CNN IBN has a recent piece on Britney Spears in which some big shit (did I mean to type 'big shot'?) analyst and addiction expert has averred that Britney's "bubble has burst" (wonder what he meant by that?) and that she is on a suicidal path where each of her recently bizarre actions (one of them being numerous visits to gas stations reportedly to pee) indicative of her fervent plea for help. If she commits suicide, she would have died young. She's only 26, you see!
"She's losing it now, and she's going to eventually lose it altogether if she doesn't get the help she needs."
Also,
"She's exhibiting bipolar signs and she's clearly fighting depression,"
...Brenner insisted that this might be Britney’s latest ploy for gaining attention after her 16-year-old sister Jamie Lynn's announced her pregnancy.
"Britney now needs to cry out for even more attention. She's really going for it. No one stops to pee that many times. She has a major problem," he said....
But the important question that needs to be addressed here is the following. Why has the great Nanga Fakir, the high profile, ultra popular blogger-in-demand whose mere name causes his enemies to shit in their pants decided to report on this?
Let us imagine that Britney Spears decided to kill herself tomorrow by choking on her own shit (a not unlikely scenario, experts tell me). Probably a lot of horny teens will lose their idol. Hers will be considered a tragic suicide, another case of a musical sensation deciding to end her life early. And that is where the trouble will start.
Commentators will instantly put her in the league of those that died early-Duane Allman (25) (of The Allman Brothers Band), Jim Morrison (The Doors), Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain (Nirvana) (all when they were 27-the age when I think Britney Spears will choke on her shit), Ronnie Van Zant (29) (Lynyrd Skynyrd), Jeff Buckley (30) and Layne Staley (Alice in Chains) (32). And that is when (I prophesy) hordes of techies will rip their shirts off, howl at the top of their lungs, destroy their cubicles, sift through the junk in their homes to find their Kurt Cobain/Jim Morrison T-shirts they hadn't worn in a long time, don them proudly and march on the streets of Kormangala and mourn her inclusion in the holy pantheon. And the damned commentators will 'interpret' this act as a march of Britney Spears fans.
Now would THAT SUCK!!!
Let the 'one more time baby' live through at least forty. After that, we don't care shit. Do we?
A really, really cute firang girl stopped Nanga Fakir as he was walking his trademark absent-minded-looking-down-on-the-ground walks. Why???
"Elementary, my dear Watson! She is smitten by your month long stubble, scattered (lice ridden?) hair and skeletal, unwashed-for-seven-days body. Look at her as she smiles in sweet anticipation of having an audience with the great man!", he said to himself.
Yes, clearly Nanga Fakir had slain one more fair maiden. Behold the power of smelly underwears!
Fair Maiden: "Won't you have a look at this book?" Nanga Fakir forcibly takes his eyes off her bewitching face to the ware she was selling.
The book was Bhagwad Gita. Nanga Fakir could not, but laugh his famous cruel, maniacal laughter (which reached across to the Fair Maiden as a soft chuckle).
Fair Maiden: "You're Indian? No? You must know the deep philosophy contained in it."
Nanga Fakir: (Still laughing his cruel-laughter-which-is-manifested-as-a-soft-chuckle) "Yeah I know! But I am an atheist". And as he said these words and felt slightly proud of himself, he saw, that a part of the Fair Maiden wilted, even visibly so.
Fair Maiden: "But you know this is independent of all these things...No?
A deep regard for aesthetics stopped Nanga Fakir from saying what he had in mind. "Let Alice be in Wonderland. The fuck you care???" he said to himself.
So he grew quiet and let the Fair Maiden begin her story-how the Prince of ISKCON had come to rescue her from the great black Demon of Despondency and how the Fair Maiden was, but a month away from her sojourn in Vrindavan-the abode of the handsome prince of ISKCON.
Nanga Fakir tried to listen but could not. So he, rather abruptly and even cruelly, stopped the (rather emotional) recounting of the Fair Maiden's story and muttered some pitifully lame excuse and ran off.
........
But he could not forget the Fair Maiden. Why??? Did Nanga Fakir finally fall in love? ...Fuck no! Why then? Why?
He kept thinking about her as he randomly roamed around. Her earnest face, full of new found conviction, kept returning back to him. He had rebuked her irrevocably and her deeply affronted (or so he imagined) face came back to haunt him.
"What the fuck is the problem with these firangs?", he said to himself, by now genuinely angered-both at the snazzy, fashionably spiritually minded firangs as well as himself, for having been thinking about the Fair Maiden for so long.
But he imagined her alone in the far off lands of the Old Country-full of dust, dirt and mysterious magic. And he saw evil demons eyeing the Fair Maiden lasciviously and also the sly sorcerers who would magically transform themselves into great yogis and lure the (rather gullible) Fair Maiden into their secret caves. He gave an involuntary, anguished cry and ran back to the one he had so wantonly wronged.
He had no problem in finding her as she unsuccessfully tried to sell spirituality to fellow kids who were probably already sold out to the great American Dream. Nanga Fakir sneaked up to her.
Nanga Fakir: "Hi, I am back." Fair Maiden: "Hi..." Nanga Fakir: "...I...I just came back to say this......"
Some oppressive silence.
Nanga Fakir: "Look, there are many imposters out there in the garb of holy men. Don't go out with people you don't know. Trust me on this. Take care of yourself".
A barely inaudible "Thanks" escaped the visibly surprised lips of the Fair Maiden. He didn't know why, but he held her hands and squeezed them as he felt a gush of genuine brotherly affection for her surge through him. He saw she was about to speak something, but before she could do that, he muttered something lame and ran off.
PS: In one of the English translations, I read Krishna referred to as The Dark Lord. (Krishna means 'Black/Dark' in Sanskrit.)
"Whoa...", I said to myself. Who wouldn't want to follow The Dark Lord? It sounds so awesome! Sauron, Voldemort, Darth Vader-all the most awesome villains (with the notable exception of Mogambo and Gabbar Singh) were referred to as The Dark Lord.
Man do I want to join ISKCON just to be called the minion of The Dark Lord!
Wanted to be a writer...but discovered Dostoyevsky, Wanted to form a band...but discovered Indian Ocean, Wanted to make a film...but discovered Anurag Kashyap, Wanted to blog...but discovered Great Bong,
So I am stuck with Math and have, but discovered Grothendieck.
Anurag Kashyap on the sets of the fabulous No Smoking enjoining junta to stop smoking and kill off the smokers
Here is an older video of him talking about Paanch and earlier struggles.
Memorable Quote: Dus baar deewar pe sar maroonga, kabhi na kabhi to tootegi.
Gawd...do I need to lay my hands on Paanch. If any of you readers comes across the same, please inform by commenting/emailing.
These are two more videos from Zapak.tv. This is part 1 where he gives the names of his favourite movies and Directors. No surprises that Scoresese and Fight Club feature so prominently.
and here is part 2 where the Director openly cites Kafka, Charlie Kaufmann, Eternal Sunshine..., Being John Malkovich-all the names that I cited as possible allusions in the movie No Smoking. Now I get to say the most satisfying thing ever-"I told you so".
I have never ever felt so militantly in favour of a movie ever before. The last time I felt strongly about saying something out (I am generally passive and not given to outbursts of any kind) was when I saw Omkara and was seen frantically messaging people I knew to watch the movie if it was the last thing they did before they died. That was one and a half years ago. Again, some months later, I felt that I really had to make people, whose well being was on my mind see a movie. This one was called Oldboy.
Pandu (henceforth referred to as Satyavrat, since I respect blogging identities while transacting business on the blogosphere), who has been seeing every Hindi movie that has been released in the past two months, counted off his fingers the names and characteristics of movies he had watched recently. The conversation left me wondering if I had missed out on so many flicks-all of them, according to him representing an unprecedented paradigm shift in the Hindi Film Industry. I decided to watch the boldest (in his words) of them-No Smoking.
As I progressed through the picture, a part of me stared unblinking in sheer disbelief at what unfolded on the screen. Was I watching a Bollywood movie??? No, I wasn't. No way.
The names of Fellini, and his magnum opus 8 1/2 came so naturally to mind! So did the names of so many others: Guru Dutt, David Lynch and his Eraserhead (I know some of my more knowledgeable and far more talented cinema buff friends would scoff at the name of Lynch and automatically decide not to see "No Smoking" since his name has been associated with this movie. If they do so, they will miss out on what is probably the most important Hindi film EVER made. Too bad folks!), Bergman's classic Persona, Alan Parker's take on the Pink Floyd's masterpiece The Wall, Natural Born Killers (in that brilliant short episode of "Kyunki Bachpan bhi Kabhi Naughty tha", Charlie Kaufmann and his wonderfully warped creations Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Being John Malkovich (incidentally, one should remember, Anurag Kashyap himself has been a brilliant screenwriter known for his taut and brilliant screenplays of Satya, Shool, Yuva, Kaun and several other acclaimed films)...Gawd, I could go on forever.
And the remarkable point is that, it is all done in such a quintessentially Tarantino-like way that at first your brain refuses to believe it. These are deliberate dedications that are being offered to masters of Cinema. Yes it also means that Anurag Kashyap is flaunting his encyclopaedic knowledge of world cinema but can we really find fault with a peacock shedding its inhibitions and dancing in the rain flaunting his fabulously regal plumage? No, we don't. In fact we have it as a National Bird simply because of this.
Tell me, how many movies have you seen whose opening screenshots are quotes from Plato followed by Socrates and Frank Sinatra (‘To Do Is To Be’ ‘To Be Is To Do’ ‘Dobe Dobe Do!’)? Tell me, which movie have you watched which mixed Franz Kafka (the hero is called K-the name of so many Kafka heroes; the mood, the scenes, the settings, the cinematography-you don't have to be a PhD in comparative literature from JNU to recognise the allusions to Kafka in particular and sundry existentialist themes in general) with Stephen King (based on his story Quitters Inc.), surrealism with existentialism, Adnan Sami with Bob Fosse, Rahman's Ae Ajnabi with Dean Martin, Black Eyed Peas' Shut Up with Gulzar's Beedi Jalaile, Schindler's List with Comic Book Bubbles? Mark my words when I say that this is a work of a staggering genius! It takes an extraordinary amount of brilliance to weave such disparate and eclectic sensibilities together in one whole. What we have here is probably one of the most brilliant Directors of not just Hindi but World Cinema. He also pays tribute to the Indian Cinematic Masters. Observe: "Maqbool, Main Hoon Na!”(This is what Abbas Tyrewala says on the phone-both films are written by Tyrewala) "Beedi Jalaile ke Vishal desh mein cigar Gulzar"-a dedication to Vishal Bharadwaj for his directorial and musical acumen and to Gulzar for what he has given to Indian Cinema-beautifully directed movies and volumes of impossibly brilliant poetry. What he is also saying via this is "Thank you for having produced this film".
This is a classic tale of a spurned young man's revenge on Bollywood and its incessant artistic timidity. It is a cry of a tortured genius much in the same way The Wall was Roger Waters', Pyaasa was Guru Dutt's and Grunge was entire generation of apathetic teens'. This is Anurag's way of showing a middle finger to Bollywood. Observe this in particular when he takes K to Uzbekistan (or was it Kazakhstan?). Is this not deliberately lampooning Hindi Cinema's fascination for foreign locales like Switzerland? I bet you it sure is! It is his way of getting back at people like Karan Johar (whom he openly hates) who make glitzy, snazzy soap operas about the rich and the powerful's debaucheries in Fantasyland. Hell, take this trip to another Fantasyland! It doesn't give a rat's ass about sloppy sentimentality that forms the basis of interaction for all characters in Hindi movies-whether male or female. It is an openly, brazenly, brilliantly intellectual movie which wallows in the journey of storytelling rather than the destination. It is an open celebration of all that is good in cinema as an art form.
Which brings me to another achievement. Tell me have you ever seen a Hindi movie with such God level special effects which are comparable to international standards? Have you ever seen such brilliant cinematography in a Hindi movie? Dharavi looks like a synthetic hell hole. The eeriness you feel when Chacha of the Kalkatta Carpet Factory takes K's handprint, the wonderful contrasts of black and white that cast their shadows during K's walks in Dharavi, the obvious debt this movie owes to Film Noir-all these features are first for a Hindi movie. An amalgamation of so many firsts in a movie is an unparalleled achievement. It is as if twenty years of evolution were compressed in a mere two hours. Have a look at the trailer as an example:
Kashyap, in his own blog has written about this movie's autobiographical character. He asks us to take it as his hopeless fight against the Hindi film establishment. His film Paanch was not released and was kept in the dustbins for years on end because it was not what the Censor Board thought of as the purpose of a film which, according to them should provide 'healthy entertainment'. Kashyap says Paanch was neither healthy nor entertaining. Then came Black Friday another brilliant documentary styled movie which was banned by the Government and was rescued only through the intervention of the courts. In addition to the new stylistic devices introduced by Kashyap in this movie, it also featured a beautiful album by Indian Ocean. His struggles for making a movie were cut short when long time collaborator Vishal Bharadwaj decided to bail him out of his financial problems. Observe that K not only alludes to Kafka's influence on the movie but possibly also to Kashyap himself. He says it was his struggle to remain afloat and not bow down before the preacher Baba Bangalis of the Censor Board who were hell bent on doing things for society's good. The only way to stay afloat, as he reveals in the movie, is to 'sell out' (his way of saying what Pink Floyd were singing in the song "Welcome to the Machine"?) and conform the way K does. The question is for how long can Kashyap survive as a non conformist?
It is a brilliant, surreal, Kafkaesque odyssey into the murky recesses of the mind of an unbounded imagination. Performances are very tight as well-from John Abraham's cocky narcissism to Ranvir Shorey's quirky oddities, from the supremely confident Paresh Rawal's grasp of the subtleties of his character, to those many more in small/minor roles-nobody disappoints. The screenplay is Kashyap trademark-taut, compact and supremely engaging, the dialogue-wonderfully character driven. The gloom, the darkness, the dystopia, the mood-a killer combination of all the effects a movie could ask for. All in all, this is a supreme work of art.
As for the interpretation, although I do think I have understood the movie on different levels and have in general, a fair amount of understanding of what it was all about, the thing to realise here is that the interpretation is actually not that important. It is the way the movie engages with its bizarre surrealism that's important. Hell, I don't think smoking's got to do anything with the movie at all! It could as well have been about pornography instead of smoking and everything else would've remained the same. But what 'No Smoking' in particular did achieve, was that it duped the Censor Board into passing it while Kashyap fooled them into thinking that the movie was anti smoking. Another evidence that the Censor Board junta are a bunch of fools.
I take this moment to pay my homage to what is easily one of the top ten Hindi movies ever and probably the most important, paradigm-shift inducing and path-breaking Hindi movie of all times and to its tortured Director. I also prophecy that it shall become a cult classic, much the same way Jane Bhi Do Yaaron did.
Thank you for making the truly brilliant "No Smoking". I am personally in debt to you.
I know critics have reviewed it badly. But fuck them man!
I am a nobody. But let me predict that this movie is going to be a cult classic and although you may be spurned as a Director from the mainstream film industry, for fans like me who care about good cinema, you have come as a godsend.
Don't lose heart if junta punishes you, critics berate you and producers harangue you. You are a genius and such is the fate reserved for all great artists.
You may have lost some producers, some money, some sleep but you have gained a DIE HARD FAN in me.
If I have money tomorrow, I'll gladly produce your film in the future. But given that your luck isn't good, I am broke.
Accept praise from a humble fan!
Yours Truly, Nanga Fakir.
I won't try to review the movie (at least not now). Suffice it to say that it is the single most important picture that Hindi Cinema has produced in many, many, many long years. It is finally solid indication that Hindi Cinema has come of age.
Anurag Kashyap is arrogant. But he is also a genius. This picture is a masterpiece in the wonderful tradition of Fellini's "8 1/2" and Kafka's "The Metamorphosis","The Trial", "The Castle" (hell, even the hero is called K-the hero's name in Metamorphosis!) etc. I am so in love with the movie!
If I were a girl, I would flat out ask Anurag Kashyap to marry me. Thankfully I am not!
You can read what Kashyap himself has to say about his movie at his blog.
PS: I added this movie in my (in)famous (???) "Top Movies" list before the first half got over. That is a new record I guess!
Try out Quintura, a new search engine which I have been using intermittently for the past ten days or so and which I think, is a better alternative to Google.
I came across a Wired (or was it Slashdot? I don't remember well) article that gave an account of alternative search engines and how they may become a threat to Google. The article was of the opinion that Yahoo! is ranked better in terms of customer satisfaction and in general, merits a larger share of the marketplace than it currently has. It also remarked that in Japan, South Korea, Russia and some other countries, Google is already way behind alternative search engines which have captured a larger share of the market. It also featured Quintura as a promising search alternative that is better than Google in some respects.
Intrigued, I began using Quintura and specifically began comparing it with Google by typing in search queries that I knew should link to some sites that I had in mind (among a vast number of others). The result was unbelievable at first and given the fact that I belong to the generation that has not used any search engine other than Google, I wasn't ready for the result. I saw Google lose convincingly in the vast majority of tests I cooked up and though it means nothing in general, especially as regards to Quintura's so called superiority over Google, it does imply that one must take another look at Google's much hyped invincibility.
Some of the things that you would find wrong with Quintura include the obviously very long time it takes as compared to Google to search something. But you should also note the fact that Google has thousands of dedicated servers running 24/7 providing enormous computing power that drives the giant Google behemoth while these fledging startups have barely a thousandth of Google's resources (hell, they wouldn't be called 'start-ups' then, would they?).
Also observe the tag cloud in the left half of the search engine. You just have to point your mouse in that direction and automatically your search is appended and the new search results are displayed.
Basically if you don't want an all inclusive search and are looking for very specific search results that you already have some non-zero idea of, then it is better to use Quintura. Your search results are more streamlined and much, much more relevant. Try it out. This kid sure looks promising!
This is WikipediaVision that shows you a Google map that displays in real time who is writing/editing what Wikipedia entry across the globe. Really, really, really cool!
"Veropedia is a collaborative effort by a group of Wikipedians to collect the best of Wikipedia's content, clean it up, vet it, and save it for all time. These articles are stable and cannot be edited, The result is a quality stable version that can be trusted by students, teachers, and anyone else who is looking for top-notch, reliable information."
Nanga Fakir does not claim the origin of the following (origins of such things are, as a rule, hazy), but he does claim to have realised the significance of the following research and edited the editable portions to couch the finding in a different language. And yes, he has begun referring to himself in the third person.
Question: Define as precisely as you can, the term geek. Answer: A geek is a thirty year old virgin.
The discovery was made while ruminating why geeks love Natalie Portman. Further insights into the nature of this profound question shall be appreciated and published in leading research journals.
The inspiration for writing this piece came from the introduction (in Wikipedia) of various comic book characters that I used to be a fan of during my adventures as a little kid in Lucknow. I remember very well, the times when these comic books were the sole means of 'timepass' (I know the purists will cringe at my use of non existent English words but let them!) of a single kid in the long and hot summer vacations when you weren't allowed to go out of the house because of the raging 'loo' (double entendre intended).
Let's see what these descriptions are like:
Note on Image uploaded: I used to read comics in Hindi. So I wanted this image to be a representative of the comics I used to read. But the website of the cartoonist Pran has English translations only.
Chacha Chaudhary: "...Chacha is seen in waistcoat which has a double inside pocket. He has a 'gandhi watch' to see time and enjoys eating watermelon with relish. Whenever Chachi nags him he takes off for a walk with Sabu and Rocket...
"Chacha Chaudhary not only fights them off and help the common man but also teach them moral lessons and good behavior. Most of the events end up with goons embarrassed of their deeds. You can see middle class dealing with everyday's problems. In a way Pran takes a whip at those problems still maintaining a happy go lucky feel with twinkling eyes and smiling faces."
I have a feeling that the guy who wrote this up was in the pay of Diamond Comics.
Sabu: "Sabu is an alien from the planet Jupiter, always faithful to Chachaji and provides the physical strength in time of need. He is huge and strong, about 20 feet tall. In some comics he is able to increase his size. He wears only a wrestler's kachha (briefs), a pair of ear-rings and a pair of gum-boots. Sabu decided to stay at Earth with Chacha Chaudhary when he tasted delicious paratha and halwa made by Chachi during his visit to earth. Sabu has a twin brother called Dabu and the giant earrings that Sabu wears had been gifted to him by his mother when he left Jupiter. It is said that whenever Sabu gets angry, some where a volcano erupts. (It is generally depicted in a small bracket in a corner). Whenever he performs an act of great strength, he utters the cry, "Hu-Huba!" Sabu eats 108 chapatis at one time,12 kilos of halwa and about 20 litres of lassi in one meal.
This is a perfect example of Wikipedia being as accurate as Encyclopaedia Britannica. No comic book expert could have got those figures right unless he was a totally wasted, wretched and jobless kid in a small town in India. I personally vouch for the accuracy of the above cited figure of 108 chapatis, 12 kilo halwa etc. I have read that issue in which Chachi gets fed up and cites this figure to sober up Sabu and shake him from his jobless existence. The ruse is effective and Sabu promptly scoots off to fetch sabji for Chachi from the bazaar. Ditto for the 'Hu Huba'.
Chachi:"...In one comic she is shown with stirring a giant pot with a ladle for Sabu and serving him more affectionately than Chachaji."
When you're a kid, somehow you don't get subtle undertones of marital infidelity/extra marital affairs in Chacha Chaudhary. I am sure that the little Harry Potter fans wouldn't have guessed that Dumbledore is gay from the nuanced writings of JK Rowling either.
"Chacha's comic with 'Raaka ki waapsi',' is one of the best selling comics of Diamond Comics. Apparently Raka was put to sleep by some potion given by a saint from Himalayas and buried in the ocean in the first time. On his return by another potion he was reduced to a small size, closed in a bottle and buried in a grave."
This is indeed true. For more dramatic consequences of this read a previous post Boy Meets Girl whose hero Ghongha Basant claims that it is his favourite comic book of all time.
Another comic book that took my world by storm was the "Fighter Toads" series. It was a cold hearted rip off from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series with the creators confident that Indian kids wouldn't know who the latter are. And they were goddamned right. We loved the Toads even though their comics were expensive.
Here's the Wikipedia entry:
"Fighter Toads are the four innocent but very brave toads. Fighter toads features in Raj comics. There names are Fighterr, Masterr, Cuterr and shooterr ("terr" is the sound that toads make in Hindi comics). These were created by "Dhananjaya", one of the friends of Super Commando Dhruva, another Raj comics character.
An inspiration from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, these characters became a superhit in their very first year. These comic books were of giant size but after some time raj comics reduced the size of these comic books to normal size."
Again, I vouch for the accuracy of all facts stated but for the "...innocent but very brave toads.." part.
As I re-read whatever I have written about the passion (by no means extinct) for comics that I have nursed for so long, I realise that one post cannot do justice to all those years spent in fervent hopes of getting one's hands on just one more comic book. So let me just finish off this part without concentrating on the other comic book characters that I was fond of. So although I focus on only the clownish acts of the Indian Comic book industry in this post, I will try to cover the other, more mature facets of the same in other parts of the series of posts that I plan to write in this area.
I end with a miscellany:
The following is the video that Raj Comics have released about Nagraj. It's funny to see the new emaciated version of Nagraj in the video as well as the Matrix ishtyle stuntmangiri that he indulges in. I don't know this Nagraj...my idea of him was the usual more macho superhero. Anyway...
The following, I remember well, was the first Nagraj comic book:
This is the first Super Commando Dhruv comics "Pratishodha ki Jwala" (I remember I asked this question in the India Quiz in Inci '07 of which I was the Quizmaster):
Read "Muft Dhruva ka ek Poster". I was a total sucker for such collectibles.
The following is Doga. The Dog-Raja (hence "Dog-A"??? I wonder...) who communicated with dogs. It was a pretty dark and very violent comic with multiple scenes of mutilation, bloody killings and gore all round. I remember we had named our PT teacher "Doga". The name was so popular that even he knew it and approved of it! I still remember the day when he was called to the dais in the morning assembly for some shit and the entire college was shouting out "Doga...doga...doga...". Boy...is this nostalgic! It was a cold winter morning in December (I think) with the dystopic fog that Lucknowites know so well covering us from head to foot.
Now we come to Bhokal. The fame of this character rested on his talwar (sword) and his popularity can be gauged from the fact that "Bhokali" meant brilliant/bond/chaapu etc before we had discovered the engineering lingo that forms the major chunk of our vocabulary now.
There is also Fauladi Singh-the android whom I believe was the first instance of Science Fiction used in Hindi comic book medium. I remember it being brilliant for its times. It was one of the reasons that I found Science interesting and it made me resolve that I would become a scientist when I grew up (in response to the overly cliched question that elders bug kids with "Beta bade hoke tum kya banoge?") (...That I changed my mind as soon as the World Cup '92 (Italy) aired on Doordarshan and promised to myself that I will become a footballer instead is a different question altogether).
And now, I turn my attention to my favourite comic book of all times: Bankelal. This was a real goofy character similar to Tantri the Mantri that you read in Tinkle. One of my earliest memories is reading the first comic book of this series (below) in my room with the sunlight from the windows falling slantingly on the book (a gift from my Uncle).
The End
TRIBUTE: The inspiration for this post is Vishal Patel. I dedicate this wretched little effort to him and his pioneering work on the comics of the '80s.
PS: This is the longest, biggest and baddest post I have written, ever! Took me close to four hours.
1) Peter Frampton (especially "Do you feel like we do?") 2) Jane's Addiction (recent discovery...topnotch!) 3) Smashing Pumpkins (yet again!) 4) Alice in Chains (can't seem to get enough of them) 5) Tori Amos (Gawd...does she kick ass!) 6) Arbit ShoutCast Ghazal Radio Station on Amaraok (the bloke isn't Jagjit Singh but Radio Ghazal stations aren't that many either)
Scene: Bus stand. Only two people there. One boy-frail and short with an over-sized T shirt on his reed thin frame hanging like...well a loose T shirt on a reed thin plastic hanger. Let's, without any loss of generality assume that his name is “Ghongha Basant”.
The second person is a female. This time however, with a significant loss of generality, assume her name as "Madhuri Zinta". As the name suggests, she is extremely good looking, spunky, confident and considers all males to be no better than her pet dog. And yeah, I forgot to add, she is extremely well read and as all such intellectuals go, pretty lit.
The bus just isn't arriving. There is uncomfortable silence in the bus stop and this is oppressing our shy, gentle hero Ghongha who seems to melt away and wish the earth would swallow him up so that he will be excused from breaking the silence by saying “Hi” to the female. Finally, the girl kind of loses patience and asks this sensitive hero of ours,
Madhuri Zinta: “Hi, I am Madhuri. You're Ghongha right?” Ghongha: (Shocked to the point of disbelief that a female, and that too a nice one, had addressed him) “Uhhh...yeah, Hi”.
Some casual pleasantries are exchanged and a couple of lines regarding the cold weather are put in politely. By the end of the three minute conversation, Ghongha is pretty much convinced that Ms Madhuri Zinta is madly in love with him. This gives him a lot of confidence and he becomes more at home talking to this insanely beautiful girl.
Madhuri catches Ghongha staring at her rear. But given that the female is lit, she obviously assumes that Ghongha is looking at the book that's jutting out of her bag.
Madhuri: “Have you read this book? 'My name is Red' by Orhan Pamuk. You know this guy won the Nobel this year in Literature.” Ghongha: “No I have not”. Madhuri: (Slightly dismayed) “Oh. So what kind of books do you read?” Ghongha: “Comic books basically”. Madhuri: “Oh I love them too. I really think Alan Moore is one of the most brilliant writers of this genre. And Frank Miller too...the way he reinvented Batman in “The Dark Knight Returns” is simply superb”. She seemed to lapse into a thoughtful silence as she said this, as if suddenly realising the supreme truth of such a profound observation. Then she added after this afterthought, “Don't you think so?” Ghongha: (Totally taken aback) “Well actually my favourite comic book was "Chacha Chaudhary aur Raka ki Wapasi” by the cartoonist Pran”. The boy had seen the girl pass into thoughtful meditation as she had pronounced her verdict. Being incredibly beautiful, this had suited her finely crafted features and had shifted her rear ever so slightly to the left. Needless to say, it was an extremely impressive stance. It was but natural that our hero Ghongha Basant would try to emulate that thoughtful lapse into silence. But suddenly he remembered vividly about the comic book “Chacha Chaudhary aur Raka ki Wapasi” which was not only the best comic book he had ever read, but also his first one. A blinding wave of sudden nostalgia swept him as he recalled in minute detail how he would hide this comic in between his “Joy of Science” textbook so that his father would not catch him reading comics. Something other-worldly, something ethereal gripped his self and he found himself speaking passionately about the world of Chacha Chaudhary. Ghongha: “You know, whenever Sabu had a fit of anger, somewhere, someplace, a volcano erupted. And Chacha Chaudhary was a super hero whose brain worked faster than a computer. And Chacha Chaudhary had a brother named Chchajjoo Chaudhary who once was mistaken for him and was taken to planet Tau Tau where he was given complicated equations to solve.....It was....it was....it was...brilliant!”
A gentle, quiet, dew drop like tear slipped from Ghongha's eyes. Madhuri looked at him with her jaws open. Silence reigned supreme in the bus stand again but the beautiful face of Ms Madhuri Zinta seemed blurred as tears quietly rolled by.
Quite noiselessly, the bus had rolled to a stop near the bus stand. Madhuri went in. As Ghongha was about to climb the steps, a lopsided smile ran across his face. He chuckled and said to himself “You smooooth bastard. She will be fantasizing about you tonight for sure.”
Vista sucked so bad that I decided to include bombing Microsoft HQ as one of the things to do before I die. Hence I have decided to postpone my imminent suicide (sorry Subbu, you'll have to wait) to the time I can complete this mission.
Amarok has got to be the greatest audio player ever devised by any intelligent life in the Universe. Not only it kicks ass by playing every which format you can have, its streaming of the lyrics automatically for the songs playing, streaming Wikipedia information of the band in the adjoining window and countless other small but very, very handy operations have turned me into a diehard, loyal fan. And yet, this is hardly the end. The greatest asset is the free access to countless radio stations 24 hours a fucking day! I remember well that I had listened to more than 200 songs in a month on the Yahoo(!) LaunchCast radio (which although was brilliant) despite the incessant bombardment of bad advertisements (Lending Tree dot com, Nissan Live Player) to scar me for the remainder of my life. What do you think the result was? The bastards refused to play any more songs unless I coughed up 3 fucking dollars! Kalyug...ghor fucking Kalyug I tell you!
But as Gita would tell us, partitran_aya sadhunaam vinashaay cha dush_kritaam Amarok came to the rescue. Not only does it not have those stupid commercials, not only is it free, but the number of embedded radio stations in Amarok is about the number of Launch Cast radio station raised to the one thousandth power! And here comes the best part. It has Bhojpuri radio stations too! Not all of you know that my mother tongue is not Hindi but Bhojpuri. So my jaw literally dropped when I came across this radio station. Dude, this has got to be the most awesome, most flabbergasting, most intesely surprising thing I have encountered...ever.
I listened to the station for some one hour or so. Yeah, it was pretty authentic...but it didn't showcase any stars like Manoj Tiwari "Mridul" for which I felt kind of bad, because you expect to hear Led Zep when you tune in to a rock station.
Other mentionable radio station that one usually doesn't encounter elsewhere (excluding an amazingly wide variety of Rock, Progressive Rock, Psychedelic Rock, Metal, Hindi Film, New Hindi chart-toppers etc) include Ghazals, Old Hindi Filmy and many more...
Feisty Fawn (Ubuntu 7.04) is the most awesome OS ever. Better than the Fedora Panini that I used in S'kal. And yes I won't mention Windows at all...the developers of Vista should as well jump in the sea.
This piece is intended for those friends who have it in their mind to embark upon an academic/research career. Please read carefully.
"The American academic scientist earns less than an airplane mechanic, has less job security than a drummer in a boy band, and works longer hours than a Bolivian silver miner."
Boy does this guy give me the shivers! This story highlights the life of a SUNY Buffalo PhD who decided his calling was the job of a convenience store clerk.
This site debunks the myth of a desperate labour shortage in the Software Sector.
PS: The career guide for the as yet unslaughtered.
PPPS: Play The Game at this guy's website to find how big a loser you are. The average score is 32. I scored -18. Really funny. If you're a Science Fiction freak, single, loner and generally consider yourselves to be inept at handling the opposite sex conversationally or otherwise then expect stern responses from the cyberdate and a comfortably negative score.
Delivered on 18th September 2007, this is video makes him a rockstar of the scientific community putting him in the league of scientists like Richard Feynman, George Gamow, and Gian Carlos Rota. Bravo!
Take hundred minutes out of your schedule and watch this video. You owe it to yourself.
I like Frank Miller because he takes comic books so seriously that the term 'comic' becomes a misnomer. A totally reinvented, old, brooding, semi-cruel, dark Batman greets you in his return from retirement. The change is apparent in the following images taken from the comic:
It is significant because Batman too had become a victim of caricature especially in the Batman TV Series where guest stars from Hollywood indulged in generous overacting as The Riddler, The Joker, The Penguin etc (Vincent Price starred as Egghead in one such episode). Adam West starred as Batman and Burt Ward was Robin. It was all in the tradition of 'healthy entertainment for kids' and all. (I remember during the mid '90s, sitting in front of TV and waiting for the series to begin desperately on Star TV (Ma always used to confuse the beginning for the end of the episode)). Batman used to beat the shit out of all the villains and there on top of the screen were green coloured alphabets that read "POW", "BOFF" etc with cheesy music accompanying it.
Ahh...those were the best days of my life!
But I grew up and apparently, so did Batman. Christopher Nolan with his Batman movies ("Batman Begins" and the yet unreleased "Batman Returns") is one of the few (along with Tim Burton who made the '89 Batman movie) who are doing justice to the vision of Frank Miller.
Let's end by some more old Batman pictures eh? (Insert "POW", "BOFF", "WHAM" etc wherever appropriate)
It has the great team of the DDFC performing the ultra famous "Ek Anek" video. Featured in this legendary Spandan '05 DDFC presentation are Anup (Founder-Director of the Shaktiman Fan Club whose membership boasts of 20 billion humans on earth alone!), Billa (another legend whose name inspires fear in the heart of the unbelievers), Josie (also known as Kumar_parvatam, Kala Pahad etc whose nuanced and balanced acting made DDFC the only club which could make the hard hearted, semi human species called Final Years cry tears of grief), Masti (he should've gotten married by now (?); guess what his wife will make of this?), Sardar (as the heartless Vyadh (=chidiya pakadne wala), Meena, Trivedi etc
Those who know me, know me to be a voracious reader of all possible kinds of things. "I use it as a means to pass time, that's all", is my response in defence. But this time, post summer, I have bettered myself. Within a month of my stay at the University, I have read seven full books and am well on the way to finishing my 8th. By the way, that reminds me of a bibliophile joke:
Two goats go to the cinema to watch a movie After the movie:
Goat 1: How did you like the movie? Goat 2: Not bad...but the book was better (satisfied bleats in unison)
The last three of these books have been (yeah guys, hold your breath!) 1) Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson 2) V for Vendetta by Alan Moore and David Lloyd (yeah the real one, with paper pages; not the .pdf you losers!) 3) Darwin's Radio by Greg Bear
Pandu asked me how was I able to get hold of these books, for you see, most of the new ones that I have read belong to that holy collection which Pandu, Nitesh, AK and I, being the Science Fiction freaks that we are, had been trying to get hold of. The answer is the Science Fiction Forum at the University.
Basically they are a set of really cool guys who share the same passion for science fiction that we had back there at Surathkal. But they are not lazy bums like us who were content with the .pdf graphic novels and SF anime (that Panda and Ra used to supply us with) and the Science Fiction library of Professor Timothy Poston (which by the way, was by no means small). They are dynamic, armed with more resources than the annual budget of a decently sized Indian University and they are willing to share which makes them totally cool. Hats off to them...
Snow Crash is a real nice cyberpunk book but still pales in comparison to what I believe is the greatest Science Fiction book-Neuromancer-the most compact, concise, brilliant, dark and (most importantly?) dystopic science fiction I've read. Snow Crash kicks ass too by the way. It amalgamates many divergent and totally unrelated topics into the cyberpunk sensitivity and has a brilliant, wry sense of humour that Neuromancer did not have either time or space for. However, let me end by quoting from one of the best opening lines ever for a novel (Neuromancer)
“The sky above the port was the colour of television, tuned to a dead channel”.
About V for Vendetta: the duo of Alan Moore and David Lloyd have created a masterpiece of sorts (I concur with the goats and think that the book was better). I finished the book with an evil smirk stuck on my face. Totally satisfying! Goats are wise!
It is ironical that the comic book was far more mature and subtle than the movie where everything is caricatured. The Fascist Leader is totally evil, V is more a freedom fighter than an anarchist and The Party captures power by nerve gas detonations or something and not the fair way through democratic elections as is shown in the graphic novel.
Darwin's Radio will be covered sometime later. Let me mention however, that it is one of the few books that was mentioned favourably in the magazine Nature for having portrayed things as they are.
Well, while you losers slug it out in the real world sitting in your cubicles programming for giant code factories for people whom you've not seen and probably will never know, I am on this SF mission.
Let me get back to you when I've finished the Sandman Series. (L to you!)
1) Snow Crash (Neal Stephenson) 2) V for Vendetta (Alan Moore and David Lloyd) 3) Darwin's Radio (Greg Bear) 4) Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (Frank Miller) 5) Ronin (Frank Miller) 6) Top 10: Book 1 (Alan Moore and Gene Ha) 7) Top 10: Book 2 (Alan Moore and Gene Ha) 8) We (Yevgeny Zamyatin) 9) Software (Rudy Rucker) 10)Flow My Tears the Policeman Said (Philip K Dick) 11)The Master and Margarita (Mikhail Bulgakov) 12)The Divine Invasion (Philip K Dick) 13)Ubik (Philip K Dick) 14)The Peace War (Vernor Vinge) 15)The Cathedral and the Bazaar (Eric S Raymond)
Maybe it's all an elaborate joke played on me by god but the place where I live is called Chapin Apts and I wasn't very surprised when I learnt that I was allotted the L block...
Born Under a Bad Sign (Jimi Hendrix) Echoes (Pink Floyd) (the 'ding tinga...ti ding ding tinga' part) Heard it through the Grapevine (Creedence Clearwater Revival) (the eleven minute cover of the Marvin Gaye song)
These are such artfully constructed bass pieces that they seem perfect for just any kind of guitar solo and obviously the sheer genius of the bands lay in providing just such a screeching, wailing solo.
I saw "Anwar" a few days ago. I didn't want to write about it because I was feeling lazy and I thought it did not deserve mention. But it kept hovering over my mind and there were many things about the movie that kept coming back to me. And yes, the movie has much of Lucknow in it. Given that not many movies mention the city and the few that do, often go back in time and dwell on the famous Lucknawi tehzeeb and nautch girls etc (a notable exception is "Main, Meri Patni aur Woh" which captures beautifully daily life in a small, upcoming and growing city) I thought I gotta write about this.
The first thing you'll notice is the absolutely topnotch album of the movie by a guy called Mithoon (exceptions are the atrocious songs "Bungla Khulla khulla" and "Maula Mere Maula(remix)") but more about this later.
I want to first talk about the Director here. The guy is Manish Jha and has to his credit a previous movie called "Matrubhoomi" which I remember clearly, polarised the movie watching junta of our hostel into those who had liked the movie and those who simply couldn't stop laughing at what the movie turned out to be (Nitesh was in the laughter gang). I didn't see the movie but was intrigued. Hence when I came to know that this guy has made another movie, and that too about Lucknow, I grabbed the chance to view it (online!).
The Directorial vision, in my view, in deeply flawed. I'll tell you why. Basically, most important characters are in deep shit on account of their love life. This is one common thread that connects all major characters. Vijay Raaj meets his sorry end because the cute dramatics chick tells him that he is a bhikhari, the local junta gets fucked and Valentine Day celebrations turn sour because the minister gets L'd by the wife of the IAS officer (incidentally all love lives in this movie get fucked on Valentine's Day...some kind of fancy symbolism on the part of the Director?), the hero, obviously suffers on account of his love for the cute Nauheed Cyrusi who, incidentally, looks delectably cute in the movie, most of all in the "Maula Mere Maula" song, which in turn is what a beautiful song. Manisha Koirala longingly takes out a picture of Sushant Singh (who never comes up in this movie again apart from this photo) and is shown to have broken up with her boyfriend or something, the SP harps upon his wife dying due to Cancer and he not being able to do shit about it...basically no end of this sorry state of affairs, all due to stupid love problems.
Now all this is not bad per se. And I think the Director is trying to say that even after this shit, love is cool etc. Again, not bad by itself, but in the Universe of Manish Jha, politicians are evil, scheming villains trying to take control of the world (or India as the case may be) just like The Joker or The Penguin would try to do the same in Batman Comics or what Daku Gobar Singh and his sidekick Dhamaka Singh would try to do in the homegrown comic world of Chacha Chaudhary. He would also want a comedian like Rajpal Yadav to indulge in lameass comedy and totally forget what happened to him in between the movie (he totally vanishes after a certain point in the movie and what happens to his efforts to nab Osama bin Laden etc is something that the Director seems to have forgotten to mention).
The basic criticism of the movie is that it lacks subtlety. It has to be loud mouthed about every which sensibility that the Director cares to speak about and this is what pisses me off most. The Director is not without talent. Certainly, I would definitely see his next movie (again, probably online) even after all this but I would expect that he understand that evil, bad criminals and politicians don't act that way brazenly, even if they pride themselves on being evil and bad and have taken up office only because they are in the pay of Pakistani intelligence agencies. It also looks like that a lot of serious editing has been done and many things have been left incomplete (Manisha Koirala's role and Rajpal Yadav's etc are examples) and the basic premise of the movie-the suspicion of terrorism and the follow up to that on the basis of some stupid sketches is laughable. Even evil, criminally insane ministers of god-forsaken states (like UP, Bihar and Orissa) would never create such a ruckus based on that flimsy piece of evidence.
If this was all that the movie had to offer, I would have not written about it, nor would this movie have occupied my mind for such a long time. Actually every other thing apart from the above in this movie is wonderfully done. It captures very smartly the atmosphere of Lucknow, its ruins, its dilapidated, no longer paid attention to mausoleums and palaces. All this is done not in an obtrusive way, not in loudmouthed way that could've meant "Hell, we're shooting in Lucknow, so you've got to see this". This subtlety is thoroughly lacking in the other departments of the movie. The dialogues sometimes sound corny but not corny enough to receive flak. The movie also has a good story and does a decent job of telling it. It also takes a very good and informed look of the ambience of UP, the villagers that dwell in there, the ways they are manipulated, the local flavour of the love story, the interesting side love story, the betrayal, the redemption-all of it adapted well to the setting that must have been chosen very carefully etc. This is something only those who would've stayed in UP for a long time and absorbed all of its nuances could've done.
And yes, the soundtrack. With the exception of the two aforementioned songs, it is a gem. Roop Kumar Rathod has sung a memorable "Maula Mere Maula" in the highest traditions of Sufi music. The song itself is picturised in a brilliant way and all that is good and beautiful about Lucknow comes forcefully to haunt you during the time the song plays. Ra, if you're reading this and you come to see this movie, you will clearly be able to spot the Ambedkar stadium in the song where we spent that scorching afternoon in the 43 degree hot sun. You will also see the places we went to in Old Lucknow when we visited Zebi, the old Imambara, the old homes that many people in Lucknow still live in, the dirty and green/black-with-moss/sludge Gomti and the many minars and ruins that are interspersed, so to say, throughout the timeline of the movie.
The song sounds particularly wonderful to my ears because probably it reminds me of the brilliant trip to Nainitaal that Himanshu and I made during summer '07 where I first heard the song.
I am providing a link to the movie. You can view it online on Google videos. The song "Maula Mere Maula" lasts from the 43rd minute to the 49th minute (for those who want to see the brilliant song/video). Here it is.
Basically this movie is another in what is now a rather long list of movies, mainly by young Turks of the Hindi Film Industry. Examples that come to mind are "Main Madhuri Dikshit Ban_na Chahti Hoon", "Main, Meri Patni aur Woh" (both by Chandan Arora), "Iqbal", "Dor" (both by Nagesh Kukunoor), "Bunty aur Babli" (maybe...(Shaad Ali), "Omkara" (Vishal Bharadwaj) "Haasil" (I forget the name of the Director here but the first half of the movie was brilliant and Irfan Khan as the Student Leader of Allahabad University kicked ass!) etc. All these movies have given the Hindi Film Industry a strong boost by making use of creativity and showing the viewers some artful, artsy yet quintessentially commercial cinema. Cheers to the new face of Bollywood.
1) The Left Hand of Darkness (Ursula K Le Guin) 2) Heart of Darkness (Joseph Conrad) 3) Fathers and Sons (Ivan Turgenev) 4) The Monk who Sold his Ferrari (Robin Sharma) 5) The End of Poverty: Economic Possibilities for Our Times (Jefferey Sachs)
This is probably going to be my last post in a long time as I cannot say for certain how much spare time I will have on my hands from now on. I could be...busy (or worse, lazy)!
Hence I take this opportunity to dedicate this post to My Generation, to the generation of the urban Indian youth, to the generation conned into doing engineering, to the generation of brilliant brains losing a hopeless battle against drudgery and monotony, to the generation now in thralls of evil corporations that have enslaved their minds with false promises of beautiful futures...
Salutations friends...those who succumbed (most),
Salutations friends...those who fought free (Pandu etc),
Salutations friends...those hoping to fight free (Somnath, Ra, Nitesh etc),
Salutations friends...those wise enough not to be conned (Zebi etc),
Salutations friends...those who rode the demon and drove it to its end (Bakchu etc),
Salutations friends...those who showed the demon the middle finger (Bacat etc)
Salutations guys! It wouldn't have been the same without you all!
This is the link that takes you to a journey which promises action, adventure, ground breaking artwork, god-level production standards and torn pockets that ruefully complain the lack of companionship of jingling coins. It is the world of Indian superheroes launched by Shekhar Kapur, Deepak Chopra and a host of artistes and designers both from India and elsewhere. The artwork, in particular is groundbreaking and way better than any comic book artwork I have encountered anywhere (yes, this includes those sleek Batman Comics and similar stuff). All of this for a price of 30 rupees an issue, which is, I think juuuust right (any more and I could not have afforded it!)
The titles are called Devi, The Sadhu, Snake Woman, and Ramayana 3392AD (yes, fellow Science Fiction freaks! Ramayana in a dystopic nuclear war devastated earth).
Though I had seen them at Blossoms in Bangalore just before I was to graduate and come back home to Lucknow, I decided to buy them when I saw them at Landmark at the East End Mall in Gomtinagar. I checked out some of the artwork, decided that Devi's was the best (it truly is! Believe me!) and hastily bought issues 2, 3 and 4. Some days later (today, that is!) I brought issues 2, 3 and 4 of The Sadhu.
I showed them to Ra (who had come over for the weekend) and Pandu and both of them agreed with me as to the brilliant artwork and the ultra high production standards comparable (if not better) to any in the world.
My personal favourite of them all is Devi. It has the best artwork and Sitapur, a random district in UP is portrayed as a futuristic New York meets Mumbai. Gawd, is it uber cool!
Check them out if you're the comic book fan. Highly recommended.
So this is what happens. Abhishek Pathak mails "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" to a mailing list of a million people and I am included in the long list of nobodys. Being totally jobless, I decide to read it (yes, I have read the others too!).
First observation: 240 pages. "Weird", I say. Second thoughts (?): "Nah, I'll read it anyway. The print's small, that's all!"
So I undertake a voyage I had never undertaken before, i.e., reading a .pdf while sitting in front of a computer. But anyway, coming to the main point, this two day intensive reading (and the consequent backache) left me furious since it turned out that this wasn't the complete book. So I mail Pathak and ask for the complete version and voila! the next day it is mailed to me. However, I wasn't ready for the shit!
Turns out that the new .pdf has absolutely nothing in common with the old one. No-fucking-thing at all! Flustered, I read a short intro of the first scene on Wikipedia and realised that the new version is both correct and complete. I go on to read the new .pdf and finish my misadventure.
This would have been normal had it not been for the fact that I was already wary of copycats and yet couldn't identify the fake one. It was so god damned intelligently written. And if you ask me frankly, in a couple of places better written than the original.
Yeah I know you're not going to read it so I'll give you a gist.
(WARNING: Spoilers aplenty!)
Basically this was so interesting because it had a couple of scenes of graphic underage sex that Harry indulges in! (Having second thoughts about reading the .pdf? Go right ahead and don't read what's coming on!). Plus it also features Harry in innumerable kissing, coddling, caressing and what-fucking-ever scenes (it was all so damn fucking mushy).
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Unknown Interrogator : How the fuck did you not know this was a fake, man? I : Maine socha Harry bada ho gaya hai!
Siriusly (bad pun I know!) though I had doubts about this being THE Harry Potter book but they were proven to be short lived as they were only minor scenes (pun intended!) when compared to the overall mood/setting of the book. And Harry Potter was so much THE Harry Potter whom the readers know and Voldemort hates! Man, they conned me!
Neville kills Bellatrix in this version and himself gets killed. Bellatrix had, earlier, finished off the kid sister of Fleur Delacour (ignore spelling mistakes, if any), Lupin becomes the Head of the Order of Phoenix, Harry and Hermione become Head Boy and Girl respectively with McGonagall (refer instructions as regard to spelling above) as the Head Mistress of Hogwarts, Slughorn destroys one of the Horcruxes for Harry and dies doing it etc etc.
The fake is also remarkable in being able to anticipate a couple of developments that are actually there in the original. The location of the locket and the role of Kreacher, the funda of RAB (this one was easy!), the role of Snape (I had guessed this too!) etc were some areas in which the fake anticipates the original. It also had in plan a much larger and more important role for Dumbledore's brother (yeah, he's the Hogmeade barman in the fake too!). But most importantly it introduces the mysterious character of JULIE (yeah, Harry fucks her in a graphic scene!) and the strange cat of Ginny. Ginny herself is more mysterious and is given a stronger role.
The only gripe I have about the fake is that it is incomplete. Man, if I could lay my hands on the complete one!
The italicised text is quoted from the First Edition of The Gulag Archipelago written by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (translation by Thomas Whitney) and chronicles the mood during The Great Purge of 1937. Having been re-reading the book after about a gap of a year and a half, I was shocked yet again by the Stalin regime. The following excerpt would have been ultra comic, had it not been for the unbelievably tragic (even farcically tragic) situation then.
Here is one vignette from those years as it actually occurred. A District Party Conference was underway in Moscow Province. It was presided over by a new Secretary of the District Party Committee replacing one recently arrested. At the conclusion of the conference a tribute to Comrade Stalin was called for. Of course, everyone stood up (just as everyone had leaped to his feet during the conference at every mention of his name). The small hall echoed with "stormy applause, rising to an ovation". For three minutes, four minutes, five minutes, the "stormy applause rising to an ovation" continued. But palms were getting sore and raised arms were already aching. And the older people were panting from exhaustion. It was becoming insufferably silly even to those who rally adored Stalin. However, who would dare to be the first to stop? The secretary of the District Party Committee could have done it. He was standing on the platform, and it was he who had called for the ovation. But he was a newcomer. He had taken the place of a man who had been arrested. He was afraid! After all, NKVD men were standing in the hall applauding and watching to see who quit first. And in that obscure, small hall, unknown to the Leader, the applause went on--six, seven, eight minutes! They were done for!Their goose was cooked! They couldn't stop now till they collapsed with heart attacks! At the rear of the hall, which was crowded, they could, of course, cheat a bit, clap less frequently, less vigorously, not so eagerly--but up there with the presidium where everyone could see them? The director of the local paper factory, an independent and strong minded man stood with the presidium. Aware of all the falsity and all the impossibility of the situation, he still kept on applauding! Nine minutes! Ten! In anguish he watched the secretary of the District Party Committee but the latter dared not stop. Insanity! To the last man! With make-believe enthusiasm on their faces, looking at each other with faint hope, the district leaders were just going to go on and on till they fell where they stood, till they were carried off the hall on stretchers and even then those who were lef would not falter...Then, after eleven minutes the director of the paper factory assumed a business-like expression and sat down in his seat. And oh! a miracle took place! Where had the universal, uninhibited, indescribable enthusiasm gone? To a man, everyone stopped dead and sat down. They had been saved! The squirrel had been smart enough to jump off the revolving wheel.
That, however, was how they discovered who the independent people were. And that was how they went about eliminating them. That same night the factory director was arrested. They pasted a ten years on him on the pretext of something quite different. But after he had signed form 206, the final document of the interrogation, his interrogator reminded him: "Don't ever be the first to stop applauding"
DAY FOUR (22nd August 2007) : The Times of Victoria (?)
Ra and I took our leave from Zebi in the afternoon. It had been a very funny, adventurous one day trip we had had and both of us felt bad at having had to call it a day. (Incidentally, I forgot to mention that Zebi is putting a lot of my stupid, rotten and incredibly egregious stuff that I would not want to be reminded of as mine, to very good and productive use! Three cheers for him for recycling useless shit into products enhancing market value. Now there's an Engineer (or designer or whatever)!)
I had seen the Engineer's India Ltd. building while I was roaming around Delhi and had been reminded of Shandy being employed there. However, having not known his address and all, I had promptly forgotten about it all. Then Ra mentioned Shandy's residence to be close by and we decided to pay him a visit of sorts.
SHANDY has been the beacon of Victorian mannerisms and etiquettes in this boorish and uncultivated world. And he has been the only one to have known more about English language and history than probably a couple of retired professors in Oxford or Cambridge. Those who don't know him will freak out when they do. Those who do, will take comfort in the fact that he hasn't changed a single teeny-weeny bit!
He lived right behind the infamous charred remains of Upahar Cinema as a paying guest of a Surd who looks younger than Shandy but is actually 63 years old!
We met Shandy in his dhinchak A/C room and cooled off for a while. His 'errand boys' were from Bareilly and Kanpur (:P) and he talked to them in atrociously pronounced Hindi. He was a walking image of Lord Cornwallis treating natives with due deference, bearing the White Man's burden all the while! (Incidentally, Shandy's favourite writer is Rudyard Kipling). Ra and I just couldn't stop laughing. I wish I had a camera then!
The impeccable host that Shandy is, he took us to a restaurant close by and sponsored our lunch even though we were famished when we started. He then took us to the Deer Park which was close by. (It is a brilliant place by the way. If you're close to Safdarjung Enclave/Hauz Khas and have time on your hands, do visit).
We walked around the forest (yes, for all practical purposes it is a forest, right in the heart of Delhi!) spotting deer, peacock, ducks in their ponds etc while I told Shandy of the Series of Unfortunate Events from yesterday. He also took us to many ruins (they are right there in the Deer Park) dating back five hundred years or more and explained to us ignoramuses, salient architectural features and styles used in building them.
However, time was short in supply as Ra and I had plans to go to Gurgaon and visit my cousin Bittu Bhaiya there. So we hastily went to a Madrasi eatery and had some coffee (Shandy poured tons of sugar in his coffee...one two three four five six spoonfuls!) and took leave, I at least not knowing when I would see Shandy again!
Quote-Unquote
1) I: What do you think of Delhi? Shandy: It is a city of boors.
(I fondly remember another such instance which was Shandian in a very forceful way. We were being interviewed for entry into NewsWagon and Sahil asked Shandy "What do you have to say about the level of English in college (NIT Surathkal)?"
Shandy to Sahil : Deplorable(!))
2) Shandy: Mr Dwivedi, I must say your English is deteriorating I : (Sheepishly) Well, I am going to the US. Shandy: That explains a lot!
Forty minutes of standing on the AIIMS road convinced us that finding conveyance to Gurgaon would hardly be simple. In fact Ra backed out and after literally pushing me in a cab en route to Gurgaon already stuffed with fourteen people, he bade me goodbye. He had not known that his company badge lay safe, ensconced within the deep pockets of my bag and that he would have to return to Delhi to reclaim it.
Bear Hunt and Chicken curry in Gurgaon
It's too bad that I don't have pictures to prove it but the Power Grid Township in Gurgaon is so much like NGV (National Games Village) in Kormangala, Bangalore that I was surprised at the observation (actually it's a couple of notches above NGV in most matters).
It was decided that I would be rolling there and Bittuya would begin making chicken the way he used to in Nazarbagh. His culinary skills have not deteriorated with the passage of time and tasting the food in the night was a veritable trip down the memory lane. Bear hunt was also organised and time was conveniently expended in discussing important and unimportant stuff and making plans for the giant 29" TV that was going to be bought and the Playstation that would make its appearance there! Bittuya's roomie was from Lucknow too and somehow or the other, I have the feeling that country bumpkins always have a nice time together!
