The Voice In My Head…

(click to enlarge)

Ty to Vinu for sending this pic of the Mumbai bloggers meet up (already posted on this here).

Clockwise from bottom left are:

Dilip, Vijay, Me, Charu, Dina, Aditya (links to their blogs in my earlier post)

Manoj, Vibha (Dilip’s wife) & Nehtra (non-bloggers)

Scott, Veer, Akshay, Salma & Naina (links again in earlier post).

No pic of Vinu (as he’s taking the pic!!) and of Sakshi & Saket (as they came in much later).

They say ‘the pen is mightier than the sword’ and many mighty ones - who dual brave knights of all colors on the wonderful world wide web - showed up for the first Mumbai Bloggers Meet Up of the Year at the Bandra Carter Rd’s Cafe Coffee Day (which is a delightful place off the lovely sea coast).

It was also the first Blogger Meet Up I’ve attended though I’ve been blogging for over 3 years now. Consequently I was not really sure what to expect & it felt a bit like I was heading to a blind date

When I reached the place I was in another dilemma - had no clue whom I was looking for! Asked the staff if they knew of any **ahem, do I feel like a geek** “bloggers who were meeting up” & though one of them gave me “m’am, everyone here is meeting up” with the “HELLO??!” look, I was escorted out to a set of four tables on the outside.

Pretty much immediately recognised Akshay (from his profile pic on his blog) though he looks (and is) centuries younger than I thought he was, considering his brilliant photography - which proves that age isn’t a barrier for anything anymore!

Scott Rafer made it to the table almost the same time as I did, so we got common introductions to all who were at the table when we reached.

I was at this point sitting between Scott and Akshay, just opposite Aditya. Our end of the table seemed to be filled with brilliantly techy people who were talking a language I couldn’t understand (let alone try to speak) and pretty much everything said was gloriously floating over my head.

For Example: They were discussing among other things: Podcasts, Audio Blogs, Ryze (and honestly, I initially thought they were discussing RICE “Rice is very popular here in India”, sue me), RSS feeds, some dude Mr X (whose name and surname they all knew so well as if he were Gandhi) who was (is?) in the Bahamas and sending feeds to Pune to do #*&$^*$^#$*_#_@#@&*

HUH????

Ok, just smile Melody.

While all this conversation was over my head, the inside of my head is thinking, “I’m a writer, I blog. I have no clue what all this techy stuff is about and I don’t really want to”. But in the meanwhile, very normal looking girls (i.e. not geeky) like Charu and Dina seem to be brilliantly informed about all these things I’m just hearing about. Feel like a dumb blonde minus the blonde bit.

Time to migrate

The other end of the table has me sighing in relief. Firstly there’s Dilip, who (I find out from his blog later) is a published writer, a very down-to-earth-kurta-wearing father of two - which he generously brought along to the meet up (awwww, cho cweet!!) along with wifey. Wifey turns out to be old friend of my sis who’ve I met a couple of years back (ah! someone known, at last!).

Also present are (somewhat quiet) Salma & pretty bubbly Naina (who ordered a mouth watering looking chocolate doughnut, which she didn’t share, shame shame)

Right next to me was the very quiet (& let me add, sweet) Vijay . I asked him why he was so quiet & he just smiled at me. I later checked out his blog & was not very surprised to read the tagline “No questions asked, No answers given”

Veer came a little later, along with Vinu, who was armed with digicam (upon which everyone with cams got into frenzied action). It may be argued that I was principle ‘phototakeouting’ advocate, but we shall not get into that right now What matters is that pics were taken. And pics were promised all around (finally got one & posted here).

Joining us a little while later (almost on my way out, since I left early for the prayer meeting) was Saket and Sakshi who unfortunately had her arm in a sling after having had a nasty fall (get well soon!).

All in all, a good meeting. I enjoyed it all (techy stuff included) and was especially happy to meet so many new bloggers I hadn’t even encountered online (Akshay & Sakshi’s blogs are the only ones of the lot I read).

New friends, new blogs & new beginnings in the new year.

I’ll toast my coffee to that.

The image above is the Chinese sign for “Come” - and Come you must!

On Tuesday, 31st of January at 6 p.m. at the Carter Road - Cafe Coffee Day (Bandra West).

The full address is:
Shop No. 14/15,
Gagangiri Premises Building,
Ground Floor,
Carter Road
Bandra
Mumbai-52

You can confirm your attendance with Akshay, or I’m guessing, just show up.

DO COME (despite the fact that 6pm is pretty early), especially the lot of you who swing by here regularly - I’ll be there & it’ll be great to have a face to put together with the names & comments

Edited 31st Jan 06: Full report here!

Went & saw this movie last night @ Imax

What can I say? I’m a die-hard romantic. Kick me up my ass & I’ll still believe in love. I still believe in soul mates. I believe in God ordained partners. And even in this world of divorce, I believe that love lasts, that it conquers all.

This movie then, was just the chocolate sweet candy that reaffirms everything I believe in. It’s got a twist obviously (& if you don’t know it, I’m gonna do a spoiler now) - that Reese Witherspoon’s character is not alive. That (minor?) detail apart, this movie is a sweet love story between two unlikely souls.

On the down side, though catagorized a romantic comedy, there’s not too much of comedy. It’s also not very fast, but manages to keep you interested (it did me at least). And Mark Ruffalo is not my idea of a cute male lead for a romantic comedy, but then he does work for the character.

All in all though, a good movie. I especially like the fact that unlike the last romantic comedy I saw, which made me feel bad I didn’t have true love, this movie made me feel that no matter what, my soul mate will come to me.

Bring him on.

It’s finally ready

Have detailed my Goa Holiday in my new travel blog.

Be sure to scroll to the bottom of the page & read Day 1 first (so that you go in the right order).

Click the image below or go to http://travel.thevoiceinmyhead.com/

Well, it’s not exactly an ethic I buy into, but recently that’s what life has been. The parties haven’t stopped & work’s been piling up & turned crazier than ever…

An old friend of mine from college asked me out to dinner on Wednesday 18th night. Was not sure of going, but realllly glad I did as we were joined by 2 other guys from college (one whom I hadn’t met for 8 years!!) and it turned out to be SUCH a fun evening. We discussed everything from the first day of college to old college crushes, imitated our professors and caught up on the goss - who was seeing whom, who’s married, who’s having kids, (& unfortunately) who’s divorced.

We had dinner at Chinagate. Though I’m not big on Chinese food, Chinagate’s always been great. They’ve extended the place like crazy - I don’t even remember it being so big!! The food was amazing as always (average prices INR/- 200 Chicken, 400/- Seafood, which is great).

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It’s been another crazy week (realised after checking that last week update was on a Wednesday too).

Since my sis was leaving, we went to Nan’s place for her blessings. Nan (who has Alzeimher’s) was in a great mood - and better still - she actually remembered exactly who we were and where we were and prayed for us both long & sweetly… “God bless these graaaaaand daughters of mine”… I really love my nana!

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Almost everything about this romantic comedy was just brilliant and I was laughing out loud almost throughout the movie.

The very cute crooked nosed Owen Wilson (my darling!) and the very amazingly funny Vince Vaughn (whom I loved in ‘Be Cool’) do not dissapoint even for a second in this crazy comedy about two single guys who crash weddings to meet (just being discreet here) girls.

The story line’s fairly obvious but the one-liners keep you laughing all the way till the end. I love to watch weddings and there are tons of wedding scenes in this movie including an Indian one, where the Indian couple are doing shots (!!) and where our crashers introduce themselves as “Sanjay Collins” & “Chuck Vindaloo”

The movie may be slightly offensive to gay people though - I myself was little put off by the potrayal of the gay brother who’s more pyscho than homo.

Anyway, that aside the movie is a MUST SEE. Unless you’re single & moping, in which case the end will kill you and leave you more sad than ever (I kinda went through a flashback of the time I went to see Hitch, this time being much worse)…

Oh well, if there’s anything this movie teaches you is that you don’t need to have a wedding to have a good time.

So, here’s a pic of a proposal I got:

Just kiddin! Who has time for all that when you’re upto your ears (& over) in medical conferences? Thought I’d take a pic of Mr. Skely in the midst of my day to make you guys smile!

Brought in the NY in Goa & am planning a separate entry for that, so won’t elaborate on the first 3 days. Was back in Bbay on the 3rd night. Went out for a short drive after that. Came home all and slept very very sweetly.

Spent most of the 4th of Jan (Wed) relaxing in bed with my new Agatha Christie (bought 2 from the airport) - They Came to Baghdad. Loved the book, can’t wait to start the other one - The Big Four.

Night went to a really fabulous Jain wedding at the Radio Club Pier. The food was simply brilliant (tons of different cuisines besides Jain) but it was the fabulous decor that really blew my mind. Besides the orchids everywhere, the place was lit up like a fairy land in the middle of the sea & you could see the Gateway of India & the Taj Mahal all lit up too. Simply exquisite.

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