The whole week I was caught up in work, yesterday I got time, but I started fooling around the house. Trying to move my internet connection cable form one room to another. When the house was wired up for broadband my computer and I used to stay in the bigger room. Then came the third roomie, and I moved to the smaller room with my computer, but the wires were not so easily transferable. So we, no my roommate suggested we will call up the broadband guys one day and get it moved. I secretly nurtured the desire to do it on my own. I am not silly enough to call outside help for something so simple.
The situation is this. There are three 2 square inch boxes, which you first open up. Then you unscrew the wiring, and you try to remember where the wiring should go back. Another hurdle is to make a hole in the window mesh in my room. I pick up a knife, a kitchen knife, and it goes through, a little pushing around and there it is big enough to fit in two wires.
I go to the roof to check where the wire is coming from, whether you can move it nearer to my room's window. Not possible, too heavy. Go back to the other room. I have successfully opened up all wires, but they are twisted, somehow I push them out of the window. The whole wire drops to the floor. We are on second floor. I can pull the wire in with the help of floor mop, but the wires' cover has come off, it’s a pipe near about 3 cms wide.
So I march to the ground floor. I realize it’s not fallen on the floor, but is in limbo between the ground floor and the first. There is a sand pile next to the wall as there is some repair of the flower beds going around. I stand their contemplating for some time, how to lift myself onto the platform where my pipe is lying. The sand pile shifts quickly under my feet, if I try to get a grip. So without much ado I lift myself up and land on the platform. Pay attention I am still in my office clothes when I am messing about.
Victorious I stand their on the pedestal holding the pipe in the hand when our apartment security guy comes to nose around what I am up to. I mumble something and jump down, run up to my floor. I am having fun.
Now my battle ground will entirely be my room. I bring the floor mop, like a cowboy swinging his lasso, my floor mop ropes in the wire in just the second attempt. The real painful struggle begins now. I have to thread the wires through the 10 feet long pipe. I succeed in ten minutes.
I am invincible.
This is the part where I start cursing myself a teeny weenie bit. I forgot to note down which color wire would have gone to which point. Six loose ends and six connection points. Damn I could have clicked a snap. Yes from now on I will click a snap of any wiring that I intend to unwire and then wire. And end up rewiring the whole house. I just decide all blues go on red and whites on green. If it doesn’t work I will just switch all the connections. I have never been good at this, peeling the insulation of naked wires and not breaking them while connecting them back. So after few breaks of wires, and little jabbing of wires in my finger my connection is ready and yes the phone is working.
Now the part which I don’t understand is how to connect this to my computer, as I see no loose ends and there is one wire left which would not fit in anywhere.
Who cares I did a good job. The phone is still working and in an entirely different room, by an entirely different window.
Saturday, December 09, 2006
Friday, November 17, 2006
Don & Dor
I have taken time, as I wasn’t sure. It is nearing a week since I saw these two fantastic movies. I have been thinking on and off about them. There are two parameters of evaluating the success of any work of art, anything at all. How much do the masses like it, and how good the movie is. Well I guess there is more to it, and that is where I come to Don. The movie was entertaining though the story was juvenile, maybe because I already knew the story.
I enjoyed the movie Don, as I had told myself I am going to. You wait for two years for a Farhan Akhtar movie to come out; you will not take disappointment for an experience. Since I had heard there were mixed reviews of the movie I prepared myself to see the good parts only, zero on them and then don’t lose focus. How can you not enjoy the movie? What about SRK? Well that I have been brainwashing myself for a long time now, I guess more than a year no since I heard that he is going to be the Don. And once the trailers hit the screen, I guess that’s where my blindness started visibly hiking.
I remember, the memory is faded, thanks to my self triggered brainwashing. I remember disliking the trailers in the beginning, yes and I think I can coax out more memories. Lets see yes there is one more; of a highly opinionated person telling me the trailers look horrible, and I blocking all those voices out. The Farhan chant starts in my brain; yes no one tells me Farhan Akhtar churns out a bad movie, no one. The chants float around in my brain. I am submerged whole heartedly. I am eager, I am on my knees waiting to be delivered.
So finally I am sitting in the hall on a weekday, it was only possibility of getting a ticket, the good thing is it costs 50 bucks less on a weekday. Well they could have kept those 50 bucks as well, as for half an hour we were tortured with ads. No exaggeration in the previous statement. Enough you imbecile, it is about Don not PVRs desperate money making schemes. So the movie starts, suave paris, suavely dressed shahrukh who pays 20 euros for a cup of coffee. Nice, cool. Drives through Paris, sorry driven through Paris. Then the movie continues slick is one move after the other. Its not loud, not it is slick, its not boring, no it is, well entertaining.
Now as to where to place the movie, I will go in the order of appearance. The Kareena K song seemed to be rudely in bad taste. If you are going for a more realistic touch, you don’t want the girl to dance, then so be it, but looks like electricity courses thorugh her vein and makes her shake and tremble uncontrollably. Or if you want her to dance, teach her to dance, or get somebody who can dance. Poor Kareena, I feel she has really come up well as an actress (wonderful in Omkara) even the anger of the character comes out well in the brief scenes she has. So why am I cribbing about a mere song, because when you make a song dance movie, then the song dance take 50% onus of making the movie a success.
Speaking of song dance, I just loved the two party songs, especially “Main hoon Don”. They were fantastic. Let’s talk about action. Well we are still imitators; we are still aping what Hollywood had achieved decades back. The level is better than usual bollywood stuff, but nothing original. We put all that we have seen in other movies in this one. It feels nice to have Indians doing all those stunts, its fun. Yeah our heroes skydive too, fight mid-air. But, they don’t do anything that hasn’t already been done in the movies of the Hollywood. Don is not the first to try to get at par with the world when it comes to car chases, but it just reaffirms the push to the standard. It makes Don looklike a wannabe James Bond. The car chases, the fights nothing is riveting enough. I was just cheering a kid on his attempt to bring it out, being a very sympathetic audience. Patronising.
The commendable part about the movie is the number of characters which have been thrown to move the movie forward, rather you can see, plot point one gone, bring the next character in, then the next. “Sir, I have run out characters”. Fine, give the existing character another shade, a darker side. One character which falls comically short of expectations is De Silva, Boman Irani fails miserably to give the cop feel.
For that matter the first scene where the cops are standing holding coffee cups, looking at Ramesh’s body. Om Puri and Boman Irani’s first conversation makes me feel as if I am witnessing all this on the sets. Translated, the scene seems so plastic. The intended suaveness is falling flat for our chief cops.
How do I sum it in one, I see it in fragments, the flaws and the efforts which went waste. The story was plain silly story, where its so bollywoodish in making. Don’s story is cent per cent meant only for screen, it cant be anything else. Every character can exist nowhere but on Bollywood screen. This is not a movie which will appeal to you for its freshness, for its insight or empathy for a character. This is not what the previous two Farhan Akhtar movies did to me. I loved them so much; they were so surreal to me, in terms of everything that I guess I was expecting another sensational revelation. But, I guess this time this guy just decided to let his hair down, and indulge.
I enjoyed the movie, but it didn’t have the pounce and the force with which the previous two movies had grabbed me. I didn’t get bored when the movie was playing. It is just when I came back I realized, I felt pretty empty handed over the days. The delight and pleasure I experienced in revisting Lakshya in my head and on screen was missing. Don was entertaining; I hope I will grow to love it, but that’s a foolish hope, as I have nothing to savor now.
I was so dying for Lakshya experience to happen again. To me Lakshya stood bold and proud above all Indian movies. It had cleared the slate of pretentious melodramatic assembly of war movies. To me there is only one Indian army movie to be spoken of.
When I had come back from Lakshya I was rattling off to various people I met, especially one person in particular the nuances of the film. I was happy with Don. I said, “Oh it was lovely”. But I had run out of words. I enjoyed the movie that was to it. And, I guess that was all there was intended to become of it. After all it was Don, cop-robber story which can fascinate the minds for centuries to come, just keep adding twists in the end till it becomes twisted.
I am not disappointed with Don, I have just revised my expectations. What else could I have expected from Don. Don was supposed to be a nice popcorn flick, blockbuster. And I guess that is what it was aimed to be. Why did I imagine something new to happen? Sigh ! :-(
As for Dor. Frankly I was not even considering viewing it. Again maybe I have a lot to learn. This I guess is too early in the career of these directos to think you know what they have to deliver. Before anyone, before any other director there was Nagesh Kukunoor. I wanted to be him. I loved him for Bolllywood Calling. I know people would hail Hyderabd Blues and RockFord as better examples of his ingenuity. To me Kukunoor ruled because he bashed up everything bollywood that I hated, and that is so much in face and still the masses enjoy it and classify as light hearted Indian comedies.
Teen Deewarein was great. Then there was Iqbal. Then Farhan came with Lakshya. I pushed Kukunoor hands down to the second spot. I have another to worship. I guess part of the reason was Iqbal. It scared me, I know it was great, the storytelling was more smoothed out than ever. There was nice music, beautiful backdrops thrown in once a while. The mother-daughter pair as well as the village setting. But I had to hate it by end, it reeked of stereotypical bad guy. Somehow ending was so rushed through and predictable. I am not against happing endings, or bad guy vs. good guy thing but I hate in your face storytelling. The biggest reason of it all was I thought there was nothing new here, to me that was death of what kukunoor stood for. I might as well go back to not looking at Indian movies with any expectation.
Then someone over the last weekend told me how different Dor was. I could not agree more with her. She was right. She said this is the first Hindi film to be made having women as the central character. There are sometimes stories which happen to women also and they generally bring in an unexplored fresh angle, mostly internal conflicts. Conflicts with society.
This movie does have some social bearings, but it is such a delight to see them delivered subtly. I am always scared that whenever there is a social evil to be brought to light, the bollywood directors take the easy way out. You have somebody in the cast get up, choking with sentiment, depicted through red eyes or moist eyes or steely eyes or flaring noses or raised finger. Everybody stands still and listens to the monologue waiting for him/her to conclude.
The compositions were beautiful. The landscapes of Rajasthan and the north are beautifully transported to the screen. So many frames are just sitting in my mind as picture postcards.
The strength of the movie lies in the fact that it hasn’t given in to the usual stereoypes in our popular cinema. The supporting cast except for Shreyas character is there only for the purpose they are, not to hog the screenspace unnecessarily. There is no fear that our filmmakers seem to be paralyzed with. The fear that works against giving due attention to the prime characters, rest should fall around it.
The movie leaves nothing to be desired. It satisfies with its placid sweet natured maturity of the story and the story-telling as well as delights with the reserved understanding it offers to every character.
I enjoyed the movie Don, as I had told myself I am going to. You wait for two years for a Farhan Akhtar movie to come out; you will not take disappointment for an experience. Since I had heard there were mixed reviews of the movie I prepared myself to see the good parts only, zero on them and then don’t lose focus. How can you not enjoy the movie? What about SRK? Well that I have been brainwashing myself for a long time now, I guess more than a year no since I heard that he is going to be the Don. And once the trailers hit the screen, I guess that’s where my blindness started visibly hiking.
I remember, the memory is faded, thanks to my self triggered brainwashing. I remember disliking the trailers in the beginning, yes and I think I can coax out more memories. Lets see yes there is one more; of a highly opinionated person telling me the trailers look horrible, and I blocking all those voices out. The Farhan chant starts in my brain; yes no one tells me Farhan Akhtar churns out a bad movie, no one. The chants float around in my brain. I am submerged whole heartedly. I am eager, I am on my knees waiting to be delivered.
So finally I am sitting in the hall on a weekday, it was only possibility of getting a ticket, the good thing is it costs 50 bucks less on a weekday. Well they could have kept those 50 bucks as well, as for half an hour we were tortured with ads. No exaggeration in the previous statement. Enough you imbecile, it is about Don not PVRs desperate money making schemes. So the movie starts, suave paris, suavely dressed shahrukh who pays 20 euros for a cup of coffee. Nice, cool. Drives through Paris, sorry driven through Paris. Then the movie continues slick is one move after the other. Its not loud, not it is slick, its not boring, no it is, well entertaining.
Now as to where to place the movie, I will go in the order of appearance. The Kareena K song seemed to be rudely in bad taste. If you are going for a more realistic touch, you don’t want the girl to dance, then so be it, but looks like electricity courses thorugh her vein and makes her shake and tremble uncontrollably. Or if you want her to dance, teach her to dance, or get somebody who can dance. Poor Kareena, I feel she has really come up well as an actress (wonderful in Omkara) even the anger of the character comes out well in the brief scenes she has. So why am I cribbing about a mere song, because when you make a song dance movie, then the song dance take 50% onus of making the movie a success.
Speaking of song dance, I just loved the two party songs, especially “Main hoon Don”. They were fantastic. Let’s talk about action. Well we are still imitators; we are still aping what Hollywood had achieved decades back. The level is better than usual bollywood stuff, but nothing original. We put all that we have seen in other movies in this one. It feels nice to have Indians doing all those stunts, its fun. Yeah our heroes skydive too, fight mid-air. But, they don’t do anything that hasn’t already been done in the movies of the Hollywood. Don is not the first to try to get at par with the world when it comes to car chases, but it just reaffirms the push to the standard. It makes Don looklike a wannabe James Bond. The car chases, the fights nothing is riveting enough. I was just cheering a kid on his attempt to bring it out, being a very sympathetic audience. Patronising.
The commendable part about the movie is the number of characters which have been thrown to move the movie forward, rather you can see, plot point one gone, bring the next character in, then the next. “Sir, I have run out characters”. Fine, give the existing character another shade, a darker side. One character which falls comically short of expectations is De Silva, Boman Irani fails miserably to give the cop feel.
For that matter the first scene where the cops are standing holding coffee cups, looking at Ramesh’s body. Om Puri and Boman Irani’s first conversation makes me feel as if I am witnessing all this on the sets. Translated, the scene seems so plastic. The intended suaveness is falling flat for our chief cops.
How do I sum it in one, I see it in fragments, the flaws and the efforts which went waste. The story was plain silly story, where its so bollywoodish in making. Don’s story is cent per cent meant only for screen, it cant be anything else. Every character can exist nowhere but on Bollywood screen. This is not a movie which will appeal to you for its freshness, for its insight or empathy for a character. This is not what the previous two Farhan Akhtar movies did to me. I loved them so much; they were so surreal to me, in terms of everything that I guess I was expecting another sensational revelation. But, I guess this time this guy just decided to let his hair down, and indulge.
I enjoyed the movie, but it didn’t have the pounce and the force with which the previous two movies had grabbed me. I didn’t get bored when the movie was playing. It is just when I came back I realized, I felt pretty empty handed over the days. The delight and pleasure I experienced in revisting Lakshya in my head and on screen was missing. Don was entertaining; I hope I will grow to love it, but that’s a foolish hope, as I have nothing to savor now.
I was so dying for Lakshya experience to happen again. To me Lakshya stood bold and proud above all Indian movies. It had cleared the slate of pretentious melodramatic assembly of war movies. To me there is only one Indian army movie to be spoken of.
When I had come back from Lakshya I was rattling off to various people I met, especially one person in particular the nuances of the film. I was happy with Don. I said, “Oh it was lovely”. But I had run out of words. I enjoyed the movie that was to it. And, I guess that was all there was intended to become of it. After all it was Don, cop-robber story which can fascinate the minds for centuries to come, just keep adding twists in the end till it becomes twisted.
I am not disappointed with Don, I have just revised my expectations. What else could I have expected from Don. Don was supposed to be a nice popcorn flick, blockbuster. And I guess that is what it was aimed to be. Why did I imagine something new to happen? Sigh ! :-(
As for Dor. Frankly I was not even considering viewing it. Again maybe I have a lot to learn. This I guess is too early in the career of these directos to think you know what they have to deliver. Before anyone, before any other director there was Nagesh Kukunoor. I wanted to be him. I loved him for Bolllywood Calling. I know people would hail Hyderabd Blues and RockFord as better examples of his ingenuity. To me Kukunoor ruled because he bashed up everything bollywood that I hated, and that is so much in face and still the masses enjoy it and classify as light hearted Indian comedies.
Teen Deewarein was great. Then there was Iqbal. Then Farhan came with Lakshya. I pushed Kukunoor hands down to the second spot. I have another to worship. I guess part of the reason was Iqbal. It scared me, I know it was great, the storytelling was more smoothed out than ever. There was nice music, beautiful backdrops thrown in once a while. The mother-daughter pair as well as the village setting. But I had to hate it by end, it reeked of stereotypical bad guy. Somehow ending was so rushed through and predictable. I am not against happing endings, or bad guy vs. good guy thing but I hate in your face storytelling. The biggest reason of it all was I thought there was nothing new here, to me that was death of what kukunoor stood for. I might as well go back to not looking at Indian movies with any expectation.
Then someone over the last weekend told me how different Dor was. I could not agree more with her. She was right. She said this is the first Hindi film to be made having women as the central character. There are sometimes stories which happen to women also and they generally bring in an unexplored fresh angle, mostly internal conflicts. Conflicts with society.
This movie does have some social bearings, but it is such a delight to see them delivered subtly. I am always scared that whenever there is a social evil to be brought to light, the bollywood directors take the easy way out. You have somebody in the cast get up, choking with sentiment, depicted through red eyes or moist eyes or steely eyes or flaring noses or raised finger. Everybody stands still and listens to the monologue waiting for him/her to conclude.
The compositions were beautiful. The landscapes of Rajasthan and the north are beautifully transported to the screen. So many frames are just sitting in my mind as picture postcards.
The strength of the movie lies in the fact that it hasn’t given in to the usual stereoypes in our popular cinema. The supporting cast except for Shreyas character is there only for the purpose they are, not to hog the screenspace unnecessarily. There is no fear that our filmmakers seem to be paralyzed with. The fear that works against giving due attention to the prime characters, rest should fall around it.
The movie leaves nothing to be desired. It satisfies with its placid sweet natured maturity of the story and the story-telling as well as delights with the reserved understanding it offers to every character.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
And i remembered the confusion.
Everyday on my way back home we are stuck in a jam. It’s a 10 kms stretch for which buses just move a metre a second. The bus scrapes a meter ahead, halts, keeps chugging, and starts all over again after five minutes. So there are at least 5 such junctures at which it happens for at least 15 minutes.
The conductors for these buses are generally very young fellows, but yesterday in my bus the young fellow seemed a little too young. Maybe he was like me, at 16 also I could have easily passed off as 10. So somewhere in the middle of another of those screech, push, grunt, move acts by all buses in synchrony. The conductor, lets call him Raghu spots a friend co-worker in the bus next to him. They are hanging out of the window chatting gaily as if sitting in their home and yapping. Its not just his stature, it’s the childlike happiness and excitement which exudes from him which makes him seem like a kid to me.
In few minutes Raghu’s friend has hopped in our bus. No he didn’t jump in through the window, he got down form his bus and easily walked into ours, restating the fact the traffic was virtually still.
So the point is, once they were together they seemed so much more alive than any one around me. They smiled smiles which showed through not just the upturning of the corner of their lips (The passing a colleague in corridor smile). Their smile was a being alive smile, it was caught in the moment smile. How long has it been since I got caught in the moment. Their chatter, their body language, their obvious delight in being with each other reminded me of how things used to be way way back.
Sometimes I think it’s the middle class morale and manners which bog us or tone us down, which make us fit into boxes, which were never meant for human inhabitation. Maybe its an offshoot though but I kind of arrived at it when I saw “Born Into Brothels”, it’s a documentary about the prostitutes in Calcutta and their kids. But it’s fascinating, it reminded me how it used be a kid, how it used to feel to be happy and feel unbound, how i used to scamper off out of the house at the odd times of the day. How it felt to never contemplate the consequences before jumping into the action.
It got lost as we moved in years, as we started seeking permanence which would forever elude us, seeking appreciation from people around us, from the society around us, without even realizing we were doing it.
That is why I did not get it when the activists (the NGO guys who had organized the screening of the film) started screaming about keeping our sympathy for the kids to ourselves. Because I had no sympathy I had a confusion facing me, their lives were supposed to be screwed up, I was dreading that the pathetic state of survival would sadden me. I was supposed to be hoping for a happy ending, but that is in movies, there is no happy ending in reality, in reality there is no ending, there is no central character. Isn’t the ending always in context of a story?
Back to the point, i had no symapthy for them when the confusion started clearing out. I realised i was stumped,i had always imagined such lives to be horrific and gloomy. But they were happy kids, they knew how to live. They were so keen on being happy, or maybe they were just as happy as we were as kids. But i was caught unaware i was not prepared for anything but sadness, sadness, destitution and more gloom.
As i was saying they knew how to live. Not by getting into so called “respectable” professions, but by living the life the way they see it, not by a million expectations around them. By being true to themselves, by being basic.
Another pictures that is related to this collage of happy kids is of construction workers in front of my sis's house. There is this construction that was going in front of my sister’s apartments when I was staying with her. The construction workers would stay there, at night playing loud music. Fighting wildly sometimes, very ugly abusive fights. I would hate them for it, despise them, wish they would clear out the premises. But then there were those days when they would sitting out in the sun, women oiling little kids’ hair. Doing anything at all on their day off. I would sit in the balcony and stare at them, envying them for those minutes which so unknowingly and placidly and blissfully slipped by them.
I am sure everyone has their share of worry. Yes I am sure but somehow I feel for the so called less privileged not living up to the society’s cosmetic propriety sake demands the worries are not invited or kept at bay. Their problems just slam them down, deal with it then and their and be with it. Their futures not planned, kids not educated, day to day existence becomes day to day. This state is definitely something they want to jump out of, but we should not consider them lesser, no looking down required, as they are hell smarter than us, and more aware of what they feel, unlike us who would not be sure what to say how we feel but speak at for hours at which books we like.
It is just that we would never want to be in their shoes though they would want to be in ours (mostly ...... i guess), as the outwards appearances that we maintain are worht fighting for. And the outward appearance that they present is not really presented, it is typecasted, it is biased perspective of a common upper class eye
The conductors for these buses are generally very young fellows, but yesterday in my bus the young fellow seemed a little too young. Maybe he was like me, at 16 also I could have easily passed off as 10. So somewhere in the middle of another of those screech, push, grunt, move acts by all buses in synchrony. The conductor, lets call him Raghu spots a friend co-worker in the bus next to him. They are hanging out of the window chatting gaily as if sitting in their home and yapping. Its not just his stature, it’s the childlike happiness and excitement which exudes from him which makes him seem like a kid to me.
In few minutes Raghu’s friend has hopped in our bus. No he didn’t jump in through the window, he got down form his bus and easily walked into ours, restating the fact the traffic was virtually still.
So the point is, once they were together they seemed so much more alive than any one around me. They smiled smiles which showed through not just the upturning of the corner of their lips (The passing a colleague in corridor smile). Their smile was a being alive smile, it was caught in the moment smile. How long has it been since I got caught in the moment. Their chatter, their body language, their obvious delight in being with each other reminded me of how things used to be way way back.
Sometimes I think it’s the middle class morale and manners which bog us or tone us down, which make us fit into boxes, which were never meant for human inhabitation. Maybe its an offshoot though but I kind of arrived at it when I saw “Born Into Brothels”, it’s a documentary about the prostitutes in Calcutta and their kids. But it’s fascinating, it reminded me how it used be a kid, how it used to feel to be happy and feel unbound, how i used to scamper off out of the house at the odd times of the day. How it felt to never contemplate the consequences before jumping into the action.
It got lost as we moved in years, as we started seeking permanence which would forever elude us, seeking appreciation from people around us, from the society around us, without even realizing we were doing it.
That is why I did not get it when the activists (the NGO guys who had organized the screening of the film) started screaming about keeping our sympathy for the kids to ourselves. Because I had no sympathy I had a confusion facing me, their lives were supposed to be screwed up, I was dreading that the pathetic state of survival would sadden me. I was supposed to be hoping for a happy ending, but that is in movies, there is no happy ending in reality, in reality there is no ending, there is no central character. Isn’t the ending always in context of a story?
Back to the point, i had no symapthy for them when the confusion started clearing out. I realised i was stumped,i had always imagined such lives to be horrific and gloomy. But they were happy kids, they knew how to live. They were so keen on being happy, or maybe they were just as happy as we were as kids. But i was caught unaware i was not prepared for anything but sadness, sadness, destitution and more gloom.
As i was saying they knew how to live. Not by getting into so called “respectable” professions, but by living the life the way they see it, not by a million expectations around them. By being true to themselves, by being basic.
Another pictures that is related to this collage of happy kids is of construction workers in front of my sis's house. There is this construction that was going in front of my sister’s apartments when I was staying with her. The construction workers would stay there, at night playing loud music. Fighting wildly sometimes, very ugly abusive fights. I would hate them for it, despise them, wish they would clear out the premises. But then there were those days when they would sitting out in the sun, women oiling little kids’ hair. Doing anything at all on their day off. I would sit in the balcony and stare at them, envying them for those minutes which so unknowingly and placidly and blissfully slipped by them.
I am sure everyone has their share of worry. Yes I am sure but somehow I feel for the so called less privileged not living up to the society’s cosmetic propriety sake demands the worries are not invited or kept at bay. Their problems just slam them down, deal with it then and their and be with it. Their futures not planned, kids not educated, day to day existence becomes day to day. This state is definitely something they want to jump out of, but we should not consider them lesser, no looking down required, as they are hell smarter than us, and more aware of what they feel, unlike us who would not be sure what to say how we feel but speak at for hours at which books we like.
It is just that we would never want to be in their shoes though they would want to be in ours (mostly ...... i guess), as the outwards appearances that we maintain are worht fighting for. And the outward appearance that they present is not really presented, it is typecasted, it is biased perspective of a common upper class eye
Monday, October 23, 2006
Welcome to the neighbourhood
Our neighbours form the floor below, sent us chicken stew. I feel formally welcomed into the niche.
Yesterday, we did our first bit of socializing around the apartment, for pure selfish reasons. We needed to enquire about broadband connectivity, cable etc. Three weeks we had been here without bothering to peek into anybody’s house. Not even diwali wishing we did. Now my roomie was damn hell bent on getting these things enquired about, me was shying away. The reason not been anything to do with anti-socialising, I looked damn tired courtesy sleep deprivation. And I didn’t want to start off the new relations as a hangover ridden person. But, one’s gotta do what one’s gotta do.
So we went forth enquiring, sipping teas, gobbling diwali sweets and snacks, we even had to refuse an offer of juice…. Sigh…. Did it hurt. Nice evening of community chit-chat and in the end we even have our dinner sent off home. Was it yum? Yeah it was, but the thing which makes me happy is this exchange which happens. I love my neghbourly exchanges, I think they are a very wonderful part of community living.
Yesterday, we did our first bit of socializing around the apartment, for pure selfish reasons. We needed to enquire about broadband connectivity, cable etc. Three weeks we had been here without bothering to peek into anybody’s house. Not even diwali wishing we did. Now my roomie was damn hell bent on getting these things enquired about, me was shying away. The reason not been anything to do with anti-socialising, I looked damn tired courtesy sleep deprivation. And I didn’t want to start off the new relations as a hangover ridden person. But, one’s gotta do what one’s gotta do.
So we went forth enquiring, sipping teas, gobbling diwali sweets and snacks, we even had to refuse an offer of juice…. Sigh…. Did it hurt. Nice evening of community chit-chat and in the end we even have our dinner sent off home. Was it yum? Yeah it was, but the thing which makes me happy is this exchange which happens. I love my neghbourly exchanges, I think they are a very wonderful part of community living.
Saturday, October 14, 2006
Me- a living embarassment to me.
I have to try, I have to really try. I have a major problem, I always always fall for the guys who act hard-to-get or maybe, I hate to admit are plainly not interested. These would be the guys who I would think of as a part of the crowd, but then something about their seeming disinterestedness would draw me towards them, though I would be telling myself, no no I loathe this guy. Yuck, eiu, I can positively puke at the idea of even looking at him.
And then BOING!!!. Another BOING!!!. “Yes a little more of the doormat treatment, please. Thank you.”, now I am drooling at the idol’s feet. I appall myself. I get pushed more and more to the edge till I find myself hypothesizing and drawing conclusions from even a sneeze. Yeah and in this pathetic stage I find myself again. Sheesh!!! I am living embarrassment to me. You know the best thing right now would be to fall over the edge and then walk on safe grounds again, with a bruised soul, till I rise again to fall
And then BOING!!!. Another BOING!!!. “Yes a little more of the doormat treatment, please. Thank you.”, now I am drooling at the idol’s feet. I appall myself. I get pushed more and more to the edge till I find myself hypothesizing and drawing conclusions from even a sneeze. Yeah and in this pathetic stage I find myself again. Sheesh!!! I am living embarrassment to me. You know the best thing right now would be to fall over the edge and then walk on safe grounds again, with a bruised soul, till I rise again to fall
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Full Metal Jacket - Joker
Yeah Joker is a really lovable character, not a stereotyoe and i love it.
One of my favourite stills, the picture speaks a lot. I love this one, every face speaks volumes, look at the onlooker with his palm one on one, like monalisa, such dumb expression, totally out of sync with the tension between the other two, I love the way they are loaded with ammo and camera, the black guy in the corner, the way he has bent forward, even the specky in the corner of the frame.
The ciggies on the helmet ... The scribbling on the helmet
Another thing i even love the conversation, i love the way juggle it around, how the weight is thrown form one character to the other. In the screenplay book i was reading as part of my course, they had asked the writer to visualise these conversations as if the actors are separated by two sticks joined at palms, and by pushing the stick ahead you throw your weight, by relenting force you draw back. This physical energy should be perceivable from words.
Thursday, September 07, 2006
____________
Sometimes even typing blanks used to be enough. He would make sense out of it. Its a friend gone, life has changed, i never really thought of it as that, what with this course and all, but today as i am going through old posts, freakily pasting them up on the Blog, i come across conversations .... which seems to have happened in childhood, its two eager kids planning to make max of the time together. I was going to Pune, and i had to meet few friends as well as old neighbours as well as both of us wanted to do allllll that we used to do.
Kid1: yaar i would reach there by 9 hopefully
Kid1: but Mennon home bhi jaane ko mangta ...
Kid1: Vohuman/matinee/Railway station is a must in the morning
Kid1: i second that
Kid1: though i am more keen on lonavala
Kid1: with Human Bondage ....
Kid2: !!
Kid2: Oh yes yes yes
Kid2: We have 2 mornings.
Kid2: So one morning can be lonavala.
Kid2: lonavala should be sunday morning so that instead of 9 we can move it up little early.
Kid2: say 7-8 ish. Better weather.
Kid2: Menon home can be a afternoon affair, the time where we cant roam outside
Kid2: And lonavala would be nice. We will get down at any of the station, roam around for an hour in the illage and hill.
Kid2: And get back again in the next train.. What say.
Sheesh being nostalgic is so sucky !!! I am feeling so moronic right now.
Kid1: yaar i would reach there by 9 hopefully
Kid1: but Mennon home bhi jaane ko mangta ...
Kid1: Vohuman/matinee/Railway station is a must in the morning
Kid1: i second that
Kid1: though i am more keen on lonavala
Kid1: with Human Bondage ....
Kid2: !!
Kid2: Oh yes yes yes
Kid2: We have 2 mornings.
Kid2: So one morning can be lonavala.
Kid2: lonavala should be sunday morning so that instead of 9 we can move it up little early.
Kid2: say 7-8 ish. Better weather.
Kid2: Menon home can be a afternoon affair, the time where we cant roam outside
Kid2: And lonavala would be nice. We will get down at any of the station, roam around for an hour in the illage and hill.
Kid2: And get back again in the next train.. What say.
Sheesh being nostalgic is so sucky !!! I am feeling so moronic right now.
No offence, but i find these names quaint.
I don’t know in how may countries is this possible, that you keep moving from one region to another every three years or so for so many years and still be surprised by the quaintness of the names that you come across
Prabhu Boomibalagadoss – some guy who keeps postin stuff on common mailing list
Pugazendhi Panchatcharam – my lead
Jijo Baby – ( it took me days to believe it was his official registered lifelong name, and you could just wince any time somebody would call the poor guy by his sir name, for that matter anybody in his family) my co-cubiclee
Jayatheertha Achar Manchali – a help desk personnel
Prabhu Boomibalagadoss – some guy who keeps postin stuff on common mailing list
Pugazendhi Panchatcharam – my lead
Jijo Baby – ( it took me days to believe it was his official registered lifelong name, and you could just wince any time somebody would call the poor guy by his sir name, for that matter anybody in his family) my co-cubiclee
Jayatheertha Achar Manchali – a help desk personnel
Need to keep moving.
I guess it bothers me to stay put at one place, it relly bothers , that’s why you have to keep moving, and there is no sense of belonging... :-). Not that I complain, you just have to get to know yourself I guess, you know whenever I have been on my roaming spree, I would notice there were a lot of people like me , a map or a book in hand, bag on shoulders, clicking here and there, noting down this and that in diary, and then these firangs , especially women who stand all the Indian eve teasing , the confusing trains, and still how much at home they seem to be traveling around, it really bothers you , you have to heed the call , and I guess though you don’t know anybody around you who does it, you might not see the logic in it, but once you get into it, you would immediately know, this is it, you don’t think of yourself as a weirdo anymore, you relax and are happy to be, and then it stops bothering you , and you just become more receptive to these calls, and I guess keep getting more and more fine tuned to what is that makes you the happiest...
The storyboard of forrked out :-D
We did a ten shot exercise a few days back, we were supposed to do it in pairs.I couldnt come up with a convincing story. My partner came with a story like this:
Girl waiting for boyfriend.
Boyfriend arrives, he is going to break up with her today, does not know how to say it.
Girl knows of it.
When the boy tells him, she says she already knows and she has a parting gift.
She brandishes a big bad knife and stabs him in broad daylight.
Well, my contribution to the theory was the fork, i said if she is already doing something wild, then lets make it with fork :-).
So instead of slitting his throat with a knife, our heartbroken femme fatale sneakily takes out a fork from her side and jams it in his hand. :-D
And so was produced the most hilarious 10 shots ever, i am still laughing at the thought of it.
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
Omkara re Omakara
Lovely Dobriyaal , I would say. His face , his expressions were a delight, he is so damn good, he can teach everybody a damn good acting lesson. What with bigies like Naseeruddin Shah doing every other role. I forget the last time Naseer enacted a character, he was so bound in Iqbaal as well. I just remember masoom, and all these Krish and every other forgettable role he does, helps me forget the magic of Masoom.
I don’t know why good acting is so rare in movies, it leaves you thirsty for a performance and every time one comes by I cling to the memory and impressions of it created by it in my head for as long as possible. Last I remember was Rajapal Yadav in Main meri Patni, I treasure Indian characters more as I identify naturally with them…
As for Devgan , nothing outstanding, but better than Apaharan , he was the sore point in Apaharan. Apaharan was more entertaining when I saw it, because of such fast paced entertaining reporting of those incidents in Bihar, but the characters not well sketched or well enacted, Ajay was flailing embarrassingly with his make do Bhojpuri, even Bipasha was better than him.
As for Saif, this is his best role ever, but I hope he doesn’t get a national award for this one cause he already got one where he didn’t deserve; for some candy floss.
Kareeena was good, not that she had much to do I guess, but for whatver she had , she did it considering that she is the POOOOO from Kabhi khushi …….., big diff, unrecognizable.
Vivek ya , as it is his role was supposed to be just another gullible idiot I guess, then i guess he can be forgiven.
But man is Saif lucky … lovely character, and he does it so well, the scene where he is swaying his palms in front of Raju, loveable character. You know we were told the protagonist is the one who moves the story forward, I think it is Saif in this case. If it weren’t to the beautiful establishment of this one character, everything would have collapsed, or become just another conniving villain aka Pran, Prem etc. Its true this movie is about Omakra, but very quietly Langda Tyagi shoulders Omakara’s onus.
I don’t know why good acting is so rare in movies, it leaves you thirsty for a performance and every time one comes by I cling to the memory and impressions of it created by it in my head for as long as possible. Last I remember was Rajapal Yadav in Main meri Patni, I treasure Indian characters more as I identify naturally with them…
As for Devgan , nothing outstanding, but better than Apaharan , he was the sore point in Apaharan. Apaharan was more entertaining when I saw it, because of such fast paced entertaining reporting of those incidents in Bihar, but the characters not well sketched or well enacted, Ajay was flailing embarrassingly with his make do Bhojpuri, even Bipasha was better than him.
As for Saif, this is his best role ever, but I hope he doesn’t get a national award for this one cause he already got one where he didn’t deserve; for some candy floss.
Kareeena was good, not that she had much to do I guess, but for whatver she had , she did it considering that she is the POOOOO from Kabhi khushi …….., big diff, unrecognizable.
Vivek ya , as it is his role was supposed to be just another gullible idiot I guess, then i guess he can be forgiven.
But man is Saif lucky … lovely character, and he does it so well, the scene where he is swaying his palms in front of Raju, loveable character. You know we were told the protagonist is the one who moves the story forward, I think it is Saif in this case. If it weren’t to the beautiful establishment of this one character, everything would have collapsed, or become just another conniving villain aka Pran, Prem etc. Its true this movie is about Omakra, but very quietly Langda Tyagi shoulders Omakara’s onus.
Stuck in the middle with you!!!
Let me give you some Bangaloree news, Sonia is coming , the city has been made ugly with her manly looking huge cutouts all over, there is one big poster of her leaning her head on Rajiv’s shoulder on display as well , it seems so out of place, its like a photo from family living room flashed in streets. There were millions of people swarming the DD tower road yesterday, 110s of buses, thoushands of villagers, to cross a stretch which takes me 3 minutes max, took me an hour, an outstanding thing was there was a hawker selling samosas in buckets along the traffic, like they do when a train stops on a stations, all of us bangaloreans had formed a human train for him, which was more or less stationed there for half an hour. :-D
Incredible Bangalore !!!
Incredible Bangalore !!!
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
Zidane and fifa 06 for me :-(
“This morning the sense of incredulousness is still there.” screamed a French daily, on the dawn of the day following Zidane’s exit in world cup 2006. And that is the case.
The moment I saw the replay of Zidane headbuting Materazzi, we were aware that the referee has not seen it. I started hoping that it stays so. But alas the fourth referee had seen it and informed the other over the headset. I know, I know red card was deserved, but it didn’t feel like it, the maestro’s last match of his career, the stage as grand as it can be where football is concerned, the audience emotions on the highest fervors, France and Zizou seemed so close to the fairytale ending that would have made him a legend among legends, but they were still to be decided with 10 odd minutes in the extra time to go. But all hopes smothered at least for Zidane as he gave in to the provocation by Materazzi.
Italy went ahead to win the world cup, with penalty shoot out win, thanks to an unlucky miss by David Trezeguet. But gloom and what gloom had descended around me from the moment he walked out of the field. The player who brought charisma back into this world cup, the one who raised the stakes, the team which pounded Brazil was no left destitute.
My passivity is painfully cultivated one, I stopped watching cricket though I used to enjoy it so much as I rationalized that when we guys scream and shout and get all worked up, for all you know they had just written the end of the story long before the match began, and then they (at least Indian team) play every third day and from dawn to dusk, no sense in wasting my sentiments on the game. But this soccer season I get lured again, Germany’s defeat the nation’s collective sorrow was so hard to watch that especially because the defeat came suddenly in the 119th minute. I think man soccer is too much of high intensity drama, with unexpected climaxes and anticlimaxes. Like Harsha Bhogle said, it’s an unscripted drama unfolding in front of your eyes, performed at the greatest of the theatres, the end of which no knows.
Zidane’s early exit brought with it such incredulousness. Such tainted chapters of your career are not avoidable but so sad that they had to be the closing chapter of his career. I just hope we all forget the last one and remember him for all that had come before, the 98 victory he brought to his nation and the only victory his nation has had at fifa world cup.
I would once again like to snare passivity in and forget soccer , for the sudden cruelty that it unleashes, it leaves lots of ifs and thens in your mind, tormenting you to go over what happened wondering if just one piece had been moved around a completely a different glorious reward would have been awaiting the now declared losers. But I guess that also is the lure of it, that so much is at stake and gambled away sometimes and almost worlds move around in a matter of seconds, that the beginning an end of the same game might seem so alien to each other.
The moment I saw the replay of Zidane headbuting Materazzi, we were aware that the referee has not seen it. I started hoping that it stays so. But alas the fourth referee had seen it and informed the other over the headset. I know, I know red card was deserved, but it didn’t feel like it, the maestro’s last match of his career, the stage as grand as it can be where football is concerned, the audience emotions on the highest fervors, France and Zizou seemed so close to the fairytale ending that would have made him a legend among legends, but they were still to be decided with 10 odd minutes in the extra time to go. But all hopes smothered at least for Zidane as he gave in to the provocation by Materazzi.
Italy went ahead to win the world cup, with penalty shoot out win, thanks to an unlucky miss by David Trezeguet. But gloom and what gloom had descended around me from the moment he walked out of the field. The player who brought charisma back into this world cup, the one who raised the stakes, the team which pounded Brazil was no left destitute.
My passivity is painfully cultivated one, I stopped watching cricket though I used to enjoy it so much as I rationalized that when we guys scream and shout and get all worked up, for all you know they had just written the end of the story long before the match began, and then they (at least Indian team) play every third day and from dawn to dusk, no sense in wasting my sentiments on the game. But this soccer season I get lured again, Germany’s defeat the nation’s collective sorrow was so hard to watch that especially because the defeat came suddenly in the 119th minute. I think man soccer is too much of high intensity drama, with unexpected climaxes and anticlimaxes. Like Harsha Bhogle said, it’s an unscripted drama unfolding in front of your eyes, performed at the greatest of the theatres, the end of which no knows.
Zidane’s early exit brought with it such incredulousness. Such tainted chapters of your career are not avoidable but so sad that they had to be the closing chapter of his career. I just hope we all forget the last one and remember him for all that had come before, the 98 victory he brought to his nation and the only victory his nation has had at fifa world cup.
I would once again like to snare passivity in and forget soccer , for the sudden cruelty that it unleashes, it leaves lots of ifs and thens in your mind, tormenting you to go over what happened wondering if just one piece had been moved around a completely a different glorious reward would have been awaiting the now declared losers. But I guess that also is the lure of it, that so much is at stake and gambled away sometimes and almost worlds move around in a matter of seconds, that the beginning an end of the same game might seem so alien to each other.
Sunday, July 09, 2006
Jodhpur Finally
I step down at the platform , my heart is buoyant again, getting high just breathing the cool winter morning Jodhpur air, the air , the station everything brings refresing sights and no smells, fortunately Jodhpur does not follow the overcrowded pattern of railway stations seen in other cities of India. Generally the bigger the station, the more are the people. I bounce till the last platform, take an auto from here to my friends place where i will be putting up.
Voila, the regalties begin from my place of residence only, the house has yellow stone walls, quaint displays of woodwork, i thought people didnt keep elaboarate furnishings in their homes anymore, but this house is a delight. It also has an angan which remonds me of my nani's(mother's mom) home in Benaras. Next few hours spent in chatting with Raji, while she cooks my lunch. I just love sitting in kitchen, where curious stuff is happening all the time, little chopping, little bending, little simmering, then the transformations, the aroma and oh yes the food is ready. And today's lunch primarily consists of ghee on yummy thick rotis, with yummy sabzi, yummy besan ki kadhi. Man what do i care for palaces of Rajasthan, i am so spoiled here.
By 3 i head off to Mehrangarh. Once there, i take a good look around, i have a nice view of the whole city, yeah nice and grand, its something else to be able to take in so much at the birs eye view. Mehrangarh is very well taken care of by the current raja of Jodhpur. And the best thing out here is the pre-recorded audio guide that you get here. It makes your walk around the fort leisurely and you can do it on your own and soak it in at your pace wihtout trying to keep up with guides.
I spend hours inside the fort re-living the grandeur. The fort is majestic, perched above the current city of Jodhpur, and that is what gives me the maximum kick here. So now the camera sleeping till now is awakened and called forth to preserve these sights around me. Well i am not sure how successful i was in preserving bit, well not much and i guess you never can take that with you, and that why you cross spaces to be there in person. Anyway so i just have lot of fun clicking every thing around me. This view, you could keep coming back for more. There arent many indian tourists around me, weird, lot of noisy firangs, one or two quiet fellas soaking stuff and wrting down i guess there impressions, cause there are lot of fleeting impressions you have here, one quickly drowned by other, but somehow related. There are a lot of locals here in the fort. They seem to have come for their evening walk. Bunch of women walking around is the brightest mix of the rainbow. You click their snap, they would want to take a look. One or two kids dancing to these 3 stringed instruments, disturbing. While i am trying to capture a parrot since on the outer of the fort wall, a group of 3 4 men gather arouund to see , waht is it that makes hang on to the edge of the wall (not excactly). They keep guessing for some time, when finally one of them nails it, the mitthu. Yes, i smile then the obvious question , where are you from. I reply they nod, smile move along. Nice people, by the standards that genrally a group of men here would jeer at you, but i guess they were just accaptably curious.
I walk around more, looking into every nook possible in the time left. I realize the forst is pretty open to and directly conscted to the villages just below. I am thinkign whether i should venture into one of those tracks, but since its getting late i as give up.
But i dont give up completely. I decide to walk back the main path, it was a very interesting curve. The sun has set and its 6:30, so concerns are showered my way, one or two passers by suggest i take an auto, which i had to eventually after walking quite a bit, once it was pitch dark and there was nothing rewarding around as the city was also nearer.
Back home, good food, good bed, man i am a royalty.
Voila, the regalties begin from my place of residence only, the house has yellow stone walls, quaint displays of woodwork, i thought people didnt keep elaboarate furnishings in their homes anymore, but this house is a delight. It also has an angan which remonds me of my nani's(mother's mom) home in Benaras. Next few hours spent in chatting with Raji, while she cooks my lunch. I just love sitting in kitchen, where curious stuff is happening all the time, little chopping, little bending, little simmering, then the transformations, the aroma and oh yes the food is ready. And today's lunch primarily consists of ghee on yummy thick rotis, with yummy sabzi, yummy besan ki kadhi. Man what do i care for palaces of Rajasthan, i am so spoiled here.
By 3 i head off to Mehrangarh. Once there, i take a good look around, i have a nice view of the whole city, yeah nice and grand, its something else to be able to take in so much at the birs eye view. Mehrangarh is very well taken care of by the current raja of Jodhpur. And the best thing out here is the pre-recorded audio guide that you get here. It makes your walk around the fort leisurely and you can do it on your own and soak it in at your pace wihtout trying to keep up with guides.
I spend hours inside the fort re-living the grandeur. The fort is majestic, perched above the current city of Jodhpur, and that is what gives me the maximum kick here. So now the camera sleeping till now is awakened and called forth to preserve these sights around me. Well i am not sure how successful i was in preserving bit, well not much and i guess you never can take that with you, and that why you cross spaces to be there in person. Anyway so i just have lot of fun clicking every thing around me. This view, you could keep coming back for more. There arent many indian tourists around me, weird, lot of noisy firangs, one or two quiet fellas soaking stuff and wrting down i guess there impressions, cause there are lot of fleeting impressions you have here, one quickly drowned by other, but somehow related. There are a lot of locals here in the fort. They seem to have come for their evening walk. Bunch of women walking around is the brightest mix of the rainbow. You click their snap, they would want to take a look. One or two kids dancing to these 3 stringed instruments, disturbing. While i am trying to capture a parrot since on the outer of the fort wall, a group of 3 4 men gather arouund to see , waht is it that makes hang on to the edge of the wall (not excactly). They keep guessing for some time, when finally one of them nails it, the mitthu. Yes, i smile then the obvious question , where are you from. I reply they nod, smile move along. Nice people, by the standards that genrally a group of men here would jeer at you, but i guess they were just accaptably curious.
I walk around more, looking into every nook possible in the time left. I realize the forst is pretty open to and directly conscted to the villages just below. I am thinkign whether i should venture into one of those tracks, but since its getting late i as give up.
But i dont give up completely. I decide to walk back the main path, it was a very interesting curve. The sun has set and its 6:30, so concerns are showered my way, one or two passers by suggest i take an auto, which i had to eventually after walking quite a bit, once it was pitch dark and there was nothing rewarding around as the city was also nearer.
Back home, good food, good bed, man i am a royalty.
Friday, June 16, 2006
Jodhpur and the rest
On my run run run spree again, have decided to check out Rajasthan, cities chosen are Jodhpur, Jaipur and Jaisalmer. Reason being, a lot of miscellaneous information and notions thrown in together as well as the fact they are almost in a straight line, Jodhpur falling in between the other two is approx. 5-6 hours from both by bus, and to cram up max touring in less time you could utilize the night time by doing slow (approx 7 hrs) traveling by train during night.
Before embarking on the tour-de-tricity I had sworn I would be well equipped with a camera, I can’t let any other beauty pass me by without having a tool to capture it.
First lap: Pune-Mumbai (buy camera)-Jodhpur
I am leaving my flat at Viman Nagar, its not day yet, everybody sleeping, feels strange, I realize though I can any time return to Pune, I guess this chapter is closed, I keep looking around the room for some time and stare out of the balcony for a little more, I guess the balcony was the best part of it, waking up (to sleep again) to see the rising sun tinting the sky red, coming back from office early in the morning, this was the part which would give away signs that another day had dawned and I thought I could stretch time by extending night into forever.
This is the first time I am traveling to Mumbai by train, seems lovely outside, but I unfortunately chose ac chair car, so I feel a little locked out and doze in between, blaming it on packing stuff, though I didn’t do much of it physically, but I seek excuse in mental exhaustion and the fact that I had been running around, meeting people, climaxing it with as always lovely dinner with the Mennon family, this time Meera didi’s mother also was with us, though it was one of the low spirited ones.
I reach Mumbai VT, it is almost nearing 11, and my train leaves from Bandra terminus at 3:00. Cannon S1IS is what I am looking for, realize it has been recalled, though I find a vendor who claims he can get it for me, I do a little more search, nope nowhere else is S1IS being offered, get online do a little comparative study of prices, check up with official cannon dealers, little more to an fro calls with shopkeepers, I finalize, go to ATM withdraw cash, shit now my wallet would not fit into my jeans, what am I whining about it would not even fold. The whole episode wraps by 2, standing at the cloak room I just confirm with the cloak room people the best way to get to Bandra, though I had already bought a ticket for Sion, they exclaim, no no, a definite no no, that is ridiculous, the guy gives me step by step instructions, go cancel the ticket, get a new one to bandra, take an auto from bandra to terminus, OK? Oops, I run back, the guy at the ticket window is confused, thinks I am getting it cancelled because he gave me a sion ticket by mistake, no time to correct him, though I can clearly see the guy is not happy with the thought.
It is 2:10 by now, I get onto the train to Bandra, which is scheduled to leave at 2:20, I realize it is a slow local, holding the poles at the entrance of the local train I scan the crowd, start questioning two 30ish guys , ask them whether I can catch a fast local, they tell me there are no fast ones to bandra on this track, one suggests I should catch a taxi, the other one just looks unsure of the suggestion, wow he is confusing me, I am aware taxis are a no no for long distance quick travel, but this guy keeps muttering, “taxi, taxi”, damn, on my repeated stressed questioning of his confidence in the valuability of his suggestions, he goes and asks a man standing nearby. Now let me impress upon you right now, when in a new city, or on travel, when asking for directions, you can get little one sentence facts straightaway without cross-questioning, but if your next course or route requires even slight amount of personal decision making then you have to first satisfy your helper’s curiosity, why do I have to rush, which train do you have to catch, in Mumbai and in other big cities I guess its less, but in small towns, be prepared to open up.
Coming back to the gentleman standing with the lady, so he asks me for some necessary information, as to how much time I have, what is the train I am catching, where do I go to, he realizes the shit I am in, but shakes his head and addressing those two guys and me says taxi would be a sure way to miss the train, wow, and these guys almost had me jumping onto a taxi, anyway after seriously considering all the options out loud he imparts me the information that I cant do anything but sit in this local train, he says there are no options at all, and says I might make it by a narrow margin. I get into a self reproach, coupled with little panic triggered imagination of me on my way to jodhpur sitting on the floor or standing in a crammed sleeper. I just sit there and let my thoughts go in a circles of self-reproach, when I realize the lady who was standing with the uncle has come running to my window, sees me and says “there she is” and happily beckons somebody, there comes the guy and he tells me that the train on the next platform leaves four minutes earlier. Cool, I jump onto it, I guess by now I have the harassed look on my face cause the moment I enter, I am asked where do I want to go, when do I have to reach there, and given reassurances that I will make it just on time, well just the thing I am hoping for. Isnt Mumbai amazing??? Although, there is no coach or compartment reserved for a community, but looking around this one, I sense these are all Muslims, but in every way true Mumbaite, compassionate reassurances and instructions are sent my way.
The second the train halts at Bandra, I jump onto the platform, run to the entrance, hot into an auto, at Bandra … the moment I start sprinting towards my platform, I can hear some dear spirits screemin “oh ho …. Express to choot gayi” , panting, though stil not carrying my luggage I realize I am following a coolie, I board the train after having run for miles, sitting in the compartment I can hardly believe my luck. The train finally started 1 and a half hours later.
Next day
I will be reaching Jodhpur by 9 or so, nothing appealing happening out of the window, pretty monotonous, there is a lady in my cabin, who keeps moving a lot, more like hopping from the bottom birth to top with amazing ease, and yes doing it a lot, she has a lot of luggage distributed over top berths and of course under the birth, is dressed in typical marwari style, when I am brushing my teeth I notice her sitting at a seat near the door, which you find in some of the coaches, she seems to be enjoying her tobacco. Back to my seat , after some time, I am somehow in conversation with her, she tells me she is going to a ceremony of some sort to her village, says since she is going after quite a long time, hence a lot of luggage. My natural curiosity of as to how is she going to mange, she says the usual coolie, auto etc; I realize not an issue with her at all. Pretty unusual for a married woman traveling alone, not that it is a big deal, but I have never met anyone like her before, all of them even consider traveling alone a big thing as well, even though you they would have somebody seeing them off, and somebody waiting for them at both the ends. In some time I realize, the ceremony is no usual ceremony she is going for, she is going fro her niece’s ‘niksa’, which she explains as her renunciation of the worldly things. From now on her niece, will have no family, will travel by foot, will never board a bus, train, bullock cart, or any mode of transport in short, she will move cities, she will be heading to Kanyakumari from here, she will never even touch a man, I am a little foggy about this but as to her food I guess she said, she can not eat something that was cooked specifically for her, she can only consume leftovers, only if there is something going to waste.
I am tentatively bugging the lady now for more details, this is news, till now I was only aware of one name, Gautam Buddha, who had left every worldly possession just like that, and now the lady in front of me seems to know dozens who do it around her. I am amazed, I ask her and in turn am trying to wonder what this society is like, in which several households seem to have let their dear ones depart from them in this fashion. She states is as a matter of fact, though with a little grimness, “agar aatma palat jaaye to koi kya kar sakta hai”.
Before embarking on the tour-de-tricity I had sworn I would be well equipped with a camera, I can’t let any other beauty pass me by without having a tool to capture it.
First lap: Pune-Mumbai (buy camera)-Jodhpur
I am leaving my flat at Viman Nagar, its not day yet, everybody sleeping, feels strange, I realize though I can any time return to Pune, I guess this chapter is closed, I keep looking around the room for some time and stare out of the balcony for a little more, I guess the balcony was the best part of it, waking up (to sleep again) to see the rising sun tinting the sky red, coming back from office early in the morning, this was the part which would give away signs that another day had dawned and I thought I could stretch time by extending night into forever.
This is the first time I am traveling to Mumbai by train, seems lovely outside, but I unfortunately chose ac chair car, so I feel a little locked out and doze in between, blaming it on packing stuff, though I didn’t do much of it physically, but I seek excuse in mental exhaustion and the fact that I had been running around, meeting people, climaxing it with as always lovely dinner with the Mennon family, this time Meera didi’s mother also was with us, though it was one of the low spirited ones.
I reach Mumbai VT, it is almost nearing 11, and my train leaves from Bandra terminus at 3:00. Cannon S1IS is what I am looking for, realize it has been recalled, though I find a vendor who claims he can get it for me, I do a little more search, nope nowhere else is S1IS being offered, get online do a little comparative study of prices, check up with official cannon dealers, little more to an fro calls with shopkeepers, I finalize, go to ATM withdraw cash, shit now my wallet would not fit into my jeans, what am I whining about it would not even fold. The whole episode wraps by 2, standing at the cloak room I just confirm with the cloak room people the best way to get to Bandra, though I had already bought a ticket for Sion, they exclaim, no no, a definite no no, that is ridiculous, the guy gives me step by step instructions, go cancel the ticket, get a new one to bandra, take an auto from bandra to terminus, OK? Oops, I run back, the guy at the ticket window is confused, thinks I am getting it cancelled because he gave me a sion ticket by mistake, no time to correct him, though I can clearly see the guy is not happy with the thought.
It is 2:10 by now, I get onto the train to Bandra, which is scheduled to leave at 2:20, I realize it is a slow local, holding the poles at the entrance of the local train I scan the crowd, start questioning two 30ish guys , ask them whether I can catch a fast local, they tell me there are no fast ones to bandra on this track, one suggests I should catch a taxi, the other one just looks unsure of the suggestion, wow he is confusing me, I am aware taxis are a no no for long distance quick travel, but this guy keeps muttering, “taxi, taxi”, damn, on my repeated stressed questioning of his confidence in the valuability of his suggestions, he goes and asks a man standing nearby. Now let me impress upon you right now, when in a new city, or on travel, when asking for directions, you can get little one sentence facts straightaway without cross-questioning, but if your next course or route requires even slight amount of personal decision making then you have to first satisfy your helper’s curiosity, why do I have to rush, which train do you have to catch, in Mumbai and in other big cities I guess its less, but in small towns, be prepared to open up.
Coming back to the gentleman standing with the lady, so he asks me for some necessary information, as to how much time I have, what is the train I am catching, where do I go to, he realizes the shit I am in, but shakes his head and addressing those two guys and me says taxi would be a sure way to miss the train, wow, and these guys almost had me jumping onto a taxi, anyway after seriously considering all the options out loud he imparts me the information that I cant do anything but sit in this local train, he says there are no options at all, and says I might make it by a narrow margin. I get into a self reproach, coupled with little panic triggered imagination of me on my way to jodhpur sitting on the floor or standing in a crammed sleeper. I just sit there and let my thoughts go in a circles of self-reproach, when I realize the lady who was standing with the uncle has come running to my window, sees me and says “there she is” and happily beckons somebody, there comes the guy and he tells me that the train on the next platform leaves four minutes earlier. Cool, I jump onto it, I guess by now I have the harassed look on my face cause the moment I enter, I am asked where do I want to go, when do I have to reach there, and given reassurances that I will make it just on time, well just the thing I am hoping for. Isnt Mumbai amazing??? Although, there is no coach or compartment reserved for a community, but looking around this one, I sense these are all Muslims, but in every way true Mumbaite, compassionate reassurances and instructions are sent my way.
The second the train halts at Bandra, I jump onto the platform, run to the entrance, hot into an auto, at Bandra … the moment I start sprinting towards my platform, I can hear some dear spirits screemin “oh ho …. Express to choot gayi” , panting, though stil not carrying my luggage I realize I am following a coolie, I board the train after having run for miles, sitting in the compartment I can hardly believe my luck. The train finally started 1 and a half hours later.
Next day
I will be reaching Jodhpur by 9 or so, nothing appealing happening out of the window, pretty monotonous, there is a lady in my cabin, who keeps moving a lot, more like hopping from the bottom birth to top with amazing ease, and yes doing it a lot, she has a lot of luggage distributed over top berths and of course under the birth, is dressed in typical marwari style, when I am brushing my teeth I notice her sitting at a seat near the door, which you find in some of the coaches, she seems to be enjoying her tobacco. Back to my seat , after some time, I am somehow in conversation with her, she tells me she is going to a ceremony of some sort to her village, says since she is going after quite a long time, hence a lot of luggage. My natural curiosity of as to how is she going to mange, she says the usual coolie, auto etc; I realize not an issue with her at all. Pretty unusual for a married woman traveling alone, not that it is a big deal, but I have never met anyone like her before, all of them even consider traveling alone a big thing as well, even though you they would have somebody seeing them off, and somebody waiting for them at both the ends. In some time I realize, the ceremony is no usual ceremony she is going for, she is going fro her niece’s ‘niksa’, which she explains as her renunciation of the worldly things. From now on her niece, will have no family, will travel by foot, will never board a bus, train, bullock cart, or any mode of transport in short, she will move cities, she will be heading to Kanyakumari from here, she will never even touch a man, I am a little foggy about this but as to her food I guess she said, she can not eat something that was cooked specifically for her, she can only consume leftovers, only if there is something going to waste.
I am tentatively bugging the lady now for more details, this is news, till now I was only aware of one name, Gautam Buddha, who had left every worldly possession just like that, and now the lady in front of me seems to know dozens who do it around her. I am amazed, I ask her and in turn am trying to wonder what this society is like, in which several households seem to have let their dear ones depart from them in this fashion. She states is as a matter of fact, though with a little grimness, “agar aatma palat jaaye to koi kya kar sakta hai”.
Yeah i am busy, bye
Listen, when I said, ”Yeah I am busy, bye”, all I wanted to really say was as follows:
I aint busy working my ass off, like you do, I aint busy spending my time chatting with the 100 people on my list, fooling myself that they are so fun to chat to, I aint busy exercising my charms and my good natured-ness on some fellow without ever actually giving a dime about them, just like you do, I aint busy just enjoying every mundane moment of the corporate environment around me.
But I am busy, untroubled in my cocoon, gobbling up new books, new movies, learning from them, changing with them, partaking a part of me the last time I read catcher in the rye, and discover something within me when tears warm my face, when I watch Dancer in the dark, busy turning the lines and recreating the image from the God of small things.
I am occupied … with things which are cherished by me, maybe in some time a void will appear, a void created by people left behind, but I guess that void is always there, and I would rather leave parts of it empty than let worms crawl into it.
I aint busy working my ass off, like you do, I aint busy spending my time chatting with the 100 people on my list, fooling myself that they are so fun to chat to, I aint busy exercising my charms and my good natured-ness on some fellow without ever actually giving a dime about them, just like you do, I aint busy just enjoying every mundane moment of the corporate environment around me.
But I am busy, untroubled in my cocoon, gobbling up new books, new movies, learning from them, changing with them, partaking a part of me the last time I read catcher in the rye, and discover something within me when tears warm my face, when I watch Dancer in the dark, busy turning the lines and recreating the image from the God of small things.
I am occupied … with things which are cherished by me, maybe in some time a void will appear, a void created by people left behind, but I guess that void is always there, and I would rather leave parts of it empty than let worms crawl into it.
Dancer in the Dark
This is one movie which took me completely unawares, all my guards down. I completely forgot I was watching a movie. As a rule I never forget that, even if the subject appeals to me , there is a part of my brain which sits back stone-faced and slices and dices the stuff on the screen, toys with it wondering where to place it.The movie walked around me like a person, a person who draws you unto them with their never seen before openness, everything, every gesture is just right, you just take the hand which is offered to you without a question and start walking the trail they walk, forgetting for those few minutes who you are, what you are. I forgot the fact that I am just a person sitting in a chair watching the goings on of the screen, surrounded by strangers in a cinephiles club.
I feel a little weird admitting it. I know the movie was very different than any movie I had seen till date, in a lot of ways. But what was the diferentest was the way I reacted, I thought I didn’t know myself that day, I didn’t know I was so pliable, so touchy. And I am so scared to admit my opinion of it, because this one crossed the lines of being another film with the revelations it brought alongside.
The strangest thing of is all the way I was that day, the way I reacted, the way I felt muted after the movie, the deep dull weight in my head and in my chest , how when I was finally in bed again the thought of wretched poverty would get me crying again.
First of all, tears started streaming down my face somewhere mid-way through the movie. Ok my eyes do get little moist once in a while when watching a movie. But this was strange, they seemed to be streaming down as if a sudden excess of fluid had been detected in my body and had to be urgently released. But generally in every movie there are one or two such phases. But bro this movie was nothing of phases it was one helluva experience, they rocked, the filmmakers shook me up, till I forgot all restraints and was crying openly I was beyond all sense of control. Here I was sitting among strangers, by the end I had stopped wiping my face, and in the last few minutes I almost crumbled into me, and was very aware of an unknown pressing ache in my chest, I thought it was because of the uncomfortable chairs, but later I realized it was nothing but weight of the sadness thrown off the screen.
Spoiler- plot give away follows ........
The movie is heartbreaking. It transports you to this forsaken land of innocence.
Selma (Björk) is this naive, honest factory worker, who is saving money scrupulously for her son’s eye surgery to save him from falling prey to impending blindness, which has already advanced upon her as she moves to middle age. Everyday when she steps out of work there you find Jeff waiting for her hoping she would accept his offer of a lift back home. With time her blindness becomes apparent to those close to her, and their concern for her rises to anxiety, but Selma smilingly casts aside their worries and admits to have no need for eyes anymore, she has seen all she ever wanted. A beautiful song ensues where Jeff is telling what all is left to see, where Selma is happy simply recounting all she has come to see.
Though the movie is not a feel-good candy floss even from the beginning, what with Selma and her kids life in a foreign land, her saving money, her kid’s running away from school every now and then, and her foggy sight. But, there is this pure warmth that one feels for some time in the beginning, which is lost as Selma’s naiveté is cruelly punished for by the neighbor and the owner of her trailer, when she confides in him about her illness and the fact that she is saving money to protect her kid from the same sickness. And what hurts the more is because she did this just to ease him of his debt-related worries.
Bill is brilliantly acted out by David Morse. I loved this character so much because there is a lot of ambiguity in defining it just they way you can never really pen down a person as one discrete entity. I love the way Bill is shown as this usual nice caring husband, friendly neighbour, generous landowner. But once he learns of Selma’s stashed away fortune and her near-blind eyesight how he stands in a corner one day to learn the place where she keeps her money and eventually takes it. The character Bill before resorting to stealing also tries to emotionally coax her into giving him the money, by offer of quick return, by telling her that he has been thinking of killing himself. Even in the sequence of last struggle between these two before he dies, I was not sure whether some part of him is actually resorting to death as an escape to this problem, as well as hoping that her blindness might fool her into giving up, thinking he has been hurt.
It’s a story told with a purity of unbiased unopinionated view. It made me a child again, how I would read a story and be swept into the world opened up before me, unwarily, how my happiness would depend on how happy everybody in the story ends up.
Recently i came upon this review of Dancer in the Dark, and i think this one says it so much better and echoes what all i couldnt express but agree with.
Here:
Milestones !!!
First
I am a spectator again, as in my role in life is currently basically of a spectator, but not that of any sports AT ALL. FIFA world cup 2006, brings me to the front of the tube, I ignore songs and the general channel surfing is shunned when they come to play.
I watched the opening match, just like that, I guess because people around me were watching me and get introduced to terms like MF DF Strikers.
Yesterday I find myself catching the ESP vs UKR, though this time nobody else is watching it, I had no idea you get hooked to soccer so easily. The sheer power and team play at work which is put on display crammed into 1 and half hours is scintillating.
Yesterday’s spectacle reminded me of how I used to be a devout cricket follower as a kid, at least when my parents would permit TV viewing. How we would switch to radio if the power went off during a India vs X during world cup. How on the day of a final the whole family will sit from morning to evening (provided it was weekend) with the day passing by and the tension mounting. And how I suddenly stopped, when one name after the other, was dragged in the mud, with claims of match fixing. The hardest blow of it all was Hansie Cronje. Cronje epitomized the perfectionist and impeccably the true champion for me in those days.
Now I rediscover the joy of enjoying a sport without ever having played it, it is so much different from the delights of watching a theatrical performance, here the whole script is is written and executed in front of your eyes, its impromptu you could say. But the way spain played yesterday, I reailsed the biggest kick you get out of being a soccer apectator would be by watching an example of perfect teamwork at play when one goal is brought to fruition by 11 kyes synced together.
And today, today my mind kept returning to the perfect clockwork like execution of the last goal, it looked like a well orchestrated, perfectly rehearsed move. And now I find myself looking forward to going home and catching the next one.
Second
I have touched 50 kgs, somewhere in these few days I have crossed the line :-). And this definitely is a milestone.
I am a spectator again, as in my role in life is currently basically of a spectator, but not that of any sports AT ALL. FIFA world cup 2006, brings me to the front of the tube, I ignore songs and the general channel surfing is shunned when they come to play.
I watched the opening match, just like that, I guess because people around me were watching me and get introduced to terms like MF DF Strikers.
Yesterday I find myself catching the ESP vs UKR, though this time nobody else is watching it, I had no idea you get hooked to soccer so easily. The sheer power and team play at work which is put on display crammed into 1 and half hours is scintillating.
Yesterday’s spectacle reminded me of how I used to be a devout cricket follower as a kid, at least when my parents would permit TV viewing. How we would switch to radio if the power went off during a India vs X during world cup. How on the day of a final the whole family will sit from morning to evening (provided it was weekend) with the day passing by and the tension mounting. And how I suddenly stopped, when one name after the other, was dragged in the mud, with claims of match fixing. The hardest blow of it all was Hansie Cronje. Cronje epitomized the perfectionist and impeccably the true champion for me in those days.
Now I rediscover the joy of enjoying a sport without ever having played it, it is so much different from the delights of watching a theatrical performance, here the whole script is is written and executed in front of your eyes, its impromptu you could say. But the way spain played yesterday, I reailsed the biggest kick you get out of being a soccer apectator would be by watching an example of perfect teamwork at play when one goal is brought to fruition by 11 kyes synced together.
And today, today my mind kept returning to the perfect clockwork like execution of the last goal, it looked like a well orchestrated, perfectly rehearsed move. And now I find myself looking forward to going home and catching the next one.
Second
I have touched 50 kgs, somewhere in these few days I have crossed the line :-). And this definitely is a milestone.
Random snips- from a conversation one day
- We are called homo sapiens , but years of 'civilized' living has made one organ 'the brain' go so disparate that though still physically alike on a mental scale we can be classified into many species.
- Just another one of the millions of samples of homo spaiens crawlingon this planet.
- As in why are wearing clothes, animals are not, but if we dont cover oursleves then we are mad, as we are very different to not feel the need of it.
- Lot of what we do is conditioned by the culture around, we never question it.
- Sorry i know i do what comes within the least resistance path and gets me max satisfaction.
Thursday, April 27, 2006
Jan- 06 kerala trip Day 2
Early morning rush, rush, by 7 we have boarded the bus to Alleppey, the buses to Alleppey are very frequent. The bus ride is nice, is it the holiday mood, or people in general seem more subdued and relaxed in terms of interactions, there is a calm deliberateness to most of the gestures. Once we reach Alleppey, PKA does some enquiry as we see a boat full of people leave the jetty, we are commanded by PKA to enter an auto, and rushed up to chase it till the next jetty, where me and Anu suddenly stand rooted and refuse to board this one as this is more like a passenger boat, not the one we see in all the “God’s own country” propaganda. We do a little enquiry here and there; we are approached by this thin guy, one of those unforgettable specimens of human species, thin, dark, the same dark leathery skin more pronounced on thin people as it generally clings to the bones. Wearing light white summery cotton all over, lungi folded to knees, sandals on feet, white shirt. He has combed his oiled hair in a fashion, which plasters his hair little onto the forehead in a curly fashion. He has a very unpestering was of following you , even suggests a trip to the tourist help desk to us, you could almost mistake him for just another local going out of his way to help you out with the options available. We realize he is offering the cheapest so far, so we take him up 200 bucks an hour, a motorboat.
Wow, it’s a little murky canal of sorts with huge stocky trees shading it from above from where our journey begins,
Wow, it’s a little murky canal of sorts with huge stocky trees shading it from above from where our journey begins,
Saturday, April 22, 2006
Rang De Basanti
I get it, its all the fatasising element which drives one crazy,
Answer fight club, if I look at it, I am swept alongwith it, it sings, its fantastic, hail David Fyncher !!!, hail chuck Palahnuik !! , hail everybody in the movie, idolize it, see it again, because it speaks of something that is repressed in me, something that I feel surprised that why everyone is not talking of.
I guess it’s a similar case with RDB it’s your views stretched and brought to completion in a way that leads for those who are already with the characters to identify with them, and feel that every bit of it was very much happening, a fantastic happening. These are things which are very possible if you let one emotion rule over you, but time and other menial tasks of the day, and the best of all
I just remembered, a friend at college had once remarked to me, that why movies like X-Men or any superman are such huge hits, primarily because they echo our hidden desires.., our fantasy, though I had strongly scoffed at the idea, as obviously I never sat and dreamt of me flying across seas, lifting houses, but with time I realized, it was the irrational desires hidden in our subconscious that she was referring to.
Answer fight club, if I look at it, I am swept alongwith it, it sings, its fantastic, hail David Fyncher !!!, hail chuck Palahnuik !! , hail everybody in the movie, idolize it, see it again, because it speaks of something that is repressed in me, something that I feel surprised that why everyone is not talking of.
I guess it’s a similar case with RDB it’s your views stretched and brought to completion in a way that leads for those who are already with the characters to identify with them, and feel that every bit of it was very much happening, a fantastic happening. These are things which are very possible if you let one emotion rule over you, but time and other menial tasks of the day, and the best of all
I just remembered, a friend at college had once remarked to me, that why movies like X-Men or any superman are such huge hits, primarily because they echo our hidden desires.., our fantasy, though I had strongly scoffed at the idea, as obviously I never sat and dreamt of me flying across seas, lifting houses, but with time I realized, it was the irrational desires hidden in our subconscious that she was referring to.
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
Kerala- jan 06 trip -Day 1
Let me get into tedious details…
We started from Bangalore Cantt at 10. We includes me, Anupama and PKA (pronounced paka and for very good reasons too). I was positively hysteric for the first few hours, till I went off to sleep, in the morning my enthu did not find any company , whenever I would see a nala or clutters of coconut trees, my delightful pointing them out would be converted into something , I don’t know what It was , but I found it strange that not everybody around me is jumping with excitement.
We reach Cochin, PKA takes control, idhar udhar, eventually we find a place to stay, in a quiet little street in Kochi, and that too very cheap and very good at that (200/-) .Since its much warmer, we enjoy the bathing hell more than we do at Pune or Bangalore. Have a very sorry breakfast at a very quaint restaurant called Colombo, in front of the Lodge. My companions have already started cribbing about sad south Indian food …(double sigh). I discover a new milk shake on the list , it is called Sharjah, and is Banana and bournvita in a milk shake. Anu’s Orange juice tastes like puke, though I didn’t divulge my opinion then to her.
By 1 we head off to the boat jetty, which is just 5 mins walk from here, its really quiet here. The sun is pumping out heat full-throttle, the next ferry to Fort Kochi is in another 30 minutes, for which we stand in queue for 20 minutes. The ticket costs an unbelievable 2.50, I had no idea there ever were modes of transport available, which cost this much. The ferry gives you a nice view of the Cochin coast, then the Cochin Shipyard, crosses wellingdon island, and finally Fort Kochi. I haven’t seen a boat jetty before, but they really cannot be compared to bus stands, as from where you get off from the boat, you generally walk through a narrow street, for a minute before you hit the road, which would be again a street only. So by now we have hit this street, there is a tourist information desk bang in front of our eyes, the moment we come out of the narrow aisle, rather there are lot of these desks all over Kochi.
There are “walking maps” of Kochi available at these desks, which was meant to be my guiding star, but they have run out of it, we make do with a plain city map of Kochi, but this is also good enough. Our stroll begins with checking out a fish dock, there are slimy puddles and flows we hop over, it is as smelly as it gets, but then in Kerala the smell of fish and stagnant sea water becomes your constant companion. Moving on, we have a direction now, we head towards Santa Cruz Basilica. Its closed, we just sit here for a whil, waiting for the clock to strike three, PKA starts hovering around the priest, every now and then , and its hilarious seeing him virtually bend with reverence , even when asking the priest for directions to Dutch Cemetery . Poor “father” as PKA had packed all his reverence in this address, seems uneasily shifty as he clutches his bag of unclean laundry and tries to live up to PKA’s image of his as the spokesperson of God. While we are waiting for the church open, a firang duo also reach here, the guy turns out to be German, but discloses it in the end, as he kept saying he is also from Bangalore. I guess we should have straightaway phrased the question as “Nationality?”. You have to pay 5 bucks to enter the church, I don’t remember who, but one of us was very offended by it. I can never forget Tirupathi, but then its all the same muckiness everywhere I guess, whether they ask for an entrance fee or not.
After having covered both the churches , we do some regular wasted tourist-type shopping, we are now facing the sea, where the Chinese fishing nets are at Kochi, its very nice here, I want to keep sitting here, we sip on hugest coconuts I have ever seen, and instead of malai we get the whole coconut ready to be eaten. We now move to the jewish town and the Dutch Palace. The jewish town might be a shopper’s paradise for anyone looking for quaint stuff, at least checking it out was fun, but my fellow companions are in a hurry to somewhere I don’t know where, when we hit the jewish synagogue it is too crowded and nothing keeps me here for long enough, I guess the major portion of my time here was spent in tying and untying my shoe laces, back in the jewish town streets, we peek into shops, but hurry hurry , (ARGH), Anu likes a cigarette case, which the owner claims is made of rose wood, it has a sheet of wood which rolls all over the box to cover or reveal the contents. We replenish our level of coconut water and head to palace, which seems to me to be nearer to a dak bungalow in comparison to a palace, it doesn’t really fit my perception of a palace, its plain wood, cement, and the stuff of which your and my house is made. We have only ten minutes to see it, PKA stays outside, me and Anu split , me trying to check out as much as possible, in the Japanese murals there are some real unseen before murals of Vishnu putting his multiple limbs to please multiple female goddesses or I I don’t know what, whew! I go tell Anu about the discovery and we remark on what a hypocritical society we have… which we keep building upon a day or two later. We see PKA standing outside a temple on which there is a board in place , which says only hindus allowed. PKA has not thought of making the visit till we arrive and enter the temple protected by us, stand there, all reverence, some firnags are entering the temple with their shoes on, I was just pointing that out to them , I guess all of us mumbled something and at the same moment the woman notices the notice in front of the temple and they leave apologizing to us, and well stupid world what were they apologizing for, and why to us, I felt like as if we for an instance were holding the baton of protecting Hindu religion by not letting anyone else enter the temple.
We head back to Ernakulum, a little lying down in the rooms, then strolling on the streets, looking for a place to eat, we find a bakery, have dinner, nice fish, head back to bakery, buy junk, buy a little more necessities and back to Hotel to sleep.
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