Russian Roulette

I think it's a fascinating phrase. Just like that. For some reason, however, I don't think it's exactly fair to the Russians either. Why are they always the bad guys. Even in non-political movies like Ronin, the Russians have to mess things up. And if the Russians are as bad as Russian Roulette suggests, why the hell don't they ever win? It's almost as irritating as those new "Pay Your Sales Tax" ads on TV.

The Indian government's come up with a brilliant strategy, shame parents into paying tax by targetting kids through television ads and asking them to ask their parents if they pay taxes. So, what. I can see some little maaru kid [no offense to maarus, just an example] going to his dad and saying "papa, papa, you always say honesty is the best policy, so why are you not paying the government tax? who will make the roads and bridges papa?" and the dad says "ye sab phokat me ata hai popat!" ["it's all for free silly parrot"]... A real brainstorm the Indian government has hit upon, sheer genius!

Ping Pong. The Japs actually made a movie on ping-pong. Well, it’s actually not that surprising considering they also made a very famous movie on noodles, or ramen as they call it. It wasn’t a bad movie actually. Not a typical sports movie. The end especially is particularly really well done. The movie builds in such a way that in the end, the ending becomes irrelevant. With beautiful hyperboles and smart ass dialogues and wickedly crazy characters this movie was a great watch. I wonder if they’ll ever make a movie like this on the Indian cricket team. God knows, with this entire Raj Singh Dungarpur and Saurav Ganguly episode, Indian cricket has become a freaking soap opera complete with the saas, bahu characters! I’ll leave you to decide who’s who.

I was watching Steven Spielberg’s The Terminal about a week ago. Typical Tom Hanks feel good movie, but there were some very funny subtleties thrown in there. The last line of the movie is particularly memorable. Tom Hanks gets into a cab outside JFK airport and asks the driver to take him to downtown NYC. The driver asks Hanks where he’s from and Hanks says “Krakotzia”. The driver smiles and says “Ah, Krakotzia, I’m from Albania”. So Hanks asks him, “So when did you get here?” The driver thinks for a while and then says, “Umm…Tuesday.”