Books!

Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read. ~ Groucho Marx

Finished reading 'The White Tiger' by Aravind Adiga. The book has won The Booker Prize for 2008 and deservedly so. Just glad that I read it :) The author has another remarkable book to his credit, 'Between the Assassinations' and I plan to read it soon. For starters, here is a short story by Adiga which was published in The Guardian (where he writes frequently) which talks about a subject very similar to The White Tiger.

Started with another Booker Prize winner book, again by an Indian author. 'The God of Small Things' by Arundhati Roy (Ya ya go ahead, laugh at me..I am probably the last Indian alive who still hasnt read it :|) Done with some 60 pages and man! does it take time to get used to her writing style!!

More on books later. Oh btw, ever since I have gone back to books, the pre-reads have taken the proverbial backseat. Wish I could balance both :| Why cant I juggle a Blue Ocean Strategy/Marketing Myopia with some Sherlock Holmes and Fourth Estate?? :(

Lemme end with a quote which I find very true.

To read a book for the first time is to make an acquaintance with a new friend; to read it for a second time is to meet an old one. ~Chinese Saying

Touchwood! :)

Got through Yahoo! India. Sales profile.Location Mumbai. Dream job. Very happy. Thanks to the Big Guy up there. :)

A 24 hour trial

4:55 am

Have been working incessantly since 11. First case analysis for WAC then editing a friend's SOP for a b-school, followed by an online depth-interview, then a live one and now report-making. Why am I mentioning here? Well. Happy Mahashivratri!! Still confused? Lemme explain. Yesterday I was struck by a brilliant idea to hold an entire day's fast for this festival. My first fast ever!!! Don't get me all wrong..I have not committed sooo many paaps to suddenly turn religious. I don't even know which one of the 36 crores gods and goddesses am I doing this for! (Ok...I think the name Mahashivratri may be suggesting something;)) But the point is I am feeling very very hungry already!! Not even 5 hours into the fast and my tummy is growling ferociously!!

Wait till you hear the worst part. This assignment is actually a Consumer Behaviour report on CHOCOLATES!!!! (^$%$#@#@$#@) I mean of all the days..I have to deal with chocolates on the very day I go on a fast!! Life is so cruel at times :(

Oh wait..the worst is still yet to come..This report basically delves into consumer perceptions of Hershey Kisses vis-a-vis Cadbury Dairymilk. There is a projective technique in which we give a chocolate to the respondent and ask what they feel about it. Yes, you guessed it right...I have around 10 Hershey Kisses in my bag!! Freaking 10 kisses with me and I cant have one!! How could I be soo unfortunate!! :(

This is going to be the worst test of my patience and will power (friggin' 10 kisses...right there on my table..what am I thinking !?!?!) I hope I sail through and keep up the promise..not for anyone else..but for myself :)

For what happens next..tune in at night when I tell you gleefully/shamefully about the outcome of this day. And yes, don't you dare wish me Happy Mahashivratri! :X

Edit 1: 4.30 pm

Hello folks! I am happy to inform you all that I am still alive and kicking!
1 cuppa coffee + 1 mosambi juice + 2 bottles of water = Rutuja alive for 17 hours since her last meal!! :)

With the WAC assignment postponed and Consumer Behaviour report presented, life was slightly back to normalcy. Or so I thought!! The PlaceComm obviously had different plans for me. They simply love... no wait....luuuurvvee to see us palpitate, sweat out buckets and curse them under our breathe! (Go PlaceComm!! you are still my favourite committee on campus...hows does it matter that I curse you the most? You guys totally rock (us)). So at 2.29 pm I was informed that I had a telephonic interview with some guy from Yahoo! India at 3.00 pm. Now this guy and I not being exactly chuddy-buddies, the prospect of maaroing jargon-laden answers to his totally irrelevant questions wasn'y my idea of an idyllic afternoon. So like a stove under my..well, you know where..I began some secondary research (You see what I mean? Just give us a chance and we maaro jargon at the drop of the hats ;)) So after some googling..err secondary research, I was all set to face the interview except for the teeny-meeny detail that I still didn't know what Yahoo! did!! I was more concerned about my GMail id on my CV fwded to the Yahoo guy :P 5 mins were all that they could endure me for. So here I am..back to the comforts of last row bench..nicely tucked (and ducked) behind my lappie screen, awaiting the elusive sleep goddess to smile upon me.

This day is turning more interesting than I ever thought! Stay tuned (coz you don't have life!).
Tada!! :)

Taddaaa!!!

So finally my blog gets a new avatar. After having changed more templates than publishing posts, I realised that I was fed up of the regular templates offered by blogspot. After much secondary research, I landed on a few sites that would help out this damsel in distress.
For those who came in late (in my life), yours truly is self-proclaimed and much acclaimed technically-challenged entity. Given a chance, I would bring back the golden days of type-writers and telegrams. I prefer a life which is simple and comes without a user manual. I have been much derided by close ones for this who fail to see my point that life can be equally good, even better without beeps, spams, blue screens and virus :|
Anyways.
After a big help from Nisha (aakhir work-ex kaam aa hi gaya :P) to fight maaro the html code, the results are there for all to see. Doesnt it look gorgeous? Its cute no? Leave a comment..the blog would feel so nice ;)

As luck would have it...

Hello dahlings!!

I love spontaneity! If anyone ever wrote a biography of yours truly, please make sure you write an entire chapter on 'How Rutuja Got Spontaneous, Got Wild and Had a Life!' :) Most of my wonderful memories till date gather around making plans out-of-the-blue and going for them. Movies..treks..dinners..even elocution competitions and eventually winning 1st prize (Okay! Enough show-off!)

So. The other day a group of us extremely bored girls decided, at the spur of the moment, to go out for a movie. Now let me give you an idea..these girls are not one of those who go 'Shit ya! I am sooo bored' as soon as they wake up, they are the go-getters, first-benchers of the class, glasses/lenses wearing, oily haired ladies with huge fines on their names in college libraries and on whom their groups shamelessly free-ride! (Okay!..One of them just died laughing). Anyway, the point is these girls are the hardworking kinds who were slogging out for days and had reached their saturation point. A few frantic phone calls to the friendly neighbourhood rickshawala - Pappu bhai and we were all set.

We were just so determined to catch 'Luck by Chance' at the nearest theatre that we really didnt mind missing the first 15 mins of the movie and the entire scene of Aamir Khan. (Oops..Plot spoilers ahead!!) The movie was fresh..the cast was surprising and it seemed as though the entire film industry dropped on to the sets of LBC to say a hi and were offered a complimentary scene :P But it certainly didnt look out of place.

Lemme start off by jotting down a few things that I remember from the movie:

• Farhan 'WoW' Akhtar: What's with this guy? He has this mesmerizing charm that you cant keep your eyes off him. He's just your regular guy but there is something as delectable as a choco-chip ice cream (double scoop topped with nuts and chocolate sauce..yumm!) about him, that you cant have enough of him! You want him in each scene, in each frame..and gawd! his smile makes you go totally 'Aaaaawwwww' :') He acts naturally - be it comedy, romance or heavy drama and even manages to pull off the regular 'running around the trees' sequence with unbelievable ease!
  

• Konkana Sharma: Now they don't make them like these any more, do they? :) She is sensuous, she is sensitive and she is real. As real as life. This lady warms my heart in each of her movies by her sheer presence. She emotes the way you and I would in the drawing rooms of our home. She reacts like us. She talks like us. And the best part, she looks just like us. Only in better clothes ;) To call her art 'acting' would be an insult, she seems to live that character. And most importantly, she makes us live that character.
  

• Hrithik 'Greek-God' Roshan (Can I please have him as my birthday gift?)
  Gawd!! What looks! What physique! What dancing skills! What acting! Why-o-why does he entice us this way? He makes women take one hard look at their husbands/boyfriends and shake their heads in dejection. He makes girls lose their sleep and sanity. He makes guys burn out of jealousy as their girlfriends lech at him with hungry eyes :P Enough said :D
  

• Isha Sharvani's figure: I hate her for being so slim :( But not feeling too bad, coz she cant act, I would have died of complex otherwise. And yes, she can do rope-malkhamb as well, but so can those tiny lil' things at Samarth Vyayam Mandir at Shivaji Park :P

The rest of the cast..well, they certainly dont deserve being called 'the rest of the cast' :D
Dimple Kapadia, Juhi Chawla and Rishi Kapoor have all performed their roles to the hilt. The one scene when Dimple Kapadia's character lashes out at her daughter, saying that she as a child never got the luxuries that her daughter was enjoying..how she was forced to act in movies by her parents, is a beautifully shocking one which requires special mention. It offers a rare glimpse to the new generation on what acting was all about in that bygone era and all the good things we have missed :)

But then how can you talk about a movie without mentioning the true star of the movie?? Zoya Akhtar..Take a bow! The film industry is paradoxically seeing a surge in talent during the economic downswing. For the efforts she has taken and are visible. For the script that is interesting. For the characters she etched on paper and brought to life. For sharing the stereotypes and idiosyncrasies of film industry she probably grew up with. But mostly, I thank her for the beautiful end of the movie. Human beings are selfish in real life. Its time we accept it. Our dhishoom-dhishoom Hindi film hero is also human and can be a selfish, self-centered moron who wants people coz he needs them. Vikram isnt a bad guy. But its high time we stop glorifying our heroes. Sona's decision to live for herself and not become a drawing room fixture in Vikram's life very subtly brings out the director's sensitivity. Sona is a woman of today coz Zoya is one. A thinking, daring, ambitious woman who has her own dreams and wants to fulfill them herself. Is she any different from the girls of today? Then why has it taken such a long time and a lady director like Zoya to depict this in reel life?

To be honest, the entire movie would have been a disappointment if Sona would have gladly become a part of Vikram's life. More so if she would have given up on her dreams.

Zoya Akhtar and more like her, hope you guys are here to stay! :) and yes, one more dance number by Hrithik wouldn't hurt next time ;)

Bas waqt hi toh nahi hai mere paas...

When SRK belted out this overtly mushy dialogue in Kal Ho Na Ho with his eyes brimming with sadness, 87.45% of the female population on this side of the earth, cried buckets of tears. Come to think of it, it could actually be a novel business proposition to bottle up that water and sell it to sub-Saharan region!! :-O (Must keep this in mind for the next B-plan competition)

Okay so the point of getting all filmy today is rather very bland. MY SCHEDULE SUCKS!! Let me explain thou, o kind readers, the reasons why my schedule sucketh...

8:22 - wake up
8.45-8:57 - breakfast
8:57-9:00 - Run for the classes
9:00-12:30 - Classes
12:30-1.30 - Rest and lunch
1:30-6:30 - Again Classes
6:30- 7:00 - Snack break
7:00-8:30 - read/delete mails, stare at the comp, chat & show innate inability to do anything constructive
8:30-9:30 - Gasp for breathe, palpitate and sweat bucketfuls and listen to aapnu Amdavad nu No.1 music channel..Radio Mirchi!! (Err..basically work-out in gym)
10:00-11:00 - Dinner; followed by a stroll around the campus (Its good for digestion!)
11:00- 11:15 - Be aghast over the magnanimous amount of pre-reads, assignments and submissions to be made for the next day
11;15-11:30 - Call up friends and horrify them with this bit of news; followed by cribbings and complaints & finally concluding that the professors are jerks to burden us with so much work
11:30-12:00 - Chat online or increase the monthly revenue of Airtel by 0.0645% ( U gotto see my bill..it looks like some rich guy's will before he was cheated by his partners :-0)
12:00-1:00 - Doodle over the assignment, figure out if some kindred soul has already done it which you can Ctrl C - Ctrl V that you can painstakingly format, accuse your group for being the stupidest of the lot and how you are unfortunately stuck wid 'em :P
1:00-2:00 - Ab paani sir ke upar chala gaya hai..err...i mean, shit has now hit the ceiling, get into the 'Crisis-management' mode and plunge into action with unbelievable efficiency.
2.15- 'Let me see which is the latest movie on junk' followed by 'Ooo..*Insert crappy movie title here*, this one toh i gotto watch!'
3:05 - ZZzzzzzzzzzzz........ (With the lights and lappie on and my roomie cursing me under her breathe)

Now do you realise? How is a poor sincere girl committed to the cause of learning and broadening her horizons in order to gain an all-inclusive perspective, supposed to study peacefully?? The pace is maddening! Well, this place too :P but thats for latter. All my innocent dreams of term I, to study in MICA library till late at night while being surrounded by the treasure of knowledge seem to have sunken faster than the Titanic :(

Ab yeh studious ladki karein bhi toh kya?? *Deep sigh*

How I wish...

I wish I could cry
as loud as a child
show pain and anger
be hurt and wild

I wish I could laugh
like a rollicking baby
my tummy would ache
and a tear-drop maybe

I wish I could envy
for chocolates & fairy-frocks
wish for candies & ribbons
and Cinderella's golden locks

I wish I could be curious
about earthworms and butterflies
airplanes and neon lights
and that lone eagle in night skies

I wish I could be enthralled
by the wonder of Nature
the dazzling sunset, the carpet of stars
the ice-caped peaks, the innocent hope of future

I wish I could fear
like mothers, for their sons
the dark, the unknown
and your own actions

I wish I could love
with such complete honesty
the sacrificing, the unconditional
lasting from yesterday, till eternity