Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Ever After

The Kashi Vishwanath Temple in Varanasi was crowded way beyond than usual numbers. Seems the number of god worshippers had increased....or was it the sinners? The pujari was having a feast time with collections sky rocketing like the sensex index. He may just be able to get his daughter the new cycle she had asked for New Year.

But all these did not bother Abhi and Aishu. They walked past the crowd hand in hand which looked at them mesmerized and awestruck. In India a man and woman have to get the license of marriage to hold hands and roam around or else tongues will wag and rumors will fly around. By the time you cross one kilometer here, the rumor would have traveled to your uncle in Kashmir and Aunt in Kanyakumari.

Love is an ecstasy which drugs people way beyond these silly stupidities. Abhi's friends openly objected his affair with her. He let out the usual dialogue of "We are just friends" and for sometime they were also convinced. But its hard to hide the enthusiasm and anxiety to the outside world when in love.

Finally he did propose to Aishu when they went first day first show to "Dhoom 2". The whole world appeared blurred to him when she said yes. Oh sorry....that was the due to the byproduct released from his eyes. It was a tradition in their family to begin a relationship in the Kashi Vishwanath temple and today they were here offering puja to the lord for their well being and prosperity. Abhi was curious to know the reason for the huge crowd today. And then he found it. It was due to the presence of their famous name counterparts Abhishek bachchan and Aishwarya Rai.

It was amusing. Abhishek Varma, the owner of the tea shop outside the Sankat Mochan Hanuman temple and Aishwarya Shukla, the Garland girl near the Kashi Vishwanath temple didn't know if their famous name counterparts were going to tie the magical knot or not...but they had just done that. They left to their new home to live happily ever after.

Saturday, November 18, 2006

The Return

He was not nervous. Anxious? Perhaps. He checked the presence of the Walther P99 gun with him and the fact that it was loaded, gave him some strength and comfort. As usual he was alone. Infact he had no partners and had never wanted one. While the rest of the world lived a life where each day was almost the copied and pasted version of their previous day, he lived one where there was no today, leave alone tomorrow.

He tiptoed into the building with the alacrity of a cat and went to the unclassified place as he had planned. The door was locked from inside. Well that was the least of the problems for this highly skilled man. He opened it and went inside as if he would enter the town hall. There were 5 men in the room and they did seem surprised by his entry.

He shot the first and second straight in the head. The third tried to run and got shot in his back. The fourth pounced on him as the fifth tried to run. The gun spilled from his hand and the fourth one hit him hard on his face. Blood oozed out of his mouth and he fell hard on the floor and got hurt on his head. The fourth one relaxed for a second. Mistake.

He bounced back and hit him hard on his face. It was such a powerful shot that even her majesty would have stood up and applauded. He took back his gun and shot the fourth and fifth. Perhaps he had been born as a cold blooded bastard and he was proud for that. He took the unclassified file on the desk as planned and called his superiors to let them do the cover up. Nobody would know about him and as usual he would go on a hiding.

He walked to the headquarters to return the file. They took him to the meds and the nurse came in with the first aid. She seemed new as he had known every staff on the building by their first name. As she nursed his bruises she asked him "May I know your name?"

He smiled. It was a smile that had made women swoon at his feet. Then he uttered the most famous words spoken by any spy on earth "The name is Bond....James Bond".

She gasped with disbelief and immediately smiled flirtatiously. She was not the first and she won't be the last.

Monday, November 13, 2006

V for Vetti

A shopping mall is the best place to look around for characters if you are a writer. You get to see anything and everything. One gets to see patterns in the people of the same ethnicity and it really surprises at times. It’s easy to spot Asians because they always tend to travel in groups. Particularly Desis are famous for that. If you happen to see someone taking a snap of another in a long shot, when no one else in the mall thought of doing that...its gotta be a desi.

During Halloween time it was even funnier. There was a woman walking in the mall with wings like a witch and a saber tooth like a Dracula. There was one thing that I observed in US when I landed here on first day. There are only 2 categories of people in terms of size. Either they look like straight-out-of-gym types or like honey-I-blew-them size. In short they are either very fit or very fat. There are people walking around calling themselves as School students, but by their size and build even I looked like a Kindergarten kid in front of them.

There was a Caucasian family where the parents walked in front leaving their children behind as if they had got the children for free from some fair. Behind them was their 4 year old kid who was pushing the perambulator of her 2 year old sibling who seemed to consider that having a feeding bottle nipple in mouth and locked to the machine was a better option than being an s/w engg. The kids are very cute, but beware before you set your eyes on them. If they happen to see you around looking innocently at their kids as such, the next thing you could know might be being frisked away by cops being implicated of acting (?) like Michael Jackson.

The best characters however are the "Yo Guys", "Brother" or our African-American brothers. I have no idea on earth how they grow their hair in all sizes and shapes. Irrespective of men, women and childern, they grow it vertically, horizontally, diagonally, plait them, and have beads around like Henry Olonga and god know what. They wear their caps on their head at an angle greater than 15 degree and less than 365 degree which in straight words can be explained that they NEVER wear their caps straight.

Even the men wear so much of jewellery and diamonds that an average Indian father could get all his 5 daughters married and settled if he were to rob just one of the "brother". They have a distance walking style limping around like as if "their mom just forgot to give them their quota of polio drops" (as quoted by my friend Jithu). Their dresses are so big and loose enough that an average Indian can raise his family, 2 kids and his dog if he were to make a tent out of it.

Just as I was thinking these, a woman just looked at me and turned her head in disgust. Wondering why I went to have a look at myself in the mirror around and found out the reason. I had stubble for 4 days and it looked like I had mourned the death of my dog and had buried it in a cemetery nearby. My eyes had swollen due to lack of sleep and so I looked drunk. That’s when I remembered the immortal last lines uttered in the movie Some like it hot

"Well, nobody's perfect" :-)

Monday, November 06, 2006

True or False

She was barely out of her teens and looked very fresh. Aslam, the film reporter of a local newspaper was looking at the new Mumbai heroine Savitha. It was the shooting of the movie "Paapa potta Thaapa" (The girl who locked the latch). While purists argued that the title sounded pornographic, the producer and director didn’t seem to mind much. They were happy that this title made them use double entendre intentionally in the movie with hell lot of glamour and oomph targeted at their youth audience. What more, they would also get tax exemption from the state government for naming their film in Tamil :-)

This was the Mumbai Girl Savitha's first Tamil movie. Her mother was seated nearby and as per heroine's mother’s norms she was having all her share of apple juice and throwing tantrums at the hapless Assistant directors. The make up girl was applying more rose powder needlessly to her already rose colored cheeks. She was reading Sidney Sheldon’s' Best Laid Plans. Aslam didn’t know if really heroines did read Sheldon or pretended to do so as he had seen most of them do that.

Aslam: So where are you from?
Savitha: I am from Mumbai. The director approached me after he saw me in an ad.
Aslam: How do you find TamilNadu?
Savitha: Oh it’s a nice place. Ennakku tamil konjaam konjaam teriyum. Is this rite?
Aslam: Wow you are good.


Liar. She was running a bulldozer over Tamil with intensity greater than the Tamil TV comparers and a touch lesser than Udit Narayan. May the noble souls of Valluvar and Bharathi rest in peace.

The physics of Indian male is funny. They fantasize heroines as their lovers or wives. That’s why the Indian heroines have not been successful playing title roles after marital bliss. Heroines were dumb and stupid or had to act as such. Those who didn’t follow the convention found themselves playing sister, mother or grandma (in worst cases) to heroes who were old enough to act as their great grandpa. The more lucky ones became mega serial heroines who cried at a drop of a hat. The rest chose to become some Durga, Lakshmi or Parvati or whatever goddess with all jewels locked in RBI and seated over a fake tiger. After the shot got over, Savitha and her super mom went inside the caravan van to take some rest. Aslam's interview was over and he just had to spice it up a little for his gossip loving public.

Inside the caravan, the following conversation happens in chaste Marathi

Savitha: I hate to do this. Why can’t I tell that I am a tamilian settled long before in Mumbai and have to lie about this?
Mom: Are you stupid? Except Trisha and Sneha how many Tamil heroines do you know in the movie industry? Nobody knows this truth about us. Look, your market rate is just based on the fact that you are from Mumbai.
Savitha: (sobbing) But I hate this mom. Did you see how that son of a bitch reporter was ogling at me? I feel uncomfortable doing this mom.
Mom: Savitha, dont become emotional. Just do a few more films. Wait till we find some rich business man or a producer's son. Do you think I want to make you go through all this?


Savitha didn’t say anything. She looked outside the caravan window. The sun was going deep down behind the mountain and nobody around seemed to be in a mood to appreciate it. She was having a sense of Deja vu.