The bronze moon

Have you ever seen a bronze moon? When there is a full moon it sometimes appears bronze colored. Today it was almost golden. The most gorgeous sight amidst high rises without trees. Even more gorgeous is the sight of full moon rising above the sea. That view is simply breathtaking! The silver reflecting off the dark waters - the beauty has to be experienced.

I always loved the moon. I have watched thousands of full moons, half moons and crescent moons rise over the coconut tree from my terrace in Bangalore. But it was in Chennai I first saw the most spectacular show on earth - the full moon rising out of the ocean and I was hooked.

I was lucky to have people around me who appreciated these matter of fact yet magical moments. And they have made these moments even more memorable.

There was this one time when in Chennai a few of us from the hostel decided to watch the moon rise. So we noted the time and decided to go to Marina beach for the show (!) But as usual we were up against deadlines and seemed almost impossible to get there in time. Somehow just five minutes before the given time we managed to get into an auto and get there just in time. Once we got there the five of us were like little girls shrieking away with joy. Fifteen minutes later we were heading back to college in an auto that was blasting the latest Tamil Hits.

Later the same year I went to Marina with another friend of mine. He had apparently never realised that moon could rise. "It is just there at night" is what he told me. (V also had similar thoughts!) So I made it a point to take this friend along. And we sat there quietly for almost an hour and watched the magic unravel with hundreds of shrieking children (they were not shrieking at the moon but at the waves hitting them.)

There was this other friend of mine who bonded with me over the full moon too. Infact we bonded over sunset, rain, hot & sour chicken soup and rajnikant too. We messaged each other everytime the other couldn't see the full moon describing it.

V of course has not got to see the moon rise yet...we never managed to be near the east coast at the right time. But once we stayed in Alleppey at a beach resort. I knew it was full moon that day and so kept alarm at 3 am and woke V up and dragged off a groggy chap to watch the full moon set into the Arabian sea (as good if not better than the rising) Usually nothing can shake off his sleep but that day he was all bright eyed.

Over the years many things have changed. I don't get to watch moon rise over a coconut tree (any tree for that matter) any more. Some of the friends with whom I enjoyed these moments with have either moved away or become strangers...but the moon is still as beautiful.

the man who makes me cry...

I don't remember how I got introduced to him. It could be that I loved his jhuki jhukisi nazar from arth and did some research to find that he could blow mind away. Or that song tumko dekha tho yeh khayaal aaya (I forget the movie name shux) was so soul stirring that I was hooked to his voice, Jagjit Singh's voice (BTW that song was written by Javed Akhtar, WOW).

I get so distracted that I can't talk about one subject without bringing in ten other topics. PHEW

Coming back to JJ. First thing I did when I started getting big fat salary (I won't tell how much because that's an embarrassment compared to what a 20 year old earns now) was to buy his cassettes, no CDs plain old Audio cassettes and play it on my brand new videocon two-in-one. I could listen for dayyyyyyyyyyyyys non-stop. I still do.

I do not know enough adjectives to describe the quality of his voice and what it does to those words. Every singer worth his name has sung the hazaaron khwahishen aisi written by Mirza Ghalib but JJ renders it sooooo beautifully that tears just won't stop. Over the years I have bought every single cassette I could lay my hands on and heard everyone of them a zillion times (yeah yeah I drove my mother crazy with it but she was glad at least I wasn't mad about rock).

My all time favourite, the one song I can listen to all day and get emotional about, every single time is Woh Kaagaz ki kashti woh baarish ka paani. You hear it from him once, and anyone else who attempts to sing it will only be booed, however good he or she is.

Why all this peetike...well that is because I heard him live in Bangalore last Saturday! I was so thrilled to be listening to him live that I had goosebumps for the first one hour and tears of joy for the next. He is simply out of the world. He creates such a wonderful chemistry with the audience, we went mad (all excpet the ones busy with their cell phones!). He has come to Bangalore, I think three times before and I missed the concert every single time. Once I got to know about it too late. Second time I couldn't afford the tickets and third time I was not in town. But it was worth the wait.

At the concert I knew 90% of the ghazals he sang (a far cry from the carnatic concerts I've been to where I feel like an idiot while the rest of the audience lets out collective wah wah for they know the song/s). V also had a blast (nothing like me because his level excitement would be "yeah it was good" compared to the 600 word ramble of mine)

I have to thank three people here. 1) Worldspace radio for letting me know about the concert 2) Sav for getting me the tickets 3) that anonymous gal who couldn't make it to the concert despite having two tickets - you have granted one of my dying wishes (no I am not dying now but you get the drift right)

Ah what an evening it was......................

I am writing about it full four days after because if I had attempted this then all I would've managed to write "Ooohlala", "beautiful", "my god" and sobbed all over the post :-)

To say or not say

I remember giving a headline "East meets west" to one of my articles back in college. I thought it was very witty (?) or something to that effect. The euphoria or the relief of coming up with something smart (!) lasted only till my professor asked me "As opposed to?"

Err, hmmm, ahem...gulp. He looked at me exasperated and said "do yourself a favour stay away from these supposed smart lines. They have been told a million times in this week alone"

Later another professor said the same thing again and again till I could actually catch myself saying it or writing it.

And in today's fast paced, globalised world cliches in the media are abound. Someone actually took time to put a list of them together and ranked them too. It could actually serve as a ready reckoner for budding journos. These things can especially come in handy when you have to end your PTC and can think of nothing smarter than your name and the channel's name.

Read all about it here.

In the list of cliches they have forgotten the most important ones "Only time will tell" and "as good as anybody's guess"

My humble contribution.

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....