Rusticating Part I

      As I mentioned earlier, my desire to decipher the experience on vacation to Madurai made to write this post. Since I am from a domestic project, I was fortunate enough to get a long vacation of two weeks. As I landed, I felt the conducive vicinity around me in forms of  language spoken and people’s faces which I am missing for the last couple of years. Simply you could describe it as the summit of nostalgia. Life in Mumbai gave me the opportunity to witness the mammoth infrastructure in terms of roads, apartments, railways, water supply etc. I wondered "We were staying in such a small city !!" as I headed toward my home at Annanagar. Roads were pretty narrow with negligible traffic, which obviates the need for its wideness. From the station, I travelled to home by the so called "City bus", which I would never like to miss whenever I go to my home town. Mumbai-life at the back of my mind and Madurai-life in front of my eyes drag my mind to a comparison between the city I love and the city I live now.

     Though detailed plan of rustication had not been made, I had a rough to-do list like meeting friends; discussing with professors ; meeting relatives and of course to eat the delicious meal prepared by mom at home.

     Metro-cities like Mumbai have strong affinity towards the western life, where things like  personal life, opinion & desire, financial security, job satisfaction are having ultra high priority. For getting these, people are ready to compromise anything and they rationalize their act in the name of “growth”. Recently I read, in In Spite of Gods , that only the society, which urbanize rapidly will be able to grow constantly by providing jobs to all common people. But the recent economic melt down defy this. Even a small crisis on any one of the industry or business sector in the global village creates its amplified repercussion on all possible business and industry there by affecting all class of people. Though we cannot deny the fact that urbanization fueled to exponential growth, equally we should accept that urbanization has increased the vulnerability of our economy for external factors( i.e a business carried out across the boundaries). I am going off the topic.. right?. So the point is, urbanization is good  for an extent, but madly following the same  would jeopardize our financial stability at times of economic crisis like “Credit Crunch”. Personally I feel, we need to encourage more variety of industry or business as we have to achieve heterogeneity in our business. Amuck westernization would be a barrier for creating a heterogeneity in our business.

      After spending couple of days in home I had visited our college for meeting the professors. I was able to visualize some changes in the college, which was on its way to lose the reputation it had. The “university issue” had already segregated the stake holders of the college into group of islands. I felt a sense of insecurity prevailing among the college staffs when I had interacted with them. Our college needs better infrastructure, high profile professors, better course work and all these could be possibly achieved through funds. Perhaps this could be the  reason why the agenda of “ The university creation” has been put forth by the management. But you know, there are always two sides for a coin. As an alumni I want a fair decision to be taken by considering all the possible inputs and analyzing all possible pros and cons.

      As a part of the vacation I had travelled towns, villages and cities to meet uncles, aunts cousin brothers, cousin sisters, nephews etc. Really nice to be a part of a big family, huh ! I had wonderful time meeting  school and college friends especially Vignesh, Reuben, Sathya and Arun (Muthu and Pras were missing). I still remember those penultimate days of our semester exams, when we (me Pras and Reuben) mock at each other in the name of “Preparing for exams”. Amid the vacation, a new fragrance of thoughts on society, culture, economy and politics blossom in my mind. It was quite peculiar compared to thought history dominated by electronics and computers. With all these memories  I was getting ready to catch the train towards Mumbai.

On My Way To Rusticate

    Everything was set for my trip to Madurai after a long gap of six months. As planned Gary and I went half hour early to catch Madurai Express, which was about to depart from Lokmanya Tilak Terminus(LTT). My past experience with second class sleeper has provoked me to go for three tire AC car. As we were trying to settle by finding place for our luggage  and in search of some amicable co-travelers, we met Maheshwaran, a voluble, outspoken and a typical tamilian. Knowing the fact that a ticket cancelled by us in penultimate day of our journey enabled him to get his ticket confirmed had made us good friends. Mahesh introduced him as a Deputy Engineer from Essar, a premier oil refinery in India. I thought his fluency in Hindi might be a reward for his outspoken nature and amount of time he might have spent in north India. We were accompanied by a Marathi family, who were embarking a tour to south Indian cities like Kodaikanal, Madurai and Kanyakumari.

    I was amazed by Mahesh’s ability to gel easily with strangers. But his wit fullness in cracking joke might made it possible. Eventually he had made the long journey easy by giving us a good company and explaining the concepts involved in process of oil formation from fossils. He went on explaining structure of tectonic plates  and how it helps in trapping oil in between the layers of earth. We exchanged common problems, prides and gossips that all south Indians come across after being migrated to northern part of our country. It gave me a sense of relief after sharing my thoughts in my mother tongue on topics varying from Raj Thackeray to world Economic crisis. Our discussion was intensively thoughtful when we talked about different cultures prevailing in Mumbai and different languages we learned in our journey from home and interesting similarities among them. Our synchronized frequency of thoughts had created a good chemistry between us, which made our journey an enjoyable one. Mahesh’s desperation to help the  Marathi family in making them understand the fact that Dindigul is near to Kodaikanal than Madurai and arranging a cab for travelling from Dindigul to Kodaikanal was really remarkable. He finally signed-off with a smile at Trichy station, where he was picked by his brother.

    Our compartment was almost empty after Dindigul, after which we met a person who was in his early 50’s. He introduced himself as a railway employee from Andhra Pradesh and he was going to meet his son, who was working in Honeywell Madurai located at the campus of our college.  Within a couple of minutes after our introduction he enquired about my package and started comparing his son’s package.  Somehow I had managed not to show my embarrassment. But his knowledge on current affairs has amused me to continue our conversation. He was worried about Biharis dominance in Southern Railways and concerned about people who are getting railway jobs with mere political support and less technical knowledge or merit. We discussed about steps Mr.Lalu had taken to improve Indian railway as a profit yielding organization and in the conversation I understood the fact that 70% of revenue for Indian railways comes from goods train. Besides he expressed his dream of making his son an IAS officer. Especially People from Andhra have lot of passion for civil service; without which guys like Charan won’t quit a high-paying job for preparing for Indian civil service entrance exam.

    I reached Madurai exactly after 36 hours of boarding from Mumbai. It was exciting to see my people and city again. This time my stay in Madurai provoked  thoughts on my society, economy and culture. Hopefully I will pen those thoughts in near future.

Sourav – A Determined Leader !!

After twelve years of international cricket, Sourav Ganguly, a flamboyant left handed opener from Kolkata has called “Its day”, before the hyped four-match test series against the Oz. Sourav, who has been known for his ability to pierce the offside field and timing the ball with perfection will be playing his last four match against Australia in the next 30 days. As a captain he has taken the Indian team from “bunch of lazy batsmen” to a “rich blend of talented youths”. As a rhetoric leader he has been respected in the team as a captain and a senior player. By taking India to the 2003 World cup final and remarkable Test Series victories outside sub-continent, arguably he is the best captain India has ever produced. Yesterday once again he set standard by announcing his retirement from cricket for giving way to the young talents in the country.

Sourav was predominantly a batman in earlier stages of his carrier. His ability to score runs consistently at the top of the order gave balance in batting order for the Indian team, which was suffering from lack of skilled openers in 1996 world cup in the sub-continent. Rahul once complimented Sourav as “next to God on the offside”. Geoffrey Boycott, the notorious English commentator, praised him as a “gifted timer” of the cricket ball. Sourav’s name has been appended in the list of Indian star batsmen, which was having only the name of Sachin for almost a decade. His cricketing skills enthralled crowds across the country and earned him respect and love among the sentimental Indian fans.

He got the opportunity to lead the Indian side when Sachin stepped-down as  captain after the 2000 Australian tour debacle. He had transformed himself from a player to a great leader. Sourav’s decision making; team selection and field setup were widely appreciated by commentators and cricket lovers. He has backed youngsters like Yuvraj, Kaif, Zaheer, Harbhajan and given freedom for them to perform and establish themselves as players. He lead a team with rich blend of experience and youth, which had won the historic Final in Lords against England; victories outside subcontinent; famous test victory at Leeds and first Test series win in England. He is great communicator and extracted the best out of all individuals and created history by beating Australia in their home after 35 years. He was involved in couple of controversies on and off the field, But I personally feel that he is one of  the few Indian players, who responded properly to happenings on the field like sledging.

As unanimously happening to all players of the game, Sourav also had been dropped from the team following series of poor show with the bat. In the midst of these humiliations, he had been criticized by Indian media and column writers for his incapability to play bouncers and the deliveries moving away from his bat. He responded to all the criticism by scoring consecutive hundreds in domestic tournaments and county matches, which earned him a place in the national Team when India toured South Africa by 2007. He emerged as a player of the series and sent a strong message to the world that, he was still determined to play cricket with passion. I was really impressed by the comeback from the “prince of Kolkata”. In a post match presentation he said “ It’s all about guts and determination, ” when someone asked about his comeback.

Sourav has been a role model for lot of young emerging players from India. His knowledge and passion for the game is still a valuable resource that BCCI can exploit for betterment of cricket in India. With hefty experience of international cricket, Sourav still has a lot with him to deliver to Indian cricket.

Quick Fix in a Blog

While writing a blog on Flash tennis, I have embedded the flash tennis game in my blog. I was happy to present this to my readers, but I forgot the fact that this flash file was having an audio playing in the background. So, whenever someone open the site, flash will be loaded and and eventually they will get the sound produced by the flash file. Reader opening my blog from a silent place may get annoyed by the unexpected loud noise. Shankar, one of my friend had experienced this, when he casually opened my pages when he was in a library. I understood the problem when he conveyed the message to me, and the same instigate me to provide an immediate fix for this bug in my writing. Here is the fix,

• Download the html code from this Link.
• Open a notepad.
• Paste this code and save the file with HTML extension
• Open the file with a browser you will get the flash tennis.

I have removed the attached flash from my old blog. Shankar’s advice at right time will help me to avoid my readers getting annoyed.

An Adorable Essay !!

Forwarding mails has become a hobby for some of my friends. Forwarded mail contents are like scintillating series of picture; creating awareness about health; urgent requirement of help; mockery which could be analogous to any recent movie; a wired picture; some time puzzles. Recently I got an interesting mail having an essay written by an IAS exam candidate, It was really a scintillating and gibberish transliteration from his mother-tongue to English. I took sometime for me and Sunil to control our laughing. I am presenting the same to you guys.

Even I am taking efforts to improve my vocabulary for giving my GRE. Who knows ? my analytical writing may be as gibberish as this one to my GRE readers.

Jubilant Federer !!

“I am jubilant, because Federer is jubilant”, these were the words I was murmuring when Federer made a remarkable come back by winning the US open 2008. He has taken his game to a new level of perfection and controlled aggression. After failed to prove his class in the Australian open; out lashed by Nadal in the French Open and unlucky in the epic final at the Wimbledon, Federer also lost his regime of number one spot in ATP tennis ranking after almost four and half years. Because of shear excellence and class he has dominated world tennis for consecutive four years which made media to bestow him the best player ever to play the game.The same media started speculating about the thirteen-time grand slam champion’s down fall so early. Once his unusual calm and uncommon lack of visible frustration has been praised by media and same set of crazy people in the recent past remarked his game as “lack of self-confidence”. But he has given answer to all the question in an unanimous way by winning the US open for the fifth time at Flushing Meadows.

                              

Federer with fifth (consecutive) US Open Trophy

Andy Murray one of strong forehanded emerging player from Scotland was finding difficult to match the 16 time grand slam finalist from Switzerland. Federer started this US Open with average wins, as he progressed further he got his serves stronger and returns accurate. I was able to feel difference in his performance in semifinal against Djokovic. Federer was able to convert all his breakpoint successfully into winners. In the post semifinal press meeting he was asked on, whom would he prefer in the final among Nadal and Murray. He said “I would prefer the trophy”, which showed his desperation to win a grand slam this year. Being a top player for consecutive 230 odd weeks you can't think of an year without any Grand title.

Nadal was lacking his usual agility and endurance in hard court this year. Even though, he won French and Wimbledon he lost in all hard-court tournaments this year. He failed to produce his trademark cross-court return, which earned him vital points in crucial stages of games he played in the past. Murray was too good to beat Nadal in the semis and ready to face Federer in the Final of US open 2008.

Rejuvenated Roger was completely back at his best in final against Murray. He swept opening set by 6 games to 2. Federer game used to be dominated by aces, but contrastingly in the finals he produced only 3 aces but he displayed all-round game by converting 70% of his break point to winners; 70% success by volleying at the nets. He thrust to a 5-0 lead in the final set by breaking the Scot thrice. He was at the peak of his form in the final set producing some unbelievable baseline shots. Finally he won convincingly 6-2, 7-5, 6-2 to become the first man to win US open five times in a row. "It definitely feels great," said Federer afterwards. "This is a very special moment in my career,” he added.

He is one title away from Pete Sampras record of 14 grand slam title. "I'm not going to stop at 13 - that would be terrible!” he said in the after match presentation. Murray said "I had a great tournament but I came up against, in my opinion, the best player ever to play the game today".

Federer would have felt lot better after winning US Open. "I think the French Open loss was brutal, but I got over that one pretty easily, played great on the grass and had a really tough loss at Wimbledon which - you know, I was proud to be part of such a great match, but at the same time it just sort of made me sad not having won that great epic match,” he shared.

Finally he revealed the fact that he was annoyed by media’s comment on his form and performance over the last year. "I mean, I'm a bit disappointed. Sometimes to a point a bit annoyed, because all sorts of crazy people started writing me and trying to reach me, telling me I need some help either mentally or physically. "You're laughing but it's the way it goes. People come out of the closet and think they can start helping me now. It's just a pain.

"For me, this sort of puts them to rest a little bit, and calms down the phones at my parents' a little bit, which I'm happy about”. Federer shines away from the press meet.

Google Chrome is Phenomenal

One more milestone in Google's history when they have launched the impeccable browser Chrome. I read about Chrome in Times of India yesterday, and I was furious to see how it looks and works. Today as I walked into the office, the first thing I did was download and install the browser Chrome. I feel Chrome resembles Picasa (web album by Google) in look and feel. It opens as fast as a notepad and the interface is also as simple as notepad. Apparently it seems it will beat Opera in speed and response. Importantly it does not have any array of menus or heavy tool bars.
It looks very gentle and light with a simple address bar and tab bar. Controls which are currently active in the browser are automatically highlighted with saffron color, which helps people who predominantly use keyboard rather than mouse. All the menu and options are embedded on the right side of your browser as a drop down menu. It makes your browser spacious to display content of the site your are surfing. Menus are grouped in to two main categories like Control menus and Customize menus.

Snap of Google Chrome

Control menu  & Customize Menu                                                          

Its left to you to exercise the functions of each menu shown above. Chrome is using the Internet setting of MSIE. Options menu will take you to the proxy setting of IE browser.

Incognito Window

Google does not fail to enthrall people with unique features. It has an option called "incognito window", which will not store the browsing history and they won't leave other traces, like cookies

For Developers
      The highlight of the browser for web developers is the developer menu, which allows us to debug the java script of the site we are browsing. Chrome has also provided a console for Javascript and it will help us in checking the Javascript and the Stylesheet (CSS) used in the page. Google has incorporated all the functionality of web-developer plugins provided by firefox inside its browser itself.
Task manager

Chrome handles every tab as a different operating system process, which helps in handling the unresponsive windows separately. It also encapsulate the functionality of one tab from other. So if any tab hangs because of some issue, it won't affect the other tabs performance and evidently allow us to kill it by leaving the others untouched. Chrome also provides a separate task manager for the browser for killing the "not responding" tabs. Task Manager provides you same valuable details like memory consumption and CPU. One step further we can drill memory statistics of the tabs in your browser up to its process nerds.

If you click the stats for nerds in your task manager, it will show you the panoramic details of each process like

• Process id
  
• Virtual Memory
  
• Physical Memory
  
• Private and shared split up of each memory.

Stats For Nerds

Chrome is simply a heap of ingenious functionality with unbelievable speed. Its awesome, isn't it?