Chak De! India

Some days before, as I was immensely immersed and enjoying the soccer match in She's The Man, a thought strike me. Would Bollywood be capable of creating a film which not just shows the game, but actually make the viewers feel the game. Of course there was Lagaan, but what about a full fledged sports movie? Bollywood can easily breed emotional dramas, but what about one that is an entirely sports-dedicated? Of course, the challenge would be then to make the audience engulfed in the game because the ending is already known and there is no point in watching if the game didn't appear exciting. Then that requires superb script, equally matching cinematography, sensitive direction, skillful acting and brisk stunts - a delicate combination because in such movies what matters most is the pace. If the pace is fast, the scenes can become leery. If the pace is slow, then it becomes a ho-hum.

When I first heard about Chak De! India and what was it about (a coach determined to give the Indian women hockey team the world cup), my first thought was it could be just another flop from Yash Raj Films. Their previous two movies were dud even though their promos succeeded creating the stir. And this one seemed to be like a patriotic one, but Bollywood is notorious for being jingoistic. So my eagerness to see this one was fiddling. But then soon I began to hear all talking about how wonderful this movie was and it did enlighten my curiosity.


So I watched. What I noticed about the movie was its pace. Slow at first, but then gradually increasing. By the beginning of the second half we can already feel the adrenaline rush. The plots were all completely believable and that's what make it special. It is not at all a tale of magic that work wonders. Even though we all know what the ending would be like, we can feel ourselves praying for the win. And that's the result of the successful combination that I mentioned before. We feel the disappointment when they lose, and the vigor when they win.


The character portrayal and development of the players was outstanding. They are all each completely different from the other, have their own ways to deal with the chafes, but had to come together as a team and what made them do it and how they achieve it are all completely convincing. And the movie not just shows a single match, but an array of them and each of them carefully pictured and stands out vivid. A huge applause for that because they not at all appeared to be repetitive, but was able to keep up with the accelerating pace of the movie. I felt like I was in a live stadium because the people around me were all shouting, clapping, cheering... made me relive the time when I went for Lagaan.


You will feel that you are not just a spectator but actually an invisible character in the movie. And when it was over, I was missing them. I was actually missing them! Can you believe that! Chak De! India will awaken your patriotism and you will definitely feel that Indian pride when you walk out from the theatre.

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A Love To Hide

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The Realization

The Year was 1998. Month, June. I was in 9th standard then. Another ordinary day and the class was going on. Then a new face stood on the door. He was so charming! I kept looking at his face and I couldn't just stop gazing at him. The teacher told us that he was a new student and she asked him to take a seat. Even though there was no space on my bench, I kept wishing to make him sit next to me. In the end, his eyes caught the vacant space on the bench behind me. "Damn it!"

The class resumed. But I couldn't just concentrate like before. Something very different just happened inside me and it longed to look at his face one more time. So with much difficulty, I looked at him, but soon had to send my eyes towards the book. Again that strange feeling. God.. What is happening?? He is a guy for heaven's sake! But I had to look at him. This time he saw me. Busted! He didn't smile and I quickly buried my head in the book.

During the break, while others were busy getting acquainted with him I stood among the group listening to what he was babbling. I didn't know what to ask him. Then I heard that his house was near to mine. Voila!! Excuse me, give way to Sam.. Time to make an official entry into his life! So we talked. That started the journey of a beautiful friendship. Pretty soon... I mean, really awesomely pretty soon, we became inseparable. My mornings became the joyous affair when he would come to my home and we both ride to school and evenings became the most hardest part of the day when I had to part him. I hated the weekends because those days didn't allow us to meet and I would anxiously wait for Monday to come, to hear his cycle-bell ring.

I was actually confused too see this unusual conduct of me. True, I always felt that I had a strange thing towards men. I always found myself weird that I was trying to imagine how would that hidden fruit looked like whenever I saw a guy wearing jeans or why was that the guy's crotch so inviting in those underwear ads. I can recollect an incident when I was traveling with my parents. I was in the backseat looking outside the window. Suddenly a biker was trying to overtake our car. Instantly my eyes went to his crotch and I was staring at it and then when I looked up, I saw that he had seen me looking and was giving me a foul look. I got so scared and looked away from him.

With Pete, I was feeling much more than that.. like I wanted him to be mine, I felt like he was my everything and days would seem dull without seeing his face. I wanted to hug him tightly forever. His smile and those caring eyes always flashed in my mind. I would twitch and turn on my bed unable to understand what was happening in me. I considered myself to be insane for having these kinda thoughts. C'mon! I am a guy and I am supposed to feel all this towards a gal, not to a guy.. Seriously, what's wrong with me??

In those days, I never knew that such a bunch called "homosexuals" existed. I always felt that I was the only one feeling like this, the only one in this WHOLE world. My exposure to outside world was limited. Everywhere I looked, guys were talking about Sophie's boobs or Maria's ass. I never heard anyone talking about Tony's pecs or Robin's bulge. Things started getting clear to me after two years when I got internet connection and I was like, "WHAAAAOWW!! This means I'm not the ONLY ONE!!"

I came out to Pete last year. He was absolutely shocked and dumbfounded. I also told him that he was my first crush. We still keep in touch, but I do not have those feelings towards him now...


Today was my current crush's 26th birthday. Well.. more about him later.

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But I Used To Be That Innocent..

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A Love To Hide

Last night, I cried myself to sleep. Those scenes kept on playing in my mind and I could feel the trauma that they must have experienced. I thought, how could man be so barbarous, how could anyone even have the nerve to think such sadist deeds. And before I knew, tears came rolling down my face..

I usually don't cry after seeing a movie. Even if I feel down, it is very rare that I cry thinking upon it. But this one, I couldn't just pass it off as another emotional story. I know though the characters were fictious, the events weren't. Un amour à taire (A Love To Hide) deals with the gay holocaust during the Nazi era. This is one truly amazing, heart wrenching and powerful film and as one viewer rightly puts it, "conveys much of what is worst and best of humanity set in 1942 during the upheaval of Nazi-occupied Paris."


Honestly, I didn't know what this movie was all about because I never read the summery of movies fearing that I might bump into a spoiler and wreck the whole experience. All I knew was, this was something concerning gay people and could be emotional. But then as the scenes started coming alive, I wasn't prepared for what I was seeing. I could feel my heart becoming heavy, my eyes becoming wet and hoping for that silver line in the dark clouds.

Not to sound all preachy here, but do we realize how lucky we (some of us) are to be born in this time and place, where people have begun to realize that homosexuality is not a disease, and we are not sent for "re-education" to become straight and we are not exterminated to "cleanse" the race. A Love To Hide is a must-see for everyone no matter what you think you are. The language is French, but with the subtitles, the touching storyline, the excellent direction and the wonderful performance by the actors, this movie could shake you to your core.

Did you choose your blue eyes?? Same here. I didn't choose to love men.

Trust me, don't wait to read the reviews. Just grab a copy and watch it!

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Chak De! India

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Is Internet Becoming Homophobic?

Today I received a mail from Erik from RestoringLove.com that their web hosting provider closed access to the blog saying that there were indecent photos of men. According to me, those pics were truly eye-candy but never ever were they sexually explicit. They were all artistic, voguish and beautiful. In no way they were pornographic. So this is just yet another evidence of homophobia that is sweeping across the web for the past few months.


To many people out here, there is no secure way to express their homosexual desires and blogs are supposed to be another medium representing the freedom of expression, giving people the opportunity to express their emotions to the world. For most of them, their blog means a lot. Their blog might be the only source to vent out their feelings and these blogs bear all the support and encouragement that they got from their friends. I have experienced it firsthand. I used to have a guilty feeling in me because of being a homosexual. But now, not at all, and this was possible only because of the support I got from my Yahoo! 360 friends. A testimony to that is the commended link appearing on the top-right of this page. You could feel how honest, straight forward and sincere they were in taking part that discussion. Each of them didn't fear to get down to their darkest fears and pains to understand the whole situation. I believe that the Discussion Blog will serve the purpose of reaching out to those who are confused by their sexuality, who are cursing themselves for being homosexual, who have got a misrepresented idea of what homosexuality is, because often false believes and misconceptions are the root cause for many problems that the gay community is now facing.

And Erik was also hosting his blog for a noble cause, to promote love among gay people. It is dedicated to all gay couples, providing tips and ideas to maintain love at the highest level, speaking about love and intimacy. But homophobia made some people to see it in a different way and that caused Erik's site to go down. It could have meant closing down the blog for him had he not made a backup and it took four days to recover and have everything working on a new host provider. You can check out Erik's site at www.restoringlove.com.


I also recently read at Plublogs that some of the reputable gay sites like Scott-O-Rama, HomoMojo, UndiesDrawer, TreyCruz.com and GayTwoGether were dropped from Google’s AdSense program because of adult or mature content on their site. The funny part is that they didn't find pictures of undressed women found on straight blogs as obscene. So is Google becoming homophobic too? In that case, what will happen to the blogs on the Blogger since it is also from Google. Gays have always been discriminated in the real world. Would we have to suffer that discrimination here too?

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The Time Has Come

I am feeling down to know that these days whisked by so fast and the time has come to give them away. I can't believe that those tiny wriggling things who could barely open their eyes have now become healthy pups, so active and naughty that the whole house has become a playground for them. They are one bunch of impish gang, trying to gnaw whatever that comes in their way, fighting and playing, making a racket whenever they feel hungry, then curling up together to sleep with their stomachs all bloated like a pregnant woman, and upon waking doing their business of making pools here and there and again back to the gnawing and fighting. The cycle continues.. I have watched them grow from the size of half of my palm to... well, they have all now become chubby because of their never-unattended hunger demands.

Two of them (one male, the other female) are exact replica of Mama-dog with black coat and white patches like socks on each toes. Another one (female) is white with brown spots and then the chubbiest (male), with brown coat and again white on the toes. The tiniest of all is the male black pup, the cutest and most furred. He looks like a doll.


I still remember the day when Papa-dog was brought to our home two years ago. He was their size then and so nervous. But seeing me, he began to wag his little tail. Yesterday I happened to see one of his puppy photos, how funny he looked! He is one very loving dog. Wherever I move around the house, I could feel his eyes following me. Always playful and active, he has become a handsome young chap. He has an undeterred will. I have often wondered, if he were born as human he would have achieved a lot in his life. The one thing that nags me about him is his unnecessary barking to even the feeblest sounds. He is still a kiddo and very much pampered by my parents. Mama-dog joined our family only 3 months back. It was more like the bringing of bride to the groom's home. She is one year old and was given to us by one of my cousins. She used to be very quiet timid type in the beginning. We even thought that she might be mute. Over time, she became used to the new home, and now her barks can be heard far and wide!

I am just thinking about the pups. All these days, they made my life more colorful. A sudden calmness would come into me whenever I watch them sleeping peacefully. My mind would get lightened up when I see them play. The way they walk with their tiny paws is so cute. Always trying to lick me when I lift them and I would get the whiff of their puppy-smell. Soon they all will be gone and I am gonna miss them terribly. We can't afford to keep another four dogs in our home because the whole place is already rocking with these two. I just hope all the four are lucky to get nice families. And tomorrow, one will walk away to a caring home.

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