Welcome to the Jungle!

And finally after a long wait GNR made it to India, Bangalore.. Me and a couple of my friends bought tickets to the section closer to the stage..

Having taken a half day at office and reaching the location over 2 hours early finally paid off. We lodged ourselves in the front row facing the stage!

A local band - Thermal And A Quarter (TAAQ) played for some time.. They were quite good.

And then the big boys entered the stage just as the skies darkened..

 For half an hour I was totally dazed seeing the rock legends stand so close to us and play our favourite numbers.. As senses returned, together with the wild crowd that rocked and pinned us to the railing we whooped and screamed in time.. head banging wildly.

They played all the songs I wanted to hear including the hot fav - Sweet child of mine, November Rain, Paradise City, Welcome to the Jungle, Don't cry, Civil War, Knocking on heaven's door, Estranged etc.,

Axl seems to be a sobered-down-version of his former self.. His voice wasn all the same. (Din look the same either ;) ) But it was still awesome :)

 I did feel most of times they compensated well on Slash's removal from the band (almost). Richard Fortus, Bumblefoot and DJ Ashba played some mind blowing guitar and their energy flowed into the crowd..

People eagerly started debating if Metallica concert was better than GNR.. I felt they both had their charms.. While Metallica wooed the crowd and became one with us (even the distance and the fact that we could not see the stage did not dampen the spirits) GNR was all glamour and music with tracks that satisfied everyone, plus we were standing so close!

El-boW

Elbow - Play the word in your mouth and feel its sensous quality. Yep and that is exactly why the band chose this name, coz they heard someone say that 'elbow' is the most sensous word ever :) Not a bad reason I say!

This UK based band I first came across as I was listening to the online radio and praised to heavens. I checked out a few of their songs and must admit I really enjoyed listening to them. Their have a very harmonious music, the lead singer has a very melodious voice. And their lyrics is just too good -strikes the heart.

The band line up consists of  Guy Garvey (vocals, guitar), Richard Jupp (drums, percussion), Craig Potter (keyboards, piano), Mark Potter (guitar, backing vocals), and Pete Turner (bass guitar, backing vocals). They do look like your backyard English guys.

Below is a compilation of the songs that I recommend from this band. Undoubtedly Their album 'Seldom Seen Kid' is the best.

Album -Leaders of the free world
"Forget Myself"  - I do love this one very much , just brings out the anguish of a lonely soul
"Great Expectations"

Album -Asleep in the Back
"Scattered Black and Whites"
"Powder Blue"

Album -The Seldom Seen Kid
"Starlings"  - What a wonderful song!
"The Bones of You"
"Mirrorball"
"Grounds for Divorce"
"Weather to Fly"
"The Loneliness of a Tower Crane Driver"
"Some Riot"
"One Day Like This"  - I always feel tremendously happy listening to this

And yeah do check out their cool site and play along - http://www.elbow.co.uk/home

Earth - Our only home

As a child I remember sleeping under a dense canopy of leaves that weaved an ever changing pattern overhead as the wind danced around the leaves of many hues and colours. Curious hanuman langurs peered at me time to time in between their endless chattering. The place I grew up was a heaven. Children played on streets, where the only things that hurt our bare feet were thorns ,that could be pulled out without a grimace, we made tree houses and did pretend-lunches. We hit the streets right after school with our mothers running behind, stuffing morsels between rests. The only vehicles on the road were bicycles and we never stopped our games for them. The plentiful trees shaded us from the sun and rain and gave us many tit-bits we munched on when they fruited.

Traffic and pollution

Fast forward to the present, which is no "present". Today living in the fastest growing city, the Silicon city, the (former?) garden city of India I battle the dust (Bangalore is the only city where all 3 kinds of dust mites abound) and the pollution (we add more cars everyday than babies being born every day in this city). Children are forced to play within the confines of their home devoid even of a garden space, we have cemented even the little space where we could not build an extra room (gotta keep out the nasties and mud!! - frankly the critters and mud does more good to your kid than the cemented space) We complain kids these days watch more TV and play video games, but have we given them any other option? What kind of a world are we passing as a legacy to our kids?

Unsegregated waste dumped by the roadside

We are happy to live in clean houses, shutting all windows in Air-conditioned offices, by dumping all our garbage just around the corner. Why bother about it? Its outside our home, someone will pick it up. The truth is much much bitter than we have thought. The unsegregated garbage we dump today overfilling the garbage bins, into any uninhabited enclosure, lakes etc., end up mostly as land fill into prime agricultural lands! They leech into the water bed contaminating our water. Why are we ignorant or rather so unwilling to deal with the reality even as it stares in our face?

Today we are rapidly accelerating towards an unsustainable lifestyle.  The greenhouse gases have accumulated by 390ppm (350ppm is the safe limit), the oceanic temperatures are increasing- paving way for imbalance in the delicate cycles causing mass extinctions in the near future, we are facing unpredictable weathers, our underground fresh water level s are rapidly depleting, Our food contain more toxins than our body can digest.

 All our acts sum together. We all are responsible. And what are we doing? Is there a way out? WHAT can be done??

 I have compiled a few things that I have been following to reduce my carbon foot-print. After all change starts from home and within!

Segregate and compost:

  

Waste segregated and collected   

Waste from our home is basically of 2 types: bio-degradable (the kitchen waste) and non-bio-degradable( plastic and e-waste). We all can easily take care of the waste generated from home and all it takes is hardly 5 minutes of our time every day. The dry waste (paper and plastic items must be segregated and kept in different bins - after washing if necessary) and given for recycling. The wet waste can be composted which in turn gives high-quality manure for our gardens. I have been using the daily dump kumbha since last year to compost the kitchen waste. Its economical and no fuss at all.

  

Avoid plastics:

Get a cloth bag and always carry it around. Use a cloth bag while shopping and say no to plastics. Avoid using bottled water.  Encourage your family and friends to do so too!

Mass transport / Car pool:

Use company mass transport / buses to travel or car pool

Water:

Shower baths means we end up using more water than is actually required during a bath. Bucket baths ensure we always know the quantity of water used. Install rain water harvester.

Organic food:

If you have a garden space – grow your own food organically. Most of the vegetables can easily be grown in pots! Buy local organic food.

Man from the Earth

What would be your question to a man who is 14,000 year old? Would you jeer at him and ask to do a cave man jig or would you ask him what he felt about where we are heading?

And what if he told you that he is in fact that mythical, mystical figure thousands of your people worship and pray to and that we got his teachings all wrong..

To believe the most atrocious lie is easy but to believe a plain simple truth is only that much harder. You would easily blame US and China for polluting the skies but you won't admit that your 2/4 wheeler is adding to the same. Nah, its just easier to deny the whole thing..

The man from earth is a very bold movie, bold in the way it was able to bring the idea of a man living as long as the oldest human race in its barest essential (He does not race the bullets for starters!) What is interesting here are the conversations, how each one of his learned audience react and try to refute to the good-bye announcement John Oldman makes after his 10 year tenure.

A bombshell is thrown to his unwilling answer when someone asks if he was anybody famous.. He starts by telling how the bible is misinterpreted and how there never were any miracles or apostles but a fabricated story strung out by many a thousand tongues over many more years. He doesn say it but they realise that he was Christ. What is further interesting is that he claims to have been influenced by the teachings of the Buddha and tried to bring a version of it to the west with disastrous results-- :-o

The movie ends with a predictable human reasoning, denial . When John realises that his audience is unable to digest what they have heard so far he laughs it off saying it was joke. I wish the movie ended here instead of proving that he really is 14k old. Watch this movie to get you thinking!