Read this

ngels wrote this
http://surreal-flavors.blogspot.com/2008/12/cry-thy-beloved-city.html

read this.. its really thought provoking.

ngels tagged me...

ngels has tagged me a couple of times.. and I being a serious contender to the prestigious award of "Laziest person on earth" didnt pay any heed :(
But today time has come to answer those question that come with the tag..

What do you do when...

- You see a man (or woman) making a pass (trying to woo/flirt/impress) on a woman (or man) you like?
hahhahaha.... It happens all the time .. and most of the time they succeed as well :(.. So what do it do I curse them and will be frustrated and depressed for some time, and will move on :)


- Someone you like, is not attracted to you?
That happens so very often that I have stopped reacting to it.. I'll just try my luck somewhere else.
Mathematically speaking with each rejection my chances of acceptance are improving but seriously I think probability is failing me in this case :(((

- You are attracted to some one, but both of you are in two different cities?
This sounds like a typical movie story..
Again Hypothetically speaking.. there could be two options.. either I am so attracted that my phone bill and traveling expenses will burn my pocket
or else I will look for other (local) avenues :P

- You are reading a book, and your best friend wants to borrow it and can’t wait for you to finish reading, ‘coz he/she has been looking for it for all their life?
Looking for a book for all their life (and not getting it) .. u must be kidding :)..
But seriously if that book is so important to my friend.. I will give that but now is the crisis situation..
was I really liking the book and cant wait for the book to be returned.. then I will either buy a new copy or arrange for a pdf :P

- You help plan his / her career, and then, they go on to achieve it, leaving you behind, alone...
Well to begin with I am not a good planner, but hypothetically speaking if that ever happened I dont think I will care much... 'coz I dont believe people do such things on purpose and maybe someday they will remember me and return (wow this is philosophical)

- Who am I...
"I am who I am".. (that comes from a movie).. To answer in one line.. I am arbit.. simply I dont know who I am or may be never gave enough thought to the question thought one thing for sure I am very LAZY
I am a movie buff (watched a lot of them of varying genre) who loves to read fantasy books (LOTR, HP, Eragon types) though I read some serious stuff as well (primarily fiction)... Love to play computer games (AOE, WOW, Ceaser the list is big)..
My other interests include physics maths mythology history algos computers ... (all thanks to wiki)
Professionally I am software engg :) and lastly I dont think much and hate taking decisions

- What is the One thing that brings-in-smile-to-your-face/or pisses-you-off quite unexpectedly !?!
brings-in-smile-to-your-face .. there a hell lot of things.. ranging from a PJs to GGs .. but most of all company of friends is most pleasing and satisfying :)
pisses-you-off.. again a variety of things but most of all decision making and UI designing :P

- Insert (and add) a new question(s) / statement(s)...
Question to the Tag Maker...and to the tagged fellows:
(Adding a question is most difficult of all.. and all the time my laziness )
~ You liked a movie very much and you come across a guy/gal who thinks the movie was the worst movie ever.. (This happens with me a lot :P)

and here I tag
Ashish - The Iron Bull

Where are the GOALS

4 matches 1 won 2 draw and 1 lost
2 home 2 away
net goals scored 3
Against -
Newcastle United 1-1(home)
Portsmouth 1-0 (away)
Liverpool 1-2 (away)
Villarreal 0-0 (home)

So where are the goals??
The team which scored most then rest last year has scored just 3 goals in 4 games.. And they are going to Stamford Bridge this weekend. Lets hope that they will break the shackles but there is a small glitch the home team had not lost on home ground for quite some time now
And the red Devils always do the things "The Hard way"
so may be this weekend the home team record will be shattered :)

Long Time No Blog

Its more than a month without new post :(
So Why No blogging for the past 1 month.. The reason I am busy.. really what the hell are you doing? I am playing WOW that's the primary reason.. WOW is one of the best games I have ever played. Its a marvel in every aspect.. firstly amazing graphics and story line. The whole setup is astonishing. Simply the Best (By the way I am a 62 lvl blood elf fire Mage :P also a low level draenei shaman, human warlock and human priest)

Thats not complete story though, I spent 2 weekends at home doing nothing :) what a blissful time that is.
Apart from that watched three really great movies
1. The Dark Knight (watched thrice.. Joker you will never die)
2. Wall -E (Pixar can make anything act earlier it was monsters,cars this time it is robots.. Please send bollywood actors to them)
3. Rock On (One of the most refreshing bollywood movies.. amazing sound track awesome songs.. going to watch it again)

Thats all for now.. will be back soon:)

Crime and punishment

I have been thinking about something lately and just want to share... As a regular habit I read newspaper and all around there are news of crimes.. and I wonder do we really have a better system today as compared to our forefathers to stop crime or rather to stop criminals. As a matter of fact this is highly debatable because I don't know what was the crime rate at that time or is it just the information overflow that makes me aware of all the crimes.. but still let me share my thought..

Well some time back I was reading an article on criminal psychology which argued that punishment can not stop crime rather it just motivates the criminal to evade it.. And the current situation is very much like that only, criminals evade punishments..

So I was thinking If we can design a punishment that can not be evaded and then I thought of GOD, and imagined that our ancestors must have been really intelligent to come up with the concept that If some one commits a crime he would be punished by GOD.. Here I am not arguing whether the GOD exists or not but If somehow this notion of crimes being punished by GOD can be imbibed into everybody.. maybe they will not commit the crime... because they can no longer evade the punishment..

Lastly I wold like to refer to the incidents of humans trying to evade even the divine punishment for sins by bribing priests, holding rituals and so on and so forth.. Though I am not concluding anything but just think if the origin of the concept of GOD is just a plan of our ancestors to design a punishment that nobody can evade ...

TOW All Lost

Sunday was a bad day.. really bad..
Ok before I recollect what was bad about Sunday.. Let me discuss TOW, I got lot all the seasons of friends from a friend. And all the episodes were named like TOW xxxx..
After some time another friend told me that TOW stands for "The One With". so taking a cue from that I named this post as "The One When" All Lost. (I have been watching lot of friends lately)

So the crux is that yesterday was a great weekend for a sports freak like me (F1, Wimbeldon final and Asia Cup final) and naturally I was supporting temas in all of these tournaments but alas all of them lost..

In F1, I was supporting Ferari, but they could not make to the podium.. :( Though the race was really eventful .. lot of spinning (because of rains and wet track) and only 13 drivers could complete the race. First disappointment of the day.. more were to come.

Asia Cup, India did well to restrict Srilanka below 300, but they could have done better, Had RPSingh caught Jayasuriya when he was at 50. But still the target was totally achievable on a flat pitch that saw targets of 300 chased with ease.
India started off in style with Sehwag in a punishing mood and raced to 74/1 in 9 overs. But then SriLanka used their new bowler (branded as new Murali) and one of the most formidable battling line up collapsed like a pack of cards. The best players of spin had no clue and India lost by huge margin. Another disappointment but the worst was yet to come

Wimbeldon, the castle of Roger was at-last conquered by none other than Nadal. What a game it was.. A truly see-saw battle between two great fighters.. But in the end Roger lost and so does BigV (lost a costly bet). This was a total heart break. Roger was not at his level best but then to he gave a fight to Nadal. And to be truthful I dont line the game of Nadal, Though he is the winner but his game is not as classy as that of Roger, rather it is more of hard work running around and just trying to sent back the return (though he has improved a lot in that as well). On the contrary Roger is pure class, only problem with him being his backhand which is not very strong. And Nadal used this deficiency of Roger to the full extent directing every ball to the champ's backhand. In the end Roger lost and I must say he tried extra hard for each point which deserves accolades. But the bottom line remains "Jo Jita wohi Sikandar" and that was the biggest disappointment of Sunday.

PS: Never want a Sunday like this :(

Skype Rocks

On Saturday, I was successful in my quest of connecting to internet from home. Yes!! At last it was done..

So in the evening I was (voice)chatting with Bunsa through gtalk, when suddenly he came up with the idea of a conference.And as per my knowledge gtalk doesnt support that as of now, so he asked me to install skype. And there after we tried to call a lot other friends as well and started the conference. There were around 7 people me, bunsa, chetan, chandan, sahu, pawan, and Kushagra Sir for some time. Tried to call others as well (atuls, ngles and sajan) but they could not join. But anyway .. it was great to talk to old friends. And then bakar started.

Time seem to melt away and It was same as it wud have been 3 years back in campus in any of our rooms. Amazing environment.. we have not changed at all.. Everything was same as was during campus days.. recollecting memories.. talking about anything and everything. It was amazing. We were in conference for more than 4 hrs. The power of true bakar lies in the fact that u never know how much time u have been bakaring for.. And I had a gr8 time.. Awesome

I am looking forward for more of such conferences. :)

And they won..

I read an article on soccernet at the start of Euro, predicting that this might be the "Year of Spain", so very true... This is the year of Spain.. they were the best team of Euro 08, playing sexy football, top class passing with excellent defending.
I think they have the best midfield with likes of Xavi, Iniesta, Seena, Fabregas...
All the matches they played were really exciting with a possible exception of Italian clash (maybe..) They always showed the intent to attack and score. They were the deserving winners.

And as BigV always says "The game of football should win". It was the case in Euro'08.

Campeonato Europeo de Fútbol Fiebre

Well I tried to compile a list of nicknames of all the 16 teams playing in EURO'08.

Germany Die Mannschaft
Spain La Selección / La Furia Roja / La Roja
Turkey Ay-Yıldızlılar
Russia (None) (USSR Red Army)
Portugal Selecção das Quinas
Czech Republic The Locomotive
Switzerland Nati
Austria Wunderteam
France Les Bleus / Les Tricolores
Italy Azzurri
Netherlands Oranje
Romania Tricolorii
Sweden Blågult
Greece The Pirate Ship
Croatia Vatreni
Poland Biało-czerwoni / Orły

From the name it can be deduced I am supporting La Furia Roja.

Chit chat

have not blogged for past 2 weeks..
reasons..
1. Nothing new
2. Busy weekends (went home and gurgaon)
3. Wanted to write about movies.. but none of them were really worth mentioning except four.

So lets go for movies first..
1) The Forbidden Kingdom .. Must watch for all martial arts movie fans. A deadly cmbo of Jackie Chan and Jet Li, with lot of magic and a reasonably good story. (7/10)
2) K-PAX : Great movie. Amazing story, Kevin Spacey rocks... the central theme is similar to "The man from earth", Just that I didn't like the climax.. (7/10)
3) Zinda : OK types movie, rather much hyped.. The first half is good but the second half does not do justice to the expectations of first half.. and I am dying to see the original (Old Boy). (5/10)
4) Robin Hood: Men in Tights .. Absolute TRASH . Don't watch it (1/10)

Busy weekend.. had a trip to Gurgaon.. the return trip was highly eventful..
Took a cab from Sikandarpur to Mehroli.. and the cab which was designed to hold 8 people was actually having 13 people .. More than the plight of the passengers, I was feeling sympathy for the car.
secondly I got a bus from Mehroli to Noida and drove in bus for around 100 min for just Rs 10. Where is inflation..

As for being busy..
Got a new TV (32inches LCD) Thanks to Sharad.. The place I live has been transformed into a neat clean house. Thanks again to Sharad :)

And lastly really goot article on the names of ASCI Characters :P
http://ascii-table.com/pronunciation-guide.php (Must Read)

8 Things Tag

IronBull has Tagged with this 8 thing tag, so here it goes....

8 things I am passionate about...
1) My machine (thats a cliche)
2) Computer Games (AOE)
3) Manchester United
4) Programming
5) Solving Puzzles
6) Cricket
7) My Guitar.
8) Movies/My Movie Collection.

8 things I want to do before I die...
1) Visit NASA
2) Hack a Real system
3) Write a Deadly virus
4) Visit Old Trafford and watch a game there
5) World Trip
6) Watch IMDB 250
7) Learn Gitar
8) Go regularly to gym.

8 things I say often...
1) Bhokal
2) Vahiyat
3) Pappu
4) Shit Man
5) OMG (Janice style)
6) Fuck
7) Dude
8) Mate

8 books I last read
1) Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!
2) Foundation's Edge
3) Narnia Series [7 Books]
4) A Time to Kill
5) The road to Gandolfo
6) Introduction to Algorithm by Coreman
7) Head First Servlets & JSP
8) Head First Design patterns

8 songs I could listen to over and over again... (Most difficult of all, the list is pretty big)
1) Hotel California (Eagles)
2) Johnny B. Goode(Chuck Berry)
3) Stairway to Heaven (Led Zeppelin)
4) Summer Of '69 Lyrics(Bryan Adams)
5) Lemon Tree Lyrics(Fool's Garden)
6) Seven Nation Army (The White Stripes)
7) Bang Bang - My Baby Shot me down (Nancy Sinatra)
8) Complicated (Avril Lavigne)

Movies last Week

Last week watched 5 movies..Started with
The Bank Job (7/10). I love British movies :) The real punch of the movie is that it is based on a true incident. The movie is not in the league of Italian Job or Oceans 11, but still it can bind you for a period of 2 hrs. The movie is at times funny and thrilling with a couple of entangled stories. There is no or rather very little macho man action but still the pace of movie keeps you occupied all the time. Bottom line .. totally watchable.

27 Dresses (6/10). Stereotype romantic comedy. Totally predictable from the word GO! Katherine Heigl the protagonist is cute and acted well Also James Marsden has done a good job and the two central characters have supported each other well (especially during the dance sequence :P). The movie is at times humorous with cheeky lines, bust the best part is the song "Bennie and the Jets".

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (8/10) WOW, I watched this movie with lot of expectations and was not disappointed at all, Narration was kool, Cheeky lines, good humor. Val Kilmer rocks and so does Robert Downey Jr. and Michelle Monaghan. Not as great as pulp fiction but still worth all the time. The movie is fast, thrilling and humorous. Bottom line watch it asap.

The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep (8/10) Kid Movie with amazing CGI, I really loved the movie. The best part of movie is the story telling with incidents of past sprayed all over the movie making it a more relaxing experience more similar to the thought train of normal humans :) Also timely humor which was blended rally well with the story. The next best part was the CGI monster himself/herself. Really a great experience.

Equilibrium (8/10) The action dose of the week, One can study the gun fire trajectory and using mathematics and simulation can improve his killing rate by 120%. Man I love this. If that is so why not teach it to everybody why there is only one who can kill the rest... Anyway the movie is a real treat for action loving junta with really amazing action sequences. The movie is based on some futuristic society developed so that humans have no emotion so that they can not harm each other and so on. Also worth watching is Christian Bale's acting, the slow evolution of emotions on his face as the movie progresses. Bottom line.. Must watch for action loving sci-fi oriented people


PS. Rajasthan Royals won IPL. (Without doubt the Best team of the tournament won).. Waiting for Euro to start

Mumbai Out...

Mumbai Indians.. They started by spending a lot of money and creating a team with was not outstanding by T20 standards.. I was supporting it because GOD was there but alas he played just half of the tournament.
Start of IPL for MI was ominous for two reasons No GOD and Harbhajan Singh as captain.. I don't have any reservations against bhajji but when they have Pollock/ Jayasuriya in their team why go for bhajji. Anyway MI los first 4 of their ties.
Then came the famous slapping incident and bhajji went out.. Pollock became captain and MI improved.. GOD returned and MI won 6 games in a row..
And during the final phase of the tournament they chocked... Lost to Mohali by 1 run, lost to Delhi with 2 balls remaining and then lost to Jaipur on last ball. making it 3 losses in a row..
Had it been once you can call it luck but losing thrice, means you have a habit of choking.. bottom line MI out and deservedly so..

I went to watch game between Delhi and Mumbai .. and the takeaway from the game was FerozShah Kotla Stadium sucks.. They don't even have an electronic score card. For me the whole game can be summed up in 1 equation
Mr X is bowling to Mr Y and the ball is fielded by Mr Z. Most of the time you will not know who X,Y and Z are. Each time you try to guess the batsman might be this or that then try to solve the puzzle looking at the primitive scoreboard, so the game was more of solving Identify the personality and less of cricket..
And lastly management was so very poor, that It took us nearly 30 min to leave our seats and come to the main road. simply pathetic was the arrangements.. Bottom line Cricket is much better a watch at home.

Heroes of Might and Magic V

Recently got hold of Heroes of Might and Magic V, This is a really good strategy based 3-D game, with amazingly good graphics. The game may not be in league of WarCraft in terms of the campaign story but it is not bad either. Right now I am playing those campaigns only and For that I am eagerly waiting for the weekend so that I can play the game for whole day.

The game has this novel concept of time, where a hero can move a particular distance only on a particular day. So the player need to plan each move of the hero and how to pass on resources to him. so this game is a pure strategy game no need to be fast with keyboard.

Also during battle one can control each character completely. be it hero or his army. And they fight in a very civilized manner where each unit is given a turn to hit. and they can hit anybody they like.

So If one thinks he is a true strategist.. he must give it a shot.

P.S. Going to watch delhi take on mumbai on friday. Hoping to see GOD in action...

Turn the Page

Read Foundation's Edge by Issac Asimov last week. This is my first novel of Foundation Series.
Last week when i was going home I decided to take a book along, And as my Friend Gaurav is a big fan of Asimov, decided to give it a shot. I am not a Foundation literate so did not know that Foundation's edge is actually the 4th book the series, when I came to know abt this I was really disappointed because of the fear of not appreciating the full story. But it turned out to be not exactly true as the book makes a good sense to a new user as well.
The best part of the book apart from the plot is its conversations between different characters, when they talk about stars their types, anti matter, galactic hyper space. All this is very fascinating.
The only problem with the book is sometimes it becomes too heavy about the mental abilities. Especially the concept of Gaia is really hard to digest but the writer has really tried it best to make it digestible by giving great analogies.

All in all a good book and I am looking forward to read more of this series...

Movie Front

Not many movies for the past 2 weeks.. Only watched 3 to be specific
Top of the list new release "Prince Caspian" O My God the book was never m favorite but what have they made, It was a good story when I read the book but the movie was totally different. In their quest to modify the characters they have changed them completely. I am disappointed to say the least Peter became selfish and Susan flirting Caspian too much, the movie is at times dragging. Having said that the best part of the movie is Graphics, which are really eye catching with some great sequences like the guard of honor of high kings and queens by centaurs, and action sequences were as usual great. So my rating for the movie 7/10. They should make a movie on The Horse and his Boy.

Also watched 2 sci-fi movies
X Files is based on my room mates favorite TV Series by the same name with same characters in lead role. The plot is interesting but the climax a bit over done, with all the aliens and stuff. and then there is the MIB type agency keeping it all secret. So bottom line a typical "SAVE THE WORLD" from aliens movie with good action and decent plot. Rating (6/10)

Also watched Aeon Flux, Charlize Theron is great in the lead role of a deadly assassin in the futuristic society where everything has been destroyed by some deadly virus. What binds the whole movie together is the slow unfolding story with lot of turns. The graphics are good and the overall set up resembles Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. Rating (6/10)

Cut me and I will bleed red

We Won.. We Won..
Champs of England
Conquers of Europe

After the long wait.. we have reached the promised lands.. As soccernet very well put it "Quests for world domination tend to fail in and around Moscow and, despite the inside knowledge of a Muscovite owner, so did Chelsea's." Also the win was historical in a lot of ways "And given their (ManUnited) history and the litany of anniversaries 2008 has provided, it was appropriate that they were the winners."

As said by the commentator on the famous 99 win "United fans will ask where did you watch the 1999 European Final? Where did you see Ole Solskjaer win it with virtually the last kick of the final?".
I was not fortunate enough to see it either in 99 or today. But all thanks to Big V who gave a sec-by-sec commentary for the last 40 min of the game.. (Actually he is a good commentator)..

The feeling of win is beyond the realms of description, It wan an elation.. that was para-natural.. supernatural or something of that sort..

I wanted to write about United EPL victory but did not do so, because of the thought that it may jinx the CL final.. but they have won and defeating Chalsea was an extra pleasure because of last years FA Cup final defeat.

And lastly United doesn't know how to win it in a normal way.. I think its their moto "Why do it in a normal way when it can be done in a more dramatic way". Ands that why I love it.. They never say die and nothing stands in their way for long.. They can achieve everything...

Lastly I hope Ronaldo not to leave United, it is just the beginning of a long and amazing journey.

Glory Glory Manchester United.

More Movies

Monday watched Cypher.. Nice "MY TYPE" movie, I mean all the sci-fi and nice plot but you will guess it by the end of the movie.. cool chopper and I love Luci Liu. Rating 7/10 when free and you are in a mood of light sci-fi, watch this one

Tuesday it was the Darjeeling Limited.. family type movie stressing on brotherly and other humane emotions which I could not comprehend so my rating (6/10). Though Owen Wilson is good and at points movie is funny but as per IMDB review I had expected more.

Also watched "A fish called Wanda" rating (7/10) comedy movie, The movie is really funny in parts with an American - British angle. The movie has won Kelvin Kline Best an Oscar (Actor in a Supporting Role). Characters are well defined and the plot is interesting as well with a lot of twists. All in all a good watch.

Lastly Wikimania is going to happen in August at Alexandria, Egypt.... for further details visit the site (http://wikimania2008.wikimedia.org/wiki/Main_Page). I love wiki and the least I can do is to help in promoting it :)






PS Chelsea did not lose so United have to win their last game against Wigan this season. May the source be with them...

Weekend Chronicles

This was a fairly weekend. Major events being...
1. Moved into new house.. All that packing and unpacking.. Thats a real pain.
2. Bought a lot of household stuff. Spent a hell lot of money.. again a pain to go from shop to shop hunting for stuff but the biggest ache is bargaining.. because you never know "ki kitna kata" so a piece of advice if you dont know bargaining go to fixed price shops.. then you have the best excuse.
3. Watched.. Iron Man.. recommended by BigV dubbed as my type of movie.. amazing graphics. enjoyable plot, high adrenaline fight sequences and nice acting.. what more can a man want from a movie. rating 9/10.. Must watch :) for better review read here (http://www.desipundit.com/baradwajrangan/2008/04/30/review-iron-man/)
4. United won.. so we are very close to a double but as Sir Alex famously said "Football, bloody football".. u can never be sure unless u win it.. so keeping all figures crossed. (Ronaldo got 40..) may we win...

PS. As BigV once said "I don't have a girl friend but still I pay Rs 2000 as phone bill.. Damm the Girl Friend, I still screw my phone". I joined the club this month:)

Last to last week movie post

On Monday (21 April) I watched Juno (rating 8/10). This is a light movie which has a good sound track. And what’s most refreshing is the acting of Ellen Page as Juno; she has totally lived her character which matures as the movie progresses. Simple story, good music and good acting.. A cute movie.

Tuesday (22 April) I watched Ocean’s Thirteen (rating 7/10). I could have rated it 8, but I was really disappointed by Al Pacino. He doesn’t add anything to the movie. Though this one could not touch the thrill of the first installment, this was certainly better than the previous Ocean movie. As far as acting is concerned there wasn’t much to act.. There wasn’t anything new.. rather this was more of an overkill with all those magical gizmo. So watch it for the sheer thrill that is the trademark of Ocean’s movies, but do not expect anything new from the movie and above all expect nothing from Al Pacino.

On Wednesday (23 April), I watched Smultronstället, Swedish movie (Wild Strawberries in English). The movie is in IMDB 250 ranked 139 as of today. And really it is a delight to watch this movie. The movie is about a 78 years old professor who is very lonely at this stage of his life and then he looks back at his past and people around him his maid, daughter in law and some complete strangers. All of them have their own problems and with them around he revisits his past. The movie talks sincerely about the losses, disappointments and emotions of life but it tells that there is hope. So please watch this movie when you intellect has a hunger for movie. (rating 8/10)

Thursday (24 April), I watched Hard Candy (rating 7/10). This is a sadist movie and Ellen Page has acted really well. All throughout the movie I thought that Ellen is a psycho and had all the sympathy for the guy. But in the end he got what he deserved. A very bold movie on a very difficult subject that keeps you thinking all the time and binds interest throughout the movie even though there are just two characters. Bottom line good watch and I have become a fan of Ellen Page

Brazilian Players in EPL

Some time back, Big V and I were debating the usual La Liga and EPL strengths and weaknesses. And then Big V said that EPL has not much class because EPL consists mostly of European players who are very physical and do not play "Beautiful Football" like South American Players.
I totally agree to the fact that few years back not much SouthAmericans were there in EPL but now a days lot of them are coming over to EPL may be because of big bucks or stardom..whatever.. but bottom line is that there are players coming from south America to EPL and to prove my point I created a list of Brazilian players part of squad of current EPL. Here is the list ..

Team	Player	Position
Arsenal	Denílson	MF
Arsenal	Gilberto Silva	MF
Arsenal	Pedro Botelho	DF
Birmingham	Rafael Schmitz	MF
Chelsea	Alex	DF
Chelsea	Juliano Belletti	DF
Chelsea	Alcides	DF
Liverpool	Fábio Aurélio	DF
Liverpool	Lucas	MF
Manchester City	Geovanni	MF
Manchester City	Elano	MF
Manchester United	Anderson	MF
Middlesbrough	Fábio Rochemback	MF
Middlesbrough	Afonso Alves	FW
NewCastle United	Caçapa	DF
Tottenham	Gilberto	DF

PS.. The above table is compiled using wiki.. Thanks wiki for that :)

What a weekend..

What a weekend this was.. I watched 6 movies.. First of all I saw Dollars Trilogy (rating 10/10) A must watch for all movie lovers.

Followed by Paris, je t'aime (rating 7/10) 16 stories in 110 min, really nice concepts.. The diversity of the segments makes this interesting to watch, but as a film, it cannot be termed great. Still it is very watchable and a nice change of pace for the frequent movie goer. And especially this is a movie about love and emotion… so beware…. Also while watching this it occurred to me that “Dus Kahaniyan” might have taken its inspiration from this movie but again bollywood has failed miserably..

Then I saw Chicago (rating 8/10).. After watching “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street”, I have developed a taste for musicals and I really liked this one as well. The story is good and star cast complements it very well. The music also scores and I liked all of the songs but my favorite is “They had it coming..”

To complete it all I watched Heat (rating 9/10).. I liked the movie before even watching a scene because of its star cast which comprised of Robert De Niro and Al Pacino. Wow what a combo.. who can resist such a movie and the movie doesn’t disappoint at al.. The story is intriguing, wonderful acting, good action sequences and above all mind-blowing dialogues delivered by two of the greatest actors of our times. This is just one of those movies where a great cast and director live up to their billing. Bottom Line . Watch it.

P.S. : I also found a new home this weekend :)

Dollars Trilogy

I just finished watching Dollars Trilogy directed by Sergio Leone. The trilogy consists of 3 movies which are A Fistful of Dollars (1964), For a Few Dollars More (1965) and The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966). All starring Clint Eastwood (Blondie), who is an epitome of “TASHAN” in these movies.

Watching these movies was a thrilling experience; these movies have good story, amazing screenplay and above all great dialogues and music.

There were these really thrilling gun-shot scenes, and duels. What more can you ask for.

All the actors have acted really well in the trilogy be it Angle Eyes, Tuco , Indio or any other, but the centre stage is taken by Clint Eastwood, He is a cult in these movies.

Bottom line.. Watch it ASAP.. Enrich your collection... It’s worth..

A Time to Kill..

I recently finished the first novel of John Grisham “A Time to Kill”. The book is a legal suspense thriller as described by wiki. Well the plot did not have much of suspense because you could easily guess it from the very beginning. This is a story about a black man, who killed 2 white men because they have raped her 10 year old daughter and his white lawyer in a predominantly white county.

So as I said plot is pretty simple but the treatment is really a class. The story goes at a natural pace with author keeping you abreast with the racism that prevails in the society. The best part is he is not judgmental about any particular race and allows the reader to have his own views. Lot of characters with their own views about the situation comes into the play and as they have conflicting interests, the story becomes more and more interesting.

The best part is the final court case, where the author explains about the jury selection process and other legalities of the judiciary system. As they say it’s not the destination but the journey that makes it different. Same is the case here the court case has a lot of twists and turns which make it really a thrilling experience. So all in all the book is a legal thriller and a really good read :).

I am reader...

Well I never gave much of a thought to what I am reading.. or what I should read.. I dont have a particular taste in reading... so Reading for me is just a Time-Pass.. You dont have anything better to do.. get something and start reading.. That has been my philosophy for past 4 years.

I read my first English Novel (Bloodline by Sidney Sheldon) during my 3rd year holidays.. and thanks to friends, hostel library and second hand book store.. I have kept my habit of reading going...

Some days back i stumbled upon a site (www.librarything.com) . Its a place where you can catalog your books online.. So I decided to just create a list of all the books I have read so far..

I added all the books that I remembered and there were 80 books in my list..

I am so thrilled seeing the list that I decided to write a blog :)
If you want to see my book list its here (http://www.librarything.com/catalog.php?view=cyzak&shelf=list)

In the company of GODs

Maths and Physics are the two subjects that excites me a lot.. Along with Computers..
Recently I attended few talks on Graphics, Modeling, GPU's and so on.. and it was really exciting.. To me, The presenters were not Humans but were Titans and believe me the experience was heavenly.. It was just amazing . AWESOME

They were talking about multi-core processors, multi-threading applications and Graphics engine with ease. And in the core of all this was a lot of maths.. Partial Differential Equations that can easily give nightmare to anybody were discussed as if it is child play.. They discussed Heat Equation for negative time.. which I did not understand much but was totally fascinating like a fairy tale (I read a lot of them :))...

The Best part was Image processing.. so fast so sleek .. totally amazing..
And as a toping to all this was Image Search Algorithms.. wow I am contended :)

After the 3 day long seminar .. I am a "theist"

On a connecting note do listen to "I am Believer" ... really good song

Believe in Natural Building Material

I am about to write about my tryst with a natural building material mixed from sand, clay, and straw, dung or other fibrous materials, which is shaped into bricks using frames and dried in the sun. The structures made of it are extremely durable and account for the oldest extant buildings on the planet. Its buildings also offer significant advantages in hot, dry climates; they remain cooler as its stores and releases heat very slowly.

Well this is what the name of my new employer means at wiki :). So let me try to recapture my journey.. If I go back and try to pinpoint the point in the space-time fabric when the journey started.. It must be the day when juniorV and MLC engulfed me.. later on after a lot of lectures from my friends I forwarded my resume to juniorV.. who in turn forwarded it further..

Phase 1 : Written Exam
I can not claim that exam was difficult. There were two papers Engineering and Language. Engineering paper has mostly subjective questions on BST, PreOrder, Consumer-Producer, DFS and some m/c language stuff. I thought I had done that well but later I was told that I barely cleared it. Language which is in my case Java was bit simpler with a mix of objective and subjective questions, with questions on String, StringBuffer, cloning, threads etc.. Also there were 5 questions on J2EE, All very simple... and since paper was simple I could not perform as per my expectations and was really disappointed...
Unfortunately India lost to Australia in 2nd test the same day, when the draw was on the cards.. But the best part of the day was we all went to party at Runway9 and had a lot of fun...

I did not have any expectations so was really chill when suddenly next week I got a call for the telephonic round.

Phase 2 : Telephonic Round
This one was really a grueling experience.. The interviewer asked me a lot about the product on which I was working and had worked. This phase went for around 45 minutes, where in there were abstract questions on performance improvement and a lot of SOA based question to test the knowledge of my work. Thereafter he asked me a puzzle on primes and some questions on java, involving instanceOf, dynamic binding and inheritance...

By the time the interview was over.. all my hopes were also over.. And I was discussing the same with BigV when the auspicious call came... On-Site Interview

Phase 3 : On-Site Interview
I talked to a couple of friends and they had already told me that I can be sure of just one thing.. the procedure is very exhaustive and grilling. I prepared myself for the final battle..:)
The best part was they arranged for everything including tickets pickup and stay.. so on Monday morning I was at Office for the Interview..

It started with filling of a form, followed by a quant test which was very simple.. but then there was a DI test and I could not answer a single question of that.. the questions were not tough but somehow I could not answer... and I laughed at myself... It was all over..

But somehow they started my interviews

#1 .. The interview started with my work and dug deep into them .. confusing me and asking indepth questions on protocols, most of which I could not answer satisfactorily... Then he started Java.. Threads, Producer/Consumer, serialization, JVM memory mgmt, dynamic binding, class loader and algorithms .. Asked me to write a couple of programs as well..

#2 .. This was the best interview of the lot.. there were a questions on thread (a lot),inner classes, cloning, XML parser, Design patterns, dynamic binding, static so on and lastly algorithms.. I might have missed few topics but this interview was long and I was happy after this.

Then I had Lunch.. followed by HR interview..

#3 .. HR interview was simple and I was asked the normal question about my current work, reason of moving, kind of work I like and so on..

#4 .. This interview was really interesting.. It started with java cloning and then moved to algorithms with some maths.. I liked it a lot.. I had to solve/prove a couple of simple problems based on binary search and Fibonacci and then write a program on recursion.

#5 .. This was the last interview.. This one was more of a discussion which started with my current work and about the technology then SOA and its use and implications .. This one was a long interview in which I was also asked to write a couple of programs implementing simple algorithms.

In the end the long day ended... and the best part is I got call a couple of days later.. and I was on cloud number 9 .. :)

MLC

MLC stands for Mid Life Crisis, And my friends think I was suffering from it, I don't know whether this is correct or not but they says so and I believe them.

Though as per wiki
"Midlife crisis is a term used to describe a period of dramatic self-doubt that is typically felt in the "middle years" of life, as people sense the passing of youth and the imminence of old age. Sometimes, transitions experienced in these years, such as aging in general, menopause, the death of parents, or children leaving home can trigger such a crisis. The result may be a desire to make significant changes in core aspects of day to day life or situation, such as in career, marriage, or romantic relationships."

and believe me all the causes stated in this definition does not apply to me.. but one thing is true that was the time of self doubt huge SELF DOUBT..

I have read many a times about great tales of friendship.. and I don't know whether there would be such a tale about my friends but when the epic is written in your heart and you have lived and felt every moment of it.. who needs an Epitaph ..

The way my friends encouraged and motivated me in those hard times are beyond the realms of words. No words of gratitude will ever be able to do justice to their support and tolerance... but still I try to thank them from the deepest corners of my heart for all the patience they have shown to my irritating habits of saying "NO" to everything.

Thank you all.. and I pray to GOD that may all have friends like you....