and i say thank you for the.....

so its the end of the year. i can write some cheesy blog about the ups n downs of this year. i can get melancholy and crib and complain. or i can simply do what i do best. look at it through a 'funny pair of spectacles'.

it started off with the lowest of low, with a 'bam bam' moment in in my life. loosing the most precious person, only to realise that i never had a hold on her in the first place. she was and in some ways is still a rocking person. she was the David to a Goliath of an illness. she was King Leonidas who led 3oo Spartans against the mighty persian king. both of them fought loosing battles but, by God did they bring the giant to his knees. thank you for this lesson in life.

life had only one direction to go from there... and that was UP... so i took a plane went to cool off in the coolest place on earth... the Himalayas. Nepal was calling and seemed like the perfect escape. well, my girl friends and i figured out that it was not enough to drive mumbai mad... so we gave khatmandu a taste of mumbai tadka. thank you for your darshan, oh great wise Everest!

our family's first international trip to singapore was nothing but a food fest gone crazy and a lesson in traffic and civic sense. 谢谢 - xie4xie - Thank you. (in mandarin)

climbing the ladder a little further; my boys started their adolescent years and i got fodder for FB. an entire theses and PhD can be done on their pre-teen years. imagine the chaos when they actually turn teenagers! makes me wonder if the madness of their massi can be passed on like a common flu! like Dharam paaji said... SUICIDE mausijiiii!!!!!! thank you K3 for being YOU.

it helped having a crazy bunch of friends who gifted me Krrish and Mr. Grey all rolled into one. it helped that friends made me feel like the queen of sheeba on the one day that i thought was ridiculous since the person who gave birth to me was missing from all the action. thanks my fraandzzzz!

So the year rolls on and i have figured that except for some speed bumps and hurdles, the road is the only constant in my life. people have come, people have gone, people have used my life as a pit stop, people have been angry with me and people have loved me to death. there is nothing else to do, except travel on this road. maybe loose a couple of inches on my 70mm backside... but then, this same 70mm cushions my falls... so thank you 70mm.

to dhoom or not to dhoom

So normally I try to blog about worldly things like friends, love, sex, traffic, kids, etc etc. But today I am breaking my own trend and am gonna a write a quick short piece on a movie I just saw. The reason being, my FB status is not enough to vent out the entire episode. The movie in question is Dhoom-3.

now I know that most of you'all will hate me by the end of it. Some of you will even be so righteous as to tell me to not be judgmental about someone else. But sorry. I cant help it. For the entire duration of the movie, all i did was wait to get out and vent my frustration out on someone. 

So first of all, being tubelight-like runs in me and my boys. So at noon I was roaming around the streets of Mumbai searching for the elusive cheap tickets for an evening show. Finally I managed to zero in on New Empire. My multiplex bred boys had a firsthand experience of how total tapori type audience watches such movies. If they were embarrassed when I whistled and clapped during Krrish… this was a total chullu-bhar-paani-mein doob jaane wala moment. Only difference was I was not the one clapping and hooting in the audience. So coming back to the movie. First of all… I had to make sure that I had not accidentally walked into another block buster movie called ‘The Hobbit’. Because you see, the protagonist/villain/grey character/bad man… was a short puny fellow who had to fill quite large impressive feet of his predecessors. I mean the casting director needs a whack on his/her backside for this goof-up! The screen is larger than life. The movie has a larger than life background. The production house is larger than life and there you go hiring a midget for a role which is larger than life. I mean, they must have gone through so many inconveniences because of one ‘little’ mistake. Imagine, the extra dancers had to give audition based on their height. The heroine could not wear heels (coz without them she was still towering over him!). The hero, a 6 point something feet guy looked like he was constantly scolding a child. So I mean, the film lost out majorly on that.

Then we have the good cops. Unfortunately, the good cops in this movie were not allowed any grand dhamakedar, hero-like entries because you see, that was already done by the villain. So here you have a 6 ft tall guy breaking a brick wall in…. wait for it…. Drum roll….. take a deep breath…. An auto rickshaw. Now as much as I respect the 3 wheeled wonder queen of the suburbs… I just thought that in a movie where you are spending 20-30 crores, you would afford a cool enough vehicle for the good cops. I know the dude in question doesn’t have any more films in his kitty but puhleasseee…. He has married the ‘most beautiful woman’ on earth. Give him some credit. As for the second good cop, the less said the better. He is just lucky to be on screen.

But do you know who/what is the really winner in this ‘magnum phus phus’? It’s the bike! I mean, how cool is it that it can run on water as well as land! Imagine what a great boon it would be to someone like me! Traffic? No problem! Flick a switch and it turns into a cycle! Floods during the monsoon?? No problem! One more flick of the switch and voila! It is a speed boat. Wanna visit France??? No problem!!! Flick on!!!! There, you have a jet at your disposal.

So the only saving grace in this fracas… the sexy moves by the heroine. But alas! Out of the 2 hours and 47 minute ordeal, she is on screen for a total of 17 minutes.

So me and my boys returned back home with lighter pockets, fried brains and a vow to watch Comedy nights with Kapil. Yes, because Gutti on Comedy Nights… is more tolerable than watching an ‘Elf’ trying trapeze semi-nude.

p.s. all those who love ‘the Elf’ please forgive me… I too once loved him. But this was too much.

 

yesterday, i attended the Murli Deora football matches, held for all schools in Mumbai. these are matches sponsored by the erstwhile politician and many other generous donors. they provided football jerseys and football shoes free of cost to all. its free for all and anyone can participate. the best thing about this tournament was that you could be playing against any school. there are no groups based on the popularity of the school or the market value of that school. so no where is the great academic divide more evident than during such tournaments.
on one side we had a school like Cathedral whose U-14 team looked like it was fed on Bheem's diet. and opposite them you had a barely 3 feet tall players from a municipality school in Worli. the entire C-team was in Nike shoes while our worlites were in spikes provided by the sponsors. just looking at them stand for the toss was amazing... the minions vs the giants, the Davids vs the Goliaths, the lilliputs vs the Gullivers, the real face of mumbai vs the 'head-in-ipad' crowd. finally the game began and not once did the minions give any space to the giants. not once did i feel that they were throwing away the match. not once did they think, "jaane de na yaar, appun ko toh sirf free frooti aur samosa se matlab hai boss." even the C-team was a bit taken aback. they assumed this would be a walk-over but hell no! you bet your jockey-clad ass, the VIP underwear aur baniyan was here to whoop it. being the lilliputs they sneaked in every available opening. they took every hook they had and tried to throw it over Gulliver. after a harrowing 20 mins, the giants realized that they need to turn the tide in their favour (like they always do) and systematically broke down every defense that David had on offer. i guess they must have used their 'trained-for-harvard' brains to defeat the 'worli galli football'. i wish the result would have been different but alas.... that is life. i dont grudge the giants their victory, they were by far the better team. but i thoroughly enjoyed seeing them break into a sweat caused by these lilliputians. but i guess they dont sweat haan... thats too LS.
so to cut a long sunny story short, i think this enterprise was worth it. it happens every year. good on you Mr. Deora. i guess not all apples are rotten.
as for my boys, dont ask me whether they won or not. they were too busy watching the girls play football. so you can imagine the result.

F.R.I.E.N.D.S.

most of the people i know today are because of internet and smart phone apps. gone are the days when we lost touch with each other. gone are the days when we meet someone by chance and squeal in delightful surprise. today, we still meet some people by chance and that delightful squeal is still there; but the familiarity is unmistakeable. hence from a handful of people who i could lean on... i now have an entire line up of 'friends' for different situations in my life. 

F - FOREVER FRIENDS
these are the friends who know all the details of your life. the personal failures, the heart breaks, the challenges. everything. they will kick your butt if you are making a fool of yourself. and they will push you ahead even when you dont see a way. these people will tell you, you are making a BIG mistake. this lot will not let you go home till your mood improves. this lot will drink with you and diet with you and then eat with you some more. 
R - RAUNCHY FRIENDS
these are the friends with whom you can share dirty jokes, bedroom secrets and be sex gurus to. not that i would be an expert on it... but experience + interest in the topic = motivational speeches at1am. 
I - IMAGINARY FRIENDS
these little devils we invent in our childhood and carry them on till puberty. that is when the male species kills this imaginary friend and we loose track of where we left this buddy behind. but i have heard of so many instances when as adults we have imaginary friends... the type who we assume are our friends but who disappear at the first sign of trouble. 
E - EVERYDAY BUDDIES
these are the people who we could classify as work buddies. people who we meet everyday of our life. either by choice or by chance. even my local baniya could be my everyday buddy. i know i am my vegetable vendor's buddy 'coz he is most concerned if i miss my regular Friday shopping 'date' with him. he will be quick to ask me with a concerned look: "kya hua bhabhiji, last week nahi aaye aap? naraaz ho?" 
N - NUNGA-PUNGA FRIENDS
now... thankfuly i dont have this category of friends. there are some who dont mind disrobing and baring all in front of others. so coolly, calmly as if its as normal as daylight follows night. for me that would be as normal as a 4 wheeler trying to cut my lane while i am on a scooter. the only person who i can think of who fits in this category is probably my hubby. 
D - DESIGNER CHADDI PALS
now i might be the one wearing '3 for 100rs' wali chuddies.... but i treasure them alot. same way i treasure all my well-heeled Marks & Spencer wali chuddi buddies. they are the ones who make shopping a pleasurable trip. they are the ones who make walking into malls look cool. these friends i value (not by the added zeros they paid for their under garments) but by their absolute sharp, well meaning and jazzy tastes in clothes. my before and after pictures will vouch for the transformation their expert advice has culminated in.
S - SOUL SISTERS 
finally, the most important type of friend. the soul sister. some of us are born with sisters. some of us have friends who are like sisters to us. these sisters we have grown up with, fought with, were jealous about, were proud about, shared rock star posters with and then some more. these people we don't need to call regularly. these people we don't have to chat endlessly for hours just to know whats on their minds. these sisters, we just have so that when words fail, the look or the silence is enough to express how we feel. these are the soul stirring girls who can tell you; "bitch, please. get over it."
so i would like to thank this impressive line-up of girls who have been the reason for my confidence, happiness and life changing make-overs. 
oh yeah!!!! i forgot the special blog-a-friend type who doesn't mind going through the endless mind numbing blogs i write. thank you buddy.

from Kanpur to Cannes

The recently concluded Cannes film festival gave me a short term diploma in long term fashion. so from a freshly-baked, straight out of the oven certificate; i can dare to blog about it. 

firstly, where were the movies? was this a movie festival? oh damn! i seem to have missed that entire bus. poor guys who slogged their butts off filming; collecting funds; bothering with dressing up their leading ladies; bothering to undress their leading ladies in the name of 'Art cinema'. i have no clue who won, who lost. do people even win and loose during this festival. Ahh! Je ne sais pas! Bof! who cares! the leading ladies, ledas and the 'two-bit role' arty actors played a more important role on a piece of old carpet than they did on screen. 

the 'poor' celebrities were getting publicly disrobed for what they took 4 hours to put on! i say, why bother putting it on. Every morning, we were witness to investigative journalism, that would put Sherlock Holmes to shame. "What did she wear!?! - a feather gown to hide her bulges or was it a fashion statement?" (the real reason was that the dress was soooo tight while putting on it ripped the seam, so that was the creativity of the poultry chef who was hanging around, ogling at her.) "Why was he dressed in silver?!?! looking like a stuffed turkey-in-foil??" Ahh! ma cherie, you are so passe!!! "Don't you know he was trying to melt his fat through all that insulation?!?!" now that's called dedication, work and work out together! 

it also looked like a 'Kumbh mela' in foreign setting. i mean we actually got to see people who are lost on the radar in India. An actress who was last seen making out big time with a snake, decided to declare herself 'the first person to wear a bikineee in hindi movies'. she obviously forgot that far more sexier ladies, before she was even born sported the two piece with panache and set hearts fluttering in the 70s. for those reading this, Helen and Sharmila Tagore rocked the bikineee before this in-your-face-boob-job candidate. why was this twit even on the carpet?!!! who did she have to cavort with this time, to put on that expensive piece of fashion???

some of the celebrities/actors/directors/page 3 daughter-in-laws, don't bother to show themselves on Indian soil because they claim they are enjoying motherhood (another term for 'jobless'). all these noble people they are willing to leave their motherly inhibitions and fat behind to done ridiculous saris and gowns, just to have it all ripped to shreds by the fashion police. Ahh Dahling!! why bother?! go back to your hide out and let your work do the talking. then that crown will definitely suit that pretty face of yours. Then 'you will be worth it'.

so coming back to the movies.... what movies???!!???! Umm... let me pause and at least Google the results coz i for one have no clue! (obviously) OK, so here it is.... <5 later="" mins="">

the most prestigious award, the palm d'or, went to a chick flick called 'Blue is the warmest colour'. its a steamy rom-com about lesbian love!!!! Oh Mon Dieu!!! look what we almost missed!!! it has no-hold-barred 12 minute erotic sex scene between the two leading ladies (sorry leddas). Wow!!! the movies now seem more interesting than the fashion fuzzball. 
going through the entire list i noticed that not a single indian movie even made a feathery flutter. so what was all that hulla gulla about?!?! the people who benefited most were the 'designers'! obviously their sales pitch was, 'we dont really design clothes like these - the star's body type was such that i had to hide those indian hips' (after all hips don't lie). the unsuspecting future client goes back home with a disaster round the corner. he can safely kiss his french fanny goodbye coz its getting publicly flogged next year.

as for me, i am shoving that freshly-baked certificate down the loo (no i am not chinese) and going to watch 'Blue is the warmest colour'. that is another blog, another time. Ciao!

the monk who sold his honk.

now i know i have written an earlier post on "the great indian driver"... but i couldn't help writing one more post on traffic rules and behaviour, given my recent trip abroad. most of you are already living in foreign lands and other half of you all have traveled to foreign lands. so i am guessing you might have a lot of opinions. but this being my first trip outside my comfort zone, my country, it was an eye opener of sorts.

the first thing that hits you when you are travelling on the road, is the silence. now i spent all of 5 days in singapore but the silence was deafening. not a HONK! not even an 'excuse me but i am coming out of my lane' warning HONK! not even a 'WTf are you doing in my lane' HONK! and forget the 'take your bullock cart somewhere else' HONK! everyone was just.... cruising! you can feel the rush hour chaos, you can feel the urgency in the cars wanting to over take; but all this chaos and urgency was in an orderly and organised manner. in certain parts of india, people are 'trigger happy'. but in mumbai we are all 'horn happy'. don't like the face of the guy who overtook you, HONK. don't like the way some idiot showing off his drawing skills by going zig-zag, HONK. want to double park your car, HONK and tell the cabbie already double parked there to move.so for a person who rides a scooter in such a city, singapore was a cultural shock. i feel incomplete without honking in protest to the cabbie who decides to show off his manliness which is in direct proportion to his stupidity on the road. i mean how idiotic can you be to honk from behind when you can clearly see that there are ten cars lined up in front of me.

no one in singapore felt the need to roll down their windows and yell..."alibaug se aaya kya!!!!???" not one sole dreamed of overtaking the guy in front even if he had a more powerful car which could easily put schumacher to the test. so why then cant we adopt this road decency?! the answer is simple, we dont know how. as much as i want to keep my mouth shut while riding my scooter, i cant. as much as i want to stick to my lane, i cant. i mean what is the sense of waiting at a signal at 7.30 in the morning when clearly there is no vehicle in sight from the other side. i am guilty as charged. i dont know if i will survive driving on foreign soil. but i know this much, in Rome do as the romans do and in alibaug drive like the people in alibaug do. that is the law of the traffic jungle. and if you dont like it you are free to HONK in protest.

the great indian office babu

this past week i have been gathering frequent flyer miles. i was doing the mumbai darshan tour of a national bank... like a bird being shooed off from one branch to another branch to another branch. now the thing is, we are supposed to be a country which takes pride in people like narayan murty and ratan tata. the former is a man who used the power of genius to carry india into the 21 century; the latter is a hardworking home-boy who dint carry any airs about being the head of a huge conglomeration. so then how come the middle class gentry don't get motivated by these great but simple people to do their jobs efficiently? 

i found myself dealing with two such people. one was a lady in the public provident fund department. all she had to do was switch on her computer and tell me if my work was done or not. switch on the computer she did, but she failed to mention that my demand draft was ready. she very nonchalantly told me to go back home and wait for the money to be transferred into the relevant account. i, being the trusting dumbo, went back home. jump to two days later... money still not reached. i go back to her, she recognises me tells me to wait for 10 minutes which in indian language means half an hour. i do so patiently. when i show her my face again, she very nonchalantly (once again) tells me... "ask the other lady. i am not dealing with this case." then i beg to know why in the first case did she answer me?!?!?! i mean did she just make up stuff from the top off her empty but well oiled skull?!?! this 'other lady' was the only one handling a long line of claimants. so it was back to face booking and whatsapping while waiting for my turn. only this time i was fuming.. like a pressure cooker about to let off all the pent up steam! and all this while i was under the impression that women were far more efficient than men.

once this fiasco was sorted out, came the true officer category 'babu'. a tall stately man in suit-boot, but looking like Alfred - the butler. i waited and waited for him to come to his seat, but Big Alf insisted on exercising his long limbs and was going round and round the department, checking on the smaller minnows below him. once he saw me drumming my fingers on his desk, he graced me with his glorious self. i explain my predicament to him. i am completely armed with all necessary documents. he looks over them, he looks over my application (impeccably typed) he fidgets with his computer screen then looks back at my letter, which i started to believe was in greek since he had a puzzled look on his face. this is a man who has the authority to sign off millions of rupees. this is a man whose signature can make or break someones hard earned investment. this is a man who wastes 2 hours over a 20 minute job. hence justifying his big fat salary. at first he was suspicious and was reluctant to do what i was asking him to do. so i also used my feminine charms and acted like a damsel in mourning. Oh! never under estimate the power of moist eyes! abracadabra!!! he agreed to do everything, provided i came back with my father as proof of his consent to adding my name in his account. then the Jhansi ki rani in me took over!!! my nostrils were flaring! he could have told me this the previous day too when i met him! i gathered my things without saying a word to him. gave him one more look which told him exactly which body part of his would shrivel and fall off and i walked away. the next day i came with my father, who is from the old school and gets intimidated by these babu-types. there he was being courteous to a man who dint know the spelling of 'courteous'! nevertheless, all work got done and i walked out, promising on my mother's dedication that i will not deal with them again.

the thing is not everyone is a poor worker... in my entire dealings with this bank, i must say that there have been people; namely clerical staff who are super efficient, who do their job while apologizing for the short-comings of their boss. maybe this class of people value the money they earn hence the loyalty and efficiency kicks in. my mother being one such employee was always before time and constantly on her seat, her fingers flying off the key board. i have come across people who have solved issues in minutes while their bosses have worried over them for days. 

but in all this i noticed that this officer babu, might be super slow and super cautious for a reason. the entire branch is under him. being a national bank, people bunk work like we swat flies in monsoon. so apart from haughty women like me he also has to ensure that his staff are present behind the counters designated to them. while i was waiting at his desk, he was trying to call up all the absentee staff. most of them dint answer him, others were 'ill', others were 'ill-in-mysore' i mean really... if labour unions were not so strong, these people would have been fired since when.

to cut a long story short, banking work is like a gladiator fight. all your men have to be on the arena or the lion (the customer) will eat you up. occasionally the lion scores and occasionally the gladiator. the only difference is you don't have to kill the lion to survive, you just have to be alert and quick in your reflexes and the lion will back off out of respect.

the aeroplane-wala nawabs

since i have been a recent traveler... i came across an entire new culture, an entire new breed called "the aeroplane-wala nawab" ('nawab' being lords or royalty in India) now you've got to understand that i don't travel much by plane. my last big journey was when i was 10 and that is a looonnggg time ago. later on i have been in domestic flights not lasting more than one hour. so by the time i realised i was defying gravity and 'flying' i was back down on solid ground. so this time, considering i was a fully mature person, travelling without 'adult supervision'.. my soul was receptive to all new experiences. i took in each and every sight, looked all around me with child-like eagerness which soaks in all the colours and smells and sounds. all around me, people were smelling of davidoff, nina ricci and chanel. everywhere i looked there were LV bags and prada shoes. but mixed with all of this was good old lifebouy soap and cinthol deo. all distinctions were removed because we all were travelling to 'phoren' shores. i could hear different languages being spoken but like all great rivers meeting the ocean, all of us spoke in one language for immigration check. 

first time, i witnessed a group going on Haj. first time, i saw the blush on a new bride on her way to her honeymoon. and first time i paid through my nose for breakfast! seriously dude, its just coffee and two slices of bread! now the thing is when you are travelling with an enthusiastic bunch of 'young ladies'... photo sessions are the norm. so i over came my initial shock and embarrassment  and posed and smiled against various backgrounds. i thought i would have been lost, but surprisingly for a country that cannot control its hormones... everything at the international airport is well organized and in control. all arrows pointed in the right direction to the right windows, the ladies room was where it was supposed to be, we got on the right bus for the right plane. thank god! coz frankly, i was worried about getting on the wrong plane... having seen the movie 'home alone 2' many times in the past.

the return journey was even more eventful. since i was travelling all alone i was in 'karate kid' mode. but coming back from my destination i met the real 'nawabs'. the prada, gucci and LV were replaced by north west hiking gear, aristocrat and VIP suitcases. all these people were travelling to middle eastern countries for jobs and some were going back home after completing super human feat of climbing various Himalayan peaks. the look on the man leaving home for 'phoren' shores, unsure about his future and destiny will haunt me always. they would call up from their not-so-smart phones and speak to their children or beloved ones. finally Mr. Graham Bell's invention was put to the real use that it was meant to be used for.. calling your beloved and saying "i love you, dont worry." i also came across a 'Jhonny Bravo' character all dressed smartly in suit-boot, even though the temperature outside was 33 degrees C. i was observing him right from security check. pulling his cabin bag with one hand in his pocket and looking around to see if he was being noticed. i was dreading that he might land up sitting next to me. what could the odds be, right? well the odds were high and "jhonny bravo" was sitting next to me!!! god save me!! a 5'4" suited man, having a hoitty-toitty attitude and flight delayed by 3 hours.. things could not be worse. the only ray of light at the end of this adventure was my family waiting for me patiently at mumbai airport. 

so coming back to the 'aeroplane-wala nawabs' - the davidoff smelling lady was truly a nawab when she dint mind sharing her personal space with the cinthol deo smelling chick. the labourer leaving his family behind was truly a nawab as he chose to fit in with the crowd while not forgetting his roots. Jhonny Bravo was a nawab in his own eyes, if that worked for him then good for him. as for me, i was just glad to witness this vibrant scenario. 

incidently, it must have been one hell of odds, coz i saw jhonny bravo later in the week riding a bike with a smug 'phoren-returned' look on his face and for a second we recognised each other. but i turned away coz i had acted like a snooty bitch and asked the air hostess to change my seat. i really was in no mood to fight my odds that day.

BAM! BAM! BAM! ...

 

there are some moments in life that change you forever. 

u live in comfort for 9 months in your mother's womb and BAM! u are evicted!!!! and that too without any notice period!!! voila... life as u knew it... changed for ever. 

just when you have found your comfort zone again... BAM! you are in an institution that tells you how to spell your name... a name which sounded so familiar till yesterday, is now a task, an achievement, a homework to be completed.

just when you have built bonds that can last a lifetime... BAM! you meet someone who whisks you away from those very people who you laughed, fought, cried and shared your sandwich with. you swear you will never love again when you hear your heart break... but there is always someone waiting in the sidelines to sweep up those broken pieces and mend them the best way he can. 

you know you have hit jack-pot, when BAM! the very name you learnt to spell correctly after all those years has to be changed. you adapt, adopt and adjust to this new environment and hope that 'global warming' doesn't affect it as the 7 year itch approaches.

BAM! BAM! you just experienced another change.... all of a sudden you are now responsible for two or more lives. you are now the adult who will be looked up to with innocent eyes.you are the adult who will have to give up all reasoning and be unreasonably, hopelessly in love with 'your creation'. of course like all new inventions in this world... even your creation will have start-up problems in the form of burps, farts and poo.... but nothing too earth shattering that cannot be resolved by fine tuning your senses to 'maximum tolerance level'.

and just when you realise that you have it all... BAM! your biological clock interrupts your stupor and tells you.. "excuse me... you need to now concentrate on me too. you have neglected me for far too long." so all the meals that you skipped to nurture 'your creation', all the chances you gave up to smile, all the sunrises you gave up to pack that tiffin box when you could be out enjoying the fresh air and walking towards a healthy 'you'; all of that comes back to haunt you. you realise... "i need to press the pause button..." but BAM! BAM! BAM! 'time' laughs in your face and tells you in that sarcastic tone that only 'time' can use... "Yeah right! like i have nothing else to do!"

so you panic!!! you run to 'your' inventor! you run to her and tell her; "Teach me! teach me! everything you learnt, from your achievements, from your goof -ups, from your dreams! and BAM! 

'YOUR' inventor is gone. you were too late. too late living it up, too late thinking that the A+ or the B- mattered more than that one important minute. too late to ask... "am i doing the right thing?" too late to argue... "green tea or tata tea?" too late to wonder... "is it one spoon of cornflour or two?" 

the only thing you have left in your hand in regret and a few pictures to help you bide the time away till you meet your inventor again and say, "Oh thank god... somethings don't change.... you are still the way i remembered you."

high on ammonia...

 

So one day I decided to go and indulge in some PBI – personal beauty indulgence. So I walked into a high end hajaam-ki-dukaan; also known as… salon. I knew that I will be ripped off… but I was in one of those crazy moods where I wanted to be ripped off just so that I could channelize my angst towards them rather than other things. So there I was…I needed a hair cut (after a year); thought paisa vasool hoga. My barber-ni or some may call ‘stylist’ takes one look at my hair and comments how well they have grown out and that there is not much she can change since I din’t want to do anything radical like chopping it all off like the last time. So a brain wave struck her and me at the same time. How about highlights! You know… to break the monotony of black and the hidden grey. I jumped on to the idea… and went into intense conversations on the after care, colour, time required etc etc… Of course in all that initial enthusiasm, I forgot to ask the cost. And when my diamaag ki batti jali… my jaw dropped. Now how to refuse after all that time-pass?! So she agreed to give me a concession which was not that concessional… and since I had already walked in with the knowledge that; today I am getting ripped off a part of my salary; I agreed. 

Now the thing with highlights is that they take parts of your hair and colour that only. When I saw her take 0.7% of my hair… I panicked… all that money and not even that much of hair to colour. So I very sweetly, like an innocent lamb, told her that I can see a lot of black still left. She equally sweetly told me… that’s the way one highlights otherwise I will land up looking like some of the tarts who line the streets. Hmm… for the price I was paying… I wanted to beg her to make me look like a tart!!! But then better sense prevailed and I let her do her job. Then a thought struck me… since I am getting ripped.. let me go all the way… how about a pedicure in one of those fancy vibrating chairs! But by the time I mustered enough confidence to think I was worthy of THAT chair… a social butterfly flitted in and sat on it like it was her throne and she was the queen of Pedicurasia! Humbled… I started looking around. A young girl was learning how to apply make-up on her already pretty face. Elsewhere, a ‘I-am-a-model’ type guy enters and asks for a haircut. But the best was… a semi-bald guy walking in for a haircut with my stylist. Now did I mention that my barber-ni/stylist is very/extremely good looking? Well, she started working on him while my colour latched on. I couldn’t take my eyes off the entire scene!! She was searching for hair to cut… while chatting him up. The entire process took 20 mins! A semi-bald haircut… 20 minutes!!!!! I couldn’t help choking on my laughter. So when she was done with him.. I asked her.. WTF was all that about? Why did he bother to spend 1k on a non-existent haircut!! And she simply answered… when you are earning in crores you don’t mind spending 20 minutes chatting up with a stylist and feeling good about it knowing fully well that a hajaam across the street would do the same for you in 60 bucks. All she had to do was touch his pate and it was paisa vasool for him. 

So coming back to my highlights… I learned to love them. She spent exactly 10 minutes ‘styling’ my hair… and now I am stuck with expensive shampoo n stuff for the hair. But what the hell…. I enjoyed getting ripped. Once in a while its ok to NOT think rationally and do something crazy to lift your mood. Rather than drink yourself silly… I got high on ammonia that day. Like someone famous once said, “Coz I’m worth it.”

End of a Dream Run

 

so finally it ends. the sure shot formula for a successful movie... the item number, is now frowned upon. do you know, we can actually write a thesis on the origin of the item song? its as ancient as the hills, but then no one complained then. the heroine was supposed to be demure and 'domesticated' while the raunchy quotient was to be filled in by the vamp. yes, the vamp an extinct species... but they had a class of their own. they dint move they glided on the dance floor. sometimes, the vamps clothes were trendier than the heroine's and we would gape at the sari blouse designs worn by her. but now all that is over and done with. i miss Bindu, Nadira and Helene!!! these ladies went about their business with class. they loved the hero secretly and went down the crooked path just to please him or because they were spurned by him. 

 

Today the heroine is not a heroine till she does an 'item' number. now the zeros on her pay check go up with the number of times her bosom heaves upwards and pelvic thrusts forwards.... and the interest is calculated to the ratio of lip biting to how many come-hither looks she gives.

yesterday, a 'top' heroine refused to do an item dance. apparently she has agreed to do it only after she listens to the lyrics (which should be holier than the choir sung in church); and only if the song is choreographed with the steps she approves of (which should be cleaner than the moves of a classical dancer). today i read again that another actress rejected an item number. what the moral brigade could not do.... one harmless girl in delhi has done. finally i can watch a hindi movie with my kids without squirming in my seat. 

 
so what is going to happen to all these Neha Dhupias, Rakhi Sawants and Yana Guptas of India? how are these women going to make ends meet because they depend entirely on this genre of music to pay for all the paint... not only on their face but also on the walls of their house. well, i dont care and neither should you. there will always be a loop hole somewhere where they will flourish again. 
Coz you see there are people like you and me who actually listen and dance to these songs in moments of weakness (guilty as charged, my friend. there are no excuses). but maybe.. every time we shake our ass to SHEILA's tunes or decide to stick someone's pic to our mammary glands  with FEVICOL...  lets take a step back and think.... that nirbhaya badnaam hui.... darling hamare liye. RIP.