Sleeper - Hilarious robotics by Woody Allen

Enthiran, bless Rajni, has whetted my appetite for robotics! If you want ribtickling HomoRobots, you should watch this 1973 movie by Woody Allen. He not only spoofs all Sci-Fi Robot movies, he anticipates by some 4 decades the kind of meaningless robot tripe that we would pay good money to watch! The only thing a greatly intelligent movie-maker like Woody Allen does is challenge our sense of what is right, but not what is stupid.

This movie shows a man who was accidentally frozen after a failed surgery in an American hospital and revived with 2173 technology and lands in a world of chaos not very different from our crazy police states of today!
If you go to the Youtube site, you can find lots of clips of the movie in a sequence. Thanks to Shinjikun2009!

Idli Suprabhata

Oh heavenly damsels clad in perfect white,

Your roundness adds more joy to my anticipation.

However many I eat of you, I want some more.

A profound satisfaction follows each bite.

Chutney especially fresh, dished out at pre-muhurtham breakfast is best,

To dip you in before the lovely swallow.

It seems God wasn't done with just creating the world's favourite food, rice.

For higher mortals like me he wanted to add shape, taste, and the ferment of anticipation.

Thus came about you angels fluffy and white

Ready to plunge and plunder the fire in the belly.

Idli, your'e matchless. Pity the dough-nuts, burger-freaks and leafy six-inchers.

With or without accompaniment, singing your morning prayer brings me bliss!



Yaa Devi...

Ultimate music, ultimate bliss, ultimate grace

Today, Goddess Saraswathi has conferred her ultimate grace on me. Ever since the sixties, I have been recalling a wonderful  Bhairavi alapana played by the maestro Lalgudi Jayaraman. I have spoken to many about it, and have searched here and there without success for a recording that harks back to that experience.

Like a Chatak bird, who waits to savour the Swati rain drop in autumn that becomes a pearl, I have waited. And today, Swati Solutions have delivered to me the album "Fourmost" (kalakendra.com) brought out to celebrate the maestro's 8oth birthday.  The four CDs are supposed to represent the best sample of his musical genius.

And the very first item on it? His Bhairavi alapana that I have been craving for!


I urge you to buy this CD set and listen to it. I have just heard the Bhairavi. And that is enough to show what else is in this treasure chest. Lalgudi Jayaraman in this Bhairavi alapana has produced the ultimate music, ultimate grace, and ultimate bliss. He is like Dattatreya, born of Vishnu's grace. Brahma's creativity and Shiva's prowess. He is the synthesis of  Bach's grandeur, Beethoven's virtuosity and Mozart's melody. He is the dear child of Bhairavi, frolicking in her courtyard, and delighting her in wonderful ways. Bhairavi's ultimate benediction is here.

I am impelled to recite:

Sarvamangalamangalye Shive Sarvarthasadhike  

Sharanye Tryambake Gauri Narayani Namostute!

Glory to the Mother! Glory to Lalgudi!

Osho on Pain

This is an extraordinary talk. I want you to listen to it in a quiet place with no distraction. It can be life-transforming. Osho is talking about pain. He begins thus, in response to a question on how to face physical pain towards the end. The questioner says that he knows how to deal with psychological pain, but is scared of physical pain.

PSYCHOLOGICAL PAIN can be dissolved; and only psychological pain can be
dissolved. The other pain, the physical pain, is part of life and death; there is no way to dissolve it. But it never creates a problem. Have you ever observed? -- the problem isonly when you are thinking about it. If you think of old age you become afraid, but old people are not trembling. If you think of illness you become afraid, but when the illness has already happened, there is no fear, there is no problem. One accepts it as a fact.

The real problem is always psychological. The physical pain is part of life. When you start thinking about it, it is not physical pain at all; it has become psychological. You think about death; there is fear. But when death actually happens there is no fear. Fear is always about something in the future. Fear never exists in the present moment. If you are going to the front in a war, you will be afraid, you will be very apprehensive. You will tremble, you will not be able to sleep: many nightmares will haunt you. But once you are on the front -- ask the soldiers -- once you are on the front, you forget all about it. Bullets may be passing and you can enjoy your lunch; and bombs may be falling and you can play cards.

The talk has worked on me. I have posted it in its entirety here. This is one of his talks from the series on Buddha, titled "The Discipline of Transcendence".
Part 1 Psychological pain
Part 2 Psychological Pain

Worshipping the Mother Goddess

Now is Navaratri, I started the day reading an email from a devout Upasaka of Devi Akhilandeshwari and Lalithamba. I am ending the day after listening to a lovely rendering of Lalitha Sahasranama by Smt.Vani Suresh, who readily sang this for us impromptu in front of her lovely Navaratri doll arrangement a few years back. Listen to the rendering below and see her mastery of music and Sanskrit. She is a close friend of my better half  Rathna for over 50 years.

Lalitha sahasranama by Smt. Vani Suresh

Endhiran - what fun!

I saw Endhiran. It's in 2D, but I can say it's 4D in fun! It's proved to me beyond all doubt that Indians love mythology and also mythology can do with a bit of technology like robotics and animation. I will not be a spoilsport and tell you the gripping story. I will just list a few things about Endhiran:

1. Rajni doesn't disappoint. I quite liked him and Ash. In fact the movie shows that there are a very small number of people irreplaceable in India like Rajni and Aishwarya.


2. The movie story line borrows heavily from Hindu epics with characters like Raktabijasura ( this is Navaratri time!) and Bhasmasura. However it is a true original.


3. In fact Chitti Chitti Bang Bang movie has copied the idea from Endhiran. You may wonder how, but you see Endhiran (his name is Chitti and he goes bang bang) defies the concept of time. For example the robot can instantly manufacture clones of himself and endow all of them with super programs which can be used in a cloud computing mode.


4. Rajni is called Dr.Vaseegaran. That is perhaps derived from the Sanskrit word Vashikara, which means a Captor. Like Ravana. But then it's not Rajni, but the robot-who-goes-bad Mr. Endhiran who becomes a Ravana. He falls in love with Ash and steals her from Dr. Vasi.


5. Endhiran is not your ordinary everyday robot. He has supersonic speed, super strength, and also SUPER magnetism (and speed 1 TeraHz and memory 1 ZettaByte- 10^21B). He can act like a 10 tesla magnet and attract large quantities of metallic objects. His preference is for machettes used to chop coconuts (he chops policemen's greedy palms).


6. Aishwarya is simply superb. Even a small nut will fall in love with her. Then why not a super robot? In fact he plans to produce robo sapiens after marrying her!


7. Even Endhiran will have to negotiate. But only with Madras mosquitoes. They tame him by reminding him of their powers of mass destruction which far exceed his capacity. They are also indestructible, and have fancy names like Rosalski.


8. Any resemblance to Toy Story 3 (robot gone wrong) and 3 Idiots (complicated delivery) is purely coincidental. If you want to know how to correct with your bare hands a wrong foetal presentation, read here.


9. It is no longer fashionable to say to a woman, "I love you." Better say, "ÿou're my wasabi".


10. You can make a full love song with words that rhyme with Kilimanjaro and Mohenjadaro. (No, they don't show scenes from these places. They use computer graphics for scenery).


11. If you thought all Bollywood dances show lots of men and women dance like robots think again. They ARE robots!


12. Robots will overtake India. They will build the next CWG stadia and stuff in time, without corruption, and without 1000% cost overrun. You see, we have the best software folks in the world like Vaseegaran!


13. However, we still need to solve one problem. Robots need electrical power. And once the power is cut, they fall down almost dead, but thank God we have lots of Amabassador cars stuck in traffic jams in Dr. Radhakrishnan Salai, T. Nagar and Nungambakkam High Road. The robots will rush or crawl and snatch power from their batteries!


14. Finally: some things never change. Sanskrit words mutate themselves so cutely in Tamil. Yantra becomes Endhiran!

Hanuman

This is Balinese Hanuman. I saw him first in an art store when I went to Jakarta. Later Niranjan and Meghana (my son and daughter-in-law) presented him to me after going to Bali for their honeymoon. The one I had seen first was black in colour but this one, showing the natural wood grain, is even more powerful. This is how he sits in my showcase. He has been meticulously hand-carved and never fails to stun the first-time viewer.

Hanuman is the ultimate creation of a poetic genius. He comes a close second to Krishna in his timeless appeal to me. In fact, Arjuna and Krishna have him on the chariot flag listening in on Bhagavadgita! And there can be no worship of Rama without Hanuman.

I give you ten points of why I love Hanuman:

1. He is the epitome of valour. He is totally fearless.


2. He is the epitome of devotion. There is no better example of a devotee with Ananya Bhakti.. Ananya here means nothing else exists for him except his God, Rama.


3. He is the ultimate diplomat. He handles the most tricky situations in Ramayana with incomparable aplomb - be it arranging the friendship pact with Sugriva, tiding over Sugriva's tardiness in discharging his side of the deal-of searching for Sita, or in finding out Sita's hide-out, or breaking news to her of Rama and vice-versa, or of tackling Ravana.


4. He is the ultimate action hero. He is totally focussed, and totally dependable. There cannot be a better example of this than how he brings Sanjivani.


5. He is the eternal worshipper. He is in constant chant.


6. He is the best listener. In fact Rama remarks, when Hanuman meets him and Lakshmana in disguise in the forest, how astutely he questions to find out about who they are.


7. He is intelligent. He works out how to prepare the ground for Rama's attack, by instilling the core of fear in the whole of Lanka and Ravana,when he is in Lanka


8. He is the only powerful hero who did not seek anything for himself. He does even better than Rama here.


9. He is totally egoless. He is the personification of someone living on this earth as a realized soul. Doing his duty totally out of love for all creation.


10. He is the most positive hero. One can never fail to be inspired by him... he has not a grain of negativity.

Jai Hanumaan Gyaan Gun Saagar!

Photosynth - a new way to look at photos!

Note: Play around with the controls. You can see both sides of the horse (choose 2D View and flip to the other side).. and also try the point cloud. It shows amazing colours!

Railways - the Arteries of India

Last night, in a chaos of colour and sound, the Commonwealth Games was inaugurated in New Delhi. Much as everyone expected, India's colours, culture and scale were truly evoked in the spectacular. And sure enough, when they wanted to show the kaleidoscope of Indian life, they used the tableau of a train winding its way slowly and colourfully, as in this picture.

Interesting that my weekend, filled with reading about Indian Railways, should end in this finale. The book I read is well written and comprehensive. Changing Tracks by V. Nilakant and S. Ramnarayan is about how Indian Railways made a dramatic financial turn-around  by conceiving and implementing  various strategic and major operational improvements and in the process made a cash surplus of 20000+ crore rupees in 2008, vastly different from their position of near bankruptcy in 2000. Various management pundits had suggested radial restructuring and privatization as well as fare increases. But the organization found leadership and commitment in Lalu Prasad, a savvy minister, and his Officer on Special Duty Sudhir Kumar. Lalu reinforced Railways' commitment to the common man. Sudhir Kumar assembled talent to go about executing a vision of a turn-around that should be the envy of any large world-famous corporation.

The authors are to be congratulated on a brilliant book. I give below pictures of the book and sleeve notes so you can quickly read what the book is about. At Rs. 399, Harper Collins have brought out a book that is a MUST READ text book for any Indian engineering or management student. 

I just give you some facts which fascinated me.

1. In 2007, India had the largest railway, ferrying 17 million passengers every day over 695 billion passenger kilometres every year!
2. Indian Railways employs 1.7 million people and supports 1.1 million pensioners.
3. The average fare in 2002  per passenger km was 0.55 cents (US) vs. China's 1.25 cents.
4. In 2000-1, accidents per million train km were 0.65, compared to 0.65 in Japan and 0.91 in Germany.

So Indian Railways is the largest, cheapest and one of the safest train systems in the world!

Some beautiful "human" stories in the book.

• Vivek Sahai, AGM, Western Railway and his crew restored the Bombay trains within 12 hours of a series of coordinated terrorist attacks in seven trains at 6:30PM (peak hour) on 11 July 2006 that ripped apart trains, cluttered the tracks and killed hundreds. It was an incredible act of engineering and commitment to fight all odds to restore life and the six million commuter traffic within hours to a city dulled by death and destruction. Sahai must have remembered Hanuman's heroic act of bringing Sanjeevani.
• When India was cut up during partition, Sardar Patel was keen to restore rail links to eastern Indian states like Assam. He gave a free hand to Chief Engineer Karnail Singh, who achieved the impossible task of building 700 km of track in malarial jungles with 635 cm of rainfall and several major rivers, by working on a war footing with 15000 workers (brought in from all over the country) within 18 months.
• At the behest of PM Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi, the Railway Board Chairman Gujral ran 200 trains (during an illegal railway strike period), to transport a few lakh party workers overnight to arrive in Delhi for the political rally, He asked and got in return one favour too... everyone bought a ticket!
• Lalu wanted a Garib Rath, a poor man's A/C train. Sudhir Kumar took the challenge and designed and built with the best talent in Railways a train within EIGHT MONTHs with design and build quality to rival Tata locomotives. The train could carry 1920 passengers at a third  of  the COST of Rajdhani Express. An impressed Lalu told Sudhir Kumar, "Aapne to kamaal kar diya, ji!"

Congratulations to Prof. Nilakant and Prof. Ramnarayan!

(click below to see large in separate window)

Crumbling Faith

This Buddha is half gone but still holds his peace. Who's disintegrated, he or me with my crumbling faith in the Beyond?

Gopala Gokula Vallari Priya - Tulsi Bhajan

This song has been tuned and sung inimitably by Balamuralikrishna in the Hindustani raga Shyam Kalyan. My day began listening to his song, from a concert recorded in Bombay in 1963, accompanied by Lalgudi Jayaraman and Umayalpuram Sivaraman.

I give you the Audio here:

Gopala Gokula Vallari Priya

The words of this Tulsidas bhajan are sweet:

Oh Cowherd, you love the gardens and creepers of Gokula. Equally are you the beloved of all cowherds and calves! I am blessed to worship your feet, a feat difficult for even gods and sages.

Your dark mein is delightful; your gait is lovely. You're always giving joy to all, and putting them in your charm.You liberated the conch demon with your blessed vision. You're childlike in appearance, but so virtuous and kind!

Your curly tresses, your lovely mark on the forehead, your moon-like face all steal my heart, much like you banish my troubles. You love to roam in the Brindavan, oh gracious Shyaam! - Tulasidasa

Singapore - my fascination continues

When Tan Tock Seng Hospital, a large public hospital, did a good job of treating SARS victims, it received 8000 spontaneous 'thanks' cards from people all over, like this one from a Montessori school.. What a virtuous cycle of public good...

Life of Pi

An extraordinary novel about a Pondicherry zoo-keeper's son who loves his idlis and coconut chutney, shipwrecked and floating at sea and surviving in a 26 ft. life boat along with a tiger for 227 days. The Canadian writer Yann Martel has taken the idea from a Brazilian novel, and turned the idea into a story as colourful, fascinating, and thought-provoking as the sight of a Royal Bengal tiger.

The book is un-put-downable. No wonder it won the Man Booker Prize, and has sold 7 million copies. There is a pictorial illustrated version, and you can see samples here.

Here is what reviews said:

Chinese Garden Pagoda this morning