Big and small screen

Manju Wariar's comeback film in Malayalam touched a chord or 2 in me! Though started off in the same lines as "English Vinglish", the daughter's refusal to reveal the question, the first meeting with the President of India(played by Siddartha Basu!!), the slow but believable recovery with the support of good friend and the much needed highlighting of pesticide and chemical laden produce, all neatly done!! Hats off to the director!!

Beautiful song sung by Shreya Ghosal



While still on the movie subject and even though very late, felt amazed, bewildered, confused, dazed, exhilarated, fascinated (and innum pala pala solla neram illadha!) after watching Christopher Nolan's "Interstellar"! For a while, for any outrageous requests my answer was 'worm hole vazhiya poi black hole vazhiya veliya vandha..."! Ada, namma mythological brahma lokam's 1 day equals 1 earth year is sci-fi-ya!!

What to say about PK? Paarkey, rasikkey and sindhikkey! Had gone to the movie with low expectations(I consider Hirani bollywood's KSR!) but came out thoroughly entertained! Total Dhamake! Drishtikku Anushka!!

After "Friends" and "Everybody loves Raymond" ended, my live TV watching also ended. After many years revived TV watching with 'The Big bang theory'. Who wouldn't love Sheldon! Right next on my favourites list is an old TV show 'Psych'. The best part is this is one show that I can watch with A1!

FM - KB Tribute

KB-MSV

Kamban yemandhaan - Nizhal Nijamagirathu



Kana Kaanum - Agni Satchi




KB-IR

Punjai undu  - Unnal Mudiyum Thambi



Kannin maniye - Manathil urudhi vendum




KB-Marutha

Siragillai - Vaaname Ellai



Azhaithaal - Jathi malli



KB - ARR

Mettu podu - Duet



Anbe sugama - Paarthale Paravasam

Chennaiiii....

My hometown, then called Madras, was a seedha-saadha yet another metro city of India until I lived there. Ippo, already hot, hot Chennai is orey the super mega hot Chennaiii-thaan featuring in one of the top 10 cities to visit in 2015! Nowadays I introduce myself as from the land of the Chennai super kings(Dhoni tweeting in Tamil!!) to non-Tamils and some Pakis even surprised me that they knew Chennai because of Chennai Express!!

Spent the summer vacation visiting a lot of places in India this time experiencing almost all kinds of weather - sweltering heat, monsoon, cool and chilly. Traffic, crowd and an upcoming metro rail is the common factor in all cities. The highlight of the trip was celebrating anniversary, birthday, rakhi and friendship day with kith and kin!

More malls and multi storied chains stores in Chennai now but our traditional trip to Landmark book store was a big flop. First got disappointed to find the Nungambakkam branch closed and the branches in Spencer plaza and City central malls had hardly any collection. Surprisingly the Kotturpuram library has been well maintained facility-wise though next time I should consider volunteering at the children's department to organize the books.

Lulu Mall

God's own counrty's newest attraction Lulu mall is so fantastic that A2 commented "I don't know if I am in India or US, Amma!" Fresh and extra green from all the monsoon rains, the scenery of Kerala from a moving train is awesome-o-awesome! Namooru Bengaluru's Cantonment station poratti pottu-fied me this time. Missed a train(did not know that that train won't stop there!), sat waiting 20 mins in a train that was supposed to stop only 2 mins there unable to get down since the pick up person was waiting at the next station!

Mysore Palace

Brindavan Gardens

Musical fountains

And as always tried to eat as much good food as I could to sustain until the next trip. Cream center in Chennai got our vote as it satisfied both the kids and grown ups. Lakshmi Shankar Mess in Coimbatore with its local and organic food scored big. Didn't have enough energy or enthu' or room to try out all that at Eat street in Bangalore, After all that extravagant food, back home, the cereal boxes mocked at me, 'hehe... welcome back!" :-(

Super, super, super!!

Chennai super local kings!




Super sweet, cute song and movie!!



A very long, old but super interesting video...

Out of the world!

Namaste Mars! Ready for Tea & Samosa / Idli & coffee? Proud mom-ent for ISRO!!




Modi is in Madison square, Mangalyaan is in Mars orbit... orey the feelings of India dhaan!!

On a related note, there is this super one way ticket to Mars offer and a few have already jumped into the bandwagon!

Seri adhellaam irukkattum, what is this Multiverse  theory, huh? I am already dizzy hitchhiking my way in the galaxy with Douglas Adam's Guide!

Friday Melody

Anandha yaazhai - Thanga meengal



Just when I started to think Yuvan has lost his touch!

Manasula Soora Kaathey - Cuckoo

Nice melody!

Pakkadha pakkadha - Varuthapadatha valibar sangam



Such a cute romantic song!! Has become a bayangara fan of Sivakarthikeyan!!

Ayayayo anantham - Kumki



Haricharan, IMO, he is the South Indian's Sonu Nigam!! Super songs, lovely cast (Vikram Prabhu is so promising and Lakshmi Menon so expressive!)

Internet-il kandathum suttadhum

 OMG!!

 I-yo!!

 And the top-tucker!!

Sad, sadder, saddest

After all that hype about the Shiva trilogy from folks in India, very excitedly started "The immortals of Meluha" but ended with disappointment! Don't know if it was too much expectation on my part or my tastes don't sync with mainstream now! Sad!

After seeing the book "A history of the world in 10 and 1/2 chapters" in the must read list at a local book store, gave that a shot and ended up sea sick!

After all that sogam, I don't know how I landed with the "Light between the ocean". I mean, it is an excellent book but I am not ready for this kind of sadness now! I was vaguely reminded of an old Banumathi Tamil film called "Annai" but the setting, an island in Western Australia in the early 20th century was new and unique. The two main characters, Tom and Isabella were such an adorable couple! Just couldn't digest the ending. The author could've atleast let her see her once before her, you know! Pch!

To get out all that depression, I aggressively turned to humor of the highest order. With high ratings on all websites and the authors belonging to blog world(orey the kinship only!), started "Let's pretend this never happened" and "Hyperbole and a half". The first chapters seemed ligthly funny. And I get so angry with Athaan when he reads a few pages and gives his verdict when I endure the whole thing hoping (& failing) to disprove him!

May Melody

Dhoorathil naan kanda un mugam - Nizhalgal



Anandha raagam - Panneer Pushpangal



Ennullil edho - Rosappoo ravikkaikari



Ther kondu sendravan - Enakkul oruvan



Devanin kovil - Aruvadai naal

Ensoy!

and last but not least,

Kids broken-hearted over school's Valentine's Day candy ban

Orey the outrage(grown-ups more than kids!) over the decision to ban candy this valentine's day at a school in Connecticut! With left over candies from Halloween still lying around and the prospect of more sweet stuff coming home during Easter looming threateningly, this would be a welcome relief if everyone followed suit. And who cares for warnings like this - Cancer 'tidal wave' on horizon, warns WHO

Seri, namakku edhukku vambu! Lets enjoy this 'out of this world' video! 

Bye 13, Hello 14!

New research! Tirupathi trip, child birth and disney world during Christmas have a lot in common. Humongous pre and post planning, wait in queue/labour and the 3 seconds bliss moment - getting Venkatachalapathy darshan, looking and holding your baby for the first time and seeing the lighted Magic kingdom castle with your kids' faces all lit up respectively!

People who are guilty about not having done enough workout during the year should make a trip to Orlando, FL. The whole year's worth of workout can be done in a few days! Even my toe nails were aching after a couple of days of theme park walking! How much ever I try and avoid not to get sucked in to the Disney mania, summa solla koodathu, the ticket is worth just for Mission space and Soaring in Epcot! Like the Princess in Arabian tales Thousand and one nights, we leave some theme parks every trip to explore for next time thereby not closing the account with Disney.

Theme park tickets - $$$$
Hotel/food - $$$
Wear summer clothes in winter - Priceless!!

MIB @ CIFF!

11/12/13

With cooler weather comes all kinds of fevers - viral, black friday and this year's added special, Sachin retirement fever!

Black friday craze is getting crazier by each passing year. Last year it was slightly promoted to late Thursday and this year the online version started from the start of the Thanksgiving week! Each and every year one or two items will go in my temptation list but by the time I consider and reconsider the item/time everything will pass!

Appappa! Even Sachin wouldn't have imagined this kind of a mega retirement party! Or else he would've decided to retire sooner! ;) Even after the official announcement when the last few matches were referred as his last match in Eden gardens, last match in Wankede I thought he would go around the world playing last Oval test, last Lords test etc. Wonder how his family is going to entertain him now?

Before I got the chance to recommend/suggest books to A1, she has already understood my taste in books and suggests good reads for me from her list! Though it surprised me a little I realised that I neither had access to as many books as her nor were they as many age appropriate books when I was her age. "Out of my mind" by Sharon Draper was one of them and it was moving story of a 10 year old girl with cerebral palsy. Powerful writing, real characters you can identify with woven in an emotional story! For a lighter read, I enjoyed "Eight keys" by Suzanne Lafleur,

Yaar Bharathi - A recent gem I found in youtube mine and on time for the birth anniversary of Bharathiyaar!
Like TTM mentioned in his last comment, youtube has become a video akshayapaatiram! S V Sekhar dramas are going in repeat mode. Haven't found that many Crazy Mohan dramas in there. Another latest favorite is Tamil 70s hits! Most not park-able but honey to the ears! This week I am watching Suhasini's Penn serial!

RIP Manna Dey Saab!

Evergreen

Caught in the (inter)net!

Earth life "may have come from Mars" - Ada, didn't I have a similar thought process sometime back?!! The mystery of life on earth is getting mysterious by the day, year, decade, century! For a change, while churning youtube, the recommendations spit out some interesting videos. So, loosely tying the knots, the pushpaka vimanas must've transported people onto earth! My earthling theory is getting super exciting, illey? ;-)

Fiat - premier padmini black and yellow taxis will be off the roads of Mumbai because of a government ban of vehicles older than 20 years-aamey! It kindled(got to use ipad, kindle etc. appappo nowadays) some old memories and took me down memory lane. For the 80s Madras-wasis, an occational auto trip was a luxury! In the then Bombay, autos were only allowed from Chembur and beyond. So, a taxi ride was sure from Dadar railway station after a long distance train ride(double damaka)! I used to envy those lucky kids who came to school in taxi after missing the school bus! But the most attoozhyam by parent folks were to take a taxi after buying vegetables at wholesale vegetable market!

Recycle tragedy!

Light refreshments!

IPL started with the usual pompousness and had a rather anti-climax! Inspite of my efforts, I just got sucked into the IPL quicksand! With every household suffering hours of power cut in TN and through out India(and some getting to enjoy it for the first time!), cricketers and spectators sweating it out in flood light matches, ennatha solla? Whatever the significance of 108, 1008, almost all TV shows, music competitions, cricket matches in India have that many rounds to reach a semi-final round! Good summer vacation entertainer for the kids!

"Ennach..." everytime reminds me of Vijay Sethupathi's dialogue in "Naduvule konjam pakkatha kaanom" whenever I start to say it now! Really? It is based on real life incident? Unbelievable!! A little dragging but a nice entertainer! Kudos to the NKPK team for believing in their script(Enna theiriyum oru song kooda sorugaamey!)! The climax was fantastic! Another entry in my light entertainer category is "Marina", especially the Sivakarthikeyan comedy scenes! ROTFL in that birthday gift scene!!

Watched the annual Vijay awards. Annathey Kamal has become their aasthana Chief guest! Chevaliar Sivaji award for SRK, really? Varalakshmi Sarathkumar for debut female actor, really? Google, google best song, really? But the nomination list for best debut director, director, screenplay showed a real tough competition and reflected the healthy trend in Tamil cinema now! With Gopinath(paavam Maddy, he was just a oppukku chappani) in his sundara tamil and the awards themselves are exclusively for Tamil movies, why-o-why do they still cling on with the "the nominees are" accented voice over!

Consultations from teachers and librarians about checking out books from teen section for my voracious Tween reader, resulted in my trying out some books (though I could never keep up with her)! It started off with "Matched" which was a page turner but the subsequent parts were super boring. "Saraswati's way" was too much even for me to handle!

For some light listening....

Moongil thottam
Innum konja neram
(Sounds similar?)

(Y)Enge!

Engeyum

Engenge

Enge enadhu

Enge sellum

Enge nimmadhi

and

Behti hawa sa tha woh