The Days Of Our Lives

I write about movies all the time so a post about a video game shouldn't seem too far off. As I've mentioned before, I absolutely adore a well told story. Most video games are too bang-bang to focus on a good story but there comes along one in a while which puts good fiction novels to shame. And since as a gamer, you get to be an interactive part of the story, it makes the experience unforgettable.

Take the case of Bioshock, a video game released last year. I've been playing it for a while (the hard part is just getting started; its impossible to put down) and it has completely sucked me in. Bioshock, in short, is about an underwater utopia gone horribly wrong. The protagonist is a mysterious figure by the name of Jack who survives a plane crash over the Atlantic and discovers an (erstwhile) underwater haven called Rapture. Conceptualized by the objectivist Andrew Ryan, Rapture was intended as a self sufficient sanctuary comprising of the best and brightest individuals whose creativity/brilliance would not be held back by socio-political constraints.

I am Andrew Ryan and I am here to ask you a question:
Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his own brow?

No, says the man in Washington. It belongs to the poor.
No, says the man in the Vatican. It belongs to God.
No, says the man in Moscow. It belongs to everyone.

I rejected those answers. Instead, I chose something
different. I chose the impossible. I chose...
Rapture.

Andrew Ryan

As Jack, the gamer gets to explore this world and piece together its history. Might I add, Rapture, itself, is hideously beautiful.

Being a game, of course, Bioshock has its fair share of enemies jumping at you left-right-and-center but what makes this game truly unique are two particular character types - called 'Big Daddy' and 'Little Sister'. Big Daddies are creatures who, due to being fitted inside irremovable metallic body armour, resemble enormous deep-sea divers; their only sole objective being to protect the Little Sisters. The Little Sisters are small (very cute looking frock-wearing) girls who wander about Rapture collecting genetic-enhancing bio-material (or something like that). Deeply twisted storyline, huh? Anyway, after defeating the hard-as-nails Big Daddies, the player has to choose between either freeing the little girl or killing her. And here is where comes morality into play. Does one go the righteous way or commit sin, thereby earning more points?

And that, in a gist, is Bioshock. Three cheers to game makers who treat their audience as mature and intelligent beings, and who have the creativity to envision such an unforgettable experience.

Lately I've been hearing a lot about my friends (or their friends) being forced to marry as per their parents wishes even though they might already be in since-forever relationships. One would think this is the case in rural parts of our great nation, but it seems it is quite common in the hip-hop US-TV watching metro cities as well. Heres my take on the issue.

India is known to be a very traditional country. Traditional in the sense that the family structure is such that parents continue to be a major part of their children's lives who might well be in their late 20s. The concept of kids moving out of the house for college and then living away hasn't quite caught on. Especially for girls. In the many Subway-dinner discussions with my gal pals, I've found out that even lots of parents still support their kids financially even though the kids might be earning money of their own - the pocket-money system if you may. Some of these gal-pals of mine, even have to report their where-abouts almost on a hourly basis back home. Now I am not the one to fill ideas in the mind of others, hence, I don't really oppose any of this but I find it quite absurd. I've always felt being financially dependent on your parents still makes one a child. And, oh boy, don't parents love their children. Its like back in IIT days we used to say "Once a fresher, always a fresher!"

Coming back to the main topic, I was just trying to say that some parents have a hard time letting go of their "children". Some feel that their kids are still not grown up enough to make decisions of their own; that they have to be picked up from falling down. Better, they should be prevented from falling down in the first place. Hence, the righteous road is defined - the road which is safe. It might not be exciting or provide as much happiness as the other roads, but atleast it doesn't have any potholes; or so one thinks.

Hence the backward Generation W thinks that their daughters' boyfriends are wrong - no matter how right they might be. As long as the man, who your daughter gets to spend the rest of her life with, is not picked by you from a ocean of "eligible" bachelors, he is just not good enough. No matter if he is known to your daughter since the past 5-6 years. And, the one who is right can be recognised in a 5 minute speed-date-in-front-of-your-entire-family session. For some absurd reason, arranged marriages are still the in-thing in India. Parents getting to gloat in front of their friends that they picked the boy themselves is a pretty big thing, didn't you know.

Haha, all BULLSHIT! Come on Generation W, let go of your kids already. Should not one's destiny be laid out by his/her own self? Be one's own responsibility?

Generation W would ask "Oh, but what if my beti's (daughter's) decision is wrong?" What they don't realise is, how do they know for a fact that their decision would be right? I believe the best way to do something right, is to do it wrong once. I'm not thying to convey that one should choose the wrong guy initially! I'm just saying that if the guy is wrong, it would make a whole lot sense that the one who does suffer is the one who chose him and not her parents.

Also, the whole thing about differences in communities in India being a factor for choosing the groom - another bullshit! The problem here is, the people who think these things look at the small picture. Hello?! Globalization was here ages ago! People outside India wouldn't discriminate a Gujrati from a Rajput, why should we Indians? When will we look beyond these petty differences? When will we stop finding invisible faults in others? When will we stop being Generation W and finally grow up ourselves?

So what do you in the (not so) middle of the week when you've been working a wee bit too much? You "reload the matrix" by watching 3 mindless movies back to back. :-)

Movie 1 - Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle (mindless score : 9/10)
I only curse myself for not seeing this movie sooner as it is an absolute gem. I had caught the actor who plays Kumar last week in the Namesake and all of a sudden, this flick seemed a lot more interesting. Thank the heavens for that, since I don't think I've laughed out this loudly throughout any movie for a long time (to be precise - a month, while watching the final scenes of Little Miss Sunshine.)

The plot is simple enough - two dudes (one of Indian origin and one of Korean) make a trip to their (supposedly) nearest White Castle burger joint. Sounds dull? The movie is anything but that. The cameo by Doogie Howser MD just adds on to the madness.


Movie 2 - One Night At Roxbury (midless score : 8/10)
Believe it or not, this is one of my favourite movies (the others being Memento, Oldboy, Fight Club and the like). A story about 2 idiotic (gay?) brothers who just want to go clubbing. It has great 80s music. It has loud, flashy suits. It has weird head-bobbing. Enough said!

Is it really the best movie in the world you ask?
SLAP!!
I hope that's taught you not to ask such obvious questions.
(The answer is a resounding YES!)

Movie 3 - Batman (1966) (mindless score : 10/10)
People are often wrong when they talk about there being 5 Batman movies (prior to The Dark Knight). There are actually 6; and the one I mention here is the one which came out the earliest. Based on the TV show of the 60s starring Adam West as the I'm-wearing-the-underwear-too-high-and-have-my-eyebrows-drawn-on-yet-I-care-not - about-my-beer-belly Batman, this 1966 movie is an absolute must-see for those who, hmm...hmmm...basically it is a sin not to have watched it.

The best scene, which I remembered for years to come before I got to watch this again, was perhaps the one in which Batman runs around with a larger-than-a-bowling-bowl sized bomb, trying to dispose of it while avoiding the following - 2 fat women hogging in a bar, 2 nuns, a woman with her baby, a marching band, a couple making out on a boat and before I forget - ducklings. Yes, thats correct - duckings! Now you see why I've given it a perfect mindless score?!

Labels: mindless movie marathon

A Short True Story

Part I

In my previous company I was friends with 2 people called Deepesh and Simran (names changed as to not reveal identities) who had been going around for almost 8 years (since their college time). Simran was affected by cancer in college time and had undergone a lot of chemo therapy at that time. At the time I left GlobalLogic (my previous company) to join my curent company -in September last year- Simran was getting unwell again - cancerous bone marrow infection. She started taking lots of days off sick leave from work for her treatment at a reputed cancer institute in Delhi. Rest of the time, when she wasn't having her treatments - she and Deepesh used to hang out together going shopping and even meeting up with friends. Finally, I had gotten to know from Deepesh that Simran was going to Bombay for some special treatment which could not happen in Delhi. This was a month ago.

Since communicating with Simran was a problem (supposedly her phone was switched off the entire month), on inquiring about her health from her parents, one fine day, we found out that she had gotten married to someone else! Through the magic of social networking sites on the internet it was confirmed that she had gotten married a couple of weeks ago and tracing the IP contained in the header of her last sent mails, we found out that she was mailing from New Jersey, USA. Mind you, not a single mail contained anything about her getting married and all she mentioned time and time again to Deepesh was the fact that she was really unwell and was unconscious for 15-20 hours, making it difficult to contact anyone outside the hospital. She even mentioned that she would be back next weekend to watch a movie together.

What was really sad was the fact that Deepesh's mom had passed away, when he was a baby, from cancer and the girl knew that and was just playing with his emotions the entire time while hiding the other man in her life. She had supposedly gotten engaged to now-husband way back in August last year itself, yet continued fooling Deepesh, who not only used to pick and drop her from home (a 50 km diversion from his usual route to office) but had spent almost 300-400k rupees on her during that time including giving her loads of cash on her request for her *treatment* and spending hundreds of thousands for processing her H1B visa to the USA. Also, he had moved out his house after having a spat with his dad about them not accepting Simran. (a typical scenario at many Indian families)

Obviously when I found out how badly he had been duped, I picked up a few of our friends along the way and rushed to Noida. He seemed mentally scarred, plus he had no real support from his family about this. We consoled him nearly for 12 hours that day. The way the girl cold-heartedly conned the innocent fellow is something I'm sure none of us have ever experienced before. We are still debating over whether the guy should just let the girl lead a ever-happy life with her obviously ignorant husband, without any interference from any of us.

Edit: Removed some specific details.

I've always wanted to put up a dedicates quotes section somewhere on my blog since there have been innumerable times when people have made the weirdest comments infront me, ranging from my college professors to my awesome boss. Here is a step in that direction. Till a section is created, enjoy this bit :

"When you lose virginity, you tend to take broad steps while walking."
- GSS

"Eggs came into prominence after the jihaadi movements in the 1930s. Sorry i got confused with eggs and AK47s."
- Samrat Verma

"We are Women. We operate on a whole other plane of existence when it comes to plotting and dramas."
- Vartika Chaubey