A simple wedding

Yesterday I traveled to Guruvayur temple, Kerala for one of my friend's wedding. My mom reminded me that, I'm going to the temple exactly after 24 years. So ideally I would take this my first visit I can remember. :) It was a Malayali wedding that I attended and I really loved the way the whole ceremony went.

Step 0: Get the bride and groom dressed up for the occasion.
Step 1: Wait in the temple's wedding queue. Yes, there are multiple podiums outside the temple where lot of weddings happen on a given day.
Step 2: Get on the podium, the chief priest will do a small ceremony and the groom ties the mangalyam (sacred rope) to the bride and pray to lord Guruvayurappan for their well being. That's it, click few snaps and you are done. Approx time 5-8 minutes for each couple.
Step 3: Walk to the nearest wedding reception hall that's already booked.
Step 4: Exchange rings, Flowers and round the sacred grains and lamps that were kept on the stage. Finally sign the registration papers. :) Its done again. Approx time 30-60 minutes.

Then its left of the members of the family and friends to give fruit and milk to the couple. Finally each of them coming to the podium for a photo session. The whole thing called wedding is done. How simple, neat and crisp.

Instead of complex long chanting mantras, burning fire, smoke, asking the bride to change the Saree every one hour, occupying a huge wedding hall for two days, the grooms horse ride the previous day and the numerous other small ceremonies that happen, its sometimes good to keep things simple. Spending so much on the materials for the wedding. Literally the bride and groom become so tired by the end of the day. Its agreed that these are traditions in many families and they did not want this to fade out and every parent will wish their children to get married auspiciously.

Still this is something many families can think about following, except the loads of gold that the bride wears. ;)

Love marriage, Arranged marriage

Last Sunday I watched the "Neeya Naana" episode in Vijay TV. Topic was "Acceptance of arranged marriage and acceptance of love marriage". This always seems to be a sensitive/hot topic for people to debate about. So I'm not going to do it here.

In the current generation, the probability of people who are against love marriages is more. They might include mostly people who are more than 30+ years old. They are people who are from the previous generation living in this generation. In fact the various reason's they quote for not accepting love marriages are,

• Caste the guy or girl belongs
• Religion
• Language they speak
• Pride they might lose of accepting the love marriage
• I don trust love marriage

Its their personal preferences and we don have a say in it.

But, how will the next generation be? Will there be a change? Will there be freedom for men and women to choose the people whom you want to live with? I remember a couple telling, We will be more than happy if their kid finds someone from its opposite gender. That should be all. Some say I'm even OK with them being gay, provided they are happy. But will this all eventually happen! We got to wait a few more decades for an update. :)

But definitely the chance to choose the life partner will increase in the coming generation. People will make their own choices and will be independent. But still there will be people who will sail along to the next generation with the same ideology for love marriage.

Whats your view?

Test Cricket Ret'urn's

It was a splendid summer for England winning The Ashes test series 2-1. But really it was cricket that won at the end. Australia faces reality by sliding down as 4th team in test cricket standings. Time has gone were many questioned, if there can be team who can perform better then mighty Aussies. Many teams have already re-written the history books. New performers like Stuart Broad and Ben Hilfenhaus come into the centre stage and what a perfect moment for Fredy to step down. I'm loving this form of cricket.

Test cricket once was a pride for nations to play and win. The long five day format of the game were each team plays two innings. Then came the shorter form of the game, One day internationals. Yeah It was one day. The game became faster and obviously more interesting for the spectators. Time rolled they introduced a much more shorter version. 20-20 Ah, Its sudden death. I still feel Test cricket has its own charm for the game. After witnessing The Ashes it convinces that a test cricket match can always end with a result.

Thanks to Australia for playing such a competitive cricket. Without them the thrill of who will win the match is not there. Since they have players who can turn the game and win series. Thanks to the never dying spirits of the English men. Using the home advantage and holding their nerve till the end was creditable. Incredible captaincy and they won as a team. Cheers to the Barmy Army, guys you made all the noise to send the message loud and clear, "Its Barmy Army...."

If I had to watch cricket it would be of this order

1. The Ashes test series
2. Border Gavaskar series
3. ICC Champions Trophy
4. IPL in India
5. ICC World Cup

Two incidents one outcome

I was reading my early posts and suddenly noted this interesting similarity.

Recently in Sankar's blog

Very early in my blog. (Paragraph starting "Then 9th")

This reminds me how long it had been since playing Cricket. Apart from limited bowling run up and arm action I do when I walk in office corridor. Its a very good way to stretch myself. Yes, I'm lazy. I should confess that first for not playing in the play ground, since nothing stopped me really. :) Let me see if I can play a few games in near future.

Anonymous

I wish I had been an Anonymous writer....

Photography: Avoiding camera shakes

Did you goof up the last night's birthday celebration photos or messed up one of your favourite portraits due to camera shake? The image became blurred, never mind. I really cannot guarantee you for a sharp click next time, but it can be largely avoided. I will try in my own K.I.S.S way! Thanks to Dwarak to start a cubicle side conversation on this.

Why does camera shake occur?

• Primary reason is one shakes the camera when clicking the shutter button!
• Low light could be another reason for the shake to occur. (Though this does not come under camera shake, its a reason for blurred images)
• You should have kept the shutter speed less.

How to avoid camera shakes?

• Practice and get used to your camera shutter button. Try to hold the camera in various ways and try clicking the shutter button. Since there might be a need to lie on the floor, in this case how will you hold the camera and click. At first someone looking at you practice might think something is wrong. :)
• If you are clicking with your right hand, you can use the left hand as a base to place the camera. This will avoid camera shake in lot of way. Samples here.
• Shakes can be very much reduced when you can keep the elbow in a stationary object. A table or a small projection should be good enough to keep your elbow.
• Try to stick the view finder to the bone near your eyebrow. Keep it gentle, else it my hurt a bit.
  
• If you have got a tummy, use it to your advantage by tucking in your elbow in it.
• I practice holding my breathe for a few seconds when I click the shutter, It works for me for concentration as well avoid shakes.
• Nothing work, invest on a tripod. :-)
  

Delicacy

A Chinese restaurant thats almost good to be recommended. After some little hesitation we decided to visit this restaurant over this weekend (yeah, my cook was on PL).

Name: Delicacy
Location: Use this map or take the road opposite to Maharaja hotel in Koramangala and the first left before smart. The entrance will look like this.
Food: Chinese
Capacity: Max 10 people can dine at one shot. Yeah only 10.

That last point was the only drawback I can think of. Food was tasting good and the price was very moderate when compared to its other cousins like China Perl, Yo China, Chung Wa. So worth the money you spend. Most importantly good service in the small place. Tried all veggies this time and they were good. But Non-Veg and sea food options were also available for most of the dishes.

So give it a try!

Cool headed

News is I'm back from Tirupathi and had a good Darshan. Thanks to the volunteers - who man handled people in the queue to take a break when we were there. Also tonsured my head during the holy visit. Hence here is the aftermath of being without something after many years!

- After taking bath, I tried adjusting my hair and ended up scratching my scalp.

- Esp when few girls got down from the adjacent bus, the hand auto magically goes to adjust the hair. :-) Chinna viyasu palakam.

- Some of my testimonials said, I was a cool head. Now I know.

- One of my roomie has more hair than me as on date.

- Its a bit awkward to see my own shadow, the curves look sexy on the head.

- Never knew a potential of a "Tamil film villain" within me. What to do, once in a while movies like Shivaji also get screened.

- Even committed the sin of touching the comb.

Airtel reads your private data - How sick!

Here is the series of events that happened...

1. My friend (say Santosh) used to stay in Hyd previously! I used to make calls to santosh often when he was there.
2. Three months back, santosh moved to Bangalore. Hence he got his Airtel mobile transferred to an Airtel Bangalore connection. So this migration was done at the cost of a change in number.
   
3. The Airtel Hyd ppl had some queries to santosh regarding his connection and they tried calling his Hyd no (which was eventually not present).
4. So now Airtel sweetly browses his Hyd connection call history and gets to find my number in the list and gives me a ring asking me to remind santosh to get back to them.
5. I initially thought Santosh should have given my number as an alternate contact number or something and informed the Airtel guy that he moved to Chennai. Also said will remind, once I see him.
6. I also asked Airtel, Don they have his transferred Bangalore number? He replied "no"!
7. Now is the ugly act two: The Airtel guy now calls Santosh directly and talks. Wait a sec. Did they look through my call logs on the server and guessed Santosh number?

I called up the person in Airtel (he was a Relationship Manager there) and asked "how did you get my number?" He said we went through the call log and got this number! I was shocked! Do you read call details like that? It should always happen with the concern of the client! Or at the worst case an FIR should be there to look into a clients private data! Asked him, if there is a disclaimer written for looking at such data? He said "no" again. After me asking many questions to him that he did not have an answer he said he will call me back! He did not get back to me, and if I ring back again he colleague picks the call and says he is not around!

So do they read just the call log or even evesdrop in the call when they are bored or browse some random sms and emails that flow across?

Is there something I can do about this breach?

Can I file a complaint some where?

P.S: The place and character name are fictional. But events along with Airtel are real!!

ROFL: SBI Card

via

And

This was the photo I submitted and this was the hand made photo frame goodie I won @ office as a part of Green Week celebration.

BlogPost (test post)

BlogPost is one of the project as part of HackWeek. I was simply interested in it from the beginning, for the reason its related to Blogging. :) So yeah, here is my test post using BlogPost. You can read more about the BlogPost in Suresh's blog. Suresh is a Kernel hacker whom I can find in my floor!

Distractions

Thank God! I have them. After an incrediable day, here are some experiements from my studio! Let me not forget, the first two is a crop from Arun's pics and model is Kishore! Good night.

That's my city

This is what my HOD Dr R. Nadarajan had to say about my college,

"As far as PSG College of Technology is concerned, there is no gap between theory & practice. But in addition to what is thought in curriculum we provide some extra training, which are actually very much required by the industry. In that way our students are salable in the market."

Source Moneycontrol.com