watched meenaxi twice in a row this evening. i'm quite fascinated altho no meaning came out of it, which makes me like it even better. hoho. Tabu is fabolous, gorgeous, terrific and sensuous. as a hyderabadi maiden, or a jaisalmer lady or maria from prague, she gets into the skin of the character effortlessly. esp the accent n body language of each of them. and more esp, her czech-slovenian accented hindi. completely adorable. so lovely. tabu has always looked beyond her years to me. in fact, it appears as a crime of condescension of nth degree when she chooses to play the routine girl. the half before the interval is better. some scenes of chemistry+humor between raghuvir yadav n tabu are amazing. kunal kapoor transforms into an actor of calibre as the movie goes on. the dialogues are out of the world. i need to sit down n produce a transcript soon. hoho. lazeez urdu zubaan ki baareekiyon se manje hue lafz aur kiredaar. har ek lamhe mein ek deewangi hai. the movie carries itself fwd with variance of Tabu's character n corresponding varied art of courtship of her man. as for the meaning, i think its basically abt inordinate pursual of romanticism. very aesthetic presentation. while direction, screenplay, actors seem to lose hold at few moments, overall i loved the aura created.

i was in cleveland for St. Thyagaraja Aradhana on saturday. altho we planned to catch the last two days, one full day of back2back concerts was sufficient to cause a buffer-overflow as my pal put it. my earlier fears of not being able to tolerate a carnatic concert were almost confirmed until the rejuvenating aruna sairam concert at the end of the day. i guess i'm too accustommed to n indian classical patterns n basically wasnt satisfied till i found hints of them here n there. plenty of raags are common in between, shivranjini n yaman being the favs. found myself humming jaane kahan gaye wo din, mere naina sawan bhado in between. inspite of all that, i found to my amazement how intoxicating cud such musical sessions can be provided one is ready to put in some initial aural effort. when i left, i was drunk like hell n cud take in infinite more. the only other such concert for me i rem was a n indian one, organized by spicmacay in calcutta few years back. all of us in the family sat awake all thru nite. an eminent passion, junoon takes over. aside: i wish there was a n indian classical festival once a year in amrika too.

and finally, found myself humming tu jo mila from alisha chinai's long forgotten Om. a sweet, lovely pleasing melodious number sung with child-like innocence. she is gorgeous, aint she?