Variety is the spice of life

Does cinema mirror the society or is it vice versa. A question for the ages and sages. But off late it does look like the screen has taken over the reign. Take the definition of a movie hero as case in study. 5 decades back, a movie hero should be good looking, should be respectful to parents, dignified before ladies and would almost always be wearing formals. Villains sported horizontal stripe t shirts with kerchiefs on their necks and more often than not, will have an overgrown mole on their face or would be seen wearing three piece suits complete with a bowler hat. Villis where invariably the mom-in-laws or sis-in-laws. It was very easy to make out who was the bad guy and the leading ladies invariably had to choose between two good guys even in a love triangle story. The lead pair would be the epitome of sacrifice and it was always, family first then job then love. Cut to the 70's, the heroes slowly began to grow a shade of grey. They began to have intra marital affair...

No wonder sports in India never takes off. Look at the awards instituted for the stream. The highest award that a coach gets is the Dhrona award and the sportsperson qualifies for a Arjuna. Two of the most controversial figures when it comes to teaching/learning. A guru - who was so partial to his student that he spoiled the life of another, probably more devoted than the former, by getting his thumb chopped off. Maybe the former student prince, paid more fees (!!) and the latter being OC graakki lead to the result? If Ekalavya had paid tuition fees would he still have underwent such a treatment?? or would there have been a change of heart? IMHO, ekalavya scores heads and shoulders above arjuna when it comes to guru bakthi and skill level rivalling the warrior prince, the award should ideally be named after him. May be the concept of naming the award as Arjuna, could be more related to the role that the prince played down the story and no doubt per the story, his dee...

They say when you hear hooves people always think of horses and never zebras. A roundabout quote directing people to think outside the rutty routine. Having been posting about 6 posts a month for close to half a dozen years, I took up the challenge of this a-z post series hoping to finish it in no time. Raanuvathula azhinjavana vida aanavathula azhinjhavan thaana namma oorla adhigam :D Proved true in my case as well. Having never been good at participating on any competition on named event for that matter, this one series, almost killed my writing hobby itself :D All I could think of was a title starting with the next alphabet to post and the mokkais that I could think of posting never could fit into one. And slowly I gave up on writing itself. As I type in this last post of the series, I could feel the rush coming back and with the finish line on sight its such a huge relief. Many a time I wanted to quit writing blogs and blabbing my head off with my verbal diarrhoea of posts. But...

A week ago I uploaded a photo of mine from school days. It wasn't just another click-the-browse-button and upload kind of a photo. No. It wasn't. I had uploaded scores of pics before. But this was one photo that I was shying away from, ever since it was taken. The one pic that made me so conscious of the way I look and the moment the photographer said "smile" I knew it. All that while, I was so dumb that I never ever realised why people were calling me fat. I was under the impression that, calling someone was fat was similar to giving bad names and foul mouthing him and it never ever occurred to me that it could be a mere fact that those kids were calling out. Few days before that pic was taken, it was raining and while I was returning back from school, crossing the vegetable vendor strewn portion of the "maada veethi", I slipped in front of one such, illegal encroachment of a "shop" who had eaten up half the road starting from the pavement it...

Kaaththu paathi fattuu meethi kalanthu seitha kalavai naan oval faceum urndai baseumaai vilanga mudiaa shapeum naan gymmuku sendru.. dietai kondru udambai kuraikka paarkindren... aanaal cheesaai thindru fat utkondu weightu mattum valargirathay nontha kumara nontha kumara naalai exercise seivaaya kuraintha weightai eedu seiyya niraiya sweetaai thinbaaya gundaai neeyum irupathanaal theepavaliku vedippaaya thiriyum illai neruppumillai thirinthay udalum ilaippaaya nontha kumaaaraaaa.... -- Azhavanthaan

 Kids, like economic classification, segregate themselves into upper class - the brighter ones, middle class - the average ones and lower middle class - the borderliners. The brighter ones, even if they dont manage to get a job on their line of study get into teaching what they were good at studying. The borderliners have the whole world ahead of them and more often than not their best bet turns out to be the last reserve of the front benchers - teaching. And some make very interesting teachers too, making up for what they couldnt grasp as students. Its the middle classers, literally and figuratively who are always stuck between the rock and hard place. They struggle to reach the heights of those ahead of them and also struggle to stay ahead of those behind them. In this forever struggle, those poor kids never get to enjoy anything at all. They are everywhere. They try to get in whichever job they could. They slog their butts off at work and forever keep running just to stay on cou...

Kannada desathula kappam kattama vetrigarama veeru nadai poattu..sorry..flowla vanthiruthu..veeru vandi vittu..vrrooom vrrooomnu veratti kittu vanthitrunthappo...again one mama stopped. Jaangiri desathulaye jamaaichitom, namma local maams thaanannu my bired started alli vittufying his soga kathai. From vayasaana amma appa to kalyaanathuku nikkara sister varaikkum he used all his asthirams ala senti tamil pada heroine. Maama ivanoda sentimental thaakuthalla sikki was almost singing "I am a beggar boy" song along with him. Innum oru anju nimisham pesirunthaanna avar purselenthu kaasu eduthu kuduthu petroluku vachukopa solliruparu. Avlo close they became. He was starting his bike when that mama asked "ellam sari thambi..enga ivlo avasarama poitruntheenga rendu perum" Adhu varikkum antha conversational silent partnera iruntha vidhi en roobathula velaaadichingarathu pinnar varum. "Athu onnumilla uncle maama...INOX la gold class ticket vaaagirukom 6 PM show ...

Few years back, when in banglore, my roomies were on one kshethradam spree and were temple hopping like anything. Forgot the name of that temple...was it ragi malt? ragi mount? it was near Woodlands hotel. My roomie had a pulsar and he his driving skills will put death well circus rider to shame. Wheelay illaama kooda wheeling pannuvaan. Typical banglore driver. He can crawl in and out of any traffic and hardly a day passed without him getting caught by some traffic police or other. At each signal they will seize his licence. Ithukaga "Saami" vivek rangeku will always carry four five copies of his licence. Andhrala ivanku fake licence print adikarathukaga oru small scale industrye iyakkitrukaannu vera arasal purasala kelvi. On that fateful day I was the pillion rider when the police caught him. By the look he identified him to be an IT guy. He started listing out the rate card. Microsoft hogi- Six hundred and fifty rubeees IBM hogitho Four hundred It took a while for m...