Writing

I am going to write regularly. Everyday I would write
3. Alai kadalin orathile - sort of my diary
4. Life and times - my personal experiences and past life
5. ellorum ellaaum peRa veeNtum - 3 postings (my world view in tamil on various matters)
6. leatherlink - about our company, its activities and future directions
7. wordpress blog - my world view in English on various matters
8. gms blog - What are the immediate concernes of the company.

All the above are published as blogs and the copies are stored in my personal folder. The writing time is from 5 am to 7 pm. No writing blogs online or during office hours. Use your time to meet up people, visit places and chat with your colelagues in office.

4am to 5am - puubaLam
5am to 6.30 am - Writing
6.30 am to 7 am - Gardening
7 am to 8 am - Ready to office
8.30 to 9.30 am - Emails reading and writing
2 emails to tech mailing lists (php, postgresql, linux or ilugc)
2 emails to clients
2 emails for new business development

The Hindu

The Hindu is associated with more knowledge and more prestige in my mind when I was a child. In our house we buy Dinamalar and in Selava annan's house they always by The Hindu. Laila atthai will borrow Dinamalar during the day. But in their house it is always The Hindu.

I never managed to read The Hindu, except glancing through the sports pages referred by Raju, those days. Then I came to college, Alagappa College - Chennai. During the first year I was at the hostel. A copy of The Hindu is provided at the Junior Hostel (JH) every morning. You do not get to read it comfortably. From second year onwards I moved in with my sister and stayed in Tambaram. Everyday there is a long commute from Tambaram to Guindy (Gandhi Mandapam) by bus (with route no now 21G, it used to be 21V, then B21 then 21J).

The distance should take about 20 minutes to cover. But the bus is overcrowded and will be stopped for the conductor to issue tickets and reach Gandhi Mandapam stop after 1 hour of starting from Tambaram. Somehow I hit upon the idea of reading newspaper during this time. I pick up a copy of The Hindu from the shop at bus stand and settle in a seat in the bus. Meticulously read all the news items on the front page, then the sports page, then the centre page. During the initial days, by this time I will reach the college. As days moved on I managed to read International Section, Business Section, Local News and even supplements when they are there.

When I read in stories that somebody reads The Hindu from beginning to end not even leaving the classfieds, I used to think that must be an exaggeration. I also came to that stage by the final year of my college.

Then I went to work in Dewas, staying in Indore. Indore has Free Press journal English news paper. Times of India will be delivered in the evenings (brought from Mumbai). In our GET hostel morning FP and evening ToI are subscribed. I had an awe for ToI to be the king of newspapers in India. With the contempt which came with familiarity I dismissed The Hindu's qualities from my mind and prepared to accept whatever ToI dishes out. In hindsight, ToI did not make much mark in my mind.

The equivalent of The Hindu reading happened with The Economic Times in Indore. I subscribed to ET and will board the morning company bus from Indore to Dewas with the copy of ET. I had decided to not to sleep during the bus journey and determinedly read ET during the whole journey every day. That opened up a whole new world of business, stock markets and economics to me. I continued the practice till I left India for Shanghai.

I became anti The Hindu when in Shanghai. The Hindu was deliberately anti LTTE and represents the Eelam news in a biased manner. The Eelam Tamils in tamil.net mailing list highlight this and wonder what can they do. I hit upon an idea and send a mail saying that I will not read The Hindu and will not buy it even when I get back to India till they mend their ways. This mail was sent to The Hindu with copy to tamil.net mailing list.

I more or less stuck to the resolution. Even today I have a mental barrier to buy The Hindu. For the past 6 months I am reading The Hindu every day bought in our office.

In China I used to buy China Daily, the state owned English newspaper. Some days I buy South China Morning Post, published in Hong Kong and airtransported to Shanghai everyday. One of my fascinations for Hong Kong is being able to buy SCMP without paying for the air fare cost.

During the time I spent in UK, I observed The Times, The Guardian and a host of smaller news papers. The Times stands out in my mind. I have picked up International Herald Tribune also a few times.

For the past 1 year reading Deccan Chronicle (The 1 rupee paper).

In my opinion, The Hindu is the best English daily in India and it will be among the top 10 in the world if not the best.

Kind acts

Yesterday, brought currency notes and tried to give to me. Details later, then he said, you have done so much for us, at the time of our marriage and before. How can we take more and more and not give back?

Till then, I never remembered whatever I had done. I was feeling a bit guilty that he is spending so much money to put the house in order. That is the beauty of our relationships. Each one remembered the kindness of the other and forgets their own kindness. The bonding, politeness and peace generated with such an attitued is immense.

I was analysing my character over the years. I have been generous to a fault with whoever I think are deserving. I am crude to law breakers, rude people and arrogant ones. But if some one is kind and respectful to me, and they are in need, I go all out to help them.