Thamie's pages...

     Growing up in a small town in south India, I used to walk past street vendors selling different items on the footpath (read as roadside as there wasn't a footpath).Among them, the one who always attracted my attention was the middle aged man who sold rings embeded with colourful stones which he claims as semi-precious lucky stones but were actually glass pieces.     Unlike other vendors who were selling essential commodities, the luck vendor was never busy with many buyers. However, occasionally he had customers who are to be first convinced about the 'quality' of the product and then about the 'positive' impact of the product.      I always pondered, "if wearing those rings, stones are sure to bring luck and prosperity, why was he not wearing them and becoming rich to live a better life away from this roadside?" and " what's so compelling for him to make others rich?"      As years passed, my visit to the place lessened...

WOULD YOU COMFORTABLY TAKE VACCINES MANUFACTURED IN CHINA? I am coming across this question too often on social media by the “patriotic” Indians. *Chinese vaccines(Sinopharm, Sinovac and others) are approved by WHO and being used in more than 50 countries including UAE, Bahrain, Vietnam, The Philippines, Hungary, Indonesia with the approval of their local health authorities. *Millions of people in those countries are already vaccinated with the Chinese vaccines and that includes hundreds of thousands of Indian expatriate workers, permanent residents living in those countries. *India manufactures only 1 brand of Covid vaccine - Covaxin by Bharat Biotech and until now, Covaxin’s WHO Emergency Use Listing approval is pending – meaning, those vaccinated with Covaxin may be considered as non-vaccinated during international travel until WHO approves it. *Remember, Covishield is not an Indian vaccine. It’s a vaccine developed by Astra Zeneca (Oxford Univ., UK) and produced at an Indian pharma...

I have always been fascinated by the entertainments of this God   man, Nithyananda aka HDH Nithyananda Paramashivam ( HDH refers to His Divine Holiness). Despite being a rape accused fugitive, he has been making rounds on the media for building his own nation, KAILASA and more recently for unveiling Kailasa currency through the Reserve bank of Kailasa😮 Let us see some interesting, funny facts about Kailasa and its de facto head of the state. 1. Nitthi (as how he is fondly called by people who love him) is a smart man who calls his nation as an E-nation to avoid his followers and potential citizens of Kailasa asking him where it is located. There are speculations that Kailasa has been set up on a privately owned island off the coast of Ecuador or in the Turks & Caicos islands, Trinidad & Tobago in the Caribbean.However, these governments have been denying the entry and purchase of any island in their territory by Nitthi. 2. Buying a private island is not any thing new as m...

As I am writing this blog post, the world, especially India will be gearing up to celebrate the International Day of Yoga over this weekend - 21st June 2020.Yoga is an ancient practice of exercise both for the physical and mental well being like any other health regimen.But it has been packaged and promoted in such a way that it is a panacea for all health issues right from impotency to infertility to cardio vascular illness to COVID 19. I keep coming across photos, videos on social media with people of different age groups performing various Yoga postures and projected that flexibility of the body is equal to 100% fitness.Being a hotel employee over 2 decades, I have seen loads of drunk people at Bars and clubs who, under the influence of alcohol can twist their bodies in many unimaginable way without having an iota of knowledge about yoga😆 Mathematics, an interesting or the most hated course in schools can be compared to Yoga.Back in the school days, our minds have ...

If we were asked this question, "Who is your role model?" How many of us can think of a person instantly? It is always a very difficult to get an answer from the top of one's mind.Whenever I have come across this question before, I always create my imaginary figure by selecting various traits of different personalities from people I personally know to those who are globally famous. Further, when I tried to enumerate the traits that I am inspired by or wanted to follow, the most on the list is came from a popular person - Tun Dr.Mahathir Mohamad, the Prime Minister of Malaysia. Though I have visited a few times and lived for short periods in Mahathir's Malaysia, I have officially  nothing to do with that country.A couple of times, I've got the opportunity to see Dr.M in public events.However, never got a chance to shake hand or get a selfie with him.I remember having in my wallet, a photo of him cut off from a news paper in the early 2000s when I used to...

Privacy and Confidentiality is no doubt losing its meaning as we are technologically advancing.We all know that our personal data are being captured by various methods whenever we shop, we open a new email account, buy stuffs online, enroll for a lucky draw and by many other ways and such data are stored by someone who we do not know and could be transferred to stranger who surely does not require to have access to such data. Leave aside the data security and breaches happening due to technology and see these scenes where personal data are shared, sought for unintentionally due to human behaviour. Scene 1 : At a Doctor's office: I was at a Doctor's office along with my wife where he is giving me consultation on my medical examination and suddenly from nowhere a nurse barged in with some papers (perhaps, results of another patient for which the Doctor was waiting for), the Doctor gone through those repots and asked the nurse to call an elderly lady waiting at the corri...

During my recent visit to Sri Lanka, I was surprised with 2 simple things that is being followed throughout the island. Though I have observed this a few times when I visited Colombo, the capital of the the island nation, I was of the impression that these things are being followed only in the capital but to my surprise this time, I have observed these at places away from the capital- tier 2 cities like Kandy, Galle and Negombo and smaller towns like Moratuwa, Kaluthara, Chillaw, Nuwara Eliya and so on. 1. Respect to pedestrians on roads: Whenever I wanted to cross any road with traffic flowing on that, all I needed to do is to reach the nearest pedestrian crossing point ( Zebra crossing) and walk across the road. The drivers of vehicles are so considerate for the pedestrians and stop their vehicles to let people cross the road.Having been used to wait (im)patiently to avoid putting my life at risk to cross roads anywhere in India, I usually wait for the road to be clear with...