Monthly Review: October 2024

I was in Delhi at the beginning of this month. I was there for a week to roam around and explore Delhi, as I’d never been there before. It was an awesome trip, and I’m writing a separate blog post on Delhi (in draft right now). Spoiler alert: Delhi has a lot to offer to everyone and makes everyone step out of their houses to witness the beautiful city. I was there only for a week and not during the time of peak pollution — so my opinion is highly biased 🙂

After my Delhi trip, I had to be with my family for personal reasons and went on an unplanned trip to Hampi. My sister and I explored Hampi for two days and went on a trek, only to get scared by a group of monkeys who were so aggressive on us that we had to give our bag for them to search and take away eateries and leave the bag for us. But the rest of the trip was good. We leisurely explored the temples there and went on a shopping spree, too.

As I was traveling for the first half of October, I couldn’t catch up with movies until Vettaiyan. The same thing for books, too. Although I was carrying a book with me, I couldn’t even turn a page while I was roaming around. The first half of the month was a bit taxing owing to the physical exhaustion attributed to traveling, and emotionally, I wasn’t in a better position either.

However, after Dussehra, I returned to Hyderabad, and the first thing I did was visit Cult for strength training to get back on track. I couldn’t afford to miss the classes as I was inactive to any form of movement for almost three weeks and missed cult dearly. Speaking of the activities, I started playing Badminton too, thanks to my friend Nageshwar. We started with walking every weekend a few weeks back and thought we’d extend it to playing a sport, the easiest being Badminton (“easy” because of the logistics and beginner-friendly). We played badminton a few times and happened to play cricket on one weekend evening too!

Speaking of that weekend when I played cricket, I was pleased about it as this is how the weekend went:
I went to cult class on a Friday morning, and the same evening, I played cricket with friends. The following day, I had a yoga class for an hour at a new fitness center (Vyb Active — it was an open day). I completed yoga and found a few people playing badminton. There were two table tennis tables, and no one was playing. I asked if I could play table tennis, but no one else could. Hence, the trainers there asked if I could join them in badminton instead. I started playing without realizing I played for about 90 minutes. It was already an amazing weekend — a relaxing yoga class and an intense game! Also, I unknowingly played with a national player there, which ticked off my checklist! After returning home, I slept until lunch!

And no, we are not done yet! The following Sunday, I thought of visiting KBR Park for a walk inside the park though. However, it was a little dark by the time I reached. Nageshwar and I decided to walk outside the park, and we finished in about 70 minutes. I completed the outer track of KBR Park!!! I was ecstatic and a little proud of myself after I finished it! :D

Even emotionally, I was more relieved towards the second half of the month. It was about planning to play badminton or cricket, the anticipation for it, and eventually doing it! Perhaps this year is constantly reminding me how much I love being around people and partaking in fun activities!
So, in the second half of the month, I was active with workouts and resting well too! I hope this continues for the rest of the year.

My excitement to be back in Hyderabad had another strong reason: the Concert of Devi Sri Prasad!

DSP Concert

Last year, I realized how much I love watching artists perform live. I made it a point not to miss any opportunity to catch glimpses of my favorite artists performing; this time, it was DSP. From childhood, I’ve been a fan of his music — the mass beats and also the melodies he comes up with. I still remember sending him a message on Facebook long back, during my college days, thanking him for his music and worried why he’s not doing films like he used to do during my childhood.

The show was full of energy; we danced, sang along, cheered to the music, and were tired towards the end of the show. He was singing, dancing, walking to the corners of the ramp to enthrall the audience, and came with amazingly choreographed set pieces that felt like a cinematic experience. A true rockstar indeed!! It was worth it, and I had a lot of fun attending it with my friends Tapasi and Arhat! ❤

Movies

Owing to traveling, I couldn’t catch up on movies this month. I wanted to watch Meiyazhagan, but I heard much about it and couldn’t watch it during its theatrical run. However, I managed to watch two films in the theatre.

Vettaiyan

How could I miss watching Rajnikanth films in theatres?! I went with my father, feeling that I’d like it and that my father might not like it, owing to my expectations. With TJ Gnanavel helming the film, I thought it would be a serious drama, but I had mixed feelings towards the end. My father liked the movie! Yeah, the premise is good and has the potential to be a severe genre film. Still, with Rajnikanth in the picture, I believe they wanted to cater to a wider audience to recover the budget, which made them take the commercial cinema route, and I felt the script didn’t stay true to its premise. I felt cheated, to be very honest. But yeah, the silhouettes of Rajnikanth >>>>

Swag

Full disclosure — I love the works of Vivek Athreya and Hasith Goli (although he made only one movie before Swag). I didn’t know anything about Swag and went into the cinema hall with no clarity on what the film was about — I watched the promotional material and was aware of the broad point they are touching in this film — Gender equality. I loved the movie. I was laughing at the jokes, vibing to the music, and emotional for most of the second half. I know I’m biased against these two filmmakers, and I feel they are honest in their work.

Amaran

This film is a biopic of Major Mukund Varadarajan, and I had good expectations of the film, owing to the actors and Kamal Hassan (one of the producers). As the film is being made, I thought let me watch it first to learn about the life of the Major and then read up more about him. My colleague and friend, Yitzhak, recommended this film before its release as he read/heard much about the Major. This film lived up to my expectations, and I was sobbing for the most part.

For the sake of publishing this blog post sooner, I’m writing about this movie in brevity, with one feeling I had throughout and until now (I watched it on the 31st and am writing this line on the 1st of November): When you hold up your tears and weep for a longer time, there’s a pain in your lower jaw that extends to your throat. I have that pain from yesterday evening, and I believe the only way to relieve that pain is to weep, to let the tears out. I greatly respect the Major, his family, the team that worked on this film, and the Indian Army.

OTT

AK vs AK

I developed a love for Vikramaditya Motwane of late. I have watched his works and loved them so far — Bhavesh Joshi Superhero, Jubilee, Udaan- and hence, I decided to explore his work more. Also, his latest movie, CTRL, starring Ananya Pandey, was released on Netflix recently, and I saw a few interviews with him. I decided to start with AK vs AK. This is an experiment, and I wasn’t bored while watching it. This film was interesting, with good dark humor that’s mostly self-sabotaging for Anurag Kashyap. Would I revisit this film? I don’t think so, but it is decent with meta elements and jokes.

KILL

I watched this film after a long wait. I loved it. I love action films that are choreographed and directed well with an emotional cause. I loved John Wick and Bullet Train and was glad we could pull off something like that in India! Above all, I appreciate the filmmaker for keeping the physical constraint of keeping the entire movie inside the train and coming up with such intense action sequences. This is one of the best films I’ve seen this year.

The film balances the emotional attachment of both the hero and the villain. Both of them have strong motives to continue the fight and kill the other person. The actors played well, and I was reminded of Vir Das while watching the actor who played the villain. He has such swag even in those action sequences. He’s cruel yet lovable — such a good performance.

Red Alert: Ganga

I was talking about my Kashi experience to my friend and college senior, Goutham, and was worried about the condition of Ganga in Kashi. He shared his thoughts on why Ganga is polluted and recommended this documentary. The documentary covers Ganga from its origin in Gangotri, touches Kanpur Varanasi, among other places, and finally, at Kolkata, which merges into the Bay of Bengal. Well, it is concerning that the river that is full of life has been polluted for decades. I wish we worked towards cleaning the holy river.

Finding Nemo

I want to get on a nostalgic ride one evening after my office work and watch the film in Telugu! I ignored a lot of the comedy and philosophical dialogues it had during childhood, but oh, man, what a film! I am amazed at the scriptwriting for this film — the clear setup pays off!! It brought back childhood memories when we watched the film on Jetix on a Sunday and discussed the movie with friends the following day at school.

Yeah, again, in the second half of the month, I watched films, catching up with my backlog. I believe it’s easier to get back on your schedule and show up for various things when you’re at your place.

Books

Now, coming to books, I have almost finished reading this book: The Age of Heroes by Mukesh Manjunath. I mention ‘almost’ because, by the time I started writing this blog post, I was able to finish 90% of the book and thought I’d complete the book by the time I published. But I couldn’t! So, I’ll finish the last few pages soon after publishing this blog post. And oh, speaking about the book, it’s good. The book covers the author’s introduction to Telugu cinema, his personal anecdotes, and also goes into detail about the heroes of Telugu cinema, the villains who fight with the heroes, and the ultimate transition of the heroes to politicians (if luck favors, ending with a position of power) — more on this book on a separate blog. I’m loving this one!

Let’s see what I pick up next 🙂

I also continued my streak of watching a lot of YouTube videos! Here are a few good ones that I watched this month.

Going back to my love for Piku, these videos showed up on my feed, and how could I resist watching them and falling in love with Piku even more?

Also, there’s this good conversation of Javed Akhtar with standup comedians, where he talks about writing, comedy, and life. I found this good, check this out:

Also, these are the songs I’ve been listening to on a loop these days:

This full-of-life and crazy one from AR Rahman from Highway:

This melody from Shankar Ehsaan Loy:

Thank you, Rahul, Meeha, and Mayank. We were roaming around Delhi when these three folks played songs in the car, and I discovered these lovely songs!

And I’ve been listening to this song, too — I found it on Instagram and started loving it!

With that, we are nearing the end of the blog post. Looking back, October had everything — a few things I was sad about, a few things that kept me happy and lively, and the lovely festivals — Dussehra and Diwali — that I celebrated with family.

Happy Diwali! 🎉 ✨

Until next time…