Birthday Girl

Happy Holidays

2013

Yet another year to close. Yet another wonderful year to close. Can I say some random year ending stuff? I am presuming you have said, 'Why, yes of course. We are all dying to know how the year was for you personally and the entire world is waiting to hear all your random, weird, almost nauseating thoughts of the year'. 

So there we go. 

I finally fulfilled my wish of visiting London. I loved London. I think I more or less fall in love with almost every place I visit. I felt I matured a lot even as an amateur traveller. I knew exactly what I wanted to do on most days which also included a whole lot of aimless walking around the city.  I remember this one day, I had gone to a small town called Egham, an hour and a half's drive from London, to my friend's university. After she went for her lecture (she is a professor), I ventured forth like a predictably excited migratory bird. So usually my experience has been that if I keep walking and walking, I am bound to discover something really cool, even mindblowing at times. So I kept walking and walking and after about half an hour I realised I have gone completely off track and have come to a highway of sorts. Then I turned back and started walking again. Before I was about to reach my friend Kopal's university, I found a pretty left with pretty houses. I took the left and started walking. I went to this spectacular cemetery as the winter sun grazed my skin and flowers bowed over loved ones' graves. I have been to at least six cemeteries in Europe so far and every time I am inside it, I feel weird. I feel almost scared. But I also feel a deep sense of calm and a sense of being (weirdo). I love the messages on the tombstones. I love the flowers, flower pots. I love the little paraphernalia of each grave. Anyhow, I then walked into a local coffee shop. Sat near a window, had half of a sandwich and coffee. Walked into another right, found a local arts and crafts shop, found some really beautiful houses. Walked ahead and found a huge park. Sat there for hours, finished the leftover sandwich and made a terrible sketch of a house I could see on my left. 

And by the time I was done with all of this, it was just 2 pm. I don't know what I am trying to say. When you are in a wonderfully strange new place, something happens to time. I love big cities but they eat up time. They swallow time and leave no traces of it. But in smaller towns, time walks next to you, tickles you, plays with you. I love that. I love the feeling that it is possible to hold time in your hands. And mix it with all the beautiful things around you and you are bound to be amazed by what you feel. It really does feel something. Trust me.  

London was London. So handsome. And so wonderfully reckless at places. Full of art. Full of passion.

Moving on. I celebrated my 29th birthday with my parents. I was with my parents on my birthday after some eight odd years. There was absolutely no plan except that my parents had booked their train tickets two months in advance to be with me on my birthday this year. They wanted to surprise me but then they gave in. So when they came, we decided on this impromptu, completely impulsive trip to this place called Jadhavgadh Fort, a little outside of Pune, recommended by my friends Urvi and Nikhil. It's a fort turned into a hotel. We stayed there for a night and left the next morning. All we did on day one was to explore the place (My dad makes fun of me for trying to "explore" everything). At the cost of sounding sentimental, the most brilliant part of the entire trip was to look at my mom and dad trying to work out the photos and videos on their mobile cameras. My mom was the last entrant from the family in the cell phones department. You should have seen her working that camera. Focus. Clarity. My god! At the end, she realised most for her pictures never got clicked since there was no memory in the phone. But she was just brilliant any which ways. She quickly hopped onto my camera. My dad was working on his newly acquired video making skills. They were a sight, both of them. Precious. 

Look what my friend Arundhati wrote for me on my birthday. "My beautiful, wish you a fantastic birthday. I wish you a year of travels, stories and poems. A year speckled with bright mornings and dark coffee. White boys and scarlet drinks. Engaging encounters and careless abandon. Lots of love to you."

Lovely right?

And now you wana see something cool (okay my kinda cool), my another soulmate friend (and role model) Anu wrote this message for me: "....Wishing so many things for you on this glorious day sista sparkles...red wine, cake with too many candles, good company, endless abandon, and a lotta love!"

Notice something? Two of my closest friends, who don't really know each other, but know me, wished me careless and endless abandon. How fucking cool is that!!

Oh, I got introduced to Roald Dahl (yes, yes, as usual, I am late to the party but at least the party is still on). I read Kiss Kiss, given to me by my friend Clare. I love the mischievousness. I love the comic darkness. I love the twists, the bends and the spunky knots. 

Also, thanks to the motivation of some of lovely friends, been editing/polishing some of my own short stories written over the years. I want to do something cool and fun with them. Working towards it. 

I want to go to Greece next year. 

I also want my friend Anu to have a boyfriend soon only so she can write a lovely poem and I can read it. 

Thought of the Day

Recommendation of the week: The Ladykillers (1955)

Just two words while recommending this movie should suffice: Peter Sellers.

However, there is much more to the movie than him including a delicious plot, the wonderful ensemble cast, brilliantly timed dark humor and above all a charming 1950s London.

Also, what makes it more special for me personally is that I stumbled upon this movie in London. One of the days of my wonderful wintery London vacation, I decided to go to Southbank Centre for the fifth or sixth time to catch a breath after walking aimlessly for a few hours. At the BFI Centre, they had an ongoing program in their media library where you could get a personal computer, couch and headphones to sift through and watch some 200 hours of original British content. And this is what I chose.

Highly recommended for two hours of clean legal fun.

My Wall Project

The landlady is going to be angry. Very angry.

I’ll be damned, it’s been a good year

"I don’t believe in optimism. I believe in optimal behavior. That’s a different thing. If you behave every day of your life to the top of your genetics, what can you do? Test it. Find out. You don’t know—you haven’t done it yet. You must live life at the top of your voice! At the top of your lungs shout and listen to the echoes. I learned a lesson years ago. I had some wonderful Swedish meatballs at my mother’s table with my dad and my brother and when I finished I pushed back from the table and said, God! That was beautiful. And my brother said, No, it was good. See the difference?

Action is hope. At the end of each day, when you’ve done your work, you lie there and think, Well, I’ll be damned, I did this today. It doesn’t matter how good it is, or how bad—you did it. At the end of the week you’ll have a certain amount of accumulation. At the end of a year, you look back and say, I’ll be damned, it’s been a good year."

Ray Bradbury via Paris Review

One

(At Trafalgar Square, London)

My London Trip

Lunches in parks.
Walks in museums.
Soup in a museum.
Aimless one way roads.
Deserted park.
Picnic parks.
People-watching benches.
Pigeons on the benches.
Glorius buildings. Red buildings.
Victorian houses. Symmetrical houses.
Flower pots.
Wide variety of morning and evening sky.
Moon, often in flesh and blood.
Dark ale. Fuller. Noisy warm pubs.
Metro newspapers. Metro crush.
Play posters.
Scattered theatres.
Angry art. Street art.
In your face art. Subtle art.
Rat art.
Directions.
Photos.
Coffee and lunch at Auntie's Tea Shop.
Cambridge. Egham. Colchestor. Outside London.
Bicycles. Flowers. Posters.
Supermarkets. Cheese. Wine. Green apples.
Sketch in a park. Really bad sketch in a park.
Australian hairdressers.
Blocked metro line. A man jumped in front of a train.
Long drives. Sheep.
A little loneliness. Too many distractions.
Coffee. More coffee. Some more coffee.
Old friends. Conversations.
Dinosaurs. Grills. Statues. Gates. Doors.
Ladykillers movie.
A few scribbles. A few lost lines.
New thoughts.
New plans.
Beautiful city.
Fresh and crisp air.
Hope.
Spectacular. Culture. People. Variety. Fish. Prawns.
Tea. Lots of it. Butter and bread too.  

A Spaceman

(At Southbank Centre, London)

Vacation

via: fisher.osu.edu

At Carters

What happens in a cup of coffee

“The ordinary-sized stuff which is our lives, the things people write poetry about—clouds—daffodils—waterfalls—what happens in a cup of coffee when the cream goes in—these things are full of mystery, as mysterious to us as the heavens were to the Greeks.”

Tom Stoppard

A letter for Ms Blobfish

Dear Blobfish, 

They have no idea what they are talking about. They just wanted to use you as a mascot, without paying you any commission and that's why they thought it would be funny to call you the ugliest animal in the world. Plus whatever said and done, just forgive the  Ugly Animal Preservation Society. They are actually kind of trying to do something good by trying to preserve your kind. Please ignore the silly method. 

You just know how fucking cool you are. You are not grumpy. You are just a bit serious and thus you are always lost in thought, pondering over life's big questions. They will shut the hell up once they know the brilliant insights you have about the age old existential dilemmas. The late Mr. Samuel Beckett would have loved to chat with you and get inspired! I am not ruling out a possibility for coffee and conversation with the late Kafka too. If Murakami wasn't so obsessed with cats, he would be obsessed with you. You get the point right. 

And please, you are so not lazy. You are just what they call 'chilled out'. I mean what are they even talking about. Your food walks upto you! Like, just how amazing is that!! You are almost divine man. Just try and not disappear. 

And come on, you of all the animals know that this world is so transitory. Next year, the tag of world's ugliest animal will go to some other poor being. And I know you are too proud and intelligent to ever feel sorry for yourself.  Enjoy all the publicity. Like they say, all publicity is good. 

So stay cool man. Just stay cool

Lovingly yours,

Me 

  

Parade's End. Rebecca Hall.

After an extremely justifiably restless day yesterday, I settled down for a show that I had just somewhere briefly read about and knew that  a friend had saved it on my hard drive along with some other fantastic (Read Bernie, Smashed and many more) movies. I easily glided into Parade's End  (despite of not being a very huge fan of British dramas). Probably just a few minutes passed before I wrapped up four hours of the miniseries, directed by Susanna White and written by Tom Stoppard. I am four episodes down right now and I am quite high on the show. And one of the most important reasons for that (apart from the sheer brilliance of the show, the costumes, the slightly muggy storyline and truly intriguing Benedict Cumberbatch) is Rebecca Hall. Right from the scene one, she held me captive.  

Okay first. I have a huge girl crush on her right now. Honestly, I hadn't seen anything Rebecca Hall so far except for Woody Allen's juice box movie Vicky, Christina, Barcelona where somewhere she might have been burnt alive (along with Scarlett Johansson) by the fire that Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz on screen are. But there is absolutely no one in Parade's End that could come near her. Her character, Sylvia, is probably the most brilliantly etched out character in the show. Don't take me wrong, Christopher's character is interesting too but personally, every time I look at him, all I want to do is either punch him really fucking hard on his stomach or shred his clothes and make him have sex with Sylvia. (Don't worry I am not a nympho, you will know the sex angle when you watch the show).

It would be an understatement to say that Hall brings so much raw life and energy into the character. She looks breathtakingly spectacular in each scene. She weaves the complexity of the character even through her breathing. Right from the moment she asks pale Christopher for a cigarette, instantly infusing blood in his veins  to her breaking the glass plate in the next to next scene when she finds him making corrections in Encyclopedia Britannica. From her casual dalliance with Potty who makes her laugh when he threatens to shoot her to her announcement of her vows to be chaste for her husband to her various pitiful, sharp, ridiculous, on the verge of breakdown attempts to be with her husband, to illicit any ounce of emotion out of him, emotional, physical, whatever. 

Rebecca Hall is the fire of Parade's End. 

(Pictures' courtesy: tumblr.com)

   

Anti- Manic Depressives

I recently was telling someone that it is hard to remember the last time I was this insanely almost peaceful and happy the way I have been since the last few months. Happiness can be very addictive. It is light and it has a sense of surreal calm about it. It feels sweet like a nap after a glass of wine in the afternoon. I have been having way too much fun with it. It wasn’t easy to get used to it initially. But once I did...oh man!

However, obviously, to say the least, this is life. Things constantly change for better or for worse and all that shit. Suddenly the road leading to some great anticipated adventure suddenly folds up or takes a sudden sharp turn and all that shit. It is easy (and I did for a bit) to get crushed. Unhappiness is always right around the corner, waiting for you to slip right in, feel miserable, recall all the crappy things that have ever happened to you since the moment you were born (Yeah, I am wired weirdly), curse all the men that inhabit this planet and all that shit. It sometimes makes me write better but now I have realised that I am now learning to write averagely well even without being depressed. Also, when I am unhappy, it is usually much more difficult for me to take decisions (I often end up using shampoo on my loofah and coffee in my tea which leads to a lot of practical wastage), to decide what to wear for work, to listen to other people, to look out of the taxi window and feel the wind and little snippets of life floating all around! And last but not the least, ALL the bad decisions in my life can be attributed to this little monster. And it is absolutely fatal when it mixes with alcohol.

So basically, I am on a mission. I cannot afford to be unhappy. It sounds like a sloppy philosophical statement, but I am not going on that road again. Even if it is hard work and requires a very rational process (I am watching a lot of Dexter and Alfred Hitchcock Presents these days to stay inspired), staying happy is fun. And totally worth it. I am not saying I am not slipping. Constantly.

Life has a weird way of punching you on your nose (mine sometimes literally does that by making me fall on my nose in my own house) but the idea is to just cry a little, get up, clean up and put on a band-aid and move fucking on.  

On another note, I think I will make a highly shady and questionable motivational speaker. 

Special mention on this post: My more than dearest friend, one of my soulmates and my anti-manic depressive machine-- Prinki (Priyanka Pereira). Only she will understand this reference. Rest of you, carry on and check out delicious semi-naked Don Draper (Jon Hamm) below. 

   

  

The Summer Man

Past

(Via: tumblr.com)

On a roll.

There it was.

Between the wavy red cloth covered ceiling, reminiscent of the romance and pathos of a circus and a staid old fashioned chandelier. Between one beer and one cigarette. Between the table cloth with check prints, stuffed under a heavy glass and the music weirdly alternating between heavy jazz and hip hop, suddenly there it was. A feeling of being fully alive; life was jumping and dancing right in the pit of her stomach, running up her legs, arms and neck. It lasted just for a minute or two probably, but nevertheless there it was. 

Oh baby's home.

Love Liberates by Maya Angelou.

About Last Night

(via: carrieparry.com)

In-between

There is something about transitions.

They remind me of you.

The in-between,

With no identity,

with no form to boast of.

Like when we met for the first time,

A moment born out of nothing,

And ever since.

Its ephemeral and fragile.

Its a bubble,

But only if you break it.

We have our own universes.

But this in-between,

Is where parts of us live,

The secret parts,

Together.

कच्ची सिलाई

कभी कभी ऐसा लगता है,
जैसे ज़िन्दगी को कच्ची सिलाई ने समेट रखा है.
आराम से उधेड़ बुन करो तो ,
हर रोज़ नयी सी बन जाती है. 

Love. And War.

via

Photo-series on Guardian 'Girl soldier: a love affair in wartime - in pictures'

Boots!

Cities

Paris was not as intense as I had imagined it to be. I have never understood how to explain it but inspite of being the embodiment of a beautiful poem by a poet who has had the perfect amount of suffering, happiness, love, longing, torture in his life, Paris, for me, needed to be more. I wanted more. I had hoped for more. It had the capacity to make me feel pretty naked in my defense towards life but like I said, somehow, the whole experience was just a bit hollow. Each and every building asked for its soul. I was comforted by a new friendship with a fellow backpacker during the first half of my time there and Leonard Cohen in a lovely bookshop and thoughts of a very lovely boy in the second half. There is a reason why I am rambling today about this. Just read this piece on Flavorwire about what these lovely people have to say about monumental Paris and I kind of feel jealous that those emotions evaded me.

Mumbai is resplendent right now. Glistening leaves. Colorful umbrellas. Hard-working chaiwallas with their little stalls and sharp beautiful steam coming out of their aluminium almost-rusted kettles. The sound of the rain. The sights. The clattering sound on the tin rooftops at various places. The raindrops hugging the taxi or the car windows. Old silly Hindi songs on my radio while on my way to work. Schoolchildren jumping into filthy puddles. If this is not the moment to be fully alive then I don't know what is.

Your eyes

Your eyes lie vacant

Sometimes sharp like a lion

Who’s been hungry for three days

Sometimes mellow like migratory birds

On their journey to a new known place

Your eyes are fearless

Like a small lovely town

Undiscovered and flourishing

Your eyes are full of distance

Like a soldier in the enemy camp

Grim and angry

And optimistic about building a country

Your eyes

Slowly trickling down my skin

Quiet and sudden

 On the day we meet 

Weekend. Mother. Kafka's The Trial. Lars and the Real Girl. Smash People's Heads.

This weekend has been so long and nice and justifiably and deservedly so.

I am being treated to piping hot-smothered with ghee-food by mother who has come to live with me for two weeks.Staying with mother always makes me emotional. Very happy. Very edgy. Very decisive. Very confused. Very confident. Very weak. All at the same time. Yup.

Re-watched 'Lars and the Real Girl' yesterday. Had almost completely forgotten it. Gosling is so different in this movie. And brilliant. And I love Emily Mortimer. Even though she usually always plays these sugary roles, I still love her. I don't remember the name of this other movie. I have written about it somewhere on my blog in which there is this scene where she stands naked in front of this guy and just asks him so earnestly to help her practically analyse her body from each and every angle, as she is an aspiring and struggling actress. I just remember that earnestness in her voice and eyes so clearly. Anyhow, 'Lars and the Real Girl' is a pretty interesting film to catch, if you haven't already. Very very intense subject treated with a pinch of butter and salt.

(Image source: designarchives.aiga.org)

Just started reading Franz Kafka's The Trial, finally. It had been stalking and staring at me for years now. Finally decided to give it a shot. 40 pages down and I am in this abysmal world of this person being free and arrested at the same time and we both have no freaking idea about his situation. Intriguing. So far.

In other news, I am feeling a little bit like this. I think I am just keeping my head on my head because my mother is staying with me right now otherwise I am totally in the mood to take a bat and smash some people's heads on the road. Just like that. Just to feel good. Most people are weird. Anyways.

 

  

SUGAR SAYS

 

via http://therumpus.net/

Pretty Much!

Ambivalence

Wanting to clutch
Hold on
Be free as air
Spreading thin
In the sky
Buried inside the earth....

Fearless

Then again, this déjà vu didn’t erase the idea of an unhappy ending. “I love you like this,” Megan purred, as Don (Draper) struggled to brand a car with no name. “Desperate and scared?” he said. “Fearless,” she replied, saying that she’d do anything to help. Her closing line hinted at the finale that the show keeps flashing like a fan dancer: “Then you can jump from the balcony and fly to work. Like Superman.”

Faking It by Emily Nussbaum for New Yorker

 

MACEDONIA! Fuck yeah!

(That's why I love blogging! This is so fucking cool. I always wanted someone who stays in a place which sounds like 'Macedonia' to read whatever shit I write)

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Obituaries

I have often expressed my love and obsession for The New York Times Obituaries section. There is nothing really cryptic about this deep interest in reading about famous/not so famous dead people. 

I love these obituaries for very simple reasons-The headlines: Most of the headlines are just like these lovely short interesting stories in themselves.

Take for example:

Rev. Will D. Campbell, Maverick Minister in Civil Rights Era, Dies at 88

Jack Vance, Novelist of the Fantastical, Is Dead at 96

Lewis A. Yocum Dies at 65; Repaired Arms and Careers in Baseball

Angelo J. Errichetti, 84, Camden Mayor Convicted of Bribery, Dies

Kim Merker, Hand-Press Printer of Poets, Is Dead at 81

Aren't these just brilliant and provoking?

The Girl at the Hospital

I kind of became obsessed with clicking pictures of this pretty young lady when I was waiting for my appointment at the hospital last to last week. She started posing for me once she realised I was slyly clicking her pictures. These are just 10% of the pictures I clicked. Once I was done she smiled at me, I smiled back and then she ran and buried her head in her pregnant mother's lap. 

(Bad picture quality, courtesy, HTC phone camera)

A chance encounter with Quimet Sabaté

                                                                                                                                                                              
My friend Sowmyatta and I had a lovely chance encounter with this great artist Quimet Sabaté in Barcelona. We saw a poster titled 'FREE Dali Exhibition' and obviously concluded that it is an exhibition of Salvador Dali's work, something that I was trying to see during my entire trip to Paris. There is infact a Dali Museum in Paris but it charges some 10 Euros for entry and considering the tight budget that I was on, I decided to give it a miss.

Anyhow, when we went up the spiral staircase, we were surprised to find that the exhibition was actually a homage to Dali by his friend and artist Quimet Sabate. We met the Mr Sabate and his twin brother, two pleasantly charming old men. Sabate sat by this little balcony and just got up to show us a collage where he was with Dali. He also asked us (in Spanish) how old were we since most of us work is nudist. We convinced him we were old enough to look at nude pictures. He showed us the picture of his other muse, Laura, with whom he had a relationship with for years. It was a really fun experience to go through his entire art space and discover interesting pieces. And he was kind enough to pose with us for a picture which now serves as a pleasant memory.  

"Half a love never appealed to me"

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

Picture from tumblr.com

Recommendation of the Week

I have a lot of things to recommend this week but right now I will just share a moderate chunk of my excitement. This week’s recommendation is Richard Linklater’s satiric dark comedy ‘Bernie’ featuring Jack Black. And here’s why:

New Yorker recently called Jon Hamm the most watchable man on screen (Mad Men’s Don Draper- and you are definitely living in a parallel ugly universe if you don’t know who Jon Hamm is!). Despite of my enormous admiration for Mr Draper, for me, the most watchable man on screen is Jack Black. To say he is a rockstar would be a gross understatement and it might confuse you with his musical talents.

If ‘School of Rock’ was probably a quintessential Jack Black film, ‘Bernie’ has the JB you have not seen before. He is simply outstanding in the movie. Bernie is based on a real story of an apparently simple but in reality a highly complex man involved in a completely “out-of-character” incident. Till the end, JB’s character Bernie Tiede will keep you spellbound and confused as to what the truth is. Linklater takes you so close to the psyche of funeral director Bernie and his intentions but the moment you think you are close enough to get any answers, he pulls you right out. That’s where the beauty of Bernie lies.  

Oh and did I already mention that Jack Black is outstanding in the movie, a fountain of brilliance. An absolute must watch.