Unattainable...

As of last week San and me have been together 11 years. A very short time compared to my parents (39) or my grandparents (73 years when grandpa passed away), but long enough for us to understand a postponing of the celebration because work.. work.. work.. came in the way.

Just like Indian festivals, birthdays, etc. etc. being pushed to the nearest weekend, the wedding anniversary plan was to go to Livermore Temple and say a prayer with the kids and San's parents.

We knew there was a Kumbhabishekham going on at the temple and we expected the crowd. It was a good walk to park and finally when we washed our feet and went to the entrance, the god's appointed bouncers asked us:

"are you kalasA sponsors?"

Me : No.

GAB : Sorry Sir. Today the temple entrance is for kalasA sponsors only. If you are a sponsor you can take the kalasA and go inside and come out.

Me : !!!!!?????!!!! We have come from south bay and my father in law is here only for three weeks. Can we go in and come out real quick?

GAB : very sorry sir. they are making arrangements for the puja tomorrow. regular devotees have to come back tomorrow.

So now we were "regular devotees". It did bother me a bit and got to thinking of how this blog got started and how the blogger mellowed out over time.

We drove all the way from Cupertino to Livermore and back without as much as going into the temple. This was a first with this temple.

They could have mentioned the prominently in the website or the folks who were regulating the traffic outside the temple could have asked us the same question and could have turned us around. Would have at least saved an hour, changed plans and driven my in-laws to some other place to celebrate. The Ghirardeli chocolate factory was actually our other(usual) choice.

God is in chocolate! God is in Vanilla! He is in every flavor is what we have always been saying.

Next year, the ritual changes. We celebrate at our usual favorite spots. The GG Bridge and some great ice cream.

Balaji Ummachi, why do you make me have this love hate relationship with you? Why?

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Deify

This is actually a very heartfelt post in the Tamizh blog, but wanted to share this with regular readers in this space as well.

It won't make sense unless we go through some glossary of terms. So ....

Tamizhnadu (Tamilnadu) : The south eastern state in India where the official language is Tamizh (Tamil) .The language is at least 5000 years old!

Kazhagam : Literally means "organization" or "collective" and is a short reference to Dravida Kazhagam (DK) and to the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK)

Dravidar (not to be confused with the cricket player Rahul Dravid) : The original people whose roots are traced to the local indiginous population that had its origins in present day Sri Lanka and Tamizhnadu - history will tell you that these people spoke Tamizh in a purer form and were dark skinned and eventually mixed with the Northern people (who were not necessarily invaders) but the people who migrated down from the Indus valley. Most of this history was concocted by the British who used the divide and rule policy to separate the North Indians and South Indians so they could rule India. They succeeded in their divisive policy because long after the Brits have left, the Aryan-Dravidian concept is still a sore spot for Indians.

Periyar : The man who is also referred to as "Thandhai" (Father) Periyar or EVR was the brains behind the origins of the DK. The man was a social reformer and tried to knock some sense into the common downtrodden folk in the south to come forward against discrimination by Brahmins. He also became an atheist and todays politics and politicians are all his legacy!

M. Karunanidhi : The present chief minister of Tamizhnadu and the head of the DMK party, who also goes by the name "Kalaignar" (artist), Periyars political grandson (It was Periyar->Annadurai-> Karunanidhi). A fantastic orator, poet, writer and thinker, he used his experience as a story/screenplay/dialogue writer for movies to good use. The man is single handedly responsible for 80% of punch dialogues over a 15 year golden period of Tamizh cinema.

Kalaignar is also a staunch atheist and takes a shot at God, Brahmin bashing at every public speaking opportunity he gets. In his lingo God does not exist. When I was an adolescent, somehow this used to appeal to me. Believe in mankind, not god. Somehow that struck a cord. Service to humans is service to god, god lives in us etc. etc. So the guy striking out against god or striking out god was in my opinion a means to an end.

Later of course when I found that he struck out only against Hindu gods and he did not necessarily go against all the evils in a caste based society and the many other things where he showed that he was just another politician without a consistant standard, the charm was lost on me.

Having gone through all that explaining, here is the funny part. Recently there was a music album release function for the upcoming Tamizh movie "Dasavadharam". On stage was Kalignar. He was introduced as "Tamizh thirai ulagai kaakkum kadavul!" or in other words "the god, the protector of Tamizh cinema!"

That was really ironic.

What happens when an atheist turns into God?

Atheist alone knows!

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Mozhi

Last week, same time, I was finding the best seat in a near empty theater to watch Mozhi. It was a very well made movie in a great theater with a big screen. This theater usually plays English movies that have been taken off the mainstream theaters for lower fares. Now that they are screening Indian movies here, it is quite a blessing. Nice seats, relatively kid free! audience, great sound, not to mention super toilets! I am seriously considering watching more movies in theaters, after this experience.

This is one clean movie. No violence, no double meaning dialogues, no crude humor! Well, you probably got all that from the movie review pros! However, I couldn't help notice the similarities in some of the situations between this movie and "Children of a lesser God", something that was not mentioned in any of the regular reviews! I had no idea what Mozhi was all about, but within the first 20 minutes, I could guess how many of the scenes were going to end.

I guess "Children of a lesser God" was probably not a popular movie in India. It came out in the late eighties. I watched it on cable (in bits and pieces) when I was in grad school. Got to watch the full movie only a few years ago. But it is one of my favorites of all time. I just can't forget Marlee Matlin in that movie. She was gorgeous and she could speak with her eyes. Later when I learnt that she is deaf in real life, I probably felt something along the lines of what Prithviraj feels in the hospital lobby in Mozhi!!

The catch though is, if you liked "Children of a lesser god" , you would definitely like "Mozhi", but not vice versa. The english movie has some nudity and strong language. So, wouldn't exactly call it a movie that you can watch with the whole family. It is a very serious movie compared to Mozhi, which has you smiling for the most part. You have to watch this movie. It got a best actress oscar for Marlee!

Now back to Mozhi! I have really taken a liking ot the soundtrack of this movie. I must have heard the song "Pesa Madandhaiye" a dozen times!! Had actually closed my eyes for a second just listening to the song. Well written, well sung and nicely directed! I did feel that it was a cross between "Deivam thandha veedu" from the movie Aval Oru Thodarkadhai, and "Evano oruvan" from Alaipayudhe. Again, I was surprised to find out that the singer is not KJ Yesudas or his son, but Madhu Balakrishnan. Let's just say that Madhu has a new fan!

If I have heard this song a dozen times, then I have been listening to "Sevvanam .." a few dozen times. Just love it. It is also Jr.'s current favorite song ("in the whole world" if I might add!). The funny thing is that when I listen to songs where I have heard the song for the first time while watching the movie, I tend to get the movie when I close my eyes and picturize the song. I get to do my own choreography in my head if I have heard the song without seeing the movie! Yes, I am actually doing the dancing. This song however is unique. For some reason, I get San in my vision instead of the heroine!

Was humming "computer kandavalo, karate katravalo" (maybe she has learnt Computers, Karate) thinking "damn, I am one lucky bastard to have married someone who knows computers and karate!" and at that precise moment San tells me: "please stop singing that song. every time you start singing it, either Jr. is coughing or the little one starts throwing up or bad things happen. That song is not good for our family!".

I burst out laughing at the irony of the situation. Considering that Jr. is the president and CEO of Virus Inc. and the litte one has recently been promoted to CTO of Germcorp, my singing has little do to with the state of affairs in the house. But an order is an order!. So, I stopped humming, we took one look at the kids, and we both started laughing!

Jokes apart, do go see Mozhi and if possible watch Children of a Lesser God too..