On the Road

Along the Bangalore-Mysore highway...




Adipampa road, Mysore...



Valmiki road...

TALENT!!!

tal·ent
n

A marked innate ability, as for artistic accomplishment. See Synonyms at ability.
Natural endowment or ability of a superior quality.
A person or group of people having such ability: The company makes good use of its talent.

I realised that 'talent' is wrongly used to refer to the ability to score in exams alone.
No, it isn't only that. If you are good at writing, connecting with people, singing, or anything at all and it comes naturally to you, it is a talent. If you are good at arguing against this, that is a talent too! ;-) If you enjoy it, it's only better.

I stopped enjoying painting and drawing. So I just gave it up. And I am not missing it one bit.

Talent

Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to nurture it in solitude and follow the talent to the dark places where it leads.

-Erica Jong

Vasco 2

Entering the room allotted to us at Lapaz Gardens, we find the AC buzzing. I turn it off and open the window to be greeted by this sight...


The sea is so quiet. We do not know it was there until we are just 2 streets away and we see the sand and feel the breeze. The sand is warm. We spot coconut trees leaning gracefully, tempting us with their cool shadows. We trudge through the sand and then lay sprawled in the shade wondering if a coconut would choose to fall into our faces at this very moment... a heap of engineers we were...




My colleague enjoys the solitude, looking into the strangely silent sea...
Stranger sleeping... blissfully...

Parasailing

Finally, I got my rolls developed. The snaps in the previous Goa post were from borrowed digicams. :-) Here are some.

The under-exposed blob you see on the bottom-right is the boat towing the parasail...

I will post the other snaps later :-)

Wish

Let 2006 bring you growth, happiness and all that sort of thing!

A bit of Vasco and then Goa

On the way to Panaji, we stopped at Vasco Da Gama for breakfast. Since there were two hours before the resort buses would arrive to take us to Panaji, we took a walk down the street in search of the beach and on the way I saw this...



As soon as we landed at the resort, we sat down for lunch, where we were given the welcome drink. Each of the tables had a flower placed in a glass. Beauty in simplicity...



We went to Panjim for shopping. As soon as we got down from the bus, this beautiful building stood there with a pretty palm tree by its side. My Goan colleague tells me it is the Old Medical College...

The sunsets there were quite good too...

I realised that Goa is not at all overrated. It has a charm that very few places can match. This was my first visit but it is certainly not the last! :-)

Different Views

Fardeen Khan marries Natasha
-Times of India

Fardeen, wife stuck in lift for 5 minutes
- Mid Day

Meghalomania

This sprightly damsel, with wit that knows no bounds, makes all other blogs (including this one) look like old farts!! :-))

Swami

"...And yet you are wandering about the house like an unleashed donkey! What preposterous list is this? Do you think rupees, annas and pies drop from the sky?' Swaminathan did not think exactly this, but something quite similar."
-R.K. Narayan's Malgudi Schooldays

Do not know why, but I liked these lines in a warm and fuzzy kind of way. Reading about Swami reminds me of my own childhood. Talking about which reminds me of Mysore... I still remember seeing R.K. Narayan taking a walk among the boulevards of the CFTRI campus. The only reason why we kids knew him was because we had watched Swami and Friends on DD then. Of course, I still remember the episode in which Swami pretends he is on an imaginary horse (or donkey?) which suddenly moves under him and his little topi falls! And I always imagine Swami as a little boy running, never walking... and of course, I still remember the song at the end of each episode which used to go, "Tandaana-tanaa-nanaanaaaaaa..."

Independence

If you are truly experiencing independence, you probably are:

1) Cleaning your own toilet.

2) Cooking your own food.

Time to Crib

1) You are sleeping peacefully. He gets a phone call. The time is 6:30am. He happily starts shouting into the phone and walks all around the house (If it is a mobile, chalte chalte baat karne ke liye haina?), making a point to walk through your room before walking into the balcony. He doesn't bother to close the balcony door and the ice-cold winter air floods the room and invades your blankets! Now, you are NOT sleeping peacefully. AAAAAAAAAARGH!


2) Time is 11pm. He is hungry. He is now the most inspired cook in the world. CLANK CLATTER! CLONK! ...searches for the non-stick frying pan.... heats the oil and adds the onions in one go: HISHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Stir well, or the onions will get burnt!! CLITTER! CLATTER! CLONK! scrape! crape! He scrapes off a lot of the nonstick coating with a hard metal spoon. So what do you have here? Teflon Bhurji! Is it YUM YUM? No...it's EEEOWGGHH!

THE AFTERMATH: You wake up to find that there was either Jackie Chan fighting with someone in the kitchen... or was there a bomb blast? NO! Your room-mate has just cooked. All the plates lay unwashed and he has fled to the office!! @#$%&!!!!

I feel sorry for the girls who will marry such men!

I Have a Dream

I Have a Dream

I have a dream, a song to sing
To help me cope with anything
If you see the wonder of a fairy tale
You can take the future even if you fail
I believe in angels
Something good in everything I see
I believe in angels
When I know the time is right for me
I’ll cross the stream - I have a dream

I have a dream, a fantasy
To help me through reality
And my destination makes it worth the while
Pushing through the darkness still another mile
I believe in angels
Something good in everything I see
I believe in angels
When I know the time is right for me
I’ll cross the stream - I have a dream
I’ll cross the stream - I have a dream

I have a dream, a song to sing
To help me cope with anything
If you see the wonder of a fairy tale
You can take the future even if you fail
I believe in angels
Something good in everything I see
I believe in angels
When I know the time is right for me
I’ll cross the stream - I have a dream
I’ll cross the stream - I have a dream

-ABBA

Burden not Shared

As we returned to Pune, my colleague from abroad remarked that all along the way she observed only women carrying things while men were mostly burdenless. I suddenly realised that was so true... it was always this: either a baby, firewood, or hay... the women would be carrying something or the other while the men walked along hands swaying in the air.

But after travelling for many, many kilometers we did come across a man carrying something and we thought, "Ok, there are exceptions"!

Fond Remembrance

At this hour of sorrow and loss, I stand by your side and share your grief. Let that roll of film rest in peace. And may that roll, which was one of the only witnesses to the amazing time we had, which is all frozen forever on it's undecipherable surface, go to film-heaven and exist among those great slide films which never saw the light of the projector. Amen! (*sniff!* *sob!* *sob!*)

-I dedicate this to my friend who smiled relentlessly to a film suffering from severe amnesia.

Plantain Leaf

A couple if weeks ago, I sat down for a lunch at an Andhra restaurant off Brigade road, Bangalore. The meal was served on plantain leaf. It had been like ages since I had a good meal served on plantain leaf... or three days to be precise ;-) . I just remembered I had such a meal at home for Diwali lunch. And for once, like a good Andhraite, I got to dig into 'mountains' of rice! The flavour that the leaf adds to the hot rice and dal curry is unmatched!

The leaf in the picture is from our garden in Mysore.

It's Either Mysore or Bull

At Mysore, we visited Chamundi Hill and on the way to the top, we saw this interesting sign. It shows the way to Mysore city and the diversion to the Nandi statue. But the English version has more meaning than intended! ;-) I actually agree with that interpretation too. If you're not going to Mysore, you are missing a lot.

Hmmm... I Got Tagged

Well, I thought so few people apparently read my blog that getting tagged would be as likely as finding life on another planet!! But I got tagged by Flickering Flame. So, finally there is only one more thing left to do: find life on another planet.

(I wrote these last week and some have changed)

7 things I plan to do-

1. Watch the movie Hanuman (I did!).
2. Gain a couple of kgs (of muscle!).
3. Buy a Samsonite (I got VIP instead, I mean the suitcase! ).
4. Meet more beautiful minds (Not ignited minds, they are a fire hazard).
5. Travel to Goa (And see the portugese architecture...).
6. Conduct further research on what women want.
7. Kick a few assorted butts.

7 things I can't (or won't) do-

1. Hate Arunima.
2. Not ROTFLMAO after reading Dave Barry.
3. Get my dad to sell his 25 year old (young?) Bajaj Chetak.
4. Get my LG phone to recognise the numbers of friends who call me often (the dumb chunk of silicon and plastic!).
5. Get rid of my LG phone --I am married to it (rather to a service provider famous for their non-'reliability'! <:- (...
6. Remember names of people I am introduced to 2 minutes ago (Yes, that's pathetic).
7. Tag anyone.
   

7 things I say most often (in no particluar order)-

1. Hi!
2. Thank you
3. Sh**!
4. Oh my God!
5. Wowww!
6. Great!
7. Ya!

Pain

'If someone is determined not to risk pain, then such a person must do without many things: having children, getting married, the ecstacy of sex, the hope of ambition, friendship -- all that makes life alive, meaningful, and significant.'

--M. Scott Peck in 'The Road Less Travelled'


I simply liked this quote. I realised that there is no such thing as an inherently painless life. We can only learn to live happily inspite of everything. If anyone asks if there is a secret to true happiness, I would say that this is one of them

Happiness

"Happiness is... a warm puppy."

-Charles M. Schulz (Creator of Peanuts)

Commercial Street

A zillion photons bombard your eyes with various hues, from the neon lights flashing on and off. They jostle for eye space filling your brain with a dozens of brand names before you can blink! No, you aren't in Hongkong, you're in Namma Bengaluru, Commercial Street!

Fog!

It's official: winter is moving in! This morning the whole city had fog. This is the view from our apartment window of a neighbouring building which is under construction...

Truth Vs. Fine Art Photography

Believing that a photograph should be untampered with and presented as it is, I had considered that anything else was as good as fraud. Fraud against truth and all that is real. This I feel was due to the image (pun unintended) photography has acquired, that it is meant to show things as they are...

But then I realised that this is the case only when we are talking about photography whose objective is to portray the truth as in documentary and journalistic photography.

It is now my belief that if you are dealing with photography as an art form, the objective of the artist is to convey a message/emotion to the viewer. This makes a photograph just the 'raw material' that the artist uses to convey his/her message/emotion. So, you might say that the act of taking the photograph is a mere beginning of the journey that the image will take to finally convey the artist's thought. For after all an artist is only trying to convey what is on his/her mind, the means that the medium he uses is nothing more than just that.

Another issue that comes to mind is digital tools used to modify images. If you think that just because things happen at a mouse-click and hence anyone who uses them can only produce kitsch, think again! To use a digital tool to produce something that is tasteful and aesthically appealing, requires a certain sense, without which we might end up making, well, kitsch!

Next time somebody looks at an image and says, "So you manipulated it?", with a facial expression that seems to say, "So, you took dope to win the gold medal?", I will simply tell that person to read this post!

Sun-day

There's nothing like the sun emerging from dark clouds...

Notice the 'rainbow' created by a cloud in the top half of the image (pointed to by the upward arrow) and the rainbow coloured cloud below it! The colours are just noticable...

This tree is apparently on some land marked for 'developement' and I doubt it if it will be there to see the next summer...

Smiles

:-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) :-)

The Charm Still Remains

Pune, Camp area.

The City that Sleeps...

The city sleeps, under the moolit sky...

New Toy!

As a kid I had always wanted a Rubik's Cube. The other day while window shopping at the 49&99 store, I saw this cube and fell for it. Well, I guess it is never too late for 'brain food'!

Cabin by the Tree

This exotic place has mesmerised me. I have visited it about 5 times in about one year and I still feel like going back. When you are here, all you see is the earth and the sky, and this little cabin with a dead tree beside it. This tree hasn't had a single leaf for over a year now but it still stands its ground. The silence here is nearly absolute, except for the distant 'whoosh' of vehicles on the national highway about a kilometer away. Now and then sparrows flit around chirping away a happy conversation...

If you walk closer to the structure, you will be a little anxious to see the pitch-darkness that you see inside. But when you look closely, you see that it is a temple. Unsual temple... It has a mound of turmeric with a red tilak in place of an idol...

A Room With a View

In the year 1999, we lived in a rented house. The sole reason why we had moved into this house was that it was just one street away from the house which we were building for ourselves. I remember how I saw many beautiful sunsets from the window of my room. I had just started using the camera and this was probably from the first roll I ever shot. That's what makes it special.

Home Sweet Home

It's been just about 3 weeks since I was home.
I am missing home... already...

One Tough Nut

The molten tar had tsunamied onto their tiny world taking away a few creatures to the nether world. But this little plant was one tough nut...

On the Way to the Office Today...

Mula river...



Tranquility....

Visit to Kailash Temple

The Kailash temple is larger than the Parthenon, and better preserved. It was cut out of a single rock starting from top to bottom (that was clever).

Standing within these stone walls takes you into another world. It is amazing what faith can inspire people to do...

The stone was covered with plaster which was painted in different colours, so the temple was a lot more colorful in its days of glory. Some of the plaster still remains in certain places, giving a glimpse of the grandeur that was...

The temple even has a balcony... :-)

The plaster still surviving has a hint of intricate, colourful designs... the parakeets seem to admire the sculptures up close!

The Invitation

We had just finished lunch. S and I were taking a walk within the company campus. The weather was warm but not too sunny and it was just right for a walk.

There was construction work going on ahead of us. We saw that one of the workers was just unpacking his lunch. As we got closer, he said something to us (in Marathi) with a happy smile. I did not know enough Marathi to understand him. I found his warm smile unusual for he had not met us before. Marathi-knowing S replied to him. I asked S what it was about. S told me that he was inviting us to share his lunch. (S had replied that we had already had our lunch and thanked him for the invitation.)

S said that this is a custom followed when anyone comes by when you are having lunch.

I had heard of this custom but had never witnessed it before. That too between total strangers. It's nice to know such things still exist! :-)

And the Painter Tames the Monster...

The Return of the Concrete Monsters

These were still in the making:

Concrete Monsters

A celebration of bad design, compromise and demented creativity. The designer must've thought that people are capable of anaerobic respiration or I should actually check if these were luxury apartments exclusively built for dementors!

Safety Begins at Home

Saw this on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway. Our vehicle was travelling at close to the speed limit when I saw this unexploded tanker. That gave me just enough time to get this badly taken snap. It had crashed into solid rock ironically with the words 'Safety Begins at Home' painted on its rear, right next to the speed-limit sign. They should have added the words 'and Ends on the Road'.

The Return of the Concrete Monsters

These were still in the making:

A celebration of bad design and compromise. The designer must've thought that people are capable of anaerobic respiration.

Critique Ugly

Sarkar: As soon as I saw how the story was unfolding, I kept expecting the events in The Godfather to happen. Some did, some did not. So that really kept me guessing!

The cinematography was very innovative. It was dark and stark, devoid of frills, moody and sinister at times. Perfect!

One thing about the movie that really put me off is the music directors... er music. It seems that the music directors Bapi-Tutul were very insecure that people will forget their presence so they kept banging away the percussion come what may! Abhishek thinking about something and you hear the them banging away all the drums! They seemed to not know that silence can be used to heighten the effect. The music was way too loud!! I still liked the 'govinda govinda' chant although this is not the first time this was used in an RGV movie (Those of u who are wondering which one, it is the telugu movie 'Govinda Govinda' starring Nagarjuna and Sridevi)! :-)

Madagaskar: Nice fun movie! Very much paisa vasool if you have kids!

Whenever I hear David Schwimmer (lends his voice to the giraffe) I couldn't help but picture Ross Geller of F.R.I.E.N.D.S! Got so used to that voice as Ross!!

The story was not so interesting. There wasn't much of a climax either. In that way the movie was not half as much fun as Shrek. Looks like they were in a hurry to release the movie before some deadline or something!

The Promise

The clouds had kept the sun hidden for so long. I do not remember when this had happened before. There was bad news everywhere, as if all the doomsday prophecies were coming true. Life is so fragile. And we take it for granted until we are reminded.

This morning all of a sudden, the sun emerged victoriously, with its warm silver rays. The Pashan skyline was suddenly bathed in a bright glow, highlighted against the dark clouds on the other side of the sky.

A rainbow appeared, arching high above the buildings. It looked better than any housing project ad. The rainbow seemed to frame the skyline, holding it in place. It held a promise of sunshine.

Now, I look outside to see. It has kept its promise.

K A R I Z M A

The lines zig-zagged and projected out of the frame, encroaching into the space around it. The indicator formed the apex of the projection, like the shoulder-pad of an evil robot. The metallic body excuded a wicked energy, threatening to unleash it at a moment's notice. Every angle of its planes suggested speed. The metal logo placed angularly lay glinting in the morning sunlight...
It spelt the letters K A R I Z M A

Concrete Monsters

The buildings rose from the filth with damp-black walls, colourful clothes waving in the wind like bright flags, each proclaiming a victory. A victory of life against the odds?

Multistoreyed buildings so close to each other that one could hop from one roof to another. Spiderman would have saved a lot of web...

The heavy sea air was laden with the smell of sewage and refuse. Plastic burning?...

The Sumo raced up a flyover, weaving through the traffic. As we rose, we saw more of these buildings jostling for a breath of fresh air, for a piece of the sky...

The sky was silver, bright and blinding but the light was no match against the darkness these concrete monsters held within them...

I was there... intimidated... mesmerised... dwarfed... awed... disgusted... overwhelmed...

Purple Flames...

Took this snap on saturday:

Purple Flames

Nescafe Moment

I see you sitting at the coffee table. The morning sun streams in and dissolves into the strands of your brown-black hair flowing down the sides of your face, making it glisten like silk, highlighting you against the shadowy background. The hot cup of coffee releases steady fumes into the cool winter air. Your skin glows with morning freshness as you prepare to take your first sip. The morning newspaper reflects the headlines in your glasses delicately balanced on your nose. Now, it is time to take a sip. You remove the glasses, and as you raise the glass to your tender lips, you look at me with your brownish eyes and suddenly a smile materialises...

I immediately check the focus, aperture and... Kli-Chck!

A perfect picture. A Nescafe moment.

A Favour...

My friend asked me an unusual favour the other day... He wanted to pose the way Brad Pitt did for the posters of Mr. Smith. It sounded funny, especially coz he did not have any Angelina Jolie in his life. But it proved to be an interesting challenge so I said 'YES'!

That saturday, 26 snaps later we got a snap which looked satisfactory. The white walls really helped and we hid the flooring under white papers stuck together to form a 'blanket'. I uploaded the image and edited it in GIMP to add the text and place it behind him.

This is what I finally got: Mr. Sunkara

Wicked Gossip!

H: You know, S has a girl-friend!
Saw them hanging out at all the hotspots and of course
their body language says it all.

I: So, is S's gf cute?

H: No... she's wishy-washy!

I: Wishy-washy? how does a person LOOK wishy-washy?? i thought it is a behavioural trait! :-)

H: LOL!!! U know - she is that delicate looking pale creature with thin straight hair...... that kind of a girl...

I: like she was caught in a washing machine and twirled
around in Surf Excel all morning?

H: Wishy-washy!!!!

Wanted Warm Hug: Tenders Invited :-))

I came to know from Desmond Morris' 'Intimate Behaviour' the true nature of the hug. Having read it years ago I am kind of vague but I remember that he says that ever since we come out of the womb we miss the warm 'hug' that the womb gave us. We do not remember the time we spent in the womb but it is etched deep within our subconcious. So, whenever we get a hug we feel good as it gives the same feeling of security and warmth that we felt when we were in our mothers' womb... Human's like any other animal seeks affection and warmth but social restrictions usually leave us extremely 'affection starved'...

When was the last time you got a big, warm hug?