Where are the playgrounds???

Seeing some of the reputed schools in Chennai this was the question that sprung to my mind. Some of the schools that earlier had grounds for the students have built new blocks in the space. How will the students express themselves in the abscence of playing fields?

I have studied in a school where there are nearly 30 odd playgrounds. Looking back on those days I realize that most of my character developed in the playgrounds rather than classrooms. I was really pained at the trend these days in city schools of not having playgrounds. Does this happen due to high cost of real estate or has the basic mind set of the people changed? Do the parents and educators increasingly think that having playgrounds is not necessary in a school??

Fear, God and Godmen

As stated in my earlier blog, Man lives in eternal fear. Most mankind need support to tide over that fear. Only his faith can help him, but in truth that faith is highly abstract and profound. Over the ages thinkers have tried to understand and give a form to the faith. This quest has lead to formation of all the philosophies of life and death. Gods, religions, theologies, holy books, ways of life, constitutions and social philosophies are all attempts to make faith less abstract by the man who was afraid of the formless faith. A person learns to assuage his fears by believing in some kind of form for his faith. For instance a Hindu sees a temple or a muslim sees a mosque and feels that within them lies the power to control all his/her fears. It is this need for faith by man that has led to the building of the institution of god. In his insatiable need for control, in most cases the "god" has been given a human form as man sees in the form an image of himself.

I believe every person should be free to give a form to his faith. Every man should invent his own wheel in this regard. In truth, right from birth a child is taught to believe and put the faith on the "god form" decided for it by virtue of the situation of when, where and to whom the child is born. The irony here is that the small phase of life in which a human being is incapable of sensing that fear, is used by the people around to repeatedly remind the being to fear everything around. Maybe it is because all these people are afraid of the small baby who is not afraid. As the child becomes more and more scared they say that the kid is growing up. Mankind has successfully established an elaborate apparatus to teach its young ones to fear, but has woefully failed in giving them the devices to overcome the fear. Within this elaborate appatatus a person can find his faith when he opens his mind and accepts his fear as being an integeral part of him.

It is also true that in this quest of every human to find his faith he comes across a lot of conspiracies and mirages through design of fellow men. We have instances of groups of people bound by ideologies into cults and groups across all cultures. Some of these ideologies leave a positive impact on a being's state of fear while some others crush the spirit and leave them defenceless against the fear. The powerful instruments in the elaborate apparatus are sometimes wielded by men who want to play god and in their hand they become dangerous weapons which destroys people who unwittingly place their faiths in these wrong forms. In the Indian culture this has led to proliferation of sadhus, godmen and other elements who interpret the vast knowledge of this culture to suit their needs. In the vedic way of life where there are millions of gods, numerous demigods and countless texts the spiritual journey becomes a virtual minefield.

As I have mentioned earlier, man created the "god form" in his own image through his vanity. This has assisted countless charlatans to assume the status of "self declared" gods made easy by the Hindu philosophy. How difficult is it for someone to accept jus one more god in the face of over a million that is already there? So a bait is set to feed on the fear of mankind. A promise of a shortcut to master the fears is enough to draw in people who are willing to test the waters. Pronto, an ashram is set with a set of disciples and we have a godman who promises nirvana. In the western culture the apparatus is defined in a more rigid manner leaving less pitfalls for an individual. But the holy books of bible and quran become a very powerful weapon for those who chose to prey on the minds of others. Alarmists and doomsday prophets abound in the christian domain. Restrictive and militant interpreters abound in islam way of life.

In the end it is choice of the individual to express his fear in ways that is suitable for him/her. The acceptance that it is not wrong for a person to be afraid will go a long way in helping that person from misplacing his/her faith. Whatever be the explanation, stay away from placing faith on fellow mortal men. Sadhus, Saints, Godmen etc are all sure ways to doom. It is a great deal if we can find human beings that we can love and trust. Faith??? NO WAY....

State of fear

Man lives in a state of eternal fear. Why is this so??

Over the ages evolution has occurred by a process of survival and selection by nature as Darwin said. But when seen in a microcosm life exisits when an entity takes control of a very small bit of the universe. It ceases to exist when the control is lost. A single celled life controls its small bit of universe. As life takes higher forms the entity tries to take control of bigger bits of the universe. Predators marking their territory, birds making a nest are all attempts at taking control. The bigger the extent of control that the organism wants to exert, it develops a greater propensity to fear for that control to stay. If you observe the world a bit more closely you will realize this point. Mankind being at the forefront of evolution as we would all like to think, has the tendency to try and control every single thing that he can perceive. You can see that everywhere. People want to control weight, complexion, traffic, speed, other animals, fellow men/women, products people buy, channels people watch and the list just will go on endlessly. Every man/woman wants the world/universe to behave exactly as he/she wants. In short mankind wants control to be absoulute and everyone wants to be God. As a result the fear of losing control is also eternal. Every single action that is happening in the world is a result of people trying to take control of whatever they feel is not in control. They fear for it every single moment of their life.

Man is identified through the way that fear is expressed. When man is able to channel that fear he ends up being "successful" or in terms of a relative statement the fellow mankind see him as someone who has achieved greater control on his exsistence than themselves. Hence that man has less to fear and hence considered "successful". When man panics because of the fear he starts requiring assistance to overcome the fear. I would term that assistance as "Faith" in something. That faith could be religion, violence, gluttony, drugs etc. Man tends to fill himself with whatever he chooses to be his faith to crowd out the fear that he has.

Over the ages man has tried to find the right kind of faith that can keep him in balance. But in the end finding the right faith has become a source of fear for man. I wish all of you to find the right faith and become less fearful (meaning more successful).

--

As thought by me after watching a regional channel making an expose on one of the Godmen thriving in the country. What makes people to get to such state??

Put your faith on anything in this universe other than a fellow man. Remember he is in the same state of fear. A rock will do more to assuage your fear. There is more merit in idol worship, even though it seems insensible.

Rin vs Tide :: Analysis

I guess many of us have had an opportunity to attend campaign meetings during elections. Before the main political leader for the meeting speaks there will be quite a few speakers lambasting the opposition for its inadequacies. In the end if you time the proceeding you will find that pareto principle makes a cameo appearance here also. Eighty percent of the time the talk is about the opposition party and only twenty percent devoted to do justice to self.

The new Rin commercial does that. Till the closing few seconds the ad talk only about tide. In fact the first time I thought i was watching a new ad for Tide. It is too early to gauge the benefit the ad had brought for the Rin brand, but for all the money spent for the ad it has given good publicity for Tide brand too. So whatever be the benefit for Rin the money spent on the ad is not well spent. This kind of a stunt would have benefited a smaller brand which is craving for awareness but not so much for Rin where publicity is not the objective. Even though gaining publicity couldn't have been the main objective of this commercial when visualized in the hallowed chambers of the marketing giant, I think that is the only end that this ad has achieved is publicity.

As far as the claims made in the commercial go I think they do not hold any weight whatsoever. Consumers are very realistic when it comes to shampoo,detergent and fairness cream advertisements. They realize that SFX used for these ads are state of art and compare to that in Avatar. So comparing whiteness is a very relative test which can not yield decisive results. The lack of clear details makes the claims look manipulated.

Overall the campaign falls flats and has earned negative points for Rin and some windfall points for Tide. The marketing gurus at HUL could have found better use for their budget and spent the money well.....

R

Looking Into minds.....

I have always wondered about how some people think? For instance what goes on in the mind of Vishwanathan Anand as he is planning his moves. How does he formulate his strategy? What does Sehwag think when he is at crease? How does sachin go about inside his head as to his next shot? The thoughts inside Schumacher as he is doing his laps..... I will definitely like to get an opportunity to experience and I do realize that it is just a fantasy and will not exactly be possible.

But what if I find a portal, just like the movie Being John Malkovich, through which it is possible to enter the minds of such people and see what is happening there? What kind of a learning will you get if this was possible? I am not talking about invading the mind and influencing the actions of the people but to be able to view the thoughts that lead to the decisions these people make. It is like you sit at a vantage point and see the small conferences and discussions that the cells make before performing an action. It will be so thrilling.

Even if my fantasy does not come true, sometime I would definitely love to observe such great people from a very close view point and figure out what makes them click???

One of the best write-up about Sachin double

Sambit Bal - On CricInfo

Sachin Tendulkar’s record-breaking didn’t stop on the field on February 24. He shattered many on Cricinfo. We recorded 45 million page views that day, and our highest number of unique users in India and the United States. The match report for the Gwalior ODI became Cricinfo's single most read piece of content.
It has always been so. If evidence was ever needed to confirm Tendulkar’s status as the world’s most-adored cricketer, it can be found in our logs. Month after month, year after year, he remains the most-searched cricketer on Cricinfo; by a huge margin, his profile page is the most visited player page on the site; and in any given month, headlines (often more than one) featuring his name are among the top 10 on the site.
Among other things, he also broke a couple of our servers that day.
Trust me, we make serious contingency plans for peak moments, and certainly we have never underestimated your love for Tendulkar. But obviously, there is no accounting for it. As he stood a couple of runs away from making history, so many of you logged in together that our servers blinked. It was a desperate few minutes, but in a sense, it was also a moment of vindication of your faith in us. Many of you got on Twitter to vent your frustration, and there was one post that stood out: “You know you are large when you crash Cricinfo.”
We hope to be ready for the next peak. We have just ordered some Tendulkar servers.

Publicity- The new age BTL marketing

A lot of debate is being done these days about ethics in news reporting. The press drew a lot of flak for its lack of reposibility during the stand-off in Mumbai. Everything is dressed as breaking news and run a million time till the crux of the issue loses its dignity and becomes a boring by-line. On-site reporting sounds ridiculous and often assumes farcial proportions similar to the scene in the movie " A Wednesday" where a news item is recorded to showcase potholes on roads. Every telecast has experts and laymen presenting their analysis and opinions about anything and everything. All news items theses days use superfluous language to describe the most insignificant piece of news. Where news is supposed to be objective presentation of facts and well researched figures , it is now becoming an assault on ones emotions. Interviews and debates on TV have become fencing matches where the participants try to show their one- upmanship. Such a trend has resulted in a skew in the media space that each news item gets. Insignificant issues receive exponentially high screen space and some news pieces of import get shunted for lack of glamor.

Such a trend in the indian new channels has created a new paradigm in BTL publicity. The basic concepts underlying are what they always used to be but the impact it has over the audience has increased tremendously. As always, what is needed is a scandal, controversy or a standoff. Small modifications and tweaking in the right direction and Voila, you have a mega publicity campaign on your hands. Lets check out this story. An american company launches a new social networking site. They do not have a media campaign at all. A minister makes a comment on the website which is seemingly controversial. Ab-ra-ca-dab-ra and Twitter becomes a household name in the nation and still the company has not spent a dime on publicity.

A super star makes a comment about cricket players of our neighbour which offends the group who are always ready to take offense on anything which really does not concern them. And bingo the new movie of the super star gets so much of publicity that even the biggest of corporates cannot afford such a budget. The "idiot" who had a planned media campaign for his new movie spent a ton and the star who was at the right place at the right time harvested rich wind fall. I guess from now on people should get into agreement with all these self righteous moral , spiritual and theological groups who are waiting to take stand against anyone who even sneezes inappropriately to get publicity. As the cliche goes " There is nothing called bad publicity".

These examples show that those who have gained have done so by default and not by design. So that brings to us the big question " Can such a circumstance be created?

Kutty - Breath of fresh air

After a slew of mediocre movies with some involving plots that are out of ordinary, this movie Kutty with a light-hearted approach towards a time tested love triangle comes as a welcome relief. At the base level there is nothing new about the whole drama but the narration has done the trick and made the movie enjoyable. The fact that this offering from Dhanush comes after duds like pollathavan and padikkathavan did help in lowering my expectation to such a level that a decently nice performance from the dude made the movie seem so much enjoyable. The scene where he drives the jeep singing the popular number from mullum malarum ( senthazam poovil) really won me over.

This movie has again reiterated the fact that a good screen play and fresh narrative is the key to success of a movie. An uncluttered plot, decent music and good humor in the movie has seen to it that the audience do not get bored at any point. Talking of humor in certain sequences were totally hilarious adding to the appeal. Instead of dull looking friends the heroine has good looking females around her. On the whole I started watching the movie with not so good expectations but got a fair deal. A happy movie to watch.....

Aayirathil Oruvan - Review

While watching this big budget Selva Raghavan Pongal release, I got reminded of one particular scene in the movie Ayan where there is this director guy who comes around to Surya and asks him for suggestions on hollywood movies to watch in order to finalise the scene in his movie. For all the originality and crude reality that SR lends to his films, I felt that he went about like the director above after watching AO the other day. Frankly it was a big disappointment for all the hype surrounding it.

The scenes in the movie continually remind you of many adventure/fantasy/grail hunt movies we have watched over the years. The basic ingredient being a "metaphoric treasure" lost through the ages and the clue to whose whereabouts lies hidden in obscure coded manuscripts. This in itself does not lend to the accusation that I have made but going just beyond this most basic requirement you start to find resemblances to the movies like Lara Croft ( Father-daughter archaelogist pair), Alan Quartermain ( Expedition to find a missing loved one who has gone beyond the known realms and possibly found the treasure", Prophecy of a chosen one coming from out to deliver the masses from suffering ( Apocalypto, 10000 BC) , Mummies ( Seven dangers on the path-Seven plagues unleashed) and on and etc.

Given this kind of "borrowing" I atleast hoped that SR would give a strong script to make the movie engaging but there too it falls flat. The narration is a total drag on especially in the second half. The plot itself lacks credibility as the treasure in this case being a " Statue of the housegod of Pandyas" which was taken away by the Cholas. A whole line of descendants of the Pandyas whose life revolves around bringing back the statue stretches the already thin plot to the point of breaking.

But on the whole the movie, especially the first half, brings something new to the average tamil audience not in terms of some message or anything but in terms of showing the female lead in a different light. The dialogues that do not have the euphemesim, ambivalence and conservativeness traditionally associated with tamil movies draw lot of shouts from the audience. The scene in which the two female leads let out a string of expletives was kind of refreshing.

As a movie AO has tried to show the tamil audience something new but has ended up making them restless in the second half. A shorter and crisper version of the movie without so many holes in the plot would have been so much more enjoyable.