Saturday, September 15, 2007

Books, Pizzas and a Ghazal

I hauled ass down to Brigade Road/Church Street today with an intention of blowing moolah on books that I have been eying for over a year now. It so happened that I had picked an excellent time on a Saturday to land up there. The fact that I was meeting a very pretty friend of mine and her boyfriend and various other friends for pizzas that she was buying (her birthday was last week) at one caused me to land up at an unearthly hour. Namely, 10:00 am on a Saturday morning. Owing to the Ganesh chaturthi the roads were empty - so much so - that it took me exactly 20 seconds to get across Residency road at the Brigade Road junction.

I started with Landmark, since they had posters outside screaming about a 70% sale. Inside, the only thing that had anything to do with a reduction in price was one free CD of things that are made for 3-year olds (who watch skimpily clad women) if you brought one CD of things that were made for 3-year olds. Somehow, the only things that were of interest were Douglas Hoffstader's Godel, Escher, Bach : The Eternal Golden Braid(Wiki link), a bunch of really awesome jazz CDs (John Coltrane,Chet Parker and the likes) and some cool and nifty Jansport bags that were obscenely expensive. The book I plan to buy later, the music I can download off the net and I'll settle for an decent imitation at one-tenth the price from National Market.

Thereafter, I stared at the pretty women walking around with idiot boyfriends who look like potential gay band-members of boy-friends. The only thing that I do not have that they have is a fat-wallet accompanied with an inclination to spend. And, of course, the pretty woman on the arm.

I eventually landed up at Blossoms which in the past I always entered mentally preparing to stop from looking at the graphic novels since I never had the money to buy one. It's kind of stupid to ask your dad for half-a-grand to buy a glassy comic. Most fathers who were born in the fifties in India and are accountants will disagree before you can say Frank Miller or Alan Moore. Now, thanks to Tejas Networks' belief that I am an asset to their organisation by way of a monthly pay-check, brought me my comic-book orgasm.

Yep! Frank Miller's "Batman: The Dark Knight Returns". At long last...my collection of graphic novels sees the light of day. Also Khaled Hosseni's The Kite Runner and Srividya Natarajan's No onion nor garlic. The last one was a random pick simply because it is a satire involving TamBrams in Chennai and so on. I've just started reading it and it is one scream, more, if you are a TamBram and you either live in Chennai or have made frequent visits to relatives who live there.

Reviews soon. The lunch was good. G was made to stand on a chair in the middle of Pizza Hut and then asked to tell everyone that it was her birthday and then all the staff sang for her. She was red and thoroughly embarrassed. Hell, her birthday was on the 9th. We all had a good laugh, including the boy-friend.

Listen to Hoshwalon ko khabar kya by Jagjit Singh from the movie Sarfarosh. The movie was brilliant, but this song is brillianter still. I am not a big fan of ghazals and metaphoric Urdu, but this one was explained to me by a Doctor of Chemistry somewhere in the middle of a snow-covered peak in the Himalayas at 13,000 feet. The last two lines are specially very nice (excuse the bad Urdu):

Hum labon se kah naa paaye unse hal-e-dil kabhi
Aur voh samjhe nahin yeh khaamoshi kya cheez hai.


Roughly, do correct me if I am wrong, it means that "I could never put in words and tell her what was in my heart, and she never understood what that silence meant". Awesome! Listen to this on Youtube here.

Have a lazy Sunday!!!

P.S: Thank God, they didn't know about yesterday. I think I would have fallen all the way through to the basement three floors lower - chair and all.


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9 comments:

Nanga Fakir said...

I've heard so much about "The Dark Knight Returns", tell me what's it like!

Never knew you would like ghazals. Thought you were a thrash metalhead. Nitesh and I think we have the complete Jagjit Singh collection...you acquired the taste too late maybe?

Safari Al said...

Nitesh is here, so I will bum the collection off him.

The Dark Knight returns is kickass. I havent started reading it yet. Just flipping through the pages.

Clean but powerful artwork. Personally, I felt Lee's Hush has some really powerful artwork. Dark Knight is more traditional but nonethless kicks ass.

Next on list : The Long Halloween, Hush Returns, V for Vendetta, 300.

Indus Creep said...

suuuuuuuuuuuperrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

who was the G and the bf? was it the goobe?

Nanga Fakir said...

Currently reading "Dark Knight Returns". I agree...

Safari Al said...

Not goobe. G is a woman.

Mrinalini said...

Glad you're having fun. Very nice new blog.

Sorry I haven't been able to keep in touch, will do soon enough.

Safari Al said...

Finally...!!!

Darkness and deep said...

knowing u inside out... the three seemingly unrelated topics, seemed kinda related.. especially the first and the last one....

Niket said...

Yes...of course

I was there...acutally only the two of us from our Baays gang.

We had shifted to a seperate tent.
The Docs tent that night at Maeli...wasnt it!

Hum laboon se keh naa paaye unse-haal-e dil kabhi..
Aur voh samjhe nahin yeh khamoshi kya cheej hai