Weird guitars

I came across a few pics of really weird - and really cool - guitars a while ago and thought I'd collect a few of them myself. So, here are some whacked out guitars I thought were worth remembering.

1) Rifle

Perfect for Janie, wouldn't you say?

2) Angel

Now that's how you do the Holy Inquisition.

3) Weird Machine

I don't even know what that's supposed to be, but it looks it could travel through time.

4) Fluffy

I bet Paris Hilton owns this.

5) Bigfoot

Sasquatch is a headbanger!!!

6) Multi

Saves having to buy different ones for each band member, right?

7) Double

A double headed monster.

8) Shark

Flipper ain't escaping this!

9) Another weird machine

Now that just defies explanation.

10) Football

Manchester United rules!!

11) Glitterati

ROCK N' ROLL BABY!!!

12) Scissors

Rock and paper have nothing on this!

13) Watermelon

For the health conscious who don't get enough fruit in their musical diet

14) Harp

Two in one. Now that's economical.

And finally....

15) THE BIG ONE

This is definitely the mother of all guitars.

A trip to remember

(Part 1 of a series)

So anyway, we took a trip to Goa recently. By "we" I mean me and these 5 friends of mine - Siddharth, Rituraj, Vardhman, Rama (aka Suraj nowadays, apparently) and Anant (aka Pandit for ever) - and by "recently" I mean I just got back from Goa today. We left for Goa directly from Pune, as a present to ourselves for actually surviving another set of semester examinations. And these were the toughest ones yet, being the DREADED 7th semester.

We caught a train to Goa on the evening of the 3th. The train, by the way, was Vardhman's idea. Our original plan of going in a bus was voted down, and so we landed up a the train station and, armed with packs of cards (both the normal ones as well as the perennial favourite UNO) bought from the station, boarded the train. Not much of note happened during the journey itself, except for Siddharth jabbering away from the very beginning till the middle of the night. He did try to teach us some infuriatingly complex game of cards called Judgement which none of us understood, but is apparently very simple. Not that we really tried to get it anyway. We were happy just playing Bluff and Poker with monopoly bits for chips. Oh, and Vardhman took over after Siddharth fell asleep and kept us awake the rest of the night with horrible songs and other stuff I forget.

Anyway, fast forward to the grand arrival at Goa train station in Vasco. We caught a couple of horrendously expensive autos and went to the bus station, from where we left for Calangute, changing buses at Panaji. Landing up in Calangute, we happily proceeded to walk till the inspection quarter that we were destined to use as headquarters, party central and sleeping place for the next 3 days. On the way, athletic sportsmen that we are, we decided it was too long to walk. Accordingly, Siddharth and Vardhman were dispatched to go rent bikes while the rest of us settled down to wait by the roadside.

Oh, that wait. It must have been at least an hour and about 50 local idiots jabbering away at us asking whether we wanted a place to stay, a taxi for hire, bikes to rent and massages to get (this last made Anant quite excited, as is to be expected with him) that those two got back. By then we'd got fed up and Anant and Rama had decided to walk the rest of the way. Me and Rituraj were left by the curb trying to fend off insidious bike-lenders and hotel-agents. Anyway, the bikes finally arrived, and with Siddharth driving a scooty, Vardhman driving his Avenger and me driving the other scooty, we ferried the luggage to the inspection quarter and crashed onto the beds.

Of course, that was around 9 in the morning, so we got up and, after performing our morning....ablutions, we left to get breakfast and discover the oyster that was Goa.

We went to Anjuna beach, cause we'd heard it was cool and stuff. Me and Vardhman, riding on the Avenger, went on ahead and reached first. There we saw a herd of firangis going off the road and onto a dirt track leading off to one side. We decided to follow them and see where they were all going, on the off chance that we might discover some hidden party centre where foreigners gathered and did their thing. After following them all over the place and on rabbit paths through graves of coconut and papaya trees, we landed up at the coolest beach ever. Huge place, practically no garbage strewn around, full of foreign people, and lounge chairs! This was brilliant!

We headed back for breakfast - or rather, brunch - with the rest of the posse and took them all back to the magic beach. After gawking away at the array of female flesh on display, we proceeded to get on with the strenuous work of lounging around on the chairs on the beach. Played around some in the water, drank a couple of beers and stuff, and decided we might as well head back home.

The only other thing worth noting was the time we stood around waiting - again - while setting out for dinner at this place called Britto's near Baga beach. Vardhman was passed out, so Siddharth took it into his head to drive the Avenger. And, just our luck, one scooty decided to start dripping petrol and refuse to work. So we waited for Siddharth to work the bike, which he failed to do. Not that he didn't know how to drive a bike at all, but apparently Avengers are tricky devils with idiotic gear systems. So, after about an hour, he finally gave up the Avenger attempt and decided to just leave on the scooty. And, since he was pretty much the only one who knew the way, he decided to ferry us all on the one scooty still working. 5 of us......on one scooty. It took two trips and, about another 45 minutes later, short of temper and high on rats skittering around in stomachs, we sat down to eat at Britto's. The food wasn't bad, but the lack of geniality and general bon homie was glaringly noticeable at our table. Anyway, we headed back home - again in two packs on that one scooty - and so ended the first day at Goa.

(to be contd.....)

Road signs

So I took a trip to Kedarnath and Badrinath (relatively) recently. Apart from the highly atheistic interests that caught my eye - like the little girl in the pink and yellow jacket loudly asking her mother which hymn to chant ("Bam Bam Bhole", "Jai Kedar", "Om Namah Shivaya" and other classics), the security cameras and exhaust fans inside the little ante room just outside the room with the idol where the select few devotess get to sit, our driver telling us the gripping story of how in 1987 he fainted and fell into the Mandakini river just below Kedarnath - the thing that really got me was the innovative road signs. I do declare, no Wordsworth or Byron could have ever matched the genius of the Uttarkhand road department. I figured the poetic abilities of these desi bards deserve some sort of recognition, hence this blog entry.

Some exmples of these works of art include:

1. No need for overspeed.

2. No race no rally
Enjoy the beauty of the valley.

3. This is highway not runway.

4. Alert to life
Rough to death.

5. Three enemies of road
Liquor, speed and overload.

6. Drink drive don't mix.

7. Life is journey
Complete it.

8. For safe arriving
No liqour in driving.

9. If you sleep
Your family weeps.

10. On the bend
Go slow friend.

11. Life is short
Don't make it shorter.

12. Mountains are a pleasure
Only if you drive with leisure.

And my personal favourite -

After whiskey
Driving risky.

These fairly brightened up my dreary days driving around the hillsides on horrible roads with scraggly bushes and the occassional high hilltop as scenery. Although, admittedly, the temples themselves were fine architectural works, and the road up to Kedarnath - the 14km long trek which I had to complete on foot, the horses having been laid down by equine flu - was pretty cool. However, the road signs were the highlight of my trip.

I am quite possibly one of the greatest atheists around. Ah well, I did fall sick on the last day of the trip. Possibly a bit of getting his own back. Or just bad luck.

Vacations are cool.

Laws of India

So, I was studying a while back (for exams, obviously) and I came across a couple of pretty interesting facts. Did you know Bhutan is still a protectorate of India? I never knew India had ever had a protectorate, let alone the fact that it still has one. In fact, Sikkim was once a protectorate of India as well. Heck, Sikkim was a separate country, became a protectorate, then an Associated State of India(meaning it could throw out Indian control over it at any time and declare itself free again), and finally it became a proper state. And now there's all this hullabaloo over it becoming free again, or a part of China, or whatever. Can't seem to make up their damn minds, the stupid gits.

Also, there actually still exists a free city, after the style of the Greek city-states of old and Danzig et all of the not-so-old. It’s called Trieste, and lies somewhere in Italy. How come Italy has these weird things inside it? Vatican City - the so-called Holy See - and now Trieste? Weird country.

Moving closer to home, did you know the richest law in India happens to be the IT Act of 2005? It’s the only law I've come across that actually has substantial fines, going upto Rs. 1 crore in some cases. Big money, that. You don't submit certain paperwork you're supposed to hand in, you get slapped with a 25,000 Rs fine. Don't keep records - 10,000 for every day you don't get your account books in order. Contrast this with the Trade Union Act, enacted in some year I forget. Failure to keep records means a fine of - hold your breath - Rs. 10 every day such failure continues. Incidentally, this is after revising the fines and charges for various Trade Union activities. I might be wrong here, but as far as I remember, it used to be 25 paise for joining a Trade Union. This has now been increased to the princely sum of Rs.2.

I understand the whole thing about Trade Union law meant for labourers and IT Act meant for the well-off and all that. I get the point that there's bound to be a difference in the amounts both these parties can pay. But, seriously, 10,000 versus 10 Rs. for the exact same offence? Our labourers aren't THAT poor.

The case of Uttar Pradesh vs. Nooh is another little ditty that springs to mind. I came across this while learning about the importance of fair hearing and the maxim Nemo Judex in re Sua - more or less meaning "nobody should be a judge in his own cause". It basically means you can't give any decision in any matter in which you personally are involved, because that would be.....well, silly, really. The whole notion of the impartial decision-maker or adjudicator rests on this maxim. Anyway, what happened was that a departmental enquiry was held against Mr. (or possibly Mrs.) Nooh. The guy who was supposed to be adjudicating on the matter also knew something about the matter and could have been a witness himself. So, well, he decided to go ahead and actually BE that witness. He got up from the enquiry committee, went and gave evidence against Nooh as a witness, then calmly sat back down with the committee and decided against Nooh. And apparently, the rest of the committee let it happen.

Cases like these occasionally (VERY occasionally, actually) make studying law worthwhile. They brighten up my day.

Of course, then I look at the rest of law and the clouds settle firmly back into place. Oh well, tidbits of interest here and there can be taken as a silver lining I suppose.

One should be an eternal optimist.

Shaving the stuff

Well, since I'm not doing anything now, I might as well write down the next incident of note that I can remember. For those who think I don't have anything better to write about, they're perfectly right. I don't. I'm bored, nobody's around, except Saket, and he's about as much fun as a log. He's been pestering me to go to Mocha with him and sit around a hookah while he inhales the stuff, but, thankfully, the auto drivers are still on strike (probably the first time I'm happy about the fact) and I flatly refuse to ride on the brakeless wonder bike his ex-roommate offered to lend. Especially with Saket driving.

Speaking of Saket, I believe I mentioned something about his shaving. We had exams till yesterday, and in keeping with tradition, Saket the cool dude hadn't shaved. He looked like a gorse bush in the middle of the monsoon. We kept telling him to do it, but he always kept saying he didn't have enough time, mostly cause he was sleeping half the day. One day, me and Siddharth were shaving, and we spot him and decide to pester him about it. So we did, and he finally caved in and consented to shave. He started in, and we all gaped in wonder at his technique. I don't know if you've ever seen an axeman felling a tree, but I really thought this was what it must seem like. The guy was scraping away at it like fungus being scraped off a ship. Or am I thinking of barnacles? Either way, something that you scrape with a great deal of vim.

Anyway, once we got over the shock of his hacking, we told him to not shave everything off, but keep a French beard. He thought it would look silly, but we champions of pestering would not give in, so finally he stopped at a French beard and peered at himself in the mirror. Of course, we fell over laughing when he turned towards us and he ran off to shave off the rest, but it was worth it. I do believe he thought it actually looked good for a little while.

Admittedly, I'm not one to critize. For those who don't know, my hair currently looks it belongs to one of those people who wander around in denim jackets and silver chains around their wrists all the time. It was suppposed to be "subtly streaked" with what I imagined would be light brown, but the experiment went kinda awry and I ended up looking highly gay. Not very nice, but at least I really can't complain, since it was my mother who was doing the actual colouring and me directing her. How was I to know it would turn out like this?

Anyway, that's about it.

I'm still bored, but now I have less time to be bored in.

Bye bye to one and all. Have fun, and be good. However, keep in mind: growing old is mandatory, growing up is optional.

Entre

So, this would be my first blog ever. Not a very reassuring thought, but I figured I might as well leave all the brilliant thoughts bubbling around inside my mind to posterity. Since I don't exactly have a backyard to bury a time capsule in, I figured why not use the power of the internet and create a blog. Hence the reason why you, dear reader, are suffering.

So anyway, hello to all. For my very first topic, I shall write about.....


Zombie Stripper. That, for the uninformed, is an actual, honest-to-God movie title. In case you didn't already guess, its a B-rated movie. Which should tell you all you want to know. I highly recommend this movie to all who are tired of The Notebook and Marley and Me.

Let me sketch out one particularly memorable scene for anyone interested. So this guy goes to a strip club, right, and sees this smokin' hot stripper. She turns out to be a really accommodating stripper, the kind lots of people wish they knew. She takes a real fancy to our hero and takes him into the standard strip-club back room. At this point, he's not really complaining, which is quite understandable. She happily proceeds to get down on her knees and - for the sake of the underaged who I really hope will read this blog and learn a lot of life's lessons from it - blow him. So there he is, in proverbial and quite literal heaven, when suddenly she (very rudely, in my opinion) bites away that highly important bit of him and starts chomping away on it like the french fries she buys at the local McDonald's. The guy's stunned, as expected, and all he can do is just lie there, while a fountain of blood spurts out, looking exactly like he's peeing. Except that its red, of course. And looking like she's found the fountain of youth, this highly enterprising and very nippy stripper drinks it all up, showing us all that she is in fact a zombie.

I always thought it was vampires who drank blood, but I guess a few liberties can be taken in a movie like this. Don't ask me what happened to the guy and his love life after this. I cannot tell you, having never really watched the thing. If I do so, and if at all I survive, I shall document it all for your sakes, so that at least the Hollywood ( or, as is very possible, Tollywood) doyens of the 26th century will know the sketchy plots of the typical family movie of the 21st.

Remind me to write about my friend Saket and his shaving sometime.

Have fun all. And remember: growing old is mandatory, growing up is optional.