Ultramarathon Man

What if I told you that you had to run 50 marathons in 50 days? A marathon is about 42kms or 26 miles. Well that’s not all, after you have run these 50 marathons you have to run more? 3000 miles actually, back to your home...your reaction???

Now, would you believe me if I told you that there is a man on this planet who is already doing exactly all that I mentioned just now? He has finished his 50 marathons in 50 consecutive days, the New York marathon on November 5^th was his 50th consecutive marathon, and now he currently running back from New York to his home in San Francisco. Oh and he has already covered about 540 miles in 12 days.

Name: Dean Karnazes - http://www.ultramarathonman.com/flash/
His daily blog including the 50 marathons in 50 days: ENDURANCE IS
Where is he today running from NY to SF? Here...
His book: Ultramarathon Man: Confessions of an All-Night Runner

Quotes:
"There is magic in misery."

"To me life is a struggle. If I'm not pushing myself, then I'm not happy," he says. "People think if we had every damn comfort available to us - if we removed all the struggle - we'd be happy. I think there's a lot of miserable people out there, and one of the reasons is, there's no struggle. They're taken care of every day. But I think there's a lot of happiness in suffering."

Mooru Plays

Saw these 3 plays at the Rangashankara theater…I must say that this theater is just wonderful and I am ever so thankful that it exists.

Art
This play was performed by a Chennai based troupe called Evam.

This one has a very interesting story line…It’s a story about three close buddies who start to fall apart after one of them spends a fortune buying a painting of white lines drawn on white background. There is a bit of technical talk about art but that part I didn’t catch much. But primarily the play explores the interrelationships of the 3 characters as they start measuring their friendship and existence with respect to each other. All this starts with one of them buying the painting, the second guy calling it “shit!” and the third friend somewhat innocent and diplomatic getting horribly caught in between. The piece of art divides the three friends at various angles through out the play as they align and realign amongst themselves. Tempers flare with intensity and they say the bitterest of things to each other but slowly confessions pour out and the dust finally settles.

Overall it was a good performance by all the three characters. I found the characters quite identifiable and the play to be really close to real life situations. There is some extra energy that flows through when you can associate with the situations being portrayed. These were friends just fighting, deliberately saying hurtful and bitter things, falling apart and finally trying to find their friendship again.

Woza Albert!
This play was performed by a troupe called Rafiki. The story is based in South Africa and deals with Apartheid (Woza means rise and Albert is the name of an assassinated leader of South Africa).

Despite the subject it deals with, the play is a comedy (a dark comedy maybe) and it starts with the rumor spreading that God (Jesus/Morena) is coming to South Africa. The rest of the play carries us through vignettes of various emotions that people from all walks of life in South Africa go through. There are two actors in this play and they play numerous characters one after the other showing a range of emotions starting with euphoria and disbelief. Seeing that this news is empowering the black population, the white government starts to clamp down. There are scenes of God meeting common folk and the expectations of these folks ranging from absurd to reality. The ending is again amusing but the message of the play is still serious and dark.

The acting was really energetic and in strange kind of way extremely intense. One of the actors had an extremely expressive face which he thoroughly exploited. He was funny as hell and kept me thoroughly engrossed. There were a couple of scenes depicting the two characters traveling in a train and even flying a helicopter! They did all the sound affects themselves and were really good at it. But the highlight of the play for me was the first 5 minutes where the lights slowly increase and the actors sing an absolutely beautiful folksy kind of song with one of them drumming on a wooden box as the only accompaniment.

Bikhre Bimb
This is a play written by Girish Karnad and Arundhati Nag is the lead actress. Need I say more?!?

The play is a solo act and I saw the Hindi version. The story starts with an author who has written only in Kannada until now suddenly writing an English “upanyas” and becoming a worldwide success. She gives a TV interview where she tells the public story of how she wrote her story, her reaction to the success and answers her critics. The story she has written is about a paraplegic girl and she says the story was inspired by the life of her younger sister who died recently and was also paralyzed since birth. With the interview done, as she is about to leave the studio an image of her appears on the TV and calls her back. What follows is the discussion delving into her family, consisting of her husband and her sister, and the various levels of her own consciousness. The lady and inquisitive TV image carry on conversing revealing a thorny story and a relationship of a dark nature consisting of love, hate and jealousy.

The acting was just superb, as you can imagine talking to a taped person the timing, delivery and placement of the actress had to be spot on for the whole duration.

Perumazhakkalam (When it rains hard)

This is the Malayalam movie from where Nagesh Kuknoor borrowed the story for Dor. He did officially buy the story from the writer and gives the writer due credit in the credits section of Dor. The Indo-German film festival screened this movie and all that this movie shares with Dor is the overall plot. The filming and handling of the two movies are totally different and both are originals in their own rights.

The story here is the same, in a fight between two Indian roommates in the Saudi, one guy “accidentally” kills the other. And the wife of murderer takes a journey to seek a signature from the wife of the murdered guy to pardon her husband. This movie is much more grounded and closer to real life. If such a thing actually happened then the story in real life will closely resemble this movie rather than Dor.

In this movie the wife doesn’t take a daring independent journey not knowing where to find the other lady. She knows exactly where the other lady lives and she sets out with her father accompanying her. Upon reaching the village, right from the first meeting she sees the other lady and begs her to sign the papers but the family members intrude and throw her and her father out. This repeats every time she makes an effort to convince her to sign. The wife of the murdered man is aptly shown, right from the beginning, lost in what to do. Finally on the last day despite knowing the consequences from her family will be dire she takes a priest’s help and makes the reverse journey to go and sign the papers. Then she returns to her house to face the brunt of the family...

The big downside of this movie is the songs. They are totally misplaced and useless. Also in the first half an hour the director seems confused as to what kind of a movie he is making, a commercial movie or an off-beat movie. The director isn't able to bring out the significance of the title in a very powerful way. For the first half the cinematography actually is very confused (other than the opening scene) but things settle down and the rest of the movie is well directed and shot. Overall if you, as I have, manage to blank out the songs then it is a really good movie, in fact better than Dor at certain places.

Mehr Filme

The Indo-German film festival is going on here in Bangalore…

Oktoberfest
This movie shows the amalgam of life on the last day of Oktoberfest, the two week beer festival held yearly in Munich. There are several stories running in parallel that are loosely linked here and there. The stories are about best friends, about relationships falling apart, coming together and about parents and children with the central theme sort of being love. None of the stories in the movie are intense as such and it just shows day to day people. The director himself said that if you really stand in Oktoberfest and take notice you will see all the things in his movie. What I really liked in this movie is that none of the stories as such reach a conclusion. There are left as loose knots that you can make up your mind as to where they will go next.

To me the story of the wheelchair guy pretending to be handicapped was really good. Twenty odd years ago there was a bomb blast at Oktoberfest and this guy keeps harassing the fest police over the phone by asking them questions like “Could it have been prevented?” In the middle he meets a girl who runs one of the rides at the fest. They obviously like each other and spend some time getting to know each other but in the end the cops catch up to the guy and arrest him. She is totally betrayed when she finds that he is actually not handicapped. At the police station he finally explains to the chief, who was patrolling the day of the bomb blast, that his father lost his legs in that blast. He was kid then and had made a big fuss about an Oktoberfest t-shirt. His dad had gone back to the fest area to get it for him and had got caught in the blast. Finally the next day he comes back to meet the girl but the scene fades there, you are left to think about what she says to him and where they go from there…

Overall the music is really very nice and had me tapping my feet time and time again. The movie is well shot given that it is almost completely oudoor and was made in the actual Oktoberfest.

Off-Beat
This is a story about kind of a reclusive guy who as a kid survived a serious car accident in which his parents were killed. After the crash, apart from the trauma, he has some medical complications for some years but now he has grown up and works as a paramedic where his nickname is “Crash”. He continues to have flashes and nightmares about his past life including the accident and it is through these flashes his story is told. His grandmother raises him and there is a beautiful scene in which she tells him about strength and courage. She says you can forget about everything else but there are only two things you can do in tough situations “inhale and exhale”.

Crash is kind of a loner but a workaholic who keeps helping all kinds of low lives on the streets. The tag line of the movie is “probes the soul of a troubled young man who rescues others but is desperately in need of rescue himself.” In his dreams he sees a woman who he actually doesn’t know. Finally one day he does meet her, the situation is complicated (I won’t explain much why it is complicated, but believe me it is nothing like a typical love triangle complicated) and they do fall in love but at the end of the movie life repeats itself in a horrible way. The scene where Crash is pulled between life and death has been shown is one of the most unique ways. So many movies show people dying but finally making it back to life due to a touch or a tear drop, this movie does the same but adds a very nice twist to it. To me the whole movie is worth watching just for that scene.

The movie also touches one of my favorite animal stories. A very touching story about a really brave and faithful mongoose, written by Rudyard Kipling: “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi”. In the ambulance when the girl tells Crash “I feel sorry for you” dealing with death, blood etc “and you always arrive late”. Crash replies with “My grandmother told me this and I believe in what Rikki-Tikki-Tavi said ‘There is reward in every good deed’.” And with that they burst out laughing.

Overall the story is pretty good and the movie is well made but it is very graphic since he is a paramedic, people with a weak stomach will have trouble.

Dry Spell

I don’t know about you but in terms of blogging the past 2-3 weeks have been dry spell. Strange and funny thing is that a bunch of blogs that I read, mostly all of them by my friends, also have suddenly hit the same dry spell. Other than Mr A posting some video links :-) from YouTube and Google videos there were basically no postings. Anyway…

The Departed
Directed by: Martin Scorsese
Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Matt Damon, Jack Nicholson, Martin Sheen, Mark Wahlberg, Alec Baldwin

Awesome movie, a gripping mob flick with plenty of violence, bloodshed and twists and turns that has lots of people going “Scorsese is back!” Although probably not as good as Scorsese’s own “Goodfellas” but it comes really very close. Personally I thought it was a little long but apart from that the story and the acting are pretty good. Jack Nicholson as the mob boss is flawless. Almost everyone in the acting department is...

The story is about the mob and the cops infiltrating each other, sending their people under cover. Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson) the boss of an Irish mob systematically puts his youngest and brightest man (Matt Damon) to infiltrate the police and rise in their ranks. At the same time two good cops (Martin Sheen and Mark Wahlberg) send their brightest cadet (Leonardo DiCaprio) to infiltrate the Irish mob. Both the undercover men do well as a cop and a gangster and quickly rise to the top, all the while passing critical information back to their people. Slowly both sides become painfully aware of the rats and then to make it worse become aware that there isn't just one rat in their group, that is when the movie picks up pace. Watching the rat become a thorn in the side of Jack Nicholson is really riveting. The cops and the mob spin circles around each other through their informants and find themselves frustrated time and time again. On the side both young men thrown in the fray find themselves struggling to tell apart the lies from the truth and at the same time having internal struggles with trust and loyalty.

Memorable quotes:
Dignam (Mark Wahlberg): Who am I? I'm the guy that does his ^$%#in' job! You must be the other guy!

by Frank Costello:
“One of us had to die. With me, it tends to be the other guy.”
“When I was growing up, they would say you could become cops or criminals. But what I'm saying is this...when you're facing a loaded gun, what's the difference?”
“I don't wanna be a product of my environment, I want my environment to be a product of me.”
This last one is very similar to the quote by George Bernard Shaw that goes “all progress depends on the unreasonable man.” So looks like whether you are a mob boss or a software engineer or anything else, to get ahead in life the same principle applies ;-)

Here are the reviews of some of the movies I saw over the past couple of weeks...

No Man’s Land
A war story set in an open field with the Serbian line on one side, the Bosnian line on the other and two soldiers, one from each side, caught bang in the middle in No Man's Land. The story depicts the idleness, confusion and blind hatred of any war. It shows how clueless sometimes the sides involved and even the UN are in these civil wars.
A tragic story bringing out the hopelessness of the whole situation. I really liked the movie since it was really very simplistic. Made in one open field with trenches, a few guns and vehicles but the situation is what is very interesting that leaves you thinking.
This movie won the 2001 Oscar for the Best Foreign Film (Country: Belgium; Director: Danis Tanovic).

All About My Mother
A very moving story about a mother but women in general. This movie is very progressive, blunt and sexually explicit so not everyone may be able appreciate the film but the overall story is quite nice. It revolves around a single mother who loses her beloved son in a freak accident and then makes a journey back to face the demons from her past that she had left behind twenty years back. A Pedro Almodóvar movie that definitely stirs up controversy.
This movie won the 1999 Oscar for the Best Foreign Film (Country: Spain; Director: Pedro Almodóvar).

Munich
This movie captures what Israel did in the aftermath of the 1972 Olympics where 11 of their athletes were brutally murdered by Palestinian terrorists. A group of Mossad agents led by Avner (Eric Bana) are recruited to hunt and kill the people responsible. Eric Bana does a really good job of portraying an assassin who is serving his country but at the same time a family man. Avner's struggles indicate how difficult it is to kill anyone doesn’t matter who they are. He and the team constantly find themselves at odds with the mission and to make it worse they soon realize that they themselves are being hunted.
A good Steven Spielberg movie which definitely communicates the darkness of the subject and the struggles involved in the world of secret agents and assassins.

O Brother Where Art Thou
A movie by the Coen brothers (Fargo is by them too) which at its center has the escaped convict Everett (George Clooney) trying to catch a break in life. He has two accomplices and together they bumble onwards trying to reach a treasure. Everett is a smooth talker and these guys get into the weirdest of situations including a KKK rally. They even end up being a big musical hit by the name of “Soggy Bottom Boys” and their song catches on in the whole state. One of the funniest scenes is when Pete, one of the convicts, questions Everett’s leadership and then they proceed to vote on who should be the leader. Everett and Pete vote for themselves and the third guy, Delmar, who has the deciding vote cluelessly says “Okay, I am with you fellas.”
An awesome movie with tons of smart alec dialogues, great acting, good music and with a very catch story all along. The song “I am a man of constant sorrow” from the movie aptly describes the situation of Everett and his buddies.

Ice Age 2: The Meltdown
The follow up to one of my favorite animation movies Ice Age, this movie is a continuation of the adventures of the 3 characters: Manny the Mammoth, Diego the Saber-toothed Tiger and the outrageous Sid the Sloth. A very enjoyable movie where the 3 friends are now facing the end of the Ice Age and the rise of water levels. At the same time Manny is facing the possibility of being the last Mammoth alive until he meets a female Mammoth named Ellie but incidentally she has been raised by possums and thinks that she is one too.
Just like in the first part the oblivious squirrel continues to retrieve and store its beloved walnut in the weirdest of situations.

Small Time Crooks
A typical Woody Allen comedy with other comics like Jon Lovitz and Hugh Grant. Woody Allen is a bumbling con who keeps hatching get rich quick plans. This particular time he finds that his wife, who was acting as the front selling cookies, is actually making a much bigger fortune than his plan. They build a big empire selling the cookies and this sudden fortune finds them rolling in high society. Then they try to fit in by hiring Hugh Grant to teach them to be sophisticated but he has his owns plans to get rich.
One really funny scene is when Woody Allen says his nickname in the jail was “The Brain” and Jon Lovitz points out that the name was meant in a sarcastic way but Woody Allen does not realize this and continues to believe himself to be a genius. Good time pass watch…

I have slept some 20 hours in the last two days...Why? Because I am on a $%#$ vacation ;-)

Diwali is here and I am lounging at home for the past two days. I got about 10 movies to watch during this week and already have finished 4...should have got more of them...

Went for a run early in the morning around 7am. It is so damn hot here that early morning is about the only time suitable for running. Getting down here from the flight at 11 in the night the temperature was 29 deg C, day time it must be 34-35. Anyway the run was really good, ran next to lake and then all the way to the departments and by my school. School starts really early now and I saw the kids go in...felt really nostalgic and my attire was almost exactly like their uniforms navy blue shorts, white t-shirt and black shoes. Maybe I should have gone inside and antagonized the teachers again, just for old times sake :)

Straight to the point...fast!

I happened to attend one of the most inspiring and open & direct presentations a couple of days back. This was by one of our vice presidents in the organization where I work and man am I glad this guy works for us.

He is as straight a shooter as one can get, this person is pretty foul mouth but is just so damn inspiring. He didn't mince his words one bit. He openly shredded some of our internal practices and policies. He took the HR people sitting on the front row on a ride a few times. I am sure they were shivering in their pants as to what he may say next but we didn't mind, we were too stirred up.

He took two sessions, one on Leadership and another on Intellectual Honesty. We came back all fired up from his session. Here are some of the quotes from him (assume a little hyper but serious guy is telling this to you and at a fast pace):

He started with this: "Everyone raise your right hand, up high, put it in your pocket...now take out that bloody cell phone and switch it off"

"Today we will have a exchange of ideas. It means you will come in with yours and leave with mine."

"BKMs suck" (BKMs = best known methods; its an acronym we use almost everywhere in our org)

"Consensus is the source of all evil"

"If you think the meeting is a waste of time then just stand up and say "It's bull $%@#"." (People in my group are itching to use this!)

"I love chaos, I love arguments. I love to participate and see people arguing in meetings." He said with a twinkle in his eye.

"Someone said attack the issue and not the person. So I asked them back "Ummm...then can I say that the issue is a son of a @#$%^?" What do you mean don't attack the person???"

In his presentation he quoted George Bernard Shaw "The resonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."
Our group came back and on the pretext of being unreasonable decided to be the biggest jerks and pain in the you know what around ;-)

Another thing he said that our organization should do is "Always challenge status quo...without fear." And "Can Do!"

How these threads of life weave us together...

In our trek through life how when we are blindsided but still end up taking the leap of faith and in return find something in someone or with someone that is so unforeseen but yet so meaningful that it is difficult even to fathom, is what the movie Dor is about...

Ok about the movie (other than too much about the story obviously)...

Dor is close to be being almost flawless. Nagesh Kuknoor has struck the ball out of the stadium. The movie is just spectacular in its direction and cinematography. Just when you think that the movie will fall apart by becoming melodramatic or "filmy" the reigns are pulled by the director and the actors. It sticks to its course beautifully. Speaking of beauty, the locations shot in Himachal Pradesh and Rajasthan from where the two women around whose "Dor" the movie is based on come from, just take your breath away. Especially the beauty that comes through from the shots of the deserts and life in Rajasthan are incredible.

The acting by everyone (other than by Kuknoor himself in his short role, but he is forgiven :)) is just exact. Apart from the two women who just shine through and through, Shreyas Talpade as a behroopiya, Girish Kannad, the grandmother and others all give great performances.

Gul Panag who plays Zeenat and Ayesha Takia who plays Meera, the women in question in this movie, deliver stunning performances. It is their lives that intertwine. The forces than bring them together and the bonds they form about love, goodness and more importantly freedom liberate them both in their own way. Many scenes will stand out, the scene where Behroopiya drunk goes and "proposes" to Zeenat in his own unique way is pretty funny but I actually found it quite touching. Such scenes will speak to you make sure you make them yours. Another one I really liked is when Meera asks the grandmother "Aap mere saath itna kathor kyon thi."

The songs and music are just right and well suited but "Yeh Honsla" stands out. It is an extremely beautiful poem and song...

You just cannot miss this movie...and make sure you watch it first in a theater.

As good as it gets...

I have been writing this post for some time and had left it as a draft for probably a month now. Anyway just decided to post it today in whatever state it was...

I am sure that if you have had friends who went or go through tough times or a crisis, you have egged them on by saying "look at the bright side, you still have your family or health or job" or whatever else the case might have been. But now what happens if that person goes on to lose someone from their family or lose their health in a really serious way say cancer. What if some of their decisions backfire on them...

This is what someone narrated to me that had happened to them. What do you say to that? Now that you have been made to eat your words how do you comfort them?

…What if this is as good as it gets...

This line is from the movie "As good as it gets" and Jack Nicholson delivers this line in his usual flamboyant style.

What if that this is as good as it'll get. This hopelessness that faces you is as good as it'll get. Forget god, higher force or anybody else coming and saving you, not going to happen. Pick a path, work for yourself with fervor and conviction and definitely live...

Oh I just found that my Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex is probably damaged! :) This I found while reading "Blink" by Malcom Gladwell the author of The Tipping Point. The tag line of this book is "The power of thinking without thinking"...

Anyway in this book there is a mention about the Implicit Association Test (IAT) developed at Harvard. I would encourage you to go and take a few of them. The tests are available at: implicit.harvard.edu/implicit

What these tests measure is our attitude towards things at an unconscious level. Varied subjects like racism, religion, computer operating system preference etc. We are probably not even aware that we have such an attitude. This attitude is the first thing that comes out even before we have had a chance to think when we are faced with a particular situation or circumstance.

The book says "The disturbing thing about the test is that it shows our unconscious attitudes may be utterly incompatible with our stated conscious values". I didn't find too many discrepancies in mine but in case if you do find that, for example you have a racist implicit attitude then there is a way to deal with such things. What you do is to increase familiarization with what you have an negative attitude against. Spend time in the environment in which you have developed a bias against. Learn about the good things of that aspect because it is the bad things that you have absorbed from the evironment around you and hence developed the implicit preference...

There are some tests related to India also at: implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/india/

It is bandh time again here in Bangalore. This time some issue with Belgaum. Cable tv is blacked out including even English/Hindi news channels. So after sending the WFH (working from home) mail there was nothing much to do ;-) other than chat with folks and write a couple of blogs. No! Not this particular post but a couple that I'll post shortly. But for now the pace needs to seriously pick up so gonna toss a coin and choose between two Brad Pitt movies Fight Club or Snatch... ... ... ... ... ...Snatch it is! "Stealin' Stones and Breakin' Bones!!!"

Do you find yourself atrophying? Then try the documentaries posted at PBS Frontline. On this page visit the Previous Reports link, it has archives from previous years.

The first one "The Dark Side" is really good and gives a deep insight on how manipulative the "War on Terror" has been. I watched it one morning when I was preparing a presentation at the absolute last minute but due to my expertise in powerpoint ;-) it got done in the about half the time and I had all this time to spare :-)

One song that helped me through my run last Sunday was Pearl Jam's "Release". It goes:

I'll ride the wave where it takes me
I'll hold the pain...Release me...

I guess if you have heard the way Eddie Vedder sings these lines you may understand why these lines had such an influence...

42.2kms

It took me 6 hours to finish the Bangalore marathon. Not a very great time as I had aimed to finish in five and a half hours but still I managed to overcome my body screaming at me "STOP!" "STOP!" for 42 kilometers...

I had decent pace for the first half, completing 10 kilometers in just over an hour and then getting half way by about two and half hours. But at about 26 kilometers I had run my last for this race. I walked the rest of the way to the finish, taking about three hours to cover the last 16 kilometers.

Almost every part of my body below my waist hurt. The groin area, knees, calfs, ankles, feet (heel and sole) and each one of the 10 toes. Pains in each these areas would come and then dull away giving way to something more painful...
Plus I developed a condition in my upper body which is very common among amateur male long distance runners but a little embarrassing to describe here. I had taken some precaution but it didn't work and the roaming medical team had to help me. I soon forgot about it but I spent some anxious 10 kilometers...

The race was very badly organized but I don't want to go into those things here as I am too busy nursing my sweet and nasty aches and pains...ow! ow! ow! ouch!