Brijesh Nair writes rarely, but when he does, it is normally an insightful post which attracts a lot of discussion. Most his posts deal with issues in India/Kerala.   

We thank Brijesh for the following interview.

Tell us more about you and your primary blog(http://sonyvellayani.blogspot.com/)
I am from Trivandrum. My house is very near to the beautiful Vellayani Lake. I did my schooling in Christ Nagar High School, Pre Degree (plus two) from Govt. Arts College, Trivandrum and B.Tech in Civil Engineering from NSSCE, Palakkad and passed out in 1997. Worked as a Civil Engineer for 6 months and got attracted to software field and worked as software engineer till early part of 2001. Decided to go back to Civil Engineering and joined for MS in Civil Engineering in Arizona State University (ASU) in August 2001. Immediately after completing MS in December 2002, I joined for my PhD in the same school, completed my PhD in Civil Engineering with specialization in Environmental Engineering two months back. I am right now working as a Design Engineer in Wilson Engineers  in Phoenix, Arizona. My main job as a Design Engineer is to design water and wastewater treatment plants.

I got married in 2005 to Deepa and she is now pursuing her MS in ASU. My hobbies include reading books about current affairs, biographies of successful people, playing, watching and analyzing cricket. Now I am into a new thing – I am working hard to improve my physical fitness for a reason – I have a dream of running and finishing a half marathon by the year 2009.

Why is it named ’sonyvellayani’? What about the title “Uyarangalilekku (Scaling New Heights)”?
“sony” is the name by which every one calls me in the family. I have spend most of my life in this beautiful place called “Vellayani”, so when I thought I should start a blog “sonyvellayani” was the name that came to my mind.

About the title “Uyarangalilekku (Scaling New Heights)” – putting the name “sonyvellayani” was easy but I want to name the blog with something I can closely relate to. I was thinking about it for a long time – what name I should give to my blog. Last 10 years, especially the last 6 years in US have made me understand that “to scale new heights” you need to always work hard. Life has taught me that there is no short cut to success and only hard work can help you “scale new heights”. I took these words “scaling new heights” and coined the word “Uyarangalilekku”. Whenever I see the title of the blog it reminds me of 2 things – one – the hard work I had put till now in my life to “scale new heights “and two – the hard work I need to put today and tomorrow to “scale new heights”

Most of your posts are on current affairs. If you become Kerala Chief Minister for a week, what would you do?
Tough question to answer. It is true that I am interested in politics and dream of becoming a politician in the later part of life. But the truth is that in the present political set up I don’t wish to be the chief minister of Kerala. I could write something like what Arjun did in the movie “Muthalvan” but thinking practically you cannot do much in a week or even in a month.

What prompted you to start a blog?
I used to think a lot even during my school days – mostly about cricket and other games like football matches I saw. By the time I reached college I started having interest in politics as well. I use to scribble my thoughts during that time in paper and latter throw that away. When I read some stuff it remains in my mind for a long time and I start thinking about it from all angles. Once I start thinking about it I get the inspiration to write about what ever I am thinking. So once I started getting familiar with the concept of blog, I started using that to express my thoughts to the outside world.

Do you have any other blogs?
I am a contributor to the Save Kerala Blog.

Why do you blog? What motivates you?
I mentioned that I think about a topic that strikes me a lot and write a blog. Once I started blogging I was able to see how the readers of my blog analyzed the same. Some of the readers criticize my way of thinking but I always consider that healthy. Their view point makes me learn more about the stuff I write and help to understand how various people perceive the same stuff differently. In short the motivation comes from the fact that blog helps to have a creative discussion about a topic I am interested in.

Do you use any blogging tools?
No I don’t. I just use the basic stuff in blogger.com

Which blog post do you consider as your best?
Few of them I feel stands out especially the post Evil Called Desi Consultants and What Next Now Kerala Government?

What is your experience from blogging? (good or bad)
As I mentioned previously, I got a chance to convey my thoughts and initiate a discussion on topics that really interest me. Another good thing about blogging is that I am able to make good friends who share some of my common views.

What are your favorite blogs that you read daily?
I read almost daily www.desipundit.com and www.blogbharti.com so that I don’t miss the best Indian blogs around. I go through the Kerala Blog Roll to keep myself updated with all the Kerala blogs.

Is there anything you want to tell Kerala Blogger Community?
It is nice to see Kerala Blogger community growing. The growth in Kerla blogger community should be in quality and not in quantity of blogs. Few months back I saw a big fight that broke out between some bloggers for some silly reasons. I got a feeling that few people think that blogging is an alternative to online chatting and these people give a bad name to all the bloggers out there. Let us all move forward neglecting these uncouth bloggers. I take this opportunity to reiterate one thing – United we stand, its then we can make our presence felt in our society.