Generation Shift Through My Eyes

Am getting older and when I see back, all I have done was completing my education, getting married, struggling for career and did nothing else. But when I look back again, I realized that I have seen a complete generation shift or rather a couple of generations during my growth and settlement.

When I recollect various incidents and lifestyles in the past three decades, I realize that some things have changed so drastically that the current generation would only listen to my words in awe, just like I used to listen to my parents or grandparents. Oh my God..am I so old ??  :(

My childhood was completely devoid of technology. No phone, no computer, no video games, no color TV, no dish / cable TV connection. Most of those who grew in 80's would relate when I say this. Only form of major entertainment was radio with a couple of stations which made our days and holidays with all those dramas, song programmes like binaca geetmala, man chahe geet, vividhbharathi, ceylon etc. The anchors of those programs were almost rockstars and celebrities those days. Radio of those days was completely different and milder than current radio mirchi "idi chaal hot guru" types.

Tape recorder was another good source of entertainment because thats the only devise which plays what we like, where we can play cassettes. I remember recording every good song played in radio into my own blank cassettes. The first cassette which I bought with my pocket money was Aashiqui (much later - 1989) and all other cassettes before that were not my kind :D. Walkman was a posh-er way of showing off the taste in music.

Black and white TV entered the scene close by and the TV we had, had a wooden door to shut when switched off. Wow. It had a knob to tune any of the 12 availbale channels, but I never understood what a channel was because the only channel the whole world (for me) saw was DD-1 which we used to follow religiously. There was an antenna on the terrace which we had to turn around and adjust whenever the picture quality diminished :)

Cable TV came into picture much later in early 90's and thus started a revolution of multiple channel color TV's and then bigger TV's, plasmas, flatrons, LCDs and other hi funda technologies. Number of channels increased, quality of the content increased (and diminished in some cases). But now we live in a completely different TV world.

Another facet which the current generation may not even know is a concept of inland letters (blue colored  letters) :). Thats the best and only mode of communications till telephones and internet took the world by storm. Uncles, aunts, cousins, friends used to write me letters and I was on cloud nine whenever I got a letter addressed to me :) It would be surprising for others to know that I used to write and receive these inland letters till final year of engineering (2001) as I didn't have a cellphone.

I also witnessed the era of telegrams. We got some telegrams when some urgent message had to be transmitted. Since it costs much, terse shortcut words were used very similar to the current sms lingo.

Roads were full of bicycles and scooters-for the well off people. Cars were a rarity and even if one is seen, that was either Maruti 800 or Birla Ambassador. Premier Padmini was be a costlier alternative. This was because in pre-1991, Indian economy was not liberated and no foreign carmaker was allowed to market its models in India.

Early 90's saw an emergence of telecommunication sector and telephones, STD / ISD booths were prevalent and flourished until early 2000's when cellphones were introduced.

The most commonly known softdrinks were Goldspot, Citra which are no longer available. But Maaza, Thumsup, Limca are still available. Coca Cola and Pepsi didn't arrive while I liked Thumsup a lot and my mom used to hate it as it looks like alcohol. Lehar Pepsi which came as a competitor to Thumsup became Pepsi. Coca Cola which was banned in India earlier returned and there started a cola-war endorsed by stars. Pizzas, burgers were non-existent when mirchi bajji, paani poori and ice cream were the only junk food available.

There were no multiplexes. Maheshwari theatre in Hyderabad (Kacheguda Cross Rds) was the only theatre with an escalator and we would travel hours to play around that. Every theater had a mirchi bajji bandi (mobile stall) outside the main gate which was busier than stock exchange during the intermission of a movie. Popcorn and softdrinks as a movie snacks came in much later.

Computer was supposed to be the device which only high end offices use and a computer needed a complete air conditioned room with a condition that shoes be left outside. The first time when I heard that a computer was bought by my friend, I kind of felt weird as computers, lathe machines were supposed to be in offices :) Some other guys used to boast that they had a computer at home when their parents bought them a handheld video game :)) Later on playing video games was cool and if you had high scores in Mario or Contra, you are a hero of the school.

Many more such anecdotes flooding across the memory lane :)

I don't know if the current generation kids still feel proud to hold a pen after 4 years of using pencils in school; if they still construct a house made of book-covers after the final exams; if they still play sword fight with broom sticks; if they still play marbles and marampeet; if they still ask two wheelers for lift to reach home faster; if they still play eyes press, lock and key; if they still say shame shame puppy shame if anybody unknowingly exposes their private parts :); if they still collect sportstar cards which they get with a bubble gum; if they still rent bicycles on hourly basis to learn riding; if they......goes on.. Nostalgic

Those were the days which will never come back. Those were the experiences which will be locked in memories and blogs like these but the current and next generations can never experience. But thats life.

• Tape recorder gave way to walkman to iPod
• Inland letters and post cards gave way to emails
• Telegrams gave way to telephones to cellphones to smartphones
• Rotary dialing telephones gave way to push button landline phones
• Computers gave way to laptops to smartphone again
• 12 channel BW TV gave way to 300 channel color TV to LCD to LED to Internet TV
• 35 mm and 70 mm theaters gave way to multiplexes;
• Mario gave way to Wii, PS, XBOX and what not
• Hard photo album gave way to webshots to picasa, flickr, orkut to facebook
• Cassettes gave way to CDs to DVDs to Blue ray disks
• Books gave way to internet; Libraries gave way to Google & wikipedia.
• Bank passbook gave way to ATM card and to web / phone / mobile banking

......and again, thats life. Every decade would be a new generation and this change goes on. Those who don't change with time will be struck in history and remain in oblivion and those who don't remember the history will remain ignorant of the development, progress made and the experiences which would add value to life.

I tried and will try my best to race with the time. Thanks to my older friends, I grew wiser, but thanks to my younger friends, I grew more knowledgeable and more street-smart. The more I interact with people younger to me, the more I know about the newer rules of life they change. Sometimes teenage kids around me make me feel archaic and obselete by their flamboyance and flair in whatever they do, but I promise, am here to stay. I'm observing you, learning from you and will get there very soon :)

Remembering College Days !

2001 - the year I completed my engineering. Its already been a decade and yet everything is so fresh in mind (not subjects and concepts though). After a mediocre show in EAMCET - 1997, my dreams of getting into Osmania University engg college fell flat. With some 4000 odd rank, I had to find solace in admission into GPREC, Kurnool. Counsellors consoled me that its one of the oldest colleges and blah blah, but my dreams of vrooming on a bike in OU campus and putting the city on fire remained dreams.

I was in a beautiful dreamland imagining how my classes, friends, lifestyle would be after admission. But the reality was completelyyyyyyyyyyyyyy and diagonally different :D

When I saw the college campus, I was so excited and felt my dreams were going to be fulfilled there. I felt it was almost as good as OU campus. But I didn't realize that a series of shocks were in store for me :D

First shock: Girls of all branches were made to sit in a single class and boys of two branches each were clubbed to form other sections. nahiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnn.....all my steam got ejected with a thud. To add to this, seniors warned us not to talk to any girls in the campus as faculty and college administration are ultra-protective about girls. Girls had a separate college bus, separate canteen, separate class and every non-student in the campus is their protector :(

Now you can imagine what a 18 yr old guy would go through, especially after the kind of rangeela dreams about engineering college I had. But if you think thats the rudest shock, you are mistaken. Stay tuned !

My another dream was to get into a company of a cool dudes as I thought I was one. I found a house-to-share along with 3 more students. My room-mates were all much more studious, intelligent than me (all of them got below 1000 rank in EAMCET out of some 1.5 lakh attendees) and all three of them belonged to pakka rayalaseema faction families (one of them even lost his father in faction murders of Kurnool). I felt like a fish out of water, eskimo in a desert, child in a strip bar; Thats how my first year started.

But eventually realized that my roomies were always sweet, protective and supportive to me. I learnt a new way of life through them, a new slang, new words, new attitude, new thinking process, raw energy. Though there were some conflicts in lifestyles and priorities, I came out of that big city snooty guy hangover and started thinking differently. I don't remember what I learned in the class, but I started learning about life as thats my first-time staying out of parents' wings.

Later I befriended few like-minded, like-cultured guys and moved to new house in the second year. And girls were my classmates from then. After living in that city for an year, I slowly got acquainted with the town, and with friends as roomies, life became easier and there was no check on me. Gradually a kind of street smartness crept in which turned into arrogance and over confidence. I was literally on rampage for the next 2 years.

Except studying and listening to professors, I have done everything else under the sun. Some 200 friends to chill out with, pocketful of money sent by parents every month, a cook and a dhobi to serve, access to everything or anything. Life was crazy and wild !

Watching second shows once in 3 days, passing letters to girls in classes, writing 10-page love letters to help friends in their love-stories, spending hours in archies / hallmark stores, spending evenings at KC canal savoring mirchi bajji, waiting for girls at a temple near the girls hostel, befriending receptionist at their hostel, one-hour exam preparation, night-out combined study-turned-gossip sessions, long walks (covering two ends of the town), long trips, silly fights, ego clashes, sulks, immature groupisms and all those silly stuff done by every student were part of the routine.

Those were perhaps the most crucial days of my life. I was 19-20 years old, nobody to keep a tab and was exposed to variety of situations: good, bad and ugly; Everyday was an experience and every situation demanded me to decide fast and act smart. I'm sure if I was in Hyd with parents, I would not have grown 5% as wise as I was then. More than academic education, I guess that phase taught me how to live and how to react to situations.

Its said that friendships that blossom during that phase would last forever. I'm guilty of not pursuing some relationships, with or without my knowledge; few are in touch, few aren't. But I feel good whenever I think of them and the experiences, days we shared together. I don't know how many of them will check this post of mine but a tight hug to all those who ever liked me or treated me as their friend: Shyam, Pavan, Ranjeeth, Sushma, Ravi, Raghu, Praseeda, Siva, Srinath, Uday, Srinivas, Kishore, Kavitha, Upendra, Naveen, Aruna, Prem, Sireesha, Chaitanya and many more.

Love, Pyar, Prema etc

Warning: This is a long post aimed at all those single / committed / unmarried boys and girls who have to know a lot about love, marriage, life. Please don't bother if you don't have much time or if you are not interested in this topic :)

Love makes life beautiful and saying this now is a cliché. The word love is a euphemism for a variety of emotions and expressions like liking, affection, infatuation, impression, care, attraction, lust etc. In one of my previous posts (Love Marriage vs Arranged Marriage) I presented my thoughts on what love is, but in this post am referring to the kind of relationship boys and gals enter into before marriage.

Almost everybody close to me has been in some kind of relationship / feeling before their marriage. Some acknowledge and some don't :) There were four consequences for such relationships

1. Converting the relationship into a successful marriage
2. Converting the relationship into a marriage, but not so successful
3. Could not convert the relationship into marriage and got depressed
4. Could not convert the relationship into marriage and are happy now :)

Interesting part here is that those who failed in their love stories don't know that option 2 ever exists and those who converted their love stories into successful marriage don't know that option 4 exists, which mean to say that options 2 and 4 are far overlooked, especially by my unmarried friends, and hence this post :D

Those who are immersed in love with somebody before marriage always dream about a happy fairy tale kinda life post their marriage and thats quite natural. Love really makes their life beautiful because of these dreams of togetherness and a lifetime of bliss. 

Its not very easy for every couple to convert their beautiful dreams into reality because a lot of times, when a boy and gal fall in love with each other, they are so attracted to each other that they subconsciously never put their worst sides before their lover. Both present their best sides and thus made to believe that their partner will be the same throughout, which is not the case in most of the cases. To make their dreams a reality, they have to understand that getting married is not the only solution for this, but they have to continuously understand, accept, support, respect each other after marriage too.

This works and worked for me, touchwood !

I was browsing through the news websites and saw that Chiranjeevi's daughter Srija's marriage is in trouble. After that cinematic revolution and hoisting the flag of love, something has seriously gone wrong now. This is not a rare situation. We find a lot of similar cases in our day to day life. I have seen my very close and loved ones going through this. Hence its not certain that if a couple gets married after their love story, they are happy. Hope all my friends out there who are going through failed love stories find some solace out of this :)

So I take the liberty of reiterating the same old golden rule to all my unmarried / single / committed friends out there. If you like somebody, if you love somebody, be yourself and present your good and bad sides, see if you can accept your gf/bf's good and bad sides before getting into any commitment, because you can't act or tolerate something for the whole life. Its better than going through a bad marriage or a bad break up.

Another rule is never assume you will be happy if you are getting married to your love. The person may change, may show his/her other side, other colors which you may not appreciate. So if you revolt against your parents and loved ones who accept you for whatever you are, just think twice. Liking somebody and being happy with somebody are completely, ridiculously and insanely different. Not understanding this silly point is the reason for the option 2 mentioned earlier in this post.

Break-up management:

It sounds like an MBA concept, but its pure common sense. Not everybody would be lucky to be successful in their love story, but that doesn't mean they are unlucky. May be they are lucky that it didn't work :)

I always feel good for people who break up before even thinking about marriage. Its a blessing in disguise rather than realizing that after marriage and kids naah ! If a boy and a girl like each other, get into a relationship and later face compatibility issues, its better to break up. If you try harder and make it work somehow, both have to live along with such incompatibility for the whole life. Life is too short and too beautiful to waste for somebody you can't live with.

A promise of love and even some physical intimacy should not be hurdles for breaking up with consensus. Lifetime of pain is not worth anything. Yes, it hurts to part ways but a relationship of few months or few years is not as important as your life in next 6-7 decades. Just understand that the person you are going to marry is somebody who is going to give you identity, security, stability, responsibility, love, support, family and everything in your life. Thats far far far more important than ANYTHING before marriage.

Its a happy ending for a love story if both break up with consensus. But the real pain lies in a break-up from one side and agony on another. Thats a real hell.

But just understand that if somebody didn't feel like spending their rest of his/her life with you, its not that you can't be happy with anybody else. It definitely doesn't mean you are not good. You are judged by somebody possibly based on some very unimportant thing. If somebody judges a fish by its ability to climb a tree, whose mistake is that ??

Realize that love stories that end up in marriage are not always successful and love stories which don't end in marriage are not always failures. Life is too important to worry about a silly relationship or commitment you got into for few months. Everybody is destined to get his / her soul-mate who is made exclusively for them. If your love story is a failure, realize that the person was not your soul-mate and you are lucky to realize that before hand. Just wait for the best to happen.

Love as what you understand is not love in the first place. You fall in love only with the person of opposite sex who belongs to your age group only because you dream to live with him / her and lead a happy life. So you don't know if your reality would be as good as those dreams or worse or better. Its a hypothesis. If dreams are shattered, would not you wake up ??? So ruining your precious youth, family life, friends, affection you are coming across from various ends just for a sake of a looser who ditches you is very unwise and immature. Understand that there would be lot of people out there who want to see you happy, smiling and playful.

Your reality may be better than your dreams. Who knows :)

I really wish all those who get married with your love lead a successful married life and all those who could not convert your love into marriage also to lead a successful married life (with somebody else, who turns out to be your soul-mate).

Demolition of a Culture

I remember when I was a kid, my parents used to take me to tank bund almost once in 2 weeks. That was a perfect getaway which gave a holiday kind of feeling then and I guess its the same even today. The lake on one side of the road and statues/park on the other side always attracted me.

Later my telugu teacher inspired me to see the statues at tank bund as a part of our education tours. At that age, I felt so happy and informed to see Gurajada Apparao, Kandukuri Veereshalingam, Alluri Seetharamaraju, Kavitrayam (Nannaya, Thikkana, Yerrapragada) and various literary, political, social and cultural icons of Telugu heritage. Thus the statues became a part of my education and childhood memories.

Demolition of these statues caused grief and a kind of unrest and uncomfortable feeling in me. Its like something close to my heart was destroyed. Statues will be reinstalled for sure but this mad act has created a friction and lack of confidence and trust among regions yet again, only much deeper this time.

Demolition of statues is a direct rip off from Talibanized Afghanistan. Now this is happening in my city. This is unacceptable and unforgivable.

Relating the demolition of these statues to success in Telangana movement is completely insane. Those 33 statues include statues of Pothana, Rudaramadevi and few eminent people from Telangana too. Even if the number of Telangana heroes' statues are not proportionate, it doesn't warrant for demolition of other great people. Those icons don't deserve this mistreatment for the very reason that none of them committed any injustice to Telangana. Potti Sriramulu when started a movement for Andhra Pradesh, never suggested any discrimination against Telangana, neither did any of the social workers or respected cultural icons whose statues were demolished. Issues propped up later due to mismanagement and vested interests.

Telangana movement started with the pretext that Telangana, its people, culture and identity are facing injustice and insult. Now the so called upholders of Telangana identity are committing the same injustice and insult to people of other regions of Andhra Pradesh. Victims have become oppressors now. Tables turned big-time.

If those who participated in million march or whatever feel they are marginalized or discriminated, they should understand that the same treatment should not be inflicted on their Andhra or Rayalaseema counterparts. Cursing Andhra people, destroying their property, heritage, respect don't only widen the gap but also dilute the sympathy of fellow Telanganites.

In my previous post about the issue (Who Developed Hyderabad ?) I wrote about the heart-burn of Telanganites, but its become irrelevant now as the movement has turned into a revenge seeking platform and I would hate to associate myself with people doing such acts.

Other side of the coin, media should not incite hatred among masses because they were attacked by some goons during million march. This propaganda will only put two regions on opposite sides of a huge chasm. Politicians, especially those who never raised a voice against much destruction that happened in Telangana and Seemandhra in the last 2 years, should observe restraint by not adding fuel to fire by referring to the same incident again and again. Goons who committed this vandalism must be brought under scanner, but the government has to avoid witch hunting during the process.

Bottom line: Everybody has to understand that movements should aim at showcasing their issues but not demolishing culture, vandalizing heritage or physically, mentally or verbally inflicting other parties in contest.

Pakka Filmi

Before you think this is another boring post about my favorite movies, actors and actress, Hold On ! It may be boring but not about actors and actresses :D; Few days back, one of my friends accused me of being an acute movie buff (I'm just a movie buff, btw :P). He doesn't like the idea of living on movies and strongly feels movies and entertainment industry diminish productivity of any individual.

I can't agree more but was thinking what would we be without movies and television. Just thought to account all that I learnt from or all that I would have missed if movies were not there in my life.

• I would never have built my english, hindi and in a way my telugu speaking skills if I was not exposed to movies of those respective languages. Even if I wanna learn a new language now, I'd start watching movies of that language first :)
• I would never have laughed so much in my life without watching comic scenes in the movies.
• I would not have known about the concepts of love and romance at right age if I hadn't watched all those love stories and scenes in movies :)
• I would not have known how to communicate, impress, flirt, talk, convey, express my mind eloquently if I hadn't imbibed so many witty lines I heard in movies.
• I would never have known the beauty of poetry, asthetic values, richness, creativity hadn't I seen these in movies
• I would never have listened to any kind of music, if filmi music, songs and singers didn't attract me with their haunting melodies, soulful renditions and foot tapping numbers.
• I would never have imagined the beauty of Swiss alps, American skyscrappers, Niagara, Eiffel Tower and other exotic locations if I didn't see those in movies.
• I would not have known most of the socially and culturally sensitive issues, if those were not portrayed in the movies I watched.
• I would never have understood the way things work in various businesses, communities, societies and industries, if they were not shown the way they were in hard hitting movies
• I would never have seen all those beautiful women, handsome hunks, cherubic children in awe if I didn't have chance to see them in movies.
• I would never have known what spoilt lifestyle was if I hadn't watched those movies filled with opulence and elitism.
• I would never have known that dirty under-bellies, underworld ever existed if I hadn't watched all those gansgter and crime related movies.
• I would never have become matured if exposed just to my circle without knowing how world functions which I understood from movies.
• I would never have known the intensity and magnitude of negative feelings like anger, revenge, frustration if I hadn't watched those revenge dramas.
• I would never have known the history, heritage, religion and culture better just by reading, if they were not depicted by mega TV soaps or period movies.
• I would never have learnt that world is full of good, bad and ugly people if I hadn't watched heroes, villains, heroines, vamps in movies.
• I would have remained naive if I hadn't seen scheming, conspriring thrillers.
• I would never have understood what fashion, trend and vogue were if thats not portrayed in movies I watched.
• I would not have dreamt of a luxurious and successful life if I didn't watch movies because I saw luxury and success in viual media before aiming for that.
• I would not have written this blog-post if there was no topic such as movies :)

As said in Telugu there are 9 emotions; haasyam (humor), roudram (anger), srunagaram (romance), bheebhatsam (disgust). bhayankaram (terror), karunyam (mercy), veeram (heroic), adbhutham (wonderful) and one more which I don't remember. All these emotions and reactions to these emotions are built in any human with the kind of expereinces he witnesses, watches or faces.

Movies or any visual media are so popular because they inject one of these navarasas in the person watching something on the screen. Most of the audiences identify themselves with the situations they are in or they would (or would not) like to be in and if that identification clicks bigtime, the movie will be a blockbuster and the actor will become a superstar.

It goes without saying that movies form a very big influence in everybody's life (with or without knowledge or acknowledgement). Life is all about being PAKKA FILMI !!!!

One Year of Active Blogging

Though I've officially started blogging in 2007, I took a loooong sabbatical before resuming active blogging on Feb 25, 2010. Yes, its been an year that I'm putting my thoughts in black and white and it has now become a sort of my alter-ego, collection of my reminiscences, my mirror image and a perfect gateway to my views and ideas.

Earlier, I used to get wary as I didn't know who the readers were and what to write. But once I decided to make the blog a transparent medium to reflect whats going on in my mind, everything fell in place. Being a voracious follower of news and current affairs, I had (have) an opinion on every topic, but lack of platform to present my points of view and thoughts made me look for an alternative where I could express all my thoughts on every topic, be it political, religious, administrative, relationships, my own progress, setbacks, convictions, suggestions, lessons, confessions, memories, memoirs, so on and so forth. I don't consider myself to be a very good writer, but all I try is to translate my mind into words which make some sense.

Whenever I feel happy or sad or ecstatic or low, I resort to blogging. If you browse through various earlier posts, you can find that most of the writings are impulsive and direct Dil Se. I have been caustic and acerbic on few topics when I personally felt distressed due to any issue. I wrote like a child when I felt happy after my birthday surprises or vacation trips.

I know the world is too busy and there would be nobody who would patiently listen to me or care to ask me about what am doing or what am I thinking about anything. Everybody has his own life and its completely natural that we don't have a lot of time for others feelings or views. But I always felt this is a space which allows me to be myself. I feel good after writing a post. It brings in positivity and gets me out of blues, almost everytime.

An icing on the cake was the kind of response and readership I got for my writings. I'm so humbled that people appreciate my way of putting down my opinions in a rather simplistic lingo without getting elitist or catering to galleries.

6800 views from 27 countries and 38 followers after one year of blogging is hugely encouraging and it keeps me on my toes to post more articles as I know there are people who try to relate to my writings or atleast who try to keep themselves abreast with my thoughts irrespective of whether they agree with me or not.

My Inspirations: 

Undoubtedly my wife has been the biggest inspiration. She introduced me to the concept of blogging with her blogs , I was so inspired by her writing skills, that I always wanted to write like that but am sure, I don't have that poetic affluence, creative head or mellifluous flow which she possesses. The only complaint I have is that she doesn't write often and she never publishes her blog in other media to get some readership.

Sree has been a constant source of encouragement, inspiration and always been a positive influence on my blogging. Her blogging skills are par excellent. I can no way reach her readership, command on languages (she's unparelleled in putting her thoughts in English and Telugu with equal flamboyance). I always look upto her blogs http://sreeszone.blogspot.com/ and http://sreemadhanam.blogspot.com/. After Facebook, Twitter and Orkut, Sree's blogs are major sources of traffic to my blog :)

Thanks guys !!!

And Thanks everybody who has ever read my blog, and thanks to all those who ever thought my piece of work provoked some thought or emotion in you and all those who appreciated, supported, commented and encouraged me.

Love Marriage vs Arranged Marriage

Two different schools of thought and often two conflicting opinions. Whenever the debate arises as which is better, the opinions are highly polarized and often subjective. But what I believe in is that success or failure of a marriage is not dependent on the kind of marriage it is, but the attitude and decision making prowess of people involved in it. And this is the very reason we don't see only one kind of marriages being successful and all others a failure or vice versa.

There are people from older generations and few in gen X too who look at the word "Love" with contempt and this is because they associate the very word with some kind of negativity and often use love as a synonym to lust or immaturity. This school of thought vehemently advocates arranged marriage and the kind of family support and thought thats put into those kind of marriages.

I often fail to agree to that as most of the cases, arranged marriage is set based on few set parameters like looks, financial status, job security and caste. I can't think of any other factor in consideration. The whole decision in taken in a matter of a month usually. Based on that, two lives get intertwined for 6 or 7 decades after that. I don't say arranged marriages don't work. Such marriages have all the ingredients to make it a good alliance, but the basis on which they are fixed has to be expanded.

Coming to love marriage, most of the current generation kids would prefer this as this kind of marriage provides an opportunity to know each other, like each other and decide if the rest of lives can be spent together. Again we see all kinds of examples here too. The success and failure of love marriages depends on what factors the guy and gal consider to know if they are compatible and their wisdom in analyzing the same.

Lot of youngsters mistake that liking or love can make their life happier. What they don't understand is marriage is not only about love or liking. Liking somebody and being happy with somebody are two different things. They have to understand that those they like or those they are liked by may or may not have that capability or attitude to keep their spouses happy for rest of their lives.

People who advocate love marriages have to answer themselves if they can be sure that the person of opposite sex is demonstrating his/her negative attributes too as it doesn't always happen during the courtship. The kind of compatibility issues rise only after two people start living under the roof. Once those differences in opinion start, the way the couple handles those situations is the key for successful marriage. Now this is applicable for both love or arranged marriages equally.

Liking towards one person is just one of the factors to marry that person as there are more important factors. Love can propel the marriage for may be 5 or 10 years. After that there are more factors which come into play. Security, comfort, support, understanding, humor, ability to resolve differences - from these factors, love automatically evolves which keeps the couple happy for the next half of the lifetime.

Love is something which is gradually developed after continuous interaction, mutual understanding, complementing each other's weaknesses, supplementing each other's strengths and being a shield of support for the partner against the whole world. Attraction, romance or infatuation towards each other don't die for decades if these factors are proportionately managed in the married life. Now this is a secret of a successful marriage.

Just because a guy and a gal are made to see each other for 20 minutes in presence of 20 people, neither can know if they can be a compatible couple for life. On the other hand, just because a guy and gal know, like each other and enjoy each other's company, it doesn't mean they can be happy thereafter too. Both these approaches involve judgement. So if parents are better judges if their kids can be happy with some person, arranged marriage will be magical. If kids can judge better than their parents, love marriages are good.

So it all depends on judgement of people involved and factors they consider, not the kind of marriage.

The magic lies in reaching out to each other, trying to accept each other's qualities, respecting each other and continuously working to keep the fire on for the entire life.

PS: I don't belong to any school of thought as mine was a love story which was turned into an arranged marriage. I`ll write about my views on pre-marital commitment and their implications in my next post.

Change in my Voice

Recently I watched Colin Firth's "The King's Speech" where the protagonist plays King George V1 who overcomes his stammering problem with speech therapy. The movie is reasonably good but I got so nostalgic about the concept of speech / voice therapy which I myself have undergone (though not for stammering or stuttering reasons).

My case was more peculiar which not many, who knew me after 2006, know about. Till the age of 26, I had a different voice. Yes, I mean it !

So all my relatives, childhood friends, school friends, college friends and few ex-colleagues identify me with a voice which I didn't sport anymore after 2006. Lot of them suffered from a panic attack when they spoke to me in recent years :) And when I made my new friends listen to my old voice recordings, they look at me with disbelief :)

Just like any adolescent, my voice changed at 14, but it was softer and low. Thats the voice with which I made all my classroom seminars, presentations, group discussions for admissions, cracked job interviews, presented product demonstrations to clients, closed sales deals and on personal front made friends, entered into a relationship with my girlfriend. I never missed that macho kinda loud voice as I always believed more in content and gist than the channel of communication;

In March 2006, I suffered from a bad cold and my voice became hoarse for a while, but soon returned to my  normal soft one in a week. But I realized that I could shout or talk louder in my hoarse voice during cold than in my normal voice and then tried to talk in a hoarse tone deliberately. After some more practice, I felt that the hoarse tone was a bit softened and resulted in a distinct voice which was louder and more authoritative than my other (read: normal) voice.

After that day, I had two different voices !!!! And yes, I mean it again :)

I deliberately started using my new-found voice with new people I met and they liked my voice. My family and fiancée though initially got shocked, slowly got used to my new voice and in the course of time, my voice evolved completely and didn't look affected a bit. I was amused at my own voice therapy and entertained myself by reading a same sentence in two different and distinct voices :)

I never faced lack of confidence due to my old voice, but my new voice has brought into me a huge confidence factor as the efforts which I would have put in projecting my points of view with older voice were dramatically cut down by my new voice. Though my knowledge, conviction and presentation style didn't change with the new voice, the way opposite person perceives me changed a bit.

But the challenge was using my new voice before old pals or old voice with new people :). I didn't want to confuse myself and others and hence started talking in my new voice with old friends and colleagues too who were alarmed initially and then amused. They concentrated more on my voice than what I was intending to speak. It was fun.

Eventually I realized that I lost my old voice. I was shocked at the developments. Then I browsed through various voice therapy related books and online resources to know the reason for this phenomenon and realized that my old voice was not exactly my voice, but just a sound coming out of some unusual channel. If you got shocked by this, just imagine what I would have gone through :)

Yes, the voice which I used from the age of 14 to 26 was not my original voice. It happens with some kids that they subconsciously get shy of the adolescent developments and try to mask those to avoid peer embarrassment. Without my own knowledge, I might have done the same which resulted in a squeaky, soft and low voice. Thats the reason, that voice was blocked after the discovery of my original voice which was dormant for 12 full years :)

PS: I've been teaching since 2007

Taare Dimaag Par !

Just like the whole country and diaspora, I too liked Aamir Khan's "Taare Zameen Par". The story of a dyslexic boy and his parents' indifference towards his trouble was heart-wrenching. The appreciation the movie and the child-actor got was very well deserving. BUT....there was a certain kind of social message which kept me pondering over and over. The same message was subconsciously inserted in "3 idiots" as well.

Both these movies say that nobody should be forced to do something which they don't like and every kid or youth is entitled to pursue his / her career in their areas of interest. It sounded very idealistic and correct to most of the audiences, but I beg to disagree.

In TZP there is another scene where the protagonist slams parents for encouraging their children to stay ahead in competition. Since the child in subject was dyslexic, it was understandable, but what if the general audiences try to implement that advice ?

In my childhood, I always wanted to be a watchman (gatekeeper) as I saw they had a kind of control over who comes or goes out of the gate. After few years, I thought being a bus conductor was the coolest job. But I'm so thankful to film industry that no one made movies like TZP then; had my parents taken that message seriously, I would have been left as a gatekeeper or bus conductor now. (I don't mean any offence to those occupations as there is a kind of dignity and respect in any kind of honest job. Just that my life would have been very different that way ).

Just like Maddy's character in 3 Idiots, I was not interested in engineering. Infact I hated physics and later machine design in mechanical engineering. My parents pushed me towards technical field which I joined reluctantly. But after earning engineering degree, I entered into my favorite field (MBA - marketing) and in a way my technical background paved way to my management PG in one of the premier B schools. It has diversified my knowledge base, confidence and career horizon.

People who get influenced by filmi theories often mock at rat-race students plunge into for competitive exams and rigorous training it needs. But thats inevitable and there is a reason.

Even if 2 lakh students appear for engineering entrance in a state like AP, almost 70% of students end up in some engineering course and will have good career prospects. There is some kind of career waiting for not only brilliant, but also average or below average performers. Now can we say the same for those students who take their hobby as a career ?

If a kid wants to pursue his career in painting, cricket, singing, dancing, acting or any other talents, can he afford to be average or below average to make a living ? Can every talented or passionate cricketer play for Indian team ? Can every talented or good looking struggling actor make it to the tinsel town ? What is the success ratio ? These are some very fundamental questions that need to be answered with some minimum common sense before leaving the destiny of any kid to his / her juvenile decision making prowess.

Career security is as important if not more than passion. Those who are interested to make a living out of their passion too have to make themselves self sufficient by earning a comfortable living and then strive towards their hobbies rather than living in fool's paradise. Or else they will have to see stars all over their brain throughout the life and Taare Zameen par will end up being Taare Dimaag Par !

PS: Those who are born with a silver spoon or those who can live with basic amenities with no inclination towards worldly or material pleasures are exempted from my theory

Rest In Peace Thathayya :(

While am writing this post here, my grand-father is lying down there without a soul; I can't believe it and I don't want to believe it !


Hero of my childhood - Head of my Family - Multifaceted Scholar - Able Administrator - Voice of Thousands - My grandfather Sri S. Venkateswara Rao garu is no more


He gave me an identity when people respected me when I was a toddler just because am his grandson. My association with the sarpanch garu / panthulu garu made me chinna panthulu to the masses of the village, when I was hardly walking on my feet.


He is the person who taught me that power is not a privilege, but a responsibility and respect can't be demanded, but should be commanded by deeds and actions. 


He showed me what dignity, elegance, knowledge and grace are all about with his mere existence. 


Rest in peace, Thathayya :((


You will live forever in the knowledge, values and ideals you imbibed in us !

How Internet Changed My Life !!!

Today I can claim that I learn more from Google, Wiki than what I learnt from my engineering or MBA. I know people better through Facebook, Orkut than personally, I communicate more through email or instant messaging than in person or phone, I get updates faster and reliable through Twitter than any other media, I present my views better in blog than through any presentation or debate. Flashback to 1998...


I was so uninterested when my mom pestered me to create an email id, know more about web, internet because I was suffering from computer-phobia. Internet arrived in some 1995 but was not widely popular until late 90's and also because I was in Kurnool from 1997 to 2001 doing my engineering, the kind of exposure to technological advancement was meager. 


But it was in 1998 I had to create my first ever email id at www.netaddress.com as that was more popular than yahoos, rediffs and hotmails then. Need for communication with US universities' admin and faculty pulled me into the cyber-world. Also when my super-seniors left for US, they forced me to visit netcafe regularly to be in touch. 


An year later, I created my yahoo account as something called Yahoo Messenger (that time with some other name which I don't remember) entered the scene and I looked at it with awe :) Chatting through internet was wicked.  40 per hour was too expensive but I slowly got addicted to that without realizing how it would change my life in years to come :)


I've literally lived on YM and yahoo-mail for next 8 years. Daily communication with professors and admins of US universities, research on universities, preparation for GRE, TOEFL, visa till 2001; eventual preparation for CAT, research about projects in MBA, job applications - I remember doing all these from 2000 - 2003 on internet. Google and Wiki became my best friends during that era. I don't really remember doing anything else during that phase except learning more and more about / from internet resources. I was talking only to people on my email contact list, chat friends list; googled / wikied every management / marketing / finance concept and never got hooked by books (and hence average grades in exams :D)


2005 was an year where Internet played my cupid. I met my girlfriend (then, now wife) on YM. She was working in Korea and I tried to overhaul my daily routine to be able to spend time chatting with her. Days, months and years passed. YM is the biggest witness of our love story. I got close to my sister-in-law during this phase and we are each other's biggest fans, I guess. I don't know what my life would have been, had I not known about internet then :)


The same year, she inspired me to shift my email account to Gmail and get an Orkut account, which again was a life-turner for me. Orkut and Gtalk made me forget my long and eventful association with Yahoo. 2006 was the year when I got inreoduced to my brother-in-law and his friend Srikkanth - my future employer in Canada (yeah, both through internet) and everything happened so fast that I saw myself in Canada, a year later :)... I don't know where I would have been working now, if I didn't know these guys :D


2007, the year of my marriage. The year when my fiancee / wife shifted her base from Korea to India and I shifted from India to Canada. Again a long distance relationship (countries changed, distance didn't) which propelled me to stick more to my lappy than with people around. My mom being more computer-savvy than I ever was, too preferred instant messaging. With mom, wife, sister living on internet, I couldn't help myself :)


2007 saw my debut in 3 different and most influential networks in years to come: Blog, Twitter, Facebook. Wifey influenced me to get into the first two, I inspired her to take up the latter.


Though joined earlier, Orkut took me into its wings only when I joined an online community "My relatives and cousins". Earlier I knew only 10 or 15 of my first cousins. This community gave me 450 of them and 50 got so close to me that I treat them as my closest friends till date, and may be forever too. I met people who liked me, loved me, admired me, supported me and vice-versa. The emotional and psychological support I received from these people made me a better person for sure. I don't know how different and insipid my life would have been, had I not known few very important people here :)


Blog happened to be one of the most beautiful things in my online life. I strongly needed an outlet of emotions, expressions, views but who would care to listen patiently if I speak all these things ? Blog was an instant answer. I started this with the very idea of putting out everything that goes on in my mind. This is the place which is till date acting as my alter-ego, my best-friend, who can listen to anything about me patiently without feeling bored :D ..and today I feel content that there are few people who like to read what I write here. I'm very humbled by the love and support I'm conferred by them. Love to all.


Twitter is a revolution. With my 3 years of twitter-addiction, I can claim without any qualms that those without twitter account are loosing in a hell lot of ways. Twitter is THE world, twitter is THE society and twitter is THE reality. Its something which keeps you connected to the world, makes you street smart, keeps you abreast of the happenings, its the first-hand, unbiased media, its better than Google search for most of the matters, its the biggest source of entertainment and its here to stay.


Facebook is something I didn't get along till recently due to my loyalty towards Orkut. But things changed, people I love shifted to Facebook and now Orkuting has become a mere formality. Today, life is more on FB. 245 friends, their updates, photos, comments, views. Its not an exaggeration if I say FB is the reality and outside world is virtual. I don't think anybody can know about their friends / loved ones in real life as much they can know through FB. Love "The Social Network" and an alternate world Mark has bestowed upon us.


Earlier, life would have been difficult without a computer / laptop. Now its close to impossible without a smartphone with data package. It was more evident when I got restless due to unavailability / inaccessibility of data network for few days during my recent vacation.


Now I can't imagine how my life was without all these things around some 13 years back. Am also amazed to see people who can spend a quality life in current period without internet and its addiction. But I can't. May be am loosing myself to the virtual world, but its way better than the real world :)

26 years of movie watching :)

Somebody was asking me what favorite movie was and I couldn't pick one as I like so many movies, genres in 3 languages. Then I got an idea of capsuling my movie watching history of 26 years :) My tryst with Telugu, Hindi and English movies in a nutshell :)

Telugu Movies

Telugu movies have been staple diet for my family like most others in AP. I tried really hard to recollect which was my first Telugu movie in a theater. The earliest I can remember was "Swathi Muthyam" (1985). Its been 26 years that movie released and hence the title of this blog-post. I vaguely remember watching that movie and my aunts say I used to imitate Kamal Haasan's eccentric dance steps of "suvvi suvvi" song at home after the show. Thanks to such silly steps, I'm such hopeless dancer today :(

I also clearly remember watching other K.Viswanath movies like Sirivennela, Swayamkrushi, Swarnakamalam in the following years. Yes, my parents used to be K.Viswanath's devotees and I grew up to become one too.

The first time I went to movie without parents was in 1991 when Chiranjeevi's gangleader released. That was with my sister who has since been my movie-watching partner for the next 10 years. During that era, RGV movies brought in new flavor and I got hugely attracted to his Kshana Kshanam, Rathri etc.

Slowly my interest in Telugu movies subsided as most of the star studded movies of Chiranjeevi, Balakrishna etc were catered to masses, galleries, song and fight routine, over-heroism or in rural backdrop which I could not relate at all. Many telugu movies could not attract my sensibilities as I got more addicted to Hindi cinema by then. Raghavender Rao, B. Gopal and co ruined my appetite for Telugu movies and I didn't remember watching many Telugu movies until Tholi prema, Nuvve Kavali era.

I don't have favorite actors except that I like Brahmanandam, Prakash Raj.

Favorite movies: All movies of K.Viswanath, Sekhar Kammula, Chandrasekhar Yeleti, Vijayabhaskar and few movies of Ramgopal Varma.

Hindi Movies

I think I started watching Hindi movies and Telugu movies almost at the same time. In mid 80's I just knew a couple of names Anitabachan (Read: Amitabh bachchan) and Mithuchakravarty (Mithun Chakraborty). 1988 witnessed the birth of a soft looking actor by name Aamir Khan through QSQT; my friends at school went gaga over him and Juhi Chawla and I loved Madhuri Dixit in Tezaab which was released during the same time. That was my first brush with Hindi movies. So Aamir and I debuted in Hindi movies at a same time (he started acting and I started watching).

The first few Hindi movies I watched in theater were Tridev followed by Ram Lakhan, Maine Pyar Kiya etc. In the following couple of years stars like Shahrukh Khan, Ajay Devgan, Akshay Kumar debuted; a different era started and I got drifted away with those waves. Simultaneously I watched many older blockbusters of Raj Kapoor, Dev Anand, Rajesh Khanna, Amitabh Bachchan.

In 90's and 2000's I watched all those popcorn movies of SRK -YRF / KJ, action and comedy movies of Akshay and other well-received movies but liked more intense dramas mostly starring Ajay Devgan and Aamir Khan. Among actresses, I was crazy about Raveena Tandon (my first crush in early 90's) succeeded by Manisha Koirala and Sonali Bendre. Kareena and Katrina among the current lot.

All time favorite movies: Mera Naam Joker, Jewel Thief, Abhimaan, Deewar, Sarfarosh, Border, Dil Chahta Hai, Company, Rang De Basanti, Omkara, Gangajal, Rajneeti

English Movies:

During my mid school-days, I often used to come across C grade porn movie posters near my school and associated English movies with such movies and was ashamed of talking about English movies in general :) There were only few theaters in Hyderabad like Sangeet, Kumar, Anand which used to play blockbuster English movies and I had very meager exposure or access to English Movies until the advent of Cable TV.

I remember watching very few movies in theaters in 90's like Jurassic Park, Anaconda, Titanic etc and I just knew Sylvester Stallone and Jackie Chan till then. 2000's saw my exposure to the world of English cinema and thats when I brushed up with most of the good movies which I missed in the previous years / decades.

I was blown away by Godfather series and contemporary heist and crime dramas of Martin Scorsese, Steven Soderbergh, Quentin Tarantino. Till date, I'm trying to collect DVDs of all the classics made by these directors. I realized that am liking chick flicks too; but I'm not a huge fan of Steven Spielberg or James Cameron kinda movies or any animation, fantasy, saving-the-humanity kind and action movies (with an exception of few) which lack some plot or drama.

George Clooney has been my favorite since I saw him in some TV series even before I started watching English movies. He is THE handsome man. Acting-wise, I like movies of Leonardo DiCaprio, Denzel Washington, Kevin Spacey, Morgan Freeman, Tom Hanks and after watching older classics, went on to become a devotee of Al Pacino, Robert De Niro and Jack Nicholson.

Don't know much about yesteryear actresses, but among the contemporaries I like Scarlett Johansson, Jessica Alba and among the senior lot: Anne Hathaway, Salma Hayek, Penelope Cruz, Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Connelly, Kate Winslet, JLo. .

All time favorite movies: Godfather trilogy, Goodfellas, Shawshank Redemption, Ocean's Eleven, Training Day, Italian Job, The pursuit of Happyness, The Departed, Inglorious Basterds, Inception.

PS: Next post would be about my history of music listening. Stay tuned :)

Rules to be Happy :)

Its easier said than done, eh :), but I thought its worth sharing what I feel and understand to make people I care for, be happy.

I feel so inspired by some people who always seem to be happy and in good spirits. Its not that they never face hardships or blues or some kinda negative vibes. Just that they are clear enough what to take to heart and what not to. And there ends the matter.

Life is a roller coaster ride and we have to take it for granted that we will have to face all kind of situations. Expecting good to happen always is the first reason to get bogged down. Hope for the best but be prepared for the worst. If you are mentally prepared to take on the negative situation by its horns, its a game from then on.

Attaching a lot of importance to something not so important will pull your spirits down drastically. If there is something which is harming you or hurting you, just get rid of that and if you can't get rid, stop taking that seriously. Life is short enough to enjoy, don't waste it for unnecessary things, people and situations.

Be yourself. Don't try too hard to impress others or get a goody goody image. Nobody cares for your image for too long. You are not so important for others (or vice versa) that you need to change your way of life to impress others. Its not a sin to be bad in anybody's eyes. Its individual perception and nobody's judgement on you is final. If they like you, good for them and if they don't like you, good for you :) As simple as that is.

Express love. Golden rule of thumb. If you like somebody, don't wait. Just let them know how much you like them. It always works wonders and makes those moments very happy. Being loved or expressed love is the best thing anybody can ask for. Be playful, compliment them, make them feel special and try not to hurt them. The only thing you have to know is "Don't Expect anything in return" since expecting the same degree of love is often suicidal and disastrous to the relationship. The opposite person may / may not like you or may / may not be as expressive as you are. Don't really care, just be expressive and thats it :)

Everybody will have people who like them or admire them immensely, irrespective of what they thing about themselves. Realize that there will be many people who love to see you happy and smiling. Thinking about these people will relieve you of all the mood swings, bad vibes and stress.

So it all boils down to understanding what / who is important to you and doing what you like and finding happiness in wherever you are and whatever you do. Again easier said than done, but definitely worth trying !

So all sweethearts out there, be happy :)

Who developed Hyderabad ?

Despite being a Telanganite, I have never been a supporter of separate Telangana state as I don't believe that the problems Telangana facing now will be solved by a separate state. Now, all protesting for separate Telangana believe that disassociating with Andhra Pradesh will solve all problems. This is a mother of all myths.

All those who are currently fighting for Telangana state on the pretext of injustice were once ministers of the same cabinets which are guilty of injustice. Political unemployment made them start the movement and once the state is bifurcated their future and political career (and also their dynasty`s) will be safe guarded.

Irreparable damage has already been done. The remainder is only a political circus. Nothing is going to make a difference.

BUT what I don't see eye to eye is when people from other regions claim that Hyderabad is what because of the development done by them.

Pro-united AP protestors claim that Telangana is a poor area and people from Andhra and Rayalseema have developed Hyderabad and they have equal share in the fortunes of Hyderabad. The very base of samaikhyandhra movement is the potential loss of Hyderabad to Telangana. If Hyderabad was geographically not in Hyderabad, its a open fact that nobody would be interested in Samaikhyandhra and Telangana would not have been given any credit of developing the combined city.

Its quite an analogy that NRI`s can`t take credit of developing US (despite significant contribution) just because the very exodus to foreign land is to prosper from that land and not to develop that land.

History Speaks:

Telangana area (erstwhile Hyderabad state) was the richest and the largest princely state in the pre-independent India and the ruler of Hyderabad was a celebrated person and the richest man in the world for decades before the state was annexed into the present Andhra Pradesh.

Before formation of Andhra Pradesh, Hyderabad (a city with 500 yrs of history) was the only city in whole South India with well planned and built reservoirs, drinking water facilities, drainage and sewage facilities, network of hospitals, roads, railways, monuments,oldest university of the state and all development related to administration. British empire, Qutubshahis, Nizams have put the city in the forefront of the economic map centuries ago. 

And during these times, others cities or towns of present AP were relatively non-existent. Visakhapatnam was a small fishing village till late 1930`s till the port was built. Steel plant, BHEL and other industries have been setup only after formation of AP. Vijaywada, Guntur, Tirupati were small towns. Kurnool which was a capital didn`t have sufficient infrastructure to have an assembly building and administrative facilities and Guntur hosted a temporary high court. By then Hyderabad had a developmental history with readymade facilities to work as a political and administrative capital of any state. This explains the mass exodus to the city from other areas (including North Indians)

SO NO ONE DEVELOPED HYDERABAD POST AP FORMATION. Hyderabad was made capital of the state so that the whole state can benefit from the development and facilities which were already in place. After AP formation, if Hyderabad was developed from combined resources, other cities like Visakhapatnam, Vijayawada were given a huge shot in the arm too.

Today Hyderabad city alone generates 37% of state revenue. And a piece of news to all those who claim, Telangana without Hyderabad is a poverty stricken under developed area; Telangana (excluding Hyderabad) generates 24% of the state`s revenue whereas Andhra generates 15% and Rayalaseema generates 4%. 45% of forest area of AP is in Telangana. This shows which is the most resourceful area in AP. But this resourcefulness is not converted into prosperity due to:

Problems:

Telangana state is still the richest area in terms of natural resources. 79% of Godavari, 69% of Krishna flows through Telangana but unfortunately no district of Telangana is benefited from the situation. Karimnagar, Adilabad districts witnessed farmer suicides despite being in the Godavari river-bed. Nalgonda`s population is still suffering from fluoride problem of borewell water though Krishna rivers flows there (and yeah Nagarjuna Sagar is in Nalgonda District). Mahbubnagar district, where Krishna river enters AP, is the most backward and barren district of AP.

Reason: There is no project built to save some river water to irrigate these lands. As a result Godavari districts, Krishna, Guntur are undisputed granaries of AP.

Nagarjuna Sagar was built in Nalgonda district and the reservoir was built after submerging many villages in the district only to end up providing 3/4th of the waters to Guntur, Krishna and Prakasam districts. This explains famers` woes in Telangana.

As mentioned in my previous post about the same issue, Singareni collieries (the largest coal mines of South india), Ramagundam (the biggest power stations in South India) and other heavy and small industries of Telangana employ very less local Telanganites. This explains the unemployemt problem.

After formation of AP, 16 chief ministers ruled the state for 54 years out of which only 6 years were ruled by Telangana CMs (PV Narasimha Rao, Chenna Reddy, Anjaiah). This explains the step-brother treatment towards the region. Though I don`t subscribe to the idea that more CMs from Telangana would have made any difference as not more than 10% of policy makers and bureaucrats are from Telangana. Tadaaaa

Govt of India recognized 13 districts in AP as backward and 9 of them are from Telangana (yes, all Telangana districts except Hyderabad)

Telugu identity of Telangana is always ridiculed and mocked by public, movies, literature and other fora alike. The fact remains that the language gets adulterated by regional factors and so did Telangana slang and same is the case with other slangs of the state. But the history says that Telangana area is the place where authentic Telugu heritage lies. The most impressive and celebrated hertiage of Telugu people comes from Kakatiyas and Satavahanas who established, ruled and contributed to the region.

Coastal area was eclipsed by Tamil dynasties like Cholas and Pandyas (with a brief respite from Chalukyas) and Rayalaseema area was ruled by an able Sri Krishnadevarayalu (a kannadiga). So it goes without saying that Telugu history is synonymous to Telangana history.

Rivers, industries, revenues, heritage - Telangana has been the cradle of Telugu civilization which has been utilized by some and exploited by some for the development of Andhra Pradesh state. But the very host area became a victim of its own benevolence. Probably Telangana is the only area in India which flourished before independence and suffered after independence :)

Solution:

Telangana supporters must understand that bifurcation can never be a solution to the under-development. After separation, Adilabad might be under developed than Hyderabad or Warangal. or Old City might be under developed compared to Banjara Hills. We can't start another movement for every sub-region. Can we ?

Samaikhyandhra supporters must understand that "being united" is about having mutual trust and respect. One can't humiliate Telangana slang, culture, roots and then protest for unity. Lack of trust due to this humiliation and indifference is the root cause for the whole issue, not under-development or other reasons.

Travel Diaries 2 - Reminiscing Hawaii

Warning: This is a really long post in which I have tried to squeeze in all beautiful memories of our vacation to Hawaii in Dec 2010 – Jan 2011. Please go ahead only if you are interested or else you will be bored to death: D

At 8:30 pm on Dec 27, 2010 we landed in Hawaii, a place somewhere in central Pacific Ocean between USA, Japan and Australia. Fresh from the memories of Banff and Jasper, we didn’t have many expectations on Hawaii as we know no place could ever be as beautiful as Banff. And as expected Hawaii is not as stunning as Banff, Lake Louise or Athabasca but there is certain trademark bohemian spirit, lovable crowd, rich canvas which took us into its arms and made us feel at home and at heaven.

The 7 day trip to Hawaii Islands has been a once in a lifetime event which made us so refreshing, recharged, happy and strong that we discovered ourselves and redefined our parameters of bliss and happiness. And I’m glad that my wife’s birthday was celebrated in such an ambience.

Hawaii is an archipelago of 8 islands and there is something for everybody to relish in their vacation. Scenic beauty, natural wonders, sports and adventurous activities, cosmopolitan urban culture, native vernacular spirit, vibrant crowd, multitude cuisines, various climatic zones and more. We were fortunate to witness all of these in a span of 7 days without making it hectic or over-burdening ourselves.

Out of 8 islands, we chose to travel across 3 islands which were completely different from each other.

Oahu – The island with activity; dynamic and oozing energy. We spent most of our time here. This is a paradise for all those who want water sports, adventures, extreme sports, parties, activity and vibrant atmosphere Our first brush with jetskiing and snorkelling happened here.

Jetskiing is not very easy especially for non-swimmers like me who get anxious when the guide warns before hand that there is an ample chance of falling in the waters of pacific :O ..Agreed that a lifejacket is given but grrrrr…..with this premonition I went into the waters and to my misfortune the waves were high enough to scare me off. But after some 20 minutes, I handed over the handle to my wifey who could’ve saved herself even if she capsized the jet ski J. But the experience itself was awesome.

Parasailing on pacific waters was again a different experience not as anxious though. Having tried paragliding and river crossing earlier in Manali (India), this was no different, except we get drenched by the waters amidst the activity.

Snorkelling was splendid. I can’t swim, but the renter handed me over a couple of fins, snorkel gear and asked me to jump into the ocean. They strictly instructed not to walk in the waters as that might harm fish, aquatic life and coral reef. So we only have to swim and I don’t know swimming. WTF @$% (this is what I exactly exclaimed) but I wanted to do it so badly after knowing the worldwide fame of Hanauma Bay Snorkelling.

First challenge was to put the face inside water and breathe through the snorkel gear which was tougher than jetskiing :D. After practising that for a while, I started swimming with fins and holding my wife’s hand tightly. I guess fins helped me a lot. The moment I saw schools of colorful fish in the ocean, I abruptly picked up swimming and left my wife wondering where I was. Ended up deep into the ocean where the seabed was far beneath me.

But that moment was not scary as some kind of over confidence crept in and I swam across safely to the shore. That was my hurrah moment. A huge accomplishment, eh !

Another day we went along for hiking through dense forest. It was a two hour trek through the woods before we ended up before a refreshing waterfall. Our shoes went out of shape and color after the trek :D

Every evening was the time to take a stroll on the most popular street of Honolulu city, the Waikiki beach walk, a colourful street with street side performances, hangouts, restaurants, tourist spots and a galaxy of the world’s most popular brands like Louis Vuitton, Versace, Rolex, Prada, BVLgari, CD, Chanel, BCBG and likes. Steering my wife (and also myself) across those stores without temptation was another hurrah moment as a step into any of those stores would’ve made a serious dent on my wallet.

We have tried atleast 10 different cuisines during our stay in Oahu, but our trials to hunt Indian restaurant went in vain as understandably there were no south Asians visible in our whole trip.

We celebrated Ammadu’s birthday here as we wanted that kind of celebration environment around us and trust me, the ambience was way way vibrant than Las vegas strip (where we spent last new year’s eve). People were ecstatic and filled with energy. The night didn’t find a respite from fireworks, music, dance, parties, noise and fun. I tried to manage a small ice cream cake with “ammadu happy budday” written on it. The baker was kind enough to oblige me.

Before the clock struck 12, we went for a stroll, got amused by the crowds, their tantrums and antics, settled in the beach, witnessed a times-square ball drop drama enacted and fireworks which put Independence Day Washington DC fireworks, Niagara or Disney fireworks to shame. Later back home, she’d cut the cake and we spent some time in the ocean facing balcony and danced to the loud music from the bar and grill below. We had so much time for ourselves that we fell in love with each other all over again J I could see happiness on her face and that was the vacation objective all about. Another hurrah moment J

On her birthday, we rented a coupe and drove along the pacific coast for 4 hours. The weather was on a hotter side, but no complaints, we went from freezing Toronto J. The next day we rented mopeds (scooty) and rode till our nostalgia of riding bikes back home waned away.

Big Island: This is the biggest island among the 8 islands and is the land of natural wonders. We flew to this island from Honolulu. This island is a home for volcanoes, lava tubes, black sand beaches, green sand beaches, deserts, rain forests, snow clad mountains, waterfalls, arid lands. We saw everything except green sand beach as it would have taken a lot more time to reach the place, but regret not going there now. We deliberately skipped snow capped peaks as we are already sick of such places: D

The most amazing place was the black sand beach. I never ever heard about this earlier. When initially heard, thought it would be some black soil which we often use for gardening. But that was black SANDDDDDD…holy smokeee…I could not believe my eyes. We were awestruck. The black color is given by the flowing lava which got hardened at the coast. Waking on the smooth hardened lava was something I never imagined I would do.

We walked into a lava tube, a cylindrical tube / tunnel created under the volcanic mountain when lava flowed earlier. Such an incredible experience it was. Then was the time to reach the active volcano. Though we didn’t witness live flowing red hot lava, we saw fuming volcano which was emitting clouds of sulphur dioxide and also steam vents which were oozing out steam, heat and smoke. I only read and saw this phenomenon on television but never thought I would stand beside that. This was as good as standing on a glacier in Jasper National Park.

We would have missed a lot if we didn’t travel to this island.

Maui: This is another island which is a traditional scenic area, just as we understand, expect and perceive what natural beauty is. The island can be called a visual epic for its eye-popping beauty.

We drove in bus to the highest peak of the island called Halaeaka which is a dormant volcano with its peak staying as high as 10,000 ft plus. But more than this height is under the sea. So, technically the whole height could be around that of Mt.Everest. The greenery and vegetation gradually diminishes as we ascend the mountain and on the top, there is no vegetation at all, thanks to very low oxygen levels. If we run or pant, we are out of oxygen. And when we stand at the summit, we could see clouds way below us, just like when we see from a flight.

Then we traveled to Iao valley which is a definition of a conservative beauty of the Mother Nature. Springs, beautiful mountains around, valley in the cradle; After this we went to a beach and basked ourselves in the relieving tides.

During the whole vacation, apart from the places we’ve been to, something which attracted us the most is the love and care the natives and Hawaiian residents bestow upon the tourists. They know their lives are dependent on tourism and they do everything to make visitors happy and at the same time, they never compromise with their own roots and culture. They project their culture which they are proud of and want the visitors to taste their hospitality and heritage. This was endearing.

Politically, Hawaii belongs to USA but apart from roads and sign boards, I didn’t see anything American - be it the people, culture, attitude, spirit. It’s more of an Asian and Polynesian spirit that we could see there.

Words I would remember forever are

ALOHA – means hello, bye and love you. They regard this word a lot and attach everything good, soothing and nostalgic to ALOHA.

MAHALO: Thank You

HANG LOOSE: Their version of “Chill”

The beauty of Hawaii, the place; love of Hawaiians is something I can never forget in my life.

The whole trip has been captured in the form of video and image collage by Hema and can be accessed by those in her or my facebook friends list or their friends at http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=144367478949665&saved

I have uploaded few pics in my facebook travelogue album which can be accessed at http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=496016489053&set=a.379957089053.158000.516769053

ALOHA

Travel Diaries 1 - Journey from Las Vegas to Hawaii

An account of various journeys and trips we traveled in 2010:

December 2009 - January 2010: California / Vegas Trip

Memorable trip with parents, sister, bro-in-law and a 2-month niece

• Los Angeles - Malibu Beach, Malibu Temple, Pacific Coast Highway, Kodak theater & Hollywood Boulevard, LA Live were fabulous. Universal studios was good and so was Disneyland.
• San Francisco - A very very unique city completely different from the rest of US. Cable cars, hilly roads are its USP. Golden Gate Bridge view from Bay beach was a view to die for. Crooked street was fun. Fisherman's wharf, Coit tower, Union Square were good. Spent Christmas here.
• Santa Cruz - En-route LA to SFO. Mystery house's location. Nice one
• San Diego - Sea World was good, again a different kind of city with heavy Spanish influence.
• Las Vegas - Rightly called the sin city, the city which never sleeps. So much vibrancy, lights and colors can lighten up anybody's spirits :). Casinos, live-shows, sleepless nights, huh :)) We spent our new year's eve (my wifey's birthday eve too) here.

That was our first visit to the west coast. Loved it and with family, it was a perfect gateway. We (bava and I) drove from LA to SFO (8 hours) and back, LA to San Diego (4 hours and back), LA to Vegas (3 hours and back) and the driving was fun, especially on pacific coast highway. Lot of memories, lot of enjoyment. Really nostalgic.

February 2010:

• Ashburn, Virginia: Tanya's annaprasana ceremony beckoned us to sister's place at Ashburn. Fun time with family again.

March 2010:

• Washington DC: Parents Canadian visa appointment, interview and approval. Celebration time in the capital city of US. Though a small city, its a unique blend of grandeur and simplicity. Capitol building was worth seeing once. Smithsonian museums, white house, monument, memorials were good too.

April 2010

• Pittsburgh: visited the famous SV Temple or chinna Tirupati en-route to Toronto while bringing parents from sister's house. one of the biggest and nicest temples of the continent. Similar one is in Malibu, LA.
• Niagara Falls (US view): Though we have lost our count of visits to Niagara, this was the first time from American side. Not as bad as I expected, but Canadian view is far better. 
• Toronto: A one day trip of important areas in Toronto City with parents - The downtown, CN Tower, City Hall, YD square, Swaminarayan Temple so-on and so forth.

May 2010:

• African Lion Safari, Hamilton: Supposedly the best safari of North America. Visited once before with cousin Preetham and Saroja. This time with parents. It was a sunny day and could experience the majesty of lion and cheetah from a foot distance. Ostrich, bison, deer - none of the hosts thought twice to stop our vehicle. Visiting casino later the day was an icing on the cake.
• Niagara Falls (Canadian view): Now from the Canadian side. Journey behind the falls captivated parents. My mom says this is and will be the best siteseeing spot anybody can ever see :)
• Ottawa: My in-laws joined to make the family gathering bigger and merrier. All of us visited Ottawa, the capital city of Canada. Parliament hill was as usual majestic and so were other parks we visited.
• Wasaga beach: Sunny day at the beach two hours north of Toronto

June 2010:

• African Lion Safari, Hamilton this time with in-laws.

July 2010:

• New Market: To a raspberry picking farms. Had fun picking raspberries, blueberries in rain.
• Toronto city trip, this time with in-laws

August 2010:

• Saugeen Country / Grey county: An yearly trip with our group of friends in Mississauga (Canada kutumbam) to Saugeen. 3 days - 30 members in a cottage, beaches, water sports, waterfalls, campfires, kayaking, canoeing, fun and frolic. Memorable !!! Already waiting for 2011 summer camping with CK.
• Virginia Beach: 2 day trip to Virginia beach along with sister, bro-in-law and niece. BEST TRIP TILL THEN, period ! 37 km Chesapeake Bay Bridge - Tunnel is a made man wonder and a drive on that was mind blowing. Later, an ocean front hotel suite with Jacuzzi and all ultra star amenities was a spoiling luxury. Strolling on the beach after midnight, drenching in Atlantic waters during the day was the routine of the day (or two).

September 2010:

• Toronto: Casaloma palace, Center Island and AR Rahman live-show.

October 2010: Alberta Trip

Another memorable trip with in-laws

• Calgary: Small but beautiful city, vibrant downtown, Calgary tower, museum and urban island park were nice.
• Drumheller: A surprise addition to the itinerary, thanks to my friend's suggestion. Completely worthy. Mushroom hoodie style hillocks, grand canyon modeled canyons, authentic dinosaur museum, river. Would have missed something if missed visiting this place.
• Edmonton: Much bigger than I expected. Vibrant downtown, WC square, largest shopping mall in North America. Good enough.
• Banff: I forget words, just thinking about the beauty the nature has bestowed upon this area. I don't think I can see a more beautiful place in my lifetime or rather I'm not sure if there is one in this whole world. Snow-clad mountains, green water lakes, lush pine blankets, a perfect treat to eyes, senses and heart. Lake Louise is by far the best location that world can ever witness. Moraine Lake is not far behind. Rope-way to the top of sulphur mountain gives a panoramic view.
• Jasper: If we missed this, I would not have forgiven myself for the entire life. This is a gateway to Athabasca glacier, the sheet of ice which is as thick as the height of Eiffel tower and which is a source of rivers draining into pacific, atlantic, arctic oceans. We traveled on this sheet of ice on a rugged snow-coach. The very feeling of standing on a glacier was overwhelming and incredible.

November 2010:

• Visited sister's place at Ashburn again for thanksgiving day weekend, but preferred to stay back at home.

December 2010:

• Blue Mountains ski resort: Karthik, my cousin visited us from NYC in peak winter and what else could be the right winter tourist spot. First visited Wasaga beach, which was then clad with snow. We danced and had fun on the snow beach and then reached the ski resort. The snow shoes we were given were heavier than us and we were novices to skiing. We slipped, tripped,struck,fell like there is nothing else to do but later picked up the techniques and had fun skiing. My second time after my brush with ski blades in Manali 3 years ago.
• Niagara-on-the-lake: For the first time, visited the place where Niagara river joins Lake Ontario. Later visited Niagara Falls.
• Toronto city: this time with Karthik

Holidays 2010 - New Years Eve, 2011

• Hawaii: This time for my wife's birthday (Jan 01), we planned to be in a dreamland called Hawaii, somewhere near nowhere. Pacific waters, beautiful islands, active volcanoes and lava fields, outdoor events and water sports like bungee jumping, snorkeling, scuba diving, jet skiing, parasailing, local new year's party (which I can never pronounce or spell, just like local area names) are awaiting us.
• Ammadu's birthday: This has always been special for us as the whole world celebrates along with us.I try to make it as special as possible, but I can never give surprise gifts like she does to me.  She holds a record of celebrating her birthday in different cities in the last 6 years. So I try to take her to the most exotic places as possible.

• 2006 - Seoul, Korea

• 2007 - Bangalore, India

• 2008 - Toronto, Canada

• 2009 - Hyderabad, India

• 2010 - Las Vegas, USA

• 2011 - Hawaii, USA

Lets hope our Hawaii trip will be as eventful and memorable as other trips were. Will post our pics in Travelogue album of my Facebook account. All the trips I mentioned in this post are captured in form of pics in this album:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?id=516769053&aid=158000

I'm not Straightbackward !

One of the most commonly used phrases "Let me be straightforward, ....." means there is something really unpleasant coming your way :) "Being Straightforward" is one of the most abused concepts in modern days !

Being straightforward is actually a behavior which makes others understand what we are without much difficulty. Its being honest, upright, good natured with no scheming or hypocrisy. Its all about portraying our own image but not commenting or judging others as popularly perceived.

But today it has become synonymous to being blunt, impolite and coarse to degrade others to feel superior or most of the times to conceal their own inferiority complex or to feel good (sadistic pleasure). Thats actually being "straightbackward" because if you are pointing out others' inabilities, negative situations or inherent inefficiencies by passing blunt remarks, where not necessary, its far from being frank as this kind of "frankness" might most probably break somebody's heart or possibly strain relations too while you bask in your own false glory.

Honest negative comments would only help a case where some kind of constructive criticism is needed to improve the situation or performance of the person at the receiving end. Though you are not completely impressed with something / somebody, a word of positivity will always bring out a smile and a ray of hope in others. Its hypocrisy or backbiting only when you laugh at the situation before someone else.

So, if you ever are brutally honest in passing a negative comment at somebody which would not improve him/her, understand that you are being straightbackward and it shows your urge to humiliate others and take pride or solace in it. AND THIS IS A SERIOUS MENTAL DISORDER.