Blame it on the weather

I came across this comic strip in yesterday's The Hindu. Having a meteorologist father, it really tickled me. Hope it does the same to you. :-)

Loss of an identity

Today was my last official day at NCL, Pune. In the last one week I had been striving to get various signatures from officers of various departments on the No Dues Certificate, a necessary procedure to be carried out before leaving. Nothing made me realize the significance of it all as much as the act of returning my ID Card.

I had started off in NCL as a guest worker. For months I worked out of my own will, without the status of an NCL employee. So when I finally got selected as a Junior Research Fellow on a project and was issued an Id. Card I decided to always wear it showing it off as opposed to stowing it away in my bag or pocket. It gave me a sense of belonging. Every morning before entering the NCL gate I would put it around my neck feeling every bit important. So I felt really sad when I had to give up my Id. Card. There was a lump in my throat. It was as if I was losing a valuable part of myself.

In the evening while leaving the NCL premises as I walked the usual distance from lab to the gate I realized that from now on I could enter it only as a visitor, a guest. Its back to square one.

Julie & Julia and me

A week back I saw the movie Julie & Julia. The film interweaves the somewhat similar lives of Julie Powell (Amy Adams) and Julia Child (Meryl Streep), two women separated by half a century.

Julie Powell lives in Manhattan of 2002. She has a supporting and lovable husband Eric. She has an unsatisfying and a sad job. Her failed attempts at writing books have left her disillusioned. Her one solace is cooking.

Julia Child is the wife of a diplomat who finds herself living in Paris in 1949 because of her husband's posting. With nothing to do she starts taking classes to learn cooking. In doing so she discovers a passion and talent for it. Starting as a student she goes on to co-author a book, Mastering the Art of French Cooking. The publishing of the book was a journey of quite a few years during which she gets immense support from her husband Paul.

Julie Powell is an admirer of Julia Child. In order to give direction to her life she decides to take up a "project" of cooking all of the 536 recipes of Julia Child's famous book in 365 days. She also starts chronicling her day-to-day experiences of this project in a blog. As the year progresses the blog gains popularity and so does Julie. After a story about it in the New York Times she is contacted by several publishers and agents who are keen on turning her blog into a book. The film ends with Julie succeeding in accomplishing her mission followed by her getting to see the print copy of her first book titled Julie & Julia.

Comparing my behviour in the kitchen to the two lead characters I realized I am more like Julie Powell. There is a scene in the film in which in trying to bone a duck Julie Powell accidently spills the entire contents on the floor. The result is an angry woman venting fire and tears at the same time lying resolutely on the messy floor. It reminded me of one Sunday morning when I acted worse than this.

The story goes that I had begun the day by cleaning every nook and cranny of my kitchen. Having done with that I collected all the necessary ingredients in the mixer for making an onion chutney to have with dosas for breakfast. I made a little puree first and then added some more onions to it. But when this time I twisted the mixer knob it generated such a force that everything came spilling out. I was shell shocked. The chutney had spared nothing. Portions of it had landed on the walls, the slab, the stove, the nearby microwave, the floor, and ofcourse me. It was horrifying seeing what my squeaking clean kitchen had been turned into within 5 seconds. Angrily I cursed the mixer and myself. Mouthing venom and crying like a lunatic I attacked the kitchen with a duster and water raging vengence. I was a riot!

In my defense I am emotional when it comes to cooking. When dishes turn out well and I see my husband eating happily it is like the best compliment ever. But when its not so, it upsets me as if I have failed as the woman of the house in some big way.

I definitely must try to become like Julia Child. Her nature was so mild. She never blew up. Most importantly she was a happy cook. She enjoyed every bit of it whether she was able to flip the contents of the pan properly or not.

From this day forth I resolve to take things lightly in my trysts with cooking. :-)

3 Idiots

Some years back I was browsing through the bookstore Crossword when I noticed a book titled "Five point someone - What not to do at IIT!". I was attracted by the reference to my alma mater and bought it immediately. When I was through with reading the book I somewhat felt disappointed. It didn't make me any happier when I heard that Raju Hirani was going to make a film based on it featuring my favourite actor Aamir Khan.

3 Idiots released close to Christmas. Initially I wasn't in a mood to see it because of my grave doubts. The good reviews and the juntas comments on Aamir Khan's blog however got me curious.

For once I thought a movie managed to beat the book that inspired it. It had lots of witty dialogues, smart situations, and a decent emotional content. I enjoyed 3 Idiots. But I did not love it. Unlike the two Munnabhais and Taare Zameen Par it just did not leave me moved. Perhaps the film was too entertaining. I understand the need for telling a message in an engaging and lighthearted fashion. But everything does not have to be turned into a joke like the struggles which Raju's (Sharman Joshi) family faces in lieu of supporting his engineering degree. This is a story of many a students coming to study at IITs or for that matter at medical schools. For me it is not a laughing matter. The funny means by which the other two idiots Rancho (Aamir Khan) and Farhan (Madhavan) help Raju recover from his suicide attempt takes away from the seriousness of the situation that had lead him to take the drastic step.

Further, I thought that the teaching community had been unjustly represented only through the characters of the Dean (Boman Irani) and other professors who insult and make fun of the three lead characters all the time. There are three cases of suicide in it. The race for coming first and the grueling learning system adopted by the engineering college which are responsible for two of these deaths is never really shown.

Except for Rancho and Farhan no one seems to have pursuits beyond studies. You just have to attend one of the several competitions in the areas of dramatics, music and art or the events in the yearly IIT festivals to know this is not true. Innovative ideas are not exactly squashed either. In IIT Bombay's famous Robotics festival you can see innumerable displays of cutting edge designs developed by students coming from all over India to participate. It is now commonplace even in colleges to invite well established figures to deliver keynote lectures at special occasions to inspire the youth to use their talent.

I do agree when the film says that one must pursue what you are passionate about. Some in audience have wrongly come out thinking that it says don't be a doctor or an engineer. Instead it drives home the point that by all means take up that profession but only as long as your heart is in it and not just because it has been mapped by your parents for you from the time you were born. My point however is that you might not really know after class 12th what you want to be. You might need those years in college in order to discover yourself and your passions. Like it is for Farhan to come to a conclusion that he should afterall pursue photography. Of course he knows it would also require him to work hard and struggle but at least it would be for something he loves.

To give 3 Idiots its due it does tell us an important message which could have got lost in all the frolic and entertainment. In Baba Ranchod Das Chanchad's words don't chase success, chase excellence. If you do the latter then success will automatically follow. But if your goal is simply earning big bucks then at some point you may end up taking a wrong route to it. I loved what Aamir Khan said in an interview I caught on tv. Instead of asking our children how many marks they scored in tests or did they come first or second in exams we should ask them did they help their friends, did they do something nice or did they bring a smile on someone's face during the day. Then automatically the focus will shift from the running madly in a race to becoming well rounded individuals with caring hearts.

Love aaj kal

Having loved Jab We Met, I had been wanting to see its director Imtiaz Ali's next film Love Aaj Kal. My wish was granted only recently. Very simply the movie compares love in today's times (aaj kal) with the way it was in yesteryears through two story lines running in parallel.

Rishi Kapoor's dialogue illustrates this difference very well. He remarks that when he fell in love he started working so that he could unite with his girl while now work has become the reason for couples breaking up, a course which Saif Ali Khan and Deepika Padukone take in the film. Neither believes their relationship would survive the distance brought about by a change in jobs and so in a very normal conversation they decide to part ways amicably minus any tears. They continue to remain "friends". They meet secretly and pay more attention to each other than the new special persons of their respective lives. It has to take Deepika to get married to Rahul Khanna to realize that she is still in love with Saif Ali Khan! However, she shies away from telling him the truth because she finds out that this time he has landed a dream job which will take him elsewhere. So once again the two lovers find themselves separately pining. Many months pass before they finally unite to give the film the traditional happy ending.

One of the reasons Love Aaj Kal doesn't work for me is because the initial love story between the two protagonists is never built up. The magic or chemistry which is responsible for bringing them together is never explored. The dating period is shown in such a fast forward manner that there seems to be no depth in the couple's relationship and it is difficult for me as an audience to understand what is so great about the two that they are still hung up on each other even after splitting up. Moments before getting married to Rahul Khanna, Deepika meets Saif Ali Khan. Yet the two of them refuse to recognize the importance of the moment and do not even then acknowledge that things were never over between them.

The film depicts a rather sorry picture of the present youth which I do not agree with. Indeed today all women are not satisfied with only taking care of home. Men too are becoming increasingly supportive of their girl friends' or wives' career goals. Both are willing to go that extra mile for each other. Unlike the lead pair, they do not simply give up without even trying. I know of couples who have handled such situations well. Not that its easy. It requires a great deal of patience, faith, and love. But they'd rather be together even if from afar than not all. Sadly the film instead depicts its hero-heroine representing our generation, first as so practical in life that they are devoid of any emotion even when breaking up and later on as two confused people who are incapable of deciphering their own feelings.