Thursday, February 28, 2013

Why do I like Korean Movies?


People have often asked me why I like Korean dramas and movies so much.Before I answer that question in this blog post,let me go over my story about how I discovered them and come to like it so much.
         This whole post is straight from my heart and you may find it a bit naive but let me tell you this is my story of how I felt and how I received the movies.You may or may not agree with my observations but the circumstances around the whole thing shaped my thinking and my liking.So here goes.
         One fine day during my third year of Engineering,my brother handed me two Korean movies,namely 'A moment to Remember' and 'My Sassy Girl'.The former had my now favourite actress,'Son Ye Jin'.I am always open to experimenting and used to watch other languages movies sometimes.Having watched a couple of Iranian movies recently and finding them interesting,I thought why not try these Korean movies now.At that time my internal exams were going on. In spite of that I watched the movies.Though the latter movie was very famous not only in South Korea but also in the whole of Asia,I liked the former better.
Lets talk about it here.Its a touching and emotionally moving story about how a young couple's happy marriage is turned upside down when the wife is diagnosed with Alzhemiers. Its a great movie with fine performances and a moving storyline.Those who have seen the movie may point out the number of clichés the movie had but even then the use of those clichés was effective and it moved me a lot.The story had beautiful chemistry between the leads and the whole story was clean,unlike many western movies
Generally I am very much affected by intense movies,they make me think about the movie and its issues for days to an end.This happened with this film too.I couldn't concentrate on my studies for the next three days.Also when I strongly feel about something I tend to do anything related to it.I think what I can do about it to make the feeling go away.I really wanted to help that woman or anybody with Alzhemiers. Now this may look naive but I resolved to do two things from then onwards,watch more Korean movies and the other of forming a club to do whatever social work I could do.The latter idea only grew bigger with time.From then onwards I went on to watch hundreds of K-movies and a handful of dramas and I don't regret my time spent on watching them.
     One day I was dining with my friends in a hotel and I told them about my new found love for Korean movies and extolled them to watch the same.They then questioned me as what I saw in them that I loved them so much.I replied that I simply love the romance and also that I learnt so much from them.One of my friends then asked me to explain one point.All I could say was that I gained a new perspective of life.At that time that was all I could think of,further discussion was interrupted by the arrival of more friends and the discussion meandered off to other topics.At that time the only movies that came to my mind were 'A moment to Remember','The Classic,and 'Failan' and I based my answer on them.
That was the conversation that led to my thinking about the whole thing and that resulted in this post.
        Now you could argue that similar movies from Hollywood could have inspired me too,but the thing is they did not. There is something about the pure and simple romance of the Korean movies that is just mesmerising.Its not for nothing that Korean movies are appreciated worldwide for their romances.Two things that struck a chord with me are,one as I said before their pure,simple and clean romance and point two is that their culture and tradition matches with that of India's. To cite an example the way they give respect to elders.The way they have separate names for calling elder brother(oppa) and elder sister(unni) and there are many other examples.They give importance to their culture the way Indians also do.This forms the core of my liking them.
           These days some of my friends and my sister are onto Korean movies and she even calls me oppa sometimes.We call our grandfather as Harabhushi (among ourselves and not in front of him) after we heard that word in that wonderful drama 'Heartstrings'.I formed and joined some on line clubs for discussing Korean dramas and movies and will continue to encourage other people to watch them.

Monday, February 4, 2013

Letter to the Student Body of my college.

This was a letter i wrote to the students representatives of my college,Jindal Institute of Power Technology.They were the body formed to look after the progress of the placements of the students.I wrote the following letter or rather an article to suggest some activities to improve ourselves.


To


Students Representatives,JIPT


Guys I have a few suggestions and have written this rather long letter to list out the suggestions as well as to provide advantages of their implementation. I am more comfortable with the written form of communication,so this letter.Please take the time to read.

And I have written this in the manner of an article.Not exactly a letter.


So the 'You' here is addressed to nobody in particular.


For anybody to succeed in anything a person should first identify what he needs to accomplish.Let us take For example a person aspiring to become a good racer.The first and the most basic thing he needs to do is pass the driving license test.Here his goal is passing that test.At this point of time all his resources should be spent on preparing for the test.


Similarly when we think about becoming a Power plant engineer we need to first get a job in a power plant.And for that every company hires you on based on your performance in some certain tests.Now every company has its own set of exams.Some have a written test and then a group discussion and then an interview,while some have only written and then interview,while some others have only interview.The most common is the written and interview one.So now our aim or what i would like to call 'Clear and Present Goal' is to pass the written test and the interview.When it comes to written test again there are a number of patterns companies follow.Some have aptitude,some don't but every test has technical questions(obviously).Written test is pretty much straight forward.You have certain aptitude skill and certain technical skill.If what you have is greater that what the test is asking you pass the test.And if you don't, you won't pass the test.Nothing complex about it.


(From here let me remind you whatever i am going to write is purely my opinion.You are free to disagree.)


Interview


When it comes to interview so many people fail not because they don't have the required technical skills but because they lack in other equally important skills.My point of contention here is that not many people pay attention to things like communication and body language.These I believe are equally important in your chances of getting selected.What I am trying to say here is that we should pay attention to other details too, apart from technical stuff.


One more thing is that when you lack a certain thing in you or you have a problem with a certain thing.The first thing to do is ACKNOWLEDGE the problem! You have to identify the problem and then acknowledge that 'yes I have a problem with this and I need to solve this.Then comes the rectification part.Rectification part is easier than acknowledging part I tell you ! People are there to help you but unless you recognize the problem and tell someone the problem there's nothing you or the other people can about it.So the thing here is lets have some activities wherein we can improve our communications skill.Activities which involve talking and discussing.These things improve us in a whole manner.


As you know there are two kinds of,say, mind.One is the conscious mind and the other the sub conscious.


Conscious mind works when you prepare for the interview reading books,discussing etc.It gives you certain knowledge.But this knowledge while you take it out to show the person in front of you,you do it with the help of the Sub conscious mind.You talk in a certain manner,you gesture with your hands in a certain manner,you maintain your eye contact,the manner of your sitting,the posture etc.All this is governed by the sub conscious. This develops by not reading about it.It has to be


1-given importance


2- practiced


For some people it comes naturally they don't have to put in much effort in that area.But for some it gets really difficult to get going.But everyone has to practice it.Only then you can master it.



The kind of activities I mentioned above improve your communication skills,(the obvious one) some other things it will improve are


1-how to disagree politely with anyone


2-how to sit properly


3-when to maintain eye contact and when to break it.


4-how to answer a question.


Let me give you an example.when somebody asks you a question like


'how was the Ironman movie?' you don't answer him with 'that batman movie was awesome' neither will you answer by starting from the first frame in the movie and continue till the lst frame.By the time you consume 2 mins the listener will have lost interest.so keeping it relevant to the question and keeping it short is the mantra.This is one of the many things we can together learn when we get together for the activities.


1- Group Discussions


2- Talks


3- Ppts with simple pics and videos


4- Mock interviews among ourselves.


5- Sharing of expertise or let me say, knowledge. A person maybe good in a particular field or topic or area.We can tell that person to share it with the rest of us.Like,one time in front of a small group, a person talks about pumps,another talks about transformers yet another about communication skills,yet another about English etc.The person who is talking on the stage is not an expert in that area,but compared to the rest of us he has better knowledge in that particular area.


With my views and rather with this long letter I hope I made my points clear. Now the onus lies on you guys to decide if we go ahead with this.If you made it till here thanks for the patience! :-)