Sandipan Bollywood Awards 2009

The Sandipan Bollywood Awards (SBA) is in it's fourth year now. This highly biased award however changes its statuette this year for obvious reasons. Also, Bipasha Basu is conspicuous by her absence.

I will try my best to stick to the old list, but some would be staying undecided and some new ones will be introduced.

Best Story: The award goes to 2 movies. Incidentally, both the stories are supposedly written by 2 different famous authors in their own field. However, the directors interpretation of the story was what made it beautiful. Hence the best Story awards goes to Raju Hirani and Anurag Kashyap instead of Chetan Bhagat and Sarat Chandra Chattopaddhyay for 3 Idiots and DevD.

Best Song: For me, it is Masakkali

Best Music Director: Who else but --- A.R Rehman for Dilli 6. The only other movie with decent songs was Kaminey.

Best Singer(Male) : Mohit Chauhan for "Pehli Baar.. Mohabbai ki hai"

Best Singer (Female): This award has to wait. All the songs I remember are all male singers. Tentatively, the award goes to my favorite Alisha Chinoy for being the female voice in the duet "Teraa... hone laga hoon" from Ajab prem ki Gajab Kahani.

Best Lyrics : Gulzaar again for "Pehli Baar.. Mohabbai ki hai". Esp the lines

Tujhe gudgudana… satana yuhi sote hue,
Gaal pe teepna… meechna bewajah besabab.

These lines always gives me shivers.

Best television interview: There was a lot of potential this year with the Indian Elections and there have been so many interviews of Sachin when he completed 20 years in cricket. However, I probably missed most of those. For me, the best one was Sourav's interview in Farhan Akhtar's Oye It's friday.

Best Item Song: Hands down, Hrithik for Baawre in Luck by Chance.

Here is a new award:

Best reality show Contestant: Nominations: Natasha Sinha (Roadies 6), Joanna Magee (Splitsvilla 2), Mona Wasu (Iss jungle se Mujhe Bachao 1), Rupali Ganguly (Fear Factor 2) and Claudia Ciesla (Bigg Boss 3). And the award goes to.... Claudia for her sweet pronunciation of Kyunki as kuykin.

And now the main awards:

Best Comedian: Rather than giving it to some cliched comedian, it goes to the actor who made us laugh the most, even with the stale jokes: Aamir Khan for 3 Idiots.

Best Supporting Actor: R. Madhavan and Sherman Joshi for 3 Idiots

Best Supporting Actress: Giselle Monteiro as Harleen Kaur in Love Aaj kal

Best Villain: Amol Gupte as Bhope Bhau in Kaminey

Best Newcomer (male): No idea. No award this year.

Best Newcomer (Female) : Again tough choice. So no awards but a special mention to Sonam Kapoor who re-invented her this year.

Best Director: Vishal Bharadwaj for Kaminey.

Best Film: Though the biggest hit was 3 Idiots, my award goes with Kaminey. The movie had it all, good script, good acting, good songs as well as a fresh change. 3 idiots lacked in songs.

Best Actress: The nominations are: Sonam Kapoor (Dilli 6), Priyanka Chopra (Kaminey), Priyanka Chopra (What's your Rashee), Vidya Balan (Paa). And the award goes to.... Priyanka Chopra for What's Your Rashee. The the movie bombed, her performance was really commendable. It was historical.

Best Actor: The nominations are: John Abraham (New York), Shahid Kapoor (Kaminey), Ranbir Kapoor ( Wake up Sid and Rocket Singh: Salesman of the year), Aamir khan (3 Idiots). And the award goes to.... Shahid Kapoor for Kaminey (woh fa ko fa hi bolta hai)

And now, another new award just for this year:

Best Cameo: And the award goes to one and only Shahrukh Khan for his role in Billu Barber. Especially the end speech in the school was personally Shahrukh Khan at his best.

Deep down, I am a bong

I just realized how Bong I am when I was discussing with Nirmal about Racist attacks on Indians in Australia. We both agreed on this statement of Shobhaa De, found here:

Both the governments should work together more cohesively, and the Australians in particular must reassure the community that the safety of students is of paramount importance to them. Our student numbers contribute a sizeable chunk to the Aussie economy. Their lives must be protected and their status respected. On our part, desi students cannot treat the host country as their filthy backyard and abuse local customs.

What Nirmal said was if you are doing illegal work there, you should be ready to face the consequences like these attacks. In reply, I said that, how-much-ever illegal it is, physical violence is not the way to show your displeasure. You should do strikes, road blockades, marches, candle light vigils and what not.

It looks like the word fell off from some Trinamool Congress 101 course. But yes, I do think that is the way things should work, though in the reverse order of the actions stated above. Well, I think that is the attitude of all Bongs. We want a peaceful solution with no physical harm, however monetary/public annoyance it may create. First and foremost priority is to be physically safe. I think that is the key to Kolkata not being a place of any Violence inspite such a large ratio of muslims and hindus.

Take a few examples. What is MNS doing? It is beating up people and sending them home whoever it feels unfit. Though we all agree it is not right, we have different opinions on what is right. My view is that if I feel endangered by foreign entities in my state, I should take it to the law. I should file a case to the court that I feel threatened in my own land by outsiders and I am not feeling secure. As law takes its own course, the next most daring thing I can think of is a protest march. What will a typical bong do? He will probably think the same as me, but then as we all know how slow law is, it would just end up being a coffee table discussion that look how Marwaris have virtually taken up all our businesses. (Well that's what is happening, though I have heard slight dissatisfaction over Marwaris taking up local businesses, I have not seen any efforts from Bengalis to be entrepreneurs. Exceptions exist).

Jayalalitha does not like something and she sends troops inside Karunanidhi's house at the dead of the night who drag him to jail. What will Mamatadi do? She will stand in the middle of Esplanade, block two hours of traffic in the middle of the day and give speeches as to how bad Budhdhababu is.

Well, I think this is the way I am and all the Bongs are. I believe in a ideal society. In this society, a candle vigil will be taken as seriously as probably the Gujarat riots. There would be reason behind everything and everybody would be well educated. As all are educated, crimes would be momentary reactions and would be corrected by a term in jail. There would be no forced confessions by the police or no crime should result in capital punishments.

Don't all the Bongs think this way? Wasn't Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose a fluke case amongst Bengalis and Gandhiji more a symbol of Bong ideologies?

Bests of 2009

This is probably the last but one post for this year. For the annual Bollywood awards, you have to wait for the next year as I think it will be injustice to pass any verdict before watching 3 Idiots. Here are some random bests according to me:

Best blogger:
Shobhaa De

Best website:
www.bing.com (Strictly for homepage looks)

Best news website:
in.rediff.com (Content not layout)

Best looks amongst Indian movie leading actresses
Sonam Kapoor


Best Talk show:
Oye it's friday

Best Indian food place where I went:
Kabab factory

Best cloth shop for my budget:
Old Navy

Best Indian Sportsperson:
Saina Nehwal

Best news correspondent:
Shekhar Gupta

Best food place near Natick Framingham:
Minado

Best book I read:
Sea of Poppies (originally 2008)

Best food I cooked:
Palak Paneer in August


Best Indian Politician:
Shashi Tharoor

Best (non personal) day of the year:
15th July 2009 (Harry Potter and Half blood Prince movie release date)

I stop at that.

Feasts

How old are feasts? Probably as old as the oldest of the civilizations. We have proofs of feasts being held in Egyptian civilization. We all know about the lavish feasts in the roman empire and the famous last supper was also a feast.

I read through numerous definitions of feasts, banquets etc but for simplicity let’s call any elaborate food arrangement as feast. I will try to list down the famous “feasts” that sort of etched into my memory.

Let’s start with the recent one, the White House State dinner. The menu was hilarious and I am sure, if this menu was served in any Bengali wedding, even the poorest of the poor weddings, the results would have been even more catastrophic than Tata Nano going out of Singur. Potato and Eggplant Salad, Potato Dumplings, Lentil Soup, Chickpeas and Okra and Green Shrimp curry. Probably the food tasted exquisite, but the menu is so disturbing. I am sure the Indian delegate would have gone back and had some Tangdi kabab and palak paneer.

The menu at Windsor Castle Banquet for Pratibha Patil was much better which included halibut, salted saddle of lamb and stuffed courgettes with mango ice cream, washed down by Chateau Cos d'Estournel, St Estephe 1988.

Another one I remember was for its fantastic menu. It was the Global Bunts Convention held in Mangalore in 2002 or 2003. Aishwarya Rai was the chief guest and the menu was all possible seafood delicacies cooked in traditional Udupi Style. It involved Mackerel, pomfrets and Bangdas. I am not able to recollect the entire menu but it was available in the Hindu and Times of India of that day.

One more was Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s holiday in Goa in December 2002. Here is the link. The menu included: “Choice dishes were on offer for dinner: traditional Goan Hindu, Catholic and Portuguese specialities will be offered. The array of seafood includes lobster piri piri, mudoshi (a type of fish) fry, sungtyache kodi (prawn curry), kulliamchem mass (crab meat) in addition to popular preparations like balchao, xacutti, vindaloo and cafrael. Vegetables typical of the region — tambdi bhaji and ambadyache udda methi and nir phanas (bread fruit) — will be served. Chinese and Mediterranean cuisine will also be offered. “

These are the ones that I will remember for a long long time.

Kalkatta

This quote of Bachi Karkaria provoked me to write this blog:

"In different applications it is ‘o’ or ‘aw’. ‘Kolkata’ is subjected to such verbal mutilation that it should Black Hole those who ordered the change. Or perhaps the Brahmins of Writers Building did it deliberately so as to perpetuate the cultural caste system which separates those who can ‘o’ correctly, and those who can only gape in awe."

Full text here.

Well, there are people who liked the name Calcutta and it was always called "Kolkata" (pronounced as Coal-Kata) for the Bengalis just like Bombay was always Mumbai and Poona was Pune. But my favorite has been "Kalkatta" (pronounced as Kul-cutta)", the hindi version. It is so sweet, just like the staple food of the people of this city.

Every year, after summer vacation when I come back, teachers would ask, Kahan gaye the (Where did you go)? And I would reply "Kalkatta". One of the first hindi rhymes I learned was:

Aao Bhai Khele Khel, Chalti hai ab apni rail,
Hum Engine hai bhak bhak karte, hum dibbe hai chak chak karte...
.. and somewhere in the middle...
Jhatpat Kalkatta ho aaye.....

Imagining saying "Jhatpat Kolkata ho aaye" gives me shivers even now.
Another instance is the iconic song Chamma Chamma. Starring my one of the favorite Bollywood actresses, it has a stanza -

Hila doon UP, hila doon MP
Jo maaroon main thumka
Tere thumke pe haan Mumbai Patna
Main haaroon Kalkatta

Again replacing it with "Kolkata" will take the whole fun out of the song. It is like replacing Urmila with Raima Sen.

The word "Kalkatta" has this sweet raw crassness which is totally missing in Kolkata and especially the way rest of India attempts to say it : Call-katta. "Kalkatta" brings back the lost charm of the city. Kalkatta brings back the time when the Hindi Heartland (Delhi-UP-Bihar-MP-WB) was "The India" and this so called new IT cities like Bangalore, Hydra-bad, Pune though always good cities were never the talk of the country. Dilli - Lakhnau - Kanpur- Ilahabaad - Kalkatta were the the places where things of any consequence "happened".

The cosmopolitan Calcutta was never due to foreign countries or even southern/western India. It was always a place of confluence for the North, East and North-east India. For them it was always "Kalkatta". Making it Kolkata robs out the cosmopolitan part of the city.

For "probashi"'s like me, Kalkatta was the way we described the city to our friends all these years. Mentioning it as Kolkata or even worse, letting them pronounce it as "Call-Katta" is I believe a big Black Hole.

A "sort of" confession

I have a small confession to make here, though it will come with a lot of justification. First of all, I am very honored by my name appearing in my school website honor roll. Have a look here: http://kvambajhari.org/results.htm. Search for keyword “Mitra”.

My name appears in the list of toppers for 12th standard, though it appears as Saneepan with a missing D. The confession is, I was not the topper. It was my classmate Chandrashekhar Munjewar. But my confession ends here. As of my present mindset, I am not going to write to my school to change my name and the justification is as follows:

Though official records say that I did not get the highest marks, the thing that was always important in Maharashtra was the PCM or Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics marks. I did get the highest there. So there were a lot of people who consider me as the topper and I would like to believe the same too.

The other reason is: I believe the appearance of the name in the webpage is partly accounted for by my school teachers themselves who like me a lot. The reason for this belief is how my name is spelt. My dad, like most of the Bengalis, misspelled my name to Sandipan instead of Sandeepan. The teachers over the 10 years had themselves corrected the name only to change it back to Sandipan in 10th standard because they wanted it to be inline with what my dad wrote 10 years back. So when my name appears as Saneepan in the website, I feel it’s some teacher who said lets put Sandeepan’s name there and not some advanced database query to find out who was first.

The third reason is more selfish. I have been in the school for 12 years and had a consistent academic performance, a teachers pet etc etc. Not as an allrounder, but I was always regarded as the “smart” (the US smart, not the Indian smart) guy. So, I deserve my name there.

Bottom line is I wrote this blog as I feel I am cheating myself if I don’t let people know the truth and now that I have published it on my blog, I will feel less guilty conscious . Whoever is reading this please let me know if you think I did the right thing or not. I know I am not popular enough like Amitabh Bachchan to have a poll in my blog, but comments would be really helpful.

Diary Sept 19 09

Been long since I wrote anything random. It has always been issue based. Of course my life is not interesting as Amitabh Bachchan or Shilpa Shetty that I can simply blog about what I ate in the day or whom did I meet. Who will even remmotely find that interesting apart from who know me. Well, on the other hand it's only the people who know me generally read this blog.

After a long time I had a good Saturday. I neither worked nor go to any place and got myself unnecessarily tired. Most important thing for me on weekends is getting up early (but little later than regular days) to maximize the day. I am a person who gets lazy by night.

I finished my intersting pattern of browsing which starts with Gmail, then orkut, then rediff.com followed by ibnlive and timesofindia. At this point, fed up, I switch to news.google adn read up all the headlines of India, US, Boston and Indian Entertainment. I ofcourse get most interested in teh entertainment section. At this point, I will search Bipasha on google news. MOst of the time I am up to date and find the news being already late. Then if I will serach some other random names depending on mood which can vary from Aishwarya Rai to atal Behari Vajpayee. Some common search terms are Varun Gandhi, NITK, Surathkal, Kolkata etc.

After this I had to drop my friend to car mechanic shop and from there we went for a morning walk near a lake. It was hilarious to see an old couple paying 5$ parking fees inside the state park and simply parking their car next to the lake and reading newspaper inside.

Then we went to Starbucks or rather Starsucks (atleast in terms of regular coffee), barnes and nobles and back home by 9:30 am. at this point my calls started starting with bro and bhabhi and moving on to other friends from grad school etc.

Went to a nice place for lunch called Kabab Factory in Boston. Still in the "no meat" mode, I just ate grilled veggies, fruit chat and shrimp masala. Came back and saw Harry Potter and Goblet of Fire on DVD. I had just finished the book and though very different from the book, the movie was pretty engaging.

After this went to temple as navaratri starts today and came back, made a few more phone calls and little more Harry Potter revision. Now it's 10:42 and will go back to revising HP and sleeping off.

This blog can't be as boring as my attempt to fiction :P

Dilemmas regarding Baba Ramdev cleared

I have been wanting to write on this topic for a long time but many thoughts prevented me. I wanted to have a solid reasoning before I published my thoughts and finally I have found one.

So here is the dilemma. My mom wants me to do the yoga taught by Ramdev baba and frankly, my mom has been a direct beneficiary. But I always found the exercises too boring for my taste. Then comes Ramdev Baba with his statement that being gay is a disease which can be cured by yoga. Now this was a fact that like most of the "learned" people did not go well with me. So then I thought because I do not agree with his views, I am perfectly alright by not following his yoga techniques. But there was always this nagging thought which can infact broken down to three:

1) Ramdev baba did not invent yoga. So why stop something which is an established science just because of one person's personal views.
2) Every person has the right to have an opinion. What is wrong if Ramdev baba has one and he is voicing it.
3) What if being gay is really a disease and/or something which can be cured.

Finally I have found my answers to all these three nagging questions. Let me go bottom up.

Counterargument to point 3) Though studies prove it as well that it is not a disease, and it may very well be a habit which is cured, but who cares. According to Indian culture/ movies, we consider love as a disease (sardi, khasi na maleria hua, main gaya yaaron mujhko, love, love love loveria hua). Can love be cured? Probably yes, probably not but who cares. It has all the symptoms of a disease if taken in a different light. At young age, it may ruin your career. Loving a wrong person may ruin your finances, your trust, your very existence in this world. Being gay may have similar consequences. But as we do not mind love being a disease, this one should also not a big deal.

Counterargument to point 2) I have been reading a lot about this issue. A blog from my friend Lalit, Gay Ho, and subsequent comments on it helped me better regarding this. Finally I read an argument as a comment on this article which is as follows:

Ramdev baba has said that being gay is a disease and he has challenged Delhi high court's judgment which says that gay sex should be decriminalized. I add these two statements. What does this imply? That Baba Ramdev thinks that all diseased people should go to jail. Is it human to put say all AIDS patients, cancer patients and the numerous millions of people in the jail just because they have a disease? This is against humanity. You may find this argument ridiculous and may say that this is putting words in somebody's mouth but then a public person should think twice before what he speaks. Like in this case his own statements lead to the conclusion that he wants diseased people to be criminalized.

Counterargument to point 1) If not already, after reading this reasoning, you might think that Sandipan is losing it by putting baseless reasons but then counterargument to 1 is the one which really has motivated me the most. I will not follow Ramdev baba's yoga but Shilpa Shetty's yoga. Two main reasons for that. Firstly, biggest motivation to do yoga for me was to reduce tummy. Ramdev baba being such a proponent of yoga, still has a tinge of tummy which I see no chance of going. Shilpa on the other hand is on diametrically opposite side of the spectrum. She has got the best abs in India. I know, abs is probably the last thing that comes to somebody's mind when someone thinks of a beautiful girl, but I find Shilpa's abs to be her best asset. Second reason is that the most irritating part for me in Ramdev baba's yoga is Kapaalbhati. Apparently, you have to do minimum of 5 minutes (300 times) going up to 15 minutes. On the other hand Shilpa suggests begin with 1-5 with no more than 3x10. You should totally see Shilpa's yoga. Search these keywords "shilpa shetty yoga" on youtube and you will get many relevant results. Even the idea of breathing-in n Kerala and breathing-out in Himalayas as her videos suggest should be enough to motivate anyone.


So this is the final conclusion and end to my dilemmas. I will do yoga but not the Ramdev Baba way, but the Shilpa way.

[Picture courtesy Bollywoodnet.blogspot.com and Rediff]

Was detention of Shahrukh Khan right thing?

Ok, I am a big time Shahrukh fan. I got up at 3:30 am tonight after having a nightmare as aftereffects of the movie 'Kaminey'. I browse as usual and go through the news that Shahrukh was detained at Newark Airport. I was terribly upset and shaken. I could not sleep after that.

Now after almost 16 hours after the story, having read a few 'counter' stories, I am at peace. So here is what I would have done if I were the person in charge of taking Shahrukh Khan to the detention room. Ok let's generalize this. Because even Shahrukh says he does not feel bad because of just himself but the room full of people who were mostly from a particular community. Here we go: (My monologue, thoughts in brackets)

Hello Sir, we have to hold you off for additional checks. Please do not panic sir, we will make sure you will be able to get to your connecting flight if any. We would like you to enjoy your stay in this country and make it as comfortable as we can.

Let me be frank, yes sir, as you might be thinking right now, you are being held because of your name. As you know Sir, we are a bit panicky country (tell exact reasons why you are doing even if it shows you in a slightly weaker position. Nobody becomes small by bowing before others). We took strong actions an entire nation because they destroyed our own WTC. But there is a good side to it as well Sir, as you can see, nobody has even dared a second attack. (On the other hand, there are some countries which encounter repeated terrorism, still get used to it, have such nice culture of equality which an outsider doesn't even realize). This is because of our security system sir, I hope and I know, you will understand as you come from such an educated nation.

(Saying this, take him to a room which should put the Lake palace Udaipur's presidential suite to shame, escort him to a seat, serve him snacks and drinks). Sir, to make this check shorter, can you just name somebody whom you are coming to in US so that we can call them and confirm? Here, take this i-phone. (A person comes to any other country for 2 reasons, he knows someone and has some purpose of visit, in which case he should have a contact address, or he is a tourist, in which case one can show their whole itinerary of stay or atleast the initial hotel. If found suspicious, one can always spy him)( So, now Shahrukh/any person makes the call, connect me and that person and we do a basic check. )

Thank you sir, I really appreciate your patience personally and on the behalf of my country. I hope you enjoy your stay in this country. Also, here is a feedback form and if you have any concerns and how we can improve this process, please let us know.

(Note that this entire process should take a max of 10-15 minutes per person with a staff size big enough to handle each and every person separately so that no one has to wait more than 30 seconds. After all, this is also an opportunity for job creation.)

This day that year

Today is 11th of August 2009. I can really go back to any year, say 2005, when I first entered this country or 1975, I was not even born but mom and dad got married. But let’s just go by 10 years. I will recollect what a typical day would have been back then.


11th August 1999, I was in 12th Standard: very important year for anyone. By this time, as it was August, I assume all the tuition classes would have been over, except Chemistry which the teacher (Kakulididi) insisted that she would not rush through.

I was a fairly early riser. So I would have got up at 6 sharp. Morning 6-8 was School study time, as the other time, I would supposedly prepare for IIT entrance. Not sure now why I did that so much. I never liked cracking all those uselessly difficult problems, but still had to do it. So I found the non IIT morning time more enjoyable. I studied Physics or Chemistry for the first hour and probably Biology from 7 to 8. Next I will iron my school uniform, go for a bath and get ready for school. Then, switch on Sony TV from 8:30 to 9 and would have breakfast and watch one of those dubbed English kids serials like Different strokes or Dennis the Menace.

Though my house was hardly 50 yards away from the school, I would still reach school 5 minutes before start. As I was the captain of my house “Nirbhik”, I would have to go through the checklist for morning assembly if it’s my house on duty. Somebody is saying the pledge- check, news –check! Oops we forgot the “though for the day”. Hurriedly, we would find some nice thought in some newspaper, attribute it to either Gandhiji or Plato or Martin Luther King and give it to any random person to deliver. I liked being backstage.

Let’s skip to the classes. Period no. 2 teacher is absent, so both classes will be done by Radha madam for physics. As soon as she leaves after grueling 1 hour 10 minutes, we will swarm on tiffin boxes. First to be opened was always Anuradha’s tiffin box. She would always bring something with potato and thus getting the nickname Aaloo herself. Next would probably be mine, or Sumit’s or Aprajita’s tiffin. By the time we (here, we = 30+ people) reach 5th or 6th tiffin, Maths teacher Ajay Pandya sir will come over. It was always fun as it was a refresher to whatever we already learnt in the coaching class but Pandya sir always had something new to add to our knowledge. Like this, 2 more classes would go one after the other until it is lunch time. This was the time we did dadagiri on the entire school being the seniormost. We would roam around the entire school, listen to complaints like “Bhaiya bhaiya, they took our wickets away”, or the 1st and 2nd grade ones will say “ Bhaiya, he ate 3 pieces of apple from my tiffin box.” Soon after, we will resume classes or some lab. Labs were fun too.

By default, one of the classes would be off that day. This time was spent in variety of activities. Either go out and play, or play indoor round robin table tennis with a normal ball on teacher’s table or sometimes, just play Antakshari (Again 30 people divided into groups of 15). Finally classes will get over at 3:30, but it would be another 15-30 minutes to reach home as we would chat all the time.

Eat food at home, do the tuition and school homework till 5. Oh yes, MTV will start from 4 with some show with VJ Nikhil Chinappa. Strange, Nikhil still is the VJ for MTV, and we thought MTV was always youth. At 5, I would just close all the books to watch “MTV most wanted” by VJ Shehnaz. This was my favorite time of the day. It will be the same usual songs –“My heart will go on”, “Am a Barbie girl” or “Show me the meaning of being lonely” or sometimes a bit different “Animal Song”. Anyway, 45 minutes to the show, I would leave for Chemistry Tuition. The class was long, 1 hr 45 minutes with a 10 minute break. But no doubt it was fun. Again, another half an hour gone after the tuition in chatting.

Come back at around 8:15, only to study for another continuous 2 hours. Dinner was usually served at 10:15. This time was reserved for the “IIT Exam” studies, hence most grueling and least attractive. At 10:15 sharp, me, mom and dad will have dinner together and it was always so nice. Little did I know then that in a year’s time I would stop eating mom cooked food? It was only in May 09 that she came here and I could again eat what she cooked.


Ok back to Dinner table of 99. Would finish the food in 10 minutes to go and start the TV again. This time, the Bengali channel DD7. It was movie time. Ideally I am supposed to resume my studies but then the movie would be one of the Bengali classics which mom and dad would not want me to miss and I would leave menial studies for better knowledge of my cultural roots.


Things have changed now. Probably for better. Wish I continue to blog even in 2019. And I will write about this day. A day spent in work, high school musical 1, iss jungle se mujhe bachao and writing a blog.

Deepika Padukone’s accent

I saw Love Aajkal yesterday. It is a good one time watch. But the thing I got hooked to is Deepika’s accent. It’s not rare for me to get hooked to some weird characteristics of leading ladies though. I like Bipasha’s slight squint, Rani’s husky voice, Katrina’s faulty hindi, Shilpa Shetty’s abs.

But Deepika’s accent is very mysterious. I still don’t understand which part is it from? My initial hunch and Nikhil confirms that it is the Hindi spoken in Marathi cities, but not Nagpur Pune or Mumbai. But then she was brought up in Bangalore and her origins are from Mangalore. She doesn’t have the typical south Indian accent also. The other strange thing is, it is such a slight accent as it cannot be categorized, it cannot be corrected or somebody can point out the mistakes. It is very subtle. I googled it and thought that it will lead me to something, but I found no such article. If anyone has any ideas, please let me know. One cannot even copy and make fun of the accent. I wish I could.

Whatever is the case, Deepika is surely the kind who is horse of long race “lambi race ka ghoda”. She is here to stay and not vanish like the zillions of newcomers. Whenever I think of her, a funny incident comes to my mind:

Me, and my 19 year old cousin, 14 year old and 7 year old nephews were playing 20 questions or what is also known as Tom Dick and Harry where you have to identify the name of a person asking only 20 yes no questions. We all knew about the limited knowledge of the 7 year old. After all, you really do not expect much from him. So his turn was after me and hence he used to think in the same lines as I do. My first character was J.K Rowling. My little friends made to it after almost 25-30 questions but that is fine. Next, is this nephew’s turn. Now we all know he knows only 1 litterateur. So the first question we ask him is “Rabindranath Tagore”? And he says yes . Next I choose a bit less complicated and I choose Madhuri Dixit. So when it’s his turn, we directly tell him, “ Is it Deepika Padukone?” He just knows only one actress :D

Another proof is my friend’s quote: All kingfisher air hostesses are like Deepika Padukone. It’s like she has become the epitome of beauty. These just prove Deepika’s growing fan following. A sex symbol can never be the most popular actor; they do not become popular amongst kids. True popularity comes if someone is acceptable to all generations. So, Deepika! way to go.

Security at Indian Airports

The security at Indian airports is under a renewed limelight after the Kalam fiasco. We will come to that later, but here are a few facts that I have observed at Kolkata/Bangalore/Nagpur/ Bhubaneswar airports.

They do not let anybody other than passengers inside the airport gates. Thus the entire episode of seeing off somebody from the airport becomes a very nasty affair where you just park you car, with all your relatives in it, get off and go inside the airport with no chance of looking back. It’s inside an opaque glass building. (Another question, why make it glass if it is opaque). This is so not the Indian culture where this will be an entire one week worth of Soap opera material. On the other hand, you can really hold hands till the train leaves the platform, may be even run besides the tracks for a while at any Indian Railways platform. No wonder, movies never show "bidai" from an airport.

I don’t know who decides these policies and are probably happy that this is so strict. Apparently this action was taken keeping into view the security threats. But now read on to see how you have to go inside the airport. Show a stupid printout of any ticket with your name and date on it (even a standard 4 student can take an e-ticket, paste it in MS Word, replace the name and get a printout). With this, they watch your ID. Sounds good, but they even accept voters ID. Haha, even I cannot recognize my face in my Voters ID and I showed my voters ID which is in Kannada at Kolkata, Nagpur and Bhubaneswar airports. We have to agree that our airport security people are really smart.

Even if we assume that it was an ok check, listen to this. I had my friend with me. Seeing that she is a girl, and that she was with me and had some printout in her hand, they let her in without any check. "Naari ka samman karo" I guess.

Inside is even funnier. You do not remove anything from your body, not even the metallic belt or the wallet full of coins. The super intelligent gate is probably filtering this out from other metallic objects which you may carry. All you take out is your mobile. Looks like bombs can only be in mobiles. Then they do an embarrassing check with that detector like thing in their hand. (You keep your wallet out at this point, so effectively never checking it). And whoa you are secure.

Let’s concentrate on the women’s line. They do not even take of their handbags (and we all know that there is nothing in the world that is not there in the handbag of a woman) and calmly walk through a curtained alley with no checks. Doesn’t matter how much jewelleries one is wearing, it never beeps. Frisking a woman or asking her to take off her jewels is against the culture probably.

I sincerely hope that this is just the eyewash and may be unnoticeable to us, they are actually monitoring us, with x-ray cameras etc. Atleast I would like to believe so. Otherwise what this means is that our security guards are the smartest people on earth who can identify people from their faces and actions and take suitable action. I can even imagine a conversation amongst fellow security men:
“You know, that guy is a great security guard, he could look at that person from a distance and guess what kind of man he is. I once remember he caught a man randomly and got 4 kilos of marijuana from him. He should get Padmashri”

Come on, typecasting people has always been a practice in India, either it be w.r.t. the clothes they are wearing, the caste they belong and even the shade of brown they are (I practice the last one myself), but security should not be typecasting.

So now, coming to the issue of Kalam, with the above argument, it should follow that Frisking of Kalam should not be a big issue. If everybody has to do that, he can also do it. Moreover, if he really did not want it, he could have chosen national carrier rather than a US private company aircraft. May be Kalam does not even want this to be an issue. May be he finds this media hype unnecessary.

But there is another side. If there is a law of land, it has to be abided. You can protest against it in court, in peaceful marches but certainly not go against it. If it is a law that ex presidents should not be checked at airports, everybody should abide it. Even though this law includes a man called Robert Vadra whose only qualification is Husband of daughter of a dead ex-prime-minister. We can discuss about changing the law, but certainly not take it for granted that for greater good of humanity, we will let a corporation tamper with the law of land.

For the same reasons, I like the fact that internet will be banned (or rather some part) in China and corporations have to abide by it. It is a blatant violation of human rights. I will be the first in any procession against it, but if China has passed it as a law, corporations should adhere to it. Google or Continental can never be bigger than China or India or for that matter even the poorest country in the world.

Company taking on policies of a country is a dangerous trend and should be avoided at all costs.

Some really useless news items

On the same day I came across three very funny articles. They really define the present day Indian media. The worst part is the source of the articles. As I go through each of them, I will elaborate how I came across them.

1) An exclusive account of what happened at Karan Johar birthday bash : Just look at the way they present the article. It is as if some red carpet is going on at Kodak Theater. But definitely the best line goes to:

"The awesome foursome, AbhiAsh and SRK-Gauri left in one car with K Jo. Gauri was seen sitting on Chota B's lap. So sad the photogs didn't capture this classic moment on cameras."

To be honest, I was the one who googled Karan Johar birthday but the intent was just to bug my friends with some gossip page 3 news.

2) Varun, Rahul greet their aunts: This is another useless article. Who really cares about who Rahul and Varun say hello to in the Parliament. And isn't it natural for everybody to greet people next to Prime minister and leader of opposition. The best line here:

"Priyanka and Robert Vadra left the gallery after Varun and Rahul took oath."

Now apparently Rahul was the last to take oath. Isn't it quite natural that the sister will wait for her brother's oath. How does Varun even come to the picture. A news like this coming from Hindu is really disappointing. Even worse is how I came across it. It was the top story of Google News India.

3) Sachin's 'embarrassing moments' not caught on camera: atleast no surprises here. The news comes from the news creator channel CNN-IBN. But the point is the relevance of the article. Who is really interested in a topless Sachin Tendulkar? We could have bought the argument that the target audience is college girls if it were Yuvraaj Singh, Dhoni or Ishaant Sharma. But Sachin? I would even compare it to M.F Hussain's Saraswati picture as Sachin is literally the GOD for most of Indians. Come-on, atleast leave this guy with 2 kids in peace. And the article has no concrete theme. Sachin siiting in kolkata musing about some dressing room at a foreign location and concluding that he likes Kolkata very much. BS.

Now honestly tell me, though none of the articles were relevant, you have to agree at least the first one was humorous and there is so much left for speculation. With Amar Singh sitting in front seat with driver, there were 5 people in backseat. Gauri with Abhi, leaves us with really hilarious combos.

Say no to Air France

This is the second incident now. Continuing my theory of there can be no smoke without fire, this is purely unacceptable. And so, as I do not buy Tommy Hilfiger garments after reading the e-mail chain, I will no longer travel by Air France.

Frankly speaking, though the Tommy Hilfiger story may even seem to be unreal, this Air France story is pretty real. I have seen a certain apathy of the European staff for the Indian customers in the flight. I have seen this in Lufthansa as well but as it was an all Indian flight, I would like to give them the advantage of "curt by nature/birth" and not due to any racism.

People may argue I have no right to be angry against racist as I myself care for fair skin. But I would like to remind that I differentiate only Indians with skin color as skin color in India can be changed by exposure to sun, makeup materials and general skin care habits unlike the rest of the world and so I think being fair in India is more a matter of self care than a genetic property. There are also a lot of gorgeous dark skin people including the great Biapsha Basu, Madhu Sapre, Kajol to name a few.

Short Note on India Elections 09

Election 09 for me was only two people. Varun Gandhi and his mom Maneka Gandhi. In 80's Rekha had shown us Biwi ho to aisi and in 2009, Maneka shows Maa ho to aisi. BJP had almost disowned him, Congress was against him but one person who was always wit him was his mom, she visited him every day when he was wrongly put in the jail. She tried so hard for him that she had almost lost in her own constituency. But all's well that ends well. Both mother and son duo has won. I do not care if they are with BJP or any other party of their choice but the sweetness of their victory can not be ignored. Imagine Varun and Maneka sitting together at one end and Rahul and Sonia on the other. Both the mothers beaming at their son as they speak and as soon as they finish, hurry up to give them a warm glass of milk, that too malai marke.

BTW, I had pulled off the post below but now re-posting it. Originally posted even before Varun was caught under NSA.

My Views on Varun Gandhi

There are 2 ways you can really have strong views about a person. When you have done all your research and when you haven’t done any. For me, the analysis below is mainly because I did not read much about it and I think I just read the facts. I do not want to read what each and every person is saying to form an opinion. But yes, this is not a hard and fast opinion (With more proofs, things may change, and come on, he’s just 29)

I feel Varun Gandhi is just a puppet in a big game that is being played by BJP or even the sinister BJP-Congress alliance which I have a feeling is always cooking under the hood. Ok, not to sound too absurd with my argument made above, but even if it is anybody’s plan, it is certainly not Varun’s own. Hate speeches like these are being made every day by RSS workers and have been made in the past by all the BJP stalwarts except perhaps Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Sikander Bakht. To make this a political issue is a part of a bigger conspiracy which I am really eager to find out. It might even be political ambitions of the likes of Rajdeep Sardesai, Barkha Dutt etc.

Second startling fact is the comparative low tone of condemnation by Priyanka and Rahul. As star people of opposite parties I had expected harsher criticisms but their statements are more like “We are ashamed of our little brother but after all he is still a kid, he will learn”. Whether these things point to the BJP-Congress under the hood pact that I speculated earlier or a case where blood is more important than political rivalry, both are good for the country as a whole. We need sensible next gen leaders who are not like present Advaniji’s BJP which had decided to oppose each and every word that Congress says in the parliament and vice versa. By showing their solidarity, Priyanka and Rahul prove that even if the become political opponents, they won’t be as insensitive as the 80+ lots.

Third reason I would like to defend Varun is his mom. She is an outcast of the great Gandhi family but she still managed to stay in picture. There are numerous people who are now nameless because of their non allegiance to Gandhi Family. But she still survives. Also, for a politician, she looks really cool( much better than Mayawati, Mamata, Jayalalitha and even Jaya Bachchan. She is in the league of Sushma Swaraj, Vasundhara Raje who themselves are collectively below the league of Jayaprada, Smriti Irani, Hema Malini). Thirdly she does this really hep and cool green and animal care thing. I do feel with most of her issues like keeping birds in cages and killing stray dogs and all such animal right things. I even try very hard to get out of Non Veg, but I promise Ms Gandhi, that the day the taste ratio of Non veg to veg based on availability even falls below 200%, I will turn a vegetarian (right now, from what I cook and what I get in restaurants, the ratio is far more than even 500%). So, I think the son of such a great mother does deserve a bit more respect and probably forgiveness because I would like to believe that he at least didn’t mean the words that we think he said.

A bedtime Story

There was a little boy who lived in a big house in the suburbs of a very small metropolis. The house had a wonderful view of mountains on one side and the sea on the other side. One day, the little boy decided that he will make a lighthouse. The lighthouse will be so beautiful that when people see it, they will feel so much peace at heart that the little boy will eventually get the Nobel Peace Prize.

The little boy sets out to find the right material for the lighthouse. As soon as he gets out of the house, his friend Artim asks him, “Dood, where are you going so early in the morning?” The little boy replies-“Hey dood, I want to build a lighthouse. I am off to get the material for the base.” Artim says that he wishes to join him and the little boy readily agrees. Artim asks: “Where do we go?” The little boy says “Let’s make this out of marble stone. Let’s go to India and get the marbles from Bheda Ghat”. They fly in Air India and reach New Delhi. From New Delhi they take the train to Jabalpur. On the way they see the Taj Mahal and its Minarets. Artim asks, “Do you want your lighthouse like those Minarets?” The little boy replies, “No, much more beautiful.” Finally they reach Jabalpur and then they take the ferry to Bheda Ghat. After 7 days of intense search, they find the right marble and then make arrangements to send it to home. They take the Air India flight where they were served wonderful Kaju Barfis for dinner and come back. The little boy says, “Artim, tomorrow I am going to select the colors tomorrow. Will you come with me?” Artim replies “No dood, I have had enough fun here and have to play cricket tomorrow.” Artim thanks him for coming and goes back to his magnificent house with sea on one side and mountains on the other.

Next day the little boy sets of again for the colors. This time he meets his friend Idnas. Idnas asks: “Dude, where do you go?” The little boy replies “ Hi dudette, I am making a Lighthouse. I am going to find the colors today. Will you come with me?” Idnas shakes her head vigorously and says “Yes, I would love to but do you have any color in mind?” The little boy says “Yes dudette, I want to get the red with white polka dots just like the Mushroom on which Caterpillar was sitting when Alice met him. I need to get his copyright permissions. I think we have to go to Amazon.” Dumb as she is, Idnas says “Wow, I would love to go to Seattle” to which the little boy replies “Dumbo dudette, it’s not Amazon.com headquarters but the jungles of Amazon”. So they fly to Rio de Janeiro in TAM airlines. On reaching Rio, they saw everybody was playing soccer. Lazy as she was, Idnas found a red and white football and told the little boy “Hey, why don’t we get permission from Pele and use this pattern?” The little boy said “Oh lazy dudette, it’s not half as good as the mushroom. We have to go to Amazon forests.” They set off on a boat to the deep jungles of Amazon. After encountering the great anacondas and the piranhas, they finally reach near the gates of El-dorado. And guess what, the gate keeper was the old caterpillar himself. The little boy asked his permission and the caterpillar was glad to oblige and also accepted the invite to the opening of the lighthouse. Happily Idnas and the little boy come back home in TAM airlines eating Banana fritas. The little boy asks Idnas “Hi dudette, tomorrow I am going in search for a reflector for my lighthouse. Will you come with me?” Idnas says “Hey dude, thanks for the trip, it was really awesome but I have to do my MBA preparations tomorrow”. The little boy thanks her for coming and goes to his big house in the small metropolis.

The little boy wakes up early morning at six fifty the next day and sets of in search for the reflector. He meets the rowdy neighborhood boy Blutu. Blutu asks “Hey Dyude, ‘ssup! so early on a Saturday morning, I haven’t even slept yet . Where are you going?” The little boy replies “Hi, I am going to get some reflectors for my Lighthouse. Do you want to join?” Blutu tags along. The little boy tells him that he plans to go to Buckingham palace to ask for some diamonds. They fly in British airways and reach Heathrow airport right on time. Restless as he is, Blutu immediately wanted to go to rest of Europe especially Amsterdam. The queen had given them appointment after a few days so they set up for a Euro Trip. The little boy wanted to go to the ongoing Cannes Film festival and from there, they sailed to Amsterdam. On the way back, in Belgium, Blutu suggested getting some glass from there for the reflector but the Little boy never changes his mind and they went to the Queen. The queen, Her Majesty Hermione I, was very nice to them and showed them all her diamond collections including the Cullinan diamond and the Kohinoor. Then she offered her own selection of diamonds to the little boy for the reflector and promised to come for the opening bash. They came back in British Airways flight with Blutu enjoying his Tandoori chicken but the little boy stuck to the very English Fish n chips with Tea and muffins. After coming back, the little boy asked Blutu if he wanted to accompany him next day in search of the foghorn. Blutu replied, “Dyude, I wish I could, but you know, I have to see this girl tomorrow who is going to be my prospective wife. So, I better be there.” The little boy wished him all the best and went back to his big house with a Bonsai mango tree in the patio.

The little boy woke up a little late at seven thirty and got ready. Just when he was about to get out, Dnohs came asking for some cereal for breakfast. On seeing the little boy all dressed up, Dnohs said, “Magaa, where are you going, da?” The little boy said, “Magane, I am going to Africa to ask the Lion king for copyrights for his roar for the foghorn of my lighthouse.” Dnohs immediately came along, even without brushing his teeth. They flew in Air Tanzania. But as luck would have it, the plane did a ccrash landing in Alexandria. It was a blessing in disguise as neither Dnohs nor the little boy had visited Egypt before. They had fun roaming around Giza and Alexandria. Dnohs was a sharp buy, To reduce travel, he told the little boy, pointing towards the Spinx, “Magaa, this looks like a lion, and you will probably never see this big a lion. Why don’t you ask this one for permissions?”. But adamant and quality conscious as he is, the little boy ruled out the idea though secretly appreciated Dnohs’s idea in one of his blogs. They set off for Tanzania first on camels and then on elephants. Finally, at the edge of a cliff, with setting sun in the background, they found Simba. Simba said “Whroaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaam, I will be pleased to give you the necessary rights, just bring my pen so that I can sign it.” After getting the signature and his consent to come for the opening ceremony they came back home in Air Tanzania eating Ugali. The little boy asked Dnohs if he is available tomorrow but Dnohs said, “Magaa, I have to finish my project 15 days before the deadline you see. It’s recession time.” Little boy just smiled and came back to his big house in the small state.


Now, the little boy had all the necessary things and just had to build the lighthouse. As this did not involve any fun travel, nobody was willing to accompany the little boy on his venture and hence he started building on his own. As soon as he put the first stone in place, a hand came and helped him place the next one. He turned around to see a beautiful little girl. He asked her, “Miss, what’s your name?” She said, “Hello my friend, I am Alimru. I live in the house on the hill. I saw you working alone and came along. Do you need some help?”. The little boy thanked her and both of them started working. With such a great company, they never realized when it was dark and then Alimru said, “It was nice working with you and I will come again tomorrow. I might be a bit late as I have my MBA prep classes at 6 and we then have practice for our softball finals, but I will join you by 9 for sure”. The little boy was fumbling for words and went back home. Soon this became a routine and Alimru came every day to help little boy realize his dream. Meanwhile, Alirmu scored an 800 in GMAT and her team won the softball. The little boy was cheering her from the first row. One late evening, they finally finished and Alirmu said, “Dear, what do we do for the light?” Both of them giggled and went zooming into the sky, beyond Milky Way and plucked one of the brightest stars. They came back and placed the star on the light house. It was looking fabulous and they decided to go for a walk along the beach. The phosphorescence of the water and the lighthouse beams created a mystic surrounding. Suddenly, the beam stopped right on them and both just stopped where they were.

They celebrated the opening day under the starry sky on the beach with cool breeze blowing. The menu was selected by the little boy. They had Palak Paneer, Crunchy Salmon sushi, broccoli and asparagus salad, Mapo Tofu, Coconut Shimp and many more with Chocolate Mousse and Rasgullas for dessert. The caterpillar, Her Majesty Hermione I, Simba, Artim, Idnas, Blutu, Dnohs everybody had come down for the occasion. But of course nobody could take their eyes off Alimru!!

A trip to Halibut point and Wingaersheek beach

Finally it is warm in Massachusetts. It was a Saturday and I and a few friends decided to make most of it. We decided to go to the above mentioned places.

The journey was different this time. I generally avoid driving such long distances (~55 miles). But this time I wanted to. We were 5 in my Blue Accord Sedan and 3 in my friend’s coupe of the same make. I thank my co-passengers for having faith in me. There were just 2 odd moments once where I got really scared as a music started with a big blasting sound and I imagined it as a honk. The other one was I got carried away in conversation and had to merge to the interstate very close. My lane changes were discrete and not analog, but apart from that it was fine. And most importantly I liked it. For the first time I really liked speed.

Let’s move on. So we reached this place called Halibut Point State park. Primarily it was a quarry way back in the past and now there is a small pond. On one side of the pond wall there is the sea and a World War 2 watch tower on the other side. The other car was late (thanks to my awesome driving) and we started playing Frisbee and soccer in a picnic area. Soon the others joined us. We played a unique combo of playing soccer and Frisbee together which slowly changed to a game called donkey. After around an hour we realized that there is too much non-zero mean noise in the rule and we set out for the trail.

The trail around the quarry was small and non extensive but when we reached the other side, we just went towards the sea. It was a rocky beach with the water just hitting the rocks. The water was ice cold but it was still fun to wet our feet. I monitored a 0.5 cm fish stuck in a crevice for a long time until another string wave took it away. Wonder how it would survive in the ocean.

There were curious stone structures on the way back which reminded me of a game I used to play: Pittuk. But some people thought it looks like Stonehenge. We set out to make one. We did make it but then destroyed it as well. It was fun acting like 5 year olds amongst an age group with average age of 26 :-o.

Next on our way to the beach, we stopped by at Rockport downtown for lunch. The place called “Rockport House of Pizza” though had good food but an absolute rude waitress who flustered a lot and was seemed to be angry on the fact that she has to make so many checks. Though yelp.com rates it good, I think it’s bad.

Anyway, next we went for Wingaersheek beach. There was a huge crowd. My last few visits to the beaches have always been to the ones either too small or too less occupied. This was full of people. We did our bit of people watching, sitting on rocks, playing in water and burying the feet in sand. There were a set of little girls who had long hairs. They played a game of dipping their hair in waiter and then splashing it all around. It was fun. The beach had rocks in one end which reminded me of the rocks in NITK beach and the zillions of associated memories. On te other end, there was Ipswich river bay and this entire place was in Gloucester. Sounds as if we are in the middle of England.

Amongst the songs played in the car, my favorite was Flight IC 408. Youtube Link

7th on BigB blog

Hi,

Not that I am a big fan of Big B, but yes, I do like his blog. And today I gotto be the 7th one to comment and the first time I really tried. The comment makes no sense but see for yourself.

Indienglish is phunny

A small post here. I realized that there are some funny usages in tamil, marathi and bengali. These are when someone tries to communicate in these above languages but using English alphabets. Here are soem of them:

In tamil, an extra h is used for everything. Though I have started using 'th' for the first sound in 'Taj' (Thaj Mahal sounds so funny) but I cannot just get used to 'dh' for the first sound in 'the'. Funniest is the usage in the name 'Darshan/Darshana'. In tamil, it becomes 'Dharshan/Dhaarshana' which has a very derogatory meaning in hindi/sanskrit.

Next is Marathi. For some reason marathis think z is 'jh'. And hence jhootha becomes zuta. Jharna becomes zarna which may not be that hhilarious, but somehow irritates me in the same way as the sound of metal against metal.

Equally, if not more in the usage of 'v' by bengalis. Bengalis think 'v' is 'bh'. So the very common word for good i.e. bhalo is spelled as 'valo'.

As an end note, this fondness of non bengali speaking people with the word bhalo can be quite misleading as it has such close relatives with very different meanings. Here is a list:

Bhalo Aachi are 2 words meaning I am good.
Bhalobashi as 1 word means I love.
Bhalo Bhashi 2 words actually mean " I float well" but some people think that it is same as bhalobashi which is I love again.

Fashion

Looks like it is becoming the most used word nowadays. We have been bombarded with fashion weeks. And they appear to occur almost every month. This year, the best actor (female) awards and best supporting actor (female) awards both went to the actors in the movie fashion. After this sudden bursts of Delhi and Mumbai fashion weeks back to back, many of the bloggers have started writing about fashion shows and they are more or less in the negative tone. I really like the fashion shows and unlike a single working professional who will be out having fun on Saturday evening, I am simply sitting at home, I thought I will pen my thoughts on this.

I will begin with hat I like in the fashion shows and later delve into what fashion means to me.

For whatever reasons, we all have either secretly or openly watched fashion TV. People like Sushma Swaraj planned to ban it, but could not stop the curiosity of the people watching it whatever may the reason. Knowingly or unknowingly, we became familiar with the terms like “fall-winter”, “spring summer”. We came to know that Milan is the fashion capital of the world. Though we always think LA will be more fashionable considering Hollywood factor, actually New York is the place of fashion. In general we started getting used to the famished looking people walking on the screen. And thus we all learnt the basics of fashion.

Needless to say, India caught up with it and the small fashion industry got more and more limelight. Few fashion icons joined the movies and then fashion shows became more important. Add to it, the burst of 24X7 news channel and the advent of color in newspapers. There had to be more flashy things to show to attract more viewers and the result is the overdose in true Indian fashion. Whenever we like something, we overdo it to an extent that we ourselves start hating it: Candle marches, social networkings are just to name a few.

But I enjoyed this overdose of Fashion weeks a lot. Every morning amongst the gloomy economic news, the mud slinging of politics and the daily terrorist attack stories, I really look forward to these skinny models walking on the ramps wearing clothes which nobody would ever wear in public. Some people object to this very fact that why show something which nobody will ever wear in public. Well take it as a form of entertainment just like IPL or EPL.

Anyway, fashion shows always remind me of the fashion show in my undergrad college. There used to be only 1 or 2 nice looking girl in every batch. The fashion shows became all about choosing which girl from the 1st year will be chosen for this coveted job and the show always happened to be 4 women (1 for each year) surrounded by 20-30 men. It was hilarious.

To me fashion can come in any form. For example, election fashion. Sarah Palin had her own fashion. Queen and her pearls are another fashion statement. Sonia Gandhi, Vasundhara Raje are the fashionable amongst Indian women politicians. Amongst the men it is Murali Manohar Joshi, P Chidambaram, Arun Jaitley and even Varun Gandhi.

The biggest fashion in India always comes from movies. I still remember the number of friendship bands we wore after kuch kuch hota hai, and how all of us in undergrad tried hard to keep small triangular stubble on our chin. Aamir khan has been the person who always starts new trends. Surprisingly, amongst women, I think it is not Aishwarya Rai as much as it is Kareena Kapoor. Whether it is her avatars with Tushaar Kapoor, or as Poo in K3G or in Jab we met, her fashion has always percolated the deepest.

As I write this big an article on fashion, I realize that I myself dress in the poorest form imaginable. This blog attests the same. More for carrying the guilt and less for people to see, here are two more How not to’s:




1) How not to dress for a wedding
2) How not to dress in a beach
3) How not to stand next to objects which make you conscious of your height.


Adios

Short Note on India Elections 09

Election 09 for me was only two people. Varun Gandhi and his mom Maneka Gandhi. In 80's Rekha had shown us Biwi ho to aisi and in 2009, Maneka shows Maa ho to aisi. BJP had almost disowned him, Congress was against him but one person who was always wit him was his mom, she visited him every day when he was wrongly put in the jail. She tried so hard for him that she had almost lost in her own constituency. But all's well that ends well. Both mother and son duo has won. I do not care if they are with BJP or any other party of their choice but the sweetness of their victory can not be ignored. Imagine Varun and Maneka sitting together at one end and Rahul and Sonia on the other. Both the mothers beaming at their son as they speak and as soon as they finish, hurry up to give them a warm glass of milk, that too malai marke.

BTW, I had pulled off the post below but now re-posting it. Originally posted even before Varun was caught under NSA.

My Views on Varun Gandhi

There are 2 ways you can really have strong views about a person. When you have done all your research and when you haven’t done any. For me, the analysis below is mainly because I did not read much about it and I think I just read the facts. I do not want to read what each and every person is saying to form an opinion. But yes, this is not a hard and fast opinion (With more proofs, things may change, and come on, he’s just 29)

I feel Varun Gandhi is just a puppet in a big game that is being played by BJP or even the sinister BJP-Congress alliance which I have a feeling is always cooking under the hood. Ok, not to sound too absurd with my argument made above, but even if it is anybody’s plan, it is certainly not Varun’s own. Hate speeches like these are being made every day by RSS workers and have been made in the past by all the BJP stalwarts except perhaps Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Sikander Bakht. To make this a political issue is a part of a bigger conspiracy which I am really eager to find out. It might even be political ambitions of the likes of Rajdeep Sardesai, Barkha Dutt etc.

Second startling fact is the comparative low tone of condemnation by Priyanka and Rahul. As star people of opposite parties I had expected harsher criticisms but their statements are more like “We are ashamed of our little brother but after all he is still a kid, he will learn”. Whether these things point to the BJP-Congress under the hood pact that I speculated earlier or a case where blood is more important than political rivalry, both are good for the country as a whole. We need sensible next gen leaders who are not like present Advaniji’s BJP which had decided to oppose each and every word that Congress says in the parliament and vice versa. By showing their solidarity, Priyanka and Rahul prove that even if the become political opponents, they won’t be as insensitive as the 80+ lots.

Third reason I would like to defend Varun is his mom. She is an outcast of the great Gandhi family but she still managed to stay in picture. There are numerous people who are now nameless because of their non allegiance to Gandhi Family. But she still survives. Also, for a politician, she looks really cool( much better than Mayawati, Mamata, Jayalalitha and even Jaya Bachchan. She is in the league of Sushma Swaraj, Vasundhara Raje who themselves are collectively below the league of Jayaprada, Smriti Irani, Hema Malini). Thirdly she does this really hep and cool green and animal care thing. I do feel with most of her issues like keeping birds in cages and killing stray dogs and all such animal right things. I even try very hard to get out of Non Veg, but I promise Ms Gandhi, that the day the taste ratio of Non veg to veg based on availability even falls below 200%, I will turn a vegetarian (right now, from what I cook and what I get in restaurants, the ratio is far more than even 500%). So, I think the son of such a great mother does deserve a bit more respect and probably forgiveness because I would like to believe that he at least didn’t mean the words that we think he said.

Kuch bhi

It has been a long time. I am not sure what to write, now that I have tried so many different things. I tried to be emotional, I tried to be gossipy, I tried to be personal and I tried writing about current affairs. Today I am bored, but I still feel like writing. I am not sure if it is a good idea to clutter the blog with such posts. But then, I have seen not blogging gets into a habit and I would not want to do that. Let there be no issue based blog, but at least keep the blog alive with some written text rather than random links and pictures.

Readership has been low. Or has it increased? I do not know. But definitely, it is not the current posts that are being looked at. I think the most read ones are the Bollywood awards that I dish out and the one about “Bengali in me”, thanks to the dhono dhanye song I have put in there.

Ok let this be an update blog. I will update all of you who do read this blog and may be more for me to read later what updates I can comfortably share on this date.

I have got this craving for some good “Rani/Priety” movies now. By Rani priety I mean recent movies with a dominant heroine role. Rani has not been doing much good stuff. I saw Priety in Last Lear and Heaven on earth. I liked Last Lear.

I have also been watching this series called “The big bang theory”. It’s about 4 geeks and a dashing girl in next apartments. It’s extremely funny and I highly recommend it.

On the bad sides, I am not at all excited about the Indian general elections 2009. I do not like NDA/BJP’s prime ministerial candidate and Congress was never glamorous. The rising clout of the regional parties will just add noise to the government and no real breakthrough can ever happen. How I wish Samajwadi party was a national party. It has got glamour, it has got the backing of industrial big shots and it seems that it always means business and no nonsense party. It may be corrupt etc, but then it’s end goal is get into the government and it makes it very direct to a common man like us. On the other hand, BJP’s election issues are so baseless: attacking congress for the global recession, Afzal Guru hanging etc. How can these be election issues. Unrealistic 2 RS rice and free color TV campaigns also make more sense than this. Congress on the other hand can do such a constructive campaign, but it is so busy with it’s Rahul baba that it cannot see anything beyond. Sonia madam was an efficient backdoor puppeteer, but the problem with Rahul is that he is the puppet.

Worse is the recession. Just when we think it cannot get worse, there is more shocks. We cannot predict. But I think we are at a stage where we have already expected the worst. Nowadays lay offs, shut down does not even alarm us any more unless it is us at the receiving end. Is the slowdown also slowing down?

But for me, the biggest concern is “Woh ladki hai kahan”. It is a combined effect of so many factors. Suddenly I realize that the often used line “pehle khud ko establish kar loon” has began to blur. There had been times when I could have really gone ahead but this line pulled me back and now when the line goes blur, the picture gets blurrer. Add to it the fact that almost all my friends are already ahead of me in this race. Not only lonely, I feel angry too.

And hence we should do yoga. I have started Ramdev baba yogas. The thing that I enjoy most in that is my daily choice of accompanying music. I need a clock with second update so that I can rate my kapalbhatis. Hence I play songs on you tube. I had started wit meditation music, bhajan, devotional songs, rabindra sangeet etc. But today I tried Aishwarya Rai songs, and I enjoyed it. Probably tomorrow will be jaadu hai nasha hai. Let’s see. I should probably follow the Shilpa Shetty yogas. It will be glam yoga .

Book Review: Sea of Poppies

After a long time, I am writing a book review. And I have read a few available about the book. One thing I noticed that the reviews are actual reviews, not the typical hindi movie reviews which just go on to praise the film if they like one and find every possible flaw if the do not. The reviews always give an idea off what the writer is trying to achieve and as he successful in doing that. It is difficult for me to write a review of that kind, and hence I will stick to the Indian kinds. So people, here comes the new Kazmi, Sen and Masand.

Bottom line first, I liked the book. So it will be only good things about the book. I am not new to Indie English novels but I am very new to historic novels which give you a balance of history along with a strong storyline. This book pleased me thoroughly but did not come as a surprise as I has already read “Hungry Tide”. While reading it I never realized that I know so much about Sunderban. This book just takes this feel further and this time it is not confined with a small region like Sunderban but instead covers a vast region of the world. It talks about China, Cape Town, England, Kolkata, Bhojpuri belt and of course about the life in sea which can be considered a whole new country of it’s own.

Another of the thing that I liked immensely was the language. It’s just so varied. I never enjoyed the language so much in any other novel before. There is English by the sea men, there is the African American English, there is the English English (English spoken in England), the French English, English that the English people spoke in 1830’s India and then the English that Bengalis spoke in 1830. Each is so different and the way Amitav has blended all of them leaves me mesmerized. To add to it, so many foreign words are borrowed all throughout the book: Bhojpuri, Bengali and especially the language of the seamen who are called Lascars. I know Bangla and can understand bhojpuri, but as I had no idea about the lascar tongue, it was a pleasure decoding that. Towards the end of the book, Amitav is blending cultures. I got so excited and kept thinking of all these people who then went to Mauritius and how is the present culture of Mauritius affected by it.

And of course the part that had me dumbstruck was the sex. The very fact that I am shamelessly writing about it shows its impact on me. I have always read sex with either curiosity or disgust and I think that was its purpose when it is written about or shown. But here it was a part of the story and blended so well. And it was in all forms. There is the straightforward straight and then both forms of non straight, there is sexual harassment of children, there are different types of punishments and there is even with animal. But it comes so naturally in the book in a way that I am not used to. You are never excited or disgusted about it. In most of the other reads, you either read a rape with contempt and hatred for the rapist or in normal descriptions it is something which bonds love more strongly. But in this book, it does neither. It comes in and goes wit the same flow as say a day goes and the night comes.

Unlike Rajiv, I will not go and tell you about the best moment in the story. I also won’t criticize the book like Raja Sen who thinks that a critic has to criticize. Unlike Nikhat, I would still rate the book with five star though it does not have shahrukh or amitabh or directed by K Jo.

My best Friends’ Wedding

Haha, an oxymoron in the title itself: ‘Best Friends’, but that’s right. This time my biggest realization during my trip to India has been married people. And I met several stages of them. Married for a couple of years, married for couple of months, just returned from HM, got married while I was there and even will marry in near future.

What happens when friends marry? You make the third person, the concerned person and even you believe that this is the best thing that can ever happen to them and which might be true, but it does feel so animated most of the time.

When your friends insist, you talk to theirs’. “Hi, how are you?”, “How is new life”. “ How do you find my friend ….?”, “ Is he/she bothering you”, “Ae, mere friend ko kuch at bolna”, ‘Pata hai, once what happened ………”. And at this point it’s like the person is saying “Why do I have to bear this guy” and you are saying “Why did my friend make me talk to this person”.

Even worse are your conversations with your friend. You have to ask about the spouse. Oh how is…. And, if they start off even once, you are again into the animation mode. If they do not, it’s even worse. The person thinks, “Isko bhi abhi phone karna tha”.

Things does not stay you and me, they become ‘both of you’ and me. The individuality is lost. May be at work life, they still have the individuality, but in the limited hours when they are not working, they rather stay as “we”. What plans for weekends?” Oh, we plan to but curtains, or we will go to buy a lamp” or some of those trivial stuff which you never thought can bother your friend. All you can say, Thank god, atleast you are not shopping for ‘Pink Chaddis’.

Worst is when you meet them in person. Ofcourse you have to meet theirs’. And then sometime in the middle of the conversation you are totally not part of it and you start feeling kabab mein haddi.

All in all, you just understand that it is time to change and focus on yourself. Do not expect them to “daak shune aasha” but instead “aekla cholo re”

Disclaimer: It’s not a generic behavior. Everybody as one or 2 of the above qualities.

Police Excesses in India

I cannot stop myself from writing about this. Here are 3 incidents:

1) 3 guys throw acid on 2 girls who died but police shot the three people down. Here is a link of the story in ToI.

2) A guy wrongly speed races on his bike at 1 am n Bangalore, police stops him. He runs away towards a house which turns out to be a brigadiers, makes a call from the roof top, in Urdu, and police shoots him down. Link.

3) The fracas began at 2.30pm in Kolkata, when 37-year-old Yadav was about to park his vehicle on the wrong side of Kiron Shankar Roy Road. Policeman Banerjee, who was on duty in front of the high court, spotted the taxi and signalled to the driver to stop. When he didn’t, the constable sprinted towards the taxi, witnesses said. “He was holding an iron clamp, which he tried to attach to one of the wheels to prevent the driver from fleeing. The driver alighted and asked Banerjee why he was using the clamp instead of filing a case of parking violation,” a bystander said. Banerjee allegedly replied with a slap. Link.

The three incidents are of varying intensity and if decided to judge individually, probably you may differ on the sides to choose on each. However, one thing is clear, on all the three incidents; the people who suffered from police violence were not clean. They all had committed some offense. But is this the way a responsible police should react?

However, I am surprised at people’s reaction. Yes there are people who think these are bad acts by the police but I thought that would be a unanimous decision. However, surprisingly people differed. One of the people I asked felt that Police did the right thing. That is why terrorism is on the rise. Nobody is afraid of the police anymore.

Here is what I beg to differ. The job of the police is to maintain law and order. It is not their job to convict people and make people afraid of them. If you see a police on the road, you should feel positive that aah, here is a man maintaining law and order. But the truth is different. We see police with either disgust or fear.

However slow the process of law may be, somebody else cannot take over it. Ideally in all these cases, police should have caught the convict and produced him in the court, but instead they chose to be the judges. When discussing with someone about the first case, I said, police should have shot him on the leg or put tear gas. The other person said may be the police wanted to do that but the shot got misplaced. Come on, why do you pay the police for if they do not even know how to shoot.

And this is precisely why I hate when people talk highly of the so called “encounters”. Yes, those people may be convicts, or may be we can even kill the dreaded terrorists in encounters, but that’s not the way things should happen. It should be for the law to decide these things. If the law process needs to be revived, let’s do it. But police taking over law is definitely not the way to go.

And this is what I think is the difference between first world and third world country. Till now, whenever people used to tell me that India is a third world country, I used to feel sad. But now I know why it is so. Police takes law in its hand because lawmakers take infinite amount of time. Digging deeper, somewhere it boils down to the fact that we do not have the money and resources to have a police which should have the decency to talk like a gentleman even to the most dreaded terrorist in the world. Wasn’t even Saddam tried in the court before being hanged?

Sandipan Bollywood Awards 2008

After the very successful blogs of Sandipan Bollywood Awards from 2006, and 2007, here we go for 2008. I say popular, because if you search Sandipan Mitra on google, the first result is the 07 awards.

This year has been tough. Not lot of good films rather mostly dismal. A few decent ones though. But I have to continue with the tradition. Here we go:

Best Story: Neeraj Pandey for ‘A Wednesday’ and Shyam Benegal for ‘Welcome to Sajjanpur’.

Best Song: ‘Jashn-e-bahara’. Melodious as well as fresh

Best Music Director: A.R. Rahman , “Jodha- Akbar”. (and borrowing from previous year’s blog ---- who else?

Best Singer(Male) : Javed Ali for ‘Jashn-e-bahara’

Best Singer (Female): I guess this award goes empty this year. Not a single memorable solo. What’s wrong with Shreya, Sunidhi or even alka and kavita madam?

Best television interview: Of course Arundhati Roy in ‘Devil’s Advocate’. I know that may be she is not at all right and her logic fails at time but she is so convincing with her words. By the way, this time I found one person so irritating that she better not give any interviews and that’s Deepika Padukone. Why does she have to speak in English when her accent is like a Gaon Khede wali of Maharashtra?
Best Item Song: Krazzy4 Hrithik Roshan

And now the main awards:

Best Comedian: Abhishek Bachchan in Dostana
Best Supporting Actor: John Abraham in Dostana. He was so hilarious and did what he can do the best. Reminds me that once during the wedding of my friend I asked him that when is his wife going to do the chawal fenko rasam like John?

Best Supporting Actress: Hands down Kangana Ranaut. She was the core of Fashion. The way she changed expressions for drug addict to supermodel in no time was top of the world.

Best Villain: Bipasha Basu in Race. In Race, everybody is a villain and not many villainy movies in 08 except Ghajini. And Bipasha has to get some prize.

Best Newcomer (male): Farhan Akhtar for Rock On. He was really impressive and a fresh and unconventional face.

Best Newcomer (Female) : Asin. Though I did not like her ‘Jab We Met’ish acting much bt she is definitely the best looking amongst the new faces.

Best Director: Shyam Benegal and Neeraj Pandey for Welcome to Sajjanpur and A Wednesday resp.

Best Film: Combining the fact that it should have story (Jodhaa Akbar, Ghajini, Singh is Kiing and Rab ne ruled out), Good looking and famous star cast ( A Wednesday, Welcome to Sajjanpur, Rock On, Jaane tu are gone), decent songs (A Wednesday, Ghajini, Rab ne, Fashion all out) and ofcourse a decent budget, the award points to only one movie which may not be best amongst any of the above factors individually but has a good combo of above all, and the movie is RACE…

Best Actress: Like last year, I again want to give it to Soha Ali Khan or Mumbai Meri Jaan but I guess that would be too much bias. A Kareenaish Asin does not impress me, Genelia is too kiddish and Fashion is all about Kangana, mugdha and Kitu and not about Priyanka. Aishwarya as Jodhaa looks more south Indian and can never look rajputani. However, I think the best actress award should still go to her but for Sarkar Raj. She really stole the show and she DID some acting apart form looking good and/or crying.

Best Actor: Shahrukh Khan for Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi. The lesser the mentioned of Ghajini is better, and Singh is Kiing is really not worth that much. Hrithik as Akbar was good but with nonsense scenes like Sword fights and dismissing court listening to Man Mohana, he has lost it. The reason it is Shahrukh Khan is not only because people really liked Surinder Sahni but because Shahrukh made people hate Raj. It is probably easy for a Superstar to make you love him but it is really difficult to hate ur favorite star and he was successfully able to achieve it.