1. Who gave Amitabh his name? What are Amitabh and Ajitabh’s pet names?

2. What are the names of the Bachchan bungalows in Mumbai and Delhi? Which home was renamed and what was the original name?

3. Years ago, in the days of Bofors, an anguished Bachchan penned a poem which was published in a magazine of repute. Give me the name of the poem and the magazine it was published in.

4. Before Brand Bachchan was launched via ABCL, he was turned into a comic book character. Name the superhero based on Bachchan.

5. Name the movie where Amitabh’s parents, Harivanshrai and Teji Bachchan played a ‘blink and you would miss it’ role.

6. What was the name of the audio company launched by ABCL which released his album of pop/remixed songs? The name of the album? And the composer who did the remixes for him?

7. Before he made it big as a hero, he tried his hand at a talent hunt organized by film magazine ‘Madhuri’. He lost the contest. But who was the winner that year?

8. Amitabh just loved a tune called ‘Yeke yeke’ by

9. ’Karim Abdul’ stopped working with Amitabh after a great journey together, because AB refused to do a guest appearance in his film he was making. Who is this Karim Abdul?

10. Name the movies where Amitabh is called Vijay? And 3 movies where his name is Vijay Verma.

Good luck!

Now here comes good news for women who are fighting a losing battle while struggling to get themselves into the latest slim fit jeans. A generously proportioned derriere actually means the owner is less prone to develop Type 2 diabetes mellitus.

A study by Kahn and colleagues from Harvard, published in Cell Metabolism claims that the kind of fat which accumulates around the hips and bottoms may have a protective effect as it improves the sensitivity to the effect of insulin. The study involved donor mice whose subcutaneous fat was transplanted to other mice under their skin and bellies. Mice that underwent fat transplant in bellies had better metabolism and controlled blood sugar compared to the other category.

Is that ample butt ample reason to rejoice and sit on your bum all day? Not all researchers are so enthusiastic about the extrapolation of results from mice to men. Far fetched conclusions or not– temporary heartening news for women with plus sizes like me!

Any guesses to the film? It is from my all time favourite ‘Deewar’ starring Amitabh and Parveen Babi. The singer is listed as Ursula in the credits of the film. Any info on her buddies? Enjoy the song. It grows on you…I bet I’ll be humming it all day.

PS: Any other interesting original English songs composed for Hindi movies, that you can think of? A friend wrote to me about Nasir Hussain’s ‘Zamaane ko dikhana hai’. This one is not on the LP, but some googling helped to discover this unusual number called ‘There could be so much joy to living‘ sung by Joe Alvares. Incidentally Joe Alvares also sang a song called ‘Shame’ in the recent ‘Mumbai Matinee’.

Push a little harder and maybe we can move mountains together!

Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
Campbeltown Loch, och aye!
Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
I would drink you dry.

Now, Campbeltown Loch is a beautiful place,
A place where the whisky is trim;
How nice it would be if the whisky was free,
And the loch was full up to the brim.

Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
Campbeltown Loch, och aye!
Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
I would drink you dry.

I’d buy a yacht with the money I got,
I’d anchor her out in the bay;
If I wanted a nip, I’d go in for a dip,
I’d be swimming by night and by day.

Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
Campbeltown Loch, och aye!
Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
I would drink you dry.

We have a gathering of the clans,
They come from near and far;
I can see them grin as they’re wading in,
And jumping from the bar.

Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
Campbeltown Loch, och aye!
Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
I would drink you dry.

But what if the boat should overturn,
And drowned in the Loch was I?
You would hear me shout, you would hear me call out,
“What a wonderful way to die!”

Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
Campbeltown Loch, och aye!
Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
I would drink you dry.

But what’s this I see, ochone for me,
It’s a vision to make your blood freeze;
It’s the police afloat in a dusty bright boat,
And they’re shouting, “Time, gentlemen, please!”

Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
Campbeltown Loch, och aye!
Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
I would drink you dry.

Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
Campbeltown Loch, och aye!
Oh, Campbeltown Loch, I wish you were whisky,
I would drink you dry.

PS: Should Scotland’s famous beverage be spelt ‘whisky’ or ‘whiskey”? Well, the ‘water of life’ as the Scots call their brew, was originally called whisky (plural=whiskies). And the Irish and Americans concocted their own versions which they felt was superior and to distinguish it from the Scottish version called it whiskey (plural=whiskeys). Ask a pure bred Scot and he will tell you the Scottish whisky is the original and the Yankees can’t spell right! A simple rule of the thumb is that if your drink comes from a country which has an ‘e’ in its name, spell whisky with an ‘e’; else dispense with it!

Hamish with our fabulous guide Patrick

We met Hamish enroute to Stirling Castle in Killmahog. All tourist buses stop here to meet Hamish, and there is a ’snack bar’ for you to buy Hamish some bananas and veggies- Nice neat business sense!

Highland cattle need to be protected from the Scottish winters and they have a thick coat of fur- hence that epithet ‘Hairy Cow’. This sheds off during spring. What I loved most was Hamish’s fringe, which protects him from the wintery winds. Hamish has become so used to tourists that he has now learnt to pose for cameras. His horns look scary, but he is a docile gentle fellow.

Hamish posing for the camera

I learnt that Hamish is quite a celebrity having made appearances on BBC. During the Mad Cow crisis, there was a campaign to save Hamish from slaughter, and he was let off as he was not allowed to mix with other cattle. He is a loner- this Hamish— but has now retired after serving for some glorious years at the Stirling Smith Art Gallery.

And guess what- I found several videos on youtube, some showing him in his spring hairless avtaar.

I remember one scene from around 20 years ago at Nagpur. Then, Nagpur wasn’t the beautiful cosmopolitan city it is now, and students who descended from the urban parts of Northern India, particularly Delhi, were prone to turning up their noses, when they reached here- for it wasn’t classy enough, didn’t have shopping malls and the only forms of entertainment were the local cinema halls. But in Nagpur, you didn’t need to speak Marathi, except to rural patients, as most people understood Hindi well.

One of my friends, a rather pretty 20 year old, decided to visit Akola with her new friends on a holiday. Now, she was rather new to the state, and Marathi was a complete no-no. As luck would have it, the train they chose to travel in was overtaken by the goons of a political rally, and they had hundreds of ticketless travellers thronging the compartments. This group of young girls couldn’t even reach their berths and had to suffer standing in the aisles till they reached Akola, being jostled and shoved by all kinds of people.

After a few hours of standing and being jolted in that uncomfortable position, their patience had given way. And when an old man in his 60s tried to push past my friend, she almost screamed, “Kidhar jaana hai, babaji?” (Where do you want to go?). To which the old man murmured “Sandaas jaana hai” (I need to go to the toilet). And my glamorous friend, almost screeched, “Sandaas Akola ke pehle aata hai ya baad mein?” (Does Sandaas come before or after Akola)!!! Needless to add everyone in the compartment was in splits despite the stress of travelling like that.

Another incident which did the rounds in Medical School concerned a Mizo student who was struggling with Hindi in the first place, and had a rougher time comprehending Marathi. During one village visit, he found a mother explaining her child’s symptoms. He needed to ask the mother whether the child had worm infestation. After mulling over how to ask the question, he made a such a boo-boo that the mother almost jumped out of her seat. He asked the mother whether her kid passed ‘janaawar’ (animals!) in his stool!

There are loads of such stunning tales from Medical School. Some other day- till we try to decipher the nuances of the languages of India.

Gold at last!: Abhinav Bindra finally fulfilled that dream of every India to see an individual gold medal in the Olympic tally. Better late than never for a country with a population of over a billion.

Yes you can!: Barack Obama at his post victory Chicago speech. Poised and down to earth in triumph, and yet confident and measured in stating his intentions. A new fresh wave of hope for the world.

Rage over reason?: The aftermath of the Mumbai carnage had one silver lining- for once Indians forgot the narrow divisions of regionalism and religion and found their collective Indian identity. For how long? Don’t know. But in one voice, everyone felt that they needed to do something for the country– rage which needs to be channelized constructively.

Singh is King moments: Indian cricket reigned supreme. Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Yuvraj Singh, Harbhajan Singh and all the other good men in that great team gave us ample moments to smile. Mostly when they made the Aussies bite the dust, and replied back to all that sledging and those unsporting gestures in a befitting manner. And despite the honorable exit of Saurav and Anil Kumble, the Indian juggernaut continues to roll on.

Destination moon: The successful launch of Chandrayaan-1 and the tricolour reaching the moon was cause for cheer in India. Another feather in ISRO’s cap for its economy class travel whch cost less than the price of a Jumbo Jet.

The Grand Vizier of Chess triumphs: Vishwanathan Anand as the undisputed czar of chess after his win over Kramnik. Shy, gentle and yet confident- Vishy is the king of our hearts.

Ratan Tata as India’s role model: Whether it was his decision to withdraw Nano from West Bengal, to reopen the Taj Hotel as soon as possible after the Mumbai terror attacks, or when Tata Motors bought over Jaguar and Land Rover from the Ford company, you had to doff your hat to Ratan Tata for his conviction. Leading from the front and inspirational stuff.

There were too many gruesome moments in 2008 too, but I prefer to chronicle the triumph of the human spirit rather than record the abyssmal lows of human character.

The internet now has several versions of the “Throw a shoe at Bush” game. You can download one here (The Shoe game) which has been doing the rounds on email. The Israeli company Mind 360 actually claims that its Bush Shoe Incident Game  measures your response time and provides brain training for leadership (something Bush desperately needs!). Catch another boring game called Bye Bye Bush here. A more interesting version which allows the Arab world to vent their ire is the Shoe Bush Worldwide game which allows you to yell in either English or Arabic and whack Bush with your choice of shoe. Once you get the shoe on his face thrice, it comes with an offer to buy a “I whacked Bush with a shoe in cyberspace” T shirt and cap. The Whackometer today showed that the maximum whacks came from America.

George W Bush called the incident ‘a sign of free society’. I was wondering if we in India, the largest democracy, exercised this freedom, how many of our top politicians would get this shoe-bash as a gift from its citizens.

                           Click the pics to enlarge

DAWN

I try to flee away from darkness

The leashes of propriety to free

To rush to the shores unbridled

And express my mirth and glee.

The waves reflect the turbulence within

A realization of my insignificance too-

A glimmer of crimson at the horizon

Lines the unending expanse of blue.

It’s a new morn, an awakening-

A promise of a bright new day

Wash away all those emotions

Fling those chains far away!

Walk up straight, your head held high

Sway not by the harshness of the sun

The night of pain has ended

Your tryst with your past perhaps won.