Roman Holiday is an amazing movie…

Guys watch the movie if you have not. And if you have already watched it, watch it again…and this time with your girl friend beside you.

Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn dazzle the screen.

Besides being a romantic, the movie has doses of subtle comedy…in short an enjoyable mix.

If my word does not count…it was nominated for ten Oscars. Click Here to know more.

Believe me..I would never have written about this darn movie, if I had time to write something better. Marriage does bring its set of problems. I am already suffocating…gasp..gasp…

How I brought together Paes and Bhupathi

Leander Paes and Mahesh Bhupathi are back again for the Olympics and that is good news for India. I would not take all of the credit for patching up Leander and Mahesh.

Agreed, I went up to Mahesh the other day and said, “Boss, this is too much yaar.” But it was purely because I wanted India to win an Olympic medal, and nothing else. This is how the conversation had gone….

“What too much?” Bhupathi had asked

“An Olympic Gold for India is at stake, and here you guys squabble on small things. This is not on, Mahesh,” I said. I was getting worked up, for I am like you an average patriotic Indian.

“I know…all that Olympic shit…and playing for the Nation bit…but I somehow hate the sight of Paes. And on top of it, there is this girl Mahima Choudhary. I hate her in the movies itself and you expect me stand her,” he asked.

I had no answer to that query, for I myself had watched a Mahima movie Pardes and did not quite buy her presence. I tried the channel two diplomacy.

“Mahesh, but I heard Mahima and Paes are breaking up?”

“Yeah, that b&^%$# would have found another babe. He gets all of them, and I like a stupid guy got married early and am stuck with one,” he said.

“That`s all fine Mahesh. But could you…please… join hands with Leander for this Olympics alone. India will get a Gold and you guys will be popular.”

“Are you sure we will win?”

“Yes, as singles players you guys are a little more than average, and when you team-up you add up the averages and end up being more than 100%.”

He seemed a little satisfied.

“And I will make sure, you win a Gold,” I added in a chest-beating display of exaggeration.

“How come?” he asked me.

“I know a guy there,” I said even as I stifled a yawn.

Bhupathi agreed to play alongside Paes at the Olympics. Now, don`t ask me who is the guy who can get the duo Olympic Gold. I am still looking, for if I knew…wouldn`t I be in Athens…

Damn! I am good!

One day I saw a smart-looking, real hot, well-dressed gent walking past me at Coffee Day. I went near to see him closely, and DAMN! It was a mirror.
– Some obnoxious SMS sender

Sometimes I wonder, how happy Rekha will be to have plucked me out of the hands of destiny, well before the other girls in the World could lay claim. Lucky girl, I would say.

I can`t imagine how she faces up to thousands of jealous girls, who would at any cost want a piece of her man. Sends shivers down my spine. Wonder what she is going through. But then, I am sure she knows there is a sacrifice in return for every good thing.

Not to mention, her man – and that`s me – is a perfect combination of beauty and brains.

It is going to be a long haul for her. At every nook and corner of her life, there will be pretty things waiting to grab her man`s arm – that would be my arm – and run away. A life-long watch, it would be.

She knows that the magnetism of her man – and that`s me – will not subsidize with age. And she is ready for it. After all, her man – and that`s me again – is a timeless masterpiece.

If you are a Man (or a boy) and have dealt with a lady before, you probably got the under-lying message. If you are a lady, you have as much chance of understanding this as I have a chance of finding a chilled Kingfisher inside my smelly socks. But, if you do get the message….please don`t share it with other girls…esp Rekha.

Smart Criminals

The crime rate in Chennai is on the rise. And I am sure it is the same all over the country. Looks like we are on our way to being a Super Power. Don’t ask me what the police or the judiciary is doing. Obviously, they are not being as smart as the criminals. Here’s to the criminal in all of us….

The day I drank acid


I got my big, pink lower lips from my father. Nothing hereditary. Plain coincidence.

Scene I

We were staying in Jallundar, Punjab when I was all of eight years old. And the Punjabi women have a habit of forming groups and idling the time under the soothing sun (it gets pretty cold in winter) after their husbands go to work.

Our neighbours did the same. The habit is hard to break and it spills over to the summer months, when it can get a little hot. As a result the post-lunch gathering is always peppered with lime juice sessions. And my mother being the magnanimous lady that she even today is, would volunteer most of the time. Hence, when we came back from school at 3.30 p.m. we would get whatever was left-over from the convention.

My younger sister and I loved it…

Scene II

The villain of the piece, that is my father, entertained a hobby. A very unique one at that: he liked making detergent soaps, which he sometimes even used for bathing. Thanks to the popularity `Nirma washing powder` was gaining, he made yellow soaps.

He sometimes also made the antiseptic soap (by adding turmeric to his preparation), the fragrant soap (by adding some perfume to the soap mix), the fair-ness soap (by adding liquid blue), the dry-skin soap (by adding vaseline), the sex-appeal soap (by adding a paste of garlic and onion) and what not. My mother knows more about his exploits and success.

In short, it was a quid pro quo. He entertained the hobby, it entertained him in return.

The Final Act

One of the most important ingredient of soap making is caustic soda (Sodium Hydroxide, chemical nomenclature being NaOH). It is used to neutralize the fatty acid that is the other ingredient in soap making.

The story is simple, I mistook the caustic soda bottle for the lime juice that my mother had affectionately made and drank from it. Luckily, I did not gulp it down. To tackle the burning sensation, I rushed to the bath-room and poured running water…the result…a chemical reaction right on my tounge. After a lot of heat and smoke was generated the chemical reaction ceased…but my tongue and lower lip were big enough to raise hell.

It has been 20 years since. Sometimes, I am glad I drank the acid…

Rekha’s farewell mail

For the last four years Rekha and I have been working from almost the same cubicle 😉 and now she is leaving. Bad. Very Bad. Here is her farewell mail. The backdrop to the mail, as can be expected, is movies..movies and more movies….

Hi all,

If movies did not have endings, today I would not be sending this farewell mail.

On 9th August, I am moving to SESL. A World far away from the celebrities, lights, camera and action…

Needless to say, I will miss the Entertainment site. The people. Definitely the Big Four of Editorial – Salim, R Venkatesh, K Venkatesh and Robin. Not to mention Cynthia and the countless meetings.

Four and a half years back, I joined Sify as a new face. I guess it’s time to move on to a new plot and a new location…

From being the Cast & Crew of Sify Entertainment, to being just a spectator is difficult. But maybe, this is just an interval…and as our beloved Arnie would say, “I will be back!”

Fine, in my case, “I’ll be around” 😉

Thanks & regards,

Rekha.

Wish you the very best Rekha!

Pillow – a perfect boyfriend

Japanese designers have come up with what they claim is the perfect solution for the unattached woman – the boyfriend pillow. And it is an ideal sleeping partner because it doesn’t snore, hog the duvet – or sleep around.

Each model comes with two shirts in blue and pink, that can be washed and ironed by the dutiful ‘girlfriend’.

And one model also works as an alarm, by shaking to alert the woman when it is time to get up.

A spokesman for the manufacturer said the pillow has been so successful they have had to draw up a waiting list of customers.

He said: “Women of all ages have been queueing round the block to take one home.”

The 39 pound pillow is currently available only in Japan but may soon be exported.

I knew you would think this was my imaginative bit…but it is a true news item reported by a God-knows-who website.

News you can use, recycle, and re-use

Water for free?

Heat can make people go crazy, especially if you own a popular electrical store in Chennai. Mahendra Bhandari, owner of Bhandari and Sons recently started leaving water cans (full of water, that is) outside of his shop. He says, he wants the passer-bys to quench their thirst. Meanwhile, his sons Sonu and Monu have asked for their share of the family wealth. They say, their father has no right to squander their share of the property.

Beer drinkers convention

More than 5000 beer drinkers met up at the Beer Drinkers convention in Bangalore to discuss the issues relating to health. The convention, quite a huge success if you consider the eight sober guys left stammering yet standing in the end, decided that with every 12-beer-pack a ‘Saridon’ or ‘Anacin’ be given. The choice of Amritanjan or Vicks balm is left to you if you buy a 24-beer pack. As for the finances, the money could come from the non-drinking tax-payer. An incentive to guzzle beer?