2
2. MASTER A SIGNATURE COCKTAIL
u o Y e r o f e B o D To
THE HUB
00 THINGS
Before you hit the bucket, master something that you can shake and pour better than your buddies or your brotherin-law. Word to the wise: avoid the Dirty Nipple school of sips. You don’t want to offer your future father-in-law Sex on the Beach or brew your boss a Blow Job. Go for straight-up classics like a martini, Manhattan or mojito, all multi-tasking cups that you can cheerfully offer your mother or your wife’s best friend as well as to guys, with variations for all tastes. Make sure all ingredients are bar basics – certainly no perry or sake that requires a shopping with a passport, nor regional specialities like palm toddy.
3.IS THE EARTH REALLY ROUND? GO CHECK
Is it really? Many of us would have no firsthand confirmation if it is actually true. Set sail in one direction and don’t stop till you reach home from the other? Commander Dilip Donde of Indian Navy is the only Indian to have circumnavigated the globe, alone, in his sailboat. Statutory warning: Before you attempt any such adventure, take valuable tips from Commander Donde. It is no easy task to keep your sanity when you are alone in a boat in the middle of a raging sea for months. It’s fine, of course, if you are able to rope in a few more “like-minded” friends.
1. GO ON A PILGRIMAGE It doesn’t matter whether you have bags of money or are poorer than a crow. If you’ve never thought of it seriously, take heed, and plan a trip to a holy city some time soon. Don’t bother about all the sneers from your peers. Put it in the right context and tell them the rising popularity of religious pilgrimages stems from a modern lifestyle linked to a constant search for new experiences. Heavy duty, huh? Rest assured, this will silence all those still living in darkness. 054 | JANUARY 11
LEARN TO BOIL! Try rice, eggs, at least five kinds of vegetables, lentils (masoor, or red lentils, is easiest) and importantly, tea and coffee, so you can eat anytime and add a decent beverage (which includes soup). Bonus survival points in the urban jungle if you can duplicate all of that in a microwave oven.
5. AH, THAT ONE
‘LAST’ MEAL
By the time you are getting ready to make the final journey (most probably, not out of choice), you may not be in a mood, or even position, to savour many things you’ve always wanted to eat. Plan carefully and don’t die feeling cheated. There’s no fun salivating for that kebab or chocolate cake while you are counting your last breath. It’s the same for drinks too. Look at it as your ‘last big’ meal and don’t bother about the numbers on the right side of the menu.
Be brave... see if ghosts exist You see, it won’t be a bad idea to check out where you would be once you say bye to the world. We’ve been told since childhood there is no such thing as a ghost. But still, somewhere in your heart, you always feel somebody lurking around in a dark lonely room or a road. Go check out if there is actually somebody out there. A good starting point could be a visit to the Valley of Ghosts in Crimea, Ukraine. 055 | JANUARY 11
7.ADDRESS A GATHERING
are here, don’t miss the sun bears, gibbons and Sumatran rhinoceros, all of which are also taken care of at the centre.
12. JOURNEY INTO SPACE
Now this one is a costly affair and many pitless pots of money is not enough to ensure a trip to the final frontier. You need to plan it much in advance and then book a seat before waiting for years to get the boarding call. Because, this is one thing thousands others too want to do before they die. There is help at hand though. Maverick entrepreneur Richard Branson seems very close to fulfilling his dream of affordable space tourism. Watch this space for more!
8.CHALLENGE GRAVITY
AR DRONE
Admit it! Lurking inside each of us is child that never grew up. Try your paws at this iPhone-controlled Parrot AR Drone quadricopter and watch yourself gurgle with glee like a 6-year old. Flaunting four fans that allow it to wing out in any direction, the Drone toy chopper is controlled by the motion of the phone’s built-in accelerometer (or motion sensor which senses whether the phone is being tilted up, down, left, right, etc.) to steer the its flight. Fitted with two cameras, this amazing chopper even streams real-time video back to the iPhone or iPod Touch that controls it. So you can fly it sitting in the next room via the video feed you are receiving on your iPhone!
THE HUB
We bet every time you hear US President Barack Obama speak, you secretly wish you had one fourth of his oratory skills. Even less would be handy, you tell yourself. No? It is understandable. The thought of being able to inspire so many people is exhilarating. Forget leading a nation out of the financial crisis through your speeches. You should perhaps try speaking, at least once, at the annual meeting of the local Resident’s Welfare Association. What say?
13.PILOT A PARROT
15. SEARCH FOR THE AURORA BOREALIS
Fly like a bird
You’ve lived all your life with it... there was no escaping it. See how it is to live without gravity, at least once. Skydive out of a plane flying at 32,000 ft, or plunge to the depths from a bungee platform. It’s exhilarating, to say the least. To rebel, momentarily, against the most drearily immutable law on earth. That’s what the daredevils who’ve done it say about defying gravity.
9
BREAK THE SOUND BARRIER
How fast is fast for you? If your answer is faster than the speed of sound, then read on. Get into the cockpit of a fighter plane in Russia. The jet flying takes place in Nizhny, Russia’s third largest city a few hours from Moscow. Some of the best pilots are found in this city, which is where more than 30 countries buy their military aircraft from. Choose the MiG 31Foxhound or the MiG 29, say hello to Russia’s top test pilots at the Nizhny airbase, have one of them sit next to you as you take off, and climb up to 80,000 ft as you travel at twice the speed of sound. Once you touch ground, catch a drink with the pilots to celebrate your experience. Avoid flying in the winter months and if you are not content with the idea of just one, then just sign up for one of the multi-flight packages on offer. 056 | JANUARY 11
Or like a kite. Whatever you compare it to, paragliding is the purest form of flight known to mankind. You have the elements for company when you are up there in sky, and may be, an occassional wandering bird. By making use of the rising currents of warm air, you can stay afloat for hours and travel great distance. Paragliding is already very popular here in India and if you couldn’t ever gather enough courage to try your hands on it, don’t wait. Now is the time.
11. FLY TO BORNEO AND SPEND A DAY WITH ORANG-UTANS
For this one, you need to fly to the islands of Borneo and Sumatra. You see, these lovely animals were once found all over south east Asia, from java in the south to China in the north. But today, there numbers are dwindling – only about 60,000 of these are left in the world. It is indeed mesmerising to see Asia’s great ape in the wild and you sure should put it on your to-do list. Fly down to the city of Kota Kinabalu, on the northwest Malaysian coast of Borneo facing the South China Sea, and from here, go to the world-famous Sepilok Orang-Utan Rehabilitation Centre. This is the oldest and largest centre of its kind where a team of professionals work tirelessly to take care of abandoned, abused and orphaned orang-utans. And while you
CHECK OUT THE A FROZEN CONTINENT
You have seen no light shows if you haven’t seen The Northern Lights, or the Aurora Borealis. Wikipedia describes it thus: “These are natural light display in the sky, particularly in the polar regions, caused by the collision of charged particles directed by the Earth’s magnetic field. An aurora is usually observed at night and typically occurs in the ionosphere. These phenomena are commonly visible between 65 and 72 degrees north and south latitudes, which place them in a ring just within the Arctic and Antarctic polar circles.” Go find.
Now, you don’t want us to tell you anything more about Antarctica. Still, if you insist. It’s the world’s coldest continent, and also the driest. Did you know that it doesn’t often snow there and rain is rarer still. There is no continent like Antarctica on earth, period. It has no government and belongs to no country. How about visiting this desert at least once in your lifetime. During summers in Antarctica, several companies offer excursions to the many islands of the continent. Most cruises depart from Ushuaia in Argentina, Punta Arenas in Chile, Bluff in New Zealand or Hobart in Australia and longer cruises often take in the likes of South Georgia and the Falkland Islands.
16. JOIN A CIRCUS SCHOOL We’ve included this for no reason but to help you become a star performer! Remember the times when you tell yourself, or a friend, that you want to leave all the stress of everyday living and run away to join a circus? Well, not that there are no tensions in a circus group. How about joining such a school. Who knows, before you die, you could be performing a back flip or be able to juggle more than just work schedules. Most of these schools have classes catering to all skill levels, from absolute beginners to advanced. Don’t leave this world without learning to do an acrobatic balancing, tumbling or mastering the trapeze. 057 | JANUARY 11
17. THE ISLAND OF LESBOS?
23. WATCH A CLASSIC
18. EAT AN INSECT!
19
20. OWN A HOUSE OF
YOUR OWN WITH NO MORTGAGES Speaking of bets, you’ll beat the pants off most pals if you can eat an insect, any insect (no, crustaceans don’t count) without flinching. Catch yourself on video for best results, and be prepared for an encore. If you’re squeamish about taking lives (note: this cannot be only insect life!), try a fermented food such as fermented bean paste or fermented tofu or bamboo shoot – stink is the next culinary separator sieving the big boys from the peewee playground.
21. WRITE YOUR WILL This is important. Assuming that you have a collection of pots full of money, it is imperative that you write your will and give it to your lawyer or spouse. Write everything, even about all those who owe you money. At least, once you are gone, the ones you leave behind will sincerely say: RIP.
25. CONFRONT A CHILDHOOD BULLY Thank Facebook, Orkut, or any social networking site. Finding him out was never easier. Indian regional classics are not just vernacular icons but works that pulled technical progress in cinema to whole new levels. Like the New Wave cinema inaugurated by Satyajit Ray in the Apu trilogy or Pratidwandi. Yet language barriers often sell these accomplishments short. So do as you would with great world cinema: take a language class or read the subtitles – but go watch because there’s much to be proud of. Andha Naal was the first southern Indian film sans a song-and-dance routine, but an even more sensational ‘first’ in its time was Raja Harishchandra – it might look dated today, but to understand the revolution that was India’s first feature film, in 1913, watch Harishchandrachi Factory, last year’s most acclaimed Marathi film (it was officially released in January 2010, but has pitched into awards since 2009).
22. TAME 22 AME T THE DEVI DEVIL Probably bab the most aggres aggressive ve evolution of Ducati’s tradi traditional design language, the Diavel (Devil in Bolognese dialect) iss a high-performance nak naked bike recently revealed by Ducati. (Devi lognese diale No, don’t just ust stop at its stunning looks. The Diavel aalso packs a sizeable punch when it comes to performanc performance: Its power comes es courtesy a 160bhp Testastretta engine that is paired to a 6-speed gearbox. Given its striking speeed gearbo ng looks and the Ducati heritage, the Diavel is nothing short must-have in yyour collection. course, needless to say, if you are a petrol head, rt of a mustction. Of co you ou mustt experience the thrill of a Diavel at least once in your lifetime. 058 | JANUARY 11
THE BIG 7 You’ve heard of the Big Five: Lions, elephants, rhinos, leopards, buffalos... Add whales and the great white sharks to the list of what South Africa is famous for. Of course, other than their cricket team and a certain Mr. Nelson Mandela. Believe us, it is a life-altering feeling to confront these majestic creatures in their natural habitat. The fun doesn’t stop at these beastly seven. When you are in one of the many game reserves in this part of the world, keep an eye out for a multitude of other wildlifers strolling around in their territory. And when you’ve had enough of the best of this world, make your way to one of the many wine cellars the country is famous for to spend a lazy afternoon checking out the pictures you’ve clicked.
SAY ‘HELLO’ IN 15 LANGUAGES
You sure don’t want us to tell you what these languages could be. Just be ingenious, creative, and even push yourself a bit while choosing the languages.
24. THE BIG 5? NAH, IT’S THE HUB
Don’t get us wrong. The Island of Lesbos, also called Lesovo, is Greece’s very own “Emerald Island” tucked away in the north east corner of the Aegean Sea. One of the sunniest and beautiful places in Greece that is still unspoilt by mass tourism, Lesbos is the country’s third, and the seventh largest, island in the Mediterranean. The good thing about this place is that wherever you go, you are never too far from the sea, thanks to Lesbo’s two practically land-locked gulfs that penetrate the island to its very core. It boasts of 250 square miles of coastline. To put it in perspective, Lesbos is just 630 square miles long.
REGIONAL FILM
S SLIM, SEXY, SWIFT... MACB MACBOOK PRO IT IS No matter how much you have read about it, or gawked at its photos and ads, nothing can prepare you for this ultra-portable’s incredible slimness, sexiness and swiftness. Cunning craftsmanship ensures that it measures an astonishing 0.11 inches (0.3cm) at its thinnest taper point and a phenomenal feat of engineering restricts it to 0.68 inches (1.7cm) at it thickest. Weight? 1.06 kg. Inside throbs an 1.6GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 3MB on-chip shared L2 cache, 4GB of RAM, Nvidia Geforce 320M graphics and a solid state disk storage that lend it mind-blowing speed. The MacBook Air is all about velocity.
27. LIVE AND WORK ABROAD
You would have surely fantasised about it with your spouse. Working in a swanky seafacing bungalow, driving past picturesque landscape everyday to reach your office on the top floor of a skyscraper. Start searching for openings now, and don’t think twice before taking a sabbatical.
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28. WATCH A TENNIS MATCH AT WIMBLEDON AND ENJOY STRAWBERRIES AND CREAM
30. GO, FIGURE OUT ORIENTALISM
If you are in India, there is a reason why you must take a professional tea tasting course. Because we grow some of the world’s finest – not just the one silver leaf. After all, what kind of foodie propounds on French haute cuisine without knowing his indigenous ingredients? ‘Conti’ is passé, glocal is where it’s at.
THE HUB
This London suburb is the spiritual home of tennis, attracting players from all over the world every year. While you watch players serve it out with aces after aces on the court, treat yourself to another thing the Championship is famous for: Strawberries and cream. Tickets for Wimbledon, particularly for the big matches on Centre Court, are very hard to get. You can get reduced price ground ticket entry after 5pm, and if you are really just interested in the strawberries and cream, go after 8pm: The admission is free then.
34. TAKE A TEA TASTINGCOURSE
35. PLAY THE DRUMS
The other way to understand this place we call home is to understand how others see it – and recognise when we’re falling into the trap of turning away from the reality before us and buying into the myth they have set up from their limited understanding. Reclaim your place in the world by reading a non-fiction classic, a must-read for any post-colonial nation: Edward Said’s Orientalism will have you questioning every ad and adjective you come across for a few days at least.
Or the guitar, trumpet, even the keyboard. But for God’s sake, play something. Join classes for a month and even before the graduation day, you will see a marked change in the way your peers treat you at a get-together. Its time you picked up the pointers and roll up for rocking in a crowd. It’s an absolute high, believe us.
36. JOURNEY BY THE TRANS-SIBERIAN TRAIN
37. CAVIAR? WHAT’S THAT
It truly is one of the greatest train journeys. Among the oldest (it was built between 1890 and 1905 to connect Moscow with Russia’s pacific coast of over 10,000 km), the TransSiberian Railway is also one of the longest networks. Give yourself more than the six days the trian takes to reach Vladivostok from Russia. You would be missing out on a lot if you don’t break your journey in between. No, we are not just talking about the seven times zones you will pass through, the 16 big rivers including the Volga you will cross, the 87 towns and cities in between, a tunnel that is 2km long, and a bridge that is even longer. Start packing now.
For calibre of a different kind, try some caviar, the real kind (not another roe) – just so you know first-hand what the fuss is all about, and can claim informed opinion if you must diss it as overrated.
31. DONATE YOUR HAIR Hillary Swank has done it on Oprah with a swanky haircut. Now the world is looking at you!But remember, don’t do it for a lark. Grow your hair enough for some time, and in the meantime, keep an eye out for a good charity programme. Come on, grow your hair and make a difference in somebody else’s life.
29. TAKE THE LEFT
BRAIN, RIGHT BRAIN TEST This is to determine which of the two hemispheres in our brain is more dominant! Not that it would lead to any life-altering changes, but it is good to know. Perhaps, once you’ve figured it out, chances are it will reveal things about yourself you never knew before. Now you know why you are so creative. Huh.
HIT A HOLE IN ONE It’s going to be tough, but what the heck! You can always try. All you need is that perfect swing, the perfect bounce, and yeah, loads of luck. You are not asking for much.
33. DO 100
CONSECUTIVE PUSHUPS
And live to boast about it to friends. 060 | JANUARY 11
Speed on a Porsche 911 GT2 RS Regarded as one of the best cars currently available in the world, this Porsche also lays claim to being the most powerful street legal car ever manufactured by the German marque. Powered by a 3.6-litre inline-6 engine supplemented by a brace of turbochargers, this rocket ship boasts of a power output of 620bhp in a stripped out, lightweight 1370kgs frame. Its performance figures, as expected, are stupendous with 0-100kmph coming up in 3.5 secs and 0-160kmph in 7 secs flat. Fondly referred to as the ‘Widowmaker’ the world over, the GT2 RS is not something for the faint hearted and definitely a car one should experience at least once in life. 061 1 | JANUA JJANUARY JA ANUA NUA NU NUARY UARY RY 11 11
TREK THROUGH A RAINFOREST Forget getting lost in a forest. Chances are, you’ve been in at least one such experience some time in your life. How about an upgrade and challenge the elements in a rainforest. And they don’t come any bigger than the Amazon Rainforest: You have all of 1.4 billion acres of land in South America, straddling the borders of nine countries: Brazil, Colombia, Peru, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Guyana, Suriname, and the French Guyana. A good idea would be to start at Amazonas, the largest state in Brazil and 98 per cent of it is covered in rainforest.
44. MOTION GAMING WITH MICROSOFT KINECT T this next-gen, motion-sensing gaming Try ssensor for literally hands-free, physical ccontroller-free gaming. It hooks into an Xbox 360 and converts your body into the X ccontroller. So to race a car, you only need ttwo hands in the air that’ll pantomine holding aand moving an imaginary steering wheel to drive as you would if you weaving in and out d of o track traffic and flooring the non-existent pedal to accelerate. Equipped with a camera, p aaudio sensors, plus motion-sensing technology that track as many as 48 points of movement of the human body, Kinect recognises faces and voices. With Kinect, you don’t need to memorise commands. Just fiddle around.
Spend a week in Las Vegas and gamble
45. ATTEND THE
FLAMENCO FESTIVAL
This is perhaps the only place in the world where no matter what time of the day (or night) you wake up, you will have something exciting to do. There are shows, events, fine dining options, shopping excursions, golf courses, spas... and of course casinos. You cannot die without being a part of the crowd at the entertainment capital of the world. And don’t worry about losing money gambling. After all, you don’t need much for your journey once you leave this life.
40. PEEP INTO AKIRA
41. STUDY
Besides the fantasy of celluloid, the other reason we love the movies is that global cinema so often captures epochal moments and adopts classic literature and proves that some human experiences will always translate across cultures and periods. A classic in that genre is Akira Kurosawa’s Ran – a take on Shakespeare’s King Lear that no Hollywood studio can better for fantastic images that etch themselves in your mind in Technicolor, put together when the director himself was almost blind... ironically matching the Bard’s protagonist.
For every Sholay- or 007-type bit of boyhood fantasy, you need to balance your diet with at least one film with an outsider hero, one who redefines authority and perhaps even masculinity. Almost all of Johnny Depp’s repertoire from What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, through Edward Scissorhands, to the Barber of Seville qualifies, and not just the camp Pirates of the Caribbean – and they’re all easy entertainment too. But also spend a contemplative evening with Cillian Murphy in and as Kitten, in one of the best genderbending leads since Victor/Victoria.
KUROSAWA’S MIND
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JOHNNY DEPP
Kick your heels, strum the guitar and go tapping all the way in Jerez, where the annual Festival de Jerez kicks off next month. From concerts to workshops, this flamenco extravaganza is bound to adorn every left foot with dancing shoes (or boots). Be there at the cradle of flamenco and let rhythm take over.
FIND ‘A SUITABLE BOY’ Next, learn to see the myths we accept in real life. Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy must be on any Indian male’s must-read list. Bonus: he’s one of the best Indian novelists writing in English, and shows you why it is no longer a ‘foreign language’ at home.
46. JOIN A WINE TASTING CLUB
47. CONFRONT WATCHMEN
Extend your drinking grounds: Join a wine club in your city (cheaper than flying to the Continent and further afield; easily possible to get stalwarts from at least three continents in your home city, unlike with whiskey or beer, where Indian non-entities still rule the roost). Or, if you can afford to take the battle to enemy grounds, do a whiskey tasting tour of the UK and Ireland (please, look beyond Bourbon, and not just for single malts) – this has the advantage of less competition than wine snobbery gathers. Or take the egalitarian route to the Oktoberfest, and beat your own bets on how much beer your belly can bear.
Myth-making of different kind is the world of the graphic novel. And no, they aren’t the same as comics, or even just anime. A nice, serious beginning to challenge Asteriskera preconceptions with would be Watchmen, darker than the movie, or even the Dark Knight himself. 063 | JANUARY 11
48. Relive the
Great War
50. BRAVE BHUT JOLOKIA
Because love and war go together, and we’re the generation that missed actually living the great wars (and, please God, will continue to avoid that distinction), it is imperative that you experience what has shaped entire nations, global politics, academies, art and social movements and more in our time. All Quiet on the Western Front is a great introduction to the glory and the senseless gore.
49. Climb
Kilimanjaro An ailing Gregory Peck, a neglected wife, memories of a former love and Africa’s highest peak — Ernest Hemingway’s short story adapted for the silver screen, The Snows of Kilimanjaro, is perhaps what you first saw of this mountain outside textbooks. The snowcapped mountain in Tanzania has five different climatic zones from its base to the summit and only organised treks along established routes are allowed. When you get to the rim of the crater, you’re breath is sure to go away.
Point the doubters to some real experiences of worth – like the homegrown Bhut jolokia, the world’s hottest chilli that gives new meaning to painting the town red. After all, why travel for exotic eats when the world’s best is in your own backyard?
51. TAKE A SHORT 3D
TOUR OF THE KNOWN UNIVERSE
53. HONE YOUR SKILLS AT THE AMG DRIVING ACADEMY
You’ve always salivated to take the wheels of one of those high-performance cars in movies and wished you could drive it the way the pros do. Truth be told, it is not easy. Especially for lesser mortals like us who are brought up on asthmatic, wheezy, under powered cars all our life. This is where the experts at Mercedes’ performance arm, AMG, come in. Not only do they let you drive some of the most powerful production cars at the AMG Driving Academy, there is a racing driver sharing cabin space with you to help you hone your racing skills and get the most out of the car. The cherry on the cake? You even get to drive the SLS AMG, one of the dream cars you can never have enough of.
54. SEND A MESSAGE IN A BOTTLE
To realise the insignificance of man in this Universe, you need to see him in relation to the Magestic Clockwork of the Spheres that float in the Cosmos. While it may be impossible to hop aboard a Starship Enterprise and have a Capt. Kirk help you explore new worlds, there is nothing that stops you from discovering the fascinating extremities of the charted universe virtually on our PCs and laptops. Try this (http://is.gd/ j3COE) 90-sec video tour of all of the galaxies known to man, in one swirling, fluid shot. Compiled by NASA with images from the Hubble telescope and other sources, these are placed in a virtual 3-D space, corresponding to our viewing vantage point.
52. DRINK KOPI LUWAK Speaking of survival, more bragging rights come with drinking the world’s most expensive coffee: kopi luwak. It is not just pricey, it is also a Fear Factor challenge of sorts – having been made from coffee beans that passed through a palm civet’s digestive tract and recovered from, yes, crap! 064 | JANUARY 11
Honestly, we thought it was a fairly simple task. Go to a beach, write something on a piece of paper, put it in a bottle... and just throw it into the water. But we were surprised after a Google search: There Internet has close to 6,00,000 sites, most of them giving you instructions on how to get the best out of the message in a bottle you are throwing into the sea. From tips on choosing the right kind of bottle to the lines you would want to write, it is an information overload on the www. Now you know why you should be doing it at least once in your lifetime.
55. WATCH ANDAAZ The flip side of the silver screen is that cinema often provides cultural icons grounded in the local experience and vernacular traditions. Thus Bollywood has managed to outdo Broadway and Hollywood both for melodrama and hysteria over histrionics – at least on home soil. Beyond favourite golden oldies Sholay and Qurbani (leaning towards the latter), you’ll want to watch Andaaz for recasting our traditions of fictional romances and relationships to aspire to, with one of the first true love triangles in Indian popular cinema, the prototype of the latter-day Silsilas and Jab We Mets.
UNDERSTAND THE OTHER To balance your understanding of self, you must engage with the Other. Rather than try a clichéd plumbing of the mysteries womankind, may we suggest a demystification of The Beauty Myth? It’s the sort of thing that gets smart women listening, because you’re the rare sensitive and sensible male. Alternatively, bone up on erotica that’s ‘literary’ enough to discuss calmly with a roomful of intellectual folk: the Perfumed Garden is NOT the everybody’sread-it Kama Sutra a la Burton.
58. DEMYSTIFY RELIGION
If that first tick on your reading list was preparation to unpack literature, this one’s to debunk the myths that make up your own psyche. Choose any religious tome but that from your own persuasion – the Bible, the Koran, the Mahabharata or Ramayan or Gita, the Zend Avesta... Because preconceptions about other religious communities abound in the politics and sociology of daily life (hands up if you’ve ever characterised Hindus as superstitious, Buddhists as pacifists or nonhierarchial, Islam as oppressive). And you can only know another man’s truth when you pray on his mat. It’s cultural armchair travel too, exploring how religions are grounded in the space and time of their origin, and yet evolve to transcend those limits.
59. DRIVE A
CONVERTIBLE WITH THE HOOD DOWN AND MUSIC BLARING
57. Experience a Samsung 9000 Smart TV If you are not stunned by its skinny 7.98mm (.31-in) panel with embeded tuner, speakers built-into the stand, four HDMI ports, Internet features, and an auto-sliding touchpad, you will be zapped by the picture quality. Shockingly sharp, surprisingly vibrant imagery aside, it comes with an innovative iPhone-like 3 inch touchscreen remote handset which has the ability to replicate the video currently being displayed on the TV screen. So as long as you have the remote with you, you won’t miss out on Sachin’s century even while squatting in the loo! 065 | JANUARY 11
66. GROW A CATERPILLAR INTO A BUTTERFLY!
67. GO ZORBING
Ideally, do it on your birthday Three good reasons: (a) It is expensive, hence exclusive, and thus confers serious bragging rights, even without being an experienced connoisseur; (b) it is expensive enough that your friends may not beat you to it (more first-dibs bragging rights) or call on you for a repeat performance you can’t reasonably refuse; (c) it is, however, easily accessible in at least most Indian metros, so you needn’t hike too far.
64. SPY WITH A
61. READ THE ORIGINAL
WOWWEE ROVIO
20,000 LEAGUES...
Sometimes, though, rather than grapple with –isms, you want a book just to leaven your mind with a boys-own adventure. Well-known and beloved, Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea is a sci-fi classic rarely read in the original, but unusually rich in the science of its day as well as easy, lovely read that reestablishes for grown men a child’s wonder in the world around him, the explorer’s thrill in a world growing ever smaller.
Delusion of becoming a Mr. Bond? Get the Rovio covert surveillance device. This webcam on wheels can be controlled via the Internet to send you streaming video and audio of any location you wish. Low battery? Rovio finds its charging dock on its own and recharge itself!
70.Trek the Patagonian Steppe Glacial caves, green forests, placid lakes, a varied wildlife, granite spires — find another landscape that offers more or as much. Spanning across Argentina and Chile, the region of Patagonia is what every trekker dreams of exploring. Several national parks with as many as four different types of vegetation can test the very best of trekkers. From 4 days to 12 days, there are trails and more trails to follow. llo
63. WALTZ WITH BASHIR 65.VISIT PARTITION Because Rambo just doesn’t do it and Bond babes are such predictable blah, turn the tide and take it back to their inspiration: real-life grit, the bitterness of war and violence that made war movies Papa’s favourite pastime. Go launch a mission to track down Waltz with Bashir – another animation... but this one’s a documentary, its comic-graphic style, classical and popular music, and even news archive footage making a political statement (on the Lebanon War) alongside inventing pretty much a new language of cinematic story-telling.
Seminal to the weave of our socio-political fabric at home is the Partition, and again, we’re the generation that does not have knowledge of it except at second hand. So let Tamas or Train to Pakistan recreate your national, cultural history for you. They make sense of so many fears and scapegoats currently bandied about, and set up warnings for your own future.
62. Drive a Lamborghini LP550-2 Balboni Valentino Balboni is a famous name among petrol heads. Being the Chief Test Driver at Lamborghini for over three decades has meant he’s a well-recognised name for car lovers. So when it was time for him to take a bow and retire, the company’s engineers decided to build a special car as a tribute to this special man who had been so instrumental to the company’s products for such a long time. So they pulled out all stops and secretly compiled a list of Balboni’s preferred specs on a car that he’d build. The result, the first ever 2wd Gallardo which is powered by a special 550bhp engine and comes standard with a manual gearbox, just how Balboni likes it. Also featured are a special paint job and interior package and limited production of only 250 units worldwide. A definite collectible and a dream to drive around.
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You used to do it as a kid, but now don’t remember the last time you rolled down a grassy land. Put on those same shoes once again and go zorbing. Say thanks to New Zealanders Dwane van der Sluis and Andrew Akers and their gift to the latest in extreme sport technology, zorbing is more exciting when you are inside the gigantic inflatable PVC ball and rolling down a hill. The outer ball, of 3m diameter, contains another smaller ball that is suspended in position by thousands of nylon strands of various colours that act as shock absorbers. It is great fun: at times you could be touching speeds of up to 35 miles an hour.
You could never imagine how much fun swatting grunting swine can be. Especially if you are a little beaky twittering bird! This delightful game has caught the imagination of the world on mobile touchscreen devices over the last few months. With its excellent gameplay and periodic level enhancements, it is both compelling and addictive. While it appear to be child’s play with flight trajectories, it actually involves more than a dollop of logical powers and tactical strategising.
THE HUB
TOAST YOUR HEALTH IN ICEWINE
69. SQUASH SWINE WITH ANGRY BIRDS
68. BECOME 100 PER CENT DEBT FREE
It is easier said than done. And you cannot do it overnight. It requires application, like every other good thing in life, and discipline...again, like everything else. But you know, it is very easy to maintain and even improve your lifestyle on a much smaller income with just a few changes in your habits. Think about the fun you will have to live a life that is not shackled by debt. To live, for some time, without wondering where your money goes, or even with the feeling that the month-end is coming way sooner than you expect or want? 067 | JANUARY 11
OWN A FERRARI 599 GTO
73. AUGMENTED
REALITY BROWSING WITH LAYAR
A very nifty augmented reality app, this one enhances what your device can see with its camera with a layer of digital info. You don’t need to type or utter anything here, you simply point the device’s camera at a building or landmark. The Layar Browser uses a combination of images from the devices camera, compass and GPS data to identify your field of view, fetch data based for these geographical coordinates from the Internet and overlay it over the camera view. Useful and interesting.
MARVEL AT METROPOLIS
72. TEST HARLEY-
DAVIDSON V-ROD’S MUSCLE POWER I think one simply doesn’t need to explain why this makes it to the bucket list, of all the times one has dreamt out one’s fantasies of riding cross-country ala Peter Fonda in Easy Rider or for the younger bunch harboured dreams of being the Terminator riding on the Harley on a mission to save the world, the bikes from Harley have been childhood fantasies for most of us. The V-Rod Muscle is even more special as it is the companies interpretation of what a modern Harley Davidson is all about so its powered by a brand new engine (developed in conjunction with Porsche) putting out 122bhp, modern styling peppered with many small detailed touches that lend it tremendous presence and all modern safety features & conveniences
Not that memorable movies rely on language at all, necessarily. Such silent-era staples as Nosferatu (the godfather of every vampire and werewolf feature since, including Bela Lugosi as Dracula), the inimitable Charlie Chaplin, war genre popular classic Battleship Potemkin come readily to mind. But there’s silent sci-fi too: pay homage to Metropolis – this big budget sci-fi from Germany was silent cinema’s most expensive film ever, at 5 million Reichmarks in 1927, all justified by the sheer visual delight of it.
75. DINE AT NOMA
79. HAVE A RACING
TRACK TO YOURSELF THE HUB
GTO editions of regular Ferrari cars have always been held in special admiration by car fans especially since the basic premise of a GTO edition is to offer a better, faster and lighter version of an already excellent automobile and so over the years GTO versions like the 250 GTO & 288 GTO have come to be some of the most coveted models from the Italian sports car maker ever. To this premise, the limited edition 599 GTO joins the elite list and offers a stupendous set of performance numbers with this 670bhp beast hitting 0-100kmph in 3.35 secs and going on to hit a top speed of 335kmph helped no doubt by its 100kgs lighter kerb weight and double the down force over the standard model. Of all the current Ferrari cars, this remains the most covetable especially since only 599 of them are ever going to be produced.
Ever dreamt of having a race track to yourself where you’re guided by professionals and you get to drive some of the best and fastest cars in the world? Porsche’s, Ferrari 458’s, Lamborghini’s, Aston Martin’s, Lotus’et al?? Well wonder no more, Thruxton Motorsport Centre in the UK offers you a chance to drive all of the above and more of your dream cars and fulfil that ambition after all. Featuring one of the most extensive car collections, Thruxton offers you the opportunity to drive these supercars in their natural habitat aka the race track with genuine guidance from trained racing drivers allowing one to develop their skills and experience cars and conditions most of us can only lust after. And the best part is that it’s affordable even for the common joe amongst us. The packages range from 7,000 to 35,000 rupees and all one needs apart from the money is a ticket to the UK!
For once in your life, be a real he-man and do as your ancestors did: make your daily bread your destination/to-do for the day. Think really avant-garde, hard-of-access, proper fine dining experiences like El Bulli (regrettably, no more) and Noma (the next/current ‘final frontier’ of food), where your travel plans will wait until you get a confirmed reservation (that would be sometime next year or the year after). Can’t fly so far? Pick up a foraging skill at home (fishing counts, as does killing your own chicken, for this purpose).
76. Balloon over the Namib Desert Africa’s second largest desert, also the world’s oldest, looks stunning wherever you see it from. But nothing compares to the view you can have from a hot air balloon. The rich orange oxide colour of the sand dunes against the vast openness gives you many National Geographic moments. Remember, you have to cut down a few hours of your morning sleep to be able to catch the balloon at sunrise.
80. WATCH 8½ 77. Stand on the edge of
Livingstone Falls in Congo
It is only fair that the world’s greatest explorer should have at least one natural wonder named after him. Dr. David Livingstone, however, had not even seen this thunderous waterfall he lent his name to. Located on the lower course of the famous Congo River, the falls have a series of nearly 32 rapids and cascades, which extend for a distance of about 350 km! Book a ride on the MatadiLéopoldville Railway for a unique way to navigate the Livingstone Falls.
Of course, good masala movies can also be extremely good cinema. For that one thought-provoking reel, the one movie you can go out to lunch on with your boss, with your pals, with your girlfriend and with the local intellectual/arty brigade too, try 8½ (Fellini’s autobiographical classic) – it’s the very metatextual epitome of what’s called the Fellini-esque in film, and a conversational all-rounder. To engage a more niche audience, choose Run Lola Run to corner the blasé or perhaps Amelie, a favourite with the ladies, but with sinister/ ambiguous overtones for the careful critic
78. Plant a Bonsai You may have kept pets... taken care of children all your life. Now try this. Plant a Bonsai. It is easy, though it requires discipline and dedication. Once your miniature pet has taken roots, you would realise that the ‘tree’ in a small pot in your drawing room is the source of years of enjoyment. You would do well to keep in mind that it normally takes up to five years or more for a see or a cutting to grow into a full-length Bonsai. Translate this into so many years of painstaking effort. Also, before you take the plunge, decide what height you want your Bonsai to be: it could be a miniature (6 inches tall) or a large one (up to 3ft in height). 068 | JANUARY 11
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84. FOLLOW
An Egyptian oasis, Siwa is where you can get some of the world’s best pizzas! Several dozens of natural springs bring travellers to this town which also boasts the Temple of Ammon, a limestone structure that is believed to have been visited by Alexander the Great. When done with history, you can go sandboarding in the dunes that circle the town.
81.BROWSE
83. JABBER ON AN ALIPH
MULTIMEDIA ON IPAD
JAWBONE ICON
If you haven’t browsed (that is, read, viewed, or heard) an issue of Wired or National Geographic on the Apple iPad, you don’t know what a multimedia enriched experience on a tablet computer can be. Or, for that matter, Or played Scrabble on it by flicking letter tiles off an iPod or iPhone onto the virtual scrabble board. Or even splashed around, played with fish in the Pocket Pond. Immerse, compelling and utterly wowsome.
As alluring, advanced and innovative as a Bluetooth headset can be, the $99 Jawbone Icon comes in as many as six design options. Pushing the technology envelope, the headset offers never-seen-before features like an iPhone battery meter and Audio and Dial “apps” that can be downloaded via Jawbone’s MyTalk website. Need we mention it’s simply outstanding audio fidelity and wind noise cancelling abilities?
82. RACE ON THE NURBURGRING TRACK
85. SAY I LOVE YOU AND MEAN IT
87. WADE THROUGH ULYSSES
Think of it as watching a magic trick through a child’s eyes: What Ulysses does with the English language, with the way we comprehend it and the way it guides us is nothing short of a revelation. Besides, it is popularly acknowledged to be one of the toughest books to wade through – on the face of it, it makes no sense. So props to you for getting to that (not quite) last page. Haven’t time or patience? Get a does of synesthesia, in poetry – read Vowels by Rimbaud to explore one of the classic paradigms of modern writing that takes language beyond the verbal, or even aural. You’ll never read anything without being aware of your other senses again.
88. UNDERSTAND KIESLOWSKI’S THREE COLORS Questioning the norms and twisting expectations around is of course the very basis of much post-modern art, and cinema’s no exception. Jan Svankmajer’s Faust or Alice or Jean Cocteau’s Orphee – which take off from classic stories about bending the rules, and then play with those boundaries some more alongside a treat of technical trickery – may be harder of access, but make it a point to at least lay hands on Kieslowski’s Three Colors for a play that puts a paradox into our conventional visual imagery of the French flag and the human values it claims to represent. (Yes, I admit, it’s a cheat to put a trilogy in place of a single movie, but here, would you rather get his even more acclaimed Decalog series of ten, based on the Commandments? You could, and I’ll bet you wouldn’t regret ponying up for them either.)
86. BE SPOTTED LAZING IN MONTE CARLO
It is the posing ground for millionaires and Hollywood biggies. It is also where many a fairytale romance blossomed — remember actress Grace Kelly and Prince Rainier? And yet Monte Carlo is a curious mix of the extravagant and the popular. So there are as many penthouses and yachts on the marinas as bustling restaurants and cafes. And the spirits are always running high. A spectacular setting by the Mediterranean is just one of the plus-es.
The Green Hell, that’s how racing legend Sir Jackie Stewart referred to one of most fascinating yet dangerous race tracks ever in the history of automobile racing. Completed in 1927 to show off the growing strength and skill of the German automobile industry the originally 22.85km long circuit proved to be a formidable course to conquer for even the best drivers in the world with its challenging, twisting terrain and lack of run-off areas. With racing cars getting more & more powerful things came to a point where Formula 1 racing was banned on the track because it was deemed too dangerous. But that only spurred the enthusiasts on and the ‘Ring (as it’s fondly referred to as) remains one of the most revered destination for car enthusiasts. For a true car lover it remains a mecca of sorts which demands a visit whenever possible and definitely needs to be driven at in a fast car to court a sense of what true danger feels like in a driving seat. 070 | JANUARY 11
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THE HUB
ALEXANDER’S FOOTSTEPS IN SIWA, EGYPT
89. VISIT YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK
94. BEFRIEND KUBRICK’S DR STRANGELOVE
90. APPRECIATE A
92. ENVY THE MV
Because the movies are all about fantasy and a quintessentially modern media, most of us have watched at least one genre-defining Kubrick classic such as 2001: A Space Odyssey, though personally I think Dr Strangelove’s the one to go for if you must see just one. If all of Kubrick’s on your DVD shelf, branch out into more post-apocalyptic fantasy in the same vein with 1991 The Delicatessen, as black comic and surreal as French films can get.
UGUSTA BRUTALE 1090RR
SEVEN SAMURAI
Push yourself a little harder to that last frontier of discovery, the mental spaces of the odd or notnormal. It is surprising how easy it is to identify with even the human mind bent out of shape in the biographical A Beautiful Mind, or even a racier thriller embracing psychological otherness such as The Incident of the Dog in the Night Time.
Honestly, we thought it was a fairly simple task. Go to a beach, write something on a piece of paper, put it in a bottle... and just throw it into the water. But we were surprised when we did a Google search: There are close to 6,00,000 sites, most of them giving you instructions on how to get the best out of the message in a bottle you are throwing into the sea. From tips on choosing the right kind of bottle to the lines you would want to write, it is an information overload on the Internet. Now you know why you should be doing it at least once in your lifetime. And, if you are lucky, a complete stranger from another corner of the world would contact you before you pop it.
Had enough ‘art cinema’ for a week, and impatient for the action? How about Austin Powers? No? Casablanca, then? Lawrence of Arabia? The Godfather? Dark Knight? Matrix? Mission Impossible? Nah, all old hat, you can tell your buddies. Kuroswa’s Seven Samurai is the granddaddy of them all, and you’ve been there, seen that. So for that quintessential geeky movie night for the guys, break out something a little different. The Japanese animation Akira is – don’t worry – no cutesy walk in a Disney theme park, with a sci-fi plot that makes you think, not just gawk at props a la Star Wars; detailing of an imaginary space that leaves Avatar in the dust; plus enough sex, violence and censor-alarming sensation. Make it your mission to find it on your next trip to Tokyo or Bangkok.
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A wild river runs along this 4,700 sq km park that boasts canyons, waterfalls and a unique limestone cave system. Riding the rapids on South Nahanni river is not a challenge for the fainthearted. And if you like to take it a little easy, go spotting the grey wolf, the grizzly bear, the moose, the mountain goat, the peregrine falcon and the bald eagle. The Nahanni waters are also home to the Arctic grayling and Dolly Varden trout in case you are an angling enthusiast.
99.WALK THE LYCIAN WAY IN TURKEY
93. BE STUNNED BY
BEAUTIFUL MIND
THE HUB
It looks so unusually beautiful that you would think that it’s created on Photoshop. With five of the world’s highest waterfalls, deep valleys, alpine meadows, lakes and granite walls, Yosemite, sitting on the slope of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, attracts more than four million visitors a year. Getting a crowdfree moment at Yosemite is tough but that doesn’t take away anything from its grand beauty.
97. RIDE THE RAPIDS ON THE NAHANNI RIVER IN CANADA
Tread upon history as you walk this 509-km footpath around the coast of Lycia in southern Turkey. It is far from cakewalk—expect many ascents and descents over footpaths and mule trails. A pair of good walking shoes can see you through this testing trail, which takes you along ruins from the days the Greek and the Romans. The stunning blue Mediterranean of course is the best companion you could ask for.
96.Vroom around the world on a Mercedes SLS AMG Mercedes’ modern tribute to one of their most iconic cars ever, the 300SL aka Gullwing (my all-time favourite car) the SLS AMG has literally taken the world of fast cars by storm and created quite a stir worldwide. The unique retro-modern styling and the car’s wide stance with those eye catching doors mean that it stands out even in the company of its competitors. And powered by a 6.2-litre V8 engine putting out 571bhp powering this car to a 0-100kmph time of a mere 3.8 seconds and topping out at 315kmph the car is right up there with the performance car biggies. And an interesting bit of news is that the first right hand drive SLS in the world was delivered to an Indian customer in Delhi itself. India shining or what?! (Contributed by Manidipa Mandal, Ashish Bhatia, Neil Sengupta, Ishan Raghava and Bobby John Varkey) 073 | JA JANUA JANUARY NUARY NUA RY 11