When faced with a constraint, while the rest of the world tries to work around it, the
Japanese go for the jugular and find a solution for the problem. So, while the rest of
the world were content with watermelons in the way nature had designed it, these
guys found that the round shape was a problem when it came to stacking the fruit.

So, what did they do about it ? They engineered water-melons that are boxy in shape
and thus easy to stack. See picture below from the Deccan Chronicle of watermelons
that are boxy in shape.

That's ingenuity at work.

For those not in the know, the convenience stores at Shell gas-stations are selling a 6-car
range of miniature Ferrari replicas for 100 bucks a car. The following snap shows the 6
models on sale.



Pic courtesy : http://lewis1882.wordpress.com/2007/08/11/shell-ferrari-cars

These are Chinese-make and not very well-built, but not a bad deal for 100 bucks.
I bought one a few weeks ago and found it to be good enough for the price. And since
my son loved it and "Ferrari" also became a part of his vocabulary, I went yesterday
and bought the remaining 5 cars to make a complete set.

I can see the joy on my son's face when I will be giving him these cars tomorrow.
Hopefully it will make up for my missing last weekend with him. He was expecting that
I would be there on Saturday as usual and was a bit miffed when I could not make it.

Makes a nice buy if you have a kid like mine that's crazy about cars.

P.S.-1 : For first-timers to Shell outlets, the service experience can be a pleasant surprise
like I myself experienced. The staff greet you with a "Vanakkam", which is a Tamil greeting
and are extremely courteous and helpful.

P.S.-2 : If my friends who swear by the petrol/diesel from Shell outlets are to be believed,
it is worth paying a buck or two more per petrol/diesel here, since your car not only returns more mileage due to the fuel being pure and the quantity delivered being accurate, it keeps
the engine clean and healthy too.

I was walking down Greames Road last weekend when I came across the MRF building.
For long, this building has been a curiosity for passers-by due to its roof top garden. Since
it was a long time since I had come this way, I looked up to see how the garden is and I see
palm trees soaring high into the sky.






It was an innovative concept when they did this many years ago. And even today it is a
pleasure for the eyes.

Unlike road-users in other parts of the world, we in India have so much more to look out
for. Apart from stuff that we have become used to over years of government apathy, like potholes, bad roads, bad patch-up works, open manholes etc, we have to be also careful
about big ditches bang in the centre of the road.

Like the one below at Bajanai Koil street in Choolaimedu, which the Innova guy seems to
have missed, resulting in one of the wheels falling into it.

Took a few hours of effort to haul the van out. But a car can be repaired. Imagine what

would have happened if a guy on a bike falls into the ditch ?

In any other country, there would be a proper cordon around the ditch, with bright tape

to warn road-users. But then this is India.

Inspite of travelling weekly on trains, I avoid the tea/coffee sold aboard the train because
it has absolutely no resemblance in taste to what I know as tea or coffee. So, on my way to Kerala, I get tea from a restaurant on Kottayam station where the train stops for 5 minutes.
And on my way back to Chennai, I have tea at the Rathna Cafe restaurant (a little too thick
for my taste, but still OK) in Chennai Central station.

The weekend before last, I was on the train to Kerala, which was approaching Kottayam
station and I was near the door of the compartment planning to detrain and get myself a
cup of tea. A Railway policeman walks past me immediately followed by a vendor selling tea/coffee.

They stop at the vestibule area which connects 2 compartments and discuss something.
The vendor complains about how dull business is and how he is finding it tough to make
ends meet. The cop dismisses this line and replies that he believes business is good.

I know by now what the whole drama is about. The vendor must be unlicensed & the cop
is taking advantage of this by demanding a hefty bribe. The vendor is trying to negotiate
on the amount by saying that business is dull, while the cop rebuts that argument so that
his cut is not reduced.

As I stand there, the vendor takes some money and hands it over to the cop, who pockets
it without even worrying about the fact that I am a witness to his taking a bribe. Then the
cop moves on to the next compartment, while the vendor returns back, maybe mentally
cursing the cop for taking a share of his hard-earned money.

Since these vendors have to line the pockets of the cops, they would need to account for
this revenue loss somewhere or the other and what better way than to shortchange their customers, by serving watered down tea / coffee. No wonder the tea/coffee tastes so bad.

I am at one of the many parks in Chennai for my morning walk. I keep trying different
parks and hope to do a post called "Parks of Chennai" or something like that soon. :-)

You have to give credit to the Chennai Corporation for the way they have renovated
most of the parks in the city. Not only does it make the city look good, it provides
greenery (lungs for the city) and also a place for people to exercise, walk or just plain
unwind.

As I finish my walk and walk out of the park, I am accosted by a guy with a flyer, which advertises a gym in the locality. Many years ago, I was a daily gym-goer and loved the experience, but then somehow the habit died away. I do think of joining a gym, but am
not sure whether I would be disciplined enough to do it daily. Anyway, I politely decline
the flyer (why take it & dump in trash, when I have no plans of joining) and walk home.

I was reminded of a time long ago when there were flyers of a different kind. And when
me (and my sisters) would vie for these flyers. Like many other things of the past, this
has also become extinct and so I thought it would be a good idea to share it here for
those that have never known about this.

Also, having posts about such vignettes of my childhood on this blog would make this site
a sort of a repository for my son to browse through when he is able to read and will help
him know about how life was in his father's time & age.

In our school-days, when we were staying outside Kerala, one annual routine was the
2-month summer vacation that we would spend at Kerala with our grandparents.
They looked forward to it as much as we kids did. After spending 10 lonely months,
they awaited the 2 months when we would be at home.

Like with other NRK (Non Resident Keralite) kids, we found a lot of things new and
intriguing at Kerala. Stuff which we did not see in other parts of India that is known
to us. And one of them was the peculiar way in which movies were advertised back
then. Ofcourse there did exist movie-posters stuck on walls, but the theatre-owners
used another advertising medium, which we kids from out of town found interesting.

Every Friday when a new movie was released, a car fitted with loudspeakers would
do the rounds of the town, with a guy extolling about the new movie, the actors and
stuff. We could hear the racket even when the car was still a few hundred metres
away and would run to the main gate. The motivation being the flyers that they
would throw out of the car windows.

The flyer would have the movie name & brief storyline and other related stuff printed
on it. Plus ofcourse a miniature replication of the movie poster itself. We would wave
out to the guys in the car and on most days they would throw out a bunch of flyers
which would fly here & there behind the car and which we would go collect.

Since our Malayalam reading skill was almost zero back then, there wasn't much
sense that we could make out of the poster, other than gawking at the picture on it.
We would take the flyer to our Grandpa who would read it out for us.

Over the years, this way of advertising movies died a gradual death. Today the daily
newspaper lists out the movies playing at the theatres in town. And ofcourse you have
the movie posters plastered on the walls in town.

I am driving my parents to the railway station last Saturday. Since they were in town to get their annual medical check-up done, I had cancelled my weekend trip to Kerala last week.

They were quite surprised (pleasantly) at the huge change they saw in me. Inplace of the
guy who slept till 7:30AM and then rushed to work, here was someone who woke at5AM, walked for 4-5kms and was home even before they woke up at 6:30AM or so. Also, from someone who was not necessarily much of a fruit-eater, I had stocked the fridge with
various types of fruits, which I consume as-is or as juice.

I was asking them about the results of their annual check-up and it seemed, the results
were really good. Dad's total cholestrol was down to 126, while it was 147 for my Mom.
Though not very surprising given their regular walks and other work they do at home,
it still was the lowest they ever recorded.

These figures are pretty impressive for their age. More so, when compared with my
cholestrol figures which are roughly double my Dad's.

Dad : How come you suddenly became so health-conscious ?
Me : Nothing. Just like that.

Dad : Happened to see your health-records file. Your cholestrol figures are too high.
Me : Hmm. Yeah, they are pretty high. Am over the safe number of 200.

Mum : So, is it due to this that you started walking and including fruits in your diet ?
Me : Partly yes. The figures were too high and I reckoned that walking would help
reduce it apart from giving me some much-needed exercise. And the fruits would
help reduce LDL and increase HDL.

Dad : The change is very much visible in you.
Me : It's only 12-13 days since I started this routine. Isn't it too early for results ?

Dad : Well, you have lost weight and we can see loss of flab at your tummy too.
What weight are you now ?
Me : For the past 15 years or so, I have been having more-or-less same weight - 67kg.

Dad : No way. You would be weighing much less now.
Me : While I would like that, I dont think I would have lost much weight in just 2 weeks.

Anyway, after dropping them at the station, I return home & the first thing I do is weigh
myself on the bathroom scale. To say that I was surprised by the readings, would be an understatement.

The scale showed 63.5 kgs. Even accounting for some error in reading and rounding it
off to 64kgs, that is an impressive 3kgs gone. Pretty awesome results for just 2 weeks.
While weight-reduction was not my target with my daily walks, it does feel good to
know that some unwanted baggage has been lost in the process.

So, if any of you are looking at reducing weight, all you need is a pair of walking shoes.
Hit the nearest park or even the road and before you know it, you would be marvelling
at how you manage to not only lose weight, but also feel healthier/fitter.

Was driving home last week when I came across this auto-rickshaw with a spoiler in place.


Given the speed at which these 3-wheelers zip by, guess its needed to keep them from flying away.


Welcome to Motown Chennai - the Detroit of India, where you have modded autos also.

It's around 4PM last Sunday evening & my son had just woken up from his afternoon nap.
As on most days, he was quite irritable after waking up. Since my wife had some chores to attend to, I decide to take him out to change his mood.

As we get into the car, my Dad looks up from the newspaper with an enquiring look.

"We are going to the nearby temple", I tell him.

I can see a puzzled expression on his face. For many months, there has been this minor disagreement between us about me skipping Sunday mass at church. And since I don't
go, my wife & son also skip the ritual. And to top it all, I am now visiting a temple. :-)

I allay his fears over my converting to Hinduism by telling him that the idea of going to
the temple is only to spend some time with the elephant that belongs to the temple, or
Kutti-Aana (Malluspeak for little-elephant) as my son calls it. I know that the short drive
and some time spent watching the elephant will cheer my son up.

A 5-min drive takes us to the temple. There are some elderly people sitting at the gate
and talking, which I guess must be a daily ritual for them. Not much activity inside the
temple though. We leave our footwear outside and walk on the fine sand in the premises
and reach the place where the elephant is tethered. My son walking on the soft sandy
premises of the temple.


As is our usual practice,we sit on the soft sandy earth some 15 metres away from the
pachyderm and watch it as it munches on cocount tree leaves. Even though very young,
this particular elephant (it's name is Premshankar) is known to be a little roguish at times.

Usually you can make out how calm an elephant is by its activity. It would just stand still,
almost motionless, occasionally swatting flies with its tail. But this guy is always swaying
this way and that, occasionally stretching at the chains that bind 2 of its legs to 2 trees.


We sit and watch it for sometime. Slowly the sun is setting and since my son is bored of
gawking at the elephant, we decide to walk around the temple. There is a pathway running around the temple made of thick stone slabs and we walk on it, taking in the view. This is
the aal-thara (banian tree with a base at the bottom, with some idols placed there).


During a previous visit, me and my wife noticed that meshed inside the banian tree's grip
is a palm tree, which is not normally visible. We can see the upper half of the palm, but the
bottom half is not visible at all.

It is so silent and serene out there. I have been to many temples in Tamilnadu, but I don't
think they have the ambience of a Kerala temple or "Kshetram" as a temple is known here. Maybe because space is at a premium in Chennai. This particular temple is spread over
some 2-3 acres of land.

You can see the stone-slab walkway that runs around the sanctum-sanctorum.


Another view of the temple.



The silence, the fresh air, the ambience, everything is so soothing and rejuvenating.
We spend some time walking around the temple and by now my son is back in a
happy mood. Time to go home, where my wife would have prepared some snacks
for him.