LifeZamaZing

YEAH, it’s holi time and you can already feel it in the air.

Suddenly there are advertisements about skin care lotions and safe herbal colors/gulal and hair oil and people in rin-ki-safedi-white clothes and then there are colors splashing all over them.

God! now it is the commercials that remind you of the festival’s coming than anything else. Well, but this year we had some different reminder as well. You see, holi is really famous in Rajasthan and it is as good as diwali for them. And since holi is coming we had a few unsolicited Rajasthani guests on Sunday morning. They came up early morning (well, it was 10 am but on a sunday that is early to me!) and started singing aloud with manjiras and a dhol-like instrument (which i am going to call dhol now onwards;))

It was a couple with their teenage daughter and one more companion. The daughter was so trained that she started dancing as soon as the dhol started playing. It was in perfect synchrony. And there was an odd indifference about the way she did it. She really did not care to feel the fact that she was in an alien place with people’s eyes zooming in on her. She had only one sense of knowledge- like Arjun’s vision of the bird’s eye- and that was the taal of the dhol. If the dhol plays she dances around in a typical fashion, if it stops she stops abruptly as if she weren’t dancing at all. And her dedicated indifference was most highlighted when i started taking pictures of her. Others in the troupe cared to look at me, she did not even grant me that pleasure.

But anyways, we were talking holi. And yes that is what they had come for- collecting money in the name of holi. You could call them beggars, nuisance, pain, alien or anything else but the fact is that i liked to be reminded of holi by them rather than the shampoo ads. Somehow they gave holi the touch it deserved! A touch of colors, a touch of LOUD and unclear music, a touch of incomprehensible lyrics, a touch of mitti, a touch of des and desipan, a touch of indianness!

Yes, indianness is what they brought about. Something that the fancy hair oil ads missed out.

[P.S.- Please excuse the pathetic lighting in the photos. I clicked them with a mobile phone and could not manage better lighting. These are the best out of 7-10 pics i clicked, so just make do with them ;)]

Popularity: 58% [?]

Well, Nita tagged me for a meme she was tagged for and hence here i am writing (thinking more than writing) in response to the Movie Quirks meme.

I am not much of a movie buff (i prefer books). But since Nita has made me put my thinking cap on i have come realize that there ARE a few quirks that i would like to share. So, here i go. I hope you enjoy them and please feel free to comment.

• I hate to land up in some Hindi movie which is good for nothing and has no story to tell. I can’t stand it and would always prefer to walk out than suffer through the three hours. (Diagonally opposite reaction as compared to Nita and Amit’s)

• And because this has happened to me more than once, now i usually do NOT go to a movie (especially hindi) until i have a review about it from some authentic source like, say Nita
• I like romantic comedies. And i like to flow with the movie. If it makes me cry- i cry; if it makes me laugh- i laugh and i laugh LOUD; and if it makes me feel like walking out- i walk out.
• i have never been to a theater for a movie all by myself and hence i think i would be really depressed if i were to ever go for a movie without some sensible company. As such i always have Abhi to fall back on so not a problem so far.

• I am a Gulzar fan. Though he hardly makes films any more but if there is a movie by him- i would not wait for a review. And he is only exception.
• I love to see the extra shots in the end that are there at times in certain movies. Like the ones where they show a few shots which were ruled out during editing (i think it is there in Liar Liar). U know where you get to see how many re-takes went in filming the shot that we never even paid attention to. For that matter i even liked the ending sequence of Om Shanti Om. It was cute
• I like RGV’s movies ;). I know i am asking for trouble by saying this but don’t judge him only by his Aag! I mean he has given some REAL nice movies (For example Sarkar, Satya, Rangeela, etc.). At least he has a different angle than the usual run-of-the-mill movie-makers.
• I hate mobile phones ringing in the theater and hate the people coolly chatting over the phone all the more. For that matter i even get annoyed with those who fiddle with their mobiles during the movie. You know the ones who keep playing games or sending SMSes. If they are behind me it doesn’t matter but somehow i always find one such person right in the next row. And every time his screen lights up in the dark it snatches my attention from to movie to see his stupid handset!
• And as most of us do, i too hate people passing comments constantly during the movie. It’s such a pain. And at times i have ended up confronting them asking them to keep their mouths shut.
• I love to see couples cooing and cuddling around during the movie. It’s like a breach of privacy i know but i enjoy doing it!

Popularity: 75% [?]

This is simply fascinating. Came across it when i was stumbling upon things and this really amazed me.

“On a cold Saturday in New York City, the world’s largest train station came to a sudden halt. Over 200 Improv Everywhere Agents froze in place at the exact same second for five minutes in the Main Concourse of Grand Central Station. Over 500,000 people rush through Grand Central every day, but today, things slowed down just a bit as commuters and tourists alike stopped to notice what was happening around them. Enjoy the video first and then go behind the scenes with our mission report and photos.”

(From http://improveverywhere.com)

You can check out the full article here.

Popularity: 73% [?]