Finally!!

3 years back, when Harsha packed up a cooker with him for his second UK trip, we (as in V5) weren’t sure if all us could or would ever shack-up again.
Forgot shacking up, till date we haven’t met up in full strength.

Come August, this may be possible, thanks to the onsite boys going out of their way to make it happen. I so very wish it would be just were we left off. Since then, obesity, defunct lungs/liver, and not to forget receding hairlines may have changed our health/appearance, but sure when we meet up the odd sense of alienation won't affect us.

As the angrezis are coming down on a very tight schedule, we are presently struggling to finalize a trip to get "wasted". Hope things go well on this, and the other important plans for the boys are not affected...

Somehow, when I think about this, Sid’s dialogue in DCH keeps ringing at the back of my head –

"saal mein theen baar to kyaa... dus saal mein ek baar bhi milnaa mushkil ho jayega."

How rude are you?

Regular return journey from Office...

Luckily get a bus...Hope onto it, and rush to find a seat. Another person tries to squeeze his way in. I over-power him and get my seat, with a smile of victory on my face...

The other person mumbles a word of apology and finds another seat. I thought, that this happens most of the time, and how people, are usually rude. This time, a word of apology felt better.

Sometime later, another guy comes over and asks my competitor; whether he knows where to get down, much to my amusement.

Stop approaches, and I get up to leave and before that, I decide to take a final look at the "loser". Except that a foldable while stick in his hand, grabs my total attention.

I didn't look up to see his face. I turned around and slowly walked to the door, with my head hung in deep shame....

Vaaranam Aayiram

Due to prolonged delays in the release of the movie, the element of surprise in the plot is really lost.

The movie as now evident to most of us, revolves a full circle on both the lives of a father and son (both donned by Surya)

First scene - We see a visibly dying, older Surya. His slow and painful death is informed to his army son, who is in the middle of a rescue mission.

The story is then narrated in flash-back with a voice-over from the mourning son - It starts from the early life of his father and continues onto his - childhood, adolescence, Love, loss, drugs, rehab, and finally in the army.

His love for his father is told time and again in the way he says, "Daddy".

The movie has no great depth in plot, but does strike a chord with the audience. I could see most of the women in the hall, weeping bitterly.

Love in all forms is expressed in a very subtle but warm manner.

If you want to know the trophy of the movie.....Its got to be Surya....This must be one of his finest performances....Be it the father, as a total cool-head or his son, as a cliched young blood. The six-pack made all the girls scream their lungs out.

The gracefully older looking Simran too puts up a fine act...

Sameera surprisingly looks pretty and Ramya is wasted...

Music is a fine blend - another great composition from Harris. Except that 7 songs make the already 3+ hours of runtime seem much longer.

Other specifics like cinematography et al, are top notch. SF never looked better, in any another movie.

Reco: A movie of plain-types, but definitely worth a watch, if you can afford to ignore some out of the place action scenes; like that of a kidnap and rescue.

Recommend you to watch the video of this song.

Happy Diwali

Diwali has always been a favourite festival....Not just for the firework part...but in general...

Be it-

the hot oil bath, before sunrise;
the occasional paaya from Shivaji Nagar;
the trade-mark Masala Dosa/Jamoon combination for breakfast;
the single fire-cracker that must be lit for the saasthram purpose;
or the diyas which beautifully light up the house...

Must of us have matured from an age, where we would envy the neighbour for an extra load of fireworks that he has, to the touch cracker not age

In school and College, Diwali would be a season of pranks; be it the dots which were carefully placed below the chairs...Or the agarbatti bombs which were planted in the loo. The must dificult part was smuggling in the crackers.

@Work, Diwali would just be a reason for us to flaunt our traditional clothes and wait in queue to pick up the yearly mithai. Following this would be a poor dance performance in the roof.

This year many preferred to celebrate a Green Diwali, and vowed not to touch fireworks...But Diwali is far from Green for me....I would prefer more colours, for a rather yucky green!! (Forgive me for the bad humour)

So all of you out there....Have a Happy and SAFE Diwali!!!

Googled Helpline for Diwali related Accidents

To Sir, with Love

We all have had teachers, helping us pave a perfect path to the future that we decide. With time, we do forget them, unless reminded by one reason or another.

One of them, who I remember is Mr. Padmanabhaiah, a retired Math professor, in pre-university.

The man had long retired from College, but continued to teach at a private tutorial institute. On first encounter, I remember seeing a bald man, with a goNicheela for a bag, and riding on a single-seater Luna.

On strong advice from friends and all, I had decided to attend his CET classes. I should say: those 12 classes that I had attended of his, were unbelievable. My approach towards numbers had taken a turn for the good. It eventually helped in cracking Maths @ CET which was quite a challenge, for most people like me.

His offline help was the best. All the other regular lots were unapproachable post the sessions. So much so for his approachability, some of us had regular visits to his place, to clear the sea of doubts we used to have. All of this, with sumptuous breakfast and hot steaming filter coffee.

As it would happen, post pre-university, college and now in Work, memoirs of him and his unique teaching style, faded away.

Then, one day, I heard from a college friend, that he was no more. In the 2 minutes of mourning, post this news I heard, my mind raced behind in time, remembering all he was, A True teacher...A True Guru.

A Wednesday

When I heard the title of this movie, I brushed it aside, as just another one. But Naseeruddin Shah and Anupam Kher in the main cast did catch my attention.

When I did manage to watch it a month later, realised that the movie is a neat little surprise package. "Little" here is in the literal sense, cos the movie doesn't stretch beyond 1.5 hours. Think both Shah and Kher, must have had a mind battle, in proving their excellence in acting. Ofcourse, they can be easily dubbed them as the finest actors in contemporary cinema.

The film starts with Prakash Rathod (played by Kher), a retired policeman, narrating an incident which occurred on a Wednesday, during his stint as the Commissioner.

The next scene, cuts to a post middle-aged man (Shah), who is placing bags all over Mumbai; Railway Terminus, Police station et al. The movie gathers steam, when he calls Rathod and says that he has placed bombs all over Mumbai, and will set them off, if 4 deadly terrorists are not released.

After much dabbling and realizing the seriousness of the situation, Rathod obliges. But he gets his best officers, Arif Khan (Jimmy Shergill) and Jai (Amir Bashir), to track the unknown caller. The caller, also informs a TV reporter, Naina Roy (Deepal Shaw) about this, but not providing her the full details. The news hungry Media team implicitly helps him in keeping a track of the situation.

The movie follows through as any other regular thriller, with a predictable twist towards the end.

There are some glitches, like the justification given by Shah, for his act, which seems unreal. The RDX being easily planted in the police station (like he was not frisked) etc etc.

But overall, the plot is pretty tight, with no drag-around (or songs rather). Also, the sorry state of the Indian Media, is exhibited in a very subtle manner.

The dialogue delivery by both Shah and Kher with the camera focused on the face is awesome (Sorry Sarkar, this was much better). Jimmy looks better with less dialogues and being more of a gum chewing, no-nonsense cop.

Something which was rather hard to believe, was the technology used by the Mumbai Police. The scenes where they try to track down the caller, seems a bit Bourneish. Really hope, that they do use such cutting-edge technology, in real life.

Reco: Should watch, if you’re bored of the regular Bollywood flicks. This is a fresh one.

And all you critics who are trying to rip this movie apart, try the other ones around; they are more crappy, according to me.

Best line: "Main apko us aadmi ka naam nahi bataunga…kyunko aadmi, naam mein mazab doond leta hain" (By Rathod in the background)

The Technology Gap

A few months back, on a weekday, Dad and I were waiting in a large office building, to attend an errand. To fight the boredom, I pulled out my then brand new IPOD, plugged the BOSE in-ear into his ears and made him listen to Ganesha Pancharatnam. He was all but smiles. Then came the obvious question - “How is this possible?”

I was just about to start with the regular jargon to explain the technology, when I had to stop. “Arrr…this wouldn’t be worth the effort” I thought, and it flashily occurred to me, to cook up something.

Nevertheless, my heart didn’t give heed, and I decided to give it a try. I went by the basics, like cassette tapes, “1s and 0s”, types of storage etc, until it looked a bit convincing. To be honest, seeing his face, didn’t look like he had clue.

This is one of many occasions, where the digital world has come face to face with my folks, leaving them clueless. Be it the personal computer, or sending a text from a mobile phone, they always decided to stay away from it.

My brother did take up computer lessons for my mom, until she started bunking it. After ages, she now knows to use a cell phone sans the messaging part. Dad’s not too far. He had computer basics training at work. He had happily flaunted his email-id before me, until he forgot the creds, and then, eventually lost interest.

I guess we have similar cases with people in their generation, and older than them. If we try to find the root cause of this ignorance (rude, but the apt term), feel it has do with both us (the genx) and our folks.

Us: The good enough reason is not being a little patient in trying to explain things to them. Not that they are techni-deficient. They are just not aware. (I must confess, that I haven’t done any good either)
Them: Merely a lack of interest.

Most of the time, our elders learn to use the PC or mobile, out of sheer necessity. Son/daughter abroad, regular calls not possible, Skype looks inevitable. With time they do get the hang of it.

Special cases do exist, when they have great interest in learning new things. Like a grand mom of mine, who had ordered me to teach her messaging, on the mobile. Or his thatha, who would use Outlook with great ease!

My final take on this: The gap is prevalent throughout, but will narrow down, if the techi-brilliant youth and the oldies do their respective bit.

The Rangeela Bus

The modes of transport in Bangalore still fancy me. The best one I would vote as of now, is the Rangeela bus. These buses as you should know are privately operated and ply from the city to the nearby rural areas. We affectionately christened them as 'Rangeela', owing to their colourful and mosaic/marble appearance.

My first stint with of one their kind was shortly after my return from Vides and initial travel to a new office. I had missed my company cab, and had to reach there by all or any means. The final destination seemed unreachable with the 'ric's asking you the sky, for a short distance fare. The very efficient public buses were not to be seen.

Then somewhere near the corner of the main road, I could see a couple of colourful looking buses, parked back to back. The drivers where roaring the engines of the stationary vehicles, giving you an indication that they would start off anytime. They looked, as if they were set to drag. The green and yellow bus bodies, added to the effect, momentarily giving you flashes of "The Fast and the Furious".

Nonchalantly I walked towards one of them. I was not able to hear a thing, owing to a cacophony created by the constant chanting of the destination(s) and the engine roar.
I was able to figure out that all of them were heading in the same direction and via my office. Left with no other option, I decided to hop onto one of them.

Trouble was to decide on, which one to choose. Considering the time factor, I chose the first bus in the row, brushing away wooing bus agents, with promises of DVD, luxury seats et al. This was, hoping that it would the first one to leave. Yeah I tried to put my Engineering brain into work :)
Murphy proving that he is the best, made me wait until nearly all the other buses left. I had got me Math wrong. Of course, it didn't take me long on realising how I was outsmarted.

Firstly, as pointed out earlier, the first buses in the row, give you an impression that they would be the first to leave.
Secondly they play one of your favourite movies on DVD, and make you forget about the time.
Lastly and probably the best tactic- The whole of the rear-side glass is painted, so you wont be able to make out whether the buses behind you leave or not!

So as it happened, I reached office much late than planned, thanks to the debacle experienced by me.

I vowed that I would never set my foot on another private bus again. That vow or promise that I made to myself diminished with time, thanks to more of cab misses. With time I got used to these Rangeela buses and actually started to have a liking for them. "Come on, no one offers you free movies within city limits!" :)

With experience, as you can say, I was able to figure out the buses which left first. Simple as it would seem, the first ones to leave were the ones which were most crowded! I was also able to figure out the signals given the agents (yes, there are more than one for each bus) to the bus driver.To any new passenger, they all seemed similar and made no sense. But, on close observation I was able to figure out the final signal for take off. It would be a shrill whistle, with constant banging of the bus frame. (hey hey ah ah!)

I now even have an acquaintance with some of them, who just issue a ticket (a dull piece of recycled paper) on seeing me, and blow the whistle, when my no one gets down stop comes.

The five minute journey to office on these buses, on days when I don't make it to the cab, is arguably the most enjoyable part of the day. I would owe it to the full entertainment on a DVD movie, and to more specifically the variety of people I see. Let me not go into detail, on the latter part. You need to see it for yourself. Believe me, its worth the effort.

The picture of a typical bus shown above, was I picked up from here.