Cinema, this magic is all over me. It is a powerful medium, more appealing than a book. It started alluring me from my childhood. I am still awe struck by its limitless beauty and magic and the pure pleasure it gives is easily above any orgasms. Amazed by the chasing scenes and Heroism in bollywood in early nineties (where always a super human Hero is required to help an always distressed heroin). I still remember how I jumped bravely out of my three wheeler toddler cycle to rescue my childhood Sreedevi out of gutter( where she landed , frightened by a harmless military convoy )and got multiple fractured during the heroic process. Though I was slightly embarrassed about the prospect but I still remember how I groped for biceps through my t shirt with ailing knees. Salman was my god during early teenage, countless eggs and all dieting and exercises were gone into create what I proudly flaunt now as my “family pack” tummy. Mom had a hard time explaining the enigma of what goes into create a sculpted six pack .When I moved back to Kerala, hero’s were a class apart, or simply shabby. I was soon accustomed to mallu ways and soon Mohanlal was become my pin-up star. I continued my heroics, as I was always there for distressed beauties, but as for my style a little changed though, I rubbed and searched under my nose for moustache after my heroics here. College time was fun. DDLJ and handful of other bollywood movies pumped in so much of adrenaline and incited an undying lover in me. Eventually as a direct result of all these when no of backlogs exceeded even my age i came to know reality bites and Calicut University barks. All the bull crap to hell and it is time to leave the college and all heart breaks and break ups, but east cost vijayan consoled me. After the college I got a glimpse of what world-cinema is. Cuppola, Tarantino, Sergio Leone, Scorsese became my new companions. I sympathised and empathised and lost in the magical world of Amelie Poulin. I doubted for a second that whether I am in a matrix or not. 24 min Oscar performance might be easily forgotten but I couldn’t get over deadly cannibalistic calmness in Anthony Hopkins eyes. I gaped at the skill in which Bob Dylan’s different shades were brilliantly stroked in the vast canvas of cinema. Al pacino and Robert De Nero, I bowed before them. Cinema was everything to me. It was only sensible thing in my morbid world. It showed me the beauty of a rainbow. It showed me what is to be like having a square meal a day. It showed me what is to be being lost and what is to be being found. It took me through a world devoid of reality yet showed how real it is. Many years were passed, many lights were put out from my life, many fan fares were settled down, many of them left me to loneliness, but there is only one true friend who is always stood by my side consoles, mimics, criticizes, forces, cares and challenges. May be this an evasion or escape but I love to do it to the fullest .As the emperor was enchanted every night by stories in Arabian Nights, I am being enchanted by cinema, every day, every minute, every second
Endless conundrums..............
Life is a conundrum. In fact an endless series of conundrums, but as Chaplin said "In the end everything is a gag"
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
My obsession
Cinema, this magic is all over me. It is a powerful medium, more appealing than a book. It started alluring me from my childhood. I am still awe struck by its limitless beauty and magic and the pure pleasure it gives is easily above any orgasms. Amazed by the chasing scenes and Heroism in bollywood in early nineties (where always a super human Hero is required to help an always distressed heroin). I still remember how I jumped bravely out of my three wheeler toddler cycle to rescue my childhood Sreedevi out of gutter( where she landed , frightened by a harmless military convoy )and got multiple fractured during the heroic process. Though I was slightly embarrassed about the prospect but I still remember how I groped for biceps through my t shirt with ailing knees. Salman was my god during early teenage, countless eggs and all dieting and exercises were gone into create what I proudly flaunt now as my “family pack” tummy. Mom had a hard time explaining the enigma of what goes into create a sculpted six pack .When I moved back to Kerala, hero’s were a class apart, or simply shabby. I was soon accustomed to mallu ways and soon Mohanlal was become my pin-up star. I continued my heroics, as I was always there for distressed beauties, but as for my style a little changed though, I rubbed and searched under my nose for moustache after my heroics here. College time was fun. DDLJ and handful of other bollywood movies pumped in so much of adrenaline and incited an undying lover in me. Eventually as a direct result of all these when no of backlogs exceeded even my age i came to know reality bites and Calicut University barks. All the bull crap to hell and it is time to leave the college and all heart breaks and break ups, but east cost vijayan consoled me. After the college I got a glimpse of what world-cinema is. Cuppola, Tarantino, Sergio Leone, Scorsese became my new companions. I sympathised and empathised and lost in the magical world of Amelie Poulin. I doubted for a second that whether I am in a matrix or not. 24 min Oscar performance might be easily forgotten but I couldn’t get over deadly cannibalistic calmness in Anthony Hopkins eyes. I gaped at the skill in which Bob Dylan’s different shades were brilliantly stroked in the vast canvas of cinema. Al pacino and Robert De Nero, I bowed before them. Cinema was everything to me. It was only sensible thing in my morbid world. It showed me the beauty of a rainbow. It showed me what is to be like having a square meal a day. It showed me what is to be being lost and what is to be being found. It took me through a world devoid of reality yet showed how real it is. Many years were passed, many lights were put out from my life, many fan fares were settled down, many of them left me to loneliness, but there is only one true friend who is always stood by my side consoles, mimics, criticizes, forces, cares and challenges. May be this an evasion or escape but I love to do it to the fullest .As the emperor was enchanted every night by stories in Arabian Nights, I am being enchanted by cinema, every day, every minute, every second
Friday, August 27, 2010
An Old post
hi folks,
It is been ages since i posted in this blog. Actually i want to post this on Independence day but couldn't get near the keyboard for a while. The day started in very cliched manner , channels showing war films and my mobile beeped many times with happy independence day messages. Most of the TV channels logo's were adorned with tri-colour. All the malayalam channels were celebrating Maduani's tussle with the forces. My brother added a tinge of tri colour into his desktop as well. I was feeling frustrated don't know why?. So with out writing anything i went out. So that's it no post for this Independence day just re posting an old letter which i posted in my groups on this day two years back. But 2 years back when i was writing that thing i was confident and optimistic but today i am a little sad to note that the conditions are gone bad and anyways i am just sharing that letter and a book which influenced me the most .
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---- Forwarded Message ----
From: sandy sandeep
To: civil2005batch@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Sun, 12 August, 2007 9:37:17 PM
Subject: Independence day thoughts - An introspection
INDEPENDENCE DAY THOUGHTS- AN INTROSPECTION
Hi folks,
I’m writing this out of resentment, hatred, and detestation of my personality. I’m writing this out of sheer pain that pricks my conscience that I needed a “wiki search” or a “Google search” to understand and to know my country.
Once I promulgated and proud of being a rebel, a non conformist, a person having abhorrence toward his country. I argued vociferously that this country doesn’t have any future and present system is a farce and country is all set to doom. I have many reasons to tell our poor infrastructure, poor planning, prevailing corruption, pathetic health condition, exponential growth of slums, water scarcity, poorly tapped resources etc etc.
It was a long list having common prefixes either poor or pathetic. I continued my gibberish over and over again whenever I got a chance. It happened me to visit a foreign country as part of my budding career, there I enjoyed to look around for a dustbin to throw my empty ‘Pepsi’ can with reminiscence of how I used to kick to a main road back in my home country and relieved a lot to see it getting crushed and giving a damn about it. I enjoyed the restrictions in that country and used to boast of how strict the rules were there.
I came back to my homeland reckoning the foreign dollars I can have by adding a MBA to my credit. Well I was back into hues and cries of “Indian living”.
It was to kill time and revive a habit of mine which got descended into memory I joined Ernakulam public library. It was then I stumbled upon some brilliant works of our great masters like Bhism sahni, Manto, Khushwant Singh, their stories gave me detailed account of post independent India immediate after partition, which was in a chaos of its own. Many books gave me detailed account of how we made the transition from freedom to independence but I never felt excited rather I was sympathizing how bad they made , and how bad our country is after 60 years of its independence. I hardly seen anything positive everything appeared to me as negative. I was sure that this country is dooming, there is no way out.
It was then I attended an interview in a leading B-school in the south, interviewer asked me about my role model, I played it safe as I said M.K Gandhi. He was not in a mood to give up “Why Gandhi? Does it mean that you will go satya graha if I won’t give you any hike? I figured out that he was intending to hear the relevance of Gandhi’s principle in current world (damn!!!!!!!!! for that I must know what were Gandhi’s principles and their current relevance, hmm poor Gandhi, poor me, poor interviewer).I ended up saying some ludicrous mumbo-jumbo which has got an immediate effect on that poor man, he quickly wound up the session. We both, I and my interviewer thus shared great relief by saving poor Gandhi. This is the very reason behind I started reading M.K Gandhi’s
Autobiography (a book, I bluffed a lot ,but never read ) I felt his ideas are hyperbolic and having no current relevance as political parties are making a hell out of it and couldn’t compromise with some of his views (especially I was wary about detesting of foreign goods). But down the line I feel still something, in the form of a question is looming behind his texts, he was a great man. I really understood how great he is by going through his text but my perennial problem remains still virgin ,how to tackle this bloody world. I thought he would have committed suicide if he was here.
It was then I got a book as a gift “how to change this world “by David Bornstein .It was book about social entrepreneurs. It was about people who know that the world they living in is hell and took initiative and devised plans and carefully executed their work to make this world a better place (a fact which is overlooked by me during the first read). There were lot successful people like Jeero Billimoria of ‘Childline Foundation India’, Javed Abidi (who fought for disabled rights), Fabio roza (flag bearer of rural electrification program in Brazil) from Brazil, Ela Bhat (organizing self employed women) the list was frustratingly endless, but I was not ready to compromise with them and their success became incomprehensible to me or it is first time in my life I came to know in India theses kind of people really exist, but after reading this book too I felt like something looming behind their success too which remains to be elusive what is that? What is the common thread connecting these people?
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It was a hartal day, shops were closed as usual and even the hospitals in our precincts were closed. Chikun guinea was taking its toll on my mom, she convulsed, barely able to walk and couldn’t even stand up. She bored jungle of intricate diseases like diabetis, cholesterol problems, high BP etc so we had to tell a long story before any doctor so we preferred doctors who knew her for a long period. But as that was a hartal day they were hardly accessible. At last the only possible option remained in front of us to take her to the “PRIVATE PRACTICE” of a govt doctor, but he informed us that he was busy with an “AROGYA MELA” organized by govt of Kerala and can be reached over there. So only possible option remained before us to take her to that govt hospital. I protested but there was no other go.
It was the first time in life I had been to a govt hospital, I was worried. The scenes were nauseating (even though I used to pass bitter a comment about this place, a face to face encounter was more that I can bear). I shocked to see how over crowded the place was, how dirty the place was, how poor the amenities were. My mom had to share her bed with two other patients, three of them were sharing a bed hardly 1m wide. “Get this injection from the counter” nurse handed over a chit to me. I felt nervous to see ocean of people in front of me ailing in various way, all I could see sadness and hopelessness in every face, all I could hear the cries. Their voices were deafening me, I stood paralyzed for a moment with chit of some unknown counter. It was then a young and animated voice fallen into my ears “what can I do for you brother?”. I seen a boy hardly 10 yrs old in his scout and guides uniform. I was amazed to see how calm he was, and was smiling. The question reverberated in my ears, is that what am I looking for?, is that what looming behind Gandhiji’s texts?, is that what each of those social entrepreneurs asked to their fellow beings?. Now everything became clear, all the ideas which seems hard to explain and thought to be incomprehensible and hyperbolic were floating around me.
I am 23 years old, I’m a professional by now, asked many questions to many, but never ventured to ask such a question. Till that moment I was preoccupied with negative thoughts, I felt like all my pride and prejudice are burning and melting down before this small boy. I mechanically handed over the chit to him and followed him as if am in trance. I really moved by that boy and his 10 member team .They didn’t had school on that day and came here thinking that at least the could help a little bit as they know hospital staff cant manage such a big crowd. Till that day I was vociferous about the misdoing others, corruption, poor health condition of the nation, prevailing unemployment and the entire negative sides of society and nation but never ready for an introspection “what is it that you are doing for them?”. I had 1000 examples of negative people, negative thoughts and negative deeds and all negative and hopeless aspects of our country but I was blind to see at least 10 positive examples, failed appreciate positive deeds and positive thinking. I overlooked the confidence shown by those individuals. My vision was crippled with negative thoughts. Now that everything became clear to me I felt like the “sixth sense” boy (who when look around could see only dead people). I looked around, now I could see the goodness in people, in the smiles of hospital staffs, in the smiles of the boy and his team. I could see people are no more crying they were smiling. I felt confident…………………..
By writing this I tried to translate my tryst with different ideas I was experiencing for some period. I am embarrassed to say that I took 23 years to know my country and to be confident in my country. Now I’m a hopeful citizen. I’m agreeing with the fact that we have to develop in many fronts and we are lacking in many. But be aware of the fact that we have done many .You can give me 1000 examples of failures and corruption and all negative side of life but I challenge you I can counter you with 10 positive examples ,hopeful examples. But 10 is small in contrast to 1000 but believe me the gap is narrowing, it will accelerate only when we fellow Indians really know about it and pledge to take part in it. Be hopeful and be confident and try to do something for others (no matter however trivial it is), try to nurture that culture in you and in your younger ones
This is the great message our leaders and masters wished us to learn. open your eyes to see the world, it is not that bad enough, be confident , be ready to appreciate and participate in those noble deeds, don’t think that you are too feeble to make a move, you go on with your small move(doesn’t matter how trivial it is). Try to learn and spread this message. It is minds of the people are to addressed first, it is the mind set of the people have to change first. In that what is very important that is understanding your role, it is very big. And it is understanding our country, understanding that the life is beautiful.
So lets pledge to confident, lets pledge to be positive, lets pledge to be tough , lets understand our country, lets pledge to appreciate others , lets pledge to do whatever we can for the nation building, lets pledge to be hopeful because life is beautiful………..
Thanks
Sandeep
I am glad to tell you that how much happy and confident I became after reading the book “how to change the world “. The title may be misleading; but certainly not a ‘Dale carnige’ kind of stuff but are actual stories about some wonderful and successful people. Let me finish off by reproducing some quotes in the book
“True compassion is more than just flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring”……….Martin Luther King Jr
“If we all did the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves “…………………… Thomas Edison
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
My religion
This is the term which is often misunderstood or misrepresented . This is term meaning of which is so simple but yet so complicated. People bomb down an edifice and kill hundreds of people in the name of religion. Many war were waged for religions. People cut the hands down of a teacher because he is accused of denigrating a religion. People annihilate in the name of religion. People wear different attire carry different symbols and go different institution for following different religion. I found it is associated with Money, power, anger, grudge, revenge,emotion, frustration, reservation, castigation,prostitution, blood, gore, right,responsibility and What not. As a habit i turned to the dictionary and it says
"a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs".
There also i find the words nature,purpose, morality,devotion,ritual, moral code,super human , super power...................... I didn't find what i was looking for . I am keeping my search on . I am hopelessly looking for a four letter word there which is "LOVE". I am not looking for it in any so called HOLY BOOKS.I am not looking for it in any institution.where i wont look or rather i am tired of looking there . I am looking for it in the hearts of people. I am looking for it in the deeds of people.I may get tired but i am confident one day or other i will prevail and i will find a religion which is called "LOVE and Compassion"
One last thought: When are we going to look beyond the so called holy text and symbols and realise that compassionate love is the greatest religion and god is love.............................
"a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs".
There also i find the words nature,purpose, morality,devotion,ritual, moral code,super human , super power...................... I didn't find what i was looking for . I am keeping my search on . I am hopelessly looking for a four letter word there which is "LOVE". I am not looking for it in any so called HOLY BOOKS.I am not looking for it in any institution.where i wont look or rather i am tired of looking there . I am looking for it in the hearts of people. I am looking for it in the deeds of people.I may get tired but i am confident one day or other i will prevail and i will find a religion which is called "LOVE and Compassion"
One last thought: When are we going to look beyond the so called holy text and symbols and realise that compassionate love is the greatest religion and god is love.............................
Friday, July 23, 2010
Bangalore Blues.....
I don't know what exactly made me create a blog , may be just the excitement of having a blog or........ what the hell?. Do we have to give reasons for each and everything what we do. Well i would like to share the hell of confusions and meaninglessness i feel in everyday of my life. Everything which is coming to me. Each and everyday is a conundrum . Myself is a boy/guy who is utterly confused and whose voices are often unheard among the clamor of bloody Successful assholes (for that matter i don't believe in populist view of success), they are everywhere and to whom we are being scaled everyday . Well i don't like rather believe in the act of comparison . I think it is quite peculiar to our generation.A generation which is fed on Complan and Horlicks, no wonder they will also start comparing each other like the ads of those products COMPARE!!!, compare like hell, compare every fucking attributes . FTW. By every passing day i am feeling totally lonely and paranoiac, the only thing which i like in this world is Books,Movies and Music. Oh In fact there are three things . Well I hate the rest .
Recently i went to Bangalore with great expectations. First one was to meet an old friend of mine , second was to see the so called garden city. My both missions were failed . The MNC she was working in was too busy in milking her brain and the pace of the Dirty city disappointed me. She was so busy ( and looked weak and pathetic) and we couldn't meet ,finally i caught her on railway station. I took a room in some darkest corners of Bangalore city named Majestic. It was quite ironical that the bloody fucking filthy scum is called MAJESTIC. I didn't find anything majestic there , all i found was KFC eatery which serves overfed chicken which survives on hormone injections and fed by soya which is cultivated and exported from some third world country where people die in the street like dogs and not having a piece a bread to survive for months, and who are never enlisted or accounted by any so called World health agencies or filthy rich charities nor reported by any filthy rich news corporations which is unassumingly wealthy by trading theses poor people's blood and flesh. i Got into that place ,a stale smell of some Crappy Rock band invited me . I almost puked at it. Wat i saw around was these kids whose spoiling their heart and brains for their despotic MNC giant. Those kids were clamorous and wore an attire of fake happiness. They are all smiling at each other just to get relieved from the worries inside. I ordered for some dead stuff and payed the bill only to get out of that place without having enough courage to bear anything more. i wandered through the street for some time only to see many lights flash past me. Streets near majestic were overcrowded and there was a steady flow of odors of perfume,sweat, body lotions, Jasmin flowers in the air. Streets were lined by prostitutes who had a pathetic taste for dresses. Well dress sense is the last thing you will expect out of a prostitute, agree!!. Well i barged in on to a tea stall which is manned by this grumpy old man. I scanned for a thing to order and i was hungry like hell. At last i gave up and ordered a Badam Milk . I said "BADAM MILK" "what?". Mr grumpy shouted back as if i ordered for his kidneys. "7 rupees " he said and open his palms . i gave him 10 bucks and A glass of Badam milk and balance change were thrown in front of me. i am lucky that he didn't put those in it. Hmm i was feeling sleepy and had to meet a bunch of assholes ,may be worse than i saw there till.(Next day i got an interview in IISC). I reached my hotel room . I could still hear the cries of the city, so i shut the door and put an end to that. I turned off the light and another dirty day smudged in memory. Too much for an opening post so ........peace out......later
Recently i went to Bangalore with great expectations. First one was to meet an old friend of mine , second was to see the so called garden city. My both missions were failed . The MNC she was working in was too busy in milking her brain and the pace of the Dirty city disappointed me. She was so busy ( and looked weak and pathetic) and we couldn't meet ,finally i caught her on railway station. I took a room in some darkest corners of Bangalore city named Majestic. It was quite ironical that the bloody fucking filthy scum is called MAJESTIC. I didn't find anything majestic there , all i found was KFC eatery which serves overfed chicken which survives on hormone injections and fed by soya which is cultivated and exported from some third world country where people die in the street like dogs and not having a piece a bread to survive for months, and who are never enlisted or accounted by any so called World health agencies or filthy rich charities nor reported by any filthy rich news corporations which is unassumingly wealthy by trading theses poor people's blood and flesh. i Got into that place ,a stale smell of some Crappy Rock band invited me . I almost puked at it. Wat i saw around was these kids whose spoiling their heart and brains for their despotic MNC giant. Those kids were clamorous and wore an attire of fake happiness. They are all smiling at each other just to get relieved from the worries inside. I ordered for some dead stuff and payed the bill only to get out of that place without having enough courage to bear anything more. i wandered through the street for some time only to see many lights flash past me. Streets near majestic were overcrowded and there was a steady flow of odors of perfume,sweat, body lotions, Jasmin flowers in the air. Streets were lined by prostitutes who had a pathetic taste for dresses. Well dress sense is the last thing you will expect out of a prostitute, agree!!. Well i barged in on to a tea stall which is manned by this grumpy old man. I scanned for a thing to order and i was hungry like hell. At last i gave up and ordered a Badam Milk . I said "BADAM MILK" "what?". Mr grumpy shouted back as if i ordered for his kidneys. "7 rupees " he said and open his palms . i gave him 10 bucks and A glass of Badam milk and balance change were thrown in front of me. i am lucky that he didn't put those in it. Hmm i was feeling sleepy and had to meet a bunch of assholes ,may be worse than i saw there till.(Next day i got an interview in IISC). I reached my hotel room . I could still hear the cries of the city, so i shut the door and put an end to that. I turned off the light and another dirty day smudged in memory. Too much for an opening post so ........peace out......later
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