TheEnchantedPileOfThatLonelyBird

Lonely

2006-05-19T08:42:00.000-07:00

Its been some time. And I needed this revisit.
The Lonely Bird sings again.
From her pile of sweet ash , she incarnates. Pain aah, how sublime, it stings again.
Unsure, Confused Melee..........STOP, stop this din again!

The wheel of time takes a turn. The dark night bows to solemn greetings. Rainbow lies broken. Its time to blend with the smoke.

AaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaHHHHHHHHHHhhh.............................the lonely bird sings again!

2005-01-27T23:54:00.000-08:00

Patel Shot.at Times Square...Well I am not gone. I am not back. Lots has brewed . And yet quiet flows the Don.....!!!!!

Well...Veer Zara--Yuxx did ya say!!!!!

2004-11-21T22:12:00.000-08:00

Veer Zara!--An Austere Zara ! An incredible Veer! A love saga told to perfection!

I had been reading reviews and hearing people damning the three and half hours, rejecting the movie out right so much so, that despite SRK I decided not to go for it. Thinking it would be another corny flick with high melodrama and over doze of singing and dancing. Singing and dancing, there was and that to what contraire!

A friend recited high points of the movie to me over ISD : ), told me how it was poetry in motion and while at that, I could not resist going for a seat in the next show. Warned the company who came along of what was in store. That made the job easy lest they should have come out with complaints.

What I liked about the flick. Well almost every thing

: The young modern and beautiful Rani fighting for women’s rights to conduct justice and be at par with the male dominion. She was the nervous rookie, her belief and principles leading to the iota of confidence which don’t we all need to start with what we want to achieve, when there’s not much hope?

: The beautiful as a portrait Zara. Pampered yet not spoilt. Brave yet not a rebel, cultured, her father’s son, in love and yet with a mind of her own. She was as the 60 year old Hindustani Sumer Singh – Amitabh Bacchan saluted her right, an epitome of tradition.

: Veer, drool, Chopper Pilot, drooool, Country boy..straight from the soil, drool some more, incredulously wise, humouredly agile, with a doting village and heart that loved with conviction, with truth, with passion (so SRK!).

: The love story. He asked her for a day of her life. So reminiscent of my all time favorite ‘before sunrise’ , a small frame flick with ethan hawk in which he spends a day with an out right stranger, all conversational in Vienna, when they meet on a train to paris! Destiny, how they meet. Symbolic, how bauji thinks zara despite a pakistani was the boti he picturised with veer on a cycle holding him from behind. I think I have forgotten what bauji says when veer asks him how do you decide if this was ‘the’ girl! All the mutual moments. Across the fields, bed of flowers, on the sledge bridge, riot of colors, a funny bauji and his madrasi turned sikhni boti, their beautiful number, zaras adab, her turn to acknowledge veer as god sent, as love himself!

: Hindu Muslim/ Pakistani Hindustani/ Rich Poor/ North Indian South Indian/ Ayingar Aiyyar/ Brahmin Rajput. Have we not heard that over and over. How fathers get disillusioned and mothers too, only to realize in the end that why they are saying no is because of the societal stigma, their adherence to community and its dynamics. Yet they concede. Agree, accept. That when they have a Veer for a son and Zara for a daughter. None less!

: SRK kaidi no 786 verse. Exuberance on display. Lata Mangeshkar and Asha Bhonsle. Gulzar. Ye Des Tera Bhi Hai Mera Bhi!

Slick Flick That!

Lost In Translation

2004-09-19T21:21:00.000-07:00

Theres a cloud out there that refuses to rain....
Theres an old feathered leaf out there which greened contrary to decay...I saw it withering again today...In no time it too shall fly away...
Theres not far away blue skies...The shade is blue very very blue....
Theres an old boat on the right in waters that close to stench, a crooked road ahead, a village, purple house , shades of grey and i am not home...

where am I............

hum tum!

2004-09-05T09:39:00.002-07:00

guys are like this , galz like zat. oh amn't i full of this? saw this saif ali khan and rani mukherjee starrer today. ok ok missed it earlier. had been pining to see it. probably because have had dozes and dozes of when harry met sally on the tv . Have heard the men are from mars women from venus... and the twain shalt not meet theory over and over every day. Have been witness to guys not getting over this gal or that. Know women who dont know why their guys are like this or that.

the battle of the sexes carries on.

picture this. guy is crazy about this gal. both are on their own. the gal confides in him. he travels half an hour to get to catch the same bus as her. they are everywhere together. the dude ,believe me ,does nothing but think of her all 24 hours a day. he asks the lady out. the equations change. completely.

picture another. the guy asks the lady for marriage. she says no because she isn't sure. the next day she bats an aye and the guy, how crude could one get, says he is undecided.

picture more. fine let that be. on an uncouth plane. i once anounced guys are pigs and pat came the answer. well yes and they is always after filth. and then some say filth also have lotus that bloom in the marshes. is this going off track?

not that there is a track. told you. this is one elliptical orbit which has two focii and they is hard to reconcile. the onus being .. and that was the catch line of the flick in context: 'tum ke bina hum....'.........is all very lonely!!!

well symphony of hum and tum revolves around the caring and cared for....love and hate....laugh and tears....meetings and partings.....gushes and guffaws.....anguish and laughter !! theantagostic parallel playing the rhythm and rhapsody in the concertus of coexistence..!!!

tis my unforgettable....

2004-08-26T09:59:00.000-07:00

words poured outta me one day months ago.... this is what they said in whole.......:

neela tha mera ambar..
chaha tha...
neele nabh pe udoon main chiridiya ban kar
us nabh me indradhanush ka fera tha....
suraj khil ke muskurata tha..aise...
lagta tha saara aakash ..woh aakash mera tha.

fir jaana us ambar ke peeche...
door us neele nabh ke neeche...
ek anant kaal tha
jise jaan nahi saka koi...woh....antariksh
aseem asmaan tha..

knock knock iam looking to marry..

2004-08-12T02:21:00.000-07:00

A friend just wrote in and I agree. We are all in the same mode of mid 20's, single, independent and being forced to look around. Because unlike the 30 something youngsters ross's and rachels, we have folks who want us settled. want us married. may be not as stringent as folks back in the 80's even 90's or before but yes they are ardent that we kids get our matches soon enough for them to breathe easy. why do i find that word 'matches' corny.

saw a movie a couple of months back. called 'knock knock iam looking to marry'. very southie, very directly put, with a story very similar to our plight. a 24 something in banglore checking out boys and men, traditional, masochists, boisterous, babies even druggists.

i have met people while not being interested for zilch in the whole 'suitable boy' game. There have been interesting people who did not click. There were not so interesting people who would have clicked but for my outcry. But to sum it all up. This is not done. This is not the way it is supposed to be. This is all wrong. I hear those drums from distant greens. People tell me how it was when they first met. They tell me they knew it, they knew that was it. They tell me it happened in due course. I say hello. Bad game. I give up . Well thats how another of friends whose mom sent him a picture of a lady lately, that when he had not even finished Vikram Seths great novel, puts it.

And now that I have made such a publication of probably peoples private confessions I wonder if I will ever look back at this piece and say -- 'well I knew it!' after writing that : ).

while i am waiting...

2004-08-06T07:10:00.000-07:00

iam all poetic today..right now..right here.. : )
so hear ye..

wither goes you wind..
leaving me behind....
wither to you clouds..
i am still here lost and found..

time you are flying away
you dont see me do you..
i waited and you is leaving me astray

sun promised me a smile..
think he missed this mile...

why dint i ask u and that gust of breeze
to take me with you ...not leave without for yonder..

come back you all..
come back i beckon...

i will wait...now and evermore....

The Chennai Chapter

2004-08-02T21:50:00.000-07:00

Its been for a long time that I have wanted to write about Chennai.
My work place for over a year. My destiny. The myth , the reality that is. The prejudice the folklore. The happenings , the traditions. The journey so far.

Iam not a good story teller. And yet I so long to tell this story. To write about the place I hate to not love and love to not hate.

To begin with, they say a place grows on you with time. Which is true. A handful of people to share your days with. A couple of places that you can reach out to. A few things that you know you could go about doing when theres little else to while on. All this and there you are. Grown with the place!!!

It started with a hotel called Abu Palace, my first lodgings in the city of dark interiors, idlis for breakfast and maxicabs, the mini dilapidated buses shaded green and a bumpy ride assured.

The hotel is located in down town across a road so narrow it would pass as a bylane. But thats how all roads are in this city. Have you heard of single lane flyovers. They are aplenty here. Useless but curving over shopping malls and huge banners. That makes for the next big attraction, hoardings. You see them all around you. Huge, of silk sarees and gold jewellery, of the latest tam flicks and the rest, they canopy the main roads everywhere.

The hotels in chennai are small. They aint very jazzy. The junta is simple. Unlike the snob appeal of a dine out in a five star at say Delhi. You can just not get it in, at Chennai.

I shifted from this place onto my next dwellings at Suraj Towers, a couplet in the whole form the Suraj and Chand towers. Apartments , minutes away from the sea. Located in very congested exteriors. Two local theatres flank the road adjacent, on its left and on the right. But once in, the serenity takes control. The place is very convenient. It has a japanese restaurant downstairs and the top floor is inhabited by its oriental staff. Amidst live families that wake up in the wee hours of the morns and sleep just before midnight or even prior. Mornings smell of incense and dosas. Old men of the society gather every evening and sit in rows basking in the evening sea breeze. Theres a basket ball court and a sand court for volleyball which the children and youngsters alike get to make the most of.

This is the basic most I could get to take off on my share of Chennai. It is just a signature. Not even a preface. I shall update hence forth on this land of the bay of bengal and its gray waters, my favorite east coast road, temples, foreigners, joints, dance, music, theatre, shopping, and ofcourse rasam and sambar. : )

'to love and be loved in return'....moulin rouge!

2004-07-25T06:37:00.000-07:00

well all said and done...you say life is not just what you do 60 hours a week its the rest of them.. my maths is fumbling here.

so lets start with that....today is a sunday. i have caught up with the latest flick in town (spidy was aWsome!!). i have spoken with all the pretty faces i needed to. i cooked, blimy i did, and ate it too, i watched pretty woman.. i was trying to catch up on the match. i went to the beach. i slept like a log. i shopped. and yet there is something that i have not done.

like a friend put in this sms today, and i quote: believe there is a purpose behind life. everyones. whats my aim or purpose. dont know . cant figure out..i unquote.

i answered coyly saying van gogh deciphered that in his thirtys while in a land of coal miners , lost , broke and hopeless, his dream of being a parish had just shattered, and there while putting coal on paper he realised art was where his heart was!

you might think being family it is. love and being loved. but is that it. does it all stop there. and when i say that i also know that i am not mother teresa. iam me. hello!!

writing more would open the pandoras box of trouble-some existence thats me! so i stop here with promise of better sustenance to this blog!

(does the title of this blog go anywhere near wot i just scribbled....ummm??!!??)

heyy wot do u do for a living .........

2004-07-22T19:59:00.000-07:00

do you sit in front of a plain old box writing lines of code, which you find hard to interpret to a layman who turns to ask you, 'woman what do you do..write mathematics on a box???'

do you work for the army and deliver food to the flood hit on dingys in remote east and wait for war to decorate your tabs, and if with family are not interested in either?

do you work in a six star luxury hotel with nothing much to do but cater to the running smooth of the place you go to work, which is running smooth anyways. you have offs on a week day when the whole world is busy working??

did you pass out of the most happening B School to find yourself selling dettol in wilderness and nooks and roads of the country you had only seen on aaj-tak!

or are you getting a monthly stipend while at research which is bound to go for aeons, conflicted if you should have picked up the job that your other class mate took out of insecurity?

well thats my closet of people who have just started to see the world with a different perspective, that of a livelihood earner...and in the process they are running out on life!!

``The enchanted pile of that lonely bird, Who sings at the last his own death-lay, And in music and perfume dies away.''

2004-07-06T02:39:00.000-07:00

If I were to count my tryst with the unforeseen, my perception of oblivion, my hunches of the unknown, I might not come upfront with statistics. But that, does not cease my belief in the numbers game that some body plays with much immaculate precision, time and again. Numbers with which that somebody mocks at you. There have been times when I have said 'God you are funny!’ Not knowing who I was addressing.

Have you noticed those days of your months of your years when the whole world that you know or once knew, remembered you out of a sack and made up for your cell phone to go off battery.

Can you recollect the time when you were desperately desolate. And the very some day next, when your time line of appointments went shooting up dizzy heights??

Have you faced the problem of plenty one fine day after aeons of struggle and strife??

Have you noticed the full moon doing tricks on you? Trickery that percolates down to the icicles of your moods...your despair, your jumpitude???

If the fourth and the hundred and eighth dimension were to merge to seek this information that comes of no where, of a certain event, person or thing I shall only bestow my amusement and reaffirmation on cults that might seem scary or freaky but have a basis on these brain waves that are so indiscreet so un adhering and yet they blow you off to surprises oh so often!!