Blink

Smoke from an extinguished candle.
Starched kurtas.
Milk powder.
Nice conversations.
Uneven mirrors.
Condensation on sides of a glass of cold water.
Melted cheese.
Soft contrasts.
4:00pm.
Dust on a table.
Snapping fingers in a candle fire.
Shifting sands due to wind.
Water rolling off a leaf.
Yawning babies.
Cool cushions.
Subtlety.
Shadows of leaves.
Smell of freshly baked cake.
Coffee with streaks of brown in foam.
Ice on torso.
Liquid stains on old pages.
Long emails that are years old.
Fire.
Spherical drops of water on fingernails.
Tall trees swaying together.
Watching babies trying to figure something out.
Spray of mist.
High speed winds.
Driving in convertibles.
View points.
Black & white photography.
Babies smiling at a camera.
Music that reaches a climax.
Smell of rain.
Sans serif fonts.
New cars.
Holding her hands, and in silence.
Winter afternoons.
Tacit smiles of understanding.
Chocolate melting in the mouth.
Dried up glue.
Seeing someone smile to oneself.
Right alignment.
Matte finish.
The colour orange.
Storms before rain.
Smell of leather upholstery.
Standing at the doors of trains at high speed.
Vaporising deodorant.
Orange on white.
Double entendre.
Fast piano.
Ink on tissue paper.
Drinking water after soanf.
Tango.

These are things I like. These are all that came to my mind. These are few of the thousands more.


Post Script: This was written in exactly 5 minutes (clocked) and closed. Just wanted to see what all came to my mind.

Bad Advertising

(Duration: 29 seconds, Google Video)

I came across this particular advertisement on contraceptives. They depict a few babies being messy (which I find adorable, by the way). A female voice then says, "There's so much more to look forward to. Get your contraception ... at your local pharmacy."

There are better ways to spread public awareness about contraception and birth control than showing babies, the most beautiful things on earth, in a negative light.
It is NOT good humour.
It is NOT good advertising.

Holy Art and the Fashion Mart

French fashion house Marithe and Francois Girbaud launched this poster in February last year (2005) as a version of Leonardo da Vinci's work, but with an almost all-female cast. Women clad in the company's latest fashion-wear pose around a table as Christ and his apostles. One man, with a bare torso and low riding jeans, representing John the Apostle gets close and comfortable with one of the women.
In Milan, where Leonardo's fresco is preserved and the influence of the Vatican is never far away, city authorities have banned it.

One of the women apostles is kissing the naked torso of a man, which just makes the imitation more offensive. As does the use of Christian symbols like the dove, the chalice and the position of the fingers of the female Christ.

The company says the image is not offensive but, as it refers to it in the advertisement, is a tribute to women. Inspired clearly and openly by Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code, the advertisement suggests that the figure of John in Da Vinci's masterpiece is actually Mary Magdalen in disguise.

With all due respect to the sentiments of the Catholics, I loved the advertisement for the stunning allusion of The Last Supper.

My Utopia

John Lennon's Imagine means more to me than a mere song. It reflects what kind of an idealist I am, and what kind of world I would love to live in. Today, as Winamp was playing songs from my 3000 strong playlist, Imagine came up in the random shuffle after a long time. I realised that this song was buried under scores of western classical, western oldies of the 60s and trance; and I had quite forgotten about it.

Here's Imagine, the world where I would be the happiest... My utopia.

Imagine by John Lennon

Imagine there's no Heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people
Living for today

Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man
Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

You may say that I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one

People don't see me talking highly of my country... I get looks of "How can you disrespect the years of struggle India has gone through to get independence?" Well, I do acknowledge and admire that, but it's not the country I am disrespectful towards; I am against the whole concept of territorialism.

I hate to see boundaries in humanity. I hate to see differentiation and bloodshed due to countries, religion, caste, colour and what not. We are a single species of mammals. Why can't we live by sharing the whole world?
I see fundamental flaws in human beings.
A destructive mind.
A quest for limelight and power.
A feeling of hatred seeing other people succeed.
An innate desire to see other people fail.
Why do we call it a rat race, when we truly are much worse than the rats?
Rats do it for food. For survival.
But we have all that.
Our main motive has become to outdo the other, and see the other suffer too.
We go wrong at a very grass root level. We do.
Can't we fix this? All we have to do is realise it...

An idealist, am I? A dreamer too, may be. Well, at least I imagine things that are happy. And I'm sure I'm not the only one.

It's a wonderful world. Not.

It is becoming an increasingly disturbing trend as to how Indians are now seeking out reasons to show agitation, grief and discontent - and bringing public life to a grinding halt.
Fine. That is acceptable to an extent.
But unprecedented deaths in these situations cannot be justified under any circumstances. Whether the public grievance is real or imaginary, it is provoking a riot and an apparently inevitable death of a number of people, that cannot be ignored. The bottomline is that this is a practice so wasteful, so pointless that it is hard to believe that the people involved are not realising it!
Frenzied fans of the thespian Rajkumar went on a rampage in Bangalore, pelting stones and targeting vehicles in and around the stadium where his body had been kept. Six persons, including a police constable, were killed in the violence.
Why? Why did the people have to resort to violence because someone died of perfectly natural causes? Why did they have to resort to burning down buses and stalling everything? What is the whole point!?!
The latest this is that now, residents of Vadodara are rioting because an old dargah that is two centuries old was demolished by the local municipal corporation. So far five people have been killed and several injured. Curfew was imposed in the area to put a stop to the gruesome killing, especially after an unruly mob of 1500 set ablaze a car burning alive a muslim gentleman, late on Tuesday night. In the Vadodara incident, the government bodies claim that they were only going ahead with a well-announced demolition drive aimed at all kinds of illegal structures, including shops and temples as well. The demolition order was preceded by an effort from Muslim organisations to have it declared as a heritage structure, which was refused by the mayor of Vadodara. The mayor's justification was that there is no dearth of such places of worship that spring up on public land and that they should be treated like any other illegal structure.
A weird incident - A couple in Gujarat exchanged wedding vows over the telephone after the bridegroom could not make it to the ceremony due to violent clashes in the bride's city.
What all this really tells us that Indian people are not capable of managing discontent without having chaos on the streets and public areas, which leads to the pointless and tragic deaths. It is as if mobs looting, damaging and burning public property and stalling a normal life have become the symbols of protests and anger in democratic India.
All the sane and probably more effective methods of raising objections or debating have become useless and irrelevant. Killing, violence and unrest have become the first choice of the aggrieved!

The irony of it all? While all of this is claimed to be in public interest, it is the public that suffers the most.

What a pity.

--
Other blog entries in Mostly Pointless related to recent happenings in India

India Files: This is outrageous! (April 4th, 2006)
Textbooks in Rajasthan compare Indian housewives to donkeys, and call the latter more loyal.
Living in a box (March 30th, 2006)
The proposal for 50% reservation in premier institutes in India - a few quoted reactions and a proposed solution to the issue.

So long... Farewell!

As a continuing ritual across all hostels in IITM, this year too we had the Mandakini (Mandak) Hostel Nite farewell video made. Thanks to Nitin, Arpan, Kartik, Rishi, Vinay, Nikhil and many others, we have the farewell video of 2006 (and 2005 as well) on Google Videos. :-)

Farewell 2006: Etchings [Click here]
(Google videos, no download required - Opens in a new window)

Editing & Direction:
Kokonad Sinha
Nitin Parihar
Arpan Nalwaya

Camera & Cinematography:
Arpan Nalwaya
Nikhil Kumar
Kartik Kamat
Kokonad Sinha

Behind the scenes:
Kartik Kamat
Rishi P B
Vinay Tibrewal

Soundtrack credits:
Safri Duo - Adagio (Starting Sequence)
OST - Pulp Fiction
Los Lobos - Tequila
Grid - Swamp thing
OST - Pink Panther
Offspring - Pretty fly
The Verve - Bittersweet Symphony
Sigur Ros - Hoppipola (Ending Sequence)
Phil Collins - Something happened on the way to heaven (Credits)

Farewell 2005: From 1/4 to 4/4 - The Metamorphosis [Click here]
(Google videos, no download required - Opens in a new window)

Direction:
[Awaiting information]

Editing:
Kokonad Sinha

Soundtrack credits:
Prodigy - Smack my bitch up
Jock Jams - Let's get ready to rumble
Vanessa Mae - Bach Street prelude

Hope they are to your liking. Each of these videos has taken more than 72 continuous working hours by each person involved.