100 days reign of The Boss

Things have been pretty hectic here at my end and that is the reason for this scarcity of posts here. The fact that I was not able to post something even for the completion of 100 days of The Boss should bear testimony to the same. Anyway, got some time today and with the logic "Better late than never" at the back of my mind, decided to post about the 100th day celebrations of Sivaji, that we had in Seattle last Saturday.

Just like how I was apprehensive when the movie was screened during the 50th day weekend, I was a lot worried whether there will be decent enough crowd for my friend (who was the one screening the movie) to at least break even. He was screening the movie just for the sake of fans like me and I want o proudly disclose here that, it was just for the sake of me that he changed the timing of the show from the usual 1pm start to a 7pm start, just bcos I had something else going on during the afternoon. So, I was even more worried and I had in fact decided even before the movie that if my friend were to incur a loss bcos of the movie, I will share some of the loss. So, that was my mentality heading into the weekend.

On the way to the theater on the D-day, I get a call from my friend asking me if I still needed the 10 tickets that I had earmarked for my friends. I said "Yes, I do need that. But why are you even concerned about it?". He goes "The movie might be a sell-out and that is the reason why I want to make sure that all your friends get a ticket". I really thought that my friend was joking around. It was hard for me to believe when he first told me that bcos there was no way the movie could have had even sold half of the tickets.

I was one of the first to reach the theater and as time of the show neared, the crowd swelled and it was about 20 mins before the show did I realize that my friend was indeed serious. The theater was brim to the full and we still had people coming. Since we did not want family audience to go back without a ticket, fans like me (a good 15 of us) decided to relinquish our seats and watch the movie standing from the side (anything for Thalaivar J). Even after doing that, we had to send 30-40 folks back home bcos of the non-availability of tickets. During all this commotion, I was sporting a big smile, a smile of just having seen a miracle happen. A smile arising out of sheer pride being a fan of Thalaivar, the only man who can pull a crowd to the theater in this remote corner of the world. Like I had said a few posts before, it is hard for Tamil movies to attract the Seattle Tamil audience to the theater even for just 1 show. And The Boss was being screened for the 12th time here in Seattle and that too on the 100th day, by which time the movie would have been available for download from all web sites. In spite of all these obstacles, Thalaivar pulls off a miracle, thus proving his clout and hold over the Tamil folks, no matter which corner of the globe they reside.

At least half of the crowd consisted of fans like me and that only mean one thing - mayhem and celebrations inside the theater. It was almost as though we were watching the premier show on June 14th (a day I can never forget). As the movie progressed, Thalaivar fans who had been seated in various corners of the theater, started to group together in the place where we were sitting and the excitement naturally grew from then on. All the agmark Thalaivar scenes – Thalaivar intro, Vaaji song intro, Style song, Adhiradi song, Mottai Boss intro, to name a few – drew the maximum applause & whistles while some fans like me were busy at the front of the theater throwing up torn paper pieces before the screen.

Personally for me, I was starved - this was my first glimpse of Thalaivar on the big screen after close to 90 days and in spite of watching all those scenes and songs in the form of YouTube videos, the experience was just electric. I was way too excited and elated during the screening. This was my 7th time watching the movie and I simply wasn't bored for one sec. If ever there was one thing I felt during this watching (and if I were given a choice to make just ONE change to the movie, that would also be the thing), it was as the Adhiradi song was being played, when I really thought how good it would have been if only Lawrence had been made the choreographer for all the songs, instead of just one. Shankar who had made the movie as a Thalaivar fan for Thalaivar fans could have made this one more thing for us which would have made the movie even more memorable. The Adhiradi song is one song which I do not think I will ever get tired of watching. Everything about the song is just perfect, making it easily the best Thalaivar song of all time, when it comes to picturization.

I don’t know what else to say than "The Boss rocks!""

Weekend Hikes - Annette Lake

After the first 2 hikes, this was another step up for me bcos the difficulty level of this hike was moderate. The site where we pick these hikes from grades each one of the hikes by their difficulty level and judgment is pretty darn accurate. On their scale this was a moderate one but to me, this was real strenuous. Though I have hiked tougher hikes since I did this one, I will always remember the Annette Lake hike as the first moderate level hike I ever did.

Date: June 23, 2007
Close By: Snoqualmie Pass, WA

Directions: From Seattle, drive east on I-90 to Exit 47 and turn right. Drive 0.2 miles to road 5590, turn left and drive 0.3 miles to the large parking lot and trail-head.

Things to remember: Starts off steep, becomes relatively easy for a while before gets steep again. Good part is that the last 1 mile or so is on level ground and there is no elevation. Trail is in good shape. You might want to take another 0.75 mile trail called Nature trail which is at the trailhead. The lake is beautiful. Lot of logs. Lot of bugs too, on the way and at the lake.

Distance (RT): 8.0 miles
Time (RT): 4 hours, with 30 minutes at the lake
Elevation: 1400 feet
Level: 3

Weekend Hikes - Wallace Falls

This was our second hike of the summer. A lot tougher one than the first hike mainly bcos of the elevation gain. It was 500 feet in the first hike whereas the elevation gained in this one was 1200 feet. The one thing that I have learnt from doing these hikes is that the distance covered in a hike does not really matter. It is pretty easy to cover longer distances. I have done hikes that are as long as 5 miles one way and I have not been very tired. But once the elevation gained starts increasing even by a few hundred feet, the hike gets a lot tougher. I realized this the moment I started this hike and was literally panting like a dog at the end of the hike.

But the good thing about this hike was that the falls at the end of the hike was way too beautiful. The sense of accomplishment that we get when we complete a tough hike like this is just unparalleled and when the destination of the hike has something as beautiful as the Wallace Falls, it makes the accomplishment all the more sweeter.

So, here are the details and photos of the second hike of the season.

Name: Wallace Falls
Date: June 10, 2007
Close By: Gold Bar off of US-2
Directions: Drive US-2 east from Everett to milepost 27.9 in Gold Bar. Turn left (north) at the Wallace Falls State Park sign. From there it's 1.7 miles to the trailhead.
Things to remember: 3 falls. The Middle Falls is the most beautiful of the three. If you are extremely tired, skip the Upper Falls. Trail is extremely beautiful, like walking through a rain forest. Trail runs parallel to a creek and you can find benches to get some rest & get some good views.
Distance (RT): 5.5 miles
Time (RT): 3 hours
Elevation: 1200 feet
Difficulty level: 2

Weekend Hikes - Twin Falls

Summer is the best time of the year in Seattle and so folks here always advise anyone planning on visiting Seattle to try to make it here during summer. That is when the beauty of this city in particular and the pacific northwest area in general is brought out to the core.

Among several other activities that one can do during summer here (playing cricket, golf & soccer to name a few), hiking is one of my favorites. Reason being hiking serves 2 purposes - the obvious reason of letting you burn a few calories and the second reason, is that it lets you explore the beauty of these surrounding areas. There are just numerous hikes in this area that constitutes of about 30-50 miles from my place and most of these hikes end up either in a lake or a waterfalls. I got inspired by this very idea of hiking from a desi group from Microsoft who have been doing this hiking & such activities for the last few years. Picking up from them, myself along with my friends decided to go on hiking during the summer time. Last summer was when it started and we did a total of 3 hikes.

But this year, we decided that we will do a minimum of 5 hikes this summer. We pick the hikes from this site Washington Hikes and also refer to sites likeVTrail, Washington Trails Association, Cool Trails and Local Hikes for more detailed information about the hikes that we have picked from the first site. So far, this summer we have already met our target of 5 hikes and since a good portion of the summer is still before us, we have now increased the target to 10 hikes. The one good thing we have done consistently is that we have started the hikes quite early in the day - as early as 6 am in the morning. Most of the times, we were the first ones to arrive at the trailheads. Starting the hike early solves 2 problems - the crowd and the sun. The sun is very benign when we start the hikes and it is when we start our climb down do we usually see all the crowd making their way up.

And just like how I have been posting these Weekend Movies posts, I thought may be I should start posting Weekend Hikes posts. I kind of wanted to have these posts form a sort of travelogue. So, it might be boring for folks from other places (except may be for the photos that I am planning to post) but I am sure folks who are reading this in the Seattle area will find something useful in here.

So, here are the details and photos of the first hike of the season.

Name: Twin Falls
Date: June 9, 2007
Close By: I-90
Directions: From Seattle, drive east on I-90 and get off at Exit 34 (468th Avenue). Turn right on 468th Avenue Southeast, drive about a half-mile, then turn left on Southeast 159th Street. Continue a half-mile to road end, parking area and facilities
Things to remember: Lots of kids; pretty simple hike.
Distance (RT): 2.5 miles
Time (RT): 2.5 hours
Elevation: 600 feet
Difficulty Level: 1.5

Seattle, the beautiful

This is one post that has been long overdue. Ever since I moved to Seattle close to 3 years back, I have been wanting to blog about this beautiful city, a city which I have come to love so much. I have lived in 3 other cities (Arlington,TX, Toledo,OH and Mobile,AL) before moving here and from my experience of visiting so many other cities, I can easily say that Seattle is my most favorite and the most beautiful city of the places. So, I thought it would be a good idea to blog something about this lovely place. This city has to offer something for everybody, be it hikers, skiers, coffee-lovers, or techies. Anyways, here are the top things that I thought someone has to know about the city

• Seattle, if not for anything, is home to the most popular software company on earth - Microsoft
• Seattle is also home to the popular coffee chain - Starbucks, with the first ever Starbucks store in the US opened in downtown Seattle in 1967. That store is a must-see if you are ever visiting Seattle.
• Seattle is the 21st biggest and 23rd most populous city in the US with a population of 573,000
• Though Seattle has almost become synonymous with rain, there is something that I need to clear things about. Although on an average Seattle is cloudy 227 days a year, the rainfall that Seattle receives is way less than many cities in the US. For example, both NYC (42 inches) and Miami (60 inches) receive more annual rainfall than Seattle (39 inches). But the problem in Seattle is that the number of days it rains in a year is higher than any of these cities bcos it does not really rain here, it rather drizzles.
• Some of the popular films that were shot in and around Seattle - Sleepless in Seattle, Assassins, Disclosure and the latest Harrison Ford starrer, Firewall. This website here has the complete list of movies that were shot in all the major cities in the US. (Wouldn't it be awesome to have a similar site for Tamil/ Indian movies?)
• Some of the celebrities who are from Seattle -Bill Gates, (Microsoft founder), Fred Couples (golfer), Gail Devers (athlete), Jimmie Hendrix (guitarist), Bruce Lee, (actor - both he and his son have been buried here), Michael Chang (tennis player - he in fact is a regular to a church one of my friends attends), Dave Mathews (musician), Jason Terry (NBA player), Ed Viesturs (professional climber who became the first American to climb each one of the tallest 14 peaks in the world)
• Other popular companies that have their headquarters in and around Seattle - Amazon, Boeing, Expedia, T-Mobile, Real networks, eBay, Accenture. In fact, the Wired Magazine has ranked Seattle as one of the top 10 techie cities in the US, along with the likes of Bay Area and NYC. For the remaining cities in the list, go here.
• A big fire (called the Great Seattle Fire) burned the entire business district back in 1889. But the city was quickly built over the remains left by the fire and thus Seattle rose from a destruction of such a magnitude to be the city that it is now. And even today, there is an underground tour which takes you through the destruction left by the fire. For details about the fire and the tour, click here and here.
• Seattle is the most literate city in the US and also the 3rd most ethnically-diverse city in the US.
• Though the official nickname for Seattle is the Emerald City, it also goes by the following names: Rainy City, Jet city, Space City, Gateway to Alaska and Queen City.
• One of the best things about Seattle is that there are numerous attractions in and around the city, which can be accessed from Seattle on single day trips. Some of the attractions that are must see if you are visiting Seattle are Mt. Rainier, Olympic national park, Mt. St. Helens, Lake Chelan, Snoqualmie falls and pass, San Juan Islands, Cape Flattery (the north-western most point in Continental US). The best times to visit the city would be anytime between May and September.

So, if you any of you reading this blog haven’t been Seattle yet, please add Seattle to the list of places that you want to see and do remember that you have a ready host in here. Folks in Seattle can add more points to this list if I have left out anything important about this beautiful city.