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Sunday, April 19, 2009

Twitter : tweet to tomorrow

When this millenium started we were guaranteed of one thing 'stronger ties'. Here neither it means the tie (that usually hits our brains) among countries and their co-operation nor the tie which we wear to office. But the ties amongst your family and friends. Of all the pleasures in life the one i personally value the most is ineraction among our loved ones. Science and technology has matured itself for easy access to my dear ones. Phone, mail booms, chat engines, social networking sites like orkut/facebook are all doing their part beautifully.

I know a friend of mine married and happy but career and job profile wanted them to be away for a small period. For ragesh and minu skype is the best invention of this century, i have personally felt the amount of time they spent and found it quite fascinating. Reminded me of my mom's story when my father was posted to Assam , he was not in a position to take her along. So writing letters and that to in my dads case once in a bluemoon was like her biggest relief. She used to read the same letter 'n' number of times, very sweet huh? Think of it now, we are blessed with advancement in technology. My room mate brenesh speaks to his mom for hours daily, most of the time she knows whats cooking in our kitchen :)

Yesterday i digged into one other pettern of web-logging its called TWITTER. Basically we give short updates on ourselves into web. Something like a log in terms of a software engineer. For a person with a very mechanical life twitter makes you understand "what the fuck?? You need a change man!!" if i extrapolate my tweets it will look like this :"wakeup, breakfast, office, lunch, tea breaks, gym, dinner, sleep ". Its like you need to open your horizons, pickup a hobby or something learn new stuffs etc etc. You can integrate your mobile to your twitter and keep tweeting.
As they say in twitter.com life happens between mails and blog posts how about logging that too (sounds like a web-hijack).

So i found my answer the most redundant question of our times. If someone asks me "Hey waasup? Howz life?". I can either answer "Oh nothing much man, Life is going on pretty much the same. All's good by Gods Grace" (typical answer huh?) or else ican give a cool and YO answer like this: "Dig this my friend http://twitter.com/ShabbuChandran ". This will tell you what i am doing right now and what i was in times i was not in touch with you or what kept me busy" Happy Tweeting my Mates...Cheers!!!

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Happy Vishu

Happy Vishu to All...
This vishu completes a hatrick of vishu's away from home. Here are some memoirs of vishu day,A vishu day when i wake up with eyes 'still' closed and first thing i see would be the 'vishukkani' arranged by mother. Amma's moist hands on my eyes covering me not to see anything but the 'vishukkani' at first. Then the best part comes up blessings form the elders and money (vishukaineettam), heavy source of pocket money during my childhood. Bursting crackers during ealry hours on a vishu day, the crackers go on till sunrise. We malayalees do not celeberate diwali so all our cracker wishes are fulfilled on vishu day. This is also the time to 'show off' or demonstrate your bravado. Bursting malapadakkam in your hand, throwing the olapadakkam at the last moment, flying skuds or rockets to your neighbours window. We do everything possible that minor burns and holed up clothes are a part and participle of every vishu.

Then ammamma's turn comes to this parade of temple visits. Our house is nearby kalpathy (south kasi as they say) where we are never short of temples. So from morning 6 in our new clothes we walk and walk through these temples. Prayer time with ammammma munching some mantra's and instructing us what, how and when to pray. As morning unveils we make trips to our aunts and uncles nearby, call up relatives on phone etc etc. Every year we(small team from our locality) play a cricket match against 'thonipaalayam team', as we grew older the betting amount increased up. Once we lost almost our entire vishukaineettam in one match and one of our team member started crying. But on the whole it was a big bargain as most of the time we won and used the money to buy new bats or football or something else.

Afternoon vishusadhya is majestic, with lots of varieties and typical malayalee style on banana leaves with 2 types of payasam. A treat for an epicure to say the least. Sometimes my mom's colleagues and their family too chip in for sadhya so the occassion becomes grander. Having said all these its not that we did not celebrate vishu here away from home. We do our share as well whether its going to temple, new dress and making semiya payasam ( as per amma's mailing instruction). But still the sanctity and joy is missed. Maybe it took me a long time to understand vishu is not about crackers, new dress, kaineettam or the sadhya for that matter. Its blessings of your elders and celebration amongst your loved ones.
Once again, Evarkkum ente hridhayam niranja Vishu Aashamsakal!!!

Friday, April 10, 2009

Story of 1.5 GYM

"yevanmaar enthinaa ee cheriya praayathil ithrayum cigarette valikkunne?"
Consider these words coming out from a naive, a bit headstrong and bold girl. I replied "enikkariyilla..athil ippo entha prashnam?". She reply's back "Avante okke kidney'um liver'um adichu pokum..athre ullu..aa vivek full time theevandi poleya eppolum aa mili storil ninnu ore valiya....koode raghu'vum undu" I could just stand there and smile and listen to her concern in the most brash way. So this was possibly a small gossip between two classmates about the ill- effects of cigarette smoking amongst their friends. The girl here is 'Sinu Padmanabhan' one of my dear friends and the guy in the discussion is Vivek Ravindran my classmate and a dear friend. So it could have easily ended there, but me being a big mouth and good for nothing turned this gossip into a wild wild story.

That evening i meet vivek and see him bragging amongst his hostelites on politics and cricket and many more, so to basically irritate him or in a way make fun of him i let him know sinu's personal views about him. And 'me being me' added some masala for the other ears listening to the whole cover story(and am pretty good at it).So after this i leave to home that evening but igniting one whole issue altogether unknowingly. Vivek and a big group (no names here) get drinking that night and feel their male ego's crushed and end up in a tirade (therivili) against sinu at her lady's hostel 'Gokulam'. The issue becomes so huge that vivek comes to me next day and says her hostel might issue a police case against him. Dude what are you saying?? i was so worried obviuosly my involvement was omnipresent but also being the first year we were a bit worried too given the history of our college.

Story didn't end there, luckily the exam season came up and there was a month break as well. Technically everything would have forgotten and forgiven after a brief hiatus, expecting this i went to college for our first exam Maths-1. I saw sinu on the hallway, she gave me one helluva look and didnt bother to smile as well. So chapter is not so closed uh? And its still burning and very much ALIVE!!! Exams are over and before classes could start there was this gimmick parent meeting by our tutors. Sounded like a formality with all students lining up with their parents like primary school days.

On the meeting day morning i come with amma to college and i introduce some of my friends and meet up with their parents its all good and friendly environment. Unnikuttan comes to me and says " nee sinuvinte chettane kanduo?" . I asked "enthu?". Unnikuttan in his prem naseer voice starts elobarating "eda oru 6-6.5 adi pokkam, urukku polathe shareeram, kai ennokke paranjaal nammude kaalinte thadi, mukathu kadannal kuthiya pole bhaavam. churukki paranjaal oru onnu onnara gym". Unnikuttan is a master in telling stories and like a thespian his expressions match his tone as well with ease no wonder he is called 'BBC'. He continues "nammude okke kaaryam pokka, especially ninteyum vivek'inteyum" .Sacchi i was a bit worried but knowing unnikuttan i ignored and said to him "poda nammude colleg'il vannu nammale aaru thallan? nee pedikkenda" somehow i knew i was giving him false hopes :) . As we finish saying this i see vivek coming to us and he asks "Sinuvinte Ettan'e kandaa?". Suddenly unnikuttan "aah kandu..nee kandaa?". Vivek said "Mone orumaathiri gym..ente kai odiyum ennu urappaayi". "lagaan'ile otta kayyan spin bowler'e pole aavum njan". Probably this worried me and made me a bit tensed as well, before coming to meeting my tension was when amma finds out i was under-sessional for 6 subjects but now all my worries were conglomerated to sinu and her 1.5 brother(cheeky). As i was guiding amma to the meeting room i see one big fella with blue jean and white t-shirt walking towards us with sinu. I am 6 foot and about 82 kg's in first year so when i call him big fella you can imagine 'he is REAL big'. And sinu she wore a proud grimace on her face totally understandable if you have a giant (metaphorically) on your arms.

Days went on me and sinu became good friends and still are (until she reads this blog), and sinu and vivek are engaged now (had to happen rite?) to be married soon, and her brother 'binu' he is in the indian army (right person for right job) and is no where near the person unnikuttan explained to us. From sinu and litty i have heard a lot of pushings about their brother binu's unconditional love and affection but still somehow that initial image of a 'giant' and an annexed fear lingers some where in our deepest thoughts.
"Vivek'e ninte kaaryam pokka ninte aliyan is an 'onnu-onnara gym' " was one of our punch dialogues to him earlier and still. Last week i was speaking to sinu, she was speaking about binu and he got engaged and all other stories....may be that evoked me to write all this.
Thought would be a wonderful story addition in my blog about a person whom i have never met in real life ;) . Call it FEAR FACTOR eh!!!