a Li'l of this and a Li'l of that

guys, i've been hit by a bad bad case of Writers' block. its almost 2 months old now. part of the following was done almost a month ago. Im just finishing it. Sorry if something is out of context. Too lazy to evaluate.

Sorry, the images are too small. pls click,enlarge and read the lines. I do that all the time.

* Its saturday and i'm in office. One of the most exciting things about my job, as i have found in the last 9 months or so, is working on saturdays. The darkness, the eeriness, the peace of mind (with ur manager not staring at you), Office just rocks on weekends. Also, the extra holiday i get as compensation gives me a lot of options. My whole mum Trip was sponsored by weekend working days- both in cash and days.

*Looks like the folks in office are gonna grant me a laptop.Bewildered by how a single mail from the US guys can charge these ppl up.I'd made the request myself, around a week back as per my US boss's suggestion, but none really paid any attention then.

* Office is cooler on saturdays, temperature-wise and otherwise. Im shivering on my seat. Hyderabadis sure know to air condition. And the coffee vending machine doesnt work on weekends, so hot chocolate/cappuccino are out of question.

*Okay, noone forced me to come to office today. Dont be misled beleiving otherwise, now that im mentioning it again and again.

* Indigo doesnt really deserve to be called an airline. Kingfisher is costly. probably this is wot they call catch-22. well, maybe not exactly.

* Coming back to the laptop. I think im gonna ask my Cousin sisters to bedazzle my name on it; or make a crayon pic. And im gonna do e'thing that'll atleast make my mngr think about,deciding on,having a discussion as to whether they shud take it back.

Will they really call me at 2 am to check if the logs are fine?

*CAT's almost 5 months ahead. My Vocab sucks big time. And i cant count as good as i used to do 4 yrs back. Data is just rows and columns for me. I'm still taking my chances and paying TIME.

I do that every year.

* I complete a year at BankAm this Monday.( 'Thats 365 days man!!', to quote Alistar Campell) I just love the company. The Managers are fun. All of them seem to have watched 'Wall Street' and read 'Winning'. I think they also have Bloomberg widgets on their desktop. 'Recession','US', [Boss's name] are mentioned twice in every sentence. Some ppl say 'lets Touch Base' every time they wanna say 'lets Talk'.

And they follow the 'the art of screwing juniors effectively' book step-by-step..

*Im still not looking for another job. I love this one. This post is from office.I can enjoy a bit of law-breaking at times.

this one reminds me of someone at office

and this is regular stuff at BankAm:

(quite a girly title, a disaster that i cant think of anything better. gotta reduce my visits to EM's blog.)

PS: I think I'm finally graduating from Calvin to Dilbert. Getting older. sigh!

hyd-mum-ahd-mum-hyd

I have never been a traveler in the real sense, although i immensely desire the image. I mean its pretty cool to be a guy who's toured a lot. Thats probably why i took extra time off from office and headed off to Mumbai. Now mumbai is not a favourite holiday spot, but its pretty okay for a starter.

the preps included buying a large livea trekking bag( which goes in perfectly with the tourist image), coercing my TM into granding two days of paid leave and saving enuf money to last 4 days in 2 cities( i also decided to catch a train to ahmedabad and take a luk at the akshardham temple).

One thing i hadnt planned for was the traffic in Mumbai. Lotto ppl say that bangalore is almost as crowded as mumbai, you know wot, they suck.

all 2 days i spent there, all i saw was the infinity mall, which is some 2 km frm the flat and takes 30 min on auto, and the CCD, where i had brunch both days. I could very well be the first guy who took off to mumbai on vacation and returned w/o seeing the taj or the gateway or the marine drive or nowadays, the leopold cafe.

By the way, spent a night at Firangi Pani. Rony paid.

Took the garib radh to ahmedabad next day, and swore i'd never do it again, the moment i stepped in. That reminds me, both Rony and me got in at the last minute. just before the whistle, to be precise. That was preceeded by we both reaching a wrong station, and that was again preceeded by me waking up late, which is not very uncommon.

Someone once told me that we NITCians have this bloody habit of keeping people waiting all the time. I mean we are always late and even if we miss a flight or two, we just refuse to learn.

Missing the train wouldnt have been a big loss in any case.

Still searching for the guy who said garib radhs are a boon.

for the record, Akshardham temple luks grand.

Im somewhat intrigued by this man called Swami Narayan( pardon me if there are any followers).

he built his own temple, and has very meticulously preserved his writings, the quill/pen he used to write those writings, the clothes he wore while he wrote them, the rope he used to tether his horse, the pichook he played holi with, and what not. His preserved tooth, nails and bodyhair were a revolting sight. but again, the temple looks marvellous.

got back on monday, went straight to office. I like it when you come back from somewhere and still make it to office on the same day. Frst, it saves you a day's salary (wage seems to be a more correct term); secondly, you get approval to leave early. I did both.

here i brag about being in a city and with some cash!

Say you are someone who lived in a village for the first 19 years, and you for all the luck in the world land up in hyderabad, and suddenly u realize u purse is heavier, how long will it be before you are dancing at a disco bar? --a day or two?

The point is, it took me a whole 9 months.

First things first, i owe my first visit to FireFly(which is almost the cheapest disco is hyd and still burnt a hole in my pocket) to Rony, who came all the way from Bombay to meet us and get a taste of what hyd is all about.

Now when a Bombay guy comes to town, you cant woo him with hyderabadi biriyani or a movie at Imax. (we watched 'WatchMen' on day one and if you are also not very satisfied with your life, go watch)

Since none of us here had been to a disco before, we just swallowed our pride and like true NITcians called up JustDial for the list. We kind of zeroed in on Firefly which is not very strict on couple entry, dont charge an entry fee and allow you to use the dance floor even if you dont have grls wid you. At that moment, Firefly was the place to be at.

The place looked rich( too dark to take snaps and show off later) and played good music. We went in a group of 5 (no girls, of course!) and were initially shown seats in some obscure corner from where the dance floor was just a dream. to our luck, the incharge was a mallu (the universal mallu-brotherhood is no longer a myth!)who made us comfortable and allowed to choose our seats; which we exploited to a great extent, placing ourselves at very strategic locations and irritating the grls on the floor.

There was a party going on in the middle of all this, i think 'twas some college in Banjara hills. There were a number of girls getting drunk and falling down every now and then- the pick of them being the one who was getting too slim her for her skirt, so that she had to pull it up,say every 30 seconds. The boys showed more maturity, puking only at the loo, and one guy almost breaking his leg trying to decide what is stronger- his bones or the door. There were also a couple who were swearing at each other for reasons unknown to us. We chose to laugh out loud and enjoy the scene amidst all this drama.

And finally when we got to dance, which i must say was a bonus given our looks and the noise we were making, we did all those moves(mallu guys know each other on a dance-floor through the salimkumar signature step) which made OAT nights very spl at college. We danced like Appan did in 2nd year, like Pulla did during ragam05, like Verkkan did in that funny video, like Mangal did after he got drunk.Boy! it was reunion; although we were all clean-shaven, with shirts tucked in.

Finally when it rang 12 and we got out, we had a glance at the girls, and we deeply regret doing that till this moment. We could in the least have left with the satisfaction of being at touching distance with divas,cuties and all those you have heard about.

The light and a clearer view spoilt it all. While none of them looked good even by the most generous evaluation, some even dressed as bad as anyone can imagine.

Maybe they tried some very advanced makeup which make them look good in the dark and as bad in daylight. I have absolutely no idea.

we lost 3.5k, by the way.

Slumdogs, are we indians slumdogs?

thanks to my job, frnds and my hard disk, i now have SlumdogMillionaire on my comp, although thats not news anymore. I dont want to sound like an idiot who always goes against the popular opinion, but sadly i dont think the film has the class of 'memento' or 'godfather' or even 'shawshak redemption'.

this much garlanded movie, as all must know by now is the story of a slumdog who wins the jackpot at a game show. its also the story of india, seen through his eyes. well shot and intelligently casted, the film gets it wrong when it tries to merge Hollywood and Bollywood. On the one side, its all bollywood masala, throughout, where the hero reunites with his childhood sweetheart again and again and saves her from all evil. the climax has all the spices of a regular yashraj flick. And what to say on that silly embarassing dance sequence during the end credits. That is very likely to be the perception of Daniel Boyle, the director on Bollywood. But all these, when they'd have made a hindi movie a compelling watch, make an english movie dull, over the top and cliched.

And on the other side, theres quite a lot of hollywood masala too. Hollywood, as a matter of fact always needs somebody to mock, villainise or sympathize with. Like all westerners, the filmmakers probably have grown up hearing the stories of malaria, tigers and snake charmers. And it might have been quite shocking to them to find a very progressed, cultured and rich India.What can they now think of, but the story of an ill-bred street urchin, who is just as shocked as themselves to find the new India?

If I am being over the top or excessively patriotic, its all because of the light Indians are shown in, every single minute in the movie. We are corrupt, jealous, immoral and probably slumdogs too.

Its not fascination, curiousity or sympathy that the film has for the country. Its sarcasm.

A boy jumping into a pool of shit, just to have a glimpse of Amitabh Bachan;Frames which show all filth in the slums;People who burn each others' homes in the name of religion; a goong who blinds kids to make them fit for begging; a don who has a 19 yr old mistress; Police walahs who hang a kid by his hands and short-circuit him; What is it, if its not very glorified and dignified sarcasm? Its clear as daylight when the boy says "You wanted to see real India; This is real India" when he's beaten up by a taxiwallah, supposedly for a crime he has no hand in. And quite shamelessly, the next line is something like "Dont worry kid, now we will show you what real America is.." from the tourists he's a guide of. And they take care of him , like saints. How sweet!!

I am in no way hinting that all this is unheard of or strange in our country, but the film doesnt make even a feeble attempt to see the whole picture.In the event of exposing the Indian underbelly, the film seems to have forgotten that we are a nation with a cultured past, a significant and a very promising future.

Just take a look at the characters, if you are still not convinced. There are no good god-fearing Indians in the movie. Except Jamaal and Latika. But one of them is a slumdog and the other a whore. Good at heart, but uncultured and uncivilised. The audience is left to sympathise with these two and be disturbed by the others. Like the host of the show, who ridicules the chaiwallah throughout the game, is the film not looking down upon a nation?This is "poverty porn", which reinforces the western stereotypes on the country.

Just like I said before, SlumDog millionaire is probably good for an Indian movie. However, quite far from the standards of hollywood. Forget the cliches and the prejudices, you have a real feel good movie, like they say it. It has already struck gold in US, where ppl are quite hungry for the story of real, poor India or real , cruel China now that Soviet Union is no more(Read Rambo 3, Rocky4, Indiana Jones 4 and many more where the Russians get to play villians). The script is nothing but food for the hungry-Just like this short story which won the CommonWealth award, but has nothing new to say.It doesnt break cliches. Nor does it evoke a feeling we are all strangers to.

I wouldnt say that i didnt enjoy the movie. Not for a second is it boring.Its an entertainer till the last shot, although it doesnt deserve all of the accolades. Very refreshing music score, which i pray will fetch AR Rahman an oscar.My personal favourite is 'Ringa Ringa'. (The choreography 'almost spoiled 'Jai Ho').The frst song(the one when the kids are chased by the police) is real good too. And very gutsy and measured performances from all the actors esp Dev Patel and Anil Kapoor. I cant remember who the casting director is, but he's probably great.

Watch it coz it might win an oscar, or something similar. Comes to India in two weeks from now. Im desperate for Rajiv Masand's take on this.

(Im still the same old guy that you know.. Not taking myself too seriously. )

how i wish i hadnt spent money on this....

in the climax, shahrukh puts a question to the lady :"Will Rab be angry with me for loving you more than i love Him?"(how romantic!!!)

Know wot, i have the answer. "No, Rab wouldnt mind. but He'll definitely be angry with you for using His name in a silly,stupid movie like this"


i think someone should ban this one. or else the kids 'll take Raj for a role model. even worse, they mite try to understand grls thru Tani.


Yashraj mite have paid Rajiv Masand some serious cash to give it 2 stars.All said, there are some moments. Like the one scene where Suri contemplates placing a rose on the note he wrote to Tani. The best part of the movie, however ws the commentary during the end credits.Some one put that on youtube pls.


I just hope no more mothers will name their kids 'Raj'.

one regular monday at office

i guess all IT pros hate Mondays. Who'd want to forget the highs of a Sunday, tuck in an irritatingly ironed shirt and carry that smug look to office?Much like the mondays we had at school. Only that there is no homework.

Today was in no way spectacular. But it ws just plain strange in that a lotto stuff happened. First, i found the silliest way any company could ever have celebrated xmas. They (probably some HR who had organised xmas celebration in his/her school) had one of our Delivery Leads dressed up as Santa (!!wait.. theres more to come....) and all other DL's following him ringing bells and making some embarassing sound. And the Santa gave away gifts in lucky draws. There were mouse pads, monopoly games,sudoku puzzles, golf balls and other BankAm merchandise. I 'won' a BankAm hankie, which very curiously had a tag made in china. I mean would the Americans really use something made in Communist China? Definitely they wud, but why make it very obvious?

okay coming back. To say that i would wipe my ass with that hankie would be quite anti BankAm, but thats exactly how u'd feel if ppl around won golfballs, classic notepads, monopoly games, sudoku puzzles and stuff like that. Gladly MSN won a mouse pad, which is even more ridiculous.(He also said this totally gross and pathetic joke on the guy who won two golfballs.) We both had the himesh reshamiya- in-karz-look till evening. Which probably beats this whole DL-as-Santa exercise. Instead of being rejoiced and drooling at BankAm hospitality, i suppose half the ppl felt more morose than they actually were. All the guys who won mousepads and hankies took a deep breath, counted till 10 and started working.

After that, i had a very private and outdoor meeting with my mentor, who is like very supportive and brutally honest, which is something i admire. it (the meeting) was obviously on the need to focus on work, amidst all this hullaballoo.Which made me skip my usual 11/2 hrs of gym, as a gesture of loyalty. that in itself was quite generous from my part. 'Focus' hasnt improved much.

and then Cricinfo ws probably too gud today. had every line read twice or thrice, escaping glances from the managers. Whhaaat..A...Match!! How many tests have we seen where the guy who made two centuries lost the m-o-m to someone who made just 83 and took no wickets!!

Sehwag has certainly changed the rules of the game..He may never come close to the man he wanted to be like, but definitely there will be more and more boys who'll want to be like him. and Rahul Dravid is perhaps the most talented night-watchman we have evr had.

more and more ppl around me are taking to blogging. hes the latest. good luck boy!!

Recession, among other things.

this recession's really a bitch, you know. And nothing could ever have convinced me better than this piece of shit. One of my colleagues derived some gud amount of sadistic pleasure in sending this link across to almost e'one in office. And almost immedietly, we had a clarifying mail from one of our Delivery Leads, which kindof confirmed that something was after all, fishy.

Now will I feature on the ever growing Victims-of-recession-list is something we'll have to wait and see. Have time till the beginning of next fiscal probably.Which tells me this is actually a very good time to remain in college. being in a high paying job is even better, provided its gonna last.

Till some idiot wrote abt that in the papers, the only way Recession had come close to pissing me off is that SmR was kindo out of touch in the last few chats. And she blamed it on the recession, which is supposed to be on the brink of ruining her placements.

In sheer contrast with the pessimistic line of thought (which is really popular these days), i hear frm ppl is that our entire team is very highly placed in the company and the industry in terms of efficency and technology(boy!! thats NEWS!!), so thers every reason that we mite be spared.

Anyways, that article is one helluva reason to stop the regular subway footlongs and start saving. I'll soon be the communist son my dad dreamt of.

If somebody reading this doesnt know what Recession really means, I really supsect ur out of this planet. In which case, u shud be reading this, this and this.

Annie,Yamdoot and Arundhati Roy..

the new job and money have come with a lot of options.I now have a 160gb WD hard disk and a fast internet connection. which means i can download movies at will.And copy many more from my friends' comp too. I came across this 110min gem last day.

A lot of people may not really know what im talking about. This post is on the campus film-

'In Which Annie Gives it Those Ones ' made by Arundhati Roy and her second husband Pradip Kishen. It ws aired on DoorDarshan in early 1989 i think.written by Roy, its supposed to be based on her life in Delhi school of planning and Architecture.This is the pic that you get if u do an image search in google.All because a very young Shah Rukh Khan plays a blink and miss role.

the story covers the life of fifth year students Anand grover (or Annie, played by Arjun raina) , Radha(Arundhati Roy),Arjun( the guy's name escapes me) and many other ppl around them.

Annie is victimised for having made fun of the HOD,Yamdoot(Roshan Seth).He is repeating his fifth year for the fourth time.

the goodness of this movie lies in its frankness and raw feel.we get to see a campus of the late 70's, running crazy on the hip culture.Almost all actors perform really well.Roshan Seth is amazing as the hard-nosed professor.

The highlight anyday will be radha, played by Arundhati Roy herself. I never knew she could look this cute and sensuous at the same time. This was perhaps her debut as a writer too.

I always had this thought that booker prize holders always write about the poverty in 3rd world countries.Reading some 10-20 pages of Naipaul proved it right to me. That is perhaps one reason i never took time to read her God of Small Things, though i have the copy with me.

After the movie, like a true Nitcian, i did a shameless google search on Annie and Arundhati Roy, which brought me to this masterpiece. I mean i had watched Bandit queen last year, thought its a good movie, though very gross. her review is quite out of the world. I wonder what the fate of the movie would have been, had she been famous while penning the critique.

Radha proves her intelligence and attitude all over again.

But at points i thought her character was a cut above the rest, which is bad because the film is supposed to be on Annie and his attempts at passing the final Jury.Nevertheless, this is one film that shouldnt be missed. will remind you of college, anyday,anytime.It has that appeal even after 20 years.

im gonna do two things, rite after this..

download DAM/AGE, also by Arundhati Roy

finish God of small things.

Dostana-all fun

One movie which made news right from the beginning. And thankfully, one movie which kept all promises it made. the trailers said a lot ws gonna come. and it has really come.

The premise being no different from a regular bollywood potboiler, the gay angle is what makes it interesting, right from the beginning.the two men being the show stealers, priyanka chopra has very less space(the clothes we not in abundance too). And rightly so. But i thought they were over doing it at times. Half sure that the knicker John wears in the opening scene(the one after the item song) is the same one bipasha wore in the lift scene(fantasy!!adolescent fantasy!!) in bachna Ae haseeno. man , sexy bodies!! both of them..

more than anything, Dostana should be appreciated for the comedy, thats both genuine and situational. glad that nobody wanted to mimic Welcome,Singh is King(or is it KKing?) or any other silly akshay kumar 'super'hits.I mean there are a lot of gags which make u laugh rather than 'cringe in embarassment', like Rajiv Masand says it.

The director has shown a lot of intelligence by covering up the poor acting skills of John abraham(Garam Masala!!! im trying to forget that i watched the movie) and giving those difficult scenes to abhishek bachan.He really comes out good in those submissive-gay scenes. cant imagine how John would have done those. We saw a glimpse of that in the party at priyanka copra's house, and surprisingly, it wasnt quite bad too. But abhishek really looked like an indian gay and John like a french designer gay.

Enough of gay talk!! What i really like about the movie is that neither of the guys(gays?) get the girl in the end. these three ppl continue to be friends, sipping beer on the beach, even after she finds a different man, in an almost bald Bobby Deol. now how many hindi movies have had that boldness to move away from the regular, safer climax? this is where dostana beats probably every other movie that has come out this year. This is one little gag that lasted for two hours. and will probably last for years to come.

meanwhile, just checkout this poster of the previous dostana.I remember watching the movie in my school days.

reflections on making it public

okay, finally, i decide to let ppl know abt this blog, after what, like some 2 yrs.
speaking (or rather writing) to yourself can be bloody boring at times.

btw, thanks to those very few friends who read it all, and got back at me.

thats it. not much to reflect. and i dont feel like a writer releasing his first book.

Chicken Soup for the NITcian's soul

The following is the child of my 4 years of hardwork(ahem..) at NITC. Do not underestimate, never ridicule.

disclaimer(s):

(a)NITCians are the only people who are entitled to question anything written below.

(b)Theres nothing in here about the girls of NITC.

(c)Theres a lot in here about the people i have been with all 4 years.

(d)Okay, its autobiographical in parts. Only in parts.

so here goes.

The few things that set NITCians apart.

(1)IITians are Gods.(nerds, though!!). And hell, we dont know what CET is, an entrance exam or an engineering college.

(2)We constantly assert that all girls we have fallen for will eventually fall for us, once we start our careers,make loads of money,drive a BMW, maybe.If that doesnt happen, we like to believe that the girl is stupid. If deep inside our minds we know that the girl is bloody logical, we just pray for a tight healthy liver.

(3)All of have been nerds at some point in our lives.Some still are. But we all like the

'cool dude cum macho man' image and make fun of greater nerds.We have always wanted to be the guys our mothers warned us about, but we are almost the guys our mothers wanted us to be, albeit drinking,smoking and flying.

(4)" lotto chicks in the frst year" - Pure wishful thinking.Happens as every new batch comes in.

(5)We almost eat,drink and sleep on the internet.And after we start working, a google search to find the nearest bus stop.( true)

(6)All NITians take two pegs every night. Okay, not all.But some drink more to keep the average.

(7)Its not music if its not Rock.Period.

(8)We always discuss matters like economic progress and the share market.That gives us some kind of orgy.

(9) Every Ragam is the best only till the next, Ragam has everything for everyone, and Ragam is second only to Saarang ( IITMadras). Dhwani sucks.

(10)We despise,mock and ridicule all mallu movies, regardless of its cast and make . And anything thats in English is godly.

(11)All NITCians in the history of mankind have been divided into 3:

a)independents

b)radicals

c)the politically ignorant.

No more comments.

(12)We actually respect doctors or medical students deep inside. On the outside, we give them looks of sympathy coated with sarcasm.

okay, 12 bulet points is huge for a 22 year old what, analyst?

okay.. this is it

I'm back. If at all anyone really cares. Its almost 3 months since my last post. I was really busy at my job and such boring things that come with it.Hope to be a bit more regular again.

This is probably my first post out of pure disgust and frustration. Since i keep the blog all for myself and people who know me really well, i dont really need to find something interesting to write on.

Now traditionally, a software professional's blog is supposed to be a very techie kind of one, or one full of the poorest of jokes. I'm not really a techie guy.(and i have the documents to support that.)I understand why the software-engineer kind of jokes are pathetic.They (infact we) lead a pretty boring life. Almost the coolest thing in 3 months for an IT guy is going for a theme function, where people dress in weird clothes. So unless we have something adventurous in life, we cant be very entertaining people.You can say we are pretty boring as people.

To me, the job gives a lotto money, discipline and thats it. Theres no fun. Configuring a server or understanding a database has never been my idea of an outing. Allow yourself to be stripped of evrything that adds to your ego, and there you are.A full fledged IT pro.

First, the dress code and the clean shaven look.

nicely ironed and tucked in formal shirts, formal pants and formal shoes. the shoes have to be the same colour as your belt. and your socks have to be the same colour of your trousers.

This is definitely the worst kind of discipline i have ever been subjected to. In the last 22 years, the only time i wore black formal shoes was in my 11th and 12th. So 2 years. thats it.

And now i have to shave twice a week. I have never shaved twice in the same week, my entire life.boy, i look gay when i have a clean shave. ( luckily, gays in hyderabad dont jus have a clean shave, they also exfoliate, moisturize and invariably wear pink). I feel morose wen i look at the mirror. I really look like those guys I would laugh at, any day.

Month old stubble, undone hair,shabby shirts and a stinking lungy was almost your trademark, back in college. You felt really macho, those days. You got high even without alchohol. You almost thought nothing in this world could end the fun. And you laughed at the people who said all fun ends at college. You said they were boring people to begin with. Who always cared about grades. You never thought you'll spend three months with nobody to joke around with.

The worst part is that you dont really know if this is bad. You cant choose between college and office, given an option.

College gave everything, except money.

Office gives the money.

You can walk around in Lee cooper shoes or grab a Subway footlong. Or watch Dark Knight in Imax, all alone. Or go to a perfumes shop and say ' Playboy musk.. the US one. oh yeah.. credit card?'

I dont think i'll be able to choose.

bangalore- frst outing

well, this is not exactly a travelogue. i found my very recent trip to bangalore very amazing.

I'm not a person who likes to travel in big groups. alone is heavenly, a good understanding friend in company is good, two understanding friends in company is okay, and three understanding friends usually dont have my company. now since it was Rony with whom i have had recent cherishable travelling expeditions, i decided to lift my lazy bum and give it a try. and it was his own idea that we squeeze the cash out of our high earning seniors- manu, who has almost lost his bachelorhood and whose younger bro is the 3rd rank holder in med entrance, deepth, who looks half his age and still works in Texas Instruments and Dj-who was a political kingpin at college.

now if i start giving u every detail like the bus i travelled in, the way the grl next seat batted her eyelids at the boy next seat, the brand of soft drink i bought, i'll end up writing a bloody boring travelogue. to sum up all, we reached bangalore after a journey which seemed like a pain in the ass to me and quite okay to rony.

They(my seniors i mean, with due respect, deference and reverence) lived somewhere close to forum mall which was coincidentally close to where SmR spent her vacation.

As it had just dawned when we climbed down from our bus with heavy luggage and very less cash, we had the chance to see the city with almost no traffic at all. the walk till home was pleasant. we then found that our seniors had really managed a grand welcome for us, with almost everyone sleeping and some snoring too. it was a crowd in there. 12 ppl in one single house, which was built and rented for four. however, the first thought which crossed our presumably shrewd brains(mine and rony's) was not scarcity of space." if one of them puts in some 300 bucks, that makes it 3600." which is like huge for both of us at the moment. we were quite excited by the thought that we were about to witness the grandest treats of our life.

after the initial planning, we decided to find refuge on their beds. meeting SmR still in mind.

like true NIT-ians, we slept till maybe 11.00 or 12.00. i then gt up, had a bath, and took off to forum mall, where after the initial exploring, i call up SmR. She shows up exactly 50 minutes later. i sigh as its one of those rare occasions when i wait for someone. im so used to reaching late that some people mistake me to be from a different time zone.

okay, now she shows up like a true diva.diva in the sense with a vanity bag and a complete cat walk. i agree to her proposal that we have something to drink from mcdonalds, which in turn marks my frst visit to the retail food chain,which is supposed to be a real big thing. what followed was quite unauspicious, we enjoying the drink standing, as there are no seats left. bad start, i say. not to the date(now this is a very dry unromantic date), but to my link with mcdonalds.

after that, we have a really long chat in the porch of forum mall. Smr suggests that we whisper to each other as the porch is full of mallus. its common knowledge that u cant walk in bangalore without rubbing shoulders with other mallus. then we decide to go on lunch. i am quite amazed by her knowledge of the city. i for one get lost most of the times in a new city.

we have a somewhat okay lunch,( sadly, green salad ws a new term for the hotel guys, dude, im an aspiring fitness freak!!) and discuss a whole range of topics like life after college, diet, attitude et al. then i leave her alone. or rather, she shows me the way and then we leave each other alone.

i figure that the next time i meet her may be some 5 years from now, wotever she says.

after that, i retire to our new home, take a nice shower, watch my seniors play football with kids and then live happily ever after for the rest of the night. at purple haze, that is.

okay thats all for the frst day,which as i said ws quite amazing. i dont know if it was the money which ma seniors shelled out, or the lunch with SmR, or purple haze, which im told is one of the poshest pubs in the city. but i really enjoyed the day.and the night too..

innathe chintavishayam..for the women..out and out

innathe chintaavishayam, which roughly translates to 'thought of the day',has been made with a lot of thought. the film is not for men. its not for flamboyant,fun loving grls either. its for women who remain glued to TV watching non sensical tear jerking mega serials. if you put the film into that genre, i must say its a winner. it never makes you laugh, or even cry either. the most important thing i noticed is, unlike satyan anthikkads previous films rasathantram and vinodayatra, there are very few irritating moments.

the plot is a tried and tested one. marital woes,extra marital affairs (without the sex part,though), children,sentiments et al. the director thought a 50+hero romancing the ravishing meera jasmine would be the icing on the cake. give us a break man!!
and to me, the sub plots seemed too far from reality. like the loving husband vijayaraghavan following his wife around, exhibiting shades of the classy act 'thalathil dineshan' at times. and mohan lal seems to change his life miraculously. so miraculously that we see a totally social and understanding and modern husband by the climax.

and i wonder if all that male chauvanism does exist. oh come on, we are not living in the eighties. a wife who can cook is fun. but a wife who can earn sounds more practical to me. watching that traditional muslim family plot unfold, i couldnt help thinking about SmR(im not a big fan of fake names, but i thought i shouldnt give her undue publicity. :) sorry SmR, if ever you come across this) whom i had long, latenight yet unromantic chats with till quite recently. i think we once had a very interesting argument on marital relationships and all. and she's pretty convinced that men are still very chauvanistic,egoistic,megalomaniacs(i agree on the megalomania part).

meera jasmine very badly needs a good personal wardrobe consultant. who the hell thought she'd be a sight in those tight fitting frocks and skirts. and not even a single scene in saree which makes her gorgeous. although she's still my fav heroine, i suggest work outs might just be necessary. you are getting too much fat on you baby!!! whats with that gents watch? if you think it gives you the air of an intellectual, get out on the road and take a look. these days evry seetha and geetha sports a gents watch. and for heavens sake,stop signing a satyan antikkaad movie just because hes directing it..

i think ur being typecast in those horrible bold-girl-with-a-bad-past roles.

one thing i really hate about the movie is its songs. i have half a mind to believe that one of them was personally choreographed by mohan lal after watching paandi heroes having a good time with meerajasmine.

one last word to the writer-director. i think its high time you get back to doing what you do best- directing an intelligent script. now for directing an intelligent script, its unavoidable that some one else writes it.
u have proved beyond doubt that ur a very bad writer.

so heres my verdict,if it matters at all: definitely far far better than rasathantram and vinodayatra. and a good one to take ur mom to. that is, if you just drop her at the cinema. watching the movie is way too much man!!!

mulla... why do they make such movies

i cant actually believe this is a movie i was desperate to watch. people expect a lot from laljose these days. justified, after two gems in classmates and arabikkatha. no doubt that he is the most talented fimmaker of our times. my only question is , why mulla? why the hell does he want to make a movie on a script that has absolutely nothing in it?

the plot goes something like this: mulla, played by dileep is a goonda, in a colony of goondas and sexworkers. lachy, played by a very unattractive meera nandan is a grl who tranforms his life, supposedly like no other. now how many times have we seen that in a movie before? a pity that laljose cudnt think of nething new. this should be his second worst movie, after of course, rasikan.

however, i wud like to say that the film has its own magical moments. the director asserts that he has got class. salim kumar is once again a laugh riot. also, there are two really good songs. apart from all that, there s absolutely nothing thats worth ur time and money. give it a watch if ever someone brings out a pirated cd. even then, skip the climax. its simply horrible.

a cool and uber-sexual alter ego.

recently i made a very thrilling discovery that im not one man, but two.

i have this stupid,idiotic nerd who breathes books and studies on one part of my brain.

and the other part is controlled by a lazy, flamboyant beauty conscious stud(now 'stud' could be a generous evaluation)

i was the nerd for 16 years.

took 2 years for the transition period.

rechristined myself as the couch potato.

coming to think of it, this trait switching could be the indirect result of a lotto movies. heroes who are lazy appeal a lot to me these days. saif ali khan in hum tum,for instance. in perfect agreement with sigmond freud, i blame it all on my subconscious mind.

sometimes i like to break free. that is wen i go to sleep.i wake up as either of the two. but 99 out of 100 times in the last 4 yers, it's been the couch potato waking up.

when its the nerd, thats wen i dont like it at all. i start studying for no reason. and become a lot more honest. Sv could have killed me the other day, when he chose me as the group partner(not that he or me had a lot of options to choose from). the decision was purely on similar frequency basis, he likes to copy and i like to copy too. but on the lab, some one somehow put me to sleep and alas!! there came the nerd. i wanted to do the lab on our own. it was late,really late when finally the couch potato rose. and the nerd wasted 3 hours of my life. and Sv's too. But he says he saved an hour by sleeping. oh well.. my 3 hrs and his 2 hrs.

thers a slightly different version to the whole incident. Sv has agreed to help me out. this is my blog,definitely my own blog,but the following few sentences, Sv has written purely out of love and sympathy.

" Aswin is placed in BankAm and knows shit about computers. if thers one thing he's really really afraid of, thats being fired.

all this nerd and couch potato thing is rubbish. he's jus trying to cover up the fact that he tried to do the lab on his own,which is pretty demeaning by his own standards."

a third person account comes really handy. saves ur face. thank you Sv.(as in "thank you shaktimaan")

comin bak ,

i hereby recognize the nerd as my real self

and

the couch potato as my alter ego.

very few have found my posts worthy of comments. if under any circumstances anyone chooses this one to, pls for heavens sake stay away. i have a pretty good idea abt the kind of words it can evoke from you.

boredom, u the mother of invention

guys i've invented a new hobby. halfwits, "i dont give a damn about a potential argument that u can only discover a hobby, not invent it." who remembers discoverers anyway? inventors are cool. and im a wannabe. not a wannabe inventor, but a wannabe cool.
back to my,err...... invention. traveling without a plan. halfwits,"i know ppl have traveled without a plan since the stone age, but u know im the frst to give it the status of a hobby".

so this is wot i do these days. apart from watching random movies,reading random blogs,attending random lectures and choosing random hours to get up.

lazy to say more on the hobby.wot more can it be? thers some amount of planning involved though. u plan the hour of the day to wake up.an unshaven face and a shoulder bag definitely adds to the aura.
ps: Traveling without a plan is an expensive hobby. needs a lotto cash. up for the taking if ur dad's an ATM.

College Kumaran

bad bad movie. not even worth a review. well,nothing more could be expected from the team of "Mr.Brahmachari".But this is even worse. Stupid and brainless script, unimaginative direction, and forgettable songs. And to add to it all, one of the most ridiculous punchlines ever-"i love you"
Mohan lal will want to forget this one.
to the producer-- giving vimala raman more screen time might sell. trim one stupid song or joke and add her in.
i am sad for the 30rs i spent.

cycle

I was clearly out of mind when i decided to give it a chance. Directed by Johny Antony whose earlier outings were CID Moosa,Inspector Garud,THuruppu Gulaan and Kochi Rajaavu, i expected nothing but a flurry of idiotic and nonsensical sequences. However,10 minutes into the movie,i was assured that i wouldnt lose my money.
The plot revolves around two friends Roy(Vineeth Sreenivasan) and Sanju(Vinoo Mohan) who are both from modest backgrounds. Put into situations which seem more realistic than extraordinary,the two protagonists struggle to stay on their lives, following the best alternative at every juncture. Anything more would be an offence to all people who wish to watch a refreshing thriller,full of hilarious moments.
Both the actors deliver well,and vineeth sreenivasan reminds you of his dad,in his early days. Much of the attention and all of the applause he recieves throughout the movie is because of this canny resemblance. Only if he could work on his dialogue delivery. Vinoo Mohan is the next friendly neibhourhood boy, take it from me.


Cycle belongs to that class of movies which have been inspired by 'Classmates'. Had the latter not happened, no one in their right mind would have put their money on 4 struggling actors and a director who irritated more than he evoked laughter. However,Cycle will eventually turn out to be the turning point in the career of Johny Antony. I am not suggesting that this is a perfect movie.But it is definitely a realistic one, and a good one at that too. Much of the praise should go to James Albert who makes a delightful comeback through his marvellously crafted script.Not a single scene goes into waste. At parts, it even has the class of 'Ramji Ravu Speaking'.This man is here to stay.