Just watched Walk The Line (2005), a sort of biopic on Johnny Cash and June Carter. It’s a riveting film that recreates the 50s in which the two musicians met, performed, and eventually married. The music scene at the time had Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Dylan, and Waylon Jennings amongst others, and it’s so great to see them appear on and off through the film. Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon are brilliant and the story of how their love returns him to his former glory, after a pill-popping roller-coaster ride, is touching. Music, history, a Hollywood film made with a measure of sensitivity; what more could you ask for on a lazy last day of the weekend. Here’s an original video of the title song.
I’ve always felt you can take the pulse of a city by its cab drivers - kinda like you can tell how good the sushi will be based on the miso soup. Or something like that! Anyway, in Bombay, meaningful conversation in a taxi is easy to come by - with someone from a much different world than yours. But for that inching hour, the traffic is an odd equalizer. You might talk about the state of the city, the politicians who run it, the people who breathe its polluted yet addictive air. It makes for a happy tipper. In Dubai, on the other hand, it’s once in a blue moon that you get a semi-sane driver. Leave conversation alone, you spend most of the time cringing or clinging. Yanne, you tip solely if you are in one piece - both mentally and physically - as the taxi screeches to a halt, khalaas!
“What good fortune for those in power that people do not think.”
Interesting thought, especially when you consider the role of the music or movie industries or even advertising in popular culture. I often find people in the biz that consider others - especially consumers - as fools. Then they deliver mediocrity of a kind that is really unacceptable, but it is often lapped up!
Unfortunate that those words are Hitler’s and we still see his vision play out day after day around us. Isn’t it time that people became less naive to the phenomenon? It might be wise to heighten awareness and learn how to see through sugar-coated manipulations. But more than anything else, I wish we would all pay just a little heed to to our intuition.
