Not Yet Smitten by the Cricket Bug :(

I remember the last Cricket World Cup very very well. Am sure every cricket fan in India remembers Reliance's "Karlo Duniyaa Muthi Me" with Shewag waving his bat and mobile phone and Shewag's mother sharing with us her Kheer recipe (I only remember her talking on TV, I don’t remember the recipe)

I watched every single match; pre match and post match session with my mother and brother. My father joined us towards the evening when he got back from work. But the three of us were at home and watched every single match. That said, more than the matches, it is Mandira Bedi that I remember. Just wondering what she was going to wear the next day provided us with enough excitement. :) ( I distinctly remember her wearing a tri color saree with noodle strap blouse for one of India’s matches)

My father, as is my brother, is a great fan of the game. So, I have grown up watching the game. I knew every player in every team. I knew the World Cup schedule by heart and I knew which team was good at what. Every morning, I got up and faithfully read the Hindu to see what the cricket experts and specialists had to say about the game, and the Times of India to read the mere mortals views on the game. (My father calls the Hindu a text book. It has accurate, to the point information. Growing up I hated the paper, but with age I have realized its importance. The Hindu’s online paper is the first thing I open every morning once I get online)

Back to the last World Cup. That one month was dedicated to the game. We were excited about it for weeks before and felt sad about not having any entertainment once the season ended.

Anyway, all this was four years back, when I led a simple life in my parent’s beautiful house in Bangalore.

I now work nine hours a day with hardly enough time to speak to my husband, let alone watch a match. (Working cannot really count as an excuse because my father has been working through every World Cup and is still charged up each time) I don't seem to be excited about the World Cup at all. I tried to muster some interest and started betting with my office colleagues. But it has been a week since the World Cup has begun and I haven't watched even one match. (I have only lost money so far betting on old favorites who seem to be losing).

Sometimes I wish I never had to grow up. What fun it was to sit at home with my mother (who can never remember the score or even who's playing), my aunt (who always asked Why?? (never how) a person got out, after he got out!!), my dad (who always switched of the TV if India showed signs of losing), and my brother (the most normal person to watch the match with. He would consume loads of kaju, lassi (more "moree" to us South Indians) and onion pakoda and hope India won).

I am just hoping that this weekend’s cricket party at my house in Mumbai is a success and I am able to rekindle some of the old memories watching India thump England.

Back after a brief hiatus!

The last few days there have been a lot of people asking me why my blog went private. I thought my only readers were Smita and her poor office colleagues who were coerced into reading. But am glad to know there are loads of people who actually find reading my blog an enjoyable pastime.

So am back to blogging!! I haven't done anything much the last few days. But this weekend promises to be fun. Am hoping to watch Tanu weds Manu and Saat Khoon Maaf.

Will be back with more soon.
Tschoos!!

Why can't we have more relaistic cinema??

This weekend I watched the movie Band Baja Barat

The movie was not too great. But the 2.5 hrs that i spent there got me thinking whether the average Indian woman is anywhere close to what these movies portray her to be.

My first grouse is the heroine's perfect hair. Every time she moves her head her hair sways in perfect tandem with not a strand out of place. I might be tilting towards a biased opinion in this matter, given that am blessed with just few strands of hair. But after having carefully examined a lot of woman in the local train I can say with some degree of accuracy that no one has such perfect hair . (I just quickly looked around my office. Not a single woman seems to be blessed with such gorgeous hair) Why can't Hindi cinema be made with more realistic actors? I would love to see a movie where the heroine with normal hair and skin with some blemishes.

Anyway, moving on. The heroine starts talking to the hero, an absolute stranger in a bus. I have never in my life spoken to a stranger irrespective of how good looking he was in a bus/ train/ plane etc. More often than not I don't even look at the people around me. So am quite amused that the film portrays a girl who's willing to talk about her business plan with an absolute stranger and then goes on to start a business with him
These are just two indents that am writing about. The movie was filled with such absolutely unrealistic episodes culminating into a perfect happy ending. It is nice to watch such glossy movies once in a way, but I really wish Bollywood makes more realistic films potraying normal women.

“Collapse your Buttocks on the Ground!!!!"

My friend Smita (by now most of you reading this would have guessed that my friend refers to Smita) was having a very stressful day at work. Part of the stress might have been because she spends more time chatting with me than working. Anyway, when she complained for the umpteenth time about how much work had oiled on and about how much stress she was under I blurted out “Collapse your Buttocks on the Ground” and that was the birth of this current post.

For those of you who weren’t born in Bangalore and who did not have an aunt who made you tag along to her yoga class, here’s what “Collapse your Buttocks on the Ground” is.

When I was growing up, my mother used to drop me off at my grandma/ aunt’s house very often. By very often, I mean almost every weekend, holidays and any other day when there was no school. 

My aunt is a stickler for doing things as per her set routine and never liked to change the way things were done. So when I was unceremoniously dropped at her door step, she had no option but to take me along wherever she went. Consequently I used to be dragged off every morning to her yoga class. This was a yoga session for middle aged woman and was fairly uneventful till the last twenty minutes. This was the time when the woman did their Shavasana. Just before starting this particular Asana which was more of a license to go to sleep than an actual Asana, the trainer would yell in her high pitched nasal voice “Collapse your Buttocks on the Ground”!!!!  Yes, she actually used the word buttocks and wanted everyone to collapse them on the ground!!

The first time I heard it as a clueless eight year old, I burst out into a fit a giggles and to this day I start laughing just thinking of the number of sessions I attended waiting for the trainer to scream these very words. J

I wonder if this yoga session still exists, And if it does, all of you who visit Bangalore must do a session. Trust me; you will remember “Collapse your Buttocks on the Ground” for ever after that.