7-Aum Arivu

What was Murugadoss thinking when he decided to make this film? I still havent figured out that. Sometimes I think that he was partly inspired by Michael Moore.

7AA is a commercial documentary. The first 20 mins of the film is a technologically advanced version of the usual videos that films division used to show in cinema halls years back. Remember the video about Nehru; this was no different. This is where Bodhi Dharma is introduced. ARM goes on to tell us that whatever we saw in Crouching Tiger and other films - I mean flying swords, people and stuff that we saw in Shaolin soccer; is closely related to what Bodhi Dharma taught the Chinese.

The present day Chinese Military begin Operation Red whose only objective is to kill a girl in Chennai.

Suriya plays a circus performer in this film. I still can't figure out why he agreed to do that part because it didnt go well with the script of the film. I wonder if it was done to help the script where Shruti is looking to experiment with a monkey or ride an elephant (this scene is horrible), it still doesnt convince at all. We definitely know that a connection needs to be established between Bodhi Dharma and Suriya but not through a circus.

Coming to the main plot - The Chinese want to kill Shruti Hassan because they think she has done some research that would make India, some kind of a superpower. What I dont get from all this is the depth. Its never there at all. If it were such a research, then how come the Indian scientists are not bothered? And there are a bunch of people fighting about Tamil and English. Gimme a break director!!! There is a lot of cross-border tension between India and China, but China sending someone to India to kill Shruti is like watching a cartoon. The chinese villain using hynotic techniques to use people to his advantage is quite weird and at times very irritating as well.

Shruti Hassan has a very long way to go. I doubt if she will be very successful in the movies. She is awesome on the screen but dialogue delivery needs a lot of work. It feels like watching some US return tamilian on screen. We cannot put the heavy weight on her shoulder that she is Kamal's daughter. She is super talented but I am not sure if this film has done the magic for her.

I cant speak much about the new chinese villain who we have seen in many other hollywood movies. I dont remember doing anything other than staring.

The movie tells us that our traditions and superstitions have scientific reasons behind and we should understand the science and not blindly believe everything. And some of the examples are very effective. What I cant get to grips is when Shruti starts a scientific experiment on Suriya for 12 days; the villain manages to kill the experiment on the penultimate day and miraculously Suriya is still in great form. Suddenly, there is a superhero who has broken the scientific laws. Did I watch a Science Fiction?

What can I say about the songs. Same Harris style. He reminds you that every new song will remind you of his previous compositions. The SPB song in this movie reminded me of the 'Kanne Kalaimaane' sung by Yesudas but a few beats faster in the former. Most other songs are typical and sometimes the beat feels like a lift-off from ARR too.

The movie definitely lacks a good script and depth. Sometimes it looks as if the scenes were just put in place to make some logical sequence. I am supportive of the fact that ARM took up a different subject and exlpored a lot, but converting that into a bio-war is again like venturing into the lines of Dasavatharam. All of a sudden, the film starts wrapping up. The last 30 mins has all the prime content and I wonder why it was only for 30 mins. Romantic sequences were just time wasting tactics getting nowhere and only becoming script spoilers.

One piece of information I got from this movie is that the Chinese definitely have a great idea to eliminate the stray dogs in India but we never want them to help us do that.

Poem: The Untold

silent dinners
late nite walks
lake side views
lying under the stars


deep dark lines
shaping her eyes
without a word amidst
the fish smiles


lost in her
in the untold
he revels
silence still prevails


lips dont move
with words waiting
she knows
he knows


a strange feeling
yes its a feeling
only the beginning
it has a fragrance


fragrance not known
not to anyone
just the two


brings a breeze
lends a voice
never stays quiet
never stays hidden
still remains untold
the secret of life
the secret of love

The way they work

My boss here is quite a big guy. Atleast that's what I can figure out. We really don't have a place/site where we can see hierarchies of roles; hence I cannot make any conclusion. My previous company used to have defined roles and all that used to be visible on Outlook. Here, the whole outlook of Outlook is different.

Anyways, in between, I must also tell you that its Diwali season here and the whole office is in bright colors (of course I am not. I didnt wish to wear kurta and enter a suburban train). Diwali here is as big as Christmas in the United States. People take off for more than a week. Literally no one is working in the office today. Most of them are preparing for the festive evening get-together for their respective departments and let me not tell anything about Monday and Tuesday next week. Work is out of question as the office will just be having a few faces here and there.

My boss is a very technically sound person. He has great ideas. I dont know how he has the time to know a lot of things but he does. Also, he has a lot of people reporting to him. By a lot, I mean really a lot, like hundreds. I am sure all these hundred don't meet him everyday, but it does make things complicated. For example, if I need to meet him, I need to go and find out where he is first and then fix up a time to meet him. This is because he would always be in other meetings all day.

This brings me to another juncture. People hardly use meeting requests here. All my meetings have been confirmed on the phone. Whenever I ask anyone for a time to meet, they say ' come anytime today ', which is a very ridiculous answer according to me. Nevertheless, I haven't been requested by anyone for a meeting. If they did, then I'd ask them to send a meeting request for sure. I wonder if there is any meeting agenda that is circulated at all.

Also, when you are discussing with another person inside a meeting room, someone would knock. They would come in and start talking to that other person. Once they are done, your conversation would continue. Nor the person you were meeting with or the person knocking the door takes the decision to postpone the second conversation. Bottomline: 'different meetings happen in parallel'. And because there is a good chance that another party is waiting for a discussion in the same meeting room while yours is happening, they may give their free unwanted advice to you when they hear your conversation.

I think there is more to come on this. Most of this is rather very funny to witness.

Bounce - Book Review

Matthew Syed is a British journalist and broadcaster, who was once a table tennis champion. He was the English number one for quite a while, then three times the Men's Singles Champion at the Commonwealth and also played on the GB Olympics team.

Bounce - written by Syed is a book that focuses on excellence in sports. Syed keeps you entertained from the beginning of the book by not focusing on the science of sports but gives anecdotes from his own table tennis days; about how it matters to indulge in sports at the right time and have the right ingredients like the coach and facilities to practise.

Syed comes across as very gentle, clear and authoritative as you flip the pages. He starts talking about the ten thousand hours (remember Gladwell's Outliers.. and there is a lot of mention about that in this book) and that's when you tend to believe in the effort that great sportsman that we hear of today - Roger Federer, David Beckham, Tiger Woods, Sachin Tendulkar, Shizuka Arakawa; would have taken. Most of the top ranking sportsmen started playing when they were roughly about 6 or 8 yrs old. Ten years of focus, meaningful practice and performance improvement at each level elevates them and they are what we see today.

Syed also talks about different experiments carried out by people across the world. The research on the West Berlin Music Academy; the research on strange distribution of birthdates of Canadian ice-hockey players; incredible working memory of SF who can remember more than 40 digits sometimes and the experiment on how we control the mindset of people.

Bounce also has a good selection of information about how top players in various fields started off initially. Syed takes us through the lives of Shaquille O'Neal, Williams Sisters, Mozart. He also discusses about the sudden increase in South Korean women golfers in the LPGA circuit.

Every human being, be it in sports or not; is always affected by certain sparks in their life. This may be like jolt out of the blue and that is it. Its such a powerful effect that it becomes a life changing moment.

As you read through, you also tend to understand why high performers sometimes dont perform at all. He very simply calls it choking and its quite evident when you pull up the facts. Top sportsmen havent always done well when it was required. And this not because they didnt practise well. Its only because their mind is choking with all the facts about the game.

After getting very serious on experiments and choking, Syed starts talking about sentiments in sports. And I would totally agree to this. Even if it doesnt make any difference, I too have such sentiments when I play frisbee locally in my city. Yes, its not even a championship but I still believe. So I could very much relate to what he says.

The next part of the book is about attentional blindness and the example is a plane crash. It is a very good insight into how people use only a part of their attention skills to focus on something they are very familiar with and then work on the remaining. The section on anti-doping and the effects of doping; followed by arguments about genetically enhanced genes for mutual benefits gets you thinking about the role of advanced science and whether we need such evils/boons in our life or not.

The gene research extends a bit and goes on to understand how Blacks dominate atheletics (sprints and marathons). The American and Jamaican atheletes are the sprint champions with the Kenyan and Ethiopians taking the marathons.

Bounce is a great book for people who are interested in sports and knowing about excellence in sports. It gives scientific insights into sports that were never known before. Any coach who wants to keep his students motivated should read this book.

Life changing experiences

About 10 people are seated in a small conference room. Everyone is wearing a white shirt and a black trouser, some sort of a uniform I think. Some of them have their laptops open and the others are chatting up about when is the latest they could leave from that place. A few others were already making calls to the local cab.

All of a sudden, the boss walks in and starts a discussion with everyone. Each one of them quotes a line or two and then its time for him to talk.

And this is what they heard

" We heard all of your thoughts now and today I am going to tell you my story and let me tell you.. this was a life changing experience for me.

About 10 yrs back, I joined the workforce at this place. Prior to that I had about 12 yrs experience. When I joined, I was given a cabin. For the first week, I really couldn't meet my boss. I didnt like my cabin and hence I requested to be seated outside with everyone. They didnt give me that option. So, I decided to sit outside along with the others and started mingling with everyone. Another week was also passing by and I had no work. My boss was very busy in meetings all day.

One day, he came by and told me to work with someone sitting in another town and help that team with some infrastructure. I did that and came back. Again, there was really not much to do.

Slowly, I began to notice that my boss used to leave very late from the office.. roughly around 11pm. I didnt know what he was doing but I wanted to know. There was no way to find out. I decided to stay late and leave only after he left. I used to spend roughly 5 hours at my desk, mostly doing nothing or at the max read some articles on technology. One fine day, the boss noticed me and asked me why I was staying up late. I told him that I wanted to know what he was doing this late and hence stayed. The boss then invited him to late night dinner with a vendor. From then on, the boss would always call him whenever he went out for dinners. During the day, the interactions used to be very minimal.

The opportunity came when my boss gave me the job to take care of vendors. I arranged for all vendor meetings (which probably meant hospitality, food, meeting rooms etc) and ensured everything went fine.

There was no looking back after this. I was always with my boss. Seeing my with my boss, people used to think that I was someone very senior in the company. They used to ask my questions about projects that happened prior to my joining; and I used to confidently answer them like I was there when it happened. To make people in other departments do some work, I used to take my boss' name and even sometimes the names of few other big people in the organization. That ensured that work was always completed.

Sooner, the guy who I worked with first in another city for a small project was reporting to me.

So, friends, all this has been the most important part of my journey in this company and I urge you to take similar steps to chalk out your future here."

Atleast half of the audience was super-shocked. They hadn't expected to hear such a story. There was no light at the end of the tunnel.

The meeting

Let's get there by 11am was the latest message on Thursday night. I was not sure if I heard it right. Why get to a place by 11am for a 2.45pm meeting? But these guys never want to take chances when it comes to the Chairman.

We were at Makers on Nariman Point by quarter past 11 or so. Our team was sitting in a small conference room preparing for the afternoon meeting. My slides had pretty much nothing to say as I had spent the least time here - just about a month and my work started early this week.

The feeling had not sunk it until it was 2.30pm. I was going to meet the man behind the new Reliance. The son who made all of this happen. The person who is in the news almost everyday. I had not imagined that this would ever happen. Absolutely not.

As we were seated in the room, MDA comes in and meets everyone personally for a few seconds. Then our presentation begins. We present all our slides - few mins each. He asks a few questions to everyone to get a feel of whats happening.

The meeting in whole was quite interesting. I wouldn't say it was very empowering but there were some key messages. MDA expects this new bunch of people to take up good leadership roles within the company. He mentioned to us about the need visualize to the future and create the path to excellence.

There was a mention of the concept of Generational Peace. He kept talking about the fact that the older set of leaders needed to shed some of their key responsibilities and believe in the idea of young blood taking the reins. For this to happen, the new set needs to step up a little.

At the end, he told us to think about the end state and then work backwards. Overall, it was ok but there could the other side to this. And that will be my next post.

Signed up for this?

Moments of loneliness inside a less than 550sqft apartment perched in between hundreds of similar ones sometimes makes you think hard about the choices that you make and whether they seem relevant.

Life in Chennai was peaceful and fun but work was boring. It never seemed to get better and no one seemed to bother about it. That was the reason to quit and do something else.

Bombay seems way out of place. Its not about the new place and adjustments that you need, to get settled. Its more about what you really want.

I get up everyday before 7am. Uncertainities in my life didnt allow me to buy even a refrigerator. So, I have to walk up to the nearest store everyday to buy a packet of milk. Now, I need to finish the half litre pack because it would get bad by evening. Bombay - the city where everyone wants to be, has power cuts everyday. The power goes off at 7.30am pretty much every day and comes back after 4 hrs. So, if I get up late, then I have to drink cold milk (i dont have a gas stove, only induction). Under rising temperatures of the morning, I shower and still keep sweating until the breeze hits my face when the auto makes a rush to the railway station. A 20 minute train ride in a not-so crowded train. The moment you get down, you need to make a quick rush to get into the free shutle to the office. If you don't rush, you will still make the next one but you may have to bear the heat as the driver wont leave until the bus gets full.

Even if you reached office as early as 9.30am, the official work timings begin at 10.30am. Thats when people start walking in. The day goes by and then you wait till 6pm as you can get out only then. Another rush to for the free shuttle. Then the train ride and an evening walk to the apartment; if possible a dinner somewhere in between.

Yes, its a bachelor life in all, but a little too demanding. Even in Pilani, there used to be a guy who'd come and get your clothes, wash and iron, and deliver it back to your room. Finding a maid here is become the most difficult task. The Lokpal Bill may be passed but I may not find a maid.

They always say that you should look at ways to elevate yourself when you move into doing anything new. Yes, I have obtained the elevation in terms on being on the 4th floor; but nothing beyond that. I never imagined before that, at 31, I would wash all my clothes, mop the house and worry about cockroaches/moths/other insects entering my house.

Like Thalaivar Simbu says in Vaanam "Enna Vaazhka da ithu"

Sountrack

Finally, I get to do some work and its sounds very interesting. Although, I cant discuss what I will be doing; its definitely close to what I have been doing before - except that playing ultimate and working from home is not part of the job description now.

I happened to see this awful film called SOUNDTRACK. Its about this music obsessed hero who wants to make it big in Bollywood and first starts off being a DJ in a club. I didnt know that DJ's in India had so much perks - this guy gets to drink litres of alcohol, smokes up all kinds of stuff and also gets to bed the hottest women in the club. AND he gets paid to do all of that!!! Whatever, the movie had no sense of script and direction. It was a mess. Post interval, our man becomes completely deaf and goes into alternative therapy.

The websites are flooding with research articles about pancreatic cancer. The newspapers in India have also started publishing front page articles with stats about the p.cancer scene in India.

The best news I read today was about SIRI - the talking iphone app for 4S. I was stunned when I saw the video demonstration. It can reply to ur SMS, fix appointments on your phone, lookup restaurants near you and can even give you suggestions on life!!! Everytime I keep thinking what Apple can add to an already feature friendly exotic phone is when they come out with something that you can never imagine.

I started reading a book by name BOUNCE, written by Matthew Syed. The book is fantastic. I think I will be writing a post about the book very soon.

Almost a month

It will be a month in Bombay, one week from now. I still dont know how I am able to survive the 6 day week. Its a big drain on personal life when you know that Sunday is the only day left in your whole week. A mid-week holiday, whenever it comes by, although it rarely does; is definitely a boon.

Last week, we had presentations from different group companies. Each rep explained to us in detail about the businesses that they were in-charge of and the kind of markets they serve. It was quite interesting to see the diversity of products that is being handled by this single entity called Reliance. I mean, its just a few words to say that they backward integrated from textiles to oil and gas exploration - but what a TASK to get that executed and moreover the will to do things so massive! Thats unbelievable.

The presentation week concluded with our visit to the Jamnagar refinery. We took a corporate jet from the military base in Mumbai to Jamnagar.

Truly World Class. There is Jamnagar, which is a small town and then there is Reliance Jamnagar, which is a whole new world altogether. For the first time, I saw the Reliance Mart which is comparable to the Walmart SuperStore in the US. The WM Store is still bigger, but I guess in India; we are always in a struggle for space and if we need big spaces, we have to go out of the city atleast 35kms. The city population would never drive all the way there to buy the household stuff. If retailers built such huge establishments in the city, they end up paying a hefty rent and hardly beark-even with such stores.

So, Jamnagar was a construction marvel. 700 acres of guest house and residential land. Amazing recreational facilities including two huge football fields, just enough to play some wonderful ultimate everyday.

The refinery itself is a maze. Although I couldnt understand every technical explanation that was given, it was still mind-blowing to see how the whole place was running all day and all night without a glitch.

Reliance has also spent loads of money on developing a green belt, which has a million plus mango trees; the largest in Asia. I couldnt believe my eyes when I saw that. We were driving through kilometres of mango trees. Now I have to wait until May 2012 to taste some of that.