~~Dubai epicenter of growth~~

Fondly called as city of gold ,growth Dubai has achieved during the past the twenty years is really amazing. What is more surprising is the fact oil exports which contributed most of its GDP during late 80's ,today is just accounted for 6 % of its GDP. Most of the money comes from real estates, tourism and other business establishment who found this a better place to do business. Another fact I came across Dubai account for more number of tourists than the number of people visit India every year.
Ten years before when any of my friends or relatives travelled to US they would choose their pit stop either London or Frankfurt but now days I see lot of people choosing Dubai as their stopover.No complains when u can spend wonderful in airport which has a city inside.
All credit goes to intelligent Shiekh who realised that his country cant sustain just depending on oil alone, there by wisely divertingthe profits got from oil to turn this desert into a modern world marvel.

Running out of topics

Weekdays are pretty uneventful and when I try to sit down to blog and think what to write nothing comes to my mind, its the same old routine work I do in office which fills the mind ,if at all there are some extraordinary incidents which happens once or twice in a month at workplace. So I thought why not I take some bizarre topics and write my opinion but my heart says I m lazy enough to take up a task like that. So apart from pasting few forwards I m planning to scrible something on my own. Being a software engineer hope I dont end up copying pasting opinion also.

~~shopping with Ladies~~

Today I went for shopping with my cousin and grandma,reason for shopping is to get dress for my aunt. I thought since these ladies are going to select the dress for a third person they will finish the job soon.
But as soon as my cousin entered the shop she forgot the main intention of coming there,she was looking like a hungry tiger looking for the right prey looking around the shop for a right dress of her choice.This went on for more almost two hours still she wasnt satisfied with the right fit. I realised this is an never ending process so I took few stuffs for my aunt and signaled her it was time to leave. She said she didnt like any of the stuffs,while leaving out the blue she found a piece of cloth and said she needs that ,it took another 15 mins for her to try that out and get it finally.
Oh man even a snail can cross the road in the given time these people choose their dresses, tests your patience a lot but no other go we need to get used to it!

~~3 stupid stages of life~~

Got this forward today


We have 3 stupid stages of life………..

Teen age:
Have Time + Energy …but No Money

Working Age:
Have Money + Energy …but No Time

Old age:
Have Time + Money …but no Energy

Book I read..

Last week I went to landmark my usual hangout spot whenever I get bored, this time I was looking for books which were written with some amount of humour at the same time gives some useful info. I got four books titles given below.
a)Welcome to advertising now get lost
b)Project management-A comedy of errors (planning to give to my PL ;))
c)Rigged
d)The Mahatma and the Monkeys

Over this week I completed reading the book about advertising ,it was written by a young chap named Omkar Sane. What I liked was his style of writing Sarcastic and cruel to the core such that he ensures that he never gets ajob in Ad world again.

Book takes us through a normal process which happens in the ad world but how things get messed up in each and every stage and also how the designated people prove their authority over each other. There are places where you feel pity for the people working in the ad world. Its pretty difficult task to write a book with filled with humour from beginning to end,mocking each and every process,clients,managers,artist etc,I never felt bored at any stage.It really needs some guts to write a book like this .

I recommend this to people who really want to have some good laugh.

PS: Krishna if you by any chance read this Blogpost do get this book!!!

Eclipse time again!

Today morning I was eagerly waiting to see the sun getting overshadowed by the moon but unfortunately weather was cloudy that i could neither see the sun nor the moon's shadow over it.

I started to office as usual but my bus didnt arrive on time , realised the driver bunked for the day because of the eclipse.When I reached the office it was nearly empty most of the people were missing. Seems they were caught in the traditional belief to come out of the house only after the eclipse got over. Surprising to know even in 21st century people still have this belief or they might taken this as a chance to come late to office.Who knows there is no way to prove these stuffs.

I remembered my good old days when my dad took me out on an eclipse day ,he took a mirror covered it with a white paper and made a small pointed hole in it.Then he slided the mirror pointing to sun in such a way that the reflection fall on the wall.I was thrilled to see the sun Shadow looking like moon's.I kept on staring at the wall until the whole eclipse got over.

Nature shows it beauty in different ways and eclipse is one of them!

~~SMS Quote~~

Love is not about expressing with heavy words.Its about understanding,a gentle touch and a pure heart.

Friendship is to laugh about the nonsense said above!

~~List of all Tamil movies~~

I was googling for few foreign language movies with search titles 'Best French movies', 'Good German movies' I was getting few titles and reading reviews regarding those movies.
Then with curiosity I tried what google would return for best tamil movies and sure it didnt disappoint me the 1st link I got was a WIKI link where I could not only find the best movies but all the movies taken from 1930's. No wonder Indian film industry produces more films than any other in the world every year.

~~Glued to Prison Break~~

When I dont have anything interesting experiences to tell what I normally do is post some forwards or link some videos or upload some pictures. This weekend I was in a similar situation dont know what to write,didnt have any good forwards nor interested to browse for pictures or videos.Moreover I was watching Prison break which has an unbelievable theme making us believable, its taken in such a manner you cant wait to watch the next episode, I started watching the 1st episode friday night and finished seeing all the 22 episodes by 3 am today morning.

Book I read..

Last week I read a book titled True stories from India s BPO and call centers, which is a collection of incidents happened in that industry over the past few years. Even though IT revolutionised India during late nineties ,it was the BPO industry which created job opportunities in plenty at every levels from graduates,English speaking trainers,cab drivers,caterers,security guards etc .




Book deals about incidents happened during the wee work hours , office politics, wild parties, well networked cabbie drivers. Each one is different from other which makes it little interesting. I have linked a sample story here. All in all it was a good time pass.

Bad experiences with mobile phones

When it comes to mobiles I never kept one properly for more than a year and always its the mobile which starts to behave erratically after sometime. First was my nokia mobile which on one fine day started blinking like a flash light and nothing came on the display, I spent few bucks on formatting it but the same problem occurred again and again. This pain ended when my friends threw me along with the mobile in the beach and the mobile succumbed to drowning in sea water. Then I got a Motorola KZR which was working fine until one day no sound came from it.When taken to service center they said there is no problem with the speaker but the mother board got corrupted.Since it was under warranty I got it replaced for free but it was giving problems then and there mainly by not ringing when it matters the most. This mobile also faced a similar fate when it got drenched in the rain while I was frantically calling my dad to let him know that his new car has been smashed up by a big tree.

Finally I got a Sony ericsson w series mobile last year, it was a cool companion during my bus rides to office,used to hear songs all the way. It too had performance issues by shutting itself down when we try to multitask it, for eg.
a)when you are playing a game or listening to songs when a call comes asking for you need a credit card .
b)When you are trying to take a picture and suddenly an sms comes asking you whether need to latest information on cricket scores.
c)When it desperately tries to search for signal and we ask it do a different operation say want to see the time.
d)Whenever it works properly for more than a week ,signaling me it needs a break.

Today I dont know what I did to it suddenly it got switched off ,alas its never turning on again. Its early to decide what to do next ,getting a new mobile is still an option which I m sure will lead to a vicious circle.

Quote-For a successful democracy!!!

In the 21st century, capable, reliable and transparent institutions are the key to success — strong parliaments and honest police forces; independent judges and journalists; a vibrant private sector and civil society. Those are the things that give life to democracy, because that is what matters in peoples' lives.

- Barack Obama

President of the United States

in a speech to the Ghanaian Parliament in Accra, Ghana, on July 11, 2009

~~On screen keyboard~~

I got this forward sometime back

An On-Screen Keyboard in Windows.

In case your keyboard or some keys stop working, Microsoft provides you with an alternative way to type-in using the mouse. To work this tool, Go to: 'Start menu' Select: 'Run' Type in: 'OSK' Press: 'OK' A keyboard will be displayed on your monitor which you can use with your mouse. TRY IT YOURSELF

I never thought this forward will have a practical use and show me off as if i have done something great,last week one of my team mates called me to her desk with a tensed face mentioning her keyboard started printing few funny characters when keyed in.When I keyed in few numbers instead of numbers there were few special characters typed on the screen. Then the forward I read flashed in my mind I typed OSK in run prompt. Keyboard popped in the screen and instead of numbers it was replaced with french alphabets,my teammate has mistakenly enabled french keyboard and didnt know how to disable it. It took few minutes to change back to the original keyboard layout. When it was done she said "Sriram you are a Genius" ( God save the real genius :) )

The movie I saw..

Today my cousin came to meet me after lunch since we didn't know how to kill time we ended up watching a movie. It was movie directed by Denzel Washington based on true events happened during 1930's.



Tolson,a professor trains a all black debate team which slowly but steadily beats all the other team and finally challenges the Harvard school who were the defending champions.A truly inspiring movie with wonderful acting and perfect dialogues.

Cherishable day in my life !

Two days back one of my friend sent an email which started like this

Folks, it's been 5 years since we rec'd our offer letters...

Its surprising to know how soon the time moves on, I started thinking about the day when I got my first job offer letter. July 9th 2004 was one of the most memorable days of my life. I still relish every moment of it. After clearing the written exam on the previous day I had to get ready for the interview in the morning,one of friend came down from Chennai was trying to help me out, lost his patience by trying to make me look presentable from properly knotting my tie to polishing my shoes. When he was done I was allowed to go to college after last minute wishes from nears and dears.

There is always a disadvantage for me when people call out the names in alphabetical order, I was there in hall by 10 waiting for my call seeing people coming and going ,waiting for my name to be called.It started becoming boring and to make the matter worst at around one o clock when I was left with another guy waiting for the call our placement officer told panel is going for lunch and he strictly us told we were not allowed to go out and wait for their anytime. Lunch was served at around 50 feet from us and no need to mention how special it would be when corporates visit the campuses. After having some seven or eighth servings the lunch time was finally over around 2 30.

Finally I was called in, by the look of my face the first question posed to me Did you have lunch? I gave my usual blush saying it can wait for sometime.Afraid I might be starved to death they asked few simple questions,write few programs. It went for ten minutes once they are done they asked to wait outside. Then I was informed to get ready for the HR round,which happened after next two hours.

It was around 7 o clock around 60 people were called to our conference room where they were supposed to announce the final list of people.I looked around saw 3 of close friends with whom I studied where also present and we sat together. When the person started reading out the names,mind it those were the most tensed moments of the day. Luckily for me my name was 3rd on the list(Thank God they didn't follow alphabetical order here),one by one all my three friends made it. After few final formalities we were allowed to leave.

When we came out the nature could not withstand the surprise started raining. There were lots of hugging and shootings and we started dancing in the rain. The spirts were so high that the people who just a minute ago were looking like professionals were like a uncontrollable bunch of hooligans.

Journey back home was another big story which needs a separate blog.

Funny(fire) Drill!

Once in three months or so in our office a particular sunny day will be chosen and past noon when the weather is particularly, hot fire alarms will start ringing. Most of us will have a look oh no... not again, what makes worse is that we will be settling down after a good lunch and we will be made to evacuate the building using the stairs coming all the way down then stand in the hot sun. Then out of no where some water will be sprayed to third or fourth floor meaning to put off the fire but it literally cleans the building walls.Then we will told the drill is over and can go back to work peacefully(!).
On the way back home I was talking with my colleague who happens to be in HR department.What she said made me jealous of the people working in that department, those people used to get mails mentioning such and such time the drill is going to happen asking for their cooperation and these people plan their breaks accordingly either spending time in the canteen or be out of the building in that particular time escaping from this monotonous exercise.

~~Indian money in Swiss Bank~~

I got this article from my friend ,regarding the amount of Indian money stored in Swiss bank and how different our country can be if that money reaches back to our country and used in a proper way. Just edited few points from it.

If black money deposits was an Olympics event….
India would have won a gold medal hands down. The second best Russia has
4 times lesser deposit. U.S. is not even there in the counting in top
five! India has more money in Swiss banks
than all the other countries combined!

Is India poor, who says? Ask the Swiss banks. With personal account
deposit bank of $1,500 billion in foreign reserve which have been
misappropriated, an amount 13 times larger than the country’s foreign
debt, one needs to rethink if India is a poor country?

DISHONEST INDUSTRIALISTS, scandalous politicians and corrupt IAS, IRS,
IPS officers have deposited in foreign banks in their illegal personal
accounts a sum of about $1500 billion, which have been misappropriated
by them. This amount is about 13 times larger
than the country’s foreign debt. With this amount 45 crore poor
people can get Rs 1,00,000 each.

This huge amount has been appropriated from the people of India by
exploiting and betraying them. Once this huge amount of black money and
property comes back to India , the entire foreign debt can be repaid in
24 hours. After paying the entire foreign debt,
we will have surplus amount, almost 12 times larger than the foreign
debt. If this surplus amount is invested in earning interest, the amount
of interest will be more than the annual budget of the Central
government. So even if all the taxes are abolished,
then also the Central government will be able to maintain the country
very comfortably.

Some 80,000 people travel to Switzerland every year, of whom 25,000
travel very frequently. ‘Obviously, these people won’t be tourists..
They must be travelling there for some other reason,’ believes an
official involved in tracking illegal money.. And, clearly,
he isn’t referring to the commerce ministry bureaucrats who’ve
been flitting in and out of Geneva ever since the World Trade
Organisation (WTO) negotiations went into a tailspin!
This may be the picture of deposits in Swiss banks only. What about
other international banks ?

It is further estimated by experts that one per cent of the world’s
population holds more than 57 per cent of total global wealth, routing
it invariably through these tax havens.

A small statistics on my birthday

Day before my birthday one of friend asked me to calculate the number of people who wish for my birthday.Since I usually brag about the number of acquaintances I have ,I said it will be difficult to keep in track of those. But she asked me to give a try.
So the statistics goes like this ,it may not be accurate deviation of one or two is applicable.
No of people who called --> 39
No of people who mailed --> 11
No of people who smsed --> 8
No of people who scraped--> 62
Apart from this more than fifty people in my office wished which I am not listing here.

I liked one of the cards sent by my friend which I have attached below.


Good thing about office,since its located in far away land there are no proper restaurants nearby so my team was to contented with the treat I gave in the canteen.
But I could not escape from my uncle who made sure I get a hole in my pocket for my birthday treat :)

~~How American government makes business~~

I really liked this forward!

It is the month of August, a resort town sits next to the shores of a lake. It is raining, and the little town looks totally deserted. It is tough times, everybody is in debt, and everybody lives on credit.

Suddenly, a rich tourist comes to town. He enters the only hotel, lays a 100 dollar bill on the reception counter, and goes to inspect the rooms upstairs in order to pick one.

The hotel proprietor takes the 100 dollar bill and runs to pay his debt to the butcher.

The Butcher takes the 100 dollar bill, and runs to pay his debt to the pig raiser.

The pig raiser takes the 100 dollar bill, and runs to pay his debt to the supplier of his feed and fuel.

The supplier of feed and fuel takes the 100 dollar bill and runs to pay his debt to the town's prostitute that in these hard times, gave her "services" on credit..

The hooker runs to the hotel, and pays off her debt with the 100 dollar bill to the hotel proprietor to pay for the rooms that she rented when she brought her clients there.

The hotel proprietor then lays the 100 dollar bill back on the counter so that the rich tourist will not suspect anything.

At that moment, the rich tourist comes down after inspecting the rooms, and takes his 100 dollar bill, after saying that he did not like any of the rooms, and leaves town.

No one earned anything. However, the whole town is now without debt, and looks to the future with a lot of optimism .

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how the United States Government is doing business today.

Significance of July second

Apart from being my birthday ,July second is 183rd day of the year ,which is the middle day of the year. Or we can say July 2nd marks the begining of second half of the year. Time to introspect how well the year has gone ,whether the goals are acheived ,what else challenges we have to over come. What could be done in the later half of the year.
So i thought I would revisit my new year resolutions took in begining of this year and how well I have fared in keeping them up.

1) Get up early in the morning(time not yet decided but it will be earlier than 9am which is my current raising time)
--->getting up before the sun rises(surprised myself)
2)Reduce weight(let me put 5 kgs,I know its easier said than done)
--->maybe increased it by a kg or two(utter failure), no hope in reducing in later half of the year with the quality food I get.
3)Devote some more quality time for reading books(shd be quality books)
-->Reading more than a book per week(pats on my back)
4)plans for future(MBA???)
--->still planning whats good for me(shd work it in later half of the year)
5)Last but not the least continue blogging :)
--->yupp still continuing it (keep it up)

Good to three out five resolutions are on track ,one unrealistic and other one acheivable. Lets see how it goes in later half of the year.

The book I read...

Two weeks before I got this book in Landmark, with a catchy punchline 'a pleasure read for ages between 19-39'. Since I was searching for pleasure for sometime,I got the book. I read those chapters slowly and steadily one chapter per day ,so that my pleasure could last a long time. I finished this book today ,it was humorous and thought provoking one,giving bizarre suggestions on how to tackle some common problems which occur in day to day life.

All those ideas are narrated by Kuttapan according to the author was ruined by the over-engineered intelligence of our education system, who sees every situation in life from a completely different perspective. There were few funny suggestions on how to tackle forwards which spam your inbox or how to make use of credit card profitably,deal with girl friends. Apart from that good observation about how cricket sentiments are fluctuated in our country and how a product is marketed in the country. I enjoyed the last three chapters on how to tackle Indian traffic where Kutthapan challenges formula 1 drivers to drive in Mumbai traffic.
In one chapter detailed analysis is given why its better to watch first day first show of Rajini s movie instead of going to Tajmahal. description of the scene where is which Rajini lites the cigarette with throwing his match and cigarette is hilarious. Finally book ends with how to make your work life happy.
As suggested in the punchline its a pleasure to read it.