I'm back. I think.
Happy New Year, by the way.
For a long time I've been trying to figure out why I haven't been writing. Two years back, I was flying like the Rajdhani, struggling just to keep up with the ideas springing to life in my brain. A novel, the novel, just bubbling over inside, building up it's flavours so fast it was a full time job just to put them all down on paper. Short stories, like little rivulets of excess story, trickling down the cauldron of Novel.
Then, somehow,the fire went out. The cauldron bubbled for a bit, throwing out a few last precious sputters, and settled into a seething mass that tormented but produced no output. Everything I wrote since has been flat and lifeless. Attempts at pushing myself have been worthless - I myself can see the poor quality of my writing, I can see that my older stuff was better, why be surprised at anyone's rejection?
It took me this long to see what was happening. What it was, was that the input to the pipeline had dried up. If your output is supposed to be prose, your input really needs to be prose. Whereas what I've been doing for a while now has been something else altogether - reading comics by the scores. Watching movies, TV serials. Reading web pages by the thousands, yes, thousands. This stuff probably helps me if I want to write for comics or make movies (indeed, ideas for movie plots have begun to bubble up these days). But that's not what I set out to be - I chose writing, long before I realized that it was a choice I was making.
All it took a couple of weeks of full-blown reading - 4 books in 3 weeks, and counting, to start building up the Writing Cauldron again. Reminded me of how long it's been since I read books like that, in great gulps, every spare minute I got. The cauldron hasn't yet reached boiling point - it'll probably take another few weeks of the intense reading - but I can feel something happening there.
Let's hope I can keep it going.
PS. In case anyone, (I'm referring to you, George) notices, yes, I've been finishing a Palahniuk book. Shows up in the writing, doesn't it?
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Monday, July 30, 2007
Me: No, no, let me think of something decent to write about first, then I'll post to the blog.
Seinfeld ka bhoot: Abbey idiot, start writing, something, anything. Do you expect to be writing masterpieces the day you get struck by inspiration? What about practice, what about honing your craft and all that?
Me (a little scared by the outburst): But Carson McCullers wrote The Heart is a Lonely Hunter when she was only 23. And it was her first book.
Seinfeld ka bhoot:So you want to write saas-bahu stuff like McCullers? Want to describe the anguish of your neighbourhood dhabawala and the mali who comes to your place? Is that what you want to write about?
Me: Er, no.
SkB: Because if you're just going to keep writing about the people about you, you could do it today, too.
Me: Really?
SkB: NO, you Schmuck! You think anyone churns out whole books in one shot? McCullers probably spent years writing that book! You think I came up with the Soup Nazi in two minutes?
Me: Er, wasn't he based on a real person, there was a question about him in the last BCQC quiz, did you see it, there was...
SkB [Tearing out his hair in frustration]: Well, is that all it was? Just think of a person to base a plot on, and you're done? Do you have any effing idea how long it takes to write a plot, to set it up to flow right, to think of the right dialogues? You think I could have written any of those episodes without practicing first? Writing is like an airplane, not like a helicopter! It needs a takeoff strip!
Me: What about one of those VTOL jets? You know, the ones that have these engines on a hinge, see, so they can take off...
SkB [Suddenly turning serious]: Are you always this dumb, or are you just playing at it so that you don't have to listen to me?
Me: Huh?
SkB: Let me just say it in very plain words. Unless you put in very sincere efforts to write, unless you put in a little time every day on your book or stories or whatever it is you want to do, you're going to wind up doing nothing but reading about Samit Basu's success story while you work on your job. Do you understand?
Me: Yes. Yes, I do. But I get so tired, so depressed, every evening, I don't think I can...
SkB: So do you ever get so tired you forget to breathe? Or forget to eat your dinner? Or have you ever been so tired you couldn't be bothered to go to the loo? Because writing's like that - you have to do it somehow, you have to express it somehow. Unless you approach your writing that way it ain't gonna happen.
Me: But I don't feel that way all the time. Like, the urge to write isn't that strong all the time, only sometimes.
SkB: Listen, buddy, you've made me up out of some web page, and you've been putting words in my mouth all through this blog post. You didn't make me up so that I can justify your laziness. Now that I exist, I'm going to listen to any of these silly excuses. The urge to write gathers strength, the more you write. It never appears full blown - like, look at me, you read that article yesterday, yet it took you a day to even write this much. As long as you're willing to listen to me, I'll be there, I'll be your 'urge to write'. All you have to do is write something, anything, even if it's a joke, every day. Write it down proper, okay? No thinking it over. You are going to put it down in black and white. The day you don't, I'm going to laugh at you all night long.
Me: Yes, Bhoot Unkle.
SkB [Talking to an audience in a nightclub]: The other day I talked to this aspiring writer-type. To tell you the truth, he wasn't worth shit...
Me: HEY!
SkB [Ignoring me]: Though he thought he was India's answer to Caleb Carr and Charles de Lint. Kept making up excuses about how he couldn't write...
Me: HEY! JERRY! Sorry I called you anything associated with Jackie Shroff, okay? Stop it!
SkB [Returning to normal state]: That's better. Now get to it.
Seinfeld ka bhoot: Abbey idiot, start writing, something, anything. Do you expect to be writing masterpieces the day you get struck by inspiration? What about practice, what about honing your craft and all that?
Me (a little scared by the outburst): But Carson McCullers wrote The Heart is a Lonely Hunter when she was only 23. And it was her first book.
Seinfeld ka bhoot:So you want to write saas-bahu stuff like McCullers? Want to describe the anguish of your neighbourhood dhabawala and the mali who comes to your place? Is that what you want to write about?
Me: Er, no.
SkB: Because if you're just going to keep writing about the people about you, you could do it today, too.
Me: Really?
SkB: NO, you Schmuck! You think anyone churns out whole books in one shot? McCullers probably spent years writing that book! You think I came up with the Soup Nazi in two minutes?
Me: Er, wasn't he based on a real person, there was a question about him in the last BCQC quiz, did you see it, there was...
SkB [Tearing out his hair in frustration]: Well, is that all it was? Just think of a person to base a plot on, and you're done? Do you have any effing idea how long it takes to write a plot, to set it up to flow right, to think of the right dialogues? You think I could have written any of those episodes without practicing first? Writing is like an airplane, not like a helicopter! It needs a takeoff strip!
Me: What about one of those VTOL jets? You know, the ones that have these engines on a hinge, see, so they can take off...
SkB [Suddenly turning serious]: Are you always this dumb, or are you just playing at it so that you don't have to listen to me?
Me: Huh?
SkB: Let me just say it in very plain words. Unless you put in very sincere efforts to write, unless you put in a little time every day on your book or stories or whatever it is you want to do, you're going to wind up doing nothing but reading about Samit Basu's success story while you work on your job. Do you understand?
Me: Yes. Yes, I do. But I get so tired, so depressed, every evening, I don't think I can...
SkB: So do you ever get so tired you forget to breathe? Or forget to eat your dinner? Or have you ever been so tired you couldn't be bothered to go to the loo? Because writing's like that - you have to do it somehow, you have to express it somehow. Unless you approach your writing that way it ain't gonna happen.
Me: But I don't feel that way all the time. Like, the urge to write isn't that strong all the time, only sometimes.
SkB: Listen, buddy, you've made me up out of some web page, and you've been putting words in my mouth all through this blog post. You didn't make me up so that I can justify your laziness. Now that I exist, I'm going to listen to any of these silly excuses. The urge to write gathers strength, the more you write. It never appears full blown - like, look at me, you read that article yesterday, yet it took you a day to even write this much. As long as you're willing to listen to me, I'll be there, I'll be your 'urge to write'. All you have to do is write something, anything, even if it's a joke, every day. Write it down proper, okay? No thinking it over. You are going to put it down in black and white. The day you don't, I'm going to laugh at you all night long.
Me: Yes, Bhoot Unkle.
SkB [Talking to an audience in a nightclub]: The other day I talked to this aspiring writer-type. To tell you the truth, he wasn't worth shit...
Me: HEY!
SkB [Ignoring me]: Though he thought he was India's answer to Caleb Carr and Charles de Lint. Kept making up excuses about how he couldn't write...
Me: HEY! JERRY! Sorry I called you anything associated with Jackie Shroff, okay? Stop it!
SkB [Returning to normal state]: That's better. Now get to it.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
It was much, much later that I found out that Power Lords were actually toys to be launched in the wake of the He-Man fever. To stir up interest in these toys, Revell collaborated with DC Comics to create a comic mini-series featuring the characters.
I have no idea whether this shrewd marketing move worked. I only know that the first issue of this Power Lords series was the one with the most attractive cover of the lot when I, an impressionable 9-year-old, first went into a bookshop in Trivandrum to buy a 'foreign' comic. I'd read other DC comics at the time - Justice League and so on, not knowing that they were DC Comics. I knew the difference between the desi Phantom/Mandrake/Tinkle comics and the glossy Superman/Batman type 'foreign' comics, and I knew that if I cribbed long enough, my father would eventually cave in and get me some of the good stuff. And so, here I was.
Power Lords #1 turned out to be the first DC comic I bought by myself. I don't remember most of the other comics that were in that bin - There was a Conan comic there, I remember, but that's it. I must have read this story of Adam Power hundreds of times. It was the acme of storytelling for me - for quite a while after that, whenever I daydreamed of becoming a comic book writer I would plot of storylines that looked suspiciously like the Power Lords plotline. And when I realized that the protagonist actually dies at the end of this issue, I was shocked. It took me quite a while to realize that this was a series - that the story doesn't end here, unlike all the Phantom comics I had. There were multiple trips to book shops after that, and on every trip I would root through the small bunch of 'foreign' comics, hoping to find further parts of the story. Hopes receded as the years passed. I shifted to Pune, where more DC and Marvel comics were available in the stores (but no Power Lords). I'd lost hope by this point.
Surat has a fascinating chor-bazaar called Shaniwari, so called because it happens on Saturdays. My uncle used to look around this place every once in a while, trying to find old electronic items he could salvage parts from, curiosities like brass lamps, and every once in a while, cheapo T-shirts to wear around the home. He took me there, too, several times, when I was in college.
The first or second time I went there, an enterprising raddiwala was displaying his wares - old Ellery Queen hardbacks, mouldering old paperbacks of Wilbur Smith and Salman Rushdie, and a bunch of magazines. I'm a sucker for this sort of thing, and I set to, sorting out the books in hopes of finding some rare items. A colourful corner peeked out from the pile of magazines, and I idly pulled it out, hoping for a Batman comic. It was - you guessed it - the second of the Power Lords set. For a moment I just stood there, unable to believe my luck. With as casual a voice as I could manage, I asked the old vendor for the price. Ten bucks! I added the comic (in almost perfect condition I might add) to my set of James Clavells and Salman Rushdies. I read the comic while sitting on my uncle's bike, on the way home, and again and again over the next couple of days. This issue, it seemed to me, went downhill from the excellent first one. Not only was the art worse, there was this annoying cartoony character who turned out to be powerful for some wierd reason (****Ahem***Jar Jar Binks****). But never mind - it was a book I'd expected never to find, and the cachet of serendipity it bought with it was enough to make me treasure it.
Years pass. College years end, and the painful daily grind known as 'working on a job' begins. I still hunt down and read DC Comics whenever I get the chance, but shopkeepers all around Pune now realize the value of these books and raise the price to an unsustainable level. I curse them silently, waiting for the day when everyone stops buying these books and the prices come down again. Amazon.com happens just around the time I start working, and I search on it for the Power Lords. They don't have it - why would they stock a flop comic from 1982? I use all the free gift certificates I can wangle out of Amazon and order anything I can get for free - Harry Potter, Ray Bradbury, a few anthologies, children's books. I also learn of how powerful searching on the net has become, and find that here and there, comic book shops do stock old comics, and yet, Power Lords #3 is among them. But $5 for a comic, and 'shipping only to the US and Canada' deter me.
Until two things happen together. A friend of mine happens to be in the US for a few months, and I go there for a week. The friend asks me whether I want him to buy something for me. Up comes Google on my machine, and out comes the address of a comic shop in his area. Eventually, it turns out that the shop doesn't have Power Lords #3, but my friend then generously pays the $1 for the comic at an online place and the $9 for the shipping, and I get the book in a neat cardboard package, the day before I'm due to return back to India. The third book is the absolute worst in the series, and I toss it onto my shelf after barely one or two readings. Or perhaps I've gotten older and have read more Batman comics. But I still have all three books, the first nearly in tatter by now, and they've survived several house changes, bedroom renovations, spring cleanings, and marriage.
*
*
*
Nearly all of our generation has some such stories of chasing after some hard-to-find media, more for the rarity than the quality. Beatzo alone has enough stories for half of his generation, I reckon.
Our parents and grandparents get all mushy when they hear a tune from Aradhana, or Shree 420 or a riff by the Beach Boys. Perhaps they have a soft spot in their hearts for Kishore Kumar or Cary Grant or Geeta Dutt. There's soon going to be a generation of old guys who grow all misty-eyed when Glo Friends are mentioned, who know who Avinash Waghwan was (even if they don't like him), who get all defensive when someone disses the Spiderman movies, and who refuse to accept that these new-fangled rappers are any better than Vanilla Ice. Well, there's already such a generation, but we aren't old guys yet (I hope). And my grandkids can expect to hear a lot about my personal saga of the Power Lords while they unsuccessfully try to read their newfangled 3-D moving comics in peace.
PS. I haven't bought any comics in nearly a year now. Don't intend to, for quite a while now, ever since Gotham Comics stopped publishing in India. The 'net and ...ahem... you know... has opened my eyes to the world beyond DC and Marvel, the stuff that has never been available at any raddiwala round these parts.
I have no idea whether this shrewd marketing move worked. I only know that the first issue of this Power Lords series was the one with the most attractive cover of the lot when I, an impressionable 9-year-old, first went into a bookshop in Trivandrum to buy a 'foreign' comic. I'd read other DC comics at the time - Justice League and so on, not knowing that they were DC Comics. I knew the difference between the desi Phantom/Mandrake/Tinkle comics and the glossy Superman/Batman type 'foreign' comics, and I knew that if I cribbed long enough, my father would eventually cave in and get me some of the good stuff. And so, here I was.
Power Lords #1 turned out to be the first DC comic I bought by myself. I don't remember most of the other comics that were in that bin - There was a Conan comic there, I remember, but that's it. I must have read this story of Adam Power hundreds of times. It was the acme of storytelling for me - for quite a while after that, whenever I daydreamed of becoming a comic book writer I would plot of storylines that looked suspiciously like the Power Lords plotline. And when I realized that the protagonist actually dies at the end of this issue, I was shocked. It took me quite a while to realize that this was a series - that the story doesn't end here, unlike all the Phantom comics I had. There were multiple trips to book shops after that, and on every trip I would root through the small bunch of 'foreign' comics, hoping to find further parts of the story. Hopes receded as the years passed. I shifted to Pune, where more DC and Marvel comics were available in the stores (but no Power Lords). I'd lost hope by this point.
Surat has a fascinating chor-bazaar called Shaniwari, so called because it happens on Saturdays. My uncle used to look around this place every once in a while, trying to find old electronic items he could salvage parts from, curiosities like brass lamps, and every once in a while, cheapo T-shirts to wear around the home. He took me there, too, several times, when I was in college.
The first or second time I went there, an enterprising raddiwala was displaying his wares - old Ellery Queen hardbacks, mouldering old paperbacks of Wilbur Smith and Salman Rushdie, and a bunch of magazines. I'm a sucker for this sort of thing, and I set to, sorting out the books in hopes of finding some rare items. A colourful corner peeked out from the pile of magazines, and I idly pulled it out, hoping for a Batman comic. It was - you guessed it - the second of the Power Lords set. For a moment I just stood there, unable to believe my luck. With as casual a voice as I could manage, I asked the old vendor for the price. Ten bucks! I added the comic (in almost perfect condition I might add) to my set of James Clavells and Salman Rushdies. I read the comic while sitting on my uncle's bike, on the way home, and again and again over the next couple of days. This issue, it seemed to me, went downhill from the excellent first one. Not only was the art worse, there was this annoying cartoony character who turned out to be powerful for some wierd reason (****Ahem***Jar Jar Binks****). But never mind - it was a book I'd expected never to find, and the cachet of serendipity it bought with it was enough to make me treasure it.
Years pass. College years end, and the painful daily grind known as 'working on a job' begins. I still hunt down and read DC Comics whenever I get the chance, but shopkeepers all around Pune now realize the value of these books and raise the price to an unsustainable level. I curse them silently, waiting for the day when everyone stops buying these books and the prices come down again. Amazon.com happens just around the time I start working, and I search on it for the Power Lords. They don't have it - why would they stock a flop comic from 1982? I use all the free gift certificates I can wangle out of Amazon and order anything I can get for free - Harry Potter, Ray Bradbury, a few anthologies, children's books. I also learn of how powerful searching on the net has become, and find that here and there, comic book shops do stock old comics, and yet, Power Lords #3 is among them. But $5 for a comic, and 'shipping only to the US and Canada' deter me.
Until two things happen together. A friend of mine happens to be in the US for a few months, and I go there for a week. The friend asks me whether I want him to buy something for me. Up comes Google on my machine, and out comes the address of a comic shop in his area. Eventually, it turns out that the shop doesn't have Power Lords #3, but my friend then generously pays the $1 for the comic at an online place and the $9 for the shipping, and I get the book in a neat cardboard package, the day before I'm due to return back to India. The third book is the absolute worst in the series, and I toss it onto my shelf after barely one or two readings. Or perhaps I've gotten older and have read more Batman comics. But I still have all three books, the first nearly in tatter by now, and they've survived several house changes, bedroom renovations, spring cleanings, and marriage.
*
*
*
Nearly all of our generation has some such stories of chasing after some hard-to-find media, more for the rarity than the quality. Beatzo alone has enough stories for half of his generation, I reckon.
Our parents and grandparents get all mushy when they hear a tune from Aradhana, or Shree 420 or a riff by the Beach Boys. Perhaps they have a soft spot in their hearts for Kishore Kumar or Cary Grant or Geeta Dutt. There's soon going to be a generation of old guys who grow all misty-eyed when Glo Friends are mentioned, who know who Avinash Waghwan was (even if they don't like him), who get all defensive when someone disses the Spiderman movies, and who refuse to accept that these new-fangled rappers are any better than Vanilla Ice. Well, there's already such a generation, but we aren't old guys yet (I hope). And my grandkids can expect to hear a lot about my personal saga of the Power Lords while they unsuccessfully try to read their newfangled 3-D moving comics in peace.
PS. I haven't bought any comics in nearly a year now. Don't intend to, for quite a while now, ever since Gotham Comics stopped publishing in India. The 'net and ...ahem... you know... has opened my eyes to the world beyond DC and Marvel, the stuff that has never been available at any raddiwala round these parts.
Thursday, March 22, 2007
Yes, yes, we've been receiving these emails about online peititions for quite a while now. "538 people have already registered for this petition against long toenails!" "105 people have registered to protest against politician X's policies!" ... And of course, nothing ever comes of them. How many toenail non-clippers or acolytes of politican X read the net anyway?
Two headlines in the past two days caught my attention though :
Source behind Internet attack on Clinton revealed
and
Two headlines in the past two days caught my attention though :
Source behind Internet attack on Clinton revealed
and
New Technique Lets Bloggers Tackle Late-Night News Dumps
Go on, read them. Neither are about India, yet. But there will soon be such stories in the desi papers, too. The 'net can and does make a difference. And there's a lot of difference waiting to be made hereabouts.Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Long time no post, I know, I know. This post more than proves my devotion to blogging.
I'm sitting here in a FabIndia kurta. My left-hand fingers are coloured in mehendi. The remains of a scarlet teeka are still on my forehead, from the khetpaal ceremony of the morning. I'm not allowed to leave the house now, until the baraat starts off. My Kakas, Mamas, other badey-log, are having dinner right now. Too nervous to sleep, eat, or sit at peace, I'm all set for my marriage tomorrow.
Yes, there are those little things left over. My bag needs one more going-over. Perhaps I need to pack one more pair of socks. My bride-to-be's sister is trying to get the two of us some time to talk, perhaps in a coffee shop. (Certainly my folks at home are going to find this idea strange, unconventional.) My cousin still hasn't arrived from Bangalore, she'll be here at eleven. My brother and Mom have gone to some mandap-guy for more last-minute arrangements.
[My buaji's now urging me to eat, else dinner will be cold. This narrative continues after dinner.]
So now my father's gone to the airport to pick up my cousin. They're slathered one more layer of mehendi over my left hand, so I'm typing this with my right hand now. Just finished with a pooja dedicated to my poorvaj. The house is in bedlam, now more than an hour ago.
We, the baraat, are leaving tomorrow morning for Mumbai. Before we leave, we need to perform the Ganesh pooja, so we're all getting up at 4 AM. Added to all the relatives coming in, there will be little time for sleep tonight. Not that I could have, even if I had the time. By this time tomorrow, I will be a married man. The girl who has been in my dreams for the past few months, with whom I spent every evening, every morning, on the phone, and with whom I felt truly not-alone for the first time in my life, will be my wife. Nabokov himself would be at a loss for words at this point.
I spent today thus: Woke up with black woollen fibres in my nose (I HATE those black kambals the mangal karyalayas hire out). Talked about The State Of Social Work In India with a -
So the second coat of mehendi is now off. The luggage is packed, I'm shaved, all we're waiting for is my cousin to arrive from the airport. To resume my narrative.
-with a cousin. Underwent the Peethi - this is when you sit wrapped in only a towel on a verandah, shivering, while your aunt slaps on cold gobs of umtan all over you and then rubs them off, to 'make you fair'. Underwent the Khetpal ceremony. This is where you pray to the 'Earth Gods' and to your ancestors to make your Union successful. Had lunch. Copied a bunch of Garba CDs in preparation for the Sangeet ceremony, which will be immediately after my wife - yes, my wife - arrives here. Composed a poster saying Sudarshan weds Payal, for the Qualis' in the baraat. Redid same four times. First coat of mehendi on hand. Slept with an old newspaper spread out under said hand. Woke up to phone from fiancee. Pottered around doing other stuff.
Now my father's given me an ultimatum. I really must sleep, since I'm waking up by 4. The cousin still hasn't arrived; I'll meet her in the morning now. No matter. Tomorrow's going to be a long, eventful journey.
Don't know when I'll blog again. This exercise too was mostly useless; I haven't been able to express how I feel. Suffice it to say I'm looking forward to this big adventure, to be conquered with my wife by my side.
I'm sitting here in a FabIndia kurta. My left-hand fingers are coloured in mehendi. The remains of a scarlet teeka are still on my forehead, from the khetpaal ceremony of the morning. I'm not allowed to leave the house now, until the baraat starts off. My Kakas, Mamas, other badey-log, are having dinner right now. Too nervous to sleep, eat, or sit at peace, I'm all set for my marriage tomorrow.
Yes, there are those little things left over. My bag needs one more going-over. Perhaps I need to pack one more pair of socks. My bride-to-be's sister is trying to get the two of us some time to talk, perhaps in a coffee shop. (Certainly my folks at home are going to find this idea strange, unconventional.) My cousin still hasn't arrived from Bangalore, she'll be here at eleven. My brother and Mom have gone to some mandap-guy for more last-minute arrangements.
[My buaji's now urging me to eat, else dinner will be cold. This narrative continues after dinner.]
So now my father's gone to the airport to pick up my cousin. They're slathered one more layer of mehendi over my left hand, so I'm typing this with my right hand now. Just finished with a pooja dedicated to my poorvaj. The house is in bedlam, now more than an hour ago.
We, the baraat, are leaving tomorrow morning for Mumbai. Before we leave, we need to perform the Ganesh pooja, so we're all getting up at 4 AM. Added to all the relatives coming in, there will be little time for sleep tonight. Not that I could have, even if I had the time. By this time tomorrow, I will be a married man. The girl who has been in my dreams for the past few months, with whom I spent every evening, every morning, on the phone, and with whom I felt truly not-alone for the first time in my life, will be my wife. Nabokov himself would be at a loss for words at this point.
I spent today thus: Woke up with black woollen fibres in my nose (I HATE those black kambals the mangal karyalayas hire out). Talked about The State Of Social Work In India with a -
So the second coat of mehendi is now off. The luggage is packed, I'm shaved, all we're waiting for is my cousin to arrive from the airport. To resume my narrative.
-with a cousin. Underwent the Peethi - this is when you sit wrapped in only a towel on a verandah, shivering, while your aunt slaps on cold gobs of umtan all over you and then rubs them off, to 'make you fair'. Underwent the Khetpal ceremony. This is where you pray to the 'Earth Gods' and to your ancestors to make your Union successful. Had lunch. Copied a bunch of Garba CDs in preparation for the Sangeet ceremony, which will be immediately after my wife -
Now my father's given me an ultimatum. I really must sleep, since I'm waking up by 4. The cousin still hasn't arrived; I'll meet her in the morning now. No matter. Tomorrow's going to be a long, eventful journey.
Don't know when I'll blog again. This exercise too was mostly useless; I haven't been able to express how I feel. Suffice it to say I'm looking forward to this big adventure, to be conquered with my wife by my side.
Sunday, October 22, 2006
So here's a great business idea. The guy who did this has probably retired by now to his villa in Southern France :).
1. Create a really good joke related to the seasons or festivals. This is the hard part. It has to be a joke that'll get forwarded and published every year or maybe even several times a year. If you can't create such a joke, pick up a newly created one of this sort which is likely to enjoy circulation for a while. Our entrepreneur either created or used this popular list called 'Rules for Halloween'.
2. Insert a reference into this that people don't understand. Treat the reference as something everyone ought to know. In the above case you'll see that rule no. 15 refers to some obscure town called 'Nilbog'. Then it rubs the point in by saying "You're in trouble if you know this one". The funny thing is, I've never met anyone who knows of that reference. Equally funny is that this particular line has been in every iteration of this joke I've seen, since I got an email id, about 10 years ago.
3. Create a web page that has as the title, the obscure term you've inserted into the popular joke or story. Make sure you put up a google ad or something similar on that page. In this case we've got a page like this, which *always* shows up as the first item on any Google search. If you try to access this site today , you'll have trouble because there are apparently way too many people googling for Nilbog, getting this page, and trying to find out this apparently well known thing.
4. Retire on the proceeds of the advertising.
5. Invite me to your villa when you get the chance :).
1. Create a really good joke related to the seasons or festivals. This is the hard part. It has to be a joke that'll get forwarded and published every year or maybe even several times a year. If you can't create such a joke, pick up a newly created one of this sort which is likely to enjoy circulation for a while. Our entrepreneur either created or used this popular list called 'Rules for Halloween'.
2. Insert a reference into this that people don't understand. Treat the reference as something everyone ought to know. In the above case you'll see that rule no. 15 refers to some obscure town called 'Nilbog'. Then it rubs the point in by saying "You're in trouble if you know this one". The funny thing is, I've never met anyone who knows of that reference. Equally funny is that this particular line has been in every iteration of this joke I've seen, since I got an email id, about 10 years ago.
3. Create a web page that has as the title, the obscure term you've inserted into the popular joke or story. Make sure you put up a google ad or something similar on that page. In this case we've got a page like this, which *always* shows up as the first item on any Google search. If you try to access this site today , you'll have trouble because there are apparently way too many people googling for Nilbog, getting this page, and trying to find out this apparently well known thing.
4. Retire on the proceeds of the advertising.
5. Invite me to your villa when you get the chance :).
So what else is blogger for, if not to vent and rant? :).
Came across this article on the PassionForCinema site, which article professes to be about 'the Lost Art of Lyric Writing', and raves about how amazing the lyrics of some songs are while others suck. One of the examples of 'good' songs is what he calls 'Kajra Re'.
FOR ONCE AND ALL : The word is Kajrare, it is an adjective used to describe those 'kaale naina' later in the line, and it means 'made dark as if by applying kajra'. Kajra isn't some babe you're addressing with a Re. Why not call Omkara 'Omka Ra', Parinda 'Parin Da', Koyla 'Koy La', and so on?
God knows which ingliss-medium-convent-ijicated marketing guy mislabeled that song, and it's stuck since then. Aaargh!
Came across this article on the PassionForCinema site, which article professes to be about 'the Lost Art of Lyric Writing', and raves about how amazing the lyrics of some songs are while others suck. One of the examples of 'good' songs is what he calls 'Kajra Re'.
FOR ONCE AND ALL : The word is Kajrare, it is an adjective used to describe those 'kaale naina' later in the line, and it means 'made dark as if by applying kajra'. Kajra isn't some babe you're addressing with a Re. Why not call Omkara 'Omka Ra', Parinda 'Parin Da', Koyla 'Koy La', and so on?
God knows which ingliss-medium-convent-ijicated marketing guy mislabeled that song, and it's stuck since then. Aaargh!
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
I sat down, after God knows how many months, to hammer out a new post on this blog. The edit window was open all day, and remained empty until I shut down the computer late at night.
Melancholy, loneliness, depression, bad luck, hope - this blog has been witness to all these over the past years. Sometime in the past few months, though, pure unadulterated happiness knocked at my door, found it unlocked, and made itself at home in my mind without telling me. When I looked around and noticed it living there, it was such a novel sensation that I couldn't figure out a way to express it in mere words.
No point in being all literary about it, I suppose. The news in brief is this : I'm engaged. To be married. To the cutest girl in the world (tm). We met a few months ago, through a common family friend, thought about it for a few weeks (mostly about how lucky we were), and decided to hitch.
And now every spare moment of my day is spent in talking to her on the phone (she's in Mumbai). The date is set for mid-December; there's not much time. Both our families are now busy with the planning and logistics and whatnot.
So, maybe the road ahead still contains sadness. Atleast I'm not facing it alone. Touch wood.
Addendum : And, as JR says in his comment to this post, the quizzing has taken a hit in the pat few months. Not only the quizzing, the blogging, the writing, the socializing, the movie-watching, have gone down. Funnily enough, the reading is still on track and in fact I'm doing more than ever of it. :)
Melancholy, loneliness, depression, bad luck, hope - this blog has been witness to all these over the past years. Sometime in the past few months, though, pure unadulterated happiness knocked at my door, found it unlocked, and made itself at home in my mind without telling me. When I looked around and noticed it living there, it was such a novel sensation that I couldn't figure out a way to express it in mere words.
No point in being all literary about it, I suppose. The news in brief is this : I'm engaged. To be married. To the cutest girl in the world (tm). We met a few months ago, through a common family friend, thought about it for a few weeks (mostly about how lucky we were), and decided to hitch.
And now every spare moment of my day is spent in talking to her on the phone (she's in Mumbai). The date is set for mid-December; there's not much time. Both our families are now busy with the planning and logistics and whatnot.
So, maybe the road ahead still contains sadness. Atleast I'm not facing it alone. Touch wood.
Addendum : And, as JR says in his comment to this post, the quizzing has taken a hit in the pat few months. Not only the quizzing, the blogging, the writing, the socializing, the movie-watching, have gone down. Funnily enough, the reading is still on track and in fact I'm doing more than ever of it. :)
Monday, June 05, 2006
I meet you every now and then, and never know what to say to you. Usually I know the bare skeleton of your life : your education, your parents' names, your job, one or two photographs of you. Usually we both know that our horoscopes match well enough for us to meet.
But none of this makes for good conversation. Because in the back of our minds, we're both frightened of being rejected. We both know that if we like the other too much, and then if the other rejects us, it might leave us in a bind. So we're afraid to smile too much, to talk about anything other than current events or our recent pasts. Pasts are safe to talk about; they will not change if we're rejected. The future, however, composed of jobs and houses and lives together, changes every time I meet a different you; so it is dangerous to talk about it. We venture only diffidently, step by step, into that territory.
So many times, I've wished I knew what made you laugh, what made you happy. So many times, I thought that even if we aren't fated to be together, I ought to leave you happy, leave you feeling good about yourself. Everyone deserves to feel that way once in a while. But if I knew how to master that secret weapon, I would have used it on the dozens of pretty girls I've fallen for at one time or the other; perhaps we wouldn't be meeting like this, again and again and again.
So often, I've wished to reassure you, when you spoke of some sadness you've passed through in your life; divorce or death or loss or loneliness or failure; wished to reach out and hold your hand and say to you that it won't always be like that, that there will be happiness soon, whether from me or from the next me you meet. But I don't know how to say that, either, without venturing into the dangerous territory of futures.
Every time I was asked, "What do you want?", I've wanted to say, "I want a good friend who loves me," but, fearing that would sound too selfish, have replied vaguely with adjectives like intelligent, homely, balanced, and that dreadful catchall, understanding. And we both nod at each other, both knowing that the answer made no sense, nor was it expected to.
My best friends are those that have known me for years; how do I show myself a loyal friend, a good companion, a nice guy, in the few minutes, the few questions-and-answers that we have together? How can one distil a personality into a questionnaire? Who knows what demons keep me awake at night, what daydreams you have when you wait in queues? Who knows, then, that we might be perfect for each other, yet are rejecting each other because of a hunch, a feeling, a gesture of the hands? Is it not safer, though, to let a hundred perfect matches slip through than to allow one mismatch?
But is that all we can be? Matches, mismatches? Not friends, pals, acquaintances? There's only a binary answer to our meeting : Match or mis-. Let us, then, forgive each other in advance for being critical, for silently imagining our possible futures without ever speaking of then, and look beyond them.
All that we speak of, possible lives, careers, homes, are built on the days, hours, moments, that we might spend together. Moments such as this sampler, single-serving moment that we've been given now. Let's not grasp this moment as if it were the last we have, let us treat it instead as the first of many, and see if we like it better that way. Let's talk about the movie we saw on TV yesterday, about that funny man at the next table, about the pranks we played on our grandfathers. Let's not drown this moment in heaviness.
Wasn't Aamir Khan funny in Andaz Apna Apna?
But none of this makes for good conversation. Because in the back of our minds, we're both frightened of being rejected. We both know that if we like the other too much, and then if the other rejects us, it might leave us in a bind. So we're afraid to smile too much, to talk about anything other than current events or our recent pasts. Pasts are safe to talk about; they will not change if we're rejected. The future, however, composed of jobs and houses and lives together, changes every time I meet a different you; so it is dangerous to talk about it. We venture only diffidently, step by step, into that territory.
So many times, I've wished I knew what made you laugh, what made you happy. So many times, I thought that even if we aren't fated to be together, I ought to leave you happy, leave you feeling good about yourself. Everyone deserves to feel that way once in a while. But if I knew how to master that secret weapon, I would have used it on the dozens of pretty girls I've fallen for at one time or the other; perhaps we wouldn't be meeting like this, again and again and again.
So often, I've wished to reassure you, when you spoke of some sadness you've passed through in your life; divorce or death or loss or loneliness or failure; wished to reach out and hold your hand and say to you that it won't always be like that, that there will be happiness soon, whether from me or from the next me you meet. But I don't know how to say that, either, without venturing into the dangerous territory of futures.
Every time I was asked, "What do you want?", I've wanted to say, "I want a good friend who loves me," but, fearing that would sound too selfish, have replied vaguely with adjectives like intelligent, homely, balanced, and that dreadful catchall, understanding. And we both nod at each other, both knowing that the answer made no sense, nor was it expected to.
My best friends are those that have known me for years; how do I show myself a loyal friend, a good companion, a nice guy, in the few minutes, the few questions-and-answers that we have together? How can one distil a personality into a questionnaire? Who knows what demons keep me awake at night, what daydreams you have when you wait in queues? Who knows, then, that we might be perfect for each other, yet are rejecting each other because of a hunch, a feeling, a gesture of the hands? Is it not safer, though, to let a hundred perfect matches slip through than to allow one mismatch?
But is that all we can be? Matches, mismatches? Not friends, pals, acquaintances? There's only a binary answer to our meeting : Match or mis-. Let us, then, forgive each other in advance for being critical, for silently imagining our possible futures without ever speaking of then, and look beyond them.
All that we speak of, possible lives, careers, homes, are built on the days, hours, moments, that we might spend together. Moments such as this sampler, single-serving moment that we've been given now. Let's not grasp this moment as if it were the last we have, let us treat it instead as the first of many, and see if we like it better that way. Let's talk about the movie we saw on TV yesterday, about that funny man at the next table, about the pranks we played on our grandfathers. Let's not drown this moment in heaviness.
Wasn't Aamir Khan funny in Andaz Apna Apna?
Thursday, April 27, 2006
Don't normally post reviews and suchlike, but what the hey...
Since no one has posted a review of Darna Zaroori Hai so far, and I saw it last night, I guess it's my turn to write this. Wanted to see this movie ever since it was announced. Especially since I really, really liked the first part, Darna Manaa Hai. Apparently there were many more like me - the theatre was full of young folks, all intent on having a 'good time' - said good time consisting of making loud noises every time words like 'chudail', 'amaavas ki raat', and so on were spoken.
So anyway, on to the movie. No spoilers here, unless you're one of those folks who don't want to know who the director of the movie was.
I was very apprehensive about the choice of Sajid Khan as director of one of the segments, but it turns out I needn't have worried. The placement of his segment (the first) was superb and did the all-important job of getting the audience primed and ready for what was to follow. All the standard horror movie cliches were tossed off and the audience had a field day shouting. This was a self-referential segment, by the way - the main character goes to a theatre to watch Darna Manaa Hai. :) Only RGV movies have that sort of humour in them, methinks.
The second story, the Amitabh Bachchan one directed by RGV himself was IMO the best of the lot. Very tight direction, very short story (less than 10 minutes), excellent open-ended climax. Paisa vasool right there. But after that it all went downhill.
At least two of the stories seem to be variations on stories from DMH. Astute viewers will figure out the 'twist' ending about halfway through. Another story, the one with Rajpal Yadav - an idea with a lot of potential, methinks - was just a total waste. The Chekravarty segment (The one with the police inspector) could have done with much less explanation. Why oh why do directors insist on treating viewers like idiots who need to be explained everything?
The production values were superb throughout, acting was mostly great (thank goodness no Sanjay Kapoor this time), background music appropriate. The only thing that let me down was the stories themselves. The standard RGV trademark - stupid letdown in the climax - was there too.
The 'cover story', within which the smaller segments were narrated, was just as hokey as in DMH. But that was expected, I guess.
All the way home, I kept thinking up alternate endings and twists that would have worked better. Ended up jotting down three story ideas that'll probably make it onto this blog someday. Now if only RGV reads this blog :)
In short : It's worth a watch if you liked DMH. It'll probably work best for folks who don't read too many horror stories. There are moments that make the whole thing worthwhile. And atleast one genuinely creepy moment that sticks to your brain.
Since no one has posted a review of Darna Zaroori Hai so far, and I saw it last night, I guess it's my turn to write this. Wanted to see this movie ever since it was announced. Especially since I really, really liked the first part, Darna Manaa Hai. Apparently there were many more like me - the theatre was full of young folks, all intent on having a 'good time' - said good time consisting of making loud noises every time words like 'chudail', 'amaavas ki raat', and so on were spoken.
So anyway, on to the movie. No spoilers here, unless you're one of those folks who don't want to know who the director of the movie was.
I was very apprehensive about the choice of Sajid Khan as director of one of the segments, but it turns out I needn't have worried. The placement of his segment (the first) was superb and did the all-important job of getting the audience primed and ready for what was to follow. All the standard horror movie cliches were tossed off and the audience had a field day shouting. This was a self-referential segment, by the way - the main character goes to a theatre to watch Darna Manaa Hai. :) Only RGV movies have that sort of humour in them, methinks.
The second story, the Amitabh Bachchan one directed by RGV himself was IMO the best of the lot. Very tight direction, very short story (less than 10 minutes), excellent open-ended climax. Paisa vasool right there. But after that it all went downhill.
At least two of the stories seem to be variations on stories from DMH. Astute viewers will figure out the 'twist' ending about halfway through. Another story, the one with Rajpal Yadav - an idea with a lot of potential, methinks - was just a total waste. The Chekravarty segment (The one with the police inspector) could have done with much less explanation. Why oh why do directors insist on treating viewers like idiots who need to be explained everything?
The production values were superb throughout, acting was mostly great (thank goodness no Sanjay Kapoor this time), background music appropriate. The only thing that let me down was the stories themselves. The standard RGV trademark - stupid letdown in the climax - was there too.
The 'cover story', within which the smaller segments were narrated, was just as hokey as in DMH. But that was expected, I guess.
All the way home, I kept thinking up alternate endings and twists that would have worked better. Ended up jotting down three story ideas that'll probably make it onto this blog someday. Now if only RGV reads this blog :)
In short : It's worth a watch if you liked DMH. It'll probably work best for folks who don't read too many horror stories. There are moments that make the whole thing worthwhile. And atleast one genuinely creepy moment that sticks to your brain.
Thursday, April 20, 2006
Been noticing some really, really sucky ad campaigns for a while. I mean, these would have belonged to Ramanand’s JaDE Hall of Shame, but I cringe from sullying that hallowed institution by adding these folks.
1.Harpic: Yes, we’ve all see the close-up shots of people’s loos and Aman Verma the bhangi showing us how to clean them, on TV. But apparently this didn’t increase sales enough, because these guys came out with a lucky draw scheme. Stop for a moment and try to think up a name for such a scheme. Go on. Whatever you thought, it doesn’t have any hint of Loos, toilets, suchlike in it, right? But no, our geniuses went ahead and named the campaign ‘Pot banaye Kismat Hot’. To emphasize exactly what ‘pot’ they’re talking about, the logo (sic) for this campaign has a western toilet seat in the o’s of ‘Pot’ and ‘Hot’. Lovely.
2.Godrej Hair dye: Well, these guys created some new hair colours, Auburn and Copper and whatever names makes women think they’re exciting colours. They then created a print ad with photos of models wearing said colour dyes. So far so good; now you’ve got a quarter page ad with like 6 headshots and ‘auburn’ and whatnot under each shot. Now comes the genius. They took this lovely ad, and saved money on the campaign by... printing the ad in the inner BLACK AND WHITE pages of all the major newspapers. All the models now look grey-haired. Thank you.
3.So there’s this ten minute radio program on Vividh Bharati that comes on every morning. Stop right here. Think of the target audience for a RADIO program. Well, whatever you thought of, this particular program isn’t reaching its target audience for sure. It’s a program talking about types of HEARING AIDS and is sponsored by Mandke Hearing Services. This is like having a silent ad on TV advertising white canes.
4. Tiny ad in the Aaj Ka Anand paper advertising a new housing scheme. Ad extols how close it is to all the facilities: Only few minutes from Airport, Railway Station, Camp, Schools, Yeravada. I swear to you, these are the five ‘facilities’ listed in that ad. For those not in the know, Yeravada is a Pune Suburb most famous for its Paagalkhana and for its prison. So these guys are basically saying that you, target audience, are going to be in and out of mental hospitals and jail all the time, why not buy our place, it’ll be more convenient for your relatives when they want to visit you?
1.Harpic: Yes, we’ve all see the close-up shots of people’s loos and Aman Verma the bhangi showing us how to clean them, on TV. But apparently this didn’t increase sales enough, because these guys came out with a lucky draw scheme. Stop for a moment and try to think up a name for such a scheme. Go on. Whatever you thought, it doesn’t have any hint of Loos, toilets, suchlike in it, right? But no, our geniuses went ahead and named the campaign ‘Pot banaye Kismat Hot’. To emphasize exactly what ‘pot’ they’re talking about, the logo (sic) for this campaign has a western toilet seat in the o’s of ‘Pot’ and ‘Hot’. Lovely.
2.Godrej Hair dye: Well, these guys created some new hair colours, Auburn and Copper and whatever names makes women think they’re exciting colours. They then created a print ad with photos of models wearing said colour dyes. So far so good; now you’ve got a quarter page ad with like 6 headshots and ‘auburn’ and whatnot under each shot. Now comes the genius. They took this lovely ad, and saved money on the campaign by... printing the ad in the inner BLACK AND WHITE pages of all the major newspapers. All the models now look grey-haired. Thank you.
3.So there’s this ten minute radio program on Vividh Bharati that comes on every morning. Stop right here. Think of the target audience for a RADIO program. Well, whatever you thought of, this particular program isn’t reaching its target audience for sure. It’s a program talking about types of HEARING AIDS and is sponsored by Mandke Hearing Services. This is like having a silent ad on TV advertising white canes.
4. Tiny ad in the Aaj Ka Anand paper advertising a new housing scheme. Ad extols how close it is to all the facilities: Only few minutes from Airport, Railway Station, Camp, Schools, Yeravada. I swear to you, these are the five ‘facilities’ listed in that ad. For those not in the know, Yeravada is a Pune Suburb most famous for its Paagalkhana and for its prison. So these guys are basically saying that you, target audience, are going to be in and out of mental hospitals and jail all the time, why not buy our place, it’ll be more convenient for your relatives when they want to visit you?
Friday, February 24, 2006
This blog has been, over the years, mostly a platform for me to post fiction, ramblings, PJs, and other suchlike stuff which isn't closely connected to the outside world. But sometimes an event occurs that so closely echoes my personal belief that it deserves, nay, requires to be posted here.
Manjunath Shanmugam's murder was not exactly one of those - we have seen it happen several times. But the response from 'Young India', folks like us, to this event was amazing. Though the case had been buried by the mainstream media, it was folks like Gaurav Sabnis that dragged it back to life. Newspapers went on to give momentum to the issue and brought the case into the spotlight.
The next logical step has been taken. A formal Trust has been created by his classmates, to make sure the case comes to the correct conclusion. Gaurav posts the mail from the trust on his blog. Please, do what you can to help.
Unless you want to spend your life talking about how India's a terrible place to live in and how society's going bad.
Manjunath Shanmugam's murder was not exactly one of those - we have seen it happen several times. But the response from 'Young India', folks like us, to this event was amazing. Though the case had been buried by the mainstream media, it was folks like Gaurav Sabnis that dragged it back to life. Newspapers went on to give momentum to the issue and brought the case into the spotlight.
The next logical step has been taken. A formal Trust has been created by his classmates, to make sure the case comes to the correct conclusion. Gaurav posts the mail from the trust on his blog. Please, do what you can to help.
Unless you want to spend your life talking about how India's a terrible place to live in and how society's going bad.
Sunday, February 12, 2006
Submitted an entry to the Flash Fiction contest over at the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival. So their short list came out today, and my name isn't on it. The story of my life. Anyway, here's my rejected effort. The only reason I entered the contest is to force myself to write something, anything. Guess I succeeded in that.
--------
A sudden chill in the air awakens me. The sound of the train continues unabated, the passengers remain asleep; the flickering green night-light in the next compartment is the only illumination. I am still wrapped up in my blanket, still in my middle-berth, still sleepy. Groggily I look around. There is an undercurrent of hush in the air, a sense of some invisible timelessness. It is as if this journey is eternal, spanning worlds. We are travelling to some nether land, I whisper to myself, carried along by my fancy, and I look over the edge of my bunk at my co-passengers, afraid that I’m traveling alone. They’re asleep. Someone far off in the distance mumbles a few words, in a language I don’t understand. In my dreamlike state, it doesn’t sound even human. The sound of the train has taken on an echoing, organic quality, like horse’s hooves. Something about the atmosphere brings to mind the ghastly, gothic, form of Death, skeletal, dark-robed, scythe-in-hand. Death, I think to myself, Death, on his black horse, is following us.
No, I correct myself. We are entering his domain. Death has been here, or will be soon, or is surveying the results of his handiwork here. The hoofbeats slow down. I pull myself out of the reverie, note the yellow squares of light marching along the floor of the compartment. From my position it is hard to make out which station we are pulling into. I twist myself out of the blankets, get my head as far down as possible, look out the window, looking for the rhomboid squares that will tell me where I am. Finally one comes into view, remains in view as the train comes to a halt. In English and Hindi and Gujarati the sign reads: Godhra.
--------
A sudden chill in the air awakens me. The sound of the train continues unabated, the passengers remain asleep; the flickering green night-light in the next compartment is the only illumination. I am still wrapped up in my blanket, still in my middle-berth, still sleepy. Groggily I look around. There is an undercurrent of hush in the air, a sense of some invisible timelessness. It is as if this journey is eternal, spanning worlds. We are travelling to some nether land, I whisper to myself, carried along by my fancy, and I look over the edge of my bunk at my co-passengers, afraid that I’m traveling alone. They’re asleep. Someone far off in the distance mumbles a few words, in a language I don’t understand. In my dreamlike state, it doesn’t sound even human. The sound of the train has taken on an echoing, organic quality, like horse’s hooves. Something about the atmosphere brings to mind the ghastly, gothic, form of Death, skeletal, dark-robed, scythe-in-hand. Death, I think to myself, Death, on his black horse, is following us.
No, I correct myself. We are entering his domain. Death has been here, or will be soon, or is surveying the results of his handiwork here. The hoofbeats slow down. I pull myself out of the reverie, note the yellow squares of light marching along the floor of the compartment. From my position it is hard to make out which station we are pulling into. I twist myself out of the blankets, get my head as far down as possible, look out the window, looking for the rhomboid squares that will tell me where I am. Finally one comes into view, remains in view as the train comes to a halt. In English and Hindi and Gujarati the sign reads: Godhra.
Wednesday, November 23, 2005
Does the rest of the world think of desi junta as idiots? Maybe they do, and maybe they don't, but check out the lone desi-sounding name in the comments to this blog post.
So many of the comments desi junta make in public forums are of roughly the same grammatical and intellectual calibre. Why oh why?
So many of the comments desi junta make in public forums are of roughly the same grammatical and intellectual calibre. Why oh why?
Monday, November 21, 2005
Some young cousins of mine were in town last week, and I was sent on a mission of buying a 'good board game' for them. Thus it was that I entered the toy section of Crossword after several years.
To backtrack just a little, I did enter a toy store in Bangalore a couple of months back - the famouse Landmark, in the Forum multiplex, and was *very* impressed by the range of toys there. Reminded me forcefully of how long ago my 'childhood days' were, and how much things have changed since then. Even saw Sandman Graphic Novels there - humongously priced, but still, available. Perhaps they'll have a clearance sale at lower prices someday ;).
But that day I didn't notice the board games section. In all probability it was better than Crossword. For now I only had Crossword, though.
Let me get the facts out of the way - I ended up buying a game called Reversi, AKA Othello, which you could play online here if you like.
But before I bought it, I read through the blurbs of the games on sale. People who follow such things, or who spent time in the US in the 80s, will find the games familiar : The Game of Life, Mastermind, Battleship, Monopoly, Avalanche, Cluedo, Trivial Pursuit, Funny Pony, Any number of cartoon-character-themed-throw-dice-and-advance games, Guess Who?, Connect 4, Twister, Scotland Yard, Snakes and Ladders, Ludo.
Now here's the funny thing. Except for the last two of that list (which are traditional games here), all of the rest of these games are basically Milton-Bradley and Mattel products, produced under license here in India. None of these are new games produced here, none of them are brainchilds (brainchildren?) of Indians. Yes, there are a few desi games there too : Picnic comes to mind. It's the worst sort of throw-dice-and-advance game. Just by looking at the packaging and concept, a 5-year-old kid could separate the desi games and the phoren games.
There's a further rider to this. Note the name 'Funny Pony' which I slipped in there. Frankly, I hadn't heard of this one before, so I took it out and looked at it carefully. Here's a desi website selling the same thing. The packaging rang a bell, and I came back home and Googled. Here's the relevant result. I got this list of the 'Top 100' games for kids in the 80s in the US from BoingBoing, and on the page above, at number 84, is a game called 'Buckaroo!'. See the resemblance to 'Funny Pony'? Except the packaging of 'Funny Pony' removes all wild west references and turns a plastic mule into a plastic pony. So basically, they're repackaging 2nd-rate games from the 80s and selling them here now. If you go through the complete list of 100 and then stroll over to Crossword, you'll find many more of the games available there.
Why must the stores be full of old 80s board games from the US? Why are we so despicably bad at creating and marketing our own childrens' games? I wouldn't mind the newest games from there being available here - that would mean an open market. But these games - so many of them are outdated and second-rate, it's ridiculous. Even the computer games section in Crossword is more up-to-date, atleast in the mainstream actioners - they have Quake 4, for example.
To backtrack just a little, I did enter a toy store in Bangalore a couple of months back - the famouse Landmark, in the Forum multiplex, and was *very* impressed by the range of toys there. Reminded me forcefully of how long ago my 'childhood days' were, and how much things have changed since then. Even saw Sandman Graphic Novels there - humongously priced, but still, available. Perhaps they'll have a clearance sale at lower prices someday ;).
But that day I didn't notice the board games section. In all probability it was better than Crossword. For now I only had Crossword, though.
Let me get the facts out of the way - I ended up buying a game called Reversi, AKA Othello, which you could play online here if you like.
But before I bought it, I read through the blurbs of the games on sale. People who follow such things, or who spent time in the US in the 80s, will find the games familiar : The Game of Life, Mastermind, Battleship, Monopoly, Avalanche, Cluedo, Trivial Pursuit, Funny Pony, Any number of cartoon-character-themed-throw-dice-and-advance games, Guess Who?, Connect 4, Twister, Scotland Yard, Snakes and Ladders, Ludo.
Now here's the funny thing. Except for the last two of that list (which are traditional games here), all of the rest of these games are basically Milton-Bradley and Mattel products, produced under license here in India. None of these are new games produced here, none of them are brainchilds (brainchildren?) of Indians. Yes, there are a few desi games there too : Picnic comes to mind. It's the worst sort of throw-dice-and-advance game. Just by looking at the packaging and concept, a 5-year-old kid could separate the desi games and the phoren games.
There's a further rider to this. Note the name 'Funny Pony' which I slipped in there. Frankly, I hadn't heard of this one before, so I took it out and looked at it carefully. Here's a desi website selling the same thing. The packaging rang a bell, and I came back home and Googled. Here's the relevant result. I got this list of the 'Top 100' games for kids in the 80s in the US from BoingBoing, and on the page above, at number 84, is a game called 'Buckaroo!'. See the resemblance to 'Funny Pony'? Except the packaging of 'Funny Pony' removes all wild west references and turns a plastic mule into a plastic pony. So basically, they're repackaging 2nd-rate games from the 80s and selling them here now. If you go through the complete list of 100 and then stroll over to Crossword, you'll find many more of the games available there.
Why must the stores be full of old 80s board games from the US? Why are we so despicably bad at creating and marketing our own childrens' games? I wouldn't mind the newest games from there being available here - that would mean an open market. But these games - so many of them are outdated and second-rate, it's ridiculous. Even the computer games section in Crossword is more up-to-date, atleast in the mainstream actioners - they have Quake 4, for example.
Saturday, November 12, 2005
Wow, it’s been nearly 6 months since I last blogged. Huge numbers of things have happened since then, and I’d like to talk about them now.
For the past 8-odd years, I’ve been working for a private software company in Pune. The ones who know my company’s name already are the only ones who need to ;). Well, it’s been a long time there and I finally decided I need to do something with my life. I couldn’t imagine myself as just a software engineer at 40.
So I quit. I’ve set up as a software consultant now, and I already have a couple of projects to work on, so I’m comfortably set up. But I didn’t quit primarily to do that. I quit because I want to write.
Readers of this blog will have noticed that I was writing like mad around the beginning of this year. Work pressures, however, put paid to that particular activity and I’ve had to slacken my pace since then. This consultancy thing is one of the things I’m doing to pick it up again. Like that story about the rocks in the jar, I want to turn my writing into one of the bigger rocks around which everything else fits.
Here’s hoping the writer’s block goes away now that I’m out the office.
And so, back to our regularly scheduled programming...
Recently caught the promos of the new Dev Anand movie on TV, and it reminded me of a birthday my father had, several years ago, that involved Dev Anand. Well, almost. [close up of my face, fade out...]
Dad had inaugurated a training session for new folks at his company a few days back. In introducing himself, he mentioned that he liked old Hindi movies in general and Dev Anand in particular. Since a major portion of the people in the company happened to be there, this bit of trivia became a well known fact there.
Three days later was Dad’s birthday. I was thinking of what present to get him, and finally, all out of ideas, decided on sending him a bouquet at his office address.
At the florists, I selected the bouquet. He handed me a blank card to fill up, to accompany the bouquet. It would be fun to fill up a prank message on the card, so I wrote, "Happy Birthday to my biggest fan, from Dev Anand." I of course was not aware of the training session speech.
So anyway, the delivery boy went up to the office and asked for my Dad. The receptionist glanced at the card that was with the bouquet and did a double take. She directed the boy to keep the bouquet there; a guard would take it to Dad’s office. The bouquet sat at the reception desk for maybe half an hour while the guard came back from his lunch break. I have no idea how many people saw it there. Even one person, of the right kind, is enough to spread this kind of information :).
When the guard delivered the bouquet to Dad’s office, he looked at the card, recognized my handwriting immediately, and asked the guard to put it in on a side table.
A few minutes later, a colleague came in, ostensibly to ask Dad about some trivial thing. Every few seconds, he’d glance at the large bouquet in the corner. Finally, he gave in and asked Dad, "Is it your birthday today?"
"Yes."
"So... did Dev Anand really send you that bouquet?"
Dad here played his cards right, and offhandedly replied, "I guess so – that’s what the card says."
"Er... may I see it?" The guy went over and looked at the card. A flush came over his face. He hurriedly went out; on his way he bumped into another person who was coming in.
Dad estimates he had more than thirty people drop in that day. Most of them were reporting trivial things, or else asking for Dad’s opinion on some report or the other. All of them "happened to notice" the bouquet and casually asked about it.
That isn’t the end of the story. Last month Dad happened to be at a conference where he met an ex-colleague, who now works in another company. Said ex-colleague was accompanied by his boss. By way of introducing Dad, the e-c said, "... and, sir, he’s a personal friend of Dev Anand!"
The Legend continues...
For the past 8-odd years, I’ve been working for a private software company in Pune. The ones who know my company’s name already are the only ones who need to ;). Well, it’s been a long time there and I finally decided I need to do something with my life. I couldn’t imagine myself as just a software engineer at 40.
So I quit. I’ve set up as a software consultant now, and I already have a couple of projects to work on, so I’m comfortably set up. But I didn’t quit primarily to do that. I quit because I want to write.
Readers of this blog will have noticed that I was writing like mad around the beginning of this year. Work pressures, however, put paid to that particular activity and I’ve had to slacken my pace since then. This consultancy thing is one of the things I’m doing to pick it up again. Like that story about the rocks in the jar, I want to turn my writing into one of the bigger rocks around which everything else fits.
Here’s hoping the writer’s block goes away now that I’m out the office.
And so, back to our regularly scheduled programming...
Recently caught the promos of the new Dev Anand movie on TV, and it reminded me of a birthday my father had, several years ago, that involved Dev Anand. Well, almost. [close up of my face, fade out...]
Dad had inaugurated a training session for new folks at his company a few days back. In introducing himself, he mentioned that he liked old Hindi movies in general and Dev Anand in particular. Since a major portion of the people in the company happened to be there, this bit of trivia became a well known fact there.
Three days later was Dad’s birthday. I was thinking of what present to get him, and finally, all out of ideas, decided on sending him a bouquet at his office address.
At the florists, I selected the bouquet. He handed me a blank card to fill up, to accompany the bouquet. It would be fun to fill up a prank message on the card, so I wrote, "Happy Birthday to my biggest fan, from Dev Anand." I of course was not aware of the training session speech.
So anyway, the delivery boy went up to the office and asked for my Dad. The receptionist glanced at the card that was with the bouquet and did a double take. She directed the boy to keep the bouquet there; a guard would take it to Dad’s office. The bouquet sat at the reception desk for maybe half an hour while the guard came back from his lunch break. I have no idea how many people saw it there. Even one person, of the right kind, is enough to spread this kind of information :).
When the guard delivered the bouquet to Dad’s office, he looked at the card, recognized my handwriting immediately, and asked the guard to put it in on a side table.
A few minutes later, a colleague came in, ostensibly to ask Dad about some trivial thing. Every few seconds, he’d glance at the large bouquet in the corner. Finally, he gave in and asked Dad, "Is it your birthday today?"
"Yes."
"So... did Dev Anand really send you that bouquet?"
Dad here played his cards right, and offhandedly replied, "I guess so – that’s what the card says."
"Er... may I see it?" The guy went over and looked at the card. A flush came over his face. He hurriedly went out; on his way he bumped into another person who was coming in.
Dad estimates he had more than thirty people drop in that day. Most of them were reporting trivial things, or else asking for Dad’s opinion on some report or the other. All of them "happened to notice" the bouquet and casually asked about it.
That isn’t the end of the story. Last month Dad happened to be at a conference where he met an ex-colleague, who now works in another company. Said ex-colleague was accompanied by his boss. By way of introducing Dad, the e-c said, "... and, sir, he’s a personal friend of Dev Anand!"
The Legend continues...
Friday, June 03, 2005
Yet another story of mine, published on Adbhut. Ah, Dinker, I don't know what I'd do without you :)
On a more serious note, this particular story is an entirely new direction for me. It's a subject I've never attempted before, and as far as I know it hasn't been taken up by anyone else in English, either. Would appreciate comments.
On a more serious note, this particular story is an entirely new direction for me. It's a subject I've never attempted before, and as far as I know it hasn't been taken up by anyone else in English, either. Would appreciate comments.
Monday, May 30, 2005
Isaac Asimov's bibliography usually talks of how he sold his first story to an SF magazine in his teenage years. Charles Dickens started off writing for magazines, as did Ray Bradbury. Almost every well known writer tends to get a few stories published, takes heart from the response he gets, and goes on to writer bigger, better stuff.
End of Fairytale. Go to a magazine stall in India and browse through the magazines. I challenge you to find a publication that contains more than a token two-page short story by an up-and-coming writer. Look through the so-called Literary sections of the newspapers. Try to find a place where a person who fancies himself a writer can get his stuff published. Nothing. Zero. Zip. I happened to ask this question to a reporter of the IE a few days back: "I write. Does IE publish any fiction?" She looked thoughtful for a bit. Then, wanting to be kind, said, "You can try sending it to <el-cheapo-supplement-that-I-hadn't-even-heard-of/>, it comes out once a month and sometimes prints stories if they're smaller than 1000 words." Thank you.
Hang on - you need to go back and insert a word in the preceding paragraph: "English". The "English" magazines and newspapers don't print fiction. Because if you happen to read the Sakal, or Gujarat Samachar, or even Aaj Ka Anand, you will by now be composing a scathing reply to me about being myopic and all that. My mom's read several proper novels, serialized into chapters in the Gujarat Samachar. Most prominent Marathi writers have at some time been featured in the Marathi magazines.
So why this imbalance when it comes to English media? I remember when I was a kid, there were English magazines which printed some good stuff - Mirror, Illustrated Weekly. Now, there's only the Reader's Digest ( I think - it's been a while since I got it.)
Dinker and I had a phone conversation on this topic the other day. For the few visitors to this blog who don't know yet, Dinker runs a web magazine specialized in Indian Fantastic Fiction, called Adbhut. And we got so riled up about this problem that we thought of starting up a magazine on our
own - say something to collect the best submissions on Adbhut every six months and print it in mag form. There is enough good material floating around the Blogosphere, to begin with, to fill up a decent-sized mag - and I'm sure most bloggers would be interested in getting published.
Someone has to do it, anyway...why not us?
End of Fairytale. Go to a magazine stall in India and browse through the magazines. I challenge you to find a publication that contains more than a token two-page short story by an up-and-coming writer. Look through the so-called Literary sections of the newspapers. Try to find a place where a person who fancies himself a writer can get his stuff published. Nothing. Zero. Zip. I happened to ask this question to a reporter of the IE a few days back: "I write. Does IE publish any fiction?" She looked thoughtful for a bit. Then, wanting to be kind, said, "You can try sending it to <el-cheapo-supplement-that-I-hadn't-even-heard-of/>, it comes out once a month and sometimes prints stories if they're smaller than 1000 words." Thank you.
Hang on - you need to go back and insert a word in the preceding paragraph: "English". The "English" magazines and newspapers don't print fiction. Because if you happen to read the Sakal, or Gujarat Samachar, or even Aaj Ka Anand, you will by now be composing a scathing reply to me about being myopic and all that. My mom's read several proper novels, serialized into chapters in the Gujarat Samachar. Most prominent Marathi writers have at some time been featured in the Marathi magazines.
So why this imbalance when it comes to English media? I remember when I was a kid, there were English magazines which printed some good stuff - Mirror, Illustrated Weekly. Now, there's only the Reader's Digest ( I think - it's been a while since I got it.)
Dinker and I had a phone conversation on this topic the other day. For the few visitors to this blog who don't know yet, Dinker runs a web magazine specialized in Indian Fantastic Fiction, called Adbhut. And we got so riled up about this problem that we thought of starting up a magazine on our
own - say something to collect the best submissions on Adbhut every six months and print it in mag form. There is enough good material floating around the Blogosphere, to begin with, to fill up a decent-sized mag - and I'm sure most bloggers would be interested in getting published.
Someone has to do it, anyway...why not us?
Thursday, May 12, 2005
Time for a change, people! I'd gotten sick of my old blog template, and was meaning to change it anyway. The lure of having people comment on my stories finally got me to editing the settings, and thence to updating the template...
Now that I've taken such pains (I had to press FIVE WHOLE buttons, and even a cut-n-paste!), I'm waiting for the deluge of appreciative comments about my stories. Or not.
Now that I've taken such pains (I had to press FIVE WHOLE buttons, and even a cut-n-paste!), I'm waiting for the deluge of appreciative comments about my stories. Or not.
Thursday, April 28, 2005
Obvious Method #34 for showing off [A.K.A The Book Survey Meme]
Finally, I put together the answers for the survey which Ramanand filled up and then passed on to me. The gestation period was long and terrible. Almost all the answers here have changed several times during this course, and I'll try to put in the older answers as well (up to reasonable limits of course).
1. You’re stuck inside Fahrenheit 451! which book do you want to be?
It's been a while since I read F-451. But from what I remember of that plot, I'm supposed to choose a book that I feel is worth preserving, worth being handed down to future generations, worth being saved from the 'Firemen'. This was, frankly, the easiest question in this set to answer.
I want to save the 'Purush Stotram' and the 'Kenopanishad'. This is not a 'Miss World' type answer - I've actually read Chinmayanandji's commentaries of these books, and probably would want to 'be' the commentaries as well. Both are thankfully short hymns/books, and these two books, put together, have been the ones that influenced and supported me in troubled times. I've tried to take the funda from them as a starting point and logically explain my world-view in a little blog, in case anyone's interested.
Not the answer anyone was expecting, I know. :)
2. Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?
Boy, have I ever!
Hi-fi Answer:
Once you think about it, every crush I've had was on a fictional character, especially when I was enamoured of a real person. The perception I had of the real-life crush's character was created within my own mind. It was this fictional perception I had the crush on. It probably had nothing to do with her real nature.
Miss World Answer:
Mina Harker, from Dracula. [Personally, I detest that female. She's supposed to be goody-two-shoes, inspirational, feminine-yet-strong, etc. But her so-called inspirational speeches turn my stomach. Read the original Dracula to see what I mean.]
The Answer(s) the world has been waiting to hear:
(i) I second JR's answer : Betty, from Archie Comics. They must not be drawing Veronica correctly - she's gotta be much more attractive than she looks if Archie's so taken with her, instead of Betty.
(ii) The first answer that jumped into my mind : Kamla, from Ruskin Bond's A Love of Long Ago. This is one of my favourite stories of his. A relevant excerpt:
She was always on the move – flitting about on the veranda, running errands of no consequence, dancing on the steps, singing on the rooftop as she hung out the family washing. Only once was she still. That was when we met on the steps in the dark and I stole a kiss, a sweet phantom kiss. She was very still then, very close, a butterfly drawing out nectar, and then she broke away from me and ran away laughing.
(iii) Phoebe Pyncheon, from The House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Wonderful, cheerful, pretty, the life of the dreary Pyncheon House. Who could not fall in love with her?
Somebody, at all events, was passing from the farthest interior of the omnibus towards its entrance. A gentleman alighted; but it was only to offer his hand to a young girl whose slender figure, nowise needing such assistance, now lightly descended the steps, and made an airy little jump from the final one to the sidewalk. She rewarded her cavalier with a smile, the cheery glow of which was seen reflected on his own face as he reentered the vehicle. The girl then turned towards the House of the Seven Gables, to the door of which, meanwhile,--not the shop-door, but the antique portal,--the omnibus-man had carried a light trunk and a bandbox.
...The young girl, so fresh, so unconventional, and yet so orderly and obedient to common rules, as you at once recognized her to be, was widely in contrast, at that moment, with everything about her. The sordid and ugly luxuriance of gigantic weeds that grew in the angle of the house, and the heavy projection that overshadowed her, and the time-worn framework of the door,--none of these things belonged to her sphere. But, even as a ray of sunshine, fall into what dismal place it may, instantaneously creates for itself a propriety in being there, so did it seem altogether fit that the girl should be standing at the threshold.
(iv) Anna Quentin, from Under the Net by Iris Murdoch. I was so inspired by a chapter in this book that I wrote a copycat story in the Pawar Guest House series. Excerpt from the original chapter:
There was no doubt that it was Anna. As I looked at her, her face seemed suddenly seemed radiant, like a saint’s face in a picture, and all the surrounding faces were darkened. I could not imagine why I had not seen her at once. For a moment I stared, paralyzed; then I began to try to fight my way out. But it was absolutely impossible. ...There was nothing for it but to wait for the end of the fireworks. I pressed my hand against my heart, which was trying to start out of me with its beating, and I riveted my eyes upon Anna.
... Anna was finding it quite hard to pick her way down. She paused halfway and, with an unutterably graceful and characteristic gesture which I remembered well, gathered her skirt from behind and continued her descent.
(v) Sanjana Kapoor's character, from Hero Hiralal. I forgot her characters name from the movie, but I was so taken by that movie that I went around in a daze for a week. This is back when I was in school.
(vi) Winnie Cooper, from The Wonder Years. I know, I know. But I too was a kid when I started watching WY.
The last four entries here show up a suspicious characteristic : I tend to fall in love with females who are describing adoringly by the medium/narrator. But then, how else to make them desirable to the reader?
3. The last book you bought is:
This answer has changed like crazy over the past two weeks since I was passed the baton. Some of my past answers, in reverse chronological order:
As of Today afternoon :
- The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury
- All the King's Men, by Robert Penn Warren
- A Deadly Shade of Gold, by John MacDonald
- Arrowsmith, by Sinclair Lewis
- A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole
As of Tuesday Afternoon :
- After the Fall, by Arthur Miller
A casual glance through the pages yields a wonderful quote. The narrator says: "I do not know how to blame with confidence."
As of Saturday Afternoon :
- A Man Lay Dead, by Ngaio Marsh [Strictly speaking, purchased for a cousin]
- Faster, by James Gleick
- Stories, by Doris Lessing
- One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, by Alexander Solzhenitsyn
As of last Saturday :
- In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote
- An Instance of the Fingerpost, by Iain Pears
- The Postman, by David Brin
- Under the Net, by Iris Murdoch
Let me clarify that this crazy influx is because of an excellent book exhibition going on in Pune (At Mahatma Phule Museum, for those interested) which is going to end on Sunday. I don't usually buy at this speed. (Yeah, right!)
4. The last book you read:
Again, this field has been changing rapidly in the last two weeks.
As of yesterday morning :
- A Man Lay Dead, by Ngaio Marsh. Not recommended as an introduction to this writer. It was her first book, and the Agatha Christie influence is apparent. The murder even takes place at a weekend party, during a game called 'Murders'!
As of Monday :
- Swami and friends by R.K.Narayan. There's nothing I can add here for this one :)
As of Friday :
- The Day of the Locust, by Nathanael West : I was not overly impressed.
As of last Wednesday :
- In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote : Ok-ok. But one can make out that Capote would be brilliant as a fiction writer.
5. What are you currently reading?
- Stories, by Doris Lessing. This is a collection of her (non-Africa-related) stories. The three that I've read so far were good. Recommended reading for anyone who liked The Golden Notebook. For some odd reason, this collection is out of print.
- The Act of Creation, by Arthur Koestler. Amazing study of how creativity works. Take a look at the interesting division of creativity he describes on the first page - It's on the Amazon site. Just a few chapters into this and already I've bored three people with the ideas I got from it. :)
6. Five books you would take to a deserted island:
- Gravity's Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon. Dense, dense, wonderfully dense book. The prose is poetry, the language is amazing. And, I haven't finished it yet - Couldn't handle it at the time. This is the only book that has defeated me by its dense prose - will have another go once I'm there.
- The Complete Calvin and Hobbes, by Bill Watterson. I know there isn't any such book yet, but I'm sure there will be by the time I start preparing for this island.
- The Bhagavad Gita, I guess. The message it has requires a lifetime to understand and incorporate. Thousands of satisfied readers over the ages can't be wrong ;).
- The CMM Implementation manuals. Because I'll need lots of useless paper for starting up bonfires, for -er- personal hygiene, and other such purposes. This requires paper that I have absolutely no guilt about trashing. So I guess this doesn't actually count here.
- One or two of the following, depending on the mood : One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, On the Road, 1984, Pale Fire.
- The Stories of Ray Bradbury. Something that takes away loneliness, that leaves you admiring it's language and fluidity, that can be read and reread any number of times.
As an aside : I once was actually stuck on a desert island with 4 books. Metaphorically of course. In my first year of college, I had exactly four non-CS books on my shelf, which I read and reread until I almost had them by heart. These were Ringworld, by Larry Niven, 'Salem's Lot by Stephen King, The House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.
7. Who are you going to pass this stick to and why?
There are very few acquaintances left on the blogosphere who haven't already answered this questionnaire. This is as much a result of the meme being popular as of my acquaintances being sparse. Still, doing the best I can.
- Srihari: I have no doubt this is going to have him thinking in a totally alien direction. Go for it, Hari! :)
- Aditya Singh: Ditto. Ady Singh, time to flex new muscles!
- Dinker: Although he hasn't a blog per se, he puts up plenty of writing on his own website. Chal beta Dinker, shuru ho jaa.
- And that is it. I am ashamed to say, this section is the least populated of all the questions here. I have more fictional *crushes* than I have real *acquaintances*!
[Update #1] Dinker is currently relocating to India - so it'll be a long time before we see his entry.
[Update #2] I've found another guinea pi... er.. FRIEND, I meant FRIEND, who has a blog and is interested in filling out this survey. Please welcome : Rohinton Daruwala, my old friend and new blogger, who trawls the net extensively for interesting online fantasy fiction and who will list the good stuff on his blog.
Finally, I put together the answers for the survey which Ramanand filled up and then passed on to me. The gestation period was long and terrible. Almost all the answers here have changed several times during this course, and I'll try to put in the older answers as well (up to reasonable limits of course).
1. You’re stuck inside Fahrenheit 451! which book do you want to be?
It's been a while since I read F-451. But from what I remember of that plot, I'm supposed to choose a book that I feel is worth preserving, worth being handed down to future generations, worth being saved from the 'Firemen'. This was, frankly, the easiest question in this set to answer.
I want to save the 'Purush Stotram' and the 'Kenopanishad'. This is not a 'Miss World' type answer - I've actually read Chinmayanandji's commentaries of these books, and probably would want to 'be' the commentaries as well. Both are thankfully short hymns/books, and these two books, put together, have been the ones that influenced and supported me in troubled times. I've tried to take the funda from them as a starting point and logically explain my world-view in a little blog, in case anyone's interested.
Not the answer anyone was expecting, I know. :)
2. Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?
Boy, have I ever!
Hi-fi Answer:
Once you think about it, every crush I've had was on a fictional character, especially when I was enamoured of a real person. The perception I had of the real-life crush's character was created within my own mind. It was this fictional perception I had the crush on. It probably had nothing to do with her real nature.
Miss World Answer:
Mina Harker, from Dracula. [Personally, I detest that female. She's supposed to be goody-two-shoes, inspirational, feminine-yet-strong, etc. But her so-called inspirational speeches turn my stomach. Read the original Dracula to see what I mean.]
The Answer(s) the world has been waiting to hear:
(i) I second JR's answer : Betty, from Archie Comics. They must not be drawing Veronica correctly - she's gotta be much more attractive than she looks if Archie's so taken with her, instead of Betty.
(ii) The first answer that jumped into my mind : Kamla, from Ruskin Bond's A Love of Long Ago. This is one of my favourite stories of his. A relevant excerpt:
She was always on the move – flitting about on the veranda, running errands of no consequence, dancing on the steps, singing on the rooftop as she hung out the family washing. Only once was she still. That was when we met on the steps in the dark and I stole a kiss, a sweet phantom kiss. She was very still then, very close, a butterfly drawing out nectar, and then she broke away from me and ran away laughing.
(iii) Phoebe Pyncheon, from The House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Wonderful, cheerful, pretty, the life of the dreary Pyncheon House. Who could not fall in love with her?
Somebody, at all events, was passing from the farthest interior of the omnibus towards its entrance. A gentleman alighted; but it was only to offer his hand to a young girl whose slender figure, nowise needing such assistance, now lightly descended the steps, and made an airy little jump from the final one to the sidewalk. She rewarded her cavalier with a smile, the cheery glow of which was seen reflected on his own face as he reentered the vehicle. The girl then turned towards the House of the Seven Gables, to the door of which, meanwhile,--not the shop-door, but the antique portal,--the omnibus-man had carried a light trunk and a bandbox.
...The young girl, so fresh, so unconventional, and yet so orderly and obedient to common rules, as you at once recognized her to be, was widely in contrast, at that moment, with everything about her. The sordid and ugly luxuriance of gigantic weeds that grew in the angle of the house, and the heavy projection that overshadowed her, and the time-worn framework of the door,--none of these things belonged to her sphere. But, even as a ray of sunshine, fall into what dismal place it may, instantaneously creates for itself a propriety in being there, so did it seem altogether fit that the girl should be standing at the threshold.
(iv) Anna Quentin, from Under the Net by Iris Murdoch. I was so inspired by a chapter in this book that I wrote a copycat story in the Pawar Guest House series. Excerpt from the original chapter:
There was no doubt that it was Anna. As I looked at her, her face seemed suddenly seemed radiant, like a saint’s face in a picture, and all the surrounding faces were darkened. I could not imagine why I had not seen her at once. For a moment I stared, paralyzed; then I began to try to fight my way out. But it was absolutely impossible. ...There was nothing for it but to wait for the end of the fireworks. I pressed my hand against my heart, which was trying to start out of me with its beating, and I riveted my eyes upon Anna.
... Anna was finding it quite hard to pick her way down. She paused halfway and, with an unutterably graceful and characteristic gesture which I remembered well, gathered her skirt from behind and continued her descent.
(v) Sanjana Kapoor's character, from Hero Hiralal. I forgot her characters name from the movie, but I was so taken by that movie that I went around in a daze for a week. This is back when I was in school.
(vi) Winnie Cooper, from The Wonder Years. I know, I know. But I too was a kid when I started watching WY.
The last four entries here show up a suspicious characteristic : I tend to fall in love with females who are describing adoringly by the medium/narrator. But then, how else to make them desirable to the reader?
3. The last book you bought is:
This answer has changed like crazy over the past two weeks since I was passed the baton. Some of my past answers, in reverse chronological order:
As of Today afternoon :
- The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury
- All the King's Men, by Robert Penn Warren
- A Deadly Shade of Gold, by John MacDonald
- Arrowsmith, by Sinclair Lewis
- A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole
As of Tuesday Afternoon :
- After the Fall, by Arthur Miller
A casual glance through the pages yields a wonderful quote. The narrator says: "I do not know how to blame with confidence."
As of Saturday Afternoon :
- A Man Lay Dead, by Ngaio Marsh [Strictly speaking, purchased for a cousin]
- Faster, by James Gleick
- Stories, by Doris Lessing
- One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, by Alexander Solzhenitsyn
As of last Saturday :
- In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote
- An Instance of the Fingerpost, by Iain Pears
- The Postman, by David Brin
- Under the Net, by Iris Murdoch
Let me clarify that this crazy influx is because of an excellent book exhibition going on in Pune (At Mahatma Phule Museum, for those interested) which is going to end on Sunday. I don't usually buy at this speed. (Yeah, right!)
4. The last book you read:
Again, this field has been changing rapidly in the last two weeks.
As of yesterday morning :
- A Man Lay Dead, by Ngaio Marsh. Not recommended as an introduction to this writer. It was her first book, and the Agatha Christie influence is apparent. The murder even takes place at a weekend party, during a game called 'Murders'!
As of Monday :
- Swami and friends by R.K.Narayan. There's nothing I can add here for this one :)
As of Friday :
- The Day of the Locust, by Nathanael West : I was not overly impressed.
As of last Wednesday :
- In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote : Ok-ok. But one can make out that Capote would be brilliant as a fiction writer.
5. What are you currently reading?
- Stories, by Doris Lessing. This is a collection of her (non-Africa-related) stories. The three that I've read so far were good. Recommended reading for anyone who liked The Golden Notebook. For some odd reason, this collection is out of print.
- The Act of Creation, by Arthur Koestler. Amazing study of how creativity works. Take a look at the interesting division of creativity he describes on the first page - It's on the Amazon site. Just a few chapters into this and already I've bored three people with the ideas I got from it. :)
6. Five books you would take to a deserted island:
- Gravity's Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon. Dense, dense, wonderfully dense book. The prose is poetry, the language is amazing. And, I haven't finished it yet - Couldn't handle it at the time. This is the only book that has defeated me by its dense prose - will have another go once I'm there.
- The Complete Calvin and Hobbes, by Bill Watterson. I know there isn't any such book yet, but I'm sure there will be by the time I start preparing for this island.
- The Bhagavad Gita, I guess. The message it has requires a lifetime to understand and incorporate. Thousands of satisfied readers over the ages can't be wrong ;).
- The CMM Implementation manuals. Because I'll need lots of useless paper for starting up bonfires, for -er- personal hygiene, and other such purposes. This requires paper that I have absolutely no guilt about trashing. So I guess this doesn't actually count here.
- One or two of the following, depending on the mood : One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest, On the Road, 1984, Pale Fire.
- The Stories of Ray Bradbury. Something that takes away loneliness, that leaves you admiring it's language and fluidity, that can be read and reread any number of times.
As an aside : I once was actually stuck on a desert island with 4 books. Metaphorically of course. In my first year of college, I had exactly four non-CS books on my shelf, which I read and reread until I almost had them by heart. These were Ringworld, by Larry Niven, 'Salem's Lot by Stephen King, The House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.
7. Who are you going to pass this stick to and why?
There are very few acquaintances left on the blogosphere who haven't already answered this questionnaire. This is as much a result of the meme being popular as of my acquaintances being sparse. Still, doing the best I can.
- Srihari: I have no doubt this is going to have him thinking in a totally alien direction. Go for it, Hari! :)
- Aditya Singh: Ditto. Ady Singh, time to flex new muscles!
- Dinker: Although he hasn't a blog per se, he puts up plenty of writing on his own website. Chal beta Dinker, shuru ho jaa.
- And that is it. I am ashamed to say, this section is the least populated of all the questions here. I have more fictional *crushes* than I have real *acquaintances*!
[Update #1] Dinker is currently relocating to India - so it'll be a long time before we see his entry.
[Update #2] I've found another guinea pi... er.. FRIEND, I meant FRIEND, who has a blog and is interested in filling out this survey. Please welcome : Rohinton Daruwala, my old friend and new blogger, who trawls the net extensively for interesting online fantasy fiction and who will list the good stuff on his blog.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)