Sunday, May 27, 2012

Granny Stories : A Pot of Gold

One fine morning,  Thangasaamy was walking along the road to Panaiyur. He is 5 feet, unshaved and walking with such an unwanted haste. This particular road is quite popular because of the forest accompanied with it. He made his bread by changing roofs and other wood work. He was thinking of his particular countenance with his wife this morning. She shouted at  rage as he failed to buy the pulses needed for their food. He thought he is done with his marriage life. At that time, his neighbour came to him and told that a roof work is there in the next town, Panaiyur. Thangasaamy accepted the work without a second thought. 


Panaiyur is a small village located at the outskirts of Poompuhar, the coastal city of Chola period. The village has all kinds of occupations soaring under the rule of the new King. Thus, he is on this very road, walking with the plans to  earn money, convince his wife by not letting their family to starve ever. Like all the forest roads of our ancient Tamil Nadu, people have built a Ayyanar temple in this road to protect the people from ill souls. 


Just as he crossed the temple, he heard a strong but cautious voice – “Stop!” 


Thangasaamy lost his balance. He is so sure that the voice came from the Ayyanar itself. A conversation with the God is not in his calendar of events. He tried to slip away. Again the voice stopped him. 


He brought some courage to himself, steadied his feet and asked – “What do you want from me? I’m bankrupt.” 


“Thangasaamy.. I know about you.  Do you know what lies under your feet?” 


He suddenly became aware of the ground. He wanted to run away, only to be stopped by Ayyanar’s voice. 


He asked in a feeble voice - “What is there?” 


Ayyanar replied “Well, how fast can you dig?” 


Thangasaamy bent down immediately and dug with all his might till his hands touched something which felt like clay. He found a pot wrapped with a yellow cloth. He unwrapped it. The pot is filled with gold coins, glowing under his greedy eyes. He emptied the entire pot inside his bag and threw back the pot to its place and began to run. 


The voice paralysed him this time. “Stop. You can’t get away with everything. Keep as much gold as your heart might wish to give to another person. Or else, you can’t move from here.”
Thangasaamy knew that it is an order. With wretched heart, he took four coins, counted them thrice and put it back in the pot. He closed the pit, thanked Ayyanar and walked away.

potofgold
     Ponnammaal is a lady at her mid thirties. In Panaiyur, she is known for her good deeds as a Siddha doctor. Her life goal is to open a hospital and help the people. But, she doesn’t have the funds to initiate it. She prayed everyday to bring her dreams into reality. She led a life of happiness. She used to sleep for 6 hours everyday. But, last night it was different. At 11PM, she heard sounds of broken roof and got up. She was alarmed only to find coconut and broken roof pieces on her kitchen house floor. So, she waked her husband, asked him to repair the roof by morning. When Thangasaamy came, he asked her to keep his bag at a safe place and started the work. He told that the bag contains pulses for his dinner. So, she tied the bag under the same roof which is repaired. He wanted to finish the job as soon as possible and sell the gold pot. He worked hastily, without concentration, his mind full of thoughts of gold. He already started searching for a goldsmith shop in his mind. In his unaccepted stroke of luck, he forgot about the bag which is tied under the roof he is working. 


When Thangasaamy was working, she was cooking at the kitchen. Suddenly, she realized that her own supply of pulses has run out and she forgot to buy new supply in this broken-roof affair. She thought of Thangasaamy’s bag. She decided to take his pulses and later she can replace them when her husband returns from shop. So, she untied the bag from the roof, opened it. She found golden coins. She sat. Sweat pulses glittered on her nose tips.  No doubt, her lifetime prayers have paid off. She thanked God for turning a pot of pulse into Gold. Touch of gold brought up a change of mind. She emptied the whole bag, went to grocery shop, refilled it with pulses and tied it to the roof. She sighed. She will start a hospital soon.  


By evening, Ponnammaal’s house got its roof back. She paid him his salary and returned his bag. When he lifted his bag, he found it lighter than he did in morning. He untied and found pulses. All his imaginations shattered. Tongue tied due to his lie, he left the house with cold-heart. He reached the forest road, blaming the fate. As he crossed the Ayyanar temple, he heard that voice for the second time that day. 


“Stop!” 


Exploded with betrayal and anger, he asked - “If I doesn’t deserve the gold, then why give it to me?” He shouted back. “See, what have you done to me? All my hopes are shattered like a fort of sand.” 


Ayyanar replied in a calm soothing voice –"Every person deserves what his heart desires to give away.” “That gold is deserved to that lady. You are just a medium of transport.” 


Thangasaamy was on the edge of tears. Ayyanar continued – “Don’t worry. Everyone will get what they deserve. Go and take the pot which you kept in the morning.” 


With that, a abrupt silence filled the forest road. Ayyanar is gone. 


Thangasaamy blamed his memory for forgetting the four gold coins which he kept back in the pot. Suddenly, he cursed his greed for keeping just four coins. 


He realized what Ayyanar’s words really meant. God will give you only if you are ready to give away. He chose his luck of four coins. He wrote his own fate.  He happily took the coins and started to his house. His eyes are no more searching for a goldsmith. They are searching for a grocery shop. 


His eyes are devoid of vanity. Finally.



Friday, April 27, 2012

War of the Colas - Fire in the hole for Mountain Dew

Who told it is easy to run a Cola company?


Coke and Pepsi are the DMK and ADMK of the Cola business. The war of brands between Pepsi and Coke is as old as the one between Tom and Jerry. Both are posting millions of dollars of profit every year. But, then have you read the first line? What makes it difficult to run a Cola company? Cola is served as the next best drink after water. 95% of Americans are Cola drinkers. Then where lies the risk?


Survival of every product is mainly based on the USP contribution to its consumer. Fact is that there is no basic USP attached with the Cola drinks. People could just go with the soda and breweries. Hence, the existence of a Cola company entirely depends on the brand management and advertising associated with it. Cola sales are directly proportional to the public mindset. They have to make the consumer believe that their drink is unique, which is not in fact! Downfall for the company, otherwise. As an added headache, when the chips are down, health activists will spread the awareness about the excess calories and potential hazards present in Cola. When the TRP rating is down and the people have nothing to chew, media will take the dusted issue of caffeine content present in Colas,  polish it and keep the shows going on. They will sponsor talk shows in which limelight guys will talk about the various side effects of Cola. Audience will end up comparing Cola with bleaching liquid. All such stuffs will be carried out till the commencement of the next important Cricket tour or the next polls and scams. Again, brand-angels like Aamir and MSD will repair the damage done by the media and the mentality of the people will change. Again. Oh wait. Who are these people? What makes them? Whatever offered to them makes them. And such an offer is decided mostly by the businessmen, not the activists.


In addition to the above mentioned foes, it is not so often we see one Cola company taking a dig at the other. Pepsi, the company which is named after the digestive enzyme Pepsin, is the first company to understand the potential risks associated with running a carbonated drinks company. They forayed into the FMCG sector long ago with products like Lays, Aquafina, Lipton and Quaker Oats. Coca Cola on the other hand has a wide portfolio of more than 3500 beverages in its pocket. 

Both are known for their long stand rivalry in advertising their products. One of the famous brand war has happened between Pepsi and Coke. I'll rate the one between Coke's Sprite and Pepsi's Mountain Dew as the second best. Mountain Dew appealed to the little adventurer hiding within every Indian. The brand projected itself as the contender of doing the impossible with no fear. In contrast, Sprite mocked the dare associated with Mountain Dew. It projected itself as the drink of people's clear senses. But, in the long run, it is the adventurer who will take over the Smart-Dude. Coke knew this so well. Hence, it decided to launch another cannon on its rival Mountain Dew. This time, it is not the Cool guy Sprite. But it opted for a rough and tough Thumps Up. Believe it or not, Thumps Up is the largest selling Cola drink in India. 

The difference between the themes of Mountain Dew and Thumps Up are so thin. In Mountain Dew, the adventure staged is projected as a result of their drink. In Thumps Up, the person is projected to go to any limits to possess their drink. Now, the latest move by Coke has diminished this thin difference. Now, Thumps Up joins the line of Mountain Dew, but with a little youth revolutionary flavor peppered all over it. Replacement of Akshay by Mahesh Babu and the drop of 'Taste the Thunder' slogan tells the whole story. Coke has got the strategy right in nailing the Mountain Dew's coffin. I feel, the double barreled pistol of Coke is enough to fire the PepsiCo. But Pepsi is not dumb either.


Health hazards. Media. People Mindset. Scorching rivals. Advertisements with costliest brand ambassadors. Brand dependency. 


Well, Who told it is easy to run a Cola company?


Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Post night Post

My Titan is glowing with 4.10a.m. I thank the Curie couple. My body is functioning like an Indian parliament. Dormant. But, My mind is working like an Indian bedroom. Over Time.  I am here, lying down and trying to sleep.. Or is it? What am I trying to do? I dunno for sure. Nights are capable of giving life to the dormant memories fossilized in our heart! Nights are dark. They are quiet. Probably our brain shouts its inherent thoughts when the earth is whispering to the moon! As I write this sentence, I begin to think about the famous creators created by this night. Theoretically, everyone is meant to be created at night.  Big shots inclusive. To hell with my humor. At this moment, most of the people will be wide awake, saying a silent-same-pinch to me. I think of my friend in USA, who is actually in a different time frame and it is daytime for him. So what really is time? Few thousand miles are capable of bringing different calendars to different people. Perhaps the time should be measured by keeping the people as constant. I wonder about the way our life is deciphered.  Philosophy is puked from my mind. I think that the nights extend to life and the days diminish to death. I think this. I think that. I think all.

Nights are dark. Dark is black. Black is capable of absorbing anything and everything which comes to it. Nights are capable of bringing back our memories and sucking our joy or sorrow. Black is a color parasite! Night is an emotion parasite.

Oh, what am I doing? I got stuck in this vicious cycle of thoughts. Again my thoughts come back to time. When I think of it, time is like a feminine brain. It is a constantly changing variable. Time is perceived based on perception geography,  environmental physics and mental chemistry. Time is Einsteined! In time, I wanna embrace the sleep which is seducing me for a while. I wanna forget everything and just sleep all the way. In spite of that feeling, I am not welcoming the sleep to my mental condominium. Such a meta-state between sleep and awake is similar to the limbo oscillating between life and death. Meta-states are highly unstable. My chemistry professor has taught me that electrons acquire motion in such meta states. Electrons radiate from atom. Thoughts radiate from grey matter. Such electric thoughts are known as philosophy. I am asleep. I am awake. Yes I am a philosopher!


Suddenly my conscious pops out of my shirt, just like the way I have seen in the movies and it starts to do self-advising. It says -"If you really do what your heart craves to do, then you are in the real heaven". As I blink, it transfigures itself into my Mathematical teacher. It goes back and writes this formula in thin air.

Happiness Quotient = No. of actions performed / No. of actions desired by our heart.

Omg, the air is not thin anymore! Revelations. And it pops in back inside my Indian Terrain. At some distant, my brain is shouting at me that my present action is more of a blabbering than real thinking.
But, I.Really.Do.Not.Care.As.Long.As.It.Makes.Sense.To.Me! My thinking tank takes pity on me. Tired of philosophies, my body takes control over my mind. My blinking rate becomes directly proportional to our interests in studies. My muscles act as if I'm their college professor. Yet, I am going to be awake...in my dreams. I decide to do what I would like to do. I give up to sleep. To improve my happiness quotient, I am entering heaven. Dot.


Saturday, February 11, 2012

'Aam Aadmi & The Art of Management' by Antony Dilip


Antony Dilip,  Jan 30 2012, Chennai

Indian tea stalls have become one of unique characteristics of this great Nation. In any part of the country they are the “hot-spots” of busy alleys where you can meet different and distinct people. Once on a rainy evening, I entered a tea shop which had every feature of a perfect Indian tea stall. Discs of biscuits arranged inside glass jars, different flavors of tea bags, hot bronze boilers, kettles blowing out steams, hot kaadai on a kerosene burner, wooden benches, pile of news papers, group discussion, politics and a stray dog sleeping at the entrance. The tea master (that is the w! ay one calls the person who makes you tea. Maybe he masters it very well that he can make a really long tea) happened to be the owner of the shop had a welcoming smile. I ordered a “cup of tea”. He replied, “Hot bhajjis ready for you sir, two minutes”. He spoke Tamil with a Malayalam accent and had a Chandan on his forehead; I don’t have to be Holmes or need Watson’s help to conclude that he is from Kerala. I wasn’t hungry but his pleasant offer made me order a plate of bhajji.  With the very first bite of the bhajji, I realized that it had coconut oil and it was made of the banana fruit. This is not the usual “roasted-batter -coated plantain”. I didn’t like this new flavor, so I threw them into the dustbin. Then I ordered few butter-biscuits and asked for the bill. The bill was not a computerized paper with a neat tabular column with rows of products bought and their rates across them. Also I did not have separate mention about the tot! al, “service” tax, round-off and the grand Total.  It was just a chit with numbers scribbled on it showing no distinction between the numbers 4 and 6. The bill was 10 rupees and I realized that he had missed to enter the bhajji’s price. When I told him that he had missed the bhajji in the bill, he said “You did not eat, so you don’t have to pay”. I was shocked; a sense of guilt had filled my heart and mind.  I wanted to apologize, so I told him “Annachi I m sorry. I will pay for the bhajjis too”. But he gave the same reply with a smile and added,” I will get paid only when you are satisfied with my service”. Oh my god! What is happening? Did this tea-master learn about customer satisfaction in IIM –A before starting his tea-stall? Or does he really belong to the middle class who lament about the surging food prices? Or is it because he is from the state of Kerala which has the highest literacy rate? Before I could reiterate, I saw something else in the tea shop which I had not noticed all this while. Babuji, father of this great Nation, was smiling from a 30x35 frame and was embellished with a fresh garland. I smiled in return. I left the shop paying for what I was asked for. 

That night I did not sleep.

*********************************************************************************

The Author of this post  is my close friend. I know him for the past 7 years. Currently, he is working as a Software Engineer in iNautix. He is a natural leader who loves to see/bring positive changes in our society. He believes in reforming our  administrative system for the upbringing of a better world.  A selfish dream, when realized has the potential to uplift only our lives. But, a selfless social dream, when realized, has the potential to uplift the society we live on, thereby providing real improvement in our lives. Our Author falls in the latter category.

Saturday, January 14, 2012

Nanban is well

Pre-Nanban release:
"Shankar is a great creator. Why does he wants to do a remake when people like Jeyam Raja are there for that particular purpose already?"
"Vijay? Casted as the scientist played by Aamir? Don't joke man. It is bullshit! Surya will be the opt guy for such intellectual characters"
"When is the last time you watched a Vijay movie without making fun of him?"

Post-Nanban release:
"Shankar proves once again that he has ability to deliver a successful message sandwiched inside a boxoffice hit"
"Vijay at his best eventhough there is not a single punch dialogue or a single action sequence"
"Just like any other Vijay movie, we ended up laughing continuously for the entire time. But he is not the source this time"

Casting:
When it comes to casting Shankar has always been a forerunner on Tamil cinema. Examples like Nambiyar on Gentleman, Radhika in Jeans shows his thirdeye to cast the actors. In Nanban, a movie-goer will not think odd to see Vijay as the intellectual. And that is the victory gained for Shankar's casting and directorial genius.

Script:
Screenplay of 3 idiots is used exactly as it is. Changes in dialogues gives the regional flavour to the film. Shankar and Madhan karky does their best here.

Cinematography:
My favorite cinematographer Manoj Paramahansa has lifted the lens for Nanban. In Eeram and VTV, he had the scope to exercise his innovations. But he did a great job for a entertainer like Nanban. Visuals never felt awkward in a single roll, unlike the experience of usual remake movies.

Art:
This is one of those departments which hasn't had a great show in original 3-idiots. Being a Shankar movie, Nanban has the gigantic sets in songs. Sets erected for Asku laska and Ileana songs shows the exemplary ground work done by the art department.

Music and Audiography:
Harris Jayaraj has exceeded his expectations in all the song numbers. Hear 'En friend ah pola' song with full bass and you will know how close competitor it is to the 'Mustafa' song. His background score is weaved close to the story-flow. Oscar winner Resul Pookutty has shown his adept at the audiography. Techniques like echo and amplification are used for particular scenes where the hero intends to tell a message to the audience.

Acting:
Acting department is under the radar of some directorial genius like Shankar. He shows how to get the best out of actors like Satyaraj and Vijay. Even Jiiva does proves his skills.

Direction:
Not to mention too much about Shankar, he has carved a great flick. Successful placement of Ileana song just before the emotional climax shows his mettle to give a masala mix to any story. Asku-laska song will be a visual treat to Shankar audience where he rectifies the limitations posed by 3 idiots script on his grandiose visualisations.

Everyone in the age group of 20 - 35 would have seen 3 idiots. It is one of those rare movies with a wide audience reach. I have watched 3 idiots four times and when I watched Nanban, I neither felt bored nor I thought of Nanban as a waste remake. Even to set a benchmark in remakes, we need Shankar.
He neither made Vijay to fly nor to fight. But he made him to act. There lies the greatest success of Shankar. 

Verdict:
Nanban - A successful remake. A remake of Shankar's success.