Robot. Dot.

In all my naivete, I used to once think that film-making is an art. Till I watched Robot, that is.
It was then that I realised that sometimes, film-watching is a greater art, requiring sublime patience to endure and sift through a three-hour (okay, leave out that last 45minutes) gaudy, kitsch-filled ordeal, in the name of hero-worship.

Robot, I am being told, is the costliest Indian film to-date, having sucked in a whopping Rs. 150Crores. To show for it, it has admittedly some of the best technical & digital effects, which have yet to be seen in any Indian movie. Specially the last 30-45 minutes do remind one of a Hollywood movie and are truly a treat to watch on the big screen.

But surely, a film is not just technology, is it? Even if it stars the biggest phenomenon called Rajnikant, it would do well for a film to have some decent emotional content, even passable music, and at least some semblance of acting from the supporting cast. Not here, unfortunately. Scratch the surface sheen and you would find, what I suspect, would be a purely run-of-the-mill Tamil film were it not for Rajnikant. Is that a strength of this top-grosser till date, I do not know.

I have to say that even though I am not sold on Rajni antics, and have not followed him in Tamil movies, Rajnikant is one genuine & honest actor, who I have always liked - right from Geraftaar and Andha Kanoon up to Hum. Somehow, he rises above the context. Which is why he is a superstar that he is.

Robot is all about Rajnikant. And some more. Rest is, as Chitti says - dot.

Out on the streets - ये गलियाँ, ये चौबारा

In this final instalment of photos, I present a random collection clicked while on the roads of Rajasthan:

Colors

इक लुक, इक लुक.....

इंतज़ार 

फुर्सत 

फेविकोल का जोड़?

लशकारा

Closer indeed  

हवेली, yet again

झरोखे 

दूर का राही 

Sunset, what else?

Havelis of Shekhawati - राजपूताना के रंग

During my recent trip to Rajasthan, when I passed through Shekhawati, I was lamenting the fact that I had not been able to see the famous havelis of this region. If you do not know, these havelis are private mansions of old Rajasthan - Rajputana, typically with intricate wood-work and beautiful al-fresco designs.
Imagine my pleasant surprise then, when the meandering road through the town suddenly brought me to a beautiful haveli, resplendent in the sunlight, calling out to us with its open doors. How could I resist its charms then?
Here below are some images:

I have resolved to take out a week-end for a haveli tour in the near future.

More travel photos to come in the next post....

पधारो म्हारे देस - Bikaner

This Deepawali took me to my hometown Bikaner after a long time.
It is difficult to look at one's hometown from a tourist perspective but I tried this time. And, the result is for you to see:

The Kacheri - Court Premises

Maharaja Ganga Singh Ji

Bikaner Collectorate in Diwali finery

Bikaner Collectorate, again

Keerti Stambh

Surreal - Collectorate, yet again

Baba Ramdev guarding over the street

Diwali Bazar

Labhoo Ji Ka Katla

Barber Shop Series - Kote Gate

Kote Gate

    In the next part, some travel photos..

Victoria's Secret or Victoria's Helmet?

A thing of beauty is....a thing of utility after all? 

It so seems from this bikini-clad mannequin serving as a helmet stand. 

Location? A cosmetic shop in Sadar Bazar, Gurgaon!!   

Happy Festive Season

Festive season is definitely not the preserve of only the malls and departmental stores, from the looks of this overladen pheri-wallah in Gurgaon:

So, here is wishing all of you the very best of festive season!

One World - Gandhi

आज २ अक्टूबर है - बापू की जन्म-तिथि.

आपको और हम सबको बधाई.

और गाँधी की सोच के जादू का एक नमूना यहाँ नीचे, इटली की एक टेलिकॉम कंपनी के विज्ञापन में-

Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 6

The posting of this series has been somewhat irregular, mea culpa. But I hope you are enjoying reading it as much as I did. Here is the next part: 

(Continued excerpts from The Last Mughal by William Dalrymple)

As the sun set, the churches, mosques and temples filled again: the ringing of the bells of the evening arti, the final call to prayer from the minarets, and the basso profoundo of the organ chords concluding Padre Jennings' evensong in St James's, all fusing together with rumble of British carriages heading out towards the Civil Lines through the bottleneck of Kashmiri Gate - where the bricking up of the second of the two arches was a cause of frequent complaints in the Delhi Gazette.

Delhi-RamageBradford-1870

As then gloaming thickened, the lights were lit in the Red Fort by a procession of torchbearers accompanied by tabors, trumpets and pipes, while out in the city the streets were filling with the Delhi College students and the madrasa boys returning in the half-light, exhausted from a day's hard study and memorising. The two streams would rarely mingle, however.
For the English, sunset was the beginning of the end of the day. They had another vast meal to look forward to - ......... but there was little to look forward to thereafter. The French traveller Victor Jacquemont was particularly unimpressed by the after-dinner entertainments offered by the British society of Delhi: 'I have not seen the slightest exhibition of pleasure among the idlers at [Delhi] parties', he wrote. 'None of the conditions which make a ball a pleasurable thing in Paris exist in the European community in Delhi'.
It was certainly true that the British community in Delhi were an eccentric lot, even by the standards of Victorian expats.
Certainly, the British in Delhi were always to some extent looking over their shoulder to the more Anglicised station of Meerut, which with its huge cantonment and large English community was famous for its theatre and its lavish regimental balls. But Delhi could boast almost none of that: 'There is little society here, complained one junior Residency official, adding that after he had finished his court work, he had little option but to take refuge in the company of his classical library.'
For the people of Delhi, however, the best part of the day lay ahead. Chandni Chowk really came alive only after sunset, as the pavements swelled with wide-eyed boys from the mufussil or Jat farmers and Gujar herdsmen in from their villages in Haryana, ogling the gamblers locked in the stocks outside the lotwal or heading off to ask for blessings and good fortune  at the city's matrix of bustling Sufi shrines. Elsewhere could be seen gentlemen visiting from Lucknow in their distinctive cut of wide-bottomed pyjamas or tall, bearded Pathan horse traders fresh in from Peshawar and Ambala, spilling out of the sarais and in to Ghantawallahs, the famous sweet shop, whose laddus were supposed to be the best in Hindustan. The coffee houses - the qahwa khanas - were filling up now too, with poets reciting their verses at some tables, scholars locked in debate at others.

Photo courtesy: http://oldindianphotos.blogspot.com/

On the steps of Jama Maszid, the story tellers would be beginning their recitations, which could go on for seven or eight hours with only a short break. The most popular of all the tales was the Dastan-i-Amir Hamza, a chivalrous epic romance....) In its fullest form, the tale grew to contain a massive twenty thousand  separate stories, and would take several weeks of all-night story telling to complete, the printed version filled forty-six volumes. As listeners gathered around the Dastango (the story teller), at the other side of the steps, Jani the celebrated kebab man would now be fanning his charcoal. Delhiwallahs used to like surprise visitors from outside by taking them to eat there without telling them of 'the pot of hot chillis' with which Jani would marinate his kebabs.
(Contd..)

Also in the series:
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 1
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 2 
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 3 
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 4
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 5

One Hundred Years of Solitude

One Hundred Years of Solitude is a difficult book to read, to experience and to describe.
Epic in its proportions and ambitious in its ambit, it tells the story of generations of a fictional Buendia family set in Colombia, South America. Rich backdrop for an interesting story, which it is, no doubt.  All through the book, you are aware that this is no ordinary book. It is said to be a thinly disguised history of Colombia with some important historical markers, and inhabited by some very interesting characters and situations.
But, the narrative style, which has been eulogized as "magical realism", fails to rouse an average reader like me. Almost forever in third person, the narrative seemed to me trudging along like a tuneless song. It is with great effort that one sifts through the debris and finds the sparkling diamonds beneath.
Salman Rushdie described this book as "The greatest novel in any language of the last fifty years". I am sure I would read it once more to be able to rise up to it.

Gods on the Road

What does one do when one encounteres Shree Hanuman Ji and Ma Kali together on the main road in Gurgaon?

What else but bows one's head in reverence, marvel again at the stream of spectacles which keep on hitting one and click a picture for posterity?

Jai Ho!

शांति पाठ

अभी कुछ दिन पहले मित्र राहुल झाम्ब ने अपने फेस-बुक नोट्स पर बाबा नागार्जुन की प्रसिद्द कविता - "मन्त्र-कविता ॐ"  लगाई थी.

इसे एक विरोधाभास (आप कविता पढेंगे तो जानेंगे, विरोधाभास क्यूँ) ही कहूँगा कि इस शानदार कविता ने मुझे वेदों में लिखे इस शांति-पाठ की याद दिला दी, जो कि सामान्यतः हिन्दू धर्म से ही जोड़ा जाता रहा है  - 

 

कुछ समय पहले एक कैलेंडर पर इसका भावार्थ पढ़ा, जो कि आप से बांटना चाहता हूँ. मुझे पता नहीं यह कितना प्रमाणिक है, और ना ही इस के उद्गम के बारे में मुझे पता है (आपको पता हो तो बताएं), पर इस को धर्म की संकरी गली से निकाल कर इंसानियत के चश्मे से पढ़ा जाये तो बहुत सुन्दर भाव है:

शांति कीजिये प्रभु त्रिभुवन में, 

शांति कीजिये प्रभु त्रिभुवन में!

जल में, थल में, और गगन में,

अंतरिक्ष में, अग्नि-पवन में,

औषधि, वनस्पति, वन-उपवन में,

सकल विश्व में, जड़-चेतन में,

शांति कीजिये प्रभु त्रिभुवन में!

ब्राह्मण के उपदेश वचन में,

क्षत्रिय के द्वारा हो रण में,

वैश्य जनों के होवे धन में,

और शूद्र के होवे चरनन में,

शांति कीजिये प्रभु त्रिभुवन में!

शांति राष्ट्र-निर्माण, सृजन में,

नगर, ग्राम में और भवन में,

जीवन मात्र के तन में, मन में,

और जगती के हो कण कण में,

शांति कीजिये प्रभु त्रिभुवन में, शांति कीजिये प्रभु त्रिभुवन में.

एक निवेदन - "और शूद्र के होवे चरनन में" के अर्थ के बारे में मुझे शंका है, हो सके तो बताएं.  

Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 5

(Continued excerpts from The Last Mughal by William Dalrymple)

For Sir Thomas Metcalfe, a little to the south at the Residency offices of Ludlow Castle in the Civil Lines, the day's work was also nearly done: his various meetings were finished, the queries from the kotwal and courts were answered, his letters were written, and the news from the Palace had been studied, summarised and forwarded to Agra and Calcutta.
Soon after 1pm, as Sir Thomas was heading back to Metcalfe House in his carriage, his day's work completed, things were just beginning to stir in the Red Fort.

The City Of Delhi - 1850s (picture from www.columbia.edu)

Zafar was quite capable of rising early if a hunting expedition was in store but after a mushaira or a mehfil, he preferred to lie long abed.His day would begin with 'the arrival of the water women coming bearing silver basin and silver water pots. Morning prayers would follow, after which Dr Chaman Lal was on hand to rub olive oil in to Zafar's feet. A light breakfast followed during which the metre and rhyme pattern for the evening's mushaira might be discussed. Then Zafar would take a quick round of the Palace, escorted by his troupe of Abyssinian, Turkish and Tartar women guards, all of whom wore male military dress and were armed with bows and a quiver of arrows.
Afterwards, Zafar would attend to petitions, receive visits and gifts from his gardeners, shikaris and fishermen, administer justice; and then receive his ustad Zauq, who would help correct his latest verses. Occasionally, he might also receive his own pupils for composition and help correct their verses. 'Zafar was madly in love with poetry'.
A serious princely education at this period put great stress on the study of logic, philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, law and medicine. It was also expected, as in the courts of Renaissance Europe, that any truly civilised prince should be able to compose verse.
In his youth, Zafar was himself fluent in Urdu, Arabic and Persian, but had also mastered Brij Bhasha and Punjabi sufficiently to write verse in both. He was also, in his youth, a renowned rider, swordsman and archer and remained a crack shot with a rifle in to old age.
Breakfast in the Red Fort would often coincide with the light tiffin lunch served at 1pm in the cantonment.
For three hours, during seven months of the year, the Delhi afternoon heat emptied the streets, leaving them deserted: a blazing white midnight clearing the lanes and galis, and hushing the city in to uncharacteristic silence. In the cantonments, the sweating young soldiers tossed and turned on their beds, shouting to the punkah-wallah outside to pull harder.
In the city, however, inside the cool shade of the courtyards of the high-ceilinged havelis, life would continue as normal: the khas screens made of fragrant grass would be soaked in scented water and then raised over the arcades of cusped arches; beautifully woven shamianas would be raised in the projecting eves of the baradari pavilions. Those who had cool underground tehkhanas would retreat there, to continue uninterrupted the day's chores - sewing, letter writing and teaching the smaller children - and pleasures - smoking and playing cards, pachchisi and chess.
It was only towards late afternoon, around five o'clock, that things began to stir above ground and life returned to Delhi streets. The bhistis would be the first out, emptying their goatskins of water on the dust and chaff covering the roads; in their booths, the paan-wallahs would begin preparing their betel leaves; the kakkar-wallah or hookah-man would begin roaming the dhabas; the opium shops would soon be doing good business too. In the sufi shrines, the pace would also quicken, as the thin stream of afternoon devotees thickened to the crowds of evening, as the thin stream of afternoon devotees thickened to the crowds of evening,as the rose-petal sellers in the lanes near by woke from their squatting slumbers, and the qawwals with their tablas and harmoniums struck up the qawwalis: Allah hoo, Allah hoo, Allah hoo..."
Zafar, meanwhile, was settling down to his favourite early evening occupation of watching his elephants being bathed in the river below his apartment or looking at the fishermen at work. This was followed by an evening of airing among the orange trees of the Palace gardens, sometimes on foot but usually in a palanquin. Occassionally, when Zafar was feeling energetic, he would descend to the riverbank and go fishing, or spend the evening flying kites on the sand near Salimgarh. Sometimes he would send for Ghalib to keep him company and entertain him, though Ghalib did not much enjoy being an attentive courtier and found the whole  experience fatiguing.
(Continued..)

Also in the series:
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 1   
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 2
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 3
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 4

दवा-दारु

"दवा-दारु" का इस से बेहतर नमूना आप को शायद ही कहीं मिले! हमारे मिलेनियम सिटी गुडगाँव की जय!

Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 4

(Continued excerpts from The Last Mughal by William Dalrymple)

Mirza Ghalib

But the biggest draw of all were the poets and intellectuals, men such as Ghalib, Zauq, Sahbai and Azurda: 'By some good fortune', wrote Hali, 'there gathered at this time in the capital, Delhi, a band of men so talented that their meetings and assemblies recalled the days of Akbar and Shah Jahan.' Hali's family tracked him down eventually, but before they found him, and hauled him back tio married life in the mofussil (provinces), he was able to gain admittance in the 'very spacious and beautiful' madrasa of Husain Bakhsh and to begin his studies there" 'I saw with my own eyes this last brilliant glow of learning in Delhi,' he wrote in old age, 'the thought of which now makes my heart crack with regret'.

Chandni Chowk (By Michael Kluckner)

Meanwhile, on Chandni Chowk, although Mr. Beresford, the manager of the Delhi Bank, had been at work since 9am, it was eleven o' clock before the first shopkeepers began turning up. They opened the shutters of their booths, fed their canaries and caged parakeets, and began fending off the first of the beggars and holy mendicants who bounced coins in their bowls as they passed up the gauntlet of shops. Some of these figures were well known and even revered Delhi characters, such as the Majzub (holy madman) Din Ali Shah: 'He is so careless about the addairs of this world,' wrote Sayyid Ahmad Khan in a sketch of Delhi's most famous citizens, 'that he remains naked most of the time and when surrounded by a crowd is likely to break out in to intemperate language. But when the desirous seekers ponder over the words, they find that behind the outward senselessness there is a clear answer to their queries'. Some of the most revered mendicants were women such as Baiji, 'a woman of exceptional talent who spent all her life under a a hay thatch near the Old Idgah of Shahjahanbad. While conversing she often quoted Quranic verses...whatever she had said would take place exactly as she predicted'.
Out on the pavements, tradesmen too humble to have their own premises were now filling their appointed places: the ear cleaner with this pick and probe, the tooth cleaner with his bundles of neem twigs, the astrologer with his cards and his parrot, the quack with his lizards and bottles of murky aphrodisiac oils, the kabutarwallah with his fantails and fancy doves. Meanwhile, in their workshops off the main street frontage, away from the eyes of the passes-by, the jewellers were preparing their emeralds and moonstones, topaz and diamonds, rubies from Burma, spinels from Badakshan and lapis from the Hindu Kush. Shoemakers took their cured leather and began curling the toes of their juties on the last; the sword-makers began lighting their forges, the cloth merchants pulled out their bolts of fabric; the spice merchants smoothed into shape their orange-gold mountains of turmeric.

Chunnamal Haveli today (taken from Wikipedia)

In the largest premises of all, guarded by mace bearers, were the great Jain and Marwari moneylenders of Delhi with their family credit networks and groaning registers stuffed full of debtors' names, which included, after Mirza Jawan Bakht's wedding, Zafar himself. Down they slumped against their bolsters, dreaming of schemes for recovering the implausible sums of money they had so unwisely lent to the impecunious princes of the Red Fort - men like Lala Saligram, Bhawani Shankar and the richest of all, Lal Chunna Mal, the largest single investor in Mr. Beresford's Delhi Bank, in his massive and opulent haveli in Katra Nil.
Just as Chandni Chowk was waking up, 2 miles to the north, in the cantonment, the working day was already drawing to a close, and most of the soldierly duties were already completed. A bathe, a quick read of the papers and a game of billiards filled an hour or two, before the heat in the small brick bachelor bungalows became unbearable and all that remained to do until late afternoon was to sprawl around in "loose dishabille, reading, lounging and sleeping'. With little to occupy them most of the day, for many British soldiers boredom was the principal enemy they faced in India.
(Contd)

Also in the series:
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 1 
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 2 
Delhi - Those Times and Lives - 3