March Read Meet under Open Skies.

One more lovely evening, I attended with my Caferati folks, this time in South Mumbai, Kemps Corner, to be exact. The theme this month was on sharing notes on the workshops that we had attended during Kala Ghoda Festival in February 2008. I was surprised by the number of people who were anxious to attend. The members at the read-meets were dwindling lately, sometimes as low as five members, but this read-meet was choc-a-bloc. Writers were waiting for some other members to drop out, so that, they could be accommodated. Was it because there were notes to be shared or was it because it was at a convenient location? Whatever, I think people always need a reason to attend, especially if they are not a regular. And, members who attended were not disappointed. Who would? A read meet on a terrace, facing the sea, a generous crowd, who is willing to share their knowledge with people, some of those, whom they are meeting for the first time, a perfect hostess, Kareena Merchant, who made everybody comfortable with her warm chats and tasty chaats and a meticulous organizer, Suniti Joshi, who did lot of leg work alone and yet, so precisely perfect. Hats off to Suniti, who always takes extra effort and time and responds to every member patiently! I was lucky this time to find two friends, who were willing to share a taxi with me and we reached at the venue on the dot of 5pm. After warm up and the introduction of 27 members in Kareena’s house, we went upstairs to the terrace to bathe in the sunshine amidst the cool winds of the open seas. The meeting continued with poem read by Jaya Bhandari, a fiction by Soma Sarkar and a descriptive poem by John. So engrossed was I in their readings, that I forgot to watch the sun-set. (Actually I was sitting in a wrong direction, facing the tall buildings and a cliff of the ‘Hanging Gardens’), But I saw a black bird, resting up there, on a TV antenna, who wanted an audience too, but his verses swayed in the breeze. A short break after the readings was not very short because the snacks were too tasty. It takes time to eat Sev Puri, sandwiches, batatwadas and walnut cake and drown it with a cup of tea/coffee. Second session started with Suniti sharing her ‘Performance Poetry’, Ramesh on ‘Writing for Children’, Samarth on ‘Screen Writing’ Archana on ‘Pastoral Poetry and Kareena on “Freelancing’. I was aware of the time limit of the read meet, and I wanted to hear about other’s experience (and not waste my time, hearing myself speak,) therefore I had prepared notes (Xeroxed it 15 times) on the points that were discussed during the workshop on ‘Getting Published’ and I was happy to distribute it to those, who were interested. I am glad I did that, because the meeting had extended for too long, (9:30pm) and it was getting very late to reach back home. Some of the busy members had to rush off half way to attend to their other commitments, and I was glad that I was able to share my notes with them too.

Spam’s made a fool of me……

Some days ago I got a mail in my inbox with a subject line of ‘Yahoo warning me to verify my password or else I would have to face suspension.’ I hold a Yahoo email account since five years and I have never received a mail like that., although, I am aware of the amount of spam that are doing rounds. So when this mail warned me that due to congestion of Yahoo users, yahoo would be shutting down all unused account and that I should verify my email and my password to in order to avoid de-activation of my yahoo account, I got trapped into their bait and foolishly gave my email and the password. Then started another string of spam’s, that started floating from my account and they were very embarrassing for me. There were spam’s sent to all the people in my mailing list asking for money or sending porn’s from my email account. I ignored them all after reporting these spam mail to the Yahoo help line. One email really gave me the jitters. It thanked me for my support and was transferring huge sum money in certain bank under my name! Was the crime of transferring money really happening, I was not sure, but I did not want my name to be associated with such transaction at all. I panicked and called few friends asking them for their advice. I even lodged a complaint at the cyber crime police on the net informing them about my non-involvement. Later, when I spoke to my cousin, she asked me to just chill and relax. These crimes are very common in Africa and anybody who is foolish enough to do transactions without confirming it on phone has only himself to blame. Since I had not signed any papers or documents, I had nothing to worry about. However, after complaining to cyber police, and reporting that I am not responsible for any transaction of any money, I started to feel relaxed. I have changed my passwords (stronger this time, with the combination of Caps and numbers) and I am no more sending or reading any emails from my yahoo or hotmail accounts.

Three years from now, Mumbaikars might travel in style....

This Saturday, when I visited my friend at Versova, I saw the construction right in the middle of the street. There was a huge crane digging out stones and tar. The centre of the two way road was cordoned off with the metal sheets displaying advertisement of ‘Reliance Metro’. On investigation, I discovered that the construction for metro rail had begun and the initial activity comprising trial pits and pile load tests had started. The eleven kilometer Versova-Andheri-Ghatkopar corridor will be completed within three years by a special purpose vehicle formed by Mumbai Metro-I consortium. (That’s what they say, although Mumbaikars had witnessed many uncompleted or delayed projects in the past.) The other corridors in the first phase include 38 km Colaba-Mahim_Charkop and 14 km Bandra-Kurla-Mankhurd route. Eleven of the 36 fully air-conditioned stations will be underground. Initially, four-car, air-conditioned trains that can accommodate 1500 passengers will run on the line-one train every four minutes. The cost will be shares by the Central and state government. This 19 months delay, caused by several problems which remain unresolved even now ((such as felling of the trees and allotments of the shops in the Malls for affected shop owners) has escalated the project cost from Rs 1,500 crore to Rs 2,356 crore. Img source of metro: http://images.google.co.in/

Yesterday, I went to watch a film (at Fame ad lab in InOrbit Mall) called ‘The Lives of Others’.

One word I heard myself after a long silence, during watching the film was ‘Beautiful’ I just loved the film and it really moved me. The emotions of the characters in the film are very real. It was really worth watching it in the theatre and I took my friends along who knew nothing about what they were to see. They didn’t even know that it was German film with English subtitles, but they came along, because I said so, and they too loved it. It haunted us long after we left our seat. Winner of the 2006 Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, ‘The Lives of Others’ is on one level a political thriller no doubt, but it’s also a remarkable study of human emotion. It is the story of a celebrated playwright Dreyman, whose house is bugged by Stasi officer, Wiesler (backed by a top governmental bigwig who’s looking for dirt on Dreyman whose girlfriend he wants to sleep with.) in the hope of collecting evidence against him. The story is set in East Germany in 1984, five years before the Berlin Wall came down, and at a time when the Stasi, the country’s relentless secret police was closely watching everyone in the Communist German Democratic Republic. Immersing himself in the case, Wiesler listens in on Dreyman’s private moments and chances upon enough evidence that can easily implicate Dreyman, but finds himself convinced of Dreyman’s innocence and makes significant effort to protect him. The scene where Wiesler walks into a bookstore to buy a book, authored by Dreyman, and dedicated to Wiesler, really moved me. The star of the film however, is its first time writer-director Florian von Donnersmarck who creates such a genius work. Image Source : http://www.history.ucsb.edu/projects/ccws/images/livesothers.jpg

Children on Mumbai streets

I get very disturbed when I see kids on the streets. They should be studying in some school. Education in India is not very expensive, and there are many NGO’s who are willing to help, but still, how these kids land up on the road and beg at every street signals, is a mystery to me. I don’t like to give them money or patronize them in any ways because I am worried about their future, if they get the taste of money at this young age, and learn that they can earn money by begging or selling on the streets, they will never understand that education is more important. While rich children lead a sheltered and comfortable life, we have poor children who are doing all kids of odd jobs like selling their wares, or begging in the local trains or cooking on the street. Rich parents would never allow their kids to even light a match and here we have street kids as young as five years old, lighting the fire and sitting so close to it. We have six year old child selling her wares in the local train. Seven year old child will do streets shows like tight rope walking Eight year old might be the street musicians Ten year old might be seen begging and crying of pain. Some of the kids are tortured and forced to beg. And some of them are learning to steal at this tender age. I remember of a day, when I was traveling in an auto and I had a food packet in my hand. At one signal, one child came and snatched the food packet from my hand. The signal changed to green and my auto drove on, but I was sorry that the child had to forcibly snatch the food packet from my hand, had he asked me politely I might have given it to him. What these children will grow up to be? I dread about its outcome