Old DD hindi serials...a trip down memory lane!!!

Deepa's latest posts http://lordlabak.blogspot.com/2006/08/mega-serials-i.html are about the Mega Serials which are churned out tirelessly every now and then and telecasted on the leading television channels in India which leaves the audiences tired and frustrated...I agree with her. These days serials are about women weeping, conspiring, marrying and re-marrying, in short about them turning from angel(s) to bitch(es) or vice versa...

There were a couple of tamil serials telecasted on Doordarshan in the 80's and early 90's which educated and entertained the audience(s). Some examples include "Thulaindhu Ponavargal", "Rail Sneham" etc...I have forgotten the names of the rest so if you could think of some, post them as comments...

Since hindi was my second language, I used to spend time watching hindi serials since school days...Some of them were really good unlike these days K serials...What made them so good was the storyline, dialogues, screenplay, and amicable characters...

Who can forget the Devki in Humraahi( it was played with charisma by Himani Shivpuri)? Devki played the vamp character with splendour and we could not help liking her inspite of all her plots and gossips...

Then there was Pavan Malhotra who played "Junior Station Master" in Intezaar...I even remember the name of the character he was in love with in that serial...Nia! The senior station master was played by Rajendra Gupta, another good performer.

The DD guys then also ventured into making historical classics...Mrignayani with National Award actress Pallavi Joshi doing the title role with Mohan Bhandari playing the Rajput king who falls in love with Mrignayani...The two set the screen on fire with their on-screen chemistry! I remember the BGM of the serial whenever someone was carried in a palanquin "Gun gunaa...gun gunaa...gun gunaare gun gunaa".

Then there were Buniyaad, Mr Yogi, Circus, Udaan, Mongeri Lal Ki Haseen Sapne...Nukkad and Naya Nukkad were wholesome entertainers...

Then there was a mischievous romantical serial called Farmaan with Kanwaljit Singh playing a naughty and haughty nawaab...

Doordarshan left no territory unexplored. Rajit Kapur played the lead role of a detective to perfection in "Byomkesh Bakshi" which made every viewer grip with curiosity. The lead character was inspired by Sherlock Holmes.

There was another serial called "Tehkikaat" featuring Vijay Anand (He is actor Dev Anand's bro and an accomplished director himself. I remember him well for his Kora Kaagaz movie) and Saurab Shukla unravelling mystery after mystery...Vijay Anand played the lovable Sam D'souza with Saurab Shukla as his assistant...If I am not wrong, Shekar Kapur directed this serial!

'Pachpan Kambe Laal Deewarein' was a good one too with Aman Verma and Meeta Vashisth. It tackled the story of a young man falling in love with a woman who was older than him and was a professor cum hostel warden...

Who can forget "I say chaps" mouthed by Abhimanyu Rai in Fauji? Every school gal then fell in love with SRK then...Shah Rukh Khan won the heart of millions of young girls by playing the role to perfection. I even remember a scene where he frantically searches for the sandals of his lady love (Fauji Doctor) just to dance with her...

Then there were classic epics namely Ramanand Sagar's Ramayana and B R Chopra's Mahabharata...They rocked! Infact the gulutis are known to prostrate whenever they see NTR potraying Lord Krishna on screen...The northie audience were not any lesser than that. Everytime Nitish Bharadwaj (Lord Krishna) came on screen, they knelt on their knees and almost worshipped him...

In short, the serials of those days had good story line, catchy and well meant dialogues, stellar performances from every actor, fewer commercials and more important a reasonable duration!

In a concluding note, Madame Radhika said in the Selvi Kondaattam show that these days serials are about Women Empowerment...Are wheeping, cursing, conspiring route(s) to empowerment?Raam Jaane!!!

Now for the tamil movie countdown...

One of my earlier posts listed hindi movies worth watching in the coming months...Now for the rocking tamil cinema...The movies are listed in increasing order of eagerness, pomp and extravaganza...
Pokiri - a henpecked Vijay movie starring Sin aka Asin...


Bheema - starring Vikram and Ricksha(w) aka Trisha...


Dasavatharam - a Kamal Haasan starrer featuring him in 10 different roles! It co-stars Reema Lambha (also known as Mallika Sherawat), Asin...


And finally, the movie the whole world is waiting for...

Shivaji-the Boss! - starring Superstar Rajinikanth, Shriya, Vivek...

I vs 'I'...

Hinduism...

Hinduism doesn't assume that it is the highest authority of all. if I am allowed to say, science is part of hinduism. even christianity doesn't say that it is above the science. it is just that the church is making that claim. science is still not close to religion because both the groups want it to be like that. scientist beleive if they are associated with religion then they would be tarnished and vice versa.also science need hard facts for it to prove that something is acceptable but the religion exactly wants to move away from that because it wants you to believe that there are things above just mere provable facts. now whose side you are in?

Dhoom 2 to Don to Munnabhai Lage Raho...

These are some of the hindi movies to look forward to in the coming months...I liked the movie stills hence posting them here...

Dhoom 2- starring Hrithik, Abishek, Aishwarya Rai, Uday Chopra and Bipasha Basu...The promos look interesting especially Hrithik's dare devil hunts...


Don- starring SRK, Priyanka Chopra, Kareena Kapoor, Isha Koppikar...Its a remake of the 1970 Amitabh Starrer Don. This has Kareena tapping her legs to the all time favourite Helen's number "Yeh Mera Dil Pyar ka Deewana..."


Munnabhai Lage Raho - the most eagerly awaited movie starring Sanjay Dutt, Arshad Warsi or should I say CIRCUIT and 'Parineeta' fame Vidya Balan...

Vipaanchi, Reverberations, Stage Coach, Sangamitra...

Does these ring a bell?

Well these are the culturals of some of the schools in Chennai...

PSBB used to host Reverberations, Stage Coach (not too sure...), DAV used to host Sangamitra...

Our AV's culturals were and are called Vipaanchi...

I am sure many of you out there would have had a blast of time during these culturals just the way I did...

Those were good old days!

Oye Aloo(Inzy)

Oye Aloo(Inzy)

What the bloody hell do u mean by "they have wrongly accused the pakistan cricket team"? You are talking as if you guys dont know what ball tampering is all about...You guys invented it...I am sure you guys would have resorted to such cheap tricks against England...

Anyways this 8 match ban serves u right ! We are so happy...Thank god that you have not been banned for life...anyways this non-ban provides us the pleasure of watching aloo(you) roll over the pitch in the name of scoring runs...

A detailed rebuking mail will follow soon...

Oh gosh! Am I becoming Moody?

I have been drinking(sipping) Odwalla Smoothie Strawberry Banana flavour periodically over the past few days...kinda similar to Mad-Eye moody drinking polyjuice potion every now and then:)

Polyjuice potion? I am sure you non-harry potter readers would not know what I am talking about! Well, polyjuice potion is something which will transform a person into something which he/she desires...All you need is a hair or stuff similar to DNA of that person...

I am sure a lot of makkal ought there might have tried Odwalla juices...those who haven't please do so at the earnest...its supposed to be the top brand quality juices...My personal favourite is the Strawberry Banana fusion...It tastes like "Elandha pazham"...Yep I was surprised too...it tastes yummy!

Classic(al) Gimmick!!!

One of the few things I look forward to doing when I go back to India is to continue my classical music...I have been missing attending kacheri(s) , practising vocal, ever since I came here...I got to know that Sudha Raghunathan and a lot others come every year to Cleveland for a set of kacheris and thyagaraja aradhanas...Unfortunately there's no such thing happening in OC...I guess I need to go to Bay Area if I wanna continue with my music atleast where there are some carnatic music teachers around...

I saw an ad few months back about carnatic classes taught by Mr X. The ad went on like this "A student of D K Pattamaal, I have learnt this, that...". I was taken back and called him up. To my surprise I found that he and his family had just moved from India few days back and he has around 5-6 years of training in music...That was pretty much the same experience which I had with vocal music...When I asked him about this learning with DKP, then came the dud! He did not learn from her it seems...its just that he follows her style of rendering music...When I asked him about the ad, he said he advertised like that so that people come to him to learn...Oh my goodness! I politely said that I would get back to him after few weeks and hung up...

Hmm...I was talking about this with some friends who are carnatic buffs too and we all had a laugh about it...cos I learnt the MLV style of rendition, one friend learnt the MRS style...I just pondered how it would be if I advertised in OC papers that "I learnt under MLV...so come and learn from me..."! I am sure it would be a classic(al) gimmick!!!

Oh no...why wasn't there any dubbing in the olden days?

I wonder why there wasn't any dubbing in old MGR or Shivaji movies especially the ones featuring Saroja Devi...Had it been there, it would have saved our ear buds...Yep, I am talking about the way she talks...Oh my god! Hearing her speak tamil or any language is as well equivalent to attempting to commit suicide...I really wonder how they gave her the title "Kannada thu Payinkilee"! Guess the ones who gave her the title were deaf! Thank goodness they did not call her a "kuzhil" or something...

Watching KANK...

I feel like watching KANK but after reading unlimited bad reviews about the film, I am in second thoughts as to whether I could put up with the longlasting so called hindi melodrama...

Ofcourse I intend taking Dolopar, Saridon, Latte with me incase Shah Rukh, Amitabh and Rani would give me a headache with their dialogue delivery...

Guys...what do you suggest? Should I give a try?

I cant burn the midnight oil...

After sweating out 3 years at Dell Inc., I decided to get back to academics, i.e pursue my post graduation. A BS in CS and a subsequent 3 year stint in SW got me bored with SW and I decided to pursue a new field, a new career...When I had deferred my MS admits way back in 2002 because US was just out of a recession and it was tuff getting assistantship in US univs, lot of folks advised me that I should not have deferred my admits and should take up MS soon incase I intend to do it as its tuff to get back to study mode after working...I did not take their words seriously...Hmm...How right were they!

Though I have almost completed 50% of my Personal Financial planning programme and still have just half the sea to cross, I am feeling just exhausted and tired with class, assignments, blah blah...I think of all the good days I had while working...Hmm...keeping my fingers crossed for March 07 to come as I would graduate by then...But I am sure my anticipated happiness is short lived as I need to give my CFP/CFA a shot next year...Uff...to hell with acads!

Some of my friends who have completed their MS and been working for a year or two are now giving thoughts about pursuing their MBA...I guess everyone wants a Management Degree to be listed in their resume...Yeah yeah...just like me...but I would never dream of doing 2 Post-Graduations in my life...I just wont have the stamina or mindset for that...I just cant burn the midnight oil AGAIN nor can give up my sleep for extra CREDIT!!!

4 stages of life...

Got it as a fwd!!!

I communicate; Therefore I exist!

Clearing all doubts...

What's the point of taking the pic?



This is the pic he seems to be taking !