In the UK, it is tough to cross a road or walk into a store without bumping into a teddy bear. They are everywhere, dressed up as all possible historic & contemporary characters worth their salt. I had a feeling that a tourist attraction in UK really means business the day it brings out its own teddy bear. Name any street in England or Scotland that had some historic relevance, had some particularly bloody past, was visited by a celebrity or just plain, sounds cool & chances are that you will be able to buy a Teddy bear with that message.
Like hundreds of other Sherlock Holmes fans, I have also tried to decipher many a man & woman's past from the way he/she dressed, walked or carried a pen. Probably it was the lack of easy availability of hallucinogens that prevented me from being too successful in those attempts. Holmes is the ultimate intellectual super hero. Here was a guy who does no cardiac exercises or weights or martial arts, has no annoying accents or pointy moustaches, wears his clothes in the right order, does not have an underground lair, but is still able to get the crook by sheer deduction - how cool is that?
So I was really glad to actually pass through 21 B Baker Street. I suppose it is the quirky English humour that has really turned an address into a tourist destination. There was a plaque saying that the legendary detective still gets a lot of cases by mail to that address. Of course, there were the mandatory teddy bears for sale.
One thing that stands out in England is the way they have branded mundane things & how poor tourists like me spend precious forex on them. The Underground is a major brand with everything from boxer shorts to ashtrays on it. The English cop's hat, the telephone booths, the double decker buses, the big clock etc etc. Why cant we make miniature ambys and sell them for dollars?
The original plan was to run around the whole day, visit Harrods, meet a cousin of ours & then catch a train to scotland. After successfully completing task 1 only the whole day, we decided to take a morning train & thus get some well deserved sleep. We planned to meet up with one of Ps cousins for dinner. So he takes us to this pseud Chinese joint called "Memories of (some chinese guy)". And we sit down and I freeze. There are these nice little chopsticks on the table & nothing else.
So I look desperately at my better half for some support, some solace & she mumbles something to the effect of "Just Try.." Luckily I am not one of those who find every minute a challenge & takes it head on. So I asked for forks. Surprise surprise so did her cousin & from that moment we really bonded. Till date I havent really met a horizontally challenged chinese guy & I believe their way of eating might have something to do with this. I mean how much can you eat with two little sticks? I am sure a lot of chinese folk are just eating very little out of sheer frustration on not being able to eat more. We Indians on the other hand know that we can eat as much as our hand will allow.
(Here, let me point out that the above is not an extraordinary observation. I am sure that there are countless obscure authors who have written the same about Chinese before. So if you think this is your idea, please claim it. But do it before I get a two book deal & a movie offer from Dream works. Dont come back running then)
Sunday, May 07, 2006
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
Part 2 - A 'moving' performance at Garrick
I doubt that I will ever become a 'theatre personality'. But I do enjoy a play or so once in three years. But what I know for sure is that I am most likely to have been banned for life from the Garrick theatre at the Westend in London.
Having taken the connecting flight from Paris & having had my first encounter with the French language - I blanked out in front of the security officer when she let loose a barrage of sounds at me & later I pretended to move my lips to make the sound 'bonjhuuuur' the 'r' kind of fading into oblivion with a flourish - all I wanted to was what any sane man would wish on arriving in a foreign country - sleep. But unfortunately, my contribution to this trip started & ended at carrying the heavy stuff & so all my talking tough amounted to nothing. I suspect that men ceased to be the dominant sex the day women started to wear pants - in the house & everywhere else.
So I shrugged off my sleep & off we went - on the London Underground. Here I first got a sign of what compensation litigation can do to the social fabric of a country. At every other station there was an announcement - "Mind the Gap between the train & the platform" - no doubt put in place after a drunk guy lost his shoe between the train & the platform & went on to sue the underground for a million quid ! (All slang used in this article are country specific). The closest Indian railway annoucement that I could think of was "Women passengers should avoid sitting near open windows with easy access to chain snatchers" or "Avoid taking biscuits from strangers, they may be drugged".
After walking through Regent street, Trafalagar Square etc we finally reached the west end. On the way we asked 6 different folks for directions & got answers in six different languages all amounting to 'got no clue, mate'. It was here that I realised I had walked straight into a carefully laid trap, what with my partner having booked very expensive tickets for a Westend performance - 'One flew over the cuckoos nest'. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that the bird folk would come back to haunt me after I had told their side of the story a few weeks back. It was starring Christian Slater, so it cant be that bad I thought. And then the performance began.
The first thing I noticed was that Christian Slater is actually quite short. The next thing I remember is waking up just in time to prevent headbutting the English gentleman sitting next to me. For the next half an hour I swayed from side to side, from front to back, almost fell off the chair & was rudely woken up a couple of times by laughter. The harder I tried to keep my eyes open, the deeper I sank. It would later turn out to be one of my most expensive moments of slumber. And just as I noticed that Christian Slater was actually quite short, the lights went out & I stood up to clap. My wife pulled me down just in time as apparently it was only halfway done.
I felt that the story was well told to its conclusion. Either way to prevent further embarassment, she agreed to leave. So like all the English folk, we got up as if to get a glass of wine & promptly slipped out of the theatre.
Till date, I have failed in giving a satisfactory explanation to my conduct.
Having taken the connecting flight from Paris & having had my first encounter with the French language - I blanked out in front of the security officer when she let loose a barrage of sounds at me & later I pretended to move my lips to make the sound 'bonjhuuuur' the 'r' kind of fading into oblivion with a flourish - all I wanted to was what any sane man would wish on arriving in a foreign country - sleep. But unfortunately, my contribution to this trip started & ended at carrying the heavy stuff & so all my talking tough amounted to nothing. I suspect that men ceased to be the dominant sex the day women started to wear pants - in the house & everywhere else.
So I shrugged off my sleep & off we went - on the London Underground. Here I first got a sign of what compensation litigation can do to the social fabric of a country. At every other station there was an announcement - "Mind the Gap between the train & the platform" - no doubt put in place after a drunk guy lost his shoe between the train & the platform & went on to sue the underground for a million quid ! (All slang used in this article are country specific). The closest Indian railway annoucement that I could think of was "Women passengers should avoid sitting near open windows with easy access to chain snatchers" or "Avoid taking biscuits from strangers, they may be drugged".
After walking through Regent street, Trafalagar Square etc we finally reached the west end. On the way we asked 6 different folks for directions & got answers in six different languages all amounting to 'got no clue, mate'. It was here that I realised I had walked straight into a carefully laid trap, what with my partner having booked very expensive tickets for a Westend performance - 'One flew over the cuckoos nest'. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that the bird folk would come back to haunt me after I had told their side of the story a few weeks back. It was starring Christian Slater, so it cant be that bad I thought. And then the performance began.
The first thing I noticed was that Christian Slater is actually quite short. The next thing I remember is waking up just in time to prevent headbutting the English gentleman sitting next to me. For the next half an hour I swayed from side to side, from front to back, almost fell off the chair & was rudely woken up a couple of times by laughter. The harder I tried to keep my eyes open, the deeper I sank. It would later turn out to be one of my most expensive moments of slumber. And just as I noticed that Christian Slater was actually quite short, the lights went out & I stood up to clap. My wife pulled me down just in time as apparently it was only halfway done.
I felt that the story was well told to its conclusion. Either way to prevent further embarassment, she agreed to leave. So like all the English folk, we got up as if to get a glass of wine & promptly slipped out of the theatre.
Till date, I have failed in giving a satisfactory explanation to my conduct.
Friday, April 21, 2006
Part 1 - Boarding Order
Apparently in international flights there is a boarding order - not according to seat nos, but according to personality types. First children less than 2 years, then infants travelling with their mothers, then old ladies (curiously enough no lady came forward during this boarding call), then IIT-IIM types going on an offshore project complete with laptop, mango pickle, iddly podi & all the masalas that have today made their list into banned articles in hand luggage, then firang backpackers who on the strength of the exchange rate can afford business class, then the unfortunate ones who paid full fare on this flight & finally in a condescending voice, we who were clever & grabbed the promo offer which would probably cover fuel costs from the Airport to Adyar were called to board the flight.
In spite of forgetting to login to seatguru.com to find out the best seats for our flight, we managed to get emergency exit seats which had more leg room than business class. The moment the pilot showed us the route map, I was a relieved man. We were flying over land for most of the way, surely in the case of an emergency the pilot would be astute enough to head for the nearest field or a highway atleast instead of heading for the sea? But I also saw Iran in our flight path, & for a brief second I wondered about the soundness of logic of choosing to fly an American airline (Delta) over Iran, exactly on the date when Uncle Bush and his band of musketeers had chosen that specific country for his next cowboys & injuns game.
As part of the onboard announcements, we were assured that even though during the flight you may see the Captain taking a nap or the flight attendants dozing or the pilots little girl at the wheel, trained personnel were always doing what they were supposed to be doing. Sure enough, some 20 minutes into the flight the Captain settled down with a book two seats away from us & woke up only at Paris. I could almost hear a midflight announcement saying "The tail is not responding. Windows cannot end this process itself. Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to terminate immediately or wait for the programme to respond"
Over the next 11 hours, every time someone flushed the loo (every 215 times), I shuddered in my seat looking for the spot where air had rushed in to the plane. My better half slept quite well through all the noise & you will later find out how crucial this turned out.
We landed uneventfully in Paris, the most fashionable & stylish city in the world & I set my best bare foot forward - wearing skimpy floaters. In the next one & a half hour I found out that I was the only one in the entire airport complex, which incidentally is bigger than some of our mid sized cities, attired so. As paranoia set in I saw that the entire developed world was staring at my feet & then looking away saying 'tsk tsk'. Luckily the visa officer could only see me chest up & so I slipped through the Paris style net. The fact that I almost lost a couple of toes to frostbite did not bother me so much then.
In spite of forgetting to login to seatguru.com to find out the best seats for our flight, we managed to get emergency exit seats which had more leg room than business class. The moment the pilot showed us the route map, I was a relieved man. We were flying over land for most of the way, surely in the case of an emergency the pilot would be astute enough to head for the nearest field or a highway atleast instead of heading for the sea? But I also saw Iran in our flight path, & for a brief second I wondered about the soundness of logic of choosing to fly an American airline (Delta) over Iran, exactly on the date when Uncle Bush and his band of musketeers had chosen that specific country for his next cowboys & injuns game.
As part of the onboard announcements, we were assured that even though during the flight you may see the Captain taking a nap or the flight attendants dozing or the pilots little girl at the wheel, trained personnel were always doing what they were supposed to be doing. Sure enough, some 20 minutes into the flight the Captain settled down with a book two seats away from us & woke up only at Paris. I could almost hear a midflight announcement saying "The tail is not responding. Windows cannot end this process itself. Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to terminate immediately or wait for the programme to respond"
Over the next 11 hours, every time someone flushed the loo (every 215 times), I shuddered in my seat looking for the spot where air had rushed in to the plane. My better half slept quite well through all the noise & you will later find out how crucial this turned out.
We landed uneventfully in Paris, the most fashionable & stylish city in the world & I set my best bare foot forward - wearing skimpy floaters. In the next one & a half hour I found out that I was the only one in the entire airport complex, which incidentally is bigger than some of our mid sized cities, attired so. As paranoia set in I saw that the entire developed world was staring at my feet & then looking away saying 'tsk tsk'. Luckily the visa officer could only see me chest up & so I slipped through the Paris style net. The fact that I almost lost a couple of toes to frostbite did not bother me so much then.
Holidays
I am not one to brag that often, but me & my wife just came back from a holiday to London, Scotland & Paris. (Yea!) I am not that afraid of flying, but to overcome an overwhelming temptation to think of how it would be like to plunge down 20000 feet while in the 10 hr flight, I carried a writing pad & a pen. All I managed to write was "Boarding Order" (the two words, not any funny anecdote) through out the trip. So here is an exaggerated version of the trip from memory. To fuel interest in this story here are the various chapters that will go into this travelogue.
1. Boarding order
2. A performance at Garrick
3. Elementary, my dear
4. Lebanese are lebanese wherever they go
5. A DJ dressed as a driver
6. Egyptian escalators
7. Shauns Elysse
8. Du E
1. Boarding order
2. A performance at Garrick
3. Elementary, my dear
4. Lebanese are lebanese wherever they go
5. A DJ dressed as a driver
6. Egyptian escalators
7. Shauns Elysse
8. Du E
Thursday, March 30, 2006
9 to 1
If the countless samurai movies that I have seen are to be believed, Japanese folks are an aggressive lot. Imagine a culture where the most disciplined & self controlled of the lot - the monks, train to be supreme martial art & lethal weapons exponents, during their free time. In India, the most extreme physical activity that any monk has undertaken so far during his free time (according to Sh Ramanand Sagar) has been watching item numbers by 'apsaras' hell bent on breaking his concentration.
So it was not surprising that the Japanese unleashed the most potent & devilish weapon ever invented by man, after Gobi Manchurian Dry. Men, women & kids across remote corners of the world are going crazy over a series of squares - labelled easy, hard & godzilla, a pack of pencils a day & antidepressants. It has been described by many as the disease which would fill up the map of the world shown in many disaster movies, fastest, in red colour. There is no defence against it other than complete illiteracy.
In a classic attempt at disinformation & covering their tracks, the Japanese have gone so far as to say that the weapon was actually invented by an 18th century Swiss post master. Many retired post masters have since then denied this allegation saying that if they could actually use nine numbers simultaneously, then why have we been having only six digit post box numbers? But the most vehement opponent to this so called past-time has been none other than George Bush, saying "It is hard enough to write from 1 to 9 in the correct sequence, making people fill them into tiny little squares along the axes of evil, can only be the handiwork of al Qaeda".
A sudden spike in the number of students taking up complex & imaginary number courses and the reduction of the Amazon rain forest by 30% to meet the demand for pencils have been attributed to the epidemic reach of this weapon. In a rather premature attempt to be the 'thinking supermodel's hero', Salman declared "I think, therefore I Sudoku". Subsequent research has shown that 'Sudoku' actually means 'I am making a fool of myself' in a Japanese dialect spoken only by shaolin monks trained in martial arts & lethal weapons.
So it was not surprising that the Japanese unleashed the most potent & devilish weapon ever invented by man, after Gobi Manchurian Dry. Men, women & kids across remote corners of the world are going crazy over a series of squares - labelled easy, hard & godzilla, a pack of pencils a day & antidepressants. It has been described by many as the disease which would fill up the map of the world shown in many disaster movies, fastest, in red colour. There is no defence against it other than complete illiteracy.
In a classic attempt at disinformation & covering their tracks, the Japanese have gone so far as to say that the weapon was actually invented by an 18th century Swiss post master. Many retired post masters have since then denied this allegation saying that if they could actually use nine numbers simultaneously, then why have we been having only six digit post box numbers? But the most vehement opponent to this so called past-time has been none other than George Bush, saying "It is hard enough to write from 1 to 9 in the correct sequence, making people fill them into tiny little squares along the axes of evil, can only be the handiwork of al Qaeda".
A sudden spike in the number of students taking up complex & imaginary number courses and the reduction of the Amazon rain forest by 30% to meet the demand for pencils have been attributed to the epidemic reach of this weapon. In a rather premature attempt to be the 'thinking supermodel's hero', Salman declared "I think, therefore I Sudoku". Subsequent research has shown that 'Sudoku' actually means 'I am making a fool of myself' in a Japanese dialect spoken only by shaolin monks trained in martial arts & lethal weapons.
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