விலங்கா ராமாயணம்

ராமாயணம் எத்தனை ராமாயணம்? எண்ணிலடங்கா!

வால்மீகி ராமாயணத்தில் ஆரம்பித்து ஒரு பெரிய பட்டியலே தருகிறார்கள்.

ஒவ்வொரு ராமாயணத்திலும் ஒரு புதிய கிளைக் கதைகளைச் சொல்லி நம்மை ப்ரமிப்பில் ஆழ்த்துகின்றனர். ஒரியா மொழியினை இருபது லக்ஷம் மக்கள் பேசுகின்றனர். இந்த மொழியினிலே 1415 ஆண்டினிலே சாரளா தாஸ் என்பவர் விலங்கா ராமாயணம் என்ற நூலை ஒரியா மொழியில் எழுதியுள்ளார்.

ராவண வதத்தில் யாருடைய பங்கு அதிகம் என்பதைப் பற்றி சீதைக்கும் ராமருக்கும் ஒரு சர்ச்சை எழுகிறது. ஆயிரம் தலை கொண்ட விலங்கன் என்ற அசுரனை யார் கொல்கின்றனரோ அவர் தான் ராவண வதத்துக்கு அதிகம் உழைத்தவர் என்று ஒப்புக்கொள்ளலாம் என்ற போட்டியினை முன் வைத்தனர். அதில் ராமர் தோல்வியுற்று, இளையவன் துணையுடன் சீதை விலங்கா அசுரனைக் கொன்றதால் அவர்கள் பணி உயர்ந்தது என்று தீர்மானம் செய்ததாக ஒரு வடிவம் தந்துள்ளார். இந்தச் செய்தியை நான் பக்தன் என்ற பழய மாதமலரில் படித்து ரசித்தேன்.

இந்த ஒரியா மொழியில் மேலும் அர்ஜுன் தாஸ் “ராம விபா” என்ற நூலினையும் நீலகண்ட ரதர் என்பவர் “சீதா பிரேம தரங்கிணி” என்ற நூலினையும் எழுதியுள்ளார்கள். இந்த நூல்கள் எல்லாம் ராமாயணத்தினை முக்கிய கருத்தாகக் கொண்டு எழுதப்பட்டவை. மேற் சொன்ன செய்திகள் இணையதளத்தில் “விக்கிபீடியா” மின்வலையிலிருந்து எடுக்கப்பட்ட செய்திகள்.

பம்ம பம்மதா தைய்ய தைய்ய தக

திரு நாதமுனி நாராயண ஐயங்கார் 1958-1960ல் ஹனுமந்த ராயன் கோயில் தெருவில் உள்ள முதல் வீட்டில் மூன்றாவது மாடியில் தங்கி இருக்கும் பொழுது சனிக்கிழமைகளில் ஸம்ப்ராதாய பஜனையை நடத்துவார். அந்த நாட்களில் இந்தப் பாட்டினை அவர் விரும்பிப் பாடுவார். அன்று அவர் கற்றுக்கொடுத்த அந்த பாடல் இன்றும் எனது மனதில் ஆழமாக பதிந்துள்ளது. இந்தப் பாடலை பாடும் பொழுது நான் அன்றைய நாட்களுக்குச் செல்லுவதாக மனதில் ஒரு இதமான உணர்ச்சி ஏற்படுகிறது. அவரது கையெழுத்துப் பிரதியில் அந்தப் பாடல் கீழே தரப்பட்டுள்ளது.

Mother Nature's Fury

We have all splashed water over our face in a bid to wake up in the morning. But one Australian man has taken it to the extreme, as highlighted in Daily Mail UK.. Taken place at Australia Bondi’s Beach and standing perilously close to the edge of a rock face, the fearless individual stood head-on with Mother Nature as she threw giant whitewater waves over Ben Buckler headland North Bondi Beach in Sydney.  Brave but foolish, he was soaked by the explosion of water.

The man had climbed over protective bars several feet further back from the edge in his pursuit of the ultimate wake-up call and was fortunate to survive as the area was engulfed by water. Right across New South Wales, coastline was battered by similar waves ramped up by 50mph winds. Sydney Harbour was turned into a no-go zone for ferries after the Australian Bureau of Meteorology issued warnings of impending gales for most of the coast.

Specialist marine forecasting and surf camera service Coastal watch said a rare weather event and the closeness of the low pressure system was the reason for the ocean’s violence. “We had something called ‘captured fetch’ happen and it’s pretty rare here“, chief forecaster Ben McCartney said.

Waves are created when wind blows over a certain area of the seas. This is called the fetch. A ‘captured fetch’ happens when a storm moves in the same direction of a fetch, so that the wind keeps pushing the same waves following them.

Backup our brain for better performance!!!

We do backup of our Computer Hard disc for saving data.

How about backup of our brain? Is it possible? What for we have to do backup of brain?  

A top scientist has claimed that in the next two decades, people will be able to back up the human brain including all of the memories. Award-winning Raymond Kurzweil, 62, told 500 guests at a sponsored ''future talk'' event in Vienna, Austria, that the human brain backup was now already technically possible.

“I believe that within the next 20 years we will have thousands of nanobot computer machines in our blood that will heal our bodies, improve our performance, and even be able to back up all the contents of our brains, just as you backup your files on a computer,” The Daily Mail quoted Kurzwell as saying. “That means they would back up every thought, every experience, everything that makes us an individual,” he added. Kurzweil has notched up a string of pioneering computer inventions including voice recognition technology during his career.

Brains can be extremely complex. The Cerebral Cortex of the human brain contains roughly 15-33 billion neurons perhaps more depending on gender and age, linked with up to 10,000 synaptic (a synapse is a junction that permits a Neuron to pass an electrical or chemical signal to another cell) connections each. Each Cubic millimeter of cerebral cortex contains roughly one billion synapses. These neurons communicate with one another by means of long protoplasmic fibers called axons, which carry trains of signal pulses called action potentials to distant parts of the brain or body and target them to specific recipient cells.

Despite rapid scientific progress, much about how brains work remains a mystery. The operations of individual neurons and synapses are now understood in considerable detail, but the way they cooperate in ensembles of thousands or millions has been very difficult to decipher. Methods of observation such as EEG recording and functional brain imaging tell us that brain operations are highly organized, while single unit recording can resolve the activity of single neurons, but how individual cells give rise to complex operations is unknown...........WIKI

ஸரஸ்வதி தேவிக்கு ராகஸ்ரீயின் சங்கீத மாலை

Kumaramangalam Srinivasa Raghavan, popularly known amongst his friends as “Squadron Leader Raghavan” and as ‘Pappakutty” to the doyens of the carnatic music world, was a Carnatic Musician, Vainika, Musicologist, Lyricist, Composer, poet, Sanskrit Scholar, Journalist, Painter and much more. Born in the year 1910, Raghavan was a contemporary and a close of friend of 20^th century legendary musicians, such as Sangeethakalanidhi Maharajapuram Viswanatha Iyer, G.N.Balasubramanian and Madurai Mani Iyer. Raghavan and GNB started their early music training under G.V.Narayanaswami Iyer, father of GNB.

He had composed and set to score more than two hundred kritis, keertanams, Padams and bajans. A multilinguist, Raghavan’s compositions are in Sanskrit, Telugu, Tamil, Kannada and Hindi. Raghavan was also proficient in playing several Indian and Western musical instruments notably Veena, Flute, Violin, Mridangam, Harmonium and Piano.

Sri.Raghavan was a great devotee of Jagadguru Kanchi Paramaacharya His Holiness Chandrasekarendra Saraswathi. He was ordained by Paramacharya to translate the Narayaneeyam into Tamil Poetry. Sri.Raghavan completed the translation in 1036 tamil verses in less than 90 days  and dedicated his work to Paramacharya. Sri.Raghavan trained his daughter and son Smt.Bhooma Narayanan and Sri.Tiruvaiyaru Krishnan respectively for giving concerts in 1950-60s.  Krishnan-Bhooma brought out a number of kritis of “Aandavan Pitchai’s” on Paramaacharya and kritis on Muruga composed by “Aadhiseshaiyer” tuned by Sri.Raghavan

The following is one of his master piece in praise of “Saraswathi” garlanding her with Ragas names and the sangeetha Lakshanams.

பன்னீர் / தண்ணீர் மசாலா

Paneer is a fresh cheese  common in South Asian Cuisine. It is of Indian origin. In eastern parts of India it is generally called Chhena. It is an acid-set, non-melting farmer cheese or curd cheese made by curdling heated milk with lemon juice or other food acid. Unlike most cheeses in the world, the making of paneer does not involve rennet as the coagulation agent, thus making it completely lacto-vegetarian and providing a source of Proten for Vegetarian Hindus. …….. (Wiki)

Dating back to Ancient India, paneer remains the most common type of cheese used in traditional South Asian cuisines. The use of paneer is more common in northern India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh due to the prominence of milk in their cuisine. It is very popular when wrapped in dough and deep-fried or served with either spinach (palak paneer)  or peas (matter paneer). While cuisine in the northern states of India features paneer in spicy curry dishes, the use of sana/chhana/chhena in Oriya, Assamese and Begali   cuisine is mostly restricted to sweets, for which these regions are renowned. The well-known rasagulla features plain chhana beaten by hand and shaped into balls which are soaked in syrup. The sana/chhana/chhenaused in such cases is manufactured by a slightly different procedure from Mughlai paneer; it is drained but not pressed, so that some moisture is retained, which makes for a soft, malleable consistency. It may, however, be pressed slightly into small cubes and curried to form a dalna in Oriya and Bengali cuisines.

Read the following news article how it is prepared and reaching us.

Is Old Age a curse or Disease?

One of my e-friend has sent this card. I enjoyed

Whether this leading us to light ?

Agni Meele Purohitam

I started browsing about “Recording” and other allied subjects. The threads led me to first HMV Recording. Then the further threads were about Edison and Max Muller. Then I started reading about Sri Sri Thakur. From there I got this piece of information which is really interesting.

Sri Sri Thakur wanted everyone to learn Sanskrit, the language of Devatas. Here is a true story to share with you... No one knows how old the Vedas are. HMV had once published a pamphlet giving the history of gramophone record. Gramophone was invented by Thomas Alva Edison in the 19th century. Edison, who had invented many other gadgets like electric bulb and the motion picture camera, had become a legend even in his own time. When he invented the gramophone record, which could record human voice for posterity, he wanted to record the voice of an eminent scholar on his first piece. For that he chose Prof. Max Muller of England, another great personality of the 19th century. He wrote to Max Muller saying, "I want to meet you and record your voice. When should I come?" Max Muller who had great respect for Edison asked him to come on a suitable time when most of the scholars of the Europe would be gathering in England. Accordingly Edison took a ship and went to England. He was introduced to the audience. All cheered Edison's presence. Later at the request of Edison Max Muller came on the stage and spoke in front of the instrument. Then Edison went back to his laboratory and by afternoon came back with a disc. He played the gramophone disc from his instrument. The audience was thrilled to hear the voice of Max Muller from the instrument. They were glad that voices of great persons like Max Muller could be stored for the benefit of posterity. After several rounds of applause and congratulations to Thomas Alva Edison, Max Muller came to the stage and addressed the scholars and asked them, "You heard my original voice in the morning. Then you heard the same voice coming out from this instrument in the afternoon. Do you understand what I said in the morning or what you heard in the afternoon?". The audience fell silent because they could not understand the language in which Max Muller had spoken. It was `Greek and Latin' to them as they say. But had it been Greek or Latin, they would have definitely understood because they were from various parts of Europe. It was in a language which the European scholars had never heard. Max Muller then explained what he had spoken. He said that the language he spoke was Sanskrit and it was the first sloka of Rig Veda, which says "Agni Meele Purohitam". This was the first recorded public version on the gramophone plate. Why did Max Muller choose this? Addressing the audience he said, "Vedas are the oldest text of the human race. And Agni Meele Purohitam is the first verse of Rig Veda. In the most primordial time when the people of Europe were jumping like Chimpanzees, from tree to tree and branch to branch, when they did not know how to cover their bodies, but with fig leaves, did not know agriculture and lived by hunting and lived in caves, at that remote past, Indians had attained high civilization and they gave to the world universal philosophies in the form of the Vedas. ******** Dr. Das 

In this funny world there is always another side which speaks about the demerits of any good thing. You would have seen the following stories.

Aryan culture is planting superstitions – Karunanidhi

Karunanidhi downplays his earlier statement

Madeira Airport - 70 meters tall

Now this is what we call an expensive runway! In Portugal, A special airport has been made — the airport’s runway with a length of 2781 meters (9124 ft.), of which 1000 meters (3281 ft.) of the runway is supported by 180 pillars, each pillar 50 meters height (about 17 floors) , surprisingly, the runway is designed for B-747.

Madeira is an archipelago with volcanic origins from a Hot Spot and a city near Funchal, Portugal that has long been recognized for its airport. Originally, the airport runway was something of a spectacle for its outrageously short length. Being that it was surrounded by the ocean on one side and mountains on the other, even the most skilled pilots had a hard time pulling planes in to land. Madeira is definitely a great spots for tourist destinations.

This new runway extension was built over the ocean. Instead of using landfill to construct the extension, the runway sits on 180 columns that are 70 meters tall. After it was completed, the Madeira Runway extension won the Outstanding Structures Award by the International Association of Bridge and Structural Engineering. This is considered the “Oscar” for engineering structure in Portugal. The new runway is widely celebrated as a great feat in architecture due to its sheer size and the amount of labor it took to erect it.

The total construction costs for the extension amounted to more than 500 million Euros, a small price to pay considering pilots and passengers can now land without fear. The new airport runway can accommodate all kinds of commercial and private aircraft and more than three million passengers per year.

Local pilots are often still said to be the most proficient at landing and taking off at Madeira Airport being that there is still ocean on either end. Nevertheless, no matter who is flying the plane, the new runway at Madeira is an architectural wonder both in appearance and in function.