Remember the Tazos?

Last week while returning from office, I had this conversation with my friends in the car.. It went from the TV serials we have now which have been aired, since we were at school, to the amazing cartoon shows we watched when we were kids. As the talk shifted to collectibles which we had from the basic pencilbox show-offs, to the pencils which had shifting nib-points, we came across the infamous craze for Tazos during those days.It was the time when 'Lay's' stepped into India and they had this brilliant strategy of giving a Tazo with every bag of potato chips.and the strategy definitely worked.
 The Tazo's was the only true 'collectibles' we had during those days. These round UFO shaped discs beared some cartoon characters in them and some points which was how the tazos and their uniqueness were identified. The rarer the charachter the higher was the tazos worth. Basically the tazo's were meant to be played by having one perpendicular over the other and realeasing one from the other, which when released would fly in a parabolic manner. It also had some short building slots, which when connected can be built into shapes or structures. But none bought a tazo for the purpose of flinging it dumb or constructing weird towers.Tazos were valued more than money and I remember seeing people exchanging around twenty to fifty tazo's for a single rare one. Shops were targeted based on how many rare tazos kids got from them. Some even go for long drives just because his friend got a rare tazo from a shop which was fifteen kilometers away. There were many names for the Tazo's too.. maybe it depended upon region to region varying. the glow-in-the-dark ones were called radium tazo's and there were tazo's with a character similar to Felix the cat which was called as 'Birla' tazo's which was the rarest among all.. we kids those times used to look up at a guy who had more than five or seven of those tazo's with respect and awesomeness.. :)
  It went Viral throughout the Country that at a particular point schools started to ban the usage of tazo's.But out of a sudden the tazo craze went down suddenly to a level that the chips company stopped giving freebies with their bags.and that was the end of it.though many other products came out with similar stuff, nothing was able to even compare with the round plastic discs. ;)

mayakkam yenna

After a long time.. a movie which satisfied me from the beginning till the end.. a feel good movie which had all the ingredients of a modern Tamil film. people critisized the song " kadhal-yen-kadhal" for being so rude on girls with obscene lyrics but its a Tamil film which after a long time puts the heroine on the front seat. the first half focused on how a guy struggles with his passion and career,in the nasty world out there, even though he has a talent. the lead, watches his talent being stolen by a reputed guy and is so helpless having an emotional trauma on the other side. the second half, on the other hand, is completely upon richa. You really doubt that this is her debut. both the leads do a wonderful task when it comes to acting. amazing melange of expressions and actions on every frame.the picturisation of the songs were different but not so appealing. many criticise the screenplay to be lengthy which is quite true, but those gaps are filled by the emotions of the leads. even the supporting actors, do their roles amazingly well. suits the tag well.. "Follow your Heart".. on the whole a must watch.

The tcs story so far... :p

joined TCS a week ago and the initial days of the ILP was good.. a bit of fun and learning combined, along with a sense of being a professional indeed, changes the whole way of life, in which i was quite a few days back.. of course ive seen similar kind of corporate behavior in polaris where i was an intern for a month, but still, a feeling of having a company to be called as mine, and being a part of it is something special. that too, when your company is at the top, it feels to have got the best of all worlds. seems like they have enrolled me into the stream of mainframe, which i am quite happy with coz its a new language or stream to learn, which is totally new to me as it has not even been touched even in the last four years of engineering. people say, learning and teaching of mainframe based subjects are tough as not many people or companies around the world have a mainframe with them and offer services. at the same time, skilled mainframe programmers are also scarce to find upon.
          about the ilp, well.. its quite fun, with the group im in, coz even the guys from other college doesn seem to be so nerdy type.seems well be split into groups of six in the oncoming sessions, in order to do projects and other team based works on ilp. quite exciting actually.well.. people inside TCS say, ILP is the best part of our career. hope its true and the experience gets better.. 

SRV 2 - a day in the life of an SRVian

The day always starts with switching off random alarms.. not once, would you be waken by your alarm but your room-mates' .. not once you would switch off your own alarm but someone else's .. and above all, nobody knows why they keep alarms at all.. it happens to be a habit and nothing more..

 Taking the brush and greeting everyone at the sinks at the bathroom with foam in mouth, and unaware of spitting, asking him, "machi.. inniki yenna testu? " returning to the room for taking the buckets and mugs from under the cot, dragging it all the way to the bathrooms,jus to see that every door has a towel upon it.. its a gesture to say that its occupied.. worse is the feeling that you have, when you see an empty bathroom which has a bucket upon which you have the towel soap and everything, except for the fact, it remains untouched. not many would dare to keep those stuff out and get into the bathroom coz u would be disturbed by the biggest thump and loud bangings on the door you wouldve ever heard in your lifetime ( courtesy, the guy who has them or owns them has so called reserved the bathroom )..

  after all these things and dressing up with the same uniform you wore yesterday,( it was too much to wear a new uniform everyday..  in an all-boys-school who cares?!!).. and now its been so late for your morning test and while rushing to the class, there awaits a whole class preparing with their each and every students' unique technique of copying.. after the ordeal, is the wonderful sumptuous breakfast spread out in front( of course it was a sarcasm..).. 

  returning to the classes which probably boasts of wonderful staff, some of them even not knowing what they are teaching about.. i loved the first day when we had an attender coming into the class, explaining about the school class and all in pure Tamil.. and finally while leaving to all our amazement he said he was the english staff for our class ..( a few know that he was dismissed and chucked out later when he was drunk and while going on regular night rounds he shouted at some students inside the bathroom thinking that was shouting the students in the lobby).. 

 the day ends with the evening tests and some real quality time with your friends in hostel..the alarm of plates falling down, would indicate that its time for your lunch and unless its mushrooms on saturdays, you wont see the crowd rush towards the canteen.. returning back from dinner keeps you in some, one hour of study time,  where the people sit in their chairs and pads to daydream of something peacefully..and often they are signaled by a studious guy who sits outside the room facing the open space within the hostel, updating the current status of  the wardens and the floors they are in.. this followed by the rush for milk at night indicates that its time for bed.. the moonlit open space within the hostel is a place for discussing all those that had happened in the study-hour and bidding good night.. 

SRV 1 - the beginning

SRV Boys higher secondary school, rasipuram namakkal Dt. a school which has 90% of people from other places distant which makes it more of a residential school. Though renowned all over the state for state ranks and toppers, personally, when it came to the academics part, choosing SRV as highschool was the greatest blunder of my lifetime.. I would definitely got a lot more than what I actually got there if I had studied even in a normal school in Chennai ..that too my precious 11th and 12th grades were totally down.. But I got something which no chennai student wouldve got.. Experience.

    There were students from even the remote part of the state, the dialects, way they mingled, their views.. It was then I realised that there was a whole world out there.. It was in SRV i found that English teachers, teach English in Tamil.. Maths can be mugged and spit out in class, you talk utter nonsense irrelevant of the subject and they call you a teacher..I wont blame the whole faculty, but there were a very few teachers, who inspired me though.. but it was just me, as all the rest of them were doing great as well as their academics were concerned.. Coming from a CBSE background I had no idea about the Matriculation curriculum. It was only after staring at the First Physics test that I realised, they had one mark questions in Matric question papers!   

   Academics apart, the school was situated out in the remote part of a neighbouring village.. rasipuram. the scenery and infrastructure was amazing and not to be complained of. It was simply the best ( atleast of what i had seen till then). 25 acres of vast land with a majestic school building at the centre, surrounded by three hostels. a mess and a store were at the background.

 But everything was just an illusion for the parents who feel relieved and satisfied that their son is studying in a prestigious institution.. If not for the friends you make there, SRV was truly a hell.. demons disguised as wardens, a doctor who prescibes medicines for fever, without even touching you,.. maggi with white chutney on fridays,(well.. there was sauce but this was better).. the great rush for mushrooms on saturday night.. time-limit phone calls that didnt even let you say good bye to your mom and dad.. no usage of electrical equipments whatsoever.. no magazines or books of anykind unless it is your Text books.. 7am to 7pm work schedule with tests on morning and evening.. fighting and banging doors for bathrooms and toilets.. sunday morning bread that feels rock-hard.. and to top it all, a barber who knows knows nothing but to shave your head totally and practices his art of hair cutting,leaving your hair in patches,for which you have to wait in a long line..

  It would be a real long story to write so i thought of splitting it up into parts.. and yup.. its quite fun to think those days, rather than being there actually..

Down with Fever

Its been three days since my last post and I have numerous things thats going in my head to write about.. though i consider myself ( and which is quite true,) as to be a not-so-perfect in my posts on expressing what happens really in my mind, i really am working on it.. and out of the blue comes this fever where i cant concentrate on simply anything.. so strange what illness could do to you on a single day.. I can see myself losing weight and eating stuff though im not hungry.. and not to mention these pills.. Man.. The thought of Having Bread and milk itself makes you to so ill and worser.. anyways.. about the stuff that going on my mind.. i really ve to write something about my old school SRV It was the most important thing where i didnt learn any stuff except the concept of whats life is all about.. how to move with people an all.. and there must be a definite post on both of my vehicles which has done a lot to me more than jus getting me here and there.. They were a part of my life actually.. and ya lots more to come.. 

The Midnight Drive

Night drives are always special.. Especially when it rains and its past twelve and you are on quite a long drive.. It happened to me last night and added to all the stuff i said above, I was listening to Ilayaraja.. yup.. was feeling like this drive was some experience of your lifetime that happens when u least expect it.. Actually I had to drop one of my Dads office staff till perungudi, which is quite far from my place.. when my dad asked whether I could, I thought "man.. this is gonna be fun" but well, I wasn't expecting this kinda strong downpour though.. I drive a black Bolero and i felt this was the ride, kinda Built for situations like this..and this my chance to experiment a lot..I was driving on the opposite side of the wind most of the time and had to set my Wipers on the high mode.. The drive was a total gamble.. The drive was more of a prediction, than the actual drive you would have when the things ahead is clear.. I pitied for the two-wheelers and pedestrians especially as it would ve been real hell (how about having yourself drowned in a splash of puddle water every time a car crosses by? :p ) over the night.. I had my battery light flickering then and there on my dashboard, every time I unfortunately Forded my way at some places.. I dunno whether it was right or not but the overhead bridges are closed during night-time, forcing us to take the route below the bridge which would be having 'waterfalls' coming at equal intervals like the ones you see in Avatar (Technically, they come from the side drains you find over the bridges) and not to mention the fact that you eventually get stuck up at the mini rivers that arise on the sides.. as my way was via the IT corridor, Even in that kinda downpour, I could see some of the night-duty travels vehicles( which are usually the cabs software people use) rushing past (well.. ya they always do) but except those, the road was at my disposal totally.. Was having a great time, testing my ride's breaks, suspension and the maneuverability on the wet roads.. learnt quite some lessons too which i would elaborate Separately in my next post..
altogether I really enjoyed the drive except for one occasion, where I had a shudder was when the wiper refused to move.. the water was splashing the windshield making the road ahead into a total blur and kept on increasing with time.. i made a little stop on the side and tried kick-starting the wiper shake manually.. but in vain.. after crossing the toll gate, it got its senses back and came back to the waving motion back again.. Though It was a Two hours drive totally from start to stop but I never felt a bit tired or drowsy at 1 PM..maybe its coz of  ilayaraja or the rain outside which brought me back the happy rainy days of campus life, but the sound of the storm along with the chill breeze is a must-have experience for all..