My Birthday - 14 Jan 2008

Thanks to everyone for making it here.
Here are the pix.

For all pix click here.

Trip to Windsor Castle ..

This was a good experince too see the Windsor Castle. I had the pleasure of soing with Dilip and Suma. Both my friends and collegues from Infosys out here in London. Well the best part is the way we tried catching the bus from Victoria Coach station. Dilip, the ass was 20 seconds late and the coach driver didn't let us in. the coach went on and we ran after it thinking we might be able to catch it at the next stop. But even though taking a Blak cab, and going to Kensington High Street via hyde Park Corner we again missed the bus by 15 seconds this time. Hence the only option was taking the next coach which as 1 hr later. This time I spent in Tesco getting some stuff to eat. :) And having a coffee from Costa. The return bus journey costed us £12. And it was a mere 40 minute journey.

Nice castle, well maintained. Here are some pix.

My Best Dance ..

This is by far my best dance that I completely admire. It has been done and shot in a best possible way. Thanks to all special people around who made this thing happen especially the producer 'Rukshana'.

See the reference post titled by clicking here.

WITH WHEELS UNDER

This is how I look while skating.

STREET SKATING in LONDON

This was virtually the best thing ever happened to me in London. We a bunch of 200 people went from Hyde Park in Central London for a 8.5 mile (2.5 hrs) journey on the streets of Central London. And I did happen to see places like .

Enjoy the pix:


Here is the one of the videos I took while skating.

My New Skates

These are my new Skates and I happen to spend a fortune on it. Well this is my long term one time investment. And I really had to maintain my monthly expenses to make up for it. I got thesse from a shop called Slick willies (www.slickwillies.co.uk). Nice shop. Go through their website and you will be impressed. Especially, the way they say that 'if they cannot repair a skate in London, no one can'.

Trip To GreenWich - 20 OCT 2007

I been to Greenwich on one of the weekends. To be precise on a Saturday 20 OCT 07. Didn't happen to write about this earlier. Well it was fun all day long. We went in a Cruise from Westminster to Greenwich and then walked to the Royal Observatory. There right at the GMT Line took loads of the pix. And the best part was the amazing view from there. Complete London visible with Canary Wharf in the background. Chandu's company was amaing and so were the others.

Here are the pix am sharing. Not able to upload them directly with my stupid IE problem in Vista. its blocking the pop-up.

London As I See

Well here are the Mojoz memoriez in pix. This would contain pix taken at different places different timings. Probably the best ones I consider on my London trip.

Namaste London

1st it was US. Then it was Sydney, Australia. But ultimately it had to be London. May be it had to be. This is what I realized after coming to this place and spending few days here. You will just happen to like the place in first go itself. Nice city, well thatz what it looks as of now. Hopefully in the time to come I will get an opportunity to xplore more around. And the best part is the opportunity I have here to learn dance. The clubs here are gud and by good I mean real guuuuud. The club culture here is engrossed deep in the roots. Go out on a saturday night and it would look like the whole London is out clubbing. On the contrary the weekdays are completely professional looked at. People dressed in suits in almost every field. N all black. Looks like an unsaid uniform.

The Accomodation: Well I would consider mysely real lucky to have got the accomodation the -day I landed here.

Okie i am sharing the pics i have as of now. Itz been 1.5 months I have been in London n there is loads of stuff to write about. the trips I need to Discuss:
1. Ice Skating
2. Club Collessum for the Salsa Republic party
3. Thorpe Park trip - a theme park
4. The finest International UK Salsa Republic at Bournemouth
5. Trip to Greenwich via Cruise

And hence RUMBA ADVANCE came to an end..

I missed the very first class of Rumba advance and hence the very basic step. It waz though pretty different from the regular Rumba basic that we have learnt in Basic batch. But I was happy about the new style, as I knew that was the one internationally accepted. The videos I had seen completely go by the new beat, starting not at 1 but at 2.
2-3 4--1

Well this time it was more stiff, crisp and tiring. Hmm by the end of the class, you can feel the strain on your arms. Well me writing this entry to make sure none of this skips outta my mind in the near future.

So here is a list of all the step and stuff I had learnt (thanx to miz Parul for her inputs):

Hold:
1) Close hold - normal Ballroom dance couple hold.
2) Open hold - holding both hands at ladies waist level.

Walks:
1) Pressed walk - short toe pressed walk.
2) Check walk.
3) Extended walk - extending foot walk.

Turns:
1) Switch turn - the sudden jerk turn after twisting your leg a bit.
2) Spiral turn - the complete slow turn on one leg.

Steps:
1) Rumba Basic Step.
2) Hand to Hand.
3) New York.
4) IEDA or watever way it is spelt - there are 2 versions.
5) Sliding Doors - bring lady on right side with and slide twice like a door.
6) Fan Alabana.
7) Hockey Stick - extension from Fan step.
8) Natural Opening out - lady on side, both facing same direction.
9) Opening Out - can open out on both sides.
10) Cuban walk (need to learn this).
11) Reverse Cuban walk - (need to learn this).
12) Rumba Walk - can be lead after taking the lady into IEDA step.

Well in case more comes to my mind I will update this entry. Also in case you more steps leeme know, I will add them.

Virtual barber Shop..

Listen to this. I particularily like the tickling in my ear when the barber uses his scissors. :)

Pune Central Salsa Competition & Kaytee @ Lush

I would have performed in Pune Central but guess it was not in my destiny. This came to me as a big shock that we ( Me n Garima) had actually qualified for the show. Had it not been the courtesy of the people at Central, things would have been much different, I believe pleasent. Garima didn't get a call from Vinay (guy @ Central) and so we assumed we are out of the game. And guess what right at the event time Vinay wants me to perform in a matter of mere 30 min. Its not possible. You can't expect me to arrange my partner and music CD in 30 min. So I denied and I was sadly happy to be a part of the audience. 5 couples performed. 3 from Rockys. Tejas and Nishita were damm good. I knew they would win, though theirs was a brilliant performance but less of Salsa. I admired Shikha's dance on the other hand with Vineet. Both Kaytee's students.
The same evening we landed at Lush (now Scandal) and it was Kaytee's workshop. He taught some good moves. Thats where I happen to meet him 1st time. Admired the guy in first go. Cool, smart and knows how to dance and carry himself. Monty -- now you know, this is where you intend to move on.

A Dancing Disaster...

Pune Central Salsa Competition. My partner this time was Garima. A sweet gal and an amazing dancer. Apart from Salsa i admired her folk dance too. So we practiced hard. Early mornings mostly. Compiling 3 traks, borrowing the laptop from my friend Satte, and then creating a CD that didn't play on the final audition day. Well thats terrible. Hotel Scirno (I know i spelt it wrong) - thats where the auditions took place. Well 1st things first few things could have been avoided. The CD-you know very well. And then never start to dance id the music isn't proper. You gonna screw up everything. If u can't listen top the music you can't dance, its a simple logic. 2ndly learn to take control of things happening if they arn't going your way. Don't make facial expressions showing your discomfort. Learn to smile and hide things for yourself as well as your partner. Well just this one memory left from the practice session video clip-a snapsjot from there.....

LONAVALA to AMBY VALLEY in almost Zero Visibility…

Okie while writing this article I was also watching this fantastic dark movie “FIGHT CLUB” and here is one expression.

“I let go. Lost in oblivion. Dark Silent and Complete. Loosing all hope is Freedom”. And this is ME. :)

Pune – Lonavala: 60 Km.

It was suppose to be Mahabaleshwar, but since Nidhi couldn’t be IN for the weekend, we altered course. So Lonavala was it. 6 people. 3 bikes. 2 red pulsars. 1 dark gray Unicorn. June time, so an awesome rainy weather. Dark clouds keep shifting places. The sun keeps coming around once in while. It was evening 1600hrs IST and we left Pune. 60 km of action packed journey. Oh I can’t forget to mention when Billi drove bike for almost 10 km @ 60kmph. Hmmm then the weather turned for good and I took in charge for the bike. After wandering for a while we did happen to find a white cottage at a decent cost to accommodate 6 of us for a price of 2000 bucks a night. Hmmm once when the adobe was set, we left to satisfy hunger. Pet ki bhook. So went all the way to the Tiger Point in pitch dark, but on a well laid road which also leads to Amby Valley. This was my 1st trip to Tiger Point and in the darkness I couldn’t figure out much. Just that the pakodas n chai were awesome. Well I remember it was Amol the person who served us this stuff. Now back to the city, for the booze (including “Blue Shark” Vodka and “Old Monk” Rum) and the bakaras. Here is all of us.

Thats us again. Hiding from rain. Just before leaving on bikes to Amby Valley.

Lonavala – Amby Vally: 28 Km.

This was the amazing road trip we took in rain and near zero visiblity. Will write about soon. For now enjoy the pix.

This is how it all looked. I miss that time.

MULSHI Trip - June 2007

Well this was the amazing trip. We 6 people on 3 bikes made it all the way in pitch dark night to this place. Shikha, Satte, Nidhi, Girish and Naina, we guyz rocked. Here are few pics to share.

Will write more stuff soon. :)

Shoot-Out at FTII

Place : FTII Studios, Law College Road, Pune, MH, India
Date: 17th May 2007


I happen to get this SMS from Supratik and he asked me n Parul to perform for a tv shoot. This was for the students of FTII (Film and Television training Institute of India) and it was Rukshana who had approached him to make this happen. This was a good chance where we can showcase our dance skills. Parul has been my dance partner for quite sometime now. So we knew it was not going to take much time to put up a small dance performance. We still spent much of the 3-4 days we had in hand, in getting the Rumba right. Salsa was kinda neglected, but we had already worked off our asses on getting that perfect the last time. Rumba was something we have not performed before , so it was pretty exciting. So on the 17th of May, 2 couples (other being Supratik and Bipasha) danced Rumba and Salsa at the FTII studios.

Few pix I would like to share: . . . . . . . .

This is perhaps the best pic I like.

Well thats Supratik n Bipasha. And I can't help noticing this amazing photography...

Another superb pic in B&W... Dosen't it look Classy !!!

And herez the group pic in the end. Well almost everyone linked with the shoot is here.

And watchout this space for the much awaited video. I will be uploading this soon, maybe within a weeks time....

La La Latin battle ... Part-3

Herez how Pune Times covered the Rocky's latin battle. This as seen, is published Pune Times page-3 on the 22nd of march 2007. In case you don't know Rocky's Lattin Battle happend on 3rd of March @ Area 51 pancards Club. You can read in detail about it and see my dance video in my previous posts (or just scroll down).

Here are the article pix, more clear..

What I must remember ....

As I sitback watching the Latin Dance performances of mine as well as all others in the very sequence they happened, I can clearly see from what happened, where I stood, the points that were in our favour, places where we went terribly bad, and some tips and inspirations from others who performed. Frankly am not at all happy with my performance. Hardly cameout to 50% of what I can do. But overall it wasen't that bad either. May be we ( me n ma partner) were good at covering up things. Still that means there needs a lot more to be learnt, practiced and xplored.
Well my moral was already low with the way I (rather than saying we) performed in first 2 rounds. Well there are things I can't mention here that did their level best to spoil my mood, but couldn succeed. I didn't lead the lady, the best possible way I can. Didn't loose my confidence though, but was pissed of with myself. Thankx to my partner & my friendz for bucking me up.

Well all well that ends well. But hey do remember the points that I need to work on.
1. Work on styling - learn to put more of free style in btw
2. The expressions should change with time n music n theme.
3. Mood - Alwayz be in a good one. Remember your mood should become better with dance and not dance only when your mood is good.
4. Energy - Get more of energy in you.
5. Bend - bend where u need to.
6. Use your hands freely to express
7. And look confident even though you are not.
8. Believe that you can win. You had won and you will ........!!!

Good Luck Monty .... ;)

Rang De Binary is back ...

See the much awaited video right here ... :)

La La Latin Battle .. Part 2

Well here is the Dance performance. Hope you like it.
Watever be the case plz leave your comments in cbox on the right. Thanks :)





A nice moment captured.