Thursday, January 20, 2011

From a student - Aditya Goel  - The juvenility in a child's thoughts, the full play in his actions, the range of his imagination, compel me to wish if each person could be as innocent, and not let facts get in his way. As puerile as it could get, your imagination will keep you calm in tribulations; and who knows, one of those unconventional dreams might come true.



ख्वाबों के किस्से,
अगर सुबह से होते,
अपने मन की करते,
और मीठे सपने पिरोते.

अपने नामों को लिखना,
गीली मिटटी में होता,
हर रोज़ का गुस्सा,
बस किताबों से होता.

डर वोह मन का,
सिर्फ माँ से ही होता,
हर झूठ, हर रोना,
एक खिलोने में खोता.

रियासत के किस्से,
झूठी कहानियों में होते,
और उनके हिस्से,
हम सोते ही होते.

कभी परेशानियों में,
वोह मुस्कुराना सच्चा होता,
क्या दुनिया वोह होती,
जहां हर कोई बच्चा होता.

- आदित्य गोयल

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Soar Beyond your Fears!

Once there was a king who received a gift of two magnificent falcons from Arabia. They were peregrine falcons, the most beautiful birds he had ever seen. He gave the precious birds to his head falconer to be trained.

Months passed and one day the head falconer informed the king that though one of the falcons was flying majestically, soaring high in the sky, the other bird had not moved from its branch since the day it had arrived.

The king summoned healers and sorcerers from all the land to tend to the falcon, but no one could make the bird fly. He presented the task to the member of his court, but the next day, the king saw through the palace
window that the bird had still not moved from its perch. Having tried everything else, the king thought to himself, "May be I need someone more familiar with the countryside to understand the nature of this problem." So he cried out to his court, "Go and get a farmer."

In the morning, the king was thrilled to see the falcon soaring high above the palace gardens. He said to his court, "Bring me  the doer of this miracle."

The court quickly located the farmer, who came and stood before the king. The king asked him, "How did you make the falcon fly?"

With his head bowed, the farmer said to the king, " It was very easy, your highness. I simply cut the branch where the bird was sitting."

We are all made to fly -- to realize our incredible potential as human beings. But instead of doing that, we sit on our branches, clinging to the things that are familiar to us. The possibilities are endless, but for most of us, they remain undiscovered. We conform to the familiar, the comfortable, the mundane. So for the most part, our lives are mediocre instead of exciting, thrilling and fulfilling.

So let us learn to destroy the branch of fear we cling to and free ourselves to the glory of flight.

Wednesday, January 05, 2011

Tees Maar Khan

So...I finally watched Tees Maar Khan. Despite strong protestations from so many, I had decided to watch it and watch I did.

Here's my take on the same.....

It was a different movie. If you have seen Hollywood spoof movies then you would understand this movie. I have seen at least three. I do not remember the names of even one but there are three I have seen. One is the spoof Hollywood action movies with exaggerations of the silly scenes of these movies. Then there was one which was about Superheroes and all the silly things of such movies, like wearing your underwear over your pants etc. being highly exaggerated. And then there was this movie with Angelina Jolie which was a spoof of Troy and some other American/Hollywood stuff.

What Farah Khan was trying was to make a spoof of Bollywood and its associated idiosyncracies. The Punjabi secretary (better pronounced as sectry), the Oscar crazy actor, the insider jokes over Danny Doyle and Manoj Day Shayamalan are clear cases to prove this.

However, where she fell short is that her self-referential locus could not maintain the centrality of the ideas as a result of the confusion of goals and hence the resultant amalgamation of ideas instead of the expected dichotomy of the two genres! In simple words, she forgot that she is making a spoof. End result, it is neither a movie nor a spoof. It is both and hence neither! 

It could have been way better had only one aim been maintained. She is two boats and hence in the water.