Quick update. I've been off blog here for a while, corresponding closely to the time I've been single again. Truth be told, I've just been drowning in work, mostly.
I came across this very interesting read, as usual on the internet, there was a link to it from a page I was reading. This is Aadisht Khanna linking mythology and current affairs, through a web of love, sex, war & big business.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Monday, November 2, 2009
Are Tamil movies getting better, or worse!?
I watched "Unnai Pol Oruvan" last night. Thanks to my brother Kapil for the links. I was expecting a lot considering it was a Kamal movie. Unfortunately I wasn't too impressed with the movie. I wish they would stop making all these message movies. But if you absolutely have to make a message movie, at least make a movie with a decent decent script that incidentally has a message. When you set out to make a movie with a message, but it also has to be commercially successful, you're starting off with a handicap. You contrive ridiculous scenes where actors spout off lines that when you consider the urgency of the situation in the movie are downright ridiculous. The script had such glaring holes, that you could drive a 18-wheeler through them.
Here's a sampling. You have a guy that calls you with a threat, and instead of taking it seriously, you lecture him, on the morals of what he is doing. Yeah, I'd like to see that from the police. Oh, and you periodically go off, "Are you serious!?", "Is this true!?". Juvenile writing. And then you have a scene in the end where the protagonist just gets off saying easily, there weren't any bombs planted in the first place. Why then go to the trouble of the establishing scenes earlier in the movie, like in the bus, train, mall, etc.
This movie had a lot of potential, no seriously. Possibly along the lines of "Kaakka Kaakka". However, it was so badly directed, badly acted, badly wrote that it was mildly funny. The one redeeming factor was the absence of the usual ridiculous song-and-dance sequences. But it still would easily be one of the worst Kamal movies.
It was the first Tamil movie I've seen in a while though. So it was good to watch for that reason. However, it begs the thought, if a Kamal movie is this bad, how bad have other Tamil movies got!?
Just thought I'd share my 2 cents on the subject. What do you guys think!?
Here's a sampling. You have a guy that calls you with a threat, and instead of taking it seriously, you lecture him, on the morals of what he is doing. Yeah, I'd like to see that from the police. Oh, and you periodically go off, "Are you serious!?", "Is this true!?". Juvenile writing. And then you have a scene in the end where the protagonist just gets off saying easily, there weren't any bombs planted in the first place. Why then go to the trouble of the establishing scenes earlier in the movie, like in the bus, train, mall, etc.
This movie had a lot of potential, no seriously. Possibly along the lines of "Kaakka Kaakka". However, it was so badly directed, badly acted, badly wrote that it was mildly funny. The one redeeming factor was the absence of the usual ridiculous song-and-dance sequences. But it still would easily be one of the worst Kamal movies.
It was the first Tamil movie I've seen in a while though. So it was good to watch for that reason. However, it begs the thought, if a Kamal movie is this bad, how bad have other Tamil movies got!?
Just thought I'd share my 2 cents on the subject. What do you guys think!?
Friday, October 30, 2009
Cricket and Benny Lava!
A lot of my friends here in America love to bait me because being Indian, I'm so passionate about cricket. I explain to them, you guys think people are nuts for football here in the south, that's nothing. Cricket is nothing short of a religion in India. It's the drug of choice for most people in the sub-continent. All I get is *smirks* But that's ok, as you might've heard on Seinfeld, from a cabbie, who was probably Indian btw, "Smugness is not a good quality!" And Seinfeld, is awlays right, wait a sec, I meant, always right.
But back to the subject. To these smug americans, I say: "A ha, a fan is born, more to the point, An American fan is born.."
Ta-da..
The next step in World domination is to... make sure everybody speaks Tamil. Hmm.. How do we do this!? I'm thinking. *light bulb moment*
Yes, Yes, we change the name of our biggest, most important city, to Tamil, except we forgot that the original name was from, wait, Tamil. Oh, who cares about facts, we're all for Tamil, don't you know. And so we get Madras becoming Chennai, and now most of my American friends think I have 2 hometowns. But yeah, that's what we want! We know we've been successful when even Wiki doesn't know how to refer to the city, is it Madras, or is it Chennai. Wait wait I'm confused.
No, that didn't work Brian! No we can't have that can we. Ergo we have Prabhu Deva, er.. hrmmm.. as.. Cue the fireworks.. Benny Lava!
And cogito ergo sum, I'm trying so hard to be kewl like the Architect in the Matrix Reloaded was it, who was what really killed the movie imho btw, (and now i'm trying to be like those kewl txting kids,) but that's a secret, we won't tell anyone that I'm trying so hard to be kewl..
Tamil featured on the Colbert Report..
..maybe I won't have to kill some kittens after all. I might still have to claim Chuck Norris's parents are Tamil though.
But back to the subject. To these smug americans, I say: "A ha, a fan is born, more to the point, An American fan is born.."
Ta-da..
The next step in World domination is to... make sure everybody speaks Tamil. Hmm.. How do we do this!? I'm thinking. *light bulb moment*
Yes, Yes, we change the name of our biggest, most important city, to Tamil, except we forgot that the original name was from, wait, Tamil. Oh, who cares about facts, we're all for Tamil, don't you know. And so we get Madras becoming Chennai, and now most of my American friends think I have 2 hometowns. But yeah, that's what we want! We know we've been successful when even Wiki doesn't know how to refer to the city, is it Madras, or is it Chennai. Wait wait I'm confused.
No, that didn't work Brian! No we can't have that can we. Ergo we have Prabhu Deva, er.. hrmmm.. as.. Cue the fireworks.. Benny Lava!
And cogito ergo sum, I'm trying so hard to be kewl like the Architect in the Matrix Reloaded was it, who was what really killed the movie imho btw, (and now i'm trying to be like those kewl txting kids,) but that's a secret, we won't tell anyone that I'm trying so hard to be kewl..
Tamil featured on the Colbert Report..
..maybe I won't have to kill some kittens after all. I might still have to claim Chuck Norris's parents are Tamil though.
Friday, October 9, 2009
Teach a man to fish..
They say there is no news like bad news. Maybe that explains all the depressing stories you hear or read or watch about crime, disasters, riots, and such. Take Africa for example. On the surface, with the war zones, and ethnic conflicts, and illegal trade in ivory, diamonds, it seems like it was made for news.
And then you come across an interesting article, like this one, almost by accident..
http://www.good.is/post/african-dynamo/?GT1=48001
Gives one some perspective. Yes, it's a feel good story, but I'm rooting for William Kamkwamba, the Malawian kid.
And in this is a lesson. This Chinese proverb encapsulates it perfectly: "Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day! Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime!"
Ok, so!? The developed world looks on at Africa with pity. And they feel bad. To assuage their guilt or out of a genuine sense of good, they send aid, sometimes manifested as food, medicines, clothes, or just plain monetary aid. Some of which winds its way to the people but a lot of which winds up lining the pockets of the rich and the powerful. While there is a place for charity in the world, in the long run, you're not doing much to further the development and progress of the place.
Why not?! Because when you dole out aid, like you're giving alms to a beggar, you're just teaching people to put out their hands. You need to trade with the continent, treat them as equals, that is true charity. Because that creates jobs, and jobs create prosperity, and so on and so forth. That will be truly empowering people.
And then you come across an interesting article, like this one, almost by accident..
http://www.good.is/post/african-dynamo/?GT1=48001
Gives one some perspective. Yes, it's a feel good story, but I'm rooting for William Kamkwamba, the Malawian kid.
And in this is a lesson. This Chinese proverb encapsulates it perfectly: "Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day! Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime!"
Ok, so!? The developed world looks on at Africa with pity. And they feel bad. To assuage their guilt or out of a genuine sense of good, they send aid, sometimes manifested as food, medicines, clothes, or just plain monetary aid. Some of which winds its way to the people but a lot of which winds up lining the pockets of the rich and the powerful. While there is a place for charity in the world, in the long run, you're not doing much to further the development and progress of the place.
Why not?! Because when you dole out aid, like you're giving alms to a beggar, you're just teaching people to put out their hands. You need to trade with the continent, treat them as equals, that is true charity. Because that creates jobs, and jobs create prosperity, and so on and so forth. That will be truly empowering people.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
The Point of Return!? I'm still wondering why..
I finished reading the rest of the book, "The Point of Return", by Siddhartha Deb. Finally. I think I originally started on it more than a month ago, early August I think. I didn't have but 50-60 pages left as of the last post, but it took me longer than I thought it would, esp. since I was at work, and I kept getting interrupted every now and then. Then again there were some very interesting passages in there, that I read and re-read and wrote down in my journal/planner.
The following excerpts in particular jumped out at me. This first one especially, I could've been writing about myself.
"As for me.. there were mostly failures. Failures in love and work, moving from town to city.. restless and uncertain..
I make no bones about my failure. Things could have turned out differently, but they didn't. If I foreclosed my engineering career, choosing what I saw as freedom over following an unexciting if well-honed groove, the illusion of that freedom disappeared soon enough in the face of everyday routine.. An unappealing job.. in the evening, an empty apartment to go back to.. the weight of books on dusty shelves, memories in some distant corner, the strangeness of one's own face when seen in a cheap mirror over a small sink, the sudden awareness of my.. breath as I bend over the lock at the front door."
"How did I achieve this unlikely feat of forgetting in the very act of remembrance.. ..the answer must be that I chose to forget. Memory is also about what you decide to remember, so that you can make sense of what has been irrevocably lost. That was the only way the past could be recovered.."
"I don't know if those friends of mine remain in touch with each other and if I am the only one who has broken the circuit. Although I have little news of them, one feels that they too are dissolved in the vast spaces that opened up once we left the town. The sporadic correspondence we maintained for a while ultimately ceased, each step one took in the adult world - career, marriage, children - serving to increase the distance from the past.... Small-town boys settled in the United States or Australia or New Zealand, where they will become old men and sit on their front porches or lawns at the end of their lives, trying to remember whether the decades have taken them across many continents or if they are still in the first, original place where their old friends live around the corner."
Having finished reading it, I have a better appreciation for the book today than even just a couple of days ago. I like it, it's a little different, and the reverse chronological order of the story can get a little aggravating at times, but in the end, Siddhartha Deb ties the knots together. And it opened my eyes to the unique problems of the Indian North-East. While it is no "The Kite Runner", it is a must read none-the-less.
The following excerpts in particular jumped out at me. This first one especially, I could've been writing about myself.
"As for me.. there were mostly failures. Failures in love and work, moving from town to city.. restless and uncertain..
I make no bones about my failure. Things could have turned out differently, but they didn't. If I foreclosed my engineering career, choosing what I saw as freedom over following an unexciting if well-honed groove, the illusion of that freedom disappeared soon enough in the face of everyday routine.. An unappealing job.. in the evening, an empty apartment to go back to.. the weight of books on dusty shelves, memories in some distant corner, the strangeness of one's own face when seen in a cheap mirror over a small sink, the sudden awareness of my.. breath as I bend over the lock at the front door."
"How did I achieve this unlikely feat of forgetting in the very act of remembrance.. ..the answer must be that I chose to forget. Memory is also about what you decide to remember, so that you can make sense of what has been irrevocably lost. That was the only way the past could be recovered.."
"I don't know if those friends of mine remain in touch with each other and if I am the only one who has broken the circuit. Although I have little news of them, one feels that they too are dissolved in the vast spaces that opened up once we left the town. The sporadic correspondence we maintained for a while ultimately ceased, each step one took in the adult world - career, marriage, children - serving to increase the distance from the past.... Small-town boys settled in the United States or Australia or New Zealand, where they will become old men and sit on their front porches or lawns at the end of their lives, trying to remember whether the decades have taken them across many continents or if they are still in the first, original place where their old friends live around the corner."
Having finished reading it, I have a better appreciation for the book today than even just a couple of days ago. I like it, it's a little different, and the reverse chronological order of the story can get a little aggravating at times, but in the end, Siddhartha Deb ties the knots together. And it opened my eyes to the unique problems of the Indian North-East. While it is no "The Kite Runner", it is a must read none-the-less.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Something to be said for being reader-friendly!?
So I have been reading this book for a while, making time for it one or two days a week at a time, for an hour here and an hour there. It was gifted to me almost a year ago by my friend, and room-mate Richey, "The Point of Return" by Siddhartha Deb. I assume he picked it out because it was a book set in India, by an Indian author. I haven't investigated his reasons.
Anyway, it is a very interesting read, more so since I haven't read a book set in India, in such a long time. If I have one quibble with the book, it is that the author resorts to more than one word that you have to look up in a dictionary. Not to sound arrogant, but if I have to resort to looking words up, it makes you wonder what the author is trying to prove. In my humble opinion, if as an author you have to resort to the usage of obscure language to arguably enhance your novel, you're fighting a lost cause. Problem is most authors have a command and mastery of language and vocabulary that may be very natural to them, but often exceeds their audience for whom it may not be second or even third nature.
However, I also believe that you should not talk down to your readers or listeners. So how do you reconcile these two opposing points of view!? I don't claim to have all the answers. But as a writer myself, I do believe that one of your goals is not to drive your readers away, even if just for a second.
A sampler of said obscure words:
poseur
bier
hangdog
Friesian
simulacrum
elisions
solipsistically
innoxious
Bannerdown
reductive
prehensile
However, here's a couple of excerpts that I feel compelled to reproduce just because of how much they resonated with me.
"Perhaps this is the true return, the completion of a cycle set in motion long ago, and if it seems lonely, maybe it is because migration is a reductive evolutionary principle where the sprawling, oppressive family gives way to its streamlined nuclear descendant, to be replaced finally by the individual straining at the limits of memory."
"Put too much weight on any particular moment, force it into an epiphany, and experience cracks in half."
I haven't finished the book yet, hopefully should in a day or two, and then the verdict. I like it so far, just for the interesting window to the Indian North-East which is one of the few parts of India that I haven't seen yet. And with my renewed interest in traveling, that's something I hope to rectify at some point in the not-too-distant future.
Anyway, it is a very interesting read, more so since I haven't read a book set in India, in such a long time. If I have one quibble with the book, it is that the author resorts to more than one word that you have to look up in a dictionary. Not to sound arrogant, but if I have to resort to looking words up, it makes you wonder what the author is trying to prove. In my humble opinion, if as an author you have to resort to the usage of obscure language to arguably enhance your novel, you're fighting a lost cause. Problem is most authors have a command and mastery of language and vocabulary that may be very natural to them, but often exceeds their audience for whom it may not be second or even third nature.
However, I also believe that you should not talk down to your readers or listeners. So how do you reconcile these two opposing points of view!? I don't claim to have all the answers. But as a writer myself, I do believe that one of your goals is not to drive your readers away, even if just for a second.
A sampler of said obscure words:
poseur
bier
hangdog
Friesian
simulacrum
elisions
solipsistically
innoxious
Bannerdown
reductive
prehensile
However, here's a couple of excerpts that I feel compelled to reproduce just because of how much they resonated with me.
"Perhaps this is the true return, the completion of a cycle set in motion long ago, and if it seems lonely, maybe it is because migration is a reductive evolutionary principle where the sprawling, oppressive family gives way to its streamlined nuclear descendant, to be replaced finally by the individual straining at the limits of memory."
"Put too much weight on any particular moment, force it into an epiphany, and experience cracks in half."
I haven't finished the book yet, hopefully should in a day or two, and then the verdict. I like it so far, just for the interesting window to the Indian North-East which is one of the few parts of India that I haven't seen yet. And with my renewed interest in traveling, that's something I hope to rectify at some point in the not-too-distant future.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Swearing Correctnes or PC is passe..
Wow! It's been a crazy last coupla weeks. I just realized today that yesterday, August 15, an esp. easy to remember date for me, because it just happens to be the Indian Independence Day, marked 5 years since I was last in India, the significance of which is, it's the last time I saw my family.
But anyways, here's something interesting I saw today. The Australian comic/ pianist Tim Minchin on the subject of censorship. I whole-heartedly concur, esp. the part about context..
I occasionally use a lot of so-called bad words, aka swear words, cuss words, or by myriad other names which basically all come down to them being offensive to different people. To start with, people have very thin skin these days. Political Correctness. All that jizz. Oops. Jazz. But even without all of that, what it boils down to is censorship. Of anything that is outside the mainstream, and hence outside people's comfort zones.
Just for example. What is so bad about "god-damn", "hell", "shit", or "fuck" !? And how has one miraculously avoided the apocalypse when you say "gosh-darn", "heck", "crap", and "fish" instead!?
But anyways, here's something interesting I saw today. The Australian comic/ pianist Tim Minchin on the subject of censorship. I whole-heartedly concur, esp. the part about context..
I occasionally use a lot of so-called bad words, aka swear words, cuss words, or by myriad other names which basically all come down to them being offensive to different people. To start with, people have very thin skin these days. Political Correctness. All that jizz. Oops. Jazz. But even without all of that, what it boils down to is censorship. Of anything that is outside the mainstream, and hence outside people's comfort zones.
Just for example. What is so bad about "god-damn", "hell", "shit", or "fuck" !? And how has one miraculously avoided the apocalypse when you say "gosh-darn", "heck", "crap", and "fish" instead!?
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