Its about time I wrote. Or is it?

Sometimes you regret the fact that you have a choice. Its probably as bad as not having any. It happens when you make a wrong choice and Murphy comes to play each and every time. I am not quite thrilled about the work I’m doing for the past few months and this is quite a sad thing to say but the station (radio) I’m working for is not going to survive even a couple of years. Its ironic that I’m in the office right now as I type this out but hey, that’s how bad it is.

The pleasure of going home is greater than the work done in the day. The sense of achievement has been lost on me. The sense of creativity is an alien concept all together. I am a writer and now they make me hate that fact. (if this is now becoming a non-sensical rant then please feel free to view happier blogs). There was a time when I could be confident of what I wrote; only once would I write it and it was a masterpiece at least in my mind. There were several who supported the feeling with zeal and more but now, here, it’s a vice to submit a singular concept. Take a brief (a sad excuse for a brief) think of two or three routes to approach the ad to be produced, write it all out with complete sound design and then one is selected with others going down in dumps.

Sometimes its worse… the selection is done by three different “authorities” and all three select the three different ideas. Then ego hassles will shoot up into cold war among the three and I get stuck in the “grind”.

Well, its not the happiest post to put up after a three month sabbatical but that’s the point, I just don’t have anything else to say to you poor souls (my victims).

Come to think of it, all the blogs I have recently visited are having the same bloody rant… damn! I got sold out to the concept of popularity.

Me Big Boss!

A single most important issue with human nature is its tendency to look for something it can not tackle. Complications spring up more because we want them to. Implicitly, it is a boost to any human’s large ego. What could also be the case, (which I have concluded after much deliberation) is that we constantly look for attention. If not in the form of approval, then in the form of pity. If not from near-and-dears then from ourselves but we want to know that we are dealing with life just perfectly.

We want to figure out all the nuances and sometimes nuances that don’t exist. We want to have a control over situations that are uncontrollable by making ourselves believe it is within bounds of human control. A simple example is an everyday argument. I’m not saying that there is absolutely no reason to put forth your point of view but more often than not, we want to simply raise issues so that we can tackle them. Not meaning to sound like a saint from the Himalayas but I do understand this from experience. I have tried this several times… let go of some issues completely. If someone says something you don’t like, don’t utter a word. Simply nod and try looking for a reason to like the point made. If you cant find any, still shut up and go ahead with the conversation. Then, if you still feel an urge to refute, go ahead. But you will definitely sto being a control freak or at least feel nobler than the rest of the world.

Think about it while I go and do some more deep thinking… (deep breath taken and eyes shut)

Memorablia

Putting up pictures and videos to comemorate oone;s escapades is nice. In honor of such wise and meaningful thoughts, one has started off with a new blog which features the pictographic remains of journeys embarked upon... knock yourself out... mind you, the videos might take some time to load. patience is required.

Its called Memorablia

Un-bored

I feel proud of myself at times. I guess that is a good thing. I find pride in knowing that I actually make use of my time. The fact of the matter is that a whole lot of people have no time to do anything. They are busy either with work or with telling people how busy they are. No really, I know people who spend a half hour on the phone trying to explain to you how much work they have and how their minds have been molested by the unwanted.

I don’t have any work to do. But I have heard “the wise owls” say, “you are lucky. Make use of this time and do things you always felt like doing. Take up a hobby.” What do you know? I did.

I always felt incomplete when the world around me spoke of the magic of books in their lives. All of them, except me, in their school days and college days seem to have finished reading bundles of books. They discuss authors like they were old pals and poets like they knew the very essence of why they wrote. It made me feel out of place and also a little bad about the fact that my parents did not push me too much to read. There it was, all too easy to blame them and sit back and grumble. Until a few days ago, I kept procrastinating, the idea of actually starting with a book. I feared font size 8 and 512 pages like it were a beast out of the bush. Then came along the power of technology and the introduction of a concept that hard core readers swore at and I would swear by: e-books; absolutely convenient to say the least. E-books are available so easily off the net and can be magnified and bookmarked and sometimes if you feel too lazy to read, ask the damn computer to read it out to you.

I finished four of Dan Brown books and I enjoyed them all. Then an Ayn Rand book which I almost slept through. Othello is next on the list but right now, its one of the greatest epics that managed to form cults all over the world: The Lord of the Rings. Enthusiasts will be glad to know that I have this book complete with the prequel (The Hobbit) and the maps (all the maps) and the tree chart of the families. I am presently hunting for Macbeth.

That’s not all. I am also watching the entire first season of LOST at my own pace. It is an awesome series. Next on the serials’ list would have to be “24”. Also I finished an entire game called “Hitman” recently and am planning to upgrade my comp so as to facilitate more games.

The point, my friends, is that when one has time, making use of it leaves no scope of regret later. I am thrilled to know that I am not busy with work or telling people that I am busy… on the contrary; it is fun when people nickname me “Lucky bastard”… (muhuhahaha)

I shall say no more...

A shop outside Heera Panna Shopping Center, Haji Ali.

I, myself, Happy Singh...

... and here is the reason why:-







































Proud owner of: SonyEricsson W810i Walkman phone... know more

Mumbai Rocked… Again!

After a year, Mumbai has been taken by shock but this time it is no ploy of Mother Nature; only some terrorists who tried to prove a point which they have not made. I personally saw it coming, like another friend did. What’s the most vulnerable region where security is minimum and potential damage, maximum? Local trains.

A lot has happened in 12 hours and there is no denying how heart wrenching these past few hours have been and still the spirit lives on and people are back to work. A sight we Mumbaikars are pleasantly surprised to see, even though we are a part of it. What I mean is, we all are back on the go and we all know we can not do much about the casualties and we will mumble under our breaths about the bad security and then in a few days, we won’t bother about it anymore. Clearly, the people who have been in the planning forum are not Mumbaikars. They should know that this is like a dent in the average Mumbaikar’s memory and no more. Terror? Hell no. It’s just one small glitch in the routinely running system which will continue to run in the same, unperturbed way. We all celebrate the spirit of Mumbai and say, “nothing can stop this city” with great pride. Is it really a matter of pride?

We get back to work like an unstoppable gear system because we know we have to. I will call Mumbaikars a sensible lot but they are not the “wow” that we make them out to be. They can’t afford to stop working. They can’t not go to work because they are scared out of their pants. If they do, the consequences are dire, leading to a dent in their income and hence in their entire lifestyle; too much of a price to pay for something as simple as being scared. So, the fear has been driven out of a Mumbaikar by his lust for a higher level of lifestyle and not because he has “the spirit to move on and not look back.” I’m sympathetic towards all those who have lost their family and friends in this unfortunate and rather meaningless mishap and with all due respect, even these people, after the thirteenth day, are going to move on to live their lives. Why should someone stop living because someone close to them has died? Unfortunate? Yes but not impossible or unbelievable. People die. I am just trying to look at this “spirit of Mumbai” thing in a rather realistic light. I feel it’s an overstated fact that can be proven wrong by an even worse attempt to make this city fall on its knees. The more we pat our backs, the more the incumbents will try to stick the peg into the gears.

May the dead rest in peace. May their families find courage to face their loss. I’m sure Mumbai definitely will.

The new and (definitely) the improved

After much labor we have finally improved the sound of:

Nishaniyaan (click to be victimized)

Lyrics: Rakshit Doshi
Music: Austin D’souza
Vocals: Shaban Khan

(This song is dedicated to our boredom and creativity. We can’t decide which came first)

What the hell?

One sits at home pondering over what shall be done about boredom. One reads a book and can’t stay up. One plays a computer game only to be frustrated with constant and persistent failure to kill random soldiers and some general as a mission protocol. Then the Lord said… let there be music… and one follows the inner voice to attempt making music.

Proud to present the very first attempt at home production in both, national language and English.

Anno domini

Nishaniyaan (guitars by Austin D'suza)

In case my willing victims have limited downloading problems with their ISP then this link will take you to a page which allows online streaming (for those technologically challenged, you do not have to download these torture-tunes, you can listen to it online by pressing the Play button)

Your feedbacks are NOT welcome... These musical works of art are strictly for the sake of ‘time pass’ and shall not be produced/distributed/copied by anyone in their own interest.

Word of Advice: Wear ear plugs.

Listen to the Unheard

So I waited there at the shore for a voice to call me. The sea was violent and there was no space between two raging white waves as they rammed the shore. I was geared for the Rain Gods to test me and I am sure, the boulders at the bottom of the ledge, where I stood, were geared for the wild oceans unforgiving rage; for they stood unperturbed by the brutal force on display. A million eyes watched the sea in awe. Two of them were mine. Little children felt their parents were divine as they hung on to them in fear and surprise. Couples bit on corn as they spoke of distant lands where they would build their quiet home. Umbrellas twisted in pain and the saree-clad ladies laughed as splashes of the sea playfully teased them. They were looking free and away from their mundane existence for a while as thy spoke of happiness to their friends. Now I was not sure if these people were watching the sea or was the sea witnessing the many colored clothes and more varied lives of people. A Million people who lived two or three lives each… how much more can the word ‘gamut’ mean to anyone.

Slowly, the voices around me started to ebb and I started listening to the sea. It said nothing. Nothing angered it. Nothing wanted to take any revenge on it. It spoke of no force that made it wild. It simply was having a nice time. It was excited with the rains setting in. It wanted to go unnoticed. In fact, it was tired of being watched all the time. It was fatigued with eyes judging it. It felt like a child who had a huge body but a tender heart. People who died in its huge form were not prey to its rage. It was their own fault; much like a monkey playing with the electric wire on a post. It was innocent. When it was done playing, it started to roll back into its natural calm and the clouds were done entertaining the sea. They, too, cleared the sky. The people moved away like getting out of a cinema hall, like they would, when the movie is over and the credits are rolling.

The tiled floor was now exposed to the few shadows of bodies that moved around and to the glimmer of the sodium lamps. A silent hum of the sea was broken only less often by the sudden violent wave, like a child’s coughing during evening mass. I still stood there. My legs felt no fatigue but they wanted to rest anyway. The silence was broken when my cell phone rang and the voice on the other side asked me where I was. I had no answer to the question for an instance but my voice cracked as I replied, “Worli Sea Face, you?”

BHAISAAB, UTARNA HAI KYA?!

Yes, you guessed it right; this is a story of a train journey. Short. Thirty-five minutes is all it takes from Grant Road to Santacruz. And this is a little incident we all encounter. Sort of a template for the quintessential Mumbai “trainee” (as in, a person who travels by the local train).

I am a meek traveller if I may say so. I am the sort of person who does not utter a word in a journey and to keep the omerta going, I carry my headset and listen to the radio on my cell phone. See no evil, hear no evil and most definitely, speak no evil. In the law books of train travellers, it is a mandate to learn at least five Hindi ‘evil’ terms because, well, it is required. I know more than five but it’s best to sit till the station you want to get off is the next one; get up at the right time, move slowly to the door and get off without being a cause of any discomfort. But this is Utopia. I never knew I could be anything but quiet. I realize now that I could.

Khar Road Station and I wait at the door to get off at the next station. The train is relatively empty and this dazed individual stands right behind me sticking his groin into my hip. “Hutt na! Mad@%$%^*&od!!!” I hear myself saying and thrusting him away. He moves away and looks at me funny and says, “Utarna hai kya?” So I scowl at him and indignantly reply, “Nahi, uss khambe pe oodi maarna hai” and point to the signal pole that is coming up ahead of us. He fails to understand and asks, “Santacruz kaunsi taraf aayega?”

I just gave up and showed him the wrong side. When the train pulled in, he jumped onto the tracks and leaped up to the platform on the other side. When I got off, a cold voice informed me, “Pocket check kar lo, chu%$^a kuch nikal na liya ho.” The blood froze in my veins as I felt my hip pocket and found no wallet. It took me an instant to remember that I had shoved it in my front pocket for I feared such a thing would happen. A bead of sweat formed on my forehead and trickled down as my blood finally thawed and I heaved a sigh of complete arrogance. I was now a member of the Mumbai Local Daily Travellers’ Club… Pukka Mumbaikar…

…of random thoughts and drifting sands

I don’t like visits to a hospital. There is negativity just hanging in the air. Every molecule you breathe seems to be filled with aches and pains, moans and even death. Solemn faced doctors and emotionless ward-boys wheeling out the cripple or sometimes rolling in the unconscious. Strange smells of medicines, hurrying sergeants slitting skin and organs and running to perform their act on many unsuspecting patients… something just doesn’t seem right about hospitals. I went there for a check up of my hurting eye and returned with some medicines and a lot of depression.

I am angry with the rains. Coward rain threatens and never falls. I don’t even want to be complaining, actually. I am in no mood to dance around in the grey open expanse of the cloudy sky. Or eat an ice-cream in the shelter of a tin roof clattering with millions of droplets. I don’t want to walk on the shore of a violent sea struggling to engulf the land it can barely reach. Over ambitious, don’t you think? I don’t want the sweltering heat to disappear or the smell of wet mud to invade my senses. Why should I be thinking about lush green gardens and fresh flowers and dew-laden grass? Who needs rains? Do you?

We sold off the Zen we owned in exchange for a WagonR… good car but too small. I guess it was mom’s choice for a city-drive. Fair enough.

I have taken up reading e-books now. Finished one and half way through the other. It's far more comfortable for me to read large font on the computer screen as opposed to microscopic letters spruned on faintly oxidized pages of a thick, demoralizing novel. I know die-hard readers are loading their guns to shoot my eyes out of my skull but hey… your passion is the bane of my existence. Sorry!

Suddenly this lazy afternoon, as I lay on my back staring at the crack on my ceiling, I thought of taking an IQ test. I don’t know why. I just want to take an IQ test. I cant fail an IQ test now, can I? They are nice tests. They don’t upset you. They tell you that you have a brain that is thinking and its rationalizing. See? It is so positive to take an IQ test. All who are wasting their lives while you wait for some dimwits to sort out their ego hassles and give a nice employee a decent job, should take an IQ test. It will surely raise your spirits by telling you that the people you are dealing with (details) are far dumber then you can even imagine being. Fie on the HR dimwits! I shall be a part of the MENSA soon. (I hope I spelt that right)

My Mahableshwar trip is still trapped in the Olympus of my cousin. I want to feel good about the photography I do best. Flowers. I love flowers. Soon I shall be posting some pictures of the flowers I have shot and requesting the flower-experts to help me name the species. I don’t know jack-crap about plants. Sava?

Oh, I digressed while I was supposed to be checking the direction the crack on the ceiling is taking... an inch to the left, from the last I remember.

Take Care Now, Bye Bye Then!

It is the norm of the day…. sufferance through deprivation and murder of raised expectations.

Three weeks of employment, complete faith of over ten people, more than a thousand congratulations, countless moments of glory… one simple rejection. This has been my month with Radio City… my first and last. A gung-ho station that had an enthusiastic employee like me… correction, potential employee and this innocent and hard working creative soul is caught between a war of EGOS! for crying out loud.

Today seems to be my last day at a work place that familiarized itself to me. An effortless association with the sweetest colleagues one could ever have had culminates into silent wondering and staring at the goings-on as an on-looker. No life, energy or inclination to work for strangers anymore.

Why is it happening only to me? - would seem to be an appropriate question to ask.

Never will I try to justify my failure but if I am made to lose on account of not being given a chance, leaves me no scope for blaming anything else but my stars. Two loves of my life, stolen away in a single month… not bad for starters. I don’t know if should expect to face worse conditions or should I sit back and think, “The worst has passed, what more can you take away from me… my life?”

A trip out of town this weekend seems more inviting now. Who cares if I sleep late on Sunday? I don’t have work to go to on Monday anyway.

...The job that was.

Show Me The Light!

It is so simple to show people a situation as it happens and all in an attempt to make the person feel that he is being cared about, isn’t it? I know it’s a vague and rather heavy note to strike up a thought or discussion but it is true.

Let’s try and explain this in a little detail. You have a difficult case in front of you, for instance, (which you need to sort by making a decision). More appropriately, a choice. Now, you know this situation. You know that I have choice A which I can’t live with or without and I have choice B which is, again, as important. You naturally turn to a friend/concerned person who you know might be able to guide you through it. Invariably, this person will land up asking a million questions. You answer them like you were sitting on a couch in a shrink’s clinic, waiting in anticipation for a light to shine through. What do you get in return? A profound, deep throated statement which sounds something like, “So, as I see it, I think you have a situation here which is not very difficult. You just have to make up your mind and let’s boil this down to a choice between two things. Forget everything else. You have here choice A where XYZABC things will happen and you should look at choice B where PQRST things might happen. Just sit over it and think about it. Once you decide, it will all be over. It’s only a phase, buddy, just hang in there”.

You know what’s worse? You get up and shake his hand and say, “thanks man, I think you put it all in perspective for me. What would I have done without you?”… I know what I would have done without him… I would have found an answer to my problem without him.

May the downtrodden be “UPLIFTED” by God!

I am hurt.

It is a major issue, slapped on every page of every news daily of this country. The entire “reservation against reservation” bit is draining me of all thoughts that are pro-education. I don’t know if my two bits about this matter would really be of much interest and much less of any use but for the sake of one more voice in the cry for justice, I shall voice my opinion.

I, for one, refuse to have a less qualified, DALIT doctor (who by the way, is no better than the rich-man’s-brat, who bought a seat in a college and does not deserve it AT ALL) to touch an ailing body of my family or friend and trade a simple solution to a simple illness, for DEATH. We all know better than giving away a doctor’s or an engineer’s seat to people who don’t deserve it. Fine, if he or she gets the marks or grades required for the entrance, then I am for having them pay a lesser amount, vis-à-vis an open category student, as fees. If they are intellectually at par with a hard working student of any category (which, unfortunately, can only be judged by the marks he/she reserves in his/her graduation exams or entrance exams, which I am not very happy to accept but… oh well…), then it is fair to grant them a higher education for a lesser price. But if you are saying “let’s trample all over the open category student just because we are a minority” then go take a hike. Worst case, let them get their reservations in fields that are not risking lives, something like management or PR or such-likes; but please, spare them from being doctors and engineers. These are professions dealing (directly and indirectly) with human life.

The open category is mistaken to be as high as the statistics show in the papers. There are ‘freedom fighter’s’ and the ‘government servant’ quotas that are being overlooked. Next you know you have 5% reservation for ‘unemployed bar dancers’ or 10% reservation for ‘Kashmiri militants’ whose fathers died in a shoot out. Why have ‘open category’ at all? Just divide all seats and distribute them amongst the ‘poor and suppressed’, while you are at it. I have been in the eye of the storm. I know how many of these ‘poor and oppressed’ lot really want to study and make something out of their lives. They are there because they have the safety-net of such reservations granting them their seats. They are there because an engineer will make more money than a union leader amongst factory workers. They know that a doctor will be able to buy a nice car within two years of his practice but a street urchin who strives and manages to run a chai-katta will not be able to achieve that dream in a lifetime. They know that the stupid government is meant to be gullible and by making a noise about their ‘poor’ state of affairs, they can manage to beg and get away with the ‘sympathetic’ government granting them their ‘rights’. Sydenham had a bloody OBC for a principal and an SC for a registrar… I challenge anyone to get a positive feedback about Sydenham from any of its alumni, from the past decade. The idiots (read management) don’t have common sense and what was even more pitiful was the fact that they were both Ph.Ds. Guess how they got their doctorate… CORRECT, reservations!

I am sincerely thankful to the Lord for giving me a wonderful family which is well off and touch wood, will always be… But then again, why are they not ‘poor and oppressed’? I would have had it much simpler then! (You get the point, don’t you?)

Coffee time vignette

I was revisiting my memory bank to see, what are the things I have truly left behind? Soon and sure enough, I landed in a debate with myself.

Amongst all the things, a substantial chunk was of ‘people’. A bunch that I, very loosely, called ‘friends’. So the debate I was speaking of was, if I have called them friends, I wouldn’t leave them behind and if I have managed to get over each one of them, then they are not ‘friends’, in the truest sense of the word. These were acquaintances. That’s where the debate, pretty much, ended.

Then there were some fond memories that sort of felt like wiping dust from a photo album and smiling at the moment captured on film; a moment that was never to return. Some were embarrassments which made me slink in my chair and still a smile was felt running from one end of my lips to another, albeit, I couldn’t see it. A lot of these things, we might say, are taken for granted but I refuse to accept that. These are things that keep you going. I think it works like a pendulum; if it does not go in the opposite direction, it will stop moving. A trip down memory lane is not so much of an adventure as it is an evening walk. At least, that’s what I would like to believe. I have no siblings and I have never been able to share a funny moment from history with anyone in the wee hours of the morning, when I can’t sleep, so I tend to smile to myself and think nothing of it. But I have rarely pulled out an album from an old drawer and I kept feeling it was rather ‘old-ish’ to do such a thing. Felt like I was sixty nine and my children had settled in the states and I had nothing better to do than to stare at pictures and wile away my (remaining) life. But I was surprised to have a reaction which was quite contrary to this popular belief. I actually refreshed myself for a new day when I saw the album with my pictures with different relatives. Playing in the arms of an annoying aunt or of a nice uncle who passed away a few years later. Having my hands around an old pals shoulder, who I have not called or heard from for eons. The funny picture of the girl I would flirt with and still never got around calling her for kicks…. So on and so forth (I’m sure all of you are now finding this a cliché because I have started sounding like an ad for retirement solutions). Actually, I really have nothing much to discuss, just felt like writing such things down for posterity. I mean, what else does one do with a blog?

Next on the list: old greeting cards.

Eh? What am i doing here?

I was reading some blogs just so I get inspired to update mine (as for the sake of good old public demand… after all that’s what keeps such futile sites ticking, right?)

What I realized is that, all of them were updates and not works of thought or literature, so I guess I shall not break the trend.

Job: none.
Searched and searched and could not find one.
And so my father, like all fathers would,
Asked me to do something with my wasting boyhood.
And my mother stood far and gave me a stare,
“what?” I asked. “do you really think I care?”
She shook her head in shame and said,
“son, you need to get out of bed
and help your old man in any way you can.
There are responsibilities of a young man”
… so here I am in a dull, cold room.
Doing a bit to keep away the gloom.
But I feel like I have a duty that calls.
The world needs me to help it stand tall.
There is something waiting to happen out there.
If only I knew where, if only… I knew where…

Na, I’m fine. Frankly, I’m at the brink of getting a nice placement in a place I want to be in. I shall put it up as soon as I am sure I am through. Until then, I shall glare at customers and passers-by. You can stop glaring at the screen. Go away! (Phbbt)

Radio Ads

I hereby present to you the final radio ads of the class… you may download them by clicking the links below…

Grp 1:
Feviply

Voice Over:

Bijoy

Grp 2:
Ishtaa
Ad1
Ad2

Ad3

Voice Over:

Mahtab Taraporewala (main VO)
Najeshda Deshpande (tagline VO)

(All background sounds done by the group members)

Grp 3:
McDonalds Playschool (Stepping Stones)

Voice Over:

Kavitha Mani (main VO)
Binita Kuruvilla (tagline VO)

Grp 4:
MoPlay

(MP3 players by Fastrack)

Ad1

Voice Over:

Clayton Gomes (main VO)
Rakshit Doshi (intro and tagline VO)

Ad2

Voice Over:

Rakshit Doshi (all VOs)

Grp 5:
Snippets (greeting cards by Cadburry's)

Voice Over:

Clayton Gomes & Sharmistha Nagarkatti (main VO)
Divya Chandramouli (tagline VO)

Grp 6:
Peter England Shaving Cream

Voice Over:

Rakshit Doshi (main VO)
Binita Kuruvilla (Tagline VO)

(Any discrepancy in the above information should be immediately communicated to me by the group at rakshit.doshi@rediffmail.com)

... and the fat lady sings

I saw the best of times and the worst of days, these last few months and I realized that it takes no time to walk in and out of warp zones. Just as one is about to embark on a journey, the destination is reached and one forgets to enjoy the journey while he is still feeling euphoric about getting on the boat. What I am trying to say here is, I did not realize where the nine months of ADMA flew past. I remember being interviewed, watching my name, first on the list of short-listed students, jumping around with the sheer joy of just getting an admission. The orientation, the first day, me being elected as CR and woosh! The last day of the year. The rest of it all just never registered, saving a few great moments and achievements (which I choose not to enlist here).

The memories of the Kune trip still linger on, the film shoot and radio recording, still seem fresh. I mean, these thoughts are like these eighty year old grannies, trying to take a seat on a low chair. They are still seeping in. I wonder if I will ever find a batch so amazingly smart and sensitive as this one.

To ADMA 05-06, may the fat lady die before she even begins to sing on us. This opera will never end. Cheers!

DHISHKYAANNWW - The Shoot...

It has all come to a fulfilling end.

Almost two months of planning and fighting and mental torture has come to a close…. Actually a semi-close (if there is a term like that) with the shooting of the ad yesterday. A crazy month has flown past me and I can’t remember anything but “Peter England” making its way into my blood stream. The group of ten, aspiring ad makers has done some good work, I might say. We brainstormed our way into making a brand extension called Peter England Shaving Cream and now we have finally finished a tormenting shoot and it was all well worth it. I don’t want to get into the description too much but the way I see it, it takes a lot of foresight to make the d-day pass smoothly (pun not intended). Some solid pre-production work and minimal interference of one person's opinion in another's job can pay off by making you complete your shoot two hours before pack-up time. What we really enjoyed was the anxiety a day before the shoot.

It so happens that my apartment in Juhu (which is our location) is to be given out on lease the day after and hence is undergoing renovation. Two days before the shoot, the ceiling is pealing off, the marble on the floor is being polished to a shine, the fittings of all the washrooms are removed and the house is not in any condition to be lived in. At any given point in time, there were 13 people working, on every wall of the damn place and our blood pressures were on a rise. There was no chance in hell of it being completely ready on the day of the shoot and well, we had almost given up hope of a successful ad. An alternative was out of question because we had decided on the story board, the props and everything to do with the shoot well in advance. It would only mean changing the script. The lack of a back-up, needless to say, was making us bite our nails, fingers and palms. And we, in our infinite wisdom, went and decided to shoot first. It is only I who knows what went into standing there for twelve hours straight and getting those electricians, plumbers and painters to finish off the area in which we were shooting and obviously my group who stayed there with me, realized the anxiety I was faced with then. Two whole days were spent on set and that’s when the fun began. The best part is, we get the place done up at 5 p.m. in the evening before the shooting day. It was interesting to watch myself doing carpentry and my dear father doing some amount of drilling and nailing walls. Thank god for him and my mother, we managed to set the props up by 1 a.m. and it looked fabulous. The next day, the model was running a little late, few last minute hiccups were giving us the feeling of a major blunder but it all smoothened out and we finished the whole shoot at 4 p.m. that day. The pictures shall now speak.

This pack was designed by the group members and is not a commercial product

“Kudos to group six”, says our professor and it was an experience of a lifetime. My first ad shoot… only I know what the high is like. I shall retire to bed now. Sleep is a forgotten phenomenon as far as I am concerned.

Erm... Hello... !

Ahem!

absolutely no apparent reason to do this but... oh well some colour is good...

fine fine... i admit... i was just bored of the black... :P

your two bits are welcome.

Back with the same, old whip...

A series of weddings followed the series of projects and at one point, they both intersected and that is exactly the point where I forgot I even had a blog to myself.

Hello all ye patient readers of mine. I’m sorry for this delay in my rant but quite frankly I dint have anything to rant about and when I did, I didn’t have the time. Funny part is, now that I have the time, I have let go of all those reasons and topics that invite my foolish banters. So, let’s see if I can come up with something totally different to talk about.

One thing I noticed in these weddings of friends and cousins and random others, is that there is a lot of waste of talent. (Actually there is a lot of waste, period). The food, for instance, has different counters. In one of the weddings, the Rajesthani counter was so empty that the fellow who was serving there had dozed off. The stuff was really good, though. And then there was this Italian counter that had a line of people standing behind a mob of the front-enders and they stood with their plates held up like they were A1 class prisoners being served Italian food in their concentration camps. It was a sight worth a click. I mean, rationing shops probably look relatively demand free compared to this pizza-and-pasta table. Then there are the decorations. Orchids, people… each costing Rs. 20 or so, just lying around the corners of the food counter or the backdrop of the stage or some even picked up by little kids who were pretending to play “i-love-you” games with their fictitious girlfriends by wooing them with these ORCHIDS! For Christ’s sake, stick bamboo shoots and they will still go unnoticed. Let me not even start on Lighting! It seemed like they picked up all the flood lamps from the Vankhede Stadium and placed them there. It would look appropriate for me to wear dark glasses at ten in the night, I would say. As if those were not enough, there were lights stuck on the floor, facing upwards, to light up coir mats on GOLDEN backgrounds. No! We need more lights, so bring on the camera-man with his, very own, flood lamp. I could have gotten tanned if I didn’t leave in a hurry. Somewhere at the fag end of the ground in a corner so far away that it would take a bored individual to notice what I did (yes, Einstein, I WAS bored!). Three individuals resembling the Guns-N-Roses with a set of Tablas, a keyboard and I think an octo-pad, stood there and played ‘Tujhe dekha toh yeh janaa sanam’ and such likes. They had medleys of old songs firing back-to-back, for an audience that would rather chase rats than listen to their music. Waste! Waste! Waste! And more WASTE!

Why cant people make marriages an occasion to be remembered for the right reasons? Is it so important to have people repent their presence there? My friends and I were dead by the end of the day. Our feet, backs and shoes were killing us. We couldn’t sit for more than five minutes and the heat would make us want to rip off our suits and dive into a swimming pool. Somehow, the fact that there was no pool there to dive into made us save our suits. Having said that, I still can’t figure the point of such functions. The groom and the bride are stuck under the burning lamps for hours, the guests are dying to get home, the immediate families are tired out of their bodies trying to attend to the million who they short-listed from a billion to be invited, the gift obligations, the plastic smiles, the flustered waiters, the traffic, the traveling… why?

I’m getting married in a court… No one is invited. I shall post the news here and you are welcome to greet me by hitting on the Comments link, just where the post ends. Like so…

the circle of life!

How small is this word, ‘sorry’? Sometimes it can work wonders for you, if used at the right place, at the right time (ironic, no? sorry is used when you are in the middle of a ‘bad’ thing, right?) and then there are these precarious times when nothing seems to work. Again, the ironic part is, it is always useless with the ones who are closest to you. Offend a stranger, say sorry and story ends with ‘they lived happily ever after’. Offend a loved one, say sorry and the bomb just blows up instantaneously… the world just turns over its head and the story climaxes with a ‘what’s the point if don’t mean it?’ or a ‘do you have the faintest idea of what that word means?’

It’s a scary thought to be a part of a drama where your character was not even given a script. You just behave naturally and try thinking that your counterpart at the receiving end would ‘understand’ you but sometimes it just gets interpreted as ‘being taken for granted’. Now, how do you explain these things? Where do you draw the line and make one understand that what you were doing was a part of a reaction and not a planned assault? Then you start wondering if what you have done is right or not. Then the questions take mammoth proportions. The funny part is, initial questions are unanswerable but progressively they start getting answerable with options at first and then, if you go further, they start having clearer, streamlined answers. Allow me to illustrate…. Why did I react that way? or What was I thinking? (Unanswerable). I am sorry but should it make any difference if I said it? (yes, at least he/she will know that I’m sorry if nothing else) / (no, he/she will only find it much more irritating. Leave him/her alone). Now the questions transform into rhetorical ones…. Will I be able to go on like this for the rest of my life? What will happen if this person keeps reacting this way in small trifles like this one? Now, you are scared. Now you want to forget about it and say ‘it’s just a goddam phase!’ you don’t want to answer anymore questions. You want to be exculpated and then you want things to fall into place, miraculously, if you will. Wonder of wonders, they do fall into place. All smooth again and the calm waters start waiting for ripples once again. What comes along can be a ripple or a wave or a tsunami and then the same questioning helps you swim through. Strange, true and completely fascinating, this human nature of ours. I am surrounded with optimism now. Happy thoughts about having to find solace in such cycles and ‘phases’. I learn and I write like this. Then I feel good about cracking the secret to not being affected… if it helps anyone of you, I shall be glad.

Two scores and a four... thats it and no more

I was just reading my own post that I posted on the last day of the year gone by and thought to myself, “even though I know it is a phase, I still react to it.”

It has been twenty odd days since I last wrote and a series of things (I shall choose not to account for all trifles) have happened ever since… bad news, to begin with… my twenty fourth birthday. I am two dozen years old. I am a year away from being one quarter of a century old… I HAVE LIVED MORE THAN ONE QUARTER OF MY ACTUAL LIFE ALREADY…!!! (Breaking into cold sweat, spasm, convulsion… glugging water, breathing deeply, coming back to senses.) No seriously, it’s a crazy feeling to be this old. Anyway, the interesting part is, rather was, that I had one of the best birthdays in years. As always, a series of calls at twelve, ringing their way into half past midnight. Forty winks and then to college. A short lecture and then a delicious lunch with my dearest sweetheart (with red wine as fine as Rosé and Kailua cake for desert, if I may say so.). A surprise cake in college from three friends, and a cake for the 60 dear fellow ad-enthusiasts (curtsy, mamma dear.) Cake at home and pudding at my Nani’s to wind off my day. But amongst all this, the sweetest gift I got was this card that was made by Revati and Rithika, which had been passed around the class (outside my knowledge, of course) and each one had written a line or two for me which really meant a lot. I also received an extremely beautiful poem from my lunch date ;) and sufficient cash from my family. So all-in-all, my life looked decent that day. Come to think of it, all these days have been hectic and all of that but they have been crazy fun. The final module about ad-film making has commenced and so has the module on radio advertising. Oh, not to mention, we had a lecture with Jaggu and Tarana from Go FM as guest faculty along with Prachi from Radio City. It was so cool. Also a lecture on music appreciation and how the different hours of the day, the mood in those hours and the appropriate music, works in tandem with one another. One day we had a decent but not up to-the-mark, lecture with Mr. M.G. Parmeshwaran (who is the MD of FCB Ulka, the fourth largest ad agency in the country and maybe in Asia.)

That’s that, as far as updates are concerned and quite frankly I have nothing beyond that to say. I love saying this in good times and bad…

It’s all GOOD!

Later then… write in about your new years etc. if you will… it’s about time this site got interactive… ;)