Weird Movie Week...

The week just past has to be the most entertaining week involving weird movies that PS and I watched. The movies we've watched this week have gone from the comic to the cheap to what-the-hell-were-we-thinking and we're-not-making-enough-money-to-waste-on-this-crap type. But all in all an enjoyable week, though I would have to cringe about telling people about atleast one movie I watched.

Anyway, starting on a high note, midway through the week PS and I suddenly decided to go watch Quick Gun Murugun. This movie is based on a fictional (obviously) vegetarian south Indian dosa eating cowboy called...umm..take a wild guess..no?..ok..Quick Gun Murugun. This character, who needs his one tumbler whisky (ok, can anyone please tell me the correct oxford spelling of this beverage? Whisky or Whiskey?)with one masala dosa while the whole universe resounds with his entry cue:

The earth is my garden,
The sky is my ceiling,
The whole universe is my native,
My name.....is Murugun

It's a pretty funny movie. Quite slapstick, but unapologetic about being one. And the art director must've had a ball while designing the sets and the entire look! Starting from QGM's clothes (emerald green shirt, Orange tight trousers, leapordskin waistcoat, bright pink necherchief, and a cowboy hat...and oh yeah, the waistcoat matching underwear) to the after Yamraj and his weird vehicle to ferry souls to the heavens to the government department-ish heaven itself- all brilliantly thought of.

Of course you don't go into such a movie expecting a great plot but this plot of preventing the arch villain Rice Plate Reddy from converting all vegetarians to non-vegetarians and hence taking over the world was just cheeky enough to bring a smile..or a chuckle. Add in a lot of hilarious dialogues in tamil accent, a bewitching seductress called Mango Dolly and QMG's Rajnikant-esque moves, and a perfect recipe for a laugh riot that stays with you only till the movie ends. The length of the movie is also just right and it ends before the gags start getting jarring

A good solid one time watch.


The second movie we saw was a bit of a disaster. Hell, it was the Titanic and the tsunami put together (purely as a scale of the disaster)! So this Friday PS and I were at home and suddenly decided to go to a movie without really caring which one it was. Now PS has had a bit of a soft corner for Sagarika Ghatge since she portrayed the role of Preeti Sabharwal in Chak de. Thus, I blame him entirely for our decision to finally watch FOX. This has to be one of the worst movies i've ever seen. And, that, is saying a lot! Terrible plot and insipid execution. And even worse, exactly three scenes with Sagarika having anything to do. Absolute failure on all fronts. Oh, I'll let you in on the main plot twist - I mean it's not like you're going to watch the movie anyway - Sunny Deol is the villain. Ho hum...

NOT a watch, infact if you hate someone dearly and want him to reach a stage of dementia, just lock him/her in a theatre playing this movie and let him watch the movie thrice. Be very cautious, anything more than 3 and the person may suffer permanent irreversible brain damage.


And the third one was the hindi remake of Death at a Funeral called Daddy Cool. It's a passable comedy but things just get in bad taste once in a while. It's basically about a guy coming and blackmailing a family about his relationship with the dad whose funeral has got all of them together. After that it's one slapstick gag after another.Funny only very very rarely and that too if you really force yourself to laugh.

Can watch once, free, on tv or...umm you get my drift, right?

So it's been a while since I saw three movies in a week. And this weird combination of movies? Never before!

Swap Singapore Stories,can? Part 1

It's been my desire for long to go to a foreign trip just for a vacation for a long time now. Now I am told that I visited Nepal when I was one or two years old, but somehow I don't think it counts. Firstly, anyplace you don't need a visa to go to just doesn't feel 'foreign' enough. And secondly, well come on, it's Nepal - when I was an infant.

Now I've been to cities outside India for work (yes, cities - plural. I still maintain that having a 4 hour stopover on my way to Toronto at Heathrow means that I've been to London...hmmpff)but to just go for a vacation after putting a I'm-not-reachable-while-you-losers-are-spending-your-life-cooped-up-in-cubicles-ha! out of office reply on my office email and not care about anything with only fun in mind...ah amazing.

Thus it so transpired that after several false starts and monumental documentation problems I finally managed to go to Singapore to visit SP and AD there. And what amazing hosts they were! (more about this later)

So writing in true blue travelogue fashion (and also the tendency of commoners to want to know EVERYTHING about celebrities) I shall give you a blow by blow, minute by minute account of the entire trip.

I took the evening flight out from Bangalore on the 26th (incidentally, my birthday) and landed in Singapore in the wee hours of the morning of the 27th. SP had asked me to call him when I land, however there was a small problem. The banks of payphones were inside the terminal while the shops from which I could've got change to actually dial the phone were outside. So I decided to venture out myself and get a cab. SP had also mentioned that the cabbies were the most interesting people there (and of course I knew this due to my extensive international exposure - read 4 days in Toronto..umm..3 years back) and I should try to talk to them. After the Mercedes cab that I wanted was narrowly missed by me, I sat in my cab and thought of starting some conversation. Apparently 6 am in the morning is not a very good time to strike up a conversation. I might well have been speaking to a solid wall for all the response I got from him.

But anyway, he got me to SP and AD's place intact. There was a small jam on the way

(Seriously? A jam caused by one car breaking down and sitting in half a lane. We would've just whizzed past it and not even noticed out here, but I guess that's what they mean by cultural differences. We sat for 15 minutes in the jam and by the end of it I knew each and everything written on the rear of the car ahead. Seriously, what use is a Masseratti or a Ferrari or a Lamborghini if you have to drive in straight lanes, stuck behind a station wagon?)but we still made good time.

SP and AD's Apartment:
What an amazing place! It's a duplex condo and the place is just brilliant. It has a beautiful balcony looking down on the club area. It's the kind of balcony where you can spend days curled up and just staring out. And I think we spent a lot of time doing just that :)

After meeting SP after I don't even remember how long, we had an important breakfast meeting with Mr. J. Daniels. After the meeting got..umm.. extended a bit we went down to the tennis courts for my first international match. SP is quite good, I think a better player than I am, but somehow I managed to match him. Good game, but was curtailed by a sudden shower.

Adjourning the match we hung out with Carl S. Berg for a bit before a lavish home cooked breakfast at, where else, the balcony. Tiredness did hit me a while later, afterall all I'd been doing for 10 days in Delhi was eat-sleep-eat-sleep, and I crashed for a couple of hours, or, you know, four.

SP had taken the day off and we went to NUS and picked up AD as she got off work. Then we walked around the entire place. Had a good dinner and then did the dreaded and necessary expedition to Mustafa mall. It's huge, but really, not being too 'shoppy' a person I wasn't too impressed. I had to buy a watch though and I managed to pick up a really good looking one. So my old watch is finally relegated to second position after four years of exemplary service. We met a friend of SPAD in Mustafa and went to his place for a while. A true blue Punjabi munda, his conversation was hilarious and we really had a good time there.

The next day we got up late and had a very elaborate day ahead. AD had to work again while SP had a half day so we took the bus to this station called, wait for it, Dhoby Ghaut. I was so kicked with the name (Dhobi Ghat is the place where washermen wash clothes on the sides of rivers in India). I was chuckling every time I saw that name. (chuckle)

SP had to go to office so I walked around the place. The central business district is quite compact and the maps seem deceptive. It's very easy to walk around the entire place in a couple of hours. The small Merlion(s), the riverfront (really really liked this), parliament house, supreme court (looks like a small office), Boat quay, Funan centre, the Asian civilization museum, the esplanade. Very nice and pretty. I especially loved the riverfront opposite Boat quay and spent a lot of time there.

The evening was brilliant. SP n AD, the great hosts that they were, took me to this place called the "The New Asia Bar", on the 71st and 72nd floor of Singapore's tallest building, the Swissôtel Stamford! That's the highest I've ever been without flying and the view from there, ah, marvelous. From one side you could see the rising modern buildings all the way to parts of Malaysia. From the other side you could see the ports with scores of ships with their lights twinkling moored beyond the coastline with the sun setting in the background. Breathtaking views. I think that view in itself was worth going all the way to Singapore!

To make this even better, we had dinner at a place called Chjymes which was a totally new experience. But the night was still young!

(it's just sad that most Indian cities, except Mumbai, have deadlines for nightlife.One feels really bad to see that people just start warming up for the night in other countries by the time we are usually back at home. It's also my theory that if there were no deadlines there would be less drunken driving and more responsible drinking. With no clock ticking down people would get a chance to relax with their drinks rather than racing to drink. Basically quality over quantity.)

We next went to what is the clubbing district and most happening place in Singapore - Clarke Quay. Spread along the river front this has hordes of clubs and food stalls and what nots!

We went to this place called Yellow Jello where a band was belting out Happy songs, quite appropriate to what we were feeling! Had a good time there and met another friend from India there. Then after some time we moved to the Cafe Iguana for some strong mexican margheritas, yumm :)

The day ended, as all my days there, in the wee hours of the morning.

And look, I've just covered two days. I guess this post will have to spillover to a sequel.

Can write post again? Can also can, cannot also can :) (shall be explained later)

L'il Jassy wrote a BAD book...

Jaswant Singh http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaswant_Singh, a senior political leader in BJP http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BJP has recently been expelled from the party for writing a book, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jinnah:_India-Partition-Independence: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/news/india/BJP-expels-Jaswant-Singh-over-Jinnah-remarks/articleshow/4910077.cms


This incident sends out some really scary signals. It is one of the most direct contradiction of the freedom of expression, the cornerstone of democracy. It is a well known fact that only the victor writes the history of war. It is thus easy to just take one point of view and stick with it. But the really mature society would be one in which people can calmly go through all evidence and make their own opinions about any incident. But more important, in my opinion, is to have the freedom to agree to disagree maturely and peacefully. Every person brings a different perspective to the same set of evidence and hence sees things in a different way. It is thus impossible to expect people to come to the same conclusion - but if people can hold on to their opinions and conclusions without fear of retribution or without trying to force them upon others, only then can the society be considered to be truly democratically mature.

Of course I'm aware that this is too idealistic a view. Hot heads will always exist. People who scream without understanding will always exist. People with my way or the highway will also always exist.

But removing a senior leader from the party gives out very strong anti-dissent messages. Or more tragically, more anti-independent thinking messages. You should not have any other interests, opinions, thoughts, arguments apart from the one that is the 'party diktat'

It reminds me of the dystopian society that George Orwell wrote in his book 1984 which I'm re-reading currently. It essentially talks about a totalitarian society where dissent is permanently obliterated through the means of fear and suspicion. But very critically the dictatorial regime also focused on 'Thoughtcrime' and one of the ways of removing that was putting together a new language, Newspeak, which would, in it's ultimate form prevent dissent as the language would be such that people would not be able to understand there own dissent as there just wouldn't be words to describe them. Newspeak would narrow the range of thoughts possible where describing concepts like freedom, independent thought, opinions would just not be possible. As a character in the book says: " The revolution will be complete when the language is perfect"

The current expulsion reeks of dark times in the party. If independent thought needs to be curbed then there is definitely something wrong and some serious thinking needs to be done.

An Ode to Apps...

Anyone who knows me and has had the pleasure of being driven somewhere by me would know that I'm directionally challenged. I keep cracking this joke that if Delhi was not a circle I'd never reach any place. People politely chuckle on this without actually realizing it's ABSOLUTELY true! The number of times i've taken the wrong turn and ended up swirling around the city looking for any familiar building, tree or shop that could give me some bearing is extremely high.

Delhi, with it's circles, and Bangalore, with it's multiple one ways, conspire together to give me that sinking feeling - " Jeez, I have no clue where I am...again"

And this doesn't happen only when i'm going to a new place. Oh no, that would be too regular. I manage to lose my way even if I am going to the same place almost everyday. B's place in Dwarka is a prime example. I've been there so many times but am still not sure what turn I have to take to reach the house. (In my defense, Dwarka has very similar looking roads and similar buildings.)

But this post is not about one of my numerous flaws. This one is about the Google maps application I have on my phone now. SO useful!

As usual I was lost day before yesterday while going to B's place (ho hum, yawn, tell us something new) and I was at a redlight with two options - left or right (hehe). My instinct and directionsense was urging me vociferously to turn to the right. I was about to follow my instincts, I mean if a guy can't trust his instincts what else can he trust. Then I stopped - (wry grin) really Swapnil? Your instincts have always led to humungous amounts of petrol being burnt up while backtracking or looking for roundabout ways of reaching the destination after taking the wrong turn.

Fortunately I had my phone Google maps on. One look at it's screen showing my current location and I realised I was right. My instinct to distrust my directional instinct was absolutely right. I had to go left.

Google maps ki jai!

Case 2:
I was going to a travel agency to get my visa done (yes, i'm finally going to Singapore on a vacation!). By the way it is unbelievably humid and hot in Delhi. I think living in Bangalore has really spoilt me. The weather here is really getting to me. I just can't seem to get out of the house unless i absolutely have to. There's a friend who's about to return to the US but I haven't been able to put in the effort to drive to Gurgaon to meet her. Crazy.

Anyway I was at the heart of the Delhi circles, Connaught Place trying to find that office. But after 15 minutes of walking around the central park, drinking milkshake at Keventers, lying down prone on the road in the heat and checking out pretty faces I was still as far away from finding that address as when I started. I whipped out my phone and fired up the Google maps app. Lo and behold, it showed where the office was located and also gave an option of dialling them for me. What else did I want? I spoke to them, let them guide me to the office and get my work done.

Really, if you're directionally challenged, if the homing device in your brain didn't really get a chance of developing - THIS is the app for you!

Google maps ki jai!

Relive the Charm...

This thought struck me on my flight to Delhi.

(Yes, ladies and gentlemen (umm particularly Delhi ladies)I am on an extended vacation in Delhi and surrounding areas.)

I still remember the first time I flew in a plane. It was, I think 2002 or 2003, and we were embarking on my legen..wait for it..dary Goa trip with my parents and granny.

pause
.
.
Are we all done with the sniggers and lame wisecracks?
not yet?

ok
.
.
Now?

Good. So the crux is that I was so excited about it. As the engines revved up my heart started beating faster and as the pilot let out the brakes I could feel the power pulsing through me as the plane started lethargically and then accelerated superlatively. I still remember the excitement tinged with a bit of fear as the plane took off at a steep angle and rose unfettered into the clouds above Delhi.

And then the plane banked to the right.

I could feel my heart pumping hard in my mouth as I sent up a prayer to God. But the plane was merely turning towards Goa.

And then being surrounded by the wispy cottonwool clouds turning slowly into thicker banks of clouds through which we pierced and looked on the sun shining benignly on the layers of clouds...

sigh...beautiful

And since that day I've taken a lot of flights. In between I was flying almost every 2-3 weeks for a few months. Very soon I saw myself reading the boring inflight magazine or a book I was carrying instead of looking out the window. Beautiful sunsets across waves of clouds were casually ignored while the urge to get out of the aircraft as soon as it landed started getting a grip.

The charm was driven out of flying by increased frequency.

But this time I was flying after a while (well there was one flight, but I had too much on my mind - anticipation, nervousness, stupidity etc. which prevented enjoyment of the flight.). So I relived the charm of flying again, complete with the buildup on the tarmac, the beautiful takeoff, flying through the clouds and finally looking down at Delhi at night (a smattering of bright jewels laid out in circles in the inky darkness). Brilliant.

I wish all the other charms also come alive - looking across the sea for the first time, the clear stars that you see on the hills at night, the first time you drive....