Weekend @ Bangalore

After a long time I did not blog yesterday. For the past one month I had been making it a habit of posting atleast once in a day. There were days – occasionally – when I used to stay back after work and make a post. Yesterday for some reason or the other, I did not feel like blogging.

My trip to Bangalore was a good one. Thought I did not have time for anything and since time flies by when you want it to move slowly, the 3 days just zoomed by. The first day I was busy watching the Ashes match. Since I do not have a TV in Chennai, I spend most of my time in Bangalore making up for it. Jaya chitta and Ammu were to arrive in the morning along with me, but their train was late by 22 and ½ hours!!!!!

Indian Railways, especially the western railways had been thrown out of gear due to the monsoon rains in Karnataka, Maharashtra and Gujarat. So the train which should have arrived in Bangalore on Saturday morning 4, reached Bangalore on Sunday morning 2:30. I had to go and receive them, and thanks to the efficient railways announcement system, I reached the railway station at 10pm itself.

Initially it was announced that the train would be arriving at 11pm, so I reached the station at 10, so that incase they arrive early, I could take them home. At 10:45pm, they announced that the train would arrive at 12am. At 11:45pm they again changed the timings to 1:30am. This time I was really irritated and went back to the car and slept in it for an hour. When I came back at 1:15am, the arrival time was changed yet again to 2:30am. I was totally stunned at the efficiency at which our railways work. Ammu messaged me from the train, saying that they were at Tumkur and would be coming in a hour, so I decided to wait in the platform. Finally they arrived at 2:30. Kannan gave me company during the long wait at the platform.

On Sunday, I went out with Ravi, Sujay and Amitabh to watch Mangal Pandey at Innovative Multiplex. I was totally disappointed with the movie. The reason was that I expected a lot from it, since Aamir Khan was the lead actor and it was his first after a gap of 4 years. Toby Stephens who played the role of Gordon was good, and I felt that his role was more important then Aamir Khan’s. The movie focused a lot in the friendship between Godron and Mangal. The main Sepoy Mutiny started and was over even before we knew it.

There were a lot of scenes and characters the movie could have done without. Kiron Kher’s low cut blowse and the two dancers rubbing their bodies against each other could have been done without. These scenes were added just because sex sells in India. Rani Mukherjee did not have much of an acting to do as a prostitute who falls for the bravery of Mangal. Amisha as the Sati, who is rescued by Gordon is also wasted.

The movie is all about Mangal and Gordon. Both the actors have done justice to their roles and somehow I liked Toby Stephens more than Aamir Khan.

After the movie I stayed back with Ravi in his house and returned home in the morning. Kochakkan Kochacchan had come home in the afternoon and we all had a nice time at home.

I left home for Chennai at 9:30pm. I came by the 10:10 Volvo, and for the first time I felt hot inside a Volvo – there was some problem with the air conditioning.

I also managed to finish reading The Bourne Legacy, shall write about it in a separate post. The book was the fourth in the series of books on the character Jason Bourne, and I had read all the other 3, hence this urge to read this book as well. Shall discuss in detail about Bourne in another post.