1 year ago
Showing posts with label Memory. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Memory. Show all posts
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Rendezvous with Meetings, Movies, Memories, Masti and Magic
Posted by Varun | Thursday, November 13, 2008 | Category:
Break,
Friends,
Memory,
Mumbai,
Review,
Travelogue
|
18
comments
One of the most anticipated trips came to an end sooner than I had anticipated. I am talking about my trip to Mumbai. It had a touch of everything in it. Right from lunching at 'Not just jazz by the bay' to shopping for leather jacket at 'Dharavi'. If you are not quite familiar with Mumbai, 'Not just jazz by the bay' is a high-end restaurant located just outside the Brabourne stadium in one of the posh areas of Mumbai and 'Dharavi' is one of the biggest slums in the world.
Going with the title of the post, I'll ramble upon every word that I have used in it;
Meetings: This was the first item in my agenda. Meeting cousins (My sisters, Brother-In-Law, Niece) meeting friends, meeting old colleagues, meeting old managers. It was a wonderful feeling to meet everyone after five months. Some people were surprised to know and looked at me as though I am an Idiot when I told them that I had come to Mumbai to meet people and not on any official work. But most of them were elated to meet me which was something very nice to see.
Movies: I watched Fashion and Quantum of Solace. Fashion is a good movie but very slow. I had booked tickets for this movie from Bangalore itself. Talk about planning :). I give it two and a half stars. I would have given it one more had it not dragged on for three hours. Quantum of Solace is a good movie but did somebody tell you that it is a bond movie? Bond should stick to his tuxedos, vodka martinis, expensive cars, gadgets and leave the action to Jason Bourne or Rambo. The action nevertheless is spectacular. It gets three stars. Now that revenge is off Bond's head, we can expect the true bond to be back in his next movie. The extra star is for this optimistic expectation.
Memories: It is such a wonderful feeling to go back to the place where one once lived and worked. It brought back all my fond memories. It brought along with it memories of people who played a part in my life directly or indirectly, memories of late night movies, memories of late night parties, late night bike rides and many other things. The feeling is very hard to describe and it is something that one has to go through to understand it accurately.
Masti: Food Court at the In-Orbit Mall, Mantra Lounge (Hiranandani), Turner Road Chaat, Main Land China, Naturals, Utsav (Powai), Out of the Blue (Bandra) are some of the restaurants / ice cream parlours I visited. Shopping for export surplus clothes, shopping for leather jackets, Kailash Kher Concert (IIT Powai), Local Train travel, Double-Decker bus travel, time spent with my adorable niece, lovely friends and relatives, and not allowing a dear friend to study for CAT are some things that I enjoyed doing the most. The masti doesn't stop here. I fought with an auto rickshaw-driver and a taxi-driver over the extra fare they were charging :).
Magic: I am speaking about the magical feeling of nostalgia that grips one when he visits a place that once was so dear to him. I was lucky to be back in Mumbai. Not many people are lucky in this matter. Something truly magical about the trip was that the time kept vanishing in thin air every time I wanted more of it.
It was a wonderful, and a truly memorable trip that made me sick (I caught cold) but rejuvenated my senses. And if one asks me if I would like to visit Mumbai again, my answer would be a big YES.
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
After contemplating for about thirty minutes, I finally decided to stick to this title. It was a three hour journey from Bangalore to Mysore that took me down the memory lane. I was going to Mysore to attend the engagement of my classmate, also my colleague and friend.
On our way to Mysore we pass through a small city (district headquarters) named Mandya. This is a place where I have spent the maximum part of my life (19 years to be exact) and due to obvious reasons it is a place that is very close to my heart.
The city does not have a bypass road which is annoying for the long distance travellers but it didn't quite annoy me. I was enjoying the ride through the city. I could recognize every building, every tree, my school, our house, shopping streets, movie theatres, and petrol pumps. It was as though every building that I saw was smiling at me and welcoming me back. It was disheartening to see few old buildings demolished but then if the infrastructure of a city has to improve the old has to give way to the new. Sir Alfred Lord Tennyson knew this a long time ago “The old order changeth, giving way to the new.”
It was this five min ride through the city that suddenly took me back by twenty years. For the next hour of my journey, I stopped the music I was listening to, closed my eyes and tried to remember every single bit I could remember about that city. It was just like any flash back that one sees in a movie. All the scenes were flashing right in front of eyes. I so badly wanted to get into those scenes again but all I could manage was to open my eyes and stare at the sunlight that was peeping through the window pane.
I was expecting to meet a lot of (at least ten) old friends during the engagement but only three turned up. Nevertheless, it fun meeting old friends. The conversation started with a 'how are you' but somehow ended up in the usual/formal questions like “Which language do you code in?” and “Who are all your clients?” I am sure all software engineers would second me on this one. We could not really help it. We did not have an odd man/woman out who could divert us away from software! The lunch was delicious and so was the vanilla ice cream. We wished the couple, took photographs and bid good bye to my friend and her parents.
On the way back to Bangalore, I passed through Mandya again but this time it was not the buildings but the twinkling stars and glittering lights that smiled and waved good bye.
The friend whose engagement I went to attend was extremely happy that I could make it. I was happy too that I could share her happiness but even happier that this engagement gave me an opportunity to take the beautiful trip down the memory lane.
On our way to Mysore we pass through a small city (district headquarters) named Mandya. This is a place where I have spent the maximum part of my life (19 years to be exact) and due to obvious reasons it is a place that is very close to my heart.
The city does not have a bypass road which is annoying for the long distance travellers but it didn't quite annoy me. I was enjoying the ride through the city. I could recognize every building, every tree, my school, our house, shopping streets, movie theatres, and petrol pumps. It was as though every building that I saw was smiling at me and welcoming me back. It was disheartening to see few old buildings demolished but then if the infrastructure of a city has to improve the old has to give way to the new. Sir Alfred Lord Tennyson knew this a long time ago “The old order changeth, giving way to the new.”It was this five min ride through the city that suddenly took me back by twenty years. For the next hour of my journey, I stopped the music I was listening to, closed my eyes and tried to remember every single bit I could remember about that city. It was just like any flash back that one sees in a movie. All the scenes were flashing right in front of eyes. I so badly wanted to get into those scenes again but all I could manage was to open my eyes and stare at the sunlight that was peeping through the window pane.
I was expecting to meet a lot of (at least ten) old friends during the engagement but only three turned up. Nevertheless, it fun meeting old friends. The conversation started with a 'how are you' but somehow ended up in the usual/formal questions like “Which language do you code in?” and “Who are all your clients?” I am sure all software engineers would second me on this one. We could not really help it. We did not have an odd man/woman out who could divert us away from software! The lunch was delicious and so was the vanilla ice cream. We wished the couple, took photographs and bid good bye to my friend and her parents.
On the way back to Bangalore, I passed through Mandya again but this time it was not the buildings but the twinkling stars and glittering lights that smiled and waved good bye.
The friend whose engagement I went to attend was extremely happy that I could make it. I was happy too that I could share her happiness but even happier that this engagement gave me an opportunity to take the beautiful trip down the memory lane.
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