Book Review: Divergent series-Mash it up Baby!

I have a horrible job. It requires me to stay and mutate in office for about 12 hours everyday, come back home, and fall dead on the bed.

Next morning: Repeat procedure. Over.

There's also the travelling bit which can last from anything between 30 minutes to infinity.

To kill time, I started reading this 'Trending' series on my ebook app -Divergent.

It's a trilogy (But of course a trilogy, because a single, powerful novel is too mainstream) namely-Divergent, Insurgent and Allegiant.

The series, set up in a dystopian America (surprise,  surprise) is about a city divided into 5 factions- Amity (peace), Candor(Honesty), Erudite(Intelligence), Abnegation (selflessness) and Dauntless(bravery). Everyone is sorted into one of these factions based on these dominant personalities and the rest are factionless, left to their own means, uncared by the government.

The lead characters are two teenage protagonists-Tris and Tobias who fight the broken system to prevent their lives and world from breaking apart.

*Yawns*

Ok. So. Where was I?

Yes. Dystopian era, lots of governmenty stuff to fight, teenagers all around.

The first book, Divergent, sounds like Veronica Roth is a huge Hunger Games and Harry Potter fan girl , who never got over those series so she decided to write one of her own. All 3 books borrow elements from both the aforementioned series quite freely to aid a silly plot.

I won't go much into details about all the 3 books here (because it's post lunch and I am sleepy).
Basically this happens:

First Book: Tris learns how to fight like a badass (Tobias teaches her) and learns she's a divergent who can resist all sorts of psychologically manipulative serums (My god there are loads of those except a serum to combat boredom). They discover that one evil-genius Erudite leader is killing off divergents to protect a huge 'Secret'.
Second book is all about rebel and more rebel and yadda yadda yadda some more rebel along with a  mind numbingly boring teenage angsty louuve story which essentially involves Tris and Tobias staring intently at each other's collarbones- because PG-13. The book ends with the revelation of The Big Secret.
The 3rd book starts off where the 2nd one left off with everyone trying to digest the the revelation. After that the book has no idea what to do with itself so it just panders around, randomly bringing in the first under-researched conflict it can lay its hands in(here, Gene Silencing) and follows it up with-wait for it- more rebellion.
At this point you're tired, the characters are tired and dying left right and centre. The only bright spot is the ending which seems more logical than rest of the series put together.

Overall the series is for the novice reader, who's just getting used to committing to a series, to feeling for the characters. The more seasoned readers who also happen to be fantasy/dystopian series enthusiasts (like me) would find it lame and full of more plot holes than Mumbai roads.

Traveblog#1 Manali

Manali, is a dream.
Atleast, it seems to me like that. I mean, it has clouds rolling down the mountains encasing pretty much everything. It has ridiculously good looking people, red-topped wooden cottages, cobbled streets, mist-covered pines....oh I could go on.
At a time where other places in India are roasting at a scorching 48 degs, Manali shivers at 2 degs.
And it's summer.
You come to know that it's summer in Manali when the locals roam around wearing flimsy shirts with no warm clothes on and you stand there in 7 layers of sweater, covered with a shawl and wearing two monkey-caps looking like a badly dressed terrorist. The people are polite and agree to everything you say (hanji hanji, okay hai ji, han han ho jayegaji), they even snigger very very politely when you drink large cups of tea in succession and shiver like a mobile set on vibration mode.
The scenery has thousands of roses, every color and shade imaginable, apple trees, snow-capped mountains, and a lot of hotels doing a passable imitation of Scottish Castles. The scenery is so colorful, so vibrant,  such mesmerizing mix of pine forests melting into mist, that it looks Photoshopped.
The streets are lined with thrift stores selling an ensemble of Himachali scarves and shawls, trinkets, colorful jwellery, usual hillstation stuff.
Driving here is a novice's worst nightmare. The roads, slippery with the rain are steep and have random blind turns. To add to that they are size zero and seem to mysteriously widen just enough to let a car and a bus simultaneously pass through. And if you don't find that challenging enough,  there are the occasional yaks (yes, yaks) standing right in the middle of a traffic snarl and not giving a single fuck.
You enjoy all that nonetheless, 'coz you are too busy pretending you're in a Yash Chopra dreamland. One can see a lot of couples on honeymoon,  and rightly so since Manali is something out of a 'once upon a time' fairytale awakening the romantic in you and giving rise to  a lot of passionate poets writing terrible poetry that later becomes a part of Google's sheron-shayari page results.
Seriously, it's an ideal place to come with your special someone and be a part of the quintessential DDLJ-ish Bollywood romance.
But what to do if you,  like me, are resolutely single and stuck in an dream-like, unimaginably romantic haven?
Sit down at the local dhaba, eat steaming hot butter-filled daal makhani with roti, and have a quarter of Old Monk warming you to your fingertips, sit back and just....enjoy.

The Quintessential Love Story

My love life sucks.

I wish I could say that.
Weird? Well not so much since the prerequisite for saying THAT is the existence of a love life in the first place. A criteria that I most certainly do NOT fulfil.

Mostly when I have a lot of free time (never) or have been assigned something exceptionally boring (always), I like to speculate (procrastinate). I am sure I cannot be the only one obsessing over my love life. There are millions of other kindred souls out there.
But I would stick to homeground and would like to illustrate the romance life-cycle of a typical middle-class Indian girl with a reasonable amount of imagination and too much free time.

Stage 1: Yash Chopra and the works.
Age: 11-12
Subject drools over Raj/Rohit/Rahul ,the NRI, romancing Anjali/Tina/Pooja, the bubbly childhood friend-now-turned-lover against the lush greens and pristine white of snow-capped mountains in Switzerland.

Stage 2: "You like him no?"
Age: 13-16

Subject takes part in regular obsessive discussions with other similar subjects about the 'options' available (adolescent boys with pimply faces). Subject chooses an 'option' who is the closest approximation to the 'Raj' inside her head (mostly,  a badly copied hairstyle,  but I digress)
Having made the choice,  subject daydreams ad nauseam about  hypothetical romantic situations inspired from mills and boons and some more crappy bollywood movies. These daydreams ofcourse star the subject and her chosen 'option'.

Stage 3: The Valentine's Day Paradox
Age: 16-17

Subject,  being a part of a bold and liberated society, decides to take matters in her own hand and let her chosen one know about her feelings.
This is ofcourse done by hiding behind walls, stalking and starting creepily at her chosen target in the weeks leading up to the Valentine's Day.
On the said day, the subject dresses up well, and hopes that the chosen boy would telepathically come to know about the subject's feelings and subsequently take the necessary action of asking her out through gifting a Cadbury chocolate.

Stage 4: To louuve or not to louuve
Age: 17-18

Case 1: Mission Accomplished
This state of ecstasy is experienced by the subject if on V-Day, everything goes indeed, as planned. 
In this stage the subject and the target make a steady progress supported by elements like McDonald's,  PVR and sometimes some  eels-in-the-desert kissing.

Case 2: Mission Aborted
Most common scenario,  in this stage subject retreats into a hibernating period consisting mostly of junk-food groups and a steady dosage of cheesy sitcoms peppered by regular telling offs from parent subjects.  Side effects include Subject bloating like a balloon and looking like a reject from The-Blair-Witch-Project.

Stage 5: Final Destination
Age: 23-25

Subject has reached a max maturity level and is considered a marriagable subject.
In this stage, the subject has a useless degree,  a job she doesn't like and a negative love-life ( case in point: stage 4 case 2)

Stage 6: The End
Age: 26-forever

Go back to stage 1.
Repeat all.

Thank You.

I Spik Gud Anglis.

Admit it. Indians are obsessed with English.
I am not talking about the metros where speaking English is a way of life. No sir.
 I am referring to the places which have a rising middle class, yet are stuck in a limbo between a humble town and a sassy city. They generally have innocuous names like 'Shahpur' or maybe 'Almora'. They also have a unique mix of culture which is trying to get into a cosmopolitan mould, yet stubbornly remains 'small town' at heart.
So what do you get as result? You get 'Subhash Mall-Ladies and Gents Castume' and 'Anand Fasin House'.
You also find that English is still a novelty and those who speak it well are looked upon with a reverence bordering on worship.  This lays down a fertile ground for seedy English classes that claim a 100% success rate of making you fluent in just 24 hours. People here, like anywhere else, have big dreams of going to 'Umricca' (America, for the uninitiated) and to do so they would have to clear the seemingly insurmountable obstacle -GRE.
GRE or Graduate Record Examination is the test any individual wishing to study in any country other than UK must clear. It is basically a test consisting of 7th standard Math and some really mind-boggling English.
So, a flourishing market of GRE COACHING -FAST AND SUPERB crops up everywhere having thousands of hopeful enrolling in them. Some students claim that coaching helped them get a decent score while others state vehemently that coaching is waste of money better employed elsewhere.
On closer look, amidst the chaotic whirl of conflicting views, one finds that the problem really is the language itself.
Every major language in the world like French, German, Russian operates within a set of rules. If you get such and such combination of letters, then you only pronounce it in a such and such manner. But this isn't so with English. It works on the rule that you make up your own rules as you go about speaking, reading or writing it. Over centuries, this language has developed so many convoluted logic and intricate
rules of appropriation that it is indeed, utterly baffling for those unfamiliar with it.
I rather pride myself in having a fairly good command over the language; but the English sections in the GRE test had even me reeling in confusion with its long, jargon filled passages, never-before used vocabulary and complex sentences. So, as I did the classic 'inky-pinky-ponky' with multiple choice vocab questions, I wondered what the less fortunate's were doing about that? I have no idea. Maybe they mug up the 3500 odd words in the flash cards, or maybe they just guess. Whatever works man, whatever works. Having lived in many small towns, I have experienced first hand, the wonder and sheer desire to speak fluent English. The ability is a milestone of sorts, sometimes doubling as a redeeming point of an otherwise worthless groom ("kaam nahi karta toh kya hua, humara beta bahut achhi angrezi bolta hai! Beta...Angrezi bol ke dikhao zara!!), it will also help you bargain in shops, help you make the local hooligans cower, get a job and so on and so forth. From your neighbourhood Khanna, patel, and Arora aunties to the Thelewala outside the colony gates, everyone finds their own way to learn this language. Some watch popular Hollywood movies and speak in annoying fake accents, some go the 'Rapidex' way. (The holy grail of English to Hindi translations and vice versa) but the heart warming thing is how sincerely they try. So, I suppose, English indeed, is a superpower. And with great power, comes the great responsibility of using the keyboard for writing coherent, articulate, grammatically correct sentences and not using your butt '2 typ lyk dis'.

Growing Up.

This post isn't a nostalgic one reminiscing about the sepia tinged days of childhood. This is about how we grow stupider and crazier as we grow up.
What is the difference between a child and an adult?
Nothing. Except being an adult has legal repercussions.
I have always felt a person's fundamental nature is formed by the age of 11. This nature doesn't change for as long as he or she lives. We just learn how to act in public.
So, whether you are grumpy, happy, sad or just plain weird. Don't expect you are gonna change by undergoing some hokey spiritual course. You are gonna remain exactly the same, only a little less richer. But where is all this coming from anyways?
Well, a panic-filled first drive experience.
Being dangerously impulsive by nature since I was a little brat, I sneaked out, took the car keys and decided to take our car for a spin. Alone.
At 21,  this may not seem like a big deal to most but it is, because thanks to a little 'crash' incident a while back, this was the first time I was driving in two years. (Making my count of individual driving experiences to a measly two).
So, there I was up and raring to go with no thought of how many lives I might be putting to risk. Little children playing around,  blissfully unaware of a clueless driver on a possibly deadly rampage, pedestrians,  cows, dogs and about a gazillion everyday life forms under possible threat of mutilation due to my expert driving. Yet, there I was. 

Now where I live, the road is about a nanometer wide with autos, scooters and school buses and BEST buses jostling for space. It also has bikes and cars parked on the sides with their rear ends jutting out just to add more fun to the mayhem.

My grand plan involved me, driving through that quagmire of lives and machines and then coming back home and boasting about it.

I know. Real mature,  grown up decision. 

So here's the story in short;

1.I drove; 

2.I hit an auto; 

3. I ran away; 

4.I got caught. 

On the way I also screamed like a banshee instead of honking to get people to make way.

But that's beside the point.

The point,  here is, that growing up and growing mature are mutually exclusive entities. 

And while the former is inevitable, the latter,  may or may not happen. So next time when you feel old and wise...you're probably not.

Movie Review: Ekk Main Aur Ekk Tu

Starring: Kareena Kapoor, Imran Khan
Director: Shakun Batra
Music: Amit Trivedi

Rom-coms have the typical quality of being sweet and very, predictable. EMAET steers clear of cliched endings atleast. The story is simple. Two polar opposites get married in a drunken haste, thanks to the skewed quick marriage laws in Las Vegas. After an initial shock, they begin a journey of discovering each other and themselves. Rianna Braganza helps Rahul Kapoor discover that there exists a life outside the stiffling rules and regulations set by his parents and the superfluous socialite world they live in.
Among the upsides, the movie scores in keepin the characters and the situations very real and relatable. The supporting cast is very strong in performances with some brilliant work by Ratna Pathak playing an exaggerated Mrs Sarabhai and Boman Irani portraying an extremely competitive father. The Braganza family ensemble cast is spot on and very funny.
 While Imran Khan's Rahul Kapoor goes through a gradual change Kareena Kapoor's character, to a large extent is one-dimensional. Her's being such a pivotal character, it lacks depth and layering. She's fun and that's about it. Imran Khan is sincere but it feels as if his acting skills need to be brushed up a bit more.
The film lacks drama which is both a good thing and a bad thing. The subtle tone complements the American rom-com style setting while the same proves a hindrance when it comes to the character's emotional quotient. Rahul claims that he is in love with Rianna. But you only come to know that when he says it himself. The movie keeps a smile to your face with a couple of absolutely hilarious sequences thrown in. The music is evocative and tells more about the character's state of mind than they themselves.

Overall, Ekk Main aur Ekk Tu is the perfect Valentine's day movie date. It's simple, fun and frolic and that's about it. It's not the kind of movie that would stay with you, it's more like a droolable strawberry shake with sugarfree- sweet but not quiet.

Movie Review: Sherlock Holmes- A game of Shadows

Starring: Robert Downey Jr, Jude Law
Director: Guy Ritchie

A game of Shadows, in short, is a masala entertainer. It has Robert Downey Jr as a more brawny than brainy Sherlock Holmes, Jude Law as an absolutely delectable Dr. Watson and Stephen Fry as an utterly hilarious Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock's elder brother. Like the first part, the movie does not follow any particular story written by Sir Doyle but makes up a new one of its own with the elements thrown in. Here Holmes' arch nemesis Professor Moriarty is out wreck havoc on the western civilization and it's upto Holmes and a newly married Watson to stop him. The movie's most outstanding feature is it's special effects. The action packed sequence make you hold your breath and brawls want to make you whistle.
The movie has witty dialogues mouthed with elan by the leads and quiet a number of thrilling as well as funny sequences. There were talks of Brad Pitt playing the brilliant Prof. Moriarty, but thank the Lord's that didn't happen. Jared Harris as the sinister genius fits the character like a glove.
Among the things that the movie lacks is the basic storyline. With all the fantastic build up, one expects the actual conspiracy to blow away the mind. But, it falls flat rather like a delicious looking dish which tastes bland.
Having, said that the add on's more than make up for a rather weak plot. The relationship between a possessive Holmes and Dr. Watson, Holmes' rather short lived but passionate love for a thief among other things are covered brilliantly in the movie.
To sum up, A game of Shadows is like a enchanting musical piece, which stops just short of reaching its crescendo.