Tuesday, April 27, 2004
It's been a mixed week --up to the jowls with work and then a sanguine trip to Bhopal, stranded there on Sunday inexplicably due to the paucity of tickets caused by the fervid zeal of the devout at Ujjain. Still, a welcome return to the bastions of Pataudi and an even more memorable tete-a-tete with old colleagues over lunch and dinner.
Am having expected hurdles in coercing Bhopal give off its best denizens to me--that will need more work.
The old organization meanders on--awake to the harshness of the corporate rays but yet preferring to cast a somnolent eye.
The old lake near the restaurant is still an eyeful--magnifique, many times better than the infernal Marine Drive with its strong sinister L Sayers feel.
The weather in central India is still the pits, sweltering and dry.
Got back in time, however, to be with my parents on their wedding anniversary. Also visited the house at Panvel where they will shift shortly, and which, one hopes will reduce the time I get kicked, crumpled and trampled on in my local train capers--what an experience, I can only empathise with sardines.
Dined in a restaurant yesterday ( treat for all the years my parents have endured one another)which was a little like the Christie story where the murderess is found out by a mirror clue. The dishes were all wrong, as in a continental dish was served in an Oriental mode, the Mughlai was of Chinese vintage etc, you get the picture. Water was reliable, though !!My mind harks back to one fine day ( somewhere in central India, again ) where my timid request for a cup of tomato soup was negated by the waiter saying they did not serve Chinese.
Sometime last week watched Barca bamboozle Real at the Bernabeu--serves them right ,the arrogant bunch of no-gooders. And I finally remember who Roberto Carlos reminds me of, the invincible Dr. Evil in Austin Powers ( which is about the promontory of English movies I watch, I confess )
Glimpsed the interminable fuss made over poor Ms. Ahlawat and it struck me as rather ineffable the pecuniary talents of some superstars of the land who have changed brands they endorse so seamlessly that it seems almost heinous. SRK , from Omega, to Tag Heuer ( one notoriously irrelevant endorsement to another), the Mr Clean Dravid whose association with Thomson seems destined to die out from public memory given its moribund status, Saif Ali Khan from Limca to Pepsi, and the list goes on. As Sprite so eruditely says " yeh to public ki kheenchte hain"
Read the pret-a-porter dished out by the Bal, unfortunately the movies i find corny makes me blasphemous in this naive land--HSJK, DDLJ, Sholay et al ( I can think of atleast one good friend who will unstintingly take up cudgels on behalf of the aforesaid films so dosti ki kasam ( sic) I give up ).
However, it reminds me of those good old college days where we used to pun Hindi film antaras and we did come up with some gems then. I will post them if I remember later.
Talking of bad ditties there is some list floating about the 50 worst songs ever which has " Sounds of Silence " at no. 42. Hmmm !!
|
Am having expected hurdles in coercing Bhopal give off its best denizens to me--that will need more work.
The old organization meanders on--awake to the harshness of the corporate rays but yet preferring to cast a somnolent eye.
The old lake near the restaurant is still an eyeful--magnifique, many times better than the infernal Marine Drive with its strong sinister L Sayers feel.
The weather in central India is still the pits, sweltering and dry.
Got back in time, however, to be with my parents on their wedding anniversary. Also visited the house at Panvel where they will shift shortly, and which, one hopes will reduce the time I get kicked, crumpled and trampled on in my local train capers--what an experience, I can only empathise with sardines.
Dined in a restaurant yesterday ( treat for all the years my parents have endured one another)which was a little like the Christie story where the murderess is found out by a mirror clue. The dishes were all wrong, as in a continental dish was served in an Oriental mode, the Mughlai was of Chinese vintage etc, you get the picture. Water was reliable, though !!My mind harks back to one fine day ( somewhere in central India, again ) where my timid request for a cup of tomato soup was negated by the waiter saying they did not serve Chinese.
Sometime last week watched Barca bamboozle Real at the Bernabeu--serves them right ,the arrogant bunch of no-gooders. And I finally remember who Roberto Carlos reminds me of, the invincible Dr. Evil in Austin Powers ( which is about the promontory of English movies I watch, I confess )
Glimpsed the interminable fuss made over poor Ms. Ahlawat and it struck me as rather ineffable the pecuniary talents of some superstars of the land who have changed brands they endorse so seamlessly that it seems almost heinous. SRK , from Omega, to Tag Heuer ( one notoriously irrelevant endorsement to another), the Mr Clean Dravid whose association with Thomson seems destined to die out from public memory given its moribund status, Saif Ali Khan from Limca to Pepsi, and the list goes on. As Sprite so eruditely says " yeh to public ki kheenchte hain"
Read the pret-a-porter dished out by the Bal, unfortunately the movies i find corny makes me blasphemous in this naive land--HSJK, DDLJ, Sholay et al ( I can think of atleast one good friend who will unstintingly take up cudgels on behalf of the aforesaid films so dosti ki kasam ( sic) I give up ).
However, it reminds me of those good old college days where we used to pun Hindi film antaras and we did come up with some gems then. I will post them if I remember later.
Talking of bad ditties there is some list floating about the 50 worst songs ever which has " Sounds of Silence " at no. 42. Hmmm !!
