Today it is R's turn to vent out............


 



   I grew up in a place where it never rained even once in a year. We would get rains like once in two years, there have been occasions when people would pray for rains. And then i came to India, and one of my favourite delights have been watching the rains splatter to gloryyy!!!!
For me rain always bring back good memories..... I call them the Rain Memories........ There are a couple of em.... me sitting at the table in my room in my old flat one evening, the table being in front of a window with the sun rays filtering away to death.........and it starts trickling, then drizzling and then pouring away.......
Sitting at my table and watching the raindrops splattering away....the air seeming crystal clear, the breeze making me feel alive.......
My next memory being having given my medical entrance exams and coming back home when it started raining and i spent nearly half an hour walking in the rain!!!! It was a walk of triumph, of having won my booty and feeling relieved!!!!!! i reached home and stood in the rain till i was drenched to my bone and i felt one in sync with the skies......
The next memory was after i won myself my girl's love and got stuck in the rain while returning from a battle for a future..... got stuck in the rain, well needless to say i walked/danced and went home. It was dawn and it wasnt a pleasant feeling to get drenched and chilled....
The last memory has me with my girl in Central Park, New York. But this wasnt as pleasant as the other ones coz we had to huddle ourselves in a small subway station. But we did walk in the rain after the downpour calmed down.All the same they are the Rain Memories!!!!!

Disappearing sights...

 A few sights from Kerala I'm beginning to forget....because I've so become used to urban life...


This may seemsimple to rural people...but nowadays I see these sights only on television.

A kaccha road, rather  an un-tarred, dusty village road....yes, that's a fast disappearing sight. Another remarkable thing about this dusty stretch is the lack of wall on either side. There are just linear mounds of earth which kind of roughly demarcates the path. If you look closely once more, you can see the brown, fallen leaves lining the sides. These days, we're so concerned about keeping our avenues neat and tidy that such a thing is unthinkable. Also, city dwllers like me will say, "What if there are snakes inside it?"

This is what I found at the end of the road...a sun-drenched field lying fallow. With theland prices going up...I guess it is fated to remain un-cultivated for the rest of its time, till some building comes up on it.

There was also this small culvert running along the field. There was only a trickle of water in this canal but the next day, after torrential rains in the night, it was flowing half full with a small but good current. This one reminds me so much of a small canal ('kaana' as we called it) behind our old house when we were children. After rains, it would be bursting at its seams with all the rain water from upstream (Yes, we knew its upstream part too....). If I remember correctly, we have even attempted fishing in it once or twice. There used to be small fish in it during the monsoons, and miraculously the fish used to seep into our well also, as the ground water levels in the well too goes up due to the percolation. That was a pretty sight...the well filling up so much to the brim that you can just dip a mug into it and scoop water!! The kaana was gradually hedged in as people owning plots on either side of it concreted the sides and reduced the width of the canal. Gradually, with increase in the number of houses, the canal also turned into a waste dump. People would come in their vehicles and quickly  fling their plastic covers with wastes into it. With the same changes happening upstream too, the water flowing through it gradually decreased, even during the monsoons it couldn't live upto its past glory....

The plantain leaf wrap or Vazhayila pothi

I was coming back home from "the home" in train. In the next coupe, there were around 10-12 kannadiga men singing kannada and haindi songs as and when they came to mind. The balding man in the old couple sitting opposite me was occassionaly following the tune of familiar old hindi songs by tapping on his thigh as his wife listened dispassionately. I was wondering what these kannadiga men where doing singing songs randomly. My initial thoughts were they were playing Antakshari. But when I listened closely, it became clear, that was not the case. They were singing just like that, one song leading onto the next. I should say that I was kind of relieved, for, the image of grown-up men playing antakshari had made put a scowl on my face. Antakshari was not by any measure my remotest idea of 'games'. Too bad that this seemed to be the only game everyone wanted to play whenever we went for picnics from school and college.

It was around 8.00pm. The old couple had alighted at Ottapalam. Now there was a 30ish young man sitting opposite. The young couple in the side berth in the coupe had opened a plastic cover and started devouring the food in a wrap in it. Soon, the young man too succumbed to the salivating aromas reaching him. He too opened a packet from his bag. It had a plastic wrap around the rectangular package. Inside it was again a layer of newspaper wrapping. The innermost was the plantain leaf wrap. I think it had kept safe a couple of chappathis and some curry for the last few hours. So he started eating. Midway through his meal, a kannadiga who was seen walking up and down the compartment a couple of times came up to this guy. He asked, "Did you all get this from the train or did you bring it from home?" The surprised young man (without showing any surprise) told he got it from home.

By the time he completed his meal, I too had succumbed to the wafting aromas and opened my own carefully prepared wrap from home. It had brown rice, fish curry, long beans upperi and beef roast. Aaah...even now the thought makes me salivate. Later I was thinking.... Almost every single mallu on that train would have opened a pothi sometime in the night. It was a well known method of packing food for long journeys. I cant help but marvel at the "Locally appropriate and entirely affordable" technology. An added advantage is that it is easily disposable and bio-degradable. And waterproof too! Gosh...truly ingenious.

And this has been practiced over centuries by mothers in evey home, long before any aluminium foil came into existence.The striking thing about the plantain wrap is how it preserves the flavours. Once the leaf is rid of its moisture by passing it over a flame, it just browns up and becomes tougher and water resistant. The flavors are kept tight and packed. If anything, it adds the smoky, leafy flavour of its own to the rice.

A little surprising was the ignorance of the Kannadiga, after all he is from a neighbouring state. Yeah but plantains are not grown in all parts of that state. So they may not know.

Long live plantains and their packages which will continue to feed many more mouths on numerous journeys
back and forth.

This pic is courtesy google. I'm cursing myself why I dint photograph mine. But then this post was not born then....

First Blood and John Rambo

A couple of days back, happened to see the movie 'First Blood'. Some thing about the movie was captivating, for I'm someone with very little patience for nonsense movies. At the time of watching, little did I know that it was the first film of the Rambo series....but just a glimpse and something told me it was a cult film in the making.  I sacrificed a little sleep for this but the price paid was worth it. Compared to the later Rambo films, this one is a psychological thriller, with less physical violence.

The film is about John Rambo, a decorated war hero from the Vietnam war, struggling to return to civilian life. I a small US town, he is hounded by their police dept for his rough looks, interrogated and jailed. This brings back his PTSD related to the torture  he suffered at the hands of the Vietnamese as a POW. He escapes from police custody and soon becomes the target of a huge man hunt. He manages to fight off the huge but inexperienced police force with his guerilla warfare tactics. The surprise package came at the end, in the form of Rambo opening his heart to Clnl.Trautman about the trauma of war. Sylvester Stallione who comes across as stone faced throughout till then, now suddenly and amazingly springs to life and breaks our hearts as the sufferring hero. As his mighty frame crumbles and he cries like a child, the human price of the war is brought into the picture. In those few, brief scenes, are etched poignantly the human tragedy of the war; a price paid by the individual soldier, some times with his life, or with his limbs or with his tattered mind.

Stallone captivates with his rugged physique and handsome looks. The small town setting and egos are splendidly portrayed. If anything, they could change the very tame ending. I'd leave everything else untouched.

Dasara 2011

Being from Kerala, Navratri was not a big occassion for me.... the only reason to remember it were the holidays we would get for that and the fact that you 'should not' study for the two days when the books are kept in the temple for pooja! Why aren't there more of such festivals...?!!

After coming to Bangalore only I started seeing this festival being organized on such a large scale. It was ubiquitous here, where as in Kerala, it was a big deal only in Brahmin homes. In college there are multiple celebrations, one by the Office, then by the individual department, in the DL, the canteenwala, library and not to be left out, the drivers of various rickety college vehicles would also deck up their chariots and worship them....

This (hopefully) is my last year in college, so I thought, what the heck, might take some pics as well. They were taken with my poor Sony Ericcson mobile cam. So quality is quite poor. But all the same, they don't miss the point...

the extensive decoration in DL...initially it seemed good...but by the time they finished, it seemed like a idol in a tropical jungle...

The humble one in my dept....compared to the previous pic

The star of the show....goddess Saraswati

The offerings for the goddess; fruits...lights, incense...

Pandu, our attender passing out the aarti....

Happy Dasara to all....

MH

Some music, dream and some narcissism

Today it is R's turn.. R has been wanting to vent out his mind for a very very long time and so here it is...

What do all of us live for.. I mean i share a dream, an opportunity to present itself at my doorstop one day , making all winnings until now seem small, one to even out the odds. One that will give life a real purpose and meaning, i dont mean becoming famous/ rich/ etc etc...its not just about material gains.. its all about having meaning in life. Its not that im dissatisfied with my life, i do what i like, i get paid to do what i like, i love my girl.  maybe its all about KARMA... What is my Karma? Well if it doesnt come searching then sure as hell i am going to go behind it!!!! I guess that makes it a lot of I's..

But then there is always a chance that this so called opportunity may never present itself, then what do i do. i shall go on hoping it to happen one day, maybe pursue it a lil!!!!
for all those who share my dream i guess linkin park would be the one to listen to... right from "minutes to midnight" to " a thousand suns" .. they do have a lil bit of grandiose content in all their songs....

The words may not mean much but they do give you a feeling of being electrified and can lift you out of gloom anyday.... this may seem like a very disconnected post but im sure that there will be people who can make sense and put 2 and 2 together... for one my girl's goin to get the meaning clear as a glacier!!!!!

Action hero

A recent episode involving a film star which made news. the thing is so funny.

1. Hero beats up wife and burns her with cigarette butts.
2. The badly battered wife files a police complaint.
3. Film industry elders prevails on her to withdraw the complaint in the 'interest of the family and child'.
4. Wife does a somersault and says she tumbled down a few steps and sustained the injuries.
5. Film producers association rushes to ban our hero's alleged girl friend, also a film star, from the inudstry for 3 years.
6. Hero lands up in a hospital with asthma and jaundice even before he can step into the jail.

Sure facts are stranger than ficiton. If you just narrated the whole thing to me I'd think that it is the story line of the latest tear-jerker serial on TV! Wonder if the film fraternity 'elders' would do the same if this happened to their daughters? May be yes, after all. Tradition and family honor is upto the woman to keep, while man simply upholds the same by beating his wife. If you take a sample, may be 50% women will respond that their husbands have the right to beat them up. May be that's how the term action hero came about after all.

An uncanny resemblance

A fasting old man has caught the country’s attention; more so, of the TV channels. While the camps should have been Anna & anti-Anna, they are now conveniently termed as ‘India’ & “anti- India”. I always used to think (based on reports) that Americans are a stupid people, they sometimes elect their presidents depending on who ran a better and attractive election campaign, not based on the candidate’s merit. Presidential electinos are jsut like selling a product, the glossier the advertisement, the more the sales. Its like they just swallow whatever crap is shown on their 'TeeVee', no questions asked. Its so pathetic to see how Indian middle class has degenerated to those levels. May be, it was not degeneration after all- it was like this through out; just came out in the open now.

              Our penchant for swallowing news and views from the TV has made us not very different from the Americans. We’re just as conceited as they are. Poor chaps (the americans), so lonely at the top till now.

You simply cannot utter a word about Anna because anti-Anna is anti-India. Such a sad state of affairs. My sincere apologies to the Americans for criticizing them. It’s a classic case of spotting a speck from someone’s eye while there is a log in mine.

I guess there were indications of this rot all along. Now I recollect hearing a man from Orissa talk. He was working in IT in Bangalore. His native place was either Bolangir or Kalahandi district, or some other name which one I forgot. Whichever it was, it is infamous for drought and poverty and is always in the news. So I thought I’d show off my general knowledge and asked him if it is true that droughts and other such calamities are common there. He looked at me as if I was talking about some other god-forsaken place and flatly refused any knowledge of such a big problem. I bit my tongue and thought it better to keep further GK to myself. But the thought was jarring, how can a man from that place deny the existence of a problem that is news in national newspapers. That was one sign.

The other sign was the facebook posts which derided anybody who decided to say Anna had shades of grey and he wasn’t a saint. If FB had a dislike button, you would be buried under a barrage of them.

Subtle and Minor signs, but all the same with a huge undercurrent.

 So I guess we aren’t an enlightened polity after all. Applying a little bit of extrapolation…may be middle class is the same everywhere.

In memoriam

One of the greatest composers in Malayalam cinemas, Johnson master passed away two days ago. It was an untimely death which fills me with melancholy every time I think of it. He should have been like any other music composer. Bu the personal element was added by ‘Gandharva sangeetham’ which I used to watch regularly at dinner time when I was home. Every night he would be humming tunes on his guitar, with the contestants singing his beautiful melodies sometimes. He always came across as a frank and simple man who never tried to hide his feelings. As they always say, he will continue to live forever through his beautiful songs. A day of real loss for malayalis.

The City of Dust

Bangalore was eponymous as the "Garden city". Later it earned so many other tags, like the 'IT capital'. Obama elevated it into celebrity status still later. 'Bangalored' has evolved as a verb for outsourcing.

There are times when one feels it is apt to call it as per the title of the post. The 'dhool' kicked up at times is too much that it even impairs visibility, like fog. The levels of pollution is just too much. Personally I know people who have had worsening of asthmatic attacks after coming to the city. Sitting in an auto at times, I'm horrified to think what colour my lungs will be, after inhaling all the smoke from the traffic.

The dust is not just confined to the air. You find it everywhere...on the seats of the auto, on the seats of the metro buses. When you get into the bus and is overjoyed to find a vacant seat, within moments your joy vaporises when you find the seat caked in dust, may be even someone's shoeprints. But you have no choice but to grab that only seat, for there are another a dozen people behind you eyeing that lone seat. Initially I used to worry sick over my kurta getting dirty from all that dust on the seat..but now I have learned to console and congratulate myself that my kurtas are dark colored and will mask the dust! But all people are not such rollovers like me. One of my friends who recently moved to the city is thinking of covering herself in a burkha even though she is not a muslim. For the time being, she makes do with covering herself up with a shawl .i.e her face and head, leaving just a slit for the eyes. That terrorist like appearance of hers has spawned a  new series of jokes in the dept! She has a paranoia about all the dust in the air. She says she finds her head coated with dust and the head comb quite full of it after a bus ride.She says there is a lot of dust on her face. I cant help but wonder if that shouldn't be true in my case too. Some how it has escaped my notice. Well...guess my standards of hygiene have taken a beating.

Talking about hygiene, today I had to sit next to a lady who was smelling like hell. You have to trust me when I say this 'coz I'm someone who is relatively resistant to bad smells, even when people cover up their noses, I can usually take it in without batting my eyelids. But this time, I was floored. Her body odour almost made me nauseous that I had to turn my face the other way and sit. No, this is not about telling everyone should use deo or such stuff. About taking bath may be...but lets talk about that when we know about water availability.

PTSD

Caught a glimpse of the TeeVee (the US pronunciation) when I was preparing a brief on the ISID NTD meeting. Just caught a wink of a scene showing an airport. Needless to say, it brought back the PTSD. (for the uninitiated- it is Post traumatic stress disorder). Just mention North statio/Lechmere, I;m ready to throw fits anytime. At the risk of sounding like a gas bag, I’ve to confess this trip has done me to death with regards to air and subway travel. As much as we enjoyed Boston, by the end of the week, we’ve had enough of the subway travel that I began to feel weary and nauseous at the thought of the shuttle bus from Lechmere to North station. Actually the subway is qyuite nice. But the problem was, we were making around 8-10 trips per day in a matter of, may be 12 hours. Now that isn’t so nice.

The same goes for airports. I’ve seen more airports and had more take-offs and landings in a week than I had in my entire short life. Actually when we missed the AI flight and had to stay over in Chicago, I was kind of secretly pleased; variations in barometric pressure 6 times in 24 ours had made my ear sick and me very nauseous on the inbound flight. This time atleast we had a break on the outbound ;-)

May be all this PTSD is gonna last just a few weeks and then I may be back to wishing for more of the fare. Hope that time is a long way off :-)

7 khoon maaf (pardon the 7 murders)

The translation of the title from hindi is mine, pardon me. After seeing the film, there would surely be the 8^th murder, that of the director. I can’t pardon Vishal Bhardwaj for directing this after the wonderful hopes he gave after Ishqiya [Now, that was some movie]. How can you ever destroy all the suspense of a movie with its title. Now that’s dumb. After the 1^st murder, you realize you have to plod through 6 more. In the end, nobody can blame you for baying for the script writer’s bloody blood. Priyanka Chopra is wasted in a role with potential. She did a much better job in ‘Fashion’. None of the male co-leads have enough in the plot to explore their repertoire. Fine actors, Irrfan khan. Nasruddin Shah, all wasted. The fellow playing the narrator, could do more with his face, for that was one of the better scripted roles in the movie. 

Honestly, if there is a Susanna in the society, she deserves mental treatment. The movie at times seems to be trying to evoke sympathy, portraying Susanna as the victim.

If you are asking me why write a review for the film which was released last year…that’s coz Air India forced me to watch this on its flight. This was the only movie in the flight DEL-BLR. The other option of course, was listening to Annu Kapoor and Durga Jasraj, which I was in no mood for.