Ramanan's Musings

Borg Alert !!

2011-02-12T07:45:00.000-08:00

It is 7.46am on a Saturday morning. I have just changed the diaper of the new princess in our family and as I sleepily stare into her beautiful face, it occurs to me that the world is slowly becoming a Borg kingdom - yes, when I say Borg, I refer to the race of humanoid creatures made popular by Star Trek.

Just look at the many ways people interact in the world today - phone, email, blogs, twitter, and facebook. With everybody having a virtual persona these days, doesn't it feel like we are slowly evolving into the Borg? One huge collective consciousness that seeks and destroys any other intelligent forms of life.

Yup, this is my pithy observation for the day. Live long and prosper!!

Camping in the red woods ...

2010-10-10T17:54:00.000-07:00

Just got back from a camping trip at the Big Basin State Park. There is nothing like camping out in the woods for a couple of nights. The peace, tranquility, and the solitude of the forests is an experience that deserves to be repeated every so often. Of course, the same two nights out camping will make you relish those hot cooked meals and a nice soft bed!!

The two year old REALLY likes the outdoors. Even 2+ mile long hikes in the mountains wasn't enough to slow him down. He walked and hiked those trails like an expert and even waded in ice-cold pools (in his undies) and still had energy to play with the glow sticks at night. He is one tough cookie.

For the parents, it was a joyous occasion to see their child interact with the other children and play as GOD intended them to. No fancy toys - just nature. On the final day, the little one got up extra early and was rewarded for his good behavior by the presence of a few deer that wandered over close to the camp site. The little one got to eat his breakfast watching the deer pretty close by.

When they say car-camping, they really mean it. Most folks came lugging all sorts of things to the camp but we were totally dwarfed by the amount of easy-to-make food that was on display. The first were the heat-and-eat meats (like hot dogs and sausages in various forms and sizes) and then the more serious stuff like steaks!! The only vegetable on display was potatoes :). Felt really weird eating our simple variety rice items that the wife had precooked and packed when our camping neighbors were taking close to hour preparing their lunches and dinners.

BigBasin

My second Father's day

2009-06-26T14:30:00.000-07:00

To reflect or not to reflect on my second Father's day, that is the question bugging me this month. I suppose I should enthrall you all with my pithy comments and insights into fatherhood but I think I can do one better. I found this article while waiting for a build to finish at work and for more reasons than one, the salient points made in this article can be applied to my life ad verbatim. Enjoy.

Father's Day: Things I've Learnt From My Baby

Beezees !!

2009-05-23T08:11:00.000-07:00

Beezees, Beezees - seems this is Adith's favorite word these days and no he is not a Bee Gees fan. This is Adith's version of the word "Bicycle" :). Yes, we have joined the biking nation. The Mrs has a brand new Raleigh 7-speed bike while I purchased the very slick looking Trek Allant. Adith has a very cool child seat on which he lords over the Mrs. directing her to pedal faster :).

I havent been bicycling for a _looong_ time. The last time I remember bicycling was when I was 16 and enjoyed pedalling furiously to go to school at Vidya Mandir, Luz, Chennai. I used to go from Besant Nagar to Luz in about 40 minutes - a distance of about 7.3 kms. Well here is the route:

View Larger Map

Hard times are here ...

2009-02-18T20:44:00.000-08:00

I seem to have very little time for myself these days given the tight schedules at work, the backyard construction project, and the tight schedules at home and so new posts will be few and far between this new year.

It has finally happened. The good citizens of US of A have elected a Democrat president who seems to have a conscience. But it remains to be seen if he can undo the damage caused by the exiting plutocrat. Much is expected of him and if the first few days are anything to go by, hope still exists for this land of opportunity. This small glimmer of hope is the only thing that is keeping severe depression at bay. Every where you turn, it is bad news followed by more bad news. I can now imagine what Frodo must have felt at the base of Mount Doom.

In all this turmoil, our little family has found a safe harbour in the eye of the storm. Our days are spent wondering what new trick our little boy is going to learn or what new car seat to buy. Adith is keeping us focused on his needs and wants and often regales us with his mischievousness and his infectious smile.

Galant head-covering meets a grizzly end ...

2008-10-19T17:09:00.000-07:00

Obituary for "Hat"

The proud and gallant head-covering made of woven straw met a grizzly end on Oct 17th, 2008 at approximately 3pm near Los Banos, California. "Hat" as it was affectionately called, had a very happy life right from when its owner, Ramanan purchased it at Disney World, Orlando, Florida on July 1st, 2003 for the princely sum of $14.99. A veteran of many campaigns over the years, "Hat" was cherised and loved by its owner.
"Hat" had survived many trips to the wilderness (even a trip to New York) but it meets its match in the hands (and teeth) of a pudgy and pugnacious (and possibly hungry) eight month old strapped to a car seat in the back seat of a Volkswagen Passat station wagon. "Hat" succumbed to the brutal attack somewhere between the towns of Madera and Los Banos on highway 152 (heading west) and was the only casualty in an otherwise wonderful 5 day trip to Yosemite and Bass Lake. "Hat" is survived by owner, Ramanan and family. In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Make it Right Foundation.

Why is it so hard to upload and organize pictures ...

2008-10-19T09:32:00.001-07:00

I spent most of yesterday uploading pictures of Adith's eighth month and pics from our recent trip to Yosemite to the popular flickr web site. Dont ask me why flickr is popular cause I wasnt very happy with their interface. Okay - they do have some nice tools to help with the uploading but organizing the pictures wasnt very intuitive. How do I sort the pictures in a group pool? If someone knows do let me know.

After much soul searching, the mrs and I have decided to splurge on a new iMac - the one with the 24" screen. Hopefully the new Apple computer will come with some decent applications for photo editing and perusal.

A lot has happened ...

2008-08-12T21:29:00.000-07:00

It has been a while since I made time to pen a few thoughts. A _lot_ has happened in the last few months that has left me emotionally drained. Here are a few salient features from the past ...

My parents made the pilgrimage all the way from Chennai to the west coast of California in the end of April' 2008 to visit their first grandchild (Adith). Airline travel is getting to be a big pain these days what with the new baggage regulations and the fuel surcharges. The flying time from MAA to SJC is a grueling 19 hours - enough to shrivel up a bonny lad of 18. Imagine what this does to travel weary grandparents aged 65.

The weather in sunny California is not what it used to be. It was May but the weather was averaging a chilly 60 degrees Fahrenheit much to the discomfort of my parents who are used to 20 years of steady 85 degree Fahrenheit Chennai temperature . Due to the chilly weather, my father suffered a mild heart attach - or a myocardial infraction to those of you savvy in medical lingo. A visit to the ER revealed that he did indeed have a couple of minor arteries that were completely blocked or close to it. The cardiologist recommended a quick angiogram/angioplasty to fix this minor problem which could turn into a major problem if left untreated. This quickly turned into two nights in the cardiovascular ER in the local Good Sam Hospital. Three stents were placed in his heart to keep the affected arteries open. I can only thank God that this event took place in SJC where the immediate family were all present. I can not imagine the turmoil my mother would have had to go through if this had happened on the plane trip over here or earlier in Chennai.

I sincerely hope none of you ever have to visit a hospital here in the US of A (excluding those visits made to visit the new baby - those are quite fun). The care is very basic and very impersonal. The ER patient has to call down to the cafeteria to order his/her meal. If the patient forgets (even if he/she was unconscious) , then he/she doesnt get a meal. But if one takes a look at the bill (which is really a book/tome), it would appear as if the ER patient was tended to by President Bush's own personal medical staff and Air Force 1 was used exclusively to courier in the medical supplies (which were all purchased in Europe using euros).

Almost three months have passed since that fateful day in May. A lot of good things have happened since then. My father is healthy and has regained his strength and spirits. Adith has had a wonderful time with both sets of grandparents spending quality time with him over the past six months. Now my parents are getting ready to head back to Chennai and we are looking forward to about three months where we will have to take care of Adith all by ourselves :). Come November, we are all headed to Pune and Chennai to visit the grandparents - little Adith's first visit to his motherland.

Indian Ads rule ...

2008-04-20T09:45:00.000-07:00

Since Jofus has taken a (hopefully, only a) temporary vacation from blogging, here is a snappy Indian ad from the folks at Vodafone. I do realize that they are focussed on only selling you something but such an ad does raise one's spirits.

Dont google for the song - i already looked. The song was written and sung exclusively for the ad but it sounds like it is loosely based on the "Rising Sun" title song from the movie "Casino".

Global Dimming ?

2008-04-01T22:15:00.000-07:00

Most of you would have heard about global warming and even have done your bit to reduce your personal contribution to global warming but what I found out about global dimming scared me pretty bad. The irony could not be more explicit - I am cradling the sleeping Adith and watching the PBS special about global dimming.

While I encourage all you to real all about it at the aforementioned link, here is the short summary. We all know that global warming is raising the global temperature and is caused chiefly by greenhouse gases - so far so good. But do you also know that a second type of pollution (particle pollution) actually causes a cooling effect (and hence termed as global dimming or dimming the sun by man-made clouds) and therefore hiding the real impact of the greenhouse gases. Particle pollution is caused by factories, airplanes etc. With the advent of carbon scrubbing technologies, particle pollution is being reduced significantly in the developed world. But in the short term, it appears that this might lead to a double whammy effect. Temperature increases of 3 degrees centigrade are expected in the next 20 years or so.

What kind of world will we leave to our children? The future looks harsh at the moment. I am thinking of investing in a submarine since San Jose and Chennai are likely to be under water by 2040 ...

Another missed opportunity ...

2008-03-29T14:29:00.000-07:00

Dang it!! Yet another idea that the Batman (you can run but you cant hide), Jofus and I only talked about several years ago has been implemented. I refer to the neat "Shelfari" (virtual bookshelf) website. Look to the right and you will see my virtual bookshelf. Dig a little deeper and you will find a wonderfully put together website that enables friends/groups to share their past, present and future reading lists. The site of course is helpfully interlinked with Blogger, Amazon etc and stands a real chance of becoming yet another successful "social" networking product.

Eric Schlosser's dire prediction ...

2008-03-13T08:01:00.000-07:00

I just finished reading Eric Schlosser's seminal book titled "Fast Food Nation - The Dark Side of the All-American Meal". In my opinion this is one of the two best books on how we should live and eat after we inform ourselves about the food that we eat - the other book in this genre being Micheal Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma.

In the afterword, Eric makes a very honest assessment of our current way of life that I found to be very chilling in its prediction. Given my previous post about the amorality of businesses, I though the following was something I should share.

Excerpt from Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation: "The history of the 20th century was dominated by the struggle against totalitarian systems of state power. The 21st will no doubt be marked by a struggle to curtail excessive corporate power. The great challenge now facing countries throughout the world is how to find a proper balance between the efficiency and the amorality of the market. Over the past twenty years, the US has swung too far in one direction, weakening the regulations that safeguard workers, consumers, and the environment. An economic system promising freedom has too often become a means of denying it, as the narrow dictates of the market gain precedence over more important democratic values."

Powerful words, eh? Comments?

Adith rules and the impossible passport size photo of a baby

2008-03-06T21:06:00.000-08:00

Since Adith pretty much dictates my life these days, I changed the color and template of this blog to a shiny baby blue :). Hope you all dont object.

It has been a fleeting three weeks since Adith's birth and I have not found the time to document these past few weeks. I am back at work this week. Isnt it a cruel world where the mother gets 6 months maternity leave and the dad gets one measly week. Anyway, I managed to go to work one day and then worked from home the next four days. This in order to ease the transition for the family is what I told my manager. But it was really to ease my transition to the daily grind :).

Adith received his SSN today and this meant that we could apply for his passport. 2 passport size pictures, application form and Adith's birth certificate are all that are required. We drag the baby to the local Kinkos only to find out that they dont take passport pics of babies - too hard they say!! Take the baby to a professional studio was the recommended advice. It is bad enough that one has to pay something like $20 for a couple of passport size photos - going to a studio is likely to cost much much more. How can these guys get away with charging us these big bucks for a couple of snaps? They dont give us the negatives since these are digital pictures anyway (and they dont give you the JPEG file either). The bane of the free market economy is that one can charge what ever he/she wants as long as there is still a demand for the product - is there no sense of morality in businesses these days?. I hope that with the advent of cheap digital cameras and digital printers, more and more people will make their own passport size photos and put an end to this daylight robbery (okay - i am done with my rant on passport size photos).

Long story short, I made my own passport size photo of Adith. Oh, before I forget, the passport photo instructions mention that the distance from the chin to the top of the head must be between 1 inch and 1 & 3/8 inch. What they mean to say is that the distance from the chin to the top of the head must be between 2.5 cm and 3.5 cm (now isnt that something you can measure using a normal ruler :)). Score 1 for the metric system.

112 diapers and counting ...

2008-02-28T17:10:00.000-08:00

Yes - he is finally here. Adith (pronounced Aadith) arrived into this world loudly complaining about being squeezed through the birth canal even though it took him only a few minutes from the beginning to the end of the "squeezing" part of the process.

Adith arrived three weeks early catching everyone by surprise. He is a cute tiny little guy but is very active and very curious about the new world that he has descended into. With each day, I think his lungs and stomach are growing exponentially (at least it sounds this way). It is amazing how these little guys can pack it away and then download it all into the diaper. Adith is averaging about 8 diapers a day and so since he is two weeks old now, thats 112 diapers and counting :).

As new parents, the first few hours are exhilarating. We are the proud parents of this darling boy and everything is new and exciting. Fast forward a couple of days and the proud parents are still happy and delirious but more due to the fatigue rather than anything else :). I must say that the feelings that you go through as a new parent is nothing like anything you might have gone through in your life before. In the first few traumatic days, the extended lack of sleep should have converted the new parents into walking zombies but it isnt like that at all. One look at that cherubic face and a mother lode of endomorphines is released into your system to cancel out the fatigue.

More musings on the cricket scene ...

2008-02-01T12:45:00.000-08:00

Read this article. I cant believe how out of proportion the "Harbhajan-Monkey" episode is being blown up in the media. This is crass sensationalism!! Now we have Indians questioning the racist tendencies of Indians. Please - Indians suffer from a whole host of maladies and/or quirks but racism isnt one of them. The day we call preference for the white skin, racism, then we better call all the women in the world who want to be super-models, racists too :).

Harbhajan probably did call Symonds a "monkey" but I dont think he did it because he is racist. I think he did it because that is what needles Symonds. Calling Symonds a whole bunch of proper insults would not have unsettled him :). All these types of insults only unsettle the Indians (and the Aussies are very fluent with these types of insults). Bhajji did what any good antagonist would do. When faced with a strong enemy, find the weakness and go for the jugular :).

Disclaimer: This piece in no way condones what Bhajji did but in all fairness, he only gave the Aussies a taste of their own medicine.

ps: Here is a neat article from Harsha Bhogle that kinda puts everything about this fracas in perspective. I think I agree with him - the fault lies with both parties and it is best to learn from this and move on.

Sense and sensibilities ... musings on the cricket scene ...

2008-01-30T21:46:00.000-08:00

With reference to the incidents described by Joe in his post, it is really funny to see how this world turns. Heckling the batsman is okay as long as one does not make racist comments but one is free to use all other forms of insults. The Aussies certainly look like poor sportsmen for taking something that should have been settled on the field and making a mountain out of a mole hill. It painted them in a very poor light. Ponting's legacy will forever be tainted by these incidents. He will not depart the game with the same respect and adulation that Waugh commanded on his retirement.

Gilly's timing of his retirement announcement might have something to do with him trying to distance himself from this team as soon as possible. He was certainly one of the old school warriors of the Steve Waugh generation and would not have liked where this team was headed. But of course he is too much a team man to say this in a public forum.

Now on to the fun part - nerves of steel and a sound backbone. Thats whats new with the Indian team. The bowling has been a revelation and it only seems to get better. Pathan's back and so are a whole score of bowlers all superbly coached by a very underrated bowler, Mr. Venkatesh Prasad. With the bowling stopping all comers, the batsmen are under less pressure to win the matches and this has allowed several batsmen to flourish.

Hotel Keralafornia (enough said?) ...

2008-01-03T09:50:00.000-08:00

Here is a hilarious youtube special ... Enjoy ....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFaeJhcOOt4

2007 - the year that was ...

2008-01-01T09:35:00.001-08:00

Year 2007 - it is gone - part of history now. It went by so fast that it took me until Jan 1st, 2008 to reflect on the year. Overall, it has been a very interesting year although the start of 2007 was a little traumatic for me. January had me in a new role in a new job and led to some stressful times at the start of the year. But challenges are part and parcel of life and I survived to tell the tale. G3 got a new IPOD in February on our 4th wedding anniversary (isnt it amazing how materialistic we can get when I mention that the acquisition of a new IPOD is the highlight of the month :)). The month of May was when the in-laws arrived in the US for their first visit just in time to attend G3's graduation. She received a Bachelors in Computer Science from SJSU. June was when G3 gave me the most earth-shattering news - I was going to be a daddy in about 39 weeks!! July was when we all made a very nice visit to Niagara Falls and stayed at a gorgeous Victorian bed-and-breakfast. September saw the end of the in-laws visit and the end of various delicious dishes that were served to me by mom-in-law. But everyone was excited because the in-laws will be back in Feb,2008 to help with the pregnancy and delivery. October saw the introduction of Tarun in this world. November and December was just a blur because I was buried under a mountain of work but served to remind me that I must not devote so much time to work when the baby is born.

The year 2008 holds much promise for us. The baby is due in March and I cannot look beyond March at this point. My new year goals are simple: Make more time for family and loose some weight - not try and loose weight but really loose some weight :).

India bad for Jaguar - really?

2007-12-14T15:52:00.000-08:00

Disclaimer: I borrowed the title of this blog from the following article in TIME magazine (http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1694653,00.html).

Gotta love the hypocrisy in today's world. The world was okay with Jaguar being owned by Ford (which had extensive experience in dealing with luxury cars??) but not Tata or Mahindra. Sure, one could always argue that this viewpoint is strictly from a business point of view but isnt that underestimating the business sense of the buyer of the brand. If Tata or Mahindra wants to make a statement and buy Jaguar, why should anyone belittle them on their ability to run a business. Wouldn't they have independently figured out their chances of owning and profiting from a luxury brand?

As each day goes by, I see many examples of such cases, where the über elite in the US are in denial about the upstarts from the Asian continent. From the self-appointed defenders of democracy and free trade, I expected to see a better response - a more worldly response.

Life is good in the womb ...

2007-11-30T12:47:00.000-08:00

We just got back from another ultrasonic womb inspection and I am happy to report that Junior is doing well and is bigger than expected :). For anyone who knows me, why would that surprise you :). Listening to the loud thumping that is Junior's beating heart, I could not but reflect upon the life that Junior is currently leading. Intravenous feeding, large living room, well insulated walls - whats not to like :).

The Mrs on the other hand is not happy. She had to imbibe 10 ounces of some sickeningly sweet dextrose so that she can be tested for gestational diabetes (GD). If a mom-to-be is diagnosed with GD, the baby is at high risk for Type 2 diabetes early in its childhood if the mother is not treated for GD. The Mrs has excellent health and so we are not worried.

The glorious four day weekend ..

2007-11-24T12:54:00.000-08:00

It is day three in the four day weekend and it has been a fun filled three days so far. On Thanksgiving day, we partook in a vegetarian thanksgiving potluck feast with some old German friends, and some new German friends and family (brother and his wife). A fabulous thick and creamy pumpkin soup was followed by a piece of a very traditional German quiche. This was accompanied by some potatoes, spinach and feta cheese all stuffed inside a red bell pepper. And this was just the German part of the course. For the Indian part of the thanksgiving feast, we brought two curries (malai mattar panner and aloo dumwale) while the brother prepared the vegetable pulao and raitha. Entertainment was provided by the three German kids who enthralled the guests with their diction and language skills (and eating skills :)).

Day two started with some general house cleaning and a round of tasks for the resident handy-man (yours truly). This of course led to the mandatory Home Depot visits and the purchase of things that I may never use in the future. End result - closet doors fixed, tub spout replaced, new door handles for all bathrooms. To round off the day, Grean Sleeves called and we arranged to meet Grean Sleeves & family along the immediate family of a good friend of mine who also just became a mother to a bonny little boy. We met at the very south indian Tirupathi Bhima's restaurant and in between mouthfuls of sambar vadai and onion & chilli oothapam, we managed to get updated with the latest news about the newborn.

Day three held the prospect of more house cleaning. Those of the Cancer persuasion like yours truly often see value in holding on to old boxes :). For some reason, we believe these old boxes may be useful in the future. While this might be true for a couple of the boxes, the vast majority of the boxes only collect dust and occupy space. Anyway, long story short, we started spring cleaning early and hauled out dozens of boxes out to the recycling bin. The high light of this morning is that we are baby-sitting the youngest blogger that I know. She is Mr. Grean Sleeves's first born and she is very talented. She is currently sitting in our den downing her second Maggi Noodles packet :).

Baby names - trials and tribulations ...

2007-11-19T22:00:00.000-08:00

A certain world traveling friend of mine requested my thoughts on pre and post fatherhood. Since I am still in the pre-fatherhood phase, I shall enlighten my friend with some words of wisdom as someone who is actively making all the wrong choices and the right mistakes :)

Choosing baby names can be an interesting experience. First time parents-to-be like yours truly and the wonderfully rotund mrs are often perplexed with the myriad choices for baby names. Now throw in the rigors of Indian names and you are looking at several zillion permutations and combinations that is likely to cause the parents-to-be run screaming for the exits. Thanks to my mother, I am blessed with a _long_ name. While it does inconvenience me from time to time, I have always looked upon my long name as a blessing since it pretty much guaranteed that I will never suffer from identity theft or fraud. One look at my name and most people just give up :).
So given that the baby will have at least one long name (the father's name), the mrs and I are currently sifting through several thousand names to find that perfect (and short) first name for our baby.

Do we pick a Sanskrit name which seems to be the current fashion trend? Or do we pick a traditional south indian name like Balamuralikrishna? Okay - two south indian names is probably a punishment for the little one especially in the US of A. I am guessing that we will still be looking at names when the time arrives to deliver the baby and we will end up picking something convenient like "Bob".

An ode to the chicken dish ...

2007-11-18T11:06:00.000-08:00

It is a sleepy Sunday morning here in the bay area. The mrs is watching an assortment of cooking shows on HGTV that is making my mouth water for the glorious chicken. Of course, it doesn't help that next week is Thanksgiving and all the cooking shows are showing how to cook that perfect succulent bird (turkey or Cornish game hen or the regular full chicken).

I had to swear off eating meat (chicken being the only meat that I would have liked to consume) as one of the preconditions for marriage with the mrs :). She feels quite strongly about this and so I have had to make the ultimate sacrifice and give up eating chicken. If I was a member of AA, I would have been given a platinum medal because it has been approximately 5 years since I last consumed a good chicken dish.

Looking back through my life, I guess my infatuation with the chicken really started in boarding school when week after week, while most children enjoyed special Sunday lunch meals (which usually was different succulent (note that this is the second time I used the "s" word) chicken dishes, the vegetarian kids (like me) received the much overrated "omelet". I wonder how long you would last before you are itching to try what the other kids were obviously enjoying so much. Flash forward a couple years and I am living with my parents again and in a strict vegetarian household. I could hardly indulge my cravings when the penalty for such a deed was instant decapitation and/or a quick cremation.

Flash forward a few more years and I am living in the US of A away from the constraints of a vegetarian household and on a voyage of succulent (yes, that makes it thrice) discovery. Life in graduate school meant a _lot_ of chicken soft tacos and grilled cajun chicken breast sandwiches. Flash forward a few more years and I am living in a small town in the east coast surrounded by some very good friends who were incidentally also excellent cooks. A steady diet of chicken in various forms (grilled chicken, tandoori chicken, chicken curry and who could forget the Hyderbadi biryani) soon inflamed my chicken cravings. It didn't help that the local Chinese establishments also made some delicious chicken chowmein and I had some good buddies who shared my passion for spicy chicken dishes. Ahh, those were some good times and some good eating.

Flash forward a few more years and here I am reflecting on the good times. My only outlet for the chicken cravings these days are the occasional guffaws when the mrs calls me at work to ask me what I would like for dinner and I respond even without thinking, "chicken curry please" :). But on the positive side, the idea for this blog posting was originated by the mrs and I suppose she did save me from the big "avian" scare.

Om Shanti Om ...

2007-11-17T12:25:00.000-08:00

Wow - It is Nov 17th already and it has been 16 days since my last post ... what hectic lives we lead - no wonder we all sooner or later succumb to some stress related disorder. But morbid thoughts aside, here is my "detailed" Om Shanti Om experience.

Kutti (those on a need to know basis know who I am referring to) and wife called us to go catch the Om Shanti Om flick at my brother's deserted theater - (begin footnote) it appears some of the local mainstream cinema halls have stumbled on the fact that screening Bollywood movies is a sure way of generating copious quantities of moolah given the zillion or so well-heeled fanatic Bollywood fans in the bay area but this is a topic best left for another blog (end footnote). Anyway, the rotund and 24 weeks pregnant mrs and I made our way to the "deserted" theatre 10 minutes before the agreed upon time. Turns out that the zillion fanatic Bollywood fans also decide that this was the movie to see on a Friday night at our "deserted" little theater (and therefore ignoring the other Bollywood blockbuster "Sawaria"). We buy our tickets and I send the mrs in to sit down and save some seats while I waited in the lobby for the rest of the tardy group. Boy, was that a mistake.

Unbeknownst to me, she was soon fighting for her life, beating back hordes of desperate and very rude country bumpkins (not from Arkansas as you might think but rather from the badlands of Mumbai and Delhi - prime breading ground for Bollywood junkies) who were ready to sell their souls for the nice seats that the mrs managed to acquire. But this attack was just the beginning. When I returned without the rest of the group (who were informed that the show was sold out over the phone and therefore never made it to the theater) and attempted to allow some folks to sit in the empty seats, I had to face the music from the people sitting in our row who apparently believed that some crime was committed. Apparently I should not have attempted to reserve the seats as long as I did - i guess I missed the fine print on the ticket where this was mentioned. Usually, I try and avoid confrontations as they are rarely worth the effort but given that the mrs was close to tears and these bumpkins just occupied the empty seats without so much as a thank you, I was itching for a no-holds-barred fight to the death. To make matters worse, the women in the bumpkin group wanted a apology from me. I kindly requested them to not hold their breaths waiting for my apology. Thankfully, before things could get any more acerbic, the movie started. The mrs wanted to leave right away, movie be damned but my cooler head prevailed and I managed to convince her to stay for the rest of the movie. I think we are both glad that we did regardless of the boorish behavior from our brethren.

I read somewhere that SRK was more popular outside the motherland than in it. Given the response in the theater and some of the posturing in the movie, I am inclined to agree. But the art of film making in Bollywood has improved considerably over the years. In fact, they have take the same song-and-dance-routine and made it funny and enjoyable. This movie is certainly testament to the fact that some well choreographed dance numbers and some witty dialog is well appreciated by the immigrant desis.

I dont want to let on too much about the movie here lest I spoil it for the folks who are waiting to see this movie but there are a couple of scenes in the movie that are hilarious because SRK attempts to mimic Rajni!! Mind it ... Of course, I am probably sleeping on the sofa for the next few days for writing the next few words but I have to say/write it. The $10 entrance is worth it just to see Deepika Padukone. Move over Aiswarya Rai, Deepika is now the most beautiful Indian actress in Bollywood. Deepika seems to have a little something extra over Aiswarya Rai - both are stunningly beautiful women but Deepika seems to have a little more grace and a sparkle in the eyes that stand out. Check out a real discussion on this topic at my good friend's blog.

Disclaimer: I have nothing against country bumpkins from Arkansas. In fact, I think they are quite funny. Also I have nothing against Bollywood junkies. I even know a couple of German ones. I am sure my experience with Bollywood junkies detailed here was the exception rather than the rule.

First day of November ...

2007-11-01T12:08:00.001-07:00

Not a very original title, I must admit but hey, it is the first day of November, 2007. This is the day I resuscitated my blog on Blogger - of course, my old blog is gone, lost among the several zillion blogs that never got a post after the first initial post. I hope this one survives beyond this first initial post.