Shreks-y!

I saw Shrek 2 on the Sunday, with the wife. It is, IMHO, better than Shrek. The dialogues are a riot; Eddie Murphy as the voice of Donkey is absolutely hilarious. This time around, there's the addition of John Cleese and Julie Andrews as Princess Fiona's Dad and Mom and Antonio Banderas as the voice of Puss in Boots. And the whole team has done a wonderful job of liberally peppering the whole movie with spoofs. Some of them so discreet, that you might need to go see Shrek-2 another time!

And yes, leave the kids out of this one. For them, it's just another animated film, but the one-liners are best appreciated by adults! So don't think of taking your Tinkoo, Pappu, Guddu and Pinky along. Leave them out for once and have a rollicking time!

Oh, and another tip: stick around in the theatre until after the credits have started rolling......

He did!

Michael Schumacher has just won his seventh Formula 1 World Championship. Kimi Raikkonen of McLaren-Mercedes won his first race in over a year with some superb driving, showing a late return to form, but it was all he could do to stop Schumi from finishing second. And yes, Rubinho came in third, making it a Ferrari two-three on the podium. This sealed the World Championshiip for Schumi, since he's a clear 40 points ahead of Rubens Barrichello.

Even assuming Michael doesn't finish in the points in any of the remaining four races, and Barrichello wins all four, at the very best, he could tie with Michael for the World Championship.

Funny, it was Kimi Raikkonen who stretched the World Championship until the last race of 2003, and all Michael had to do was finish in the points ahead of Kimi.

Schumi did it then, I don't see why he shouldn't do it this time.

Will he? Won't he?

All Michael needs is a two-point difference separating him from Rubens Barrichello. He's currently on P2, between the Renaults. Which means he needs to finish ahead of, and with forty aggregate points more than Rubens Barrichello, to take his seventh World Championship.

I'm not going to have fingers left by tomorrow, at this rate!

Rats! Is the plague upon us?

In an interesting - and unsettling - photo essay, the BBC has featured the troop of NRK (Night Rat Killers), 45 municipal workers of the BMC whose only function is to make nightly rounds of the city and kill up to 30 rats apiece, every night.

While the Beeb can be forgiven for its eccentric viewpoint - I guess they don't have any rats in England? - it did point out that there are fears that the Bubonic Plague - officially eradicated 30 years ago by the Indian Government - may be back. And it poses a greater threat in Bombay than it does elsewhere in India. Given the fact that Bombay houses close to 18 million people and - I guess - an equal number of rodents.

That set me thinking. It's all very well to blame the Government for the outbreak of any disease when it happens. It's an accepted fact that Government departments do not work. Will not work. But the other factor is the population density in Bombay. Far too many people, in too little a space. Isn't that the single reason why we generate 6000 tonnes of garbage everyday?

Why are our cities so crowded? Simply because all the homeless and migrant population is a convenient vote-bank for the politicians. And they're all concentrated in a small area - any urban megapolis is small as compared to size of the country - so the pickings are easy. It's easier to promise, not deliver and then intimidate and rule over a populace that is often ekeing out an existence from day-to-day.

So it's easy to project the urban cities as "employment centres" and "city of dreams" and denying any development in the rural areas, accelerating the migration to the cities. Given the proclivity of some segments of our popluation to breed like rabbits, its no wonder that a city like Bombay is choked with people and their garbage. Added to that the absence of any civic sense. The rich have their Potemkin villages, churning out an amazing volume of filth and eco-destructive garbage. The poor, adding to this volume simply because of their sheer numbers.

Add to that an apathetic and callous administration and you have all the ingredients of a disaster, simmering away in the melting pot that is Bombay. One day, we're going to have an epidemic on our hands and all because we're collectively just callous. Bubonic plague is the least of our worries.

Sorry-ass...

.....the fuss over the first flight of India's first indigenous aircraft, that is. It's a crying shame that we haven't been able to build a single aircraft in fifty-seven years of Independence. And now that we have built something that looks distinctly archaic, we're going ga-ga about it.

The development of Saras is being linked to the success of Embraer of Brazil. So now we're having aircraft also "inspired" by someone else, huh? After movies and soundtracks, it's now the turn of aircraft? And what, pray, was the realisation? That developing an aircraft to serve a niche segment would prove to be profitable.

Over the years, we Indians have become inured to such drivel that we don't even bother to think that:

• In fifty years, we haven't been able to develop any indigenous defence equipment - apart from some sidearms, perhaps.
• The much-hailed Arjun MBT will be so much scrap metal when it actually comes to combat - if it doesn't sink into the ground or run out of fuel before that.
• We don't have any fighter aircraft that we can be proud of - the ALH and LCA have all been developed after dollops of foreign help; the "totally indigenous" Kaveri engine was so much money down the drain.

The plain and simple reason for this is our overreaching greed. We cannot open the defence sector to private players because of the fear that substandard defence products will compromise our defence - because the private sector is full of scheming capitalists who will suck the country dry.

Therefore, we persist in letting behemoths like the DRDO spend copious amounts of the taxpayer's money in developing something that is outdated before it is even prototyped. To ensure that our public sector remains equally corrupt and inefficient, we pay our scientists measly amounts, treat them like dirt and let monkeys like this decide their fate, making the scientists automatically prone to the lust for lucre.

Service affected

I haven't been posting very much in the past few weeks. I don't know whether it's catching - but I've noticed quite a few avid bloggers dropping off the Net. Of course, some of them will probably metamorphose or materialise somewhere else, as someone else, but for all practical purposes, they've stopped.

And why? Some of them just seem to have had enough. Others don't want to tell. Oh well, to each his own, I guess.

Me? I've been at work, mostly. The Firm has been going through a rather unsettling patch and some days I just get depressed. My work no longer gives me the kind of satisfaction that it used to a few months ao. I yearn for change. So, the visits to Monster, Naukri and other related sites have increased.

And the wife. She thinks of blogging as some waste of time, so I try and avoid openly posting when she's around. Someone said the secret of a happy marriage is the liberal use of two words: "Yes, dear".

Turns out those are the two words that partially give me my personal space!

In the words of Gov. Schwarzenegger: I'll be back.

Rock DJ

One of my nightly activities - once I get off work - is to plug in my radio and catch the show by Glenn, Monday through Thursday. The Night Shift - and the Midnight Shift - both rate as my favourites. And Glenn kind of grows on you. It's hard not to like the guy. With his questions ("Just answer my ques-tin and you can win....") and Bugs Bunny-esque chatter ("I have some gweat twacks lined up for you tonight...."). Malini, Jaggu and Tarana come next. And oh, of course, the Big Brunch with the T-Man on Sunday mornings. Classics for four hours.

Even in its earlier avatar - as Radio Mid-Day, I think - used to be the better of the private FM stations around. This time around, it's even better.

Radio City on the other hand, is one station I hate. Especially the morning shows by a weirdo who goes by the totally inconceivable - and ludicruous - name of Ravi I Yaar (".....aap ka yaar.."). He's irritating, he's fawning, he's nauseous, ingratiating, unctuous.The other DJs (Prachi and Lavanya in particular) are tolerable, but only just. "Popatrao" - which is the radio equivalent of MTV's Bakra - is a shining example. Canned laughter, weird noises and contrived humour make this feature one of the most boring and tasteless shows on the station. Yet, Popatrao is touted as a "complete riot!". If these shows are popular with the public, then it only goes to show how poor our sense of humour really is.

There are face savers, however. "Babbar Sher" does come up with some ribtickling shaayari sometimes and "Pareshaan Hoon Main" is palatable. But On the whole, the shows lack any kind of creativity and are downright boring. Oh, I have no choice but to listen to this station on the way to work because the bus driver plays the radio at full blast.

Why doesn't Radio City - or anyone else - hire Malishka? I used to enjoy listening to her banter all morning before Win 94.6 FM shut down. I used to find her a tad irritating at first, but then her constant prattling actually turned out to be enjoyable.

But until someone does find Malishka, play on Glenn!

Choker bluey

In the end, I'd like to think it was the 24-ball 4 runs scored by Dada that did us in.

India did a fairly decent job of restricting Sri Lanka to 228, but we should have figured that the batting would be difficult for us, too. And then, there were the usual mix-ups. Sangakkara dropped at 6, then a run-out chance missed later. And the field placements? Our boys seemed to always hit the ball straight to the Sri Lankans, who never even worked up a sweat while fielding, leaving them plenty of energy to chase those errant strokes before they reached the boundary. Now perhaps we need to work on our field placement, in addition to batting, bowling, fielding and fitness.

What never ceases to amaze me is the way Pakistan and Sri Lanka never seem to lack that definitive score-building partnership. No matter if their best batsman has departed for a paltry score, there's always another waiting in the wings to take the match away from India.