Strange Idols....

At the very beginning of this post, I should mention that it concerns a representative from a group of people I dislike with single-minded devotion. I have faced maximum rejections, not at the hands of employers or men but ….auto-rickshaw drivers.

The upside of this is that any auto rickshaw driver, who does not reject me, agrees to turn on the metre or is even reasonable in his demands and is not a lech appears GODLY to me.

I encountered such GODLINESS on my way to work this morning. Not only did the first auto driver agree to take me to my destination, he agreed to do so on my terms. If I remember correctly, his exact words were, “De dena madam, jo aap ko theek lagey”. To a hassled public commuter, this is pure, unadulterated sweetness!!

On the way, I took a look around the small vehicle and was slightly surprised not to find laminated Rs. 10 posters of skimply clad Bollywood actresses on both sides of the seat.
( I have noted that auto drivers prefer Kareena and Priyanka to the rest of them!!) Although these pictures officially offend me, I totally get it!! While searching for Kareena inside the auto, I spotted something rather odd but oddly reassuring.

On the mirror, there was not one, but two unevenly cut out (heart-shaped, if I might add) postcards of two unlikely heroes…..Ritesh Deshmukh and Rajpal Yadav.

Now, not only did I wonder why those pictures were up there and how, in God’s name do you get postcards of these fellows for a price?? (I am pretty sure they weren’t newspaper or magazine cut outs but an actual, 50 paise/ Re. 1 postcard), I decided to wonder aloud.

The answer I received was obvious in many ways yet it appeared to me as charming. He said, ‘Woh hasatey hain madam…unka chehra dekh ke din achha jaata hain’. My response to that was a dim, not so charming “Oh” (Not that I intended to discuss my sociological findings with him and appear even more stupid).

Today, I learnt to keep it simple, go back to the basics and I already feel good. What I did not learn, however, is where you can buy postcards of strange idols as I have some of my own!! :-)

Food for Thought: Globalisation and Androgyny

Heterosexual, Homosexual, Metrosexual, SNAGs (Sensitive New Age Guys), Retrosexual, Neosexual.....

Cross-dresser, Transvestite, Hermophrodite, Androgynous....

When girls go baggy and boys go skinny....

For every Audrey Hepburn and Aishwarya Rai, there is a Tilda Swinton and Charlotte Rampling (Strong yet sensual)

For every Hugh Jackman, there is a Justin Timberlake (with that falsetto voice and boys too can cry kinda' appeal).

An actress, Diane Keaton, whom I love just for her spontaneity on and off screen, starred in a movie titled Annie Hall in the early 1980s, where she iconised androgynous fashion as it is known today, wearing baggy pants, waistcoats, oversized shirts, neckties and fedora hats. She was consistently voted as the Worst Dressed Female for years for her conservative and rather 'eccentric' fashion sense. She never changed though. Today, international fashion swears by that look.

The importance of trends and buzzwords in our daily lives is overwhelming...Ah...the things I have to keep up with in this lifetime!! Having said that, the revival of androgyny continues to fascinate me in its impact on gender relations (not only in fashion but in the real world..inside our homes, at the workplace, in other informal social spaces etc) and someday, equipped with better knowledge on the subject and a live muse, I will seek to undertake detailed research on GLOBALISATION AND ANDROGYNY...SERIOUSLY!!

A.Kashyap is angry and it works!!

No Smoking could have been a masterpiece if told simply and of course, if John Abraham himself understood his character a little better. Dev D and Gulaal, however, have turned the tables in favour of a trend that was increasingly losing its stronghold in Hindi cinema. 'Anger' that made Amitabh Bachchan the legend that he is and 'Revenge' that cemented SRK's career is now being re-invented by Anurag Kashyap to tell it as it is.

Dev D, a take-off on Devdas, the legendary lover a.k.a loser who 'sacrificed' his life in the name of unfulfilled love re-looks at the character of Devdas as he was probably originally written. Having read Devdas in the original, I can vouch for the fact that the one thing that the author did not want to do was glorify Dev's submission to alcoholism which is exactly what every movie interpretation- from greats like Bimal Roy and not-so-greats like Bhansali have done because creating sympathy for the protagonist is Bollywood formula. Even if you create a flawed character, you have to justify the flaws to the audience because according to trade pundits, the intelligence of the Indian movie-going audience does not allow them to accept 'simply flawed' characters without any emotional baggage. 'Pure evil' remains unacceptable, even in the movies.

Dev-D and Gulaal challenges that in a way. Kay Kay's character in Gulaal is supposedly a leader of a separatist movement that has no clear objectives. What becomes increasingly clear towards the end of Gulaal is that he is amoral and arrogant and will go to any lengths to achieve his ends (Rajasthan for Rajputs), whatever the means. Ransa, living in a ramshackled palace turned Democracy bar with strobe lights and Bob Marley life size posters is a bundle of contradictions. He wants no part of his father's aristrocratic legacy yet is dependant on that very legacy to sustain himself. He does not work, drinks and philanders yet is idealistic and moral in a way. Although he does not know what he wants, he seems to know what he does not want. Dilip Singh, on the other hand, just wanted to get a law degree but gets entangled in this dirty mesh of campus, family and gender politics. Naive as he is, when asked, what he knows of Rajniti, he says 'Politics'!!. In love as he is, he believes that his lover's abandonment was not an independent decision and was guided and manipulated for political gains. True as that may be, the audience is left to wonder as to who was really exploited by whom and for what purpose? Brother exploiting sister, Rajput exploiting co-Rajput, half Rajput leading Rajputana movement...what for?? Did any of the characters in the film know what they stood for despite their strong political ambitions and definitive plans of action? Casting Jesse Randhawa and that new girl in their respective roles was probably not a good idea but may be, Kashyap could not convince our 'holier than thou' Bollywood actresses to play murky female characters. While the female characters are not unimportant in the scheme of things, they are not fleshed out as well. This is a male film with female catalysts. Powerful performances were delivered by the 'male' cast and the music was phenomenal and very. very, well placed in the context of the film.

Coming to Dev-D...Dev is no more than a spoilt brat who cries because he did not get his favourite toy. Nothing exposes the subtlety of gender equations in Indian society as this film. Dev does not want Paro when he learns of her sexual history. This he does when he himself is 'sleeping around' to use crass Indian English. Paro abandons him....oh wait..Paro VOLUNTARILY abandons him...no family pressures here!! Now, that, of course, virtually kills Dev..it's not love, it's the male ego that is crushed to pieces in the process. Dev's ultimate rejection, of course, comes, when the very married Paro comes to meet him in the shady Paharganj hotel room, shows him she cares by offering to wash his dirty clothes and then leaves when they are about to make love...That, my friends is 'emosanal atyachar'...the brutal fact of rejection by a woman and not some cooked-up, well-packaged romantic idea of unfulfilled love that we've been fed for generations that we almost believe to be true. There would be no Devdas if the decision to split came from Devdas himself-Go figure!!

Unlike Devdas in the novel, Kashyap's Dev gets to mend his ways and interestingly enough, he does not flush it down the toilet (not in the movie climax anyway). Chanda, the escort girl by night and college student by day encounters Dev surrounded by a haze of drugs and alcohol. As is characteristic of Dev, she is spared no part of his ego-centrism but she stands her own-loving and supporting him yet not submitting to him. When Dev hits his lowest lows and finds himself alone and abandoned serving momos at a streetside food joint in Dilli, life gives him a second chance and he embraces it. But knowing Dev, a relapse is not totally out of character but for now, he seems to have found his feet.

Kudos to Kashyap and looking forward to his next..Meanwhile, KJo's masterpiece on the aftermath of 9/11-an untold story is also sincerely awaited!!

You read my mind.....

The Terrible People
-Ogden Nash

People who have what they want are very fond of telling people who haven't what they want that they really don't want it,
And I wish I could afford to gather all such people into a gloomy castle on the Danube and hire half a dozen capable Draculas to haunt it.
I dont' mind their having a lot of money, and I don't care how they employ it,
But I do think that they damn well ought to admit they enjoy it.
But no, they insist on being stealthy
About the pleasures of being wealthy,
And the possession of a handsome annuity
Makes them think that to say how hard it is to make both ends meet is their bounden duity.
You cannot conceive of an occasion
Which will find them without some suitable evasion.
Yes indeed, with argumetsn they are very fecund;
Their first point is that money isn't everything, and that they have no money anyhow is their second.
Some people's money is merited,
And other people's is inherited,
But wherever it comes from,
They talk about it as if it were something you got pink gums from.
Perhaps indeed the possession of wealth is constantly distressing,
But I should be quite willing to assume every curse of wealth if I could at the same time assume every blessing.
The only incurable troubles of the rich are the troubles that money can't cure,
Which is a kind of trouble that is even more troublesome if you are poor.
Certainly there are lots of things in life that money won't buy, but it's very funny --
Have you ever tried to buy them without money?

Of Obscene Wealth and Superstar India....

A super rich person like Doctor (apparently, he gets super-duper pissed if you don’t refer to him as Dr. which although not earned but gifted does indeed display his intellectual ability….so there you go, Doctor….no less no more) Vijay Mallya with an empire that feeds off people’s vices, two airlines (one, the epitome of cheap air travel and what often comes with it…. inefficiency and the other, the symbol of glamour and good travel), a failed cricket team, two rival and fairly successful football teams, the Kingfisher calendar (for the uninformed, the Indian equivalent of the Pirelli calendar and any man’s fantasy desk adornment), etc etc etc…..is not exactly my idea of a role model for superstar India, to use the dame's words. Nor is Donald Trump for that matter with his loud-mouthedness, Trump this and Trump that, Apprentice, pink ties and not to mention, the inimitable hairstyle or a really bad wig..whatever that is!! Watching Mallya or Trump speak fills me with a sense of immense hopelessness…as we get richer, what kind of people are we becoming or aspiring to become and what kind of entrepreneurship/business leadership are we promoting?

With one business launch after another, Dr. Mallya has not learnt that there is humility in accepting defeat. Whatever Dr. Mallya does, he does it big. Not only does he sack the team’s CEO in violation of the ‘sportsman spirit’ that we so often talk about and lambast and very publicly at that, everyone who he thought was responsible for the team’s dismal performance, including captain Dravid and coach, Venkatesh Prasad; he goes ahead and claims his part ownership of the best performing team in the IPL, not because they are great but because they are sponsored by him. So, in effect, the performance of the Chennai, Delhi and Chandigarh teams are of little relevance beecause they are not screaming “HAIL MALLYA’ on their jerseys. Even praise, therefore, is associated to ownership and profit. If it is mine and doing well, it is good..otherwise, no comment! One wonders why Kat Kaif was not sacked as team ambassador because even her pretty presence failed to revive a nosediving Royal Challengers (Oh..I forget, she is a young woman, a pretty one at that..one of Mallya’s many weaknesses, after his shameless pursuit of wealth, of course). And all this is referred to as the ‘killer instinct’, ‘perform or perish’ or the attitude of a true winner in some circles!!

There is always the nouveau riche attitude of not knowing what to do with suddenly acquired wealth. Tasteless spending or over-spending on things of limited importance screaming “I have what you don’t” is on the rise. Look at the wedding industry in India. It's booming (for crying out loud) In fact, a person who earns well but lives modestly (by modest, I do not mean lives in a hut and survives on fresh air) is termed a miser in our modern, progressive scheme of things. Parsimony and prudence is looked down upon. Wastage and obnoxious ostentation are encouraged. Seriously, since when did saving money become a crime??

Perhaps, I don’t earn enough to know what it feels to be rich and powerful but I know a whole lot of people from the earlier generation who have earned and spent in moderation and you know what…they are neither unhappy nor dissatisfied. As someone once said, money is the petrol that runs the car that is life. The importance of money cannot be undermined but to make it all-important is probably a mistake. But what do I know? With television channels like NDTV Good Times (sponsored by the King of Good Times himself) airing programmes like “Limited Edition” (on luxury brands in India) and “Best Spas”/Best Hotels”; Shobha De’s path breaking treatise on modern India making it to the best sellers list and popular opinion caring a rat’s ass for anything beyond their bubble, India’s rich-poor divide will further deepen and Mallya will be King….who knows??

Ah....the 1970s!!

Watched about ten minutes of a movie called Parvarish which made me recapitulate some of the terribly cliched but oh-so-kitsch Bollywood lines from the 1970s which would invariably be repeated in every single movie made during that time. Story, plot, continuity could easily go and take a walk while these lines carried the movie and coming from Amitabh Bachchan, any word was oracle-like.

1. Driver, gaadi roko! (The car would be a Fiat in most cases (green or orange in colour) or if the person is super rich, a Merc...first would come his shiny pointed shoes, then his white bell bottoms and then those retro, oversized sunglasses...oh!! the sheer magic! Although the standards of living have moved ahead by miles, probably by light years in Bollywood...these stupid actors will invariably drive on their own..no matter what the car and how rich...idiots! ek aur character actor ke pet mein laath!)

2. Isse dawa ki nahin, dua ki zaroorat hain...dua kijiye!! (This is a sociological comment on the medical profession in India at the time and how doctors were often unable to handle sensitive cases. This is also a take on the whole faith question that Bollywood has now adopted as her pet theme ...whether you are a doctor or a farmer, the importance of dua and bhagwan can never be undermined!! Added to this are eternal truths like 'choubees ghante ka waqt hain', 'ab sab upar walein ke haath mein hain' and 'bachche ko toh humne bacha liya par ma.....' )

3. Inspector sahab!! Isse giraftaar kar li jiye!! (Please note that the 1970s was the period when the Indian Police Service was glorified. Their uprightness and honesty were above question with actors like Ifthikar playing a police inspector/commissioner- his position in the Bollywood police hierarchy was often directly proportional to his age whereas protagonists like Amitabh Bachchan and Vinod Khanna were always cast as police inspectors because they were always, you know, aged under 30. Compare it to the Bollywood police of today, no respectable actor in the 21st century would dare to play a policeman...if they do, they will call it a challenging role..not only because the role is difficult but the stereotypes the said actor has to fight!! So low is the confidence on the police that kanoon is often taken apne haath mein by the likes of the RDB boys!! Bring back Ifthikar I say..)

5. Raam Raam Kaka ...(The most common and endearing form of greeting in Bollywood is now lost..The overtly thin, supremely old, dhoti clad, toothless smiling kaka has given way to uncles in business suits and hawaiian shirts who only respond to wassup??)

6. Heere kahaan chhupaya hain?? ( Self explanatory when followed by "Boss, maal pakda gaya!)

7. Ghar mein do-do jawaan betiyaan hain (This dialogue delivered by my father....a really funny sight!!)

8. Gawaaon ke bayaan aur sabooton ko madde nazar rakhte hue, mujrim ko dafaa 302 ke tahet, sazaa-e maut sunaye jaati hain... (No wonder the death penalty will never be abolished in India given its representation in pop culture..In other words, a 'mujrim ko ba-izzat bari kiya jaata hain' in movies would be friggin' sweeet!)

9. Aye ji sunte ho, aap bade woh ho!! (Since one never quite understood what 'woh' means, Bollywood has become more explicit and decided to call a spade and spade without all the cute talkin')

10. Maine tere liye kheer banaya hain beta (with proverbial tear in the eyes) - Unfortunately, no mom makes kheer these days nor do kids like it too much, especially when fondue is available in the nearest restaurant!

11. No I haven't forgotten this....

MAIN TUMHARE BACHCHE KI MAA BAN NE WAALI HOON

This is still true in Bollywood, except that these tear jerkers are now called Salaam Namaste or Kya Kehna and they will always get someone urbane like Preity Zinta to play these parts who will carry the baby alright but cannot, for the life of her, carry off these legendary lines...what a shame!

and the last one for today (I read this on the web...ROFL)

12. Pesh hain shahar ki jaani maani kalakaar, Miss. Renu

These Miss. Renu type roles will almost always go to Bindu, Helen or Aruna Irani and let me tell you, they won't just be nightingales with a mike on a stage addressing a family audience because their bhai is under the kabza of the proverbial kutta-kameena (In Bollywood, a dog and a depraved person are one and the same...always).

This list is endless but I shall end the post. Oh..how I love the 1970s. I swear I would do anything to turn back time and turn Ekta Kapoor into Manmohan Desai or Karan Johar into Prakash Mehra while Yash Chopra still remains!!

Cosmic questions..

On blogs and bloggers-
1. Why do bloggers bare it all (and I mean...ALL) on their blogs and then, to create an illusion of maintaining privacy, name the people in their stories as "Max", "A" or sometimes, literary or poetic sounding names, knowing fully well that their friends (who are their only readers, in most cases) will in all likelihood know what they are talking about??? Is it some sorta' cool blog trend that middle-aged wimp blog-owners and occassional bloggers like me are missing out on??

On kids....
1. Why are kids these days so irritating? What happened to the inherent kiddie sweetness that once likened them to the Almighty? They are like, they said in some movie, anti-Christ!! Needy, cranky, demanding, precocious and you cannot even scold/slap them in the fear of being branded a child abuser for life. In other words...uncute (especially the ones aged between 3-12, after which they are teenagers and are supposed to be hormonally irritating anyway)

2. Why do they dress like adults, especially the girl kids wearing backless sequinned dresses with matching jewellery, shoes with heels, sunglasses, chunky bags and the works!! Obviously, I blame the parents and not the kids...

On parents (new age)
1. Why do they have to fulfill every demand that their child makes?
Kid- Mamma, I want a new pink dress to wear to Pinki's budday party.
Mamma (Sometimes, even metro Dads) (stealing a glance at the child's wardrobe)- Haan beta, you really need a new pink dress for Pinki's birthday. I will get your a pair of pink shoes with matching bag and hair clips too (Looks at other parent who is, by this time, totally following the conversation..Kitni cute lagegi na...my baby!!)
(Thankless kid walks out of the room thinking what she wants next..The end!!)

Parents (old) in a similar situation with older kids...
Response- Get lost (Emphasis added)
Older kid walks out of the room abusing parents for being so under-indulgent and becoming (as Praachi and I often discuss) "scarred for life".

On people who crib....

Why do most of my friends and acquaintances working in the corporate sector always (by always, i mean always) crib about long work hours and how they don't have a life??

My questions to these kinds

a) You guys get paid a bomb and while I am not saying that is a bad thing....ever heard of the term "adequate compensation". Plus, most of you have weekends off.

b) If you are unwilling to trade "life" for a "fat pay package", then you have two options: a) quit or b) challenge the Indian corporate work culture in the courts ( all of you are well-paid, qualified lawyers, remember or will you leave that also to under-paid, well-qualified (yeah!! and some of them with LLMs and all) human rights people or activist/PIL lawyers??)

c) If you need the money and therefore, need to work hard (or simply work) to support your lifestyle, then why is it such a big deal?? Remember, the grass is always greener on the other side!!

d) Also, define "life" and how do you people manage to "not have it"?

No offence meant, love ya' all !! (See..I am diplomatic also)

On random stuff....
1. Is the world generally dumbing down??

2. Why should anyone read a book on India's development written by the author of cult classics (I mean it) like Starry Nights, Spouse and Socialite Evenings and scriptwriter of the runaway hit television series "Kitty Party" where she has very suttly remarked that "it is okay to photoshop the poor out of the India story". Yes, b@#$&, in your socialite bubble, the poor don't matter because "if you don't have money, you are a loser". Good said!!

3. When will Mahesh Bhatt stop and given his legacy of Pooja, Emraan, Vikram and the likes, will he, ever?

4. Why is Amitabh Bachchan writing a blog and abusing the shit out of everyone?? Some call it courage and all that, while folks like me, still think its senility!!! What happened to all the "mazhab (read babuji) nahin sikhata aapas mein bair rakhna" attitude. Methinks, its a thing of the past!! Go, Amitji..we love the re-emergence of the angry old man!! Also, why did you leave Jaya Bachchan out of Sarkar-2?? Was it becoming too much of a family thing?? Nothing else explains her absence. Also, time for national debate on who does the older Bachchan love more..Amar or Jaya??; hate more..SRK or Raj?? (They are alter-egos, just btw); prefer more..Abhishek or Ash (given that both are supremely "gritting my teeth/clinching my fists* irritating). On a more serious note, do parents realise how irritating their children actually are or does one spouse/partner really know what the other is up to?? Do they??

5. Why should Manoj Night Shyamalan get the Padmashri, especially since he referred to SRK as "the dude who is in every film"..LOL and also because he hasn't turned in a classic after the great Sixth Sense and the even greater Unbreakable (what a concept!). Dude, when you donot have a Bollywood copy of your movie, you should really rethink your career moves before flying in confidently to steal our top citizen honours!!

6. Who is Khalli and why is he so famous?? I mean, an Indian makes it to the WWE right after I stop watching it...not cool!!

7. Why is Rahul Gandhi touring India and calling it the "Discovery of India" tour?? Although, I mostly believe that it is indeed a journey of self-discovery and get in touch with the real India, political commentators are finding flaws with his approach etc.. Ya, losers..carry on with your discovery and give us more media fodder coz we are so news-deprived already!

8. I am wondering, after a discussion with Praachi and carefully listening to a speech..who speaks better Hindi...Sonia or Manmohan?? Also, how spineless is Arjun Singh to say " I will always be loyal to the Gandhi family" after being snubbed as a sycophant (and very publicly at that) by the Gandhis.

9. Why do most married people hang out with other married people?? Or new moms with other new moms?? Don't tell me they have things in common...yeah right, my baby coughed thrice today..how many times did yours??

10. Why do all hip Delhi gals look alike?? Is style actually individual?? Living in Delhi has made me question a lot of things, this being one of them.

11. Why do these newly married women wear those red and white churas and sindur with Western wear? I mean, when will these women realise that somethings just don't mix...like chalk and cheese..even if you are married!!

12. Why can I never actually send a SMS using words like F9 (fine), c (see), u (you), dat (that), der (there)?? I use tmrw (tomorrow) and btw (by the way) though. Full power to me!!

13. Why do I always sub-consciously judge people who are not quite like me?? (what do you think inspires this post) Every person is different and you are no epitome of perfection either, for crying out loud...you with your copied and unacknowledged gtalk handels thinking you are too cool and uploading every picture on facebook habits...lame!!!

14. Why do I exclaim so much??

More to follow as and when things happen around me and I am tickled by those happenings (which is also the new Manoj Night movie, btw which I will be sure not to watch especially since he has said that this is his scariest movie ever..the last time he said that, I was laughing in the theatre..yes people, it is SIGNS that I am talking about!!)