Da Vinci Code and the Cleveland Cavaliers

Two things made an impact on me this weekend. The movie "Da Vinci Code" and my beloved Cleveland Cavaliers.

To start off, I have not read the book. I did hear about the reviews panning the movie.I kinda know the story.With all this background information I went to watch the movie last nite in Ballston.

I liked the movie , I liked the performances by the actors and more importantly,the movie made me want to read the book. But it is important to remember that this movie is based on a fictional story. There is no empirical proof of any theories the movie suggests. Robert Langdon , the protagonist, keeps repeating this fact in the movie !! I dont know what all the side show regarding banning this movie is all about , I think its a waste of time.

Check out these interesting sites : http://www.opusdei.us/
http://www.davinciantidote.com/

Also check out this interesting review I read about the book.

Overall , this movie made me think about all religions. Now I am interested in knowing the history of Hinduism. Notwithstanding the fact that this movie is fictional , it should be pretty unsettling to realize that the things that we take for granted are not so true after all !!


Now..Moving on to my CAVS.Yes they lost to the Pistons in Game 7 in Detroit. I knew our best shot at winning the series was at home. But it was not meant to be. Im happy and proud of my team and I have one proclamation to make to all other NBA fans

"Get Used to seeing LBJ & the CAVS in May & June every year"

As a side note , I was on travel all last week. I was in the Phoenix airport during the 4th quarter of Game 4. The bar I was in had about 200 people . All the folks erupted in unison when the CAVS won. There were 3 reasons that this happened

1. Everyone roots for the underdog (unless your team is not the underdog)
2.Everyone hates Detroit(for obvious reasons)
3. And..Yeah EVERYONE LOVES LEBRON JAMES...

I have never been happier as a CAVS fan than I am today !!!

Tamil Nadu Elections - What do you make of it ?

The Tamil Nadu general assembly elections results are out.

Tamil Nadu
Total No. of Seats : 234	Results Declared: 234
Party Won DMK 103 Congress 35 PMK 21 CPI (M) 9 CPI 5 AIADMK 52 MDMK 6 DPI 1 DMDK 1 Others 1

The DMK alliance has won and Karunanidhi(82 years old) is going to be the CM for the fifth time. He has jus won his 11th straight assembly election. Mind boggling , considering the fact that he has been in public office for more than 55 years.

Though the DMK alliance won , the DMK as a party has not been able to capture the majority by itself. This has resulted in the possibility of a coalition govt. , a rarity in the state. Though the PMK and Congress have indicated that they are not interested in being part of the government , I find it hard to believe. Here's why ..

The congress has won 35 seats , thats a pretty significant number considering that they dont have a leader like GK Moopanar.But they have Chidambaram , who is considered by many as a future CM of TN or even a future PM of India. The congress is the ruling party in the centre and the DMK has several ministers in the Central Govt ( Dayanidhi Maran for instance..who is by the way an alum of Don Bosco, Egmore..my alma mater as well...Yayyyyyyy !!!) as so does the PMK.

It only makes sense that the Congress would want "power" in some way even if they are not part of the Govt. But here is the tricky part , I think that all the alliance partners(Congress,PMK) would be happy to play "Best friend" until Karunanidhi is the CM(or until he is alive)...Karunanidhi is 82 years old and has had a few scares lately.

Im not sure if there was a huge "anti-incumbency" wave in these elections , considering the ADMK alliance won about 60 seats. But the issue that turned the tide towards the DMK was the election Manifesto..(2 Kg Rice..Free color TV..etc., etc.,) .

Often most of us "Indians" living in the US and elsewhere..think about the positive developments that our country has made over the years. But it is a travesty that people still get carried away by "free stuff". Where is the dignity of a person if he/she would vote for the DMK just because they have promised to give more free stuff than the ADMK ?

Frankly after a few hiccups in the first couple of years..the ADMK administration has been pretty solid. This is just not my opinion but the opinion of experts. For instance , I was in favor of the way Jayalalitha handled the Govt Employees strike...suspending 100000 people overnite ..to get them back to work...gutsy move... But arresting them overnite and threatening them was not so much gritty it was more like a vendetta move !

Overall ...I dont think there is a huge difference in the way that Dravidian parties administer the state of Tamil Nadu. I think its a question of who is the lesser evil.

People have short memories...and its not coincidental that other than MGR , no leader in recent history of TN politics has been the CM for two consecutive terms. MGR was a charismatic ...honest..and "easy to access" leader. People identified themselves with MGR.

It is also interesting to note that Vijaykanth has won his assembly seat from Vridhachalam. The only seat his party managed to win..though his party was a respectable third in most of the constituencies. It would be interesting to see if he becomes a responsible member of the Assembly or not.

Other tidbits :S Ve Shekar won his seat in Mylapore by about 2000 votes beating out Actor Napolean ... Vaiko and MDMK have been wiped out of the political map... Sarathkumar and Radhika are in trouble coz they jumped ship from the DMK but RADAAN (media company owned by Radhika) is the producer of all the top shows SUN TV has to offer today...

End of the day..there was one positive development...the student party started by a group of Ex-IIT'ians..has fared well in Chennai..though they did not win , they gave the other candidates in Chennai a run for their money. I hope these youngsters dont lose their momentum now but keep working towards establishing a name for themselves in the political arena