Category Archives: opinions

Personal opinion about culture, movies, books.

Pakistan Open

Islamabad: As a spontaneous reaction to the 31st May’s Bharat-Bandh in the friendly neighborhood country India because of the Petrol Price hike, Pakistan has decided to call a Nation-wide Open on 1st June in their country. They have decided to keep open all the roads, cinema theaters, schools & colleges, restaurants, shops, hospitals, Courts and their Senate and National Assembly which usually are closed owing to the threats from local nuisance creating groups. Also, the government institutions are generally shut down because of the callous and laid back attitude of the people working in these places as they don’t know who is in charge, the government or the army, rightly so, they shouldn’t be blamed. All the mentioned places and institutions will resume their services at wee hours of the morning and continue to remain open till the late hours of 1st June 2012. The local police authorities (heh) have cascaded this information among all the facets of the society, both terrorists and non-so-harmful-civilian population of the state.

A majority of the civilian population has welcomed this gesture by the government because they are happy that for the first time Government has decided to open and work. Prof. Qureshi, a well-known name in Pakistan’s Political Studies forum, and a regular in Times Now show with Arnab Goswami, from Lahore had this to say, “These Indians are always up to something notorious. Creating all possible measures to make Pakistan look like a minion. Which we are not. Yes. So this move by the government to open up against Bandh in India is a great way to show to the US that we want development here! They might give us some economic aid as a result. Nowadays, khafa khafa se sarkaar nazar aate hain. Hilary came to Asia but didn’t announce anything good for us. Tcha!”. Hina Rabbani Khar has decided to do a road show in Karachi to attract camera persons from media from all over the world and especially from India to let know that Pakistan can do whatever Indian can in a better manner and with a pinch of glamour too. But certain eminent personalities in the society are afraid that Indian Government might use up this working opportunity to create some mischievousness again. Mrs. Fatima Rehman, a women’s rights social activist said that “This useless Government always wants to compete with India. What is the need? They make missiles, we will make 2 missiles. They make Agni, we will make HATF, Arrey WTF, what was the need of this Open-Day? We are trying to be peaceful since some days now and now when everything will open, people will come out on the roads, some body mua from RAW will again disrupt the peaceful country of ours. We are happy this way!”.

Ex-Pakistani Cricketer, now a British citizen was also wary of this Open day concept. He has rather suggested to counter India by creating a Cricket league of their (Pakistan he said to clarify) own and try to attract the sponsors. He said that whatever he is saying, it is because of the fact that he considers himself a brand ambassador of Pakistan in the UK. He said that he is getting lot of moolah by playing in IPL as an export from England but he feels that  Pakistan can compete with India by creating a League where no Indian Cricketer is allowed to play. Though he suggests that Pakistan should not be showing too much arrogance and should allow Ravi Shastri as a Commentator and Mohinder Amarnath as a bowling coach because IPL also allowed Rameez Raja and Wasim Bhai there. Imran Khan has appreciated the ex-Pakistani and now a British citizen (like most of the Pakistani cricketers).

The terrorists clan of Pakistan has welcomed this decision and have issued a fatwa to not to kill anyone just like that, only if needed. They want to show that Pakistan can do a better job in Kashmir so they have planned to show off their strength by spilling petrol on the roads of POK, which they call Azad Kashmir, because petrol is just around Rs. 60 there in Pakistan.

(Disclaimer: It’s only a rumour that Pakistan is trying to stage a Pakistan Khulla. Their actual motive is to make India buy fuels from them and topple the Indian economy face first)

Critically Act Lame Post

Since the day I’ve became famous (heh, I’ve still got a bit of humor left in me) and was adjudged a movie buff, I’ve come across plenty of people/bloggers who kind of consider themselves as movie reviewers. Not that this is a new practice or path breaking stuff, people used to share their takes on the movies they watched earlier too, peacefully. I also shared my expert opinion about Tashan once and how much I enjoyed it but everyone is a reviewer now. Whenever a new movie, music album, TV show or even a trailer hits the web/TV, they come out and start pimping their expert reviews about the subject with the word go. This pimping continues every <insert your desperation limit> minutes on Twitter and other social media platforms till <insert your tolerance limit> until you click to read the review finally. And I have a problem with all that jazz.

Firstly, anything which is shoved up your face that read my review on this and that, becomes a turn off. But since we are on Twitter so I should better stay away from this practice.

Secondly, I firmly believe that nobody has any right to hold back anyone from sharing their opinion. Everyone is entitled to say what they feel where ever they want, whenever they want, how many times they want. My problem is just that while they are sharing their opinions, they forget that it is ‘their’ opinion and ‘their’ opinion only. I look for certain words and phrases in their blog posts which range from: in my opinion, i feel, i think, it looked like to me, my point of view is that, my conclusion, etc. And I found none. Nobody owns any copyright (heh) or any qualification to become a reviewer but point to note that it is you who is giving your opinion about a certain thing. What you have concluded cannot be the final judgement. Look around, the movies you had written off, say Housefull 2, to be a circus of non sense scenes and full of idiots, has earned more than what you could ever dream of. (I have not watched that movie and have no intention to watch crap) In a country of ours where opinions are so much divided that people can fight even over anything, even the way one glanced the other, how can you be so sure that your take will be even given any respect. You talk about technical details? Take a look at your own blog Sir/Madam and the aesthetics of the space from where you are announcing that the movie is a unedited series of ham videos not even worth of being shown in Bangladesh’s Funniest Videos but the movie ends up being a hit and the normal people actually enjoying it whole heartedly? What sense do you make out it?

Like they say, the best way to become famous now is to hit below the belt and when the person cries out in pain, take pics of him and put it on 9gag. Similarly, to become a critic, blast the movie off. Don’t become a constructive reviewer, no no no no no, how will you be famous then, just make fun of it, that is the right way, no? The most hilarious thing is the stars or thumbs up these reviewers give. This movie had bad direction, lets cut 1.523454 stars out of 5, this actor had slept with the producer’s wife, lets add 0.69 stars to it. This movie had brilliant music but all inspired from Asian and Arabic music, lets cut the stars from the rating by 2 bilangs.

Try doing something creative and let others judge you. Then review whatever you can.

That is my opinion. And i don’t expect you to follow it. But you should.

Dear Dr. Anjali, Why Sachin Should Not retire now!

Hello Anjali Tendulkar Ji,

I hope you are doing good, ahem, unlike your husband, err, no offence, as compared to his usual standards I mean. And what do I call you? Anjali Didi, Anjali Bhabhi or Anjali Aunty or let me call you Dr. Anjali, simply.

See Dr. Anjali, you all know him better than all of us, why does he adjust his abdominal guard every time before facing a delivery? Heh. Sorry. I mean you know what he goes through every time he comes to bat. More than a million people have already written that he carries the burden of billions of Indians who want him to perform every time he is out there in the middle. That pressure which he handles is enormous and no way anyone can even imagine. Still what he has achieved for the Country and himself is mind blowing. So no point writing about it again. This letter mainly focuses on the growing voices telling him to retire and all.

This ongoing CB Series is not going well for the Indian team as a whole. Sachin being a part of the team cannot be spared. When he was performing well say all his life and lately in the Cricket World Cup, everybody was quiet. And now when he is struggling, people are making jokes about him. Ex-cricketers who have nothing else to do other than giving expert comments are asking him to retire and hang his boots. Hanging boots might be difficult for him owing to his height but I also think that he should get retired. See the Aussies, they have all retired on a high note. Since I started watching Cricket, I saw Mark Taylor saying bye bye at the time he was brilliantly in form. Waugh Bros, Michael Bevan, Glenn McGrath, Mathhew Hayden and even Shane Warne bid adieu at the correct time. The best example remains Adam Gilchrist. These people will remain great. But, this Ricky Ponting, who is second only to the one who happens to be your husband tried to stick around. But Cricket Australia, the second strictest organization after the Nazis, dropped him and hence he had to say goodbye to ODIs disgracefully.

On the other hand, Indian Cricket has been sluggish when it comes to have an exit policy for the players. As far as I can remember, only Anil Kumble hung his boots at the correct time. All others have hung around. One of the best Captains we had ever, Saurav Ganguly, who played the most key role in shaping the team around the last decade so as to enable it to win the world cup under Dhoni, had the most shameful exit ever. Even the IPL franchisee didn’t want to bet on him. So, every voice from every nook and corner of the world wants your husband to retire NOW. Even I want the same.

But, see Dr. Anjali, if he retires now, history will be written. It will say, even though Sachin was, is and will be the greatest ever Batsman we could have, but during the end of his career, he was made to step down and not that he himself quit. It will be a small but visible blotch in his illustrative career. See, making 100 hundreds or one lesser won’t diminish his image. I cannot suggest anything to him as I am a nobody, but you can ask him to continue and keep all the allegations/advises/comments aside. I want you to tell him to go on and hit not just 1 but 10 more centuries and shut the critics up. I want you to make him believe, which he already knows, just that if you tell him, he will agree more, that if he quits when he is needed the best, I feel, his greatness, which needs no evidence to be proved, will increase many folds. Obviously we will miss the lofty cut over the 3rd man for six, the straight drive no mortal can play, the cover drive which goes faster than the Ravi’s tracer bullet cutting it in to pieces, the six over the long on which makes Shane Warne nights miserable but at least we will be slightly more happy to see him end on a high.

I have already promised to name my son Sachin, if I have a son and if the wifey (if I get married) agrees, I want you to tell him to stay.

Thank you Dr. Anjali, I hope your husband shuts up the critics one more time, for the last time though.

Still a believer that SachinIsGod.

That's Traffic!

Bangalore: The Garden City or the City of Bangalore (Bengaluru) has known to be a harbinger in many aspects as far India is concerned. While people in rest of India were still looking up in the sky in order to irrigate their crops with rain water, people in Bangalore were thinking ways of loosening up the pockets of people in USA who were looking for cheap labor, thus making itself the Silicon Valley of India. Bangalore became the first city in India to get electricity. It was the first City to get an Internet Service Provider and similarly, it has been the first to achieve things, other cities could only dream of achieving.

Not Silkbaord
Silkboard, as rendered from a commuter's dream while sleeping on the traffic signal.

While Bangalore was still in its nappy as in infancy, after the British had left, it gradually became Pensioner’s Paradise. Army Personnel and other retired people got shifted to Bangalore because of its delightful climate and peaceful environment. The city boasted of many gardens from which it bears the nickname ‘The Garden City’. This concept of making the city Garden-like, though, had some ill-effects which could have not been thought by the people then. As garden has narrow walkways, the architects of the city thought of playing a practical joke with the future residents of the city by making the main roads and streets as narrow as possible. Their vision of future Bangalore was as narrow as the possible and so they kept up with the legacy of being the first city to make narrow roads with heaviest traffic.

In a recent study, it was found that the traffic running on the roads of Bangalore is so slow because of pathetic traffic condition that even atomic clocks are finding it difficult to measure the speed. Chief Assistant of Bangalore Development Authority’s youngest son’s Girlfriend who also happens to be a team member of the research organization Search for Lethargic Objects WorldWide or S.L.O.W. told us that they came up with the speeds of lowest objects on this planet and surprisingly   they found that Bangalore traffic is slower than the slowest of the slowest things possible. While it takes 1 minute for a snail to travel 1 cm, it takes hours for a vehicle to even shake a bit to be measured. Turtle, Sloth all travel faster than the Bangalore Traffic. In some weird cases it was observed that it might take more than to deliver a baby from conception than crossing an important junction of the city called as ‘Silk Board’.  Of course we are talking about the gestation period of Eastern quoll of Australia and not humans. Though she added that it might be unjust to compare living entities with the speed of traffic. So, she showed the stats and figures that proved that even the Indian Postal Service can be called lightening fast when compared to BT. Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the former Prime Minister of the country, was known to complete his speech in lesser time as compared to time taken to cross Brigade Road on a vehicle.

Another series of experiments like time taken for ketchup to drip completely from a bottle was compared with the time taken to cross the Marathalli bridge, the time taken to login to Airtel’s Website was compared with the time taken to cross the Graphite India red light signal in Whitefield, the duration of an Ashutosh Govarikar movie was compared to the time taken in turning towards NGV from Forum Mall in Kormangala showed the same story that everything other than the traffic moved faster.

Initially, the study suggested that there are only pockets of city where the air is thicker as compared to the rest of the city. Thus, the viscosity of the air makes travel difficult. But then it was soon realized when the device used to measure viscosity viscometers didn’t reach at all the places because of the traffic itself and they had to be returned back. They were on rent, for your information.  The traffic police was not shy in poking fun at the fate of the people who travel on Bangalore roads by creating an outrageous upper limit of 60 KMPH for all vehicles. Demonstrations were held at Freedom Park against this inhumane sarcasm on the part of the traffic police. Though the demonstrations were not attended by much as they were stranded and stuck at traffic lights at various parts of the city so they were called off soon. To add to the fun, the BDA decided to start as many as 6 flyovers, underpasses on Outer Ring Road where there is basically no need but since they had extra money so no one complained.

To help the commuters from this draconian task of travelling on the roads, Namma Metro was devised and after spending millions of Rupees, the services finally started between places where there was no need of metro.

Finally, the research came to a conclusion that Bangalore can be a perfect spot for testing the Einstein Theory of Time Dilation as people travelling in other cities as compared to those who were on the roads of Bangalore tend to age quicker. Therefore, once again, living up with the tradition, Bangalore has been named as the first slow-motion city of India.

– An Agent Foobar’s Exclusive.