ARUVI - All is Well

It’s been a long time since I posted a write up here and that too about a movie. And to be specific, this is the first time Iam writing a long post on a movie. To put it as a disclaimer, this is not a movie review (Still didn’t reached that level and not interested to do that as well) but just a pure evacuation of questions provoked in my mind after watching the movie, ARUVI.

Yes. Iam not able to get rid of it and was constantly thinking what the director has really intended to convey through this film? Why this movie has received such rave reviews, awards and recognitions? My mind didn’t accept the fact that I like a movie because majority people liked it too. Of course, this is not a mainstream commercial drama where the entire movie goes along with a single theme. In fact, I have even been asking some of my friends as to why they like this movie. But there were no readymade answers made available for me. Well, that has what made me to think a little bit deep into it about this movie. Thanks to Sunday for giving me some time to do it.

Aptly suiting to the title, the movie flows in multi layered directions adding to it, the non-linear narrative and the sudden revelations and by the time we think what the movie unfolds, we reach the climax. The flamboyant title character ARUVI (Need not be gender specific here) has strictly conveyed some life rules which needs to be designed and reserved with us throughout our life.

To start with, the movie pre-dominantly conveys only one message. Learn to live your life independently. Don’t depend on others. Because, we don’t know when that others will become strangers in our life. Like how a full stop is used in a Para to make the sentence meaningful, even life requires a full stop to certain people to make it meaningful. We should not worry about the full stop made, rather be happy that it will lead to the start of a new sentence.

Life will become easier when problems are viewed with a sense of humor. The satirical scenes will not only make you to laugh rather question yourself that, when there are people with so much of problems in their life who are still happy, what you are facing is nothing at all. It altogether throws a diverse standpoint on the way, life is to be viewed.

In fact, the ending scene where the lead character was proposed by a boy question you to think that whatever happening in the current era in the name of love is not the real one at all. Love is something which must be felt on someone without any reason, without any expectations, without any benefit in return. If you can list down the reasons why you are loving someone, believe me that is not love at all. It is called like.

Nowadays, leading a happy life means changing your social network DP’s once a week, partying with friends, going on monthly tours etc. The movie even touches upon this. Real happiness does not lie in captivating things from others rather lies in giving things out to others. That cannot be explained rather than be felt.

You need not be serious even when things are not going as per your wish in life. In fact, you must be happy because if everything happens as per your wish and you are not at all struggling in life, you have not gone into the real-life phase yet. You are like in the phase of a kid whose wish will always be fulfilled by its parents.

When life throws dis-appointments at you, rather than bending down to it, stand up and convert those negatives into positives. The only one place where impossible has a real meaning is in the dictionary. In our real life, there is nothing called impossible. It is just lack of involvement. Your habits are designed prima facie by your friends and for this movie too, the story takes a U turn (which we may not even know at that time) only because of a friend. So, be extra careful when accepting friend requests.

Having said all, Aruvi (Waterfalls) metaphored to life here will look good when we see, but the force it penetrates can be handled only with rock-rollicking calm happy helping mindset. With this, I can positively say that ARUVI has joined with Mayakkam enna to convert my list of favourite film from singular to plural.

De-coding the characters G S and T in GST – A funny debate

Ever since the evolution of the ideology to integrate the entire indirect taxes into a single tax network, GST has been making the news and with the President’s assent, the effect of the same has manifolded multiply that it is hitting the daily newspaper headlines and Prime time slots in Television. Touted to be the India’s biggest tax reform post independence, this Act captures all the necessary elements of an action hero even before its implementation.

Well. Getting into this write up, we are normally accustomed to various debates over the GST happening all over televisions, newspapers and other media forums, but for a change, what will happen if the characters in the statute itself debate with each other claiming themselves to be a hero.

Yes. This write up is just an attempt into the same, de-coding each of the characters from their own point of view.

1. GOODS called as “The Gigantic G”

2. SERVICES called as “The Superlative S” and

3. TAX called as “The Terrifying T” 

Starting with the “Gigantic G” as the name goes by:

We, GOODS are the tangible elements upon which the entire tax is levied and our importance can be understood just by the priority given to us, as we precede others in the name of the Statute itself. We find ourselves in all the types of movable property except money and securities. We even include actionable claim, grass, crops and everything that are attached to the land.

We are the ones that are manufactured in big industries, traded everywhere right from the big malls to the Kirana shops and we enjoy the physical presence and people love to pay just for using us. We contribute to the Government’s Ghazaana in different forms of taxes and we even get advertised in all the television channels and you cannot even find one place without our existence. Hence, we are the heroes of all, says the Gigantic G.

As the Gigantic G finishes off, now its turn for the “The Superlative S”:

You, GOODS may include all the types of movable property but still you are just an inclusive definition whereas we contain everything else except those falling under you. Thus, we constitute majority of the transactions for the tax base as compared to you.  And you may be tangible, but even the biggest corporates would like to develop their intangibles and we are very happy that we are falling under the same category. You can get money from those who are buying you but we’ll tax the money itself on its conversion into any other mode. You get crushed through those big heavy machines and get stalled in the shop racks whereas we are the opted ones for millions of young graduates and business tycoons to venture into. You are incomplete and have no value without us and thus we form an integral part of your existence. Needless to mention, our importance can be noted just with the pattern of marks in the exams as the Single Finance Act taxing service constitutes for 50% and all the other Acts taxing you, GOODS constitute the rest and hence we are the heroes of all, goes the Superlative S.

After listening to the furious hit backs between the Gigantic G and the Superlative S, “The Terrifying T” takes the centre stage now.

I feel pity on both of you for your opinions on each other, as none of you are complete without me, which can be understood if you simply go by the name of the Statute itself. Iam the base because of which both of you are defined and without me you’ll not even find a mention of your name in the statue. Iam the “terrifying terminator” in the eyes of the people and they just fear on listening to my name and the “thirsty trading a/c” of the Government which wants me to grow bigger and bigger. Even if you both cease to exist, I will still be trending in the form of direct taxes and Iam sure that there will many more ways devised out to introduce me in the un-explored areas. And hence, Iam the un-disputed real hero of all, ends the Terrifying T.

As all the three finished their speech proving points in favour of each of them, now it’s time for the judgement. A movie without an action hero is in-complete and so does the characters in this article. Compared to all of the three, the views presented by the Terrifying T are more practical and hence warrants superiority over others.

But Wait… We forgot the fourth character.

Yes. It is none other than the Act in the GST Act, “The Action hero A”. Even though tax is the fulcrum of the entire discussion, it should be sanctioned by an Act laid in accordance with our Constitution and the power to levy the terrifying T by the Government cannot be subsumed without the mere presence of the Action hero.

We humans tend to easily forget whatever we come across and this article is no exception to that. The introduction part itself states that the Act is the hero but it is those characters in this article, which didn’t notice that and went on debating. And Iam lucky enough because if they have noticed that, then this article would not be available here before you.

Having said all, a movie is not complete without an action hero and you don’t become a villain for me after reading this.

Thank you. J

Distress aka De-stress

Every person in this world has their own stories and problems and you cannot even find one in this universe who lives happily without any problem. A student has the pressure to score more marks than his best friend; an unemployed has the pressure to get placed in a good job; a married man has the pressure to assist his family’s needs and the list goes on like this.

In our life, we are always running towards a target object which may be marks, job, money and so on and in the process, we completely forget the purpose beyond running for it. A boy was standing in the terrace and looking at the sky wondering, how beautiful and happy a bird was flying. But the bird only knows that it is flying high to keep it safe from its enemies as well as to secure a piece of bread for its livelihood. In that process, it forgets that it has been given the boon to fly which is not possible for humans. Just visualize that the boy standing in the terrace is the GOD and the bird is we, human beings. God has given everyone with a unique talent and he is sitting and wondering about how well we are going to use the same. But we in the process of paying attention towards either securing marks/searching jobs/ getting promotions, fails to notice that we are having something unique which is not available to others and end up wasting the same.

A child looked at the sky and asked his brother, why there is no moon today for which, his brother replied that today we cannot see the moon as it is a new moon day. The child started crying and the mother on seeing the same, consoled the child and told, that there is only one day i.e., today where we cannot see moon but during the next fortnight the moon is going to get bigger and bigger. In the same way, today may not be your day but ensure that one day the world is going to acknowledge your efforts and hard work and believe that day is no way far.

And nowadays, it has become a habit to expect the result from a job even before starting it. It is not wrong to estimate the same but at certain times, it is better to do what life gives you without any expectations. In schooldays, we were reading the theories in Physics, Formulae in Maths, Time period in History but we have never thought how it is going to help us in our life or the higher studies or the jobs we are going to undertake. We cannot say that I want to become an Engineer and hence studying Tamil grammar is of no use to me. The thing is that we don’t know what benefits and at what point of time is going to accrue to us due to the efforts we are putting today and we expect to see the results tomorrow itself. And we will start to worry about the same.

 If we have to put the same in costing terms, result is just a by-product upon which we don’t have any control. Our control should be on the process so as to ensure that we are eliminating the process loss to the extent possible, and the by-product will eventually come out. But, we keep on worrying about the by-product and thereby lose control over the process leading to an ultimate collapse.

To conclude, as said earlier, everyone has problems in their life but the magnitude of the same depends upon how one looks at it. There is a saying which goes like “Your determination determines your destination” But it is your perception which is going to determine, what your destination is. It is obvious and easy to note the distress surrounding us but a simple change of a vowel can help us to de-stress from the distress. :)

Everyone’s desire is to FAIL

I know that by reading the topic of the article, most of you would be feeling awkward as to why this guy has titled the article in this way. Wait… Let’s carry on reading the article.. This article is going to pre-dominantly discuss on the two 7 letter words between which everyone’s life is passing through. One is the highly toxicated word “SUCCESS” beyond which everyone is running hard and the other is the often rewarded awful word “FAILURE”. 

Everyone in the world is gifted with the same 24 hours a day. Some people accumulate their wealth and knowledge by leaps and bounds whereas others depreciate what they have in the said time. Your effort towards achieving the target is mainly driven by two factors.

1. Your strategy to achieve the target in an optimal manner and

2. How time responds to your strategy.

The first one is only in our hands and we need to simply forget the time factor. Anyways life is not about finding the Net Present Value. So we can very well ignore it. 

"Expectation is the root cause of misery", a quote which can suit at any circumstance. Here iam not talking out other people’s expectation on you.. It is your perception that other people are expecting from you. Imaging that everyone is thinking you are an idiot is your perception and at the same time imagining you are intelligent is also your perception. There is no role for others to decide about your abilities. Your ability is only to be decided by the attribute you carry with yourself.

Each and every one of us would have put efforts to achieve our target and if it did not yield the expected results, it doesn’t mean the efforts we put are worthless. It is definitely going to help us but the time alone has delayed. Whether success or failure, the same should be remembered only at that moment and we should not take it to our heart. An aeroplane travels at a speed of nearly 500 miles a hour yet the passengers sitting inside will feel as if they are sitting in a chair in their home. And this is how we should take our life also. The speed/aggression to achieve the target should be retained with the brain and we should not take it to our heart.

I should say that whether the result is positive or not, the efforts to achieve the target should be consistent. The only thing is we should not feel regret in our heart at a later point of time. We will know the value of a thing only during its absence. So,the absence of success should make us to work positively towards achieving the target rather than getting distracted by losing our self confidence. And everything in life happens according to our time, our clock. You may look at your friends/neighbours and some may seem to be ahead or behind you, but they are not. They are living according to the pace of their clock. So be patient.

Let me end it up with an old yet worthy story. There was once a king who placed a boulder on the middle of the road. All the wealthy merchants and traders were passing by the road but none came forward to remove the obstacle. Then, a peasant came by the way carrying a vegetable load and he took the initiative to remove the same. After much pushing and straining, he is able to remove the boulder. Below the boulder there was lying a sack containing gold coins and a note from the king that the same belongs to the person removing the obstacle. So, every obstacle presents an opportunity to improve one's condition and let us not keep on worrying about the past.

Thank you!!

Wait... I didn’t told what is meant by FAIL till now… The word FAIL has different perceptions and I think we should perceive it as to “Flawlessly Ascend in Life…” 

Now, I hope that you also will be agreeing with me, that you desire to FAIL… J