Broken floor :(

Ulu and I are staying in a 2 BHK in Madhapur (Hyderabad). Some time back, in one of the bed room floor started coming out (honestly i didn't break it) and made it almost unusable. After few days we got adjusted to the broken floor - we are very adjustable types :). Few days back when i entered the house i was shocked to see the state our hall. It was worse than what happened to bedroom. Actually walking in our house now become like walking in unknown river bed. You need to know the ups and downs, some place the floor will be hollow.

I checked with few of my friends (living in Madhaour), either theirs or some flat in their apartment is in same state. Same is the case with the flat next to us. Apparently similar thing happened in 'cyber towers' also. Wondering about the quality of these contructions. Worst thing is i can't even think of moving out if this flat. Getting house for rent in Madhapur is tough one, esp if you are bachelor. Even if we you rent will be too high irrespective of quality of the house. I better talk to watchman regarding fixing these floor tiles before getting adjusted to this also.

Look who's talking...: How to watch a film !

Look who's talking...: How to watch a film !

interesting post on how to watch movies oops films.

Guru

I wanted to watch this movie for long. It was in my ‘to do’ list for some time. For some time I didn’t get tickets in PVR then I was busy playing cards in Gopi's place. Whatever it got delayed than I thought it would... Last weekend Gopi and I went to PVR to book tickets. We got tickets for 5 (Gopi, Sush, Ulu, Kavya and I). Only first row was vacant. Gopi gave his funda that watching from 1st row is like watching in 140mm theater (some crap like that) and it is worth the money. Anyway I was also desp to watch it.

Plus

Mani can get good ating from anyone. He got the best from Abhishek and Madhavan in past (Abhishek in yuva, Madhavan in Ayutha Ezhuthu both did the same role) and he has got good performance in Guru from both. Art direction, sets were good. They recreated the mid 19th century of Mumbai (Bomaby??) pretty well.

Minus

Screenplay is a big minus. Abhishek getting away by giving a lecture in the commission is too much. Songs were not in sync with the flow of movie. For Rahman's standard re-recording is very mediocre. Songs are ok (merely ok).
Rating: 3/5

This is the second movie Mani is making based on some true life story. First one is Iruvar (Tamil). Though Iruvar didn’t do well commercially it didn’t have any of the minus I mentioned above. He beautifully conveyed the friendship between the two rival party leaders (DMK head Kalangar and ADMK supremo MGR). Prakash Raj and Mohanlal gave memorable performance. Rahman gave some good melodies. Another thing in common between these two movies is Aishwarya. Surely she has improved in her acting skills (who expect acting from her by the way)... After watching crap movies (last 2 weeks), I felt lot better watching Guru. Though this falls short of usual Mani’s standard Guru is lot better than other (at-least most) of the movies out there.

Movies @Hyderabad

These days i am cribbing a lot about everything, from work to home to movies...This is one such thing.

I used to watch lots of movies when I was in college. Even when I was working in b’lore I watched quite good number of movies. I am talking about the movies i watch in theatre not home videos. After coming to Hyderabad i have had very few options. Not all English movies get released here. You can expect only Bond movies, Super/spider man type movies. I diligently watch these movies also. But you can never expect parallel/classic movies here. Don’t even dare to expect the movies to get released on (almost) the same date they get released in b’lore or other cities. Hyderabad must have largest number of theaters in (at-least in south) India (only couple of multiplexes). Every corner has theatres. Floating population in hyderabad has increased so much these days... Why dont the theatre owners realize its high time they put more English movies..

If English is like this I can’t state my frustration about Tamil movies. I am not sure whether there is some ban for Tamil movies in Hyderabad. No Tamil movies here. Man, Tamil movies get released all sorts of places but not in Hyderabad. My friends in US watch it before i could, sigh... There are quite good percentage of Tamil people are here but still... So I end up in watching all movies when I go to Thanjavur / Chennai.

Srisailam Trip

When Ulu called me for the trip i said no to him as i visited this place in Jan '06 only. Then Gopi called me and somehow convinced me. I was also not feeling well. I was in dilemma till the last moment. But at the end it turned out to be a really fantastic trip. Good i didn't miss the trip.

I should agree that i was shocked to see Ram's mail about the preparations. Man....what an exhaustive list. Irrespective of that none of us got all the items mentioned in that mail....thats different story. We were supposed to start 5:00 am... It got delayed a bit (not because of me oversleeping :)...). In total 7 people were there (Ulu, Gopi, Jeyanth, Sushmithaa, Ram, Nawate and myself). We reached the ghat near Srisailam and enquired about "Lotthi falls". One of the villagers told it is 1.5 km and we need to walk. Everyone felt 1.5 is quite ok and we started to walk. We walked for about 70 mins. Still no signs of falls or any village. We are deep inside the forest. We were completely exhausted. Temp was around 40 C and we were carrying just 2 litres of water. To add to this, that forest is supposed to be Tiger sanctuary and hideout for naxals. Somehow we made our way back.

We started towards Mallela Theertham (falls). We reached there around 2:30 pm. Awesome place. Planning to go there during monsoon also. We spent time till dusk. We had our lunch there amidst fighting with monkeys.

Nextday we went to Sundipetta. Place was OK. But the journey to it was amazing. We had to travel in a jeep for about 15 km (i guess no other vehicle can go through that path). Its full of ups and downs. You will constantly jumping inside the vehicle. Its adventureous just to sit in the jeep.

Destination was a small temple (it looks like an eskimo house). You need to crwal inside that temple. In the evening we went to pathal Ganga. Went for a parisal ride in the krishna river. We statred from Srisailam around 7:45pm and reached hyderabad around 1:00 am.

Badminton

As part of my plans to reduce my midlle region i started going to badminton. Me and Kasi are going to the indoor stadium in yusufguda. It was quite good stadium with 6 courts. In 2 courts kids were playing. I was watching them for 5 mins. I wish i play like them. They are damn good. In next 2 courts people in their mid thirties and early foutrties were playing. I should agree that all of them were more sportive than me or Kasi.

As usual getting up ealy is a big problem for me. Stadium will be open till 7:30 am only. If you go early you get more time to play. We generally reach there around 6:30-45am. As per advice from the peer players there got a yonex 'Muscle power' - 23 racket and changed the guts. It is really really good, light weight.

Let me see how long i could continue this. I certainly don't want to stop playing baddy. Actually there is vacancy for 2 ppl there. Might pull in some more friends. It will be fun playing with friends. It reminds me of Raja and I playing in our college. We used to play badminton in my college. Hmmm...atleast during Ist and IInd year time frame. I hope those good times will return.

"He who has health has hope; and he who has hope has everything"

SHIP IT

I finally got my SHIP IT plaque. It is wonderful feeling when you actually see your product released to customer and they start using it. I was part of Visual studio 8 team. We are part of Visual studio for Devices team (VSD).