auto raja

is the name of a kannada movie, by shankar nag, which sorta immortalized and elevated the status of an auto driver, his hard ships, his big aortic pump (heart) etc etc

In the past week, I've had the fortune of traveling in an auto, with some rather colourful drivers manning the wheel...

1. One guy asked me a "onnendaaf" fare (one and a half for those who haven't cracked it yet). When I protested, he said "en saar neev software novre hing and bittre?" and shaved off 10 bucks on the condition that we'd both (me n the auto driver) smoke a cigarette together!

2. At 10 pm in the night after a rather hilarious play, bro sis in law n I catch an auto. All's fine till we encounter some traffic cops with breath analyzers. At this point somebody (dont remember who) ponders about the mechanics of this exercise of catching alcoholic drivers... And the driver gives us his glimpses of drunk driving episodes that he's seen in his illustrious career!

He tells us about this drunk guy at 11 pm in gandhi bazaar who takes his brand new shiny white tata indica and drives it neither on the left nor the right but straight OVER the median on the road...of course 'under the influence'! ;)

So a few guys on the spot, including our beloved auto driver, rush to the spot to help him...But our elated indica guy is, apparently, talking about "making the car fly" over the median and onto the road...With a smile on his face...

At this point our auto driver in the role of narrator, is excited and leaves no details unmentioned...He goes on to use some expletives with my sis in law right there in the auto! funny :D

The indica was rescued, btw...

(Some) Auto drivers rock!

Jhoom le!

Jhoom le has bol le pyaari agar hai zindagi
Saans ke bas, ek jhonke ka, safar hai zindagi :)

Hariharan is a funny looking man now.

He has a goatee kinda short beard below his lip, with mane type of hair extending upto the middle of his back, in a weird kinda plait.

All this is true and is to be focused upon until he hath his mouthshut.com

Cos once he opens it, there is nectar...The sweet nectar of ingenious, creative beyond par music!!

I got to his concert early, made friends (conversation) with a police constable who I found out lives close to my house, ate overpriced crappy snacks, walked around looking groups/couples of ppl and wishing how i had some company for 2 hours (thats RIGHT!) and at the end of it he comes and takes away all reason to complain...

Even in his madness, u see melody...His control over music, the accuracy and precision of notes he can produce can be explained, I think, using the following example : Take a grain of rice and divide it into a 100,000 pieces. If you think u can imagine how big each piece can be, then divide it into 10,000,000 pieces. Ah better...Each piece is equivalent to one fine sliver of tonal variations Hariji can distinguish between.

He's just awesome! And I got to see him from some 10 feet away, live, crooning away to glory, "tunn" (the hindi word) in his own ecstatic world!

And I come back home to a smiling mommy waiting for me with food and some kickass football!!
Good night indeed....

I cry, when angels deserve to die...

It is a sin to be a good samaritan. Atleast, ur rewards aren't what you expect (Was I even expecting something?)

The scene is the square which holds the Coffee day in one corner. You will find a plethora of vehicles, on all the four roads, converging towards the center. And a rather generous display of uncouth, undisciplined driving at that.

So I come to a halt near the center, thinking I should try to help the jam. So I slowly back up one foot in my two wheeler and slightly touch the activa behind me. He says "aye aye aye aye AYE!" at first and before I can understand whats going on and utter an apology, he (with his wife and a small kid) are right next to me asking me to move to the side (I'm pretty much towards the centre of the road). Now I'd have offered some explanation as to why i was exhibiting inertia in a traffic jam, had he not have started uttering extremely vulgar swear words. I, amidst shock and anger, say "I'm not gonna go anywhere...you can go around me". (There was enough room). At this point, time T, he threatens to hit me. At time T+1 another guy props on the other side asking me to move. And as I turn to answer him, the first guy gives me one around the head.

I realize at this point that my temparature has reached the boiling point of blood. But I couldn't hit him. Civility, Nobility, the sight of a female with a kid and I don't know what else constrained me as I trembled against the strongest of impulses to throw a few back (I'm strongly ruing it now). He didn't stop cursing my mother...

So much for my social tendencies. I need some rehab...

On an aside, I observed that most ppl there were angry/impatient. Is there not one minute they can spare to allow another to pass, which COULD resolve the traffic jam? Apparently not. I made a mistake today and learnt it the hard way.

Seene mein jalan, aankhon mein toofan sa kyu hai?
Is sheher mein har shaks pareshaan sa kyu hai?

P.S : Anybody who reads this post and thinks that I'm a sissy or something like that, will be in for a rude shock...

Good morning

Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up thinking it must run faster than the lion or be killed.
Every morning in Africa, a lion awakens knowing it must outrun the slowest gazelle or starve to death.

It doesn't matter if you're a lion or a gazelle.
When the sun comes up, you'd better be running.