My Goal 2 Journey

Monday, November 02, 2009
I have lived a life with a great sense of self-importance. I don’t know if I am proud of it or ashamed, but this is who I am so I live with it gracefully. Last November I got married.
After my marriage the time came with lots of adjustment difficulties. So many things changed in life. Though I consider myself extremely lucky as my husband is also my best friend and he helped a lot to go through most of them. He tolerated my tantrums and I tolerated his, but we survived the rocky phase.
But what I lost in the process of this adjustment and survival game is this:
1. I lost my zeal for life, creativity and no-reward activities.
2. I put on a good deal (10 kg) weight and lost my “I am very attractive” feeling.
Now, I am a person who likes to be in control of my weight, to me it symbolizes how much I am in control of my life. I know that it’s very subjective feeling and I don’t intent to say that the people who don’t control their weight cannot control their lives. But for me, this psychological association is strong.
The realization came in a funny manner. I didn’t put on weight overnight. It was an ongoing process which was the result of my inactivity and inappropriate diet for over a year. But when I walked on the weight machine that day and read that figure 73.50 kg. I felt pathetic. I had not gained so much weight ever since I lost real good amount of weight after my class 12th. My maximum weight after that had been 60 kg and here I was with 13 kg more weight.
I started going to gym (sorry to mention that I don’t go very regularly). But soon I understood it loud and clear that gym alone will not make any difference. There is something really wrong with the way I eat.
Not that I had this realization yesterday, but still today is my first day when I am writing all this in the form of my journal.
I have a clearly defined goal.
I want to reduce 16 kg weight by 31st May, 2010.
And I really want to keep a record of how I started and where I reached. So I am writing this. I will keep writing the entries because I like to keep a track of the path. As-
1. I might have to walk it once again.
2. Someone else might want to walk the same path and may find my journey interesting.

12 Angry Men

If you have not seen it so far…12 Angry Men. I was suppose to analyze this film during our course at FTII but could not. But that’s not the end of life. I saw the film today and want to share my experience of this film with you guys, with “the 12 angry men” I know.
We all have problems with characterization, it’s difficult for us to bring out characters, here is a feast, there are 12 characters, each distinct, each accurate and each as peculiar as it can be. We have problems with dialogues, here is another feast, the dialogues, spoken never mean what the words mean, and they are always as a rule loaded with subtext. We have problem with creating atmosphere, here is I must say another feast, when I saw film I almost start feeling hot and sweaty. The story of the film is known to the entire world, I will not go over that, it’s a story how one person in the Juror No. of 12 who is not sure of the verdict that the prosecuted is guilty helps the other 11 to make up their mind. Such a simple tale becomes a classic only and only as a result of such strong characters, each and every one of them is so accurately put. You will know what I mean when you will see the film but very briefly I will go about it.
Juror No. 1 (Martin Balsam’s character): The man who takes up the position of the spokes person. The one who takes the chair himself and who wants to see that everything goes right. He is unbiased and doesn’t seem to give his decisions based on prejudices.
Strength: Helps the group to conduct properly.
Weakness: He needs to feel organized and in control to contribute anything to group, when he joins in as he still is giving to his ego, he doesn’t hold any extraordinary opinion actually, nothing and I mean nothing comes out of his mouth in the course of entire film which helps other in any way to reach their decision, not a single original input.
But still he is quite crucial to the group.
Juror No. 2: A man who must have been treated like an “idiot” all his life, but who clearly has a mind of his own. He likes to give other people space to talk, he is willing to listen, his motives are not colored with prejudices.
Strength: he is intelligent, when he speaks about the point of height and position of knife, it’s quite clear that he is sharp.
Meticulous- he is really good in measuring details.
Weakness: he can tell someone “I will kill you” if that person will call him an idiot. He cannot stand this. The way he speaks it’s quite clear that he is been treated like that for long enough.
Juror No. 3 (Lee Cobb’s character): One of the most interesting characters of the film. Please here his dialogues very carefully as they are so loaded with subtext, nothing that he says is what he means in his heart. In his heart he wants the boy to go to chair, not because he has committed a murder, he like anyone else in the film is not sure if the boy is guilty or not, but the idea that this boy “might” have killed his father, reminds him of his boy who slapped him and left the house. His personal grudge colors his judgment, but he is one of those who most strongly speaks against the boy. He speaks repeatedly that it’s not personal, till the time it becomes transparent to entire group.
Weakness: He lets his personal emotions come in the way of his judgment.

Juror No. 5: He is very smart, sharp and intelligent. He likes the games life offers, be it how to make it big or how to play big. He is a real achiever. He likes argument for their intelligent quotient and not for personal prejudices.
Strength: There are only 2 leaders in this group according to me, one is Juror No. 8 and this is the second one. This are the people who wants to argue for what they believe in till the time they believe in what they are defending. Juror No. 5 doesn’t like to continue an argument for some personal prejudices, he likes to argue because he is sharp and has gotten in the habit of being right. He likes when he meets a match.

Juror No. 5: The man who has seen life the hard way. The man who says a pass in the first round, the man who feels spaced out to begin with but once he makes up his mind he becomes one of the strongest asset to his team.
Strength: He has seen life. He is not very willing to speak at first but he is the one who shares a personal and embarrassing truth about himself to make his point. He is smart and intelligent.
Weakness: He is like Amrish Puri’s character in Akrosh; he has come from an underprivileged group and that makes him over cautious in taking their side, he wants to perceive in a certain way, and it’s very important for him.

Juror No. 6: He is a man who has his opinions and he doesn’t like colored opinions. When Juror No. 6 and Juror No. 10 bully Juror No. 9 as he changes his vote, he is the one who stands up. His idea and morals are quite in place.
Strength: His mind is very clear about what is right and what is wrong.
Weakness: His very strength is his weakness, his vision is binary. He will rather prefer a non guilty being punished then a guilty being released.

Juror No. 7: One of the most interesting characters. His opinions changes with the fan in the room. When the room is sweaty and heat he feels the boy is guilty, when the fan starts to work he feels he is not guilty! He is one of those people who likes to crib their rights are been taken away from others and who finds the greatest satisfaction in bullying others.

Juror No. 8 (The Henry Fonda character): brilliant character, brilliant characterization, brilliant acting. Juror No. 8 is a leader not only for this group but for any society. He is the first one who stands up and says he doesn’t think the boy is guilty. He makes it very clear that the reason he holds this opinion is not his conviction but his doubt. He is not sure if the boy is guilty, but the thing is if he is not sure how he can send him to chair! Now here is an enemy of people! Here is someone who is not afraid to be called minority. He starts with his doubt. He is not the one who always comes up with best insights, on the contrary he hardly contributes anything to the existing knowledge, but he provides an environment where doubts can be voiced, where judgments can be questioned!

Juror No. 9: The wise old man! He is an extremely intelligent fellow; he provides the group with information that result from detailed observations and insight of life and psychology of human behavior. He is the first one, who changes his side from guilty to not guilty, he also doesn’t change the side because he is convinced that the boy is not guilty, rather he changes the side so that they can talk if the boy is guilty or not. I think he is one of those people whose minds have not been used by the society, who could not contribute as much as they could have…

Juror No. 10: Another bully! He is someone whose opinions are result of their environment and not personal convictions; but who wants others to perceive it differently. He has strong prejudices and he takes major decisions based on them but he wants others to believe that he takes decision resulting from his sharp intelligence. “Loud mouth” says Juror No. 2 quite correctly. He wants to raise his voice even in absence of content. The only thing he cannot stand is to stand alone, its great for him to make noise, but the moment he realizes his voice is not heard he cannot take it, it’s most humiliating thing for him. Though he never have provided anyone the environment where they can talk freely.

Juror No. 11: The smart, intelligent, meticulous, migrant. He found the place in USA, the hard way. He has got his lesson, to stand out in life you have to be good. So he has worked hard to be damn good in whatever he does. He must be the best in his work and in his conducts that is his defense. He is the one who provides the “other” team with evidences, the reason is simple. He has to check the ground before he hit it.

Juror No. 12: The advertising guy, he likes to believe that world is created so that he can live happily ever after. He is self centered and nothing that is not directly related to him can arouse any interest in him. He changes his opinion generally to remain with majority and not because he believes in the idea he defends. He is one of those people for whom the world starts and ends with them.

This is a brief analysis and doesn’t stand anywhere to the experience of the film. The film is a mind blowing master piece. I will recommend it to everyone, at least to our class, because we were the 12 angry men in some senses. Just as an exercise try to figure out who in our class plays which character of the Juror No.

Palace of Illusions

I think the most difficult part of writing a novel using a character of Mahabharata as a protagonist is to avoid the temptation of being Vyaasa. Chitra’s novel was supposed to be the story of Mahabharata from the point of view of Draupadi told in first person. The novel started on a very interesting note where for the first time Draupadi is not portrayed as the beloved daughter of her father. Rather she is a confused princess who is not sure what part she will play in this world. She is neglected by every one except Dai Ma and Dri (Dristhadrumya) for 2 reasons:
1. Her reluctance to confine to the male dominant world where woman are not suppose to be anything but daughter, sister, wife or mother.
2. Because of the weird prophecy at the time of her birth.
But fortunately for her, her brother is really compassionate to her existence and extremely supportive.
The novel started at such interesting note that when I left it yesterday evening I almost ached to read more.
It opened an entire new gate for me to look into Mahabharata; especially when Kunti rags her daughter-in-law and makes her sleep at the feet of her sons.
But quite unfortunately the novel didn’t keep up with expectation in last almost 200 pages. It went so away from it’s starting that when it got some novelty close to it’s climax reader already have lost interest.
Since the time of narration of Palace of Illusion, the novel became more and more narrative. Draupadi as we saw her in the first pages suddenly became Vyaasa, the all knowing. Her initial confusions and lack of knowledge disappeared completely. Whenever she needs to know something she got the information either through a dream or through a messenger.
But worst of all; the entire novel became so horribly repetitive that there was no salvation.
Draupadi’s attraction for Karna almost seemed absurd after the dice game. She seemed like this extremely annoying woman who has no purpose in life but to poke her husbands and for what! The men whom she alleges of dishonoring her, she wants to be with one of them.
These are some other things which I missed terribly in the novel.
1. Drapadi was a woman who was hot with passion; you can deprive her of any other characteristic but passion, it’s like depriving Ram of his virtues. But in Palace of Illusion she has no passion. She understands the world as well if not better then Krishana and Vyaasa.
2. There is no depiction of her special bounding or relationship of hers with her husbands. Nakul and Sahadev the most ignored characters of Mahabharata should have gained some space in a novel supposedly written from Draupadi’s point of view.
3. There was no distinction between Kunti’s conflicts and that of Draupadi’s. It almost seemed that both are same woman. Extremely monotonous portrayal of woman.
4. Hello! Was Draupadi’s not supposed to wash her hair with Dushashan’s blood! Unless and until she is shown consciously aware of her forgiveness, this part should not be missed. Or was she too occupied with Karna to remember why her hair were open for these many years!
5. Draupadi’s and Arjun’s relationship’s portrayal is so flat. Not a moment of drama.
I think that was one of the main problems with the entire novel. Were the drama was? I think Mahabharata works so well for Indian psyche for its high paced drama. I have no problem if you telling it from Draupadi’s point of view, but why on earth you missing the drama. Draupadi could be accused of anything but a boring life for God’s sake! In short a real disappointment. The novel was so boring that I had to drag myself to read last 200 or something pages.

This is the problem

This weekend my husband Mrityunjay, his friend Vivek and me, we went to Lonavala and Khandala.
At Lonavala we ordered Kandabhajji and Chai.
I could see that all around us there were empty plastic cups of Chai.
this disturbs me a lot as i always question that if we continue to pollute these places of scenic beauty at this rate then we might not have any such place left any more in near future.
so when i finished my tea, i went around to figure out if i can spot a dust bin.
when i could not spot one i went to the person from whom we bought the tea.
i asked him "Dada aap ke yahan dustbin hai kya?"
so he said "haan iss box mein dal do"
i wanted to be sure so i asked "dada yeh dustbin hai?"
he said "haan haan, aap ko lagta hai hum kachara yahan vahan dalte hain?"
the moment i threw the cup in the dustbin and moved ahead i heard a fellow shopkeeper speaking this in marathi to the shop keeper from whom we had bought tea
"atta kuthe tari dala, nantara toh tu bahara ja dalnara" (doesn't matter where you threw it right now later you will throw it outside only)
now i can understand marathi. ( i m sure he didn't know that)
and i felt frustrated.
i just don't know how this problem can be solved.
we can make sure that we throw things in dustbin, but how can we be sure that the dustbin would be emptied in a proper place?

Power of your subconsious mind -- Book Review

“The power of your subconscious mind” the book tells you one thing loud and clear- how to write a book if you are a mentally retarded person with a limited 100 word vocabulary!

I had picked this book by a roadside a few years before and now I know why my “subconscious mind” prevented me from reading it all these years. This is one of the worst self-help books I have EVER read, no not one of the worst, this IS the worst.

I finished the book only because I was doing a perception exercise to increase my visual span while reading and I was mentally prepared to even read nonsense syllabus for 270 pages. Though I think nonsense syllabus would have been less of a torture.

The book tells only one thing, if this writer can do a Ph.D and if this book can become a bestseller, anything is possible in the world. So keep trying, who knows the junk you wrote and threw in the waste bin a few minutes before might become a bestseller book!

The book essentially says just one thing and that is also neither a truth nor scientifically proved fact- that your subconscious mind with the help of prayer can pull you out of anything. Bull Shit! If you really have the tenacity to tolerate repetition of a single line in same language for 270 pages, go ahead. If you are looking for anything even a bit scientific or interesting, this is not the book for you.

Do I have a Profession?

Hi Fellow Writers,
Past few months, I have been extremely "unproductive". I am proud to declare that I must have made some kind of record about being unproductive.
I figured out that:
1-Folding those stakes of cloths is always more important then writing.
2- Reading those junk mails and replying those meaningless scraps on orkut is also much more important.
3- Making a list of all the debts you need to pay and counting how much money you urgently need is supremely important.
In another word anything, that keeps you away from writing is more important then "to write" if you are a screenplay writer.
Honestly, I got so frustrated that I felt that anyone and every one including my servant has a better profession then I do...
Nonsense apart, I have figured out one thing today. I have chosen a career which is not regular. It doesn't demand me to be in any office and it doesn't give me a fixed salary at the end of every month. But that was a conscious decision. I cannot let lack of conservativeness kill my instinct, my motivation to write.
So any of you, who feels that running away is a solution, feel the disappointment, it's not.
Just stop wasting time and Write, that's the solution.

Book Review of Millionaire Nextdoor

One of the worst books I have read on wealth management. The book starts with a hypothesis of the authors that all the millionaires live frugal life. Then it continues to repeat the same philosophy again and again and again. I don’t think that anyone interested in wealth management would be infinitely interested in knowing the facts such as:

1. Millionaire drive cheap car.
2. They wear cheap cloths.
3. Their children hardly know how to handle wealth.

It doesn’t say a word about how to create wealth, what the options are, how economy or personal finance work. If I will have to rate this book I will rate it 2 on a scale of 10.