent and abducted.

Coming to think of it, I think the success of his movies were because of the scripts which usually involved ordinary people getting into extra-ordinary situations and most people could relate to it. The actors and their popularity are secondary to the script and Hitchcock made sure that in all his movies, the script ruled !!

Story of a song ..

You sometimes think that when people agree with you on something, they actually mean it. Little do you know that in some cases, they are in complete disagreement and that this facade of agreement is only a comma and not a period. They wait and watch and then when you expect it least, attack you in your own style and give you a taste of your own medicine.
Months ago, when I used to discuss with my cousin about the tamil lyricist Vairamuthu and his 'romantic' songs, I was naive enough to think that Niranjan (my cousin) actually agreed with me and that he hated Vairamuthu's love songs as much as I did. That belief was shattered about 6 months ago. That my cousin was a closet Vairamuthu fan, came out in the open that fateful day. I have heard that the sacrificial goat, is usually decorated well and fed sumptuously before it is sacrificed. I realized later the relevance of the above metaphor and the significance of a particularly good dinner cooked by Anu, (my cousin's wife) that day. (Given how vocal I am about the unnecessary drama and theatrics employed by our movie-makers and politicians, I surprise myself often with the kind of build-up I give for some lame stuff !!)
We were casually talking about my interest in books and our blog posts etc. I was enthusiastically talking about my interest in writing and how blogs had opened up a new way for me to write and also get to understand what others think about my writing etc. That was when Anu asked a seemingly innocent question - 'Have you written poems?'
'No', I said. 'I believe one has to be romantic at heart to be able to write poems. So except for a few childish attempts (thankfully as a child) to write poems, that were nothing more than rhyming sentences, I have never dared to attempt any such thing'.
'Why don't you try?' asked Niranjan.
'Because I don't think I can write one', I said.
'We think you can.' said Niranjan.
I realized something was fishy here and started to steer the conversation to other harmless topics. But our family is known for our perseverance. So in about 2 minutes, we were back to the topic.
'Actually, I composed a tune about 6 months back and wanted someone to write the lyrics', said Niranjan.
'Your mother (my aunt) is excellent in Tamizh, why don't you ask her? There are many of our cousins who are supposed to be good at poetry'. I said.
'Anu and I were thinking of you !' said Niranjan.
'We think you can do it' said Anu.
Well, there I saw in the manic gleam in the eyes of this crazy couple (CC), what I had suspected all along. They had resented from the start, my vitriolic comments about Vairamuthu and this was their way of getting back at me.
'There is no pressure of time. I don't want the song to be in the usual lines, describing the girl as a moon or cloud and all that. Write it at your own pace. Think about it. We can get it recorded with you or Vishali (another cousin) and we will release it to our relatives once you are done.' said Niranjan.
'Ok, what is the subject?'
'What else, its our favourite topic ! Love', said Niranjan. By this time, the CC were giggling looking at the way my expression changed, from a worried smile to sheer disbelief.
'You are joking !! Right? Why me? What did I do? Why this double punishment? You are looking at one of the most unromantic person on earth !!' I cried out.
'Like I said, give it a shot !' said Niranjan and that was that !!
Now that the issue was settled and I had accepted with much reluctance, I approached the task at hand, like I would approach any other job, which is do nothing. Once in a while my conscience would raise its ugly head and remind me of the promise. I learnt to simply ignore it. In the initial enthusiasm of doing a job I have never done before, I came up with some broad ideas for the song. This list of ideas, turned out to be more of what not to have in the song, than the other way. It was something like this:
a. No descriptions of the girl - no comparisons to the moon, angels or flowers (poor things !)
b. No mention of sweat, saliva or other body fluids
c. No nonsense about how the person was dead all along and he/she came alive after the other one came into his/her life.
d. No formulaic songs - a:b as c:d or if a=b then c=d etc. Lyrics must be free-flowing.
e. Chaste tamizh was not required. But definitely no English words or other meaningless words (like Mukkala, Uyyala, Salomi etc.)
f. Lyrics can be about reactions caused by love etc.
So now the framework, if you could call it that, was ready. Niranjan had sent me the tune, with him humming in place of words. Now came the difficult part of actually putting words in the tune. The tune was simple in the beginning, but the 'charanam' or the stanza was a little more complex. It was longer than usual and the only relief was that there was only charanam.The other difficulty was the language. Although I love Tamizh, my proficiency in the language was not good enough to write a song. I had studied the letters in class 1 and forming sentences in class 3. After that I had not learnt Tamizh as a subject. My attitude towards Tamizh is similar to my attitude towards studies, at first and work, later. I am fascinated by the idea of it, but don't care to actually work on it! The only plus point was that Niranjan knew lesser Tamizh than me !
I wrote the pallavi first and circulated it to Niranjan and Anu. They were happy about it and said so (probably to keep me motivated). With these 2 lines in hand, I started putting on airs as though I was and had always been lyricist! After 2-3 months, when I could not take Niranjan's inquiries about the 'progress' anymore, I wrote the entire charanam. (or atleast the skeleton) on a single day (this guy has a surprising knack to keep track of the conversation - no matter how much you try to distract him and steer the conversation away from the topic, he has the uncanny ability to pick up the thread from where it was dropped and continue from there !).
After the lyrics were ready, Niranjan asked for a few minor corrections. I thought the entire song had to be changed. I had lived with the lyrics long enough to have grown tired of them and thought they were all rubbish. These minor corrections took longer than the song itself and I finally gave the lyrics to Niranjan about a month back. Our singer- my cousin Vishali ordered a mike online to get ready to sing. Things moved fairly fast from there and Niranjan finally put together the different tracks together and uploaded them on to coolgoose.
Below is a link to the song. Those of you who can, please download and listen and give your valuable comments.
http://music.cooltoad.com/music/song.php?id=405635
Below are the lyrics with the translation. The more I read them, the more I cringe. The translation, to me sounds like what is popularly called Junoon Tamizh.
பல்லவி:

விழிகளில் வரும் விளக்குகள் அவை விரல் தொடா கடிதங்கள்
இந்த பார்வைகள் இன்று போதுமே இங்கு தேவையா வார்த்தைகள்
வார்த்தைகள் வரவில்லையே, உந்தன் பார்வைகள் கணைகள்
என் மனம் சொல்லும் எண்ணங்கள் சொல்ல தோற்குமே மொழிகள் - உன்னை பார்த்ததும் (விழிகளில்)

சரணம்:
மாலை பொழுதுகள், மழையின் அழகுகள், கடல் தாண்டும் அலைகளும் உன்னோடு
பார்க்க கூடுதல் சுகம்
இரவின் பனியில், நிலவின் ஒளியில் நடக்கையில், இங்கு, நீ அருகில் இருக்கையில்
நம்மோடு உள்ள மௌனமே இதம்
உன் பெயரை எவரும் சொல்வது கேட்டால், நடை தடுமாறிடும்
நண்பர்களின் கண்களை பார்த்து பேச கொஞ்சம் தயக்கம் வரும்
நெஞ்சில் உள்ள காதலை கண்கள் சொல்லும் என்ற பயம் தோன்றிடும்
உன்னை கண்ட நிமிஷத்தில் உலகம் எல்லாம் மறைந்தோடிடும் - நாம் தவிர
யார் இருப்பதும் மறக்கும்
Translation:
The lamps that light up in your eyes are letters untouched by fingers,
These sights /glances are enough for today, do we need words?
Words don’t come out (I am at a loss for words), your looks are like arrows
The thoughts that my heart says- languages will fail to say - (When I see you)
Charanam:
Evening times, the beauty of rain, the waves that cross the sea - I
feel good looking at these with you
Walking in the nighttime, under the moonlight, with you near me -
the silence between us is soothing
When I hear someone saying your name aloud, my walk staggers
I am scared to look into the eyes of my friends when I talk
I am afraid that my eyes will betray the love in my heart
(But) The moment I see, I forget about the whole world - I forget
about everyone but us

Viva Las Vegas !!

If Niagara Falls and Grand Canyon are must see natural beauties in the US, I have been hearing from people that Las Vegas could be termed a man-made beauty. In fact a colleague of mine tried very hard to dissuade me from making a trip to Grand Canyon and asked me to visit Vegas instead. So when I was told that the CES conference was to be held in Las Vegas on Jan 9th, I jumped at the chance. Only a month back, I had driven to LA and had been to Universal Studios (awesome place !!). Las Vegas was about 6 hours away by car and my mother was getting bored taking turns looking at my face and the book. So I decided to drive down and save my company some big bucks too!! The biggest expense in Las Vegas is only the accomodation and that issue was resolved when a friend offered to host us at her place. The added bonus was my friend’s cute little kid (who, by the way, was way more entertaining than any of the casinos there !!).

On Jan 8th, we set out from Phoenix AZ, at about 10 am in the morning. The drive was not a tough one. The only trouble is that it can get monotonous after some time and without company, it would have driven me crazy. The route was filled with miles and miles of dry land, interspersed here and there with every variety of cactus that you have heard of and not heard of !!

Since the trip was technically an official one, my conscience did not permit me to go out on day 1. Added to the misery of conscience was a ‘casual’ dinner meeting with people from different companies. Honestly the idea of sitting in an expensive restaurant, with a group of strangers, grinning stupidly is as appetizing as the idea of grazing in a vast pasture (I know the comparison is weird, but that is probably because of the kind of ‘food’ I had in the restaurant - a plateful of different boiled vegetables, with no salt or pepper). The only attractive part of the dinner plate was the medley of colours on it - green spinach (uncut and boiled), red tomatoes, white and pale green something, yellow corn, green asparagus, some more of green and white something. The only thing tougher than eating such food is to respond to comments such as ‘That looks good !!’, ‘Do you like your food’ etc, with a perfectly straight face !! After that comes clinking your glassful of water with other glasses of wine and toasting to God knows what (again pretending that the whole thing was normal !!)

Anyway, the bad part was over after a painful 2 hours. I had no strength to do anything else that night and simply crashed at my friend’s house. The one sensible thing (I think) I did was to ask my mother to explore one or two casinos with my friend while I was out having that fabulous dinner. As a result, she, my friend and the little princess - Nadhi were roaming around in MGM Grand - a very popular casino. An interesting story about this casino- The casino has a huge statue of a lion that is seen roaring in the MGM emblem. Apparently this lion is in memory of one that lived in the casino till a few months back. Its death happened like this. One day, my friend, her husband and Nadhi were out roaming around in the MGM Grand casino. Nadhi being only a year old, saw the lion and called it bow-bow (to her any four legged animal is bow-bow) and the lion apparently dropped down dead, incapable of bearing the insult of being called a dog !! There are sentries posted at MGM Grand who keep an eye on Nadhi these days and they have put off the plan to get another live lion till Nadhi grows up or at least learns to differentiate between a lion and a dog!!

The whole of 9th was spent in the conference and it was only after about 8:30 pm that night that we decided to step out. All the big casinos are on a street called Las Vegas Boulevard and every casino there is a work of art. Life begins after 9 pm on this road (called the strip). Since there was no way that we could cover all the casinos on a single night, we decided to visit 3 of them - The Venetian, Paris and Bellagio (remember Oceans 11?).

Even before we could get off the car, we noticed that the famous fountains outside ‘The Bellagio’ had been turned on. This time they were dancing to the famous song by Elvis Presley called ‘Viva Las Vegas’ (Long live Las Vegas !) I have heard about the famous fountains in Brindavan Gardens in Mysore, but have never seen them. This fountain show was brilliant. There is a bridge on the road which provides a beautiful view of the fountains. Lovers of Oceans 11 will remember them from the final scene of the movie. (I have a beautiful video of the entire show but cannot upload it because of the size !) This show is supposed to repeat every 15 minutes and we decided to watch the next one too before proceeding to the casinos.

Each casino has a theme and is usually named after the theme. For example, the Venetian is built with the theme of Venice. As a result the entire decor inside is that of Venice. We had decided to simply look around and not gamble under any circumstance. After going around the casino floor, my friend took us upstairs where there is a shopping mall. And surprise ! All of a sudden, we had gone back in time !! No, I am not talking about traveling back a few centuries !! We had traveled back a couple of hours ! The ceiling upstairs is designed to resemble the evening sky and everything, including the dim lighting, convinced those inside that the time was about 4-5 pm !! The next surprise was that similar to the real Venice, there are small rivers in the center with gondolas floating in them. The boatmen go around singing songs in Italian. Our little lady was waving to all of them like they were old friends.

Our next trip was to Paris (the casino). As you would have already guessed, the theme of this casino was, what else - Paris ! Outside is a replica of the Eiffel Tower. The casino hall here has a decor similar to that of the top floor in Venetian, i.e., a false ceiling designed to look like the evening sky. The entire casino hall is designed like a street in Paris, complete with artificial trees reaching the sky (ceiling !). The buildings around appear like French houses (this comparison is purely based on speculation and also on some French movies I have seen !). Roads are paved. Overall an interesting experience. A not so pleasant experience was the sight of numerous middlemen holding out photographs of women to all those passing by. I am not sure if it was illegal, but it certainly did not appear to be so !

We then left to Bellagio. It was already about 12 midnight and we simply looked at the decorations inside the casino. Due to the approaching (or already past) Chinese new year, the decorations were oriental. The Bellagio looks as beautiful from the inside, as from the outside. One interesting thing about all the casinos is the chandeliers in them. There are literally 100s of them and each one is better than the other. My friend told me that she would frequently count the number of chandeliers in each casino and wonder at the money spent on them. Coming to think of it, I think the money spent in decorating each casino for a month, would probably feed the hungry of a third-world country. But then, who said life was fair?

Spending too much time on the casino floors is a sure-shot way to get lung cancer, even if you are not a smoker ! Liquor is free on the floor. I also marveled the talent of the waitresses or their dress makers to stretch a tiny piece of cloth to its limits and call it a dress !

The next day was packing time. We set off back to AZ and were greeted by the familiar sight of cacti and dry barren lands. The contrast between Vegas and these lands almost hurt my eyes ! To sum up the experience, I thought Las Vegas or more specifically the strip in Las Vegas was one of the most beautiful sights in the US. It is better not to think too much about the reasons for the beauty and the fairness or unfairness behind them and simply indulge onself.

Given below are some of the pictures I took during the trip. This time, I know the make of the camera. It is Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ8. (The pictures are not in sequence because our site has some weird way of sequencing files as they are uploaded!)

Happy Chinese New Year ! (Inside the Bellagio)

Eiffel Tower (Outside Paris)


Streets of Venice (Inside The Venetian)
How many Chandeliers can you count? (Inside Paris)

Outside Paris
The dancing fountains- Outside Bellagio

Vegas by Night.The Bellagio
The Gondola Men (Inside The Venetian)

The Killer

The Victim
The road to Vegas

Work from Home or Homework - Which do you prefer?

Every time I saw someone in the office, with a laptop or a blackberry, I used to feel jealous. They looked so damn cool. They did not have to raise PC requests. Their CD drives were functional. They could access their emails from anywhere etc. As cliched as it may sound, the fact is that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence !! So as you must have guessed, these misconceptions vanished a week or two after I got my laptop a couple of years back. I was now permanently available to work, to respond to emails etc. The only time I could escape, was when I was driving to and from work.

Then I started envying people who worked from home. They did not have to travel all the way to work. They could wake up when they wanted to, take bath when they wanted (and if they wanted to), they did not have to wear formals everyday, no shoes (in US) and so on (may sound silly to you, but they meant a lot to me). And now I know how wrong I was in wanting that !! I seem to have the knack to always want the wrong things in life or atleast, only when I wish for wrong things is my wish granted !!

Now I have been working from home for more than a month. So what is wrong? I am a positive person (or so I would like to think) and I don't mean only my bloodgroup. So let me start with the good points :

• I can wear a salwar kurta when I work
• I don't have to comb my hair every day
• I can eat food out of a plate instead of from a tiffin-box
• I don't have to meet with people
• I don't have to spend money or time on commuting to work.
• No shoes required
• I remain silent most of the time.
  

So what's wrong with it?

• I am cooking 3 times a day
• I don't see people
• I am turning to something like a UFO (heard of but never seen)
• I never 'go home' after work. An hour, a day, a week - are all like the next
• I feel guilty when I go for grocery shopping, since I am 'missing work'
• All days are workdays. A workday is 18 hours long.
• My phone's receiver is losing weight instead of me. I swear that once when I took the receiver from my ear, I found my dislodged ear attached to the phone. I then had to use some 'Made in China' glue to stick it back in position. You will believe when you see me and find one ear slightly differently positioned compared to the other.
• I am forgetting how my voice sounds, except when I chat with people at home
• I have no place to run to, when I receive my daily call from my manager telling me how disappointed he is in me. I would like to have a team-member to shout at too.
  

My habit of wishing to be like people older or more experienced than me or different from me, has more often than not, led to all my disappointments in life. As a child, I remember always wanting to grow up and get out of school, so that I would not have daily homework, or to write any assignments or tests or examinations or wear uniforms. I thought taking a book or a single notebook and wearing clothes of your choice was cool and longed for college. In college, I wished to become financially independent and longed to start working. Now I would give anything for the life of a student, a life with a lot of certainty (again, you see I am wishing for something out of my reach !!)

Give me home-work any day. I would prefer that infinitely to working from home !!

Kalki's works

At the age of about 5 or 6, I remember being fascinated by my father, who could read a book, only with his eyes ! He did not have to read it out aloud to understand and I remember thinking it was one of the coolest things I had seen in my life (till then !!). I guess my initial reading was restricted to devouring anything and everything by Enid Blyton. So there I was, living in a small hill station in Tamilnadu, dreaming about ginger-beer, ham sandwiches and bacon (not knowing it was meat of course !!) without a clue on how they would look like.

I had studied tamizh for exactly 2 years in school. The first was in class I, when I learnt the alphabets and then in class III when I learnt words and sentences. The difficulty in finding a good library was probably the first reason for me to turn to reading Tamizh magazines and books. That and the concept of a circulation library where a person would come and deliver weekly and monthly magazines right to our doorstep. Now tamizh magazines and books were usually censored by my mother then. There were authors that were considered acceptable by my mother and I could read anything by such authors and then there were those that were absolutely banned for fear of getting my mind corrupted. In case of authors like Sujatha, the book had to first be read my mother before the verdict was passed.

Kalki is probably the first writer, that my mother encouraged me to read. ‘Ponniyin Selvan’ - supposedly Kalki’s most popular work was serialized in the tamil weekly magazine called Kalki, was my first attempt at a historical and it was my first exposure to Kalki’s works too. And the rest, as they say, is history (I mean, my history !!).

R.Krishnamurthy, more popularly known as Kalki was a freedom fighter, magazine editor, novelist, short story writer and an art critic. He was the man who made the popular weekly ‘Ananda Vikatan’ a household name in lakhs of Tamizh homes. He gained a lot of popularity for his epic trilogy - Sivagamiyin Sabatham, Parthiban Kanavu and Ponniyin Selvan. His other famous works include Alai Osai, Tyaga Bhoomi, Poimaan Karadu, Kalvanin Kathali etc.

I will not elaborate on Kalki as a person as I will not be able to give more information than Wikipedia or the internet, nor is my information drastically different. I will instead, attempt to describe his greatness as a novelist, especially in his works based on Tamizh history, or atleast their impact on me and my literary tastes.

So what makes these three novels great? Why, the characters, for one ! Every character is well-etched and Kalki’s writings made you actually visualize a lot of incidents. His works are a wonderful mixture of history, fiction and humour. They are historicals, but no less thrilling than any best-selling mystery novel. For once, his female characters are extremely strong and not mere supporting characters.

For instance, take the case of Sivagamiyin Sabadam :

Facts :

-King Mahendra Varman converted from Jainism to Hinduism after Appar (aka Thirunavukarasar) cured him of some disease.

-The Chalukya king attacked Kanchi.

-Narasimhavarman (popularly known as Mamallan) avenged the seige of Kanchi by attacking Vatapi and burning it down.

-Paranjothi was the commander of Narasimhavarman’s army and lead the attack on Vatapi (Trivia : He supposedly brought back a pillar with the idol of Ganapati on it as a proof of his victory and installed it in the temple in Tiruchengatangudi in the Tanjore district. This idol was the inspiration for the Vatapi Ganapati idol installed in Tiruvarur temple and hence the song ‘Vatapi Ganapathim Bhajeham’ by Dikshitar).

-Paranjoti later gave up worldly life and changed his name to Siruthonda Nayanar and was one of the 63 Shaivaite Nayanars.

-During Mahendravarman’s rule and his son Narasimha Pallavan’s rule, arts and crafts flourished in the region and the shore temples and numerous other sculptures were created in Mamallapuram (now known as Mahabalipuram).

Now if I look at sculptures of a beautiful woman in Mamallapuram, I would probably take a few snaps (most that would include me in silly poses and posing for the camera !!). What would happen if a creator of Kalki’s stature saw them? - An epic romance set in the time of Narasimha Pallavan !!

The prince Mamallan (aka Narasimha Varman) loves the daughter Sivagami of the master sculptor Ayanar. Sivagami is a great bharatanatyam dancer and is the inspiration of many of her father’s sculptures. As in any love story, the emperor is against this romance and orders the son to stay back in Kanchi while he engages in a battle with the Chalukya king Pulikesi. After a lot of interesting twists, Sivagami and Ayanar are captured by Pulikesi. Pulikesi humiliates her and Sivagami vows that she would leave Vatapi only if Narasimha Varman burns the city down and rescues her (and hence the title). So even when Narasimha Varman visits her secretly and tries to rescue her, she refuses to go with him. Narasimha Varman later returns after almost 9 years and re-captures Vatapi, but things are not the same anymore.

On reading the novel, you will realize how beautifully the above mentioned historical facts have been woven into the novel. It is hard to separate facts from fiction. All characters are complete and well-written.

The heroine is a damsel in distress, for sure, but she is extremely strong willed and is not faultless. She has a bad temper and is extremely stubborn. This novel has one of the most chilling villains in Tamil literature. The Jain monk - Naganandhi, whose actual name is Neelakesi and is the brother of the Chalukya king Pulikesi is a connoisseur of arts, unlike his royal brother and is a master king-maker and spy.

‘Parthiban Kanavu’ is chronologically after Sivagamiyin Sabadam and describes the story of the Chozha prince Vikraman who father dies in the battlefield after expressing his dream of regaining his kingdom from the Pallava King Narasimha Varman (the hero of the previous novel), to a mysterious monk. As in a good Indian movie, our hero falls for a girl Kundavi, who is none other than the daughter of his arch-rival Narasimha Varman. This novel too has many historic references and has interesting narratives of practices during the period including the Kapalikas (worshippers of Goddess Kali) who believed in human sacrifices etc. There is a wonderful suspense in this novel too, but unfortunately I saw the B&W movie made on the novel first and knew what the suspense was in the first shot (Why did they think that makeup could completely disguise a person like Ranga Rao?

‘Ponniyin Selvan’ is the last in the trilogy and is about the Chozha dynasty. This is by far the most interesting of the 3 books and has more colourful characters than the other 2 put together. Although the title Ponniyin Selvan (son of Ponni, the river) refers to the prince Arulmozhi Varman, the actual hero of the novel is Vandiyathevan, a lovable rascal, who is a close friend of Karikalan, Arulmozhi Varman’s brother. This book has not one or two, but at least 6 very strong women characters - Arulmozhi varman’s sister Kundavai, the boat woman Poonkuzhali (what a beautiful name !), the queen of pazhuvoor Nandini (a wonderful character), the kodumbalur princess Vanathi, the mute woman Mandakini Devi, Raakammal the spy and so on. The most interesting character is that of Aazhvarkadiyaan, the vaishnaviite who roams around the country and picks up fights with Saivaiites.

The plot of the novel is very intricate and maintains a superb suspense till the end. One part of the novel, that seems particularly etched in my memory is where Kalki describes and compares the beauty of Kundavai and Nandini. Both of them are extremely beautiful women, but while one’s beauty is pleasing and has a calming effect, the other’s is mesmerizing and is capable of driving men crazy. He compares Nandini’s beauty to that of a serpent and for some reason I seem to remember this particular description very well.

For each run of these novels in the Kalki weekly magazine, a different artist was responsible for the illustrations. I remember Maniyam Selvam’s illustrations and later Vishnuvarman (I think that’s his name). However, the best illustrator would be our own minds. As I have said often before, my worst fear about Ponniyin Selvan is that someone would decide to make a movie out of it and ruin the whole magic. One of my favourite pastime is wondering who, in the current crop of actors, could play of each of these roles and sadly I can’t think of any suitable ones, especially if they have to speak in chaste tamizh.

I have read all the other works of Kalki too, including Alai Osai and Tyaga bhoomi, but to me none of them can match this trilogy in terms of pace or characterization. I have also had a chance to read some of his other non-fiction works including some music reviews that he wrote under the pen-name Karnatakam, some of his old editorials and a collection of essays etc and the genius of Kalki shines through every single piece of work.

Sorry about the long post, but the comment from a fellow blogger on one of my previous posts, brought a flood of memories of Kalki and ‘Ponniyin Selvan’. For those who cannot get the book, the entire book is available online here. The English translation is available here although if you can read Tamizh, I would strongly recommend the original.