Some heartening news from home...
http://www.hindu.com/2006/02/28/stories/2006022818150100.htm
TN High court has struck down the governments ill-conceived attempt to abolish Entrance exams and just use the State Board marks for admissions to professional courses. The State Board exams, if any are a test of memory and recollection capabilities of the students and in no way identify students that can successfully compete in the academic rigor of a professional course. In addition to that seperating since large number of students get the same marks (read 100%), it would be a herculean task frought with pitfalls to rank them. Am happy to see that there is some authority that uses logic in arriving at judgements.
There will definitely be appeals and exploration of other ways of "rescuing" the students...but the government would do extremely well to stipulate one entrance exam for ALL admissions and improve the standard of that exam so students dont face the hassle of preparing for one exam after another.
Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Monday, February 13, 2006
Baghu Sucks...
Here is the mail from this kaiyalagatha fellow:
From: prasanna s
Date: Feb 13, 2006 1:09 PM
Subject: Feb 13th Treat status.
To: softthinkers, praveen.DS@trilogy.com, karthee_sivalingam@infosys.com
Hi all,
I have been told by Murr that there are a few changes in the scheme of things for the treat that we had planned.
1.The sponsor is now changed from Baghu and miss.x
to
2. The reason of treat now changed from Introduction of miss.x
to
Welcoming back Baghu to the elite group of singles.
3. Date now changed from 13th February
to
'Yet to be decided'
4. Venue no change i.e. 'Yet to be decided'..
Murugu will send a detailed mail regarding the same shortly.
@Murr : is this all fine?
and my reply is "Baghu, You suck!!!"
From: prasanna s
Date: Feb 13, 2006 1:09 PM
Subject: Feb 13th Treat status.
To: softthinkers
Hi all,
I have been told by Murr that there are a few changes in the scheme of things for the treat that we had planned.
1.The sponsor is now changed from Baghu and miss.x
to
2. The reason of treat now changed from Introduction of miss.x
to
Welcoming back Baghu to the elite group of singles.
3. Date now changed from 13th February
to
'Yet to be decided'
4. Venue no change i.e. 'Yet to be decided'..
Murugu will send a detailed mail regarding the same shortly.
@Murr : is this all fine?
and my reply is "Baghu, You suck!!!"
Sunday, February 12, 2006
Baghuvin Sabatham...
Last year this day, one of our dear friends, Baghu, made a solemn pledge that he reaffirmed countless times with status messages on Yahoo Chat and that was: he will find his dream girl, before the next Valentine's day (that is tomorrow). I initially was (and still am) skeptical of his cupidial abilities. But if anything, Baghu is definitely unpredictable...so we were waiting. This fellow doesnt stop there, he goes on to declare to every soul he has known in the last four years, that he is giving a treat on Feb 13th to everyone and there he will unveil the object of his sabatham to everyone...he is supposed to introduce his girl to all of us on this day. Notwithstanding the ominous threats of GKB-"Mavanae nee mattum emathinaennu vaiyi...eppadi irunthaalum, treat vangama vidamattaen..", Baghu was (and still is) confident. Grand plans are on to give him the bumps of his lifetime should he fail to deliver, but somewhere in the corner of my mind there is still a ray of hope left for this maverick, adament, self-conceited (but loveable) rascal...lets wait and see. As Ram's status reads...today is definitely the judgement day.
Thursday, February 9, 2006
Salam Hyderabad...
These are some reasons why I love this city:
1. Friends- it has truly been a college away from a college here, we are a gang of about 15 guys, we completely enjoy each other's company-I feel like I have rediscovered each one of them after college...more on each one of them in a seperate post:).
2. Roads- the first thing that strikes you on landing in Hyderabad are the amazing roads that connect the whole city (the unruly traffic running on it is a sad story, but we will ignore that for the moment). They are really wide and well-laid, making driving a great experience.
3. Eat Street-my favorite hang-out, a bunch of eateries just on the banks of Hussain Sagar Lake-a lake and food at one place-what more could your truly ask for?? A stroll along the lake is enough to cure the worst headache and releive the stress-the breeze here competes with that in the beaches in Chennai.
4. Cooking (ofcourse by JP and Bhoopesh)-the initial 6 months were horrible-I had to go scouting for decent food every night and breakfast was a word absent in our dictionary. Then we slowly started-initially just with curd rice, then moved on to many more delicacies (courtesy: Bhoobi ofcourse). Now, on normal days we have a full three-course south indian meal ending at around 1am in the next morning:).
5. Shopping at Hyderabad Central (esp. when there is a sale:) and watching a movie at Prasadz. I have watched movies in gutter-like theaters in Chennai (Devi theater is one example where the low-lifes sell tickets officially in black!!). Here at Prasadz, you can do the booking online and just walk in about an hour earlier, pay for it and collect the tickets. The ambience and facility inside the theaters has to be seen to be beleived!
6. Temples-occasionally we visit a beautiful but crowded temple called Chilkur Balaji temple. I kinda like a small silent Hanuman temple near our house where you dont have to stand in queues and you dont bump into acquaintances who want to talk about everything under the sun inside the temple premises.
7. KBR Park-This park deserves a special mention among the various parks available in the city-they are all amazingly well-maintained. In this park we have a walk-way of about 6km along the circumfrence of the park open to public-the cleanliness of this walkway (inspite of being a free entry) and the greenery surrounding it makes it an ideal destination for a morning/evening walk.
8. Our Friday night activities-these have varied over time starting with watching movies on the VCD player huddled together in the hall, to playing board games like Business, Scotland Yard etc. Now we have a subset of us preparing for a Yoga course which takes away most of their time and so the rest of us are waiting...:)
9. Microsoft parties- being singles (every one of us AFAIK), we are not allowed to stalk any clubs/parties. So we relish the occasional parties that Microsoft hosts to the fullest extent...dancing our hearts out singing until everyone's voice is a mere croack.
10. Restaurants-once you are ok with spending, Hyderabadi hospitality and cuisine opens its doors to you-there are some superb restaurants like Angeeti,Mainland China,Chutneys,Utsav, Ohris-which are sure to burn a deep hole into your pockets, but are worth every bit of it when you do it occasionally. Then there is this small mess called Kakatiya (quite far from our house) where you would get the most satisfying meal for a paltry Rs. 28-their customer service would put every other restaurant I mentioned previously, to dust! It is truly six-sigma!!
11. Cars-Two of our guys Naresh and Arun have bought cars and all of us like to jump-into one of them whenever the occasion arises (or we might create one:) and these two wonderful souls have never ever refused us a ride and even take the pains of choosing the right CD to play during the ride at the right volume to make it a real pleasure ride.
These are the ones that come to my mind now..will add-on to them as I remember..
1. Friends- it has truly been a college away from a college here, we are a gang of about 15 guys, we completely enjoy each other's company-I feel like I have rediscovered each one of them after college...more on each one of them in a seperate post:).
2. Roads- the first thing that strikes you on landing in Hyderabad are the amazing roads that connect the whole city (the unruly traffic running on it is a sad story, but we will ignore that for the moment). They are really wide and well-laid, making driving a great experience.
3. Eat Street-my favorite hang-out, a bunch of eateries just on the banks of Hussain Sagar Lake-a lake and food at one place-what more could your truly ask for?? A stroll along the lake is enough to cure the worst headache and releive the stress-the breeze here competes with that in the beaches in Chennai.
4. Cooking (ofcourse by JP and Bhoopesh)-the initial 6 months were horrible-I had to go scouting for decent food every night and breakfast was a word absent in our dictionary. Then we slowly started-initially just with curd rice, then moved on to many more delicacies (courtesy: Bhoobi ofcourse). Now, on normal days we have a full three-course south indian meal ending at around 1am in the next morning:).
5. Shopping at Hyderabad Central (esp. when there is a sale:) and watching a movie at Prasadz. I have watched movies in gutter-like theaters in Chennai (Devi theater is one example where the low-lifes sell tickets officially in black!!). Here at Prasadz, you can do the booking online and just walk in about an hour earlier, pay for it and collect the tickets. The ambience and facility inside the theaters has to be seen to be beleived!
6. Temples-occasionally we visit a beautiful but crowded temple called Chilkur Balaji temple. I kinda like a small silent Hanuman temple near our house where you dont have to stand in queues and you dont bump into acquaintances who want to talk about everything under the sun inside the temple premises.
7. KBR Park-This park deserves a special mention among the various parks available in the city-they are all amazingly well-maintained. In this park we have a walk-way of about 6km along the circumfrence of the park open to public-the cleanliness of this walkway (inspite of being a free entry) and the greenery surrounding it makes it an ideal destination for a morning/evening walk.
8. Our Friday night activities-these have varied over time starting with watching movies on the VCD player huddled together in the hall, to playing board games like Business, Scotland Yard etc. Now we have a subset of us preparing for a Yoga course which takes away most of their time and so the rest of us are waiting...:)
9. Microsoft parties- being singles (every one of us AFAIK), we are not allowed to stalk any clubs/parties. So we relish the occasional parties that Microsoft hosts to the fullest extent...dancing our hearts out singing until everyone's voice is a mere croack.
10. Restaurants-once you are ok with spending, Hyderabadi hospitality and cuisine opens its doors to you-there are some superb restaurants like Angeeti,Mainland China,Chutneys,Utsav, Ohris-which are sure to burn a deep hole into your pockets, but are worth every bit of it when you do it occasionally. Then there is this small mess called Kakatiya (quite far from our house) where you would get the most satisfying meal for a paltry Rs. 28-their customer service would put every other restaurant I mentioned previously, to dust! It is truly six-sigma!!
11. Cars-Two of our guys Naresh and Arun have bought cars and all of us like to jump-into one of them whenever the occasion arises (or we might create one:) and these two wonderful souls have never ever refused us a ride and even take the pains of choosing the right CD to play during the ride at the right volume to make it a real pleasure ride.
These are the ones that come to my mind now..will add-on to them as I remember..
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