total timepass...

IPL is over.. phew.. !! Though obviously the aftermath isn't yet:). Once the Shoaib-Sania daily updates finished, started the Modi saga, giving enough work to the Indian media.. This latest saga will continue to give us many more 'manu-ranjan ka baap' moments for sometime.. but we still need to wait and watch for the end to this.. Anyways, this article is more about the IPL stadium experience again. Most of the earlier IPL league matches that I saw were in Braborne stadium (of which I have already written before in detail ). They were fun to watch and so I kept going again and again to see those matches. Saw the IPL final in the DY Patil Stadium however and it was a different experience. Not sure if I would want to go there often though! The stadium is beautiful! Very well constructed: its huge and there are no columns blocking your view at any location. Any seat you sit on, you get a complete view of the ground (and this was quite different from Braborne). The sound a...

Maya never fails to make it to the news on a regular basis.. and all the reasons are mostly the same; more money to her; more statues of her; or just her telling other politicians and the judiciary (and of course the general public) to go to hell!! Anyways here are some more stats on Maya, on how she has worked so hard over the last few years to uplift the weaker sections of society as she had always promised to do...

Read this article on the Samba spy case sometime back and was shocked! Did not know what to say or think.. Justice is delayed and denied often in our country, but for something as serious as spying? And of course, one person falsely implicating 50 other army officers and for 35 years!! It just does not sound right.. feels very sad... Of course, we don't know the genuineness of this claim and there may be more to the story than what meets the eye. Still, its quite a big shocker.... And if its true, is terrible.. Falsely implicating possibly innocent army officers of being spies; of them having served rigorous sentences; of the ignominy they and their families would have suffered for years; and of the damage to the image of the army... Can we ever set it right?

Our soldiers are nowadays busy fighting not just the external aggressors but also internal enemies; the Naxalites. Its a tougher fight for them, as the enemy is not clearly distinguishable from our co-patriots; and the use of power can get the human rights activists up in arms; 'how can we be so barbaric to use force against our own citizens??!!'. The laughability of the situation is ironic. It does not matter how many innocent policemen and their families die due to Naxalite action; it does not matter how much loss to public propert they cause. But it is barbaric to harm them or their supporters!! I find it tough to even try to argue against such statements , it just seems so stupid... Anyways what prompted this article, was this newspaper piece . Don't really think can say much about it, it just hits you so hard, makes you numb and unable to even think of how our defence personnel are doing what they do!!

Saw an animation movie after ages I think, but should say, it wasn't too bad an experience [I seem to find them too childish and compare them to cartoons to the chagrin of my friends]. Anyways, the storyline of 'how to train your dragon' was quite routine, nothing new there. A viking village which kills dragons for their own survival; the village leader's son who appears to be good for nothing; father-son relationship issues; the son realizes that you do not need to kill the dragons to win them, you just need to befriend them and of course how he solves the village's problems and makes his father proud! On this journey, the son "Hiccup" is helped by his friend dragon, "Toothless", the cute but mighty dangerous "night fury" dragon. Hiccup's interactions with Toothless help him learn about these creatures, how to control them and of what controls them too. Of course, there are mistakes and confusions, but in the end, Hiccu...

For the last month of so, IPL 3 has been the best entertainment source for a lot of us, if not the only source! Its sad that even good hindi movies have dried up for this period. It helps though that any restaurant or club you go to would have the match playing, so at least we are all still going out!! Anyways, this year have managed to see multiple matches at the stadium too and they are real entertainers, a good evening out... The 'Grand Indian Tamasha' is what IPL should be renamed as:). Increasingly I have come to realise that the IPL is less and less about cricket and more about entertainment. In the stadium, the atmosphere is electric. Loud music playing continuously. Cheerleaders, mascots, dhol wale. The entire gamut of entertainers only to please the crowd. And the cricket being played in between:). Thats what the IPL is all about and it works well too. The crowds absolutely love it and have a ball at the matches. Watching IPL has become a good ev...

Given the recent drought of good movies in the last month or at least lack of big starrers recently (thanks to IPL I guess), I landed up to see a movie which otherwise I may have given a miss, 'Well done Abba'. And what a good decision it turned out to be!! Its a long time since a (good) movie based on rural India has been released and this movie really does justice to this setting: the story of a person trying to fight the system while trying to get a well (baudi) for himself in his village in Andhra Pradesh. It is essentially a 'social message' movie, but it has been so simply and so skillfully done, it actually surprises as well as entertains you completely. Well done Abba doesn't really boast big stars (though it does an acclaimed director), I guess that adds to the charm of movie by itself. The movie has a host of smaller actors playing multiple characters, mostly the tableau of the village. The movie is very slow, and for a long time ...