Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Last blog for 2008

I am sorry folks, for all who were waiting for the famous “Sandipan Bollywood Awards 2008” (if any) but it has to wait because of Ghajini which I am going to watch only in the New Year.

Here, I will just try to recap the year for me. The year has been a year of Travel. On first Jan 2008, I was in San Diego. During Labor Day, I went to Miami. 4th of July, I was in NC and Atlanta and 22nd of July I was in New Hampshire. Thanksgiving time I was again in California, but the Bay Area this time. Apart from this, I have been thrice to Rhode Island and twice to the wonderful Cape Cod which is hours away but truly they are amazing. And finally and hopefully, I am flying to Kolkata tomorrow.

I was really new to Boston last year but now I know a lot about in and around places and I love it more and more. Yes, mid December to mid February is bad, but after that it is really wonderful spring summer and fall.

Blogically, I have maintained my stats, 26 blogs are more like a one a fortnight which is cool. I have stayed away from Bollywood but I cannot control myself in saying this now: “If reports are true that Bipasha is acting pricey and does not want Juhi Chawla on the sow, then to hell with Bipasha”

Apart form movies and the musings and ‘News that I follow’, my past few blogs have been a bit to sensitive. But I think I am going to continue that and keep nurturing the impossible dream of boundary less world with no war or crimes or criminal punishments.

As for social networking goes, I managed approximately 500 scarps on orkut which is on the lower side. I keep calling chacha chachi, mama, mami, nani, bua, bhabhi, bhatija, bhanja and all possible relations and do keep in touch with my friends too. What’s new this year is the emergence of their fiancés/fiancées. Being the good guy that I am, I have got these new friends now. It was kind of embarrassing early on, but now it looks fine.

2009 looks to be a promising year already which economy booming towards the middle of the year and my fist month beginning with a holiday and a cruise from Miami in the second month. As for movies, ofcourse waiting for Harry Potter the most. Apart from that looking forward to “My Name is Khan” and the ‘Sushmita-Shahrukh’ movie. The annual Disney-Pixar also has been something that I am looking forward to every year now.

Merry Christmas and a Happy new year

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Impact of Mumbai blasts on me

In my vain attempts to be a neutral citizen and not form and opinion about the incidents have failed. But what surprises me the most is that I have mixed emotions for both for or against.

Let’s go to the bad part first. Not blaming the terrorists. There can be many shades of positive arguments about this. First which I think is more important is not to give them a death sentence. I am strictly against death sentence. What if they land up in heaven by accident? Then the whole purpose of death sentence will be lost. We can rather give life long imprisonment making their life like hell. I think that’s what should be done to all the criminals who are sentenced to death.

Second is, these are just brainwashed youngsters made to do all this because they have nothing better to do in life. Let us create fair job opportunities on both sides of the border rather the sub-continent as a whole. Killing these people either by encounter or by conviction is not a solution. I specially hate the media hyped and liked by many – the so called encounter specialists. I always get the feeling that by accident, they are may be not killing absolute offenders but also some people just at the wrong place. I always get reminded of some incidents which happened to me and I bet every one of us at some point. Here are 2 examples:

1) Did it ever happen to you that you are with a bunch of “friends” who suddenly get into eve teasing? So they are passing comments at a certain girl on the road. The girl looks back. Is there any reason that she will believe you are not amongst them? Same may happen to a guy killed in an encounter. I agree that you should avoid such company, but you know, it’s not always avoidable.

2) You typecast just because of your geographic origin. For me, though jokingly, people call me Commi, Bangladeshi infiltrator and in one case was a part of a convicted group for just being from “Maharashtra”. I do not say that I should be separated from the rest. After all, yes, I am from the Commi state, my great grand parents did live in Bangladesh way back in 1905 and I am a proud Maharashtrian born. I would not like to be separated from these groups and revered in isolation.

3) You are doing the right thing in the wrong time. Once I took my very dear school friend for a walk. He is physically challenged so we took some time for the walk. And I was beaten by the teacher for being late and my nice deed was entirely unappreciated.

So, might be many of the terrorists fall in one of the above 3 categories and put friendship/loyalty first? Do they deserve to be killed?

Another ting I liked about this entire last few days of event was failure of BJP’s terror campaign. Deep down, I think I still prefer this party over others. But it is high time they learn that national issues do not and should not concern common people who do not have even access to basic amenities like drinking water. How is getting killed by a bullet worse than dying of thirst. It should get into the root cause campaigning mode and not this “India shining” or “Anti terror” campaigns. Terrorists most likely will never target small villages.

Having said so many things against the common people, I don’t know why, deep inside me, a small hatred has started against Pakistan. I would not justify these acts as enough has already been said and done by politicians, media and intelligentsia. But as a consequence of that, I could not make myself buy the 1000 times better Pakistani biryani masala and the Basmati rice and instead chose the inferior Priya and Swad brands. Still not able to fathom why and how to get rid of this emotion.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Happily grazing cow in New Zealand

A very strange thing happened today. Like the last few days, I was awake since 4:30 am. Today at 5:30, I get a call from my School friend Shubhajit. He always calls in odd hours but though I will never talk in those odd hours even from my parents, I can never hang up on Shubhajit or Bhaji. The reason is that he calls from the borders of Jammu and Kashmir, where one rarely gets signals. I always feel a strange guilt attending his calls. He did something which I never had the courage to do and instead, to public and to myself I always spoke of joining army as joining a band of fools. But deep inside, I do know that it is more because I am not capable of so much sacrifice.

I asked him abut what’s happening as it was Election Day and he said that it was very hectic but he was happy that I remember. Yes, and I had just read it in rediff some 10 minutes back. There is a lot going on in that part of the country. We can just speculate, the locals can just suffer, the army people might just be the pawns but whatever is happening in the power corridors on either side of the border, we do not know, rather we may not wish to know.

Is it justified? Fighting for the country? After all, if we do believe in some sort of superpower, it might have just been a split second decision of the god to pass the next life on earth as a human being of a particular country. Next second, we could have been a cow happily grazing grass in New Zealand. Well, with my present, I am happy. I am paying back to the world in whatever form I came in. I am paying tax so that we walk on better streets, I have sent money to Indian charitable organizations also and if that is not enough, I did buy the Unicef greeting cards to have the proceedings sent to Africa. I will also buy ‘Tales of Beedle The Bard’ and the proceedings will go for betterment of the world. And so is the cow from New Zealand paying back to the society. It is making more cows, it is giving lot of milk and it is also maintaining the balance of nature.

But what is a man in military doing? Isn’t he being brainwashed to fight for SOME country on the whims of certain people? For example, India and Pakistan are fighting for ages now on may be some stupid decision of the then Viceroy and queen Victoria’s ‘Let’s have some fun, let’s split the Hindus and Muslims’.

Same with the World Wars, the present Iraq war or any other wars. It is a few people who decide the fate of so many others, who simply decide to die for the country, when if one instant late they would have been happily grazing cows in New Zealand.

I am so happy that I was born a few seconds late, so now I am a happily sitting on a couch and frantically pressing keys on the laptop keyboard, not much different from the grazing cows of New Zealand!!!

It is probably inevitable to have wars, or it might be really important to go to space when children are dying of hunger on the streets, or it is really important to spend millions of dollars to go deep down into the sea and find some stop watch in the titanic, it is just that I do not know why.

Saturday, November 08, 2008

Titbits

It has been long since I wrote something. I had consciously tried to write a blog every other week. So ideally the total would have been 26. I think I will manage it, now that this is the 24th one, and the usual annual 2008 bollywood awards will come towards the year end.

However, after being quoted in Mumbai Mirror in an abridged way which gives a wrong picture of me but on the whole carries the point, I did not know whether I should be happy or sad. When I saw that I did not receive any comments (forget angry ones) I realized that even if people would have read it, they would have done it on the newspaper, and nobody was crazy enough to type out the link on a computer and read it for themselves.

Hence, I will be talking about myself a bit, though I know not for whom. I have moved to a new apartment and the net connection hasn’t come yet. This brought 2 nice things with it. One, I started reading agan and secondly, I stopped watching bigg boss season 2. The show was very addictive. Watching a bunch of brain dead people over and over again fight over lost tomatoes and less sugar in the tea left me brain dead too. Not that I was following a lot of quality news before bigg boss started, but I was not even watching the hindi movies which I always made sure I watch. I was out of touch with the blogs I read, the google news searches that I do. Atleast now the little time I spend surfing in the office, I spend it on reading some news keeping me up-to-date with the current affairs.

However, watching any news or reading any news website had become so boring in the past few days. It was just Obama everywhere. Beaten to death. It was so difficult to get any other news other than which country head congratulated hi and how he out smarted McCain or how the fall was all due to Sarah Palin. I had had enough. However in my desperate attempt to find more news on the day after the elections, I found 4 events that I found non Obama.

  • Pt. Bhimsen Joshi being awarded the Bharat Ratna. He The last Bharat Ratna was awarded was in 2002. It has been a long time. On thinking who would be the right choice for the next one, three people came to my mind. The first one surely deserving and the other two should be atleast considered. They are: Sachin Tendulkar, Narayan Murthy and Al Gore.

  • Uma Bharti slapped her party worker, kissed him again, he was still angry after the kiss and then she was on a strike till he forgives. Really crazy.

  • B. R. Chopra died. This news though supposedly important, it just to be read as a headline and moved on to the next.

  • Abhishek Bachchan suffering from high fever in Kerala. This news did not come from any news site but from Amitabh Bachchan’s own site. And sure enough, next day it appears in the news websites. I don’t know whether I should like or hate these easy journalisms: getting news from celebrity bloggers. But then it’s absolutely legal to do so.

Anyway, the second good thing that happned with no internet is that I started reading books again. I read ‘White Tiger’ by Arvind Adiga. It is a fast and good read. Does give you a picture of how India is shining in fools gold. And then ofcourse, I am re-reading Harry Potter 7. I have re-read selective chapters but for the first time re-reading the entire book. Some parts are just amazing. The two shifting minds when Harry runs out of Bathilda’s house. The tussle between Hermione and Ron after he returns and how he keeps agreeing to everything she says for truce. And many more things here and there.

Anyways, turned out to be a long post. Will be back soon.

Sunday, October 19, 2008

Endorsing Arundhati Roy

I just saw an interview of Arundhati Roy in Devil’s advocate by Karan Thapar and needless to say I am impressed by the lady. I have always been awed by her and am still continuing to be.

Generally, when Karan Thapar grills anybody, either they go backfoot or they counter his evidences convincingly and we feel that the person has done so well. But this lady, not only accepted whatever Karan Thapar quoted from various texts, but also provided enough evidences why she thinks that way and why it is the right way.

But the best part is not that. The best part is she knows what she is doing. She knows that she will only get the wrath of politicians and even the common people for this. She will be compared with the terrorists (if not already) but still she carries on her job. She knows she is fighting a lost battle. But we need people like her. What if Narmada Bachao is actually required, what if Afzal is actually not guilty, what if Kashmiris really want an independent Kashmir and are denied of that. What if the Indian Mujahideen is a media creation and the police are actually just cooking up stories and fooling the people with collaboration from media.

Let’s hope this is all not true. What the government is doing is actually right. We will feel immensely happy and I am pretty sure Arundhati will be happy too. But what if the above is actually true? We are turning into a fascist nation and soon will become another Germany? At least we will have something to say: “But one amongst us stood up against it. One amongst us fought for it. And that is Arundhati”.

I am very sure Arundhati knows all this. She is doing all this knowingly that how much wrath this will invite for her. After all she is an author and which other does not like popularity? But the fact that she is going against all this shows that she is a big humanitarian. She has her own principle and not relenting to even the public pressure is a big courageous act. She is doing all this, just to make sure that we are all right in our decisions and not hurriedly doing anything wrong. This is my principle too, I can stand convicts moving freely in the societly, but I cannot stand a single innocent person to be punished.

Let’s briefly talk about Singur. Yes, there would not be any industries after this in West Bengal, yes Mamata Banerjee is a Mahishasur in a female form. But do you think everything was alright in the way CPIM allotted the land? Do you not think there was some underhand money involved between Tata and the government? Most importantly, do you really believe that there was no other way possible that would have convinced the entire concerned group? I believe there would have been ways out. I already read somewhere that the initial land for the tatas was allotted somewhere near Kharagpur, but it is just that the Tats said can’t you offer anything better and they gave away more important land. Can’t a compromise be arrived with the Kharagpur land as well. Why will a government have to act like a Ramu servant to a business powerhouse.

Arundhati, I am not as courageous as you are. But like you, I do really hope that the correct convicts are punished and the correct thing in Kashmir might be a way that brings peace to the actual people of Kashmir. In many other cases, I would hope that you are really wrong and the media/ common man opinion is right. Because if it is not, we are really heading towards doom. But for all your endeavors, I really respect you a lot! It is not easy to go against the people for the people.

Sunday, September 28, 2008

I wish

It’s my one year in Boston today. As a recap, this is after 17 years in Nagpur, 4 in Surathkal, 0.5 in mysore, 0.5 in bhubaneswar, and 2 years in College Station TX.

Boston is different from all the other places I have been before. This place has 4 distinct seasons. You really need 4 distinct set of clothes for the four seasons. The trees are four different colors. And now coming to think of it, I do like the fact that we do not like the winter. It’s so good to have not liking a season over the other unlike say California where people have no choice as it is sunshine year round.

Aah, enough of false praising. I really would love a warmer place, a place like Miami or Houston or Austin, or say a place like Bangalore.

Bangalore, it is my favorite place. As you might have noticed above, I have never stayed in Bangalore but I still love it and I think that is my final destination ten years down the line. Ask the people of Bangalore, and they will say “Oh, so much traffic, things are so unnecessarily priced” etc. But the simple fact that I am still interested in hearing these people out who say so shows my concern. The reason may be because I have never felt any place as my own. Though I love Nagpur a lot, there is nothing in Nagpur to hold me. Though there is enough to hold me in Kolkata, I really don’t feel any connection with that place. I do feel sad about the issues like Singur because of being a Bengali and I also secretly do not like when non Kolkata people bash Kolkata, but when it comes to me being a part of the people and the city, I feel like an outsider.

On the other hand, Bangalore has always been a pampering place for me, thanks to my brother. When I went there the first time, bro was new in his job and he spent a lot and we were always eating in good restaurants, going to the fancy malls, buying expensive clothes etc. Then, during my stay in Surathkal, this became the place where I used to come when I needed breaks from the college life. I ran there once for Holi. In first year, when I was really afraid of my seniors, Bangalore was a soothing comfort. I will come by an early bus in the morning, and then always get cheated by the Autowallas on my way to Dada’s place but all to be reimbursed by him. His roommates also ensured I have a nice time. Overall it was always a fun place. Then, the one year after college, Bangalore became the place of dreams because it had all my “college friends” and it was a place where you had all the good paying companies. I yearned for Bangalore even in my first few months in College Station when I was still making friends and I was always jealous that my college friends are having so much fun together.

Thinking on practical terms, may be staying anywhere else will be no different than what I have been imagining about Bangalore, because few years down the line, when I will eventually think about coming back to India, none of my friends will be single and may be not even me. Things might be totally different. But there still be the Forum mall with it’s characteristic smell (if not already blasted by the terrorists) and there will always be newer and better eating places, either my brothers favorites like Parivar, Nagarjuna, Amravati and Sues kitchen or the one with the get ups like “Chandni chowk” or fancy names like “Rumali with a view” (As if the rumali rotis have a hole in the middle to peep out while eating). And of course those out of the world Bangalore Times articles talking about trends which nobody follows and finding terms like Gastrosexual ( Just heard this term from Umesh, apparently it means “women of Bangalore” nowadays like men who will cook food for them). I am very sure this is also a BT finding.

But then, I may meet my brother again by surprise on the stairs of PVR cinemas, introduce our friends and move on.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Scary thoughts on the blasts

Lot is happening around the world, especially those which bother me like Ike, Georgia, Singur and to a bit even the US presidential elections. But this post, I would like to discuss the blasts happening in the Indian cities.

Yes, enough has been written about it, and various views. There are many topics to discuss on. They are:

1) What is government doing?

2) Is it justified to have an anti terrorism law like POTA

3) Is what was earlier known as the “Mumbai spirit” actually “Mumbai cowardice” or “Mumbai apathy”?

4) Should we begin to suspect all Muslims?

5) What do the terrorists really want?

Let us begin with the last question. I wish and I can just wish that they would tell me “We want azad Kashmir and nothing else.” If I had power, I would have immediately said “Yeh lo, and take this extra 1 square meter from ladakh too, and please stop this”. I wish it was as simple, and if it is, I urge the politicians please do this right away. But we all know that is not the case. I think the reason for the blasts has to be something else, and it might not be entirely based on reason, region or religion. It very well might be, they had nothing else to do. These big terrorist organizations, once found that everything is already ok in this world but they have these huge infrastructure established and they will go jobless if they do not do anything, started brainwashing people. And where else will they get such a large population to influence and to attack. Yes, Indonesia has the biggest Islamic population, but then they can’t create havoc there, because it is all Islam. India becomes a natural choice.

No I am not typecasting the religion, I am just typecasting terrorism. To sound more secular, let me bring out a Hindu example. What would VHP and Bajrang dal do if India was a Hindu nation?

Now this drives me to the next point. See how in he above explanation, I had to do Hindu bashing for the sake of sounding secular. This is what I am so concerned about and this is what Rajdeep has also discussed in his blog. Why do we have to do our own religion bashing just to sound secular? Even in common life, we consider a Muslim good if he is clean shaven, he takes part in festivals like diwali and holi alongwith Eid and he even goes to temple. We the Hindus say “See, that is how a Muslim should be, and see, how we accept such good Muslims to our society and we think we are tolerant hindus”. But that is not right. We should also respect a Muslim who does not want to participate in Holi or Diwali. Frankly speaking, Holi diwali are not even Hindu festivals, they are Indian festivals. How many Muslims do take part in the “Sathyanarayan katha”?

So now that we see that it is all about a change in mindset for all the people is needed, we look at what is the government doing for this? And the answer is obvious, not only nothing, but just the opposite. Ideally the government should have made conducive atmosphere for the peaceful co-existence of the two communities (which I think occurs more by naturally than by the government) and change the mindset of the young people through education. Considering that it is the government who designed the CBSE syllabus, I would say it was a job well done. So you see the government would have been actually helping the problem if it just stopped what it was doing but no, they just did the opposite. They started appeasing one community and thus actually creating differences between those who would have become an ally over time.

And now the most difficult question, so what can be done now? And I am afraid the answer is : I have no idea..

Monday, September 01, 2008

Ganesh Chaturthi

Yes, after a long long time, I am back to my old blogging style. Musings. This times that year kinds. And this one is about Ganesh Chaturthi.

Lord Ganesha has been in my life since I had senses, but in a very peculiar way. The Lord has never been my primary point of inspiration. But he has always brought joy. All hindus tend to have one primary god, though Hinduism believes in polytheism. It can be a good study in itself to see how this is across India as well as classes and subclasses amongst people. But that is not the point of discussion. Anyway, so that way, if I have to choose my primary god, it has to be goddess Saraswati and I would like to believe that it came naturally to me. As a student, it is goddess Saraswati who gives you knowledge and you should pray to her to score good marks in exams. Being a student till last year, you can imagine that she has to be THE goddess for me. And now that I started work, logically speaking I should change to Goddess Laxmi, the goddess of wealth, but I do not like to change. And here comes lord Ganesha. People say, he is the god of knowledge and god of wealth. I think he is also the god of sane thoughts. In short, he is highly capable of being THE god. But, for some reason, he never features that prominently in Bengali culture.

For me, Lord Ganesha has other significance. I was born and brought up in Maharashtra. The land of “Ganapati Bappa Morya”. So every year, Ganpati puja was a big festival in my colony. This also coincided with the “Durga Puja Shopping” commencement. This process involved going to Nagpur city 14 km away and buying new clothes, going to the various ganesh pandals across the city and finally a good dinner at some restaurant. So you see, Ganesha commences the happy season.

Later, when I moved to Karnataka, I realized, it is equally big here and in my college it was a regular event. Infact, this was my first day at Surathkal. I was sitting in the auditorium where the idol was established. It is here, I sat with the people of my state “mattha party” and were introduced and thus made friends who not only made the following four years enjoyable, but even became the most trustworthy friends for life.

Then I came to Texas A&M. Who would have believed that out of the zillions of Hindu festivals celebrated across India, this will be the one that is celebrated in A&M? Yes, diwali, holi rakhi all are celebrated, and I believe even Durga puja and Saraswati puja, but none at the same level as Ganesha utsav. I know the reason too and that is the timing. This coincides with start of fall semester and what better way to start a semester than prayers. I could have ignored this celebration as I do with nearly 95% of the traditions followed in the Aggieland, but as luck would have it, I stayed with Marathi roommates here and hence never missed this occasion. And as luck would have it, this was not only the place where I met many of the friends for first time in college station, but also the place where I met my advisor, the person who shaped my career.

This is the first year; I will have nothing special to do, but now comes the best part: The reason which made me write this blog. It is not me who realized this connection, this subtle realization that knowingly or unknowingly, I have been following this tradition since I was born. And no prize for guessing who made me realize this. Of course, it has to be Maa. And yes Maa, I will definitely do something this time too.

Any good writer, Jane, Jhumpa or JKR, would have stopped here, but no, I want to write more. This may not even be a strong point, but I cannot not mention about it.

The prep of durga puja is described by a poem as follows:

Shiuli phool-er gondhe momo,

Pujar thane dhaker baari

Bhorer aalo fotar aagei

Pounche Gechi taratari.

Somehow I always associate durgapuja with this poem. The poem is pretty meaningless so I won’t dare to do a mundane translation, but it is the first line: Shiuli phool which is a tiny white flower with orange stalk, the frangrance of that flower is the mark of start of the puja season, and the first time we use this flower, is ofcourse for ganesh chaturthi.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

My blog turns 3

Today is the 3rd anniversary of my blog. Happy birthday “Sandi’s Musings”. I won’t look back much but here but here are some stats: 103 blogs in 156 weeks which is like one blog every 10 days and I believe is a good frequency. Also I have evolved over the years. Earlier in my first year it was always about my past and my feelings and what I did and what I liked. Slowly, I became more conscious of my identity and there were some self discovering posts. Then I started taking interest in the current affairs around the world and mainly India. There have been some repetition of ideas and one of them being “what news I follow” and I still like it and I think I will do that more often. Bipasha has been a consistent topic of my blogs too.

Anyway, in this blog, I will do something which I have never done in ages and for which I have been asked many times. I have never reported my trips here after a one day trip to Austin in 2006 summer. I have had many long and exciting and beautiful trips since but did not have the patience to write a travelogue. But today I will describe about this place called Beavertail State park in Rhode Island USA.

I went there with my friend Sumit who is also my colleague and an amateur photographer. After a quick visit to Newport, which I have already been to before, we headed to Beavertail State Park to be on time for the sunset. The island is named so after its shape which is like a beaver’s tail. The extreme tip of the tail is supposed to have sea on all three sides. We parked the car a bit far from the tip and walked through the trail with trees around and getting glimpses of the bay here and there. It was almost sunset so there were lot of activities by the insects and I was intently listening to their sound. I had not consciously listened to this sound for quite a long time. And far from the noise of the cars on the road or ACs in home, this was a welcome sound.

Soon we arrived at the tip of the island and I was dumbstruck. This was one of the best places I have ever been too. There is sea on all three sides and rocks at the place where they meet. I ran as far as I can go to the tip. Sumit shouted: “ How do you like the place?” . I replied “ I feel like Swami Vivekanada already”


There was also this foghorn along with the lighthouse. Quoting Wikipedia : ‘Foghorns are a navigation aid for mariners. In foggy conditions, when visual navigation aids such as lighthouses are obscured by the weather, foghorns provide an audible warning of rocks, headlands, or other dangers to shipping.’ I remember foghorn from a old story I read in my English textbook about a dragon (probably last living dragon) thinking the foghorn as a call from his mate and coming from far away only to find the lighthouse with the foghorn. Can somebody please share the exact story if you remember?

Anyway, I was fully immersed into the scenery when I witnessed a clear sunset after a long time. How the sun touched the horizon and the illusion of sun actually changing shape from a circle to an inverted ‘matka’ and then making a nice ‘Sunny Side Up’ egg before finally disappearing, and then the dancing of the colors, the various shades of oranges and reds and yellows and pinks and blues and whites in the scattered clouds and sky and ther constant change of wardrobe makes you forget even the best of the dances like Bipasha’s “Beedi” :)



PS: A video with a vague and funny commentary by me is attached alongwith. Notice the foghorn sound and the great roar of the sea.


Sunday, August 17, 2008

Bachna Ae Haseeno Review

Bipasha does it again. Yet another crap movie. The list is just becoming endless, but I can still not stop praising her. Her looks are killing (तीखी नज़रें , कातिल अदायें)। God knows what she means by when she says I choose my movies carefully. For that matter, which heroine can really claim that she chooses her movies carefully except may be Shabana Azmi.

Yes Advay, I also have to admit that in one song, she did look more like Serena’s sister than Venus, but that was just one wardrobe in one song. Other than that she was the best in the entire movie. But that should also not come as a big complement considering the rest of the starcast: newbies Ranbir, Deepika and Minisha. Bipasha had to be the best and she does it in style. Finally Bipasha has understood, that she has to do the oomph roles very much like Aishwarya has understood that she can only do crying and simply sitting looking beautiful.

Anyway, now the other characters starting with Minisha Lamba. She reminds me of Divya Dutta trough and through. Needless to say she can’t act which is true for any contemporary heroine other than Rani and Kareena, but this girl also does not have the heroine looks. She looks so much like heroine की बहन . Additionally, I don’t know why the cameramen did not notice this but her nose is much redder than her rest of the face in the entire movie giving her a look of joker with the red ball on the nose. And who designed her outfits for her first 30 minutes? She was wearing a green pajama and violet short kurta in Zurich. Give me a break. Even any काम वाली बाई will have better dressing sense. Overall, Minisha has scope for improvement and she looks promising but she should change her makeup man and dress designer immediately.

Let’s move on to Deepika Padukone. I did not like her in OSO, and I did not like her here either. She is too much girl next door kinds. I thought she has an eggface, but this move it was small and back to circle. So she is more of the egg yolk face now. And where did she learn her dialog delivery? She is born and brought up in Bangalore but her way of speaking is very Pune types. I have seen many pune girls talk like this. Feels very out of place and weird. The funniest part was her crying. She cried twice in the movie. Once from right eye and once from left and never from both. Why, God only knows. And the crying is like a tap of water is opened and then suddenly closed.

Now to Ranbir Kapoor. Even in this movie he tries to be Raj Kapoor. I would suggest he should try to be more like his father or Kareena, the only 2 decent looking people and decent actors in the entire kapoor खानदान . Ranbir has done his homework, he has presentable body, knows dancing and can act fairly well. He just needs to improve a bit more.

Now some movie aspects but so much has been said about it already by other reviewers: length is long, story second half is predictable, story lacks good humor etc etc. I have nothing new to add. On the brighter side, te Yashraj did what it always does well: breathtaking locations.

Now back to Bips, she has done perfectly what was expected out of her but I did not like what was expected out of her. But that should not be a problem. Also, why does she have to do that showing hands with mehendi to the camera. It doesn’t look sympathizing but scares me by reminding me of “Kile ka rahasya”. Suggestion to her, Bipasha, you look beautiful in almost any style and any look but sometime you do look like Serena. Please try to avoid that look. It’s not difficult.

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Funny observation about News Channels

Off late, we many times keep bashing the internet news and TV news channels for showing nonsense stuff. We want quality news. News that matter to us and that’s where I think is the catch. What news matters to us?

Do we really care if Obama wins or Mc Cain does? Even their decision on healthcare doesn’t bother us as company pays our healthcare. None of our families are serving in Iraq or Afghanistan too that we will be worried about them. Even if they had been, their news would have been brought to us by they themselves over phone. Nor even does the news of serial blasts in Ahmedabad or Bangalore directly affect us because it is not going to prevent you from going to work. Yes, certain part of it does matter but these news you as a resident of Bangalore would hardly have got from news channel, you would rather have over heard in person.

What are the news that matter to us directly? May be what is the best school in vicinity for the kids (if you have any), what are the good restaurants nearby Where do you get cheap and good groceries. This information (news) is more important to us rather than what Omar Abdullah shouted in the Indian parliament.

Now there may be certain issues which matter like how much percentage government hiked the pension scheme or what is interest rate cut by the Fed but then that’s hardly .001% of what TV news channels cover. Another important thing might be weather. But even that, the Indian news channel in particular hardly pay any attention to.

So the bottom line is that, news channel are entertainment channels and the show us what we want to see. That is why we have Britney all over the news and even news like people do not want to see any more of Britney becomes news. Or we have these murders of beautiful or rich women in India starting form Jessica Lall to Aarushi. I am pretty sure atleast one per month is killed in the tiny villages of India for petty reasons as dowry or even caste etc but they do not cover that. They rather cover what’s happening in Delhi and Mumbai. And they are right too. They have to sell.

A good idea of our own want of news can be judged from the most read or most watched sections of news websites.

Here is a sample:

One of the 5 most read news in BBC: Soul icon Isaac Hayes dies at 65

In CNN: 'Batman' No. 1 for fourth straight weekend

In Times of India: Are you hot in bed or a hopeless wreck? Read on for tips to get your act right... What makes a person great in bed?

In NDTV: Durga Puja rights sold to US company.

Now apparently, death of Isaac Hayes is the biggest news in BBC, CNN etc and may be the guy was really famous. Bit do I care? Not really.

On the other hand, rightly so, the news in Times of India is of most direct consequence. But do we really need that as part of news?

For me, the most important news form the above 4 is the last one, but probably it interests only the smallest portion of the readers of my blog.

Strange world.

I guess what the news channels and sites try to do is to put up news that most of the people would cherish and hence we get all the masala news we want to read/see but also love to comment on that what is news media becoming today.

Sunday, July 20, 2008

Make sense yourself

I just saw a movie called ‘Via Darjeeling’. I recommend seeing it but do not compromise any schedule for it, but when you have nothing better to do, typically Sunday 5-7 pm, just go for it. For this blog, I will be inspired by the same movie and write so many things without really making any sense. I will touch my favorite topics: Review, News I am following, musing, women and filmy gossip all at once.

Ok, so I went for this movie the Dark Knight, people said it’s the biggest grosser till date, well I slept for the first half, but I truly give credit to the movie that I atleast woke up for the second half. Next day, I went for the long awaited ‘जाने तू ’ movie alone.Before the movie, I was eating at a local sandwich shop and suddenly a procession went outside. This is very unlikely in US I guess but a group of people, old, young and even some kids were demonstrating for ‘No war on Iran’.

Anyway, afterwards I went for the movie and though the first fifteen minutes were boring and over acting, I don’t know why and at which point I liked the movie. Even when I think now, there is no single or even multiple points which are good about the movie, but it just sailed along. Initially I thought Genelia was boring but slowly she was just unstoppable. She was too good. And her voice is exactly like Urmila. To be precise, the Urmila of ‘ एक हसीना थी ’ questioning Saif always.

After coming back from movie I was chatting with a friend and we started rating which girl u liked in the movie. And here was my order: The girl with the guitar (Sugandha Garg), Genelia and Kitu Gidwani. Yes, the old timer, the Junoon woman and the Swetlana of स्वाभिमान. She was really cool. At least I found her so.


By the way, both these movies had one thing in common. They made me feel old. In Batman, the crowd around me was all high school kids and the freshmen and sophomores. If it were kids, they would have found Batman good, but these people, like typical people of the same age group were actually cheering for joker. I was pretty impassionate and was glad that the movie was over. Similar experience with जाने तू . The movie involved an अदीति and जय

of 20-21. And they were already talking about marriage and they were surrounded by friends and friends were the most important part in their life. Well, at 25, my friends are getting married around me, and I really love my friends, but things are not they way when I was 21. I think I became more mature in these 4 years than any consecutive 4 years except transition from age 1 to age 5. may be.

Talking of old times, Bachi caught my attention (yet again), with this wonderful article on Nagpur. She mentions Nagpur as a city with permanent prefix via. Mumbai to Kolkata, via Nagpur. The Nagpur people may take offense, but if you really read deep, you will appreciate each and every word of her and you are not sure whether she is telling good or bad about Nagpur, but the fact is that she has portrayed Nagpur as clearly as I have ever seen. These are the exact things what a non-Nagpurian thinks of Nagpur and these are also the things which make Nagpur so special to my heart.

By the way, I will be going to Nagpur (most probably) after a long gap of 6 years. Hope I still find the same warmth there.

P.S: The idea of this blog, as mentioned in first paragraph, is as convoluted as ‘Via Darjeeling’ and is also inspiration from the famous Big B blog, and his mixing of daily activities with viewpoints.

Monday, June 30, 2008

Too old!

Is it growing up or is it already seen it all? Or is it that I am turning dumb over time? My yesterdays visit to Museum of Science in Boston left me with all these questions.

Why did I go there at first place? I don’t know. May be it is because this is one of the “to do” things in Boston and secondly it is free for MathWorkers. Ok, so now I land up there and see these “cool stuff”. A straight rod if rotated at an angle and at a radius form a centre doesn’t really form a straight line surface but a hyperboloid. Randomly falling balls in a series of vertical columns will form a Gaussian distribution. Definitely, these are not Kiddo stuff, but still I was not at all excited. Oh and then there was a spark generator and there were birds and the usual conversation of energy demos. Probably all I liked in the theater was the Rattle snake and I attempted speaking in Parseltongue with no real effect whatsoever. This definitely proves that it is not the “growing up” that has bored me.

The second reason can be overexposeure. The excellent “Science City” and “Birla Science Museum” in Kolkata or “Raman Science Center” in Nagpur or Vishveshwaraiyah Science Museum in Bangalore. I think I have overdone it. But if it is just loss of curiosity, then there were many things in here that were not there in the 3 above mentioned places and vice versa.

That really leaves me with the third option. Am I getting dumb or rather detached from these technology and science? Wow, so encouraging for my company whose motto is “Accelerating the pace of Science and Technology”!!

To my defense, this is what I have to say: At the exhibit hall named “Evolution of Computer”, all of us literally ran in the other direction.

What is worse is after coming back home, I logged into bhejafry.net and started watching IIFA 08. Needless to say I was enjoying it. Whether it was over enthusiasm of the Bachchan family in the event because Big B is the ambassador or be it the Gorgeous Urmila taking stage after so long. Loved it lots.

And this scares me even more. Such indifference to technology and such attention to the old timers like Urmila, makes me feel ashamed when I scold Maa and Baba for not learning how to e-mail or sms. Where will I be? I will still be driving my 2008 accord when my kids willl be traveling at light speed in their solar powered mini copters and communicate with people through the chips embedded in shape of earrings and pierced in lips and ears. They will read the video books. For example, now JKR would be able to not only pen or voice record her thoughts on Harry Potter but actually store what she visualized in her mind. She can also do revisions on the “video thoughts” just like one would do to the manuscript. Oh and she could transmit emotions too through these video books.

Well, this is the whackiest I can think of happening in the next 15 years and this is not all that whacky either. On second thoughts, am I being too realistic here? Haha, this is what a true engineer should be. Curtail your imagination and do what is needed. Well, now I am happy. :)

Saturday, June 07, 2008

Book review: 3 Mistakes of My Life

You can also read Advay's review here.

When writing about Chetan Bhagat, we should always remember that we are not expecting a 'Da Vinci Code' from him. We expect him to connect with the middle and upper class educated youth (thankfully, there is negligible difference amongst them nowadays). What's the %? Someone told me it's around 20% who are middle or up. Youth will be 50% of that, so let's say 10%. Well, he does write for them. For the people aged 17-30. And yes, he does it well.

Five Point Someone was much more hilarious, but there was nothing new in the story, just over dramatized version of our own life. Midnight at call center had a very poor ending though the buildup was nice. However, The 3 mistakes of my life is a better attempt. The language usage was improved and the story though was nothing out of the box, had a certain sweetness in it.

What I found most commendable is the delicate balance he maintained in the book about cricket, religion and politics. Certainly, these 3 are the most discussed thing in India and he maintained a good balance without tending to go towards cricket much more which would have been an easier path.

What I really liked was the way he portrayed the cause of Gujarat Riots, the father of a dead boy brainwashed by drinks carries on the riots while the biggies watch silently. This was by far the most neutral account of Gujarat Riots i have heard. Reminds me of 2 different versions of the riots I have heard before:
1) The hindus inside the carriages lit themselves, just for an opportunity to create riots. Give me a break.

2) The other and only true ( first person report) I had heard about this entire riots is by one of my gujju friends. His mom had a difficult time going out after the riots as she had to make sure that she wore all possible golden jewels and a big red bindi on her head showing that she is a Hindu. Well, not bad proposition for a woman to be saved from riots. What say?

Anyway, another thing that impresses me about Chetan is his ability to discuss on god. In the last book as well as this, god came very naturally and in a nice way without any particular religious belief. This impresses me so much because I can see a slight dilema even in JKR. generally in magical books where good and bad come up so easily, god and devils come in the same breath, but JKR has avoided it. Is it her mastery or her cowardice? Well, Chetan did manage it well and that I think is most commendable.

Sunday, June 01, 2008

Movies I like

One can categorize movie watchers into the following groups:

The one who like the Action/ Sci Fi, in short, fast paced movies with no brainer or something so technically advanced that they can get totally immersed and actually love the so called scientific concepts in the movie.

There is another class which likes the Oscar movies with intense drama and deep thought provoking theme.

There is the widest class which like any movie with a great star cast, lots of style, lots of romance angle even if it is action (Spidey 2) and which are generally hit even before they release.


I fall in class 3. But somehow there is sometimes a thin line between category 1 and category 3. An example will be the recent Iron Man or the National Treasure 2. For the same reasons mentioned above, I chose to go for both of these. But I was disappointed.


Or was I? Actually not. I was motivated. Motivated to watch more of “Tanananananaaa… Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham” kind of movies where Shahrukh stammers, Amitabh gives well punctuated but long dialog deliveries and the heroines do a virtual fashion show with Manish Malhotra clothes. Off late, Kabhi khushi kabhi gham has become a benchmark for me. It lies in the critical region below which any movie can become unwatchable. Example: Veer Zaara, KANK, Tara Rum Pum, Aaja Nachle. Movies which barely cross it on the other side will be No Entry, Laaga Chunari mein daag, Om shanti om and even bhootnaath.


Amongst the English ones, I guess such a movie will be “The Departed”. It lies in the better side of the movies but for English movie, the criteria are totally different. There has to be a good story, because if there is no good story, I will again rather watch des ki movie…tanaanaaanaana….with loads of songs and dances.


You might be wondering why “The Departed”, its because it has all the factors I consider important : An A1 star cast, a wonderful story and not so sci fi-ish. However where it fails is the use of swear words. I can understand, to give the true picture, you do need to be realistic, use the language of the people. But then you also have to keep in mind that movie is a mass medium, and however common in lingo, swear words can never be good and should be consciously avoided. A classic example of such a movie will be “Omkara” which had to have some bad words, but they were kept to the minimum required.


Now the interesting comparison. Movies above and below “The Departed”. The ones that are bad : Iron Man, National Treasure 2, Oceans 12, Pirates 3, Beowulf etc etc. Movies better: All HPs ( the best story in the world), Atonement, Oceans 11 and 13, Spidey 2, Lions for lambs, Charlie Wilson’s war etc.


Hehhe, again a post so full of me comes to an end. I know this will end up with no comments. But I can’t stop myself from copying Bachi Karkaria at this stage. Bachi always quotes a certain Alec Smart ( Interestingly, when wikied, Smart Alc refers to a person who is regarded as obnoxiously self-assertive and an impudent person. Anyway, so here we go:


Alec Smart says “ I started enjoying Rajnikanth movies from the day I saw ‘The Transporter’”

Thursday, May 22, 2008

The Scared Blogger

Well I am scared and not just as blogger. The whole freedom of expression definition needs to be changed. This freedom of expression issue started with the M.F. Hussain pictures. Then came Taslima's books. Well, well, we can argue for both sides for hours. Not long before it cooled down, there came the Message by some Gurgaon guy about Sonia Gandhi. Well can you say anything about any person? May be yes, may be not.

For me, it will be this: If the person is not talking directly to me, he/she can say whatever he wants. If saying about me to a person who cares about me, that person should be smart enough to not get angry by some stupid saying something about a person you like. And finally, if the person is saying bad things to me with me, good enough, let's sort it out. No way, you can complain to a court. That too, here the case was scenario 2. I guess, this was just another of those futile attempts to get into the good books of N-G family.
As for me, whenever I tell someone that I am a big fan of Bipasha, they immediately say: " But dude, she is a B****. She had 4 boyfriends in the past". Expecting a angry reply or a defensive statement form me, what they get really shuts them up: " Hey, can you find me a more gorgeous B****?" This really shuts everybody up and then they come up wit meek replies like "Whatever, I don't like her", and I reply "ur wish, I never asked you to. The lesser the better"
I wish the fans of Sonia were as smart as me (eh!!)


The other scary thing happening is Aamir and Amitabh writing. Amitabh is just defending himself from the many many things that have been written about him. His latest style (as of day 34) is scan the newspaper and critique everyline. Do read his defense to Shobhaa Dey for Aishwarya's creased dress in first day at Cannes 08. It goes like this:

" Oh ! About the creases on Aishwarya’s dress, I never noticed any and it is hardly expected of a team of 15 stylists, dress makers and make up professionals from Armani to L’Oreal working on her for hours since the morning of the event, to have overlooked such obvious detail. The protocol at the venue is strict and disciplined. Celebrities are seated in respective special Festival cars to ride in a motorcade almost 50 meters long to a destination just 100 meters away; the crowds, and traffic and paparazzi making this innocuous little journey an hour long ! Sitting on any dress this long would crease.

I am disappointed though that your customary wit failed to notice the creases that needed repair on the faces of many of the other celebrated stars from Hollywood. Whither patriotism ??"

Well well, Amitabhji, you are surely a role model. every bahu will be proud of you. You have redefined Sasur Bahu relationship. Is Ekta listening?

The other thing was Amitabh defending rather denying Aish/Abhi's premarriage temple tours being anything to do with Aish being Mangalik. Well Sir ( as most people call him), you need not defend, infact, it shows rays of hopes to the hundreds of lovers whose stories are not going further because of this issue. Now they really dont care of they have to marry trees et al to get to their loved ones.

Aamir aamir. poor guy, innocent humor turned so costly. I know your fan base is mostly concentrated on a web based so called educated young generation making yours the highest membered community on Orkut and making your movies like RDB and TZP rise to levels it should not. But you know and I know, even a KKKirrran or a "taaanannanana, kabhi khhushie..kabhie gham" kind of hamming can shake u off the chair.

Extending what one of my colleagues commented today on Bush (apparently Bush has a cat called India), what if aamir's dog pees on him? It will be " Shahrukh peed of Aamir."

Lolz...

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Justifying being Bips fan

Haha. Since this seems to be an argumentative topic, the first question that you might ask will be why justify if you truly like her? Well, I don't have the answer except that there will be somme sense of self praise tat will go on in the following paragraphs.

Nobody can deny that you ought to have a favorite movie actress though orkut has not introduced it yet(preferably one in hollywood and one in bollywood). You can definitely like all the heroines but like favorites in anything (sports, politics, travel) you do have favorites in movies too.

My choosing favorite heroines had started long back when I used to say 'fyavrit' for favorite. The first one was hema and then it was Juhi for a long long time and she is still my favorite only that she is doing roles of sisters and middle aged women nowadays. That was followed by Urmila after her famous dances in Rangeela and chamma chamma. I liked her in all the movies but somehow she turned into a similar role witha bhoot types looks with specialization in scenes in which she has to act scared.

After Urmila age which ended in around early 2000's, there was a time when the favorites kept changing and then it settled on Bipasha.

Well, I have to say I am alone in this new choice. My friends not only have other favorites but they really hate her. Many of them tend to go towards the homely looking "Amrita Rao" who simply reminds me of Mallika Sherawat's comment "If you want to see a girl next door, go next door". My friends are predominantly marathis and they like Sonali Bendre a lot, I guess because she has a typical marathi face. The majority though still crave for Aishwarya. Well my point is: It is a fact that she is the most beautiful woman on earth. I think ash can't be somebody's favorite the same way sachin can be nobody's favorite. These two people are beyond comparison.

Well, and that is the starting point of liking Bipasha. You tend to like someone who is hatke. Bipasha is sexy but she is not the usual league of Neha Dhupiya, Amrita Arora and Mallika Sherawats. Bipasha can never be the typical Yash Raj/Karan Johar women like Rani or Preity. She is also not as rare as Chitrangada and nor is she as artistic as Konkona who tends to act more when more money is paid. Well that leaves me with 2 choices: Kareena and Bipasha, and naturally I choose Bipasha.

There is something about her that is so enchanting and inspite of me being a "fairness ka pujari", I just can't take my eyes of her. I also like the way she portrays herself. She takes acting as a profession and does things similar to what we do to improve our resumes. She acts in different kinds of movies to have a hold on all of them. Her voice is the other thing that charms me. It's so different from the rest of the people.

Ok enuf, I just realized that this is the crappiest post am ever writing and the justifications above won't even change the views of a single person. Signing off on a lazy sunday....

Saturday, May 03, 2008

Current Reality Shows on Indian Television

Well, to my defense (or should I), I do follow a few American reality shows like American Idol, So you think you can dance and Hell’s Kitchen, but it is the Indian shows that I like the most. In the past, I have compared the reality based Indian Idol 3 and the most unrealistic show Koffee with Karan.


Today I followed 3 reality shows almost back to back.

Let’s start with “Kya aap paanchvi paas se tez hai”. Copied from “Are you smarter than a fifth grader”, though some liked it YET, I can’t guarantee that I won’t like it later. First thing was the concept was not new to me. Secondly, I expected that Shahrukh will give a totally new dimension to the show, but he was almost enacting his KBC only not sitting in a chair this time. Te children gave it away. Though all of them were selected to be nice smart and cute, it was very apparent that they were trained to act so. I bet even their dialogs were scripted. But the funniest part of the entire show was the first contestant. The lady from Jharsuguda. She looked like she is just out of the “Saas Bahu” serial sets. Her all actions reminded me of Tulsi of KSBKBT (the only show I saw some 10 episodes of). She wore bangles till elbows in both hands and the saari also looked like one from the sets. The way she put hands in the ears and kissed the kids, all looked like copied from the ‘Saas Bahu’ serial. But I guess we cannot blame her. I have seen a few samples before my eyes and this one from TV who have made me believe that the new Indian Housewife, or new indan wife who watces this saas bahu serials try to enact them consciously r subconsciously. So its not the Bipashas, Kareenas and Aishwaryas who are defining styles of modern women but the Kkusums, Gangas and Tulsis.

Moving on to reality show II: MTV roadies 5.0. Well, this is the reason for the YET in capitals in the previous paragraph. Just a few blogs back I had thrashed this show simply because I had seen an unedited version of behind the scenes in the MTV website where they did not censor the swearing. Apparently, they are censored in the main show. The game is all about politics and the ladies bitch a lot. That does add lot of spice to the show. The tasks are not very easy and cover all sorts. It’s the true DARE tasks one may think of in Truth and Dare. They ask them to strip, dance with shaved legs, eat snakes and roaches, sleep with moving saw below, jump form high spots etc. What makes t more exciting that though people do all these tasks, it doesn’t ensure them a chance in next round. That is entirely dependent on the contestants. And I guess the Saas bahu effect has reached me. I can’t leave the show midway.

The third one is the most passionate one. People won’t call it reality show, but I do. The Indian Premiere League or IPL. Since day 1 it has been dramas and they never seem to end. The day the bidding started with Shahrukh, Juhi and Preity falling into cricket business, it got the required entertainment factor. Just when things were beginning to get sporty, Shahrukh came up with Korbo Lorbo Jeetbo re and soon Preity, Akshay, Katrina, Hrithik started singing and dancing for their own teams. Next came the cheer leaders’ episode. I don’t have any views on whether it’s good for the Indian society or not but I have one comment. Either let them as they are, or eliminate them with Bhangra, Koknaki and Lawni dances but please don’t make them wear long clothes and continue the same.

But this is not the end of the drama. To add the sent plot to it, bhajji slaps sreesanth and worse: he starts crying in front of TV. If this was not setup beforehand like all reality shows do, surely the 10 match ban was a setup. Even if that is not, the Ganguly- Warne one has to be one. And the usual spice is there too. Rediff didn’t delay a bit in coming up with stories with the Katrina and Akshay pictures. If that is not enough there is all the hoopla with Priety hugging only the star players. Surely, it is the baap of all reality shows.

Sunday, April 20, 2008

Unaccustomed Earth; A review from a Jhumpa Fan;

There are few people whose opinion I value and I change my adamant stance about my thoughts and views only based on these selected people. One of them told me that Jhumpa writes too much about Bengalis immigrated to US and their lifestyle. I believed and the next day, Jhumpa was out of my orkut community which I have diligently kept to a small number of 13 which identifies my past and my passions.

But still I could not resist the weekend “Unaccustomed Earth” was released. It was released on Friday the 4th April and I bought the book on the 6th from Barnes and Nobles, the counter lady telling me that the book is becoming very popular. Well I didn’t care because something told me, I have to read this. I have this knack of following authors and reading all of their work; so far have finished Jane Austen and Mario Puzo. From the goddess (JKR) and the queen (Jhumpa), I expect many more but I guarantee I will follow all of their works.

Anyway, with an opened mind, I read through the stories. As always, the language so simple yet so elegant made me fly though the stories. Here each story was quite different from the other, all dealing with some form of complicated relationships. The base was still the same though (Immigrant Bengalis) but now it was all about the GENNEXT: The first generation immigrants. Some of the views really opened new windows of thoughts. Once she mentions how the Indian parents always tell about the hardships they faced before coming to the US but never do the children tell about the humiliation they have to go through in the schools for their strange habits of greasy lunch boxes and unfamiliar rituals. The parents do not like when the children fall for a non-Indian partner leaving their parents speechless and heart-broken but did the parents realize that they have done far worse to their parents leaving them 10’s of thousands of miles away?

Another nice part I liked and this has to be personal is the location. All the stories are primarily based in and outskirts of Boston. Cambridge, Wayland, Marlborough, Peabody and even my present place Natick. To all the readers of this blog who know me, please read this book just for the sake of the description of New England, the weather, the people etc. Just yesterday for the first time, I went to one of my family friends place on their anniversary. It was full of Bengali people and pages from Jhumpa’s book just flashed before my eyes. The kids speaking with rolling r’s and not eating the elaborate 7 course meal and instead savoring the cheese pizza. The parents discussing the school they have put the children into, the grading etc. It was just like they were acting on Jhumpa's directions.

But the masterpiece of the book is surely the 3rd part, consisting of three short stories jointly called “Kaushik and Hema”. It can surely be made into another of those movies like The Namesake. And this should be an eye opener for all the people who criticize of her choice of topic. Though the story is still about immigrant Bengalis, it is not about their lifestyle. It’s a story; I feel is ageless and location less too. Infact, still leaving the characters to be Bengali Immigrants, she just proves her literary superiority. The flow of the story so elegant and so different from the other Bookers I read where I spend almost 50% of the book before I get glued to it.

Again, for the readers, who know me personally; if you decide to read this book, let me know. I will be truly happy to gift one copy. (Well, a few don’t have a choice : ) )

Sunday, April 06, 2008

Of birthdays and birthday gifts

Today (In India)/ Tomorrow(here) (i.e. 7th April) is Umesh Bude’s birthday. Happy Birthday Doobs. When I called him, his phone was busy and instead he called me in sometime. This is one of the firsts oh this kind. Generally people (me included) generally don’t give calls to others on their own on the birthday. But it does sound like a good idea. What he explained to me was that there was a brief gap between his calls and he thought of maximizing his efficiency by himself calling up other people. Good Idea Doobs, will surely implement it from next time.

Somehow I have always enjoyed friends birthdays more than my own. Over the top of my head, I remember these few:

1) Mana’s birthdays: They were always fun with me going a bit early to help in the decorations. And Mana always got an amazing number of Sketch Pens as birthday gifts.

2) Sumit’s Birthday: Sumit’s birthday in 2000, the last one before I left home was a fun. It was one of those last get togethers we school people had. We both wore Kurtas instead of usual clothes just to be different and did soil it thoroughly.

3) Doob’s birthdays in college: It was rare that we brought cakes for friends birthdays. I bought one this time. But what I remember that for is that was one of the worst cakes ever. The icing was too sweet and non-soft. The cake was dry too. But we were all so hungry that we finished all.

4) Vikram’s birthday in 2nd year: Vikram likes his birthdays low key. But somehow that day was some function at college open theater and when everybody knew he was thrown his birthyear times in the air and every time it was around 20 feet into the air.

If I try remembering now, I would rate my 2005 birthday as the best because what happened was totally unexpected. And I was actually cribbing that how my past birthdays were and how I am stuck up in such a faraway land this year when suddenly 20+ people come in with a huge cake. And it ended with me in almost zero degree water(that time zero degree as still cold, now its warm). It was certainly the most pleasantly surprised birthdays.

Now coming to gifts. Even though the most popular gifts evolved over the ages, since for some reason I never celebrated my birthdays, I never got any. Till I was 6-7, the traditional gifts were always vessels (tumblers, plates or bowls) wrapped in Magenta color papers and with to and fro names etched on it. Most of the tumblers at my home still have “Tua ke.. xyz”. Still don’t know why there was no “Tublu ke..”

Then times changed and plastic took over steel. The gifts: Pencil Boxes, tiffin boxes (especially the one with spoons with it) and of course The Sketch Pen set. People would get 6-7 sketchpen sets on birthdays but by default, still a month later, you will make your dad go to the store and get another set. Sketchpens are meant for losing.

And then came the time of show-pieces. These were the most nonsense gifts one could think of and added no value but were considered very up class. It was mostly black metal photo frames or Natraj or Ganesh.

Then things changed to perfumes and deos (and this was not so long ago) when somebody told me that these gifts are just meant for girlfriends and boyfriends. So since I have none, that was also out of question.

And at this time, I realized that books are the safest gifts. I have received a “Blandings Castle” every year during my undergrad from dada. When I started gifting people, my favorite was Pride and Prejudice. I have gifted it to atleast 10+ people. Books are still my favorite gift items to be given because its easily available and offers such a variety, that it can often be considered “oh so thoughtful”

The most selfish gift I ever bought was a headphone to enable a friend for voice chatting so that telephone minutes could be saved.

Anyway, can anyone suggest more ideas? To a girl you can give flowers, plants if not books. What do you buy for guys?

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Control system and the present state of nation

Certainly this is something big. Same day in Times of India, there are four columns by Bachi Karkaria, Jug Suraiya, Shashi Tharoor and Taurn Vijay. All lashing out against oust of Taslima Nasreen from India. Apart from the slight Hindu angle by Tarun Vijay (which is expected) all others speak of freedom of expression at different levels.

The root problem is that we are succumbing to a very small group of people. And the reason is obvious. Because this small group of people always vote. (or are they made to vote?) I still remember my mom voted only once and that too because a local party worker provided her and her friends a ride to the polling booth. Well, we so called educated people feel lazy to vote. We need some stimuli which will make us vote. Certainly the poorer classes of the people get those stimuli. They are targeted by the politicians during the run up to elections that their needs will be met. They are the people who attend the mass rallies. We conveniently sit in our couches and listen to the Sagarikas and the Barkhas. Whatever they present to us, we discuss all about it but on the crucial day we chicken out. I have heard during elections, politicians do come door to door to ask for vote. But I have never seen anybody at my door asking my parents to come and vote. Only once did the local municipal leader come and that was the only time Maa voted. Is it the way the politicians treat us or the way we treat the politicians that has made the middle middle class and upper middle class disconnected from politics. Worse still is with India Shining, this middle middle class and upper middle class is increasing. And so we are seeing a growing political disinterest amongst people. And sure enough, politicians are all out to woo the lower middle class and the poor and not in a proper way but the cheap tactics. The result: 60000 Cr loans, Oust of Taslima and many many more. By the way, the tax slabs are such that the lower middle class and lower class doesn’t pay taxes.

What’s the end result? The taxpayers’ money goes towards cheap appeasement and creating vote bank of the non tax payers. It doesn’t need a control system engineer to say that this is an unstable system. It needs a feedback loop (well the control engineer in me says that open loops can be stable too and closed loops can still be unstable).

Well how did this happen? Let’s say that the open loop system was stable and the transient responses (independence, emergency) being over, it was the steady state responses that were taking effect. This system can now go unstable because of some external disturbances. I don’t know the creator of disturbances, but I can see the kind of disturbances. It’s religion. I have been taught all along that all religions are equal and I believed it without even questioning it. And so did everybody. We all thought Sanskrit as an ancient language which defines India. Was it so Hindu? We all learnt shlokas as a part of pur curriculum. So did we learn the stories of Jesus and all the Muslim soofis. We learnt ramayan and mahabharat as stories. I enjoyed the complex characters, the wars and every bit of it. I bet all of my Christian and Muslim friends did too. After all it was a nice story, and the way it was presented was a story and we didn’t sit with flowers and agarbattis in our hands to read these books. So were the stories from old testaments and Akbar and Mughals. It all came to us as a natural course. We never thought of it as religion. But then one day (thankfully after I passed out of school) some moron politician started rethinking the curriculum. They thought Mughal portion is more and it should be otherwise. Well it started with that. The other party came to power and not only vetoed this decision but also made sure that vande Mataram is not sung in schools. Saraswati is a hindu goddess and not the goddess of knowledge. I think soon the Ramayan and mahabharat will be banned from school and our morning prayers, though still will have

“Vatan ke waaste hi jeena, watan ke waaste hi marna”, it won’t have “Sarve bhavantu sukhinah, sarve santu niramayah, sarve bhadrani pashyantu, Ma kashchid dukhbhagbhavet, om shant shanty shantihi”.

Everything we were taught had been dissected. We were not told that Hinduism is a way of living. We just accepted it not as Hinduism but as Indianness. We always liked Christianity not because God is great, but we associated it with God loves children (the pictures showed so) and Christians make cakes which are good to eat. We even had a faint hope of getting fairer. But all that went on in a subconscious level. It is the new age politics which is putting finger in eye and and saying this act is Hindu, this act is muslim and so on. The disturbance made the loop unstable.

The solution? There can be 2 ways: the engineer may want to introduce a feedback loop which will make it stable even against disturbances. But then I guess this loop will be that educationàpolpulation circular loop. Unless we tackle polulation, we can’t educate people, we can’t stop population unless we educate people.

The other solution is cut off the disturbance. After all, its there in Gita:

“Yada yada hi dharmasya ( countrysya) glanirbhavatu bharatah”

“Abhyutthanam adharmasya (bad people) sambhavami yugey yugey” Only this time, it won’t be Kalki, it has to be all of us.

Friday, March 14, 2008

News I am keeping an eye on

Well, yet again, I want to write something but not have anything to write about. So I do the usual, news that I am following nowadays. The comments to the blog have reached an all time low so this post will help me later when I try to think "What was I thinking that time?"

To begin with, the most nonsense piece but which is talked about everywhere but is of least significance I think. US elections. My local friend says US has never withdrawn troops from any country it ever attacked (like even Japan), so no way anybody who comes will have chance to do anything different. The healthcare plan both Obama and Hillary talk about is nonsense. It can never match India's healthcare system where you can afford to go to a doctor even if you sneeze in the morning. And whenever people talk about "First colored President" or "First Woman President", I get reminded of the great president of India who inspite of being the "First woman president of world's largest democracy", fills me with shame. Nobody can deny that she is in noway more talented than our kaamwali bai - Parvatibai Gayakwad.

Next ofcourse is the bloggers favorite: The great 60000 Cr Rs loan waiver to Indian farmers. This topic hurts me lots and I tend to avoid it but so many people constantly writing about it leaves me with no choice but to read. My Take: This may be a bad step, but which govt hasnot done something this foolish before the elections?


Getting on to better topics, IPL. The money game. It cannot be anything other than that. Right now, none of my firnds seem to be too much interested in that but soon they will be. And we will have to choose a team. But I will be waiting for more teams that are planned for future. I will wait for Nagpur team. Let's see when the "Nagpur Narangis" are ready to rock.

WLIFW or Wills LifeStyle India Fashion Week. Offlate it seems that this event is not a yearly but a quarterly event. And ofcourse none of the clothes they have makes any sense to me. But then the best part of every IFW is Bipasha's commitment to fashion industry. She always comes and wears some funny clothes and surely there is John to cheer her up and rediff and Hindol Sengupta of IBNLIVE to cover the news.

Aamir Khan blogs. They have been a news item in themselves as I have seen Times of India and Rediff making news articles out of his blogs. It's utterly funny because Aamir's blog are so amateurish. I guess he doesn't know anything about blogging but still I bet his blogs are most read and most commented (May be in the world)

And ofcourse the evergreen Bipasha Basu. Well, she is never out of news and if Google News is to be believed, she makes it to some news on Times Of India everyday. After her disastrous Dhan Dhana dhan goal, and the splitting and making up stories with John, latest she is in news for her "Classic Bob Cut" and her saucy role in Race. Well, but the funniest of all that was Bipasha saying she doesn't like makeup ( I can't find the link where I read this). And here is the news I just read today. This news is surely written for the visually impaired:

"Bipasha showed her curves in a jersey knit black halter top with a revealing neckline and a short tube skirt. Her top was accented with a satin bow at the center of the V-neckline.

She wore two necklaces with lovely pendants in silver tone and a black wide bracelet in her right arm.

Bipasha's newly acquired bob cut is still in place and continues to look great on her. It compliments her facial cut and gives her an air of confidence."

Well that's all I follow. Thanks rediff, for my complimenting my interests. :)

Monday, February 18, 2008

Obscenities and Moral Policing

I am against both moral policing and the obscenities in public. But when I try to analyze it, I myself stand confused. Let me do a self introspection and writing always helps.

What motivated me to write this article is the latest post by Rashmi Bansal. She writes about MTV roadies and channel V hotties. What she wrote and what videos I saw when I did a bit of background check was shocking. They are so narrow-minded; they have just concentrated on the college kids and the fresh out of college generation. I myself don’t swear in common day to day dialogues, but I know it’s pretty natural and I do accept it from others. But it is entirely different if these come on national telecast and that too without beeps. I just saw a video about behind the scenes roadies and the profane obscenities totally shook me. Asking people to roam around in undergarments in a 7 pm show is not really acceptable.

Another thing I dislike more is swear words in public. I know it’s close to reality, but there should be some scale. I didn’t like “Departed” in spite of it being a nice movie is just because though I tried hard, I could not justify the F word in every 10 seconds. In the Indian context, obscenities strike me even more. I can accept if these kinds of shows (Hotties / Roadies) are reserved for after 11, or some other channel. Or even if parents just take care that the child is not watching these. But I myself has once seen that a small kid and his father both watching “Kaanta lagaa” and enjoying it.

Am I being Shiv Senaish? May be. But I still don’t support Sushma Swaraj’s act to ban Fashion TV. Banning is not a solution. But definitely, the parents should be responsible. But who will do that?

And doesn’t this contradict with the fact that I like Bipasha Basu? I definitely wouldn’t have liked Jism to be a movie where whenever John and Bipasha come, they show two flowers.

I guess it is just the beginning phases of a developing nation. In a developed nation, all things are available. But because the people are educated, they themselves can differentiate between right and wrong and take care of their children. On the other hand, in India, the content has come but people are not smart enough to take it wisely. I guess, with time things will settle. Let’s just pass this trend as momentary.

Side Note: Off late, I realize that most of my posts end up in a solution where people have to be more knowledgable and wise? Is this a practical solution? And is it achievable, If so, how?