Death and Marana Ghana viji

Incident 1 :
This was one of my earliest memory. It happened in pudukottai, My father was sitting beside his Grand mother and was reading a devotional hymn from a small booklet.Tears were rolling down his eyes. The old women was in her death bed and some one asked my father to read the book so that she could die peacefully. For some reason this scene got struck in my mind. I should have been 3-4 years old at that time.

Incident 2 : We were travelling from Trichy to Erode in a bus. It was pre four lane days and I guess the average speed should be less than 50kmph. Suddenly the bus stopped on the highway. Outside of my seat window, There was a dead body of a man hanging from a tree. I could still recollect the scene. Everything looked so orderly, I can still recollect the bus driver's remarks "Somebody, might have killed and hanged this guy!..look at his slippers were placed just below the hanging body very neatly ...side-by-side". I felt the an uneasy feeling first time in my life. The feeling comes to me when ever I think about my  and every one's eventual death. For several months, I nagged my parents about death. Asked several questions pertaining to death and did not got any satisfying answers. I should have been 6-7 years old.

Now when I look back, the second incident could have been a turning point in my life.That uneasy feeling about death might have drove me to spirituality.


Last week, As I was browsing thru the Internet. I happened to see an interview about Marana Gana Vij.Honestly, I was impressed. Then went to his site maranaganaviji.com, downloaded 2 of his books and read them.My verdict is, this guy is a different guy. In his life so for, he has seen everything Good, Bad and ugly.His story, if made into a movie properly, would be a classic. Above all, it eased my uneasiness about
death to great extent.

When you are free, Have a look @ maranaganaviji.com

Staring Again.....

- Planning to start my blog again........

- In these 5 years Several things have changed....

- I met a girl of my life,

  Joined the company of my dreams earning 4 times more than what I earned then,

 Moved to a different city which I thought I will never do

  Finally..    "Became a father ..."

- Why this blog now?...Honestly , I dont know. But I am planning to write this for me..

Price for becoming a NRI

Beauty of life is its uncanny knack of shaping you, without your knowledge.When you look back and see, there are certain special moments in life, which completely changes your direction and path.

One such moment happened to me after doing my BE in 2001.The moment is reading this article penned by Sujatha (Renowned Tamil writer/novelist).It gave different perspective on US.

http://www.desikan.com/blogcms/wiki/index.php?id=s_k_anbudan

This article explains the price a person pays for settling in a foreign country especially US.I don’t know how true is this, but this essay drew amazing response from people of all walks.

It’s difficult to translate any essay with my half baked knowledge in both English and Tamil. However, I am going to try this.....

The essay was an open letter from the author to youngsters who want to go abroad especially US at any cost. The author proclaims that he doesn’t want to stop any body from going to US, but just want to highlights the price, a person pays without his knowledge for choosing to live in US. And he lists the price, one pays for immigrating to US and they are the following

1. You will not come back. This would be happening 100% .People who says that they will be back after the studies are lying. This is because US spreads on you, it’s like an octopus or an anaconda, and it squeezes you. Its credit card society pushes you and your next three generations to debt. It’s a debt paradise, from which you can’t escape forever.

2. Once you spend considerable time there, you will induce new meaning to relationship and love. You would feel that your parents have done their responsibility in taking care of you and you are no way indebted to them. You feel your job is done by just sending $100/$200 once in a while or sending Mother Day & father's day card would suffice. In simple words you become stingy and detached.

3. Once you start earning in dollars, you will feel India and Indians are cheap. You would start saying thing like, “why don't your city have a good toilet? “, “Oh I am sick and tired of this bloody traffic man “. “As long as people urinate in public places, your country wont improve “(Please not the words your city , your country)

4. You will slowly loose opportunities to talk in Tamil. In few years you would lie that you are unable to read Tamil.

[Note: Sujatha's two sons are in US and he has visited US several times.In responding to the criticisms to this article, he admits this and also adds that because of this specific factor , he was able to write this article with truth and clarity]

Last few months

Things happened between last blog and till date:

Death:
My deaf & dumb Chitappa died suddenly this year. We rushed to native to perform his last rites. It was my first experience in a non-electric crematorium. I have read some where that certain Buddhist monasteries make young monks to spend considerable amount of time in crematoriums, just to make them witness dead bodies burning and understand the insignificance of a person's body in a spiritual path.If its true,I certainly see why its being done, Witnessing a body just like yours, being covered with cow dung and dust and put on fire is a spiritually up heaving experience and unnerving at the same time. Though this appears philosophical, the thought that this is going to be your body's plight one day has an astounding impact on you. Its is airy and uncomfortable to watch a body burning into ashes, the feeling is worth experiencing.

Marriages:
Last few months, many of my friends got married. I attended most of the marriages and its real amusement to watch your friend getting married. For once it brings out variety of feelings and emotions all at the same time. Feeling of envy immediately followed by "Thank god! its not happening to me now" feeling !!.Any ways within months, I have lost significant amount of friends to this chronic illness called marriage. Hereafter it would be impossible to plan a trip or movie with just a single phone call. Already I am witnessing sudden decrease in the weekend outings.

Love life:
My love life has been always DOA (Dead On Arrival).First of all, there should be something fundamentally wrong with my sex appeal (if there is any):-) . Mostly I fell for girls who have little or no interest in me. And I fail to learn from each of my past mistakes .Probably my hormones are working overtime .But to be honest the position of my committed and married friends are also not that envious. I really feel sorry for them when they talk things like "I had idly for breakfast, what did you had", over phone to their gals, with their mouth half stuffed with curd rice during lunch breaks. Hum does this reminds you, of jackal saying "che ..che..intha palam pulikum" story :-)


Long drive:
I almost killed four ppl!!. Yes this happened on our drive to neyveli in my car for yogi's marriage. The worst is, all the four were traveling in my car. As usual my plan to reach the destination before the sunset was screwed badly, by a person, who came late to the boarding point. I paid him back with such an eventful ride that he would be definitely remembering it forever and probably describing about it as a great adventure story to his grandchildren. My car suffered a great deal and I clearly understood that driving on Indian high ways with a small car during night time is a sure way to commit suicide. In simpler words, we can say it’s the most dangerous adrelin pumping game on earth.



Friends:
As I said I lost many friends to the chronic marriage illness.The remaining few ppl left India in pursuit of their dollar dreams. But I am unable to understand the rationale of this ppl leaving India at this juncture for few extra bucks .We, in India are witnessing an amazing socio-economic change happening around us and which happens to a country once in several centuries Just to witness and part of this amazing change is a great experience. By not leaving India to make few, I might be poorer than my friends, but I donot regret it .Again probably jackal + sour grapes story:-)

Books :
Its official now, I have stopped reading books!!. Books are no longer enticing me.I don't know what could be reason might be my laziness or could be due to mypre occupation and day dreaming. Whatever it is, I have stopped them. Though I miss books, my lazy mind points out that a person’s faces become very serious as the number of books he read increases. I believe there is some truth in it.I have noted this in my father and slowly witnessing it on my sister. My simple theory is "Number of times you smile & laugh is inversely proptional to number of books you read". Can any one point me to a good research professor (?!!) so that,I can take this as my Phd thesis.

Movies :
I watched quite a bit of movies.Though the number of movies has decreased considerably,I am unable to recollect all of them.Following are the few that sticks out

Katrathu Tamil aka Tamil MA:A thought provoking movie and I salute the director for taking up such subject.goudas to actor Jeeva .And already the lead actress visited my dreams 14 times in last one months.

chak de :This my second hindi movie in theaters after lagan.I think with this statement,you can clearly understand my proficiency in that language.But due to our PM'scompulsion,went for this.And it was a treat to watch.It was refreshing to watch a hindimovie without several khans and bacchans dancing in lavish sets.

Pollathavan:The latest one.Probably inspired from the bi-cycle theif.I really liked the don and his assistant "OUT" in this movie.

A lot more things happened in-between , will update soon

Pain of Rejection

Getting Rejected is always a pain and its more pain when the same happens in a romantic relationship.The mood would oscillate between utter bitternes and sudden resolve to face the reality.So this little blog would act as some help for those who are facing the pain.

1.Accept the reality:This is better said than done.What i mean by this is,the more you try to woo a person,more you appear desperate in their eyes and you would end up screwing whatever chance you have right now.When things aren't going your way,its better to be silent and dormant till you regain your composure.Accept the reality means , do not try too hard.A person has every right to reject you and respect their decision.

2.Share your emotions and feelings with some one who would not judge you.Vent out your anger,bitterness.More you do these, the speedier will be the recovery.

3.Positive sides of rejection are
a) Atleast you tried what most people are afraid of ie you had the guts to ask some one.so pat your back for that.
b) Hereafter you need not care what you wear or how you look...atleast for sometime to come. Believe me this is a great feeling...Being yourself without worrying what the other person would think about you.

4.If you think its definately over and if you think you still have the feelings for him/her then do not accept the invitation to be a friend.If you believe there is no chance of getting her/him,its better to move away.Delete her/his phone number from your mobile,remove his/her chat address from your chat.In simpler words shut yourself.If you are able to do this,you would recover quickly.

5.Finally,these things happen in life and it has happened to millions of ppl.Nothing to feel bad about it.Lie low for sometime and then startlooking for some one special again.May you find them soon.

Vijayan!!!................................

If you are stuck at a very difficult situation of life and death
And you are allowed to make only one call. Whom would you call?.....I, without hesitation would call vijayan, Not only because he is my best friend but also I genuinely believe that he will do something to get me out of the difficult situation. For several his several friends like me,He is one person who has perfected the art of making opportunities out of hopeless situations.

I know him for 15 years now, Infact I still distinctly remember the day we met. It was during one of our grueling sports day preparation camp. I don’t know whether he remembers that. We were just any other classmates for the next six years.Vijayan was studious and me being a back bencher had very few things in common. But the guy had all the qualities that are required to push his lower middle class family to few notches up in the socio-economic ladder.

Our friendship really took off after we completed our engineering.we zigzagged the entire Chennai during our jobserach. Though vijayan got selected in campus interview, due to 911 fiasco and thanks to Osama, we both were literally lurching on streets of Chennai. It was a difficult time for all of us but more so for Vijayan because ,His father a humble mtc bus driver had almost invested his entire life savings on his son's education and if he had faltered then, that would have been a full stop for his family's well being. It was tough time and that made us close friends.The next year was toughest in our lives , I worked on a call center for 10 hours at night with just a day as off and Vijayan worked in a small software company during day and was taking tuitions in a tuition center during early morning and evenings. I even heard that he was asked to white wash the tuition center by the owner and he did it with a smile :-).And our friendship went to another level, when finally our luck got its act to gather as we joined HCL in the gap of 15 days. And ever since our days were always fun..movies, fun trips, endless discussions ,yoga classes :-) and recently our fun filled Hindi clases :-).

When I look back, really feel happy to have a friend like him.Some things that made me to respect for vijayan are

1.After we joined HCL, Vijayan wanted to help some is college friends who were
jobless(for 1-2years) to get a job. He taught them JAVA daily for 3 months after officehours and prepared them for interview.He was a terror teacher and more sincere than his students :-).Having watched the show from sidelines,I had little hope as the job market was very tight but to my utter surprise the three got great jobs(one in IBM,one in HCL and one in TCS).

2.He has amazing social skills.If he is there in a place for more than three hours, he would definately made minimum 5 frieds.For most of his friends he is the “root” node( I am working @ HCL-CISCO:-))

3.He has one of the coolest head I have ever seen. I rarely see him get tensed.
He remains calm even on trying circumstances. Even if you push him to a torture chamber, he would not sit and feel for his situation rather he would push his emotions aside and would just lookout for some way to escape.Even if he is unable to escape,he would try to befriend some one there.In simpler words he is stree-smart.

4.He is an amazing driver, this guy drived his car from chenni to kanyakumari a week after getting one (He has never driven before!!).For me this is the most amazing
feature about him.The ability to learn any thing quicker and mastering it.

I have alot to write about him ....but due to time constraint i am stopping here.....

Today is Vijayan's birthday...Thru this, I wish him a very happy birth day

A lenghthy blog!!-My swimming class with "J"

"When was the last time you did something for the first time"...a Great one liner,I take this kinda of catchy one-liners very seriously and by doing so I end up in some serious trouble most times.

Trouble came in form of my friend "J".This happened in July this year."J" called me up on a sleepy Saturday afternoon and said "Machan...I am planning to go to swimming class neeyum variya?". Most of my friends are like me, they need co-passengers :-) whenever they attempt a new thing. I said I am not that interested, J requested me to spare some time at least to accompany him to enquire about the class details next day.I obliged and that was my first mistake.

He arrived promptly next day morning in his car, we went to velacherry which is some 15 kms from our house. But for J distance doesnot matter, wanted only that swimming pool because according to him, its the best place for swimming in chennai. J is kind of of person who always wants best in everything[he got a shoe for Rs9000,when his monthly salary was just 4000 few years back,I guess you can understand his urge for"The best" things from this]

On our way to the pool,he slowly roped me in to the idea of swimming by giving lectures how swimmingis absolutely necessary incase of a Tsunami ,how swimming improves ones physique drastically which in turn make gals fall for you etc etc... He almost convinced me that the swimming is the most essential thing required next to food in this planet.

The swimming pool was awesome and J looked at me and I could see that he was implying "Did I not tell you this is the best pool man!!". We met the coach,he said the class had already begun 2 days back and the next batch is after a month.I was greatly relieved after hearing that, because at bottom of my heart I didn't want to learn swimming, but I put on a disappointing face for J's sake. But to my utter dismay and disbelief the coach dropped a bombshell the next minute "if you ppl wanna join now ,you can,as the class has just begun 2 days back and you can catch up be practicing harder". J pushed me aside and gave a pep talk "dei we need to do this da,only two days has gone,if we practice hard we could make it". I was confused and said " practica!! I don't know anything abt swimming da". Sensing what's going in mind J played it well "I also do not know ABC of swimming da, do not worry I feel we can make it". This pep talk and the one liner at the very top of this blog confused me and I nodded my head,that was my second mistake.

The coach hurriedly slipped in two swim wear to us and almost pushed us into the pool.It was large pool about 5 1/2 feet depth.There were around 10-15 ppl practicing and some of them seemed to look at us sympathetically for our brave decision of joining the third day of class directly.Most of the guys were practicing floating for 2 days now,coach gave a brief 5 min demo about "floating" to us.From the first look of it,I clearly understood that its goanna be very difficult for me to catch up 2 days class in 2 hours.But surprisingly J was composed and said "lets start" , we both started out floating together and next moment I drank half a liter of water and touched the floor of the pool and came up and was thinking that J would have had the same fate. But J,the B*****d had crossed half the pool by floating. In fact he was doing better than our 2 day old seniors in our batch. I was shocked becoz he had lied to me about his swimming skill earlier. Further the fear of going a to be lone back bencher in the swimming class for next 15 days was unimaginable to me . J came back with a smile and said "I don't know how, but I am able to float in the first attempt da". I really wanted to kick his ass, had it not beena public place i swear i would have done it.

That day started my swimming ordeal for the next 20 days,most tiring days of my life.I was in a drowsy state for rest of the day after swimming.Swimming, believe me, is one of the best cure for insomnia and I don't know why doctors are not recommending it.

Though with encouragement of J and my effort I was able to float next day, but found swimming definitely not my cup of tea. And more than swimming, the weariness after that, killed my productivity at work.I was eagerly waiting for the last day of the class.

I don't remember whether its 8th or 9th day of the class , coach took us all to a bigger pool 8-9 feet depth and started demonstarted us the diving. J as usual pepped me up with a one liner "Dei everybody has fear but ppl who don't show it out are called courageous person". I was coaxed again. Jumped in to the pool real flat and water banged on to my abdomen, Ouch....it really hurts!! . But it was fun for next few days except I felt more tired now and I was also very happy as the class is nearing is end.

Just a day before the last class , the incident happened. Coach had increased the distance we are going to swim for the day. Normally we would dive in and just two strokes we would reach the pool side.Today the distance was around 10 meters diagnoally across the pool.and the depth of the pool is 9 feet.It was tough and I requested J, who was standing before me in the queue to just have an eye on me till I reach the other end safely.For which he nodded his head reassuringly. My turn came and I delayed it for few mins to make sure J reaches the other end so that he could help me incase of any trouble. By that time I had lost faith in the coach , as he was more interested in coaching ladies and gals:-). So my only savior incase of any mishap is J.

I jumped instead of diving as usual, slowly came up and coach who was satisfied turned to the next person. I was slowly swimming towards the destination. And suddenly lost control and started drowning. Since we were swimming diagnolly across the pool, going back would not serve any purpose and the shore(?) of the pool was not nearby. I went down and gulped few liters of pool water and no one was noticing me.I totally forgot the lessons learnt on the 15 days and started to do shake my hands and legs in an haphazard manner. Finally after a lot of struggle, after filling my stomach with huge quantity of water and almost losing my consciousness. I reached the side of of the pool and came out crawling .To my utter shock no one had noticed my flirtations with with death not even J. After regaining my thoughts I was looking around for J, who was in a serious discussion about how his previous dive with a guy. I really wanted to push him down in to the pool and hold his head under water but was totally drained and shaken by my near death experience. Meanwhile J came to me and said "dei you did well da", which really made me to loose my cool and said "Yes I did well, that it almost killed me idiot". I told him that I am quitting the class . He started with his pep talks and his theory that no one can drown in 9 feet wateretc..etc..But for me "my something for the first time" ended just there. and strictly told him that I cant come to the class again. Though I got a certificate from the class, I did not get in to a swimming pool since then.J attended the next class alone and completed the course successfully.

I did not meet J after that day for 2 weeks.Out of the blue, he called me one Saturday and said "Macha,I am planning to learn Hindi,neeyum variya?".I paused for a moment and said "Yes..!!"...


Hummm........ somethings never change!!!