Toast with Olive oil and Tomato

Yes, that is what I am eating. Regular Toast, drip extra virgin Olive Oil on it and grated tomato with salt and pepper. Poor mans Bruschetta but soooooo good. A friend in Spain made this for me one summer morning and it has remained my favorite breakfast/lunch/dinner/snack since.

Why do I eat this?

Oh to celebrate!

Celebrate what you ask, my chickadees?

Celebrate the hottness that is SRK. Even if he did wear a sequinned tie inside his unbuttoned shirt, even if his hairline looked painted on and even if he had been too generous with the spray tanner ( or was it just too much make up). He was fun, witty and appeared relaxed when he presented at the GG's. He was truly represnting!!!

Bollywood can only benefit from this kind of exposure.

I am so glad Slumdog Millionaire won the accolades that it did. It deserved everyone of the them and then some.

For those who complained that it was "the generic western movie about India", I have this to say, atleast someone made a watchable movie about the reality that is India. A movie with wit and genuine heart. It told a tale set in India, that people across the world can easily relate to. Cinema needs to be understood the first time it is seen. It does not need reference books to be consulted after the fact. Slumdog did all this.

I hope they dont change a thing in the hindi version of the movie. It is the directors complete work as it is now. It beats with his heart right now. "Cleansing it" and/or makeing it more palatable for the desi audience to accept and appreciate will be doing this very distinct view a disservice.

Danny Boyle showed India as it is.

The India that middle class desis would like the West to see... exists but it is a real and tangible India for that class only. This class of people includes you and me and even the rich and everyone who can afford to see the movie without thought to thier next meal.

The fact is that there are more people who face odds in making a daily living than do not. It takes going away from the milieu to sensitise to inequity again and then coming back to the country to realise that most middle class urban people in India live on an intellectual island that only they have entry to... where thier patch of the sky remains a money green (or whatever color desi money comes in now). And no I do not believe for one minute that the west is only obsessed with seeing poverty in "Have not nations". I say that they are willing to see it ALSO.

People who "have" would much rather just have the "havenots" be hidden away in thier place in the outhouse. And poverty is not a disease. Dont worry you wont catch it if you see the movie. Poverty is just a symptom of a disease, that of indifference. Hiding the symptom does not make it go away.

And MadInMumbai, I have not forgotten. I have asked for Pixote and Salaam Bombay to be sent to me, will report on that later on.