Kane Chronicles - The Red Pyramid, A Review ..

The first book of the Kane Chronicles series is out titled ”The Red Pyramid” and I should agree Rick Riordan is a very good story teller with lots of emphasis on detailing. I just loved the way he went about describing every place and the keenness he had to carefully bring out every character in the story. The Kane Chronicles is all about Sadie and Carter who were born with great supernatural powers. Dr Julius Kane, the father of the two brings them together for an experiment in a museum and there he is said to have provoked the Egyptian god Set, who forces him to oblivion traps him in a sarcophagus and gives Sadie and Carter a run for their lives. The story unfolds with two strong characters in the book, Carter and Sadie, who after losing their mother a few years before, deal with the disappearance of their father, whom they fear will never come to them.

Here is where their long-lost Uncle Amos helps them escape on a magic boat that whisks them to a Brooklyn mansion in seconds. In the story, Carter and Sadie are portrayed as kids who happen to be descended from the pharaohs of ancient Egypt and which for sure requires a lot of history telling to make the reader understand the plot and also as the story proceeds, two siblings slowly discover that their lives are far from being ordinary. The final pages of the book goes quite exciting at a rapid pace showcasing how the siblings go from one life threatening escapade to the next and how they wield the gods and battle against evil.

There are plenty of battle scenes against gods and monsters that feel very much like fantasy, with a bit of bloodshed, and some scenes in a bleak afterlife. The book kept me close to how Sadie and Carter were feeling throughout their epic adventure. But the main qualm one would find or figure out was the retelling of a particular incident from both the character’s point of views constantly that obstructs the fast paced plot otherwise from start to end. Though it does possess some negatives here and there, it is still a lot better than many books on the market for the 9+ age group.

I also loved the way Rick Riordan built the mythology of Ancient Egypt into this modern tale - this man really knows how to go about the detailing and his passion for ancient mythology and history. But this one might take a struggle and may require a couple of reads before things straighten up about history and mythology. I am really excited and geared up about this series in the future and I feel now that the scene has been set and the characters well established; we will see more of the Rick Riordan storytelling that we have come to know and love!

WIRED – Get Hooked

Now here is a place in Chennai for gaming aficionados – WIRED Get Hooked!

The Wired on Nungambakkam High Road is now turning a busy place with a constant rush of the teenagers and corporate people. WIRED is a very good hangout place that is getting an attention for its range of gaming consoles - X-box, Wii, Kinect, PlayStation3 while they also posses eating joints. It goes without saying that it indeed is welcome news for all you gaming enthusiasts and racing fanatics! They also have struck a deal for their online games with one of the popular free games website, Zapak. However the WIRED Pc gaming has created a stir among young people keeping them occupied for long hours. As you step inside their second floor, you are invited with a different series of gaming consoles like air hockey, foosball and Water Zorbing.

Though PC Gaming attracts a good amount of people, Water Zorbing which is one of its kind stays the main crowd puller says Ms.Prashanti Reddy, CEO, WIRED. She further explains, the giant water ball allows a human occupant to walk on water and this ball has a zippered entrance for easy entry and exit. Imagine yourself in a huge transparent sphere that floats on the surface of water, wherein every time you try hard to stand up, you always end up falling. I agree that it is interesting and peps up the fun part of it when every muscle of your body is put to work! Though the pool for Zorbing is rather small and that it sweats your heart out within the zero ventilation balls, you get to flip and roll with your friends – something which we yet haven’t tried.

The Zorbing at WIRED draws a good crowd of about 60-70 people on weekdays and about 100 odd people on weekends. The staffs at WIRED are quite hospitable and they say kids are just loving the Zorb here and it easily attracts a lot of people as this game is charged at Rs 100 per head, which is nominal. Some of them who have experienced the Zorbing all alone said it was quite an experience and they would certainly wish to come back for the Zorb with their friends and family. Such is the grip of excitement and such is the experience – exceptional and extraordinary!

So would you want to experience what being inside a washing machine is like? Well this is the closest that you are going to get inside the Water Zorb at WIRED! So, drop by the WIRED on a cool evening with your friends or family at 8/20, Rutland Gate, 4th Street, Chennai - 600 006.

Mission World Cup - Clinched .. for the Second time !!!

Never before have we experienced something like this – Road lanes jammed everywhere with people, more than one billion glued to their TV sets. Especially when it was all for a cricketing reason!

The World Cup final at Wankhede drew a huge fan base and Team India went on to register their second World Cup win after 1983 under Kapil Dev at Lords. Let us give this moment to one of the greatest cricketer in the world, Sachin Tendulkar for him to cherish and remember. The Indian skipper displayed one of the finest captain’s innings of 91 alongside an intensive and fine-tuned innings of 97 from Gautam to pull-off the highest run chase ever achieved in a world cup final.

Initially, team India had the toughest of times when Mahela switched gears going for the lofted shots and even when Dhoni’s trusted bowlers to the likes of Zaheer and Harbhajan went for some runs, tension started gripping everyone on the field and every Indian who were there to support Team India. Mahela was on a killing spree slicing every bowler over the boundary ropes. And there was a sigh of relief all over when Kulasekara was run-out by a beautiful Dhoni work behind the stumps. But soon, the big man Perera was there just to show us how big the park was and took efforts to make the damage he was capable of. Finally, India were expected to chase a humungous total of 274 when 230 was considered a winning total.

Wankhede were literally on their toes cheering the most aggressive batsman on Earth, Virender Sehwag and India’s most protected Cricketing Icon, Sachin Tendulkar when they walked into the Cricketing arena to bat. The excitement was very short lived, just for 2 balls when Sehwag was sent back to the pavilion for a duck. Tendulkar braved the Lankan attack from there along with southpaw Gautham Gambhir. And especially after that straight drive off Tendulkar’s bat, I really thought who can play that very shot with ease without hitting the ball hard and only just by sheer timing? It just was like Wow. Tendulkar was going really good until a controversially-legal Malinga delivery kissed Sachin’s bat and landed right into Sangakkara’s gloves. Tendulkar departs. Silence everywhere, not a pin was dropped. When everybody thought it was curtains and this was just going to be India’s third World Cup final game, came in the man who lead the Super King Lions to victory in the IPL 3, Mahendra Singh Dhoni.

Yuvraj graciously stole a single when India required just 5 runs to get their hands on the most prestigious World Cup. The man of the moment, Dhoni sealed the game with a hard-hitting six that went sky-rocketing into the clouds and over the mountains! Everybody were excited right from the players in the dressing room, the support staff, the management and the fans who have come there to cheer their warriors in the lighter shade of blue!. It was emotions all over and the crowd erupted hugging and kissing each other and when the master blaster Tendulkar was carried by his teammates for a victory lap, it was all the happy tears that came down cheering. This seemed more than a World Cup game, almost 5 hours of cricket showcased outstanding professional talent and truly the game of cricket won, hands down! The Indians displayed an excellent sense of sportsmanship realising the responsibility they had earned as ambassadors of Indian cricket and especially when the younger players like Virat and Yuvraj stepped up with vital contributions in one match or the other in the World Cup, it speaks great volumes about the sense of commitment and the urge to perform. Also the constant backing of the senior players like Zaheer, Harbhajan, and Sachin really motivated them to bring out the real match winners in them.

Performing under pressure is a true trait and a reflection of one’s character and attitude and it comes naturally to the Indian Skipper every time he is on a mission. We saw that even in the IPL when Chennai outplayed the Kings XI Punjab in a decider. And it seemed even under extreme pressure conditions, Dhoni would exude calm and composure; even when an asteroid was plummeting directly towards him with just 20 seconds to react. What we saw on the screens was not for the camera, not for the crowd, but that desire to win a World Cup for Sachin Tendulkar showed every time Gautam, Yuvi and Dhoni went over the run chase. Team India played the game for each other, motivating every other player when they were down, battling big teams like Australia and Pakistan to take a fight with the SriLankans in this very final showing great sense of brotherhood. I really couldn’t control my emotions when Virat said “Tendulkar has carried the burden of the Nation for 21 years and it is time we carried him on our shoulders” making it Tendulkar’s proudest moment and a perfect swansong for him. The 28 long years of wait ends here, Dhoni and his men have proved it yet again wielding their willows and rolling their arms. The game of cricket has been elevated; it has gone one notch higher. It no longer is just a game of 11 players!

Truly, Incredible India!!!

Microsoft's Dream Spark Yatra

Here it is, the much awaited Microsoft’s Dream Spark Yatra in Chennai, after covering its sessions in Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, Pune, and Coimbatore. The Dream Spark Yatra (DSY) is an initiative by Microsoft to conduct 100 events, in 100 days, across 100 cities! The DSY is easily one of the largest student conferences with a lot of participation from budding engineers. The one day mega-event aims at imparting the student community with lots of learning providing them with oodles of updates on latest technologies broadening their technical horizons. This event also brings with it the brightest of students and professionals in front of us – to discuss technology, career in IT related fields, and to hint us on real-world skill as well.

This time The Dream Spark Yatra was in Chennai on 4^th March at SRM University with its Student Partners for the event. The event is said to have been a huge hit amongst the student community registering about 3200 students compared to the 1600 registrations it received last year. The Chennai .Net User Group (CNUG) Student Chapter which is a community for the Microsoft Student Partners here in Chennai stole the show with their outstanding way of coordinating and organizing the event. They had hired Mr Udhay, a thorough professional to compere the event and he definitely had the audience in splits almost every time he came out to speak – very entertaining and engaging!

The event unfolded with three technical sessions, a fun and a quiz session. Mr. Floris van Heijst, GM (Business and Marketing Organisation) was the first guest to hit the dais with the keynote address. His speech had a main focus on “Microsoft for Students” and the students reciprocated so very well and had a good time interacting with him, throwing and fielding questions. Mr Floris went ahead promoting Microsoft’s Project Shiksha, which aims to accelerate computer literacy among teachers and students. He also explained to the students about the need and objective of the Dream Spark program.

Next on stage from Microsoft was Mr.Sandeep Alur who was there for a technical session. His session was called “Unleash a more beautiful web with IE 9”. He went on to tell us about the features and advantages of the Internet Explorer 9 and it yet again was interesting and absorbing as of course we all knew With IE 9, Microsoft got to show off some of its best work to an audience that is increasingly indifferent and hard to please!

Following a break, Mr Arvind Ganesan took over emphasising the need to make software development easy and said The LightSwitch could be of a great help for those not-so-great programmers out there! Even those students who weren’t technologically inclined took a special liking towards the session as they heard and saw what the LightSwitch could do!

The Microsoft Xbox Kinect session with Shweta Satish was a real entertainer and was the most interesting part of the event. Almost a crowd of about 2000 students were waiting to get their hands on the Xbox. When you have no controller with Kinect and when Kinect responds to how you move, it for sure is bound to be a hit! It was an awesome Kinect experience to select people from audience.

The quiz session also went on very well with good amount of students attracting a huge participation from the students. Hemant Kumar Goyal from MNM Jain Engineering College grabbed a first place winning 1 TB External Seagate Hard Disk Drive while Kushal Bandari from Rajalakshmi Institute of Technology came second and walked back home with a Sennheiser eh150 headphone.

The students seemed to be thrilled about the whole experience. They offered a few suggestions and pointed out that the event this time topped last year’s. One of them was literally taken aback when I said this event was completely organized by the Microsoft Student Partners in Chennai with no professional support.

Shweta Satish, Secretary CNUGStudent was all smiles and said the stress, anxiety and hard work put in by every CNUGStudent paid off and it was once in a lifetime experience for her. She was also very happy about the overwhelming response they received from the audience and especially when people had turned up from far off places just for the event, it speaks volumes about the success of the event!

The Chennai .Net User Group students (CNUGStudent) were completely happy for the good show they put on attracting students from over 120 colleges. Its Public Relations Secretary and CNUGStudent, G Sreenivaasan said he was on cloud nine after the success of the event. He thanked his fellow CNUGStudents for their effort into the Dream Spark Yatra and said they as a team are very happy and ecstatic to pull off such a big event! Well done CNUGs, and Cheers to Microsoft!!

NXg Turns Three !!!!

The NXg has given me a platform that provides absolute freedom from the stereotypical clutches of the society. Writing for this sixteen page funloid has been an experience of a lifetime for me. It has given me the exposure and the opportunity to meet people who view life from a different perspective and who have achieved so much in life. And it indeed has been a learning experience with every opportunity NXg had given me to express myself in this forum. I feel very proud to have associated myself with this weekly and it gives me immense pleasure to join the bandwagon of people who voice their views on various issues, reveal their dreams and aspirations. It has been a part of my life for a long time now and I wish it ever will be. I congratulate everybody who has worked for its every edition and I hope to see NXg rock n roll for many more years to come!

The State Elections .. Here I come !

I had sort of built it up for a long time and here is my first time opportunity to vote in the 2011 state elections. Iam really excited and thrilled about the whole concept of voting wherein every citizen of the country possess a small responsibility in bringing a good and a transparent government to power. It very well reminds me that I have a big task at hand and I have to do it with a great sense of satisfaction. But one great feeling that you are as equal to anybody else in the country, gives me an inspiration to vote. Voting primarily is my democratic right and I would love to exercise it with a great pride supporting a political party that will satisfy my expectations as a citizen. Keeping my fingers crossed not to fall prey to an identity theft and hoping to get a rewarding and a wonderful feeling I will go to the polling booth to cast my vote to a possible best candidate!

Big Returns On Hardwork !

With the end of the turtle walk season on the charts, Organizations who have been a great sense of support for the “Save A Turtle” campaign are up here giving us an insight into the whole process of the sensitization campaigns and the long Turtle Walks on the beaches as a part of the awareness program. It’s now almost been full three months since we started talking about the Turtle initiative and it feels very good when people start responding from their side showing some social responsibility keeping the plastic bottles and polythene bags away from the beaches, it’s a welcome change truly.

When I went on to ask Hafiz, an experiential learning facilitator with the EZONE about the whole experience, he said he could see a difference with people who hit the beaches very often. When I prompted him about the whole process at the campaigns, he said it will start off with the screening of a turtle movie for ten minutes and then the volunteers will go ahead shooting out questions they have about turtles, the challenges they face and what people like them can do to for the environment, etc. Then comes the most interesting part, the photo session with the turtles and the volunteers get even happier when they get a feel of the baby turtles as well! There would also be a tattoo session at the end, Volunteers would be able to sport the “Save A Turtle” tattoo at their arms and advocate this initiative. Indeed a good move from EZONE towards a brighter tomorrow!

Akila, a volunteer from the Students Sea Turtle Conservation Network (SSTCN) said they have concentrated more on the Turtle Walks and it has been their mainstream awareness program but she also accepted that they also do awareness campaigns at schools. She went on to explain that volunteers who are a part of the Turtle Walk will start by 11:00 pm with their scout in the lead searching for turtle tracks and trails. The volunteers will then get themselves down with the relocation of the hatcheries with the same measurements as it was originally found at the beaches. The SSTCN are now a happy lot as it was quite a surprise for them at the Marina as they went on to collect 82 nests to the 30 they had collected last year. She said, it was simply a pleasant feeling and at the same time she realises that the responsibility has grown with an increase of the hatchlings and they had asked more volunteers to pitch in to have an eye on the hatchlings 24*7.

Now people really have to understand that turtles play a very important role in the marine ecosystem and the future generation indeed have a meaty role to play as responsible citizens!

For those who wish to do their bit for the society and some good to the endangered turtle species, here is your chance. Ring Hafiz @ 99401 42349 for Turtle Initiative campaigns at your corporate office and colleges or make the difference joining hands for Turtle Walks with SSTCN ringing Arun@ 9789864166 or Akila @ 9940300200.