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When one actually goes shopping for windows, what is that called?!
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Travtorpetrid (n.): The queasy recurring doubt in a foreign country that you have somehow inexplicably misplaced your passport. Is usually followed by a frantic nonsensical search through all bags except the one that has the passport.
(Yup, I’m totally nuts. I’m also totally inspired. Douglas Adams rocks, and this is one of the reasons why. http://folk.uio.no/alied/TMoL.html)
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The Wallet bulges more from the chunk of loose change than from a wad of notes.
It’s not inspiration or achievement or recognition that keeps us humans going. It is just plain simple boredom. Invention, progress, advancement, civilization; all are forbore from the mind of someone who didn’t have enough to keep him/her too occupied.
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Time does fly.
Here I was, happily vela in good ol’ Bombay, minding my own business and wasting my own sweet time. And one fine day, out of the blue, was informed that my posting gonna be far away from the beloved land of local trains and hot vadapavs, in a country that was smaller than the city I came from.
Brought to my head images of clean roads and rules and fines, but then didn’t know much else about the city-nation. Had to wait until I finally packed my bags and landed in Singapore, or Singapura, the Lion City.
Will not give the usual tourist guide perspective. But there are so many small details that amaze me everyday, because I never believed that cultures and the nations that are born out of them can be so different from each other.First thing that hits you about the island is that it is very very organised. As Suketu Mehta writes about NY, you can go a whole day, take a bus, go to a movie, go in the metro, buy a card, issue books, without ever talkin to another human. Infrastructure is very good, and everything in general, works. And yea, junta follows rules like crazy.
P&G treats us like expats (which we actually are), puts us up in one of the poshest localities in Singapore (Scotts Road) in Far East Serviced Apartments. But the catch is, the honeymoon lasts only two months. Then we pack our bags from this place (the weekly rent here is rumored to be more than my monthly pay!) and drudge along until we find a place to live within sane budgets. The fact that the land rates have gone up like crazy in the last five months doesn’t help either. Apparently some new construction has been taken up by the govt (Integrated Resorts) and so everyone who has too many greenbacks is investing here like there’s no tomorrow.
Food is an issue for vegetarians like your truly. Until I discover Little India and the food courts near my office,that is. Let me illustrate the gravity of the situation here. Most people around here don’t understand the concept of being a vegetarian. They have heard the term many times, and they tried to make sense by defining it as people who don’t like to eat beef, pork, chicken and the works. But the issue is, ‘the works’ doesn’t sometimes include fish and eggs. So the first day when I went down to this chain called Hans, I was foolishly delighted to find a ‘vegetarian’ section in the menu card. Little did I know that the dish I so hungrily ordered would come with ultra bland noodles and a fresh cut egg on top. Life’s gotten better after I discovered the Indian veggie food stall in the nearby food court.
Had a Singapore guided tour in the first week. Guide was a Singaporean lady named Shamla Nathan. Is 52 years old, has a tamil name, is the daughter of a Srilankan man and a Chinese woman, speaks only english and french. Mom is Catholic, and this lady is Buddhist
Lots more interesting events and places and people to reminisce about. Lots of new experiences to commit to my digital memory…
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Die-hard Spidey fans, not-so-die-hard Spidey fans, rather, any kind of Spidey fans, stay away from this movie. Maybe I am being a bit too harsh on Sam Raimi, but then it is a love story with a Spiderman theme thrown in. A lousy love story at that. Arbit sacrifices, arbit changes of heart, arbit character development. The only thing that is not arbit and hence stands out is the special effect content of the movie. Fantastic graphics and action sequences that we have started to kinda take for granted nowadays. Especially Sandman and Black Spidey; painstakingly done detailing.
Definitely passable movie, this. As in, you can definitely let is pass by without having any qualms about missing a good movie.
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Yesterday was my dear DK’s D-Day
She finally tied the knot with Mr.AK and is on her way to a happily married life. But then my trip to Nasik for the marriage and the marriage itself deserve a blog post.It was the shortest wedding ever! Some mantras, a few dress changes, a short baarat, garlands exchanged and ‘Saavdhaan!’. I knew Maharashtrain weddings were simple affairs, but this is the first time I actually saw one. A nice simple affair, reflecting the simple loveable nature of both the bride and the groom.
A post can’t end with so less of incidence, can it
After the marriage, I reached Nasik station only to find that my train had been postponed by a mere seven and a half hours. #$@!$!@!@#. Deciding that I could not possibly wait seven hours for a three hour train journey, I bought a general ticket and hopped on into the next train to Bombay, praying to all the benevolent stars above that I manage to find an empty seat.The bogie was surprisingly empty, and I plonked myself opposite to a family of seven; five kids and their parents. This is where I introduce the protagonist of this post. The small kid of about six years old; still in his school uniform unwashed for weeks, unkempt hair and a pair of shorts held together with a frayed string.
I was suddenly reminded of the line “poverty is not an economic condition; it’s a state of one’s mind.” As I saw the innocent eyes dart helter-skelter, I realised, here was a mind that is numbed by days of beating, a desire that had been taught to shut up, and an ambition that ridiculed itself. I saw the child endure a muteness in his eyes, and I just prayed that it wasn’t his mind that had given up on circumstances even without realising what they were. Then came a flurry of questions:
Do I have the power to change a person’s life for the better, and if yes, then how many lives are my responsibility to improve, given my abilities and influence?
But then, is altruism necessary at all? Or is it just an over-rated goodness quotient generator that helps get back some societal funds from concentrated wealth pockets?
Is there an inherent need to work for the betterment of others? Should the need change with how well-to-do I am or is it just a matter of opinion and attitude?
The answers came in bits and pieces, but thats all I have for now. I present them thus: I choose to help others, or rather I will help others, because I have the power to. May it be because of my own hard work that I gained these abilities, or may it be because of some opportunities I had; but then I am more in a position to change things for the better than many others.
The other powerful facilitator for philanthropy is the fact that even if you consider it blatantly as an investment, it makes more sense to invest in people than in property, gold and other monies. For a man who believes that love can transform more than any other thing, it gives immense returns or satisfaction to see happiness derived out of giving. I am no Mother Teresa, but the kid has gotten me thinking about some small way I can do something. And according to me, better than try changing the ways of adults, feeding them or helping old people, educating the young has the maximum impact, in terms of long term emancipation and social transformation.
And it doesn’t take much to educate one child and shatter that invisible strong-box that shackles his mind. To take him from fighting over a half a vadapav with his younger sister to fighting over marks and Engineering admissions. Too much big-talk for one blog post. Time for me to shut up.
Bless you Dk and AK, and wishing you a fantastic life ahead. Bless a relatively empty unreserved compartment. And bless Mumbai for having rickshawallas who will drive around at 2 in the night
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What can I say that’s not already said about this movie? It’s a moving comic book, just like the other movie based on Frank Miller’s graphic novels, Sin City. It is a visual treat beyond compare, each frame art-worked with extreme love and a panache for violence. There’s no story, no sir. So please don’t use the tight-upper-lipped “it didn’t do justice to the artistic expression of the medium of cinema, while attempting to explore an unnecessary gamut of bloodshed… yada yada…” Leave the criticism tightwrapped at the farther end of your colon.
This movie doesn’t need critics or fans. It
needsbegets worshippers. It sets out to be an entertaining two hour visual and aural spectacle, and that’s exactly what it is. The right rock mix at the right action-packed moment, the right camera angle that gets you into the skin of the soldier who is taking a spear pounding from a Spartan, the anger in the eyes of a king and the pride that makes a queen.Definitely worth a watch at the cinemas. Rather, make that two visits to the screens, not one.
When a Brazilian movie running subtitles is rated IMDB Top 250 #17, it usually intrigues me. And when the movie finally came to Indian theatres 3 years after it was released world-wide, thanks to the ever-enthu buddy of mine, Vivek, we landed in a theatre so empty that it seemed to be a private screening for us.
We had no shit clue about what to expect from the movie, and that made all the more impressive. It is set in a slum-town near Rio, ironically named City of God. It was a place where it was a rare blessing to live beyond 20, if one lives past disease, poverty, plunderers and gang-wars. A place where kids do drugs, the police are gun-runners, and everyone shoots first, talks later. Where survival is an everyday challenge, and losing your kin is an everyday occurance.
It is in this setting that the hero Rocket discovers his love for photography. The film is about the delicate game one has to play in the City of God to just stay alive, and about a passion that pulls a boy out of a living hell and gives him some purpose in life.
This movie is no fairy-tale, nor does it promise a feel good ending. It just tells a story as plain as truth itself, in its brutal and shocking self.
Again, definitely worth a watch. And definitely worth reflecting upon.
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Or an optical mouse… depends on the way you see it
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A gifted few who can play with words and bring out humor in the very mundane of things… Sameer Bhatt for one, and then there’s the incorrigible Jat friend from IITB, Pawan Kumar.
One of his best comments, too risque for this blog, but what the hell
His own version of ‘The grass is always greener on the other side’:“Abbe bata raho hoon… doosre ke kachche mein loda hamesha bada dikhta hai…”
LOL!!
Thanks Dahiya for remembering this gem
