Chronicling the 1000 days before I hit 30.

Day 814: 5th Anniversary Celebration!!!

2012-02-11T15:07:00.002+08:00

Had the most terrific day!

Tomorrow, the hubby and I complete five years of our marital bliss and to celebrate this occasion our close friends put together a yacht party! And it was AWESOME!

A small yacht that could accommodate about 10 people was rented out for a few hours in the evening. We reached the Changi Sailing Club at about 5:45pm and boarded the yacht, sailed by a nice old guy called Derek, at 6pm. It was not too sunny by then and the weather was perfect - windy, cloudless, cool.

Our friends had organized a lot of food - pizzas and snacks, and drinks and we spent a few hours eating, drinking, taking pictures, chatting, laughing, singing, listening to music, watching the sun set, watching the planes above our aheads right after they take off from the Changi airport runway, watching the fishing villages floating by, balancing on the edges and tip of the yacht in the attempt to take cooler pics, sitting and dangling our legs off the edge to touch the speeding waves with our feet, getting thoroughly wet in the process, loving the sailing in daylight and loving it even more when night fell. In short, having the time of ours lives! Our friends also presented us a series of gifts, in an elaborate ceremony - bringing them out one by one and making quite a show of it! It was rather cute and the gifts were awesome! And at the end, they got us to pop a champagne too! It was all very sweet, happy and unforgettable!

After the yacht ride, we had our dinner at the Changi Sailing Club. It was my first time there and that place is really beautiful. It is almost like a resort in Thailand or Bali... loved the quietness and ambience and the ocean a lot!

Post dinner, we walked to the beach and spent some time there. We saw a gorgeous moon rise - the moon was huge, golden in colour and was very low down to the horizon and ascended very quickly into the sky as we watched it. It was stunning!

It was one of the most beautiful evenings, one of the most beautiful experiences ever! I couldn't have wished for a better anniversary celebration! It was perfect and I couldn't stop smiling through the night!

A big thank you and much love to our amazing friends who made this day truly special!

A big hug to the hubby for five years of being around as the hubby!

Here's to a lot more!

186 more to go.

Day 813: 5 km!

2012-02-10T14:50:00.000+08:00

This week was rather stressful at work. And I got it out of my system by going for a more than usual jog. 5 kms... in a very nice, breezy, cool Singapore.

The stress evaporated! And I was back to feeling on top of the world!

187 more to go.

Day 812: Remote Consumer Work!

2012-02-09T13:00:00.000+08:00

I am sure I have said this before somewhere on the blog, but let me repeat. I love doing consumer research as part of my work! It is always eye opening to listen to total strangers talk about their lives, habits, inspirations, thoughts about anything and everything including dandruff shampoos!

I had not been to any consumer research for a while but for the last two days I had been remotely (i.e. via videocall) participating in a focus group discussion. And I had a ball doing it! Two whole days of listening to a bunch of young & old men and women just talk, talk and talk!

Not only was it inspiring and encouraging, but I managed to lock what I believe are pretty good product concepts, post the research! I loved all the debriefings, discussions, multiple concept revisions as we learn more and more things from the consumers, and finally locking something that the consumers like and we like too! So it was fun as well as very productive. Awesomeness!

188 more to go.

Day 811: മലയാളം ബ്ലോഗ്‌!!!

2012-02-08T14:59:00.000+08:00

My sincere apologies to any non-Malayalis who planned to read this blog. For today alone, I am writing in Malayalam!

എനിക്ക് പെട്ടന്നൊരു ആഗ്രഹം. മലയാളത്തില്‍ എഴുതാനൊരാഗ്രഹം. അതും അവിടെയും ഇവിടെയും എഴുതിയാല്‍ പോര. ഈ ബ്ലോഗില്‍ തന്നെ എഴുതണം. ഏതായാലും എന്‍റെ ഒരു കൊച്ചു ആഗ്രഹമല്ലേ. സാധിപ്പിച്ചു കളയാമെന്നു ഞാനും വിചാരിച്ചു.

ഈ ബ്ലോഗ്‌ വായിക്കുന്ന നല്ലവരായ കുറച്ചു പേരോട് ഞാന്‍ ആദ്യം തന്നെ ക്ഷമ ചോദിക്കട്ടെ. മലയാളം അറിയാത്തവര്‍ എന്നോട് ക്ഷമിക്കു ( ഇത് ഞാന്‍ മുകളില്‍ ഇംഗ്ലീഷിലും എഴുതിയിട്ടുണ്ട്). മലയാളം അറിയുന്നവരും എന്നോട് ക്ഷമിക്കു.മലയാളം എഴുതിയിട്ട് വര്‍ഷങ്ങളായി. ഇതില്‍ എത്ര തെറ്റുകള്‍ വരുമെന്നെനിക്കറിയില്ല. അതുകൊണ്ട് നിങ്ങളും ക്ഷമിക്കു.

ചിലപ്പോള്‍ ഈയടുത്തിടെ വായിച്ചു തുടങ്ങിയ പി. പദ്മരാജന്‍റെ ചെറുകഥകള്‍ ആയിരിക്കാം ഇങ്ങനെ ഒരാഗ്രഹം പൊട്ടിമുളക്കാന്‍ അവസരമുണ്ടാകിയത്. അദ്ദേഹത്തിന്‍റെ എഴുത്ത് ശൈലി എനിക്ക് വളരെ ഇഷ്ടപ്പെട്ടു. കാര്യം ഓരോ കഥയിലും മരണത്തെ കുറിച്ചും മരണത്തിന്‍റെ പശ്ചാത്തലത്തില്‍ നടക്കുന്ന സംഭവങ്ങളെ കുറിച്ചും മറ്റും ആണ് എഴുതിയിരിക്കുന്നത്. സാധാരണഗതിയില്‍ ഇതെല്ലം മടുപ്പിക്കുന്ന വിഷയങ്ങളായി എനിക്ക് തോന്നിയേനെ. പക്ഷെ ഇദ്ദേഹം എഴുതുന്ന ശൈലി വളരേ മനോഹരമായതിനാല്‍ വായിക്കാന്‍ ഒരു രസമുണ്ട്.

ഏതായാലും ഞാന്‍ മലയാളത്തില്‍ എഴുതാന്‍ തീരുമാനിച്ചു. അപ്പോളിതാ അടുത്ത പ്രശ്നം. എന്തിനെ കുറിച്ചെഴുതും ? സാധാരണ എഴുതുന്ന പോലെ ഇന്നത്തെ ദിവസത്തെ കുറിച്ചെഴുതാണോ? അതോ വേറെ വല്ലതും?

പലതും മനസിലേക്ക് വന്നു. പണ്ടത്തെ കുറേ ഓര്‍മ്മകള്‍. കേരളത്തിലെ ഓര്‍മ്മകള്‍. കേരളത്തില്‍ മാത്രം കിട്ടുന്ന ഓര്‍മ്മകള്‍. എന്നാല്‍ പിന്നെ ആ ഓര്‍മ്മകള്‍ തന്നെ ഇവിടെ എഴുതാം. മനസിലേക്ക് വരുന്നത് അത് പോലെ തന്നെ.

സാധാരണ ചെയ്യുന്നപോലെ ഒരു ലിസ്റ്റ് തന്നെ ആയിക്കോട്ടെ.

1 ) മഴ - മഴയിലാത്ത കേരളമുണ്ടോ. എല്ലാ മലയാളികളെ പോലെ എനിക്കും മഴ ഭയങ്കര ഇഷ്ടമാണ്. എന്‍റെ അഭിപ്രായത്തില്‍ മഴയെ ഇഷ്ടമല്ലാത്ത മലയാളി ഒരു മലയാളിയേ അല്ല. മഴ മാത്രമല്ല മഴകാലത്ത് റോഡുകളില്‍ പടരുന്ന കുണ്ടും, കുഴികളും റോഡിന്‍റെ രണ്ടു വശങ്ങളിലും ചിലപ്പോള്‍ റോഡിന്‍റെ നടുക്കിലും കെട്ടി കിടക്കുന്ന വെള്ളവും, വേഗത്തില്‍ വണ്ടിയോടിച്ചു പോകുമ്പോള്‍ ആ വെള്ളം മുഴുവനും കുതിച്ചു ചീറി പായുന്നതും , വീടുകളിലേക്ക് വെള്ളം കേറുമ്പോള്‍ അതുലൂടെ ഇഴഞ്ഞു വരുന്ന അട്ടയും, ഞാഞ്ഞൂലും, പാമ്പുകളും, തവളകളും, ആമകളും മറ്റു ജീവികളും, നനഞ്ഞു കുതിര്‍ന്ന കാക്കകളും, മഴക്കാലത്ത്‌ ടി വിയില്‍ വരുന്ന കുടകളുടെ പരസ്യങ്ങളും, അവ തമ്മിലുള്ള മത്സരങ്ങളും, ഇടിമിന്നലും, ഇടിമിന്നലില്‍ വീഴുന്ന മരശാഘകളും, മരശാഘകള്‍ കമ്പികളില്‍ തട്ടി കെടുന്ന വൈദ്യുതിയും, ഇരുട്ടില്‍ കത്തിക്കുന്ന മെഴുകുതിരിയും, ഇടിമ്മിനലിനെ പേടിച്ചു കാലുകള്‍ രണ്ടും കസേരയുടെ മീതെ കയറ്റി വെക്കുന്നതും, ഓടിട്ട വീട്ടില്‍ വെള്ളം ചോരുമ്പോള്‍ അത് പിടിക്കാന്‍ വേണ്ടി നടക്കുന്ന വഴി മുഴുവനും വെച്ചിരിക്കുന്ന പാത്രങ്ങളും, മഴ തുള്ളികള്‍ ആ പാത്രങ്ങളില്‍ ഇറ്റിറ്റ് വീഴുന്ന ശബ്ദവും, ഒക്കെ എന്‍റെ മനസിലേക്ക് വന്നു. എല്ലാം എനിക്ക് ഇഷ്ടപെട്ടത്.

2) കാറ്റ് - മഴ പോലെ തന്നെ മനോഹരമായ കാറ്റ്. വൃശ്ചിക കാറ്റ്. "മോളെ , കാറ്റ് കാലമായി" - ഇപ്പോഴും എല്ലാ കൊല്ലവും അമ്മ വിളിച്ചു പറയുമ്പോള്‍ എനിക്കസൂയ തോന്നും. ഒരു മാസത്തെ തണുത്ത കാറ്റ്. കൊല്ലം തോറും വെയിലും മഴയും മാത്രമായി കഴിയുന്ന, തണുപ്പ് ഒരിക്കലും സ്പര്‍ശിക്കാത്ത കേരളത്തിലെ തണുത്ത കാറ്റ് കാലം. മഴയെ പോലെ കാറ്റും ഒരുപാടു ഓര്‍മ്മകള്‍ മനസില്ലേക്ക് കൊണ്ടുവന്നു. കാറ്റിന്‍റെ ആദ്യ ദിവസം രാവിലെ മോര്‍ണിംഗ് വാല്‍ക് കഴിഞ്ഞു വരുന്ന എന്‍റെ അച്ചന്‍റെ ഉത്സാഹം - "കാറ്റ് കാലമായി ... വാ പുറത്തേക്കു വന്നു നോക്ക്", പുറത്തുപോയിആദ്യത്തെ കാറ്റ് ചുറ്റും വീശുന്നത്, സ്കൂള്‍ ഗ്രൗണ്ടില്‍ നിന്നും കാറ്റിന്‍റെ ഒപ്പം ഉയരുന്നപൊടിപടലങ്ങള്‍, യൂണിഫോം പാവാട ചുറ്റും ഇറുക്കെ പിടിച്ചു നടക്കുന്നത്, വീട്ടിന്‍റെ പുറത്തു ഉണക്കാന്‍ വെച്ച അരി കൊണ്ടാട്ടം പറന്നകലുന്നത്, വെയിലിനെ അകറ്റി നിര്‍ത്താനുള്ള കുട കാറ്റില്‍ മലക്കം മറിയുന്നത്, അങ്ങനെ പലതും.

3) ഭക്ഷണം - ഇതില്ലാത്ത ഒരുപരിപാടിയും നമ്മള്‍ക്കില്ലല്ലോ! കേരളത്തിന്റെ രുചികള്‍. ഹോ! എവിടുന്ന് എഴുതി തുടങ്ങും എന്‍റെ ഈശ്വരാ! നാരങ്ങ വെള്ളം തൊട്ടു ബീഫ് ഫ്രൈ വരെ, കഞ്ഞി തൊട്ടു ബിരിയാണി വരെ , സദ്യതൊട്ടു തട്ടുകട വരെ, എല്ലാം ഒന്നിനൊന്നു മെച്ചം. എനിക്ക് ഓരോന്നായിട്ട് പറയാന്‍ വയ്യ. എങ്ങിലും മനസ്സില്‍ വരുന്നത് എഴുതട്ടെ. പുട്ട് കടല പത്തിരി നൂലപ്പം അവിയല്‍ സാമ്പാര്‍ ചമ്മന്തി കാളന്‍ ഓലന്‍ തോരന്‍ അവില്‍ കരിമീന്‍ കപ്പ കൊള്ളി മുട്ടമസാല അടപ്രഥമന്‍ പഴ പായസം കായ വറുത്തത് ശര്‍ക്കരവരട്ടി പപ്പടം കള്ള് ഇഷ്ടു എനിക്ക് അതെല്ലാം ഇഷ്ടമാണ്, വളരെ വളരെ ഇഷ്ടമാണ്!

4) നാട്ടുകാര്‍, വീട്ടുകാര്‍ - വീട്ടുകാര്യങ്ങളെ കാട്ടും നാട്ടുകാര്യങ്ങളില്‍ താല്‍പര്യമുള്ള നമ്മളുടെ സഹമാലയാളികള്‍. .. . . , കുശുമ്പും കുനുട്ടും അതേ സമയം മനസ് നിറയെ സ്നേഹവും മറ്റുള്ളവരെ സഹായിക്കാനുള്ള മനസുമുള്ള നാട്ടുകാര്‍, എത്രയൊക്ക പ്രശ്നങ്ങള്‍ ഉണ്ടെങ്കിലും നാട്ടിലെ ഉത്സവം വന്നാല്‍ എല്ലാം മറന്നിട്ട് മുന്‍നിരയില്‍ നിന്ന് പഞ്ചവാദ്യത്തിനൊപ്പം ആഹ്ലാദിക്കുന്നവര്‍,ലളിതമായ വേഷധാരണതോടും, വെള്ളവസ്ത്രങ്ങളോടും പ്രിയമുള്ളവര്‍ , ഒരുപക്ഷെ ഇന്ത്യയില്‍ വച്ചു തന്നെ ഏറ്റവും ദൈര്‍ഘ്യം കുറഞ്ഞതും ലളിതവുമായ വിവാഹച്ചടങ്ങുകളുള്ളവര്‍ , എന്നാല്‍ അതേ സമയം ഇന്ത്യയില്‍ വിവാഹത്തിനു ഏറ്റവും കൂടുതല്‍ ആഭരണങ്ങള്‍ ധരിക്കുന്നവര്‍.. , സിനിമാതാരങ്ങള്‍ക്ക് "ഫാന്‍സ്‌ അസോസിയേഷന്‍" ഉണ്ടാക്കുന്നവര്‍, ആ പേരും പറഞ്ഞു പരസ്പരം കൂട്ടുകൂടുകയും, തല്ലിപിരിയുകയും ചെയ്യുന്നവര്‍, ഒരിക്കലും അവസാനിക്കാത്ത മെഗാസീരിയലുകള്‍ ആകംക്ഷപൂര്‍വം കാത്തിരിക്കുന്നവര്‍, ആനപ്രേമികള്‍, ക്രിക്കറ്റിനെ പോലെ ഫുട്ബോളും ഇഷ്ടപ്പെടുന്നവര്‍, പഠിക്കാതെ തന്നെ ഇംഗ്ലീഷും ഹിന്ദിയും തമിഴും ഒക്കെ പുല്ലുപോലെ പറയുന്നവര്‍, അങ്ങിനെ ചെറുതും വലുതുമായ പല രസകരമായ സ്വഭാവഗുണങ്ങള്‍ ഉള്ളവര്‍.. . നമ്മുടെ മലയാളികള്‍. .

5) സിനിമ, സിനിമ - എനിക്കെപോഴും പ്രിയങ്കരമായ, ഒരു കാലത്ത് ലോകത്തിലെ തന്നെ ഏറ്റവും മികച്ചത് എന്ന് ഞാന്‍ വിശ്വസിക്കുന്ന മലയാളം സിനിമകള്‍. . . മലയാളം സിനിമയിലെ രംഗങ്ങള്‍ , കഥാപാത്രങ്ങള്‍, ഗാനങ്ങള്‍, അഭിനേതാക്കള്‍, എഴുത്തുകാര്‍, സംവിധായകര്‍, ഇവരെയെല്ലാം കുറിച്ച് മണിക്കൂറുകള്‍ എനിക്ക് സംസാരിക്കാന്‍ ഇഷ്ടമാണ്. അങ്ങിനെ സംസാരിച്ച് വേറെ കുറെ പേരെ വട്ട് പിടിപ്പിച്ചിട്ടുണ്ട്! ഇന്നും കുറെയധികം സിനിമകളിലെ ദൃശ്യങ്ങള്‍ മനസിലേക്ക് വന്നു.

മുകളിലെ ലിസ്റ്റില്‍ പെടാത്ത വേറെയും കുറെ സംഭവങ്ങള്‍ - കേരളം അല്ലെങ്കില്‍ മലയാളം എന്ന് കേള്‍ക്കുമ്പോള്‍ മനസിലേക്ക് ഓടിയെത്തുന്ന പല പല ചിത്രങ്ങള്‍. --- ഓണാഘോഷങ്ങള്‍ പൂക്കളം പുലിക്കളി വള്ളംകളി വിഷുദിനത്തിലെ പടക്കങ്ങള്‍ ക്രിസ്മസ് സ്റ്റാര്‍ വടക്കുനാഥനും ഗുരുവായൂരപ്പനുംറാന്തല്‍ വിളക്ക് നിലവിളക്ക് ശബരിമല അയ്യപ്പന്മാര്‍ മോഹിനിയാട്ടം കഥകളി ചാക്യാര്‍കൂത്ത് ചെണ്ട മദ്ദളം ഇടക്ക പുല്ലുവന്‍പാട്ട് അടക്കയും വെറ്റിലയും മുത്തശ്ശിമാര്‍ പാത്തുമ്മമാര്‍ മാര്‍ഗംകളി തിരുവാതിരകളി ഒപ്പന പാടങ്ങള്‍ തെങ്ങിന്‍തോപ്പുകള്‍ കടല്‍ കുന്നുകള്‍ പുഴകള്‍ കുളങ്ങള്‍ കാടുകള്‍ അങ്ങിനെ കണക്ക് കൂട്ടിയാല്‍ കൂടാത്ത ഇനിയും കുറെ കുറെ ഓര്‍മ്മകള്‍

ഇതൊക്കെ ഇപ്പൊ ഇവിടെ എന്തിനെഴുതി എന്നറിയില്ല. പക്ഷേ മലയാളത്തില്‍ എഴുതുവാനുള്ള ആഗ്രഹം സാധിച്ചു. അതുമതി.

189 ദിവസങ്ങള്‍ കൂടി.

Day 810: Thaipusam!

2012-02-07T23:23:00.000+08:00

Thaipusam, or Thaipooyam as it is called in my language Malayalam, is a very popular festival amongst the Tamils. Given that there is a significant Tamil population in Singapore, it is celebrated with a lot of pomp and show here as well.

Dedicated to Lord Muruga/Karthikeya/Kartik/Subramanian (all names of the same person!), the most fascinating thing about this festival is the procession whereby the devotees carry huge "kavadis". The idea is to inflict some pain on oneself as a form of physical sacrifice. So the kavadi can be simply a big decorative heavy piece, or one that has metal hooks which are hooked on to the carrier (yup, they actually pierce their skin with the hooks!), or one that has spears instead of hooks which are drilled into their bodies! Some devotees also pierce their cheeks and tongues with small spears and others walk a few kilometres on sandals made of nails! The whole ceremony or procession would seem rather bizarre but I have always been fascinated by how much pain these people seem to be able to take and the amount of faith they have in God and themselves.

Today was Thaipusam in Singapore and I caught a glimpse of the procession on the way back home at night. And as it happens every other year, I was once again astounded by the sheer determination of these people. They would be in so much pain with so many metal spears and hooks spearing them all over!

But just as that thought crossed my mind, a group very close by started to play the drums in true Tamil style - that is to say peppy and upbeat! And the guys carrying the huge heavy kavadis - with their bodies pierced with metal hooks, spears piercing their tongues and cheeks, started to dance! They just danced and danced as the beats turned heady! Am sure that if the spears in their mouths allowed them to smile, they would have!

What an incredible sight it was!

P.S. For those of you who have never heard of this... I strongly recommend googling for Thaipusam images. You are sure to be stunned!

190 more to go.

Day 809: Cycle Confidence!

2012-02-06T22:34:00.000+08:00

I had written here about how I had been trying to better my newly developed cycling skills. If you read that post, you will see that I was just beginning to learn how to make turns on the cycle. What I had conveniently missed out in that post was that all that cycling was done within the premises of my condominium because I had lacked the confidence to venture outside!

But today, together with the hubby who had recently gotten himself a bike too, I ventured out with my cycle. And together, we cycled and cycled and cycled!

Initially I was doubtful whether I will be able to cycle at all because well... since January 4th, the day I was learning to make turns, I had not cycled at all! But the fact that I could and that too for so long until my legs started to hurt, was just too awesome! My confidence on it has improved by leaps and bounds!

Awesomeness, really!

191 more to go.

Day 808: Canopy!

2012-02-05T22:53:00.000+08:00

Today, I had breakfast with two of my very good friends, who were also the key actresses from Mausams. We had not caught up in a really long time, so we decided that it was high time we met up. Happily for me, the venue for the rendezvous was the gorgeous Canopy which is hands down my best discovery in Singapore in a while!

Canopy is a beautiful outdoor restaurant set within the lush greenery of Bishan Park. I absolutely loved being there - it was almost as if I was having breakfast right in the middle of a tropical forest!

Not only is the ambience and the environment super cool, the food was pretty awesome too! That of course took things to a totally different level.

But the beauty doesn't end there - they actually allow pets into the cafe, so I saw some really cute dogs in there too! They were all just hanging around calmly, serenely almost, as if they were taking in all that greenery as much as we did.

I had a great morning - chatting with the ladies for hours, enjoying my breakfast, ogling at all those adorable dogs and puppies and relaxing in that lovely atmosphere. Perfect!

192 more to go.

Day 807: Wedding, Catch Ups & A Midnight Jog!

2012-02-04T21:20:00.001+08:00

A fun saturday!

After a morning of working on some audio stuff as well as designing a publicity leaflet for Inganeyum Oru Katha for a potential screening, I made my way to Fort Canning Park for a friend's wedding.

It was my first time at Fort Canning for a wedding and I must say the venue was just lovely! The celebrations happened both outdoors at the Raffles Terrace and indoors inside the Raffles House, and the whole place was very tastefully decorated, making the already pretty place very, very pretty!

Both the bride and the groom are my juniors from university, so I ended up meeting a lot of others from college as well, many of them after a really long time! So it was wonderful to catch up with everyone!

Oh, special mention goes to Daisy, the darling little dog who was running around the venue. She belongs to one of our friends and she was quite a heart stealer with her cute looks and awesome behaviour! Needless to say, she was got royally pampered through the evening!

After the lovely wedding reception, we came back home and I sat down to do some more sound design work on Inganeyum Oru Katha. I had been feeling too lazy for any exercise through the day but somehow, just as I was doing the sound design work, I felt myself all kicked about going for jog even though it was already midnight!

But that's exactly what I did and it was an awesome jog. The weather was absolutely gorgeous and I really enjoyed running against a strong, chilly breeze.

Lovely day that ended really well...!

193 more to go.

Days 805 & 806: Two Super Awesome Days!

2012-02-03T19:44:00.000+08:00

2 & 3 February, 2012

Two incredible days that just got better and better and ended with a bang! I loved every bit of both the days but there is simply too much to cover, so am just gonna do a list.

So here's everything that made me smile/cheer/jump with joy etc. over the last two days.

a) My super successful presentation and the offsite - I had been working my ass off the last couple of months to put together this "action plan" offsite at work. I was leading it both in terms of general organization as well as the prework, agenda, content, etc. etc. It was finally D-day today and since it was the first time I was organizing something of this scale, I was hoping and praying that things go well. And it did! People said it was a very useful session and everyone seemed to have a great time! Also, I had presented a bunch of materials I had been working on for so many days now and those were well received as well. It made all that work worth it!

b) The lovely Screening Room - it was the venue for the offsite and I loved everything about it! It was nice and cozy and had a restaurant that served some of the best food ever (but hey, let me cover that in a separate point).

c) All that yummy food! - Everything from the breakfast to the lunch to the tea time snacks at the Screening Room rocked! I loved the chocolate cookies and the mayo-veggie sandwiches they served for breakfast, the absolutely lovely coriander-veggie soup, the super awesome fried prawns with rice, the delicious mutton kebabs and the yummiest cake for lunch, and last but not the least, the samosas and pastries for tea!

d) Team time - The offsite was also a good time for me to spend some casual fun time with my colleagues, something which we very rarely do these days. I quite enjoyed that!

e) Power of You Gold - Post the offsite, the boss thanked me for my efforts in putting everything together including the presentations. I thought it was really nice of him because he highlighted all the specific contributions vs. a very generic formal note. But most unexpectedly, he also declared that I am to receive an internal recognition award called the Power of You Gold for my work over the past couple of months! That was most unexpected but needless to say, I felt quite touched by the gesture. This was the second time I am winning this award over the last six months, even though it is usually pretty rare (the one I won before that was about 4 years ago!), so I felt very encouraged.

f) Hubby's great presentation - The hubby and his team at Teamie (that's what his new startup is called) were competing at the Startup Arena, an Asia wide pitching contest for startups, and he did his presentation for the same today. Half the shortlisted contestants gave their pitch today and the others are to give theirs tomorrow, after which the results would be announced. Usually the hubby is highly critical of his work but today he said that his presentation did go well and that a couple of investors showed interest in the company! That was pretty awesome and I felt super happy for him because he had been working really hard on this event for a while. While we don't know the results of the contest yet, it was good that he was satisfied with what he's done and he seemed to be very happy too.

g) Celebration at Clarke Quay - To celebrate the hubby's good presentation as well as my successful offsite, presentation and the award, we went to Clarke Quay and had dinner at the Renn Thai there. Over Green Curry Chicken, Hotplate Tofu, Tom Yam Soup and Rice, we chatted for a long while. It was nice to take time out on a Thursday evening and have a small celebration to ourselves!

h) "And the winner of Startup Arena 2012 is... Teamie!" - Yes, the hubby's startup won the competition today!! It was AWESOME, really! OK but wait... I must write about how it all happened. I knew that the results were to be announced sometime around 5pm today. I was busy at work the whole day but my thought kept going back to this. Being top 5 in this contest would be really awesome for the hubby and his team and would be a much needed motivation. So I was really crossing my fingers for a top 5 spot for them! At about 5 pm, I was in the middle of a discussion when it suddenly struck me that results are probably already out! I quickly called the hubby... the phone rang but he didn't pick. I tried again and this time it was switched off. I gave up on him and instead decided to check on the contest organizers' website. There were no updates there when it struck me that maybe their Twitter feed would have faster updates. I went on Twitter and found them but again, there was no update. Just then one of my bosses came over to discuss something. Just as he finished I glanced at my computer screen and I saw the highlight "1 new tweet" and I knew that would have the result. I was a bundle of nerves when I opened it... and immediately my eyes first fell on "Teamie"... and then I read the rest of the tweet "And the winner of Startup Arena 2012 is... Teamie!" I squealed at the top of my voice, sitting in my office! I was SO happy... ! I don't think I've ever reacted that way to anything before. I was clapping my hands and punching the air in excitement! Needless to say, I made a fool out of myself, much to the amusement of my colleagues around but what the heck!

i) Sharing the news - The hubby called soon after and talked to me briefly before he got bombarded with interview requests at the other end. I couldn't control my excitement, so I called up my in-laws and parents and shared this awesome piece of news, even without waiting for the hubby (but I did get his permission to break the news to them myself)! It was super nice to share the happiness and excitement with all of them and I had a ball bringing them up to date and hearing all their excitement!

j) Birthday party - Later, once the hubby was free, he and I met up and together we went to the birthday party of his partner's son. The little one had turned 1 today, right on the day his dad and his company won a super cool contest! How awesome is that?! The party itself was fun and we spent a few good hours there... chatting, eating, taking photos, watching the magician who was around etc.

k) More celebration - After the birthday party was done, I felt that it was still not time to end the night because surely there must be more celebration! So I called our close friends and together we went to Cafe Iguana and downed two pitchers of margaritas together with other drinks. Post that, we decided to continue the celebration but this time at the Wine Connections in Robertston Quay. There we popped a champagne and had another run of fun over some crazy conversation, all the way until 2 am or so.

It was indeed two super awesome days!

194 more to go.

Day 804: IOK Screening Discussion!

2012-02-01T23:15:00.001+08:00

Awesome day! If all goes well, an organization in Singapore would present the global premiere of Inganeyum Oru Katha (my malayalam short film) at their venue here in Singapore, in March! That would be pretty nice because inspite of being a short film, it would get a sizeable audience and a good premiere!

I met the organizer today to check out the venue and talk the detailed of the screening. It's not yet 100% confirmed but fingers crossed!

In any case it was nice to meet him because he happened to be from my same hometown and we hit it off very well! He also treated me to some really awesome food at Spice Junction which serves authentic Kerala cuisine. Over Fried Prawns, Beef Coconut Fry and Fresh Lime Soda, we discussed IOK, Malayalam movies, movie making, food, Thrissur (our hometown) etc. etc.

So yes, it was a nice evening and am hoping the screening works out! Even if it doesn't, am happy that at least somebody wanted to give it a proper premiere. Sometimes, even that is such an encouragement!

195 more to go.

Day 803: Lo Hei!

2012-01-31T22:41:00.000+08:00

Today we had the fun Lo Hei celebrations in the office!

Lo Hei is a cute Singaporean custom where you make a huge salad of sorts in a group, as part of the Chinese New Year celebrations. It is to mark the coming together of a group (be it family or work or friends) during this auspicious time of the year to wish themselves and each other a good year ahead.

The ingredients of the Lo Hei are to be added in a particular order and as you add in each ingredient to the mix, you shout out wish designated to that ingredient! So for example as you add lime in, you call out for "good luck and smooth sailing", as you add in pepper you call out for "attracting wealth and treasures" etc.

Once the ingredients are put in, you mix it all together - the mixing is a group effort with chopsticks, mind you - wishing for even more things, this time none of the predesigned wish list but anything that comes to your mind. In our group it happened to be things like project approvals, more budget, promotions etc.! Interestingly, as you mix the salad and make your wishes, you are to raise the food up as high as possible with your chopsticks. When about 15 people madly poke at a salad with their chopsticks, grab it, lift it up and shout out wishes in maniac excitement, food start to fly about. It's inevitable, really.

Soon we were not just mixing the salad but also avoiding the food darts whizzing past. After mixing, wishing, and getting a few bits of salad on the hair and even in the eye in some cases, we settled down to eat whatever was remaining of it in the bowl. And it was yummy, which of course was awesome!

I always enjoy doing Lo Hei and for some reason didn't get a chance the last couple of years. So had huge fun today!

197 more to go.

Day 802: This Blog & My Lists!

2012-01-30T22:37:00.000+08:00

This blog completed 800 days just a couple of days ago and today I had this overwhelming feeling that I would miss writing it. Because when all else went wrong, this "compulsory" task of finding the silver lining in the day, had helped a lot with my sanity. I also think it was a good way of tracking my journey and progress as I worked towards completing my "to-do before 30" list. I am pretty certain that if there was no compulsion to do something exciting, big or small, every single day, I would not have done half the things I ended up doing in the last couple of years.

So after work and yoga, I spent some time going through old posts and that was pretty nice.

Sure, I still have more than 6 months to go before this draws to an end and there is absolutely no need to get so emotional right now, but somehow even six months feel short suddenly.

So I did what I usually do whenever I feel time is short - I made another list of things to do (God save me!).

Given that I have already completed my "before-30" list, and given that other things that I was looking forward to like the Dhaka film festival and short film completion are now drawing to a close, I had a feeling that I might end up slacking for the next six months. In order to avoid such a situation which would be completely unacceptable and which I would surely regret later on, and in order to ensure that I make the most out of the next 6 months, I drew up a nice, packed list!

Alright, one might think that I need some help for this compulsive behaviour, but it is definitely gonna ensure that I am gonna have a terrific 6 months ahead if I can stick to the plan! So am definitely looking forward to that!

Here's to this blog and my endless lists!

198 more to go.

Day 801: Done With Dubbing!

2012-01-29T21:29:00.000+08:00

Wrapped up the dubbing for Inaganeyum Oru Katha today, including syncing and balancing it! Compared to Mausams dubbing which was a painful journey of a few months, this was seriously quick and sweet! Ah, the joys of short films! It gave me such a sense of satisfaction and happiness that I decided to simply chill out for the rest of the day. Awesomess!

199 more to go.

Day 800: Back to Dubbing (And 800!)!

2012-01-28T22:23:00.000+08:00

Yup, after a long, long, long time! More than a year, if I remember correctly!

This time it was for Inganeyum Oru Katha. We were planning to work with live or sync sound and not dubbing, but somehow the audio turned out to be pretty horrid for one of the scenes which kinda forced me to dub. So two of my actors came over and we spent some time over the dub, over Dhaka and Las Vegas news (both of them were part of Mausams as well), etc.

Dubbing work had driven me nuts during Mausams but for today, I quite enjoyed it!

And also, we just have 200 more days to go! Under normal circumstances this would seem like a very long time, but I kinda feel like it's so close to the finale! Can't wait!

200 more to go.

Day 799: Eventless, Enjoyable Friday!

2012-01-27T21:51:00.000+08:00

It was a pretty decent Friday. I didn't do anything fancy yet I managed to do all that I wanted to - which was basically finish off some critical work in the office, go for a run (after a long gap) and relax and read a bit.

And I managed to do all three. After successfully completing all that I had to at work, I went for a run. Given that it was after a long break (maybe about 3 weeks since I last jogged), I was skeptical about how well I would be able to do it, but it wasn't too bad. Post that, I just settled myself down and finished up the Secret of the Nagas in one sitting. I didn't like its prequel at all, thanks to very poor writing, but kept at it only because of an interesting plot. But the second book was much, much better and I had a good time reading it!

So that was pretty much my Friday - not very eventful but still quite enjoyable!

201 more to go.

Day 798: Subtitles & Gift!

2012-01-26T03:02:00.000+08:00

Two awesome things happened today.

1) I completed the subtitles for Inganeyum Oru Katha! Yay! It felt super awesome because like I'd written here, getting it done was not easy at all! Even after spending 6 - 7 hours on Tuesday, I was only half way there! But today I managed to complete the rest of it, even though it meant staying up until 3am. So I felt quite good about it!

2) My editor, who had attended the film festival at Dhaka, had stayed on an extra day there because of his flight timings. That day he had met up with some of the volunteers from the festival, and they had, very sweetly, passed on a card and gift for my hubby and I! That was such an unexpected and lovely gesture! The editor who went back home to Mumbai, took pictures of the both the card and the gift and send it over to me today because we don't know when we would meet next. The whole thing brought a huge smile because seriously, they have been way too sweet! God bless them!

202 more to go.

Day 797: After A Long Time...!

2012-01-25T02:31:00.001+08:00

It was a day of things happening 'after a long time....'.

Firstly, it was my first day back in the office after a week in Dhaka followed by the Chinese New Year. That was eleven days out of office in total, that too with no work at all throughout, which is quite long by my standards. But good thing was that, rather contradictory to my own expectations, I didn't feel blue at all! While yesterday evening I was feeling like it was the last day of the two-month Indian summer holidays and tomorrow I would have to back to school (something which I never enjoyed), today I had no such turmoil. Instead, I felt rather happy to be back and do my work, clear my emails, catch up on updates, rush for meetings, meet up with my colleagues etc. So that was nice!

After work, it was my turn to get back to swimming, again 'after a long time....'. And by long time here, I mean 1 year and 25 days! Yup, my exercise log shows that the last time I swam was on 31st December, 2010 and interestingly, as per my blog that day, I had done my longest ever swim at 20 laps! Why I quit swimming after that is something I myself can't figure out. Anyway, I decided to get back to swimming today but not without much difficulty. Looks like 1 year 25 days of not swimming does make you struggle a bit. In fact, I even forgot to take my goggles because that's how much I have become out of touch with the routine! But I survived about 10 laps and felt pretty good in spite of my sore muscles and blood red eyes.

Post swimming, I took a work call at night, again....'after a long time'. My night calls had significantly reduced over last few months and I realized that they are fun in their own way. To sit in your pajamas, pick at your dinner, listen to people from Latin America and Europe and try and solve a 100 issues with them over the phone, is indeed fun, especially when it doesn't happen too often!

The night ended with the hubby and I going over to my brother in laws place to take part in his birthday eve celebrations. It's been a while since I took part in anyone's birthday celebrations right at the stroke of midnight, so that was fun too!

Overall, a day of "after a long time..."s, but all awesome!

203 more to go.

Day 796: Subtitling, Malayalam Movie & Catch-Ups!

2012-01-24T02:16:00.002+08:00

Today was a the last day of the long Chinese New Year weekend in Singapore. I spent a bulk of it on doing subtitling for Inganeyum Oru Katha. Given that it is a dialogue intensive, that too very fast paced ones, getting subtitling done was not an easy job. It was taking me a couple of hours to finish off each scene and every time I read through what I have written, I was finding more and more corrections to be made! But somehow it was more fun than frustration and I spent a good six to seven hours on it and enjoyed myself thoroughly!

Then I caught up with a few fellow Malayalis and together we went to watch that rare Malayalam movie that gets released in Singapore. The feedback on this film, titled "Arabiyum, Ottakavum Pinne P. Madhavan Nairum", had been pretty negative but I didn't mind it that much. Sure it had a ton of flaws, many of it rather annoying, but my friends and I enjoyed most part of it, maybe because of our low expectations, or from the joy of getting to watch a Malayalam movie on the big screen, or the good company I was in, or maybe even just the samosas we were having. Whatever be it, I definitely had fun!

Then it was time to meet up with the hubby and proceed for dinner with our usual gang in Singapore. We had not met the gang as a whole for more than a month now, because of everyone's travel plans during Christmas and New Year and our own Dhaka plans. So this was more or less like a reunion and needless to say, that was huge fun too!

So it was both a productive and a fun day, something's that's always welcome!

204 more to go.

Day 795: Being Sound Designer!

2012-01-23T23:59:00.000+08:00

I had done extensive dubbing and syncing for Mausams, but today I got to play another role of the sound designer.

Like I had written here, I had completed the edit for my Malayalam short film Inganeyum Oru Katha, along with my editor, when we were in Dhaka. Now that the edit is done, it was time for fixing the sound.

I had invested in a boom mic and pole during the shoot of IOK and was hoping that the sound would be mostly fine and no dubbing would be required for this film.

But the way the edit was, it looked like the sound was indeed very much all over the place and unless I go through every single take again, and choose and extract the right audio clips from them, and try and sync them with the current edit, we will have to dub. But I am completely against dubbing because not only is it a lot of work, without excellent sound design for the background ambience, it does sound very unreal.

Which brought me to the first option - which is to go through every single take, extract suitable clips and try and fit all of them to the current edit. This was easier said than done. This means doing some extreme detailing work. For example, there could be a place where there is excellent audio of the dialogue but there is some background disturbance such as a bird cooing or some construction drilling. So I need to look at every single take of that exact dialogue, choose one where the actor might have given the same modulation and pacing, and then try and fit it in the edit. And when I say dialogue, I actually mean a word by word copy past from different videos!

But I sat down for about 12 hours and finally had a workable audio file for three of the most problematic scenes!

It was back breaking work and meant being unaware of the passing of a holiday (it's Chinese New Year eve) but was extremely satisfying! The work's far from being over but I felt like a real sound designer for a while!

205 more to go.

Day 794: Dhaka Memories!

2012-01-22T23:50:00.002+08:00

After an uneventful flight, we got to Singapore at about 4:30am today and got home by 5:15 or so, thanks to the very speedy, excellent service at Changi airport!

After getting home, we slept off (of course) and woke up well after noon. And did pretty much nothing for the rest of the day, other than going through the Dhaka videos and pictures. I also got connected with many of the delegates and organizers of the festival via Facebook, which was really great because now we can ensure that we are in touch. That also led to a flurry of messages and photo exchanges, all of which were pretty nice.

Dhaka film festival has come to an end but today, it was nice reliving it again!

206 more to go.

Day 793: Last day in Dhaka!

2012-01-21T23:10:00.003+08:00

Today was our last day in Dhaka and it was also as eventful as the rest!

We had met a very interesting couple at the festival. He is Indian, she is Bangladeshi. He is an editor cum musician (sarod player, amongst other things) cum martial artist (not just a student of it, but a martial art instructor) with a degree in Hindi and Music. She is a financial analyst/economist turned make-up artist. You see what I mean by interesting? They met in London and now are in Dhaka for a while. They had been coming for pretty much every day of the festival and we met the guy when he came for Mausams. The wife's uncle and brother in law were both amongst the best and most renowned amongst Bangladeshi directors and both her and her husband had a keen interest and good taste in films.

We got quite a few chances to catch up with them at the festival and they had kindly offered to take us out for lunch today, given that our flight is only at 10pm at night and we had a fair bit of time to kill before that.

So they picked us up at around and 12:30pm and we made our way to an Italian restaurant which was at a fair distance from our hotel.

On the way we saw the prettier and non crowded parts of Dhaka - including the Parliament House, Dhaka Air Force camps, etc.

The food at the Italian restaurant was pretty good.... pretty much everything we've eaten in Dhaka seems to be yummy!

Over lunch, which lasted for about 2-3 hours, we had another marathon chatting session, which I enjoyed thoroughly!

Post lunch, they dropped us back to our hotel. We said our goodbyes and then it was time to take off for Singapore.

We waited for our airport pick up, but as luck would have it, our pick up car from the festival got stuck in some immense traffic somewhere and we had to resort to taking a really shady, rickety taxi at the very last minute to rush to the airport. After a journey of more than an hour, which should ideally only have taken 30 minutes max, we reached the airport.

But we made good time, and in hindsight, the journey in taxi was quite fascinating. The car seemed to have been made from some left over scrap metal and it didnt even have any covering for its door locking system - i.e., we could see the entire mechanism inside! But the ride was still enjoyable and we even tipped the driver extra because he turned out to be a very nice, helpful chap.

At the airport, we were greeted by a festival volunteer, the same one who had picked me up from the airport. After checking us in, he too took off. And with that everything associated with the festival came to an end.

It was with mixed feelings that I boarded the flight. It was great to go back home to good old Singapore - but I was sure to miss everything about Dhaka! The festival, the people, the food, the joy for mindlessly watching one movie after the other for so many days, even the traffic, the crowds and the noise! Everything had a rustic, innocent charm!

Not sure whether I'll ever get a chance to go back but this was very, very special!

I guess it's a big Thank You to everyone who made Mausams possible and also to God for the last one week. It was indescribably beautiful!

A special thanks also to my editor for coming down to the festival and working hard to drive publicity around Mausams and its screenings amongst the media and others, as well as for working on Inganeyum Oru Katha editing in every free hour possible, which made this trip not just fun but also fruitful!

207 more to go.

Day 792: Closing Day!

2012-01-20T22:41:00.000+08:00

Final day of the 12th Dhaka International Film Festival 2012 and it was a fabulous day!

Once again, after breakfast, we were transferred to the screening venue - the public library, where we caught up with the volunteers, took several pictures around the venue since it is our last day there etc.

Then I had a flurry of interviews for a TV channel, the festival video archives and even with a photo journalist, all of which was fun!

Lunch was back at Dhaka Club and we had a round of catch up with other delegates, many of whom were leaving in the evening and again, might be the last time we might be meeting each other. So in other words, it was already time for goodbyes, which kinda sucked.

Post lunch, we attended the closing ceremony which was an adventure on its own with the media crowding the stage... leaving nothing to be seen by the audience, cameras flashing all over, the Bangladeshi celebrities making their appearance in full swing, the volunteers running hither tither trying to organize everything, the utter confusion on who is accepting which award on someone's behalf, etc. etc. But it was all immense fun! The ceremony was short and sweet and we had a ball, especially with the very witty Iranian distributor sitting right next to us cracking one joke after the other.

Post the opening ceremony, we watched a Japanese movie by a fellow delegate who has by now, turned into a very good friend! His movie was as lovable as he was and I thoroughly enjoyed watching it.

Then it was time for the closing dinner and party at an interesting outdoor upscale restaurant called Spitfire. The food - which was everything from Bangladeshi to Indian to Italian to Continental - was awesome! Even the starters were so good that I got myself rather overeaten by the time I was done with starters itself!

Over dinner, we had a last round of catchup with all the Bangladeshi folks as well as the delegates and organizers. Tomorrow everyone would be on their way back to their own countries! I seriously felt bad saying my byes because they were all such kind, friendly, fun and interesting people!

Thus the festival came to an end but after giving me a bunch of memories to last a life time! What a truly awesome experience!

208 more to go.

Day 791: Screening Marathon!

2012-01-19T12:32:00.002+08:00

Today we were simply running from one screening to another.

After breakfast, we watched a documentary by a German film maker, who was present at the festival. Then we walked down to the Dhaka Club for lunch, hung around there with a few of the other delegates for a bit, checked internet etc. and then walked back to the National Museum for another screening - this time a feature film under the spiritual section, made by this lovely couple from Mumbai. Post that we rushed for another feature film - a Chinese one brought by fellow delegates at the festival.

Three films back to back was quite something and it was the first time we were doing this at the festival. So that was pretty cool.

There was no party this evening, so we were free to do what we wanted. Given that all of us were pretty tired, we just had dinner at the restaurant in our hotel itself. We ordered ourselves a huge spread and had a very satisfying meal!

Tomorrow the festival draws to an end and with it, an unforgettable experience!

209 more to go.

Day 790: Mausams Screening at DIFF 2012!

2012-01-18T18:04:00.000+08:00

The much awaited day of the Mausams screening at the Dhaka International Film Festival!

After breakfast, the editor, the hubby and I made our way to the public library. The allotted slot for our screening was 1pm at the public library auditorium and we got to the venue by 11 am.

Upon reaching the venue we realized that our movie poster that was up at the ticketing desk has disappeared. Given that we had spent quite a considerable time just yesterday figuring out one round of disappearance by these posters, this was beginning to get quite annoying. In any case, we walked upto the ticketing desk and asked them what on earth happened to the poster now. They very politely and apologetically informed us that the Mausams poster was stolen last night by unknown thieves.

Yup. The poster was stolen. First a dog takes off with a Mausams DVD and now someone steals a Mausams poster. Must admit that we have the most fascinating things happening to us!

All of us were highly amused, but given that we couldn't do much about it, we simply proceeded to take pictures around the area and kill the time before the screening.

At about 12:45 pm, under exponentially increasing nervousness, we made our way in to the auditorium.

To our huge surprise, we found that there was a pretty good crowd in the auditorium waiting for the Mausams screening! The 1pm slot had been the most poorly attended one over the past few days because of the clash with the lunch hour and prayer time. So we were expecting to see very few people in there but was very amazed by the turnout! I must say a big part of that has been played by my editor who had been spreading the word about the film amongst the visitors to the library, other delegates, volunteers etc. But even he looked surprised at the number of people who were seated just as we entered!

Anyway, the turnout made me feel pretty happy and also pretty nervous because now the film better be good or they would all be so disappointed!

There wasn't much time to think of anything more because before I knew it, the emcee was announcing the film and inviting the three of us on to the stage. We were given bouquets and I spoke a bit about the film and its making. By the way, I must also mention that the hubby, when introduced as the actor cum husband etc., got a roaring applause, mainly by the female audience! Just before we went on stage, several girls had been crowding around him and telling him how handsome he was and asking for "single" pictures with him (i.e. they didnt want to stand in a group around him but take individual pictures with him)! God save us all. Needless to say he enjoyed all the attention!

Then it was time for the Mausams screening. We settled down in one of the front rows. I crossed my fingers and prayed for a good reaction from the audience. This was the first time I would experience Mausams as it being watched by an auditorium full of perfect strangers. During the screenings in Kerala and Singapore, many of the audience were friends or family or at least acquaintances of the cast and crew in the film, and they would obviously tend to be biased. But this time, there will no such bias and the reaction would be honest. So needless to say, my fingers were tightly crossed.

At first, things went for a toss, when we saw that the subtitles were not working. So many of Hindi dialogues were hard for the audience to follow. But soon the crowd started to get the hang of it. Luckily the Hindi dialogues too were mostly towards the beginning only, so afterwards they didn't have any issues following the film.

Watching Mausams with that audience in Dhaka would be one of the best experiences of my life! We realized that despite the subtitle glitches etc., the audience was thoroughly enjoying the film! . In fact, I would say this was the most encouraging response we have had till date... probably even more than in Singapore given that they were all were perfect strangers! The audience was so involved in the film that they were laughing, cheering and clapping throughout! Sitting there and listening to them reacting to the film like that was truly an out of the world experience!

As the final scene wrapped, the crowd gave us a huge applause and I thanked God with all my heart! Mausams screening was immensely successful!

People rushed up to us to congratulate and to my utter astonishment I was asked to give autographs! Thus I gave my first few autographs as a film maker!

We stayed around for a bit talking to the audience and enjoying their very positive feedback! Then we were rushed away for lunch as it was well past 3pm. Lunch was Bangladeshi Chinese food which was very similar to the Indian Chinese and was quite yummy.

Post lunch, still basking in all the glory of a successful screening, we went back to the screening venue. The hubby and I tried to watch a Turkish movie but the very gory and torturous violence in it drove us out after a while. So instead, we just hung about, talking to the people around.

For dinner, we were taken to the Gallery of Fine Arts which was exhibiting the stunning works of the expatriate Bangladeshi artist Maruf Ahmed. I am usually not a fan of abstract art but I must say that I found Maruf's works very captivating. His choice and use of colours were truly brilliant! The dinner was hosted by the very smart and witty Foreign Secretary of Bangladesh who was also chairing the international jury of the festival.

Over dinner we once again caught up with the many friends we had made over the festival. One of the highlights was when a three-time National Award winning Indian director called me over and gave me very positive feedback for Mausams. Coming from a person of his calibre and credentials, it made me feel on top of the moon!

Post the dinner, we made our way back to the hotel - happy with the turnout at the screening, happy with the reaction during the screening, happy with all the feedback post the screening. All three of us were simply elated!

Back at the hotel, we got the hubby to watch the edit we had worked on for the short film. While the editor and I had done about 80 - 85% of it over the last few days, I realized that the editor had finished up another 5-10% of it on his own, which was awesome! We only had to do some remaining finetuning work, so we stayed up until 3am and finished it off! Thus we had the full and final edit of Inganeyum Oru Katha, my first Malayalam (short) film!

A great day of films - not just an awesome screening for Mausams but also a full edit for the next project. Absolutely blissful!

210 more to go.

Day 789: Screenings, Interviews, 10 Years & Hubby!

2012-01-17T17:13:00.000+08:00

After breakfast, my editor and I as well as other delegates were brought to the festival venue. Upon reaching the venue we realized that the Mausams posters, which were meant to be up on the noticeboards by now, were still not to be found on them. Upon asking about its whereabouts to the volunteer who took the posters from us, he directed us to another volunteer who in turn directed us to another and this went on for a while. Needless to say we started to get frustrated! To think that we took so much trouble to get the posters printed just the yesterday, only to lose them without ever getting them on the noticeboards! Ugh!

Just as all the leads seemed to have gotten exhausted, I loudly wondered where on earth such big posters could possibly have disappeared to. Just as I was saying it, I looked around the information desk tent we were standing at and my eyes fell on an unruly pile of papers lying around in one corner of a long desk there. Almost immediately the editor pounced on the pile, rummaged through it and almost as if by magic, pulled a huge brown envelope from beneath that mess. We got our posters!

We didn't waste any time after that. We immediately put them up - one on the notice board at the festival ticketing board and one just outside the public library auditorium which was the primary venue for the festival and where Mausams was to be screened.

After successfully completing this task, the editor and I found a quiet spot and did some editing for the short film we were working on. We couldn't progress much because the quiet spot very soon ceased to be quiet with the arrival of a few other delegates. So we packed up the editing and went to catch a movie and thereafter went for lunch.

For lunch, amongst other things, they served the very yummy Kachchi Mutton Biriyani which is a Bengladeshi speciality. Apparently there are only two chefs in the whole of Dhaka who make the authentic Kachchi Biriyani, and our lunch was done by one of them! Needless to say, it was a real treat!

Post lunch, I went in to watch another movie while the editor decided to hang out outside with some delegates, volunteers etc. The movie I caught was this insanely good Iranian film Santori (the director of which was the chief guest at the festival and I had the good fortune to meet). It was Seriously-Awesome-Stuff! I was gulping at the sheer excellence of the performances, music, direction etc. when the editor came in and told me that I was needed for a couple of interviews.

So leaving Santori behind, I made my way out. The first interview was for the festival daily bulletin and the second one was for ATN News which is a TV news channel. After giving both the interviews, posing for a few photos for the bulletin and enjoying the tea that the first interviewer kindly got us, we went for another movie screening - this time a highly critically acclaimed Indian film whose makers we had just met at the festival.

After that well made, thought provoking film, it was time for dinner again - this time hosted by the Swiss Ambassador himself!

So once again, the delegates were packed into various vans and driven to a posh area called Gulshan which is were the rich and famous of Dhaka reside. It was also here that the Swiss embassy was located, where we were to have our dinner party. The embassy and the Ambassador's residence were very tastefully done up and the ambassador and his wife themselves were a really cool, unassuming, super friendly couple! They had also arranged for a folk dance of Bangladesh to be performed at the embassy as entertainment for the delegates and it was pretty much the first and only exposure we got of the country's performing arts culture. The music they played was very upbeat and several of the volunteers and delegates danced away with them!

It was soon time for the arrival of the hubby, who would be reaching just in time for the Mausams screening tomorrow and probably as importantly, just in time for celebrating our 10th year anniversary as a couple tonight! It was 10 years ago today that the dude officially asked me out and I accepted!

After a few phonecalls to sort out the whereabouts of his missing receiver at the airport, the hubby managed to make it to the Swiss embassy in time for dinner. By now, the story that it is our 10th year anniversary and that he, who is also the co-producer and actor in the movie, is about to arrive, had spread around and everyone who was "dying to meet him" crowded around him and gave him a warm welcome!

After dinner, which was an amazing spread of authentic Srilankan food, it was time for the long journey back to the hotel. During the journey, the editor and I filled in the hubby with all that he had missed over the last few days. It was great to have him be part of the festival as well!

A very eventful, fun day and tomorrow, it's Mausams screening at the 12th DIFF 2012!

211 more to go.

Day 788: The Festival!

2012-01-16T05:07:00.000+08:00

This was the first day of my attendance at the festival proper (since I was busy with the editing most of yesterday) and it was huge fun!

After breakfast in the morning, my editor, me and a few other delegates were driven to the public library which was the primary screening venue as well as where the festival's information desk, media desk, etc. were located. It was during this drive that I first
got to see the streets in Dhaka in daylight and it was beyond fascinating! The crowds, shops, rickshaws and the equally fascinating passengers on it, all the vehicles with some kinda damage or the other, the unavoidable traffic jams, etc. were all very interesting.

At the public library, after collecting our official delegate passes, the editor and I walked around the premises and realized that our movie was pretty much the only one that had no publicity around the premises. Many of the other film makers had put up their film banners, posters, leaflets etc. but of course we had not planned any such thing for Mausams. We talked to some of the volunteers and they agreed to take us to a printer post lunch if needed.

But then there was the problem that we didn't have a copy of an appropriate poster with us. So then both of us went around in search of an internet place, found one within the library premise not without a bit of difficulty, and then found an old email which had a copy of
the poster.

Then came the issue that neither of us nor the guys at the internet place had a thumb drive for us to download the poster onto and take it to the printer! After some to and fro conversation in broken English and sign language, it was established that they have a card reader and that was a good solution because we had several cards for our cameras.

So after downloading the poster successfully, grabbing a delicious samosa and a cup of awesome coffee, we decided to watch a film first, before going for lunch and to the printer afterwards.

We picked the Shorts and Independant Section and watched about 3 short films - one shocking, one boring and one interesting.

Lunch was served at the Dhaka club, which was a very short distance away and it was pretty good food. Post lunch we sat down and reworked the poster a bit to change the screening details to the one in Dhaka vs. the one in Singapore it originally had.

Then along with a volunteer, we proceeded to the printing shop. The printing shop we visited was one amongst several other printing shops that lined what seemed to be like a primary printing-shops-area. With the help of the volunteer, we explained to the printing guy what we wanted - i.e. 2 glossy A3 posters and 100 A5 leaflets. As we waited for those, the printing guy decided to be super nice to us - chairs appeared from nowhere ensuring our comfort and this was immediately followed by cups of excellent hot tea, ensuring that we were well pampered.

We enjoyed this Bangladeshi hospitality and spent some time there, marvelling at the crowds outside or as in the case of my editor, photographing every nook and corner of the printing shop.

Post collecting the posters and flyers, we had one of the most adventurous road experiences in Dhaka! We had to maneuver through an avalanche of cycle rickshaws, hordes of fellow humans, cars that never seem to follow any traffic lights etc. before we could get to our own car! It was truly adrenalin pumping!

Back at the public library, we passed the publicity materials to one of the organizers who promised to put them up the next morning, and proceeded to enjoy some Bangladeshi snacks and catching up with a few fellow delegates.

Later in the evening, we watched a screening of three documentaries - one rather unrelatable, one shocking and one absolutely delightful. Post the screening we were taken to another dinner party, this time at the national arts centre.

So dinner was in a lovely, extremely well lit exhibition hall where we were surrounded by excellent paintings all around. We got to meet a few more of the who's who of Bangladesh - mainly from film and other artistic fields. I must also mention that the food was excellent with a special mention for the fried chicken which was to die for! Yummm!

Post the party, it was time for some more editing, before hitting the bed.

Today I really felt like I was part of a huge film festival, in spite of the fact that half the time was spent on downloading, redesigning and printing posters!. Felt awesome!

212 more to go.

Day 787: Editing & Party!

2012-01-15T12:10:00.000+08:00

My editor and I decided that today we will work on our short film edit
and complete it before we take off anywhere to watch films. So we sat
the whole day on the edit and made quite some great progress.

During lunch we ordered naan, fried rice, chicken curry, prawn curry
and also chilli chicken in chinese style. While the curries and chilli
chicken came in very little quantities, the naan came as sliced pieces
that amounted to a mountain on the plate. It looked intimidating, to
say the least. But the food tasted awesome. It was my first proper
meal in Bangladesh and I must say I wasn't disappointed at all!

Later in the evening we attended a party thrown at the Dhaka Club.

The party was super fascinating and a first of its kind experience for
me. We met some of the biggest shots in Bangladesh including their
central minister for media, the guys who run their TV networks, their
superstars of acting, leading directors including one who has worked
with Polanski, one who is being touted as the next best thing in
Bangladeshi cinema and whose film has has been banned on controversial
political grounds, etc., and several such who's who of Bangladesh.

Needless to say, it all felt surreal. At many points in time when I
was there, I couldn't believe that I was actually hobnobbing with the
biggest shots of a country and that too because of a movie I made. And
of course, it was indeed beautiful.

213 more to go.

Day 786: It's Time For Dhaka!

2012-01-14T18:48:00.000+08:00

It was a morning of running a few pending errands before I could fly
off to Dhaka for the International Film Festival!

I was done with everything including the never-ending packing by about
2 in the afternoon after which I waited for the hubby who was on his
way back from India.

He reached home at about 2 after his week long trip and at 4:30 it was
time for me to take off. The hubby, who is going to join me in Dhaka
next Tuesday only, very gracefully agreed to accompany me back to the
airport from where he just got home, so that we can spend a little bit
more time together before my flight!

So together we went to the airport, checked me in, had the customary
Ananda Bhavan meal, the McCafe Himalayan Chai Tea Latte (something I
should seriously consider having more often) and then it was really
time for Dhaka!

After an eventless flight (on which I watched the surprisingly well
made Tamil film Ko), I reached Dhaka at about 8pm.

The volunteer from the film festival was waiting for me and he took me
straight to join an after-screening dinner party organized at the
Uttara Club.

There I met the Mausams editor who had arrived from Mumbai last night
to attend the festival. It was good to see him after so many months (I
think last was in August in Kerala when he came down for the Mausams
screening there) and we caught up with each other over dinner.

Dinner was a small, cozy affair where interestingly, there were more
drinks (alcoholic, of course) than food and I got to meet many of the
other festival delegates, guests and organizers. There were delegates
from Iran, Malaysia, Russia, Italy, US, Japan, China, Brazil,
Australia, India etc. and it was fun to know all of them.

Post dinner, we were taken to our hotel. I must mention that the
traffic in Bangladesh is exceptionally...hmmm... fascinating, to say
the very least. There are more cycle rickshaws than anything else, and
they go whichever way they please in their slow pace, which in turn
disrupt everything else. And everything other than the cycle rickshaw
believes that it is running on some expressway and tries to race and
cut lanes inspite of the fact that there are a thousand other vehicles
crowding around it. Like I said, fascinating.

So after that drive, I got to the hotel, checked in, freshened up and
then started to work on the editing of my short film Inganeyum Oru
Katha together with the editor. Given that he is based out of Mumbai
and me in Singapore, we wanted to ensure that we make use of the time
together in Dhaka to finish off this pending work.

After a few hours of editing and some good progress, it was time to
call it a day!

Night 1 in Dhaka ends!
215 more to go.

Day 785: University Town, Catch-Up & Independent Films!

2012-01-13T14:09:00.000+08:00

University town (U-Town) is the new extension to the NUS (my alma mater) campus. It opened just last July and I hadn't been hearing quite fabulous things about it. Today I got to go there, to attend a film premiere by a bunch of students from NUS. In fact I had written about them once before here.

Anyway coming back to the University town, it was seriously amazing! I couldn't believe that there was all that space near the original campus! It seemed to be sprawling in all directions, filled with residential houses, a lot of eating outlets, an auditorium, "Mac rooms", research centers, playground, etc. etc., each buzzing with activity! I really liked the place!

A good friend of mine, who is currently doing her phD there, took me around the U-Town and we had a lovely time catching up over dinner as well. It's been really long since I last met her but everytime we meet, it's never like there's been a gap at all! Had a great time!

Then it was time for the movie itself. Titled Gauri, it was an hour long tale about the first semester of an overseas (Indian) student in NUS. I was pleasantly surprised by how well the film was executed. I think my Facebook comment post the premiere can be repeated here - "Really enjoyed Gauri, especially the perfect first half! Wonderful attempt by The Film Guys! Very convincing performances, fresh dialogues, beautiful cinematography and an excellent background score! Congratulations to the entire team! :)" The whole movie was shot inside one room, with pretty much no resources but it was quite engaging - truly good independent cinema!

After the premiere, I got back home, packed for Dhaka and watched yet another independent movie! This one is 15-min short film made by the fellow Filmie Fanatic I had written about here before. Titled "Amaranth", this was a poignant dialogue-less, simple tale of a cancer stricken girl and her positive attitude towards life. This film too had strong performances, very good cinematography and a simple but classy execution! Oh, and I must also say that I smiled when I saw that the protagonist was named after me! The director had mentioned this to me several months ago but it had completely skipped my mind when I was watching the movie. So when that popped up suddenly towards the end frame, it was a pleasant surprise! Needless to say, it was a very sweet gesture by him!

So yes, it was a lovely evening of U-Town, catching up with a dear friend and watching good independent films!

215 more to go.

Day 784: That Lovely Big Family!

2012-01-12T00:08:00.000+08:00

When I first came to Singapore, I somehow got myself involved in the Kerala Association activities here. While I met a lot of fellow Malayalis there, I got closest to one particular aunty. She has been in Singapore ever since she was a child and hence was a Singaporean in the true sense but without letting go of Malayalam or any of the Kerala culture and customs for that matter! In fact, she was quite the veteran at Malayalam playwriting as well as acting!

We got along like a house on fire and once when I found myself stranded with no place to stay for about three months in Singapore, she very kindly even offered a room in her house to me!

It was during this time that I got acquainted with her family. She is the oldest amongst six siblings, and all of the rest were in Singapore. With their spouses and two to four kinds each, they had a huge family settled here. Given that Singapore is a tiny place, the members of this family were very much in touch all the time, and every now and then they used to have a gathering with all of them coming together for some serious catching up.

And I happened to become pretty close with most of her family members as well. I always used to be amazed by the unity in the family and how everyone always seemed to have a lot of fun! Just like this aunty, her children (who are actually very much grown up adults) as well as other siblings, nephews, nieces, etc. were all active in arts or social work or other such activities. So their lives always seemed to have this very lively buzz and I used to enjoy meeting each and every one of them. In fact over the years, I have done several plays and dances and management of events etc., mostly for Kerala Association, with this aunty as well as her family members. I had also done a copywriting internship at her son's advertising agency, given tuition lessons to her nephew, taught dance to a bunch of the kids etc. etc. In fact, I used to feel very much part of this lovely family!

Now the only reason why none of them had featured on this blog till date is only because many of them, including aunty, relocated to Australia about six years ago. Since then I have not been in touch much, except when aunty comes for visits to Singapore and I get to meet her once in a blue moon.

But today, I had the good fortune of meeting aunty again, and that too with a gathering of her huge family! Not all the members were there of course, but there were the ones who are remaining in Singapore as well as the few who had flown in from Australia.

And it was so, so wonderful to see all of them again and feel a part of this gorgeous family! I had a fabulous evening, chatting and catching up with all of them! There are just the same as ever - united, loving and always looking like they are celebrating life to the fullest.

May God bless this Lovely Big Family!

216 more to go.

Day 783: "Beautiful"!

2012-01-11T16:58:00.000+08:00

I had been getting increasingly disappointed with Malayalam movies given that they are either just utter crap or the few that are actually good, are shameless copies of some other film.

While I expressed much of this opinion on Facebook, some of my friends asked me to go watch a recent release called "Beautiful".

To be honest, I wasn't too keen in the beginning because the trailers showed that it is about a paraplegic guy and I really have no taste for movies about handicaps because they usually end up as predictable and in your face calls for sympathy. So I had been avoiding it for a few weeks.

But today, I decided to watch it and get done with it once and for all.

And man, was I not surprised!

The movie was anything but a tear jerking, "pity-me" shouting mess, which was what I had been expecting. Instead, it was a very lighthearted, brilliantly written, laid back film with super cool performances, an interesting soundtrack and excellent cinematography! In a nutshell, I loved it!

I was so happy that not only was this such a well made film, but that it came from Malayalam!

"Beautiful" is indeed, beautiful!

217 more to go.

Day 782: Longest Scene!

2012-01-10T00:31:00.002+08:00

For a change, instead of watching movies, I spent some time on making my own film. I wrote the longest scene in my currently work-in-progress feature film script, one that I had been struggling with for a while!

Now that it is done and I am happy with how it's turned out, the day's automatically rocking!

218 more to go.

Day 781: Blog Award & 180!

2012-01-09T22:58:00.004+08:00

A few cool things happened today. Firstly my darling, super supportive teacher gave this blog of mine the "Versatile Blogger" and "Candle Lighter" awards on her blog, which basically are awards that bloggers pass on to other bloggers whose blogs they like. So that was a very sweet gesture and a nice surprise! I am yet to figure out all the next steps I need to do on the awards, but for now, a HUGE "Thank You!!!" to my teacher for being such a wonderful and encouraging person!

In the evening after work and yoga, I settled down to continue with my movie watching spree and I discovered the absolutely delightful Tamil film "180"! I enjoyed watching it so very much! One of those films that surely has its flaws but that stands strong and tall thanks to its sheer sincerity and class! And to add on, the songs from the film were just mind blowing! They were so unique and were visualized in full justice (one of the best uses of the Red One in Indian cinema)! I couldn't stop listening to the songs and thinking about the visuals from the film, for hours into the night!

A totally lovely day!

219 more to go.

Day 780: Multilingual Marathon!

2012-01-08T21:12:00.000+08:00

The hubby took off for India this afternoon and I found myself with a lot of potential "me-time" but with nothing much to do.

So I decided to do what one naturally decides under such circumstances - watch a movie.

So I watched the delightful "Adukalam", a Tamil movie had gotten rave reviews and had even fetched its actor a National Award, for all the right reasons. Tamil cinema anyway does a great job of rustic, raw films and this one was no exception!

After "Adukalam" I realized that there is still quite some time to go before I really need to hit the bed. So I decided to watch one more film - this time, the Malayalam comedy "3 Kings", only to find it atrocious. But I persevered until the very end of it for reasons not yet known to myself.

After enduring that torture, I realized that I still have more time before I must absolutely hit the bed. So then I decided to watch a Telugu movie. I am not at all familiar with the language but a friend had insisted I watch this movie called "Magadheera" and sent me a link with the subtitles. And it completely blew me away! It is a fantasy/period/current-day romantic tale and I was completely taken by the quality of stunts, art direction, music, direction, choreography, performance of the lead, etc. etc. Sure, it had its share of flaws but I was happy to ignore all of them! There was something really, really awesome about it and I enjoyed myself thoroughly watching it!

So there - I watched a Tamil, Malayalam and Telugu movie each, one after the other and got 2 out of 3 of my choices pretty right!

So it was a thoroughly enjoyable, successful multilingual marathon!

220 more to go.

Day 779: The Power of Yapping!

2012-01-07T22:16:00.003+08:00

The day started pretty eventfully with a visit to the bike shop where the hubby got himself a bicycle. Now that he has somehwat managed to teach the wife, that is me, cycling, he figured that he too should get a bike and we together can be like this bike-riding couple.

And then just after he bought the bike, he readily ditched me and happily went on a solo bike ride. Oh well.

Anyway after that, we decided to go for a movie with a friend. The plan was that after the movie, which was to end by around 6pm, we shall get back home and the hubby shall get some work done while I finish off some chores like packing for Dhaka, writing pending blogs etc.

So as per the plan, a friend joined us and we went for the movie.

And then began, the Yapping.

Throughout the movie, which was downright atrocious, we were making random but super fun conversation and also commenting on the atrocity of the atrocious movie.

After the movie-watching, the hubby had to go to his office to collect something, so the friend and I went along as well. And throughout, we just yapped and yapped and yapped.

Then the three of us decided to have dinner together.

We successfully downed Appam, Mutton Ishtu, Kerala Paratha, Beef Coconut Fry, Varutharacha Chicken Curry, Egg Podimas and Fresh Lime Soda from Swaadishth. Needless to say, all this food consumption was done over some serious yapping - the conversation continued to be totally random but super fun!

Then the three of us decided to have dessert together.

Again, while we were successfully downing Rasmalai and Malpoa from Mustard, the yapping continued.

Then the three of us decided to have chai together.

So over a steaming cup of Masala Chai from Jaggi's, we continued to yap, yap and yap.

And then, at about 10:40pm, we decided that it was time to wind up the yapping. We had already done it through one movie and also at three different restaurants within one evening. And we also realized that whatever was planned (the hubby's work, my chores etc.) has completely gone for a toss. But no one was complaining!

So yes, it surely was a fascinating evening because I don't think I have talked so much or listened to anyone talking so much for so many hours at a stretch, in ages! And surely it was engaging conversation, otherwise it wouldn't have lasted this long! I didn't realize how fast time passed by and that always is a good sign!

So for today, it is the beauty of long, random, fun, engaging conversations!

In other words, the Power of Yapping!

221 more to go.

Day 778: Milestone

2012-01-06T23:37:00.004+08:00

Today the hubby's new startup finalized his first contract with a client! The contract itself is not huge but it is a significant milestone for the company! Sure, it has got very little to do with me directly but I was incredibly happy for him and his team!

So after work, I bought a cake and took off to his office and his whole team had a small celebration via cake cutting & eating, of course. Then the hubby, his partner and I chatted away until very late in to the night about everything under the sun. It was a wonderful evening and a beautiful day!

222 more to go.

Day 777: Their Stories...

2012-01-05T00:26:00.000+08:00

Today, I happened to catch up with two different friends of mine after a very long time. Over lunch with one and after work, with another.

Given that it had been a while since I had last caught up both of them, they had some very fascinating stories to tell me. Stories that revolve around how they are managing to turn around their lives after a very tumultuous times.

And these stories are always very fascinating to listen to! The things that they did ranges from putting their foot down and ensuring they bring order to their life by following strict organized processes (extremely detailed to-do lists and tracking), looking for new experiments (e.g. apprenticeship under a baker!), doing something completely crazy (e.g taking off to Korea for one whole week to work in an Italian cafe), ensuring that they spend some "me-time" no matter what, etc. etc.

Their stories were not just fascinating but inspiring too and it felt wonderful to be involved, even if it is by just listening to them! Both my friends looked and sounded incredibly happy and at peace and that was wonderful, especially since I know how much of a tough time they have had before! When they smile, you can help but smile too!

223 more to go.

Day 776: Turning Right!

2012-01-04T11:56:00.002+08:00

It's obvious that the holiday season is over from the number of emails that's been hitting the inbox at work today. But I decided not to be blue about it but instead to end the day off on a high by getting back to my new found joy of cycling! While I had gotten my balance and I could cycle quite a bit the first day, I was quite unsure of the turns especially sharp ones. So tonight, with the help of the hubby, I learned how to make the turns. I wouldn't say I am 100% there but it felt really really awesome! Small joys and a beautiful day!

224 more to go.

Day 775: The Pain After!

2012-01-03T10:02:00.002+08:00

My whole body is in knots today. I can't move my neck, shoulders, legs - especially the calves, my arms, and pretty much everything else that's remaining. This is on top of the huge multi coloured bruises I have on my knees.

And am feeling super happy about the whole deal! It might sound rather weird but I have a very good reason for it.

Because they are all the signs of an extremely good dancing session - one where I have learnt something very new and something that reminded me of muscles I never realized existed. I already noticed the sprains and bruises yesterday post the dance practice, but today the pain was at an altogether different level!

What's most interesting was this was almost nostalgic because it reminds me of all those wonderful dancing sessions we used to have in college where we explored all kinda different styles and stunts and which used to leave me in this badly bruised, sprained and painful condition.

But the feeling of satisfaction that this brings is just unbelievable! You know that you have pushed yourself hard and tried your best because hey, your body is very evidently is telling you so!

In the evening I hit yoga, to try and relax all those muscles a bit and they did relieve a lot of the discomfort. It was like getting a super good massage and I felt high through the day - from the very obvious feeling of having done something productive, from the pain, from the memories that it brought with it and last but not the least, from the awesome yoga that helped me pull and push and stretch all those sore muscles which was like a totally different kinda workout!

225 more to go.

Day 774: I Shall Dance!

2012-01-02T10:47:00.002+08:00

One of things in my to-do list for this year, is to ensure that I continue dancing. Even though I was very active with dance in college, it completely stopped once I graduated, except at weddings that I attend on the hubby's side of the family (them being north Indians have major dancing events in their weddings). There were three such occasions so far and I enjoyed dancing at all three of them.

But now that there is no family wedding in sight for this year, I decided that I need to make a conscious effort to continue dancing if I do not want to lose touch with it. Hence, in my things-to-d0 for 2012, I have added in "Learn 5 new dance pieces". Which basically means I will watch 5 dance videos online, each in a different style, and try to learn and perfect them. That way I get practice a lot of different styles, I can do it in my own time at home, and it would be fun!

So today was the first day of this experiment. I chose a dance video I liked and started learning from it. And after about a couple of hours and several bruises, sprains and profuse sweating, I had learnt the whole piece! Sure there is huge room for perfection which will need a ton of practice of course, but I felt awesome!

This is something that I would really, really enjoy this year!

226 more to go.

Day 773: New Year!

2012-01-01T09:57:00.000+08:00

Alright then, it's the new year!!!

And I spent it in the most relaxed way! Evidently, am not one for having a jam packed New Year's day to ensure the rest of the year is equally eventful! But that doesn't mean it wasn't without its share of beautiful moments - be it calling and wishing a lot of my relatives a very "Happy New Year" and having long catch-ups up with them (something which I probably do only once a year with most of them, before getting swept away by life and its excitements for the rest of the year), drawing up a long list of things-to-do in 2012, finishing up the character sketches and story-line for a new project that's in the offing, making a quick visit to the temple to thank God etc.

But mostly, it was just chilling out at home, doing pretty much nothing and enjoying what's remaining of the holiday season! I kinda liked that!

227 more to go.

Day 772: The Most Terrific Year!

2011-12-31T03:08:00.006+08:00

2011 hands down gotta be the most terrific year of my life, till date. It passed by in a flash but not without squeezing as many thoughts, experiences and smiles in it!

Just like how I did it last year, I am gonna first say why today was a beautiful day before doing a round up of what made this year the most terrific of all!

Today was pretty awesome because the hubby and I had a very nice and cosy dinner at the Punjabi Grill by Jiggs Kalra at the Marina Bay Sands, with two of our friends. Sure, the dinner was over priced and the ambience wasn't the best, but their New Year's Menu came with three glasses of different wines and the food was indeed very new, innovative and surprisingly yummy. We had a wonderful time chatting and having a lot of fun over the dinner, after which we went to one of the friend's place for the midnight countdown, further drinking (I had the maximum alcohol I've ever had in a single night at 2.5 glasses of wine!), fireworks viewing (his awesomely located high-rise flat made the fireworks at both Marina Bay and Sentosa very visible!) and a few more hours of fun, as we welcomed the new years together!

That was for today. Now for this year and what made it so super awesome! There's a whole load of stuff really, so let's do a list.

Here's all that made 2011 awesomely beautiful!

1) Blog - Completing two years of writing this blog! To be very honest, wouldn't have expected myself to get that one done!

2) Cooking - I must say that this year was quite a remarkable one for the amount of cooking I've done and of course, for their yumminess level! And needless to say this was a huge, huge jump from my cook-once-every-year routine that I had been following for the last 6 years or so. So that's pretty awesome!

3) Fitness - This one am pretty happy about because the number of days I exercised this year was a good +20% vs. last year (my target was +15%) and specifically for yoga, there was a jump of +44% vs. last year (my target was +25%)! This has in turn continued to maintain my fat percentage at levels am pretty happy about!

4) 15 Countries - Travelling to 15 countries across 4 continents, 7 of them for the first time ever! In my wishlist from 2007, I had wanted to travel to 15 countries by the time I turned 30 and the fact that I could do all of them within this 1 year was a blessing just too good to be true!

5) Europe with Parents - Taking my parents and in-laws on that fantastic European holiday, again one of the items on my wishlist from 2007. I had always wanted to take them to all those wonderful places that I've had the privilege of visiting and finally that dream came true!

6) A once in a lifetime experience - Not just taking the parents on the holiday, but giving them that surprise of a lifetime, when we unexpectedly popped up at the Bombay airport just as they were about to board their flights, and told them that we too were joining them on their trip - something which was a top secret till then! The expressions on their faces and their reactions were simply to die for, it was indeed a once in a life time experience! I hadn't shared the video of that very memorable experience here before but let me do that today.

7) The Entrepreneur Hubby - This has less to do with me and everything to do with the hubby but this year, I watched his transtition from a consultant and analyst to an entrepreneur which is a dream come true for him. Like I said, I have nothing to do with any of it (other than offering the name Teamie for his company!) but I am incredibly proud of him and I find this milestone has made this year even more wonderful for us!

8) Family - I had a whole load of wonderful time spent with my family this year! The year kicked off with my mom and in laws being in town, after which all four came down for the Mausams premiere, all of us travelled Europe together and they again came down for a visit mid-year. We also spent some time with not just the parents but also the extended families - uncles, aunts, cousins etc. etc. on both sides, thanks to the weddings of a cousin each on my end as well as my hubby's! And all of that was huge, huge fun and remains very close to my heart!

9) Dance - Thanks to the hubby's cousin's wedding in November this year and a dance performance that was required for it, I had a blast choreographing and dancing to a few songs. I always miss dancing, something which was such a big part of my life during my college days and this year, I put in a lot of time into it for a couple of months. That was an incredibly awesome feeling!

10) Work - This year was evidently very eventful because of travel and film making and all that but what I am very happy about was also how, during a very tough time at work, I could really put my whole self into it and pull things around. It gave me such a sense of fulfillment like I've never had before! Had this not happened, I would have ended up feeling like an underachiever at my job and that I had to compromise my work for some of the other things I did. But that was not the case! In what was very aptly titled "One of the best days ever" post, I had explained the whole thing but for now I would just say that it was one of the biggest and best learning experiences I've had. I learnt that it is absolutely possible not to give up on something and you just have to keep trying really really hard, no matter how things seem otherwise!

11) Mausams - My God, Mausams! This year saw its completion and what a journey it had been to get there! Some of the milestones had been captured in this blog as and when it had happened - the theme song release, the teaser release, the last minute highly nerve wrecking editing, background score and sound design work (which has several posts dedicated to it), the behind the scenes video, ticketing and publicity work including giving interviews for video and radio shows and several newspapers and magazines and last but to the least, the fantastic and unbelievably eventful premier night in Singapore which became the mother of all coincidences by falling on the 500th day of this blog! Mausams is and will stay one of the most beautiful journeys I've made in this life.... it was just out of this world!

12) Unexpected Blessings - All of the above Mausams stuff are probably the expected ones - you know, things that I was expecting to happen and working towards it - i.e. completing the movie and releasing it on time in Singapore. But what I absolutely didn't expect and hence was like the biggest blessings of all was what happened afterwards. The incredible response to the film, meeting a lot of wonderful people - other film makers, film maniacs, etc. who came into my life thanks to Mausams, having a wonderful screening in my home town, getting accepted in a few film festivals and last but not the least, winning an award at one!

13) Vegas & the Award - Sure I travelled to 15 countries in 2012, but nothing like the 1.5 day trip to Vegas to pick up the Silver Screen award for Mausams. That was just surreal.

14) Inganeyum Oru Katha - this is the short film I started on post Mausams. What makes this truly special is because it's my first film in my mother tongue Malayalam and I had a wonderful time working this with my lovely Mallu team! I think IOK was simply an excuse for us to hang out together, talk in our language, discuss Malayalam movies and actors and politics and food and what not! And all this contributed a lot to what made this year very awesome!

15) Ready to be 30 - Last but not the least, I am officially ready to be 30, having ticked off every single thing on my Before-30 list. In my yearly round up from last year, I had mentioned that I was well on track to completing this list by end of 2011, and sure enough, that turned out to be true! The things pending were sky diving, making a film (in this case, completing Mausams), taking parents on a non-Asian holiday and last but not the least, learning to cycle. All of which I managed to do this year! That's truly a very satisfying feeling!

So yes, it's been a wonderful, wonderful year! One which was so special for several reasons!

And since many of the above would not have been possible had it not been for some very wonderful people in my life - family, friends, colleagues, strangers even, here's a BIG THANK YOU to everyone who's stopped to care and reach out in whatever way, big or small! And of course, there is no denying that am incredibly blessed, so here's a HUGE THANK YOU to our dear God as well!

Now it's time for 2012.

228 more to go.

Day 771: Lovely Final 2011 Friday!

2011-12-30T14:04:00.001+08:00

The final Friday of 2011 was wrapped up beautifully!

a) I had the last yoga class for the year and very happily, I finally managed to balance myself in the ekapadangusthasana! Usually am able to balance only with one hand off the floor, and this was the first time I managed to bring both my hands in a namaskar and balance on my toes. The feeling was AWESOME!

b) Post yoga I enjoyed some dim sum on my own at the newly discovered Din Tai Fung followed by chai at Starbucks, of course!

c) Post that, I finally managed to get myself to do some shopping for things I absolutely don't need. You see, once in a while I like to be in touch with my female side and buy myself things that are strictly nice-to-have but not really needed. I wanted to do a bit of it in December, given the sales and all but didn't manage to do anything until now. Today, I bought myself a few earrings (last time I bought earrings was around 5 years ago), a top and a few bangles (last time that happened was surely 7 years ago, other than the Indian bangles my parents and in-laws keep getting for me)!

d) It was the hubby's last day at his workplace of 6.5 years, as he starts now to focus full time on his own company. That obviously was a big deal for him and I was, of course, very proud of him! I went to his office to help him pick up all his stuff and after dropping them at home, we went off for a nice dinner followed by in-home wine drinking to celebrate this milestone in his life!

So a lovely Friday... just the best way to close off the last one in 2011!

229 more to go.

Day 770: Dogs!

2011-12-29T11:22:00.003+08:00

Today, out of the blue, I felt like checking out dogs or pups that are up for adoption in Singapore. Truth is that I am not exactly planning to adopt one because...well.... the hubby is least interested (in fact, he is terrified of them) and I don't want to inflict something so big on him if he is not interested. But I did feel like going and meeting a few, just for the fun of it and also given that I seem to have more time on my hands than usual!

So I went to an animal infirmary and checked out their pups and dogs. Some of them were downright naughty, some were way too huge and one adorable one looked downright terrified of me! Nothing tangible came out of the whole experience I suppose, except well.... the experience of spending a little bit of time with those adorable beings of course.

230 more to go.

Day 769: Tai-Tai Bliss!

2011-12-28T10:19:00.003+08:00

I had another wave of Ta-Tai-sm today. After a day of pretty much no work (I received a grand total of 3 emails only!), I decided to just relax the evening away. By that I mean that I went to Starbucks, I ordered my favourite chai tea latte and sat there, reading a book through the evening.

Without a worry in the world, it was perfect Tai-Tai Bliss!

231 more to go.

Day 768: Shukla Does It Again!

2011-12-27T23:49:00.000+08:00

It's been a while since I shared some of the gems that the hubby comes up with every now and then. Given that there were a couple of these today, and also given the fact that I didn't do anything very fancy during the day other than listen to these, I have decided to dedicate today's post to the hubby and his gems.

The first one was around yoga. Here are a few facts about it, before we get into the gem itself. The hubby and I had signed up for yoga together but I turned out to be far more regular than him. In fact, the instructors at the yoga place always ask me where he has disappeared to. He does pop up at the studio once every 3-4 weeks, make a big deal about his presence there and then wouldn't turn up for another month or so.

Recently, during one of his rare visits to the yoga studio, its lead instructor and founder caught hold of him and asked his help to be part of an advertising video they were making. In fact the conversation went something like...

Instructor: It would be great if you can come and be part of it. All you need to do is demo a few postures.

Hubby: But why me? I can hardly do any posture perfectly.

Instructor: Oh that's alright. We just need people of different shapes or physique for the variety.

Hubby: Oh... and am I supposed to be of the "circular" shape?!

Even though he pushed back on it at first, he was nice enough to join the shoot and contribute his bit. FYI, I didn't join because I was out of town that day.

That was a while ago and we had forgotten all about it. Today when I went for yoga (the hubby was not present as usual), I met the same instructor and she told me that the video was finally ready. I, in turn, conveyed this message to the hubby. This is how the conversation went.

Me: Hey, that video you did for Bikram Yoga... it's ready.

Hubby: Which one?

Me: Erm.... How many videos have you done for Bikram Yoga?

Hubby: Oh.... that one.

Me: Yeah.

Hubby: And?

Me: And nothing. They have put it up in the studio and should be putting it up online soon.

Hubby: *snort*

Me: What?

Hubby: I've done it.... all. I've done it all!

Me: Huh?

Hubby: You know.....if someone asks, "Ever been on Bikram Yoga advertisement?".... I'll be like "Of course! Been there, done that" (Smug.... no wait... SUPER smug)

Me: Yeah, who would have thought? Given that you go there like once a month.

Hubby: Exactly! Even then I am the face of Bikram Yoga. (smugness rise several notches - the eyes begin to pop, the smile widens, the nose twitches, the eyebrows flicker, the ears wiggle....)

Me: Sure.

Hubby: I am Bikram Yoga! (more eye-popping, smile-widening, nose-twitching, eyebrow-flickering, ear-wiggling)

Me: Erm....

Hubby: Bikram is my middle name!

Me: Wha...

Hubby: Shivanu Bikram Shukla! (ta da ta dum doooom! drumroll!)

Me: *speechless*

That was the first incident. The second incident involved my mom-in-law as well. She had recently sported a new hairdo when she went for a party and posted a few pictures of it on Facebook. The hairdo was very evidently different from her usual styles and suited her perfectly. I quite liked it and told her so when I caught her online on chat later. She asked me to ensure that my hubby also sees the pictures when he is free.

Now here's a bit more background about the hubby. He is like the least expressive guy to have hit planet earth. For example, a typical conversation between his parents and him, about something that's exciting to regular people, like the trip to Vegas to pick up the Mausams award, would go like this....

Parents: How was the trip?!!!!!

Hubby: Good.

Parents: What did you guys do?!!!!!

Hubby: Nothing much. Picked up the award.

Parents: How was Vegas?!!!!!!!

Hubby: Nice.

Parents: How was Grand Canyon?!!!!!!

Hubby: Good.

You see what I mean? Usually around this point in the conversation, they would kindly ask him to pass the phone to me and I, in my very articulate self, would describe the entire trip without skipping a single detail.

So yes, the hubby isn't expressive. So when the mom-in-law asked me show the pictures of her new hairdo to her son, I told her that I can definitely show but I wouldn't bet on any great reaction. Mom-in-law agreed that wouldn't be any major reaction, but there still could be something, hopefully on the positive side. Both of us brainstormed on all possible reactions that the picture would elicit from the hubby and decided that "Oh...it's nice", is the best we would be able to squeeze out of him. That seemed like a reasonable hypothesis and I proceeded to test it.

When the hubby came home, I showed him one of the pictures from the party, that featured my mom-in-law and her friend's son.

Me: What do you think?

Hubby: About?

Me: The picture am showing you!

Hubby: Hmmmm....

Me: Anything you notice?

Hubby: Oh! He (the friend's son) looks like Devanand (an old Indian actor) from Guide (an old Indian movie) just before he dies in it.

Me: Uhm. OK. How does your mom look?

Hubby: (looking very closely at the picture) My mom looks like my mom.

Genius.

I called up mom-in-law:

Me: I showed the picture to your son.

She: Oh!!! And.......?

Me: First he commented on your friend's son.... (and I proceeded to repeat the old Indian movie comparisons)

She: Oh!

Me: Yeah.

She: And?

Me: And then I asked... "How does your mom look?"

She: Did he just say "Nice".

Me: Nope.

She: "Good"?

Me: Nope.

She: Oh.... something more?! (obviously one can't blame her for thinking and being very surprised at the thought that there might have been more than a "nice" or "good" this time)

Me: Erm.... (clears throat).... he said "My looks like my mom".

She: What?

Me: "My looks like my mom".

She: Oh.

Me: Yeah.

And then we burst out laughing - at having been way too optimistic about the one and only Shukla, my husband, her son.

232 more to go.

Day 767: 55th!

2011-12-26T22:09:00.000+08:00

It was a totally chilled out day. I did absolutely nothing other than a going for a jog, until the evening.

Then I declared that if I sit at home any longer, am gonna go out of my mind. So the hubby and I went for a stroll around Orchard, mainly around Ion.

After a bit of shopping, an overpriced chicken rice dinner at the foodcourt at Ion and Starbucks tea, we ran out of things to do. That's when the hubby mentioned that there is a nice restaurant and bar on the 55th floor of the Ion. You see, he being the more "happening" one amongst two of us, he knows about these things more than me.

So we went up there to check it out and maybe get something to drink and I realized it was indeed a very beautiful place...! Well, I guess anything at that height oughta be beautiful with all that terrific view, and this was no exception. But even then, I really loved sitting there at that height, watching the view through the fully glass paneled walls and enjoying the flickering lights of the night below! It somehow makes you feel... blessed!

233 more to go.

Day 766: Major Cooking Day!

2011-12-25T09:57:00.000+08:00

And yes, it was!

I was up by 9am and by 12 noon I had made Sweet Corn Chicken Soup, Potato Cutlets, Spicy Fried Chicken and Dhaniya (Coriander) Paneer!

A friend came over for lunch and the three of us - the friend, the hubby and I, ate up all that food as well as the Chocolate Cake from yesterday, over wine and lots of conversation, all the way until 8pm!

Needless to say, am very proud of my feat!

234 more to go.

Day 765: The List is Done! All Set for 30!!!

2011-12-24T14:25:00.000+08:00

It was the P.e.r.f.e.c.t day!

Firstly it was the first day of the first long weekend that's marking the end of the year. We have a three-week holiday weekend (and next weekened too, is another long one), so I was already in a very upbeat mood when I woke up!

To add to the upbeat-ness, the weather was chilly and breezy with short spurts of downpours, which I loved!

Just as the hubby and I were enjoying our breakfast and some tea, watching the beautiful weather outside from our windows, I decided that it was time to tick off my "Before-30" list. I made this list in 2006 - it had 10 items listed in there and I had completed pretty much all of it except the one last elusive thing-to-do - "learn cycling".

I had tried a couple of times to learn cycling over the last few years but wasn't too successful. I would kinda get the balance but then I would fall or ram into a tree and then lose all interest in pursuing it any further. But today, I decided that it was time to set it all right.

Instead of finding a bike rental spot, which is what I usually do, I decided to get myself a bicycle which I can practise riding on any time I want. The hubby dear did some research and figured out that there was a cycle shop right on our street!

So the hubby and I took a short walk, went to the cycle shop, I picked up a bike and the hubby insisted that it would be his gift to me (yes, he did score a few brownie points on that one)! Then we brought it back home but didn't pursue any cycling right then, thanks to yet another downpour that took place.

Instead, we did some reasonably extensive grocery shopping at the newly renovated, huge NTUC in Bishan (which somehow I really like). Once back from the shopping, I decided to bake a cake! Yeah, a chocolate cake!

After successfully baking some yummy chocolate cup cakes which were then topped up with whipped cream and thick chocolate syrup, making it as rich as it could possibly be, well... we ate it all up!

While we relaxed after sufficiently stuffing ourselves with chocolate cake, I noticed that the rain had stopped and decided that it was probably a good time to test out the new bike.

So the hubby and I went to the nearby HDB block and I started out to try cycling with some good guidance from the hubby. After about an hour, I seemed to have gotten the hang of it and after about 2 hours, there I was... cycling left, right and centre! Sure, I could be a lot more confident and less panicky especially during tough turns, uneven grounds etc., but I can now officially cycle!

And with that I am now, officially, all set to turn 30 (about 8 months in advance)! Yayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!!!!

I love that I could finally completely ticked off the list! The feeling is OH-SO-AWESOME!!!

Just as we were getting back home after the cycling expedition, there was another round of very strong chilly, breeze. The hubby and I spent some minutes outside doing nothing but enjoying that lovely, lovely, weather!

To celebrate the fabulous achievement of finally being able to cycle, we went out to Clarke Quay for dinner.

And that's when we unexpectedly got caught in the Christmas Eve crowds and cheer! The ridiculous traffic jam and the never-before-seen crowd at Clarke Quay (oh, also the never-before-seen-bizarrely-dressed crowd) were quite fascinating!

Close to midnight, we noticed that the crowds were automaticaly merging towards the central area near Clarke Quay, right next to where we were having dinner. And just at midnight, there was this uproar - cheers, screams, whistles, party poppers, foam sprays and a fantastic welcoming of the Christmas day! There was no count down or even a big clock giving the time, but the crowd just took it upon themselves to create a huge wave of vocal welcome! It was amazing and I couldn't stop smiling!

That was the perfect end to a perfect day!

It was perfect for the beautiful weather, my new bike, my first baking expedition and the successful chocolate cake, the fact that I can finally bike myself, a completely ticked-off Before-30 list, spending an entire day with the hubby - not just watching TV or working on our respective computers through the day but spending a whole day together - shopping, cycling, eating, chatting, walking and enjoying the breeze; and last but not the least, being part of the wonderful Christmas welcome cheer!

I felt terrific - absolutely on top of the world!

235 more to go.

Day 764: Jog, Rain, Shopping, Cabbie, Holmes, Music, Wine & Others!

2011-12-23T11:58:00.003+08:00

What an unexpectedly eventful day!

After doing whatever work was there to be done, which was very little, to be honest, thanks to 95% of the folks being out of office, and following it up with a quick jog, I decided to go out and do some grocery shopping. The first long weeked of the year end is coming up and I plan to cook!

So I got Jumilah along, and together we went to good old Mustafa. Now, shopping in Mustafa is rather eventful in itself and given that I had a long list of things to buy, it turned out to be more eventful than I would liked it to be. We basically ended up walking up and down that humungous building and its newly done extensions, a thousand times!

After that long but successful shopping, came the next challenge - finding a cab to get back. It was pouring cats and dogs and considering Singapore's downright pathetic taxi availability situation these days, it turned to be a true horror. But interestingly enough, I wasn't impatient or fidgety. I kinda enjoyed the rain, the panic of the people around that it induced, the fact that the wind blew the rains to even where I was standing which was initially considered a pretty well covered area, watching Jumilah use all her energy to flag any passing car etc.

Finally it was Jumilah, the superstar, who managed to successfully get a cab. After loading all the bags into the taxi, we had an interesting journey back home in the lashing rain, catching a glimpse of the floods that seem to plague Singapore these days and having a great conversation with the cabbie who was really one of the nicest cabbies ever!

At home Jumilah and I made ourselves some hot tea and spicy pakoras!

Later at night, it was time for Sherlock Holmes with the hubby but not before a dinner at Nandos. The movie was fun and it was even more nice that after the movie, getting a cab was not an issue at all! After the cab hunting extravaganza this evening, that was more than a welcome change!

But the night was not to end there. The hubby and I decided to go through our music playlists and play all the wonderful songs that we enjoy, and that too over some good white wine! Thus we sat up listening to songs, one after the other, well into the night!

It was an evertful, perfect day!

236 more to go.

Day 763: Me-Time & SK-II folks!

2011-12-22T17:31:00.000+08:00

Another fabulous day!

After work, I dropped my laptop home (OK... I didn't drop my laptop home but Jumilah came over to the MRT station to pick it up, making me feel like a princess... but hey, the damn thing was super heavy and I wanted to walk around Singapore without lugging it around!) and then went off to Orchard road.... to soak in the holiday cheer, watch all the happy people around, window shop and generally feel awesome.

I did all the above for about an hour and did feel super awesome! I looked at all the decorations lining up the road and in and outside all the malls; walked through a couple of malls, stopping at pretty much every other shop watching all the sales buzz, analysizing the products,; watching people chatting, shopping, taking pictures, holding hands, hugging and very obviously feeling on top of the world, just like me; so on and so forth! It was some very quality "me-time"!

After that I went my SK-II ex-colleague's house - actually she was my ex-boss and is a very good friend who is now expecting a little one into her life very soon. A few others from the old SK-II team who are still around in the company joined in and we had a blast, chatting for more than 5 hours straight, well into the night! It was wonderful to catch up with what's left of this wonderful team from all those years ago!

237 more to go.

Day 762: A Musical Idea!

2011-12-21T19:32:00.001+08:00

Interesting day, coz I happened to do something that I don't often. Which is basically, brainstorming for a music video! It all happened by chance. I was chatting with a friend who is quite the musician and I had this idea for a song for him to compose (I wish I could do it myself but God, very obviously, had not given me the ability to make songs or anything that would remotely sound like a song!) Anyway, so we discussed the idea for a bit and then I got super excited about it and I started brainstorming for a video that we could make once the song would be done. Well, given that the ball is completely in my musician friend's court, am not quite sure if and when the song would be made, but for today I had a real ball thinking of a song and a music video, something that I had never done before!

238 more to go.

Day 761: Yoga Joy, Figure Skating & Some Yearly Reflection!

2011-12-20T23:39:00.000+08:00

Warning: Contains some hardcore philosophical stuff at the end.

So the holiday joy continues.... which basically means, just like yesterday, I continue to feel upbeat and I continue to beam with no particular reason to do so!

But some highlights are:

a) Spreading yoga joy to a good friend. He is leaving the country pretty soon and given that he is a fitness freak, focused on running, biking and swimming, I decided that he must have a taste of hot yoga before he leaves! And so I got him down to the studio and successfully got him to try a class. And he loved it too! So that was my good deed for the day!

b) Watching the figure skating performers at Novena. Every year, if any of my family members are in town, I usually take them to watch this. It takes place at the Novena Square Velocity mall, for about 5 days until Christmas and the performers usually come from Australia. Every single year, the performances had been breathtaking and today was no different! I watched them, mesmerized! I also missed my family back at home - my mom, in-laws and even my aunt who had been here one year or the other, watching this with me. But missing someone is not necessarily bad I suppose. It just means you are remembering some good times... so that's nice as well!

c) Watching the Google Zeitgeist video that shows a review of 2011. I loved this one! Sure, you can say that it is just Google marketing itself ... blah blah.... but there is no denying that there are a few great moments in there and the music is to die for! Watch it if you haven't done so yet.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAIEamakLoY

And that's the best part about this calendar year process. Imagine how it would be if there were no years or birthdays or any such time related flags that pop up on a regular basis?

We might just go on and on and on without stopping and looking back. Or for that matter, thinking about what next. In my head, that would be a pretty horrendous situation.

But good news is that we do have regular time related reminders. Every time a year ends, we can look back and reflect. So much to think about, smile about, many precious instances to store in our heads forever and several to be forgotten and letting go. It's a wonderful process, really. It heals and builds hope. And that's what makes it so beautiful!

OK, if I have completely oversold the "year" as a concept above, well... am not gonna apologize. I still love it! And hey, you were warned!

239 more to go.

Day 760: Holiday Week!

2011-12-19T23:15:00.000+08:00

So the holidays are officially here! It is pretty evident from the relatively empty office, the long lunch I had with a colleague, the 50% reduced number of emails in my inbox, the longer periods of day dreaming etc.

So am super upbeat as such! I think I was just smiling through the day without any apparent reason than the fact that it's holiday time! Ah, this yearly joy!

To add on, the lunch with the colleague ....actually friend more than colleague... lunch with her was awesome! Being fellow Mallus, we went to Swaadhisht and had the most amazing meal over an ever more amazing conversation!

In the evening I hit yoga after a gap of a week with the stupid viral fever. But the class was awesome too and I thoroughly enjoyed myself!

So even through the mrt and the walk back home, I was just beaming.

Bliss!

240 more to go.

Day 759: Home Yoga, MI4, Mentalist, Maggi & Such!

2011-12-18T23:14:00.002+08:00

Awesome day, really!

It started with me waking up and deciding that I badly needed yoga to fix all those muscles that were sore from too many hours of sleeping and doing nothing else. At pretty much the same time, I also decided that I am too weak to hit the hot yoga room.

So there was only one thing to do. Go through the yoga routine at home!

And I did just that!

Interestingly enough it was better than I had expected it to be! I had expected that without the heat in the hot room as well as the fact that I had not been to the class for a week, I would be pretty stiff. But I wasn't, yay! So I had a really good home yoga session!

Post that it was another round of the Mentalist marathon with the hubby. That too over multiple rounds of Maggi 2 minute noodles - yummmm! Sure, they are super unhealthy, but hey, I did home yoga this morning!

Post Mentalist marathon, it was time to watch the talk of the town - Mission Impossible 4! And man, that didn't disappoint at all! What a brilliantly executed movie!! Seriously jaw dropping stunts in there!

So overall it was a very pleasant Sunday and by the end of it, I also felt like the flu was finally going off. So then the pleasant Sunday turned into pretty much a perfect one!

241 more to go.

Day 758: Patch Up!

2011-12-17T21:33:00.000+08:00

OK, I didn't patch up with an old friend or anything as dramatic as that. This patch up simply refers to a patch up shoot we had for IOK. Actually now that I think of it, it is less of a patch up and more of a reshoot.

The background is that we had one scene shot entirely at night and then my editor (the same guy who edited Mausams) had this really cool edit suggestion with the only requirement that this scene should be re-shot during day time!

Ah!

But for the sake of a cool edit, one gotta do these things.

So three of us got together this morning and had a re-shoot! It was pretty awesome fun as usual! Oh, I must mention that I was in front of the camera for this scene, so that was fun in its own way....in spite of the fact that I was all snotty and sniffly from the fever that had given to just a flu.

But we had an awesome shoot... which was of course followed by hours of random conversation - the one unmissable thing when Malayalis get together!

Post the shoot (and the conversation that followed) which lasted for about 6 hours, I felt dead tired. Like drop dead tired.

So I crashed on the bed for the rest of the day and night, only getting up once in between for a quick dinner.

Yeah... so the patch up shoot got me incredibly tired, yes. But I was also incredibly happy! Yes yes!

242 more to go.

Day 757: The Mentalist!

2011-12-16T22:34:00.002+08:00

Yes, that's the new American series on Warner Bros that I've fallen in love with!

I like that its a crime investigation series but one that doesn't take itself too seriously!

After a long day of work .... it was long because there were a million things to complete before bosses and my team went off for their holidays.... I got back home and watched several episodes of The Mentalist back to back!

It was my way of ending a very nice week - sure I fell sick and it was hectic and all that - but I really did enjoy each and every day!

After all, it was a December week and the last proper working week of the year!

243 more to go.

Day 756: Me vs. VF!

2011-12-15T21:01:00.000+08:00

This is more of a "Must Go On" part 2!

In other words, today too I had to fight with Viral Fever and make sure that I emerge as the ultimate winner. Well....technically, the fever was down, thanks to the wonderful medications from my doctor, but I still had a flu... so yeah, it was me vs. Viral Flu.

Given that I were to have meetings from 1pm all the way to 9pm, I decided to the morning off and get to the office by noon only. And my idea was that the morning off will not only give me some more of the much needed rest, but it will also get me some exercise. I knew that no exercising will happen if I shift it to the evening, thanks to my ridiculous meeting schedule....so I had to ensure that I finish it all off in the morning itself.

So after waking up late enough and getting sufficient rest in the process, I made my way to the gym and burnt around 300 calories. That already kick started the day on a great note!

When I reached my office at 12 noon, I was full of energy and was able to bulldoze my way through the entire day - all through until 9pm without even a single Starbucks Chai Late break!

And I felt awesome! Sure, I was still sick and that part of it was awful but mentally I felt really on top of the world. I felt Oh-So-Productive!

And then I concluded that in the war between Me vs. Viral Fever, I have emerged as the ultimate winner!

Yay!

244 more to go.

Day 755: The Doc!

2011-12-14T20:37:00.002+08:00

There is this doctor in Singapore whom I absolutely love and I decided that I must write about her on the blog!

She is the chief GP at the Healthway Medical Centre in Novena, which is my company's official health centre for its employees. So I end up going there every now and then.

Today too I ended up going there, given the newly caught flu and sudden descent of an ridiculous amount of fatigue and chillness in the afternoon.

This doc, as usual, was in her exuberant self and just talking to her made me feel a lot better! SThere's something very pleasant about her personality and she sounds genuinely concerned about you, which you obviously appreciate when you are ill! he must be meeting so many sick people every day, but she always smiles, cracks jokes and makes this clinic-going experience a lot more pleasant than it would have been otherwise!

Thanks to her gift for lifting my spirits up, I always leave the clinic feeling like a child who's been given a candy to compensate for the pain of going to the doctor. And this time was no different either! I left the clinic slightly better already!

And hey, the best part is not just her jovial outlook and interpersonal skills that make you feel so happy and less sick, but she is actually SO good at what she does!

My personal experience (as well as my mom's and my hubby's who have also been to her) is that she is excellent with her diagnosis and her prescriptions. She has always cured everything, pretty much quickly also! And she never prescribes more medicines than absolutely needed.

Even this time, my viral fever (that's what I was diagnosed with) dipped within a few hours, thanks to her medicines!

In short, she is one person who's had quite some impact in my life without probably realizing it herself and I decided that today's post would belong to her, for making me leave a medical clinic with a smile!

245 more to go.

Day 754: Must Go On!

2011-12-13T20:26:00.001+08:00

I had a total "Must Go On" attitude today!

By that I mean that I refused to succumb to a stupid flu that's been cropping and decided that I will work as hard as possible and also get my fair share of exercise in spite of that sore throat or the running nose.

So that's exactly what I did.

Work was crazy to say the least. Everyone, including my bosses, will be off on holiday as of next week, so ever single thing had to be completed within this week. Which meant a ton of stuff to get through! With a flu that wasn't easy but I refused to let the flu spoil my cheer at work, which is a rather cheery cheer thanks to the December spirit! I managed to finish off quite a chunk of work and I felt pretty great about it!

Then I got back home and went on a 4km brisk walk. A run or hot yoga would have been a bit much given my health conditions, so I just stuck to brisk walking. That still counts as exercise in my books, so I felt super proud of myself once that was done!

So yes, I told myself that I must go on no matter what and I did! Happy!

246 more to go.

Day 753: A Singapore Walk!

2011-12-12T20:26:00.004+08:00

Today was one of those days when I fell in love with Singapore, again. I have been living in this country for the last 13 years and every now and then I take a step back and enjoy everything that's around me!

It happened today because post yoga, I walked from Raffles City to the Singapore Cricket Club for a friend's birthday celebration.

The weather was very pleasant - very cool and breezy, just before the rains. And as I walked on the very deserted road, I had the magnificent view of the Singapore skyline ahead of me. No matter how many times I look at it, it still makes me all wonder-eyed!

The view, the roads, the walk that made me smile!

As I walked towards the cricket club, listening to my music, enjoying the cool breeze and taking in the view, I couldn't stop smiling.

It simply felt perfect.

Yes, even a 100% urban city state can make you feel that way even after a decade of being in it. I guess all you need to do is take the some time to appreciate it!

So yes, my highlight for the day was this lovely Singapore walk!

247 more to go.

Day 752: Social Butterfly, Masala Chai Maker & Script Writer

2011-12-11T13:33:00.002+08:00

The productivity and fun from the Saturday continued to Sunday! Here are the highlights:

a) I attended two (yeah not one but TWO) birthday parties today, which made me feel like such a social buttery! Phew! First it was the birthday party of one of my closest friend’s daughter. It was a pretty grand event, it being her 1st birthday, with an elaborate buffet lunch at Shahi Maharani. Not only did I stuff myself with all the yummy chaats, tandoori dishes and desserts, I also managed to mingle around pretty well with the 70-80 people who had turned up. It was quite fun! Then at night, I had another round of birthday celebrations. This time, it was that of a close friend from college, and it was more of a small group, intimate but nice celebration. We had a great time chatting away into the night, enjoying home made mojitos, vegan cup cakes and watching cricket intermittently (India won, yay!)

b) Anyone who’s been reading this blog would know that I am a great lover of chai. Masala chai, to be precise. But I had never made chai, let alone masala chai. Yeah I know. It is quite a shocker that I have made chicken fry and upma and seyal and vermicelli and all those fancy stuff but not chai. But these things happen. However, today, things were to change. For once and for all! OK… so this is what happened… When we got back home after the first birthday party, the hubby readily declared that he wanted to have chai. I gave him a dirty look and then ignored him. You see, today’s Jumilah’s off-day which the hubby is very well aware of, so such declarations implying that I need to get working on what he needs, were not very acceptable. But then I realized that the mention of “chai” has gotten me to crave for chai as well. Argh. So I decided that it was time. It was time to make my own masala chai. After googling up some recipes, I got down to work. Within a few minutes I had a boiling cup of chai in front of me. To be honest, I was a bit hesitant to taste it at first. What if it’s really horrid? The inability to make masala chai would leave me scarred for life! But then I realized that the chai was smelling really good. Like really, really good! That encouraged me to take a sip. Slurp.. I sipped. Ahhhh…. I exhaled, in absolute elation and complete contentment! It was the perfect masala chai! Perfect. Just the way I like it! Slurp… Ahhh…. Slurp… Ahhhh…! I felt like Zakir Hussain in the Taj Mahal teabag ads. It was the next level of awesomeness! I am now officially a Masala Chai maker. And the realization that I can now make masala chai any time I crave for it.... pure AWESOMEness!

c) Last but not the least, I also progressed with the script of my next feature film and completed about 6 scenes (about 35%) of the script. I had a great time writing it, imagining the scenes in my head and enacting it as I went by. And the fact that I reached about 35% made me feel super good!

So yes a Social Butterfly, a Masala Chai Maker and a Script Writer. All in 1 day!

248 more to go.

Day 751: Seyal, Upma, Yoga, Nando's, Fun!

2011-12-10T12:59:00.003+08:00

It was a pretty cool Saturday! One which was completely satisfying because of the range of things I ended up doing, most of which were rather productive.

It all started with me making a breakfast of Seyal Dabroti, a Sindhi dish (of bread in a thick gravy) that I had taken a fancy for at my favourite restaurant Kailas Parbat, and which I was determined to reproduce at home. And that came out pretty well! So the hubby and I had a yummy breakfast and chilled out for a while – watching TV, Facebook-ing, reading and such.

Then it was lunch time and I had this really strong craving for some Upma. Not just any Upma, but the carrot-tomato Upma that my mom makes. So I called my mom up, got the recipe, and made that. That too came out pretty yummy, much to my satisfaction… and a bit of surprise! To be honest … to try making TWO dishes in a day and both turning out well was something I had not quite expected. So that was indeed awesome!

After all that eating of Seyal Dabroti and Carrot-Tomato Upma since morning, it was time to burn it all off. So the hubby and I made our way to our Bikram yoga class. There we bumped into the founder of the studio who expressed her extreme surprise at seeing the hubby back in the studio after “ages”! She looked more surprised than she would have, had she bumped into a dinosaur. It was quite a sight, to say the least. After the hubby blabbered out enough unconvincing excuses for his absence from the hot room for all these months, we proceeded for our class.

And the class turned out to be pretty good for me and I felt on top of the world!

Post the burning of all those calories, it was time for putting all of it back again. For dinner, we met some friends, and went to my favourite place Nando’s for some of their fiery spiced grilled chicken (reasonably healthy) topped with their fiery spiced French fries (anything but healthy). That was super yummy and I felt even more on top of the world!

To wind off a pretty great day so far, all of us went and watched this movie called Ladies vs. Ricky Bahl. It was decently entertaining, and had some fantastic performances by the cast. So I enjoyed that too!

Nett, a pretty great day of cooking (not once, but TWICE), yoga, enjoying great food & company and generally feeling on top of universe!

249 more to go.

Day 750: A December-ish Friday!

2011-12-09T14:40:00.001+08:00

The holiday season is here, it's even reached the office which has started to look emptier now! And that already puts me in pretty good spirits! Oh how I love December!

And everything through the day felt like a mini celebration almost...

The fact that the office was pretty empty and that I hardly had any meetings...

Ticking everything off my to-do list at work, now that there were no meetings to distract me...

Enjoying Jumilah's really good egg curry with chappathis for lunch...

Getting out of office earlier than usual....

Having an awesome yoga class! Initially I was dreading it because I hadn't been to class for more than a month, thanks to all the travelling, but I had the most amazing time! It really felt like all my body parts were fixed proper and that all the strain from countless hours in a flight were removed once and for all! I even got a "that's such a beautiful posture" for my Rabbit pose! Yay!

Having really yummy soups, noodles and dim sums from Din Tai Fung at Raffles City, with the hubby. This was the discovery of the day... I have no clue why I hadn't tried their food before because it's just mindblowing! Seriously yummmm!

In short, a perfectly December-ish happy and smiley Friday!

And with that, we only have 250 more to go!

Day 749: Idea!!!!

2011-12-08T14:21:00.002+08:00

One of those days when the birth of a new idea gets you so thoroughly excited that the day just becomes one rocking beauty!

It happened over a chat with my editor from Mausams, and by the end of the chat both of us were totally inspired and kicked to get working on it!

Of course, at this point in time it is very hard to say for sure that this would see the light of the day, but as far as the day is concerned, thinking and discussing about this idea made it a totally awesome one!

251 more to go.

Day 748: Non Stop 3.4!

2011-12-07T20:48:00.001+08:00

Now that I am back in Singapore with no more travelling or any other distraction for a long while, I decided that it's high time I got back to exercising. The last time I got any kind exercise was probably three weeks ago! Sigh!

So I decided to go for a run. Take my usual 3.4km route. And here's what happened...

I start to run.

And I run....

And then I realize that I have already passed by my usual first resting spot and I am not tired at all!

You see, after every kilometer or so, I usually pause for about a minute, catch my breath and then run again. However, this time around, that regular first resting spot of mine was well past but I was still going strong!

Pretty amused by this unexpected turn of events, I continue to run...

And I continue to run....

And then, the second resting spot also whizzes past and I still am not that tired. Tired, yes. But not that tired.

And then the mind games begin. One part of me wants to run the remaining distance, about 1.3-1.4kms without stopping at all. Another part immediately starts to feel tired, more mental than physical for sure, but it definitely starts to feel like I wont be able to make the remaining distance without stopping.

But one gotta give it a go.

So I continue to run....

And I continue to run....

And I continue to run...

And now things are very obviously getting hard. I feel my heart in my mouth. I hear my heartbeats in some seriously loud decibels. I begin to sweat like a pig.

But then there was only about 500 mts or so left...

So I run.........

And I run........

And then suddenly it ends. Like an oasis in a desert, the swimming pool of my condominium, appears right in front of me. That's the official stopping point of all my runs.

I made it!!!

Non stop 3.4 kms!!!

Hasn't happened in more than a year or so!

Yeah baby!

Never gonna do that again because it felt so bloody hard, but for today, it was a rocking experience and I feel super awesome about it!

252 more to go.

Day 747: Kickass Welcome Back!

2011-12-06T20:24:00.004+08:00

It was indeed a great day!

We got back from US late last night but still managed to go to office in the morning. Not just that, I managed to be productive through the day as well! So that made me feel pretty awesome about myself!

And on top of that, what was really cool was that there were sooooo many congratulatory and "welcome" back messages buzzing on my phone, email, chat and Facebook through the day! People were seriously SO sweet! Everyone wanted to know how the festival went and what exactly did we do there etc. etc. and I gave my looooong narrations over and over and over again, and not getting bored of it even once!

It was like living through the event all over again.... more so, after sharing all the pictures later in the evening which led to another burst of comments and messages. All of it felt pretty awesome and it was as if I were still back in Vegas!

Indeed a very kickass welcome back, it was! I must say I have such lovely people round me!

253 more to go.

Days 743 - 746: Nevada Film Festival, Las Vegas!

2011-12-06T11:44:00.007+08:00

2 - 5 December, 2011

Wow... Where can I start?!

The last 4 days have been one of the most incredible phases in this entire 1000-day journey I must say! I really had the best time ever!

This is because over the last 4 days, the hubby and I went all the way to Las Vegas and back, where we picked up a Silver Screen award from the Nevada Film Festival for my little film, Mausams!!! The fact that we had won the award in itself was cloud 9 material but the fact that I could make it there and pick the award myself made it go way beyond cloud 9!

There is lots to write but before we start, let me say that given that all the time zones are very much screwed up, am gonna write the fantastic stories of the last 4 days in one single post.

Ok... So here we go... We started from Singapore on Friday, December 2nd morning. Well.. Ridiculously early flight actually... 6am! Which meant waking up and getting to the airport by 4am! But what was really cool was the flight we took, Delta airlines, turned out to be pretty good! They had a very good personal entertainment system with the video and audio quality beating even Singapore airlines, which was a real surprise!

So yes, the journey started on a very positive note and it made the almost 7 hour flight to Tokyo very pleasant! I ended up watching 2 films - Crazy, Stupid Love and X Men First Class, both of which I enjoyed! It was also pretty cool that the hubby and I were to make this journey together because it was like we had all the time in the world over the super long flight to catch up with each other, which was a very welcome change after some very hectic time we had to go through recently!

We had a 2.5 hours stopover at Tokyo, which we spent by walking around the airport, getting some good Japanese curry udon at a food court we ended up at and laughing at this silly event where the dear hubby tried to communicate to a Japanese sales girl in sign language and weird noises only to be responded back in perfect English!

Then it was time for a much longer flight to Los Angeles (almost 12 hours). This time the Delta flight was different - it wasn't as nice as the flight we took to Tokyo and the entertainment program list wasn't as extensive and good. However it was still pretty decent if we do not compare. I tried to sleep through the flight as much as possible and whenever I couldn't, I ended up watching a movie (Juno, which I thought was terrific) or reading my book (The Immortals of Meluha). Overall I continued to enjoy the journey!

And then we reached Los Angeles. After a pretty quick immigration process, the hubby and I ended up walking from one terminal to another in search of our next flight. Under normal circumstances this would have been annoying but given the very pleasant weather in LA and the fact that we had 5 hours to kill in transit time, we enjoyed the walk. We also had our first of many cups of Starbucks Chai Latte from the USA on this trip, followed by breakfast at the typically American Ruby's dinette.

And then, we got to the final leg of the journey, the flight to Las Vegas!

I had gotten a window seat for this flight and I could get a glimpse of the Vegas strip, the desert landscape around, the hilly terrain beyond that and the snow capped mountains at a further distance. All if it looked pretty nice from up in the air and I decided that I already love Vegas! Oh, I must also say that I was very amused to see so many slot machines even within the airport! Obviously Vegas makes sure people gamble until the very last lap of their visit!

Once we got out of the airport, we took a pretty long cab ride to JW Marriott in Summerlin, where the film festival was to take place. Summerlin is a few miles away from the strip, in a very affluent neighbourhood, with absolutely nothing touristy about it. I enjoyed the cab ride, taking in the lovely hills at the distance that seemed to have more colours on them than I had ever seen on any mountain range before, and I fell in love with the very lovely (or highly "manicured" as the hubby calls it) suburbs of Summerlin when we got there.

The JW Marriott resort was a pretty, sprawling establishment, set up in a very peaceful, quiet area with lovely views of the mountains! A special mention goes to the tastefully done up Chritsmas tree that greeted us at the entrance! To add to all the loveliness, we also got upgraded to a room with a balcony from where we enjoyed the gorgeous sunset (at 4:30pm!)!

The lovely sunset from our balcony!

We napped for a couple of hours to get over the fatigue and then made our way to the welcome dinner organized by the festival folks, at an Irish bar within the resort premises (by the way the resort is also home to the Rampart casino, since apparently no hotel in Vegas can possibly exist without a casino!)

The welcome dinner was interesting, to say the least. It was my first experience of being part of a large film group and I can totally get why people really take to this field so much. We, from Singapore, had travelled the longest to get to the festival but there were also others from Germany, Netherlands and Italy while the bulk was from within US and a few from Canada. Within minutes of getting to the dinner, we realized that the kinda characters and stories you come across at these events are just beyond this world!

There were full time film students and full blown professionals in the field, or others, like me, who took to films in a completely unplanned manner and had struck gold with an entry to a film festival. Even if not in films, most held a job in a creative field, be it being a writer, or animation artist, or singer etc. while we happened to be pretty much the only ones having a fully non creative working life. The youngest film maker was a teenage girl whose animation film had entered the festival (and interestingly enough, a film whose script her dad had written, has also entered the festival) while there were a few 60+ film makers as well. At one end, there were people, like me, who've made films with pretty much no budget, and right at the other end, there were others who had taken a million euros from their own pockets to make their films, very much unlike me! This million-euro person is an Italian multi millionaire singer-actress, one of the most fascinating people we met at the festival, thanks to her incredible sense of humour, her way of speech and her absolutely amusing balance of down-to-earth mannerisms together with her diva air! There were those who have been pursuing film making for years, there were complete freshers, there were stories of a single film being worked on for 5 years and stories of films that were cooked up overnight. There were also films where the same person had written, directed, produced, acted, edited etc. which was pretty incredible. There were comments like "My editor is an Academy award winner" and a response of "Oh, mine works at Burger King." So on and so forth. You get the deal.

In short, it was fascinating! I loved, like absolutely LOVED, the experience!

A special mention goes to the lovely old couple from Canada whom we had the opportunity to spend maximum time with. The husband had worked as a sales representative for about 30 years after which he took to writing children's books, novels, writing and directing stage plays, and recently, comedy films. The wife, a pharmacist, has been married to him for more than 30 years and is very supportive of the husband's newly found passion. I found them adorable! They have travelled very widely and had a plethora of stories to share and I found them incredibly fun to talk to! One thing that the husband said, stuck with me. He said that all this writing and film making etc came to his life pretty late and that he would give his very best to take his passion forward for the next few remaining years. So he was determined to write as much as possible, make as many films as possible, visit as many festivals as possible – in other words, give his best shot at living the remaining years to the fullest! His passion and determination and realistic sense of time – I found them admirable!

After that very interesting dinner, I hit the Jacuzzi (yeah, they actually have Jacuzzi baths in every room!) to get over the exhaustion of the long flight, before calling it a night.

3 December, 2011

We woke up at 5:30 in the morning, because we had to reach a place called Palace Station by 7am, from where we were to be picked up for our trip to the Grand Canyon. We had decided to squeeze in a visit to this wonder of the world, so that it feels like we have made good use of the arm and the leg that we spent in making such a short trip all the way to the US. We also booked ourselves on an airplane to get to the canyon because otherwise it would take about 5 hours to drive there one way and we simply didn't have the time for that. So yes, we were all set for our Grand Canyon trip!

It was freaking cold in Vegas that morning, unusually so, from what I understand. Even the cabbie was complaining about the cold, saying that it was the worst he has experienced in his several years in the city.

We layered ourselves sufficiently in warm clothes but even then, when I opened the door of the cab to get off at Palace station, I reeled from the shockingly chilly wind and cold. A quick chai at the Starbucks helped a bit to warm ourselves up and we waited to be picked up for the trip. Soon the mini van arrived and the driver, a very nice African American, gave us the humungously disappointing news that the trip to the canyon has been cancelled. We were to take an airplane to the canyon and that would no longer be possible because well, apparently the runway got snowed in the night before.

Snow at the Grand Canyon? I was quite surprised because I had no idea that this part of the world got that cold! Anyway, it was disappointing. The van driver told us that we could call up the tour operators and ask for a refund or shift the trip to another date. Well…!

Just as the van was about to take off after delivering this very unwelcome news, I got the driver to stop and asked for a lift to the Vegas strip, which is the most happening part of the town. The van was anyway going around all the hotels on the strip to tell the other tourists about this disappointing news and I didn't want to stick on at Palace Station, which was only a pick up point for us and was really in the middle of nowhere. Plus it was FRIKKING cold. I needed some place warm to sit down in and sort this mess of a tour out!

The nice guy agreed to drop us anywhere we liked on the strip, so we hopped on. On top of taking us around, he gave us a running commentary about the sights around. So we got a chauffeur and a tour guide, all in one! When he took a break from the commentary, I called up the tour operators and changed the tour to an airplane "non-landing" one, which basically meant that it will take us around the grand canyon by air, so we can see all the sights from the sky, but will not be dropping us anywhere on the canyon. And that trip would take off at 1:40pm. We thought something was better than nothing and decided to proceed with it.

After booking this back up trip, we thanked the van driver and got off at the Luxor on the Vegas strip. Every hotel/casino on the strip follows some theme or the other and the one for Luxor was anything and everything Egyptian. We spent some time there taking pictures and looking around. Then we decided to walk down the strip. Given that it was early in the morning and that too freakishly cold, there was hardly anyone on the roads. But we did manage to catch some typically Vegas sights of drunken couples, men so high on drinks/drugs that they cant stop screaming, brochures lying around that gave lavish information on ... hmmm... every single thing a tourist could possible want in Vegas etc. etc.

After strolling around for a bit we ended up at New York New York, another hotel/casino – this one based on well, New York.

We had a typical American breakfast buffet here and started to contemplate about our options. It was only 9am or so in the morning and the 1:30pm canyon trip seemed too far away. Both of us were being hit by severe jetlag and lack of sleep, and I was pretty sure I had no energy to go around the strip anymore, neither did I feel like I will be up and about until 1:30. Going back to our hotel and returning also didn't seem like a viable option because it was so far away.

So I decided that it might be worthwhile to check with some other tour company on whether they have a good tour option to the Canyon – something earlier and maybe on helicopter (which will not have landing issues at the canyon but our original tour operators were sold out on their helicopter tours for the day). Thankfully New York New York had a very efficient tour desk and they quickly booked us up on a helicopter trip that was to start at 10:30am. That was perfect!

So at 10:30 a van picked us up and dropped us at the airbase. There, together with three other couples, we boarded the helicopter to the canyon. And then, I had one of the most amazing times of my life! It was my first time on a helicopter – that itself was pretty cool but seriously, the landscape around Vegas is just stunning! I do believe that the whole "sin city" tag has completely overwhelmed everything else about Vegas because it was just S.T.U.N.N.I.N.G and people should seriously talk about that more!

The view beyond the city!

It was absolutely breathtaking to see the smaller canyons, the desert, the snowcapped mountains, the volcanos, the lakes, all of which makes this interesting collage of browns, reds, white, blues and greens across the ground. I think I had my mouth open in wonder pretty much through the trip!

The clouds hovering around made all kinds of interesting visuals on the ground and I couldn't stop clicking pictures. There was Lake Las Vegas and Lake Mead and Hoover Dam, all presenting fantastic sights of their own! Lake Mead especially came in a variety of blues ranging from tropical turquoise to startlingly deep shades!

And then after the lakes and the hoover dam etc., suddenly, the Grand Canyon appeared right in front of us! Not just the Grand Canyon, but the Grand Canyon covered in the first fresh snow of the year!

It was surreal.

But even before I could take in the entire sight, the helicopter descended into the canyon… we were actually within the canyon, losing height rapidly, closing in on to the river below! It was amazing!

Descending into the canyon!

The chopper landed about two-thirds down in the canyon… we had the tall walls of the canyon on one side and the river roaring away a few hundred feet below. The snow had not reached into the depths of the canyon and hence it was pretty dry and nice where we landed. Here, the pilot, a really nice chap, set up some snacks and opened a bottle of champagne. We spent close to 30 minutes there… in that very peaceful place where you can hear nothing but the roar of the wind above and the gush of the river below, sipping a glass of champagne and feeling on top of the world!

Then it was time to go back. We hopped back in to the chopper and it took off, slowly ascending through the canyon. This time, as we left the river and ridges of the canyon behind, suddenly out of the blue, once again the spectacularly snow covered canyon platforms above came into view. And I literally had goosebumps! Within a few seconds, right in front of us, there was just an endless expanse of snow covering the Grand Canyon! It was spectacular!

The spectacular Grand Canyon covered in snow!

The journey back to the airbase was as visually satisfying as it was when we went. Every mile seemed to have something to offer! We took a quick fuel break at one point in time in the middle of the desert, which was also a really beautiful place to stop! On the way back, we also got another very good look at the Vegas Strip. It was all so amazingly wonderful!

The city of Las Vegas slowly sneaks up from behind the mountains...

After the chopper ride, we were dropped back at the strip and we opted to get down at Bellagio. It was yet another hotel/casino but what was fascinating about this one was the wonderful musical fountain outside the building. I thoroughly enjoyed that – we watched two rounds of the musical demonstrations of the foundation – once to a opera song and another to a Celine Dion song. Both were wonderful and despite the cold, I thoroughly enjoyed it!

After some more walking around through the strip and lunch at the hubby's favourite Mexican food chain Chipotle, we decided that were both too tired for anything more for the day. So we took a cab and got back to the hotel at about 4pm. A special mention to the wonderful Filipino cabbie – a thorough gentleman and great conversationalist!

After a little bit of rest, it was time for the Nevada Film Festival Awards Night!

I got dressed up in a sari while the hubby suited himself up and we made our way to Marquis ballroom for the Awards night. Most of the other film makers and participants were already there and by the time we got to exchanging some pleasantries, the award ceremony began. Oh ,I must mention that my sari was a big hit! Pretty much everyone commented on it and some of the girls were almost squealing in excitement! Ah the wonders of the Indian heritage garb!

And then the awards ceremony began. There was a great deal of cheering for Mausams when the award was called out, thanks to a very high level of enthusiasm amongst the group – they were very encouraging and everyone was enjoying themselves thoroughly! I picked up the Silver Screen Award for Feature Film for Mausams, gave a short acceptance speech and smiled from ear to ear!

Receiving the award and successfully grinning like an idiot!

As I was leaving the stage after the accepting the award, the emcee also commented on how wonderful I looked, thanks once again to the one and only sari! It really seemed like one of those red carpet costume highlight moments!

Not just accepting the Mausams award but the overall ceremony was HUGE fun – I loved all the acceptance speeches and the general excitement in the ballroom! At several points in time, I genuinely wished for the entire Mausams team to be there because that would have been some super cool fun! Post the ceremony there was a photo taking spree especially against the Nevada Film Festival banner backdrop that had been set up. There was another round of catch up with everyone, exchanging contacts, taking pictures, and having a ball!

I must say that it all seemed to end pretty soon. Everything passed in a jiff… it seemed like one brilliant flashing wave of fun, happiness and smiles!

But in spite of how fast everything seemed to whizz past, I definitely remember one thing - I beamed through the night!

Soon after, we got back to the room, changed back into normal clothes, packed our bags and then met the Canadian couple and the Italian diva for dinner. After a long dinner over some amazing conversation, it was time to wind up.

But not before some gambling!

The hubby decided that it would be sinful if we come all the way to Vegas and do not gamble at all. So we made our way to casino, played a few rounds of roulette, won about 40 dollars, out of which I got the hubby to spend $2.50 on a hot chocolate for me, and felt pretty good about the whole deal!

Then we caught a couple of hours of sleep, and woke up at 4:30am to catch our flight to Singapore.

Thus our 40 hours stint in Las Vegas came to an end. But such beautiful 40 hours!

On the way back to Singapore, again, there was a stopover at Lost Angeles and another one at Tokyo. And once again, the flights and the stopovers were all very pleasant. Great food, multiple rounds of running through all that happened over the last two days with the hubby, watching films (Black Swan and Horrible Bosses), writing this blog entry – all of them were wonderful!

And thus ends the 4 day trip to the USA.

Seriously, I can't stop counting my blessings! To be able to make a film, to be able to win an award for the film, to be able to travel to US to receive that award, to have such a great time in the process – all such wonderful blessings!

A big THANK YOU to the Mausams team, family and friends who made this possible. And of course, the biggest THANK YOU to God!

The best 4 days ever!

254 more to go.

Day 742: Trainer!

2011-12-01T21:18:00.002+08:00

Today I gave my first ever training in my company! I always like teaching/coaching etc. and this 2 hour session when I had a bunch of new hires patiently listening to my tips on how to quickly progress their career in the company, was really great fun! Needless to say I was super nervous before and through the training, given that it was my very first one, but I think it went off reasonably well.

So yes, now am officially a Trainer and it makes me super happy!

The training was the last big thing I had to get done before leaving for Las Vegas to pick up the award for Mausams (yeah, am taking a flight tonight!!) and so after it was done, I felt on top of the world!

Sure, a whole bunch of stuff at work awaits when I get back from Vegas next Monday, but for now I feel super duper awesome!

258 more to go.

Days 739 - 741: Missing Days?!

2011-11-30T21:50:00.002+08:00

28 - 30 November, 2011

It's almost like 3 days have gone missing. That's what it feels like because that's how ridiculously busy I had been at work the past few days! I was clocking in about 14 hours on an average each day, with additional hours of emailing, working on presentations etc., that I don't think I even had the mind space to wonder whether my day was beautiful or not!

But I am OK. I am pretty happy, in fact. I am exhausted, sure, but I feel good. Which should mean that all the days were good. Busy but beautiful!

So yes the days are almost like they went missing. But they were beautiful missing days.

259 more to go.

P.S. Am adding this as an afterthought. I managed to think back and realized that there were a few things I did rather enjoy about the days. The late night scrambling for sandwiches in the office pantry on 28th, the video conferencing meeting (that always seem to give me this great feeling that am using such "high-tech" stuff) on 29th and last but not the least, the wonderful training session on 30th - it was one of those where they share a lot of inspirational brand building case studies, something that I always love. So well the days are not altogether missing from my memory... but well not changing the initially written content above because well... what's really the point?!

Day 738: Next Level Normalcy!

2011-11-27T20:45:00.001+08:00

The Sunday was also pretty much spent on getting back to normal. Which basically meant the routine Murugan Idly visit in the morning, dropping the hubby at his work post that and then getting back home for a long afternoon and evening of watching TV, reading, writing, and other such things that normally belong to an eventless Sunday.

But this "getting back to normal" day had a special twist because I cooked Aloo-Gobi Paratha with some awesome egg curry for dinner. In the earlier days, this would have contributed to an entire blog entry on its own, but now that am turning into such a regular cook of awesome food, this is turning out to be part of my "normal" day as well! How cool is that?!

I already like this normal day but this last bit took it to another level of normalcy altogether which I LOVEEEEE!

262 more to go.

Day 737: Perfectly Normal!

2011-11-26T20:22:00.001+08:00

This morning the hubby got back from Delhi! This made me happier than usual!

You see... we had gone to the wedding in India together, but after that he had stayed back in Delhi while I came to Singapore. Given that I ended up sick in Singapore and he ended up sick in Delhi, neither of us were in the best of spirits the last few days.

So it was really great to have him finally back at home this morning!

And the rest of the day was spent exactly the way we would have spent a perfectly normal, jobless Saturday - watching T.V., eating tons, taking a siesta, going for an evening outing (it was to Orchard Road to see the Christmas decorations followed by dinner at Clarke Quay) and lotsa chatting.

A perfectly normal and absolutely lovable Saturday!

263 more to go.

Day 736: Back to Scripting!

2011-11-25T20:13:00.002+08:00

It was another day of work, recovering from sickness, going over the wedding photos and videos all over again etc.

But I felt like it was time to get back to some productivity beyond the obvious, so I decided to get back to my feature film script.

After some effort, I completed scene 3, which had been stuck for weeks now!

The holiday is over and am back to work!

264 more to go.

Day 733 - 735: Yet Another Bunch of Memories!

2011-11-24T19:51:00.002+08:00

22 - 24 November, 2011

Thus the wedding comes to an end. On 22nd we made our way from Lucknow to Delhi and I carried on from Delhi to Singapore, while the hubby stayed back for some work. 23rd and 24th were spent in catching up on work, recovering from the unavoidable sickness, uploading pics and videos etc.

But what was commonly beautiful for all three days was that we were reliving all that fun once again -by looking through the pictures and the videos and discussing all that happened an umpteen number of times!

Yet another bunch of awesome, terrific memories!

265 more to go.

Day 732: Wedding Time!

2011-11-21T13:25:00.001+08:00

Finally it was time for the wedding day!

In the morning, after a fair amount of photo-taking and dancing to the dhols, we made a very long but fun bus journey to Lucknow, where the wedding's to take place.

My dad also flew down from Kerala to take part, so we could spend a little bit of time together as well.

The wedding was fun as usual - lotsa dancing during the baaraat (procession), lotsa food, lotsa chatting, etc.!

It lasted until 5am by which all of us were dead tired! But a day well spent!

268 more to go.

Day 731: Festivities, Photography & Triveni Sangamam!

2011-11-20T12:54:00.002+08:00

The wedding festivities carried on through the day!

It started off with the Haldi ceremony where the groom gets his beautification done - in other words, he gets oil and turmeric (haldi) applied onto him, to get this skin to glow for the upcoming wedding. This ceremony usually ends with not just the groom covered in haldi but the rest of the attendees as well. Right after the groom was adequately smeared with oil and haldi, a haldi war raged ensuring each and every soul present gets drowned in haldi too! That included me too! Sigh!

After the Haldi war and follow up cleaning, it was time for the Janevu ceremony of the hubby's youngest cousin brother. Janevu is the official "Brahmin"-ization of a Brahmin, something all Brahmin guys are supposed to go through. So this young boy had his turn today and he seemed pretty pleased with the entire proceedings. After converting him to a true blue Brahmin, we realized that we have some free time.

So we made our way to Sangam (or Triveni Sangamam, as we call it in Malayalam), which is the meeting point of the rivers Ganga, Yamuna and Saraswati. You can literally see the different waters of Ganga (brown) and Yamuna (green) merging, while Saraswati is supposed to be hidden somewhere below.

The Sangam visit was truly fascinating - for several reasons! The fun boat ride to the meeting point of the rivers, the hundreds of birds flying around, the puja performed in the middle of the river, watching people dip in the holy waters at their meeting point with the help of a platform set up with several boats tied together, the visit to the nearby Hanuman temple the specialty of which is that the Hanuman idol here is sprawling on the floor vs. standing upright, etc. etc. etc.

But what was most lovely was the beautiful foggy atmosphere and the resulting serene look of the waters, the calm bobbing boats and the quiet shores beyond.

Post the Sangam visit, it was back to wedding festivities. It was time for Nikaasi, the official farewell of the groom as he leaves his house to bring his bride home. Since the professional photographer didn't turn up for this one, I was picked to do the photography for the event. I must admit that I made quite a show of getting everyone to pose proper or hold their poses longer so that I can get their snaps right! How fun!

So yes, another super hectic day but a very lovely one at that!

269 more to go.

Day 730: Tilak, Sangeet & Dance!

2011-11-19T20:00:00.004+08:00

In the morning, the hubby and I set off for the Allahabad airport to pick up brother and sister in law who were to arrive from Singapore. Given that we reached the airport pretty early, we decided to drive around the area for a while. That was pretty nice and it was a good opportunity to see a bit more of Allahabad.

The airport itself was quite interesting too. It was the civilian terminal of the indian air force and was situated in a beautiful, quiet area, very much away and different from the rest of the city.

After picking up bro n sis, we made our way back to the wedding venue for the Tilak ceremony which for me, basically meant getting dressed in a gorgeous sari and having a fab time!

After the ceremony, everyone went into major preparation for the upcoming Sangeet in the evening. There were songs to be prepared, dances to be rehearsed, program schedule to be made, props to be finalized etc. There were last minute additions to the program and we even had new dances being choreographed until an hour before the show! In short, it was chaotic and huge fun, really!

And then of course, it was time for the sangeet! We had a fantastic time going through the concert! I enjoyed watching all the performances as much as I enjoyed performing myself. It was the culmination of all those days of rehearsals and I had a great time performing! I must add that at the very end of one of my dances, I lost my footing thanks to a very slippery floor and let's just say that I ended the dance in a pose very different from what I had intended. But even that didn't mar my excitement and happiness!

Here are the videos of the dances we performed:

My solo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bON5m23VBI

Couple dance with the hubby: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1RBOZYMo-A

Post the sangeet, it was another round of great food, fireworks and some mindless dancing to the DJ's music!

Thus another awesome day came to an end!

Day 729: Allahabad!

2011-11-18T19:54:00.000+08:00

Early in the morning today, we set off for Allahabad!

After a reasonbaly long wait at the Kanpur railway station (which was made less boring by the several fascinating sights we were subjected to - a family with 8 kids, a conversation between a Hindu saint and a Muslim haji, an effort to help a pigeon who was struck by the blade of a ceiling fan, etc. etc.) and an eventless train journey, we reached Allahabad and made our way to the hubby's uncle's place, where the wedding preps are underway.

Then of course, it was all about catching up with the family and the wedding preps!

Lotsa food, lotsa dressing up, lotsa photo taking, lotsa singing, lotsa dancing especially in preparation for tomorrow's sangeet function, lotsa talking, lotsa laughter, lotsa fun!

271 more to go.

Day 728: A Kanpurian Day

2011-11-17T19:52:00.000+08:00

Today's the second and last day in Kanpur during this trip, as tomorrow we will be leaving for Allahabad for the wedding. So we made the most of it by ticking off every item in the to-do-in-Kanpur list!

This include:
A) Having a lot more yummy food including the very special postha and a lot of others that I don't even know the names of, which were yummy nevertheless!
B) Having the lovely Motijeel chai in the small clay containers. It's really like the most awesome chai!
C) Having the super good Indian Chinese food at Chinmi.
D) Having the really yummm meetha paan (sweet betel leaves and condiments) post dinner.
E) Yes, the list above is all about eating but we did do other things like, driving around in the foggy early winter days, which I loved!
F) Visiting a very close friend's new born, where the hubby made quite a drama of how to carry the baby.

And then a perfect Kanpur day came to an end. Until the next time!

272 more to go.

Day 727: Incredible India!

2011-11-16T14:46:00.000+08:00

Early this morning, the hubby and I set out from Delhi for Kanpur.

Every time I am in India, so many amusing incidents happen that thoroughly entertain me! And this time was not too different either.

Here are a few instances.

Incident One:

We are at the airport, at the Go Air check in counter. While the Go Air official prepares our boarding passes, the hubby engages him in some meaningful conversation.

Hubby: Is the flight on time?

Officer: Yes.

(Pause)

Officer: But.... you know...

(Pause)

Officer: These things... one never know...

Hubby: Oh...

Officer: Yeah...

Hubby: Is the flight coming from somewhere else or is it already here?

Officer: Oh yes yes. It is right here...right outside.

(Pause)

Officer: But one never knows about these things... you know...

Hubby: Yes. Of course.

Incident Two

We pick our luggage up from the Lucknow airport luggage belt and walk towards the exit. Right then a rodent crosses our path and makes its way, also towards the exit. There are three security guards at the exit and they notice the rodent.

Guard 1 kicks the rodent to Guard 2.

Guard 2 kicks the rodent to Guard 3.

Guard 3 kicks the rodent to Guard 1.

Meanwhile, the hubby and I are waiting for the guards to finish off this game before we can actually exit the airport.

Guard 1 kicks the rodent to Guard 3.

The rodent gets tired of the game and finally manages to free himself and rushes out into the open. He immediately rushes back in, probably worried by the sight of hundreds of human feet outside, all ready to kick him around.

The three security guards get alert now. Who goes first? Guard 3 lifts his leg but he is a second too late.

The rodent rushes in, way beyond the reach of the guards' physical extremities, and rushes into the State Bank of India cubicle inside the airport. There it shall stay until found again and the hubby and I get to finally make our exit from the airport.

Incident Three

Our cabbie, who is taking us from the Lucknow airport to the Kanpur home, stops the car midway on the journey, to fill petrol.

We carry on and after a while, he stops again. This time he honks a couple of times, but the chap who is deeply asleep on top of a wooden bench, covered in layers of woolen blankets, at whom the honks were directed, doesn't budge. The cabbie gets out of the car and walks towards this air filling machine next to the sleeping chap, and uses it to fill air into the car's tyres. He then puts back all the gear in their rightful positions, gets back into the car and drives away. The sleeping chap continues to sleep. I ask my husband, "Isn't he supposed to pay for that air filling thing?". Hubby replies, "Yes. I would think so." OK then.

We carry on and after a while, the cabbie stops. Again. After appropriately parking the car in a highly congested and narrow road, the cabbie gets out without a word and walks across the road. The hubby and I watch him, wondering what the need is this time. The petrol tank is full of petrol and the tyres are full of air, what could it be now?

The cabbie walks to a paan shop and gets himself a doze of paan (betel leaves, a favourite snack/digestive of Indians especially in the northern states). The hubby, "It's 7:00 am. He is having paan now?". I shrug. What am I supposed to say? The cabbie returns and starts the car, as if it was perfectly normal to leave your passengers behind without a word of explanation, let alone apology, as you go and get yourself paan-ed. The hubby, who for some reason takes a tone of apology, asks in almost a whisper, "Brother, will you take us home now?" The brother responds, "But of course, brother." Cool.

So as you can see it was a very eventful journey all the way to Kanpur. Incredible India, Indeed!

In Kanpur we have a fab time, catching up with dad-in-law, mom-in-law and also grandmom-in-law, who is like the sweetest person I know, really! After the catch up, it was time for a LOT of yummy food. Then began the wedding preps. We are here to attend the hubby's cousin's wedding and the parents have done all the necessary preparations for it - like designing the clothes (my dad in law is an expert fashion designer), getting them sewed, getting all the accessories ready, etc. All that the hubby and I had to do was to make sure the clothes fitted alright, get the packing done etc.

Then it was time for some routine shopping, eating more yummy food from different eateries in Kanpur etc.

In the evening we attended the birthday bash of one of the hubby's best friends all the way from childhood days! It was lovely to meet the birthday boy, his wife, as well as all the other friends whom we hadn't met in ages! The party went well into the night and we had a lovely time!

So yes, fantastic, eventful day!

273 more to go.

Day 726: Larry Crowne!

2011-11-15T14:20:00.002+08:00

Today we made our way to Delhi, from where we are to take a flight to Lucknow from where we are to take a cab to Kanpur, the hubby's hometown.

On the flight to Delhi, I happened to catch this lovely Tom Hanks - Julia Roberts starrer called Larry Crowne.

I had never heard of this film before and the only reason I watched it was because it had Tom Hanks and I believe that he makes no wrong movie choices. So I watched it and I was blown away by the simplicity of the film!

I absolutely Loved it!

Thus the holiday begins on an excellent note!

274 more to go.

Day 725: IOK Music Release!

2011-11-14T15:05:00.000+08:00

Yup!!! After a day of major work in the office, followed by making coriander chicken in 30 mins (yeah, am like SO into cooking these days), followed by another work call that lasted until 10pm, I sat down to make the montage video to go with the final Inganeyum Oru Katha Theme Music. For those who are still unaware of what this is, it is my Malayalam short film.

And the video was done. The song was uploaded.

Thus the IOK Theme Music was released!! (Here's the link!)

Yay!!

275 more to go.

Day 724: Frustration to Gobi Parathas!

2011-11-13T09:45:00.004+08:00

Well.. well... what a day!

I did pretty much like the stupidest thing in the world, which left me frustrated for a good couple of hours! Here's the story...

I was to attend a play directed by a friend and very happily I left home, in the pouring rain, to go to Fort Canning Park where the Drama Centre is located.

Everything went off very smoothly till then. In fact, I was almost chirping and hopping because the cabbie, a very sweet chap, even offered me his umbrella to get to the building from the car park! He said, "You can take it. I have another one." How generous is that?! Anyway, I didn't take that of course.. instead I simply dashed to the nearest shelter I could find to take cover from the rain.

So yes, everything was rosy and nice and I decided that I will wait for a few mins before making my way to the Drama Center which is just a little distance away. After all, I was well ahead of time, so all was good.

Except, I figured out in a few minutes from a map of the park nearby, that the Drama is not located at the Fort Canning Park.

I was stumped. How could that possibly be?! I was pretty certain that it was location for the Drama Center... I mean, I myself have performed there a while ago!

A bit of googling told me that yes indeed, the Drama Center was located at Fort Canning Park but since 2005, had shifted itself to the National Library building.

Blah.

This basically meant that I had to immediately rush to the Library. Only that the universe wasn't making it any easy for me to get there. It was pouring cats and dogs, I had no umbrella, the park is in the middle of nowhere and I had no human beings or vehicles around me and the taxi company was unreachable via phone as is the case with Singapore every time it rains. In other words, I was stuck. Majorly so.

So I ended up staring at the rain for about 40 minutes until a blessed cab happened to pass by. Given that it was too late to make it for the play, I just returned home.

Needless to say, it was frustrating.

But what the heck. You can always turn the day around. So I decided that I shall cook and make something super cool like Gobi Parathas (cauliflower breads, north indian style). After going through a few recipes online, I felt I was ready to take the plunge.

And I did.

And the Gobi Parathas were awe.freaking.some! Even the hubby looked surprised at the quality (*snort*).

Thanks to that always-ready-to-come-to-the-rescue option of having some awesome food, which is made even more cooler by the fact that I made them themselves, I went to bed a very happy person!

276 more to go.

Day 723: Historic Stuff!

2011-11-12T22:04:00.000+08:00

Given that I had a bit of time today, I decided to bring some order to all my online stuff. Over time, I seem to have accumulated a variety of email ids, Facebook pages, blogs, websites, short films on youtube and vimeo, picasa albums etc. etc. that had happened as I worked on different projects. There had been no focus on putting everything in one space so far, and that was something I thought I should probably start working on.

So I created a Google+ page as a one stop place for all past as well as upcoming works.

and a Youtube channel where I brought in all my short films so far.

More than bringing some order to my disorderly online world, this exercise got me to start looking through old photos of my plays and also to watch all my old films.

They brought back a ton of memories and more interestingly left me with the feeling that are all so... so... Old! They seem so far away! The oldest amongst the lot would be a play which was done in 2007 (pics are available in the G+ link above) but even that seem so long ago!

Anyway, at the end of the day I probably didn't achieve much in terms of organizing things because I still have a whole lot to do... but it was nice to go back to all that historic stuff again!

277 more to go.

Day 722: Rahman & Ranbir!

2011-11-11T01:48:00.000+08:00

Today I saw a phenomenal performance on screen by what I think are the best actor and best musician from Hindi cinema today - yup, the movie was Rockstar and the actor & musician were Ranbir Kapoor & A.R.Rahman respectively!

(OK, I know A.R.Rahman is probably the best musician in Indian cinema today and not just Hindi, but let's not get technical).

I didn't add the movie itself in the list because after an exceptional first half, it turned completely ridiculous, at least to me.

But my God, the level of genius these two men displayed is just mind boggling! Acting, music, soundtrack par excellence! Must also give credit to the director for so beautifully visualizing the songs as well.... if only he had a better script in the second half! Oh well.

But am so very much awed!

Completely made the day to watch such fantastic talent in Hindi Cinema!

278 more to go.

Day 721: Knowing it.

2011-11-10T20:47:00.003+08:00

You know how people always have this question "But what do I really want?"...."What would make me really happy"? It happens in terms of career, family, even hobbies ... in other words, life in general and as a whole.

When people ask this question, they don't usually find an answer. Same with me, really. I am a very good list-making human being but in totality, even I stumble at this question at times.

But today I think I totally cracked it!

Yup, in a decently articulated statement, I shared this thought with the hubby. The question "What do I really want" and my answer to it.

His response was, disappointingly enough, "Oh it's so amusing to see you thinking so much all the time."

OK then.

But the whole point is that at least for the time being, I know what I want.

Am not gonna share my decently articulated statement here lest the world also gets amused... so that shall stay with me.

But today is an awesome day, because I know it!

279 more to go

Day 720: My Music!

2011-11-09T22:21:00.001+08:00

When I don't have anything particularly exciting to do or when I don't want to do anything particularly exciting in spite of having several options, usually out of sheer laziness, I tend to sulk. To avoid sulking I tend to listen to music that makes me wanna smile. That almost always works.

So today, after a pretty eventless day of work, I went for a jog. After that rather eventless jog, I took a work call at night which lasted until about 10:30. That was also pretty eventless - rather, it went smoothly enough, so am glad it was eventless.

Anyway the point is, it was all rather eventless.

Which invariably led to me sulking and that's never good. I had to solve the issue before I hit the bed so that I can enjoy a good night's sleep.

So I sat down and listened to my favourite songs. After the first few random but nice songs, I realized that I was listening to the songs from Mausams and Inganeyum Oru Katha, one after the other. That felt really good!

It's like I am listening to the music and then I suddenly go, "Oh wait a minute... what movie is this song from? Oh, it's from my movie!" You see?

Sounds super egoistical am sure, but hey, it is a very surreal feeling!

Of course, I am very aware of the fact that the songs were all results of pure genius of a couple of my friends and that it has pretty much nothing to do with my work. But that actually makes it even more awesome - the fact that they put this together for a couple of minuscule films of mine!

Well to cut a long story short, one I started to listen to what I consider my music, I felt like the world was indeed pretty exciting even without having done anything exciting for the day and that there is a lot of hope and goodness and dreams and smiles and all such wonderful things in it!

And I went to bed a very happy person!

280 more to go.

Day 719: Happy Exhaustion!

2011-11-08T21:31:00.001+08:00

I was ridiculously tired today. Like really really so. I didn't realize that the very happening weekend would end up making me feel so drained!

Oh well.

So what did I do? After work, I went off for 10 straight hours of sleep.

10 hours of sleep is already something pretty beautiful I would say. But that's not really the highlight of the day.

The highlight was that I was having this glow inside throughout. Whenever I think back about the weekend and all the film work that happened, I keep smiling to myself! It is so wonderful to get together with a great team and make something, you know? And the feeling lasts way after the process is over, which is even more fantastic!

So yes... I was super duper exhausted, but very, very happily so.

281 more to go.

Days 715 - 718: A Wonderful Long Weekend!!!

2011-11-07T21:05:00.005+08:00

4 - 7 November, 2011

I had such a fantastic weekend! Like a really, really awesome one!

It was a long weekend due to Eid and the bulk of it was spent on completing the shoot of my Malayalam short film Inganeyum Oru Katha! But it is probably better to do a list as there is more to it than that... so here we go!

a) On Friday after work, I came back and cooked Baingan Bharta (a Punjabi dish with brinjal) by following an online recipe. Yes, I am indeed getting very seriously domesticated! Who would have thought?!

b) Post the Baingan cooking and dinner, it was time for shooting one of the scenes for IOK. I had a pretty significant role to play in this scene, so I was more of an actor today than a director. The character I play is alway nagging and shouting at her husband, and I had a real fun time doing that!

c) Post the shoot, it was of course, time for general chit chatting in spite of the fact that it was already 1:30 am. Oh well... general chit chatting is always welcome and thoroughly enjoyed, so am not complaining about that!

d) On Saturday, after a dance rehearsal session together with the hubby, I made bread rolls. Yup. And I was very pleased that the hubby wiped off the whole of it within seconds!

e) Interestingly culinary experiments didn't end there for the day. Post the bread rolls, I immediately made some really yummy egg curry for dinner! You see what I mean by serious domestication now?

f) After dinner, it was time for shoot of the next scene in which I again had a significant role to play. Once again, I thoroughly enjoyed acting! After being just a director for so long, I had begun to forget how much fun acting was! So this was really awesome! I must, however, admit that before the shoot this weekend, I was really nervous. I had not done any major acting projects in a long time and I had little confidence on how I will be able to manage this. So it was also good to conquer the fears and go through the experience, in spite of how it would all turn out at the end!

g) Just like the night before, this acting session was also followed by another round of general chit chatting which went well into the night. But just like the night before, nobody was complaining!

h) On Sunday, it was time for an outdoor shoot! This time, I was back to my full fledged director's role. The outdoor location was Labrador Park, which is always really lovely. Today the weather was more beautiful that the usual and we had a great time shooting there. In fact, even the issues such as the noise from the crowd around didn't seem to bother me at all. I felt on top of the world, for no apparent reason really!

i) Post the long shoot, I met up with a bunch of students from my university who are making their first feature film! They wanted to talk on screening options etc. and it was lovely to meet them. I always love to see people getting together and working on a creative project and the passion, dedication and ideas this bunch seemed to have was really inspiring!

j) Post that meeting, the hubby and I met a few friends for dinner at Mozza at Marina Bay Sands. It was our first time at that restaurant and the food turned out to be pretty good even for a non-lover of Italian food like me! And the fun conversation that accompanied the food, made it a really good dinner overall!

k) On Monday, that is today, we had the last and final schedule of the IOK shoot. And most nicely, it had the entire cast and crew involved! So we had a great time shooting and having a last round (for a while at least) of catch up as one big team together!

l) Post the shoot, my brother and sis in law came over to work on the one last dance we had to prepare for the upcoming wedding. So it was choreography and dance time once again, and that was very good fun too!

m) Then it was time to organize all the IOK footage into a hard disk, to be sent to Mumbai, for editing! The editor for IOK is the same as the one for Mausams. He is based out of Mumbai and I had to get all the footage to him through my hubby who is on his way there tonight. Honestly, getting the footage tidied up was quite strenuous but I managed to get most of it done just in time, before the hubby had to rush for his flight! But there was a lot of satisfaction in feeling that I technically have my entire film in that disk and now it is all set for the next round of work!

n) I must also mention that I just got the final version of IOK theme music! We were planning to launch it within a week or two and it is all ready to be shared! So exciting!

o) Last but not the least... the hubby and I booked our tickets to Las Vegas for just a weekend, to pick up the Silver Screen awards for Mausams! It cost us an arm and leg but we didn't feel like letting go of this experience! Super duper excited!!

OK, a really long list, that.

But a truly beautiful one!

282 more to go.

Day 714: A Little Bit of Everything!

2011-11-03T19:17:00.004+08:00

Today had a bit of everything that I like or I feel happy about.

A little bit of good work in the office.

A little bit of work on my short film, Inganeyum Oru Katha.

A little bit of catch up with a few old friends.

A little bit of family time.

A little bit of reading.

A little bit of music and dreaming along with it.

A little bit of awesome food.

A little bit of chai.

A little bit of dance.

A little bit of blogging.

In short, a little bit of everything. But a whole load of happiness!

286 more to go.

Day 713: Silver Screen Award!

2011-11-02T22:01:00.003+08:00

The most wonderful and very much unexpected thing happened today!

It all started with me reaching out for my phone just as I woke up in the morning. I was still almost deep asleep when I opened my email on the phone and glanced through my inbox. One of the subject lines "Nevada Film Festival...." caught my eye and I opened the email thinking it might be a Film festival rejection email or maybe even an advertisement for a film festival.

Because the truth is I had applied to this festival several months ago and had completely forgotten about it. It was very much off my radar, mainly because I had no hopes of getting into it.

Anyway, back to the email. I opened it, and in my very sleepy drowsiness, I scanned through its contents. It was saying something like "congratulations"..."won the Silver Screen Award".. etc. I rubbed my eyes a couple of times and read through the email again, almost certain that I could be misinterpreting the whole thing. In the second or probably third reading, it looked clearer that they are indeed saying I won some award. But somehow I couldn't be sure. What if it was a mistake and am not the rightful recipient?! After all, the email had started with "Dear film maker" and not in my name?

That's when I noticed the line "the complete list of winners is given below" and then a list of films beneath that. And there I saw... under the Silver Screen Awards, it said "Mausams by Shilpa Krishnan Shukla".

Mausams just became an "award winning" film!!!

I sat up gaping. For how long, am not sure.

Like, seriously! Who would have thought?!

Even as I woke the hubby up I said, "I think.. Mausams won some award?!" It was just surreal! I just couldn't believe it!

And from there it just turned to one awesome day! I immediately shared the news with my cast and crew and family and everyone was on top of the world! My editor even called me up at 5am his time to respond to the SMS I sent him!

In the evening I went to the temple and thanked God for so much kindness! This was then followed by celebration via skipping yoga and instead do the exact opposite thing on the health meter - i.e have the awesome thalassey biriyani from Swadhisht! Yumm!!

I must also mention that while winning the award was nice, what made it a lot nicer was how all my wonderful friends responded to it! My Facebook notifications simply went bonkers! My phone remained busy throughout with calls and messages! Everybody was so thrilled and happy for us, which was so incredibly sweet!

I felt like giving one fat hug to all of them!! God bless them all!

This one goes to the Mausams team and everyone who supported this tiny film in any whichever way! Thank you!

287 more to go.

Day 712: A Date!

2011-11-01T21:17:00.000+08:00

These days, given that the time I get to spend exclusively with the hubby are so rare and so far between, each such opportunity easily gets into the blog as the "beauty-for-the-day" story. The last such story was on October 2nd, i.e. a month ago... so you get my point.

So yes, that's what made the beautiful today as well! The hubby, very magnanimously, announced this morning that he is free to spend the evening with me. And immediately I threw my yoga plans out of the window and freed up my calendar.

Thus the evening was spent on some good food, drinks, lots of conversation involving some list-making (every time we talk, I gotta a make a list of things to do in my life... it's some kinda weird obsession), and even some dance rehearsal for the upcoming wedding.

Nothing out of this world, but exactly what I had wanted and what made me very happy!

And yes, am gonna get brownie points for such a romantic entry.

288 more to go.

Day 711: Healthiest Month!

2011-10-31T12:54:00.001+08:00

I believe October has been my healthiest month ever! I have exercised a total of 20 days through October, which must be some kind of a personal record! From my tracking since 2008, the max I've hit is 16 days in a month... so this is a pretty big deal!

This record was achieved via a combination of runs, dance, yoga and even a 8km walk once.... all of which have contributed significantly to my health, am sure!

So here's to the closing of my healthiest month!

289 more to go.

Day 710: Overdue Catch Up!

2011-10-30T20:51:00.003+08:00

There are friends with whom you are constantly in touch and with whom you have a "keep-each-other-updated" routine going on. Then there are others whom who are hardly in touch with, in spite of the fact that they are in the same city (or same office even, as in this case) but you hardly get to meet up with them. And what I really love is how, when you do get to catch up with one of the folks in the latter group, it feels like you have never been out of touch at all! You can pick up exactly where you left off months or years ago and realize that absolutely nothing has changed over this long gap!

So that's exactly what happened today. After dropping my mom at the airport (and feeling adequately blue about it), I made my way to this friend's place for a highly overdue catch up. She works at P&G as well and we go back a long way, right from when she worked with me as the Asst. Director for one of my plays. She is by far one of the most dedicated, hard working, responsible people I have worked with, who has also a great initiative in getting things done without me having to specify every single detail, which is something I really appreciate!

So yeah, we decided that it was high time we had a catch up and that's exactly what we did. Over some awesome chai and yummy risotto that she made, we yapped away for 3 straight hours. Like I mentioned above, we could start off right where we stopped last time (which was probably a year ago) and not feel any of the time gap at all! That feeling always rocks!

We did part by saying that we should catch up soon again. Not sure how much of that is gonna materialize, but for today I loved this overdue catch up!

290 more to go.

Day 709: Mom's Saturday!

2011-10-29T20:17:00.001+08:00

The saturday's was pretty much spent on how my mom wanted it to be, given that it was her last day in Singapore before she leaves for India tomorrow morning. And what mom wanted turned out to be tons of movie watching, eating and chatting. Oh well, who can complain about that?!

So that's precisely what we did.

I think we ended up watching about 3 movies, binged on both the food she had cooked as well as the yummies at Kailas Parbat for dinner, wandered around Little India and had a marathon conversation that lasted the whole day, am not kidding!

After a week of happening Diwali celebrations, a nice, quiet Saturday with mommy dear was just what I wanted.

291 more to go.

Day 708: Diwali - Last Stretch!

2011-10-28T22:17:00.000+08:00

Today kinda marked the last day of my personal Diwali celebrations, which had been kicked off about a week ago with the party at my place. Post that, everyday had something going on - be it attending some party or attending some puja or enjoying a mid-week public holiday or watching some new Diwali super-hyped film release or general uplifted holiday mood!

And this stretch of celebrations came to a close today with the biggest Diwali release of all times, the Hindi film Ra.One.

I wish I could say that film was incredibly awesome and added to the beauty of the day by heaps and bounds. But I can't. However the experience of going for it in a huge group, which was a culmination of all the hype preceding its release, was in itself quite something!

So with that, my first and longest proper Diwali celebrations end! Awesomeness!

292 more to go.

Day 707: 7am Arivu!

2011-10-27T16:35:00.003+08:00

Diwali celebrations are continuing for the rest of week with one movie a day! So after a day of work and a good yoga session, we set out to watch the Tamil magnum opus "7am Arivu".

The last time I watched a Tamil movie on the big screen was more than 4 years ago. So I was super duper excited to watch this very much hyped film!

The movie had its set of very obvious flaws but I had a great time watching it! It was party due to the company I was with (9 Tamil movie fans went together!) and also the performance of its lead actor Surya, who I think is one of the best things to have hit Indian cinema in recent times. He was flawless!

A great evening and the holiday spirit continues!

293 more to go.

Day 706: Diwali, Dance & More!

2011-10-26T16:05:00.001+08:00

This has gotto be one of the best Diwali ever! A few very nice things happened, and I felt pretty happy at the end of the day!

Time for a list:

a) The day started with a dance rehearsal and a dream come true for me. As silly as this may sound, I had always wanted a good picture of me dancing. Something where am in motion and not a static shot. This is something that has never ever happened for whatever reasons, in my several years of dancing (13 years altogether!) and something I had stopped thinking about, having given up dancing for a few years now. But today I was just fooling about with my camera and I happened to figure out how to take action shots. So with the help of the hubby, I took a few pics of the rehearsal. And most unexpectedly, I got the nice-dancing-in motion-picture that I've always wanted!! As small as this is, it made me super happy and Diwali started on a wonderful note!

b) Later on, it was time for multiple rounds of Diwali celebrations - first at my place and then later at the bro-in-law's place. A couple of friends came over and we had a nice time of puja, having sweets, lighting the diyas, taking a number of photos and general merrymaking! Then we repeated the whole deal at the bro-in-law's place!

c) Then of course, the Diwali wishes. Several messages flew to and fro through the day and in way, was a nice way to catch up with a lot of people!

d) And last but not the least, the day ended with the fantabulous "Real Steel"! I loved it - it's such a simple, heart warming film with terrific performances which also happens to be pretty good at the graphics! Completely enjoyed that one!

So yes, it was a very perfect Diwali!

294 more to go.

Day 705: Party Animal!

2011-10-25T15:52:00.001+08:00

Gosh, it's like am turning to a party animal!

If anyone's been reading this blog for a while, you would realize that parties don't feature too often here, because well.. I don't really party a lot.

But now with the upcoming Diwali and my new found interest in parties, it's all that I seem to be doing!

After last saturday's major Mausams/Diwali party that I had hosted as well as the Durga puja celebrations a couple of weeks ago (which is also a party in my head because I was with a big group of people, I was dressed up and I ate a lot - all clear signals of a party), today I were to go for two different Diwali parties. Which means another round of dressing up, having a lot of food, being with big groups of people and having a load of fun!

So yes, today's for the party animal in me!

295 more to go.

Day 704: Labrador Park!

2011-10-24T00:34:00.000+08:00

It was supposed to be a very normal day - you know, work the whole morning, go for yoga in the evening, have dinner at home with the hubby and mom at night etc. Nothing major was supposed to happen.

But then at about 5pm my mom decided that I shouldn't go for yoga. She made quite an argument about how she would be going back to India this coming sunday and hence how crucial it is for us to spend time together, even though it comes at the expense of my yoga.

Oh well, moms are pretty good with their arguments and my mom is especially so. Thus yoga went out of the window.

What came in instead was a visit to the Labrador Park!

A few weeks ago, I had happened to mention that there is going to be a direct train from my place to Labrador Park. My mom had stored this piece of information intact in her brain since then and she decided to pull it out today.

Given that I didn't have a very strong opinion on whether we should or should not go to Labrador Park, we ended up following mom's idea and found ourselves in a train.

Upon reaching the station called Labrador Park we realized that it is a reasonable distance away from what actually is Labrador Park. But the adventurous people that we are, we decided to take a stroll.

Somewhere down the road, we took a turn that brought us right in the middle of a dense jungle. Labrador Park is not only located awesomely next to the sea, but also has a very densely vegetated hill inside it. And that's where we found ourselves. We walked pretty aimlessly through the jungle and discovered quite a lot of interesting war relics (apparently this hill we were on was a vantage point for shooting at approaching boats from the sea), secret storage rooms, tunnels, etc. right in the middle of all that vegetation! Super cool stuff!

I must also mention that given that it was just the two of us in the middle of a jungle, it was rather spooky as well.

Anyway, after quite a lot of walking about, we found ourselves to the more familiar stretch of the park by the sea. Every time I go to Labrador park, am fascinated by how pretty it looks! The last time I was here was during location scouting for Mausams - that was 511 days ago, according to this blog. However that time a friend had given me a ride and we had spent very little time there. This time we really got to discover the park in detail and that too on foot, which was pretty nice!

The very nice mix of the forested area, the stretch by the sea, the lovely platforms, the lack of fellow humans, and the very strong breeze from the sea was perfect!

It was a lovely experience!

Oh, and needless to say, mom was pretty pleased with the trip. Given that it was her idea to go there, she almost thinks she discovered Labrador Park and introduced it to me!

Let me wind up with a picture of my pretty mom, looking pretty happy, at a pretty spot in Labrador Park!

296 more to go.