india on big screen: a movie review

a few hours ago i watched slumdog millionare.

It is like a greek tragedy: the story is known. an indian boy who lived in the slums wins at who wants to be a millionaire. but as my language teachers repeat like an ancient magic formula, its not what you write but how you do it, the suspense, the empathy, the "leserlenkung". slumdog millionaire fulfills this basic sucess formula. take a story that can be told in a sentence and make it somehting special.

I remember a few scenes where i turned to my accompaniment in horror, disgust, i just couldnt see it, didnt dare to see what i knew was coming: misery, torture, pain hurt. the movie has a strong undertone of what reality is like for "poor" people or people that arent as priviledges as we are. it surely contains all the above: loosing loved ones, hunger, interrogation, child labour, dirt. ...ouch.but its good that an entertainment movie talks about this.
of course slumdog millionainre is not the first, blood diamond, hotel ruanda, seven years in tibet etc, etc,etc. but for me slumdog millionaire has a take home message. i just have to work out what it means for me, but ill have the night to sleep over it.

then theres the touching scenes. the other part of the movie; a love story worthy of a huge bollywood export hit, and truely touching scenes.
one of the ones that sticks out goes somethign like this:, the protagonists favourite movie star is coming to his slum. of course like all the others he wants to go see him, but hes been locked up in the bathroom...shitplace or whatever the propper term is, by his older brother for taking too much time. he sruggles to get out but cant. what does he do? hes faced with the decision, shit and moviestar, or no shit and no moviestar. he takes the shit.

all is blended in with some great pictures of a very different place from here, the typical head nod which i couldnt destinuish fron a no until i realised it actually meant yes, the atmosphere of violence, dirt, tension comes across. so if you havent already, this is a movie well worth spending half your weekly pocket money on.

picture from http://dansemacabre.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/slumdog-millionaire-poster-full-1.jpg

avalanche

whilst pragathi over there was charming india (or at least bangalore) with her amazing english accent, I was out of the country once again- skiing with my mum in austria, in a pretty touristy place called ischgl.

driving there through a winding mountain road that sllthered its way through the valleys of giants, Ischgl was the second to last village before the high alpine road, which was not open due to snow.

the weather was wonderful. the right moutainside had no snow at all, at least not at 1300m (but surely above 1600m+). the left mountainside which was the one we skiied on, was still well covered in the white fluff.

you know that I dont especially like snow. it wet and sticks to you, is freezing cold and melts to a mush in your boots, down your back (if some ideot dared to do that) and well basically everywhere it gets. no usually snow really is not cool. but my attitude changes once im on the two long planks called skis. I all the sudden adore snow, find it the best possible invention ever and curse the spots its melted away from.

Ischgl was a completely touristy place: 4 star hotels basically made out the entire village. après ski bars lined all roads etc etc. cheese and getting money everywhere. but the pists for skiing were wonderful. great snow, nice and wide "highways" where you really could get nice speed,sun, and a big area which went over at least 5 valleys.

needless to say i enjoyed it, despite my slight sunburn on my forehead which came from not using any sunscreen...bad idea. travelling with mum is still great, (and cheap for me) and shes a plesant companion(most of the time;). plus shes also a pretty good skiier and has a car. two big bonus points. and no i dind not get covered in an avalanche. but so many had come down in the valley this winter that they were inevitable to notice-i even climed on one (without skiis).

on air!!!!!!!!!!!!

it was almost a dream..so exciting and pretty cool. it was just like any other day, got up early, walked around in a trance till my glass of bournvita (indian choco drink) jolted me to my senses, went to my door, shut the door and started studying.

i put on the radio, got fed up of why boron was a very inmportant element (some serious bore on stuff). so i sent radio 1 a message saying i wanted this song and that dedicated to this and that..and then i sent answers to a question on one of the only movies i have seen for a long time. hardly was i expecting it and then she called ---the RJ FROM RADIO 1!!!!!!!How COOOOL---!!!!

But somehow only to be a tad disappointed. She puts me on air for a show called Dosti Fatafat (roughly translated to FAst Friendship or something on those lines). basically a girl (or guy) asks a whacky question and the guys try to impress and then she exchanges phone numbers and you can become friends.. Well, the thing was she kinda called me at the wrong time when i was about to go and eat lunch. biut how could i refuse. it was the CHANCE...so we had a conversation,..sort of interesting. but i really couldn't scream or jump up and down with excitement cos my mom was just outside wondering how long i would be on the phone. so the disappointing thing was that i didn't sound all that excited (actually mayb even a little morose). so teh question of the day was

If you were to compare a mother-in-law(saas) and daughter-in-law(bahu) to a vegetable which ones would it be?

Point no 1 she gave me the topic
POint no 2 she gave me the question and askes me to ask it
Point no 3 if she had given me some time, i could have come up with an original question, mayb not quite as good but still..
Point no 4 it felt BOGUS!!!!!!!!!

anyways some guy called teja came on air and compared saas to potato and bahu to beetroot. they are good when cooked seperately but a disaster when mixed. i think the guy had a pretty good imagination (i hope the RJ didn't tell him t tell that..i don't think so). so we came on air again and talked again. and that was it. no contact with that guy again. no phone no. exchanged as promised on air (not that i've the time 4 tat)... but after all i came on air. AWWWWESome..(now i actually respect an RJs job, it's pretty difficult to handle people like me on air. you did a good job pavithra)


so that was one differnt thing that happened in my monotonous life.Since im learning physics right now, id like to add...

my life (right now) is like a monochromatic light, while yours julia is the visible spectrum...

apart from this my life is a constant rush, rush to the auto stand, rush to classes, rush to catch the bus, rush to college, rush to the phone, and sorry have to rush again..mums calling..!!!

pragathi.