Subhajit

December has been quite a likable month for me as an individual. Birthdays (yes, I do celebrate on two days), Goa trips, Christmas fever and the year-end retrospections. All these constitute to my special liking to this month. The list is long though, will try to put them all here today. The last year and half has been crazy. The work schedule is insanely hectic. Just one trip to home. Little brother has been a part of Mumbai off late. I have become one more year older. Mumbai is still surprising me. New additions in buddies, new CCD mates, new perfumes. No significant addition to my gadget list though. A better maid, a great boss and best of the times in South Bombay. Same room-mate, same health and same relationship status. Seems I have been consistent in certain elements in my life. Still missing 25 th of December, the day I said someone that I like her. This year it completes 12 years of this brave act, out of which I’ll be celebrating my 5 th as a single! I’ll be into my 7 th

It does not happen always that a guy like me will go to watch a movie thrice, it has happened earlier when I had to make it twice owing my commitments to friends and girlfriends and 'other' friends. But this time, I am just stuck with this flick. Though I was eagerly waiting for Imtiaz's next after his last three worthy projects, I was not prepared to travel through this insanely awesome journey of love. When I saw it first two days post its release, I just had one guy commenting that this is worth watching, specially for its climax. And the rest said that the director goofed up in the climax. Nobody spoke bad about the movie though. Masands, Komals & others didn't say bad either. So I entered the theater with an open mind and just for Imtiaz.  Then the next 159 minutes were possibly the best Imitiaz has portrayed so far in his career. 'Rockstar' is not so much the rock as it is about an individual. It's about a man's journey through a span of 8-1

Actually I was kind of used to it. I was used to the everyday pain, complications and people around me going through a range of emotions. It was not just a day or two that it was happening. It was happening since a long time, some ten odd months is actually not a long time. But it seemed to be. It is the suffering that made simple things look so complicated, it made the entire process so tiresome, it basically made the days longer than they actually were. Life was not the same anymore. The family had to stay calm; they knew it was inevitable with each passing day. But who wants to accept certain truths of life and just move on. Practically, it was impossible. At the same time it was also impossible to accept what was waiting. I was just a passive observer throughout. Expressionless, as usual. Life has told me once again to stop expecting. I never had actually, but when things go beyond our control, we become terribly submissive. To a point where, even the Gods/Goddesses feel that we a

I have lived a life with so many colours that it keeps me grounded. I've always remained grounded. So grounded that couldn't help my sibling get a job, being in a profession where I design seductive CTCs and sometimes take more than a dozen interviews a day. I failed to help him, that's the bottom line. Period. And I talk about my network, feeling so proud of them. More than ever. Tell you what, life is on such a fast ride that I have just become a puppet in its hands. My objectives have become - getting a seat in the 9:10 local (else screw your a** standing for an hour, wonder how some morons sit till the train literally stops at CST), reaching my workstation by 10 AM (where 'sometimes' the no. of hours you spend in front of the PC is directly proportional to the percentage hike in March), call a bunch of morons as colleagues without a choice, then catch a train from THE most busiest station with humidity touching atleast 90% day in and day out, then reach home to

There are cinemas that are made with a lot of sincerity but they somehow do not click. There are films which are completely commercial-driven, and they really work with the masses. And then there are cinemas which are honest without any added gloss, they not only click but remain with you for long. As long as you love yourself. Because they are just an extension of yours. In the last decade till now, there only a few which has pushed the bar of Indian cinema creating new benchmarks for others to follow. Some of the movies were stuck in between when nobody wanted to produce them, but when they got a helping hand, there was no more stopping. Even the audiences were ready to accept the product with open arms. I look back to the last decade till date, to find some of those films that made a mark in the hearts more than the box office. Some of them managed to get the commercial success as well. This list would again be subjective as I have skipped few movies as have not seen them yet

When you are in your early teens, you feel like doing wonders in your life. All larger-than-life dreams floating around. A late teenager adds and subtracts some colours in those dreams. Then comes the phase of early twenties where you feel that it’s time to get serious about life. Actually all these phases were more or less hallucinations till you close in and cross 25. Then you have the fire to do something worth, instead of the regular dreams that everyone has. I have more or less gone through all these phases and ended up leaving my home and coming to a distant place to pursue my management studies, which in turn made me understand that life is also about a lot of such dreams which actually makes some sense. NAB, Worli, Mumbai N I started my first job with a lot of pre-conceived notions that I had with me during my MBA. It all started fading with each passing day and I started understanding that it is pretty easy to seat in an air-conditioned room and discuss with all the

Life's moving on, so are the timelines, priorities and responsibilities. I don't know where exactly life's moving towards. I am very much aware of the fact that where my professional life heading towards, where my priorities lie and where I belong today.  Your life is the sum of the choices you made. I made some correct ones, so many wrong ones. But do all those have any significance today or will they impact tomorrow! Sometimes I feel I am just keeping my pace up with the race that I am a part of today. The so-called term "value-addition" that I read & lectured some uncountable times during my MBA, is looking so hazy today. May be I need to have few add-ons in my professional life to make it up for the void that I feel inside me. May be I need to go back to the basics and start doing few corrections in my priorities. May be I am sounding weird, may be I need treatment, but I really do not believe that I stand at the wrong end. I don't know, but I fee

Well, this post is not the result of anything that has happened a week back. My 6 years stay. 3 such moronic acts. That’s like once every 2 years. Now no one is immune to it, but we all have become used to it. We are used to it so much that it’s just like any other thing that keeps happening. These have become like either a pre-diwali or a post-diwali event for a group of people. I will again reiterate that I am no way influenced with the last event that happened, but yes, I am just sick of the events happened throughout the last decade or so. It starts right from the top, Kashmir, to every part of the country. Today we have no identity of terror unlike few years back when we very proudly used to discuss about a particular community or religion. Let’s not give terror the colour of green, saffron or white. That’s irrelevant. The best part with us is that we are so used to all these that we tend to forget everything next morning. Else, when India wins a Cricket match or we see a masala

  June '06 June was ending. The train slowed down as it was approaching the final destination after a 37 hour journey. It was drizzling outside. Reached a place called Belapur after one more hour travel. It was windy & pouring outside. Got down and headed for Kharghar to find my new college and the hostel. Clueless about almost everything apart from just one thing. Rains. It was simply all over. My first glance from the auto rickshaw of my new place for study was a great feeling. Throughout dad's stay for three and half days, it kept on raining. We both did not like it, did not dislike as well.  November '07 The noise in the hostel was dying. Placements started. Rains were almost over. But I remember those quiet nights with the sound of rains falling on the empty plain spaces of Kharghar. The sound of it, the smell and the feeling is beyond words. The feeling of batch-mates leaving each other after two years, the hostel & the college, everything summed up in thos

It's been a grueling past few months with almost every possible thing happening in the workplace. Have always tried balancing both the personal & professional life, but last 3/4 months has made me almost a machine. It has programmed me to the needs of various departments, people & the organization as a whole. It's not that I am not liking it, though it's too damn hectic, but what I realize is I have started missing few things that was/is on my priority list. Won't blame anyone apart from me, for not being able to balance it out. Had taken few but effective initiatives in the ever going to attempt of 'Change Management'. It is a constant process and will take long. Aligning mindsets, overcoming the resistance to change & accepting differences are my core areas to work for these days. With my little and negligible experience in the corporate world compared to other Gurus, but loaded heavily with my experience of understanding and analyzing people, I

Waiting since 1992. Because that's when I started understanding this game. Since then have witnessed 5 of this mega event, each with its share of emotions attached to it. Won't talk about our performances in each of its edition. Coz that's past, let's not live in past records anymore. Let's not just look at that ever-happy moment of Mr. Kapil Dev lifting that cup, let's not keep feeling bad of how close we were to lift the same 8 years back. It's been close to 3 decades since we won our only World Cup, been close to 2 decades of my loyalty with it & nearly a decade of mourning of being so close. I would be watching this World Cup as a bachelor for the last time. The God himself might be playing his last World Cup (but surely not retiring) and this edition will see a lot of Greats of our generation playing for one last time who will be remembered always in the history of this addictive, hysteric & great game called Cricket. If there's anything th

J ust one clean beat… that’s it. That’s more than enough to get me going. That strumming of guitar, that passage of the song where you go to a different world, those punches that sets you up. Right up there. The crooning, drooling & velvet voices. Music. It’s just 10 seconds, that all I need to like or dislike a track, some compositions are that strong. Some does take a bit more time, since they are like distant dreams. Not my dad, not my boss nor any important assignment or deadline, but only an awesome song can only wake me up in the morning. That’s how I can summarize my fixation, my addiction & my bond with music. My taste varies to almost all the genres, generations but with selective singers. Singing is a real talent man… I respect their community. So are the master lyricists behind each of such great songs. But the real genius is the man who creates everything, the composer. He is the ONE. Take a bow you Masters. What are you made up of! Won’t hesitate to write the clic

When is the time that we lose 'hope'? Do we ever lose 'it'? I mean, more than once we say that I lost hope on this or that or almost everything. But while saying that we still have that 'hope' inside us which very categorically tells that anyhow we will make something out of the situation. Losing 'hope' has been a pretty common thing, more so these days. To be bluntly honest, we actually never lose 'it', we just say it for two simple reasons: either we do not have the skill or courage to find a solution for a particular situation or we just want to make a noteworthy statement. I do not see a third option here. Because, for years we have lived on this one thing, 'hope'. So it is simply not possible that one can just say that 'I have a hopeless life' or 'he is a hopeless brother' or 'this is a hopeless job'. Infact, nothing is 'hope'less till the time we tag it so. To put it in a pretty raw format - We sleep

     A lmost after 2 quiet and lonely days, today's Sunday. Sundays becomes nostalgic if you are not inside a bloody mall and shopping. Being bachelor has all these pros and cons attached to it. But it's a tag that I still like next to my name, atleast till the time I can push the inevitable ;) Over last few years in the corporates, I realized few things which always were my mental blocks. Became less emotional for the employees, started understanding situations from different perspectives, taking everyone around you into confidence and being simple in whatever I want to execute or implement. I always knew that everything that the B-school taught me can not be practiced in the real world but still tried my own things by covering some of those theories with my ideas. Few of them clicked, some did not and some got discarded instantly by bosses. So, with every passing month or year, I am experiencing new dimensions of looking and doing the same things in different modes. Talking a

         W ill start with 'Dhobi Ghat' as it earned a first place in the hearts of many who watched it. Feel bad for those still not seen it, go watch it. Good cinema pushing the envelope of contrived movies and taking film-making to another level. Last year gave us 'Udaan', now 'Dhobi Ghat' is a good start to this year. Hope we can see some more film-makers coming in front & more importantly guys backing them up financially. Ronnie has been doing quite well since last few years and came up with few really good ones under 'UTV Spotboys'. Though few others trying their hand as well in this genre giving opportunity to young but talented guys to take up the directorial mantle but overall the scenario is not bright. But with biggies like Aamir coming up strongly with such movies, it only augurs well for an audience like me. Hope next few years will pave way for more content-driven cinema instead of commercial-driven cinema. Simple example, a movie like &