The Chettinad of things

Chettinad cuisine is known for its mix of spices and pulses. It all started with the cuisine and now it has affected anything that is food. Any restaurant in Tamil Nadu has to be christened with 'Chettinad' or it will not sell... this mindset has forced even buttermilk vendors to name their product as Chettinad buttermilk.

Any chicken is Chettinad chicken, even when its prepared in the Chinese way. Even sandwiches are named so ... did sandwiches originate from Chettinad? Companies marketing pulses and grains boast the name ... and so on

The sad part is when my friends order the 'Chettinad' christened dishes and my taste buds refuse to acknowledge that this is the extent of marketing that prevails.

Local bus fares and the three-word-services -- its time for a fare-hike

Local bus fare in Tamil Nadu is kept unchanged for more than ten years in the past. Though government has ruled out the deregulation of diesel prices in the near future, the price has doubled in the last decade. TN government should seriously consider a fare hike in lines to the rising trend of diesel prices at least now and send out a clear message to people on city-travel optimization. Among all states in India, TN is the only state where the local bus fare is less. In fact the base fare in Karnataka or Andhra Pradesh is thrice that of in TN.

In major cities, the TN transport corporation plies various schemes of buses that charges a higher fare compared to the so called normal buses. There is an air-suspension deluxe service, limited stop service, many other three-worded service buses plying across the city. It actually confuses the traveller and grabs the high fare. Though this tactic of the government is laudable on account book terms, we worry ourselves remembering the junk three worded services and their fares, when we can utilize our potential for some productive causes.

Learn it in your native tongue... in your own way !!

Four years from now we will see engineers with more concrete basics who had opted for studying in Tamil medium. Had there been no Tamil in the engineering entrance question paper side-by-side to English, I swear I would have score 2-3 marks less. Reading it in my native tongue increased my comprehending speed and avoided any ambiguous situation. I had then dreamed of studying engineering in Tamil, and now it is a reality. Yes, from this year onwards selected colleges will offer Civil and Mechanical streams in Tamil.

Some might argue that Tamil-engineers cannot cope up with the current industry which is services based. But at the end of the day what matters is how much of an engineer you are rather than how much of a communicator you express. It all depends on what people consider as success...Being an engineer or being a fluent English speaker. We can study the degree in Tamil and still learn to communicate in English, but not the other way round. When the whole world is embracing web2.0, Let's embrace this next step with pride.

Birth Centenary of Arignar Anna

It is heartening to see that Tamil people world over instead of rejoicing the birth centenary of Arignar Annadurai, are complaining over the government order issuing a state holiday today. If the government had issued this order a month earlier, it would have been good for planning long vacations for them. To say the truth, we are selfish beings. Why not take this one day holiday, a chance to know about the great politician and literaturist of the modern Tamil.

I got a chance to relish one of his thoughts on ‘Rain’ where he speaks as rain and how people see him coming. Some welcome him; some consider him as a disturbance. Whatever be, he cannot stop and he has to reach the earth below. Reaching the land, he finds no easy route as most of the water bodies are ill maintained. So he wanders about reminiscing the songs sung in praise of him till he finds refuge in the vast ocean which is ever welcoming.

More info on his life and works can be got at
http://www.arignaranna.info/Home1.htm.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C.N.Annadurai and www.tamilnation.org/hundredtamils/annadurai.htm

Plastics...

11.58 p.m. 29th May 08

It is close to midnight. There is an eerie silence that has engulfed the city as there is a power cut. A shower of rain had thrown the Bangalore city out of gear few hours ago. The rain water did not find an easy path to drain off…they occupied the roads, flooded them: this is the state of engineering here: there are no channels to drain the water into sewer. The situation in the drain is no good. They have their own enemy… plastics; the drains are heavily clogged by plastic covers. This is the state of any city or town at present.
In the process of reviving ‘Noyyal River’ in Coimbatore, nature enthusiasts submitted a report to the city corporation and have got a rule in place which bans usage of plastic covers at all stages. The point here is, the rule exists day-in and day-out and not just on paper. Moving further, I see a great need in creating the basic awareness of waste disposal and I firmly believe that this can be achieved only if we start it from our own home and our surrounding. Few years ago, the then ruling party in Tamil Nadu state issued an order requesting every household to install rain water harvesting sites in their house. Every other household now has it at least on paper. Even then, after an year, the water table rose to a considerable amount…imagine if every other household did the exercise with whole of their heart…
A small tipping point can change the fate of the world…I think so, Do you?
As engineers, we need to design for future at the least and we get the prophecy only by sharing our thoughts and ideas… Are we?