The Alien Feeling

I cannot stop thinking about this theory my brother told me, about how we are the true aliens on the planet. That we are so different from everything around us, its not clear how the jump in the evolution was made.

I am not a specialist in any of these subjects but I must say this view point is turning me off Zoos, Museums etc just when my son has started enjoying them!  

Its strange we just collect samples of animals put them in a Zoo, so we can take a peak at their world. More eerie when I accidentally ended up seeing a huge display of  stuffed animals in the Museum. Actually I never verified whether they were just models or stuffed animals, birds and fishes. I am kind of scared of finding off the truth. I spent all my time there running after my toddler who was thrilled to see bigger versions of animal pictures he has seen in a book.

But if they are indeed stuffed, then what a strange fettish for humans to have! Why do we want to see what other animals look like while we live in cities.  Over time we have lost all ability to truly live in wild, we got rid of all the animal hair, we cannot survive without clothes, eat only cooked food. In fact, most of us would not know how scavenge for food in a forest. We have shed every animal instinct we may have had (barring a few I suppose!) and surrounded ourselves with things that keep us busy.

Its almost as if we created work so we had something to do! In the event of eventual distruction, perhaps some people will be transported to a different planet and would start from scratch !!

The art of doing nothing

I think I have finally excelled at it. I can sit for an hour not even day dreaming, just with continuous flashes of what I should be doing and next thing I know a huge chunk of time has passed. I decided today was my day to take a break. How is different from yesterday , you ask me? I do not know. Except perhaps yesterday the goal was to have fun, enjoy ride into the city, eat out watch a movie. One gets tired when having fun.

A break on the other hand is .., well it is the ability to sit idle and not feel bored, not feel the urge to be somewhere else, feel the need to talk to people. A break is sheer contentment in the present, not feeling stressed out about work piling up as I sit here blogging away after years ... A break is cooking without putting your mind into it and discovering halfway through lunch that hey, am a pretty decent cook! A break is being able to sit down and write what one feels like without worrying about the quality of though that I am professing.

There have been other Sundays where I have spent the whole day without seeing a human face...ok am exaggerating a tad bit there, but lets say spent the whole day without having a real conversation. Usually by evening I am at my wits end about what to do with the rest of the Sunday other than get back to work.

Today, I must say has been pleasant, there have been short spurts of work being done feeling and yet I have managed to while away time without being bored.

Its been a good day; a break from the everyday, from the stress of underachieving, from the desire to be elsewhere, from the thought of wrong turns one has made...from the dread of the ticking clock, its been a Sunny day, a day for bad puns :)

Thin films

I was going to write about how life is like a thin soap film, sometimes, it just looks so perfect that you think that if you touch it or change anything it will just break it :(

And then I see my last post it seems to be on same subject. No wonder I haven't posted much on this blog lately. I have only been having the same thought every month!!

So its Spring now, the air is still chilly but its sunny today. That just makes everything better. Spring brings flower buds, small green leaves, my plant seems to have made it through the winter and finally I see new leaves and I think, this is going to be a good year after all.

perfection

Its hard to imagine that life could be perfect. The second I think that my life is perfect now and I don't want to change anything I assume I have jinxed it. Cause otherwise it would be strange. I have done nothing in my life to feel happy or content for very long, because one is supposed to earn it and its not clear what one did to earn it!

If I am saying everything is good, then of course something will mess it up. Cause otherwise that would be too easy. How can I be happy knowing that I am happy and there is nothing left to yearn for?

Cause if somebody discovered that there are very few wishes that have yet to true then this life may not last very long. Don't they say that there is a calm before the storm.

Of course they don't say every calm has to be followed by a storm. But you cannot assume that. Cause if you did, as luck goes, there will be a storm following the calm.

So in anticipation of the storm you spend you happiness stingily. You would rather have bouts of small sorrows rather than a big long lasting sadness. So when there is nothing to feel sad about you create it. You create imperfection there is none.

In all, i am always in state of almost happy, perfection. There is always that craving for one little thing if it were to come true life will be perfect..

But that is life haan? else what else would there be to live for?

one liners

I have been recently thinking about changing my profession. I would like to be an advertisement critic. There probably are people who get paid for doing that. Part inspiration is the TNT series Trust me, which gives an idea about how much work goes into making an advertisement. Partly its the few adverts that took me by surprise and the others which made me bang my head to the wall.
Let me start by telling you about the latter first! Fortune Oil,
The tag line? Compare the oil to dishwashing liquid, why? because when you make food in Fortune oil you will lick off the plate cleaner than the dishwashing liquid!
OMG, I felt like pulling the hair of the person who came up with that idea. Chances are of course that person is bald by now anyway.
The best one recently I saw was Max New York Life Insurance.
Tag line : Karo Zyada ka Irada
Plot : Child repeating everything father says
daddy dada
banana banaana
chechslovakia brrr Kid makes a face!
It was brilliant and well supported.
Whats a good advertisement? Context, (which precisely means that you dont have to throw in skimpily dressed women in each and every ad you make!)
A good tag line which relates to the product, and then a sixty second spot which brings it home!
Dont overthink your audience, just think!

slumdog millionaire (spoilers warning!)

So I finally saw this movie in the theater. Friends visiting for the weekend was excuse enough to go watch a movie.
The first half hour of the movie was so depressing that I was almost ready wait outside the theater for everyone. In fact, I would have done so if I was sitting on the aisle. I spent at least ten minutes closing my eyes. More so because none of background they showed was totally unbelievable, except for the first bit where he jumps into shit. That utterly gross!

Anyway, as the movie progressed into a fantasy mixed with reality the tone changed. No more gory scenes. It was still sad but the worst was over. The dialogues were funny, especially bit about Taj Mahal being a hotel and the king dying before any of the rooms being built :) Fully points to all the actors and even for the casting directors. The character roles being played by bollywood veterans did the trick.

Street children talking in english was a little wierd at first but after while it just felt like a movie in english, thats all. All the hindi usage was indiscreet and at least not noticable to me..but then again they didnt put in subtitles very often. So am not sure how the non hindi speaking people liked it.

In the end, it was a well made/written fantasy tale of rags to riches.

The only thing is it probably had a sum total of the bad things that can happen in India to the poor. So not a fair representation of the reality, but neither is the commercial indian cinema anyway. I walk back home thinking at least I cannot point my finger at anything in the background which was untrue.

Final Verdict : Worth a watch.. with a strong heart...

my point of view

We were talking about healthcare system in the US at lunch the other day. And someone was telling me about the argument against having the government take care of it. One of it was it will become like DMV and my response was maybe I am used to standing in lines in India so I find nothing wrong in it.

But then, it occurred to me later, if that was the flimsy argument against it then I am not sure privatization is the way to go either.
Think about any non-essential companies like cable, phone etc... I have had to spend hours on the phone to order, cancel, fix any service I have had. Even though it might be in their interest to keep me happy, if they are the only company providing the service they won't care.

I know its not an argument for having the government take care of it...but I just had to mention it. Actually I my experience at the DMV at recent times has been quite simple. I have never had to wait more than an hour for anything. It was quite systematic last time I was there. For the amount of people they cater to, they do a fair job.

I have one more argument against the logic that private is the way to go. In all honesty, ever since I have come to this country, I have stood in lines to get coffee, to get food, at the checkout counter and, I have learnt to become patient.
Everybody seems to take their own sweet time to do things. I had always thought that its in the businessman's interest to get these lines cleared up quick. But no! you can stand in line for 20 minutes to get a cup of coffee, to check out your groceries..

Then again, I have never really tested out the health care system in this country and I am thankful for that. So I have no way to verify any arguments for or against government.
All the same, I hope the next decade brings new ideas, open mindedness, gives the "government vs private" a rethink.

my main man..C H A R L I E

I had completely forgotten how much I loved this movie when I first saw it. I saw it probably for the nth time yesterday, after a break of some years and, I sat engrossed the whole one hundred and thirty three minutes of it. I was supposed to be working alongside, but what can I say? I never got to my backpack to even open my books!

The Rain Man starring Dustin Hoffman and Tom Cruise released in 1988. You can read more about that here .

I cannot quite remember when I saw the movie first, because I probably saw the movie in pieces initially. However every scene made an impression, Hoffman and Cruise walking together out of Wallbrook, walking out of the airport, riding down escalator in las vegas, the drive ...There just are so many.

There are scenes in the movie I never quite forget. At that note, after contradicting myself in about 15 lines I recommend you watch the movie and then perhaps this is not a contradiction.

Don't you care?

I got early to class today to teach..and my students were talking about which part of the country they are from.. and suddenly I felt real ashamed.. Ashamed to say that I am from Bombay... Mumbai..

I used to be once so very proud of this city which was a complete representative of our country..where no language was considered higher, no race given preference..it was anything but what it is in the news for today.

Do we not have a conscience anymore ? Will we use any excuse to beat up another person and even kill? If we are not that person..who are we? the ones do not even stand up for our fellow human beings.

I can understand the fear of the mob.. 12 hitting 4...but what about the 100s who could stop those 12..

If we know this is wrong..how come nobody seems to be vehemently voicing our opinions? I find it hard to believe that a speech about how mumbai belongs to marathi speaking people but location is reason enough to let someone be murdered.

Is there no law and order? I didn't think we had a very good law and order..but where is the mumbai police ? Can anyone kill anyone just because they speak a different language.. I can't think of any other part of the country where this can happen...!

If this is the ideology people believe in..they should never move..! live and die in the same house they were born in. Never walk to the neighbouring house either..after all if we start dividing on basis of language, caste, religon.., why not generalize it further and realize that its every man on his own..
Sounds extreme...? but what about those people are drawing these lines of boundary ?

but of course

they should pay me to write movie reviews. I watch at least a movie a day. I notice tiny details in the characters, and sometimes even get so engrossed in the movie that I am at one with them.

so I think they should pay me to write this..as I tell you that definitely maybe is a must watch for all those who like the mush with some common sense and sensibility. I could predict most of the story and yet it surprised me and some and most of all made me feel good at the end of the day! and best of all got me to write (even if this post is full of and's)

fiction should be like that..running parallel enough to real life that you can imagine." hey this can happen to anyone" and yet manage to sort out the difficulties in a non-earth shattering way so you come out of the theater (or in this case the living room) feeling content that you spent your last few hrs sorting out some virtual life!

and this is partly addressed to my dear friends (if they ever should read this post since they think that this blogger has vanished for good!), fiction does not have to be inspired by real life. More often than not, its a tiny incident which triggers a train of thought, a wave of emotion, a burst of imagination all expanding to a dozen paragraphs of often rosy prose.
and the game that meghana plays in "jaane tu kya jaane na" namely "whats this?" is all it is.. really. you see a banyan tree she sees a witch with flying on her broom stick !

of idols and idolizing

My friend was complaining about Aditya Narayan, once of "chota baccha samajh ke mujhse naa takrana" fame,now the compere ( I really cannot spell the word) MC of
Saregamapa. He sings ok but not enough to be idolized.

I realized in todays world ...with internet anyone can be idolized..or infamous..or famous..
Like Ms South Carolina was it? Her slip up in Miss America spread on internet like wild fire.
Or the desi guy in American Idol who became famous for his bad singing!
Or the stars of various song competetions..Especialy if they are from small towns..they become the talk of the town real quick.
If you check online..there is a fan club for anyone who is remotely famous. Tehre are already at least 20 communities on Orkut raving about Ishant sharma.

My Plan? If I really get nowhere in proving my theorems in math...then prove that anyone (and really anyone) can become the rage of the town on the "internet " :)

PS: I should not forget to mention my TV idol..Since am more into reruns and watch old seasons of tv series on DVDs..For the past two years its been Ms Lorelai Gilmore.. what can I say..she has the "TV life"

more and butter milk

What is it about us humans ( and I am generalizing this a fair bit already..so not including all living beings!) that we always want more?

We are happy but we want to be more happy (as if we could really quantify it..but maybe that is the point!) We have money but we want more. We have freedom..but it just ain't enough. We have love but god forbid if we were ever satisfied with it.

Ok..there is an argument in life that if you don't want things..you will never achieve. So if you had been just happy with fire ( and by you I mean B. Franklin) there would have been no electricity. If you had been happy with mail.. and again..I really mean G. Bell there wouldn't have been any telephones. ( At this point I sincerely hope that there were mail carriers well before Mr Bell arrived on the scene!)

Alright so I buy that argument and say that maybe one should not want more of what we already have..but want different things. Except at this point..one of Mahatmas (and I do say this with all due respect) arrives and preaches that we should not want anything. That the whole purpose of life is letting go..etc etc..

And my argument against that is, well why live a life trying all your life not to live it? Why try new techniques when you happy already.. ? Why give up what you got..instead of making it better.. ? Why want something else? At this point I realize I have a come a full circle with an argument. If I had really known any better..I wouldn't be here blogging instead of working on my thesis..in fact..I would be here at all.I would be a Swami.. or Gyani..or something like that! Either making tonnes of money (most possibly that!) or living in Himalayas..on alms..

Right now I am amused that whatever word processor blogger is using recognizes Swami
and Mahatma:)

About the buttermilk ..so my ABCD cousin was at a wedding reception in India. He had had a cup of this amazing Tamilian filter coffee. So, he went to the cook and asked for "more". The nice man poured him a glass of buttermilk and gave it to him.

Moral? So when have you ever gotten anything you asked for?

black and grey

shadow of doubt

the world of darkness
is nearing
closing in on you...

how do I know?
i switched off the lights when I walked out on you, silly you!


hope

and the glimmer beckons me
where to i know not
so i keep walking to the end of the rainbow
where the pot of gold
i pass by silvery lights
and red glowing rubies
and several other gems that hold no value for me
should I stop here?
near this bed of rocks
there is no end in sight!!!


PS : A little too much of nirvana nad pearl jam..and no end of the math!

"Music n movies

So typically Hollywood movies do have a popular soundtrack. But not half as influential on the success of the movie as in Bollywood.

Yet there are some movies, which use a famous or a well heard song at the most appropriate occasions to bring out the real meaning.

So for anyone who has watched "In America" a story about Irish immigrants remember the following scene.

The elder daughter singing "Desparado" by Eagles at a school Talent show searching for her father in the audience and meanwhile him stumbling down the stairs of ther apartment building..drunk..
Dont your feet get cold in the winter time?
The sky wont snow and the sun wont shine
Its hard to tell the night time from the day
Youre loosin all your highs and lows
Aint it funny how the feeling goes away?

Desperado, why dont you come to your senses?
Come down from your fences, open the gate
It may be rainin, but theres a rainbow above you
You better let somebody love you, before its too late


Or the scene in Squid and the Whale with the older son runnin away from his troubled life ( his parents having divorced)

Hey you, out there in the cold
Getting lonely, getting old
Can you feel me?
Hey you, standing in the aisles
With itchy feet and fading smiles
Can you feel me?
Hey you, dont help them to bury the light
Dont give in without a fight.

Bombay and Germany...no connection at all.

This post possibly belongs in the book blog. But then again, its already been reviewed once. It was the review which made me read it.

Maximum City is a book about Bombay. Suketu Mehta does a good blend of his life on returning to his homecity and the story of the city itself. So I spent most of my trip and back to Germany (and I have been meaning to mention that one way or the other :) ) reading this book. On the train ..(and german rail system is amazing!), on the flight, etc. On a side note, I really had fun riding the rail. I believe I travelled at least 5 different types of trains..at varying speeds..going upto 240 km/hr (and not even feeling it..).

I had a couple of days to see some of Germany (after my conference) and I did my best. The book gave me wonderful company. I remember sitting at Karlsruhe station waiting for the connection. I was reading this book with at most concentration. Suketu Mehta was explaining the life of a bar girl. The whole courting process, and suddenly I heard at least 10 dogs barking at hte same time.
Apparently some search party was out, there were these men in uniform with trained dogs. The dogs had been barking quite randomly at the passengers getting out the train. For a second, I looked around to realize that I might be looking a little suspicious sitting there alone. The dogs luckily showed no interest in the sweets I had in my backpack.

Germany was very tourist friendly, inspite of language issues. But then again, I possibly visited only the touristy areas. I got a chance to take treks in the black forest, eat the original black forest cake. Meanwhile, I reading about another life filled with murder and mayhem of black collared workers/ mafia in Bombay. The starking contrast of where I was ..and the city I had lived in most of my life left me with this unworldly feeling.

The disbelief of what I was reading and beauty of my surroundings, have made the whole experience quite surreal. Bombay and Germany..no connection at all..except in my head!

Dreams and Reality

Its amazing how something that was a big deal for days together, when it is over..or when it just doesn't work out they imagined way just turns into nothing.

All the excitement, the enthusiasm, the expectations become nullified in an instant.

In a way dreams rarely ever turn into reality, cause if they did why would they be dreams in the first place. Then again, if they never become real why dream at all?

Perhaps sometimes, the fun of it all is in the excitement, the
expectations, in dreaming those impossible dreams; in being brave to want something that may not happen.

Change is a reality....

The faces that were a norm fade away into deep corners of memory. New surroundings take control and over time become normal. Once in a while an unexpected tidal wave, brings about new breezes. The scent of old memories take over. The surroundings become hazy as the sweetness in the air consumes everything. For a few moments, life just goes back a few years. The rest of the day is spent in this dazzling unreality of past and present together at the same time!

gripes nd likes.. on trivialities..

irritated with how people misuse public toilets

amused by how people talk with actions on the phone " can you find it..its in that cupboard..its sqaure" the guy draws out a sqaure shape with his hands..
I feel like telling the guy, I can see it..but the guy at the other end clearly cannot!

feel good when strangers on the road make it a point to say hello and smile..

amazed how the right song on the radio can change the mood in the room for the better..

still find it fascinating when there is sudden burst of rain from the sky..and the whole scenery blushes in greenery.


I decided that the cover of a book can decide whether i will pick it and browse through it.. so that one cover can make or break its sales..by a lot if there are more readers like me!

First impressions dissolve into oblivion when you really get to know a person. And even though you were not wrong about your first impression, they are only a small part of their character.

There are some people in this world..when you look at them you know they are nice..that you would have to dig hard to find anything bad about them...

And one fly moving across the screen can make blogging tedious!!!!!!!

printed impressions

Aren't books the most wondeful things in the world? I hope that the printed word never goes out of fashion, even as I type this up and realize there is almost zero chance these words ever getting printed :) but hopefully some chance of being read!

I was sitting in the public library today and realized that what boon it is to any given community to be able to afford a free library. Why, you don't even ever have to take stuff home. You can basically sit there all day and read everything, from newspapers to magazines, fiction to how to do..help books. Anything and everything.

I used to read a lot of Louis L'amour stories and the heroes were all self educated, learned men.
In particular I would be facinated by the fact that a person could know a lot without ever stepping into a school. It struck me today that if you have access to libraries then you just need to become literate to become educated.

If educated means being aware of the surroundings, to know what is going on in the world, the ability to learn more and more then its just a few meters away! And any man, woman and child can be educated at will free of cost!

nasha yeh pyar ka nasha hai :)

Kudos to Amit Paul! He made a song which I barely remember, into a memorable song. Now, I was all set to forward his singing on todays episode of Indian Idol 3, for I cannot remember him ever making an impression.
No offence to Udit Narayan, but this chap made the song come to life. The scale changes, and the soft voice, it was so good that even Alisha Chenoi asked for an encore.

Its amazing how good singing can bring life into simplest of songs. I have to admit I have heard him sing three times already and felt compelled to write this.

As an aside, well not quite an aside but an add on, Ankita Mishra (the wild card of Indian idol 3) actually has managed to impress with her performance on the (what I would call "Sideiest ) very generic songs. She has a style which gets attention, whether that qualifies to make her a playback singer I don't know.

Of course given the structure of Indian Idol and all of these singing competetions, more often than not who sings well or performs well rarely is connected to who wins. So let us see, cause I was really disappointed with the results from last year!

Meanwhile, both Star TV and of Zee TV (the originator of singing competetion Sa re ga ma pa) have a corresponding show, which very often showcases a higher quality singing talent. Its really hard to follow all of them simulateneously so I have stayed loyal to Indian Idol. Partly because of the ease of getting hold of the videos !

For the uninitated, you can watch Amit Paul in the Part 12 of the July 13th episode on
http://indianidolclips.blogspot.com/


PS: For those who expected something else on reading the title..I apologize ;)