kirukkal.com

Retail Renaissance:

Writer Shobha De fondly remembers the time when she would, along with her mother, painstakingly plan and prepare Diwali sweets. “Today I buy mine from Satish Ladoos,” she says, adding: “I feel sad at the passing away of an era when I see the crass commercialisation of a beautiful festival.”

The above para was lifted from Nidhi‘s cover story in India Today. And what a statement it is with asheer understanding of the descending standards of modern mankind, especially in India. These much hyped retail merchants in all forms hijack festivals. In Chennai, right from the textile retaillers to the pizza merchants everyone hypes their products and tries to push it through to the public.

The buying power of the current generation has increased ten fold and the push is more than what could be grabbed by them. Chennai was once considered to be a conservative city. But with the silicon revolution, the city has grown into a multi-faceted, multi-cultutal market for retail industry.

Last week when I was at Spencer’s I had peeped inside Landmark (a vast bookstore and music shop) to see what they are upto. They have some of the best collection of books and music. Music was selling hot cakes while a few serious readers were around the literary section. But the variety of music is just too much. Their collection ranges BoneyM to Bombay Dreams and a wide range of unheard IndyPop. Really welcoming but what worries me is the hype thats created around the music and on the electronic gadgets that are sold.

Least used feature in a electronic gadget is hyped to be the latest technological invention by the manufacturer and prized one and half times more than the previous version. A Dvd player sold at Rs.25K plugged in with the latest technology and with some exotic ‘unwanted’ features becomes invalid if I stops playing in-between a movie. I would rather prefer a mid-range player that has minimum features, which is not-so-technologically advanced that can play a movie with ease. Mobile phones are better examples in this regard. Nokia 3330 was pushed with a hype that WAP can be used with ease. None of the cellular providers in chennai give WAP connectivity. So someone who has bought Nokia 3330 for some 12K is using it to the same extent as I use my Nokia 3310 bought for 6K.

This would become a balanced market, when the manufacturers listen to what customer wants. Till then this hype creates a hole in our pocket.

If you are a India Today subscriber read Nidhi’s Diwali Dhamaka.

Crazy !!! Crazy !! Crazy !!

Disguised in the form of cultural experience, a cannibal act happens in a Japanese restaurant.

Sachin celebrates diwali at Eden Gardens

Though this being a old news as far as an Indian cricket fan is concerned, I think Sachin Tendulkar has celebrated a better thought about diwali this year at Eden Gardens with his 31st century. But his celebrations have gone past that century.

Now don’t pounce on me after hearing this. It’s a general feeling that apart from square cutting Dillon’s bowling, Sachin is all out to play the political chess with Indian skipper Ganguly. My assumption is that there is a subtle egoistic clash going on between Ganguly and Tendulkar.

A couple of weeks back Sachin came out of the shell, to convey that he would like to play in the opening slot again. Personally, he has missed a bunch of centuries and a heap of records, which he could have broken if he were to play in the opening slot. And Ganguly moves of making Sehwag on par with Sachin would have irritated him badly. I am sure Sachin has a superb temperament. But with a lot of speculation in the media on Ganguly’s plan for Sehwag, its tough to keep up to your principles.

Now due to hamstring injury Sachin is going to miss 7 long one-dayers with W.Indies. That’s a huge loss for his personal records and also for India. But nobody seems to have been worried due to his injury. Everybody looks forward to Sehwag anxiously. And if Sehwag fails in this series, its Ganguly who will face the issues.

Now as the media hypes these issues, there is a chance of India not being the favorites for the World Cup 2003. Since Sachin and Sehwag being the favorites for the opening slot, the strategy should be to make both of them open the one-dayers in the next New Zealand series. Good if it works out well, probably we can manage the same partnership for the World Cup too. We might arguably miss the right hand – left hand combination of Sehwag – Ganguly but that’s the trade-off for a match winning partnership.

We will have to wait and see who gets a checkmate. I hope not it is we…

Note : By the time I finished typing this, India lost its first one-day match against W.Indies. Agarkar becomes one more Chetan Sharma( he gave away a sixer in the last ball against Pakistan in a Sharjah Final) by giving away 4 runs in the last ball of today’s match.

Geeks Rule, AGAIN !!!
And heck, finally geeks rule again. The US DOJ has passed a bill that makes extension for H-1Bs much easier than what they were. Initially if one can only extend their H-1B once in succession. Now has relaxed this H-1Bs can apply for extensions without regard to the ability to file an immigrant petition by the end of the sixth year.

The immigration laws previously required non-US medical students to go back to their country for minimum two years before they can apply for green card status. Due to lack of qualified doctors, now this is also relaxed but the catch is that they need to serve out 3 years in the area which is assigned to them by the US government.

It is a welcoming move from US at this scenario when there is declining belief in the growth of high-tech sector amongst IT students and workers in India.

And so we geeks get a chance again to rule the world. so RULE !!! Link via: Economic Times

No making charges, no wastage, lots of varities, missing, inundated saravana stores, frenzy crowd, bubbling children, rush everywhere, dust everywhere, missing, oceanic textiles, throw away prices, lot many prizes, its missing, trafficed roads, late-to-office workers, overtime trafficmen, hungry husbands, hunting-for-saree wifes, jubliant shop keepers, its still missing, claustrophobic chennai silks, mushroomed fast food shops,high hoped roadside textilers, about to rain, never bother teenagers, chocolate girls, missing’n’missing, discounted fireworks, poor yet shopping people, rich yet high interest marwaris, full decibel traffic announcers, head, head and heads everywhere, chennai prepares for diwali mela, i am still in search of the missing….the missing soul of diwali.