I don’t know when I last undertook a local train journey in Mumbai.  I guess there was this one time when I had to go to a bank in Masjid some 4 years ago and before that in 1999.

We tend to be critical for no reason and I started believing local trains are not for me anymore. Well, one thing for sure, nobody cares from railways...
Local Trains of Mumbai carry some few millions everyday from places as far as Virar, CBD Belapur, Kalyan and Badlapur. I am insignificant and I really am no one to say anything about service/standard and my likes and dislikes about railways. Business guys, executives, staff and students travel at a cost which perhaps is the lowest in the world and they reach on time.

 What I experienced was fantastic. Platforms are clean, Train bogey or wagons are mighty impressive and punctual to the nearest minute. I travelled Dadar/Vasai/Dadar which I believe should be 140 km. I spent Rs. 220/=.  When I embarked on my journey, I had an outlook as if I am doing a favour to Railways by travelling. When I reached home, I was humbled by sheer experience and in my mind did a small calculation and realized that I have saved close to Rs. 600/= and not to mention no risk and no stress of driving.

 Few stray of thoughts as I was looking around with sheer admiration with the progress, all over.
1)      Builder make mega mega bucks: provide residential accommodation in extended Mumbai  towns, very conveniently assuring “ just 5 or 10 minutes from station”.... what does the railways get, more passengers and more strain on capacity... using railway’s goodwill for their business!!!
 2)      Most abused phrase is ‘there are scope for improvements in service’ they have to do this... and that.. What about scope of improvements amongst people... they continue to place their legs on empty seat in the front, spit and stain the corners of platform which is cleaned twice a day.
3)      I shudder to think of the statistics and logistics of number of train, number of passengers, technical trouble shooting, rail roko etc. We all work somewhere, run a department or execute some functions... I can only say this, Hats off to operational and support staff of Indian Railways
4)      A fellow passenger was complete with latest mobile and MAC laptop and was working with total dedication.  I thought I was stupid to  drive 140 km and listen to some atrocious music in FM

 As to whether I did have vada pav in Dadar Station, NO.... Vada might be of same quality as before, but cautious part in me in me prevailed. I guess I will overcome this too, in next 2/ 3 journeys.   I saw  a guy with a bag pack about 22 years old, hogging vada pav and holding Energy drink in another hand.  I just couldn't stop envying him. Somehow, I could just script what he will do in the evening, weekend and his rigorous thinking on how to achieve his career objectives........I just saw myself in him

no new year's day.......

We are just about a couple of months away to group sms all in our prized list of contacts. Happy New Year.  We are just a month away perhaps to plan out painstakingly where the hell we go out during New Year eve and sport a right social image of ourselves.

To me till date, I can recall only 3 or 4 new year party which was different otherwise it is the same old thing,  Earliest, I recall was  riding with Venkat to Gateaway in Yezdi in my early teenage years, drinking to the brim  and coming back at 3am. We danced to the tune of music blaring ‘i want to take you to ... funky town.... this is all I could follow.... rest was all noise to my ears.

Had a couple of Catholic friends, who would pronounce ...aks me to say ask me and would mumble man, whath a parthy we had man.... the only time we used to think of these bums were during xmas and new year.

Never understood, why it was such  a big deal for these  native east Indian guys to claim they are Goans when only time they have gone there was during a college picnic to sing ‘brown girl in the ring...’ But certain Fernandes’, note not Fernandez’ prefer to say they are from Mangalore.. It was never from Mysore or Karnataka. Mysore just became a city from a state with one headline in morning newspaper.  No morcha, no lochas.... they were too busy forwarding Bio data through a friend for job in  Bombay /Muscat or Kuwait.

I remember visiting a college mate named Rodrigues... he was called Rudy of course. . I saw only Pink in their house. Lady of the house had worn a pink skirt with polka dots,  the curtains were pink with big flowers, Rudy’s sis ( remember it is never sister those days) in a pink mini skirt with a frilled blouse with pink flowers again.  When introduced, she flashed her eyes and gave a coy smile ... before you could work out a smart thing to say, she would leave with her boyfriend Tony for a party, who is invariably the best friend of Cousin Martin. Party I realized later on is to go to neighbouring building terrace. Guys from that building would visit this building of Rudy. Man of the house, Rudy’s dad was on his own world, in a vest and Indian Bermudas, drunk. 

Life just drifted from one cricket series to another, it was Gavaskar and Vishwanath in 70s to 80s, Kapil and Shastri in 80s to 90s.  I don’t need to name the God who played cricket and brought smile to us often from 90s till date.

Coming to films during these period, for me,  it was  Amit in 70s, Amitabh in 80s to 90s, AB in 90s onwards till date.

Our fight for livelihood, recognition and achievement has been a continuous process from 70s till date.. I thank these sporting legends and artist for giving us great joy during our journey from school days to college days to Aura.

MGR to Rajni in Aurora

I am not too sure whether my excitement is to see the Endhiren the movie or to see a tamil movie in Aurora.

It seems just like the other day when Aurora was showing MGRs  Kavel Karen, rickshakaren, vetaikaran...from 12 to 3, 3 to 6, 6 to 9 and 9 to 12.  Not to disappoint the Malayalee crowd, on Sunday 9 to 12noon the classic and serioust flick of Madhu/Prem Nazir / Sathyen will be shown.

For SIES student from tamil division, I always used to wonder why is that Malayalam movies have the same cast movie after movies. It was like a family of 15 odd people moving around as a troupe to act in some 100 movies.

Usually the well behaved Kerala crowd will be followed by a frenzy crowd after a blaring alarm bell would make a dash for gate which will be manned by a hapless guard, who will eventually leave his post to a much tougher looking local dharavi born bouncer.

 Bouncer will also have business interest of being the inside man for the touts sellingtickets in black. The tout is   a woman with  50 odd tickets rolled and hidden in her no look (can’t look) area.

Promoting a movie is not recent a phenomena, MGR and Shivaji, used their massive fan base to just do this 30 years ago.

The purist would like to sincerely see the photo posters of the existing movie neatly displayed on the left side of the entrance and to the right would be the ‘coming attraction’  Claims and prediction whether the movie will run for 15 weeks or 25 weeks will be made then.

Cat calls followed by roaring laughter and reprimanding by a serious movie buff will be followed by a nice live fight.  It will be over in 5 minutes and they will continue to enjoy the movie being seated in the adjacent rows. When the show gets over, both will do their best to avoid each other but will loudly ask engaiya avan... The proud lady from his family would say .... vittu thallu ya....

With all these happenings, Aurora was the place to be with family for movie watching

It is sad to hear that this could well be the last movie of Rajni and Last movie to be shown in Aurora.

Chennai Super King.... ku whistle podu...Rajni will b probably be the last Super King from Tollywood.

CWG

Enough is written and televised about CWG fiasco. Let the world know what we have ignored for long in our own back yard.

It shames us because hundreds of thousands of foreign nationals are visiting for CWG in Delhi. Otherwise, it is fine. Toilets in Government hospital, hotels, and restaurant have been dirty. Why even public toilet in any railway station in India is dirty. We mutter few words, put handkerchief on our face as we enter this toilet and after 5 or 10 minutes it is not a problem anymore.

Our Politicians are dirty, our civic administration guys are dirty, and our cops are dirty. We see filth everywhere, so much so that we all are convinced in our lifetime nothing is going to change. We all get exasperated and think nothing will change in this life time. Actually even this thought is not right and actually dirty.

Dharavi and its filth have been there for more than 40/50 years. It has not bothered us so far, lot many taxis carrying foreign passengers have crossed by this area. Why so much ruckus now for CWG? I am glad though. Let something shame politicians and administrators.

Lalit is making money, or is it some politician or is it some money bag with a shady background converting his black to white or white to black. Who cares, I am absolutely sure none of the 50000 guys who were in the stadium or few 1000s who were in various cinema halls watching the match or countless millions glued to TV munching bajias and kurkure in the comfort of their home.

We have heard and seen the frenzy of soccer, American football or baseball and NBA in Europe and US.

I am just thinking about what is in store for us in India . Just to think, 600 plus millions, following a sport with passion that is unmatched for involvement or for sheer number. They are consumers too. Suddenly, US of A and Europe look downsized compared to India in the business of Sports. China do not count. They may have some guys winning in gymnast or badminton or TT.. But to drive the entire nation with a sport, MR. Modi has done it.

My customers in the business of printing Plastic cards got IPL business, my cousin running a leading retail chain is all smiles and informs me about fantastic footfall in the mall. Printers all over India are running 3 shifts.. Ad and creative agencies, signage companies are recruiting people left, right to keep up with the sudden surge in demand.

Okay, there are corrupt people around, they just don’t matter now. Ancillary industries like above are doing business which is 100 times more than all these franchisees put together. In my business I do involve touts at times, teek hai na,,, there are some politicians in this business of IPL too.
Forget all charges against Modi.. Just handover COMMONWEALTH GAME management to him and see what he can do for us. If he is making some 100 Million dollar in the process, so be it..

What we can do without amidst the entire melee is when a player of Tendulkar’s stature not coming clean when he took the catch of Dravid which he would know for sure that it bounced off the ground. Come to think of it, these two icons have fought together many a battle standing up to each other.. Sorry, Mr. Tendulkar, maybe I am from old school of thoughts, this is just not done.