Movieees!

Snatch
Super! Guy Ritchie, Britans answer to Quentin Tarantino does live up to his reputation here

Death at a Funeral
A typical Brit comedy, dark and at times gross.
A good weekend watch though.

Superbad
Err had heard a lot about this movie, the screenplay at times had me in splits, but other than that, not much really.

Grandma’s Boy
I was pleasantly surprised with this comedy, about a 30 something video game tester who is forced to live with his Grandma. Yes it is a Stoner movie, yes it has some toilet humour, but its wackiness got me.

Summer of 42’
Hmm, a movie about coming of age, decent enough.

Good Luck Chuck!
WTF!

Hitman
If you want action, here is some. But it follows all the paths already taken and the plot is nothing great.

City of GOD
Fantastic! Must Watch!

When in Mangalore...

May saw us in Mangalore !

There was a wedding to attend and of course the added benefits of having wonderful beaches around :)

The wedding I shall deal with in the learnings section of this post, but first here is a glimpse of Kaup beach (for reasons as yet unknown, Kaup is pronounced Kapu :|)








Learnings from the trip/attending a Mangalorean christian wedding

Learning #1: When given a glass of wine, do NOT drink it up immediately !, wait till you see at the very least 200 other people drink. Lest you down your glass of wine and then realise you were supposed to hold on to it for 30 minutes and wait for the bride and the groom to sip their wine first.



Learning #2: When some one over the microphone asks the crowd to stand up and bless the couple, do NOT stand up and raise your right hand in Heil Hitler style just because everyone around you is doing the same. Lest you realize that everyone around you is at least 40 years old and you need to -at the very minimum - be elder to the couple in order to bless them.

Affecting an Accent

Whats with trying on a Firangi accent? How many times have you seen an American try and talk in an Indian accent to either be 'helpful' or to show-off?
Well I for one, have never seen that happen. I know a couple of firangi acquaintances try and learn Hindi, and learn to speak it quite well!

But I find so many people around me, producing different accents for different occasions/contexts.
A firangi asks you a questions and out comes the accent.

"Yeaaah, I mind ahhctuaaly"

Arre! subah mere saath baat ho rahi thi to "Ahhctuaaly" ko aap "Actually" keh rahe thhe.


Personally, I think nothing sounds as stupid as an artificial accent.
I am not buying it if you tell me your 3 month, 2 year, stint in America/UK naturally got you an accent that keeps changing
(I doubt if a 3 month stay in Bangladesh will give a Bangla tinge to your accent. Selective absorption of accent then?)

Hey! be comfy the way you are, if nothing else, at least you will save me the effort of cringing in disgust!

Back from a wonderful vacation !

Yes, Hampi again :)

Random Ramblings

Ah, the pleasure of winning a game of scrabble after trailing at one point 36 to 127 is unparalleled. :D

Unparalleled is the irritation one feels when after two weeks of contemplation one, suddenly at the last moment realises, hey "Actually we should postpone it, a couple of these guys cannot make it" :|

Also unparalleled one feels is Blogger.com's audacity to delete a 4 year old blog, and then not respond when questioned! its true it happened to a friend! unnerving!

The joy of designing your own personalised T-shirt and gifting it to a friend is unparalleled as well :D

Movieeees

Manorama 6 feet under
What-e-beauty of a movie, simply loved it! A wonderful effort at making an Indian Film Noir movie, excellent!
Most people I spoke to did not seem to like it, but oh well, Sometimes the majority only means... :P

Alexander
Puke! Colin Farrell stumbled through the movie looking like he suffered from an irritable bowel syndrome.

No Country for old men
Watch it for Javier Barden, never before have I seen a more disturbing villain in any form of cinema. Excellent performance!
Also, the Cohen brothers have their own style of directing. The most unexpected things happen at the least expected times. This is one thriller you do not want to miss.

Monty Python- Life of Brian
Is this the same group that conceived the brilliant "Fish Called Wanda" ? surprising, the much acclaimed Monty Python falls flat.
Only one scene evoked laughter, the one where Caesar stumbles through his pronunciation evoking uncontrolled snigger from his centurions.
and only one scene made me go wooow
The scene where the entire group is crucified and Eric Idle (one of the members being crucified), begins singing "Look at the bright side of life" as the credits start rolling.

Else I do not understand what the big deal (Biggus Dealus? :P ) is about Monty Python.

Good Fellas
Decent gangster movie, but tends to get boring. IMDB rates it as #15 of all time great movies. I disagree. The Untouchables is easily a better movie in the Genre. Watch it for Joe Pesci's portrayal of a mobster.

Wonderland
A biopic about the Wonderland Murders, bad movie!

Pink Panther
Steve Martin's Inspector Closeau tries hard, and fails to live up to Peter Sellers' Inspector Closeau

Judging a book by its fly-leaf

Today I took out a book (Calvin and Hobbes), that someone happened to gift me (reasons unknown). To my horror and disgust I realised that there exist people who gift books for the sake of gifting them, I would understand a gift given as a formality, but to gift a book and not bother to jot down a couple of words on the fly-leaf is outrageous !
Why would this person (whom I hold [held?] in high regard) do such a thing?
I wonder. For once this lifetime, I just don't feel like reading the book :)

Thanks, but no thanks!

On the brighter side of things, I did get another book (Dilbert, this time) that has a fly-leaf covered with the funniest of comments, making the gift immediately a personalised one !
also got the most beautiful set of PG Wodehouse!

Thank ye for your thoughtfulness

Hampi

Easily the best place I have been to in recent times, Hampi in its golden age was a rich and bustling city by the banks of the river Tungabhadra, the capital of the prosperous Vijayanagar Empire.

What makes Hampi special today is the fact that, it transports you back to the age of its glory instantly.

All the streets are 'intact', all the temples are 'intact' (of course the Deccan Sultans destroyed the idols and lots of the architecture), its as if only the people have moved on, leaving behind the empty shell of a once thriving city.

Hampi is poetry in stone, a must visit place.
Also visit a restaurant called the 'Mango Tree'.

Take a look at the pictures and learn of things you can do in Hampi:


Hire a two wheeler - the best way to visit most places spread across a 10 sq km area


Enjoy the lovely architecture


Stroll through the well maintained gardens of the Palace


Trek up hillocks


Take a coracle ride on the river Tungabhadra


Take a nap!


Lie down on the rocks surrounded by beautiful structures, waiting for ...


a beautiful sunset!


Have a blast!

Open Sesame

I wish it were just those two magical words that would open the doors, but its a bigger number of magical words one needs to remember today.

Here is a list of places I need to remember (complex) passwords for! The list is too long for my liking

My laptop
My Desktop - home
Lotus Notes -my office email client
Yahoo Mail/Yahoo Messenger - My personal Mailbox
Google - Blog, Youtube, Gmail, Gtalk
My Desktop on the client site
IMDB
My Bank
My ATM pin
Stickcricket.com
Facebook
Deviantart.com - my favorite site for stock photos
My RSA pin to remote access office network
and ofcourse
The passwords for the Application that we are currently building

Whew! Ali Baba had it easy!

Taare Zameen Pe

I liked the movie! but ironic how, Aamir Khan's character has this dialogue that (rightly!) admonishes the parents for trying to make children part of a rat race to nowhere and how senseless competition can break a child.

And then, the kid after the movie on being nominated in the best child artiste category, proclaims that he deserved the nomination for Best Hero or something along those lines since he was the crux of the movie!

Sadness.

Well having said that, the movie was very well made and the only thing that kept going through my mind as I watched it was, relief for having parents that never asked me to or forced me to study! :D

They always let me do my own thing, trusting me that I knew best!

I do know of people who have frittered away their childhood in the mechanised rat race that is Bombay, studying to achieve those 90's and 100's, today as I see them, I wonder what they have attained that is so different from me, all I see is childhoods lost in back to back tuitions and the like.

NICE road

Last weekend saw u on the NICE road :)
Here is a view of the BMIC corridor that will connect Bangalore and Mysore.


picture taken by Raj

Movies

Big Fish
Fantastic Movie ! A must watch for all you lovers of 'Forrest Gump', if you have never heard of it, well what can I do?

A Fish called Wanda
Aha! the best comedy I have seen in recent times, the Monty Python gang gets together to create a sublime comedy that scores every ball!

Before Sunrise
Decent movie, but if people tell you it is the best etc, watch it unbiased before you decide whether it deserves to be so highly rated.
Bad dialogues and artificial Conversation ruin some good acting and a very impressive concept. Having been in a situation where these characters find themselves, I know that one does not talk such bullsh*t such as the characters are made to talk through 95% of the movie, trying so hard to sound intellectual, GOD it hurts.
The movie does have some high points
- The 'telephone' conversation
- The poet by the river, who writes poetry for money
being the ones that come to mind

8mm
ummm a wee bit disturbing, but an edge of the seat thriller. I like it!

Transformers
Brilliant! I have never been a fan of the animated series, but watching this movie had the same effect like watching the dinos in Jurrasic park for the first time. Fabulous FX

Crank
Jason Statham, well out and out action movie, but does have a decent plot. decent!

Bourne Ultimatum
Yes sir! it lives upto all the build up :) move over James Bond, Jason Bourne is here!

The year that was...

I had a wonderful year, this blog has kept track of most of the travel - Mahabalipuram, Vellore, Kerala, USA, Bermuda, Hampi

There were loads of other things, that the blog has subtly referred to, but not stated :) all in all a great year!

Signing off on an extremely eventful year, a year that changed things upside down, or like a friend puts it, downside up.
A year filled with travel, surprises, pranks, joy, happiness and laughter :)

Here is to loads of such years to follow!

New Mouthpiece

I exchanged my sturdy 3 year old Nokia 6600




for a brand new



Nokia 5610 Express Music Edition phone.

Nokia rocks! the usability aspect and just the general sturdiness of the phones are wonderful, I thought parting with my 6600 would be painful, but the transition has been made delightful by the superb performance of the 5610.

Way to go Nokia!


Big GRIN !

Oh Carols...I am but a foool!

With Christmas round the corner, my music tends towards carol singing!
Practice has just begun and is going just super, here is a video a friend pointed me to

It is the 12 days of Christmas performed by Boymongoose and the Indian Band



Extremely hilarious and one of the funniest watches till date!

Click on the picture to watch it now !

Mahabalipuram Reloaded

Well, visited this place in March, and back again with a different group in December :)
Here be the pictures...


Calmness


Trinket shopping


Carvings, a beautiful Ganpati


The largest captive crocodile in India, 17 feet long!!




Monkeying around


Sunset, Shore Temple, Mahabalipuram

Songs in the cranium

Tum se hi - Mohit Chauhan (Jab We Met)
Aaoge Jab Tum - Ustad Rashid Khan (Jab We Met)
Duur Chala Aya - Silk Route
Jadu Tona - Silk Route
Yeh Nigahein - Khoya Khoya Chand

Phew! quite a few :)

What the signs say...

Yes, it has been long since I have put up a sign story post, here is one I found in Bermuda

Found in a bar...

Om!

The weekend saw us at the lovely Om beach :)

A 12 hour bus ride from Bangalore turned out to be a 15 hour ride, with the bus breaking down and we having to change buses to reach the temple town of Gokarna (in coastal Karnataka). An 8 kilometre auto ride from Gokarna saw us at Om beach.
The coast contains quite a few beaches (Kudle, Om, Paradise, Half Moon and Long beach) and is lined with shacks.
We stayed at one such shack right by the beautiful beach, the evening was wonderful and a couple of mats, candles, and a clear starry night above made the night absolutely sublime.
We hired boats to get to the other beaches for breakfasts, lunches and dinners. All in all a wonderful weekend getaway :)

here are some pictures (I am partial to sunset pictures as you may notice)

Thoughts...

Above the tumult and the strife,
I hear the music ringing;
It sounds an echo in my soul
How can I keep from singing?

- Pete Seeger