Melodious and Soulful songs Tag

Nimmy tagged me for this meme where I have to list my most favorite ten songs from two languages; songs which are soft and melodious. Iam a sucker for old Hindi film songs and still havent grown out of them. I never seem to have enough of them. I will go nuts if I really try to decide my top ten Hindi songs. I absolutely love not 10 or 20 or 50 but perhaps 500 songs. So, I will just list random ten favorite songs of mine, songs which come to my mind first. I will list some slow/soulful Punjabi songs too. I tag all active bloggers on my Blogroll, Amit, Anamika, Chris, Nomad, Nova, Nita, Poonam, Prerna, Reema, Roop and Shefaly, to do this meme.

Woody Allen sings Jai ho Pinto….

It seems as if Woody Allen has finally connected with India. Of the 40+ movies he has made, mostly based in New York city (melting pot of the world), I don’t remember a sub plot or even a single character involving Indian angle or person of Indian origin. Yes, there were references to Indian culture, Indian food, Hindu philosophy, Mahatma Gandhi etc, but never an important Indian character in any of his films. There is a scene in his “Everybody Says I love you“, the only musical he made, where two of the main characters are inside a taxi and a romantic song is played in the background. The taxi driver is a Sikh who then sings a Hindi song for few minutes. That was the maximum footage an Indian character got in a Woody Allen film.

So, when I read that Freida Pinto has been cast in the next Allen film to be shot this summer, I wondered if Pinto really realizes how damn lucky and blessed she is. Not only is she the first Indian actor/actress who has caught the fancy of legendary Allen, but also by appearing in an Allen film, her career in Hollywood has already gotten on a flying start. Superstars such as Diane Keaton, Mia Farrow, Sean Penn, Julia Roberts, Madonna, Scarlett Johansson and many other present and past stars owe a significant part of their success to Allen who cast them in important roles early on in their careers. Also, Allen’s actresses, especially in the supporting role category, have always been favorite of academy members for the Oscar in that category (Dianne Wiest, Mira Sorvino, Penelope Cruz etc). So, who knows that Pinto might now even fetch an Oscar nomination next year!

The glorious case of A.R. Rahman

A.R. Rahman made Indians across the world proud by his double feat at Oscars. My heartiest Congratulations to him. He is a genius and deserves every award, including the Oscars. Today in the morning, when everybody in my office was talking about the awards last night,  one of my non-Indian co-workers asked me what I think of Rahman’s speech after he won the Oscar for best Music. I said to her that I think he gave a decent speech and I asked her why she is asking me that. She said that she found Rahman’s reaction bit strange as he seemed very nervous and sort of ran away from the podium after receiving the award. I tried to explain to her that Rahman is a terribly shy person and infact his response yesterday was much better than what we Indians are used to and expected to see from this reclusive and shy genius.

What you say-and how you behave- at Oscars in those few seconds is remembered by the world for decades. People still vividly remember Marlon Brando joking about the weight of Oscar trophy while receiving his Oscar for “On the waterfront” more than half a century ago or Jack Nicholsan’s humorous dig at Academy members while receiving his Oscar for Cuckoos’s nest more than 30 years ago or Michael Moore blasting George Bush after receiving Oscar for his documentary or Russell Crowe’s very effective and humble speech after receiving his award for Beautiful Mind or who can forget emotional outburst of Halle Barry some years back.

My Predictions for the Oscars tommorow

Best Motion Picture of the Year

Nominees:
	Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The  Frost/Nixon  (Havent seen) Milk  Reader, The ( Slumdog Millionaire

My personal favorite: The Curious case of Benjamin Button

Most likely winner: Slumdog Millionaire

Dark Horse : Milk

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role

Nominees:
	Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The (2008) – Brad Pitt Frost/Nixon (2008) – Frank Langella Milk (2008/I) – Sean Penn (I) Visitor, The (2007/I) – Richard Jenkins (I) Wrestler, The (2008) – Mickey Rourke

My personal favorite: Sean Penn for Milk

Most likely winner: Mickey Rourke for Wrestler

Dark Horse : Sean Penn for Milk

Billu Barber

(No spoilers in the review below)

Billu Barber is a story of an extremely ordinary life led by an extraordinary man. Everybody else around this man Billu (his family, friends, other village folk) want much more from life than what life can ever give them. But, Billu is like a Buddha in this modern world; in complete harmony with both his inner and outer world. Yes, on surface, he looks and acts very ordinary; struggling to make ends meet, bluffing his way to get around paying his kids’ school fees, not always friendly with people and so on. But, that’s deceptive. In reality, he is living his life as perfectly as it’s possible in the circumstances he is in, circumstances which are extremely harsh to say the least. He successfully goes through his tough life with the help of his extreme wit and intelligence. He jokes away harsh realities of his everyday life and also has the intelligence to see through the guile of some people around him (for ex, he politely refuses to borrow any money from the conceited landlord). He hasn’t given up on life and will prefer people making fun of his problems rather than sympathizing with him.

On another end of the story’s spectrum is Sahir Khan, a film superstar, who is living the most extraordinary life possible; life of extreme wealth, fame and power. On surface, he is calm & composed and handling his success and fame pretty well. But deep inside, he feels very uncomfortable because he knows somewhere that he has been just extremely lucky to be in that position. So, to undo that discomfort in him, he tries to give back to the world as much as it’s possible. He is very similar to Billu in the sense that both go through their very different lives with same wit and abandon.

Any ideas??

Ok, this is really silly, but then when did I pretend otherwise. Let’s say, you need to stay at home for a week, because for some very personal reason, you cannot show up in the office. You cannot afford to take a week off and you can also not take a sick leave for that long, as it will require a Doctor’s note. Now, your boss and your office rules do allow you to work from home under special circumstances. And, you do have all the time and the resources to work from home. But, the problem is, what excuse you can possibly give to your boss which will sound credible and will justify your staying & working from home for a week? Ofcourse you cannot tell the real reason. You can also not fake illness or cite family reasons because you have no family here. 

Any ideas/excuses you smart people can come up with?? Thanks in advance!

Most of the times…

While I go through each single moment, each single day and each single period of my life, I realize that there is constant conflict between mind and the heart, between mind and the body and between mind and the soul; most of the times, the wrong candidate wins.

Have a nice weekend everybody!

Racism in the elevator! :)

Funny! (Got it as an email forward)

OBAMA’s NEW LOOK WITH FAIR & LOVELY