Divya Dharshini has updated her blog :)

I am visiting my blog after over one and a half years. All those kutty thoughts, the occasional epiphany that used to get translated into blog posts truncate/s to mere status messages on facebook. You of course get the instant gratification of fellow facebookers "liking" the status. (There's always someone or the other to like every status you put up - if you are a girl. If you are a guy, there is always someone to immediately kaalaichufy you . Yes guys, these are the tests that the modern man faces today. Tough life) Status messages on my homepage usually fall within these categories. ( P.S : I think there is another article probably Krishashok's.. just like this. Therila. Doesn't matter )

1. The Loudspeaker : The guy that has the urge to spit out everything he thinks on a public forum. It is usually in bursts of moods, every few hours.

eg: ' I am sad' ' I am so pisseddd.' ' I am sooooooo happy, life is awesome' - all these on the same day.

2. The Music Player: Does not put up status messages as such, just links. I do this a lot. And invariably all of them are 'most awesome/amazing/cool video he/she has ever seen'. Least annoying type.

3. The safe commenter: These people never put up status messages/links/articles. They only "like" or comment on other people's links. When the comments are interesting, they are likeable, but sadly more often than not the comments are either silly, or mokkai or even worse " awww.. so cute"

4. The wannabe mysterious: These are people that put up status messages no one understands, or it is an inside joke, or things like " :(" and a hundred comments follow asking "why"

5. The attention monger : I know what you guys are thinking. Yeah I seek attention.. but at least I care enough to make my links or statuses interesting or funny! These people are the ones that put up statuses that say " I m sick :(" or " Arghhh this cold/cough/bloody diarrhoea". Some go like this -" I got my H1!" or " I got a job!" or something along the lines of 'I just want to vayitherichal kalapify and rub it in your face, so I'm not even going to attempt being humourous or interesting, let alone being humble'.

6. The Photomonger: Every week there is an album that goes up on facebook. And believe me, these are unfiltered (shaky pictures, out of focus pictures, random pictures,bad pictures, pictures with the unintentional cleavage show or jatti show - everything goes online) Do these people really want everyone to see every photo they take in their life?

7. The Gamer: All I 'm saying is - Keep playing, people. Keep the gaming companies alive. They are very important to our economy ;) Just don't notify me of every damn fish or fruit or crop you buy.

8. The Family : Well unfortunately my entire family is on facebook, and I sometimes yearn for those days when family and internet were as unrelated as TR and Tetrachloroethane. ( T - T kaaga . :) )I love my family, don't mistake me. But I don't want ambujam mami to know that I am LOLing at a Russel Peters' very adult rated piece on how blessed men from different races are. (Real Funny one. Apprama kaamikren :) ) Every random family member I only met in weddings and never met until the next wedding a decade later, is on my friend list now, and the result is on a picture of me wearing a skimpy tank top ( hypothetical. bayapadadheenga :) "and my friends hanging out in a hypothetical bar :), a random mami goes " hi divya. i am ur amma's athai's orpadi's daughter's cousin. nice to meet you . You look just like your paati" Yarrite! unless my paati was also wearing tank top sipping ( a hypothetical ;) ) cosmo at a bar! But I have to admit, it is cute when my amma goes on facebook, into my wall and types without punctuations, spaces, in an unrelated thread between me and my friends just to type a "hidivuhappynewyear". ;) Psst: anyone tells her, I kill you. But if you do tell her, remind her to punctuate the next time she types.

9. The ' louu panraangalaama' idiots : These are my personal enemies. If you know me, you know how much I hate this kind. In fact, I want to dedicate my entire post to venting my frustration about this one type and frankly the other types don't bother me as much. I literally want to throw up when I see these people. Especially, December is that time of the year.. these couples get very hormonal during the wedding season, like mushrooms sprouting all over the place during rainy season. Seriously, is it just me or are there really that many people getting married these days? Newly married, yet to be married, the newly dating, the dating for a long time - but families came to know recently- so I am orey the open on FB now -cases , they come in all shapes and sizes. Changing your relationship status on facebook is almost a milestone in relationships these days. It falls right between going out for a year roughly and getting engaged. Usually around the same magnitude as telling the families.These couples are somehow urged to declare their louu for each other on a public forum on a daily basis. Get a phone please! even better- get a room!

Anyyyyway, thanks to privacy settings, I do get rid of most of these problems. But many people ask me why I am even on facebook if I hate almost every activity on facebook. Same reason as everyone - Indha mokkai comments, sick couply couples oda comedy, kalyana photos, TR video idhellam semma time pass!

We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun

Our cooler is not working and I am sweating like a pig. Reminds me of how dependent we have become on the cooler, here in the U.S, especially without pedestal fans. I have been running up and down trying to fix it, dreading how I am going to spend the night. I open the window, door, no change. Out of curiosity I login to the weather channel to see what the temperature is . It's 21 degreee celcius and thats the hottest it is going to get tonight. Out of curiosity again, I check the temperature in chennai /madurai . It s a whopping 37 degree celcius. I remember that heat. Madras used to be worse than Madurai. Madurai was scorching/burning hot whereas Madras used to be this sweaty sticky hot.

When we were kids and summer came I remember the whole new routine. Fruits were different- mangoes, watermelons, ice apples (nongu) would appear out of nowhere. Food was different - there ll be less frying and more kootu types. Best part was the dessert- rosemilk, milkshakes, lassi s , fresh juices, and elaneer ( thanks priyanka for the reminder).yummmm.

Our habits, sleeping styles would change.The whole family had an intra-house migration pattern. Everyone would compete for the cooler parts of the home. So we had to earn our cool spots. We did have AC . But that was only for our parents' room. It seemed mean then, but hey I am paying my electricitiy bills now, so it doesnt seem that mean now. Anyway, when summer came, it usually brought along exams. Annual exams. Studying was hard enough, leave alone studying in that hot room of ours( mine and my sister's). Most of these memories I am talking about, are after my sister left for college(hostel). So my regular study area was mottai maadi after sunset. I had my own cot and a chair in the terrace. We also had a kind of Mullai poo climber growing all over the beams in the sitout. The smell used to be brilliant. It was like a 100 scented candles around you. Around five thirty in the evening, my maid (& thozhi) Selvi and I used to go upstairs. She d bring a bucket and a mug. There was a tap upstairs. My job was to sprinkle water throughout the terrace and her job was to pluck the flowers ( poo parikradhuku vera better english yaarukavdhu therinja pls let me know. am not happy with picking/plucking ). It was amazing how the hot concrete would suck up the water so quickly, I d be sprinkling water over and over again and be amused at how it would disappear. I d then sprinkle extra water over the roof of my room not knowing it wouldnt help much.
Then Selvi would sit right next to my wire cot and threading the flowers she had picked, keeping me company I thought then. But only later did I realize that she was actually sitting there to make sure I studied and didnt fall asleep.

And then after a couple of hours of studying/arattaying with Selvi/ star gazing, I d go down for dinner and come back upstairs, collect all my books and go down to continue studying in my room which would have cooled down by then. This was a ritual every year.The first year it was just me, cos all other kids in the neighbourhood were too small to be studying alone or even studying!. But the subsequent years,
at around sunset, all kids in the neighbourhood, even accompanied by parents started assembling in their respective terraces. I felt proud/annoyed that people were copying me. We then started having these mottaimadi - mottaimaadi conversations about exams and when they were getting over.
After a few years, our room also got an a.c, but the ritual continued because we were conserving electricity - so only our parents would have their AC on. So sometimes I d end up sleeping in their room cos the only other choice I had was- to end up getting baked in my room.

Scorching heat, insatiable thirst, sweaty nights, sweatier days, endless summer - its all the same now, the difference is- we had fun then. To be continued..

Jeyam Kondaan- not a movie review

This is not a movie review, although it was a decent movie. Not bad. The part that I hated is the fact that they make the heroine speak awfullllllll thamizh , calling it Madurai thamizh. Is that what is perceived as madurai thamizh? I dont think so.

I would love to storm off this post with a strong and intense thamizh poem . But cant think of anything right now. But I am deeply hurt. Madurai thamizh is not what they show in the movie!

Homecoming part 2

Well well well. If you guys are wondering what took me so long to write home coming part 2- well I ve been busy and the real reason is that I was waiting for the second India going season- Dec- Jan. If you are that big a fan of my blog, u ll remember the first part was during summer.

Once the pampering , feeling on top of the world , limelight and the first week's excitement fades, the second week is the transition week. It s a luke warm week. Now these experiences may not be universal.. but you can kinda relate to it.Everyone wud ve had different versions of the same experience.You ll know what i mean.

You feel people are giving you a little more space. You get to go meet not so important friends who you didnt meet the first week. People start doing things other than just asking you about life in the U.S. . You feel weird but nice being vetti at home. Parents start going for work and you ll be left at home all by yourself not knowing what to do. So you end up gtalking till parents come back from work. Afternoons will be spent relishing the joy of dozing off watching Ktv movies and Sun tv serials and the paridhaabamana Raj tv, because the jetlag really hits only after 4 or 5 days. Once you get up at an odd 7 pm and have nice coffee in ever silver tumbler, you watch tv. You feel nice watching news and how they make even stupid things so sensational. But these are the precious times you missed here. The bliss of being vetti at home.

Then comes the third week . Now is when you get really bored . Bored enough to miss this hellhole.Its almost like Stockholm syndrome. This place actually grows on you!You are slightly looking forward to go back. This is the week where most of your meals are eaten outside home , with random uncles and aunties ( "family friends"- btw what does the word mean? are all the members in the familes friends with each other?) .You get sick of eating a full meal every meal. Pakkathu veetu aunties uncles invite u home and ask u for grad school advice fr their children. Im especially sorry for all u guys who went to India now- you would ve had the added trouble of people asking about the economy. One of my friends got continuously asked "Inime anga enna irku, vandhuda vendiyadhudhane" lol. lemme not digress.
And towards the end of the week people start asking you when you are leaving . Parents start asking what all you need to buy.Podis will be made. (Notice you would ve come with ipods - u ll leave with podi s . :) )random people will start asking you if you have space in your suitcase to take stuff for their sons/daughters/relatives/friends in "the U.S". They do not realise the country is freaking hugggggggge . But you still do it cos you don wanna say no.
The final week is when you are busy as hell. Shopping, packing, scheduling lunch times, dinenr times to say bye to people. I hate the airport. Its gloomy and depressing. When you disappear behind the security check walls, you take a look at your family and friends for the last time- the sad, gloomy faces in the depressing airport- you know that s the image thats going to linger on your mind until you coem back the next time. Its a disturbing image.
Its true you miss US but you also know you are going to miss India no matter which one you call as home. The grass is always greener on the other side.
You many notice that this post is nto as emphatic and fun to read as the Homecoming part I. I think thats because its been 6 months since I came back from India and I m missin the place already. I wrote this post because I had promised to do soand it was incomplete. I m definitely not in the mood to not miss home. Ooops! I called India as home this time! It is. Isnt it? I think , at this stage, my definition of home is - the place I miss. :)

Titles not really wanted

Well I ve decided to keep it as My diary for now, unless soemone coems up with a really good title. :)Keep working on it people!

I want to become a space scientist!

Well I'm starting to write this blog not knowing what I want to write about. I m writing yet, because of this irresistable urge to write. So as of now I don't know what I want to write about.
thinking.. thinking .. er.. hmm.. Oh today I was going through this rough notebook of mine. It's my rough notebook from 7th std. I had these scribblings on various subjects- math, science ,english, tamil, hindi , interspersed with these favourite quotes from everywhere ranging from Reader's Digest to unheard of -tamil movie-song -lyrics.

It was not exactly a walk down memory lane because I did not remember most of those things. It was more of soul searching. I had wanted to alway stand out in a crowd, do something unique, things like that.It was like finding out who I really was, who I really wanted to become before external factors started influencing me. By external factors , I mean factors like competition, knowing that there are thousands of others who want to be the exact same thing, knowing that college is not like what they show in movies. Well for one- we do not carry just one notebook and a tiffin box. We carry piles and piles of xeroxes and notes and notebooks and a stinky lab coat that has never met a washing machine before, and of course tiffin box. In grad school its even worse- It's like you are back in school. The huge bag and a lunch box - only difference- this time its a lot heavier (because of the laptop) and so are you. Its like a reverse evoultion cycle- the famous crouched man to erect man chart- its just the opposite. you are born erect and you end up all stoopy in the end. Funny- I am listening to 'khoon' chala now on youtube. ( Sorry I couldnt resist the mokkai)

Oops I digressed. like I warned- this is a very off -the -top- of- my- head- post. Anyways, like I was saying, as long as you are unaware of the external factors like money, salary, pressure, luck, - reality to be precise, you are blissfully ignorant as a kid. We ve all wanted to do exotic stuff like become a pilot or a space scientist or a film star or an interior decorator/psychologist/architect in my case. Did any of us grow up saying we wanted to become a system analyst or a microbiologist or a professor? I hope not. But I am sure some of you geeks did. As you grow up, the fog clears and you stand there face to face with reality.

Reality:" Space scientist? ha aha ha"
Kid:" Ok ok, I wont. Can I become a doctor?"
Reality:" Doctor? ha aha ha. Space scientist may be easier".
Kid: " Ok.. what other choice do I have?"
Reality: " Choice? ha ha ha".

Kid grows up, studies hard and joins an engineering college (surprise!!) just like thousands of other kids,works hard to become a software engineer in Infosys ( surprise), just like thousands of other kids,works hard to come to America with dollar dreams, just like few more thousands of other kids , works his ass off , also falls in love with similar girl kid who works for Microsoft, and just about when they are about to get married, some bank on Wall street screws up and the kid goes back to India for good, the girl kid's parents suddenly reject the guy kid because obviously he s not good for their princess any more and both of them return to the place where it all started. Again, just like thousands of other kids.


Phew! One heck of a depressing story. Anyways the point I am trying to make is - well not much of a point but a scary observation is that when we are kids we all strive to be unique. But slowly, as we grow up, we give up and at some point our desire to be unique fades out slowly and we start wanting to 'fit in'.Fitting in in college, grad school, u.s, work place, social circle, in-laws.. we want to fit in these random groups of people whom we mostly do not care about. The fear of being the odd man out sets in. Sad..isnt it?

This is why I get terribly pissed reading success stories and listen to victory speeches. Because there are so many winners and winner speeches, that it looks like its such a common easy thing to win. It looks easy to get to the stage when you ve succeeded and you get to talk about it. Its almost liek writing an SOP.You connect the dots in such a way that it looks like you were born to do the final task. Thats why it looks like achievers always seek something and they manage to 'go after ' something and get it. But the actual truth is that probably they too are just fleeing from one thing to another.
And unfortunately life is in the reverse order. To get to that pinnacle is tough and all success stories and victory speeches have only managed to under describe this arduous journey.

I m probably on the shadow side of things and I m refusing to move to where there is light. May be it takes just one step to go from shadow to light. But like one of my quotes in my 7th std rough notebook said, " Reality is just a very persistent illusion.- Einstein".Hope that helps. :)

Titles wanted

Just an announcement. One of my friends feels my blog's name- Princess's diary is very lame. Another friend argued that it cannot be Princess's and it should be Princess' diary. Indha madhri kostins laam varudhu..ennala blog la concentrate panna mudiyala (Kamal, 2005) (lol).
So people please suggest good blog names .
Vetri perubavar kulukkal muraiyil therndhedukapaduvargal.



Reference:
1.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-TUL7XIbAE&feature=related