The Phoenix

Ashish doesn't live here anymore...

2010-12-07T08:30:00.003+05:30

Dear awesome readers and followers of the blog, this is to inform you that I will no longer be blogging here. The new blog is at http://stupidusmaximus.wordpress.com.

All the old posts have been imported there with typical WP efficiency. You can also try http://www.ashishshakya.com (this redirects to the WP blog, where I will be tinkering around for a while, trying to come up with a better web presence) Of course, the funny, infrequent updates will continue as usual, so come away with me, ignoring the fact that I just lifted a line from a Norah Jones song.

Sir, will that be a table for one?

2010-12-05T11:46:00.001+05:30

There are times when it's great to be an Indian, like when you look at Somali people, or if you happen to be Rahul Gandhi. We have really matured as a society. For example, we’ve exported Shilpa Shetty to London, and nobody even pretends to like Sanjay Leela Bhansali anymore.

But there’s an area in which we sorely lack, and this weakness sticks out like the Pope at an abortion clinic. I'm talking, of course, about the dating scene in India.

I agree that in places like Delhi, things are quite simple - the woman belongs to the guy with the biggest gun. But it gets a little complicated for those of us who prefer legal methods.

Maybe you think it's easy to go out and meet new women in Bombay. Maybe you're an idiot. Mind you, I'm not even talking about dating, or sex, or the hugely entertaining Daddy issues - all that comes in later. I'm talking about merely approaching a woman at a bar - a woman who’s single, someone who is not surrounded by an army of male 'platonic' friends who, given the chance, would love to pound you (or her for that matter), and most importantly, a woman whose face will not be the last you see before waking up in an ice-filled bathtub, your left kidney en route to Bangkok.

Let's consider other places that are routinely touted as 'a great place to meet women', like gyms. Maybe this works for some guys (read: producers in Lokhandwala), but I can't imagine a woman ever saying, "Oh I first met Raj at the gym. He fell in love with the pattern of my underarm sweat stains, while I got really turned on watching him get a hernia."

Then there's the online world, highly recommended by experts from the Indian Fraandship and Luvship Association. I'm quite active on Twitter (Motto: Follow me, or else God will shoot a kitten in the face) and it is indeed a great networking tool that allows you to directly congratulate Yaana Gupta for her recent vanishing-panty magic trick. But again, the facts are simple: Shashi Tharoor is the only guy who has managed to get screwed via Twitter.

To add to the confusion, men and women have very different ideas about meeting new people. This is what a single woman sounds like: "It's been a year since Champak Singh and I broke up, and 237 pairs of shoes later, I think I'm ready to move on, although this time I'm looking for something real, y'know, someone who'll comfort me, love me, hold me and automatically guess what I'm thinking before I've even thought it, somebody who doesn't mind if I talk during a suspense film, somebody who's mature, kind, respectful, funny, handsome, rich, honest, gentle, poetic and has a 12-inch-diamond penis."

And this is what a single man expressing his need for a soulmate sounds like: "Dude, I need to get laid."

Apparently it’s best to just stick to the basics: don’t lie, be chivalrous, and make eye-contact (Note: Eyes are not located on the chest) I'm also told that women really appreciate a good sense of humour, so this column is definitely not helping my case. I should just pack up and go to Delhi.

(Note: This is my HT column, dated 5th Dec 2010)

Idiots Killed the TV Star

2010-11-21T13:14:00.002+05:30

Every generation grows up with a defining image; one that stays etched in its collective memory long after the generation itself has gone senile and joined the BJP. For example, people in the '70s grew up with ‘free love’, believing that the key to world peace lay in unshaven female armpits and - OHMYGOD I'M RIDING A GIANT UNICORN! WHEEEEE!!!

Of course, the psychedelics wore off at some point in the ‘80s, but it was too late - 80s fashion had already been created. While women walked around sporting huge plastic earrings that men were trained to jump through, my ‘90s generation was shedding its diapers and becoming aware of the phenomenon that would shape its world for a long, long time. I'm talking about paradigm shifts in the erstwhile neo-socialist Indian economy.

OK no, I'm talking about TV.

The '90s were a simple, yet glorious time for Indian TV, because Ekta Kapoor was still in school, giving English teachers a stroke with her kkkspelllinggg. As a result, people on TV did not look as if a jewellery store had thrown up on them, and cameras were not operated by epileptic monkeys.

But modern TV raises a lot of questions. For example, why has law been outsourced to Rakhi Sawant’s bosom? Who pissed in the gene pool that Raja Chaudhary crawled out of? And most importantly, what is a Dolly Bindra and why is it stomping across my TV screen?

Things were better in the '90s. With fiction programming that included Circus, Fauji and Byomkesh Bakshi, it was clear that the TV industry could produce quality content that, unlike today, was not about some underage bride getting married to a Thakur, who also had a half-brother married to two women, one fair and one dark, both of whom were having an affair with the midget woman next door, who also happened to be a manglik, thus causing their 'Baa' (Gujarati for 'old women who look like sheep') to die and be reincarnated as Pamela's implants.

Even Mandira Bedi - a woman who thinks 'leg slip' is some kind of lingerie - managed to appear normal back then with the critically-acclaimed Shanti (which I would've watched if they had incorporated ninja turtles into the story)

Then there was Sea Hawks, Surabhi, Malgudi Days – shows that, if you were to try and pitch to a channel head today, would result in him rolling up your script and using it to do blow off a sponsor's arsecrack.

Remember, all these shows aired on just two DD channels (which, today, are the TV equivalent of a Chilean mine.) And now, with 100+ channels, there’s no room for fresh ideas, thanks to "market research", which is a technical way of saying that a watchman sitting in Gorakhpur will not like them.

It’s scary that kids today will grow up and nostalgize about present TV shows. They'll talk about the good ol' days, when an ‘undercover agent’ seduced a guy, then had a sex-change and seduced his girlfriend, or about how Arnab Goswami created history by sitting silent for thirty seconds.

I, on the other hand, will be the incontinent geezer at the retirement home, harping on about DuckTales and Talespin, until somebody shuts me up, or better yet, gives me a BJP ticket.

(Note: This is my HT column, dated 21st November 2010.)

Achtung Baby: The German Invasion of 2010

2010-10-24T14:24:00.002+05:30

'What is this life if, full of care, we have no time to stand and stare?' These words, penned by a pervert looking into the ladies compartment, remind us that we need to take a break from our hectic lives and soak in some culture before the Shiv Sena bans it.

Think about it. When was the last time you had a culturally stimulating experience? (And no, admiring the pattern of Manoj Tiwari's shoulder-hair does not count.) Last week, I'd had enough and decided it was time to do something classy - something that would engage the intellect.

So I went to a beer festival.

I'm referring to Oktoberfest Mumbai, which is the poor man's version of Oktoberfest Munich - the world's biggest display of public urination.

Here’s a brief history of the German festival: Once the German king got so drunk, he marched into Poland... oops, wrong story! Anyway, it was decided, as per the Treaty of Versailles, that Germany would hold a beer festival every year, where it would be compulsory for them to - and this is the tough part - actually laugh and show real emotion.

The Bombay event took place at the Royal Turf Club, also known as the ‘You Burbie Types Will Never Get Membership Here, Haha’ Club. It was a great set-up: a huge air-conditioned tent, with pretty women flitting about, while some withered old men sat a few feet away, gambling on horses with their insulin money. All in all, it was a nice and tranquil Sunday afternoon.

Then they served us the beer, thus smashing tranquillity to pulp with a giant mug.

(Note: I do not completely remember what happened that evening. The following has been pieced together from friends' accounts and photos that should never be made public. Think Ghajini, but with more hair.)

We'd been promised authentic German entertainment, which began with a performance by that famous German, Gary Lawyer. Anyone who has been to a concert in Bombay in the last century will have encountered this man singing Bon Jovi's 'It's my Life' with the enthusiasm of Nitin Gadkari at a buffet.

However, the music doesn't matter when you've downed a truckload of nuclear-powered German beer. What is important is that you maintain decorum at all times. For instance, with French and German people sitting nearby, you must never stand up on a table and do a Hitler impression. Furthermore, Adolf was NOT a red-nosed reindeer.

Also, going up to a German bartender and yelling out 'Aye Hans! Beer de!' is rude. (Not all German men are called Hans. Some of them are called Fritz.) All of this constitutes a major 'faux pas' (French for 'We're too lazy to say the whole word')

In my defence, idiocy seems justified when there are enough people doing it. And honestly, it was amazing to see thousands of Mumbaikars under one roof, singing, dancing and acting like they were in the climax of a Sajid Khan film.

Celebrations like these are rare here, what with public entertainment being restricted to events like the now-cancelled Kala Ghoda Fest, or - if you like getting molested - religious festivals.

That's why I hope Bombay gets to see more such events. Although, can we get the Shiv Sena to ban Gary Lawyer?

(Note: This is my HT column, dated 24th Oct 2010)

God Wants You to Read This

2010-10-10T15:57:00.000+05:30

I've always been fascinated about various aspects of religion, such as its origin, evolution and the fact that your hands could get chopped off for writing about it. Having said that, it's still nice to see how religion unifies society by providing nutjobs with an open-air pissing contest.

(Relax. I'm talking about the nutjobs in someone else's religion, not yours.)

So clearly, I'm not a religious person. Sure, I was born into a Hindu family, which means that I believe in the all-encompassing power of whatever the BJP tells me to. I also know that my religion is polytheistic (from the Greek words, 'poly', meaning 'many' and 'theistic' meaning 'traffic jams')

That apart, I’ve grown up with a poor understanding of the various rituals attached to religion, such as fasting, or genocide. On a totally unrelated note, I must bring up the issue of India's Most Famous Land Dispute at this point. As children of the 90s, this conflict is not our fault, but we're embarrassed about it all the same (Sort of like Sanjay Kapoor's acting career.)

Now I like having my limbs attached to my body at all times, so let's refer to the Gods involved here as Superman and Batman. So, the issue in a nutshell: Fans of Batman built this kickass house for him, but then Superman fans - you know how those crazy red-chaddi lovers are - said that the land originally belonged to Superman, as established in Superman Issue No. 1. In between bouts of acne and not getting laid, the two sets of nerds battled it out and decades later, innocent people had to face the trauma of watching Barkha Dutt pretending to care.

It’s not just the big stuff - as a heretic doomed to hell (where people communicate only in SMS language) I don’t understand the smaller aspects of religion either. Take for example, festive season, which is defined as "the period of time when the Gods must be appeased by blasting 'Munni Badnaam Hui' at eardrum-rape levels."

It doesn't help that all major festivals have been hijacked by politicians, resulting in a glut of unknown faces occupying billboard space that rightly belongs to Asin's underarms. However, these posters do promote secularism by showing us that no matter what community they belong to, all politicians are uniformly ugly. (The only thing uglier than the man-beast on a political poster is the design of the poster itself. Professional graphic designers have learnt to not look directly at these posters, for fear of eyeball haemorrhage.)

My degenerate little brain is also baffled by why the term 'God-fearing man' is considered a positive attribute. (According to matrimonial ads, this is the third-most appreciated quality in a partner, the others being "Fair" and "NOT Rahul Mahajan") Now since I'm a writer, I'm completely in favour of arrogance, but not when the basis of someone’s condescension is the size of their imaginary sky-penis.

The thing is, whoever invented religion probably didn't intend for it to turn out this way. It was supposed to have been upgraded through the ages, but that didn't happen because efficiency collapsed after someone invented meetings. However, there's one principle that holds true after all these years: Don't attack writers. I’m sure both Superman and Batman would agree.

(Note: This is my HT column dated 10th Oct, 2010)

Once Upon a Time in Delhi...

2010-09-26T10:55:00.001+05:30

You know that feeling when you wake up after a wild night - a night that involved Jagermeister, beer bongs and doing coke off Dimpy's Mahajans - and look around, wondering "Where am I? Who's that woman next to me? And WHY DOES SHE HAVE A GOATEE?"

It was that disorienting to wake up to the news this week. Little slices of madness were thrown our way each morning. It began with the collapse of a bridge outside the Jawaharlal Nehru stadium in Delhi, making us shake our heads in despair because Kalmadi hadn't been standing under it.

Now I know you're sick of CWG news. And yes, cracking jokes about it is very easy, like kicking a kid. Then again, some kids deserve a roundhouse kick to the face (If this statement made you think of Darsheel Safary, then congratulations - I'll see you in Hell)

So in the run-up to the Games, here's a quick step-by-step account of how it all happened:

1. 2003: Delhi bids for the 2010 Games, with the other contender being Ontario, Canada. Delhi wins the bid comfortably by flashing a country-made revolver at the meeting.

2. Cut to 2010. Suresh Kalmadi gets out of his gold-plated bed, puts on diamond-encrusted briefs and announces that the Games will be awesome. Inference: Kalmadi has just returned from a great Manali trip.

3. Corruption in the CWG is exposed. The sheer scale of the scam makes Mayawati feel insecure, so she gets another bunch of statues built, but with a bigger codpiece. Meanwhile, Arnab goes into hyperactive banshee mode, decrying Kalmadi, Dixit, M S Gill, the Sports Ministry, Pakistan and Lady Gaga in one breath. Suhel Seth is visibly aroused.

4. The famous toilet-paper news rolls in (sorry). 4000-rupee toilet paper becomes Delhi's new status symbol, with new-money "Jat Boyzzz" buying it for their friends, girlfriends and buffaloes (Sometimes, all three are the same)

5. More reports of corruption tumble out, with the total cost of the Games estimated at 65000 crores. Mayawati gives up and goes off to seek solace in the Temple of Mayawati.

6. A.R Rahman presents a CWG anthem that angers Delhiites due to its lack of bhangra beats. The situation is resolved when Rahman adds a 'bhhrrwwwaaah' to it, although he's still unclear on what a 'tutak' is.

7. The Games Village is thrown open, only to discover that certain deposits have already been made in the toilet area. Sources say Mani Shankar Aiyar was spotted scampering across the Village carrying a bag of laxatives.

8. Kalmadi assures us that the Games Village will be cleaned up if everybody chips in. He then suggests mopping up the mess with that thing growing on Jairam Ramesh's head.

9. The agitating Jats of Haryana threaten to disrupt the Games by marching thousands of bullocks and oxen into Delhi. For maximum impact, they convince Sanjeev Nanda to ride one of the bulls.

10. Kalmadi gets a new job. He will now feature on packs of Durex Long-Lasting condoms. Tagline: Nice guys finish last.

Seriously though, I hope the Games go off well, so that we can go back to more innocent times, when the most embarrassing thing about Delhi was the rape industry. Until then, I say we cheer for India. Bhhrrwwwaaah!

(Note: This is my HT column, dated 26th Sep 2010)

Modern Art 101: Try Keeping a Straight Face

2010-08-29T14:25:00.001+05:30

I'd like to state, for the record, that I'm not an expert on art. Sure, I'm familiar with general trivia about the art world, like how Vincent Van Gogh (the 'Van' is silent) cut off his left ear after listening to Himesh. Also, I think the Mona Lisa is an exemplary piece of art, second only to Savita Bhabhi.

I understand symbolism as well. For example, when an arty film-maker, while focussing on what is usually an angst-ridden Bengali protagonist, fills the frame with darkness, I know he's using symbolism to indicate that Maoists have cut off the power supply.

All this knowledge, however, does not make me an expert.

I realised this recently when I found myself at not one, but two modern art exhibitions in Colaba. I was accompanied by friends from the art world - serious people who can actually tell the difference between modern art and a paan stain. They gave me a very professional-sounding tip on how to critique a work of art.

"If you don’t know what to say, just use the word 'interesting'."

(This makes sense. In the art world, 'interesting' can be used to mean anything from 'I don't get it', to 'This painting looks like goat vomit')

The first exhibition consisted mainly of a series of photographs of trees in a cemetery. I wandered about, frowning at picture after picture, before discovering an exhibit that spoke to my soul like nothing else could - free booze.

After a while, I wanted to rest my philistine butt on two mattresses lying nearby. Upon closer inspection, I realised that the mattresses were propped up by flower vases (hey, why not?) and were actually a part of the show. The artist said that they were "offerings against gravity and decay", which I totally failed to see (although the phrase "offerings against gravity and decay" would make a great tagline for Viagra)

We soon moved on to another gallery - a gigantic warehouse really, designed to accommodate the average artist's ego.

And that was where I saw it.

It was the highlight of the night, the money shot, the pièce de résistance (literally, "The French Resistance") - a 30-foot-high installation that consisted of a bunch of long, intersecting bamboo sticks jutting out in various directions. It looked like regular bamboo scaffolding that had collapsed in a heap, as if built by Kalmadi's men. This explosion of sticks was titled - I kid you not - Pubic.

The artist had also offered insights into her work, stating - and I quote - "My personal anxiety is pubic." (If I went around telling people that my anxiety was pubic, they'd put me in a padded cell, or worse, on Bigg Boss.)

Other works here included a blank canvas that had been ripped apart, three logs mounted on a wall and three other logs mounted a little distance away. Of course, there was an underlying theme to each, i.e. 'Guess What We Were Smoking When We Made This'.

Now I'm hardly one to comment on others’ jobs, seeing as how I spend the day sitting around in boxers writing Mayawati jokes. But that evening, the art world actually made me feel useful. You should try it sometime. It's really... interesting.

(Note: This is my HT column dated 29th August 2010)

The Indian Who Survived Australia (Part 2)

2010-08-09T15:09:00.003+05:30

This is the second of a two-part series about my recent Australian vacation. For those of you who missed the previous instalment on account of having good taste, here's a brief recap: I learnt that, contrary to popular perception, Aussies aren't keen on killing Indians. That's because they have way too much fun trying to kill themselves.

I'm referring, of course, to Australia's reputation as the adrenaline capital of the world. To visit Australia and not try something life-threatening would be like visiting Agra to check out the sewage system. I simply had to follow the maxim: When in Rome, go skydiving.

The jump site was the picturesque Wollongong beach, an expanse of blue and gold, where the splattered remains of a skydiver would seem completely out of place. We were each assigned a professional skydiver, who would take care of the important stuff, such as not dying, while our job was to focus on not wetting ourselves at 14000 feet.

We got into a plane the size of a suitcase and ascended to drop height at the pace of an Ashutosh Gowariker film. This was it. The moment I'd been waiting for. I had to savour it and brace myself and - Woah what the hell? Is that my plane I see receding in the distance? I’m out??

*INSERT MANIC SCREAM HERE*

5 minutes, one backflip and countless 360-degree spins later, I can honestly say that skydiving is the most fun you can have with a man strapped to your back.

Sydney offers a bunch of terrestrial delights as well, which I discovered when I unwittingly booked my stay at King's Cross, Sydney's red-light area. Of course, I wasn't interested in getting an STD in Australia, when I could do the same in India for much less. However, I was intrigued by "gentlemen's clubs" with names like Porky's that promised "customised service" (What does that mean? Once they find out I'm Indian, would they rub two flowers together and sing a song for me?)

This was also the first time I stayed in a youth hostel, where, for a nominal cost, one gets to meet alcoholics from all over the world. One night, I found myself hanging out with a Canadian philosopher, a Swiss IT engineer, a German chef, a Belgian schoolteacher and a couple of Italian students, all high on goon, which, simply put, is Australian desi daaru. (It is a vile concoction, sold in packets and sourced directly from Andrew Symonds's bloodstream.)

To sum it up, if countries were people, Australia would be the guy at the bachelor party doing shots off the stripper's belly-button. And now, in no particular order, here are my favourite Oz facts:

Random Fact 1:
The creation of Australia meant that most of England's petty crime industry was outsourced there, leaving it free to concentrate on more important crimes, such as imperialism and 18th century fashion.

Random Fact 2:
Tim-Tams, indigenous to Australia, are chocolate-coated biscuits that are worth selling your children for. These were created as means of an apology for Foster's.

Random Fact 3:
Souvenir shops in Australia sell lighter holders made from - and this is absolutely true - kangaroo Scrotum. This is what happens when people drink Foster's. (That was the last Foster’s joke. For this column)

(Note: This is my HT column dated 8th August, 2010.)

The Indian Who Survived Australia (Part 1)

2010-07-25T17:30:00.001+05:30

Three weeks ago, I took off on a vacation to Australia. I realise that's an unusual destination, for a couple of reasons. Firstly, since Australia lies way down South (or as North Indians call it, 'Madras'), it is currently the middle of winter there. It's so cold, Aussie women are dating Indians just for the body hair.

Also, we've all heard stories about how hunting Indians is a popular Australian activity, second only to disowning Mel Gibson. So naturally, I was quite apprehensi¬ve about the trip. I had visions of being mugged, stabbed or worse, having to drink Foster's (Australian for Kangaroo Piss)

About thirty seven drinks later, I landed in Melbourne. Up ahead, there loomed a visa officer who looked like the love-child of Sly Stallone and Razor Ramon. As a brown goateed man travelling alone, I needed this about as much as I need rabies.

However, Australian Rambo just asked me a couple of routine questions and waved me on with a cheerful "Have a good trip, mate!” This politeness, as I soon found out, was a regular feature across the country. Bus drivers, cabbies, shopkeepers, pimps - everybody was friendly, thus leaving me confused and disoriented, like Akshay Kumar at an etiquette class. My head was clouded with questions - Why is everyone so nice? Where are the violent racists that I'd been promised by the media back home? Are they afraid that if they mess with an Indian, Anchorman Arnab will break out from the TV screen and eat their children?

You know you're in Australia when you step out and see Indonesians, Malaysians, Indians, Koreans, Japanese and maybe three Aussies. The first 'native' I met was two days into my stay. It was good to meet him, especially since he owns a beach house at a small seaside town called Sorrento, about 2 hours away from Melbourne. As it turned out, this place was the scenic equivalent of Scarlett Johansson in a bubble bath. With Megan Fox.

The ocean at Sorrento is an expanse of blue Listerine mouthwash being gargled by a rugged coastal mouth, creating reams of froth in a metaphor that I swear wasn't meant to be disgusting. Let's just say that Australia has a coastline desktop wallpapers are made of. Also, miles away from the city, in the dead of winter, millions of stars come out to frolic in the night sky, turning it into God's own Punjabi Wedding Decoration.

However, there's only so much nature a city boy can take. Soon enough, I sought out some of the city's most famous sources of liver and coronary damage. This was followed up with my first attempt at ice-skating, an experience wherein you pay to have all of Earth's gravitational pull focussed on your butt. (I know there's an ice-skating rink at Esselworld, but since I live in New Bombay, it's easier for me to travel to Melbourne.)

Due to a lack of space, I have to end this column here. However, the next one will be an account of my trip to Sydney, featuring prostitutes, skydivers and that Sydney landmark famous for its operas, Harbour Bridge. The only downside of my Sydney trip was that I caught a cold there. I think it may have been racially motivated.

(Note: This is my HT column, dated 25th July 2010.)

So... what's the deal with stand-up comedy?

2010-06-27T14:39:00.001+05:30

I've spent a few years working as a humour writer (or as my parents call it, 'being unemployed') and the voices in my head always told me I was funny. Also, within each writer is an attention-whore so brazen she makes Sherlyn Chopra look like a nun. These factors, coupled with unholy amounts of beer, pushed me towards my dream of getting up on stage and soiling my pants in front of 300 people.

I’m referring, of course, to my first stand-up comedy performance at Hamateur Night at Blue Frog a few months ago. One stage, 15 amateurs, 2 minutes each – it’s like the comic's version of 'Wham Bam Thank you Ma'am!’

To say that I was nervous would be an understatement. (It's kind of like saying 'The vuvuzela is annoying' when what you really want to say is 'It's like Himesh's nose on steroids'.) Waiting in the wings, I was shaking more than Mohammad Ali in a massage chair. However, the loss of my comedy virginity went well, thanks to friends who'd been promised free beer for applause.

Cut to seven months later. I can't claim to have extensive comedy experience, but by now I’ve spent more time on stage than Sania Mirza ever did at Wimbledon, and as such, I've learnt a few things.

For one, nothing beats the thrill of making people laugh, especially if they're sober. It's an amazing head-rush, even better than sex. Think about it. No matter how good you are in bed, you're never going to get a round of applause (unless you're one of those who try to spawn at Bandstand. That place always has a supportive audience.)

Secondly, stand-up comics are - and I mean this in the nicest way possible - damaged in the head. If you make a career out of writing jokes, you lose the ability to see things straight. For example, a regular person reads a news report about the Queen's baton coming to India, and moves on without a thought. However, a comic reads the same report and wonders if he can use the phrase 'queen's baton' to describe Elton John's you-know-what.

It’s great to see the comedy scene in the city picking up, especially with the recent opening of The Comedy Store, an English institution far more relevant than the Royal Family. Audiences are now willing to spend an evening watching stand-up, as opposed to, say, a movie. This makes sense - the last time Bollywood cracked me up was when Sajid Khan referred to himself as a ‘director’.

I don't know what it’s like to be a full-fledged comedian. I imagine it involves tons of writing, rehearsals and underwear, preferably female, being flung on stage. Also, I can imagine what it must be like to go to a school reunion and meet former classmates - the kind that would eat chalk on a dare - who now head major banks and use important-sounding words like "fiscal synergy", "fiduciary incentivization", and "charge the hooker to my expense account", whereas you spend your day mulling over obscene modifications to Mayawati statues.

(P.S: If that last line made you imagine the statue with a 'baton', then you might want to try your hand at comedy. Leave your ego at the door.)

(Note: This is my HT column dated 27th June 2010.)

BREAKING NEWS: You've Heard It All Before

2010-06-13T14:10:00.003+05:30

By the time you read this, the monsoon may have hit Mumbai the way it's supposed to - like a full-blown love affair - instead of grudgingly flirting with us like an underpaid bar girl.

Apart from bhajias, bhuttas and leptospirosis, the monsoon will be marked by the media throwing important, eye-opening headlines at you, such as "Mumbai's Monsoon Report Card!", "Does that umbrella make your butt look fat?" and "Kareena Kapoor carried away by strong breeze."

It'll be hard to keep up with so much news. Fortunately, you don’t need to. All you need is the following Generic Monsoon News Special that tells you exactly what news channels will be saying for the next three months.

THE GENERIC MONSOON NEWS SPECIAL

ANCHOR: Good evening and welcome to Slime Now. My name, for legal reasons, is Gornab Aswami and you're watching our Generic Monsoon News Special. Every news channel is showing the same footage as us, but here you get to marvel at the sound of my voice, which, I must warn you, may cause your wife to spontaneously fling her lingerie at the TV.

As you can tell by my grave and serious expression, I had too much rajma last night. Also, something grave and serious has just happened. An event Mumbaikars have never witnessed before. That's right - Milan Subway is flooded. Let's go straight to our reporter Rinku for more details.

REPORTER RINKU: Thank you Gornab. I'm standing outside Mumbai's famous Milan Subway, although why one would call this a subway is beyond me. I've seen handbags that are bigger than this.

GORNAB: That's great Rinku. Now can you tell us what exactly is happening at Milan Subway?

REPORTER RINKU: The place is flooded. Vehicles here are sinking quicker than Kites at the box-office. And as usual, the BMC's confused and clueless, like Pritam at an Ethics class. To top it off, I'm surrounded by guys who insist on staring at the camera, as if they expect Marilyn Monroe to pop out of it and sing 'Happy Birthday'.

GORNAB: I see. This is a grave human tragedy indeed, worse than the time I saw Shobha De without make-up. Now we must interrupt the sound of my voice to bring you another exclusive, never-before-seen event. Dadar is flooded. Reporter Rocky has more.

REPORTER ROCKY: Yes Gornab, as you can see, Dadar TT is completely flooded. The locals here suspect that this is the work of a North Indian.

GORNAB: Gadzooks! I'd love to milk that throwaway comment, but I have with me on the phone right now, Chief Engineer for the BMC, Mr. Fixkare. Mr. Chief Engineer, I want to begin by asking you this - how the hell do you sleep at night??

VOICE: Hello? I -
GORNAB: How dare you call yourself an engineer?
VOICE: Please let me spe-
GORNAB: The people of Mumbai demand an explanation!
VOICE: But I -
GORNAB: YYARRGHHH! This. Is. SPARTAAA!!!! *spittlespittle*
VOICE: Sir, I’m not the BMC engineer! I’m just the telephone operator!

(A rare moment of silence. Gornab regains composure.)

GORNAB: So as you saw, that was a clear case of government apathy. Luckily, it's now time for an uplifting story about Mumbai's Spirit and Resilience.

AUDIENCE: We’d prefer leptospirosis instead.

(Note: This is my HT column dated 13th June 2010.)

For Whom the Wedding Bells Toll

2010-05-30T10:13:00.002+05:30

There's stress in the Shakya household today. In fact, my house has the same cheerful vibe as Hitler's bunker circa 1945 and that’s because - I'm sure you'll appreciate how stressful this is - we've been invited to a wedding.

This is a problem because my dear mother responds to any wedding invitation by turning to me and saying, "Listen up, first-born child aka Godless Heathen. Before I step out with you in public, I demand that you get a haircut because you currently look like a cross between Baitullah Mehsud and a young Shibu Soren."

The idea that I’ll show up at someone's wedding with long hair worries my mother more than, say, global warming. I understand completely, because weddings make women go – I believe this is the correct scientific term - batshit insane.

Women become familiar with the concept of marriage at a young age, as evidenced by their toys such as Princess Barbie, Bridal Barbie, Gold-Digger Barbie, Alimony Barbie and so on. Guys, however, reach their 20s and then slowly start becoming aware that marriage could happen to them one day (so could a hijack, not that I’m drawing parallels)

I was reminded of this when a friend - let's call him 'Ravi' because that's his name - narrated the story of how he had recently gone to "see a girl". (Notice how people never say they're going to "meet a girl", but merely to "see her", as if she were the Qutab Minar.)

This elaborate process of Bridal Tourism kicked off with the girl's family showing Ravi that they had enough mithai to last them through at least two nuclear winters. Half of those mithai reserves were then forced down the poor guy's throat, even as he sat around being scrutinised by the girl's parents, brothers, uncles, aunts, nephews, cousins, plumbers, carpenters etc. As dictated by Indian tradition, there was also a middleman who had set up the whole thing. (Ravi kept referring to him as "my contact", because it would've been inappropriate to say "pimp".)

After what felt like an eternity, the girl walked in, carrying a tray. Now Ravi may be a cynical, smug man-beast, but once he laid his eyes upon her, he felt something he hadn't felt in ages. The blood rushed to his head as he realised, in abject terror, that she'd brought him yet more food.

The couple were then ushered into a separate room where Ravi tried to collect his thoughts. This didn't work because he had visions of the girl walking around a fire, trampling his manhood underfoot as she did so.

Also, it didn't help when, fifteen minutes later, the girl's sentimental grandmother showed up, and went all Nirupa Roy on my friend, telling him she thought he was "the one", which was also what Morpheus told Neo before stuffing his face with a laddoo.

Following this, Ravi proceeded to get out so quick he put Yuvraj Singh to shame. I don't think he's getting married anytime soon, which means that our local shady bar will continue to remain profitable.

As for me, I don't think I'll ever get married. Mind you, I'm not against the concept. I just know that if I don't get a haircut, my mother will bar me from my own wedding.

(Note: This is my HT column dated 30th May, 2010)

My Overcompensation is Bigger than Yours

2010-05-16T13:28:00.001+05:30

I've always thought of myself as a proud Indian, despite national embarrassments such as dowry, corruption and that thing growing on Jairam Ramesh's head. I'm frequently overcome by Sunny Deol-levels of patriotism when I think about India's historic achievements, such as that one time we wrote the Kama Sutra and conned white people into trying positions involving banyan trees.

I was reminded of our sexual history this week, after news reports revealed that the Union Health Ministry was now "sampling 1400 penises" in order to design smaller condoms for Indian men who, when it comes to middle-stump size, are known to be more Sachin, less Pollard, if you get my drift.

These small condoms are mostly targeted at guys who drive around in SUVs the size of Parliament, with Mika playing on full-blast. But when it comes to overcompensation, India’s never short (ha!) of contenders.

For example, there's the eminent thinker and philosopher Pramod Muthalik, who’s all about 'Riot, Kapdaa aur Makaan'. He shot to infamy after the Mangalore pub incident last year, following which women from across the country sent him pink chaddis that he wears only on special occasions.

Earlier this week, Muthalik unwittingly became the star of his own sex tape when he got screwed by a Tehelka reporter on camera. Of course, the good man maintains that he was framed, and that the fake camera footage was created by some guy called James Cameron.

Also, North India is pretty good at stamping its macho authority all over the place. This is a place designed to showcase acts of extreme masculinity, such as bench-pressing cattle or shooting your daughter for marrying the wrong guy. (When questioned about this, a khap leader shrugged and simply said, "A man's gotra do what a man's gotra do.")

Don't get me wrong - I think violence is a great concept, and that the world would be a happier place if I was allowed to shoot, say, customer care executives.

But - and call me a flowery hippie if you will - I think when khap leaders start demanding legal status for "traditions" that were born centuries ago, back when Simi Garewal was just a baby, it's time we realise that they’re full of khap.

Now I don't mean to deride tradition. In fact, traditions serve an important purpose in modern society, i.e. they help Ekta Kapoor mint money. But there are some traditions that are - how do I say this nicely - downright stupid.

Such traditions often work under the assumption that women have the IQ of cabbage. That's because the people who came up with wonderful ideas - like women shouldn't work, drink, talk to men or step out of the house on dates that are prime numbers, unless of course they have their periods, in which case they should jump into a fire - were all men.

Had these men put their egos aside and allowed women to be involved in the decison-making process, things might have been different today. (On the flip-side, Shoe-Shopping may have emerged as a major world religion.)

So if you, dear reader, are up for it, I'd like to start a petition against stupidity in this country. Heck, if you pay me enough, I'll even throw in a riot or two.

(Note: This is my HT column dated 16th May, 2010)

I'm just tweetin' ‘bout my generation!

2010-05-02T21:26:00.002+05:30

Journalists everywhere - and I don't really claim to be one, unless I need entry to a fancy party - seem to have grabbed on to Twitter with the enthusiasm of a pervert in a crowded bus. Every other headline now seems to contain the word 'tweets', as in, 'Lalit Modi says Shilpa has a nice pair of tweets.'

For those of you still wearing animal pelts, let me explain that Twitter is a micro-blogging site that allows you to provide real-time updates about what body part you're currently scratching, and even who that body part belongs to.

Of course, there's a solid, journalistic reason for Twitter featuring prominently across media: Celebrities are using it. Twitter breaks down barriers between stars and commoners, and as you read the innermost thoughts of men and women considered to be demigods, you realise that these demigods were dropped on the head as babies. In fact, the 'thud' sound they made was so awesome that they were dropped again and again, and even used for free-kick practice.

Take, for example, Salman Khan who recently joined Twitter, which means he now mumbles and slurs his way through 140 characters. Now don't get me wrong - I do like the man. He's truly an international star, with an accent that's part British, part American and part Bandra West. (Throw in some Afrikaans and you have the audio equivalent of a Benetton ad.)

His tweets, however, make as much sense as Sidhu after an acid trip. Have a look at this actual, untouched Salman tweet: Being human clothing line nt out yet , vil launch in 4 mnt,s , all fake,s out thr. Being human watche,s out in abt 2 mnt,s

Notice how the tweet reflects his personality, in that it looks as if the alphabets have drunk-driven themselves on to the page. (But Salman does serve an important function on Twitter - he makes Vaseline Boy Shahid Kapoor look literate in comparison.)

The point is, Twitter needs normal people to counter the barrage of celebrity droppings on the site. So sign up now. The following Twitter FAQ list should clear all doubts.

TWITTER FAQs

Q. Ok so I signed up for Twitter. Now what?
A. Your objective is essentially the same as that of any organised religion - to get more followers. Sex scandals are optional.

Q. How is Twitter different from Facebook?
A. It's far easier to stalk people on Facebook.

Q. Will Twitter help me get laid?
A. Only if you can get Shashi Tharoor to follow you. Once that's done, it won't matter if you look like Shibu Soren - all the ladies will want to have an external affair with your minister, if you know what I mean.

Q. So SRK and Salman are on Twitter. What about Aamir?
A. He's still trying to figure out the perfect username, and should be done in about a year or so.

Q. How do I respond if Shahrukh Khan actually replies to my tweet?
A. Play it cool. Never do what a top journalist - who we shall refer to as Darkha Butt - did and go "OMFG! SRK tweeted to me first LOLZZ!!11!"

Q. Hhhhnnnzzz v'rw snreeee mumble m in gym hw r u LOL.
A. Seriously Salman, stop tweeting.

(Note: This was my HT column dated 2nd May 2010.)

The Kochi IPL Scandal for Dummies

2010-04-18T15:25:00.001+05:30

Firstly, let me state that even though I may be four beers down, I'm fully aware that you readers are absolutely sick of the Kochi controversy.

I understand that you'd rather be violated by a Mongoose bat (or an actual mongoose for that matter), than read another word about how Tharoor allegedly partook in shady dealings, instead of doing the job he was appointed to do, i.e. making small-talk at official dinners.

I get all that. But like it or not, this event is hugely important, because it means we don't have to think about real issues like Dantewada. (Also, that issue is being pondered over by the likes of Arundhati Roy, who not so long ago, described the Dantewada Naxals as 'Gandhians with Guns', which is like saying Bobby Darling is a man, but with some lady parts.)

Therefore, as a responsible humour columnist, I must write about this IPL controversy, since the alternative would be to find a real job. So let's have a quick look at the sequence of events:

1. Kochi trumps much-favoured Ahmedabad to win its very own IPL team. Keralites are delighted at the prospect of their favourite son, Sreesanth, finally earning his rightful spot as Head Cheerleader.

2. India wakes up to find that one of the owners of the Kochi IPL team is Sunanda Pushkar, a former beautician. Upon learning this, Sreesanth asks her for a free facial.

3. Tharoor, also known as 'The Justin Bieber of Indian politics', is incensed when Lalit Modi tweets about the former's relationship with Ms. Pushkar. (I understand how Mr. Tharoor feels because I too, used to get upset when somebody publicised the fact that I liked a certain girl. In my defence, I was 13.)

4. An epic bout of mudslinging begins, with Tharoor's aide referring to Modi as a convicted drug trafficker who was also once charged with assault and kidnapping. Such a man, they say, has no business running the IPL. I agree. With drugs, kidnapping and assault on his track record, Mr. Modi is fit to be sent to only one place - Parliament.

5. Tharoor's camp goes on to add that the Minister received threats from D-Gang, asking him to leave Modi alone. Later it turns out that the D-Gang had called Tharoor only because they wanted his help in setting up their official Twitter page.

6. Rendezvous claims that Modi had offered them 50 million dollars to leave the IPL. This claim makes Modi look like one of those pipe-smoking, silken robe-wearing rich daddies in old Hindi films, who bribes the poor hero (Kochi) to leave his daughter (the IPL) alone. Except that in this case, the father has also whored his baby out to corporate fat-cats who claim that she's 'ekdum Karbonn Kamaal' in bed.

7. Lalit Modi rubbishes all these claims, but deep down you know he's hurt because he needs Ms. Pushkar more than Tharoor does. After all, he could really use a beautician.

8. Shashi Tharoor tries to defend himself in Parliament, but the opposition greets him with the same respect one would accord a hijra at Bombay Gymkhana.

This pretty much sums up the entire controversy. Also, if I’m assaulted or kidnapped as a result of this column, you know whom to arrest.

(Note: This was my HT column dated 18th April 2010.)

Love Sex aur Travel: A Mumbai Romance

2010-04-04T12:19:00.002+05:30

I've recently spent a lot of time thinking about relationships. This is unusual for someone who’s been incapable of making a long-term commitment to anything except the Batman franchise. No seriously, my track record is a disaster of Vivek Oberoi-proportions, and the blame for that lies naturally, on the city’s local trains.

I'll explain. You see, a typical Mumbai love story goes like this:

Boy meets Girl. They fall in love. Boy and Girl happen to live in two different areas, separated from each other by what seems to be the entire Asian landmass. Boy braves local train to meet Girl, even though he’s not being entirely faithful, as is evident from the fellow commuter’s briefcase making love to his bottom. So Boy stops commuting to meet Girl. Girl gets angry. When Girl gets angry, volcano explodes on Jupiter. No wait, that's Sabu. But you get the idea.

(Relationships are easier in cities like Delhi, where apparently, one doesn't need a lady's permission to have intimate relations with her.)

Honestly, if I had a buck for every time I came across a local long-distance love story, I'd be able to buy that goddamn MRF blimp (or as it's known these days, Yuvraj Singh.) Over the years, I've seen Borivali date Belapur, Walkeshwar waltz with Juhu and Colaba go off to meet Andheri, only to die of monoxide poisoning along the way.

Some lucky ones get to date within their own postal code, but even then, practical issues keep popping up like eunuchs at a signal. For example, real-estate prices in the city have ensured that now along with rents equalling the GDP of a small African nation, you also have to hand over one kidney to your landlord. (On the plus side, it needn't be your own kidney.)

Also, many areas (i.e. areas that *you* want to live in) treat young bachelors the same way a father might treat Shoaib Malik if he came asking for his daughter's hand.

Therefore, it's quite common to see people my age (25 while sober, 16 otherwise) and older still living with their parents. This gives rise to an important question: Where do couples go to discuss deep questions like ‘Oh baby, who’s your paternal figure?’

Well, Mumbaikars aren’t short of imagination. I once chanced upon a couple at a popular hillside in New Bombay, making love on a narrow rocky ledge that overlooked a steep valley. Had they rolled about even slightly, they would’ve fallen off, thus adding a whole new dimension to the word ‘climax’. Also, this was happening at four in the afternoon, with the girl lying bare-backed on the blisteringly hot rock. (A frying-pan fetish, maybe?)

Of course, many urban couples avoid all this by living in together. But live-in relationships can get dangerous. The concept of willingly moving in with your girlfriend reminds me of that drunken guy who – also willingly, mind you - wandered into the elephant's enclosure at Byculla zoo last week, only to be crushed to death for leaving the toilet seat up.

So as you can see, love isn’t easy. If you, dear reader, are having problems and are wondering what to do, just remember, it’s all about being mature and asking yourself one very important question - What would Batman do?

(Note: This was my HT column dated 4th April 2010.)

Will Somebody Please Switch Off the Sun?

2010-03-21T19:13:00.002+05:30

The Mumbai summer is upon us, unleashing its fury like a Pakistani who's just discovered that his wife can read. It hit home last week or so, making this one of the few times that it's socially acceptable to talk about the weather. Of course, when I say "talk", I mean "describe the weather using cusswords that would make a Punjabi truck driver cringe."

Summer is kind of like Shilpa Shetty - hot, irritating and totally pointless. In fact, things are so bad here that for once North Indians are actually considering staying in U.P, where there has been a boom in the field of Mayawati Statue Maintenance.

So last week, when confronted with such extreme weather, I did the opposite of what any pansy, AC-loving city boy should do - I went to Brabourne for the Mumbai-Rajasthan match.

In the afternoon.

You see, I love the IPL. It's as if the game of cricket went ahead and decided to have a ridiculously loud bachelor party. I'm also a Mumbai Indians fan, despite the fact that from the start, they've been about as reliable as the Mira Road water supply. But most of all, I was excited about watching a match without being subjected to that cellphone ad featuring Akshay Kumar and his demented laugh (maybe he lost his mind after watching his own films?)

As I entered the hallowed gates with friends and fellow fans in tow, the Mumbai Indians theme song filling up our senses and every beat, every thump racing to our heads, I began to feel something I hadn't felt in a while - the Niagara Falls of Sweat rushing down my body, boldly going where only lovers or doctors ought to go.

We had East Stand seats, which are highly recommended for those who want to die of sunstroke. The ambience was great though. We were surrounded by loud, manic fans who were unfamiliar with the concept of 'personal space' and danced wildly every time our batsmen did something extraordinary, such as make contact with the ball. I mean what better way to enjoy a well-timed shot than to feel your chair being humped by the guy behind?

Also, watching a match in the stadium gives you a golden opportunity to call your loser friends who're at home, and find out who the hell is on strike, because from where you're sitting, Saurabh Tiwary might as well be Nita Ambani in a helmet. There was other entertainment on display too, such as the foreign cheerleaders, who have been brought here to send out a very positive cricketing message, i.e., "A pelvic thrust knows no borders."

Anyway, after the first innings, we couldn't take the heat anymore. I realised what the early Israelites must have felt like, roaming around in the desert for 40 years, until they finally had enough and took a cab to the Bombay Gym to watch the match on TV. Or at least that's what we did.

Die-hard cricket fans may boo us for leaving a match halfway, but we won, so I'm going to take that as a sign that God, aka Sachin Tendulkar, wants me to watch the IPL in sublime comfort. It would also help if Akshay Kumar stopped laughing like Rahul Mahajan.

(NOTE: This is my HT column, dated 21st March 2010.)

"Gentlemen, welcome to Fat Club."

2010-03-07T21:55:00.004+05:30

I'm ashamed of myself. This is not because I watched the Nithyananda video, which I had to, for solid journalistic reasons of course. No, I'm ashamed because I just had three gulab jamuns. I'm supposed to be on a diet, so as of now, eating three gulab jamuns is criminal, kind of like drop-kicking a child (unless of course it’s that kid from Balika Vadhu.)

Yes, I know what you women are thinking: "Why does he need to diet? He looks great in the picture above. In fact, I want to do things to him that cannot be mentioned in a family newspaper." Alas, the fine visage that accompanies this column is only the tip of the iceberg. Underneath that face, I *am* the iceberg. Darwin would be amazed at how I've managed to evolve into Free Willy, minus the stamina.

I blame my profession for this. Writers don't really get much exercise, unless they write about the burqa and have to run for their lives. I mean the most physically demanding aspect of my job involves scratching (usually myself, unless someone else makes a very good offer.)

It's not just writers - a huge percentage of young, urban professionals, as a result of being confined to their desks all day, are facing a multitude of problems, ranging from weight gain and chronic back pain, to more serious mental issues, such as the need to play Farmville.

Dieting aside, I also went ahead and hammered the metaphorical final nail into my happy spot. That's right - I joined a gym, also known as ‘the place where you go to feel like a little girl as men twice your size benchpress weights the equivalent of a post-buffet Mayawati.’

Now don't get me wrong. I quite like my new gym - the trainers are helpful, the music's not bad and even the air-conditioning has its moments. But these little joys don't count for much when I'm sweating it out, dark spots dancing in front of my eyes, as I wonder who I molested in my past life so as to deserve this ordeal.

And that's just while filling out the application form.

(I must add that the management at most gyms is very optimistic, imagining that they can actually sell me the one year package, including 'sauna', which is just another way of saying 'a local train compartment, except that everybody's dressed in towels.')

As a new member, I had to undergo a physical evaluation, a process wherein a trained professional measures your BMI, body fat percentage and endurance levels, all the while maintaining a solemn expression, when what he really wants to do is go all Navjot Singh Sidhu on your fat ass. ("Oye Guruuuu!!!! Your body fat percentage is more than my SSC score!")

The actual workouts involve a machine called a cross-trainer, which is a certified weapon of ass destruction. It may well be my ultimate downfall. A cross trainer to me is what Waterloo was to Napolean, what Stalingrad was to Hitler, and what grammar is to Chetan Bhagat.

Of course, I needn’t kill myself in the gym. Instead, I could try the Kareena Kapoor method *coughbulimiacough*. It's simple – I’d just need to make myself puke. It might help to watch that Nithyananda video again.

(Note: This was my HT column dated 7th March 2010.)

My Name is Shakya, and I love SRK

2010-02-22T03:39:00.002+05:30

There. I said it.

Of course, it's much easier for a girl to say that in public. For a straight man, this confession elicits judgemental stares - the kind you'd get if your porn stash included the N.D Tiwari videos.

I’m a fan, but not because of MNIK. Sure, Shahrukh has wonderfully essayed the role of a mentally challenged man, but let's face it - Salman did the same thing more convincingly in Veer. Also, while it was impressive to see SRK stand up to the Shiv Sena via the totally courageous method of putting the Congress on speed dial, it’s still not the reason for my admiration.

No, I became an SRK fan in the early 90s, a time when all of Bollywood seemed to be on some nuclear-powered ganja. This probably explains why, when Chunky Pandey called himself an actor, nobody bothered to correct him.

Into this madness entered a scrawny, brown man with hair that looked like it had been hit by a hurricane, following which a million rabbits had humped in it. SRK, whose great achievements today include sharing two-thirds of his name with KRK, made his debut in Deewana, wherein he, via the subtle process of knifing Divya Bharti's name on his forearm, attempted to steal her away from Rishi Kapoor. (He succeeded because by then, Rishi Kapoor had begun to resemble present-day Govinda.)

However, one of my favourite SRK moments came in Baazigar, when he threw Shilpa Shetty off a building, presumably turned off by the frocks she wore in that film. There was something else he did which made me a fan for life.

It was a little film called DDLJ.

I wanted to be Raj Malhotra, mostly because of this new girl who had walked into Class VII-A and made me realise that girls, those damn pig-tailed pests, weren’t actually all that bad. (That year, I went on to express my 'love' for her by hitting her with a pencil box, throwing water on her and blank-calling her residence. My approach has changed since, mostly because of caller ID.)

Defending SRK hasn't been easy though, especially when confronted with films like Guddu, Chaahat and the epic English Babu, Desi Mem. Later on came Asoka, a mega-historical, starring Kareena Kapoor's navel. Asoka's only virtue was that it was slightly better than Bhansali's Devdas, which was the celluloid equivalent of an enema.

I’ve stuck around despite all this, and I'm not alone. This was evident last week, when Mumbaikars, spurred on by the fact that it didn't involve any real work, rushed to the theatres in support of Khan.

Mumbai has always defined itself around 'outsiders', and things are no different for this erstwhile Delhiite. For years now, Bandstand has been referred to as 'that place where Mannat is located', instead of its more accurate, historical definition, i.e. 'that place where couples practise baby-making while simultaneously trying not to drown.'

Also, during childhood visits to my native place in U.P, I was often asked one question: "Aap Bombay se ho? Toh aap ne Shahrukh Khan ko dekha hoga na?" Sadly, I haven't met the man yet, although if I do, the first thing I'll say, as a life-long fan, is, "Sir, where’s my refund for Devdas?"

(This was my column for the Hindustan Times dated 21st Feb 2010.)

Just (Don't) Do It

2010-01-24T06:43:00.004+05:30

(Note: This is my HT column dated 24th Jan 2010. I've posted it here because the published version was edited - mostly because of space limitations - and I feel it takes a bit away from the original. This was a bit tricky to write, considering the sensitive nature of the topic, so do let me know what you think.)

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I feel like such a dinosaur. I say this because I'm clearly out of touch with current trends, such as owning a Blackberry, or committing suicide.

Oh sure, I *know* what suicide is, just like I know what PMS is (a type of biological warfare). But I'm not an expert, seeing as how I'm alive as I type this. I'm also not a trained psychologist, but I did catch a bit of Oprah once, so I feel sorted on that front.

Keeping those credentials in mind, I want all of you to drop everything, unless you're holding a baby, and listen to what I say next, very, very carefully:

DON'T. KILL. YOURSELF.

Seriously. I'm not trying to be funny here. Suicide is not, and never has been a worthy option, unless you happen to be Manu Sharma.

And yes, if you're in school or college, please do not even entertain the thought. When I was your age (there I go being all Dev Anandosaurus again), there were better things to think about, than methods of depriving the poor world of my existence.

Of course, I don't know how many of you are young students, since this column isn’t in SMS lingo, and it must be difficult for you to read material that does not look like it was typed by randomly throwing pebbles at a keyboard.

So yeah, life sucks. Of course, you already know this. Hey, you're a teenager – you know EVERYTHING, including how your parents are idiots, and how your teacher's sole aim in life is to land a starring role in your suicide note, and how suicide is cool because, y'know, Kurt Cobain did it, and who better to give you lessons on life than a man who began his days with a nice big breakfast of heroin?

As angsty as you may be now, adulthood, especially your 20s, is all about realising that as a teenager, you were being - and I mean no offence - a complete idiot.

Your problems appear bigger than they actually are. Take, for instance, exam stress. Yes, exams are important, but you are more than your marks. You're not some form of pestilence just because you can't remember when the Indian National Congress was formed (Ans: In 1885, after a night of heavy drinking).

Parents and teachers go overboard too, thus becoming part of The System – an evil entity that includes colleges where, if you proudly present a marksheet that says '90%', the peons will spit in your face and then use your marksheet to perform intimate acts of personal hygiene.

Counsellors love to tell that inspirational story about a young Einstein, whose teachers wanted to throw him out of school because he tried to deliver their babies with a vacuum cleaner. (They weren't even pregnant at the time.)

But I’d like to tell you about one of my oldest friends, who scored abysmally throughout school. He received about the same respect as a bag of horse manure. Today, he owns a thriving (self-made) event management business, and is one of the youngest MDs in his industry. He still doesn't know what the Mid-Point Theorem is, but do you think he sobs about this into his business-class seat, as hot women ply him with free booze?

If you stick your head above that wall you've built around yourself, you’ll see many success stories like that. Ok, enough preaching now - I sound like the bastard child of Robin Sharma and Paulo Coelho.

Simply put, if you're troubled, stop reading this two-bit humour writer and go see a real expert. Parents and teachers - talk to your children as if they were actual human beings. And while you're at it, can you please get them to fix their goddamn SMS spellings?

An Idiot's Guide to Engineering

2010-01-10T03:42:00.001+05:30

(NOTE: This is my HT column, dated 10th Jan 2010. I've posted it here because the HT website doesn't seem to have a permalink for this particular piece, and it bothers me if I miss out on the opportunity to demand your attention.)

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Before I begin, I must offer due credit to Chetan Bhagat, or else he may just do something drastic, like write another book.

Now before you Bhagat fans send me angry e-mails replete with words such as 'elitist', 'ignorant' and 'biased' - all of which you will misspell - let me just clarify that I’m an Idiot. By 'Idiot', I mean I'm a qualified telecom engineer who saw no point in being a frustrated slave in the tech world, and instead, chose to be a frustrated slave in the media.

I’ve come across many questions raked up by the media after the release of 3 Idiots - pertinent questions such as "Does the film trivialise higher education?", "Does it encourage ragging?" and most importantly, "Who is Shahid Kapur sleeping with?" (Is it Chetan Bhagat?)

No, seriously, many, including journalists, seem to be concerned about Chopra and Co. performing 'mutravisarjan' on our education system. But honestly, journos don't really care about students. They're busy with more vital tasks, such as inviting Shobhaa De to their studios and then trying to guess her age.

Therefore, I’ve taken it upon myself to answer some common questions about engineering. Let’s start:

Q.) What does it take to become an engineer?

A.) Alcohol. Lots of it.

Q.) Do engineering colleges actually drive kids to suicide?

A.) Yes. In fact, I wanted to shoot myself when I realised that I had less facial hair than the girls in my college.

Q.) Where did you study engineering?

A.) In local trains, on the way to the exam centre.

Q.) What is the one word that defines Mumbai University?

A.) That would have to be ‘Nostalgia.’ This is because a good chunk of the first year is spent in learning skills such as carpentry, welding and sheet-metal work, as a tribute to the glorious era when engineers actually had to do manual labour, as opposed to now, when manual labour involves craning one's neck above the cubicle to check out that hottie in HR.

Q.) On another note, MNCs have said that many engineers lack basic communication skills...

A.) False. It's just that engineers converse in geek-speak, which most managers are unable to comprehend because their brains are too busy concocting jargon such as 'incentivizing', 'dynamic synergising' and the most offensive of all, 'Let's touch base.'

Q.) What do you mean by geek-speak?

A.) Well, an engineer may say something like, "Check out the Gaussian curves on that babe!”

Q.) Yuck. Moving on, the portrayal of professors in ‘3 Idiots’ as ignorant and pedantic was hugely exaggerated, right?

A.) I know of a professor who insisted that 'forty' was spelt 'fourty'. He argued with my friend DURING an exam, ordering him to rewrite his roll number (which was Forty Thousand-something) with a ‘Fourty’, or else he wouldn't accept his answer sheet. So yes, you were saying...?

Q.) Never mind. Have you ever peed on a professor's door, as shown in the movie '3 Idiots'?

A.) Are you talking about that incident ages ago, when a hypothetical group of drunken guys sneaked into a hypothetical college at 2 a.m, and hypothetically peed on a certain door? I know nothing about that.

Q.) Oh come on. Tell us the truth.

A.) As the erudite Vidhu Vinod Chopra once said, "Just SHUTAAAPPP!!!"

Pimp it up!

2010-01-09T21:15:00.006+05:30

You know those nagging feelings when you can't remember whether or not you've done something that needs to be done, like say turn off the geyser, or lock the door, or look like an ass-clown in front of a couple of hundred people?

Well, I realised I'd never done the last bit, which is why I signed up to perform at the the Weirdass Hamateur Night at Blue Frog a couple of months ago. 15 amateur comics, 2 minutes each. This is what happened:

CAUTION: Liberal sprinkling of cuss words. NSFW.

Thankfully, no one asked for a refund.

Also, as mentioned in the previous post, some people thought it would be a good idea to give me a regular column in the Hindustan Times. The following links will tell you what I've been doing with it:

RE-PIMPAGE: Here is the link to my first HT article, about how I was humiliated by a townie, and why Andheri sucks.

This next one's about baby-sitting a white female tourist in Bombay. Or as a friend put it, 'Walking your foreigner.'

In the third one, I take on the Mumbaikar vs. North Indian issue. However, my take is nowhere as erudite or classy as Deshdrohi.

Next, I pay a heartfelt tribute to Mumbai's shady bars, where the kids of today are turning into the alcoholics of tomorrow.

Finally, in this last piece I talk about being nose-raped by a virus.

Alright, that's enough attention-whoring for now.

Over and out.

Raju Ban Gaya Columnist

2009-11-06T15:12:00.003+05:30

Alright so this post should have come up a few days earlier, but procrastination seems to be the general trend around here. I just popped in to say that I've recently started writing a fortnightly humour column for the Hindustan Times. The first piece was published this Sunday, and you can read it here.

I don't really have much more to say now, except that this is important to me. So, loyal readers (yes I mean the two of you, plus the porn bots) please do the online equivalent of flinging your underwear on stage in appreciation, that is, check out the column and spread the word.

P.S. Also, for more frequent updates about general rubbish, follow me on http://twitter.com/stupidusmaximus

Dance Pe Chance!

2009-02-20T01:11:00.004+05:30

The road to mature adulthood is booby-trapped with a lot of questions. Almost 24 now, I've managed to sidestep most of the dangerous question-traps, such as 'What am I doing with my life? What is my purpose?' etc., but there are some that have found their mark. For example, I wonder if I will ever find that One True Love, who will stand by my side forever, leaving only to go fetch me more beer.

However, there are some questions I'm glad to have found answers to, such as 'Will I be able to finish the large pizza by myself?', 'What happens if I move my finger a little to the left?', and of course, the most pertinent and pressing question of them all, 'What does the inside of a dance bar look like?'

Yes, that's right. The deed is done. After years, yes, years, of being constrained by lack of money, will and testicular fortitude, I, Ashish Shakya, straight A student in school, erstwhile Hope and Pride Of The Family, have finally been to a dance bar. While doing so, I looked thirty seven different kinds of stupid, but that's something I'll discuss a little later.

Now I understand if this dance-bar revelation makes you think of me as some sleazeball who can't have a normal relationship with women because he keeps flicking money at their faces. However, that's definitely not the case, for I have many female friends and as far as I can remember, I haven't paid them a dime. Moreover, I respect women to the point of having made a supreme, gut-wrenching sacrifice for some of them - I've gone shoe-shopping. The defence rests, Your Honour.

DIGRESSION BEGINS:

Another major sacrifice one can make for a woman is to travel to Andheri to meet her. The way I see it, in relationships where the girlfriend stays at Andheri, a trip there is insurance against future misdemeanours, imaginary or otherwise. In other words, suppose you travel to Andheri once to see your girlfriend, and then cheat on her with, say, a transvestite midget, she cannot be mad at you. This isn't a formal law yet but I'm told the Supreme Court will work on it once it is done pardoning terrorists.

DIGRESSION ENDS.

So yes, dance bars. For years, I've been fascinated by the subculture, and I don't see how anyone can not be. After all, these are getaways from the real world, where the only thing louder than the music are the colours - pinks, yellows, neon - that shimmer and shine, as if to defy the darkness outside. These are palaces, no less, where money buys you queens, and where mere contact with the upholstery can give you herpes.

My imagination was fueled further by Suketu Mehta's account of Monalisa, a famous bar dancer, in his book 'Maximum City'. I imagined striding into those shady portals armed with journalistic resolve, just like Mehta had done, and effortlessly picking out a muse named after a fat Italian of indeterminate gender.

Unfortunately, things did not quite go that way.

Let's start from the beginning. My first attempt at entering a dance bar was about three months ago. A cocktail of extreme boredom and curiosity finally overpowered the wimp within, and my friends and I decided to hit the bar. We reached the area soon enough, directed on the phone by a friend who had made the pilgrimage once before. It's not like we'd be lost without directions though - the bar sits on a busy main road, bang opposite a famous supermarket (thus adding new meaning to the phrase 'bang opposite a famous supermarket'.)

This was it.

Money, balls and body hair - we had what it took to get inside. Nothing was going to stop us now.

We could see nervous laughter on each other's faces. We walked.

We could see ourselves entering the forbidden world of molls and gangsters. We walked.

We could see...some girls leaving in rickshaws?? We walked, now a bit confused.

"Arre sahib...bar band ho gaya hai. Time ho gaya na 9.30..." said a watchman, hurrying up to us. What do you mean the bar's shut, we ask him. No women inside?

"Nahin sir, ladies service nahin milega. Gents service chalu hai," he replied helpfully. (You won't get ladies service. Gents service is available though.)

'Gents service'. The phrase naturally conjured up images of men in shiny sarees, dancing to 'Saat Samundar Paar' with hair peeping out from where cleavage should be. I still get nightmares about it.

But what he meant was that the Cinderellas had left the building, thanks to evil stepbitch R.R Patil's 9:30 p.m deadline, and now it was just like a regular bar inside.

Of course, we had no idea that the rule was being enforced so strictly all over. The evening wasn't a total loss though, for the watchman turned out to be quite the orator. Seeing that we were newbies, he let flow earthy wisdom gleaned from 19 years of experience as a dance-bar watchman. The essence of the Wise Watchman's lengthy discourse is as follows:

1. Bar dancers are not dancers, not anymore than Bruce Willis is a ballerina. They are all whores. They will do it with anyone, including you. Yes, you.

2. The bar we were standing outside was a 'decent bar'. Scum like "rickshawalle aur bhajiwaale" did not come there. They went to another bar in Vashi, owned by the same 'decent bar' owner.

3. Do not, I repeat, DO NOT, attempt to pick up any women in and around the bar premises, including a short path leading up to the entrance. Giving them a lift in your car parked 5 metres away is ok though, because this is a 'decent bar'.

4. If you misbehave inside the bar, the bouncers will rip you a new hole, stuff it with masala papad and charge you 250 bucks for it. Which brings us to the next point...

5. Dance bars are expensive. 250 bucks for beer, 100 for water, 170 for a soft drink. "Aur yeh toh kuch nahin hai sahab...log lakh lakh uda ke jaate hain. Yeh aisi jagah hai sahab, jahaan aadmi sirf deta hai...leke kuch nahin jaata," added the Wise Watchman, following it up with an Alok Nath-type sigh.

(This is nothing. People blow up hundreds of thousands of rupees in here. This is a place where a man only gives, and takes back nothing.)

He further implored us to not get addicted to the shindig, seeing as how we looked like "young students from decent families". And yet, in the very next breath, he asked us to drop by in the evening sometime, "just to see what it's like". We told him we'd be there. Heck, if a guy outside the bar could be so entertaining, the bar itself was a seedy film begging to be watched.

Which brings us to December.

Boredom caught up with us again, and this time we knew where we had to go. I headed over to my friend Anant's house to pick him up. As I was waiting downstairs, all pumped up and ready to enter the Bootysphere, I saw something that absolutely skewered all hopes of a great evening.

It was Anant. Wearing shorts.

Now I don't have a problem with guys wearing shorts, even if they boast of a body hair cover that little children occasionally get lost in. But Anant is the guy who was once stopped from entering a theatre showing 'The Mummy', because he didn't look old enough to watch the A-rated comic adventure. And now, on our first trip to a place populated by tough, swarthy men - the kind who had probably knifed a few people and then used the same knife to scratch their balls – my friend had decided to turn up looking like a schoolboy. We told him that if he was turned away, he would be on his own. Just this once, we would have to break the (quite literal) 'Bros before hos' rule.

However, we made it past the watchman without a hitch. Off the main path, through an entrance on the right, up a flight of stairs and there it was - the door. Standing there, I realised what Columbus must have felt when, after months of scurvy and sailor sweat, he finally came upon the first Hooters. The doorman smiled at us, shook our hands and swung open the door.

Have you ever had one of those dreams where you're naked in a ridiculously inappropriate place, like a wedding, and can feel a thousand eyes upon you, not just because you're naked but also because you happen to be the groom? That's what it felt like when I walked in and saw about 20 bar girls staring at me while mentally undressing my wallet. Not used to being objectified by ladies of the night, I turned towards my friends who, judging from their line-of-sight, had developed a sudden interest in the floor tile pattern.

At this instant, for some strange reason, the strains of Dostana's 'Maa da ladla bigad gaya' started playing in my head. Of course, it was drowned out by the eardrum-raping music that filled the bar in an attempt to either titillate the men or impact the earth's rotation, I'm not sure which. This complete initial assault on our senses took about two seconds, after which we were shown to our table by about six hundred staff members, each of whom smiled and insisted on shaking hands. It was time to get down to business, and we would have done so if only we knew how.

Now at this point I should mention that the term 'dance bar' is a misnomer. The government has banned the women from dancing, so these places really should be called 'Stand-around-and-occasionally-pout-at-the-customer Bar', because that's what they do in there. Not that I have anything against pouts - in fact, I would do terrible things just to have Scarlet Johansson pout in my general direction. But instead, I found myself being eyed by a hefty middle-aged woman and it made my penis want to curl up and die.

Thankfully there were prettier specimens around, and we did what young, virile men do when given the opportunity to order women like items off a menu. That's right - we looked down at our glasses, then back at each other's faces, then back and forth, glasses to face, face to glasses, clueless and embarrassed, like Tibetan monks at a bondage convention.

Meanwhile, the other customers continued with their routine, immune to novice afflictions like embarrassment. We watched as the man seated behind us got about a hundred rupees exchanged for a stack of tenners. He then passed a couple of notes to a waiter, pointed out a dancer and hey presto - she started a striptease on his table! Ok no, not really. What happened was, she came up to the guy, spoke to him for about 20 seconds and swished away back to her spot at the centre of the room, maybe to practice her pouting. There was NO touching involved, and the man seemed quite pleased with himself for having made a 20-second conversation with (gasp!) a woman.

By now, the traitors that I call friends had decided that they were quite content with staring at their beer, and were blushing a deep shade of red that probably matched their frilly panties. It was up to me to restore the manhood of the table. I had to take the next step. So naturally, I went to the loo.

With the pee break over, I had exhausted all possible means of procrastination. So I approached a bouncer, and yelled over the din into his ear, "Yahaan kya system hai?" (What's the system here?)

He looked at me as if I'd just asked how his third nipple was doing.

"Dance bar system hai (It's a dance bar system)," he replied, slowly. Maybe the in-house music had killed all his brain cells.

I hollered again, asking him about the rates and what was and was not allowed.

Big Moose was more helpful this time. "Paisa tumhaare upar hai, kitna bhi dene ka. Ladki ko direct paisa nahin dene ka. Waiter ko dene ka. Ladki aayegi, baat karegi, baithegi nahin tumhaare saath, khaali baat karegi," he said.

(Pay whatever you want. Do not pay the girl directly. The waiter will pass on the money. The girl will only talk to you, she will not sit next to you.)

I walked back to the table, confident in the knowledge that come what may, I would end up leaving the bar looking like a douchebag. As the Grammy-nominated track, 'Teri kurti saxy lagti hai/ Kurti saxy' blared in the background, I explained to everyone the novel concept of paying a woman to talk to you. We agreed that it was a dumb and loser-like thing to do, and then forked out two hundred bucks to be exchanged for tenners.

After a few minutes of shyly casting glances at women who, technically, were supposed to be blatantly ogled at, Anant picked out one of the slightly better ones. We passed on about 20 bucks to a waiter and pointed to her. "The white one", we said, as if she were a shade in a paint catalogue. The waiter gave her the money and she turned her heavily-lined eyes towards us.

Gulp.

"Call her here," hissed my friends.

"What the fuck are we gonna say to her?" I hissed back.

"We're not going to talk. You talk. You wanted to do this. Now call her."

"Bastards"

All this while, the girl was staring at us from across the room, giving us the same look prom queens give nerds in teen movies. I looked in her direction, beckoning her with the classic raised-eyebrows-and-head-tilt gesture. At least I *think* I beckoned her. What she saw was a guy shyly raising his head, like a newlywed Indian bride from the 50s, doing something weird with his eyebrows and turning away again, all in a matter of milliseconds. Thankfully, she got the hint and started walking towards the table.

This was it - my first conversation with a being that until now had been almost mythical. As she leaned over, her tresses lingering over her face, now dangerously close to mine, the journalist within woke up (And no, that is not a sexual metaphor). I had to say something deep and engaging, something that would make her stay a while and eventually lead to insights about women living on the dark fringes of society. I took a deep breath, letting her perfume fill my senses, and said, "What is your name?"

Yes, I'm quite the Don Juan.

Her response to the tepid question was better. She put a hand to her ear and shrieked, "Kya??" (WHAT??)

My use of English had sent my friends into a tizzy. Ignoring them, I repeated the question in Hindi, "Aap ka naam kya hai?". "Sanjana," came the dour reply. She was clearly uninterested and wanted to go back to normal customers who did not scare her with words like 'aap'.

I tried again.

"Aap kab se yahaan pe kaam kar rahi ho?" (How long have you been working here?)

"Ek saal", she mumbled. (One year.)

After a moment's silence, she turned and walked back. By now, my friends had multiple hernias from holding in their laughter. I had paid to be snubbed by a bar dancer. It felt strange, almost dirty, and stupid. There was only one thing left to say, so I said it.

"Let's call another one!"

In my defence, I understood the game better now, so I wanted to play it again. My friends were perfectly fine with the idea, as long as I did all the talking (Have I used the word 'traitors' already?)

The next dancer was much prettier. She was petite, with full, maroon lips, straightened hair and a glittering sari that promised to fall off any second, if it weren't for the shiny clip on her shoulder. When I first saw her, she was flirting with a man who looked like he was a member of the 1980s Bollywood Junior Artistes Association. I wondered if he was a regular high-roller who would stab me with a fork for looking at his girl. The ten rupees he was handing over though put the high-roller notion to rest.

I went through the whole routine again - call the waiter, point out girl, hand over money, tip the waiter extra for handing over money, signal for the girl to come over using the 'shy-indian-bride-head-tilt-raised-eyebrow' method, and try to think of something clever to say.

This one had a little trouble comprehending the signal. She couldn't figure out if I was calling her over or practising Kathakali. A few twitchy eyebrows later, she mouthed the words ‘Aaoon kya’? (Should I come over?). I nodded meekly. So much for second attempts.

Determined to not look like a fool again, I opened my mouth, only to say 'Aap ka naam kya hai'? (What is your name?)

"Shama", she replied. Yeah right. And my name is Studmeister Steelcock.

"So...Shama", I ventured, "aap ke paas yahaan khade hone ke alawa aur koi bhi talents hain?"

(So Shama, do you have any other talents besides standing around?)

"Nahin," she giggled shyly, her Maharashtrian accent coming to the fore, "mere ko aur kuch nahin aata."

(No, I don’t know anything else.)

Her giggles were well-timed, rehearsed like part of a Bollywood script. She walked back, throwing us the occasional glance, as if to say that her milkshake did bring all the boys to the yard, but it wasn't her fault that the boys were cheap virgins. It was a great act; one that brought out the ‘Shama’ in a girl whose real name was probably Savitri Bajirao Thorwade. It was the same with Sullen Sanjana, and every other woman in the bar. And yet, despite the pretences, the appeal of such places is obvious. It gives many men, brought up within the confines of a regressive social structure, a taste of lust, power and yes, even love, that evades them in the real world. Or simply put, dance bars help ugly people get laid.

I wish I could tell you more - about the prize dancer with a heart of gold, about her fat stockbroker client whose wife smells of onions and about the leper pimp who has the singing voice of an angel. But there was no time to explore all that. We’d had enough of being rejected by bar dancers and were itching to get back to the real world, where we could be rejected by regular women. We called for the bill and as we hurried out, I could feel the women still staring at us, quietly laughing at our problem of ‘premature evacuation.’

25 Utterly Useless Details About Me

2009-02-19T21:30:00.003+05:30

Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you.

1. I love talking about myself. So while I may roll my eyes at ‘yet another tag’, I quite enjoy it.

2. When I was really young, I thought the world was actually black and white in the 50s, and that it was filled with colour much later.

3. As a kid, I used to watch this cartoon about a guy, who used to raise one arm towards the sky, yell ‘Shazam!’ and turn into a superhero called, naturally, Shazam. I went out on my lawn one night, raised one arm and yelled ‘Shazam!’, hoping for superpowers. I believe that was the first KLPD of my life.

4. I never saw Star Wars as a kid, and it didn’t really interest me when I grew up. So yes, I haven’t seen a single Star Wars movie and I think it’s a perfectly acceptable way of life. You can put down your tubelights…sorry, lightsabers now.

5. I cannot stand it when ‘ppl typ lik dis n tink itz kewl’. It brings about a physical sense of revulsion, followed by an urge to break things. Also, what the fuck is ‘lolzzz’? Does it mean you were laughing out loud and suddenly started snoring?

6. For the longest time, I thought that the lyrics in the Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan song, ‘Afreen Afreen’ were ‘uske Nana ki tareef mumkin nahin.’ (Translation: It is not possible to completely praise her maternal grandfather.) I always wondered why, when talking about a beautiful woman, someone would think about praising her grandfather. (Maybe he passed on exceptionally good genes?) It made sense when I learnt that the actual lyrics were ‘Husn-e-janaa ki taareef mumkin nahin’ (Translation: It is not possible to completely praise the beauty of the beloved.)

7. I have a freakishly strong memory when it comes to recalling names, faces, dates, phone numbers, license plate numbers and other absolutely useless details. I sometimes freak people out by telling them things like what they were wearing at a birthday party 14 years ago. I get a nervous laugh in return, followed by a restraining order.

8. If I were ever a superhero or an action movie character, I’d be called The Procrastinator (Tagline: I’ll be back…tomorrow.) Seriously, I’ve spent hours just *looking* at two pages of a textbook.

9. While growing up, I found it silly that adults expressed surprise at how much I’d grown, as if I was supposed to shrink with age. I now find myself expressing the same surprise at my younger cousins and nephews.

10. I don’t understand how people can read on the crapper. It’s something I never do, although I do spend hours daydreaming there. And when I say hours, I really do mean hours.

11. I’m not vain about too many things, but I absolutely love my hair. I think it is bloody awesome and will really miss it when it’s gone.

12. I hate musicals. I cannot watch stuff like Chicago, Moulin Rouge or Sweeney Todd. I. just. can’t.

13. There are days when I think I’m the greatest writer in the world, and that I deserve to be borne aloft on a winged chariot helmed by nymphs wearing nothing but shimmering gold dust, as the world looks skywards and worships my genius. And then there are days when I look at my work and it makes me want to jump off a building, land headfirst and have a road roller flatten whatever is left. Mostly though, I’m somewhere in between, tending towards the positive side.

14. In Class XII, I once memorised the entire periodic table, including the Lanthanide and Actinide series, just to see if I could. This really helped with my study of inorganic chemistry, but it didn’t do too much for my social life.

15. I regret not being able enough to join the armed forces. I think a compulsory, short stint in the military will do our pussy generation a world of good, and that no matter how rich or intelligent you are, a soldier owns your pansy ass.

16. I love first dates. The nervous anticipation, the last minute check in the mirror, cologne, mint, random conversations, laughter and the voice in my head reminding me to look at the girl’s face – I love it all.

17. I feel I need to earn my vacations and leisure time. If I’ve had a particularly unproductive stint at work, it bothers me, and while a quiet drink or two is fine, I can’t really get into a party mood when this happens.

18. I have to watch a movie on the day of its release, i.e mostly a late night show on Friday. There’s something very comforting about settling into plush, multiplex seats and kicking off the weekend with a movie. It irks me if I cannot make it on a Friday, and if, for some reason, I fail to catch it over the weekend, I will pester all and sundry until somebody agrees to watch it with me on a weekday.

19. Like any self-respecting kid who grew up in the 90s, I love The Wonder Years. I have all the episodes on my comp, and have seen them multiple times, except for the last episode, which I’ve seen only once when it aired on TV. I simply can’t bring myself to watch it again, because I’m afraid it will me break down and sob like a little bitch.

20. The longest continuous stretch I’ve watched a TV show for is 12 hours (6 p.m to 6 a.m). This was for Prison Break: Season 1. Also, after back to back viewings of Dexter: Seasons 1 and 2, I spent at least two days living with a dispassionate voiceover in my head.

21. I always feel hungry after watching the opening sequence of Dexter.

22. I go for the crazy chicks. I like the normal ones, everyone does, but there is some twisted pleasure in chasing a woman who you know will rip your heart out and spear it with her stiletto.

23. I’m a big fan of toilet humour. Also, I think the word ‘chuddies’ is extremely funny.

24. As a boyfriend, I’m quite the romantic. (Ok you can stop laughing now) Random roses, a dash of poetry (including dirty limericks) and other such schmaltzy nonsense – I’ve done it all and thoroughly enjoyed it.

25. ‘Written by Ashish Shakya’. I think those words would look great on a book jacket and film and television credits.

BONUS: Told you I liked talking about myself.

26. I cannot imagine ever being married. Then again, I can’t imagine being alone either. I think if it has to work, I need to be really good friends with the woman crazy enough to say yes to me. To quote the wise philosopher Shahrukh Khan, ‘pyaar dosti hai.’ *waves multi-coloured friendship band*

27. I want to meet Dave Barry once before he goes to the Big Writer’s Office In The Sky.

28. I believe religion was born out of ignorance and later manifested into a form of mind-control. It is a game of Chinese Whispers gone horribly wrong and I do not see the merit in following arbitrary “laws” that were created for a different time and place.

The Weigh You Make Me Feel...

2008-08-20T20:58:00.003+05:30

Hundreds of years have passed since the Renaissance, yet the art from that era still serves a vital need in modern society, i.e it gives rich people something to frown at while they sip their wine. I’d like to join the frowning contest, but honestly, I’m as much of an expert on renaissance art as Britney Spears is on childcare. However, I do know the true history behind the Mona Lisa and its creator Leonardo Da Vinci, who, as you can tell from the ‘Da’ in his name, was South Indian. No seriously, I’m mesmerized every time I look at the Mona Lisa. It’s as if she’s reaching out to humanity from behind that enigmatic smile, and asking us the all-important question, ‘Does this dress make my ass look fat?’

Let’s face it – women just love asking that question. Despite the knowledge that straight men are genetically incapable of answering correctly, they persist like Nazi interrogators on crack. In fact, given a choice between answering their girlfriend’s weight-related questions, and having a fanatic German yank out their genitals with pliers, most men would, without a moment’s hesitation, introduce the woman to the German, who would then end up using the pliers on himself. America used this very tactic to win WWII.

So as you guys can see, we’re dealing with an issue that has enormous consequences.

However, you needn’t despair, because there is a way to offset the impact of the deadly ‘fat’ questions – just use humour to distract your woman. All you need to do is to come up with a sincere, yet light and humorous reply that also reflects your unconditional love for her. For example, you could say something like ‘Yes you’re fat, but it’s absolutely fine because luckily, I have a whale fetish!’ (Yeah I’m single. How did you guess?)

However, this article isn’t really about poking fun at women. Ok, so they’re creatures who believe that men are turned on by ‘Haute Couture De La Somali Refugee.’ That’s no reason to make fun of them. And yes, these otherwise independent, outspoken beings allow thong-wearing, coke-snorting, flowery-smelling men with unpronounceable names (How the hell do you pronounce ‘Yves’ anyway? Is it ‘Wives’ or ‘Aaives’?) to tell them what to wear. We must refrain from making cheap digs, even if their sacred fashion rules change more frequently than Shilpa Shetty’s nose. (For instance, it seems like just yesterday when voluptuous women like Marilyn Monroe were considered hot, whereas compared to the hotties of today, Marilyn Monroe, with all due respect, is an oil tanker) But we shall ignore all these idiosyncrasies and focus our attention on a group whose weight issues really need to be tackled – men.

Unlike women, men have always been blessed beings who go through life completely oblivious to their ballooning weight. Things may reach a stage where even their shadows are causing craters to form on the ground, yet in terms of Stud Factor, they will still think of themselves as John Abraham, only smarter.

But what if, hypothetically speaking, there’s a young, dashing humour writer who’s had enough of this ignorance? What if this writer, still hypothetical mind you, put on so much weight during the course of his sedentary career, that he now has his very own personal moon orbiting gleefully around him? What if this hypothetical writer, who once worked with JAM, is not kidding when he says that he feels physically tired after simply watching a sports channel? What if this hypothetical…oh never mind! I might as well own up. The ‘hypothetical writer’ I’m talking about is none other than - you guessed it - Sidin Vadukut.

Haha! Just a little media fraternity-humour there! No, I was indeed referring to myself. If you’re wondering how this happened, then you’re as bright as the hero’s batty old mother in the Bollywood village movies of yore. I’ll explain. You see, when the old woman learns that her nubile, unwed daughter is pregnant, she screams the most redundant question at the trembling waif. ‘Yeh kaise hua?’ (How did this happen?) the old cow wants to know. It’s a stupid question, because everyone in a 300-mile radius knows that the chick has been knocked up by the Thakur’s son, because - let’s face it - no one else would have the cojones to screw around with the hero’s sister (although I’m sure many wanted to, especially his bumbling sidekick).

So yes, if you still want to know, my answer is – the weight gain happened pretty much like the incident with the hero’s sister. Like her, I too was aware of the risks, but thought that nothing would happen to me. And just like her, I was having fun, until I realized that I was eating for two.

Even after all this, I’m not worried, for there is still some hope. After all, the Olympics are on, and there’s no better inspiration to lose weight than an unabashed display of muscle and sinew by men in tights that look like they were originally designed to fit 2-year olds. I’d go out and exercise, but honestly, watching all these athletes run around has left me exhausted.

PS: This is a guest article I wrote for JAM's 13th anniversary issue (dated August 15-29)

A Knight's Tale

2008-08-03T20:28:00.003+05:30

I saw 'The Dark Knight' yesterday for the second time, despite the notion that a repeat viewing would kill the awe inspired by the first. I shouldn't have feared though - after all, the film is one of the most satisfying experiences one can have in a dark room. Real and reel unite in an almost perverse manner, as you watch a dead man devour scene after scene in a role that, in some small measure, led to his death. The film, which may seem like The Joker’s story with Bat-whatshisname relegated to the shadows, is by far the most complete and complex superhero film ever made.

Didactic marries dynamite in a furious narrative that's forever slashing away at the faces we'd like the mirror to show us every morning. Virtuous, moral, with hair neatly parted to the side - that's what your mommy wanted you to be, that's what society expects of you and that's probably what you pretend to be. But under that presentable face lies a scarred, perhaps grotesque visage - maybe you believe in its existence, maybe you don't - but in Gotham City, it doesn't matter, because The Joker believes in it and gleefully conducts a grand symphony of mayhem in anticipation of its unveiling. Gatecrashing the performance of course is Batman, along with Gotham's latest hope for redemption, District Attorney Harvey Dent.

Batman versus The Joker is like matter versus anti-matter, yin versus yang – this dependency expressed wickedly with a line from Jerry Maguire. What starts off with a bank heist, turns into a frenzied, almost-biblical battle between two absolutes - the righteous superhero and the Devil incarnate in a purple suit - with Harvey Dent at the centre of it all. Gunfire rents the air, engines roar, hospitals explode, trucks perform 'perfect 10' flips and the Joker, practically dancing around the bonfire that is Gotham City, hits you with questions - who are you really rooting for? The 'freak' who contends that morality is a sham and humans are a degenerate, hypocritical bunch of sheep, or the superhero who exists only because morality is a sham and yet, chooses to place his faith in something as idealistic as a white knight? Also, what can you take away from a man who has nothing to lose?

Don’t look at me for the answers. All I know is that from now on, I’ll find myself wincing every time I come across the phrase ‘smiling from ear to ear.’

Who's Your Daddy?

2007-12-13T18:15:00.000+05:30

Alright, so I'm sitting at my desk, "working from home" and generally minding my own business, when the cell rings. I don't recognize the number, but when I answer, a young girl's voice shrieks out:

"Hello...DADDY??"

FREEZE. FRAME.

Do you ever have those 'Scrubs' moments, where reality pauses for a while, and in your head, you're facilitating a vagina transplant*, giving an Oscar acceptance speech or wondering what would happen if the paternity-related phone call was NOT a wrong number?

Funny. Scary, but funny.

UNFREEZE.

Me: "Err..hmm..hehe...wrong number child.."

And the weird thing is, I've got quite a few of these phone calls from different kids in the past. I wonder where I'm headed to.

*Best Scrubs fantasy ever.

This Makes Perfect Sense At 3:00 a.m

2007-12-11T04:14:00.000+05:30

"Hey whaddup?"

"Nothing except...well..we broke up...again!"

"Haha! Fuck what is this..the 15th time you've broken up with the same girl?"

"15th..20th..fuck knows..."

"When did it happen?"

"Just a couple of hours ago..."

"What happened this time?"

"Usual shit...distance and all that crap...dimaag bhosada ho gaya benchod!"

"Arre chhod na..you'll be back together in 2-3 days..you always get back together. Chutia ek saal se tera yeh natak dekh raha hoon!"

"No man..not this time. The break-up was different this time."

"Different how? Like 'her-body-is-in-the-boot-of-my-car' different?"

"Very funny (thinks) Waise which car would be the best in that case..Skoda I guess, no? It's got one of the biggest boots."

"Maybe..but fucken' Skoda handles like a truck man...you'll yourself die driving it."

"What? I thought you enjoyed driving the Skoda...1.9 litre na, turbocharged and all?"

"Yeah..ripping it is fun, but it's fucken diesel na, so it's like a truck only. Full sardar log ka gaadi hai benchod...just like Tata."

"Yeah, but Skoda's expensive...it's for the sophisticated sardar...Tata is for the common ones.."

"Hehe..yeah. (Pause) So what were you saying?"

"About what?"

"Wohi..break-up and all?"

"Haan...wohi it was just different this time. Like I've heard it from her before y'know - 'I can't do this anymore, you're never there, I need you to be physically present all the time' blah blah blah. Fucken' how can I be there ALL the time? So anyway, everytime she says stuff like this and insists on a break-up y'know, because that's her thing..that's what she does..she runs away. And I can understand why..I mean I know the reason she behaves like this. Not many people know her like I do.."

"Dude, you can't help it. All chicks have issues. Especially the pretty ones. In fact, they're the loneliest of the lot."

"Yeah I know but what's the need to panic? I'm not running away anywhere...chill na thoda!"

"Ladki hai yaar..what'd you expect?"

"I know..so everytime she wants to break up, I convince her otherwise...but this time, it was so mindfucking..ek toh she's acting all detached..and things are more stressful now...

"Uh huh.."

" So anyway we fought about that, shit happened, she asks if I wanna break up and I'm like 'Ok. Just take care of yourself'. I didn't even feel like convincing her otherwise...quite a weird break-up it was."

"What do you mean...weird?"

"Well there was no screaming, no anger...I just wished her luck and genuinely meant it. I want her to be happy. I mean she of all people, deserves to be happy. I don't even hate her...and I don't think I ever will."

"Hmmm. Waise it's not just the chicks...we're also retarded in a way. We only fall for the crazy ones don't we?"

"Yeah true...the normal ones are too boring. Don't last more than a month. And even that's too much. (Pause) And plus I'm not saying that the break-up is entirely her fault y'know? If I could do this again, I'd do it better. But I don't think she's gonna change..."

"And let's face it...neither can we. We'll be back to our usual haraampanti in days."

"Heh! Yeah maybe...but fucken chicks are *never* happy. At least we're not going crazy thinking about the future and fucking up our present y'know?"

"True, that."

"It's like I can see God sitting up there. He's probably looking down at the world He created, full of fucked up people like us, and He's sitting there thinking 'Ok so I messed up a bit, but hey..just because I'm God doesn't mean I'm perfect.' And He's saying to Himself 'I've got like till Eternity to sort this mess out, so I'll deal with it later. Right now, I need a beer.' And He's sitting there chilling, sipping Corona - obviously heaven is full of Corona - and fucken Mrs. God walks in, looks at the world He's created and fuckin flips. And now She's giving him The Look. You know...the raised eyebrow look..the look that says 'Saala you've been hammering away in the garage for thousands of years now and THIS is what you've come up with?' And then She shows Him the parallel universe that She created, and it's fucking nice and clean, and smells like flowers, and She's all nonchalant like 'Oh I did this in like 20 minutes, while waiting for the cooker whistle to blow.'"

"Fuck..I can totally see that happening."

"Totally. (Pause) I mean you do all you can and it lasts more than a year, which is a fuckin long time for people like me and her - not that I'm saying I did everything right, but still, I, or rather, we, me and her, we made it last this long - and then it just died out. And why? Because of the fuckin'distance! Because it takes 1.5 hours to drive from my place to hers. It ended because of logistical issues. Sheh! What kind of an end is that?"

"What's your point?"

"My point is that when we were together, and weren't fighting, fuck...it was such a headrush! She's smart, hot, fuckin' talented...every day was like an adventure. The flirting, the randomness and the fuckin' speed at which we moved...leaving the entire world behind, it was...magical. And something surreal like that just fizzled away...turned into flat beer. A love
story like this deserves a cool end...cool doesn't mean tragic - like fuckin devdas and suicide and all - but something consistent with the whole initial magical phase y'know?"

"Like what?"

"I dunno...she could've been a spy on a covert mission..like Mata Hari...she was thinner and hotter than Mata Hari of course. Fuckin that Mata Hari was fat..dunno why those guys found her hot. Plus I'd never be able to fuck someone called Mata..that's just plain weird. Or maybe an alien..like a human female, but from a parallel universe, so technically she'd be an alien.

"Ohkay..."

"Think about it man...how many guys have made love to an alien? That'd be a love story I'd fucken write a book about, sell the movie rights for it, write the fuckin screenplay and also bloody claim royalty on the action figures...whatsay?"

"Dude..nobody's gonna buy an action figure of you. Action figures aren't supposed to have beer bellies you know.."

"Fuck you."

"Hehe."

"Hey you know what would be even better...she could've been a bisexual alien. Or at least a straight alien who liked to experiment. And of course she'd have hot, curious, morally-impaired friends. Fuck, now THAT would be an epic love story."

"Yeah...instead of Romeo and Juliet, they'd fuckin teach schoolkids about you..the alienfucker."

"Heh..yeah. But fuck that...all I get is an ordinary end, no aliens and all. How the fuck am I supposed to write about it?"

"I dunno..I guess you'll think of something."

"Yeah I guess I will. Anyway, let's meet up tomorrow evening. I need to get drunk."

"Yep sure."
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Disclaimer:
The conversation is inspired from real life and is part-truth, part-fiction. Resemblance to any persons living or dead is purely intentional. And yeah, it won't kill you to leave a comment.

The Blunder Years

2007-09-23T01:55:00.000+05:30

I've always been fascinated by cinema and film trivia, especially of the obscure and degenerate kind. I'd link this attribute to an open and unfettered mind that is unbiased in its acceptance of knowledge, but the truth is that, as a child, I must've walked into one glass door too many.

How else do you explain the fact that not only do I remember the entire lyrics to Govinda's chart buster 'Meri Pant Bhi Sexy/Meri Shirt Bhi Sexy', but that I can also conduct a thrust-by-thrust comparison with a similar Mithun Da number, in which he describes the sartorial actions of his lady love with the lyrics 'Dhoti Ko Phaad Ke Rumaal Kar Gayi'?

And what of the Dolph Lundgren action movie, that I remember watching with great interest the night before some engineering exam? (Dolph Lundgren, in case you don't get cable TV in your cave, is an actor who wouldn't have survived a minute in my school with a surname like 'Lundgren'.)

I've also watched masterpieces like Umrao Jaan, Baabul, and Nishabd (for journalistic reasons of course). So imagine my disappointment when all the theatres in the vicinity pulled out Ram Gopal Varma Ki Aag - the Big Daddy Of Bollywood Trash - barely a week after its release. Even the local shady multiplex, with its 10 a.m shows of films like 'Salwar Mein Talwar' and 'Laal Tamatar Ka Juice Choos', decided that it wasn't worth a slot. And that is how I lost the chance to watch RGV ki Aag - probably the greatest mid-life crisis to have been transformed into a film.

See, that's the thing about being RGV. To add zing to your life, all you need to do is to make a film, and then gleefully watch as audience members beat themselves to death with their food trays.

But what can I, a common writer, do to resolve my crisis?

No, not the mid-life crisis - that's still years away, and considering the number of articles I've read about it, I shall be prepared to look ridiculous. The problem I'm referring to is, of course, the quarter-life crisis.
(Note: This should not be confused with an actual 'Quarter Crisis', which is what happens when college students order a quarter at a swanky bar, only to be reminded by the sweet staff that "we only serve pegs, and you will have to sell your kidney to buy one.")

No, a quarter-life crisis hits you in your early 20s, and before you know it, the 'Mature Decisions Department' of your brain, which had been on strike since you were born, has suddenly decided to get back to work, without consulting you on the matter.

For example, consider the 9th of September. It was the final day of I-Rock, a mega event that sees rock fans from all over the country unite in an attempt to smuggle booze into the venue. The old me (which, technically, was the young me) has headbanged at Rang Bhavan, cursed the pandus at Gateway and sung along at Chitrakoot. But this year, I didn't go. And why? Because I had a meeting early next day, and I needed the rest. (Next person to call me 'Uncle' gets shot)

So instead of being pushed around by dopeheads with questionable personal hygiene, I chose to spend a quiet evening with a bunch of 22-year old friends, discussing (this is absolutely true) the Air Cargo Industry, including the role of Third Party Logistics.

(Yes, I'll wait till you're done making that L sign on your forehead. Done? Good, now move on.)

Keep in mind that these are the kind of guys who, at any given point of time, can rattle off 43 different slang words for 'boobs'. It scares me when guys like these - childhood friends of mine, no less - start comparing India and China in terms of aviation market potential. Whatever happened to conversations that began with "I don't really remember what happened last night..."?

Thankfully, the business talk digressed towards airhostesses, where the aforementioned 43 slang words came in handy. However, the incident did force me to look for my inner child, but the punk was too busy getting smashed at I-Rock.

It's interesting - in the same way that being chased by a randy orangutan who thinks you're his mate can be called interesting - to see where this 'growing old' business will lead to.

For instance, I wonder if I'll ever turn into one of the wine snobs. You know the type - sniffing at wine glasses, commenting on aroma, swirling the wine about till it gets giddy and yells at them to cut it out - doing everything except actually drinking it. I've always been a beer person, although on several occasions I have offered an objective opinion after tasting wine
("Ack! Horse piss!"). My multiple beer bellies would feel betrayed if I switched to wine.

Jokes apart, I think it's high time I began to find some meaning in my life. This can only happen when I move out of my comfort zone, and go to Sion, where I believe Ram Gopal Varma Ki Aag is still playing.

This article was published in JAM, dated 15 Sep-29 Sep 2007.

Wiggle Me This, Wiggle Me That!

2007-09-23T01:46:00.000+05:30

In moments of solitude, my mind is often flooded with thoughts about the past - thoughts such as "I shouldn't have eaten the entire 14-inch pizza before sitting down to write." But the very fact that you're reading this article establishes an undeniable truth, i.e the pygmy slave who lives under my cupboard and writes my articles is bloody efficient.

Anyway, let's move on to more important topics, such as Jessica Alba.(I can already see a bunch of people rolling their eyes, thinking "Oh there he goes again, writing inane stuff about hot chicks that will eventually lead to a bunch of beer jokes, degenerate puns and sexual innuendos." Yes I get that a lot, and I'd just like to say that this article is of a scientific nature...with sexual innuendos coming up a few paragraphs later. So hold your horses, yeah?)

Back to Jessica Alba. You might have come across a recent report in the Times Of India, which said that mathematicians at Cambridge - and this is true - have proved that Jessica Alba's wiggle is the sexiest of them all.

A wiggle, in case you didn't know, is the sashaying of women's hips as they walk 'the walk'. You know which walk I'm talking about - the same one that female models use while on the ramp, until a wardrobe malfunction reveals that they're just a bunch of really thin guys.

The study was commissioned by a women's hair removal corporation to "see what gives women their wiggle". Now I'm no businessman, but shouldn't women's hair removal companies be focussing their resources on tapping lucrative markets, such as engineering colleges? Maybe the corporation thinks that if a woman's walk is sexy enough, we might ignore her soft, Grizzly-bear pelt. Maybe the corporation is smoking a medicinal herb.

The scientists studied some famous women including Angelina Jolie and Eva Longoria, before declaring the Dark Angel as the sexiest..umm..wiggler?

To my mind, these guys - and you just know they're guys - are surefire candidates for a Nobel Prize in the 'HAHA! I GOT PAID TO DROOL AT JESSICA ALBA'S BUTT' category. They even have the power of mathematics on their side, as you can see from the following excerpt:

"The academics found that it is the ratio between hips and waist that puts the sway into a woman’s walk-and the nearer that ratio is to 0.7, the better.

This ratio provides the body with the right torso strength to produce a more angular swing and bounce to the hips during the walking motion. Therefore, a woman with a 25-inch waist and 36-inch hips would have just the right proportions to carry off a sexy swagger as she walks, like Alba’s."

--Source:TimesofIndia.com

The above findings are described, in journalistic terms, as 'A Load Of Bull.' But as an engineer, I can imagine and fully comprehend the jubilation that erupted in the Cambridge math department when this study was commissioned.

Mathematician 1: (thinking wistfully) Someday, I'll be like Matt Damon from 'Good Will Hunting' and score with a chick who has a cool name like Skylar. Actually any chick would do...

Mathematician 2: Hey have you heard? A corporation is paying us to study hot celebrity butts!

Mathematician 1: This news just caused an exponential increase, if you know what I mean.

Of course, now that the study is public, these guys will become heroes. If England had a King today, he'd probably knight these guys. For now though, the knighthood is on hold because women, including the Queen(citation needed - she seems like a very old robot to me) just cannot appreciate 'Leching' as a career option.

However, knights or not, these mathematicians have given a new hope to their brethren around the world, whose idea of 'a hot time' until recently involved bets like 'Let's see who can stare at this rotating fractal pattern the longest without going dizzy!'.

Cambridge will now be flooded with applicants seeking to research topics like 'The Paris Hilton Perkiness Coefficient' and 'Lindsay Lohan's Leggy Logarithms'. (Notice the absence of degenerate puns on 'bell-shaped curves') Meanwhile, the biomedical guys at Cambridge are thinking, "Screw stem cell research...let's do some math!"

If I owned a large corporation, I wouldn't spend money on pointless research - I would just buy Jessica Alba. There are also other socially relevant purposes that money can be used for, such as sniping customer care executives. But that's matter for another article and another day. I have to go celebrate now. You see, I completed an entire article without cracking a beer joke.

This article was published in JAM, dated 30 Aug - 14 Sep 2007.

Toon courtesy: Vivek Thakkar

DRIVE SLOW, HUMP AHEAD

2007-08-23T18:09:00.000+05:30

It's been sixty years since the first light of freedom shone down upon our sleeping nation, causing irritated citizens to draw the curtains and go back to sleep. Keeping this patriotic spirit in mind, I'd like to talk to you about how to optimise our ratio of GDP to fiscal deficit, with a special emphasis on agrarian reforms.

Haha, just kidding! I'll stick to my usual modus operandi and talk about something that I have no idea about, something like say, seduction.

Throughout history, men have tried to seduce women and given our population, I'm sure a lot of them succeeded.

The prehistoric-era techniques of seduction did not have much to offer in terms of variety and class. It was always "Hey baby, want a ride on my big, woolly mammoth?", followed by a whack over the woman's head if she refused. This technique is still popular in many parts of North India.

Then of course, we had the cities of Harappa and Mohenjodaro, where women frolicked freely in public baths. This caused a lot of engineering colleges to be set up in the area. Things were fun for a while, but the civilisation declined when all the engineers flew to the US.

Cut to the present. We may not have public baths anymore (except when it rains), but I still think we're better off than our ancestors, and the reason is cars. Yes, cars are the ultimate seduction weapon and give us advantages that the Romeos of yore never had. Those guys had to rely on horses, often with embarassing consequences. For example, picture the following scenario:

It's sometime in the nineteenth century. A fair maiden steps out on to a dark road. She's missed Ye Olde Call Center Pickup, and is wondering how to get home, when suddenly two horse-drawn carriages, manned by two gallant youths, race towards her, reaching her at the same time. Wondering which one to climb into, the fair maiden is jolted out of her thoughts by a big, fat *PLOP*. The pleased-looking horse on the first carriage has just made a deposit, if you know what I mean.

"Ewww!!", she says, and climbs into the second carriage.

The man in the first carriage goes home alone, spends some time tinkering around in the horse shed, and invents the world's first car.

Ok so that's not how it happened, but do you really believe that the inventors never thought of using their cars to score with those prissy, overdressed women? You think the backseat was invented to take whiny kids to school? Ha!

Figuratively speaking, a car adds about seven inches to a man's trousers - it makes him feel like more of a man. So I completely understand the need for our kind to show off. After all, it's in the noble name of seduction. But every once in a while, you come across a man who deserves to be sodomised with his own gear shaft. Last week, I met not one, but five such men.

My friend and I were driving around in his car, indulging in the classic Navi Mumbai sport called Driving Around Aimlessly Just Because We Have Good Roads. Suddenly a car cut across from the left, hitting our front bumper as it did so. Furious, my friend sped up behind it, and when we were close enough, I yelled out salutations to the five guys inside, suggesting that they were too close to their female relatives. Pissed off, they stopped by the side of the road and so did we. They were drunk and a full-blown session of "AYE!, AAAYE!!, KYA BE!, KYAAA BE!" went on for about ten minutes. In the meantime, my friend and I continued to sport our angry-henchmen-from-bad-mafia-movie expressions. Then came the moment that I shall tell my children about. One of the drunk guys, in an attempt to intimidate us, exclaimed with full emotion (I swear this is true):

"(I'm so tough) bullets come out of my ass!"

Of course, he said it in Hindi ("Mere G se G nikalta hai!"), which made it even funnier. We got into our car, dropped our henchmen expressions and had a good laugh.

While women claim to not judge a man by his car, how many ugly chicks have you seen inside a top-end car? I'm guessing none. Of course, the only thing more seductive than a car is a good humour article *wink wink*. However, if humour writers are not your type, then I can fix you up with a guy who shoots bullets out of his ass.

This article was published in JAM Magazine, dated 15-29 Aug 2007.

"This Might Hurt A Little Bit"

2007-08-18T21:24:00.000+05:30

Famous French existentialist philosopher and novelist Jean-Paul Sartre (not to be confused with Baban Rao Sartre, the famous beedi seller from Sholapur), led a tough life. This was because Sartre (Jean-Paul, not Baban Rao) was what the French refer to as 'le intellectual', and every little statement he made was analysed in the quest for deeper meaning. I imagine that if he pointed to the loo and said "I need to go", admirers would type out a flurry of papers, remarking upon "the eternal quest of Man to rid himself of the burden that society, and last night's stale cheese, have thrust upon his free Self."

However, one of the genuinely clever statements Sartre made was: Hell is other people.

By "other people", I'm sure he was talking about a lot of people I know. To be more precise, the people who open their mouths to say "Hi!" and end up bombarding you with their entire medical history.

For example, once in college, a classmate turned up after quite a few days of absence. He remarked, to everyone within earshot, that he'd been struck down by piles. He then went on in great detail about the symptoms, the experience and basically how his toilet was so red, it'd put a Communist to shame.

People like these are unaware of the searing effect they have on society. But that's not the worst part. The worst part is that I'm one of them.

Ok before you stop reading this column and knock me off your Orkut lists, I'd like to clarify that I'm not as bad as the piles guy. In fact, I swear to you right now that if the Red Sea ever invades my bathroom, I'll take that secret to my grave (which will be kind of tough since I'm Hindu and we don't really have graves, but I'll manage).

That being said, I admit that in my buffet of Social Conversation, a few dishes are named 'Medical History'. There are two things you might deduce from this:

1. I wrote this when I was hungry, which impaired my ability to think of good metaphors.

2. I don't have many friends, and the ones that I do have are dimwits who can't think of an excuse quick enough to get away when I start talking.

Seriously though, my friends are quite supportive. Whenever I'm faced with a life-altering medical condition, I can be sure that they will turn up to crack dirty jokes about it. It helps that of late, I've been suffering from the weirdest afflictions ever.

For example, I recently accomplished a feat which put me in the same league as Sachin Tendulkar - I developed Tennis Elbow. This is a condition wherein you get excessive news coverage, earn crores from endorsements but can't really use your hand. It prompted my friends to express concern by asking "Haha! Now how will you pursue the favourite late-night activity that is generally pursued after everyone has gone off to sleep?".

A few weeks before the Tennis Elbow, I was struck by a disease that mainly affects Mumbaikars. It is called Jumping Off A Moving Local Train And Crashing Onto The Platform (now you know why this column is called Maximus Stupidus). As a result, whenever I tried to bend my right leg, my knee would send a signature petition to my brain, asking it to stop. The doctor used words like "incision" and "surgery", to which I said "Oh crap" and "Bye-bye".

It's not like I'm scared of inviting foreign objects into my body. In fact, the process is fun if you're one of those whip-brandishing, black-leather-wearing kooks. But I'm more of a brown-leather-wearing kook.

Also, I'm not sure about the capabilities of medical personnel employed in state-of-the-art hospitals. Once I'd gone to such a place after two days of headaches and fever. This is what happened:

Nurse: (checking temperature) Sir, you have a 106 degree fever.

Me: Surely you're mistaken O kindly, overworked, underpaid woman who looks younger than me. That's 4 degrees away from death. Please check again.

Nurse: No Sir, it's 106. I'm telling you na...

Me: (making Angry Eyes) Check again.

Nurse:(after re-checking) Oh..it's 100. Sorry. *Giggle*

Me: (thinking to myself) I should just smash her head with that empty beer bottle lying in the corner...waitaminute..why is there an empty beer bottle in the hospital?

True story, that.

You know what they say: Prevention is better than cure, and cheaper too. So I request you to go online and sign the petition to cover all railway platforms with soft, fluffy mattresses.

This article was published in JAM Magazine, dated 30 July - 14 August 2007.

Shut Your Hole!

2007-08-10T21:15:00.000+05:30

"Man is a social animal", droned our Social Studies teachers in school. Some kids repeated after them and took notes, while others, more inclined towards Biology, kept "accidentally" dropping their erasers and picking them up. I,on the other hand, was thinking " Is being a social animal really a good thing?".

It's a thought that's stuck in my head all these years, as have the scientific observations made while innocently picking up fallen erasers ("Aaj blue hai"). But let's focus on the whole society thing for now, shall we?

Thousands of years ago, the concept of society was in its infancy. Primitive men, armed with spears and clubs, roamed silently through the wilderness, looking for Chinese food and beer. Grunting and scratching one's crotch were the only forms of communication. As a result, the world was a nice and quiet place, where people spoke only when absolutely necessary.

For e.g:

Inacceptable conversation:

Primitive Man: Grunt Grunt?
(So..wassup?)

Acceptable Conversation:

Primitive Man: Grunt Jhinga Oooga Booga Scratch Scratch!!
(Look out...there's a sabre-toothed tiger lunging at your ding-dong!!)

So far, so good.

But then things began to change. No one really knew how this happened, but suddenly everyone was supposed to be "civilised". Why? Because everybody ELSE was being civilised, and nobody wanted to be a "social outcast", even if they didn't really know what the term meant.

This had grave repercussions on mankind. It meant getting rid of the body lice that men had grown so fond of. And if that wasn't enough, "get-togethers" were also invented, where erstwhile grunters and scratchers had to actually TALK to other people. This practice evolved to become the modern social phenomenon called "Small Talk" or "Chit Chat" (I believe the scientific term for it is "Homicidal-Tendency-Inducing Vapid Verbal Ejaculation.")

As with most people, I was introduced to this phenomenon at a tender age. There I was, a precocious toddler, busy sticking crayons up my nose, when all of a sudden, there appeared a voluminous mass of whale blubber wrapped in a sari. It pulled at my cheeks, messed up my hair (NOTE TO THE WORLD IN GENERAL: You NEVER mess with my hair!) and asked me if I knew the alphabet.

"Of course I do! ", I said. "F is for F*** You, Can I Go Play With My He-Man Now?"

Ok so I didn't really say that. Blame my manners on the absence of cable TV.

Things didn't really improve in the coming years, as random guests dropped by and amused themselves by testing my memory.

Uncleji: "Helllooo beta..remember me? Ehehehe..I had come to your parents' wedding.."

Me(thinking): Hey retard..I wasn't present at my parents' wedding. They're not exactly Liz Hurley and Arun Nayyar y'know.

Actual Response: "Umm..no Uncle, I'm sorry I don't."

Uncleji:"..then I saw you when you were one year old..you have grown SO big beta..it's amazing!"

Me(thinking): Not really. You see, every night my parents bury me six feet under, and sprinkle on me water and fertilisers enriched with DNA extracted from Dara Singh's earwax.

Actual Response: (a constipated smile)

And so it continued, the filling up of spaces with meaningless chatter. The lift, the grocery store and even my own bedroom - no place was safe. There were kindly senior citizens who asked me what college I went to EVERY SINGLE TIME they met me (Bharati Vidyashit College Of Engineering, if you must know), while others discussed job prospects, the weather, Laloo Prasad's third nipple and other such scintillating topics. The 'civilised' Me smiled and faced it all, thus saving the actual Me from getting thrown out of the house.

But then my generation grew up, and boring chatter ceased to be the domain of the 'Unclejis'. The Internet, originally developed by the US Department of Defense as a storehouse for Jenna Jameson videos, degenerated into a fertile sowing ground for Small Talk. As a result, there was born an intrepid race of friends, foes and people you talked to for 30 seconds in 1997, that has made it their life's mission to scrap, buzz, tag and poke the living bejeezus out of you. Armed with the intellect of a retarded snail, they leave their droppings all over the web. Like this:

1st Scrap:
Hieeee...wasssuppp?

(Two days later)
2nd Scrap:
Hieeee...u dnt reply 2 my scraps..bhul gaye?
.
.
.
.
(20 scraps later)
hieee...u still nt replied 2 a single scrap..y..wat happ..anyway wassup..

To this, the actual (ok fine, uncivilised) Me would say:

You wanna know why I haven't replied? Let's see now. Maybe I'm too busy having a life. Maybe you have the charm of a gooey butt-pimple. Maybe I'd rather have my pecker pecked by a woodpecker, than engage in a conversation with you. Get over it.

But of course, the civilised Me does no such thing. After all, I wouldn't want to be a social outcast now, would I?

This article was published in JAM Magazine, dated 15th - 29th July 2007.

Rain Is Falling Chhama Chham Chham!

2007-08-01T16:08:00.000+05:30

It's here! It's finally here! No, not the Apocalypse. (The Apocalypse happened last week when due to low disk space, I was forced to delete some "important video files". *Sob*). I'm talking about the monsoon - a time for poetry, for love, loneliness and water-borne diseases.

No seriously, I love the monsoon. In fact, if monsoon were a woman, I'd fall for her in a snap. And who wouldn't? Think about it. She'd be wild, delicate, sensuous and beautiful, all at once. Plus she'd be wet ALL the time.

Of course, when I say 'monsoon', I mean the Navi Mumbai monsoon, and not its Mumbai counterpart. Yes, the two are different - if the Mumbai monsoon were a woman, she'd smell of overflowing gutters and would scrap people like 'Dillistud' and 'bedrocker69' for fraandship. And even they would refuse her. (Well, maybe 'Dillistud' wouldn't, but then Dilli men are known to lech at anything even remotely female, including hairclips.)

No siree, if you really want to enjoy the monsoon, come over to Navi Mumbai and do as the locals do - gaze out the window, watch the rain lash against an expanse of half-constructed malls, and exclaim, " When WILL that mall open? I'm bored."

Let's face it - there's not much to do during the monsoon. The internet behaves like a stubborn mule, the city police messages you to stay indoors ('or else...')and after a while, the sight of all that water gets really monotonous. The poet S.T Coleridge aptly summed up this frustration when he wrote:

"Water water everywhere
Makes me wanna pee."

Weirdly enough, the news suddenly becomes the most-watched programme on television. And it's fun too. Of course, you have to be somewhat sadistic to enjoy watching hapless souls battle the rains. But worry not - if you're reading this column, you're already on your way to moral degradation. And now, it's time for (cue in sweeping 20th Century-type music here)

News For The Extremely Bored

News Anchor:
Good Evening, and welcome to News For The Extremely Bored. I'm Chudaman Sumdipatti Rao. Tonight, we bring you a special feature on the tree that uprooted and ran away in panic when Aishwarya tried to marry it. "How can I marry a girl who is more wooden than me?", were reportedly its last words before it fled.

But first, our main story. The monsoons are finally here and everyone is rejoicing at the prospect of wanton flooding and bosses/professors being washed away into the sewers to become rat food. Our weatherman Bobby Badal will now tell you what to expect in the coming days.

Bobby:
Thank you Chudaman. As you can see, there's a huge depression region building up over the Bay of Bengal. Preliminary reports indicate that this may or may not worsen over the next few days, with a hitherto unexamined possibility of heavy or light precipitation in certain parts of the country now becoming an ambigous uncertainty, to be determined stochiastically by the Anthony Gonsalves Level Of Haemoglobin In The Atmosphere. Mumbaikars are therefore advised to stay indoors on all days that rhyme with 'Gay'. Back to you Chudaman.

Chudaman:
I see. Some dark times ahead indeed. Let's move to our correspondent Pinky, who is standing outside Mumbai's infamous Milan Subway. Pinky, what's the situation like over there?

Pinky:
(dressed in a pink windcheater, looking like a member of the Ku Klux Klan: Paris Hilton Division)
Yes Chudaman. I'm standing outside Milan Subway, and as you can see, it is entirely flooded. We believe this happened because a stray dog piddled in it during high tide. The flood has left thousands of people stranded, all of whom insist on crowding around me and looking at the camera. Like that's gonna help!

What has happened here is that Gravity, along with the Cosmic Attraction Force Of The Potholes, has resulted in the formation of huge Black Holes that..

Random Black Guy In The Crowd:
Hey watch it! How would you like it if someone talked about YOUR anatomy on TV huh?

Pinky:
Err..yes..well..hehe. As you can see, Chudaman, the people are quite angry here. Who will come to their aid? Is the government even listening? Why does this happen year after year? Why can't you give me the bloody nightlife beat? WHY DON'T YOU GET OFF YOUR COMFY STUDIO CHAIR AND GET YOUR BUTT HERE, YOU FILTHY PIECE OF...(sound goes off)

Chudaman:
We appear to be having some technical problems. Now would be a good time to go watch some of those "important video files."

This article was published in JAM Magazine, dated 30 June - 14 July 2007.

The Night Of The Pappurazzi

2007-08-01T15:34:00.000+05:30

Some of my friends from college, who are now software engineers engaged in challenging corporate projects such as Rapid Minimisation Of Messenger Windows When The Boss Walks In, seem to think that being a writer is "glamorous and easy". They have visions of me in silken bathrobes, cavorting with exotic dancers and puffing at cigars the whole day. "I should have been a writer too", they lament.

I have two problems with such ignorant views:

1. It is completely inappropriate for male friends to have visions of me in silken bathrobes (or any sort of bathrobes for that matter).

2. I hate cigars.

Yes, we journos do get invited to parties/events at swanky venues on a daily basis - parties that the average man does not have access to. But far from being frivolous, these are highly important news-making events that offer mediapersons a chance to build up their contacts. Also, booze is on the house.

So you can imagine my reaction when I was invited to watch Ocean's 13 at a "star-studded" premiere, a good 4 days before its international release. I believe my exact words were:

"F*** NO! NOT IN A MILLION YEARS!"

You see, the premiere was at Andheri, which is about 3 light years away from my house. For those of you not familiar with the western suburb of Andheri, it is, as a friend once commented, "the armpit of Mumbai." If you take the local train, there's a 50% chance that your remains will have to be scraped off the compartment floor. If you go by road, you might arrive at the venue with two kids and a mid-life crisis. Once you do reach Andheri, you're greeted by the sight of autorickshaws engaged in fervent copulation, nudging at each other from all angles and renting the air with 'horn'y cries.

"It's not like I haven't been to a premiere before", I said to myself, thinking of the Spidey 2 premiere years ago, where I had had an intimate encounter involving Bipasha Basu. I was busy trying to locate the booze counter, when I was swept away by a violent wave of photographers. The cause of the commotion was Ms. Basu's entry into the theatre, and as the lissome beauty walked past, I couldn't help but think, "Where's the bastard who stepped on my foot?".

However, Andheri evils and past mishaps weren't going to put me off. I had a movie to watch, and the fact that the event was sponsored by Bacardi did not alter my journalistic integrity one bit. On a totally unrelated note, did you know that their pure and classy white rum is brewed by the Gods themselves, and is worth selling your children for?

Anyhow, I made it there and it is this intrepid streak that allows me to bring to you (drumrolllll)

The Page 3 Report You Will Not See Anywhere Else

It was a muggy night in Mumbai, and random beautiful people hung around waiting for entry to begin. Sweat trickled down their designer-embossed crotches, but they were still smiling - botox can have that effect. The night began to find its groove when the horde of insignificant TV stars made its way into the multiplex. Carrom Board and Goofy Dude were in their casual best, trying to convince the media that they were The Shite. Item Number was seen chatting with Toilet Cleaner Man , even as Ugly-Without-Makeup was glued to her cellphone. The movie started more than an hour late, causing Non-Important People to collapse due to excessive perfume inhalation. Hoity-toity people stormed the bar like refugees at a relief camp. All in all, it was a "great success"/"night to remember" <other butt-kissing cliches go here, so that we do not offend any bloated egos and get invited to more such events>.

(Names have been changed so that faltu people do not get more publicity than they deserve)

PS: I did check Pg.3 and was elated to find a picture of the celebrity who had brushed past me on the way to the loo. It's a story I shall tell for years, just as Bipasha will recount her encounter with the handsome man at the Spidey 2 premiere, who was wincing because some photographer had stepped on his foot.

This article was published in JAM Magazine, dated 15 - 29 June 2007.

Loo-natics!

2007-08-01T15:22:00.000+05:30

Dr. Freud led a long, busy life, most of which was dedicated to correcting people when they mispronounced his name. "It's pronounced like Reuters!!", he'd scream in frustration. His temper was obviously a manifestation of a very complex Complex, which is explained in great detail in his book 'The Interpretation Of Dreams', which, as the title suggests, is unmatched in putting people to sleep.

However, people like Freud have made significant conclusions like "Man is a highly complex animal", which are mostly true, except for the fact that men are not complex - they are just animals. So in an effort to help the ladies understand them better, I present to you (drumrolllll)

Things You Always Wanted To Ask Guys But They Were Too Busy Watching Football To Answer Your Stupid Questions.

Now while the following question may sound idiotic and even blasphemous to the average guy, keep in mind that it is an actual doubt that has been put forth to me.

If two guys are peeing, do they ever peek to see whose is bigger?

I was floored when I heard this question. It left me bamboozled, befuddled and utterly zapped (as you can see from the usage of words like 'befuddled'). Why, in the name of everything that is holy and heterosexual, would girls think such a thing? (Mind you I don't have anything against gay people - they make for great stereotypes) I was then told that "chicks totally check each other out in changing rooms" and the realisation that "mine are bigger than hers" have made many a girl happy. Now you see why it would be totally natural for girls, who are genetically designed to go to the loo in packs even if just one girl wants to pee, to ask such a question. And the answer is:

No. Nada. Nyet. Never. NAHIIIINNN!!

Whenever guys step into a public urinal, their eyes automatically start searching for The Blind Spot. This is a spot that lies somewhere in the lower confines of the urinal, where the chances of seeing another guy's you-know-what* are zero. Once their eyes lock on to The Blind Spot, they focus on it with monk-like concentration, until the deed is done. Although I must admit, it's getting harder and harder (no pun intended) to find The Blind Spot, what with new fangled minimalistic toilet designs and extra narrow slabs separating two men. It's a salute to our evolutionary skills that we can find The Blind spot, even when we're peeing on an open road.**

Peeking is not even an option according to The Guys Handbook, which states that "If two guys are peeing, and one of them needs to talk to the other, then he must talk without turning to look at the other guy. Even if one guy is peeing, and the other's not, you DO NOT LOOK." An exception can be made only in emergencies such as The Deadly Zipper Bite, wherein a guy has full liberty to turn towards the victim and laugh and click pictures. It is also perfectly acceptable to walk up behind a friend who's peeing, and push him so that his face meets the wall ahead in a collision worthy of F1. This is a safe prank, unless the would-be victim turns around, striking pre-emptively with his hosepipe (this never happens though - it's a tricky manoeuvre)

So there you have it, ladies. While you're gossiping and comparing sizes in the loo, guys are busy pushing each other into bathroom walls. I'm putting myself at great peril by bringing you this Classified Guy Information, but if I don't write about real issues like these, then who will? Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go to the loo. And if anybody tries to push me, I *will* use The Force.

*Face.
**No girls, we're not gonna stop doing that, no matter how many disgusted faces you make.

This article was published in JAM Magazine, dated 30 May - 14 June 2007.

The Deep End

2007-07-17T04:24:00.000+05:30

I was three years old when my father almost drowned me. I don't really remember the details, but I've heard about it often enough to tell you the story.

My father was an officer in the Indian Navy at the time, and much like subsidized Old Monk and clubs that forbade entry for those wearing chappals, swimming pools were an integral part of naval life. Not that I complained - I loved splashing around. In the shallow end, that is. I was chickenshit about venturing into the deep end, and one day, my father, understanding Dr. Phil- kind-of-man that he was, grabbed me by the arms and hurled me into the deep end.

And the rest as they say, is history.

I grew up to be the proud owner of 5 Olympic Golds, and a foot size of 17. No wait..that's Ian Thorpe. But I did take to the deep end like Harry Potter to a broom. And before you could say "Aquaman", I was busy perfecting cannonball dives and hunting bad guys within the dark, chlorinated depths of the pool. I grew up to master a series of painful stomach-landings, which later developed into bastard forms of The Backflip and The Somersault.

Looking back at my fear, I realise I was never in any real danger of drowning. The pool was full of professional deep-sea divers, and I was skilled enough to stay afloat. And of course, my own Superman, the man who I thought could do nothing wrong, the man who'd flung me into the deep end, was always by my side.

He hadn't "almost drowned" me. He'd taught me to swim.

I'm not three anymore, and Superman has assumed a fallible, more human form. But there still remains the small matter of crossing the raging cesspool that calls itself The Real World.

*takes a deep breath*

Here goes nothing.

Sue Kar Mere Mann Ko...

2007-06-28T00:19:00.000+05:30

There comes a time in every writer's life when the words just don't flow like they used to, choosing instead, to indulge in constipation of the mind. At times like these, the writer must retire and move to Tajikistan, where he must eke out a living by sculpting celebrity statues out of yak droppings.

Unfortunately for you, this is not one of those times. So you'll just have to sit your ass down and read the following (mostly) true story.

Our story takes place in a land far far away, where baby boys with names like Edson Arantes Do Nascimento Pele grow up to challenge Sri Lankan cricketers in an 'Oh Baby Say My Name!' contest (Warnakulasuriya Patabendige Ushantha Joseph Chaminda Vaas tilts the balance in favour of the Lankans). The place I'm talking about of course, is Brazil, also known as the land of topless women, although for the sake of finishing this article on time, we shall not think about that now. And by 'we', I mean 'I'.

So, back to our Brazilian story. A man here has done what most guys around the world can only dream of achieving. For legal reasons, the man cannot be named, so let's call him Mr.X.

(Digression:

X has got to be the coolest letter you can put in a name. In fact, I think 'Xerxes' is one of the most kickass names around. Just look at it! It should be the name of one of the X-Men. He'd be a lean, mean killing machine who'd kick Wolverine's ass without batting an eyelid.

Although in reality, most boys named Xerxes are rosy-cheeked, soft-spoken Bawas who're capable of killing only one thing - the Hindi language.

Digression ends.)

Mr.X was a beer taster at a brewery called Ambev. His job involved drinking an average of 1.5 litres of beer everyday. He used his refined senses to come up with important feedback for the brewers, such as 'Burrrp!' and 'Mmm..beeeer.' He also received a bottle of beer at the end of each shift (their version of homework, I'm guessing).

Now comes the twist in the tale. After ten years of faithful beer drinking, Mr.X did what some term as 'unimaginable'. As a popular Hindi saying about backstabbing goes, "Jis bottle se piya, usi mein moot diya". He filed a lawsuit against the company, claiming that the job had turned him into an alcoholic. Mr.X said that the company had taken no measures to ensure that he wouldn't turn into an alcoholic. The news reports say:

"...the employee's alcohol dependency had worsened in recent years and that even on vacation, the employee felt like drinking the same amount of beer he drank at work."

- Source: Associated Press

Mr. X gives a whole new meaning to the term 'workoholic', doesn't he?

The company defended itself by claiming that Mr.X was an alcoholic even before they took him on. Solid strategy, I say. It's kinda like employing an impotent man to clean up after a drinking game in the nuclear plant control room goes horribly wrong. I mean it's not like his reactor core is firing. So the job gets done, and nobody gets hurt. Sounds logical, no?

Apparently not, for the judge ordered Ambev to pay Mr.X a compensation of 100,000 reals (US $49,400). Let me sum it up for those of you with short attention spans.

Man gets paid to drink beer. Man quits. Man says beer made him alcoholic. Man gets paid some more.

Now I know what you're thinking. " Why am I struggling here with all these stupid books, professors and exams, when I could just go to Brazil and become a beer taster? My parents can even tell the neighbours 'Mera beta foreign gaya hai, kuch chemical research ke liye'".

I don't blame you of course. But think of it this way - India is shining right now. There are jobs opening up in every sector, and companies are loosening up their purse strings. Money is pouring in, and employees are empowered like never before. So instead of using deceit and taking advantage of a flawed judiciary in Brazil, why not do the same in India? As it is, Babubhai Katara won't be able to fly you out anymore, so make the most of what your country has to offer.

The software guys could set the ball rolling. The headlines would read:

" Young software engineer sues employer; says coding killed his sex life."

The scenes in the courtroom would play out like this:

Engineer:(sobbing) "...and then, milaad, she threw the martini in my face and said 'Your pen drive ain't big enough for my ports, loser!'"

Company Lawyer: "I object! This is not my client's fault. It's a well documented fact that an engineer's sex life is comparable to that of coral. In some cases, even coral gets more action."

Judge: "Overruled. The company is hereby ordered to pay the engineer Rs.5 crores, and set up an office for him in Amsterdam."

So what are you waiting for? Go ahead and make up your own lawsuit today. And when you do strike gold, don't forget the writer who made it all possible. Cash is preferred, but payments in the form of beer will also be accepted.

Toon: Vivek Thakkar

This article was published in JAM Magazine, dated 15 - 29 May 2007.

Confessions Of An Ex-Teenager

2007-05-27T23:19:00.000+05:30

Every number etched on to the scoreboard of life brings with it a certain set of follies and eccentricities. At one stage we're drooling babbleheads, bawling, laughing, throwing up and tripping over at random, much to the amusement of people around us. Once this phase passes, we realise that we shouldn't have drunk so much the previous night and WHO IS THIS HAIRY WOMAN LYING NEXT TO ME???

But indulging in crazy, drunken acts is something that most of you might have to wait for, until you're as old as Alister Pereira at least. This brings me to the subject of this article.

How To Cheat On A Blood-Alcohol Test.

Ok no, seriously, I'm talking about teenagers. Maybe you're a teen, maybe you're not, but there's no way you can ignore the pimply brats. Especially if you, like me, were a part of this brigade not so long ago.

When I look at the teens of today, I can't help but contemplate on the fleeting nature of time and how the shift into 'adulthood' suddenly alters your priorities. I contemplate for about two seconds, after which the teens' cargo pants catch my attention. With enough pockets to hold the entire cast of a Barjatya movie (dog included), these pants dangle off the end of their butts, as if to show gravity the finger. Only they show a lot more. Not a pretty sight. When it comes to hairstyles, the gelled look is dominant, with styles ranging from 'I look like a mafia don (with braces)' to 'I look like the dominatrix from that movie which I saw when I was alone at home, but my friends think the style's like cool, so yeah, like whatever'.

And that's just the guys.

The girls, as always, are smarter in that they actually look older than they are. This gives rise to awkward situations, such as when a friend spotted a deceptive specimen (he later termed her as a BHBB* - Badi Hokar Babe Banegi). The sight of her brought about several thoughts in his ex-teenager mind, thoughts about acts that are illegal in all civilised countries.

Yes, he was thinking of using her as a suicide bomb to blow up Parliament. All because he was stuck in traffic for hours due to a political rally. My friend has shit for brains really. An air-strike is way more effective than a suicide bomb.

Anyway, I see all these teenagers with the same bored expression on their faces, hanging out at the same old malls, scoring dope from the same old dealers and my sympathies go out to them. For this is the generation that has never even heard the electronic moans of a dial-up modem, never paid a paisa for incoming calls, never enjoyed a movie on a 50 buck ticket and never, for the love of God, watched DD Metro for more than 5 minutes.

And if this privileged generation sits around all day with a glazed expression that says 'Lost a PS3, Found an Atari', then something's really wrong. Apart from the fact that I don't own a PS3, that is.

My generation ushered India from the socio-economically straitjacketed era, to a glorious era where Shahrukh Khan did not have an ugly block of hair sticking out from behind his neck. We couldn't do much about his nose though.

But can these these young padawans lead us into the future where, to misquote Tagore, the head is held high, and the fridge is never without beer?

I mailed this question to a few teens and have been trying to decipher their replies ever since. Here, you try:

"im a rtrd n cnt typ 4 nutz lolllzz v rockkzzz"

*The opposite of BHBB is the classic concatenation, Bunty.
Babe + Aunty = Bunty. This message is issued in public interest.

Toon: Vivek Thakkar

This article was published in JAM Magazine, dated 30 Apr - 14 May 2007.

The F-word is for pansies!

2007-05-02T00:33:00.000+05:30

Disclaimer: The following post is likely to be highly offensive to the refined sensibilities of most readers. If you're the type who blanches upon hearing the F-word, and would faint if someone called you a C, then stop reading right now.

Disclaimer #2: You're still reading, aren't you?

Disclaimer #3: Ok fine, don't say I didn't warn you.

Language is a wonderful thing. As someone who makes a living out of breathing life into words, I appreciate the identity that language imparts, by manner of tone, figures of speech and punctuation. There are phrases, idioms and metaphors to fit every emotion possible, and there's nothing to stop you from making up your own.

However in the world of words, as in the human world, there exist 'good words' and 'bad words'. If words were people, then the former would be nice, bespectacled boys who listened to their mothers. The mother words would tell them to stay away from the bad words, who to my mind, would be leather-clad punks who'd cut school to smoke up and race bikes. And today, ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to introduce you to some of my favourite people from the leather-clad gang. Here they are, in no particular order:

Apne lund pe ghanti baandh ke, teri aisi maa chodunga, aisi maa chodunga, ki tere baap ko lagega Satyanarayan ki puja chal rahi hai!

- First heard this from my friend A, who'd heard it during a ragging session in his college. What sets it apart from the usual MCBC, is the aural impact it has. You can almost hear the bells ringing.

Gaand mein jhaadu de doonga, mor ban ke nachega!

- If delivered in the right style (with a topping of Northie swagger), this one can be a killer. If the previous gaali boasted of aural impact, this one dazzles you with its imagery. If you still find this ordinary, think about a person who, in your opinion, deserves such sentiments, and picture him/her in the specified position.

Courtesy: AJ and S, who also happen to be senior creatives in two of India's biggest ad agenices. They'll probably slip this into an ad someday. (The famous 'Mortein: Machcharon ki Maa Chod De' audio clip was done by a bunch of ad guys)

Chut Tamatar, Babla Gobhi

- I almost fell out of my chair laughing, when I was introduced to these by my friend and fellow lazy-blogger, Ziii. Slip these into a drunken conversation, and watch as the laughter rises to deafening levels.

Cuntpappu

- This one's my creation. It began on a sarcastic note, when we were ribbing a friend from office about being hoity-toity. Y'know, the Bandra types who'll say 'Mothafucka' a 100 times a day, but look down on people who say 'Madarchod'. So 'cuntpappu' came about as a replacement for that Dilli classic 'Bhosadpappu'. It's caught on in office like mad, and people there think that's my only significant contribution to the workplace. And you know what..I think those cuntpappus are right.

Aai Zhavadya

- Yeah yeah I know, it's plain and simple Marathi for MC. But after spending four years being shat on by the scum of Sangli, it's impossible to ignore this. There is a way to say this - the pace of your speech increases as you reach the 'zha' bit, and you almost spit out the last bit 'vadyAA!'.

Andha Lauda Fauj Me Dauda

- I'm not sure what this Northie nugget means. It's probably got something to do with being a clueless shmuck.

Chootium Sulphate
Bhosadum Bromide

- A geeky 13-year old's experiments with chemistry. I forget who it was, but dayyum those were the days!

Bhund,Tatte

- I think these are Punjabi for poonani and balls respectively. Smuggled into college by the Northie hostelites (yes, us Northies seem to have a treasure trove of abuses. I'm sure the South has its share, but I don't know much apart from the childish 'Poda Patti', 'Poda thendi' stuff), they were introduced to me by my friend K, nicknamed Despeshwar. He used 'bhund' and 'tatte' in every sentence, as if his tatte would drop off if he stopped using them. I bet he used them in his sleep too. We used to sing the following to the tune of Dhoom Macha Le (from Dhoom Part 1):

"Bhund Mara Le, Bhund Mara Le, Bhund Mara Le.."
(repeat till prof enters the class)

Randiprasad, Randilal, Chodubhagat, Lundfakir, Gaand Ka Baal, Sooar Ka Lund, Gadhe ka lund, Chut Ke Bhut, Chut Ka Dhakkan

- All terms of endearment, used among friends in everyday speech. I came up with the term 'Randiprasad' and was very happy with myself, until AJ burst my bubble by explaining how it was a simple concatenation and nothing special.

These are all I can think of right now. Feel free to add your own to the list. As Shakespeare once said, " A chutia by any other name...

Humour Writing for Dummies

2007-05-01T15:20:00.000+05:30

As a writer, I often have to deal with hordes of maniacal fans, both male and female, ranging in age from the young, to the middle-aged and even those from the Simi-Garewalosaurus era. Some fling their earthly possessions at me while others (read: 'Hot women') fling themselves at me.

That's when the alarm clock screams.

I realise that I'm two hours late, and what's worse, I don't think The Boss will accept my usual excuse of 'Aliens abducted me to further their research on a cure for AIDS. My special DNA holds all the answers, they said to me.'

There's a time when honesty *is* the best policy. There's a time to be a man. I stride up to The Boss' volcanic expression and say in a level voice:

"There's a mouse under your chair."

Chaos ensues, as people scamper onto chairs, desks and other people's backs. Tardiness forgotten, I live to write another day.

Which brings me to the topic of this article. Humour Writing. Although I possess well-informed views on serious issues such as poverty, nuclear proliferation and the names of Abhiash's unborn children, I still prefer irreverent humour as a release for my Freudian complexities. It fascinates me that an idea born in the deep recesses of my mind can cross borders, reach out and make the reader think, "What WAS he smoking when he wrote this?".

It is this fascination that makes me want to share the professional secrets I've gathered over a career spanning around 9 months, 22 days(and counting). Here goes...

The Beginning:

If you look back a couple of paragraphs, you'll notice that the main point of the article(i.e humour writing) is a good 3 light years away from its beginning. This separation allows you to ramble like a drunken lover, about things that don't really matter. A friend of mine loves to use the term 'verbal masturbation'. Why is it this way? Simply because if humour writers knew what the hell they were writing about, they'd get to the point and be done with it. And that would be no fun.

For e.g

Maximus Stupidus

I write humour. Humour writing is fun. I went to the zoo yesterday. Mummy says I should have stayed there.

Ashish Shakya, Class II-B

See what I mean?

The Subject:

This is the most important part of a humour article and requires copious amounts of research. The first step, naturally, is to get some food. Food is the source of all inspiration. As Michaelangelo famously said, " I'm not painting that goddamn ceiling till I get a pizza!". Dominos obliged (in less than 30 minutes), and as a result, the Sistine Chapel came to be renowned worldwide for its ability to give people a crick in the neck.

The next level of research includes browsing through newspapers, scouring through web feeds and amusing co-workers by belching out Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. The quest for inspiration can go on for days, as writers immerse themselves in a deep, meditative trance punctuated by peaceful snores. Inspiration, like death, can strike anytime - in your sleep, in the bus, on the pot etc. But it usually strikes when The Boss gently reminds you that failure to submit the article soon will result in your (insert name of appropriate body part here) being (insert unprintable act here).

The article begins to take shape amazingly fast now.

Embellishment:

Contrary to popular opinion, metaphors do not lie between metathrees and metafives. Metaphors and similies, if used wisely, can pump up the humour quotient of your article.

For e.g, consider the following sentence:

" My college principal is ugly and stupid."

Although it conveys heartfelt opinion, it's quite bland. You could jazz up the sentence to read like this:

" My college principal is the fruit of Gollum's dalliance with a dodo."

Disclaimer: The above technique can be injurious to your academic life. It is best performed by trained professionals who've finished college, and have collected the necessary marksheets, certificates and caution money.

So there you have it. All that I know about humour writing lies before you. Looking back at it, I realise that I don't know much. But I do know this: If you can't think up a subject for your article, you can always write an article on 'How To Write A Humour Article'.

PS: Maximus Stupidus is the column I write for JAM (apart from many other articles). Will post here every fortnight, along with my usual ramblings.

Random Page from a Random Life

2006-12-25T23:37:00.000+05:30

Silhouettes danced against the dusk-hued backdrop of his mind, their contortions tempered by the need to cocoon himself in stillness. The shadows fought back of course, spurred by the rhythm of his vicissitudes. The opera swirled up to a crescendo before slinking back into peace, and rearing up all over again, as if reborn. Daylight was its death, and daylight would
not come. So they danced, till the reds bled deeper, obscuring the yellows in a wave of contempt.

And then, he awoke.

----------------------------

Reality gifts you with a certain degree of control, that the mind robs when you're asleep. Dreams, at least in my case, offer different, often wilder and deeper perspectives. Which is why I love to sleep. The fact that I can justify sloth with pseudo-excuses like the one above, just adds to the fun.

----------------------------

What I learnt (and re-learnt) in the past six months:

1) I'm good. I'm bloody damn good.

2) The day I refuse to see beyond the above statement, is the day I die.

3) Letting one's guard down is scary. Which is why I'm glad I did it.

4) The rat race is for real. This realisation is the first step towards staying out of it (or so I hope).

5) Never, ever stop giving a fuck.

And on that note, I shall sign out. Till we meet again - so long and thanks for all the pageviews.

A Broken Silence?

2006-08-21T00:08:00.001+05:30

I can deal with solitude - it's the silences I can't stand.

And yet, I seem to have sold myself to Silence, in return for a new-and-improved 'Defence Mechanism' ( Benefits may vary from user to user).

Don't get me wrong - it's served me well all these years. But sometimes, just sometimes, the armour needs to be discarded. Not without reason, but for none in particular, this is one of those times. And the virtual world is as far as I dare go with words unsaid, for people who might not even read this...

1) I wish you'd talk to me. I can't do this without you. Or maybe I can, and end up like an
unfinished sculpture - a masterpiece framed by emptiness that shouldn't be.

2) Maybe someday I'll tell you what I really think of you. Or maybe you already know.

Naaah...you couldn't possibly know everything

Anyway, have a great life.

3) I missed all that old shit today. I never thought I would - I guess I overestimated myself.

4) I'm really curious to see where this goes. The trail seems worth following.

5) I did what needed to be done. Don't lose too much of your old self because of it.

6) So...how you doin' stranger?

7) You know how people lose touch without ever meaning to?

Yeah well...let that not happen to us.

That's it for now. And extra-analytical-types, don't stress yourselves too much - you don't (and can't) know everything.

*looks around*

Dude...where's my raksha-kavach?

Guess who's back!

2006-08-16T02:29:00.000+05:30

It's been almost five months since I updated.

Five. Bloody. Months.

A lot can happen in five months. Empires can rise and fall, orgasms can claim to be half-human and Britney Spears can get married AND divorced about 60 times.

If you know me, then you also know that I haven't been responsible for any of the above. However, I did manage to complete my engineering, which is orgasmic, albeit in a different way...

Think Shawshank Redemption.

Andy Dufresne.

Struggling out of the sewage pipe, raising his arms in elation, Jesus-like, as the thunderstorm washes over him. Imagine that kind of elation. Raised to a power of 896978534.

So yes, I'm happy about that. And I guess I'm filmy too. But I'm not out of order...you're out of order...this whole COURTROOM'S OUT OF ORDER!!!

*composes himself*

I finally got my 'markshit' and assorted documents from college today. The place, by the way, is still full of cuntpappus. But the sane, reasonable man that I am, I'll make my peace with it soon enough. Right after it's carpet bombed or something.

I also got a job as a feature writer with JAM. Which means that I get paid to write, and poor sods pay to read what I write. Some of you, of course, have fallen victim to my scintillescent literary endeavours for free. I shall be sending you a bill soon.

It's funny how people sometimes mistake you for one of those intellectual types - the ones who climax everytime someone utters a 15-letter Russian name. You realise this when your ruminations on "Debi Does Dallas: Part 2" are interrupted with a query about the Middle Eastern crisis:

" It's terrible what's going on there. It's all a manifestation of capitalist greed, juxtaposed upon a highly misunderstood region. And the media is blind. Do they even know about Sheba Farms and the AFP reports about what actually happened? What about Hezbollah's geopolitical history? Grrr..it makes me so mad. What do you think?"

"Ummm...yes..Lebanese women are hot."

Local trains throw up a multitude of contradictions. You can feel alonein the middle of a crowd. By 'crowd' I mean 'clinging-for-dear-life-in-a-cesspool-of-humanity' kinda crowd. And by 'alone' I mean a hollow, dull loneliness that hits you suddenly like a cold gale. Conversely, you're completely at peace, leaning out precariously, as a creek whizzes away below and the crowd jostles for mere inches of space.

' But I'm here in my mind

I am here in my mind

But I'm a million different people

from one day to the next'

- Bittersweet Symphony, The Verve

It's fun building a career that textbooks and teachers haven't defined for you. Instinct is my weapon of choice - it's not the only one.

It's good to be back in the blogosphere. Word limits and content constraints are like the points on 'Whose Line is it anyway' - irrelevant. And their absence is liberating.

How about taking this further - like say a Bombay Blogspot meet? It's an idea that suffers from lack of participation (including my own) but would be fun if we pulled it off. Think about it.

Over and out.

21

2006-03-29T00:13:00.000+05:30

I graduate in two months.

Jobless.

Standing alone at a crossroad...and someone's stolen the bloody signpost.

Maybe there wasn't supposed to be a signpost.

What the...hey who the fuck are you? And how did you get in my head?

I'm you.

Yeah? So tell me, who am I then?

"I'm the ghost in the machine/I'm the genius in the gene/I'm the..."

Shut up, will ya? I'm not in the mood for music.

Why not?

I can't connect to it the way I used to.It doesn't inspire me or move me so that my goosebumps get goosebumps.It doesn't bring to mind a montage of my life,the past,present or future.It doesn't bring a smile to my face,a spring to my step or a lump to my throat.Lately music just seems like a bunch of dicordant harmonics, digitally processed and packaged , for my listening displeasure.

Wake up and smell the rot,boss.It's music-not magic.It won't move you until you move off your lazy butt and do what needs to be done.It won't put a smile on your face or lump in your throat if you shut out the world behind a blanket of Numb.And it most certainly won't put a spring in your step, if all you do is walk from Cynicism to Sloth and back.Look at you...if self-pity were mud,you'd be a water buffalo.

ME?? Listen to you...what are you - Sidhu's love child ?? This isn't what I need! There's nothing wrong with me..

Denial is the most predictable of all human responses.

Yeah, so The Matrix Reloaded was on HBO last night.Big fuckin' genius you are..

You're doing it again.Shielding yourself with words.You're good with words - I'll give you that.But if you look hard enough,you see they're nothing more than a hollow defence.And there really is no point shielding yourself from the truth.

Which is?

It begins with you.It may or may not end with you.There's no way of getting around it.Deal with it.Alone, if you have to.

What does?What begins with me?

Change.

Happy Birthday.
Grow up.

With best wishes
You.

Aye Saala!

2006-02-09T02:39:00.000+05:30

I saw,no,experienced 'Rang De Basanti' a few days ago and have been trying to come up with a post that would do justice to it.Disjointed thoughts,however, refuse to surrender to coherence.The movie thrusts a mirror at you and then coaxes you,like a friend would, into looking in.Beyond the cynicism and past the indifference.Deeper and further,till it pushes you out of your comfort zone,whatever that may be - your college campus, a cushy job or anything else that prevents reality from getting its filthy but strong grip on you.

It's not the first time I've looked inwards.I still don't like what I see.

And that's where I think the genius of the movie lies.In inspiring thought.

The story touched me on a personal level as opposed to an all-encompassing patriotic one.The irreverent madness,fiercely loyal friendships,the fear behind the nonchalance,the need to find a passion - all of these and more juxtapose to create a collage that bears a striking resemblance to my life.The movie may shout out 'Lose Control' but to me it says 'Find Yourself'.And someday,when I look at that mirror,I might just be happy with what I see.

Tagging Along...

2006-01-18T01:25:00.000+05:30

Ok so I was tagged by Tushar and this is my first tag ever.And it seems like a decent one,so here goes...

The Rules :

1) Start with six random/weird facts about yourself

2) Tag six people who now have to write six random facts about themselves, as well as clearly posting these rules.

3) Make sure to post the names of six people at the end of the post

4) Leave the six tagged people a comment on their website telling them that they are tagged, and to go to your website for the rules/information

Six weird/random facts about me:

I'm reaally laid back,too much for my own good.The last time I got into a proper, full on fight was when I was 11 and gave one of my best friends(Priyo) a bloody nose.There have been many more brawlworthy occasions since,but like I said,I'm too laid back.
The sight of my own blood had a dizzying effect on me as a kid.I thought I'd got over it until I recently nicked myself while shaving.Nope...it still has the same effect,only I don't go screaming 'Mummeeee' anymore.
The only time I've danced on stage was in the Ist standard.It was some Russian folk dance(wipe that wtf expression off your face) and my pants were kinda loose.And no,they didn't fall off.
For a self-absorbed person like me,this list sure is taking a long time.
I have an awesome memory(and this is being modest) when it comes to names,faces,conversations,dates,telephone,vehicle numbers etc.I still remember my own and my friends' numbers from 11(and more) years ago.So if we haven't really met much but I talk like I know a lot about you, I probably do because I remember conversations and meetings you might have long forgotten.Sometimes to freak people out,I tell them things like what they were wearing at some party 10 years ago.Baba Bengali Memory Churan was gonna sign me as Brand Ambassador,but I hear Amitabh Bacchan's endorsing that now.
I believe I have sexy hair(the one on my head,you smirking wiseasses)-no other part of me can be considered even remotely sexy.A lot of people have said good things about my locks and I take their word for it.
Bonus Weird Fact #1:I've always been a trivia geek.Sitting through three hour long quizzes? Been there,done that.This is one reason I liked The Da Vinci Code(except for the lame end)-it was so full of trivia.
Bonus Fact #2:I've always been a good swimmer and there was a time,around age 13 or so, when I could manage(semi-graceful) somersaults.Nothing the Russians or Chinese have to worry about though.

I tag Medha , Mirage , Ziii, Mahima , Camphor and The Monk .

A Date with History

2005-12-31T15:35:00.000+05:30

A cursory glance at this page will reveal a secret that until now,was known only to 913412723 people,4 cows and 3 space monkeys : I'm Lazy.Always have been.But I referred to the recent lull in my writing as a case of Writer's Block.You know of Writer's Block right?The big,looming structure off Bored Avenue,opposite the Yawn building?Anyways,I continued to be Lazy and blame it on Writer's Block.And all the King's men couldn't get Lazy writing again.They even offered him hot sex in return but who wants to have sex with the King's(or anyone's) men?

Ok I should stop rambling and get somewhere with this.
The vacation gods have been good to me this time around.Blissful nights dissolved into mornings, which yielded to mellow evenings as I hibernated for 12 hours straight,sometime even more.The 'days' started post 7 p.m,with drives around the town and meeting up with old friends over beer and rock.I'd forgotten what daylight looked like.

Until of course,I set off on a trek to Raigad Fort with 16 college friends.The plan?
Quite simple really...a 3 hour drive to Raigad,followed by a short trek up to the fort,where we'd chill out for a while before heading back home.

And now the part that scares off lazy,i-make-sloths-look-like-hyperactive-baboons-on-speed kinda ppl:

Arrival time at Raigad: 3:30 a.m
Temperature: ganji-bermuda level if you're from North India,but ball-numbing enough for us tropical Bombay types.

Vertical Displacement:3000 ft...in the metric system that translates into "Chutiye,bahut upar hai...let's take the ropeway instead!"

And so it began,our fight against ourselves,against muscles that screamed out in agony,the journey that made every breath seem like a wonderful victory,as we trudged along a narrow path,our immediate neighbour to the left being the rocky abyss of the Sahyadris - the same abyss that served to consume traitors during the Maratha period.
As I ascended the slope, one step at a time,the full moon playing benovelent guide,a blanket of calm pervaded my senses, silencing the noise in my head save for one voice which urged firmly:

"Mind over matter,mind over matter,mind over matter..."

And that's what it's all about really-this game of Life.The power of the mind - the power to create,nurture,inspire,lead,seek and destroy.Each one of us is the centre of the universe and what we do with our power decides the manner in which the universe unfolds.

Random philosophy,a narrow path,the abyss of the Sahyadris still yawning wide open to my left,as if to swallow the moonlight that guides us - a state of blissful solitude, even as I was surrounded by friends.

"Mind over matter,mind over matter,mind over matter..."

We reached our destination at 5:30 a.m,our fatigue banished by the regal authority of Shivaji, a force not yet dead, moulded in stone and metal, still standing guard over the fort that served as his capital.The fort that the mighty Mughals could never capture during Shivaji's lifetime.A behemoth set in stone,it commands respect and stands watch over miles of hilly terrain even today,for enemies that refuse to give up.

A bonfire and some photography later,we perched upon a stone wall and gazed eastward,waiting for the sunrise.The sunrise,after all,was the reason for the crazy timing we'd chosen.As we sat waiting, a friend who'd been exploring around,shouted that he'd discovered a hidden series of steps. Carved into the dark,curving walls of the fort entrance,they led to the watchtower,which offered a much better view.So of course,doing the exact opposite of what 'normal' people would do, five of us climbed to the top, a straight drop to the rocks below reminding us to refrain from the usual buffoonery.And yours truly,along with two of his friends,still ignored common sense and walked around the entire perimeter on a narrow ledge,citing reasons such as 'finding the right camera angle'.Bullshit.We did it for the headrush.

This, of course , was just after the sunrise.Ah yes..the magical sunrise! The most spectacular one I've seen in all my life.A confluence of colours slowly breaking free from the darkness,shades of yellow at first, metamorphosing into red,orange and shades of pink,as if God himself had wielded a divine brush to create a portrait of Hope and Warmth.

They say a picture speaks a thousand words...so open your eyes and Listen!

Coming Back To Life...

2005-12-17T20:16:00.000+05:30

A blank page waits to be defaced by my thoughts,its barrenness, a resilient foe that sweeps in across my defences,even after being vanquished several times.It expects death with honour, to be lacerated by jagged wit, or ambushed with brutal prose and relegated to oblivion as the words, victorious, dance around its funeral pyre and fall into place as the final sweet insult, a mocking epitaph.

Not this time.
Not when the void is filled up with a dull,aching silence that fails to provide the cushion solitude usually does.

Fear incapacitates you in ways more than one.Not only does it clip your wings when you want to fly, it also plants a seed of thought in your mind.Seemingly innocuous,the seed takes root in your insecurities and strengthens them, while clinging like a parasite to your will - the same will that led you to victory all these years.You stare your enemy in the face and fight it.A small victory here, a glimmer of hope there...

And then you take the easy way out.Fall into mediocrity as Fear holds you close and shows you a more palatable version of Hell.It's like the Stockholm Syndrome, with love being substituted by a numb indifference.And there's no SWAT team waiting to get you back to safety.

Cynicism in command, every extra ounce of energy spent is an aberration.You've fallen pretty deep into the trap, the irony being it doesn't feel like a trap until,of course,reality rages in,ripping away the blinds to leave you face to face with a reality that only moments ago, seemed like a distant mirage.

That dull,aching silence again...

And then, a voice you had long given up for dead,asserts itself:

"Dust thou art, to dust returneth
Was not spoken of the Soul"

Wake up and smell the RDX!

2005-11-03T23:18:00.000+05:30

What did you get for Diwali this year?
"I got a kickass home-theatre system.."
"I got these gorgeous designer tops...omg,they're,like, so haute!"
"I got an awesome comp...wait till you hear the config.."

Hey kid,what about you..what did you get for Diwali this year?

"I got orphaned."

Civilians, for God's sake.They were innocent civilians.Fathers,arms loaded with shopping bags, indulgent smiles on their faces.Mothers bargaining over prices,trying to hold on to kids who race around the shop,pretending to be cars.Kids,who believe that Mummy and Papa are stronger than Superman and will protect them forever, come what may.

Bombs ripping through the city,marketplaces reduced to a grotesque collage of charred limbs,Delhi in mourning,a nation on high alert,mission accomplished - and then,the charade begins.

"World leaders condemn Delhi bombings. "

Oh reallyyyy??? Cho chweet of you.Everything's all dandy now.Hey terrorists, yeah you,I'm talking to you, you unwashed scums with your Kalashnikovs,RDX and nuclear blueprints...did ya hear that...you're "condemned"...ooooh..bet y'all just shitting bullets now ain't ya! Now put down those weapons and come out before they "CONDEMN" you again.

That's where international support ends.Condemnation.If you believe that anyone else gives a fuck about us, then I guess you believe in unicorns too-after all, Santa gifted you one last Christmas,didn't he?It's entirely possible that instability in South-East Asia is beneficial to Bush.Hiked-up defence budgets,dangle the Weapons carrot in front of India and Pakistan, and voila - two sycophants that can be manipulated at will.If you think imperialism is dead, well, you can just go play with that unicorn of yours,because imperialism is rearing its ugly head all over the world.Again.

"PM takes a hard stance on terrorism."
Oh yeah...the hard stance.No you pervert,not that.The actual hard stance...a no-nonsense,non-negotiable position.The one where you make it clear that "acts of terrorism will not be tolerated".Like we did the last time, only this time we mean it...and I mean reeaaally mean it mean it, y'know?Pakistan's not gonna bitchslap us into submission, right Mr.Prime Minister?
*Maybe not in one go, but yeah, little by little.*

It's a fucking joke how we never learn from our mistakes.We are at war.Not the people,as individuals, but as nations,with much at stake.Kautilya's Arthashastra teaches that there are no good or bad nations,only powerful or powerless ones and that the powerful ones must do all they can to maintain the balance of power in their favour.

So why don't we hit the bastards now?What are we waiting for-an attack on Goa in Christmas,or in a school in J&K as students celebrate Republic day,or perhaps a bloody Holi?We know where the terrorist camps are,the Pakistanis are preoccupied with earthquake relief(which,incidentally, we are helping with in a big way) - so here's a suggestion: stop being Mr.Nice Guy, halt the flow of aid from our side and send in the troops, and wipe out the camps.

Easier said than done?True.

Worth fighting for?Hell Yeah!

Chronicles of The Raped Crusader

2005-10-21T23:22:00.000+05:30

So what have I been upto all this while?Let's start from the beginning...the beginning of the end.

Darkness shrouded the city,casting a pall of deathly gloom,even as the rain pelleted empty streets,playing out a rhythmic staccato.Oblivious to the storm outside,I lay relaxed at home,solving a Rubik's cube blindfolded with one hand tied behind my back, even as I added the finishing touches to The Grand Unified Theory with my other hand.These, by the way, are some of the most useless things a man can do with his hands, but more on that some other time.So like I was saying - rain falling,thunder booming and me wasting time.Just then the phone rang.It was my buddy from college and he sounded scared...almost terrified.I could sense the fear almost eclipse his voice as he spoke:

"A..Ashish..It..It's c..coming."

"Huh?"

He was almost hysterical now."It's coming Ashish...it's coming.."

"It's cumming? Dude I wish you wouldn't call up when you're watching porn...I mean we're good friends and all but c'mon.."

"Not cumming you blindfuck.Coming.C-O-M-I-N-G.It's coming Ashish.."

"It? It who? The guy from The Addams Family? The one they call Cousin It?"

"End of Days, Ashish...the End of our Days is coming."

And then the phone went dead.

"Shithead's been smoking weed again",I told myself,and went off to sleep.The rain continued to lash the earth, and had I looked out my window I would've seen the sky turn a crimson red.

The next day started off normally enough.It wasn't until I reached college that I started thinking about what Shithead said last night.

"What if it's true?"
"Naah..it can't be..not now."

The voices in my head continued to argue as I made my way to the classroom.Maybe it was the glazed zombie look that my classmates had in their eyes,maybe it was the classroom itself - it looked like a million rabbits had humped in it right after it had been hit by a tornado.Or maybe it was the chicks from the anti-erection squad(and we ain't talkin buildings here)-no wait,in my college, there's nothing unusual about that.But apart from the ugly chicks, everything else seemed out of place..so frighteningly out of place.
The realisation gave me a sick sinking-tightening feeling in the pit of my stomach - kinda like the feeling you get when you've had too much booze and feel like shitting and puking at the same time: It was true..my friend had been right all along.The End of Days had been made official by the powers that be...

The submission and exam dates had been announced.

Life would never be the same again for me.What followed next would've broken a lesser man and yet I'm not proud of having survived the first phase.Sure,I gained some valuable insights.For instance, I learnt that men too can exhibit PMS sypmtoms.This was amply demonstrated by my professors, who went from jovial friendly men to anally retentive bastards in a matter of minutes.Their mood swings would put a pendulum to shame.

Submissions over now,the transformation is complete.From mere mortal to Superhero,from Ashish to The Raped Crusader.In case you're wondering,I don't wear a spandex suit because of the beer belly and neither do I wear a cape-it just gets in the way when these self-styled pricks of the universe want to screw me.

Randomness

2005-09-17T13:29:00.001+05:30

So I see that my blogcounter has crossed 400.It was on 399 last night and I was waiting for the scales to roll over and fall into place.Not that 400 is a significant number or a very large count.In fact it's peanuts and only monkeys are happy with peanuts, they say(Ok so maybe THEY don't say but I do..and they should too, whoever they are).But considering the scant number of posts, it's still a decent quadruple century.I'd like to take this oppurtunity to thank the Academy, my producer,my cast and crew..
*Oh shit..wrong speech!*
*Fumbles around in pockets for the right speech*
Seriously though, I absolutely love the fact that you take the time to visit my little home in cyberspace.Maybe you know me personally, maybe you don't, but it's a fascinating realisation that something born in the deep recesses of my mind could reach out to people anywhere in the world and inspire them,make them laugh,cry,ponder,barf in disgust or just give them something to do when they're bored to death.

And bored is what I have been lately.Not all the time of course but yes, bored enough to come up with stupid jokes.Like this one:

If a threesome is three people having sex and a twosome is two people having sex, then why is hand-some still a compliment?

Jus warming up folks.There's more:

Porn Films that probably haven't been made(but you never know):

Sex Files:The Chut is out there
Shaving Ryan's Privates (copyright with my buds Priyo and Anand)
Salwar mein Talwar(copyright with Vineet)
Andar Bahar(btw this is actually a copy of '48 hours' and has Anil Kapoor and Jackie Shroff in the lead-hope they don't retain the starcast ....*shudder*)
I Know Whom You Did Last Summer
I Still Know Whom You Did Last Summer(whaaat?you didn't see that coming?)
Mera Naam Poker(ouch...)
The Sperminator
Forrest Hump

Sigh.I need to get a life.

Or maybe take one.Not to get rid of the boredom(although yes, it certainly would make things exciting).But some people have been pissing me off real bad these days.They're called professors, spelt 'D-I-C-K-H-E-A-D-S'.Pathetic,insecure and petty ignoramuses who strut around demanding respect.Now I'm a reasonable man,peace-loving and all so I do the sensible thing-live my life independent of them,finish my work and generally avoid crossing paths,even if that means I don't get the oppurtunity to kiss ass,which again, is absolutely fine by me.But every now and then,when they get in my face, I imagine what it would be like to have 'a little less conversation, a little more action':

A full blooded M-16 unleashing a guttural fury as it shreds flesh and decimates bones to dust.Or a Heckler-Koch MP5 suppressed submachine gun, stealthily spitting out bullets that tear into the heart without as much as a whisper.Perhaps a .50 caliber armor piercing sniper round from 800 yards away.The sweet click that sounds just as a .32 caliber Silver talon is loaded, before it blasts a human head off with unexpected brute force at short range.The thunder of a sawed-off shot gun echoing through the room after it has finished ripping a full grown man into two.

No I'm not a psychotic nutcase who had a traumatic childhood and spends half his day with FPS games.But admit it-there is something surreal about the whole fantasy.And that's what it shall remain - a fantasy.Let the dickheads wonder what I'm smiling about when they're telling me that I'm gonna be a failure in life just because I don't conform to their pedantic notions about education.

I really have nothing specific to say.And yet, I don't feel like shutting up.So here's some more randomness for you.

Ever taken off one of those masks you wear, even for a little while, and let someone walk in and see you without it? It's a paradox really, for every look that someone takes at your naked face reminds you of how you scarred yourself and put on the mask in the first place.But once you've let down your guard, you realise what you've known all along-that you're much bigger than your mistakes and you don't really need to hide behind a facade.

It's liberating.

The Day The Music Died

2005-09-04T12:57:00.000+05:30

3rd September 2005
Gateway of India
Mumbai

5:30 p.m:
India's biggest rock show, Independence Rock - a legend in its own right, a triumph of passion over economics,red-tape and culture vultures- is all set to bring in its 20th anniversary by doing what it does best: rocking the nation. With the majestic Gateway and the Arabian Sea for company, the mood is set for an unforgettable night as metalheads wait,a sea of black, calm for now but dying to rage forth into a moshpit.

*The soundchecks are over, they'll let us in anytime now*

6:00 p.m:
Farhad Wadia, a mountain of a man, the father of I-Rock, arrives on the scene to address the crowd, a bunch of indifferent- looking cops by his side.Metal heads cheer as he stands up on the barricade, even as he looks out pensively at the mass of black, who have come from far and near for one reason alone.And then, the words that made history:

"Sorry folks,I-Rock is cancelled."

Now for those not clued into the Indian rock scene, here's a little piece of information:I-Rock does not get cancelled.It never has been.Not in the last 19 years.Not when the moral brigade raised a hue and cry about it(which they do almost every year).Not when sponsorships were hard to come by.Not when Rang Bhavan was taken from us.And definitely not when some "just a formality" permit was denied by fuckin' cops at the last minute.

*Mdrchod,Bnchod,Mdrchod,Bnchod,Mdrchod,Bnchod...*

What the fuck were they thinking?
"A law and order situation might have been created",says the pandu in charge.Listen asshole,
a law and order situation might have been created if pissed- off rockers had gone ahead and done what you've always expected them to do.I was half-expecting a Molotov cocktail to fly out of somewhere.Maybe it was the police presence that deterred them, or maybe they didn't want to add to Farhad's worries.Whatever it was, kudos to the crowd for their behaviour.Notice the touch of irony - the "good guys" i.e the cops played the "obnoxious asshole" part to perfection, whereas the long-haired,multiple pierced "corrupt Indian youth" did the sensible thing and peacefully trooped over to Mondy's for much-needed beer.

It's Been A While

2005-08-16T16:16:00.000+05:30

There was a lot to choose from on TV yesterday as the medium was awash with the colours of India, some vibrant and others subtle.I chose to lay back and watch 'Swades', a movie I'd missed out on a long time back.I won't launch into a lengthy movie review here, but it was a fine piece of work-Shahrukh Khan has delivered one of his best performances ever.There is a certain realism to it and even minor characters are well-etched out.No, it didn't inspire me the way the ads promised it would.But it did bring back a perspective that had been missing for a while- to what consequence I do not know.And it reminded me of a poem I'd written a long time back:

It's been a while

Glimpses,from the sky,
of an erstwhile home
bring back memories
which had long been swept away,
by foreign seas,
like footprints on the shore.

It's been a while,guys.
Remember our second home-the coffee shop?
I do-cappucinos laced with solitude
Still remind me of days
When we were free

Eager to change the world
A vision only we could see.

And change we have...
But it's just us,I see.
The world around us
Is the same it used to be.
..Still exuding hope
In the face of misery.

On land now,the warm air embraces me.
My eyes are moist-not surprising , really.
" It's just the dust ", I tell myself
"There's too much of it in this part of my world."

No Wheel Drive

2005-08-01T21:06:00.000+05:30

"Water Water Everywhere
Little Johnny wants to play..."

Ok,fine - I have nothing better to do than to torture people with stupid rhymes.So sue me.It's not like you're doing something earth-shatteringly significant - I mean here you are reading THIS post(and I'm willing to bet my last bottle of bottled water that you'll read the entire thing). And just in case you've been living under a rock in Botswana all this time, let me give you the reason for my ranting and raving:

It's pouring in Mumbai.
It's pouring as if God went out for a drink and forgot to shut off his bathroom tap.
Again.
And He's still at the damn bar-no silly 01:30 a.m deadlines in Heaven.

Now don't get me wrong. I love the rains, almost impossibly so.I love discovering new shades of green.The sight of verdant slopes draped in a white expanse of serenity,of rainwater glistening down rocky facades and an unexpected rainbow framed against the sky-at a point, words become meaningless and there's nothing left to do except to let go and allow Nature to rejuvenate your senses.

But like my teachers always used to say, "Ashish, there's a LIMIT!!!". A limit that was crossed when roads turned into rivers and a 3-foot water level was seen as a 'mere puddle'.A limit blurred into oblivion when I was forced into confinement at home,talking to the shadows on the wall, the voices in my head gleefully laughing at my impending doom, as I waited, cold and numb , for a fate uncertain but as dark as death itself.Ok maybe that was a little too dramatic(I'm good ain't I?).But I'm bored.
Aaj mere paas electricity,cablenet,radio,TV aur running water(albeit brown-coloured) hai.
Tumhare paas kya hai?
See there I go drifting off again, like a car on a Mumbai road.So like I was saying,I'm bored.In spite of the amenities I feel privileged to have, I'm bored.Given a choice between my college lectures and sitting around at home doing nothing,I'd still choose the latter but that doesn't change the fact that I'm fatally bored.
*Is there an echo in here?*

I can't go out without a car(well duh!).And since my Dad hasn't really taken well to my bestseller, "101 Reasons To Buy A New Car Exclusively For Your Son",I'm stuck at home until someone hypnotises him into letting me use the family car. Men are born with a thirst for power and control.This includes control over everything from the remote, to a seat in Parliament. Yes I know I'm also one of those power hungry men,which is exactly why I can appreciate the subtle nuances of this power struggle. I mean my parents love the car more than they love me.As long as the car's safe in the garage, I could be anywhere and they wouldn't lose sleep over it.Take, for example , the following conversation:

Me:Dad...umm..I've made up my mind..

Dad:(not lookin up from the paper)Uh huh..

Me:(with a little more spine) I've decided that I will not not sit by and watch imperialism bring the free world down to its knees.The path to progress cannot be lined with the graves of the innocent.The world needs a new order that is not a slave to money,the spawn of Satan.And I have vowed to offer my life and soul to this cause.Starting with Iraq, where I shall join the mujahideens in their struggle for freedom,my journey will take me far and near, to blistering deserts and frigid mountains, to choppy seas and steamy jungles.I will face a hell that none of you, in your capitalist and subservient existence, can even dare to imagine.Of course, I wish to convert so that I can find my real God.And when I realise my vision of heaven on earth, I shall quietly slip away and find solace in the mountains of Afghanistan, eking out just enough for an existence by rearing sheep.

Dad:(still not looking up from his paper) Ok but don't take the car.

See what I mean?They just don't care!
During one week of intensive research(which means thinking up crap to beat the boredom),I have come to the conclusion that this struggle for control over means of locomotion in a family unit dates back to the Stone Age, when the inventor of the wheel(let's call him Dunlop) was besieged by his son for the family wheels:

Dunlop Jr: Ooga ooga buga woo!

Dunlop:(brings his club down hard on his long-haired son's head.A dull thud echoes through the forest)

I guess Dunlop was a man of few words, just like my Dad.So if you know a good hypnotist,please call me and let me know.Just stare at the fullstop at the end of this sentence for 22/7 seconds and when I snap my fingers, my phone number will appear on the screen.

Water Water Everywhere...

2005-07-29T12:54:00.000+05:30

There was a short poem I read when I was a kid.It was one of those things they taught you in the "Value Education" class and made you(or your parents) prepare a chart about. It's still stuck in my head after almost 12 years.Maybe something in it appealed to the mind of an 8-year old, in a subliminal,understated manner.Or maybe it's because of my freakishly strong memory.Anyway, it goes something like this:

As a rule
Man is a fool
When it's hot, he wants it cool
When it's cool,he wants it hot

Always wanting what is not.

I think the last line has a lot of depth to it. No, I'm not trying to be funny about the deluge that grabbed Mumbai by the neck and tried to drown it in its murky belly. The fact, however, remains that just about a week ago, we were wondering where the rains had disappeared to.It was getting hot and humid and you couldn't blame a Mumbaikar for exclaiming, "The heat is killing me - why the hell doesn't it rain?"

And then, rain it did.

Macabre,chilling and desperate.How else would you describe a situation wherein a dead body curled up in a foetal position floats by and you wade on through waist high water, trying to ignore the fact that there's absolutely nothing you can do? Or you step out of the house to the sight of a dead bus driver and a schoolboy, still seated in the bus?

My family and I weren't really in danger anyway.We were all at home,except for my sister, who reached home an hour before train services stopped.Everyone I know is safe and at home, even if it took them a day or longer to get there.I haven't suffered financially either. I'd even played in the rain like a kid before I called for the car to come and pick me up from college. I was as stupidly happy as a kid whose paper boat just won a race.Hell, I was enjoying the damn rains on Tuesday evening.

The biggest problem I had to face was driving through about 2 odd feet of water in a Maruti Zen and then drive back in carrying nine people in a car that seats five.Compared to what the rest of Mumbai went through, that was a joyride.Eight friends stayed over at my place and we chilled out throughout the night.And of course, we got a few days off from college too. Sounds like fun right? I thought so too, because TV services were disrupted as well and as they say, no news is good news.

So why am I feeling a bit low now that the gravity of the situation is becoming starkly clear, bulletin by passing bulletin?I'd almost stopped reading newspapers for the past week or so, simply because I stopped caring about whatever everyone else referred to as "news".Why, then, did I devour every inch of newspaper space today morning? It's not like we were hit by a tsunami (though by now,I can begin to imagine what that must be like).I might revert back to the cynical phase in a few days.But for now I realise that for whatever it's worth, I do care.

Unbreakable Bonds

2005-06-28T04:13:00.000+05:30

Life- a journey through hope, pain, pleasure, ecstasy, fear, monotony- a series of seemingly unrelated events unfolding in time and space, which mathematicians might classify as a set of infinite random variables, a multitude of possibilities and probability functions that just cannot be mapped out. After all, what is the equation of good karma? How do you quantify it? Of course, if you believe in karma, i.e. the idea that one’s thoughts and actions determine the course and nature of future events, then the randomness of events reduces to an illusion and you realise that no matter how insignificant, obscure or painful it might be, there is a reason for everything. Yes, it’s natural to not see this fact, to be oblivious of one’s own destiny being moulded around each moment of one’s existence, to be blind to the scenes scripted by one’s own hand, being played out on the stage everyone knows as The World. It’s so easy to dismiss simple coincidences without too much thought. For example, you meet someone new, say in college or at the workplace, and after a few minutes of conversation, realise that the two of you live not far from each other and have a few common friends too. Big deal?Maybe, maybe not. After all, since the two of you stay in the same city, your living in the same locality, attending the same college, working at the same office or having a few friends in common aren’t really earth-shattering events, right?
What about coincidences that may be a little harder to explain in purely logical terms? For example, you’re cleaning out your room and chance upon a dust-laden album, which lay forgotten for years, until now .You open it and a young man-boy, maybe twenty years younger smiles back at you-it’s you, with friends who swore they’d stay together but eventually went their own separate ways. An hour of nostalgia later, you decide to look them up but as usual, the task gets put off till ’tomorrow’. That ‘tomorrow’ never comes, and a few days later you’re busy with your life again, when the phone rings. It’s your long-forgotten best friend - the face in the album now has a voice.

“What a coincidence!”, you exclaim excitedly.

Is it really? Would he have called had you not come across that album a few days ago?

So far, I’ve discussed fairly simple events, none that seem to be of great significance, at least not at the outset. These are very common and are experienced by everyone in numerous ways. And then there are those that shake you to the very core of your existence, alter your perception of the world and bring to life the most basic question – Why? The answer to this ‘Why’ is elusive, often painfully so, but there is only one way of coming close to the truth, and that is through Faith.

Faith, in the idea that a higher power exists and governs the world, fuelled only by the actions of the souls it governs – a karmic feedback system, if you will. A nebulous premise, you say, even questionable? Try questioning the faith of people who have had epiphanic realities thrust upon them – like the man whose otherwise perfectly functional car broke down on the way to work, thereby delaying his arrival at the office in the WTC, New York, on the morning of Sep. 11,2001, even as his co-workers arrived at the usual 8:30- 8:45 a.m. Or the tourist who would’ve been in the vicinity of the towers, had he not rushed back for the camera he forgot in the hotel room. What about the family that had to cancel their Christmas and New Year holiday plans in Phuket, Thailand (Dec 2004), on account of the death of an elderly member of the family? Or the Australian mother who was in a position to save only one of her two sons from drowning and had to choose which one, only to be reunited later with the boy she’d let go of. Or the toddler who survived the tsunami, even when the survival of an adult seemed impossible. Stories like these reaffirm faith and then there are those that destroy it, often with a single cruel blow.
A young girl, nine years old maybe, killed while crossing the road, by a junkie who decided that red lights aren’t for him. Wrong place, wrong time. But the question still echoes in the throes of silence – Why?

Albert Einstein once famously said “God does not play dice!” and I’m inclined to agree. Of course, the idea of karma is an intrinsic aspect of Hinduism and has been embedded in the Indian psyche since ancient times. The cycle of life and death, past lives and reincarnation, the idea of one being responsible for one’s own destiny are implied by the idea of karma itself, which simply reminds that, “As you sow, so shall you reap.” Looking at science through the eyes of a poet, beautiful parallels can be drawn between the physical and spiritual worlds, the latter home to metaphors for all the tangibles in the physical world. Take, for instance, the Chaos Theory that can be used to describe and predict the behaviour of a variety of systems, from population growth rates to weather phenomena and most significantly, the universe itself. An aspect of the Chaos Theory is the Butterfly Effect according to which:

“The flapping of a single butterfly's wing today produces a tiny change in the state of the atmosphere. Over a period of time, what the atmosphere actually does diverges from what it would have done. So, in a month's time, a tornado that would have devastated the Indonesian coast doesn't happen. Or maybe one that wasn't going to happen, does.” (Ian Stewart,Does God Play Dice? The Mathematics of Chaos, pg. 141)

This fits in beautifully with the idea of karma and reaffirms the notion that nothing is a coincidence. Even the existence of life on earth in its present form is poised on a delicate balance of mathematical precision. As Max Tegmark, professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Pennsylvania, points out, just a few minor changes in our universe and it would not exist. If our sun, for example, were slightly larger or smaller than it is, then our planet would be too cold or too hot to sustain life. Or if protons were just 0.2 percent heavier they would decay into neutrons, leaving us in a lifeless world of darkness.
It’s easy to see that our physical world is far too symmetrical and precise in its construction to be a coincidence. It’s the same with the spiritual world; only in this case, no observations and measurements exist to give us a clearly defined view.

The truth however is that we, at each moment of our lives, are presented with a multitude of options and the choices we make determine the future that follows. Each choice leads us on a unique path, the path branching out every time we make a new choice, forming an infinite web, stretching out as far as the mind can see, and beyond. So here we are, billions of souls, journeying along our respective paths, not realising that ever so often, they cross and merge and separate, but never do they completely detach from each other. We are in this together, this cosmic puppet show, the strings in the hands of the Puppet Master, but the script written by our own. The futility of wars, religious conflicts, political games and other divisive instruments becomes starkly clear when we realise that we are bound together by quantities as fundamental as time and space. Why then, do we insist on drifting apart and losing touch with humanity?

PS: When it comes to topics like these, there is immense scope for discussion. These are a few places where I found relevant information for my post.

http://www.meta-religion.com/Physics/physics.htm

http://www.mathjmendl.org/chaos/

http://www.imho.com/grae/chaos/chaos.html

Pari...Neat,huh?

2005-06-22T18:40:00.000+05:30

The whole world and its uncle have been praising the movie Parineeta, for quite a while now.That, of course,wasn't reason enough for me to NOT dismiss it as "a weepy chick-flick".Instead, I spent my time in masculine pursuits, such as burping out Beethoven's Fifth after a round of beer- I can appreciate classical music from time to time, not to mention philosophy.

"I drink, therefore I am."

But I digress.Sorry, I have a problem with focus. According to Freud,its roots can be traced back to my early childhood,when....aaargh, here I go again!Let's try, one more time, nice and easy..

Parineeta:

It is the story of a woman,orphaned as a child,torn between her obligation towards the family that brought her up as their own daughter, and the childhood friend who owns her,and she him, this bond unspoken of but real nonetheless , just as the sky is home to the golden and grey moods of the sun,without ever staking a claim towards its warmth.

It is a story about a man who is trying to find himself,unaware that he is trying to do so,his mellifluous dreams drowned out by his father,discordant and domineering, a man who is so blinded by the serenity of a childhood friendship that he fails to see it blossoming into love,until circumstances threaten to snatch it away from him forever.

It is the story of a man,who, for all his successes in the world of business,finds himself stranded on the wrong side of a one-sided relationship, a relationship that threatens to grow deceivingly strong.

It is the story of how the truth,if left unspoken, hurts more than the lies spoken to hide it.

PS:This is one of the reasons I love to write-it brings out thoughts and perspectives I never knew existed and helps me sober down,though that may not always be a good thing.Enjoy the movie- it's not "just a weepy chick-flick".

Five Points on Ten

2005-06-21T01:30:00.000+05:30

It took me a quite a while to start my own blog.It's not because I'm such a pathetically lazy shirk-aholic that I make Kumbhakaran look like an aerobic trainer on speed.The reason for the delay is simple-I'm a private person and wasn't really sure about opening up to the world,bit by bit, byte by byte, my innermost thoughts scribbled on a webpage, floating around on the Information Superhighway, within easy reach of anyone who was interested and anyone who wasn't....ah who am I kidding.The delay IS because I'm such a pathetically lazy shirk-aholic that I make Kumbhakaran look like an aerobic trainer on speed.

Since I'm not a big fan of small talk, you won't find posts chronicling fascinating information from my everyday life such as food habits, bowel movements and the absence of sex in my sex life.Well maybe I might write about the last aspect, but apart from that, passing off irrelevant and useless information as "life-changing and profound" is not my forte- that's best left to the Indian education system.

Which brings me to the topic of the day: 5.Someone by Chetan Bhagat

" A Contemporary Classic" the website proclaims . If that's a classic then my blog is sure to win the Booker Prize,the Nobel Prize AND the Pulitzer Prize this year. Sure, it serves the purpose, like a drunken one night stand, but true love it's not. It has its moments , like the apt decriptions of shallow horny guys who fall in love and lust at the same time and the occasional witty one-liners do bring about a laugh. The descriptions of the Slog Overs in Engineering conjure up a painfully real image, a reminder of what's waiting for me once these blessed vacations get over. But let's not get carried away here- if I were an IITian(and that's a biiiiiiiiiig IF) then I'd probably buy a copy,for posterity maybe, but even as an engineer it's not something I'd read twice.The characterisations are mostly sketchy, the story predictable but read it once, if only to realise that the "scholars" in India's Mecca of Engineering can also be frustrated,clueless nobodies teetering on the brink of nothingness, just like the rest of us "poor, mortal souls" , who didn't make it there.

Cheap Stuff

2005-06-21T00:31:00.000+05:30

A couple of thoughts that deserve a mention just because this is MY blog:

Being in Engineering is like making love to an ugly woman you hate,while thinking about the beautiful woman you do love . Forget about barking up the wrong tree,this is like climbing up the wrong limbs...and yet, here we are, getting screwed by something we thought we'd nail easily.
A headline I read recently went something like, "Michael Jackson says he's tired,has no hard feelings towards the accuser ...." Is it just me or is that headline actually perverted?

On a day like Today...

2005-06-18T04:20:00.000+05:30

Today.

A day as good as any other - to break the monotony,to 'unbreak' last year's New Year Resolutions, to wake up with a sense of purpose and to drift off into Dreamland with a sense of contentment, to fill up deafening silences with the words you've always wanted to say and apologize for those which should never have been said, to fall in love and see the world in shades of rose,to fall out of love and yet stand tall, rising above cynicism,Dystopia never a destination during your Grand Trip Around The Sun, to go bungee jumping and revel in uncontrolled ecstasy as the world whizzes by, to tighten the reins on your life before it too whizzes by, to realise that children can unknowingly teach you lessons that your adult mind is too blind to learn, to strip away the different masks that you put on for the world and look at the stranger in the mirror and to hide behind them again if you don't like what you see.

Today.
A day as good as any other,as was Yesterday, and so is Tomorrow...

Identity Crisis?

2005-06-17T00:48:00.000+05:30

I stand alone , high atop a ledge on Parsik hill, savouring the green slopes stretching out before me. A mild Mumbai mist, an expanse of serenity, is gently nudging the city out of its slumber with an icy-cool touch. As I lose myself in this surreal scene, an enchanting melody rises out from nowhere and seems to fill the air. It is the deeply melodious strains of Rabbi Shergill that have drifted into my consciousness.

The line goes,”… I know not who I am.”

The city that has been my home for the past decade seemingly lives out this very statement in every moment of its existence. Every stride it takes towards progress, every niche it carves for itself is another step taken towards finding its true identity, In the not-so-distant future, modernist glass and steel structures shall stand tall and proud, juxtaposed upon a green, unsullied landscape. I can already see the golden sunlight reflecting off their facades as they shine like beacons, lighting up the path to glory. This city, however, means more than just an assortment of buildings, hills and roads. It gives each of its people the right to script for it a unique identity- an identity which no barbs can erase. It’s like an album of memories, maybe not sepia-toned but precious nonetheless. Flip back a few pages and you’ll see what this city really means to you. Maybe you’ll see yourself as a child here- you’ve long forgotten what it’s like to be a child- jumping the school wall to feast on forbidden snacks at the local shop, endless games of football played with a fervour that only the local monsoon can incite, fights that you could have only with your best friend, first loves in a time when falling in love didn’t mean falling out of innocence…

Maybe you’ll remember the innumerable times when the inherent peace and serenity here provided succour to a body and mind exhausted by the rigours of professional life in its hectic sister city. Family picnics to the rainy, verdant environs of Gadheshwar, lone trips to the hidden beaches of Uran, witnessing a magical confluence of colours , as you bid the evening sun farewell on Palm Beach road, that ‘special someone’ by your side- you hoped that the sun would never go down on your relationship. Maybe it did, maybe it didn’t- pain, ecstasy, hope, faith – as real a consequence of life as the fleeting nature of life itself. And from all your emotions and memories, an identity sculpts itself and the place becomes a part of you even before you realise it. Is this what they mean when they say ,”Home is where the heart is”?

What If Women Ruled The World?

2005-06-15T02:35:00.000+05:30

“I believe women are far superior to men. They can do everything men can, and in a far better way..”. Oh great! I’d been fixed up with a feminist. As she went on and on, I considered, among other things, faking an epileptic attack to get myself outta there but since I’m no actor, I just sat there, stuffing my face with food (food that I’D eventually pay for, feminist or not). That was when this thought just hit me (I get creative insights from time to time, like the time when I hit upon a solution to the energy crisis but that’s another story…): What if women ruled the world??

I’m talking women militaries, female global leaders, female cops (yes I know they already exist..think in terms of majority)…and what the hell-even female cabbies, dance bar owners (men dancing, naturally)…get the picture?

Things would change…and how!

1) Toilets would be manufactured with the seats screwed down. YAY!! A million points to all the hapless ladies who had to (gasp) manually put down the seats..

2) PMS would become a viable plea in order to obtain a lenient sentence, much like the insanity plea is used today.

Judge: Miss Hussein(women rule,remember?) you’ve been charged with genocide
and creating conditions that could well lead to the elimination of the human race.How do you plead?

Miss Hussein:It wasn’t me , Your Honour ..it was those hormones..

Judge: The court hereby pronounces you not guilty.Next!!!

3) The study of Communication Techniques would be revolutionized the world over because of new theories such as “Say no even if you feel like saying yes, then express your displeasure to the concerned party, firstly by denying that you are displeased and then citing the reason for your obvious-but-non-existent displeasure as the party’s inability to delve further into your twisted psyche, which if done with the aid of a mind-reader would, in fact, reveal what you actually wanted to say, as opposed to the words you said out loud.”

Go ahead, read it again-let me know if it makes any sense.

4) Vehicles would become lethal weapons in the hands of these marauding motorists. You’d be safer standing naked on top of a skyscraper holding on to a 50-foot metal pole during a thunderstorm, than on the roads. Of course there’d be traffic cops to assist accident victims and deal with jams but being lady drivers, they’d probably get into an accident or two themselves before reaching the original crash site. Maybe that’s a li’l thoughtless of me…after all, driving in 6-inch platforms takes time to learn and there’s only one rear-view mirror. If they use that to look behind, then how will they put on their make-up??

5)*Women would pay for the men, nightclubs would have free entry for guys…*

POOF! Back to reality ! The bill was on the table and Miss Superior Being from Venus had clammed up all of a sudden. I’d gone too far with my dreaming…some things will never change! Somehow, the epilepsy act didn’t seem that daunting now.

PS: Ladies, please take the above views with a pinch of salt.A dash of lime and a shot of tequila with that would be even better.