The artist within.....

Like it ?? was trying my hands at making Fatman, ended up doing this. Fatman is still in the pipeline. 

pani wali aurat - my two bits

I must say, I have nothing but un-maligned and dedicated admiration towards any movie that Shyamalan makes. Though my journey started with his fourth movie – Signs, and I never saw The sixth sense until recently, I admire the guy a lot. So even thought the world will criticize “The Lady…”. I won’t.

Not because I am a fan of his. But because I liked the movie. And those who didn’t, should try and understand the theme of the movie first, his motive behind making this movie and then think of criticizing it. Though the move should get its share of brickbats. As it’s quite….lets say difficult to apprehend and weird. But not bad.

The movie does not share Night’s typical twist with his older ones and unlike the others, the whole story is narrated to you in an animated prologue. The rest of the move is just different parts within that story. So if you are expecting a clinching climax, forget it and concentrate on trying to understand the movie rather than waiting for it to unfold before you.

Because believe me , if you do that, you will never know when the movie got over and that’s why I like movie. It’s straightforward, the more you try to understand it, the more perplexed it will seem to be. Its simple bedtime story, it is supposed to have the type of characters which it has.

The fun part is that Shyamalan has made the main asshole in the movie a film critic. And not just any critic, but one so arrogant he convinces himself that his keen knowledge of horror movie construction will allow him to survive an encounter with the scrunt (one of the monsters) unscathed. Which has enraged their types and the resultant idiotic reviews for the movie.

Random..

What happens when Shaggy bumps into Batgirl in an elevator

Shaggy: hey

Batgirl: Hey

Shaggy: Nice costume

Batgirl: Thanks. Are you new here? Haven’t seen you here earlier.

Shaggy: Ya, kinds of. I just took the lift as an escape route.

Batgirl: Escape from? What do you do?

Shaggy: I am a sidekick. Me and my partner Scooby do try to run away from ghosts and criminals, but in the process end up catching them. So I was saving my life from a bad guy on the top floor and the lift was the first option in front of me. Scooby preferred the garbage shoot. But Scooby is a dog and I don’t know how but he manages to get the glory every time we catch a criminal. He can’t even speak for Gods sake.

Batgirl: Oh! So we are quite similar but you do the opposite of what I do.

Shaggy: and what is that

Batgirl: I am also a sidekick. I have a partner, but he does not consider me as his partner. He is Batman and I a’m Batgirl, as you can see from the costume. I try to catch criminals, bad guys, ghosts, etc…. but never end up catching them. So eventually I have to ask Batman’s help to do so and he gets all the glory. But he’s stupid.

Shaggy: Hmmm…...sad.

Batgirl: Ya, very! ...say, I have an idea!!

Shaggy: are you thinking what I'’m thinking?

....

You know you are in Gujarat, when you see this...

 

Scratch and win..

The first time I saw this hoarding, I knew it had to go up on my blog. I was on a street signal and soon as I saw it, I started laughing only to find other people around staring at me. Even when the light had gone green, I stood there smirking to myself, thinking that I need to capture this. Couple of days later, on a late night excursion after watching "The return of Zorro" I took this snap. Unfortunately at that time I was not an avid blogger, so this snap got lost in the labyrinth of my collection and I forgot all about it.

The worst thing that can happen to you on your way to work

To all those inquisitive ones who wanted to know why was I asking them this question, I simply read it somewhere but ended up asking everyone. And in the process when people asked me, “are you gonna post it on your blog?” I thought why not. So thanks for the idea guys, and as many requested, I have mentioned their names, and provided gracious links to their sites or blogs.

Irrespective of the 1 worst thing that can happen to you on your way to work, the most worst thing is that you are working. Surprisingly, getting raped and girlfriends breaking up was the first thing most people could thing about.

1. You are walking, thinking of skipping work and planning to watch that raunchy movie you’ve missed out on, and this is the last day it will be running in the theaters and a car comes behind you, a window opens your boss’s face stick out and he says “Need a lift” - Me

2. while reaching you're late.. and while you're calling up your boss explaining how you're at the doc, he sees you at the signal? Nirwa

3. you shit your pants – SID P

4. i could get raped by a guy :-D – Chintoo

5. you need to make a major presentation to your boss and you spot an unbelievably hot girl , then of course you will not make good presentation ;) , it is uncomfortable to do it under the effect of an erection - Rishit

6. ur gf calls and says she doesnt love u anymore – Fatman, Rohan

7. getting fined at all signals and reaching office to realise its the weekend – Maitri

8. DC - tire flat followed by an accident followed by a speeding fine

9. get kidnapped and raped by a desperate middle aged aunty? – sunandan

10. you get into an accident with a girl, and people beat the shit out of you, beacuse it is always the guy's fault - Nihar

the cop finds the stash of marijuana in your trunk - Nihar

a hot girl asks you to do her, but you cant beacuse you have to go to a meeting? - Nihar

11. bird shits on you and you are late

12. you're not wearing underwear and your zipper is open - Deepesh

All those who didn't contrubute when I asked are still free to do so.

more...

And this is what a friend had to say regarding the ban on the blogs.

"The Indian Government has decided to turn off the water supply as it has been reported that the terrorists use water to live. Its always good to see that any government has intelligent people making all the decisions."

- Chaitanya Sharma

Next thing you know they might ban Orkut ! and all those endless hours of hard work, of finding old friends, joining communities and scrapping will go down the drain.

Are Internet Service Providers blocking blogs?

What the f*** !!@%$^%

Here.

Adventures of the Fatman - Vol 1 , Issue 1. "Fatman can act too"

I’m starting a new series called Adventures of the Fatman, as you can read the heading. Fatman being my brother, who is no longer fat, but since he was christened Fatman when he was fat, the name still goes on. These series will be events and adventures in the life of Fatman, as he battles the world, eats, sleeps, goes to college, talks to girls, watches football, battles the world again, eats, talks to girls and eats again. These might be real life incidences in Fatman’s life or might be some beautiful fiction born in my mind.

Fatman can act too :

My brother is not a dramatic. He can’t act and he can’t lie, usually. Among the both of us you can expect me to do the foolish things in life which you’ve never heard of. He’s more of the balanced, organised and studious kinds in life, who will want to be good in front of the teachers and do the class assignments and not be late in class. So when he pulled of this incident everyone in our house was dumbfounded.

School is a strange place. When you are in it, you want to get out of it and when you are out of it, you miss the life, the friends, the games but of course not the studies. Most of us get roughened up at the school playground, and this is what happened to my Fatman. He was a flabby kid, fat to be specific. Always there in the team but he last one to be picked up as a substitute. But he was persistent. One such hot afternoon, during the recess, while playing basketball someone knocked him over and he fell down. If it were any other normal day he would have gotten up and joined the game again, but this time I think the fall was a bit harder and he took some more time to get up. In the meantime, the other kids swarmed around to see what had happened whereas Fatman was still taking his time to “heal up”, curious sounds of “are you fine”, “hey are you ok” started shooting at him and suddenly an idea struck him.

He closed his eyes and continued on lying down. Soon the entire playground was around him trying to figure out what happened and wake him up. But our man had decided, I’m not going to wake up lets see what happens. The next four periods are boring, I have not done my homework and I’m tired of being a good boy anyway. Two punes came along to see what happened, splashed some water on his face, picked him up after which he showed some signs of consciousness. They took him to the Fathers office after that, where supposedly the father knew a lot about how to handle such situations. Fatman was asked to lie down for a while and given something to drink. After an hour or so when Fatman had his share of sleep and rest, he got up and said “I’m fine now father, don’t feel so sick anymore”. Father does a check-up and tells him “Son, your blood is very thin, that’s why you fainted. You should drink more water”. Fatman smirks, says “Ok Father” and runs away.

This month Fatman was featured as Ruud Van Nistelrooy’s fan of the month, on a website, check it out over here.

At least comment a smiley when you read this !

Thanks DC.

Better off as a statue

A letter to the Times of Inida, which echoes what I have been thinking in the past couple of days.

We travel in trains and buses packed like Muscat dates, we are made to cool our heels in the scorching sun whenever a neta decides to use the road built with our money, we are subjected to power outages while ACs hum away at ministerial bungalows. Our democracy ensures that every political party gets a chance to bring the city/state/country to a grinding halt with its bandh call. Our farmers kill themselves while our netas feed each other laddoos over municipal election victories. Fourteen year olds are raped and killed while the cops stand guarding our netas and their statues. Shiv Sainiks go on the rampage because some lunatic on throws mud at Meenatai's statue. In my next janam I'd like to bea neat, or a statue.

-Bharatram Gaba, Mumbai

The Anatomy of a woman’s magazine

I was forced to receive a virus of the common cold a few days ago by staying in the vicinity of someone who had it too. This resulted in coming down with it too, and I was confined to my house for a couple of days, the tyranny of which ended just day before.

For some reason unexplained to me, just like this one “why people don’t like himesh reshamaya, he makes groovy, sexy songs”, I picked up a copy of Femina, which my mom subscribes, and started browsing through it. I remember earlier, a lot earlier when I was very young, when I say very young I mean like 7^th, 8^th, 9^th , I used to sneakily read the letters sent to “sexy query” and “home problems” in it.

Every month I used to anxiously wait for the subscribed copy, just to go get amazed and enjoy reading peoples sexual and domestic problems. This act was also replicated by a lot of my young friends in their respective homes. Some had the luxury of Femina, while others had to do with cheaper substitutes like Women’s Era. Though the content and the “knowledge” derived were still the same.

Can you imagine the first time I saw a cosmopolitan what was raging in my mind!! “Oh my God.. Almost naked girl on the cover, this means more raunchier and open letters, more dark secrets revealed, more dirty sex related questions”

This time it was the “Short Stories”, which grabbed my attention. Of course I must confess, reading the letters was as much fun not as it was earlier, but peoples sexual and domestic problems have their own course and after a certain point of time, keep on repeating themselves in different ways. Coming back to the short stories. They were not any of these. Imaginative, creative, humorous, exciting, and other adjectives which you associate with a short story. And that’s why I got hooked on to them, just to find out one good one. I went thought all the older issues, fortunately my mom had saved them, till some time back in the attice, as long as Femina used to use “Times New Roman” as their font on the cover.

I switched magazines, I sneaked out of the house un-noticed and got a dozen other ones including good housekeeping, womens era, and lots of others, names which I can’t recall. The stories didn’t change much. It’s the same writes who prowl on different magazines. In this whole process I ended up reading so many of these magazines that I can myself start a new one and be the editor. So here are some tips of beginners who want to start such a magazine. It’s very easy, don’t worry.

The Anatomy of a Woman’s magazine

Or

All the stuff you ever needed for a woman’s magazine.

1. You NEED to have a few pages of recipes with photos of good looking things to eat. No-one tries them out, because no-one reads them. But you cannot do without recipes in your magazine.

2. There has to be one survey. Examples can be “How selfish are you” or “How man crazy are you” or “Are you really into him” or “How good in bed are you”, or “ will both of you stay faithful” etc.... you get the idea. Everyone knows that the results are baseless, but still they like to do them.

3. The letters of course. The different heading should be.

1. Family matters – or something to that effect
2. Sex Queries – or something to that effect
3. Skin query – ditto
4. Use your imagination
5. Use your imagination

The answers to these letters should be idiotic, neurotic and should scare the hell out of the poor reader.

4. One article on dieting, exercises and healthy food. Thrown in would be some snaps of a big bum and a small bum with a before and after tag. Heading can be “Idiot proof dieting”, “From fat to thin……the ultimate journey”, “You are not FAT……just big boned and here’s how you reduce the bones”

5. A review of a book written by a female author.

6. A small interview of a good looking guy, he need not be famous. Good looking is the only criteria, with as many snaps of him as possible.

7. One article on relationships. Like “Love him! but can you live with him”, or “The mind of a married man…and what we found therein”, or “Does your spouse irritate you” or “Have career, NEED a man ? Should you let papa find a match” or “The morning after your divorce…..cleaning up your life”, or “Friends – Get one it’s good for you”…..you get the idea.

8. An article on sex. Eg “Say NO to SEX, learn your ABC”, or “Are you really that good in bead, as you think you are….here are some tips”, or “Sex at work…..the ultimate high” or “Does size really matter”…..you get the idea.

9. One short storyJ, with a random image or a snap which does not make any sense.

10. One article giving make up tips. Headings can be “From bhootney to Britney in 5 minutes” or “Make up tips for mamas who look like dadis” or just put a picture of a gay applying make-up on some girl and everyone’s bound to read it.

11. Most of your ad space will be taken by garnier, lakme, loreal, fair and lovely, fairever, lux, Revlon, Himalayas, platinum, de beers, etc..

12. There will be some pages with snaps of models in funny and stupid clothes, sponsored by a designer or if not you yourself will have to put them. You have to have a modern outlook you see, so you need snaps women wearing stupid flowery clothes which don’t match at all. Wearing hair bandanas and looking in different directions.

13. The Cover – Bold headings of the articles inside with a nice looking lady posing.

Done your magazine is ready to be out. If you have any more ideas pls feel free to comment !