Padmaavat - Movie

 A fictional story based on poet Malik Muhammad Jayasi's poem 'Padmaavat' it shows how Allauddin Khilji was besotted by the beautiful Rani Padmavathi of Mewar and wages war to possess her. However she commits Sati by jumping into a burning pyre with the other women in the fort before he can capture her. 

 

Mrs Dalloway - Virginia Woolf

 Published in 1925 and rated among the top 100 novels Mrs Dalloway is a story set in post first world war Britain. Apparently Virginia Woolf had written two short stories 'Mrs Dalloway in Bond Street' and 'The Prime Minister' and combined the two.

The story takes place in a day in the life of an English socialite Mrs Clarissa Dalloway who is throwing a party that evening to be attended by elite classes including the Prime Minister. She has married a successful and reliable man Richard Dalloway instead of her old flame, the enigmatic and demanding Peter Walsh, and another female flame Sally Seton. Now both Peter and Sally are invited to the party. While Sally is happily married and has five kids which is a far cry from what she was in her youth, Peter is still madly in love with Clarissa who also yearns to get away from her life. In all this there is the story of Septimus Smith, a war veteran who is slowly losing his mind and who also remembers his friend Evans for who he has sexual feelings. At the moment though he has no feelings for anyone, including his wife. 

Towards the end Septimus commits suicide, an act which Clarissa apparently sees braver than the choices she is taking.

Pretty forward for those times one must say. I liked the intensity of Walsh's feelings for Clarissa and their unfulfilled love story.      

Smile Please - Movie

 Marathi. 2019.

A sensitive film that addresses the issue of dementia and how a family copes with it. Mukta Barve is very good

in the lead role as Nandini, a fashion photographer who slowly realises she had early onset of dementia and how she and her family copes with the gradual loss of her memory. 

Liked it.

Hyderabad By Walk - Nampally Sarai, Nampally Railway Station and Ek Minar Masjid

 Sunnie and I decided to head to Nampally and check that area out. We started off at 6 am as usual, parked near the IDBI office and walked past Public Gardens and headed straight to Nampally Sarai - it showed up when I searched for sights near Nampally. And I was surprised by its location because I must have passed it for over forty years now and never noticed it! 

If you are coming towards Nampally station from Moazzamjahi Market and turn into the station area, it falls to the left. Currently it is a dilapidated building, but a huge structure which I wonder how I missed all these years. The place is full of taxis and one taxi guy came running the moment he saw us and asked us what we wanted and when we said we were just looking he told us it was now a taxi stand and there was nothing to see. Seeing us inch forward even after his boring pitch he went another step to dissuade us to warning us that there were dogs. We nodded and walked in.

Nampally Sarai aka Tipu Khan Sarai

 As with many structures our state governments were in a big hurry to tear it down and build some structures here which would fetch everyone some benefits. Thankfully the building has been protected and named as a heritage structure which means that tearing it down won't happen.

The Sarai was a resting place which was constructed for travellers coming in from the Nizam;s Railway station at Nampally. It was built in 1919 by the sixth Nizam Mir Mahboob Ali Khan apparently in memory o the First World War Treaty. Also known as Sulah Sarai.

Currently is has a heritage structure status, thanks to INTACH (2011)

Nampally Railway Station

We walked over towards the historic Nampally Railway Station where we had gone for many send offs and receptions. Been years since I went there though. Anyway got a picture of the station from far and we scooted off along the road by the side.

Originally called the Hyderabad Deccan Railway Station (1883-1950), it was built by the Nizam's Guaranteed State Railway Company (it was privately built by the Nizam and operated under a guarantee from the State). Then Nizam's Railway was consolidated with Hyderabad-Godavari Valley Railway (HGVR) In 1951 both HGVR abd NGSR were nationalised.

 

Favorite memories - dropping Mom off with Mythily when they went to Faridabad, shipping my Chetak to Pune for my second job, meeting Vasant who worked in the Railways at the ticket counter, seeing Raja and co off and having to deal with an irate auto rickshaw guy who wanted to get paid an extra ten bucks and so on.

Ek Minar Masjid

A short walk from the Nampally station along its left side and we saw a few old buildings. 

And then we came across this beautiful masjid. Now this is an impressive structure right in the centre of the chaurasta  which is called the Ek Minar masjid. One huge minaret.

Ek Minar masjid

All around this masjid are little shops selling second hand furniture. I remember Choudary used to have his friends here from his demolition team - when they demolish structures they normally salvage the doors, windows, furniture etc if possible and you can see tons of such old doors, windows and stuff here that you can bargain and buy. Choudary was very good and this and he bought a few such stuff for his house.

A close up of Ek Minar

Sunnie and I checked the Google maps for Yousufain dargah which seems to be close to Ek Minar. The map pointed straight ahead. There was a cute little restaurant which beckoned for a chai but we plodded on.

Pillalamarri - 800 Year Old Banyan Tree at Mahbub Nagar

Pillalamarri is an 800 year old banyan tree in Mahbubnagar. I visited the place with Vinod and Sunnie - Vinod works there and Sunnie joined us. To get there from the main Mahbubnagar town, we needed to cross a railway line. Tickets were sold for the banyan park and the little zoo which were bought - and we entered the area. 

Apparently the tree got some disease and was in danger of dying as recently as 6-7 years ago and was revived and is now alive. The process on how they revived the tree was also shown in some board with pictures.

Vinod and Sunnie - enroute

Main tree 

Its name is because of the many pillalu (children) that the marri (banyan tree) has had thanks to its many off shoots. The main tree has spread across a large area of some 3-4 acres and its such a lovely sight to behold. 

Buddha

Serpentine

Tombs of the two saints Kamal Hussain and Jamal Hussain 

Ever since the tree had trouble it has been fenced off and we cannot touch it. There is a Buddha statue there, some benches to sit, a dargah of two sufi saints Kamal Hussain and Jamal Hussain (another version is that it is called Peerlamarri (which means Saints banyan). We sat there for a while, took pics and headed out.

Sri Rajarajeshwara temple

Outside the banyan tree park there is a reconstructed Sri Rajarajeshwara temple which has been trans-located from Erladinne on the banks of Krishna river. Its beautiful - some pilgrims were resting there - apparently on their trek to Srisailam according to Vinod. And there is an Archaeological museum which has some lovely 3AD sculptures in it. We spent some time in both places and headed back.

  

Breakfast of Champions - Kurt Vonnegut

Looked like an interesting title and I had never read a single Vonnegut book so I bought it in Abids. It looked like an easy read but it was not. It goes all over the place and demands your attention in a funny way - it requires a space between mind1 and mind 2. Apparently his most famous book is titled 'Slaughterhouse Five' which is based on his personal experience in the army when he witnessed the destruction of Dresden.

Anyway this book is full of illustrations which drive the story forward and make for easier reading. The book is also titled Goodbye Blue Monday but it never is mentioned  on the cover and it is his 7th novel where Dwayne Hoover a car dealership owner who is slowly losing his marbles is heading to meet Kilgore Trout a broke, sci fi author who has many books published without his knowledge. Along their journeys towards each other they find themselves meeting people like truck drivers and car salesmen, salesmen, receptionists who are mistresses, black people, and towards the end they find that Trout, who has a very rich man as his fan, has won the Nobel Prize and Hoover commits suicide after being inspired by Trout's novel.

Its apparently brilliant work. I could not make sense of it while reading and wish those who read it luck. Apparently a film was made based on the book with Bruce Willis, Nick Nolte and was withdrawn from theatrical release after some negative criticism. 

India Unbound - Gurcharan Das

Guracharan Das traces India's rise from poverty to prosperity after 1947 and then 1991. He blames Nehru fro all the problems India had with his narrow, socialist thinking and wonders if we would ahve had a different outcome if the Japanese had run India (what about India running India). There's some references to Clive and the British and how they actually did not contribute to India's fall from prosperity as much as Nehru and successive Congress governments. 

He says that Nehru failed to end poverty, ignorance a

nd disease and inequality of opportunity. Nehru's errors also included the fact that there was no opportunity to rapid export expansion. He says the system suppressed growth and that Nehru's mixed economy theory was greatly flawed. We would have benefited from a capitalistic approach. He mentions two idealistic people he knew, Satpal and his wife, and how their socialist dreams were pipe dreams. If Patel had been PM, things would have been different. Thankfully Shastri came and started the Green revolution.

In the issue of  caste Das, who went to Harvard and then joined an MNC selling Vicks in India (was instrumental in making us aware that we catch cold when we get wet in the rain) and then grew to be a corporate honcho later on, says that for a long time he was not aware of caste. Later on he found that below the top four varnas the Hindu society was casteless (how they can be casteless and still be Hindus I wonder). Anyway he says that all opportunities are now open to all and that even chamars were now going beyond doing chamar work - they are actually weaving. They have caste associations and use caste to enlarge their reach. The President is a Dalit and there are ministers who are dalits too. Then for some reason he quoted Naipaul who says 'when the oppressed have the power to assert themselves, they will behave badly.' Das says that the old stereotype of village occupational rigidity was never entirely accurate. The lower castes have always shown the capability by moving up or changing occupation. And of course, modern organisations hire people on merit.

Then he quickly talks about reforms and Ambani and the rise of the middle class and how knowledge is wealth (and of course how everyone has access to it now).

Somewhere I got bored to death. And skipped the rest of the book.