...

love this painting by Toulouse-Lautrec!
...saw a special on him some days back on Channel 4

...was intrigued by the guy and his work...especially this one.

hypothetically speaking

Was just thinking how I 've always wanted to be one of those white-suited (why does it have to be white when they do a moon or space walk? - must have some logic) people walking on other planets, finding microscopic life on the same or getting to view the grandeur of the cosmos up close and personal...

but then, I'd rather watch them on the Net, the TV or read about their findings in some journal...

why? because I'm pretty claustrophobic...and the thought of being packed in a closed artificial environment with 3 or more other humans, with NO fresh air (and I mean the polluted emission-filled stuff I live on, not the pure stuff in the hills, if it exists), no way of opening a window or going out for a walk, basically having to live or simulate living *normally* in that setup, just freaks me out.

I'm sure they have ways around it, acclimatization sessions etc...but unless they give me a mosnter dose of a sedative, I don't see myself there....but never say never.

Long intercontinental flights kill me for the very same reason...I have to fight the urge to just saunter to the exit and try to bash my way through for a walk after every some minutes. And dont even get me started on seeing the same bunch of people around me forever in that lil space.

oh well, I guess science can wait for my 2 pence worth of contribution. :-D

./.

Nalanda - Revisited.

_________


Saw Dhoom-2 on dvd.

The script at best seemed like it was scribbled through by an over-imaginative 10 year old boy...only if viewed as a kiddie flick, the twists and turns might be swallowable...the effects and action pieces are all quite impressive...but... I preferred the first flick, as millions do too, I guess...less contrived and hyped...

the music was pretty average except for the Crazy kiya re number which is hummable...no idea why they opted for fultoo english lyrics for the title track tho...Abhishek is almost part of the wallpaper in this one...

must say tho Hrithik and Aishwarya look pretty good together!...and theres definitely some chemistry there! hope to see more of them together in future.

An okay time-pass.

As the year ends, from the flicks I saw that really stood out were:

Omkara, Rang De Basanti, Gangster and Corporate (tho it had a depressing n melodramatic resolution). Havent seen Lage Raho yet.

Golmaal made me laugh, a lot..so that was good. :-D

And yes, won't forget my only reason to visit the theatres this year, Casino Royale. :-)

2007 better be better!

time for some jazz

love this song...love her voice! slow smooth classy stuff...liked her version of 'under my skin' too...

its catching!

'So, here it is, a merry christmas, everybody's having fun...' :-)

hard to miss it...the jingle's all over the place...seeped through to every cranny...images beamed out from everywhere..nothing else on the telly except for maybe the fog.

the spirit is infectious...herds of early shoppers trotting to the superstore across the road....happy smiling faces, anxious stressed faces...unless, you live under a particularly big rock, theres no escaping it.

sometimes, have this strong urge to get off the posterior, stuff a turkey, haul a big tree home, splurge on gifts for anyone (which I might have done before around this time of the year before, and which really doesnt need a context :-), and generally do Christmas the traditional way...

but then the moment passes, I realize I really don't have to and I remain content in sharing in the festive feeling like any other non-Xmassy-human would, right here from my couch or maybe strolling through the mall in the weekend.

Hmm, but a chocolate cake, some wine, a tree for her and a gift should do it. :-)

Anyway, happy holidays and a peaceful sweet 2007 to all!

and yes, a merry Christmas....!

<&:-)

cheesecake and memories

sigh!...memories...can imagine trudging through downtown. my home away from home for couple of years.

a bright tomorrow?

Yaay! :-)

the world's shrunk amazingly, Web 2.0 or whatever they might now annoint this phenomenon...no stopping it...with all its bad eggs.

I can connect with an eskimo in Lapland and exchange angst-notes, through a blog or just simple visuals...

we're one race and hopefully all other superficial barriers will give way...one day.

must read, yes...must watch, not sure.

'Perfume' is a movie now...!

read it sometime back...an unusual, intense and disturbing story...horror at a rather sublime level. The protagonist born without a sense of smell, who goes on to be an ace perfumer and serial killer in the process. Completely amoral and beyond the pale of humanity.

The last scene is still vivid in my memory...abhorrent and yet justice delivered.

Am really not sure how it will translate onscreen....it just won't be able to capture the essence of the central character...tho it might be watchable for its performances.

Do I want to watch it...don't know.

___

Remembered loving 'Freedom' (90) by George Michael...the video was pretty neat too...all the supermodels lipsynching...

...grew up with the guy belting out his stuff right from his Wham days...Father Figure was another fave...had his poster on my wall...his and Boris Becker's... :-)

The sweet 80s.

Madonna, Top of the Pops, Eurythmics etc...in school, we all had lyric books from Archies..I remember getting mine a bit later than the rest of the crowd... :-)

Lost track of music somewhere in the Noughties I think...quite a few CDs gathering dust, literally...waiting to be remembered...some great instrumental tracks too...

Alanis was the last artiste I remembered getting buzzed about, her Jagged Lil Pill...not that I don't know whos who and whats hot...but just not that into it.

Have my eye on certain artistes whose time to entertain me will come. New people. And some old aces.


oh well.

Dense fog continues today...frosty days.

Manu Sharma convicted of the murder...finally. So was Santosh Singh.

Hopes for justice in countless other cases where the victim might not have been a high-profile person, from the middle-class even or as in some fast-track cases, a foreigner.

This is a start...! And kudos to the people whose outrage made sure justice was not just a laughable concept or a topic to be discussed at socialite evenings.

+++

India beat SA...finally. First ever on SA soil. :-)


+++

Really like the 'Pal' song by K.K....one of his old ones...'hum rahe ya na rahe kal...'

Also, 'Aadat' by Jal...

+++

Its all about personal choice and circumstances but thinking about it clinically and in a lucid moment, people who choose to remain single or not to have children seem to be so much more sane and sensible than the ones who have toed the old and crumbling ways of the world. Not spreading themselves thin etc etc...

It needs courage to stick to either one of the decisions. To jump into sharing a life and people the world as messed up as it is, as much as to stay true to oneself and not jump into the first boat because everyone else is doing it.

I live by my self-willed choices and am pretty busy, deep into and happy with them, but the point remains, that if I hadn't, would I have led a less full life? Not really. I would have that much less baggage tho. Like the movie 'Sliding Doors'. What if.

But, the grass is never really green anywhere, I realize that.

ho-hum, its just one of those existential-angsty moments that crop up and its really grey outside. A cup of chai should cure me of any pretensions of profound thought. :-)

his folks

The other day, on one of the morning shows on a channel, the male anchor while chatting with a psychologist on the christmas phenomenon and how to stay sane through all the motions, quipped that his wife gets kinda claustrophobic when they visit his folks on Xmas, and needs atleast some time on their own in the middle of all the family bonding stuff...

which was pretty harmless tho the female co-anchor ribbed him abt whether his folks knew his wife didnt like them and even if they didnt they would now thanks to his blurting it out to the nation. he just shrugged and grinned it off.

What struck me was that it will take atleast another century for the average Indian male to evolve to this level of casualness and acceptance regarding his spouse's feelings about his folks.

Forget joking about it or in this case talking about it casually and unintentionally on national TV, its a pretty sensitive mine-field for most couples in private conversations too, especially the M-I-L factor...and I'm talking urban, well-educated, supposedly with-it people here...lets not even go to the small towns or rural belts...though I'm sure there are exceptions there as everywhere...

Personally, I'm pretty okay in that my hubby knows exactly what I think about my in-laws which is mostly good n loving and sometimes fodder for a nasty row...we keep our communication channels open all the time and talk everything out like adults or atleast pretend to till I fling sharp-edged objects at him and he looks fit to burst all his blood vessels out...

but the fact remains, that for an average Indian man, his parents and family are haloed topics who should not be talked about casually...and definitely not to be analyzed as human subjects.

Its changing, I know, from personal experience, with my brothers and from some of the couples I've known...but its still too tiny a percentage.

You don't marry a man back home, you marry his family and thats true whether its the old traditional arranged setup or the fell-in-love-individual-choice-cool inlaws bit...

but our men are slowly getting weaned off from the old mindset and treating the wife as a separate human entity who deserves as much respect and consideration as his folks.

And it all works wonders or should, if his folks realize that its not about cutting down the old family tree as some rather regressive saas-bahu soaps and tear-jerker movies state, but having another sapling grow near somewhere but in its own little patch of soil, water and air.

Space and respect are pretty damn important in any relationship...and especially in the one, which sees you through more than half of your life-span in this world!

Getting that buzz again!

Being a grown-up isnt all that fun, is it? all that getting buzzed up on mad projects that was part of childhood remain faint-ish memories.

I used to love running down the stairs at school, dangerously jumping 6-7 steps at a time, the feeling of now-I'll-fall-and-break-my-front-teeth getting the ole adrenalin pumping...a teacher wrote she'd always remember me as a girl running madly in the halls with someone in hot pursuit trying to pull my hair...but well I was a huge tomboy and thats just another post...:-)

I love roller-coaster rides, the gorier the better...5 yrs ago, on a Vegas trip with a bunch of people from work, I was desperate to try da bomb of the rides at Stardust, but really lucked out cos that day was really windy and they'd closed it down temporarily.

So anyway, I managed to scrounge out a tamer but still cool ride ( in one bit, it went up on a vertical slope and then whooshed back breakneck, breakfast churning inside the stomach) the next morning minutes before we were starting on our way back, at the Sahara, I think it was and went alone on it...the rest of the gp chickened out....the only guy in the gp couldnt since he was eitehr chicken too or since his wife wasnt going herself, protocol etc. and did I love it...! :-D I still wouldnt think twice taking up on a bungee jumping invite...

Just remembered being on this infuriatingly slow crawly merry go round and there were these 2 other strange women with me from work again, one of whom was actually yelling for the ponderous thing to be stopped and that she wanted out...she was in tears and thought she was going to die....no accounting for people's fear factor!

but anyway to return to the drift of my post:

having a kid (yours/sibling's/neighbor's/friend's/colleague's/anybody's) in your life, really helps to visit that mad juvenile part of you which isnt really dead and decomposed.

so my having a feisty 2 year old really helps...you see each grand step through their eyes and revisit the wonder and the glee...

almost got the same buzz from running down the stairs, tinier tho when I went down the huge blue slides with her at an indoor play centre couple of days back...we went thrice, and not just cos she loved it :-D

Am waiting for her to grow up a bit more so we can take on the theme park rides anywhere...if she has my DNA bits, the right ones, shes going to love every blood-curdling moment!

Hopefully!

we the acquisitive

there goes the neighborhood...we've pretty much screwed up this planet and now we're eyeing another. No wonder any intelligent life out there (much much evolved, am sure) is staying light years away from us and our grubby hands.

Of course it is a great find for science and we need to keep on searching for more answers, and this might sound faint-headed (actually, not), BUT I can bet on my toenails that need to be clipped asap, if our race finds even a corner in this cosmos that can be colonized and made into an apartment complex, it will.

___

Really hope the Mara comes out unscathed from all the recent hype and noise. Please don't gate off any part of the great migration route. It has been the object of much fascination and wide-eyed wonder, no matter how many specials I see on the topic. Fingers crossed.

telly stuff

Any sociologist wd say a good measure of the zeitgeist of a place, among other indicators, is of course to sample its dailies, tabloids, streets, and its favorite soaps (and now, reality shows).

During my 5 month long (till date) stay in England, I've gathered from the print und electronic media that the hot topics any given day are: global warming, anti-ageing, crusty politician shenanigans and Kate Moss. And not necessarily in that order.

The classic sitcoms like Are You Being Served and Keeping Up Appearances remain my faves...we got to see them way back when DD ruled, thanks to the BBC connection. I recently saw another oldie, Last of The Summer Wine...and loved it. :-)

I admit I'm totally hooked onto Deal or No Deal (good ole Noel) and Countdown.

But am yet to delve into two of its longest-running soaps, Coronation Street (46 apparently!) and Eastenders (21). I realize I might not get whos doing whom, whos having whose baby or whos breaking whose house by just tuning in one fine day.

I imagine, this would be the n+1 generation at play in the current instalment and their antecedents are zilch for a newbie like me. I could go online and ferret out the details, but I really don't care so much and I am not writing a paper on it anytime soon. Just an idle curiousity...

Also, I forget the essential truth behind a soap: the history doesn't matter. And it really wouldn't need a rocket scientist to figure out the details. Human drama has had the same key elements since the birth of story-telling.

Someday, though, before I leave, I shall sample. :-)

here's a first

well, I never stop surprising myself, do I now?

never been tagged and never dug tagging or answering too many questions about myself...
saw this in The Pawnshop and decided to try and see what I came up with...might or might not be the truth, but what the heck! :-D

... one-word answers required.

1. Yourself: weird
2. Your boyfriend/girlfriend (spouse): solid
3. Your hair: horror
4. Your mother: achiever
5. Your father: erudite
6. Your favorite item: none
7. Your dream last night: surreal
8. Your favorite drink: tea
9. Your dream car: none
10. The room you are in: living
11. Your ex: who?
12. Your fear: boredom
13. What you want to be in 10 years? me
14. Who you hung out with last night? usual
15. What you're not? fake
16. Muffins: well?
17. One of your wish list items: tote
18. Time: gone
19. The last thing you did: blinked
20. What you are wearing: rags
21. Your favorite weather: stormy
22. Your favorite book: many
23. The last thing you ate: cracker
24. Your life: changing
25. Your mood: mercury
26. Your best friend: me
27. What are you thinking about right now? "when does this damn thing end?"
28. Your car: sweetheart
29. What are you doing at the moment? duh!
30. Your summer: hot
31. Your relationship status: cooked
32. What is on your TV? nada
33. What is the weather like? grey
34. When is the last time you laughed? today

cool is

...Steve McQueen. :-)

saw 'the great escape' again yesterday... great flick.

I'll say, this is *really* stretching it...talk about socio-conditioning and the works.

a baby doll that comes with 'real tears' and nappies and also some infant bodily functions.

not-so-subtly preparing the little girls for the future at age 3+?!!

Or maybe, funnily enough, making up their minds for them already, this stuff really isnt all play and cuteness...but hey, pretending to be an astronaut seems like more easy fun and it might well be the line to toe. :-D

the war within

this one has decided to be nothing for a while. to just flow with the waves, to just stubbornly be. to not to prove anything.

the other, super-nag, who wants to push and drive and create and become, has been muzzled. for now.

the sand is running out, slowly but surely...but both are right.

I, bemused and amused, observe the tug.

Yaay! so, the grey cells arent really ready to be sent out to graze...the book is 'Savages' by Shirley Conran...! am so happy I finally got it. :-D

___

umm...really bummed...

can't remember the name of the book...google isnt much help either.

have read it twice, ages back...loved it...about this bunch of corporate other halves who accompany, well, their other halves (duh?!!) to a retreat for a conference or some such...these women, well-coiffed and airbrushed, can't open a jar for fear of chipping a nail etc, then go on a trip to one of the remoter islands....the plane crashes (or was it a boat?) and they are all stranded there....
they have to shed all their urban sophisticated feminine frills n ribbons and get down and dirty to survive. stripped of all the civilized layers, to the only instinct that makes all living creatures tick. survival.

really neat work...and in a funny sort of way, a precursor to the big reality fix nowadays on telly here, I'm a Celebrity GMOOH!...

I remember thinking while reading the book, how it wd make a really cool movie...all the right masala in it.

pity I can't remember the author's name or the book's.

I

land on my feet, always

take all knocks chin-up.

the

cat in me is too proud to acknowledge

stubborn little dog in me refuses to call it a day.

but...

sometimes, the silly heart mutters, under its breath, afraid

that I might hear.

1 doc per 60, 000!

wow.

so yesterday it was just me, lots of popcorn and Bond. a well-deserved solo treat. :-)

was watching a movie all by myself on the big screen after 3-4 years and it felt good if a bit strange. a sense of freedom from the usual.

was it as good as the old ones? different I'd say...grittier, a bit soppier with the love angle which is eventually doomed and never to return, and definitely more menacing with the new guy. The birth of 007.

I am not going to gush ad nauseam abt the lead actor. He is smouldering...and pretty convincing with the stunts and violence. Looks vulnerable in the right moments. And I stand by my last post. :-)

The sort of ingredients, acute charm + suaveness + comic timing+formulaic bits etc, that the Brosnan flicks had in dollops, are done away with.

Leaner and meaner. and hotter.

this thought just popped in my bean last night as I watched one of the zillion 'Making of CR' specials and refused to go away, so here I am blogging it...

I can't see myself ever working on a mundane hows the weather, whens the meeting, 9 to 6 basis with someone who looks exactly like daniel craig.

:-)

never ever.

ever never.

In hindsight, this post seems to be a simple case of adult myopia on my part.

A 2 year old anywhere has every right to make what might be a loaded statement in the warped world of adolescents and older creatures...she really might not like anything too brown (which the doll was, in a rather paint-job way - the school's way of sensitizing children to people of all color, maybe), like I might not like green in clothes.

What you hear is what you want to hear or something along those lines...

It can only be the curse of the politically correct syndrome that visits adults which made me wish aloud that it wouldnt carry on to her adult life...after all she did seem to like me, though I admit I am a couple of shades lighter than the doll in question. There I go again...pathetic! This is a rare case of me quibbling with non-issues. Well, theres always a first time for everything as they say...

***

shes an absolute doll...blonde to the point of white, lovely blue eyes behind the fringe, the works...sassy and sweet...made a card with her colored paper and sparkle sprinkle stuff...said it was for me...all of two and a half and a whiz with jigsaws, her kind.

lisped the other day,'I dont like that doll'....before I could ask why...'shes too brown'.


seriously hope she outgrows that particular feeling on her way to adulthood!
:-D

saw this somewhere...

“I think of life as a good book. The further you get into it, the more it begins to make sense.”

well, atleast some of it does... :-)

___

the parfum is down to the last dregs now...will be on the hunt for the next. this one was some french thing, lovely!

...but, of all the stuff I've ever used, Chanel No.5 rules. Seriously worth the hype and Marilyn's testimonial! :-)

quirks

saw a lady with her groceries going home, her left hand on her cheek, the body a bit bent in the process...have seen her before, same hand on same cheek as today...
we made eye contact and she smiled I think, couldnt see her face, eclipsed by the hand on one cheek. I wonder why its there.
A physiological condition or a nervous tic?

Reminded me of the man I saw years ago in a bus in denver, whispering to someone on the side through a hand cupped to his mouth...telling secrets...to someone the others can't see...a friend, maybe.

http://www.hinduonnet.com/mag/2006/11/12/stories/2006111200090300.htm

even as a rather diluted, rank illiterate, never-been-chauvinistic NRM, I agree :-)

ma spiel

Created life.

Am really tempted to add that to my resumé. I do realize any prospective employer might look at it in disdain and remark, 'so did my mother', or 'so did I'...and so did the lions in Africa or the penguins in the Arctic... any sceptics who read this might add, and added to the planet's woes by increasing the load a bit more.....but the point remains...that when I look at it from even during a really clinical OBE, it seems bloody marvellous!

Personally for moi, to think that the being inside who used to do cartwheels exactly when I was in the middle of a rather solemn and vacuous meeting or who stuck her feet out in a 'Present, Ma'am' way, when I patted around the premises, my constant companion on the dreary and long cab ride back home in the sweltering heat and non-stop FM, to our first face-to-face in the OT...that tiny red squawling thing that looked like a shrivelled squirrel to this little person of 2 years of the incredible curly mop, the killer smile, who throws tantrums, dances to film songs and tries to spell everything she sees in her own language, the most beautiful thing in this world...to think, she will have a life of her own in another couple of years, friends, crushes, learn new things, deploy strategies to combat ozone depletion, the works...it is bloody marvellous!!!

Well, it does help, that today's one of the good days when she has cooperated with the meals and the naps...hence, the gush...

on a bad day, I would be advising the uninitiated not to commit harakiri and not to *ever ever* harbour any maternal or paternal thoughts...you will be sleep-deprived for atleast the first 3 years, not remember what it is to have a conversation with an adult if you decide to work from home or not work at all, have a house that resembles a war zone at any time of the day, have odd bits of goo on your t-shirt, crayons in your hair...and I am not even touching on the tantrums here.

for the uninitiated again, its a bit like owning a character or a bunch of them in the Sims, only a zillion times more exhilarating, educating and nerve-wracking...

still, bloody marvellous!

an itch...

just must get this simian off my back...like an itch that must be scratched till it bleeds...

acting is fake, actors are fake, they are pretending to be someone else in a story.

hence the story is more important becos you know it is XYZ playing that role. it cd be nicole trying a new nose in 'the hours', de niro playing a disturbed guy in 'cape fear' or amitabh pretending to be an asthmatic on-the-verge-of-retiring honest cop (in khakee... one of his best ever!)
...its still just them, memorizing lines, learning their cues, knowing the spot to stand in, putting the paint on, the wigs....all that doing homework, getting into the skin, living the role...

how has it become such a godawful hyped up thing today...!!! all the sundry awards and accolades, the big O being especially hallowed and sucked up to...the crazy fans, the websites, the tabloid frenzy, the papparazzi, the red carpet...just for pretending to be someone else or for being something good yourself?

or are we finally just devoid of any real sensibility or any real reason to celebrate and adulate...?!

SO, the big deal is really just about that element, known to lit students world over as 'willing suspension of disbelief' (coleridge, i remember)...I know its braindead, its just a story, edgy or mushy as the choice of flick might be, but it lets me forget my humdrum life for 1 and a half or 3 hours...

yes, it is an art form....yes it is entertainment, that lowest common denominator for humankind at large..

but does it or rather do the players have to be taken SO seriously! you just need to look at our own film industry where even mediocrity is adulated over...the good ones are not surprisingly then treated as absolute gods and all kinds of titles are bestowed on them....and somewhere inside despite their apparent humility, they do buy into all this...they do think they are IT. and for what?

pretending to be someone else, faking all emotions known to humankind and taking a paycheck which would embarass a top-notch scientist or a solitary soldier perched in Siachen?

I know, tomorrow I might sing a different tune...but the fact remains...the monkey will remain perched on my back, somewhere.

...this really is out-of-the-box ideating! :-D

true...and thank God for this new wave!

btw, Omkara was the only recent Indian movie in these neck of the woods, that got a review from the Sunday Times (majorly, for the Bard connection of course) and got 3 stars! (tho they couldn't stomach all the songs and melodrama, predictably)...which is pretty generous, considering most of the lot gets 2 or even just one...!

emma thompson...an amazing actress...one of the people that make cinema the big deal it is....loved loved loved her in Wit....her movie, through and through...and what a movie! touching and funny and so solitary...

her latest should be good....

He's back! and so hot!!!

brosnan was a fave too with his suave slinky ways and the perfect comic timing...this bloke seems more of a cold, dark killer-machine who means business...but still has his ways with the ladies...yum!

gyaanlet

was telling a friend abt how its best not to have too many expectations in life...the lesser, the happier you are...and this was not just sounds-cool-BS...it has worked with me.

am kind of an extremist in a very lazy, one-eyebrow-raised way, whatever that means...

I either have very high expectations from people or none...(to digress or not, really, I either have dress to the nines phases or go without any jewellery at all, even earrings, in rags phases...

and I find, as I've travelled through much of my lifespan, I have shed almost all my expectations from anyone...was it due to any social disappointments way back in my gawky adolescence, I dont know and dont care really...now, if I get a prompt-enough reply (thats a whole other post about how uncool it is to be ready with the response anywhere), a thanks, a smile without any reason from a person from the other end of any spectrum, a kind gesture, or even an honest-to-goodness arbit how are you mail from an acquaintance/friend, I feel good...

is this a kind of reverse snobbery in terms of high standards?...maybe. Funnily enough, I have high stds for myself in any and all equations...so, maybe I am a rank full-of-myself person or just a sad loser. whatever...

anyhow, the lighter the baggage, the happier the journey. and no forking out dough for the extra kilos...

surreal!

http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=7032316303141404085&pr=goog-sl

this place cracks me up...almost always :-))

...wonder how much of it is honest-to-goodness-real! but hysterical, nonetheless.

All about GuluWalk...

every night, the kids in Uganda walk for their lives...to escape the horrors of war and childhood denied.

Got to know about it just today. A noble cause. It should reach desh too.

a no-brainer. cheney and the other amigo rumsfeld really raise my hackles...stupid dangerous arrogance dribbling over from every pore.

and in a lighter vein... :-)


___

it helps just venting it all out to a stranger, like the lady found...dont know each other from Eve and the floodgates just opened up, in rather ordinary happy circumstances...and God knows, her family is suffering...a monstrously heavy burden...a 3 year old with cancer, with all the muckiness of chemo...the rarest of its kind in the UK...hope the little boy makes it...I do believe in miracles...will hope and pray for them.

It can't be that unfair, but it is. :-(

me, the hypo

and while I check my mail, this unpleasant truth still lurks out there...I lead my life happily embalmed in a cocoon of urban comforts, chores, responsibilities and my random searches for personal happiness....
scouting out a good playgroup for my munchkin, that swish bag to be bought, that haircut that is yet to be, that much-dreamed about visit to masai mara etc...and yes, satiate the do-gooder in me with a spot of online volunteering...but who am I kidding?
I reek of a mild hypocrisy as I blog about this here ugly fact...
820m waiting to be fed a decent meal. hits me right in the solar plexus region. and I promise to do something about in my own way before its time to make my exit. And...

Publish Post.

./.

bright shiny day

yellow green leaves

man walks dog

tree winks; a private joke

a puddle a river

a doorbell sings

somewhere.

/*/


another hour to laze in bed from today...yeah, right, with her around :-)

reasons

A friend sent me this...slightly long but very well-written and analytical in a not-so-bookish way...makes sense.

http://www.reason.com/0603/fe.th.why.shtml

sigh sigh sigh

there's something about old b&w movies, pictures....something so romantic and poignant...making even the ugliest mug look ethereal...it just pushes the 'sigh!' button inside somehow...

last night, saw a beautiful old movie c1945 by david lean...a lovely heart-tugging romance...'Brief Encounter'....two married strangers meet at a station and fall in love and how they keep meeting despite being comfortably settled in life...and how it ends tragically.
Both of them are pretty ordinary looking and yet the illicit affair transforms them silently. Stolen happy moments, lies, excuses, walking with the other till the platform, the train chugging away, the smoke billowing through the screen, the shadows, the corners...it was beautiful, all the more because there was something so decent and restrained in the whole treatment of the story...
its all narrated in flashback by the heroine to her sweet hubby...the dilemma she finds horrible will be laughable in today's flicks. today, she would just dump her spouse, get a hefty alimony and shack up with her lover who would have left his family too or not and if they were serious about the till-death-do-us-part bit they would sign a pre-nup. cynical but true!

Sadly I feel romance is dead in the cinema today, be it in the West or in India. everything is so in-your-face and blatant, there is no subtlety, no chemistry in the movies anymore. the black and white era didnt just not have the loudness of colour, it also was all about, at least in the beginning, an understatement in the depiction of emotions...and thus mirroring the intensity within.

casablanca was another b&w classic....the works.

but then the early colour age had its high points too...an epic spectacle like mughal-e-azam had its immensely tender moments which are immortal now....that was beauty...that was romance. the lamp-lighting scene in sholay was romance. so many others...

still, black and white. sigh!

you have to go.

yes, its that time of the time again.

I can't stand it. I curse it, ignore it, plead with it in turns. I find myself looking closely at specific hairdos on the telly or on the road. I see myself getting the job done in a salon in a dream. It must be chopped off to the required minimum. As one lady somewhere said, you have high-maintenance hair, her polite PC way of saying your hair's a mess and why did you bring it here of all the salon joints in the world.

its only a matter of when.

come to think of it, the last time I had a haircut which didn't leave me with a not-so-happy feeling was 4 years ago. Every do since then has been naah-can-be-better.

so I wait and let my discontent grow while my mane breathes its last few.

It really must go. No shape, no form, no manners, no nothing. It must be done.

thought as much!...
it was house no. 25 where she lived for some months not 24 but for some reason I found 24 more attractive and took random shots of it...remember pausing in front of 25 since the guide had enunciated it pretty clearly and deciding it wasnt aesthetically exciting enough, moved to 25.
anyway, just the front of a house and an address...did the touristy thing but of the wrong one :-))

doesn't matter.

a rainy Bath

so, we visited Bath, or Bath Spa.

a beautiful old city that just oozes history from every crack...to think the Romans lazed around their baths here and the Victorians wandered down its cobbled streets...
the great pulteney street made that much long and that much wide for horse carriages to go through with ease in their day...the Roman baths themselves....squatting there, feeling the warm water...which was green in the pool but funnily enough, orange when it rushed through the channels...the relics...the stone coffins...Minerva's bust...ancient brooches....and the rain just adding to that otherworldly ambience.

the gorgeous old Abbey which dominates the skyline....the ancient architecture...

Jane Austen's temporary residence at 24, Gay Street (not sure if it had any connotations)
she penned her Persuasion and Northanger Abbey here....my buried english lit. signals tingling all over...missed the tour of her centre, we reached late after all the wanderings...and the tea and scones with it.

the beautiful old trees just towering over us...leaves all overthe place...fall in all her beauty....and the rain...our rather wet open-top bus tour and the wind stinging us when the rain paused briefly.

its a pity that tho our desh has zillion times more of a historical heritage and treasures to be showcased in every corner, we do not have the same respect that the europeans have for their past...
go to any old ruin in Delhi, and the city has quite a few of them hidden in its bowels, and find graffitti, paan stains, violent etchings and public lavatory smells.....tragic and frustrating...
these guys not only preserve, document and showcase their past with excruciating love and pride, they also earn huge bucks off it...so its not only sentiments...

so, anyway, we had a fleeting brush with the past that we had only read about or seen NatGeo specials on...wondrous and poignant.

And the rain softly fell on the old houses and streets and the hazaar tourists like us happy but not completely satiated...

'Once there were green fields kissed by the sun,
....
....
...
where are the green fields that we used to roam?'

:-)

A time to dress up, celebrate, make some serious noise, add to the bad bad emissions and get stuffed with endless rounds of mithai...wishing everyone a brilliant Diwali and a fabulous new year!

Wish I could do all of the above, can't...will be dull not being back home. anyway...can always try and burn down the place and get a sugary high :-D

da great dabbler

All my life I've dabbled merrily in stuff...music, dance, acting, learning languages, acquiring hobbies, even my friendships...never followed anything through to the next stage.

Lacking a killer instinct/a drive to excel/an intensity which has exasperated many of my good teachers/lecturers/parents/well-wishers. I realize that I have it in me to be be an ace at the stuff I had taken up at various points of my short life. And I am most definitely not talking about my abysmal Maths or Physics experiences here.

But I mulishly inherently almost always just skim the surface. Testing the waters or rather sampling a bit from all the pools...

Except for maybe writing, reading and hmm, photography. When I say photography, I do not in the least want to sound like I presume to any aspirations of an Henri Cartier Bresson or Eisenstaedt or Diane Arbus...but I do take pictures and have done so for some time....mediocre mostly with flashes of Aha-ness....

and Flickr has me hook, line and sinker...the great leveller...where wannabes like moi, pros and hungry amateurs are all offered a platform to display our wares and see some of the most amazing stuff the world has to offer, from all crannies of this planet. I think its one of the best things to have happened to me (circa Jan 2006) and the Net, circa I dont have the faintest.

Its almost like a little world unto itself...the familiar people 'contacts', their handles and the buddy icons, the zillion groups and their silly or not games...a parallel world...even if I have not a single frame to post in a day, I can just get sucked in jumping into strange lives and seeing the beauty they see...

like with the blogosphere, more than the happening places where the whole world and its granny seem to congregate (becos they have some great stuff and becos some are just da gurus), I prefer stealth-bombing into strange not so frequented spaces which have even more unusual takes on life...ordinary people who might not advertise themselves in group pools like me and everyone else....

I could go on and on till the cows get itchy....but to cut to the chase, I'm proud that I do have something I have been vaguely consistent about finally...and yes, my erratic blogging is another.

I think I'm done for today...

ein Buch

sat up late on sat night and finished it, at last.

a beautiful book. very disturbing, thought-provoking and SO opulent in its wordplay. I found myself returning mesmerized to some of its passages, words..

Beloved by Toni Morrisson is one of the some books I found precious and am glad I read it. It totally deserved the big one it got.

it stays with me. the incredible overarching 'thick' love of a mother which defies and disdains morality, sanity and other social labels, the querulous tender primeval love of a lost child that has returned, and the other that lives and grows up through a tempest of a life. The sadness, the poignancy and lives ripped open that run through the pages.

Black slavery and what it really meant... for a layperson like me who has just glimpsed it through pages, screens and trivia - the book educated. The horror, the inhumaneness, the jungle within.
Humans treated worse than dumb beasts.....a race, persecuted.

Amazing.

____


My poor Anna, hope she sees the light. God bless, either way. :-)

in my head...

This used to be my playground (used to be)
This used to be my childhood dream
This used to be the place I ran to
Whenever I was in need
Of a friend

Why did it have to end
And why do they always say

Don't look back
Keep your head held high

Don't ask them why
Because life is short
And before you know
You're feeling old
And your heart is breaking
Don't hold on to the past
Well that's too much to ask
...

I love this song...one of the few precious by the lady...I dont have much time for the past, but this brings back happy moments..

yesterday, saw a lil black fly insect thing fighting for its life after being accosted by a lil spider...it fought till the last..and the spider kept biting it...it was a one-sided contest all the way...

the scene took place right on the thick outer window glass of the living room...she and I watched...up close...in morbid fascination...

faced with the eternal dilemma that I'm sure on a much higher level confronts the wildlife photographers/researchers/filmmakers...should they intervene and save...but that would tilt the balance Nature works on....the food chain...it would be sacrilege for me to have played saviour...

so the insect died...a struggling, feisty wannabe survivor a few seconds ago and then just a lifeless tiny black form encased in white web...hanging there, preserved and safe for the spider's next meal...and sure enough it was gobbled up in another couple of moments...

the image stayed with me, and inside I felt a discontent as I had my rice noodles...that the life and death of a humble innocuous bug could have been decided by my passivity...it could have lived for another moment before it either lived on for another day or became food for the next predator in the area...the spider could have starved a lil longer and thus hunted with renewed vigor...

I do realize I'm being melodramatic as I'm wont to...but seeing it writhe and struggle to be free, stayed with me.

the spider still has its home under the casing of the glass outside.

Life.

youngest female writer to get the Man Booker...her mom was nominated quite some times...great job! the third Indian after rushdie and roy...

orhan pamuk gets the Noble prize for lit...

almost through this one...

time was when I used to have books for lunch and dinner...on the way to work, in between chores, a comfortable moment etc...now its more erratic, they just hang on for my attention when I can oblige...life changes, doesnt it? But I can never not have a book to return to. They've been part of me for as long as I can remember...and it runs in the genes too.

my memory isnt as sharp as it could be...I know I love the books I do, I can retrieve some snatches but not as much as bonafide book-lovers do...they can recite whole pages even. I can't.

But I love books in my own kooky way. I still have the dog-eared ones from my school days...4th, 5th grade on...love the smell of them...they form part of some good memories!

I'm already building a collection for her...a legacy of some good books...if not much by the way of assets, atleast she will never want for books :-D

a glance

"female"

"male"

"brown"

"white"

"nice"

"cute"

walk on past...

all about an auto ride

we're all heroes...or can be...

I've always felt each one of us populating this planet comes with an inbuilt survival package. We just get different scripts and get thrown into varied scenarios. each one of us specks is heroic in its own extraordinarily ordinary way.

we all have it in us to be heroes and make the best of what life throws at us. some are luckier enough in that they get to tap that hidden fount in their lifetime, some too busy scraping a living and battling prejudices, don't. And yes, there are some that spend the precious moments whingeing and cribbing about what could have been, not knowing that its upto them to shape the future with their hands.

I remember expostulating my belief to quite some people at different points in life, when they felt that they couldnt have survived a certain set of circumstances like somebody else had. You can be that somebody, when push comes to shove, when its time to make your dreams come true and be true to yourself.

even a roving glance at the animal world is telling enough. each day in the Masai Mara is a twirling circle of birth and death...and survival. the impala that gives the pack of wild dogs the slip lives, for another day.the carnivores, the herbivores, the omnivores...fighting tooth and nail to live.

And aren't we humans possessed of that ultimate weapon of consummate creation and destruction, that elixir of ideas, the brain. How then can anyone claim to be helpless, weak or awestruck with the ones who have made it upstream.

each one of us has stories of courage, strength and overcoming the odds in our lives...in different shapes and forms.

somebody I worked with whos around my age juggling two kids and a job, hasnt had a vacation since she was a kid, who hasnt travelled anywhere in particular, who's saving to retire to travel and enjoy life. is she any less a person for not doing all the amazing crazy things me or other women of her age have done and laughed at? Is her practicality and old-fashioned mindset to be laughed at or condescended to? I don't think so. Different strokes for different folks.

that's what is remarkable about the human spirit...the freedom of choice...to be what you want to be and not what the world's hype machine tells you to be.

Free will to Be or Become.

break a leg! :-)

the sun hasnt shown its face since yesterday....still raining....grey is what I see with some splashes of a dull green which might be trees.

__

Channel 4 aired a special on credit card data theft last night...undercover expose on touts in Delhi, Calcutta and Hyderabad....how easy it is to get a customer's security code on the card, bank account details etc...
it isnt painting a very bright picture for the already suspicious and paranoid customers in UK and other Western countries...it seems Kiran Karnik was rather rattled by this report...hope this was the last of such glitches and not the ubiquitous tip of the iceberg...

Interestingly, the same channel seemed to have screened 'Lamhe' at 10.30 in the night...per my programme guide...with English subtitles of course...

two of the great Indian claims to fame...BPOs and the Hindi film industry...

was it them saying we hate your guts as far as call centres are concerned but your movies are almost good enuff for our mainstream viewers...

funny.

__

its a special day today, wish the weather had obliged too. God bless her with a fabulous life and hope she lives it to the last drop. :-D

its a really cold grey day today...'the' English weather notorious for being as unpredictable as the female of the species...so the sun is apt to punch a few clouds out and be crowned champ again later today...which is good since I have some work outside..

__

you're sitting there and suddenly a huge grey cloud descends on the inside. no friggin reason why it should, considering you have almost everything you wanted, been that and done there...still some dreams to be fulfilled, yes?...but its just an inexplicable greyness...weighing you down, enervating you, so much so that you want to just sit there and grow roots..existence seems pointless...and then suddenly, it all clears up, you let out a huge guffaw at something and its all blue sky and white clouds again...funny human beings...

___

FYI - If you flip a shark upside down, the shark gets unconscious, has a blackoutwhich can help you make your getaway...but how do you get the cojones to flip it in the first place...hmm, worth a thot...!

saw 'gangster' last night...liked it...gritty, taut, A+ music with the usual pinch of melodrama thrown in...shiney shines :-)
the female's good too in an edgy sort of way, except for her voice and diction which really grate on the old ears...especially, in the screechy bits...hashmi's okay...
the bhatts keep experimenting...thank God for filmwalas like them...

the other half usually falls asleep even during the most testosterone-driven flicks...but was wide awake and actually looked interested in the proceedings which was a good sign..

+++

another one that i love and refuses to vacate...love it!

Ain't no sunshine when she's gone
It's not warm when she's away
Ain't no sunshine when she's gone
and she's always gone too long
Anytime she goes away

Wonder this time where she's gone
Wonder if she's gonna stay
Ain't no sunshine when she's gone
and this house just ain't no home
anytime she goes away

And I know, I know...

Hey, I ought to leave the young thing alone,
Ain't no sunshine when she's gone
Ain't no sunshine when she's gone
Only darkness everyday
Ain't no sunshine when she's gone
and this house just ain't no home
anytime she goes away

hahahaha! the joys of motherhood - be afraid, be very afraid! :-D

just remembered steve mcqueen for some funny reason...he was SO dishy...memorable movies - papillon, the great escape and 'the towering inferno'...usually, the last man standing...and what a man!
___

one of the songs that just keeps coming back...
...
I wonder how
I wonder why
Yesterday you told me 'bout the blue blue sky
And all that I can see is just a yellow lemon-tree
I'm turning my head up and down
I'm turning turning turning turning turning around
And all that I can see is just another lemon-tree
...

Oct 2 - the birth of a man who helped a country free itself from being a colony with some really unique set of tools, a shrewd king-maker, a spiritual figure for the masses and the classes, an icon if ever there was one...he captured the collective unconscious of people of varied hues within the same nation and of the world too...became an example for other greats fighting injustice in other forms, martin luther king, mandela et al. His words are quoted by nerds in every corner of the world till today. The man who thought it would be a good idea, when asked what he thought about Western civilization...the one they called Mahatma or Bapu...

Is he now just a face on a rupee note, a reason for a holiday or the protagonist of an amazing movie made by a gora?

I remember him if only for a minute today. It must have been something to be living in those times...

___

Today Ravan shall burn and Durga shall vanquish Mahishasura. In the South, its also time for Vidyarambham...Dussehra, Vijaydashmi, Dashmi Puja...celebrating Life.

Vanitas vanitatum et omnia vanitas

one option for the ole epitaph....

yaay! still miles to go...

funny things keep happening to me. and i seem to enjoy these odd bits. :-)

like this one...no idea why...two different takes on the art...even if you were stoned out of your cranium, you couldn't see any meeting points. harmless. and very bizarre.

i think thats what life is about. Absorbing, embracing and laughing at all the quirks it throws at us.

the stranger the better.

there's enough time for the normal and the mundane. and a whole lifespan devoted to it.

the idea of an alternate reality, a parallel universe is tempting as long as it does not eat into the real.

maybe thats why anonymity isn't such a bad excuse for most of us. we have enough going on in the real world. roles to play, errands to run, promises to keep, responsibilities to see through. why spill some into this other state of being.

this is where one can be amorphous and purely a self. uncluttered by any noise or reference points.

To be a Hindu. Tharoor hits the nail. He spells out some home truths about the religion and what it means really to be a hindu and not alluding to the saffron brigade here.

And I relate to it, all.

I believe in the One Above but not in places of worship. The last time I went to one was two or more years ago. Not that I won't but I don't have to. I could as easily have been a christian or a zoroastrian or a jain. And that is what being brought up within this faith has provided me with.

I have more of a private chat with the One ever so often. And its true, that whenever I have been down and out and just chatted it out inside, the scene has changed...there is definitely a superior force at work, within and without.

It could be a moment of stillness in the middle of my chaotic day, an idyllic time by the great sea which never ceases to touch me deep inside, touching a fine old tree and feeling the peace within. Or just smiling at someone I dont know, helping someone out in any way....

My mother has her own lil mandir at home...she believes in God, the works, she believes the One Above has seen her through many trials and is the reason she has achieved so much on her own, though I would only give her amazing resilience and courage the full credit - she is an unconventional lady who has pretty conventional views on life, the feminists would easily claim her for one of them...she reads the assorted japp books...despite being a scientist (retired, now) she would i think qualify as the devout one among us. She has colleagues/friends from other faiths too and has visited their places of worship too and thus has no problems embracing their beliefs.

My dad views temples and festivals in a more socio-cultural light....where he can hear great pieces of literature being read, meet some like-minded people, where he can observe rituals and understand the source of these....it takes him back to his childhood....he attends the Gita lectures where the book is discussed and analysed....the Vedanta sessions...enriching the spirit and the mind. A whole other way to staying in touch with the spiritual.

Yes, the Gita - a source of strength, solace and an acceptance of the rhythm of the unknown. I remember a time when I only had this book for company in a foreign land, I was yet to get cable or membership in the local library. :-) I can still return to it. Or not. The words remain inside.

As parents we can hope to provide our daughter with the same open skies where she can soar to without looking back and not let her faith pin her to the ground.

We all need to believe in something....some find that in God, some in love, the fundamentalists in their warped idea of religion, others their work, their children, their drugs, their causes, their lusts, and even the atheists have their non-belief to hang onto. Something greater than us has to drive us on....that something which helps us graduate from being mere shells. Call it passion, life force or faith.

anyway, an interesting read...

http://www.bikereader.com/contributors/misc/fish.html :-D

A spin on the old 'a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle' by I. Dunn.

the good and the downright ugly

i saw two movies thru the weekend. one was brilliant and the other was a sheer assault on my senses, leaving me enervated, drained and with a glorious headache, which persisted the morning after.

the first was obviously Omkara...raw, earthy, salt of the earth...amazing performances, ace screenplay....and tragically elevating. all the performers turned up aces...the music, a delight. only bummer was seeing ajay devgan succumbing to the shaved-chest syndrome. why!?!!

the second which i seriously dont want to waste much of my blogspace on but just might, was the dreaded KANK. this and the other moronic family saga, K3G are the only ones by this director that i have dared to sit through.
this one was the best in terms of an utterly braindead infantile screenplay, horrible acting especially from the king of ham and an irritating rani mukherji who has definitely has had some job done on her jawline....both of who keep weeping or passing khadoos lines....
the same DDLJ gag, trying to be oh so cute humour, hot punju auntyji jokes (obviously the johar and chopra stable have lots of raw stock in common)...same kajol doing a guest appearance in the perennial bhangra rock family song....recycling toxic waste at its best.

no idea what abhishek bachchan was doing here...he must have had a lobotomy done to keep ms.mukerji's face job company. the only time i could manage a smile was when abhishek or his dad did their bits...

here's a director who sticks to the same formula, the same 'fave' actors, the same cute gags, the same set design, the same initial alphabet for his titles - it all just screams stale.

there, i am done.

after 'bheegi bheegi' from 'gangster', its 'tere bin' from 'bas ek pal'....good for the grey moments.

whipping a dead and decomposed horse

as usual, I go out on a limb, but am not alone i think. its about time that the holocaust, Hitler and the horrors of that time were consigned to history. it was a horrible time yes, unparalleled in sheer evil, but aren't the people who are bent on muzzling everyone who has a different opinion on the event, keeping the guy's legacy alive. the name hitler is still reviled...and they are making sure that future generations remember what he did and stood for. it might actually backfire and there might be sickos who idolise this guy and will in the times to come.
now they're ready to burn this guy for his opinion...he doesnt have a squeaky clean past but to try him for a viewpoint is something else.

der aaye durust aaye...par itni der se aaye!

13 years is a long time for delivering justice to the relatives of the 257 killed. the real kingpins flourish, unfazed and confident of never being punished. even if they do get extradited (never!), they can happily hang around for 13 or more years before they are brought to book.

sanju baba goes to court again. dont know if i pity him for his imbecilic actions which continue to haunt him through the years, 18 months behind bars notwithstanding. he obviously isnt very sharp upstairs....

so many other zillions of cases gathering dust in our courtrooms...the guilty grow fat, old and die...the victims if not dead already, go broke, old and die....as do their relatives....tandoor case, graham staines, kolhapur sisters, rajiv gandhi's killers, jessica lal, shivani bhatnagar, priyadarshini mattoo...and these are just the high-profile cases...there are so many more in each and every taluka of our great huge country!

fast-track courts dispensing sentences at lightning speed only for cases involving foreign nationals is an insult...

we deserve more. and soon.

someday

so many blogs. so many voices. some become communities. some islands.

lives. stories. colours. reaching out across the vacuum.

some using masks and smokescreens. some transparently themselves.

the quest continues. helps to have a listener. a sounding board. an empathizer. a fellow angster.

but sometimes just shouting out into the silence is good. venting out the words. not caring if anyone listens or understands.

the world has shrivelled up. races and spaces do not matter.

poor dear humans...SETI is all good and amazing. More immediate shd be the search for intelligence within ourselves and within our fellow travellers. Understanding. Evolving.

+++

Bush has the second lowest IQ of all the american prezs. But he just might be the only one ever who burns the charts for causing mindless destruction, arousing sheer hatred and redrawing lines across the global arena.

watched bits of 'layer cake'...lots of gore, coke, dishoom-dishoom, four-letter beauties and the works...but all i remember is just gawping at how BLUE daniel craig's eyes are...i kinda like his roughshod looks...rugged and rather delicious.....nice bod too...didnt observe much of his acting capabilities to comment on...
brosnan was a good Bond, suave and feline...dont know how this guy will measure up...but... damn! hes nice. :-)

++++
RIP Croc man....fearless to the end. Dame Nature got you, aptly.

a river runs through....

hahaha :-))) he's good.

whoever thought the humble dal could send Indian expats in a tizzy! but its quite nice to see apna govt acting tough on something....even if it be lentils....quite sexy!

and what do you know we're out of moong dal...the yellow one...the asian stores here would already have hiked up the prices....great timing!

___

Saw 'snatch' yesterday....LOVED IT! mad hilarious fast-paced edgy thriller with some gory boxing kabooms thrown in for good measure...no females...which was just right. (oops, did I just trample over some feminist's grave?)

has jason 'transporter' statham (i kinda like him), brad pitt (as this quirky gipsy boxing champ), and a host of other brit actors....great great stuff! benicio del toro has a littlish part too...he ends up without an arm and a tea-cosy on his head....

Dags!! :-)) must add it to my faves....am yet to see 'lock stock and smoking barrel' by the director of the afore-mentioned....Madge's hubby...tho he hasnt really come up with anything remotely brilliant since...i think.

----

' mutton dressed as lamb' - love it :-)

I keep surprising myself. every now and then. a mystery within me. lets see what I reap...if I sow.

rainy day.

forgotten what i came to blab about.

oh yes

every woman must have a secret, a past she can fish out of her attic on a rainy day and smile at. faces, a goodbye-not-said, glances, smiles, an unspoken buzz. jilted admirers, crushes....what could have been...a part of her that is still saucy and bouncy.

visit them when life gets too messy, when it seems like there are only dead ends and no forward movement. when she feels as attractive as the kitchen rag.

every woman must have a past.

very important.

tom cruise's become the latest cuss-word...feel bad for the poor guy...so he has a few screws loose, who doesnt?! the higher you rise, the more chances of you falling with your posterior on your face....

why don't i like catherine zeta jones...hmm...theres something that puts me off...she was totally not needed in ocean's 12...not like the movie itself made any sense....the first was an ace.

quite some to-dos hanging around....damn!

so this is the article that enraged a whole lot of people...women, mostly... sparked off debates all over the West...seems like no matter how liberated we think we are, it just takes a silly man to get our hackles up...the article itself is not as full of lies as is made out to be...tho yes it does generalise and simplify stuff to the point of being ridiculous. like the notion that a professional career woman will most probably vamoose with her slick colleague...duh, yes, if her spouse happens to be an uncouth slob....michael noer works on the premise thats the fantasy of most unevolved men in the world....a perfect wife is the one who stays at home, happy pottering about with the duster, whose only aim is to please her lord....:-))) sheeeeesh, beam me back to the 21st, scotty!!

what ultimately matters, feminism, chauvinism and all isms be damned, is free will...whether you choose to marry or not, have babies or not, be a stay-at-home mom or a working mom (thats another sticky issue that never seems to have a resolution)...and live through the consequences....

marriage will forever remain a project between two adults that requires immense amounts of patience, respect, tolerance and compromise....especially when you marry the one you choose and love...
and motherhood, wow kaboom, thats just a huge life-altering dimension altogether....exhausting, mind-numbing, exhilarating, never-ending, frustrating, reducing-t0-abject-tears, humbling, enlightening experience which can age you 65 one instant and make you feel like a 2 year old the other...its like signing away the next 16 years of your life at the very least....ah, life!

sad. hrishikesh mukherjee dead. a genre dies with him. natural, humorous, subtle, light, true-to-life with some home-truths woven within. gems like chupke chupke, golmaal, namak haram, bawarchi, chhotti si baat, khatta meetha, so many more...they don't make people like him anymore...but his humour, his take on life would be lost on the masses salivating on KANK and its likes. he will live on in the zillion reruns of his movies...God bless.

*****

i salivate on bags...oversized totes, anything...the bigger, the roomier, the more pockets the better....like some lady said she likes to carry her life around and hence her need for a giant momma of a bag...i've had bagswhichhave been virtually bottomless pits with stuff of all classification floating around from every moment of my short life...my hubby, like any mere XY, cannot understand my craving and tries to steer me clear of any accessories section anywhere...but like a true bloodhound, i find my corner. at last count there are three i am happy about...others that fill in on the odd days. Not abt the brands, naah...just the bags themselves that get me going...

***
one bloke fed up to his gills with all the brands that have taken over his life has decided to burn all the goodies and lead a brand-free unadulterated life. hope he succeeds in his quest. i myself have never understood the mania for brands....i find it rather air-headed honestly....just weird ole me, maybe. i do have the odd kewl brand but was not deliberate and was more functional and primal actually....i like something and buy it. i might or might not use it more than once...thats just its fate. the stuff i like, i wear out to the bare bone.

'emily's cat can beat up your cat'.

- seen on a T-shirt on the tube

so, yes, that was funny....bumping into a hindi movie shooting bit at waterloo station and who shd I spy but the young turk himself, abhishek bachchan and preity zinta!! shes pretty but much shorter than you'd have thot...and he, well, was dressed in rather outlandih garish clothes, beard and all...hair all greasy but sweet....made eye contact with him for about 2 seconds...they were all, like backslapping distance, from us tho the bouncers kept asking everyone to keep moving so theres no blockage...wonder which movie it was....the scene involved him walking with some extras (crowd scene) and the lady walking past him...must be the ubiquitous intro scene of the flick....scene over, people rushing for pics and autogs and they both left separately....didnt see them getting much chummy...he was busy on his cell for a bit, guess who, hmm!?!

could have easily stepped up with the rest of the gawkers and asked for a pic or shook hands but didnt....not that star-struck yet....but was a sweet experience...

hyde park was gorgeous,,,lurved the giant trees, the autumn leaves all over, green and serene...

the foreign film crew at the queen's walk....wonder where they were from...

the tube...smelly, no AC, crowded....but wonderful mix of ppl from all races and spaces...a people-watcher's paradise...

sloane street, harrods....gods of consumerism...anti-fur protesters asking us to boycott the latter....
**
hollywood size 00?!!! saw a pic of nicole richie - the princess anorexia - in a glossy....she looked like she was just abt to give her ghost up in a bikini, the bones sticking out - she'd have made a great bio lab prop...and thats fashionable?!!! funny, there are lots of unfortunates the world over who have a body like that and can't help being so...and who could like manage a week's food with what the bikini cost!

saw 'one fine day' last night...one of the few romcoms i genuinely like...something really frothy and loveable abt the flick....michelle pfeiffer is gorgeous (if i would ever get the option to be a white woman, it wd have to be either her or kim basinger) and clooney does his yummy bit rather well...the whole NY backdrop just fits in....the kids are cute without getting cloyingly so....and yes, the sparring which inevitably leads to love... :-) and the funny thing abt this movie is that there is no making out, no kisses...just the teeny first one between the hopelessly-attracted-to-each-other protagonists at the very end. clean and yet not kiddie-stuff.

remember seeing it the first time in the theatres with some people....no idea where they are now. come to think of it, remember seeing quite some movies with quite some people in the late 90s (wow, that sounds so chronological) and no clue whats become of them. hmm.

other flicks i like in the same genre wd be 4 w and a f, notting hill, while you were sleeping, 2 day notice (hmm, or was it 2 weeks?), my best friend's wedding and some more I'm sure I'm forgetting...sandra bullock's perfect for these bits...something really daft and loveable abt her...

anyway....

Hope things work out for her. Feel bad...going thru a grey patch. Shes a brave positive strong full of beans gorgeous person with so many dreams...hope they come true and she wrestles her way out of the mud. She will, i know.

still.... :-(

afghanistan, iraq. lebanon. iran, north korea....israel, US, Londonistan...the foreign policy that alienates. We're all sitting on a huge A-bomb waiting to happen...the third world war when it does announce itself officially at the door, won't surprise anyone. i would think from my lil layman's corner that the world finds itself in the most hostile environment ever...hotspots everywhere...just needs one mad man, one slur and kaboom! terrifying thought but pretty realistic. megalomaniacs return through the ages.

the brits are rethinking their immigration policies...about time too...in the last few years, they have had as many as 500,000 ppl from east european countries coming in!....with bulgaria and romania joining EU soon they will be making their way to the Ben too...open-door policy? they've trampled the door down, hinges and all...! its a regular stew here alright....but the immigrants dont seem to be that integrated into the mainstream as it might be in the US...

and how expensive is this place!! and obviously i'm not the only visitor who thinks thusly. healthy discussion on the same, there...okay, so those guys go down to the lil details of how much a bottle of Pantene costs somewhere but on the whole it is pretty steep....where's all that money going to....america's much more developed on the face of it, and cost of living there is pretty decent....transport, eating out, entertainment etc...

this nice old man's happening!...his debut and a gazillion hits n comments....got covered in the news too....good for him...83 and finally his 15 mins of f.

___

lady in slinky red dress, rushing off to work...talking to an invisible other. not very pleased at who she was talking to either...didnt find it strange...i find myself talking to...well...myself, quite a bit too...seems like the only other intelligent company I have found to date...another time, another place, saw this man on a bus, with one hand cupped around his mouth, whispering to his 'friend'...weird n fascinating....

maybe we all talk to this other in us but are not so out-there abt it and hence not labelled nutcases by the common folk...madness and sanity are just constructs...successful rich ppl are 'eccentric'and 'creative', the not-so rich successful are plain bonkers and need to be in a padded room?

my lil right foot still doesnt feel happy...twisted it gloriously some weeks ago...the agony and emotional vortex accompanying it - yet another experience to be filed away....

so anyway, have run out of stuff to say, as always...so I shall ooze back under the sand.

so, the brassy driven estate agent won the 1000 pounds....he surprised everyone by getting soft abt it.... missed watching his turn as host...the anthropologist and the warbling singer-actress tied at 4th posn...not surprisingly...though, the bravest of the lot was linda, the anthrop, with her exotic what-the-hell-is-that dishes which didnt taste or look very right, and her South Indian prawn curry...fishmonger came second while the perfectionist gay interior designer proved its not all abt the packaging...too clinical in the end..he came 3rd, thanks to john's clever stingy 6! will miss this bunch...they were a funny lot, totally different sorts...especially the girls...had got hooked in a sort of way.

so the brit big brother's pete...i couldnt care less...havent watched it ever...just some snippets of couple of dodgy-looking people sitting around talking abt someone whos been evicted maybe, and girl shaving in the bath etc...am not being snobbish...just wasnt gripping me buds...tho theres a huge fan following here, it seems per the sun etc...intels are already dissecting its socio-cultural meaning etc....yada yada....gas.

its raining again...

i love how the brit media's so irreverent abt their political heavyweights, especially the PM...they just stop short of throwing pies at his likeness...the writing style very tongue-in-cheek...generously doling out sarcasm and wit ...

'snakes on a plane'...another critter-disaster flick....trashy and entertaining, per the review...hmm, my kind of brain-on-a-holiday stuff...

ta!

rainin again

grey rainy wet...the sun's cowering somewhere...ready to bluster forth when the tides turn....

that was funny yesterday...an unlikely bitchin partner...both of us just spewing angst like some tiny red button had been pressed somewhere....different people...shes just 20 for cryin out loud and a mum already...been quite sporty about it all...a kid herself...i surprised myself, like i'm wont to do...confiding is a totally new thing for me...but being strangers, well, sort of, helps...we're all united in the shit we face....

life's funny.... :-D

http://www1.yashrajfilms.com/d2/d2_theatrical.htm

velly velly nice! hope it lives upto its teaser....

was just remembering the few times in my life when i have just laffed my posterior off...literally. that one time with a friend from work during lunch...we just kept guffawing and guffawing (tho she had a more feminine giggle, mine's not pretty...more like a cross between a donkey in heat braying and a mad cockatoo, actually thats one of the many I have in my armoire)...and what do you know on the way back home, in the cab, we just looked at each other and yes, went at it like maniacs...with the rest of the ppl bemused and then not so, when they couldnt understand what the fuss was all abt....that was one laff that just went on and on...

another time in the hoary past, my brother and I, my second brother who always knew just how to get my funny bits shaking, went hysterical at home when one of my dad's visitors, a forensic guy came over and sat on the sofa which we hadnt dusted on that particular day...so both of us holed up in the kitchen, seemingly making tea for the poor chap, started tittering abt the 'prints' he would leave behind when he bade his farewells...soon giggles became howls...the guest left hurriedly and our dad did not find it all that funny :-D

there were others...and i somehow always had a partner in crime to share in the repast....i remember stuffing my hanky in my mouth, in one particularly violent episode trying to push the stuff back...didnt succeed...

there was a girl i knew in school who used to have laffing fits which became hysterical bouts of crying and we'd have to slap her or throw water on her face to quieten her down...rather dramatic it all was...

but yes, nothing like a full-blooded, spittle inducing laff that keeps ticking your insides like a persistent worm...

i love the carry on series, the mind-numbing comedies, silly stuff that just gets ole Vesuvius started....theres this series on BBC One is it? 'Come DIne with me" where 5 or 6 random strangers are asked to play hosts and cook for the group in turns and the winner with the most votes gets a 1000 or is it 10,000 pounds...they have an anthropologist, a rather ditsy global traveller woman in this group and an old woman whos an eccentric singer...funny...the anthropologist got sloshed with the wine yesterday at the fishmonger's place and couldnt stop giggling....i totally got her. :-D

Q.E.D laughter, like yawns = highly infectious....

eeyu...cobwebs!

hajaar cobwebs in this place, man. khandhar only you have become, sweets.
i will try to come and give you company, some.

been ages, yes?

like being in a reality tv show...with crappy lines and crappier weather.

was fun.

people watching. miss the hole in argyle street. old man and the dog...scratching, reading, smoking...portuguese family downstairs...full of life and lovely food smells. the loner in the studio across the road...chinese couple. the black queen. the burqa clad women and the bearded muslims. the goras, the desis. a melting pot of cultures, sounds, colors, fabrics, smiles.

moved to more polite parts...greener, emptier, duller. smiles on an evening walk.

cheers, mate.

rambling.

i return to the blog. did i miss it? maybe. but i didn't die without it. what was that line in 'heat' abt vamoosing....got it:

"A guy told me one time, "Don't let yourself get attached to anything you are not willing to walk out on in 30 seconds flat if you feel the heat around the corner."

great soundbite but how easy is it?

'leaving on a jet plane, don't know when i'll be back again'...trite but fits the occasion.

so in another day, the pages will flutter, and a new chapter will be laid bare. hope its a fun happy colorful one...

let the games begin.

mixed feelings. feeling kinda adventurous...

not sure when I can resume my visits here...seems like a long time till then, right now...but who knows...

will miss you, crazy lil blog...maybe not...you know me. so caught up in the moment and its paraphernalia that everything else is blanked out. i am the world, how can it exist when i am not around? :-D

wish me luck...and to any and all good folks who care to visit, peace and keep your nose clean.

hmm, i might try and squeeze in another peek before its time to leave...


'muss es sein? es muss sein!'

so, yes.
say something. words. saw my name in print yesterday. lost in a sea of text in a huge glossy. 150 words and a name. funny sweet to think that some random stranger in a flight to somewhere, or while waiting for someone something, for godot, idle, will/might casually browse thru and it might leave a smudge somewhere. silly happy.

i visit you i might not for some days. bhadaas nikaal-ing.

cells, mind, mood mutating. the tramp refuses to budge.

wish i cd think of something clever to say. my epiphanies usually drop in when i'm in the shower...by the time i'm decent and dry, they've hotfooted it out.

nonetheless.

dull, i shall be, today.

filling up the white

i must respect myself, else the others will not be in a tearing hurry to do so.

the Self remains proud and aloof, inscrutable and untouched. perched coldly on the highest cragface, the eyrie leagues below.

the not knowing keeps the show going.

i must don new masks, slip into new roles, bang my head on walls, be cornered, get bloody and messy. i must reach out to strangers. i must smile and be sarcastic.

i must get over it not raining.

i must stop this BS.

this just killed me :-))

so i log onto yahoo messenger thinking i will find some pal online...i did...some weird person i dont know buzzes me...did yesterday too, had ignored...got curious today...seems wants to know asl. now since i'm prone to cerebral blackouts, had no friggin idea what it meant...his stats were 16 m ind :-D politely told him off with scary cooked-up age factor...only to be invited for 'fun'...i say 'what?!!'...reply, hot chat.
the door bangs while i make my exit.

but guffawing all the way. seriously, me, hot chat? always a first for stuff...my insane curiousity wd have made me linger a lil longer...but didnt. chicken? not.
am not that ennuied too, tho. :-D

have a feeling this undefined object will be around when i login next. :-))

my day looks funnier already. thank you 16 m ind.

a post

something's wrong with this mouse.

hmm, interesting, all about an elephant.

an old tortoise rumored to be darwin's find died. reminds me of advaitya, the other relic that passed on to the beyond.

the title track of 'golmaal' is funny...the video's corny too...love the deadpan totally into the mood look on the guys...

why the %^576 am i blogging? its neither a habit, nor a social expression nor high art...just one of those things i sampled and return to erratically.

i bore me.

publish post, already.

...hanging by the coat-tails of a thought that is in a hurry to leave.

i feel like hugging the inventor(s) of aspirin/dispirin to bits... a day ago, had a monster momma of a side headache the epicentre of which seemed to be my right eyeball...the tremors were red hot...lots of stuff to do, people to attend to...popped one and kazoom, was at my genial best with nothing of the throbbing left behind. and what could have easily been moronic small-talk gibberish was actually intelligible. nothing short of a miracle, i say.
seems innocuous enuff, but being the melodramatic hag, i have to pump it up a few notches.
whats life without a lil drama...masala all the way.

**
tune in head - 'coconut woman is calling out...'...an old one from the crannies of the past...:-)

finally. talk about persistence. mittal-arcelor deal thru. merged entity to be called arcelor-mittal, 43 euros per share. biggest steel conglomerate...

the wind's going ballistic outside...hope it whips up a huge frenzy enuff for the rains to enter...its so hot, my hair's getting singed.

dont know how regularly i can visit you bloggie or the other spaces...monday, will see me slipping into another one of my roles...not a horrible thot but just won't be the same. and then it will be time for the move. so i can hope to resume my me-ness here when i'm settled (?) in the new zone.

~ change is a constant.

yes, theres still tomorrow.

gems, that came my way...

Everything in this world into which there is only one way to arrive,
but so many ways to leave,
that it makes us different people.
A public place, this world, and one doesn't always know
whether this is what is called a room, and whether this room
is growing darker, by gusts.

- Paavo Haavikko (Finland)

I've stayed here; haven't bothered to go
or come either. Sometimes I've wished
going and coming would end.
But ending is like beginning -
a going and a coming. On his deathbed
Meister Eckhart was asked by his acolyte:
'Master, I have to know, where are you going?'
'No need to go anywhere,' Eckhart said.

- Mirrka Rekola (Finnish)

grrrr,,,there's something infernally irritating inside me which refuses to let me soak in the greys....just doesnt let me wallow in the s-p stuff anymore...time was when i could actually fill reams in my old diary when the greys invaded...and what cheesy beauties I could turn out, man!.....but this is unpardonable. just when i think ok my self-esteem is promising to recede a bit and I can happily contemplate my navel in that beautiful mood called a depression, this stupid thing bounces me back...i mean, not to let a person enjoy their angst in peace!! i know just who the wretched evil green goblin is...its my Ego...never stays down, just can't understand when its been beaten and should just go and lick its wounds in a corner...

i remember telling somebody ages ago that I am depressive and have suicidal thots...and he just plain refused to believe me...tho one old palm-reader chap who doubled up as a sari-shop owner did gauge as much...gave me some home-truths tho a bit of what he predicted didnt exactly turn out the way he said but most, yes. funny guy.

i'm pretty possessive about my sadness...its mine alone...it enriches me and makes me more connected with Me...it defines me as much as my crazy guffaw does, if not more.

something so focused, intense, proud and pure about sadness...not like happiness which is scattered, ditsy and shared with the world at large...it has inspired ppl to churn out works of art and dramatically driven them to madness...who has ever gone mad with happiness?!!?

i want to drown in the stuff and plumb the depths again...inshallah!

so, what are the chances of getting killed by lightning gone amok? plenty, it seems...69 people dead in maharashtra...one girl with her buddies strolling on chowpatty...must have had paani puri and never thot she'd be blitzed the next second...the rest were mostly poor farmers who had no option but to be out working....

open areas are highly unsafe in thunderstorm-prone areas...not to make light of the deaths that happened,,,but if there was in my neck of the woods, thats where you'd find me...out in the open. yes, maybe its a death wish-self-destruct-mode-what-have-you...but theres something so sexy and wild about storms...nature at her freakiest best...

my mum tells me about how once decades ago, while at work, she saw a lightning ball enter the room she was in with her colleagues, slither through and go through the roof leaving a gaping hole behind!!! oooh...talk about making an entry!

I miss my Discovery Travel n Living....stoopid cablewalah says some glitch at the backend...miss all the fantastic travel, lifestyle, food and makeover stuff on it...mostly miss the armchair travelling to weird lil places of this wonderful planet, we call home... :-(

anyway, tomorrow's another day...

so, will it be tharoor or the thai, or the srilankan or the korean? pakistan as usual ready for the "me too or else" routine. the SG or the permanent seat. choices, gambles, stakes.

passive euthanasia...right to live and die on your own terms...with dignity. sticky subject for some. a no-brainer for others. active euthanasia, stretches it further.

a major squall, hailstones, rain in sheets, the wind going wild yesterday evening. today its a lovely overcast cool morning...waiting for the rain and yet not, cos once it does, the sun will be worse.

*
no rain, the sun's out...bummer.

mahajan jr shaved and scrubbed holds forth, i am innocent. yeah right, even tho the CFSL report says lots of interesting stuff in his innards...even tho, the zaroo guy who now says he was tortured let the whole bunch of cats out of the bag on day 1 of the breaking news itself...oh well, it will all be forgotten soon after many more damage control exercises and cover-ups. another day, another scandal.

wonder where all the missing/ gumshuda people are...ran away, eloped, abducted, killed or wandering around mentally unhinged? the strays that just vanish into oblivion.

'omkara', 'corporate' - seem to be promising flicks...