going places....hope this is just the beginning

The vaguely familiar sevag and thiravid (as in tamil if am not wrong) titles (and cover design) caught my eyes at once. There was a sense of recognition, a familiarity which one would associate with those moments in life that have been spectacular in their own way but very brief, that they do not enter your senses unless you come across something related to it or a repetition of the entire scene. All the world maybe a stage but you dont get to play the same scenes again and again and again...mind u.
And a couple of searching glances to the left and right and of course I found what I was looking for; the greenish background housing the ubiquitous New York skyline photograph...America Poganuma...Suvadu Shankar's debut tamil offering. Around ten to fifteen copies sitting pretty in New Horizon Media's very own stall at the Bangalore's Biggest Book Festival/Exhibition (Dt. Sunday Nov 20, 2005). The sense of pride is inimitable...way to go :-)

Can i call it one of the most happening weekend..... !!!!!

I wanted to tell you about the great weekend I had last sat and sun. I had been to this place called " The lost maples". It’s a small forest area where you have a lot of maple trees.. The point behind going there at this season is that, the leaves of the maple tree becoz of the weather conditions would turn in to a crimson color. 9 of us went. I knew jus 4 of them but everyone was fun loving. I loved the gang. I think we should have gone next week since there was a bunch which had turned red but there was another bunch that hadnt turned red yet.. the autumn had set it and it was showing.. There was a bunch of trees that had yellow colored leaves still.

We started from our place at around 10.00. The place is 78 miles from our place. The drive was excellent. Sara did the driving. We went in shiva’s car but shiva didn’t join us since he had a team outing. The drive was too good. Actually part of the route, the roads were really bad. But other parts there was a lot of lane merging so it was thrilling but then not too scary.. so we enjoyed it. Finally we reached the place afther 2 ½ hr drive. :)

The place has been designed for trekking. We had to park the car in the parking lot and then walk to a particular spot to start the actual trekking. It was lunch time by now, so We had lunch in the picninc area. The gang had cooked something and brought it along, nobody told me and I went empty handed :( but then since it was jus 9 of us, they thot if 3 of them cook it would do and that’s exactly what happened. Also we didn’t want to eat a lot and then trek. Post lunch and the clean up, we hit the roads. The road that we took to the trek spot was jus too beautiful. The road was flanked by red and yellow maple trees :) it was jus tooo beautiful!!!!. I shall upload those fotos and send them to u.

We took a looong time to even cover the road that took us to the trek spot, coz we found every spot on the road worth being fotographed. Especially sridevi , who is a professional fotographer wouldn’t budge an inch from any of the scenic place. Finally we reached the place from where we could choose any of the trails. There were a lot of designated trails. We took a trail that took 40 minuets to be covered one way.

The trekking was really good. There was jus one strectch that would have been a mile long that was really steep but other than that it was pretty simple not too difficult. Then we reached the top and from there we saw that everything below looked like cheentis :).. the site was great.. I loved it..

After spending around 10 – 15 mins we came down and that took another 30 mins. Drove down to the San Antonio again. That drive was even more thrilling since we could not see the road in front of us due to the inclination of the road.

Sunday I went for the airshow here which was brilliant.. we saw them doing acrobatics with jet plane… The show started at 9.00 AM , we went a lil late for the show.. The first show that we saw was that of a glider plane.. it was really good .. the person did that topsy turvy and sudden drop and again sudden elevation.. it was brilliant..

The ultimate acrobatics was that of the thunderbirds which was the last of the events. It was the best!!!! They were 6 of them performing it. The best of the things were when 4 of the F16 was flying parallel to each other in the same direction, 2 of them slightly higher than the other two , there was the fifth one that zoomed along jus between the gap given by the 2 flights on the top and the 2 on the bottom. it was jsu tooo good. !!!!!!!

One must truly appreciate the americans for the respect and patriotic fervour that these ppl have. During the last of their feats, the song "GOd bless America" was played and thats when the f-16 is made to fly relatively slow, as if to touch all the emotional nerve running in your body. It was so lilting... anybody who was there was bound to feel patriotic about america, irrespective of the persono being a citizen or not!!!! it was a treat to the eyes and ears.
After the show, we had the oppurtunity to get the autographs from ppl who actually flew these F-16 thunderbirds.. i could not manage to get it from all of them in the team, but Sara managed to get it from almost all of them, barring jus one. !!!

Hey BTW I have got my driver’s license here. :) thanks to shiva who really took time off and taught me how to drive. Anyways, ppl think it is easier to drive here, but jinu, my brother and I share a different opinion from junta. Initially even I thot that driving here was easier but then I would say sheerly becoz of the speed factor, it would be too difficult to get the hang of the car. No wonder auto gears are famous here. !!!! the whole system is very very favourable as long as you know your lanes and routes right and don’t mess up there.. but if anywhere the person goes wrong then the mistake will cost a lot .. literally a lot.. all becox of the speed here.. On the highways the speed is around 70 mph!!!!! which is around 100 Km/h.. !!!!whew!!!Thats a lil scary..

okie guys, tell me one thing, can i not upload more than 2 image files in one blog, is that a deiva kuttham , y is this blog not allowing me to do that.. is it that way or am i imagining things.. Please .. lead kindly light!!!!;) ..

Okie guys, i republished this for the nth time now!!!!! guess I was imagining things, it didnt upload the fotos earlier , but i guess, i won over the system merely becoz of my perseverance, it let me do it the 450 th time !!!!:) After all in the encounter between water and rock , water wins not becoz of strength but becoz of perseverance...(Bacchon thaliyan thaliyan!!!!!;) ) jus kidding but then still 3rd was irking enough!!!..

So thats all folks, for now!!!!

Some time back.....

Can't believe how small things can remind us of real bigger events in life. ... and now when I say small things, I really think twice to word it that way, sheerly becoz of the impact it has on us... to word it "small" exhibits gross disregard to the "thing"..

Am I confusing you ... dont worry neither am I clear !!!!!

Anyways, I was referring to the songs that can unearth the most cherished of your memories and bring it live to you!!!!

As I sit here, after a day's long work, strecthing my leg, listening to "vizhigalil aruginil" from azhagiye theeyae, you bet it acts like a time machine!!!

Takes me back to those peaceful ambattur days where it used to be a jolly well 25 mins ride in the bus from vadapalani to my office in Ambattur.

Buses ply from 8.30 AM and the last bus is at 8.45 AM..

As usual I will have exactly 7 mins to reach the place from my house and thats for the last bus!!!

I used to hurriedly race my bike to the JNR office, park it and then go to the bus stop and wait in the sun for the sophisticated bus;) No kidding.. it was indeed a sophisticated one. One of those parveen travel buses. I never had to wait for long, well er...you know about me, me always either on time or late.. yes yes ladies and gentleman , there are times when I am on time too. Cant believe that isnt it !!!! well you see it was no fun tryin to pay 600 for the bus and still getting to ride the bike all the way to ambattur so I better be there atleast on time if not earlier!!!!

Right when I enter the bus, I could always hear suchitra hollering.. "kaarthalla ezhunthu nalla suda suda coffee kudichitu, kulichi ready aay wifekku bye bye sollittu office kalambiteengala"... Initially I never liked the way she jockeyed, but then later on it almost became impossible for me not to like it. Guess the decibel level was too high for a RJ!!!!! but anyway trust me, it didnt take long before I started liking her. I liked the variety of topics that she used to touch and the "girl-next-door" style of compering :) Yes intially it will be difficult if you are used to listening to "Radio cittyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy" the Rjs there were a class apart, they knew their job really well, it was not a joke to maintain the right kind of intonation and the right decibel level and adjusting it according to the content that was being told, but then radio mirchi as the byline goes was never warm, it was always sema hot macchi.. !!!!! Nevertheless I used to enjoy Suchi's program. They used to play " vizhigalin" quite often especially in the morning...

I would enter the bus looking for Sudha. Never had to look hard for her. She always used to sit in one of the first rows. And it was never too hard to spot the fair skinned spotless beauty, even in the most crowded, to find her in the bus was a no brainer ;)!!!! On seeing me she would join me to sit in one of the seats at the back. Back benches are always fun!!!!;) I love them.. I have been having the record of being a back bencher from eleventh thru college!!!!

As with girls, the topic always used to cover anything from the weather to anything remotely close to weather!!!! It was those early days after having started my job so there was this small fun of trying out new dresses, new things and getting engrossed in the new environment.

Sudha and I always had a lot to talk about. Books, movies and music were always the hot topic and ofcourse team mates and project were the other dimensions!!! We use to laugh at small things and it was real fun to do that. Sudha had a way of laughing that was pretty infectious, I used to get reminded of srividhya of our class. You bet it is difficult to find ppl who laugh their heart out these days, on the contrary you can find some zillions of those who move around as though the they have to revolve around the sun with the earth on their shoulders. So anyways it was fun to be with her!!!

Its hard to find a wave length sync with ppl after some point of time in life. I dont think everyone would agree with this. My brother for one, would blame my learning curve and would give me a dozen other fundas and "hence prove that" it was upto me to pick and choose my wave length, ignorant he , still doesnt realize that it takes too much of work and err...hmmm.. I wouldnt want to venture in to kind of hardworking that I am . I for one have found it difficult to find some good wave length sync here.

I never stop thinking about the small joys that we used to share . Those small talks over a cup of tea, those instant shopping evenings, gangotree "who-eats-the-most" competition, ( Yes, Ladies and Gentleman, we are girls las extraordinaire !!!) so on and so forth.

We used to usually take the bus back home together and all of sudden the idea of spending some time together would cross our minds ( as though we were never together), so she used to get down in JNR along with me and both of us would go to the good old JNR canteen to chat up, with some chaat in hand :).

Its hard to find such friends with whom you can laugh out the way you want to, be at peace and its so hard to find a person on whose shoulder you can just throw your arms and just walk around with all smiles on your face.

Honestly never thot would get to meet "friends" in the corporate world. I had prepared my self for the worst, but then found Sudha and Jinu. Sudha is happily married and is known as the proud Mrs. Ramesh now :) and Jinu is terrorizing the north western part of the United States. Guy is having the time of his life in Seattle!!!

okie time to go home,but cant help staring at the empty chair behind me, which would have seated Sudha, yes I can prove it, if only I can change two dimensions.... time and geography!!!!!

Hmmm.. Sigh !!!! Miss you guys!!!