1 missed call

"THINGS YOU OWN,END UP OWNING YOU!"
-BRAD PITT as TYLER DURDEN in FIGHT CLUB

almost more than a decade ago,wen cellfones were the LATESHT technology in india,very few of us may have had the chance to use or even see a cell.but gradually as the telecom industry flourished,rates wer slashed,incoming was made free,rates wer further slashed,handsets were made cheaper by the day and now DHIRUBHAI ka sapna has almost been fulfilled.ya thats right...having a cellfone isnt a big deal anymore.any aira-gaira-natthu-khaira like me has started using cellfones now. but i hav seen very few people who use this facility wisely.Seriously! so following are some of the trite situations which irk me off(arranged in ascending order of frustration)-

1. i m in a lecture(irrespective of how interesting it is!) and some one's cell rings.now thers a first time for everythin.may be he forgot to put it on silent,so u wud expect him to put it on silent now.but the phone rings again.now thats irritating!

2.i call up a friend on his/her cell. it keeps on ringing for a while and just wen i m about to hang up,he/she picks it up and

a)whispers,"dude,i am in a lecture(or a theatre)....i'll talk to you later!"
now y did u hav to pick up the call if u wudnt hv been able to talk to me at that moment? didnt u c the "call reject" option? first of all u risked urself by picking the call if u wer in a lecture or disturbed others if u wer in a theatre and on top of that BLOODY WASTED MY CALL! wow...lucky me,u'll talk to me later!!!

b)speaks slowly making it evident that he/she was asleep and says,"arrey...kya hua? i m sleepin now...i'll call u later" or "haan...carry on its ok..." and just tries hard to listen to my gibberish but hardly manages to stay awake thru it! then again i hav to hear the golden words,"arey i'll call u later".
wen u wanna sleep,u obvioulsy dont wanna be disturbed...SO Y DIDNT U SWITCH OFF UR CELL? or if u dont want to miss ur calls or messages U CUD HAV WELL PUT UR CELL ON SILENT(including VIBRATOR off!). and by chance if u had forgotn to put ur cell on silent,the least u cud do is just reject the call,switch it off and go back to wonderland. but no...! u hav to pick it up...make the groaning noise,put me thru a guilt ride and again BLOODY WASTE MY CALL!

3.THIS ONE'S THE MOST IRRITATING HABIT!
wen i go to a theatre to watch a movie,i really dont want to hear some idiot in the hall going,"arrey i am in the theatre...unh...BLACK FRIDAY dekh raha hun..BLACK FRIDAY...BLACK FRIDAY...arrey range nahi hai...i'll call u later...!" bloody shut up dude! i dont wanna miss an important dialogue of the movie because some raju called up his bro to find out whereabouts of the chapatis.

having listed out my encounters,i wud like to admit that even i may have been a bit careless with my cellfone once in a while,but that may have been an honest mistake,cuz i always try not disturb anyone while talkin on my cell. so kaha-suni maaf...! i just hope people understand that cells are meant for us to communicate with each other efficeintly and not to disturb or irritate each other efficiently!

shamie,
24th feb,2007.

Black Friday

About an year ago while watching the KIDCO-CANDY sponsored,poor video quality version of this awe-inspiring movie on my pc,I never thought I would be able to watch it on the big screen.....EVER! But as Inspector Rakesh Maria(Kay Kay Menon) avers in one of the intense scenes of the movie,"This time Allah was with us,else we wouldn't have caught hold of the maruti van(which actually leads to the prime suspect)...", even I believe that. Allah was with them and was definitley with ANURAG KASHYAP and so this masterpiece could make it to the theatres after so many verdicts were finally passed recently.

In bollywood it is rare that we don't see the age-old disclaimer,"All the characters in this movie are fictional and any resemblance and all the blah blah..",which even Mani Ratnam used in his GURU. Anurag opens the movie with "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind-Mahatma Gandhi" after boldly admitting that the movie is entirely based on the book by S Hussain Zaidi. The movie frankly places the real places and names the real names involved in the tragedy.The chapter-wise presentation takes you through the entire journey as a TRUE journalist(the meaning of which has been long-forgotten by our media giants) would.The performances are highly commendable.The show-stealers are of course Kay Kay Menon as the efficient and tactful cop,Pawan Malhotra as Tiger Memon who ruthlessly plans the entire massacre and Aditya Shrivastava as Badshah Khan,a helpless pawn of the executor(Memon) who is on the run trying to save his ass from the cops. Anything more realistic than the movie would be original clips of those times. Speaking of which,we are treated to some of these,like the destruction, the operations of the bomb squad,the interviews of a Pakistani Official,a Mumbai cop and many more.

The fate of such movies(the delayed release)makes me wonder- Will bollywood and its complacent audience ever accept,let alone appreciate,artistic talent in its purest form? Though lately,there has been a change in the trends of movie-making, I believe film-makers who want to be different and bold and want to narrate great stories in a simple way or vice-versa will always be over-shadowed by phony presenters who just want to make big bucks by t(s)elling the same old love stories or the revenge stories or the extra-marital affair-based stories garnished with the crappy song-sequences which in no way appeal to the classes.Nonetheless,guys like Anurag are never deterred by such set-backs,else we wouldn't have got this gem.

shamie,
10th feb,2007.