June 2001

Amitabh, Shyam and myself finally managed to see “Someone Like You” at Sterling. I arrived a bit early, at 10PM, and the show began at 10:45PM. The wait was well worth it, because it seemed to me that the who’s who of Mumbai fashion were parading about the theatre. Not that I recognised anybody, but then, not that I would recognise anybody anyway. We got corner seats, unfortunately, with the AC directly above us. The three of us sat huddled in the corner, trying to warm ourselves. Fortunately, the movie proved a hilarious piece.

Carl Steadman’s book, NetMogul, is evolving online. It’s about dot-com startups. What I liked best was the way the book has been formatted online.

And now you can send out your genes into space. You write a poem on your photo, stick your hair on it, and they’ll throw it into space. Read the FAQ. Oh, and by the way, it costs $50. If they can store 4.5 million submissions, and get $30 per submission (after discounts), they still make $135 million. Plus merchandise, advertising, etc. How much does it cost to launch a spacecraft? (NASA lets you send your name to Mars for free, though. I signed up and got a certificate.)

After having been stood up on a dinner engagement, Amitabh and I walked from Regal to Food Inn, which looked fine from outside. We decided to have dinner in the AC section upstairs. I didn’t notice anything, until Amitabh wondered: “Anand, why is it that there’s no one in this whole place except us?” Well, there were, actually. 4 waiters, all standing with their backs to the same wall, with a tray in the hands, equidistant from each other. Looked like those thugs in movies who’d move away from the wall at the villain’s orders, and say, “Yes Boss!” Our hypothesis was that the place was run by the Mumbai mafia, and was the meeting point for the shady deals in the city. ...

Crystal is opposite to Chowpatti beach. I didn’t know that, so when Bhura suggested we take a cab there from Churchgate, I boldly said, “Let’s walk down the beach.” It’s not that long a walk, but longer than I’m normally used to. At the end of the walk, I nearly collapsed. Crystal is apparantly pretty famous for its value-for-money. We ordered 2 alu parathas with malai kofta and paneer masala and dahi. The food was quite tasty, but filling. Neither of us had space for many more rotis. The bill came to about Rs. 100.

Dikshit and I had a 12" Spectacular Spinach ‘Over The Edge’ pizza (Over The Edge means that the pizza is thin and the topping is thick right till the edge. The pizza has spinach, mushrooms and jalapeno peppers) and a fettucini with pesto sauce at the Pizzeria. Fettucini is the flat pasta, as opposed to macaroni (which looks like sliced tyres) or spaghetti (noodles). I had pesto sauce at London a couple of times, and loved the taste. At Rs. 400, the bill was a little high. But we had a beautiful view, sitting at the Pizzeria, of Marine Drive. It started raining as we were there, which at Marine Drive is a sight to watch as well.

If you have a POP account and want to read mails on it, MailReader.com offers a good web interface. Their mission statement is a revelation.

Saurabh and I had Pav Bhaji and Bhel Puri at Vittal. The place was a pretty small outfit, like the Kamaths or the Sagars. But the dishes were among the best that I’ve ever had. Not expensive – we finished at Rs. 75 between us, including an extra pav bun. Then we watched Miss Congeniality at New Excelsior. The theatre didn’t have a balcony, which is pretty surprising, but it appeared larger than Regal. The movie was produced by and stars Sandra Bullock as an FBI agent in a beauty pageant. Extremely funny, and without any message, thankfully.

I help a guy in Texas propose to his love in Hindi. (I’m root_node) cody_bam_bam: Any Patels here? cody_bam_bam: Any Patels here…from Texas? cody_bam_bam: Anyone know what the name Geeta, comes from? root_node: Geeta comes from the Sanskrit word for song (gaay), I think. root_node: Doesn’t ‘Geeta’ mean song, in the firat place, cody? cody_bam_bam: I dont know… mahindersingh_mayank: hi any good &truthly friend cody_bam_bam: i tohguht it was a name of soome teachings? cody_bam_bam: Well i live in Texas cody_bam_bam: And im in lov with this girl her shes Indian root_node: “Bhagavad Geeta” is what you’re probably referring to. That literally translates to “God’s Song”. crush0508: hello cute root_node: That’s interesting! Where’s your girlfriend from in India? cody_bam_bam: her last name is Patel, she says its a pretty popoular name in India root_node: Oh yes, fairly popular ...

Having spent several hours at office, Amitabh and I walked down to the Regal Cinema Hall to watch “The Emperor’s New Groove”. Given that it was a saturday afternoon, and a Disney movie, we were expecting only to see a family crowd, and weren’t disappointed. Tickets, as always in Mumbai, were a bit more expensive than we were used to. Rs. 60 and Rs. 80. We took the Rs. 60, and discovered that there was no difference between the two. Well, there was, but not much. ...

I missed seeing Someone Like You at Sterling. The show was to start at 10:45PM. At 10:30PM, four of us were deciding on a go/no-go for Rs.200 in black. We figured, having come all this way, may as well go for it, and hunted for the chap. Not to be found. In the meantime, there’s another offer for Rs. 250. We spend a while over it. Finally, yes, it’s probably worth it. We go hunt for him again. The guy says wait, and wanders around trying to buy tickets. That’s crazy! But we waited. By which time it was 10:45, and the market rates rose to Rs. 300, and only two tickets were available. ...

After the good worm, we now have the social worm, which searches for child porn and reports it. This is starting a Robin Hood-esque trend.

Sumit & I had dinner at Dosa Diner. I was fairly absorbed in a discussion relating entropy, evolution and free will, hence did not pay much attention to the place or the menu. But what remains fresh in my mind is the long green tunnel you walk through to get to the place. It used to be a discotheque earlier, and the tunnel had been painted black completely. At least its brighter now, but green is almost as discotheque as black if you ask me. But then, at least I don’t wear black nailpolish (as opposed to green ;-) ...

I shifted from Netscape Navigator to Internet Explorer because I could cut and paste tables from IE to Excel. But now that I’ve downloaded Opera 5.11, used its zoom function, it’s gesture keys, and so on, I’m moving over to Opera. Long live Opera! (Which, given Netscape’s fate, is perhaps no more than a fond hope.)

Nomic is a game that you play by changing the rules of the game. You start with an initial set of rules and then players can vote to change the rules. Steve Gardner has produced a summary of many such games played on the Internet. If you’re interested in legislation, or online games, this is an interesting topic.

Amitabh, Xavier and I, after considerable deliberation on the choice of tonight’s restaurant, ended up at Gaylord, again in the Churchgate area. We sat at one of the tables near the entrance, informed a (relatively young, clean shaven) waiter that we’d like a seat inside ASAP, and we’d have drinks in the meantime. Just to be on the safe side, Xavier confirmed with him that it was OK if we got a seat in-between our drinks and we could take the drinks inside. After a few rounds of explanation, he seemed to get the point, and nodded. But the explanation must have done him more harm than good, because he forgot to make our reservation. ...

By the end of the year, Bangalore will become a zero piracy zone. First, the Karnataka Government will try and eliminate all piracy within. Then it’ll appoint compliance officers who’ll walk into offices and check randomly. And this will reduce piracy. Right. What of corruption?

Orbitz, the travel site backed by Delta, Northwest and American, is online. It cuts through travel agents and lets passengers book flight tickets directly with the airlines. (I tried booking a flight from Mumbai to Bangkok, but for some reason, it kept giving me an error.)

Kamdar’s Just Around The Corner is, in fact, just around the corner opposite Churchgate. It’s supposed to be Raveena Tandon’s favourite hangout, so hopes ran high. Rajesh and I walked in, sat down, and started discussing the the hope that the man in a white chef hat sitting at the adjacent table would come over. After a few minutes, we figured that Just around the corner is a self-service restaurant, and the man in the chef’s hat at the adjacent table was a guest. So we got up, walked down the food aisle through the exit gate. (The manager gave us a dirty look, but I’m hoping it was because he was jealous we were thin enough to squeeze through.) There were soups, salads, pastries, sandwiches, and burgers. Except for the salads, the items were 75% non-veg. But the variety was fairly good, despite that. A bit on the expensive side, with sandwiches at Rs. 80, salads (a side order) at Rs. 70, and my apple pie at Rs. 45. But the ambience was nice, so were the people around. There were just 3 or 4 groups dining, while the place could seat several more. ...

While in the US services sector employment is falling, high tech employment, which is about 8% of the services sector, continues to grow. Meaning technology is still growing, despite the recession. Strange!