Concerts

Couple of big concerts happening here next month. Megadeth and Black Sabbath are in town around mid october on consecutive nights.Wow..last time i went was when Slayer was here, and even though i had never heard them it was a fun night. With these two, at least i know some of there song, so hoping to be rocked

The Wonder Years

Well i was watching a "The Wonder Years" episode where Coach Cutlip teaches his students about sex education. That got me wondering about the time when we were taught about reproduction and stuff.

It happened in class 8th. I remember the first day in the new session, all the guys were discussing pg 99 of our biology text book. I knew i wasn't alone in skimming thought it during the summer holidays. Well part of the excitement lay in knowing if the girls had also read about the male reproductive system as we had read about the female ones. Of course, till then we were made to sit besides a girl so that each bench had a boy and a girl each. For some reason, this practice was discontinued from that year.

The teacher assigned to us was Mrs Banerjee. A short, bespectacled lady. Very soon we knew that sitting in her class meant keeping absolutely mum and having a straight face. A slight curve or a small noise would make her very angry and she would leave the class without even completing the chapter. We did not want that to happen as we progressed to reach the chapter we all had been waiting for since school began.

In the end it was a bit anti climatic, she taught the chapter as a newsreader trying to finish the broadcast in 30 mins yet covering everything. No one asked any cheeky questions and girls did not giggle among themselves.

We boys however certainly did discuss about the in's and outs of the female form all through that session.

Sometimes, i wonder if the girls too discussed about sex during that year. I think they did, because when the class got over, a girl came over to my friend and asked if she had spelled a word correctly( now i don't recall the word, but i am sure it was related to the male anatomy). As she went towards her friends i could catch a hint of smile on her face. A smile to her friends as if to say look, i did it.

That year there were many first. This was just one of them. It was also the year that i enjoyed the school the most.

BACK

Got back yesterday after a week back at home. Feeling a little less frustrated and a lot more relaxed now. I guess a week away every 3-4 months is just the right tonic to make u feel fresh.

I picked up "THE KITE RUNNER" at airport since i forgot to carry the book that i was reading.

Although, still not through with it, it is interesting to me because it feels like a typical 70's Hindi movie, mixed with friendship, betrayal, dirty secrets, lost brothers, redemption, love, and action. Let's see how it ends, though i am pretty sure it would be a happy one.

Bourne Ultimatum

Watched Bourne Ultimatum yesterday. The trend of good action movies this summer continues with this one. Nice watch for all..

Bourne Ultimatum

Watched Bourne Ultimatum yesterday. The trend of good action movies this summer continues with this one. Nice watch for all..

Bad Throat8

Last week was bad. Throat infection made life tough and had to visit the doctor again. Nothing much happening though planning to see Bourne Ultimatum today. Heard it's really good.

Same to Same

It's been raining most of the time here. Weekend was spent in office, although instead of finishing up work i just read newspapers and while surfing the web got registered on EBay.

Work is the usuall, nothing to wake up in the morning and get excited about

Simpsons Movie

Why would you pay to see something on the big screen, when you can see it for free on your TV??

I absolutely enjoyed this one... well worth the wait. The focus is solely on Homer as he attempts to convince his family and save Springfield. I wondered if they would mess it up by trying to do too much in this one.. just like i felt Pirates 3rd part was overdone.. however they have been true to the series and not done anything too jazzy.

That's not too say that it is exactly like the TV series, the humour and jokes are much more frequent and the other characters all have very minute role. Appu doesn't even say a word while Mr Burns just has 2 line.

However, the movie is very nice and you will hear Maggie utter her first word.. S----L

Vacancy

Saw Vacancy last night. The only thing good about it was that it got over in 80mins. Now i am not a avid horror movie buff, but movies like this which don't have a story and the only chills that u get are the loud thumping noises that start and stop at there wish are certainly not my cup of tea.

Yestarday, had the house extended to stay for 5 more month. However just when i thought that the house issue was over, people have been asking me to accomodate 3 new fellows comming over in this very house. WTF....

Monkeys

Heard some more guys are comming over here soon... More monkeys who will be given peanuts to clean up the shit.

Harry Potter

Watches Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I was a little disappointed, not because the film was badly made, but rather for the fact that i found it lacking in action and frankly a little boring. Thats not to say though that it not worth a watch.

Interesting Pics

Couple of intresting pics that i took while shopping for groceries.

Angry and Confused

Absolutely pissed today.. for a variety of reasons. Got my bonus letter today and it was along the expected lines, although it did give me a shock when i saw it for the first time. Another reason is beacuse our current house lease expires on July22 and till now we haven't found a new home. Although it's not entirely our fault, there are higher powers who $#$%
#$%g^ are absolutely incompetent and don't have the decency to call a person when something happens to there mentee.Opps... i am going off track now....

Getting back...BHAI has arrived at work to further torture us mortal beings. The cap is back and so are all the things i hate about him.

Well all said.... i really don't know what to do next... Should i get mad or should i get even.

Finally a big congratulaitons to all the guys who got promoted in this cycle.

Optimus Prime...

Watched Transformers last Thursday and it turned out to be more than what i had expected. No wonder it had the highest 4 day gross ever here. The effects were out of this world and although the story is wafer thin, you won't mind that when u have robots battling out in front of you. After two and a half hours of absolute action the movie closes with Linkin Park's lates what have i done.... absolutely perfect

I never followed the comics or the animated series, but i sure have become a loyal fan after watching this one.

2 absolutely hardcore action movies after a long time... Die Hard 4.0 and Transformers.... ooh what a rush..!!

Phuket and Langkawi

Had a wonderfull time on the 4 day cruise to Phuket and Langkawi. This was my second time on a cruise and it was absolutely wonderfull. Here are some images of the trip. I would have written more but i am very tired now and almost slumping.

Movies - Apne & Die Hard

Well not quite felling well the whole of last week. Had fever for couple of days and then after that had an upset tummy. In fact as of this moment the tummy is still rumbling.

However, i did catch garam dharam's Apne yesterday. Actually, was trying to get tickets to Transformers... but looks like it has transformed every single human being here in to movie going, popcorn eating, cab calling ... human beings. When we went there at 5:30 all the shows till 12:30 at midnight were sold out. Today when we went at 3:30 pm all the shows till 11:30 pm were sold out.Phew... Well anyways after that decided to watch Apne. Total of 20ish people in the hall... Dharam paaji's slurred speech.. sunny bhaiya's hairy chest and many lines of cheesy dialogues made for a not too bad movies experience which kept all 4 of us entertained till very late into the night.

Saw Die Hard 4.0 today. Total thrill ride which reminded me of the old action movies like True Lies and the very first Die Hard. Very super action and nice story too.

And at last will be getting the bonus soon.. Yippeee....

Oh.... BTW..... 2 more office colleagues are planning to tie the knot soon...

Stuff

WTF... just wrote a nice little post... went to the preview page and after that fuck.... hit the back button and evrything got lost.... aah... tired now.... will write some other time

Get Laid.....off

Firm laid off 15 guys yesterday. Absolutely the worst thing to do. From morning itself i had been hearing abt these things but i was stunned to hear it getting confirmed. Bloody asses they recruit people by the truck loads and then when they can't give them work they fire them. I wonder who should get fired ....
1) Guys who joined.. after cracking 2-3 rounds of intvw and then worked late nights to finish work.
or
2) Guys who recruited them in the fist place to increase head count, then sold the firm and then could not bring the business even after getting acquired by a big company.

Not even a warning... that is the troubling part... i can't understand the reason behind this. Not all of them were the bottom lot.... some were average guys just like most of the group.

Guess this will make a perfect case study in B-Schools.. Past...small kpo provider.. doing well.. but needs capital.... looks for potential buyers... start building up resources to increase valuations.. big bpo firm takes over.. perfect for both... big guy gets into a new domain.. small guys gets more money and access to big guys existing clients.... 6 months down the line... Present.... Increasing of resources takes it toll.... all play and almost no work... some guys move out... still no project and most of the people free... half yearly targets not meet.. worst 6 months in history.. lays of 15 guys... Future... focus area changes from high end analytics to small time reporting and stuff... people have left.. big shots in the small firm take cosy seats in the upper management of the big firm be it in sales or BD..

Where am i in between all of these.. i don't know.

Shrek 3 and more......

Watched Shrek 3 this week. I liked the movie, although the story is not as strong as the second part, it's very funny and makes u laugh. For the sake of comparison it's better than POC - 3.

Having an extended weekend this time. Thursday was a holiday because of Buddha Jayanti(i guess so.. not sure but something related to buddha). It's surprising that it wasn't a holiday in India, the land from where Buddha came... ahhh. Went to office on Friday... and did nothing for the whole day. Caught Cheeni Kum Friday night. Cute movie with good acting from all.

Saturday was spent on a bar-be-cue at senthil's place. Had most of the office team come over at his place for food and drinks. Was fun talking to everyone in a no official environment. Man this place really need such kind of activities. Office is so boring, with everyone pretending to do work, or actually doing work. Hopefully ore such events will loosen them up and it can become a more fun office to work in.

Pirates of the Carribean -At Worlds End

I was waiting for this one ever since the second part was released last year. I loved the second part, it was witty, crisp exciting film which moved the story forward and left it at an interesting situation.

Going in here's what i was expecting in this one

• Cracken.... more of it and jack's battle with davey jones
• Explanation of barbosa's past and his return
• Will and boostrap's reunion and eventual rescue
• Chow yun fat and his story
• Good old fashioned sword fights

What i got to see was

• No cracken at all. No explanation of how jack was where he was in the film.
• Loads of new characters with little or no use. Chow yun fat's role was lesser than expected both in screen time and substance.
• No explanation of barbosa's past or how he returned
• Less than expected emphasis on davey jones story
• Miss swan gets kissed by 3 different men
• Norrington dies :)
• The apparent villian changes....
• You have pirate lords and a pirate king...
• Black pearl has a new captain :)
• Loads of emotional crap... with even davey jones getting senti
• U see davey's real face and his love interest
• Less witty than the previous installments
• Something we didn't know abt daveys heart
• Keith richards in a 2 min appearance... well worth it

Well i found the movie to be too long with some parts of the story not explained fully. The thing that disappointed me the most was that instead of focusing on davey jone being the main villian he becomes secondary to beckett.

Lastly, someone dies, someone is born, flying dutchman must have a captain and at the end jack is in the same position as he was at the start of the first movie. Happy watching... :)

Almost forgot...

Almost forgot i had this blog... Well last week was sort of easy. Spent most of it in training.... where i could sleep sitting at the last bench. Yeah... and also i have started running again... You have dedicated jogging tracks here and almost everyone around here has a sense of physical fitnesss in them. You can see small kids to grandmothers engaged in some sort of physical activity on the grounds. So, after weeks of delibration i decided to join then and went on my first jog last sunday. Lets see how far i can continue with it.

Saw Metro last week. It's a nice movie with good music. Really enjoyed it. Another one that i saw was 28 weeks later. Zoombie movie, but again really well made, the pace is fast and you never get bored.

Gods own country

Phew... after a hectic week i was finally off to Kerala for my cousins marriage. Had nice start to the journey when i checked in for my flight to Cochin by silk air. I was pretty excited since i was travelling business class for the first time. Man.... i was not disappointed. I had forgotten that you get to use the premier lounge with you ticket. The lady at the check in counter gave me the card and i coudn't stop smiling, premier lounge... here i come. Well the funny part was i coudn't find the lounge, even after looking throughout the airport. Fuck... with just abt 1 hr to the flight i realised my mistake... here instead of ground floor you have 1st floor. So, while the card said 3rd floor i kept going to the 4th and found nothing. Well, i managed to locate the lounge, was pleasently surprised to find free dinner there, munched a little and then went to board my flight

Landed safely and after a 2hr drive reached Mangalam, which is abt 45min from pallakad. Had a blast the 5 days i was there, met up with all the cousins after a long time. Attended my cousin Kamalesh's marriage on 6th. The thing that surprised me was that u have may of these retired uncles and aunties comming to such marriages just so that they can spot a eligible boy/girl and start fixing there matches with girls/boys they know of. I was very surprised with the kind of networks these guys have, one aunty seemed to know the entire history of almost all the girls there.

The day after marriage we had reception at my uncles house. The dj guy played some really nice tamil songs which i liked. Found a new love for tamil music, so much that i have started listing to them more than any other music now a days... he he he.

After 5 days of masti, i came back on 10th, missing kerala a lot.

Holiday in Hell

Man... what a terrible last week i had. Just because of my stupid manager very nicely did not tell the big boss abt my leaves i had to cancel my holidays to meet the deadline. Fuck...
Then on top of that went out to see TaRaRumPum on sunday. What an absolute shit movie it was, wonder why do people make such movies.The last 3 hindi movies i have seen are - Salaam-e-Ishq, Namaste London & Tararumpum. Pretty bad i know......

Saturday....

Saturday... Was at work again... but as usual did very little work. Had a nice discussion with a colleague abt the work culture here as compared to the US. Found out some intresting things...

As i write this Chris Gayle has 74 from 50 balls and is showing why is one of the finest stikers of the ball we have today... too bad for WI that it came so late in the tournament, otherwise they well might have been playing for a place in the semis today.

What else... yes... car parks supposedly have higher resale value in HK than houses. Don't we all want a carpark in HK.

Ohh.. almost forgot was watching Linkin Park's new song. Nice song and an equally nice video.http://youtube.com/watch?v=8sgycukafqQ

Data.. Analytics ???

Was looking at websites of some consulting firms today. Reading about the sample cases, the problem solving methodologies and in general the hectic life of a consultant, made me miss the fun days at inductis. Why do i miss it, probably because tomorrow like today and like every single day for the past 3-4 months, I'll have to run couples of merges...(shit... error here.... couple of sorts and then one merge).... one summary, 10-12 sets of arrays and a final sort.

Wow... wonder why am i called statistical analyst??

Frustrated

Absolutely boring day at work today. Had a couple of things to finish EOD, but i kept delaying it, dunno why but no energy or excitment towards work. Wonder, why this is, beacuse i have been feeling hmm.... yes frusrtated lately. Frustrated from what i don't know, maybe a change of some sort might help.

Had good food at Anjappar for dinner. Way better than the stuff they serve in KL, even the service and the ambience (whatever little there is of that) was nice. Dinner dicussion revolved around what the definition of BOND (hindi wala) would be. Sarfaraz's reaction seemed a little defensive on certain points, wonder if he took personally.

Massa won.. ...yippee!!!

Easter weekend and a lost passport...almost !!!

Last weekend would be a memorable one... for all the right and wrong reasons. The plan was to leave singapore by 7:00 am to beat the rush of weekend travellers. So far so good.



Well come friday morning, i woke up only to see that the time was already 6:45. Fuck... only 15 mins to take a bath, pack my stuff and above all shave my 10 day old beard (which BTW alone takes me 20-25 mins). Chucked shaving given that underneath the beard there is no tom cruise.... had a bath and just as i was abt to finish packing my stuff the phone rings. It's moorthy, calling to say that the van is delayed and i can take my own sweet time to come. As they say "Kat Gaya"



Slept a little after that and then went to Moorthy's house to meet the rest of the gang. Total 10 guys including moorthy and family(with a kid), a gujju couple (yet to celebrate there 1st anniversary i guess), lakshmi&lakshmi(each trying to talk less than the other), tvs(camera guy), sarfaraz(office wala) and me.



Easied our way into Malaysia, and i must say i was impressed with the country. Excellent roads, good infrastructure and massive open spaces with palm trees... which reminded me of kerela. A welcome change from the artificial Singapore. Well after abut 4hrs of ride, we reached Port Dickson, our first pit stop. The resort looked old, however the rooms were spacious, nice and clean. The best part was that we were expecting a man made beach there, but what we found was this.
















A beautiful beach and a room that had the best view i have ever seen.

That nite we had our dinner at a local road side stall (veg fried rice). As i was a tired i decided to go to sleep early. That's when it hit me, bag having the passport was not with me. Last i remenber was keeping the bag in the van. Fuck.. i just hoped it was still there.... Ran down, asked tvs to call the driver. He was in johor by that time, but thankfully the bag was still in the van and he was comming to KL the next day, so we could take it from him then. zzzzz... after that


Next day was qualifying, so from port dickson we directly went to Sepang. It was hot and humid, but my first F1 experience was worth it. People were everywhere, there was however excellent bus service to take u to different parts of the circuit. We sat on the hill stand near intermidiate 2. Ferrari at pole and i went home happy.


From Sepang we went to KL the 2nd pit stop of out journey. We were supposed to stay at a service apartment, but the fucking guys there had given our rooms to some gora firaang. There only excuse was faulty internet booking... whatever. I don't get this, but everywhere i go, i see people bending over backwards to please them, from cute chinkis trying to seduce these goras in to marriage, to places like sucasa where they think that it's ok to give ur rooms to goras. Asses..

Well, in the end we did manage to get our rooms that too beacuse 2 guests had to leave earlier than expected. After all this i was tired and dozed off as soon as i hit the bed.


Next day was Race Day. Departed at 11:30 for the 3:00 pm start. Got stuck in the traffic for abt 1hr but still made it to the race by 2:15. Absolutely amazing atmosphere with ferrari fans being the most vocal. The race starts and as we go into the first corner, alonso is first and massa and hamilton are battling it out behind him. I can say for sure that at point the noise was more than u could hear in an Indian cricket stadium when sachin comes to bat. Amazing..


Moorthy and gujju however, had the last laugh as mclarens finished 1-2 with ferrari coming 3rd. After the race there was a small stop at KL airport to drop a frnd going to India. After that all tired and hungry we headed home to Singapore via johor bahru. Reached home at 2:00 am, uploaded some pics, chatted with some guys, and slept at 3:00. Phew.... quite a weekend that was


P.S I got my passport (BTW even sarfarz's passport was in the bag, so i would not have been alone behind bars) not in KL, but in Johor, where we met the driver near the immigration building.

Fist Post

I came across a blog for the first time in 2003 while surfing the Internet at British Library. In the 4 years since then many of my friends/colleagues have started there own blogs. I try to read most of them on a regular basis. It's always an interesting read, and quite often it tends to reflect a side of people i never knew. Hope this blog reflects a side of me that people already know and some which they don't.