Friend, philosopher and a techer too...

It was sometime in June 2007, that I first sat in his class, I still remember him teaching us “Nomenclature” in Organic Chemistry, initially I was not that impressed. This was my first impression, but this was never my last impression.

The famour Sanskrit Subhashita which say, “Vidya Dadaati Vinayam”, meaning Knowledge gives humility, KNN sir was a living example of the above statement.

As time went by, I got to know him more, his tests, his lectures were all so amazing, the “American Way” of teaching were all so awesome. Every single thing of KNN sir was just so awesome. I still remember that class he told about “Gay Bars”, the class was laughing their ass off. His charismatic yet humble persona. If I have to list the things that made me salute the man, I am sure I wouldn't be able to complete it in a day. He not only to taught chemisrtry, he induced great fighting spirit in us, he made us work hard with an awesome incentive based programme “ Chocolate for scoring above 90”(I still have my collection of chocolate wrappers). His famous line on how one should lead a life still echoes in my mind “ Neeralli Taavare ele hegiratto haage irbeku”, meaning one must lead life without getting bound to the world. If ever I could revisit my past, I would definitely want to attend those lectures of his. For me he was a Philosopher, Friend, Role model and a teacher too..

RIP KNN Sir, end of an era!

There can be none like you Sir

My new found love!

No, it's not a person I have fallen in love with, but it's something that most people love, "Reading", to be more precise reading books. For people who don't know me well, reading books is something that didn't come to naturally nor did I love the idea of reading books, seeing those huge books, I used to wonder, how do these people read such huge books? I really felt those who read books were all Bozos, I was wrong, very very wrong! I had tried my hand in reading books, but I never really got into the habit of reading books regularly, until one fine day.

             I had a few landmark vouchers worth a grand and I couldn't buy any electronic goods with it, so I decided to splurge my vouchers on something that I had vowed never to buy, BOOKS! I always felt books were not something to invest on, you get e-books for free, right? So why buy books..
But then I had no choice that day, henceforth I made up my mind to get some books for myself.

“The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.”
― Jane Austen

The above really applied to me till this day!

Me and a couple of other close friends hitch-hiked to Forum mall, where Landmark was located, the journey was memorable, my dad allowed me to use the car, I was on the wheel and all three of us had a laugh riot during the journey. We reached the place, parked the car in the lot and there again we attracted the attention of people around us, with our loud laughter.

We wandered around  the mall and finally headed to Landmark, I had drawn up a list of books to buy, without prior knowledge of how much it would cost me, but I decided to buy three books, the list being

1. "Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson". I idolise Steve Jobs, hence this was an obvious choice.

2. "Losing my Virginity", Autobiography of Richard Branson, someone who has really done wonders according to me.

3. This was undecided, I really didn't think that I would be able to buy another one..

When I was checking out books in the store, I couldn't find the books I was looking for, on enquiring, I found out that the book on "Richard Branson" was out of stock. So I had to look for another book. My friend suggested me to buy two books, which happened to be " I did it my way", a book on Amir Khan and another book called "Dongri to Dubai", a book on the mumbai underworld.

I took them all home and the book "Steve Jobs", my favourite was a huge book, over 800 pages. I stared at the book for sometime, puzzled about its mamoth size and doubting my ability to complete the book. After a while I said "Screw it, let's read it". I started off, the honeymoon period of a couple of days was over, yet my determination to read the book continued. Infact I loved the book so much, that I skipped my daily routine of turning on the comp for a couple of days, I was engrossed in the book, plugging in my earphones and songs playing in the background, the eyes were just focussed on the book. I was able to beautifully visualise every line I read, missing no lines, but enjoying each line. It was an amazing experience. I could literally see Steve Jobs in front of me.
The love had happened and there was no turning back, I finally fell in love with amazing world of books. There was no turning back and the love grew stronger with time. As told in the movie "Jab tak hai Jaan" ( I am not an SRK fan at all and I strongly disliked the movie too ), "har Ishq qa waqt hota hai" (every love has a right moment) and my time to love books finally arrived. 

FOSS, How it changed my life??

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FOSS stands for Free and Open Source Software

It's been about a year and a half since CONF.KDE,IN happened, people who were part of it would certainly know, how successful it was. Conf Kde was where my journey into Free and Open Source Softwate truly began. Helping organising the conference was a great satisfaction and an amazing learning curve to me. Meeting some amazing people who are really inspirational and friendly. I took back a lot of things from the conference.

If anyone of you have seen or heard “Harsha Bhogle's” talk at IIM-A, he speaks about the need for godfathers, role models in a particular field. He says because of the absence of such a god-fatherly figure in his field, he looked upto the cameramen who did a flawless job while capturing various cricket matches, he was in awe of the scorers and statisticians who had numbers of batsmaen and bowlers at the back of their hand, they were his role models and godfathers. This happened to me too.

In my life, in the things that interested me, there weren't many people whom I could idolize or look upto, I was constantly searching for people whom I could look upto for inspiration and guidance. While all this was running inside my head, one part of my mind told me to look at people in this amazing FOSS community. People who were highly passionate about the work they did, people who lived and breathed Free software. It was amazing how people in this community bonded with each other over codes, programming stalwarts spoke and encouraged budding geeks and coders. After witnessing this, I realised that these were my “Godfathers”.

During the Conf.KDE.IN in March 2011, I was lucky to meet and work with a few of the amazing FOSS guys, a few names here, Shantanu Tushar, Pradeepto, Sinny, Sudhendu, Madhusudan (he happens to be my bro's bestie ), Aditya Kavoor and so many other people. They were such awesome people, I was in awe of them. Working for the conference alongside them, I learnt a lot of things, especially the need to totally devote youreself to the thing you love to do, eat sleep and breathe it, only then will you be able to reach great heights in your field of interest. While working alongside them, I could see their love, devotion and passion for what they did. They took a lot of pride in what they did. Never were they tired of it. I was an outsider there, with no programming background at all, they made me feel at home, treating me as part of one big and happy family, listening to what I had to stay, guiding me and helping me at the work I was assigned to do and most of all motivating me at times. There is a Sanskrit saying which tell us, “knowledge which is not shared is always a waste”, people here are always ready to share!

It's through experiences like these, that we discover something new about ourself, something that could help shape our careers or lives.

While campaigning for this conference, my job was to go to various colleges and talk to students and convince them that this conference was amazing and by attending this conference, there would be a lot of value addition. I had about 5 colleges to campaign. Initially I was skeptical, but these folks convinced me and filled me up with confidence. I started the campaigning job with my college, went to various classes with a poster in hand spoke to hundreds of students on how this conference could change their lives. Some were courteous to listen to me and some weren't, but I kept my head high and did my job with a lot of pride and passion, which of course I had learnt from these FOSS folks. Fortunately my campaigning cameo paid off and as a result, no of people attending the conference shot up. While I was campaigning, I realised, that I enjoyed promoting/marketing it and to an extent was good at it too. This helped me make a very good choice in life, the choice was to take up marketing as part of my profession. Judging whether I was really good at it or this was just my self-pride was not very hard to figure out. Successful and knowledgeable people told me that I was indeed good at it ( They were not telling me just to make me feel good ), their decision was backed by some keen observations and good critical judgment. This made me feel good about myself and help me chalk out a path for my career. Today I work part time for a startup called Tailspin, where I get to do what I am passionate about and what I love to do. If I had not been part of FOSS, I would never have been able to discover what I loved. This is one of the greatest things that FOSS has given me and I will always be grateful for that.

The positives I derived don't end here. I made great friends, people with whom I went to movies, had dinner and shared a laugh with. Apart from a lot of value addition to my career, I made some great friends.

“FOSS did change my life”

This is Vattam signing off, until next time, goodbye and sayonara!

How one man's cleverneess, made lives of VTU Students Stress Free!

For those of you who have done their Engineering under VTU, you all know the fact that the most horrific thing about this university is viewing the results. We all have to sit in front of the computer and log on to the website and enter out University Seat Number and keep pressing the “F5” button to know whether our results are out. To describe the whole experience, it's like a coma patient who could die anytime. One guy from BMS college of engineering, ended all our woes and found an awesome solution. Here's how he did it. Let's refer him by the name “Mr Geek”.

During his third year of Engineering, Mr Geek fed up of the result woes, decided to write a piece of code which would check the result page and refresh it by itself and notify him when the results are out. It was a simple thing but it had a clear cut sign of ingenuity. He was a hostelite and this news about his masterful invention spread like wild fire in the hostel. During the time of the result, “Mr Geek's” room would be flooded with other students waiting to find out their results.

Everytime, the results were out, people would flood “Mr Geek's” hostel room and his phone would be buzzing every second with calls and texts from everyone. This was literally a pain in the a**, so he decided to take it to the next level and making this idea into a full fledged website which would help people in reducing the anxiety and also relieve him from dealing with a flooded room :P. He came up with this site, http://vtu.shaan7.info/, where you click on the link, enter your University Seat number and your mail id, you get your results as soon as the results are out directly to your mail id. It worked great!

During the time of my results, I was not in station, but I had access to the internet via my smartphone. I was on my way back to Bangalore, me and my friends had been to coorg. While we were returning back, everyone around were hooked onto their phones, constantly checking if the results were out or not. I was a little nervous too. But, luckily thanks to “Mr Geek”, I had subscribed to the above mentioned link and I knew that as soon the result would be out, I would get a mail. The digital watch indicated it was 7 PM and we were almost nearing bangalore, I got a beep on my phone and I checked out what it was. The phone told me I had received a mail, I opened the mail there were the whole list of marks, the class I had obtained. I was happy to see the results and I was happy to know that “Mr Geek's” inventions worked flawlessly, I shouted to my friends, “Guys Results are out!”, they all started checking out the website, which would take an eternity to load, while I sat there and enjoyed the music that played on my headphones. Mr Geek was the hero of the day for me, he made my life more Liveable and Enjoyable and most of all “anxiety free”. I went home and forwarded the mail to Mr Geek and as a mark of thanking him, liked his page,

and shared it on my wall,

If you are interested in taking a look at how to do it, check out the link

https://github.com/shaan7/vturesults

Mr Geek is my long time KDE friend, Shantanu Tushar, his blog roll

http://www.shantanutushar.com/.

So, the next time you want view your results stress free, you all know what to do, just register at the linkhttp://vtu.shaan7.info/ and stay stress free during results and of course do like its page on FB,

https://www.facebook.com/vturesultsnotify

Thanks Shantanu, we owe you!

A friend's experience in my words

With a notepad to take notes and ipod to record the conversation, it was like an interview, my attempt at expressing my friend's experience in my words.

Kung fu panda ring tonne of my cellphone woke me up from a deep sleep, it was my friend from RV, I answered the call, on the other side was an excited and an elated tonne, "Maga place Aadno" (Dude, I got placed ), my sluggishness was erased after hearing this awesome piece of news. My reaction was stereotypical, " Congrats dude, great achievement". After hearing the whole experience, I really had to put this on my blog. Will be addressing this friend of mine as "Mr  Oathla", this is his twitter name.

Mr Oathla woke up in the morning and through his smartphone, browsed for a company named " Air Watch" on the wikipedia app, read through all the relevant details. He was feeling good that day, an air of hope and optimism. It was placement day, the previous day he was informed that a company named "Airwatch" would be coming down to the campus to hire students. Mr Oathla was unsure whether his department i.e. Instrumentation would be allowed to take up the test. But he was ready, both mentally and intellectually to take on the arduous task ahead of him, even though there was ambiguity whether his department students would be allowed to take the test.
       
              Morally  Mr Oathla was down, after he didn't get placed in the 4 companies he wrote, he had almost no hope of getting placed. Amidst such negativity, there was hope though it wasn't burgeoning. He left home as usual and reached college at around 9. At around 10.30 he learnt that his department would be allowed to participate in the recruitment drive. Relieved, he geared up for the first round, an aptitude test. The test was scheduled at around 12.30. He reached the test venue just about ten minutes in advance along with a few of his friends. He wrote the test like any other aptitude test. ( Mr Oathla has a clever mind, an erudite he was, a lucid quizzer ). He completed the test and headed off to his department premises, where he had to attend lab. "Ok, not bad he told himself" and forgot about the test. Engrossed in the lab work, he was interrupted by his depratment placement co-ordinator, "Dude you got through the aptitude test", you have to attend the interview, which will be starting any minute. He was nowhere near to "ready" for an interview. Unshaven , no formals, this was his attire, he had falsely convinced himself that he wouldn't be to going to the interview round. But then here he was, selected for the interview. His mind was running like a jet engine, millions of thoughts, he told his mind to shut up and get ready. Luckily the placement co-ordinator exchanged his shirt and shoes, this helped Mr Oathla put up a formal look for the interview. Then began a wait that seemed like Pandavas exile period, never ending, from about 2.30 to 6.30, this dude waited for his turn literally in the dark. At around 6.45, he gathered all his courage and went to the interviewing room and asked whether the interview would be held today or not. On seeing him, the officials there cross checked his name in the list of candidates selected for the interview round and asked him to sit down at the room across and get ready to face the interview. All charged up, the dude was ready. In came a gentleman, as a mark of respect, Mr Oathla got up. The interviewer courteously offered water and some biscuits, to which MR Oathla politely refused, thinking this could be a hideous plan to check the mindset of the interviewee. Questions were being shot at Mr oathla, he handled them like Rahul Dravid handles swing bowling, "easily and elegantly". Some notable questions being,

• Interviewer : What's your view on the Apple Vs Samsung court case
  Interviewee : Banning devices is not the right way to go, the companies should
  learn to co-exist in an environment where healthy competition is necessary.
• Interviewer : Tell a short story about yourself.
  Mr Oathla, quickly told a story, which included his accomplishments and all
  other positive things that one could tell in an interview about himself. Some
  "Cool Bull-shit".
  
  By this time, the interviewer was quite impressed, he threw a rather tough question!
• Interviewer : What's your sales pitch??
  Interviewee : I always back my instincts,I am good quizzer, I can participate in extracurricular activities/corporate competitions on behalf of your company.
  Also, I know German, I could help establish an office in Germany.
• Interviewer : Give an example which indicate your entrepreneurial skills.
  Mr Oathla gave an awesome Business model he had thought of a few years earlier.
  The Interviewer was more than impressed. 

After a good HR round, Mr Oathla had a final Tech round. He was up for it!
It was a lady, she seemed to be a tough taskmaster.
After formal greetings, the interview began.

Interviewer : What do you mean by NFC?
Mr Oathla was enthralled, he knew the answer and he nailed it.

Questions were shot at him and he responded gracefully and honestly, to a couple of questions that he didn't know the answer, he honestly accepted.

One more memorable question was,

Interviewer : What is Geo fencing?
Oathla didn't know the exact answer, but he was clever to have derived it!
"Madam, I know what Geo tagging is. I guess Geo fencing means to secure a network in
a particular geography". The lady in command was impressed, this kid is smart!

The interview got over and the interviewer wished him luck for the results.

Oathla headed out with an aura of joy and accomplishment, he knew he'd get the job. By the time he came out it was around 7.30. The results were announced at 7.40 and
Mr Oathla who saw the notice board with his name on it was not surprised, his instincts had told him that it was his day.. His day it was!!

“Instinct is a marvelous thing. It can neither be explained nor ignored.”
― Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair At Styles

An elated, relieved and joyous Mr Oathla returned home all smiles. Informed his near and dear ones and slept a satisfied man.  

He was sure that the time was his and his instincts turned out to be right.

Congrats Mr Oathla. An apology from my side, this incident happened a few months ago, I am posting this blog now, but then, "Better late than never ". 

Mr Oathla is my good friend and the Quizzer pro "Varun Athreya". 

Keep rocking Varun!

Consumer experience, product judgement, well that's about it!!

I am not a B-school grad, nor am I a Product designer but, I am a consumer who walks an extra mile before buying a product. This habit of mine has made me into a not so mediocre consumer (I don't want to call myself an intelligent consumer cause the company fools you in some way or the other) . This post is my attempt in admiring(in my view) some products/innovations the industry has thrown to consumers.

“We want consumers to say, 'That's a hell of a product' instead of, 'That's a hell of an ad.'”

- Leo Brunett

It was a busy evening for me, I had to go around town insearch of a vital component for my project, I was searching all over town for this particular component. During my quest for this component I happened to pass by an area where my friend was put up too. We made a quick plan to meet up to discuss something for our final year project. We decided to keep the meeting brief as my friend had to head to swimming classes in a short while. We had some thought provoking discussions on the nature of the project we intended to do.

Our meeting ended, both of us waiting for my friend's cousin to arrive in a grey Honda City, to pick up my friend and head to the swimming classes. Two headlights showed up at a distance and my friend said, “ There he comes”. The dude got down the car, the light in the car turned on and he closed the door and the lights turned off!!,well they didn't turn off immediately though, they gradually dimmed down. Damn! They were amazing to see, the interiors of the car gradually merging with the darkness as the lights faded out. My first reaction was, WOW!!, why couldn't the folks at Maruti Suzuki think of this, both are Japanese, why the difference. I was in awe of the car, not because it was the best engineered car around me, but because it made the consumer who owned it feel special, it made the owner feel special everytime he got down and got off the car, that's how the consumer experience should be according to me. Everytime we use something, it should make us feel special, it should make the owner feel he is a class apart, it did make the owners feel great, here are some stats to support it http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_City

               Sometimes you become part of some amazing discussions that your view towards some simple things change forever. I was lucky enough to be a part of this particular discussion with two great engineers, the discussion was all about consumer experience.

                     A sunday morning, me my bro and my parents headed to my aunt's house, where my cousin and his wife had just returned from a holy voyage to the divine “Maanas Sarovar”. A topic came by where my brother and cousin had a discussion on the functionality and the restrictions that Apple imposes on it's users. My cousin who is a Phd and director at IBM brought up a very interesting point when he asked my brother to get his laptop's battery adapter. He said, “ Dude, go get my laptop charger, it's in the room on the table”. My brother got the adaptor and handed it over to my cousin. My cousin continued, “ See this adapter, most of us with laptops have it. But then, this here is the adapter of a macbook, how is this different from other adapters? We all wind up the wire and then always wonder what we have to do the end of the wire which has a socket, we wonder what do with it? We tuck it in between the wire. But the blokes at Apple had a different idea, they have given a small hook to tuck this particular socket, this is Consumer experience!!”. I was awestruck. I really asked the questions why didn't any other consumer electronics maker think of this. I really didn't like Apple as a company till then, I really felt their products were not value for money and the restrictions  they imposed on users were just meaningless. My views changed from that day onwards, it's not just the functionality and the value for money that a consumer should look at, but also consumer experience aspect that one has to look into before judging a product as a whole.

When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You’ll know it’s there, so you’re going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through.

— Steve Jobs

At the end of the about two incidents, I really changed my view towards judging a product. As an aspiring entrepreneur, I'd certainly like to bring in the above mentioned things when I venture into making a product for the consumer.

passionately passionate

“Macha oodi oodi bore aagogide, enaadru different aagi maadbeku”( bored of this studies dude, want to try out something different ), a line from a conversation that I had with a person who has shown me the power of Pure Passion. This blog is about the power of true passion and where it can take you in the journey of life.

             It was 1 A.M.and I was awake just like all my other collegemates to study for the upcoming exams. The exams were to start in a few days. I got bored of studying. To take a break from studies, I called one of my friends. During the conversation, I got to know that he is ill. The dude stays just nearby, I dropped by to check on him the next day. To tell you more about him, he is a very passionate photographer, very easy going ( More than required :P) and a man with Obsessive compulsive disorder. He happens to be my senior too. Coming back to the visit to his house, I was there for a very brief span of about twenty minutes, during which we had a conversation of what next after Engineering, as he was passing out of college in a few days. During the conversation, he told me his plans for the future, during which he hinted that he would not be opting for a normal life, on my curious questions, he just replied “ Wait and Watch!”. The conversation ended there and I returned home. I thought I'll address him as “The Jr Kamal” in the blog.

Life moved on, I became busy studying for the exams and I had totally forgotten about this conversation I had. On the previous day of my fourth exam, I got a call from the “Jr Kamal”. On hearing his voice, I was able to sense a feeling of joy and satisfaction, a sense of accomplishment was clearly visible in the tonne of his voice. The talk began in usual style and he enquired about my preparations to the exam. During the conversation, he asked me, “Lo ninge Rajiv Menon gotta? (Do you know, who Rajiv Menon is?), to which I replied, “ Illa maga, gottilla”. He told me who Rajiv Menon was and for those who don't know who he is, kindly check out the link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rajiv_Menon . During the whole description of “Rajiv Menon”, I was wondering, why the man is telling me about him so much. Realising that I was puzzled with this sudden description, he enlightened me about the reason for emphasising so much on “Rajiv Menon” it was about his future goals, a question that was unanswered the other day, had clear cut answers. He had decided not to work in any sort of a company, instead he chose to take up something that many would call the biggest risk or biggest mistake of his life. He chose to take up a course in cinemataography and decided that he would take up cinematography as a profession. Many people decide upon something in life and then give up on it, but this dude is different. As they say fortune favours the brave and fortune did favour his bravery. He got selected for a course in cinematography at the prestigious “Mindscreen Film Institute”, the film institute started and run by the acclaimed cinematograher, Rajiv Menon. To tell you more about how difficult it is to get into the institute, only ten students are selected from all over India and the selection is done personally by Mr Rajiv Menon. It's a different league altogehter.

So rarely do we see “gems” like these, who decide to make their own path in the road of life. We often dream about what we truly want to be in life, yet our dreams go astray because of our mediocre thinking. Inspiration needs to be drawn from dudes like these, who not only decide to set sail in a storm, they are determined to crossover the storm and reach the horizon. As one of the famous companies taglines say, “what dreams drive”. They definiely drive their dreams. But what is that fuels their undying spirit to chose something that the wiseman warn them from.

It's PURE Passion

I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious.”
– Albert Einstein,

There is no greatness without a passion to be great, whether it’s the aspiration of an athlete or an artist, a scientist, a parent, or a businessperson.”
– Anthony Robbins,
Speaker and Author

Passions have fuelled such enery in the past, they will continue to do so. From souls like these, we need to draw inspiration, Inspiration to do things that we are truly passionate about, even the legendary Steve Jobs said, “Love what you Do!”. Hope that like this Jr Kamal, me and many others fuel our dreams with the fuel called “Passion”.

Thats why the world admires Amercians!

My friends tease me as "American Lover" and often criticised me as being unpatriotic, this blog will strengthen their feelings I guess.

I have never liked or enjoyed watching reality shows.I have always disliked them for the too much of exaggeration and over dramatisation. I have even found them to be unreal and made upquite a number of times. But a few days back while I was channel browsing, I found one show on a popular TV channel, which did have all of the exaggeration and over dramatisation, but it also had an honest message that really attracted me to watching this. It is a show where the "decision makers" of a huge corporation/organisation like the CEO's, the mayor of a city all take up jobs at the execution level to learn more about the employees and what problems they are facing and what are the changes they expect from the top management so that their lives and work environment would be better. But the Bosses are undercover! I have watched quite a few episodes and I should say that I have been impressed by the swift and effective changes that these bosses bring after they have witnessed the problems of their employees. The bosses also gave away wonderful holiday packages to a few of the employees to honour their exceptional service to the organisation.
This is not the part that amazed me much, holiday packages or some extra cash is all ok. The employees at the execution level, took a lot of pride in the work they did. Be it garbage collectors, be it mechanics at the service department of a city, the firefighters, the window cleaners, the sweepers had one common thing which was so remarkable and wonderful. They took a lot of pride in the jobs they did. They all were so proud of themselves to do those jobs. Even the common people had immense respect for the work these people did.They felt they were responsible for making life of the public better. It amuses me, as why we can't have the same mindset of respecting the different jobs people do, why we tend to have scepticism in respecting other people's jobs. The show also showcased the CEO's, the Mayor, the Director all of them were kind enough to come out off their white collar jobs and work as ground level employees undercover. They also had the patience and the care for solving their problems.
So many people in India have spoken about the equality and dignity of labour, the concept of "work is worship", yet till today the society is biased and treats the ground level labours in a very unpleasant way. Hope this changes soon. Change is the only thing which is constant.

This is Vattam signing off.

Why do I Blog?

When I started blogging seriously about two and a half years ago, I didn't know whether I would continue to do it for a long time. I had written my first blog out of the sheer thrill that the incident gave, I wanted to express it so badly and tell the world what an interesting thing had happened to me. If I look at it now from a third person's view, I laugh at my action and wonder how kiddish of me to publicise something that didn't deserve so much of attention.I even remember, I had mailed my cousin in the US to see and comment on my blog.Since then my blogs have covered various aspects of life.I have enjoyed writing them and seeing others people's reactions for it.I have learned from credible sources that Writers always enjoy the appreciation from their readers appreciation.I have felt the same too.Many people mostly friends and relatives have come up to me and appreciated on blogs that I have written.I really felt on top of the world when they did so. After I started blogging seriously, my view in general towards the world has changed, I look at things in a more analytical way, a way which makes me question every incident/action of the world around me, which has helped me get answers to some complex questions. I have a rather strange habbit, whenever I write any blog,I always ask my brother to give his opinion about it, I feel he's my worst critic, he has always criticised me for my mistakes while writing.He has been very blunt about his opinion and sometimes his opinions have been very harsh and discouraging,I have been angered by his opinion,but they were all very honest. He even criticised me badly for calling myself the “Elite Vattam”. I was quite let down, but then I thought my next blog will keep him quiet. But that didn't come for a long time, until I posted my blog “What is humanity?”, he just said one single sentence in our very very brief conversation, he said “Eno hosa blog ella bardidya? It's good”( you seem to have written a new blog,it's good) these were his words.I was really awe struck, with no words,though I didn't express the joy inside me even a tiny bit, I just replied, “Hoon baribekalla, thanks”(Ya have written,thanks). Though my reaction was very subtle, my mind was filled with some strong happy emotions. It was an elated feeling for me. To sum up on why I blog, there are three things that I have realised that has kept me going are, primarily the satisfaction that I get out of writing,by letting my thoughts off my mind and into the words and then because of some kind and encouraging words that people have showered after they have read my blogs and lastly but definitely not the least to impress my brother he's been a critic and he has been a great role model for me. I have a few names to take this time round,I would like to thank a few people for their really encouraging words which has drived me into continuing my blogging spree, my friends Prateek(dude called me just to tell about my blog),Rajesh Dubal,my cousins Arun,Ajay and Vishal.My Kde friend Shantanu Tushar who helped me better the appearance of the blog.Thanks guys!and of-course my bro Santosh Vattam for all his criticism that helped me better my writing. This is Vattam signing off.

What is humaninty??

Recently one of my maternal uncle's passed away.It was something that no one had expected,it was so shocking.He died of a massive heart attack in a temple near the port town of Mangalore.He was 59 years old,a cheerful,fun loving and a very social person.He was always into some social activity or the other and he had a great devotion towards God.During the last year I had become quite close to him,whenever he called my mom,he made it a point to speak to me.
My heart goes out to his family members,especially to his 17 year old son who has to face his 12th board exams in three months time.I really didn't know what to say to him.I heard the news from my father and I was really shocked to hear it.I still remember speaking to him a few days back over the phone.At the end of the day I had to accept that he was no more and move on.
Amidst all this tragedy there was this tussle in his family where there was a divide on the way his last rites had to be performed,this was because,my aunt (his wife) belonged to a different cult,my aunt's brothers wanted to do his last rites in their methodologies while my maternal uncles (my uncle's brothers) wanted to do in their methodology.It was a very shameful tussle is what I came to know from my dad's words.While my aunt's brothers were the ones who had supported my uncle at all times,they definitely had a greater say in this regard,but my other maternal uncles were keen that their words were considered.My dad the diplomat in his imitable style like always came off as a hero by bringing an amicable solution to both parties involved.Cheers Dad!
Amidst all this,I wondered one thing,why is all this happening?Isn't there something called humanity?Agreed his last rites need to performed in a just way,but then there are some things which ought be given a little more thought during such tragic times.I really felt that any one of the two parties should have just let it go,so that the sensitivity is the situation is safeguarded and no one would be burdened to handle the already stumped family.I was shattered to witness all this,cursing myself in my inability to just ask the people to shut up who were making some unnecessary noise instead of consoling the family members the loss they have just had.I sometimes wonder in what civilised society I live which fails to understand the situation and react to it.Why the human being is bent on getting pushing his point of view when something more important and more sane is to be done.My paternal uncle had put an amazing line in his short story that he has written and published,which I wish to quote here "what is life when Living is extinct?",which truly accounts for the situation I witnessed,the living was really extinct.I wish the world changes soon like the very meaningful song from "The Beatles" called "Imagine" which talks about the world as a unified and a single place,even "lord Krishna" said the same thing Vasudaiva Kutumbakam which means universal brotherhood,which we have failed to achieve till date.I really hope that song is not just a song but reality.At the end of this I really am confused about the meaning of the word humanity."Humanity" what does it really mean?"is it just another word with just a dictionary meaning with no true meaning to it like so many other words in this language.What is Humanity???

This is Vattam signing off

The deathly hallows

Dedicated to my friend who choose to kill himself.May your soul Rest In Peace my friend

"Sometimes life is going to throw the brick at you don't loose hope"greatly inspiring words by a world changer who is no more with us today!
A rather disturbing news stuck me recently!! Something I'd never dreamt in my life would happen! A classmate or should I say a friend of mine chose to do something that would leave a lasting impact on so many people around him!! He chose to kill himself for a reason that only he knows I guess. He was a quiet guy with a nice smile on his face,he used to wave to me every time we came across each other.we have also sat and had lunch together quite a few times. I still remember his witty and funny punch line jokes.its so disturbing that everything gets over in an instant.A person who was walking and talking with you every single day, would not be there with us.whatever be the reason for his strong self destructive act,I don't intend to disrespect it but I'd say I would dislike it.but death is something we can never undo.
I have always been of the opinion that one must always fight in life we have failures, we falter,fumble and we're broken but the true test of ones character lies here.a person becomes admirable if he overcomes the hurdles that life throws at him! Life has always been hard sweaty and dirty, we all have had to work for whatever little or big we have gained. After this incident my desire to live has become
Much stronger, I have found a new purpose in life! I wish to achieve great feats and be recognised for the work I do!!I would again like to quote Steve Jobs "Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary".This is so rightly said,we must always find purpose to live in this world.Infact I find that,if there's a problem with the way the society is,I strongly feel we should grow in stature and then see to it we change the society by making ourself a role model to it.In his Stanford University's speech,Steve Jobs also adds this line "If you live each day as if it were your last,someday you'll most certainly be right".I really found the line very inspiring,something that I have tried to adopt,"to live each day like it were my last"that way we tend to live our fullest every single day.
One must never think of killing himself,whatever be the reason,one must always fight and jump over the problems and hurdles that life throws at us.

This is the elite Vattam signing off!