Monthly Archives: June 2011

india, US

Have you kept rice in the pressure cooker?

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5 years back we emigrated to India – and here is the story.

July 13th – 2006 :
My sister got a phone call around 10.30 AM. We called her from Meenambakkam airport – and this is what we asked her : “Have you kept rice in the pressure cooker?” – she did not understand – why will we call from US to know if she has kept rice in the pressure cooker for the afternoon.
We were not supposed to come to India till October and it was not yet confirmed – and why was he asking this dumb question. Anyway I did not let her wonder too much – and broke the news that will be in landing in Coimbatore airport in another hour. So please add some more rice for both of us!
Good my mother did not take the call – she would have got a heartattack.
My sister’s and my mother’s BP shot up. After we had spoken, my sister suspected I was playing a prank. But she knew I will not play with sentiments like this – so it has to be true. And for the first time ( her claim ) she scolded me as “Naai” (dog ).
July 11th, 2006 :
We had to board Air India flight in Chicago’s O Hare Airport. We packed a little too many things – thought will pay ( no not bribe ) for the excess and get through. We had a little too many sentimental things and of course chocolates. The iron lady behind the counter was unforgiving. She hated Sangeeta for some reason and will not allow any slack to us. So we had to take off all the chocolates and bring it to precisely within the range. Ideally we should have got embarrased with so many people watching us take things out and giving it away to a lady who had come to see someone off ( her lucky day ) – but we were so excited about getting back to India – and the very thought that we were going to shock everyone..kept us in high spirits.
July 2, 2006 :

Witnessed Formula 1 at Indianapolis – one of my lifetime dreams to watch Formula 1 Live. Schumi won – but what a bore. Watching it on TV was much better. Some dreams should always remain dreams – should never meet them.
It was hot sweaty, everything was expensive, nothing good to eat. Bought 2 Ferrari caps and Ferrari 2005 replica adding to the weight of our suitcases ! This was our last long drive in US. Will surely miss those gas stations, slurpies, starbucks, cruise control…

June 2006 :

Shipped off 10 boxes of stuff we had accumulated. Then put ads in craiglist etc to sell off our cars, router, futon, table..
A cousin’s family was planning to visit Chicago in end July – and we had to discourage them without letting out the big secret. Having a secret was too much of stress – especially when the D day was just a couple of weeks away- we had to watch what we speak to home and friends.
May 2006 :

Applied for transfer to India – and finally got it approved after a few twists and turns. Got off work early that day and went to Devon avenue to book tickets to India. Picked Air India as they let people carry a little excess weight – someone knowledgable had once advised me. 2 one way tickets – and they were quite expensive.
Sangeeta was in Cleveland that time – got into the car, kept the tickets on the passenger seat and called Sangeeta to tell that I have got the tickets. It was an amazing feeling.
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So that was what happened 5 years back. The story had some more events – none of our suitcases arrived with us, flight got delayed, missed the connecting flight, they put us on a flight to Hyderabad (??) and finally landed in Chennai. There Sangeeta & I lost each other in Meenambakkam airport – and we had no cell phones to find each other.
And since we had to give away all the chocolates while checking in, I bought some in a shop inside OHare, and had kept it under the foot, but forgot while changing planes. So we landed without a single chocolate on our hand. Till date my sister, my nephew and Sangeeta’s brother have not forgiven us for this oversight on our part.
Musings

Eat Pray Love

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I picked this book because the cover had Julia Roberts saying – “this is an amazing book and I gifted this to all my girl friends”. Before you start passing a judgement let me just say – I agree. It is not a smart way to pick a book.

But – I did and ended up reading this one. and I recommend it wholeheartedly to both boys and girls.

This lady, Liz 34 years of age, goes through a pretty messy divorce. She is an accomplished writer/journalist living in New York – like one of the New York movies ( wait they did make a movie out of this – with Julia Roberts ). Has an affair that does not go well either.

So she takes off on a vacation for a year – split in 3 parts equally – Italy, India and Indonesia ( Bali actually ).

In Italy she joins a class to learn Italian. And she hunts for great food. I was hungry all the time while I was reading this part of the book – every page will have some dish or the other that she relished to the core. That is all she does – day in and day out and puts a lot of weight.

Then she moves to India – to an ashram near Mumbai. She was to spend 6 weeks and then go around India – but she ends up staying the full 4 months and never leaves this place. There are some hilarious bits here – how she does meditation and how her mind keeps getting in the way. If you are a beginner in meditation you should read this part – you are not alone.

Then something magical happens during her stay. She experiences ecstasy – the divine one. Till date I have only heard of this – but she explains it beautifully. She gets over her messy divorce finally – and is at peace with herself.

Then the story moves to Bali – where she had a deal with a renowned medicine man who had said during one of her earlier visits ( she is a journalist – and keeps travelling to interesting places – and during one of her trips she had met him ) – she can come and live with him to understand things better.

However the medicine man does not remember – but accepts her and she learns interesting things. She finds a place to stay and from here it is like a fiction. She is to find the balance in life in Bali – between the pleasure ( Italy ) and divine stuff ( India ). She gets lot of insights into the medicine man – he has mastered various types of meditation and can visit Heaven and Hell apparently.

It was interesting reading on Bali culture – Bali babies never touch the ground for the first 6 months of their life – as they are still Gods. After 6 months there is a ceremony to convert them to humans. Also they have only 4  names – The firstborn is “Wokalayan” (or Yan, for short), second is “Made,” third is “Nyoman” or Komang (Man or Mang for short), and fourth is “Ketut” (often elided to Tut). [got this from wikipedia] The fifth kid on wards the names are repeated. So if someone tells their name you can easily place them where they are in the family.

The books ends well – she falls in love with a 55 year old divorced Brazilian and ends on a high note. I read that her second part of this book ( which I am not going to read – as 2nd part always suck ) is about this second phase of her relationship.


So that is it – got a nice mix of spiritual and meta physical, 2 interesting cultures ( Italy and Bali ) – all written very fluently and in an entertaining manner – good TP.


and for me – I have moved on to metaphysical stuff – I am conversing with God now for the third time – perhaps will write about it next. 







books, movies

The Pixar Touch

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The above video is from 1967 Disney’s Jungle Book – and this is the best part of this movie in my opinion – smooth animation, great synchronization wtih music and great drama. While watching the movie it does not feel it is a cartoon – what an achievement Disney!

This post is however about the story of Pixar. The founders have a dream – to create a full length animated movie – not hand drawn like Disney’s but animated on a Computer. The founders were all along inspired / coached / educated by Disney’s philosophy on how to make an animated movie with emotion and a story. Pixar wouldnt  be Pixar without Disney.

The technology, software, methodology – none existed when they started. This core team of Pixar – which came into existence as part of George Lucas’s Studio and later got sold to Steve Jobs later – were involved in developing some of these methodologies – Z Buffer, Ray Tracing, Shadow on Shadow, Particle animation – Photoshop was originally developed at Pixar and then sold to Adobe.

The second half of the book devotes a chapter each for each of the Pixar’s hits – right till Ratatouille.  The story behind how the team was formed, how the idea originated, the legal troubles they fought – you will get tremendous respect for each of these movies.

If you are a fan of animation and Pixar ( /Steve Jobs ) you would love this book. Here are some interesting stories :

* It took almost 2 years of coercing to make Disney approve Toy Story. And mid way they almost scraped it  thinking it was not good

* Finding Nemo was laughed at by Eisner ( Disney’s horrible CEO ) – and when it is released Finding Nemo eclipses The Lion King in BO collection ( till then held the all time record for biggest BO collection )

* For Monster’s Inc – Pixar gets sued for copyright violation of the theme – Monster hiding under a closet. Apparently the brave girl, the hairy hero and one eyed side kick were part of a poem – and inadvertently Pixar’s story writers got influenced / inspired ( their defense ). They settled out of court for an undisclosed sum

* Dreamworks was started by a guy who was pissed off by Eisner. He wanted to hurt Disney – so he stole the 2nd movie idea – Bugs Life from Pixar’s director over coffee – and made a clone called – AntZ – similar theme, story line – and released it before Bugs Life. After that Pixar became very closed to outsiders.

* Cars is the worst movie to come out of Pixar – though technically it had many advancements like Ray Tracing in it. Each frame took some 20 hours to render. That is 24 frames per second, and movie is more than an hour. But made hell lot of money for Disney

* There is a very intriguing movie called Princess Mononke that I watched last month – the director is apparently a respected Japanese Animator – Miyazaki – he visits Pixar HQ. They pitch the idea of Incredibles to him and he gives some wise crack I cant recollect now. One of the directors have a wall full of Miyazaki’s characters.

* Pixar went IPO 10 days after the release of Toy Story – Steve Job’s idea – so they had the movie drive their opening day numbers.

Incidentally – my review of Incredibles – written way back in 2004 was the first post of my blog. I for one love Computer Animation and I watch all cartoon movies. If you read this book you will get the answer to the following question – which keeps coming to me whenever I watch a Pixar movie.

How in the LIVING HELL can Pixar manage to make hit after hit after hit.