The evolving Bollywood heroine

When PH & I were looking for "Chota Rajkumar", one of our stops was Odyssey in Indiranagar. Here we came across some Hindi movies in the DVD section, and when I was giving him my thoughts on the evolution of Bollywood cinema, he had a brainwave of arranging the DVDs in chronological order and clicking a picture.

From left to right:
a) Daag (1952) -> only the faces of the actresses are shown
b) Abhimaan (1973) -> the actress is shown fully covered
c) Beta (1992) -> the actress seems to shedding her clothes a little
d) Fashion (2008) -> much bolder actresses (wonder where the heroes vanished)

Dal, dal & more dal

Woke up really late and went for some shopping at SPAR. Pappu was playing at some gig at Bangalore Central, and Meena, Lawrence & Shaarad were going. I was too lazy so I took a raincheck.
Watched the Royal Challengers defeat the Chennai Super Kings quite easily and enter the finals of the IPL.
Meena & co came home later and Meena made a LOT of dal for us. Danny also brought some of her home cooked dal, so we had a ton of dal to finish. I did the best I could, but there was just too much dal for me to handle.

I went to bed around 2 am coz I was too tired. Woke up in the morning to find that the others had managed to finish all that dal - very impressive indeed!!

Alvida PH

Today was just another boring day at the office. Came back to see PH packing all his stuff. Shaarad, Stag[1] & I went up to the terrace at chilled out for a bit. Then we came back down and had a quick dinner. PH said his byes to Shaarad & Stag; and off we went towards Majestic on my motorcycle. After the past few days, PH had become so comfortable on the bike that he could now easily carry his heavy backpack whilst riding pillion!

PH's bus was set to leave at 10.30 pm, but we left home at 8.30 pm. We had reached Corporation Circle within no time, and I was beginning to think maybe we had started off a little too early. But once we entered KG road, the traffic came to a near stand-still and I was glad that we had a lot of time to spare. The bus-stand was about a kilometre away, but it took us close to 45 minutes to cover that short stretch.

Finally parked the bike, and began the search for platform 25 in the KSRTC bus-stand. The night Volvo to Pondicherry leaves from platform 25, which is located in some remote corner of the bus-stand. It took us about 15 minutes just to find the platform, but we did get there eventually.

Chatted about random stuff over the next few minutes, and then it was time for the bus to leave. Said goodbye to PH, and got back home.

Found Adi B, Danny, Pammu & Stag at home already. Meena, Lawrence, Adi T & Shaarad joined us later and we had a good time singing songs and stuff. Went to bed at 6 am :)


[1] - Adi Y will be called Stag henceforth!

Dancing in the rain

As planned PH took it easy at home most of today, and later went out exploring the city by himself. He was actually looking for a particular tree in Lalbagh, and eventually managed to find it too. Once back home, he recounted his experiences of the day of being greeted by random strangers on the road. Entire families would sometimes come up to him and have their picture taken with the friendly white guy :)

Apparently, everything was not all fun and games for good old PH, as he got accosted by a gay who probably just wanted to try his luck. That ended up in a sour note with the two getting into an argument. I felt bad for PH, but couldn't help grinning from ear-to-ear :D
PH is a funny guy even with his limited command over English. I'm sure he'll have his French speaking friends in splits most of the time!

It started pouring cats & dogs in the evening, and Shaarad was itching to get out in the rain. Finally, he couldn't control his urge anymore, and against all warnings from our cook, off he went and stood in the middle of the road in the torrential downpour. PH was out of the house in a jiffy as soon as he had seen Shaarad. I continued to stand in Shaarad's balcony and look at them in the street outside. Finally, the peer pressure became too much for me to handle; and I jumped out from the balcony and joined the other two.

We could see so many people staring at the three psycho buggers from their windows and balconies; but we were too busy dancing and playing around in the rain to even care!

When we'd had enough, we got back home and had an amazing chicken dinner prepared by our cook. Later, when the rain subsided, we went to Legends of Rock where PH bought us a few beers, while we watched the Royal Challengers Bangalore beat the Deccan Chargers to enter the semi-finals of the 2nd Indian Premier League.

When we got back home, we saw that the entire basement parking lot was flooded; but fortunately the water hadn't risen high enough to cause any serious damage to the engines.

<- The tree PH was after

View from atop the hillock in Lalbagh ->

Busy day for PH

In the morning I took PH to my workplace and showed him around. Ramjee, PH & I went to the dhaba at Michael Palya for lunch.

Then we went to all the big bookshops around Indiranagar looking for the book "Chhota Rajkumar".
['Chhota Rajkumar' is the Hindi translation of 'The Little Prince'. It has been translated into more than 180 languages, and remains one of the best-selling books ever!]
Although we couldn't find it, PH gifted me the English version. He said that even though it is classified as a children's book, it has some very valuable lessons for adults.

Next, we went to the Vidhana Soudha and clicked a few pictures.

From there, we rode to Majestic and saw the KSRTC bus-stand, the BMTC bus-stand and the railway station from a distance. PH was fascinated looking at the huge crowds of people!

Then we went to Rex Cinema to book our tickets for the movie tonight (99), and finally returned home.

PH was exhausted by all the information overload, and slept through most of the first half of the movie. He's planning to take it easy tomorrow, and stay in and around home most of the time.


<- Ramjee & I at the Michael Palya Dhaba

BMTC bus stand (Majestic) ->

<- The crowds at Majestic

PH & I on the bike ->

More French speaking people!

After getting back from work, I took PH to the Oasis Center and we did some clothes shopping. He had to meet a friend of his at Forum in the evening so I took him there. Met Claudine, invited her to Angie's farewell dinner tonight, and left PH & Claudine to catch up over coffee. Claudine's phone number is so much similar to mine, that its almost eerie!!

Later in the evening, PH, Claudine, and Claudine's flatmates Morris & Nabeel came over. So we had a lot of French speaking people in our home that evening!

Walked to Nandhini in the slight drizzle, and met Meena, Adi T, Angie & Sarah who were there already. Adi Y & Lawrence joined us later, so we had 7 different nationalities being represented at our dinner table!!

Shaarad - UK
PH & Claudine - France
Nabeel - Lebanon
Morris - Senegal
Sarah & Angie - USA
Meena - Australia
Adi Y, Adi T, Lawrence & me - India

<- Googie, Claudine & Morris at our place (sorry about the quality)

Angie's farewell dinner - Googie & Shaarad ->

<- Angie's farewell dinner - Angie, Meena & Lawrence

Beer @ Pecos

Today Shaarad had a sudden craving for having beef, and he sent me an e-mail suggesting we have some beef for dinner. I'm always up for any kind of meat, so I was game; and we chose to go to Pecos. As luck would have it, the cook called in sick, so it seemed like there was nothing to stop us from going out to get some beef for dinner - till we spoke to Adi Y. Adi Y in his usual manner made a long face, saying that he wanted to have Punjabi food. After what seemed like ages, we somehow managed to convince him that we also get some paneer in Pecos, and off we went to good old Brigade Road.

We parked our motorcycles near Crossword, and began walking towards Pecos. Thats when we realised that we were closer to Mojos, and since the management is the same at both places, the food & beer must also be the same! Moreover, Mojos is not as congested as Pecos. We were just about to get into Mojos when Shaarad got a call from Lawrence, who said that they were already at Pecos. So we decided to simply join those guys.

Met Angie, Meena, Lawrence & Ajay at Pecos, and had a very heavy dinner. Got back home close to midnight.

At around 12.30 am, I was just preparing to go to bed when I got a call from an unknown local number. I wondered who could be calling this late, but answered it anyway. It turned out to be Pierre-Henri Le Besnerais (PH) from France. He had requested to surf my couch sometime back, and I had agreed; but I had completely forgotten about him :) He said he had just landed in Bangalore, and was going to take a taxi to our place.

So I waited, and PH reached at around 2 am. We spoke to each other about our countries, our languages and our cultures till about 3 am. He was so excited to be in India, that he had to smoke a few cigarettes back-to-back to calm his nerves...

Bicycle Ride # 1

Woke up early in the morning on Sunday (after only about 4 hours of sleep), and also awakened Adi Y. Both of us got to the Oasis Center with our bicycles at about 7.15 am to find Eva, Ash & Megha waiting there already. The original plan to ride to Begur got canceled and we decided on an alternate route.

Read more about the ride here.

Came back home and crashed after the ride, only to wake up in the evening. Went to SPAR with Adi Y and did a lot of shopping for the house. I was wearing the red "Shiamak" T-shirt, thanks to which one Mr. Roomi came up to me and enquired about the classes for his kid. I took his card, and later e-mailed him the details he needed. Shaarad got back from Delhi, and we talked a bit about making a short trip to Bandipur the coming weekend. Lets see if that works out...


Photos of the bicycle ride (same as those present in the above link):


<- First break (Sarjapur Road, Outer Ring Road intersection)

Weed covered Bellandur Lake ->

<- The group at Bellandur Lake (L to R: Adi, Googie, Megha, Ash & Eva)

Riding along the narrow streets ->

<- The route (http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2829565)

Saturday party & late-night movie

Woke up late on Saturday morning, and watched TV for a bit. Meena called sometime in the evening, and Meena, Lawrence, Anupam & I went to one of Meena's friend Ruchi's place for a house party. Today was a dry day (meaning no alcohol to be sold anywhere) since the counting of the ballots cast at the recently held assembly elections was to take place across the country.

But since our country is a place where all sorts of "jugaad" is possible, I heard that they did manage to buy alcohol but at outrageous prices. Anyway, reached Ruchi's house late in the evening to find an already well-stocked fridge. Helped myself to a small drink and a few munchies. I had to leave early (just when the party seemed to be picking up) since I had an early start on Sunday.

Since I was very close to Hashir's place, I thought I'd drop in to say "Hi" to those guys. But they weren't at home, so I came right back hoping to get to bed early.

But Adi B & Danny were at home already, and Adi Y was busy making something in the kitchen. Chatted with them for a while, and someone decided to watch a scary movie. "The Amityville Horror" was chosen, and I agreed to watch it with them - albeit a little reluctantly. The movie ended close to 3 am, after which Adi Y & I dropped Adi B & Danny home. Finally got to bed at about 3.30 am.

Dinner at MTR

Shaarad had gone home to Delhi this weekend to meet his Mom, who had come down from the UK; so it was going to be only Adi Y & me at home this weekend. On Friday afternoon, I was preparing for a lazy weekend and wondering what I could do to keep myself busy. In the evening I got a call from Adi T saying that they've planned to meet for dinner at MTR. Since I wasn't doing anything, I decided to join them.

A quick look at Google maps showed me the shortest route to get there, and I reached just when the others had found a table. Preeti, Angie, Meena, Adi T & I had a heavy dinner, with Adi Y joining us midway. From there, all of us came to our place and chatted a bit. Adi Y then left for his friends' place in Marathahalli and the rest of us decided to watch a Brit comedy movie "Hot Fuzz". Nobody seemed to be enjoying the movie so much, so we stopped after an hour or so. It was close to midnight then, and they all prepared to leave just as Adi B & Danny came over.

I dropped Preeti home, came back and chatted with Adi B & Danny till the wee hours of morning. We also put up a poster of Slash that I had got from the US. Then I dropped them home, came back and went off to sleep at around 5 am.

<- The Slash poster that now adorns our living room

From up-close ->