SHAMBOLLIC

2010-03-21T21:15:00.000+05:30

This is not funny

2010-03-13T21:09:00.007+05:30

I can only guess at the sensational and heart-breaking cases of Indian journos whose lives have been ruined by some charge of libel, or just the threat of it. I can only guess because so far I haven't read anything particularly impassioned on the subject in the liberal media. Perhaps it's because the real reporting these days is being done by bloggers. Anyway, there is absolutely no time for me to plead the wisdom of doing away with libel, moreover the links I'm going to splatter here, do all the talking on the issue. Simon Singh, author of 'Fermat's Last Theorem' and Guardian columnist, has written his last column for the paper. Indeed his career has come to a certain halt, as he deals with the legal headache of libel action brought against him by the British Chiropractic Association. The wrangle has already taken two years of his time and he says even if he wins the case, he isn't going to recover legal expenses.

In case we all forgot because it was so many years back, there was the nice case of ToI strongarming the blog Mediaah! into deleting posts/shutting down or prepare for legal action, for reporting too effectively on ToI's marketing journalism. Also, if you wanted to know how exactly Cyrus B gets away with his dangerous play on that show of his on cnn-ibn, keep guessing. I'm only guessing it's not all covered by this thing called liability insurance (presumably taken out by the channel). If it is, maybe blog hosts should be taking out such a thing for bloggers? I certainly would like to know what cover FakingNews is taking. No risk of action from Jolie-Pitt?
--
In other news, a certain nubile son of some Rhodsie scholar known for a snakey play and artsy movies, should try looking at his face in the mirror more often when he jerks off with his sock. Try wearing the appropriate expression when you jerk off. And don't speak, just grunt. Grime out. Time Out.

Beautifully tetrahedronal

2010-03-05T17:16:00.003+05:30

Buckminster Fuller's design for a floating city.
More and more.

Never believe

2010-02-22T16:08:00.000+05:30

Small items play big role in robust Dec industrial growth

Mahesh Vyas: Its rise and fall, according to the CSO

it's TATA

2008-08-12T21:45:00.012+05:30

(img)
As for Shambollique, it's 2 lips together aaaand shut.

Kwame Anthony Appiah

2008-08-06T00:14:00.000+05:30

2008-08-03T23:56:00.009+05:30

Hours after seeing photos of Infosys' appallingly bizarre aesthetics for its Mysore campus, I couldn't help afterimages of mangled wireframe domes, glass long-since shattered, cracked plaster, destitution, giant pan stains and general decrepitude. Why does Infosys just get it wrong in every way, especially in visible structure design. It seems they will it. There is that unforgivable imitation of the Louvre pyramid on Hosur Main. Wipro on the other hand, has built its equity and buildings and image with unmistakable class. Who cares if Premji's keeping most of the shares to himself? He's spread the wealth around handsomely. It's striking that every third person (xagg) you meet has done something for Wipro in some capacity, as for the dreaded agencies, I haven't come across a single one in town that hasn't done something for it once upon a time; what is entirely likely is the company is a serial agency-dumper which is perfect because ad agencies deserve to treated that way.

2008-07-28T14:08:00.000+05:30

4/4!!! and 1 pending. Now for the labour.

We mated with Neanderthals. Can we breed with other animals, too?

2008-07-27T15:03:00.004+05:30

pic Via

Pathetic

2008-07-27T14:51:00.000+05:30

1. People who flirt with news issues expecting to be taken seriously while trying to fit into every airy social grouping imaginable, mostly the kind of group that thinks it seriously profound to follow the trail of Israeli tourists in India in fashion and tour operator, down to their tour guidebook in Hebrew. Surprisingly apart from vocab like 'dude' which such a bpo-set must use, 'wannabe' is another favorite.
2.People who register companies because they had a few spare lakhs, ambition, money to launder from another company, something to gain from bidding for contracts/funding under another name. All that, but no idea.

2008-07-27T07:48:00.005+05:30

'If I can drive a car, I can do anything' is just one of the thoughts that dance in juvenile drivers' heads unexpressed but felt. You would think only vulgar residents of off-color cities like Delhi had that complex. But calm down - in that wholly underplayed but doubly-vexing way, possession of a car and the driving of it plays the same tiring power game here. 'I got the car' - what does it do for the driver? If they are already disposed to a mania for control - it gives them their kick while the hapless companion crouches supine on the side seat, powerless and subject, a spectator. If the supine has little choice in the company he keeps, in no time he/she will be overtaken by the need for ownership and actual use of a similar 4-wheel gadget, hoping to gain the latitude he was previously only witness to ... After a party, the animals disgorged on the pavement, 'who has a car?' is like 'who has the penis?' If you are in certain professions, the employment of such a vehicle and all its prestige significations (over the ubiquitous and less capable two-wheeler) feeds the the need to feel you are physically getting somewhere, doing things - indeed, covering ground. Some dafts deserve to be in petit bourgeioise professions where their attentions are cr(/l)owded out by gadgets, conversation, frequencies that prevent them from even considering the significant ratio of signal:noise.

2008-07-25T17:01:00.001+05:30

Epiphany 1: All that talk about how the exigencies of the Great Wars birthed a contingent mood that birthed an edgy passionate overdrive (creativity?) in bold movies, street fashion, music, art in Europe. Just made me think: that all the loadshedding, whether scheduled or not, is doing something of the same for our sweet little self-conscious Banglo. At least that works on the level of private work: like freelancers (with lances) who manage their own deadlines or if u can only fuck to radio, you hurry with it anxiously before loadshed.

2008-07-25T12:21:00.001+05:30

wauuuh! occasionally i love it when people get so worked up about something most others think was a tiny wada. Here is The Times food reviewer getting nicely worked up

"...It's not fucking rocket science. It's fucking pre-GCSE scansion. I have written 350 restaurant reviews for The Times and i have never ended on an unstressed syllable. Fuck. fuck, fuck, fuck...I am sorry if this looks petty (last time i mailed a Times sub about the change of a single word i got in all sorts of trouble) but i care deeply about my work and i hate to have it fucked up by shit subbing. I have been away, you've been subbing joe and hugo and maybe they just file and fuck off and think "hey ho, it's tomorrow's fish and chips" - well, not me. I woke up at three in the morning on sunday and fucking lay there, furious, for two hours. weird, maybe. but that's how it is..."

Sea of Poppies

2008-07-23T21:03:00.007+05:30

World's largest opium factory, Ghazipur, did you know. An indisputable review I read months and a respect for Ghosh I developed after a performance, has compelled me to decide to spend on Sea of Poppies. I would of course rather have access to the documents he plumbed, but this should do. Meanwhile, remembering to paddle for appointment in bosky BSK tomorrow aft.

2008-07-23T14:51:00.003+05:30

I want all featured. what is inside them

2008-07-22T13:54:00.001+05:30

1. I thought I appreciated this tomb place in lyon, but no. Cannot take anything so deliberate and pretentious. What should we think? The thinking that went behind it? A basic mistake. sorry
2. Does anyone have a Baedeker - vintage types?
3. Prefabricated Houses, at the Modern http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2008/07/18/arts/0718-DWELL_12.html
http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2008/07/18/arts/0718-DWELL_12.html
4. Wouldn't mind this: Perfumes: The Guide (Hardcover)
5. Reality shows are better suited to this kind of challenge: http://momahomedelivery.org/
6. Another article: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/18/arts/design/18dwel.html

NEWSFLASH:Brangelina expecting twins - get sextets! and EVEN MORE good news

2008-07-21T18:16:00.001+05:30

Less than a week after receiving a surprise set of six babies from the lady's womb, Brangelina were in for another surprise when the French gynaecologist who had assisted in the exceptional delivery, revealed in a statement this morning that a regular checkup 4 days after the delivery, showed that angelina was indeed pregnant again - only this time round she would be in for triplets only.
Ecstatic as this news should be for the couple that delight in such expansion, sources close to the pair informed us that this time, the celebrity couple were distinctly unamused. Already overlooked for his acting abilities, Brad has also failed as producer, all his last 23 movies having registered unprecedented negative box office returns. By most estimates, Angelina too appears to have careened to the end of her acting career as we know it, her increasingly exoskeletal structure leaving hapless scriptwriters to protest at the unnatural retrofitting of story to suit the actress. Not to mention the third world refugees who have taken affront at having an unatural ambassador foisted on them.
It is opined they may shortly have to surrender all their children to adoption with the option of redeeming them later when at least either one of their careers picks up, at which time, if they are still together they may even lauch their charges into the world of celebrity.

2008-07-20T08:35:00.001+05:30

To Dennis, thnx for some unspeakable help

2008-07-17T18:03:00.003+05:30

Doesn't take a brilliant to figure out, Gangaram's should be folding soon. Apart from the physical detoriation and scaling down of premises, stock and staff, the despondence in staff and management is almost painful to observe, and infectious. Now if only spreading the pain meant reduced misery for the individual; i don't know.

2008-07-12T22:13:00.006+05:30

The Marriage of Maria Braun

Fascinating - economic locked-in script, thrilling turns, unreal dialog. Both Fassbinder. A possessed Hanna Schygulla. Fela (a viewer) watched this cynically but managed to be gripped; how did this happen? I suspect Fassbinder intended this: something like a radio show is playing throughout in the background - this would irritate anyone at the start. You are not encouraged to judge/evaluate, just receive, the pace helps. And of course the dependence on subtitles that robbed more time off the possibility. He is not compelled to make sense; he wishes to throw off the bumviewer within bounds.

2008-07-08T20:57:00.004+05:30

First Monday
(Fire in the belly, run run run)
Content is not king (for his deftn of contentum)
Defeasible Reasoning
Event: 28th July

2008-07-03T17:02:00.008+05:30

On my visit to bfs today, Gkutty let on about a talk that's going to happen: About an hour before this month's bfs screening on the 25th, lawrence liang will speak on 'A touch of evil'. The paper was published in the Jan issue of Deep Focus. If any of you can make it, please do come prepared for what you can always expect from liang and secondly for crying out, an informed debate, for which it makes sense to have done ur own research on the history of censorship in cinema and if you can, his article. The article is not online but I can lend the copy to whoever wants it and will extract major points up here next week.
***Must learn my lesson: a burst of greed and hyperactivity made me break my no more ad agencies promise. zombie vibes were picked up. will say it again: no more. i will hereafter be happy with my modest gear -> power transmission assignments and look at educating myself in the plentiful spare time. blugh
***Alan Jonston, hostage for a year in Palestine some time back, returned to the bbc after the experience to host 'From Our Own Correspondent'. However his new-founded voice tone of irritating long-drawn resignation and abdication from interest, struck me straight off as tiresome and stultifying. As if to say he's been, everbody knows, through so much, he's earned the right to sound like this. The BBC is beholden but I think he should be asked to pick up or pack out. In a people's job you should be thinking of the stories you're presenting, no matter how mentally ravaged you were this time 2 years back.
***Wrk blogs bookmarkd: Frederick Noronha
http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/user/55
http://fredericknoronha.wordpress.com/
http://www.i4donline.net/june04/creatincontent_full.asp
http://www.tacticaltech.org/africasource2/blog
http://www.bytesforall.net/

2008-07-01T11:03:00.000+05:30

falling back on most deadlines- not at all happy about it.

“Where else would I get away with such mediocrity?” - Navdeep Singh (Director: Manorama Six Feet Under)

2008-06-28T12:09:00.009+05:30

Tehelka correspondent and profiler in current issue, Nisha Susan dishes out consistently good output - impressive. watch her.

When all's bled and done

2008-06-26T13:47:00.004+05:30

my title piece for bwg theme night: July 3.
(all amassing, causing lungs to limp)

2008-06-24T01:09:00.008+05:30

notes to my bricoleur:
Man as his own maker (Prolog)
The Craftsman (Review)
Inner-city Scholar
The Civitas of Seeing
Good work takes time

extract: "What I think of as urbanity is precisely making use of the density and differences in the city so that people find a more balanced sense of identification on the one hand with others who are like themselves but also a willingness to take risks with what is unlike, unknown.... It is the kinds of experiences that make people find out something about themselves that they didn’t know before. That’s what urbanity is at its best....To me, how to privilege the notion of difference that is what urbanity is all about."

and did you ever really know the meaning ofSUSPENSION OF DISBELIEF

2008-06-22T19:09:00.011+05:30

No you didn't; because guess what isn't. Not even is shitting not a universal SOD moment. Because there are the chintoos crapping widely in my exposed link road before flying motorists; the drama-artifice thing is there: 'o look at my genitalia i am' mischief license (they know it is playacting). and motorists seeing it fullfront pretending unmoved by a display they can't get from any known relative, friend or sprouting spouse. So to qualify it: whatever you are cagey about admitting to, is a measure of what is not an SOD event/moment. Like you suppose, fugitive jerking off, (remember: teacher's school sanctimony after night of manic sx), or more seriously: murder, subterfuge, bad faith. Then again, only in places/among people where you suppose such things are defendu (or criminal), and then only if that matters at that moment. what moment were you thinking?
Reading/watching fiction is bad enough, cannot take prolonged SOD in real life which urban Bangaloreans are splendid at practicing. > Exeunt from right

2008-06-16T22:18:00.000+05:30

on the subject of ah, meet dean young in vacationland

2008-06-16T20:22:00.004+05:30

i've stopped even mildly tracking the mainstream or anything music scene - but the last really inventive work i remember was this guy's. still doing good; let me check out. the album of the track i recall went platinum or something. Came across some interviews in that phase and what a measure. he has it. wont explain

2008-06-11T09:33:00.006+05:30

Over the last 2 weeks, I've been spending a lot of time reading almost every one of the tedious posts of this alok's blog i've pasted before; I wouldn't have bothered if it was just opinion. There's hardly any of that, in fact it's vigorously derivative and is steeped in references to sometimes obscure european art house films and a series of books starting with 'Melancholy', Sebald comes in a couple of times. Can't help noting the restraint and even academic temper of his posts which are a devoted record of critical impressions, sample this post.
The few times he does dot his opinion, I can't always agree (like when he can't understand what's so great about The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie). Considering my infantile but steadiy-eroding prejudice against north indian people (will remain anti-Hindi though) even if they happen to be on the social sidelines of New York, my reverence for alok's posts is a development. Admittedly he lacks some essential slant and original convictions, but he is somehow reassuringly comfortable with his relegated position of temerity. He is up the right street.
***
'sikkapatte kannada, swalpa hindi, totall bengaluru' hoarding/ print ads
wtf BigFM or the other ones? I'm sorry but the debrained visualizer-copywriter (actually glutonnous CD - since they usually hog the fancy accounts) of the hot shop 4-letter agency that came up with this revelation is wrong. He forgot the 3 other south indian languages + inglish-of-a-sense which have precedence over hindi in the south. I think the ideal here is: if a south indian radio station (it isn't i know) isn't going to register south indian languages - who is? jabalpur fm?
all that said - the radiocity website design by bcwebwise is a super job.

Funereal

2008-06-05T10:00:00.012+05:30

Watch this interview. Icelandic band Sigur Ros.
Their painful selfconsciousness, resounding discomfiture is impressive. you could trust them. But the interviewer has a lot to be pulled up over. I do not appreciate the interviewer's insensitivity to the complexes his subjects have to deal with. These include:

The language English (not a language the band is comfortable with)
Their place as visitors (shakey for anyone but the most arrogant, culturally/personally)

Facts such as these you can fairly factor even before you begin an interview. These are 'benefit' facts, that gives your guests the benefit of consideration. The most composed (relative) and eloquent of the group is the one who has not surprisingly spoken from the start. He could be a father, the oldest in the group. He is not half as interesting a study as the rest. I don't refer to him after this; he fields the first question and remains in unassuming charge ...
Note how 2 members reach out for their papercups at the same time on the second question. The meek-postured boy in stripes closest to the camera only wants to leave and has taken to contorting his tongue in his mouth. He is the last to put on the headphones; wisely he puts it on only when the interview has begun. Half way into this interview, the mood of dire unease has not lifted. The member furthest from the camera has now placed his hand to to the side of his head - the thinking stress pose. Inspite of the thinking, he has spoken little yet his eye movements indicate he may be turning manic and distressed. When the interviewer uses the word 'life' ('Are you enjoying life?') it seems to offer hope, and most of them look up but not much is said. The interviewer hapless in his own desperation at what may go down as a failed interview asks a rude 'Are you having fun...'. This helps no one and the answer is a deadpan 'we're having fun'. clearly this Icelandic team is not going to open up like the savvy American. The interviewer seems to raise his voice a bit and asks 'Are you a bit of a phenomenon in Iceland?'. The word 'phenomenon' cracks them up and they chuckle privately but audibly suggesting they have private opinions about the interview, the interviewer, the choice of words, what it tells about the culture.

The cruellest move is when the interviewer turns on the one who has not spoken a word till then. The boyish one in stripes. His anxiety is clear, an expression of dread, he clears his throat holds his breath and taps his fingers in the runup to the specific question 'hopelandic'. Then it should surprise no one that this tense boy's first answer is an expletive. He nervously-defiantly says 'fucking bullshit' which is beeped. After initial laughs, the expressions of the bandmates indicate they do not approve of what their bandmate just said, the impression he is creating. The interviewer turns indulgent and school marmish. The interviewer persists and tries to put in words for him which makes the boy more difficult and contrary.

The interviewer becomes confrontational and strident when he could be considerate. Embarassed, his bandmates try to answer on behalf of their boy to cover up his social deficiencies. There is an expression of part-sympathy, -concern, -anger in his fellow member's . One of his mates, on the extreme right turns red-faced after putting in a quick word on his mate's lyrics.

The interview ends with an obvious 'edit' and the withdrawn face of the fractious band member in stripes and his bandmates; we could imagine there was an ugly face-off ('Drop it will you; picking on Jaan')?

Looking back, I see the interviewer has spoken more than the rest - we know nothing more about the band. Quite remarkably, they have succeeded in showing up the inefficiencies of the interviewer, who is likely an over-acheiving media student with 3 children of his own.

We could consider the challenge in interviewing groups, where the one interviewer decides to question each and every person in that group before all. What happens inevitably is that the first to be interviwed has the pleasure of speaking primally, instinctively, less selfconsciously. While the others among the last to be called up have to deal with their own built-up opinions and reactions to everything so far. And unless the room was noisy and distracted, there would be every reason for the final few who are called up to be nervous, self-conscious and unable to express the complex range they have built up by then. It would be the responsibility of the interviewer to pick out then who he would not naturally pick out for a comment and give that person the lead in expressing and in a sense dominating proceedings (subsequent to this initiation, the turned-in member would not even be occupied by his primacy or deficiency in participation)

2008-06-04T05:23:00.003+05:30

corpus

Cities and Ambition

2008-06-03T15:01:00.000+05:30

2008-06-02T16:28:00.004+05:30

Blogs: Alok's Dispatches from Zembia and The Laws of Light and Honey
Essay: College a toll booth on the road to employment?
Essay: The Craft of Musical Communication
Random: Polyhedral Maps
Mag: Jumpcut

Dr Binayak Sen

2008-05-31T08:56:00.008+05:30

It's not officially a crime to put in a word for Naxalites, but it appears all you need is a bit of prominence in which case a sympathetic word/act will find you ambushed into jail. Ignorance of law is not a valid claim for defense in court; so even if we can forgive the untenable expectation of awareness of all daft legal developments, CAN THE PUBLIC KNOW WHAT THE STAND ON treating Ns as humans IS? If there isn't one, who should be held for pre-emptive imprisonments? The government and Left is so spectacularly self-absorbed, dishing out Padma Bushbags to metal-chewing Mittals and dyspepsic Noyis, they should really look up from their orgy and see what their wilful oversight is telling the world. Tell me that the A-team NDA boys of Wharon, Harvard, MIT don't read the Economist. Or maybe Mukti Morcha's Shaheed Hospital doesn't rock their radar like Mount Sinai. They say, justice delayed is justice denied - i'd say: injustice prolonged = bloody crime

Renaissance woman؟

2008-05-31T07:57:00.004+05:30

How to undermine karma

2008-05-29T08:19:00.003+05:30

The wise man built his house on rock, dumb man on sand parable was the product of a system that didn't know better than to sustain elitism and discourage invention. What if a poor fucker had an inheritance of only sandy land? Be sure that today, it isn't only low income houses in Ejjipura that are willing to fall. Sure every second sundry one storey construction even in tenements are using reinforced steel bars filched or borrowed, but I'm not sure the quality of land on which they intend to stand is given much thought even in more prestigious commissions. Whether it's water logged is about the only issue. Pumps are got from somewhere and the water bed for the locality is drained out. That's another issue altogether and the point is: the dumb fart who was left with sandy land can either follow Laurie Baker's advice and keep that land for a beach frond shack nothing more, or he can try flicking a couple of helical piers and anchors directly from some Razack of the Prestige Group who is I think getting away too easily with fucking up roads with construction material while he lives in a gated community. Ya – so the sandman should consider this. And some heavyduty drills.

Thachom Poyil Rajeevan

2008-05-27T22:55:00.004+05:30

Most writers (mostly the kind who go about describing themselves 'writer') perform as miserably as their prodiguous input/output. Then there are those that crush you to abject humility in the sound of what theyve done. T P Rajeevan I heard once in a decrepit book shop reading out his poem translated from Malayalam, and I could not handle it. It's been 5 years and I do not remember the poem exactly but I wish to point out that most of his work, it was self-published - none of the starry eyed plopshit or a face in femina. Try out
When glasses look back.

VK Krishna Menon

2008-05-15T15:52:00.006+05:30

Of all those blue-eyed babes in that Independence Mooment Club, there is one who makes my blood jump*: VK Krishna Menon. Although born into what passed for privelege (though nothing is certain in Kerala), his story suggests the thrum of someone with the hunger of an underdog, strangely. He never had his meals on time and ran on tea. You probably remember him for the marathon UN thing? A gripping orator, enviable conversationalist and not surprisingly a nifty networker, this is someone I would want to spy in his element.

Did you know he co-founded Penguin Books? And Pelican.
He has been described as 'the most disliked person in India' (which says a lot about the TIME editorial line and a lot about him). I really would like to know who constituted TIME's survey sample. really some rags.

2008-05-08T18:48:00.004+05:30

So i spend on the cheapest sl in the market that comes without hdds, optical drives and worst still for all sluts for convenience - without windows. Yes, it comes with linux (xandros) and you'll have to pay 3K extra if you want the familiarity of your jealous cross-eyed old wife, windows. then the nervy part, I needed an usb hdd.'Seagate snubs Linux'; and what about Lacie. For psychological confort I returned the Seagate for a Lacie 120G (Seagate makes too much money anyway; the Barton Centre guys even made a refund of the difference). And it wasn't all plug and play. You've got to mount that fat(32) from console. And I had to hunt for all this. And figuring out mighty clever things like my hdd was identified as sdc1 and not sda1(as given in most quick examples) by rummaging through output of the dmesg command. So what did it in the end was: mount -t auto dev/sdc1 home/usb after mkdiring /home/usb. The best part is I don't need to mount and unmount everytime, the loading and unloading happens. I hear this compatibility crap isnt going to happen with the dvd drive. And for the connectivity bit that got me walking in the sun for 2 days to speak to various bums in tata and reliance (no options support linux), I figure my best solution is what is still being called breakthrough technology - dove (anangram). I don't want to give everything away. But i will soon.O, and if you find yourself in the same situation, here are the links that saw me through:
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/mandriva-30/mount-an-external-ntfs-usb-hard-disk-201441/
http://www.fraw.org.uk/download/cltc/cltc_bb-01.html
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-hardware-18/mount-external-usb-2.0-hard-disk-with-ntfs-74312/
http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?id=875&p=3
http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?id=12602
http://forum.eeeuser.com/viewtopic.php?pid=105296
*Note to uber: My post on tehelka next. as soon as my eeep is set free for my post is sitting in it - amassing 2 pages in that time; it might be a short story*

2008-05-04T22:31:00.002+05:30

Create like a god, command like a king, work like a slave. - Brancusi

Vindhiya

2008-05-04T09:15:00.003+05:30

With a blurb photo like that, I'd want to pick up this book. The reviews snatched my interest, 'Cupid's Alarms' and 'Warmth in his eyes'. Regret I cannot read Tamil but the brotherly translation is supposed to be good. O and Vindhiya was her plume name, her actual: India Devi.

2008-04-29T19:21:00.001+05:30

2008-04-29T14:23:00.001+05:30

While I munch currencies of expired beaten rice, let met tell you there is a lost generation of South Indians who do not speak 35 pure and deep indigenous languages and dialects. There is also a subset of that lost gen that happens to be direly dyslexic and so incapable of learning any of those tongues even after ardent and prolonged exposure. So a standing joke between my sis and I (who has now left me behind by showing after marriage she knew malayalam all long; latent) since college days, was our earnest translation of the Tamil Hit song: 'Chinne Chinne Assae'. Guess what our take was? Here goes: 'Tiny Tiny Ass'.
But the best part has to be that I am learning from scratch.
scritch scritch.

The Supremes

2008-04-28T11:18:00.004+05:30

Not to get lachry-nostalgic, but hearing about The Supremes made me think that us 3 siss should get together some day and give a performance surpassing even those of old times.

Let this not take away from the person and work of Vaikom Muhammad Basheer

2008-04-26T22:21:00.014+05:30

The Perch production was alright. Actors with their urban confidence and awareness. A mediocre production and the joke of a standing ovation which began when one clapper wanted to stretch his legs. I was suspect too. What was the point of putting up a little show of resistance, so we stood up and clapped and blushed a bit at our own show while the performers linked hands, touched their several toes and looked up touching their respective hearts at intervals; a few seconds into the awkwardsness I think it became fairly obvious to them what the case was. I am very clear what I appreciate is the absolute selection of Basheer for a production; not so much the delicate distracting Aparna Gopinath as Basheer himself. No mistakes about that.

[Written yesterday: I'm fairly zimmed since ages after protective company in old dens after a venerable malayalam english play and everyone saying byebye and how we must fix for a parting trek in 2 weeks, I am fairly marooned and in need of not engineered privation but fixed meditation - unthrown. I will miss insights and D's one on geniune people she introduced me to but whom she felt unworthy of, whom I already knew were 'true'. You know who they are no? The kind of smile that invests everything and dies right in you, some fragility that kissed you on the cheek and did not want to leave you.]

In the adaptation, I suspect the plainess has gone missing with the urbane tics/antics of the actors except most definitely the one who played the part of Basheer - a composed, even and perfectly-cast Paul Mathew (ex-Captain). All in all, I need a break from stories of men and their outlook.

Tum brum allergy or What goes round or One ick deserves an ack

2008-04-25T14:21:00.004+05:30

"The daily rituals in Kerala temples are traditionally performed by Namboothiris, and often by Embranthiri migrants from the neighbouring Karnataka, but not by Tamil Brahmins...
...in the past Nambudiris considered themselves polluted by even the touch of other Brahmins: Eda Shudha touch of Tamil Brahmins such as Iyer, Iyengar, Pattar which required the Nambudiri to bathe before resuming activities)..." - Wikip

African Institute for Mathematical Sciences

2008-04-24T16:02:00.000+05:30

2008-04-23T14:55:00.000+05:30

D getting married. awww. What can I say? Congrats.

2008-04-22T22:32:00.001+05:30

At long last, i can announce my fully amicable divorce from 'writer' jobs and yes a nevermore to the top spin world of somebody else's advertising. For this I have to thank the meeting I had with a pretty smart mallu head of a beat 4-letter big agency of my picking. Walking in as a dyedinthestool socialist (as I had) in a thin kurta with underarm sweat moons reaching to the waist - is like asking for it. But I had a perfect exchange with the gun who pointed to exactly what it was I was trying to hint at: no more jobwriting for me please; i'm into people and talking to them and always have been. So 'suit' obviously. And now the ball's in my court and I hit it not only beyond the stands but outside the stadium, and I walk into exit all smiles at making my peace.

**** My special thanks to D (who doesn't read blogs) for just being there in a tricky patch. I'm not one to believe in the friendship biz. which is mostly about public show and pledged to sex arrangements; we're frigid, distant, emotionally-impaired planks with separate agendas, but she was there when I needed an ear, and that counts for something better.

Kiss kiss fuck fuck

2008-04-18T11:02:00.005+05:30

2008-04-17T14:21:00.000+05:30

Astounding

2008-04-09T23:24:00.009+05:30

The bunch of photo-op-seeking Indian Yinglish writers are balls. Because O V Vijayan came before them and quietly wrote 'Legends of Khasak' and went on with work; no keeness, smiles or special angles for a lover behind the camera. I'm glad I didn't die before reading it. Astounding. Read it and then remind yourself - he wrote this in Malayalam and then did the glish translation himself. This is not about false pride in flaunting the vernacular like U R Ananthamurthy proved to a friend yesterday, this is about being humble enough to notice, hear and understand everything: people from outside places even brilliance beyond language.

Tee-hee. titter. Goldfinch braves snow.

2008-04-07T08:33:00.003+05:30

BBC: William Wells' photo of a goldfinch in Oxfordshire.

2008-04-05T20:44:00.002+05:30

Let's forgive this guy for living in Delhi and then blogging about it like anyone should care. He opines like a non-Delhiite though from his name you couldnt tell which part of the grand land he's from (which is at it should be). Mayank Austen Soofi must have parents, or atleast one, more enlightened than many to give him that name. But to get to his ogging: I remember objecting to one of his posts; his writing is excruciatingly underformed when not superbly rescued by his caption-spiked photos. Readers, readers - take a look at his Delhi photos; they express better. Just take a look at them. Excellent. As with other good documentary photographers, the point is: their hearts in the right place. Then they're building a body of work. It's the kind of journey that's worth watching.
other news 1, Can someone assist me in moving out once and for all from Bangalore? My spine is slowly filling with dead lead.
other news 2, Trolley talk - mixedrace identity ; Adwoa-Shanti Dickson
other news 3, And what's with not announcing Frederick Dove's removal as presenter of Outlook on the BB World Service? Few weeks back, I just happened to catch his swansong and the sadness in his voice saying it was his last show. And that's the last thing he says. Nobody like that should leave without an elegy.

miasmic

2008-04-02T10:06:00.010+05:30

This left me very strange. Yesterday night i had harmless but affecting overlapping dreams as if they were happening again from the exact past with some inventions. My first acquaintances - who used to come home and whose families I would move with shamelessly - were back and visiting me like before with some boys i was a little anxious about on behalf of neighbours. Parents had just left and party had just arrived and the place was bright and done up fine. Just as the party stepped in, I had to step out (along with a very longstanding friend) for a quick visit to a kind of old city club - a very run-down small sort of bowring. This club which was a kind of wooden pub was frozen in time - with a few old civil service men and attitudes. dusty tables and worn wood panelling. Somewhere reached through a bylane of Shivajinagar - and there they all sat, not many, moving slowly and waiting for some old man or another. A family came in - Armykind with Southern class, strong wife, and wellsettled adolescent son more like a friend of his father. I was only moving about. Back to the first frame when the friends were at the gate, *issa for some reason had pinched my cheek and looked sympathetic which as always made me feel arrogant because she had no idea. Things moved on - no conclusions, just miasmic.
***
I had no opinions about this treat of a sequence, I was just on an errand but I was so disembodied and in very odd way alienated by the whole tapestry.
So today at desk, I'm feeling a bit shifted, displaced, mislaigned...
***
another feature piece in the miasm was that the fridge door closing mechanism was impeded for good. So what? i slam it a lot in real life big deal who wants a fridge.

materialicious

2008-04-01T10:52:00.004+05:30

Another thing and featured above page 2: Acrylic One Composite Solutions: material is a solvent-free, water-based resin It is used to mimic all kinds of materials - wood, concrete, metal, slate. Criticism would be brought on by large-scale production.
In other news: Not only is Baichung Bhutia one of the few Indian sportsmen in the right sport, he also happens to be one of the few with any balls.

Dayabai

2008-03-25T18:51:00.004+05:30

I was thinking if I were to leave this blog alone for a long time, the post I would want seen right on top would be about Dayabai (Mercy Mathew). Almost every day there's a moment when we think we were belittled by someone or something we read on other people's wins of some kind. Some people I've met lately have been saying they dont know what it is they want to do in life and fear they'll end up nowhere and pitied and without the pledge of a man. It should be clear that everyone has an obligation to be a very particular fanatic. Dayabai is someone about whom many herdhumans, who have seen her about her life, feel sorry for. She's about 60 now and with age comes a little immunity from unwanted impressions. But in her 30s40s they thought she was positively deranged - an unmarried woman unaligned to any ideology or political party, club, living in a village she was neither born in, brought to nor invited into. If you watch videos of her you can see how easy it is to pick her weakneses out, you could start with her voice that is almost constantly shakey with poorly managed emotion. This makes me think of a certain opposite a lot of women and men (Jat Club) like to hold up as a model for strength and women: Renuka Choudhary. Strident in everyway: large, loud and commanding. Another moment is enought to deliver up the ghost of stage thrills. Everybody likes a good show; the pity is not knowing the default is masks-off and forgetting lines and mumbling and looking disgraceful and vulnerable. Then again lets be true to ourselves about what it means to be a woman; something that's isntinctively puzzled at the ambition of boxing police officers and outshouting another gender.

2008-03-19T16:40:00.006+05:30

This time last year, Tony Joseph stepped down as Editor of Businessworld after a couple of years in which he really made it something that poohed out some infectiously dull competition. Really, it wasn't just that, I remember thinking ever since it was launched it carried the best journalism in the country. But even after I came to see that financial journalism is simply better than pulpy mainstream because it just had to be factually competent and name the right theories in a way politcal journalism here for some reason doesn't even pretend to know, it was still clear that businessworld was combining exciting information in right-sized packets in a dimension and cover that never threw attitude, just excitement in a very new way. It would be pertty accurate to say Tony made this happen.

So when I saw last month he was no longer the editor, I could only hope Jehangir Poch wouldn't bung things up. From what I've seen so far he's playing it safe and not trying to fix a fantastic creation.

2008-03-19T10:08:00.001+05:30

Marcel Proust: everything makes sense

The art of letting slip: the name of a famous relative & other more meaningful arts

2008-03-18T10:35:00.008+05:30

To certain people letting slip the name of a famous relative is the only fix for their flagging self-worth; they do it very often. Others marry for that sweet privelege, acceeding to bonded copulation for a long-coveted proximity to recorded literary history. This gets me to my most famous contemporary relative who by above standards is emininetly disreputable. This would be something to boast about if he were'nt deceptive and apologetic of what it is he really does. dear cousin chroma (not real name but rhymes).
On to the more meaningful arts and news:
- I've been looking for this medieval illustration of the the mythical-seeming Land of Hermaphrodites that Marco Polo mentioned from his travels. But it's nowhere on the net this illustration.
- This morning I found myself dancing like Pan to some radio track. With shades on. Halfway in a pose, Peeping into the mirror for an inst, I was in this bachanallian Pan pose [image], one knee cocked to the level of my neck
- Sestinas make sense but still not certain what canzones are meant to obey
- In thoughtful news: Coming to the assistance of Kerala's vanilla farmers (facing falling prices) Amul has decided to switch to natural vanilla flavour in its entire range of vanilla icecreams. An Amul spokesman said the move would make Amul the first national brand to use natural vanilla extracts instead of synthetic vanilla. Farmers had contacted GCMMF and Sharad Pawar to make use of natural vanilla flavour mandatory for all ice-cream maufacturers in the country.

Aluzinc cladding house, Chile

2008-03-14T13:59:00.003+05:30

Aluzinc cladding house in South Chile (?good in all lighting)
Architects: Pezo von Ellrichshausen Architects

2008-03-13T21:48:00.003+05:30

I am in absolute love with my darling eldest sister who visited home yesterday in a fresh boy cut. Now in her seventh month with her second, she sat like a sweet happy bud when i saw her yesterday evening. Wearing her favorite pink T with white polkas and sportingthis new tumble boy cut that brought out her cherub blossom. What a pretty thing. And pulling off a nice surprise like that on everyone including her husband. Simply Adorable and the most precious sweet thing I have seen in ages. Exuding this general love for all things even the air blunting softly around her. Only small fulfilled independent birds have made me feel the same way. Some plants, and flowering trees too, squirrels and sparkling stars.I must get something for her this weekend. dear sweet treasure.

2008-03-11T00:33:00.002+05:30

It's been a year since I could pick up any fiction, so what can i do but congratulate my instincts and the circumstances that led me to sound direction that got me here: Last month after tortured mulling, it was picked; nothing could change my speed and it took 3 weeks to walk through the confiding marvel of Banville's The Sea. Being so well turned at every step, I can't reconcile with the need for its smart ending. Just past midnight, you see it's been just a few minutes since I read the last words. Was Rose's identity coup really necessary? Maybe I'll come round in time?

David Yocum and Brian Bell's architecture office (Atlanta)

2008-03-03T11:25:00.002+05:30

2008-02-29T16:14:00.004+05:30

Isn't it pathetic there are writers incapable of self-reflection who boast THEY DO NOT WRITE FOR MONEY and then expect their books to sell. I mean then you write for what?? Brushing your teeth with capacitors? Or some kind of erection you get from saying it? But no - we're supposed to understand your hidden inheritance; that fixed deposit and apartment your parents left your bleeding butt. Old wealth. I can smell the prestige. like Chanel or something. That such self-effacing greatnesses live among ussses makes me cry. Sitting on all that wealth and dressing like one of us; spending money on books instead of flashinesses.
In other news I'm having some fun curating at Pigmy - which get us to another thing. I'm doing a retrospective of some of my blog posting that never got posted because it piled up in .txts instead.

2008-02-25T16:49:00.001+05:30

Whatever you may say, Maureen Dowd is right up my street. Read her here and then here.

Madame Tutli-Putli

2008-02-24T09:34:00.005+05:30

Hey, so instead of watching sub-standard Hollywood mulch described in last post, here's something you should try and catch. S mentioned this yesterday! Ofcourse this wasnt inspired by married women who think theyve sorted it out so well for themselves.

2008-02-24T08:44:00.001+05:30

The first Hollywood flim I see in years leaves me sniggering from the fourth frame or maybe even the second and discounting 6/10 of the visual content of most frames. This Michael Clayton thing in running for the tra-daah Oscar. The tired trademark devices of outrageously busy office rooms in impressive panic mode where everyone succeeds (to me, hilariously) in appearing busy and if they're important, also fashionably distressed so they get to rub their face and put a hand on their hip. Dialogues that carry the audience along; allowing them to snoop on some intense affair of involved jargon. Then the usual pyrotechnics for relief and then a line that makes a desperate-for-cooption Indian audience exclaim and puff and guffaw at: 'I am Shiva, the God of Death'. Only both times it was spoken I heard it as: 'I am Sheba, the God of Death'. Ok, anyway, that really makes the grade.Lawfirm vs. biotech co. Sooo this is an Erin Brokovich, Bourne Identity overlap that's taken the worst of each and brought in little else except hack and treadmill dialogue only 2/10ths of which anyone understands unless they really care and watch it a second time. Again its male-dominated, women are artless or shakily crafty which I know is true in real life but in the last year I've begun to see a good majority of well- grounded, rounded women. On the whole, flim-flam waste of time. Oh and there's all that dolby-digital gravitas thing going to forbode some pyrotechnic or the other.

That brings me to a little tribute I'd like to make to my companions of the evening 'IS' and 'S' who have taught me a couple of lessons in the little time I've known them. Their stable, undemanding and free-willed selves have taught me that company is best enjoyed for itself and is ruined by demands. Their ancient friendship is before me and there is no other set of guys I have enjoyed drinking with as much, even if at any time, one or the other or both have some excuse for abstaining. Well. Here's a mug to them.

Exhibition on till March 30

2008-02-20T11:31:00.005+05:30

Venue: NCBS
Already begun, exhibition on till March 30th 2008, 9.30 am to 5.30 pm, Monday to Friday
Curator: Annamma Spudich
More details

2008-02-19T14:35:00.016+05:30

Wikileaks

global defense of sources and press freedoms, circa now—

Tuesday 19 February, 2008

1. This, my friends, is news of the day: Following a Calif Court ruling, wikileaks.org was taken offline. Who was petitioning what? "The case was brought by a Swiss bank after "several hundred" documents were posted about its offshore activities.[Source: BBC]". The bank in question is Julius Baer and it was whistle-blown upon by Wikileaks.

But is this an empty victory for Baer? Because there be mirror sites. You can read the offending documents here: http://wikileaks.be/wiki/Full_correspondence_bewtween_Wikileaks_and_Bank_Julius_Baer
And here is an an instance of someone who got jittery about wikileaks back in March. I mean downright hostile - he gets to reputation even.

2. In other news, with a exciting ruling awaited on the BAE-slushfund-Saudi case any time now. This appears the latest development: Blair used 'irresistible pressure' to halt investigation into BAE-Saudi arms deal

2008-02-18T11:37:00.006+05:30

Can the media try covering new Indian authors who avoid: summing it up as 'love and loss', protagonist pairs like twins or alteregos, inclusion of pickle factories, getting their blurb photos taken by their caring husbands*, auspicious references to critical time done abroad. does it go on?
Honestly the most original and sensible English writing in India today are translations from the vernacular.
The metro English stuff is just self-conscious piddling. To make things worse their champions try to make a fashion statement while theyre at it. With all the sub-standard stuff parading I'm ready to read only in kannada or malayalam; only its going to take some time. Movies should help.
*this is to send the message that the author has a rich nude private life

2008-02-13T12:10:00.002+05:30

clinton: the common crafty catty shrew
obama: exceptional

Sarah Lucas

2008-02-12T19:41:00.001+05:30

Nayi Neralu (Based on a novel by S L Bhyrappa)

2008-02-11T08:32:00.001+05:30

Exquisitely composed, sensibly paced and simply reassuring. In sets, Kasarvalli has dispensed with the responsibility of weighty historical fidelity in details by keeping it spare, but this is alright and even possibly accurate. If I had a problem with anything, it would be in the continuation of historical representation in stories of a kind placing the brahmin woman as queen of virtue and the tribal woman as available. (If at all such a thing is about virtue and worth making declarations on, I know only too many half or full brahmin sluts, legs and home wide open like a venus flytrap, clinching a marriage out of their life's only catch along with their balls.) This perceived flaw in the ethics of the narrative occurs to me only much later though, and again - this should be laid at the door of Bhyrappa.

I loved it and it was perfectly and quietly concluded with Venkatalakshmi's 'radical conversion of her being-in-the-world'.

2008-02-06T20:28:00.000+05:30

I want to make it this Sunday 7:30 am to the Glass House. really do. and you?
(Following post will list all we found)
Brahminy Kite
Pariah Kite
White-cheeked barbet
Koel (male-female)
Coucal
Spotted doves (making out)
Grey drongo
Palm swift
Golden Oriole (small!)
House Crows
Jungle Crows
(Prasad addressed himself largely to the kids which is fine; they were a more loyal audience, unlike a group of flitty adults who insisted on getting distracted by 'Visit Shimla' salesboys and similar sideshows. Subbu was in better form sketching with strange enthusaism for kids)

Wanted: either The Sea or Book of Evidence

2008-02-05T09:56:00.000+05:30

unwell

2008-01-20T09:56:00.000+05:30

First thing to report in ages,

2008-01-09T07:46:00.000+05:30

When the invitation arrives one long week after being informed that I might be considered for an invitation to curate, you'd think this was the time to say something arrogant. Instead I'm saying:

It is my honor to Curate.

My first subject is Botero. Will need 3 days to settle on one work and put down the right line.

2007-12-11T16:28:00.000+05:30

the blue light will do.

2007-12-01T01:30:00.001+05:30

Wait wait - but this talk is absolutely brilliant because its at some of the multiple interstcies of my multiple interests: African fractals in buildings and braids. Bamana sand divination as 'geomancy' in Europe?
Conscious use of scaling and recursion in Logone-Brini's architecture
Ring-shaped fractal in Ba-ila architecture
Fractal model for Mokoulek; Nankani village in Mali
(Scaling patterns common to all indigenous architecture? No
That any society without a 'State' structure functions on a heirarchy and has a bottom-up architecture.
Only African ones were fractal; native Americans used a combination of 4-fold symmetry and circular symmetry)

Intuition? In some case they had sophisticated algorithms:
Recursive geom in Mangbetu design
Fractal construction in Ethiopian cross design
Recursive Eulerian paths in Lusona(Angola) *
Self-organising patterns in Owari/Mancala/Bao/Sogo

Practical Fractal: Scaling in an African windscreen (when fences in the Western world are Cartesian; strictly linear) And the great: Bamana sand divination (Binary code recursion) using deterministic chaos like a pseudorandom number generator: thjis may be implemented in hardware (relevance as core-base study in Engineering schools in these communities)

Using fractal structures for structuring postal addresses (imbalance of imposing a grid structure postal structure on a fractal village). Finally, google's search engine ranking uses the fractal structure of the Web; why it was a more successful than other engines; it was the first to take advantage of the selforganizing properties of the web. It's in ecological sustainability; the developmental power of entrepreneurship; ethical power of democracy; why the AIDs virus (and other virulencies) spreads so fast; destructive effects of capitalism

2007-11-23T16:16:00.000+05:30

IN PIC: Columbia Street Building designed by French-Brazilian architecture firm Triptyque for an ad agency called Loducca
On the other hand, mathew & gosh architects sounds more promising than what they've put out so far. what were they thinking of? desert homes? it's Bangalore - i dont think the city needs people who want to make a dubai out of it. they can of course, still change. their current style is more welcome in a more crowded market with numerous breathing alternatives. in their homes, i can picture my skull cracking in an unremarkable fall on one of their hard edges. Their work for Malabar escapes is much nicer though - which I suspect is because they weren't creating from scratch and a lot of the charm was irrevocably in place. The good news is that Bangalore has a sweet outfit called Total Environment.

2007-11-22T20:53:00.000+05:30

Yes, Publishing. How important? This important.

This one goes out to my sis - Buggles 'Radio Star'

2007-11-20T15:24:00.000+05:30

I heard you on the wireless back in Fifty Two
Lying awake intent at tuning in on you.
If I was young it didn't stop you coming through.
OwwaOwwa
They took the credit for your second symphony.
Rewritten by machine and new technology,
and now I understand the problems you can see.
OwwaOwwa
I met your children
OwwaAwwa
What did you tell them?

Video killed the radio star.
Video killed the radio star.

Pictures came and broke your heart.
Oww-A-A-A-Oww
And now we meet in an abandoned studio.
We hear the playback and it seems so long ago.
And you remember the jingles used to go:
'OwwaOwwa'
You were the first one.
OwwaOwwa
You were the last one.

Also posted to bngbirds

2007-11-19T17:51:00.000+05:30

Hi - I was finally initiated into birding after years of static interaction with the g&i 'birds of south india' (the book was enough to please me). however, i got round to a kind of professional birding only yesterday in zwin - with a passionate birder from Manchester. He lent me a pair of 8x24 binoculars, let me view through the telescope and provided top-class commentary on everything birds. This was a dream initiation. To get to the point, here are the birds we spotted mostly all on the same stretch of marsh-like land:
little egret; lapwing; shellduck (uses rabbit burrows for nest); starlings; jakdaws; starlings; red shanks; oyster catchers; curlews; waders (either grey on golden. not certain); grey plover, ringed plover; greater crested grebe; little grebe; mallard; gadwell; pochard; greylag goose; buzzard; kestrel; herring gull; less black back gull
blackheaded gull; cormorant (very happy to spot; last time i saw one was in kerala)
Since it was right there, we went to the bird enclosure in the reserve; and i hope the birds within are there only because they were injured or ailing; i would be sorry otherwise; i dont think its doing anyone a favour if the proposers thought it would be a helpful crash course. I saw a rook, night heron and stork there. And then the very striking eagle crow.
Thats all. The total experience really picked up a stale period in a retentive country. And reaffirmed something I never doubted: the unique and thrilling urge among birders to share and discover with anyone. This is a fine religion.

2007-11-17T18:15:00.000+05:30

From last weekends guardian review, the evocative story and art of edward burra, and the sparkling *The Bridge of the Golden Horn by Emine Sevgi Ozdamar* reviewed by Jaggi. And I was going to pull up The Big E on something, but I didnt get the damn special report to the damn cafe.

2007-11-16T16:54:00.000+05:30

If ur wasting urself on a charmless life-wife-butterfly fiction, first of all, its an insult for u to stop by here, secondly if you see the chink of redemption, listen to Juan Enriquez on 'growing new energy'. He makes a reference to Normal Borlaugh - read about him here.

Neil Gershenfeld on Fablab & Stefan Sagmeister on why design

2007-11-15T19:54:00.000+05:30

2007-11-15T00:04:00.000+05:30

I'm not going to blame the brun bier but i slipped on the floor of an internet cafe and broke nothing thanks to my fitness and running . running tmmrw mornign also after foot heats since my left foot's been feeling broken for some time. In other news, decided on UL and MD...Can you see the impassioned ambition in BM's first albums - first the work always.

Hyperbolic-paraboloid surfaces - notorious

2007-11-09T21:58:00.000+05:30

Africa - Do business there

2007-11-06T19:14:00.000+05:30

And a good ambassador - though the speech is not incontestable.

2007-11-05T22:02:00.001+05:30

2007-11-05T20:31:00.000+05:30

I'm curious about John Banville. The Sea.
and W G Sebald;
also left was mentioned by newly appointed cd at om belge.

2007-11-05T19:16:00.000+05:30

I've never been able to separate a person's attitude from what they have to say. They may make a really good argument but be perfectly hateable as persons; and I would never put my vote with them. Like Naomi Klein - unbearable. If I would have to list people to back up an argument, I'd go for someone else, less smug, shallow and botheringly cocksure. Like the Edwards Saids and Chomskys who aren't spending time on their eyebrows, freetrade lipstick, or a commanding voice. Making a point without being ungracious, messily combative, unbearable and over-the-top. On the whole, men have the composure for it; like favourite sons who have always been sure of their authority and strength. Dignity and sense.
A few good women are around though, they're just so hard to find I think they have to take a conscious effort to develop a kind of composure in strength. The package of both good content and matching form I'm afraid is so important and hard to come by.

2007-11-01T17:27:00.000+05:30

Not for nothing is Brussels celebrated as the most boring city in Europe, I had my suspicions but I suppose its only decent to reserve/commit opinion till after the first wave. Predictably as a city aware about the bitching, its put in place some red herrings like gay/lesbian bars, which I suppose those at desperation visit to see something genuinely seamy. Will be going there very soon. I also reserve my suspicion that police turn on their sirens only to remind that theyre beign dutiful and reassuring taxpayers. Considering I have to keep myself amused, here are the other nice facts Ive been entertqined by: telephoto lens to be less intrusive in filming of the drumming monks; the federql reserve interest rqte cut sounded wrong; oxfams concern of the regularisarion of use of biofeuls leading to a land rush in africa and asia (this has to be weighed); rebound effect; the significance of significant figures.
We shall leave this decent morning with a Bakhtin quote used by AKR in his essay Towards a countersystem:
"Every thought senses itself to be from the very beginning a rejoinder in an unfinished dialogue. Such thought is not impelled towards a wellrounded, finalised systematically monologic whole. It lives a tenselife on the borders of someoneelses consciousness."

2007-10-31T18:49:00.000+05:30

i miss the stupid cups of cheap coffee you could keep having and a few days back i was craving the spoilt and fluorescent cream on old cakes slices you easily get in all edgy bakeries. then yesterday i wanted to gnaw wheat grain; feel it between my teeth and tongue and after biting it some softish flour thing you can finally make it after dissolving long enough in saliva. then i missed ubiquitous pointlessness. what do you think is happening?
maybe spending whole holiday tomm on a unaffordable book got on 'e.m'. did i tell you i got half-mugged on the metro when i was walking in a dark passage last sunday. 2 guys were tailing me and as fate goes i was the last person in a crowd up the elevator, one of them tapped me on the back. isn't that a spooky way to start? and why was I calm. but not going ahead with the story. we'll keep it.

great stuff

2007-10-30T14:29:00.000+05:30

2007-10-27T23:00:00.000+05:30

Spent the whole day getting to Louvian_la_Neuve to meet A Drese who put together the book on Dayabai, Lady of Fire, that you would have read in a past post here. Here's a pic of dayabai again; A Drese was a wise gracious host and shared a sense of remaining viciously commited to what you feel strongly about. She gave me a copy of the film she put together; will try to put it up on youtube. after permission, how could i forget.

Another world is possible

2007-10-24T14:01:00.000+05:30

Almost forgot I had a stand on it in the first place. That most people allow themselves to feel complete in society settings (read 'parties') only when their better half's languishing somewhere in view in the same enclosure. Enough so if they feel even partially alienated, they mope through the bravery and finally agitate their mobile to getting their aff over using some voice tricks with implications. It is a failure of faith. This sight has been so disappointing from birth. It was strange, observing it all yesterday whether they're putting up a good show or not, they're fishoutoftwater without their halves; less ready to throw caution to the winds on their own terms. It's exactly the sort of situation I really pity; but some cava sparkling (Freixenet) helps at those times to play a little game about being airy for a stiff while only. Which is when I decided to say biebiegottogo to cameo regret faces somewhere and walked to the metro and rode without putting in the ticket; officials can pull you up for that; and there was a tense moment when one tailed me as I waited.
In other news, it seems Malta and me just click. And also that if tomorrow evening's readings are going to be about gender tensions, I am going to make a very big noise next to my duvel. and zats awl.

Tracy Chapman: You're the One [Live]

2007-10-19T21:15:00.000+05:30