the golden age of the fatherland.

now playing: kissing the lipless, the shins.

just returned from chennai today. maybe staying in mumbai too long has made my immunity to the charms of various places a tad weak. or maybe with time, space, effort and change, i've learnt to disassociate myself from the horridness of chennai. perhaps, it has really come a long way. whatever it is, chennai 2007 will be the golden age of all my visits to the fatherland.

the purpose of this visit was to attend a wedding of a cousin (not blood ties, rather, a legacy of friendship that my grandfather continues to nurture). it was in equal parts beautiful+emotional and ostentatious+disturbing. nonetheless, it happened and this paved the way for a long, deep introspection session which will eventually be shelved for want of a feasible solution until i'm forced to think again. actually, the various aspects of the chennai trip tied in to create a reasonably unwanted introspection session when i'm already in the throes of turmoil. i don't want to tap the turmoil potential now, though. it's something i'd rather leave buried in the yard.

i never imagined myself growing so fond of a city which i disntinctly loathed the first time i set eyes on it. there were certain moments, though, which i relished even back in the dark ages especially the mandatory visit to nalli (mumbai nalli cannot top it or even come close to it by a mile). though it's expanded to almost unimaginable proportions, that heady smell of mallee (flower like jasmine) in the air conditioning still greets you through open doors of the whitewashed institution as you walk in from the hot, sultry streets of panagal park. small time shopkeepers selling everything from flowers to bangles and bindis to amla, ginger and green pepper and fruit by the plate stand discreetly near the entrance enticing you with the sheer riot of colour. nouveau riche joints like saravana stores, rmkv and the like really draw the junta but they possess none of the charm, tradition and classiness that nalli does.

let's be fair here, though. it isn't as if nalli is the ultimate place to shop but certainly is a good place to start. there are reasonably established places like rangachari and radha silks (rasi) as well as tiny boutiques that pepper the chennai clothes-shopping landscape. personally, i have a fondness for shopping in exclusive nooks with a relaxed, cozy atmosphere. these blink and you miss places were a huge factor that caused chennai's ratings soar in my books.

another important factor in any place is the food. it can really make or break not just a city but an entire region, especially in a country like india. sadly, though, the food in chennai isn't nearly as good as some of the other places. in this respect, bangalore and ahmedabad are far more passionate about food and you'd have a handful of well priced places that can surprise you with sheer innovativeness at best and run of the mill but mouth watering fare at the least. even the coffee wasn't as orgasmic as i'd like it to be- this was a massive sore point.

rediscovered the hindu, chennai edition. in a day and age when you have the internet and 24 hour news channels for the daily dose of happenings in the world, you really don't need newspapers. there are very few publications that can actually make print journalism seem worthwhile despite newer media springing up with an almost alarming regularity and the hindu, chennai is one of them. it really doesn't get better than this- the brilliant and consisitent quality of writing, the complete grasp of information that the hindu journos possess over the subject and the razor sharp editing and proofing are the reasons that the hindu doesn't have to shout out its presence unlike its counterparts like mumbai. good journalism doesn't require guerilla marketing, twisting figures of abc/ readership surveys or witty taglines on hoardings. it just requires a tubelight hoarding with nothing but a masthead that lingers permanently like a polite sigh over this southern metropolis' changing landscape.

there are things that i long to talk about but can't for lack of ability to pin down my expressions and arrive at why they affected me the way they did- little signs, small places that would seem insignificant at first but which would, in retrospection hold the key to where chennai is going to be. there are places, too, that i couldn't see which i wish i can in the near future. nonetheless, as change blossoms, in erstwhile madars, one can only hope that it escapes the rut that the other megapolis have fallen into and retain its individuality or if nothing, let stand the whitewashed facade and mallee atmosphere of nalli, panagal park.

Macchan, macchan, macchan ne...

Rajnikanth is one of the greatest common denominators of pucca Southies all around the World. You're a qualified southie if you like Rajnikanth. You're not Southie if you don't.

History textbooks will speak of Shivaji Rao Gaekwad's invasion of Tamil Nadu as more potent than any previous Maratha invasion. He's got the charm, the grace and that spark to tap into the pulse the tamil speaking conscience which Chhatrapati Shivaji didn't possess.

I digress, though. My intention is not to carry forward further information on Indian Journalism's topic du jour.

Sivaji is an IT hotshot who has returned from the 'States to do his bit of Corporate Social Responsibility and the not so noble intention of producing spawn to add to the already burgeoning population of the Indian subcontinent.

Noble intentions (CSR) are thwarted by red-tape system and Iyengar named Adiseshan. There comes a point where our hero is penniless but strikes back at Adi by playing his own game. Having accomplished his main mission, he goes on to save all of Tamil Nadu and in the meantime, marry the woman of his dreams.

Moral of the story: Micro finance is going to put India in the G-10 by 2015.

Sivaji's Production Values were what left me screaming for more. In order of what impressed the most- gorgeous camera work, slick action sequences, superb makeup (let's face it, the 58 year old Rajnikanth shed about 20 years. Easy.), brilliant dialogues (execution was wonderful- kudos to all the actors, not one of them was shoddy.), good clothes (I think this is possibly the best that the Tamil entertainment industry has seen by far. Out of a period movie, that is. Naturally, there were glitches including this unforgivable one where the lead actress' boring beige underwear was showing when it shouldn't have.), lovely background score (the songs were just okay, dances didn't excite.)

High points of the movie: Rajnikanth-Vivek chemistry. Rajnikanth and clan pataoing Tamizhselvi (Shriya). Rajnikanth. Move over, Superman, Batman and Robin Hood.

south of the border, west of the sun

i don't remember the last time that i felt *this* depressed after a book.

"south of the border, west of the sun" really fucked up my circuits and it's getting me to evaluate murakami's position in my favourite authors list.

it's standard murakami- fucked up characters, strange incidents (including strange sex) and all the trappings of a consumerist society that's beyond redemption.

but this one was just depressing simply because of the idiocy of the central character- hajime. and the fact that this was so uncomfortably close to the truth of my existence and that of my friends.

then again, murakami's magic realism and his short stories (at this point in time, i can't help but smile about "family affairs" and "kangaroo communique") really helps pull his act together to retain his position in my list of favourite writers.

1984 was paranoia. martian time slip was that inaccessible world. cakes and ale will always be fascination. everyman redefined loneliness. the 100% perfect girl was love. and south of the border, west of the sun- it will be loss.

the wiki.

maybe i'm just spending more time actually browsing these days, but it seems to me that there are more wikis around than i previously imagined.

the first time i heard of a wiki was when my friend, A had/visited (not sure) a wiki outlining all the annotations on alan moore's v for vendetta.

some time lapsed before i stumbled on the wiki detailing all the er.. "happenings" connected to nine inch nails' year zero (for the uninitiated, check out the link which is my post before last). Today, again, i was reading the wiki dedicated to warren ellis' "doktor sleepless". Of course, there are all those artist wikis on last.fm...

the wiki concept is one solid step ahead to making sense of the information overload. i don't know whether academicians use wikis or not to organise their references, but considering the massive bodies of work that they reference and cross-reference, it would be a fairly prudent thing to do.

from what i could gather of warren ellis' interview on comicbookresources.com, the wiki can also be a sort of an extended back matter- it goes beyond the standard 2-3 pages that comes with the printed edition and helps create an entire context, particularly for readers not quite familiar with ellis...

"It's there to gather up all the information inside the book...There's more information written than could possibly be fitted inside the narrative of the comic itself -- at least, not without completely distorting the shape of the narrative and doubling the book's run. It's also there for people to play with. There's a complete backdrop and mythology to 'Doktor Sleepless,' and the wiki will allow people to make connections between it all, and perhaps see what some of the characters are really up to... I was inspired by the 'Lost' wiki project, where the first connection was made between a screenshot of the 'boatbillies' and the Dutch scientists involved in Dharma. If you work hard enough, then you can provide enough material that interested readers can find a whole new level of engagement with the work."

dreams and the endless

i promised that i'd write on experiential marketing.

instead, i'll write on the sweet, seemingly endless sleep of hashish- it's an experience to be cherished, especially since sleep in otherwise normal circumstances is a fleeting, furitive presence.

add to that the heat waves that linger when the summer sun is long gone, the sweat streaming from my body and the lack of desire for anything worth living for.

i realise now, though, that writing about a hash trip ruins the very foundations it stands on... it's an esoteric bond between the individual and the endless. i don't know and i won't comment on who is worthy of it, what the best hash is or why it is taboo.

all i know is that i long to bow down to the endless and get enveloped in parvati's womb. over and over and over again. for the dreams of hashish are the elements of the endless.

year zero

experiential marketing.

slowly speed my aching need...

on this space that has been christened raskolnikovna, i thought i'll probably do a series of essays on "globalization", particularly the fallacies of the term "anti-globalization" and how it belies a cause that's perhaps a shining testimony to the concept of "globalization" itself

however...

a. this requires much reading and reference work and all that fancy academic shit.
b. i was listening to 12 rounds this morning.

12 rounds can be classified as post-rock, industrial and shoegaze... as is my wont, i can't and i won't genrify the band. 12 rounds is not the kind of band that would induce you to take up suicide attempts or serial killing or pissing off born again christians as a full time occupation.

what makes the genius of claude sarne and her buddies refreshingly different are the totally off the kilter lyrics rendered in the smokiest, huskiest voice since beth gibbons of portishead. smokier and huskier, even.

oh, and if you do feel a tad doped, don't be surprised, 12 rounds does that to you sometimes.

do sample the lyrics while the going is good...

Sodomize the rage in space and watch your red red sky
Fill my heart with happiness and give me reasons why
Slowly speed my aching need no more so old so new

Breathe in me don't fight just be
Call your own come be my home

Ripped up sideways chained to Always
Spread so wide so true
Scratch the very life that fed
And sucked his fingers blue

Breathe in me don't fight just be
Call your own come be my home

Love the way he puts it
ripped and chained but I loved it
In as much

Strange daze