Wedding Woes

No this is not the usual cribbing on how-wedding-spoils-a-person's-life. I am talking about the woes arising out of the great Indian wedding. I recently attended a wedding and it was as always a great experience, lots of colors, happiness, so many people and as many rituals. I just love Indian weddings.

But the question which troubled me was why the hell an Indian wedding is not complete. What I mean is, after you get married you still have to go to court / registrar and get your marriage registered and only after getting a certificate, you can prove you are married, especially to the officials where you need to prove it. Most troubles are faced by women, as they generally has to tussle with virtually all the govt offices to get their name changed. Then I thought to myself may be registration is important to have a proper record of and to be able to validate a marriage. Because in Indian weddings traditionally we invite the whole society as witness and may be then it is difficult to convert it into paper work.

Then another question shot up, If registration is indeed important and almost everyone is going to be married, then why not make it easy to register a marriage. This will be in best interest of everyone in the country. So, how to make it convenient to register a marriage. I believe the answer is change the approach. Instead of having offices where people will go and register their marriage, which creates chaos at offices and too much complications for everyone involved, just reach out to people in a way which doesn't require much hassle and efforts.

Simple and yet effective solution could be, give some basic training and legal authority to the priests on whom we put the whole faith for our successful marriages anyway. This will have many benefits.
1) Widespread & established network: As we have priests in possibly every corner of country they make a very strong network and increase our reach.

2) Convenience to everyone: All they have to do is carry a registration form to the wedding, and with all the rituals take out 10 minutes to fill up the form with all the details. There can be as many witnesses as one wants and the registration can become on the spot. So, least hassle for everyone.

3) Induce competition to make it viable: As soon as some of the priests will start this practice they will boast of providing legal registration of marriages and that will encourage others to follow suite or they will loose business.

And then I believe our great Indian wedding will become complete. I know many will not agree to my point of view but I believe changing times require change of approach and this looks like the best way to me.

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Restaurant Seven

Today I tried a new place called Seven in Koregaon park lane no 7. We went there for lunch and we reached a little late (in rush hour), so couldn't find a place because they have a seating arrangement. It can seat only 12-15 people at a time. Tempted by the looks of chicken grill, we waited for about 20 minutes before we got the place. It has a small menu i.e. around 6-7 items each for veg and non veg. Food includes Burgers, Rolls, Falafel, Shredded chicken and Chicken grill.

I ordered a Non-veg platter which includes one chicken burger, some shredded chicken, 1 quarter of Chicken grill and served with salads, two kinds of sauce and some kind of rotis. The meal was really heavy. Chicken grill was quite good I wish it was hot and I have decided to visit the place early next time for that. Chicken burger was awesome. Shredded chicken was okay I liked it after mixing it with the spicy sauce. All this in 100 bucks. So, its very economic as well. My vegetarian colleague ordered a veg platter and it included a veg burger, 4 pieces of delicious Falafel (koftas/keemas made of chickpeas and spices), salads, sauce and rotis.

So, overall the presentation and food is quite good and provided the budget of (INR 100 per person).. It's just awesome.

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Lessons in life..

Lessons in life..... you never know when you will learn them. Sometimes there are things you come across which look very insignificant and they make you think and realize things a lot more than you would ever expect. As today I received a series of mails building up a typical love story of a guy who secretly admires a girl but doesn't have guts to talk to her and the girl also likes him but wants him to take the first step. Nothing very interesting in the story and the also ends in a very simple way without a "happily ever after" touch. The story was written as diary entries by the Guy and the girl and in between on behalf of God, when he is supposed to help and a common friend .

The story in brief is .. the guy (Niru) and the girl, both s/w engineers, like each other, but their hesitation has kept things to them. Finally a common friend (Rajesh) comes and introduces them and he also happens to be the guy on whom the girl had a crush back in college. But Niru and the girl fall in love; and now Rajesh starts loving the girl. But Niru is not yet settled down while Rajesh is; also Niru is going for further studies so the girl must wait for him for 2 years. Meanwhile Rajesh proposes the girl and after thinking over the options .. she chooses practical convinience over her love and Niru goes ahead with his studies alone. The END!!!

Now there is a briefing at the end by GOD,

God: ok. Here is the end of this story, not particularly unique; in fact a very common one. You might be expecting me to interfere in it at the eleventh hour and change the ending so that either; before the bus starts, She runs to the bus and gets into it and goes with Niru to Mumbai or probably when the bus is about to leave, Niru jumps out and hugs her or Rajesh feels something wrong and just takes her on bike and follows the bus just to stop it and make her get into the bus for Niru and so on? Nopes. This is not a hindi film. This is a real life story and not a reel life one.

She took the decision after evaluating each option she had. She had thought practically in every aspect. Won't interference by me be just an injustice to her thoughts? Won't it be just a wrong deed on my side and that too just to please some others without any particularly sensible reason? It's her life she will have to make her own decisions and will have to bear their consequences herself. Well that's what life is all about, you make decisions everyday some important and some not so, some right and some not that right, only time will tell if those decisions would make you happy or not in the long term. There is nothing like the so called "Happily Ever After", Life's not that simple, where would be the fun in Life if it was that simple?

This was like a great revelation for me.. it just gave me a whole new point of view of looking at things. It's simple, its logical and its obvious.. but never accept the truth that what happens to us is the result of decisions we take, the choices we make.. As it was said by Morpheus in The Matrix, "The problem is choice... and it is you who has to make your choice." It's easy to do/leave things in the god's name and the later blame it on him. But the truth remains that we are the victim of our own choices and decisions and that's life. Now that I realize that whatever happens to my life depends on my choices/decisions, I feel more confident and more responsible.

Similarly, once I read the book "The bridges across forever" - by Richard Bach. I never liked the love story genre.. but I still read this one just because I had a crush on a girl and she happen to own and like this book ;) But after reading this book I started looking at relationships from a whole new angle.. and that really helped me understand things I wouldn't otherwise. It really made my life very easy.. I was no more hurt when call frequencies dropped from any friend and actually never had bitter relationships with anyone after that. So, I will always thank her for the book :)

I am sure everyone of us learns his/her lessons in life one way or the other.. It's just awesome to look back and ponder over it. Makes our journey all the more interesting.

So, just Waiting for the next lesson....

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Plan for a movie extravaganza

A long weekend is coming and I will be home alone; as my brother is going home for Raksha Bandhan. I am not doing quite well on health front; hence I have decided to spend this weekend watching movies at home. Following are the movies I have short listed for the long weekend

1) The Shawshank Redemption
2) The Usual Suspects
3) The Boondock Saints
4) Se7en
5) Silence of the lambs
6) The Patriot
7) The Bank Job
8) The 40 year old virgin
9) Meet the fockers
10) Johny English
11) The happening
12) License to wed

I am excited already. Let me know if you wish to join :) Cheers!!

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Zafrani Zing

Zafrani Zing is an Indian restaurant in Lane 7 of Koregaon Park, opposite to Koyla. Restaurant on the first look looks an average place with not a lot of space. But it starts to look interesting the moment you are offered the special & the regular menus. The menu has a lot of variety to offer, there are some unique indian dishes on the offing along with the regular ones. They claim that Kebabs and Biryanis are their speciality and they actually offer some really good kebabs and Biryanis. I won't say it was the best I ever tasted but yes it was certainly better than the most.

Biryanis are not authentic, and they are modified to suit the preference of locals but they certainly have done a good job at that. As the taste is quite good and enjoyable. Most interesting thing I found was some fusion dishes, which have western ingredients and indian preparation.. on the similar lines they have some fusion desserts and they sound like Chocomosa (chocolate filled samosa with ice cream), Gulab jamun with cake and some others. I am going to try them all in some time.. just the idea makes me drool a Dessert lover like me :)

I had an reservation there and still I had to wait to get a table.. that's the only problem I faced (may be because of the shortage of space there). But they sure compensated that by offering us a complementary kebab and a fusion dessert (gazar ka halwa with ice cream) to us. Which I was very impressed with. Most of restaurants will just apologize and escort you to another table. But not this one.

I found that they were going to have a couple food festival this week. In which they will make the evening special for the couple from their side. I don't know much details so you will have to findout on your own. But sure sounds like another interesting idea.

I was impressed with the new ideas, service and attention they provided us. I will surely visit this place again and will recommend it too.

Variety - Very good
Ambiance - Good (but not spacious).
Food - Good
Service - Very Good
Pricing - Above average (350 - 400 per person for a multi-course meal)

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Drunken Wisdom - The Buffalo Theory

Cheers!!

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Jaane tu ya Jaane na

I enjoyed the movie thoroughly and I found it's worth paying 150 bucks for a movie on a Tuesday night; which, now a days, is a rare occurrence ;) I recieved quite a simple and yet an effective review of the movie from my cousin Pushkar. Hence, I will just borrow it here.

Movie is truly good.. Especially the freshness and the simplicity of the movie…Songs and music are very beautiful.

Scenes that stand out in Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na...

1. Conversation between Jay and Aditi’s parents regarding their engagement. Funny!!
2. Aditi wonders how the 5 years passed by; “On the phone beta”, says Jay’s mother. Too Good ;)
3. Scene between Aditi and her brother Amit; his confession. Brilliant!!
4. Scenes between Jay’s mother and his dead father, who talks from a portrait. Hilarious!!
5. Club scene in which Jay rescues Meghana... Superb!!
   
6. The chemistry in the gang of six friends. You will love it!!
7. Aditi begins to realize her love for Jay only after Sushant (Manjari Phadnis) enters the scene. The jealousy, sadness and regret is executed and performed perfectly.
   
8. Last sequence at airport.. Fantastic!!
   

Overall, the movie is quite enjoyable and is high on entertainment. If you’re looking for a movie on friendship and love; which makes you smile and laugh at times; then you shouldn't miss this one…

My rating is: 4 out of 5….

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