Caught napping!
I have book-marked a few blogs which includes aamirkhan.com, BigB’s blog amongst others. Aamir khan is not as regular as Amitab Bacchan when it comes to posting write-ups but topics are like his films-well chosen. Though I like Amitab Bachan’s writings personally. They inspire me at times. I had heard that Ram Gopal Barma, the famous Director also maintains a blog and out of curiosity I googled him.
And there was this website, which I thought was his blog, opened in the middle of the night with an ear-splitting scream (I didn't know my computer's volume had been cranked up).Imagine this: around midnight, alone in a flat, concentrating on the computer screen to see if there’s a blog or not and all of a sudden a lady with horrible looks, whose face is mutilated (it seems she is a “churail” in his new movie PHOONK) pops up in the screen and starts screaming/laughing. I was totally taken by surprise and was scared too(to be honest).
I suggest myself, “Forget about his blog, just go to sleep"!!!
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Friday, December 5, 2008
Barcelona in fast forward
I… found myself basking in the sun on Barcelona beach this year. Finally, something which I had not seriously thought had come true! Yes I did see Barcelona football club’s match, I did see Lionel Messi, Henri and others. This was the match (8th Nov 2008) where Barcelona thrashed Valladolid 6-0, including a hatrick (or may be quadrick?) from Samuel Oto’o. Worth what we paid, I must say as goalless draw or something similar would not have been too good.
Lionel Messi is no doubt one my favorite soccer players. I took photos of him playing so many times that my host, who is a scientist in a local university bantered, “You took 500 photos of messi alone”. Yes, for his consolation I did take a few photos of Henry and Jersey No. 2 (I don’t know his name) too in the end.
Inside the stadium, the atmosphere was exhilarating and people were fantastic. I asked a middle aged person if he could take a photo of us against the backdrop of football stadium. He not just obliged kindly but also went out of the way! He climbed up the stairs, leapt over a few rows and stood up on top of a vacant chair, asked us to change the pose, adjusted the lense, took time to click and it was indeed a great sight to see someone doing so many things for a stranger. However, the photos merely turned into a shot with three stupid people standing in front of a huge bill board or something but that’s a different story altogether. May be he over-zoomed us with 55-200 mm nikkor VR lense in fit of excitement, blurring the background which I was particularly interested in. Anyway, his friendly gesture was commendable, I must say!
Thanks to Andreu and Cyndie and especially Andreu’s fast forward travel approach (Fast forward because we literally ran from place to place, even I had put camera on sports mode so that I can catch important pictures without motion blur), we could see almost everything that Barcelona is famous for in just three days. The world heritage sites like Antoni Goudi’s masterpiece the Sagrada Church, Torre agbar building, the arc de Triomf, hotel arts, statue of Christopher Columbus and cozy lanes of Barcelona city buzzing with music and entertainment, everything was worth clicking. A Trek to castle in one of the evenings and watching crimson colored sky after sun was gone from the top of Argentona flaked by blue Sea and city blinking with lights were the best things to treat these eyes with.
A short Mountain bike ride, Spanish “dahi handi” festival and local food (called as tapas) in a restaurant was also equally delightful.
Second day, Andreu and Cyndie explained to me about all the famous places I ought to see. I did listen to them carefully before going out but could not make it to most of them!
I thought I‘d better start with the beach. But as I strolled along the beach and took photos of people, sea and other things (so many things indeed), day was already over soon. No, I can’t blame my camera (with whopping 8GB memory card) alone for being glued to the sea whole day and unable to make it to other places of interest.
Magnetic beauty of Mediterranean Sea and sun playing hide and seek with the cloud was an intoxicating combination, too difficult to walk away from. Moreover, extremely short days during winters in this part of Europe are equally responsible for my “super flop” supposedly “one day-whole city-outing” which I end up spending in sea shore alone!
On the last day, we went to Andreu’s lab as he had some experiments to do. As I had ample time, I went out to a nearby metro and got into a train going towards “somewhere”. I had arrived at a station near national art museum unknowingly; I spent some time looking at children playing soccer with an empty water bottle. A group of people sitting on the stairs were busy sketching various portraits, while a few young couples were seen romancing.
After an hour or so I walked away from there and few yards away was an Olympic stadium (Spain had hosted summer Olympic 1992) which was surprisingly open. Yes it was free! I took my breakfast there, clicked photos, bought some momentos (from a surprised place that I had reached without knowing) and then left for the university again retracing the same path. You see, some times walking is important, having a fixed destination isn’t.
Anyway, by the time I reached university and took lunch with Andreu and Cyndie it was time to bid farewell to Barcelona already! Three days in Spain was surely more fun filled than any travel agent on earth could have claimed through their packages. Many thanks to my hosts: Andreu and Cyndie.
I… found myself basking in the sun on Barcelona beach this year. Finally, something which I had not seriously thought had come true! Yes I did see Barcelona football club’s match, I did see Lionel Messi, Henri and others. This was the match (8th Nov 2008) where Barcelona thrashed Valladolid 6-0, including a hatrick (or may be quadrick?) from Samuel Oto’o. Worth what we paid, I must say as goalless draw or something similar would not have been too good.
Lionel Messi is no doubt one my favorite soccer players. I took photos of him playing so many times that my host, who is a scientist in a local university bantered, “You took 500 photos of messi alone”. Yes, for his consolation I did take a few photos of Henry and Jersey No. 2 (I don’t know his name) too in the end.
Inside the stadium, the atmosphere was exhilarating and people were fantastic. I asked a middle aged person if he could take a photo of us against the backdrop of football stadium. He not just obliged kindly but also went out of the way! He climbed up the stairs, leapt over a few rows and stood up on top of a vacant chair, asked us to change the pose, adjusted the lense, took time to click and it was indeed a great sight to see someone doing so many things for a stranger. However, the photos merely turned into a shot with three stupid people standing in front of a huge bill board or something but that’s a different story altogether. May be he over-zoomed us with 55-200 mm nikkor VR lense in fit of excitement, blurring the background which I was particularly interested in. Anyway, his friendly gesture was commendable, I must say!
Thanks to Andreu and Cyndie and especially Andreu’s fast forward travel approach (Fast forward because we literally ran from place to place, even I had put camera on sports mode so that I can catch important pictures without motion blur), we could see almost everything that Barcelona is famous for in just three days. The world heritage sites like Antoni Goudi’s masterpiece the Sagrada Church, Torre agbar building, the arc de Triomf, hotel arts, statue of Christopher Columbus and cozy lanes of Barcelona city buzzing with music and entertainment, everything was worth clicking. A Trek to castle in one of the evenings and watching crimson colored sky after sun was gone from the top of Argentona flaked by blue Sea and city blinking with lights were the best things to treat these eyes with.
A short Mountain bike ride, Spanish “dahi handi” festival and local food (called as tapas) in a restaurant was also equally delightful.
Second day, Andreu and Cyndie explained to me about all the famous places I ought to see. I did listen to them carefully before going out but could not make it to most of them!
I thought I‘d better start with the beach. But as I strolled along the beach and took photos of people, sea and other things (so many things indeed), day was already over soon. No, I can’t blame my camera (with whopping 8GB memory card) alone for being glued to the sea whole day and unable to make it to other places of interest.
Magnetic beauty of Mediterranean Sea and sun playing hide and seek with the cloud was an intoxicating combination, too difficult to walk away from. Moreover, extremely short days during winters in this part of Europe are equally responsible for my “super flop” supposedly “one day-whole city-outing” which I end up spending in sea shore alone!
On the last day, we went to Andreu’s lab as he had some experiments to do. As I had ample time, I went out to a nearby metro and got into a train going towards “somewhere”. I had arrived at a station near national art museum unknowingly; I spent some time looking at children playing soccer with an empty water bottle. A group of people sitting on the stairs were busy sketching various portraits, while a few young couples were seen romancing.
After an hour or so I walked away from there and few yards away was an Olympic stadium (Spain had hosted summer Olympic 1992) which was surprisingly open. Yes it was free! I took my breakfast there, clicked photos, bought some momentos (from a surprised place that I had reached without knowing) and then left for the university again retracing the same path. You see, some times walking is important, having a fixed destination isn’t.
Anyway, by the time I reached university and took lunch with Andreu and Cyndie it was time to bid farewell to Barcelona already! Three days in Spain was surely more fun filled than any travel agent on earth could have claimed through their packages. Many thanks to my hosts: Andreu and Cyndie.
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