Events
Indian Premier League is Back
Love it or hate it but you can’t ignore it, that’s Indian Premier League (IPL), the domestic professional Twenty20 cricket competition inIndia. Since its inception in 2008, initiated by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), IPL has come a long way and has emerged as one of the top sports brands in the world. IPL was the fifth largest brand in the world of sports in two years of operation, just below FIFA and higher than Wimbledon and F1. The IPL has actually become the number one cricketing property in the world.
All said and done, as the fifth edition of IPL is round the corner, its worth to check where IPL as a brand is heading. According to a valuation by Brand Finance, the brand value of IPL has fallen to $2.92 billion (Rs 16,163 crore) from a peak of $4.13 billion (Rs 19,675 crore) in 2010. A Business Standard report noted that even television ratings have fallen consistently from 4.81 in the first year (2008) to 3.27 in 2012 edition. Even ad revenues have slumped 30 percent this season from a year ago. So will the Sixth season of IPL be better and bigger? let’s wait and watch.
Driving Tata Indica Vista D90
So when I received the new Tata Indica Vista D90 for blogger review, I decided to take it to some interior parts of Tamil Nadu. So this was the route.
Started the day 1 from Chennai to Pondicherry, via ECR road
On way to Pondicherry!
In Pondy
Day 2: Morning: Pondicherry to Tiruvannamalai
It was a great experience driving through village roads
Day 2: Afternoon: Tiruvannamalai to Thengannur
Then back to Chennai, covered close to 400 kms!
What Does Chennai Mean To Me?
This post is part of the blog tag titled, The CBC Tablog where CBC stands for Chennai Bloggers Club. About 35 bloggers from Chennai are participating in this blog tag; everyone will write about their favourite city Chennai and what it means to them. So here’s my post for the CBC tablog titled, What Chennai Means To Me. Thanks for passing the baton to me Shashi !
So now its my turn. Well I came to Chennai in 2001, in search of job and in the last 12 years or so, Chennai has gone through so many changes. As most of the bloggers mentioned earlier, there are lots of things that I like in Chennai. Some being Marina Beach, The Schmidt Memorial on Elliots Beach, The Central Railway Station, Ranganathan Street, T.Nagar ,Wonderful temples in the city , Fort St. George and the latest and my fav Anna centenary Library in Kotturpuram.
But then what surprised me the most in Chennai is the emergence of so many interesting and wonderful events in the recent years. Being an event blogger this excites me the most. Chennai hosts of all kinds of events, you name it. Tech events, events in arts, music and drama, on entrepreneurship, startup events, events like TEDx, BIL, PKN and SAM. These events are not only entertaining but informative also and a great place to network and meet interesting people.
I wish Chennai host more and more such wonderful events. Now the tablog must continue, introducing the next blogger Vid Dev, a Chennaiite who blogs at ‘The Pensieve’. http://viddev.wordpress.com
Chennai-Pondy Heritage Rally 2013
Unlike the Chennai-Pondy Heritage Rally 2011, this time I didn’t take photos of the cars, all the usual suspects were there. It was similar to the 2011 car rally, except there were half a dozen bikes and scooters. This time I tried to capture the response, the crowd, the photographers. So here it is
To start with, some cars 
Some more
Now the real heroes! Photographers! Everywhere you can see them, with different gadgets
They hunt in groups
Oh, that’s me
Then, everyone wants to take photos with the car
All together, it was a great fulfilled Sunday morning!
30 Days, 30 Bloggers, One Thrilling Car, The Vista D90.
BlogAdda has come up with an exclusive product review in association with Tata Motors for its latest offering – The Vista D90 exclusively for Indian Bloggers. 30 Bloggers from Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad will be sharing their experience of driving Tata’s Vista D90. I am happy to be selected for this novel & an exciting programme. So the programme is you will be given the Vista D90 car for three days. During these 3 days, each blogger is required to share their moments of driving the car in the form of tweets, images/posts on facebook & a post on the blog as well.
So wait for more updates and live tweeting, hey roads of South India, here I come
“Parallel Lines” : Lecture-concert on Aaron Copland Vs Lalgudi Jayaraman By Anil Srinivasan and Lagudi GJR Krishnan
What’s common between Aaron Copland and Lalgudi Jayaraman? In comparing different perspectives to classical music (as voiced by Edward Said and Daniel Barenboim in “Parallels and Paradoxes”) Anil Srinivasan, a classical pianist best known for his collaborative work with Carnatic vocalist Sikkil Gurucharan, have come across interesting parallels in the work of the legendary Lalgudi Jayaraman and American contemporary composer Aaron Copland.
In their bold use of compositional dynamics, taking inspiration from several domains and creating new heights in musical collaboration – both these master legends show startling similarity.
Lalgudi GJR Krishnan, scion of the Lalgudi family and master violinist, along with Anil Srinivasan, classical pianist who has now worked across domains present a unique lecture and concert of the works of these two master composers. The culmination of the morning will be a joint presentation. Krishnan and Srinivasan have now performed in different venues across the world. Their work was commissioned and recorded by Felmay Records, a label based in Europe and has already come in for immense critical acclaim and serious dialogue. Their concert at the Purcell Room in the Southbank Centre in London on a similar vein was met with great appreciation.
Both these musicians present this morning as a tribute to the living legend Lalgudi Sri Jayaraman.
This unique and interesting lecture-concert is on 24th december, 10 AM at Sri Krishna Gana Sabha. For more details, visit Anil Srinivasan’s Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/MadrasPianist
Dr. Marshall Goldsmith on Developing on Yourself, Your People and Team
CII Chennai chapter organised an interaction with Dr. Marshall Goldsmith, World renowned Leadership thinker and author of best selling books like ‘MOJO’ and What Got You Here Won’t Get You There. It was a lively session with lots of exercises and participation from the attendees. I found Dr. Marshall Goldsmith quick witted and extremely humorous. Here are some of the highlights from his talk
Great is the need for student to learn, greater is the need for teacher to teach
Great achiever is all about me, great leader is all about them
If we say great, but… to the people we love, we send a message that there is no great
Four words to be a better person, help more judge less
Once you go up the ladder, your suggestions become orders
Classical challenges of successful leaders are adding too much value, telling the world how wonderful we really are, passing too much judgment and winning too much
Over-committed is one of the most common problems of successful leaders
More successful people are more committed
Every time we get promoted, two things happen, we get more power and we get more freedom
Peter Drucker once said, we spend lot of time thinking what leaders want to do, but never discuss what leaders should stop doing.
The Children’s Musical Rhapsody 2012
Rhapsody, An initiative to take music to children, is organising the first ever children’s music festival – The Children’s Musical Rhapsody – as a special effort to bring the magic of the music season directly to children in schools. As a format that consists both of explanations, storytelling about music/musicians and short performances by very eminent artists.
The schedule:
19th – at PSBB TP Road, with a conversation with Unnikrishnan followed by a recital by Mysore Chandan Kumar (Flute), Storytrails Storytelling.
20th – at Arsha Vidya Mandir, with a conversation with Neyveli Santhanagopalan and a recital by Suma Sudhindra (Veena), Storytrails Storytelling
21st – at Bhavan’s Rajaji Vidyashram, with a conversation with Sikkil Gurucharan and a recital by H K Venktaram (Violin), Storytrails Storytelling.
For Student Passes please write to admin@rhapsodymusic.in
To know more about Rhapsody, visit https://www.facebook.com/Rhapsodymusiceducation
Don’t tell my mom that I organise TEDx events
“Don’t tell my mom that I organise TEDx events, she thinks I smuggle goods from East Africa”. Sandeep Varma
I have started getting innumerable phone calls from close friends, relatives and news reporters. Some surprised, shocked and even paranoid, reason? I was in the organizing team of ‘the most controversial’ TEDx events India has ever witnessed i.e TEDxChennai.
Cancellation of TEDxChennai’s license is the latest viral on net. All the leading news papers have covered in length this national tragedy. I wish we had half of the publicity for the TEDxChennai event itself. Once again I am convinced that everybody likes a controversy and negative / cooked news travel faster.
So here are the reasons for not letting my mom know that I organize TEDx events,
1. Because I was part of the most biggest and well received TEDx events in India
2. Because we slogged for almost 5 months wasting (yeah now I feel it) our energy, time and money in organizing one of the best conferences Chennai has seen so far
3. Because we decided to take TEDxChennai to International standards
4. Because we thought it would be great to bring the best of speakers from all over the World
5. I am sorry that we produced such amazing talks by people who have achieved great heights, like
Romeo Marquez Jr : 1029 views on Youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OQ2um_nlb8&feature=plcp
Prabakaran Murugaiah: 13,977 Views
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNxlZ1DSOaU&feature=plcp
Neel Raman: 24,374 views
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lk63R03BQCA&feature=youtu.be
6. Because we were responsible in making 1200 plus attendees thrilled, motivated and be proud to be part of such a wonderful event
So please don’t tell my mom that I organize TEDx events, she still thinks that I smuggle goods from East Africa.
SAM Global : Where Ideas Meet
“Ideas can be life-changing. Sometimes all you need to open the door is just one more good idea.” Jim Rohn
Ideas are really powerful, as the ad line says an idea can change your life. Samuel Eddy, who is passionate about life changing ideas, has come up with this wonderful concept called SAM Global.
SAM stands for “Science, Art, Management” which means it encompasses almost any subject and SAM global will be a place where ideas meet! So what we can expect in SAM? its TED like concept, but with a twist. SAM will showcase the best talks from all over the world and will be a platform “where Ideas Meet“ and will encourage the cross pollination of ideas from all over the world. It will also encourage the implementation of such Ideas .It will attempt to connect the Innovator and the person wanting to implement the Idea!!
How SAM works
If you are a great orator, an achiever in your own space and has got a great story / idea to share, the team from SAM Global will come and record your talk. Talk will be for maximum 12 minutes and will be featured in SAM website. Once your talk goes viral and becomes popular, you will be invited to share your idea at the SAM Global event. The first SAM Global conference is scheduled to happen in Chennai on August 2013.
To know more about SAM Global and to be part of the community, visit the website, facebook and Twitter
So let the ideas come from all sides and change our lives.
