But why would India welcome him? Well, because in 90s, he had painted Hindu goddesses and mother India nude.. and he hurt sentiments of so many Hindus or I should say, Indians.. but that was just his freedom of expression and there was nothing wrong in it..

I am sorry, but I don’t buy the bullshit of freedom of expression. I am game for the freedom of speech or freedom of expression but not at the cost of hurting anyone’s sentiments.. what was the need to paint mother India or any goddess nude? What was he trying to achieve from it? I am really not sure about it..

And, if he actually feels it as a freedom of expression, then why can’t he try with prophet or any other Muslim gods?  Well, he won’t.. he wants to live in this world

I have noticed that Indian media is always most interested in bringing up anti-hindu issues.. they never show the stuff on Kashmiri Pandits or other issues where Hindus are being attacked (or got injustice..) We are shown only one side of the story..

I am actually very much afraid by this “political” side of these news channels.. (Specially the English ones), these guys have got lot of power in their hand.. and they are misusing it..

I have nothing against any religion but the news or anything should not be judgmental based on the religion.. it should be balanced..

And I am yet to see that day..

Update: Following videos which will throw some light on the issue… (Excuse the poor guy’s English)

Let me start with an example..

You are driving the car, suddenly RTO stops you in the middle of the road and asks for your car papers.. you realize that your car’s PUC has been expired or you have left it at home.. so? the officer tells you, you have to pay Rs. 1,000 as fine.. and.. the process of pataofying mama starts.. you end up paying him Rs. 2oo 0r 300 bribe and feel proud that you saved Rs. 700..

But did you even bother to check if there is actually fine of Rs. 1,000 for the PUC? or he was just fooling you to get the bribe money?

Well, if you are not sure, then you should do something to make sure that, you know the fine you have to pay.. so that no one can fool you with some bogus charges or figures..

I have been into this kind of situation more than twice.. we have even fought with the RTO guys in their office and made them read their own rule book… and realized that, the charges which were told to us did not exist at all.. the fine was 10 times lesser than what they had told us..

Obviously this does not happen all the time but we never know when it will happen to us.. so it’s better to be prepared…

Not many of us know about this.. Traffic Police of Mumbai website has a PDF document with the list of all the charges.. you can download it from here, take a print of it and keep it in your vehicle.. so next time, if someone tries to slap you any charge.. you better be ready with the exact figures

I hope it helps..

My thoughts are mainly roaming around the political angle of all these recent happenings and trying to understand the Congress is playing very very smart political game here.. obviously there is nothing bad in it, afterall, everything is fair in love and war..

So how does this whole thing work? If you have noticed in this general elections, the Congress acted very differently from the earlier elections.. earlier, the party had to take the support of others to remain as the central government but this time if you see, they have made sure that at almost all the places they have the strong hold and they do not have to go begging for the seats.. so basically, they want to make a point that, in the whole India, Congress should not be depending upon anyone.. they are reaching out to poor people to get the votes.. You must have seen how Rahul Gandhi was visiting the small villages throughout the year..

Now, the game plan is, the opponent should be crushed and should not be able to stand on it’s own feet.. on the larger scale the opponent is BJP and the last election they made sure that, BJP is almost crushed.. and now they have stronghold in very few places… (Gujarat, Bihar [With JDU], Karnataka etc..), they managed to crush BJP/ Shiv Sena in Maharashtra too..

But still in Maharashtra, Bal Thackeray’s word holds more importance than any other political leader and that’s the fact.. so now how to break that?  Let’s start the divisional politics and bring in the personal wars in.. and then break the ice..

So what did they do.. In the first chapter, we saw MNS vs Shiv Sena.. they both started fighting to show the strength of each other, Congress watched the game quietly and laughed over it.. yeah, on the name of “taking action” they arrested MNS chief Raj Thackeray but we all know what happened to it.. so let’s keep that aside and stick to the main topic..

So, in the elections, you saw the votes getting divided, and it certainly helped Congress to win the seats very very comfortably..

But this did not affect the ties of BJP – Shiv Sena.. so now how to break that? But I think without pushing much, Congress just got what they were waiting for..

Marathi Manoos issue is back.. infact, back in full swing.. Senas targeting icons like Sachin Tendular, superstars like Shahrukh Khan, business tycoons like Ambanis.. Sena even threatens to stop screening of SRK starrer film, My Name is Khan.. BJP makes some statements which are not so in favor of Shiv Sena.. RSS makes statements which are again not in favor of Shiv Sena.. but what government is doing in this? Silent spectator..  Rahul Gandhi in Bihar, to get votes, makes some silly statements.. Shiv Sena strikes back on them in their own way.. Congress calls Shiv Sena leaders mental.. Shiv Sena sends notices to all theatre owners not to screen the movie.. Maharashtra government (kind of) tries to assures that no one can take law in their hands etc.. (Now that’s the different story that their statements do not carry much weight).. but in the middle of this, the war game does not stop.. sometimes it’s Shiv Sena or sometimes it’s MNS..

But if you notice.. Congress is not making any firm statements here.. they are letting these guys make the things worst, so people get angry and never bother voting these parties..

I am sure in all these things, a common man is least interested coz they are not bothered about what a superstar or a businessman is saying.. but after seeing these kind of acts by Senas I am sure, it’s hurting a common man somewhere and this is what helps the other parties.. the vote bank slowly moves towards the other party.. because Senas are not interested in development of Maharashtra, they are only interested in the communal fights between religions and languages.. (That’s what is being projected..)

So moral of the story.. at the cost of a common man’s sentiments, these political parties are playing games and dividing people.. I am sorry to say but we are divided.. we are moving backwards..

And yes, many people will say that, Congress is in power because it’s a good party and people have elected them.. my take is… people have elected them because they did not have any options..

Hmm okay, let me start this with the last day at Pattaya.. i.e. Day 4…

The Day 4 was mostly the day to rest but we had Alcazar show at 6 PM.. we went for the show.. nothing great.. not sure why people get so much excited about it.. some of the dances were very good no doubt.. but nothing impressive..

We left for Bangkok on Day 5, I was having high expectations for the hotel but sadly, the hotel was pretty bad, I am not sure why I did not bother researching about the hotel, I simply booked it, thinking if Amari Orchid pattaya is good then Amari Boulevard should be good too.. So, moral of the story… do a proper research before booking the hotels..

The only good part of the hotel was, the area.. 2-3 Indian restaurants at just 2 minutes of walk, BTS Skytrain station just 2 minutes away.. Oh yes.. the public transport.. very important thing about Bangkok.. Bangkok is mostly jammed during the peak hours.. so, get a city map from the hotel or from the airport (Don’t spend money on it, you get it for free) and hunt for the nearest BTS stations.. frankly speaking, firstly, I was very hesitant to use the public transport as I have not had any good experience with the public transport in Mumbai.. but this BTS changed my thinking totally.. it was very convenient and cheap too.. (Tip: If you are planning to travel more than once in a day, you can get daily pass for 120 baht), I think I should stop praising BTS and move on to the other things..

My Day 5, went into relaxing and then going to MBK Center in the evening.. very good place to shop, specially, footwear, leather goods (bags, belts etc..) & clothes.. dirt cheap stuff.. but at the same time very decent quality too.. At the end of the day, we found a very good Indian restaurant called Bukhara near our hotel.. (Just outside BTS station, Naana – E3), great food, very decent pricing.. what more we could have asked..

Day 6, this one was a good one.. we left at 8.30 AM for Safari world.. I was not so keen to go there but the place was totally opposite of what I had in my mind.. I thought, the place will be good only for the kids and adults will get bored.. but no, I was wrong.. we thoroughly enjoyed there.. fantastic, Orangutan boxing, sea lion and dolphin shows.. we also got ourself clicked with the tiger curb.. so overall, it was fun there..

We left from there at around 3 PM and directly moved to this place called Indra Square, this one is a wholesale market for clothes, accessories, electronics and lot more.. cheap stuff mainly.. the place is full of Indians.. (I did not find many thai people there), I went there just for the sake of it.. the things were very very cheap out there.. t-shirts as low as 40 baht per t-shirt etc.. but it did not impress me at all, I found it more like some Indian wholesale market.. we did not spend much time there..  (Tip: Do no expect anything to be original at these cheaply priced goods)

The next day, Day 7.. this was the last day at the Bangkok.. we checked out from our room at 1.30 PM, kept the luggage at the hotel and moved to MBK Center again, as we had to spend time somewhere and we did not want to visit museums and all, bought some stuff from there.. and by 6 PM, left for the airport.. (Our flight was at 1 AM but the travel guy had pickup at 6 PM).. checked in at the airport at 11 PM.. sadly, we had company of Indian crowd with us.. the ones who were travelling by flight for the first time in their life and are used to train travelling.. so they were behaving as if they are in some Indian train with no queue system and cleanliness.. (This require a separate blog post.. will try to post something soon)

So finally, we reached Mumbai at 5 AM in the morning.. as we touched Mumbai airport.. we started getting a different feeling.. the comfort zone was gone.. we started missing Thailand.. the time we spent there.. the polite people.. I will never forget the experience I had there.. this holiday is going to be always special for me…

And this brings an end to the travel diaries of Bangkok and Pattaya.. I hope my experience helps someone in someway.. if you have any kind of questions about these places.. do let me know, I will try my best to help you out..

As mentioned in my Day 1 post, Day 2 started with visit to Coral Island.. actually, we went for the parasailing first followed by underwater walking. Paid 350 baht per person for the parasailing.. it was worth trying out.. I personally loved it.. and enjoyed it fully.

Underwater walking sounded pretty interesting in the first, paid 1200 bath per person for it and 600 baht for the underwater photos and video shoot.. frankly speaking, this one was a big let down for me.. I had high expectations for this underwater walk.. but it turned out to be pretty dull.. they just made us walk around a small area.. we posed for some photos.. checked out some different types of fishes etc.. I would never pay for it again.. so moral of the story here, try it just once.. and also I would suggest, don’t bother paying 600 bath extra for the photo shoot… not worth the amount..

After that point, we moved to Coral Island.. amazing place I must say.. but sadly, we got only 1 hour to spend there.. this place had water sports like, speed water bike & banana boat. I couldn’t go for it as we were already tired.. but I would strongly recommend trying out these 2. The beach was very very clean.. the water was blue and clear.. I would suggest, plan accordingly so that you can spend more time here..

We left the place at around 12.30 – 12.45 PM, had lunch (Indian food) at some funny place.. (Lunch was included in the package), we then moved to this placed called Gems Gallery, this one was a marketing attempt by some jewelry company, but it was informative but more than that, their showroom had awesome jewelry.. so, for all those husbands, if you wife loves jewelry, don’t go to this place.. she will fall in love with it and it will leave a big hole in your pocket.. haha But seriously, if you have some cash in hand and don’t mind spending.. buy the stuff from there.. your wife will be the happiest person on the earth..

Apart from jewelry, they had some more items like, show pieces, painting and other Thailand based products for sale.. we bought some show pieces from there.. but while leaving, we found out that, the group we had come with had already left.. (I have no idea how they managed to leave without us..) but the showroom staff was very very friendly and cooperating, they did not let us go and arranged the vehicle for us to drop at the hotel.. (heads up for that…)

And we finally landed at the hotel.. dead tired with no mood to get out of the room.. we ended up ordering some funny pizza.. managed to eat half of it.. we went for a short walk after that.. got back to the room at around 7.30 – 8 PM and went to sleep.. woke up directly in the morning..

It was a nice much needed sleep..

So.. the Day 3..

Had lovely breakfast at the hotel.. followed by a super quick nap and the lunch.. we left for this place called Noong Nooch Village at 1.30 PM (We had paid USD 36 for this to the tour operator – I will list out all the expenses at the end of the trip, so it helps others in planning – ),  the place had very beautiful garden, where we did not get much time to explore.. we then rushed to the shows… 2 shows back to back.. 1st was traditional Thailand culture show – which I did not like much and felt was kind of boring – 2nd one was elephant show, it was far more entertaining.. fantastic show by elephants.. they dance on the songs, they play football, volleyball, ride cycle, give massage to people, paint and what not.. crazy stuff and a must watch.. actually, kids might like the thai traditional show too.. and yeah, make sure you reach before time and get the seats in the front.. if you fail to do that, you might have to run around to get the seats.. (it’s very difficult to get the seats there)

Also, there, you can get yourself clicked by sitting on the elephant or getting wrapped around in his trunk and all.. they charge around 50 – 100 baht for the same.. (this depends upon what you chose). Both the shows are of around 1 hour total..

So, after the show, we returned to the hotel and relaxed.. had dinner at another Indian restaurant called Shahi.. pathetic food.. very oily.. we will try another restaurant tomorrow to see if it’s good or not..

I guess that’s it for the day.. tomorrow will be mostly relaxing day with Alcazar show in the evening..

Oh yes, keep in mind that, when you travel here… the tour operator will definitely push you for the striptease shows or sex shows like Coconut shows etc.. so, go only if you want to.. don’t get into their talks and pay just for the sake of it..

And lastly… if you happen to visit Pattaya with your kids.. make sure you don’t roam around much with them on the streets in the night.. you will find lot of prostitutes around.. and I don’t think you would want your kids to see them..

So, let me start with the diary of this holiday with the Day 1..

Got boarded on the flight from Mumbai at 5.15 AM.. Cathey Pacific… pathetic service, great food, best rates.. so you got what I meant right? If you want to save money, get on to Cathey Pacific..

We landed at Bangkok airport at around 11 AM (Thailand Time 1.30 hours ahead of Indian Time), got immigration and all cleared and landed up in a coach for the Pattaya.. this experience was not very pleasing.. nothing bad at all but from next time, I would prefer to by the car next time.. We landed at the hotel, Amari Orchid (Ocean Wing) at around 12.30 – 1.00 PM (frankly speaking, we didn’t even look at the watch as we were dead tired)..  we were welcomed by super awesome traditional thai welcome drink.. we got into the room within 15 minutes and trust me..  it was heaven.. it was exactly liked what I wanted.. super cozy bed.. a big bathtub, balcony with splendid ocean view.. what more could anyone want.. I strongly recommend this hotel to everyone.. the rates are not that high at all.. (compared to what we pay in India for the five star hotels)..

So.. now what? Food.. food.. food.. Since we both are purely vegetarian, so we were in kind of dilemma about what to order for the food as their menu had mainly non vegetarian items and we were not at all in mood to get out of the room and grab the food at nearby Indian restaurant.. BUT Margherita pizza (Yea, that’s how they spell it) and nachos saved us.. awesome food..  So.. now it’s sleeping time.. we slept like crazy… and woke up directly at 7.30 PM.. headed out of the hotel to roam around.. bought some slippers and shorts for tomorrow’s Corel Island visit (As we will get totally wet there), had food at an Indian restaurant called Deli Haat (Delhi Haat), decent food..

Pattaya looked beautiful in the night.. I can see lot more people in the night than in the day..

Got back to the room.. enjoyed the beautiful weather.. now, watching Music ka Maha Mukabala on Star Plus (Sadly, that’s the only Hindi channel is being aired here).. So the day 1 comes to an end.. so far, very good experience.. really loving it.. bought an hourly net connection pack from the hotel.. so gonna, use it to post this and check the mails.. Tomorrow, have to get up at 6.30 AM and leave for Corel Island by 8.30 AM.. tomorrow is going to be the exciting day.. water sports, a walk in the underwater and much more.. really looking forward to it..

So, I am signing off now.. hopefully there will be one more post tomorrow.. 

Frankly speaking, I needed a break.. for last almost a year.. the work has taken toll on my life.. and now I need sometime off for myself..

Last year, during this time, I had planned to surprise Megha by taking her to Goa.. I booked flight tickets, hotel etc.. but had to cancel at the end time due to some issues..

So this year, I have made sure that, everything is properly planned..

I am kinda bad guy in giving surprises.. but I think I have managed this one quite well.. No one at my place knows where I am going (Including Megha)…

Currently, I have mixed feelings running around in my mind.. I am not sure what are the reasons.. But at the same time, I am equally excited about seeing reactions of Megha..  (When she gets to know about the actual thing..)

I wanted this holiday totally without phone calls & internet but I guess that might just not be possible.. though, I would love to disconnect from the whole world..  let’s see how I succeed in it..

Okay, I am gonna shut my mouth now.. have to leave in next 3 hours..  will post more details about which place I am going etc.. later..

And touch wood.. hope things turn out well this time..

So, the big question is, how was 2009 for me?

Well, frankly speaking, it was the worst year for me.. lots of ups and down.. I mean, in all fronts.. but learnt lot of lessons.. got to know new things.. slowly climbing the ladder so I don’t fall again..

Yeah, there were good things too.. moved to new office.. now, I have 15 people in the team.. started working on new SaaS based project, I am really counting on it actually.. I just hope this one works as expected..

But despite of many good things, I am still not satisfied with the way year turned out.. may be this year will be much better than 2009.. I am sure it will be.. I ain’t losing hope so easily..

I guess that’s it..

Love & Peace
Deep

Coming back to the movie.. here is the synopsis, directly from Wikipedia:

Paa tells the story of an intelligent and witty 13-year-old boy, Auro (Amitabh Bachchan), who suffers from progeria, an extremely rare genetic disorder wherein symptoms resembling aspects of aging are manifested at an early age. Mentally he is 13, very normal, but physically he looks 5 times older. In spite of his condition, Auro is a very happy boy.

Auro lives with his mother Vidya (Vidya Balan), a gynecologist. He is unaware that idealistic young Parliament-member Amol Arte (Abhishek Bachchan) is his father, who had had a relationship with his mother while the two were students at Cambridge University. Amol.

After Arte meets Auro, whom he does not know is his son, at an event at the upscale Prince Edward VII School in Lucknow, the two develop an unlikely and occasionally difficult friendship, to Vidya’s dismay. Auro eventually learns the truth, keeping it from Arte as he comes to grips with it himself.

The movie has so many brilliant moments which are very hard to explain in words.. few of them include, the scene where Vidya is trying to make Auro eat khichdi and how Auro replies to her with the bottle of pickle.. the scene where in hospital Vidya gifts Auro photograph of her with Amol.. the telephonic conversation between Auro and his best friend Vishnu… the scene during the end of the movie.. (on the bed).. just brilliant.. I will end up mentioning most of the movie scenes, if I don’t stop haha..

I really loved the director’s work.. loved his earlier movie, Cheeni Kum too and this one too was brilliant.. what I like about Balki is, his movies are very simple and easy to understand but at the same time very different too.. the characters look like part of your daily life.. in this movie too, all the characters were very well explored but I somehow felt that, Amol’s character was not explored so well, was he a good politician or slightly corrupt one? (Moments likes taking the corrupt officer in for the talk, or say, mentioning about small parking space at the time of opening ceremony etc…).. but that can be taken as an exception as the main focus was on Auro’s character.. and his relationship with his mother and father..

On the acting front, Amitabh Bachchan needs a standing ovation, Vidya Balan was brilliant too.. Abhishek Bachchan was pretty good.. Arundathi Nag was very impressive.. the child actors were very good.. specially, Pratik Katare who played the role of Vishnu..

The film’s music was brilliant too.. very simple and pure form of music.. love Illayaraja’s music… (loved in Cheeni Kum too)

So, overall, the movie was simply brilliant, I would rate it Rating: 4 out of 5 stars IT IS A MUST WATCH FOR EVERYONE.

On the box office front, I think word of mouth can get lot of people dragged to the theatres..

Haha and also other funny point is, during his last movie, Karzzz, he had also mentioned that, he won’t act in the movie if people don’t accept him in this movie (or the movie bombs) but the Himeshbhai didn’t live upto his promise..

Okay, so coming back to the movie..

The movie is aimed at young / multiplex going audiences… it resolves around RJ Vivan Shah (Himeshbhai), his divorced wife, Pooja (Sonal Sehgal) & his friend, Shanaya (Shenaz Treasurywala). After the divorce, Vivan prefers to remain single but Shanaya falls in love with her.. he is afraid to get into any relationship again because of his past. But at the same time, Pooja falls in love with Vivan again.. (Yes, they are still friends even after the divorce). So now our Himeshbhai is kind of confused in this so called complicated confusion he makes manages to make the whole movie complicated..

The movie is divided into some 13 odd chapters… each chapter of around 10 – 15 minutes with some odd chapter titles with “It’s Complicated” stamped all over… Himesh and company also tried to make the film “cool” by showing Macbooks all over and Facebook and also using the curse words like “a**hole” & “f***” so openly.. but sadly it didn’t work.. and it doesn’t work of your script is weak..

The movie had so many flaws, very poor actors from each and everyone except Sonal Sehgal. Himesh was a big joke, he can’t even deliver the scenes properly, you can’t make it whether he is crying or laughing.. he looks same all the time.. even Dino Morea, Zyed Khan are better than him…  Shenaz Treasurywala should now give up her hopes on the acting front.. she just can’t act.. she is SO fake all the time.. Sonal Sehgal was the only pretty face and a good actor in the movie.. Paresh Rawal was totally wasted in the movie and his role was a BIG joke.. I think he did the role just for the sake of friendship / relationship with the actor or someone in the movie..

On the other parts, I think people should gather in beat up the one who wrote the dialogues in the movie.. even I can write better dialogues.. Some of the funny dialogues:

Shanaya: What’s your relationship status?
Vivan: It’s complicated..

How pathetic is that? Another one…

Vivan:  (Crying)
Shayana: Don’t cry..
Vivan: Us aurat ka kuch bhi mujhe mere paas nahi rakhna, ye aansu bhi usike hai, behnedo unko. Wah himesh Bha

This dialogue was supposed to be a serious one with Himesh crying and all but everyone in the cinema (Around 15 odd people) laughed like crazy and clapped..

And there are countless dialogues like this in the movie..

The only good part in the movie was, the music.. very melodious songs… really loved the songs..

But I guess only songs won’t be able to save this crap..

So, don’t bother wasting money on the movie.. I would rate it Rating: 1 out of 5 stars The 1 star is only for the songs..

On the box office front, I don’t see this movie doing well at all.. but due to low budget, I have heard it has already earned it’s profit by selling satellite rights and the high music sales..