Homeland

An Indian lady colleague told whether or not I will bring back a mixer/grinder from India after the wedding. I told her not really – the American blender works very well thank you. Apparently every newly married Indian couple here brings back a cooker (larger size) from the avg single person cooker (350-500 ml me thinks), the stone grinder for dosai, the idli steamer, and the blender and food processor for chutneys. Esp the south indians.

So immediately I made a mental list:
- Cadbury’s Eclairs. I FUCKING miss those. My happy fix for any hour.
- Sharp ball point pens that are <=0.6mm tipped. American ballpoints are the thickness of pasta. I MUST have pens that draw lines and
- Anjali dabba – the little box custom designed for Indian spices – with the little boxes.
- Little little idols of Gods that my grandmom got me used to.

I may not be into avidly praying a fervent prayer every morning, but lighting the occasional diya and the blue moon incense stick raises my spirits and spiritual quotient. I am a sucker for feel good morning rituals.

Doesn't sound like a list that will impress my colleague though.

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There was a time when I used to chide anyone I knew who was Indian who over-valued Indian things like movies and festivals and rituals. After being here for nearly 11 months, I am beginning to understand why. On diwali, the same Indian colleague invited me over for dinner. Pongal vada dosai sambar chutney and payasam. I dressed to the nine's and went. As if it was my first diwali or something. Bought Kaju Katli to introduce experimental minded roomies. Threw the box into the garbage because mofos here keep stock that is probably 3 months old and nonrefrigerated for the most part. Dass sweets something. Mofos I tell you.

And don't even ASK what happens when i watch a documentary about India or senti scene from an Indian movie. Bawling doesn't begin to describe the outcome.
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Wedding prep in full swing. After J's departure and the end of ceaseless shopping and packing weekends – normalcy has returned to the turtle. But still hours are spent searching for the perfect jewellery that can't be bought yet because the outfits haven't been found yet. And yet the heart isn't going flutter flutter as it should be about the wedding itself.

I find myself jumping and calling bloody murder when I hear J met Bartinda and Shaman and they didn't discuss me. And then laughing and craving to be back in Bangalore. The heart also does a trapeze act every time past gilded memories come to the fore along with the prospects of making some more – with some sistahs and breddas who are traipsing the world at the moment – and some yogis and yoginis who are ascending spiritual dimensions and establishing kilometric records.

1 month 7 days to departure and counting down!

Smile

“Hey, who let in all these elephants?
Did you know that elephants are made of elements?
Elephants are mostly made of four elements
And every living thing is mostly made of four elements
Plants, bugs, birds, fish, bacteria and men
Are mostly carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen and oxygen

Come on come on and meet the elements
You and I are complicated, but we’re made of elements
Like a box of paints that are mixed to make every shade
They either combine to make a chemical compound or stand alone as they are”

Meet the elements from the children’s album “Here comes science”; Artists:They May Be Giants
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They all kept saying
How much we look alike
I don’t think that we look alike at all

But I’ll admit that I look more like a chimp
Than I look like my cousin the shrimp
Or my distant kin the lichens
Or the snowy egret or the moss
And I find it hard to recognize
Some relatives of ours
Like the rotifer, the sycamore
Iguanas and sea stars

My brother the ape
My brother the ape

My Brother the Ape from the children’s album “Here comes science”; Artists:They May Be Giants
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Navratri Kheer Craving Crack
http://www.nanakfoods.com/upcoming.htm

All hail Guru Nanak.

Lost and 2BuckChuckAnna

I was feeling really strongly about something before I came here. Now I forgot. So much for strength of thought.

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Confession: I am addicted to Lost. I seriously believe that if modern day fiction has shifted to the visual medium, then Lost is the best fiction I have ever encountered. It’s got a lot of bullshit of course – like radio hookups that won’t happen and will happen when you want them with a piece of red twine and can call London from a frikking freighter which is causing people to time travel to a Royal Scottish Regiment and a mouse dies trying the same —–. What I am REALLY happy about. Netflix has Seasons 1 through 4 for online streaming. For the past two weeks, barring a few exceptions, all my evenings have been spent planning a departure from the living area without being noticed by my roomies and then crawling into bed and watching back to back episodes of Lost. Things came to a head yesterday when I took half of the day off from the indulgence hangover that consisted of sore swollen eyes a headache and a general inability to stop thinking about what would happen next. I was even dreaming about John Locke and Kate Austen and Jack Shepard in a flight and on an island.

What I am really grateful for is that I started watching Lost at a period of time when I have access to 5 full seasons. What I hate about this is that I don’t have access to Season 6 yet. The waiting and anticipation for good fiction is unbearably nail hurting and cuticle peeling.

With that purged out of my system, I strongly encourage anyone who hasn’t had a good time in a LONG time to invest in a few DVDs and give their mental stimulations a healthy boost. I mean c’mon – if you could believe and enjoy and relive Gondor and Elves and Gandalf and appreciate a good story with a twist every second, Lost is totally up your alley. Brilliance I say.

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My roomie Anna – she wakes up at 6 45 am – is at work by 7 45 – works till 4 30 pm – comes back and goes for a bike ride or a speed skating expedition every evening – comes back all sweaty and high from an endorphin orgasm – and then showers, cooks, smokes, up, and drinks between 1 to 2 bottles of wine – and finishes her day with a Haagen Daaz ice cream stick at 1 am. The same time as when I have been falling asleep in the days before Lost. However, on a day I get less than 8 hours of sleep, exercise or a walk for me goes right out the Dee-Oh- Oh- Are.

This morning I look at her looking up at me grumpily in the morning as I left for work and I asked her what did I do to earn the stare. She said she was sore from the 20 odd miles of speed skating she did yesterday.

I asked her how does she do it- that after the 2 bottles of 2buckchuck she sent the previous night.

She said, in truly Annaesque style:
Coffee, carbs, supplements, vitamins, ice cream – whatever it takes!

It’s Friday morning at 9 45 am and I am thinking when was the last time I wanted to do whatever it takes for anything at all. I’m chewing on it.

Two things

“You talk when you cease to be at peace
With your thoughts;
And when you can no longer dwell in the
solitude of your heart you live in your lips,
And sound is a diversion and a pastime.
And in much of your talking, thinking
Is half murdered.
For thought is a bird of space, that in a
cage of words may unfold its wings but cannot fly.”

-Khalil Gibran

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Someone thought of Charles Babbage:
http://www.harkavagrant.com/index.php?id=5

I feel immense respect for creative genius that feels compelled to visualize and explore the dark crevices of the defining pillars of history. It’s after all informative of where we come from and also don’t come from.

Using “volume” where it counts

is like fucking for virginity

Discoveries of the Week

1. The Annals of Improbable Research
Where Apples can be compared to Oranges and hence the analogy is proved invalid. Where the scientists come together with flowing manes of luxuriant hair. Where navel lint matters. Where IgNobel prizes are given out to experiments that “first make you laugh, and then think.”

2. Segway
Go green! Go gas-less!
But first, overcome your vertigo of course!

tid-bits

Have consumed the following and enjoyed muchly:

1. South Park Season 13 – Margaritaville

2. South Park Season 13 – Fatbeard (Somalian Pirate We!)

3. Weeds – Seasons 1 and 2

4. Currently reattempting reading Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance. I will get thru it this time. Slow and steady.

5. Also on the bed side – South Park and Philosophy Why Flatulence is philosophical? and Can a saint really laugh at south park? are the questions being explored here. Morality – the south park way. The book is authored by a professor who teaches philosophy and had recommended SP as the basis of his students’ thesis.

6. Watchmen – Saw it, liked it.

7. Ma Vie En Rose It’s amazingly made. Softly. How a little boy comes to terms with his distaste for his Y chromosome and wishes suddenly he will get his period and turn into a girl. Until then he wears satin frocks, red shoes, and lipstick. And plans to marry the boy next door. Like I said, softly.

8. Super High Me – Must watch stoned. Absolutely must. A regular stoner stand up comedian gives up smoking pot for 30 days and stays high for 30 days.

9. Super Size Me – A man goes on a 30-day McDonald’s ONLY diet.

10. King Corn – How everyone in America is made of Corn. And everything. 2 guys from Idaho go back to their home town to plant 1 acre of corn and then follow it into their foods and bodies. Corn is everywhere here.

We’re all made out of ticky tacky

I have to thank Weeds for introducing me to ticky tacky.

ticky tacky: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ticky-tacky

Top 10 “Everyone must do this” – Films/Documentary/Visual Media

There are some things that I think are SO exemplary that I must shove it down the throat of anyone I like. Which I have done, no less, or plan to do, no less. It’s like watching a film and going “Wow! I have to show this to everyone.” It’s the kind of film that makes you grind your teeth, and clench your fist, and react. Period. Any reaction is good.

This evangelistic instinct does not come from all the films that you completely digg. For example, I like Reality Bites. A lot. But it’s  a personal joy to watch the dialogs, and I’d rather savor them by myself. Also, A love song for Bobby Long. That’s all for personal pleasure.

Then there are the duet kinda films. I’d rather watch them with a co-enthusiast. Like watching a chick flick with a chick or a guy playing the role of a chick companion, watching a Rasta film with Chivas, or watching a doomsday conspiracy movie with Tinda, or watching evolutionary movies with J.

And then there are the group movies. That must be seen as a group. As a community, as a nation, as a people, as a race and species, as any being entitled to a brain on this planet that is in the act of cognition, feeling, and subscriberism. Even if we don’t watch them in the same room. We must all watch them.  I am talking about those kinda movies.

So why did I bring this up now. Because I am reaching a critical mass of information that I agree with, feel strongly about, identify with, cannot do anything about most of the time, but would want to amplify the message. Because everyone must know about these. Because everyone will understand this irrespective of their background, race, color, religion or language (assuming sub titles). Because I simply must.

#1 1 Giant Leap

It started with the music. Then the quest for why these guys made this brilliant music and how. And then a study of their journey and their idea. In short, they wanted to combine “video, sound, and the written word to highlight the unity that underlies all of us, despite our heavily accentuated diversity”. Brilliant music, and a goose-bump-giving documentary.

#2 The Zeitgeist Movie and the Addendum

The most compelling documentaries of our time that put together, in an extremely coherent and logical fashion, the message that we all have been aware of, but never sat down and thought too much of it. Because no one told it like that.  No one viewed it like that. No one could afford the long-range vision and broad-range speculation to coherently arrive at so many conclusions at the same time. And it talks about the biggest delusions in prevalent times, freedom.

#3 Baraka

If imagery didn’t work more than words did, I would put this a rank lower. In fact a couple ranks lower. But it does. For serious imagery, for lost treasures, for rhythm, groove, beauty, and a decidedly wide screen HDTV experience, Baraka takes the crown.

“Baraka is an ancient Sufi word, which can be translated as “a blessing, or as the breath, or essence of life from which the evolutionary process unfolds.”  For many people Baraka is the definitive film in this style. Breathtaking shots from around the world show the beauty and destruction of nature and humans. Coupled with an incredible soundtrack…“

# 4 Koyanisqaatsi, Powaqqatsi, and Naqoyqqatsi

Darker version exploring man’s existence. Hardhitting imagery that will drain you and music that will churn your psyche.

“The title is a Hopi Indian word meaning “life out of balance.” Created between 1975 and 1982, the film is an apocalyptic vision of the collision of two different worlds — urban life and technology versus the environment. The musical score was composed by Philip Glass.

KOYAANISQATSI attempts to reveal the beauty of the beast! We usually perceive our world, our way of living, as beautiful because there is nothing else to perceive. If one lives in this world, the globalized world of high technology, all one can see is one layer of commodity piled upon another.“

# 5 Network

We saw this film today. After looking at the credits in the Zeitgeist Movie. It blew our minds. Everyone who watches television, must watch this. Amazing, that the same thoughts are true and repeated in 2009.

# 6 George Carlin

Again inspired after watching The Zeitgeist Movie, I went looking for this guy on YouTube. J has been a fan for ages and guided me through the best. Standing ovation material.

Two of my favorite videos include:

The Modern Man

Religion is bullshit

Kind of makes me appreciate form over function. Why the way you say something is sometimes more important in driving in the point than what is being said.

# 7  South Park

It’s not for kids. It’s as Douglas Adamsian toilet humor as American television can deal with. It’s deep-rooted satire and it comes with a laugh. Not too many people can look at their lives or those of others’ this way. All hail, Eric Cartman, Kyle Broflowski, Stan, and Kenny. You guys rule!

# 8 Waking Life

If you can deal with passionate 4 paragraph dialogs. If an anthology of truth, opinion, speculation, and philosophy, beautifully intertwined in a gripping anime entices you, then Richard Linklater’s animated film is a pot of gold.

I still always have a copy of the script with me at all times. Still. It’s been 6 years and counting.

# 9 Story of Stuff

# 10 Les Carabiniers

Godard’s take on war. And I could have sworn, my best war film before this one was Life is Beautiful. The optimistic war film. The happy war film. Or Platoon. The raw war film. But the dark humor won me over here.

If you have any such experiences (and not necessarily films) that you absolutely must share with the rest of the world (read shove it down my throat, mine at the least), and not to share would be tantamount to blasphemy, please put up a post like this one and leave me a link.

It’s always fun to be angry about and at the same thing.

In a new land …

…things about yourself confront you from new mirrors. It’s like going to one store and finding that widening mirror when all along your home mirror has been telling you of a narrowing waistlines.

I am brand conscious to a degree. To be precise, I don’t want to be caught wearing the same jacket as 3 others at a vacation spot in another state. Obviously a popular choice, but then obviously a very en masse availability. I didn’t know I had these airs till I saw those jackets. I am ashamed of myself, but that jacket is going back unworn. I will buy myself a cheaper or different one from a beat store in hippie land. But I feel this strong need to assert my individuality here.

Whining aside. I have come to realize other selfish things about myself. My life revolves around my job, which I do really well. Take that away and I am like a lost puppy on crack sniffing glue. Nope the yoga doesn’t help. Neither does the walking. The only thing that does seem to help some is reading, watching sitcoms, or doing mundane routine work like cleaning the house.

Further whining aside, on a brighter note.

Dub. The music is so chill, I wonder why it took me 3 years to realize that. Bob Dylan has finally made a place for himself in my heart. 1 Giant Leap is a definitely recommended watch for anyone with a soul and ear for good music. I swear by the music and have made all true friends listen to it if they haven’t already. Now my quest is to show other people this documentary that I procured with great effort and cost.  It’s wonderful and you deserve to see it.

Saw Amadeus. It’s definitely worth one watch. But everything about the movie pales in comparison to the last one hour. Watch it at least once.

J introduced me to  the Zeitgeist movie that comes from the Zeitgeist movement. It’s a free Divx download. Do watch it. Yet another thing has broken down my belief mechanism. So I thought I will take it a step further, by reading not just The Autobiography of  a Yogi, but also The Selfish Gene at the same time. So far the experiment is having no effect on the lost puppy on crack sniffing glue. But I am not believing anything anymore.

Beauty continues to rock. Be it in America or in India. Take a peek … 

Lake Powell, Page, Arizona