I went to see 3 idiots and instead saw a Pirate on the horizon

3 Idiots.....

I liked the film. It was good. Just that. Good. Made it to the Good category. By the skin of its teeth. Barely. Not a standout and not quite as smartly and tightly made as the first MunnaBhai. It was a good enough time pass and paisa wasool. Amir's enthusiasm is infectious. Kareena is pretty and has an adequate performance. Madhavan was stellar and the other fellow remained just that "the adequate other fellow". The movie was adequate in all the departments except for... DRUMROLL PLEASE... the darned script. Pesky things those scripts! If only movies did not need scripts we would all be Fellini. It was not a watertight script; which is what I was hoping for, being that there was actually a book published long enough ago, to lift the darned thing from!

And hell yeah, the book (Five Point Someone by chetan Bhagat) is definately the meat and potatoes of the script never mind what VVC and Co contend and froth at the mouth and deny. Anyone... even a pirate with a eyepatch... would be able to tell that if they have read the book and the seen the movie. Without the book, there would have been no skeleton to the story unless Abhijaat Joshi and Chetan Bhagat have some telephatic connection and think the same thoughts at the same time, and put them on paper at the same time... which they dont.

So yes, my appreciation of the movie is tainted by the blatant disregard for someone else's creative idea.

My friend Memsaab tells us about her discomfort with the way Rancho was played. (Go read her blog, she's amazing) I agree with her at the somewhat dissatisfyingly unidimentional Rancho. I think if you dear reader, have read the book you will understand his character (Ryan) better. That character was real, and there was a reason for Ryan being so disturbingly and uncomfortably real.

Was five point someone stellar writing. Hardly. But it was an interesting and original idea and very true of IIT's. 3 Idiots in its dithering between purporting to being an original story and trying to build a tale on the original scaffold built by another architect else, fails in that it is merely good. It could have been taut and brilliant. Unfortunate.

Even more unfortunate, is that VVC comes for a family rife with writers. His nonchalant disregard for what is obviously someone else's creative baby is disturbing and deplorable.

I wonder what Raju Hirani was thinking when he read the script. If in his defence he had not read the book... strange... since EVERYONE in India had, and the book has been around for along enough time, he probably needs to be more of a complete director. He needs to read more. As does Aamir! When you are the captain of the ship, the rigging is really your responsibility.

The rigging was stolen, so is the plunder now stolen riches?

So 3 idiots.. good... I gueeesssssssss.

I need something with a high alcohol content and something else crunchy with a high calorie content to feel better again! I need comfort food and drink!

And how were your New Year celebrations?

Why I am interested in Tiger Woods's musical beds.

A friend asked in her blog if the media interest in Infidelities was justified. I had a comment to make on her blog. Go check her blog out. She is an insightful writer and the blog is very good.

Below is what I wrote as a comment on her blog.
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I do not see why the media should NOT write stories about Tiger Woods and his shenanigans. Tiger Woods sells and how! As bad boy and good (endorsements). He is a whole economy by himself. PGA will suffer, golf and all its support industries will suffer, why even shaving cream companies will suffer millions and billions if the Tiger Woods brand is devalued by his actions.

As such his story is deserving of media coverage and as the ultimate consumers we have the right to be both amused and entertained by stories of his peccadilios; just as much as we have the right to be informed of how the devaluing of his brandname will affect our own purchasing power. Any phenonmenon that affects my saving/purchasing capabilities must be investigated, giggled at, raged at or ultimately shelved for future reconsideration.

In the US context, it follows that the brandname devaluing of politicians or other powerful people who behave badly, will affect my life in many ways.

Indian or European sexual mores or definition of badboy behavior and brand devaluing is different. The corruptability of the press and also the profitability of the press in other countries is also a factor in what stories are newsworthy in economic terms. I am not going to compare what is acceptable and where. It is apples or oranges to guavas.

Money decides everything ultimately in any country, in any era, even how many beds a man or woman can warm.

Money also decides if it is acceptable for the aggrieved spouse to rage at the unfaithful one, golf club in hand or to accept the "transgression" in sati savitri fashion.

Ultimately money defines a culture and its mores.

Men and women have behaved badly everywhere, and in every era. Today, it affects me monetarily. Damn right, I am interested in the gory details.

Google schmoogle

Did you know that THE top google search keyword that brings folks to my blog is....

drumroll please....

CHUTIYA!

I guess I am owning it since I talked about Chutiyas and Chutiyagiri a very long time ago. Folks from Argentina to Norway and Patna have been searching for Chutiya and stumbling across my blog. I hope they enjoyed the rest of my humdrum posts too.

Okay here is another one : Haraami Kutta!

That should bring a lot more people to my blog.

Excuse me while I go wash my mouth out with carbolic soap.

In which she gives you a household hint and an excuse to get yourself a drink to start the weekend right!

So I can flip from fertility issues to household hints to political rants and then gossip! Yeah, I know sometimes you dont know what to make of me. Sometimes I dont know either.

So get yourself a glass of something good, a plate of something fatty and crunchy to eat and start your weekend off right... and read on.

I just saved myself a pile of money! Saving money is cause for celebration right? Go on, celebrate with me... go have have another drink! See, I just gave you another excuse to start your weekend already.. did'nt I?

Why am I so thrilled? Because I stopped myself... in the nick of time... from throwing away a couple of All Clad pots, that were the stars of my culinary world. I used them for everything. They were very expensive but just the best things that I had ever bought for my kitchen. I think I probably saved up for a few months for each pot, so you know how much I loved them.

Recently I have become a less than careful cook and they had become horribly charred. So bad that even steel wool and earnest scrubbing could not rescue them. Everything stuck to the bottom and everything cooked in them tasted burnt. I wrote to the manufacturer and used every possible thing to fix the problem... including this which can basically clean anything off anything. Sigh... I was ready to weep.

I had tossed them in the garbage, when an Aunt of mine came to visit from India. She pottered around my kitchen, switched all my spices and pots around until I could not find anything anymore, declared that we did'nt eat enough good ghee and she also lectured me endlessly on how wasteful we were. Worse, she threw away Husband's preserved pickled Herring! You can tell that she was generally begining to annoy me.

I was not really surprised when she started frothing at the mouth when she saw the pots in the trash. What she did next though surprised me.

She had me dive headfirst into the slimy garbage and pull them out and rinse them off. Then she told me put an inch of water in the pots and soak a cupfull of Sago .. Sabudana... which is different from Tapioca ... in the water overnight. The next day I was instructed to boil up the whole slimy mess and stir with a wooden spoon/non stick spatula while the mess boiled. Imagine my surprise when the charred bottom bits came unstuck... in huge flakes! No scratches, no elbow grease, no hard labor. It was like a miracle! It was wonderous! My pots were back to thier new pristine glory. It truly is a miracle I tell you. It was like pulling a few hundred dollars out of the garbage!

Since then I have used Sabudana to clean pretty much every mess in the kitchen. Counters with stuck on, dried on food like egg or aataa? Those burnt on patches on the oven shelves? Non stick pans which actually do stick if you forget to turn off the stove and are on the phone with a fun friend? Cleaning the outdoor grill? Scuff marks on highly polished dining table? Yeah, you guessed it. Sabudana in its various forms! Boiled up/powdered/gloppy paste. All of them work.

Now if I can only get the family to eat Sabudana Khichadi... sigh!

For rent?

Amitabh Bachchan has been a larger than life figure in my childhood and adolescence and certainly epitomised my idea of a movie star! I have always admired his acting skills and recently have come to appreciate his writing skills on his blog... though perhaps not the content.

Recently his noisy rants have been colorful and mildly amusing being that they come from his august mind. In a post on his blog he writes about gestational surrogacy and his feelings about that phenonmenon. His thoughts are buried in this post.

As someone who has gone through the entire wretched and excruciating process of fertility treatment, I was disturbed by his remarks. But then he can be excused. He and several others with hardline opinions have perhaps not walked a single step in the painful shoes marked infertility.

For me and my husband, while the process was long and sometimes felt hopeless we were blessed to have two children.

Has the experience left us completely unscathed? Perhaps not. The psyche is scarred and the joyous presence of our kids is still an incomplete balm. The entire process of fertility treatment has left us slightly different people. Very happy and content, but different. That my friends, is how big the issue of fertility is for many couples. For those who have not walked in our shoes to color the issues as good/evil in broad brush strokes is not warranted. To say children are merely commodities in our eyes makes a mockery of our desire to nuture a biological future generation.

I have written a comment on his blogpost and reproduce it here. Every blogpost of his generates a few hundred comments and perhaps my comment will get buried somewhere. So here it is for your reading pleasure and comment.

I do reccomend that you read his blogpost too so that you get reference to context. Let me know what you think.

My comment follows.
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At the risk of sounding curmudgeonly and shaking a virtual finger at you, I have something to say about your view of surrogacy for those faced with fertility issues.


It really and truly takes someone who has been through the extremely hellish process that is dealing with fertility issues to understand the anguish, hopelessness and feelings of personal loss that women and men seeking a child are subjected to. As a veteran of that process, let me assure you that even my own beloved mother did not understand my pain during those excruciating years. There is no way she can understand (though she tried hard to see things through my eyes and heart)… just as I do not expect you or Kutty, Madan or Puri to understand unless they are face to face with the issue of thier own infertility.

Ofcourse it follows that desperate people seeking a biological child will follow through any avenue allowed by modern science and where legal issues are not insurmountable. Surrogacy is just one such avenue. Does it make someone less of a mother because she did not carry her child in her own womb? Is seeking an affordable surrogate a crime for middle class person? Do middle class people have no right to pursue that course and pay less for the procedure if the “birth” mother (and i use this term loosely) is being also benefited? Is the child going to be less loved because it was not nourished by its nurturing mother’s placenta?

I think to color the entire issue in broad strokes with a black paint is wrong and is insensitive to those who struggle with fertility issues.

i hear so often… oh why dont they just adopt! yes, that is certainly an option but hearts and minds must come to terms with that eventuality when all other options are useless. Some decide to adopt and some cannot. Does it mean that the ones who decide not to adopt are incapable of loving a/thier child? ofcourse not! So why would I blacktar the issue of a possible surrogacy without considering that there are many shades of grey to that decision… just as there are so many in life.

Yes, i do agree with you that laws need to be carefully examined to allow for all circumstances to be covered before the child is even concieved. In that and in adoption laws, India needs a huge wake up call. However to denigrate the avenue of surrogacy as lacking in human values of parental love and affection is wrong. For some of us, it is the only way out.

Pugilistic

So this is what I have been doing! On many fronts! More to follow.

Yeah, that is my strong arm!

Interview with the Vampires

This tag is going around and I loved it. No one tagged me for this. No one ever tags me *sigh*

I ganked it from my namesake in Mumbai.

As much as I complain, praise and declare my love for my "just turned 5 Son" and "just turned 7 Daughter", perhaps a faithful reportage of my kids own words and actions will give y'all a sense how they interact and think.

ME: What is something I always say to you?
SON: Behaaaave! *makes exaggerated eye rolling motions*
DAUGHTER: I love you. *gives me a hug*

ME: What makes me happy?
SON:Singing in the shower. *giggles*
DAUGHTER: When I kiss you *kisses me*

ME: What makes me sad?
SON:Hitting your head! *makes wild and crazy whooping sounds and makes windmills of his arms*
DAUGHTER: When your legs hurt, like today. *kisses my left knee*

ME: How do I make you laugh?
SON: Singing in the shower. *now he is rolling on the ground with laughter*
DAUGHTER: When you tickle me *looks very serious*

ME:What do you think I was like as a child?
SON:A vegetarian.
DAUGHTER: I dont really know. *said very slow* ....IwantanAmericanGirlDollGymnasticsOutfitSetFromSamantha *said very fast*

ME: How old am I?
SON: A million *very serious*
DAUGHTER: Oldddddddddddd. When are you going to Billy to color your hair again?*very serious*

ME: How tall am I?
SON: 17 feet *said very fast*
DAUGHTER: 5 Feet or something. But Dad's really tall. He is the tallest in the family. *squinting at me*

ME: What is my favourite thing to do?
SON: Singing in the shower *makes dancing motions and pretend scrubs himself*
DAUGHTER: Buying Stuff *giggles madly*

ME: What do I do when you’re not around?
SON:You coooooook something.
DAUGHTER: Go to work.

ME: If I become famous, what will it be for?
SON: Wearing makeup. *jumps on the couch*
DAUGHTER: Singing *does some Hip Hop dancing motions and sings Romeo (Taylor Swift) into pretend mike*

ME: What am I really good at?
SON:Training *makes weighlifting motions and goes aaaahhhh aaaahhhhhh*
DAUGHTER: Doing Kick boxing. Sometimes you are and sometimes you ar'nt. Right? *squints at me looking skeptical*

ME:What am I not really good at?
SON:Singing in the shower *very serious and straight face*
DAUGHTER: Fixing things. *very, very, very serious and straight face*

ME: What is my job?
SON: Cooking and talking *runs into the kitchen and comes back waving a ladle in the air*
DAUGHTER: Stuffffffffff *looks very bored*

ME: What is my favourite food?
SON:Meat
DAUGHTER: Vegetables

ME: What makes you proud of me?
SON:When you give me a pedicure. *jumps on couch and throws a pillow across the room*
DAUGHTER: After you are done getting a shot without crying. *looks very serious*

ME: What makes me proud of you?
SON:When I sing in the shower. *proceeds to sing Tomorrow from the musical Annie*
DAUGHTER: When I get everything right on my spelling test. *kisses me*

ME: What do you and I do together?
SON:You give me a pedicure. *massages his left foot while hopping on the right. Daughter pushes him over. Son falls down. Fight ensues. Son cries*
DAUGHTER: Go to the Mall. *looking hopeful*

ME: How are we the same?
SON: Same in a different way. *looks very puzzled*
DAUGHTER: We both have black hair. *swings her long hair around and around and around and promptly falls down from dizziness. Spends two minutes crying. I have to kiss her*

ME: How are you and I different?
SON: Mom I want Pancakes! *loud voice*
DAUGHTER: You wear glasses when you read. *soft voice*

ME: What is one thing you wish you could change about me?
SON:Mooooooom I want pancakes! *very loud and swinging aforementioned ladle*
DAUGHTER:You not wearing glasses when you read. *pulls my glasses off*

And I tag whoever wishes to take this up. It is fun.