Why do recollections of the past always appear sepia toned in my mind?
Why does a tear form in my eye when I hear that one song?
Why does her face always come to mind along with that afore-mentioned tear?
Why does losing a friend hurt more as time passes?
When do we know it's time to move on?
Why do the words remain close to the heart even when the face begins to fade away from memory?
Why do I feel pity for the less fortunate yet don't treasure every moment of my good fortune?
Why do these words I write seem so meaningful now yet will embarrass me when I read them in a lighter mood?
Why does the title say 21 questions when I could only come up with 9?
Saturday, June 23, 2007
Friday, June 15, 2007
The Rajini Phenomenon
The papers and news websites are filled with mention of just one movie. Sivaji the boss, starring the inimitable Rajinikanth, who in his 60 plus 'eth' year effortlessly plays a 30 something year old larger than life protagonist.
Now I confess that I have never watched a Rajini movie in Tamil.
I have only watched his Hindi movies where he played Shivaji Rao Gaekwad - the dusky hero ... surprisingly he has acted in quite a few old Hindi movies.
I have read in the newspaper reports of how the crowds are going crazy over his latest movie , performing poojas, bursting crackers, distributing sweets and dancing in the aisles during the movie.
This of course is something that regularly used to happen for Rajini movies in the recent decade or so ... buts its the first time that his movie has gotten such mainstream publicity outside the south.
I caught the trailer of the movie on rediff. It seemed really wierd with Rajini sporting a blond hairdo with his face all bleached dancing wit ha nubile nymphet. his regular stunts have gone high tech with reportedly 80 crores being spent on the making of this movie .. .wit ha major chunk having gone to his paycheque itself i'm sure.
One stunt in the trailer blew me away .. I mean seriously it threw me .... it's a stunt where he has both his arms outstretched to his sides, in the right a gun. He pulls the trigger, shoots, then bounces the gun off his shoulders on the back of his neck, to his other shoulder into his left hand and shoots again. Go check it out.
That scene is so awesome that i'm sure no one in Hollywood would have been able to conceive such a action shot ever. Another person who comes to my mind is Mithun who still continues to make movies where his logic defying action sequences are the main attractions of all his depressingly same films.
But Mithun has nowhere near the style of Rajini.
This still doesn't mean that I'll be watching Sivaji - The Boss.
Its not due to any prejudice against the movie or its lead actor. Its simply because I don't understand Tamil.
Man what I'd give to act in a Hindi movie and be adored by so many million!
Which is why I can understand why that misery of living Himmesh is coming out with his own movie wierdly titled (notice all the alphabets here) - "Aaapka Surroor - The Movee - The Real Luv Story" Yawn! Whatever!
Now I confess that I have never watched a Rajini movie in Tamil.
I have only watched his Hindi movies where he played Shivaji Rao Gaekwad - the dusky hero ... surprisingly he has acted in quite a few old Hindi movies.
I have read in the newspaper reports of how the crowds are going crazy over his latest movie , performing poojas, bursting crackers, distributing sweets and dancing in the aisles during the movie.
This of course is something that regularly used to happen for Rajini movies in the recent decade or so ... buts its the first time that his movie has gotten such mainstream publicity outside the south.
I caught the trailer of the movie on rediff. It seemed really wierd with Rajini sporting a blond hairdo with his face all bleached dancing wit ha nubile nymphet. his regular stunts have gone high tech with reportedly 80 crores being spent on the making of this movie .. .wit ha major chunk having gone to his paycheque itself i'm sure.
One stunt in the trailer blew me away .. I mean seriously it threw me .... it's a stunt where he has both his arms outstretched to his sides, in the right a gun. He pulls the trigger, shoots, then bounces the gun off his shoulders on the back of his neck, to his other shoulder into his left hand and shoots again. Go check it out.
That scene is so awesome that i'm sure no one in Hollywood would have been able to conceive such a action shot ever. Another person who comes to my mind is Mithun who still continues to make movies where his logic defying action sequences are the main attractions of all his depressingly same films.
But Mithun has nowhere near the style of Rajini.
This still doesn't mean that I'll be watching Sivaji - The Boss.
Its not due to any prejudice against the movie or its lead actor. Its simply because I don't understand Tamil.
Man what I'd give to act in a Hindi movie and be adored by so many million!
Which is why I can understand why that misery of living Himmesh is coming out with his own movie wierdly titled (notice all the alphabets here) - "Aaapka Surroor - The Movee - The Real Luv Story" Yawn! Whatever!
Friday, June 8, 2007
An Indian 'Idle' fantasy.
Every day for the past few days ... whenever I return home after a gruelling schedule at work - what with having to squeeze time to work between playing games and reading e-books ... I see the programme 'Indian Idol' playing on the TV.
Sometime in the recent past ... some wise soul decided to import the hugely popular American Idol and foist it on Indian audiences. Of course as all things Indian theres a lot of mirch masala(pepper and spice), adrak(ginger) and lasoon(garlic) added to make the reality show more palatable to us.
Thanks to Indian Idol ... guys-and-girls-next-door have a chance to become famous ... live out their dreams ... become superstars within their own neighbourhoods.
Lots of these aspirants come from small towns and sleepy hamlets and become the most popular venerated inhabitants of that area.
Truly even those who don't win the final prize truly become idols to worship in the eyes of their community. After all India is a country .. and Hinduism (it's dominant faith) is a religion which places a lot of importance on idol worship.
The above paragraph has nothing to do with the overall theme of this piece but just me showing off. Is it working?
So I come home and I see these people performing and I see montages where their life back home is shown in flashes accompanied by some senti Hindi song going on in the background...
...And at night I start to dream.
I dream that I am participating in Indian Idol.
I appear for the auditions in Mumbai. Theres a long queue of people waiting already stretching from Chembur to Ghatkopar.
I turn up with my guitar in hand, my mouth organ in my pocket and a book of song lyrics that I have penned. (Babas and Babies ... now remember this is a fantasy. In reality I don't know the difference between a guitar string and a G-string, a mouth organ brings to my mind jokes on the human anatomy and the only lyrics in my books would be of stupid and ridiculous limericks.)
My turn comes. Judges are stunned by my performance. They're speechless. They are thunderstruck. Anu Malik has a tear in his eye, Alisha Chinoi looks at me longingly ... and for some freaking reason so does Udit Narayan.
They invite me to the next round. I come out of the audition room. Mini Mathur hugs me. I hug her back. She tries to pull away. I continue to hold on tightly...
So they send a cameraman and an interviewer back with me to my home. Since I'm selected and I'm so obviously talented they want to shoot a segment of my life back home.
So I go home, round up all my friends, relatives and members of my society.
Everybody sings my praises ... of how great a singer I am ... All my neighbours who used to chase me for breaking their windows ... All the girls in my society who never gave me a second look ... My watchman Jung Bahudur Sherpa who used to heap upon me the choicest of Nepali abuses ... everyone's my fan now.
The rounds pass by. I sing Western songs, classical numbers, item songs, folk songs. After each round Anu Malik grows more teary eyed, Javed Akhtar grows more constipated and Udit Narayan more lecherous.
The audience vote for me through smses en masse.
So finally I am in the top two. The entire nation knows my name.
They have renamed the name of the street where my Apartment is located after me. My building is a tourist attraction. My house is regularly filled with congratulatory sweets and bouquets.
I have had access to more pussy in the past 24 hours than I ever had in the past twenty four years... Er... of the meow variety I mean.
The evening of the final performance arrives. I am confidant. The guy who is pitted against me sings well ... but has the personality same as that of a wooden pole ...
He has come so far on the wave of public sympathy because he is very poor and his entire family of 15 used to live in a one room house in some corner of Arunachal Pradesh sharing a single bathroom and a single TV, Microwave, AC and only one measly 15 inch flat screen Plasma TV.
Audiences obviously love a sob story.
But India loves me. I know because a girl in the audience holds up a banner - "India loves you." Oh I tell you! My cousin sister is so sweet.
We need to sing three songs one after the other in the Grand Finale.
Each performance leaves the judges in waves of ecstasy and the audiences gasping for more. I am sure to win. Chong Chang - my competitor surely slipped up in the second song. Javed Akhtar surely had frowned, Anu Malik surely had sighed, though Alisha still as usual had smiled vacuously.
I rush back to my waiting room. I start sending smses from my cell phone. As many as I can. I am sure each and every one of my relatives and neighbours are doing the same. After all I had gifted all of them new Hutch Sim Cards and Nokia Cell phones (God! I hate product placements ... they happen in my dreams too.)
The next night Chang and Me sit next to each other ... both of us are nervous as hell. His fingernails are all chewed up. Chang is praying in his native language. I am mentally going over both my speeches. One for if I win. The second If Chang loses. Everything seems a blur.
Even in this state of heightened nervousness I notice that Mini is wearing a new chiffon sleeveless blouse...
Then the final moment is here. Mini Announces ... "And ... The ..(Hurry Up! For God's sake) The ... Next Indian idol is ....... (O my God! Spill your guts b....!!!)
...You'll find out after this commercial break."
I could have started a massacre then and there.
Commercial time is over ... She starts again ... This time infinitesimally quicker ... "And the Indian Idol 2007 is .............."
"Santosh! Santosh!"
"Huh! I won!! I won????"
"Win what? Idiot! Wake up. You're late for work!"
"Geez!!! Maaa .... ! I was almost on the verge of finding out if I had won Indian Idol!!!! ..."
"Yeah right! Like that's ever going to happen!"
I love my Ma. I really do. But she has this nasty habit of bringing me back to Earth quickly.
Oh well I guess I will have to wait till tomorrow night to see if I won.
Stay posted!!!
(Please don't kill me for wasting your time ... U are 5 minutes older now than when you started reading ... and will never recover that lost time you spent reading this crap! Sorry! )
Sometime in the recent past ... some wise soul decided to import the hugely popular American Idol and foist it on Indian audiences. Of course as all things Indian theres a lot of mirch masala(pepper and spice), adrak(ginger) and lasoon(garlic) added to make the reality show more palatable to us.
Thanks to Indian Idol ... guys-and-girls-next-door have a chance to become famous ... live out their dreams ... become superstars within their own neighbourhoods.
Lots of these aspirants come from small towns and sleepy hamlets and become the most popular venerated inhabitants of that area.
Truly even those who don't win the final prize truly become idols to worship in the eyes of their community. After all India is a country .. and Hinduism (it's dominant faith) is a religion which places a lot of importance on idol worship.
The above paragraph has nothing to do with the overall theme of this piece but just me showing off. Is it working?
So I come home and I see these people performing and I see montages where their life back home is shown in flashes accompanied by some senti Hindi song going on in the background...
...And at night I start to dream.
I dream that I am participating in Indian Idol.
I appear for the auditions in Mumbai. Theres a long queue of people waiting already stretching from Chembur to Ghatkopar.
I turn up with my guitar in hand, my mouth organ in my pocket and a book of song lyrics that I have penned. (Babas and Babies ... now remember this is a fantasy. In reality I don't know the difference between a guitar string and a G-string, a mouth organ brings to my mind jokes on the human anatomy and the only lyrics in my books would be of stupid and ridiculous limericks.)
My turn comes. Judges are stunned by my performance. They're speechless. They are thunderstruck. Anu Malik has a tear in his eye, Alisha Chinoi looks at me longingly ... and for some freaking reason so does Udit Narayan.
They invite me to the next round. I come out of the audition room. Mini Mathur hugs me. I hug her back. She tries to pull away. I continue to hold on tightly...
So they send a cameraman and an interviewer back with me to my home. Since I'm selected and I'm so obviously talented they want to shoot a segment of my life back home.
So I go home, round up all my friends, relatives and members of my society.
Everybody sings my praises ... of how great a singer I am ... All my neighbours who used to chase me for breaking their windows ... All the girls in my society who never gave me a second look ... My watchman Jung Bahudur Sherpa who used to heap upon me the choicest of Nepali abuses ... everyone's my fan now.
The rounds pass by. I sing Western songs, classical numbers, item songs, folk songs. After each round Anu Malik grows more teary eyed, Javed Akhtar grows more constipated and Udit Narayan more lecherous.
The audience vote for me through smses en masse.
So finally I am in the top two. The entire nation knows my name.
They have renamed the name of the street where my Apartment is located after me. My building is a tourist attraction. My house is regularly filled with congratulatory sweets and bouquets.
I have had access to more pussy in the past 24 hours than I ever had in the past twenty four years... Er... of the meow variety I mean.
The evening of the final performance arrives. I am confidant. The guy who is pitted against me sings well ... but has the personality same as that of a wooden pole ...
He has come so far on the wave of public sympathy because he is very poor and his entire family of 15 used to live in a one room house in some corner of Arunachal Pradesh sharing a single bathroom and a single TV, Microwave, AC and only one measly 15 inch flat screen Plasma TV.
Audiences obviously love a sob story.
But India loves me. I know because a girl in the audience holds up a banner - "India loves you." Oh I tell you! My cousin sister is so sweet.
We need to sing three songs one after the other in the Grand Finale.
Each performance leaves the judges in waves of ecstasy and the audiences gasping for more. I am sure to win. Chong Chang - my competitor surely slipped up in the second song. Javed Akhtar surely had frowned, Anu Malik surely had sighed, though Alisha still as usual had smiled vacuously.
I rush back to my waiting room. I start sending smses from my cell phone. As many as I can. I am sure each and every one of my relatives and neighbours are doing the same. After all I had gifted all of them new Hutch Sim Cards and Nokia Cell phones (God! I hate product placements ... they happen in my dreams too.)
The next night Chang and Me sit next to each other ... both of us are nervous as hell. His fingernails are all chewed up. Chang is praying in his native language. I am mentally going over both my speeches. One for if I win. The second If Chang loses. Everything seems a blur.
Even in this state of heightened nervousness I notice that Mini is wearing a new chiffon sleeveless blouse...
Then the final moment is here. Mini Announces ... "And ... The ..(Hurry Up! For God's sake) The ... Next Indian idol is ....... (O my God! Spill your guts b....!!!)
...You'll find out after this commercial break."
I could have started a massacre then and there.
Commercial time is over ... She starts again ... This time infinitesimally quicker ... "And the Indian Idol 2007 is .............."
"Santosh! Santosh!"
"Huh! I won!! I won????"
"Win what? Idiot! Wake up. You're late for work!"
"Geez!!! Maaa .... ! I was almost on the verge of finding out if I had won Indian Idol!!!! ..."
"Yeah right! Like that's ever going to happen!"
I love my Ma. I really do. But she has this nasty habit of bringing me back to Earth quickly.
Oh well I guess I will have to wait till tomorrow night to see if I won.
Stay posted!!!
(Please don't kill me for wasting your time ... U are 5 minutes older now than when you started reading ... and will never recover that lost time you spent reading this crap! Sorry! )
Saturday, May 19, 2007
Crossroads
My life, for once has come to a standstill.
i have been doing the same thing for the past two years, and theres not much guarantee that things will change ... for better or for worse ... in the next one year.
I gotta make a decision. Either go down one road and continue to do what I've been doing, earn and live comfortably and face the same question again next year, or to take the other road and switch now to something else.
Now everyone who reads this will immediately go like ... now what's so difficult in this? take the second road ... that's what we would have done.
And therein lies the nub of the entire thing. I have always been and always will be a procrastinator.
I delay things to the last microsecond, be it something as trivial as going for a haircut or something as major as visiting the doctor when I'm ill.
Oh chuck it all ... I'm tired of indecision. 'm going to sleep.
I have noticed that I never face such dilemmas in my dreams. Pretty quick and decisive o'er there. Whether it being to save the damsel from distress, or to becoming Bill Gate's son-in-law.
Sweet dreams y'all.
i have been doing the same thing for the past two years, and theres not much guarantee that things will change ... for better or for worse ... in the next one year.
I gotta make a decision. Either go down one road and continue to do what I've been doing, earn and live comfortably and face the same question again next year, or to take the other road and switch now to something else.
Now everyone who reads this will immediately go like ... now what's so difficult in this? take the second road ... that's what we would have done.
And therein lies the nub of the entire thing. I have always been and always will be a procrastinator.
I delay things to the last microsecond, be it something as trivial as going for a haircut or something as major as visiting the doctor when I'm ill.
Oh chuck it all ... I'm tired of indecision. 'm going to sleep.
I have noticed that I never face such dilemmas in my dreams. Pretty quick and decisive o'er there. Whether it being to save the damsel from distress, or to becoming Bill Gate's son-in-law.
Sweet dreams y'all.
Monday, April 30, 2007
Snippets of the Story
Hey people i'm putting up the first few paras of ek chhotisi it love story. If u feel its any good... then write your comments and i'll finish it.
Every once in a while we get to hear or read about a tale which immediately finds resonance with something that happened in our lives. This could be one such tale, especially if you, dear reader, have gone past that milestone called graduation and have been in that environment called as "the workplace."
Call me Amrit.
I am the narrator or the sutradhar, and the following story is about a girl I loved, lost, found again and then..., well you'll read about it soon enough!
We initially stayed at a hostel which was populated with like - minded job hunters from all across India. Recruitment season was on and every day we left the hostel to visit hundreds of IT firms that dotted the landscape of Bangalore. Every evening there used to be a party hosted by all the hopefuls who had secured a job during the day.
A month had passed by and many of my friends had got placed. Finally the day arrived when I finally landed a job, at GloboTech Inc (GTI), a MNC with branches in Bangalore, Chennai and Mumbai.
During the job - hunt days, I had found become very good friends with a Bihari named Sanjay. It turned out that he had gotten placed in GTI too. The two of us immediately started rented apartment hunting in the vicinity of the IT park where our office was located. The IT boom had of course driven up the prices but finally we were able to locate a modest 1 BHK flat which suited our purposes, not making too big a hole in our pockets and was just located 15 minutes away from office, by Sanjay's bike.
Sunday, April 29, 2007
This blog stuff
Hey I really like this blog writing stuff. It's pretty cool. I get to write whatever I want and it reaches a potentially world wide audience. I mean of course, this potentially means opening myself up to ridicule...but that's never stopped me before.
I mean after all only 10 people might read my blog ... out of that only 1 might like what's written and think it to be funny while the other 9 might be going --> "Whadda F***?"
But even if that 1 person leaves behind a comment of appreciation........
.......That makes my day!
So please the 2-3 people who do come over here....Please don't hesitate to comment on what I've written ... If only to trash it. I'll mightily appreciate it.
I mean after all only 10 people might read my blog ... out of that only 1 might like what's written and think it to be funny while the other 9 might be going --> "Whadda F***?"
But even if that 1 person leaves behind a comment of appreciation........
.......That makes my day!
So please the 2-3 people who do come over here....Please don't hesitate to comment on what I've written ... If only to trash it. I'll mightily appreciate it.
The Art of Loving
I dunno what's the big deal with all this love stuff. In the next few pages i'm gonna rant and rave against it. This is the kind of stuff that I normally spout or splutter when Valentine's day comes along ... along with its cutesy heart shaped saccharine sweet accessories.
I mean of course even I've been in love ... more than once ... made me feel so crappy each time.
I just saw a squeamishly romantic, tragically pathetic Hindi movie on TV ... was forced to watch it for reasons best left unexplained here. Each time the on screen couple coochie - coochied to each other ...singing sweet paeans about the glory of love and what not ... i felt like puking my guts out.
I mean we Indians can't stand public displays of love right? Yet our movies seem to be full of them. The hero - heroines prance all around the rest of the world dancing .. generally displaying their love by gyrating their hips and shaking their booty for all to see. So then what's the big deal?
Why do couples at Bandstand get booked for indecent behaviour? Why the cops harass young couples just aching for some privacy? Why do two communities excommunicate and issue fatwahs against two people who did just the silly mistake of falling in love? Why does Richard Gere get an arrest warrant issued against him for just giving a peck to Shilpa Shetty on her cheek. Why don't I ever get such an oppurtunity? With Shilpa I mean ... not Gere ... ahem moving on.
Well it's because we Indians have a purdah mentality which we like to impose on others irrespective of whether they like it or not.
I call it the "Yahan mat karo, Wahan karo, Jhaadi ke peeche!" mentality. Of course currently even the Jhaadi ke peeche part is frowned upon.
I feel that such a moralistic attitude is right...I mean even though we Indians produce nanha munha bacchas at a rate like no other country...we still like that stuff to be hidden...which is absolutely correct. But hey that's my opinion. Because i'm irrational. Because I'm an Indian.
Next week's topic...Mandira's sarees and Ash and Abhishek's honeymoon...Pretty Intelligent stuff. Stay tuned...
I mean of course even I've been in love ... more than once ... made me feel so crappy each time.
I just saw a squeamishly romantic, tragically pathetic Hindi movie on TV ... was forced to watch it for reasons best left unexplained here. Each time the on screen couple coochie - coochied to each other ...singing sweet paeans about the glory of love and what not ... i felt like puking my guts out.
I mean we Indians can't stand public displays of love right? Yet our movies seem to be full of them. The hero - heroines prance all around the rest of the world dancing .. generally displaying their love by gyrating their hips and shaking their booty for all to see. So then what's the big deal?
Why do couples at Bandstand get booked for indecent behaviour? Why the cops harass young couples just aching for some privacy? Why do two communities excommunicate and issue fatwahs against two people who did just the silly mistake of falling in love? Why does Richard Gere get an arrest warrant issued against him for just giving a peck to Shilpa Shetty on her cheek. Why don't I ever get such an oppurtunity? With Shilpa I mean ... not Gere ... ahem moving on.
Well it's because we Indians have a purdah mentality which we like to impose on others irrespective of whether they like it or not.
I call it the "Yahan mat karo, Wahan karo, Jhaadi ke peeche!" mentality. Of course currently even the Jhaadi ke peeche part is frowned upon.
I feel that such a moralistic attitude is right...I mean even though we Indians produce nanha munha bacchas at a rate like no other country...we still like that stuff to be hidden...which is absolutely correct. But hey that's my opinion. Because i'm irrational. Because I'm an Indian.
Next week's topic...Mandira's sarees and Ash and Abhishek's honeymoon...Pretty Intelligent stuff. Stay tuned...
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