taare zameen par - an honest effort

I can not recall any movie from recent time where the songs related so much to the movie's theme. Poetry gives life to the soul. And Prasoon's words do the same for TZP. They touch the heart and take my words - the tears that you saw in those eyes all around you in theatre were reflection of might of these words. Check this -

"Aksahr Jo Nache Kya Khayi Hai Bhang?
Idiot Duffer Lazy Crazy
Idiot,Aye Duffer,Lazy,Crazy
Kyun Bhasha Kharaab,Kyun Na Dete Jawaab?
Kyun Karte Nahin Try, Why Why But Why Why Cant
You?"

These words bring Ishan to life. It became so easy to relate to Ishan after listening to the song "Bheja Kam". Songs in TZP build the characters and bring the storyline to motion. Be it Nikumbh's entry with song "Bum bum bole" or Ishan's heart speaking in "Maa".

Brilliant!!!

The unending energy and enthusiasm that Aamir showed in "Bum bum bole" speaks volume about his commitment to cinema as medium. He is a proclaimed perfectionist and TZP goes well to suit his style of work. It's him after all. Cinema as a medium as immense power. And it takes someone like Aamir's hard work to prove that. OSO will always remain a superhit but it will never be able to prove Cinema's real intent as a instrument of bringing about change.

Coming back to the movie, if you take TZP as just a movie about kids suffering from dyslexia, you are missing the whole point. Ishan is just the medium. TZP is a story about our children. It's a story about the dreams that we thrust in those tiny eyes. It's a story about how wrong can we be in making those sweet little strive for our own failures. It's about some of those unfulfilled dreams from our childhood. It's about how we have changed ourself in this world.

Nikumbh says it right "Aaj sabhi ko engineer and doctor chahiye. 95%, 95.5%m 96 % is not enough. We need every child to score 99%. Sabhi ungaliya barabar nahi hoti, par nahi, ham to usko kheech kar lamba karna chahte hai.. phir bhale hi vo toot hi kyun nahi jaaye"

Every parent should watch this movie. You child may not be like Ishan (thank god for that) but then do not try to make a Ishan out of him. In the movie, though, Ishan is the winner in end. Butevery time we may not have a Nikumbh around.

Respect every child. Respect them for what they are.

Big applause Aamir. It's brilliant effort. I really respect your commitment for cinema.

I pledge for Shashank. Do you?

Here is a mail from Shashank. My personal request to go through it. If you are interested to pledge for him or want more info, feel free to contact him at given mail id. Or else you can always contact me at jain.pritesh@gmail.com

Heylo! J

I am back with my Marathon running! :)

Short personal update:

For those of you who are interested in knowing where I have been all this while as far as Marathon running and pledge raising is concerned, here is what has been happening:

Mumbai Marathon, Jan '07, where I participated in the Full Marathon (42.195 km) I got injured. Although, I completed it but I nearly gave up running after that. Recently after some medical help, I have been training for the upcoming Mumbai Marathon, Jan '08, in the Half Marathon Category ( 21.097 km).
The good news has been that it has been going on well! :)

What am I doing:

Off I go to Mumbai to participate in Standard Chartered Mumbai Marathon ( http://scmm.indiatimes.com/) in Half Marathon category on 20^th January '08.

Why I am doing so:

Apart from my personal passion to run, I dedicate my run this time for Ananya children.

Ananya management needs funds for construction of hostels for children thereby attempting to reach out to more children in the society.

What you can do:

1) Just call/write/say to me that you support me! J

2) Pledge for me, i.e. donate money to Ananya!

3) Forward this note of mine to as many people as you can. Ask them to pledge for me.

Your pledges will not only reach to a really passionate NGO but will also encourage me in effort! J

How can you donate:

· Visit the page that I have created at the GIVE India Site.

http://www.giveindia.org/give/pledgepage/ShashankGupta

The website helps you out with how you can proceed.

· In case, you have any problems or don't wish to donate via website, write a mail to me at:

Shashank Gupta amitabh.bachchan.bigb@gmail.com

I will be eager to help you out!

After you donate:

You will get receipts from GIVE INDIA. Ananya can accept money in INR/UK Pounds/USD. So, feel free to contribute from wherever you are! J

Final word from me:

Sometimes my well wishers have felt apprehensive thinking that I may not appreciate a small amount pledge considering the fact that my target is in 6 digits. Please rest aside such inhibitions and support me with however you can! For me the spirit is more important!

Thanks a lot for your taking time to read this mail of mine. I will be back with more updates!

Best regards,
Shashank Gupta.

About Ananya: ( http://ananyatrust.blogspot.com/).

Ananya is an NGO working with underprivileged children providing them with food, shelter and education. Education in this school is 'non-formal'. They do not follow classroom, standard system and the education is customized based on the capacity of a child. Respecting the uniqueness of a kid is one of the core values Ananya has been practicing and preaching for close to 10 years now.

About Marathons:

Marathons are often seen as fund raising events for charities. A lot of people run in Marathons dedicating their run as 'Run for Cause'. They run to convey a message to the world about their passion and belief about some cause of their thereby generating awareness and seeking support.

Good Game is on...

Heard this in a song from Johnny Gaddar:

क्या होगा वो है तेरी किस्मत
लेकिन बाजी खेलेगा इस वक्त...

Yes. I am doing the same.
The good game is on.

ps: It's a sixer. :)

Amen...

It was a beautiful dream. I saw it on a chilly morning snuggled up in my cozy blanket. Logic compels me to think that it's just an extension of my thought process. But I would love to defy my logic today. I am dreamer and I want this dream to come true.

A moment to cherish for the whole life.

May this dream comes true.

Amen...

Garv nahi to kuch nahi...

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has suspended its tour of Australia pending the outcome of an appeal for suspended spinner Harbhajan Singh.

"The Board will appeal to the International Cricket Council to review the decision of the Match Referee and suspend its operation till the appeal is disposed of," the BCCI said in a statement released on Monday.

- rediff report

my two cents: I am really proud of BCCI for taking this action. "The Indian Board realises the game of cricket is paramount but so too is the honour of the Indian team and for that matter every Indian." - this speaks volumes about the passion we have in game of cricket.

chalo bhatinda - chalo ludhiana

Euro study notes says "Eighty out of every 100 Mercedes S Class sold in India are sold in Ludhiana."

One more reason why we should leave Bangalore and move to bhatinda or ludhiana. :)

ps: News clip taken from youthcurry by Rashmi Bansal.

Stories from the far lands

Life at home [Maheshwar] is really different. It's relaxed and peaceful. Imagine this - for 15 long days I did not curse my boss. No tension of work [or no work], share market or girls. Last one is a surprise for me too. Luckily this time my parents did not bother me [much] with this. :)

It feels so great when two little monsters wake you up every morning to go for a morning walk to river side. My nephew and cousin made it a point to wake me up every morning at 6:00 am. How could they get up so early automatically is a question to be answered. Here in Bangalore 2 screeching alarms can not do the same in these chilly mornings. Early morning fresh air filled our lungs and pumped in all the energy to keep us active the whole day. That followed by sight of sun rising. River Narmada is very beautiful in this stretch in MP. Watching people taking holy dip in the river, offering their prayers to maa narmada, kids learning swimming from their grand-dads - so simple and beautiful a morning to start a new day. An inspiring sight was many people coming to ghat to feed fishes. They came with home made fish food and fed the fishes. They do it every day without fail.

Breakfast followed as soon as we reached home. Sardi ke laddoo, Poha and loads of namkeens. We Indorians have a capacity to eat namkeens. We can survive on them. Give us namkeen any hour of the day and we will be a happy clan.

Play time from here till evening. Lunch and some more rounds of namkeens to take some breaks from playing. Lunch at home are grand affairs. On a normal day too, you can have a 3 course meal. Sweets and Namkeens are found in our kitchen as abundantly as salt and sugar. It's winter time so Hola [I don't know english word for same], singada and ganna (sugarcane) can be enjoyed too. We had great time fighting for that last singada left in the basket. :)

Evening it was the same walk, this time to witness the sun set. I have never seen sun so beautiful. Day and again we saw it setting in the backdrop of a temple in river and some boats making their usual trips. The reflection in water make you think so much. I did think for some time too. Not much though. I was on a break yaar. :)

The palace on the banks on Narmada is beautiful. Everyday we explored new parts of it. Temples, corridors and other sides that we had never seen. Little kids have so much enthu that you automatically forget all your laziness. I used my camera after so long.

Being at home means early dinner and then lazying in night. The towns sleeps early. So we played indoor games. And were in bed by 10:30 pm types. Evening was the only time we enjoyed the idiot box. A cheerful end to a cheerful day. Getting ready for a new day ahead.

Overall a really satisfying day. My vacation this time was filled with such days. I really enjoyed it a lot.

Missing you all :(

oh..it's over :(

The vacation is over. :(

Here is a glimpse of my life during last few days.

I will update about it soon.

BRB

Every time I go home, there is a nagging fear of losing something behind that haunts me. They are not just a figment of my imagination. Some of them have proven to be true. A costly truth, to say the least.
Still, it can not deter me from taking a break from it all and go back to where I came from. This is one more such chance.

Yipppppeeeeeeee
I am going home.

Miss you all.

And I will be back with loads of Indori namkeens and stories. :)

gyarah kahaniyan

Summarizing my last two evenings in a simple mathemagical equation:
gyarah kahaniyan = dus kahaniyan + aaja nachle

Dus Kahaniyan is a brave attempt to say the least. Frankly speaking it did not live up to my expectations. I imagined it a Indian attempt of love actually or babel. Though the stories are some of the best you have heard [and watched] in recent times, no linking amongst them is bit of a uneasy factor. Box office has tagged this movie as a flop. It was bound to be. No masala to sell here. I feel this movie is a link between out-and-out commercial crap and over-the-head crossover cinema. And that makes it special. Content and execution are top notch and that surely makes it stand out in the lot.
Good work guys. Keep it up.

Aaja Nachle is another proof of Madhuri's brilliance. She rocks and she dances. And nobody can do it better than her. Watch if for Madhuri. Storyline is loose. At end of three hours you will realize that there is nothing that you did not expect. Swades meets Chak De India. There are light moments throughout the movie. Time pass assured. Laila Majnoo show is something you have never seen in your life. It's enjoyable to core. Madhuri's dance is the icing on cake. She has grace and persona that none of the current heroins in bollywood can boast of. Would love to see more of you Madhuri. Keep dancing.
And to those of you who tagged it as woman oriented movies, fish off. Just that lead actor is a girl does not make a woman oriented movie.

the good game has begin...

The good game has begin.

I was browsing through some of my old posts and this one caught my attention: To win all, you need to risk all.

This is what I needed at this moment. Last few days have been mixed bag in terms of experience. The pursuit gave me an indication of things to come. I second it after spending my last few days doing nothing. I have had my lows and highs. For no reason at all. Or were they indeed the reasons. I will never know. It's just impulse of the moment. And I know that I have to let it pass by.

One thing I have learnt from it all is that risk is unavoidable. If you dream, you need to dare of breaking the mould. I am doing what I think is right. I may be wrong, but I want to learn it firsthand. To cut above the rest needs risk. Mediocrity leads you nowhere.

programming maxims

Rob Pike offers the following "rules" in Notes on Programming in C as programming maxims, though they can be easily viewed as points of a Unix philosophy:^{[citation needed]}

• Rule 1: You cannot tell where a program is going to spend its time. Bottlenecks occur in surprising places, so do not try to second guess and put in a speed hack until you've proven that's where the bottleneck is.
• Rule 2: Measure. Do not tune for speed until you have measured, and even then don't unless one part of the code overwhelms the rest.
• Rule 3: Fancy algorithms are slow when n is small, and n is usually small. Fancy algorithms have big constants. Until you know that n is frequently going to be big, don't get fancy. (Even if n does get big, use Rule 2 first.)
• Rule 4: Fancy algorithms are buggier than simple ones, and they are much harder to implement. Use simple algorithms as well as simple data structures.
• Rule 5: Data dominates. If you have chosen the right data structures and organized things well, the algorithms will almost always be self-evident. Data structures, not algorithms, are central to programming.
• Rule 6: There is no Rule 6.

Pike's rules 1 and 2 restate C. A. R. Hoare's famous maxim "Premature optimization is the root of all evil." Ken Thompson rephrased Pike's rules 3 and 4 as "When in doubt, use brute force." Rules 3 and 4 are instances of the design philosophy KISS. Rule 5 was previously stated by Fred Brooks in The Mythical Man-Month. Jon Bentley's Programming Pearls also has a chapter on the same design principle. Rule 5 is often shortened to "write stupid code that uses smart data", and is an instance of the guideline "If your datastructures are good enough, the algorithm to manipulate them should be trivial." Rule 6 is merely a humorous reference to Monty Python's Bruces sketch. In C strings, the last byte of the string is null, thus indicating the length of the string.

ps: Taken from wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_philosophy

fri sat sun mon

Fri: Not much work as usual. Was thinking of leaving early from office and try my luck at attending any Bangalore Habba event. But as it turned out to be, I ended up being at home. This year, somehow, I did not go to even a single event in Bangalore Habba. Strange and sad, but that's the way it is. :)

Sat: Lazy morning followed by a visit to Spar. First hypermarket of it's kind in Bangalore. And it impressed me. Lot of variety and competitive prices. Not much crowded like Big Bazaars. And to top it all - nice and fresh vegetables and fruits. You should try it out at least once if you are in Bangalore. Chitchatting post lunch and then evening at a friend's place. Nice homely food enjoyed with nice homely people.

[Forgot that it is Saurabh's Bday]

Sun: Again a lazy morning. Bachche log exam ke liye chale gaye. Arpit came home and told that it was Saurabh's Bday today. shucks... Checked on orkut. Went straight to cake shop. Bought cake. Bachche came home. Wished Saurabh then had lunch. Movie with a friend. Ice-cream and pani-puri followed. Bought yoyo for Sarthak. Came home and left for Saurabh's dinner treat. China Pearl again. Hogged like anything. Reach home at 10:30, ChakDe on cable. Watched ChakDe. Had Cake cutting and Happy Bday singing program at 11:15. Ate cake and then directly off to my bed.
What a day!!!

Mon: OMG. It's lazy morning again. Got up late. Was in two minds about taking my bike. Somehow decided against it. Was late for the bus so took an auto to catch the bus. No issues. Came to work. Breakfast. Some work.
Going for lunch now...

That's all....

i miss you kiddo...

I really do...

Dhan Dhana Dhan Goal - Avoidable

Let me try to keep it very objective:

What works:
1. Title song. Nice catchy tune and good lyrics.
2. ManUnited dressing room and views from Old Trafford stadium.
3. N/A

What does not work:
1. Story (or the absence of it).
2. Shoddy camera work (it's slow and dull. Frames do not have continuity. Watch anyone play FIFA 2005, you will get to see better action)
3. Obsessively chauvinistic south Asian references. (Mr Chocolate man - there is more to game than racism.)
4. No characters. A football movie can not be made with just 2 players. I would like to ask the directory if he actually thought even name of the 16 players. They are just no-one.
5. Side stories. Bipasha-john romance, Arshad-wife's fights, Sardar's wife, John's mom - too many untold stories. They pop up from nowhere and just make it worse.
6. Songs - Pathetic pathetic pathetic...

It is more boring that watching a goal less draw in Durand Cup.
I really don't think this movie was made to bask on glory of Chak De India. Aug 10th to Nov 23rd is too less a time to make a movie in bollywood. But may be it is the case, the product has no quality.

Avoid yaar.

ps: My worst disappointment with this movie is the fact that AK has written dialogue for it. It's disappointing stuff AK. You certainly can do much better than this.