I hate this, but...
I hate to say this, but I agree with Chris (thanks for the link - I have been trying to resist talking about this for a while now) - SI.com - Pro Basketball - Malone commits to signing with Lakers - Friday July 11, 2003 10:58 AM - with the addition of Gary Payton and Karl Malone, the Lakers are just 82+14 games short of the NBA Championship title this coming season. I was talking to a Spurs fan the other day, and we determined that the other teams might as well give the trophy to the Lakers right now and play the regular season for fun. Seriously, with a frontcourt of Malone and Shaq and a backcourt of Payton and Kobe, who does the opposing team guard on the court? Who do they double-team? I know a lot of people are predicting chemistry problems, but I am not so sure considering Phil Jackson’s coaching style and ability. This has got to come as a great news for all Laker fans, but as an outsider, all I can say is - NOT FAIR!
(All the above is going to happen regardless of any other moves in the other NBA teams - Zo to Dallas, Kidd to Spurs and everybody else to Timberwolves, will still not change a thing - the East will still play like the NBDL).
Blogging dumb
I was going to post a review of the movie “Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azakaban” today. Then I read the news and felt stupid for posting nothing but fluff for the past few months. I am reminded this is the day and age of snuff videos (ala Nick Berg) and pictures of gruesome death (see Paul Johnson) - who cares if a bunch of kids fought a bunch of make-believe problems in a fantasy jasminlive movie?
I know I have been very effectively hiding under the veil of being pregnant and refusing to acknowledge the awful things going on around me. I am keeping up with everything, even though I am not talking about it. Things depress the heck out of me till I pretend nothing exists anymore but me and my boy. I have been playing ostrich for far too long - time to stop pretending and start talking about things that matter.
Oh yeah, fuck the Islamic radicals and the camels they rode on!
Of course, it isn’t like any of these inhuman bastards will admit that they killed Paul Johnson to satisfy their bloodthirst - they did it for a reason, supposedly.
Didn’t the bleeding hearts tell them that the way to heal problems and resolve issues is by talking to each other, hold hands and sing peaceful songs? It is also interesting how everything is blamed because of what America supposedly did to the poor. I am still waiting for them to explain how this plays into their so-called mission statemen.
White people, black people, brown people
I quote the above since it perfectly illustrates the way most first-generation Indian immigrants in the US think. They don’t like the white people since they think they are arrogant, immoral and racist (yes, all of them are racist - or so they think). They don’t like the black/Latino people since they are supposed to be dumb and not exactly upto “our class”.
Why am I ranting about this? Because I have had enough of this kind of mentality and irritating attitude from these people I know - I am in very close proximity with them daily and am sick of trying to tell them people are people no matter what color their skin is. These people have this idealised vision of India in their minds and as far as they are concerned, Americans don’t care about their families, have no morals and will not associate with us brown people except to make us do their work. While ranting away about how most programmers are Indian and most Project Managers are white, I wonder why these people don’t once admit that it might be because most Indians are NOT interested in management…
Any Indian being friendly with the white people is considered to possess “slave mentality” - of course, we cannot just click with their Jasminelive personality, can we! They don’t care about their children, these people say with their voices dripping with self-righteousness. How many families do these people know intimately enough to pass judgement on them? Oh, none - why do you ask…
These people think they have left behind a paradise in India and are suffering endlessly here because the poor things have no friends, family and are having to slog their butts off trying to make mortgage payments. Cry me a fricking river, but if those things were that important to their lives, they shouldn’t have come here in the first place. Why come here, bitch about everything in sight and then cry over something you couldn’t wait to get away from the minute you graduated from your Engineering college? Why?
Fine! You left your friends behind - make new friends here. Nope, we prefer to live our lives safely tucked away within the Indian community without ever venturing outside. There is no curiosity for other cultures, while we nod sagely at the wisdom of the Westerners who are “finally realizing how much superior our ancient culture is compared to theirs”. Culture is a give and take, morons! Someone is paying you a compliment trying to find out about you - it doesn’t behoove you to sit smugly and act superior. Show some appreciation to others once in a while - that will not “diminish” your culture in any way.
Does all this mean these people will actually leave here and go to India if given a chance? Who are you kidding! It is absolutely disgusting listening to this drivel day-in and day-out. Here is a clue, people! Be happy with what you have. Simple, isn’t it! You are not only making your lives a living hell with this crap, but you have kids whose minds you are poisoning with this kind of an attitude. Ever wonder why so many second-generation Indian kids have issues adjusting? This is why!
Collateral
I don’t know if it was the late night show we took in or the 7-hour shopping marathon I had been through before that, but I found the http://www.chaturbaterooms.com movie absolutely boring. Sleep-inducingly boring! The loud music was the only thing that kept me from falling asleep.
By now, everybody knows that Tom Cruise plays a hitman who hires Jamie Foxx’s cab to take him to all his victims through the night. You don’t need me to give away the ending to you or the last victim’s identity - you will figure it out five minutes into the movie - one, if you are not sleepy. I was hoping to atleast stay awake staring at Cruise’s normally gorgeous mug, but the grey hair didn’t do much for me. Dialogue? There is so much pseudo-cool philisophy in there you don’t even want to think about understanding it.
The only thing I liked about the movie was Jamie Foxx’s character - not his acting, but his character. Foxx spends the whole movie trying to look perplexed, worried or angry and you will not know one expression from the other. His character though, is very believably written - there are no super-human heroics - just a plain, old cabbie trying to do the best he can under the circumstances. All in all, this is a movie you wanna watch on DVD...not worth the movie ticket.
Update: Something that I kept mentioning to my husband as we were watching the movie was that the movie made me feel like I was driving on a long road-trip late at night. It had a very lonely, sleepy feel to it at moments that really made me feel like I was in the cab late at night ready to go home.
Hum Tum
Hum Tum is a surprisingly well-done and stylishly executed Indian version of “When Harry Met Sally”. It is almost as funny as the original it tries to mimic without bothering to be bold enough, even while translating most dialogues from English to Hindi - like the famous one about men and women not being able to remain friends - sex always comes between them in the English version, while it is Pyaar (love) in the Hindi version.
Saif as Karan Kapoor, a fun-loving flirt is breezy and fun as usual in a way that mirrors his “Dil Chahta Hai” role. Rani Mukherjee as Ria is alright playing the straight person to Saif’s nutball antics. The songs are not that great except for the title track, which was pretty hummable. On a side note, did anyone who watched the movie get the feeling that the script originally required Karan and Ria to sleep with each other at the end of the title song? That was not how it went in the movie, but the conversation between the two after the song really doesn’t make any sense unless you assume they have slept together.
All in all, a pretty different movie for the desi crowd and very entertaining too. Don’t miss it.