Of Banning and Blocking

Not many are complaining the growth of Internet and arrival of Web 2.0, except a few. Hardware and Bandwidth going cheaper, on one hand has been beneficial to web companies, it is growing headache for sysadmins. They have strict orders from respective companies to control the bandwidth cost. Authorities have troubles keeping their employees productive with arrival of blogs, social networking and what not. Result? Banning of youtube,orkut,blogger is in rage. Can't do much about banning of orkut and youtube, but there are some workarounds for blogging.

One, Use PKBlogs. This was created when Pakistani government imposed ban on blog and in totally unrelated event later on by Indian government. Simple and easy to use, but it has issues with images and people have raised some privacy concerns.

Two, Get an RSS Reader. RSS phenomenon is fast catching attention everywhere. Concept is simple, instead of roaming all around the internet, just gather the places you are interested in and use it, which Google calls Inbox for your web. There are both online and offline RSS readers available. I strongly recommend Google Reader above all. IE7 and Flock have built-in RSS reader.

Well that's pretty much it. Necessity is mother of invention, they say, but no donuts for me as orkut remains banned at my workplace.

a PJ

Q. What is movie Janeman all about?

A. Tarzan.

As Gaurav once put it, sometimes I am happy I am not you. Johnny has all the copyrights for this PJ. For any kind of republishing, in full or parts, contact him.

You haven't had...

You haven't had perfect Vada Paav until you haven't had them at Andheri station.

You haven't had perfect Pani Puri/Chat until you haven't had them at Agarkar Chowk (Andheri, no sir , not Juhu-Chowpati)

You haven't had perfect Veg Sandwich until you haven't eaten at Narayana Sandwich.

Wondering I had gone to Mumbai for Diwali or for some food festival? That makes two of us. This was one of the best part of my Diwali vacation. More coming up :)

I officially...

...hate Indian cricket team. Stupid Dwayne Bravo has only one weapon, SLOW DELIVERY and Indian batsmen fall into the trap all the time. Today Smith trapped Yuvraj by same easy but slow delivery. Dravid is too confident about fielding of his own side and opponents that he is sure that when you are aiming with only one stump, you can NEVER hit it. Never mind. Pay the price and put your team into grave trouble, when it seemed that you are cruising along fine. No wonder Guru Greg (term developed by Indian Media) hit on them about their body language. How I really wish I could quit cricket someday like Formula-1

Retiring from Formula-1

...and Michael Schumacher is not alone. Herewith I am declaring my retirement from Formula-1 too. Not that it matters too much, but it's essential to declare it to the world :)

World is stage and players come and go and blah blah. Good for words, but I don't believe in it, atleast for Formula-1. Ever since I have been following F-1, I have seen Michael Schumacher growing, dominating, crushing opponents. Michael Schumacher, for me, has been greater than the sport itself and I know that's the case for many Indian F-1 followers. I can't imagine watching F-1 again without MS on circuit. Can't believe there won't be high jumps on podium in red dress. Can't believe German National Anthem won't be played at Paddock regularly. Adios Master!!! Luck didn't favour him in last two race or we would all have seen him dancing and jumping on podium with eighth world championship under his belt. Just when he looked all set to take the win, something happened, which hadn't happened to him in last six years. His engine betrayed him :(

Last race showed what MS is truly made of. There was only theoretical possibility that he could win, but he ran marvellous race. After dominating first two fabulous qualifying sessions, when he came on to the circuit, some problem with engine and had to return to pits. Even after such a disappointing qualifying, he ran his supreme and already pushed Fisi for fifth position, but worst was yet to come. He had tyre failure and after a long pitstop rejoined at last position, but as Damon Hill says, he never gives up. He had shifted to one-pit strategy now and was with heavy fuel, but started showing his mattle after second round of pit stop started. After zapping through tailenders with ease, now came the big names. Barichello et al was relatively easy. Now comes turn of Fisichella to feel the heat. Schumi took his best work at Turn 1 and did most overtakes there itself. He took inside track at turn 1 and others couldn't do anything but watch. Poor chap, Fisichella tried hard to outbreak the champ at turn 1 and ran wide outside grip. You don't do that with Schumi, boy!! suck on that, Fisi. Probably Kimi understood and managed to stay on inside track, but can't hold the man for long and ultimately saw Michael zooming past him. If it wasn't for the big gap that had already occured we would have easily seen him on the podium. What a race!!! What a man!!!

Although I won't be watching F-1 now, but I will support whoever is challenging Alonso. Don't take me wrong, he is good driver, but passion comes with a price. And I have developed sort of dislike Alonso just like that. Kimi is a good driver and now in good car and hope he continues legacy set by MS. Massa is shaping up good too. and I seriously hope McLaren continues their poor reliability and we see Alonso in pits well before the end of the race. Amen!!

As promised by MS, I hope we see him back with Ferrari soon in important role. Long live master!!

Ram Gopal Varma Ke Sholay

After years of speculation, RGV's Sholay is finally hitting the floors. It's offically called Rom Gopal Varma Ke Sholay , sucks. It has been making news ever since RGV announced it. Starting from the whole hearted acceptance from Amitabh Bachchan to denial from Ramesh Sippy, Dharmendra et al. In a chain of events, RGV , almost everyfortnight declared an actor for the particular character in Sholay, creating buzz all around. He sure knows how to stay in headlines. In the recent move, he unveiled new look of Gabbar, which has brought mixed reactions. Anyway, it has been topic of lunch table discussion and here I am to summarize some of the points/suggestions/comments straight out of discussion, Ram Gopal Varma might think helpful.

Katrina Kaif

Katrina Kaif plays role of Jaya Bachchan. Well sort of suits given that Jaya Bachchan didn't have many lines to speak, but we are seriously worried as to how she will do the scenes of Holi where Jaya did running and speaking at the same time. We wish Katrina luck in her most adventorous and toughest job of her filmi career. This one being new age version we have our own suspicion that she might originally belong to London, so that Hindi can be pardoned.

Mohit Ahlawat

Mohit Ahlawat. strain your brains and dude on the left side might seem familiar . Yes he is the RGV's latest find, protagonist in the latest movie "Shiva", which was remake of movie "James" (duhh), which in turn was remake of the movie which brought RGV into limelight "Shiva" (huh??). And what role he plays? oh yes. Jai. All Amitabh Bachchan fans, start digging your graves. We wonder considering his chemistry with Nisha Kothari in above mentioned movies, why Ramu didn't opt for Nisha in role of Radha?

Urmila Matondkar

Urmila Matondkar plays seductress Helen. Considering her early reputation of hit item girl with Rajkumar Santoshi camp, she might be able to live upto expectations.


Trivia :- In one of the biggest ironies of World Cinema, Anu Maliik's (no typos there) Chhamma Chhamma was copied to Hollywood hit double oscar-winning musical Moulin Rouge!, albeit with permission. Oh did I say irony? I take my
words back after coming across this piece of interview.

Q : The music industry is facing its worst-ever recession now...



A : Let me tell you why! It is not downloading, nor technology like MP3, nor piracy. It's just bad music! Why are we still seduced by The Backstreet Boys and Whitney Houston? Why can't we be original? Why should people pay money to listen to poor music? The pop element and the obsession with sound and technology is a passing phase.

Thoughtful indeed(Source)

Suniel Shetty

Suniel Shetty (No sir, no typos there either) has gone too far this time. He is playing Sambha. I wonder how much he paid for this role. His boutique business must have earned him enough to pay for this role.

Here are the two choice, IMHO, which might surpass or atleast match the original cast. Mohanlal as Thakur and Rajpal Yadav as Surma Bhopali, but we have serious issues to handle i.e. unconfirmed cast.

RGV approached Shreyas Talpade (Iqbal) for role of Ahmed (originally played by Sachin) and when he asked for narration, RGV got temperamental saying what does he think? won't I do justice to him? Doesn't he trust me? Man's gotta do, what he's gotta do ... anyway... so we were talking about unconfirmed cast. For Basanti we have scanned everyone from Rani Mukherjee to Esha Doel but none of them seems to fit in the scheme of things, but we'll soon find it out.

On the other line of thought, we were thinking who from Original Sholay can still part of this one, without losing his/her original charm. Considering fact that Mac Mohan hasn't changed a bit in last 'n' years, he could still play Sambha, but as mentioned above Suniel Shetty has already paid hefty sum, we couldn't back out on that, but then we finalized the man to top them all, A K Hangal, I don't think anybody would have problem with that. Do ya? do ya ? do ya?

BUT, Here comes the biggest of all, which made me right this whole crap in first place. Who is going to sing Mehbooba Mehbooba opposite Urmila? Just try to sing this in Jalal Aaga's voice



Mehbooba O Mehbooba.. uuuuuuuuuuuu



and tell me the name comes first into your mind. Bingo! You got it
right. Devil's own singer, Himesh Reshammiya, is going to get featured opposite Urmila in this song and is also composer of the movie. What else could you ask for? Guys go watch this one in theatres near you. SUMMER ... 2007...? 2008?..2015? Let's just keep it SUMMER as of now.

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PS:- Reasons for putting so many outgoing links and pictures, are simply pedagogical, on the special request by SlimShady, who says he doesn't know half of the name mentioned in this article. Uff yeh nayi generation!!!

Arrgghhh....

Michael Schumacher's engine betrays him only 17 laps away from chequered flag and when he looked all set to take the championship lead. Can't stand it any more..!!! :(