20 books which shaped my life

Vikram tagged me for the first time. The deal is, I should list 15 books which shaped my life. I sat down to enumerate. List has reached 20 books but it is not seemed to be complete. Alas, let me put a period here and let me ask my fellow friends to complete theirs. Please tag me again when you tag your friends so that let your favorites suggest me to read them in future.

Along with these books, my study table usually have Kannada-Kannada and Hindi-Hindi dictionaries. I still haven't found the decent online version of them. Do you have any suggestions?

0. Short stories by O. Henry

1. 'Alice in Wonderland' by Lewis Carroll

2. Entire work by Sir P. G.  Wodehouse

3. Harry Potter Series by J K Rowling

4. 'Yayathi - A Classical tale of Lust' by V S Khandekar

5. 'Parva' and 'Aavarana' by S. L. Byrappa

6. 'To kill a Mockingbird' by Harper Lee

7. 'Mankuthimmana Kagga' by D. G. Gundappa

8. 'Mookajjiya Kanasugalu' by Dr. Shivarama Karantha

9. 'Jonathan Livingston Seagull' by Richard Bach

10. 'Maus: A Survivor's Tale' by Art Spiegelman

11. 'Matte Ramana Kathe' by Bannaje Govindacharya

12. 'Mysooru Mallige' by K. S. Narasimhaswamy

13. 'Madhwa Ramayana' and 'Madhwa Bharatha' by His Holyness Sri Madhwacharya

14. 'Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid' by  Douglas Hofstadter

15. 'The Hobbit' and  'The Lord of the Rings' by J. R. R. Tolkien
16. 'Robinson Crusoe' by Daniel Defoe

17. 'Gulliver's Travels' by Jonathan Swift

18. 'Life of Pi' by Yann Martel

19. 'Eminent Historians: Their Technology, Their Line, Their Fraud' by Arun Shourie

 

 

ABCD + 45

A - Age: 28

B - Bed size: I sleep on floor, I dont own any bed.

C - Chore you hate: Doing Laundry

D - Dog's name: I don't!

E - Essential start your day item: I would give it off to my iPhone!

F - Favorite color: A combination of sky-blue and light green.

G - Gold or Silver: Oh boy, neither, I need Saphire... 

H - Height: 5'9''

I - Instruments you play: None; does laptop keyboard qualify here?

J - Job title: go-go boy??

K - Kids: Hell! I just a kid.. Hopefully my parents and in-laws are not reading this piece ;-)

L - Living arrangements: My wify feeds and takes care of me ;-)

M - Mom's name: Malathi

N - Nicknames: Vacha, Hospi

O - Overnight hospital stay other than birth: None, atleast 

P - Pet Peeve: Ignore me!

Q - Quotes from a movie: Kitne aadmi the, Kaaliya?

R - Right or left handed: Right

S - Siblings: 1

T - Time you wake up: It usually changes, currently I get up around 7 - 7:30 am

U - Underwear: I own many, all of different shapes and multi-hued.

V - Vegetable you dislike: None actually

W - Ways you run late: Forgetting to pick up my car key and vallet

X - X-rays you've had: Teeth, teeth and teeth

Y - Yummy food you make: Banana Halwa??

Z- Zoo Favorite: I dont like to see animals in zoos.

45's
1. Do you like blue cheese?
Nope

2. Have you ever skinny dipped?
yeah, many times during my high school.


3. Do you own a gun?
which gun are you talking about ;-)


4. What flavor of Kool Aid was your favorite?
I never drank any!


5. Do you get nervous before doctor appointments?
All the time. Not that I am afraid of injections but I am worried about diet restrictions.


6. What do you think of hot dogs? 
Sounds gross to me!

7. Favorite Christmas movie? 
Polar express? Not again 4-D movie though.

8. Favorite thing to drink in the morning? 
Water, plain a litre of water.

9. Can you do push ups? 
No. I am not athletic. The closest exercise I get is when my neighbor's dog tries to chase me

10.What's your favorite piece of jewelry? 
My ear studs, although I don't sport them anymore

11. What is your favorite hobby? 
I am still thinking it!

12. Do you have A.D.D.? 
What does it mean?

13. What's one trait you hate about yourself?
I talk too much!

14. Middle name? 
Say it names.. I got two!

15. Best Birthday so far? 
I am still thinking!!!

16. Name 3 things you regularly drink: 
Gatoraid, horlics and green tea.

17. How many siblings do you have?
My parents are not super-humans to change the number within couple of minutes. 

18. Current "hate it right now"?
My project deadline!

19. Favorite place to be? 
Manipal

20. How did you bring in the New Year last year? 
Trying to fix my MacBook. I shad screwed it up while updating operating system.

21.Where would you like to go? 
Hawaai, Carrabian islands and Mt. Kailash.

22. Name three people who might complete this? 
Let me think, hmm, upto some extent Vinaya?

23.Do you own slippers? 
Actually a couple of pairs, one is from aeropostale and other one is some old from IIT days.

24. What shirt are you wearing? 
DOS Techies, a free tee shirt which i got last year this time at Austin Conference.

25. Do you like sleeping on satin sheets? 
I wouldnt mind. 

26. Can you whistle? Without spitting on someone? 
I can do it very much. 

27. Favorite color?
Do you think I will change my favourite after typing this never ending questionair!!!

28. Would you be a pirate? 
I could, if you promise me to make Jack Sparrow my colleague.

29. What songs do you sing in the shower?
Idu elelu janumada luv?

30. Favorite girl names? 
Sharmista, Krithika, Rohini and Madhulika

31. Favorite boy names? 
Karthik, Rahul, Aniketh and so on!

32. What's in your pocket right now? 
A rather soiled handkee and my reynolds pen.

33. Last thing to make you laugh? 
You don't need any.. You need something to stop me laugh!

34. Cars- stickshift, auto or tiptronic? 
Ofcourse stickshift baby!

35. Worst injury you've ever had? 
I hurted my right arm very badly in 10th standard when I was riding my friend's cycle.

36. Do you love where you live? 
I don't have any other option.

37. How many TVs do you have in your house? 
None, But I own a projector and a couple of laptops!

38. Who is your loudest friend? 
Vinay Agarwal, there is no doubt about it now!

39. Do you have any pets? 
Nope

40. Does someone have a crush on you? 
How does it matter now!

41. Your favorite book(s):
Actually many, Alice in Wonderland, Mankutimmana kagga etc!

42. Do you collect anything? 
Memories in which some are sweet and some are not!

43. Favorite Fashion accessory? 
Belt?

44. What song do you want played at your funeral? 
It doesnt matter to me then!

45. What are you listening to right now? 
Lattoo from Ghajini...

Whom shall I tag? Kislay do you got time?

A dozen things which make me roll my eyes

I read a post on my Vikram's wall about his 15 things that makes him roll his eyes. Inspired from there, here goes a shorter list which annoys me the most.

0. People who take no pride in their culture or integrity. They totally turn enagmatic to me, when they have no single sentence to describe their heritage. This also extends to people who can't talk their mother-tongue/local language. You get thousands in number who can't understand/speak kannada even they were born and brought up in bengaluru.

 

1. Men may be from mars, women are from Venus. But the fact is men are good at macro-managing and women are at micro, of course with some exceptions. Now lets respect that. But just because you are a man and if you try to show your power on fairer sex, who are also known as MCPs, you turn-me off.

2. Hypocrites who talk nonsense just to prove that they are secular. You are not a racist if you say "Ajmal Kasab is a muslim". This is also applicable to Varun Gandhi. For the good or bad, you threatened to chop their hands if they hurt hindus. When the law-maker came in between, you try to escape with replacing hindus with the Indians. Sad part is people fall for it.

3. People who call their quixstar business as life-savior during this economy. Just an interesting observation that  I haven't been approached by these salesmen for quite a some-time now. May be I should thank to my orkut self-description. "Please stay away from me if you have any 'quickstar' proposals. I have no interest for you guys.

4. Anyone who spend more time in front of the mirror than actual time of the jaunt. Hope my wife is not reading this piece ;-)

5. Any forward which tries to scare the shit out by warning if not forwarded within ten minutes to dozen scapegoats, that would invite a dozen more curses for next twenty years..

6. People who update their Facebook status messages every ten minutes. I am least concerned about you are feeling bored or took metacine after your last meal. 

7. Pick-up lines. All forms of them which men use to impress women (or men in some cases ;-)) or vise-versa.

8. People who feel cartoons are only for kids. Go and have a life guys..

9. Anyone who sends me an email written in a short hand. "Hw r u doig my swthrt?" "O dear, tht mst B 4 me rite?"

10. People who wonder vegetarians do not have any options. On the extension it also mesmerizes when someone who think idli, dosa, chutney and the sambar are the only food items available in south india. Hello, the number of diferent varities available is more than you can actually count.

11. Just that you spent in USA for couple of weeks doesn't give you right to doctor your pronunciation which is difficult to follow.

--
Stay beautiful,
Venkatesh Acharya

'Do you know,' said a thoughtful Bean, 'I'll bet that if all the girls Freddie Widgeon has loved and lost were placed end to end—not that I suppose one could do it—they would reach half-way down Piccadilly.'
'Further than that,' said the Egg. 'Some of them were pretty tall.'
-Young Men in Spats; P.G.Wodehouse

Testing

I heard a lot about someone able to post their blogs by simply sending an email. I am trying that feature now. Let me see whether that is really true.

--
Stay beautiful,
Venkatesh Acharya

'Do you know,' said a thoughtful Bean, 'I'll bet that if all the girls Freddie Widgeon has loved and lost were placed end to end—not that I suppose one could do it—they would reach half-way down Piccadilly.'
'Further than that,' said the Egg. 'Some of them were pretty tall.'
-Young Men in Spats; P.G.Wodehouse

!!!!

It has been more than six months. Ajmal Kasab was shown on national television spreading terror with his shoot-out in public. There were more than 160 people died including 17 police personnel. After all these, even today someone needs to recognize the dress he wore that day, AK-47 rifle used by him. Does anything make any sense? That means the photograph all the leading newspapers published have no regard, all the footages telecasted by the national leading channels will have no value. A clear cut case is taking so long time, imagine how long it will take for cases like Aarushi murder or Rizwanpur Rahman murder cases which involved influenctial people in them.

Have we really lost it?

Few days ago, I came across an article in timesofindia about bomb attacks in india in past ten years. Interestingly the author had completed the list with no reference on any attacks in jammu and kashmir. Well, it is shame but i am afraid that in due course of time, this bias will turn towards on every attacks in india. when people in mumbai turn up in their work place tomorrow pretending nothing has happened yesterday, the media will cover this as spirit of mumbai, they cant be defeated etc etc.. it is not spirit, it is the hunger of a middle-class man drags him back there.. His soul has been crushed real hard a long time ago.

Have we really lost it? Do we have no other choice other than acting like a cowards? Does our india really need a Prime minister like Narendra Modi ? 

Firstly, the creators of the indian constitution ( or medial-cut-and-copy-paste-experts) didn’t do a right thing by calling India a secular state. If Pakistan was already declared an islamic nation, what was the problem in calling this country a hindu nation? 

Who said, terrorism has no religion, month by month a load of islamic terrorists are attacking the fabric of india and shamelessly they are accepting the brutal felony. And even then no one muslim  is openly condemning the attack. What a shame. 

Now, the another major threat to indian fabric is a set of people from our own community, so called secularists.I would call them nothing but psuedo-secularists.. P-secs. I really dont understand who are they trying to appease. Terrorists are blowing the bombs everyday as if that day was a deepawali and these people start blaming the government or another, but assume a muslim criminal is beaten by a fellow criminal who happens to be a hindu, in a jail, next day an open letter will be in my inbox. there is a more danger to our society from these p-secs than those dick-head terrorists.

Lastly, My blood is boiling, my senses are going haywire. But at the same time I am worried and much more worried. If the government doesn’t do anything instead start blaming on each other states, then few extreme right wings of the society will take the law in their hands. In the words of “Francois Gautier  “ “When the Mahatma's cowards erupt in fury, it hurts.” But the grey area  between terror and retaliation is very narrow and it takes no time to cross the border. And then it hurts real bad to society or to the country.

All the views below are mine, if it hurts the sentiments of muslim community or so-called p-secs, I really don’t care. If you are a moderate Muslim, and you think islamic terrorism is a cancer in your community, then act on it.. do not start arguing back with me.

Obsessions Addictions and Quirks

Kislay tagged me once. I tried to finish that blog but later my laziness overpowered everything.. that post is still halfway.. Hope to finish sometime soon! But I decided to complete this piece when I saw his blog today.. And I think I will finish today before hitting the sack.

1. Numbers : I am obsessed with prime numbers. May be because they are unique or may be because my lucky number is a prime number!! i have a friend whose hobby is to write prime numbers on a sheet.. at some point of time he had written upto 6 million.. we used to check randomly whether some number is a prime or not using a C-code... i havent found a fallacy in his list yet!!! I don't know where he has reached now! 

2. Indian History: is my obsession from couple of years now... Now I can understand how people like Romila Thaper is screwing the generations of our country and thus our country. People if you haven't read "Eminent Historians -  their technology, their line and fraud" please do it when you find time. Another person, I love is SL Bhairappa, for his Parva, Aavarana. (AvaraNa - I need to write about it sometime ) Too many things to do, so less time amidst my time-pass activities.

3.Order and Method : I basically can't keep things tidy. For this the partial credit goes to my mom, who took care everything till I turned 21. I take no times to spread stuff on my table. Vinaya wants now two extra rooms in our home and one will be filled with my books and another will be with my clothes.

4. Signature : Another interesting yet may-be-problematic my characteristic quirk that unknowingly I start signing everywhere if I am given a paper , pen and free-time. 

5. Food : I love cooking foods, I love feeding others.. The cuisine hmm, I am not that specific as long as the food is vegetarian :) I don't really like 'junk' food that much but my loud take on anything have made  wrong notions about me! when I took  a piece of pizza on Shilpa's defence day, aravindh asked me whether I ate pizza.. It may be because I lecture everyone about my "healthy" preferences and ofcourse central market story.. I used to like sweets, in all forms, but being a new calori-freak, now I only like feeding others.. But I wont mind, tasting them a little ;-)

6.Bookstores : I spend considerable amount of money on Books, when I cross Half-Price Books, I feel like turning my face away. But every-time I end up spending minimum $10.00 there!!! Let us not talk about frequency of this "everytime" because I know my wife will read this blog and she has taken over my mom's responsibilities these days.. And chauvinistic enough "I am open to all suggestions as long as they are mine".

7. Traditions : I respect some  traditions which I sense meaningful. In most parts of Southen India there is an interesting custom of giving vermilion (I should say Kumkum, because vermilion means red pigment made from mercury sulphide.. our kumkum made from termeric with calcium hydroxide.) Symbolically speaking it is meant to be saying "Wish you all the best". There is no wrong in finishing the good wishes verbally. But this custom makes us different from others. When we have a rich unique culture it is our responsibility to keep it alive. Some of my requests may annoy my wife, but sooner or later she realizes what I am trying to ask her, and she obliges with open heart..

7. Soda : Another my quirk! Can anybody believe if I say that I have never tasted a coke or coco-cola, carbonated beverages which contain cocoa..  When I was in india, pesticide breakdown in these beverages prevented me from tasting them, but in USA, somehow I preferred sprite or mountain dew over others.. 

8. Apple-philia : I own MacBook, iPhone, ipod, ishuffle and now fancy owning an iMac. Do I need to say more?

9. Naming my gadgets : I have another freak for naming my gadgets. My bike in india was Mooshaka. My macbook is named Krithika, namesake of my first and probably last hard-diary!! My Canon S2IS is christened DarpaNa, I call my pendrive Kalasa and external hard disk Kanaja. KoLalu is my iPod-nanno and last but not the least Raayasa is nothing but my new iPhone.

10. Unexplainable attraction for Trash :  PhD comics told me once, as a graduate student you research ( used here as verb ) when you don't have anything else to do. I realize how true it is :)

Recent thrash to which I was addicted to was MTV Roadies 5.0, the reason why it is a trash, is worth another blog. 

11. Travel : I love traveling, Time more than money prevents me from often trips. But Alaska, colarado were the great trips of recent times :) Bolivia, cancoon, Europe are the destinations in pipeline for me :)

Whom Shall I tag along.. let me know if you need that help from me :)

Havent watched "Jaane tu ya jaane na" what are you doing here?

When Jai ( Imran Khan) sings “Tera Mujse koi naata” to Aditi( Genilia ) in Airport in the climax scene, you wont start comparing his voice with Kishore Da who rendered that awesome song in late 70’s, instead you just cant stop bringing a smile on your face. First thing first, I loved the movie. Amir had done his homework right. Perfect casting, perfect editing and perfect product.

As name suggested the movie “Jaane tu ya jaane na” is a story of two best-of-the-best friends in their early twenties and made for each other couple and still unaware of their feelings to each other. Instead they try to find partners to each other. They take all three hours before admitting that they indeed made for each other. It is not story which attracts you instead the the gang of six crazy, lunatic people make it work like a magic.

First of all my favorite among the all is Jiggy patel. He is the ‘biggest’ clown in the gang. He invites himself for his “surprise birthday party” and of-course acts totally surprised when people wish him “Surprise, wish you happy bday”. If you happen to watch the movie again, please watch his acts exclusively in “Kabhi kabhi Aditi” song, then you will know why is he my favorite. When he says “Visa sabko aise thode hi milta hai” you should watch glow in his eyes. I am sure that his Su’sa’nth diction will catch onto youth out there in undergrad.

“Bombs ke plane ke take off ke liye do runways lagte hain” so says Aditi to sushanth, her fiancee in the movie. Couple of reels later when Jai crashes into airport security check-in area, she utters “Woh Jai hain na? woh bhi America jaa raha hai?” with her eversmiling face, you will wonder whether two runways were enough for her? LOL.. Somebody has said “Never frown, because you never know when someone will fall in love with your smile” now I know, I have already fallen in love with her smile. Smile works baby, it works.

Sharleen, intelligent girl in the group, who understands everyone in the group, has there for anybody in need is very well played by Sugandha. Rotlu, who annoys at the same time amuses by his rendition ‘Tu hi re’ to his newly found girl-friend ”bombs”.

Why do you think works of ‘Nasuruddin Shah- Shabana Azmi’, ‘Faruk Sheik-Deepti Naval’, ‘Shahruk-Kajol’ work magically on screen? Because most of the times, the it works ‘magically’ due to their on-screen chemistry. And of-course the Imran-Genilia did look like they knew each other for ages, and the magic happened. Imran may not able to bowl the ball as fast as his namesake, but his naive candid down-to-earth attitude, strikes you with couple of reels on screen. I always liked Genilia from “Boys” days.. She got stuff in her. She doesnt act, she just delivers naturally. The conversation between them, when Jai comes to wish her on her birthday after missing her surprise party, is worth a mention here.

One of the best elements in the movie is Ratna Pathak Shah. She is always best from her “Idhar Udhar” days. When she delivers with “hoot” worthy “Phone pe beta phone pe” nobody cant stop loving her. “Honto pe seeti, chaal pe uchaal, maanjla kyaa hai beta” gives an idea how her character has been developed over the movie. My favorite scene in the movie is when Jai informs her that he met Aditi with her fiancee in the party and cries. In the whole sequence, not even once camera focuses on Jai’s face instead tried to capture her view. At a moment you will wonder whether Imran was unable to bring required emotions on his face? but hell No, looking at his acting for more than two hours earlier, it is not that difficult for him. It was the classy touch given by debutant director Abbas Tyrewala; yet not complete stranger to us, we have heard his dialogues in Main Hoon Na, and adorable Munnabhai MBBS; He deserves all the kudos and bravos. If you bump him anywhere treat him on my behalf :)

There were couple of cameos in the movie, Now I am not sure which is my favorite. Was it Nasuruddin shah, who I am sure, had enjoyed playing the small and interesting role ( ofcourse if you are big time harry Potter fan then you will feel nostalgic ), or was it Prateik Babbar, son of late Smita Patil and Raj Babbar, who strikes you with his body language or terse dialogue delivery. He has got it in his genes right baby. Chemistry between him and Genilia is also worth a mention here. I hope to see his full-fledged action ‘on-screen’ soon. Paresh Rawal has given complete justice to his cameo as a police inspector Waghmare. Also as desi cowboys, brothers Arbaas Khan and Suhail Khan added enough spice to fun element in the movie. They can act better than their brother, one and only Sal’maan’ Khan.

A.R.Rehman has given a wonderful music to the film. Usually you wont be fan of his any music when you listen for the first time, It should grow onto you. When you watch the movie, you will total love the music. It wasn’t the case here. You will glue to this music on the first time itself.

The presentation of the movie was new to most of the audience, we have already seen it earlier in Nuvve Kavvali where a set of friends tell a story to a new person about their gang in an airport. Here that new person is Mala, an airhostess whom Jiggy was wooing. I felt Mala was hamming a bit but thats ok, sometimes with the flow some hamming can be tolerated :)

I always thought that movies with completely based on theme “Love” has been always under-rated ( Remember “Ishq Vishq” ). If you didn't like this movie, then definitely you don’t have the right to say “ I love Andaaz apna apna, I watched it more than hundred times” because it has everything that that ever-green classic offered us and we have it here plus some extra bonus. So stop watching it in bhejafry.net instead get it in the right milieu.