The Silver Eel
– A Film Watcher’s Guide to What to Watch and What to Slip Out of.
(Because no film worth it’s salt has no tag line) (e.g. Shabd – The word)

Someone pointed out that I’ve been watching quite a few animated films recently. I caught Enchanted, saw Miyazaki’s Spirited Away (which I recommend to all), caught Paprika (which I fell asleep through) and downloaded Grave of the Fireflies (which I hear is great). Well… it’s quite by chance. I’m just re-committing to my filmy career and planning to catch everything I can. So I made a list of must watch films from recent times–

1. The lives of others
2. No country for old men
3. Killers of sheep
4. Atonement
5. Sweeny Todd – the Demon Barber of Fleet Street
6. Persepolis
7. No End in Sight
8. In the Valley of Elah
9. Waitress
10. Michael Clayton
11. Before the Devil knows you’re Dead
12. There will be Blood
13. Dan in Real Life
14. Juno

As I check off on the list I’ll develop some review system to point you guys in the right direction. After all you haven’t committed yourselves to films. (Significant background music here).

To See or Not To See

Put A Penny In The Slot

Music is a very visual medium to me. If a song doesn’t give me an idea of how I’d shoot it, dance it, see it wafting through smoke or falling clear with rain then I just end up switching to the next number.
Here’s a list of numbers from among many that are just seeped in grocery shopping, curved handled canes, sex, top hats, purple silk dresses, legs kicking up gently while walking on a street, exultation and all that jazz.
1. Green Hornet by Al Hirt
2. New York New York by Frank Sinatra
3. Between the Bars by Madeleine Peyroux
4. Sinking Soon by Norah Jones
5. Take Five by Dave Brubeck

Herald of New Intentions

t for trivia

For some time now Piper has been at me about how the blog has not been living up to its promise of being about everything and everyone. And I find that it’s true. There were supposed to be movie reviews and music reccos and must reads and… Like I said in the first post - I spend so much time trying to make everything special and important that I lose the plot. Well... no more. As promised, the blog will be random and regular and about all thoughts and opinions.
So let me begin with some Trivia that I picked up yesterday –
I was chatting with Mrs. H and there is a statue in the room of a man on a horse with forefeet in the air. Mr. H said it was Shivaji but Mrs. H said it can’t be. And then with superiority she asked, tell me why this can’t be Shivaji.”
I looked from my prone angle and said, “He’s got a lance and his turban is different.”
Mrs. H tells us something interesting. “When a man dies a natural death, the status has all the hooves of the horse on the ground. When a man dies of battlefield wounds but not on the field, one foot up and one down. And when he dies on the battlefield both feet fly.”Shivaji died of wounds received on the battlefield but not on it.

So the wedding evening arrives and we go to help Jane get ready. Ostensibly. We actually end up blitzkreiging her with camera flashes and make ourselves useful by feeding her and helping her cousins do up their saris and drapes. Jane was quirky as usual.. no shadow of tension on her, or atleast none relating to getting into a lifelong commitment. She had more earthly worries - toget the perfect balance between being a Punjabi and Kashmiri bride.

We don't know if she hit it to her satisfaction but we thought she was beautiful. That's Corey in the bg taking the sanp. She's a professional. Our Bride is captured and waiting.

And Bingley arrives. On the horse weighed down by a silver crown and a garland of ten rupee notes (one of which i stole as souvenir). He was happy and dancing and most importantly... before time.

Corey joined the baraatis....

... and danced with the more than ready wife-to-be.

As Jane and Bingley got wed, we got fed and tried to keep ourselves close to the fires. It was a middle of the night wedding in Capital's winter. We shivered and sneaked out to the car park for medicinal alcoholic intake.

That's all us girls at the wedding bar Jane who was busy -

Getting married.
All the best to two people who are like babes in the woods. Warm hearted, generous, naiive, sweet and worrying to all those who love them.

Happy married life.

Back from Surajkhand we indulged in a bit of R & R. Bee and I got out nail polish only to inspire a revolution. The conversation wandered around to French manicures and the MEN summarily dismissed the beauty of it as 'paying good money to make your nails look more like nails... pink and white.' We groaned.
Dundee and Mr. George decided that the nail industry lacks imagination and soon i was being used as a celebrity promotional client. (Read: guinea pig). Armed with his Swiss army knife and an array of polishes Dundee proceeded to paint faces and landscapes (cough) on my nails. i do have a close up but i'm sparing you guys.

Then we headed out to The Groom's Cocktail Party... better called the Gadda and Whisky Fest. We had a hous eto ourselves and a chef. Starters appeared at a blink and you inhale food rate and we drank away. The night was cold and we were warm. We drank to Bingley....

... and ragged him a bit. Question-Answer Round.
D: You guys done it yet?
B: You can't start with the one crore question.. you got to start with a grand.
hmmm.. he has a point.
D: When did you first know you liked Jane?
B: At the alumni meet.
(he claims he doesn't remember the song playing. We don't really believe him.)
We taped it all for the Bride. And also passed on a message from her - Be On Time.

The excesses of the night before forgotten and with true adventurous spirit.. we got on the road again.. this time for the Surajkhand Mela. Varying reports told us it was 'far', 'very far', 'mayhem', 'madness' but we had resolved to go.

On reaching Surajkhand we came up with a plan in case of anyone getting lost or wandering away from the others. We would meet under this archway. Dundee disappeared half way thru the plan and the rest of us stuck together anyway.

There was performers ina every segment of the mela.. singing or dancing or both or performing with puppets. These Rajasthani women were fabulous in their dazzling colors and dervish whirls. I never have a camera. If i did what fascinated me most about them were their feet. They were lined and lined and lined not just on the sole but also up front. And so beautiful with their thick anklets and those lines of dance.

This was one of many transformed rickshaws roaming the place. Little kiddies were taking rides but surprisingly it didn't strike me to take one. I am now desolate at the missed opportunity. I'd have been horse riding! It's so jazzy.

This was a mask shop. I loved the sadhu.

And this burst of colours was a shop of window hangings and stick puppets. There camels that had every joint moving so that at one instead of stooping to sit it was as if the camel is beheaded. And there was Hanuman and Ravan (both of whom Dundee purchased). The paper is translucent and coloured so that it's like stained paper art and you stick it on your window and it slooks pretty. I decided that when i have kids i'll have one window in their room with different art in each pane - so Ravan and al elephant and a horse and all that. Only later when i met Dundee he tells me that the translucent material is not thick paper oiled over as i had thought but rather goat skin!!!! Ack.

Wandering about the expansive grounds we came upon this man selling jaljeera. He was performing for his audience with panache and flare and a mechanically fluid grace in the selling of his wares. We went back to him when we got thirst again.

There was this huge bunch of students with their faces painted posing for photographs. I think they were addressing issues. The girl with the pink wings is i think a statement on the girl child as an angel.

And finally... there was this man with his magic movie machine. And i'd see a fairy tale unfurl with every circle of his and like a wand being waved. Yeah right. He was showing a string of unrelated posters taped together so suddenly there was a chubby baby followed by a film poster and then a valley scene. Sigh. why can't people be a little more enterprising. Is a story too much to ask for? Does anyone know what this machine is called? I think i want one.

The intrepid explorers.. we were ready to set off for the Bride's Cocktail bash with smiles (for her) and hopes (for drink)... little did we know the trials that awaited us.

That's right. We were stuck in TRAFFIC for three and a half hours. Corey asked me to pose for a photo that showed i was bored and miserable. I did.

Bee got the same brief. She is a bad actress. Or actually a good one. She was whining till the flash went off. For the camera she finds smiles. We passed some time watching Dhoom II in the car. I think that made us even more miserable.

This is the cause. We circled the airport for a good hour and a half waiting for Mr. George to land. Delayed. Landed. Delayed. Let's Leave Him (that was obviously me). Finally he came and this is him changing clothes in the backseat of our Innova. (Corey misses the best shots).

The Bride was angry with us for being late.

But she is also a Drama Queen and forgave us in seconds. All she wanted was people to fill the dance floor. And introduce to her dad preferably while still sober.

So dance we did.

Bee took concept shots that only she understands the deep significance of. Kind of like Calvin (of Hobbes fame) saying that when you pander to the clichés and the majority you’re actually mocking them and hence there is true irony in your commercial art. That’s the best I can say about her photography skills. Dundee on the other hand is a better showman. He looks the part of a travelling photographer. His long hair, foreign looks and lack of Hindi certainly helps him in the country. So he wandered up to some bandwallahs loitering around a subway in their best and with trumpets and drums. Dundee asked to take some photos. They agreed with alacrity and soon enough he was surrounded. The photos taken with much smiling and posing with gleaming instruments Dundee turned to leave. One of them band guys says in hindi, “let’s take money from this f%&$er.” Dundee says, “hindi aata hai.” The band wallahs burst into guffaws as they correct him, “aati hai.” But fortunately they let him go.

I was having a great time. This was the first time I’ve been to a wedding where we are spending more time roaming around and getting drunk than attending mehendi’s and sangeets et al. The only downside was that given the size of Capital we hardly saw Jane at any time other than for the have-to-be-attended functions. The first day Dundee picked up Bee, Corey and I. We dumped our luggage and headed to Chandni Chowk by the metro. The magnificence of the new travel system stumped us hicks from different towns. Cesspool can only dream of such space and streamlined traffic. Once at CC we walked around, drank lassi, marveled at the brownness of everything and ended up walking around the Red Fort.

The Beginning of a Deservedly Cheesy Film

Tang tang ta tang tang tang ta tang… Friends continue their walk into matrimony. Audrey (now rechristened Jane) wed her Bingley last weekend. The nuptials were in Capital and a bunch of us friends from college put up together at a flat. I can almost imagine the nostalgia this weekend will evoke in later years.
“Ohh... that was some trip… we missed the main function coz we were stuck in traffic for three hours.”
“God! Remember Gopi and his strange moaning! Dundee thought it was the pigeons.”
“Thank God we found our luggage!”
“But I lost my earrings.”
It’s funny how the hazards of a trip are so much more entertaining than the main event.

How You Doin'?

When I look at photos of Piper’s wedding I cringe to see the facial hair and the gaudy gold on red clothes, the bad haircut and the shararas. But when I think back on it I remember flirting, I remember smiling and holding my own and giggling with Sky over various men. Then somewhere along the way life became serious business. Simple joys like matching wits, exchanging inconsequential’s, charming with no serious intent began to seem like a waste of time. I lost an art that can give almost as much satisfaction as a well finished poem. The force was not with me.
The last weekend I felt some of the old joy seep back in.
I was a bit shy and a little hopeless but I managed. There are two kinds of power – when you don’t care at all and have nothing to lose and when you care and really want something. All I’ve wanted for some years is a fleeting ability to sparkle.
Last weekend at Jane’s wedding to Bingley, I was sharing a room with Bee (newly engaged) and Corey (newly married). They very kindly passed on any and all eligible men in my direction that id didn’t know what to do with. They also shared their knowledge with me.
“Always go in with what you expect, what you’re willing to give up and what you’re not.”
I apply this to my single status and come up with some interesting answers. Hehhe.
That night at the cocktail I got high, kicked up my heels and danced like a mad woman. I could feel the amazement in a few of my old classmates. Bharat says astounded, “How people change.” I’m too lazy to correct him. I don’t think they’ve ever seen me drink, dance or drink and dance.
There’s nothing like high heels and a little shimmy to shake loose the courage in you. If it wasn’t for my hangover I’d have been invincible.
The next night Bee and Corey requested a repeat performance of a bed time story. What little confidence still hid inside me now unfurled. There’s nothing more alluring to a story teller than to find an eager listener. And strangely enough when Bee started snoring in the middle of Kwaku Ananse and the Python I took it as a compliment.
The wedding night arrived. Jane was beautiful if a bit lost. It was a cold night and fires littered the grounds. All of us huddled here and there. When Bee and I stumbled upon Long Haired Hot Cousin Of Bride she pushed me towards him. I was scooping out ice cream for self when he wandered by and started small talk. I indulged in some non verbal communication. He asked for some extra dollops of chocolate sauce and I couldn’t squeeze hard enough. I passed the bottle back to the waiter and sidled away. Bee shut her eyes and shook her head. But I must have done something right (or my backless blouse did) coz LHHCOB came up to me later and started a conversation. Bee grinned and I blushed. In small ways that night I shone a bit. It was pointless but it felt good. I laughed secretly and hugged it close. And when morning came the light stayed. While waiting at the airport for our flight a sweet scene played out. In the midst of the sleepy airport a young man helped me take off my stubborn jhumka.

I re-learnt the pleasure of a moment that doesn’t have to mean anything beyond the moment.

Matthew 21:22 and Luke 11:9

I have nothing to write. I haven’t felt possessed and overtaken by a need to write in a long while. The persons that used me before, the haunted lost girl, the old Irish woman, the libertine playwright, the fey changeling have forgotten my body. I fumble to string together words that might be a story, a history, an argument, a hope, a lie, a discovery, an epiphany, a forgotten minute, a beloved secret or a note to Paris of half felt ideas that might seem whole to her.

The moon is nothing but a string of stars closely packed together like a ball of wool. They’re strung on platinum wire and hence the shine.
My fingers bloat and then stretch and stretch till they’re thin and cackly like a witch’s laugh.
Every surface is a dance floor.
If you don’t believe in love at first sight… you’ve just forgotten the first time you met. I want to travel back lifetimes and meet again for the first time.
Gold is our color. Rich, pagan, a houri on a block, painted queen and lion eyes.
I’m a word. So are you. The word is the biggest secret of our lives. Most often it is hidden even from ourselves.
If the world was simple a kiss would just be a kiss.
I’m waiting to slip sideways into another world. Imagine how exciting it will be. Poof. Sometimes I think I have. Women in saris fly on bears for their honeymoon. Once I was hurt, I lay down and became an icicle. I’d love to mix up the worlds so that everyone was traveling to and fro and then one day you’d all visit and I’d show you around.
I promise to do better tomorrow are the only words I always mean.