Macro

”Security is the essential roadblock to achieving the road map to peace.”
–George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., July 25, 2003

UNDAAZED

That is exactly what I felt after watching ANDAZ. Try as I might to be dazed by this spectacle, I was just left dark and gloomy that I had watched it. The movie is an exercise in predictability – predictable story, predictable acting, predictable situations, predictable songs and a hopelessly predictable climax. Even when Priyanka Chopra declares her noble intentions wrapped in not so noble actions in the end, except people on the reel, no one actually is shocked or bemused . instead, you just yawn and say . This was anyways going to happen!

So begins ANDAZ with a blooming .friendship. between Raj and Kajal. After Kajal does a Forrest Gump . .run Raj run. and restores his legs, their .friendship. grows beyond bounds. That you have no premonitions or expectations of any kind, the fact that they are .best friends. is iterated at least a dozen times . its almost an exasperated try at making us hammer in our brains that they cannot fall in love . no. Not so soon perhaps. But of course, we always knew that a man and woman can be everything but friends. And if they are best friends, it follows that best friends fall in love only when either of them in on the thin red line of getting engaged/married with someone else . providing handsome situations for (i) The hero / heroine to do his I want my girl / boy Boo-Hoo act (ii) The second hero / heroine to make that valiant sacrifice by giving away their love, without of course realizing their good luck. Don.t worry, ANDAZ is no different. Didn.t I tell you its predictable?

So just when the hero conveniently joins the air force, the damsel in friendship also falls in love . pretty easily by a millionaire. Of course, the hero cannot bear to see tears in her eyes, asks her to marry him. Really . what would he do anyways? Anyhow, to complicate matters, just when she is about to leave, she comes to know oh-my-dear-he-loves-me-i-am-such-a-fool situation. As conveniently as everything else, she just quips . .Why didn.t you ask me before?. to which the devastated hero has frog like face with eyes popping all over the place. So much love for friends eh? Now as if to redeem himself, our hero puts his mind out in flying and is sent to Europe for a Indo – *** joint exercise. To his misfortune, he has to meet the .other. heroine Jiya (or whatever her name was) and she falls head over heels (literally, she is drunk in the scene) in love with our hero . of course our hero cares a hoot. All it takes for him to fall in love eventually is one Kadva Chauth and one Hamming session on Rocks-don.t-have-hearts-and-cannot-love philosophy. Really, the kadva chauth left a bitter taste within us . come of it . I can now write a thesis on the Kadva Chauth . If someone cannot change the script, at least for heaven.s sake change the occasion!

Anyhow, turns out, the hero who has barely fallen in love discovers that Kajal is actually Jiya.s Bhabhi. Conveniently for all of us, right after marriage, Kajal.s husband died . just in case he would create any problems further. Gates open, love blossoms and Jiya schemes a sinister plot to give us a surprise twist in the end by uniting the lovers . surprise! we are not surprised though! Tsk! Tsk! They just might have killed Jiya for the added effect of sacrifice and make the movie more predictable. I mean, if it was this predictable, why not a bit more. Everything is back to happy days, and best friends realize they are the friends in love . while a valiant sacrificial lamb of a heroine looks on. Oh lovely . And as if to justify how predictable things get, every character of the movie then embraces the couple and camera just stops with all 16 people showing their 32s and standing arms in arms. I only hoped they didn.t display the banner . .The beginning.. Shudder!

From acting point of view, really there was nothing much to act. The scenes and situation were ones which even I might act out with finesse, then why even bother about the cast. Though Priyanka Chopra and Lara Dutta look hot respectively and together (why they even have a song together), they don.t do much in terms of acting . Though Lara does look to have potential. Akshay.s second act as I-am-lord-Ram after Deadcan (for the un-inspired, its Dhadkan), fails again miserably. He is best suited for Wham-Bham roles and must stick to that. His facial expressions change from extremely happy to extremely sorry . whether for us or himself we don.t know.

The music is also predictable as if to keep up the mood of the movie. Almost every song has been sung by Kumar-nosy-Sanu, and with each song he increases his aalaps progressively. Every song takes away 6 to 7 minutes easily, and there are 8 to keep you interested in the Loo. The songs fall in predictable situations . you can almost hear a song coming! We didn.t try guessing the lyrics, but I am pretty sure we would have. A movie with a predictable script doesn.t need any direction to speak of, but whatever direction from whichever angle to wherever, deserves a kick in the butt. There is no screenplay to speak of (oh come of it, I could have written a better screenplay!) , and its pretty evident by a lack of script. I had heard the girls of the movie scream how different their role was . I suggest, they take a look at DDLJ, K3G, KKHH and realize how stupidly common they are.

In the end, why did we see that movie? Well, we saw another movie . OOPS! And to get over the hangover of seeing my own species strip, and before we changed our sexuality, we decided to view some hot chicks to restore our sanity and sense. However, in comparison, the other movie at least had an element of surprise. But then, we had not prepared our selves for such a predictable fare- in retrospect . it didn.t matter! In the end, well, I had just thing in my mind.

Oops we saw Andaz!

”I recently met with the finance minister of the Palestinian Authority, was very impressed by his grasp of finances.”
–George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., May 29, 2003 (And I thot finance minister had a grasp of everything else….)

28 days later

Day 1: Infection

I know not what I did. I know not what I was going to do. All I remember is going to the hospital as a messenger. I hear some kind of chaos in the hospital . some shrieks to be precise. As I listened harder, it was definitely not human. What could it be? What could it possibly be? Monkeys? Yes they are definitely monkeys! What are monkeys doing in the hospital? I saw monkey rage towards me . its eyes were bloodshot; its mouth dripping blood; and a savage look as if telling me that my very existence was a sin. I ran for my life . under the tables, over the beds and hid myself in the cupboard. I could see through the small hole in there . it was still chasing me. It came near; I could almost feel myself killed by that monster. Its bloodshot eyes, blood all over the face. The face. No it cannot be! But it was. It wasn.t a monkey. It was a human.

Day 8: Epidemic

A monkey tied to the operation table sleeps. But it not sleeps, it whims. It is in rage that is for sure, but being strapped with metal chains makes it helpless. Its clamped to bed and several wires connect from the brain of the monkey to displays. Those displays? What are those displays? People killing people. People in rage. People running around. A man hanged and beaten. Someone.s heart was pumped out. A fire burning a city. A man kicking another man in such contempt that even God could think twice. A monkey sees it all. But what has the monkey got to do with it?

There were people who came to set it free. They were people who didn.t bother whether they were infected or not. Man was not important, monkeys were. There was not just one monkey, but so many other monkeys. They didn.t listen. They didn.t budge. Even force couldn.t stop them. Slowly, she turned towards the cage. Was the monkey angry? Was the monkey mad? No. she had to free them. .NO. called the doctor, but it was not to be . after all the monkey was created equal to man. She stepped. Freed. It came. It saw. It attacked. It Infected. She needs blood now. She is full of rage . she knows no fear now; her lust for blood she kills. Infects. Spreads. The monkeys are free . the man has been infected. Its only a matter of time before it spreads. That was 8 days ago.

Day 15: Evacuation

I don.t know where I am. I don.t know what I am doing. I am still in the hospital. I know not what happened. Nor do I have any sense of where I am. I am in a coma . a perfect world with perfect memories. What are doctors doing? Where am I? Oblivious to the fact you are, there exists a world full of chaos outside. There is shooting. There is running.

You do not see that people have run away. The virus has stuck. Its an epidemic. You cannot but survive more than 20 seconds without blood. You need blood. Yet you sleep and so you survive. Britain has been evacuated. Lucky ones flew. Others ran. On the way, one infected, killed and spread the virus. Get busy driving or get busy killing. The option is yours. Slowly and surely people are waking to the fact that they are going to kill or get killed. Who are they? Zombies? Yes! Zombies. Zombies in search of blood. I know not what has happened outside, but I do know I am still in the hospital. I have no idea if I too am living or dying. How far can people run? Funny.

28 days later…

I wake up to a silence in the hospital. What has happened here? Where are the doctors? What I am doing on the bed? I come outside and see no one. Where is any one? Is there no food? I need to see. I call out to people . yet no one hears me. Let me see outside the hospital. Where is everyone? Why are the streets deserted. Eh! Who was he . a monkey? No it wasn.t. It was a human. Dead. More. More and more. Why are so many people dead?

I am sad; I am depressed. I need god to help me. Ah! There is the church. I come upon this church . inside . what is this? Hundreds of dead. I couldn.t control myself . .Father. I shrieked. Instantly someone flipped up. I cannot believe my eyes. Was it a zombie? A dead man waking up? NO! It cannot be! But there are more. I see the same blood in their face, their eyes. O my God! Out comes the father . I walk towards him . but he too is dead. Why are they after me! I run out and am surrounded by a mob of zombies. Luckily she was there to save me.

I ask her what happened . and she explains me. She survived and a couple of others. I need the company of the living . I befriend her. We befriend more friends . I hear a faint radio at my friend.s place; the only place where humans live. Radio said there exists a place where there is a cure to the virus. Radio asks us to come there if you want to live. So we set out in a car towards Manchester . where the soldiers and the cure is.

We struggle along. All along people dead, people hungry. The living dead. The dead living. All in search of blood. All in rage. I know if I get a drop of blood from the infected, she will kill me within a heart beat. You don.t kill in 20 seconds, you are dead in next 5 she said. All along zombies, dead, dead. We stop at a place. We lose our friend. We stopped at another. I killed a boy. I know not no remorse . what to do? He was infected. He was the dead.

But it did shake me up. Would I make it? What if the soldiers are dead? What if I get infected? I need my friends . the living . as much as they need me. I know I have doubts; but I am going to take the chance and make it to soldiers . living or dead. Its almost night when I reach there with my friends.

28 days later…

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These days I am getting too bored to write. I mean, I always start something, but I am not able to end it at all. I wanted to so much write on whether people should choose DSL or Cable modem, but as it still stands, its incomplete. Then yesterday morning, I got the mail telling me that my suggestion to add top 5 Hollywood movies of 2002 had been accepted. “Good Heavens!” I thought, “Another review to write!” I had already made up mind as to what those 5 movies could be; now what I needed to do was write a review on the same.

But, me being me couldn’t start writing it. I mean, I didn’t want to write another bland review just stating my favorite movies of 2002 – I want my review to be ‘different’. Of course, it also dawned on me that in trying to be different, I may not get to write the review at all. I first thought – why not write the review in a style where I, koshish and premjit would sit around a table and discuss my favorite movies. I started with a normal conversation happening between the three of us, and then started to get to the movies. I told them that I loved The Lord of the Rings – The Two Towers, and waited their response.

Koshish added – “Me too! Don’t you think the way movie has been shot has been amazing? Just look at New Zealand, how I wish I was there. The special effects were awesome too!” Premjit was more thoughtful -“but nothing much happens in the movie right. I mean, the movie begins somewhere in between, and stops somewhere in between – and yet its interesting; its hard to make a movie like that! I didn’t like the first part, but eh, the second part caught me by surprise – I enjoyed it more!” Before I could speak, koshish spoke “yeah, but Gandalf returns to this tale, and that whats make this movie even more better, don’t you think Suyog?” I agreed. Silence. I figured that I couldn’t write a review THIS WAY! I mean, I cannot have three people talking about the same thing and agreeing always!! How boring! I decided that was not the way to write a review. I need to be normal!

I took a break, and watched comedy central for a while. While watching it, I hit upon an idea. I decided, why not write the review in a TV-show format! I could be some whacky host who tells upon his favorite movies! The more I thought about it, the more I began to like the idea. So I created the show – Suyog’s top of the tops and began imagining what I would say if I had to describe the movie 8 Mile. I imagined myself saying this in front of the camera – “Hello and welcome to Suyog’s top 5 movies! We begin with the movie 8 Mile, one of the most hard hitting movies to have released this year. A semi-autobiographical movie on Eminem, this movie has the punch, and punches the audience hard man. A sincere performance by Eminem man, and some dirty, corny rap make this a cool movie. And yeah, Brittany Murphy is cool man…isn’t she hot? Kim Basinger is hot as well bro, and you gotta see it for the rap man, its cool. Yo man, I tell ya what man, go see it! Cool!” ARRRRRRGH! No! I couldn’t do that! I mean I want to let my friends at MS know which movies I liked – I didn’t have to be a VJ for that! No way, there has to be another way of writing this!

I got confused yet again. I want my review to be simple and straight – but different. Why can’t I write review like that! I imagined again, how about using a true incident and then relating myself to that incident. I had never written a review on a personality before, how about becoming one and writing and autobiography! So there I became – Frank Abagnale, one of FBI’s most important man alive – cool! I could start by telling my MS friends about the movie based on me – Catch me if you can, and how it could be a good guide to my life. I mean, the movie is based on the real incidents of my life, and tell you what I am damn intelligent! I became a doctor, a lawyer, an airline pilot, all at an age before 19! I could also tell them how I got caught by FBI, and then I am now one of their most important man!! CUT THE CRAP! I cannot do this! If I had to be Frank Abagnale and tell others to watch Catch me if you can, why the hell would they read anymore of the review! No, why the hell can’t I write this review!

Concentrate. Try hard. I don’t know whats the problem with me! I want to write a review where nothing much happens. Things are normal. Things don’t change. People just read, rate, comment it, and go to the next review. I want the review where nothing happens to my reader by the end of it. Much more like the movie Adaptation, where nothing much happens. How I loved that movie. I mean, why can’t my review be like the movie – Nothing happens in the movie. People don’t change. The movie is about nothing in particular, and is completely whacko! I imagined myself to be Nicholas Cage in both the roles – one as the struggling writer who wants to write a screenplay about a movie on flowers, and his brother, who aims to write a thriller where the cop and the killer are the same person! I could relate so much to both Nicholas Cage. A part of me is still struggling to write this review, and my alter self says, you probably could have written a normal review and got away with it! How I wish Nicholas Cage wins the Oscar for the best actor and best supporting actor for this movie. But something reminded me from the movie – even though its about nothing, people not changing, no heroes, no conflicts – yet all is there in it! Why can’t be in my review too? Things can change, the review may not be normal, yet it may not be too different, it is easy to read, yet confusing… why the hell can’t I write such a review!

Six hours later, I am still trying to think hard. I have promised myself a burger if I can finish this review in the most normal way possible. I decided, the only way to write a review is to be yourself – let your emotions flow, let your instincts take you over! I have faith that I can write well! My instincts told me that it was high time I began telling about my favorite movies to my friends at MS, else, I am going to get kicked. Let me begin then – Signs according to me is the best movie of the year. M. Night Shyamlan again comes with a supernatural thriller about a family trials when a alien sighting is reported. I remember seeing a interview where Shyamlan mentions – “its not what you see that scares you; its what you don’t.” So true! I got scared a couple of times in the movie. Add to it, some splendid direction – check out the basement scene with just one torch light – that must go down as one of the best scenes filmed! I didn’t like the ending though- thought it was too cliché! However, its negligible when you have some fantastic performances by the kids, Mel Gibson and his brother. What more do you want from the movie!

NNNNNNNNOOOOO! This is sounding too normal! I have written countless reviews like this! This is just too bland a way to write a review. No, I cannot let my instincts take over – I need to think. I need to focus. I need to plan my review. I know I need to write. I need to be different.

Heck! – What is “different?”

Dedicated to Ekta Kapoor.

Acknowledgements

This book would not have been possible without the combined efforts of certain specie residing in Bangalore, and of course Ekta Kapoor and her Spooky villa better known as Krishna Cottage. In addition, I also wish to thank my neighbors, rats squeaking at ungodly hours near my house, a couple of cats wanting to kill those rats, and a dog which I am not very friendly with, but keeps the cats away to my dismay.

Contents

Chapter 1: The History of the Ring
Chapter 2: The Curse of the Ring
Chapter 3: Samara’s viewpoint
Chapter 4: The old man and the horse
Chapter 5: The strange kid
Chapter 6: The Hotel and The well.
Chapter 7: The Ring.
Appendix A, B and C.

Author’s note – viewing audience are kindly request to avoid reading Chapter 5 through 7 as they may contain horrific details, and may spoil your mood.

Chapter 1: The History of the Ring.

First of all, this Ring is not to be confused with Lord of the Ring’s Ring. This Ring is categorically different from Sauron’s Ring, in the sense that the Ring in question is an illusion. The Ring does not exist, but it can been seen. Something like Matrix – You cannot be shown the Matrix, you have to see it yourself. Similarly this Ring appears in different forms and illusions, which one must look out for.
A brief history of the ring – There was a video tape. How it got made, no body knows, no body cares. It exists, and therefore it is. No, the video tape has nothing about Ring, but only an illusion again. The tape is cursed, and anyone who sees it shall not live to see the 8th day of their life.

Chapter 2: The Curse of the Ring

Once there was a beautiful girl and her room mate. The girl and her roommate were enjoying a quiet dinner, when they decide to spook each other. It was there that the first instance of the video tape was made. One of the girls gleefully claims she has seen the tape which kills you after 7 days, and it was her seventh day, that day. A few minutes later, she dies, and her friend remains paralyzed.

Enter the heroine; author regrets he cannot remember her name – heroine is a relative to the girl who died, and is also a journalist. Her 5 year old son is smarter than her in most things, but is spooky himself. He was the closest to the girl who died, and hence can feel her around, though how when why where is not be questioned. The heroine sets out on a goose hunt about the possibilities of the girl’s death, and comes across the tape.

She watches the tape at night, and as the legend goes, you get a call from someone right after it ends to tell you about the 7 days time. The phone call was made; She makes a few copies of the same for further investigation, however like all filmy moms, forgets the important one at home, which her son like all filmy sons decides to watch. So, her son too is cursed the next day. And since she shows the video to her boyfriend too for further investigation, he too is cursed for 7 days. The heroine is about to embark a race against time to save herself and know more about the ring.

Chapter 3: Samara’s viewpoint.

There existed a girl called Samara on an island. She was born to a woman who had 64 abortions, and much to surprise of many was born. It is said that she was cursed since beginning, and her birth had a serious repercussion on her mother as well, who, was actually mentally deranged. Her father locks her up in attic above the horse shed, where Samara is made to live in shoddy conditions, and that is when her evil powers begin to surface. A freak accident involving killing of people and horses, Samara is investigated by the local police. Her only need in life was she wanted to be heard by people about her. She feels sorry about the whole killing thing, but she cannot do anything about it – the curse has been fallen. All she needs in return is others to know about her.

Later, the deranged mother, pushes Samara into the well, killing her, and then puts up slab to cover the well. Look carefully, it’s the first instance of the ring – as Samara drowns and keeps her eyes fixed above, a ambiguous hand slides the slab on the well – and when its nearly complete, just before the complete darkness, she can make out the ring of light she has seen.

Chapter 4: The old man and the horse

The heroine is out to the island depicted in the video she saw. In midst of nearing the island, a horse jumps out of nowhere and commits suicide. Poor she, for she does not know the history behind the horse. Samara hates horses, and she killed them while she was young. And yes, the curse remains – horses die or commit suicide on the island. Yes, but the heroine is still not aware.

The heroine at the house of an old man – yes it is the house she has seen in the video. The old man is not friendly, but as she later finds out, he is the father of Samara. His wife died, and before he is able to help the heroine out of her life saving trauma, he kills himself by shocking himself – quite literally. The heroine must find the truth quickly now.

Chapter 5: The strange kid.

Her kid is cursed. He used to be strange anyways, but now he claims he can see the girl who died. He claims strange things at home. At one instance in school, he literally draws rings and rings together – again a mere illusion of the ring, signifying the ring Samara saw.

The curse is working on the hero too – his face is disfigured when he gets a photo of himself. He is busy trying to figure out where Samara was born and where was she killed. On the sixth day, he is finally able to do so, and gets to see Samara’s video of mental delusions. As described above, the above events occur after this.

Chapter 6: The Hotel and the Well.

The heroine has discovered the well Samara was buried. It is the same place where she saw the video for the first time. With her boyfriend and time at stake, she rushes to the hotel and digs. The day is ending, but they are still trying to find the well – it is below the room she and the girl stayed. The day is ending, and its already the 7th day. Tearing through, walls, they come to a desolate basement, and there lies the well.

In trying to uncover it and looking in, the heroine falls in. No she does not die, but meets Samara down there, which finally crushes to bones. Up above, before she hits the bottom, the Slab slides again to close, and yet again as Samara, the heroine sees the ring form of light. After Samara crushes, away, the hero is able to save her, and she finally believes that she is safe.

Chapter 7 : The Ring.

She didn’t get it. The next day, the hero dies watching Samara come out alive. It is then it strikes her about Samara’s statement – “she wants to be heard”. She knows now it can’t stop, but it can be prevented. She knows now, that if you can make a copy of it and show it to someone else and let Samara be heard, you did be safe. That’s the reason she is herself alive – she showed it to her boyfriend. Promptly she makes sure her son makes a copy.

Her son simply asks – what will happen to the person whom she shows the video to?

Appendix A
There is a part 2 coming.

Appendix B
The original in Japanese is equally scary. For information, Ringu (in Japanese) has got around 5 parts. A prequel, and 2 sequels and the one more in middle.

Appendix C:
Enjoy the movie.

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© Suyog Deshpande.
The above content was originally posted on Mouthshut.com under the username suyog.

Did your dog run away? Call Rimjhim for help.

Is your son plotting to kill you and take away all the wealth? No problem – Rhimjim helps solve the issue.

Is your daughter in law 1 conspiring against daughter in law 2 and planning to frisk her son? Rhimjim makes sun shine.

Is your neighbor’s wife having an affair with your boss? Rhimjhim ahoy!

Do you need a lawyer, a soothsayer, a spiritualist, a mother teresa? Rhimjim again!

To solve all the associated sundry events and quandaries of this world, there is none but Rhimjim, whose life is perpetually on tenterhooks trying to bring about world peace and harmony to herself, her house, dogs, cats and a depressed teddy bear passing off as head of family. (The depressed teddy bear is courtesy MS member Suprena1). That in sums up what this serial tries to pass off as – Piya Ka Ghar.

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Of course, I am yet to figure out whose Piya and whose Ghar it all belongs to. A complicated whirlwind of a story hasn’t helped either. A mega large family (why can’t people in serials produce lesser number of children simply fails me!), with a depressed teddy bear leads the cast of this serial. Other delectable members of this enterprising family are –

3 monkeys passing of as teddy bear’s sons.

A vixen with broken legs passing off as teddy bear’s wife. All that the vixen has to do in the serial is growl menacingly at any passerby and utter a few words like “Aey Ladki” with utmost glee.

A confused hedgehog with glasses passing off as teddy bear’s sister. The hedge at most times accompanies the vixen and loves to shirk its thorns every time the vixen gets hyper active.

2 Hippos passing off as 1st and 2nd monkey’ wives. The elder hippo loves to play the disgruntled villain not satisfied with the ocean around it and tries to aim the stars, while the second hippo gives it immense competition being equally wily, and at the same time getting involved in underworld, world politic and the likes.

Oh yea, there is a third hippo always scheming and plotting of eating other’s babies – I mean stealing someone else’s babies.

A couple of foxes, a cow passing off as politician, a buffalo as underworld mafia and a rather slimy giraffe make up for the rest of the inmates of this zoo.

Meet the zoo keeper – Rhimjim.

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If Rhimjim is not getting the teddy bear to smile, then she is either settling a bout between the two hippos, or is trying her best not to uproar the vixen and its companied. If Rhimjim is not pleasing her monkey, then she is busy stopping the other two monkeys from tearing each other’s hair out. And if Rhimjim is not doing anything in particular, there is always the giraffe who threatens to run away with her beloved monkey. The of course, the cow straying 10 miles away is as much her business as much as the black buffalo (No, its not a paradox!), is her concern as well. In between, she also keeps busy shooing away un-required species like mamaji-fox and other sundry elements.

The three monkeys while their time in business pleasures, and fight amongst themselves. The first 2 monkeys want the cage torn down, which causes the teddy bear to have multiple bouts of hysteria and heart attacks – alas, not once does he die. Why the teddy tries to hang himself once, but the whole circus troupe somehow manage to save him. Anyhow, I hope you got the gist of it all.

Of course the receiving end of all this is the zoo keeper called Rhimjim. The inmates have such tremendous liking and obsession towards Rhimjim that any specie even remotely with Rimjhim won’t do. Thus, she is always at receiving end of it all – The hippos threaten to eat her off, while the vixen can’t wait to tear her face in two. The hedgehog fantasizes herself entangled in her too. The teddy is the only one quite understandable towards Rimjhim.

As if this weren’t enough, the giraffe is always busy poking her nose in zoo keeping activities trying to learn some tricks herself.

Gosh so much for animal exotica eh? I best, animal planet has better things to watch.

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As expected, the direction is crass from the word go. There is no rhyme or reason or anything. A misguided doctor from another serial has ended up as a vet in this serial trying to cure the zoo keeper who is suffering from a vixen bite – I mean, cancer. There is no reason why zookeeper needs to die, and there is no reason why she will survive.

I don’t have animal planet telecast on my TV – thus I get my share of my animals by watching this serial. As expected, the depressed teddy bear steals the show by its sheer intensity and its idiosyncrasies of its life. Its indeed a great relief to my comic bones when I see the bear sing or break into a jig. The others merely add or decrease some amount of glitter. I only hope they don’t show the two hippos hugging each other ever – that might cover the whole TV screen – gosh!

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If you were wondering why my review began with humans and quite inanely moved towards animals, well, the review has no purpose and its purposeless at this serial is. I know my review meandered endlessly into something else, but that’s just a melancholy out of watching Piya Ka Ghar. Yes Yes – its still a human serial.

Go figure out the animals.

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PS: thanks suprena1 for the giraffe and the teddy bear.
© Suyog Deshpande.
The above content was originally posted on Mouthshut.com under the username suyog.

Every generation has a memory. Whilst my adolescent days were buried in innocent treasures like Small Wonder and the likes, it was probably The Wonder Years that simply stay put in memory, and will last an epoch. Adolescence passed, and then into college, where there came again, another series, which again will last a lifetime. Yes, as I will always reminiscence The Wonder Years, years later, will I also cherish another memorable series – F.R.I.E.N.D.S.

Admittedly, I don’t claim to have seen all ten seasons. Nor did I see the complete tenth season too, but then that has always been the beauty of this serial. You really didn’t need to follow it to get hooked – you could start on it anywhere, and yet fall in love with it. Nor were all seasons great too, but then there is an unmistakable aura about the series which remains. A decade later, the chemistry between Monica, Joey, Rachel, Phoebe, Chandler and Ross is as fresh as…. Err… yesterday’s Rose (Ok stupid analogy… lets try again) as fresh as fresh air.

Indeed, its difficult to choose the worst amongst them because they are so good, I will just go ahead and name the worst character I did not like most. Lets make it simple – I mean its difficult to choose the best amongst them because none of them are worst, I will just go ahead and name the best character I did not hate most. Excuse me, my English is as worse as Joey’s geography, but you may guess it right – it had to be the lazy, dull, unassuming Joey.

Chandler: [To Joey who’s removing his tie] Would you put that back on? Monica’s gonna be here any minute!
Joey: But it hurt’s my Joey’s Apple.
Chandler: [frustrated] Okay, for the last time. It’s not named for each individual man.

All-right done with the favorite parts – but lets be fair, I think I liked Rachel too, I mean who wouldn’t ;-), though she was not necessarily the funniest character. And Monica too- I mean her err…mmh… cooking?. Cannot do without Phoebe – No No – the ultimate sneaky peaky a must have friend, and especially her poetry. Chandler is so funny, especially with Joey – No he is my favorite too – especially his one liners and enders. Of course I love the dinosaur too, and because I love dinosaurs, I love Ross too- I love his I-am-so-confused-with-this-world attitude. Ah well, what a waste of two paragraphs trying to guess whom I liked best.

An eclectic wandering of Phoebe–

Smelly cat, smelly cat
What are they feeding you?
Smelly cat, smelly cat
It’s not your fault
They won’t take you to the vet
You’re obviously not their favorite pet
You may not be a bed of roses
And you’re no friend to those with noses

The point is – None of them were above the theme of the whole series – friends; precisely why I loved all the zany characters. More so, because a little of friends is in everyone.

What I loved about friends was that the show was not pretentious in nature. American TV is obsessed with catering to every segment of society, and irreversibly any damn show you pick, the makers make it a point to have a character from prominent ethnic communities to satisfy both audiences. Friends was different – they didn’t follow the normal TV standards, and there was no pretensions. The show rose above the menial suit-to-everyone characterizations to actually consist of people in a real life situation, which made it all the more appealing to everybody. Friends was a good example of a script being larger than the character’s serial – and of course, for 10 complete years, being blessed by a star cast that shared an amazing acting chemistry.

Phoebe: [Right after playing a song in the coffee shop ] If you want to receive e-mails about my upcoming shows, then please give me money so I can buy a computer.

Of course Friends was not without it fair share of flaws. As in all sitcoms, seasons 8 or 9 weren’t really spectacular. Additionally, their underlying humor towards life sometimes got a little too crass and amateurish. Their handling of fatherhood, motherhood and babies was done pretty amusing and amateurish and sometimes felt went overboard with the humor, but then compared to ten years, small facets like these don’t really matter a lot does it? All in all, barring its small share of flaws, Friends remained on a singular track with lots of sideys, specials and such happening, but basically revolving in and around the coffee shop, and more prominently Monica’s apartment.

The season finale (05/05/2004) –

The season finale drew the curtains on FRIENDS for good (hopefully). What I loved about the last episode was the spirit of the serial – no melodrama, no overdone hyperdramatics – just the way it began, it just remained. Of course an hour long special did provide a lot of scope for emotions, but were subtly handled. The humor remained intact. The best part was the evening long specials of best scenes of FRIENDS really lighting up my day.

Should I be giving the end of the finale? Nah – I resist. Though a memorable mention to a particularly humorous part of the finale –

Doctor [To chandler and Monica]: The other one will be out in a minute.
Monica: Excuse me? What will be out of what?
Doctor: The other baby! You knew they were twins right?
Chandler: Twins? Two babies?!!. Hey, we ordered just one!

The F.R.I.E.N.D.S shall and will always remain. Now I hope to but the entire ten seasons DVD set in one go sometime. As they the Show must go on, and I hope there is something as lively and as friendly as FRIENDS soon on TV, else a generation might just have to live with the re-runs.

Happy viewing and cheers to one of the best sitcoms to hit televisions in a long time.

Joey: I play Doctor Drake Ramoray.
Sarah: I’m sorry. I don’t own a TV.
Joey: You don’t own a TV.? What’s all your furniture pointed at?
© Suyog Deshpande.
The above content was originally posted on Mouthshut.com under the username suyog.

Sleeping is no mean art: for its sake one must stay awake all day.
— Friedrich Nietzscheu

And I think, how so true these words are. Sleep is perhaps the most beautiful thing on earth and its rather a shame that a normal human spends 1/3rd of their lives sleeping. I wish everyone could sleep at least half their lives. Think of the advantages it would have produced –

• People could sleep more (Ah, profound observation here.)

• Population control. Yes, yes, come to think of it people sleeping more could produce lesser. Err, only it doesn’t back fire that is 😉

• Normal workday hours would be a 6 hour a day work – bliss!

• World would be a safer place since half the times either part of the world would be busy sleeping instead of bothering about other half of world’s problems.

• Kekta would have a hard time finding spots to air her horror shows – I think this is the best reason!

But then, life is not this simple. Sleep is something simply sacred, something simply divine, simply irreplaceable, (of course lord of dungeons and grim reapers will severely debate this 😉 – they have better permanent methods they did argue, but sigh… ), simply irresistible, and plain simply enjoyable. The most profound things in this world are simple, and if you look above, there are so many simple joys of sleeping. And best part of all – falling asleep is really simple too – just close your eyes. Ah, so much simplicity in life eh? How can one not like sleeping!

A few simple reasons why one must sleep –

• You always dreamed of double date with J.Lo on one side and Tina Turner on the other side (all right, not Tina, mayhaps Queen Latifah? – no eh? Britney then?). Anyway point is, a mere mortal may achieve all that (s)he ever wanted to achieve in life.

• The day began badly; your boss fired you again for coming late, for not working hard, for not being motivated, for not being interested enough in job; Remedy? – SLEEP. You always wanted to kick his bu*tt hard – at least take the satisfaction that you could at least kick him while sleeping!

• Sleep usually induces other activities which then help reduce stress, tension, relief, oppressed feelings, and most of all release for a few moments of this ungodly world.

• Sleep makes you appreciate life 😉 (Hail Grim Reaper here!)

Anyways, so much for the sleep inducing introduction to this sleeposgasmic review. Life is too short to stay awake, hence my friends, one must cultivate healthy sleeping habits. These habits will not help people sleep more, but also err… will help people err… sleep more… yawnnnn.

So how must one cultivate healthy sleeping habits?

• Don’t sleep for 16 hours of your day. You will automatically feel sleepy enough. So Intelligent eh? The point is, for me a healthy sleep is night sleep – other sleeps are pleasure sleeps err… I mean, siesta sleeps.

• Eat like a bakasura – u is bound to develop very healthy sleeping habits indeed then ;-).

• Ignore the point above – I meant the opposite. If you sleep on an empty stomach, you will wake up empty 😉 (Stop. Applause. Continue). Seriously, one must not sleep on empty stomach. Not only you will feel much emptier next day, I kind of feel rather weak! I simply don’t believe in the King-Prince-Pauper food theory, and I think I always sleep well when I have had a sumptuous helping of chicken tikka masala coupled with 3 tandoori rotis topping it off with a serving of pulao and raita and of course Kheer as desert. Gluttony is an art, and if practiced well can really help you sleep well. Point is, eat healthy to have good sleeps.

• Exercise! – Kehne main kya jaatha hain. I do regular exercise by holding peanuts in my hands, and trying out different ways I can toss them up and land them in my mouth. Anyways, I have heard that by exercising you can sleep well. I am always too sleepy to exercise anyways, so I don’t know the efficiency of the results. Reminds me, I need to exercise my mouth before the next sentence. There are also other exercises, though I am very reluctant to suggest them in public spaces, though are a sure fire way of falling to sleep – no, it doesn’t fail ;-).

In addition sleeping healthy has health reasons –

• You grow hairy like a bear. Sleeping is believed to reduce hair loss, temporary hair loss, alleviate baldness (sorry wrong word), lessen baldness, and give kali-reshmi-zulfi to those who desire. It doesn’t mean that all ladies should sleep more ;-).

• Then, I guess I have also heard that if you don’t sleep well, your neural system may start malfunctioning. Next time that dog runs behind you when you jog at 5 in the morning, you know what went wrong with the dog. Allow your dogs to sleep well, please. Sorry, lost my way. On second thoughts, how many agree that dogs actually act to kill our sleep?

• Sleeping is fun.

Well, I think I have nearly come to the end of this review. I have been feeling sleepy ever since I started this review. Its nearly 3 weeks I have started this review, and yawn; this has been one boring review!

Oh, by the way, research hasn’t still found a reason why we sleep. Lets sleep to this!

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© Suyog Deshpande. The above content was originally posted on Mouthshut.com under the username suyog.

Indian authors have never enjoyed world fame – Not many have been lucky in getting their work across the globe and show to people what fine writers India possesses. While most good authors have been vernacular authors in India, their works are rarely translated in put forward on the globe – While Bhyrappa was not as lucky as Marquez to get his work One Hundred Years Of Solitude to world and eventually win a nobel prize for that, Bhrappa’s most works evoke similar respect – For example, there is no better deserving book than Parva to literally sweep any kind of awards that exist in literary world, however, the lack of outreach has prevented this. For a long time I was in complete awe of Parva and though One Hundred years of Solitude did bring me out of that hang over, it required another of the same author’s work VamshaVriksha, translated The Uprooted (not quite literal translation, but very appropriate to the content), to bring me out of the magic of Parva. Incredibly simple and incredibly complex at the same time, this is a book that leaves its readers so drained, so full, so many answers, and so many questions, that in the end, a reader is bound by the duality of nature of the book.

”Who are you? What are you? Where are you going? Ask these questions to yourself and watch these answers change…”
— Richard Bach, Illusions

While Richard Bach merely chose to pose the questions and leave it to the reader, Bhyrappa asks the very same questions and more in the book. Its not the questions that enthrall the reader, it’s the justification to the answers that enthrall you. What is your purpose in life? Can faith be guided by greed? Do you love a person so much that you did give up your own child to be with him? Do you love your work so much that you did give up on your wife and family to pursue your goals? Are you strong enough to shed any kind of hatred towards another person? How much do you know about your child, and more importantly, yourself? Does your past make a difference to who you are? Does your past influence your future? Is devotion love? Is love devotion? Whose sorrow is great – a mother who lost her child or a child who lost her mother? Do you think you are firmly rooted in this circle of life?

Probably that is half the thinking a reader will do in reading this book. This is a book about 2 families, and yet the complexities of each character touch upon almost everything in life. This is a story about a mother who lost her son to floods and feels the sorrow of it. It’s a story about a woman who lost her husband and her sorrow at becoming a widow so early in life. It’s a story of progressive thinking of the widow wishing to be happier in life. It’s a story of commitment to one’s dharma and karma by a person. Its also a story of man who is so passionate about his work that he forgets his wife in it. It’s a story about a man who marries another lady out of pure love and greed of common goal. It’s a story of woman’s undivided love for her husband and her loneliness. It’s a story about a child loving impotent man, and his introspection of the various aspects of life that he has changed his opinion on. But ultimately it’s a story of a woman, a widow who mourns her husband, loves another man so much she wants to marry him. Yet she is also in the duality of her love to a man and duty of a widow, her unquestioning quest for the path that leads to mental peace.

Bhyrappa weaves his story around such principles and is able to bring about a justification which you cannot just help nodding with – Every character justifies his or her actions throughout their life, to the point, that their duality becomes an issue you think off, and not the characters. You cannot help sympathizing the wife who longs for her husband, but you cannot help agreeing to the justification of the husband in leaving his wife. Such is the beauty of book – along with every character and their metamorphosis, you think the same way they do – to the point you ask the same questions to yourself. It’s a book that just doesn’t go by characters, but it’s a study of human nature and its desires, the norms of the society, the regulations of an Arya life. At the very core lies in a story about 2 families, orthodox Hindu Brahmin families, trying to make sense of their duties as Brahmin, and at the same time find themselves uprooted of the very foundation of their life. Or like the author best describes in a passage – like a branch which fell from the tree as if the tree had no longer the use of that branch.

Prakirthi and Purusha, (Nature and Man) give this book an absolute meta physical look to the book – while every event in the book derives an relation between nature and man in form of woman and man, it also derives beautifully the meaning of being uprooted on the nature (woman) and Purusha (man). To really grasp the meaning of this metaphysical line, its best left to the reader to understand it.

Fortunately, the translation is again by my related grand-father Dr. K. Raghavendra Rao, and he doesn’t fail to deliver. This is a joint effort by him and his wife (who by the way is a very nice lady, and I shall always miss her tea that she used to prepare when I got home from college), and the effort shows. A translated version never really tells you the magic of author’s real wordings, but a great translation will captivate you in any language by the way it has been translated – same is with this book – the translation itself captivates you so much that you did desire to read the original too.

In the end, you must have made out how much I have loved reading this book. If Parva is possibly the best book I have read in my life, then The Uprooted comes a close second. Not a book to be missed at any cost in life.

”I glance at the headlines just to kind of get a flavor for what’s moving. I rarely read the stories, and get briefed by people who are probably read the news themselves.”
–George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Sept. 21, 2003

Reading a techie novel is something which doesn’t really inspire me (after all why would I read something which I do for a living?!). However not counting that, with 3 more techie novels which I have to finish (since I have bought them), and also with a hope that some combination of keys which I am typing doesn’t cause the notorious Office XP to hang and crash, I proceed therefore to review, which is actually, well, about a BUG. Now, for hopeful environmentalists here or some bug expert, first and foremost, this is a book about a BUG as in the world of computers; sorry to disappoint you, but this BUG lives in the machine world, and unlike objects of curiosity of its lively counterparts, the BUGS in machine world excel at making you gape with horror, shock, amazement, irritation, anger, loath, hatred, and have you tear your hair apart for its sheer capacity to tease you when you expect it the least.

What’s worse than finding a bug in a program? Catch the next computer programmer beside you and ask.

Ellen Ullman herself has been a programmer for around 20 years, and now a days writes for various magazines and has a fan following. So when she decided to write a fiction novel set in the techie world, eyebrows were raised as to how would she come up with something that was easily accessible to readers in all domains, and still avoid the smirk of the geeks. While she succeeds at both, her intrinsic sense of programmer gets the better of her at many places, there by making geeks happier than others. However that should not deter people from other fields to try out the books, however the audience acceptance will definitely be amongst computer literate, and of course anyone familiar with C and the ubiquitous monster UNIX (which perhaps is the best thing the machines could have ever asked for).

THE BUG
A BUG can be anything in your program – a simple pointer going haywire, your memory allocation going berserk, or even a simple loop which instead of terminating after 10 iterations, decides it doesn’t want to. Of course bugs are caught sooner or later, with ‘later’ being an infinite concept of time; Its the harrowing time between finding the cause of the bug that makes life miserable. Like any other BUG, once found, it usually is a ridiculous piece of code which just happened to be there.

While it’s a simple one line story, I am sure the geeks here appreciate the horror of the predicament.

There is a bug in the system which causes the application to crash at random times due to random input responses.

The book well, is about finding that elusive bug and correcting it. Simpler said than done eh?

REPRODUCTION
One of the toughest things you can encounter with random BUGS is the reproduction. If you cannot reproduce an error, or more appropriately, the BUG itself, then you don’t know where to start. If you cannot see the ‘effect’ of the BUG again and again, chances are you will never the ‘cause’ too

The BUG deeply explores an era set in time when Graphical User Interfaces were becoming famous – a story set back in the programming world of mid 1980s when the root ruled (pun intended). The backdrop of the company, programming an interface for their latest database is going through all the typical chaos of a company trying to get a product to market. A typical scene of a techie company is superbly narrated – a bunch of programmers coding a application, sending over their modules to testers, who then will return with BUGS, and programmers correcting the BUG until an acceptable level of tolerance is reached and the software is released in the market, with BUGS un-discovered or intentionally, for some newer person to find it and report it back. (In a lighter vein, I wonder if Windows XP development team ever had a testing team!)

Reverting back to book again, a BUG which surfaces out of nowhere, creates havoc amongst the life of the tester and a programmer respectively. A superb narration of a (rather cliché American) life of the programmer makes for compulsive reading – the trials, the hopelessness, the frustrations of not finding out the BUG and correcting and it and overall mental tiredness of trying to catch something beyond your control, all the emotions are superbly captured by a one time programmer herself, giving it more scope and understandability – I guess it take a programmer to feel a programmer.

CAUSE
Sometimes BUGS may require as simple a step as declaring your variables from one data type to another. At times a simple change which took care of one BUG, doesn’t necessarily mean you wont face another BUG caused by the effect of the change. In real world systems, there is no such thing as a perfect software system – even mission critical software have bugs, and as the author brilliantly points towards the end – its there, waiting, lurking behind the doors, may be weeks, may be years, to strike at that opportune moment when it shouldn’t and create havoc. If you are lucky you will never see it.

The explanation right from the first page is pretty technical with oodles of UNIX and C programming thrown in – that an attempt is also made to make the novice reader understand the happenings is an appreciable effort by the author. While taking a parallel to the BUG, the author also vividly paints out images of techie world to the readers – the constant head-banging deadlines, the eagerness to release half finished products, the layoffs, venture capitalists, role changes, almost every aspect of a techie company is brought about as an undertone in the book, making it immensely enjoyable. She also perfectly captures the feelings of a human when dealing with a BUG and the art of debugging the BUG. Probably as a mistake or may be an intentional trick, the author leaves a BUG in the BUG for the readers to grasp. I admit I had to see again to find that BUG!

TEST
Once a bug has been dealt with, you cannot clasp your hands with wonder. For you never know what you may face next. Sometimes you can predict what will occur, a newer bug may awake, where that bug will occur and so on, however its what you cannot predict you should be scared of. A software without bugs is a BUG itself, and probably useless – that’s a fundamental nature of software, in a lighter vein that is!

In short, let me just state that the book has been a very enjoyable read for me, and even if you are not a geek, you should read this for pure thrilling narrative. On the only flip side of the novel is the language which goes from first person to third, from past to present and future in an eccentric manner. But that is probably just about it. On the whole, the BUG is a very a good read, and if you are from the geek world, then this is one book you must read!

Ps: I have and clearly avoided mentioning any part of the philosophical jingo in the book – its eminently enjoyable and very true to today’s world which is ruled by computers and not humans.

”We had a chance to visit with Teresa Nelson who’s a parent, and a mom or a dad.”
— George W. Bush, Jacksonville, Florida, Sept. 9, 2003

I had solemnly decided after the horrific experience of last time that I would never ever fly the Maharajah again. However fate it seems had crueler joke to play; and I had to visit the Maharajah, Air India yet again. So when two weeks ago I had fly our national carrier back to India, I made sure that

1. I had a copy of Hanuman Chalisa with me (Just in case you know…)

1. A couple of good books which would distract me from Air-India’s in flight and out flight entertainment (read scare).

However my situation was not helped very much when I discovered that I had to sit besides a Gujju Old Couple whose first remark to me was – “Gujarathi cho ne?” (I assume you are a Gujarati only!) After settling down with kem cho and other pleasantries, I quickly decided to bury my head into the book I had to chosen to read in-flight, lest Air India or my pleasant companions decided to bug me.
The book I had chosen to read was “Stupid White Men”, written by Michael “On the Oscars stage who bushwacked bush” Moore.

STUPID WHITE MEN
In a nutshell, Stupid White men is about –
1. Stupid White Men (Glory to my brains!)

1. White men who are Stupid (Applause please, thank you!)

2. Stupid men who happen to be White (I am too much!)

In a screwshell, the book is a big eye opener on Corporate America and how some Stupid Corporate Americans are making ordinary citizens look, well – Stupid.

Stupid White Men though begins with a Stupid man from Texas who got elected to be the President, it traces back and forth between different scams and hams of the American Life. Moore takes a dig at everything that has made the country America. Though being the most developed nation in the world, the country Americans still don’t belong anywhere, half the world hates them, live a life driven my media, have no sense of culture in their lives, and still support a stupid man who has brought more misery to the world than Hitler himself some eons back. In a way, I fully endorse what Mr. Moore has to say about the sorry state of affairs burgeoning in the country.

Stupid White Men doesn’t take the normal road in telling you about the vagaries and scams of America – Instead of writing a book, Moore simply talks to you. He talks for a good 300 pages, and yet you never ever tire of him. His premise is simple – Most of world’s chaos within and outside America has been caused by Whites, and by that he means Corporate Whites. Moore knows he gets a lot of flak for what he says, yet he goes about publishing books which he says what he means.

In a clean sweep, Moore addresses the following issues with superb spice and humor backed with some excellent research work –

1. How Bush got himself elected in 2000 – The details and intricacies of how the election was flawed and how Bush got through the elections

2. General American myopia in knowing about the world and their world knowledge as good as zero

3. How should men of America behave and live. He also suggests that Men should give up their places to women and let them do the ruling!

4. Corporate Scandals like Enron and how Americans were duped into the stock market; the stock market cost millions of Americans their livelihoods

5. How Economy not doing well is a quite a lie when all the big companies in the last five years and their corporate heads only raked in more money in millions

6. That the education spending in America is gone to dogs – why in some schools there aren’t no drinking water too?

The above is just a breather as to what Moore addresses in this book!! And he does it in great style, with dollops of bush-whacking and cheney-slapping.

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Sorry for digressing, I just thought I did put this here to make my review longer!
America is nation starving for media – it cannot live with media dishing out daily dosage of how one should lead their lives here. One of the funniest things this country always brings about is the amount of surveys they do; for example –

• In a recent survey they found that 12 % of pet owners called their pets home from work!

• Around 24% of homosexuals smoke! Wait there is more – out of the 24% more than 60% who smoke and are gays have equal chances of getting an STD!

• People who are distracted while driving have more chances of meeting an accident! (This one takes the cake!)

• There was one in TOI today morning, though not American in nature – People who fail in love are equally to lose in gambling!

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It would be unfair for me to say what kind of political aspirations this man has, but nonetheless the book provided a good dose of humor. I was more concerned with the hidden information and the humor and less about the political inclinations. I least cared what Moore thought for others, but yes, when he whacks bush, then its immediately my interest too! More on his political inclinations follow in my next review.

Moore’s style is simple, and to the point. He doesn’t use flowery language, nor does he fail to call a spade a spade! He simply presents the facts and then asks his readers to do the thinking. He writes letters to Bush, Arafat, God, Sharon and other leaders and while using humor suggests practical suggestions to end the world’s troubles. That is the greatest success of the book – practical and humorous!

In epilogue Moore mentions that success withstanding, this would be the last book he did write. The book went on to become the highest selling non-fiction book of year 2002, showing there are more sensible people in America than he thinks! He keeps his promise – he wrote another humorously witty book, this time completely devoted to dubious dubyaman – “Dude, where’s my country”!

And that’s what I am going to review next! Till then, grab this one immediately! And by the way, the old couple weren’t finished yet…