Puerto Rico - Foods

The first week of June this summer, we went to Puerto Rico. In this post I will tackle the crucial topic of food.

Morning temps were in 80s and after 10am it was 90F-100F. And every movement was lazy.

One afternoon tour of Old San Juan and we indulged in street side slushies in Old San Juan cobbled streets.

Our first stay was in AirBnB in Luquillo, the East side of PR. So the first order of business - Walmart stop for basic supplies (shampoo, sunscreens, snacks, etc) that we couldn't get in our carry-on bag. There are a million of them everywhere. We picked the one in San Juan downtown. Parking here was in multiple level building, which means long line of carts to elevator & then beyond to the car. Prices were expectedly different from Walmarts in rest of USA. But best thing - it was a given to use our own grocery bags. Being tourists ofcourse we were not prepared for it. Plastic bags costed extra; but they were good quality thick plastic which we could reuse. That's one of the reasons, why they have a clean island & beaches. Everyone else gave us the side-eye. 

There was big variety in the local food scene in Luquillo. Tried different Mufungoes, which is famous in PR. Plantain Mufungo, Fish nuggets & Fried Crab Mufungo with the safe choices of Pasta.

The dining options in Hyatt Dorado Hacienda were good. Staff of Mahi Mahi Bar and Grill was overloaded but churned out everyone's orders well.

A whole complete breakfast which makes you feel you don't need lunch but no you do.

And then Red Snapper with rice & beans for lunch.

After an afternoon at Cabella beach, the Indian food craving hit us. We went to The India House nearby. Good quaint place. And pure coincidence, one of the managing guys actually flies in from Georgia to PR every few weeks.

Another day and another hunt for comfort food took us to Faccio Pizza.

 

On the climb to Mount Yonah, the vegetation was all tropical, reminding of Shiradi Ghat and similar. And likewise, there were Bonda (tender coconut) shop and tea shops along with Souvenir shops.

And throughout the stay, we drank loads of unlimited Mango slushies, Pina Colada & Pineapple drinks.

 

More Puerto Rico posts

Puerto Rico - vegetation and coastal parallels with India

The very first week of Summer, we went for a week long Puerto Rico trip. Beautiful island state. Great local people.

The very first thing to hit us is how much like coastal India it was. I said it for the first few days. Morning temps were in 80s and after 10am it was 90F-100F. And every movement was lazy.

Old San Juan could totally be mistaken for Pondicherry. Colorful buildings and cobbled streets.

Fort outside San Juan was lined up with very familiar flowering bushes.

Lots of Gulmohar trees in full blazing bloom everywhere.

And fully loaded Mango trees ! Everywhere !

The East side PR-66 highways were all packed with rush traffic. Drive on the highway, showed many 4 storied colonies, which were total replicas of government colonies from everywhere in India.

The Luquillo Airbnb we stayed in was in a high-rise and society exactly like in Pune or Bangalore. And the houses around, were like in Ulsoor or any coastal village. Cement construction, bright paints, and tile floors. Almost all apartments & house-bunglows were designed individually. All entrances were covered with iron bar coverings - all fancy designs like in anywhere in India. Locked up tight for security and to save AC against humidity. Hardly any people outside during the day; which eventually made sense cause it was 90+F everyday and no one wants the home AC to escape.

Dorado city neighborhood houses were like Indian construction. No junk or garbage pile anywhere. 

Walmart shopping experience totally like in Bangalore Food World or Big Bazar.

For the first few days, we were stunned to see gas prices - 96 cents, etc. Then after first refill, we figured it was 96 cents for a litre. Math translation mode on. And then most of the road signs were in Spanish first and English secondary. 

And then again, way too much Vegetation similarities. There were Datura plants.

Drive up to Mount  El Yunque National rain forest itself was a full on dejavu of Dakshina Kannada area ghats.

 

On the road trip from Dorado to Agra Dilla saw wild cows, the same breed as Indian. 

Sunset point at El Merendero De Guajataca. The park was lined up with Almond trees. 

 

More Puerto Rico posts

Dipping My Toes in Video Gaming World

I have been watching the gaming world as an outsider, all my life. My wide-eyed moment was in 2011 when I saw a Games store in mall and big posters about Gaming awards. I was stunned - so gaming is a parallel world - like cinema, TV and so on !

Now that my kids are full on into it, I was very curious. I mean, my kids played games like their peers. At one point, as any parent, I considered Gaming as a big bad place for kids, so I had rules in place. Then came short videos/reels/shorts, and kids were spending unlimited time there. Heck even I was addicted, spending 6 continuous hours watching non-stops short videos. Upon realization I started coaxing kids to play video games. (See how the cookie crumbles - said my kids looks).

For last years Black Friday, I bought XBox for myself. To step into the world of Video Games. It was almost Valentines day, by when I connected the Xbox and switched it on. By "I", I mean my kids, cause they couldn't stand it anymore ! That a perfectly good equipment was gathering dust..

I also did a round of Gaming Arcade along with my kids & nephews. The Gen Z is the most caring of all generations. They taught me the steps, rules and looped me in their world - no judgements for a noob. Pinballs in arcade were nostalgia overload, though I don't remember if I played the real one in past or only digitals ones on the old keyboard and large box monitors. And Pac-man are so additive - I want one home console now to play Pac-man non-stop. 

Arcade is how I learnt the basics of gaming - games get faster with time, more balls etc on next level and the basics of scoring. Some experience in steering and controller functions in driving games coz those are way different from real-world car driving. Anyway, those were the best few hours in spring break.

Tetris book was another nostalgia overload. With the books thriller pace, it made me want to play again. Google search showed a paid version on Xbox. And they have a mobile version too. Quick download, few games & deleted it. The unpaid one had ads ofcourse. Then it was in COLOR ! And the phone screen made it different. The experience was totally different. During the peak years, I used to even dream of those B&W bricks in my sleep. And here these are in color. And that it dawned on me, Candy crush is a version of Tetris - arghhhhh what a let down. Thankfully Amazon still sells the handheld version and I need to get my hands on them soon.

The ads in free games are such a nuisance. Now I feel bad for all the years, kids had borrowed parents phone and waded through ads, to play nonsense games. It doesn't mean I am a convert & will start paying everywhere for games. Just saying, I now know the pain.

Back to X-Box, how I fell in love was when my kids & nephews let me handle the BMX game. That was my initiation to the sensitive controller and how things are not as easy as it looks. In the meantime, I have graduated to car-football game () and floppy-jumping game. I am yet to enter the world of Fortnite or any multiple-player games. 

With my past experience being limited to Tetris and Minesweeper, I decided to read up on games before I started. I got hold of many books, but eventually finished these.

Press Start to Play - Short story collection

Wide variety of short stories. Lot of them sci-fi and some in twilight horror category.

Notable ones - Andy Wiers, Anda's Game by Cory Doctorow.

The Tetris Effect - The Game That Digitized The World - Dan Ackerman

Got to see the Tetris movie released recently. Book was better. I mean, the movie is thriller format with lot of physical action. Same events & situations happen in the book but in a realistic fashion; and yet they were no less thrilling.

Covers a lot on how software business deals happened, atleast in 80s & 90s. Communication might be faster now ofcourse, but people dynamics still are the same. One book about current s/w business world was in the Instagram book. Other insights were about the beliefs and philosophy of the coding world - about the passion for free nature of open code and it becomes a sin when its popular, sharing via floppy disks and 80s & older models of desktops.

Movies

Might I add some movie recommendations as well.

Ready Play One - 2018 movie, based off of 2011 book, I read in 2016, set in dystopian future 2045 but totally living in the 1980s.

1Up - 2022 movie, small budget but well made.

Jubilee on Prime

Just wrapped up soaking in Jubilee show on Amazon Prime. And am still not out of it. I don't know what I will see next, cause I don't want to leave this zone yet. 

 

Makes me crave for Dev Anand, Gurudutt and even some of the 60s-70s tragic ending Kannada dramas of Manjula & Aarthi. 

Plotlines used the elements of folklore and scattered it around the stories. Even the starting point of each of the 5 main characters is nicked from many major players of Bombay showbiz initial years. But ofcourse the later years are not an authentic biography. And that's because those players refused to give the rights for biography on films. But there was a series long thread and each episode takes rest of the story forward for all 5 main characters.

They got the Brown sepia tone looks, location and set so very right. Stories had all elements of 50s even in the storyline, like focus on tragedy.

Actors were at their brilliant best. Lanky Jay Khanna with his sifty eyes & nervous energy. Aditi looking elegant, delicate with watery eyes & translucent skin.

Background music by Alokananda Dasgupta is so fantastic, I am going to say, the show would be totally different without it. Sets the right mood of dread and suspense - even when repeated every single episode. 

Talking of dread, it was so evenly spread through so many episode. There is a point in the last or previous episode, when Das says and "aur woh hai ", then a pause, which I filled with "..." the right answer.

The songs by Amit Trivedi, were spaced out through the episodes. My first instinct was to cringe - trying to emulate 50s songs usually is for mockery. But nope, these work even outside the show. I have been playing Jubilee jukebox on YouTube.

The plot to reinsert Nilo into Jay's life after the scandal was totally unreal. Yeah ok it was the means to allow for an even, tragic ending for all the main characters.

Talking of the tragic ending, I don't not agree with the ending. Ashok Kumar, Kishore Kumar, Dev Anand, Raj Kapoor, Mukherjee studio owners, Himani Devi - everyone went on to live a full life with usual ups and down. Of course this was not a direct actual historical, so the ending does not have to match real life. Plus the whole bonus of being authentic to 50s cinema - where tragic ending made every audience poignant and tied to them for life.

Overall, the show gave some inside insight into Movie business of the the 30s-60s decade. 

How Sindhi Punjabi folks got their hold in Bombay film industry and practically defined the rules of this trade. How certain people deals were made and the detailed power-play industry. Some hint on their friction with Maharashtra locals - story as old as time and wide as this world.

On technology side, showcased old sets, studio logistics, silent to cinemascope technology jump, old telephones. More specifically, this show displayed the different Audio equipment and even a slide show. Like mentioned here, its thanks to Motwane's family connection. I am happy this show showcased this like no one before. Some theatre reels, projector rooms and some wire-tapping equipment by Americans & Russians.

And this is one show I see Jalgaon mentioned and an event occurs in theatres there.

There are loads of ideas for Part 2 or Sequels. There is still a bulk of folklore about the 60s & 70s. Hindi movie Music industry is its own monolith. Golden era and the thousands of people who created it deserve their own stories.

#JubileeOnPrime More Reading:

Picture the Past - A new series by Vikramaditya Motwane celebrates all that has changed in Hindi cinema and all that hasn’t since the 1930s - Kaveree Bamzai  | 07 Apr, 2023

Memoirs of Hindi Cinema - A series mirrors the early life and times of Bombay studios—and India Rachel Dwyer | 21 Apr, 2023

All of the OTT / Web Series watched every year.

Run Report 2022

2022 was purely Georgia miles with a few in Dallas for Thankgiving week. I added some walks in my regime just to be able to go out.

 

In December 2021, we moved to a new home. So my run routine changed again. The route around my neighborhood was a mountain. A torture which nearly tempted me with run-retirement. So I made the expensive decision to keep my hobby alive. I decided to burn my precious gas and drive to a trailhead 3-5 miles away. Gas was expensive in the beginning of the year, in case anyone forgot. And later that's how walk was introduced into my routine. Rather than let a day get wasted, cause I missed the run-bus, I introduced walking around my mountainous neighborhood. 

In the very first week of June, the mood was complete HOTlanta with missing MinneSNOWta very badly. June & July are killer in humidity. But August the rains have transformed the sidewalks. The algae coating makes it as slippery & dangerous as black ice sidewalks in Minnesota. October was pleasant till the cold blast for a week. Then it was a warm first-half of November. But December was all sleet & tropical rains along with 2 weeks of Artic blast cold wave. That brought down my Dec mileage immensely. 

Runkerchief - so nice to see another runner flaunt the huge mens-handkerchief. It was that kind of June morning. I am not the only one carrying handkerchiefs to wipe the sweat & blow snot. And in summer I bought the cooling towel. That's definitely needed in South on just regular outings in summer.

For the last day of Dec, I scrambled to join my run group - but surprise ! It was hurricany weather, so stuck to treadmill walk. My GPS phone walk mode did not match with treadmill and showed 0.5 miles on watch for the 2 miles of treadmill walk.

I thought I had run less, but at 471 miles of running it was still more than last year. And add the 84 miles of walking. But my pace has dropped to 15-16 min/mile. Its a very depressing number which I attribute to increase in weight & age, and add Georgia's topography to it.

Another milestone - I did one of a Georgia things. So as soon as we landed in the heat of August, I saw people walking everywhere - every sidewalk of every crowded road. Anytime of the day - even 90F afternoons. I knew of hiking on Appalachian Trail but Hiking as such was a big thing everywhere. Saw glimpses of that in different Hiking FB groups where people hiking in different state parks & mountains posted theirs. As much as I grappled with the nuances of hiking vs trekking vs walking, I wanted to Hike with a group. I got to do that this November. Went with a big ladies gang to the Sawnee Mountain Preserve (4075 Spot Rd, Cumming GA 30040).

I did become a morning runner this year finally. Because morning temps are pleasant and not freezing like MN and it gets hotter later in the day. I tried a few evening runs & couldn't imagine, how I did evening-runs so many years in MN. It's too much effort after the exhausting efforts of the day.

I had one very interesting Saturday long run in last week of July. After moving to Georgia, I looked up and joined a few local Run Groups via Facebook. I ran with only Lifetime group but followed rest for local trail info. This Saturday I decided to turn up at one groups starting point at Halcyon at 6:30am. Waited awkwardly in dark for strangers to turn up with the same confidence as my MN run groups. There was another group gathering & I kept looking at them, asking telepathically if they were Wind Runners. Finally 2 dudes came asking about this group & I introduced myself. Since they were fast runner, I decided to skip this and went back for breakfast and went to my usual  trail. When I was about to start, the second group from Halcyon reached here by running. Haha & chatted. Its 5.3 miles from there and took them an hour. Later I remembered they must be the Peachtree group. I started my run and ran into a few women who looked like 'She RUNS This Town' run group. After a pause I asked them and they did turn to to be. Lot of good natured Runners Yelling. So thrilling. And in my return trip I ran into my Lifetime run group buddy. So one Saturday morning run and I bumped into 4 run group runners !

My only race of the year was Alpharetta Women's Half Marathon on 23-Oct.

Races here are just not like in MN. In MN there were races across seasons. All routes were beauty areas with definitely flat-ish routes. Format were classic plain vanilla; which is very comforting. Now in Georgia I have found only one in my hometown which works for me. Then rest are quite a driving distance. And I found all really weird ones. There is Alien Half in Rosewell with Alien theme & it's at night ! There is another Marathon which is run around a 1 mile loop - its a good way to ensure the entire race is on a flat route. Plus Georgia is a mountainous state. The inclines are killer and we don't need it in a race routes. I don't know how I will find other races that work for me.

All of my yearly Run Reports are here.

Wish you all a very Happy & Prosperous New Year !

Rest of the Read Books of 2022

My notes on reading experience July onwards. The books I read before July in this year 2022 are here.

My immediate  next step is I need to memorize the spelling of my new favorite author Sylvain Neuvel. I read 4 books by him in 2 months. First 2 books of 2 trilogy. Last books of both are not in library yet. 

Most of the books this year brought me personal comfort & peace; answered the questions that were pestering me. Appropriate Self-help books have a good reason for existence and I am just finding out.

My book count is up. My count is almost 18+ books this year. I re-read my old favs for comfort (like Hunger Games, Tintin, etc). I think this count has been going up every year. Nice change, I say. I started reading more books to get away from the mindless-scrolling phone addiction that has been on steroids' this year.

Em And The Big Hoom - by Jerry Pinto

I have always been aware of the caliber of Mr Jerry Pinto by his newspaper & magazine publications and fame; this was the first book I read. This book won the Shahitya Acakami award in 2016 and I feel very well deserved. And I was happy to find his book in a GA, USA Library.

Very well written book, it has brought immense comfort to me. I don't even feel guilt, on how much pain & suffering is captured in the book and all of it non-fictional. Its because it got me answers to many questions. The book captures the grudge holding that happens in large family through their long-lasting relationships, even if in begrudged way.

No movie or even OTT series can cover the roller coaster of his family. No acting can convey what even the bland reporting is doing. I can almost see all of them; maybe I already have.

80s Bombay almost had an epidemic of such cases. I have always been curious why? Also depicted in movies like "Honeymoon Travels" - Bomen Irani part of movie. 

Something about restrictions telling against marriage, not wanting kids but having them , all pile up in their head. Also the suffocations induced by financial limitations, no resources , no budget for travel or hobbies or acquiring beauty objects to satisfy or divert minds. 

This superstition of acknowledging love or good stuff or happy birthday to their children. It’s almost like they are worried someone will hear & spoil it. Power of superstition can drive anyone batshit crazy. "Angel roaming around can hear what you say & make it true" was used as caution to stop any kids or naïve people from bragging or saying ill. Extrapolated someone believing it from childhood will start seeing things.

But it always bothered me that when there is no financial or health or personal or other misfortune, why they create relationship troubles ? Because once broken or splintered, they were never fixed again.

PSA ask us to limit resource usage to save earth from thrash. But that is a surefire way to drive 7 billion humans to craziness..

Noteworthy passages:

Page 21-22: "Em's mother spoke in code. She omitted almost all the important words in each sentence. She had had far too many languages drummed into her ears - first Konkani in Goa, then Burmese in Rangoon , then Bengali in wartime Calcutta and now English, in which her children spoke and dreamed. It had taken away most of her vocabulary. She communicated through gestures, facial expressions and the assumption that everyone knew what she was talking about. "

Page 26 - "Hierarchy breaks down and revenger must be had." to describe a class which just got a nervous teacher.

Page  68 - Analogy of tower is perfect - 

"Love is never enough. Madness is enough. It is complete, self sufficient onto itself. You can only stand outside it, as a women might stand outside a prison in which her lover is locked up. From time to time, a well-loved face will peer out and love floods back. A scrap of cloth flutters and it becomes a sign and a code and a message and all that you want it to ne. Then it vanishes and you are outside the dark tower again. At times, when I was young, I wanted to be inside the tower. so I could understand what it was like. But I knew even then, that I did not want to be a permanent resident of the tower. I wanted to visit meant nothing because you could always leave. You're a tourist; she a resident."

Page 137 - "It puzzled me, this ability to fight over things that had happened years ago until I realized that Em and Granny could only fight over things that had happened years ago. They used them as placeholders for the slights and hurts of the present. In ten years time, whatever was bothering them now would spill out in the open, when it could be handled just that much better"

The Art of Gathering - How we meet and why it matters - by Priya Parker

I managed to scrambled through and finish this book on the last day of Dec, so I had to update it in this blogpost.

The book is very impressive. Given the authors extensive work, every chapter is filled with different instances of gathering. And each kind of meeting, conference, wedding, parties etc is used to explain a certain principle. That makes it all interesting.

The only other book I found talking formally about hosting was the fiction novel Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. I found it hard to follow, because of its hard language. But at an young age, I got an idea of the power of a party.

Most of my work life have been defined and structured by meetings. So with The Art of Gathering, I found the great breakup and methods for different aspects of a meeting. Some of them may sound incredulous to apply in our situation. But it obviously worked in that situation. What might be missing in the book, is the resistance to some of these methods, that would have happened. Knowing those, would help in being prepared to be mocked while we try it out.

But the good part is reading all this, opens our mind to find solutions to better our own gatherings.

I heard of this book after attending a live event by Priya Parker hosted by MURAL. Now MURAL is a great tool for making even remote meetings very interactive. So it made sense for her to share about the book. To know more, here is the YouTube interview of Priya Parker.

Noteworthy passages:

The one on Page 132-133 is something I have been repeating a lot in my house about device usage - there are millions of dollars & hours of work involved in overcoming our willpoer of giving up device.

Page 120: If etiquette is about sustaining unchanging norms, pop-up rules are about trying stuff out.

Page 121: Etiquettes allows people to gather because they are the same. Pop-up rules allow people to gather because they are different - yet open to having the same experience.

Page 132-133: Making it an individual's responsibility not to be distracted, Harris told The Atlantic, "is not acknowledging that there's a thousand people on the other side of the screen whose job is to break down whatever responsibility I can maintain."

A Man Called Ove - Fredrik Backman

 

I LOLed at many places. I read it all in 3 days of reading. It's a fast pace book; pages keep moving from one to another. Its set in a cozy setting - a housing community with an assortment of interesting characters. 

This para summarizes the book aptly:

Page 230: Considering how they are constantly preventing him from dying, these neighbors of his are certainly not shy when it comes to driving a man to the brink of madness and su?ci?e. That's for sure.

The book is a gem and ends with a happy ending. Found it after seeing the Tom Hanks movie trailer. 

Third Culture Books - The Experience of Growing Up Among Worlds - By David C Pollock and Ruth E Vad Reken

Most emotional book for me, in a long time. I filled up a separate blogpost with notes from this book.

The book lists a load of frustrations that we suffer all our life, Not knowing the real reason & assuming our reaction from a totally different reason like family background or luck or the entire world. This book lists them with all with explanation & hence brought me peace with a lot of points.

Steal Like An Artist - by Austin Kleon

I can't every begin to say how beautiful and important this book was. I want to buy & gift it to my favorite people.

Starstruck - Cosmic Journey of Neil DeGrasse Tyson

Good one. When NDT wrote on his FB abut the book being banned in some Philly library, I needed to check it out; so got it from my local library.

Take Them To Stars series - by Sylvain Neuvel - A History of What Comes Next (1)  & Until the Last of Me (2) 

 

Since I couldn't finish the previous trilogy, I hopped on to the next trilogy by same author. Totally different in tone, language, setting & everything.

Again my favorite genre of space science fiction. Here the desire to reach the stars, so no real space adventure. But lot of adventure on earth, in different countries, in innumerable time-eras and cultures.

First of all such an intriguing premise. And then executed well. The multi generation of ladies meant multi stories from decades & centuries & cultures. Multi cultures are refrenced - those who have been involved in astronomy in some way but yet to spot India yet; lets see in 3rd book, not a big deal.

The gore in Book One was hard to digest and one particular story gave me nightmares I have to say. Back story for it based on true incidents upset me & I had to take a break from reading the last of the book. No such violence in the Book Two. 

About the violence in the Book One, made me doubt about maybe the villain & victim are interchanged & not what is portrayed. 

In Book One, the information section in the end is multiple pages. Every historical reference in the book (which is a lot) is provided its real back story. That was very educational.

The Further Reading section in Book Two is an entire chapter in itself, with each that can send you down the wiki rabbit hole.

There is even a Spotify playlist of songs which named the chapters. Haven’t enjoyed a true blue space s I-go in a long long time. 

The Diet Trap Solution - Train Your Brain To Lose Weight and Keep It Off for Good - by Dr Judith S Beck & Deborah Beck Busis 

 

I found this book useful, as it was not about dictating what to eat or recipes. It was about how to handle situations, which throw us off from our diet. Holidays, traveling, family pressures, eating to seem nice, etc there is a chapter & different strategies for each.

Older Reading lists: Entire Book list  | 2022 (1) | 2021 (2) | 2021(1) | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 |

2022 Banquet of Movies

New generation of movie makers are gems, in all language. They have varied plots. And most of the conflict conclusions are with so sabya-vyavahar, its inspiring - as compared to alpha macho-male ways of resolving conflicts which are dangerous actions to replicate in real life.

One of the tricks which helped increase our family viewing, was to merge profiles. So many OTT apps, so many show/films options, so many varied personal choices. We all ended up just scrolling & not seeing anything. So this year, I suggested we merge the profiles so there is one Profile for grownups & one kid version. Now one profile for couple, meant one set of recommendations to choose from. It actually helped increase our viewing.

Other Phenomenon of this year were South films. I have always been watching. But my eye opener for this phenomenon was when a Bihari friend said she was Mahesh Babbu fan & watches all Telagu films dubbed in Hindi on Youtube. Seems like its a far & wide thing as proven after Pushpa success. Slowly details came out from many North Indian friends that their parents & relatives have been watching South movies for a long time, ofcourse in dubbed or subtitles version.

KANNADA

Kantara - in theatre. Very impressive 👌🏼👌🏼👌🏼 Language, background music & songs, sub-plots, characters, performances, stunts, pacing of story & closure. 

Kshamisi Nimma Khaatheyalli Hanavilla - Diganth. Language play kept it engrossing.

MALAYALAM

Tovino Thomas is the flavor of this year and my new favorite actor.

Minnal Murali - on First class. Mallu Super-hero movie. It had the familiarity of Kerala setting & people, along with Hollywood elements of super-hero origin movie. Background music for every sequence was ah heart-beating one. Like all Kerala movies, filled with 100s of characters and each interesting than the other with separate background story and quirks. 

Forensic (2020)

Kilometers and Kilometers (2020)

Dear Friend (2022)

Naaradum (2022) - Ok movie with the weakest part being the faulty background music and other being the simplistic story & arc of the bad guy.

Night Dive (2022) - on Netflix. Spread over one night, good thriller with twists. And good acting by Anna Ben, Roshan Andrews, Sukumaran and others.

TELUGU

And flavor of Telugu cinema would have to be Nani & Allu Arjun

Shyam Singha Roy (2021)

Ante Sundaraniki (2022) - rollercoaster of events and hence engrossing comedy. 

BENGALI

Thanks to Prime & Hulu , saw a few of Bengali movies this year - old & new

Ahare Mon - Always wanted to see this movie  esp for the lovely song Ogo Bideshini. Good 

Banshewale - Its the quite peaceful approach movie; through the storyline involves lot of complicated drama. Sent me down the rabbit-hole about Sayan Munshi's whereabouts.

Sweater (2019) - Darjeeling views.

Mukherjee Dar Bou (2019)

MARATHI

Marathi film industry has a huge legacy and hence the lovely movies, excellent acting and music they create.

66 Sadashiv - Fun involving movie on the topic of skill of arguing. Lot of story sub-plots working together towards a satisfying conclusion.

Mogra Phullala - Movie as soft as Mogra scent.  Story-line is as usual family drama as it can get - what brings this movie up is the acting skills of the leads ( Swwapnil Joshi, Sai Deodhar, Neena Kulkarni) & others, beautiful language and lovely 4 songs.

Jhimma - Ladies group tour to UK with male tour owner & guide. Great visuals, beautiful Marathi dialoges, multiple stories with ups & downs. 

TAMIL

Beast (Tamil) / Raw (Hindi) - Enjoyable masala movie - spiced with action, gore, comedy and good 1 song (Arabic Kuttu). First there was Phanthom on ship, then John McClane on skyscraper and now Beast in mall. And the movie ending was Top Gun. Perfect.

Love Today - on Netflix. Its as fun as fun can be. Every subtle thing in that situation is exaggerated very imaginatively created scenes.

HINDI

Kaun Pravin Tambe - Good one. Firstly for Shreyas Talpade. Next Parambratta C & other actors. Story unfolding with interesting flashbacks. And then for the cricket bits sprinkled right.

Jaadugar / Love Goals - TVF & Jeetu Bhaiya movie on Netflix. It had magic, football, MP small town underdog. Brilliant movie.

83 -  Such a lovely movie in every way and I feel bad about missing it in theatres when it released. So many scenes & such lovely progression of storyline. So endearing in not a emotional manipulation way. Story unfolds very realistic & believable fashion like it happens in any of the sports teams.

Gehraiyan - 

It was genre breaking. Was it romance or thriller or suspense (like in second half). And then a open ending as in more to follow. And later when I was thinking, I realized that they will wiggle out of this one too. 

Also, so the only untainted characters turned out to be Nasser, Karan & to a large extent Tia. 

Pushpa - Hindi dubbed from Telegu. Shreyas Talpade dubbed for Allu Arjun & Rashmika looks & acted good. 

dubbing - Ek Saal Ke Pehle.

Visually powerful movie - grand locations, hundreds of people in every frame, black stained clothes. Clothes of girls, ladies & men is as casual as Magadi Road, Bangalore. Worn in full pride with no apology or sub-texting & that's a win.

Power of dubbed movies. Friend from Mithila first told me, she watched Telegu dubbed in Hindi movies on YouTube. It hardly registered. But that trend reached its full power with Pushpa being 300 crores+ super hit.

I learnt of the gravity of Telegu film industry, historically & today from Mahanati (Savithri).

Full on masala movie with lot of swagger, violence & gore. Stunts, Story plots, songs, swagger.

Background music was appropriate even when loud. Songs were cool & catchy.

Initial credit sequence animation was a great opening. I would be disappointed if it turns out to be inspired or from Blood Diamond or some such thing.

Atrangi Re - The damn movie used every single social issue to move the story forward. I guess that's the left & right critics cribs - the movie did not use their platform for highlighting or solving the issue, just used it like a tool. Their is Tamilian in Delhi, groom-kidnapping in Bihar, forced marriage,  psychiatry used in casual terms.

Jersey - Good remake of Nani's Telugu Jersey. Worth a watch.

Good Luck Jerry - Good remake. Fun watch.

Darlings (2022) and Thappad (2021) are like from same universe but way different tones. Both equally good. Darlings was delicious in its wickedness and Thappad for being evocative. Good work.

Love Aaj Kal (2020): Finally saw it on Prime. Avoided it when released coz negative reviews. Now Youtube played its songs one after other. And one fine lazy night, play the movie. Very worth a watch. Almost poetic in the way it proceeded, and maybe that why the scenes didn't work in trailer. Also might have failed coz the 90s pair did not end up together - that's usually a dhak-kha. Movie covered work life balance question and resolved it so well. But very poetic flow for existential pain.

Dobaara (2022) - fascinating & watched it twice.

Jayeshbhai Jordar - good treatment for a serious topic. Ranveer is always a dearie.

Bhool Bhulaiyaa 2 - Kathik Aryan best as ever. Perfect songs. 

Kaamyaab - Sanjay Misra

Jhund - Bachchan, football and the catchy orchestra recreation of Lawaris.

ENGLISH

Top Gun Maverick- music, bikes, planes, boats & fireworks. Worth the wait for theatre. 

Gift (Netflix) - African movie. Lovely background singing & music, cicadas. Located amidst greenery & woods & farmlands. It was like watching a Malayalam movie. 

Lots of movies on OTT

My Yearly Movies List here.

TV Shows & OTT 2022

Once upon a time, say 1985 or so, we would hire a VCR Player and a few VHS tapes of latest movies and nostalgia Kannada movies. This would be for some bank & school holidays long weekend. Then all bank expats would gather around in one house have a communal movie marathon. Even late nights, which was fun for us kids.

Now the entire process is with OTT. When everyone began with Netflix, it was like cable subscription. Once & forever. 

Now there are like a thousand OTT and a million new series or movies to choose from. It impossible to subscribe to all at the same time - because of the cost and who has time to watch it all ?

So we subscribe to 1 or so OTT at a time, watch all wanted shows, unsubscribe and then repeat the process another OTT. The OTT guys have understood our play. So now for new hyped show or season, they release 1 or 2 episodes each week. This way they ensure we stay subscribed for longer or atleast till end of season.

These Shows which required a seated viewing. Not the ones to play on TV for background noise which we do other chores. 

OTT

Other popular ones we watched on OTT

Panchayat - Lovely as widely well reviewed show. But the gut-punching ending in the last episode totally destroyed the happiness 

Aranyak - Because Raveena Tandon, Parambrata Chatterjee and hilly woods.

Fame Game - only for Madhuri. At one point I forwarded other actors parts & stay on Madhuri scenes. That's the only way to survive 8-10 episode in these time crunch times.

Never Ever Have I (S3) - every season deserves an immediate watch.

The Peripheral - Sci-fi time travel. Good one.

Cobra Kai S5

Reacher S1 - 

Jack Ryan S2

Inventing Anna - The kind which is all consuming and holds a tight grip on you till its done. Production value wise its big screen quality. Storytelling is at its refined peak. Brilliant unfolding of each episode. Anna actress as standout - delusional, unempathatic, twitching lips, wet eyes and ratty nose. Show was amazingly impressive. Overdramatic reactions of Vivian, dramatic emotional conflict in brilliant situations. Only things that mattered were to see the dramatization of wiley debacle in financial situations.

The Playlist 2022 based on Spotify - Unique way with each episode being from each roles perspective .

Guilty Minds

TV Shows

Father Brown - S10

Sister Boniface S1 - How delightful. Such a surprise that a character who appeared in only 1 episode of Father Brown & 10 years back, got her own spinoff. Its set in 60s and very delightful.

Bob Hearts Abhishola

Ghosts

All of the OTT / Web Series watched every year.

Alpharetta Women's Half Marathon 2022 - Race Recap

 I signed up for  Alpharetta Women's Half Marathon  immediately after last years (2021) race. This year it was on 23-Oct-2021 Sunday starting at 7:30 am. Not as dark as last year, but colder than last year. This week was some unseasonal cold blast through the country.

Start point is in Avalon Mall, which is an open outdoor mall. Parking was in the usual mall places. Route experiences were entirely like last year's.

Once more thanks to those who wrote funny & motivational quotes throughout, I mean throughout, the 5-6 miles of Greenway. Kept us going throughout he difficult 2nd half.

Official race results says 3:28 finish time. The route had 0.40 miles more than the watch. I am taking this my new HM time benchmark considering current age, weight & inclines. Maybe I need more HMs in a year for practice & to increase my speed. But it was not lonely at the finish line. For that matter, throughout the second half, while I was chugging all engines fired jog, I was surrounded entirely by leisurely walkers - all.

Thanks to the Water support volunteers for the frequent water & Gatorade (watermelon flavor). Guides at almost every turn. The MC announcer with powerful voice. Starting point warm-up. Perfect parking spots. Spacious spread-out waiting areas.

Race gear was interesting. Pickup at Big Peach Running Store. Medal was a wine bottle cap - so multipurpose medal, that's good. Race shirt was comfy cotton - but if it was a tech material, I could use it in run training.

IISc Memory Refresh

 I worked at ERNET for 3 years and each month was filled with rich experiences. IISc campus and ECE department were my mother-ship for that duration.

Begining with an exhaustive joining interview with Vinay and SVR Ananad which invovled actual programming. Interacting Prof Anurag Kumar while building VoGram prototype and during renovations. All my ERNET interactions with Prof Malati Hegde, SVR Anand, Gopi and Chandrika Ma'am. Programming time goofing off with Ajit and Aditya in Network Architecture Labs.

ERNET training session in Delhi, which I attended with MCR, to support the new labs and equipment.

Delicious and super affordable lunches & coffee at Coffee House.

One time one user forwarded something which had disturbing content, and I lost my cool that day and brokedown. And I went to NetOps labs room and ranted looking at the wall, with Chitra & Gopi listening. I felt better after the talk with them. But Gopi called the user and told him 'clearly' about this being a misuse.

Those years were my personal version of Big Bang Theory.

Looking back I learnt everything or stregtened my skills here - computer programming, network technologies, co-worker interactions, reporting in multiple areas, inter-departmental relationships, project management.

Its been years since I left. We had so strong bonds then. With time we may be out of touch. But all the memories are so clear.

This year, I got a chance to visit the campus and ECE department and ERNET lab and meet Anurag sir and Anand sir. 

I got to show my kids, the very room I worked in way before they were born. And those rooms haven't changed a tiny bit - just frozen in time, thank god.

I was reliving this campus memories by watching Rocket Boys. Am so grateful, I got to visit here 

again.