Weekend Trip - Pics

Here are some of the photos from our weekend trip to Tanjore. Credits to Prabhakar for clicking these. Click on the pic to enlarge them.

1.Thanjavur Brahadiswarar temple

The pic below deserves a tamil description 'பொன்னொளியில் மின்னும் பொன்னியின் செல்வன் கட்டிய இராஜராஜீசுவரம்'



Southern Side of the temple- By Photostitching the individual pics. I'm currently trying to stitch the photos of other temples also. Will update them once completed.


Front View


2.Tharasuram Airavateesvarar Temple

Southern Side of the temple


The entrance to the garbhagraham is beautifully sculpted to resemble a Chariot.


Thanks to ASI - A Before ASI and After ASI picture - from the art gallery inside the temple.



3.Gangai Konda Cholapuram
Front View

Southern Side of the temple as seen from the Inner Praharam

Southern Side of the temple as seen from the outer Praharam

Found Him!!!

A couple of days back we(Bala,Prabhakar and I) were at Tanjore Brahadiswarar temple, scanning the inscriptions on the southern wall of the temple to locate a couple of words - Vallavarayan Vanthiyathevan.After enjoying the sculptures and trying to decode the stories behind those sculptures we set out to search the name of one of the heroes of 'Ponniyin Selvan'. Intially we started searching together, for it was very difficult to map those fonts to our current fonts. Then we split and scanned each section separately but were unable to locate it and finally gave up. But I managed to click the inscriptions on the entire south wall of the temple ,hoping to search it slowly.And now I have finally found him!!!.

Here I present you - the name of my Hero - Vallavarayar Vanthiyathevar-inscribed as in Tanjore temple . Click on the pic to enlarge it(marked with yellow rectangle- The second half of the name is not clear though) I'm really happy to have located his name in the inscription.It was one of the reasons we set out to Tanjore.The effort of painstakingly looking at my monitor and zooming in and out the pics for two hours was not futile in the end.



On the whole it was an excellent weekend.Check Bala's blog for a detailed travelogue.I will soon try to update the other pics as well.

A very big Thanks to varalaaru (a special thanks to Gokul Seshadri) for providing us with all the knowledge about art,architecture,culture,inscriptions etc., that made the trip more exciting. In case you are interested in knowing the history of Tamil kings,temples,Inscriptions etc.,do check out the articles in their portal.

Quotes of the week

Some of the comments,quotes,dialogues that I heard this week and last week.

Opinion of experts in Indo-Pak match

"We were the worst fielding side of all the teams when we won the world cup in 1992. The current pakistan team is also like that'.Mr.Rameez Raja's comments when Sanjay manjrekar asked why is Pakistan's fielding not upto the standard. I donot understand if Rameez agrees that they are not good in fielding or is he trying to say that Pakistan will win worldcup this time.

Mr.Sanjay Manjrekar commenting on Sidhu's exaggeration of Sachins Injury in a Indo-Pak match.'Neither of this like Blood on his shirts,Sachin falling down in the pitch actually happened'.Sanjay we have also heard your comments when Sachin was batting and even a defensive stroke was sometimes overstated by you as an excellent shot before realising that the ball did not go beyond the bowler.

From the Austrailian Open..

Andy Murray after his defeat 'If you people expect me to play well each and every match that I play then its not going to happen'. Andy..Thanks for the clarification. We indeed want you to win atleast one match that you play.Only then we will get to see news columns like 'The no.1 Brit Andy Murray prepares himself for winning Wimbledon' in British media.

Maria Sharapova 'This is one of the hottest days in my Life.Wondering how do you people sit there watching the matches all day long'. hehehe..ecjactly..Totally agree..I myself can feel the heat sitting inside my house and watching you play.Is there any chance of Maria and Hingis playing a match. :-;

Simbu on Madan's Thiraiparvai..

Madan : Simbu, What do you feel about the lengthy dialogues in the movie Saravana. Particularly in one scene you were really good.
Simbu : That was something that is an inherent quality.From the days I started acting in my father's movies I practised this skill. Now I feel comfortable with these lengthy dialogues and even K.S Ravikumar appreciated my efforts.Everybody who saw the film appreciated this.

Oh..ho.Simbu you got them all wrong.Didn't you listen to the first half of the question.Did you see Madan's toon.It was similar to saying that the film would have been a hit if it didn't have those lengthy dialogues.

Best quote of the week:

I didn't get a chance to see captain's movie this weekend, which would have easily been the quote of any day/any week.So it was a tough one..But I feel the dialogue by Shalini's mother in the climax of the movie Kaadhalukku mariyadhai was the best quote of the week.

'Kuttitu pongalen.Yaar venamnu sonnathu'.

Appo ivalavu nerama yaarum yethuvum sollave illaiya.Nalla velai.Naan fulla padam paakala. Illana sema kadupayiruppen.Intha dialogue kekaruthukuthan thevai illama 150 minutes ellorum padam pathirupangalo.

What is that?

Djibril Cisse, footballer playing for France and Liverpool FC. He played yesterday's match against Manu with a similar hair style except for the white bleach.Couldn't get a picture from yesterday's match. The above is the closest to his new - supposedly a hairstyle...yuck..

Keepy Up

Gearing up for FIFA World Cup 2006!!!!!!



Indian express(Chennai edition) reports :Seven-month-old Chellammal the only elephant calf at the Vandalur zoo showcases its skill with a football by balancing it gingerly between its trunk and fore-legs. She arrived at the zoo four months ago and has been training with her favourite toy' the ball ever since.

Even Elephant plays football these days in chennai...wondering why humans dont?? :-)

Sitting in a bus

This post is totally from a guy's perspective. I drafted this post sometime back but then didn't get a chance to publish it.

I travelled to office by company bus for about a week.For me one of the difficult decisions to make is choosing the seat, either the window or the aisle one.It requires lot of analysis before deciding which is a better one considering lots of other related aspects.For those of you who think it is an easy choice read below.

For those Window seat lovers,

In a company bus there is every chance that the people sitting next to you,adjacent to your seat,infront of you, behind you,diagonally opposite to you might all end up to be young ladies(a.k.a aunties).Their topic of discussion is most probably going to be about the best diaper available in the market.Imagine people all around you talking about the advantages and disadvantages of the various brands available in the world explaining every small details. Only thing you can do is to pray that the person sitting next to you do not have any doubts and try to act as if you are sleeping.If it happens in the morning you will have to skip your breakfast and lunch and if it happens in the evening you will have to skip the dinner and next days breakfast.Words from experienced folks suggest that the vomitting sensation will be there for atleast a couple of days.

In case if it rains, water will definitely seep out of the window next to you(at times only next to your window) and as a professional there is nothing you could do when the person next to you is in deep sleep unprofessionally. The summer is more worse.You will be suffocated to death because the person next to you might not allow you to open the window.Simply because the air is so polluted outside which is not good for health, for they have been living all these years in an unpolluted Amazon forest.

Now for those sportsmen who prefer sitting in the aisle seat, probably because of a ligament tear in knee,

There could be a girl standing next to your aisle seat whose looks might suggest you that she is tired and is standing with great diffculty.Trying to be humane you might try to offer them your seat for which the answer you will receive is a strong 'ITS OK' and one of those suspicious look at you, meaning that 'I can stand and what bothers you. Vandhuveengaley jollu vida'.If you have a bit of self-esteem then from the next day you will definitely not come by bus.

What if you had a bit of a fight with the driver about his rash driving.The driver will wait for his chance, the day a girl standing next to your seat without any support.(without holding anything). At that fine moment he will apply the high technology disc brakes in the bus and then bang....the girl next moment will be on you.The damage in this case to the already weak knee ligament is directly proportional to the number of unlimited meals the girl eats during lunch.There is more to it.In case if the anti women harrassment team in your office had already been monitoring your activities then action will be taken against you, once the girl complaints(which again depends on the amount of hair in your head). On the other hand if you are not bald and is capable of sporting Anniyan hair style then there is every chance that you might have to bid adieu to your bachelor life.(pinna..annalum noki..avalum nokinaal..nam thana..nam thana..nam thana in background).

So IMHO the best place to sit in a company bus is either on the footsteps or inside the driver's cabin or on the rooftop.

Hat-trick Heroes

Wow..I was awestruck by the performance of Arsenal over the weekend.Was this the same team that was struggling a week back.It was a beautiful game of football which Arsenal is very well capable of playing it every weekend.But due to some major Injury problems and attitude of certain players they were not upto the mark with their performance.But they came out strongly this weekend and thrashed the depleted Middlesborough with the score reading 7-0.Theirry Henry is the hero for Arsenal scoring a Hat-trick.He is a kind of player who is very good with his dead ball kicks also.He is capable of scoring goals from outside the penalty box, with a clever swirl to the ball.But for me, some of the specatacular goals he scored are the ones that he hits low from the edge of box.A couple of them he scored in this match belongs to that category.As a player(striker) or a viewer the sight of ball rolling on the grass eluding the outstreched hands of a keeper and hitting the net at the back is a wonderful sight to watch.For that matter I like the way (Brazillian)Ronaldo scores these kind of low-shots with ease. He is capable of changing the direction of his shooting foot at the last moment, thereby deceiving the keeper. Most of the times the goal-keeper would just be seeing the ball eluding him under his outstreched hands or legs.Such is the composure of this guy inside the penalty box.
Now to the other great French footballer - Zidane.Thanks to his hat-trick against Sevilla over the weekend that Real Madrid are now in the fourth place in the league standings.Real madrid won the match 4-2.The match review and stats show that Real played very well and the Bernabeu crowd who were whistling them till now, appreciated their performance.(Retelecast tonight at 12.00 in ESS).
Looks to be a good start at home, for both Arsenal and Real who will face each other in a Champions league knock out match in a month's time. I couldn't wait for it.Add to that Barca vs Chelsea.Really mouth watering games at hand if these teams continue to exhibit this kind of form.

Shytype

I met a Shytype today.

For those of you who do not know a shytype - Shytype is a person who can be classfied as a male with all his physical attributes without a doubt(yeah..I mean it..definitely male by appearance),but still has some exceptional qualities that creates the uncertainity in one's mind to really call him a male.So what is this exceptional quality. In very simple terms, these people are totally apprehensive in talking to a guy, but still love talking to the opposite sex - girls, incredibly well, whatever be the situation. We were able to identify lots of people with these qualities during our college days, thats when we came out with this term to name this breed.

It is not that difficult to identify this breed - shytype.Some techniques that we used in our college to identify people belonging to this elite group.

• If you can talk to one shytype for five minutes then you can find out that he usually uses a suffix 'pa' after completing every word in the sentence coupling it with a tune. If you ask a shytype why is he late.His answer will will be 'illa paaa..athu vanthu paaa..naan trainla varumbothu illa paaa...stationla illa paa..oru ponnu illa paa..books ellam keezha pottuduchu paa..athanala paa..naan erangi poi paa..antha books ellam eduthu koduthutu paa..adutha trainla varen paa'.The reason is pretty simple, he might have been used to this kind of talking to all the girls he meet and continues to do the same when a guy talks to him. If you are a guy the hard task here is to make him talk to you atleast for a minute. You might have to talk him in by saying things like that you overheard a girl talking something about him.That might work sometimes.
  

• If you are able to hack a girl's email id/ password, to whom a shytype is usually talking(I dont want to call that flirting.its too big a word for these people.) you can easily find her inbox flooded with a lots of email from shy type. The content is usually going to be something stupid like 'Hey pa..why didn't you say bye before leaving home pa. I was watching you from the crowded third compartment sitting inside the train..but you never looked at me after getting down the train?'. Now what will be interesting is if the girl doesn't respond to this, the shytype will eventually keep sending her an email every 15 minutes with some more stupid stuffs like 'en melai kovama pa','I'm sorry pa', 'please pa..reply pannu pa'. He will be online the whole night waiting for her reply.Beleive me.This is true and has happened during those dial-up internet connection days.He is such a dullard that he wouldn't realise that he has asked a very dumb question.Even at times if the question is valid he wouldn't realise that she is not interested in him or she is sleeping or she hasn't checked his email.
  

• If the shytype travels by train then he will definitely stand outside the ladies compartment talking to his girl until the train starts.He will then run to general compartment and try to board the train while it is moving without understanding the basic laws of physics or inertia and usually hurts himself before getting in.

• If you are not capable of identifying a shy type using the above methods then you can try this.This should be pretty easy. During a lunch session you can find this bloke sitting near a girl(Usually the girl will be sitting in the chair and this fellow will be sitting on dining table) and talking to her, while she is trying to eat her lunch.You can try slogans like 'Do not do these things here, Go to a park or a Beach(Ithellam poi beachlayo parklayo vechukoda)', he will not be bothered.He will still talk without heeding to you.Even doing things like hitting a stone on him or banging the table wont help.In case if the girl is not interested you feel sorry for her fate, but if the girl is interested then you will pity their parents and the junior shytype to be born.
  

So these are the exceptional qualities - though he might look physically alright but still he will definitely lack the pride,dignity and self esteem that a guy usually commands.If you are a guy you can have a hearty laugh, if you are successful in making a shytype talk to you.If you are a girl then beware of these blokes.In my opinion it could be more of a trouble.

Now to the shytype I met today , he looks to be a college student, talking to some girl on his cell phone and I could clearly hear 'hey hey please paa..phona cut pannatha paa..Nee cut panninalum naan marupadiyum marupadiyum phone pannuveney..'.aiyoo.aiyoo... Ivangellam eppo thaan thirunthuvangalo.Until then if you get a chance to meet one, you are guaranteed a hearty laugh.

Real and ManU suffer goalless draw

Real Madrid were held to a 0-0 draw at Villareal in their first primera liga match of 2006.Beckham and Garcia were suspended and had to sit out while the rest of the team was available for selection. I didn't get a chance to see the match yet, infact a repeat is scheduled tonight at 12,as per ESPNSTAR Tv times. Hopefully i'll be able to watch it. Getting up in the middle of night with the help of an alarm to find the match not being shown will give one the sickest ever feeling.The sad part of the match is Ronaldo getting injured in the half hour mark.He is pretty much now essential for Real Madrid to bounce back in to the league.
I was watching the second half of the FA CUP third round match between Burton Albion and Manchester United. The commentator was saying Burton is almost 100 ranks lower than ManU, obviously teams belonging to different league.Its something like Australian cricket team playing against some Dubai Cricket team.It was one of those matches in which one of the teams would have been very happy even if they lose by a three goal margin. Imagine what would happen if such a team holds on to draw the match.Such was the celebration when Burton drew against ManU.
Burton went on full defense in the second half, at one point I saw Rooney alone surrounded by four-five defenders in the six yard box when he had the ball.(But this guy still kept the ball and tried to lob it over).The penalty box was always pretty much crowded.Be it they defended or attacked,credit has to be given to the Albion team for sticking on to their game plan and sweating it out. The pitch on the whole was very hard like those one gets to see in First class Indian football and the ManU players found it hard to adapt to the bounce and roll of the ball.And Mr.Silverstre why in the world are you trying too much of aerial passes(long passes) when you know that Ruud is not playing. Whenever Mr.Richardson got a ball he almost ran on to the defenders of Albion. Not sure what is the hurry. I'm not a great fan of ManU, and so wasn't upset, though I enjoyed the match pretty much after the introduction of Rooney. Had United reduced the tempo of the game and controlled the ball possession, they would have won it.Now Burton face ManU at Old Trafford in two weeks time, eventually ManU will win there. But for now its celebration time at Burton Albion.

The SMS about SMS

'Hi. Effective 3rd Jan 2005, you can enjoy 100 SMS free per day. Additional SMS beyond 100 per day will be charged @ 20P'.
I got this message from hutch.

First of all i'm not an avid cell phone user.The only reason I bought it was to give my mobile number to the job consultants when I was planning to quit my job.I was not so mean to use my office telephone for attending phone interviews.But nowadays it substitutes my watch be it for checking time or setting alarms and occasionaly I do use it for messaging/talking.

So for me 100 SMS free per day looks to be like too much of an offer.Infact i'm not sure what is my current plan and how much is charged for an SMS.Thanks to the dictionary feature in the cell phone otherwise I would have gone crazy typing messages in it.Obviously I was surprised, will someone be able to send close to 100 messages per day.

But as I was speculating, I was reminded of this college goer whom I saw in the station(I mean Railway station) sometime back. She was messaging someone, typing using both her hands on a cell phone key pad, at a speed which will be easily 100 times faster than whatever I can type at my fullest concentration. It was amazing.(I'm unbiased,this is a compliment for her skill).The immediate question that came to me, do they have any special training institutes to help people learn to type in a cell phone like typewriting institutes.I guess these skills come by practice.And no wonder then, Hutch might even go on to make lots of profit.

Bison

This post is not related to the ad that we used to hear in All India Radio few years back.But about this news I saw in Indian Express(chennai edition) about a Bison giving birth to a calf in Vandalur Zoo.

Some three years back when I went to Vandalur Zoological park,I got the oppurtunity to see an Indian Bison at close proximity. I was struck by the enormity of the beast at my first sight. Infact all three of my friends were gaping at the beast discussing about the size of its leg and head, while the Bison was majestically standing near a tree. The guards who supply food to the animals there told us that there are also a couple more bisons in the zoo.I never beleived it and assumed that its just another statement to attract more visitors.But now the above news confirms whatever that guy said :-).

Two years back when I was away to Coonoor, I got another oppurtunity to see the beast , this time on a village road.The whole village has gathered on one side of the road with the Bison parading on the other side of the road without giving a damn to the whistles and shouts of the on lookers.In fact one of my friends with a camera in his hand ran for almost 100-150 meters to get a snap of it.Such was the pace of the animal.

The third time I saw the Bison was somewhere in the Kodai to Munnar Trek trail. He was peacefully grazing when we hid ourselves behind some thick trees. Suddenly the Bison realised that he is being watched, then exactly turned towards us, looked at us and then started running. The last act surprised me.I didn't expect an animal of such a tremendous size to sprint away from some 5 guys whose collective weight will not be more than the weight of one of its leg.If you are lucky enough you can sight one or two in Kodai and they will neither run away nor attack you(under normal circumstances).

The guide who accompanied us then clarified that Bisons are being hunted in those areas.I was told that poachers used to come in Jeep and hunt these animals, obviously for their skin,meat and horns.Every now and then when we were walking we could hear some trees being rattled, deafening footsteps near us all because that Big beast was scared of us and is running for its life. It scared the hell out of us ..what if it misjudged the sound and came running towards us.Fortunately nothing like that happened and infact we didn't see any other animal throughout the next day.

Coming back to the article, I was indeed very happy to see this news,(infact the paper had a picture of the calf, but I dont see it in the website). This might appear silly to some of you, but had you been in the middle of the forest and seen this huge Bison running for its life in its own habitat then you might as well appreciate this news.

'Give it to me'

I would have been more happy had the kid on the road playing cricket stopped with the above words.

It was a beautiful saturday evening perfect for a game of football. I was waiting outside my friend's house to pick him up.There were a few kids playing cricket on the road. It so happened that the batting kid hit the ball towards me and I caught it. The kid at the bowling end then shouted 'Give it to meeee - Uncle'. huh..'Unclea naana..adede pheel panna vachitaney pa..velayada porappave ippadi solraney'.

This is not the first time somebody called me uncle.But for sure the first time when I was wearing my football outfit with shorts,jersey and shoes.That was the piece that surprised me.I looked at myself and wondered why.

Just then my friend came out of the house chuckling 'Freeya vidu..appave sonnen vazhukai theriyara mathiri hair cut pannathadannu. Kaetiya..Yetho DCH,1/2 inch cut, mudi kottudhu appadinnu solra..Paaru antha kutti payan kadasiyile unna 'mama' va aakitaan...Nee enna than football velyadinalum..ithayellam maraika mudiyathu..avan enna paathu solrathuku munnadi vaa kelambalam'. I cannot argue with him as whatever he said was 100% true.

So another year passes by and I'm still as young as I was at the beginning of 2005 mentally, but may be not physically.

Wish you all a very Happy,fun filled and fabulous 2006.