Ponniyin Selvan part-1

Finally we saw Ponniyin Selvan! I must say it definitely lived upto the expectations built up by the positive reviews and ratnam fans, and I cant wait for the next part. 

Of all the great things in the movie the one that most impressed me was Karthi. He seems to naturally bring that perfect blend of humbleness, mischievousness, and macho-ism. In scenes with Nandhini devi and Kundavai, he somehow manages to hold his own even while showing how floored he is by their looks, stature, etc. And that holds true even in scenes with Aditha and Arulmozhi varman. He comes across as a valued warrior and a good friend even though he is doing their bidding. While every scene he was in was amazing, my favorite was his reaction to Poonguzhali when she asks him to give a message to Arulmozhi varman. 

Almost every actor fit the character perfectly……and I say almost because I didnt like Prakash Raj (esp after CCV) and I don’t understand what was Prabhu doing in this movie! In fact it took me a few mins to realise it was Prabhu. And after a few lame dialogues he vanished! Here is yet another role for Prakash Raj - a man who has seen better days, helpless in his current condition, commanding a certain respect from people around him due to his past glory even though they are backstabbing him, waiting for his sons to come home and take charge. Sounds familiar?! I think anyone could have fit that role however the key difference is he was called ‘Sundara’ chozar for a reason! So why Prakashraj?! 

Vikram was unbelievable! In the book, his history with Nandhini is said in bits and pieces and we need to piece it together. However, the movie brings it all out in one-rush and it doesn't even seem to be a secret or a discreet affair. While it might otherwise take a lot of songs and dialogues and context-setting to explain the history between them, his amazing acting takes care of all that! He is at his best when playing the role of a passionate person! Again, even when playing the role of Kundadvai’s brother, there was this subtle sibling equation between him and Kundavai when they meet. That scene was also wonderfully done. 

Kalki’s Ponniyin Selvan gave a lot of respect and importance to the female characters. Every one of them played a very significant role. Trisha, Aishwarya and Lekshmi deliver this really well.

Personally, my expectations from the movie were very low. I find ManiRatnam’s recent movies a little annoying. There is a lot of posturing, superfluous dialogues, forced acting. So I was actually dreading this movie. I thought - omg he is going to ruin it! But in reality, there was so much depth to the movie and a certain regard and respect to the original story. In many scenes the dialogues were so witty! Not the typical smart-ass dialogues we have been seeing of late. After seeing Baradwaj Rangan’s review I was convinced the movie has to be good - esp because he kinda voiced what I have always felt but couldnt articulate about CCV. 

I wonder i Maniratnam tried for a musical kinda of movie with so many songs interspersed into the story. For once, I found the songs actually annoying! Somehow they just slowed down the pace of the story and were an unnecessary distraction. Sorry ARR, somehow this time the songs just didn’t work. 

While most mythological/historical movies show actors with an overwhelming amount of jewelry and shiny clothes, in this it somehow wasnt so overwhelming. Despite the rich silk clothes and loads of jewelry, there was something radiant and beautiful, esp about Trisha and Aishwarya that had nothing to do with the clothes and accessories. And it was very very refreshing to see royalty wearing rich kanjeevaram silk. Except for very few scenes, almost all the sarees were rich kanjeevaram silks with beautiful color and border. Most historical/mythological movies resort to some weird georgette or some shiny clothes with embroidery and glittery stuff. But the sarees here were so classic - so rich and beautiful (sorry cant help repeating myself). However, what is with Aishwarya’s weird cheeks? Anyone else noticed?! One quick observation on accessories: Unlike the huge nose rings actors wear in such movies, these two wore very subtle and lovely nose rings. 

I unfortunately dont recall much of the story from the book - I read it 11yrs back while on maternity leave - in-between diaper change and feeding my babies :) I saw a drama version few years back, but couldn’t connect to most of the scenes. I definitely don’t recall reading lengthy fight scenes - neither the Rashtrakuta war nor the ones in Lanka. So I am getting back to the book and plan to watch the movie again to see just how much of a creative liberty has Maniratnam taken. 

Also, I think the movie must seem very disjointed and difficult to follow for those who haven’t read the book. I think it is too complicated to fit 2.5volumes of a book into a 3hrs movie. Since I had read the book and my kids had read the ACK version we could follow the story and appreciate every scene. So to anyone who says Maniratnam should send a book to help them follow the movie - well, it is a movie based on a book! So it goes without saying that a lot of details are bound to be missing if you haven’t read the original. And the beauty of watching a movie made from a book is to keep connecting it to the original and find out what is missing, what is handled smartly, what is handled even better than the book! So go read the book! And see it all over again….which is what I am going to do :)

THE Vacation 2022!!!

This year I decided to break away from our standard practice of going to a hill station around TN and instead explore a totally new place far away from home. I am not really much into travelling. Before marriage, our trips were always for visiting temples in TN - the usual Trichy-Madurai-Pazhani routine. The most exciting trip from my childhood was probably to Ooty! It was exciting because we went to sightsee in Ooty and not to see temples, and it is somewhat different from other trips because it was just our dad and us 3 sisters (mom couldn't join). I have been to Bombay and Delhi but I guess we spent more time at our grandparents' place rather than exploring the city. 

The travel bug caught me after my very first trip after marriage. My husband had planned an elaborate trip in Kerala full of experiences - we stayed in a Tree house, a Cave house, boathouse,etc across many places - Munnar, Idukki, Kumarakom, etc. Since then we have been to many more places - Mysore, Pune (Lonavala, Khandala), Thiruchendur, Thirunelveli, and close with Kutch - our last long trip before we settled down with kids. Few years back I took baby steps to travelling again with a 4-day trip to Kodai. But then my son fell sick and our doctor strictly advised us against going to a hill station. So since then we have been very conservative in our travels - mostly travelling to nearby towns and hill stations and often to places where we have a relative or close friend. So a week-long vacation to the North-East - a completely unfamiliar territory to all of us was very very exciting! To make it even better, my sister and her daughter joined in. 

I took help of my friend who was brought up in Guwahati and so very familiar with the Northeast region. She recommended a travel agent who put together an itinerary covering many places - though it was left to us to pick  and choose based on our interest. In the 7days we covered Guwahati, Shillong and Cherrapunjee. On the whole we were very impressed by the lush green vegetation, the people’s reticence in meddling too much with nature and instead making their life around it, the lovely valleys and mountains. A big disappointment was that we were unable to find anyone who would talk to us and give a little more context and backstory to the places we visited. We found maybe 2-3 people in this one week who were somewhat friendly and helpful. Also - shopping and traditional food completely evaded us! 

We landed in Guwahati on 24-Sep late evening around 7-30PM. The airport as such was quite devoid of people but when we stepped out we were very surprised to find hardly any vehicles or people on the streets! How can a city be so empty on a Saturday evening?! 

 

 

Just as I expected (although it is mighty obvious) there was bright sunlight streaming through the gaps in our curtain by 5AM! I thought - wow! More hours for our ‘Cultural Immersion!’ - a slogan I have been chanting since we landed in Guwahati (much to my kids’ annoyance). Shockingly,  for a city with early sunrise, no tea shops were open near our hotel. And we were in the middle of the city in a market area! 

Our agent had made a list of many places to see in Guwahati - museums, gardens, temples, zoo, etc. But we decided to prioritize -3 of them and visit any more places only if time permits. 

Our first stop was at the Sukreshwar Temple. The first thing that caught our eye was the beautiful bamboo frame for the foot bridge across the road of the temple. Later we found that many foot bridges in Guwahati have this bamboo frame. It gives a nice rustic touch to an otherwise mundane utilitarian bridge. 

Foot bridge with Bamboo frame

The temple complex actually had many sights to see. There was Janardhan temple, a small sanctum for Shiva and family, a walkway leading to Brahmaputra riverbank,and then Sukreshwar temple a level higher. It was interesting to note that the Janardhan temple had a priest while theShiva sanctum and Sukreshwar temple were open to devotees to perform their own rituals. Coming from the south where all temples have a hierarchy of roles (priest, assistant priest, an admin to issue tickets, etc.) this was quite a cultural shock. The Janardhan temple was big but there was just one sanctum with the lord’s idol. So it was a very quick visit. We next went to the Shiva temple beside it. Another interesting departure from the south is the beautiful brass idols for all the deities. All the idols were beautifully carved and were shining as if they were just made. The complex had a big Shiv ling with water dripping from a pot above it. There was a big snake encircling the shivling, and a nandi further away. On a raised platform were the idols of Murugan, Shiva, Parvathi and Ganesh. 

 

 

 

All these idols were just there for anyone to walk-in,touch, offer their prayer, perform ceremony, etc. I was quite taken aback by the easy access to the deities. There was no aarthi, sacred water, offering of flowers to devotees or any such formalities. So basically there was no takeaway from the temple! It all seemed so strange, so carefree and lacking any order. I consider myself lucky (after paying some money) if I get to see Nataraja statue up close in the Chidambaram temple. And by ‘upclose’ I mean some 50-100ft away. Yet here I was with full access to all the deities. I could look at every single idol from all angels and appreciate its beauty. But all I could feel was an overwhelming feeling of discomfort, of being put in a very strange situation where I didnt know how to react. I vaguely remembered that something like  this was mentioned in Amish Tripathi’s Shiva Trilogy and Biswanath Ghosh’s Aimless in Banaras. I think both authors talk about going around the main idol in the Kashi Vishwanath temple and touching the idol. 

We then went to the Sukreshwar temple and that was quite a revelation! The Sukreshwar temple was a large hall  with devotees spread across the hall performing rituals(some with a pujari’s guidance). Yet again there were beautiful brass idols of Lakshmi, Durga, Shiva, Ganesh. The floor was mostly wet because of all the ongoing rituals all over the place. But once I got past all this the main Shivling was a sight to behold! At first the sight of the sanctum was very confusing until I realized what was happening. There were many people singing, chanting and pouring water. When I finally got to see the shivling it was a huge one made of stone,with water dripping from a pot on top of the idol. The devotees all around were pouring water, wiping down the water,applying kumkum, etc. Again no priest! There was particularly one man who was singing with such abandon that it was very mesmerising to watch. We went a little closer to go around the deity and noticed that there were multiple people performing the rituals. One family was pouring cured, milk, etc., on the idol,  while most others were bringing water and pouring into the pot. The men were all in pants,shorts, tee-shirts. No dress code! There was no one overseeing anything or telling people what to do or not to do. This way of worshipping was somewhat liberating. In the south we believe the deity in a temple is powerful because of all the rituals performed by the priest (being a learned man), denying physical access to the common man,  and strongly believing in the existence of God in the idol. Yet, here we are in a temple where the common man is performing all the rituals, praying with such abandon, displaying just pure strong belief in God. How can such a deity not be powerful! So it was quite a surreal and awakening experience for me. Much later, in retrospect, I realized there was no woman in that sanctum - except one who was helping a man by passing on items for  the ceremony he was performing. And she was rather quiet and discreet. Otherwise not a single woman.  Huh. 

Sukreshwar

 

Of course,  I do realize that this is not common across the north or even within the Northeast. And by the way, we still got caught by charlatans trying to make money by tying a sacred thread to our wrist. We next went to the riverbank behind the temple. The Brahmaputra river is truly astounding in its vastness! Not that I have seen any other river to compare it with. The only huge waterbody I have seen (apart from Idukki and Veeranai dam) is our beach. So the still water stretching across such a vast area was an amazing sight. There were many along the bank offering prayers and performing rituals. So we chose to stay at one of the viewing points built for looking at the river. These viewing points also had benches, lamp posts. It gave the feel of being a very quiet and peaceful spot at night. 

Brahmaputra riverbank behind the temple

 

My half-baked attempt at panorama 

We then went to the Guwahati Zoo - apparently the largest in the Northeast region and is the 4th largest in India. I must say, after visiting Vandaloor zoo, Bannerghatta, Mysore Zoo, Hyderabad Zoo, it is a little difficult to objectively appreciate any new zoos that we might see. While the Aviary section was a refreshing change from others, the rest of the zoo was pretty standard or even worse. Some of the big cat’s enclosure was so small that they hardly had any space to move around and the Panthers definitely looked sick. And there were no elephants! That is so strange! Even the snakes section was disappointing - an extremely small section with 10-12 snakes. On the plus side, the zoo looked very lush with greenery. Not that the other zoos aren’t green enough. But something about the combination of trees, plants and rest of greenery made it seem a lot more naturally green than other Zoo. It was like walking through a hilly region lush with foliage. 

The entrance to the zoo

A really huge python

One of the selfie spots from the zoo

Now coming to the Aviary section - this is something I almost always avoid. Something about the caged birds sitting on a rod with their feathers, poop and half-eaten food around makes it a very ugly sight for me. However beautiful a bird might be, the sight and smell is too overwhelming for me to appreciate it. So when my niece insisted that we take a look at the section we unwillingly followed. But what a wonderful experience it turned out to be! The Aviary section was a huge area with lots of plants and trees (esp plantain) and a walkway carved out for us in the middle. You will find parrots, mynah, crane and many other birds (not the predatory ones, of course) happily roaming around with no fear of the humans walking among them. A peacock even walked past us at a touching distance! There were also loads and loads of rats that kept coming out of their burrow and sneaking food from the birds. Towards the end of the Aviary we came across a cute little mynah that was actually responding to people. It kept repeating ‘Moynah’ whenever someone called its name. Sometimes it would switch to a different sound - which sounded like it was tired of responding to us. It was one of the best sights I have ever seen of a bird!

Crane at the Aviary

The Mynah that kept talking! 

 

After almost 4hrs in the zoo we were terribly hungry. As we had already booked for the evening Brahmaputra Cruise, we had very limited time to have lunch. We tried looking for a vegetarian restaurant near the zoo or our hotel on Google and Zomato but found only cafes. We eventually ended up going to a very small fast food kind of place called 'Food Mantra' - a place we wouldn't step-in over here. It was so congested and the surrounding wasn't very clean. But on seeing us (and our visibly shocked faces!) the owner walked out to welcome us and insisted that we wait a few minutes for the table (the one and only,  except the bench against the wall) to clear. We quickly succumbed as we were so very hungry and tired and didn’t have the patience to look for anymore vegetarian places. 

There was not a single traditional Assamese food - just your standard fried rice, pulav, roti, sabji - dishes you would find in any standard North Indian and Chinese restaurant. However, the food was very yummy and quite economically priced too. We were a little worried about the kids catching any bugs as the place didn’t look very clean. It was almost a hole-in-the-wall kinda place with space for 12 (when tightly packed!). And the little glimpses of the kitchen we saw didn't fill us with anymore confidence. Thankfully kids didn’t show any negative reaction to the food. 

Grumpy and tired at Food Mantra

After a very brief rest at the room we started off for the Brahmaputra cruise by the Alfresco Grand cruise line company. When we booked the cruise, we only knew of two options - a sunset cruise and a cultural one with folk dance,food,etc. The latter was expensive for a group of 6 and was at 6-30 to 8 or so. So we opted for the sunset cruise. However, on arriving at the riverbank, we found that there was also another cruise where they take you to an island in the middle of the river and visit Umananda temple, which is supposed to be a very beautiful temple. Am sure by now you know we didn't get to go on this cruise. There was also a ropecar option that took you from shore to island and back. We couldn't go on this as well. I am not sure if people just want to answer your questions to the point or indifferent to a tourist’s interest in exploring their city. But no one gave us the complete options of what all we can do at the Brahmaputra. Though my friend told me about the temple and Sunset cruise, it was sometime back and too confusing to put it together until you are on the spot. Even our driver kept insisting that the ropecar was broken, whereas we saw people going back and forth right in front of our eyes! 

Anyways, the Sunset Cruise was a wonderful experience in itself. Not that we actually saw the setting sun…….there was slight darkness at one point and soon it was completely dark. So we didn't really see the sunset. But the slow moving of the ship, the wonderful music onboard and the discotheque was a great experience in itself. The cruise was very neatly arranged and well organized.  There was no confusion or hassle over which table to occupy. There was already a table for 6 that had our name plate. Likewise, everyone’s table was prebooked with no cause for confusion. 

Before boarding the cruise

Live music onboard

Guess who is not enjoying the cruise :p 

View from the cruise before it got dark

A final pic before leaving

The cruise had a mixed set of people onboard and I realized it serves different purposes for different people - a lot like a park! It was like a place to hangout for a group of young girls, a quiet evening for a family with older adults, a fun outing for a couple with a small kid, and a break from routine for a young mother who had come with her mother, child and a friend. The cruise had a mini bar-cum-restaurant  and live music, and much later a DJ as well. We ordered some snacks and tea for ourselves. Unlike all other places that are frank about serving only Nescafe or Machine coffee, this one had a cryptic coffee called ‘handmade coffee’. On enquiry we found out that they mix nescafe ‘by hand’ and make the coffee. Ahem….so again we avoided the coffee and went for the tea. However, my sister tried coffee a few times (not on the cruise though) and almost always repented. 

The live music included some melodious songs from 80s and 90s bollywood movies. All the songs were humworthy and were beautifully rendered by the singer. This was followed by a DJ who combined different catchy songs of Bollywood and turned the floor into a discotheque. It was so nice to see people of different age groups dancing to the music. A few in particular were having a lot of fun dancing. Anywhere else I would have been weary of the combination of discotheque and bar but here it was just people having harmless fun and minding their own business. We begged and begged the kids to join the crowd - and we have two dancers in our group! Still none of them would budge and unfortunately none of us have ever been on a dance floor. So we closed the evening on some borrowed fun, but exhilarated all the same!