Holiday

No thinking up of story ideas. If its very good no one else will think of it for a while. Else someone will do it any way.

No worrying about no story ideas.

No watching news.

No reading news.

No fretting over the madness of all the news I hear.

No worrying about joblessness.

No worrying about falling out of the race. If I am good I will be back.

No worrying about all the follow ups needed. Just call / mail / confront and get it over with.

No making to do list.

No reminding of the to do list. Everyone is grown up. He / she wants it they will do it.

No blogging; Got an idea? Do it. Have a point to make? Say it to whom it matters. Else forget it.

I am taking a holiday. Going nowhere in particular...staying put and having a holiday.

Dil Chahta hai!

I watched it for the umpteenth time today. I stopped counting after the ninth time I watched it in a theatre. Today I watched it at home after a very long time; pausing at will and replaying some favourite scenes. It is amazing that after four years and umpteen viewing it still excites me. The song "koi kahe" still makes me dance automatically; even after dancing many many many nights away to that song. Every frame of the film is worth watching. The movie is simply the best. Couple of weeks ago I had some friends over and we were talking about "Rang De Basanti." Flawed as it was but everyone gathered had liked the movie. Then I had to bring it up - that DCH is still the best. Of the 9 gathered 8 agreed. You can imagine what could've happened to the one disagreeing soul. Thankfully he survived, mostly because of the impending football finals...

Coming back to DCH. The movie was good. But what made it brilliant was its timing in my life. It became a part of probably the best ten months of my life. I've had good times and great times before and after that. But that year was special. And now four years later, many happy moments of those times have become distant memories and DCH has come to be the symbol of that fantastic time of my life. And for everyone associated with the viewing G2, Sri, KB, K, P, and Sav, it is still a happy thought.

Some special moments have songs but I have a whole film. Joy indeed...here's to good times!

Koi kahe kehta rahe kitna bhi humko deewana....

Blog power!

Try as one may blogging is here to stay :-) They are not just diaries holding frustrations and joys of a person anymore apparently. Read more here.

Definitions, derivations, theories and their side effects.

Definition:

fem·i·nism (n). a) Belief in the social, political, and economic equality of the sexes. b) The movement organized around this belief.
fem·i·nist ( P ) Pronunciation Key (fm-nst)n. A person whose beliefs and behavior are based on feminism.

Derivation: The women who believe in feminism -
1) don't wear bra
2) don't like men
3) use men only for sex
4) must be lesbians
5) defy tradition
6) will be bad wives / daughter-in-laws / mothers
7) will smoke and drink.

Theory:
Any woman who defies tradition even in the slightest way is a feminist. The fact that she does wear bra and likes men will not be considered. She is a threat to the society (read my wife / sister / daughter-in-law) keep her away.

Side effects:
1) No woman wants to say openly I am a feminist.
2) Feminist woman is every mother's nightmare - "who will marry her?"
3) No mother-in-law wants her son to marry one.
4) Some "open minded" men secretly admire these qualities and find one such woman for themselves and then when the woman speaks her mind tell her "Sweetheart, I am not against feminism, I love you for being independent just don't bring that up when I ask you to make my bed."

Definition:
mar·riage (n. )
a)The legal union of a man and woman as husband and wife.
b)The state of being married; wedlock.
c)A common-law marriage.

Derivation: Depending on the gender
1) End of happy life but beginning of a life that's taken care of by wife
2) beginning of a new chapter but no more funky jewellery (only karimani (Mangalsutra) and kaalungura (toe ring)), jeans (sarees and salwar kameez only please), no male friends, no take out dinners (married and still eating in hotels tche tche) - the list is depressingly long.

Theory:
1) Married man can continue to live his life only he should be seen with his wife often enough. No change in dress code is required of him.
2) She should wear sarees (ok salwar kameez), start going to temples, cook like Nala (!), know the solution to every problem - why is the cupboard stinking to how to keep away cockroaches to throw the best birthday party ever to satyanarayana pooja details to why is husband so losing weight. All on her own, no expecting dear husband to help.

Side effects:
1) Men spend more and more time in office to take care of their wives.
2) Women take less demanding jobs to take care of their husband.
3) Husbands who help wives are tagged "hen pecked"
4) Wives who ask husbands to help are "bloody feminists"

And so the cycle lives on and on and on and on.

Moving house.

The news is all over the place. Instead of quietly blocking particular blogs they have blocked the entire blog sites. Pretty much no one in India can read what I write here. Then why am I writing? Because they have found a backdoor entry into the blogs, through a pakistani site! Everyone knows about it. Wonder what the guy in the department thinks of it. The other reason is that I have got used to posting my thoughts, that don't find expression otherwise. I have missed blogging in the last four or five days.

Now I might have to move to another site to do this. It is like moving house. I spent months deciding to blog or not to blog, then set it up and settled down. Now I have to do it all over again and inform all those friends who looked me up here. The very thought is exhausting. I can't make up my mind if I want to do this.

A comment on our security setup can be found here. It may be a sentimental one but makes a very relevant point.

Bloody hell!

They were just going home finishing their work. Looking forward to a fresh bath, warm food and a quiet evening with the family. Many of them even glad for the fact that today is over, tomorrow is another day may be better. All they got is a bloody carnage. Many of them didn't live to tell the tale. Those who did, their trust shattered forever.

It is all so pointless. True they will pick themselves up today and move forward, in their famous mumbaikar stride. How far though? Till the next blast?

It is that simple and easy to kill hundreds at one go eh? All in a day's work? The people who planted those bombs did they go back home tell their family "My day was good today; I finished what I was supposed to do"?

In all the carnage I saw on TV, one thought occurred to me. People in that far away Kashmir, witness blood bath like this everyday may be not on this scale, but blood bath nevertheless. We don't see the kind of outrage that Mumbai blasts caused yesterday. Is it because we have become used to the news of violence from there? Will we reach a stage where we will react to this kind of news with a “tut tut” and move on, even if it is in our neighbourhood?

Just like the fact that in the neighbourhood women are being harassed, houses burgled, young men beaten up and killed for mere mobile phones, does not move anything in our hearts, anymore. One day the violence of the scale like that in Mumbai will also mean nothing.

Blood will run cold soon and not because we are dead.

Alcohol consumption is injurious to health but...

Check out this hilarious post titled "Reality is an illusion caused by alcohol deficiency"

hic hic hic!

Wonderings...

Where have the real people gone from our movies and television serials??? They all turn up well dressed, say the right things even if they are doing world's worst thing. Perfect hair, perfect dress, perfectly coordinated accessories and almost perfect make up. The screen perfectness has spilled over to the streets too. In movie halls, malls even vegetable markets people look so well coordinated, it is as if everyone is set to walk the ramp. Will we soon see people bursting into the song and dance routine complete with hundreds of extras backing them up to express joy, sorrow umm err confusion...in true Bollywood (should I say Indian) style? If that's hard to pull it off then may be we will see people doing soliloquies, quiet to the shock of those around to make important decisions or take to walk and move in slow motions at important moments of their lives - keeping in tradition with (K)Ekta Kapoor's world.

One not so regular Sunday evening.

One evening. Nine friends. Some old some new. Old memories refreshed, new ones formed. Some familiarity some shocking revelations. One harried week forgotten in one evening. Some wine, some Vodka, blueberry cheesecake and yeah football too.

13!

"You will understand this when you grow up" I heard this all my childhood. I thought since grown ups can do what they want, know and understand many things, it must be fun. Then I grew up and still didn't understand many things that happened then. Add to that, newer complicated issues surround me. I am still figuring out many many things. Just when it seems like I've got this one under control WHAM another thing comes at me, non-stop. If you are sensible and sensitive, you will make a better person , some one once told me, it doesn't make sense. Where's the fun part?

I would like to be 13 again. I hated being 13 then because I hated mathematics and all the writing I had to do. But then it was such a riot to beat the boys in a game of Kho-kho or kick up some mud during Kabaddi or even do all those History and English essays. Give me Shantakumari Miss in that classroom with my maths homework book to throw at me now and I'll take it this instant.

Humour me :-)

"My apologies are offered for any factual inaccuracies discovered subsequent to publication, but all details have been thoroughly researched by spending five minutes on the internet and then giving up."

I read these lines and I knew I will love the boook. This is the beginning of Author's note from the book 'global illage idiot' by John O' Farrell. It is a collection of his columns that appeared in "The Guardian" between 1999 and 2001. He is very very very entertaining with his satirical view of political events in Britain during that period.

So far the best piece has been "fifty-seven channels and nothing is on." He takes a dig at the technological advances in the world of communication. He says "New technology is a wonderful thing, but just because we can do something it doesn't mean we should do." A point, I totally agree with. In the piece he also talks about the madness of "round the clock news."

He says if you want to know what's happening with parliamentary elections in Scotland at 4am you will find some channel that'll bring you the latest developments since 3am :-) "Scottish secretary will be sitting in his pyjamas being grilled by someone not as good as Jeremy Paxman."

Further, the anchor will ask questions like "what will the government's strategy at this point time to the fact that scottish electorate has gone to bed?"

Just change Scotland to Bangladesh and the channel to one of our many enterprising 24-hour channels, it gets awfully close to home. He is just too good :-) You should read the book.

Ah just one more point, any guesses as to who is the global village idiot? No no its not me or you. It is someone we all love to hate...but have loved him for his entertainment value to the world.