Games we Play!

We are all settled into the mundane life of student-hood. Orientation and all that done and it was time for the "Swagat" celebrations which invite the newbies into town by the Indian Student Association. Swagat was combined with August 15th celebrations and we were all there at the flag hoisting. I ignored G completely the first time he saw me there. He was looking soooo cute (at least for me) but still I knew that he was the one who had irritated me a couple of days ago and hence I should ignore him.

He walked up to my roomie as we filed back into the building for intro's and asked her, "Why is she not talking?" and she was like, "I dunno, you ask her."

And we then we did the whole intro thing and then food followed by games. We played musical chair. G and his best friend from UG who also went to KSU stood at both ends to remove the chairs and keep the game going. I won. And he tried to talk to me but I was like "whatever," and kept cold shouldering him.

Until he could not bear it at all. He came home with N after Swagat was over and spent sometime talking with us three roomies. It was fun. We laughed a lot because G and N have a good sense of humor and he was trying to make friends with me. We made friends...

Cute Sardar

It was our first Friday in our own apartment. We were still getting used to the whole living without family stuff and my roomie and I decided to hit the bed early because we really had nothing planned. Around 12.30am it started. Loud foot banging noises from above. We had three Sardar's living above, of which one looked like a Greek God...awww...anyways...the Sardar's were drunk and having a party.

My roomie and I got mad. We took our brooms and tried to pound on our ceiling hoping they would hear but to no avail. Then we checked the door right across from ours and saw that all of them boys were gone and probably were at the party too. Then we went down and called G.

He was all groggy eyed but told us not to worry and that he would talk to the cute Sardar and help us get to sleep. And so we waited....

waited...

waited...

half hour and still it did not seem like the music or dancing would stop. Roomie and I climbed up the stairs and knocked the door...and guess what we saw...G with a beer in hand dancing bangda. He stopped half way his step and had the sheepish smile and told us, "how about joining the party."

ARRRRRGggggggggghhhhhhhhhhh...we requested cute sardar to not make noise as we wanted to sleep and it was already 2.am plus and headed down.

That was the last Friday in my two years at school when we slept at 2.00am. The rest of our KSU life we hardly ever slept on a Friday night.

Falling Lungi

When we moved in, we did not have phone lines yet. So my roomie and I went to G's apartment because the rest of the apartments were also filled with newbies and none of them had phone connection. I called home and everyone, told them I was safe and sound and moved in. After making the call I was heading up to my apartment when I saw G and friends standing and chatting on the mid-landing (remember he is in the basement and I lived on first floor but the entrance to our building was on the mid-landing). G was wearing a lungi that he had pinched off a fresher.

The minute he saw me, he told me, "run to your apartment fast. I don't know how long the lungi will stand without falling down and it might fall any minute now."

I gave him the WTF look and ran up stairs and then could not stop laughing. He was (is) super funny.

Shut Up!

Lock, stock and barrel, which equalled two big suitcases and some bedding that my brother had bought me, I moved to Manhattan, Kansas. G was nowhere to be seen. There were two new guys M and S who introduced themselves as the substitute housing co-ordinators when G was away on a vacation to Ohio. These guys showed me one crappy apartment/house after another. I was so mad at G that he had said one thing and had not done it and here I was with two sweet guys but no apartment materializing.

G was back in town and I met him briefly once in the food court and just exchanged plesantaries. He was busy with guys and I did not feel like talking to him because he had dumped me in regards to getting me the perfect apartment.

Then after using my Tamil influence with K4 (an senior student) I moved into the apartment K4 was moving out of. Which, as luck would have it was on the 1st floor diagonally opposite of where G's apartment was in the basement.

When all this was sorted out G came back. He told us that he will be with us through the signing the lease process and told us to meet him at our apartment-to-be around noon. My future roomies and I were there and so was G. He started chatting with us and I had a whole bunch of questions and kept shooting one after the other. Suddenly, G turned and looked into my eyes and pointed to his watch and said, "I am going to clock you, dont talk for another five minutes."

*silence*

I could not beleive that someone actually said that for me. I know I am very chirpy and talkative but no one has ever asked me to shut up ever before that and ever after that. I looked wide eyed at him and then got all sad and such. Embarrassed I held my peace nad kept quiet and from that moment on I hated him and decided that I will never talk to him again.

But as we all know, life has its own idea of what is to be and whats not to be...

Nine Years!!!

Nine years to the day G and I decided that we should start dating seriously. And guess how many days it took us to decide that after we met???? About 5-10 days approximately. G's and my saga is very funny. Actually, it is like a movie story, a cliched desi movie story. I will write about it in parts.

On August 5th, my brother and I decided to pay Kansas State (KSU) a visit so drove from Kansas City to Manhattan, Kansas where I was going to do my masters. I had spoken to a GS over the phone because he was listed as the housing co-ordinator on the Indian Student Association guide and he had told me to meet him at a certain location at a certain time (think it was like 4.30pm or something).

Brother and I were there but the hero was not. So we took help of other students around and checked out the campus and got preliminary paper work out of the way...and then we got back to where we were supposed to meet him. I sat in the living room of one K4 when G walked in. Looking so HOT (sizzzlinggggg) that I was for a second taken aback. I knew that he noticed me too.

He told me to move in and he would make sure that I would have a house ready to move in. I liked his confidence and all the charisma along with his good looks. Happy to see that KSU was not filled with pazham (fruit) material headed back home...

So that is how we met...

Rest in next...short post keeps it interesting...I think...what say?

Compliments and Me!

I suck at receiving compliments. I know some people who are really in control of the situation when someone throws a compliment their way and handle it all poised and nice...and then there is me. I say that because everytime I get a compliment I do one of the following or worse:

• I blush, smile and avoid the person the rest of the day lest I burst the bubble that the person saw me through.
• I say, "me? really? no way...you are not looking right, I actually have a flat nose"
• or I say, "ya, but yours is better." and then get into an argument as to why I suck and go about proving it.
• or I am surprised, shocked and look embarassed that someone noticed and complimented.
• or I do something silly to make the person wonder why they ever told me anything at all.

Do any of you have that problem? Or is it just me??!!!

Love

ART

Love Aaj Kal

A very simple story and directed decently with some really funny moments and some romantic moments too. When I got out of the theater I did not get the total feel good feeling that I got after "Socha Na Tha" or "Jab we Met." The movie is all fine and dandy and ends happy for everyone but still the feel good factor was missing. I exited feeling...teek hai. Not bad. I did not waste $5 but it would have been better on a DVD than in a theater.

You know there are certain movies that have to be watched in a theater. Like action movies or Rajnikanth movie. I say Rajnikanth movie only because of all the hungama and fun the people do before the movie starts and during the movie. Most of the time you will have to watch the DVD to figure out the parts you missed out because of excessive yelling or commenting but nevertheless it is fun. You will know what I am talking about when you see one. Even G was impressed. Which is why Rajnikanth is Super Star as all these cheers and fan clubs were started for him before anyone else ever had one.

I digressed. Sorry about that. Back to LAK...Saif looks old. Old enough to be Padukone's dad and he is trying very hard to look, sound and act cool. Sorry daddy, I can only see your age from the lines on your face. And D looks pretty and cute and please honey do not try sexy it is not becoming for you, and golly how emaciated you look. Anyway, both DP and SAK have done a very decent job at acting.

Rahul Khanna has been reduced to a joke. He was, when I was in college the coolest dude on TV and now he is doing small bits in movies with two line dialogues. I feel for you bro!

Catchy dialogues, decent songs, but the movie did not do it for me. It is definitely an average watch...if you like romanceeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

Love

ART

Love it or Kick it

We have seen uber-romantic movies from the past in black and white. In all Indian languages...be it Devdas in Hindi or in Tamil or Telugu or be it Missiamma in any of the languages. But the director could not show scenes of love making or even lip locking for that matter. Yet we knew exactly what emotions were springing up between the actors. The actors were good and the directors were even better. No kissing of skin show was necessary to show that someone was in love or going through lusty love feelings. It was obvious.

But with the onset of Western influence each and every Indian director in his own way has been trying to push the envelope. In the very recent past on-screen romance in Hindi and Tamil movies has taken a sharp leap. the past few years we have seen the so called "item numbers" increase very rapidly. It became mandatory for every commercial and sometimes even non-commercial movie to incorporate an item number into the script. In most cases they were just interjected to appeal to the front benchers and the mass in general.

A lot of item numbers of course are very raunchy and do get very explicit in the lyrics as well as bodily gyrations. Most of us ignored the video and hummed the songs like "beedi Jalai..." (Omkara 2007) just because the tune is catchy. Of course Sunidhi Chauhan has made a fortune on these very songs and a few actress gained popularity off these things.

But now the directors want to incorporate lip locking and love making scenes in every movie so that they can get the attention of the mass and use it as a lure instead of using the story or the script or other movie-making talents to attract audience.

If you were to ask a director or an actor why there is a love making in the scene, the director will say, the script demands it and the actor or actress will say, "I only did it because the script demanded it."

I am writing this because I saw the hindi movie "New York" (2009) last night and there is a scene showing John A and Katrina K love making in a song sequence. Now I want to ask the director, please sir, elucidate me, how on earth did that scene do any good to the movie?

How did that scene help the story? Is this a heist story where the actor sleeps with the leading lady, steals the secret code while she is snoozing away? Or is he going to kill her afterward? Why do we need to see them making love? So that we understand how they land up with a kid afterward? Would'nt her saying excitedly, "I am pregnant" not give us the watchers clue that they had to have had sex to have a kid? We are certainly not stupid you know and as far as I am concerned about kids, that peice of information is unecessary to them.

I was so mad. I can understand a movie titled "Kama Sutra" showing love making scenes. I am not going to take my kid to that movie period, but a movie on terrorism? why? If he was trying to attarct girls by showing John half naked and the men with Katrina then director failed on more counts than just bad direction and casting. If a movie sucks, no matter how many love making scenes you include it is going to flop. But if a movie is good then you cannot stop it now, can you? I do not remember seeing any love making scene in Rang De Basanti...hmm...wonder how the people saw it!

In a hurry to attract the masses directors seem to be forgeting to make the script and story the leader instead they are trying out short cuts and short cuts only last for a short time...so go on and make GOOD movie and not shoddy B graders.

Love

ART

One day it is OZ and then next day...

its Wimbledon??

So on Tuesday when we played tennis, like I said, it was like 100F+ and we were both burned to our bones and on Wednesday when we got to the court it started to drizzle. We decided that we will play and take the risk against lightining. We played a good 20 minutes before the rain beat us out of the court. We got back into the car soaking wet and giggly.

One day we played like the conditions would in Australian Open and the next day it was like Wimbledon...Love Texas and Texan weather...love it!

ART

Tennis!!!

I remember the times clearly. Summer vacations in BHEL Township when I was a little girl. My brothers, dad and I would take our tennis net (ya we owned one) and go to the tennis court. Put up the net and then play tennis for the next few hours. We started at 5 in the morning and went on till my brothers could move no more. My brothers played tennis for the state and they practiced like crazy, dad was their coach and I was their designated ball girl.

We had to buy our own net because BHEL tennis courts would put up the net each day at 3pm or later only, so to practice early mornings with no one else bothering us dad just bought us our very own net. Brothers were ruthless and played with such focus that it was always fun to watch them play. Me on the other hand did sprints, excesises, ball picking and wall practice a lot. I loved it.

When we got back home, mom would have raw eggs ready for us to gulp down before we had our shower and cleaned up for breakfast.

When I was in grade 5 my brothers decided that it was time for me to ball pick for them in the evenings too. I diligently went with them and did the ball girl duty for them until one day few boys wanting to play doubles in one of the courts were short of one person. My older brother told me to

go and join them. I was more than eager and ran and took my place.

Boys are always boys, at first they just used me as a prop until of course I began kicking their ass and then I became a threat. So from then on my brother encouraged me to go and play with everyone so that I can develop a court game. So I had graduated from being a wall practicer to a tennis player. Phew! That felt good.

And again boys will be boys...they ill treated me. They would make me wait till 7 in the night before letting me play a game. Then I took matters into my hand and bought my mother along. Things sorted out and I played when my turn came up and I continued to kick their ass! Jerks.

I had solid foundation. I could (at that time) hit the ball to the wall and back straight without dropping for an hour. The rest of them bought a raquet and thought they could play tennis. Plus I practiced with my brothers too everyday. I mean what were they thinking. Seriously.

So now y'all know why my first love in sports is Tennis.

I played a bit of tennis on and off after coming to US but then again the jerk of male friends I have do not want to play with me because I am a girl. Which probably is true now because I do not drink raw eggs and neither do I work out regularly and I am rusty as a 100 year old nail submerged under the ocean bed.

Last Saturday I was at my BIL's house and we decided to play some tennis and it was so relieving. I felt so happy and I lived through my childhood days all over again. Everytime my family gets together we do a tennis evening when all of us get our raquets and hit the court.

G and I went out and played tennis at 6.30pm last night in 100F heat. We came back home roasted and hot and we could not for the life of us believe how players work under 100F+ temps in Aussie Open. Probably because they practice under similar conditions too.

The bottom line for me is that Tennis Rocks and I love playing the game. I would be so happy if Babs also develops an interest in the game so G, me and Babs can go play and enjoy a sport as a family...lets see how things turn around...

Love

ART

Love Ping Pong too... to play and not to watch though :)