Happy Diwali!

Here's wishing you all a wonderful Diwali and a great year ahead!
Pic courtesy: http://www.gheehappy.com

What I've been up to

Now that I’ve started working from home, I’ve started reading voraciously and I love the anticipation of deciding which book to read next, thinking about the books, and then occasionally, blogging about them. So my next few blogs are some book reviews.

Kitchen Confidential - Anthony Bourdain

I love "No Reservations", a show hosted by Anthony Bourdain, a no-nonsense, bad-ass guy who also happens to be a chef. He's brutal about the restaurant business, absolutely detests vegetarians and spares no bones (no pun intended) with anyone in the food industry. I see him as the "ultimate cool guy"; raw, unapologetic, gritty, creative and adventurous.

His memoir does not disappoint; I didn't really get all the French and Italian words related to cuisine, but learnt some new ones. A fast-paced, very well-written read.

Rant – Chuck Palahniuk

Chuck Palahniuk is at it again with another of his bizarre novels. His protagonist is as usual, a bored-out-of-his-mind suburban kid who likes to contract and spread rabies. He then joins a club where people bang into each-other’s cars to achieve immortality. It gets weirder, but I’ll spare you the details. Two words should suffice here – “skip it”; watch/read the “Fight Club” instead.

The Language Instinct - Steven Pinker

My favorite of the lot. It talks about how language is “hard-wired” into all humans, and gives explanations about how language evolves over time; why kids exposed to more than one language pick up languages much better than adults; and (surprisingly) how deaf-dumb people pick up the sign language. Of course, the best part about it was that it was scientific enough for me to appreciate it; while at the same time explained in lay terms.

In the Miso soup - Ryu Murakami

Fast moving thriller. I liked the intimate look at Japan’s sex industry, and the seemingly orthogonal view of Japanese culture and the woman’s place in the work force in their society. It seems to be a very male dominated society; teens are extremely fashion-conscious, and lonely, while adult women seem to be very regressive and following in the men’s heels. I might be making some really untrue statements here, but that’s what I thought after reading the book, and from scenes from Babel.

The New Life - Orhan Pamuk

“The New Life” – a little too esoteric and out there for my taste, I picked up this book because I thought I’d try something different. I was a little disappointed that I didn’t quite enjoy the book. I love the way time-space seems to collide and intersect in movies, but I just didn’t feel it in the book.

Yet another cliché of a movie

1. The title is the one I hated the most - it's regressive, the word "daag" seems straight out of a medieval novel, and I feel really angry about it, and that's why it doesn't figure anywhere on this blog post.

2. Jaya is definitely trying to usurp Nirupa Roy from the not-so-desirable position of whining mom, helpless wife and sacrificing mother. She seems almost demented in some scenes.

3. Give us a minute dose of reality, and we the viewers will willingly take it. But oops...we're talking about Yash Raj movies here. The mansion of a house (which of course is justified as a white elephant); the late night sewing sessions of the aforementioned self-sacrificing mom in darkness, the Catlic sidekicks with bad Hindi/English, cliché after cliché of ghise-peete dialogues - here's one - "I'm marrying you because you're the only (whore) who knows her Hanuman chalisa"!! What! - where did this come from? As far as Suketu's novel goes, most of the sex workers come from very poor families, and are very god-fearing.

4. One last silver lining - I'm sure the classical purists hate her for selling out to mass media, but I quite liked the Shubha Mudgal's remixed version of the title track.

At the Guggenheim

Last Saturday was a virtual overload of senses. We went to the Guggenheim in the afternoon, and then the evening show of the Phantom of the Opera. I was really impressed and overwhelmed with the collection and the exhibitions, and of course the interior space at the Guggenheim. I literally got goose bumps when I saw the famous paintings that I had seen only as postcards before in real life, so close that I could smell the paint on them (well, ok I exaggerate). Early Picassos, Kandinskys and Légers made the afternoon really memorable.

The Phantom of the Opera

We were in NY for the labor day weekend, where we had a mini reunion of sorts with some high school friends and finally managed to catch the longest playing Broadway show ever after so much anticipation. And boy, it did not disappoint. The sets, the music, the acting and the costumes made it a real treat! I loved the Phantom's lair and the smooth ride in the boat. Candles and wrought iron cages and smoke appeared from nowhere and disappeared just as seamlessly. If Lalunadiosa is to be believed, the show was nothing compared to Les Misérables, but that didn't stop us from raving about it.

The Sopranos

I'm only about 8 years late in joining the fan club, but the Sopranos is an awesome series, and L and I are hooked. I love the slick direction, the crisp dialogs (and the Italian accents), and the way all the characters are fleshed out.

iEconomics

I know you've had enough of iPhone and iPod related news, but this article offers a fascinating insight into the complexity of globalization and how the iPod is really much more than the sum of its parts.

(Picture cropped from a graffiti-styled white wall of the MOMA)

Stumbled upon something really cool...

The basic premise of this site is that our experience online, most often called "surfing" is more likely a stumbing experience. We search for something, click on the link, don't like it, go back, click on some other link...you get the picture.

StumbleUpon is a great site to discover new sites, tag them with a thumbs up or down. I've found some really cool sites this way, and what better way to pass your time than stumbling through websites? I love their Firefox extension, so a cool site is just a click away!

The Reluctant Fundamentalist

Read this book in literally a day. It's a wonderful book with a view from the other side of the fence. Whoever is tired of the jingoism in American politics, and the paranoia surrounding terror, will not only relate; but also empathize with the protagonist Changez. It's a narrative storyline of a disillusioned Pakistani Princeton graduate, as he relates it to an American interviewer.

It's very easy to think that this story is autobiographical. This is how Mohsin Hamid (the author) answered this Q in his interview: "People often ask me if I am the book’s Pakistani protagonist. I wonder why they never ask if I am his American listener. After all, a novel can often be a divided man’s conversation with himself."

Some Photoshop fun

A solarized image using the Filter > Stylize > Solarize option in Photoshop Elements. The image looks too dark, so adjust the colors by using the Enhance > Auto Levels option. The end result is a cool, pop-artsy look.

Old San Juan

Old San Juan mesmerized me with the cobbled-stone alleys, the curio shops, and the vibrant colors on the walls. What fascinated me was that seemingly ordinary buildings and in fact even chain stores used these colors to create an effect of harmony and vibrancy. Of course, the city has done a great job in maintaining this effect, and it definitely is not a coincidence that the redeveloped section of Old San Juan where El Morro, and the galleries are, also have repeated this architectural style. The architecture in San Juan seemed to be a medley of Spanish and island architecture - no wonder it seemed like I was in Goa. Featured pic (the ubiquitous Burger King – San Juan style)

Puerto Rico!

I'll let the pictures do the talking for you. Watch this space for posts on our travel.

The Flintstones...

I really thought I was reading some kind of a bad, ignorant joke. A creationism museum has opened in the heart of Jesus country extolling a universe where creationism rules, and evolution, securalism and pure science are ridiculed. I was really appalled when I read this article. I feel sad for the parents and their kids who are planning a trip to this myopic universe. Up next - an exhibit showing how the earth is flat and how the sun revolves around it.

Five things you don’t know about me

Petty-Change tagged me, and since you already know that I can be a real slacker, I'm just going to link you to a very similar post that I had blogged about almost a year ago.

Shear Genius!

I don't consider myself a very logical person, but I'm always intrigued by paradoxes and oxymorons...though I will not be inclined to draw any derivations out of them - just something to tease the brain, and I'm happy. Here's one very interesting one:

A very dedicated barber shaves all men (and hirsute women) who do not shave themselves. Under this scenario, the question is "Does the barber shave himself?"

Check out the rather above-my-head explanation here.