Film fest - weekend dhamaka

With unseen movies piling up in my hard disk, I could not ignore the fact any further and started watching them yesterday. What had kept me so long from watching those movies was my schedule, a product release to a new client. But the story doesn’t end there. What little time that was extracted from my sleeping hours was dedicated to playing FIFA 2010. So I started off with “Double Indemnity”. It was one heck of a movie and for the movie being released during the war, around 1944; it still stands the test of time. Casting was spot on and the screenplay was spellbinding, not to forget the dialogues. If I were to rate the movie, every department in that movie would score a minimum of 9/10. It is worth a watching more than once and for the writer’s sheer brilliance that radiates in his dialogues.

Since I could not stay away from FIFA 10, the idea of watching back to back movies was shelved and was continued today with “Wakeup Sid”. This cannot be compared with the earlier movie as both belong to different genres and I ended up liking the movie. It was filled with restrained performances from the artists and a stirring music from Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy. Nothing new has been churned out in this movie but the director had to be lauded for his efforts for not offering a tearjerker the production company is known to serve the audience.

Time to sign off now and resume my duties: Folder “Kaminey” is screaming for attention that I am yet to pay my respects toward it. It’s a long weekend ahead and movies galore.

Savouring till the last morsel at..... Giorgio

I was so engrossed with my office work that I couldn’t keep in touch with my friends for over 2 months. I don’t remember a similar instance prior to this since joining the IT workforce. So this led to a meeting of sorts and catching up with updates during dinner. We had to decide a restaurant and we wanted to try out someplace we haven’t been. I gave a call to my colleague (fondly called “Macha”¹ by his peers) who can rant about n number of restaurants in any place you ask for. People look toward him for suggestions on apparels/footwear/movies/Tours/anything under the sun. To cut a long story short, we use him as our yellow pages. I gave my location and my expectation and pat came the reply.... “Giorgio”.

Few meters from the Beseant Nagar church is this small restaurant where I feel the management never had to turn away any diner as it was empty bare 2 tables and it was a SATURDAY. We settled ourselves in a corner and started glancing at the menu. It was a multi cuisine restaurant that boasts with serving food varieties from more than 10 countries’. A usual routine of Soups with starters’ formality was completed with a Mexican (Nachos) and Indian (Baby corn & Mushroom) starters. It was decidedly yummy and I knew we were in for a feast. Soon, the main course followed with pastas (Al Forno and Cantolleni) and sizzlers. Both were rich in cheese, no doubt about that except that the sizzler had an Indian/Italian mix of vegetables while the pastas had more of mushroom. The starters had tickled the taste buds and when this irresistible food was placed on that table I started devouring them as if it was my last meal. If you find too much of mushroom in the food we ordered you have myself to blame for, I am mad about mushrooms or shall we say obsessed? I try to squeeze in as much mushroom as possible when I have my food outside and even enjoy mushroom “Masala Dosai”² in Ratna Cafe apart from those “Idly Sambars”³.

After this heady mix, we thought we could still attempt at having a Pizza and an order was placed for the same. No surprises there, a mushroom pizza of course. This was not of the type you get a Pizza huts and corners or the ones you get at authentic Italian restaurants – Little Italy/Bella Ciao. It was a sumptuous meal and none of the items were found lacking in taste. Though the pricing is on the higher side, I would still recommend people to try out here. One of the best I have had in the last few months and being a food freak, it was gratifying.

All said and done, my favourite food will always be “Vatha Kuzhambu, Thachi mammu and vadumangai”⁴.

PS:

1: Refers to being lucky and not to be confused with “Machan”.

2, 3, 4: South Indian food items.