Kuttalam: Yea you heard me!!

Kuttalam Waterfall, Old Kuttalam (Courtalam)

Beautiful landscape

Meter gauge railtrack over a colonial arch bridge

Sankar, Sankar Nair, 000

Road to the heavens

WilD domestic peacock..or hen or whatever ;)

Yippee, camp fire..

The background and the colors just did it!!

Scarecrows

Moi..

The gang, Jonathan behind the cam

Bleeding BackwArds

Trivandrum has been my hometown for quite some time now and even though I was not born here, I do have a strong sense of belonging attached to this place. Each time I come here I feel that something very special inside my chest. The pride one feels about his own hometown.

But as a few hours pass by and I move through the roads, I am invariably disappointed. Nothing has changed. I can even see the same tea stalls and the same pot holes playing mentor to the upcoming young pot holes. None of the roads have improved (Mom enlightened me that Kerala did not have a decent minister for roads in quite a while), and I hear people cursing Japan Kudivella Pathadhi which I do not have any idea about, and no one knows much about it anyway to enlighten me.

The number of vehicles on the road has increased drastically over the last one year, with the roads teeming with the big fellas of the road like the Scorpio, Innova and Civic cluttering up the already breathless roads. The half done flyovers sport all new political banners and shabby writings. Vishnu enlightens me that these will stay untouched for a minimum of two years, before someone analyses the design and finds that the design is not at all sufficient and we'll have to start from scratch. So the contractors hired to restart the project can get more money smashing up the crores that already went into building those piers and eke out more money to build to even more rubbish designs (Gamon flyover in Hyderabad, even though crashed due to bad staging, really impressed me with the pace at which the lagging behind project progressed , with the pre-cast blocks assembled very fast).

Mom again enlightened me that the Peroorkada-Kudappanakunnu road was completely unusable until the public went on a protest and made the ground shake with their demands to repair the road ( they have done a quarter lane width tarring of the supposedly 2 lane road).

And I keep listening to the anti-entrepreneurship government dissuading foreign/domestic investment, may it be Reliance/Infosys/Patni/Vizhinjam etc (check out pending land requests at technopark here). I also read about the general disdain that Malayali investors have towards hiring malayali help in their ventures outside the state because of the lack of cooperation from kerala government/trade union tedtape (silverine's blog).

I also read a few very interesting articles on Kerala politics and development projects related to tvm at Vinod's blog.

But it got me thinking on what the underlying problem is. I am sincerely fed up of all the non kerala resident mallus pointing out the mistakes of all malayalis. Philipose was very very insistent of point out the lack of insight and incapability of mallus, which as far as I'm concerned, would fail to explain the success of mallus all over the country. Maybe the answer is like what some others say; mallus working for mallus inside kerala is bad, and as soon as they step out of the state they start making money. Here too, the out of state businessmen are reluctant to hire mallus in fear of the backfiring from mallu workers union backlash.

The cause of the problem has to be complicated and would probably be part reason of the success of our race, what ever it might be. It could be communism in the last generation or it could be a collection of too many small reasons to enumerate clearly. What ever the reasons for the growth/holding back now, it is definitely time for us to break free, change our views and look at everything with a new perspective.

Today talking to my friends here, especially Sankar gave me an insight into how mallus hold on to cliches that held good a good generation back, but have been blindly adopted in a generation when everything deserves a fresh approach. I do not have the vocabulary to try for a clear discussion on the modern/traditional mindset debate, hence am stopping this post here..

Will add on more later ..

BIS certified work

Well, its not like I have been working my ass off for the last few weeks in office (smothered by the work load and the works) but still compared to these last few days I had been working quite a lot earlier. That is to say that quality of work that I do makes up for the quantity or rather the lack thereof for the period under consideration.

Thinking of going home, and that too for 10 days is enough to keep me from even starting on any of those pending things. And to top all that the weekend was awsome with a P200 ride through the city, all the salsa acrobatics with Anuhya, a birthday party at Soni's place, a fun filled coffee outing with Anuhya/Cho/Pritvi (or Prit as his american friends call him he says) and to give it that sense of completion, Beowolf on Imax 3D with a cute little monkey. Well I would say I am pretty justified in feeling completely off from the, working hard, frame of mind.

Well lets hope my onsite/offshore managers do not fly off the handle when they do find out about my quantity/quality of work...!!

Admirers UniTed !!

All of us need a respite from our hectic schedules, to unwind, to relax and think about something else other than work which occupies every inch of disk space in our heads. Even though there are some people who never unwind, most people do something which would help them unwind (consciously or unconsciously).

Now most people in my office revert to the healthiest of such recreations: Admiring the beauty of nature (pachha malayalatthil paranjaal, vaayinottam). So during lunch hour our daily escape from an environment thick with code, scripts, deadlines and appraisal cycles begins at about 1...

It usually involves a tingly sensation in my body (the vibration of my mobile phone ringing in my pocket, Shinu calling). So after I do a "Right Click> Refresh" in my head a couple of times, my mind is clear of the cluttered thoughts of all the problem tickets, artifacts and other issues with which I would have been wrestling with till then. I make my way out of the ODC trying to irritate all my team mates on the way out with what ever jest available. That might involve a smile or a mocking face at the new chick in the team (and she IS hot, if you are wondering, as I know you are), asking how many problems a new team member created that day or just enlightening someone on how their module is the uravidam of all bugs in the system.

Shinu, would usually be waiting at ground floor, with hands in pocket scrutinizing everything around him. As soon as he spots me walking down the stairs, there would be a reaction on his face to what ever I am wearing, which is usually a look of horror thanks to my god given gift for fashion (I do wear a black party shirt with wide shiny green stripes, which glows like bright green laser beams in the light, to office).

The paradooshanam (finding fault) starts soon after, and we shift to top gear soon after. Now, when Shinu starts it is something on a different level. I mean I was always the forerunner everywhere I went in this direction till now, but he is definitely a bonafide, certified master Vaayinokki (admirer, for the poor uninitiated non-mallus). Comments flow from his mouth as smoothly as the fountain in front of infosys campus here(both are equally examples of a work of art). I found that malayalam is an excellent language to express a myriad of situations and feelings to a such a degree of precision which cannot be nearly matched by english. This continues throughout our small walk to the cafeteria, and through our wait in the queue to get the food coupons.

Absolutely every girl in the office campus worth a look at has a nick name which fits her to such a degree that we would never need worry about forgetting their nicks or getting confused about them. There is Seema, who comes along with Muscle'an and Kuthira. This is the gang, on whom the whole campus of atleast 5k employees concentrate. The guys wont take their eyes off Seema and the gals cant get enough of the almost 6 foot Muscle'an. Then there are our favorites Princy Jacob and Annamma Varghese. Now first time we saw Princy we were 110% sure that she was a mallu. Hence one day I went confidently and asked her whether she was a mallu, to which she replied with a dazzled look on her face that she definitely was'nt. Anyway the saga continued with us mutually waiting for them everyday and escorting each other across the corridors(with our eyes ofcourse). Annamma was just the side kick whom no one noticed, untill we decided that we would drop looking at Princy and concentrate on Annamma since "Princykku ippo marana jaada. Nee aaradi thilothamayo" (Princy was acting too pricey). Now Annamma was definitely taken aback by this. She underwent a sudden makeover from a butch boyish type with a soda kannadi to a contact lens sporting, feminine churidar wearing lady who just could not hide a smile each time she sees either one of us.

Then comes Shinu's personal choice, Maanpeda. "Maanpedayude Kannukul. Aaha. Pennungal aayal ingane venam. A kaanukalil maanpedaye pole aa pedi kandille!" Sure enough from the very next day we started sighting Maanpeda only with dudes, and sitting on the phone for hours. So Maanpeda was suddenly dropped as the personification of feminine timidity.

There are many other notables among our regulars. Face-off, for turning her head suddenly when caught looking at us; Model, which is self explanatory, Kingini, Thakkudu, Nettholi, Shakkeela, Shinu's Vedala Romancham, my Vedala Romancham (most names are self explanatory, and don't ask me the meaning of vedala) etc..

Now, if I have given an impression that we are the only one monopolizing this industry, you are gravely mistaken. During the one hour between 1 and 2 in the afternoon, hoards of Vaayinokkis (from either sides of the gender barrier) line the verandahs on either side of the corridor to the cafeteria engaging in code review of all the people walking across. So we join them and sit on the verandah, along with some leading women professionals in this field on the other side.

All in all, lunch hour is only for admiration of nature's beauty and not even one thought of coding or work enters ours minds.

Now this, my blogosphere friends, is our Happy hour!!!

Purple leaks...

People might think that a sudden increase in expendable income, from a meagre 1.2k allowance for food and petrol, to something 10-15 times more would mean that I would be able to save money or spend money and be a party animal. But somehow this theory never quite came true, and after more than a year of being on the payroll (sounds so godfatherish), I am left with almost the same bank balance that I had started out with.

In retrospective, I never bought anything which was mind bogglingly costly, or never have I had to send money home. I did buy one teeny weenie 6 megapixel canon digi cam, which set me back by say a month's pay, but hey, a guy like me definitely needs to capture those moments and frame them for ever on film and all that stuff... I would not count this as an overtly undue expense.

But one thing I must say has been quite heavy on my pocket, and that sadly has been my purple machine. I have shelled out about 15k on it in the last one year to just keep it running (ok..not really running.. more of in reasonably good shape), including a paint job on the tank which was destroyed by the transfer to hyderabad, a change of electricals twice and a change of shocks to the new nitrox gas ones.

The last payout was the worst. I had taken my bike for a minor repair, i.e the headlights were not working properly. They kept the bike for 2 days and finally, fixed it and gave it me. I took out the bike for about 30 meters when I noticed that the indicators were not working, so I took the bike back to them, and as soon as I got off the bike, the whole bike started smoking. And it definitely was not Ashton Kutcher kind of weak and thin smoke. I really mean smoking, in thick plumes, like in the Arnold movies, after the Arnold has left the whole island burning kind of smoke.

So I was left with no options, but to leave it at their mercy to fix it (which was really bad since from past experience I knew they caused more trouble than they fixed) and give it by the next day, which later turned out to be a holiday for them. Three days later they were still giving explanations of inspite all their manouvering with all the required new spare parts they still were not able to get it back running.

To cut a long story short, I had to shell out close to 1k on the new wiring, battery recharge, wiring check up .. and to top it off a water service from their side (ofcourse not complimentary).
And the worst part is, now the rpm does not drop as fast as it should and this creates complete havok to my riding, since it makes a hell of a lot of noise because of the cut silencer.. :(

I could have easily bought another second hand RX100 for the amount I spent on it last year. And to think Philly's RX135 5-speed was sold for only 15k .....
Maybe my next bike is meant to be a Ducati..

Persuation

When I went into the conference room, I knew that I would not come out unbattered. One has to expect atleast a fair level of badgering from any good meaning manager, in any sort of status meeting. Ofcourse we were never going to stick to our plans, or complete our work within our estimated time, which would have been practically cut in half through mild or severe persuation of the managerial kind.

So this week had been more than normal stressful. So what.

Its only that a few issues and a couple mega code changes were requested in a very mild manner to be analysed, documented, completed and tested within 3 days. It would have been a piece of cake for the people who came up with the plan because, these issue were open only for the last 8 months, with the same number of people working on them, with the same work load on them. And well it is little consequence how many issues were solved by my predecessors in the past few months.

Managerial skills are pretty difficult to come by. But it definitely is overflowing in my project. It definitely has convinced me to give my very best, in being a model of non-production for the next few months, as I enjoy looking into the future at my absolutely bright chances of making to absolutely nowhere on the chain.

Life is beautiful. Keep smiling. The world is ofcourse mine.

pointleSS

I am at a point where I dont know what I want, but am so damn bloody sure that I want something...

Wonder when I'll figure it out..

Burdened Soul...

Today the immensity of the task that has fallen upon me finally has begun to sink in. As I waved goodbye to V, along with the whole team in the hot searing Hyderbad SEZ sun, the feeling of doom for having lost my mentor in this project, and a friend finally hit me. Lots of lost feelings came flooding back. Leaving college, waving goodbye to those accacia forests, leaving home waving to my friends and Mag, leaving Bangalore, waving goodbye to my first grown-up experience and Meenu, waving goodbye to Spoorthy, the only thing keeping me sane in Hyderabad, deciding to stay in Hyderabad, inturn equivalent to waving goodbye to Meenu again... Waving to Mag and Malu in chennai was the same, bringing back all those old feelings to the fore.

Seeing his excitement to go back home was good, even though I envied his pure joy at the thought of going back to his home town and family. I never had that feeling about Trivandrum, maybe partly because my life there fragmented and drifted away in the wind, never to be a part of the whole that was my past, or maybe partly because I will always be searching for things which are new and exciting and I certainly am nowhere near ready to settle down.

When I had first stepped into this project, I could see only experienced guys, who did not look like they were going to gel with me and I had a feeling of doom about the whole thing. But anyway it was supposed to be for only a month. V had seemed to be the person in control, and Y had seemed to be a person who was to be reconed with on what ever track that he was on. As time progressed it was clear that V was the only person in the project who knew what was going on or knew anything about what ever track he was on. Everyone else was completely clueless about what was going on. But then things happened and I have commited myself to the project and will now be a part of it for atleast the next one year.

My situation is that I am one of the youngest members of the project, but I have been given a whole module to handle from offshore, which I would say is a big risk they are taking, considering the large number of avenues available to me to screw up and end up costing the company millions. Vishwa was tried and tested in this track and even though he too was surprisingly young, he definitely was not just 4-5 months experienced like me. He was handling it perfectly, maintaining the trust of the managers and the client. Now I am supposed to step into those shoes and I know that it is definitely not going to be an easy task.

Another absolutely inherant problem with the project is that the management is one of the worst available with a steady string of screwed up projects under its belt. This is just the 4th project they screwed up in their eyes. And they have their list of valid reasons blaming others on why it failed ready, so they are not worried. But this fact impacts me heavily since, it means the client is so pissed off with our company that they are definitely pulling out of any future projects and is even contemplating on terminating our current project soon. That would mean the development project that I was eying for the future has almost certainly gone down the drain (even though not confirmed yet). That means it has opened up a flood of people taking release from the project and running for their lives. V has obtained release and has left, so has G who was holding the whole project together from onsite almost single handedly. I have replaced Y so he is also out. R and S are in the process of giving KT to other preparing to be released soon.

That just leaves me and Y.

I had decided that I am going to work my ass off and get to a position to demand this and and be in command. If no one comes into the project that could come true pretty soon, since there is no one else in the project up for it because the others are as inexperienced as me or simply do not have it in them. Well who says we have to take the stairs or the escalator, when a high speed elevator is available. I just hope the power stays on the whole time, and I am not boxed in for ever....

Release yourself

I have not slept yesterday night. Well even though many of us in the IT Field are used to that, yesterday night is taking it toll of me. The day was hectic enough with me riding around town with roshan, covering atleast a total of 100 -120 kms. Coupled with the hectic hip-hop routine and absolute lack of sleep due to the project release I am feeling absolutely like crap in the morning now. I had to come to office at about 12 at night .. fix the issue.. go back.. be called back at 3.. go back after 4 .. not sleep.. come back at 7 am.. and feel all shitty..

God let the replications run so that portal can be up and I can do my final changes and go to sleep.. Please this is inhumane..!!! Torture..!!!!

Somebody help meeeee.... :(

Live to Ride(in peace), Ride to live(in peace)

Well, for the last one year I have not been enjoy riding my bike in the two metro/semi metro cities that I have been living in...

Why?

I dont have Insurance , Road Tax, NOC or a license..

Insurance: I paid on time, they wanna see the bike in tvm.. while it is roaming about in Karnataka and AP and its in no mood to go back. Its in love with the pretty Scooty Peps here..

Road Tax: All these idiots have only life time taxes, for the one year or less we'll be here.. and that will set us back by about 5k, as opposed to 100 bucks or so for each encounter of the third kind with the cops.

NOC: Tedious process, which I never intended to undergo. My bike is basically a mallu at heart. I cant imagine my bike being a canadian (kannadiga) or telegana..

License: I do have a license. Not just on me. I managed to forget to get it back from a constable, when I was caught by police near charminar about 3 months back. I realized that I had lost it about a month back. Now a duplicate is in the works back in mallu land, and since nothing works there even with some bribes.. I am still waiting..

Summary
If I manage to lose my RC book, I can be 100% illegal. Yippeee..

Remedy.
Since I have been victimized by a company initiated transfer to Hyderabad from Bangalore, I will recieve those small perks associated with transfers of the forced kind. In short, I can pay my road tax and get it reimbursed. So what I need to do is get an NOC and then somehow manage to pay the road tax here. Easier said than done, as NOC would require me cum all the documents present back in mallu land. Now that does not seem that probable, hence I need to courier the papers and optimally myself there and get the work done. Then I can pay the tax here. And if and only if I manage to pull off that feat would I be able to get someone else to renew my insurance from here from last year even though I have actually paid for this year too.

Red Tape. And not the shoe kind..

Cyderabranded..

Now that I've had a weekend to think over the options that are in front of me, I've made up my mind to stay in Hyderabad for the next assignment as well. This would come as an anticlimax to the hot blooded mail I had sent to my practice head urgin him to send me back to Bangalore.

The more I thought about it, the more I began to feel that going back to my known and already explored life in Bangalore might not be what I really want. I am sure that I would have been completely happy with my friends there, but again, I would be with the same set of people and would not experience anything new.

Hyderabad on the other hand might turn out to be better off for me, in terms of oppurtunity to meet more new people, with lots of new girls in my salsa batch and ofcourse orkut like ever. Professionally, even though I'd be stuck in a support project I'll be replacing a 10 year experienced guy and there are extensive oppurtunities to touch varied technologies like Biztalk for orchestration and Informatica for replication. So it might very well turn out good for me, especially since a large number of team members are either onsite, or have had enough onsite experience. And so the bait of onsite really did help me make up my mind even though there is a more than 50% chance that they might not send me at all..

Anyway, I've taken a decision, and a bold one from my point of view to go into the unknown in Hyderabad..

So many things to do....

Lock Down

When the management is out to screw you, there is very little left for us to do, and what ever little is left for us to do would not make much of a difference anyway. After 6 months in Hyderabad, after the hundreds of promises of not forcing us into permanent transfer here, we are finding ourselves in the position where infact we are all getting screwed by the management. If they say straight out that we, the almost one year experienced associates, do not have any say in the matter of transfer, the matter would end there. But at the end of almost all the lines coming out of each manager's mouth, will be the suffix - " At the end of the day, the choice is yours".

So after putting all my acting skills to its ultimate field test, I came out of my Tech managers cubicle smiling after all sentimental acts I put on. It might not have mattered to much in the final outcome of things, but I was not going to leave any of my leaves unturned. Thus came about a long mail incorporating all the formal verbiage that I could cook up without being too obvious (hope those idiots need a dictionary to read it).

Even after all this, I sincerely doubt whether it would make even an iota of difference. The fact of the matter remains... If the management is out to screw you, you are screwed. Period.

Will know the outcome soon enough.. probably by end of day .. or latest by monday. Will update the status soon...

Ponmudi..

Beautiful Ponmudi, the view was breathtaking.

The mist was covering most parts of the hills. The hills peeking through.

The winding roads were perfect for riding. The best part though was the ride up the hills at night.

The guest house was a 2 bed cottage, forced to accommodate 10 guys.

Everyone tried to keep their speeds down.

Tea anyone...?

The trip was always fun, especially since Sankar was at his best.

Kallar, No time to take a dip.

The guys..

Of course, the inevitable accident...

The Wheel Turned Once..

The wheels of time have turned, and to be exact it has turned once and have brought me away from home and got me through two cities and through so many learning experiences on the way. This day last year I boarded my train to Bangalore on my way to join my first company. This day last year, I waved to my friends from the train while they ran along the platforms waving back at me, JJ and Joji even venturing to jump onto the train and hug me. This day last year I waved good bye to my family and friends, so many of them. Tear filled, Mag staring out after me. I knew I would miss her.

Life promised to be exciting for me and it indeed has been. Bangalore, Hyderabad. So many friends made, so many scattered in the winds. Rashmita came like a blizzard and left as quickly and shockingly. Bangalore roomies stood by me . Meenu stood by me every moment of the way in Bangalore, making my life there immensely better every single day. The hour glass turned and I slid down it inevitably, on to hyderabad, and it dragged Spoo in too, who gave me company for every second of the first 3 months in Hyd, before she was called back. I started out on my first project here. Found what it was to work in the industry. What disappointment was, what the joy of working well and everything turning out good, the hoop of victory.

Hyderabad gave me so much time. Time to think, time to pursue dreams, time to dream for more. Salsa, hiphop offering a mutlitude of new people to meet, and dance like no one is watching. And that I did.

Its been over six months since I set foot on my home soil, six months since I saw my parents or saw many of my friends. I can bearly contain the excitement of going home after this long peroid. I can barely sleep at night, thinking of the 4 days in tvm and kollam. Its sad that I will get only 4 days at home, but it can be well compensated in the months to come when I'll be safely back to the bustle of Bangalore. And this time back in Bangalore I plan to rock. Really rock. Savour it.

But for now...Trivandrum herrrrrrreeeeeeee I comeeeeeeeeeeeee.....
I've got my new camera ready... ;)

Nailed bY the TaiL...

Today I had a meeting with one of my managers. It really surprised me, to what extents they would go, what cheap and dirty tricks they would pull out to get people to do what they want and keep their mouths shut.

The short version of the story is that we are 5 people (was 6.. spoo left) who have been brought to hyderabad on company's expense. Now when the expenses are being paid by the company, they expect something in return, therein lying whole logic of actually shelling out about 1.5 lakhs per person for a total of 6 months. All this money would have to be made back and more by making clients pay up good money for us. But this is were the glitch happened, in the fact that they actually failed to get any one of us satisfactorily billed for the enough amount of time so as to justify the company taking so much expenses on itself for our benefit. The time has almost come upon us when we are to be returned to our rightful masters, that is to the imperial lord of the office in Bangalore, without much to show for paying us so much dough. Heads have to roll. Heads have GOT to roll.

Now at this point it would have been nice, even amusing to see the managers take the fall for their mistakes or lack of foresight or pure lack of managerial skill which brought about this immense investment/return anomaly. But since two of us(which sadly didnt include me) flatly refused to stay back in hyderabad when asked directly, he resolved to the underhand method of a completely unexpected and intense battery of one's senses with pretty obvious(to me) psychological tricks. Thankfully he picked my teammate for the first round and I was more free to observe the tactics that were being adopted, and saw to my relief that this guy, how ever experienced he was in this, was leaving far too many openings to be classified as a completely unsurmountable obstacle on the steep road of career progress. But my colleague fell for it, and was dutifully mashed up into a pulp state somewhere in the vicinity of a mango milkshake. And when he turned to me, I was prepared mentally that I would reply reply professionally to what ever he asked and appear to be as competent as possible and not give him much of a leeway for him to do his bagdering my self esteem.

I could see that even though the meeting was held under the pretensions of being a discussion he was expecting more of a one sided monologue. But how could any self respecting professional who thinks he is any (or a lot) good in what ever he does keep his mouth shut when their skills were being blatantly played down. Underappreciation was not even in the same league as this. So what ever point he made, I made it a point too to somehow make him lose his flow by either agreeing with him at the wrong point or not agreeing with him at all when ever possible. Finally when the meeting was over, neither me nor my colleague could recollect what had been actually discussed even though it has lasted for a good 30-40 minutes. Anyway since this was not a proper HR manager (was a techie manager) he was also definitely not able to achieve his final objective. Actually if we are lucky enough we could both wring the situation a little more and collect the money that leaks out it, in the form of another extension to our relocation and personally I could do with a stub for the future in the form of a BizTalk resume entry.

Though staying in hyderabad without finding a real nice chick would certainly not be worth it... even with the money.
Somethings never change.. where ever a person might be .. or how much ever time has passed ;)

Hyderabad: FrAmeD!

Well, I concede that my life in hyderabad has given me very little to blog about indeed, and I was forced to make some underhand moves and steal tags from Silverine and copy out mails to my manager. It did give me an incredible oppurtunity to go out and savour the city of pearls with Spoo's friends and meet some cute chicks in the process. Well finally I have gotten around to bringing my hard disk concealed in my pocket and plugging in the device hoping that the IT management group would not have any facility to come to know of a storage device attached to the system. Well here goes the photo story...


Even though it messes up the sequence of things completely, I wanted to put up my favorite shot at first. This snap was taken during the Golconda trip. Let me assure you it was the best sight in hyderabad.


Two shots of the Qutb-Shahi tombs near the Golconda fort, from where we started out our journey that day. The first one was taken by me with PG's cam and the second with my w700i camera phone. You can make out the difference, which makes me really want to buy a real cam.

One of those beautiful corners in the Qutb-Shahi tombs. There were many similar shots in and around the place, and since I was severly prohibited from putting the pics of any of the chicks, I have to stick to beauty of the archetectural kind in my blogs.


This is the shot while climbing up the golconda fort common way, which was used by the commoners to climb up to see the king.



Narrow passages through which visitors had to pass through, where they were checked by the guards.



Another shot of the top, from the kings path, where the kind was brought down on 'Dholi' by african slaves, wherein the slaves were selected that the heights would match up to the incline of the steps.


This beautiful wall is supposed to have been adorned with beautiful and precious stones. One can only imagine now.

A view from the top

View of the Golconda Fort at night.

Now that the Golconda pics are over, I thought I'd add a couple of snaps of the fun I had this weekend with some new friends that I made at Steps, where I have joined up for Salsa classes. Most of the people in the pics are expert dancers,who are good enough to participate in dance competitions and win them too..

The sardarji and the dude in the white t-shirt were the most noisy people I have ever met in my life. They made the trip the enjoyable experience that it was.

The cricket team which won the match, which according to the very strict umpire, was won by cheating, to which I completely agree because I was in the losing team.

A shot of the sky from my guest house, which is my phone wall paper now.

How can I not put up a picture of the charminar even though I could not take a good picture of it with my phone cam.....
It was a severe disappointment...

Mala Engane Marikkaam?

The mad rush for the appraisals are gathering force and it has forced me to start thinking about my very own 'Mala Marikkal' (mountain moving) mail to my ex manager in the vague hope of 'gore and glory' in the form of a forwarded mail to the senior managers of my business unit. Well Anitha and Debasish had done it, and that has forced even poor Uzzal who is stuck in a bullshit project to look at the bright side of the mere copy paste work he is stuck with and write his own 'a** kissing' mail to the manager, which I gladly helped him edit into more of a corporate form.

Now, let me try my hand at it here .. and like my previous post i'll await valuable reviews from helpful arse kissing experts from blogosphere.

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Sir,

I am now working on a new release of a web application, for Energy and Utilities Vertical, for an US client(*name purged). The full project is immense and is handled by Infosys and Wipro. The rest of the team is working on the 1.6 release of the application, and I was brought in to help with 2-3 features of an added functionality. The main resource who is 3 and a half years experienced is stuck with her earlier tasks due to the complexity of the N-tier architecture of the application, and hence I am now in charge of all 9 features of my project. I have been able to complete the complete detailed design spec in two weeks, understanding the system and its architecture.

All this has been greatly facilitated by the design and architecture training and tips given to me during the DA Training by you and S (purged for my protection). It also helped me in easily picking up latest technologies like Web Client Software Factory within days, which without the understanding of the basics that you had imparted, would have never been possible for a non-IT rookie like me. It also helped me in easily designing the architecture for the POC for boeing, which was similar to designing the dummy projects given by you.

Thank you sir, for taking a initiative from your side in training us rookies and elevating our career prospects greatly inside the organisation. I also would like to acknowledge all the great help from S to us.

Thanks and Regards,
(Your truly Moi..)

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Whoaaaa.. that took some effort...
so people out there, with a knack at ass kissing, feel free to contribute additions/modifications/masalafications to my little endevour of self promotion...

Cheers.. PEACE OUT..
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Note, Attatchment: Anitha's and Debasish's mail for those who are interested..

Hi sir,
How are you? How is DA?

I am into (*) project. It is a project in TMTS vertical. My client is (*).

This a new project starting right from the scratch. Designing was also involved. My tech lead asked me to create use case diagrams.

The tool used was Argo uml. I was able to do it all because of the training given by you and S.

The project is a fixed price project we don’t even have 1 min to spare. Even Saturday and Sunday we are working. Within 40 days our project should be over, that is the plan. Everyday the time we go is at 9:30 or 10 pm.

Today I had the task of doing a module. I had to implement the whole thing ie, BL, DAL and UI. He asked me to complete that then show to the team how to do it. He also told the team to follow the method I followed in handling the layered architecture.

I could do this easily because of the Dummy project and the trainings given by both of you.

Sincerely speaking I wouldn’t have done all these things if you wouldn’t have given me this training.

I sincerely thank both of you for giving such excellent trainings and grooming me up.

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Sir,
Good evening. How are you?

Yesterday I was having Microsoft Interview (3 Hrs of Interview) to work in Microsoft IDC HYD. I got selected in that.

Monday onwards I will be working in Microsoft IDC on (*) (They are going to ship (*)) as a resource from Wipro.

I do not know my exact work but I have to work from Monday.

Today I attended 2 hrs of KT session in MS.

Today I am getting release from the (*) project.

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Appraisal

Appraisal times are here, and I am inviting all creative minds out there to put all your creativity together and write me a good self appraisal ;).

Also would be appreciated, completely shameless, self promoting letters to my old manager Subbaih Anandan, telling him how big a job I am doing here, and that I would love to go back to Bangalore and work with him in the DA Team.

So do not lose this wonderful oppurtunity and rush in with your entries in my comments !!!

Cheers... :)

The ei8ht tag..

So again I've swallowed the pride that is left in me after all those shameless acts of Blogosphere thefts, and yet again I steal a tag from Silverine, just because I cannot find anything in my hyderabad life worth blogging about, as of yet.

The tag is pretty simple, and it just involves writing 8 random things about yourself and tagging 8 people.

So here goes...

Even though its time that I left this habit, I still listen to heavy rock music and it still surprises me with the extent to which it helps me handle my moods.

I AM getting old, along with my bike, as my hands start shaking after a real fast ride through city traffic.

I love watching the same movies over and over again untill I know the dialogues by heart.

The only thing that I have ever stuck to in my life till now is gym, which I have never really dropped in the last 5-6 years, though people would still be surprised to hear that I work out pretty regularly.

Recently I have grown interested in dancing, and try my best to move my stiff body, any chance I get to, may it be a new year party, or my birthday bash at a chennai disco...

Even though it may come as a shock to many people who do not know me much, I do not drink or smoke.

I am not very creative, but I try my best to make what ever creative endeavour I undertake to come out good...

And even though a lot of people reading will find it funny, I have joined up for Salsa classes here in Hyderabad.. ;)

So cheers to any one who read this, and any 8 people who hopefully read this blog is welcome to take up this tag.

p.s: I really hope atleast 8 people come to read this...

Swatchamaya Video

Life Rewinded Forward

Continuing with the flow of events from the previous blog, the pretty lady that I was trying ever so desperately to impress did finally waltz into my life, along with 3 other equally adorable beings of the fairer sex into my life this weekend. The twist in the tale that made it happen was Spoo's birthday, for which all her cute female buddies decided to give her a visit here in Hyderabad. Her male buddies also joined in with the girls for the trip but they were also cool dudes, hence in all the weekend was a blast.

I have been in Hyderabad for quite sometime (more than 2 months) and we, even though a big enough group to actually go out and see places, have never ventured out much into the city and enjoy the delights it has to offer. The only claim that we can lay to the exploring we have done in Hyderabad seems to be the weekend we visited Prasad's Mall and the Hussein Sagar lake. Hyderabad unlike Bangalore had many places of historical and general tourist value including Golconda fort, Qutb-Shahi tombs, Birla temple, Snow world, Ramoji filmcity and of course the trademark Charminar. This in an ancient city with history of over a few centuries, hence if one were to look closely through the gap between those modern ugly buildings, one would find mosques, buildings and other structures which are obviously from an era long forgotten.

So our journey started with me and Spoo going to greet our new friends and take them to the guest house that we had searched out for them. Meeting them was amusing since I was so painstakingly trying to engage one of them through mail correspondence and been teasing another so badly that she wanted to shoot me at sight. Thankfully the first meeting went completely smoothly with us all being late for our first tourist outing; the Qutb-Shahi Tombs.

Now, these old king dudes were amazing fellows. They built tombs for themselves while they were alive so that they can die peacefully (or forcefully) and be buried in style. Hence we were able to see beautiful tombs constructed in intricate detail with a sense of innate beauty. I being desperate to capture all this Mogul architecture, cunningly stole a digital camera from one of my newly made cute girl buddies. The poor thing did not even know what hit her and she did not even lay eyes on that canon S410 for the whole day. So I started taking photos of each and every brick that I found interesting, and it being a Mogul architectural treasure had a lot of interesting 'bricks' which in turn resulted in quite a number of snaps being taken. Actually, there were more than quite a lot of interesting and moderately interesting things (other than the girls) which qualified for a snap in my books, but I showed a relative amount of self control in limiting myself to shots that had more than a good chance of being appreciated by owner of the camera. The sun was up and Hyderabad sun was unforgiving.

From the tombs we found our way onto the nearby Golconda fort. Now this a place I can relate to from the many number of novels I have read which told tales of fortress towns which could never be penetrated, even after months of siege by very determined foes. The outer walls were 7 km in diameter and let me tell you, it was an impregnable setting with its own hidden water supply and granaries which could easily outlast a siege. We scrambled up the gravelly steps up the hill while a guide explained the history of each part of the fort. The light and sound show in the night was amazing, even though it could not stop Debasish and Anitha from sleeping through the whole show. From there we went to Eat-Street which was an exclusive food court on the banks of the Hussein Sagar.

Next day everyone was promptly late by 45 minutes making the whole tourist bus wait for us to take us to Ramoji Film City. The bus ride was enjoyable enough, and after about an hour we landed at the gates of Ramoji. The place was no where as interesting as Golconda fort or the Qutb-Shahi Tombs, and the heat of the sun caught up with everyone in the group throughout the day. In the afternoon we went for a trip around the campus on a guided bus tour, and the guide chap got us all laughing with his very witty comments about the sets of the film city. One set would have 4 separate facades for 4 different situations; where else can you get married on one side(church) , go to honeymoon from the next (airport), deliver a baby on the next (hospital) and get a divorce from the last side (court). Another good one was houses one each for hero, heroine, villain and comedian on each side of a set building. The day ended off with a long walk through tank bund on the bank of the Hussien Sagar lake.

The last day was to be slow and no rush, when compared to the previous two days. We went to Birla Temple where the hot sun had made the stone steps so hot that everyone was performing tap dancing on their barefoots. From there we made a mad rush to snow world only to find out that the next show would be on only in 1 hour. This was a pleasant place to spend ones time if you have 5-6 people out with us in the city. We spent most of our time throwing snow balls at each other and catching everyone offgaurd in the face with well aimed shots. The show turned even cooler with snow fall and a dance floor where we danced our hearts out.

The last (but the least) place we visited was the Charminar which did not impress me as much as other ancient monuments of India have. But it was open to the public and we spent a few minutes on top of it looking out into the crowded streets of the old city and looking into the Mecca masjid where the recent bomb blasts had taken place.

The day came to an end for us on a deep note, with me and Spoo dropping off her best buddies and my new made buddies at the railway station. It surprised me that even though I had met them only 3 days back, I felt I were dropping of people that I had known for ever and had missed for long. I relished the moment when I felt a lump forming in my throat and drifted back to the times when I were with my various gangs back in home in Trivandrum.

It made me realise how I missed each gang's company, even though each was so different from the other.....
Thanks to Spoo and her sweet friends.... Hope they did not find me an intrusion in their group.

Book'd For Life

Well, recently a very pretty friend of my friend's, whom I've been trying desperately to impress, asked me to list my favorite books stating reasons to it to go along with it. It was infact a wee bit of maneuvering on my part which brought her to this question, and I do suspect that this fair dame understood the mild drift I was trying to impose on the direction of our mail correspondences.

Anyway, since I'm back into 'Competency Area' (the bench, for the uninitiated) and my Hyderabad life has degenerated into a sleep-throughout-your-weekend story, I've decided to write about my favorite books and why them ..

First a bit of background...

So my reading started, not too early, not too late at around the time when I was in 7th standard. Mum was such a sweetheart till then, reading me books and getting me all those comics and Famous Five/ Secret Seven series. But in 7th I got to read my first book, which was a thriller/adventure of sorts named Shaitan. From then it was kind of slow untill I reached the stage where I got my hands on the regular Sidney Sheldon range when I was in 8th or 9th. The period was bliss for me, with mom bringing home 2 books every two weeks from the heaven for readers, Elloor lending library. So that period was pretty monotonous with me finishing almost the whole line of Sheldons within the year, and going on to pile up titles from all the major best seller authors. It was a bit slower during my 11th and 12th, with maybe a book in two months or even lesser. And my reading spree was finally cut off with a villian of all books; War and Peace, which officially ended my golden days of reading.

Now to back to the subject. Some of my favorite books as of now are:

1) Godfather: For justice, we must go to Don Corleone. And my chest fills up with pride and other emotions so strong that it cannot be penned down onto words. Each re-read brings up more emotions. This is the book I have gotta read atleast once a year, and each time I read it I feel good about being a man and generally about being myself. And don't begin to ask silly questions like why, cos Godfather is simply the sum of all wisdom. The Godfather answers all of life's questions. What to pack for a trip? "Leave the gun, take the cannolis." :D

2) Fountainhead: Who does'nt like Fountainhead?
Well it was a rhetorical question and you need not answer it if you don't like Fountainhead, because I am aware that there are hoards of people who tend to think that it is just boring and it never ends. But to me it is like philosophy for dummies or Beginner's guide to philosophy. Who would'nt identify with the lead characters? I've heard almost everyone who has read the book to have claimed that Howard Roark was nothing but an replica of their own selves.

3) One Hundred Years Of Solitude: This is a very personal choice of mine and I do not expect many people to side with me on this one. I've been reading it over and over and again, and still cannot explain what is the thing in the book that draws me back again and again to it. This is the book that leaves me feeling like I'm lying in air somehow being bouyed up from beneath. And do not mistake this as floating in the clouds kind of feeling, because it's just the opposite. I just feel so disturbed to the core about the whole deal. Maybe it is because of the time span of the work, or maybe because of the sudden changes in pattern from a completely serious line with a sudden short intrusion of fantasy as if it were a mere everyday event.

4) Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: True that the idea for this book (radio show at first) came to Douglas Adams while he was drunk and reading "Hitch hiker's guide to Europe" and looking at the sky, but thank heavens that he was drunk, because I do not think that he could have pulled something this crazy off if he were anywhere near sober. This was something that came heavily recommended by everyone I knew, and correctly placed after Terry Pratchetts putting me in the receptive mood for modern humour. I have not read the fourth installation of the inaccurately termed Hitchhiker's Trilogy of five books.
There is an art, or, rather, a knack to flying. The knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.

5) Wilbur Smith: Again one of my favorite books, even though I cannot say that I've gained something deep or worthwhile while reading his works. Its pure adrenaline rather than anything else and even though most of his works have the same general theme it ends up being a blast to read. His books are long and they have good language and more than enough excitement to keep you hooked on for the 700-1000 pages that they usually stretch on to.

6) Terry Pratchett: Shrutz had always been telling me about how she loved Terry Pratchett and how she thought he was the greatest author on earth. Of course this gave me more ammunition to avoid the guy for at least a year. Finally, with nothing else to read I stumbled upon Captain Carrot and the Disc World. This, I would consider as one of the best things that happened to my reading, because I found that, humour writing was one of the wonders of the world. I went on to read quite a few of them, though not the whole series, not to mention an inevitable move towards hitchhiker's series.

Well, I have decided to stop here, even though there are lot more books that I have quite liked. But these were the first that came to my mind and feel strongly about.

Now Reading (rereading) : The Source - James Michener

Dropped Ones

Being from Trivandrum, heat is nothing new to me. But let me tell you, the heat in Hyderabad is another story. It would have been much more comfortable if we (Me and Spoorthy, my teammate), were to get up early and go to office by 8:30. Then we could have beat the rush hour traffic, which is even though better than Bangalore, is still pretty horrible, which when compounded with the searing heat of midmorning sun makes one hell of a hot furnace. Today, I had to go to office, and being Saturday I made the mistake of thinking that I would be better off going around 11 and coming back after lunch. Now, this turned out to be a very bad decision and I spent half the day waiting in the sun at traffic intersections and blocks, trying to blow out the flames bursting out of me due to spontaneous human combustion.

That's half the story. The reason why I was forced to leave my cozy little room and still cozier little bed was that me and Spoo made a very inconsequential little mistakes that we usually tend to make quite often, which in turn happens to wipe out what ever consequential work that we (including many unsuspecting teammates) had done over last few weeks. Anyway I went there and found out that there is infact no way to recover a dropped table from a database unless you had backed it up before. So now I've got to go back on Monday and hope there is a way to undo the damage what I've done or face the consequences.. :D

Hyderabad Blues

Leaving Bangalore was not easy. It had been my home for 6 months, and my life had gripped it in its familiarity and comfort. The Electronics City Office was heaven as everyone working there will swear by. A luscious campus, the greenery, the chicks, the lawns, the amphitheatre, the 7 cafeterias, the centre of Wipro and 18000 employees in one campus. Nothing could beat that. My team, fellow CETians, everything was going to be left behind...even though it was only for 6 months, the prospect of leaving it brought a deep sadness in my heart. What I was leaving behind was...

The beautiful Electronics City campus....

The amphi, my cubicle for 4 months...


My lifeline, the basketball court and gym..


The bench in EC...


My team mates, Anitha missing ...

Reaching Hyderabad was almost movie like, with a snazzy telugu number playing on the radio, which just matched perfectly with the scenes just flicking by me out of the cab window, and I could almost feel the camera zoom in and out of the delights of the city, a well edited music video. The first impression I got of the city were very favorable and warm and in striking comparison to the first impressions I had got of Bangalore. As far as I could make out the city was as big as Bangalore in terms of area, but no where as crowded, dusty or noisy. The holiday roads were almost devoid of any other traffic and we easily made the trip to our guest house in under half an hour, which was pretty good time considering the fact that the guest house (and the wipro office) were about 25 kms from where we had started.

Enroute, the Hussain Sagar tank.

Now, the city might have been very beautiful, with a beautiful lake, but the same could not be said for the region in which our guest house was located in. It was pretty far away from normal civilisation to an extent that we would have to later travel on a total of 4 autos and 2 buses to go get a toothbrush and get back. The only building near us were th Microsoft development center and the Infosys center.

Microsoft Development Center

The way the Microsoft people work...

Another look at, Sleeping at work

Infosys , Hyderabad

Beautiful like everywhere, Infy

The guest house met all our expectations with almost 3 star facilities. But the very next day Me and Spoorthy were transferred to another office which was in Secunderabad, 25 kms away from our guesthouse. But now that is an interesting experience with my bike here in hyderabad, and the roads being like an imitation of a motoGP race track 6-lane with curves, gradients and all combinations in between.

Our Guest house room

What we have done so far in Hyderabad are...

Climb the corporate ladder...

Get stamped with a phoenix...

And go for a team outing....