Dec
29
Movie Review: Religulous
Filed Under Entertainment, Reviews | 2 Comments
So after weeks and weeks of waiting, I was finally able to watch Bill Maher’s Religulous, the controversial documentary directed by Larry Charles of the Borat fame. I had previously stumbled across feedback about the documentary from those who had seen it over various online discussion groups, and the composition of hate and admiration for the same made the whole waiting process even more frustrating. Adding to that, the corrupt mainstream Indian mentality of the distributors and the Censor Board here that basically just focuses on profit maximization instead of showing people what they really need to see, made sure that this strong message was better off the Indian crowd. So, the movie never had an official release venture in the country. But then again, even if a movie such as this one was to come here, the extremist termites from various socio-politico-religious groups would have dared to pop out of their lonely shells again only to cause a little more chaos that exists in India already. You can watch the trailer here.
Through Religulous, the much-hated amongst extremist corridors all across the world, Bill Maher, tries to question the authority. Throughout the story, he challenges the authorities to clear his doubts and questions that he raised to the self-conscious followers of God. He also adds a flavor of the sense of humor he’s known for on the stand-up that he does and his show, Real Time with Bill Maher. I wouldn’t be wrong to call him an anarchist, since he has been after the various politicians in the States, and many abroad, for their belief in God and the religious faith. Anyway, so that’s pretty much everything about Bill Maher. Time to shift focus to the documentary.
Technically, the word Religulous does not exist. But as far as the this particular title goes, it is supposed to signify how ridiculous religion actually is. Throughout the stretch of time, Bill pokes fun at Islam, Christianity, the Jews, the Mormons, Scientology, Hinduism, and basically any other religion that comes to one’s mind. He discusses with forefront activists from all these religions on their own working grounds, and brings up issues that come attached to the whole deal with religion. The kind of character sketch of Bill Maher that one can build from watching this particular documentary is the fact that the man has taken a very clear, and stern stance against religion, and you cannot reason him out no matter how convincing stuff it is that you’re saying. But for a major part of the documentary, when the interviewees felt cornered, they basically just stated faith and belief countering Maher’s attacks. This is exactly what he wants, and apparently, that’s what he gets.
I must admit though, that personally, in spite of agreeing with most of Bill Maher’s views, I’m not much big a fan of the kind of comedy he individually presents. There are various instances where it felt like he got caught in his own web, and then desperately threw sarcastic tantrums at the folks he was interviewing. But then, that’s just for a short while, and pretty inconsistent. All in all, he did indeed succeed in putting forward what he’s trying to say. Heck, many atheists who’ve seen this movie felt slightly offended. The whole thing about whether religion makes sense or doesn’t is a deep discussion in itself, and so are various opinions by various people on various related topics, so I will refrain myself from going into all that. Though as I said before, a very strong statement goes out through this movie. Bill Maher makes it clear that religion needs to end for man kind to live. Obviously, many people don’t agree, including the guy in the red tee at the Truckers’ Chapel in Raleigh, NC. That particular guy was immediately offended when Maher started shooting questions. That is basically the stereotype this documentary wishes to target. People put forth arguments based on just blind faith, slight belief and sheer coincidence, and they seemed to fail at every Bill bullet that came at them. We also have a clear cut example of how religious extremism is plaguing peace all across the world. Religious phonetics from a particular group in the middle-east and south-east Asia are completely dedicated to ensure that stability doesn’t exist and there’s chaos, fear and anarchy all around. And they’re succeeding, because of the indirect support these bunch of people get from the outside world, who’s not exactly physically involved in enforcing their thoughts and beliefs over the common mass.
The use of reference in the form of various archival footage, movie clips, and all of that was well set, and well coordinated with the theme the movie wants to shed light on. He also focuses on how exactly some phonetics and selfish extremists use this blind faith as a tool for extract financial benefit and personal gain, no matter how deep they have to get inside the innocent people’s minds. The documentary also targets the irony amongst every representative figure who appear in the video trying to stand for some certain scenario, but eventually coming off as a figurative approach for something absolutely opposite, giving Bill Maher just another opportunity to mock them even more. Another hilarious moment was when Bill was interviewing Mohamed Junas Gaffar, from the Taibah Mosque in Amsterdam and his cell phone started ringing. His cell phone ring tone was a Led Zeppelin song, Kashmir, and everyone knows what that particular band stands for. Most of the people from that particular religion interviewed by Maher were in absolute denial when he stated facts and asked them for reasoning. And it wasn’t just them. Most of those when questioned about the motives behind what they do in the name of religion, flipped completely.
To sum up, Bill Maher notably did a good job. He succeeded in his motives, and came up with something that is very assertive. Mockery is the only way you can possibly deal with a creationist. Religulous is a must-watch for anyone who’s in two minds about whether religion has to do with all the problems in the world, or not. Even if you’re someone who thinks it’s sad on Maher’s part to think the way he does, you’ll still love the way for the way he presents it, only until you start taking everything he says on a personal level.
Skyward Rating – 8.3 / 10
Nov
30
To Invoke The Horned God
Filed Under Politics | Leave a Comment
The 26th of November, 2008, might have been the darkest day in the 21st century modern Indian history, when the city of Mumbai in India, the nation’s commercial capital, went into siege under the terrorists who went on with the bloodbath for the next 60 hours, that finally ended on the 29th of November. The most prominent locations in the city, namely the CST railway station, the Oberoi Trident, Taj Mahal Palace, Taj Mahal Tower, Leopold Cafe, Cama Hospital, Nariman House, the Metro Adlabs theatre, Vile Parle, and the Mazagaon docks were attacked, almost at the same time, and the time line begins at around 10:45 PM, just a day before Thanksgiving in the United States. As claimed by Maharashtra administration, there were a total of 10 terrorists who were determined to kill and raise a body count of 5000. Nine of these militants died, and one was captured. But this body count was limited to 195, and over 350 were injured.
Personally, I have been to all these locations before, and I must say, the city has a charm of it’s own, which is now scarred for a long time to come. But first up, this one’s for all those security personnel who died in the entire wipeout-rescue mission, namely, Mumbai ATS Chief Hemant Karkare, Additional Commissioner of Police Ashok Kamte, Encounter Specialist Vijay Salaskar, Senior inspector Shashank Shinde, Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, NSG Hawaldar Chandar, NSG Hawaldar Gajendra Singh, and the 14 policemen from Mumbai Police, who have all been now, cremated.
Amongst the many things unexplainable, there’s something I just don’t understand. Why is it so hard for us and our Administration to accept failure. Why’s everyone so hell-bent on calling this entire mission a success. We failed and lost the moment these bastards stepped into mainland India. We failed when the first bullet was shot, we failed when the first grenade was thrown, and we failed when the first life was lost. We, as a community altogether, failed big time. But then, it’s hard to believe we still have people like Home Minister Shivraj Patil (who resigned this morning) and Home Minister of State RR Patil. Later yesterday, RR Patil made a statement saying the Mumbai bloodbath is a small incident, and such situations are inevitable in big cities. Obviously, Mr. Patil here has his own standards and value for human life, clearly, which seems worth poop to him. It’s because of ignorant folks like him and Shivraj Patil and many other primitive thinkers of their kind that, in the name of passive aggressive democracy, sit in the nation’s Parliament. These are the primitive people we selected to represent us. Seriously, who am I kidding? Shivraj Patil didn’t even win the Lok Sabha elections that he contested, yet, he was made the Home Minister. The only one justifiable reason for that I came up with is the fact that he was close to Sonia Gandhi, and knowing the man’s meek attitude, he was the best choice for the post that didn’t seem like a cause for collision in the Cabinet’s decision making process in the UPA coalition.
And the Patils aren’t the only ones to be shredded up here. Another major name in the entire facade is the PM of the country, Manmohan Singh, who hasn’t been as aggressive to the cross-border terrorism issue as he should have been. The man has been long considered one of Sonia Gandhi’s many puppets in the process of trying to make Rahul Gandhi the future prime minister of the nation. Now, this is the kind of family politics I’ve always hated. Congress on a whole has always been a selfish monarchy in the country, trying to bend the basic fundamentals of a democracy for a really long time now. But then, that is not the point.
The point is, how many people will have to die to get things straight? Obviously, this isn’t the first time, but this certainly is the first time such a buzz was created in the air in the country. Jammu & Kashmir and the North Eastern states have had a long,red history, but this attack is the first of it’s kind. We have been hit in the heart of Indian’s commercial capital, that has made an impact all across the world. If you take a look at the numbers game, a lot of foreign nationals have died too. But as long as the value of human life stands equal, I guess the nationality part doesn’t make much of a difference. Looking at the trend of the aftermath of the various terrorist attacks in the country, one can clearly notice the get-hit-and-ignore rule we the people stick to. After every other attack, politicians vomit words of condemnation, news reports sensationalize everything, those slain have candle ceremonies and obituaries read for them, the common man tends to get a little patriotic and anti-Pakistan, and that’s it. Nothing else is done. And that’s the cycle of ignorance that has long plagued the country.
I am not questioning the courage of the men who went down fighting for the nation, cause Heroes are as Heroes always are, but we lack a mechanism that could have avoided these deaths and numerous casualties, including those who came under direct fire, or were taken hostages. Urban warfare is a completely different branch of anti-terrorism where India lags. Why is it so hard for us to accept we’re lag behind when it comes to trained & experienced strategically advanced man power that can counter terrorism? This is where the self-centered narrow minded ego thing and the deal with nationalism and patriotism comes in. Defense & Offense groups like the SWAT, JTF2, RAID, Eko Cobra or the UEI specialize in immediate response to large scale, urban terrorism that needs immense tactical expertise for killing / capturing the terrorists and rescuing the hostages, and at the same time, covering the contemporary squads, in a given amount of time. Clearly, the Mumbai Police, the Marine Commandos, and NSG lacks that kind of methodological intensity that could have limited damage and everything could have been done in a lot less than 60 hours. I must say this again, in no way, I’m questioning the courage and the internal urge of these very brave men, but accepting facts doesn’t have to be so difficult for the rest of us.
As far as accepting facts go, we lack on a whole lot of other points too. Why is coming off as a surprise to the investigating agencies and the people to accept that these terrorists were a couple of steps ahead of us when it came to planning and executing. Everyone (or at least the television media) is completely blown away by the fact that these men had modern gun weaponry, hand grenades, plastic explosives, GPS devices and Blackberries on them. It’s hard for me to understand why they’re all so amazed by the effort these terrorists put into making sure they did their best to avert investigations by planting decoys and cause as much damage as humanly possible. The kind of predictability and reaction to these situations that is much needed, is not available. And who do we have to blame for that? Yeah. Me, you, and everyone else who calls themselves a global citizen. Gone are the days when everyone thought terrorists speak only Urdu, wore ethnic Islamic dresses, they were suicidal just for the heck of it, and lived in caves. This is twenty-first century urban guerilla warfare with major in-direct involvement at gigantic levels.
Preliminary investigations suggest Pakistan was involved. But many people say it’s an pre-mature emotionally impaired judgment on India’s side. No, it isn’t. May be saying that Gilani & Zardari knew of these attacks is a little too judgmental, but there is no denying that the Lashkar, the ISI or lower level Pakistani administration isn’t involved. And then those aren’t the only people we should blame. How did these terrorists get into Indian land through the sea route bypassing the eyes of the Coast Guard? Either, the Coast Guard men were a little to easy to go when it came to accepting bribes or they are horribly ill-equipped to do best what they’re meant to do. Also, there’s no denying that India’s hardcore Islamic extremist outfits like SIMI aren’t involved, and may be even the underworld is at it. And since the Mumbai siege has that typical Al Qaeda blueprint, and the attacks took place just a day before Thanksgiving right on time for daytime viewing in the United States right after Al Qaeda’s threat to defy the next rule of President-Elect Barack Obama, may be even Al Qaeda is indirectly involved. Let’s see how the investigations unfurl.
The major objective of terrorism has been the most fundamental one – to make an impact on everything, and spread terror. And the job of those men is done. Even thought we ended nine of them, captured one, secured hostages and recovered the hotels, in no way does it mean we won, as many of us think so. As far as making an international impact is concerned, let’s see the example of these hotels where so many conventions and meetings were scheduled, which now stand postponed indefinitely, thus putting a whole lot of business aspects in the pooper. This will scare away a lot of people who were here in India and were directly or indirectly involved in the incident. Many conversation excerpts in the print media have already quoted people saying so. Australia is amongst a bunch of countries that has issued travel advisories to their citizens against travelling to India. The Israeli press and the Government have issued a statement that the Nariman House killings could have been dealt with more cautiously. People of Mumbai and the rest of the nation themselves are now a little too scared and uneasy. And to some extent, everyone is indeed right the way they are reacting to the situation. As of this moment, India is a very unsafe place, vulnerable to many fatal blows from the terrorists.
But what can be really done? India needs to take a tough stand against Pakistani administration and put them under pressure for giving up Dawood Ibrahim and the many wanted terrorists that are currently in refuge over there. Pakistan needs to put an immediate end to all the training and residential facilities these terror outfits have in Pakistan-Occupied-Kashmir and Northern Pakistan. We need to prepare a final action plan and execute it when it comes to strategically dealing with Pakistan. As far as enriching the domestic front is concerned, we need to come up with a full fledged federal agency on the concept of the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security in the United States. Local governance needs to improve drastically. Our politicians must act as our representatives, and not as the loudmouth douche-bags that all of them actually are. EMTs and the emergency defense response squads need to be trained and paid better. A command centre for emergency teams needs to be present in every important city, not just the capital. India needs to think out-of-the-box, beyond mainstream, conservative ideologies. A line needs to be drawn between freshman theocracy and the religious hard-cores. Tougher laws to check, counter and punish terrorism need to be placed and implied upon. As far as the common man is concerned, the state of mental unrest and blind-belief in faith and rumors needs to come to an end. Television media needs to shut the hell up and stop feeding the BS it’s telecasting bluntly in the nation. We must all responsibly exercise all our duties if we want all our rights to be granted to us without conditions and drawbacks. In a nutshell, we need to come up with an independent united offensive.
So what is next? As depressing as it might sound, absolutely nothing. We’ll all be the ignorant mob we’ve always been. Change will happen, because change is inevitable. But it will take a lot of time. We just have to never stop trying invoking this horned god, and I’m sure after this particular incident, we probably wont. That part completely depends on us. In the mean time, we should brace ourselves for every other challenge that we have to face in the near future because this chain-reacting battle has no end.
Personally, I have been to all these locations before, and I must say, the city has a charm of it’s own, which is now scarred for a long time to come. But first up, this one’s for all those security personnel who died in the entire wipeout-rescue mission, namely, Mumbai ATS Chief Hemant Karkare, Additional Commissioner of Police Ashok Kamte, Encounter Specialist Vijay Salaskar, Senior inspector Shashank Shinde, Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, NSG Hawaldar Chandar, NSG Hawaldar Gajendra Singh, and the 14 policemen from Mumbai Police, who have all been now, cremated.
Amongst the many things unexplainable, there’s something I just don’t understand. Why is it so hard for us and our Administration to accept failure. Why’s everyone so hell-bent on calling this entire mission a success. We failed and lost the moment these bastards stepped into mainland India. We failed when the first bullet was shot, we failed when the first grenade was thrown, and we failed when the first life was lost. We, as a community altogether, failed big time. But then, it’s hard to believe we still have people like Home Minister Shivraj Patil (who resigned this morning) and Home Minister of State RR Patil. Later yesterday, RR Patil made a statement saying the Mumbai bloodbath is a small incident, and such situations are inevitable in big cities. Obviously, Mr. Patil here has his own standards and value for human life, clearly, which seems worth poop to him. It’s because of ignorant folks like him and Shivraj Patil and many other primitive thinkers of their kind that, in the name of passive aggressive democracy, sit in the nation’s Parliament. These are the primitive people we selected to represent us. Seriously, who am I kidding? Shivraj Patil didn’t even win the Lok Sabha elections that he contested, yet, he was made the Home Minister. The only one justifiable reason for that I came up with is the fact that he was close to Sonia Gandhi, and knowing the man’s meek attitude, he was the best choice for the post that didn’t seem like a cause for collision in the Cabinet’s decision making process in the UPA coalition.
And the Patils aren’t the only ones to be shredded up here. Another major name in the entire facade is the PM of the country, Manmohan Singh, who hasn’t been as aggressive to the cross-border terrorism issue as he should have been. The man has been long considered one of Sonia Gandhi’s many puppets in the process of trying to make Rahul Gandhi the future prime minister of the nation. Now, this is the kind of family politics I’ve always hated. Congress on a whole has always been a selfish monarchy in the country, trying to bend the basic fundamentals of a democracy for a really long time now. But then, that is not the point.
The point is, how many people will have to die to get things straight? Obviously, this isn’t the first time, but this certainly is the first time such a buzz was created in the air in the country. Jammu & Kashmir and the North Eastern states have had a long,red history, but this attack is the first of it’s kind. We have been hit in the heart of Indian’s commercial capital, that has made an impact all across the world. If you take a look at the numbers game, a lot of foreign nationals have died too. But as long as the value of human life stands equal, I guess the nationality part doesn’t make much of a difference. Looking at the trend of the aftermath of the various terrorist attacks in the country, one can clearly notice the get-hit-and-ignore rule we the people stick to. After every other attack, politicians vomit words of condemnation, news reports sensationalize everything, those slain have candle ceremonies and obituaries read for them, the common man tends to get a little patriotic and anti-Pakistan, and that’s it. Nothing else is done. And that’s the cycle of ignorance that has long plagued the country.
I am not questioning the courage of the men who went down fighting for the nation, cause Heroes are as Heroes always are, but we lack a mechanism that could have avoided these deaths and numerous casualties, including those who came under direct fire, or were taken hostages. Urban warfare is a completely different branch of anti-terrorism where India lags. Why is it so hard for us to accept we’re lag behind when it comes to trained & experienced strategically advanced man power that can counter terrorism? This is where the self-centered narrow minded ego thing and the deal with nationalism and patriotism comes in. Defense & Offense groups like the SWAT, JTF2, RAID, Eko Cobra or the UEI specialize in immediate response to large scale, urban terrorism that needs immense tactical expertise for killing / capturing the terrorists and rescuing the hostages, and at the same time, covering the contemporary squads, in a given amount of time. Clearly, the Mumbai Police, the Marine Commandos, and NSG lacks that kind of methodological intensity that could have limited damage and everything could have been done in a lot less than 60 hours. I must say this again, in no way, I’m questioning the courage and the internal urge of these very brave men, but accepting facts doesn’t have to be so difficult for the rest of us.
As far as accepting facts go, we lack on a whole lot of other points too. Why is coming off as a surprise to the investigating agencies and the people to accept that these terrorists were a couple of steps ahead of us when it came to planning and executing. Everyone (or at least the television media) is completely blown away by the fact that these men had modern gun weaponry, hand grenades, plastic explosives, GPS devices and Blackberries on them. It’s hard for me to understand why they’re all so amazed by the effort these terrorists put into making sure they did their best to avert investigations by planting decoys and cause as much damage as humanly possible. The kind of predictability and reaction to these situations that is much needed, is not available. And who do we have to blame for that? Yeah. Me, you, and everyone else who calls themselves a global citizen. Gone are the days when everyone thought terrorists speak only Urdu, wore ethnic Islamic dresses, they were suicidal just for the heck of it, and lived in caves. This is twenty-first century urban guerilla warfare with major in-direct involvement at gigantic levels.
Preliminary investigations suggest Pakistan was involved. But many people say it’s an pre-mature emotionally impaired judgment on India’s side. No, it isn’t. May be saying that Gilani & Zardari knew of these attacks is a little too judgmental, but there is no denying that the Lashkar, the ISI or lower level Pakistani administration isn’t involved. And then those aren’t the only people we should blame. How did these terrorists get into Indian land through the sea route bypassing the eyes of the Coast Guard? Either, the Coast Guard men were a little to easy to go when it came to accepting bribes or they are horribly ill-equipped to do best what they’re meant to do. Also, there’s no denying that India’s hardcore Islamic extremist outfits like SIMI aren’t involved, and may be even the underworld is at it. And since the Mumbai siege has that typical Al Qaeda blueprint, and the attacks took place just a day before Thanksgiving right on time for daytime viewing in the United States right after Al Qaeda’s threat to defy the next rule of President-Elect Barack Obama, may be even Al Qaeda is indirectly involved. Let’s see how the investigations unfurl.
The major objective of terrorism has been the most fundamental one – to make an impact on everything, and spread terror. And the job of those men is done. Even thought we ended nine of them, captured one, secured hostages and recovered the hotels, in no way does it mean we won, as many of us think so. As far as making an international impact is concerned, let’s see the example of these hotels where so many conventions and meetings were scheduled, which now stand postponed indefinitely, thus putting a whole lot of business aspects in the pooper. This will scare away a lot of people who were here in India and were directly or indirectly involved in the incident. Many conversation excerpts in the print media have already quoted people saying so. Australia is amongst a bunch of countries that has issued travel advisories to their citizens against travelling to India. The Israeli press and the Government have issued a statement that the Nariman House killings could have been dealt with more cautiously. People of Mumbai and the rest of the nation themselves are now a little too scared and uneasy. And to some extent, everyone is indeed right the way they are reacting to the situation. As of this moment, India is a very unsafe place, vulnerable to many fatal blows from the terrorists.
But what can be really done? India needs to take a tough stand against Pakistani administration and put them under pressure for giving up Dawood Ibrahim and the many wanted terrorists that are currently in refuge over there. Pakistan needs to put an immediate end to all the training and residential facilities these terror outfits have in Pakistan-Occupied-Kashmir and Northern Pakistan. We need to prepare a final action plan and execute it when it comes to strategically dealing with Pakistan. As far as enriching the domestic front is concerned, we need to come up with a full fledged federal agency on the concept of the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security in the United States. Local governance needs to improve drastically. Our politicians must act as our representatives, and not as the loudmouth douche-bags that all of them actually are. EMTs and the emergency defense response squads need to be trained and paid better. A command centre for emergency teams needs to be present in every important city, not just the capital. India needs to think out-of-the-box, beyond mainstream, conservative ideologies. A line needs to be drawn between freshman theocracy and the religious hard-cores. Tougher laws to check, counter and punish terrorism need to be placed and implied upon. As far as the common man is concerned, the state of mental unrest and blind-belief in faith and rumors needs to come to an end. Television media needs to shut the hell up and stop feeding the BS it’s telecasting bluntly in the nation. We must all responsibly exercise all our duties if we want all our rights to be granted to us without conditions and drawbacks. In a nutshell, we need to come up with an independent united offensive.
So what is next? As depressing as it might sound, absolutely nothing. We’ll all be the ignorant mob we’ve always been. Change will happen, because change is inevitable. But it will take a lot of time. We just have to never stop trying invoking this horned god, and I’m sure after this particular incident, we probably wont. That part completely depends on us. In the mean time, we should brace ourselves for every other challenge that we have to face in the near future because this chain-reacting battle has no end.
Nov
20
The Normandy
Filed Under Entertainment | Leave a Comment
Two days ago, I celebrated another birthday. And I had one hell of a party thanks to my friends and family who are the best people I have ever known. I should have done this that day itself, but considering the lazy ass I really am, here it goes. There’s a list below of people who wished me for my birthday.
Those who wished on Facebook - Jazzie, Natasha, Shilpa, Audra, Disha, Avi, Manya, Ajita, Haza, Amjad, Sonia, Ritwik Bhai, Ninzy, Shobit, Vishwajit, Christine, Deepak, Aaron, Shirin, Ahana, Priyanka, Satwik, Joesph, Trisha and the friendly neighbourhood folk from Xbox Live.
Those who wished on Orkut - Vaibhav, Wasif, Kislay, Nicole, Shashwat, Soumalya, Preeti, Ritwik (Brutality) and Vivek.
Those who wished through email - G Krishnakumar and the very helpful folks from Sony Japan
Those who wished on Twitter - Deep, Reetesh, Shadez, Sathya, b50 and Harshad
Those who wished on Phone - Komal, Saba, Sana, Shruti (the very dear friend), Sohil, Chris, Ahana, Ninzy, Nathan, Ritwik, Sonia, Ahana, Ninzy, Priyanka, Vishal, Doc, Shawn, Shweta, Abhinav, Adrian, Eric and Priyanka
Those who wished on IM - Jenson and Nitesh
Those who showed up - Dad, Trisha, Sonika, Tara, Sree and more family folk.
And now, time for a few special mentions. First up, my mother, and obviously my dad, without whom I would never have been here in the first place. Thank you for the five odd cakes I cut last week. Then, there’s the lovely Komal, who had her birthday a day before mine. I was excited about her birthday more than I was about mine. How can I forget the very gorgeous twins - Sana, and Saba. Komal, Saba and Sana sang me the birthday song over the phone. You guys rule. It was amazing to talk to you.
Then there’s this one person who I expected to call me up but she didn’t - Disha, but you know I still love you very much. Then, Sonia gave me a Lorenzini shirt. The biggest surprise this year was the fact that my cousin Trisha flew in all the way from Dubai just for the heck of celebrating my birthday with me, and so did her sister Tara, from Mumbai, and they together gave me Fallout 3 for the PS3, a 12 month XBL Gold Subscription, and Call of Duty 5 for the X360. I also have to thank the lovely cousins for the beautiful dinner that evening, and the getting drunk part that followed. I got a Brioni gift card from Priyanka, and another Amazon gift card from Ahana. Natasha says her gift will come in a little delayed. Doc gave me the AC/DC’s special edition Black Ice DVD. Thanks to Abhinav, I now on Dead Space, Left 4 Dead and Red Alert 3. It’s not his fault though, if I pre-owned the last two. I can’t say I mind keeping two copies of the same game. And with all credits to la familia, I am richer by thousands.
Last, and certainly never ever the least, I must mention my fiancé Shruti. In spite of the disctance factor and the deal with her being all the way in London and me over here in India, you were so close to me all day long. Thank you for that. Thank you for pulling off karaeokes with me all day long. Thank you for the Star Wars boxset and those vintage issues of GDM I had been on a lookout for ages. Thank you, each one of you, for making the day so extraordinary in every other possible way.