Had a great time with friends. Good food, conversations and beer. Another weekend wasted chasing money. There’s so much to do, wonder when will I get to it. Made a few new friends, let’s see how it plays out. Will know in weeks to come.

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A post after almost a year. Twenty ten promises to be a fresh start. Clean slate. No more hangups, no more living life in a rut.

Lots of resolutions. Lots of promises. Lots of things to do.

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The year 2009 is finally upon us. The Year of the Ox sure does have a promising ring to it. The strong and mighty Ox embodies fortitude and hard work. It is said that the Ox is unswervingly patient, tireless in its work, and capable of enduring any amount of hardship without complaint. Hope the new year brings good tidings for each one of us.

2008 was an absolutely spectacular year. For me it stood more for highs than the lows, more about achieving goals and less about failing. I could have barely asked for more.

In terms of personal life and relationships, the last year left a lot to be desired, although professionally it was everything I had hoped for, and much more. Leading a wonderful bunch of kids, getting an internship despite of messing up (very badly, that too) an interview, and finally, getting a job before anyone else… I have had very few reasons not to smile.

Especially the last one - a job, was something that was very unexpected and surprising. To be the first person (ever) to get placed from the very first batch of a different, innovative MBA programme, from a rather new institution is a feeling quite indescribable. I had heard a moment can change your life, but I never thought I would get to experience it. Getting congratulated and recognized for all the hard work, a culmination of something that you strived to achieve for years together coming together is indeed euphoric. Becoming the most talked about figure in a crowd of thousands sure does make you feel special.

December 15th especially is one day I will never forget. It made me feel like an overnight celebrity of sorts. Best feeling EVER.

To end the year with the very best of friends is to have your cake and eat it too. The very best of house parties consist of good food, drinks, music and above all, great company. For me, the last party of the year that I attended had it all.

Some things about 2008 that I shall never forget: Kerala, Bangalore, December 15th, New Year’s Eve, GG, OTH, Diablo 3, Barça, home made Pasta and indie love <3

Goodbye 2008, I shall miss you dearly.

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Desperately needing a break from the busy life, I was handed a golden opportunity to visit the Garden city - Bangalore right before Diwali break.

It was a five day trip, more about work than play, but I was hardly complaining. Heck, how many people get to travel on college expenses besides?

The trip had a pretty serious agenda - Placements. Judging by the current scenario of a global slowdown, recession and what not, it was very much needed to say the least.

The journey

Getting to Bangalore (or shall I say Bangalooru?) was not as much fun as I had expected it to be. We (there were 3 of us - two other girls and I) had to swallow the bitter pill and travel by bus on a dull Sunday afternoon to make it in time for a meeting the next day. Raj Travels, I was told was a good way to travel and sadly it turned out to be anything but that. We had the last row of seats to ourselves, and while it was fun chitchatting and all that, the bus in itself was old, rickety and dusty! So dusty that every time it hit a bump, some dust would fall from the overhead luggage shelf. The air conditioning barely worked, and being the cheapskates that they are, they turned it off at night! Some grand service for 1300 odd bucks I’d say! And to top it off, I was covered with dust by the time I woke up in the morning. To add to the misery, the bus didn’t even get us to our destination within the promised time og 18 hours, as a result of which we couldn’t make it for the meeting. So much for customer service.

Thankfully the rest of the trip wasn’t even half as bad as the trip to Bangalore.

Bangalore - the Garden city

The city sure did seem quite a bit different from my last visit here, which was roughly two years ago. The city has some vintage charm which I very much like. On reaching our “booked” cab never really arrived, and after a lot of haggling with the auto mafia (read: auto drivers who extort money as they please) we finally got going. At least the driver was nice enough to get us to our hotel, which was located in the heart of the city on M G road.

The hotel in itself was rather modest, very traditional by the looks of it. The rooms were dirt cheap (we had a stay budget of 500 bucks a day) so it was a steal. The girls took up a rather grand double room while I settled for a rather small single room which felt more like a room straight out of an old age home.

^{Does it not match the description?}

Placement work

The placement bit of the trip went A-OK. Some of the companies were simply dazzling. Like that of a particular aircraft manufacturer where the HR head of its country operations was kind enough to let us in and give us a good amount of time. Similarly, it went from OK to pretty well with most companies. Although it left a lot to be desired on a personal level as this was something that should have been done a year ago. Sadly now we have to pay for those timely mistakes and live with it.

Evenings in the city

Being the not-so-adventurous bunch that we were, most of the evenings were spent in browsing through countless shops on M G road or usually in some mall or the other. While it does sound a bit sad, it was not too bad. I guess I probably enjoyed myself as it was a new city. Or something like that.

Somehow it was very different from Bombay and even Delhi. As I said before, Bangalore has its own charm, and I really liked that.

^{They didn’t have a T or a C unfortunately}

I particularly liked what little I saw of the city. The offices seemed rather grand and awesome. The public transport - considerably improved (not accounting for the auto mafia who seem to have gained more notoriety) and the traffic was comparatively lesser than in Bombay.

At the end of the trip, come to think of it, I would certainly not mind being there for a couple of years. It seems like a pretty great place, and judging by the way Slumbay is degrading and dying a slow death, Bangalore might just be that perfect alternative (besides Goa that is :P).

Going home

Before I knew it, my time was up. It seemed awfully short (well longer than my last trip, but still) but it was quite a memorable one. Not only did it erase whatever bad memories I had from the last trip it also left quite a few lasting and postive impressions in my mind.

My favourite part of the trip was the food. I prefer simple food, and having just that throughout the trip was great. I especially LOVED the donuts we picked up for the return journey from this little donut shop on M G road. They were by far some of the most delicious ones I had ever had - something for which I wouldn’t mind coming to Bangalore over and over again!

Thankfully we had a better bus while returning home and it was a pretty comfortable journey.

All in all it was a pretty great trip, and I’m glad I had the opportunity to visit it and explore whatever little I could on my own terms.

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This is a modified repost of an old review, originally written on 20 May 2005

Mysterious Skin is a sensitive and a touching movie that deals with a very delicate issue. Disturbing, intense, warm and shocking are probably the words that would sum up the experience of watching this movie. I have not quite felt the same way after watching a movie in a long time.

^{Promotional Poster for Mysterious Skin}

The movie, eighth by director Gregg Araki is an adaptation of a novel by fellow American writer Scott Heim by the same name.

The movie has a sexual theme, which is quite common for almost all Araki’s movies albeit this one deals with a slightly more serious topic of child sexual abuse. The plot is set in Hutchinson, Kansas, USA, and describes effects of childhood sexual abuse through the eyes of two teenagers.

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This is a modified repost of an old review, originally written on 3 March 2006

The Great Indian Rock festival is an annual event to promote bands on the Indian rock circuit. The festival, which is mostly held in New Delhi, makes occasional forays into Bombay as was the case this year.

Bands performing in this tenth edition of Great Indian Rock included Demonic Resurrection and Split from Mumbai, Joint Family and Prestorika from Delhi. Progressive metal band Freak Kitchen was flown all the way from Gothenburg, Sweden to feature as the headlining act. The city’s very own Medusa was also scheduled to perform at the show, but were unable to do so as their drummer unexpectedly fell ill. Nevertheless, the line-up was good enough to enthrall the masses and had all the right ingredients to make it a memorable show.

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This is a modified repost of an old review, originally written on 14 November 2005

Hypnotize is the latest (and probably the last) offering by the Armenian quartet System Of A Down. It is the second and concluding part of the Mesmerize/Hypnotize double album. Nearly six months after the release of Mesmerize, Hypnotize is finally here and delivers what it promised to -  an old school System of a Down. Good news for the fans of the band as the foursome is back, and how!

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It certainly does feel good to be back. Roughly fifteen days have passed since I purchased a new address to move into, since my old domain, beautifuldisaster.co.uk died a rather unexpected and untimely death. Lost all files and posts stored on the old servers. Luckily, the Internet Way Back Machine had archived my website a couple of times in between the sporadic updates, so hopefully I will be able to recover some, if not all of my previous posts.

Here’s to the new beginings. Hopefully the posting will be a bit more regular now that I have a clean slate (of sorts). Cheerio.

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