Travelogue

Mysore & Somanathpura

A trip down memory lane. It reminded of my school excursions, we did the exact same routine too Srirangapatna, KRS and Somanathapura leaving out only the palace and the zoo. The new additions being Mylari and Olive. Oh what joy one can find in smallest of things.

Somanthapura - the hoysala temple of Lord Vishnu

The KRS

Madurai

I sometimes wonder how the people there can be in such a jolly mood in such a bad weather. It makes me super cranky. The wonderful people and the horrible weather all intact- its always great to go back to people who are genuine and believe in what they do.

Ullal, Mangalore, Belthangady and Malebettu

My monsoon break :-) Totally unexpected but very lovely break. Loved every minute of it with a healthy dose of nostalgia thrown in. As I am growing older I am realising my need to find the roots that are otherwise lost in the concrete jungle and the catching up game.

Monsoon in Malebettu

Ullal beach

PS: I am glad I can upload pictures now! I've been struggling with my browser for long now!

No way out!

Last weekend there was a film released (some 3 hindi, 2 English and 1 Kannada but those are not as important) It is called Aap Ka Surroor: The Moviee: The Real Luv Story. Please do not even start me on the numerolgy of the title. It is Himesh Reshammiya's (HR) debut film. The promos hold glorious evidence of his non-acting skills. He actually makes Mallika Sherawat (who given a chance can act and act well) look like an oscar winning actress. I very strongly believe that the man must be eliminated from the entertainment industry (in every form) and the promos only strengthen this belief of mine. The very premise of the film that HR is a big singing sensation that can sell tickets in Germany (have all the germans gone deaf? or have all HR fans moved to germany?) is laughable.

This isn't the first time though that bollywood is making its stars sell internationally (in fictional world of course) we had Bobby Deol and Upen Patel shown as BIG hits in America singing hindi actually punjabi songs in shakalaka boom boom (whats with the title anyway!) But since in Bollywood there's no concept learning from other people's mistake the premise has been adapted again in HR's film. I do not know what the story is about. I don't even want to know what the Gayathri mantra has to do with him meeting the heroine or the hysteric cries of "I am innocent" are about in the plot. The critics "panned" the film. I read the reviews and I started making plans to start "Ban HR" groups.

But three days later I read this report that says its a hit! Apparently this inane movie with bizarre spellings and stone faced HR is a hit!!! The opening weekend box office collection is as much as Sivaji some reports claim. The collection was as much as Dhoom and Krrish 2 that released last year. Read report here.

Now how did this happen? Apparently even the Delhi multiplexes are running to packed houses proving the theory that he is for the masses only, wrong. My only solace is that in Bangalore this may not be as bad what with Sivaji keeping everyone in theatres and Kannadigas rejoicing over their new found super star hero Ganesh's 4th film. In TN of course its just going to be Sivaji. In AP there is an impressive line up of new releases and in Kerala I am not sure if anyone will watch it except may be G2 (she actually likes his music and watches any thing thats on a 70 mm screen atleast once)

Coming back to my question - why is HR such a hit? Is it his baseball hat? Is it his nasal singing? is it that fact that he is regular guy who made it big. But how did he make it big without any talent? What is it???? Last year he had a concert at Bangalore Palace grounds. I've never seen north indian junta in that quantity ever before! The tickets were priced at 500, 1000 and 1500 and there were families of 20 going in together. (no i was not attending his concert but going to the October fest next door at the same venue)

Now that his moviee is a hit my worry is I'll have to see more of him on screen too! I already have a long list of people to avoid.

But here's another view of this unusual success story. Although I do not want to pray for HR I do wish the filmmakers learn something. If they do it won't be very hard to ignore HR.

But till then I will be clinging on to DVDs of my old favourites and watching then over and over again. Unless I develop a taste for daily soaps.

BTW the heroine of the film, Hansika Motwani is just 16 years old. This is why we should have more children's film so that these kids don't have to behave like grown ups in stupid films.

Third week of June and no rain in Bangalore. We should cut some MORE trees.

Road to Future!

We are building so many roads just in and around Bangalore. We are 4 laning and 6 laning (on Hosur Road its 10 laning) everywhere. We are building ring roads to connect the ring roads. All this while the current roads are in a bad shape or some areas have no roads at all. And not surprisingly this is the case in all the cities across the country. Like a friend of mine once said soon India will be one big road! Then we could simply move to Pakistan, Bangladesh, Burma and Srilanka to live. Commuting will not be an issue at all since there will be anyway so many roads connecting the country's borders.

Coffee anyone?

Have you seen the new Nescafe ad? Its about this guy who turns off his hot neighbour by asking Will you have a cup of milk with me?

Yes the ad makes its point and works well. But I have a problem - I don't drink coffee. I can occasionally have tea. And this has been a problem since I hit the age when one cannot be friends over just chocolates and icecream.

At my first job everyone would have tea except me. For the first one week everyone in the office tried to coax me to try. Then they gave up but the taunting that I was "milk baby" never stopped. (Honestly I am not a big fan of milk either) It would get worse if we had some newcomer around tea-time. I had to explain all over that I don't drink tea and was subjected to stares of disbelief.

Then by the time I got to my second job I was ready to give tea a chance. Actually it was my only chance to make friends of my colleagues. All the tea-drinkers bonded over it (they resemble the smokers gang that way) while I was left hanging around (nothing deliberate I was assured). So I drank tea sometimes (talk about peer pressure).

Later I was quiet disgusted (with the tea and myself for bowing down to peer pressure) that I gave up tea. This wasn't helping my social life at work plus I never got to take a break from my desk. "You don't even drink tea why are you here?" I was asked by some concerned colleagues so I took the round about way. I started drinking Pepsi! Those were the days when MNCs were just beginning to pamper the "Indian middle class" so we had fountain pepsi machine installed at the canteen which pumped tons of litres a day. So here I was back in the social circle :-)

Then the whiff of breeze from far away Bodhi tree hit me. I woke up to the health hazards of aerated drinks (which my tummy reminded me on an hourly basis) and of course the whole why consume some American company's product while ignoring your own tender coconuts thing also happened (yes I was attempting to grow up in my own way). So I stayed off Pepsi too.

Now I was back to square one. But then one curious thing had happened which I had previously failed to notice. That is I was after all in the company of grown ups and had friends irrespective of my caffeine non-addiction. So I stopped worrying about it.

But journalism proved even tougher without coffee or tea consumption; especially when I had to go off to people's homes or villages to do a story. They either got very offended or got so obsessed about providing an alternative that I would feel horrible about being a non-caffeine person. So I would gulp it down. (That is when I discovered another advantage of being a grown up you can actually control your facial muscles when you are consuming something you don't like.)

Summer is the worst time for someone like me because you go somewhere for a story and they say "suda suda coffee saapudunga" (TN junta is extremely hospitable and they try their best to humour a young female journalist with a camera). It is truly a testing time. Don't believe me? Try having piping hot coffee under a tin roof at 2 in the afternoon when the temperature is 42 degrees.

In some of the villages they ask me if I want "colour" Tamil colloquial for soft drinks in recent times. Very often it will be some local replica of branded colas with god knows what in it. But if one can guzzle down the branded colas despite Sunita Narain screaming hoarse about pesticide content I can surely be courteous to my well meaning hosts (not before sending up a quick prayer that whatever happens the medicine could be found in Amma's kitchen). Occasionally I have been offered tender coconut and butter milk too which is truly god's gift to me. But the thing is these are expensive so can't expect them in places where people are earning just 20-30 rupees a day. And some of the places I've ended up in there's nothing but tea available for breakfast or lunch.

So given the circumstances I have made peace with caffeine. I have them in dire situations only.

However this doesn't mean that while hanging out with my friends I hold on to my bottle of Bisleri. I am very comfortable with wine, vodka and rum (no beer thank you very much) so I am doing okay even without caffeine. I wonder if this is an example of "She was meant for higher things"

Psst: I don’t like to drink coffee but love the ads and yeah I can have cold coffee like once in 3 months or so.