After a 5-month long hiatus... I'm back !!!
I'm now working full time with Reliance Retail helping them set up their newly launched hypermarkets all over India... I just got back to Mumbai (my new home) after a month long stay in Ahmedabad where we launched Reliance Mart...
Well, thats enuff about my job... on to more exciting stuff
Though there r a lots of movies I've seen recently, there r none i'd particularly like 2 write about... Chakde was one of the best movies in recent times & Heyy Babyy was a wholesome entertainer... Ratatouille was amazing & Transformers was average... But what stole the show was RGV ki AAG... I don't remember seeing such a wholesome load of Crap in my life... For all those who thought Salaam-e-Ishq was the worst... we have a new contender in town !!!
I thought the movie was an utter insult to the original Sholay... if RGV wanted 2 spoof Sholay I think he should have just gone ahead & done so, rather than get caught in the dilemma of whether to spoof or to remake... even the Big B has embarrassed himself by becoming a mere caricature of Indian cinema's greatest villain...
I think that's sufficient bashing for now... I'll try 2 keep the blog up 2 date with the latest in my life...
Ciao for now...
Friday, September 7, 2007
Sunday, May 6, 2007
Ta Ra Rum Pum
As I was preparing to leave my house to watch this movie yesterday, one of my friend's strongly opposed my plans. Her exact words were, "nahiiiiiiiiiiii .... don't!!!!!!!!!! .... i've seen it ... it totally sucks!!!!!!!! ... spend ur money elsewhere ..." I explained to her that it was the only movie I cud watch wid my family and that another frnd had told me it was "cute & a one time watch" so it cudn't be that bad... She finally submitted and said "so when r u leavin for the gawdawful saccarine fest called tararumpum ..." (for the uninitiated, saccharine means 'sweetener' and pertains to the word 'Shona' which finds wholesome use in the movie). However, she also proceeded to give some more 'vishesh tippani' on the film... "that movie totally pissed me off ... redundancy at its best ... i think rani does only those kinda movies ... in which she is like the fulcrum for the whole house ... n the heroes r just spineless morons ..."
After this kind of an appetizer for the movie, my expectations were zero... Maybe that's why I quite liked it... :-)
Ta Ra Rum Pum is another movie from the Yash Raj Films (YRF) camp that attempts to do something different with the Hindi film, to get across a larger message for society with a story devoid of "bad guys" and maintaining enough value for the entire family to watch. Director Siddharth Anand's second movie (after Salaam Namaste) has proved to be something that all people, from adults, to the youth & the kids should be able to relate to... The story & situations of the movie are something almost everyone who has watched the ad will know... A successful racer, who loses it all in a race accident... and the tale of how he & his family brave the circumstances & succeed....
A carefree man who stumbles upon an early success in life ... This is Saif's character called Raj Veer Singh (RV) in the movie... He is uneducated, is a highly successful racer and loves to splurge... Rani's character (Radhika) is the opposite ... She plans everything, is pursuing her degree & is penny-wise even though her father seems to be a millionaire... They hook up, get married and have kids... RV becomes hugely successful and the audience waits for the "crash" which everyone seems to have seen in the trailers...
Yes, the crash changes everything for RV... After a gap of 1 year where he recovers from injuries, RV gets back to racing, but seems to have lost the "killer instinct" with which he raced before... After a series of losses, he is kicked out by the team... On the street, with no income, RV & family find it tough to cope with the lifestyle they have become used to... The loans for the house and the cars are unpaid and the family is forced to shift into a low class society, with no assets to speak of... And RV still doesn't have a job...
The rest of the story deals with how the family learns to cope up with poverty... RV becomes a New York cabbie, Radhika plays the piano at restaurants & clubs, and the kids save their lunch money so they can contribute to the school fees... have tears in your eyes? Well, so did I...But after all, TRRP is a Hindi movie, and a happy ending is inevitable... In the end, RV teams up with his pal from race-days, Javed Jaffery, and gets back to the track to earn enough money for his son to have an operation... Obviously, he wins the race... And success returns to the family...
Like a grade school fairy tale, the filmmakers give us a "moral" at the end... not to spend beyond your means, live wisely, plan your future... Gosh, that was like a "message issued in the interest of the public"
However, there were ridiculous sides to the movie as well... For starters, Who the f~#k calls their kids "Princess" & "Champ", even if they're only nicknames ??? (I found out their actual names, Priya & Ranveer, on another review, n I swear I didn't hear them in the movie ...) And why was the first half so cramped up with songs??? And how the hell did they manage to find four animated bears (named Ta, Ra, Pa & Ma ...) to sing n dance with on the kid's birthday (I just cant make myself use their so-called names) and that too at a Disney store, which was magically open for them late at night, without any burgler alarms or the sort...
Hehehe, between these inanities, I still quite liked the movie...
Coming up next, hopefully, will be a bit on YRF and how they've contributed to Indian cinema...
Friday, May 4, 2007
It's over, folks....
Yes, ppl, Its over... A year (10 months to be precise) of moulding us into managers has concluded... It's 2 weeks since I've been back at home, n I've just been making up on the sleep I've lost over the past 10 months...
I've been 'preparing' to join Reliance Retail, and RIL is famed for stressing out the employees.. I figure it can't be worse than Ispat, where 12-14 hour work days were a norm, and the 'alternate Saturdays off' remained just in the HR Policy...
But it will be challenging to enter a company which is poised to transform the retail sector in India. Whether it succeeds or fails remains to be seen, but I'm sure it will be a hell of a ride...
I've been 'preparing' to join Reliance Retail, and RIL is famed for stressing out the employees.. I figure it can't be worse than Ispat, where 12-14 hour work days were a norm, and the 'alternate Saturdays off' remained just in the HR Policy...But it will be challenging to enter a company which is poised to transform the retail sector in India. Whether it succeeds or fails remains to be seen, but I'm sure it will be a hell of a ride...Aside from Reliance, another thing happening this summer will be 'Sequels'... As Spiderman: 3 releases today, it starts off a juggernaut of 'thirds' and then some which are set to release this summer... Shrek the Third, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Ocean's Thirteen, The Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Live Free or Die Hard, Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix, Rush Hour 3, Mr. Bean's Holiday... these are a few of the sequels lined up... Being a movie buff, I think my summer's gonna be quite busy....
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
I Did It My Way...
Shucks, its 2 months since I blogged... In the beginning of this period, I was busy with a lot of stuff... Exams, placements, n then exams again... I got placed, and I'm gonna be living "Dhirubhai ka sapna" with Reliance Retail...
There are only 3 weeks left for my time at SPJCM to end, and though I'm not an emotional sort of person, I cant help but absorb some of the sadness in the eyes of some of my batchmates... It is durings times in your lives such as these, when u suddenly start to understand & relate to the words of some of the more well-written songs... One of them, is a song which I heard for the first time when Michael Schumacher retired from Formula One last season... Schumi said that this was the song he could most easily relate to during his last race... It is a song originally composed in French, with English lyrics put in by Paul Anka... It was made famous when Frank Sinatra rendered it in 1969... It's called 'My Way'... I remembered it today when I saw the song's name listed along the name of one of my batchmates on Gtalk... I'll end today's musings with the lyrics of this beautiful song...
"And now, the end is near
And so I face the final curtain
My friend, I'll say it clear
I'll state my case, of which I'm certain
I've lived a life that's full
I've traveled each and every highway
But more, much more than this
I did it my way
Regrets, I've had a few
But then again, too few to mention
I did what I had to do
And saw it through without exemption
I planned each charted course
Each careful step along the byway
But more, much more than this
I did it my way
Yes, there were times, I'm sure you knew
When I bit off more than I could chew
But through it all, when there was doubt
I ate it up and spit it out
I faced it all and I stood tall
And did it my way
I've loved, I've laughed and cried
I've had my fill, my share of losing
And now, as tears subside
I find it all so amusing
To think I did all that
And may I say - not in a shy way
No, oh no not me
I did it my way
For what is a man, what has he got
If not himself, then he has naught
To say the things he truly feels
And not the words of one who kneels
The record shows I took the blows
And did it my way"
There are only 3 weeks left for my time at SPJCM to end, and though I'm not an emotional sort of person, I cant help but absorb some of the sadness in the eyes of some of my batchmates... It is durings times in your lives such as these, when u suddenly start to understand & relate to the words of some of the more well-written songs... One of them, is a song which I heard for the first time when Michael Schumacher retired from Formula One last season... Schumi said that this was the song he could most easily relate to during his last race... It is a song originally composed in French, with English lyrics put in by Paul Anka... It was made famous when Frank Sinatra rendered it in 1969... It's called 'My Way'... I remembered it today when I saw the song's name listed along the name of one of my batchmates on Gtalk... I'll end today's musings with the lyrics of this beautiful song...
"And now, the end is near
And so I face the final curtain
My friend, I'll say it clear
I'll state my case, of which I'm certain
I've lived a life that's full
I've traveled each and every highway
But more, much more than this
I did it my way
Regrets, I've had a few
But then again, too few to mention
I did what I had to do
And saw it through without exemption
I planned each charted course
Each careful step along the byway
But more, much more than this
I did it my way
Yes, there were times, I'm sure you knew
When I bit off more than I could chew
But through it all, when there was doubt
I ate it up and spit it out
I faced it all and I stood tall
And did it my way
I've loved, I've laughed and cried
I've had my fill, my share of losing
And now, as tears subside
I find it all so amusing
To think I did all that
And may I say - not in a shy way
No, oh no not me
I did it my way
For what is a man, what has he got
If not himself, then he has naught
To say the things he truly feels
And not the words of one who kneels
The record shows I took the blows
And did it my way"
Sunday, January 21, 2007
Another week gone by...
Before I begin to pen my thoughts for the day, I must acknowledge the excellent blog that one of my frnd’s has begun to maintain. The link to the blog named “I Ran Over The Rain…” is to the right, under the name “Richa”… And no, this is not a reciprocation for her having mentioned my name on her blog … (I can almost hear her saying, “Yeah Right…”)
The previous week had been by far the most hectic for SMM students at the Dubai campus… With a schedule ranging from 8 in the morning to 9:30 at night… To top it all, we had a FIVE hour break in the middle… We had two courses this week, i.e. Industrial Economics (IE) and Business-2-Business (B2B) … I have never missed so many classes of a single subject than I have for IE… My attendance is like 4 out of 9 classes… K … But wat 2 do, the Prof was the single most boring faculty I have ever encountered in my student life… That added to the killer scheduling really killed my appetite for attendance… I must credit him for one thing, though… This blog (& for that matter Richa’s too) was started during his classes, and all the work on the blog so far had been done in his class… For that, I am grateful… Also scheduled in the week, were submissions & a viva for Mkt Research (MR), another subject which I dread… Even though we had more than 3 weeks to do the MR project, our group of late lateefs began doing it only half a day before the deadline & viva…
On the other extreme, B2B was one of the most enjoyable courses we had… I didn’t miss any of the classes… :-D … It was simulation based (INDUSTRAT), which is somewhat better than lectures, and the faculty from Mumbai was excellent… I don’t feel sorry that Richa’s group (Mowgli) beat our’s (King Louie) to the top spot, since I really enjoyed the simulations, & hey – 2nd place aint half bad, is it …?
So another week in the GMBA saga has gone by, but I hardly feel any smarter… Two more new subjects and another grueling week await us in a couple of days , interspersed with Guest Lectures (the so-called ‘Visiting Wisdom’) and Pre-placement talks… Well, I guess that’s life at a 1-yr MBA program… We asked for it, didn’t we…
Signing off, a few lines dedicated to Richa, Ritu n Rashi (our honourable team members & adverseries)…
“Jungle - jungle baat chali hai, pata chala hai…
Arre, Chaddi Pehan Ke Phool Khila Hai, Phool Khila Hai…”
The previous week had been by far the most hectic for SMM students at the Dubai campus… With a schedule ranging from 8 in the morning to 9:30 at night… To top it all, we had a FIVE hour break in the middle… We had two courses this week, i.e. Industrial Economics (IE) and Business-2-Business (B2B) … I have never missed so many classes of a single subject than I have for IE… My attendance is like 4 out of 9 classes… K … But wat 2 do, the Prof was the single most boring faculty I have ever encountered in my student life… That added to the killer scheduling really killed my appetite for attendance… I must credit him for one thing, though… This blog (& for that matter Richa’s too) was started during his classes, and all the work on the blog so far had been done in his class… For that, I am grateful… Also scheduled in the week, were submissions & a viva for Mkt Research (MR), another subject which I dread… Even though we had more than 3 weeks to do the MR project, our group of late lateefs began doing it only half a day before the deadline & viva…
On the other extreme, B2B was one of the most enjoyable courses we had… I didn’t miss any of the classes… :-D … It was simulation based (INDUSTRAT), which is somewhat better than lectures, and the faculty from Mumbai was excellent… I don’t feel sorry that Richa’s group (Mowgli) beat our’s (King Louie) to the top spot, since I really enjoyed the simulations, & hey – 2nd place aint half bad, is it …?
So another week in the GMBA saga has gone by, but I hardly feel any smarter… Two more new subjects and another grueling week await us in a couple of days , interspersed with Guest Lectures (the so-called ‘Visiting Wisdom’) and Pre-placement talks… Well, I guess that’s life at a 1-yr MBA program… We asked for it, didn’t we…
Signing off, a few lines dedicated to Richa, Ritu n Rashi (our honourable team members & adverseries)…
“Jungle - jungle baat chali hai, pata chala hai…
Arre, Chaddi Pehan Ke Phool Khila Hai, Phool Khila Hai…”
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Gurubhai a.k.a Dhirubhai...
Spoiler warning !!!
Hell, that sounded just like a Wikipedia article... but then, for those of u who don't want me 2 spoil the movie for u, u can stop reading right here...
Mani Ratnam’s Guru is a story of a villager who dreams big and makes it big... Abhi's performance is one of his best in the title role as Gurukant Desai. The story follows his life starting as a teenager who travels to Turkey in search of work, and finds his inclinations to setting up his own "bij-nuss"... he finds lucrative ways of making money even in Turkey and returns to his village back in Gujarat as a young man who has made a little money in "phoren" lands... He wants to travel to Mumbai to sell polyester; but Guru needs more money to set up shop… he marries Sujatha (Aishwarya soon to be Bachchan Rai) only for the money he’ll get as dowry… Sujatha’s brother Jignesh plays a close friend of Guru’s, who becomes a business partner after Guru’s marriage…
The story then goes on to show how Guru fights the odds to start trading polyester in Mumbai’s Masjid Bunder area, and slowly goes on to expand his enterprise… Along the way he meets newspaper editor - Manik Dasgupta (Mithun-da), his grand-daughter Meenu (Vidya Balan), the journalist - Shyam Saxena (R. Madhavan) and others who help and/or oppose Guru and his ways… Through a series of expansions, IPOs, new plants et al, Guru & his Shakti Corp. reach the pinnacle by becoming “India ki No.1 company” (applause !!!)
Yes, Guru is shown bending and breaking laws, bribing officials and other corporate activities that easily classify as “un-ethical”, but Mani Ratnam somehow manages to show Guru in a positive light… Shyam keeps writing negative articles about Guru & his law-breaking schemes. Shyam regularly throws blows at him but Guru in the end always finds a way out…
The only failing point is peraps the music... A.R. Rahman has composed the score, but the songs are ill-placed and hamper the continuity of the screenplay... 'Tere Bina' is the best song by far... the songs also play in the background where they suit the situations more aptly...
All official announcements have denied any “relationship / resemblance to any persons, living or dead”, but anyone with a knowledge of Reliance & Dhirubhai Ambani’s past will easily have caught the obvious ‘inspiration’ drawn from the names I mentioned… For the uninitiated, Dhirubhai went to Yemen at the age of 16 where he worked for Royal Dutch Shell (in the movie, Guru worked for Burma Shell…) and returned to India to set up shop at Masjid Bunder for the trade of Polyester as well… The various scams of Dhirubhai are well chronicled in the unauthorized biography “The Polyester Prince” but have never been officially admitted (the book is banned in India)… Mithun heads the newspaper “Swatantra”, which has obvious similarities to Indian Express, which attacked Dhirubhai earlier. Guru’s scams are mysteriously similar to those allegedly done by Dhirubhai… Even the cars that Guru is shown to drive early in his career are the same that Dhirubhai is known to have driven…
And to top it all, Gurukant Desai is affectionately called “Gurubhai”, which has more than an obvious resemblance to Dhirubhai…
For the record, my frnd Nisheeth provided me with a commentary during the movie which pointed out the various similarities that I have mentioned above… But I have researched Dhirubhai Ambani (on Google & Wikipedia … :-D) after watching the movie and confirmed all these… I’ll post links to the articles after compiling them…
Well, that’s it for now…
Wishing Abhi n Ash all the Best !!!
Hell, that sounded just like a Wikipedia article... but then, for those of u who don't want me 2 spoil the movie for u, u can stop reading right here...
Mani Ratnam’s Guru is a story of a villager who dreams big and makes it big... Abhi's performance is one of his best in the title role as Gurukant Desai. The story follows his life starting as a teenager who travels to Turkey in search of work, and finds his inclinations to setting up his own "bij-nuss"... he finds lucrative ways of making money even in Turkey and returns to his village back in Gujarat as a young man who has made a little money in "phoren" lands... He wants to travel to Mumbai to sell polyester; but Guru needs more money to set up shop… he marries Sujatha (Aishwarya soon to be Bachchan Rai) only for the money he’ll get as dowry… Sujatha’s brother Jignesh plays a close friend of Guru’s, who becomes a business partner after Guru’s marriage…
The story then goes on to show how Guru fights the odds to start trading polyester in Mumbai’s Masjid Bunder area, and slowly goes on to expand his enterprise… Along the way he meets newspaper editor - Manik Dasgupta (Mithun-da), his grand-daughter Meenu (Vidya Balan), the journalist - Shyam Saxena (R. Madhavan) and others who help and/or oppose Guru and his ways… Through a series of expansions, IPOs, new plants et al, Guru & his Shakti Corp. reach the pinnacle by becoming “India ki No.1 company” (applause !!!)
Yes, Guru is shown bending and breaking laws, bribing officials and other corporate activities that easily classify as “un-ethical”, but Mani Ratnam somehow manages to show Guru in a positive light… Shyam keeps writing negative articles about Guru & his law-breaking schemes. Shyam regularly throws blows at him but Guru in the end always finds a way out…
The only failing point is peraps the music... A.R. Rahman has composed the score, but the songs are ill-placed and hamper the continuity of the screenplay... 'Tere Bina' is the best song by far... the songs also play in the background where they suit the situations more aptly...
All official announcements have denied any “relationship / resemblance to any persons, living or dead”, but anyone with a knowledge of Reliance & Dhirubhai Ambani’s past will easily have caught the obvious ‘inspiration’ drawn from the names I mentioned… For the uninitiated, Dhirubhai went to Yemen at the age of 16 where he worked for Royal Dutch Shell (in the movie, Guru worked for Burma Shell…) and returned to India to set up shop at Masjid Bunder for the trade of Polyester as well… The various scams of Dhirubhai are well chronicled in the unauthorized biography “The Polyester Prince” but have never been officially admitted (the book is banned in India)… Mithun heads the newspaper “Swatantra”, which has obvious similarities to Indian Express, which attacked Dhirubhai earlier. Guru’s scams are mysteriously similar to those allegedly done by Dhirubhai… Even the cars that Guru is shown to drive early in his career are the same that Dhirubhai is known to have driven…
And to top it all, Gurukant Desai is affectionately called “Gurubhai”, which has more than an obvious resemblance to Dhirubhai…
For the record, my frnd Nisheeth provided me with a commentary during the movie which pointed out the various similarities that I have mentioned above… But I have researched Dhirubhai Ambani (on Google & Wikipedia … :-D) after watching the movie and confirmed all these… I’ll post links to the articles after compiling them…
Well, that’s it for now…
Wishing Abhi n Ash all the Best !!!
Friends, Romans, Country-men.. Lend Me your Ears...
This post marks my return to the world of blogging... I had started a blog earlier in 2004 but never got around to maintaining it too much... As a result there r only 3 or 4 posts on it... anyhow, for future reference the address is http://rajatsinghvi.blogspot.com/ ... Well, so something about me... I'm 24 (as on 12th Aug'06, which happens to be my b'day), I'm an engineer, and am currently doing my Global-MBA in Services Marketing at SP Jain Centre of Management, Dubai-Singapore.... God, that sounds so much like a resume for a job application... but then, we've been brought up to give these kind of "Intros" ever since our first day at skool... I can just imagine..."Roll no. 245, khade jo jaao... Class ko apna naam batao... Aapke papa ka naam kya hai? Woh kya karte hain? Aapka ghar kahan hai? ... " So on n so forth... And even today we keep doing the same thing... the importance of our parents' names have diminished over the years, but in place we have things like qualifications, work-ex, extra-curricular activities etc etc... i've forgotten my point here, so I'll just leave it at that...
Now on to what my writings will address or try to address, both consciously and unconsciously, what an Industry would call its "Mission"... I'm gonna talk about frnds & family, music, movies, SPJCM, & to sum up all of these - "LIFE" - b'coz that's my life right now ... all the components, in that order of importance...
I'll just go on 2 introduce some of my frnds who r blogging around to establish the links ... Deva, Vandit, Shawshank, Devesh, Harshad, Sowmia, Richa, Abu... I'll add more later, coz dat's all I remember right now...
So i'll sign off for now... I'm in class actually... I'll try 2 keep this blog up-to-date...
Ciao !!!
Now on to what my writings will address or try to address, both consciously and unconsciously, what an Industry would call its "Mission"... I'm gonna talk about frnds & family, music, movies, SPJCM, & to sum up all of these - "LIFE" - b'coz that's my life right now ... all the components, in that order of importance...
I'll just go on 2 introduce some of my frnds who r blogging around to establish the links ... Deva, Vandit, Shawshank, Devesh, Harshad, Sowmia, Richa, Abu... I'll add more later, coz dat's all I remember right now...
So i'll sign off for now... I'm in class actually... I'll try 2 keep this blog up-to-date...
Ciao !!!
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