Things I want to get better at.

i.  Being a person. I mean, at this point I do not suppose I am a day person or a night person, just being a person works for now.

 

ii. Not forgetting the song I was obsessing over a week back.

 

iii. Making lists and following them.

 

iv. Letting go.(I still can't) I am the kind of person who wants to hold on to people even if they don't want me in their life.

 

v. Being real and sharing my lows as much as I share my highs, we are all in this together(I guess).

 

vi. Not watching the same movie\series every time I have some time and start watching something else.

 

vii. Feeling loved. For the longest time, I had my walls up high but feeling loved is a feeling that everyone deserves.

 

viii. Giving myself the margin of being human. Often, we go so hard on ourselves, but we forget that it's okay to be flawed.

 

ix. Getting out of the blanket in winters and being productive.

 

x. Saying 'no' and 'it's not okay' to people, saved the toughest one for the end. :")

Trying to Ryhme

 

 Sitting at my desk,

My keyboard, I am typing .. I am deleting... Come on words, come on now, Flow, like what they call poetry.

I need to finish this poem,

Its been a while I wrote one.

(..or I posted one)

Atleast give me something to write about, A thought, a prompt... 

Should I write about her?

 Hello??

Argh!

Come on brain, come on now!

Even if I get the thoughts what If I cant rhyme for godsake!

What are  the basics? The second and the fourth should rhyme, 

Wait rhyme doesn't rhyme with much, Should I end with Dime time... slime? (That makes no sense)

Why is it so difficult?

It's should be a child's play! 

Match the syllables to the alphabet and start, Alay blay clay dlay elay flay? (Am I really that dense?)

 

I'm wondering if I should push myself this hard?

 So I wanted to say this on everyone's behalf. Somethings in life can be tough to crack, But that doesn't mean you leave it halfway.

If you started something, go finish it, If not right now, then when?

. . .

 

Inspired from The Struggles of Writing Poetry

Dear Future Self

A letter to my Future Self,

 

Hi! Hoping that you are doing well there, I'm writing this letter to you and somehow I feel like this letter is long overdue.

How is everyone doing there? I am curious about you! And have some questions that I want to ask you. Do you still write down those feelings when you are unable to express them? I know I used to and always do it from time to time, but do you? Or have you just started to ignore them, as you are in the rat race to succeed? hope you do write those unexpressed emotions, to let yourself all out on those white notes.

Are you still just as reckless and clumsy as I am? Or have you matured with time? I somehow want you to and not to at the same time, as I wish you keep the child inside alive and do all kinds of things people tend to forget to do as they grow up.

Hey, what about your job? Did you manage to get that dream job of yours? Are you adjusting well in the new and unfamiliar atmosphere?Don't back away from speaking your mind.

That Solo trip you planned to travel all over India in trains, have you accomplished it yet?

And I have saved the most critical question for the end of the letter, are you happy? And not just that fake for everyone's sake' wala happy. I'm talking about real happiness. Have you found it? And if not, are you making efforts towards it? Because I know all the hurdles you have gone through before and many more you are going through now. But just remember, despite everything going on, start making yourself happy.Don't mind other people's opinions because I know you are much better than you give credit to yourself.

So start making little 'me' times in your schedules. Accomplish all set goals and make way for new ones. But above all, stay happy, healthy and become all you want to be.

 

 Love,

Your Younger Self

When an Introvert Falls in Love 💕

Introverts dont care much about interacting with others. They always like to live in their own imaginary world.But once they are in love,that's the foremost Innocent & Beautiful moment for them.When they fall for someone,they fall too hard. Its sort of a sharp blow, a havoc in their serene world.

The points which I am gonna list below may not apply to all of the Introverts but most of them have these personality traits. Well I do most of it. 

Introverts can easily hide their feelings to the planet either of sorrow or happiness. they will be dying inside to talk to you and still wouldnt give a single stare at you.They steal glances at you,( a minimum of they think so). If you're alert enough, you'd know they actually are staring. Plain, innocent staring.

They let all of their high walls they need build around themselves over the years come down, only for you.They find reasons to initiate a conversation and fail miserably to carry on to it.Finally once they get the chance(once in a blue moon though),they tend to be a wallflower! Or if not, everything follows Murphy's law!

Their silence is usually interpreted as their ego, but their ego becomes the last item they care about when the love bug bites them.One thing that they' are professional at, is OVERTHINKING and OVER-IMAGINING. They lack in expression, in order that they dominate in imagination. They imagine the situations that never were and circumstances which may never come. You never even know and that they have just established a happy home with you in some galaxy far, far away!

They concentrate to the most trivial things about you and remember the tiniest details of every conversation. They note of every small detail about you though they may not have the courage to talk to you about it, still they know A to Z about you(well, almost all).

An unexpected, out of the blue text from you will light up their entire day.They can go on blushing the entire day just by hearing the words like, ‘Nice Shirt!’ from you.They will send cheesy one liners and terrible jokes just to make you smile.

They are afraid of getting rejected, they are frantic of getting friend zoned , in order that they wont come up and express their feelings so easily. But once they do, it takes a hell lot of courage to confess their feelings!

They will try to do all that you love. they might read every book you suggest, hear your favorite songs, watch your favorite movies even when its not their cup of tea.

Many of introverts are after all good painters, writers, musicians, etc. If you would like to know if they really care about you, closely observe their art, its their way of expressing everything that they would rather not express.

They will let you go. If you ever decide they are not what you want anymore, they will let you go, without any hard feeling or grudges. But they can never be the same again.

 

Also read 

When an Introvert Falls in Love - Part Two 💕💕

 

Dear Friend - Not Everyone's cup of Tea

 

Classmates, Notebook, Friends, Mumbai Police, NPCB etc. Malayalam cinema has seen different types of friendship movies and Dear Friend is just another experience.

 

 

The film is directed by actor Vineeth Kumar and scripted by Sharafu, Suhas and Thanmatra actor Arjun Lal(what a comeback, hope he stays) who also plays an important role in the movie.Shaiju Khalid's impossible frames which didnt seem to be a Malayalam movie, and Justin Varghese's background music that went with the story remained excellent.

The film introduces us to a group of 6 friends living in Bangalore who are very close to each other and spend most of their evenings together. The guys of the group work out their ways to find a proper investment for their start-up idea. One fine day, a member of the gang goes missing which leaves the remaining 5 friends in confusion and tension.  

It has an interesting storyline about friendship presented with a mystery. The first half gives a feel good experience, where the second half will take you through a personal emotion which most of us have experienced.

Tovino Thomas showcases an impressive performance playing Vinod who could be part of one's life as a friend who touches their souls and become an unforgettable human.The character Vinod will definitely be in the top 5 roles of his career.

 

Everyone did their job pretty well. Basil Joseph was a comic relief, Darshana Rajendran was impressive(as usual), Arjun Radhakrishnan's performance as Shyam seemed very convincing.

 I must say Cinema rarely portrays the grey side of friendship and Dear Friend definitely succeeded in doing that. Its slow (and thats the beauty of it), its not a nail biting even though the team tried a few a thriller effects here and there.

Friendships might fade away as we grow older with time and we'll be okay without them. There is no cheating or intentional cut off because we all get busy living and we change. But here in the film, Vinod ain't a person like that. He is a mysterious conman who just wants a temporary shelter for the time being. But from his POV, he says that he hasnt hurt anyone or cheated anyone for money. Instead he was there with them when they needed them the most, gluing them together, touching their souls and spreading happiness.The climax that didn't take us anywhere will be remembered and regretted.And that is what excited me as it broke all stereotypes.A special thanks for ending the movie without making it a cliche, giving the audience a space to think.You cannot show reality more realistically. Because reality is neither good nor bad.. its neither black nor white..Thats Life!!!

If you enjoy movies that leave you stuck for a while after the end credits roll, movies that make you read between the lines, solve some puzzles on your own and don't spoon feed every single thing to you. Movies that do not give you the ending that you expect and if you are ready to take that then do miss this one.

 

Dear Friend is an interesting take on friendship which unfortunately might not find a lot of takers since it's a rather unorthodox film. But its team deserves kudos for creating a movie that feels very real and is not designed to feed its audience with feel-good stuff!!!

 

 

Also Read:

Malayalam Movies I want the World to Watch! 

 

 

The Missed Train Part - 1

End of semester exams and was time for an another vacations in Kerala.

So the plan of the journey was that I had a SuperFast Express from Panvel(Mumbai) at 17:30 to Chengannur(Kerala).Even though there is a direct train from Pune to Chengannur,but it takes around 38 hours to reach whereas the train from Panvel takes only 24 hours(including visual treat of Konkan Railways).So in order to catch that I had to reach Panvel by a passenger train. Had kept the whole journey planned way before a week. Well, I enjoy planning journeys :P If everything went well I would catch the passenger train that leaves Chinchwad  at 11:10 and in the worst case I would reach Panvel by 16:00 and I would have at least one hour of good time to reach the correct platform and board my train. And once I boarded that train I didn't have anything to worry about till I reach Chengannur.But the great Indian Railways had different plans for me.

Woke up really early so had a whole lot of time to get ready and double check the packing. And as planned reached Chinchwad station, bought a ticket to Panvel.The passenger train came on time and was nearly empty. Found myself a window seat and was really happy as everything had turned out exactly as planned.

After the train had reached  Lonavala, it started to get crowded and the vendors started coming in. Chai Chai. 
Miles after crossing Khandala station the train stopped and there was no station around, which is not unusual at all. Happens quite a lot of times. I thought maybe we had to wait for another train to pass.But the wait extended more than usual. Soon more than thirty minutes and before I was tensed I heard people talking about some mishap in the engine and apparently we were waiting for another engine to come.

So it would easily take more than an hour in the best case which would more or less mean that I am going miss my train to Chengannur.

There were not many choices on what I could have done at that moment. One obvious choice was to keep calm and wish for the engine to come as soon as possible and hope for the best. But when you know something won't work and you desperately need to make it work, you need to form a new plan. Though the new plan did not guarantee success it is better than just staying still and hoping everything would happen on its own. So picked up my bag and started walking towards the next station which was nowhere to be seen. Well, in the confidence of the fellow travelers who were walking ahead of me. After walking for about 20 minutes, it turned out that all the while the people who were walking ahead of me were the workers of a nearby factory and the station is even far. After walking for so long I neither had the courage nor the energy to continue more. At the same time, I did not want to give up and go back to the broken train. I explained my situation to one of the co-passengers who was walking with me. He suggested me to leave the railway tracks and walk for a while and I would reach a small village from where I can get auto-rikshaws to Karjat station. And then I can get local trains to Panvel from there. Sounded fair enough!

 I calculated the time and it looked totally possible to reach Panvel by 17:00 and catch my train by 17:30. Re-routed my journey and started walking as that guy instructed me to. And after reaching the auto-rikshaw people won't start unless they have enough passengers or you have to pay the whole fare. Now I had to wait for five more passengers or pay the whole of 120 rupees myself and leave immediately. Being a man on a mission whose sole aim is to catch the Superfast Express, I did not have the patience to wait for the auto-rikshaw to get filled up. To add to my worries I was low on cash. I had just around four hundred rupees in hand. But the hopes of catching my train to Kerala made me compromise with the money issue. I had my food packed from home so I thought I could manage with nearly no cash and yet could reach Chengannur peacefully. So I paid the whole fare myself and reached Karjat station in a hurry.

There is always an excitement while  boarding a moving train. Those two-three steps that you take before you catch the handles of the train doors are really exciting isn't it? I boarded the train which was just leaving the platform as I entered Karjat. Nearly all the trains in that route would go to Panvel. But unfortunately, it turned out that the train I was in was heading to CSTM. Now I had to get down at Kalyan and change another train to reach Panvel. On top of that, it was an Express train while I had a ticket for Local which meant I had to look out for any TTEs around the corners to avoid a penalty. Finally, it was 16:30 when I reached Kalyan. In one hour  the Superfast  would depart from Panvel. At that very moment, I heard the announcement of a train to Panvel but I had to cross the platforms to catch that. After all the adventure so far, hurrying up on a crowded foot over bridge was not a big challenge. Then again I had to board a running train. Now thats the second time within a span of one hour ;) Now the countdown began. There wasn't much that I could have done. So waited in anticipation. Got myself ready to deboard from the running train to save one or two precious minutes. Unfortunately, the local train did not get its green signals as expected and got delayed. And it was exactly 17:30 when it started entering the platform. But to my utter disbelief, the Superfast Express had just started to move out of the platform as the local train started to enter from the platform next to it...

To be continued...




My Other Train Stories : A Second Class Journey ,
                                         The Harthal Punk ,
                                  EKM to PUNE TRAIN TRAVEL

Malayalam Movies I want the World to Watch!

Mollywood Cinema have their own class and you wont regret after watching them at least the ones that I am going to suggest ! There have been remakes to other languages but still they miss something.
There has been a plethora of cult classics in malayalam movies before the 2000s but I am not focusing on that.
I started loving malayalam movies during 2010s when there was a different wave in film making. There are few of them which I can watch again and again and never get up without a different kind of feeling over powering me , the feeling which comes to you when you know you have watched something really good!
So these are my personal favorites which I want others to watch.


Traffic (2011)

A trend setter in Malayalam. The treatment and pace of the movie was pretty new to Malayali audience. Was really impressed by the screenplay which is said to be inspired from an incident happened in Chennai.The trailer of the Hindi remake has been released.Hope Bollywood goers find this interesting as it doesnt have big names excluding Manoj Bajpayee and Jimmy Shergil.


Neelakasham Pachakadal Chuvanna Bhoomi (2013)
(Blue Skies, Green Waters, Red Earth) 

My all time favorites.The movie is about a teenage guy,along with his friend travels from Kerala to Nagaland to meet his college love, who was not accepted by his parents.But on the way to Nagaland they keep halting, for good amount of time,in several places, which gives them first hand experience of different kinds of people from different circumstances.
A single thought which has truly inspired my heart from the movie:
 “എന്റെ വിധി, എന്റെ തീരുമാനങ്ങള്‍ ആണ്”
  “My destiny is my decisions”   



North 24 Kaatham (2013)

Another Road movie.The story occurs during a strike/bandh day.Three strangers due to circumstances need to travel to from South to North Kerala.The cameraman captures various shades on a harthal day and different modes of transport taken by the characters to reach their destination.The lead Fahadh Faasil also suufers with OCD.


Drishyam (2013)

A gem by director Jeethu Joseph.Most of you might have seen the Hindi remake starring Ajay Devgn.I havent seen the Hindi flick yet, but I am sure its no way near to the acting of Mohanlal.A brilliant innovative plot.The narration of story line was clever and natural which  enables the audience to stick in their seats till the end.


Memories (2013)

Yet another brilliant thriller by Jeethu Joseph.The director has shown his brilliance in plot of serial killing.A suspense thriller, where the lead is an alcoholic police officer who is investigating a psychopathic killer.


Mumbai Police (2013)

A crime thriller movie.ACP Antony Mosses finds the killer of his friend ACP Aryan Jacob and just before revealing it, he meets with an accident, causing him to forget everything. Days later, he is forced to investigate the murder once again.An engaging thriller with the mind-boggling climax.If rumours are correct it is being remade in Hindi with John Abraham playing the lead.


 Manjaadikuru (2008)
Theatre Release : 2012
(Lucky Red Seeds)

A surprise entrant to the list. :P I guess even most of the Malayalis havent watch this movie,reasons being an art movie which are only screened in Film Festivals.Directed by Anjali Menon won many awards in International Film Festivals.A story of homecoming from late 1980s, when a 10-year-old boy arrives at his grandparents home in rural Kerala to attend his grandfather's funeral. Vicky discovers more about himself, his family and culture than he had expected to. The journey is narrated through the memories of an adult Vicky who returns to the same house to recount the experience.



Thattathin Marayathu (2012)
(Behind the Veil)

 A beautiful, simple, muscial love story set against the usual cultural norms which leaves a smile at the end.Vinod an average student from a Hindu household falls in love with Aisha born in a wealthy and influential Muslim family.



Premam  (2015)
(Love)

There was no trailer/teaser released for this movie,  only two video songs and couple of posters.Yet the movie was able to attract cinema lovers.The story tells the matters of the heart of a young guy named George David from his adolescence to his late 20s.Premam is a cinematic brilliance with both music and cinematography, a few nostalgic moments as well.



Usthad Hotel (2012)

The storyline created by Anjali Menon is beautiful.All in all, it is a good family movie, about love ,between a grandfather and a son, between a girl and a guy, between a man and his goal.Doesnt have any thrilling plots or dramatic twists but it is etertaining to watch and at some instances make your eyes moist.



Shutter  (2012)

The story is set in teo days and one night in Calicut.It showcases unexpected incidents bteween three men when they happen to meet a women.A suspense thriller, was also remade in Marathi with the same name starring Sachin Khedekar.

Chappa Kurish (2011)
(Heads or Tails)

 As the name suggests shows two sides of a human being which changes due to unexpected circumstances.The film follows the life of two young people from the two extremes of society.Their lives get entangled with each other when one loosed his phone and lands in front of the other guy.

 
 1983 (2014)

A cricket based film.The story of a man,wanted to be a cricketer  tries to look upon his dreams through his son.It also brings in a lot of nostalgia for those malayalis who were born during the late 80s.But I am not not sure how this aspect would connect to the non-malayalis :




Maheshinte Prathikaram (2016)
(The Revenge of Mahesh)

One of the simplest movies ever seen.Debutant director Dileesh Pothen has portrayed a simple story of photographer in an aestetic but detailed way.Mahesh(Fahadh Faasil), a studio photographer and studio owner gets into a fight and loses. He ends up taking revenge which leads to certain realizations in his life. The scenic beauty of Iduuki is well captured by DOP Shyju Khalid.The Idukki  song beautifully captures the scenery and everyday life of villagers living there.Every single detail has been taken care of by the director, which is not limited to the main characters, but also the ones in the sidelines too. 

KammattiPaadam (2016)

A story of how poor Dalits in old-time Kochi were driven out of their homes by the builders who transformed it into the megacity as it is today, filled with high-rise residential complexes and other modern structures.The movie spans for about 30 years, starting from the childhood to their adulthood of two friends and ending as a revenge thriller.Though Dulquer Salmaan is the lead in the film but the movie is all about the memorable performace of Ganga and Balanchettan played by Vinayakan and Manikandan respectively.Kudos to the director Rajeev Ravi for making such an attempt.

Charlie (2015)

One of the best movies to show someone who doesn't know Malayalam.Tessa (Parvathy Menon)wants to go go away from daily chaos of life and she lands in a hotel room,where she finds a poster where ishe is enchanted  by Charlie played by Dulquer Salmaan.The poster is incomplete and she finds people potrayed in the poster to enquire about Charlie.Each person share their own experiences with Charlie.Tessa discovers herself and Charlie throughh the stories narrated.Dulquer,Nedumudi Venu,Aparna Gopinath and soubin Shahir have done their job with pure excellence but Paravathy Menon mesmerizes the audience with her expressions and acting skills.Half of the movie's charm is due to amazing camera work by Jomon T John.

Vinod (Nivin Pauly), an average student from a modest Hindu household falls in love with a beautiful girl named Aisha (Isha Talwar), hailing from a wealthy and influential Muslim family

Read more at: http://www.sify.com/movies/thattathin-marayathu-review-malayalam-pcma0Jfgdcjcf.html

three strangers due to circumstances have to travel from South to North Kerala on a bandh day forms the crux of this road movie.

Read more at: http://www.sify.com/movies/north-24-kaatham-review-malayalam-pcmbaCbeiadgb.html