Category: Society

4. We can also take up spoken/written Sanskrit courses from Samskrita Bharati and participate in the events they organize. It would be great if our youngster community can produce Sanskrit teachers.

>When Tamil Nadu Government announced tax exemption for Tamil movies with Tamil titles, I did not feel bad. This act was different from the usual Tamil-fanatic acts that the ruling party is known for.

I was never amused by titles like ‘Jeans’, ‘New’, ‘Run’ etc. in the past. An occasional English name that is relevant to the movie’s theme was ok, but a sudden surge of English names for Tamil movies was a plain marketing gimmick. After the announcement, this trend has almost disappeared ! I like innovative Tamil names like ‘vETTayADu viLayADu’, ‘Ayutha ezhuththu’, ‘kAkka kAkka’ etc.

These small acts will go a long way in saving the language from getting wiped out by socio-political environment of the country. I might sound backward, but I really marvel at Chennai that has been in the forefront of development while laughing at ‘Hindi-only’ speakers of the country.

Go to Mumbai – you cannot hear Marathi. Go to Bangalooru – you can survive without knowing Kannada. Go to Chennai – In one year, you WILL learn Tamil ! I don’t find this to be rude. I equate it to Japan where you cannot live without knowing Japanese.

I agree that patriotism takes priority over one’s language, but neglecting a 2000+ year old language for the sake of a 50 year old nation is stupidity, mildly put. A language cannot live on its own. It needs great poets and poetry lovers. It needs great personalities who speak it proudly. It needs native speakers who are proud of it. It needs the socio-political conditions to be favorable too.

Christianity would never have survived more than a couple of centuries without the political support of Rome. English is all over the world not because of just Shakespeare, but mainly because of the gun power of Britain in the last few centuries and the power of the US today.

Tamil lives on, thanks to its passionate native speakers.

>Most of us try hard to remain ordinary throughout our lives.

Every facet of our lives is plagued by ordinariness. We often fear that we might become different during the course of life. We try everything to prevent it from happening.

We make sure that we wear the leading brand of Jeans (If we can afford it).

We listen to the top 20 songs in the music channel. And believe that they are the best songs and try hard to ‘like’ them.

We eat Rasam Rice with a spoon in the office cafeteria so that others do n’t think that we are not modern enough. Others too eat it with spoon and they too are thinking the same !

We yearn to buy that cool car the moment we know we might be able to afford it. What if somebody asks us : “Hey, you are a software professional for so many years. No car yet ?” So we buy the car partly to kill that question.

We read business magazines to make sure we don’t lag behind our colleagues and friends.

We go to Adyar Anand Bhavan because everybody else goes there. How can we miss something that everyone else thinks to be good ? Long waiting time at the counter, no place to sit. So what ?

We go to Shabari Mala because everybody else thinks it is a good way to earn Positive Karma in 41 days. We too think so because we are afraid to think differently.

A certain amount of uniformity in our thoughts is required to keep the society from collapsing, but sometimes we go overboard – like a set of computer game characters with programmed lives.

>When I was a kid, I used to love spicy food. I did not like too much of sweet stuff then. It wonders me that these days I have developed a better liking for sweet food and am slowly moving away from spicy food.

I do not know the exact reason, but I like to believe that I have had too much of spicy food and hence nature is asking me to change my ways before I cause damage to my body. I like the idea of ‘going with the flow of nature’. The trees sway in the direction of the wind. They never rationalize. And I guess they are pretty fine too.

Adyar Anand Bhavan Bhel Puri is usually a bit spicy for me. The first few spoonfuls are really exciting, but it soon turns out to be too spicy for the tongue to truly savor. I wondered if it is only me or the Bhel Puri is really spicy.

Recently, I went for a walk on a beautiful Sunday evening. Rain had just stopped. The air was pure. Bangalore was at its best. I visited the Deenabandhu Temple in CMH Road. The Vedic chanting and the serenity of the place relaxed me very much. I continued walking in CMH road with Norah Jones crooning through the earphones of my MP3 player.

I reached Adyar Anand Bhavan and decided to stop for a snack. I bought a plate of Bhel Puri. Norah’s Voice was shielding me from the noisy restaurant environment. I took the first spoonful. What a shock it was ! It felt like a spoonful of needles. I tried to ignore the feeling, but stopped after taking a few more spoonfuls.

Realization dawned. A highly relaxed mood was in great contrast with the spicy Bhel Puri. I still like Bhel Puri, but realize that most people fail to notice that it is sometimes too spicy to relish – because they are in a rush. The mad rush of modern life.

Tongue-burning Spicy food. Deafening music. Aggressive corporate culture. Dil maange more ?

>“The Sanskrit language is of a wonderful structure, more perfect than Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either”
– Sir William Jones, Third Address to the Asiatick Society of Bengal

It is very unfortunate that most Indians lack the knowledge of Sanskrit – That means we have a big chest of treasure, but do not have the key to open it 🙁
A huge amount of literature full of wisdom, exquisite poetry and science is inaccessible to us.

Though my knowledge of Sanskrit is just the tip of the iceberg, typing in Sanskrit, printing out verses of wisdom, etc have been my wishes for quite a long time.

Like Kuralsoft quenched my thirst of Tamil computing, Baraha was the end of my search for a good Sanskrit software, This was created by a gentleman called Sheshadrivasu Chandrasekharan. He started with Kannada – with an aim of sending emails to his mother who did not read English. It was then extended to other Indian languages too. Though some Sanskrit experts say that certain complex consonant combinations are not supported well by Baraha, it suits most of my Sanskrit typing needs.

Baraha integrates nicely with standard Windows Apps like MS Office. It has a transliteration scheme that allows you to type using the standard English keyboard.

Baraha can be downloaded for free here.

>My energy has been unusually high this week. Some unusual things I did:

• Tried (and succeeded partly) to stay consciously relaxed throughout my day – be it at office or home.
• Walked from office to home on 4 days of the week (more than 3 kms distance). My legs did not ache a bit. On Friday, I became more walk-hungry and hence did a round each inside 2 nearby parks before going home. I was a bit baffled when I found myself enjoying the process !
• Got a caprice to try out an interesting idea that sprung in my head, at work in the morning. Finished implementing it on the same evening, which I had thought would take longer.
• Cracked a couple of data structure problems with unusual ease, thanks to the new fresher in our team.

Contrastingly, today(Saturday) was different, still unusual though.

• Got up in the morning and decided to do something serious that I had n’t planned at all. Anxiety shot up.
• During the day, I was involved in something that kept me anxious.
• What I had always thought to be my strength – let me down totally.
• Used auto rickshaw and walked very little. Now, its time to go to bed, my legs are aching !

Do I see a pattern ? The first point in each of the above scenarios tells me something…

>SWill I ever truly love my job ? Should I ?

Five years in the IT industry have made me realize that work is just work.
The fire that burned in my belly when I was a fresher is no more.
There was a time when I admired mere source code. Now that illusion has dissolved.

I get thoughts about making my favorite hobby my profession – Composing music, which is the most satisfying thing I have done in my life.

Practical difficulties aside, will a hobby remain enjoyable when it becomes a job ? Will it not change to an exhauster from being a rejuvenater ? Will creativity survive when deadlines loom ? In such a case, I will have to ensure that my creations are liked by others too, which is not necessary when it is just a hobby.

Similar thoughts have been blogged by Anjana.

But then, there are people like A R Rahman, who are like creativity-factories – delivering with a punch every time. Touching the fan’s heart every time.

Probably, I should make living a hobby.

Modern Indian society is going through an interesting phase in the area of child-naming.
Suddenly realizing his/her global identity, the young Indian parent is breaking traditional conventions while naming his/her kid. Trying to find that perfect balance between modernity and tradition, he/she hopes to build a great brand for the offspring in the society.

Some seem to exercise creativity at dangerous levels when synthesising new names. Some seem to be fascinated by uncommon Sanskrit names. Some want to make sure that the name sounds cool in school, college, corporate, parties, international airports and the other side of the globe. Should I mention the numerology craze that garnishes the confusion ?

While taking too many factors into consideration, the cultural/geographic identity of the kid is sometimes lost in the process of naming. For example, the craze for chic Bollywood style names among some South Indians robs the Southern identity totally.

Anirudhdh. Beautiful name. Krishna’s grandson in Mahabharata. But, who would imagine that this is the name of a Tamil kid ? Well, it is.

It is debatable whether we need to preserve regional identities within a nation. I think India’s richness is largely its diversity. Each region has undergone cultural evolution over millenia. Trying to crudely mix them all in a big culture pot to create uniformity is outrageous.

An easy way to retain the Tamil/Mallu identity while picking up fascinating Sanskrit names is to suffix it with ‘an’. Anirudhdhan ! Well that looks definiely Tamil/Mallu ! Does it sound old fashioned ? I pity those who consider their ancestors an inferior lot. For girl names, we don’t have such an easy suffix algorithm, but there are plenty of Sanskrit names used predominantly by South Indians. Pure Tamil names are on a decline these days. A former colleague of mine was very thoughtful and mature when he was particular in giving a pure Tamil name to his daughter.

I am talking more about South Indian names because I am a South Indian who knows more about South India. I believe these things can be easily applied to other regions to India too.

I can’t help but wonder at the name of my close friend – ‘Devanathan Varadarajan’.
What A Punch !

>A new flavour is spreading across the continents. A poor third world country is slowly emerging out of the globe. An over populated, over polluted land in South Asia is starting to make an impact in the global society.

Many things Indian are entering the lives of the world citizen in a big way.

Yoga is changing the way a person thinks of health and wellness. Indian food is probabily the next big exotic cuisine. Indian music is a breath of fresh air in the world of grooves and loops. Indian spirituality is giving refuge to people injured by the tsunami of materialism.

My return trip to India after a month’s stay in Chicago made me experience this new India phenomenon in subtle ways.

I was heading to the O’Hare International Airport, Chicago in a cab. The cab driver started a chat with me which went like this:

Cab Driver(CD) : Are you going to india ?
I : Yes, to Bangalore.
CD : Are you into computer business ?
I : Yeah.
CD : Your country has got the best school for that in the world !
(I was on the floor now)
CD : I saw that in a special TV program. I don’t remember the name of the school.
I : Are you talking about IIT ? (I knew he was)
CD : Yes, now I remember !
I : Thats the Indian Institute of Technology (I was flying now)
CD : They said everyone who comes out of that school is really smart.

After reaching the Airport, I headed towards the Lufthansa counter, already thinking about blogging this incident…

Later, after a long sleepy flight to Frankfurt, I boarded the connecting flight to Bangalore. Around half the passengers if not more were Indian. Quasi-Indian food was served as expected. Then came the surprise – A flight attendent was serving ‘Masala Chai’, trying his best to pronounce it correctly ! I was delighted to the core.

A European airline was operating a flight to India and was offering an Indian beverage to please the Indian passengers. This thought made me fly in flight. This is no act of plain courtesy – it is business.

Every big company wants to do business in this ‘poor’ country. A natural consequence of this is the global recognition and acceptance of things Indian.

After centuries of slumber, India is waking up. And making an impact.

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Chatting in Tamil is almost like real Mokkai !

Tamil gives word processing a new meaning !