OPEN ART

Last week i went to movie screening of "Hola Venkat". A low budget Indian-in-America movie. I enjoyed it, because its dark comedy and its free.

I was leaving right after the movie but my friend bid me to sit there and listen to the producer-cum-director speech. Its a low budget movie where Travelling charges eaten up a lion share of budget. A whole bunch of actors are friends of the director and apparently they didn't pay a penny for locations and cars used in the movie.

After he explained his troubles in making the movie, the director asked us to donate any amount of money to support his work. With that, i was impressed with  the concept of movie making and distribution more than movie.

As a guy who gets bored too soon, i was already bored with mainstream cinema. Low budget movies, plays and short films become my resort for recreation as they are willing try new themes. Especially short movies and plays.

While coming home, i tried to link the art with the technology. Before technological evolution, the artist have to have money or blessings of a rich  fellow to make his art known. Imagine number of movie ideas which might be great but got rejected by the producers before YouTube. We never know how many articles, short stories , poetry and novels before blogosphere started got rejected by publishers.

One hobby which got boost from technology is photography and painting. Digital art is one way of expressing self , however most of the digital art is produced by an armature in Photoshop who think creating weirdness is modern art. The cheap cameras  gave birth to good photographers, but they are hard to find. Most of the hobby photographers are just idiots with SLR cameras just zooming and shooting shit thinking its art.

Anyway, what technology did to art is , it saved creativity from the clutches of production and publishing houses. The same goes to educational system too. Without internet how i am supposed to know the contemporary thinkers and professors of west or east.

Art of irritating people , some of my methods -2

In the last five years, i have developed new methods of annoying/irritating people.

1. Stop being humble :  "I am always right" . This simple statement annoyed almost all of my friends. I kept saying it for the fun, and now people started scrutinizing my every action. This is keeping me on the edge.

People expect us to be humble in receiving compliments. The response to "You did great", should be "No, anybody can do that". Then we can play the stupid game of , i-am-humble-so-praise-me-more. If your response is "yes, not everyone can do it" with a smile, then it may sound like a witty remark initially, but others will start perceiving it as arrogance. The trick here is, not being humble in dialogue, but being one in actions. Do not let the body language give any cue that you are arrogant. I learned this little trick from great boxer Ali.

2. Give them their own medicine : More than half of us have identity crisis. We lie and exaggerate to get admiration. People lie about great literature they read and great things they did. Be their loud speaker and propagate how great they are what great things they did, to the point where other parties will get tired of you praising that person, question the credibility of him, which in turn, keep that person in soup. You have created an image for him, now he has to protect it or he will become a fool.This method takes a long time to get results.

3. Decoding persons :  Generalizing behavior of an individual. You need not be right in understanding his behavior. Just say something like, he did that because he thought so. Many hate being decoded. Everybody thinks he is a complex personality. Just demolish that belief. One need to have an eye for observation, to guess correctly. If your guess is wrong, its fine too, now the victim has to explain himself, which is pretty annoying. Any way, the mission is accomplished.

4. Take a moral high ground and say it. I learned this technique from religious preachers. They think they are better than rest of us, and preach us because its kind of  wise-man's-burden. Modify it and use it. Say out loud that, you are better than rest of them. When i say, i know a lot, it  implies that the victim does not know much. Its an indirect insult. Works most of the times and keeps victim in a soup. He cant refute , because it will make him a villain to argue against morals, if he didn't refute , it implies he doesn't have a clue on morals. Anyway, we win.

5. Correcting : An old trick , but still effective. Correct their grammar, spelling or childish acts like biting nails. Make them feel, they are immature and posses less knowledge. Its similar to above technique , without lecturing.

PS : These methods are not to insult, they are meant to have a light moments among friends. Do not fall in the pit of irritating others and think you won. Once you got the wrong idea that, annoyance of others is the proof to your intelligence , then you are doomed. Once people got used to your methods, they stop being annoyed. It might force you to escalate, like insulting in public. That's how you become friendless. Annoy people, but never become annoyance all the time.

That PS is example of method 4 :P

For part-1 of the series, click on it 

sceptical Patriot

If you are like me, who can remember history from school a bit, but not sure if the forward messages on India which are intended to feel proud of being Indian, like , India never invaded another country in the last ten thousand years etc etc . Then, this book is for you.

Author Sidin, busts some of the messages which get circulated on Facebook, email and on whatsapp. He dug into history and tried to bring out the truth. Well, that's just not what i liked in the book.

I admired the tone of the book in which author tried to present his views. His views are balanced, thought he busted the false pride we get from such messages, he maintained that India is great, and instead feeling pride of the actual Indian things, we thump our chests on nonsense. I admire the tone of the book in fact, if i had to write something like, i would dedicate at least one chapter to abuse idiots who forward such nonsense. However, he didn't do it.

The book is informative and covered variety of topics from Number theory to Radio technology, to greek mythology to analysis of GDP.

As the author wrote humours novels previously, and he tried put comedy in this book, Flipkart kept this book under humour section which derogatory to the topic. I wish they move it to non-fiction.

I didn't feel like i wasted money on this one, over all a good book.

Traveling Unreserved

I have little knowledge on public transportation for long distances. When it comes to Railways and Airlines, i am truly dumb. I cant even understand the words used in them.

I dont have to deal with flights, but as a middle class person, i have to with Trains. Its a whole different story when my father used to book the tickets and gets the confirmation, and i board on train, sitting and enjoying the ride, with hands out of window.

I had to attend my close friends wedding in Delhi, he informed a month and half before, but i am too lazy to book tickets then. In my defense, the waiting list was 80 then, i thought i would go for Tatkal. It didnt workout.

Uday bought  General Tickets, paid the penalty to the TC and we got into AP express sleeper coach. Got window seats and napped till Khajipet, then the struggle started.  We are the guys with no reservation. So our bums require mercy of others to land somewhere.

Then came a Punjabi family. The whole family is noisy , especially the granny. She been advising everybody on everything. She shown mercy on us and let us sit on the side upper berth. Then two old ladies from the same family had a lengthy discussion on how long they can extend the mercy on us and at what time they should ask us to leave the berth. Well, i didnt understand any of that, Uday translated it for me.

For this 24hr journey , i have bought three books with me. I was meaning to finish them off and buy few more at Delhi for return journey.

 I passed time till evening, sitting on the edges of berths and  standing at foot board,  I cant strike a conversation because i am not fluent in Hindi, , i have nothing much to do except staring at Vindhyas.

The night brought more problems. Now that reserved people are going to sleep, all unreserved ones, including Uday came to the door making it hard for me to hold my ground.

The irritated TC, become all friendly, once he removed the coat and washed his face. In broken Hindi, i asked if there is any chance of getting a berth, now the answer is a friendly NO.

There was a large aluminum box near washbasin. I was planning to sit on it and sleep. Owner of the box said, its his seat, like Sheldon of Bing Bang Theory. I was back on my feet, and contemplating if i could sleep  like horse, standing. No, our body doesnot work that way, if only we had evolved from Horses instead of Monkeys.

The box-guy, who is Telugu, gave permission to sit on it with him, as his wife got berth in the next compartment. I just began to the enjoy the cool air blowing on my face, so let Uday sit on it. I was hoping that, as a notorious nocturnal , he could pass the night, so i can sleep on the box.

But, he slept, with head on the box and legs stretched towards bathrooms. He slept !

At Bhopal, a Sardarji, boarded, who is exuberant and funny. Instead of sleeping on his reserved berth, he engaged all unreserved in a conversation. I took part in it with nods and laughs. Soon, i was part of the large group. We spent some time, eyeballing the ladies ( only beautiful and young ones) going to the toilets. Then each one of us, started telling how they ended up in this train unreserved. Just like me, most of them were having unconfirmed tatkal tickets of other trains reaching for Delhi. One fellow said, his waiting number was 2, when i showed empathy, he showed an old guy, who is trying to sleep beside another guy on the floor, and told that his number was 1. The old guy, got up and started telling me how his fate is always bad.

Once Sardarji went to sleep, we are bored. I am bored and tired and getting tired of boredom. I went to the door, closed it , sat on the floor with my back on the door and started resting. Now, my other unreserved brothers, called me and gave me a rolled-up bed which belongs to a passenger who is already snoring on his bed. The bed is huge, there is no way to unroll it and sleep. I just sat on it and slept.  When i woke up in discomfort , Uday is struggling to sleep, may be people going to Toilet are kicking him in hurry. For sometime, he sat beside me and tried to sleep, it didnt work as the door knob is prodding. He went back to his favorite position and slept again.

Somewhere around 3, Uday, woke me up and said there are berths. I gave the bed to another brother-who-could-not-get-berth and followed Uday. He is following a police. The police lead us to faraway compartment , where he thought there are berths. Then started negotiating with the people who are sitting in RAC berth. As i said before, my Hindi is weak, i was half-asleep and they are talking in local dialectic. From their voice modulation, i understood that, the police guy already sold the berth to them, now he wants it back as expecting much from us.

The talks didnt go well, then he lead us to another compartment, which is far far away. One police guy, asked me to sleep in the empty middle berth and another took Uday to another compartment.

I thought , that night will pass without me resting on a flat surface, but it finally happened. Uday visited me to tell that he got it in S1. I asked him to switch on the phone and went to sleep , ignoring the snores.

I woke up at 7 or so. Then i realized that i dont have change with me. I am sure, Uday wont be awake. After much contemplation, i have decided that me having tea is more important than he having a sleep. I got down to go to him, only to realize that he is on the upper berth. I didnt show mercy and woke him up for money so that i can have my elixir.

He slept again, and in couple of hours we reached Delhi.

Boys and Porn

Today , i stumbled upon this TEDx video by Ran Gariveli. The title is "Why i stopped watching porn". Seen a couple videos with similar title which fall under comedy category, but not this one.

In Min, the author explained, or lets say presented his treatise on how a simple thing like porn affects us in return how it changes the society.

Porn , bunch of videos or photographs , which gives us enough material to boost the imagination so that we can masturbate, have been a deciding factor how we treat sex. In the words of the speaker, sex is not just penetration. Its kind of twists the minds of teenagers , for who porn is always available , to think that, in sex, there is no role for hands. Where is the romance? Could they tell the difference between sex and love-making?

Another issue, the speaker pointed out is something i never thought of. That, porn is nothing but video graphed prostitution. Something to think over.

Another TED video discussing the same subject,

Me? teaching ?

I never actually believed i could teach someone. Or i would agree to a situation like that.

However, my Boss, asked me to teach basics of computers to kids from weavers family, so that they might develop designing skills with the help of IT.

I agreed without second thought , as he would ask me to sit in the office and  do the deskjob if i dont go out on some work.

Went to Chowtuppal, a small town,  to test my abilities as a teacher, in which , i think , i have failed like congress party failed in 2014 General elections.

Kids studying from 7th class to Degree first year sat before me with poker faces, except a girl who is too eager and boy he got convinced that i have nothing new to teach him. When i asked, how many of them didnt know computers at all, some of them raised their hands, and these same kids, started playing classic solitaire when i was writing on board.

I tried to explain the difference between hardware and software first, because thats the class my teacher taught me. Then i forgot what he taught me next. I dont know where to go after that, even Google could not help me in that regard the previous night.

From my personal experience as a student with English as third language, i planned to make them understand the meanings of simple words like path, properties, rename , save, settings, etc etc. However, the audience didnt expect a English class.

I was struck for moment, kids are struck too, they wanted to play and paint but i am stopping them. Its like the silence before war. Its no more teacher-student, its more like performer- audience. Well, though i am officially their computer "teacher" , i cant punish them not listening to me. Without raising interest in their little heads  , they would treat computers just like maths. Thats the opposite of  purpose of the classes.

I taught them how to change wallpapers and screensavers. Then how to save a file to desktop , then asked them show their creativity on MS paint and left.

I might have to take another class in couple of days, need suggestions to improve my skills in teaching. 

Foot ball league

I am not actually a sports person, never took them seriously, and I am not ashamed to announce that, so far, I have not seen a cricket match from toss to trophy.

However, I liked the concept of T20 and IPL. I liked them because, local players, who could not sustain melee in the Ranji trophy, able to play at international level, bypassing the politics.

Today, Sachin Tendulkar announced that he wants to change the sports fabric of India. Thats one refreshing thing. I am sick of people around me talking only of cricket, noticing lengthy articles on newspapers. Badminton penetrated a bit, but thats not sufficient.

IPL style hockey trophy with funky team names failed to grab our attention. Now its football, lets see if it could the change the fabric of sports as Sachin thought.

Sneeze, Arrangement and Sugery - Plays by Anton Chekov

Watched three short plays by Anton Chekov back to back today.

I dont who Chekov was, but i really liked them. 

"The Arrangement" focuses on how a father wants his son to grow up, become a man. Unfortunately, he links it with having sex. So he takes his son to a brothel. The innocent young boy, was confused, excited and scared at the same time. After paying the prostitute, father decides , not to kill his innocence so early. A 15 min play. We went late, and missed first five minutes.

"The Sneeze". Story of a clerk who is interested in the theater. He goes to a theater with his wife, and buys first class tickets. When the show is about to start, he realizes the minister, under whose department he works came to the show and sitting beside him. He got excited , invades the privacy of the minister to get to know him, which he believes who help him in the career. When everybody is deeply involved in the cinema, the clerk sneezes so hard that, he dampens the Minister's hair. Minister was cool about it, but the clerk would not let it go. He drags apologizing to a point which annoys Mrs. Minister. Minister tries to change the topic and starts small talk, but the clerk continues to apologize.

Clerk could not sleep that night. He gets anxious about the sneezing incident and tells his wife that he is going to apologize the minister at his office one more time. Not minding suggesting from his wife, he goes to the office. The Minister, could not recall clerk. Clerk narrates whole sneezing incident and tells him how sorry he really was. Minister asks him to go easy on what happened and sends him away.

Now Clerk is tension free. But he is furious. He concludes that the minister was responsible for losing mind over such a trivial matter. He wants to question the minister why he tormented him. He goes to the ministers office again, asks him why. The Minister gets annoyed for getting disturbed over such a silly matter and gets angry. Terrified by the anger of Minister, while trying to talk to him, he sneezes on Ministers face. The Minister shouts and warn the clerk to not to show his face ever.

Poor clerk, reaches home frustrated than ever, and dies.


"The Surgery " . A comical play where a yet-to-get-degree intern pulls the tooth of a priest complains of toothache.

Of all the three, i liked " The Sneeze" . 

Art of Intervewing bureaucrats.

Finally, at last, after years of waiting, i landed up in a job which involves traveling and talking to people. I joined in a NGO which works on Right to Information Act.

My job involves, going to remote districts and conducting a sample survey on selected offices regarding implementation of RTI Act. The job description might sound boring, but for a guy like me, its fun.

Its not a public survey, where i can move to next idle person who wants to talk. I have list of a specific officers to talk.  I had to interview, panchayat secretaries , superintendents at MPDO office and MROs.

I am not a journalist, which gives them publicity, i am not from Information Commission who will threten them to pour red ink on their service books. I am just from a NGO which will submit the report to govt. I dont have a carrot or a stick to make them talk to me out of their "busy" schedule.   




I have decided to be the "ear" who listen to them, a shoulder for them to cry and promise that i would become the hand which will wipe their tears. And it worked.

Village secretaries are usually docile and talk a lot. Superintendents friendly and offer hot beverages. And MROs, once started, hard to stop. And my tactic to make them give an interview to me , is to let them indulge in self-pitying, of course, most of them already in it and they just need an ear, and some must be pushed.

First and most important task is to show my face to them. I tried call to request an interview with them but, they would say they are busy with municipal election and ask me to come after ten days, in a tone we shoo the salesmen selling Tupperware. 

1. Dont walk to the face of the interviewee. They are bureaucrats, and that too head of the respective offices, they should be approached through subordinates. Though i can read MRO is sitting in his chair, with a big name plate on the wall behind him, i would ask some one, if he is available. Lower staff respond well to words like "Delhi", "Indian Institute of " , " Administration " . ( My NGO got the project from Indian Institute of public administration, Delhi). A man from Delhi, will be treated like a man from Moon. Now, he would take me to game.

2. Patience and Manners. Locals, barge in to the room and start talking not minding if the officer is on phone or counting letters in paper before him. But, man from Delhi , is well mannered and well educated. Dont sit, no leaning on the wall, no checking mobile.

3. After introduction , and purpose of arrival and purpose of the survey, i listed out few problems of them and pity them to show them the path of self-pitying. This technique is rarely used and not need mostly, as they are ready to burst out. However, it worked great with  hard-core bureaucrats who wish to be look busy. Sadly, it took me some time to realize this technique.

4. Pay attention, and scribe something on the paper if the officer tells something in the tone of a philosopher, though its not related to the survey.

5. When he wish to upgrade my status from an interviewer to some NGO, to guest, i never denied it. I drank every tea or coffee which is offered to me.

6. Ask open ended questions, though in questionnaire its a closed ended one. Let them open up and talk.

7. Indulging in small talk in between the interview is actually a good practice.

Its fun to observe, the body language of officers. More the rank, more the ego is what i guessed, but i was wrong in many cases.

Eternal sunshine of the sptoless mind.

The love story of a shy guy and exotic and impulsive girl. They fell in love, they fight, the girl went to get her memory of him erased from her mind. When the guy came to know about it, he went to the same clinic to get her memories erased from his head.

While technician erasing each memory , we get to watch that memory. While her memories getting wiped out , the guy decides that her memories are important so wanted to cancel the process. But as he is unconscious ,so, he could not do much. So he tried to hide her in memories where she was not there before, making it hard for technician to finish what he had started.

Meanwhile, the pissed off receptionist, who understood that she was once in relationship with the old doctor and then got her mind erased of his memories, resigns her job, took all the records with her and sends them to the clients.

The guy and the girl, met each other in a train again , treats each others as strangers and they went out.  After receiving their records they realize that they were in a relationship, and wanted to continue it.

Jim Karrey and Kate Winslet. Those were the keyword for me to go for the movie. For a change, i have seen a movie where Jim Karrey wont act like " The Mask" Jim Karrey. I never knew Jim Karrey is such a fine actor for romantic comedies and Kate Winslet excelled as a girl who changes the hair color to match with her dress.

My first Rastharocko

I received invitation from a friend to participate in RastaRocko. I was in lets-try-new mood, so went.

The Rastarocko is to protest against the locking down of a Temple in my friend's colony by the Municipal authority. The Rally was already started when i reached their colony. I parked my bike and participated in it. I was still not decided  to participate in the road-blockage. 

The percentage of people according to age and gender is intriguing. The rally is headed by youth. Not even ten members and most of them are known to me. I was  surprised to notice the low participation of youth from that colony. Its a big colony and i have seen the youth power in Ganesh Pandal. I bowed to the father of my friend in respect and joined youth.

A large gang of ladies followed behind , with banners depicting the temple behind bars. I agree, a group of middle aged aunties should not be called a gang, but they are more active and looked more ferocious than the youth ahead of them, and middle aged men following them. 

I let the rally move ahead of me to join the Uncles behind the train. They are slow, sloppy but shouting the right slogans. Like the youth , they are not much in number. Its like kids are running faster, mothers are behind them shouting and fathers slowly walking behind knowing how the whole story going to end.  However, the choice of slogans shows their distorted aim and how they want to get focus on them but not on the actual issue. The whole protest is for a temple of  Lord Venkateswara, and the slogans were " Jai Sri Ram" and " Bharat mata ki jai" . 

Few priests with pigtails and a well groomed local politician were waiting for us at the cross roads.Soon , everybody started settling down on the road. Its Nagarjuna Sagar Highway which we are trying to block. Its a four lane road, with bunch of  always-half-asleep traffic police controlling it.

Initially i was hesitant to sit on the road to block, that too for cause of a temple. But then i thought, i might not get another opportunity to sit on road with my friends.  Its not that bad, road is relatively comfortable to sit except i cant lean back with support of elbows. Sun is not too harsh on us, i was hoping that the police will bring us tea.

The gathering grew as many BJP members joined it. Slogans are unrelated and just RSS stuff.  The well groomed local leader , like father of a bride, over excited but wants to maintain cool demeanor, tried to prove his leadership qualities by giving new slogans. That attempt backfired, they are long and not catchy. The new guys from BJP continued their standard slogans which are largely unrelated to the temple issue. Everybody is waiting for the media to shoot them and police to arrest them.

Sat there till legs got numb. When i woke up walked few steps, the numbness and fun are gone. The traffic jam beginning to build up. I felt guilty a little, for blocking the traffic for a temple. Why could not God help devotees construct temples. Why cant Lord Venkateswara appear in the dream of that municipal officer like Lord Rama did in the case of Sri Ramadasu.

When i returned after tea-break, the traffic jam expanded beyond  horizon. It was frustrating and irritating. My friend tells me that four college students, in car, struck in the traffic and they have to go to an exam. They are just behind the gang of ladies holding banners. I could not do much except offering sympathies. I walked further tried to guide few vehicles to take a detour to escape the jam. Some listened , some didnt. Soon, police from nearest police station came.. The local leader is nowhere to be seen now. The talks were successful , everybody agreed to get up from the road and let the traffic flow. Jam was cleared in less than 3 minutes.

Everybody congratulated everybody for making it a huge success and left. 

 

Beyond Coffee by Khadir Babu

Picked this book at Hyderabad book festival. Picked it,only because its written by Khadir Babu, the author of Polerammaband kathalu and Dargamitta kathalu.

Its a collection of short stories. Except for one story, most of them are based on upper middle class or upper class where the characters either tend to jump into an illicit relationship or make their lives miserable out of boredom. I might be undermining the theme in a line, but the old saying " An idle mans mind is devils workshop" is true, and author tried to elaborate it with stories, only, its not a mans mind, its women's mind he talked about.

I have never finished a collection of short stories which are not related with each other, like , Malgudi Days ( Which reminds me that i am yet to finish that book ), but, the style of author is too gripping to loosen the grip on the book and not to turn pages.

Overall, a good read, however i strongly feel, its overrated, Rs 135 for few stories which can be finished in couple of hours is not acceptable.

Expanding RTI to media!

There was much argument on bringing political parties under RTI. I agree to that, but sadly none of political parties which preach transparency did not.

All the present media, both paper and electronic, propagate a particular ideology to the people. Of late, they have started cooking stories to make a news and entertain us. According to me, this is more dangerous than corrupt political parties.

Once, we start to build opinions based on unverifiable stories, that's the end of reason. If the reason is gone for a toss, then the assumption that people are sensible individuals capable of apply reason to make decision to some extent,  on which concept of democracy is built,  becomes false.

A law is important as media stopped educating people but instead started entertaining them like cinemas. The motto is to give people what they want to know, not what they have to know.

Attacks on Reliance stores which followed after few popular Telugu news channels stated a provocative discussion that Reliance industries made sure that Late CM YSR get killed pertaining to krishna-godavari basin. The source being a German website. Before, rest of the media started enlightenment that the source is not reliable, the damage was done.

If not RTI, at least we need an ombudsmen which force media to share the source of the news.

i lead india campaign

The campaign to spread understanding on Right to Information act, in collaboration with Times of India.

The organizer was Mr. Ali, a software employee at Unisys.

 I already knew how to apply RTI and have applied few times before. My RTI endeavours are mostly because of enthusiasm. I have no idea on getting information for change in the system.

But, the organizer , with his success stories, and balanced opinions showed me a path and gave me whats needed to be change the system. I.e stop complaining with friends and start complaining with the authorities. Its that simple.

I am one of those citizens who talk in length on how badly govt is working, and how it worsened the situation. Deep down, i knew, there something i should be doing for that, and i dont know what to do, so , like many, there is nothing to do.

More than the lecture on RTI, its the shared success stories between organizers and participants, gave me hope that, sooner or later, India shall raise.

The workshop made me realize that, to change the system, we don't have to dig up a 2G like scam. A simple act of getting the road you use repaired will inspire others to do the same. Until then, i dont even know that GHMC runs a portal to receive complaints from the citizens. Its the information like these, we do not know which makes ignorant to the solutions of everyday problems.

Moby Dick by Herman Melville

Revenge story of a captain on a whale. Thats the story in nutshell.

The book is considered as American classic, and a website mentioned that , this book along with " Atlas shrugged " was left unfinished by many readers. If I had not known that, probably I would have done the same thing.

Instead of calling it a novel, I would like to call it " A study on whales and whaling ships ". The author wrote too much on taxonomy and anatomy of whales, about the interactions between the ships , and how the room mate of narrator baths and many more trivial topics. The uncontrollable wish of the author to make a bulky book , made reading an ordeal.

It took me almost six months to finish it. Many times I thought of abandoning it, but like captain Ahab who resolved to kill the rogue whale of all the seas, I have resolved to finish the novel. The reader must have the same qualities of the captain Ahab to accomplish the task. Patience, determination, ability to boost self and a broken leg, so that you can't run away.

Ishmael, narrator of the novel, knows too much, thinks too much, observes too much and has the urge to verbalize every thought. After reading a hundred pages I wanted to put a plaster on his mouth. Apart from nonsense on details, it's the Victorian English used by characters which pushed the annoyance to the next level.

Anyway, it's one book, I am proud of finishing. Like, Zen and art of motor cycle maintenance, it deserves another reading, may be after few years!

The Great Gatsby

The story of an eternal lover trying to get his love back , though she is married to someone else.

I have not read the original work, just saw the movie. I think, what the movie say is, that, guys are good at giving commitment and girls are not. The hero loves her so much that, he is ready to take the death of woman who was killed in a car accident by the girl he loves on his head. And the girl , who jumps into the love at first kiss with hero, then , love at first gift with somebody in the absence of hero and marries the second guy , who is not loyal to her. Then our hero, The Great Gatsby, tries to win her heart by throwing parties for her and throwing expensive clothes at her. She comes close to him, and her husband came to know whats going on.

When the husband takes off the cover which is hiding the whole thing, Gatsby says the girl never loved him. The girl confirms the same in low voice, but when husband asks her again after reminding her a romantic moment, she changed tune to , i loved him in past but now loves Gatsby.  The husband successfully annoys Gatsby regarding his low-born, when Gatsby loses his temper and tries to hit her husband, the girl starts crying and could not come close to Gatsby. On the way to home, the girl hits the mistress of her husband with a car. Husband of the girl,  convinces the husband of that mistress-girl, that its Gatsby with whom she is having an illegitimate relationship.

In a trial to protect the girl, Gatsby got ready to take the blame of death on him. The girl and her husband leaves the home for good. And our poor Gatsby waits for her call which confirms the elope. While he was waiting for the call, the husband of the mistress-girl, shots him in the heart.

The acting-crew performed so well that, i hated the characters. The author might have succeeded in what he wants to inspire in people. Have to read the original work, for a better judgment.

Seven Samurai

An old Black & White Japanese movie. Its the movie from which sholey is inspired. Of course, there are major differences.

Seven Samurai, maintained a simple story line than sholey. In sholey, villain character is elevated more than protagonists.

Village is attacked by group of bandits after harvesting. On the advise of village old man, a group of villagers set out to city in search of Samurais who would risk their lives to save the village. These are poor farmers, so there is no reward for the samurais , except rice.

To their luck, seven samurais agree for the deal. They come to the village, prepare battle plan, strengthens the defence of the village, train villagers for battle, won the battle. A simple story, but captivating photography and screenplay. Though , its three and half hours long movie, i never felt boredom. A must watch for drama genre lovers. 

Adventures of Chinnari

I went to this only because my friend is part of crew . Director thought its for children, but i refuse to agree so.

The story is simple. There was a demon, which steals valuable things. One day it steals the dress of chinnari , in which her wants to see her. So, chinnari set out to seek the dress. Two villages went along with her. The path to reach daemon is guarded by two lesser daemons , Fast-food-daemon and Television-daemon. She passes through them, kill the antagonist and takes her dress. 

Though its aimed at kids. I highly doubt if this generation kids like it or not. In the era of 3D graphics, which kid wants to see a drama where cloth and bamboo sticks are used create the background, which i felt , extraordinary. The Hut in which chinnari lives, the boxing ring, a boat in ocean , a mountain, a rope bridge  etc etc are set using clothes. And the background music along with songs are good. 

The play is by Theater-outreach , Hyderabad central university.  They are organizing the play all over Andhra Pradesh , on request. 

The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid

I expected something else, but the author gave me better.

By the title , I expected a story line similar to Anil Kapoor's " Black & white ", where an Islamic fundamentalist becomes reluctant to blow the bomb at Redfort in the last moment.

The story of the book is based on a Pakistani , who went to America for studies. After he got selected in a reputed financial firm and falling in love with an American, attacks on world trade center happen. Major part of the novel deals with how he was affected by those attacks.

More than the story, it's the narration style which kept me going. The author had made the reader, me , a character in the book.

Not a great book, but , not a bad choice, for someone who wish to try new.

Freakonomics

One of the famous books on popular economics.

Be warned, though the book claims to be a book on economics,  its in fact a book on sociology. The reader hardly learn anything about economics from this.

The author talked about the how conventional wisdom might not true all the time. To support his point, author had given many examples. These examples, give us a different view on society in general.

Instead of discussing chapters like GDP, GNP , growth rate etc etc  author chose to discuss much on criminology and popular misconceptions. However, some of the arguments against misconceptions are hard to agree, or hard to check the authenticity. For example, in an argument against the popular belief that watching TV damage brains of kids, author says that, in Finland, where children are allowed to go to so from the age of seven, sit at home, and learn to read by watching American channels with finnish subtitles. Another chapter is dedicated to money spent by contestants in American elections and their percentage of victory. I find that chapter, really ridiculous.

Too many statistics in some chapters, and while breaking generalizations, author made few generalizations. I disagree with the misconceptions author has mentioned, but can't really accept the examples he provided.

If you really want to learn something on economics or get an insight into world trade or something like that, dont buy this one, instead go for "Underground economist" .