I spent two days in bed over the weekend, with a terrible headache and cough. Even the fever bouts in the past did not flatten me totally like this for the last few years. Even though there wasn’t any fever this time, the kind of “fever dreams” of scenes that run in a loop adds to the disorientation. Recovering now.
2.
Watched two movies in the past week. Chamkila (Hindi) - story of Amar Singh Chamkila, a Punjabi musician and his wife Amarjot Kaur, who were both killed at the peak of their popularity. Some of their songs were suggestive about extra marital affairs and drug use and they got caught up in a web of professional jealousy and militant uprising in Punjab. What is right or wrong in such - but solution wouldn’t have been shutting down voices. This was well acted, liked the music and the slice of life from Punjab.
Watched Oppenheimer (English) finally. During the Barbenheimer, I had watched Barbie (which was boring for me), but kept this for later. I won’t be able to digest killing and maiming generations, even if the creator of that was tortured soul and had moral compunctions later. I was trying to second guess what might be whitewashing in the story. As a movie, it was an interesting watch.
3.
Listened to a podcast - How to discover your taste, in Ezra Klein podcast. Taste as something that stimulates and makes us connect with others in our own way. With content explosion, AI is flattening the culture and everyone's taste is averaging out. There used to be curators before who discovered unique content and people followed them - but now algorithms are curators, but it is not doing a great job in personalising, but rather amplifying our worst instincts to keep us hooked to the platforms. This may be connected with the averaging of everything - fashion, music, movies, books, politics, religion. In such times where algorithms guide us, how to discover what we like? This may warrant a longer post.
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