What you want Tuesday, October 8, 2013

There is a very fair possibility that everyone has atleast a faint idea of what they want to be in life and what they don't want to be. Now based on the fact that you must have done somethings right and somethings wrong till now in your life, there is a good chance that you are somewhere between what you want to be and what you dont want to be. Of course the side to which you are closer to depends a lot upon the number of things that you've done right or wrong. Now do not confuse these right and wrong things with the morally right and wrong things. In this context the right things are the ones which take you closer to what you want to be and the wrong things take you to the other end. Ofcourse morals are important, and in most cases that's where life gets complex. But that's always a controversial discussion. So  avoiding that, the key may be is take a to moment before everything that you are doing, and ponder over the question - Which end will that thing that you are about to do will take you closer to.

Big Hard Sun Friday, April 5, 2013

After a 20 km ride from my home, probably the longest I covered on a bike yet, I stepped into my college for the final last time. There have been so many last days of my college life, the scribbling day, the last exam, the get together for returning books to library, each time I heard people cribbing about that being the last day of college. But I never felt anything like 'm leaving something behind or 'm gonna miss this place like they talk about in songs. Its not like I haven't had my share of good times in college, but I don't know why m not able to relate those times with my college. So on any of those "last" days it didn't feel like 'm going to loose my friends, but then no one else was going to loose their friends. So why were they all talking like it was a big deal that college is ending.

Anyway, here I was, knowing that I won't be entering into this college again in my life, 'coz there is nothing I owe to this place anymore, and i have it in writing, literally. And I was here to claim the last thing the college owes to me (the security cheque). I thought that at least this time I'd get that feel. I walked to the accounts section. And asked for the cheque with all the cool attitude i could gather up. While the accounts lady was arranging documents to be signed i took a look around the empty campus. Things were pretty strict in our college for students to bunk classes and roam around in campus, and i heard it has gotten worse in these 2 years. There were only two girls walking past the Engineering building to Law block. I recognized one of them from facebook, Ritika, she had made some confession on our college's confession pages (there are a lot of these on facebook right now, for every college, with anonymous confessions. So how did i know that this confession was made by her? Here's how: Girls are dumb, she made a typo in the confession post and tried to correct that typo in the comment). The lady handed me the documents, I signed them, took my cheque and out of the main gate.

I still wasn't getting any nostalgic feel or what-so-ever, and I don't even know why I felt like I should get some feeling. May be 'coz I wanted a proper closure to the four years i spent at this place. so I took a pic of the main gate 'coz I felt like I should write a post. So here it is. I walked to the bike stand, which is literally at the other end of the college from the Gate they allow people to go in or come out from. In may be a last attempt to impose that feeling on to myself, I plugged in earphones as I started the bike and Eddie Vedder started yelling Hard Sun in my ears. I thought of having a one last look at the main gate as I pass by, but a truck started honking in front me and reminded me that 'm on Sohna road, the road that takes accidents for daily meals, on a bike at least 6 times heavier than me , and also m not that confident as a rider so I figured I'd better stick my eyes to the road.

♪ Once I built an ivory tower 

So I could worship from above 

And when I climbed down to be set free 

She took me in again ♬

Amar Akbar Anthony Friday, January 25, 2013

Amar Akbar Anthony was a hit. It needs no introduction (if you were born in India, say around 70s-90s). The title song of the movie goes something like this "Honi ko anhoni kar de anhoni ko honi". Now if you observe closely, the word anhoni is very similar to Anthony. Now I know it was just a song and the similarity of the two words could have been just coincidental, or the it was only used for the making the song more musical, but some how I feel there must be more to it than just for lyrical purposes. May be it was that Amitabh Bachchan's character Anthony, was supposed to be unlucky or his birth was unfortunate in the movie. Was this the reason that the character was named something that souded so much similar to anhoni. Or may be there was a whole different angle that the writer and lyricist wanted to portray. And if you are still reading this I applaud you for your vella-pan, you have reached my level of vella-pan, or even higher. Congrats :P.

Tab zindagi shuru hoti hai Friday, January 4, 2013

Jab nange badan pe besharmi laadey hue chalte hain
Jab apne armano ki akhon mein aakhein daale milte hain
Or sharm kisi or ke bistar pe so rahi hoti hai
Tab zindagi shuru hoti hai

Jab tapti dhoop mein nange paon nikalte hain
Jab har thokar par gir kar taesue bhi jalte hain
Or chhiley hue ghutne dekh ke hasi chhoot jaati hai
Tab zindagi shuru hoti hai

Travelling Friday, December 28, 2012

Travelling, anything more than or around an hour, always gives you enough time to wonder about mysteries of life, reminds you of things you have long forgotten. With almost nothing to do and just sit and wait for your destination to arrive, your mind id the only thing you can run freely. People tend to bring novels, listen to music, watch movies, or even do something constructive for a long journey to pass their time. I've tried them all, watching a movie actually works the best for me. But i really like to let my mind run free. I know it can also run free on a sunday or any other holiday, but a static non changing environment around just doesn't work. While travelling everything is changing, at least outside the window. I don't know how but it helps me let go of my mind. It's like it starts talking to me, about past, about friends, about just stuff. It starts to pour explanations in front of me that i'd have never thought of otherwise. The only problem is it never finishes it's stories. It always leaves to some other plot in between leaving me wondering about how it would have ended. But i like each and every one of those incomplete stories it tells me (much like Pheobe from FRIENDS once said about her novels "being the only one who has read them, i can say they have been received quite well").

Hope Thursday, December 13, 2012

So I am in the roadways bus, going back to Jaipur from home. Random thoughts all over my head. And I start to think about a dream i once had of achieving something. That something being something that I’d have died to get at that time. But now if I get that even for no cost, i don’t think it will be same, I don’t get those butterflies in my stomach thinking about what if I actually had that. So what happened in between. Did I find something better than that? I don’t think so Did that something lose it’s lustre? Naah that’s not possible. Did i loose the desire for that something? Naah, even that’s not true. I think I dreamed of that something for so long that it actually became just a dream. I didn't do anything about it, so the belief that i could actually achieve that slowly faded away. With the dying probability my excitement also died. May be it’s just like when we get all hyper excited listening to concept of Santa Claus when you are a kid and wish u’d get free gifts. But what happens when you grow up? Would you not like some fat guy from north pole to drop you something you desired for since a long time, that too for free? Yes, you would. But you don’t get excited on the concept of Santa Claus, because you know that is not gonna happen. May be to get anything we need to make ourselves believe that it can happen. Because it’s only then we can imagine how happy we’ll be when it happens. It’s only then we feel a small part of that adrenaline rush we’ll be getting when it’s really happening. That small part of excitement of it actually happening is I guess a big driving force for us to do what we are supposed to do to make it happen. And at the end may be its all about keeping that hope inside us alive that it can really happen, that we can make it real. Taaliyan!!!

Showdown

I think it all started with Slumdog Millionaire, a hollywood movie adapting typical bollywood masala theme. I mean Hollywood is without a doubt superior to bollywood in almost all respects, then why would it make a movie using an age old masala-formula, which even people in bollywood have started to leave. May be it was an attempt to make a parody on bollywood style cinema, or may be the director seriously liked that genre. Whatever may be the reason, but it started with Slumdog Millionaire. And then I think it was Ghajini, a movie made in home production of a bollywood A-lister, and a complete ripoff from a tollywood movie (which itself was parody of an awesome hollywood flick Momento). I mean what was Amir Khan thinking. All the reasons why any one would hate a tollywood movie were carefully included in every part of Ghajini. A stupid love story that can never happen (now I know that bollywood love stories are no When Harry Met Sally, but atleast they don’t have a heroine who literally proves she’s dumb than a dolphin and a hero who falls for that), all action scene fast forwarded so that it seems that hero is actually fast, a unbeatable hero (Amir Khan sure made an credible effort to make that look realistic, but seriously there is something called fight direction that can be used too you know), and the villains so dumb that they could never think of any possible way to kill a person with no arms (guns!). So there it was, Ghajini, a movie certainly of below standard than currently existing quality of cinema in bollywood. Of course it was a hit, it was an Amir Khan movie, how could it not be, and no one dared bad mouth about the movie. Following Ghajini were a series of tollywood movie remakes (Wanted, Ready, Bodyguard, Singham), and a couple of normal scripts tollywoodified (Dabbang, Once Upon A Time In Mumbai). It was a nightmare seeing bollywood turning into ugly twin of tollywood. I mean there were of course good movies which come and hit you now and then (Wednesday, Oye Lucky Lucky Oye, Gangs Of Wassypur), but these movies often get categorized into non-mainstream cinema. The main stream cinema was surely witnessing a crisis of style and scripts. And then came Talash. The trendsetter of bollywood is here with another trend. He made a movie with a theme that was once used in horror tv show on Door Darshan (remember Aap Beeti?). I mean there were better episodes on Aahat than the movie, for atleast they made people wet themseleves in pants. I don’t know what will happen if the coming movies start to copy who's who of awfull tv shows. Frankly I’m too terified even to imagine. Does it gets worse than this? What’s next? Picking up stories from Mastram's novels (all due respect to that awesome novelist)?