Mutterings, Movies and Free Popcorn

Okay, so after another week slogging in the office, managed to escape at 10.00pm Friday night, and to celebrate decided to splurge my time and not work on Saturday for a change (hurray!). So, having a rare free Saturday we decided to go catch some movies. J and I both agreed that this year's Oscar shortlist offers great choice for movie lovers. So having had a leisurely brunch we sheepishly borrowed the newspapers from the neightbours and scanning through the list, headed out to adventureland. Rushing out of home a half hour before a show on a weekend is never a great idea, and definitely not when there is major confusion on the venue. So rushing through the mad traffic, parking and racing across the streets, we did get to the show - only either we were at the wrong venue or at the wrong time (hmm..or was it both). Anyway, we couldn't care less in the mid-day sun so bought tickets for the next show of Crash and hung about in the mall, watching people watch other people hanging about. Major giggling fits at being searched by a very embarrassed looking security woman (girl!) we headed to the theatre for a very satisfying two hours of movie watching. The movie was great but interrupted in between with the girl next to us giving instructions on locating files on her computer in a very loud voice to someone on the other end of her mobile phone (WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE????). She seemed genuinely puzzled at being asked to shut up, but did nevertheless. Great movie - go watch it folks.

J was keen to catch in another show and used major persuasion which ultimately resulted in us entering the theatre a few minutes later (being hurriedly waved in this time by the same embarrassed looking security girl, - as soon as she realised we were about to break into another round of giggling fits). This time we saw 'Mixed Doubles' or was it Mixed-up Couples, or Mixed-Up Direction, or Mixed-Up Boring Jokes...anyway something like that. The concept was great, Mr Kapoor unfortunately couldn't follow it through. Determined not to fall asleep we entertained ourselves with shutting-up people who kept talking on mobile phones, but gave up after being outnumbered by the punjabi ringtones blaring out from all diretions. J had requested the usher to give us seats in the last row in case noone turned up, and sure enough about 10 min into the movie we were moved to the middle seats in the last row. Which was great as the seats had mucho leg-space but unfortunately the seats also had mucho airconditioning blast. (My knees started aching by the way (early signs of rheumatism?) and while walking out I had to pretend my leg had gone to sleep..) J's mumblings on the movie being boring and my musings on how thin Konkana was looking in the movie and how much weight I had put on, were interrupted by the usher coming over and asking if we wanted anything to eat. What?! Uh where did that come from? J said a quick No (always think before answering I say, yes Sir I sure do) but used the next half hour trying to figure out why he had asked us that question. I pretended not to be interested but kept looking out from the corner of my eyes at the usher picking and choosing people to ask them the same question. Oh Gosh, maybe we had won free food, maybe we were in business class seats and the service came free,...I gave up pretending as my stomach growled and the two aunties close to us got a massive bowl of popcorn and coke. We spent the next few minutes debating on how best to approach the usher and finding out what the mystery was (or rather, what was the 'majra') and discovered that it was an order-from-seat service as opposed to free food or a million rupees in prizes and oter such day-dreams that we had. Luckily our disappointing 'Ohs' were soon followed by KonkanaSS and the guy who was playing her husband (but came out as playing a badly raised pouty pre-teen) getting back home and the credits rolling on screen, and we rushed out of the hall to heated arguments on whether we should have watched this before Crash so as to have a good end to the evening, or maybe should have just watched one movie, ..oh whatever. A mad rush along the streets ensued and culminated in satisfying drinks (Stolinchkaya by the way, great vodka) and dinner. Followed by more plans to catch the other nominees..Keep watching this space for reviews.....

Hey Sexy!

The wispered sentence jarred the senses once again..its funny how things came rushing back. "Hey Sexy!" for Gods sake, people don't say that anymore!! Do they? They do. Standing at the corner of a road in the afternoon, waiting for a friend, a stranger walked by with a 'hey sexy', I didn't even register the person till he had gone, saw a checked red shirt from the corner of my eye. My only reaction at that point was "What the..", "People don't say that anymore", suddenly I felt vulnerable, how dare someone wisper lecherously and walk away? Why didn't I say anything? Do anything? Replaying the (non?)incident in my mind again and again I wonder if I should have reacted sooner and caught him by the collar and asked him why he said that. WHY? Perhaps I would have beaten him to pulp for this, if I was in a movie, thats what they do all the time,..but instead I felt uncomfortable, was mad at my friend for being late so as to put me in a situation where I had to leave the comfort of my car and wait at the street corner. She was guilty. I was guilty for having not done anything? Guilty! Guilty! GUILTY! But then, for women, aren't there checked red shirts at each street corner...

Started and finished reading 'Sita's Curse' by Seema Sirohi this weekend...In the last decade, had dowry deaths really increased by 225 percent? But I thought these had actually reduced since my time as a teenager a couple of decades ago when the media used to report how women had been burnt by family here and there. I still remember a few incidents being reported on tv 'Three sisters hung themselves' because the prospective grooms demanded dowries which the parents were unable to gather. I remember reading in the newspapers that they were 'nice girls', they were proficient in cooking and taking care of the house, were 'BA passed', the neighbours never saw them hanging out in the terrace of their houses, because they were nice girls they stayed in the house....sigh. I thought this stopped happening ages ago, youngsters nowadays are so 'modern' as compared to our days, I see young girls walking confidently around the city. I see couples confortabley walking together. I see the country's economy booming everywhere. I see perfectly made up women driving large cars, I see the opposition being led by a woman, I see women in the high rungs of the govt., of UN, of corporates, and yet it takes a book to make me wonder if I actually see whats going on around. The case studies mentioned in Sihrohi's book contain examples from different strata of society, from the girl who had dropped out of school after Vth standard to the girl who had completed higher studies abroad and was thoroughly independent. Gosh, if it could happen to them, it can happen to anyone. We don't see this anymore, after all women are doing so well that we don't really see that not much has changed. We all still have to avoid the checked red shirts at the corners.......