Why Mumbai again and again?

After 26/11 that happened in 2009, the city lost 50,000 crore rupees per day for 3 days.

After July 13 bomb blast 2011, the Zaveri Bazaar alone is losing 250 crore per day.

Had the terrorist attack been in any other city, the amount of loss (in rupees I mean because for the India government human life loss is not a loss at all) would not be of this magnitude.

People who say that Mumbai is suffering terrorist attacks again and again because of its close connection to the underworld, they don’t understand one thing that these terrorist groups are not local goons or gully ka gundas that they will plot bombs only in the locality they know. They are big international organizations funded by people from all over the world and being operated centrally with high-tech instruments. They can plot bomb anywhere, at least anywhere in India. For them India is a cake walk because the country government is either sleeping or busy to retain its power (or who knows it’s not a ploy supported by the government itself to divert people’s attention from daily scams and scandals!), then why wouldn’t they choose to hit the financial nerve of the country which is none other than Mumbai? It’s just a matter of their choice!

ARR and Oscar

I hear many people saying that A R Rahman should not have received Oscar award for Slumdog Millionaire. I want to ask them who they think should have received best music director Oscar award in 2009? Should it be Alexandre Desplat for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button or James Newton Howard for Defiance or Danny Elfman for Milk or Thomas Newman for WALL-E?

So when you argue that A R Rahman shouldn’t have received the Oscar award for Slumdog Millionaire in 2009, please tell me who among the above mentioned music directors should have got it that year.

I don’t understand why people in India don’t understand the simple fact that the Oscar award for the best music director in 2009 was NOT to honor “The Best Music Director of the World Ever Walked on the Earth” or for “The Greatest Music Director of All Time”. Neither was it designed to locate, identify and honor the “Best Unexplored Music Director Whose Work is Never Recognized and Who is Living in Some Corner of the Earth” nor to pick up the “Best Work Ever Done by Someone Called A R Rahman”.

So when A R Rahman was nominated for Slumdog Millionaire for the Oscar award in 2009, he was not competing with Illiyaraja, MSV, R D Burman, S D Burman or Naushad.

So when A R Rahman was nominated for Slumdog Millionaire for the Oscar award in 2009, his work was not being compared with Roja, Thiruda Thiruda, Bombay, Kannathil Mutthamittal, Zubeida or any other classic by him.

So when A R Rahman was nominated for Slumdog Millionaire for the Oscar award in 2009, he was competing against Alexandre Desplat for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, James Newton Howard for Defiance, Danny Elfman for Milk and Thomas Newman for WALL-E.

The jury of the Oscar awards thought his score was the best compared to other four so he got the award in 2009. Every year someone is getting the best music director Oscar award for example, Michael Giacchino for Up in 2010 and Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross for The Social Network.

But people in India are still stuck in 2009 Oscar awards and never stops making comments like “Illiyaraja is better music director than A R Rahman. How can A R Rahman get Oscar award”, “R D Burman is all time best music director. A R Rahman’s composition in Slumdog Millionaire doesn’t even stand in front of any R D Burman composition. A R Rahman doesn’t deserve Oscar for that”, “A R Rahman has composed many better music than that of Slumdog Millionaire. He shouldn’t have received Oscar for that”...etc etc...

I can’t stop but laughing when I hear such statements because I know any reasoning to them would be futile. And If I try to explain the facts that I have written here to them they will say “Oh, you are so biased!”….but still they just can’t see the reality.

I thought I would post this feelings of mine in my blog. You might think why I am posting this after two years of A R Rahman getting the Oscar award? Well, better late than never :)

FlipKart - the Genie

Last Saturday I was approaching the end of the novel Simoquin Prophecies by Samit Basu. As I was fairly enamored and enchanted with the novel, I couldn’t wait to start on with its sequels – The Manticores’s Secret and The Unwaba Revelations. So on Staurday, after attending my gohonzon meeting near my house I went for Swapna book store in Indiranagar only to find that they don’t have the books with them. Broken hearted I placed the order with them and was thinking of what options I have in hand to get the books-
Option 1: Landmark (what if I don’t get the book there? It’s already 3pm!)

Option 2: Crosswrd (bad option…they didn’t even have The Simoquin Prophecies when I had checked earlier, forget about its sequels)

Option 3: The shop from where I had bought The Simoquin Prophecies on March 27, 2011 as a birthday gift to myself (I can’t go there without any friend taking me there…I have forgotten the route…I just remember that it’s somewhere in Kormangala opposite to a Persian restaurant called Sufi….forget about the route, I don’t even remember the name of that shop L….I tried calling two friends who can take me there…one is sleeping and one’s call is getting forwarded to dunno where)

So, finally after 2-3 minutes of mental juggling between three options, I decided to come back home with a heavy heart.

Next day at office as all my friends came to know about my book crisis, one friend suggested that she could place the order in Flipkart on behalf of me and I could get the books delivered to me in two days. As I had no alternative option in hand, I agreed. She placed an order with Flipkart for The Manticores’s Secret and The Unwaba Revelations on Monday at 9pm. Next day at 2pm I get a mail from my office mail room that I have received a courier and to my utter wonder what I see that Flipkart has already delivered my books to my office address! I hardly could believe it and ran towards the mailroom to grab the packet. I knew Flipkart is efficient but this amount of efficiency even I didn’t expect.

All thanks to my friend Chandrima who took the initiative and ordered the books for me. But then what are friends for?

Thanks to all my jumping around with new books in hand that all my friends came one by one to smell the fragrance of new books while passing comments on what kind of books I read, thanks to the tooth-breaking, mind-frisking-but-still-can’t-understand-the-meaning book titles. Now that I am 80% submerged in the pages of The Manticores’s Secret (20% consciousness I have held back to carry on with my office and house hold work), all credit goes to the Genie in my life - Flipkart.

Fighting Ignorance

They say ignorance is bliss. But my ignorance is like a bottom less pit, it has no limit. But my will to fight with it also has no bound. I keep checking and searching internet for every bit of unknown information that I come across while reading books, watching movies, in office meetings or even in client calls. And for this I have keep note of every unknown information I find so that I can check for it when I get the internet access. The fact that in spite of being in 21st century, I don’t have access to 24X7 internet access just proves my ignorance; it’s a different thing though with ignorance another attribute of mine has combined which is laziness. For example during my mad mad reading days of Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons, I kept noting all the monuments, paintings, sculptures and any kind of historical information that I used to know about while reading it sitting in my long bus journeys to office and search for it in Google immediately after reaching office. This was real fun as as the novel was proceeding, I was coming to know so much about Christianity and the European culture as I am always fond of studying about the European history.

But even after all said and done, I can’t forget and forgive myself for the greatest ignorance of all time of not knowing that the Vatican city is in Rome! I never knew this particular piece of information before reading the Da Vinci Code. I don’t know why I never tried look for it in the map in spite of the fact that checking maps used to be one of the most favorite pass time when I was in school and also in spite of the fact that I always wanted to do my MA in History with a special paper on the European history after I am done with MA in English with a Comparative Literature as my special paper and a diploma in Instructional Designing and also MBA (probably) when I think about my profession and not about passion!

Still the bottom line remains the same that I am ignorant person and fighting all day to come out of it.

Another confession: I have a very bad vocabulary also. I keep checking the dictionary in my mobile phone when I am reading any book which is written in English.

Girls and Shopping

People say that going for a shopping with a girl is a boring affair. They say that girls keep roaming in the entire market to look for stuffs and then can’t decide what to buy. I never agree with this since I am also a girl and I don’t shop that way. My way of shopping is

1. Identify the requirement
2. Decide on the brand
3. Locate the shop
4. Pick the stuff, make payment and come out of the shop/mall

I keep deciding the points from 1st to 3rd in my mind and I go to a particular shop only when I have decided on the first three criteria. My sister also shops in the same fashion.

People say girls don’t shop that way. For some girls, well, this is true.

I remember I had a friend in Kolkata who was a shopaholic. Then I was too young to know the meaning of ‘shopaholic’ but now when I think about her I understand that she was a shopaholic. I remember once me and my sister had accompanied her in a market called Dakshinapon in Kolkata. We entered the first shop and me and my sister were done with our shopping for the Puja. She liked one dress in that shop and didn’t buy it as she wanted to be sure that the one she chose was actually the best dress in her affordable range in the market (thank god she didnt go for the entire city!). So she kept checking all the dresses in all the shops. Me and my sister were on the verge of falling down with pain in legs and feet and then she went back to the first shop to re-look at the dress that she had liked initially only to find out that it was sold out. So she kept regretting and took another round of the market looking for a similar dress. Finally she didn’t buy anything. This was such a horrific experience for me and my sister that we used to get scared whenever that friend used to ask us to accompany her for shopping. The root cause analysis of the matter tells that this girl didn’t know what she wanted.

I had a similar experience recently. I had gone with a friend of mine (a girl) for shopping. This was the first time I was going with her for shopping. I picked up my stuff and then started looking for her. I found her confused between two three shirts and trousers (she was shopping for her brother) so decided to help her out. There was some offer going on that if you buy two, then get one free. I helped her choosing two shirts and one trouser for her brother. I was happy as it was done and then asked her to go for billing. But she was still looking confused. I asked her ‘what happened?’…she says ‘this brand is not good. Let’s check another brand.’….and went ahead towards another brand outlet. I was shocked! If she didn’t like that particular brand then why did she choose so many clothes from there in the first place? Then she went ahead with another round of selecting dresses from another brand...........Anyway, the root cause analysis of this matter also tells that this girl didn’t know what she wanted.

I think the basic objective of shopping should be ‘buy what you want’…if you know your requirement then it won’t take more than 10 minutes to figure out if the dress you want is there in the shop or not….and if the shop has that dress…it won’t take more than 5 minutes to locate it. Just go systematically. It’s simple. I don’t understand why these girls are so confused!

“Oh! I am so afraid of travelling in planes”

Most of the people who don’t travel by plane, make this excuse. Their excuse goes like: “Plane flies up in the air so I am scared of travelling in planes. If you go by trains, and if the train derails at least you can jump out of the train as it is on the land but how can you jump out from plane?” – I can never understand this logic. People having vertigo, cardiac problem or claustrophobia may prefer to travel in trains. But I don’t understand how can people jump out of the running train and be safe? I find it a big lame excuse.

Another reason that I find probable is that the clean and stylish airports, the process of getting the boarding pass (you have to speak in English!), the process of getting your luggage booked for the plane, climbing by escalators and getting in the right departure gate to get in to the right plane and finally travelling by plane might be a problem for those who prefer to stay in the well of their lives. So what could be the best option to blame it on ‘oh I am afraid of travelling in planes’. So that way they have an excuse to save on some money and avoid walking the swanky airports also. But some people are so stubborn to stand by their ground that they won’t even accept a free plane ticket just to prove that they don’t travel in planes.

If you are finding my second probability irrational or a pigmentation of my mind, then let me share a real life story with you.

My brother is very fond of searching out for good food from various places. It’s the time when he was in college and used to have samosa from a very unclean, dark and dilapidated shop. My brother used to claim that the samosa there was the best in the town. Whenever he used to go there he used to find the shop was crowded and mainly daily laborers, rickshaw pullers and cullies used to come and buy food from there. One day my brother asked the shop owner, “ Why don’t you repair the shop and make it look good? You earn so much daily.” Then the shop owner said, “But then all these people will stop coming here.”

I have also seen people who prefer to go to dark and small stores to buy for grocery shopping and avoid well lit A/C retail showrooms like Reliance Fresh, Fine Mart or Big Bazaar even if they charge the same price for the stuff they are buying. They will always argue that the price is higher there and if they see the price is the same then will say that the quality in these showrooms must be bad because they must be covering the money they spent in A/C, decoration and for the lighting of the showroom by giving low quality products in high price. Just another excuse on the similar lines of ‘oh I am afraid of travelling in planes’.

Delhi Belly

I watched Delhi Belly today with my gang of friends. What a hilarious movie. Thanks to Priya, Namrata and Navneet for making the plan successful.

Please watch the movie with your like minded people...or you might be really embarrassed....

My first day at school

It was my first day at school. It was my twin sister’s first day at school too. We had gone to the school once before when our father took us there for admission and I remember looking at the headmistress from behind the chair where my father was sitting. I remember both my father and the headmistress were trying to drag me out of my hiding but I was not giving in. Though I still remember the fragrance the headmistress was wearing that day, I don’t really remember what my twin sister was doing then.

At that time we were staying in a joint family with two of our uncle’s families. It was our ancestral house built by our grandfather. It was huge house with one huge pond, one cow shed, one mango garden, one vegetable garden and many flower gardens. My mother and her co-sisters used to be busy all day cooking and serving 20 average people on any average day while we kids were blissfully oblivious of their daily struggle and used to play all day in the long stretches of verandas or in the long front and back yards.

Anyway, the day came when we two had to go to school for the firm time. We both were ready in new dresses with new tin-suitcases, new slates, new books, new pencil boxes with new slate-pencils and new chalks. My father had arranged for our old and trusted rickshaw puller to take us to the school. My mother got us to sit in the rickshaw with our tin-suitcases placed in front of us in the rickshaw. Though we had gone to that lane where the school was situated many times with our parents and uncles and aunts, this was the first time we were going alone there (two of us were surely not alone but it was more like being alone :)). So we were excited, nervous, happy to go to school and also sad to be away from our mother for the whole day.

We reached the school. We were supposed to meet the headmistress and she was supposed to take us to our class. I took my tin-suitcase, got down and we two met the headmistress and she asked some teacher to take us to the class which was on the other side of the field. When we were going towards the class, then we realized that my sister had forgotten her tin-suitacse in the rickshaw and immediately she started crying, turned around and started running. I was surprized standing there not knowing what to do at that moment and out of reflex I also started to run after her the next moment with my suitacse in hand while screaming ‘stop stop’ to my sister....and she kept crying and saying ‘I have lost my suitcase and now my parents will scold me’.....and she kept running by the side of the main road and finally stopped after reaching our house.

My mother was surprised to find us at home and started consoling my sister. I don’t remember what happened after that. The next day my father must have gone to the school only to find that the rickshaw puller had deposited my sister’s suitcase with the headmistress and then left. Or might be the rickshaw puller himself told my father about that. Whatever it was, it was my first day at school.

Just like I can’t forget the image of my sister crying and running by the main road and me running behind her, I can’t also forget my amazement of her finding out the road to home from school. She is always good at finding roads. Even now she can find out roads better than me.

Kung Fu Panda 2

Kung Fu Panda 2 is just beyond my explanation. It’s so good..Yes…. it’s even better than the first one….the entire storyline is so good. The first one when ended didn’t leave a cue for a new story like this one has done…..but still the way the story is developed deserves a big salute. The concept of making a peacock the villain and showing him fighting with all his feathers blowing is something I could never imagine. It was dangerously beautiful. I just loved it and felt that it should never end.

The movie is also special to me as it’s the first time I have gone out and had a great time with friends after coming to Bangalore. Thanks to Priya and Gayathri for this.

You give what you have

Paulo Coelho’s ‘Like The Flowing Rivers’ is one of my most favorite books. There was a small story in that book. The story goes like this :

Once upon a time there was a humble man who was roaming from one place to another trying to spread the words of God. But for some reason the people misunderstood him and were insulting and harassing him a lot. One day while he was walking on the street saying God’s words, some people came and hit him with stones and abused him badly. He turned around and said ‘May God bless you’..and kept walking. There was a man who observed this and asked the humble man that why he didn’t scold those people who hurt him but even blessed him! The humble man said ‘They gave me what they have. I gave them what I have’.

This one story is somehow etched in my heart. I always remember this story whenever someone insulting me, abusing me or hurts me. This is what this person is capable of giving to the world. I try to be the humble man. But it’s not easy. I falter and then realize again.

Tees Maar Khan and Farah Khan

I was watching this movie sometime back when it was being telecast by some satellite channel. I know it was a big flop and also what people think about it. But just for time pass I sat to watch it. I thought ‘it has Akshay at least. Won’t be that bad’…But I was wrong. It was not only bad, it was pathetic.

The worst message that I got from the movie was that the director and her husband think that we people are fools. And just because they are movie directors and roam around with biggest film stars of the country and some big production houses are lending them money, they think themselves to very smart people. You can’t call them stupid or idiot. Because at the end when they show the movie that was shot by the hero and his team, the scenes they show are actually taken in the same camera angle how it was shown while being taken in the movie. So, they are not fools, they are very smart people but they think people are fools; the same people for whom they are making the movies.

The movie Tees Maar Khan falls in the genre of ‘satire’. But making a satire doesn’t mean making fun of audience who love to see their original versions and showing the world ‘see, I am so smart’. I remember watching the best satire movie of my lifetime ‘Andaz Apna Apna’, which never made me feel that I am a fool. For that matter the movies like ‘Ajab Prem ki Ghazab Kahani’ and ‘You don’t mess with Zohan’ were also satires and I enjoyed watching them both.

The smart Ms Director Farah Khan comes as a judge of dance reality show now a days. If you watch this show you can discover some more colors of this lady; of course all colors adding up to same slogan: ‘I am the smartest’. There came a simple guy from village whose father is farmer. The fact that this guy can’t dance didn’t really bother our lady, what she was more concerned was how he speaks in English and made fun of him to her heart’s content. On the other hand when one guy came in London audition, who was very smart and good in conversation, Farah Khan gave away the certification to him saying (with a lot of fumbling) that he seemed confident and she didn’t need to see his dance. But the real joke was to see this guy dancing! This guy doesn’t know how to dance at all!

But these unconfident, not-able-to-speak-English and not-so-smart people are at least genuine in what they are doing. They are not faking people. So, if you think them fool, you are only proving how big fool you are; no matter how much you harass them in the reality shows.

Quality is good

If you have a quality…..any quality….quality to sing, dance, paint, write…anything….great! You should be happy that the God has bestowed you with such a quality……practice it, nurture it, show it, flaunt it….even take pride in it……but please don’t make your quality a reason to insult or make fun of others who don’t have this……I have heard people making strongest statements like ‘you don’t even come close to my sister’s toes, you can’t even do what my sister does’….ok, might be your sister has great quality….but believe me…the moment you say so, your sister’s quality comes to zero! Sad….but it’s true. The moment a person insults another person for not having a quality what he/she has, he/she just loses the quality…or comes in the verge of losing that quality….sorry…God is there…

Dead Metalhead

This book landed up in my hands quite accidentally. I happened to know the writer of this suspense novel Bhrigu Chaddha and I bought this book just to encourage him after learning the fact that he has dared to write a novel and published it all by himself!

So, initially I had no expectation from the novel. But I understood that I was wrong the moment I started reading it. The initial reading left me ‘awestruck’! My god, this boy has such a great command over the language and he knows how to explain an emotion! His elaborate description of an incident or a particular time of a day is really impressive.

I found Bhrigu’s writing much better than many new age ‘best seller’ writers of India. This novel offers much more than those conversational-soap-operatic novels that are coming up now with all those Engineer-turned-writers (They think writing to be a joke or what!). I wish this book were published by some famous publishing house, Bhrigu would be a adored name among teenagers by now.

Kudos to you Bhrigu! You rock. Waiting to read more from you.