Disclaimer: Ok, I know the title might be provocative/misleading, but I have to make it clear that this is about the bollywood movie.

Ever watched a B-Grade action flick on Star Movies or HBO? Observed how stupid the fight/action sequences are? After semi-watching (other semi was reserved for yawning/commenting/laughing) the movie 'Mission Istanbul', I could gather the following points.

1. Vivek Oberoi is desperate
2. If you took out the blood in a few scenes, it could as well be Rated R for gay love-making scenes (and I am not making fun of gays here)
3. One-liners in action movies are fine, as long as they are well-made and delivered by a Bruce Willis
4. If you do want to make an action movie, work on the ACTION too, even if they are in fight sequences
5. Apoorva Lakha should read "Product Placement in Movies For Dummies" before making another movie
6. Liza Lob (Swetha something) character looked like "inspired" from Lara Croft (Angelina Jolie's version) complete with the costume
7. And yes, she was cat-walk-ing a wee bit more than needed, especially after she was doing just fine in a fight sequence featuring 30 extras. The pronounced sashaying (if that indeed is a word, Hail Lord!) looked like she was trying to seduce everyone on the set and in the seat and needless to say looked like a physically challenged person
8. Was she related to the director? or the producer?
9. Wives/GFs of heroes are always stereotyped in action movies, this one was no excpetion, except that Shreya was on the receiving end. Hmph!
10. Few scenes were comfortably imported from the usual movies. Nothing wrong with that, as long as you COPY THEM PROPERLY.
11. We really really lack good action heroes.
12. Pair of shades, a goatie, french beard, gelled hair, ample show of well-toned torso is a must for any action movie made past 2002.
13. Dubbing was really bad
14. Talking hindi in Turkey, especially on TV for Turkish people is even worse. Showing Indians everywhere is also bad (even though it's true). I wonder why sub-titles are such an alien concept to us (afraid of losing illiterate crowd ticket sales???)
15. Where the HELL did Abhishek Bachchan come in from?? I understand his role is guest appearance, but if you had to insert him, you could have as well put the song somewhere meaningful!!! (unless you wanted to mislead the audience. Oh!! You CLEVER director/editor/screenplayer!!)
16. The lingo's there. All over. "What the Fs", "Holy shits", "Freakin", they are all there. Funny how the characters stopped at "what the F!!!!!". Even a school kid knows what it is.
17. Talking about kids, was it mentioned at any point that this movie was being made for kids? Oh, if they said so, then this entry would be pointless!!
18. I am not going to talk about the storyline. Nobody expects them to be perfect, not even Dark Knight was [1]
19. Why use baseball sluggers when you could finish off the business with guns, especially when you are BLOOD-THIRSTY-DANGEROUS-COOL TERRORISTS!!!!
20. The best scene of the ENTIRE movie was Dubya's first scene in Air Force Won (not One). They killed the humor by trying to use it second time. For those who don't know who Dubya is, it's George Bush.

I am gonna try to sleep now.

References:

1. Some random movie review site, or IMDB forums.

I hate moving. Period.

Not only does it disturb your already set routine, you also have to begin anew. And this my dear, is a two-fold headache.

1. Destroying

I don't know about others but I like my life running according to some sense of routine. If not the "life" as such, but at least this part of life at home. I keep my keys at one place, mails at another. Clothes are hung at a particular place (new and old separately), I know where my pens are, my stapler is, where my documents are stored and, where the extra batteries are kept.

I don't go about creating a routine out of nothing. It forms over the first few days. And once it takes a shape over the next few months, any attempt to run contrary to that routine is not only a physical disturbance but also a mental one. Being organized is not WRONG. No matter how much the "cool" kids (do I even talk to kids anymore??) tell you, taunt you, there is nothing wrong in being organized.

2. Creating

Unfortunately, stagnation is a disease affecting many of us without we ever noticing it. So in a way, change, in the form of moving from one place to another, is also a good thing. But the process of moving is always difficult.

You start from the scratch (not bad sometimes) and then it takes time and patience to set everything in a place before you start feeling at "home". Even this is bearable. Trouble begins when you have to move again.

My stay is US can be broken into 3 phases (so far).

1. The really crappy phase
2. The good phase
3. The "?" phase

I really don't want to talk about #1, and #2 doesn't need any specific introduction (good suffices). This leaves #3, which is one where I am off from my comfort zone. This place is called Harrison, in New Jersey. I am here to a) find a permanent job; b) to find a part-time job while am searching for (a).

This is as closest as I can get to NYC. I haven't visited NYC yet, ok now close that open mouth of yours. I landed at NY Penn station and that brief glimpse of the City in that 50minute period spoke volumes about the place.

It was as if I came to an altogether different country!! People were in mad rush everywhere. There were small groups, walking together, hanging out together, or just waiting at traffic junctions. Oh yes, they were crossing the road even when they were not supposed to. That should be a relief, I was thinking this happened only in Hyderabad!! Except for a small difference, here, they were crossing when there were no on-coming vehicles. Anyway, I digress.

A new (really really NEW & FRESH) life begins for me tomorrow. Am I excited? Hell no!! That would be so un-ME-ish.

I have done a big mistake today.

I was trying to convert a 50GB NTFS partition to Fat32, which, if you are a techie, know is not possible by any software. You have to delete it and re-create the entire thing. My external hdd had a 50GB partition followed by a 365GB partition, the latter which I wanted to extend so that I can limit the Fat32 partition to 32GB. Got it?? :P

Anyway, I put in the Gparted CD and I started the resize process when I realized that the thing took time to read the 365GB partition by 12MB or so. Can you imagine that??? 365,000 in increments of 12!!! Holy *bleeep*!!!!

It took 3 hours just to finish reading. And then it started the copying process, moving 365GB to the new extended size of 387GB!!! OMG!! It's gonna take a cool 10 hours to do that.

But, the good side of all this was, apparently, pointed out by my room-mate, that I actually stayed away from my laptop and internet. "You spoke too soon son, I am using your laptop now".

Anyway, thanks to this mistake, I could bond with my New Zune. Oh wait, before you roll your eyes and dismiss me as another "anti-pod-ian", listen me out.

I don't like Apple's management. Period. I though appreciate what the products are - The Macs, the iPods, and etc. They are definitely things of beauty to look at, have a good heart and work well. Good for the owners.

I like Zune, for what it is. I like bulky gadgets, something which I can hold on to, heavy and rigid. I will be honest, I have handled the iPod like 3 or 4 times, that's it. But, it's not to my liking. I don't like its slick feel (too smooth for me) and it feels damn delicate!! May be if I handled it more I would have grown to appreciate it, but, seriously, no thank you.

I got mine for free. But, it was the very thing I wanted. Although, I must admit, it's a bit bulky to fit in my trouser pocket's but I love big screens and that's exactly what I got!!

I was carried away by the antipodian movement for quite sometime, but seriously, now I refuse to get drawn into this war. An iPod is an ipod, thing of beauty, and a Zune is obviously a Zune, for whatever I like it for. If you still insist on calling me names, *bleep* yourself, but unfortunately, these things work 'cos of you guys. Sigh!

I will do a good review of the Zune sometime later, but for now, I am a proud owner of a Zune.

DOTD: (Doubt of the Day)
China's definitely flourishing, right? You can't deny it. The people get everything they want "consumerically". They don't have the freedoms that few others have. Or some might call it "lack of liberties". I am not an expert on this but, seriously, the only thing independent thought and liberties have always brought is chaos. And why would anyone want it??

More later.

My friend today reminded me of a landmark. It didn't even occur to me with all the events going on right now in my life. Ironically, it is precisely the very beginning of this end that I completely forgot about.

Confused?? It's normal don't fret.

Today (today in India, tomorrow in USA) marks the completion of 2 years of my stay in USA. I still remember (although vaguely: Courtesy my memory) the first day (or rather night) when I reached here. Not to mention the travel from India, which was the first time I traveled by air (ignoring one such flight in one "vayudoot" back in 90s) and so far a distance from home. Nothing could prepare you for such a journey. No matter how many forums you browsed, how many people you talked to, how many movies you watch, it's completely different experiencing it first hand.

Now, 2 years later, $30,000 poorer, I look back at the those days of uncertainty, fraught with worries (of appearing as a FOB) and tension, which now seems like a "distant past", as my friend suggested. Not to me I said, perhaps not realizing what it means.

I am at the end of another degree. The one goal of these 2yrs. Others would say, the goal was achieved long back, when we first set our foot on the US soil (or floor after the Immigrations) for those others believe that once you are here, you are here to stay and earn (must add that).

2 years.. 2 seems to trivialize the issue, and years does otherwise.

For me, it has been a journey which I would like to forget. Perhaps, as a concession, remind me at the back of my head that the future is based on these 2years of struggle.

Thanks to everyone who made it possible.

The net is rife about Microsoft's new ad-kinda campaign called the "mojave experiment". What it basically is that few people are first asked about their opinion on Vista and when they are negative (thoroughly and mostly), they are introduced to a new Microsoft OS called "Mojave" (unknown to them is nothing but Vista but for the name). They were shown few features of Vista which "wow"ed them and once they are done with calling it "awesome", "great" and the like, they are told the truth.

The test group (at least the ones shown) all respond in awe that Vista could do so much, change their opinion about it and ready to "buy" Vista.

It's not bad. I mean if the whole idea was to change people's perception about Vista being the "big bad villain" that they head about or keep hearing day-in and day-out, then may be it does work. But the net is rife about articles which wham-bham the whole ad (if I can call it so?) that everyone feels it's a bad idea.

May be not. I am quoting my personal experience here, so I suppose you can take with a pinch of lemon. I was eagerly looking forward to Vista all through 2006 till it was released. But then came the barrage of criticism from all the "Gurus" of the tech industry that I was taken aback. This was a guy who helps people with tech-issues. Soon, my wait for Vista became a free wireless transmitter for an anti-Vista campaign that was to discourage anyone from upgrading, make fun of people who had already upgraded.

Yes, I did. Months passed. Now, I finally got myself a Vista Ultimate from my university at an "undisclosed" price. Couldn't the resist the itch, at the same time being apprehensive about it, I opted for a Dual-Boot. First time Vista booted, WOW!!!!

Next thing I did, I disabled the UAC. Don't ask me why, don't give me sermons about it. I know my stuff and moreover I was experimenting. Anyway, my Dell 6400 laptop had all drivers natively accounted for by Vista (except for audio drivers which I had to get from the site). The OS partition was up and running with all updates and patches.

Experience?? Hmmm, this is the tricky part. I remember the initial days when I was trying out XP. Everything was different, much more was the transition from 98se to XP than from XP to Vista (mostly because of the eye-candy). Configured the system to run optimally and I got a score of 4.1 for that Vista experience thingy. It was fast, and seemed to know what it was doing for the most part. I threw in an antivirus and couple of most important utilities and NOTHING ELSE. Mind you this was still an evaluation and at the same time, the disk space was limited. After poking around for a bit, trying Dreamscene (which by the way is amazing though boring after the initial 5 minutes), and other eye-candy of Vista, I left it at that. I need to further try it to make sure it can stand my general operational routine though.

Seriously, all this Vista bashing aplenty in the media affected me, and from me, it went quite some way. But which OS wasn't this ill-received? I remember horror stories about XP and it being called BAD BAD things. And then it became the darling of the masses, over 2 years??? I am still critical of few things in Vista, but that's me because I consider myself a power user. I know a lot of people around me who wouldn't even bother doing what I do with a virus infection and instead proceed to do a clean install of the OS. For them, I don't think it really does matter which OS it is, and considering that Vista (at least in terms of technical stuff) is better (???) and faster than XP (*Conditions apply - such as system specs), I don't see why they shouldn't use it. I think it deserves some more time just for the sheer number of people using it or the number of software/hardware it has to work with. (Yes I still have issues with the prices though).

Vista would gain acceptability sooner or later, and then everyone will forget about XP, just like people forgot about win98. But then, I think before that comes, we might have Windows 7 on our hands (guessing). And then the cycle repeats.

And apple?? That's an interesting watch at a completely different level. Can it sustain the good-will/form by venturing into the whole wide market????