Just downloaded and read first chapter of the book and let me assure you this is really looking a great trilogy.

Update: Finished reading ‘The secret of the Nagas’ and let me tell you it is much better and gripping than the first book ‘The immortals of meluha’.

In this book a great [...]]]>  

Just downloaded and read first chapter of the book and let me assure you this is really looking a great trilogy.

Update: Finished reading ‘The secret of the Nagas’ and let me tell you it is much better and gripping than the first book ‘The immortals of meluha’.

In this book a great secret of the secret about ‘Nagas’ is revealed and in the process everywhere it is mentioned that ‘Good’ and ‘Evil’ are nothing but two sides of the coin.

The secret is maintained in a very gripping manner and you cannot put down the book unless you finish it.

I was super tempted in between to directly read the last chapter as I could not hold my anxiety. Thankfully I avoided the temptation of directly reading the ending.

Go get your copies quickly here.
This book can be ordered from flipkart at 35% discount. (Rs. 192 against the original Rs. 295/- )
Order here  –>   (It is officially released now.)

This book introduces two new prominent characters like ‘Serpent queen’ and ‘The serpent with the Aum Symbol’. All mythological references are very beautifully interwoven and new logical meaning is provided. Awesome is the word from my side.

I would any day prefer reading about Shiva Trilogy than reading/watching any other series. (be it harry potter/indiana jones).

Couple of trailers for the secret of the nagas:

Sati :

Somras : My personal favourite trailer. (Somras: The Elixir of Immortality, The Drink of the Gods)

Much awaited Book 2 in Shiva Trilogy after the huge success of The Immortals of Meluha. (I think first time in indian fiction history someone is allowing pre-order option for books. I may be wrong on first time part.)

Today, He is a God.

4000 years ago, He was just a man.

The hunt is on. The sinister Naga warrior has killed his friend Brahaspati and now stalks his wife Sati. Shiva, the Tibetan immigrant who is the prophesied destroyer of evil, will not rest till he finds his demonic adversary. His vengeance and the path to evil will lead him to the door of the Nagas, the serpent people. Of that he is certain.

The evidence of the malevolent rise of evil is everywhere. A kingdom is dying as it is held to ransom for a miracle drug. A crown prince is murdered. The Vasudevs – Shiva’s philosopher guides – betray his unquestioning faith as they take the aid of the dark side. Even the perfect empire, Meluha is riddled with a terrible secret in Maika, the city of births. Unknown to Shiva, a master puppeteer is playing a grand game.

In a journey that will take him across the length and breadth of ancient India, Shiva searches for the truth in a land of deadly mysteries – only to find that nothing is what it seems.

Fierce battles will be fought. Surprising alliances will be forged. Unbelievable secrets will be revealed in this second book of the Shiva Trilogy, the sequel to the #1 national bestseller, The Immortals of Meluha.

Characters:

The Shiva Trilogy abounds with a wide variety of characters. You would have heard of many of them in the Indian myths. A few of them however, are completely imaginary. The key characters that drive the story are listed below.

Shiva: Shiva was the Chief of the Guna tribe at Mount Kailash, before he decided to emigrate from his Tibetan homeland. In ancient North India, the land of the Sapt Sindhu, Shiva was recognised as the prophesied destroyer of Evil due to his Neel Kanth, his blue throat.

Sati: Sati was the princess of Meluha and the daughter of Emperor Daksha. Despite being a princess, she was discriminated against as a Vikarma – a carrier of bad fate – which made her an untouchable. Undeterred by this, Shiva wooed and married her.

Daksha: The Emperor of Meluha. He was the prime mover of the project to find the Neelkanth.

Parvateshwar: The strict and law-abiding Meluhan General was an ideal Suryavanshi. He did not believe in the Neelkanth legend initially. However, he did come to believe in the personage of Shiva, becoming one his most ardent devotees.

The Naga with the serpent Aum symbol: Note from Amish: Sorry guys. I cannot say anything about him till after you have read The Secret of the Nagas. But he is one of the most interesting characters of the trilogy for me.

Nandi: A Captain in the Meluhan army. Nandi is the man who discovers the Guna tribal who becomes the Neelkanth, Shiva. Nandi remained amongst Shiva’s most loyal followers throughout his life.

Bhagirath: The Prince of Swadweep and the son of Emperor Dilipa. A pragmatic and brave man, we will get to know him much more in The Secret of the Nagas. He has an important role to play in the trilogy.

Anandmayi: The Princess of Swadweep and the daughter of Emperor Dilipa. Passionate, mercurial and intelligent, Anandmayi makes for the perfect Chandravanshi.

Bhadra: Brave and loyal, Bhadra was a member of the Guna tribe and Shiva’s childhood friend from Mount Kailash. He travelled with Shiva wherever he went.

Krittika: Krittika was the handmaiden of the Meluhan Princess, Sati. She eventually fell in love with and married Bhadra, Shiva’s childhood friend.

Came across a very interesting video trailer for Indian Fiction – The Immortals of Meluha. (Thanks to Reem Saied and Gayatri for posting it)

The Immortals of Meluha is – The Story of Shiva, the simple man, whose Karma recast him as [...]]]>

The Immortals of Meluha - Shiva Trilogy

Came across a very interesting video trailer for Indian Fiction – The Immortals of Meluha. (Thanks to Reem Saied and Gayatri for posting it)

The Immortals of Meluha is – The Story of Shiva, the simple man, whose Karma recast him as our Mahadev. The God of Gods.

‘The Immortals of Meluha’ is written by Amish Tripathi, 35 year old IIM (kolkata) grad  who works with IDBI as National Head Marketing & Product.

This book is the first in the trilogy he is writing.

Trilogy is as follows:

Book 1: “The Immortals of Meluha” – Released on 28′th Feb 2010

You can buy this book from FlipCart at 50% discount and free shipping here :  Buy the Immortals of Meluha

Book 2: “The Secret of the Nagas”

Book 3: “The Oath of the Vayuputras”

Check his website :  http://shivatrilogy.com/

Check the video trailer here :

I’ll be buying these books as I love fictions around Mythology.

I personally always believed in the theory of humans being treated as Gods.

Strongly believe Ram, Krishna were super human beings who by their Karma attained a state of God.

(I’m assuming in most of the cases man has to take an initiative and propose.)

Typical girl answers are (In my limited knowledge on this matter ) :

First Pic

Break of Dawn — New lease of life, embarking upon a New Voyage…… A Child Flying Kite — Young Blood, Aspiring to Fly High with Enormous Zest n Zeal…Coz U Know, Sky is The Limit…… A Small Tree — Need to Nurture……. Two [...]]]> Just got this in email forward ….

First Pic

Break of Dawn — New lease of life, embarking upon a New Voyage……
A Child Flying Kite — Young Blood, Aspiring to Fly High with Enormous Zest n Zeal…Coz U Know, Sky is The Limit……
A Small Tree — Need to Nurture…….
Two Birds Hovering Above — There r People Around to Take Ample Care of You, You r Actually Carefree…….

Second Pic

Daylight — You r Almost Halfway Through in This Voyage Called Life…..
Couple — You Have a Better half of Yours to Lean Upon n Speak Your Heart Out to……
Grown-up Tree — You Have Been Nurtured Profusely to Stand Tall n Rigidly in The Storms That May, Otherwise, Let U Down…….. .
A Small Tree — You, Together With Your Better half, Have Given a New Lease of Life to Another Breaking Dawn (Your Child)………
One Bird Hovering Above — There r Comparatively Less People around You to Take Care of You, Unlike during Your Wonder Childhood Years…….

Third Pic

Fall of Dusk — Twilight is setting Upon, Life Has Come a Full Circle….
An Old Man — It’s a Race Against Time Now On, It’s The Beginning of The End of The Voyage……
Ageing Tree — Signifies The Above Two Things, Second One Being The Personification of This……..
Grown Tree — Your Kids Have Grown Up; It’s High Time You Start Supporting Them With Tender Care Rather Than Clashes……….
One Bird — Self Explanatory, I Guess???
Grave — In Course of The Voyage You Have Lost Loved Ones n You Also Start to Anticipate Your Ultimate Fate n Destiny……….

Fourth Pic

Nightfall — Voyage is Over, Darkness is Looming Over, High Time to Say Good Bye….
Starry Sky — There’s Still Happiness Around, Thanks to The Aesthetic Memories Left by You n The Good Work Done Too….. .
Grown-up Tree — Your Kids r Walking in Your Shoes now, It’s For Them to Follow Your Footsteps Drawing Inspiration From Your Exemplary Life..
Grave With Two Crosses — You r United with Your Soul mates n RIPS……..

And lets admit most of us have used/are using pirated softwares on their home/work computers.

I’ve came across following awesome response by USB Overdrive X to anyone using pirated [...]]]> We all know that piracy in some or other formats cannot be stopped and there have been number of futile attempts in past by large organisations.

And lets admit most of us have used/are using pirated softwares on their home/work computers.

I’ve came across following awesome response by USB Overdrive X to anyone using pirated code to register their software online.

It’s kinda awesome personal request to that person using cracked code, which questions the moral actions of the wrong doers.

Only one issue with the above message: They should have termed the guys as Crackers and not as hackers.

IMHO hackers do have good intentions unlike to crackers.

If I’m using that software illegally, I would definitely consider as paying the license fees.

However it helps that I’m using Linux and open source most of the times, and all softwares on my windows machine are licensed.

USB Overdrive X is a Device drive software used on Mac OS X that handles any USB mouse/trackball/joystick/gamepad or any bluetood mouse.

See the related post on piratesdillema here.

It’s a story about a panda names Po (Voice: Jack Black) who goes on to fight against the ods to become the ultimate ‘The Dragon Warrior’ the [...]]]> Kung fu panda is an awesome movie and i thoroughly enjoyed it with my family. I’ve seen it with my friends and loved it everytime I saw it.

It’s a story about a panda names Po (Voice: Jack Black) who goes on to fight against the ods to become the ultimate ‘The Dragon Warrior’ the extreme superior Kung Fu Fighter with the help of Master Shifu (Voice: Dustin Hoffman).

However this blog post is not about Kung Fu Panda. I happen to see a short (~24 mins) bonus film “Secrets of the Furious Five” which came with Kung Fu Panda.

This short mostly 2D anime talks about the origins of each of the Furious Five and mentions what virtue they had to learn in order to become the Kung Fu Warrior.

The movie starts with few cute little bunnies fighting with each other and refusing to listen to Panda.

In an attempt to teach them that kung fu is more than only kicks and punches; in this 24 minutes movie Panda tells them the story of each warrior and virtue they had to learn to become super warrior:

• Mantis  :  Patience
• Viper    :  Courage
• Crane   :  Confidence
• Tigress :  Control/Discipline
• Monkey : Compassion

Kung Fu Panda - Secrets of the Furious Five -- Image taken from IMDB

It teaches some nice lessons in ways that are simple to understand.

Synopsis (from Wikipedia. I chose to paste entire content here along with giving link.)

Po is assigned by Master Shifu to teach an Introduction to Kung Fu class for a group of rambunctious bunny children.

After some initial difficulty bringing the class to order, Po finally begins his lesson emphasizing to the kids that combat is only part of Kung Fu, while its true meaning is “Excellence of Self”.

To illustrate the point, he uses the stories of the Furious Five’s individual pasts and the basic philosophical concepts they learned that enabled them to be great kung fu masters.

Mantis

In his youth, Mantis was a petulantly impatient warrior who was prone to jumping to conclusions and making impulsive decisions.
When that habit gets him captured, the long wait he was forced to endure in his cage allowed him to find the patience to play dead long enough to ambush his captors.

Viper

Viper, the daughter of Great Master Viper, was born without venomous fangs.
Her father, who relied on his venomous bite (referred to as his “Poison Fang Technique”), was despondent she could never succeed him as a warrior.
However, upon reaching adulthood, her father encountered a bandit who wore armor hard enough to shatter his fangs when he tried to bite him.
Seeing her father in peril, Viper found the courage to fight the bandit and defeat him with her ribbon dancing skills.

This story also makes a slight retcon – in the main film, Po bemoans the fact that he’s “not like the Five. I’ve got no claws, no wings, no venom“,
but of course in this story we find out from Po himself that Viper doesn’t possess poison, a contradiction at odds with Po’s encyclopedic knowledge of Kung Fu and its heroes,
though it could be possible that he recently found out that Viper doesn’t have venom.

Other brief shots from the main film shows Viper to have tiny fangs that don’t stick out, but fangs nonetheless, posing an alternative theory that viper did gain
slight poison capabilities, but that her ribbon dancing skills still formed the basis of her kung fu style.

Crane

Crane was an unconfident janitor of a martial arts school until the star pupil, Mei Ling, encouraged him to try seek enrollment in the school.
Although his nerve failed him at the try outs, he accidentally found himself in the intimidating challenge that determined eligibility.
Suddenly, he found the confidence to take the challenge and his skinny body proved to be an asset that enabled him to succeed.

Tigress

Tigress was an orphan whose status as an apex predator and her destructive lack of control of her strength left her feared and
isolated with no hope of anything better.
Master Shifu came to teach her the discipline to control her movements until she could perform delicate tasks with ease enough to allay the concerns of the
orphanage.
When she was still rejected for adoption by the adults who still feared her, Master Shifu took her in as his student and foster daughter.

Monkey

Monkey was a troublemaker who tormented his village owing to him being publically humiliated in his youth.
He defied all attempts to force him to leave until Master Oogway confronted and defeated him, but
also deduced the cause of his anti-social behaviour.
As such, Oogway encouraged him to stay in the village while encouraging his compassion.

At the end, Shifu returns to see Po’s anticipated lack of progress teaching and is surprised he underestimated Po’s talents yet again
considering how much the panda’s students have learned.

However, the bunnies ask Po how his first day was, the unpleasant memories prompt him to lie through his teeth at how wonderful it was.

I have never consumed alcohol till date and its easier for me to join this

I went ahead and signed the pact, received the following certificate where my signature is alongside of Lewis hamilton, Mika Hakkinen, Pedro Rosa [...]]]> My friend paras told me about signing a pact about ‘Never Drink and Drive’ today morning.

I have never consumed alcohol till date and its easier for me to join this

I went ahead and signed the pact, received the following certificate where my signature is alongside of Lewis hamilton, Mika Hakkinen, Pedro Rosa and Heikki Kovalainen.

Join the pact Certificate

Looking at the accidents caused by drunken driving these kind of initiatives are very important.

Hope to see more people joining the pact.

check here :  http://www.jointhepact.com/

Today’s BombayTimes mentioned this with following promotion for Mercedes McLaren.

Mika Hakkinen will be racing McLaren Formula One Car through bandra reclamation, mumbai on 30th November 2008.  Mostly signing of above pact will yield some passes for the same.

It will be cool to get to see/hear/feel the Formula One car on Mumbai roads.

Obama with little child ....... (From boston.com)

The long awaited match between Viswanathan Anand (Elo. 2783) of India and Vladimir Kramnik (Elo. 2772) of Russia began today.

The championship match consists of 12 games, from 14′th october to [...]]]> I’m sure all indian chess players will be eager to follow the world chess championship which is currently going on in Bonn (Germany).

The long awaited match between Viswanathan Anand (Elo. 2783) of India and Vladimir Kramnik (Elo. 2772) of Russia began today.

The championship match consists of 12 games, from 14′th october to 31st oct 08 (Iff tiebreak-2′nd nov 2008) for prize money of 1.5 M Euro.

I’m sure more than price money, its pride for which kramnik and anand will be fighting for.

Vishy is much stronger player + better human being + much more consistent than kramnik, and I’m following and supporting vishy for a world chess crown.

This entire year (apart from couple of tournaments) vishy has been in phenomenal form and I’m sure that he will show similar form and ensure that the title stays with him.

this is a time for vishy to break his WCC ‘K’ jinx {lost previous matches to Karpov (1992 n 1998), Kamsky (1994) and Kasparov (1995)}.

Coming back to the first game where Kramnik played usual ‘safety-first’ game where both parties were trying to judge the preparation of each other teams. This will continue for first few games after which we should see some agressive play on board by these guys.

First game of WCC is drawn where Kramnik playes white with anand opting for Exchange Slav variation.

Game One:

Kramnik,V (2772) – Anand,V (2783) [D14]
WCh Bonn GER (1), 14.10.2008
1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.cxd5 cxd5 5.Bf4 Nc6 6.e3 Bf5 7.Nf3 e6 8.Qb3 Bb4
9.Bb5 0-0 10.Bxc6 Bxc3+ 11.Qxc3 Rc8 12.Ne5 Ng4 13.Nxg4 Bxg4 14.Qb4 Rxc6 15.Qxb7
Qc8 16.Qxc8 Rfxc8 17.0-0 a5 18.f3 Bf5 19.Rfe1 Bg6 20.b3 f6 21.e4 dxe4 22.fxe4
Rd8 23.Rad1 Rc2 24.e5 fxe5 25.Bxe5 Rxa2 26.Ra1 Rxa1 27.Rxa1 Rd5 28.Rc1 Rd7 29.Rc5
Ra7 30.Rc7 Rxc7 31.Bxc7 Bc2 32.Bxa5 Bxb3 draw.

The complete game can be viewed here (Russian website)

Wish you all the best Vishy

As they have already touched upon most of our [...]]]> Google has launched the Project 10^100 (”Project 10 to the 100th”) to mark their 10th birthday;
a call for ideas to change the world by helping as many people as possible.
The price is around some $200,000 per idea. (they are selecting 5 ideas for $1 Million)

As they have already touched upon most of our daily habits and tracked us completely.

They can go ahead and take following ideas to own us completely

    - Worldwide Google Security number agency (something like Social Security Number)
    - Run Spy Agency  (They already know many more things about us than probably we know about ourselves)
    - Visa/Passport Agency
    - Start Television channels (They already have satellite)
      I’m sure they can definitely run targeted ads on Set-Top boxes
    - Start Hospitals
    - Start schools (All kind of)
    - Start building military applications and appliances
    - Provide alternate Energy source and make money
    - Run a full fledged financial institution (World needs few more players in this zone — after the current debacle)
        catering to banking needs
        investment needs
        mortgage
        credit authority
        ….and so on
    - Start something on geologists and geophysicists
        First target to find oil mines
    - Start film production house (producing all type of films including adult movies)
    - Start a Soft+Hard Drink manufacturing company
    – And many more …………..

Please check the 10^100 original announcement here.

Please feel free to add your ideas here …. (I assure that I’ll share prize money )

[digg=http://digg.com/tech_news/All_your_base_belong_to_us_funny_ideas_for_google_10_100#]