Sepia Mutiny, Bollywood et all..

One of my everyday reads is Sepia Mutiny. The following that the posts have there are phenomenal. It comes with little wonder why. What with posts that cover thy desi-amrika linked stories with much chutzpah! Talking about issues and happenings that are mostly overlooked by me otherwise. I have a new perspective about various aspects - I always thought desis in US feign stories of India and its associations with the world outside. Not true! I have a bunch of friends who religiously read Sepia Mutiny for the wonderful coverage of human interest stories they do. And most of them are the desis in America.

What Initially drew me to Sepia Mutiny, though, were the colorful banners (note the "color" and not "colour" - Im turning American!). When i dug up the blog to have a look at the banners that are used here - I was surprised to see the amount of them having the bollywood and Bombay influence. The swell banners are here! I cannot help but not deny the association of India with bollywood. Not a bad thing. But it does not feel great about not having associations to the culture or the the cosmopolitan fabric it holds. Bollywood is not niche, and that is why it is not the done thing to be associated so heavily to it.

Not a day passes by in most parts of an average Indian's life without having the talk of bollywood. (Pardon the not-so-much-of-a generalization!). It is somehow has had the most drastic influence on minds in India. The youth take on to bollywood. Allow me to say that - No! I don't mean bollywood is a bad influence. But it does not deserve to have the influence to bring a cultural shift. A simple example - any dress that Madhuri dixit wore was a rage!

I recently read this article about how long loved Indian sari has been less embraced by Indian women, thanks to Sepia Mutiny to pointing me to the article. You can find it here - The sari saga . Shashi Tharoor, notes how suits and slacks and trousers have replaced saris at work place. Yet, I clearly remember women flanking gorgeous looking saris after the Aishwarya Rai movie Shabd. It was glamorous to do so - wear light saris to work, for it looked great in the movie! Oh yes it would! She is Aishwarya Rai! You don't want society to follow the foot steps of bollywood!

Oh well...

Was it divine providence?
Or just the lame happenings
Of bygone days
That memory wouldn't relinquish?
For time yields
And I will let them be
I have kicked the dust
To walk past ahead
While you lie in the shrouded mists
Of my remembrance
Until all of 'you' is effaced
Into the worthless abyss of time

Mid-week off!

The holiday on America's birthday was more than welcome! Apart from it being another holiday it was a mid-week holiday - which I much liked. I am sure most of you would too. This Wednesday holiday suggested me of many more pleasant soothing mid-week holidays, if at all they were an option! And why not so!? Just when you thought you are out of your monday blues and settle into your tuesday the mid-week wednesday holiday is right there! And just another 2 days and you will be off for the weekend! I could not help but think of all the positive effects of this. There were times when I wanted to just laze at home in the weekends - yet I would take off shopping and partying. With this wednesday off I could do all the resting and lazing on the wednesdays and all the fun in the weekends! Sounds too good! Oh I wish!! Wednesdays would then have been a day for naps, lots of coffee and reading books!

Speaking of which, in the last 45 days I have read 6 books - not a great feat, I am delighted much the same. Ever since setting foot on the US, this is the first time I read so much at a stretch and I am oh so glad! An equal music(Vikram Seth), Animal Farm and 1984(George Orwell), Catcher in the rye, Sidney Poitier's autobiography and Tolkien's The Hobbit. All of them made for an enjoyable and thought provoking reading! I have 2 more to finish before I leave to India. And they being - Gabriel Garcia Marquez's Love in the time of cholera and the other being the much celebrated "The world is flat". I would love to boast and yap about my 8 books feat to my dad! So much for the love of books!